LIBRARY 
 
 UNIVERSITY QF 
 CALIFORNIA 
 
 I SAN DIEGO ! 
 
 1
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 by 
 CHAUNCY J. HAWKINS 
 
 Author of : The Mind of Whittier : Will the Home Survive 
 The Ned Brewster Books : Etc. 
 
 THE PILGRIM PRESS 
 
 BOSTON ! NEW YORK : CHICAGO
 
 Copyright, 1914 
 
 by 
 Luther H. Cary 
 
 THE PILGRIM PRESS 
 BOSTON
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 I His PLACE IN OUR TIME 1 
 
 II THE MAKING OF THE MAN 9 
 
 III BUSINESS CAREER 22 
 
 IV PRESIDENT OF THE CONGREGATIONAL SUNDAY 
 
 SCHOOL AND PUBLISHING SOCIETY ... 32 
 
 V THE BOSTON SCHOOL COMMITTEE .... 53 
 
 VI PRESIDENT OF THE BOSTON MUNICIPAL LEAGUE . 79 
 
 VII IDEALS OF CITIZENSHIP 95 
 
 VIII INTERNATIONAL ARBITRATION .... Ill 
 
 IX PRESIDENT OF THE AMERICAN BOARD . . . 127 
 
 X MAKING DENOMINATIONAL HISTORY . . . 153 
 
 XI THE LAYMEN'S MISSIONARY MOVEMENT . . 164 
 
 XII WELLESLEY COLLEGE AND OTHER ACTIVITIES . 179 
 
 XIII THE JOURNEY ABROAD 193 
 
 XIV THE FUNDAMENTAL MOTIVE 227 
 
 XV CHARACTERISTICS . . . . . . . 236 
 
 XVI THE LAST DAYS AND RESUME 248
 
 CHAPTER I 
 HIS PLACE IN OUE TIME 
 
 Some men are great because of certain powers 
 they possess within themselves. Others are great 
 and are remembered by posterity because of what 
 they have accomplished. Homer, Dante, Abraham 
 Lincoln, were great souls apart from anything 
 they did; they possessed that divine gift we call 
 genius and they belong by birth to the immortals. 
 Others are not great either by virtue of their 
 intellect or imagination, but impelled by their con- 
 secration to some fine ideal they accomplish im- 
 portant results which compel us to hold them in 
 loving remembrance. They are great because of 
 what they do. 
 
 In this latter class we must place Samuel 
 Billings Capen, a man who belonged to what may 
 be truly called the new Christianity and who 
 brought about results that have made a distinct 
 impression upon the social and religious life of 
 our time. 
 
 The excuse for adding another biography to the 
 many that have come to our generation is that Mr. 
 Capen stood for an ideal which is becoming in- 
 creasingly the glory of the Christian Church, an 
 ideal which is saving the Church from the shame 
 which had come upon her and promises to make 
 her the most glorious of all the institutions of to- 
 morrow. To call our age materialistic is far from 
 
 [l]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 the truth. Our age is in some respects the 
 most idealistic of all times. The fight for social 
 righteousness has never enlisted so many brave 
 hearts nor been so intense as at the present hour. 
 The cry for economic justice and for a more demo- 
 cratic method both in the production and the 
 distribution of wealth, the demand for civic right- 
 eousness, for the substitution of arbitration for 
 war, for the promotion of peace and good will be- 
 tween nations, and the growing consciousness of 
 the need for the brotherhood of rich and poor, em- 
 ployer and employed, have never been so intense 
 or persistent. Editors, lecturers, social workers 
 and clergymen have all become preachers whose 
 gospel is that of the social uplift. 
 
 Yet in spite of this fact, it is also probably true 
 that there were never more men living on the out- 
 side of things than at the present hour. The great 
 springs of life are not only neglected; they are 
 mistrusted. The confidence of man is placed in 
 the dollar rather than in ideals, in material con- 
 ditions and comforts rather than in the soul of 
 Christianity. Men are living by bread alone 
 rather than by the words that proceed out of the 
 mouth of God. They deem it much more impor- 
 tant to "get in on the ground floor" of a paying 
 business than to spend time in the Upper Room, 
 and consider it more worth while to stand among 
 many with the winning interests than to stand 
 alone with God. 
 
 This subtle distrust in idealism, though few men 
 will confess to it, gives form today to the working 
 creed of the vast majority of men. It is at bottom 
 
 [2]
 
 HIS PLACE IN OUE TIME 
 
 a positive belief that the teachings of Jesus are 
 impossible for practical use in the realm of affairs. 
 They are humanity's most beautiful dream, but 
 they cannot be applied to business nor to the prac- 
 tical politics of the world. They are man's 
 comfort and inspiration, but they are also his 
 despair, having no place in a labor union, in 
 an employer's office or on either side of the 
 salesman's counter. 
 
 Robert Ingersoll's crass infidelity and Tom 
 Paine 's open attacks upon Christianity, compared 
 with this unconfessed but ever active distrust in 
 the things of the spirit, were only as the attack 
 of a child, compared to this mighty menace to the 
 higher life. The former were open and answer- 
 able; the latter is hidden and cannot be reached. 
 It makes no parties and draws no credal lines, but 
 permeates to a greater or smaller extent the whole 
 of society, not only taking from the soldier his 
 vitality, but also weakening the very purpose for 
 which he is to fight. 
 
 It is a form of unbelief, also, which is quite as 
 common in the Church as outside of it. It often 
 blinds the Church to its real work, frequently 
 substituting the task of building up a great ec- 
 clesiastical organization for the Christian task of 
 bringing the Kingdom of God on the earth. If 
 careful investigation of the real state of the Chris- 
 tian Church should be made there might be wail- 
 ing and gnashing of teeth. How many men would 
 be found who give liberally for the building up 
 of a large membership and for strengthening the 
 material conditions of a church as an institution 
 
 [3]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 but have never tried the simple experiment of ap- 
 plying the teaching of Jesus to the politics of their 
 community, or to the industry in which they are 
 engaged? How many men would be found who 
 not only have never tried these experiments but 
 who do not believe that they would be practical 
 experiments to try? Should the investigation be 
 made, the world might be astonished to discover 
 that thousands of men are giving money and 
 energy to maintain an institution which has never 
 yet seriously undertaken the real task given to 
 it by its Lord, and chiefly for the reason that the 
 members of the Church do not believe that the 
 task is practical. 
 
 This weakened form of Christianity is not wholly 
 to be condemned. Even in its anaemic condition 
 it is still probably the best thing that is in opera- 
 tion for the uplift of mankind. In spite of the 
 subtle unbelief of confessed Christians and the 
 gross materialism of the Church, the spirit of Je- 
 sus has permeated and transformed the institu- 
 tions of society and the moral life of nations as 
 has the life of no other man. If we should take 
 out of our civilization what we have received 
 from Christianity there would be nothing left of 
 those things we value most highly. Our standards 
 of morality, the conception of the family, the sac- 
 rificial life of the home, the democracy based 
 upon the principle, "to every man according to 
 his need, from every man according to his 
 ability, ' ' especially as it is revealed in our public 
 school system, the wise and loving care for the 
 poor these are things that have gradually 
 
 [4]
 
 HIS PLACE IN OUR TIME 
 
 emerged from Jesus' teachings of love and 
 brotherhood. 
 
 It might be argued that this uplift has come 
 from the irresistible life of Jesus much as the sun 
 sends its cleansing light throughout the earth, 
 rather than from any positive program on the 
 part of his followers ; and some might even con- 
 tend that it has come in spite of the blunders and 
 unbelief of his disciples. Yet either position 
 would do a cruel injustice to the long succession 
 of consecrated men and women who, according to 
 their knowledge and so far as they have been able 
 to rise above their environment, have tried to be 
 true members of the Church. 
 
 When this is admitted, however, it must 
 still be confessed that men have never un- 
 dertaken, on any large scale, the real pro- 
 gram marked out by our Lord for his 
 Church. Contented to have the leaven slowly per- 
 meate the entire lump, they have neither had the 
 courage to seek first the Kingdom of God nor 
 the faith to believe that their prayer, ' ' Thy King- 
 dom come, thy will be done on earth as in heaven," 
 would find any answer. 
 
 The last century, especially the later half of it, 
 witnessed the rise of a new class of men who be- 
 lieved that the social world could be won for 
 righteousness, and despised the whimpering atti- 
 tude of those who declared that the moral ideal is 
 only a dream, impossible of realization in the poli- 
 tics and business of mankind. They not only 
 declared the possibility of this realization but 
 seriously undertook the task of carrying their 
 
 [51
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 idealism into political action and making it the 
 very soul of the corporate life of society. 
 
 One division of this army, bent upon the task of 
 making a new earth, included the social workers 
 the men and women who were pioneers in social 
 settlements and reform movements and the au- 
 thors of those works which might roughly be clas- 
 sified as the new sociology. "With a large part of 
 these sincere and passionate souls the religious 
 message was entirely omitted. Some of them were 
 men who had grown weary of the platitudes of a 
 lifeless orthodoxy which was only waiting to be 
 buried. They had lost their faith in the Church and 
 had left her that they might devote their energies 
 to a field where they thought they could be of more 
 service to mankind. Some of these social work- 
 ers not only left the Church, but even lost 
 their faith in religion and turned their attention 
 to ethics as the force that could redeem the 
 world. 
 
 A second class of men, however, remained in 
 the Church. They saw her defects but they be- 
 lieved that the teachings of Jesus afforded the 
 only program for the reformation of the social 
 structure, and they consecrated their energies to 
 the bringing upon earth of the Kingdom of God, 
 as exemplified in the life of Jesus and defined in 
 his teachings. To them ethics without religion 
 was like an engine without steam, and to fail to 
 utilize the teachings of Jesus was to ignore the 
 highest ideals that had ever been given to the race. 
 Some of these leaders were clergymen and some 
 were laymen; some held the new theology and 
 
 [6]
 
 HIS PLACE IN OUR TIME 
 
 others held only a modified form of the old New 
 England theology, remaining conservative in their 
 thinking and following the faith of their fathers. 
 But they were united by a great motive, the desire 
 to make the kingdoms of the earth the Kingdom 
 of our Lord. 
 
 To this latter class belonged the layman and 
 business man, Mr. Samuel Billings Capen. He re- 
 mained to the last day of his life a conservative 
 in theology, though with a sympathy broad enough 
 to tolerate the most liberal wing of his Church, 
 but the passion of his soul was to bring the King- 
 dom of God on the earth. He had an interest in 
 every social movement for the improvement of 
 the race, but he gave his time, money, energy, and 
 prayers that Jesus and his teachings might rule 
 the hearts of all men and become the life of all 
 institutions. 
 
 In speaking before a company of boys in 1893 
 Mr. Capen said: "If I may be allowed to say one 
 earnest word it is this, that you should all have 
 some great, noble, unselfish ambition as the ruling 
 motive of your life. To have an education with- 
 out this is like having a well-appointed steamship 
 without power, and to be at the mercy of every 
 current of the ocean. Oliver Wendell Holmes has 
 well said that the human race is divided into two 
 classes, those who go ahead and do something, and 
 those who sit still and inquire, 'Why wasn't it 
 done the other way?' Take your place in the 
 former class at once. Do not waste your time in 
 criticizing other people, but day by day be per- 
 sistent in your purpose to make the world better 
 
 [7]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 because of your living in it. 'It is not failure but 
 low aim that is a crime. ' 
 
 This was not only his advice to others ; it was 
 also the law of his own life from which he never 
 departed. The purpose which ruled his entire 
 being was none other than to conquer the whole 
 world for God and truth. He believed it could be 
 done and to this sublime task he devoted all his 
 energies. 
 
 [8]
 
 THE MAKING OF THE MAN 
 
 Mr. Samuel Billings Capen was born in Boston 
 on December 12, 1842, in a humble home which 
 stood near the sea, on the very spot where the 
 South Union Station now stands. 
 
 It is difficult for those who know only the Bos- 
 ton of today to imagine even imperfectly the city 
 into which this boy was born. James Elliot Cabot, 
 in his "Memoirs of Emerson," gives a touch 
 which brings to our imagination in some measure 
 the section near the home of the Capens: "The 
 Summer Street region was a boy's paradise, and 
 echoed every holiday afternoon and mid-day 
 recess with 'Coram' and 'Hy-spy'; having 
 just the right admixture of open ground, 
 fences, and thoroughfares, with intricacies 
 and lurking-places of sheds and woodhouses, and 
 here and there a deserted barn, with open 
 doors and a remnant of hay long untouched. 
 There was even a pond where a beginner might 
 try his first skates; and the salt water was close 
 by, with wharves where he might catch flounders 
 and torn-cod. Then, near at hand, the Common, 
 at that time a playground from end to end. ' ' 
 
 Boston was then a big town with lineaments 
 which could be recognized, not only affording the 
 opportunities of natural playgrounds and country 
 life, but also what was even more important to 
 
 [9]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 her citizens nurturing a community spirit. She 
 had not grown so large as to become impersonal 
 merely a place where men carry on their business, 
 and, if they are greedy and selfish, live by head 
 alone, using the city as a means of adding a little 
 cake to their diet. She was still small enough to 
 have a distinct individuality. Though not with- 
 out her rogues, she contained an unusually large 
 number of men and women who were proud of her 
 history, knew, at least, what her charter was, 
 were familiar with the chief problems she had to 
 confront and considered it their moral obligation 
 to devote a part of their energy to her improve- 
 ment. Her personality, as Henry Cabot Lodge in 
 his '"Early Memories" has suggested, "may have 
 been narrow, austere, at times even harsh, but it 
 was there, and it was strong and aggressive," a 
 personality which inspired a devoted citizenship 
 of the highest type. 
 
 It is not without significance that Samuel 
 Capen, a sensitive youth, was born into such an at- 
 mosphere. Boys then were not very different 
 from boys of our day. Fierce combats were waged 
 every winter on the Common between the young 
 giants of South Cove and North End and the aris- 
 tocrats of Summer and Beacon Streets, until the 
 aristocrats, as is always the case, were outnum- 
 bered and driven back in defeat into more se- 
 cluded country places. Neighbors' apple trees 
 were raided every fall and the beautiful flowers of 
 carefully-prepared gardens disappeared in a 
 night. There was then, as in every time, a great 
 mass of unimpressionable dullness which no in- 
 
 [10]
 
 THE MAKING OF THE MAN 
 
 fluence could awaken; but no boy who was alert, 
 possessing intellectual promise, could grow to 
 young manhood in these surroundings without 
 gaining the consciousness that he had a history 
 and was part of a community. It was an atmos- 
 phere that left a deep impression upon the young 
 Capen, an influence he never escaped ; and it later 
 revealed itself in his efforts toward civic reform 
 as well as in his devoted citizenship. 
 
 But we must not forget that he was part of a 
 family as well as of a community. We are con- 
 stantly tempted to think of men as individuals, as 
 isolated, great or small in their lonely personali- 
 ties. But, in reality, no man so exists. At best 
 every personality belongs to that glorious trinity 
 of father, mother and child. Part of that social 
 trinity we remain, never being in any true sense 
 individuals, but always part of a larger whole. 
 Hence nothing could be more important to a man 
 than the family that gave him existence. 
 
 In this respect Samuel Capen was fortunate. 
 He was the second son of Samuel Childs Capen 
 and Anne Billings Capen. The Capen family had 
 long been connected in honorable ways with Bos- 
 ton and its vicinity. Samuel B. Capen belonged to 
 the eighth generation from Bernard and Jane 
 Capen, who came to Dorchester in the ship Mary 
 and John, May 30, 1630, and were the progenitors 
 of all the Capens in New England. His great- 
 grandfather, Christopher Capen, who lived at 
 Stoughton and married Abigail Thayer, a direct 
 descendant of John Alden of the Plymouth 
 Colony, rushed into his house at the time of the 
 
 [11]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 battle of Lexington, exclaiming, "The war has 
 broken out," took down his gun and ran without 
 another word to the defense of his country. But 
 it was so far to Lexington that he did not reach 
 the scene of the battle until after the fight. A little 
 later he enlisted and was settled in Boston. But, 
 as the army was not active at that time and he had 
 much work to do on his farm to support his large 
 family, his son Samuel, who was at that time only 
 fifteen years old, took his place, giving the father 
 freedom to do his work. While his son was thus 
 acting as his substitute, the regiment was sud- 
 denly ordered to another field and the substitute 
 went in place of the father, remaining in the 
 army for some time and serving through several 
 engagements. 
 
 The Billings family was also closely connected 
 with the early history of our country. William 
 Billings was a lieutenant in the Continental 
 Army and his son was a captain in the Army of 
 the Revolution. The son was also the first author 
 and publisher of music in this country. 
 
 This family history, rooted in love of country, 
 gave to Samuel Capen the elemental background 
 of his life. He was a patriot by inheritance. A 
 child of the Plymouth and Massachusetts Bay 
 Colonies, he loved the very soil of New England, 
 had a profound faith in her institutions and was 
 an American of the best type. 
 
 His father belonged to the great middle class 
 which has so largely contributed the men who have 
 been most useful to our country, a class neither 
 smothered by wealth nor blighted by poverty. It 
 
 [12]
 
 THE MAKING OF THE MAN 
 
 has come to be recognized that one of the greatest 
 evils of wealth is its deadly moral, mental and 
 physical effect upon children. Many who have 
 started in life without money and have accumu- 
 lated large fortunes have maintained their crea- 
 tive powers and have not reached that unfortu- 
 nate state where it is impossible to find joy in com- 
 mon things. But it is seldom that children born in 
 wealth are sufficiently original to become leaders 
 among men ; seldom that they succeed in growing 
 an unspoiled human nature which can find pleas- 
 ure in small things or can enter into real sym- 
 pathy with commonplace human needs. 
 
 Poverty is equally destructive of the highest 
 manhood. There are a few who are able to rise 
 above its deadening effects, a small company who 
 seem born to be great and useful ; but the atmos- 
 phere of poverty stunts the average life. To 
 every child there comes a time when he craves ex- 
 pansion of personal tastes. He begins to find him- 
 self and to reach out for something that will en- 
 large his developing nature. If his atmosphere is 
 bleak, if there is nothing to suggest romance, to 
 encourage observation or to compel him to project 
 himself into a world of new interests, he becomes 
 dull and coarse, sometimes even bitter. 
 
 The young Samuel Capen came into a home 
 where there were none of the luxuries of life. His 
 father conducted a small business, bringing home 
 each Saturday night enough money to provide 
 food, clothes and shelter ; but not a sufficient sum 
 to provide those luxuries which were enjoyed by 
 boys who lived not far away. Many times the 
 
 13]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 contrast must have seemed strange to this alert 
 youth, especially as he craved books and educa- 
 tion. But the advantage was not all on the side 
 of those who lived in wealth. He had to create 
 most of his joys ; they were not thrust upon him, 
 and, being compelled to originate his pleasures, he 
 could never exhaust the supply. He found them 
 in such commonplace things that in after life it 
 was not difficult for him to discover the joy that 
 was always near at hand. He was not dependent 
 upon money, nor was he compelled to resort to 
 abnormal excitement to satisfy his needs. Accus- 
 tomed from the earliest years to rely upon his 
 own powers, he knew how to find joy in that which 
 to others had become not only uninteresting but 
 irksome. 
 
 His father was a genial, charitable man who 
 seldom spoke evil of any one, was always leni- 
 ent in his judgments and saw the good rather 
 than the evil that was in men. This latter was 
 one of the most marked elements of character in- 
 herited by the son, an element that later became 
 one of the secrets of his power. It was only on the 
 rarest occasions that Mr. Capen ever spoke a 
 severe word against even his worst enemies, and 
 he saw the good in men long after others had lost 
 faith. Indeed, there never came a time when he 
 could not see good even in those who had made 
 grievous moral blunders or when he ceased to 
 labor for their restoration. 
 
 While the father was charitable, he was firm in 
 his convictions and did not hesitate to obey his 
 conscience, even though obedience meant loss of 
 
 [14]
 
 THE MAKING OF THE MAN 
 
 material comforts. It was customary in those 
 days for nearly all grocery stores to sell liquor, 
 as it was also the habit for those who were sup- 
 posed to be good Christians to drink it. But the 
 temperance crusade, which was then sweeping 
 over the country with power and was touching the 
 consciences of thousands of men and women, 
 touched the conscience of Samuel Childs Capen. 
 He became convinced that no Christian man ought 
 to sell that which destroys so many lives and 
 brings unhappiness into so many homes. Hence 
 he left the store where he had been compelled to 
 sell intoxicants and, at a sacrifice, went to another 
 place where groceries alone were kept. 
 
 It was a home of the Puritan conscience where 
 the Sabbath was strictly, though not oppres- 
 sively, observed, where card-playing, dancing and 
 theater-going were classed as forms of worldiness, 
 and wiiere the reading was confined mostly to seri- 
 ous books, novels being excluded. It was not dif- 
 ferent from the homes of other Congregational 
 families of that day but represented the conserva- 
 tive, somewhat austere life common to that time. 
 While its atmosphere was not congenial to the cul- 
 tivation of the arts and while it was perhaps nar- 
 row in its outlook upon the world, it did produce 
 a high sense of duty, that * ' stern daughter of the 
 voice of God, ' ' and gave to men a devotion to the 
 great things of the spirit, which made them war- 
 riors upon whom the Church could depend in 
 every crisis and who were destined to extend the 
 power of the Church beyond anything it had ever 
 attained in the new world. 
 
 [15]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 Among these leaders Samuel Capen became one 
 of the strongest. He was conspicuously a child of 
 this Puritan atmosphere. He seldom read novels, 
 not because he thought it was wrong to do so, but 
 because he regarded it as a waste of valuable time 
 that could be more advantageously devoted to 
 other things. While to him every day was sacred, 
 the Sabbath was a time to be carefully observed 
 for the cultivation of the things of the spirit. He 
 never played a game of cards, never danced, and 
 never in his life did he go to the theater or the 
 opera. His King's business required haste, and 
 nothing was ever permitted to enter his life which 
 would rob him of a second that ought to be de- 
 voted to this great service. In youth and old age 
 there was but one thing he feared : he was afraid 
 to do wrong. He had but one desire, and that was 
 to do the will of God. 
 
 In this account of the forces which contributed 
 to the making of the man we must not omit his 
 frequent visits to the country and his love for the 
 fields and hills. Probably the greatest danger 
 confronting the boy or girl who is born in the city 
 and is compelled to live there is the danger of 
 growing into a life spoiled by affectation. City- 
 bred youth are surrounded by a civilization that 
 is artificial, both in its natural aspects and in its 
 social and intellectual expressions. Men, by their 
 language, dress and manners, pretend to be what 
 they are not. They are away from reality and 
 often fail to catch the mystery and poise, the calm 
 and self-reliance of the great out-of-doors. They 
 lack the earthly element, that which comes from 
 
 [16]
 
 THE MAKING OF THE MAN 
 
 close association with smiling country and running 
 brooks, with birds and dumb creatures, horses and 
 cows, with barns and the upturned soil. They are 
 easily shocked and count that which is common 
 as unclean. Mr. Capen used to speak of Sharon, 
 where he made frequent visits, as heaven. It was 
 then not a suburb, a place of beautiful homes and 
 posted lands, but a farming community. There 
 he came in touch with things as they are. Instead 
 of finding his recreation in stuffy halls where boys 
 and girls were dressed as little prigs, where they 
 were moulded after the pattern of the fashion 
 book, taught to obliterate their personalities in 
 stilted speech, called culture, and unnatural 
 movements, called graceful, he spent his recrea- 
 tion among things that are natural and real, gain- 
 ing the unconscious wisdom that belongs to things 
 as they are and acquiring that naturalness which 
 wins the trust of those who are sick of "the great 
 town's harsh, heart-wearying roar.'* 
 
 He was a boy when Boston was famed for her 
 great men. Within a few minutes ' walk from his 
 home was Summer Street, where lived Daniel 
 Webster, Edward Everett, and the Grays, Gard- 
 ners, Frothinghams, Bigelows, Lees, Jacksons, 
 Higginsons and Cushings. In Winthrop Place 
 lived Eufus Choate and not far away was George 
 Bancroft, the historian. In this region were the 
 Hunnewells and the Bowditches. Before he was 
 far in his youth, Garrison and Wendell Phillips 
 were challenging the attention of the public. Oli- 
 ver Wendell Holmes, Whittier and Emerson were 
 forming the first great period of American litera- 
 
 [17]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 ture. When he walked up Summer Street Sunday 
 morning, in company with his parents, on his way 
 to the Central Congregational Church, he often 
 met these great men going to divine worship. 
 They were, to the aspiring boy, giants in the 
 world of affairs, an inspiration, and created in his 
 soul fires which could not be extinguished. In 
 later life he often referred to these walks as one 
 of the greatest forces in the making of his life. In 
 his boyish dreams he, too, would be great, sway- 
 ing men by his eloquence and entering into the 
 battles for righteousness. 
 
 The influence of these great men upon the boy's 
 life was indirect, inspirational, but there was one 
 who was the intellectual father of many great 
 men, Thomas Sherwin, Principal of the English 
 High School, who was a very direct and powerful 
 influence in moulding the life of this youth who 
 came under his care. He was a man of unusual 
 strength, dignified, standing for the best in every 
 department of life, with the ability to inspire 
 boys, and to call out that which is noblest. Samuel 
 Capen first entered the Quincy Grammar School 
 and then the English High, where he came under 
 the influence of this great master. The teacher 
 acted upon the boy as the first warm days of 
 spring act upon the soil, causing the sleeping 
 earth to leap into life. He became the boy's ideal 
 of dignified and courteous manhood, an ideal 
 which was doubtless reflected in after years in a 
 life that was marked by dignity and courtesy 
 above all other graces. In the High School Sam- 
 uel Capen formed habits of methodical work, con- 
 
 [18]
 
 THE MAKING OF THE MAN 
 
 centration, and appreciation of the best in educa- 
 tion. He was graduated in 1858, winning the 
 Franklin Medal for scholarship, and passed from 
 the direct influence of the school system, which, in 
 later years, he was to serve so effectively. 
 
 It was not only a period of great men, but a 
 period of intense religious interest, out of which 
 came the characters who have made the strong 
 churches throughout New England. The brilliant 
 intellect of Edwards A. Park of Andover was re- 
 stating the old New England theology with a 
 freshness of thought and style and a power of 
 logic that brought new life into the churches; 
 while Horace Bushnell of Hartford, Connecticut, 
 with his poetic genius and the power of his per- 
 sonality and his eloquence, was precipitating con- 
 troversy that quickened religious discussion and 
 interest. Richard Storrs was just rising into 
 fame as a pastor in Brooklyn, at the Church of the 
 Pilgrims ; and Henry Ward Beecher was speaking 
 to the heart and conscience of America, as no 
 preacher had done for half a century. Mrs. Har- 
 riet Beecher Stowe's ''Uncle Tom's Cabin," was 
 being published as a serial in the * ' National Era ' ' 
 of Washington. Great revivals were stirring the 
 churches, first under Charles Finney and later 
 under the early leadership of Dwight L. Moody. 
 Several of the pulpits of Boston churches were 
 filled by men who were not only intellectual giants, 
 but were also afire with the revival spirit. So in- 
 tense was this religious interest that the Congre- 
 gational denomination gained more new churches 
 and members in the next third of a century than it 
 
 [19]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 had gained in the previous two hundred and fifty 
 years. The growth in the enrollment of Sunday 
 schools was even greater than had been the 
 growth in the membership of the churches, while 
 other religious work among young people was 
 just beginning with a zeal that was to burst into a 
 flame of enthusiasm, finding form in many young 
 people's organizations that were to encircle the 
 earth. 
 
 Samuel Capen was fortunate in being born into 
 a Christian home, where God was recognized and 
 where all things concerning the family were daily 
 committed to the keeping of the Heavenly Father 
 in family worship. His mother was a very devout 
 woman, manifesting the graces of the Christian 
 life, and having a profound faith in prayer, while 
 the father was one of the old New England type 
 who believed that a man should be a priest unto 
 his household. In this atmosphere the young 
 Samuel grew up a Christian, never having to pass 
 through the agonies of violent conversion so com- 
 mon in those days. 
 
 Only second in importance to the influence of 
 the home was the influence upon the young man 
 of this new religious life that was permeating the 
 community. It was sometimes exceedingly nar- 
 row in its outlook upon the world and often 
 strained at the gnat while it swallowed the camel. 
 It was largely lacking in a consciousness of any so- 
 cial mission, being much more engaged in prepar- 
 ing men for heaven than in equipping them for 
 the struggle of bringing heaven on the earth. It 
 had the virtue, however, of being intense, arousing 
 
 [20]
 
 THE MAKING OF THE MAN 
 
 in men a deep devotion to the Church, demanding 
 a part of their time for Christian service, and 
 placing upon them a heavy sense of responsibility 
 for the great missionary activities. It did not fail 
 to touch this young spirit which was always sen- 
 sitive to that which was best. There came to him 
 very early a sense of responsibility for taking 
 the message of the Kingdom to the whole earth, 
 and when he first began to earn money he placed 
 aside, each week, one tenth of his earnings to give 
 to the Church, a habit which he carried through 
 life, except that the proportion became much 
 larger with the passing of the years. 
 
 There were no Young People's Societies in the 
 churches in those days but, while he was still a 
 youth, he formed the habit of speaking at the mid- 
 week service. This was one of the most difficult 
 things he had to do. Public speech was not easy 
 for him and he was exceedingly timid. Slight of 
 body and sensitive in spirit, the young man would 
 rise, with knees trembling and heart beating fast, 
 to utter a few words he had already carefully 
 written and fixed in his memory, speaking not 
 only because he thought it was a religious duty 
 but also as a means of increasing his effectiveness 
 in the community. 
 
 [21]
 
 CHAPTEE III 
 
 BUSINESS CAEEEE 
 
 Much of the inspiration of Mr. Capen's life 
 came from the fact that he went into business 
 with definite ideals. When he entered the carpet 
 business he knew what he meant by success. 
 There was not a moment, from the time he ac- 
 cepted a humble position for the small salary of 
 seventy-five dollars a year, until his death, whenhe 
 would not have left the firm with which he was as- 
 sociated had his business demanded any compro- 
 mise with the best things of character or made it 
 impossible for him to follow his vision. " There 
 was never a moment when, in the deeper, wider 
 currents of his mind, he was not moved by im- 
 pulses greater than the acquisition of wealth; 
 never a moment when this was not a secondary 
 and subordinate object of his energies." 
 
 We find his ideals clearly set forth in an ad- 
 dress he gave to a company of young men at the 
 Boston Young Men's Christian Association. He 
 enumerated five things, apart from which he 
 thought any life would be a failure. 
 
 "The first condition I would mention is fidelity, 
 by which I would mean, that kind of conscientious- 
 ness which performs the smallest details well; 
 that faithfulness which sweeps under the mat and 
 into the corners; that which lays a poor carpet 
 ten miles out of Boston as thoroughly as a better 
 
 [22]
 
 THE BUSINESS MAN 
 
 carpet on Beacon Street; that which tries as 
 earnestly to sell an oil covering in the basement, 
 as a Wilton on the main floor. 
 
 ' ' The second condition I would name is earnest- 
 ness. There is no chance or hope for the idle or 
 indifferent ; they will be left far behind in the race. 
 
 ' ' The third condition is integrity, and by this I 
 would mean not that larger form which refuses to 
 tell a downright falsehood, but that higher form 
 of conscientiousness which will not swerve a 
 hair's breadth from the strictest truth whatever 
 the temptation; the courage to lose a sale rather 
 than do that which is mean or questionable ; which 
 cuts out every carpet as if the customer were 
 watching the process; which does not take rem- 
 nants off the shelf and charge them in for waste ; 
 which is faithful in sending all the odd pieces to 
 the purchaser and never puts them aside to be 
 made into a hassock by and by at some one's ex- 
 pense. I know men sometimes appear to prosper 
 by overreaching and by fraud. But it is a tempo- 
 rary success only; they are soon known, shunned 
 and despised. If a man will build up a business 
 that will stand, one of its foundation stones must 
 be integrity. 
 
 * ' The fourth condition I would name is purity of 
 heart and life. In my judgment, I cannot empha- 
 size this too strongly, for impurity is, next to in- 
 temperance, the greatest danger to young men. 
 When I see a young man reading a novel of a 
 doubtful name, when I see him go with those who 
 delight in telling questionable stories, I feel that 
 to continue in that path is his ruin. Shun such 
 
 [23]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 men as you would the pestilence. I do not doubt 
 that we shall agree on this point. You will pardon 
 me if I go a step further; for I feel that I would 
 not be true to my convictions if I did not add that 
 I do not believe it is possible for any man to be 
 true and pure and faithful in every respect with- 
 out help from above. We need the personal help 
 of a personal God. Here is where I believe we are 
 most apt to fail; we miss the real object of a 
 successful life. It is not the securing of wealth, or 
 the acquiring of fame; it is the development of 
 character. ' ' 
 
 Mr. Capen entered the employ of Wentworth 
 and Bright in 1858, soon after graduating from 
 the High School. Both physical health and the 
 financial conditions of his parents made it impos- 
 sible for him to follow his natural inclination. His 
 disposition, as well as his environment, would have 
 turned him toward the Christian ministry. In the 
 Congregational churches, however, this high call- 
 ing had been surrounded by the best traditions, 
 requiring academic training, and no serious- 
 minded man would have considered this work who 
 could not have devoted four years to college life 
 and three additional years to theological training. 
 For the young Capen this was impossible and he 
 entered the greater university of life, gaining 
 from hard experience in the business world the 
 elements which contributed so largely to his suc- 
 cess in the larger field of politics, education and 
 religion. 
 
 Mr. Capen entered the employ of Wentworth 
 and Bright to learn the carpet business. He was 
 
 [24]
 
 THE BUSINESS MAN 
 
 not thinking entirely of immediate returns, the 
 thought in the minds of so many boys at the pres- 
 ent time, but beginning as an office boy, on very 
 low pay, he gave himself faithfully to learning 
 everything about the trade. As a result of his 
 faithfulness, his ambition and his hard work, he 
 became a member of the firm within five years, 
 and occupied an important place in the councils 
 of the managers from the time when he became a 
 stockholder. 
 
 Being one of the younger members of the firm, 
 Mr. Capen was given charge of many of the de- 
 tails of the business. It was this training that 
 gave him one of the most conspicuous characteris- 
 tics of his life his mastery of small things. As 
 a successful business man he had every item of 
 the business in his mind and this attention to de- 
 tails was carried through his life. Whatever he 
 undertook he knew thoroughly. He was not satis- 
 fied with a general knowledge of a subject; he 
 must know its work in detail. This was what made 
 him so valuable a member of the School Board, 
 such a successful president of the societies he 
 served, and such a helpful member of his church. 
 He carried all the work in which he was engaged 
 in his mind and was able to give advise that was 
 almost unerring, because he knew the work in its 
 comprehensiveness. 
 
 No young man was ever more fortunate than 
 Mr. Capen in the firm whose employ he entered. 
 Both Mr. Wentworth and Mr. Bright were Chris- 
 tian men who carried their Christianity into their 
 business. Their employees were treated in such a 
 
 L25J
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 manner that trades unions were not necessary for 
 their protection and the buying and selling was 
 always according to the highest standards of 
 honor. 
 
 After the great Boston fire, Mr. Wentworth 
 went out of business and the firm became known 
 as Torrey, Bright and Capen, Mr. Torrey being a 
 leader in the old Second Congregational Church 
 of Dorchester, a man of the highest Christian in- 
 tegrity, and widely known in church circles. 
 
 One incident will serve to indicate the high stand- 
 ard by which the firm conducted its business. The 
 custom officials had overcharged a large furniture 
 house for some goods which had been imported. 
 When they were correcting the mistake the book- 
 keeper of the firm asked the officials if their at- 
 tention had ever been called to a case where they 
 had undercharged an establishment. "Only once 
 in the City of Boston, ' ' was the reply. * ' That was 
 the firm of Torrey, Bright and Capen. We had 
 sent them a bill for a sum much under the amount 
 due the government. They called our attention 
 to the mistake and paid what was due the 
 customs. ' ' 
 
 The same high sense of honor characterized 
 their relation to the men who worked for them. 
 They demanded that their employees should be 
 men of the best character. In the early days of 
 the firm Mr. Capen had the habit of standing at 
 the front door every Monday morning as the 
 clerks came to their work. He greeted them with 
 a cordial shake of the hand and some pleasant 
 word. Seldom did he fail to express the hope that 
 
 [26]
 
 THE BUSINESS MAN 
 
 they had attended some church service on the 
 previous day and had enjoyed the privilege of 
 hearing a good sermon. This was his quiet, un- 
 obtrusive way of keeping up the moral tone 
 of the clerks and indicating in an inoffensive 
 manner that the managers were interested 
 in their spiritual as well as their material 
 welfare. 
 
 When a worthy employee was taken sick his 
 wages continued during his absence from the store 
 and in more than one instance men with families 
 were carried on the pay roll for months when 
 they were unable, through physical infirmity, to 
 be present at their work. The firm always acted 
 upon the principle that they were trustees for the 
 wellbeing of their employees and no man who had 
 conducted himself in an honorable way ever 
 had any reason to complain of the treatment he 
 received. 
 
 One man, who was bookkeeper for years, was 
 often called upon to work overtime. Not only did 
 he receive just compensation for such work but 
 Mr. Capen, as he passed the office on his way from 
 the store at night, would usually insist that he be 
 permitted to remain to help this man with his 
 task. He created a sense of companionship in 
 toil, assuring his men that he did not ask of them 
 what he was not glad to do himself, and it was 
 often only the most insistent refusal of his offered 
 assistance that would compel the overworked em- 
 ployer to leave the office and go to his home for 
 rest. It was not merely the attitude of an em- 
 ployer toward his help, but it created an atmos- 
 
 [27]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 phere which made his store one where the men 
 loved to toil. 
 
 When Mr. Capen ceased from active business 
 and withdrew from the firm of Torrey, Bright and 
 Capen, this bookkeeper left his place and sought 
 employment elsewhere. When he was seeking for 
 work in other establishments, a man, who had been 
 in business for years in Boston, said to this book- 
 keeper, "You must not expect to find a place like 
 the one you had with Torrey, Bright and Capen. 
 You will not find it. In their treatment of help 
 they stood in a class by themselves. ' ' 
 
 We cannot overemphasize the influence of such 
 a business house upon the life of a young man 
 just entering upon his career. The highest 
 ideals of Church and state were incarnated in the 
 older men with whom he associated and the young 
 Samuel Capen found in their store congenial soil 
 in which the seeds of his idealism could grow and 
 flourish. 
 
 He had been in the firm only a few years when, 
 from close confinement and hard work, he needed 
 a rest. His employers sent him to Washington 
 for a short vacation. Many young men would 
 have spent their time in visiting places of interest 
 about the capital. But Samuel Capen, who had 
 been under the influence of the great men of Bos- 
 ton, both in Church and state, who had already 
 tasted the delights of public debate, and who had 
 ideals of civic and political betterment, spent 
 nearly all his time in the galleries of the House 
 of Representatives and the Senate, listening to 
 the great orators who were then in Congress, learn- 
 
 [281
 
 THE BUSINESS MAN 
 
 ing from them what he could of the art of public 
 speech, in which he always had great interest. No 
 other incident in his career could reveal more 
 clearly the fundamental trend of the young man's 
 life and the attitude toward life which he main- 
 tained to the very last. While other men were 
 seeking entertainment and amusement, he passed 
 these that he might select those things only which 
 ministered to his purpose and increased his value 
 to society. 
 
 On December 8, 1869, Mr. Capen married Helen 
 M. Warren and started one of the most ideal 
 homes ever established by two Christian people, 
 a home that was not only a source of constant 
 happiness but also one which contributed very 
 largely to his useful life. 
 
 He had been married, however, only two or 
 three years when he was overtaken by a serious 
 sickness. A nervous disorder affected his throat 
 and hands. For a long time it was only with the 
 greatest difficulty that he could talk. Added to 
 this terrible affliction he had tuberculosis of the 
 knee. For many months it seemed that he would 
 never be able to do any more work and even his 
 life was in serious danger. It was only the most 
 rigid self-discipline that saved him. He was di- 
 rected by the doctor to take breathing exercises 
 and also to give regard to other matters concern- 
 ing his health. Though they were taxing in the ex- 
 treme, he followed them with a conscientious- 
 ness which characterized his life to the end and 
 which finally restored his health. 
 
 It was during this sickness that there entered 
 [29]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 his life a deepening consecration to the higher 
 purposes of religion. Compelled to remain for 
 months in absolute idleness, unable to talk to his 
 friends except to a limited extent, he made the 
 solemn resolve with his God that if his health was 
 restored he would never shirk any work nor com- 
 plain of any task that might be presented to him. 
 It was an experience that affected his entire life, 
 deepening his religious nature and sending him 
 into the great needy world to be an untiring 
 worker who was never heard to complain that he 
 was too busy to undertake a new duty and who 
 met every call from needy men as from God. 
 
 A short time before his marriage he had moved 
 from Boston to Jamaica Plain. On the Sunday 
 when he first attended the Central Congregational 
 church there, the leader of the Men's Bible Class 
 was absent and Mr. Capen was asked to teach the 
 class. He was immediately persuaded to remain 
 as its teacher and from that time until his death 
 he continued in that position. Under his inspiring 
 direction the class became famous throughout 
 New England and was made the model after which 
 many classes were formed in other communities. 
 
 Before his marriage he had been made deacon 
 of that Church. It was a rare thing in those days 
 to elect a young man to the diaconate. It was 
 an office to be filled by the aged and godly elders 
 who had supposedly experienced great things in 
 the realm of religion. It was a tribute to this 
 young man's power of leadership, as well as to the 
 confidence men had in his spiritual life, that he 
 was placed in this exalted office. 
 
 [30j
 
 THE BUSINESS MAN 
 
 But lie had not been without training to fit him 
 for the place. He had been a successful 
 teacher for several years in the Old Colony 
 Mission School and, even better in view 
 of this new office, he had been one of a 
 group of young men who had organized them- 
 selves in the old Central Church of Boston for 
 Christian service. They met each week to dis- 
 cuss religious questions and also topics concern- 
 ing good citizenship. It was in this society that 
 Mr. Capen had cultivated the power of public 
 speech, an ability to express himself clearly and 
 forcibly and to extend his influence through the 
 medium of public utterance. Though he did not 
 enter conspicuously into public life until he was 
 over forty years of age, he was through all those 
 early years preparing himself in the consecrated 
 atmosphere of a Christian business house and in 
 every possible opportunity of Christian activity 
 for the high privileges which were to be offered 
 him later for service to the Church, the city and 
 the state. 
 
 [31]
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 PRESIDENT OF THE CONGREGATIONAL 
 
 SUNDAY SCHOOL AND PUBLISHING 
 
 SOCIETY 
 
 Preceding the year 1880 the missionary work of 
 the Congregational Sunday School and Publish- 
 ing Society had been insignificant. A few mis- 
 sionaries were employed as early as 1852 in New 
 York and in the central western states, but the work 
 was of very small proportions, and at the opening 
 of the Civil War it was practically abandoned. 
 Rev. Asa Bullard was Agent and Secretary of the 
 Sunday School Society for more than fifty years 
 beginning in 1834. His work was confined largely 
 to New England, although he did some work in the 
 West, but this latter went for the most part to 
 build up Presbyterian churches. 
 
 In 1874 the National Council of Congregational 
 Churches recommended that the missionary Sun- 
 day school work be transferred to the Home Mis- 
 sionary Society. This was done in 1876. The 
 action was taken against the judgment of many of 
 the officers of both Societies and it proved to be a 
 disastrous act to the denomination. It nearly 
 destroyed the Sunday school missionary work, 
 and if it had been allowed to stand, it would have 
 severely crippled the denomination. 
 
 The receipts for Sunday school work that were 
 transferred to the Home Missionary Society were 
 
 [32]
 
 IN SUNDAY SCHOOL WOEK 
 
 very small and those of the Publishing Society, 
 as a result of the action, fell from $12,224 in 1873 
 to $1,464 in 1879. Shorn of what little missionary 
 work it had done, the Society had small hold upon 
 the denomination, and that little was almost 
 wholly in New England. 
 
 In 1880, however, a few Sunday school workers 
 began to agitate the question why Congregation- 
 alists could not have a Sunday school leader, fill- 
 ing some such position as that held by Dr. Vincent 
 in the Methodist Church, or by Dr. Worden in the 
 Presbyterian. The State Association of Illinois, 
 and some other bodies, passed resolutions recom- 
 mending such action and sent them to the Society 
 in Boston. 
 
 Whenever there is a great crisis in the nation 
 or in the Christian organization, God has a 
 leader ready for the hour. The case of this So- 
 ciety was no exception. A man was needed who 
 had great ability, was fertile in resources, cou- 
 rageous, and not only enthusiastic himself, but 
 capable of arousing enthusiasm in others. Such 
 a man was found in the person of Rev. A. E. Dun- 
 ning, who became Secretary of the Society on 
 January 1, 1881. 
 
 It is necessary to recount some of the difficulties 
 confronted by Dr. Dunning in order to understand 
 the great work accomplished by Mr. Capen for 
 this organization. The first difficulty encountered 
 was apathy and indifference. Within a year of 
 the time when Dr. Dunning was appointed, he se- 
 cured, through the proper officers, an opportunity 
 to speak before the Massachusetts State Associa- 
 
 [33]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 tion. When it became time for him to speak a 
 gentleman arose and asked, "Who is Mr. Dunning 
 and what is the Sunday School Society?" He 
 was not allowed to proceed until Dr. Quint, the 
 moderator, in a quaint way, had answered the 
 question. And this was in Massachusetts but 
 little over thirty years ago. 
 
 The second difficulty was opposition from with- 
 out. The moment Mr. Dunning began vigorously 
 to promote missionary work he was bitterly op- 
 posed by other interests. One of the great de- 
 nominational leaders felt that he would, if allowed 
 to go on, secure funds that he himself wanted for 
 another Society, and he did everything in his 
 power to prevent Dr. Dunning from securing a 
 hearing before the State Associations. This 
 leader was indorsed in this attempt by 
 many whom he influenced. Nor was the 
 organization represented by this opponent 
 the only one determined to crush the life 
 out of this Sunday school movement. The 
 opposition often took the form of petty attacks. 
 In Illinois a place had been given Dr. Dunning to 
 present the cause of the Sunday School Society 
 at the State Association, but a plan was made to 
 prevent him from speaking. The opposition was 
 severe, but, to his credit be it said, the moderator 
 was determined there should be fair play. He de- 
 cided that Dr. Dunning should be heard and he 
 carried the Association with him. A year or two 
 later, in the same state, a most bitter attack was 
 made against the Secretary personally and 
 against the Society. 
 
 [34]
 
 IN SUNDAY SCHOOL WOEK 
 
 The third difficulty was opposition within the 
 Society. A majority of the Board of Directors 
 did not favor the plan of raising money for send- 
 ing out Sunday school missionaries. They wanted 
 what little money was given put into the pub- 
 lishing work. The result of this opposition was 
 practically a revolution in the management of the 
 Society, the retirement of several of the old di- 
 rectors, and the appointment of men who were 
 more interested in pioneer Sunday school work. 
 
 The nominal capital of the Society at this time 
 was $35,127 but most of this was afterward 
 charged off to profit and loss. Unless very wise 
 management and strong personalities could be se- 
 cured it was evident that the Society could not 
 continue its work. 
 
 With these almost insuperable difficulties before 
 him, Dr. Dunning, seeing signs of promise in one 
 of Boston's young merchants, conceived the idea 
 that if he could persuade him to become president 
 of the Society he could save it from ruin and make 
 it one of the strong organizations of the 
 Congregational Churches. He wrote a letter 
 to Mr. Capen, urging upon him the rea- 
 sons why he should give his services to 
 this difficult undertaking. The first letter 
 received a negative answer, but Dr. Dun- 
 ning 's perseverance finally prevailed and he suc- 
 ceeded not only in securing a leader who was to 
 be one of the greatest factors in reorganizing this 
 Society but also in bringing to the attention of the 
 churches a man who was to become one of the most 
 useful men of his generation. For this act, quite 
 
 [35]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 as much as for his excellent work as secretary of 
 the Society and later as editor of the ' ' Congrega- 
 tionalist," the churches are under great obliga- 
 tion to Dr. Dunning. 
 
 Mr. Capen was elected president on May 30, 
 1882, on the fiftieth anniversary of the Society. 
 He accepted his duties in no perfunctory way but 
 entered with deep devotion into every department 
 of the work. Indeed, this was one of the char- 
 acteristics of all his public activity. He would 
 never accept any office to be a figurehead, perhaps 
 ornamental, but useless as far as real service was 
 concerned. He felt the responsibility of making 
 the entire denomination realize the importance of 
 the Sunday School Society, and he threw himself 
 with untiring zeal into the task of reorganization. 
 
 His first work was in securing funds to save the 
 Society from bankruptcy and to give it a working 
 capital. He secured three subscriptions of $5000 
 a year for three years which gave the society a 
 working capital to carry forward its activities, a 
 contribution obtained by reason of the confidence 
 men had in his leadership. 
 
 The second important work done by Mr. Capen 
 was the reorganization of the Board of Directors. 
 One of the conditions made before he would ac- 
 cept the office was that he should have the right 
 to name six business men as members of this 
 Board. The request was granted and several 
 leading clergymen, together with six of our ablest 
 laymen, who had the confidence of all the churches, 
 were elected. They included strong ministers 
 such as Doctors Alexander McKenzie, Mortimer 
 
 [36]
 
 IN SUNDAY SCHOOL WORK 
 
 Blake, Joshua Wellman, Charles B. Rice, B. Frank- 
 lin Hamilton, J. T. Duryea, George M. Boynton, 
 Robert R. Meredith, Michael Burnham and such 
 laymen as Alpheus Hardy, William H. Wardwell, 
 Charles A. Richardson, Joshua Davis and E. C. 
 Stanwood. 
 
 The result of this business reorganization can- 
 not be better stated than in Mr. Capen's words 
 in an address given in Hartford in 1899. "The 
 nominal capital in 1882 was $35,127, much of 
 which was charged off subsequently to profit and 
 loss. Considerable of this capital was in stereo- 
 type plate, etc., of small value. If everything had 
 been marked down rigidly, as has been the policy 
 of later years, the real capital would have been 
 much less. Five thousand dollars of it had been 
 transferred from another fund and put into the 
 working capital, which in later years was restored. 
 New energy was put into the business; earnest 
 efforts were made to extend it ; the new mission- 
 aries employed were interested to press our liter- 
 ature upon the schools ; great care was shown in 
 the character of the books we published; stores 
 which had frequently refused to look at our pub- 
 lications were now able to give our books a place 
 upon their shelves, and there was a new conoUtion 
 of things everywhere. The capital March 1, 1899, 
 is $125,490, all of which, except about $19,000 
 raised in 1883 and 1884 for new capital, has come 
 from the profits of its business. The circulation 
 of our lessons helps about twenty years ago was 
 less than 50,000; last year they were 644,000." 
 
 Even more important gains were made in some 
 
 [37]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 directions than would seem to be indicated by the 
 above figures. The business prosperity of the 
 Society warranted a vote, taken in 1882, that one- 
 half of all the expenses of the Secretary should 
 be paid by the business department. While the chief 
 work of the Secretary was, of course, with the 
 missionary department, yet he did not have, under 
 its rules, large responsibility for its publications. 
 Its missionaries were more or less agents to push 
 its business and it seemed just, therefore, that 
 the business should pay one-half of the Secre- 
 tary's salary and expenses. The President and 
 some of the directors wanted the time to come 
 when the capital of the Society would reach such 
 an amount that they could give all their surplus 
 profit each year to the missionary department, or, 
 at least, pay all the expenses of the administration 
 of the Boston office. To some extent their desire 
 was attained and they gave out of this surplus 
 amounts varying from $2500 to $5000 a year for 
 several consecutive years. This made it possible 
 for them to make a stronger appeal to their con- 
 stituency, as men throughout the denomination 
 were made to feel that the Society was not only 
 a business but a great missionary enterprise. 
 
 Under the new administration there was also 
 an extension of missionary work. The first Sun- 
 day school missionary began work in December, 
 1882. Since that time the missionaries of this 
 organization have covered every western state 
 and some of the southern states. Before Mr. 
 Capen resigned the Society had reached a point 
 where, on an average, twenty-five missionaries 
 
 [38]
 
 IN SUNDAY SCHOOL WORK 
 
 were kept in the field all the year, and in some 
 months from thirty-five to forty. One of these mis- 
 sionaries led over five hundred persons into the 
 Church. Between 1883 and 1899 the Society 
 organized over seven thousand Sunday schools, in- 
 to which were gathered at the time of their organi- 
 zation over three hundred thousand people. In 
 1882 their workers planted and aided only four 
 hundred and twelve schools. In the nineties they 
 planted each year, on an average, about five hun- 
 dred new schools and assisted about one thousand 
 more, most of which, perhaps the majority, would 
 have died without this aid. From the years 1885 
 to 1895 seven hundred and sixty of these Sunday 
 schools grew into churches, and more than two 
 thousand of the Congregational churches were 
 aided by this Society in their Sunday school work. 
 In other words, about one-third of the Congre- 
 gational churches of the United States have been 
 aided by this organization and one-tenth have 
 grown directly out of its work. Of the one hun- 
 dred and forty new churches reported in the year 
 book for 1898, thirty-seven were started in Sun- 
 day schools organized by these missionaries, six- 
 teen others were aided from their beginning, and 
 thirteen more were helped during the year: that 
 is, more than one-fourth were organized from be- 
 ginnings made by this Society and nearly one- 
 half were helped by it. Of the eighty-nine new 
 churches reported in the year book for 1899, thirty 
 grew from Sunday schools planted by these mis- 
 sionaries and eighteen more were aided by the So- 
 ciety at some time during their history. Such 
 
 [39]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 figures show what a large part this Society, under 
 its new direction, played in the development of 
 the Congregational churches. 
 
 Probably one of the most far-reaching steps 
 taken by the Society under its new management 
 was the calling of a secretary to edit the Sunday 
 School Lesson Helps. Before 1885 the preparation 
 of the Lesson Helps and other literature for Sun- 
 day school work had been done by special arrange- 
 ment with individuals. Doctors Alexander Mc- 
 Kenzie, William H. Wilcox, C. B. Bice, D. N. 
 Beach and E. R. Meredith had prepared Helps for 
 teachers and schools. In May of that year, how- 
 ever, Mr. M. C. Hazard was called from the posi- 
 tion of Secretary of the Western Sunday School 
 Society to remove to the Boston office and become 
 editor in charge of the literature of this new de- 
 partment. How greatly this added to the value of 
 these publications was indicated by their increas- 
 ing circulation. Previous to this time the Congre- 
 gational churches had felt no obligation to secure 
 their literature from denominational headquar- 
 ters, but this new departure was so successful that 
 the Congregational churches everywhere turned, 
 in increasing numbers, to their own Publishing 
 Society for the source of their supplies ; until, to- 
 day it is only the exceptional church that seeks the 
 outside publisher. 
 
 It is difficult for the younger men of the Con- 
 gregational churches, who see the Congregational 
 Sunday School and Publishing Society in such a 
 flourishing condition, one of the strongest and 
 most influential organizations of their denomina- 
 
 [40]
 
 IN SUNDAY SCHOOL WOEK 
 
 tion, to realize what work has been done to give 
 it the place it occupies today. This is due first 
 of all to the personalities of Dr. Dunning and Mr. 
 Capen and to the strong men they gathered about 
 them, but also to the far-sighted business policy 
 they adopted. 
 
 It is due largely to the fact that they agreed 
 that whatever work was undertaken by the So- 
 ciety should be made, so far as possible, perma- 
 nent. They recognized that the Church is a divine 
 institution and that it was their mission to plant 
 Sunday schools where, first under the care of 
 their Society, and later under the care of the 
 Home Missionary Society, they should grow 
 into permanent churches. They believed that the 
 Sunday school was father of the church. The re- 
 sult of the years justified their faith and it was a 
 pleasure to them, after their years of anxious and 
 untiring work, to have one of the largest denomi- 
 nations in a great assembly, a few years ago, de- 
 clare that the missionary work of the Congrega- 
 tional Sunday School Society was the best in the 
 country. 
 
 While this policy of doing permanent work was 
 the fundamental principle, they also recognized 
 the call to enter fields where there could be no 
 probability of such results. As a consequence, 
 they planted nearly one thousand Sunday schools 
 where there was no other religious work. Some 
 of their schools were of very slow growth and 
 they knew some would perish, but they believed 
 it was their mission to let children in out-of-the- 
 way places hear the message of the Christ. 
 
 [41]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 They tried to recognize the importance of time 
 in their work. It makes an infinite difference to a 
 community whether the Sunday school or the 
 saloon gets the first hold upon the community. 
 They tried, therefore, to keep their men at the 
 front, doing the hard work of pioneers, and the 
 thrilling stories of some of their missionaries, 
 fighting the forces of iniquity which tried to cap- 
 ture the communities in which they worked, af- 
 ford some of the most interesting reading of our 
 American history. 
 
 They also felt the importance of circulating the 
 best religious literature as an antidote to the vile 
 stuff that was circulated everywhere. What this 
 meant to the dwellers on the prairie and in the 
 mining camps only eternity alone can reveal. 
 
 Finally they adopted the settled policy never to 
 incur a debt. They felt that the limit of their 
 responsibility ceased with the money given them, 
 and that it was their duty so to administer the 
 trust as to take no chances of incurring a debt. 
 They believed that a society, as well as an in- 
 dividual, should live within its income. As a re- 
 sult of this policy they established a legacy fund. 
 In this particular organization this meant that 
 all legacies left to the Society, instead of being 
 spent in one year, should cover a period of three 
 years, one-third being spent each year. Such a 
 fund gave the Society a little reserve at all times 
 and helped toward steadiness in work. As a con- 
 sequence they made a record that no missionary 
 of the Society ever waited for his salary for one 
 hour from lack of funds. The men on the field 
 
 [42]
 
 IN SUNDAY SCHOOL WORK 
 
 were in hearty and cordial sympathy with the 
 home office ; they were enthusiastic in their work ; 
 they were devoted and true; and this was due 
 partly to the knowledge that there should never 
 be any delay in the payments of their salaries. 
 
 It has been necessary to review somewhat at 
 length this history of the Sunday School and Pub- 
 lishing Society, as it is so intimately connected 
 with the life and development of Mr. Capen. It 
 was here in a sense that he found himself, that 
 he had the opportunity for the expression of his 
 peculiar talents, and it was through this organi- 
 zation that he received his introduction to the 
 religious world. 
 
 It is probably true that few men were more 
 eagerly sought to make addresses for all sorts of 
 gatherings religious, social and civic than this 
 Christian layman, and there were few whose 
 words were more carefully considered. He never 
 developed into a polished orator, like some men 
 who have had the benefit of the schools, and his 
 public utterances were never marked by wide 
 learning or great scholarship. It is not probable 
 that they will be read by succeeding generations 
 or even preserved in a single volume. Yet the ut- 
 terances of few men received such wide circula- 
 tion among Christian laymen of America as did 
 the spoken and printed words of this man. His ad- 
 dress upon peace, delivered before the American 
 Board in Portland and printed by the World 
 Peace Foundation, has been called for more fre- 
 quently and given wider circulation than any 
 pamphlet they ever printed. Nearly all of his im-
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 portant speeches were published and were read 
 not only by the laymen of his own denomination 
 but by Christian and social workers throughout 
 the country. 
 
 It was while he was President of the Sunday 
 School and Publishing Society that Mr. Capen 
 developed this art which made him so useful to 
 the religious and social world. Dr. Dunning, as 
 Secretary of this Society, was crowded with more 
 work than it was possible for one man to do. There 
 was need of arousing interest among the churches 
 and presenting the work of the Society, a need 
 which far exceeded the powers of a single sec- 
 retary. Mr. Capen saw this open door and when 
 he saw an opportunity he accepted it. He began 
 by addressing Sunday schools, often using some 
 object which would catch the attention of the chil- 
 dren and then drawing lessons from it, and again 
 making a simple but earnest appeal to a group of 
 young people. But all who heard him saw great 
 possibilities and in a little while he was sought by 
 churches everywhere and soon developed into an 
 exceedingly effective speaker. 
 
 At first these addresses were always written out 
 and, like the first efforts of many men, they were 
 cumbered with an over-abundance of words and 
 lacked form. Many times he would read them to 
 Dr. Dunning for criticism and suggestion, and 
 under this kindly criticism he quickly came to see 
 his faults, and he developed that concise, pointed 
 form of speech which made him one of the most 
 effective ten-minute speakers this generation has 
 produced. 
 
 [44]
 
 IN SUNDAY SCHOOL WORK 
 
 The theory he adopted for himself is stated in 
 an address he gave to a body of ministers : 
 "Many ministers fail, I think, in not making the 
 points of the sermon definite. Whatever else you 
 do, make them clear and sharp. I believe this is 
 extremely important. I listened a few months ago 
 to an address from a doctor of divinity who 
 stands high in his profession. After listening 
 about thirty-five minutes, a clergyman with whom 
 I had a little acquaintance, sitting near, touched 
 my shoulder and said : ' Do you know what he is 
 talking about ? ' Another person near said : * That 
 was just my thought. ' It may have been noticed 
 that Dr. William Taylor in his sermons usually 
 makes just three headings and I have another 
 very able preacher in mind who told me that he 
 had adopted that rule. Their points are made so 
 direct that everyone feels their power." He cut 
 from his addresses all superfluous words, ar- 
 ranged his material so clearly that no one could 
 fail to grasp the meaning and by the power of his 
 intense earnestness drove his thoughts into the 
 minds and hearts of his hearers. 
 
 Indeed some men thought his most effective 
 speeches were his short ones, where he seized 
 one or two outstanding principles and, by his 
 peculiar grace and power, made them vital to the 
 lives of those who listened. Many large as- 
 semblies over which he presided were lifted at the 
 very beginning of their sessions to a high plane 
 of moral and spiritual enthusiasm by one of his 
 brief introductory addresses, a plane which they 
 were able to maintain to the very closing hour, 
 
 [45]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 when he would deliver another short address, 
 which would seem to clinch everything that had 
 been said and done. 
 
 It was not without significance that he devoted a 
 large part of his life to work among children, first 
 in the Sunday schools, then in the Society of which 
 he was President, and later on the School Com- 
 mittee of Boston. It was while he was President 
 of the Publishing Society that the importance of 
 the work for the young grew upon him. In one of 
 his addresses he said: "Many living can remem- 
 ber how in their early days the young were kept 
 back in everything which looked toward active 
 Christian work. There has just been called home 
 one of the noblest men of the ministry, Dr. Brand, 
 of Oberlin. When he became a Christian in the 
 church in Maine where he attended, there was but 
 one male member in the church under thirty years 
 of age. Even when this Sunday School Society 
 was reconstructed, less than twenty years ago, it 
 was regarded as a rather small work compared 
 with that of some of the other societies. But that 
 day, thank God, is gone. We live in the children's 
 age, and we have learned that to shape and mould 
 the boy of five is the easiest and surest way to 
 hold the man of twenty-five. Work for the chil- 
 dren represents the greatest economy of force." 
 
 One thing which he said often to the churches 
 cannot be repeated too frequently. He was a 
 strong believer in influencing little children to 
 unite with the Christian Church and he was fond 
 of saying: "Act as though you expected the little 
 ones to come to Christ at once. There has been 
 
 [46]
 
 IN SUNDAY SCHOOL WORK 
 
 very much of unbelief in the past about little chil- 
 dren becoming Christians. Thank God, that feel- 
 ing is passing away ! Christ wants the little ones 
 at first, before sin has made a stronghold of their 
 souls. Then let them feel that this expectation is 
 of the first importance, more important than all 
 other things put together; that money, or gain, 
 or dress, or station, are nothing in comparison. 
 The child with its keen instinct will readily detect 
 what the parent wants of it above all else. To the 
 little one none is so great or strong as the father, 
 or so loving and beautiful as the mother. Let 
 that power be uniformly exerted in one direction 
 and it will be irresistible. ' ' 
 
 It was during this period of his work that his 
 Men's Bible Class in the Central Church in Ja- 
 maica Plain became very widely known, and was 
 studied by hundreds of people interested in the 
 new movement among the churches of organizing 
 the men of the parish for Bible study. Mr. Capen 
 often quoted in public speech the familiar saying : 
 "If you want to hold the boys in Sunday school 
 build a wall of men so high that they cannot jump 
 over it." He was a profound believer in this 
 truth, and for years he was one of the most suc- 
 cessful teachers of a large men's class that this 
 country has produced. The secret of his success 
 may be found in ten principles which he adopted 
 for his own work and which, he believed, were the 
 foundation for any successful worker. 
 
 "(1) Always be present unless detained by 
 some important reason, a reason that your class 
 will feel is a good one. (2) I try to keep very 
 
 [47]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 clearly in mind the great aim of Bible class teach- 
 ing; namely, to lead all to Jesus Christ and then 
 to inspire them with the thought of noble service 
 for him. (3) I try to be faithful in preparation, 
 remembering not only the beautiful responsibility, 
 but also the unspeakable privilege, of moulding 
 young men for the life that now is and for that 
 which is to come. I think that every layman should 
 spend at least five hours in preparation. (4) I 
 write out all the questions and the headings of 
 what I wish to say. There is nothing more 
 demoralizing to a class of bright young men than 
 for the teacher to be fumbling around to find the 
 place. They want things quick, sharp, prompt. 
 (5) I try never to do the same thing twice alike. 
 It adds greatly to have variety. (6) As a part of 
 this plan, I have no regular order of asking ques- 
 tions. I sometimes begin in one part of the class 
 and sometimes in another. In going around, if a 
 hard question comes to one whom you feel may 
 not be able to answer it, and who will be thereby 
 embarrassed, it is easy enough to put in another 
 question, or to ask the difficult question of all, and 
 see how many answers you can get; or 'plump it' 
 at some one you know will be glad to answer, 
 as if you had been saving it for him all the lesson. 
 (7) Be cheerful. A long-faced Christian, if such 
 a term is not a contradiction, ought never to be 
 asked to teach a Bible class. I do not believe that 
 there are either icebergs or fogs in heaven, and 
 there is no place for them, personified, in the Sun- 
 day school. The person who goes through life in 
 a 'hang-dog way,' as though he was apologizing 
 
 [48]
 
 IN SUNDAY SCHOOL WORK 
 
 to the Almighty for being in the world at all, can- 
 not teach young men. (8) Be earnest. If there is 
 anything that ought to arouse all that is in us, it 
 is the thought of moulding human souls by the 
 presentation of the gospel. (9) Remember, in 
 the last five minutes, to gather up and enforce the 
 central and spiritual thoughts of the lesson. Let 
 everything lead up to this; and allow nothing to 
 prevent the final impression, the last thought, 
 from being the one you would be glad to leave if, 
 when you gather the next Sabbath, there should 
 be a vacant chair, and the one who sat there a 
 week before should have gone. (10) The most 
 important duty of every successful teacher is per- 
 sonal work. We must make our scholars feel at 
 once that we are personal friends, interested in 
 their business, in their studies, in their amuse- 
 ments, in all that interests them. I usually call 
 without delay upon a new scholar. If he be not 
 a Christian, as soon as I feel that I have a little 
 hold upon him, I invite him to my own house 
 and talk freely and frankly upon personal 
 religion. ' ' 
 
 The value of these rules cannot find better jus- 
 tification than the results they produced. Not only 
 did he gather about him a large company of men 
 who, through his teaching and personal influence, 
 became the spiritual teachers and leaders in his 
 church, but scores went out to other churches, scat- 
 tered all over this country, to become centers of 
 power. He always carried with him a complete 
 list of the membership of this class and no day 
 passed when he did not pray for each one by name. 
 
 [49]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 He considered himself responsible for the spirit- 
 ual welfare of this little flock, and there was not 
 one in the group with whom he did not at some 
 time talk on the subject of personal religion, mak- 
 ing a definite effort to bring him to a decision to 
 serve Jesus Christ, and to unite with the Church. 
 Even when he was on his last journey around the 
 world, crowded by engagements, busy making ad- 
 dresses, visiting mission stations, writing letters 
 and making notes, he not only held to his practice 
 of praying for each member every day, but also 
 wrote a long letter to be read to the class at each 
 weekly meeting. Through these years of fidelity as 
 a teacher and leader of his class, he verily attained 
 an immortality by living over again in lives made 
 better by his presence. While his interest was in 
 the children, it was equally vital in the men, and 
 all during his presidency of the Sunday School 
 Society he was a great power, both through public 
 addresses and personal example, in encouraging 
 the organization of men's classes throughout the 
 country. 
 
 It was during this period that men became con- 
 scious of his intense religious earnestness, the 
 element more than any other which was the secret 
 of his power. His life, as well as his words, was 
 essentially an appeal to men for greater loyalty 
 to Jesus Christ. Here is one out of many passages 
 from his addresses revealing the intense earnest- 
 ness of the man: ''While there has been so much 
 progress made, and while the Sunday school work 
 of our denomination and of others has given such 
 splendid results, let us not forget the stupendous 
 
 [50]
 
 IN SUNDAY SCHOOL WOEK 
 
 task yet remaining to be done. With over ten 
 millions in Sunday school, there is another ten 
 millions of school age outside. And one of the 
 saddest parts of it all is that of these millions 
 many cannot get a chance to go if they would. 
 There are hundreds of places in our country 
 where, as yet, the name of Jesus Christ is not 
 taught in Sunday school or church. And these 
 places give such splendid results when the Sun- 
 day school missionary does come. The people are 
 so often hungry for the gospel. A single illustra- 
 tion: It is of a mining town with over four 
 thousand people and forty-seven saloons, with no 
 Sunday school. One of our missionaries a short 
 time ago was instrumental in planting a school 
 which, in a few months' time, had three hundred 
 scholars; a church was organized which now has 
 over two hundred members, thirty-six being 
 added last year at a single communion. Compare 
 this with a report which came back recently to us 
 from an inquiry we made in a certain place. I 
 quote literally : ' No school, no church, no mission- 
 ary, no religion.' Such a report, which could 
 be duplicated so often, ought to inspire our 
 churches with larger consecration and greater 
 liberality. ' ' 
 
 Always thankful for the great work that had 
 been accomplished, he saw greater work to be 
 done. Nothing could discourage him. He was es- 
 sentially a crusader, not content until there should 
 be a Sunday school and church upon every hill 
 and in every valley from the Atlantic to the Pa- 
 cific. Men caught his spirit. Young men followed 
 
 [51]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 the noble commander, and the result was not only 
 a Society reorganized on its business side but a 
 Society filled with a new spirit, and made a great 
 factor in our religious life. 
 
 [52]
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 Mr. Capen had become well known in the 
 Congregational churches through his connection 
 with the Sunday School Society and in Boston 
 through his active interest in municipal reforms. 
 When the schools of Boston needed the touch of 
 a strong guiding hand, the leadership of some one 
 who could free them from the control of the poli- 
 tician and of other forces which were trying to 
 cripple them, the citizens of the old Puritan city 
 turned to Mr. Capen as a man of the type who 
 could bring them to the standard worthy of the 
 traditions of the past. He was elected to the 
 School Board in 1888 and immediately threw all 
 the power of his consecrated personality into 
 these needed reforms. 
 
 The first urgent work before the School Com- 
 mittee of Boston in 1888 was the erection of new 
 buildings, to accommodate the children. The old 
 City of the Puritans had always given special at- 
 tention to the education of her young. The free 
 church and the free school had been her pride and 
 she had been a leader in providing the best equip- 
 ment that skill and money could obtain. Between 
 1875 and 1887 she had built thirteen primary 
 schools and seventeen grammar schools. Then 
 certain interests that had been opposed to the 
 public school system, but had not been successful 
 
 [53]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 in fighting it openly, gained secret control of the 
 political machinery of the city and, instead of 
 open opposition, used indirect methods of stran- 
 gling this favorite child of our free institutions. 
 Working through the mayor and City Council 
 they succeeded in withholding all appropriations 
 of money for school buildings, apparently hoping 
 to stop all building until the population should 
 so outgrow the accommodations that there would 
 be an added argument for the need of the paro- 
 chial and private school. 
 
 The city of Chicago built in the old city proper, 
 between 1886 and 1890, nineteen grammar and 
 primary school buildings, at a total cost of $1,- 
 129,047. During the same period the city of 
 Brooklyn erected nineteen new school buildings, 
 while in Boston, with a rapidly increasing popu- 
 lation, only one new building was added. As a re- 
 sult schools were overcrowded and vacant stores 
 and rooms were rented to supply temporary needs. 
 
 The situation in one school of the Dorchester 
 district may serve as an illustration of what was 
 the condition in several school districts at that 
 time. The building was inadequate for the large 
 number of children, so that rooms outside of the 
 school had to be rented. One of the grades was 
 placed in the basement of a church. Two rooms 
 were rented in rickety tenements, so old that in 
 the winter months the children could look through 
 the cracks in the walls, rooms that could not be 
 adequately heated and were dark and in every 
 way unsuited to the needs of school work. Still 
 another group of the pupils was placed in an old 
 
 [54]
 
 WITH BOSTON SCHOOLS 
 
 store, not only unfitted for school work but also 
 used as a source of graft by the politicians. Apart 
 from the disadvantage of scattering the pupils 
 over such a wide territory, with the loss of school 
 spirit, was the more serious fact that the equip- 
 ment would have been a disgrace to even a back- 
 country school district. Yet there were districts 
 in the city of Boston that were worse than this 
 one. 
 
 With this condition existing in the city, whose 
 boast had been in her educational institutions, Mr. 
 Capen was elected to the School Committee and 
 was made chairman of the sub-committee on 
 school buildings. Report was soon made to the 
 City Council concerning the conditions confront- 
 ing the Committee, calling attention not only to 
 the way in which Boston was failing to meet her 
 present needs but also to the fact that by with- 
 holding her funds she was failing to provide 
 adequately for the future. ' ' To illustrate, there is 
 a portion of our city very rapidly filling up at 
 the present time, where in two or three years 
 there will be need of both a new grammar and a 
 new primary school. The land could have been 
 bought last winter for ten cents a foot. We ought 
 to have been in a position to purchase it; for, 
 when we come to buy it, it will have appreciated 
 so much that the city will probably pay two or 
 three times the above price for it. It seems un- 
 necessary to say that we ought not to be so far* 
 behind with the needs of today that we cannot 
 provide for the certain needs of tomorrow. ' ' 
 
 The chairman of the Building Committee 
 [55]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 even suggested to the honorable Council that if 
 the matter of erecting commodious, well-lighted 
 and well-ventilated buildings should be submitted 
 to popular vote, the citizens almost unanimously 
 would give their voice in favor of this imperative 
 call for increased school accommodations. 
 
 But, in spite of all argument, the mayor and the 
 City Council could not be moved. Something had 
 effectively blocked the wheels of progress. What 
 it was, many had their suspicions, but none could 
 prove. There was money for the politicians but 
 a very inadequate amount for the training of the 
 children in the schools. 
 
 When it was evident that the money could not 
 be secured and that the city machinery was in 
 the hands of some unseen power opposed to the 
 public school system, Mr. Capen carried the cause 
 into the public press of Boston. Going in person 
 to the editor of the ''Boston Transcript," he se- 
 cured not only his sympathy but his co-operation, 
 and there began the open controversy through the 
 columns of that paper between Mr. Capen, repre- 
 senting the School Committee, and some one rep- 
 resenting the mayor and Council, who signed his 
 name, ' ' A Boston School Boy. ' ' Under that name 
 the power fighting the schools was hidden and 
 no one could draw the enemy into the open. 
 
 For several weeks the controversy continued, 
 Mr. Capen revealing to the public with great skill 
 the actual state of Boston's schools, creating wide 
 interest throughout the city, and making a public 
 sentiment that could no longer be resisted. 
 
 "The plain truth is," said an editorial in the 
 [56]
 
 WITH BOSTON SCHOOLS 
 
 "Transcript," "and it may as well be plainly 
 spoken: Boston's school children would not have 
 to wait for decent and healthful accommodations 
 if the Boston schools had in their employ an army 
 of ward politicians and political strikers. There 
 is a limit to the defiance which can be safely put 
 upon intelligent public sentiment. There is a wide 
 and widening, a deep and deepening demand for 
 more schoolhouses. Whether City Hall knows it 
 or not, the slates of the school children are en- 
 titled to more consideration as well as the slates 
 of the politicians. If no desk room is provided for 
 the former slates, it is not unlikely that some of 
 the latter will be shattered in consequence." 
 
 As a result of this agitation legislation was se- 
 cured that enabled the School Committee to ob- 
 tain funds. The politician and the secret power 
 were completely routed and the Committee im- 
 mediately formed plans for building many of the 
 finest schoolhouses of which any city can boast. 
 The disgraceful conditions were overcome and 
 with adequate equipment Boston started on a new 
 era in her educational history. 
 
 The second great achievement of the School 
 Committee, when Mr. Capen was one of its most 
 influential members, was the introduction into the 
 Boston schools of manual training, an element in 
 the education of the child that had its strong ad- 
 vocates but no less its opponents. Mr. Capen 's was 
 largely the voice that was to speak to the public 
 on this new venture, and now that manual train- 
 ing has become a part of our educational system, 
 it is interesting to recall the reasons which were 
 
 [57]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 then advanced in its favor. In an appeal made 
 through the "Boston Transcript" for a school 
 devoted to mechanical training, Mr. Capen ad- 
 vanced these arguments : 
 
 "First, we ask it as an act of justice to a large 
 class of boys in our public schools. We all point 
 with pride to our Latin School with its splendid 
 record of more than two hundred and fifty years 
 in fitting boys for professions. We have equal 
 satisfaction with our high schools, fitting for the 
 best places in mercantile life. But how about the 
 boys who are to enter the industrial world? Are 
 they not entitled to an equal chance ? Should they 
 not have, at the public expense, provision for such 
 higher education as will fit them for advancement 
 in their chosen calling? We do not believe that it 
 is right for this city any longer to make such a 
 discrimination. 
 
 "Second, such schools are a great moral force 
 in any community. It has been proved again and 
 again that the best way, often the only way, to 
 arouse the intellectual faculties of some boys is 
 through their hands. They do not at first care 
 for books. They are listless, heedless, indifferent. 
 They are discouraged by repeated failures, and 
 ready for mischief of every sort. But when they 
 are put before the bench and the anvil, another 
 set of faculties is aroused; they begin to take 
 pride in their work. In the classroom they dawdle 
 over the book, and all the entreaty of the teacher 
 has no effect. But when they stand before the 
 anvil, and the red-hot iron must be moulded that 
 instant or not at all, then the lesson as to the im- 
 
 [58]
 
 WITH BOSTON SCHOOLS 
 
 portance and value of time is driven home with 
 resistless power. So at the carpenter's bench, 
 with the drawings they have made, they learn the 
 necessity of accuracy and precision. The differ- 
 ent parts must be fitted together. No sham will 
 pass, and they have learned a lesson in truth. 
 Furthermore, their work is done in the sight of 
 all ; they cannot carry it home and have it worked 
 out by some older brother; and they learn self- 
 reliance and true manliness. These faculties and 
 others that might be named are the very basis of 
 character. This is not theorizing; it is the uni- 
 versal result everywhere. 
 
 "Third, we need this school to properly com- 
 plete the whole plan of manual training in our 
 school system. What is done in our elementary 
 schools fails in its full fruitage and value without 
 this. The kindergarten system is being generally 
 adopted all through the city. The little child is 
 here taught to think, to observe carefully, to be 
 persevering, his thinking and his efforts being 
 wrought out with his fingers. It has been proved 
 that the child who has been a year in the kinder- 
 garten has his faculties so much quickened that 
 it is practically a year in advance when it enters 
 the primary school over those who have not had 
 this training. Going on from this first step, with- 
 in the past year, provision has been made in the 
 course of study to teach the principles and lay the 
 foundation of manual training itself in all our 
 primary schools, and primary teachers are being 
 instructed to this end. In some of our grammar 
 schools the boys are being taught the use of tools, 
 
 [59]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 and the system is to be introduced into them all 
 as rapidly as possible. But it can never be com- 
 plete without this high school. It has been demon- 
 strated again and again, all over the country, that 
 the college and the seminary are necessary to lift 
 to a higher plane the common school and make it 
 more efficient. When in a community there is no 
 higher education the common school is usually of 
 a very inferior order. The same principle is true 
 in the matter of manual training. We need the 
 school of the higher grade to give completeness to 
 the whole system, and give enthusiasm and in- 
 terest in it among our pupils. ' ' 
 
 Mr. Capen with his keen moral insight into our 
 social order saw even a deeper need for this type 
 of education than is advanced in the * ' Transcript ' ' 
 article. Speaking before the School Committee he 
 said : ' ' One of the greatest dangers to our nation 
 comes through class distinctions and the errone- 
 ous idea that those who labor with their hands 
 are not quite so high in the social scale as those 
 whose labor is more largely of the brain. Manual 
 training in our schools is doing much to correct 
 this false notion in our children before it becomes 
 permanently fixed. The cultivated teacher, with 
 the children of the rich and the poor dressed alike 
 in the garb of a toiler, and working together with 
 their hands, serves to impress the truth that 
 manual labor is honorable." 
 
 As a result of this continued agitation, Mr. 
 Capen, co-operating with the faithful efforts of 
 other men equally interested, introduced manual 
 training not only in our grammar schools, but 
 
 [60]
 
 WITH BOSTON SCHOOLS 
 
 there came that crowning achievement of mechani- 
 cal education, the establishment of the Mechanic 
 Arts High School. In 1891 the City Council ap- 
 propriated one hundred thousand dollars for the 
 building of this School and the School Committee 
 in the same year began to shape the course of 
 study in the elementary schools with this ad- 
 vanced course in mind, so that the boys who in- 
 tended to follow the industrial pursuits should be 
 trained in the best way to avail themselves of this 
 new opportunity. Cooking and sewing for girls 
 was introduced in the grammar schools and wood- 
 work for boys. Mr. Capen was Chairman of the 
 Committee and wrote the report, outlining a com- 
 plete course of study which was to launch Boston 
 schools in this new enterprise and to some extent 
 to revolutionize our educational ideals. 
 
 There was still one class of children for whom 
 adequate provision had not been made, those who 
 had never been taught to obey in the home and 
 were growing in idleness and defiance of au- 
 thority. To illustrate the type : In one school dis- 
 trict was a boy whose mother was dead, whose 
 father was rarely at home, his occupation being 
 to entice strangers from the country into gam- 
 bling dens where they were robbed and he took 
 half of the profit. This boy attempted to defy the 
 teacher, to demoralize the whole room when he 
 was present and to absent himself from the school 
 when it pleased him. He was not a criminal but 
 he would soon become one. 
 
 For such boys there was a truant school in Bos- 
 ton Harbor or the reform schools, but many 
 
 [61]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 judges would not send boys to those schools be- 
 cause they knew that in contact with crime they 
 would be ruined. Hence such boys were often al- 
 lowed to remain in the schools, continuing in defi- 
 ance of restraint, until they took the first step in 
 crime, when they were sent away to be kept with 
 other criminals and this meant, as a rule, that they 
 were only to be confirmed in their crime. 
 
 Mr. Capen, as chairman of the appropriation 
 committee, had the satisfaction of presenting an 
 order, which was adopted by the School Commit- 
 tee, "that the City Council be requested to appro- 
 priate one hundred and fifty thousand dollars for 
 land and buildings for a parental school. ' ' It was 
 to be "a school to prevent crime, not one to cure 
 it," to take the boy before he became a criminal 
 and help him to form a character and strengthen 
 his will. 
 
 In characteristic ways, Mr. Capen had been 
 very careful to prepare public opinion on this 
 matter before asking for the appropriation. 
 Through public utterances and articles for the 
 press, he had fully acquainted the public with the 
 need of such a school and the ideal that was to 
 dominate it. This was one secret of his success. 
 He never ran ahead of public opinion, but took 
 time to prepare it for the work he wished to ac- 
 complish. If the matter in hand concerned only a 
 committee, and it was a question on which there 
 was difference of opinion, he saw the members of 
 the committee, made them familiar with his point 
 of view and knew how they were to vote before 
 they came to their meeting. If it was a matter 
 
 [62]
 
 WITH BOSTON SCHOOLS 
 
 that affected the public, he took time to educate 
 them, using the press freely, so that they not only 
 saw a need but became advocates of the principle. 
 All his great causes were won by personal inter- 
 views, before his committees ever came together. 
 He sufficiently educated the public so that when 
 he launched his enterprises it was ready for 
 them. 
 
 Through a long series of utterances the public 
 was prepared for this new step in the treatment of 
 degeneracy and the City Council granted the re- 
 quest, thus providing Boston with a system of 
 schools that should minister to every class of 
 children. 
 
 One of the most difficult tasks in a large city is 
 to keep the hand of the politician from the public 
 school. With the large number of appointments 
 to be made and the large expenditures of money, 
 this is one of the fields he most covets for his self- 
 ish purposes. 
 
 In Boston for years the appointment of janitors 
 was one of the fields where the politician had been 
 most active, and while there were many able men 
 in this department of her service there were also 
 a large number of incompetents, who had received 
 their appointments through political influence 
 rather than on the ground of fitness. 
 
 Mr. Capen, keenly sensitive to the evils of this 
 system, was one of the leaders who influenced the 
 General Court to pass legislation providing that 
 all janitors having a salary of over three hundred 
 dollars a year should before being qualified, first 
 be examined and certified by the Civil Service 
 
 [63]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 Commissioner. The practical working out of this 
 law has fully justified all that its friends claimed 
 for it from the beginning. Vacancies are filled, 
 whenever they occur, either by the promotion of 
 the best men already in the service, or by the ap- 
 pointment of those who have the highest rank in 
 the competitive list. The effect has been to relieve 
 the School Committee of all pressure of appoint- 
 ments to be made for political or other selfish rea- 
 sons and the whole service has been placed upon 
 that higher plane where fitness and not favoritism 
 is the test of all appointments. 
 
 Probably one of the most effective works with 
 which Mr. Capen was directly concerned in con- 
 nection with the educational system of Boston was 
 the placing of teachers upon tenure of office. It 
 had been the custom to elect teachers every year ; 
 and not only was the teacher always uncertain 
 about his term of service, but many times injus- 
 tice was done an able teacher, who had rendered 
 the highest work, on the complaint of some of- 
 fended parent who did not think his child had been 
 treated fairly, or by the influence of some person 
 who thought a teacher too active in reform 
 movements. 
 
 This incident is told of one of Boston's ablest 
 masters. One morning he looked despondent, 
 when a friend met him and asked what troubled 
 him. 
 
 1 'I haven't done my duty," was the gloomy 
 reply of the master. 
 
 "What on earth do you mean!" 
 
 "Haven't you seen the morning paper! I re- 
 [64]
 
 WITH BOSTON SCHOOLS 
 
 ceived last night every confounded vote of the 
 School Committee." 
 
 It was a bit of humor that represented a tragic 
 fact. Not only was the teacher often treated un- 
 justly but his conscience was often wronged by the 
 fact that he was held back from active work in 
 many righteous causes for fear he would offend 
 some politician who could bring enough influence 
 to bear upon a not wholly responsible committee 
 to deprive him of his position. 
 
 Through an act of the General Court, for the 
 creation and passage of which Mr. Capen was 
 largely responsible, this practice was stopped, and 
 all regular teachers were placed upon permanent 
 tenure of office to continue at the pleasure of the 
 School Committee. This placed the teaching force 
 of Boston above the greed of the politician, or the 
 spite of the grieved parent, and made it possible 
 for teachers to retain their positions so long as 
 character and efficient service made them useful 
 to the school system. 
 
 One thing which made Mr. Capen so useful to 
 the School Committee was that he carried the 
 same high business ideals into his work for the 
 city that he had maintained in his private affairs. 
 It was this fact that made him the despair of the 
 politicians. They could not understand him. His 
 code of conduct was so far above their standard 
 of action, his way of doing things was so far re- 
 moved from graft and so-called practical politics, 
 that they not only could not use him for their self- 
 ish ends but did not know how to approach him. 
 Constantly they found themselves defeated and 
 
 [65]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 put to flight by his straightforward and righteous 
 methods. 
 
 This could not be more clearly illustrated than 
 by a transaction whereby a Boston politician tried 
 to sell a piece of land for a school building. It 
 was offered to the School Committee for several 
 thousand dollars. The deal was a shrewd politi- 
 cal move, an unadulterated piece of graft, and was 
 about to pass the Committee. Mr. Capen asked 
 that the matter might lie over for a week and 
 the request was granted. Then he went in person 
 to examine the ground. He found it not only un- 
 desirable, but he discovered a larger and much 
 better lot a short distance away, in a better loca- 
 tion. He had this lot surveyed and then secured 
 an option on it for a week at eighteen thousand 
 dollars less than the sum for which the politician 
 had offered his land. 
 
 The next week the question came again before 
 the Committee and the politician was present to 
 urge his case. Then, when everything seemed to 
 be in favor of the grafter, Mr. Capen asked him if 
 he had ever noticed the lot across the street. He 
 said he had. "Don't you think it more favorably 
 located than the one you offer ? ' ' asked Mr. Capen. 
 The politician admitted that he thought it might 
 be but urged that it would be much higher in 
 price and that it was probably not for sale. Then 
 Mr. Capen took from his pocket the option show- 
 ing a saving of eighteen thousand dollars to the 
 city and presented it to the Committee. 
 
 This was a way of conducting municipal affairs 
 with which the politicians were not familiar and 
 
 [66]
 
 WITH BOSTON SCHOOLS 
 
 with which they could not cope. Yet it was this 
 method of doing business which made one of the 
 most experienced masters in the Boston schools 
 say, when Mr. Capen was thinking of resigning 
 from the Committee: "The city could better af- 
 ford to pay ten thousand dollars a year than lose 
 that man. He has saved us at least one hundred 
 thousand dollars. One hundred thousand dollars 
 is but a small fraction of what might have been 
 saved the city in the last five years had the ex- 
 penditure for schools been in the hands of men 
 like Mr. Capen." 
 
 While his methods were the despair of the poli- 
 tician they won the confidence of the public. His 
 faithful, honest services were so appreciated by 
 all classes of citizens that in 1891 he was re-elected 
 a member of the School Committee by a larger 
 vote than was given to any other candidate for 
 public office. 
 
 While Mr. Capen 's service upon the School Com- 
 mittee covered a term of unprecedented achieve- 
 ment, both in securing new buildings and in the 
 introduction of new methods, it stands much more 
 conspicuously for the development of great per- 
 sonalities in the teaching and supervisory forces. 
 It was a term of ardent public and professional 
 loyalty during which the schools were brought to 
 a moral plane from which they have never 
 receded. 
 
 While Mr. Capen seemed to possess an almost 
 magic power of bringing things to pass, accom- 
 plishing things of which others had despaired, 
 there was a moral contagion about his personality, 
 
 [67]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 as well as a moral inspiration in his words, which 
 permeated the entire school system. His ideal for 
 the teaching force is stated in an address made 
 before the School Committee in 1893: "The 
 teacher's power is next to that of the parent in 
 its formative influence on childhood, and hence 
 the School Board is laying more and more stress 
 upon the character of its new appointments. Of 
 all the wise words spoken by the late John D. 
 Philbrick, none were more true than these: 'To 
 cultivate the conscience, and to strengthen it so 
 that it will exercise complete sway over the life 
 and actions of an individual, is the highest aim of 
 education; and any system of training the intel- 
 lect which does not embrace this is a mockery.' 
 The teacher who does not acknowledge his obliga- 
 tion to attend to this, let his sentence be, 'Thou 
 art weighed in the balance and found wanting,' 
 and let his kingdom be taken from him. ' ' 
 
 "Mrs. Alice Freeman Palmer has most wisely 
 said, 'I am such a heretic in these latter days, that 
 I have great sympathy with that Superintendent 
 of Schools in a great city who has often talked 
 with me during the past ten years about the quali- 
 fications he desired for teachers in his schools. He 
 has said, ' ' I am not going to ask for deep learning 
 as the first qualification of my teachers. I shall 
 ask first, for firm, high, noble character; second, 
 for fine manners; third, for sound learning; 
 fourth, for professional training. " It is not only 
 the direct instruction given out by the text-books, 
 but the silent moral influence of the teacher 's life, 
 which makes its power felt for good in all the 
 
 [68]
 
 WITH BOSTON SCHOOLS 
 
 years. Many a boy or girl has gone from school 
 out into the world's conflicts, and the hour of 
 temptation comes. There is a moment of hesita- 
 tion and then of victory, because of a memory of 
 some faithful teacher, the silent power of whose 
 life is felt across the years, and it may be across 
 the continent. There is no limit to the power of 
 a high moral life, and no teacher ever dies who is 
 fit to live." 
 
 1 i Character first, scholarship afterwards, is the 
 order of requirement today for every teacher's 
 place in this city," became the slogan of the 
 School Committee. They were more anxious to 
 know by whom the children were trained than to 
 know merely what they were to be taught. Be- 
 lieving that the chief aim of education is not the 
 acquisition of knowledge by certain methods so 
 much as the formation of a good character under 
 the power of uplifting personalities, they were 
 resolved to prevent the entering of any into the 
 service who could not bear the severest test in this 
 respect. "The teacher's profession," said Mr. 
 Capen, "is a very sacred one, and those who do 
 not thus consider it should never be permitted to 
 enter it. On the other hand, those now in the serv- 
 ice who do not feel it to be such, should leave it 
 forever to those who have some proper conception 
 of its supreme dignity and importance. ' ' 
 
 The demand, though always uncompromising, 
 never seemed harsh or unreasonable. It never 
 gave offense, chiefly because it was so evident that 
 Mr. Capen was trying to exemplify in his own life 
 what he required of others. Men could know him 
 
 [69]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 but a short time before they were impressed by 
 the fact that he lived and toiled only for the 
 things of character. Everything else sank into in- 
 significance in comparison with this one great 
 quest. 
 
 There is always a danger that this Puritan type 
 of conscience will become harsh and critical, creat- 
 ing fear rather than affection in those who work 
 under it; that it will create a man who will rule 
 by the power of a dominating will rather than lead 
 by the attractiveness of a rich life. Mr. Capen 
 was saved from this by what has been described as 
 1 1 that enkindling and transforming temper, which 
 forever sees in humanity, not that which is bad 
 and hateful, but that which is lovable and improv- 
 able, which can both discern and effectually speak 
 to that nobler longing of the soul, which is the 
 indestructible image of its Maker." His person- 
 ality, as well as his methods, inspired rather than 
 discouraged. Men and women went from his pres- 
 ence desiring to be better and to do better work. 
 
 Unconscious, probably, that this was one of the 
 chief sources of his strength for it was an ele- 
 ment of character as natural as the breath of his 
 life he tried to inculcate this attitude in all the 
 teachers. "Try to discover that which is best in 
 your scholars and then inspire them to the devel- 
 opment of all that is pure and ennobling." 
 
 Eecognizing the great service Mr. Capen had 
 rendered to the city of Boston, the citizens of 
 Jamaica Plain, where he resided, petitioned the 
 School Committee to name the new and beautiful 
 grammar school for girls on Green Street, which 
 
 [70]
 
 WITH BOSTON SCHOOLS 
 
 had been built through his efforts, the Samuel 
 Billings Capen Grammar School, and the Com- 
 mittee granted the petition. It was a great honor 
 and would have served to keep the memory of his 
 good life before the successive generations of 
 children who were being prepared for citizenship, 
 as well as to provide a perpetual tribute to the 
 man who was regarded as the first citizen of his 
 community. 
 
 Mr. Capen, always keenly sensitive to any ex- 
 pressions of regard, and always declaring that it 
 was better to pronounce a man's eulogy before 
 he died than after his death, appreciated greatly 
 the honor his fellow citizens and the School Com- 
 mittee had conferred upon him, but after careful 
 consideration, and with the wise foresight that 
 always characterized his actions, he declined to 
 have the school named after him, fearing that the 
 acceptance might be misunderstood, and that 
 some might feel that his efforts on the Board had 
 been for some selfish motive and that his useful- 
 ness for the coming year might be impaired. As 
 a guardian of a great trust he was not willing to 
 have his public influence prejudiced by any per- 
 sonal honors. 
 
 There was also another motive, which did not 
 find its way into the public press. Mr. Capen saw 
 that if the precedent should be established and 
 followed some of our schools might be named 
 after self-seeking politicians whose influence 
 would be neither good nor abiding and whose 
 memory would not be uplifting to the children. 
 The School Board reluctantly granted his request 
 
 [71]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 and at Mr. Capen's suggestion, on December 23rd, 
 1890, the school was named the "Bowditch 
 School" in honor of one of Boston's most re- 
 spected citizens, Nathaniel Bowditch. The Board 
 also passed the rule that no school should be 
 named in honor of any living person. 
 
 It was not until Mr. Capen proposed in 1893 
 to resign from the School Committee that he 
 realized to the full extent how much his services 
 had been appreciated by the citizens of Boston 
 and by the teachers of her schools. Letters and 
 personal requests poured upon him, asking that 
 he continue his great work. The following resolu- 
 tion was passed and signed by every member of 
 the School Committee: "We, the undersigned, be- 
 lieving the proposed resignation of Samuel B. 
 Capen from the Boston School Board would be 
 very detrimental to the best interests of our 
 schools, as by his faithfulness, efficiency, and devo- 
 tion he has proved himself a most valuable mem- 
 ber, therefore earnestly request him to reconsider 
 his determination." 
 
 The same petition was signed by seven hundred 
 and sixty-two teachers of the Boston Public 
 Schools. This action came in March, 1893. The 
 expressions of appreciation and the petitions to 
 continue in office had a great effect upon Mr. 
 Capen. He felt truly that it "was never given to 
 any man anywhere to have his associates treat 
 him with more kindness and more courtesy and 
 more generosity than you have always treated 
 me." While at the beginning of the year he had 
 resolved, owing to obligations that seemed to 
 
 [72]
 
 WITH BOSTON SCHOOLS 
 
 make it imperative, to retire at an early date, this 
 unanimous action caused him to hesitate and con- 
 sider carefully where the path of duty lay. 
 
 In September of the same year, in justice to 
 other interests and in fulfillment of other obliga- 
 tions, the resignation was renewed and on the 
 evening of the twelfth he had his last official meet- 
 ing with the School Committee. 
 
 One secret of the high regard in which he was 
 held by the members of the School Committee 
 was revealed in the speech made by Mr. Murphy, 
 a Koman Catholic, in seconding the motion to ac- 
 cept the resignation. He spoke of the retiring 
 President as a man of great breadth of observa- 
 tion and intelligence, a man who gave his whole 
 heart to his work, who, without religious or po- 
 litical bias, recognized the fact that public work 
 must be based upon the sympathy of the whole 
 people. 
 
 This, however, was not the last of his influence 
 in school affairs. Dr. "Winship, editor of the 
 "Educational Review," who knew Mr. Capen inti- 
 mately, and was thoroughly conversant with his 
 work, wrote after Mr. Capen 's death: "For sev- 
 eral years before he went upon the School Com- 
 mittee he dominated the selection of the members, 
 and for some years after he left the Committee 
 he continued to be influential in the selection of 
 the members, and when at last it seemed wise to 
 have new charter provisions with a small com- 
 mittee he was a vital factor in securing the new 
 charter. All in all, for a quarter of a century his 
 influence was indispensable in every crisis because 
 
 [73]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 he had the public confidence in all those years to 
 an unprecedented extent." 
 
 In an address delivered at the time of his resig- 
 nation he said: "I would like to urge that in all 
 the future, in everything that relates to the School 
 Board, the influence of partisanship and politics 
 shall never be felt. This department which cares 
 for the children is most sacred, and I am glad to 
 feel that almost without exception, during the 
 years of which I have personal knowledge, the 
 questions of party and creed have had no place. 
 Character and fitness have been the only test of 
 appointment and in the management of such a 
 trust these are the only considerations which 
 should have any place. ' ' 
 
 In this address he gave expression to two of 
 the most fundamental facts of his faith. He was a 
 thoroughgoing American in his attitude toward 
 the public school system, believing that it should 
 be absolutely separated from the dominance of 
 any church, and as firmly believing that the only 
 hope for the future of our republic was in having 
 the children from all classes of homes thrown into 
 this great melting-pot of American citizenship. 
 1 1 When I was upon the School Committee," he 
 wrote in 1896, "one of our Boston schools had 
 children representing twenty nationalities; every 
 political division except Greece. I have been at 
 the school and watched the teaching by sign lan- 
 guage, for there was no other method of communi- 
 cation between teacher and pupil. And I have 
 gone from those lower classes up to the first class 
 and seen those lads made over into intelligent, 
 
 [74]
 
 WITH BOSTON SCHOOLS 
 
 earnest, loyal, American citizens. Do we realize 
 what our teachers are doing for our city? We 
 divide up into parties and sects in other relations. 
 But in the public school all barriers are down, the 
 rich and the poor from homes of every nationality 
 and creed meet together upon the same level, 
 fitted to bear their part in the government of our 
 city." He saw that there was scarcely anything 
 more dangerous than class distinctions, and noth- 
 ing that tended to break down this barrier so 
 thoroughly as the public schools, where children 
 of the rich and the poor, of the Protestant, Cath- 
 olic, Jew and unbeliever met upon the same level. 
 Hence he never ceased to raise his voice against 
 the private school of whatever church or class and 
 never failed to use an opportunity to urge parents 
 of all classes to send their children to this great 
 unifier of our heterogeneous population. 
 
 Even more intense, if such a thing were pos- 
 sible, was his interest in keeping the hand of the 
 politician from the school system, the man whose 
 interest was not in the child but in nominating this 
 man or that to keep the party machinery running 
 smoothly and in filling the pockets of the political 
 parasites. 
 
 To prevent this the Public School Association 
 was organized. In 1895 there was so much dis- 
 satisfaction with the nominations for the School 
 Committee that several gentlemen met together, 
 among whom Mr. Capen was one of the leaders, 
 to suggest the names of Mr. A. Lawrence Lowell 
 and Mr. Ames. Each of the parties took one of 
 these names and they were both elected. 
 
 [75]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 The following year there was a similar meeting 
 of gentlemen, especially interested, and they sug- 
 gested to the parties the names of Prof. Sedgwick 
 and Mrs. Morton Kehew. The parties refused to 
 nominate either of them. The following year the 
 names of Prof. Sedgwick and Miss Edith Howes 
 were suggested to the parties, and they were again 
 refused. It was then decided to organize the Pub- 
 lic School Association. What else could be done? 
 Suggestions made in an honest way for two years 
 had been rejected. The Association thus being 
 formed, it was decided to renominate five of the 
 old members of the School Committee. 
 
 At that time only one of these was taken by 
 either party. The following year, not wishing to 
 seem presumptuous, the Association simply sug- 
 gested candidates and waited for the parties to 
 take the initiative. The result was most unsatis- 
 factory. Having tried every plan, therefore, the 
 members of the Public School Association were 
 compelled to take an entirely different course and 
 nominate a ticket of their own. They were forced 
 to this position by the leaders of the parties at 
 that time, who, as long as they could feel that 
 the Public School Association had but few votes, 
 had no interest in what it had to say. 
 
 This first year in which they put up a complete 
 ticket five of the Public School Association can- 
 didates were elected, including Mr. George A. 
 Ernst, who was nominated by neither of the par- 
 ties. The following year the Public School Asso- 
 ciation again put up a complete list, eight persons 
 for three years, and two persons for one year. 
 
 [76]
 
 WITH BOSTON SCHOOLS 
 
 This year the Republican party indorsed the 
 whole ticket of the Association, the Democrats ap- 
 proved of five candidates and seven that were on 
 the Association ticket were elected. The follow- 
 ing year the Republicans again approved the 
 whole Public School Association ticket. The 
 Democrats approved three. Four names that were 
 on the Association ticket were elected. 
 
 Probably nothing ever organized in Boston did 
 as much to save the schools from the waste and 
 deterioration inevitable under the rule of the poli- 
 tician. To the last of his life Mr. Capen continued 
 to be one of the dominating figures in this work, 
 helping to nominate the members of the commit- 
 tee and by public utterance and busy pen he con- 
 tributed much toward their election. 
 
 In 1900 he made a stirring address in which he 
 uttered a warning that ought to be heard by every 
 citizen of the country: "It is for the highest in- 
 terest of rich and poor alike that there should be 
 good schools. Only a little handful of men can 
 possibly reap any advantage in having them in- 
 ferior. It has been my belief for many years 
 that our citizens as a whole do not fully realize 
 the importance of our educational system. We 
 have welcomed to our shores men of every race 
 and clime and their children fill our schools. 
 Twelve or fifteen nationalities are often repre- 
 sented in a single school. It is in these schools 
 that they learn the meaning of American citizen- 
 ship. But even more than this, many children 
 come from homes of poverty and wretchedness 
 and too often of sin and shame. Do we realize the 
 
 [77]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 importance at this early formative period of an 
 antidote to these unhealthy surroundings, by hav- 
 ing finely equipped school buildings with modern 
 sanitary arrangements and teachers of culture 
 and refinement? With the greatly enlarged 
 powers of the school committee, the politician has 
 seen the possibility of building in a few years a 
 great political machine centering around the 
 Board. The Committee is no longer, as formerly, 
 simply an educational body, and naturally posi- 
 tions are sought by some men who would have lit- 
 tle wish to be there if it were not for these 
 increased powers." 
 
 [781
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 PRESIDENT OF BOSTON MUNICIPAL 
 LEAGUE 
 
 The city has became the peril of our American 
 life. The first great contest in our country was 
 over the independence of a nation and was settled 
 more than one hundred years ago at Yorktown 
 by the surrender of Cornwallis. The second con- 
 test was over the unity of the republic and was 
 settled nearly fifty years ago at Appomatox Court 
 House by the surrender of General Lee's army. 
 The third great question is over the purity of the 
 municipal unit and it is more serious and more im- 
 portant than either of the others; it touches our 
 very life and our very existence. 
 
 Thirty years ago this fact concerning the Amer- 
 ican city was just coming to be recognized by a few 
 of the most thoughtful and conscientious of our 
 Christian leaders. The mass of laymen were 
 neither indifferent to the problem nor skeptical 
 concerning the belief that anything could be done 
 to better conditions. Some of them were in open 
 opposition to any effort on the part of the Church 
 to ' ' meddle in politics. ' ' They believed their busi- 
 ness was to herald the "simple gospel," that 
 abominable phrase which has been used as the 
 covering for dead men's bones. A few of the 
 leaders of our American religious life, who 
 
 [79]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 have come to be regarded as prophets, were 
 then counted by multitudes as heretics or, at 
 least, as men who were "not quite safe to 
 follow." 
 
 Mr. Capen, whose religious faith was never 
 questioned, and who had the advantage of holding 
 the confidence of laymen, became one of the 
 leaders in this new movement toward saving the 
 city. In 1892 he delivered an address before 
 the Congregational Club of Boston in which he 
 awakened enough interest to start one of the most 
 vital movements toward cleaner politics that 
 Boston has ever had. He said: "I believe the 
 time has fully come when in all our cities the 
 churches, as a whole, must find a way to have their 
 influence felt in securing a proper municipal gov- 
 ernment. We are asleep, most of us, in the midst 
 of perils nearly as great as those which confronted 
 us in the Civil War. Wendell Phillips said that 
 the search for the solution of the problem of our 
 great cities will test our free institutions more 
 severely than our struggle with human slavery. It 
 is a shame the way some of us neglect these public 
 interests. We live in a time when there is a 
 decay of public spirit. We should consider it 
 an act of patriotism for the right men to give up 
 their time and strength for public service. We 
 ought to lay hold of some of our young men who 
 are especially fitted for such service, and make 
 them see that this duty, for Christ's sake 
 and the country's, is as sacred as the prayer- 
 meeting. The Church must come to the position 
 where it shall be considered as honorable for one 
 
 [80]
 
 BOSTON MUNICIPAL LEAGUE 
 
 of its members to be an official in the city 
 government as to be a church warden or a 
 deacon. 
 
 "A Governor of one of our States has lately 
 been reported to have said that 'personal char- 
 acter has nothing to do with the question of the 
 Presidency ; it is simply one of availability. ' Have 
 you read 'Boss' Crocker's article in the 'North 
 American,' in which he fully justifies Tammany 
 methods? No wonder that Dr. Parkhurst's 
 righteous soul is stirred to expose the evils that 
 are so defiant ! And who is to blame for this con- 
 dition of things ? You may remember a few years 
 ago when the present District Attorney in New 
 York was a candidate for his office against a man 
 who had been faithful and successful in his ef- 
 forts to bring to justice the 'boodle Alderman' 
 of that day. When that election came, and when 
 it would seem as though every man would rejoice 
 in an opportunity to vote and show his interest in 
 the right, hundreds and thousands of church mem- 
 bers did not take the trouble either to register or 
 to vote. On Fifth Avenue from Fortieth to Sixty- 
 eighth Street there were three solid miles of 
 brownstone fronts, and yet how many men who 
 lived in these houses voted at that election? Only 
 twenty-eight ! Such a neglect is more than a dis- 
 grace and it ought to be made a crime. In many 
 of our wards there are several hundreds of voters 
 who are members of our churches. If you get 
 fifty of them out to a primary meeting you do 
 well, and yet we all know that here is the place 
 to begin. It only takes a comparatively few men 
 
 [81]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 to break up the plans of the ' rings ' if the few are 
 in earnest." 
 
 The result of this address was the forming of 
 the Pilgrim Association, an organization which 
 was of short duration but which became the first 
 step in the foundation of the Boston Municipal 
 League. 
 
 The object of the Association was "to secure 
 the choice of such men to public office, the enact- 
 ment and enforcement of such measures for mu- 
 nicipal government as shall best promote the good 
 order, prosperity and honor of our city. To this 
 end the Association will co-operate as far as pos- 
 sible with all religious denominations and all civic 
 and philanthropic organizations in the city. ' ' 
 
 In February of the next year, 1893, Mr. Capen 
 spoke before the Baptist Social Union, where he 
 set forth a plan for a city reform organization 
 which would include every society in Boston de- 
 voted to idealistic ends. A practical politician in 
 New York once said: "It's great sport to see 
 people go to the polls in hordes and vote like cattle 
 for the ticket we prepare. Eeformers don't begin 
 at the right point ; they should begin at the point 
 where nominations are made. The people think 
 they make the nominations, but we do that busi- 
 ness for them." 
 
 Mr. Capen felt that the same thing was true 
 in Boston. "Are we not about weary of voting 
 for men who go around with hat in hand in a 
 shameless way, asking for our votes, some of 
 whom we would not trust in our business to hold 
 any position whatever? We live in an age where 
 
 [82]
 
 BOSTON MUNICIPAL LEAGUE 
 
 there is such a mad haste to be rich, when self- 
 ish interests are so supreme, that there is a de- 
 cay of public spirit, and patriotism is not quoted 
 at par in any of our public exchanges. ' ' 
 
 As a result of this feeling, under the leadership 
 of Mr. Capen, the Pilgrim Association chose a 
 committee of seven members on municipal reform, 
 desiring that every club or association standing 
 for the best things in municipal life, should choose 
 a similar committee. "There are from ten to 
 twenty of these organizations and if each one 
 will choose a committee of five or seven members, 
 dependent somewhat upon the number of mem- 
 bers in each case, there will be thus brought to- 
 gether a total of fifty or seventy-five men from 
 all parts of the city and standing for its best in- 
 terest. By a simple organization, and coming to- 
 gether from time to time for mutual consultation 
 and help as representing these various organiza- 
 tions, they could wield an immense influence for 
 good. Some say this is an attempt on the part of 
 the Church to enter politics. We deny that this is 
 its purpose in any way. For any branch of the 
 Church, as such, to enter into such a movement, is 
 an offence to our people. The intent is to take 
 advantage of the associations and clubs already 
 formed, which represent the conscience and the 
 philanthropy of the city, and make them through 
 their representatives, a united power for good. 
 For it must never be forgotten that this whole 
 movement starts with the one idea to confine itself 
 wholly to municipal matters, and have no part 
 whatever in National or State affairs. In this 
 
 [83]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 way it is believed it can be kept entirely free from 
 anything which savors of 'polities' so called. 
 People are getting weary of partisanship, and to 
 govern cities along political lines is as absurd as 
 to control a railroad or a bank in this way. ' ' 
 
 There was an enthusiastic response throughout 
 Boston to this appeal and, as a result, the follow- 
 ing organizations came together on November 9, 
 1893, to form the Boston Municipal League : The 
 Pilgrim Association, Baptist Social Union, Meth- 
 odist Social Union, Unitarian Club, Massachusetts 
 Society for Promoting Good Citizenship, Chan- 
 ning Club, Tolstoi Club, the old Boston Congre- 
 gational Club, Young Men's Baptist Social 
 Union, Monday Evening Club, the Catholic Union 
 and the Eliot Club. Mr. Capen was elected presi- 
 dent and Mr. Edwin D. Mead secretary. 
 
 The new organization represented men of every 
 shade of political opinion on State and National 
 questions but men who believed also that in city 
 affairs the need was simply for business methods 
 and good leaders. "We must remember," said 
 Mr. Capen, "that neither of the two great parties 
 has any special principles to guide in municipal 
 affairs. Their principles apply almost wholly to 
 National and State interests ; but men have been 
 so much accustomed in all the past to work on 
 party lines, even in municipal matters, that much 
 time will be required before they will, in sufficient 
 numbers, be willing to vote individually on mu- 
 nicipal election issues. This League is to be abso- 
 lutely non-partisan, and its discussions are limited 
 to questions relating to municipal matters. We 
 
 [84]
 
 BOSTON MUNICIPAL LEAGUE 
 
 are not organized for the political advancement 
 of our own members, for we have no wish for 
 public office. We are trying, first, to understand 
 better the problems of municipal government and 
 then to be helpful in solving them. We have, 
 therefore, no desire at present to nominate candi- 
 dates for office, provided men of character and 
 persons fit for public trust are nominated by 
 others. When this is not the case, we shall make 
 our protest by suggesting, if possible, other 
 names. It seems almost unnecessary to add that 
 in a movement of this kind there would be no use 
 or place for the local 'boss' and the ward politi- 
 cian of either party. They are, as a class, truly 
 selfish ; they are only for themselves and they have 
 no place in a business corporation. ' ' 
 
 The League was equally free from sectarian 
 prejudices the membership being composed of 
 liberals and conservatives, Protestants and Cath- 
 olics though it could in the highest sense be 
 called religious. It was part of a great movement 
 sweeping over this country, probably the most im- 
 portant that had come to the American people 
 since the overthrow of slavery. The men who com- 
 posed it believed with De Tocqueville that " mu- 
 nicipal institutions are to liberty what the primary 
 school is to science," and that the only way 
 America could be saved was by saving her cities. 
 They were for the most part avowed Christian 
 men, most of them members of the Christian 
 Church, but men who believed that Christianity 
 was good only as it was good for something, only 
 as it could be made part of the practical affairs 
 
 [85]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 of life and, almost with the spirit of crusaders, 
 embodying their religion in their politics, they 
 determined to capture the city for the Kingdom of 
 God. 
 
 Being religious men they had profound faith 
 in the principle set forth by the great Teacher, 
 "Know the truth and the truth shall make you 
 free." Their chief weapon was facts and their 
 great hope was in public opinion. Mr. Capen de- 
 clared in his opening address before the League : 
 "Public opinion can be depended upon always in 
 favor of the best things. Mr. Moorfield Storey 
 was right when he said at the Philadelphia con- 
 vention that we should be surprised 'if we could 
 in each city see the photographs of men who con- 
 stitute the "rings" of which we complain and 
 could read their histories; we would be ashamed 
 of our subjection. Municipal reform is only ac- 
 tion of will.' It certainly is true that there are 
 far more good men in every city than there are 
 bad, and that the number who desire a corrupt 
 government is very small. The poor man is even 
 more interested than the rich in good city gov- 
 ernment. He needs good public schools for he 
 is obliged to send his children to them while the 
 rich man, if he is dissatisfied, can send his to some 
 private institution. The poor man, especially, 
 needs clean streets and good sewerage for he must 
 stay in the city through the heat of the summer 
 while the rich man can take his family to the 
 mountains or the seashore. We only need to get 
 those who are interested in the best things to work 
 together and the whole problem is solved." 
 
 [86]
 
 BOSTON MUNICIPAL LEAGUE 
 
 At the first meeting of the Municipal League, 
 after its reorganization, the President set forth in 
 characteristic clearness a program he believed 
 it should follow. It was revolutionary so far 
 as the political organization of the city was con- 
 cerned, striking at the very roots of those things 
 that had made possible bribery and political 
 corruption. 
 
 Boston had always elected a mayor for a term 
 of one year but Mr. Capen proposed that he 
 should be elected for three years. "All citizens 
 would feel more strongly the importance of the 
 election, if it was to be filled for a longer term, 
 than they do now. Many people cannot be aroused 
 when the election is an annual one. Furthermore, 
 the Mayor himself would be less worked, would 
 be more free from the influence of politicians, 
 would be better able, also, to do the best things, 
 if he was conscious that the term was for three 
 years. ' ' 
 
 The second radical reform proposed was that 
 there should be one representative council instead 
 of two. The arguments used for continuing the 
 two bodies were : first, that it would be more dif- 
 ficult to corrupt two bodies than one ; and, second, 
 that one acts as a check upon the other. In answer 
 to this, it was argued that if there was but one 
 body it should be of such size as not to be easily 
 susceptible to improper considerations, and that 
 it should be provided that all appropriations and 
 all questions of great importance should not be 
 acted upon without two readings, which should 
 take place several days apart to give opportunity 
 
 [87]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 to citizens through the press and otherwise to 
 make protest if occasion should require it. 
 
 The most far-reaching reform suggested in this 
 address was that there should be some sort of 
 minority representation. ''The principle of hav- 
 ing one man or a group of men from each district, 
 which practically disfranchises nearly or quite 
 one half the voters, is wrong. When a Bepub- 
 lican votes in a Democratic district for local rep- 
 resentatives, his vote is thrown away, and in the 
 same manner when a Democrat votes in a Repub- 
 lican district his vote is thrown away. To illus- 
 trate the injuries of this matter let me use figures 
 which will be familiar. In Maryland one party 
 cast 92,000 votes and the other 113,000 votes, and 
 the latter had all the representation, while the 
 92,000 votes had no voice. In Indiana at the last 
 national election one party cast 254,000 and the 
 other 259,000 votes, an almost equal number, and 
 yet one party had but two representatives and 
 the other eleven. The same state of things exists 
 in our cities where there is a district system. As a 
 consequence, men remain away from the caucus 
 and the polls because they know that their votes 
 amount to nothing. Furthermore, on the district 
 plan, both parties would often nominate the avail- 
 able and not the able man. Men of positive con- 
 victions and force make enemies and cannot be 
 elected in their own district but by a general rep- 
 resentation they can be. Again, reform measures 
 cannot get a hearing for they have no representa- 
 tion, and cannot have until they can secure a 
 majority in some one district. But if all those 
 
 [88]
 
 BOSTON MUNICIPAL LEAGUE 
 
 interested who are scattered through a city will 
 unite on some one man then the reform would be 
 represented and would be sure of a hearing. Giv- 
 ing up the district system as a whole and voting 
 for officials on a general ticket would be a death 
 blow to bribery, which almost universally occurs 
 in close districts. Where there are no close dis- 
 tricts, there would be no inducement to purchase 
 votes. On the new plan we shall have more of 
 what could be called larger and better men. A man 
 may appear quite important in a little district, 
 but he is very small when he has to run the gaunt- 
 let of a large city. On such a plan, men in office 
 would not be obliged to spend so much time in pos- 
 ing and balancing their votes so as to make sure 
 of their re-election. In doing their duty they 
 would be sure of the support of the best citi- 
 zens whose influence would be felt at the next 
 election. ' ' 
 
 In addition to the work of making these radi- 
 cal changes in the political organization of the 
 city, the League proposed the larger work of 
 creating such a civic pride that the best men of 
 the city would be willing to accept public office. 
 Public opinion was such that when good men made 
 sacrifices of their private affairs to serve the pub- 
 lic they were often subject to the sneers of their 
 friends. The League proposed to change this 
 to make them feel that it was just as honorable 
 to serve the city government as to be a director 
 in a bank or a professor in Harvard College. 
 
 "I do not wish to be misunderstood," said Mr. 
 Capen, "for I have no sympathy with a hasty 
 
 [89]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 expression that is sometimes heard, that there are 
 no good men in public life. My experience has 
 proved to me that there are just as honest and 
 capable men in municipal positions in the City of 
 Boston today as there ever were in the past. The 
 trouble is that there are too many of whom this 
 cannot be said in truth. 
 
 1 'Our work is to increase the number of those in 
 public life who can be absolutely trusted to watch 
 over the city's interests as they would their own. 
 We want, if possible, to have the same interest 
 taken by a class of our citizens as is seen across 
 the water. The personnel of the London City 
 Council is said to be equal in character and ability 
 to members of Parliament. In the City of Oxford 
 two presidents of colleges are members of the 
 Board of Aldermen. In Germany it is demanded 
 that the performance of civic duties shall deter- 
 mine civic rights; failure to perform the one de- 
 prives of the other. In the City of Berlin, if a 
 man refuses to accept office when called upon by 
 his fellow citizens, he is not only disfranchised but 
 compelled to pay larger taxes. Ought there not 
 to be a list made from the registration list after 
 election of those who have not voted? And ought 
 not a constant neglect of suffrage be punished by 
 a fine? Certainly some way must be found to 
 make people ashamed of the neglect of their duty 
 as citizens." 
 
 The urging of this program was not all that 
 engaged the energies of the League. It gave its 
 attention to a large number of problems that were 
 of vital interest to the citizens, such as the im- 
 
 [90]
 
 BOSTON MUNICIPAL LEAGUE 
 
 provement of the fire department, the extension 
 of school accommodations, a better and enlarged 
 system of docks, better housing of the poor, a 
 school of practical trades and a wiser administra- 
 tion of public institutions. This program, how- 
 ever, outlined the greatest activities of the 
 League and made this body, as Mr. Edwin D. 
 Mead has declared, "the best municipal organiza- 
 tion that we have ever had in Boston." 
 
 Mr. Capen was a firm believer in representative 
 government. In politics, he was a Republican, op- 
 posing in his last years many of the Progressive 
 tendencies, but in political theory he had un- 
 bounded confidence in the principles at the foun- 
 dation of our government, and he never doubted 
 that the voice of the people was the voice of God, 
 if the people only had a fair opportunity to learn 
 the truth. 
 
 Believing this, no man ever had more confidence 
 in the power of public opinion that public opin- 
 ion would be right if the facts, free from preju- 
 dice and deception, could only be placed before 
 the people. Hence his speeches were usually 
 printed, so that they might reach a wider public 
 than could be touched by the spoken word, and 
 those delivered before the Municipal League were 
 given very wide circulation. Thus his written and 
 spoken words became great factors in moulding 
 the thought of the citizens of Massachusetts, and 
 later were very largely embodied in the new 
 charter of Boston. The term of the mayor was 
 lengthened and the single chamber in the Council 
 was adopted. Many other reforms advocated by 
 
 [91]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 Mr. Capen and his fellow workers were accepted 
 and, while the League ceased to be an active 
 organization, it was a mighty forerunner, prepar- 
 ing the thought of men for a later reform espe- 
 cially for minority representation. 
 
 In one of his speeches before the League, Mr. 
 Capen pointed out the extremely interesting fact 
 that the expenses of Boston had grown until they 
 exceeded those of the Commonwealth of Massa- 
 chusetts. With an enormous volume of money 
 to be collected and dispersed from year to year, 
 he showed that the voters and tax-payers 
 of Boston were entrusting the financial interests 
 of the municipal corporation to men of small expe- 
 rience and ability in business operations. Boston 
 had two separate representative bodies a small 
 Board of Aldermen and a large Common Coun- 
 cil. A half dozen members of the Board of Alder- 
 men paid no taxes whatever, except the poll tax, 
 which is levied against every citizen, and out of 
 seventy-five members of the Common Council only 
 sixteen were on the tax lists. Yet this body of 
 seventy-five was largely concerned with the levy- 
 ing of many millions of taxes every year and with 
 the expenditure of from thirty to forty millions of 
 dollars. To remedy this great defect and secure 
 a better class of men to administer the affairs of 
 so great a corporation as the city, Mr. Capen and 
 the League declared boldly in favor of the total 
 abolition of the Common Council and the enlarge- 
 ment of the Board of Aldermen in the municipal 
 chamber to perhaps twenty-five members, with 
 salaries of three thousand dollars each and an al- 
 
 [92]
 
 BOSTON MUNICIPAL LEAGUE 
 
 lowance for expenses. Under the arrangement 
 which existed at that time the members of the 
 Common Council ran up most extraordinary bills 
 for carriage hire and other expenses, incurred os- 
 tensibly in the municipal sendee. 
 
 But the great principle for which Mr. Capen 
 and the League contended most earnestly was the 
 election of all members of the municipal govern- 
 ment on a general ticket recognizing a propor- 
 tional representation. Mr. Capen was one of the 
 most conspicuous figures advocating proportional 
 representation in the entire country and the 
 League had for the chairman of its committee on 
 that subject Mr. Moorfield Storey, who was 
 widely recognized as an authority. It was natural 
 that Boston, of all cities of the United States, 
 should be the one to set the example of an appli- 
 cation of some form of minority or proportional 
 representation in the election of a City Council. 
 Massachusetts was the home of enlightened and 
 progressive legislation and the whole country was 
 looking to Mr. Capen and his colleagues for the 
 securing of some such system which would guar- 
 antee a better government, t 
 
 The "New England Magazine" said: "Mr. 
 Capen is an ideal citizen, a man of broad mind 
 and of great catholicity, of kindliness, of rare 
 political sagacity, with a passion for public purity 
 and the public welfare, and with an infinite ca- 
 pacity for taking pains. Ten such men could save 
 any Sodom or Gomorrah. No other man in recent 
 years has rendered such important service as Mr. 
 Capen on the Boston School Board. Wherever 
 
 [93]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 any improvement for the good of Boston is in 
 progress, there he is likely to be found." 
 
 While this League did not wholly save the 
 modern Sodom of Boston, no group of men has 
 ever gathered in the city which has done more to- 
 ward shaping its future. The principles they ad- 
 vocated were later embodied in the new charter 
 and while the League, after a few years of strenu- 
 ous service, ceased its activities, owing largely to 
 the fact that its work was subdivided and carried 
 forward by other organizations, the main prin- 
 ciples for which it stood are today the working 
 principles of the Boston city government. 
 
 Not only did Mr. Capen do very important work 
 as President of the Boston Municipal League but, 
 also, in the National Municipal League. For ten 
 years, from 1895 to 1905, he was its Vice-presi- 
 dent. He occupied important places in its pro- 
 grams and was helpful in its councils, throwing 
 much of his energy into the larger questions of 
 municipal reform. 
 
 [941
 
 CHAPTEE VII 
 IDEALS OF CITIZENSHIP 
 
 There is a providence in the life of men as well 
 as in the life of nations. Frederick Robertson 
 was turned aside from the army to become one 
 of the greatest of English preachers by the simple 
 incident of the barking of a dog, and Sir Walter 
 Scott was saved to the world, to be one of its 
 greatest novelists, by a few humiliating failures at 
 the bar. 
 
 There were two incidents in the life of Mr. 
 Capen which saved him from lines he would have 
 marked out for himself and resulted in his becom- 
 ing one of America's most useful laymen. When 
 he was a young man he looked toward the minis- 
 try, but sickness made this impossible, turning him 
 toward a larger ministry where he was to have the 
 world for his parish. The other incident was more 
 subtle, belonging to those mysterious providences 
 which can only be explained by belief in an over- 
 ruling hand. He had an ambition to become one 
 of the great authorities in the world of finance, 
 to accumulate a fortune, not for the sake of the 
 money, but that he might use it in the bringing 
 of the Kingdom of God on the earth. There were 
 several times when it seemed that this dream of 
 his life was to be realized. One was when he 
 resigned from the Boston School Committee to 
 become Vice-president of the Howard Bank. This 
 
 [95]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 seemed to be an opening for which he had waited 
 but, like other opportunities, it proved a bitter 
 disappointment. It was not God's will that he 
 should become a financier. A larger opportunity 
 was awaiting him that of becoming one of the 
 leading laymen of America, of influencing the 
 spiritual life and contributing to the uplift of 
 the social life of the nation. 
 
 It was inevitable that a man of such intense, 
 wise and practical patriotism should become an 
 influence extending far beyond his city, battling 
 with the perils which threatened his nation and 
 strengthening those positive forces which were 
 to make a better people. Wherever there was a 
 public danger, he was sure to be one of the first 
 to enter the conflict against it, and wherever there 
 was an oppressed people, he was one of the first 
 to use his voice in protest. He gave much of his 
 energy especially to fighting four of our greatest 
 national evils. 
 
 Someone went to Dr. Parkhurst, after his cam- 
 paign of reform in New York City, and congratu- 
 lated him on what he had done. He replied, ' ' We 
 have not done a thing and we never shall do any- 
 thing until we have gotten rid of these saloons. ' ' 
 Perhaps this is putting the matter too strongly, 
 but Mr. Capen had a deep feeling that we can 
 never reform any city so long as we have open 
 saloons, thronged with loafers of the worst kind, 
 who want things that are bad. He was confident 
 that it was the power of the liquor interests that 
 was largely responsible for blocking reform the 
 world over, that it was in their places that mis- 
 
 [96]
 
 IDEALS OF CITIZENSHIP 
 
 chief was concocted, and he believed that if we 
 could get rid of the saloons in our cities it would 
 make municipal reform an easy matter. 
 
 He gave his aid, therefore, to every movement 
 which blocked the progress of this national evil. 
 He threw himself with tremendous enthusiasm 
 into the fight during the year of 1895 for the Nor- 
 wegian Bill, a bill which was intended primarily 
 to abolish the common saloon, to authorize the sale 
 of liquor by an association of persons who had 
 no inducement to increase their business, to con- 
 fine the sale of liquor within decent hours, and to 
 devote its profits to public advantage. The prim- 
 ary object of the bill was to take away from the 
 liquor dealer all financial profit, thus, at one blow, 
 destroying the chief motive which keeps him in 
 business. It was supported heartily by many of 
 the leading citizens of Massachusetts, including 
 people like Senator Hoar, Alice Freeman Palmer, 
 Julia Ward Howe, Curtis Guild, Mary A. Liver- 
 more, Dr. Alexander McKenzie and Dean Hodges. 
 
 Mr. Capen was an ardent advocate of the bill, 
 first, because it appealed to his sense of justice 
 and fair play. Boston was surrounded, like every 
 other great city, with towns which persistently 
 voted out the saloon, turning the worst elements 
 of their communities into the city for their liquor. 
 As a result, all the late trains were crowded with 
 those who had spent the evening in debauchery, 
 and travel was uncomfortable for decent people. 
 Mr. Capen saw that this plan of the Norwegian 
 Bill would remove the saloons from the suburbs, 
 would reduce the number in the city from nine 
 
 [97]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 hundred to one hundred and fifty and would thus 
 relieve thousands of citizens of the inconvenience 
 and the unpleasantness involved in the existing 
 license arrangements. He supported it because 
 it appealed to his reason. It would abolish the 
 gilded saloon, taking away everything attractive 
 about it, and thus depriving it of its attractive- 
 ness as a social center for young men. But his 
 chief reason for supporting it was that it was a 
 step toward ultimate prohibition. The illustra- 
 tion which he used in one of his addresses is worth 
 remembering : ' * Here is a tremendous conflagra- 
 tion ; it has been going on for years ; we have been 
 fighting it with water and it does not go out. It 
 goes out in one place and breaks out in another; 
 and bye and bye somebody goes to the rear and 
 finds out the cause. There are men behind pour- 
 ing on oil. They come back and say, 'We shall 
 never put this fire out until we stop these men 
 putting on oil.* Somebody says, 'Oil smells bad; 
 oil is dirty stuff; and if you touch it you won't 
 be clean when you get through. ' These men say, 
 'We don't care if it does smell bad. We are willing 
 to go in there and stop that pouring of oil on the 
 fire.' Now it seems to me, here is the thing in a 
 nutshell. We have been trying by temperance 
 text books, and moral suasion, and every sort of 
 thing, and it does not put out the fire because 
 there are so many in the rear who are making 
 tremendous profits; and you can never stop it so 
 long as this goes on. When you stop the private 
 profits, when you get the motive out of the way, 
 when you stop the oil, you can put the fire out. ' ' 
 
 [98]
 
 IDEALS OF CITIZENSHIP 
 
 Mr. Capen was equally sensitive to tne injustice 
 done to the Indians by corrupt politicians. Indeed, 
 the blood of every American ought to tingle at 
 the thought of the foul stain upon our national 
 honor because of the treatment the Indian has re- 
 ceived. General Sherman declared that we have 
 made more than one thousand treaties with the 
 Indian but the United States government has 
 never kept one of them, if there was anything to 
 be made by breaking it; while the Indian has 
 never broken one unless he first had an excuse in 
 some cruel wrong from the white man. Our treat- 
 ment of him has been such that our boasted Amer- 
 ican Eepublic is to him only synonymous with a 
 nation of liars. 
 
 Mr. Capen gave expression to these wrongs in 
 one of his public addresses before the Indian As- 
 sociation: "While our ears have ever been open 
 to the cry of distress the world over, the silent 
 Indian moan has passed, too often, unheard. We 
 have made him a prisoner upon the reservation, 
 and when we have wanted his land we have taken 
 it and put him on some which, just at that time, 
 we did not happen to want. His appeal, when in 
 suffering and distress, has been stifled by those 
 who can make the most money out of him, and if, 
 hungry and in despair, he leaves the reservation, 
 we shoot him. We have put him in control of an 
 agent whose authority is as absolute as the Czar's. 
 And I beg of you to notice that the wrongs are 
 not all in the past ; they are of the present. Those 
 who say otherwise have either not examined the 
 facts or else they are deceived. While there has 
 
 [99]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 been much progress made since General Grant's 
 administration, the machinery of our Indian af- 
 fairs in the last analysis seems yet to be largely 
 a scheme to plunder the Indian. Its mechanism 
 is so complicated that there are comparatively 
 few who understand the wrongs and these seem 
 almost powerless to right them." 
 
 The Indian has suffered even at the hands of 
 those who have been paid by the government to 
 care for him. An Indian in Nebraska, on one of 
 our reservations, slightly injured his knee. There 
 was a physician paid a large salary by the govern- 
 ment, but when asked to visit this man he refused 
 to go. The Indian grew worse until the leg de- 
 cayed. The cries of the sufferer could be heard 
 far and near, yet the physician heeded not, until 
 finally a friend in mercy took a hatchet and 
 chopped off the limb. The Indian died in his 
 agony, the physician never once having visited 
 him. This may be an extreme illustration, but it 
 is only one of the hundreds which might be cited 
 to show the neglect these people have suffered. 
 
 They have been robbed through the politicians. 
 In North Dakota one of the tribes asked that they 
 might have some barns. The request was 
 granted; the lumber, valued at three thousand 
 dollars, was bought in Minneapolis and the freight 
 charges, which ought to have been about fifteen 
 hundred dollars, were twenty-three thousand. A 
 little clerk in Washington who belonged to the 
 "ring" added an extra cipher to care for the 
 pockets of the politicians. 
 
 The Indian 's land has been taken from him. To 
 
 [100]
 
 IDEALS OF CITIZENSHIP 
 
 show exactly what this means, let us notice an in- 
 cident that occurred in Southern California. A 
 lot of land-grabbers took from the Indians their 
 property. When private individuals ascertained 
 the facts, complaint was made, and an order was 
 issued from the government for the removal of the 
 exploiters, but in spite of this mandate they re- 
 mained where they were, in defiance of law, and 
 the Indians were left in poverty. 
 
 In view of all these abuses Mr. Capen said of 
 the department constituted to meet the needs of 
 the Indian: "The Indian Bureau, as at present 
 constituted, cannot do for the Indian what he 
 needs. It is part of the political machine, and its 
 appointees are selected because they have done 
 good service as ward politicians. It is no more 
 fitted to lead the Indians aright than Pharaoh was 
 to lead the Israelites out of their house of 
 bondage. ' ' 
 
 To correct this abuse, he was active in the for- 
 mation of the Indian Association and in advocat- 
 ing reform measures for better conditions. He 
 was a member of the Boston Indian Citizenship 
 Committee, which included such men as the Hon. 
 John D. Long and other of Boston's leading citi- 
 zens. This Committee not only criticized the 
 policy of the government, but offered a positive 
 program which did much to lift the burden from 
 the Red Man's shoulders and brought a new and 
 better day for these people who had been the vic- 
 tims of the politicians. 
 
 In the great crisis of 1896, when Mr. Bryan was 
 trying to carry the country for free silver and was 
 
 [101]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 striking at the very foundation of many of those 
 institutions which had been considered the 
 strength of our nation, Mr. Capen entered the 
 campaign with characteristic earnestness and 
 made some of his best adresses. He truly felt 
 that: "Not since the foundation of the Republic 
 has there been an election of such infinite im- 
 portance as the one which is soon to be decided. 
 Not even that of 1860, which involved the slavery 
 issue, went deeper to the very foundation of our 
 national existence. It is a serious hour, and every 
 patriotic citizen should be ready to contribute 
 whatever he may possess for the public good. It 
 is not a time for harsh or bitter words, and it is 
 certainly not a time to raise a sectional cry, for 
 the questions are not and cannot be sectional. The 
 nation is one and our interests are common in- 
 terests. That man is a public enemy who attempts 
 to array class against class, the farmer and the 
 laborer against the 'gold bugs' or Wall Street. " 
 Mr. Capen was elected as Vice-president of the 
 Business Men's Non-Partisan Sound Money 
 League of Boston and his utterances found wide 
 circulation. He spoke in September before the 
 Boston Ministers' Meeting. The address was 
 presented verbatim in the * ' Congregationalist, " 
 and later was issued as a campaign document by 
 the Sound Money League. In no other address can 
 one of the chief characteristics of the man be more 
 clearly seen than in this. He was dealing prima- 
 rily with the question of finance, yet it was a ques- 
 tion which involved, as he believed, the very 
 destiny of the nation. Hence he could not discuss 
 
 [102]
 
 IDEALS OF CITIZENSHIP 
 
 the issue as a question of economics alone. His 
 patriotism rose, like that of the Hebrew prophets, 
 to a spirit of religion and involved the very issues 
 of the Kingdom of God. He felt that his nation 
 was on trial before the earth, one choice leading 
 to national honor and prosperity, the other to re- 
 pudiation and national disgrace, and with the pas- 
 sion of an evangelist he pleaded with men to turn 
 to God to lead them in their decision. 
 
 While Mr. Capen was a leader in that new civic 
 movement, which proposed to establish the King- 
 dom of God on the earth and was a brilliant per- 
 sonal example of the attempt to apply Christian- 
 ity to the problems of city and nation, yet he was 
 equally firm in his conviction that the Church as 
 an institution should take no part in active poli- 
 tics. Wherever she had tried this experiment, she 
 had not only cheapened herself, but had weakened 
 her power in regenerating the world. * * A church 
 'ring' would become as obnoxious as any other 
 'ring.' It is fundamentally regeneration and not 
 reformation that is needed, and it is to this great 
 work that the Church, with singleness of purpose, 
 should devote herself. ' ' 
 
 He believed that if the Church should enter 
 politics, she would not only fail in her great work, 
 but would also bring upon herself endless divi- 
 sions. "If with an open Bible," he said, "the 
 world is divided into many sects, what further 
 divisions and sub-divisions and semi-sub-divisions 
 will there be where there is no revelation and 
 where men honestly differ. Is it not clear to all 
 that the inevitable result would be confusion, to 
 
 [103]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 the shame and reproach of Him whose mission 
 was peace, and whose last prayer was that they 
 might be one?" Yet believing that the Church 
 should not enter politics, he also believed firmly 
 that Christian men should organize themselves, 
 irrespective of church divisions, into civic clubs, 
 and he was one of the leaders in advocating the 
 formation of these clubs, especially among young 
 people. 
 
 Writing in the ' ' Christian Endeavor World ' ' he 
 said, ' * Christian Endeavorers are sacredly bound 
 to be intelligent upon these questions which have 
 to do with the well being of the cities where they 
 reside. To secure such knowledge will require 
 study and effort. There is more ignorance to the 
 square inch at this point than at almost any 
 other. Comparatively few ever read the charter 
 of their city, or the reports of the school commit- 
 tee, or know definitely very much about the prac- 
 tical workings of their own government. Instead 
 of this our young men have been reading David 
 Harum and Eben H olden. An exception should 
 be made in one class in many of our cities, the 
 Irish Americans. A recent conversation with one 
 of the trustees of one of our city libraries brought 
 out the fact that for many years he had been 
 watching young men's reading. The Irish Ameri- 
 cans read history, biography and constitutional 
 law; the young men of American ancestry read 
 novels. The time has certainly come to urge 
 Christian Endeavorers to see a religious applica- 
 tion, as well as a glorious opportunity, in the study 
 of social and municipal questions. ' ' 
 
 [104]
 
 IDEALS OF CITIZENSHIP 
 
 He advocated that these clubs be organized 
 after the pattern of our national and state legisla- 
 tive bodies, with speakers and other officers and 
 various committees, each with some definite pur- 
 pose; that they should study rules of order and 
 Parliamentary practices and methods so that the 
 members would be fully capable, when older, of 
 presiding over public assemblies. These clubs 
 should discuss questions concerning the best or- 
 ganization of city government; they should study 
 the principles of proportional representation, the 
 care of criminals and paupers, arbitration be- 
 tween capital and labor, tenement-house laws, 
 public baths, parks, schools and many other 
 questions. 
 
 He saw that a number of such clubs, with dis- 
 cussions and courses of study, would soon make 
 a generation of intelligent young men fit for splen- 
 did service. Furthermore, they would help to 
 make the Christian life attractive, not only to 
 "goody-goody" young men but also to those 
 who are strongest. They would keep before 
 them the glory of service and the splendid pos- 
 sibilities of noble Christian citizenship; they 
 would guarantee the vote of the city to the side 
 of righteousness and would insure the safety of 
 the republic. 
 
 Mr. Capen, w T ho was not only an idealist but a 
 practical politician, saw clearly that many of our 
 national perils grow out of the neglect of citizens 
 in attending the caucus. It is here that our battles 
 are fought and lost or won. Notwithstanding this, 
 it is neglected by the vast majority of men. He 
 
 [105]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 saw that the thing we have to fear is not ignorance 
 alone, but also this criminal indifference, upon 
 which the politician can always count in his plans 
 and trades. 
 
 "Our difficulty," said Mr. Capen, "is not with 
 the great number of selfish voters, but with the 
 far greater number of indifferent good men. Such 
 good men, whenever they come out to vote, bury 
 the politician under an avalanche, and for the 
 simple reason that there are far more good men 
 than bad. The forces of evil can be conquered at 
 any election in any city when the forces of good- 
 will practically unite by voting at the caucus. It 
 is important that we should keep ever before our 
 people that popular government in our cities is 
 still in the experimental stage, and that unless in 
 some way we can arouse the whole community to 
 be interested at the caucus as the initial point, 
 failure will not be far away. The question is 
 one of self-preservation. The first duty of every 
 citizen is to be interested in politics and he should 
 no more desire to escape it than to escape paying 
 the fair proportion of taxes to the State. To 
 shirk either duty is to steal from the Government 
 that which is its due. We want a patriotism 
 which does not exhaust itself in singing about the 
 stars and stripes, but which is willing to go into 
 the thick of the fight at every primary meeting. 
 If we complain that the politicians control these, 
 it is nobody's fault but our own, for the politi- 
 cians are in a helpless minority against the great 
 population. We say things are all cut and dried 
 by the selfish schemer, before the caucus. What 
 
 [106]
 
 IDEALS OF CITIZENSHIP 
 
 is to hinder the other class from doing some cut- 
 ting and drying in advance? There is no mo- 
 nopoly of this work in any community reserved to 
 any class. Put in some work yourself and see 
 how fruitful for good it will be. We say, ' politics 
 are dirty.' Then take hold and clean them! But 
 some will say, 'I am in sympathy with neither 
 party and cannot go to either caucus. ' Then you 
 are in honor bound to get together with other men 
 and make a new one of some sort. As an Ameri- 
 can citizen you have no right to be silent and dumb 
 in the initiative. You are practically useless 
 unless you try to improve the old parties or 
 start an independent movement. Simply com- 
 plaining of others cannot satisfy the duties of 
 citizenship. ' ' 
 
 It is not enough for the citizen simply to nomi- 
 nate; that step will count practically for nothing 
 unless he sees to it that his nominations are en- 
 dorsed at the polls. Yet the study of the statistics 
 concerning the voters of any city will reveal the 
 fact that there are vast numbers who never take 
 the trouble to register a choice. It was seldom 
 that Mr. Capen ever made a political address when 
 he did not take occasion to say that this neglect 
 is little short of crime; that the man who is so 
 full of his pleasures or so interested to get to his 
 place of business in the morning, that he cannot 
 turn aside a few rods and cast his vote for right- 
 eous government is only one stage removed from a 
 criminal. "For an American citizen to neglect a 
 vote, is to be false to the flag that covers him and 
 to the state and city that protects his property 
 
 '
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 and his home. The sacrament of our political life 
 is the casting of our ballot." 
 
 While he had such confidence in the people and 
 believed in the power of public opinion for purify- 
 ing the nation, he stood against many of the 
 modern political movements which are supposed 
 to be in the direction of greater democracy. He 
 opposed especially the referendum. This prob- 
 ably grew out of his practical experience in the 
 realm of politics. One of the best bills ever 
 brought before the General Court of Massachu- 
 setts was presented when Mr. Capen was Presi- 
 dent of the Municipal League. That bill had a 
 most remarkable list of names in its favor. It had 
 the approval of the leading banking firms of Bos- 
 ton, the great mercantile nouses and the members 
 of the Board of Trade and Chamber of Commerce. 
 The committee on municipal affairs was most sym- 
 pathetic toward the bill, while men of both politi- 
 cal parties seemed to be almost equally interested. 
 The leading citizens of Boston appeared in its 
 favor and it had almost no opposition. Yet in an 
 evil hour the referendum was added to it and, as a 
 result, in spite of all the power it had behind it, 
 the bill went down in defeat. 
 
 Mr. Capen resented the statement that he was 
 afraid to trust the people. He said, "I am not 
 afraid to trust them if they could be separated 
 from the influence of selfish men and if the facts 
 could be brought before them. If all the voters 
 could be brought together on Boston Common, or 
 in smaller groups, where someone could explain 
 the various features of the bill and give the peo- 
 
 [108]
 
 IDEALS OF CITIZENSHIP 
 
 pie a chance to ask questions, so that they might 
 thoroughly understand it, the result would be 
 fairly safe. I have always believed that there are 
 more good men in the city than bad; that there 
 are more in the city who want good government 
 than bad. The poor man suffers more from waste 
 and extravagance than the rich. But every one 
 must know that it is very difficult to get these 
 problems and questions before the voters as a 
 whole. Too many feel that the more money spent, 
 the more chances for work, for the property 
 owners pay the taxes. They do not see that waste 
 directly or indirectly adds to their own rent and 
 all other expenses. Too many are apt to be con- 
 trolled by some district or ward leader and they 
 vote as they are told to vote. You do not get an 
 individual expression of opinion by the referen- 
 dum; what you do get, too often, is the opinion 
 of men who have power to control others." 
 
 His personal example in citizenship was prob- 
 ably even a greater inspiration to young men than 
 his words or writings. To him the caucus and 
 the ballot box were as sacred as the prayer-meet- 
 ing, and nothing short of severe sickness could 
 keep him from either. Into every city campaign 
 for the election of a mayor, as well as into the 
 state and national elections, he threw himself with 
 all the power of his personality, always showing 
 intense but controlled feeling over the issues. 
 There was no cause, however slight, which looked 
 for the betterment of his community, in which his 
 influence was not felt. With all the duties of his 
 busy life he was never too busy to attend a com- 
 
 [109]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 mittee meeting or to speak a word at gatherings 
 in the interest of civic improvement. He kept 
 Memorial Day as sacred, always marched with the 
 old veterans and never refused to speak a word 
 of praise or encouragement when they sought his 
 aid. He kept in touch with the Republican Com- 
 mittee of his ward, exerted personal influence in 
 the choice of the candidates, was for years se- 
 lected as a delegate from his district to the State 
 Convention of the Republican Party and entered 
 into many of the city, state and national cam- 
 paigns. Usually, for weeks before election he 
 would discuss with his Bible Class the issues in- 
 volved and urge the members to active participa- 
 tion. As a result of this personal example 
 hundreds of young men received inspiration and 
 entered into the movement for cleaner politics. 
 
 [110]
 
 CHAPTER VIII 
 
 WORK FOR INTERNATIONAL 
 ARBITRATION 
 
 We have seen how, with his profound convic- 
 tion that the gates of hell could not ultimately 
 prevail against the Kingdom of God, Mr. Capen 
 threw himself into every reform touching the 
 city and nation and into every good work of the 
 Christian Church, believing that the right would 
 ultimately triumph and the earth would become 
 the Lord's. Even the dense ignorance and super- 
 stition of Africa and the tenacity of the religions 
 of the Orient could not overcome his persistent 
 optimism concerning the victory of his Christ over 
 the whole earth. 
 
 It was natural that this man, whose fundamen- 
 tal conviction was that Christianity contains a 
 workable program for the practical affairs of life 
 and who threw himself into the crusade of tak- 
 ing the world for his Master, should also carry 
 his religion into the politics of the world and 
 enter the campaign in behalf of international 
 arbitration. 
 
 He became a part of the Mohonk Conference, 
 one of the pioneer movements in behalf of world 
 peace, when the nations of the earth dreamed of 
 no other way of settling their disputes than by 
 armies and navies. For untold centuries all 
 tribal and national troubles had been settled on 
 
 [111]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 the battlefield. Outside of a few poets and other 
 men who were considered dreamers, the majority 
 of people could think of no judge except death, 
 no conclusion except that which was written in 
 human blood. The mere mention of arbitration 
 in Congress brought forth sneers; statesmen; 
 were on the side of war and nations were ready 
 to fly to arms to settle any disagreement. 
 
 It was a little company of people, mostly pro- 
 fessional men, who met at Mohonk at the invita- 
 tion of that grand and good Quaker, Mr. Albert 
 K. Smiley, to create public sentiment against war. 
 A few business men were included, among whom, 
 as we have indicated, was Mr. Capen. He imme- 
 diately threw his energies into that work and his 
 optimism became contagious. Though their com- 
 pany was small they could not become dis- 
 couraged. With such consecration and faith in 
 their ranks, they were destined to become a world 
 power, leading the thoughts of nations. 
 
 These evangelists of peace were not blind to the 
 terrific forces against which they were compelled 
 to fight. There were war leagues in every nation, 
 and these leagues, directly or indirectly, were the 
 greatest enemies to progress. They grew more 
 bitter as they saw the rapid advance of the peace 
 movement. There were navy leagues in this coun- 
 try and in Great Britain, Germany and France, 
 which were skillful in playing one nation against 
 another. Pictures of every warship built by a 
 nation were published in the newspapers and 
 magazines of others, primarily to encourage the 
 building of more and larger battleships. In one 
 
 [112]
 
 A PEACE MAKER 
 
 national assembly the increase of the navy of one 
 nation was given as a reason why other nations 
 should increase their navies. When we built more 
 warships, they built more warships. Newspapers 
 gloated over the weaknesses of rivals and wrote 
 insulting articles to arouse the passions and keep 
 alive the war spirit. Whenever there was a bill 
 before Congress for the building of more dread- 
 noughts, the navy leagues did not fail to bring 
 before the country the cry of war with Japan. 
 They played skillfully upon the passions and prej- 
 udices of men to increase the fighting machinery 
 of the world. 
 
 Another foe to peace was the yellow press. The 
 German chancellor said some time ago in the 
 Eeichstag that "Wars are not planned and 
 brought about in these days by governments, but 
 noisy and fanatical minorities drive nations to 
 war." It was the yellow press that drove the 
 United States into the war with Spain in 1898. 
 Mr. Root when he was Secretary of State de- 
 clared : ' ' There are no international controversies 
 so serious that they cannot be settled peaceably if 
 both parties really desire settlement; while there 
 are few causes of dispute so trifling that they 
 cannot be made the occasion of war if either party 
 really desires war. The matters in dispute be- 
 tween nations are nothing ; the spirit which deals 
 with them is everything. ' ' Thus the jingoism of 
 the press, with its power to create a war atmos- 
 phere, was one of the obstacles which made it 
 difficult to settle international controversies by 
 arbitration. 
 
 [113]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 No one can be blind to the fact that there is an 
 organized effort to make our country a great mili- 
 tary nation. Nowhere is this more clear than in 
 the new life that has come to Washington, our 
 capital city, in the last few years. Brass buttons 
 and epaulets are constantly becoming more con- 
 spicuous. In 1908, there were seven hundred and 
 twenty- seven military and naval officers on the 
 active and retired lists. Most of these had their 
 families with them and in addition there were a 
 number of families of deceased officers. This 
 group of people were gradually transforming the 
 capital of the country into a military and naval 
 center and was constantly exerting an influence 
 upon Congress for continued development and 
 increased expenditures in military and naval 
 lines. 
 
 But in spite of these forces which strove to keep 
 the war spirit alive, and which are today the 
 greatest enemies of peace, these consecrated 
 workers in behalf of international arbitration pro- 
 ceeded to the task with confidence in the triumph 
 of the right. In the second meeting of the Con- 
 ference, in 1896, Mr. Capen presented the report 
 of the Business Committee, which was based upon 
 a principle characteristic of the man, that was 
 clearly one source of his usefulness to every great 
 reform movement. He said: "We are trying to 
 be leaders of public thought and unless we can 
 blaze the path ahead, Mohonk is false to its op- 
 portunities and its traditions. But we do not 
 want to take so long a step forward that the great 
 mass of intelligent people shall feel that we are 
 
 [114]
 
 A PEACE MAKER 
 
 proposing that which is impracticable ; for in that 
 way we shall lose our power and our ability to in- 
 fluence and hold public thought." It was this 
 ability to lead without offending, to stand for 
 idealism without incurring the stigma of 
 "dreamer," which gave to him the confidence of 
 the people and enabled him to guide organizations 
 and movements to something better where, per- 
 haps, other men, equally earnest, failed. 
 
 It was probably this quality, as much as any 
 other, which characterized him as a leader and 
 which made him so eagerly sought in difficult situ- 
 ations. During the Andover Controversy, when 
 the trustees of that Seminary were divided, and 
 when the theological debate threatened to divide 
 the Congregational denomination and the Ameri- 
 can Board, he was sought as a man who could 
 bring peace and lead the contending parties to- 
 gether. Earnest letters were written, urging him 
 to become a member of the Board of Trustees, but 
 he declined. If there was any difficult situation in 
 his church, or in the missionary societies, where 
 someone was needed who could heal ugly wounds 
 or lead differing elements to a useful result, he 
 was usually the man who was sought. This gift 
 for settling disputes and misunderstandings made 
 him an unusually useful man, placed him year 
 after year upon the Business Committee at Mo- 
 honk, and enabled him to contribute much to the 
 effectiveness of this peace movement. 
 
 The appeal read by Mr. Capen before the Con- 
 ference in 1896, calling for a permanent tribunal, 
 is interesting not only as a matter of history, but 
 
 [115]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 as a clear and forceful statement of the peace 
 program for which he exerted so much of his in- 
 fluence. "In the settlement of personal con- 
 troversies civilization has substituted the appeal 
 to law for the appeal to force. It is high time for 
 a like substitution of law for war in the settle- 
 ment of controversies between nations. Law estab- 
 lishes justice; war simply demonstrates power. 
 Such a substitution of law for war requires a per- 
 manent tribunal to which all nations may appeal. 
 Its personnel may change but its judicial life 
 should be continuous; its mere existence would 
 often prevent controversy and its decisions would 
 become a recognized interpretation of interna- 
 tional law. It would not impair the sovereignty, 
 lessen the dignity, nor hazard the honor or safety 
 of any nation. The enforcement of its judgments 
 might be safely left to the moral obligations of 
 the nation concerned and the moral sentiments of 
 mankind. Such a tribunal should be so constituted 
 that all civilized nations may, if they choose, by 
 adhering to the treaty constituting it, avail them- 
 selves of its benefits. Disarmament of the nations 
 should follow such recognition of, and provision 
 for, the reign of reason over the passions of 
 mankind. ' ' 
 
 He believed the great weapon by which men 
 were to fight for this principle was public opinon. 
 The greatest enemy after all to the peace move- 
 ment was the apathy and indifference of men. The 
 majority of citizens had no more interest in this 
 subject than they had over a discussion of aniline 
 dyes. Mr. Capen saw that "We must help to make 
 
 [116]
 
 A PEACE MAKER 
 
 public opinion in this country; for public opinion 
 is master here." 
 
 Not only did he seek to create a public senti- 
 ment among the adults of the country but he 
 devoted himself with zeal to interesting young 
 people in this subject. He was appointed by the 
 Business Committee of the Mohonk Conference to 
 interview Dr. Clark, the President of the United 
 Society of Christian Endeavor, and to present to 
 him the wish of that Conference that he might be- 
 come interested in this movement. Mr. Capen met 
 with a most gracious reception and probably had 
 something to do with the shaping of the Society 's 
 policy. On March 15, 1899, Dr. Clark and those 
 associated with him wrote a letter to the Chris- 
 tian Endeavorers of the world asking them to 
 devote some of their energies to this great move- 
 ment. He especially recommended to the young 
 people of this country to petition Congress in be- 
 half of peace. Mr. Capen felt confident that this 
 was the way in which the Peace Movement was 
 to be made to triumph. It was not by letting a few 
 people in Boston and a few more in Philadelphia 
 and Baltimore do the work. Each man was to be 
 a center for radiating influence and power in his 
 own circle until the cause should triumph. 
 
 There were certain aspects of the question to 
 which he devoted himself in public address and in 
 newspaper articles with great enthusiasm. First, 
 he attacked the evil from the side of economic 
 waste. "It is a sad fact," he said, in his Portland 
 address, "that sixty-seven per cent of the ex- 
 penses of our Government are being expended 
 
 [117]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 either because of past wars or in preparation for 
 possible future wars. It has been well illustrated 
 by a man having an income of one thousand 
 dollars a year who is spending six hundred and 
 seventy to pay for the expenses of former fights, 
 or in preparation for new ones, and is leaving 
 himself only three hundred and thirty dollars for 
 house-rent, food, clothing, fuel and the education 
 of his children. Last year the figures showed 
 that the United States spent on preparations for 
 future war a per capita of three dollars and thirty 
 cents. Of this total sum, we Congregationalists 
 have had to pay over $2,250,000 or three times as 
 much as we have given for foreign missions. The 
 condition across the sea is even worse than it is 
 with us. The annual German expenditure is 
 $731,000,000, and of this, $318,000,000 is spent for 
 war expenses in one way or another. It is said 
 that every farmer in Germany is burdened with 
 the equivalent of the maintenance of six non-pro- 
 ducing men in arms. Four million men are under 
 arms in Europe at an annual expense of $1,682,- 
 000,000, thus absorbing the life of these nations. 
 If these conditions can be changed, and the fear 
 of war removed by arbitration agreements, not 
 only will the bulk of these immense sums be saved, 
 but these men themselves could be returned to the 
 ranks of peaceful citizens and perhaps be able to 
 earn as much besides. We need courts of arbitra- 
 tion and of world peace to save the nations in 
 the social revolution that is going on. The world 
 is full of labor strikes and men ask for larger 
 wages because of the increased cost of living. 
 
 [118]
 
 A PEACE MAKER 
 
 With the total debts of about $27,000,000,000 and 
 an annual interest charge of nearly $1,000,000,000, 
 the nations of Europe are running into universal 
 bankruptcy. All the nations of the earth are so 
 closely interwoven that a disaster to Europe 
 would be a tremendous blow to us, followed by a 
 panic and disaster which would seriously impair 
 all missionary enterprises. Not only that, but in 
 order to keep up in the race our Government is 
 increasing its battleships at an enormous cost. 
 The Massachusetts Commission on the High Cost 
 of Living properly included militarism, and the 
 waste and the expense which is the natural result, 
 as one of the chief causes." 
 
 He was equally earnest in attacking the delusion 
 which is common among us that it is necessary to 
 have a war every few years in order to create 
 heroism; that our young men will lose their vi- 
 rility unless there is some contest. He believed 
 that men ought to recognize the fact that it is just 
 as great to sacrifice to save as to destroy; that 
 the noblest heroism is not necessarily exhibited on 
 the field of battle, but may be shown in more quiet 
 ways. * * I venture to say that Herbert Welsh con- 
 tending against the iniquities of the 'Indian ring,' 
 or Clinton Rogers Woodruff fighting political cor- 
 ruption, is just as much a hero as a man on the 
 battlefield, and that Theodore Roosevelt, when he 
 stood at the head of the Police Commission and 
 contended for righteousness and law, was doing 
 as much for humanity as when he led the rough- 
 riders at San Juan. This is where we can all help 
 to create public opinion. We can teach that there 
 
 [119]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 are glorious deeds to be done along the line of 
 peace and that, if we can secure national peace 
 through universal arbitration and a permanent 
 court of the nations, our young men can be turned 
 from thoughts of war to the great questions that 
 are waiting to be solved. ' ' 
 
 It was his keen insight into what Christianity 
 ought to mean in the life of nations that made 
 him alive to the fact that Christianity had not 
 only failed to touch the real heart of nations, but 
 that the Christian nations of the earth, through 
 their greed and selfishness, had become one of the 
 chief obstacles in Christianizing the Orient. He 
 saw what England, a so-called Christian nation, 
 had done to China. In 1840, China destroyed a 
 few chests of opium that England had tried to 
 force upon her and then England compelled the 
 Chinese, at the mouth of cannon and against 
 every principle of justice, to admit opium into 
 all her ports, thus becoming the leading factor in 
 the poisoning of a great people. 
 
 He saw what the so-called Christian Empire of 
 Germany had done to China. In 1897, two Ger- 
 man Catholic priests were killed in two of the 
 Shantung provinces. Out went the German fleet 
 and took Kiao-Chau harbor, a large section of 
 country, the right to develop all mines and rail- 
 ways in that province, and a large indemnity 
 besides. A little later, to add to her previous un- 
 christian action, England stepped in and helped 
 herself to Wei-Hai-Wei. He saw that "Christian" 
 France had treated ' ' heathen ' ' China in the same 
 way. He saw that after the Boxer uprising in 
 
 [120]
 
 A PEACE MAKER 
 
 1900 not only had hundreds of Chinese women of 
 the upper class committed suicide rather than live 
 after the indignities they had suffered at the 
 hands of Christian nations, but that these same 
 Christian nations had compelled an indemnity of 
 $333,900,000. This thing had continued for years, 
 until China, with a coast line that would reach 
 from Eastport, Maine, to the Panama Canal, had 
 hardly a harbor left, robbed of the opportunities 
 of commerce by the nations who were sending her 
 missionaries. He heard Turkey, that fanatical 
 land of the Mohammedan, offering to submit her 
 grievances with Christian Italy to any tribunal 
 Italy would care to name. Italy refused and stole 
 from Turkey the land of Tripoli. 
 
 When Mr. Capen made his address on ' * Foreign 
 Missions and World Peace," in Portland, he 
 quoted this significant paragraph from the 
 " Japan Advertiser" of Tokio: ''The first act of 
 the Persian tragedy is that the Persian people are 
 guilty of the unpardonable crime of possessing a 
 magnificent country with magnificent resources, 
 and this crime constitutes the crime of crimes 
 which Christian Europe, armed to the teeth, can 
 neither condone nor overlook. From the danger 
 signals that are already flashing forth it is easy 
 to foresee that the victory of Russia and England 
 over Persia will not only mean the subjugation of 
 a practically unarmed nation by two fully armed 
 powers, but the present triumph, if it does come, 
 will surely contain an aftermath, which will have 
 to be reaped by the victors. The world is accus- 
 tomed to associate Russia with merciless and des- 
 
 [121]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 potic barbarism. The case will, however, be dif- 
 ferent for England, one of the two makers of the 
 Persian tragedy. British prestige must un- 
 doubtedly come out of this transaction heavily 
 besmirched; and in the background of England's 
 Empire, India, British justice must come to be 
 looked upon askance and British reputation must 
 suffer as it has never suffered yet. It is well also 
 that missionaries and supporters of Christian 
 missions to the 'heathen' should know that the 
 Oriental mind now defines Christianity as battle- 
 ships, cannons and rifles, devised and constructed 
 for the plunder of the earth, and that the bleeding 
 figure on the cross which missionaries hold up to 
 the view of non-Christian peoples gets blurred out 
 of their sight, for on their horizon looms largely 
 the figure of the armed robber with cannon and 
 rifles leveled, threatening 'your country or your 
 life.' " 
 
 It is this fact, growing out of the greedy spirit of 
 Christian nations, that has become the greatest ob- 
 stacle to the progress of Christianity throughout 
 the earth. Mr. Capen saw that it put the mission- 
 ary upon the defensive, making it incumbent upon 
 him to explain why so-called Christian nations 
 should be guilty of such high-handed proceedings, 
 that it identified Christianity in the eyes of the 
 Orientals with power and big guns and that the 
 Kingdom of God could never come on the earth 
 until the war spirit should be killed and nations 
 should become Christian indeed. 
 
 A little while before he started on his journey 
 around the world, he made an address in which he 
 
 [122]
 
 A PEACE MAKER 
 
 expressed a protest against several public move- 
 ments of today looking toward an increase in the 
 spirit of militarism. First he opposed the tend- 
 ency toward making state militia more and more 
 a part of the reserve forces for the regular army. 
 He objected to this chiefly upon the ground that it 
 stirs up unduly the spirit of war among hosts of 
 our citizens and plays mischief with public 
 thought. He believed that if the United States be- 
 haved herself she would have no fear about any 
 attack being made upon her. The militia had 
 been a state organization to be used only in the 
 case of riot or disorder and he believed that, as 
 lovers of peace, we ought to oppose this plan for 
 the centralization of the volunteer militia in our 
 various states. 
 
 He was equally interested in securing a modifi- 
 cation of the Panama Canal Bill. The original 
 intent was that the canal should be a great world 
 water-way for commerce and also should make an 
 easy passage for our navy from one coast to the 
 other, thus making a smaller navy possible for de- 
 fense. The passage of this bill, exempting our 
 coastwise shipping from tolls, he believed to be a 
 piece of bad faith which has damaged our nation 
 at home and abroad. He thought it a clear viola- 
 tion of our treaty with England and he main- 
 tained that, if we needed to subsidize our shipping, 
 we ought to do it directly and in the open and not 
 jeopardize our national honor. Especially did he 
 protest against the spirit represented by one of 
 our distinguished senators, who declared that he 
 would never submit the question to the Hague Tri- 
 
 [123]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 bunal. He believed this spirit to be against the 
 example of our leadership in arbitration and to 
 represent an attitude that was purely selfish an 
 attitude that was truly unworthy of a great Chris- 
 tian nation. 
 
 He joined, also, in the protest against fortify- 
 ing the Panama Canal, believing that it should be 
 neutralized like the Suez. The latter is in the very 
 war center of the world and yet all these years it 
 has never been fortified and no one has ever 
 touched it. ' ' If there had been fortifications they 
 might have been attacked; such fortifications 
 would have invited attack. For us now to fortify 
 the Panama Canal seems to me to be contrary to 
 the whole spirit of the past." 
 
 He urged that all good people should stand to- 
 gether and oppose the present tendency to in- 
 crease our navy to a size far beyond the needs 
 for defense. When David Starr Jordan went to 
 Japan a few years ago as representative of the 
 World's Peace Foundation, he was cordially re- 
 ceived by that nation, but it was significant that 
 the press of Japan criticized conditions which pre- 
 vailed in the lands he represented, emphasizing 
 the fact that, while these nations were constantly 
 holding their great peace congresses and sending 
 out peace workers, they continued to increase 
 their equipments for war. It is important that 
 these international conferences be held, but Mr. 
 Capen was of the conviction that much of their 
 work is undone by the fact that these same nations 
 continue to build their battleships and that if we 
 should take the initiative and call a halt in our 
 
 [124]
 
 A PEACE MAKER 
 
 great expenditures the world would soon follow 
 us. "No nation ever built up a great army or 
 navy that sooner or later did not get into war; 
 peace which depends upon force to preserve it will 
 never last." 
 
 No group of men working for a great moral 
 cause have lived to see their faith so nearly 
 realized as this company who met at Mohonk year 
 after year. Not that wars have been abolished; 
 but the peace sentiment has been widely diffused. 
 The business men of the world, excepting the in- 
 ventors of the instruments of war, and those who 
 make capital out of armies and navies, are de- 
 manding peace. 
 
 The delegates to Mohonk were at first largely 
 professional men, editors of newspapers, minis- 
 ters and workers in reform movements. There 
 were few business men in the membership. Mr. 
 Capen was exceedingly helpful in increasing the 
 number of business men at this Conference, and 
 devoted much of his energy toward interesting 
 Chambers of Commerce throughout America in 
 the cause ; and he had the profound satisfaction of 
 seeing about two hundred Boards of Trade and 
 Chambers of Commerce endorsing President 
 Taft's treaties on arbitration. 
 
 From so small a beginning in 1895, this peace 
 movement had taken such a hold upon the business 
 men of the world that at the Fifth International 
 Congress of Chambers of Commerce, held in Bos- 
 ton in 1912, the question of arbitration was given 
 a large place both by foreign and American dele- 
 
 [125]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 gations. They had come to recognize that all 
 business and financial interests are thrown into 
 chaos by anything that interrupts the peace of the 
 world. This Congress was one of the most impor- 
 tant meetings of business men that the world had 
 ever seen, and it was a great moment when, under 
 the leadership of the President, M. Canon-Le- 
 grand, a resolution which he had drawn covering 
 the whole field of international arbitration was 
 passed with intense enthusiasm so great indeed 
 that the members of the Congress stood on their 
 chairs and waved their hats. It was a message of 
 the commercial leaders of forty-five nations to the 
 governments of the world. 
 
 While we have written of Mr. Capen's work 
 for peace in connection with the Chamber of Com- 
 merce and the Mohonk Conference, we must not 
 forget that he was also President of the Massa- 
 chusetts Peace Society and a director of the 
 World Peace Foundation. As President of the 
 former organization he gave much of his time, 
 both in committee work and in public utterance, 
 to furthering its principles ; and on his last jour- 
 ney to India and China he went as an official rep- 
 resentative of the Peace Foundation. He wrote 
 many enthusiastic letters from India indicat- 
 ing the spread of the peace idea and the eager- 
 ness with which men listened to the plea for 
 abolition of war in favor of arbitration. 
 
 [126]
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 PRESIDENT OF THE AMERICAN BOARD 
 
 The American Board of Commissioners for 
 Foreign Missions has always enlisted in its serv- 
 ice the strongest men of the Congregational 
 churches. Its first President was John Treadwell, 
 Governor of Connecticut, and the noble succession 
 has included such leaders as Mark Hopkins and 
 Richard Salter Storrs, men who have represented, 
 both intellectually and spiritually, the best reli- 
 gious life of our nation. During the one hundred 
 and three years of the Board's history, there have 
 been only eight Presidents, four of whom were 
 laymen and four clergymen. The laymen have 
 served a total of fifty-five years and the clergymen 
 forty-five years. A Vice-President served three 
 years. The shortest term of service was that of 
 the fine-spirited minister of the First Church of 
 Hartford, Rev. Charles M. Lamson, who was 
 elected in 1897 and was permitted only two years 
 of leadership before death brought his work to a 
 close. 
 
 For the Board to continue this succession of 
 great men was no easy task. The memory of Dr. 
 Richard Storrs was fresh in the minds of its 
 constituency, and the traditions of Dr. Mark Hop- 
 kins still so exalted the office of President that it 
 was difficult to find any man who could meet the 
 demands which had been set so high. 
 
 [127]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 In 1899, at the annual meeting of the American 
 Board, held that year in Providence, Ehode 
 Island, Samuel B. Capen was elected President. 
 Though he had gained wide experience in church 
 and civic affairs, he hesitated before accepting 
 this new honor. He knew what were the tradi- 
 tions that must be upheld, and moreover he felt 
 himself inadequately informed on the foreign mis- 
 sionary problem. He had always been a liberal 
 giver to the work, and since 1883 had been a cor- 
 porate member of the Board; but, absorbed in 
 other phases of church activity, and especially in 
 the problems of the city, he had not given atten- 
 tion to the special problems confronting the 
 foreign missionary nor to the questions of admin- 
 istration. He realized also the greatness of the 
 work, believing that the presidency of the Board 
 was the highest office the Congregationalists could 
 bestow upon any of their number. Repeatedly 
 in after years he has said, when speaking of 
 the widely-extended and diversified activity of the 
 Board, "Surely this is the greatest work in the 
 world. ' ' He felt this from the time when he was 
 suggested for the presidency, and he questioned 
 his ability to undertake the great task. 
 
 Once he consented to the election, he took his 
 conspicuous position with solemn seriousness, 
 feeling that he had been called of God to lead the 
 work of establishing His Kingdom unto the utter- 
 most parts of the earth. Those who have been 
 closest to him during the intervening years know 
 how conscientiously he has obeyed this call. 
 
 [128]
 
 IN FOREIGN MISSIONS 
 
 Immediately after election Mr. Capen under- 
 took the tasks before him in a manner that had 
 characterized the work of no other President of 
 the Board. This distinctive method of adminis- 
 tration was due in part to the fact that he lived in 
 Boston, but chiefly to the operation of one of the 
 fixed principles of his life. He would never accept 
 any office to be a figurehead. He would enter upon 
 a task only with the understanding that he could 
 become a vital part of the work, throwing into it 
 the whole force of his personality and contributing 
 to its guidance his wisdom and strength. 
 
 The rules of the American Board made its pres- 
 ident and vice-president ex-officiis members of its 
 Prudential Committee, the body which controls 
 and directs its work, both at home and abroad. 
 Mr. Capen, immediately after election, began to 
 attend the weekly meetings of this Committee, to 
 contribute to the direction of affairs and to the 
 shaping of policies. Not only did he give to the 
 office a meaning that it had never had, but he be- 
 came a vital factor in the organization and his 
 activity was second only to that of the secretaries, 
 who devoted all their time to the work. 
 
 Through this close association with the Pruden- 
 tial Committee, he brought to the work of the 
 Board the same keen business insight as he had 
 shown in the Sunday School and Publishing 
 Society and other organizations. Through his 
 efforts some departments were entirely reorgan- 
 ized, becoming more efficient and economical. 
 
 Those who were accustomed to attend the an- 
 
 [129]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 nual meetings of the American Board can never 
 forget the dignity and grace with which Mr. 
 Capen presided, the ease with which he carried 
 through crowded programs, nor the strictness 
 with which he held every speaker to his time, for- 
 bidding him to steal the minutes alloted to the 
 man who was to follow him. He was a prince 
 among presiding officers, uniting firmness with 
 courtesy and combining a thorough knowledge of 
 parliamentary procedure with a kindly human 
 spirit. 
 
 By this combination of qualities he was able to 
 accomplish needed reforms in these annual gath- 
 erings. It had been customary to have the secre- 
 taries read their reports, though they were 
 printed and in the hands of the people, and then 
 to have long reports upon the reports. Noted di- 
 vines were invited to deliver eloquent orations on 
 what they thought about missionary problems, 
 and as most of them usually exceeded their time 
 limits, those in attendance generally had no op- 
 portunity to listen to the missionaries themselves, 
 whom they really wanted to hear. Mr. Capen was 
 largely instrumental in abolishing the reading of 
 the reports of the secretaries and in holding 
 speakers to the time assigned to them. He proved 
 himself the friend of the missionaries by giving 
 them an opportunity to deliver the messages they 
 had brought from the foreign lands with the hope 
 and the prayer that they might touch the hearts 
 of the friends at home and awaken greater inter- 
 est in their work. 
 
 [130]
 
 IN FOREIGN MISSIONS 
 
 His bearing upon the platform and his manner 
 of speech were so full of sympathy that he gave 
 courage and strength to those who were to speak. 
 James D. Taylor of Impolweni, Africa, in a letter 
 written after Mr. Capen's death, bore beautiful 
 testimony to this trait : * * I shall never forget how 
 I was heartened for my speech at the Board Meet- 
 ing in Brooklyn, by the hearty hand-clasp and 
 cheering word with which he drew me to the desk 
 and presented me to the audience. It was just 
 the right thing to make a man forget himself at 
 the moment when it was most necessary and most 
 difficult to do so." 
 
 A similar testimony is received from one of our 
 missionaries in Turkey, Miss Clara Richmond, 
 who is supported by the Central Church of Ja- 
 maica Plain. Referring to the time when she was 
 compelled to meet the Prudential Committee, in 
 anticipation of her appointment to the mission 
 field, she writes: ''Although my heart was full 
 of the desire to come and live my life for our 
 work here, as I thought of what our American 
 Board stands for, and of what a great force it is 
 in the world, I was almost overwhelmed with the 
 thought of being a part of such a great organiza- 
 tion and work. For a moment I was overwhelmed 
 with fear. Can I do and be what a missionary of 
 this Board must do and be? Just then I reached 
 Dr. Capen as we were being introduced to the 
 members. As my name was given to him, putting 
 his hand on my shoulder he said, * Oh, yes, this is 
 our girl!' That may have been a small thing 
 
 [131]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 compared with the many greater things he did, 
 but it meant so much to me. Such a gladness 
 came and the fear went. I felt that God would 
 give strength and everything needed." 
 
 Mr. Capen had a profound belief that the rapid 
 conversion of the world had become a question of 
 money, and he felt that he was himself called by 
 God in a special way to press this phase of mis- 
 sionary work upon the conscience of the American 
 people. A few months after his election to the 
 Presidency of the Board, he wrote to Mr. Mott: 
 ' ' For twenty years I have been praying and writ- 
 ing and speaking about this money problem, and 
 it has become a passionate desire that somehow 
 the Lord may use me to help toward the larger 
 things which are perfectly within the power of the 
 Church to accomplish." 
 
 Those who knew him personally understood 
 how earnestly he gave his attention to this prob- 
 lem, and those who have read his published ad- 
 dresses will find this the theme that is ever to the 
 front, presented with all the power of great con- 
 viction. One of his strongest and most telling 
 appeals was made before the National Council at 
 Syracuse in 1895, when he uttered his plea for 
 denominational loyalty, showing that only a little 
 more than one-half of the gifts of the members 
 of his Church went to the support of the Congre- 
 gational missionary societies. Not less than $1,- 
 000,000 was contributed outside of recognized 
 denominational channels, and while some of this 
 was devoted to the most worthy purposes, much 
 
 [132]
 
 IN FOREIGN MISSIONS 
 
 of it fell into the hands of religious tramps and 
 was frittered away. "Good business and com- 
 mon sense declare," said Mr. Capen, "that money 
 given to our own missionary societies, whose work 
 is publicly and constantly open to review by a 
 whole denomination of givers, is the least likely to 
 be wasted and the most likely to bring permanent 
 results. It is self-evident that the men who care 
 for our societies, and whose home and field secre- 
 taries and missionaries are experts in their vari- 
 ous lines, can invest money for Christ's Kingdom 
 to better advantage than the inexperienced. 
 There is something very attractive, I know, to a 
 certain class of minds in the appeal not to be nar- 
 row and sectarian in their gifts, but such breadth 
 is usually at the expense of efficiency. The money, 
 if not wholly wasted, might be used to better 
 advantage. ' ' 
 
 In his annual address in 1901, delivered at Hart- 
 ford, Mr. Capen presented a plan which he 
 thought would increase the gifts of the Board. 
 If three hundred thousand members of Congrega- 
 tional churches, or less than one-half of its total 
 membership, were to give on an average three 
 cents a day for missionary work, the total amount 
 secured would be over three million dollars an- 
 nually, or nearly twice what was being given at 
 that time. When he thought of the men who were 
 giving hundreds and thousands of dollars every 
 year to this work, such a small individual average 
 seemed to him entirely within the ability of the 
 Church. Apparently it was simply a question of 
 
 [133]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 method, and method had largely been lacking 
 throughout the churches. Public appeals were 
 good, but they were not sufficient. A nickel or a 
 dime satisfied the conscience of men when the con- 
 tribution plate was passed. Pastoral and church 
 committee circulars were good, and, when wisely 
 used, had often doubled and trebled the contri- 
 butions of the churches; but every one has a 
 waste-basket, and people not interested in mis- 
 sions find it very easy to consign all such circulars 
 to this receptacle. 
 
 Mr. Capen believed that the churches should go 
 further than these methods by making personal 
 appeals through some of their members for they 
 cannot easily be put into waste-baskets. He ar- 
 gued that : 1 1 Our churches should enter upon some 
 plan of systematic organization with the purpose 
 of reaching by personal canvass every member of 
 our churches, securing from each one a definite 
 pledge for our missionary work. The church must 
 be as earnest in its efforts as business men are in 
 theirs, if it is to have the means to properly carry 
 on its missionary work. Other people are can- 
 vassing for everything under the heavens. Our 
 churches cannot sit still in the old way and trust 
 people to give when the day arrives for taking the 
 annual contribution. They must be personally 
 asked to make a pledge worthy of themselves, 
 bearing some fair proportion of their ability to 
 give, and worthy of the Master whom they serve." 
 
 With his practical business insight and experi- 
 ence, he realized that if men were to give in any 
 
 [134]
 
 IN FOREIGN MISSIONS 
 
 large amount they must know the needs. Hence 
 he urged upon the leaders a greater definiteness 
 in the missionary appeal. In writing to Mr. Mott 
 he said: 
 
 "We want, somehow or other, to get the facts 
 of what is possible to be done, if we had the 
 money, before men who have the money to give. 
 I have been led perhaps to feel the force of this 
 because of an experience which I had over ten 
 years ago, when a member of the Boston School 
 Committee. I was elected at a time when there 
 had been very great neglect in the matter of new 
 school buildings. There seemed to be a studied 
 attempt to stifle our public schools by cutting off 
 their supplies. I remember that almost the first 
 thing I did was to look up the figures, and I found 
 that the City of Boston was appropriating at that 
 time less for buildings than it had been ten years 
 before, while the expenditure for sewers had 
 gained one hundred and fifty per cent and the 
 paving department two hundred and fifty per 
 cent. I presented these facts publicly; they were 
 taken up by the press, and an ex-mayor, in self- 
 defense, attacked me over a fictitious name. We 
 had a contest through the press and the facts got 
 before the people. The result was that the next 
 four years we had two million dollars appropri- 
 ated for new buildings. Now it seems to me that 
 if we could in a similar way present, in a clear 
 light, how many native pastors and teachers could 
 be employed, how many schools could be opened, 
 hospitals built, etc., with increased money at our 
 
 [135]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 disposal, the appeal would have force. In other 
 words, would it not be possible for the representa- 
 tives of the different societies to make a great 
 comprehensive plan together, making a budget 
 costing millions, if you please, showing how it 
 would be possible, during the next twenty years, 
 to cover the whole world? Do you not believe it is 
 possible that with a well-thought-out plan of this 
 sort we might interest some very worthy men to a 
 very much larger extent than they have been inter- 
 ested in the past! Has not the time come for a 
 little more audacity in our work? If only God 
 would touch some man's heart and lead him 
 to give a million dollars for foreign missions, 
 or even a quarter of it, I believe others would 
 follow. Giving might become as contagious as 
 meanness." 
 
 Being a business man, Mr. Capen naturally 
 looked upon the missionary problem from a busi- 
 ness point of view. In 1905, at the annual meeting 
 of the American Board, in Seattle, Washington, 
 he presented an argument for foreign missions 
 which had never before been offered to that body. 
 It brought considerable criticism upon him; not 
 because anyone questioned the sincerity of his 
 motive, but because the argument itself had in it 
 a commercial ring, which offended some who did 
 not consider the purpose which gave it birth. Mr. 
 Capen suggested that only as we develop missions 
 shall we have a market in the Orient which will 
 demand our manufactured articles in sufficient 
 quantities to match our increased facilities for 
 
 [136]
 
 IN FOREIGN MISSIONS 
 
 production. It is the Christian man, he declared, 
 who is always the customer of the manufacturer ; 
 the heathen or the non-Christian, as a rule, has 
 very few wants. Trade follows the missionary 
 rather than the flag. "When a heathen man be- 
 comes a Christian," said Mr. Capen, "he wants 
 everything new. He wants the conveniences of a 
 Christian home; he wants a Christian plow. 
 When he is changed within, his environment must 
 be changed." 
 
 In support of his argument he offered a wealth 
 of illustrations. "When our missionaries arrived 
 in Hawaii, in 1820, the people were only one stage 
 above the brute. Under the teachings of the mis- 
 sionary, and the influence of Christianity, they 
 were so far developed that at the end of twenty 
 years their business with the United States, as 
 shown by the tables which I studied recently in 
 the Boston Chamber of Commerce, was as fol- 
 lows: Imports, $227,000; exports, $67,000; total 
 trade with the Islands, $294,000." 
 
 "A few years ago a missionary in the Eastern 
 Turkey Mission, seeing the waste and loss to the 
 natives because of the destruction of their cotton, 
 due to their rude methods, sent to America for a 
 cotton gin. As a result, in that region, there are 
 today ten of these machines at work. He also saw 
 their loss in grain, because it was often kept for 
 weeks waiting for a breeze to winnow it. To pre- 
 vent this, he sent to America for a winnowing ma- 
 chine, and now there are in that one locality a 
 hundred such machines. 
 
 [137]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 "Without multiplying illustrations, I think 
 what I have said indicates how the missionary is 
 making business for our American merchants. 
 The story is told of a pastor who tried to interest 
 one of his business men in foreign missions, but 
 without avail. The man was a large manufacturer 
 of plows, and one day the minister persuaded his 
 parishioner to visit one of these foreign nations 
 where our missionaries are at work. The result 
 of it was that the manufacturer opened up so 
 much business that he is today supporting four 
 missionaries; and yet the market for plows is so 
 great that the salaries of these missionaries are 
 only a fraction of his profits from this field. Of 
 course, it would have been far better for this man 
 to have become interested in missions from the 
 higher motive of loyalty to Christ and because of 
 the needs of men. But failing here, it was better 
 for the pastor to interest the man through the 
 lower and selfish motives. To prevent any possi- 
 ble misunderstanding, it ought to be said emphat- 
 ically that it is no part of the business of the 
 missionary to develop foreign commerce. He is 
 not interested in selling modern machinery; his 
 one thought is to help and save men. But from 
 his work of Christianizing and educating men and 
 planting Christian homes these other results fol- 
 low as inevitably as the mist disappears before the 
 rising sun." 
 
 It was easy for men to misjudge this argument. 
 On the surface it seemed unworthy and lacking in 
 altruistic motives. Some people who did not know 
 
 [138]
 
 IN FOEEIGN MISSIONS 
 
 Mr. Capen personally felt that he was placing 
 missionary work on a commercial basis and reduc- 
 ing its high purpose to one of pure selfishness. 
 But those who knew him intimately caught the 
 force of his argument. He was interested prima- 
 rily in winning the strong business men of this 
 country to his cause, and it may be said with truth 
 that few people have been more successful in this 
 work than he. He would make a journey of hun- 
 dreds of miles to secure a large gift from some 
 wealthy man, or to persuade him to include in his 
 will a bequest to the Board. Men of means had 
 great confidence in his judgment concerning 
 causes that were worthy of help, and this ac- 
 counts, in part, for the fact that he was able to 
 secure contributions where other men would have 
 failed. He believed that his mission was to the 
 laymen, and the passion of his soul was to lead 
 them to consecrate their money, as well as their 
 thoughts and prayers, to the work of establishing 
 the Kingdom on the earth. A study of his ad- 
 dresses will show that most of them were directed 
 to this end. His arguments were thought out in 
 the counting-room; his facts were gathered from 
 the commercial world. He did not go to literature 
 nor to history for his illustrations ; he found them 
 in his conversation with business men, in the re- 
 ports of the great world of affairs in the daily 
 papers, and all his facts and illustrations and ar- 
 guments were arranged to appeal to the business 
 man. He seldom had a message directed to minis- 
 ters. He did not speak primarily to the student 
 
 [139]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 nor to the theologian. He was a part of the great 
 commercial world, and he spoke to those who lived 
 in this world. 
 
 This argument for missions must be judged in 
 consideration of this fact, and it probably had 
 more weight with the audience to which it was 
 directed than many more finely conceived spiritual 
 arguments would have had. It did not touch the 
 clergy; it may not have had great influence upon 
 those who were already devoted to the missionary 
 cause. It did, however, interest some men who 
 had to be fed with milk before they would consent 
 to eat meat. 
 
 While Mr. Capen felt himself called in a special 
 way to emphasize the financial side of the mission- 
 ary problem, it would be unfortunate and unfair 
 to leave the impression that he believed the world 
 was to be converted by dollars and cents. He was 
 not all business. He had a rare spiritual sense, 
 lived a life of prayer as do few men of any genera- 
 tion, and believed there was only one name given 
 among men whereby they could be saved. "What 
 we need, today, more than anything else," he 
 said, ' ' is a deeper spiritual life. We shall get the 
 men we need without the slightest difficulty when 
 we are all more faithful ' in the Quiet Hour. ' Life 
 is so intense, there is so much to be done, that we 
 do not take time to grow within. The tree must 
 have roots strong and deep, reaching down to the 
 hidden springs, if it would have a sturdy trunk 
 and bear fruit to perfection. The men who give 
 generously, and who have power in the world, are 
 
 [140]
 
 IN FOREIGN MISSIONS 
 
 the men who have first touched God; who, with 
 the world shut out, have been alone with him. The 
 motive of it all will be love to Christ. To quote 
 from Dr. William M. Taylor, 'The Lord did not 
 say, Peter, lovest thou the work? Or lovest thou 
 my lambs? But lovest thou me?' 
 
 If Mr. Capen used the commercial argument 
 when speaking to the uninterested business man, 
 he lifted his whole appeal into the highest realm 
 when he spoke to church people. Looking about 
 him he saw that a large percentage of the mem- 
 bers of the Christian Church were entirely indif- 
 ferent to the cause of missions. "If we ask," he 
 said, "for the definite reasons for such indiffer- 
 ence, they may be found in the fact that some men 
 have failed, as yet, to accept the great teachings of 
 the Master in regard to the Kingdom of God on 
 earth. The most superficial reader of the Bible 
 must recognize that his purpose was to found a 
 universal empire. Jews and Greeks had an exclu- 
 sive religion, and they called the whole world out- 
 side of their circles barbarians. Jesus destroyed 
 this by teaching the brotherhood of the whole race 
 and the universality of his religion. There are 
 men in our churches today who call themselves 
 Christians, and yet who tell you with unblushing 
 faces that they do not believe in foreign missions. 
 These people admit their interest in city missions, 
 in home missions, or possibly in work for the 
 Anglo-Saxon race, but that is all. They would 
 feel insulted if you told them that they were as 
 narrow in their thinking as those who lived nine- 
 
 [141]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 teen centuries ago, but that is the exact truth. 
 They stand where the old Jews did in Christ's 
 time, believing that the true religion was only for 
 the Hebrew race, and that the interest of those 
 outside was no affair of theirs. Such a position is 
 absolute disloyalty to the expressed command of 
 Christ." 
 
 Many of Mr. Capen's friends often marveled 
 at the zeal with which he would impress the obli- 
 gation of giving upon the conscience of some man 
 who he believed was not doing what he should in 
 the work of his church. He never failed to ap- 
 proach such a man with his natural grace and 
 courtesy, unless he felt that every argument had 
 been exhausted. Then he would talk, with the 
 sharpness of an Amos, directly to the man's con- 
 science. To one man of wealth he pointed his 
 finger, looking him straight in the eye, and said, 
 "You are robbing God; your money is not your 
 own, and you have no right to keep it as you do. ' ' 
 It was this profound belief that men did not own 
 their money which furnished the real basis for all 
 his arguments for giving. In one of his addresses, 
 he said: "There is an entirely erroneous concep- 
 tion about the ownership of money. Men start 
 from the wrong premises, and believe that what 
 they have is their own, and that it is entirely op- 
 tional whether they give anything or not. You 
 ask for a gift to foreign missions, and they treat 
 your request as they would to buy a ticket for a 
 lecture or a concert, as a matter simply of per- 
 sonal choice or inclination. This is the worst pos- 
 
 [142]
 
 IN FOEEIGN MISSIONS 
 
 sible heresy. God said, 'The silver and the gold 
 and the lands are mine.' We, therefore, are not 
 the owners, but only the trustees of what we have, 
 a difference that is almost as great as that be- 
 tween darkness and light. The question then is 
 not, 'How much of mine shall I give?' but, 'What 
 part of God's shall I keep for myself?' It is not 
 what we give, but what we have left, that meas- 
 ures the gift from God's standpoint. Stewardship 
 is the great idea of the New Testament, and the 
 Christian who does not recognize it is, in plain 
 language, stealing trust funds. The money He 
 helps us to make is His money, and how we use it 
 is a test of our discipleship. " 
 
 Mr. Capen's greatest argument for missions 
 the one upon which he loved to dwell was the 
 spiritual argument. He believed that we must 
 develop foreign missions to save our nation spir- 
 itually. He saw that the great peril of America 
 was the materialistic spirit, the passion to be rich 
 at any cost. He once quoted Dr. Charles Cuthbert 
 Hall's word picture of our American civilization, 
 which unfortunately has in it a large element of 
 truth. "It is a matter of consternation and deep 
 concern to us that the moral standard of American 
 life is deteriorating. In the hustle and bustle of 
 every-day activities, we have astonished the 
 world, but morally we are rapidly going astern, so 
 rapidly that one is dumbfounded at the contrast 
 after a visit to some of the countries of the Old 
 World. I know, from observation, that religion 
 has little, if any, part in our American civilization 
 
 [143]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 today. This is a lamentable state of affairs, and 
 it behooves each and all of us to do all we can to 
 help to stem this tide of indifference. Our home 
 life is not what it should be. Is it to be wondered 
 at, when we realize the general apathy of the peo- 
 ple as regards their spiritual welfare?" Mr. 
 Capen, with his keen spiritual insight, saw that the 
 wonderful prosperity of this nation is its peril 
 that other nations, in centuries past, have declined 
 because they have become prosperous, and wealthy 
 and luxurious. "The antidote to the poison of 
 selfish ease is self-denial. There is no law in the 
 universe more certain than this; wealth that is 
 hoarded is certain to be a curse. If we neglect the 
 needy and think only of ourselves, there must be a 
 decline in our spiritual life. Every man and na- 
 tion must be interested in foreign missions to save 
 him from narrowness." 
 
 There were three convictions which he used as 
 guiding principles in his local church in Jamaica 
 Plain and which he was constantly presenting to 
 other churches. The first was that it is missions 
 that will save the home church as well as the na- 
 tion. As a result of our great material prosper- 
 ity, worldliness has crept into our churches, 
 oftentimes weakening their influence; yet they 
 have more serious problems confronting them 
 than they have had for generations. The govern- 
 ment of our cities is still in the experimental 
 \ stage ; in many respects it has been a conspicuous 
 failure. We are all working upon one of the 
 greatest tasks of the centuries that of welding 
 
 [144]
 
 IN FOREIGN MISSIONS 
 
 into one free republic representatives of all na- 
 tions. If our churches are to meet and help to 
 master these tremendous problems, there must be 
 an awakening of the religious life. Whence will 
 it come? ''Not education or culture," said Mr. 
 Capen, ''but God in human lives is to be our sal- 
 vation, and I believe the surest way to have this 
 new religious interest at home, is to be more ear- 
 nest in our work abroad. It is the self-sacrificing 
 spirit that makes the most forcible appeal. When 
 we get into broader sympathy with the whole 
 world, remember that we are our brother 's keeper, 
 and that our brother is the man in greatest need 
 at the ends of the earth, then the blessings the 
 Master gives will come to our own churches at 
 home. ' ' 
 
 Mr. Capen 's second firm conviction was that 
 extravagance is as wrong in the home church as in 
 the life of the individual Christian. He was con- 
 fident that many of our churches are failing to 
 exemplify the Christ life. Many times he referred 
 to a gentleman in the city of New York who once 
 tried to persuade Dr. A. J. Gordon to spend a 
 Sabbath with him, and as an inducement offered 
 the opportunity of listening to the wonderful five- 
 thousand-dollar quartette in his church. "How 
 much does your church give a year for missions?" 
 was Dr. Gordon's quick response. The man 
 turned red in the face and finally stammered, 
 "About five hundred." 
 
 Irony and sarcasm were seldom utilized in Mr. 
 Capen 's public utterances. These elements, so 
 
 [1451
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 common to the rhetorician, were foreign to Mr. 
 Capen's manner, yet they crept into the tones of 
 his voice and into his language when he referred 
 to those parishes which were spending perhaps 
 twenty thousand dollars upon themselves and only 
 two thousand upon benevolence. He believed that 
 they were untrue to the spirit of the Master and 
 disloyal to his great command. 
 
 The third principle upon which Mr. Capen was 
 insistent was that no man should ever be or- 
 dained to the ministry or installed over a church 
 who is not earnestly in sympathy with missionary 
 work. "If a man has been settled over a church 
 and seeks to change, I think one of the first in- 
 quiries should be as to his attitude toward mis- 
 sionary work. I do not care how sound he may be 
 in his doctrines and confession of faith, so long as 
 he is in his practices unsound. A pastor who does 
 not believe in missions has a flaw in his title. An 
 ambassador represents his sovereign; so a man 
 represents the Christ whom he has promised to 
 serve. It is a downright breach of faith to men 
 out on the firing line to have ministers at home in- 
 different to the missionary appeal. If they will 
 not bear a hand in the commissary department 
 and help support the army, let them resign. The 
 time has come to make this issue clear and unmis- 
 takable. One clergyman said recently to another, 
 who had been spending a great deal of his time 
 in raising a large amount for ornamental win- 
 dows in his church, 'What are you going to do 
 next? You can't run a church forever on stained 
 
 [146]
 
 IN FOEEIGN MISSIONS 
 
 glass windows.' This pointed rebuke, in some 
 form, ought to be spoken to many. ' ' 
 
 There has been one constant embarrassment in 
 writing this life. Nearly all that Mr. Capen ac- 
 complished was done in conjunction with other 
 men. He did not work independently, but through 
 committees and recognized organizations. Yet we 
 have written of him as an individual, trying to 
 present a picture of his personality as it ex- 
 pressed itself through ideas and achievements. 
 We may, at times, have done injustice to his asso- 
 ciates, those with whom he labored faithfully, and 
 who often contributed as much as he did toward 
 the final results. It is a fault which seems una- 
 voidable, owing to the nature of the case. 
 
 But there was one thing that he did for the 
 American Board which may be called his own 
 creation. He established The Twentieth Century 
 Fund, the purpose of which is to provide against 
 incurring a debt through the uncertain income 
 from legacies. To illustrate this irregularity : re- 
 ceipts of the American Board from legacies in 
 1892 were nearly $250,000; in 1893 they were 
 $187,000; and in 1899 they were only $102,000. 
 The debt with which the Board started the year 
 1900 was due entirely to this shrinkage in lega- 
 cies. The large increase in gifts from the living 
 would have prevented any debt if it had not been 
 for the decline in legacies. 
 
 The method had been to use legacies as they 
 were received. Mr. Capen proposed to put lega- 
 cies into a fund, only one-third of which was to be 
 
 [147]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 spent each year. To effect this change in financial 
 administration, however, it was necessary to cre- 
 ate a fund of at least $250,000, and this was to be 
 known as The Twentieth Century Fund. 
 
 1 1 To prevent all misunderstanding and make en- 
 tirely clear the plan in its practical working, let 
 us suppose we have no debt, that the $250,000 was 
 in the fund today and that the current receipts 
 from legacies for this fiscal year were $100,000. 
 This would make the total $350,000, and spending 
 one-third, or $117,000, would leave the fund $233,- 
 000 for the next year. Suppose the legacy re- 
 ceipts for 1901 were $150,000, the total would then 
 be $383,000. Spending one-third, or $128,000, 
 would leave $255,000 to carry forward. Suppose 
 now the legacies fall again in 1902 to $100,000. 
 The fund would stand at $355,000, one-third spent 
 would be $118,000, and $237,000 would be carried 
 forward. If in 1903 the receipts were $125,000, 
 the fund would be $362,000. Spending one-third, 
 or $121,000, the fund would remain with which to 
 begin 1904 as $241,000. These figures do not take 
 account of accrued interest on the fund. With 
 this added, the fund would be over $250,000 Jan- 
 uary 1st, 1904." 
 
 If there was ever an example of true, Christian 
 service, it was in the life of this man. He never 
 received a cent of pay for any of his work for his 
 denomination, but gave gladly and lavishly of his 
 time. Men often marveled at his energy. Dr. 
 James L. Barton, Foreign Secretary of the Board, 
 wrote : ' * His activities in raising money, attending 
 
 [148]
 
 IN FOREIGN MISSIONS 
 
 conferences, holding private interviews, conduct- 
 ing an extensive correspondence, sitting in com- 
 mittees and informing himself on the subject were 
 incessant. ' ' 
 
 Rev. H. Fairbank wrote to Dr. Edward W. 
 Capen concerning his father's last journey to the 
 mission fields: "Your father worked hard on the 
 way from Colombo to Hong Kong, writing letters 
 and articles and thinking over his addresses. I 
 felt ashamed when I did not feel equal to doing as 
 steady work as he did." 
 
 This intense activity, never ceasing, never wast- 
 ing a minute, grew out of the conviction that ' * The 
 King's business requires haste" that if the 
 world is to be won, it must be won in this genera- 
 tion or else, perchance, the opportunity will be lost 
 for centuries. The spirit of the man is revealed in 
 his annual address delivered in Manchester, New 
 Hampshire, in 1903, as much as in any words he 
 ever uttered: "Commerce is going everywhere, 
 and commerce without Christ is a curse. It means 
 firearms and the slave trade and rum. A schooner 
 left Boston for the west coast of Africa with a 
 cargo of rum and gin valued at over $110,000. It 
 has been well asked how many missionary contri- 
 butions it will take to counterbalance the curse of 
 that cargo. The exports of rum from the United 
 States for the year ending June 30, 1903, were 
 1,096,719 gallons valued at $1,458,393. Judged by 
 previous years, ninety to ninety-five per cent of 
 this went to Africa. These statistics are a fear- 
 ful arraignment of our sin as a people. Heathen 
 
 [149]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 nations have not the moral stamina, nor have they 
 Christian surroundings, as we have in America, 
 to help them resist temptation. They need pro- 
 tection because of their weakness. While we are 
 neglecting to send the needed missionaries, our 
 merchants are shipping to them what has been 
 well called 'shiploads of barreled deviltry.' 
 
 ' * Our Western civilization is pressing in every- 
 where in the East. Scholars in India, China and 
 Japan are seeing the absurdity of what they have 
 been taught ; the telegraph and the locomotive are 
 telling the Orient of the superiority of our Occi- 
 dental civilization. The fearful peril now is that 
 by our delay we shall leave in these educated 
 minds not heathenism, but agnosticism, which is 
 far more difficult to conquer. This is the real peril 
 in India and Japan today, and will be in China in 
 a few years unless we push our work more rap- 
 idly. In Africa there is another peril. The Mo- 
 hammedan College in Egypt is educating its 
 young men by the thousands, and its representa- 
 tives are going to the Dark Continent in the pro- 
 portion of 10 to 1 to our missionaries. The easier 
 religion of the Mohammedan, with its low ideals, 
 is especially attractive to the ignorant and de- 
 graded African. We recognize here in America 
 what a difference it makes in our frontier places 
 whether the Sunday school or the saloon is first on 
 the ground. 
 
 11 There is another reason why our work re- 
 quires haste, namely: to save the lives of our 
 brave men and women who are so fearfully over- 
 
 [150]
 
 IN FOBEIGN MISSIONS 
 
 worked. As we have already seen, this great cor- 
 poration has worked nearly a century, has opened 
 up a great business with unusual success. We 
 have in every mission evangelists, teachers, medi- 
 cal missionaries, etc., a splendid set of men and 
 women who are familiar with every detail, and 
 who are compelled by the exigencies of the case to 
 work overtime and under bad conditions because 
 of our inability to give them the necessary 
 helpers. This is bad business and worse human- 
 ity. What makes it harder, they never complain 
 but stay at the front oftentimes until they are 
 ready to drop. 
 
 "It ought to strengthen our purpose to rein- 
 force our men in the field to remember the daily 
 sacrifices of our missionaries. In many cases the 
 self-denial at the beginning does not compare with 
 what comes later. I had in my home last Thanks- 
 giving one of the ablest missionaries of our Board 
 and his devoted wife, who sailed within a day or 
 two for their distant field. To all outward ap- 
 pearances they were calm and undisturbed, but 
 we can understand what was going on in their 
 souls when I tell you they were leaving behind 
 them in this country their six children, putting an 
 ocean between them and those they so dearly 
 loved. Let us put ourselves in their places, if we 
 may for the moment, and would not our hearts 
 be torn in anguish at such a sacrifice? The chil- 
 dren must remain here in order to be brought 
 up under American conditions, but the price for 
 parents is an awful one. It is not so very long ago 
 
 [151]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 that a missionary whose boat was to sail very 
 early in the morning, put his little ones to bed in 
 their American home. He said 'Good night' and 
 * Good-bye' to them as bravely as he could; he 
 could not help returning three times after they 
 had fallen asleep to look once more into their 
 beautiful faces before he went thousands of miles 
 away. Is there anything but the love of Jesus 
 Christ that would lead any man to make such a 
 sacrifice as this?" 
 
 [152]
 
 CHAPTER X 
 MAKING DENOMINATIONAL HISTORY 
 
 There is one important phase of Mr. Capen's 
 work which will be of little interest to the general 
 reader, but which is so important in the history 
 of the Congregational churches that it should be 
 embodied in this biography for the sake of those 
 who will wish to follow the development of the 
 denomination. Those who are not interested in 
 technical matters of polity might conveniently 
 pass this chapter. 
 
 While the Congregational Church in America 
 may be truly considered as the mother of mis- 
 sions, yet in another sense it has been only in re- 
 cent years that the denomination has come to the 
 consciousness of the great obligations resting 
 upon it. Its work has lacked unity. Each mis- 
 sionary organization has worked independently, 
 caring for its own separate field. It was only in 
 the last decade of the last century that there was 
 any organized effort to bring the various mission- 
 ary organizations into unity of action and to make 
 a concentrated appeal to the churches for funds. 
 There was a universal feeling of dissatisfaction 
 among leaders concerning the missionary activi- 
 ties, not because any one distrusted the men at the 
 head of the various organizations, but because it 
 was felt that the denominational machinery was 
 
 [153]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 inadequate and unfit. Leaders believed that there 
 was a waste of energy, a lack of method in work 
 and a failure in concentration, and that while 
 these unfortunate features of administration had 
 been operative in plunging several of the societies 
 into debt the resources of the church members 
 had hardly been touched. Missions were being 
 abandoned, stations were being given up, 
 and the whole work at home and abroad was 
 crippled. 
 
 With these conditions confronting the Congre- 
 gationalists, Mr. Capen set before them at their 
 National Council in Portland, Oregon, in 1898, a 
 comprehensive plan which he believed would 
 bring greater effectiveness into all their mission- 
 ary work. He argued that as consolidation or fed- 
 eration had become a practical necessity in the 
 business world, so it had become the great need 
 of the Church. "I believe it is time that our six 
 Missionary Societies should come into a closer 
 touch, a practical federation. The foundation of 
 this has been laid in recent years by the secreta- 
 ries themselves, in meeting once or twice a year to 
 discuss problems which the societies have in com- 
 mon. But far more than this, the work which our 
 Denomination is doing through its Societies 
 should be regarded more as one work, with no 
 divided interests and no rivalry." 
 
 As a means to this end, he urged that there 
 should be one annual meeting of these societies 
 in place of three or more separate meetings, to 
 which they had been accustomed, and that a week 
 
 [154]
 
 MAKING HISTOBY 
 
 or ten days of every year should be given to a 
 joint consideration of their common problems. 
 "As it is now, we see one set of men always at the 
 meeting of the American Board, another at the 
 Home Missionary Society, another at the Ameri- 
 can Missionary Association. It is too much like 
 the condition of the Apostolic churches: 'one of 
 Paul, another of Apollos, another of Cephas. ' We 
 want to change this and have our whole constitu- 
 ency interested in one whole work as being 'all 
 for Christ.' Although much progress has been 
 made in recent years, yet there is an appearance 
 at times of a spirit which looks like rivalry, and 
 the churches sometimes look at the secretaries and 
 field agents as rivals with them. We want to do 
 away with all rivalry by having the whole work 
 planned together, with the amount needed for 
 each society agreed upon each year." 
 
 To bring about this result Mr. Capen recom- 
 mended that a committee of fifteen be appointed 
 to advise with regard to our whole missionary 
 activity. The work of this committee should be to 
 remove the societies from debt, to reach, so far 
 as possible, every Congregational church in the 
 country, to try to enlist each church in the plan of 
 giving something every year to each of the six 
 societies and to organize throughout all the states 
 similar committees, which would, in turn, organize 
 conference committees large enough so that each 
 member would be responsible for not more than 
 five churches. These committees were to develop 
 and have charge of some definite plan of mission- 
 
 [155]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 ary work in the churches in their territory, receiv- 
 ing an offering from each of them, and a gift from 
 every member. Mr. Capen urged furthermore 
 that the general committee appointed by the 
 Council should advise as to the sum of money 
 which ought to be raised for each society, and 
 should apportion this amount among the various 
 states, and through the state conferences among 
 the local churches. 
 
 Mr. Capen was aware that this plan for consoli- 
 dation of the missionary societies was not so radi- 
 cal a proposition as many desired. There was a 
 feeling in many churches that there should be two 
 societies instead of six one for foreign work and 
 the other for the work at home. * ' But I have not 
 felt that we were yet prepared for this. The plan 
 I have proposed is as long a step forward as our 
 churches are now ready to make. The more com- 
 plete union may come later. " 
 
 As a result of Mr. Capen 's proposal, the follow- 
 ing resolutions were passed: " Resolved, that we 
 recommend the appointment of a Central Com- 
 mittee on Missionary Work, of fifteen members: 
 six to be appointed by the National Council; one 
 of whom shall be a woman especially interested in 
 home missions; seven to be chosen by the execu- 
 tive committees of our six missionary societies in 
 such manner as they may deem best; one to be 
 chosen by the Woman's Boards of Missions, and 
 one to be selected at the Annual Christian En- 
 deavor Convention by the Congregationalists at 
 their denominational rally. It shall be the duty 
 
 [156]
 
 MAKING HISTORY 
 
 of this committee to use all possible efforts to 
 secure the appointment of similar committees in 
 the State Conferences throughout our country, 
 to devise plans for promptly paying the debt of 
 every society, and for offering such increased 
 gifts as shall make it possible to enlarge our work 
 at home and abroad. It shall also suggest such 
 other messages, looking to a closer union in the 
 prosecution of our common work, as may seem 
 expedient, reporting the result of its conclusions 
 to the next National Council. 
 
 "Resolved, that this Council at this session 
 choose its five representatives upon the commit- 
 tee, and that they be instructed by us to ask the 
 co-operation of our missionary societies and the 
 Young People's Society of Christian Endeavor in 
 selecting the remaining members of the committee 
 as proposed. In this battle with evil all over the 
 world, in which as Congregationalists we wish to 
 bear our full part, every dollar should be invested 
 where it will most speedily provide a permanent 
 church or school for a base of supplies. We ought 
 to push forward in the prosecution of this holy 
 war for righteousness in all the world; close this 
 century and open the next by a grand forward 
 movement all along the line." 
 
 Some delay was necessary in the completion of 
 the membership of this Central Committee, but its 
 personnel was finally selected on December 29, 
 1898. Its first meeting was held in the parlor of 
 the Broadway Tabernacle Church, New York 
 City, on April 19, 1899. As a result of this gath- 
 
 [157]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 ering the Committee prepared a report, urging 
 that there should be chosen: first, by each State 
 Association a committee composed of one mem- 
 ber from each conference ; secondly, by each local 
 conference a committee of such number that each 
 member should be responsible for not more than 
 five churches ; and thirdly, by each church a com- 
 mittee to make some plan best suited to itself for 
 systematic giving. 
 
 There was an enthusiastic response to this ap- 
 peal on the part of the churches, although, true to 
 the Congregational fashion, they were still lack- 
 ing in unity of action. Each State Association 
 acted according to local needs and to the personal 
 preferences of its leaders. The methods suggested 
 by local churches for systematic benevolences 
 were also varied, but it was evident that there was 
 a very substantial gain in missionary interest.. 
 While the plan did not call forth unity of action, 
 it increased and fostered denominational loyalty. 
 It led the churches to feel that their missionary 
 societies were their children and were not to be 
 treated as orphans left to care for themselves in 
 this cold world. It was too much to expect that 
 any plan could be devised that would in a short 
 time bring the Congregational churches together 
 in a proper denominational spirit. But the inaug- 
 uration of the new system proved that Congrega- 
 tionalists were beginning to feel not only that 
 they had a share of responsibility in winning 
 America and the rest of the world to Jesus Christ, 
 but they also had an obligation to unite for the 
 
 [158]
 
 MAKING HISTOEY 
 
 accomplishment of the plan formulated by their 
 leaders with this end in view. 
 
 The second matter referred to the Central Com- 
 mittee was that of a clearer federation of the mis- 
 sionary societies. They held their first meeting 
 with representatives of the six societies in Hart- 
 ford, Connecticut, on February 6, 1900. At this 
 conference it was recommended that a committee 
 of nine be formed, one member being selected by 
 the Executive Committee of each of the six socie- 
 ties and the other three being chosen by the first 
 six. This recommendation was adopted and the 
 committee held its first meeting at Hartford on 
 July 6, 1900. 
 
 In view of the great gains that had been made 
 in federation and systematic benevolence, Mr. 
 Capen, at the meeting of the National Council held 
 in Portland, Maine, in 1901, urged still further ad- 
 vances in these directions. "We believe that with 
 the opening of the new century the time has fully 
 come when a personal canvass should be made of 
 the whole membership of our churches, to secure 
 from each one some definite pledge for missionary 
 gifts." 
 
 As chairman of the Committee of Fifteen on 
 Missionary Work, he presented the following res- 
 olutions, which were adopted by the Council: "It 
 is, therefore, Resolved, first, That we urge upon 
 all our churches the importance of laying added 
 emphasis upon the great missionary work at home 
 and abroad to which, as Congregationalists, we 
 are pledged. Resolved, second, That each church 
 
 [159]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 be requested, by a personal canvass, to reach, as 
 far as possible, every one of its members with a 
 direct personal appeal for some gift to each of our 
 six missionary societies. Eesolved, third, That 
 our churches, so far as practicable, make the 
 month of October a missionary month. Eesolved, 
 fourth, That all our churches should make some 
 provision in their Sunday school and Christian 
 Endeavor Societies for educating our young peo- 
 ple in every department of our missionary work. 
 Eesolved, fifth, That as the pastors are the great 
 leaders of the church, we urge that in all ordina- 
 tions and installations the missionary knowledge 
 and interest of the candidate should be a matter of 
 faithful inquiry. Eesolved, sixth, That we ap- 
 prove of so much of the report of the committee 
 of nine as recommends the appointment of all sal- 
 aried officers in our six societies by executive 
 boards; of the plan, so far as practicable, of one 
 administrative head; and of a limited governing 
 membership for each of our home societies. Ee- 
 solved, seventh, That we would urge the five home 
 societies to try the experiment of a united annual 
 meeting, allowing the meeting of the American 
 Board to remain unchanged for the present. Hav- 
 ing two annual meetings each year, one in the 
 East and one in the West, will be one step to- 
 wards a closer federation of all our missionary 
 work. Eesolved, eighth, That we recommend that 
 the executive boards of each of our five home so- 
 cieties consider the proposition of having an advi- 
 sory committee of seven chosen from their own 
 
 [160]
 
 MAKING HISTORY 
 
 number which shall hold stated meetings, and to 
 which all questions having to do with their joint 
 work shall be referred for advice; that with the 
 addition of two representatives from the Ameri- 
 can Board, this advisory committee take such 
 measures as they deem advisable, looking to the 
 organization in all our conferences and State mis- 
 sionary committees to urge upon the churches the 
 adoption of definite and systematic plans of be- 
 nevolence, and the appointment of local commit- 
 tees to carry these plans into effect. Resolved, 
 ninth, That we recommend that there shall be two 
 missionary publications, one devoted to foreign 
 work, the other to home work, both of them to be 
 published monthly and to be equal in literary abil- 
 ity and typographical style to the best publica- 
 tions of the day. Resolved, tenth, That we recom- 
 mend that our missionary societies unite in issu- 
 ing brief manuals of instruction and information, 
 suitable for permanent use in our Sunday schools, 
 Young People's Societies and other organizations. 
 Resolved, finally, That in memory of our noble an- 
 cestors and what they have wrought in doing 
 foundation missionary work at home and abroad, 
 and remembering their enthusiastic belief in the 
 Congregational polity as in harmony with our 
 national institutions, it is for us, their children, to 
 push on to larger service, showing thereby that 
 we are worthy to represent the faith and courage 
 and devotion of the Pilgrims." 
 
 This Committee, with Mr. Capen still Chair- 
 man, employed the Rev. Charles A. Northrop of 
 
 [161]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 Norwich, Connecticut, as the secretary for the 
 promotion of systematic benevolence. Mr. North- 
 rop 's salary was supplied by a gentleman greatly 
 interested in the success of the plan, and he en- 
 tered upon the duties of his office on March 
 1, 1904. He gave his time to speaking before 
 State Associations and Conferences and at other 
 similar gatherings at which he could obtain a hear- 
 ing. He continued his work until the spring of 
 1906, when the office was discontinued for lack of 
 funds. A little later, however, the Committee took 
 up in a practical way the matter of systematic 
 benevolence and devised and submitted to the 
 churches a plan of apportionment which had great 
 promise. The societies united in supporting it 
 and for the first time in their history their entire 
 work was presented to the churches both as a 
 whole and by the individual organizations. The 
 following resolution, passed by the officers of the 
 societies, indicates the spirit in which the plan 
 was received: 
 
 ' ' The secretaries of the national benevolent so- 
 cieties, in conference assembled, wish to express 
 their very hearty appreciation of the recent state- 
 ment of the Advisory Committee of the National 
 Council and of the plan suggested by that commit- 
 tee whereby all our benevolent work can be con- 
 sidered as a whole, and of the amounts proposed 
 which would need to be raised by each State for 
 the several societies if we are able to secure the 
 two million dollars which our benevolent work at 
 home and abroad imperatively needs." 
 
 [162]
 
 MAKING HISTORY 
 
 It is not necessary to trace this history further, 
 as this sketch brings the matter down to the pres- 
 ent apportionment plan adopted by the Congre- 
 gational churches and to the proposals for further 
 unifying the work that were adopted by the Na- 
 tional Council in Kansas City in 1913. Many of 
 the leaders of Congregationalism became more 
 radical in their progress than Mr. Capen had been 
 or desired to be, but he, more than any other man, 
 was the father of the plan which has led to such 
 important changes and which seems not yet to 
 have reached the end of its successful application 
 and development. 
 
 [163]
 
 CHAPTER XI 
 THE LAYMEN'S MISSIONARY MOVEMENT 
 
 "It seems to me that there is a fundamental 
 error in the minds of the great majority, as to the 
 supreme business of the church. It is not a reli- 
 gious club for the education and help of the con- 
 gregation, nor is it primarily for divine worship ; 
 its real purpose is to give the gospel to the world. 
 Missions are not a department of the work of the 
 church ; they are to be the center of its activities. ' ' 
 
 This significant utterance brings into marked 
 contrast Mr. Capen's high ideal of the program of 
 the Church and the actual condition which exists 
 in many churches. Only about one man in ten in 
 the membership of the Christian Church is inter- 
 ested in world-wide missions, while the average 
 gift per member is less than one cent a day for 
 missions at home and abroad. The Church, as a 
 whole, has never taken the missionary enterprise 
 seriously. 
 
 In view of this condition, Mr. Capen had the 
 profound conviction that the great need was to 
 awaken the men of the churches. To do this he 
 believed that the first great need was to give them 
 an ideal worthy of their manhood, and he was 
 convinced that there was no ideal to be compared 
 with that of the missionary purpose. For the task 
 of missions is nothing less than to give the knowl- 
 
 [164]
 
 THE LAYMEN'S MOVEMENT 
 
 edge of Christ to every man wherever he lives and 
 whatever his conditions. It brings the greatest 
 thought that can ever come to us. l ' Such a concep- 
 tion of a man's obligation broadens him and 
 furnishes the real antidote to selfishness and little- 
 ness and narrowness which make so many lives 
 petty and sordid and unworthy. ' ' 
 
 In order to give this great vision, Mr. Capen 
 felt that the Church must be more earnest and 
 persistent in furnishing information to those who, 
 in the rush of worldly things, have never gotten 
 the full meaning of life, nor had any adequate 
 knowledge of missionary work. "What men need 
 is not more rhetoric and exhortation but more in- 
 formation. ' ' And he believed that one of the best 
 ways to educate men is to secure their personal 
 interest by having them help to plan the work 
 about which they are to be informed. 
 
 While these convictions were bearing heavily 
 upon his heart there came a movement which 
 seemed to be an answer to his prayers. Mr. John 
 B. Sleman, a young business man of Washington, 
 while on his way to attend the Student Volunteer 
 Convention of 1906, held at Nashville, Tennessee, 
 conceived the idea that if the Christian business 
 men of North America could be given a vision like 
 that of the students and could be led to follow it 
 with their business sagacity and energy, the 
 slogan, "The evangelization of the world in this 
 generation," might soon pass from dream to reali- 
 zation. After the convention Mr. Sleman, who 
 was a Congregationalist, naturally laid the idea 
 
 [165]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 before Mr. Capen, and he received it with enthu- 
 siasm. Conferences were soon held with other 
 men and, on November the fifteenth, 1906, in the 
 Fifth Avenue Presbyterian Church in New York, 
 The Laymen's Missionary Movement came into 
 existence. 
 
 The purpose of the Movement as set forth in 
 the simple charter of the organization was : * ' To 
 consult with the secretaries of the foreign mis- 
 sionary boards with reference, first, to the produc- 
 tion of a campaign of education among laymen to 
 interest them more largely in missions ; second, to 
 the designing of a comprehensive plan for the 
 evangelization of the world in this generation; 
 and third, to have a commission of fifty or more 
 business men visit the several mission fields and 
 report their findings to the churches." 
 
 When this organization was formed there was 
 never a question in the mind of any member as to 
 who should lead the movement. As Lieutenant- 
 Colonel Half ord has said : ' ' There could have been 
 no other chairman but Dr. Capen, as there could 
 have been, and would have been, no successor to 
 him, unless God, Himself, should have decreed the 
 necessity. Never was the preparation of a man 
 for a place of important and unique responsibility 
 more evidently of God. His years of success in 
 business life ; his sympathetic and active relation- 
 ship to the highest movements of civic righteous- 
 ness, the leadership into which he had come not 
 through any effort of his own, but by the law of 
 natural fitness and selection in the social, educa- 
 
 [166]
 
 THE LAYMEN'S MOVEMENT 
 
 tional, philanthropic, and reformatory movements 
 of his generation ; his thorough identification with 
 every phase of the expression of the ideal Ameri- 
 can citizenship, and the humble conspicuousness 
 with which he adorned the doctrine of God, his 
 Saviour, as an earnest, practical, achieving mem- 
 ber of the church of Christ, bespoke him as the 
 elect layman of this new and important duty." 
 
 Mr. Capen threw himself into this new organi- 
 zation with unusual zeal, because he believed that 
 we are living in the age which is pre-eminently the 
 time of the layman's opportunity. "The clergy- 
 man is no longer held in awe; he is not, as 
 formerly, the only educated man in the commu- 
 nity. Our common schools, the cheapness of books 
 and magazines have changed everything and edu- 
 cation has become universal. As a result, the lay- 
 man is in every way far more influential. One 
 hundred years ago school boards were made up, 
 so far as possible, of clergymen; today in our 
 cities they are almost exclusively laymen. I pre- 
 sume it would have been but little short of sacri- 
 legious to have had anyone but a clergyman presi- 
 dent of Yale ; now it seems most natural to have a 
 layman like President Hadley. Princeton has fol- 
 lowed in the election of Woodrow Wilson. The 
 layman is wanted as never before in the work of 
 our mission and philanthropic societies. The Y. 
 M. C. A. work is exclusively his. The business 
 man's training is valuable in both organizations 
 and in executive work the layman has come to 
 his full opportunity. ' ' 
 
 [167]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 "We have already seen how Mr. Capen devoted 
 a large part of his life to an effort to awaken lay- 
 men to their responsibilities and opportunities as 
 citizens. In this Movement he devoted himself 
 with even greater earnestness to arousing the 
 laymen of America to their obligations and privi- 
 leges in that which is the chief work of the Chris- 
 tian Church, seeking to make them feel that they 
 were chosen of God to carry forward his King- 
 dom. One of our popular story-writers has 
 declared : * ' There is a whole lot of difference be- 
 tween a great man of wealth and a man of great 
 wealth. Them last is getting terribly common." 
 It is a fine distinction and men are making it in 
 increasing numbers. Many men of wealth are be- 
 ginning to realize that what has been called suc- 
 cess may be fearful failure, and they are not only 
 trying to apply Christian principles in the mak- 
 ing of their money, but are also recognizing that 
 their wealth is a trust which they hold for the im- 
 provement of the race. 
 
 In an address at Northfield, Mr. Capen dwelt at 
 length upon this subject : " The man who gives and 
 the man who preaches are partners together in 
 Christian service and neither can do the work 
 without the other. Not far away in the city of 
 Springfield there have lived three men, George, 
 Charles and Homer Merriam, who have consid- 
 ered themselves as stewards of God, and who have 
 used their great income by large and constant 
 gifts for missionary work. They have distinctly 
 declared that they were in business as stewards 
 
 [168]
 
 THE LAYMEN'S MOVEMENT 
 
 to make money that they might do more for 
 others. They wanted to accumulate that they 
 might give, and there are multitudes of men in 
 our country who, because of their business success 
 and their wealth, are doing untold service in the 
 Kingdom of God. Shall I mention a man who was 
 one of the leading merchants of Boston a few 
 years ago, the Honorable Alpheus Hardy? He 
 started in life to be a minister of the gospel, but 
 he was compelled by ill health to give up his study. 
 For a time his disappointment was bitter, but 
 soon a great light fell upon him; he saw that a 
 sacred calling was still open to him and with rap- 
 ture he cried, ' Oh, God I can be Thy minister ! I 
 will make money for Thee ; that shall by my min- 
 istry!' Henceforth he felt himself to be God's 
 man, and as much chosen and ordained as those 
 preaching the gospel from the pulpit." 
 
 In a concise and businesslike address before the 
 Annual Conference of the Foreign Missionary 
 Boards of the United States and Canada, which 
 met in Philadelphia on January 9, 1907, Mr. 
 Capen set forth the reasons for the existence of 
 this new organization. 
 
 "First, because of the inadequacy of present 
 plans and methods of missionary work. In mak- 
 ing this statement, I am not failing to recognize 
 the great work that has already been accom- 
 plished. We have planted Christian churches and 
 schools and colleges and hospitals and printing 
 plants, and have transformed nations. Neverthe- 
 less, it must be acknowledged that this represents 
 
 [169]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 the work of only a small minority of all church 
 members. We cannot have any patience with a 
 man who argues that we cannot do many times 
 what we are doing now. We have the money in 
 our pockets. There is a perfect mine of wealth 
 in the possession of the rich and of those of mod- 
 erate means, which is as yet untouched. Am I not 
 right in saying, therefore, that we need to supple- 
 ment our present methods with something else in 
 order that we may more speedily evangelize the 
 nations $ This is the primary purpose of this new 
 movement. 
 
 "The second reason for this new organization 
 is the indifference, in pews and pulpit alike, to our 
 foreign missionary work. The missionary mes- 
 sage, so far, has not touched multitudes of men in 
 churches, the very ones the movement is designed 
 to reach. We need something radically different 
 from our present plans and methods, because 
 many people do not consider proper proportion in 
 these various gifts. We rejoice in the great bene- 
 factions for secular education and philanthropy at 
 home, but the foreign missionary appeal is too 
 often forgotten. There are resources enough for 
 all. Certainly the time has fully come to adopt 
 some new plans which shall give proper place and 
 emphasis to the regular missionary work of our 
 churches. In our new movement we want to make 
 it clear to all that missions are the supreme work 
 of the Church and that money given for work 
 abroad inevitably tends to help and not hinder 
 generous gifts at home. We should recognize as 
 
 [170]
 
 THE LAYMEN'S MOVEMENT 
 
 never before the world-wide opportunity. The 
 doors are open all over the world, and the com- 
 mercial traveler has entered everywhere. Our 
 business men must have a broader vision that 
 takes in the whole world. Our own spiritual 
 safety requires a more vigorous missionary cam- 
 paign. America must save the world if she would 
 save herself, and our laymen have it in their 
 power to turn the current of thought in the 
 churches to these higher things. We want to save 
 men, and then we shall have their gifts. We need 
 a great addition to the Christian educational in- 
 stitutions abroad, in order to train more rapidly 
 native teachers. We need more hospitals and 
 more printing and industrial plants. We want 
 what President King of Oberlin has called 'capi- 
 talistic statesmen.' 
 
 A definite program, which did not duplicate the 
 work done by any other organization, was outlined 
 for the new Movement. In some respects the 
 work was to be unique in its methods. The Move- 
 ment was headed by a central committee of one 
 hundred, composed of representatives of various 
 denominations, with an executive committee of fif- 
 teen. It was proposed to secure personal pledges, 
 so that men who never before had manifested any 
 interest in missions might come under some posi- 
 tive, definite obligation which would match 
 present-day opportunities and be worthy of them- 
 selves and worthy of Christ. While some of the 
 work was to be done through organizations for 
 individual canvassing, the leaders recognized a la- 
 
 [171]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 tent power in social influences. They proposed 
 that men should meet in parlor and dining-room 
 conferences, where they would come into close 
 touch with one another, and where by questions 
 and answers they might be led to consecrate them- 
 selves to the great work. 
 
 The leaders of the movement planned to secure 
 their money by calling together small groups of 
 men and presenting to them the largeness of 
 the opportunity, and by hand-to-hand work, the 
 method employed for obtaining large gifts for col- 
 leges and hospitals in this country. They also 
 proposed to send out a commission of business 
 and professional men, who would visit at their 
 own expense the various mission stations of the 
 world, would see for themselves what was being 
 done, and would then report to the home churches. 
 They believed that such a body of men would do 
 more than could be done in any other way to re- 
 move the skepticism which exists concerning mis- 
 sionary work. " There is no lack of money," said 
 Mr. Capen, in speaking for this movement, "for 
 wherever there is an appeal for humanity, a flood 
 in Texas, a volcano eruption in the West Indies, 
 or an earthquake in San Francisco, the result is 
 always the same, generous gifts from rich and 
 poor alike. If we can only make good with our 
 churches at home, there will be money enough 
 to properly support our missionary work." It 
 was with this faith that these consecrated laymen, 
 led by Mr. Capen, launched out in the enterprise 
 of securing princely gifts for this work. 
 
 [172]
 
 THE LAYMEN'S MOVEMENT 
 
 The Laymen's Missionary Movement made its 
 chief appeal to men who were accustomed to see 
 things in the large. It never failed to present the 
 missionary problem so that it looked to men like a 
 "man's job," a call to finance the work on a scale 
 of $1,000,000,000. It was this point of view that 
 reached hundreds of men who had hitherto looked 
 upon missions as a task for women. Mr. Capen's 
 addresses were full of illustrations showing the 
 strength of the masculine appeal. Let me give 
 but one. 
 
 1 1 One of our secretaries tried to reach recently 
 one of the strongest men in the city, but it was 
 impossible for him to get by his private secretary. 
 He then tried him on the telephone and succeeded 
 in reaching him in that way. He asked for an in- 
 terview, and the man declined. He said, 'I will 
 ask you for only three minutes.' The man re- 
 plied, i I am too busy to give you even that ' ; and 
 the secretary replied, 'I am busy also.' The man 
 then asked, 'What do you want?' The answer 
 came, 'I want to see you about the Laymen's 
 Missionary Movement and the conquest of the 
 world.' The man replied, 'Come along, I have 
 time enough for that.' In another of our cities, 
 one of our former mayors and also a judge of the 
 United States Court were willing to make a per- 
 sonal canvass for missions. The judge of the 
 Court of Claims, a Cleveland man, was chairman 
 of the committee of arrangements and closed his 
 court for two days in order to take a message in 
 the name of the Laymen's Missionary Movement 
 
 [173]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 to the City of Richmond. I believe that it can 
 truthfully be said that there was never a move- 
 ment that has discovered the leading men of the 
 churches as this Laymen's Movement has already 
 done. It is bringing the laymen to have a larger 
 share in Christian work, for when they have be- 
 come interested in foreign missions they become 
 interested in other forms of church work. It is 
 bringing their business and professional training 
 to use, as well as leading them to make larger 
 gifts." 
 
 During the first two years after the organiza- 
 tion of the Laymen's Missionary Movement, great 
 progress was reported in many parts of the coun- 
 try. In eighteen cities in the South and West, and 
 upon the Pacific Coast, men met together and 
 voted to increase their foreign missionary gifts. 
 In Canada a similar campaign was waged in seven 
 cities, and as a result of it many givers voted to 
 treble their missionary offerings. In these Cana- 
 dian cities the gifts included home as well as for- 
 eign missions, as most of the denominations there 
 have but one society instead of several. In each 
 of at least four cities in the United States, one 
 denomination gave more than all the churches of 
 the city together had given the previous year. In 
 St. Joseph, Missouri, the churches voted to in- 
 crease their gifts from $12,000 to $50,000. In the 
 city of Atlanta one church that gave $1,875 in a 
 previous year secured pledges for $8,000. A con- 
 gregation in St. Louis that gave $500 one year, by 
 personal work on the part of the men raisecl their 
 
 [174]
 
 THE LAYMEN'S MOVEMENT 
 
 offering to $2,000. In a year of business de- 
 pression the Southern Presbyterians increased 
 their foreign mission offerings from $276,000 to 
 $323,000. 
 
 But these gifts were the smallest part of the 
 benefit secured from The Laymen's Missionary 
 Movement. Its campaigns inspired churches to 
 organize their men for better service in years to 
 come. One of the first to organize was the Pres- 
 byterian Church, South, which adopted as its 
 motto, "All at it and always at it, and a million 
 annually for missions." They placed a strong 
 representative in each of their eighty-three pres- 
 byteries, with the understanding that he was to 
 secure in every congregation in his division one 
 strong layman who would act as a leader of the 
 men's missionary activity in his own church. 
 
 While this movement was leading strong men to 
 give larger service to churches, it led them also 
 into a life of more frequent and earnest prayer. 
 1 l Men are becoming more and more conscious that 
 it is the most real and the most reasonable thing in 
 the world for men to talk with God. The organiza- 
 tion for foreign missions in this country started 
 from a prayer meeting at Williamstown. This 
 Laymen's Missionary Movement in its turn, one 
 hundred years later, was born in a prayer meeting 
 in New York. All the meetings of the movement 
 since, have been in the spirit of prayer. It has 
 developed the prayer life in multitudes of men. 
 They are no longer saying prayers but praying. 
 I was very much touched two years ago at Chat- 
 
 [175]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 tanooga, when I spoke before one thousand men 
 of the Methodist Church, South, that in a letter it 
 was stated that ' twenty thousand of the people 
 are praying for you. ' Many difficulties have come 
 to us, but in the most marvelous way they have 
 been removed in answer to our prayers. ' ' 
 
 Possibly the most important work that The 
 Laymen's Missionary Movement accomplished 
 was that done in the Dominion of Canada. There 
 was a vigorous campaign in all the principal 
 cities, from Halifax to Vancouver, which resulted 
 in a Canadian National Congress of The Move- 
 ment at Toronto, March 31 to April 4, 1909. Over 
 twenty-five hundred laymen were registered as 
 commissioners, and fifteen hundred ministers at- 
 tended. It is probably true that never before 
 in modern history have so many representative 
 men of the Christian Church come together in the 
 interest of world-wide missions. This Congress 
 adopted a national missionary policy, embodied 
 in these resolutions : "We recognize the clear duty 
 of the churches of Canada to evangelize all those in 
 the Dominion, all who come to our shores, who have 
 not been led to the Christian Church, and also to 
 provide for the adequate preaching of the gospel 
 to 40,000,000 souls in the non-Christian world. 
 
 "We accept the estimates of our missionary 
 leaders, that at least $1,300,000 annually should be 
 contributed to our home missionary work, and $3,- 
 200,000 annually by the churches represented in 
 this Congress aggregating a communicant mem- 
 bership of 900,000." 
 
 [176]
 
 THE LAYMEN'S MOVEMENT 
 
 The Methodist Episcopal Church, South, organ- 
 ized a Laymen's Missionary Movement and had 
 eleven hundred delegates at its first convention 
 at Chattanooga, where it fixed as its goal $3,000,- 
 
 000 annually. The South Baptist Church also or- 
 ganized its laymen and proposed to increase its 
 missionary offerings to half a million. The Inter- 
 synodical Foreign Missionary Convention of the 
 Presbyterian Church, North, held a meeting at 
 Omaha and a second one in Philadelphia. Both of 
 them voted to recommend to their churches to 
 raise, on an average, five dollars per member for 
 foreign missions. 
 
 Thus a mighty power in reshaping the lives and 
 policies of men came into existence. Mr. Capen 
 believed that this Movement among the laymen of 
 America would furnish the moral equivalent for 
 war. " Foreign missions give us that equivalent 
 in their spirit of conquest, and in the courage and 
 sacrifices they call forth. We work to mobilize 
 the men of today for the last great struggle. We 
 believe that they are going to swing into line with 
 such reserves of money as was not dreamed of a 
 few years ago. Our times are full of 'big things.' 
 
 1 like the word 'big' rather than 'large'; it is a 
 much stronger word. We see how the Pennsyl- 
 vania Railroad can tunnel the Hudson River and 
 have great terminal facilities in New York at 
 an expense of fifty or one hundred million dollars. 
 Similar enterprises are going on all about us. We 
 are coming to a better time in missions. The day 
 of formal praying and petty giving is about over. 
 
 [177]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 The day of great consecration and self-sacrifice 
 is at hand." 
 
 In The Laymen's Missionary Movement all dif- 
 ferences of creed were forgotten and men united 
 in a common work. ' ' Men are beginning to realize 
 as never before the solidarity of the race, that our 
 world is our home, that we are children of one 
 father, that the barriers are now down, and that 
 it is possible to reach all our father's children 
 throughout the whole world very quickly. It has 
 been well said, 'The nineteenth century made the 
 world a neighborhood.' The twentieth century 
 must make it a brotherhood. ' ' 
 
 [178]
 
 CHAPTER XII 
 
 At the time of his death Mr. Capen was Presi- 
 dent of The American Board of Commissioners 
 for Foreign Missions, President of The Massachu- 
 setts Peace Society, Director of The World Peace 
 Foundation, Director of The Charlesbank Homes, 
 Vice-president of The American Bible Society, 
 Chairman of The Board of Trustees of Wellesley 
 College, Trustee of The United Society of Chris- 
 tian Endeavor, Chairman of The Finance Com- 
 mittee of The United Society of Christian 
 Endeavor for the erection of its new building, 
 Director of The Boston City Missionary Society, 
 Vice-president of The Congregational Sunday 
 School and Publishing Society, Chairman of The 
 Laymen's Missionary Movement, Director of The 
 North American Civic League for Immigrants, 
 member of The Boston Indian Citizenship Com- 
 mittee, member of The Committee on Municipal 
 Affairs of The Boston Chamber of Commerce, 
 Vice-president of the American Congregational 
 Association and Vice-president of The Con- 
 sumers' League of Massachusetts. 
 
 Even this list of varied offices, appalling as it 
 seems when measured by the energy of the aver- 
 age man of today, does not represent all the serv- 
 
 [179]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 ice that this consecrated Christian was giving to 
 the world. It must not be forgotten that to the 
 last of his life Mr. Capen was a business man. 
 While he sold his interest in the firm of Torrey, 
 Bright and Capen in 1909 and retired from the 
 confining work of the carpet industry he was 
 engaged in active business enterprises until the 
 end, especially carrying the heavy responsibility 
 of several large estates for which he was trustee. 
 There were, however, certain activities to which 
 he gave so much of his time that an account of 
 his life would be incomplete if it did not make 
 brief mention of them. 
 
 A large part of Mr. Capen 's life was associated 
 with the cause of education. Though his book 
 training did not extend beyond the high school, 
 he was honored with the degree of Master of Arts 
 by Dartmouth College and received the title ' ' Doc- 
 tor of Laws" from Oberlin and Middlebury. He 
 gave much of his energy to the Boston schools, 
 to the colleges connected with his denomination 
 and to Wellesley. A Wellesley trustee, Mrs. 
 Frank Mason North, has given such an excellent 
 account of his connection with this institution 
 that we cannot do better than to embody it in 
 this biography. 
 
 "Forty years ago," she writes, " beneath the 
 oaks of Wellesley, Mr. and Mrs. Durant placed 
 the foundation stone of the College, upon which 
 was written, 'This building is humbly dedicated 
 to our Heavenly Father, with the hope and prayer 
 that He may always be first in everything in this 
 
 [180]
 
 A WELLESLEY TRUSTEE 
 
 institution; that His Word may be faithfully 
 taught here; and that He will use it as a means 
 of leading precious souls to the Lord Jesus 
 Christ.' With a College thus 'founded for the 
 glory of God and the service of the Lord Jesus 
 Christ,' and enshrining within it both the love of 
 learning and the joy of serving, Dr. Capen must 
 always have been in sympathy. To it he entrusted 
 his only daughter, and when in 1900 the College 
 sought the aid of his counsels he became an hon- 
 ored Trustee. The pre-eminence of which he 
 was ever unconscious was at once evident to his 
 colleagues and in 1905 he was chosen President of 
 the Board of Trustees. No office was to him a 
 sinecure; no title was merely honorary. Every 
 opportunity of helpfulness he 'filled up to the 
 brim.' He became the Chairman of the Execu- 
 tive Committee, which is constantly at its task, 
 and a member of the Finance Committee, upon 
 which large responsibilities must always rest. 
 Whenever special needs called for special serv- 
 ice, the finding of a new President of the College, 
 the raising of a million dollars, he quietly, gen- 
 erously, cheerfully carried a large share of the 
 burden. 
 
 "In the last half century the type of college 
 trustee has greatly altered. Formerly the clergy- 
 men, eloquent and learned, were the typical ad- 
 ministrators, now the business man, alert, practi- 
 cal, swift in judgment, wealth-commanding, is 
 sought for the large office. In President Capen 
 there was a remarkable blending of both types, 
 
 [181]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 so that he was the ideal Trustee of a great college. 
 His fervent prayers were a benediction upon 
 young hearts, as each class paused at college 
 altars for a farewell service before going forth 
 into the wide world. His eloquent addresses en- 
 kindled the enthusiasm of the Alumnae, with whom 
 on festal days he was an eagerly-welcomed guest. 
 When the call came for generous giving, his was 
 the first response. Without losing sight of the 
 great aims of the college, he devoted time and 
 thought unreservedly to business details and prob- 
 lems, mastering them easily, 'without haste and 
 without rest.' That beautiful courtesy which is 
 the very flower of Christian character, the out- 
 ward and visible sign of the graces of Christ with- 
 in, made fellowship with him, even in the most 
 laborious hours, a delight. Upon his wise, well- 
 balanced judgment the President of the college 
 and every member of the Board of Trustees re- 
 lied. In his quietness and confidence they found 
 strength. Being 'very sure of God,' he was un- 
 burdened and unafraid. Because 'he knew and 
 pursued daily the individual road that leads into 
 the presence of God, ' he brought to his tasks cour- 
 age, buoyancy, enthusiasm, efficiency, and that 
 wisdom which is pure, peaceable, gentle, full of 
 mercy and of good fruits. 
 
 "It is significant of the dominant traits in his 
 own character to discover what Dr. Capen pre- 
 eminently valued in the ideals of the college. In 
 a letter to a friend last year, he said : ' I am sure 
 that you know something of the value of Welles- 
 
 [182]
 
 A WELLESLEY TRUSTEE 
 
 ley College, the number of whose students has 
 doubled since I became a Trustee twelve years 
 ago, and it now numbers over fourteen hundred. 
 It was founded by Mr. Durant as a great Christian 
 college, with this text as its motto: "Not to be 
 ministered unto, but to minister." The college, 
 I believe, is keeping true to that purpose. While 
 the intellectual equipment is of the very best, the 
 real "Wellesley spirit, to live for others, is never 
 lost sight of. One of the very interesting things 
 to me in the life of the college is that wealth and 
 social position do not count against fitness when 
 the students have their own officers to elect. I am, 
 also, glad to write that the missionary spirit is 
 strong in the college. Wellesley women are in all 
 the world, so that we can feel sure that the sun 
 never sets on our work.' 
 
 "Dr. Capen took delight in the beauty of 
 Wellesley lakes and lawn and woodland, and in 
 the effervescing life of the thronging girls, 
 'crowned with youth's white crown of aspiration' : 
 he cherished the material prosperity of the col- 
 lege and sought its increase; he counted precious 
 that scholarship which is deep, sincere, reverent, 
 modest, serviceable, the love of truth in nature, 
 in history, in arts, in literature, and in the soul 
 of man. But to him, as to the Founder of the col- 
 lege, the new higher education never meant sim- 
 ply the opening of doors of profound learning to 
 women; it was a summons to a larger service in 
 the Kingdom of God. These words of the Founder 
 might well express his thought: 'The Shekinah 
 
 [183]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 light must shine to the ends of the earth and the 
 light-carriers must be Christian women. I could 
 see the college in ashes, but I could not bear to 
 have it send out only intellectual women, without 
 the radiance and the vitalizing power of the spirit 
 of Christ.' The last message of the Founder 
 might have been his also : ' Christ first in all things 
 and always.' 
 
 After Mr. Capen's death The Board of Trus- 
 tees of Wellesley College passed resolutions which 
 not only embodied their appreciation of his 
 excellent service, but which also placed strong 
 emphasis on certain dominant traits of his 
 life. 
 
 "Mr. Capen brought to the service of the Col- 
 lege all that made him prominent and useful in 
 church and state, devotion to the cause which he 
 served, enthusiasm in his work, mature judgment, 
 and large experience. He was regular in his at- 
 tendance at meetings of the Board and its various 
 committees and informed himself carefully of the 
 many matters brought before them. With no self- 
 ish motive and with rare tact, he contributed 
 largely to the solution of all questions under con- 
 sideration. Not the least important of his service 
 was his work on the sub-committees, to which 
 were referred many important, and at times, deli- 
 cate matters of administrative policy, of law, of 
 ethics, and mental problems, which cannot be 
 treated in the infrequent gatherings of the Board, 
 or in the limited time given by the standing 
 committees. As a presiding officer, he was firm, 
 
 [184]
 
 A WELLESLEY TEUSTEE 
 
 courteous, influential; at public functions he rep- 
 resented the college with dignity and impres- 
 sively. The regard and, indeed, affection Mr. 
 Capen commanded from all his associates was 
 due to his personality, and this he carried into his 
 relations with the faculty and students; to them 
 he was a sympathetic friend, as well as a sound 
 adviser. Mr. Capen carried his duties to Welles- 
 ley upon his conscience, and we know that many 
 of its problems he took into his closet and made 
 them the subject of prayer. His own judgment 
 did not suffice for him ; he sought Divine guidance. 
 His Christian character, unobtrusive and imper- 
 sonal, created an atmosphere in which he moved 
 and worked." 
 
 While Mr. Capen gave much of his energy to 
 general education, it was the Christian college in 
 which his interest centered. He looked to those 
 institutions where Christianity is exalted as the 
 hope of our country. He saw that they supply 
 the majority of the recruits for the mission fields, 
 that from them came very largely the young min- 
 isters and those men and women who are ready 
 to sacrifice and suffer for the redemption of the 
 race. With his keen practical sense, he observed 
 that they send out students who have, in addition 
 to trained minds and much information, hearts 
 full of enthusiasm for the coming of the Kingdom 
 of God and who possess the spirit of which mar- 
 tyrs and crusaders are made. 
 
 "The safety of the Republic not only depends 
 upon its intelligence, but it is vitally important 
 
 [185]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 that the basis of that intelligence shall be reli- 
 gious. Education without Christianty has left out 
 its chief factor, and the source of the greatest 
 power. You may take a block of marble and chisel 
 it ever so skilfully into some matchless human 
 form, but it is marble still, cold and lifeless. So it 
 is with education without religion; that which 
 gives the life and power and meaning is wanting. 
 We need more men like Senator Hoar, with reli- 
 gious convictions to lead the people in civic mat- 
 ters. While men think and act for themselves, 
 perhaps as never before, yet it is equally true that 
 people are more and more being guided by leaders 
 in whom they have confided. While it is not so 
 blind a leadership as in the early centuries, or in 
 other lands, yet in its intelligence it is just as real. 
 The Christian college is needed to train such men 
 in righteousness. If you want to sustain missions 
 then sustain the Christian college of the newer 
 States, for they furnish the missionaries. From 
 what other sources are men to be obtained who 
 will most intelligently carry the gospel into the 
 hundreds of places west of the Missouri River, 
 where no gospel is preached? If you want Chris- 
 tian teachers, then support the Christian colleges, 
 for they must furnish the teachers for the new 
 States. Where shall we obtain men for our theo- 
 logical seminaries unless we obtain them from our 
 Christian colleges 1 Statistics show that our State 
 colleges and universities furnish comparatively 
 few men for the theological seminary. Figures 
 obtained a few years ago show that the Christian 
 
 [186]
 
 A WELLESLEY TRUSTEE 
 
 colleges furnish ninety-three per cent of these 
 theological students, and there is no reason to be- 
 lieve that there has been any material change. No 
 Christian civilization can exist permanently with- 
 out a thoroughly educated and Godly ministry, 
 and such a ministry cannot be perpetuated with- 
 out the Christian college." 
 
 It was this conviction which led him not only to 
 give much of his energy to Wellesley and Chris- 
 tian colleges in the "West, but also to assume, in 
 1901, the presidency of the Corporation of the In- 
 ternational Institute for Girls in Spain. Mrs. 
 Alice Freeman Palmer had been the President 
 of the Corporation but owing to the condition of 
 her health and because of her many responsibili- 
 ties she had been compelled to resign the office. 
 She persuaded Mr. Capen to take her place and 
 for several years he entered heartily into the work 
 of this institution which, under the leadership of 
 Mrs. Alice Gordon Gulick, was doing for the 
 young women of Spain what Mt. Holyoke and 
 Wellesley were accomplishing for the women of 
 America. He was especially active in raising 
 money for new buildings the Institute needed and 
 showed wisdom and tact in guiding the Corpora- 
 tion through a time of trying experiences. 
 
 One of the most significant organizations de- 
 veloped among men of the modern city has been 
 the Chamber of Commerce. Mr. George S. Smith 
 of the Boston Chamber has truly said: "It is only 
 a few years ago that a man would have been called 
 an impractical idealist to confess himself a be- 
 
 [187]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 liever in a city plan. Today the most practical 
 business men believe in it. The men of a few 
 decades ago were called idealists if they discussed 
 housing conditions from an economic standpoint. 
 Today the majority of business men are recogniz- 
 ing that it is fundamental. So I could go on citing 
 to you thousands of men in this city, and their 
 prototypes found in every city, who in the last 
 few years have come out of themselves and have 
 broadened their sympathies and are interested in 
 the weal of society in general." In other words, 
 the social conscience has been awakened, so that 
 business men by thousands are today trying to 
 accomplish through Chambers of Commerce what 
 Mr. Capen and his fellow workers were endeavor- 
 ing to bring about through civic leagues and kin- 
 dred organizations a decade or more ago. These 
 Chambers are more than mere business organiza- 
 tions developed with the object of increasing the 
 material production of cities ; they are moral and 
 social forces working for the uplift of the entire 
 municipal life. 
 
 It was this broadened purpose which led Mr. 
 Capen, during the last years of his life, to devote 
 much of his time to the Boston Chamber of Com- 
 merce. He was a member of one of its most im- 
 portant committees, that on Municipal Affairs, 
 and gave freely of his time and energy to guiding 
 and creating legislation that related to Boston; 
 and he devoted hours to matters of civic improve- 
 ment. Probably one of the most important pieces 
 of work he did for the Chamber was to act as 
 
 [188]
 
 A WELLESLEY TRUSTEE 
 
 chairman of the committee which arranged for 
 the important meeting of the International 
 Chamber of Commerce, which met in Boston in 
 1912. This gathering of the leading business men 
 of all nations was one of the most influential con- 
 ventions that ever was held in Boston. Its resolu- 
 tions were the most far-reaching that had ever 
 come from any similar gathering, not only on 
 purely financial matters, but also on the question 
 of world peace. 
 
 In the last year of his life, Mr. Capen was 
 greatly interested in the work of The North Amer- 
 ican Civic League for Immigrants. During the 
 past generation we have received into this coun- 
 try sixteen million persons, or more than five 
 times as many as lived in the original thirteen 
 colonies when we secured our liberty from Great 
 Britain. Most of these people have come to us 
 not only ignorant of our language, but also un- 
 trained in our traditions and ideals. Many of 
 them have suffered so keenly from oppression 
 that they regard all government as evil and the 
 representatives of all law as enemies. A majority 
 of them, however, come with the best intentions, 
 desiring to improve their own conditions and 
 those of their families. But Mr. Capen saw that 
 if they are to do this they must be welcomed by 
 those who can guide them aright. In their ig- 
 norance they are often a prey to the vicious and 
 the selfish, but, if met at the start with a kindly 
 and brotherly spirit they will become loyal, self- 
 respecting, helpful citizens. If, on the other hand, 
 
 [189]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 they are neglected, they will become a menace and 
 a source of peril. 
 
 The North American Civic League for Immi- 
 grants was organized with the purpose of inform- 
 ing the incoming multitude of the requirements 
 of American citizenship and of protecting them 
 from the designs of the unscrupulous. It pro- 
 posed to do this by having the immigrants taught 
 the English language and by forming schools 
 where they could be instructed in the fundamen- 
 tals of good citizenship, becoming acquainted with 
 our history and learning the ideals of our national 
 life. Pamphlets were printed in four languages 
 and in one year one hundred thousand persons 
 took advantage of the opportunities offered. 
 
 It was just the type of work to which Mr. Capen 
 could gladly give his energy and wisdom. It 
 seemed to him an opportunity to bring the King- 
 dom upon the earth. In writing on the subject he 
 said: "What greater honor could come to any 
 people than to continue to become the hope of the 
 oppressed? The story of the great Republic is 
 known in all the world. The people of the old 
 world love this nation and that for which she 
 stands. Those who come here are friendly, prej- 
 udiced in our favor. In our Civil War men born 
 under another flag were loyal soldiers and gave 
 their lives freely that the Republic might live. 
 Such foreign-born men will continue to be loyal 
 and true, if we meet them as we should with a 
 hand of welcome, throw about them protection 
 from wrong, educate them in our language, our 
 
 [190]
 
 A WELLESLEY TRUSTEE 
 
 hopes and our purposes, and lead them to an in- 
 telligent citizenship. With our wide-open doors 
 there is an awful peril, if we are careless and in- 
 different; if, however, we are true and faithful 
 there is an opportunity for service to other na- 
 tions such as has never before been accorded to 
 any people. This new movement makes a univer- 
 sal appeal. Most organizations represent some 
 one party, or creed, or sect, or section ; this organ- 
 ization appeals to men of all parties and creeds 
 and nationalities." 
 
 It was a movement that appealed to Mr. Capen 
 from the side of economy. He believed that the 
 ignorant laborer, especially if embittered against 
 the law or against capital or society, is not as val- 
 uable a helper as the man who is an intelligent 
 citizen. 
 
 The work appealed to him also from the side of 
 patriotism. " Every man who loves America, and 
 that for which she stands, must be an enthusiastic 
 believer in this movement. To take these men who 
 are coming to our shores in such large numbers 
 and make them and their households over into 
 self-respecting American citizens is a mighty 
 work. The destiny of the nation for weal or woe 
 depends largely upon our fidelity to this trust. 
 We must either lift them up, or they will drag us 
 down. ' ' 
 
 Again, the movement appealed to him from the 
 side of humanity. He believed in it because it was 
 trying to lift men higher and give them a better 
 chance in life. "It is in harmony with the spirit 
 
 [191]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 of our day. It has been pointed out that the eight- 
 eenth century stood for toleration, the nineteenth 
 century for competition, the twentieth century for 
 brotherhood. There is a great world conscience at 
 work, and we no longer hear the old cry which 
 sounded through the centuries, 'Am I my 
 brother's keeper?' but a new message in positive 
 form, 'I am my brother's keeper.' " 
 
 When the League was young and unknown it had 
 to struggle for a hearing. Men were indifferent 
 to its appeals and gave neither time nor money to 
 its work. It was then that the Hon. D. Chauncey 
 Brewer enlisted the active sympathy of Mr. Capen 
 in the organization. He became one of its directors 
 and devoted much time and energy to securing 
 money for its work and to presenting its claim 
 before The Boston Chamber of Commerce and be- 
 fore strong men in the churches. 
 
 [192]
 
 CHAPTER XIII 
 THE JOURNEY ABROAD 
 
 For years it had been the purpose of Mr. Capen 
 to see missionary work in actual operation, but, as 
 he frequently stated, he did not wish to do this 
 until after he had "learned the home end of it." 
 In the spring of 1913, when it was being planned 
 that a commission should attend the Centenary 
 Celebration of the opening of the first American 
 mission in Asia, it seemed to him, as it did to all, 
 that the time had come for his visit. He and two 
 others were chosen as the commission by the Pru- 
 dential Committee of the American Board and 
 great satisfaction at his appointment was ex- 
 pressed in many letters from the nearer and far- 
 ther East. It was decided that the party should 
 proceed through Turkey, Egypt, India, Ceylon, 
 China, Korea, Japan, returning home by way of 
 the Pacific. Details for the entire journey were so 
 carefully worked out that the arrival of the party 
 in Shanghai, China, nearly five months after the 
 start from Boston, fell upon the date originally 
 scheduled. This is a commentary upon Mr. 
 Capen 's habit of punctilious promptness. 
 
 He went also as the representative of The Mas- 
 sachusetts Peace Society and The World Peace 
 Foundation. Mr. Ginn contributed a generous 
 
 [193]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 check to make this possible and it was arranged 
 that, especially in China and Japan, Mr. Capen 
 should speak before representative bodies of busi- 
 ness men. 
 
 On September 6, 1913, Mr. Capen, accompanied 
 by Mrs. Capen, Miss Mary Capen and other 
 friends, sailed from Boston. The trip was made 
 by way of Italy, where he visited in Pompeii and 
 Rome, studying the monuments of the decayed 
 civilizations, of which he wrote at length to his 
 Bible Class. 
 
 But he was more interested in studying the 
 Italy of today. He wrote : ' ' I am glad for this op- 
 portunity to see a little of the new Italy. The 
 Italians are very proud of their nation, especially 
 of the last fifty years of its history, since Garibaldi 
 set them free. Seventy-five to eighty-five per 
 cent of the men of Italy are lost to the old church. 
 I am told there are three reasons for this. (1) 
 The men are full of enthusiam for their nation 
 and they feel that they cannot be patriots and 
 Catholics. They have chosen, therefore, to be pa- 
 triots. (2) The Catholic religion of Italy is reac- 
 tionary and faces to the past. The leaders do 
 not care to let in the light. New Italy on the other 
 hand is progressive and is facing the future. (3) 
 They hate the heads of the church because they 
 are a political machine and they are weary of its 
 intrigue. Northern Italy is much more progres- 
 sive than Southern Italy; the people are better 
 educated and more intelligent. In the south, the 
 church has its strongest hold. The Mayor of 
 
 [194]
 
 THE JOURNEY ABROAD 
 
 Rome is a Hebrew and he is outspoken against the 
 papal authorities. What Italy needs, it seems to 
 me, is a new Martin Luther with the gifts of 
 leadership and the people are ready to follow him. 
 They are a wonderful people with a great history. 
 Some day, and not a very distant one, I believe, 
 they will be redeemed from their ignorance and 
 superstition and come into the larger liberty of 
 the children of God. They have thrown away their 
 old religion. It is to be Christianity or Atheism. ' ' 
 
 Owing to a plague of cholera in Turkey, the 
 commission did not visit the mission stations in 
 that country, but proceeded directly from Naples 
 to Cairo, Egypt. 
 
 While in Cairo Mr. Capen saw the value of mis- 
 sions in an unusually striking and concrete way. 
 "In the afternoon, with our guide, we drove 
 through the streets with their old shops, 
 then through the Mussulman quarters and the 
 oldest streets in Cairo, miles of dirt, wretched- 
 ness, squalor and ignorant humanity. There is 
 no race suicide here and what wretched people! 
 It seems a blessing to learn that the conditions are 
 so unsanitary that seventy-five per cent of the 
 children die before they are two years old. If 
 anyone does not believe in missions I would like 
 to have him go through that wretched Mussulman 
 quarter, and then in contrast go and look at the 
 faces of the boys and girls at the American Mis- 
 sion, and see how Christian education is redeem- 
 ing noble men and women. ' ' 
 
 The primary purpose of the commission, as we 
 [195]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 have stated, was to attend the Centenary of 
 America's Christian connection with Asia, ob- 
 served in the Marathi Mission in Bombay, India. 
 The account of the arrival of the commission at 
 that city and some of their observations were re- 
 corded by Mr. Capen: "We arrived early in the 
 morning of October thirty-first, and saw the glori- 
 ous sun rise over the harbor and the city. The 
 steamer did not come up to the wharf, but we were 
 landed in a tug. On the wharf to meet us was Dr. 
 Robert A. Hume and his son Ernest, who has be- 
 come so famous in his knowledge of Indian litera- 
 ture, the pastor and officers of the church, and I 
 don't know how many of the members. "We were 
 immediately garlanded; it is the Indian way of 
 honoring guests. It is a beautiful custom. You 
 have a long garland of flowers put over your neck 
 and are at the same time given a small bouquet of 
 flowers. We were then driven in carriages to the 
 church compound. Here the church was gathered 
 and the children from their mission schools, hun- 
 dreds in all, and we had a great reception. We 
 were all garlanded and then several photographs 
 taken. We then went to breakfast about ten 
 o 'clock. Friday afternoon we rode to the Towers 
 of Silence, the Parsee burial place. We had the 
 permission to enter through the favor of one of 
 their leaders. At death, the vultures come and de- 
 vour the bodies, and then the bones are buried. 
 We drove also through the Hindu quarter of the 
 city in the early evening. It was the closing day 
 of the Feast of Lamps and the houses and stores 
 
 [196]
 
 were all lighted. Merchants open a new set of 
 books at this time and every man worships his 
 own business, whatever it is. The new ledgers are 
 brought to a Brahmin priest and worshipped 
 through him. In the evening we had a reception 
 in the church in honor of the Commission and 
 were garlanded again. We all had to respond. 
 
 ' ' On Saturday, November first, we went to Miss 
 Millard's Industrial School for Blind Boys. Then 
 we visited the home of a very wealthy merchant, 
 a great leader here among the reformed class of 
 Hindus. He is a manufacturer of cotton cloth. It 
 was a great opportunity to see the inside of his 
 beautiful home. In the afternoon we saw just the 
 opposite of all this. We went to an old Hindu 
 Temple where a rich Hindu woman has spent her 
 fortune in a resort for Hindu holy men, so-called, 
 and Hindus on a pilgrimage. The entrance to it, 
 through which we passed, was vile, and the sight 
 of wretched humanity was awful. They sat on 
 the floor in this wretchedness, long haired, dirty, 
 an unspeakable sight. We saw Hindu philan- 
 thropy at its best and it was wretched enough. 
 In the afternoon at 5.30 we had a meeting of the 
 Christian Association, more speeches and more 
 garlands. That evening, with Dr. Strong, I went 
 to Sholapur,one of our mission stations, and spent 
 our first Sunday in India. At 9.30 we had a meet- 
 ing with all the Sunday schools. They were lined 
 up and we walked into the church between them. 
 Part of the way we walked over some red cloth 
 which I found afterwards were some red turbans 
 
 [197]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 unwound. The owners were told that they ought 
 to feel greatly honored because we had walked 
 over them. The children's exercises were splen- 
 did, although in Marathi language. Indian boys 
 are great on dialogues. We were garlanded again 
 and also had bracelets of flowers put around our 
 wrists. We saw one very sad sight. Several of 
 the Hindu girls were betrothed to be married, al- 
 though only about eight or ten years old. They 
 had the mark on their foreheads and a necklace 
 which answers to our wedding ring. 
 
 1 ' Sunday afternoon there was a united meeting 
 of the church and several Christian Endeavor So- 
 cieties. We were garlanded four or five times 
 more by the different Societies. At 6.30 I spoke 
 at the Eipon Club, a social club of English speak- 
 ing Hindus, Mohammedans and Parsees. They 
 have a fine club house. My theme was on 'Inter- 
 national Brotherhood.' On Monday we visited 
 the mission schools. We then went to the leper 
 asylum, more speeches and more garlands. They 
 then drove me out to see a low class people who 
 make their living by pilfering. They were raw 
 heathens with no schools and miserable straw 
 huts, not high enough to even sit up straight in. 
 In the afternoon, the native helpers from the out 
 stations came to the bungalow. There were about 
 sixty-five of them and about ten white mission- 
 aries and teachers. They told of their work and 
 we were garlanded again. Three girls of the grad- 
 uating class were there and had dialogues, as 
 beautiful Christian girls as you ever saw, with the 
 
 [198]
 
 THE JOURNEY ABROAD 
 
 light of heaven upon their faces. The girls' 
 dormitory was illuminated for us with tiny lamps 
 consisting of a little earthen vessel with some oil 
 and a wick exactly like what they used in Bible 
 times. If anyone doubts what Christ is doing, let 
 him see what I have seen in the last two days. The 
 first missionary came here fifty years ago and it 
 was spiritual darkness. Today there is a church 
 of six hundred and fifty members, Sunday schools 
 and Christian Endeavor Societies, schools for 
 boys and girls, out-stations with Christian 
 workers and the community is being transformed. 
 There have been in this station about five thou- 
 sand Christians in the fifty years. No one has 
 any idea of the wretchedness of the homes of the 
 low caste, or outcast proper; they are made of 
 mud and straw and cost about three rupees, or 
 one of our American dollars. These are the better 
 class ; the poorer ones do not look as if they cost 
 thirty cents." 
 
 The feelings of Mr. Capen and his fellow 
 travelers as they stood in the presence of the 
 great Christian congregation of India at the cele- 
 bration of one hundred years of missions, taking 
 to those people the greetings of President Wood- 
 row Wilson, of the governor of Massachusetts and 
 of the American Board cannot adequately be 
 described. 
 
 In his address Mr. Capen reviewed some of the 
 more important changes of the century, calling at- 
 tention to the fact that one hundred years before 
 there had been no steamships nor railroads, no 
 
 [199]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 telegraphs, telephones, nor airships. Little had 
 been known in the United States either of the 
 Near East or of the Far East; it was a strange 
 country to which Gordon Hall and Samuel Nott 
 had sailed, and six or seven months had elapsed 
 before the home office knew of their safe arrival. 
 The United States had been flooded with French 
 Atheism, and Tom Paine clubs had been very com- 
 mon. Yale and Princeton had been centers of in- 
 fidelity, the former having only two Christian 
 students and the latter not even one. Sunday 
 schools and similar organizations had not been 
 dreamed of. There had been no organized Chris- 
 tianity outside of the local churches. When the 
 American Board petitioned the Massachusetts 
 Legislature for a charter, it had been at first re- 
 fused, with the statement that Massachusetts had 
 no religion that it could afford to export. 
 
 One hundred years before, he continued, there 
 had been little missionary interest anywhere in 
 the world. When the first missionaries had tried 
 to enter India, they had been refused admission, 
 the authorities asserting that they " would rather 
 have a ship-load of devils than a ship-load of mis- 
 sionaries. ' ' The first Sunday school in Massachu- 
 setts had not been established until 1810 ; in 1913 
 there were in the United States alone 13,732,841 
 schools, and missions were being given a place in 
 their courses of study. The first Young People's 
 Society of Christian Endeavor had been organ- 
 ized in 1881, only thirty-two years before, but 
 there were then in the United States 44,864 socie- 
 
 [200]
 
 THE JOURNEY ABROAD 
 
 ties, with about 2,000,000 workers, and missions 
 were everywhere a part of the warp and woof of 
 Christian Endeavor work. The Student Volun- 
 teer Movement for Foreign Missions had had its 
 birth at Mt. Hermon in 1886, and it had reached 
 by its propaganda nearly one thousand institu- 
 tions of higher learning in the United States. In 
 the twenty-seven years of its existence 5,500 of 
 those enrolled by it had been sent out to foreign 
 lands by the mission boards. Growing out of The 
 Young Men's and The Young Women's Christian 
 Associations and The Student Volunteer Move- 
 ment, The World's Student Federation, which 
 then comprised 2,305 associations and 156,071 
 members, had become a parliament of the world. 
 In 1906 the Laymen's Missionary Movement had 
 been started. No organization had ever reached 
 mature men as this had. 
 
 But great as had been the development of the 
 thought and the activity of the Church and other 
 religious organizations there has been an even 
 greater change in the thought of the world. ' ' The 
 diplomacy of the world is on the side of mis- 
 sions," declared Mr. Capen. "Our great leaders 
 in the United States, President Wilson, Ex-Presi- 
 dent Taft, Secretary of State Bryan, and many 
 others, are enthusiastic believers in the mission 
 enterprises. The press of America is almost uni- 
 versally in favor of missions. Within the last few 
 years there is hardly a paper of any prominence 
 in this country which has not had some sympa- 
 thetic editorial notice of missions. ' ' 
 
 [201]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 While Mr. Capen dwelt at length on the new 
 forces which had enlarged the religious life of 
 America in one hundred years, he recognized that 
 greater changes had taken place as a result of the 
 reflex influence of missions upon this country. He 
 pointed out how missions had saved the United 
 States from narrowness and provincialism, how 
 it had appealed to the heroism of the student class, 
 furnishing a moral equivalent for war, how the 
 work had brought together the various denomina- 
 tions of America, not only reducing ecclesiastical 
 divisions, but also preventing a wicked waste of 
 money, men and energy, and how it had become 
 one of the greatest forces in uniting the whole 
 world and hastening the day of universal peace 
 and good will. 
 
 Mr. Capen was an optimist, but his opinion was 
 based upon facts of history. When he contem- 
 plated them, his great soul looked forward with 
 confidence into the future. "We are on the 
 threshold of a great movement that is to Chris- 
 tianize the nations. To accomplish this we should 
 federate our work at home, and federate all our 
 missionary work abroad. This passion for re- 
 deeming humanity has been one of the greatest 
 phenomena of this century, and it is based on love 
 for a personal Christ. With courage, faith, 
 and indomitable patience, our missionaries have 
 sought to Christianize the older nations of the 
 world. 'What an absurdity is this effort,' so the 
 world says. It has learned better now. Yet, it is 
 the same absurdity as when a little band of fisher- 
 
 [202]
 
 THE JOURNEY ABROAD 
 
 men, inspired by their risen Lord, sought to Chris- 
 tianize the Roman Empire. Who triumphed 
 then! "Who will triumph now? God, God, who is 
 back of all." 
 
 Wherever Mr. Capen went in India he was im- 
 pressed by the degrading social conditions the 
 enslaved womanhood, the loveless lot of wives, the 
 hopeless state of young widows, the deadening ef- 
 fect of the caste system and the wide-spread im- 
 purity. He realized the regrettable lack of wise 
 philanthropy and appreciated the inability of the 
 native religions to reform or redeem. 
 
 Concerning his visit to Benares, the sacred city 
 of India, he wrote: "We started at seven o'clock 
 in the morning, piloted by Rev. Mr. Longman of 
 the London Missionary Society, to go to the 
 Ganges and see its Hindu Temples. We took a 
 large flat-bottom craft, rowed by two men with 
 long sweeping oars, and we went back and forth 
 and saw the crowds taking their morning worship 
 by bathing in the sacred Ganges. The banks were 
 lined with temples, the bells were ringing to wake 
 up the gods, people were bringing their gifts of 
 flowers and fruits to give to the gods, which the 
 priests got. The holy men were in evidence. 
 Some of them were saying over and over again, 
 'Ram, Ram/ the name of their god; others had 
 their hands over their faces and were swinging 
 around; one was holding his nose, as certain 
 prayers are to be said holding your breath. There 
 was an ascetic in a stone cavity going through his 
 prayers. There is a regular formula, and to do 
 
 [203]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 the whole thing takes three or four hours. There 
 are about three miles of these temples, and thou- 
 sands of priests who live on the credulity of the 
 poor people by taking their gifts. The pilgrims 
 come from everywhere. At times of festivals, 
 sometimes a million people are here and what 
 must it be then! Bullocks are brought as offer- 
 ings and two of them were having a fight on the 
 steps of one of the temples, the worshippers urg- 
 ing them. Strange sights indeed they were ! We 
 then left our boat and walked a while in the nar- 
 row gulleys and lanes among these temples. It 
 was the saddest sight I ever saw. Horrible idols, 
 impure and corrupt, lined the way. I would not 
 write about them; it makes me recoil to think 
 about them. I saw a spiked bed and a holy man 
 sat on it for the gift of a few annas. He was a 
 downright fraud. There is the Inner Pool, which 
 we passed in our walk, considered the most sacred 
 spot in India. We went by the Golden Temple 
 and the Cow Temple. In the latter, you can often 
 see poor deluded people kissing the cow's tail. 
 There was a constant procession of people passing 
 into these temples with their offerings of jars of 
 water from the sacred Ganges, and other things. 
 The bells were clanging and the narrow lane was 
 lined with a solid row of beggars holding out their 
 hands and beseeching us to give. The whole thing 
 was awful and depressingly sad. I have seen it 
 once ; I never want to see it again. The holy men, 
 so-called, are the biggest frauds ! They are prac- 
 tically naked. We photographed one and gave 
 
 [204]
 
 THE JOUKNEY ABROAD 
 
 him an anna, which is two cents. We were fol- 
 lowed for a mile or two by another one, who said 
 we gave the other man an anna and he wanted one, 
 too. He was also after other visitors. The whole 
 system is awfully degrading; it is a religion of 
 lust. One of the temples has a sign over it, 'No 
 Women Admitted ' ; the images are awfully vile, I 
 am told. Some of the temples have rooms up- 
 stairs kept for vile purposes, and all in the name 
 of religion ! One of the sacred books declares that 
 if a Brahmin teaches an outcast, both will go to 
 one of the lowest hells. That is all the message 
 that Hinduism can give to fifty million human 
 beings with immortal souls, who are born outside 
 of caste. Compare this with the message of Jesus 
 Christ to every human being, a message of love 
 and forgiveness. Yet we have swamis come to 
 America and tell about the beauties of Hindu- 
 ism. If I ever run across one of those fellows 
 when I get home, he will have an uncomfortable 
 time. ' ' 
 
 In view of these conditions, and considering also 
 his own passion to bring the Kingdom of God on 
 the earth, we do not find it unnatural that in his 
 addresses at the Centenary of the Marathi Mis- 
 sion he laid the chief emphasis upon the social 
 message of Christianity. He dwelt at length upon 
 what Christianity has done for woman and upon 
 her place in the world, showing that where Chris- 
 tianity has not entered woman has everywhere 
 been degraded, and has been used as a slave and a 
 drudge. Once, he stated, it was thought impossi- 
 
 [205]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 ble for woman to be taught; people considered 
 that it would be easier, for example, to teach a 
 cow to read. 
 
 "Where Christianity has entered," he con- 
 tinued, "there is a growing recognition that 
 woman is the equal of man. She should have the 
 same legal rights. Where Christianity has en- 
 tered, universal respect is paid to her. The first 
 institution God made was the home, and woman, 
 as the mother of the children, has been the center 
 of it. Christianity has made her the queen. No 
 wonder women love Christ, for it is his teaching 
 which has lifted them to their present broad posi- 
 tion of influence." 
 
 He dwelt also upon the fact that it is Chris- 
 tianity that has emphasized the sacredness of 
 marriage. "Where the principles of Christ have 
 never entered, the marriage tie has been lightly 
 held; plural wives, wives of inferior rank, wives 
 kept and used as slaves, have been the rule. We 
 know the wretchedness and degradation of it all. 
 Compare this with Christian marriage, one 
 woman with one man, as equals, as partners to- 
 gether, for joy or for sorrow, for better, for 
 worse, to the end of life." 
 
 He emphasized the fact that it was Christ who 
 first laid supreme stress not only upon the outer 
 conduct but also upon the inner thought who 
 taught the world that the sin of lust is in the 
 thought and that this comes before the outward 
 act. "We know the awful immoralities permitted 
 in non-Christian lands, not only permitted but 
 
 [206]
 
 THE JOURNEY ABEOAD 
 
 often committed in the name of religion. No man 
 can be a Christian, however, who does not strive 
 for a clean heart and a pure life. ' ' 
 
 In the midst of a nation of poverty, where there 
 was no systematic charity and no effort on the 
 part of the higher caste to elevate the lower, Mr. 
 Capen made it clear to his hearers that Christian- 
 ity creates respect for the weak and the poor 
 that the heart of Christ's religion is in the love 
 and care which it inspires its followers to show to 
 the sick and the dependent. Finally, in a land 
 honeycombed by the caste system, he led them to 
 think of Christianity as the origin of civil and re- 
 ligious liberty, of the Sermon on the Mount as lay- 
 ing the foundation of democracy and of the letters 
 of Paul as showing that in the Kingdom of God 
 there can be no recognition of distinctions between 
 master and slave, but that all stand as Christ's 
 free men. He prophesied that some day oppres- 
 sion of every kind will cease and that the truth of 
 Christ's message that greatness is not in wealth 
 and power and position but in service to others 
 will be everywhere realized. 
 
 Even when he spoke to these Christians of In- 
 dia upon a distinctly religious subject, "The 
 Cross of Christ, ' ' it was the social aspect that was 
 uppermost. The cross, he declared, is a challenge 
 to every man to the noblest service, a call away 
 from a life of ease to a life of unselfish devotion. 
 ' ' The way of complete and final victory is only by 
 the way of the cross. The things most worthy are 
 achieved by sacrifices. We must make Jesus 
 
 [207]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 Christ Master and Lord in all our lives. We must 
 yield a sacrificial obedience to His will. We must 
 consider our lives a trust from Him. Not until 
 we are willing to work and give so that it will be 
 real sacrifices that cost something, shall we be 
 able to perform the task that is permitted to us. 
 It was not an easy thing for Christ to redeem the 
 world, nor has the work thus far accomplished 
 been carried on in an easy way. All the gains 
 thus far have been through sacrifices in the way 
 of the cross. Let us join the number of those who 
 are willing to give themselves, their time, their 
 means, their pleasure, that Christ may be quickly 
 known in all the earth. ' ' 
 
 He was much impressed by the work of those 
 far-sighted missionaries who had established 
 schools and laid their foundations by developing 
 a generation of intelligent Christians rather than 
 by devoting all their time to preaching and direct 
 evangelistic work. Thousands of dollars have 
 been wasted by some denominations in work of 
 this latter type. Their missionaries have gone 
 forth with enthusiasm and have often enrolled 
 large numbers of so-called "converts," but they 
 have failed to build up Christian communities or 
 to effect permanently the social life. On the other 
 hand, missionaries like Hume and Fairbank and 
 their families have established schools, and have 
 not only made converts, but have changed the life 
 of entire cities, forming intelligent Christian com- 
 munities and creating leaders for the new India. 
 
 Mr. Capen wrote concerning his visit to Ah- 
 [208]
 
 mednagar: "Dr. Hume is the leading missionary 
 here, although he has a fine group of splendid men 
 and women about him. There are about fifteen 
 hundred pupils of all grades in the schools and 
 nearly all are Christians. The population is 
 twenty-five thousand, and six thousand of these 
 are Christians, or one in six. It is one in four in 
 the United States, so you can see what great work 
 has been done here since 1831, when this station 
 was opened." 
 
 He went also to Vadala, where the Fairbank 
 family has worked over sixty years. When this 
 consecrated group of missionaries went to this 
 place it was in the darkness of heathenism. No 
 work had been done for the uplift of the people, 
 life was in danger from outlaws, and schools were 
 unknown. Through the efforts of the Fairbanks, 
 schools for boys and girls have trained a genera- 
 tion of men and women who have developed a 
 community where life is safe, property is pro- 
 tected and justice is administered, and where hun- 
 dreds enjoy the privileges of the Christian faith. 
 
 While Mr. Capen was visiting the Vadala sta- 
 tion he had an experience which he counted one of 
 the greatest events of his life. "It was just after 
 sundown when four men appeared with a Chris- 
 tian spokesman. They were 'Mahars,' outcasts. 
 They had walked twenty-two miles to plead that 
 they might have Christian teachers and preachers, 
 and a school for their children. They had made 
 this plea many times before and had been refused, 
 for there was no money to pay for the man. They 
 
 [209]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 said there were one thousand people in the village, 
 there were one hundred men who wanted to be 
 baptized and become Christians, there were fifty 
 boys for the school. What a plea! They were 
 willing themselves to put up the schoolhouse and 
 the teacher's house at a cost of $50. Mud walls 
 and straw roofs are cheap! Rev. Mr. Fairbank, 
 the head of the station, to whose bungalow they 
 had come, told me he had a trained man all ready 
 when the salary could be provided. He wanted it 
 for five years before starting the school ; it would 
 be folly to begin and stop. The last state would 
 be worse than the first. I asked what salary was 
 needed to support the trained leader and was told 
 $50, the regular price for such men. I felt as 
 though I must accept this trust. To send these 
 men back into darkness, when I could help, would 
 be a wrong; so I said I would stand back of the 
 man's salary for five years. I rejoiced to have the 
 chance. Such happy men as they were when they 
 started back! You wonder perhaps at the price. 
 One of the arguments I have used for foreign mis- 
 sions was the increased power of money; a small 
 sum in our money will do so much here. A man 
 who makes cheap shoes earns six cents a day; 
 some of the laborers earn only five cents a day. A 
 fifty-dollar salary, therefore, for an educated man 
 out of our Christian schools is a low wage in 
 comparison. ' ' 
 
 Mr. Capen was deeply impressed by the sacri- 
 fices made by the native Christians. While he 
 was in Ahmednagar there was a service of offer- 
 
 [210]
 
 THE JOURNEY ABROAD 
 
 ings. "The men from the different stations 
 marched in with their banners. They sung and 
 made more noise before the meeting opened than 
 a college crowd or political rally. They went 
 around and around in a circle, singing 'Victory 
 for Christ.' Then their offering came. Men 
 brought their money and laid it upon the com- 
 munion table, as the colored people used to do in 
 the South, but they did not all bring money. One 
 brought a dozen bananas, another needlework, 
 eight or ten chickens, three eggs, and a basket of 
 sweets. These were sold at auction on the church 
 steps after the service. Sometimes they bring a 
 goat. This is very natural for the people back in 
 the country who know nothing about money ; some 
 of them never saw any. They bring in eggs or 
 chickens or goats to the pastor and barter them 
 for clothing or whatever they want. They bring 
 for the Lord 's offering, what they have. ' ' 
 
 To become Christians sometimes costs these peo- 
 ple their family connections. From Madras Mr. 
 Capen wrote: "In the early evening we went to 
 a meeting at the Baptist Compound. At the Bap- 
 tist church in the morning they had a very promi- 
 nent man from the Telegus unite with the 
 church. The leaders of his caste met and voted 
 him out of the family. Around the church there 
 were hired mourners at the time of the service, 
 making a great noise, mourning for him as one 
 dead. It costs something to be a Christian in 
 India." 
 
 Not all the sacrifices, however, are on the part of 
 [211]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 the natives. In Ahmednagar is a great industrial 
 work carried on by a graduate of the Institute of 
 Technology. He has invented a loom for the poor 
 people which received a gold medal from the 
 Government Exhibition. "His wife died a year 
 or two ago, but he stays at his post with his two 
 small boys. He has the regular salary of an Amer- 
 ican Board Missionary; I think $40 a month, 
 or $480 a year. He has a standing offer from the 
 Indian government of $6,000 a year and another 
 from an automobile firm in Great Britain of $10,- 
 000 a year. The spirit of self-sacrifice has not yet 
 gone out of the world." 
 
 One of the finest services rendered by Mr. Ca- 
 pen on his journey through the mission fields was 
 in the friendly encouragement that he took to the 
 missionaries and the hope thathe inspired in them. 
 Indeed, at home or abroad, he was interested 
 chiefly in people and in what they were doing. 
 He knew the power of sympathy and the value 
 of the sense of companionship in service, and hun- 
 dreds of men and women all over the world have 
 risen to bear testimony to what his Christlike 
 character has done for them. Loyal L. Wirt, who 
 was one of the pioneer missionaries of the Sunday 
 School and Publishing Society in Northern Cali- 
 fornia, wrote: 
 
 "After five years of pioneer Sunday school 
 work, a settled pastorate with opportunities for 
 study and travel was making its strong appeal. 
 But it took all my courage to tell the good Secre- 
 tary I had made up my mind to resign. It was 
 
 [212]
 
 THE JOURNEY ABROAD 
 
 then that I learned one of the secrets of the So- 
 ciety's wise administration and vigorous policy. 
 'Let us go down and see President Capen about 
 it, ' said Dr. Boynton. Every man has his sacred 
 hours. They are not many. Usually he can count 
 them upon his fingers. The hour I spent in the 
 private office of Torrey, Bright and Capen I have 
 always counted on my index finger. It was a rev- 
 elation to me of a business man's valuation of the 
 Kingdom of God. Of ministerial valuations I had 
 heard many, and they were pretty much alike 
 but here was a new set of values, a new termi- 
 nology, an ardor, a sweetness, a loyalty, a 
 comprehensive sweep of the triumphs and oppor- 
 tunities of the Church Militant that somehow put 
 me in the class with the soldier who, having 
 touched Wellington's hand, was ready to count 
 the most difficult or dangerous mission a privi- 
 lege. Here was one of the unpublished springs of 
 vitality. I was beginning to touch the sources of 
 the power and passion felt in thirty states through 
 the channels of this young Society. The particu- 
 lar object of our visit to that business office was 
 almost forgotten as President Capen sketched the 
 glorious fields of service committed to this 'John 
 the Baptist' Society and to the men who were 
 laying the foundations of a City whose builder 
 and maker is God. Little country schoolhouses 
 became Bethels; the packs of Sunday-school sup- 
 plies were no longer heavy, but had become leaves 
 of healing to the wounded in life 's by-ways. Some- 
 how as Greatheart spoke in those low, vibrant 
 
 [213]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 tones, the work of a Sunday-school missionary be- 
 came the most sacred thing on earth. To break 
 the Bread of Life to groups of isolated men, 
 women and children, who would not hear the 
 evangel again until his next visit many months 
 hence, made a cathedral pulpit seem common- 
 place. He stretched both hands across his office 
 desk, palms upward, and seemed to weigh the 
 comparative importance of each. What a man he 
 ever was for bringing out the true values of life. 
 But not satisfied with his own judgment, he qui- 
 etly turned the key in the door and said, ' But wis- 
 dom cometh from above; shall we talk to the 
 Father about it 1 ' My eyes grow dim as I think of 
 that hour, nineteen years ago. I cannot walk 
 down Washington Street today without wanting 
 to take the shoes from off my feet as I pass No. 
 350, for to me it will always be holy ground. 
 When we arose from our knees he came over to 
 my chair, slipped his arm about my shoulders and 
 said, 'The Society needs you, the people in the 
 mountains need you, I think Christ needs you out 
 there where the lambs stray. ' As I took his hand, 
 the greatest pulpit in the land had no attraction 
 for me. I was hearing the call, not of the ninety 
 and nine, but of the one. 
 
 li 'And you will go back?' 
 
 " 'Yes, I will go back, if you let me, with a 
 new sense of the dignity and the privilege of 
 this wider ministry, and will stay there so long as 
 you and Dr. Boynton hold the ropes. ' As we went 
 out into the busy street, I overheard him say 
 
 [214]
 
 THE JOUENEY ABROAD 
 
 to the Secretary, * I think the funds of the Society 
 will admit of an increase in the appropriation for 
 California, will they not?' He waved a cheery 
 good-bye and was gone. I never saw his kindly 
 face again. Five minutes before my mother's 
 spirit slipped through the 'wicket gate,' I heard 
 her whisper, ' Soon I shall see my great and good 
 Dr. Finney again.' Some day I hope to see my 
 great and good Dr. Capen again." 
 
 This element of his character was a part of his 
 very life not an adjunct to his office, not a thing 
 worn professionally. He was not one man offi- 
 cially and another man in his private capacity. 
 Sympathy was a part of his being, because love 
 for his Christ was the breath of his life. It was 
 expressed at all times and to all classes of people. 
 
 It was his habit to salute policemen, as he met 
 them at their posts of duty. A friend, who often 
 came from the South Station with Mr. Capen, 
 noticed that he never failed to greet the officer on 
 duty in the crowded street in front of the entrance. 
 After Mr. Capen 's death this friend, out of curios- 
 ity, stopped one day to ask the officer if he remem- 
 bered Mr. Capen and had heard of his death. 
 Immediately the man took a postal card from his 
 pocket, saying: 
 
 "I received this card from him only a few days 
 ago. It was written from India. ' ' He wrote hun- 
 dreds of such messages to people all over the 
 world, some in humble places and others in posi- 
 tions of influence. 
 
 Rev. Charles S. Mills, well known to the Congre- 
 [215]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 gationalists of America, and a child of the Central 
 Church of Jamaica Plain, wrote to Dr. Edward 
 W. Capen: 
 
 * * Your father and mother gave me the privilege 
 of their affection for the sake of the old days. 
 When a boy I used to see them and felt the 
 strength of their influence in Jamaica Plain. 
 Through all the years your father's love and 
 friendship has been most precious to me. I re- 
 member the impression he made upon me when I 
 first saw him in his young manhood, eagerly giv- 
 ing his life to the service of the Church and to the 
 Master. I can see him as he rose in the prayer 
 meeting to speak and can feel still the fervor of 
 his Christian appeal. I have no question that this 
 personal sense of divinity touched my own life in 
 those early days, and when I came to know him 
 familiarly after entering the ministry, I always 
 felt that he was like an elder brother, almost a 
 spiritual father. I do not think I ever passed 
 through any particularly significant event in my 
 ministry, which became known to him, that I did 
 not receive from his own hand, a warm, hearty, 
 personal letter, and I never met him anywhere 
 without having the sense of his personal affection. 
 It is a great quality of a noble life to share itself 
 with those younger in service; that, your father's 
 life illustrated to an extraordinary degree." 
 
 Mr. Capen was an optimist by faith. If there was 
 work which needed to be done, he believed some 
 way would be found to accomplish it. If there was 
 no immediate solution of the difficulty, he encour- 
 
 [216]
 
 THE JOURNEY ABROAD 
 
 aged men to hope that a way would be opened. 
 He took his optimism to the mission stations, 
 spent hours in conferences with the workers, 
 heard sympathetically the story of their needs, 
 and sent them back to their posts of duty with 
 the feeling that they had a personal friend in the 
 President of the Board a man who was helping 
 to bear their burdens, carry their sorrows and 
 share their disappointments. They were made 
 to feel that the Board was more than a machine ; 
 that it was a personality full of love and hope and 
 that failure was impossible. 
 
 When Mr. Capen was in his native land much 
 of the value of his service came from the fact that 
 he was a layman giving unselfishly of his time for 
 the advancement of the Kingdom of God. Mr. 
 George S. Goddard, State Librarian of Connect- 
 icut, writing of the time when he was a young man 
 in preparatory school, says : 
 
 "It was through Mr. Capen that I received my 
 first outlook toward the missionary field. I re- 
 member his intense earnestness when speaking 
 and the clear manner in which he presented his 
 subject. I can never forget the impression made 
 when I learned that Mr. Capen was not a minister, 
 but that it was a Boston business man who was 
 speaking to us boys and girls instead of a minister 
 or returned missionary. The influence and im- 
 pressions made by his visit have been emphasized 
 by the several addresses which it has been my 
 privilege to hear him make during these later 
 years, and I am inclined to believe that the im- 
 
 [217]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 pressions made upon me were not much different 
 than those made upon my schoolmates and the 
 other young men and young women, to whom it 
 has been his privilege these many years to present 
 his favorite theme." 
 
 Mr. George W. Coleman bears a similar testi- 
 mony: ''May I tell you that I took Mr. Capen for 
 my ideal Christian business man nearly twenty 
 years ago ? It has been my ambition ever since to 
 do as he did rather than to devote all my energies 
 to accumulating a fortune, or to winning fame and 
 power. I suppose there are thousands of other 
 young men who have looked up to Mr. Capen in 
 this same way." 
 
 Professor Williston Walker of The Yale School 
 of Religion writes : "It was my privilege to be as- 
 sociated with him in a good many matters, notably 
 and lately in the Commission of Nineteen. The 
 longer I knew him the more my admiration for 
 him increased. He was in a peculiar degree a 
 man of sanity of judgment, of clearness of vision 
 and of integrity of purpose. He was a man to be 
 trusted and admired. But even more, he was a 
 man of Christian character that was in no way 
 superficial, but was of the fundamental core of 
 his being. I saw him in some, to him, trying sit- 
 uations, and he bore himself ever with simplicity 
 and strength and even more, in eminent sweet- 
 ness of Christian spirit. He has done a noble 
 work. ' ' 
 
 When Mr. Capen visited the Orient the power 
 of his influence as a layman was even greater 
 
 [218]
 
 THE JOUKNEY ABKOAD 
 
 than it had been in his own country. In the Far 
 East religion has been associated with the priest- 
 hood, and the laymen from the West whom they 
 had seen had come largely in search of wealth. 
 Here came a man without pay, serving because he 
 loved mankind and was eager to lift them to a 
 higher plane. He came with only one purpose and 
 that was to give, ''not to be ministered unto but 
 to minister," and through his example scores 
 of men got a new vision of the meaning of 
 Christianity. 
 
 When he left India and went to Ceylon he was 
 further impressed by the value of Christian edu- 
 cation as the foundation of missionary work. He 
 wrote : 
 
 ' * The great number, 118, of village schools, with 
 9,000 pupils, with the great school for girls at 
 Uduvil, made famous by the long service of Miss 
 Agnew, and now of Miss Howland, with Jaffna 
 College for the boys, have been providing preach- 
 ers and teachers among the vigorous families of 
 Ceylon. There are now nearly 2,000 students in 
 our high schools and colleges. 
 
 ' * Our last Sunday was spent in connection with 
 the work of this mission. The center of our op- 
 erations was from the bungalow of Rev. Giles G. 
 Brown at Vaddukoddai. I started with Mr. 
 Brown for the church service at Uduvil, several 
 miles away, passing one village school and the 
 ruins of another by the way. The church at Udu- 
 vil was filled with a large audience when we ar- 
 rived, and I had the privilege of speaking to them 
 
 [219]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 through an interpreter. At least 300 girls from 
 the Uduvil school were in attendance. There was 
 a communion service, and several united with the 
 church. 
 
 1 1 On our way home we called at the house of an 
 old Indian preacher who has been a noted leader, 
 an old saint dying of creeping paralysis, and al- 
 most ready to be translated. He could hardly 
 move a limb; his speech was impaired; but his 
 mind was perfectly clear. He spends much of his 
 time in prayer in a systematic way. He has a 
 topic for every day of the week, and he is praying 
 for the whole world. I have a copy of his plan, 
 which impresses one with its breadth and com- 
 prehensiveness. The name of this old saint was 
 chosen by him when he was baptized, and is Paul 
 Lowe Christian. He wanted it to be apparent to 
 every one that he was a Christian. His middle 
 name, Lowe, was chosen by him in recognition of 
 the man who had been most instrumental in lead- 
 ing him to Christ. This remarkable man has 
 had a wonderful experience. He comes of a 
 Buddhist family, and was expected to have been 
 a priest in the Buddhist temple. His family now 
 own one of these heathen temples, and his grand- 
 father's shoes are worshiped there. When a 
 lad he went to one of our schools, was led to see 
 the folly of his old belief, and became a Christian. 
 He was persecuted for a time, and did not dare 
 to go home. As a result of his giving up his old 
 religion he lost all his property. He has a fine 
 mind; has enjoyed reading such books as those of 
 
 [220]
 
 THE JOUENEY ABROAD 
 
 President Henry C. King and Professor W. N. 
 Clarke. He knows what he believes, and when in 
 health could hold his own in any religious discus- 
 sion. We could see in this man what we have seen 
 everywhere, that many of the high caste as well as 
 those of the low caste and the outcast, are leaven- 
 ing the nation with Christian truth. 
 
 "At four o'clock we spoke in the church oppo- 
 site the compound of Mr. Brown's bungalow. The 
 building is an old one, erected by the Dutch in 
 1678, and bears that date on the door. It was a 
 pleasure to speak from the pulpit where Rev. Mr. 
 Sanders, the father of Dr. Frank K. Sanders, 
 preached for so many years in his faithful service 
 to these people. 
 
 "After the service we had an informal gather- 
 ing never to be forgotten. About twenty pastors 
 and teachers, including three from Jaffna Col- 
 lege, came to the bungalow, and were there for two 
 hours. They were all Tamils, and had been 
 trained in our schools here, and were vigorous and 
 capable men. They told me of their work, and the 
 difficulty they have in living on their meager sala- 
 ries. The increased cost of living seems to be a 
 world problem. The price of rice, the staple of 
 their food here, has doubled in the past few years. 
 Formerly it was a cent a pound; now it is two 
 cents. Eggs were four cents a dozen; now they 
 are twelve. The salaries of the native pastors and 
 teachers in the village vary from ten to twenty 
 rupees a month, or from $40 to $80 a year. And 
 yet every one of these teachers, out of their small 
 
 [221]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 incomes, with families to support, give one-tenth 
 to support the church! They put many of us to 
 shame by their self-sacrifice and their love of the 
 church which means so much to them. 
 
 ' ' Jaffna College buildings are in this compound. 
 These will always be memorable, among other 
 things, for the fact that the first Y. M. C. A. in 
 Asia was established here, April 26, 1884, when 
 Frank K. Sanders was a teacher. This event is 
 commemorated by a tablet. 
 
 "We left India and Ceylon with the glad 
 thought that the work of our mission boards is 
 changing the nation; that the results are wider 
 and deeper than we had been expecting; that our 
 missionaries on their own ground are a wonderful 
 group of men and women, worthy of their great 
 predecessors who laid the foundations of Chris- 
 tian institutions a generation or two ago. The 
 burden, however, is greater than they can bear. 
 Let our churches strengthen them quickly. There 
 never was such an opportunity before ; there never 
 will be such an opportunity again. The battle is 
 on now. It is no time for men to be skulking 
 in the rear. Let us put up the money and the men 
 to match the opportunity." 
 
 It must not be forgotten that Mr. Capen went 
 on his mission not only to study the mission fields 
 but also to deliver a message on peace. He was 
 much impressed by the eagerness with which men 
 listened to this message, but more by the enthusi- 
 asm with which he was sought by various organi- 
 zations as a speaker on this question. 
 
 [222]
 
 THE JOURNEY ABROAD 
 
 "A man is respected here in the East," he 
 wrote, "because he is an American. We have 
 found this to be true everywhere and it is a source 
 of a proper patriotic pride. Our country from its 
 situation has been free from the entangling alli- 
 ances and difficulties of European nations; what 
 we do and say is not open to suspicion. The di- 
 plomacy of our nation for the most part has been 
 in harmony with the ' golden rule,' we have 
 ' played fair' with others: cordial expressions of 
 good will have been received everywhere. 
 
 "It has been a surprise to us to find an eager- 
 ness to listen to the discussion of at least one great 
 international question. When we left home as 
 one of a commission not only to represent the 
 American Board at the centenary exercises at 
 Bombay, but also to represent the World Peace 
 Foundation, we supposed there would be little op- 
 portunity to interest the people of India on this 
 latter subject. We knew China and Japan were 
 greatly interested and were not surprised, there- 
 fore, to receive letters asking us to speak on world 
 peace in these nations. But we did not realize the 
 interest there seems to be in this subject in India. 
 We have found letters and telegrams awaiting us 
 from place to place, asking us to speak upon this 
 question. These audiences have been composed 
 of Hindus, Mohammedans, Parsee students, as 
 well as Christian leaders. In one place the pre- 
 siding officer was a leader in a wealthy social club, 
 and the meeting was held in the clubhouse ; in an- 
 other he was the principal of the largest Hindu 
 
 [223]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 college, with 1,200 students, and was one of the 
 two leading Indians in a great city. In another 
 case the leader was a prominent Hindu lawyer, in 
 another a judge of the courts. The theme chosen 
 was "International Brotherhood," and the re- 
 sponse of the audience and the sympathetic words 
 of those presiding indicated their deep interest. 
 They were glad to have a business man from the 
 United States discuss the question with them. In 
 every case the audiences were educated men, so 
 that we could speak to them in English, and not 
 through an interpreter, as was necessary with 
 other audiences of a different class. 
 
 "This idea of brotherhood, and that nations 
 should find a way to live as brothers, found a re- 
 sponsive chord. The thought that nations should 
 give up their suspicions and jealousies and reduce 
 their army and naval expenses seemed to be 
 everywhere heartily approved. 
 
 "It is not difficult to see why the people of India 
 have such respect for the people of the United 
 States, and why they are willing, therefore, to 
 listen courteously to one of her citizens. For a 
 hundred years our nation has been sending to 
 India great missionaries, educators and physi- 
 cians. The American Board alone has invested in 
 the work $10,000,000 for churches, schools, col- 
 leges, hospitals, dispensaries and industrial 
 plants. And the American Board, while the old- 
 est organization, is but one; there are 40 other 
 American and Canadian societies. In 100 years 
 probably 40,000 men and women have left our 
 
 [224]
 
 THE JOURNEY ABROAD 
 
 shores on their errand to uplift and bless a great 
 nation. In times of famine and distress we have 
 poured out our money generously and saved tens 
 of thousands from starvation. All this mighty 
 work has been done freely and heartily without 
 the slightest hope of selfish gain. India is on the 
 other side of the world from us ; we are not con- 
 nected with her in any way politically, and our 
 commercial dealings are very small. The unself- 
 ishness of this work has won the hearts of many 
 of the thoughtful men of India. It was a pleasant 
 experience at different places in public receptions 
 to have the head of the municipality, and in every 
 case a Hindu, pay his tribute of praise for what 
 we are doing for them; the words were apparently 
 sincere and spoken without reserve. It has been 
 a great satisfaction for me to say that the thing 
 in which we at home take pride is not our rapid 
 growth as a nation nor our size nor our wealth; 
 it is not our manufactures, nor our great agricul- 
 tural and mineral wealth. Material prosperity 
 makes neither a man nor a nation great. The thing 
 of which we are most proud is what our nation has 
 done for civil and religious liberty; that to many 
 of our nation there is a word larger than * nation- 
 alism,' and that is ' internationalism, ' and that 
 we desire to exemplify real 'brotherhood' to every 
 nation. 
 
 "The United States holds a proud position for 
 what she has done, but with it there is an ever- 
 increasing opportunity and responsibility ; in fact, 
 * responsibility ' is another way of spelling f oppor- 
 
 [225]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 tunity.' It ought to sober every American and 
 give him a new purpose to help keep our nation 
 true to the highest ideals, not for her own sake 
 alone, but to uplift the world." 
 
 [226]
 
 CHAFER XIV 
 THE FUNDAMENTAL MOTIVE 
 
 By this time the impression must have been 
 made upon the reader that few men of any genera- 
 tion have undertaken such a variety of duties and 
 have performed all of them so well as did Mr. 
 Capen. This success is especially remarkable in 
 view of the fact that he had no specialized train- 
 ing to fit him for the accomplishment of any of 
 his greatest achievements. 
 
 He had no special education, for example, to 
 equip him for his work on the School Committee, 
 where he was surrounded by some of the best edu- 
 cators of the day, yet a man who was in a position 
 to know declared that " Boston never had any 
 three men in her history who ever did so much so 
 well in three years as he had done." When he 
 went to the Congregational House as President 
 of the Sunday School and Publishing Society he 
 was only a young business man, inexperienced in 
 the arts of public speech, and as yet but little 
 known to his denomination. Here he was asso- 
 ciated with a company of men who had the best 
 that colleges and theological schools could offer. 
 Yet he did for the Society what others had failed 
 to do and in a very few years became one of the 
 most conspicuous figures in the Congregational 
 churches. Many of his predecessors as Presidents 
 
 [227]
 
 of the American Board had been men of the most 
 conspicuous ability, men who had dignified the 
 position by their scholarship and adorned it by 
 their eloquence. Only two years had intervened 
 between his presidency and that of the king of 
 extemporaneous preachers, Dr. Eichard Storrs, 
 and he followed immediately that polished and 
 gifted preacher and rare spirit, Dr. Charles M. 
 Lamson. No one ever thought of Mr. Capen as 
 either a scholar or an orator, as compared with 
 these predecessors. He possessed neither their 
 academic polish, their breadth of learning, nor 
 their knowledge of the fundamental theological 
 and philosophical tendencies of his day. Yet no 
 man in that high position has ever been more 
 respected by the constituency of the American 
 Board than he, and probably none ever accom- 
 plished so much for the Board as did this layman 
 who rose from the ranks with only a high school 
 education. 
 
 One is compelled to ask what was the secret of 
 his power. Yet the more intimately one knew 
 Mr. Capen the more keenly did he realize the diffi- 
 culty of answering this question. It is easy for 
 men to name certain conspicuous traits which 
 were evident to those who served with him on com- 
 mittees. There were characteristics which made 
 him one of the most ideal committeemen that ever 
 sat about a table. But it may be doubted whether 
 the real secret of his influence was to be found in 
 these qualities. Deeper in his personality there 
 lay something which affected men, something as 
 
 [228]
 
 THE FUNDAMENTAL MOTIVE 
 
 difficult to define as the subtle influence that 
 touches the earth in spring and makes the flowers 
 open and the birds sing a spiritual element that 
 vanishes when one tries to imprison it with the 
 pen, and that will scarcely speak through the 
 rough medium of words. 
 
 This mystic quality in his character is touched 
 by Mrs. Frank Mason North, one of the trustees 
 of Wellesley College : ' ' Now and then against the 
 background of our common humanity one life 
 shines forth with such radiance that by its light we 
 discover anew what God meant us all to be. Such 
 a life manifests a genius for spirituality. The 
 purity and simplicity of its consecration, its aloof- 
 ness from tangling alliances, the swiftness of its 
 response to the Divine Spirit and to human need 
 becomes to us a revelation of the power of God in 
 the human soul. Through it God is able to speak 
 to us of his ideals for his children in the terms of 
 a human character." 
 
 This is probably as clear an expression as can 
 be given of the ennobling influence which seemed 
 to radiate from Mr. Capen's life, exerting a 
 strange power over those who knew him. It had 
 its basis in his strong religious faith. He be- 
 lieved that conscious fellowship with God is the 
 foundation of every strong life. He held this not 
 only as an article of his intellectual belief but as 
 a part of his most vital experience. In very truth 
 he lived with God in the constant consciousness 
 of the Divine Presence and in the absolute faith 
 that he could accomplish nothing without divine 
 
 [229]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 aid. It was a faith that gave to all who met him 
 a sense of the dignity of life, that made men feel 
 that they could do things they had never dreamed 
 of, and gave them a conviction that anything less 
 than the highest was unworthy of them. 
 
 One of the most certain facts about Mr. Capen's 
 career is that he never sought any position. He 
 was never an office-seeker nor was he looking for 
 honors. Yet he was the most outstanding figure 
 in any gathering he attended. Men felt that he 
 had something they needed, that he lived a life 
 which in some way gave dignity and power to any 
 position that he filled. The movement of which 
 he was a part turned to him naturally as its leader, 
 for there was no other who could lend it such 
 grace as he. ' l He glorified whatever he touched, ' ' 
 said one man who knew him well. This phrase 
 almost perfectly expresses the secret of his lead- 
 ership and states the reason why he was eagerly 
 sought by many a cause that wanted to make its 
 appeal to a New England audience or to the wider 
 interests of the Church. 
 
 This religious element of his life was as much 
 the secret of his power in things commonly called 
 secular as in his distinctively church activities. 
 Those who knew him as a member of the School 
 Committee, as the leader of the Municipal 
 League and as a vital force in the Chamber of 
 Commerce speak of his grace, his gentleness and 
 his broad sympathies, but these were only fruits 
 of his humility before God and his love for his 
 fellow men, born of his devotion to Jesus Christ. 
 
 [230]
 
 THE FUNDAMENTAL MOTIVE 
 
 His nature was fundamentally religious and his 
 character was absolutely the fruit of his faith. 
 He was not a gentleman who was religious; he 
 was a gentleman because he was religious. He 
 was full of grace because his life was full of the 
 love of God. His religion was never offensive. 
 He never thrust it upon men; it radiated from 
 him. Those who heard him speak felt that his 
 words were not those of one who lives by bread 
 alone, and those who were closely associated with 
 him realized that all his motives had their origin 
 in a realm where few men dwell. 
 
 Mr. Capen always held to the theory that men 
 even the most worldly of men respond most 
 readily to the moral and religious note in public 
 addresses. He was impatient when public speak- 
 ers tried to tickle the ear of their hearers by funny 
 stories. He thought it not only a waste of pre- 
 cious time but an insult to the intelligence of men. 
 They are ready, he believed, to listen to something 
 better, and to feed them with sop when they are 
 waiting for meat, seemed to him an unpardonable 
 sin. 
 
 At a recent meeting of the Massachusetts 
 Peace Society one of the best known of Eng- 
 land's scholars presented the economic argument 
 in favor of arbitration instead of war. Then Al- 
 fred Noyes, the young English poet, presented 
 with much force and grace the moral and religious 
 arguments, fairly hypnotizing his audience and 
 calling forth a most enthusiastic response. As he 
 was returning from the meeting, Mr. Capen re- 
 
 [231]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 marked, "It is that argument which reaches men 
 every time. They respond to it as they do to no 
 other." He himself never spoke without sound- 
 ing the highest note. He never wasted his time in 
 cheap stories while making an approach. He 
 plunged into the very heart of his theme in the 
 first minute, speaking out of his consecrated life 
 with such earnestness that his audiences not only 
 listened respectfully but also responded heartily. 
 During the last years of his life Mr. Capen fol- 
 lowed the principle of speaking upon distinctly 
 religious topics before gatherings of men who rep- 
 resented wholly secular interests. He was con- 
 stantly receiving invitations to address men's 
 clubs, Chambers of Commerce and various other 
 organizations for civic improvement, but he re- 
 fused to accept them unless he could speak upon 
 some of those themes which were dearest to his 
 heart. As a result many gatherings of men lis- 
 tened to addresses bespeaking deeper interest in 
 foreign missions, even though they had never 
 manifested any interest in this subject, and had 
 sometimes even referred to it with scorn. If Mr. 
 Capen did not give the entire time of an address 
 to this theme it was sure to be introduced before 
 he concluded. The cause of Jesus Christ, the com- 
 ing of brotherhood, or the application of some 
 phase of the teaching of the Nazarene to human 
 affairs, was sure to be included in his message. 
 Men, though often not avowed disciples, listened 
 to him with respect and were won to active 
 sympathy. 
 
 [232]
 
 THE FUNDAMENTAL MOTIVE 
 
 Mr. Capen believed that clergymen lose great 
 opportunities when they go before secular gather- 
 ings and make an effort merely to please instead 
 of endeavoring to raise the ideals of their hearers. 
 More than once large companies of men have 
 laughed and applauded at the jokes and brilliancy 
 of some speaker who used half an hour in enter- 
 taining them, and then have sat with serious but 
 sympathetic faces, without a ripple of laughter, 
 listening to this layman as he presented the great 
 work of establishing the Kingdom of God on earth, 
 and at the close of his address the generous ap- 
 plause which he received showed that his audi- 
 ences appreciated his fine courage. 
 
 Mr. Capen had absolutely no use for the old 
 rule that when you are in Rome you must do as 
 the Romans do. He despised that worst form of 
 unbelief abroad in the world today, a lack of con- 
 fidence in the moral ideal; he deplored the ease 
 with which men desert it and resort to the cheap 
 ways of the world to attain their ends. He be- 
 lieved that right was might and that if men would 
 be true to their idealism it would win. Writing 
 in the "Christian Endeavor World," he gave an 
 illustration of this principle from his own life: "I 
 had an experience years ago upon the School Com- 
 mittee, when a number of gentlemen came to me 
 and urged that I should use my influence in the 
 appointment of a janitor for a schoolhouse. 
 Their one argument for this appointment was that 
 he was a 'good worker' in the ward, and his ap- 
 pointment would be helpful for party interests. 
 
 [233]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 When I told them that this argument did not count 
 now, and gave them to understand that there were 
 higher considerations, they looked at me in bewil- 
 derment. They did not seem to understand the 
 alphabet of such a language. And yet my experi- 
 ence has shown that in such cases, if one is courte- 
 ous, men will soon see the force of his position, 
 and underneath will respect him for it." 
 
 We sometimes find more light in the life of a 
 good man on some controverted passage of Scrip- 
 ture than we do in all the commentaries, or in 
 the wise arguments of the theologians. In Mr. 
 Capen's faith in the might of right we find more 
 illumination on the old text which has been 
 the source of such heated controversies between 
 Protestants and Catholics than in volumes of 
 their dry-as-dust books : * * Thou art Peter, and 
 upon this rock I shall build my church; and the 
 gates of hell shall not prevail against it. ' ' 
 
 He so believed the truth in this passage that he 
 dared to stand with a few men against some pub- 
 lic wrong where most men despaired, remained 
 at home and gave the host of wickedness their 
 way. He once wrote : ' ' Even one or two men may 
 have great influence for good, as I have learned 
 from an experience which occurred so many years 
 ago that it may be spoken of now quite imper- 
 sonally. There was a plan on foot by a lot of very 
 selfish politicians to control public interests for 
 their own ends. A public meeting was held, and 
 I was called upon to preside. A gentleman of high 
 integrity was appointed to act as clerk, and then 
 
 [234]
 
 THE FUNDAMENTAL MOTIVE 
 
 the battle began. The selfish men tried to accom- 
 plish their end, but they were entirely defeated, 
 though the chairman, as they themselves admit- 
 ted, treated them with absolute fairness. It tran- 
 spired afterwards that they had planned to cap- 
 ture that meeting in furtherance of their own 
 schemes. When upbraided afterwards by some 
 of their followers, they said, 'How could we suc- 
 ceed when that presiding officer was watching us 
 all the time 1 ' The chairman and the clerk of that 
 meeting prevented a public wrong. ' ' 
 
 [235]
 
 CHAPTER XV 
 CHARACTERISTICS 
 
 I have dwelt at length upon Mr. Capen's reli- 
 gious nature because apart from this it is impossi- 
 ble to understand the man. It would be easy to 
 write a biography setting him forth as a public- 
 spirited citizen who did much good, utilizing to 
 the utmost every talent with which he had been 
 endowed. It would even be possible to picture 
 him as a man who was of great service to mankind, 
 and who was intensely religious, dividing the two 
 sides of his nature. Either view would fail to 
 give us the man. He was a Christian first and last 
 and he was everything else because he was a 
 Christian. 
 
 Out of this life of devotion to Jesus Christ grew 
 certain characteristics which made him one of the 
 exceedingly useful men produced by the Church 
 in his generation. Among the most conspicuous 
 of these was the element of grace. ' ' That beauti- 
 ful courtesy," wrote Mrs. North, " which is the 
 very flower of Christian character, the outward 
 and visible sign of the grace of Christ within, 
 made fellowship with him, even in the most labo- 
 rious hours, a delight." He never lost his pa- 
 tience and never showed any sign of irritation 
 when serving as a presiding officer or on a com- 
 mittee. He listened to every argument, gave every 
 
 [236]
 
 CHAEACTEEISTICS 
 
 party to a controversy equal consideration, and 
 made every person feel that he was absolutely 
 fair. Though his desk in his store on "Washington 
 Street was always piled high with letters waiting 
 for an answer, or business needing attention, no 
 man ever sought him there who was not received 
 with courtesy. He had that peculiar gift of mak- 
 ing every man feel that he was especially glad to 
 see him, that he was interested in all his affairs, 
 and that he stood ready to serve him in any pos- 
 sible way. 
 
 Every Sunday morning when he was at home 
 Mr. Capen stood at the end of the aisle in his 
 church and shook hands with people as they 
 passed from the auditorium. Probably more than 
 one minister in the church has felt that Mr. Capen 
 was the best antidote to a poor sermon that could 
 possibly be found. A warm handshake, a smile 
 that lit up other faces as by contagion, a few 
 words "I am glad to see you; hope you are all 
 well" sent scores of people from the church feel- 
 ing that life was worth while, even though the ser- 
 mon may have failed of its purpose. 
 
 After the church service men and women in 
 trouble and those seeking advice gathered about 
 him. He not only had time to see them but even 
 made them feel that it was a privilege to serve 
 them that they had really conferred a favor 
 upon him in seeking him out. While he never 
 permitted any man to trespass upon his time, pos- 
 sessing an unusually gracious way of ending the 
 conference when the business was done, yet when 
 
 [237]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 the one seeking advice went from his presence 
 it was with the feeling that of all men on the earth 
 Mr. Capen was especially glad to have seen him. 
 This capacity for cordiality is a gift which we 
 usually associate with insincerity and hypocrisy, 
 the sham courtesy that arises in polite society or 
 develops in men seeking power and influence. But 
 no one ever associated this gift in Mr. Capen with 
 insincerity. It arose out of the unusual grace of 
 his manner and his eagerness to serve every man 
 in need. 
 
 He was absolutely forgetful of himself so long 
 as there was any service he could render others. 
 This element of his character found beautiful il- 
 lustration in what was one of the most trying 
 hours of his life. In his last years he was called 
 upon to bear a great disappointment and sorrow. 
 When he was in the midst of it, when his heart 
 was heavy and he was bearing the sting from one 
 whom he had tried to help but who had proven 
 himself ungrateful, he was sought for advice and 
 comfort by a man to whose family he had been a 
 lifelong friend and counselor. A great sorrow 
 had come upon them and Mr. Capen was naturally 
 the one to give advice. He spent the evening with 
 this man, comforting, advising and praying, as 
 though he had not a care of his own, until it came 
 time for the man to go. Then, putting his arm 
 around the man's shoulders, he drew him close 
 and, calling him by name, said, "I, too, am bear- 
 ing this night the greatest burden of my life. " It 
 was said not to cast his load upon another but to 
 
 [238]
 
 CHARACTERISTICS 
 
 give the man the consciousness of fellowship in 
 suffering. 
 
 Indeed, so far as his own troubles were con- 
 cerned, as is often true of such men, outside of the 
 comfort of his family he had to bear them alone. 
 Men were so accustomed to rest upon him that it 
 never occurred to them that they might enter into 
 his sorrows and carry his burdens. So far as his 
 life was concerned, there was no man of his com- 
 munity about whom less was known. He was in a 
 high sense an isolated and lonely figure, minister- 
 ing but not being ministered unto, comforting but 
 not being comforted. 
 
 The second element which contributed to his 
 success was his capacity for hard work. The old 
 expression, "a self-made man," often contains as 
 much error as truth. So many factors enter into 
 the building of a man, largely forces contributed 
 by society, that at best a self-made man is the one 
 who has the will to utilize the opportunities within 
 his reach, the man who has the moral courage to 
 make the most of his inheritance and of the ele- 
 ments offered to him by his fellow men. 
 
 Mr. Capen was a conspicuous illustration of 
 this type of man. Not born as a genius towering 
 in intellect or imagination above his fellow men, 
 a meteor shooting through a dimly-lighted sky, he 
 had through his life a physical equipment below 
 the average. Mentally he was not brilliant above 
 his fellows, either in his power to create great 
 ideas or in his ability to conceive plans that were 
 to change the destiny of empires. His public ut- 
 
 [239]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 terances were not those of a heaven-born orator, 
 destined to be read by future generations or to be 
 seed germs out of which are to grow great 
 schemes of thought, nor were they explosives that 
 are to cause revolutions in the realm of society or 
 politics. He was only one of the great brother- 
 hood, enjoying like gifts and powers with the 
 great mass of mankind, but he was unlike many 
 of his fellows in that he possessed the heaven- 
 born capacity of utilizing to the utmost extent 
 every power nature and society had placed within 
 his reach. 
 
 After all our sentiments are reduced to the 
 realm of fact, it is this element that creates that 
 peculiar character we call a genius. Occasionally 
 there is one set apart from his mother's womb 
 who is to write lines that will be an inspiration to 
 all time, speak words that will be a model for all 
 aspiring orators or catch the symphonies from 
 the spheres that will stir the emotions of all suc- 
 ceeding generations. On the whole, however, a 
 genius is a man with a capacity for hard work who 
 utilizes every minute of his time and who turns 
 every power within his reach to the achievement 
 of some great end. 
 
 In this sense Mr. Capen was a genius among 
 the men of his time. His life has been an inspira- 
 tion to the entire religious family and his conduct 
 and accomplishments have placed him in that 
 unique position where he was justly called the 
 leading layman of his city because of his ability 
 to turn every faculty with which nature and soci- 
 
 [240]
 
 CHAEACTERISTICS 
 
 ety had endowed him toward the uplift of his fel- 
 low men along some line of their growth. 
 
 Not only was he capable of doing sustained hard 
 work but he had an unusual faculty of utilizing 
 every minute of his time. Only a few weeks be- 
 fore sailing on his journey to the Orient, he said 
 one evening to a friend, while on his way home 
 from his office, "I have had today an engagement 
 every fifteen minutes. ' ' This was not an unusual 
 experience with him; but to be able to block out 
 time in this way to meet an engagement and 
 without permitting men to rob you of your time to 
 end it and then pass to the next is a gift pos- 
 sessed by few men. 
 
 Even his Sundays were regulated by rule. He 
 rose and ate breakfast, after which he looked over 
 the lesson for his Men's Bible Class. Then with 
 his family he went to church. If he had visitors 
 in his home they were invited to go with him, but 
 they could never keep him and his family from 
 divine worship. Neither did he ever take them 
 to another church to hear some famous preacher. 
 After the morning service he taught his Bible 
 Class. Then followed his dinner and an hour and 
 a half of rest. At four o'clock he was called by 
 some member of the household, when he arose and 
 started for two hours of calling through the par- 
 ish, either on members of his Class who had been 
 absent or upon some new family who had just 
 moved into the parish, or on some person who was 
 sick or in need. At six o'clock the family gath- 
 ered for a lunch, after which he spent the evening 
 
 [241]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 in preparing the next Sunday's lesson for his 
 Bible Class. 
 
 To say that he never played would not be quite 
 true. He found not only supreme delight but 
 pleasure in his work and his home was a veritable 
 playground. No finer tribute could be paid to his 
 joyous companionship with his children than is to 
 be found in the dedication of " Social Progress 
 in Mission Lands," written by his son, Edward 
 Warren Capen. 
 
 "TO MY FATHER 
 THE IDOL OF MY BOYHOOD 
 r -. , , COMPANION OF MY MANHOOD 
 
 ALWAYS LIVING IN THE SPIRITUAL WORLD 
 , PASSIONATELY DEVOTED TO THE KINGDOM OF GOD 
 IN ADVOCACY OF PEACE 
 
 IN CIVIC REFORM 
 
 IN MISSIONARY LEADERSHIP 
 
 WHO WENT HOME FROM THE FIRING-LINE/' 
 
 Not only was he blessed with a wife who had the 
 genius for conducting the household so that there 
 was no friction or disturbance in its manage- 
 ment, no petty cares left to worry or annoy, but 
 he was the head of a home where each studied to 
 make the other happy and to lighten the other's 
 burden. Added to this was a fine sense of humor, 
 that divine gift which enables some to laugh when 
 others weep and which enables some to discover 
 delightful vistas all along the way where others 
 are only pricked by thorns. The dinner-table was 
 
 [242]
 
 CHARACTEEISTICS 
 
 a place for story-telling and there was scarcely a 
 night after the day's work when the home did not 
 ring with laughter over a good story some mem- 
 ber of the family had found during the day. 
 
 Yet no one could really think of Mr. Capen as 
 attending a football game between the colleges, 
 much less a game of baseball between teams of 
 the American League, not because he disapproved 
 of these forms of recreation but because he was 
 too busy to use his time in these ways. He always 
 had more duties waiting for him than he could 
 perform and he used every minute, including holi- 
 days, which were the days when he prepared many 
 of his addresses, to contribute toward the results 
 he hoped to accomplish. 
 
 He once said to a company of ministers : ' * The 
 pulpits would have more power if the preachers 
 had more method. I have known cases where men 
 wasted their time the first of the week, to be 
 driven at the end almost to distraction. Such 
 shiftlessness would ruin any modern business. 
 My wife can pack twice as much into a trunk as I 
 can, for she knows how to economize the space. 
 The man who methodically and systematically 
 economizes his time can pack twice as much work 
 into a year. The work of the ministry is too noble 
 to be injured by carelessness. ' ' No man ever fol- 
 lowed more faithfully his preaching on this point 
 than Mr. Capen, and this accounts to a large de- 
 gree for his success. He used all his capital all 
 the time. 
 
 Another marked element in his success was his 
 [243]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 ability to say, "This one thing I do," and to give 
 no thought to anything which did not contribute to 
 the purpose he had before him. When he was a 
 member of the School Committee that work ab- 
 sorbed his attention. All his reading was on 
 school problems, and whenever he visited another 
 city he utilized his time in interviews and observa- 
 tions that would add to his knowledge. When he 
 was active in the Municipal League he read the 
 best books on the city problem and acquainted 
 himself with the best thought of reformers. 
 
 He probably knew the opinions of more men con- 
 cerning the issues with which he was struggling 
 than many who had devoted their lives to the 
 questions, because he lost no time and wasted no 
 opportunities to make himself thoroughly in- 
 formed. There was only one thing which made 
 him hesitate to accept the Presidency of the Amer- 
 ican Board, and that was his lack of knowledge 
 of the mission fields and the methods of work of 
 the missionary societies. He had always been 
 deeply interested in foreign missions and he had 
 been a liberal giver to this work but, absorbed in 
 other duties, he had given little time to the prob- 
 lems confronting the Board. When, however, he 
 decided to accept the Presidency he centered his 
 attention on these problems and by his reading, 
 observations and study, became one of the best- 
 informed men on the missionary problem that this 
 generation produced. Concentration was one of 
 the secrets of his power, and by shutting out 
 everything from his life that did not contribute to 
 
 [244]
 
 CHARACTERISTICS 
 
 his usefulness he became an unusually effective 
 man in whatever he undertook. 
 
 He used to say that he could drive work but 
 when work drove him it wore upon him. As a re- 
 sult, with his unusually methodical life, he seldom 
 reached a place where he was crowded by his 
 tasks, but planned his activities so far ahead that 
 he w T as continually driving his work. Scarcely did 
 he complete one annual address for the American 
 Board before he began to plan the next. First, he 
 chose his theme, and then his reading during the 
 year, his conversation and observation were made 
 to contribute to it. He would talk with every man 
 he found who knew anything about the problem 
 with which he was to deal, and weeks before the 
 time to deliver the message he would have much 
 more material than he could use. It was this fact, 
 doubtless, which accounted for the impression, al- 
 ways left upon his hearers, that he had much more 
 to say than his time limit would permit. After 
 the collecting of material came the process of 
 writing, which was always done carefully. When 
 completed the addresses were usually submitted to 
 critics, especially for the purpose of eliminating 
 anything that might make an undesirable impres- 
 sion, for, after all his hard work, the material of 
 his address was only of secondary importance. He 
 had an object to accomplish, and his matter was 
 only a means to this end. Each important speech 
 he was to make on his journey through the mission 
 fields was carefully written and it was forwarded 
 to leading missionaries in India, China and Japan 
 
 [245]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 with the special request that anything might be 
 penciled which was not fitted to the Oriental mind. 
 This was especially true of the address on peace 
 he was to have given in Japan, where he was very 
 anxious not to sound any discordant note. 
 
 This habit of preparedness manifested itself in 
 the smallest details of his life and in the most 
 unexpected places. Even when he was called sud- 
 denly to make an address he almost invariably 
 gave the impression that he was an easy speaker 
 and a man so familiar with political, civic or reli- 
 gious subjects that he could talk without prepara- 
 tion. Nothing, however, could be further from 
 the fact. He seldom spoke without the most care- 
 ful planning. If he was to attend any meeting 
 where he thought there was the least possibility 
 that he might be called upon to express his opin- 
 ion, he either wrote out in full what he wanted to 
 say or else made headings that he could follow. 
 This habit became so much a part of his life that 
 there were few times when he was ever asked to 
 speak that he was not ready to deliver a message. 
 
 This habit of preparation found no better illus- 
 tration in the life of Mr. Capen than in the talks 
 he gave at the mid-week prayer service of his 
 church. Men who attended these meetings will 
 remember these weekly talks as among the most 
 helpful utterances which came from his busy life. 
 They usually occupied about five minutes seldom 
 more than ten and they never failed to produce 
 a spiritual impression or to convey some valuable 
 information. But they were never extempora- 
 
 [246]
 
 CHAEACTERISTICS 
 
 neous. It was seldom that he trusted himself 
 to the inspiration of the hour. Each Friday 
 night, the evening for his prayer service, after he 
 had eaten his dinner, he would go by himself for 
 a few minutes to think over the subject that was 
 to be discussed, carefully arranging what he 
 wanted to present, and then he would go to the 
 meeting with the consciousness that he had a mes- 
 sage. If half a dozen of the strongest men of 
 every church would follow the same habit, the 
 prayer service would be the most helpful meet- 
 ing in the life of the Church. 
 
 [ 247 ]
 
 CHAPTER XVI 
 THE LAST DAYS, AND EESUME 
 
 There can be no satisfaction in dwelling at 
 length on the incident of death. It was never a 
 question upon which Mr. Capen placed great em- 
 phasis. Life was the thing of importance to him, 
 and it is his life that will be remembered. He al- 
 ways regarded death as the opening of a door 
 through which man would pass, taking with him 
 the good or the evil he had done. True, he consid- 
 ered it the most important door through which a 
 man would go, but the seriousness of the entrance 
 came not from the door itself but from the life 
 that had been lived before the entrance was made, 
 from the material that had been woven into the 
 texture of character that one would carry into the 
 presence of the just Judge. The chief concern 
 with him was in living right on the earth. The 
 final result was in the care of one who knew all 
 things and would deal with the departed more 
 wisely than man possibly could. Our only reason 
 for adding this chapter is that we may answer 
 certain questions which are naturally raised by 
 the sudden ending of a life which seemed to be in 
 the very height of its usefulness. 
 
 The end came very quickly. On Sunday, Jan- 
 uary 18, Mr. Capen spoke in three churches in 
 Foochow. In the afternoon he wrote a long letter 
 
 [248]
 
 THE LAST DAYS 
 
 to his Bible Class in Jamaica Plain. Monday was 
 a hard day. He rose at three-thirty A. M. and went 
 with the missionaries to dedicate a new church 
 at Diong Loh, yet after a long day of tramping, 
 speech-making and sight-seeing he seemed no 
 more tired than the younger men. He enjoyed it 
 all and on Tuesday was especially helpful at a 
 conference about the proposed Union University, 
 encouraging the workers to believe that their 
 project could be accomplished. 
 
 He sailed for Shanghai on January 22, and had 
 a very comfortable trip in the best boat on the 
 line. There was no hard wind and the sea was 
 fairly calm. He reached Shanghai Saturday 
 morning about ten o'clock and went directly to 
 Mr. Evans' Missionary Home. In the afternoon, 
 with his family and Dr. Strong, he attended a re- 
 ception at the International Institute, where he 
 spoke on peace. Sunday morning he gave an ad- 
 dress at the Union Church, and never spoke bet- 
 ter. In a letter written just before reaching 
 Shanghai he told how happy he and the others of 
 the party were that they were so far on their 
 journey and were so well. They were planning to 
 spend the week in Shanghai and he was to attend 
 a meeting of the China Continuation Committee 
 on the thirtieth. 
 
 Monday morning after breakfast he had a 
 chill, fainted and then had a fever. They called 
 one of the best doctors, who thought all he needed 
 was a rest. On Wednesday he was removed to the 
 Victoria Nursing Home, at the doctor's solicita- 
 
 [249]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 tion in order that he might have better care. He 
 did not anticipate anything serious until Thurs- 
 day morning, when the symptoms of pneumonia 
 developed. Even then there was only a slight 
 affection in one lung and he spoke very encourag- 
 ingly. Thursday afternoon Mrs. Capen and her 
 daughter, after spending an hour and a half with 
 Mr. Capen, attended a reception for the United 
 States Consul General, who was a friend of Mr. 
 Capen. That afternoon Mr. Capen spoke of their 
 journey as the Lord's trip and expressed the be- 
 lief that all would be right. He did not realize how 
 sick he was. He grew much worse during the last 
 part of the afternoon and the family were given 
 rooms in the hospital. They sat by the bedside in 
 the evening while oxygen was being administered, 
 but later they withdrew. A little after one A. M. 
 on Friday, the thirtieth, there came a change. The 
 heart could not stand the strain and he ceased 
 breathing. 
 
 There are many, who live more idle lives, who 
 would complain that such a useful man should 
 so prematurely consume his energies. There are 
 some who knew him well and who valued his 
 service who regret that he should have under- 
 taken a journey which placed so heavy a tax upon 
 his strength. We need not linger over their per- 
 plexities and queries. We would rather use his 
 death to illustrate his character, believing that 
 thus we may give a better answer than in any ar- 
 gument that could be formed. 
 
 There was never an hour from the time when 
 
 [250]
 
 THE LAST DAYS 
 
 he entered business, except a few months when his 
 career was interrupted by sickness, during which 
 he was not crowded with work. He always faced 
 more tasks than it seemed possible that a dozen 
 men could accomplish. Much of his work was con- 
 nected with some sort of leadership, which taxed 
 his physical and mental powers to their utmost. 
 The conduct of a carpet business which for years 
 had the patronage of the wealthiest families of 
 Boston was enough to engage the energies of most 
 men. He was a man with a growing family and 
 did not fail to give his children time for counsel 
 and play. He was a deacon of a church and car- 
 ried the details of its work, knowing almost as 
 much as the minister about the organization, the 
 cares and burdens and responsibilities of its large 
 membership. 
 
 Yet these things occupied only a small part of 
 his time. What might be classed as public duties 
 consumed by far the larger part, especially in the 
 last half of his life. He was sought probably more 
 than any other man in Boston to preside over pub- 
 lic meetings. In every reform movement he was 
 one of the leaders, carrying the heaviest burden 
 and placing himself where he bore the brunt of 
 the battle. Hours of his time were given to the 
 conduct of the business of his denomination, and 
 in the last years of his life no one, except the reg- 
 ular secretaries of the American Board, gave 
 more time and energy to the cause of foreign mis- 
 sionary work. Yet this intense and continuous 
 activity, as we have already seen, was a settled 
 
 [251]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 policy of his life. When, in his young manhood, 
 he was sick and battling for life he promised his 
 God that if he should recover his health and be 
 given strength to labor, he would never complain 
 of any work that might be placed upon him. It 
 was a sacred pledge he had made with his Creator 
 and it was never broken. He felt that his life had 
 been saved for a purpose. No minister of the gos- 
 pel ever believed more truly that he had been 
 called to preach than Mr. Capen believed that he 
 had been called to a great work. This was a faith 
 that was never absent from him. Others might 
 waste their time and refuse burdens ; he dared not. 
 He had heard a voice and he must obey. He had 
 seen a heavenly vision and he must follow it. He 
 had heard a call to service and his life, crowded 
 with activities, was an answer to the call. 
 
 While sailing from Gibraltar to Naples he wrote 
 a letter to his Bible Class which embodied the 
 principle of his life. "We saw one day a full- 
 rigged ship running before the wind with skysails 
 set, three jibs, the spanker set, crowding every 
 rag of canvas she had. She signaled us to get 
 our position to see if her reckoning was correct. 
 I thought it was a pretty good illustration of 
 what we ought to do. Crowding every sail on the 
 voyage of life, it is wise to take counsel of God 
 and the Bible to make sure we are right and not 
 take any chances." 
 
 Yet he was never careless of his health. He 
 realized that his body was frail, that it could 
 stand the strain placed upon it only by the closest 
 
 [252]
 
 THE LAST DAYS 
 
 observance of the laws of health. No man was 
 ever more regular in such matters as deep 
 breathing, physical exercises, eating nourishing 
 food and in the right proportion, and regularity 
 of sleep. These things were as sacred to him as 
 his prayers. They were part of his religious 
 exercises. His whole life was consecrated to 
 God, body as well as soul, to be used in a glori- 
 ous service. He was as anxious not to expose his 
 body to that which would weaken it as he was not 
 to expose his soul to that which would harm it. 
 On his last journey he denied himself the privi- 
 lege of seeing many mission stations because 
 trips to them would have involved undue expo- 
 sure to hot sun or rain or unsanitary conditions. 
 Every power of his being was placed at the serv- 
 ice of his great Master, and he felt it a sacred obli- 
 gation to keep himself in the very best condition, 
 so that his service might be most effective. 
 
 This vigilance over his physical condition was 
 not spasmodic, as it is in the lives of many men. It 
 was as regular as his devotions, being continued 
 each day through a period of over fifty years. 
 His mother died of tuberculosis and his father 
 also had the disease, though his death came from 
 pneumonia. His brother wasted away from the 
 same terrible plague, and when Mr. Capen was a 
 young man, as we have noticed, he had tuberculo- 
 sis of the knee. Handicapped by such an inher- 
 itance as his, fighting from youth a weak body, 
 and in young manhood suffering wasting disease, 
 most men would have despaired of rendering 
 
 [253]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 large service. But his consecration of will knew 
 no such word as defeat, and by what to most men 
 would have been laborious observance of rules of 
 health he maintained his vigor, and lived, accord- 
 ing to the calendar, over seventy years but by 
 comparison with what most men accomplish he 
 lived twice that length of time. 
 
 Indeed it was a part of his gospel that health 
 is found in work, and he often declared that if 
 those men and women who are running to the va- 
 rious cults of healing would lose their lives in 
 some great service they would find both health 
 and happiness. He was disgusted with that atti- 
 tude toward life that is embodied in the phrase 
 "Save your strength," and his own life ought to 
 do much toward helping to make the disgust more 
 general. The common idea that to each of us is 
 given a certain amount of strength and that if we 
 overdraw on this allotment we must suffer he re- 
 garded as a pernicious doctrine. He knew that 
 most human ills grow out of idleness. They 
 spring up in lives which are not absorbed in some 
 great purpose. Life grows by exercise and the 
 more work done, with proper precaution, the more 
 will life increase. The arm does not grow flabby 
 by a constant swinging of the hammer; this con- 
 tinuous toil strengthens the muscles. No black- 
 smith was ever enfeebled by his work at the anvil. 
 
 So Mr. Capen believed that labor of any kind 
 is the greatest source of health and he proved the 
 truth of this principle by his life. Beginning life 
 with a handicap, inheriting a weak body, fighting 
 
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 THE LAST DAYS 
 
 
 for his life against disease, he grew strong in serv- 
 ice, becoming more efficient with the passing 
 years ; for in his later life he was remarkably free 
 from those diseases which come to old age. If 
 there is any one thing his life pre-eminently 
 teaches it is the life-giving power of severe, con- 
 tinuous and well-managed toil. 
 
 There were two elements in his gospel of work 
 which saved him from much of the wear and tear 
 which creeps into many busy lives. He took such 
 a deep joy in his work that no part of it became 
 mechanical. It is drudgery that kills. When our 
 tasks become our masters and stand over us with 
 slave-whips, they lacerate our nerves and deplete 
 our energy. It is not the work but the worry 
 which sends men to early graves. Mr. Capen was 
 deeply interested in whatever he did. His work 
 was not his master, but his friend. His nature 
 was not divided hands in one place and heart in 
 another. We have already observed that when 
 men sought him for counsel they went from his 
 presence not only feeling that they had been wel- 
 come, but also that they had bestowed a compli- 
 ment upon him in seeking him out. It was a result 
 of the overflowing joy he felt in service. Idleness 
 would have shortened his life, for it would have 
 taken away his deepest satisfaction. Work made 
 his life blessed. The more he had to do, the more 
 his joy was increased. 
 
 Added to this fruit of the Spirit was an un- 
 bounded optimism. He went through life with the 
 confidence that his cause was sure to rule the 
 
 [255]
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 world. When a man loses heart his work drags. 
 Regrets over the past and worries concerning the 
 future consume his energies. He parts with that 
 spirit which makes conquerors and wins battles. 
 Mr. Capen never doubted that the Kingdom of 
 God would cover the earth. The letters he wrote 
 during his journey through India, while revealing 
 the sin, the ignorance and the superstition of the 
 land, were veritable songs of triumph, the one 
 theme being the certainty that Christianity would 
 soon rule the nations. If there were any discour- 
 aging conditions confronting his work, whatever 
 they might be, they were overshadowed by this 
 ever-present faith, and the contagion of his opti- 
 mism touched his fellow workers, carrying them 
 through to victorious results. 
 
 When Grover Cleveland was President of the 
 United States, Mr. Capen, with other gentlemen, 
 visited Washington in the interest of the North 
 American Indians. After listening to their case, 
 Mr. Cleveland said: "Gentlemen, I have had a 
 great many people come here to criticize, but you 
 are the first who have come to offer assistance." 
 Mr. Capen seldom criticized. He would not per- 
 mit himself to dwell on failures and mistakes. He 
 always attacked a problem on its positive side. 
 Not one ounce of his energy was consumed in 
 regrets, in moaning over human failures or sins. 
 This is an attitude of mind that leads to despair 
 and despair always means weakness. He would 
 have nothing to do with this human frailty which 
 cripples Christian workers. He had a Kingdom 
 
 [256]
 
 THE LAST DAYS 
 
 to win. He was confident that his Captain could 
 not be defeated and he threw himself into the con- 
 flict with the certainty of success. 
 
 He not only did his work without the usual wear 
 and tear that shortens life, but he went through 
 life with a companion who helped greatly to make 
 his work easy. He lived in constant and grateful 
 recognition of this fact and often showed his ap- 
 preciation by relating an experience in the life of 
 Mr. Dwight L. Moody. The great evangelist at 
 one time wanted to talk to a woman on the subject 
 of her salvation, but she held in her arms a crying 
 baby and serious conversation was impossible. 
 Finally, one of the Christian workers, standing 
 near, took the baby and gave the evangelist an 
 opportunity to accomplish his purpose. Mr. 
 Moody used to say that the unnamed worker who 
 held the baby did as much toward the woman's 
 salvation as he had done. Mr. Capen would tell 
 the story and would declare that he was able to 
 accomplish much of his work because he was saved 
 by his wife from many of the worries and cares of 
 life. She knew how to make a home a veritable 
 haven of rest, where the tired body could find re- 
 cuperation and the active mind could enter into 
 peace. When Mr. Capen came from his busy day 
 and entered his house, he was always welcomed by 
 loving hearts, a wife and a daughter, who studied 
 to save him from every possible care, who antici- 
 pated every desire, and, so far as was reasonable, 
 withheld every anxiety. 
 
 Mr. Capen was an idealist in his attitude toward
 
 SAMUEL BILLINGS CAPEN 
 
 life in general, but especially in his attitude to- 
 ward the family. In the presence of women he 
 was chivalry incarnate. He was never heard to 
 indulge in any of those pleasantries which mini- 
 mize her character nor to participate in any of 
 those supposed bits of humor savoring of sarcasm 
 or irony which men often pass with their wives or 
 friends. He was always not only dignified but 
 reverent before womanhood, and this attitude, 
 while always a part of his nature, was intensified 
 by his association with a wife who commanded 
 love and respect and who made a home in which a 
 man could be at his best and do his greatest work. 
 He wanted to "die in the harness." His wish 
 was granted by the good Father he had always 
 trusted. And could there have been a better spot 
 for him to cease from his labors'? His life will 
 ever be associated with the cause of missions. No 
 country was more interesting to him than China. 
 There seems a peculiar fitness that in this land he 
 should have lain down to sleep. When the news 
 flashed across the seas, "Father glorified," his 
 closest friends felt that in those two words his 
 biography had been written. He had lived as an 
 inspiration to thousands. He had stood for a 
 faith that made him a spiritual example to laymen 
 and ministers. His life had been spent on the 
 earth but only to make earth a heaven. Now in 
 the very height of his power, in intense activity in 
 the cause he loved best, he went home. He died 
 in the battle. His cause will win. 
 
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