DISCOURSES COMMEMORATIVE 
 
 OF 
 
 PROFESSOR TAYLER LEWIS, LL.D.,L.H.D., 
 
 Delivered at Commencement, 1877; 
 
 AND OF 
 
 PROFESSOR ISAAC W. JACKSON, LL.D., 
 
 Delivered at Commencement, 1878. 
 
 BY 
 
 ELIPHALET NOTT POTTER, D.D., LL.D.,. 
 
 President of Union University. 
 
 PUBLISHED BY REQUEST 
 
 OF THE 
 
 ALUMNI AND TRUSTEES. 
 
 ALBANY, N. Y.: 
 J. MUNSELL, PRINTER. 
 1878. 
 
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Discourse Commemorative 
 
 of 
 
 -Protessor Tapler Pewis, LL.D. L£.O.D. i 
 
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TayterR Lewis, LL.D., L.H.D., Norr Prorgrssor or 
 THE ORIENTAL LANGUAGES AND LecturER oN BIBLI- 
 CAL AND CLASSICAL LITERATURE, IN UNION COLLEGE, 
 DEPARTED THIS LIFE ON THE ELEVENTH DAY OF May, 
 1877. 
 
I know that my Redeemer lives ; 
 
 And o’er my dust, Survivor, shall he stand. 
 
 My skin all gone, this [remnant] they may rend; 
 Yet from my flesh shall I Eloah see ; — 
 
 Shall see Him mine; 
 
 Mine eyes shall see Him — stranger now no more. 
 
 JOB xix, 25, 26, 27; 
 in Doctor Lewis's Rhythmical Version. 
 
 No subject can form for us a more suggestive 
 Baccalaureate theme than the life of the Alumnus 
 whose career as pupil, professor and p:triot, as scholar, 
 author and Christian gentleman, we are assembled 
 to commemorate. And yet the biographical sketch of 
 a great man is apt in its impression to be as unsatis- 
 factory as are the attempted reproductions of the Alps 
 in miniature. The relative height of mountains and 
 depth of valleys may be given exactly, and the places of 
 glaciers and the course of streams may be traced accu- 
 rately, but the grand impression of nature is wanting. 
 
 If we portray him who is the subject of this me- 
 morial discourse with fidelity, the portrait at best 
 will lack the power and sympathy of life. 
 
 ‘“Oh for the touch of a vanished hand 
 And the sound of a voice that is still!’ 
 
 Oh for his presence once more with us here now! But 
 alas! that may not be. 
 
 p $5275 
 
6 , 
 
 Like Cromwell, who is said to have exclaimed to the 
 too flattering artist, ‘‘ Paint me as Lam,” Doctor Lewis 
 were the last man to be fond of flattery, to have 
 courted eulogy or permitted panegyric. And yet it 
 is difficult to speak of him in ordinary language and 
 as we speak of ordinary men; for “ one star differeth 
 from another star in glory,” even in that spiritual 
 system of which Christ is the central life and light. 
 
 In the year of our Lord 1802, the honored subject 
 of this discourse was born in this State, at Northum- 
 berland in Saratoga county. Those who have visited 
 his birth-place and are familiar with the scenery of 
 the upper Hudson as it flows through rich fields 
 and fragrant meadows, with wooded hills near at 
 hand and mountains in the distance; those who have 
 traced along the river’s bank the winding and ro- 
 mantic walks, shaded by noble trees — the evergreen 
 pine and cedar predominating —can understand his 
 life-long love for his old home, his unwearied delight 
 inthe similar scenery of this beautiful Mohawk valley 
 and his reverent appreciation of the being of God as 
 revealed in nature. 
 
 The time of his birth is somewhat memorable in 
 our national annals. Peace and prosperity, to which 
 the land had long been a stranger, had at last succeeded 
 to the storms of the Revolution and to the partisan 
 disturbances of early constitutional and political strife. 
 The administration of Thomas Jefferson which began 
 the previous year, was to continue until the year 
 1809. Aaron Burr was Vice-president. Napoleon, 
 already First Consul, had extended his hand and 
 grasped the presidency of the Italian Republics, an 
 earnest of his limitless ambition. By the peace of 
 
 Luneville and Amiens, critical and dangerous ques- 
 
 be, 
 
i 
 
 tions for the United States as to impressment and 
 neutral rights were temporarily put at rest. But it 
 was only for atime. The renewal of war in Kurope, 
 the aggression of belligerents upon neutral commerce, 
 the assumption of despotic power by Napoleon in the 
 government of France, were regarded in the United 
 States with bitter indignation by one party, the federal- 
 ists, while the aggressive and haughty policy of Eng- 
 land was as intensely irritating to the other party in 
 our national politics. The opposing schemes for meet- 
 ing these exigencies, were soon to rekindle anew the . 
 vehemence of partisan controversy and to prepare the 
 public mind for the war 6f 1812. These events occur- 
 ring during the first ten or eleven years of the life of 
 Tayler Lewis had their effect upon his impressible and 
 precocious nature. The home and neighborhood in 
 which he lived was one where these exciting topics 
 were sure to be discussed. His father, an officer in 
 the Revolutionary war, had served his country with 
 devotion and distinction. Monmouth, Germantown, 
 Fort Stanwix, Yorktown, and the storming of the re- 
 doubts-of Cornwallis, were among the battles, sieges, 
 patriotic fortunes he had passed. These memories, 
 with the then fresh details, entered deeply into the 
 young life of his son, were frequently alluded to with 
 justifiable pride in after years and, we may well believe, 
 were the foundation of that high, devoted and enthu- 
 siastic patriotism which was among the distinguishing 
 characteristics of Tayler Lewis. 
 
 He was baptized in his infancy; his mother having 
 made the long journey to Albany in several instances 
 with a view to the baptism of her children; and she 
 gave her son the Christian uame, “Tayler,” for she 
 was a niece of Lieutenant Governor John Tayler, of 
 
8 3 
 Albany. Her son was wont to speak of her as a good 
 Christian mother devoted to her household. 
 
 The earliest testimonial to his youthful scholarship 
 is contained in a time-worn document found among 
 his papers, dated, ‘‘ Northumberland school, July 
 19th, 1811,” and written with the old-style precision 
 of the day, as follows: 
 
 “This may certify that Mr. Tayler Lewis is well 
 versed in reading, writing, English Grammar and 
 Geography ; and has obtained the rudiments of Arith- 
 metic, commenced classical studies and made profi- 
 ciencies beyond my most sanguine expectations. His 
 good manners, disposition, and assiduity in study, 
 highly recommend him to friends and acquaintance 
 and to those who are friends of science.” Like a 
 quaint but life-like portrait, this shows that young 
 Lewis already gave unconscious testimony to the 
 truth of the poet’s line, “The child is father to the 
 man,’ and evinced the scholarly passion of his life 
 in the assiduity which led his intelligent preceptor to say 
 he commenced classical studies and made proficiencies 
 beyond the most sanguine expectations. The pre- 
 ceptor long remembered his bright little scholar, and 
 quite recently his descendants have written from the 
 West, giving evidence of the strong impression of 
 ability so early made. He was afterwards at school 
 in Milton, Saratoga county. <A friend, then his 
 schoolmate, after an interval of more than half a 
 century, recalls with deep interest characteristics 
 similar to those here referred to. 
 
 His preparation for college was made at Salem, 
 Washington county, under the direction of Dr. Proud- 
 fit, aman ofstrong character, who, like his relative, Prof. 
 Proudfit of Union College, was affectionate and kind in 
 
u 
 
 his intercourse with his pupils. Doctor Lewis traced 
 some of his earliest and deepest religious impressions 
 to this influence; and was profitably and permanently 
 affected, from waking in the night to find his faithful 
 teacher and friend kneeling at his bedside and pouring 
 out petitions for his spiritual welfare. As he was but 
 eighteen years old when he graduated from college in 
 1820, and a mere boy when four years earlier he entered 
 it, we cannot but be struck with the deep and lasting im- 
 pression there made upon him. Wetrace his courage 
 and patriotism to his father, the first elements of his 
 religious life to his mother, and the impetus given to 
 his intellectual life to his Alma Mater. Although, in 
 his later career, he was to stand for the metaphysical 
 rather than the physical, for the ideal rather than the 
 practical, while President Nott, then in his prime, 
 was eminently practical in his aims aud influence, 
 yet the spell cast upon this pupil in college days 
 never left him. As when a pupil, so when he became 
 a professor and finally a biographer of President Nott, 
 he still honored, revered and loved him as in many 
 respects the foremost man of his time, one whose 
 memory was so dear to him that in the last days of 
 his life he asked to be buried near Dr. Nott in the 
 College Cemetery. 
 
 , Among his classmates were Laurens P. Hickok, 
 William H. Seward and others, destined to eminence, 
 while some are respected citizens of this neighborhood. 
 His room-mate, now an aged clergyman, has recently 
 revisited the college, the room, the walks, the scenes, 
 once enjoyed with this early friend whom in college 
 days and ever since he has loved as a brother. This 
 intimate acquaintance, commenced during early boy- 
 hood when prosecuting the academical course of 
 
10 ; 
 
 studies, about the year 1814, was continued in college ; 
 and his room-mate during his entire course informs 
 us that he regularly read a portion of God’s word and 
 that, generally in the early morning; nor was he 
 backward in speaking to others of the thoughts that 
 were thus suggested to him. His little pocket-Bible 
 was always upon the table and numerous pencil com- 
 ments were to be seen on its pages. Sometime in 
 the year 1817, a weekly praycr meeting was organized | 
 in the section. Young Lewis was not only regular 
 in his attendance, but took an active part init. Shght 
 and boyish in appearance, he was, as Dr. Hickok 
 informs us, the best swimmer in his class and by no 
 means neglectful of athletic exercises, although chiefly 
 remarkable for his quiet, earnest and diligent attention 
 to his duties. 
 
 Judge Samuel A. Foot of Geneva, who graduated 
 from Union College in the year 1811, states that Tay- 
 ler Lewis entered his office at Albany as a student of 
 law, soon after his graduation trom this Institution, and 
 continued in the office until three years later, when he 
 was admitted to the bar. His classmate in college, 
 William Kent, son of the distinguished jurist, James 
 Kent, was for a time his fellow-student in the office. 
 So purely intellectual was young Lewis, that, when 
 tired of his law books, his recreation was found in eal- 
 culating eclipses. He had one of the clearest and most 
 active intellects and was regarded as certain of great 
 distinction in the practice of law. Declining a pro- 
 mising opening, he returned to Fort Miller and pre- 
 pared to practice law in the immediate neighborhood 
 of his birth-place. He connected himself with the 
 Reformed Dutch church there, was one of its most 
 efficient members and was elected a member of its con- 
 
11 
 
 sistory. His brother, who studied in his office during 
 this period, writes that ‘‘ when the cholera, small-pox or 
 other contagious diseases prevailed, the young lawyer, 
 unaccompanied by any ministers, would visit the sick 
 and the dying to pray with them and administer 
 spiritual advice and consolation.”? He was also brave 
 and generous in defending without pecuniary compen- 
 sation the cause of the poor, the defenceless and the 
 oppressed. | 
 
 But meanwhile he was perplexed by conscientious 
 doubts as to his professional duties. The true direc- 
 tion of his future career was given, in the seemingly 
 accidental suggestion of & clergyman interested in the 
 Hebrew Scriptures, that he should take up the study 
 of Hebrew. This he did with avidity. In his pro- 
 fessional journeys, his Hebrew Bible became his con- 
 stant companion. I well remember his glowing 
 description of his deepening interest and progress in 
 this study and in the renewal and further prosecution 
 of his college classics; how the dawn would creep up 
 over the hills, and the rays of the rising sun flood the 
 valley of the Hudson, rousing this eager student to 
 the consciousness that all through the night and far 
 into the morning he had been pursuing those classical 
 an:' Seriptural studies which he was destined to follow 
 through life over great obstacles and on to great emi- 
 nence, and which in return were to be found the 
 source of his delight and solace in the shadow of the 
 valley at the close of life’s pilgrimage. 
 
 That pilgrimage was not made alone, for life-long 
 friends walked onward with him. Neither was he with- 
 out those domestic surroundings which were essential 
 40 a nature so loving and social and sympathetic. He 
 was married in 1833. You may see the old home- 
 
12 
 
 stead of his wife’s family, still in their possession, 
 standing near Fort Miller on the borders of the 
 Hudson. I know of no more touching tribute to 
 domestic felicity than that scene toward the close of 
 his life, when, calling his aged wife to his side with a 
 fond embrace, he alluded to the lovely walks along the 
 river banks in their youth, but exclaimed of the love 
 of these last days of earthly life, ‘‘ It is even better, far 
 better, now.” Later on, after a restless night, in the 
 stillness of the early morning, to his wife and daughter 
 who insisted on sitting up still longer with him, he 
 exclaimed, ‘‘ Ruskin has written a great deal about art 
 and nature, but he has never yet written anything 
 about an old man who lies sick and suffering, with a 
 dear old wife and devoted daughter tending him; and 
 until he has written that, he has never written all that 
 he should.” 
 
 Soon after his marriage, influenced by his tastes and 
 circumstances, he became principal of the Academy at 
 Waterford. In the columns of the Waterford Atlas, 
 when he was about thirty years of age, we find the 
 earliest traces of his authorship. Discussing earnestly 
 such themes as Skepticism, the Stage, Earthly Illu- 
 
 sions, the Heavens, Religion, Intemperance, the Sin of — 
 
 Pride, the Relations of Church and State, the Dangers 
 of the Republic, he wrote in a spirit which devoutly 
 recognized the Bible as a logical power as well as a 
 rule of action; so that he once said, ‘* Reason com- 
 mits suicide when it refuses the aid of the Bible.” His 
 style, in his earlier articles, hardly foreshadows his 
 later power, yet they are strikingly characteristic in 
 their reverence for religion, their elevated speculations, 
 their practical exhortations and in the choice of themes. 
 
 He moved to Ogdensburgh, St. Lawrence county, 
 
 a 
 
_ 
 
 13 
 
 in the year 1835, accepting the principalship of the 
 Academy there and writing frequently for the Ogdens- 
 burgh Times during his residence of two years; after 
 which he returned for two years more to his old post 
 at Waterford. 
 
 His public life dates from 1838, when, in accordance 
 with the wish of President Nott (who had discerned 
 the genius of his pupil), he delivered the Phi Beta 
 Kappa oration at Union College. His subject was 
 ‘‘ Maith the Life of Science.” In his treatment of the 
 difficult and then novel theme, he showed ‘an acute- 
 ness of analysis, a power of generalization, and an 
 affluence of classical learning,” which justified the 
 wide circulation achieved by the address when pub- 
 lished. Its repetition was called for at other institu- 
 tions. His consequent reputation procured for him at 
 once the offer of several collegiate professorships. He 
 accepted that of Greek and Latin Literature in the 
 University of the city of New York. It is interesting 
 to note that the Union graduate in whose office, as we 
 have seen, he had studied law, together with his fellow- 
 student at the bar, who was also his classmate at 
 Union, was instrumental in securing his appointment 
 and acceptance of this important position for which 
 he was so well qualified. 
 
 The change to the Metropolis produced a marked 
 effect upon the development of his character and 
 scholarship. He could then measure himself with his 
 peers; in place of village periodicals, the great news- 
 papers and magazines and publishing houses of the 
 period surrounded him and were open to him. His 
 pupils were older and more advanced than those he 
 had previously taught, with the alertness stimulated 
 by city life, and an appreciation and sympathy which 
 
14 
 
 led, through evenings spent in scholarly intercourse, to 
 life-long and helpful friendships. Society introduced © 
 him to converse with refined, congenial and highly cul- 
 tivated minds; the University, to scholars eminent 
 and inspiring. The great political, moral and religious 
 interests of the community, of which he always felt 
 himself to be a responsible member, opened to him a 
 still wider arena. He who might have been but a 
 selfish scholar and recluse, entered upon it as the 
 champion of whatever he believed to be right; fur- 
 nishing articles for reviews and newspapers, and de- 
 livering forcible addresses at colleges and seminaries ; 
 proving that a new individual force had entered into 
 the higher politics of the city, State and nation. 
 
 In one of the metropolitan papers of the day he pub- 
 lished a pungent criticism on certain public lectures 
 which he regarded as open to the charge of dis- 
 belief in the Mosaic account of the creation. The 
 lecturer was touched to the quick and demanded the 
 name of his critic. Professor Lewis promptly gave his 
 name; but ‘“‘when called upon, in my office,” said 
 Judge Foot, “by a portentous relative of the lecturer, . 
 some six feet in height, who looked with surprise on 
 the firm but frail little professor and proceeded with a 
 demand for a recantation of some portions of the cri- 
 ticism, those bright, sparkling eyes fairly beamed with 
 fire as he answered, ‘ Recant? No, not one word!’” 
 The interview ended satisfactorily, however, as he 
 readily and fully disavowed all personal ill-will or in- 
 tention to injure the feelings of the lecturer or to go 
 beyond the subject-matter of the lecture. Naturally 
 a controversialist, whether because of his martial an- 
 cestry or no, he readily took the aggressive against 
 whatever he believed to be erroneous, and was prompt 
 
15 
 
 to rebuke it, alike among friends or foes. It is 
 the comment of an intimate friend that he was looked 
 to as one of the readiest defenders of the church 
 against skepticism, even while he awoke alarm by his 
 exposure of Scriptural misinterpretation and orthodox 
 fallacies: that he rejoiced in the strongest, not to say 
 the most defiant, assertion of his convictions; that while 
 his ready wit disconcerted opposition, his versatility . 
 was a match for opponents, and that these’ qualities 
 making intellectual combat a source of pleasure to 
 him, he himself realized that in controversy he did not 
 always remain dispassionate. Writing of Farrar’s Life 
 of Christ, he says, “In some places Farrar seems too 
 tolerant; but this may be only because he is a better 
 Christian than [am in my harsher judgment.” Still 
 the controversialist, if he be earnest, cannot but give 
 thrusts which wound, even as the soldier who battles 
 must draw blood. Paul, in all ages recognized as one 
 of the ablest of the champions of the truth, exclaims 
 not only, ‘‘I have kept the faith,’ but also, ‘I have 
 fought a good fight.” 
 
 Professor Lewis, let us here remark, was well armed 
 for the battle of active, earnest life, because, though 
 unconscious of what awaited him and pursuing know- 
 ledge purely for its own sake, his leisure as well as 
 his working hours were always well employed. His 
 was an example harmonizing with the counsel which, 
 when Chancellor of Union University, Governor 
 John A. Dix gave to our graduating class as to the 
 life-long prosecution of studies begun in college. 
 Already the [liad and Odyssey, the Greek drama, 
 Plato, Aristotle; the pastoral poets and lesser Hexa- 
 meter poets; Herodotus, Thucydides, Xenophon, 
 Plutarch, Longinus, Lucian, Cicero, Virgil, Horace, 
 
16 | 
 
 Ovid, with other classic authors, and last, but not 
 least, the Hebrew Bible, were re-read frequently and 
 critically. And thus it has been truly said of him that 
 he read ancient authors in the original, instead of 
 reading about them; the quotations and references 
 for which he was so remarkable, being recollections 
 or spontaneous suggestions of his own mind and not 
 taken at second hand from note, index or lexicon. 
 
 The degree of Doctor of Laws, received while he 
 was at the University of New York, was conferred by 
 Union College. Although fulfilling successfully his 
 professional engagements, prosecuting his scholarly 
 researches and giving attention to the duties of a 
 citizen, he was also preparing to offer to the learned 
 and religious world a contribution worthy to be the 
 first-fruits of nearly twenty years of toil. 
 
 In opposing the materialistic and skeptical tenden- 
 cies of the times, it was natural that Doctor Lewis 
 should turn to the great classic writer, who, centuries 
 before the Christian era, combatted the same ten- 
 dencies among the cultured and progressive men of 
 Athens. In 1844, in his forty-second year, he pub- 
 lished the first of his works. It was entitled, ‘‘ Plato 
 against the Atheists,” and was dedicated to Doctor 
 Nott as ‘‘ President of the author’s revered Alma 
 Mater and in remembrance of the lessons of theoretical 
 and practical wisdom,”’ received from him. It received 
 from scholars in this country and Europe a cordial 
 welcome. It is only for the life-long student of Greek 
 literature and philosophy to measure its value; but 
 the thoughtful reader will admire its multitude of 
 learned and apt citations from the poets and thinkers 
 of Greece and Rome and from Hebrew writers, its 
 subtle etymologies, its profound and sometimes beau- 
 
 r= 
 
17 
 
 tiful disquisitions in metaphysics, and will enjoy the 
 simplicity and clearness of the style. Plato, it will 
 be remembered, attacks, first, those who deny God’s 
 existence, then those who deny His providence and 
 lastly those who deny His sin-avenging justice. His 
 commentator selects the principal points of the argu- 
 ment and the difficult passages and words, and. gives 
 more or less dissertation to each. He treats these topics 
 with a just reverence for his master, with the insight of 
 intellectual sympathy and with a sense of fellowship 
 with those who in all ages have stood for right, duty 
 and Godliness. 
 
 In 1849, Doctor Lewis accepted the professorship of 
 Greek in Union College, and later, its chair of Oriental 
 Languages and Biblical Literature. As in his former 
 position, so here, he exerted an unusual influence, espe- 
 cially upon the finer minds among his pupils. In the 
 class-room he aimed rather to interest and stimulate 
 than to drill. To those to whom his department of in- 
 struction was congenial, contact with him was like a 
 revelation. The classics, the Scriptures, philology, 
 history, current events, seemed filled with new mean- 
 ing. Jis statement of facts and events as proving the 
 presence and purpose of a Divine Providence ordering 
 ‘all things for good,” the inculcation of a purer aim, 
 a higher patriotism, scholarship and Christian man- 
 hood — whothat knew him in his prime and has listened 
 to these utterances in his class room, lecture-room, 
 Bible-class, or in his matchless conversations, has not 
 caught somewhat of the inspiration of his earnestness 
 and realized the originality and power of his genius ? 
 His eye brightened, his voice rose, as he gave with 
 rhythmic beat the noble Homeric or dramatic passages. 
 He advised his pupils to commit these not merely by 
 
 2 
 
18 
 
 rote, but “by heart,” that their influence might be life- 
 long. He called his students to what he had himself 
 exemplified — the pursuit, for its own sake, of truth, 
 knowledge and philosophy. 
 
 Here too, as from early manhood, he continued his 
 laborious study of the Hebrew and Greek languages, 
 literature and philosophy. He became familiar with 
 the Rabbinical writings. He could converse easily in 
 Greek and sometimes conducted his reflections in it. 
 His marginal notes in books were more frequently 
 written in Hebrew, Greek or Latin than in English. 
 He wrote original Hebrew or Greek verse readily. 
 To these acquirements he now added Syriac, Samari- 
 tan, Koptic, Chaldaic and Arabic; the Koran being 
 thoroughly studied, and the Thousand and One Nights 
 
 in the original furnishing him with light reading. | 
 
 He had some knowledge of the Gothic, and read the 
 German and several modern languages. It is need- 
 less to say that he was master of English. 
 
 In 1855, the world of theological and scientific 
 scholars was moved by the publication of a volume on 
 the Creation as Revealed, maintaining that the Bib- 
 lical day was not limited to twenty-four hours. His 
 argument is mainly philological but is also meta- 
 physical. The closeness of its logic, the breadth of 
 its learning, the delightful surprises of etymology 
 everywhere occurring, the relief it offered to many 
 an earnest and doubting mind, the eloquence natu- 
 rally inspired by the sublimity of the subject, well 
 justified the attention which it received from friends 
 and opponents. The attacks of the latter drew 
 forth in the following year a defence of the author’s 
 position, entitled, The Bible and Science, or The 
 
 World Problem. In 1860, he published The Divine 
 
19 
 
 Human in the Scriptures; in the preface to which 
 he promises a work for posthumous publication, 
 on the Figurative Language of the Bible. Mean- 
 while he had supplied the editorial and other columns 
 of many leading magazines and newspapers with an 
 immense amount of invaluable material, weleomed 
 by an ever-widening circle of readers. 
 
 The civil war of 1861 found him ready for his 
 country’s service. He helped forward to the field his 
 son and son-in-law, who had taken commissions in the 
 army. He was unwearied in patriotic appeals and argu- 
 ments. He furnished aseries of articles on the subject 
 of State Sovereignty which excited greatinterest among 
 the influential of all parties. He filled columns with 
 disquisitions upon slavery and with similar discussions 
 and appeals. Somewhat later appeared his Heroic 
 Periods in a Nation’s History. Unable to wield the 
 sword, he wielded untiringly a pen as sharp and power- 
 ful. His ‘“‘ State Rights, a Photograph from the Ruins 
 of Ancient Greece” was, without hisintervention, scat- 
 tered far and wide and was felt to be influential in 
 moulding the opinions of the cultured classes. ‘The 
 Union professor,” wrote Charles Astor Bristed, ‘“ has 
 studied Greek in a thoroughly practical and profita- 
 ble manner. With the spirit of Greek philosophy 
 as illustrated by Greek history, he is perhaps more 
 thoroughly imbued than any man in the country; 
 nay, we have little hesitation in saying that no Hel- 
 lenist throughout Anglo-Saxondom has ever drawn an 
 historical parallel so finished and telling as this Pho- 
 tograph.”’ 
 
 Before the war Doctor Lewis had held, on Biblical 
 grounds, that slavery was not in itself a forbidden in- 
 
20 
 
 stitution. His characteristic conservatism kept him 
 at first from the ranks of the abolitionists, but it soon 
 transferred him to the advocacy of freedom for the 
 Southern slave. He demanded the restoration of the 
 Union and the destruction of slavery; and President 
 Lincoln’s willingness to accept the first without the 
 last aroused his utmost indignation. When asked » 
 what we should do with the negro, he answered, 
 ‘¢ What, sir, shall the negro do with you? With dis- 
 respect to nobody, the one question is as fair as the 
 other.” He loved the Union but was unwilling to 
 accept it at the sacrifice of what to him was a matter 
 of principle. In a letter to a friend after the war, he 
 wrote, ‘‘ My soul clings to the old issues not yet de- 
 cided after all the blood that has been shed. It is 
 solely a question of truth and righteousness.’ Horace 
 Greeley said of him, that he had “ placed Conservatism 
 in its true light before the world and was one of those 
 who would be more highly appreciated atter decease 
 than while they yetlived. Able, acute, andindustrious, 
 devoting‘not only his hours but his energies, his heart 
 with his life, to a vindication of the claims of the 
 Christian faith to the acceptance and reverence of 
 scholars and thinkers, he is one of the precious few 
 who are aiding to rescue the word Conservatism from 
 its popular perversion to the foulest ends, and to devote 
 it once more to the characterization of steadfast 
 loyalty to truth and righteousness.” If a conservative, 
 Doctor Lewis was also a firm believer in human pro- 
 gress. ‘The world,’ he writes, “we may joyfully 
 believe, is advancing and is destined to advance. To 
 doubt it is to doubt the prophetic record. The world 
 for which Christ died is not destined to ultimate 
 barbarism or the final chaos of infidelity. The true 
 
21 
 
 conservative stream of religious influence must rise 
 with renewed energy from every encounter, until, in 
 the language of prophecy, it covers the earth with the 
 knowledge of God.” And this progress of mankind, 
 he believed was also tending toward the realization of 
 true catholicity in Christian unity. ‘‘In Christendom,” 
 he wrote, ‘‘ separation, division, is never to be treated 
 as a good per se ; the church was one in the beginning, 
 visibly and organically one, and such it will be in the 
 end.” 
 
 In 18638, having suffered already for many years 
 from extreme deafness, his nervous system became 
 still farther impaired by the prolonged excitement of 
 the war and the disasters which befell his sons in the 
 field. The alarming wounds received by one and the 
 sudden death in battle of the other, produced a shock 
 which utterly destroyed his hearing and undermined 
 his general health. But he never lost interest in the 
 movements of society, writing for the papers on topics 
 such as ‘ Kvolution,” ‘‘ Religion and Morality, ete.” 
 So late as 1872, he conducted vigorous discussions on 
 the question of the Bible in the Public Schools. In 
 these debates, he maintained that the State had a dis- 
 tinct religious responsibility, its very right to existence 
 being not in popular consent — for he had little respect 
 for majorities — but in the command of God. 
 
 Doctor Lewis was an interested and honored member 
 of the University Convocation of the state of New 
 York; and among the valuable papers which he read 
 before it, one of the latest and most celebrated was 
 entitled, ‘‘ Classical Study; there should be more of it 
 in our Colleges or it should be abandoned.” Not that 
 he would abandon it. By better and more extended 
 training in preparatory schools, he hoped that college 
 courses might yet come to be more than avenues of 
 
22 
 
 grammatical drill; so that through the vestibule of phi- 
 lology the student might thence enter the temple of an- 
 cient thought and classic philosophy. He spoke as one 
 who, not without success, had striven to introduce his 
 pupils to these higher realms of contemplation, and he 
 received the thanks of scholars and the Convocation 
 for this masterly and timely effort. From this body 
 he received the honorary degree of L.H.D. 
 
 His closing labors would alone have been worthy of 
 along life. He gave three years to his translation and 
 annotation of Genesis for Lange’s Commentaries. 
 Then followed, for the same great work, his Rhythmi- 
 cal Version of EKeclesiastes with notes, and then that of 
 Job; from which I have selected his favorite passage, 
 not so much as the text for this discourse as present- 
 ing at its outset the substance of his faith in immor- 
 tality. 
 
 In 1875, appeared those lectures, delivered before 
 the Theological School at New Brunswick, N. J., and 
 published by order of the General Reformed Synod, 
 in which he treats of the Fearfulness of Atheism, the 
 Denial of the Supernatural, the Cosmical Objections 
 (astronomical and geological) to Scripture, and the 
 Superiority of Bible Theism to the physical or philo- 
 sophical views of Cosmos. In re-affirming in these 
 lectures and elsewhere truths for which, like those 
 ancient writers whom he most revered, he lived 
 and would have willingly died, how many hearts 
 has he gladdened with the vision of the truth which 
 fills the cold void of materialism with the loving 
 presence of the Divine all-fatherhood! There are 
 passages in his writings which, recalling the solemn 
 utterances of Socrates and Plato, burn with an im- 
 agination lurid and terrible as that of Jean Paul’s 
 
— 
 
 23 
 
 dreadful dream of Atheism, in which he portrays the 
 wanderings of a despairing Christ through a Godless 
 and crumbling universe. 
 
 It was fitting that his last public appearance should 
 be upon the Commencement stage of his Alma Mater; 
 and there in 1876 he delivered that address ranking 
 in some respects among the best of his utterances, in 
 which he congratulated his life-long friend, Doctor 
 Jackson, upon reaching in sound heart and health the 
 semi-centennial anniversary of his connection with the 
 Faculty of Union College. 
 
 Not long before his death, Doctor Lewis said to me 
 that he had made it a rule of his life to return to his 
 Alma Mater at each Commencement — an example 
 worthy of general imitation. Forsome years he drove 
 down from Fort Miller, to Commencement. The wagon 
 was the same, perhaps with the addition of a patch or 
 two, in which in his college days he used to be brought 
 here, not without some forebodings, at the opening of 
 each term. His way towards the Commencement 
 festivities, however, was bright with pleasant anticipa- 
 tions. - The prospect of re-unions with college friends 
 and instructors as well as of the literary features of the 
 occasion attracted him. On the morning after Com- 
 mencement, he started homeward to drive through the 
 same enchanting scenery, but “‘guam mutatus!’’ The 
 world looked dark and he was oppressed with a sense 
 of sadness and dreariness as he saw the place he loved 
 receding behindhim. And having loved Union College 
 then, he loved it unto the end. When from other 
 quarters, after he had become a member of its Faculty, 
 tempting offers were made him, he could not be drawn 
 away. One of his few regrets in parting with this 
 world was evinced in the exclamation in the last weeks 
 
24 Y 
 
 of his earthly life, Oh, how can I leave Union College! 
 His love for it, for its summer landscape, its autumnal 
 foliage, its garden, its sunsets, even for its old build- 
 ings and its winter, was unfailing. He remembered 
 the memorable year in his college days, when the 
 snow fell in Juneand July; and during his last winter, 
 when confined to his room, he would ask, ‘Is the snow 
 piled high on the Campus?” In the opening spring, 
 though so long insensible to sound, his question was, 
 “¢ Are the birds singing and the winds sounding among 
 the trees in the College woods ? ” 
 
 He loved his friends and associates with peculiar 
 constancy. The classic ideal of guest-friendship was 
 not unlike his friendliness to his friends and friends’ 
 relatives. He condescended to men of low estate or 
 rather his sympathies were with them as though they 
 were his peers. Whoever did more literary labor for 
 others without reward? He had no pride of intellect. 
 How patient he was, with people who insisted on his 
 examining and correcting manuscripts destined to be 
 rejected by the publishers, or if successful with pub- 
 lishers and the public, owing their success to the un- 
 recognized influence of his revisions and suggestions! 
 If irritated, he bore malice toward none. The slave 
 and the outcast found in him afriend. He took little 
 children into the embrace of his scholarship with those 
 Scriptural lessons which are taught in so many Sunday- 
 schools and by which ‘‘ he being dead yet speaketh.” 
 
 His versatility and the range of his accomplishments 
 were surprising. Inthe higher mathematics he worked 
 out original problems with diligence and delight. 
 His enthusiasm for astronomy, of which one of his 
 earliest printed articles treats, led him often in the 
 nights of his sickness to ask, ‘Is Orion shining to- 
 
20 
 
 night? Is he bright?” His love for music was attested 
 by occasional compositions and by his eloquent ad- 
 vocacy of its early cultivation as conducive to order 
 and beauty and to the believing spirit. After he had 
 lost all sense of hearing, he sometimes by fingering 
 the notes upon the key-board, sought to revive the 
 memories of music or to trace some new musical 
 suggestion. 
 
 His familiarity with the poets, especially with 
 Shakespeare, was unusual. He sympathized with all 
 phases of human life, so that (an omnivorous reader) 
 the popular romance, or stories read in the original 
 Arabic, or the scrap-book of olden times were alike a 
 refreshment after intellectual labor. Keeping him- 
 self informed as to the current events, he followed 
 with intelligent interest the progress of modern science. 
 I have not time to quote within the limits of this d*s- 
 course the copious extracts I have made from his pub- 
 lished works and from his early fugitive efforts, terse, 
 pregnant and foreshadowing, as we have seen, the great 
 productions of his life. I trust that a uniform edition 
 of his works may be projected and published, including 
 those left by his wise forethought ready for the press, 
 and preserving also the scattered jewels which fell so 
 freely from his tongue and pen. 
 
 IT need not in this presence describe his striking 
 personal appearance, his noble brow, his dark pierc- 
 ing eye, his flowing locks, his facile hand, his alert 
 movement. 
 
 But the mental habitudes of such a man, naturally 
 an object of much interest to all students, young and 
 old, are not to be passed over in silence. As one in- 
 forms me, who knew him well, before the beginning 
 of my own student-life in college and our continued 
 
26 
 
 intimate association in its Faculty, the Doctor was 
 from the first an incessant worker. He never set apart 
 a study-hour or one exclusively for recreation. I would 
 that he had! His walks were meditations, his only 
 excursions were excursions in the fields of thought. 
 He was never happier than in the cloister-like quiet 
 of his study through the long summer vacations on 
 the College hill. With doors locked and curtains half- 
 closed, with back square against the arm of the settee 
 and knees drawn up to hold an Arabic folio prayer- 
 book of the ninth century, his contentment was 
 supreme. He often went reluctantly to his meals (not 
 unfrequently omitting them) and returned directly to 
 his work. Sleep was another intrusion which he re- . 
 sented, always sitting up late into the night and yet 
 rising at the hour usual with the family. Acute suffer- 
 ing and actual loss of power convinced him, when too 
 late, of his mistake in not recognizing and obeying the 
 laws of health. Neglect of them injured the sense of 
 hearing and indeed all the faculties, lessening both 
 happiness and hopefulness. 
 
 His reading included, as we have intimated, an im- 
 mense number of books, ancient and recent, on every 
 imaginable subject; but still he would re-read one 
 book, even a favorite fiction (such as the Arabian 
 Nights, Romola, The Millon the Floss), over and over 
 again. Hewasvery fond of history. He delighted in 
 re-reading his Euclid in the Arabic of three centuries 
 ago. He enjoyed broad humor as thoroughly as he 
 did the subtlest wit; sometimes by anecdotes of 
 blundering utterance, illustrating a nice distinction 
 in psychology. 
 
 Keeping pace with his thoughts, his pen was always 
 
27 
 
 busy, as a vast quantity of marginal and loose mem- 
 oranda, attest. For forty-five years, without a day’s 
 failure, he noted down the incidents of his personal 
 and household life, a walk, payment of a bill, arrival 
 of letters, visitors, topics of an interesting conversation 
 and invariably the state of the weather; although 
 never recording his sentiments or reflections. His 
 grief over a beloved daughter’s death sought relief in 
 the touching form of a little book of consolatory 
 verses from the Bible, each one beautifully written 
 out in Hebrew, Greek and Latin. His hand-writing 
 in all languages was clear and symmetrical. He was 
 never content with the first form of his thought or ex- 
 pression and seldom sent a first draught to the printer. 
 He re-wrote the whole of Plato against the Atheists 
 and of the Vedder Lectures, at least three times. He 
 disliked and habitually put off letter-writing because 
 of this necessity which he felt for accurate and full 
 expression even on ordinary subjects. THis love of 
 symmetry led him, in arranging his books on the shelves 
 of his library, to regard not simply their subjects but 
 their appearance and size. His books in fact were 
 his only indulgence, nay, his necessary companions. 
 His library was.as essential to his enjoyment as to his 
 literary life. Many years before the semi-centennial 
 celebration to which we have referred, it was the privi- 
 lege of his old friend, Doctor Jackson, as the eldest 
 member of the Faculty, to convey to him a pecuniary 
 testimonial which far more than removed a distressing 
 mortgage then resting upon this library. His surprise 
 and gratitude were like those feelings with which upon 
 his Jast birthday he received a floral tribute accom- 
 panied with loving lines from his brethren of the 
 Faculty. He valued the sentiment and the affection, 
 
28 
 
 and his appreciation was as quick and natural and 
 out-spoken as that of a child. 
 
 He was especially grateful in the former instance, 
 because of the fact that his “scientific friends,” as he 
 was wont thereafter to call them, representing a class 
 he had attacked with no little vehemence in his contro- 
 versial writings, were among the most active in the 
 movement which rescued his library. Its shelves bear 
 witness, like the strata of the rocks, to the order, se- 
 quence and progress of systematic work —a library 
 not large, but so choice and so characteristic, that his 
 admirers and pupils would do well to secure it intact 
 to be preserved permanently as his memorial in the 
 College Library. For that library is to be placed, for a 
 time at least, in the Alumni and Memorial Hall, the. 
 progress of which he watched with deep interest and 
 for which he wrote the motto, both oriental and clas- 
 sical, which stands inscribed in Hebrew characters 
 upon its dome: 
 
 Dies brevis, 
 
 Opus multum, 
 Merces magna, 
 Magister domtis urget. 
 
 3p DA 
 map Apdo 
 Aan Tawa 
 pmys yan 
 
 The brief day drawing to its close found him still 
 laboring for the Master, whose claims are vast but 
 whose reward is infinite; for, his Biblical Expositions 
 for children, though the last of his works, were, it has 
 been remarked, as important as any; and this because 
 of the immense numbers and peculiar impressibility of 
 the class addressed. They were distributed monthly 
 
29 
 
 throughout the country. Through six months of con- 
 finement to a bed from which he never arose, they 
 were completed according to the original plan, despite 
 the pangs of sciatica, sleeplessness, slow wasting, and 
 physical weakness that refused to hold the pen. With 
 eye bright, recollection prompt and true for nearly 
 every needed verse of the Bible or passage of an 
 author, with reason clear and penetrating, he still 
 wrought in his seventy-fifth year the work of many 
 men, and such work as few at their best accomplish. 
 During these last days, while his intellect was clear 
 and vigorous although his frail form was thus racked 
 with pain, he had caused to be written out and placed 
 where his eye could constantly rest upon it, that 
 sentence from the book of the Wisdom of Solomon: 
 
 For the corruptible body presseth down the soul, and the earthly 
 tabernacle weigheth down the mind that museth upon many things. 
 
 On looking through the most prized volumes of his 
 library, soon after his death, [ saw written on a blank 
 leaf in his Hebrew Bible, the following note : 
 
 ‘¢ This Hebrew Bible was purchased in 1829. For 
 a number of years, it was read through twice a-year ; 
 then once a-year and since repeatedly. Almost every 
 difficult place has been made the subject of marginal 
 or separate comment, every rare word noted and every 
 rare meaning préserved in mnemonic marginal signs. 
 It is much disfigured, but a much-studied and to me 
 a very precious book.” 
 
 This precious book and its diligent study was the 
 foundation of his posthumous monument, destined 
 long to endure in Biblical articles and comments and 
 translations of the holy Scriptures, and more espe- 
 cially in his metrical version of the sublime book of 
 
30 
 
 Job. The pages of the chapter in his Hebrew Bible, 
 from which the text is taken, are crowded with 
 marginal notes and references made years previous. 
 He entered into the very spirit of the ancient collect: 
 ‘“‘ Blessed Lord, who hast caused all holy Scriptures 
 to be written for our learning; Grant that we may in 
 such wise hear them, read, mark, learn and inwardly 
 digest them, that by patience, and comfort of thy holy 
 Word, we may embrace and ever hold fast the blessed 
 hope of everlasting life, which thou hast given us in 
 our Saviour Jesus Christ.”” By the thoughtfulness of 
 a tender heart and the last tribute of a loving hand, a 
 Hebrew psalter was buried with him, because he had 
 often expressed his sympathy with the classic custom 
 of placing the warrior’s arms and trophies in his tomb. 
 Even in family prayers, he always read from the He- 
 brew, Syriac, Greek or Latin text or from a version 
 in a foreign tongue, rendering it fluently into admira- 
 ble English. And that worn Hebrew Bible, filled with 
 his notations, was the armory in which he was uncon- 
 sciously gathering weapons for future conflict. It 
 was the reservoir from which flowed streams making 
 glad the people and church of God. Justly he con- 
 sidered the rhythmical version and annotation of Job 
 as ‘“‘the crown of all his works.” And the public 
 at large recognized the services he was rendering. 
 His reputation is not simply local nor only national, 
 but extends to the world of scholars and to the 
 numberless hearts of those who love the Scriptures. 
 It was his sincere belief that the authority of the 
 Bible rests not simply upon a theory of inspiration 
 but rather upon the general acceptance of, and vene- 
 ration for, the book as the Word of God; so that 
 its supreme influence upon human life and conduct 
 
31 
 
 must out-last all controversies about it, and all 
 theories concerning it. His ideal of the Bible Christ- 
 ian was so high that, like St. Paul, some of whose 
 traits he possessed in a remarkable degree, he would 
 say, “Iam least of all and not meet to be called a 
 disciple of Christ, but I believe His Word, I love 
 those who love my Lord, and my hope is in the atoning 
 merits of Jesus as therein disclosed.”” An author and 
 a reader of many books, he placed above them all, at 
 the summit of literature, the Book of books, and re- 
 garded all knowledge but as steps leading up out of 
 darkness to the revealed light and enduring truth of 
 the Word of God. 
 
 Our land, the world of scholars, and Christendom 
 itself has suffered loss. The pulpit and the press 
 proclaim it. But as with the going down of the sun 
 which he loved to watch from. the College Campus, 
 there are glorious traces and influences left to us. 
 
 For you, my beloved pupils who now go forth to 
 your life-work, and for manhood and _ scholarship 
 everywhere, what better lesson, what nobler incent- 
 ive can there be than such a life ? God speed you, every 
 one of you, at every step of your pilgrimage! May your 
 life and your last end be like his, whom in the bright- 
 ness and beauty of the spring, pre-figuring the better 
 life, and after the soul had craved and found release 
 from the weary load of the body, we bore to his grave. 
 From the solemn services conducted by those who 
 had long known and loved him, and the eloquent 
 words spoken by a pupil of other days, and from this 
 sanctuary where he was wont to worship, you saw the 
 long procession go, with solemn step and slow, bearing 
 him to his burial, in the hope of a joyful resurrection. 
 The gathering throng of students near his grave, 
 
32 
 
 the Alumni, the members of the Faculty, his friends 
 and relatives and mourning family, the noble aspect 
 of nature, the towering pines standing like giant ward- 
 ers, the hills round the College cemetery reéchoing 
 the voices of the College choir with those of the sor- 
 rowing assemblage as they sang unitedly and touch- 
 ingly the favorite hymn, ‘‘ [ would not live alway,” the 
 last ministries of religion, the place of burial strewn 
 by your own hands with flowers, tokens of love and 
 symbols of the resurrection — may the scene long be 
 impressed upon your memories! From that open 
 grave, may his voice seem to say to you, beloved 
 pupil, Follow Christ, and ‘‘ whatsoever thy hand 
 tindeth to do, do it with thy might.” 
 
 The sun was drawing near its setting as in silence 
 we left his burial-place. The night drew on and 
 solitude reigned there ; but he, being forever with his 
 Lord, was not alone; nor was that silent grave the 
 scene of hopeless loneliness. It was not alone, for 
 from out the sky into which he had loved to gaze, stars 
 looked down watchfully ; not alone, for voices of Nature 
 which he had loved and ceased to hear, whispered 
 peace. It was not alone, for he had placed his trust in 
 One who saith, ‘‘ Il will never leave thee nor forsake 
 thee.”? He was not alone; but for him, rest after toil; 
 after battle, victory; after separation, re-union and the 
 fruition of his faith that it is better to depart hence and 
 be with Christ. Said one who was near him at the last 
 and participated in his latest and unintermitted labors, 
 Without you, life will lose all its brightness. ‘ But,”’ 
 said he earnestly, ‘I go where all is brightness, and 
 you must meet me there.” So may we meet him, 
 beloved, and like him find fulfilled at the end of our 
 pugrimage the promise, ‘“‘ Be thou faithful unto death 
 and I will give thee a crown of life.” 
 
33 
 
 O God, the protector of all who trust in thee; 
 without whom nothing is strong, nothing is holy, in- 
 erease and multiply upon us thy mercy, that thou 
 being our ruler and guide, we may so pass through 
 things temporal that we lose not finally the things 
 eternal. Grant this, O heavenly Father, for Jesus 
 Christ’s sake our Lord. Amen. 
 
Discourse Gommemorative 
 
 of 
 
 Wrotessor Esaac Ga. Jackson, LL.D. 
 
Isaac W. Jackson, LL.D., Norr Prorgssor or MAtHE- 
 MATICS IN UNION COLLEGE, DEPARTED THIS LIFE ON 
 
 THE TWENTY-EIGHTH DAY OF JULY, 1877. 
 
«ft 
 
 Lovely and pleasant in their lives, in their death they were not 
 
 divided. 
 I SamuzEt, 1, 28. 
 
 A year ago we paid our tribute of respect to the 
 memory of Professor Tayler Lewis, of whom we had 
 but recently been bereaved; assembling then for our 
 Commencement exercises, in the church of which he 
 was amember. Our vacation was soon clouded by the 
 loss of his beloved coadjutor. By custom and the 
 courtesy of this congregation, we find ourselves now 
 gathered, on another Commencement occasion, in the 
 church where for more than fifty years Professor Jack- 
 son devoutly worshiped; andamid the sacred and colle- 
 giate associations of this place, it has been decided to 
 pay to the memory of Professor Jackson likewise the 
 tribute of collegiate service and memorial. I esteem 
 it no light responsibility to be called upon to fulfil 
 this duty toward one whose entire life since his gradu-. 
 ation, for more than half a century, was devoted to 
 this institution ; a life neither eventful nor conspicu- 
 ous in the world’s view, presenting no such scenes 
 or facts as those in which orators and biogra- 
 phers delight, yet a life most worthy of record and 
 remembrance. For a great German writer well 
 reminds us that we should honor most highly those 
 who labor faithfully in class-rooms, since, although 
 
88 | 
 
 they may fall from notice like the spring blossoms, 
 yet like the spring blossoms they live and die that 
 fruit may be borne. It is no light responsibility, then, 
 to speak on such a theme and at the same time to 
 reécho the solemn tones in which God is calling to 
 us all from the graves of so many others connected 
 with the College who have gone from earth within 
 this collegiate year — intimate friends of Professors 
 Lewis and Jackson, Trustees and former members of 
 this Faculty. The invaluable services rendered to 
 Alma Mater by many of them, and circumstances of 
 peculiar interest in the career of others, call for a 
 fuller memorial than can here be offered. 
 
 Prominent among them, was the late Mr. James 
 Brown, who, at the time of his death and for more 
 than thirty years previous, was a Trustee of Union 
 College. He attested his confidence in this institu- 
 tion and his interest in its permanent welfare, by 
 recent gifts and endowments amounting to one hun- 
 dred and ten thousand dollars. He was a man of 
 elevated Christian character and an exemplar of com- 
 mercial honor and success. His charities were great 
 even compared with the great fortune he amassed. 
 His word was, in all parts of the world, a guarantee 
 of sound and unlimited credit. He placed his talents, 
 experience and means at the service of this institu- 
 tion, of which he was an honored counsellor. 
 
 Two others who have just entered into rest, the 
 Hon. Professor Joel Benedict Nott and the Rev. Pro- 
 fessor John Nott, had been members of this Faculty. 
 The first was an officer of Union College from the 
 year 1820 to 1831; a man of rare accomplishments of 
 mind and manners, of whom his friend Professor 
 
hd 
 
 39 
 
 Joseph Henry remarked, ‘“‘ We scientific men suffered 
 a great loss when he left us.” Having served the 
 College and the country with loyalty and ability, he de- 
 voted his latest studies to the elucidation of the Holy 
 Scriptures. His brother, Professor John Nott, was 
 an officer of the College from 1830 to 1854, deeply in- 
 terested in the students and familiarly associating 
 with them, modest, charitable, a simple-hearted clergy- 
 man, an enthusiastic teacher and an unfailing friend. 
 As contemporary with the latter in our Faculty, we 
 may here refer to the lamented Professor J. Louis 
 Tellkampf, J.U.D., who departed this life a few 
 months before Professor Jackson and was his friend 
 and correspondent. His accomplishments, learning 
 and rare modesty and amiability are still recalled by 
 the older members of our College circle. He left us to 
 return to his native Germany; and through late years 
 he occupied with distinction a Law Professorship in 
 the University of Breslau, a seat in the Imperial Par- 
 liament and Council and a high position among 
 German writers on Political Economy. He always 
 cherished grateful recollections of Union College, 
 welcomed to his home any one associated with it and 
 entertained bright anticipations of its future. 
 
 The Hon. John V. L. Pruyn, LL.D., connected with 
 us as an honorary Alumnus, an invaluable adviser 
 in the preparation of the charter of Union University 
 and also by addresses delivered here on many important 
 occasions, is deeply missed from the Chancellorship 
 of the University of New York, from the Board of 
 Regents and from many other prominent positions of 
 public usefulness. Among the wealthy and distin- 
 guished of our own country, the eminent in Church 
 and State from foreign lands, and among the hundreds 
 of our toiling teachers who enjoyed frequent and 
 
40) 
 
 cordial invitations to his home, he will long be re- 
 membered as conspicuous for a Christian grace, rarer 
 now than of old, in that he was “ given to hospitality.” 
 
 The Hon. William F. Allen, recently departed, was — 
 a class-mate of Professor Jackson, and from first to 
 last it could be said of him with truth that he was 
 ‘‘lovely and pleasant in his life.”” The Bench and the 
 Bar, the Press, the College, the Church have done 
 honor to his exalted station aud reputation and to his 
 Christian faith. We knew him here alike to honor 
 and to love him. When, hesitating to accept the 
 presidency of this College, [ turned to its prominent 
 friends for counsel, Judge Allen assured me most 
 ‘earnestly that he sympathized with one upon whom, 
 as he felt, so many unusual difficulties, anxious cares 
 and arduous responsibilities were to be thrown and 
 that I could command his best and constant efforts. 
 No father could have been a wiser or more aftection- 
 ate counsellor. Prudent in resolve, tenacious of 
 purpose, efficient in execution, abhorring crooked ways 
 and of unbending integrity, he was a rock of strength 
 for our College. 
 
 Of the younger Alumni also, there are several who, 
 closely associated with Professor Jackson here, in 
 the year of their death are not divided from him. 
 Of those thus departed, in whom he was especially 
 interested, were Edward C. Taintor, a member of 
 the class of 1863, who won early in his course 
 the Nott prize scholarship and during his long official 
 residence in China sent to our learned Societies valu- 
 able contributions in Oriental Philology; Grenville 
 Tremain who presented the resolutions at the Alumni 
 celebration in Doctor Jackson’s honor and whose 
 brief but brilliant career has just terminated; and 
 Betaz Brockelmann of the class of 1876. Itseems but 
 
ea 
 
 41 
 
 yesterday that this youngest of the departed was with 
 us, his warm heart full of hope and his active spirit 
 seeking a field of enterprise in the West. His bright 
 prospects, his love for his family, his friends and 
 Alma Mater, all are now shrouded in the blackness 
 of a mysterious and fearful tragedy! My hand almost 
 refuses to record the fact and my voice would fain be 
 still; but the very memory of Doctor Jackson, an- 
 swering the promptings of my own heart, assures me 
 that he never would have passed in silence an event 
 so full of admonition to us all. When the story of 
 his assassination reached Germany, from her distant 
 home in Heidelberg his mother wrote: ‘ What 
 shall I say in the agony of my soul? Shall I ever 
 be able to realize this cruel fact? O Lord! why didst 
 thou not hinder the arm of the slayer? How can I bear 
 it, that he should end thus? my goodand noble son, the 
 joy and pride of my heart, the crown of my children, 
 my proud, beautiful boy so cruelly dealt with. My in- 
 ward eye sees the vast, endless solitude of those western 
 plains and the lonely spot where hes my bleeding child, 
 with his last cry to his Lord and to his mother. How 
 can a mother’s heart bear this and live and not die? 
 Night and day, I cry unto. the Lord for help not to 
 doubt His love and to keep faith to the end. His 
 last letter is written when he is worn out with weeks 
 of travelling; still he writes to me, his mother, his last 
 sien of love. I could speak forever of my own dear, 
 faithful son, but my heart aches so, and tears almost 
 blindfold me. God bless you.”? With submission to 
 an inscrutable Providence I here denounce the ‘‘ deep 
 damnation of his taking off.” I echo the question of 
 a near relative of his abroad, Can it be that while our 
 western emigration is the nation’s hope, our general 
 
42 
 
 ‘ 
 PT 
 
 government does not prevent nor even pursue such 
 outrages as this, especially where local authority is - 
 necessarily weak and intermittent and where private 
 efforts at their best are utterly inadequate? And 
 shall our country be called, as once was Spain—a 
 land where law protects not life? 
 
 Of others in the long annual list of deceased gradu- 
 ates, time forbids me speak. Their memory will be 
 duly honored on the Alumni day. We turn now to 
 trace, so far as the limits of this discourse permit, the 
 career of our lamented Professor Jackson. 
 
 From the quaint memorial of Isaac Jackson and his 
 wife, the first of the family who settled in this country, 
 we learn that previously they were resident in Eng- 
 land and were esteemed members of the Society of 
 Friends; and that they were about sixty years old 
 when they thought seriously of America as their future 
 home. They were ‘under exercise and concern of 
 mind” regarding the undertaking; since Isaac, in- 
 spired perhaps by the Scriptural imagery of the new 
 earth and new heaven with the fair river and 
 tree and healing leaves of the Apocalypse, dreamed 
 a dream of landing in the new world, of enter- 
 ing a beautiful vale through which, fed by a erystal 
 spring, ran ‘‘a pleasant stream with hills of fair 
 prospect on either hand.” It is added that, at first 
 a seeming wilderness, the vision changed and it be- 
 came the homestead of succeeding generations of his 
 family. Thus influenced, he embarked and landed 
 with his household on the eleventh of September, 
 1725, near New Garden, Pennsylvania. After relat- 
 ting his dream, he was directed by friends to an 
 unoccupied tract near by, which to his wonder re- 
 sembled closely the pleasant valley of his vision. 
 Assisted by stalwart sons he soon established a com- 
 
43 
 
 fortable homestead. His grandsons devoted a portion 
 of the adjoining tract to a botanical garden, and a 
 great-grandson further improved it by plantations of 
 evergreens and deciduous trees now forming a some- 
 what noted grove. The garden ranked at that period 
 among the first botanical gardens of the country. 
 It is an interesting question for the student of heredity, 
 how far we may attribute to a strain in the blood 
 that taste for landscape-gardening and horticulture 
 which resulted so happily for our College in the 
 adornment of its garden, which with vale and brook 
 and hillside-spring resembles so remarkably that of 
 the ancestral dream. 
 
 Professor Jackson has left on record a brief but in- 
 teresting estimate of the family as ‘“‘ honest, industri- 
 ous, sufficiently-enterprising, God-fearing, God-loving 
 people, with very few ‘Honorables’ so-called among 
 them and not a single millionnaire; men and women 
 discharging the providential responsibilities of their 
 several stations in a manner satisfactory even to that 
 good man who, in a community where all were honest, 
 was commonly called by his friends and neighbors, 
 honest William Jackson.” 
 
 From this God-fearing, honest and sufficiently pros- 
 perous stock, was born at Cornwall, Orange county, 
 in this State, on the twenty-eighth of August, in the 
 year 1804, the son who received the old family name 
 of Isaac and whom we have known as Professor Isaac 
 W. Jackson. Both of his parents were members of 
 the Society of Friends. The scenery of the neighbor- 
 hood, which early made its impression upon him, was 
 as beautiful and striking as that which had welcomed 
 upon landing in America the forefather after whom 
 he was named. In his childhood and during the long 
 
44 
 
 \ 
 
 life of his honored mother, he was a faithful and de- 
 voted son. The talents which he manifested in his 
 early youth induced his friends to send him from home, 
 to secure the best advantages of academic education. 
 He had a taste for mathematics and mechanics which » 
 was not unusual in the family, one of his uncles having 
 invented a method in logarithms; while an old clock, 
 bearing the family name and an early date, is still pre- . 
 served, both as a memento of its maker and as an ex- 
 cellent time-piece. His interest and progress in his 
 studies were such that after receiving the ordinary 
 schooling of the vicinity he was sent in his seventeenth 
 year to the Albany Academy. 
 
 ‘¢' The first knowledge I had of my old friend,” wrote 
 Doctor Lewis, ‘‘— I may call him so, though a number 
 of years my junior —was in the city of Albany in 1828. 
 I was then a law-student, he a boy in the Academy. 
 Two things drew to him more than the usual notice. 
 One was his youthful Quaker coat, and the other the 
 distinction of being even at that time a most superior 
 mathematician. I must not omit a third fact that 
 brought him — boy as he was — before the public eye. 
 At that period when Albany was an intensely Federal 
 city, there predominated in the Legislature a peculiar 
 species of Democrats called Bucktails. The name is 
 to be found in ancient newspaper files though the 
 variety itself has long since been extinct and fossilized. 
 They had ventured upon the hazardous political strata- 
 gem of ejecting De Witt Clinton from the office of 
 Canal Commissioner, although the very creator of 
 the canal policy. It was too much for our youthful 
 mathematician, absorbed as he was in geometry and 
 logarithms. He made the outrage the theme of his 
 public academic exercise and exposed the atrocious 
 
45 
 
 meanness of the transaction in a most ‘scathing Phi- 
 lippic,’ as our sensational reporters say. The public 
 prints took special notice of it. It became an exciting 
 subject of conversation throughout the city; and its 
 stripling of an author, if [am not mistaken, was in 
 some peril of being brought before the senate on a 
 ‘question of privilege.’ I mention the incident as 
 showing what the indignant orator might have become, 
 had he devoted himself to politics instead of the higher 
 pursuits with which his intellectual life has been oc- 
 cupied.” 
 
 Having completed his studies at the Academy with 
 the highest honors both in the classics and mathe- 
 matics, he entered Union College, where he attained 
 high standing in the classics and from which in 1826, 
 in his twenty-second year, he graduated with the first 
 honors in mathematics and chemistry. He was at 
 once appointed a Tutor in the College. Here, as at 
 the Academy, it was evident that he possessed charac- 
 teristics hardly compatible with the quiet spirit of 
 Quakerism. He became actively interested in mili- 
 tary drill and, having been chosen captain of the 
 College company, retained that position long after 
 graduation. Alumni fond of praising the good old 
 times remind us that the ‘ Captain” received his 
 commission from President Nott in the summer of 
 1828 after unanimous election to the post by Com- 
 pany A of the Union College Cadets; and that he 
 was promoted, receiving the title of Major; “ but as 
 no later title nor achievement of the First Napoleon 
 could displace in the hearts of his soldiers that of 
 ‘The Little Corporal,’ so, not that brilliant manceuvre 
 which sealed the heights of Catskill under the fire of 
 a July sun nor the triumphant march upon Fort 
 
46 
 
 William Henry and ultimately to the gates of the 
 Capitol could give our Major any prouder and dearer 
 title with his ‘ boys,’ than that of ‘ Captain.’” ‘ Mar- 
 shalling the classes for that well-ordered procession of 
 Commencement, what a figure he used to make in © 
 those days! Some remains of the Quaker style of 
 dress still accompanying the military show, and the 
 flourishing of the Grand Marshal’s baton, gave it 
 an appearance as picturesque as it was original.” 
 In his later years, Doctor Jackson pointed often to 
 the improved bodily vigor, carriage and manners of 
 the students, as indicating the wisdom of the system 
 of military drill and physical culture. He rejoiced 
 towards the close of his life to see the system suc- 
 cessfully revived and he seconded cordially the efforts 
 of the military officer detailed by the General Gov- 
 ernment for this duty. He watched the erection of 
 our large gymnasium with interest, since he held 
 that the College cannot fulfil its duty without send- 
 ing forth into the battle of life graduates trained 
 in body as well asin mind. His garden was asource 
 of health and prolonged life to him and showed the 
 advantage of exercise in the open air and of an in- 
 terest outside the routine of aprofession. Yet he was 
 far from giving undue prominence to physical, when 
 contrasted with intellectual culture. Intellectual labor 
 rather than rest, was the rule of his life. Friends 
 sometimes warned him against overwork and it may 
 be thought that, had he labored less, he might have 
 lived even longer. Possibly, and his life from the 
 beginning to the end of it might have been of little 
 value to anyone. Intellectual as well as physical toil 
 is healthful; labor is life, long life often, honorable 
 and useful life. The instances—and they are many 
 
ue 
 
 47 
 
 among graduates of this College besides Seward, 
 Lewis and himself—in which the slight and frugal 
 toilers wore out and distanced men more muscular 
 but less intellectually active, these instances suggest 
 that enthusiasm for physical training should not sur- 
 pass that for intellectual culture. Canon Kingsley, 
 the noble advocate of Muscular Christianity as it has 
 been called, scarce lived out half his days; and from 
 the career of Dickens and of others physically as 
 active, we are led to conclude that over-excitement 
 and those twin emissaries of Satan, hurry and worry, 
 are greater enemies to the longevity of brain-workers 
 than the most intense, industrious, recluse, yet 
 regular and frugal, life. 
 
 In this connection we may recall the fact that during 
 his college course, with the codperation of a band of 
 congenial companions, some of whom have since 
 attained to positions of eminent usefulness — among 
 them Orlando Meads, LL.D., and Thomas Hun, 
 M.D., LL.D. — he founded and maintained a society 
 for social and literary purposes. In succeeding years, 
 other like associations were formed; and hence 
 Union College has been called the mother of the 
 Greek-letter secret societies of the country. Doctor 
 Jackson felt that the confidences of friendship, like the 
 confidences of the family, though secret, may be none 
 the less innocent; and the older he grew the more 
 confident he became that a useful and salutary method 
 had been devised by which College students might 
 have such enjoyment as they craved, without violating 
 the canons of morality or religion; the grave and the 
 gay in temperament being mutually benefited, while 
 the oldest College officer and graduate as well as the 
 youngest might enter into close relations of confidence 
 
48 
 
 and friendship with undergraduates. Youths in the 
 stage of life most needing the cordial intimacy of elder 
 friends that they may receive in the right spirit their 
 cautions and counsels, often lose these blessings through 
 supposed lack of sympathy or because of artificial bar- 
 riers. Professor Jackson hoped to remedy this evil by 
 an association of younger and older members, both 
 undergraduates and Alumni, whoshould be inspired by 
 brotherly sentiments like those of home and church. 
 Whatever be the counter-arguments and whether or 
 not he builded in his youth better than he knew, such 
 was the institution of the Greek-letter secret society 
 in his conception of it; and as he believed, such was 
 it to a great extent in its development. Hopeful and 
 warm-hearted sentiments, characteristic of the man 
 and which every member of sucha society should 
 strive to realize! 
 
 He was promoted to the Professorship of Mathe- 
 matics in the year 1831. His section, comprising 
 in accordance with our College system the rooms of 
 the students underhis moreimmediate charge, adjoined 
 his residence or rather, by the construction of the 
 building, formed part of it. He treated these students 
 as responsible to himself mainly and like members of 
 his family. He had access to their rooms at all times 
 of the day and night, and his visits were frequent and 
 friendly. He would turn the point of ill nature by a 
 well-timed joke and meet serious wrong-doing with | 
 fatherly expostulation. Kind to the erring, he could 
 crush vice relentlessly ; and under the easy companion- 
 ship which disarmed opposition, were the firmness and 
 strength which gained the desired end. In his class- 
 room, those were taught the topics of the text-book 
 who desired to learn them ; and those who in addition 
 
49 
 
 desired to solve the abstruse problems of higher 
 mathematics, found that his clear and powerful in- 
 tellect elucidated each step of the most obscure 
 processes and conclusions. | 
 
 Professor Foster states that when sent to ‘‘ Captain 
 Jackson” for his entrance-examination in algebra, 
 having given much more study to the classics than to 
 mathematics, he found himself with several pairs of 
 excited nerves in the august presence. The questions 
 proposed were more comprehensive than numerous; 
 What were the rules? and Why were they thus? On 
 this latter point the old school text-book had been 
 grandly reticent. Its readers should receive the rules 
 as objects for faith and not for vain curiosity as to 
 their source or the reasoning upon which they had 
 been founded. The captain graciously considered 
 these facts, admitted the plea based upon them in bar 
 of adverse judgment, but accompanied the desired cer- 
 tificate with a gentle intimation that he regarded the 
 recipient as not well grounded; as an unprincipled 
 youth, in fact, who would do well at the earliest possi- 
 ble moment to make the acquaintance of some author 
 who would condescend to give reasons for his rules. 
 The advice was not given in vain. 
 
 When students were indisposed or unable to grasp 
 the mathematical problems and principles of the text- 
 book, it was seen that he was indeed no pedagogue, but 
 an educator inspiring mental activity by indirect sug- 
 gestion. He published books on Trigonometry, Op- 
 tics, Conic Sections and Mechanics, which were adopted 
 in American colleges and in one important British in- 
 stitution; one of these works drawing from a competent 
 authority the remark that he could not wish a single 
 
 4 
 
50 
 
 \ 
 : 
 
 sentence changed; but in these productions Professor 
 Jackson had no view to reputation; he based them on 
 the observed needs of his classes and designed them 
 directly for their help. The obituary record of the 
 Faculty well declares, that, thoroughly conversant ~ 
 with that inductive method by the employment of 
 which so large a portion of our knowledge has been 
 obtained, he delighted in familiarizing his pupils with 
 its principles and in illustrating its application to the 
 discovery of new facts. 
 
 As an executive officer of the @ollese he was prompt, 
 energetic, ever watchful and active, selecting his 
 measures judiciously and pursuing them with discre- 
 tion. The severity of his earlier conceptions of disci- 
 pline was modified by the influence of one whom he 
 loved and assisted most faithfully — the late President 
 Nott — and whom he revered as ‘“ the majestic man, 
 the first of college presidents, the true founder and 
 guardian genius of thisinstitution.”” Whatever there 
 may have been of severity and impetuosity in his 
 nature, was at length mellowed through experience, 
 inborn kindliness and Christian charity, until at last 
 nothing so marked the man as forbearance with youth, 
 tender oversight and friendly counsel; traits which 
 won from his students a regard ripening with years into 
 abiding respect and love. Thusin presenting him with 
 a beautiful token of esteem, a number of his former 
 pupils improved the occasion to say that ‘“ they can- 
 not express their high appreciation of the great-hearted 
 man whose long life of usefulness has been so filled 
 with beauty and whose unwavering kindness contri- 
 buted so much to make their college days a joyful 
 recollection.”” He could be patient with the exu- 
 berance of youthful spirits and even with seeming 
 
51 
 
 disregard of his wishes and seeming disrespect toward 
 himself. How many have testified to the long-suffer- 
 ing patience and encouraging counsel with which he 
 sought to reclaim the erring! This Christian spirit, 
 the growth of years of experience and patient endeavor, 
 is one which we who are members of this Faculty 
 may all well emulate. 
 
 In his family as well as in general intercourse, he 
 was socialand genial. Often in the evenings, coming 
 out from his study to the drawing-room, he contributed 
 his share of entertainment by reading aloud or by his 
 cheerful and instructive conversation. When absent 
 he wrote daily to those at home. He was interested 
 in the progress and watchful of the health and educa- 
 tion of his children. In my childhood, with an instine- 
 tive appreciation of his filial devotion I have often 
 watched him wheeling along the garden-chair which 
 he had devised for the comfort of his aged mother, de- 
 hghting in her enjoyment of the scene and pointing 
 out the beauties of flower-bed, lawn or grove, which 
 he kept and dressed with unceasing care. 
 
 He was always neatly and simply attired; slight in 
 form, well-built and active, with clear, piercing eye 
 looking out from under a large and prominent brow; 
 his head finely developed; his voice frank and friendly 
 as he welcomed one to his study or garden. And that 
 garden played no small part in extending the reputa- 
 tion and influence of the College. Itis said that before 
 the present excellent equipment in apparatus for the 
 several departments was acquired, President Nott used 
 to invite the inquiring visitor to call on Professor 
 Jackson and to walk through the garden; thus not 
 only producing a pleasant general impression of the 
 College, but emphasizing the beauty, healthfulness 
 
52 
 
 and capabilities of its situation. The cordial recep- 
 tion given by Professor Jackson but exemplified the 
 spirit of hospitality for which the College was distin- 
 guished. 
 
 His household gave ample proof of the presence of — 
 an efficient and cultured helpmeet. It was the prized 
 resort of a large and cultivated circle of relatives and 
 friends from abroad. During Commencement week 
 especially, “‘open house” was kept and students 
 and returning graduates founda hearty welcome. The 
 importance of such hospitality in attracting youth to 
 the institution and in moulding and refining student- 
 life — especially with that controlling portion of the 
 public who value the elegant amenities of society — 
 cannot be over-estimated. No matter what one’s in- 
 tellectual gifts and efforts, he suffers great disadvan- 
 tages in the race of life without some share of these 
 graces. We may well hold, with Bacon in his Ad- 
 vancement of Learning, that while behavior or “ the 
 Wisdom of Conversation ought not to be overmuch 
 affected, much less ought it to be despised; for it hath 
 not only honor in itself but an influence also with 
 business and government. The poet saith, Nec vultu 
 destrue verba tua. A man may destroy the force 
 of his words with his countenance; so may he of his 
 deeds. Saith Cicero, recommending to his brother 
 affability and easy access, Nil interest habere ostiam 
 apertam, vultum clausum. And if the government 
 of the countenance be of such effect, much more is 
 that of speech and other carriage appertaining to con- 
 versation; the true model whereof seemeth to me well 
 expressed by Livy, though not meant for this purpose : 
 Ne aut arrogans videar, aut obnoxius; quorum alterum 
 est aliens libertatis obliti, alterum sue.” 
 
53 
 
 Doctor Jackson’s table was noted, if for its simplic- 
 ity yet also for its excellence, as Professor Lewis re- 
 minded us in his reminiscences at the semi-centennial 
 celebration; and many another favored friend has re- 
 membered the College through the same pleasant asso- 
 elation. He codperated with those sensible and 
 philanthropic men and women who are striving to 
 popularize economical, healthful and palatable cook- 
 ery. He often purchased the works and tested the 
 methods of those who seek so to educate poor and 
 rich alike that the dinner, whether of herbs or of the 
 stalled ox, may have good digestion, health and con- 
 tent therewith. 
 
 The salaries of collegiate professors are often de- 
 clared to be too small to permit their enjoyment of the 
 elegancies or even of the comforts of life and the pleas- 
 ures of charity to the needy. But although Professor 
 Jackson’s means were very limited, his home, as we 
 have seen, was a model of hospitality, and his charities, 
 although at the cost of self-denial, were abundant. 
 He indulged also for ‘“‘ our four-footed friends ” — the 
 comfortable old horse, the graceful hound, and other 
 animals dear to his domestic circle —a care that would 
 have satisfied the heart of their public champion Mr. 
 Bergh. In addition to these objects, he contributed 
 from his own means toward the maintenance of his 
 beloved garden, expending on its construction and 
 embellishment —as he stated privately a short time 
 before his decease — from first to last a sum of about 
 ten thousand dollars. On commencing his residence 
 in the College building, he found a few beds of poor 
 flowers or vegetables and, adjoining them, a rude, 
 tangled vale. He left a garden well-ordered, widely 
 extended, filled with select plants, shrubs and flowers, 
 the long, shady rambles and sun-lit glades of which 
 
54 
 
 \ 
 é 
 
 became one of the most attractive possessions of the 
 College. Ile cultivated over three hundred varieties 
 of roses, corresponded and exchanged with the best 
 horticulturists of England and America, improved 
 many species and distributed far and wide the new 
 seeds; thus laying this State especially under great 
 material obligations in ways not recognized. A house- 
 hold and its surroundings managed thus shows what a 
 good heart, clear judgment and diligent hand can 
 accomplish with slender means; andit further shows 
 that in the exemption from extravagant expenditures, 
 in the regularity of even a meagre stipend, in the com- 
 parative permanence and the social influence of our 
 professorial positions and in the opportunities for cul- 
 ture and usefulness, there are compensations which may 
 well attract the best character and talent of the times. 
 
 It is needless here to say that the science and art of 
 horticulture were a delight and solace of the Pro- 
 fessor’s life. Valuable works on this subject make up a 
 large part of his hbrary. His affection for his shrubs 
 and flowers was like that manifested by old Erasmus 
 Darwin in his quaint poem on the ‘ Loves of the 
 Plants;”’ new varieties grew as if by magic beneath 
 his hands. The bowers and walks of his creation be- 
 came familiar haunts, lit up by the joyous presence of 
 youths and maidens and troops of children, while often 
 the old came halting back to revive once more the 
 memories and emotions of other days. These grounds 
 having been committed to his care and improved 
 and extended during a long period by his own hand, 
 he learned with pleasure in the last year of his life 
 that a fund had been projected for continuing his 
 work. He could receive no more appropriate memo- 
 rial tribute. 
 
55 
 
 His life centered in and was mainly bounded by his 
 College. It was passed in his family circle, his study, 
 his elass-room or with members of the Faculty. 
 He avoided occasions of personal prominence. When 
 the degree of Doctor of Laws was conferred upon him 
 by Hobart College, his modesty led him to hesitate 
 before accepting it. In social intercourse he consid- 
 erately turned the conversation toward the interests 
 of others rather than his own, drawing them out 
 pleasantly and speaking of subjects which they could 
 discuss to advantage. He always expressed himself 
 with clearness and simplicity and often with elegance. 
 While he wrote readily, he reviewed his diction care- 
 fully and altered and polished it until acceptable to 
 his critical taste. His diary, his study, his house- 
 hold and all his affairs, whether relatively great or 
 small, show that he was determined to do whatever 
 he attempted, as well as he could. His intellectual 
 concentration and perseverance were such that he 
 could not rest satisfied until he had completed what 
 he had deliberately undertaken. Conscientious and 
 regular in his attendance upon public worship, yet 
 as to his personal feelings and meditations upon re- 
 ligion and other sacred topics he was characterized by 
 a Quaker-like reticence, which however never pre- 
 vented him at the critical moment from speaking 
 and acting boldly for the right. He was always 
 sympathetic, especially so with the sorrowing and 
 the needy. Professor Henry of the Smithsonian 
 Institute, an honorary Alumnus of this Institution, 
 who was his fellow-student in boyhood and his life- 
 long correspondent, said that he was ‘the truest 
 and most generous soul he ever knew.” His chari- 
 ties were from the heart as well as from the hand 
 and he concealed their objects and extent. A 
 
56 
 
 nervous system extremely sensitive to physical pain 
 and moral excitements might cause at times a certain 
 irritability or impatience of manner, but the soul, 
 the true man, was patient and forbearing even to 
 tenderness. More than most men of his time, he 
 possessed a trait which, a thoughtful observer has re- 
 marked, is, of all the moral qualities, the one becoming 
 most rare — childlikeness, genuine simplicity of char- 
 acter and a modest fearlessness: such as Goldsmith 
 and Wordsworth sometimes manifested, such as Hans 
 Christian Andersen possessed to a fault and Ruskin 
 has at times evinced as a mild radiance relieving 
 periods of storm and change. Doctor Jackson felt 
 with Doctor Lewis that the humble faith of some child- 
 like believer elucidates at times the meaning of God’s 
 word more clearly than the learning of the undevout 
 scholar. In his case as in that of his friend Doctor 
 Lewis, to a life of good works was joined a life of sim- 
 ple, Christian faith. He had-no sympathy with that 
 scientific pharisaism which, in the search after im- 
 possible certainty, reaches the creed of universal 
 nihilism; nor with such boasted positivism as that 
 which forbids belief in anything we cannot see or feel 
 or fathom, like a blind prisoner beating his body 
 against the cold walls and bars of his narrow cell and 
 calling out madly, Only the tangible exists; only 
 that which I feel or handle or comprehend is positive ; 
 faith is a falsehood; beyond the limits of my narrow 
 cell, there is nothing, no orbs of light, no nobler modes 
 of life, no spiritual truths, no immortality, no Heaven, 
 no God! 
 
 Fulfilling the duties of his position ably, faithfully, 
 contentedly, no achievements of wealth or fame could 
 have brought him wider usefulness or higher happi- 
 
57 
 
 ness ; for thousands of the educated men of the country 
 attest their gratitude for his aid in the development 
 of mind and character. 
 
 No less noticeable was his high appreciation of order 
 and beauty in the natural and in the moral world, his 
 discriminating delight in the best literature, ancient 
 and modern, his love of justice, and his sympathy - 
 with the oppressed. Doctor Jackson’s view of life in 
 the retrospect was like that so strikingly expressed 
 by the Rt. Honorable Mr. Gladstone, in his letter 
 regretting his inability to address us as Honorary 
 Chancellor of Union University: —‘‘I have but one 
 complaint to make: life is too full, time too rapid ; 
 which in truth means that the provision Divinely made 
 for our exercise and growth is too bounteous. But it 
 produces a relative penury of power to do the duties 
 that are waiting and crying out to be done.” 
 
 The civil war roused his patriotic heart to the 
 highest enthusiasm. Like his ancestors, who had 
 suffered loss of all things for conscience’ sake, possess- 
 ing the courage of his convictions, he manifested an im- 
 petuous fervor of attack upon whatever excited right- 
 eous indignation. His sense of honor and his moral 
 rectitude made him impatient of false assumption and 
 indignant at persistence in oppression and wrong. 
 He was always an open foe, withstanding his opponent 
 to his face. He cordially approved of the enlistment 
 of hisson William, a man of rare ability, presence and 
 personal magnetism ; and when, a sacrifice to his 
 country’s cause, his loved remains were brought 
 home, Doctor Jackson received them with unmurmur- 
 ing submission and followed them to the grave with 
 Christian resignation. In no conventional sense but 
 with the true spirit of patriotic devotion, he traced as 
 
58 
 
 the inscription for the granite monument. of his son 
 words familiar but immortal, at once classical in 
 language and Christ-like in sentiment of self-sacrifice ; 
 
 Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori. 
 
 At the close of the war for the Union, while the 
 country at the north was prosperous, Union College 
 was felt to be in a critical condition, declining steadily 
 during many years in prestige, influence and numbers. 
 Doctor Jackson was among the first to comprehend 
 the situation. The institution having depended for 
 more than half a century for its endowment and suc- 
 cess upon one man of exceptional genius, it was re- 
 quisite for its future usefulness that it should no 
 longer be dependent upon any one alone, but that a 
 broader foundation should be sought in the sympathy, 
 influence and watchful care of its Alumni and of all 
 others naturally interested in its well-being. Having 
 been founded upon the principles of Christian unity, 
 Union College, lacking denominational support, had 
 claims upon the yet broader patronage of all desiring 
 the fulfilment of our Lord’s high-priestly prayer for 
 unity; and might also turn hopefully to the unusual 
 number of influential and successful men in all parts 
 of the land to whom she had given efficient practical 
 as well as literary training. Professor Jackson there- 
 fore sent forth ringing appeals to the graduates to or- 
 ganize local Alumni Associations. Not content with 
 circulars or stereotyped forms of address, he wrote 
 with his own hand letter upon letter, studying the 
 character of all who had been his pupils, seeking how 
 most effectually to move each one of them and rest- 
 ing not, day nor night, until hearty affirmative re- 
 sponses poured in from all quarters. On the memor- 
 
 te . 
 
59 
 
 able evening of April twenty-seventh, 1869, telegra- 
 phie greetings flew to Union College from New York 
 and the principal cities of the State, and from the Hast 
 and West and South, laden with the cordial expressions 
 of the Alumni gathered at their banquets. They 
 abounded in the warmest expressions of devotion to 
 Alma Mater and to Professor Jackson, her represen- 
 tative on the occasion. The excellence of the ad- 
 dresses, the eminence of the speakers, the character of 
 the representative Alumni, the simultaneous outburst 
 of loyalty, made the movement as conspicuously use- 
 ful and admirableas it was unparalleled. But unfortu- 
 nately, it was believed at the same time and widely 
 proclaimed that the College was richer than any ot 
 her children and needed no aid but their sympathy 
 andinfluence. The fever of development of real estate 
 following the war ran high. The Trust in land pro- 
 vided by Doctor Nott was considered of vast value if 
 only held for further improvements and rise in prices. 
 Thus the moment for immediate profitable sale or lease 
 slipped by; the high tide in the liberal endowment ot 
 educational institutions needing and making known 
 their needs, also slipped by without the requisite 
 effort for this College. It was not long before this 
 mistake began to be felt. Doctor Jackson lived to 
 see with deep anxiety the depreciation of the unpro- 
 ductive and heavily assessed estate which chiefly 
 composed the property of the institution. 
 
 When I was invited to take the Presidency of the 
 College, Doctor Jackson urged my acceptance as a 
 duty. After several interviews it was arranged 
 that, devolving upon its efficient Faculty much con 
 nected with the ordinary routine of the College, the 
 in-coming President should carry foward undertakings 
 
60 
 
 long since begun ; such as the increase of the Library, 
 the completion of the Alumni Hall, the provision of 
 special facilities for the several departments together 
 with the increase of the means for general culture. 
 But the yearly support of the College; the increase of 
 its regular income to meet proper salaries and other 
 usual expenditures; provision against deficiencies until 
 the real-estate investments could be improved; and 
 endowments for general and ordinary purposes; this 
 was rightly the broad field for the efforts of Trustees, 
 Alumni, Faculty, citizens and friends of Christian 
 unity and of education. Professor Jackson was con- 
 vinced, and the history of Colleges shows his sagacity, 
 that the continuous power of such corporations de- 
 pends upon the efforts of the many as well as the 
 devotion of a few, upon all friends interested in 
 education and especially upon the Alumni. Know- 
 ing that while the individual dies institutions sur- 
 vive, he sought for the College a life not individual 
 or circumscribed but widely expanded. He was will- 
 ing to work and wait for such an era. The College 
 would thus gain a responsible, perpetual constituency, 
 active for its honor, its usefulness and its progress. 
 
 Doctor Jackson saw with gratitude more than three 
 hundred thousand dollars secured, mainly toward those 
 objects — buildings, Library and_ scholarships — to 
 which the efforts of the President had been directed; 
 he knew this sum to exceed in amount all our educa- | 
 tional Funds or Trusts acquired during the previous 
 three-quarters of a century except the Nott Trust now 
 yielding but little for College purposes. That sum, 
 however, was not larger than the outlay in a single 
 year of some of our prominent competitors. Mean- 
 while, this institution had no share in the Congres- 
 sional land-grants; and the many new colleges and 
 
61 
 
 universities were’dividing college patronage and add- 
 ing costly attractions. Doctor Jackson therefore 
 earnestly desired the furtherance of the definite 
 though not inflexible plan by which it was hoped 
 to maintain Union in its just position among its 
 peers. The incorporation in 1876 of Union Univer- 
 sity —the idea of which had long slumbered in our 
 charter—was a portion of that plan. He wrote 
 of it in the first University catalogue: ‘Union Col- 
 lege acquired, by its charter, full university powers ; 
 but the creation of post-graduate institutions at Sche- 
 nectady had not been found practicable. Schools of 
 Law and Medicine and also an Astronomical Obser- 
 vatory had long existed at Albany, the distance 
 between which city and Schenectady, estimated in 
 time, is less than that which in many cases separates 
 the professional schools from the other departments 
 of a university. The arrangement naturally sug- 
 gested by these circumstances was that the pro- 
 fessional schools and the Observatory at Albany 
 should be united with Union College. The union of 
 the several institutions — although each will continue 
 to hold its own rights, properties and Trusts as here- 
 tofore—was consummated by the incorporation, for 
 university purposes, of Union University.” 
 
 Doctor Jackson learned with approval that the 
 resources at command would be henceforth devoted 
 to the educational departments. He saw with satis- 
 faction the raising of the standard of scholarship and 
 the actual improvement under it, and a total increase 
 in numbers despite losses through greater rigor of 
 examinations. He concurred in discouraging the pre- 
 valent tendency to luxury and extravagance which, 
 alien to the spirit of our national institutions and to 
 
62 
 
 \ 
 é 
 
 the college usages of earlier times, has never found a 
 place at Union; a tendency which threatens to injure 
 the sons of the rich and to exclude or mortify the 
 sons of thepoor. He would have seen their college days 
 characterized by simple, habits and by enthusiasm for 
 educational rather than social objects. 
 
 If we admit with Lord Chatham that confidence is a 
 plant of slow growth, and with Doctor Jackson that 
 after the ‘trials of the last quarter-century those 
 laboring for the College have before them an arduous 
 task,” yet with him we have faith in her motto, 
 ‘¢ Perseverantia vincit ; ”? and we believe that her trials 
 were designed to disclose alike her needs and her 
 resources, so that upon the broader foundation may 
 stand the superstructure of enduring success. 
 
 Doctor Jackson had been deeply interested in 
 the war for the Union; but when at its close he 
 longed for peace and for the cessation of all sectional 
 animosities, he thought it a most happy omen that 
 among the first considerable endowments secured 
 was one designed mainly (though not exclusively) for 
 the benefit of students from the southern States and 
 meeting many of the expenses incident to their resi- 
 dence at College; at the same time, bringing the 
 North and the South into friendly contact and thus per- 
 petuating the influence of one who loved both national 
 and Christian unity. I allude to the John David 
 Wolfe Scholarships Foundation, of fifty thousand dol- 
 lars, the gift of filial affection in memory of one of 
 New York’s most benevolent merchant princes. 
 
 The culmination of Doctor Jackson’s career was in 
 1876, at the semi-centennial anniversary of his connec- 
 tion with the College. Can we forget the scene? the 
 hundreds of graduates gathering from all parts of the 
 
63 
 
 land; the Memorial Hall ringing with cheers of wel- 
 come and with his praises; his modesty at the ban- 
 quet of the Alumni of which he was the honored 
 guest; and how, on the Commencement morning, 
 his dear friend, Doctor Lewis, spoke as the old man 
 eloquent to the old man grand and true? Recalling 
 his acquaintance with him in his youth as inspiring 
 an admiration which deepened into the friendship of 
 a lifetime, Doctor. Lewis’s voice grew strong and 
 clear as he said, “‘ He has lived a most useful and 
 honorable life. It must have been a happy one. To 
 say nothing here of that all-transcending element of 
 the Divine grace, in which, I trust, he has been a 
 sharer, he has had aclear mind constantly gazing 
 ’ upon the science of certainty, as it may be called, in 
 contrast with the dimness and doubt and shadow that 
 rest upon almost all the provinces of human thought. 
 To this, has been added the most charming of out- 
 ward pursuits. I refer to his cultivation, for so many 
 years, of that beautiful garden we are all so fond of 
 visiting. It must have been a happy life. Surely 
 may we congratulate him on having possessed two 
 such elements of physical and intellectual serenity. 
 His life belongs to the past and has nothing to fear 
 for the future. Of the love of his classes, he is sure. 
 The warm esteem of every one who has ever sat 
 under his teaching, the unfeigned respect of all who 
 have ever been his colleagues, this is his literary in- 
 heritance as long as Union College holds a place 
 among the institutions of our land; and may that be 
 as long as our land holds its place among the nations 
 of the earth!” As Doctor Lewis ceased, he stood 
 where I now stand; and Doctor Jackson, rising from 
 his seat beside him, acknowledged with the warm 
 
64 
 
 grasp of his hand the loving greeting of his old friend 
 and coadjutor. Thus lovely and pleasant in their 
 lives, it was fitting that in death they should not be 
 divided. 
 
 What changes in history, letters, society and in the | 
 institutions and industries of this country and in the 
 material, educational and religious interests of the 
 world at large occurred during the span of this one life, 
 which, just as he became conscious of failing powers, 
 ebbed tranquilly away in sleep ! 
 
 It was in the bright sunlight of a summer afternoon, 
 in the garden, which by his care had just reached its 
 most perfect condition, and under the great elm which 
 he loved, that his friends gathered for funeral rites - 
 befitting the departed. It is a usage of the Moravian — 
 church with which those of us who are descendants of 
 Friends sympathize, to banish tokens of heathenish 
 despair from their burial service, that all things may 
 betoken the joy and peace of the Christian entering 
 into the reward of his Lord. And thus, as our honored 
 friend would have wished, without ostentatious dis- 
 play, his bier borne by the College workmen and 
 surrounded by his life-long and loved associates, with 
 bloom and brightness, and Christian hope and the 
 peace that passeth understanding breathed in the 
 very atmosphere of that fair and tranquil afternoon, 
 was the appropriate service said by his pupil and his 
 friend, close beside the home of his wedded life. 
 Before the stars, as silent guardians, had appeared, 
 and while the sun still hung resplendent above the 
 - horizon, the long procession having reached the por- 
 tion of the College cemetery beautified by his reverent 
 care, the last rites were said, the grave was closed 
 and flowers of his rearing covered it. 
 
 * 
 
65 
 
 Our two venerable friends, Professor Lewis and 
 Professor Jackson, departing so nearly together, also 
 rest together, after a life-journcy travelled side by side. 
 Thus have we seen two pilgrims on their way. 
 The first, listening attentively to all voices and sounds, 
 finds in their mystery and method deep delight. 
 To him the winter storm wails its melancholy, or re- 
 sounds its sublime tokens of power and majesty, as 
 though speaking a personal message. When the 
 summer zephyrs whispered their bewildering secrets 
 to his boyhood’s imagination, when the thunders 
 pealed their anthems to his mature mind, they found 
 in him an appreciative and rapt listener. The song of 
 the bird and the roll of the storm, nature’s separate 
 melodies and its united chorus, seemed to his sympa- 
 thetic soul to resound the praises of the Creator. In 
 his latest days he made his highest and holiest achieve- 
 ments. The Hebrew tongue had become to him 
 as his own, and his utterances as to the word of God 
 sped from land to land, illuminating deep valleys of 
 ignorance, while his masterly exegesis of the Bible 
 led many a captive soul out of the darkness of doubt 
 into the marvellous light of the kingdom of Christ. 
 But even before he reached these heights, the sounds 
 of earth replete with mysteries of tenderness and 
 sublimity were growing indistinct. The branches of 
 snow-laden pines swayed in the storm but made no 
 moan; nature reeled beneath the shock of the winter 
 blast but its grand diapason was to his ear silent. 
 Loving lips opened and the air was laden with greet- 
 ings of reverence and affection, but the tympanum 
 gave no record and the fondest utterances fell dead. 
 At the close of his pilgrimage, this Christian scholar 
 who had delighted in melody and’ harmony and human 
 
 5 
 
66 
 
 speech walked onward in a voiceless world. From 
 this lower sphere, as from the upper realms of light, . 
 there was left for him but the sad assurance of the 
 poet Addison in his favorite hymn, though with a new 
 and striking application: 
 
 What though in solemn silence all 
 
 Move round this dark terrestrial ball? 
 
 What though no real voice nor sound 
 
 Among their radiant orbs be found? 
 
 In reason’s ear they all rejoice 
 And utter forth a glorious voice. 
 
 With duty done and heart at peace, this pilgrim 
 toil-worn in his Master’s service laid him down to 
 rest and fell ‘‘ asleep in Jesus.” 
 
 There were two pilgrims pressing forward and 
 journeying ofttimes together. While he whom we have 
 first commemorated possessed an ear attuned to sound, 
 this fellow-pilgrim had given him of God an eye 
 which, like the eagle’s, gazed upon the sun. To him 
 light was a perpetual study and joy. His glance, 
 early lifted toward the stars, in thought through long 
 years rested there. The night-watches were sweet to 
 him because of the planets’ presence, their deep and 
 glowing mysteries, their atmospheric beauties, their 
 exhaustlesssplendors. From the outset of his pilgrim- 
 age, the consideration of their movements fascinated 
 his attention; and soon pure mathematics revealed 
 to him celestial secrets. He knew the thrilling delight 
 with which the solution of a difficult problem is re- 
 warded. Above poetry and music or beauty in any 
 other form, much as his esthetic nature appreciated 
 them, above all else his delight was in the Law 
 of God as seen in principles of mathematics and 
 laws of astronomy. He outwatched the stars to study 
 
67 
 
 them and burned the midnight oil in pondering the 
 laws of light. Lifting his eyes toward the vault 
 studded with God’s suns and systems he felt flowing 
 thence successive waves which, falling upon human 
 orbs as upon welcome shores, told there the secrets with 
 which they come laden to those gifted to interpret 
 them. Astronomy was to him, as to Plato, an essential 
 element in educating and inspiring mind and soul; 
 pure mathematics was a sacred science, the science 
 of ever-being, the science with which Pythagoras 
 believed creation to begin andendits universal though 
 voiceless oratorio. Yet light came not alone to 
 illustrate law and to advance science, but also to 
 reveal and to embellish earth’s beauties. This pil- 
 grim saw with joy, lights, revelations of color and 
 of form, fair shapes of tree and shrub and flower. 
 His affections went out and rested on them and he 
 passed his life among them. Botany, with mathemat- 
 ical relations in some respects akin to those of 
 astronomy while no less filled than is the general re- 
 pertory of nature with entrancing sequences and 
 harmonies, is also replete with instruction for mind 
 and eye. Thus his chosen paths became more and 
 more the walks of an expanding garden which was 
 the outward embodiment of his thought and love. Of 
 him it might have been said, as Wordsworth wrote 
 of Duty, 
 
 Flowers laugh before him in their beds, 
 And fragrance in his footing treads. 
 
 And light came not merely to illustrate law and 
 advance science and adorn nature. It spoke to him 
 of the Divine Person who said, Let there be light. 
 If the undevout astronomer is mad, if ‘the fool hath 
 said in his heart, ‘There is no God,’” light, which he 
 
68 
 
 loved, led this pilgrim to say in his heart of hearts, in 
 the very spirit of the seer of old, “‘ When I consider 
 the heavens which Thou hast made, the moon and the 
 stars which Thou hast ordained, then my soul pro- 
 claims thy glory, thy goodness. I bow and adore 
 thy Being in the temple of the universe whose 
 foundations Thou hast laid, whose irresponsible suns 
 and systems and responsible souls Thou hast created, 
 whose Redeemer Thou hast sent forth upon his 
 merciful mission of re-creation.” 
 
 Thus this pilgrim had loved the stars and flowers, 
 the light of heaven and its fair reflection on the earth, 
 the laws of pure mathematics, and the wondrous re- 
 velations of form and color which, but for light, were 
 unseen or non-existent. At last he too was nearing 
 his journey’s end. Suddenly the fear of a horror of 
 great darkness fell upon him, such as that which, 
 brooding over Milton, inspired his immortal lines in 
 praise of light, and his lament, 
 
 These eyes, though clear 
 To outward view of blemish and of spot, 
 Bereft of light, their seeing have forgot ; 
 
 Nor to the idle orbs doth sight appear 
 Of sun or moon or stars, throughout the year. 
 
 But this fear, which, as a threatening cloud, over-shad- 
 owed our pilgrim’s pathway for a time, was mercifully 
 removed. Sight yet remained to him and as his natural 
 force abated he too gained the delectable mountains 
 whence poets and prophets tell of glimpses granted 
 them of the glories of the promised land. Then, weary 
 and worn in the cause of duty and with no spoken 
 word of the ravishing view which lay just before him, 
 he, like his fellow-pi!grim, fell tranquilly into that last 
 sleep which knows no earthly waking. 
 
69 
 
 For them, the sleep of death is not the end of life. 
 That elder pilgrim whose ear was deaf to earthly 
 sound wakes in the realm where the. believer’s faith 
 has gained the fruition of the inspired exclamation, 
 ‘‘] HEARD as it were the voice of a great multitude 
 and of many waters and of mighty thunderings say- 
 ing, Alleluia! for the Lord God omnipotent reigneth. 
 Let us be glad and rejoice and give honor to Him.” 
 This other pilgrim whose joy was in the light and 
 who dreaded the on-coming of the loss of vision, wakes 
 to the blissful realization of the meaning of those 
 other words of the Apocalypse, ‘‘I saw a new heaven 
 and a new earth, and a pure river of water of life pro- 
 ceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb; 
 and on either side, the tree of life whose leaves are 
 for the healing of the nations; and they need no 
 candle neither light of the sun, for the Lord God 
 giveth them light.” For them both, as for all those 
 _ who love His appearing, our Saviour’s blessed words, 
 as we believe, have been fulfilled — “I go to prepare 
 a place for you, that where Iam there ye may be 
 also.”” 
 
 A few months previous to the silently approaching 
 summons, I was standing with Professor Jackson amid 
 a throng of friends who were calling for a few words 
 from him. Lifting his hand to request silence, he spoke 
 somewhat as follows: ‘‘For me, the time for speech- 
 making has passed, the day for reflection has come and 
 for looking forward and upward. From this present 
 life and its absorbing interests, from astronomy and 
 the laws of matter, thought turns to the spiritual realm 
 whither the aged are hastening. Reason and Revela- 
 tion point from nature to nature’s God. In quietness 
 and confidence, faith leads the way to the better life, 
 
70 
 
 Let us then be ever ready to join those whose eman- 
 cipated spirits shine as the brightness of the firma- 
 ment and like the stars for ever and ever!” 
 
 Beloved pupils of the graduating class, may these 
 scenes and these lives be impressed upon your memo- 
 ries. In this age, conspicuous for its admiration of 
 wealth and worldly advancement, you will need to em- 
 phasize moral qualities, as he emphasized them; to 
 believe, as did he, that the straightforward path of 
 Christian duty, though the narrow way, is yet the true 
 course to honorable success and enduring happiness. 
 One of our own poets has said, “‘ Look not mournfully 
 into the past; it comes not back again. Wisely improve 
 the present; itisthine. Go forth to meet the shadowy 
 future without fear and with a manly heart.” Seek 
 Christ for guidance, the Spirit for illumination and have 
 faith in the Fatherhood of God. Thus He who “ en- 
 lighteneth every man who cometh into the world,” 
 will lead you through this dim vale of discipline to the 
 land of everlasting life and light. 
 
71 
 
 Almighty God our heavenly Father, give us grace 
 that we may cast away tle works of darkness and 
 put upon us the armor of light; and because through 
 the weakness of our mortal nature we can do no good 
 thing without thee, grant us thy grace that in keep- 
 ing thy commandments we may please thee both in 
 will and deed. May we truly repent us of our sins 
 past, and after the good example of those thy ser- 
 vants who, having finished their course, do now rest 
 from their labors, may we constantly speak the truth, 
 boldly rebuke vice and patiently labor and if need be 
 suffer, for the truth’s sake, through Jesus Christ our 
 Lord. - Amen. 
 
NOTE. 
 
 Tus limits of time necessitated the omission of portions 
 of the foregoing Discourses in delivery, and additional 
 material has since been acquired. 
 
 Among the influences always cordially recognized by 
 Doctor Lewis as affecting his literary career, should have 
 been mentioned the sympathy and assistance rendered him 
 in his earlier Oriental studies by Doctor Isaac Nordheimer, 
 then Professor of Hebrew and German in the University of 
 the City of New York and formerly Professor of Arabic, 
 Syriac and other Oriental Languages in the University of 
 Munich. Doctor Nordhcimer talked with fluency and ac- 
 curacy eleven languages. His Hebrew Grammar, “the 
 most elaborate and philosophical in the English tongue,” 
 was the subject of Reviews by Professor Lewis and several 
 other eminent scholars; as was also his Hebrew Con- 
 cordance. 
 
 Professor Wendell Lamoroux, to whom I am herein in- 
 debted, will also supervise the printing and publication 
 of these Discourses and will add in an Appendix material 
 
 which will tend to complete this memorial tribute. 
 
 E. N. P. 
 
 #> 
 
imcder Jee de NL Dee 
 
LIST OF THE WORKS 
 
 or 
 
 PROFESSOR TAYLER LEWIS. 
 
 Books. 
 
 Plato against the Atheists; or, The Platonic Theology. Harpers, 
 N. Y., 1844. 
 
 Nature and Ground of Punishment. Putnam, N. Y., 1845. 
 
 Six Days of Creation; or, The Scriptural Cosmology. Van De 
 Bogart, Schenectady, 1855. 
 
 The Bible and Science; or, The World Problem. Van de Bogart, 
 Schenectady, 1856. 
 
 The Divine Human in the Scriptures. Carter and Co., N. Y., 1860. 
 
 State Rights; a Photograph from the Ruins of Ancient Greece. 
 Weed, Parsons and Co., Albany, 1864. 
 
 The Heroic Periods in a Nation’s History ; An Appeal to the Soldiers 
 of the American Armies. Baker and Godwin, N. Y., 1866. 
 Special Introduction to Genesis, with Commentary on chapters 1 to 
 
 11, and 387 to 50, inclusive; in Lange’s Commentary. Scribner 
 and Co., N. Y., 1868. 
 Rhythmical Version of Ecclesiastes, with Introduction, Dissertations 
 
 and Aunotations; in Lange’s Commentary. Scribner and 
 Worse) 4000, 
 
 Rhythmical Version of Job, with Introduction and Annotations; in 
 Lange’s Commentary. Scribner, Armstrong and Co., N. Y., 
 1874. 
 
 The Light by which we see Light; or, Nature and the Scriptures; 
 the Vedder Lectures. Ref. Church Board of Publication, N. Y., 
 1875. 
 
 Memoirs of President Nott; Contributions to,and Revision. Sheldon 
 and Co., N. Y., 1876. 
 
 ADDRESSES. 
 
 Faith, the Life of Science. Union College Commencement, 1838. 
 
 Natural Religion, the Remains of Primitive Revelation. University 
 of Vermont, Commencement, 1839. 
 
 The Believing Spirit. Dartmouth College Commencement, 1841. 
 
 True Idea of the State. Andover Theological Seminary, 1843. 
 
 Nature and Progress of Ideas. Union College, 1849. 
 
16 
 
 Association discussed; or, The Socialism of the Tribune examined. 
 Methodist Quar. Rev., N. Y., Jan., 1848. 
 
 Chalmers. Bib. Repository, April, 1848. 
 
 Bible Ethics. i July, 1848. 
 
 The Revolutionary Spirit. Bib. Rep., Oct., 1848. 
 
 Introductory Notice to Miss Dwight’s Mythology. 1849. 
 
 Astronomical Views of the Ancients. Bib. Rep., April and July, 
 
 1849. 
 
 Spirituality of the Book of Job. Bibliotheca Sacra, Andover, May 
 and July, 1849. 
 
 Spirit of the Old Testament. Bib. Rep., Jan., 1850. 
 
 Book of Proverbs. Bib. Rep., April, 1850. 
 
 Names for Soul. “ * Oct., 1850. 
 
 Review of Hickok’s Rational Psychology. Biblio. Sacra., Jan. and 
 April, 1851. 
 
 Trinitarian Letters. New Church Repository, N. Y., May, June, 
 1851 and Jan., March, 1852. 
 
 Three Absurdities of Modern Education. Princeton Review, April, 
 1851. 
 
 Editor’s Table of Harper’s Monthly, from Oct., 1851, to Oct., 1854, 
 inclusive; also in 1855 and 1856; among which articles, are, in 
 1851, Marriage (Nov.), Time and Space, and Geology (Dec.); in 
 1852, Pulpit and Press (Jan.), Value of the Union (Feb.), Immen- 
 sity of the Heavens (Mar.), Individuality of the Soul (Ap.), What 
 is Education? (June), Moral Influences of the Stage (Aug.), Who 
 is the Statesman? (Sep.), The Sabbath (Oct.); in 1853, Religious 
 Liberty, what is it? (May), The School Question (July), What is 
 Science? (Oct.), Woman’s Rights (Nov.); in 1854, Remedies for 
 Political Corruption (Feb.), Political Regeneration (March), 
 Sacredness of the Human Body (Ap.), Politics of the Church 
 (May), Union Saving (Aug.), Unity of the Race (Sep. and Oct.) ; 
 in 1855, Are there more Worlds than one? (Mar.), The Self- 
 made Man (Ap.), Conscience (Noy.); in 1866, Socrates in Prison 
 (Ap.). 
 
 Principles or Laws of Translation ; or, The True Mode of teaching 
 Latin and Greek. New Brunswick Review, Nov., 1854. — 
 
 The Old Family Bible. sf < Feb., 1855. 
 
 Review of Hickok’s Moral Philosophy. Presbyterian Quarterly, N. 
 ¥., Dec?, 1850: ; 
 
 Method of teaching Greck and Latin. Barnard’s Jour. of Education, 
 Hartford; May and March, 1856. 
 
 Analysis of Sentimentalism. Mercersburg (Pa.), Review, Jan., 1857. 
 
 How Little we know. M4 2) SUly; 1808. 
 
 fy 
 
77 
 
 Significance of earlier names for Deity and Soul. Young Men’s 
 Association, Albany, Dec., 1849. 
 
 Conservative Character distinguished from the Radical. Young 
 Men’s Association, Albany, 1855. 
 
 True Idea of Liberal Education. New York University Convocation, 
 1863. 
 
 Memoriter Instruction. _ i. $7 1864. 
 
 Knowledge of the Holy Scriptures, an indispensable element of a 
 liberal Education. N.Y. Univ. Convocation, 1866. 
 
 The Revolutionary Spirit. Wesleyan University, 1868. 
 
 Classical Study. N. Y. Univ. Convocation, 1871. 
 
 The Moral and the Secular in Education. N. Y. Univ. Convoca- 
 tion, 1872. 
 
 My old Schoolmaster, “ a 1875. 
 
 ARTICLES AND REVIEWS. 
 
 Method of studying the Classics. Lit. and Theol. Review, N. Y., 
 Dec., 1888. 
 
 Great Value of the Classics asa Means of Mental Discipline. Lit. 
 and Theol. Review, March, 1829. 
 
 The Comparative Value of Natural and Moral Science. Lit. and 
 Theol. Review, June, 1839. 
 
 The Orphic Hymns. Iris(N. Y. Univ. Magazine), N. Y., Dec., 1840. 
 
 Study of the Heavens. ss i Jan. and March, 1841. 
 
 Review of Nordheimer’s Hebrew Grammar. [Biblical Repository, 
 N. Y., April, 1841. 
 
 The Ancient Metres. Iris, June, 1841. 
 
 Review of Nordheimer’s Hebrew Concordance. Bib. Repository, 
 April, 1842. 
 
 The Divine Attributes as exhibited in the Grecian Poetry; Attribute 
 of Justice. Bib. Rep., July, 1848. 
 
 Review of “ Vestiges of the Natural History of Creation.” American 
 Whig Review, N. Y., May, 1845. ¢ 
 
 Cases of Conscience. American Whig Review, July, 1845. 
 
 Hnman Rights. “ 5 Oct. and Nov., 1846. 
 
 The Church Question. Biblical Repository, Jan., 1846. 
 
 Political Corruption. American Whig Review, May, 1846. 
 
 Has the State a Religion ? a ¥ March, 1846. 
 
 The Sufferings of Christ. Bib. Repository, July, 1846. 
 
 Human Justice; or, Government, a Moral Power. Bib. Rep., Jan. 
 and April, 1847. 
 
 Classical Criticism. Knickerbocker, N. Y., Sept., 1847. 
 
 The Bible, Everything or Nothing. Bib. Rep., Jan., 1848, 
 
18 
 
 The Pearl of Great Price; or, The Evangelical Creed, a Platonic Idea. 
 Lit. & Theo. Review, Feb., 1860. 
 
 The two Schools of Philosophy. American Theological Review, 
 Jan., 1862. 
 
 Hard Matter. Presb. and Theol. Rey., N. Y., Jan., 1863. 
 
 Emotional Element in Hebrew Translation. Methodist Quar. Re- 
 view, N. Y. Four articles in 1868 and 1864. 
 
 Regula Fidei; or, The Gospel of St. John. Presb. and Theol. Reyv., 
 N. Y., Jan., 1864. 
 
 Abraham Lincoln. Hours at Home, Scribner and Co., N. Y., June, 
 1865. 
 
 The Bible Idea of Truth, as inseparable from the Divine Personality. 
 Presb. and Theol. Rev., April, 1866. 
 
 Fables of Pilpay. Putnam’s Magazine, N. Y., July, 1868. 
 
 Bible Words for Salvation. Presb. and Theol. Review, N. Y., Oct., 
 1869. 
 
 Nature of Prayer. ‘i April, 1870. 
 
 Ancient Oracles; or, The Primitive Greek Religion. Presb. and 
 Theol. Review, Jan. 1871. 
 
 Jowett’s Plato. Presb. and Theol. Review, Jan., 1872. 
 
 The One Human Race. Scribner’s Monthly, April, 1872. 
 
 Primitive Greek Religion. Presb. and Theol. Review, July, 1872. 
 
 The Purifying Messiah; interpretation of Isaiah, 52:15. 1873. 
 
 Introduction to Farrar’s Life of Christ. Wendell, Albany, 1876. 
 
 Critical Notes on the International Sunday-School Lessons on the 
 Old Testament. Philadelphia Sunday School Times, Dec., 1876 
 to July, 1877. 
 
 Power and Pathos of Euripides. Harper’s Monthly, Nov., 1878. 
 
 Many shorter articles; brief Reviews; Discussions in the New York 
 Independent, Christian Intelligencer (N. Y.), Christian States- 
 man (Phil.), Chicago Advance, Yale Courant and others. 
 
 PostHuMOUS MANUSCRIPTS. 
 
 Treatise on the Religious Responsibility of the State. 
 
 Figurative Language of the Bible; or, The Bible Language of the 
 Heart. | 
 
 Notes (in Arabic, Latin and English) on difficult passages in the 
 Koran. 
 
 Notes on 468 difficult passages in the Bible. 
 
 Treatise on the Greek and Latin Metres. 
 
 Syriac Roots of the entire New Testament. 
 
 Scholia Arabica. 
 
 Many other MSS. on Biblical and Classical subjects, written chiefly 
 in Hebrew, Greek or Latin. 
 
 =) 
 + 
 
ACTION OF THE TRUSTEES OF UNION COLLEGE 
 
 ON THE DECEASE oF 
 
 PROFESSOR TAYLER LEWIS, LL.D., L.H.D. 
 
 The Board of Trustees of Union College have adopted the follow- 
 ing record expressive of their sentiments on the occasion of the 
 decease of Professor Tayler Lewis. ) 
 
 Doctor Lewis was a professor in Union College for nearly thirty 
 years. Of rare capacity as a logician and of rare acquirements as a 
 - linguist, he possessed the most valuable stores of Oriental and Clas- 
 sical literature. 
 
 He was an exact and erudite scholar. He was more. He knew 
 the songs of Zion as well as the learning of Greece and Rome, and 
 drew from all, the philosophy of human life alike of the ancients 
 and of his nineteenth century. 
 
 With all his acquirements and capacity, he wasa faithful and hum- 
 ble Christian whose rule of life was to follow the right wherever it 
 seemed to him to lead. Tenacious of purpose, loving the truth 
 for the truth’s sake, he maintained his convictions in the face 
 of all opposition unflinchingly and with ardor but without bit- 
 terness. While he hated heresy, he loved the heretic. An illus- 
 trious author and voluminous writer, his sole end and aim was that 
 right aud truth might prevail and that God should be glorified. 
 The infirmity of his later years, which lessened his power to influ- 
 ence new men drew him within himself but only increased his love 
 of learning for its own pure sake. 
 
 What his hand found to do, he did with all his might. 
 
 The influence and example of such a life is precious to all who 
 come within its sphere. Even careless youths who failed to appre- 
 ciate it when it was enacted before them in College, felt in after life 
 its inspiration in their conscience, and with gratitude to him learned 
 to admire and imitate its nobleness. 
 
LIST OF THE WORKS 
 
 OF 
 
 PROFESSOR ISAAC W. JACKSON. 
 
 Elements of Conic Sections. Oliver Steele, Albany, 1838. 
 
 Elementary Treatise on Optics. Vande Bogart, Schenectady, 1852. 
 
 Elements of Trigonometry; Plane and Spherical. Barhyte, Sche- 
 nectady, 1874. 
 
 Elements of Mechanics. Barhyte, Schenectady, 1874. 
 
ACTION OF THE TRUSTEES OF UNION COLLEGE 
 
 ON THE DECEASE OF 
 
 PROFESSOR ISAAC W. JACKSON, LL.D. 
 
 The Board of Trustees of Union College have adopted the follow- 
 ing record, presented by Silas B. Brownell, Esq., on the occasion of. 
 the decease of Professor Isaac W. Jackson: 
 
 Professor Jackson gave his whole life to Union College. For more 
 than fifty years he was one of her successful instructors. A devotee 
 of his calling and our College, he was illustrious as an author of 
 scientific text-books, and a profound scholar also of the highest 
 branches of Pure Mathematics and the Physical Sciences. 
 
 Familiarity with abstruse science never deadened his love for hu- 
 manity nor cooled his zeal for service to his fellow-men. 
 
 Communion with Nature and research in her secrets never led him 
 into doubt or skepticism. “Through faith he understood the worlds 
 were framed by the word of God.” 
 
 That word of God which said, ‘‘ Let there be light, and there was 
 light,” lightened his heart and soul and made his whole life a beau- 
 tiful poem of tender charity and stainless purity. 
 
 Both literally and figuratively he dressed and kept the garden into 
 which his Lord put him. 
 
 His loving treatment of his youthful pupils endeared him to them 
 all; and late in life when College needed their support, he roused 
 their enthusiasm by their affection for him. 
 
 A grateful Alma Mater values his services and celebrates his vir- 
 tues while her scattered Alumni cherish his memory and, amid their 
 grief and sorrow for their loss, reverently give thanks that such a 
 teacher of their youth and friend of their manhood and age was 
 so long spared to honor College by his daily life and to adorn the 
 State and nation by the light of his example and teaching as it 
 
82 
 
 shines out in the walk and conversations of the thousand of grateful 
 Alumni who shared his instruction and his friendship and now 
 mourn his death. 
 
 This was the heritage he craved, the reward he sought — that 
 those whom he instructed should follow his example, imbibe his 
 spirit and embody his precepts; that so, when they ceased to be his 
 disciples, he might thenceforth call them friends. 
 
 His was thus a successful life. To him beyond most men,was it given 
 to reap the harvest of his life’s work. On the fiftieth anniversary of 
 his connection with College, while men of note in church and State 
 delighted to honor him, the boys whom he taught during those fifty 
 years came round him once more and thus resolved: 
 
 We, the Alumni of Union College, contemplate with unmixed 
 satisfaction the record made during the last half-century by our be- 
 loved friend and Professor, Isaac W. Jackson. We take great pleas- 
 ure in congratulating him that throughout this long period of service 
 he has retained the genuine love and veneration of the Alumni. We 
 rejoice that this semi-centennial anniversary of his advent to Pro- 
 fessorial work in connection with the College finds his health unim- 
 paired, and we trust that many more years of usefulness and 
 happiness await him. 
 
 We cherish among the most precious memories of our College 
 days the recollection of his warm-hearted encouragement and in- 
 terest in our welfare; and it is our earnest hope that the closing 
 labors of his life may be cheered by the consciousness of possessing 
 the confidence and love of a vast army of graduates through- 
 out the length and breadth of the land. It is therefore 
 
 Resolved, That we greet with profound pleasure this anniversary of 
 Professor Jackson’s official connection with the College; and it is our 
 hope and prayer that he may be long spared to the institution and 
 the world, in the full possession of his eminent faculties of mind and 
 his warm impulses of heart. 
 
FORM OF BEQUEST 
 
 TO 
 
 UNION COLLEGE. 
 
 President Potter has, on several occasions, called attention to the 
 importance of gifts and bequests to the College, of whatever kind as 
 well as amount. 
 
 If the forty or fifty graduates yearly enrolled among our deceased, 
 and if other friends of the institution, of Christian unity and of educa- 
 tion, each contributed some token of remembrance; whether a pecun- 
 iary endowment; books for our Library ; antiquities, photographs, sin- 
 gle works of statuary, painting or engraving, for our Art Collection ; 
 every department of Union would soon be enabled to answer the 
 highest demands upon its efficiency. 
 
 Every such gift, apart from its intrinsic value, not only affords 
 special encouragement to the officers of the institution but by its 
 example produces other benefactions perhaps greater than itself. 
 
 Already in response to these suggestions of the President, a num- 
 ber of bequests and gifts of interesting objects have been received 
 and others are promised. 
 
 The most desirable form of benefaction to the College at the pre- 
 sent time -is that of contribution to its general resources, untrammeled, 
 so far as may be, by special conditions; and since, through unac- 
 quaintance with legal details, the College may fail of the aid which 
 would willingly have been given, its authorities have recommended 
 that the proper title of the institution and form of bequest be pub- 
 lished, as follows: 
 
 I give and bequeathe to the Trustees of Union College, in the town 
 of Schenectady, in the state of New York, the 
 
LMAO 
 
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