IREN^EUS LETTERS ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN THE NEW YORK OBSERVER. THE NEW YORK OBSERVER. 1881. COPYRIGHT, 1880, BY NEW YORK OBSERVER. Prest of 8. W. Gunn'g Sow, 14 Beckman Street, Mew York. PS 6 r? 1881 INTRODUCTORY NOTE, BY THE EDITORS OF THE NEW YORK OBSERVER. IN the year 1837 the signature of IREN^EUS first appeared on the pages of the New York Observer. The writer was then a pastor in the Highlands of the Hudson. In the month of April, 1840, he became one of its editors, and has been writing in it, with brief intervals, every week for more than forty years. He has established such relations with his readers that he has come to regard them as personal friends, and he has received abundant assurance that this feeling is reciprocated. Requests, many and earnest, have been made by our sub scribers for the collection of these letters into a volume. "Travels in Europe and the East," "Switzerland," "The Alhambra and the Kremlin," " Under the Trees " and " Walk ing with God," are the names of books originally published as " Irenaeus Letters " in this paper. But this volume con tains a selection of more familiar, household letters, such as have been specially mentioned by our readers as giving them pleasure, and it is now published in compliance with their repeated requests to have this in this permanent form. IT-; / THE NEW YORK OBSERVER: A NATIONAL, RELIGIOUS, FAMILY NEWSPAPER. NOT SECTIONAL. NOT SECTARIAN. // has two distinct sheets in one : Readily separated so as to form two journals. One filled -with Religious and the other -with Secular Reading, All the news of all Christian Churches of all denominations and from all foreign countries is furnished by correspondents in every part of our own country and in every quarter of the globe. So wide is the range of religious intelligence, of Literature, Science, Art, Commerce and Agriculture, that the reading of this paper is an education to the whole family that receives it. Its editors and sole proprietors are the REV. DRS. S. IREN^US PRIME, E. D. G. PRIME, CHAS. A. STODDARD, AND WENDELL PRIME. Besides these it has four editors of special departments and a large corps of special contributors. Its correspondence from Europe, Asia, Africa, and the Pacific Islands is a valuable feature ; its editorials are fearless and fair ; its selections are made from an extensive reading with taste and discernment, and its Notices and Reviews of Books and Magazines give a correct idea of current literature. TERMS: IfcS-JS (postpaid) payable in advance. SPECIAL OFFER: The New York Observer will send to any OLD SUBSCRIBER who pays his own subscription in advance, one copy of "Irenaus Letters "for each NEW subscriber whose name he also forwards with $3.15 CONTENTS. PACK Adams, Dr., Intercourse with 389 Agatha and her Dish 300 Among the Icebergs 131 Amphitheatres and Theatres 230 Anna Dickinson on Theatres 340 Apostle in Rome 295 Arguing with a Poker and a Hammer 336 Babes in the Woods 113 Bear in Boston 52 Beggar, An Interesting 134 Beggars' Church and the Beggars of Italy 288 Bryant, William Cullen 160 Calling Bad Names 25 Castle of Unspunnen 190 Cemetery beneath a Cemetery 238 Chester Cathedral Service 178 Childhood of Christ 6 Children and the Church 79 Choosing a Minister's Wife 16 Church and a Picture 225 Church and Cloisters of St. Mark 263 Convent on the Sea 235 Country Pastor's Sermon 46 Cowper and Ray Palmer 137 Cox, The late Dr. S. H 394 Doremus, Mrs 49 Doughnation Party 98 Dream of the Year 62 Dresden Pictures . 202 CONTENTS. Eternal City, Why? 276 Evil Eye 105 Fife and the Violin 311 Fine Old English Gentleman 207 Gamblers at Monaco 329 Going to a Glacier 193 Going to Rome 272 Great Exaggerator 153 Green Vaults 197 Habits, especially Bad Habits 102 Henry and Hildebrand 123 His Grandfather's Barn 22 Hold up your Head 127 It's his Way 55 Jews' Quarter in Rome 291 Lance of St. Maurice 215 Lesson from a Sick-room 150 Long-winded Speakers. ... 120 Made without a Maker 333 Manners in Church. 116 Man who had to wait for a Seat in Church 326 Meanest Woman in New York 381 Milk and Water 370 Ministers' Pay in Old Times ., 87 Ministers' Sons 359 Minister who was hung 362 Miseries of being reported in the Newspapers 308 Model Minister 109 Monastery and Convent 186 Morning Adventure in Rome 280 Muhlenberg, The Good Dr 385 Murray, Dr. : Bishop Hughes 90 Music Composer Spoiled 9 My first Sight of Niagara 314 My Vine: my poor Vine! 374 Name above Every Name 141 New England Homes and Graves 30 O Thou of Little Faith 167 Qur Friends in Heaven 344 CONTENTS. 7 PACK Our Windows in Florence 243 Pastor and Friend 59 Pleasant Recollections 13 Sabbath among the Hills 69 Sabbath in Cambridge, England 181 San Miniato and Vallombrosa 249 Santa Croce and the Inquisition in Florence 255 Service of Song 73 Shakers of Canterbury 82 Spring's Prediction, Dr 66 Story and the Church of St. Cecilia. 284 Studies in Torture Rooms 211 Summer Board and Summer Boarders 40 Sunday Evening Supper 304 Taxing a Child's Brain 36 Ten Days on the Ship 173 That Dreadful Boy i Through the Tyrol 220 Torturing the Little Ones 366 Two Hours in Court 94 Two Pictures: Ideal, but Real 170 Warriors on War 164 Week in the White House 145 When it Rains, let it Rain 157 When not to Laugh 348 White and Yellow Meeting-Houses 377 White Mountain Notch 321 With a Pirate in his Cell 351 Woman's View of Crime 355 IREN^US LETTERS. THAT DREADFUL BOY. HE was going from Boston to Old Orchard with his mother. I was sorry to be in the same car with them. His mother seemed to exist only to be worried by this uneasy, distressing boy. He had only one fault he was perfectly insufferable. If I say he was "an unlicked cub" I shall offend your ears. Lick is an old English word that means either to lap or to strike. Shakespeare uses rinlicked as applied to the cub of a bear ; there was a notion that the whelp was at first a form less thing that had to be " licked into shape" by the mother's tongue. So it came to pass that the vulgar expression, "an unlicked cub," was fittingly applied to a boy whose mother never gave him the culture essential to make him present able, or even tolerable, in the society of well-behaved people. The two meanings of the word are not very diverse. This boy had never been licked into shape. He needed licking. I use the word in its two senses. And the use, if not elegant, is intelligible and expressive, perhaps graphic also. The mother besought him to be still for a moment, but the moment of stillness never came. He wanted something to eat, got it; to drink, and he kept a steady trot through the car ; the anxious mother prayed him not to go to the plat form, not to put his head out of the window, not to climb over the seats ; all in vain. She might as well have en treated the engine. In travelling, one is often haunted by people from whom he tries to fly. He meets them at the galleries or the dinner- 2 1REN&US LETTERS. table. The dreadful boy and his mother were in the parlor of the seaside hotel where I had engaged my lodgings. In half a day this dreadful boy was the pest and nuisance of the piazza, the parlors and the halls. His intellectual mother, coddling and coaxing him, sought to win him into the ways of decency and peace, but he rejoiced in showing he was not tied to his mother. The more she reasoned the more he rioted in his liberty. " I would drown the little plague if I could catch him in the water," said a crusty savage from New York City ; " the ill-mannered cur minds nobody and fears nobody." One evening we were seated in the parlor, in little groups, conversing. Into the room rushed the dreadful boy pursued by another whom he had hit, and both were screaming in play at the top of their voices. As he was passing me I seized him by the arm with a grip that meant business, and said : " Here, my boy, we have stood this thing long enough : it has come to an end." An awful silence filled the room ; his mother, frightened, sat pale, and not far away, while I held the culprit and pursued the lecture " If you do not know how to behave in company, let me tell you the parlor is no place for such romps as we have suffered from you ; go out of doors and stay out for such games, and when you come in here, sit down and be quiet." He wriggled to get away, but I led him to the door and left him on the outside. As I had not been introduced to his mother, I was not sup posed to know whose boy it was, and therefore made no apologies for this summary discipline of somebody else's child. The next day I was sitting on the beach under a sun um brella, when a party of ladies and the dreadful boy hove in sight, and sought seats near me. I offered my seat to the mother, but she found one at hand, thanked me, and said : " I am under great obligation to you, sir, for taking my boy in hand last evening." " It is rather in my place," I made answer, " to apologize for laying hands on the child of another: but I saw he was regardless of authority, and thought to give him a lesson." THAT DREADFUL BOY. 3 "Thanks: but I would like to tell you of him: he is a dear child, an only child, and his father, often and long away from home on business, has left his education and care to me entirely. I have the impression that the strongest of all influences is love, and that none is so strong as a mother's love : I never speak to him but in tones and words of affec tion: I never deny him any indulgence he asks: I let him have his own way and never punish him, lest he should be offended with me. I wish that he may not have any thoughts of his mother but those of kindness, gentleness and love. Your sudden and decided measure last night startled me, but its effect on the child was remarkable. He has not yet recovered, and this morning he spoke to me of it, as if a new sensation had been awakened. Will you tell me frankly what your opinion is of the probable result of the system which I am pursuing?" " It is not becoming in a stranger," I said, " to speak plainly in regard to the domestic management of another, and I hope you will excuse me from expressing an opinion which it would not be pleasant for you to hear." " But I want to hear it ; the good of my child is the dear est object in this world : I have nothing else to live for, but it seems to me that the more I love him the less he cares for me or my wishes, the more unruly and troublesome he be comes. Your decided dealing with him has frightened me in regard to my course of training." " Rather you should say your ' want of training him.' You do not read correctly the words of the wise man, ' Train up a child,' etc. You are letting him grow up without training, and my fear is that he will be hung " "Hung! hung! what do you mean ?" " Only this, that you are allowing him now to be a lawless, selfish, domineering, disagreeable boy: he has his own way always : he tramples on your wishes now, and will tread on your heart soon and love to do it : such boys are bad at home and worse out of doors : growing up ungoverned, he will defy authority, be hated by his companions, get into trouble, become turbulent, riotous, perhaps an outlaw, and 4 IREN&US LETTERS. will come to some bad end, I fear a rope's end. This plain talk offends you, I perceive." " No, it does not : I am thinking, but I am not offended. I asked your candid opinion and have received it, and it has made me anxious lest I have already done an irreparable injury to the dear child. Do you believe in the corporal punishment of children ?" " It is sometimes a duty. You may restrain the wayward ness of some children without actually whipping them, and if you can, by all means do so. But the first duty of a child is to obey its parents. Your boy never obeyed you since he was born !" " True, very true : he has always had his own way." " Yes, and is therefore never happy : he would cry for the moon, and fret because he cannot have it. He is no comfort to you, and is a torment to all about him. If you would make him happy, you will make him mind : and especially to obey his mother. I do not believe that you will succeed." " Pray, why not, sir ?" " Because, madam, you have ' views ' that are opposed to these. You believe only in moral suasion, in the largest lib erty, and you cannot break away from your opinions and surroundings and persistently, steadily and faithfully pursue a new line of life with that boy." " But I will try." " God help you, madam, and you will need his help, for you have a long struggle before you. But the prize is worth it, and I wish you success with all my heart. Your child will love you ten times more if you teach him to respect you : he will not love you while you let him defy and despise your authority as he does now. Soon he will love you, and love to obey you, and then he is saved. Solomon was a wise man, and spoke divine wisdom when he said, ' He that spareth the rod hateth his son, but he that loveth him chasteneth him betimes.' " The madam had a smile of contempt on her face, and said, " I don't think much of Solomon." " Probably not," I replied. " Did you ever read the Apoc- THAT DREADFUL BOY. 5 rypha ? Those Oriental writings are not inspired, so you need not be afraid of them" she laughed "and I will give you the sage advice of the Son of Sirach: 'Indulge thy child and he shall make thee afraid : humor him and he will bring thee to heaviness. Bow down his neck while he is young, and beat him on the sides while he is a child, lest he wax stubborn and be disobedient unto thee, and so bring sorrow upon thy heart.' Which means teach him to obey, or he will govern you and break your heart." The mother was silent a moment, and then spoke with quivering lips : " Did you ever read Patmore's lines, ' My Little Son ' ? No ? Well, I will say them, for they are on my heart : ' My little son, who looked from thoughtful eyes, And moved and spoke in quiet grown-up wise, Having my law the seventh time disobey'd, I struck him and dismiss'd With hard words and unkiss'd, His mother, who was patient, being dead. Then, fearing lest his grief should hinder sleep, I visited his bed, But found him slumbering deep, With darkened eyelids, and their lashes yet From his late sobbing wet. And I, with moan, Kissing away his tears, left others of my own ; For, on a table drawn beside his head, He had put, within his reach, A box of counters and a red-veined stone, A piece of glass abraded by the beach, And six or seven shells, A bottle with bluebells, And two French copper coins ranged there with careful art, To comfort his sad heart. So, when that night I pray'd To God, I wept and said : Ah, when at last we lie with tranced breath, Not vexing thee in death, And thou rememberest of what toys We made our joys, How weakly understood Thy great commanded good, 6 IREN&US LETTERS. Then, fatherly not less Than I whom thou hast moulded from the clay, Thou'lt leave thy wrath and say, '"I will be sorry for their childishness." ' " " Thank you," I said, as she paused her eyes filled with tears " thank you : no child should be ' struck in anger and dismissed with hard words.' Punishment in love and justice breaks no child's heart : that father was all wrong." " I see it," she answered, " and I begin to feel it also." We exchanged cards, and I hope to hear of the dreadful boy again. THE CHILDHOOD OF CHRIST. When I was in Nazareth, the child-life of Jesus excited emotions of a character not difficult to recall, but very hard to relate. I was led to the shop where tradition says that Joseph wrought at his trade of a carpenter. And now I have on the wall before me an exquisite engraving of the man at his work, while a lovely boy is looking on. The light divine is playing on the child's brow. Nazareth is in a valley, and the hills surround it like the rim of a basin. On this ridge, perhaps, the child Christ had often walked, and from it looked away to the hills now famous and sacred in the story of his life and death, and in the history that was the prophecy of his coming. Carmel stretches away to the sea on the right. The dome of Mount Tabor salutes the vault of heaven on the left. Gilboa and the lesser Hermon remind us of Saul and Jonathan, and the sweet singer of Israel. We look out on the plain of Esdraelon, the wide battle-field of old, and the field of mira cles of mercy as well. In the distance are places where the Saviour, in the days of his ministry, went about doing good ; and the region finally sanctified by his death and ascension to the glory that was his before the world was. THE CHILDHOOD OF CHRIST. 7 It requires no superstition to invest such a walk with holy interest. The spot is not marked by great events to which the world makes pilgrimage. It is not certain that the child Jesus ever stood in the place where I was standing when I looked down upon Nazareth, and off toward Mount Moriah, and the City of the Great King ! But the mystery of the Incarnation and Youth of the Son of God was invested with fresh beauty and power as I wondered what were the emo tions of the boy in those days of his childhood, before he took on his shoulders the burden which he came to bear. He knew all that was before him ! When he was an infant on his mother's neck, she was conscious of the mighty secret that he was the Son of God, and she alone of all the daughters or sons of men knew that truth : even then, in the tender years of his infancy, the cross and the nails and the spear were in his heart, as afterwards on Calvary. She, too, had been told that the sword would pierce through her own soul, and thus the sorrows of the infant Jesus were shared in the sympathy of his mother. He was strong in spirit when yet in the dew of his youth. He was filled with wisdom. And the grace of God was upon him. Wonderful must have been the boyhood thus endowed. What the thoughts of his mother were in those days we know not, but she kept all his strange sayings in her heart, and linked them with the awful mystery of his advent by a way known only to herself and the Spirit of the Lord. He was only twelve years old when he went up with his parents to Jerusalem, and there stood before the teachers in the temple, and taught them so that they were astonished at his understanding, and his answers to the questions which they proposed to the precocious and inquisitive lad. It was more marvellous then than it would be now for a child to take such a place before a college of professors. The rever ence for age and wisdom and authority is much less now than in those days, and the doctors of divinity might well have been surprised at the courage no less than the learning 8 IREN&US LETTERS. of a child of twelve, who could sit in their presence and hold his own in extemporaneous debate. " Don't you know that I must be about my Father's busi ness?" were the strange words he uttered when his mother found him, after three days' search. It is very plain that Mary, the blessed Mother of Jesus, whom millions of igno rant people now worship with prayers invoking her protec tion, is no more able to take care of us than any other mother is, for she could not keep watch of her own child on the journey from Jerusalem to Nazareth, and it took her three days to find him. I am sure that she is no more able to help and save than my mother is, and it is just as well to pray to one as the other. And with what filial respect and confidence the child Jesus met his mother's call, and turned away from the congenial company of those men of learning ! He must go back to Nazareth, to the carpenter's shop and the daily toil. He might be a Rabbi among Rabbis. But his time had not yet come. He went home and was obedient unto his parents. He was a good boy. That is saying much for him. And it is a wonderful fact that a life of Christ, written on one sheet like this, has space for the record that he obeyed his mother ! He was the Saviour of Men, the Lord of Glory, the Man of Sorrows, the Prince of Peace. He came to seek and save the lost, and his life of work for a world is full of incident, activity and tragedy, but his biographer begins by telling us that he was a child who was subject to his parents. I find in that simple statement a great truth for all time, all lands, all parents and all children. I thought of it as I stood on the hill over Nazareth, and looked off into the western sky where the sun was going down to shine on an other dear and sacred home. And when with my friend now in heaven, the missionary Calhoun, I went to bed in the Convent that night, and talked with him of those we loved across the sea, my mind was filled with thoughts of the childhood of Jesus when he was subject to his parents. The holy child Jesus ! At this season of the year, and on this day of all the days in the year, I would write to the parents and the children who read these lines, and commend A MUSIC-COMPOSER SPOILED. 9 to them the life of the Holy Child Jesus: of Jesus when he was a child. Even then he was filled with wisdom and grace, and he grew in favor with God and man as he in creased in stature, but the crown of his childhood was obe dience to his parents. The happiest child in the world is one who takes delight in doing what is well pleasing to God and its parents. Out of that vale of Nazareth has gone a child whose life and death have been the light and joy and will yet be the salvation of the world. To be like that Child is heaven be gun. To be like him here is to be with him, in his Father's house, forever. A MUSIC-COMPOSER SPOILED. THE FATE OF POOR RICHARD LEARNING TO SING. When I was a lad of a dozen years, we had a singing school in the congregation of the "Old White Meeting House." No such schools are in these days, in this part of the country. It was held once a week, in the big ball-room of the tavern, across the green, opposite the church. From all the region, miles around, the young men and maidens came by scores, and were trained to sing the tunes that were used on the Sabbath day. The school was a great winter treat, and the intermission in the middle of the evening was particularly enjoyed and improved. Of one of the boys who attended this school you will now be told, but to spare his feelings, especially his modesty, his name will be carefully concealed. Sufficient has been his mortification, as you are to learn, and I remember the remark of ^Eneas to Dido, when she asked him to tell the story of his sufferings : "What you, O Queen, command me to relate, Renews the sad remembrance of my fate." Therefore I shall not mention his real name, but speak of him as Richard. 16 IREN&US LETTERS. Richard was one of the minister's sons, and very ambitious to be a singer. He had a passion for music, as was apparent from the vigor with which he beat the drum and blew the horn in those childish plays which made the welkin ring and annoyed the neighbors. When a teacher from Connecticut came there, and got up a singing school, Richard entered it with the fire of genius kindling in his eye, and his ear open to the expected sounds. The primary rules of the science and art of music being readily mastered, and easy tunes rehearsed till they were quite familiar, he seized the pen of the composer, and with rapid strokes produced one and then another tune of his own, with judicious and discriminating indications on the staff with Cleff and Slurs, Hold, Staccato, Swell (much of that), Piano and Forte and Mezzo, even now and then Con Spirito, Andante, Ad Libitum, etc. These tunes the teacher examined, played them on the bass viol, and sang them with fitting words. They passed that dread ordeal, and were pronounced remarkably well done for a child. Alas, that this same teacher should prove the ruin of this incipient Mozart or Handel ! The winter rapidly slid along. The school flourished grandly. A choir of a hun dred was ready to fill the gallery and shake the pillars of the church. As the young Richard was singing at the top of his voice, and doubtless making obvious discord, the master, passing near him, was provoked, and stopping in the midst of the tune, and in sudden silence, said impatiently and severely, " You have too many corners to your throat to learn to sing !" The cruel man might better have broken his viol over the boy's head. As it was, he broke the boy's heart. Down went his aspirations, and from that hour to this he has never tried to learn a line of music, and has long since ceased to know one tune from another. Then and there a sense of discouragement took hold on him and never let him up. Whatever else he could do and did, he made no further prog ress in the culture of his voice or the art of composing music ! Yet he never ceased to love it, and never ceased to regret that he did not despise the rebuke, and give the lie to the prophet, by overmastering the difficulties, rounding the A MUSIC-COMPOSER SPOILED. II corners of his throat, and learning to sing. Thirty years after this blow fell on him he tvas relating his fate to Mr. Thomas Hastings, the famous teacher and composer of sacred music. That excellent man, of blessed memory, said to him on hearing his story : " Sing with me the eight notes." He did so to the best of his ability. " There is no reason in the world," said this master, "why you should not be a good singer. If you will begin now, you will succeed beyond all doubt." But the man would not undertake what the boy had abandoned as a hopeless task. The boy was father of the man. Mr. Hastings said : " Every one may learn to sing : not one in a thousand has any natural deficiency to prevent him from being a fair singer." But Richard was too old a bird to begin. He could not be flattered into a fresh exposure of those fatal corners. The fate of this ambitious youth, and the sad loss the world has suffered by the early clipping of his musical wings, may be utilized in a note of warning to parents and teachers. There is a bent, a trend, a tendency in the nature of children, which should be taken into account in the culture of their minds and the choice of a pursuit in life. Some times it should be discouraged, for it does not always point to usefulness, honor and happiness. Just as the twig, etc. And in early years, even a bad tendency may be repressed or eradicated, which, left unchecked, will become a resistless flood, an ungovernable passion, a fatal power. But this natural force, inclination or propensity, when rightly guided, will be clear gain in the development of character, making a grand success. It is better in the training of the young to rely more on cautious encouragement, than rough reproof and constant censure or fault-finding. The race is weary enough, and the toil up hill is hard enough, to justify all the help that parent and teacher can afford. Repression and scolding only 12 IRENMUS LETTERS. irritate the soul, without adding to its power. Often the brain is confused by a harsh word, and the mind is diverted from the point, when a smile and kindly remark would be a ray of sunlight guiding to the true answer. One of the marvels of human nature is that loving parents often abuse their children under a mistaken sense of duty. But there is something for every one to do in this world, and when a musician is spoiled, it is not certain that he does not turn out to be something better. " There's a Divinity that shapes our ends." The great difference in the men We meet is energy or the want of it. Given fair natural powers, the average, then put on the steam, and the man will go. With virtue at the helm, the worker will win usefulness and bread, and with them the chief end of man. This is rather a dull ending of poor Richard's musical career. He did not go singing his way through the world. He never learned to distinguish one tune by its name. But no waters could quench the music in his soul. He heard it in the spheres when " in solemn silence all move round this dark terrestrial ball." He listened to it among the pine trees through which the meadow brook wound its way. In the sounding ocean and the shells he listened to the mystery and melody of the sea. Even the growth of the plants, as he put his ear to the sod, made music. And at home and in far cities he heard the great masters of voice and instrument, Braham and Jenny Lind, the two greatest human voices of the century, and all the lyric songsters that have swept the heart and harp chords of the age: he felt the passion strains in the Sistine chapel, rose in rapture on the organ tones at Frieburg, and wept in a delirium of emotion under the choir of St. Roch . he thought with the wisest of men to get him " men singers and women singers," and perhaps has found as exquisite delight in the concord of sweet sounds as any untutored mind can enjoy, but he has never ceased to regret that his first music teacher, that peripatetic pedagogue from Connecticut, said to him, in the hearing of a hundred, " You have too many corners to your throat to learn to sing." PLEASANT RECOLLECTIONS. tj PLEASANT RECOLLECTIONS OF A ROMAN CATHOLIC PASTOR AND FRIEND. This, as I learn by the daily papers, is the anniversary of the death of Rev. Dr. Cummings, the pastor of St. Stephen's Roman Catholic Church in 28th Street in this city. His church was, and is, distinguished for its music, which draws throngs to its courts. The style of the music is more artistic than we have in our most fashionable Protestant churches, but it is attractive in the highest degree. He died thirteen years ago to-day, and, as on the return of each anniversary, a solemn high mass of requiem was celebrated in the church of his affection. He was a remarkable man, a companion able, cultivated scholar and gentleman. My recollections of him are refreshing, and they come to me this evening so cheerily that I must ask you to share them with me. I was indebted to a " mutual friend," Mr. W. A. Seaver, formerly an editor, and now the worthy President of the Adriatic Fire Insurance Company, for my first acquaintance with Dr. Cummings. We were Mr. Seaver's guests at din ner. A few moments after first speaking with him, for the grasp of his warm hand assured me he was ready for a cheer ful word, I said to him : " Dr. Cummings, I take this, the first opportunity of meet ing you, to beg your pardon for breaking open a letter of yours at my office." " Ah," said he, " how was that, I have forgotten it?" " Yes, a letter came to us with your name on it, and as one of our editors bore the same name as yours, he supposed it was for him and broke the seal. But finding it was writ ten in Latin and came from Rome, we concluded it must be for some one else, and we returned it to the post office." " Oh, yes," he replied, " I remember now, it was an Indul gence we had sent for from the Pope, but probably you 14 IREN^EUS LETTERS. needed it at your office more than we did, and so it went to you !" We were soon at the table, and it proved to be one of the early days of Lent. Our host made an apology, and said to Dr. Cummings : " Perhaps, as it is Lent, you abstain from meat?" " Oh, no, it's meet, meet, meetzVz^ all the time," he said ; " and without meat we should be unequal to the duties of the season." In conversing with me on the subject of newspaper-mak ing, and especially the conflicts of the religious press, he re ferred humorously to his own experience when he was a young man, and in the family of Bishop Hughes. He said : "The Bishop was at that time running a newspaper him self, and I was his assistant ; he would sometimes come in when hard up for copy, and throwing down the New York Observer before me, would say, ' there, take that, and pitch in.' " To which, I " And you always did as you were told, I be lieve." Speaking of the power of music in church, he said to me : " I will undertake to fill any one of your churches to over flowing every Sunday if you will let me provide the music." "Your music," I replied, "will not suit the taste of our people, who do not fancy the style of St. Stephen's." " But it shall be purely Protestant and Presbyterian : such music as you delight in ; adapted to your forms of worship and the wants of your people. Our music would drive away your congregations ; but music delights, and will always draw the crowd. I am very sure that your churches do not appreciate its value as a means of bringing the multitude to the house of God." " We spend money enough on it," I said ; " often as much on the choir as on the pulpit." " Very true, but you pay for that kind of music that does not accord with your service it does not address itself to PLEASANT RECOLLECTIONS. 15 the sentiment, the sensibility, the emotional nature ; it is often an approach to the opera without reaching it so that it is neither the one thing nor the other. Ours is artistic, in harmony with our ritual, addressing the imagination through the senses ; you appeal to the intellect and the heart, and need a music to match your services." These are a few only of the words we exchanged, but we met not long afterwards at his own table, in his own house. Fifteen or twenty gentlemen sat down ; all but four were priests or eminent laymen of the Romish Church. Dr. Cum- mings, at the head of the table, had two of us Protestants on one hand, and two on the other. The Austrian Consul presided at the other end of the long table. After we were seated, our host, looking along the rows of guests, remarked with great glee, " Now we have these Protestants, we'll roast them." I returned his smiles and said, " I thought we all belonged to the same sect." " And which ?" exclaimed some one. "The Society of Friends," said I, and they gave me a cheer along the line, and did not try to roast a Protestant. It was a memorable dinner. I made the acquaintance of several men of learning, travel and genius, whose friendship I prized. Among the books lying around was a volume of epitaphs composed by Dr. Cummings. He told me that his people constantly came to him for lines to put on the grave stones of their children and friends, and he was obliged to make a book of them, so that they could take what pleased them. He gave me a copy, and I made a commendatory notice of it in the New York Observer. He remarked after wards, to a friend of mine, that he did not suppose it possi ble for a Protestant to speak so kindly of a Catholic produc tion. As the epitaphs were the expression of human sym pathy and love, the most of them were such as come from and to every aching heart. And by and by it came his time to die. He was in the prime and vigor of life when disease overtook him, and with slow approaches wore his life away. His constitu- 1 6 IREN&US LETTERS. tional cheerfulness never failed him. I think an invitation he gave to our friend, Mr. Seaver, has no example in the speech of dying men of ancient or modern times. Socrates conversed with his friends serenely. Philosophy and religion have both made death-beds cheerful. I have spoken of Dr. Cummings' love of music and its exquisite culture at St. Stephen's. It was his pride and joy; and one who has no music in his soul cannot understand his dying words. Mr. Seaver was in the habit of seeing him almost daily, and each visit was now apparently to be the last. One day, as the end was very near and the two friends were parting, the dying said to the living, "Come to the funeral, the music will be splendid." And so it was ; and on each return of his death-day, January the 4th, the arches of St. Stephen's become anthems, and its walls are vocal with song, in memory of the departed pastor, an accomplished gentleman and genial friend. CHOOSING A MINISTER'S WIFE. A great innovation is proposed, and the beginning of a new Reformation dawns on the world ! Whether the people should choose their own pastors, or not, has been a vexed question in the Church through the ages. In the Papal Church the parish takes the pastor sent. In the Church of England the pastorate is a property which the owner bestows on the minister he is pleased to name. Patrons have only very lately ceased to appoint pastors in Scotland. The Methodist Bishop in this country saith to one minister go, and he goeth, and the people accept the gift. When the Pope set up to be infallible, a number of priests and people in Europe were unable to swallow the absurdity, and went off by themselves. They like to be called OLD Catholics, because they hold to the faith as it was before CHOOSING A MINISTER'S WIFE. 17 the modern heresy broke out. They have gradually intro duced changes into their church order, and in the direction of greater liberality and conformity to the teaching of Holy Scripture. " Forbidding to marry" is one of the marks of an apostate Church. Only a Church that had set itself up against the express will of God would command its ministers to trample on the holy ordinance of marriage, and make a virtue of celibacy. This the Church of Rome has done, and by this wicked law it has made itself, as the Rev. J. B. Brown of London says, " worse than the world it ought to save." The reformers who are now seeking to build up a new reformation in the heart of Europe have made an onset upon this rule of clerical celibacy. They have had a Synod in which the subject was discussed long and learnedly, and so strong is prejudice, and so bound are they to the traditions of their Church, it was with the greatest difficulty they could be brought to release themselves from the cruel yoke. And when at last it was carried that priests might marry, it was coupled with a strange provision that we, enjoying the liberty of those whom Christ makes free, are not able easily to un derstand. They resolved in Synod to permit priests to marry, but it was required that " the wife shall be acceptable to the con gregation and to the Bishop, and shall be approved by them." It would be a curious canvass in a country congregation, or a city one either, when the sense of the people was taken on the acceptability of the lady whom the pastor proposes to make his wife. If she were a member of the flock there never would be agreement. If she were not a member how would they ascertain her qualities? A preacher can come on trial, or a committee can go and hear him, see him, weigh and measure him, and report the result to the congregation. But now just suppose a committee of ladies is sent from New Jersey to ascertain the merits of the lady in Vermont whom their pastor wishes to marry. They can talk with her, and ask the neighbors what manner of woman she is, and in spect her school diploma and read some of her old compo sitions, and get her photograph, but after all it is precious 1 8 I REN & US LETTERS. little they will be able to report as to her ability to " keep house" for the minister, or to get up a church fair, or to eke out a poor salary, that is rather diminished than increased as the number of backs to be clothed and mouths to be fed is quadrupled. And then the question comes up if the people or the bishop ought to meddle in the matter. What business of theirs is it? If the pastor and his wife are mutually satis fied, is it the right or duty of anybody else to interfere ? But it is one of the peculiarities of our church life, espe cially in the rural village or district, that the young wife of the pastor is claimed as a part of the church property, to be talked about, criticised, instructed, sat upon, dissected and pulled to pieces, at the sweet will of the congregation. When the pastor has brought to his people a wife whom God has en dowed with gifts to be a wise and useful leader in the work of the church, it will be her joy to use her gifts, and to be much in the service. But she may be better fitted for a " keeper at home ;" to make the house the abode of order and peace and health, and the solace, inspirer and helpmeet for her husband. Thus she may be a greater blessing to the people than one who is always " on the go." Some wives combine the two in one, and some are neither. The Lord did not ordain wives for his disciples. We are told that a bishop must have one wife, not that he must have none, nor two. And we are not instructed as to the qualities of a minister's wife, as we are in regard to his own qualifications. Happy is that people whose pastor is blessed with a pru dent wife, because he is blessed in her. But she is not the people's wife. She is not called by them. They were not al lowed a voice in her selection. She has no salary. But she delights in the ministry of the saints. She is a pattern in her own house, and accord ing to the measure of her strength she goes about doing good. But it is a grand mistake to suppose that she is not the very best wife a pastor can have who makes his house what it should be. Did you ever think of the worry, the wear and tear, of that minister who has to look alter his house and CHOOSING A MINISTER'S WlfiE. 19 parish too ? And of the peace and power oi that preacher who can give himself wholly to the work of the ministry be cause his wife takes joyfully the burden of domestic life upon her tender hands ? A lawyer, now worth a large property, lost his wife a few days ago. Before she was buried 1 called in sympathy with him, and he began at once to tell me how he began his prac tice with no money and no friend but the poor girl who loved him, and had for thirty years managed all his domestic affairs without his giving them a thought. Business, wealth, friends, children were added, and his wife had been the stew ard while he had attended to the work in the world. Far more than a lawyer does a pastor need a wife like that. I do not believe the congregation, nor a bishop, nor a town meeting, could pick out a wife for anybody. And when we remember that the first and highest of all thingsjx> be thought of in the marriage relation is mutual affection, and without it religion, sense and beauty are not enough, it is ridiculous to talk about the congregation having a voice in the choice of a wife for the pastor. It does not speak very well for the Old Catholics that they are spending their time in such matters as this, when the weightier matters of the gospel are at stake. But they are improving. It was something to agree to get married. Other improvements will follow. Rome was not built in a day, and Rome will not be destroyed in a day. To a minister's wife I wrote, to comfort her, these words : TO A MINISTER'S WIFE. 1 have read your letter with serious attention. You ex press a wish that Paul had written an epistle to Mrs. Tim othy, and as he did not, you ask me to supply his lack of service. Thank you, but I must be excused. I couldn't think of supplementing that distinguished letter writer. But the fact that he did not write to her, nor to the wives of ministers as a class, is very significant. You say that you are expected and required to be the 20 IREN&US LETTERS. bearer of a large part of the burdens of the female work in the church : to superintend ilie societies, to lead the ladies' meetings, to visit the sick, to receive constant applications for directions to the women of the flock, and in general to see to it that the "female department" of your husband's pastoral charge is kept in vigorous repair and running order. I was quite amused (pardon me for being amused by any thing that gave you distress) by your account of the call which Mrs. Alltalk made upon you, and with her remark that your first duty is to the church, and your spare time may be devoted to your children and the house. You ask me if you were right in saying that you " married your husband and not the church," and that " your children, not your neigh bors, were the gift of God to you." Yes, madam, you were right : just right. And if you re plied to her with even more spirit than your meek words imply, I think you served her right. And what you failed to say, I will say for you, thus : The temptation and strong desire of every pastor's wife prompt her to do all she can to help him in his work, to serve the church and please the people. She is, usually, a woman of education, sense, and force, and by her position is readily put at the head of things without giving offence to any one; whereas, if Mrs. Alltalk or Mrs. Fidget is made the leader, half the women in the parish are put out because they were not put in. As the pastor is the best taught man, so his wife is apt to be the best qualified woman to teach, lead, guide and quicken. So, trusts are easily laid upon her, and her temptation is to accept them to the extent of her strength ; yes, and beyond her strength. But her relations to the pastor and to the church, and to Christ its head, are not such as to require any service from her that is incompat ible with fidelity to the nearer and more sacred trust of hus band and household. HOME is the church to which she was called, in which she was ordained and installed, to which she is to minister with her whole heart and soul, and for which she will be called to as strict an account as her husband will be for the service he has rendered in the pulpit. When the CHOOSING A MINISTER'S WIFE. 21 younger class of married women are taught in the Bible, they are told ' to be sober, to love their husbands, to love their children, to be discreet, chaste, keepers at home, good obedient to their own husbands, that the word of God be not blasphemed.' This counsel and these commands are quite as pointedly addressed to the wives of ministers, as to the wives of merchants, farmers or mechanics. And if you ask " How am I to do all this, and what women of the church want me to do," I answer that " duties never come into conflict with each other." If you cannot be a keeper at home and a visitor of the sick in the parish, then your duty is to stay at home ; and to do only so much visiting as your domestic affairs, care of children and the house, will permit. Do not send Mrs. Alltalk or Mrs. Fidget, in your place, to see the sick. They will do more harm than good. But the pastor and the deacons, and the neighbors, will see that the sick are cared for, while you mind the little ones who are dependent upon you for daily care. And as to the sewing circles, and benevolent societies, and Sunday-schools, and all that kind of good works, which every working church abounds in, you should not feel any responsibility which is not shared equally by all the ladies of the congregation. You will feel more. Nothing that I can say will convince you that you are in no sense called or set apart as a pas- toress. But you are not. You are the pastor's wife, not the female pastor. You took no vows upon you to serve the church ; you promised to be faithful to your husband. The Bible does not bid you teach, or to go visiting, or to manage the sewing societies ; but it does bid you to see to your own house, and to be a helpmeet for him who is the servant of the church. Comfort yourself then, madam, with these words. In the circle of which you are the centre, the light and the soul, you will work out the mission unto which you were sent, by Him who said to the disciples, "Go into all the world." Your ministry is to one of those disciples and the little dis ciples that are around your feet. I am glad to know that you value the honor God shows you in putting you into 2 2 IRENSE 75 " LE TTERS. such a ministry. It is the sweet gospel of love, of conjugal and maternal love, recognized of the Saviour when, on the cross, he turned his dying eye upon his own mother and said, " Behold thy son." John was to go with the gospel to the churches : to Patmos in exile : to the death of martyr dom : but the woman was to go to his house. God has made everything beautiful in its time and place. His order is perfect. And when it is allowed to work itself out, the result is perfect : perfect peace, harmony, effi ciency and love. Therefore, be of good cheer. Be faithful in a few things, and the many things will be cared for of Him who careth for us. And when Mrs. Alltalk calls again to sting you with her impertinence, and to make you feel miserable because you cannot be in three places at one time, ask her to read this letter while you are getting the chil dren's supper ready. HIS GRANDFATHER'S BARN. You may have heard, of the " Old White Meeting House." It was in Cambridge, Washington county, N. Y. Every body in that region of country knew it, and the " Corners" on which it stood were famous as the scene of town meet ings, general trainings, and travelling shows. Some fifty years ago the Rev. William Lusk was settled as pastor of that church. He was about 28 years old. His face, that in dicated intellect and force, was marvellous for its classic beauty, and, while he was preaching, it lighted up with a smile and radiance that, to my youthful fancy, was the face of an angel. I am quite sure that no preacher ever ap peared to me more seraphic than William Lusk when, on the wings of holy passion and thought, he soared among the lofty truths of the gospel: His sermons were written out with great care and rhetorical beauty. They were delivered with energy and without mannerism, but with a naturalness that was unusual in the pulpit of that day. The people were HIS GRANDFATHERS BARN. 23 delighted with him. A great revival of religion was enjoyed. More than one hundred persons were received into the church on one communion Sabbath. In a rural congrega tion, or any other, such a large accession was remarkable. He had come to Cambridge from a place in Massachusetts, where, he said, there was no need of his staying, for all the people were converted. It looked as though all the people in Cambridge would be converted also. But the Old White Meeting House was -very old. How old I cannot say. Few, if any, then living saw its timbers laid. It was very shaky now. Inside it had never been painted. The pews were square, so that half the people sat with their backs to the preacher. The windows were loose and rattled, and the bleak winds of winter rushed in at many a chink, and the one stove in the centre aisle roasted those near it, but served only to rarify the air a little, so that the outside winds drove in the more furiously. The winters were very severe in that part of the country. We often had the mercury twenty below zero, and even thirty was not unknown. This antiquated and dilapidated house was a sore trial to the young and eloquent pastor. Much did he meditate upon the ways and means to get a better. Perhaps he took coun sel of Sidney Wells, George W. Jermain, Deacon Crocker, or others. More likely he did not, for he was apt to take his own way, and keep it. But the fire burned within him, and all the more fiercely as the winter became more severe. At last it broke out. It was a terribly cold day. The farmers had come to church in their sleighs, which were housed under the long shed in the rear of the church ; horses were carefully done up in blankets; the women had their foot-stoves filled with hot coals, over which they toasted their toes : the men were wrapped in their overcoats, and were cold. The pastor stood in the pulpit and shivered. He looked down upon the people and then around upon the walls of the house as if he had never seen them before, and after a silence that led the congregation to wonder what was coming, he remarked : "My grandfather has a barn" the people were startled in 24 IRENsEUS LETTERS. their seats at the announcement of a fact so very probable indeed, but apparently very slightly connected with the ser vice now in progress : he paused for them to recover, and began again : " My grandfather has a barn that is altogether better for a place to worship God in than this house." Amazement sat on the faces of the people. Half a century many of them had worshipped the God of their fathers in that venerated house. There they had consecrated their children to His service: there they had been taught the way of life and found it, so that of many it might be said, "this man was born there." To be told now, and in that pulpit, that any man had a barn that was better than that church was nearly enough to drive them mad. Mr. Lusk paused a moment to see the effect of the first shot, and then, with some calmness, he went on to give the obvious reasons why the congregation should build a new house of worship. He had no difficulty in making out a clear case, and his words fell like fire on the heart. It was plain, before he was done, that the knell of the Old White Meeting House was tolling. After service the people talked the matter over, and it was admitted on all hands that the matter must be thought of, if nothing more. The next Sabbath Mr. Lusk took up the subject in a set sermon on the duty of having a fit place for public worship. In the course of few days the congregation were wide awake, some for, and some against the proposal. But the for was the larger party. It became very evident that the opposition came from those whose old associations with the house made it very painful to tear it down, and make all things new. This was a holy sentiment, but it ought not to stand in the way of a movement manifestly made necessary by the decay of the old house, and the demand for a new and better one. If the zeal of the building party abated, it was easily stimu lated by an allusion to a barn belonging to an ancestor of the pastor. The work was begun before the spring was fairly open. Money was subscribed. Materials were given. Bees were held for drawing stone and timber. And so it CALLING BAD NAMES. 2$ came to pass that, by one and another means, and without going to New York or even to Albany for help, the new house was built, very comfortable, neat and appropriate. I had the pleasure of preaching in it within the first year of my ministry. Mr. Lusk, with genius, power, industry and success in the ministry, was never so prominent in the Church and the country as many men are with less than half his ability and learning. This was the result of eccentricities that were per sonally pleasing to his intimate friends, making him an en tertaining companion, but detracting somewhat from his public influence. Probably these traits did not appear in his later life as they did when his reputation was forming. But there is no wrong, and there may be usefulness, in men tioning the fact now, as a hint to young preachers. Mr. Lusk was a pure, good man, of splendid natural gifts im proved by careful study. And many souls brought by him to the knowledge of the truth are his crown of rejoicing now. CALLING BAD NAMES. Some time ago a religious newspaper No. i, in the midst of a controversial article, called another, No. 2, PECKSNIFF. Not long afterwards No. 3 in similar discussion, called No. i PECKSNIFF. A week or two ago, No. 4, under the same cir cumstances, applied the same term to No. 3. It now re mains for No. 2 to call No. 3 PECKSNIFF, and the quartette will be full. It is not likely to be ; for No. 2, " that's me," has too many sins of its own to be casting stones at its neighbors. We have all done the things we ought not to have done. And human nature is so weak, and there is so much human nature in folks, there is no telling how soon we may so far fall from grace as to do the thing that seems the most unseemly. When the word PECKSNIFF was used as a term of re- 26 IREtt&US LETTERS. proach, I took " Martin Chuzzlewit" from a shelf near me, and studied the pen and ink portrait of Mr. Pecksniff, by Dickens. Familiar as I had been with the general features of his face and character, he revealed fresh and startling points as viewed with eyesight sharpened by the fraternal assurance that he was reproduced in my immediate vicinity. Mr. Dickens had drawn this character with masterly skill to illustrate and emphasize the Hypocrite and Humbug. Neither of these words alone expresses the condensed char acter of Mr. Pecksniff. The evil, the devil that our Lord said Judas was, is in a HYPOCRITE; the HUMBUG may want the malice, while he is no less an impostor and deceiver. Both these unlovely and detestable characters rolled into one, wrought out PECKSNIFF. I heard Mr. Vandenhoff read some passages from the story a few days ago, and saw the character more vividly even than I did when listening to similar scenes enacted by the author himself. But in hearing o'r in reading or merely in remembering them, the idea of PECKSNIFF is that of such a consummate scoundrel, that one has hardly patience to believe that the world tolerates such fellows in society.; and no one will be lieve, until he sees the evidence around him, that such men do succeed, where solid merit starves. What then must be the estimate in which we hold a man, a Christian, a fellow- citizen, a co-worker, when we hurl at him the epithet, as a title that expresses our whole opinion of him in one word, PECKSNIFF? We are now passing through a political campaign. It is indeed a campaign, itself a term borrowed from the language of war, where and when on the champaign, or the campagna, the missiles of words instead of bullets have been hurled by the combatants. And what words ! It was a fair commen tary on our political warfare which was made by an intelli gent English gentlemen, writing home from this country during a Presidential campaign, "that it was evident the two worst men in the whole land had been put in nomina tion for the highest office in the gift of the people." And what is even more remarkable, we seem to be wholly uncon- CALLING BAD NAMES. 27 scious ourselves that we are thus offending the laws of taste, charity and common morality. One of the newspapers when speaking of its neighbor as PECKSNIFF, had on the same page a lovely essay on the sin and folly of personali ties. And this evening, with my after dinner cup, I read in the paper yet damp from the press, a leading editorial justly censuring calumny and falsehood by which our best men are assailed, and in the next column, parallel with these just words, is another editorial in which " lying" and " bigotry" and "fanaticism" are imputed to religious men who oppose the editor's views. I cite these examples because they are here before me, of present and pressing interest, flagrant and sickening illustra tions of that insensibility to our own vices which attends the keenest sight and scent of faults in others. O that our eyes had been so made as to enable us to see inwardly as well as outwardly ! But in the days of the Great Teacher, men went about the streets, with beams in their own eyes, trying to pick out little specks from the eyes of their neigh bors. Nobody was ever convicted of error of converted from sin by being called a bad name. Many a man has been con firmed in his wrong doing or wrong thinking by the insult he feels when a name of reproach is given him which he repudiates and resents. It is not impossible that wars, in which rivers of blood have been shed and thousands of lives and millions of treasure lost, might have been averted and avoided, by the use of argument in the place of abusive words. It has sometimes occurred to me that we might have preserved the peace and accomplished all that has been gained of good, if we brethren of the North and the South, had heard and obeyed the call of the Lord, " Come now and let us reason together," instead of indulging in reproach, denunciation, vituperation, as the staple of internecine war fare, until the cannon opened its mouth and drowned all talking in its deadly roar. It is not the way to convert a sinner to knock him down first and then reason with him. God struck Saul with light 28 1REN&US LETTERS. so that he fell from his horse. That kind of argument be longs to the Lord "who alone doeth wondrous things." We cannot send light from heaven. We must approach men with the gentleness of persuasion while we know ourselves the terrors of the Lord. Terms of reproach become sometimes names of honor and are gloried in by those who wear them. Christians, so called first at Antioch, are now the leaders of thought and masters of nations. The cross is no longer a badge of shame. Puritan, Methodist, Huguenot, it matters not what, the name is nothing : there is no argument in it. Politicians try the power of bad names and find they amount to noth ing: Christians, alas ! dishonor themselves by the same sin, and gain a loss by it. It is evil and only evil and that con tinually. How ashamed we shall be of this kind of warfare when we are all together in the Father's house, with equal and un merited glory on our brows ! And this reminds me : Some years ago I had a war of words with a man who did not see with me about well, it was of so little importance that I cannot now remember what we quarrelled about. But we waxed warm, hurled at each other the hardest words we could find in the dictionary ; then ceased to be on speaking terms, and met in silence or passed with no sign of recogni tion. I went abroad, and in the Vale of Chamouni was lodging in a hotel at the foot of Mont Blanc, the monarch of mountains, crowned with snow. Having arrived at even ing, and knowing that sunrise was the most favored hour for beholding the greatest glory that mortal eyes may see, I arose before the sun and, throwing my blanket around me, went out the ground was covered with snow to catch the first view of sunlight on the summit. As I stepped from the door on one side of the court, a stranger, similarly robed and on the same errand bent, emerged from an opposite door; we met midway in the yard, and stopped before the glory then to be revealed. He was my foe in the war of words. With a hearty laugh and glad recognition, as if we had been friends from childhood, we shook hands, and stood, CALLING BAD NAMES. 29 alone and at one, before the Majesty of God in the works of his hand. The king of day was rising; now the peak was glistening in his beams, and then along and down the sheeted sides of the monarch fell the robes of sunlight, dazzling in splendor as if the floor of heaven had given away, and the golden beams were coming down to men. We both thought of the Sunrise Hymn of Coleridge in this vale, and one of us said : " Companion of the morning star at dawn, Thyself earth's rosy star, and of the dawn Co-herald ! Wake, oh wake and utter praise." We went into the breakfast room, called for our coffee and rolls, and, breaking bread together, forgot we ever had a fight, and were good enough friends ever after. He has since passed through another valley into the presence of the great white throne of which Mont Blanc, with the sun for its crown, is the faintest emblem, yet the most glorious we shall see till we stand before the other ! And just now I have received a letter that gives me a touch of the pain that calling bad names causes even in a man who has had so many hurled at him that he ought to be used to them. It is not a thorn in the flesh, as St. Paul had, but it comes from St. Paul in Minnesota from a gen tleman of that city, who informs me that he is a jobber in supplies for pump dealers, plumbers, gas and steam fitters, mills and railroads, steam and hot air heating apparatus, reg isters and ventilators, gas fixtures, pumps, hose, iron pipe, lead pipe, sheet lead, bath tubs, sinks, brass and iron fittings, etc., etc. He writes these words : " Reading ' Irenasus Letters,' I should judge him to be as fat and unctu ous as his style fond of the pleasant ways of life and taking unkindly to the martyr's crown, except by pleasant reference in jaunty style in his snug office or at the mansion of a wealthy entertainer." What an amiable man he must be to write like that ! He thinks I am " fat and unctuous ;" there he .is wrong: " fond of the pleasant ways of life ;" there he is right wisdom's ways are pleasantness and all her paths are peace : I like 30 IREN^EUS LETTERS. them : he thinks I would take " unkindly to the martyr's crown." which is quite probable ; we know not what we are till the trial comes. Grace according to our day is the pro mised help. To be played upon by one who deals in " Hot- air heating apparatus, pumps, hose, iron pipe, sheet lead, and brass fittings," may fit me to bear racks and thumb-screws, and chains and gridirons, by which better men than either of us have been helped into heaven. We cannot all be martyrs : but there is no good reason why we should not be gentlemen and Christians. If I had another life to live and two thousand letters to write again, with God's good help I would not hurt the feelings of the humblest of all God's creatures honestly trying to do good. He might be as big as Daniel Lambert, and I would not call him fat and unc tuous : he might be as lean as Calvin Edson, and I would not call him a bag of bones. I would count each day lost on which I had not made some hearts gladder than they were in the morning ; on which I had not plucked up some thorns, or planted some flowers on the path of human life. No man can so live without enjoying life. Dogs will snarl at him. but angels are around him. He may never have riches or fame, but better than both are friends and God. My St. Paul friend is trying to serve his Master in honest trade : if riches in crease, my prayer is that he may never be pained by receiving a letter like his own. NEW ENGLAND HOMES AND GRAVES. MRS. EASTMAN'S FAMOUS RIDE. Nothing touches me more painfully, in the romantic rural region of New England, than to see large and comfort able houses empty and decaying. I have just returned from a drive of ten miles over the country, and have seen several of them. One was a spacious mansion, with a large courtyard filled with great trees and luxuriant shrubbery and vines, NEW ENGLAND HOMES AND GRAVES. 31 showing that in years gone by it had been the abode of wealth, refinement and taste. Now it was windowless and shattered. Rank vegetation choked the walks and gardens. I passed three or four such deserts on this one drive. They are more or less frequent in many parts of New England. Commercial and manufacturing places and the more fertile lands of the West seduce the inhabitants to emigrate. The tendency of things is out of, not into, these rural regions. If the population of the State increases or holds its own, it is in the growth of villages and cities. And as one passes these vacant dwellings which could now be bought, with plenty of land about them, for a trifle he thinks of the home life that has been enjoyed within them, the fireside, the family, the birth of children, their childish glees, the joys and trials of this world of work and care. If the stones in the hearth or the beams of the wall were to speak, what tales they could tell of domestic and social life in these halls now given up to bats and owls ! THE FIRST PASTOR'S GRAVE. We went into the oldest graveyard in the town of Oilman- ton, N. H. It lies on a plateau, from which we have a wide and lovely view ; it was laid out in 1776, when the first inter ment took place. The first church in the town was near it, and one still remains, but no pastor looks after the scattered and diminished flock. A new school-house, with the best modern furniture in it, shows that these people will have the means of education. It was an impressive hour among the graves of this congregation, a far larger one than now lives. The first settlers of the town are here. In the middle of the enclosure, with a brick monument over him, is the grave of the first pastor, the Rev. Isaac Smith : a man of great re nown, whose fame is still a part of the wealth of Gilmanton. He studied with Dr. Bellamy, and was with Dr. Wheelock at Dartmouth College when that President was wont to call the students together by blowing a tin horn. In the habit of preaching carefully written sermons, he finally laid them 32 1REN&US LETTERS. aside and preached extemporaneously " with great power and eloquence." And of him it was said : " Justice, truth, mercy and goodness shone in his character." He was a Princeton (N. J.) College graduate. On the top of the mon ument is a slate slab covered with an appropriate inscription and these lines by way of epitaph : ' ' Life speeds away, From point to point, tho' seeming to stand still ; The cunning fugitive is swift by stealth ; Too subtle is the movement to be seen, Yet soon man's hour is up, and we are gone." He died in 1817, aged 72; and his wife, who sleeps by his side, died at the same age eleven years after his death. A SPIRITUALISTIC GRAVESTONE. Capt. Daniel Gale, a worthy citizen, whose grandfather, Bartholomew Gale, came from England to Boston, died and was buried here in 1801. His wife Patience died also in 1804. They were buried side by side, and a suitable stone was set to mark their graves. This was nearly 80 years ago. There are older gravestones than theirs in this venerable enclosure, and the more ancient the more interesting is a monument in the eyes of all sensible people. But all peo ple are not sensible, and one of the descendants of this Daniel Gale was foolish enough to become a Spiritualist. While enjoying its nonsense, she received a communication from the long dead Daniel that he wanted a new gravestone over his bones. She was obedient unto the revelation. It was not much of a stone that she caused to be put up, but it is large enough to receive the name of the Captain and his wife, and to say when they went "to the Spirit Land." Then the inscription follows : " Love, Wisdom and Progression." I hope that no mischievous dealer in gravestones will take a hint from this to employ a medium to instigate the present generation to have their ancestors' tombs done over. NE W ENGLAND HOMES AND GRA VES, 33 ROMANCE AND REALITY. Real life has tragedies and episodes and secret histories more remarkable than fiction invents. If any spot in the world could be free from all romantic incidents, this secluded region might be quiet, uniform and natural. It is so for the most part, and years may speed their course without any event to make a ripple on the surface of society. But we rode by one lone house to-day which has its story. The owner of it, when a young man, a prosperous, promis ing farmer, was disappointed in love. He took it so much to heart that it went to his head. He became mildly de ranged. Unable to manage his affairs, the farm fell into the hands of relatives, who took care of it and him. He did nothing but walk around and around his house, in one uniform circle. His footsteps made a path which he never left but to go into the house, when he rested from his circu lar course, to resume his walk on the morrow. Years and years revolved with his revolving pilgrimage, and still he travelled on. All the years of his strong life wore away, and old age came with white hair and beard, making his journey more pitiable in the eyes of friends, who, passing by. would be unnoticed by him on his dreary travel. And so he marched on, until the silver cord was loosed and the wheel at the cistern stood still. In this meadow, the history of the town records, the wife of one of the well-known citizens was killed by lightning while raking hay on the Sabbath day. By her death these lines were suggested : " It was upon the holy Sabbath day, When she went forth to rake the new-mown hay ; The forked lightning fell upon her head, And she was quickly numbered with the dead." Here Mr. Drew froze to death. In this house " a child of Capt. Page was chocked with beans going down the windpipe and died in seven hours." A little lake lies at the foot of 34 IRENMUS LETTERS. the old meeting-house hill, and the records state: "1809, May 28. A man, , ran out of the meeting-house, threw himself into the pond, and was drowned." It seems to me justice to the preacher required that the cause of his rushing out should be stated : couldn't he stand the preach ing ; or did the eloquence of the stalwart Isaac Smith, who was then the pastor, stir his conscience so that in remorse he ran from the house of God and plunged into the placid bosom of the convenient pond? I rode along by the side of this peaceful water and came to the house concerning which another sad story is written : " 1819, Oct. 1 6. Polly chocked herself by tying a garter round her neck." And even more minutely is described the melancholy mode of Mrs. Barter's departure in 1826: "She hung herself on the Sabbath, behind the door, in a dark closet." And so recently as in 1844, a man who bore the same name with the second President of the United States " hung himself in his barn, by a cord twisted from new-made hay, of only eight blades." And the venerable Daniel Lan caster, author of the History of Gilmanton, and now resi dent in the city of New York, relates with like minuteness no less than 82 fatal accidents or suicides in this one town before the year 1845. Many doubtless occurred that are not included in this register, which was closed 35 years ago! Such is human life in the most favorable circumstances for health, peace and sweet content. MARY BUTLER EASTMAN'S RIDE. In a desert field near the roadside we saw a hollow, in which was growing a small tree. The turf now covers the ruins of a dwelling, and the site is marked by this hole, which once was the cellar. A friend who was with me said: ''There Mary Butler, Mrs. Eastman, lived, when she took the famous ride." "Tell me the story, please." " It is a tale of the Revolution. At the very opening of NEW ENGLAND HOMES AND GRAVES. 35 the war this town of Gilmanton was wide awake, and had her delegate, Col. Antipas Oilman, in the Convention, and twelve men from this town, volunteers, were in the front at Bunker Hill. Lieutenant Ebenezer Eastman left his young wife and their first-born infant in the house that stood on this spot, and led this little band to battle. Boston is 90 miles away, but it is said that on the i7th of June, 1775, when the battle of Bunker Hill was raging, the sound of the cannon was distinctly heard. There was no way of getting speedy intelligence, but the news soon came that a great battle had been fought and Lieut. Eastman had been slain. The wife was in church attending public worship when the dreadful report was made. But she would not give credit to it till she had it confirmed. Returning home, she saddled a horse, took her only child, an infant, on the saddle in front of her, and rode through the forests, along the bridle-paths, and in some places guided only by trees that had been blazed. Forty miles of her lonely journey were travelled when she reached her father's house at Brent- wood. She had expected to hear the truth, whatever it was, when this first half of her ride was accomplished. But they had heard only that a great battle had been fought. The fate of her husband was still in the dark. Here she spent the night, and in the morning, leaving the child with her friends, she resumed her saddle, and dashed on another 40 or 50 miles to Charlestown and the arms of her gallant hus band, whom she found alive and well, one of the heroes of Bunker Hill. " That was the feat that is celebrated in song and story as Mary Butler's ride. Butler was her maiden name, and was dropped when she married. She is not known by that name in these parts. We will soon come to the graveyard where she was buried. And as we are riding, I will repeat the names of the eleven children that Mary had, ten of them being born after that memorable journey on horseback to find out whether she was a wife or a widow : their names were Abigail, who was on the saddle with her, Ebenezer, Stephen, Samuel, Nehemiah, Sally, Ira Allen, Polly, Shuah, 36 1REN&US LETTERS. Dolly, and William Butler. And now we have come to the graveyard, and the grave is in the northeast corner." I left the carriage. The gate was fastened (in a manner quite common in the country) with a stake slanted up against it from the outside, and wading through the rank weeds and grass to the spot, I found the headstone easily. On it was inscribed only these words : " To the memory of Mary Eastman, wife of the late Lieut. Ebenezer Eastman, obt. Dec. 13, 1832, aet. 78 yrs. Blessed are the dead that die in the Lord." By the side of her grave is that of her husband, who died 38 years before her, and on his headstone is this inscription : "In memory of Ebenezer Eastman, obt. Oct. 27, 1794. JEt. 48 years. He was one of the first settlers in Gilmanton. He commanded in the Battle of Bunker Hill. He died in early life, but died in the triumphs of faith. 'That life is long enough that answers life's great end." TAXING A CHILD'S BRAIN. A case of remarkable memory, of great folly and atrocious cruelty, is brought to my knowledge. There is no doubt that the facts are as you will now read them, and you will be prepared, when you have read them, to believe with me that the party in fault deserves severe censure, and perhaps punishment. But the case ought to be made public as a warning to teachers and parents and children. In a class of one of our Sabbath-schools was a girl of fine promise, bright, studious, serious, and fond of the school and the Bible, which she read with attention. She was in the habit of committing large portions of it to memory, and reciting them with fluency and correctness. This led hef teacher to encourage the child, exciting her pride and ambi tion, as well as fostering the idea that nothing was too hard TAXING A CHILD'S BRAIN. 37 for her to accomplish. A few weeks ago the teacher pro posed to the girl to commit to memory the Proper names in the Bible so as to repeat them at one recitation ! ! ! Anything more absurd, more foolish, and more cruel in the way of a Sabbath-school lesson, it would be hard to invent. No possible benefit could be derived from the knowledge were it obtained. What good would it do for a minister or anybody else to be able to repeat all the names of men, women, cities, countries, rivers and peoples men tioned in the Bible ? If the child had a concordance of the Scriptures, in which all these words are arranged as in a dic tionary, she could work at them more readily than by taking them as they stand in the Bible itself. But it is quite likely that it would aid the memory to use the text of the Bible, and have the association with chapters and verses. I am not informed as to the mode in which she undertook to work out the useless task. But she came to her class as usual, and the pious teacher, taking the Bible in hand, lis tened and watched, while the little martyr stood up bravely to the torture and went through it from beginning to end ! AND SWOONED AWAY. On recovery she was led home to her mother, a pitiable, perhaps ruined child. Now I have no words of indignation adequate to express the censure which this injudicious teacher deserves for in flicting such a task upon a child, or permitting her to under take it, or even allowing her to repeat the result of it. It may be that the teacher will say the child proposed it, or performed it of her own choice without being told to do it. But it is of little moment whether this particular task was self-imposed or not: the girl was made a martyr to her memory, being encouraged in these feats until she taxed her brain to a degree that will probably result in life-long weak ness, if not early death. It would have been quite as wise, Christian and kind, to have put the child in a walking-match, to see if she could walk six days running. The physical strain would soon show for itself the injury done, and the victim would be rescued. The mental strain does not appear in the suffering until the task is accomplished, and then 38 I RE N^, US LETTERS. comes the reaction, revealing the fatal effects of the folly and the sin. In Sabbath-schools, as a general rule, the child's memory is not employed as much as it should be. Instead of, or in connection with, answers to questions in a book, every child ought to repeat at least six verses of Holy Scripture every Sabbath day. This may be easily attained by the admirable habit of learning one verse every day in the week, reviewing and repeating them all on the Sabbath morning, and then going with them to the school, there to be recited to the teachers. These verses thus treasured will be more precious than rubies as long as life lasts. In this way I learned in childhood some of the Psalms that are now like pearls. " Behold how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity," was one of them ; the 23d Psalm, and the I39th, were also learned in the same way, and mark this what portions of Scripture I did not learn then, I have never learned. The study of the Bible since has doubtless made me acquainted more and more with its meaning, its breadth and depth and power : but when I woo repose, or seek communion with the Author, or would soar into regions of divine contemplation, the portions of God's word that were ingrafted before I was twelve years old, re fresh me as did the old oaken bucket that hung in the well, when, a heated and wearied boy, I took its waters on my parched lips. Sweet as, yes, sweeter than the honey-comb are words that have lived in memory half a century, while they who taught me are with David and Mary in the king dom of glory. It would be a blessed reaction and reform if our Sabbath-schools would encourage and require every scholar to commit to memory six verses of the Bible every week. But that does not mitigate the folly of the teacher who puts upon a child the absurd task of learning to repeat by rote the Proper names of the Bible ! It may be that her memory was of that abnormal type which easily retains vast sums and sounds without associating with them thoughts. Persons have been known to repeat whole columns of a news- TAXING A CHILD'S BRAIN. 39 paper after once hearing them read. Cyrus knew the name of each soldier in his mighty army. Shepherds have had a name for each 3~heep in a great flock. Pastors have been able to call each of their many lambs by name. A lady near me repeated every word of the Shorter Catechism on the day she was five years old. I can now repeat the exceptions to the rule under the 3d declension of Latin nouns ending in e of the Ablative case, though I have not seen them since early childhood, and we used to say there were more exceptions than examples. But all these are as nought compared with the silly task of pressing on the brain of a poor child more than 2,000 Proper nouns, that cannot be used when learned, and which no sensible person ever tried to learn. Just take a lit tle slice out of the lesson. There are 28 names in the Bible beginning with the letter O, viz.: Obadiah, Obal, Obed, Obed-Edom, Obil, Ocran, Oded, Og, Ohel, Olympas, Omar, Omega, Omri, On, Onan, Onesimus, Onesiphorus, Ophel, Ophir, Ophrah, Oreb, Orion, Oman, Orpah, Othni, Othniel, Ozem, Ozias. How long would it take you to master that short list ? It is very easy to get the run of words that have some principle of association among them. " Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers : where is the peck of pic kled peppers that Peter Piper picked?" is easier to learn than to say. The i iQth Psalm, in the original, is divided into sec tions, each beginning with the letter at the head of the divis ion, and thus that longest of the Psalms was more easily learned. There are systems of mnemonics, artificial aids of more or less use according to one's taste or needs. The very simple rule is " the strength with which two ideas, words, or things, stick together in the memory, is in the inverse ratio of their phrenotypic distance." You understand that, and all you have to do is to apply it and you will remember almost anything else. Have mercy on the children. Spare their infant brains the labor of holding what is of no value, and may greatly injure them. When I see children on the street taking home their books, maps, &c., after five or six hours in school, I am tempt ed to complain of their teachers and parents to that useful 4 IRENES US LETTERS. institution for the " Prevention of Cruelty to Children." It is very well to invade the circus and theatre and rescue acro bats and ballet dancers : it is very well to stop Italian beggar boys from following monkeys and organ-grinders : but better and humaner would be the charity that should open the eyes of mothers and others to. the sinful folly of overlading the young mind with the lore of books, when what they more need is beef and fresh air. And if the S. P. C. C. will arrest and punish the Sunday- school teacher whose indiscretion inspires this epistle, I will pay the expenses of the prosecution. SUMMER BOARD AND SUMMER BOARDERS. " Advice gratis" is never taken to be worth anything. As the fruit of long experience may be of some practical use to a numerous class of people, viz., boarders and those who take boarders in the country, I offer this letter under the trees to my fellow-sufferers and friends. ADVICE TO THOSE WHO TAKE BOARDERS. First get a gridiron. This is a kitchen utensil made of iron ; as the name indicates. It differs from a griddle in a very important respect : the griddle is a solid flat surface on which meat or any compost may be fried in fat. Everybody in the country knows a griddle. It has been in use from time immemorial, and the soft memories of griddle-cakes linger in the mind of every one who was raised in this or any other land of cakes. A frying-pan is used for the same purpose as a griddle, and for other purposes, the chief of them indicated by the name. It is for frying. But a gridiron is another and a totally different article. Its nature, design and duty are in a line of service distinct and different in all that concerns the comfort, health and life of the boarder who, for the time being, is your guest, and looks to you to be his minister in things pertaining to his daily SUMMER BOARD AND SUMMER BOARDERS- 41 food. Gradually approaching my subject, again I ask, have you a gridiron ? Or, not having one, do you know what it is ? It consists of several narrow separated iron bars usually lying parallel, secured at the ends, so that they will support a slice of meat, or a cleft chicken, over a bed of glowing coals. The process of cooking meat on a gridiron is broiling, in con tradistinction from frying, which is done in a griddle or pan. In the latter case, the flesh is cooked in its own fat, which becomes set or fixed in the meat, baked, jellied, and the food is tough, hard and indigestible. In the broiling process the outside is quickly charred, the juices are retained, and the meat is more tender, better flavored and far more digestible. The same difference exists between baking and roasting. Put a piece of beef or a turkey into a pan and shut it up in a hot oven till it is done, and you call it roasted, but it is not : it is baked. Put it on a spit, in a Dutch oven standing before the fire, or hang it over the coals and let it cook and drip, basting it meanwhile with things appropriate, and the meat will be roasted. The difference between baked and roasted meats is similar to the difference between fried and broiled. And the difference in the taste, though great, is not so great as the difference in the digestibility of the two. The frying-pan is the source of a large part of the dyspepsia that abounds in the country. And so painfully sensible are many people on this subject, they will not eat that which is fried, preferring to fast rather than become the victims of a fit of indigestion which with them is sure to follow the eating of meats that are thus cooked. Therefore, I say unto you, whosoever purpose first to take summer boarders from the city, get unto yourselves a grid iron. I do not deny that the frying-pan has its uses. And the saying " out of the frying-pan into the fire" is so ancient, that it is certain the utensil is of no modern date. But many evils in this world are of long standing, and antiquity is no palliation of their ill-deserts. It does indeed render them more respectable, and much harder of extirpation, but they do not grow better with age; and their respectability does not forbid their criticism. 42 IREN&US LETTERS. There is a moral aspect also in which this gridiron versus frying-pan question is to be viewed. Good digestion is in order to the normal exercise of the moral faculties. Much of that depression of spirit which gets the name of religious melancholy, gloom, loss of hope, actual despair, comes of dyspepsia. A writer on physiology says : " Many persons do not exactly know where their stomach is, and a still larger number are apt to forget that it lies very close underneath the heart." Just so nearly related in morals, as in physics, are the stomach and the heart. This is another and constraining consideration in favor of roasting and broiling, and against baking and frying our meat. Passing from this, but without leaving the table, let me intimate in the gentlest terms that are adequate to the emer gency, that city boarders in the country desire abundance of those things which are supposed to be abundant in the rural districts. Yet to my certain knowledge farmers and others who have attracted summer boarders to their houses, send eggs, poultry, and even milk to market, while their boarders are hungering and thirsting after some of these good things, and find them not. Fruit and vegetables which ought to be furnished in the greatest profusion, are often far more of a rarity in the country than in the city. For this there is no adequate excuse. It is little short of robbery, it is certainly an imposition, to offer board in the country, without making provision for the supply of those staples of the country with out which health and contentment are impossible. This is more emphatically true when children are to be fed. And when they cry for food, it is a shame that they cannot have plenty of that which is convenient for them. Yet many a good matron in the country thinks to please her boarders by pastries and puddings, while she neglects the weightier matters, such -as poultry and peas. And the bed ; O my friend, have pity on the weary bones of your guest, who has been beguiled to your rural resting place. That is not a bed for an honest man that you have made of straw, or shavings, or husks. A good bed may, SUMMER BOARD AND SUMMER BOARDERS. 43 perhaps, have been made out of some such materials ; and I have slept on worse beds, and been happy and thankful. If duty or necessity required, one might sleep on the oaken floor, or on a rock out of doors, and enjoy it. But that does not make it right for you to put me upon a bed worse than my desired gridiron, and charge me a round price for the luxury ! I have been at the seaside, and in the mountains, and in country villages, paying fair prices for summer board, and the beds were so thin, hard, uneven, hillocky, musty, and the pillows so insignificant in size and so contemptible in material, that each night was a torment instead of a re freshment, and " O how welcome was the morning light !" I will not write to you of cleanliness. No rhetoric will open the eyes to dirt. The faculty of seeing it is a gift ; and with all your gettings, if you have not a horror of this great evil you will never acquire it. Therefore, one must put up with your infirmity once and never suffer it again. Yet cleanliness is a grace that crowns the rest with a halo, and without it a palace would be unendurable by a " pure and virtuous soul." Pardon these hints. I will now speak to the boarders. They need speaking to. They are unreasonable, exacting, provoking, ungrateful, impertinent, and take so many airs upon themselves that I must take them down a little. There are many excellent people, who spend a few weeks or months in the country every summer, reasonable, Chris tian, pleasant people, who have regard to the rights and feelings, and even the weaknesses and shortcomings of others. To such good people, of whom the world is hardly worthy, why should I write ? I could not make them any better if I were to try. And my fear is that the other sort of boarders will imagine that they too are perfect ; and so between them both my words will be like water spilled on the floor, that does no good where it is, and cannot be gathered up again. One of the most difficult of all attainments is the art of easily and gracefully adapting one's-self to any circumstances, 44 IREN&US LETTERS. so as to be at home, and agreeable, whether all things go to one's satisfaction or not. To be thoroughly pleased with the arrangements that others make for us, after having for a time abandoned our own, is next to impossible. Hence we put it as the highest proof of being pleased, that we are per fectly at home. Next to being so, is the honest effort to make others feel that you are so. To find everything in a farm-house, or boarding-house, or a hotel, as you left it at home is out of the question. And it often happens that the more show, fuss and cost, the less real comfort is afforded. But if you go to the country with a conviction that be cause you are city bred, you will be " looked up to," and treated with a deference that your rank is entitled to, you will be disappointed. Many city people, especially those who have suddenly acquired wealth, assume the position of superiors, and when they act out their assumptions, they make themselves both ridiculous and unhappy. It is the token of true nobility to make even the lowliest at ease in your presence. And the advent of such a well-bred person into the house of a rural family is soon found to be a pleas ure to the old and the young. While on the other hand, the airs and tones, and fidgets and fretfulness, and sneers and complaints of a parvenu are enough to make a boarding- house wretched to all its inmates. Some people imagine that they will be thought genteel just in proportion to the number of times they ring the bell and call for a servant to wait upon them. They are careful also not to manifest in terest in the family whose services they pay for, and by keep ing a thick wall between them and others they hope to ex hibit that exclusiveness which they have conceived to be the specific mark of high aristocracy. Such people are never comfortable. And happy is that house and that neighbor hood where none of them go to board in the summer. On the very common sense principle that every one is bound to make himself useful wheresoever he lives and moves, what a world of good might be done if each city boarder were a missionary in the country ! Not of religion SUMMER BOARD AND SUMMER BOARDERS. 45 only. That duty needs no preaching from me. Bear in mind that you are not your own, and you do not live for yourselves even when seeking health and pleasure away from home. But there are other duties, not classed under the head of religious, though in one sense all duties are religious the duty of making the best of everything; of enduring what is past curing; of bearing other people's bur dens ; of wearing a kindly face and speaking friendly words ; of being the servant of those who need service, albeit they are ungrateful. There is a way to make the house and grounds cheerful by such a manner as will spread itself like the breeze and sun shine, gladdening all hearts, and giving pain to none. There is also a way to make everybody uncomfortable because you seem to be so : it is a habit of finding fault with everything, or certainly with many things : of often saying, " How much better everything is at home than here :" which may be very- true, and yet it may be very unkind to say it ; and it is gen erally agreed that those people who live the most shabbily at home, find the most fault and put on the greatest airs when they are away. And there are many you, dear friends, are among them who take delight in making the village, or country-side, or the sea-side brighter and better by your presence, identifying yourself, even for a little while, with the church, and every good work that needs a helping hand, and leaving behind you memorials of your usefulness, that will often call up your name among the country people who, for a time, had you as a summer boarder. 4<5 IREN&US LETTERS. A COUNTRY PASTOR'S SERMON. It would have done you good to be with me yesterday. Up here among the hills, and therefore the valleys, we have "the stated means of grace," and very good means they are, better by many degrees than are sometimes enjoyed or endured in the more elevated parts of the Church. The min ister is much more of a man than he looks to be. And he looks to be more and more of a man the oftener you set your eyes on him, especially if you can see him when you can hear him also. Personal appearance ought not to be of much account in the pulpit, but it is. He is of medium height and age. His voice is strong, so is his style. Earnest, and yet gentle, he commands and wins. He has been here ten years, and has a firm hold on the affections and respect of the people. He deserves it. I have no wish to disturb him by publish ing his name abroad, but I will give you a specimen of his preaching. It will be only a skeleton, wanting the muscle, blood and life of his discourse. The text shows that he is a thinking man who finds suggestions of truth where others see only the one beautiful and simple story. It was a line taken from the narrative of the woman at the Well of Samaria : "THOU HAST NOTHING TO DRAW WITH AND THE WELL IS DEEP." The well is the infinite truth of God in his written Word. The deep things of God are not so deep as to be entirely beyond the reach of those who have something to draw with, but for those who thus come without, there is no help : they cannot get a drop of water from the well of salvation, the Word of eternal life. This is the simple explanation of the well-known fact that many who are called the people of God go all their lifetime without obtaining, clear, comforting and satisfactory views of divine truth : they are perplexed with doubts and fears, and even suffer so severely from want of water, that they dry up and become skeptics, unbelievers, and perish in their ignorance and sin. They have nothing to A COUNTRY PASTOR'S SERMON. 47 draw with and the well is deep. They can get nothing out of it to slake the thrist of their immortal souls. The man of science, or the wise philosopher, or the learned rationalist, comes to the well, each with his own instruments for the measurement of its depth and to get the water up to the surface. Each of them makes a trial. The man of science discovers that there is nothing in it, for he can prove that many mistakes have been made by those who have relied upon it for a supply of water. The philosopher says it is far better to seek water at a running stream or a bubbling fountain, than at the bottom of a well. And the rationalist is sure there is no water in it, for he has often tried to get a drink and always found it exceedingly dry. The preacher described, in very neat and appropriate terms, the motions of these wise men in their explorations of the well, going all about it, peering over the edge of it, and look ing down into the abyss, and turning away in disgust because there was no water they could reach. They had nothing to draw with and the well was deep. This is just the difference between those who have and those who have not the means by which the water of life is to be drawn from the well of God's eternal Word. The woman of Samaria (he said) knew not that she was speaking to the Saviour himself : the foun tain of life : the living well, when she told him He had noth ing to draw with. But he opened unto her the gospel and revealed Himself to her, and then to her friends, as the water of which if a man drinks he will never thirst again. And so it is in all the ages of the world. To get the water of life out of the truth of God, it is needful only to come through Jesus Christ, with humble faith in Him who is the way and the truth, and the water which no man of science or wisdom can draw with all his inventions, will spring up in him in stantly unto everlasting life. The untutored peasant, in his cottage with the Bible on his knee, reads, loves and receives. It is refreshment to his soul. Not to the traveller in a dry and thirsty land is a gushing spring more gladdening than is the promise, and the poetry, and the story of God's mighty Word, to the humble and believing child of poverty, or sor- LETTERS. row, who receives it as a child, and trusts his soul with joyful faith in the Divine word. "I remember," said he, "the 'old oaken bucket that hung in the well,' and the gladness with which I pressed my dry lips to its rim and drank the cool water which, in a hot sum mer day, I had drawn from the well. I knew the water was there: the bucket was there: and before I ever drew it I knew it was good. And I come with the same childlike con fidence to the fountain of God's Word : I know it is pure and true and good : and that I may drink of it freely and abun dantly and shall live forever. 1 do not take a microscope and examine each drop to see if there be any impurity in it : nor do I search the town records to ascertain if it be the same well that our fathers drank of : I come to it with faith, and love, and joy ; and its waters are sweet to my taste, and my thirst is slaked, my heart is full, and I bless God for the provision of his holy Word." It is quite impossible for me to give a fair and adequate impression of this able and ingenious discourse. Its obvious object, and he worked it out well, was to show that the spirit of captious criticism, or of doubt and fear, was fatal to the understanding and enjoyment of the truth : that Christ gives the water to them who believe and do His will, and he quoted the familiar texts of Scripture that teach this elementary truth of the gospel, that they who are willing to obey shall know of the doctrine. I looked over the congregation, and observed them care fully as I came with them out of the house at the close of the service, and saw that they were rural and simple folk : not rude, but unfamiliar with what is called the world: and under the wise teachings of this noble preacher and pastor they were being trained intelligently for the true enjoyment of religion and for glory beyond the skies. Happy people! They have something to draw with when they come to the well. Their pure, unclouded faith, that no shade of doubt ever disturbed for an hour, brings to their lips and their hearts the cooling draughts, and they will never thirst with out having the living waters springing up in them unto ever lasting life. AfXS. DOREMUS. 49 MRS. DOREMUS. Soon after my coming to New York, to the work that still is my life-work, Mrs. Doremus called to enlist me in aid of some scheme of benevolence, to which she had put her hand. She had then been more than ten years the leading spirit in missionary enterprise: having been one of those noble women in 1828 who sent out aid to the Greeks by the hand of Jonas King, and in 1834, with Mrs. Divie Bethune, had set on foot a plan to educate women in the East, a scheme that ripened into that mighty ministry of mercy the Woman's Union Missionary Society a tree with many branches, whose leaves are for the healing of the nations. When she came to me thirty-seven years ago it was in the interest of the City and Tract Mission, and afterwards the City Bible Society; and by and by the House and School of Industry, and the Nursery and Child's Hospital, and then that grand establishment, the Woman's Hospital. Dr. Sims, who is the father of that house of mercy, has told me that he made no headway with his project till he went to Mrs. Dore mus, who touched it, and it lived. What men could not do, she did. Even the Legislature of the State obeyed her will, m&gave the charter. All the charities of the city, of every sect and of none, private or public, were objects of her solicitude and prayers. I never knew which one was her peculiar care. She had no hobby, and made no claim that this or that object was the most important. She was the good genius of every good work, and so the blessing of all the good came on her. It was a privilege and a joy to do what she wanted done. Her wishes in the sphere of Christian work were laws which it was a pleasure to obey. For full well did I know her wisdom was equal to her zeal, and it was safe to assist in any plan which had enlisted her intelligent support. Nearly forty years I have seen her at work : have recorded much of it : have gazed on it with wonder, and sometimes with awe ! Not one plan of hers has been the subject of just 50 IREN&US LETTERS. criticism. Never has the manner of her work been open to exception. She never betrayed a weakness, never assumed a prominence that was not becoming a sensible, Christian wife, mother, lady and woman. I have the memoirs of nearly three thousand women, dis tinguished in many ages, for deeds that have made their names illustrious in the annals of time. Among them there is not one, no, not one, whose record is more bright and beautiful in the light of heaven than hers. I have studied these records carefully and dispassionately, and if now the women were standing before me in one shining company, I would say without fear, " Many daughters have done virtu ously, but thou, my friend, excellest them all." Some of them wore crowns and had power that was not hers. Others were endowed with gifts to write, and have filled the world with their fame. Some have gone on foreign missions, and others among the sick and wounded, and have visited prisons and founded orphanages, and made thousands of homes and hearts glad with the music of their lives. I have not forgotten their names or their deeds. I remember the women of Old Testament times, and the Marys of the gospel, and her who bathed her Saviour's feet with her tears : I believe in the sainted women of the Church of Rome, whose works will be in everlasting remembrance, and the martyrs whose blood was the least of their gifts to the cause of their Redeemer: and the noble women of modern times whose pious labors for the poor and the insane have added lustre to the beauty of their sex, and entitled them to the gratitude of mankind. I know their names, and love to read them on the roll to be called when the King shall say, " Come ye blessed of my Father." But of them all there is not one who wrought more for Christ than she whose name is like ointment poured forth among us, and whose virtues shall be cherished as her richest legacy to the Church of God. The fine arts have preserved the form and features of the great and good, who thus live on canvas and in marble. Churches and galleries and parks are made luminous with these memorials. It is a good thing to set up a stone to the MRS. DOREMUS. 51 praise of virtue, that it may, though dead, continue to speak. It is no waste of ointment to pour it on the Master's feet, though it might have been sold for the poor : for it is to be always a memorial of holy love. So it would be well if the women, and the men likewise, would cause to be made a statue in the form and likeness of our friend Mrs. Doremus, of the purest, whitest marble, bending beneath the weight of years and many loads of care, faint yet pursuing, the image of the heavenly shining on her seraphic brow. Such a statue is due to her who fulfilled every trust and mission God ever gave to woman, and, by what she was, taught us what woman ought to be. Such a statue, in the vestibule of the Woman's Hospital, would be a monument to the sex she adorned : for she was a type and example of what woman is when she makes real in her life-work the conception of Him who created her in his own image. The money it would cost would be worthily ex pended, for in all time to come it would testify to the power and the beauty of one who was spent for Christ and his. I have looked with silent admiration on the statues of great men and fair women that make beauteous the palaces of art in the old world : where ancient civilizations and ex tinct mythologies have been preserved in their highest con ceptions of what is had in reverence and love : I have read in story and song of the ideal of genius, 4 ' A creature not too bright and good For human nature's daily food : The reason firm, the temperate will, Endurance, foresight, strength and skill, A perfect woman nobly planned, To warn, to comfort and command ;" but I never found in marble, or canvas, or history, or poetry, one that embodied the idea of useftdness so perfectly as it was presented in the life-work of our sainted friend. It is well to perpetuate the memory of such a woman. But whether we build a monument or carve her form in stone, her record is on high, and in the hearts of thousands and the history of the Church her memory will never die. 52 IREN^US LETTERS. THE BEAR IN BOSTON. On Christmas Day the children of the Sabbath-school being gathered to sing their hymns, receive their gifts, and hear a few speeches, I was called on to say something, and this was what came of it. Since we were last in this place to celebrate our Christmas festival, a bear died in Boston. If it seems strange to you that I mention this fact to-day, and you see no bearing that it has on the subject before us, bear with me a little and you shall see and hear. You have all come here from homes that ought to be happy, where your parents have tried to please you by mak ing Christmas merry, and loading you with good things. They care for you, feed and clothe you, pray for you, and deserve your respect, obedience, and love. But there are many families, yours may be of the number, where the chil dren are disobedient, disrespectful to their parents, and un lovely, and it is of this sin of the young that I am to speak to you, taking for my text THE BEAR THAT DIED IN BOSTON. It was a private bear. His owner was a gentleman who took a fancy to such a pet, and when his favorite died, he determined to bury the bear with respect. Boston is in ad vance of us in many things. We never have yet had a funeral for a bear in this city, but the proprietor of this Boston bear invited the wise men of the town to assemble and assist at the burial of his dead friend. Among the poets, philoso phers, and philanthropists who abound in Boston was Dr. Holmes, a celebrated physician and wit, who was invited, and he replied to the note of invitation that "he was sorry he could not attend : for ever since he read in his youth of the bears of Bethel, who taught the children to respect old age, he had had great respect for bears as moral instructors ; and he thought if one were employed to go about Boston THE BEAR IN BOSTON. 53 and its suburbs for the same purpose, the effect would be salutary upon the youthful population." It is my belief if one bear would be good in Boston to teach the children respect for their parents and older people generally, a dozen bears might be usefully employed in New York and its vicinity in giving lessons to our irreverent youth. You remember the bears of Bethel to which Dr. Holmes referred, the bears whose moral forces produced such lasting impressions upon his early mind. The naughty chil dren in the days of Elisha saw the good prophet going along the way, and they mocked him, made fun of him and of his bald head, when two bears came out of the woods and tore more than forty of them. But our boys are not afraid of bears. I have heard of one boy who made mock of an old gentleman in the streets, and then, jumping behind a bale of goods, put out his head and called aloud, " Now bring on your bears." What a wicked boy ! But it is not alone in such insults to the old that young America shows his disrespect. There are thousands of boys and girls in this city who call their father " the old man," and their mother " the old woman :" boys and girls of twelve or fifteen years, who think they are wiser than the parents, and insist upon going when and where they please; who will have the kind of dress, and just such a hat or bonnet, and just such company, and such amusements as they please ; and they will worry or badger their parents till they get what they want. And this disobedience is not confined to the city; it is almost as common in the country, and all the country over : it is the vice of the age, and the parent of many vices. A gentleman riding in the country heard a man calling to his son to come into the house, and as the boy paid no attention to the call, the traveller stopped and asked the lad if he heard his father calling. " Oh ! y-a-a-s," replied the youth, "but I don't mind what he says. Mother don't neither ; and 'twixt us both, we've about got the dog so he don't." All over the land it is the same thing. Children and young people are less mindiul ol their manners towards the old 54 IREN^EUS LETTERS. than they once were. I asked a boy the other day in one of the street cars to rise and give his seat to a lady, and he an swered, " Five cents is jist as good for me as her, let her stand." Manners are not as they once were, at home or on the street. And from disobedience to parents comes disre gard of law and order ; then comes crime and punishment. The fifth commandment is a promise of long life to them that honor their parents : for the child who refuses to obey his father or mother, begins vice early, is likely to go on from bad to worse, and it is not strange if he comes to some bad end. Many a man under the gallows has traced his career of crime back to the time when he refused to submit to his father's will. When I was travelling in the East, I saw near many large towns a pit or valley where the carcases of dead beasts were cast, and there came the birds of prey and feasted upon the carrion. In ancient times, if not now, the bodies of men put to death for crime were thrown out into the same place to be devoured. And then I understood the terrible mean ing of that strange passage in the Book of Proverbs : "The eye that mocketh at his father and despiseth to obey his mother, the ravens of the valley shall pick it out, and the young eagles shall eat it." These birds of prey may not, will not, indeed, come down to tear out the eyes of children in the streets, but the child who begins when young to despise the counsels and com mands of his or her parents, is in the bad broad way that leads to destruction. Now in the morning of life, while home is happy and par ents are dear to you, and Christmas presents are in heaps around you, love, honor, and obey those who are so good to you. So shall it be well with you all the days of your life, and each year shall be happier than the one before. IT'S HIS WA y. 55 IT'S HIS WAY. " It must be right ; I've done it from my youth." Crabbe. My friend was defending the conduct of a man whom I had censured with some severity. " O it's his way. You mustn't be hard on him. He is not to be judged by the same rules that other men are. You know there was always a queer streak in him, and in deed it runs through the family: they are all queer: you must overlook some things in them that would not be put up with in other people." This talk may savor of the charity that covers a multitude of sins, but its does not make the sins any the less, nor the sinner more excusable in the sight of God and all right- thinking people. There is a way that seems right to a man, and perhaps to some of his friends as well-, but it is wrong, nevertheless, and there is a terrible hell at the end of it. When you come to morals, there is no such thing as a code of right and wrong for one man and not for another. There are degrees of light, and capacity, and opportunity, and we must not measure all men by the same standard to determine the amount of blame or praise to which they are entitled. It is required of a man according to what he hath. Unto whom much is given of him much is required. And vice versa. But to every man unto whom the light of divine truth has come, the standard of right and wrong is the same ; and nobody, however great or small, shall escape his re sponsibility for wrong by the plea, " It's my way, and you mustn't mind it." Yet you have often heard this plea set up in defence of public men, and private Christians, whose ways are so out of the common, so repugnant to good morals, that they would be condemned without mercy if their offence had just once come to the knowledge of the world, but they are pardoned and rather petted and liked for their boldness and eccen- 5 6 tRENsEUS LETTERS. tricity, if they put a fair face on it and keep on until people say " It's their way." In reply to my friend's remark, I said: "Suppose, now, that the Rev. Dr. A., or Judge B., or Gen. C. had done the very same things that are not only charged upon your man, but are admitted on all hands to have been done by him, and are justified by him and gloried in, what would you say ? Would you palliate their conduct ? Would you still respect them as honorable, honest, and good men? Or would you turn upon them as wrong-doers, the more worthy of contempt and condemnation because of their position, knowledge, and power ?" He owned up to the force of the argument, and fell back on his first principle. "Yes, yes: that's all true, but all men are not alike, and that's his way: he doesn't mean to do wrong." One of my neighbors was telling me about his minister : said he, " I like his preaching, but his manner of doing it is awful. He has no ease, no grace, no dignity : he makes wry faces, and awkward gestures, and acts all the time as if some thing was hurting him. But then ' it's his way.' " Certainly it is, and a very bad way, too. It hinders and harms his usefulness : takes away from the force of the truth : pains the hearer when he ought to be attracted ; and so the Word, even the Word of God, is made of none effect. He has been taught better, and is yet so young that he might cure himself of these disagreeable habits that have become so characteristic as to be called his. But he himself thinks they are his -ways, and therefore innocent and rather great. Dr. Johnson was a bear among men and women, his manners intolerable and his speech outrageous. It was allowed and even enjoyed, on the ground that it was " his way." But that made it no more decent. And no amount of genius or learning will justify a man among men in failing to be a gentleman. All peculiarities are not to be found fault with. Far from it. Every man has a way of his own, as his face and walk and voice are unlike every other face and walk IT'S HIS WAY. 57 and voice. To be distinguished for virtues is itself a virtue. Dr. Cox was told that Calvin Colton said of him, " If it were not for his Coxisms, Dr. Cox would be a great man." "Yes," said Dr. Cox, "he might have been Calvin Colton." Learning, wit, goodness, every good, may adorn and illus trate a man's life, and the more of such ways a man has the better for the world he lives in, his age, his country, the Church, and the kingdom of God. But it sadly happens for the most part that we speak of "his way" or "my way" as an excuse for something that might be better. Mr. D. comes home from his day's work weary and hungry, and therefore (he thinks it is therefore) cross. He makes himself specially unpleasant to the little family whom he ought to brighten and bless by words of cheer and love. But " his ways" are not ways of pleasantness. And so it comes to pass that his paths are not the paths of peace. For as iron sharpeneth iron, so one cross man in a house crosses all the rest, and he gets as good as he gives. Like begets like. The savor of his presence while the mood is on him spreads a pall on the spirits of the household ; cold ness, petulance, and general discomfort reign. Over the evening meal he thaws and melts and the better nature flows : the children catch the returning tide and begin to play in it : the man is himself again and the house is glad. It is " his way" to be out of sorts when he comes home. And it is a bad way, a mean way, a wicked way, and he ought to repent of it and be reformed. I never heard Mr. E. (a man whose company I am often in) speak well of anybody but himself. His rule is : " If you can't say something ill of a man, say nothing." That's his way. He goes on the principle that if a cause is good, or a man is good, or a woman is all right, there's no need of talking about it, him or her; but if there is a screw loose, or room for improvement, or danger of going wrong, it is best to say so, and so make it better. And on this ground he finds fault with everything. He is a pessimist. The worst side of everybody is before his eye. The spots on the sun 5 8 I REN ^E US LETTERS. fix his attention. No sermon ever satisfied his mind or escaped his criticism. The newspaper he enjoys in exact proportion to the number of mistakes he finds in it. Society is out of joint, in his judgment. Nobody knows how to do anything as it ought to be done. If they would only let him run things for a while, he would show them how to do it. He is disgusted generally, and takes pains to say so. This is his way. And it is just about the most disagreeable way a man can have. He forgets that other people are annoyed by his in cessant grumbling ; that most people love to take cheerful views of things, to look on the bright side, to hope for the best, to find good even in the midst of evil, and to try to im prove what can be mended, and not to fret about what can't be helped. Mr. E. often comes into my office and wants me to "come down on" this man and that society 'and cause ; and he thinks I am timid and time-serving because I will not let him swing his whip over the backs of all the saints and re form them, as he thinks, into necessary righteousness. He is the most unsanctified friend I have, and yet he thinks all the rest wrong and himself about right. I have no fear of offend ing him by saying this, for his self-righteousness renders him all unconscious of his sinful infirmity, and the first time I see him he will thank me "for giving it to those everlasting faultfinders." " Mark the perfect man." Would that we might have a chance. There was one. No guile was ever found in his mouth. He was meek and lowly in heart, and the lion also of his tribe. He loved those who hated him. He gave his life for others. His way was like the going forth of the sun. And all the nations are blessed in him. His friends never had to make an apology for him. His judge could find no fault in him. His ways were not offensive to any good people. And he was lifted up to draw all men unto him. So, my friend, bear in mind when you say, in defence of a habit, " It's my way," or " It's his way," the strong presump tion is it's a bad way. A PASTOR AND FRIEND. 59 A PASTOR AND FRIEND. When the Rev. Dr. Dickinson, first President of Prince ton College, was on his death-bed, the rector of the Episco pal church in the village (they were in Elizabethtown) was also dying. The President was first released, and when the rec tor was told that his friend and neighbor had gone, he ex claimed, " O that I had hold of his skirts." This was the thought of Elisha when the other prophet went up. It was my first desire when I heard that my old friend Dr. Brinsmade, of Newark, had been suddenly translated. Eighty years old : full of years, full of grace, with his arms full of sheaves, rejoicing in the Lord : he was not, for God took him. What a tide of emotion rushed in as I remembered the years of our daily companionship, while he was pastor and I led the Sabbath-school. The friendship was warm, tender and holy ; as free from dross as human friendship can be ; cemented by the common love we had for Christ, His Church, and especially the lambs of His flock. For them we labored hand in hand, and great was our joy and reward. You will be interested in some of the recollections I have of this dear good man. Perhaps you will be profited as well as interested. At any rate, the hour I spend in writing of him will be " privileged beyond the common walks of life, quite in the verge of heaven." For as I sit in my silent study, in the still night, and the fire burns low, and the city itself is asleep around me, I call up the memories of my departed friend, and even now, this minute, it seems as though he might step in as he was wont to every day what time he was in the flesh, and had not yet ascended to his Father and my Father. And that reminds me of one interview in the study : to tell of it will be the shortest way to discover the calm, equable, trustful nature of the man. Facts had come to my knowledge, very painful, and per- 60 tREN^US LETTERS. sonally to him distressing, which he ought to know, and which it became my duty to impart to him. I evaded and avoided the unpleasant task, until a sense of duty overcame : and when he came to my study in the evening, I went at it with protracted circumlocution, and after a tedious introduc tion managed at last to lay the skeleton at his feet. Then I paused, expecting to hear some pious ejaculation like a prayer for help : but, to my relief and surprise, he simply said : " Well, I have long since made up my mind not to expend emotion on what cannot be helped.'' That sentence has been like a proverb with me ever since. It is only a paraphrase of the adage, " What can't be cured, must be endured." But it has a little more philosophy in it, and means " don't fret : there are two things never to be wor ried about : things that can be helped, and things that can't be helped. If you can cure them, do so and don't fret : if you can't cure them, fretting only makes matters worse." This is philosophy, Grace comes in and says: "Your heavenly Father careth for these things : his will is wise and kind : let not your heart be troubled." We never made allusion to the matter again. It was as though the skeleton were buried in the darkness of that night, and its burial-place were not known. Eighty years! Fourscore years of usefulnesss, devotion, holy living and active Christian benevolence. For, like his Master, he went about doing good. His power in the minis try was in pastoral work. It is not probable that any church ever had a pastor more nearly perfect than he. He was a good, not a great preacher, except as goodness is often the greats/ greatness. Warm, earnest, drenched with Scripture, and rich Christian experience, his sermons were poured forth from a heart full of tenderness and love, so that every hearer knew the preacher yearned to do him good. Himself a disciple in the school of suffering, taught by the Man of Sorrows, he was a son of consolation to them who mourned. In every household of his charge he ministered in affliction, and his people, especially the children of his peo ple, died in his arms. Just here I could speak of scenes that A PASTOR AND FRIEND. 6 1 he and I will talk over together, when we and ours are sitting on the banks of the river that flows from the throne of the Lamb ! Hallowed memories ! Tears thirty years ago now flowing again, while his are all wiped away by the hand of Infinite Love ! It is not weakness to weep when these memories come, and little fingers of the long-ago-lost fondly play with our heart-strings in the night watches. Jesus wept. And he wept by the grave of one he loved. I would be like my Lord, and if I may not resemble him in aught else, let them say of me, as they said of Jesus, " Behold, how he loved him." Children would stop in their play to take his hand as he passed along the street. And there is nothing in the descrip tion of the village pastor of Goldsmith more beautiful than was daily revealed in the walk and conversation of this good shep herd. He was able to give money to those who had need of it, for his own habits were exceedingly simple, almost severe, and his income ample. It was freely spent upon the poor in his own flock, and in the ends of the world. The father of many orphans, he was as the Lord is to them whom father and mother had left behind when going home to heaven. So have I seen a peaceful meadow stream winding its way among green fields, and trees planted by the water-course; verdure and flower and fruit revealing its life-giving power. It made no noise. It was often hid from sight by the wealth of overhanging branches : but it was a river of water of life to the valley it blessed. Like unto such a stream is the life of my departed friend. This day the garden of the Lord is glad for him : his whole course of 80 years may be traced by the fruit and flower and joy which rose into being along his path. He did not strive nor cry, his voice was not heard in the streets. Others were more gifted with golden speech, and had wider fame among men. But no minister of our day has been an angel of mercy to more hearts : none is wept by more whom he comforted : none has been welcomed by a goodlier company of saints whom he saved, and of them whose angels do always behold the face of my Father. 62 IRENES US LETTERS. How better to be good than to be great ! How much greater than greatness goodness is ! A DREAM OF THE YEAR. " I saw a vision in my sleep, That gave my spirit strength to sweep Adown the gulf of Time !" T. Campbell. We have more dreams awake than when we sleep. A large part of every one's life is passed amid "the stuff that dreams are made of." At times we hardly know whether we have been asleep or not, a vision of past and future appears and then vanishes away. It was in one of those moods between waking and sleep ing, before rising on the morning of the first day of the year, that this vision passed before me, with all the vividness of the sun, and left its impress so that I can tell you what I saw and heard. I was walking on the bank of a deep, broad, silent river, flowing onward toward the sea. The stream was cov ered with vessels of various names and rig; all going with the current ; making progress, some more, some less, but all getting on. Some of these ships were so near me that I could see the men on board, and with a little care I could dis cover the work that each was set to do, from the master to the cabin boy. There was enough for all, and each vessel kept on its own course, when every man did his own work, faithfully and well. There was some bad steering and slov enly handling the sails, and here and there a captain was tipsy and things were out of sorts, and one ship would run into another or get aground ; and I saw that the neglect of any one to do his duty, made mischief that brought trouble to all on board. Before me in the path stood a man whose white hair and A DREAM OF THE YEAR. 63 wrinkles told me of his great age, and even if he had not carried a scythe over his shoulder, I would easily have known him as Father Time. He said to me in firm and man ly tones : " Whither goest thou ?" "With the current," I replied; "all things seem tending to the sea : some go by water, some by land, and I suppose we are all going the same way." " Turn," he said, " and go back with me, on the path thou hast travelled." We reversed our steps, and he spoke to me of the path of human life : it is often called a journey, a pilgrimage : but it should rather be spoken of as a place, a house, a field, a bat tle, a service ; he said it was wrong to think of life as a sort of space or distance between two goals : a race to be run and then over : a voyage to be made and then the port to be en joyed : and as we walked side by side he discoursed to me of the duties of life, of the works that each man has to do, and neglecting which, he makes a failure. We came, in our walk, upon wrecks of vessels stranded and rotten on the shore : by the side of the pathway, and now and then in the very road itself, were the remnants of broken engines, and the scattered members of beautiful machinery and the bones of human beings lying in the grass by the wayside. Puzzled with the sight of these things, not one of which I had noticed when pursuing my journey alone and with the current of the stream, I looked up with wonder to my patriarchal guide and asked : "What are these wrecks that strew the road ?" "Losx OPPORTUNITIES," were the only words that fell from his lips, but they fell as from out of the sky, so far off and so solemn did they sound in my ear. I was silent, awe struck, and anxious, for a faint suspicion came to my mind that this was in part my work, and these ruins were memorials of my neglect, if nothing worse. And I repeated his words in a tone of respectful inquiry : " Lost opportunities ? Whose and what, tell me, my coun sellor and friend." 64 IREN&US LETTERS. He paused in his walk, and removing from his shoulder the scythe, he rested on it, and began : "We have gone back far enough to learn the lesson of the day. The distance we have walked is in time ONE YEAR. The wrecks and ruins we have passed, and those now in sight, are the resolutions made, the purposes formed, the works begun, the chances enjoyed, the means neglected, the mischief done, deeds left unfinished, friendships lost, Sabbaths spoiled, months run to waste, weeks fruitless, days idled away, hours spent in vain : each one of these lost opportuni ties is a wreck and skeleton on the pathway of thy existence. Hadst thou done thy whole duty in this one year over which we have walked, this shattered frame, now helplessly ruined, would have been in beautiful operation, working out a noble mission fof the good of man. Hadst thou stretched out a hand to save this struggling fellow-man, or let him lean on thy shoulder, when he was weak and thou strong for the struggle of life, he would now be by thy side, or if left behind would be praying for thee, as he pressed on toward the mark. You have done well for yourself, but no man liveth to himself, if he live rightly. You may make a long journey and at last rest from your labors, but you will never forget these memorials of lost opportunities that now cry to thee from the ground." I was cut to the heart by these words of reproof, and in my remorse, perhaps inspired by that terrible allusion to the death of Abel, I exclaimed, "AM I MY BROTHER'S KEEPER?" " Certainly thou art," he said, with a calmness that was more severe in contrast with the earnestness of my cry. " The whole world is kin, and thy brother is he unto whom thou canst do a good turn, as both pursue the journey of life. All are parts of one great whole : members of a large family : the strong must bear the burdens of the weak : the tempted are to be shielded : they that are out of the way are to be reclaimed : the sinning, yes, the very wicked, are to be sought and saved." " And shall I have one more year in which to repent me of the past and to do works meet for repentance ?" A DREAM OF THE YEAR. 65 And old Father Time shouldered his scythe, turned him self about, took me by the hand and said, softly, "That is not for thee or me to know. Thy times are in the hands of Him who gave thee life and opportunities. The Present is thine, and of that only art thou sure. Improve the present. With thy might do what thy hand findeth to do. To-mor row never is. Yesterday is gone forever. Now is the accept ed time : behold now is the day of salvation." He was gone, scythe and all : his snow-white beard still shone in my mind, but the vision was past, the sunlight was piercing the crevices of the window-blinds, and the shout of " Happy New Year " announced the advent of another morn. But it was not all a dream. The river flows toward the sea. The vessels, with their freight and the sailors, are borne onward. This pathway is thronged with travellers, brothers and sisters all. The year is to be full of opportunities, golden opportunities, to be useful. In the household lie the best and holiest duties to be done. A cheerful heart, and voice, and countenance, an open hand, a word of blessing when another's heart is weary or in pain, the thousand little tender services, too small to have a name, precious in the eyes of love, are noted in the book that records each cup of cold water a child of Christ receives. By this time the uproar was too great for dozing or medi tation, and changing the robes of night for those of day, we were soon amid the gladdest scenes of the year. Let us hope that it will be ended as happily as it begins. 66 IREN&US LETTERS. DR. SPRING'S PREDICTION. At the funeral of a distinguished citizen of New York, a large number of the clergy were present by special invitation The late Rev. Dr. Spring, pastor of the Brick Church, was one who bore a part in the service. As we were leaving the house to enter the carriages in waiting, he took my arm, for his eyes were dim and his steps uncertain. I assisted him into the carriage, and Dr. De Witt took a seat by his side. Dr. Vermilye entered also, and I was shutting the door when one of them bade me come in. I said, " No, my place is with the younger brethren." This was speedily overruled, and I was seated with these Fathers of the Church. As the procession moved, Dr. Vermilye said to me : " You declined our company because of your youth ; pray, how old art thou ?" I answered : " I am FIFTY-ONE : and you ?" Dr. V. responded, " SIXTY-ONE." We turned to Dr. De Witt and begged to know his age, and he said, " I am SEVENTY-ONE. It was now the patriarch's turn to speak ; we looked our desires to Dr. Spring, and he answered : " If I live until Feb ruary next, I shall be EIGHTY-ONE." Perhaps a more extraordinary coincidence in ages was never ascertained : four men finding themselves in the same carriage, with a decade between the years of their birth : now all of them beyond the half century, and ascending by tens to fourscore. The conversation that ensued was naturally suggested by the discovery we had made, and by the associ ations of advancing years with the occasion that had thrown us together. Dr. Spring, with great preciseness of manner, as though the words were well considered, said to me : " You are now fifty-one years old, and you have the best thirty years of your life before you." " How can that be possible ?" I asked : "at fifty a man be gins to think the best years of his life are past, and the journey onward is only down hill." DR. SPRING'S PREDICTION. 67 "Not at all," replied Dr. Spring: "you will have better health of body and mind : you will do more and better work for God and man in the next thirty years than you have done in the last fifty. I will not live to see it, but mark my words and see if it is not so." The words of the venerable man were to me like those of a prophet. His voice and manner, in the pulpit or out, were as of one sent to speak by authority, and some who sat in his presence sixty years will remember with something like awe his majestic tones and words. He must be more than a com mon man who can stand in one pulpit, in the midst of a great, impulsive, changing commercial city like this, and maintain himself and hold his people more than sixty years ! If a man does not run out in that time, his hearers are very apt to think him exhausted, and to want young blood in the pulpit. Dr. Spring was before his people in thinking of this. And his treatment of the case was so characteristic of human nature that the fact, as I can mention it, will be a hint to pas tors and to congregations. In the year 1849 Dr. Spring came to me in my study, and said : " I want you to help me in finding a colleague in my pulpit and pastoral work. " " A colleague for you" I said with some surprise ; " the need of it is not apparent to me." " That may be," he replied, " but I am now sixty-four years old, and am approaching that time of life when I shall require assistance, and when that time arrives / shall be sure that I do not need it, I wish to secure a colleague in anticipation of that event." This purpose showed the strong, good sense of the man, great foresight, firmness of resolve, and a degree of self- knowledge very rare indeed. We gave ourselves to the task of finding the right man. His people knew nothing of his intention ; and they saw no signs of decay in those splendid powers of body and mind which had so long placed him in the front rank of living preachers. Perhaps they would have resisted his purpose had they known what was going on. 68 IRENES US LETTERS. His trustees voted him an extra sum with which to employ occasional aid at his own discretion, and various preachers were invited to supply his pulpit. No one of them seemed to be the man some perhaps were too great, others too small : the one just right did not appear. And now for the result : five or six years went by, and when the congregation felt that a colleague was desirable, Dr. Spring was in the state of mind that he foresaw in 1849, and was very sure that he did not need one. This is not a condition peculiar to Dr. Spring. Men do not perceive their own mental failures. Often men think they can write as good a sermon or as brilliant an essay, and even a better one, than they ever could, when they are past fruit-bearing. Their friends will not tell them so. They would not believe their friends if they were told. They are more fluent of words, with tongue and pen, than they ever were, and so mistake the number of words for power of thoughts. Dr. Spring's mind did not fail him. He became stone- blind, and the cataract being removed he was restored to sight. The weight of eighty-eight years made " the strong men bow themselves," but his soul was triumphant as it trod the shining way upward to the glory that awaited him. When his limbs could no longer walk the floor, I was with him in his chamber, where he sat upright in his chair, clad in a white flannel robe, with a silk cap on his head : and in all the years of my intercourse I never had so cheery, familiar and entertaining discourse with him. It was discourse indeed, and he delivered the most of it. He told me of his boyish days, his adventures, his loves, his successes, not a word of his trials, and when I had taken leave of him, and was near the door, he called me back to tell me a story of Lyman Beecher and his wife being tipped out of a wagon. As we finally parted, he said : " I wish you would come oftener; do come at least once a week : it will not be long" I never saw him again. What a volume could be made of the "pastors of New York" dead in the last forty years. I saw the sainted Milnor SABBATH AMONG THE HILLS. 69 just after his soul ascended to his Father. He lay in white raiment, on his couch, as on a triumphal car. And the vol ume would be bright with the names of Phillips, Potts and Krebs, Knox and De Witt, Maclay and Somers, McClintock and Durbin, Skinner and Alexander, Bethune, Parker, Asa D. Smith, McElroy, McLeod, McCartee, Janes, Hagenay, Rice, Vinton, Hoge, McLane, Mason, Muhlenberg, and others now on the right hand of God ! SABBATH AMONG THE HILLS. Never do I feel the power and the beauty of God's word and works more than among the hills ! Those familiar pas sages in the Psalms and in the Prophecies come with energy to the mind when the mountains stand around you as they do about the Holy City, and the hills encompass you like the towers and the promises of the Everlasting God. Once a year I make a pilgrimage to the valley where Williams College stands, in Berkshire County, Mass. Of so many in Switzerland, and England, and America have I said, " It is one of the loveliest in the world," that it seems idle to repeat it of another. But if I were to invent a place for a seat of learning, and a school of science and art, a site for a college, I would pile up wooded hills, around green fields, and through the openings among the mountains that shut out the world and support the sky I would have two rivers of living waters, emblems of knowledge and virtue, flowing gently in; uniting within the vale, they should min gle in the midst of a grove ; and then, in one broader and deeper stream, they should flow on through another gateway, with verdant meadows and wild flowers on its banks, into the world to be made gladder and better for its healing and sav ing power. So is this happy valley. It was a beautiful Providence which guided a soldier, who fell in battle with the Indians 7 t IREN&US LETTERS. before the war of our Revolution, to select this spot in the wilderness as the seat of a school, now a College called Wil liams, his own name, and it is quite likely that so long as grass grows and rivers run, and hills stand, and men live and learn, this place will rejoice in the wisdom that ordained his choice, and will call his memory blessed. Here, then, I come once more, on the return of the Col lege Commencement season. A few hours ago I was swelter ing in the heats of the great city. I am sitting in my over coat now, on a piazza, and am very cool, if not comforta ble. The mercury was 90 in the house in town ; it is here about 65, and as it is raining hard, and a tremendous thun der-storm has clarified the atmosphere, the change is so refreshing as to be truly exhilarating. It is a sort of magical transformation that sets one down in such a high valley as this, in the midst of the mountains, so soon and suddenly from the heart of a great city ! And its enjoyments have become so well and widely known, that hundreds who have tastes to appreciate the intellectual festivities, as well as the natural beauties and enjoyments of the region, flock hither at this season, and make a high holiday of it in the early summer. This season we miss some who were wont to be here, but the place is full of guests. EXTRACTS FROM MY DIARY. June 29. Sabbath. Rain. There is no need of saying, "When it rains, let it rain," for when the clouds, with their bosoms full, get in among these hills, they stay, and it keeps on raining with wonderful perseverance. In the forenoon the annual sermon was delivered before the Mills Young Men's Christian Association of the College. The preacher was the Rev. Roswell D. Hitchcock, D.D., Profes sor in the Union Theological Seminary of New York. His text was from the parable of the talents, " He that hath, unto him shall be given," etc. The vein of deep Christian phi losophy running through the discourse imbedded in the mind of young men the great truth of the text that having SABBATH AMONG TH2 HILLS. 71 is using, or the result is losing : that the use of talents increases them, the misuse tends to their destruction, so that the analogies of nature confirm the laws of divine grace. A more practical and important lesson the wisdom of the Great Teacher never taught, for in the womb of it are the embryos of all success in this life and of salvation after. Especially in this muscular-development age, when young men's minds are full of the glory that comes from brawn rather than brain, and from brain rather than heart; when the physical is asserting itself over the intellectual, and both are preferred to the spir itual, it was a capital idea with which Dr. Hitchcock was inspired, to put before these young men in the early period of their education the inseparable connection between the im provement and the enjoyment of the talents God has granted. The peculiar sententiousness, the epigrammatic form of ex pression, the sharp, short and incisive phrase, in which a whole volume of wisdom is concentrated, these are characteristic features of Dr. Hitchcock's way of putting things, and they stick like knives into the memory. The hope would spring up, as he spoke, that under these timely teachings these young men will get impressions that will tell on their entire lives, and bear fruit in ages far beyond the boundaries of time. So influence perpetuates and propagates itself. In lines direct and divergent, mind touches minds, and these others, in many devious courses, till " thoughts that breathe and words that burn" go out into all the earth, unto the ends of the world. In the afternoon President Chadbourne preached the ser mon to the graduating class. He seized upon the pro gramme or curriculum of a finished Christian education as marked out by the Holy Spirit in Peter, who bade those whom he taught to add to their faith virtue, in the old sense of the word, manly courage and excellence, then knowledge, temperance, patience, godliness, brotherly kindness, charity. Each and all of these were illustrated and enforced in such strong and earnest terms as to produce on the mirror of a lucid mind the image of a perfect character : a fully-de veloped, disciplined and furnished man, thoroughly equipped 72 1RENAZUS LETTERS. for the conflict and the service of a human life in an age of active mental and moral forces, when inaction is treason, and to doubt is to be destroyed. Toward evening it is the habit of this College, on the Sab bath preceding Commencement, to meet its friends in the Mission Park, where in 1806, by the shelter of a haystack, five students prayed American missions into being. There a white marble has been set up, with a globe on its summit, and the names of the young men on its face. Around this monument, under the shade of giant trees, and beneath the canopy of the sky, we sing the songs of missionary devotion, listen to rousing words, and pray for a fresh baptism of the spirit of the men who made this spot immortal in the mem ory of the Church. In this out-of-door, under the trees meeting, some years ago, I met the Hon. James A. Garfield for the first time, and heard his voice in the cause of Christian missions. To-day the ground was so wet with recent rain, that we met in the house of God, made with hands, instead of the groves, "his first temple." The venerable ex- Presi dent, Mark Hopkins, presided, and spoke with vigor that showed the fire of Christian love brightens as it nears its consummation in joys supernal : Dr. Hitchcock threw his soul into the communion, and talked with us of the Christ in conscious Christian aggression on a world to be saved : Dr. R. R. Booth, of New York city, a graduate of this Col lege in the class of 1849, stirred all hearts with a fervid appeal that the birthplace of American missions might always be filled and be glorified by the spirit of them whose works had in 72 years made the Gospel to surround the globe. Later in the evening the Alumni spent an hour in the chapel praying together, Professor Perry presiding. And so closed the day : a great day : a day of high intellectual and spiritual power, when minds and hearts of educated, think ing men rose into the loftier ranges of Christian enjoyment, and on the mount of vision said one to another, " It is good to be here." A SERVICE OF SONG. 73 A SERVICE OF SONG. It was in the village of Litchfield, Conn., where and when we met of a Sabbath evening for a service of song. Services of praise or song are frequent, consisting, for the most part, in singing miscellaneous hymns, one after another, with no special relation to each other, or to any spe cific point of doctrine or duty. An hour may thus be passed with delight, but without much profit beyond the enjoyment of the song. Our service contemplated something more. And, having frequently introduced the same thing into the parlor, at thronged watering-places on Sabbath evening, to the great satisfaction of the guests, who enter into it with zest, fervor and spirit, I am quite willing to think the plan has some merit of its own to commend it. The idea is to make the singing of successive hymns answer the higher purpose of praising God, while it illustrates, enforces and tenderly impresses religious truth on the hearts of those who sing and hear. To this end, a portion of Scripture is selected and as many hymns arranged as can be conveniently sung within the time allowed, and these hymns are to be specifically adapted to apply the portion of divine truth. If the congregation has a choir the hymns may be given to it for rehearsal, and in any case it is desirable that no time be lost in " getting ready to sing" after the hymn is announced and read. But the service will be more happily exhibited by giving the programme as we conducted it at Litchfield. The subject and the order may be varied to meet the taste and habits of the people. HYMN. " Come let us join our cheerful songs, With angels round the throne : Ten thousand thousand are their tongues, But all their joys are one." 74 IREN&US LETTERS. PRAYER. Reading the Scriptures: Matt, xi : 25-30. The words on which our minds will dwell this evening are these : " Come unto me all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." REST is the theme. If, on the stillness of this Sabbath evening air, a voice should come down to us from the lips that spake as never man spake, no sweeter words than these could fall upon the ears of listening men. Rest. I will give you REST. Wearied, worn and ready to sink beneath the heat and burdens of the day, we long for rest. It is found in the blessed Gospel which brings immortality to light. First, let us meditate the blessedness of rest on the Christian Sabbath. It comes to us in the midst of the cares, toils and even the pursuit of pleasures, and every heart welcomes its holy, peaceful, refreshing presence. Tired nature's sweet restorer, more than sleep. The whole earth rejoices in its rest. The beasts of burden rest. Is it fancy that the fields and flowers, the sun shine and meadow streams are sweeter and brighter when the Sabbath comes ? Let us sing two or three songs of the Sabbath rest : " Welcome sweet day of rest, That saw the Lord arise ; Welcome to this reviving- breast, And these rejoicing eyes." " Thine earthly Sabbaths, Lord, we love, But there's a nobler rest above." And the words of the Saviour were an invitation to rest in him. Come unto me, and I will give you rest : rest from the weary load of sorrow and of sin : we are all sinners and therefore we are all sufferers. Every heart knoweth its own bitterness, and there is none that has escaped the common lot. Many wear the tokens of sorrow : and many an aching heart hangs out no signal of distress. Unto you who feel sin an evil and bitter thing, and would find peace of con- A SERVICE OF SONG. 75 science, sweet forgiveness, the Saviour says, " Come unto me." Unto you who are bowing down under sorrows that no loving words of human sympathy can assuage, the mes sage of the healer and the comforter conies in these words of divine compassion : " I will give you rest." Come and cast all your care on him : take him as your Saviour from sin : as the rock of your salvation : the consolation and joy of your hearts, while we sing : " Sweet the moments, rich in blessing, Which before the cross I spend, Life and health and peace possessing From the sinner's dying friend. " Here I'll sit forever viewing Mercy's streams in streams of blood ; Precious drops, my soul bedewing, Plead and claim my peace with God." " Just as I am, without one plea But that thy blood was shed for me, And that thou bid'st me come to thee, ^ O Lamb of God, I come 1 ' Just as I am, and waiting not To rid my soul of one dark blot, To thee, whose blood can cleanse each spot, O Lamb of God, I come !" *' Come, ye disconsolate, where'er ye languish, Come ! at God's altar fervently kneel ; Here bring your wounded hearts, here tell your anguish ! Earth has no sorrow that Heaven cannot heal 1 " Joy of the desolate, Light of the straying, Hope, when all others die, fadeless and pure, Here speaks the Comforter, in God's name saying, " Earth has no sorrow that Heaven cannot cure 1" " Jesus, pitying Saviour, hear me ; Draw thou near me ; Turn thee, Lord, in grace to me, For thou knowest all my sorrow ; Night and morrow Doth my cry go up to thee. 76 tltEN&US LETTERS. " Peace I cannot find : oh, take me, Lord, and make me From the yoke of evil free ; Calm this longing never-sleeping, Still my weeping, Grant me hope once more in thee. " Here I bring my will, oh take it ; Thine, Lord, make it ; Calm this troubled heart of mine : In thy strength I too may conquer ; Wait no longer ; Show in me thy grace divine. And then conies REST in Heaven : O blessed rest : the rest that remains : infinite, eternal rest : rest in God. Eye hath not seen, ear hath not heard what waits for them who enter into that rest. The prophets of old : the poets of all time : dying saints : have had visions of that rest, and their songs of praise have helped to lift us heavenward, while wrestling and toiling here below. Let us sing : " Jerusalem, my happy home, Name ever dear to me, When shall my labors have an end In joy and peace and thee." And when we had sung two or three hymns of heaven, of which there are so many so precious that we never weary of them, I read some of the noblest stanzas of old Latin hymns, which have come along down the ages, getting strength, beauty and glory as they came: the faith and hope and blood of successive saints, martyrs and confessors ringing in their notes of triumphant harmony : " For thee, O dear, dear country, Mine eyes their vigils keep ; For very love, beholding Thy happy name, they weep. The mention of thy glory Is unction to the breast, And medicine in sickness, And love, and life, and rest. A SERVICE OF SONG. " O one, O only mansion ! O paradise of joy ! Where tears are ever banished, And smiles have no alloy. " Thou hast no shore, fair ocean ! Thou hast no time, bright day ! Dear fountain of refreshment To pilgrims far away ! Upon the Rock of Ages They raise the holy tower ; Thine is the victor's laurel, And thine the golden dower ! " Jerusalem, the Golden, With milk and honey blest, Beneath thy contemplation Sink heart and voice opprest. I know not, oh, I know not, What social joys are there ! What radiancy of glory, What light beyond compare. " And when I fain would sing them, My spirit fails and faints ; And vainly would it image The assembly of the saints. " They stand, those halls of Syon, Conjubilant with songf And bright with many an angel, And all the martyr-throng ; The Prince is ever in them, The daylight is serene ; The pastures of the blessed Are decked in glorious sheen. " There is the throne of David, And there, from care released, The song of them that triumph, The shout of them that feast ; And they who, with their Leader, Have conquered in the fight, For ever, and for ever, Are clad in robes of white ! LETTERS. " O holy, placid harp-notes Of that eternal hymn ! O sacred, sweet refection, And peace of seraphim 1 " Oh, none can tell thy bulwarks, How gloriously they rise ! Oh, none can tell thy capitals Of beautiful device ! Thy loveliness oppresses All human thought and heart ; And none, O Peace, O Syon, Can sing thee as thou art ! " O fields that know no sorrow I O state that fears no strife ! O princely bowers ! O land of flowers ! O home, and realm of life !" And we closed the service with the appropriate doxology : " Hallelujah to the Lamb who hath purchased our pardon, We'll praise him again when we pass over Jordan." The interest certainly increased every moment, as the ser vice advanced : the people catching its intent, joining with growing emotions in the songs, as they gave expression to the longing desires of every living heart. So many afterwards asked for repetition of the service, it was evident that it was not in vain. Any other theme might be chosen and developed in the same way; as many hymns being sung under each division as the time would permit. An hour and a half will fly away in such a delightful exercise, and many an ardent worshipper will then exclaim : 11 My willing soul would Stay In such a frame as this : And sit and sing herself away To everlasting bliss." CHILDREN AND THE CHURCH. 79 CHILDREN AND THE CHURCH. The Hon. William E. Dodge stirred the Philadelphia Chris tians a few nights ago with some plain but very timely words. He was on the platform in a great meeting gathered to pro mote a General Council of Presbyterians, to be held in the City of Brotherly Love. Mr. Dodge told them that the chil dren of the Church are systematically taught to neglect the Church, and while the clergy and others are laying plans to gather their great men in council from all parts of the world, it would be well to look into a little matter in their own fami lies and at their church doors. Mr. Dodge referred to the practice now almost universal of allowing the children to attend the Sunday-school, and then to be absent from the church. His remarks on this habit, which he condemned most earnestly, were loudly applauded, the people being convicted in their own conscience, as the men of Jerusalem were when Jesus said, " He that is without sin among you let him cast the first stone." I was going to church last Sabbath morning, and as I approached it, a procession, or rather a throng of children, not infants, but boys and girls of ten and twelve years of age, with books and papers in hand, were pouring out of the lec ture and Sunday-school room, and going down street, away from the church ! Had they been suddenly seized with ill ness, so that it was necessary for them to get home and into bed? Had the labors of the school been so severe that the poor things were exhausted, and must find rest and recrea tion without delay ? Mr. Dodge thought the children went home and spent the day in reading Sunday-school books, a large part of which, he said, were not fit to be read on Sunday or any other day. If they do not spend the day at home, it is better than I fear, for in the case of the boys it is often true that the Sabbath is made a play-day, and the Sunday-school is the only hour of confinement to which they submit. But it is not about the way in which the children spend the 86 IREN&US LETTERS. Sabbath that I am now writing. It is the fact that they do not attend church with their parents regularly, sitting in the same pew, and receiving the regular instruction of the sanctuary. The time was when this was the uniform, steady and excellent habit of all Christian families. It is not so now. It ought to be so again. The Sunday-school has led to the change for the worse. It should now lead the way in a reform. Were I the pastor of a church in which this evil prevailed, I would break it up in two ways : first, by so regulating the Sunday-school that it should not hinder but should posi tively help the children to attend the church service : and, secondly, by so enlightening the darkness of the parental mind that the sin and misery of the present habit should appear to the most benighted. I would show them that the church, the ordinances of God's house, the regular worship in the sanctuary, will prove to be more useful in the forma tion of character, and in training for usefulness and heaven, than the Sunday-school can be: that the church is the home for the soul of the child as well as for the parent, and for its power no human substitute has yet been invented : that the habit of church worship should be formed in early child hood, and no means of pleasing or profiting the young are to be compared with it, or put in the place of it : and if but one, the church or the school, can be enjoyed, the church is to be prized and the school abandoned. This is the plain truth, and that is what we want. Then there are two other matters to be attended to : the Sunday-school must not be held at such an hour as to make it tedious or trying for the children to go to church. It is quite likely that the modern contrivances for making Sunday- schools amusing have given them a distaste for the more solemn services of the sanctuary. If so, the amusement is a sin. The school should feed the church. Children ought to be led by one into the other : exposed to the preaching of the Gospel, taught the ways of God's house, and brought up under its influence, with all its hallowed and elevating influences. To make this service attractive to children, it may be that CHILDREN AND THE CHURCH. 8i the preaching of the present day may have to be modified in some pulpits. But to be modified it need not be babyfied. The namby-pamby twaddle talked to children, and called "children's preaching," is just about as palatable to them when they are old enough to go to Sunday-school as pap is to a boy of ten. Nothing is more attractive to a child of Christian parents than the Bible ; itself a wonderful picture and story book, more wonderful than all others together; and he is a great preacher to parents who will hold up these pictures and stories to the entranced attention of the young. Dr. Bevan says that in London he was wont to devote a part of each morning service to the special wants of the chil dren, and so made them feel that they were an important part of the congregation. Mr. Dodge was so thoroughly applauded by his Philadelphia hearers that he was sure they knew the state of things there to be just as bad as it is here in New York. And now I have a letter from a pastor in Bal timore, who tells me how it is in that fair city. He writes : ' ' The difficulty with us and it is a very serious one is that children are not brought to church as formerly, and as they certainly should be. It is a painful sight to see the large proportion of children who, at the close of the morning-Sabbath school, instead of going into church, go home ; and what renders the evil more alarming is that parents not only seem to make no effort to arrest the practice, but approve it ; or, to say the least, apologize. The plea is that to go to Sabbath -school, and then to church, is too much for children; the confinement being so long as to prove neither healthful physically or religiously. Some even go so far as to contend that the Sab bath-school answers all the same as church-going, and is perhaps better adapted for children. 1 ' Now as to the matter of physical endurance, is the present race of chil dren more feeble and effeminate than were their fathers and mothers ? The latter were trained to go to church as punctually as to Sabbath-school ; and none of them were probably the worse, but very much the better for so doing. The plea is only one of the indications of the increasing flabbiness of the piety of our day. " And as to substituting the Sabbath-school for the sanctuary, what will be the effect of this upon the Church of the future ? On Solomon's prin ciple that the training of the child determines the character of the man, what will be the proportion of church-goers in another generation ? The 82 IREMMUS LETTERS. New York Observer of forty or fifty years hence will have to speak even more urgently than in the recent editorial on the ' Falling off of Church- going.' The Great Enemy does his work b'ttle by little, perhaps, but he does it ; and whilst parents, church officers, and possibly pastors, are sleep ing on this subject, the tares are being sown. From different and widely separated portions of our country the writer learns that the evil exists, and is, perhaps, increasing. Is it not time to call a halt ? Take the children to church. L." What more can I say than unto you has been said ? Here is an evil that is sore under the sun : in the Sunday-school and the Church : every teacher has a duty in the matter and every parent and pastor. Their combined action can work a speedy reform. THE SHAKERS OF CANTERBURY. Some seven or eight miles south of the spot where I am now writing, and in full view from the hill-top on which our farm and farm-house repose, is the Shaker village in Canter bury, N. H. We drove over there yesterday. So much romance, sentiment and poetry have been invested in these Shaker communities, that one is hardly prepared for the hard, practical work-a-day communities they are, when he comes to see them. They are related to the Dervishes of Turkey, the Monks of Italy and the Saints of the Desert. One touch of madness makes them all akin: the blunder that to be outside of duty is doing it : that God is pleased with those who shirk his precepts, and set up their own vagaries in place of his will. Freeman, the Pocasset Advent- ist, slew his little daughter under a mistaken idea of duty: the Shakers sacrifice the husband, wife, father and mother, under an error as wild and as fatal as the fanatic of Cape Cod has made. Shaker villages are substantially alike. A few large, barn- like houses, pierced with many windows and a few doors, a meeting-house, shops, and barns for the crops and cattle, all THE SHAKERS OF CANTERBURY. 83 near together, no ornament, no architectural taste, nothing to please or to offend the eye, but rigid lines, perfect cleanli ness and order, these are the principal features of the settle ments. We drove up to a door over which was the sign " Trustees' Office." Our party was large fourteen and we were look ing for something like a hotel, but there was nothing to be found more public than this. We were welcomed at the door by a neatly-attired and prim Sister, who pleasantly invited us in, and gave us seats in the reception-room. Another sister joined her, both of them bright, smiling, cheerful women, and, without waiting to be asked, they gave us ice-water, and also mint water, a pleasant beverage. Their kind attentions, especially to the ladies of the party, were grateful in their simplicity. Presently Elders Blinn and Kames entered and gave us a cordial welcome. Their cheer ful, animated conversation, the interest they showed in the topics of the day, and their readiness to make us acquainted with their mode of life, won upon our regard, and we felt that we were with friends. Elder Blinn invited us to walk through the village, the houses and barns. Most of the company followed him in what proved to be a pleasant and entertaining stroll. The stalls for the cows, which were in the milking-way at that hour, were scrupulously clean. The milk-maids, mostly young, did not take kindly to the exhibition, and rather hid their faces under cover of the cows. The cows knew their own stalls, over each of which was the name of its tenant. The school room was supplied with all modern improvements, but school was out for the day. The shops were models of neatness and convenience ; a place for everything, and everything in its place, being evidently the law of the house. Machinery and factories have cheapened the production of many articles which the Shakers once made, so that their line of business is much restricted. But they do nothing which they do not intend to do well, and their work in the dairy, the garden, the field or the house, is honestly done and commands its price. Elder Kames remained with me while the others surveyed 84 1KZN&US LETTERS. the village, which, being as nearly like other Shaker villages as one pea is like another, was not to me a novelty. Our conversation ran along : /. How many persons have you now in your community? Elder K. About one hundred and fifty. In years past the number has been much larger, as many as three hundred at one time. /. Then your numbers rather diminish than increase. Do you have frequent accessions to your connection ? Elder K. Nearly every month in the year persons come who wish to join. But they are mostly broken-down, dis gusted and discouraged people, who think it a sort of asylum for played-out parties they soon get tired of it and pass on. We receive none as members until they show that they understand our principles and intelligently adopt them. Even our own members are not restrained when they insist upon going. If they have brought property into the com munity, they are paid what is just if they leave, and no one is sent away empty. /. How then are your numbers recruited, as you do not marry, and some must die? Elder K. Children are brought to us by their parents and guardians, and we bring them up in our ways. When they have reached mature years, and are disposed to do so, they join by signing the covenant. The boys are less inclined than girls are to fall in with us. Boys are more restless, ambitious, and disposed to go into the world. Hence we always have a much larger number of women than of men in the community. /. You are a corporation, I suppose, so that you can hold your property and people under law? Elder K. Nay, we are not incorporated : our bond is a voluntary covenant by which the management is confided to trustees, in whose name the property is held and all business is done. We have between three and four thousand acres of land here, and a farm in the State of New York, where we raise wheat and sell it, and we buy our flour here, for this is not a wheat-growing region. We have no trouble from THE SHAKERS OF CANTERBURY. 8$ the want of a legal charter, and it is not the custom of our people to put themselves into such a relation to the State. /. You have a post-office under the General Government, I noticed as I came in ; is that for your own convenience, or the public generally? Elder K. For all who choose to use it. Our rules allow families of parents and children to live near us in a degree of relation with the Society, but they manage their own tem poral concerns : parents are required to be kind and dutiful to each other, to bring up their children in a godly manner, and manage their property wisely, and so long as they con tinue to conform to the religious faith and principles of the Society they can stay, and no longer. Here they can enjoy spiritual privileges and live away from the world, while they preserve their own domestic relations. /. This feature of Shakerism is quite new to me : how do you train the children given to you by their parents ? Elder K. A good common school education is given them, and if any one discovers genius and special aptness to learn, he is provided with the best instruction in higher branches of knowledge. They are all taught in the Holy Scriptures, particularly the life and lessons of Christ and the apostles. At this point in our conversation, Elder Blinn returned with the party of visitors, and in reply to some inquiries which I did not make, he went into an explanation of the religious doctrine of the Shakers. This is as unintelligible as the mysticism of the Buddhists, or the transcendentalism of Emerson. The priestess of Shakerism was a woman, Ann Lee, who was born in England, and coming to this country, had a following of believers who formed a Community near Sche- nectady, N. Y., where she died. The sect discards the mar riage and parental relation, leads a life of isolation from the world, men and women living side by side, in all the gentle relations except the dearest and sweetest, refusing to obey the first command that God gave to his creatures : thus enacting rebellion bylaw as the basis of their Society. What is their idea of the Heavenly Father ? 86 JREN&US LETTERS. They teach that God exists in a twofold nature, male and female, and manifests himself in the creation of the sexes in "his own likeness." Jesus, the Son of God, was the male manifestation of the Fatherhood, and in these latter days Ann Lee was born as the revelation of the Motherhood of God, and so we have in Shakerism a religion that enjoys all the communications of the Dual Deity in whom we live. They find passages of the Bible which they hold to favor this unintelligible statement. They superadd a pure Chris tian system of practical duty in which the moral law is fully enforced and a life of simple godliness is inculcated. So far as the knowledge and belief of their friends and enemies extend, they are true to their principles, upright in their deportment, honest in their dealings with the world, and the breath of scandal or suspicion of vice among themselves has never sullied their good name. This is a noble record. Such a people cannot be very numerous in this world, for very obvious reasons. There are eighteen communities of them in the United States, nine being in New England, three in the State of New York, four in Ohio, and two in Kentucky. As some of these communities are very small, it is not prob able that they number in all more than 2500 members in the whole country. It is not quite a hundred years since Ann Lee died, the mother of Shakers, and another hundred years will not see the race more numerous than it is now. It is more likely to die out than to grow. Elder Blinn put into my hands the printed programme of their next Sunday service, to consist chiefly of singing. The world's people are welcomed, and seats are provided for them. Dancing, or a measured march, is a frequent part of the service, which is conducted with deliberation and without enthusiasm. Quietness and self-control are cardinal beauties of the Shaker system. We left our kind friends with mutual expressions of regard. Grateful to them for their kindness, we drove homeward in the cool of a lovely summer evening, taking Loudon Ridge, Jones' Mill and Shell-Camp Lake in the way. The moon stood over the mountains in glory indescribable, her silvery MINISTERS' PAY IN OLD TIMES. 87 sheen clothing woods and waters, meadows and hillsides. So still, so calm, so pure, perhaps all the more so because we brought such elements with us from Shaker Village ; but as the sound of a steam-engine on rail or river has never yet disturbed the serene repose of this sequestered vale, we could for the moment enjoy the heavens and the earth as if they were summarily comprehended in the town of Oilman- ton. MINISTERS' PAY IN OLD TIMES. Isaac Smith was the first settled minister in Gilmanton, New Hampshire. The town had "hired a preacher " before, and William Parsons had been with the people some ten years, being hired from year to year. But in 1774 they called Mr. Smith after he had been well tested by preaching some months in Jotham Oilman's barn. A town meeting was then held, and it was voted to give Isaac Smith a call to become the settled minister, and to give him ^50, lawful money, for his salary the first year, increasing ^5 yearly until it became _75, which was to remain his full salary annually so long as he continued in the ministry, he reserving three Sabbaths each year to visit his friends. The town also voted to give him ^75 toward hfs settlement if he accepted the call, one third in money, and two thirds in labor and materials toward his house when he builds. But there was one more point to be cleared up before he could see his way to accept the call, and another town meet ing was called, when it was voted that " Mr. Smith's whole salary should be continued to him in sickness, if necessary." This form of expression was derived from his own letter of acceptance, in which he called their attention to the fact that no provision was made for him in case of his sickness, and he said he should expect them to pay him his full salary or " such a part of it as shall be judged a competent 88 IREN^EUS LETTERS. support by disinterested persons." To this they agreed, and he was settled Nov. 30, 1774. Three several and distinct provisions are made here that are worth being noted in these later days on which the end of the world has come. 1. Mr. Smith was manifestly settled for life. His salary was to be continued " so long as he continued in the min istry." They were not bound to pay him unless he continued to be a minister. If he became unsound in the faith, or immoral in life, the same men who put him into the min istry could put him out, and the people would be released from the contract. But so long as he lived in the ministry they were bound to support him. 2. They were to support him whether he could preach or not. If sickness overtook him, or the infirmities of old age came on, they were not to turn him out like a superannuated horse to starve on the common. This contract they carried out, and having labored with them forty-three years, he died among them at the age of 73 ; and they built him a tomb. 3. The people at the outset, and before he was settled, voted in the terms of the call that he might take an annual recess or vacation of three weeks. That is a fact worth looking at a moment. It is not a modern invention this shutting up the church for successive Sabbaths while the minister goes aside awhile for rest. Call it a time to go and visit his friends, or to go fishing, or to the mountains, as long ago as before the Revolution, which is our line of demar cation between ancient and modern, the good people of New England of Gilmanton at least gave and the minister took a vacation. It was good for him and it was good for them. It is no new thing. And there is no evil in it. In the country a house of worship is not closed because the preacher is absent. We used to call it a " deacon's meeting " when an elder or deacon led the service. At such a meeting in my own church, one of the elders took the desk, and, opening the hymn book, said : " Our pastor is absent : let us sing to his praise the 94th psalm." At such services the prayers were offered by the praying men, and a printed sermon MINISTERS' PA Y IN OLD TIMES. 89 was read aloud by some one selected for the purpose. This good practice is still pursued in many places. Our city churches may unite, two or three, in such a service, or they may readily find temporary supplies in the pastor's absence. It is not true that preaching is the only object for which a church is opened, Nor is it the chief purpose. The wor ship of God is the service, and the preaching is part of it, or an aid to it. Our Protestant ancestors swung away from this truth when they preferred to call God's house a " meeting house." That is not a bad name for it, if its meaning is that there they meet God and one another. But if it be used as a rendezvous simply, where people meet to hear a sermon, then the true idea of "divine service " is repudiated. All of which means that the minister is not necessary to public, acceptable and profitable worship. His work is arduous, and it is for his profit and that of the people that he take a vacation, "to visit his friends," or to go into the woods or to the sea-side or across the sea. But the people are not deprived of the privilege nor released from the duty of pub lic worship because the preacher is gone away. He is not a priest. He is a presbyter, an elder, a teacher. He offers no sacrifice as the Jewish priest did, and as the Romanist pre tends to. Once for all our Great High Priest made atone ment. There is no more sacrifice for sin. It is right for ministers to retire for a season : it is wrong for people to neglect public worship because there is to be no preaching. But we must get back to Gilmanton and their pastor, Isaac Smith. He was settled in 1774, and for many years afterwards things went on smoothly. By and by other denominations began to take root and grow, where the Congregational ists had been the "standing order." The people became slack in paying their minister what they had promised, and he took the law on them. They had made the contract when they were in the capacity of a town ; now it had come to pass that they were only one of the churches in the town. They appointed a committee to defend the suit or to settle it with Mr, Smith. They settled with him. Many thought 90 IREN&US LETTERS, he was hard on them, but as he asked only what he had a right to demand, all sensible people approved of his course, and he retained the respect of the community to the end. The large and handsome house in which he lived and died is now the abode of bats and owls. Great shade trees stand in the front yard, and the ancient shrubbery, vines and flowers, untended, grow in luxuriant disorder, outliving the genera tions of men. DR. MURRAY: BISHOP HUGHES. The sad and sudden death of Thomas Chalmers Murray revives the memory of his father, one of the warmest friends of my life. Not many years ago Nicholas Murray, " Kirwan," was the most popular and perhaps the most useful writer in the columns of the New York Observer. I cannot think of him without a smile on my heart, even in sadness on the death of a noble young man, his well-beloved son, whom I knew in his infancy. The first time that Dr. Murray came to my house he had with him a beautiful boy nine years old ; shortly afterward the child sickened and died. I hastened to his home. In the hall he met me, and fell on my neck and wailed in the anguish of a strong man bowed with great grief. Six times the hand of his Heavenly Father put this bitter cup to the loving father's lips. That was sorrow piled on sorrow : clouds returning after the rain : yet was his great soul strong in God. The prevailing feature of his character, by which he was better known than any other, was his overflowing, genial, hearty good-humor. As he made his mark on the times, and commanded wide respect in the world and the Church, it is to the honor of religion that his walk and his conversation compelled all men who met him to know that the highest type of the Christian is reflected in the cheerful, useful man. When he was called to Elizabethtown, one man only did DR. MURRAY: BISHOP HUGHES. 91 not concur in the cordial invitation. After the pastor was settled, and had been preaching some weeks, the dissatisfied parishioner said to him : " Mr. Murray, I hope you understand that I have nothing against you personally, but I do not like your preaching." " Well, I agree with you perfectly," said the pastor ; "I do not think much of it myself." The man was so palpably met by this remark, that he gave in on the spot, and they were the best of friends ever after. Both of his parents were Irish Roman Catholics. Many a time in his childhood he had crept on his knees into a darkened room in his father's house to confess his sins to a priest, and the nonsense, inconsistency and absurdity of the system of religion in which he was instructed appeared to him in his childhood. When he came to this country, and fell under better influences, he became intelligently a con verted man. I was walking with him one day, when he related the experiences of his early life, and the facts that impressed his young mind with the folly of the Roman religion. Our walk ended, and as we put our feet on the doorstep of my house, I said to him : " Write this all out, and let us print it." He had not thought of it, but struck by the suggestion, he encouraged me to believe that he would. This was the origin of the " KIRWAN LETTERS." He addressed them to Bishop Hughes, like himself a native-born Irishman. They were printed weekly in the New York Observer, the first number appearing February 6, 1847. They made a greater excitement than any series of papers in the religious press of our times. They were read by Romanists as well as Protest ants. Meetings were held weekly in this city attended by Romanists, when one of these letters was read and discussed. The truth of all the facts was obvious to all who heard. They knew how it was themselves. They had been there. The wit of the letters was Irish wit, and they relished it as they do potheen at home and whiskey here. Bishop Hughes was bothered immensely. On all hands he was challenged to answer them. Finally he was goaded into the ring. He 9* IRENES US LETTERS. began a series of letters in reply, but in the midst of them he was called to Halifax ! This was handled cleverly by Kir- wan in a second series, in which he pursued the subject and the Bishop with a vigor that was almost ferocious. It was impossible to answer him. If any one was equal to that task Bishop Hughes was. He was head and shoulders above any man of his sect in this country. And he was witty as well as wise. The New England Society invited him to their annual dinner. Many thought it an outrage to ask him. But he paid them off better than their critics could have done, telling them that his sensations on being there were like those of Pat : riding home drunk in his cart he got sound asleep : some wags stopped his horse, and took him away, leaving Pat to his dreams in the cart. Waking in the morn ing and rubbing his eyes, with a dim memory of the night before, he says : " Be I Pat, or be I not ? If I am Pat, I've lost a horse ; if I be not Pat, I have found a cart." The Bishop's audience laughed, of course ; but it was a modified mirth, that came very near the other thing. Bishop Hughes rarely had the worst of it in debate or dinner-table talk. A new New York lawyer rather got him once. It was in those good old virtuous days we hear so much of, when the Common Council frequently gave great dinners at the city's expense, and they were usually given on Blackwell's Island, in the midst of the criminals and paupers who are there lodged and fed. At one of these dinners Bishop Hughes was a guest, and he had spoken of his deep interest in the people there confined. N. B. Blunt, Esq., rose and proposed a toast: " Bishop Hughes, the chief pastor of this Island !" Then, as now, the Bishop's people furnished the " larger half" of the inhabitants; members confirmed in the church in their youth and now doubly confirmed in pauperism and crime. It was so then, is now, and always will be, until the second reformation. Dr. Murray saw the relations of Roman ism to the poverty, vice and misery of the people, and his letters brought these truths so fearfully to the sunlight as to startle the public mind. When the first series of those let- DR. MURRAY: BISHOP HUGHES. 93 ters was finished, I took them to Mr. John F. Trow, who printed them in a little book which could be sold for ten or fifteen cents, and thousands on thousands of them were sold. They had already become famous in other lands. In Ireland they were immediately reprinted with notes, by the late Dr. S. O. Edgar, author of " Edgar's Variations of Popery." They went in Ireland like wild-fire. In districts where Scriptural schools were enjoyed the Roman Catholics read these letters eagerly. And many believed when they read. They were translated into the French and German languages, and then in the East they were rendered by the missionaries into Oriental tongues, until their lines went out into all the earth. It was not denied that Nicholas Murray was the<*uthor. His signature was borrowed from an Irish preacher famous once, and of whom a very entertaining sketch might be made. But there were many little incidents in the letters that revealed the authorship, and the pastor of Elizabeth became suddenly as famous in this country as Goldsmith or the other Smith whose first name was Sidney, were in their time. He was sent for everywhere to preach. He was not an orator, and those who for the first time heard him missed the brilliant sparkles of that keen wit and broad humor which illumined his letters. But I have seen the old Broadway Tabernacle packed and overflowing by eager multitudes thrilled by the lofty, burning and mighty words of truth with which he denounced the great anti-Christian rebellion of Rome. In the height of this sudden popularity he took his seat in the General Assembly at Pittsburgh in 1849. Named for the Moderator's chair, no one was thought of in competition with him, and he was elected by acclamation. I had strong hope that his son, who bore the name of Scotland's greatest preacher, Thomas Chalmers, would per petuate his father's fame and usefulness. Like his father, he was a graduate of Williams College, the one in the year 1826, the other in 1869. Displaying a fine taste and great facility in the acquisition of languages, he became a remarkable linguist, and was filling such a chair in the young but already 94 IRENMUS LETTERS. celebrated Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, when he was called to die in the very spring of his life, and is now laid by the side of his father and mother in the old cemetery of the First church of Elizabeth. While the helm of the Universe is held by Infinite Wisdom, Love and Power, I have not the shade of a doubt that ALL is WELL. But there are many things hard io be understood, and I am glad to believe that what we know not now we shall hereafter. Dr. Sprague came home to find on his table a telegram saying, DR. MURRAY DIED LAST NIGHT. It was like the fall of a thunderbolt. The same bolt fell on me and I was stunned. He was not old when he died with the battle- harness on, but he cried, " My work is done," and fell into the arrps of death. And now his son, in the morning, full of promise and hope, is taken away ! The more who die, the more for them to do who live. Let us put on the whole armor of God : fight the good fight : be ready always to be offered, and so much the more as we see the day approaching. TWO HOURS IN COURT. An errand of mercy led me into the Court of General Ses sions, Judge Cowing on the bench. Mr. Russell, the Assist ant District- Attorney, was so kind as to bring me within the bar, and give me a seat where I could see, hear and apprehend what was going on. The room was filled with a motley crowd ; most of the people were friends of prisoners, witnesses summoned, jurors, or parties interested in the cases to be heard. No trial of great public interest was on hand, and the company was there fore only the daily gathering in this hall of justice. Mr. Rus sell had the calendar of cases in his hand, a long and fearful list, and as he called one after another, the lawyer in behalf of the prisoner came forward, and he and Mr. Russell arranged for its disposal. They were all criminal cases. But one class of lawyers appeared, and only three of them in all the TWO HOURS IN COURT. * 95 twenty or more cases. These were lawyers whose names are familiar in police reports, men employed by criminals, and who have made large wealth, as well as a certain reputation, by their practice in these courts. Yet all the criminals wore badges of poverty. This was something to think of. They could find money to make lawyers rich, but they were very poor themselves. There were no old criminals. It was dread ful to observe the youth of the prisoners, male and female. With only one or two exceptions, they were under twenty years of age. Three young roughs stood up before the Judge, pleaded guilty to a charge of assaulting an officer, and one of them made a little set speech in extenuation of their offence. They were sent to prison for three months, and went off as unaffected as if they had been dismissed from school. Two women were arraigned for stealing; coarse, hardened, vulgar creatures; they confessed their crimes and went up for six months. A tall, angular, ugly-looking woman was put to the bar. " A professional pickpocket," Mr. Russell said to me, as she stood up. One of her friends brought to her a three-year- old child, which she took in her arms, and pleading guilty, began to cry fearfully, if not tearfully. When she was sen tenced to prison the cries were redoubled and the child clung around her neck, resisting the efforts of the officer to take it off. But she was obliged to part with it, I think it was a baby borrowed for the occasion, and she disappeared. So far every one and I have mentioned but a few had confessed, and there was no need of a trial. But the pressure of cases was so great, and such was the variety of circum stances to be looked into, even when the parties pleaded guilty, that I said to Mr. Russell : " I wonder you do not go crazy : how it is possible to carry all these matters in mind, and be ready to speak and act intelligently in each case, passes my comprehension." I admired his patience, humanity, self-control, and judg ment, but had no wish to change places with him. Judge Cowing seemed to be the right man in the right place. Calm, judicial, prompt, blending the kinder feelings 96 IREN&US LETTERS. of the man with the firm purpose of ihe judge, he made care ful inquiries into the circumstances surrounding the criminals who admitted their guilt, and meted out the penalty with intelligent discrimination, having an eye to the welfare of the community and also of the prisoner. Two young men were arraigned for highway robbery : they were about 18 years old; charged with seizing a man in the night, and robbing him of his watch. Their plea was not guilty. A jury was called and sworn in. They were all very respectable men in appearance ; not one of them unsuitable to hear and decide on the evidence in such a case. The com plainant was the first witness, and he testified, in German- English, that he was going home from a wedding party, where he left his wife and his hat, being somewhat excited with liquor ; he was set upon by these two prisoners at the bar, who robbed him of his watch : he seized them both : held one of them, and the other fled, leaving a portion of his coat in his hand. Calling out for help, he was heard by an officer, who came, meeting the escaped robber flying. Him he cap tured and brought along, and coming up, took the other also into custody. The watch was found near the spot where he caught the runaway. This was one side of the story, con firmed by the officer. The two rogues were examined, and swore that they were peacefully walking the street when this half-drunken man, hatless and coatless, stumbled against them, wanted to fight, did get into a fight, during which his watch was pulled off : they left him and he called the police : an officer appeared and took them into custody. This was the other side of the story. Their lawyer made a speech very like those we read in books, where high-sounding words and platitudes are made to take the place of argument and sense. He sought to impress the jury with the fact that this case involved the rights and liberties of two American citizens whose intelligence and virtues were entitled to respect : that there was no evidence against them but the story of a drunken vagabond who did not know at the time whether he was afoot or on horseback : and if on such testimony they were to be sent to State's Prison, then Magna Charta, Fourth of July and TWO HOURS IN COURT. 97 the Constitution, were all in vain. He did not say these words, but that was the drift, and perhaps mine is the better speech. Mr. Russell followed with a brief, lucid, unimpas- sioned recital of the facts as proved : exhibited the coat and the fragment left by the flying assailant : read the law and decisions explaining the grade of the crime, and left the case. The Judge charged the jury with clearness and brevity : they retired, and soon returned with a verdict of guilty. The Judge sentenced them each to the State Prison for ten years. Mrs. Dr. Sayre was walking in the street a few days ago, when a young man, seeing a pocketbook in her hand, snatched it and ran. He was pursued and caught and now was brought to the bar. He pleaded guilty. His crime is one of the highest except that of murder. What would be his fate ? A gentleman, in whose employment he had been four years, came forward and said that the lad had been perfectly trust worthy all that time and was without a fault. For want of work he had dismissed him and others, and now for months he had been without employment. It further appeared that his old mother had depended on his wages, and when these failed they were utterly destitute. She had urged him to pawn the few things they had, but he refused, and daily traversed the streets seeking work in vain. Desperate and reckless, he saw this purse in a lady's hand, snatched it and ran. Dr. Sayre was present and did not wish to urge extreme measures. Mr. Russell was satisfied that it was a case for judicial mercy. The boy might be saved if not sent to prison, but that would finish his ruin. His mother stood up by her boy and, with flowing tears, tried to plead for mercy. No one in court could refrain from weeping. Literally I do not think there was a dry eye. Judge Cowing set before the boy the enormity of his crime, gave him earnest and wholesome counsel, and consigned him to the Elmira Reformatory. " Thank you, Judge," cried the poor mother, as she turned away brokenhearted, but glad to hear that her son was not to go to State Prison. I said to the Judge : " How unjust we often are in speaking of your decisions! had I read in the daily papers the simple 9% IREN&US LETTERS. mention of the fact that you had let off this young robber with a commitment to the reformatory, I would have thought justice was not done. But I see that it was wise as well as merciful, just to society and kind to the criminal." "It is often very hard," he said, "to determine what is for the best, where discretion is left to us, but we do as well as we can." " I have not a doubt of it," I replied ; " and I am glad I am not on the bench." " I wish you would often come here," he said, as I left the court. This was a very instructive and impressive scene. It was a revelation. Sermons could be made out of it. These young men, already hardened in crime: women thieves : children in the midst of vice. And this all about us : the air we breathe is laden with the crimes of our fellow-beings. Is there no balm in Gilead : is there no remedy here ? A DOUGHNATION PARTY. Perhaps you have not heard of such a party. A surprise party, a wedding party, even a dancing party, you may have attended. And it would not be strange that you are familiar with donation or giving visits. When a lady remarked to me a few days ago that she had attended a doughnut-an party, the name was new to me. But she was kind to my dulness, and explained its hidden meaning. There be many kind of nuts in the world. The butternut is so called because of the oil which abounds in it. It was once called the oilnut. The chestrmt is named from the cyst, chest or case in which the nut is enclosed, the burr so called. The walnut is not a w//-nut, but comes from the Anglo- Saxon, ivalh-knuta, walnut, meaning foreign nut, as it is of Persian descent. Then there is the doughnut, which groweth A DOUGHNATION PARTY. 99 not on a tree like unto the fruits aforesaid ; but a woman taking dough prepared as for the oven, and cutting it into shapes that please her, or more frequently making it into the form of a ball, or a round nut, of such size as seemeth good unto her, droppeth it into boiling fat, lard or oil, and when it is sufficiently cooked, she taketh it forth with a skimmer. Various are the qualities of these doughnuts, according to the amount of shortening and sweetening. They are of Dutch origin, as the walnut is Oriental, and the cruller, and oly- koek, are varieties of the New England doughnut, which holds its own against the world. Mr. Irving has embalmed the Dutch preparation, and the immortality he gives to what he puts into his books shows it is not true that " you can't eat your cake and keep it too." Fifty years ago, more or less, rather more than less, the annual giving-visit was a great affair in the country congre gation. The minister's, salary was always of the smallest, and there was a fond delusion among the people that they helped the matter greatly by afflicting the pastor once a year with a spinning-bee or donation party. The term spinning-bee has so long been out of the speech of people, that you do not know what it means. In good old times, when much linen and woollen were wrought on looms at home, and great fac tories were few and far between, every farmer's wife had her spinning-wheel. And as in the days of the Psalmist a man was famous according to his ability to chop trees, so in my youth a woman sought and found renown by the smoothness of the thread she could spin, and the elegance of the fabric that came from her loom. The wisest of men celebrated such a woman when he said : " She seeketh wool and flax, and worketh willingly with her hands. She layeth her hands to the spindle, and her hands hold the distaff. Shemaketh fine linen." And the Roman matron, Lucretia, at work among her maids was more royally employed than the Queen of Sheba arraying herself in all her glory. Therefore, when the annual giving-visit to the poor pastor was made, the women brought of their store of thread or yarn, or of the cloth they had made, while the men brought 160 IRENES US LETTERS. wood and oats, and such articles as were more in their line of production. As the visit included a supper, it was expected that the women would provide the supplies, and foremost among the provisions for the feast were the inevitable and abounding doughnuts. As everybody had them at home, they were no treat to anybody at the party, and it came to pass that, of the bushels of the article furnished, few were consumed on the occasion. Indeed many brought them as their present to the pastor's wife ! Ah ! well do I remember how long those unsavory lumps of dough and grease lay on the table in the dull days that followed the jolly party. We had doughnuts for breakfast ; doughnuts haunted the dinner ; and doughnuts eked out the supper. It was doughnuts to take to school, and doughnuts when we came home hungry, and doughn-uts when we wanted to eat before going to bed. What became of the woollen and linen goods I knew not, but a lively sense of the prevailing presence and power of dough nuts remained many days after the party, and has not wholly disappeared in the lapse of half a century. We took an account of stock the morning after the visit, and estimating the goods at the givers' valuation, the whole thing might be reckoned as worth a hundred dollars. Half that sum in money could have been used by the minister so as to be of more service than all the produce of the visit, including doughnuts. It was, of course, the prevalence of this last named commodity, over and above the rest, that gave the name, Doughnation Visit. By and by, for short, it was written Ztonation. Hence we view the gradual improve ment in spelling according to Prof. March, LL. D., of La Fay- ette College. Doughnation is now Donation, as walhknuta is walnut. The world moves. The season of the year is at hand when people meditate giving visits to the pastor. These may not be as common as they were fifty years ago, but they are far from being out of fashion. They had in old times, and they have now, this one thing specially to commend them they bring the people together socially and make them personally acquainted. Breaking bread together is a great bond of union, and city A DOUGHNATION PARTY. IOI congregations have done a wholesome thing in providing church parlors where all the people may meet on common ground. It is not the eating and drinking that makes the party useful, though that is something, and not to be omitted. It is the meeting face to face and hand to hand of one family in Christ, members one of another because of Him. Such reunions were more common in the primitive church than they are now, and we may well go back to those days for the model of a working church. There was a Christian socialism then prevalent that fused all the members into one body. We have lost the spirit of those times, and have suffered by the loss. In many congregations there are strangers who are likely to remain strangers, for they never speak nor are spoken to in the intercourse of years. Whose fault it is, it may not be easy to say. But it is a fault that ought to be corrected, and church sociables are in the line of reform. I am not disposed to make light of giving-visits, even if their purpose is to aid the pastor. It is easier for people in many parts of the country to give anything they raise than money. It is hard to raise money. When they have paid the promised salary, it is a pleasing duty to increase the min ister's income by bringing to his house of the fruits of their labor. There is beauty in it. It is a heart offering. And its effect, beyond the value of the gifts, is to show the kindly feelings of the people, and so to cement their union to the pastor and his household. But there is no need of giving a man two or three bushels of doughnuts at once. And this is also to say that the lack of judgment in these promiscuous gifts is fearfully amusing Things utterly useless in the household, and that cannot be sold or exchanged, are often poured in, until there is no room to receive them. In a sweet Swiss village where I was sojourning, a wed ding was coming off. I found it was customary for the near friends of the bride to make out a list of things which were likely to be the most acceptable as gifts, and each friend intending to give anything put his or her name down for some one of these things. Sometimes several persons united 102 1REN&US LETTERS. in the purchase of an article more costly than one alone would give. Thus all were sure that their gifts would fit in, and be useful as well as ornamental, helpful and pleasing. HABITS, ESPECIALLY BAD HABITS. " Habits are soon assumed, but when we strive To strip them off, 'tis being flayed alive." Couiper. Rev. Dr. Adams, who has recently assumed the Presidency of the New York Union Theological Seminary, is in the habit and this is a good habit : all his habits are good so far as I know : he is certainly a model and the young ministers will not fail if they become like him Dr. Adams is in the habit of having one of the Senior class at breakfast with him each morning. Afterwards they retire to the Doctor's study, and from that they go to the church next door; the youthful candidate takes the pulpit and the teacher the pew, and the young man preaches a sermon. Dr. Adams hears and notes the points important to be criticised, matter and manner, voice, tones, gestures, attitudes and faces ; sins of omission and commission ; and then and there, alone and freely, points them out, requires him to try again, to correct the fault on the spot, to get out of the bad habit he is getting into, and if one lesson fails, he must come again and never give over, until the practice is broken up utterly, and a better one formed in its place. This is a capital plan, requiring great labor and self-denial on the part of the accomplished President ; and a service which not many teachers would render, day after day, to a single pupil. For one such lesson a student ought to be grateful to the end of his days. How few have sense enough to know the value of such individual instruction ! Because lessons in the family, the school, the college and the seminary are for the most part given to the children and HABITS, ESPECIALLY BAD HABITS. 103 youth in a group or class, the individual peculiarities of each one are apt to escape that attention which is necessary to their correction if they are evil. And this is true not of young ministers only, or young men only, or young women only, but of all the children and youth growing up, and of millions who have grown up with habits now utterly beyond all hope of improvement. It is a question worth a moment's thought, " Is any bad habit corrected after a person is twenty years old ?" If we answer the question in the negative, and I am strongly inclined to take that side the duty of parents and teachers is invested at once with tremendous responsibility, and this is the object of the letter you are reading. It may also be a warning and so an aid to the young, who need all the help they can have to become better and wiser. You meet a man after a separation of a score of years. The same habits mark him now that were his before. The child is so truly the father of the man, that the man of sixty has the ways that made him notable when a boy. He carries his head just as he did, is stooping or straight, quick or slow, talks through his nose or not, pronounces words wrong just as he did when a young man, and repeats himself all the days of his life. I know some of the most polished gentlemen, of the high est culture, who invariably say Africar for Africa, Asiar for Asia, Jamaicar for Jamaica, and in fact they distinctly add the letter r to words ending in a, especially to proper names. They are unconscious of it, would not know it if it were pointed out to them as their habit, and would probably be hurt if it were mentioned to them. And this suggests the two reasons why bad habits are rarely if ever changed by men or women of ripe years, i. After the habit has become confirmed the person loses all consciousness of it, just as the perfection of health is to be unconscious of having a stomach. 2. One's self-esteem is wounded by criticism, and a habit is cherished all the more fondly because assailed. It has been said it is very nearly true that no mortal is willing to be criticized, found fault 104 I RE N^. US LETTERS. with, and this makes criticism an ungracious and ungrateful task. I have ventured in the course of my life, to make the attempt to do unto others as I would have others do unto me, and to point out, in a kind and inoffensive way, the glaring fault of a friend : perhaps a public speaker, or a writer. In no one instance did any good come of it. A preacher has a habit of wrinkling his forehead while he speaks, or of pitching his voice immoderately high, or of mouthing his words, or shrugging his shoulders, of speaking too low or too loud, too fast or too slow; whatever it is, after he has fairly settled to his work in the ministry he goes on, more and more so, the bad habit growing as his strength increases, moderating somewhat as old age weakens him, and he dies, the same habit clinging to him till the end. He was hurt whenever any one alluded to his habit : he said he could not help it, or he did not believe it, or it was his way, and if the people did not like it they could let it alone, and so repulsing friendly criticism, and hugging his fault, as a parent loves the deformed child the most, he sticks to his own, and goes from worse to worst. Peculiarities are not necessarily faults. Something dis tinctive belongs to every earnest man. But faults of man ner are no more to be cherished for the sake of distinction than lameness is to be preferred to sound limbs. The children that play at the fireside and sit at the table with you, are even now growing into habits that will never be broken up. You may treat it lightly and let them become fixed in their ways of doing or not doing things, of leaving the door open when they ought to shut it, of dropping their work or playthings when they ought to put them away into their proper places, of using improper words, of being selfish and proud and vain; peevish, fretful, censorious ; neglecting duties that should be done at once; of disobeying when spoken to once ; of speaking when they ought to be silent ; little habits so little that their mention seems idle ; but let these habits, any or all of them, be unconnected when children are under age, and they will never be changed. Put a grown up man into a mortar and bray him with a pestle, yet will THE EVIL EYE. 105 not his bad habits depart from him. The way the child walks in he walks when he is old. And all this has not so much to do with those habits which may or may not be vices, according to the extent in which they are indulged, for it is not always that an eccentricity is a vice but it refers to those little foxes that spoil the vines ; faults too small to be named, that make up character and a large part of the life that now is. Bear with them in your friend ; they are spots on the sun ; remembering that he sees greater faults in you, perhaps ! And as Cowper furnished me a motto to begin with, let us find a fitting couplet for the close in Dryden : " All habits gather by unseen degrees, As brooks make rivers, rivers run to seas." THE EVIL EYE. A beautiful, life-like portrait of an old friend has awakened the memory of a fact that may point a moral. I refer to the smooth well-rounded face of the late Milton Badger, D.D., that adorns the last number of the Congregattotial Quarterly. When I came to this city, in the year 1840, Dr. Badger and Dr. Charles Hall were secretaries of the American Home Missionary Society. Their office was very near to mine, and I was soon pleasantly acquainted with them. We were in the daily habit of taking dinner together at a restaurant on the corner of Beekman and Nassau street, in the building which is now the Park Hotel. In the summer of that year, conversing with a friend and speaking of pleasant persons with whom I had become associated since coming to the city, I mentioned Dr. Badger as one of them. My friend remarked: " What a pity it is that he is afflicted with such turns!" " I was not aware that he was suffering in any way. To what do you allude?" 106 1REN&US LETTERS. "Perhaps I ought not to have spoken of it," my friend replied ; " but lest you should imagine it to be something worse than it really is, I may as well tell you ; he has occa sional turns of derangement, and is obliged to leave his work and retire for a time to an asylum. They do not last long, but they have been coming on more and more frequently for some years." " This is very sad : I would not have suspected it from any thing I have seen ; but now that you speak of it, I perceive a sadness, a reticence, and almost a melancholy in his expres sion, that may well haunt a mind that is disordered." " Yes ; it takes the form of melancholy without cause, and is temporarily relieved by medical treatment, only to return more painfully than before." From this time onward I began to pay more particular attention to the looks, the acting, manner and words of my poor unfortunate friend Badger. I observed that he and his colleague always came to dinner together, which indicated the importance of his being kept closely watched. He sometimes failed to notice a remark made by another of the company at the table, which led me to think his mind was wandering. He would now and then cast a glance so full of pity and sor row, I was sure that he was himself suffering. His knife and fork began to appear dangerous weapons in his hands, and if he rested a moment in the midst of dinner, he seemed to me meditating an attack upon some other meat than that on his plate. The signs of latent madness cropped out continually, and the danger of being with him appeared to increase, so that I determined to have a consultation with Dr. Hall, in reference to some decided course to be pursued with him. Seeking an opportunity I said to him, when we were by ourselves: " It is very sad this trouble of Dr. Badger's; don't you think something ought to be done about it?" " I do not understand you," said Dr. Hall. " I beg pardon if I have touched upon anything that is secret, but I supposed it was generally known, and it was in the purest sympathy that I referred to it." THE EVIL EYE, 107 Dr. Hall replied, " I do not know what you are speaking of, and you will have to explain yourself." I was still under the impression that he was tryingto divert me from my suspicions, and I said frankly, " I am told that he is subject to fits of derangement, and is often confined for treatment, and then returns to his duties." Dr. Hall exploded with laughter, to my astonishment and relief: and, calling to Dr. Badger, whose room adjoined his own, he said, " Come in here, and tell us what you have been doing." He then repeated to his associate the story I had told him, and they made themselves as merry over it as was becoming two divines. When the explanation was sought, it was found that my informant had confounded Dr. Badger with another person, of whom all the facts were correctly stated, but they were applied to the wrong man ! For a long time afterward the incident was the occasion of pleasantry between us, and besides the amusement it afforded, is the lesson it teaches to be very cautious of awakening unjust suspicions in regard to others. If I had been called on to testify in a court of justice, as to the sanity of Dr. Badger, before I went to his colleague with my suspicions, I should have been compelled to speak of the "look out of his eye," the "incoherent observation," the "absent-mindedness," the "sudden movement," the appa rent "melancholy" which had marked the deportment of one of the most even, placid, well-balanced, judicious and undisturbed men in the world. But the evil eye of suspicion, with which I had regarded him, had discovered signs of incipient insanity, and had perverted the suavity of a Chris tian gentleman into the lurking seeds of mental disease. To injure the usefulness of a good man, to poison the hap piness of a noble woman, it is necessary only to give wings to words of suspicion in regard to character, and the evil deed is done. A faithful pastor has won his way to a well- earned reputation, and a report gets abroad that " he drinks :" that is, " he is intemperate :" for with many people " to drink Io8 IRENsEUS LETTERS. at all is to be intemperate," and the story is confirmed by every instance of special success in the pulpit, and by every failure that he makes. It is quite as well to kill a dog at once as to give it out that he is mad, for then he is sure to be hunted to the death. And when once the suspicion is awakened that a man or a woman is not altogether right, every act, however innocent, is construed into evidence of wrong. Words that are as gentle and good as if they fell from the lips of angels, are perverted by prejudice into wit nesses of evil, and out of their own mouths the innocent are condemned. To speak ill of a neighbor is in almost every case an injury to society, and to speak evil unjustly is to bear false witness, which is one of the most grievous sins. I have heard you say that it is a namby-pamby milk-and- water sort of virtue that requires us to speak only what is good of people, and that faults are as fair a subject of remark as the merits of others. But I do not agree with you in that. The law of love is the best rule of life, and to speak ill of others is to be allowed only when love requires it. Censure is as just at some times as praise at others. Only let it be in love. But if the truth is not to be spoken always, if silence is better than speech when speaking the truth would do evil and no good, how wicked and how dangerous it is to utter a word of untruth, even a breath of suspicion, a trifling hint or insinuation that may soil the fair face of a spotless name, and dim the lustre of a virtuous character. The tongue is a little member, but it is a mighty power. And words once spoken can never, never, never be unsaid. MODEL MINISTER, PROFESSOR, AND MAN. 109 THE MODEL MINISTER, PASTOR, PROFESSOR, AND MAN. REMARKS AT THE INAUGURATION OF THE TABLET IN PRINCETON THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY CHAPEL, TO THE MEMORY OF REV. SAMUEL MILLER, D.D. As I speak of Dr. Samuel Miller, he rises on my memory as when I saw him for the first time. It was in the autumn of 1832: in the 63d year of his life, in the morning of that old age which put on immortality at 81. Coming to the Seminary with a letter of introduction to him, I called and was received in his library, in the midst of which he was standing, clad in a white flannel study gown, and with a black silk cap on his head. The walls, from floor to ceiling, lined with books ; the gently burning wood-fire ; the imple ments of learned toil ; a form of manly grace and beauty ; his paternal smile and pressure of my hand ; all these come back to me fresh and warm, though nearly half a century lies between that scene and this, as we meet to cut his name in marble and pay this honor to his memory. Having given me a kindly welcome and learned my intended course of study, he said : " You will often want books that others have drawn from the library ; you see mine; while you are in the Seminary, consider them yours; take as many as you wish ; come whenever you please and help yourself." He followed this remarkable offer by taking down some works, the names of which I remember distinctly, and I carried them off " rejoicing as one who findeth great spoil." Whoever speaks of Dr. Miller without personal knowledge of him, portrays a man of great dignity, formality, with that reserve which weak men sometimes suppose to be essential to the manners of a gentleman. He was free from those weaknesses. Without affectation, he was simply a refined Christian, with the nicest sense of the proprieties ; the most no IREN^US LETTERS. delicate consideration for others, deep personal humility, and unbounded benevolence. When these virtues are com bined with large learning, extensive intercourse with culti vated men, and a fine person, you have as nearly a perfect model as God often makes. The first time that I read an essay before the class Dr. Miller was in the chair. The juvenile performance was sub mitted to the tender mercies of the students, each of whom was at liberty to make his comments. These were free, and some of them very caustic. My epidermis was then much more tender than it is now. Some kindly criticisms fell from the lips of my distinguished friend, the Rev. Dr. D. X. Junkin. The Church and the world have heard of other men who took me in hand that morning. When they had flayed me alive, cut me up entirely, it remained for Dr. Miller to hold an inquest on the remains. With exceeding gentle ness he said, " Will you be so kind as to remain after the class retires ?" I remained, in sure and certain fear that the excoriation was to be so severe that his tenderness would not suffer him to perform the operation in public. We were alone, and he broke the silence by saying, in his blandest tones, " Will you do me the favor to come and take tea with me to-morrow ; I wish you to become acquainted with my family." I recovered and went. While in the lecture room, I am reminded of one of the happiest illustrations of Dr. Miller's manners, his genial humor, and regard for the feelings of those whom he would correct. We took our seats in the old oratory often in chairs of our own, provided with a leaf on which we could write our notes. One of the class had so 'placed his chair that he sat with his back to Dr. Miller; the impropriety of the position deserved rebuke, but he did not wish to mortify the young man ; and as he was about to commence his lecture Dr. Miller said : " Mr. , I prefer in this lecture to reason a priori, rather than a posteriori" Amid the roars of the class, he wheeled right about face. Dr. Miller's standard of clerical manners was admirably MODEL MINISTER, PROFESSOR, AND MAN. in expressed in one of those memorable Sabbath afternoon conferences, when that subject was up for discussion. He said to us: "I would have the minister, in his manner of life, his dress, his equipage, so conform to the reasonable expectations of society, as to avoid remark either on the ground of parsimony or of extravagance. Thus, if he rides, I would not wish the people to be able to say, ' What a fine horse the parson has ! ' Nor on the other hand, 'What a rat of a thing our minister rides ! ' " Born in the State of Delaware, his father a rural pastor, he had the best home that children have who are to be trained for usefulness and heaven. His collegiate course was completed with honor in Philadelphia. His pastoral life was begun and ended in the city of New York. In the early years of his ministry, with men of might and renown around him, the youthful soldier of the cross bore himself so bravely as to command respectful admiration and honor. Before the time when Doctorates were then wont to fall on the reverend head, he met his fate. It does not take so much to make a doctor in our day as it did in his, the boys become Doctors of Divinity now almost as soon as they leave off their aprons, but he was decorated when so young, that we may easily appreciate an incident which occurred on a journey he made in New England just after he experienced a change from simple Mr. to a more excellent degree. His travelling friend introduced him to a plain-spoken divine as " Dr. Miller of New York," and the man taking him at once to be a physician, asked him about the yellow fever; when his friend informed him that this was a Doctor of Divinity ; upon which he lifted up his hands and exclaimed, with emphasis peculiar to the expression, You DON'T ! His pulpit talents, both as a writer and speaker, were of a high order ; graceful, able and eloquent, bringing only beaten oil into the sanctuary, preaching without notes, with earnest ness, fluency and force, he was heard with profit, and his ministry was eminently useful and successful. His life of 20 years in New York must have been won derfully distinguished, far beyond that of men of his years, 112 IREN^US LETTERS. He was 24 years old when he was ordained pastor of the First Presbyterian church; he was 44 when translated to the Seminary in Princeton, yet, in this first score of his min isterial years, he became the acknowledged champion of Presbyterian Church order ; a voluminous author, some of whose books were republished in England, extorting from one of its reviews the reluctant admission that " Mr. Miller has deserved well of both worlds." He was one of the fathers of Theological Seminary education in the United States. He was one of the consulting and devising minds that gave form to the Andover Seminary. He and Dr. Ashbel Green " may be considered the founders of Princeton Theological Seminary." And in the midst of labors, multifarious and multitudinous, he was called to the Presidency of Dickinson College, Pa., the Presidency of the University of North Car olina, and to the Presidency of Hamilton College, N. Y. He came to the Seminary, the child of his affections, in the second year of its life, and in the early prime of his own. With what devotion, diligence, and ability ; with what learn ing, wisdom, and success, he served the Church and its great Head! His broad, ripe, liberal culture forbade him to be a High Churchman, for he held that to be the tap root of Popery; but he was an intelligent Presbyterian divine, a beautiful type of the best school of ecclesiastical science, a full-orbed example of the thoroughly furnished minister of the Word. Hundreds who sat at his feet have gone out into the rich harvest fields to do work for the Master. Some of them are among the great men of the ages ; others, unknown to fame, have lived and died ; no white shaft rises from the green sod that covers their precious dust ; no tablet tells the genera tions that such men ever lived, but He whose hand upholds the spheres has set them with the stars. Thus, Dr. Miller trained men to be true and faithful, to be proud of their lineage, loyal to their Church, and gallant soldiers of the cross. The prophets, where are they ? We write their names on tablets, their memories are holy in our hearts ; their instruc- THE BABES IN THE WOODS. 113 tions we follow with reverence ; grant God that when we too have finished our course with joy, we may sit down with Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, with Samuel Miller and the Alexanders and Breckinridge and Hodge, the last ascended, and join with them in the humble cry, " Not unto us, not unto us." THE BABES IN THE WOODS. Whene'er I take my walks abroad, how many babes I see, because I leave the dusty road, and seek a shady lea. That lea in New York is the Central Park ; the only meadow which dwellers in the city made with hands can enjoy. It is a great luxury to have it. Even we who cannot afford the luxury of equipage, may take a cane for company, and stroll miles and miles in the smooth walks, by the side of charm ing lakes enlivened with white and also black swans ; under the shadows of great trees ; now and then resting our weary feet by sitting on the rude benches. It is a habit of mine, when it is possible, to fly from the shop to the Park for a nip of fresh air and a bit of exercise. In the hot weather of the present October this retreat has been specially agreeable. Indeed we have not known such an October since the Dutch made this city New Amsterdam. The Park is the useful refuge for nurses and babies. Thou sands of mothers are only too glad to have their children taken from home into the open air or anywhere, and the nurses are quite as well pleased to go as mothers are to have them. But of these thousands of mothers, few, if any of them, know what becomes of their children when once out of sight. Yesterday I turned into the Park at the head of Sixth avenue. There are some charming little retreats not far from the gateway. Shady and cool, by the waterside, they invite the children to play, and the nurses to meet their friends. Another favorite resort is over on the East side U4 tKENMUS LETTERS. near the wild beasts. Here the little people gather numer ously, and are easily amused. The great thing is to get where the children can take care of themselves, so that the young-lady-nurse may not be disturbed with duties while she enjoys the pleasure of an interview with her " cousin," who has happened to be in the Park at the same hour. A little way into the Park, and I encountered an Irish nurse administering discipline to a babe a couple of years old. The child was crying, the nurse was scolding and shak ing her. I stopped in front of the group : "There, now," said the nurse to the child, "the man is going to carry you off ; you naughty girl, you." "No," said I, "that's no such thing; you ought to be carried off yourself and kept off, for frightening the child; you are sent out here to amuse the child, and you are scaring the life out of it with your lies. I wish I had the right to punish you on the spot." By the time I had made this long speech the babe was quieted, and the nurse, finding her tongue, began her retort, which, I have no doubt, was sharp enough, but I did not wait to hear it. At the other end of the lake Bridget and her " cousin" were so closely engaged in conversation that she did not observe the babe wandering off on the green grass ; it was pleasant for the child and quite safe, unless the little crea ture should fall into the water. She would not have drowned, for it was an easy matter to pick a baby out of the quiet lake. Not one has ever yet been drowned under such cir cumstances. As the children joined each other on the grass, hugged and played and tumbled about in their childish glee, it was easy to see how rapidly infectious diseases are spread. Mrs. Jones' child is out of sorts, peevish and languid. Bridget must take it to the Park. The mother does not know that a few days before it was playing on the grass with a number of children, one of whom was in just the condition of her pet to-day ; it was ready to break out with the scarlet fever, or diphtheria, or some other complaint. Half a dozen children from as many different parts of the city are thus THE BABES IN THE WOODS. 115 exposed. To-day Mrs. Jones sends her child into the Park ; it is in the state to give the same disease to all the babes she plays with ; to-morrow she is down sick, everybody wonder ing where she could have caught that dreadful complaint. Wandering along my winding way, and passing a bench of Bridgets, beaux and babies, one of the latter fell head first from its cradle and struck upon the solid concrete walk. It made no scream, and I hoped it was not hurt. But when I had passed a few steps on, the cry came, piercing my ear and heart. The stunned child had " come to," and was now shrieking in pain and fright. Doubtless it was soon hushed, and Bridget pursued her interrupted tete-a-tete with her "cousin." The fond mother at home will never know of the accident that happened to her darling child while the unfaithful nurse was flirting with a man ; but in the course of a year or two the child will become more and more restless, fitful, uncontroll able ; then it will be lethargic ; convulsions will seize and distort it; parents will weep and pray, and plead with doc tors to do something for it ; they will shake their heads and fear there is water on the brain, and if so, there is great reason to fear ; " did the child ever fall on its head ?" no, never ; and then comes one more convulsive struggle ; its little hands are clutched ; its limbs are drawn into fierce con tortions ; and the doctor says it does not suffer pain ; it is quite unconscious ; these awful throes are involuntary ; then it opens its eyes in the light of a mother's love, and its soul goes out to Him who gave it. That is the result of just such an accident as happened when I passed the unwatched cradle in the Park. Hundreds of such cradles and nurses are in the Park to-day. Fond mothers think they are doing everything for their babes when they hire one woman for each child, to give her whole time" to it. But they are trying to get for their children what money cannot procure. You live in the country, and imagine that the hints in this letter are intended for the mothers of New York, whose babies and nurses enjoy the Central Park. But I am writing to them and to you. The progress of social refinement, the Il6 IREN&US LETTERS. increase of wealth and culture, the division of labor, the demands of society, women's work in the Church, take up so much time that mothers turn off the care of their babes upon hired nurses. Mrs. Smith sends for me to come and talk with her about founding an asylum for deserted and orphan children. Her own son, twelve years old, was stretched on the rug, with dirty shoes, munching an apple, and acting more like a pig in the straw than the oldest son of a lady. She told him to get up, but he wouldn't, and he didn't. We talked as well as we could, and I thought her own children needed care quite as much as the Arabs of the street or the desert. And so it is everywhere. Home is the source of salvation for society. We want good homes. Mothers are the makers of the manners of their sons and daughters. But the mother who commits her tender babes to the unwatched care of a half-civilized pagan or papal nurse, and then imagines that she has done her duty, is a mother false to her nature, to herself, to her children, false to God and to society. If she has heart enough to ache, she will yet regret her neglect of maternal duties, when it is too late to retrieve the lamentable loss. MANNERS IN CHURCH. Thirty people, young men and maidens, " taken up" and brought before a magistrate, for misbehavior in church, pro duced no small stir in a quiet Long Island village, the other day. If they had all been fined, or even imprisoned for a while, that they might give themselves to reflection and pen itence, it would have served them right, and perhaps would have been a wholesome discipline. They had been laughing, talking, and disporting them selves in a most unseemly manner, and it was well to bring such base fellows, of both sexes, to the only bar of which they are afraid. Indeed, it is strange that, in a civilized and MANNERS IN CHURCH. 117 Christian country, there can be, in any community, a set of youth so destitute of decency as to go into a place of prayer to make fun ! Yet this is only an excess of ill- breeding or bad manners, and there is not a little of it in the most refined cities and church circles, different in degree, and in kind also, but liable to criticism and censure nevertheless. It is not the proper thing to come to church after the ser vice has been opened. Where circumstances have made it impracticable to be early, the late comer may be justified on the ground that it is better to come late than not at all. But it is a fact that some people have a habit of coming late, and it is very plain, to those whom they disturb, that they might have been in time had they taken pains to be so. Invited to dinner, they would regard it very rude to keep the other guests waiting, or to make a disturbance, by com ing five or ten minutes after the dinner is served. But it is almost an unheard-of event, probably it was never known, that a Christian congregation had the privilege of beginning its public devotions without being immediately afflicted by the arrival of those who come tearing up the aisle while others are trying to pray or praise. To speak of such offences against, good manners as whis pering in divine service, laughing or sleeping, ought to be quite unnecessary, for it is hard to believe that such vices prevail to any extent in Christian churches. Yet we do see it sometimes, and always with a feeling that those who indulge in it have no proper sense of the fact expressed in those words : " Holiness becometh thine house, O Lord of Hosts." On a beautiful Sabbath forenoon, I was in the middle seat of one of the largest Fifth avenue churches in this city. Before me, in another pew, sat a well-dressed man, who was also an Orthodox divine, whose garments were so thoroughly imbued with the odor of tobacco, that the fragrance filled the circumambient air as if the man were a hogshead of the weed. Probably to some near him the aroma was delicious, and they blessed him for bringing the scent with him, that they might enjoy it and the gospel together. But unto us Il8 IREN&US LETTERS. whose olfactories have never been refined to the delicacy essential to appreciate the sweet savor of such a Sabbath sacrifice, the stench was abominable. Was it according to the law of Christ for this good man to come into the house to be an offence unto the ladies and all the weak brethren in his vicinity ? In this connection, I am sorely tempted to say that there are other odors equally disagreeable to some which the brethren do not bring to church ; but it is not safe to say a word against perfumes, lest those who come laden with them should be more offended than are we who endure them. It is indeed written in the Psalms, " All thy gar ments smell ot myrrh;" but however much some may fancy myrrh, it is not possible to build an argument upon one poet ical passage like that, to prove the propriety of poisoning the atmosphere of the sanctuary with musk, patchouli and mille fleurs. The right and wrong of this turn upon the rule of doing as we would have others do to us. Intensely unpleasant to many people is the smell of tobacco. Many perfumes, deli cious to some, are quite as disagreeable to others. The church is a place where we ought to be allowed to meet without being compelled to inhale odors which are purely artificial, and have no necessary relations to the comfort and convenience of any. On this principle of doing as we would be done by, and remembering that it is our duty to deny ourselves for the sake of others, we ought to forego the privilege of public worship when we are liable to carry in our garments or our breath the germ of disease. It is often a dreadful truth that scarlet fever and other infectious and contagious diseases are spread by the presence in church of those who come from houses where these pestilential sicknesses are, or have been recently. Kind, good women will go to a friend's home and minister with angelic faithfulness by a sick bed, and from that house go to the sanctuary with the diseases all over and through their raiment. Persons suffering with severe colds and coughs make themselves an affliction to MANNERS IN CHURCH. 119 Others, preventing all in their vicinity from deriving profit or enjoyment from the services, when it is their Christian duty to stay at home. They need the medical doctor. Let us be very gentle in our treatment of mothers who come to church with babes in their arms, for well do we know they would not bring them could they leave them. Yet even they will leave the house, when their infants insist on being heard, to the disturbance of public worship. While we were singing the doxology, I counted sixteen Presbyterians putting on their overcoats. It would have been better had I been worshipping instead of counting, but it was almost involuntary, and did not take me more than ten seconds ; while those stout worshippers wrestled with their garments, and, wriggling into them, finally stood erect in time to come out with the words, " By all in heaven." Had they reverently paused till the benediction had been given, they might have arrayed themselves comfortably and reached home in reasonable time. Coming down the broad aisle, the fragrant divine asked me, " How did you like the sermon ?" I told him in the fewest words. A lady friend said, " How did you like the sermon ?" I replied in words more, because a lady was to be answered. Approaching the door, a gentleman greeted me cordially, and said, " What did you think of that ser mon ?" I told him as I had told the others, for it was an excellent discourse. In the vestibule one of the elders took me by the hand and, with true seriousness, asked, " Didn't you like the sermon ; we have just such every Sunday." No one of these Christian worshippers appeared to have any other thought of the morning service but the sermon, and how other people "liked it." Let us not undervalue the sermon. But also let us not make it the test of one's profit and comfort in the worship of God. And I must say I would rather not be required to pass an opinion upon the preach ing, while yet at the gate of heaven. How it was in days of old, we need not now discuss. It was never right to make preaching the primary business of church service. Prayer and praise are the more important 120 1REN&US LETTERS. parts. And the feeling of every hearer should be that of reverence, as in the presence of the Infinite and the Holy One. If a sense of the divine excellency fall upon us in God's house, it will make us suitably afraid. The place will be sacred. And it will be good for us to be there. LONG-WINDED SPEAKERS. His Royal Highness the Duke of Blank was presiding at a public meeting, when and where the Rev. Rowland Hill was to be one of the speakers. One who preceded him had the bad taste, bad manners and great folly to talk an hour and more, to the weariness of the audience, the disgust of the chairman, and the injury of the cause for the promotion of which the meeting had been called. The Duke whispered to Mr. Hill, who sat near him, " Really, Mr. Hill, I do not think I can sit to hear such another speech as this : I wish you would give one of your good-natured hints about it." When the man on his legs had at last exhausted himself, as well as his hearers, and had subsided, Mr. Hill arose and said : " May it please your Royal Highness, ladies and gentlemen, I am not going to make a long speech, or a moving speech. The first is a rudeness, and the second is not required to-day : after the very moving one you have just heard, so moving that several of the company have been moved by it out of the room ; nay, I even fear such another would so move his Royal Highness himself that he would be unable to continue in the chair, and would, to the great regret of the meeting, be obliged to move off." This put an end to the long speeches of that day, but it did not put an end to the evil. For it is an evil that has held its own in spite of all remedies, and is quite as afflictive and fatal now as ever. Even this eccentric yet very sensible man, as he became old, would spin out his discourses to an unreasonable length, LONG -WINDED SPEAKERS. 121 to the injury of their effect, and consequently to the detri ment of Christ's cause. He continued to preach long after he was fourscore, and, though feeble when he began, he v/armed up with his work, preached the people into a good frame, and then preached them out of it again. He would say, after finding that he had been preaching more than an hour, " Well, I am sure I had not an idea of it : it was too long for me and too long for the people : but when I am once set a-going I cannot stop. I must be shorter." In one of his letters, Mr. Hill speaks of the sufferings of those who are obliged to endure long speeches, " without any remedy or redress, upon the high fidgets, above half the time gaping and watching the clock." " In most of the public meetings, I have been tired down before they are half over, and have been obliged to sheer off with the remains of my patience, and leave the finishing to others. " In the way in which too many of these public meetings are conducted, I have my fears that many a good cause is injured by the means adopted for their support. Though some may be gratified by what may be said to the point, yet, oh, the? dulness, the circumlocutionness, the conceit, the tautology of others. In short, few know how to be pithy, short and sweet. And as I find it very difficult to be pithy and sweet, my refuge at all times is to be short." My sympathies are with Mr. Hill and the other man who said, " If I never did a great thing in my life, I am sure I never did a long thing." While the Scotch minister was of a very different disposition who was asked if he was not very much exhausted after preaching three hours ; he said, " O no ; but it would have done you good to see how worried the people were." Dr. Emmons, a celebrated New England divine, was wont to say to young ministers : " Be short in all religious exer cises. Better leave the people longing than loathing. No conversions after the first half hour." The last remark is terrible, and perhaps not literally true, but there is a thought in it to be pondered by preachers and all public speakers. To carry conviction home to the heart, 122 IRENJEUS LETTERS. to persuade men to will and do that to which they are now averse, this is the work which the speaker sets before him, and he makes a grand blunder if he imagines that he is becoming more and more effective as they become weary and wish that he would be done. Of this sort of preachers was he who, when he had split his subject into so many heads as to split the heads of his hearers, and harried them under each division beyond all reason, at last exclaimed, " And what shall I say more !" " Say, amen," said a child who was one of the few awake. When we censure these men of lungs, who love to be on their legs when their hearers wish them to sit down", we are uniformly met with the reply that, " in old times," it was com mon to preach one, two and even three hours : and the fault is in the people, and not in the speaker, if these long services are not acceptable now. But a sensible man will take things as they are, and make them better if he can. Things are not now as they once were. And if the age has become impatient of long speeches and heavy essays, and learned books, let us give the age what it will hear and read, and do it all the good we can. The man who overdoes the matter in public address, usu ally is betrayed into the mistake by forgetfulness of the flight of time, or by a secret self-conceit of his own that he is enter taining and instructing the audience. Some men actually mistake for applause the good-natured efforts of the people to remind them that they have had enough. It is impossible to lay down a rule on the subject, by which the length of a speech or sermon is to be measured. We ought to have some plan by which, at public meetings, a speaker may be brought to his bearings when he has been up to his allotted time. And in these days of electrical tele graphs, what hinders the construction of an apparatus, easily adjusted to every platform, by which a dull speaker may be shaken up a little, and the long-winded one reminded that his time is out, and then if he will not sit down, he shall be knocked over gently. Such a contrivance would greatly enliven public meetings, and tend to increase their useful- HENRY AND HILDEQRAND. 123 ness. Should any inventive genius put this hint into prac tical operation, no claim of priority will ever disturb his patent ; I throw it out for the use of the public. Be short. You may not be able to make a great speech. But you can be short. Some of the most effective speeches ever made were short. Generals on the eve of battle are brief. He who spake as never man spake, said few words at a time. The time is short. Life is short. HENRY AND HILDEBRAND. This tenth day of January is a memorable anniversary. The Jesuits celebrate it. It revives the memory of the proudest day in the history of the Church of Rome, and the date of the beginning of its fall. Eight hundred years ago, Henry IV., Emperor of Ger many, barefooted and bareheaded, with a rope around his neck, stood at the gate of Canossa Castle, begging for par don, while Gregory VII., the haughty Hildebrand, revelled in luxury with the Countess Matilda within. By some writers she is spoken of as his paramour. There are Prot estant historians who believe the relations of the Pope and the Countess were pure. They were certainly not discreet. This Pope was a great reformer, and the dissoluteness of his clergy was the chief object at which he directed his blows. He forbade them to marry also, thus vindicating the now admitted supremacy of Popery in the art of doing one thing and pretending to do another. The priests were dis solute in their morals, and the Pope prohibited the mar riage of those who would lead lives of purity in holy wed lock according to the law of God. The Jesuits throughout the world observe this day as the anniversary the Sooth of the degradation of the Emperor of Germany at the feet of the Pope of Rome. The story is the most romantic in the annals of Popery, and the day is 124 IREN&US LETTERS. a pivot in the history of that great anti-Christian power. That was the day when the power of the Pope of Rome was at its zenith. All earthly kings and kingdoms were then at his disposal. From that day began his fall, which has been steadily going lower and lower, until to-day, Jan. 10, 1877, there is not one crowned head in Europe who cares a six pence for the Pope of Rome. And the successor of that mighty Hildebrand, who claimed to be and was at that time the disposer of all lands on earth, is not now the proprietor in fee of a foot of ground beneath the sun. Like Lucifer he has fallen, never to rise again. The sceptre has passed out of his hand, and instead of having kings standing as beggars at his gate, there is none so poor to do him reverence. And he begs pence from the chamber maids of New York and the peasants of Ireland under the pretence of being a prisoner in the Vatican, dependent on the charity of his poor parishioners. History furnishes no such example of a retributive provi dence. Henry IV. of Germany claimed the divine right of kings, as one ordained of God, and mocked the notion of the age that the Pope was supreme in States as well as in the Church. The Pope and he fell out, and the Pope beat him. For in that dark age, when a bishop might be unable to read or write, and there was far more superstition than religion in the Church, the people thought the Pope had two swords, the spiritual and the secular, and with the former he could cut off a bishop's head, and with the other a king's head, whenever he wanted exercise. Henry excommunicated Hildebrand, and Hildebrand ex communicated Henry. The Pope absolved Henry's subjects from their allegiance, claiming this right as vested in the head of the Church. This proclamation fell like a pall of death on the fortunes of the King. His subjects turned away from him. His allies deserted him. The Suabian and Saxon princes assembled in solemn conclave, and deter mined to elect a new king who would obey the Pope. , Henry quailed and finally succumbed. The man went out of him. HENRY AND HILDEBRAND. 12$ He consented to humble himself before the Pope and ask forgiveness. In the coldest winter then known in the mem ory of man, he set out before Christmas day, and, through incredible sufferings, he crossed the Alps in storms of snow and the freezing cold, with his wife and child. The Pope had taken up his residence in the Castle of Canossa, with the Countess Matilda, and there awaited the coming of the humbled monarch. Before the excommunicated sovereign went a melancholy procession of excommunicated bishops and nobles who shared his fortunes, and were now with him seeking absolution. They, too, were barefoot, for they were all beggars together. The haughty Pope put each one of them into a solitary cell, and finally sent them back with his ghostly pardon. But he reserved his chief terrors for the prostrate monarch. Admitted within the first gate, the king was made to stand in the second enclosure, barefoot and fasting, for three whole days and nights, in the bitter cold of winter, while the Pope and the woman revelled in their luxury within. At last the Pope yielded to the impor tunities of the woman and admitted the degraded king into his presence, and finally patched up a peace with him. This was the bold assertion of the supremacy of the Church of Rome above the governments of the world. It is the doctrine of the Church to-day. It is taught in the writ ings of the authorized teachers of that Church in the city of New York to-day. What was the effect of the scene we have now described ? Henry returned to Germany, rallied his people, who came back to their senses and allegiance, marched upon the Pope and put him into prison. An old enemy of his delivered him, and he was set up only to be cast down again ; and loaded with contempt and scorn, torn with disappointment and chagrin, he perished a miserable exile from power. From that day, Jan. 10, 1077 the battle has been going on until the Pope found his Waterloo at Sedan. Down to that downfall of the last French Empire, he had managed to keep up the illusion of temporal sovereignty ; playing at the game of kings and pretending that he was one of the rulers 126 1RENJEUS LETTERS. among the powers that be. But one after another of the kingdoms that were once governed by the permission of the Pope have outgrown the superstition of his right, and when the dogma of Infallibility was proclaimed, and the last friend of the Pope followed it up by a declaration of war against the successor of Henry IV., Hildebrand's old foe, THEN began the final struggle between the claims of the Pope on one hand and the rights of men on the other. It was Roman ism represented by the Pope and Napoleon, and it was the Protestant principle incarnate in the stern old German King. How firm the tread of the monarch as he came to do the will of God ! How the legions of superstition, with the blessing of the Pope on their eagles, went down like grass before the scythe, as the mighty Northmen moved on and avenged the loth of January, 1077? The spirit and the doctrine and the purpose of the Church of Rome are to-day identical with those of eight hundred years ago. This is the boast of the Church. That is what the Jesuits celebrate to-day. In all their high places, in their secret recesses and vast assemblies, cathedrals and colleges, with incense, and song and organ peal, and procession, ban ners and sacramental service, they commemorate on this day the anniversary of their enjoyment of the loftiest throne the world ever saw; when the servant (as they pretend) of the meek and lowly Jesus stood on the neck of the mightiest Emperor, and looking abroad over all the earth, saw no monarch who could stay his hand or say, "Why doest thou so ?" The struggle is not over ; for in the nations where a free Bible, and a free school and a free press abound, there, here the successors of the men of the eleventh century are making one more fight. If we are true to our religion, it will be the last. HOLD UP YOUR HEAD. 127 HOLD UP YOUR HEAD : SPEAK LOUD AND PLAIN. During the travels of the last few weeks and months, it has been a duty or privilege, and sometimes both, to attend diverse conventions of able, learned, earnest or good men, in the interests of religion or science or politics. The first was the Presbyterian General Assembly, where five hundred ministers and elders met and spent a fortnight in the business of the Church. The second was the Scien tific Association. The other was a political State Conven tion to nominate a Governor and other officers for the November election. The ministers and elders often failed to make themselves heard when addressing the house. This failure did not spring from a want of lung power, or from any defect in vocal organs. It may be safely assumed that no sensible man who has a weakness or want of the faculty of speech, will undertake to make a dumb-show in the presence of a congregation whose time and patience are limited. But it is no less true that nine out of ten failed to be heard distinctly and usefully over the whole house. The fault was entirely with the speakers. They did not try to be heard. The few immediately around them might be conscious of their wis dom, but to the less favored, who sat in the more benighted regions, they were merely beating the air. This same fault is common in the pulpit. Ministers often let their voices fall toward the end of each sentence, and the last few words are quite inaudible to those in the distance. I once heard a pastor say : " I desire particular attention to the following notices" then he gave the notices, and the people sitting around me could not hear even the subject matter of the notices, much less the times and places named. In every theological seminary there should be a school for training the voice : teaching and requiring young men to hold up their heads, to speak loud and plain. If the greatest of Grecian orators confronted the waves of the sea to enable himself to master the roar of a great assembly, surely Chris- 128 1REN&US LETTERS. tian preachers ought to qualify themselves to speak so as to be heard. In the Assembly, and in all ministers' meetings, there are few men who speak out so loud and plain that they com- mand attention, and reach the understanding of their hearers by sound words with sound enough to be heard. Dr. Mus- grave is one of the men who are always heard. Because he speaks plainly, the house always listens. There are compen sations in Providence, and as he has not as perfect eyesight as many of his brethren, God has given him a better voice than any of them. Dr. Darling, of Albany, speaks distinctly and forcibly, and never fails to be heard with attention. The elders are rarely willing to speak up so as to reach the remote parts of the house. Mr. W. E. Dodge and Judge Drake were not heard for their much speaking, but when they did speak they were easily heard. Rev. Dr. Crosby is a model speaker in debate or in the pulpit. Would that all the Lord's proph ets would open their mouths wide when they prophesy. But if the religious people were afraid to speak out so as to be heard, what shall we say of the scientists ? Men of learning and renown, who had consumed midnight hours and oil in preparing papers for public reading, appeared to the weary hearer to be pouring a confidential communication into the ear of the patient President. Not a sentence of a half- hour or an hour-long treatise was audible twenty feet from the platform on which the modest master of art and science whispered his discoveries and calculations. Exhausted in vain attempts to gather wisdom from lips that the bees of Hymettus had kissed, I sometimes fell asleep, and after refreshing dreams, awoke to find the flow of silence going on with the same delicious calm that lulled me into repose again. Now these papers will be read with interest and profit in print, and the Association deserves the gratitude of the pub lic for important contributions. But there is very little advantage in getting an audience without giving it something to hear. It is not eloquence, oratory, the graces and charm of public speaking, for which I am pleading. Few, very few, HOLD UP YOUR HEAD. 12p have the gift. Few have been trained to the perfection of this highest of all arts. The greatest orator is the leader of men. It is not every man who is called to be a great speaker. But if a man cannot or will not speak so as to be heard, he is not called of God to speak in public. Whether a man of religion, letters, or science, if he cannot hold up his head, speak loud and plain, it were well that he had the grace of silence. But the politicians ! They met in the Town Hall. It was packed, piled, jammed. It was turbulent, restless, impatient, disorderly. But when a man was on his legs he spoke so as to be heard, or the multitude put him down. When they found that he had not the gift of voice or sense, they gave him rounds of applause that cheered his heart at first, but it went on and on until he found there was no chance for him, and sinking into the abyss, "the subsequent proceedings interested him no more." Then sprang to his feet no he had no feet, for both were shot off in the war but to his stumps, a little fellow, whose shrill voice rang like a clarion : the waves were stilled : his earnest, impassioned tones pierced the remotest corners of the house while he extolled his hero : and in seven min utes he fixed the flints of the convention and carried his man in triumph. All these political speakers spoke to be heard and so that they could be heard. No one of them dawdled with his subject : or talked as if he were half asleep : or let his voice down with a half-finished sentence: or suffered his cause to fail for lack of physical and intel lectual work. They threw their soul and body into the struggle. "They fought, like brave men, long and well." They compelled attention and got it. And I said to myself, "For what is all this?" And the answer came "They fight for men : for place : for power over one another : for office : the spoils : but they could not be more in earnest if heaven were to be stormed and immortal glory were the prize and price of victory." It was nearing midnight when I left them in the fight and stepped out beneath the stars. And the infinite distance 13 IREN^US LETTERS. between the visible and the invisible, the temporal and eternal, appeared in the light of those lamps of God. If min isters of Christ, elders in the Church, men who bear the responsibilities of God's work on earth, all who wear the name of Christian and rejoice in being redeemed, were as much in earnest as these political leaders, how they would push on the columns, until they had made Jesus the King of the Jews and Gentiles, and crowned him Lord of all. It is easy to say that sense is of more account than sound : that sound and fury signify nothing : and that the noisiest speakers are often the windiest : that word reminds me of a little story This summer two distinguished Scotch ministers were on their travels, and together worshipped in a cathedral where the organ was so rapturously lovely that one of the ministers, an earnest hater of instruments in public worship, was com pletely overcome by the power of the music. As they emerged from the temple, he said to his brother, " I will never speak another word against wind instruments, not even against you" But this is not to the point. My point is that preachers and all public speakers should speak loud enough to be heard by all the people in the house. As a hearer I sit before the preacher and see the movements of his lips, and as the man on the outside of the crowd said, when Senator Preston was speaking in the street, " He does the motion splendid," I say with the Apostle Paul, " If I know not the meaning of the voice, he that speaketh shall be a barbarian unto me." AMONG THE ICEBERGS. 131 AMONG THE ICEBERGS. The rush of the Arizona into an iceberg, and the awful peril of her passengers, bring to mind an old experience. In the month of March, 1854, I left Liverpool for New York in the steamer Baltic, Capt. Briggs, of the Collins line. It was my first voyage on a steamship, and naturally I was more sensitive to the several forms of danger than those are who have long been in the habit of " going down to the sea in ships." We had been out a few days only, I might say hours, before I was well satisfied that the captain would take the ship safely into port, if it required a year. The ship was new, stanch, and steady, and a well-built ship is as safe on the sea as a house is on the land. If this appears to be an extravagant remark, let me add that the best built dwellings are exposed to fire, lightning, hurricanes and mobs, and that a good ship is exposed to no more and no greater perils than these. The greatest danger to a ship arises from the incapacity or negli gence of those who navigate her, and against these dangers no human foresight is adequate to provide. You pay your money and take your choice of steamers according to the best information you can get of the judgment of the men who manage the line. They may be deceived. And you may be lost at sea. But the risks are not much greater than in cross ing Broadway a thousand times, or travelling by rail from Boston to San Francisco. Some years ago a stranger came into my office, and with out introduction went on to say " Long before the time when steamboats were on the river, I was going from New York to Albany on a sloop with several passengers. When we reached Tappan Zee, a great storm arose, and many were afraid the vessel would be overwhelmed. In the midst of the alarm a young and beautiful woman stepped from the cabin, and in a sweet voice, but without trembling, she said. In God's hands, we are as safe on the water as the land.' That lady became your mother. I have made her words my I3 2 IRENJEUS LETTERS. motto through, life : have watched you so far in yours, and thought you would be interested in this incident." Having said this, the stranger took his departure. And I will return to the Baltic and Captain Briggs. The weather proved bad. The voyage was disagreeable. There were only forty or fifty cabin passengers on board, giv ing us more room than company. But the silent, incessant vigilance of the commander inspired us all with a sense of serene security, so that we seemed to one another prisoners indeed, but sure to be well cared for, and in due time set at liberty. A week out, and we came into the region where ice bergs might be expected, whether the almanac said so or not. In the morning I was on deck with the Captain, and he called my attention to a blazing, white light, in the distance, like the reflection of a mighty mirror set in the horizon, or a pal ace of ice or glass coming down out of heaven. " That's an iceberg," he said calmly. I had never seen one, and rejoiced greatly that we were to make the acquaintance of one so soon. The captain did not share my enjoy ment. Drop a bit of ice into a tumbler of water. It floats, but almost the whole of it is below the surface. A small frac tion of the mass is out. As the gravity of ice is to water, so is the part above the surface to the part below. It makes no difference how large or how small the lump. It may be as big as a mountain, or as small as an apple, nine times as much of its weight will be under the water as above it. If, then, the huge mass stands like the Pyramid of Cheops out of the sea, it reaches nearly nine times as far below. Such was the immense cathedral-like, turreted, towering, stupendous pile as we gave it a wide margin, and passed it, glowing and bril liant in the clear, cold morning sun. With the knowledge of its proportions, and the necessary fate of a ship that should run upon it, we looked with awe while its beauty was fascin ating. There was " a weight of glory" in it. The iceberg which the Arizona sought to go through was seen from the Anchoria, and its dimensions were estimated at one hundred feet in height and five hundred feet in AMONG THE ICEBERGS. 133 breadth ; a solid block one thousand feet by five hundred, millions of solid feet of ice. The steamer President had gone from New York with a precious company on board, to cross the sea, and had gone down without a sign. Not a spar or plank, not a cry, not a rumor, had ever come to any shore to intimate the fate of one of that great company. Whether the eloquent Chaplain Cook- man had time to speak to them of the sailor's Friend, we never knew, but the general impression was, and still is, that, being very heavily laden and running against an iceberg, she went down in the twinkling of an eye. We shall know no more about it until the sea gives up its dead. We talked of this and other disasters all that day, and as another night set in, and we were still in the region which icebergs traverse, it seemed to me quite important that I should take care" of the ship. " What's to be done, Captain ?" I said. " Nothing but what was done last night." He then kindly explained to me the special watches that were set, the extra spies, the positions they occupied, the mode of changes, and the watchmen to watch the watchmen, and then he added : " I am here as I was through the night before, and shall be until we are out of all danger." At ten o'clock I went below and turned in, to meditate on the horrors of a night encounter with an iceberg ; and to roll with the ship till the morning. I thought of that " young and beautiful woman" whose words had comforted a stranger in many storms. I thought of Him who holds the waves and his children in his hands. And the faithful captain who is the agent of Divine Providence for my care and and and just then the morning sun was shining into my port-window and I had been sleeping soundly eight good hours. But the vigilance of the captain was not relaxed until his ship was safely in port. I was on the platform when Everett made his splendid oration at the inauguration of the Albany Observatory in 1 856 134 1REN/EUS LETTERS. and heard him relate this incident : " Coming across the Atlantic on a steamer, I asked the captain how near he could determine the precise location of his ship by the best obser vations. He said within about three miles. When we were supposed to be off Cape Race and were pacing the deck, I asked him how far he supposed the Cape to be, and he said, ' Perhaps three or four miles.' Thus, according to his own reckoning, we might be on the Cape any moment, for he could not tell within three miles where we were." Such a fact illustrates, and ought to compel, the extremest vigilance and carefulness, because after all is done that can be done, on sea or on land, the skill and the power of man have their limits, and our refuge is in God. AN INTERESTING BEGGAR. In the midst of my morning studies yesterday, when every moment is precious to a man of business or letters ; when every pastor or student wishes to be let alone ; when thoughtless or impudent people make it a point to call because they are quite sure to catch their victim in ; it was during these precious hours that I was summoned to give attention to a young lady who wished to see me on very urgent business. With that sense of being annoyed, if not irritated, which every hardworking man feels, when his favorite and only hours of solitary labor are rudely broken in upon by a rob ber of his time, I laid aside my pen that was just then trying to do its very best for you, dear friend, and reluctantly waited upon the young woman who had made this unsea sonable demand. She was neatly dressed, very small, delicately featured, invalid in appearance, pale, thin, tender-eyed. And thus looking, thus she spoke : " My mother and I are now in this city, in great distress AN INTERESTING BEGGAR. 13$ for the want of a small sum of money. Mother is a writer for the press ; she contributes to the literary periodicals and has several pieces in the hands of publishers, from whom she is in daily expectation of receiving money ; but we have been compelled to go from one lodging to another, cheaper and cheaper, until now we are to be turned into the street without shelter. We have had no breakfast to-day, and have not the means to pay for a morsel of food. In this dis tress, I have come to you" (and here came in some words of flattery which are omitted as not essential to the story), "and, if you will /<?*/ us ten dollars till our remittance comes from the publishers, you will save us from suffering," etc. etc. etc. I said : " To whom do you refer me in this city, that I may ascertain the general correctness of your statements, and especially as to your character, for I never give to strangers until I have made inquiries as to their worthi ness ?" " We have no references," she replied ; " we are total strangers in the city ; there is not a person of any standing to whom you could go to learn anything of us ; we are suf fering, actually starving, and we want only a little to keep us a few days till our money comes in." I pursued my inquiries until I learned where they had been living for some weeks past, and, assuring her that I would attend to the matter that very day, I gave her a trifle with which to procure bread for the morning, and dismissed her. Her appeal was touching ; but it was more the silent pathos of her feeble, tearful, pallid, sinking appearance, than the pitiful tale she told. The heart of old Pharaoh would have been softened in her presence. I returned to my study, but the interview had upset me for the morning, and I could think of little else than this literary lady and her invalid daughter at the mercy of some merciless landlord, turned out of doors and wanting shelter and food. What a brute was I, too, to be coolly sitting down at my table, while these interesting people were wait ing with anxious hearts for the sweet relief that I was, per- 136 IREN^EUS LETTERS. haps, soon to bring! Dropping my pen, I set forth on this errand of loving-kindness. How good a man feels when thus engaged ! What can be more satisfying to one's best nature, than to be able to provide for the poor, especially women, ladies, literary, unfortunate and very interesting! My first call was at the place where they had last boarded. "Yes," said the man of the house, "they left here yester day to go to the bank ! and draw some money with which to pay me what they owed me, and they have not returned." " To the bank for money ! why I thought they were poor. " " O no," said he, "they were very particular to have every thing of the best quality, but they were not particular about the price ; they paid freely until the last day or two ; there goes their man now," pointing out of the window to a well- dressed man walking by. " They kept a man, did they ?" " Yes, he was constantly running of errands for them ; but what it was all about I did not know." " Where did they come from to you ?" I asked. He gave me the name of a hotel, to which I repaired, and introduced myself and errand to the manager, who instantly responded : " They are not people, Sir, who deserve your sympathy or attention ; they have been at other hotels and stayed as long as they could ; here they had two men with them, one a mes senger in their service ; a bad lot, Sir ; quite unworthy of any trouble to you, Sir." By this time my eyes began to open leisurely, and I per ceived that I was running about town after a couple of women whom I had better drop before I took them up. But curiosity, not charity, now led me on, and this was the result. For two or three years at least, and perhaps more, they have been infesting this city, adventuresses, preying upon the clergy and literary people, raising money on substan tially the same story that the little beggar told me. They are Roman Catholics, but they are not particular about the religion of the ministers whom they select as their gulls. They write beautiful letters, so sweet, so imploring, so sad, COWPER AND RAY PALMER. 137 and their messenger, as a friend, delivers the letters after a call by the invalid daughter. They live in luxury on the money thus extracted from tender-hearted shepherds, whom they fleece as innocent sheep. They have been generously offered an asylum for life by the Roman Catholic Church, and have refused to accept it, preferring to play the confi dence game which they find so profitable. I feel quite slighted by their neglecting to call on me until they have worn out the patience of nearly all the other " brethren." And this disgraceful story has a moral. Because the most of good people give without investigating, wicked adven turers, impudent impostors, and lazy huzzies, with smooth faces, and languid looks, and plausible tales of woe, continue to persecute the charitable, and to get their living by shame less persistence in beggary. There is no law by which they can be put into prison. But it is a safe and wise law for every one to enact for himself, "Never give one cent of money to a beggar on his or her own story alone." COWPER AND RAY PALMER The first of these poets has been a fireside favorite in Chris tian families for nearly a hundred years. " Melancholy marked him for her own," and the charm of sadness, a strange sweet sadness, lends a pathetic interest to h is name and works, so tender, holy and strong that he will never lose his place in the affections of those who love pure English song. From the Task to John Gilpin, the grave to the gay, illus trating the varieties of genius perhaps as widely as they appear in any poems of one author in our language, we never find a line the poet "dying wished to blot," while there are passages and pictures all the way along that delight the eye and the ear, endearing the writer to the reader, making his name and his works familiar in the family circle, and his lines more frequently quoted with a knowledge of their source, 138 IRE N^. US LETTERS. than the words of almost any other of the bards of Eng land. The hymns of Cowper are the best of his works. The longer poems, like " The Task," " Table Talk," " Progress of Error," have a vast deal of prose in them, measured by syl lables into lines of equal length, and by this process much good sense has been buried, for many will read a sensible essay who will justly avoid the same thoughts done into blank verse, or worse still, into rhyme. But Cowper lives in the hearts of Christian readers rather as the writer of hymns, with which the spirit rises into converse with the unseen and eternal, than as the author of the more elaborate poems that cost him intense labor and many pains. But there is no one of the many poems of Cowper now precious to the Church of God, more valued by Christians in this and all other countries, than some of the hymns of Ray Palmer, whose Poetical Works have just been published. It has been with him as with many another writer of songs, that one of them attains such a popular pre-eminence that the poet is supposed to have that one only offspring. No one thinks of Key except as the author of the " Star Spangled Banner." What did Payne ever write but " Home, Sweet Home ?" Even Heber's Missionary Hymn wafts his name more widely than all else he has written or said. Dr. Muh- lenberg will live longer for teaching others to sing " I would not live alway," than as the founder of a hospital or St. Johnland. Charlotte Elliott wrote many sweet poems, but "Just as I am " is the one thing she did, as "Nearer, my God, to Thee" is the perennial flower in the wreath of Mrs. Flower Adams. This list might be readily enlarged to illustrate the now obvious fact that the \\4orld seizes on one, perhaps the best, perhaps not the best, but certainly the one thing of a writer that it wants, and sings it along down the years of time ; does it into the languages of earth ; and in all lands and climes it becomes the censer in which the saints offer their praise and longing desires before the Throne. To give the human soul fit words to express what it otherwise could not utter is an unspeakable pleasure. And so, I think, COWPER AND RAY PALMER. 139 the makers of those old Latin hymns that have wafted martyr souls to glory, and they whose songs are now the joy of the Church in the Wilderness, must be glad even in the gladness of heaven that God gave them words which they strung on the lyres of Christendom, to ring in the churches of Christ from the rising to the setting sun. Ray Palmer says of his hymn, " My faith looks up to Thee," that he " cannot doubt it came from the inspiration of the Spirit of God." From Him all holy desires come. And as this precious poem is a holy desire, an expression of faith and love and hope, it may claim with great force its origin in the fountain of all that is pure and good. With that poem of less than thirty lines his name is linked as Wolfe's name is with " Not a drum was heard," and other names, " the few the immortal names that were not born to die." I sat down more than a score of years ago, a stranger in a foreign church, and opened the hymn book to this hymn, marked as by an author unknown. I knew him well, and loved to read in a strange land a song of Zion by one who, in my own, was a brother and friend. And as I journeyed Eastward, and in other tongues than ours heard hymns to Jesus, this was always one of them, everywhere recognized as the one on which the soul calmly rests in sight of the Lamb of God, who taketh away the sin of the world. Even under the shadow of the Seraglio Palace, in the city of the Sultan, I found them turning the words of this and other hymns into what seemed a jargon to me ; but when youthful voices uttered them to the tune of Olivet, I felt their power, and saw that in all places and in all tongues the love of Christ is the same, and delights in its utterance by the same signs. And there are other poems in the volume now in our hands, with more poetic life in them than this, and that will as certainly retain life as long. They will not touch so many hearts, and therefore never will be so popular in the best sense of that word. I have put the author's name with that of Cowper at the head of this column, because the larger 140 IREN&US LETTERS, poem of Dr. Palmer, " Home, or the Unlost Paradise," and some of the shorter poems treat of those themes in domestic and social life which employed the fine powers of the friend of Mrs. Unwin, Lady Austen,and John Newton. Dr. Palmer has all the love of nature and acquaintance with its varied charms, all the taste for those delicate refinements of home without which Cowper could not exist: and, then, unlike Cowper, Dr. Palmer never sinks into the melancholy mood : never dwells on the dark side of things : never thinks of " a frowning Providence" with a smiling face behind. Dr. Pal mer is ever in the light : rejoices in the Lord always. The lark in the morning is not more joyous than the " rising soul " of the poet who lives in the light of faith divine. Even in singing of one whom fear has called " the king of terrors," Dr. Palmer, with that firmness of a Christian hero, writes: To Faith's keen eye Thou, Death, art light ; 'tis but to sense That thine are dead ! And in the strong confidence of that gospel which brings life and immortality to light, he says : " From yon blest shores, When souls redeemed shall backward turn, To look on thee, All beautiful thy form shall be : Thy ministers once deemed so stern, Shall seem sweet ministers of grace, That Heaven adores !" That is poetry. It converts death into an angel of blessing to them that have overcome, and scatters the gloom of dying and the grave by the power of the glory that is to be revealed. Such poets are among God's best gifts to men. Well may they be called bards, and prophets and seers. They make (poieo, poema) wings for souls. They are not many. Poets do not come in troops. Happy is the age that bears a pair of them. The race will not die out. Heaven sends them when they are needed. And so in successive ages the Church THE NAME ABOVE EVERY NAME. 141 finds among her sons and daughters those who set her wants to the harmonies of numbers, and, as music is the universal language of the soul, it comes that the saints of all tongues unite with one heart and voice in such songs as those of Dr. Palmer. THE NAME ABOVE EVERY NAME. It is quite likely that I shall offend some very good people by this letter. Certainly some very good people have offended me by the use they make of the name that is above every name. And it is of this use and abuse that I have a word or two to say, and with all gentleness and diffidence ; for they who are to be criticised are far better people than he who ventures the criticism. Full well do I know that the precious name of JESUS is the human name of the blessed Saviour, and when written in another form, as Joshua, it has none of those associations that render it so sacred to all who love Him. I will first tell you what has impelled me to this present writing, and then we will talk the matter over. In a large religious meeting, where a high degree of spiritual life was apparent, a revival meeting, it might be called, so warm, earnest, and impassioned were the appeals and exhortations, there were some speakers who, having had large experi ence in Sunday-school work and young men's meetings, were very fluent and eloquent, rousing the feelings of the assem blies by their glowing addresses. With them the only name by which the Saviour of sinners was spoken of was JESUS ; and this would not be the occasion of any criticism, if they had not employed it with such familiarity and frequency, and with the prefix of such terms of endearment, as to take from the name that association of reverence and respectful affec tion with which it is always invested in my mind and that of many who have expressed to me their sentiments OP this subject. It is not in good taste for a husband and wile, o 142 1REN&US LETTERS. parents and children, or brothers and sisters, to lavish, with great profusion, very strong terms of endearment upon one another, in the presence of company. The practice suggests to the hearer the possibility that such warm expressions are for the purpose of misleading those who hear, and that it is within the realms of belief that those who seem to be so extravagantly affectionate in public, may be just a little less so in the seclusion of domestic life. And when these burn ing and effective speakers were, in nearly every sentence, speaking of dear Jesus, sweet Jesus, precious Jesus, the dear little Jesus, darling Jesus, brother Jesus, friend Jesus, and stiil more frequently "Jesus;" as if he were no more than one of their own number, one to be spoken to and spoken of as a child, companion, and every-day person, I was asking, " Do they love Him so much more than others ?" It hurt me, as if one dearer to me than life was being lightly handled in the face of the world. I remembered that a writer, whom the Spirit of God had taught, declared of this Saviour that God had " highly exalted Him," and "given him a name that is above every name, that, at the name of JESUS, every knee should bow, in heaven, earth, and under the earth !" Such a triumphant prophecy, for the fulfilment of which the martyrs and pro phets and faithful men and women have looked, and will yet anticipate with longings that no words can clothe, I would not construe into a precept to forbid the use of that great name except with an outward sign of reverence. Such genuflexions are often superstitious and never necessary to testify respect. But the reverence in which that name is held, and every name by which God maketh himself known, by all who have a becoming sense of the infinite exaltation of Him above us, forbids that his name should be spoken familiarly, or with such frequency and levity as to make us forget that we are unworthy to take it upon our lips. Especially is this familiar style of speaking to be regretted when it is indulged, as it is more than elsewhere, in the presence of very young persons. It abounds in Sunday- school eloquence. It is the staple of thousands of speeches THE NAME ABOVE EVERY NAME. 143 to children. It is not unknown when the little hearers are expected to laugh at the funny anecdotes of the entertaining speaker. It does not bring the Saviour nearer to them : it does tend to diminish their reverence for him, and thus to weaken the hold upon them of his commands. If you reply to these words that it is the htiman name only of Christ that is thus employed, I would remind you that they who think of Christ only as a man, do not, in their writings or addresses, indulge in such familiarity. Their cultivated taste perhaps forbids it. But if good taste is offended thereby, there must be, in the nature of the case, something radically wrong in it. Poetry, passion, exalted sentiment, will justify the use of terms, occasionally, that cease to be allowed in the ordinary duties and enjoyments of religions service. The poetical language of some portions of Holy Scripture may never be properly used except in its connections, that the true import may be understood. Hymns in praise of JESUS are among the most precious of human writings : " Jesus, lover of my soul," is as fervid as the Song of Songs. " How sweet the name of Jesus sounds In a believer's ear ; It soothes his sorrows, heals his wounds, And drives away his fear." "Jesus, I love thy charming name, 'Tis music to my ear, Fain would I shout It out so loud That earth and heaven should hear." ' ' Jesus, the name that calms our fears, That bids our sorrows cease ; 'Tis music in the sinner's ears, 'Tis life and health and peace." Such stanzas are dear to every Christian heart that delights in sacred song. And the hymns of the Church are more abundant in praise of JESUS than on any other theme. They 144 1RENALUS LETTERS. are criticised by the cold and uninitiated as sensuous, mate rialistic and voluptuous. Fanaticism finds in our best hymns lines to express unsanctified emotions. But it finds them just as easily in the inspired songs of the Bible. We sing, ' ' Millions of years my wondering eyes Shall o'er thy beauties rove," and only a very sensual person can find anything sensual in the words. We sing joyously such lines as these : ' ' Sweet Jesus, every smile of thine Shall fresh endearment bring ; And thousand tastes of new delight From all thy graces spring. " Haste, my Beloved, fetch my soul Up to thy blest abode ; Fly, for my spirit longs to see My Saviour and my God." Such is the language of poetry, of highly wrought imagina tion, taking the wings of music, and soaring into the spiritual, the unseen and eternal. It is susceptible of abuse, and it is not strange that they who do not know what it means to be in union with Christ should wrest, as they do many other words, to a use which they were not made to answer. And the name of Jesus, and all the names by which the Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit, and the attributes of God, and the offices which he executes, are made known to men, should be used with reverence on all occasions. Profane speaking is not unheard in the pulpit. The plat form has more of it. The Sunday-school hears the most of it. Oh that we might hear the last of it ! A WEEK IN THE WHITE HOUSE. 145 A WEEK IN THE WHITE HOUSE. Mr. Franklin Pierce was nominated for the Presidency of the United States in the summer of 1852, and was elected in November. Between the time of his nomination and elec tion a bright, beautiful and promising son, his only child, was killed by a railroad accident. Mrs. Pierce, a lady of great loveliness of character, daughter of the Rev. Dr. Appleton, President of Bowdoin College, was crushed by this blow, and the bereaved parents, childless and heart broken, went to Washington. In the freshness of their grief they saw no company. They went to the church of which the late Rev. Dr. John C. Smith was pastor, and at the close of service he spoke with them. I had recently published "Thoughts on the Death of Children," and Mrs. Pierce remarked to him that she had been reading the book with much comfort. In the course of that week I was in Washington making some arrangements for a foreign journey, and Dr. Smith spoke to me of Mrs. Pierce having derived comfort from my little book, and he asked me to call on them, though as yet. they had received no one. I did so : Mrs. Pierce received me at once, and sent for the President, who joined us. The sympathies of parents in a common affliction soon united our hearts. The interview was sacred. I went to Europe and the East, and was absent a year. Mr. Pierce had been in office about three years when I was in Washington again. After being there two or three days I called on the President, and he insisted on sending to the hotel for my luggage, and my spending a week with him. Mrs. Pierce joined in the invitation with arguments that made it impossible to refuse, and in the course of an hour I was in my room in the White House. As my visit was purely social, having no reference to political or public matters, it would be inconsistent with the whole tenor of my correspondence to speak of much that 146 IREN&US LETTERS. made that week one of the most memorable and remarkable of my life. And political prejudices are so strong that we are apt to judge the private character of public men, espe cially Presidents, by our likes or dislikes of their party rela tions. This was stiikingly illustrated by a fact resulting from my visit. In a letter from Washington I mentioned that the President prayed daily with his family, assembling the servants in the library for that purpose. One of the sub scribers to the Observer ordered it discontinued, giving as the reason that he "would not have a paper coming into his house that says Pierce prays." In my simplicity I had sup posed any Christian would be glad to hear that his worst enemy was praying, but I was mistaken in that opinion. Mr. Pierce did not lead the devotions in family worship while I was there, insisting that it was my duty as a clergy man. Mrs. Pierce told me that he always conducted it when a minister was not present, and that no public engagements were allowed to interfere with the daily family service. He called upon me invariably to ask the blessing at table, but one day, as we sat down, he involuntarily did it himself, and then turning to me, said : " Excuse me, but for the moment I forgot." It showed his habit. Every day, except Sunday, he had a dinner party, usually from eight to ten gentlemen and ladies, and this brought together the most distinguished members of Congress, stran gers visiting the Capital, and officers of the Cabinet. Half a dozen wine-glasses were placed at each plate, and as many kinds of wine were freely served : but at the President's plate was no wine-glass, and he drank nothing but water. In the early part of his public life he was addicted to the free use of intoxicating liquors, but he had put himself upon rigorous abstinence, even from wine at his own table. Once a week he excused himself from whatever company might be present in the evening, while he went unobserved to a prayer meeting in the lecture-room of the church. He sat in a back seat, unnoticed by any one but the pastor, who said nothing about it to his people, though he mentioned it to me in speaking of the President's private life. A WEEK IN THE WHITE HOUSE. 147 One morning Mr. Pierce asked me to step with him into his bed-chamber. The bed was standing a few feet from the wall. We sat down on its side, and he drew a curtain from a portrait hung low, and near the head of the bed. It told its own sad story of his beautiful boy, his son, his only son, who was killed as they were coming into this mansion. He put his hand into mine and wept. Who could refrain from weeping with him ? " It is dark, desolate, dreadful ; we thought it would be for his pleasure ; that his future would be so much brighter : but my wife and I are longing now to go away and be at peace." I had no words. We sat some moments in silence and withdrew. At breakfast one morning Mr. Pierce said to me : " I would like to have you see my Cabinet together, and if you will be at home at one o'clock I will call for you at your room." At the hour he called, and led me to the apartment where the members had been in session, and were now through with business. After introduction I had a few words with each of them, except one: he resumed his seat and his writing, and yet I remember him quite as distinctly as any of them, for he has since been very distinguished as Jefferson Davis, President of the Southern Confederacy, William L. Marcy was then Secretary of State, and had been also at the head of the War Department in a previous administration. Governor Marcy, wishing to make a moral reflection, observed ; " Is it not strange, sir, that men are willing to come here and bear these burdens, and for what ?" " Oh no," I replied ; "not strange, Governor, some gentle men are willing to come twice !" He laughed heartily, and said, " Ah, there you have me," for he was one of them. James Guthrie of Kentucky, Secretary of the Treasury, was a man of commanding appearance. Mr. Dobbin, Secre tary of the Navy, from North Carolina, was then in delicate health, and did not live long after retirement from office. Robert McClelland, Secretary of the Interior, has just now died in Michigan. Mr. James Campbell was Postmaster- 148 I REN Ai. US LETTERS. General, a Roman Catholic, who alluded to that fact himself when saying some pleasant words to me. Caleb Gushing was Attorney-General, a man of such varied accomplish ments, industry, versatility, and capacity for public affairs, that he was for many years, under successive administra tions, indispensable, whether in or out of office. A few years after this, Mr. Marcy was residing at the Hotel Sans Souci in Ballston Spa, in the summer, and my family were guests in the same house. The alarm was given that Mr. Marcy was dead ! He had just come in from a walk, and lying down upon the bed, expired. The room was soon filled with the boarders ; a physician was summoned : he searched for signs of life, and asked one of the ladies of my family to place her hand over his heart, as her more delicate touch might detect its throb. All was still. His eyes were wide open, and she closed them. In the course of the week Mrs. Pierce was to hold a levee, and she was so kind as to request me to assist in the recep tion. A few minutes before 12 M., the appointed hour, the President called for me, and we went into the East Room awaiting Mrs. Pierce, and the opening of the doors for com pany. We walked up and down the long apartment in silence : his thoughts I do not know ; but mine were such as these " What a sublime position does this man hold : the chosen Chief Magistrate of one of the most powerful nations on the earth ; in a few moments the doors will open, and ambassadors from distant kingdoms, senators, scholars, 'fair women and brave men ' will enter, pay their respects and retire." As such reflections were in my mind, he laid his hand on my shoulder and, as if he divined my thoughts, remarked : " After all, a man who can preach the gospel, and win men to Christ, holds the highest office on earth." In a few minutes we were in position, receiving the distin guished company. The day was brilliant, the dresses were elegant mooting costumes, the company included represen tatives of many courts and peoples. Mr. Pierce was a gen tleman of graceful manners, and Mrs. Pierce, very delicate in health, was an accomplished woman of the highest per- A WEEK IN THE WHITE HOUSE. 149 sonal worth. Sad, almost melancholy, she shrank from such a scene, in which duty held her, but she would be equal to her position. Two lads were presented, strangers and unattended. She greeted them kindly, almost tenderly, and as they turned away she looked at me with eyes full of tears, and said softly, " Ah, those boys, those dear boys." And there in the midst of all the splendor of that scene, with fashion, pride and state around her, the vision of her boy, her lost boy, her only child, had entered the hall, and her poor heart died within her as she thought of him and her buried love. She trembled as with an ague, and, at my suggestion, sat down until she regained composure. During the week that I passed in the President's house, I heard less of party and politics than would be heard in a day outside. At table, when leading statesmen were present, with conflicting views of public questions, it was proper to avoid such topics as would provoke discussion,. The con versation was, for the most part, on live subjects in litera ture, art, philosophy, and the progress of the age. Ex- Senator N. P. Tallmadge, of Dutchess County, who became a Spiritualist, had recently put forth a volume of revelations from statesmen and others in the spirit-world. After dinner, extracts were read by these living statesmen from the utter ances of Madison, Calhoun and others, and the general impression was that they had amazingly degenerated in intellectual force by their change of state. Even Mr. Tall madge, it was remarked, must have softened, or he could not have edited such twaddle and thought it sense. The Sabbath at the White House was wholly devoted to such pursuits as would mark a Christian home in New Eng land. No company was received. We went to church twice. The reading and conversation were in keeping with the day. In the evening I had a long conversation with Mrs. Pierce on the subject always uppermost in her mind : the boy that died. She told me but I cannot feel it to be proper to write the words of a fond mother, whose life was blighted in the hour of her brightest hope. 150 IREN&US LETTERS. Mr. and Mrs. Pierce have been dead several years. King David said, when his boy died, " I shall go to him." They have found their boy. L'ESSON FROM A SICK-ROOM. " Since Christ and we are one, Why should we doubt or fear ? Since he in heaven has fixed his throne, He'll fix his members there." Hearing that a friend of mine, a brother minister, whom I had long known and highly esteemed, was very ill, I made haste to go and see him. He had been suddenly attacked with pneumonia, a form of disease which has carried off so many of our friends this winter, and is one of the most dread ful scourges in our trying climate. But the crisis was past before I came, and he was evidently on the mend. " I was almost over the river," he said, as I took his hand ; " 1 thought I was crossing at one time, but it was not His will, and 1 am here yet : I am very glad to see you once more." 1 sat down by the bedside, and he looked me full in the face, with a sweet, loving smile, and then, to my surprise and delight, he said : " That letter of yours about manners in church : putting on their coats during the Doxology : how I did enjoy it !" It was a real pleasure to know that, in the sick-room, on a bed of pain and perhaps of death, though apprehension of that event was now over, the words that I had written, with no thought of their being read with such surroundings, had ministered, not for a moment only but for after thoughts, to one in trouble, and had given him something to think of and enjoy. And then I talked with him of his life-work and mine : how the shadows were lengthening as the sun was going down ; and what we had tried to do for God and our fel low-men ; how we had often been misunderstood and oftener misrepresented, but the Master knew it all, and in the stormi- LESSON FROM A SICK-ROOM. 151 est weather whispered to the soul, " It is I, be not afraid." And I learned much from the few sentences he spoke to me of his confidence in God when the end seemed to be at hand, and he thought death was at the door : " Nothing in my hand I bring, Simply to thy cross I cling." Years of service in one of the most self-denying of all the departments of Christian labor, though much in my sight, were nothing in his when he looked back on his work. He was ready to say, " When did I see Thee sick or in prison and came unto Thee ?" It was less than nothing when the light of eternity came in through the chinks of the falling tabernacle ! " Not what I have done," he might have said, "it is what Christ has done, and that alone : He saw me sick and he came and healed me : He saw me in prison and opened the door and brought me forth redeemed by his blood : He saw me naked and clothed me with his righteous ness : starving, and he fed me with the bread of Life Ever lasting." Then we went to this precious Saviour with our wants, and told him all we would, thanked him for the unspeakable gift of himself, and made a new dedication of ourselves to him, whether for death or for life ; for, living or dying, we would be the Lord's. To every sentence, every clause in these prayers, the sick man responded with fervent spirit, and pressed my hand in his, so that I knew his soul was in sympathy with mine, while we had communion with our common Saviour and Lord. " The fellowship of kindred minds Is like to that above." I have just come from this chamber of sickness, this holy communion with one of the saints, and I am almost ashamed to mention the one thing that ought to be known to under stand the fulness of the pleasure which this hour has given me. He is not of the same religious denomination with me. Is it not a very small thing to say ? And is it not a shame 152 IRENsKUS LETTERS. that I should write it, as having the least possible bearing upon the subject of Christian intercourse ? He and I are not of the same sect or sect-ion of the Church of Christ : that is all: we are both believers in Him, and therefore members of Him, and so members one of another. When he lies on a bed of pain, I suffer with him and want to take a part of his suf ferings, and yet, because we are not called by the same Chris tian name, it is thought by many that we are not in full sym pathy and intercommunion of soul. Four of us were at dinner this afternoon. The golden oranges were very large ; I divided one into four parts, each of us took a sect of it, and ate. It was the same orange of which we partook: it was equally sweet and refreshing and healthful to us all : and every one said, " What an exquisite orange this is ;" not " My orange is better than yours ;" not "Yours is no orange, mine is the only one that is good ;" not " Yours is only a sect, a part cut off, mine is the original fruit." No, there was no such nonsense at the table. We all partook of the root and fatness of the orange-tree, and knew in our own souls that it was the same fruit, as good for one as for another, and equally sweet to the taste. And as we were eating, I was saying to myself, that dear good brother whom I was holding by the hand an hour ago, while both of us put ours into the hands of the same atoning and only Saviour, is surely as near to me as if he were called by the same family name. And this was the lesson that I brought away from the sick-room of my friend and brother. It is good for the whole Christian Church. It is Christianity itself. Sad, indeed, that we must teach it as an elementary truth at this late day in the history of Christ's Kingdom. And sadder still it is that so many who profess and call themselves Christians are unable or unwilling to see that there is just as much of Christ in another sect of the Church as in the section to which they belong, and that all are Christ's who have been made partakers with him of "the divine nature." There is noth ing in this that requires or implies a loss of attachment to our own creeds or forms. They have their uses, and the older we grow, and the more we learn, the stronger becomes THE GREAT EXAGGERATOR. 153 every honest man's attachment to the doctrines and the methods which he has intelligently adopted and professed. Latitudinarianism and Liberalism are the pet names by which weak and ignorant and often bad men would conceal their hatred of the good and true. The holiest of all things is the right thing, and he who thinks he has the right will stick to it. But charity is kind. It endureth all things. It is love. And whoever has his heart filled with the spirit of the Master is my brother ; if he is ever so far away from me in his ways of worship, he is my brother, and has a place in my heart's best love. All this I have written you, as the lesson learned at the bedside of my brother minister this afternoon, and having put it upon paper, I will say Good-night. THE GREAT EXAGGERATOR. Riding up in a street-car, I was by the side of a young man who had several copies of a well-known weekly newspaper in his hand. He made conversation with me very freely and was disposed to be communicative. In response to my observation that he had a large supply of newspaper, he said that he was on this paper, handing me one of the lot. And when I showed some curiosity to know what depart ment of the journal he filled, he said, " It might, perhaps, be called the exaggeration department. I write an article every week which is to be a wonderful story, a narrative of remark able facts, not necessarily real, or true, but things that might possibly be true, and so will entertain the reader and aston ish him some." I was amused by the coolness with which he detailed his business, and asked him if there was anything of his in that line in the paper he had given me. " Oh yes," he replied, " I have been writing this week on the rats of Brazil : here it is." Here he opened the paper and called my attention to the 154 IREN&US LETTERS. part of it which he fills with his imagination and invention. It described with great minuteness the immense numbers and size of the rats in Brazil they grow as big as dogs, are very fierce, attacking children often, and are the dread of animals t\vice their size. Illustrations were given of their ferocity and great strength, and the measures adopted to reduce their numbers, if they could not be exterminated. When I asked him what was the source of his information, he said frankly he knew nothing about it, but had made it up, knowing very well it would be interesting to read, and yet nobody would care enough about it to inquire into its truth and detect the exaggeration. " I am now writing," he continued, " another paper on 1 the Cockroaches of Japan.' Do you know whether there are any in that curious country?" My studies in natural history had not been directed that way, and I told him frankly I did not know that a cockroach had ever landed on that shore, but I had no doubt they were abundant there as here. "Well, it don't make much difference whether there are any or not : as I know their habits in this country, I shall give them many that are peculiar to Japan, where the people do everything in just the opposite way from ours : so I will make the cockroach a delightful domestic animal, which the ladies are fond of playing with as a pet, &c., you see ?" "Yes, I see, but do not greatly admire the work you are doing : a man with genius enough to invent such stuff is fit for something better, more elevating and useful, Besides, what's the difference between this and lying?" " All the difference in the world : this is harmless and amusing: people love to read wonderful stories. Perhaps you call DeFoe a liar, and John Bunyan, and Cervantes, and Walter Scott, and Dickens : they are novelists : authors of fiction : so am I ! All my stories are fiction, and, as the great authors I have named did not expect to be understood as writing actual facts, I am so much better than they that I want to be believed, and so I confine myself to what might be true but is not." THE GREAT EXAGGERATOR. 155 By this time we had reached Fourth Street, and the great exaggerator was obliged to leave the car, as his factory was located there, and I saw him no more. But I have since seen and heard, and read, many in the same line of business, whose habit of exaggeration is quite as large and fearful as this newspaper-man's. Some of them are preachers. They cannot make a simple statement of truth, in language that everybody can under stand, and in terms that commend themselves to the hearty confidence of the hearer. But they pile up the agony, with all their might, making terrible more terrible, and lovely so ineffably sweet that neither one nor the other is credible. In revivalists, and travelled speakers, and the sensational men generally, I observe this same habit in full flow. All their geese are swans. All their good people are angels. Even their reports of work done, souls saved, and reforma tions accomplished, are not in strict accordance with the facts. Sitting on a platform last week at an anniversary meeting, while a speaker was careering splendidly along the brilliant line of his rhetoric, with a pyrotechnic display of facts and figures glorious if true, and he believed them so, a friend near by whispered to me : " I wonder if he wouldn't discount that fifty per cent for cash !" My friend was in the commercial line evidently, and intended to ask me if it would not be safe to take off fifty per cent, or one half of that, for the sake of sober truth the cash. Writers as well as public speakers draw the long bow. Even in the serious business of delineating the character of a departed friend, some persons have been known to indulge in eulogy justly liable to the suspicion of being somewhat overdrawn. Women are not wholly exempt from this tendency to hyperbole. As a mouse is to them often more terrible than a lion, so they magnify trifles into mountains and hug their delusions as positive realities. Men and women indulge in 156 IRE N^. US LETTERS. this habit of exaggeration until they come to believe what they say, and thus are victims of their own folly and sin. When charged with misrepresentation, they defend their bad habit and resent the suspicion of falsehood as an insult. Even when convinced of their fault they fall into it in their confession, and repeat themselves, as did the minister whose brethren rebuked him for his habit of exaggeration, and filled with shame and repentance, he cried, "Yes, brethren, I know my fault. I have tried to correct it ; I have shed barrels of tears over it." It is no excuse for this or any other bad habit to say of the offender, " It is his way." No man has a right to continue in a bad way. It is his duty, when the wrong is shown him, to repent and reform. It is just as wicked to be an exag- gerator in the pulpit, on the platform, at the dinner table, as in writing for the sensational newspaper on the rats of Brazil or the cockroaches of Japan. Dean Stanley intimated, when he was among us, that the authors of America have the reputation abroad of being given to exaggeration. I do not think the habit is Ameri can. It would be quite as easy to find examples of it in British authors, and French and German, for it is a fault of human nature that it is never content with things as they are, and always is prone to make molehills into mountains. " A plain, unvarnished tale" is more forcible and useful than the inflated style which often passes for eloquence. And so I have been taught by my companion in the car to despise the exaggerator. When I hear him in the pulpit or out of it, I ask myself if he would not take off fifty per cent for cash. WHEN IT RAINS, LET IT RAIN, 157 WHEN IT RAINS, LET IT RAIN. My father was one of the rural clergy : a country pastor. It was his habit when he went from home to exchange pulpits with a distant brother, or to attend Synod, to take with him a few sermons. For them he had a pasteboard case, into which they would slide, and travel without being folded. On one side of this case he had written in a bold hand a Latin motto, of which I may write to you hereafter, and on the other side these words . " WHEN IT RAINS, LET IT RAIN." Long before I knew what they were intended to teach, I spelled them out, and wondered what difference it made whether he let it rain or not : it was not likely that it would rain more or less because he had a will about it. But as I grew older, and perhaps a little wiser, I began to see the meaning and the value of the motto, and to lay it up in my heart and to practise it in my life. I soon found, also, that ministers have special need of the virtue it teaches in the matter of rainy Sundays. They make preparation for the pulpit, with much care, labor and hope. They have a special object perhaps in view, and are very anxious to see all their people in their places when they come with this message from the mouth of God. They rise on the Sabbath morning, and lo ! the rain is descending, the floods are coming, and it is certain there will be more pews than people in church. What shall he do ? The sermon is not for those who will turn out in the rain, so much as it is for those who will cer tainly stay at home. He is tempted to fret at the weather. The discontented missionary to Nineveh, when there was too much sun, exclaimed, " I do well to be angry," and the country pastor is ready to be angry because it rains. Then comes up the much-argued question, " Shall I preach my sermon prepared for to-day, rain or shine, people or no people, or shall I take an old one, or preach an off-hand dis course : on the principle that anything will do for a rainy day ?" The wise pastor has no invariable rule on the sub ject. Sometimes he does the one thing, and again he does 158 IRENMUS LETTERS. the other, according to circumstances. And those of his people who go to church in all weathers say., " Our minis ter preaches his best sermons on rainy Sundays." They do not know the secret of it, which is that they who have the heart to brave a storm, and go to the house of God, are sure to find its word and ordinances sweet to their taste, yea, sweeter than the honeycomb. Like wine on the lees well refined, it rejoices the heart. When Dean Swift's congregation was so small as to include only the sexton and himself, he began the service, instead of " Dearly beloved brethren, the Scripture moveth," etc., by saying, " Dearly beloved Roger, the Scripture," etc. The Dean was not a very serious preacher, and with him this was a pleasantry. But many a preacher, whose audience was nearly as few as his, has preached with power and great effect, to the glory of God. The jailer was the only hearer when the gospel made him cry out, " What shall I do ?" The Great Teacher himself was willing to teach one at a time. And the minister who dismisses all thought about numbers, and just goes onward preaching the Word to many or to few, trusting in God to make it effectual to accomplish that whereunto it is sent, will, in the end, do the best work for the Master. My father faithfully acted upon this principle, and always let it rain without worrying himself about it. He never stopped for a storm. He said it was no part of his business to bring the people out when it rained, but he would do his whole duty in the pulpit, and they who heard and they who did not would have their respective accounts to render. This was the quiet conviction of a strong, brave man, who did not undertake to regulate the weather or to manage the affairs of the universe. He was content to do his duty, and he just did it. The rule is as good for the people as it is for the pastor, and quite as good in all the affairs of this life of ours as it is on Sunday. How often even good people say: "I'm so sorry it rains to-day: I would rather have it rain all the week than on Sunday." But that rain which shuts them in WHEN IT RAINS, LET IT RAIN. 159 the house on the Sabbath, and deprives them of the means of grace in the sanctuary, would not hinder them from going to their daily business or to a kettledrum. Nor is it the weather only that worries the souls of dis contented people. They are never pleased with things as they are, and would like to have the ordering of events in their own hands. But if they had, they would then com plain of having so much to do, they have no time for rest. And it js altogether likely if they had the management of the weather, and everything else, they would not have it any more to their minds 'than it is now when Infinite wisdom directs it for the greatest good of the greatest number. It is a fact that they who fret the most about the little troubles and vexations of every-day life are they who have the least faculty for making things go better. Real executive ability and force belong to persons of a calm, equable and steady mind. Such people take things as they come : if it rains they let it, and, with umbrella and rubbers, go about the work that is to be done ; if company comes unexpectedly to dinner, they give them the best they have, and with the sauce of cheerfulness make a dinner of herbs more enjoy able than a stalled ox ; if the china falls they smile at the last remark as if they did not hear the awful crash ; or when the market falls, and real estate and fancy stocks, and the price of corn, go rushing amain down, they possess their souls in patience, saying it will all come around right, by and by : when it rains, let it rain. This spirit of acquiescence in the divine will is in har mony with the use of all right means to produce such results as our judgment approves. But it also forbids impatience, grumbling, fretfulness, the sulks, despondency ; and it re quires us in all things, even in the smallest, to say with reve rence and childlike submission, " Not my will, but Thine be done." 160 IREN^EUS LETTERS. WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT: HIS RELIGIOUS VIEWS AND THE REV. DR. ALDEN'S THOUGHTS ON THE " RELIGIOUS LIFE." New and beautiful light has been shed on the inner life and thought of our late illustrious poet and friend, Mr. Bryant. This is the lovely, leafy month of June, the month in which he wished to die and be buried. His wish was granted. It is now just a year since we buried him by the side of her whom he loved in youth and old age. It is natural, and it is well, to think of him at such a time as this. And it is the sweetest of all pleasures, in connection with his memory, to think of him as one who trusted with child like faith in the work and worth of Jesus Christ for salvation, and having entered into rest through that living way, is now a partaker of the promises. The Rev. Dr. Joseph Alden, President of the Normal Col lege, Albany, enjoyed the friendship of Mr. Bryant, and when he had prepared a brief, but very clear and evangelical treatise on "The Religious Life," he submitted the manuscript to Mr. Bryant, and requested him to write a few pages by way of introduction. This request was cheerfully complied with, and it is a remarkable fact that these few pages, written just at the close of his long life, and left unfinished on his desk when death suddenly summoned him, contain a more distinct and satisfactory declaration of his religious opinions than he has given elsewhere in the thousands of pages that flowed from his prolific mind. It was not new to me that Mr. Bryant held tenderly and truly to that view of the atoning work of Christ which is inconsistent with the Unitarian idea of the person and office of the Saviour. When in Italy twenty-five years ago I learned the circumstances under which Mr. Bryant came to partake of the Lord's Supper with her by whose side his mortal now sleeps waiting the resurrection. They were in Naples with an invalid lady friend, who was visited in her illness by the chaplain of the Scotch Presbyterian church. It was sup- WILLIAM CULLEW BRYANT. 1 6 1 posed that her death was near, and as she had expressed a desire to receive the Holy Communion, the pastor made an appointment for its administration. In the meantime Mrs. Bryant informed her husband of the expected service, and asked him if he would be pleased to participate with them. He said that he would be very glad to do so if the pastor thought it proper, and for this purpose he conversed fully as to his views and feelings with the Presbyterian minister, who encouraged him to unite with the family in this touching memorial. Mr. Bryant did so, and on his return from Europe, being a regular attendant at the Presbyterian church at Roslyn, where he and Mrs. B. are buried, he came regularly and devoutly to the Lord's table, though he never removed his membership from the Unitarian church of which Dr. Bel lows is pastor. Dr. Ely, the Roslyn minister, was a college friend of mine, and being intimate with Mr. Bryant, often related to me his conversations, with the assurance that Mr. Bryant was a humble and sincere believer in the evangelical system. Dr. Alden's little book is a vigorous assertion of the true idea of a religious life, the way to it, by repentance and faith. The author shows faith to be something more than believing that Christ died for sinners, and he explains that "one has faith in Christ when he trusts him as his personal Saviour." He teaches, also, that " the influence of the Holy Spirit is ne cessary to the exercise of repentance and faith." And again, he says " if a man seeks to conform his whole life to the Divine will, looking to God for help, and relying on the merits of that Christ as the ground of his acceptance with God, he has a right to regard himself as a converted man." These are the opening sentiments of a brief work on the religious life, the life of God in the soul of man, the indwelling of the Spirit bringing to the surface and producing the fruits of holy obe dience to the law of God. It would be well for the Church, well for individuals, for each private Christian, to get this book and make its practical principles a part of daily experience. But how did Mr. Bryant take it ? He read it in manu script ; and he very carefully says that, as to those sentiments 1 62 IRENJEUS LETTERS. in the book about which there may be " a divergence of views among Christian denominations," he will not express an opinion. And he adds ; " But I can only regret that there should be any who have disowned the humble and simple faith which, carried out into the daily acts of life, produces results so desirable, so important to the welfare of mankind in the present state of existence, and so essential to a prepa ration for the life upon which we are to enter when we pass beyond the grave." Then this great poet, philanthropist and philosopher laments the tendency of modern scientists to turn away the attention of men from the teachings of the gospel, and to look with scorn upon the Christian system. Now I am about to copy a passage which, in the value of its testimony, in the beauty of its expression, and its evangel ical spirit, was never excelled in the same number of lines by any uninspired man : "This character, of which Christ was the perfect model, is in itself so attractive, so ' altogether lovely,' that I cannot describe in language the admiration with which I regard it ; nor can I express the gratitude I feel for the dispensation which bestowed that example on mankind, for the truths which he taught and the sufferings he endured for our sakes. I tremble to think what the world would be without Him. Take away the blessing of the advent of his life and the blessings purchased by his death, in what an abyss of guilt would man have been left ! It would seem to be blotting the sun out of the heavens to leave our system of worlds in chaos, frost, and darkness. " In my view of the life, the teachings, the labors, and the sufferings of the blessed Jesus, there can be no admiration too profound, no love of which the human heart is capable too warm, no gratitude too earnest and deep of which He is justly the object. It is with sorrow that my love for Him is so cold, and my gratitude so inadequate. It is with sorrow that I see any attempt to put aside His teachings as a delusion, to turn men's eyes from his example, to meet with doubt and denial the story of his life. For my part, if I thought that the religion of skepticism were to gather strength and pre vail and become the dominant view of mankind, I should despair of the fate of mankind in the years that are yet to come." I have read that passage over and over again with ever- increasing admiration and gratitude : my mind consents to his acknowledgment of human guilt, its need of pardon, of WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT. 163 the sufferings and death of Christ "endured for our sakes," "purchasing" the blessings without which we would have been left in an abyss of darkness. And my eyes fill with tears of sympathy when I hear Bryant saying, " It is with sorrow that my love for Him is so cold, and my gratitude so inadequate." To the wall of my library, in which I am writing, I lookup and see the portrait of Bryant, serene, sublime, in its thought ful, penetrating gaze into the future. It is as if taken while he was composing the lines which I have just quoted from his pen. Underneath it hangs, framed, a note he wrote to me, with the gift of a poem that he copied, at great length, for me with his own hand when he was 80 years old. He seems very near, when I see him in the light of his beautiful life, his trustful faith in Christ as his only Saviour, and his earnest expectation of immortality. It is good to bear in mind that outside of the blessed con gregation who are called by the name we bear, there are mul titudes innumerable whom Christ knows as his and loves with dying and undying affection. The system of religion on which Unitarianism exists as a Church, and the system of Romanism, appear to me utterly incompatible with the Christian religion as Bryant explains it, as Keble and New man sang it in their spiritual songs. But in the mazes of error in which even devout minds are sometimes involved, there are members of the body of Christ, of Christ's Church, and whoever anywhere, and under whatever system, bewild ered, oppressed, or rejoicing, feels himself to be a sinner par doned and saved by the sufferings and death of Jesus Christ, that man, though he were the Pope of Rome or the thief on the cross, I love to call my brother and a member of the Church of Christ. 164 IREN&US LETTERS. WARRIORS ON WAR. While I am writing this letter a funeral pageant is passing in sight from my study window. In the Governor's Room in the City Hall the dead body of Major-General Hooker has been lying in state. Crowds have been going in to look on the face of the soldier as he lies A -warrior taking his rest, With his martial cloak around him. Now they are bringing the coffin down the steps. The procession forms. Banners are draped, and droop in honor of the dead. The pageant passes on. Five minutes ago the Park was thronged. It is deserted now. Dust to dust. In August last I spent a Sabbath among the White Mountains, at the Profile House, with Gen. Hooker. He spoke to me of his mother, of her fondness for the New York Observer, and of the religious instruction she gave him, and he was not able to say that he had lived up to the lessons of his childhood. " But the truth is," he said, " a man cannot be good, and be a fighting man. He must have the devil in him. To kill one another, men must have their blood up, and then they are just like devils. Now there's General ," naming one of the generals of the last war, " he is too good a man to command an army : when two armies come in collision, he is afraid somebody will get hurt : he can't bear to have blood shed : he's a good man, very good, everybody loves him, but he has not enough of the devil to be a good general." I sought to take another view of the subject, and argued that many splendid generals had been men of high moral and religious character, who pursued the profession of arms as a duty to their country, regarding war as a necessary evil, and the last resort of government. " Very true," he said, "but when it comes to fighting, all the devil that is in a man must come out." And then the conversation took a turn for the better. He WARRIORS ON WAR. 165 had been listening to one of the discussions for which the piazza, of the Profile House is famous. Every day, Sundays not excepted, a group of lawyers, clergymen, statesmen, and men of business, get into a war of words on some question of ethics, science, or politics, the first remark made by any one being challenged, defended or argued, until the whole company is by the ears. On this Sunday afternoon some of us wished to keep the debate on a Sabbath day track, and the morning sermon by Dr. Bridgman furnished the topic. Some one made an observation on the folly of prayer, which was like a red flag before a bull, and we of the orthodox persuasion rushed into the arena, ready to do battle for the truth against all comers. It was to this discussion Gen. Hooker had been listening in silence, sitting out of the circle, unnoticed by the company. He was infirm, his tongue unready for service, but his mind was clear and his hearing perfect. He said to me the next morning: " You carried too many guns for those fellows yesterday. I never listened to a conversation in my life with so much interest : but you had the advantage in being at home on the subject, while the other side were all at sea." This gave me an opening to say a word or two to the Gen eral, not as pointed, perhaps, as they would have been had I known they were the last between us. But they were. We parted at Bethlehem, and I did not see him again. As they are bringing his body down the stone steps of the City Hall to bear him to the house of God, and thence to his sepulchre in the West, I remember his words with a shuddering distinctness, and I ask myself if it be indeed true that a man must have the devil in him to be a great captain and a good soldier. Well, I do not believe it. I could fill this sheet with the names and story of illustrious generals, whose gentleness and firmness, genius and success were never associated with the fierce, fiery, dare-devil ferocity which Gen. Hooker regarded as an essential element of the great military man. The brilliant, dashing, impetuous chieftain rarely, if ever, is also the sub lime, self-contained commander who organizes campaigns 166 IREN&US LETTERS. and decisive battles. Seldom, indeed, are all the elements of the true soldier blended as they were in our Washington, or in the British Wellington. Perhaps Alexander or Caesar, or Napoleon, was a more splendid general than either of them. But the last three were selfish and ambitious: the first two were simply patriots, and having served and saved their country, laid down their arms without a stain on their names. The devil had much to do with the three, very little with the two. War is an awful evil, almost always a gigantic crime. It may be necessary as the last resort for the preservation of national life, when the madness or the folly of an enemy requires his destruction. To maintain government, the enemies of it as every law-breaker is its enepiy must be restrained or punished : and so the army is the nation's police, essential while bad men live to plot and murder. But it is high time that Christian nations, like Great Bri tain and the United States, pursued the arts of peace, and so lived with the barbarous peoples near them, or far off, as to avoid the horrors of war. It is not true that we or the British people are guiltless before God for the blood that is shed in reducing savage or semi-civilized peoples to submis sion. If the lust of territory or gold inspired the aggression that provoked resistance, and thus precipitated conflict, when inquisition for blood is made it will be required at the hands of those who kindled the fire. In all my reading of history and biography, ancient or modern, I have read nothing more awful than the battle scenes when the Russians were first beaten by the Turks in 1877; and the storming of Badajoz by the British in 1812. Yet the history of the human race is a long register of such lurid and frightful scenes. Gen. Hooker was right when he said that the devil is the chief instigator of war. Hell must be the only place in the universe where such scenes give delight. It is vain, perhaps, to indulge the fond hope that the day is near when nations will settle their disputes by reason and law. Yet the international conferences, freedom of THOU OF LITTLE FAITH. 167 commerce, frequent intercourse, advanced intelligence, and the power of the gospel, not the least though named last, are doing a work that must gradually make war more difficult among civilized, commercial and Christian peoples. We may hope in God that the future is not a far future when the nations will learn war no more. Gen. Hooker's funeral pageant brings to mind the various meetings I have had with him, and among others one of the most enjoyable dinners. A dozen guests were at table, of whom all were military men except myself. In the midst of animated conversation one of the generals let slip an oath ; when our host, by way of apology, said to me very dis tinctly : " You are probably not accustomed to that at table." " No," I replied, " but I see the great necessity of my being here." This was received with a hearty laugh, and during three or four hours that followed, there was no more of that. If there be any defence for war, there is no possible apology for profane swearing. It is said to be a military habit, more common in the army not in Flanders only, but in every army than elsewhere. Yet it has less excuse than almost any other vice, and no vice has any. O THOU OF LITTLE FAITH ! One of my friends is in a bad way. Once he was poor ; now he is above the fear of want. When he was so poor that life was a daily struggle to live ; when those depending on him for bread would be left destitute were his health to fail, then his soul was calm and joyful in the God of his strength, for his faith was like a mountain, and his peace like a river. His faith did not hinder his works, but with the firm persuasion that God helps those who help themselves, he wrought out success, and is now well-to-do in the world. And here comes the mystery of his experience : he has not 1 68 IRENsEUS LETTERS. the same faith in God that he had when he had nothing else ! When he had no money he had faith : with the increase of wealth he lost his childlike trust in God. He does not enjoy the comforts of religion as he did when the cares and anxieties of unsuccessful business might have worried him night and day but for the grace that gave him comfort. He simply verified the promise of strength according to his day. One night, on the Mediterranean, the ship was supposed to be in great peril. The Italian captain and all hands, hav ing lashed everything fast that had not been swept overboard by the waves and tempest, betook themselves to prayer. It was a long agony with the storm. Darkness made the scene more terrible and increased the hazards of the night. It was evident enough that there was no help in man. In that supreme hour the principle of faith had its perfect work, as it does not in fair weather and smooth water. Not faith in the strength of the vessel or the skill of its master, but faith in the wisdom and goodness of God, who will do what is best, so that life or death will be the highest good and most to be desired. That gives peace to a troubled soul, and the excitement of such an hour sometimes rouses the mind into a state of almost joy. This is the fulfilment of the promise, "My grace is sufficient for thee" not to remove the trouble or danger, but to give courage and comfort in the hour of peril. How hardly shall they that have riches enter into the kingdom ; they hinder in these two ways : men trust in them and so forget God, and men are troubled about them lest they lose what they have, and thus are turned away from God. This is one, and the chief reason why the soul often prospers more in the pursuit of wealth than in the possession of it. Every sensible Christian knows that except the Lord build the house the workmen labor in vain : unless God pros per our industry and skill.our diligence in business will be of no avail, and so, if we are wise and true, we cast ourselves, with childlike confidence, on the arm of the Almighty and work with a will, knowing that it is not of him that willeth or runneth, but God who giveth the increase. The sovereign THOU OF LITTLE FAITH. 169 will, wisdom, power and love of God are as truly to be felt and seen in the success or failure of one's business, as in the matter of his life and health. Yet there are many Christians who kiss the rod when a lovely child is removed by death, but will not recognize a Father's hand in the loss of all their worldly goods. In making money, a good man may ear nestly and sincerely seek God's blessing on the labor of his hands, but when the money has come, he is in great danger of saying to himself, " Soul take thine ease, God has done all you asked him to do, and you need not be anxious any longer." The boy had this spirit in him who said his prayers always on going to bed, but never in the morning, giving as his reason for this neglect, that a smart boy could take care of himself in the day-time. On the pendant leaf of a text-book before me is this passage : " For I have learned in whatsoever state I am, therewith to be content." And the soul that, like a bird away from its nest, is uneasy until it finds its young and its home, has as hard work to be content with riches as with out. Money does not touch the spot where religion lives in the human breast. The heart of the poor man and the heart of the rich are alike open to the grace of God, both have their own temptations and difficulties : it is a question, " Which is the more exposed to the assaults of evil," " which is the more congenial to the life of God ?" So Agur rea soned, and so he prayed that neither the one nor the other might be his lot. If we had our choice of the three estates, nothing, something, or everything I reckon we would all take the last and run the risk of being hurt by having too much of a good thing. But the compensations of God's providence are wonderful. As a blind man has his sense of feeling exquisitely refined, so that it becomes the inlet of pleasure and a means of usefulness unknown in the day when the light of heaven shone upon him, so the man who has lost his property by the depression of trade and the shrinkage of values, may have his heart enlarged, his faith in God tried and purified, his joy increased a hundred-fold by reason of 170 IRE MM US LETTERS. the rich communications of the Spirit such as were never his in the days when corn and wine were increased. Even so, and more marvellous, is the experience of the Christian who grows heavenward as he lays up treasures on earth. It is possible so to do. There is a high and holy sense in which it is sinful and dangerous to hoard money. It is always sinful to be miserly. Wealth is a power for good, and therefore may be sought, and, when obtained, may be a help to the highest kind of usefulness and happiness. It is blessed to give. Money answereth all things, And in the right use of wealth the good man gets the heart-glow the poor never feel. And so it comes to pass that the higher life of man on earth, the true living above the world while living in it, may be enjoyed when a man has no money, when he is making money, and when he has become a man of wealth. As the furnace of adversity may purify the Christian, he may grow in grace while tried by poverty, or disappointment and failure in business. In the storm his faith may be tried and greatly strengthened. In the mount of prosperity, his soul filled with gratitude and the spirit of self-consecration, he may exult in God, from whom cometh every good gift. In all circumstances, conditions, and changes, faith in God brings contentment and peace. It is not of him that willeth, but of God who giveth ; and to them who trust in him and do his will He gives all needful things. Good when He gives and good when He withholds, blessed be His name forever- more. TWO PICTURES: IDEAL, BUT REAL. In the morning of her career she made choice of the life that now is. She shut her eyes upon the glories of the better land where are pleasures forevermore. In the domestic circle, of which TWO PICTURES: IDEAL, BUT REAL. Ift she should have been the light and joy, her wilfulness, sel fishness and impatience of parental authority and counsel made her a living anxiety and grief to parents and friends who would have won her to their hearts by the love she put away. In school she despised knowledge, counted every loss of time and chance of improvement a decided gain, and gloried in freedom from wholesome restraints : that liberty which to her seemed the essence of enjoyment, but which is the door of licentiousness and shame. She was now in the bloom of youthful beauty, gifted with graces of form and fea ture to win the admiration of the world. And forth she went, the gayest of the gay, and rushed into life to quaff its nectar and revel amidst its sweets and flowers. A few brief years after, and a good man met her on the streets of a great city, a lost thing, outcast, homeless, blasted, ruined, all but damned. She knew him, a friend of other days, but no trace of her former self was there and she was strange to him. She told him the story of her gay, wild, joyous, reckless, sinful, wretched, downward career, and then begged for a pittance with which to buy the drink that should first madden and then stupefy, anything to quiet the cries of memory that rung in the ear of her frantic soul. It was in vain he pointed to the door of escape from the doom to which she was hastening. She spurned his proffered kind ness, and told him that all she wanted of life was to be rid of it, and the greatest good for her was to die. He gave her money, and in an hour she was senseless. She woke but to repeat the scene. Lost to all feeling of shame, without conscience or hope, she sank from one dark depth of woe and crime to another, till she was found at last a bloated, diseased, disfigured, loathsome corpse, exposed for a while in the Morgue, but no friend appeared to reclaim the disgust ing remains that were hurried away to the charnel-house and hid out of sight in a pauper's grave. And is that the end ? Would God it were ! But this life of ours is an endless life. And who is bold enough to lift the veil and watch the career of that fallen angel into the realms of lost souls ? Who shall report the sorrows and 17* IREN&US LETTERS. the shame of one who beholds afar off the blessedness of the good, while she reaps the fruit of her own doings, and forever, as she contemplates her eternal loss, exclaims in those saddest of all sad words, " // might have been." " I might have been pure, and holy, and wise, and useful and happy! I might have been like an angel among the angels, washed in the blood of the Lamb, amid the seraphs who continually do cry, ' Holy, holy, holy :' but I am here, a wicked, miserable thing ; and the gulf between me and them is impassable. My forever is begun. This is my endless life." II. Another vision rises. She was the sunlight of the home where parental kindness and filial love anticipated heaven. Endowed of God with fair powers of mind, she gave the spring-time of life to pre paration for the future. Her soul was united by faith in Christ to the Infinite Father ; loving God in the person of his Son, and in all the manifestations of himself in his works and word, she was in union also with all that is lovely in the world around her. She stored her mind with useful knowledge : trained her spirit to obedience by patient acceptance of every duty : bearing with cheerfulness the burdens laid upon her. Within her own spirit, silently and alone, she fought a great fight with self ; with passion and pride, and love of ease and pleasure : pleasures falsely so called, the foam on the deep sea of life : the frivolous amuse ments well enough for the pastime of an hour to recreate the wearied soul, but miserable as a purpose and end. Life to her was serious : life was earnest. She would be and do for others, and so become like Him who loved us and gave himself for us. The refined, cultured, Christian woman, the noble wife and mother, she took her place in the sphere which Providence assigned her ; doing, day by day, what her hands found to do ; lightening the burdens of others, minis tering to their wants with unfaltering care ; shedding, as from angels' wings, the fragrance of her worth on every path she TEN DAYS ON THE SHIP. . 173 trod, winning all hearts by ways and words of gentleness and grace. The almighty power of love was wielded by her fair hands. God is love, and she dwelt in God, and by him sub dued all things unto herself. Sorrows gathered round her and covered her as with a cloud. But the face of Him who walked in the furnace with his children, illumined the cloud, and out of it came a voice saying, " Fear not, for I have redeemed thee." Her power reached the springs of effort in every department of useful Christian work, and by her agency the ignorant were taught, the poor were fed and clothed, the sick were healed, the sad were comforted, and this bright beautiful world was made more bright, more beautiful, by her being in it. To those who knew her, she never gave a pang until she came to die, and then they sorrowed only that earth was to lose what heaven stooped to take. Angels had waited long to have their own, and hovered on willing wings, above her couch, to bear her to their home on high. Hark, they whisper ! angels say Sister Spirit, come away. With cheerful voice and smiling face she answered, " Lend, lend your wings I mount, I fly," and passed within the veil. * * * TEN DAYS ON THE SHIP. And here's a hand for you from beyond the sea I A floating hospital, a floating hotel, a little world in a bark on the ocean ! We had not been out a day before three of every four yes, five out of every six were sick, down sick, miserably sick, and helpless, too. There is no remedy known to man that cures this dreadful malady. We were very 174 IREN^EUS LETTERS. closely packed at dinner ; the crowd so great that each inch at the table was measured, and we were put as close as sardines, or pickles in the Reckhow jars. But when next morning came, the long rows of empty benches told the sad story of sorrow on the sea. As in wisdom's path, there was only " here and there a traveller." And he who was there had a look of stern defiance on his brow, or of woe-begone-ness, that be spoke the coming storm. There is no rank so high, no digestion so strong, no will so stubborn, but it may have to yield to this foul despot of the sea. A few men, with no bowels of pity, are exempt, and, true to their nature, they have no compassion on their wretched neighbors. They insist that it is all in your disposition ; just brace up and not mind it ; stir about ; keep moving and it will all pass over. It does pass over the side of the ship. And you may be ready to pass over also, but these strong-minded sea-dogs laugh at the calamities of their best friends, and are proud and happy in inverse proportion to the misery of others. When I was abroad, ten years ago, a man from our country was getting up a company to supply ships with a chair of his invention, in which whoever sat should be free from this internal disorder. It was to be screwed into the floor of the deck, and the passenger was to be strapped into the chair, and the theory of the thing was that the man would partake of the motion of the ship, and being part and parcel of it, would not be disturbed. The inventor would have earned a seat in the Department of the Interior, had his invention proved to be what he promised. But these ten years have rolled by, and ships roll, and the seas roll, and men who go down to the sea in ships are as sick of the sea as before, and no chairs are yet made in which the wayfaring man may sit and say, " I shall take mine ease." In the dead of night, above the roar of the billows and the rattle and thumping of the engines, breaks on the ear of the wakeful passenger the groan and the retch of some poor body in her agony, and when the morning comes a concert of voices celebrates the sufferings of those who have waked only to renew their misery. TEN DA YS ON THE SHIP. i 75 Yet to most travellers all this is transitory, " The darkest day, live till to-morrow, will have passed away." The ship that was a floating hospital becomes a great hotel, a house of entertainment, and the amount of eating and drinking done is something fearful ! The appetite is sharpened by the strong, salt air. High health follows the brief illness. The system, thoroughly renovated by the strange process, comes up with a bound, and the man who was yesterday as limp as a rag, has the maw of a tiger, and comes to dinner as to his prey after a famine. It is dinner all day. He eats at nine in the morning, and calls it breakfast ; at twelve he lunches, but he dines heartily at the same time ; at four the regula tion dinner comes on, and he attacks it as if famished and afraid that the larder would give out; at six he takes tea and many other things ; and at eight, nine, ten, and so on, he takes his supper, the heartiest meal in the day, for now he has no prospect of another until breakfast, and he must live through the night some way. And so he eats to live and lives to eat. Eating is the grand thing to do. There are other entertainments : he may play shuffleboard on the deck, and cards in the cabin ; see the sailors at blind-man's- buff, and at bear ; get up a concert in the steerage, and kill time in many ways known only to those who are accustomed to " life on the ocean wave ;" but after all there is nothing for him that takes the place of eating, and when he goes through five meals a day of twelve hours, there is little time left for anything else, especially if he tarries long at the wine, as the manner of some is. SABBATH AT SEA. The Scythia left port on Wednesday, and by the Sunday following, the ship's company, some five hundred souls in all, were in good health, and welcomed a bright Sabbath morning in May. Notices were posted that divine service would be held in the main saloon, and as several ministers of the gospel were on board it was reasonable to expect that we would have preaching. But the Cunard line belongs to the Established Church of England. And it is one of the 176 IREN&VS LETTERS. peculiarities of the religion of that venerable Church, that a sea captain who is no saint, and it may be is quite the reverse, may conduct divine service, pronounce the absolution, which is specially a ministerial office, and the benediction also the Apostolic benediction J I have preached the gospel on a Cunarder, after the Episcopal service was read ; and any one of the clergymen on board would have been happy to do so on this occasion, had we been requested by the captain, who is also the chaplain of his own ship. But he chose to keep the thing in his own hands, and to do the religious as well as the nautical service of the vessel. And he did it very well. At the hour appointed^ a few passengers assembled, perhaps a fourth part of them, not more r a dozen seamen filed in, and took their seats, for this service is designed for the crew, not for the passengers ; the captain sat in a chair, and, neither rising nor kneeling, he read the lessons, prayers, &c., for the day, including petitions for the Queen of England, the President of the United States, Prince Albert, and all the Royal household. He is a good reader. I have heard many clergymen read much worse. Indeed, it is rare to hear the service read so well. Good reading is less common than good speaking. But there is such a sense of incongruity in a sea captain's leading the devotions of a public assembly when there are ministers present whose duty it is to preach the Word, that one is indisposed to profit. It requires an effort to be reconciled to the situation. After service, which was very short, the passengers spent their Sunday as to each one seemed good in his own eyes. Whether there are any rules and regulations for the observ ance of the day, I do not know ; but it was pleasant to observe that many things regarded lawful and proper on other days, were laid aside by common consent, and the hours passed by as in a well-regulated Christian household. No cards were played in the saloons. Indeed, all games and pastimes were omitted, and reading, conversation, walking, and talking, whiled away the hours. Perhaps the dinner was rather extra. In the evening some of the company joined in singing sacred songs, old familiar hymns and tunes, TEN DAYS ON THE SHIP. 177 and some of the popular revival melodies were welcomed with great favor, showing how deep a hold they have on the universal heart. And this ship is a little world, a floating world. As the great globe is but a speck in the ocean of infinity, and floats in the hand of Him who made it, with its endless variety of life and interest and destiny, so this ship, a mere dot on the great ocean, tossed like an egg-shell on the waves that would not be parted for a minute if the whole vessel were to go down into the fathomless chambers below, is a world in miniature, with a countless variety of hope and business and purpose and everlasting destiny. There is scarcely a rank or condition of men that has not its representative within these wooden walls. There are sixty nurses and children on board. And it doth not yet appear what they shall be. The British Minister is on his way from Washington to report to Her Majesty, his sovereign. Several newly-married pairs are out on their first voyage, life all before them. The great majority are men of business seeking the pot of gold at the rainbow's foot. And the poor invalids, tired of one side of the earth, are trying to find on another what, thus far, they have sought in vain. Trying to live. All passions play on this little stage : petty ambitions, jealousies, rivalries, and the gentle courtesies, sweet friendships, and the kind civilities of life, are just as pronounced, in their deformities and their charms, as in the social world on shore. It brings out the nature of people, the good and evil in them, wonderfully, to be kept a week or two on the water, and you hardly know what is in a man, or what you, yourself, are, until you have been to sea. And so we have worried away these nine days on shipboard ; taking in great supplies of oxygen from the pure air on the ocean, sleeping much, and so getting the rest that belongs to the just, meditating on the mysteries of eternity suggested always by the sight of the unbounded waste of waters, and working out problems saved up for such a leisure time as this. It is a good thing to have a little time in life when one can do nothing but think. 1REN&US LETTERS. CHESTER CATHEDRAL SERVICE. How many hundred years ago the Cathedral of Chester was founded, I do not pretend to know, but in those days of old, when monks of Romish order had their habitations, like moles and bats, in crypts, cloisters, and cells, this pile was reared, and afterwards came, with scores of other church properties, into the hands of the Anglican communion. It was the Abbey of St. Werburgh, and to this day the Bishop sits in his throne which was the shrine of the saint, what time he was venerated in these venerable walls. The wall of the city, now a promenade, winds along and near the cathedral ; and in the evening before the Sabbath, a solitary visitor, I stood on the wall looking down, by the uncertain light of the moon, into the old burying ground, where the dead forgotten lie, who, long centuries ago, stood on this same wall, and looked upon the place in which their dust now waits the resurrection. The chimes waked me on the Sabbath morning : sweetly solemn chimes : the only bell- ringing that we ought to have in a city : sacred music, uni versal worship. There ! they are going again this moment, and from my window I see the towers and turrets from which the voices of the bells come with their sweet melodies on the evening air : fit expression of the heart's incense of praise : it is above the city, it is not infected with the greed and grime of the earth, earthy ; but as if the upper and better life of man were calling out to heaven, these chimes waft his prayers and praises to the skies. They waked us, and then they invited us to the great cathedral for morning worship. So dilapidated are the sur roundings of this irregular and antiquated pile, it was hard to find an entrance. But as we saw others passing in by a 'little door a needle's eye we followed, and a verger an usher we might call him received us politely, and, without a moment's delay, led us to excellent seats within the choir, where the service was conducted : he expressed regret that he could not give us better seats, but we would not have CHESTER CATHEDRAL SERVICE. 179 chosen any others. In the midst of the choir stood a very aged man, the chief of the vergers, who, leaning upon his staff, seemed to have nothing to do but to look about him and be in the way of the people as they came in. Presently, when a large congregation was seated, the procession of singing boys and singing men filed in, led by three vergers with symbols of office on their shoulders. When they had taken their seats, the choral service, or the service intoned by the choir, began. All the parts usually read by the minister, and responded to by the people, were performed in a voice which was neither singing, chanting, nor reading, but a mixture of them all, and so mingled as to produce an effect exceedingly pleasing to those who have a taste for the musical ; but to others far from being devotional. I have heard monks intoning their service so much, and am so un accustomed to hear anything of the kind elsewhere, I was not edified by it now; but those with me enjoyed it greatly, and assured me that the music was often exquisite, and the whole service very impressive. Another "officer" marched in, followed by a venerable clergyman, who ascended the steps of the reading desk, and gave the lessons of Scripture. And soon afterwards, the bishop and two other clergy were conducted to the altar, where, in turn, they continued the service. The youngest of them, a minor canon, ascended the pulpit and preached a sermon of fifteen minutes ; and, as the service altogether was more than two hours long, it is plain that "prayer and praise are here regarded as a far more important part of worship" than the preaching of the word. The sermon was good. The doctrine of the presence and power of the Holy Spirit in the church, attending the word, and helping the soul in its struggles after holiness, was set forth with clearness and force. It was a disappointment to us that Dr. Howson, the Dean of the Cathedral, author of the Life of Paul, etc., was not in the pulpit: he was out of town. But the whole service was grateful to the Christian heart, and in the special thanksgiving for those who had just safely crossed the ocean, we were able fervently to join, for only the day before we l8o IREN^EUS LETTERS, had been on the sea, and this was our first Sabbath on shore. And there is something in the place of worship. God is everywhere, and they who worship him in spirit and truth will find him and be found of him, not in this mountain only nor in that, not in the mighty temple only, but in the hum blest home where the contrite heart pours out its wants into his ever-open ear. Yet he has inscribed his name in places where he has promised to meet his people, and of which places he has said, Here will I dwell. And when one comes into a House of Prayer that has stood a thousand years, and during all that time has been the shrine where human hearts have been brought with all their yearnings after peace, hope, and heaven, where the sin-sick and sorrowing have come kneeling at the footstool of Infinite compassion asking for giveness ; where kings, conquerors, and conquered have laid their crowns before the altar and prayed to be servants of the Most High ; where rich and poor have always met together kneeling on the same stone floor ; and the strong man has bowed himself, and the maiden, in her loveliness and grief, has come with her story none but Jesus ought to know ; where saints have sung songs of triumph on their way to Zion with everlasting joy upon their heads, and where the ashes of the dead sleep in blessed hope while angels watch their sepulchres, waiting the music that shall call them up, through " old marble," to the judgment; when one comes into such a place, he may well hear a voice saying, " Put off thy shoes from off thy feet, for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground ; this is none other than the house of God ; this is one of the gates of heaven." It is not the exalting power of thes"e Gothic arches, nor the harmony of the lines and the silent music of the curving traceries in stone, nor the many-colored stories on the painted windows through which the sun at high-noon steals gently in as though his light should not disturb the solemn service of the hour ; these are not the elements that form the sense of holiness that fills the place. Without doubt they enter into it. But as the heart clings to childhood's A SABBATH IN CAMBRIDGE, ENGLAND. 181 home and haunts, and every year makes stronger the ties that bind us to the scenes we loved, so the old church, the place where our fathers and theirs worshipped, is dearer to us than the more splendid house that our new neighbors have reared. Such an ancient cathedral as this is written all over, within and without, with the prayers and tears, and songs and glory, of successive centuries, and every column, every stone, is full of the presence of Him who has, in all these revolving years, made this house his dwelling-place. The floor of the choir is laid in curiously-colored tiles, and at my feet Saint Ambrose is singing his own Te Deum, and the twelve apostles, in the same quaint style, make a sacred circle, over which we step : but I forget all that the art of man, rude or skilled, ancient or modern, has wrought to adorn and illustrate the place. These are human, and, whatever uses they have are lost when I remember that the things seen are temporal, but the unseen the soul-work on this cold floor and under this groined roof the unseen soul- work is eternal here, through these long centuries, men and women, such as we are, have been fighting the battle of an endless life. This invests Chester Cathedral with its majestic power, and makes one day within its sacred courts better than a thousand elsewhere. A SABBATH IN CAMBRIDGE, ENGLAND. From early childhood, when I was a boy in Cambridge, N. Y., I had such associations with Cambridge, in England, and its famous University, as to inspire the strong desire to see the place and its venerable seats of learning. There Sir Isaac Newton studied, and Milton and Bacon ; and no other names but Shakespeare's have equal lustre in the firmament of English letters. I had been at Oxford in former visits to England, but had not been able to go to Cambridge, for it is not on the line of usual travel, and is therefore less visited by tourists. 1 82 IREN^EUS LETTERS. It is less than two hours from London. The road is through a region of great beauty, passing the seat of Sir Culling Eardley, and Earl Cowper's at Hatfield, Brompton Park, Welwyn, where Young wrote his " Night Thoughts," and where he is buried, and many spots celebrated in Eng lish history. We left London at 5 o'clock on Saturday eve ning: London crowded with life: London the largest, migh tiest, richest, busiest, most surging, restless, tumultuous city in the world : the city that overpowers you more than any other with a sense of its greatness and importance, and from which you escape with a sense of relief, as if you could breathe more freely and feel that you are somebody and not merely a mote in the boundless air. As we rode out of this great city, toward the close of one of the loveliest days in June, and instantly were ushered into the beautiful scenery of rural England and that is the same as saying into the sweetest in all Europe we were charmed every moment as we fairly flew over the fifty miles. In the midst of the colleges and churches for they are clustered closely stands an ancient hotel that bears the name of BULL the Bull Hotel. It is a marvel of rare taste and elegance, the landlord being a virtuoso, rejoicing in old china, curious furniture, and exquisite prints and paintings, with which he has filled his rooms, and made them a museum of art, while his wife manages the establishment and makes it a delightful home for the traveller. Here we rested over the Sabbath. It became a day of days. We might well call it a red-letter day, for it was known in the University year as " Scarlet Day," when the heads of the colleges attend divine service in scarlet gowns, making a picturesque appearance. Cambridge is not so imposing in the grandeur of its old halls as Oxford: there the very smoke and grime of ages seem to cover the outer walls with the marks of antiquity. The grounds in the midst of the twenty colleges of Oxford are more highly ornamented with flowers than these, and alto gether there is more culture in the walks and- probably more books in 'the libraries, as there are more students in the halls. But Cambridge is the most classical, most like a A SABBATH IN CAMBRIDGE, ENGLAND. 183 University town ; its college grounds are more extensive than those of Oxford, and nature has done so much for them, that little is required of art. It takes its name from the river Cam on which it stands. It is old enough to have been burned by the Danes in 871, and to have been rebuilt and to have a castle reared by William the Conqueror, a bit of which is yet in the midst of it. The University has not kept its own history, and, with all its learning, cannot tell when it began to be. Six hundred years ago, according to Hallam, it was incorporated, and one college after another has been founded, until there are now seventeen : they unitedly own the great library, the press, the observatory, and such insti tutions as are of common importance, but each college has its own funds, with which it is endowed, its own students, professors, and fellows. The oldest of these colleges is St. Peter's, founded, it is said, in 1257, and the stained glass windows of its chapel rival those of the Cologne Cathedral. Caius College gave Jeremy Taylor his education. King's College has a chapel that is the chief architectural glory of the city. As I stood in front of it in the evening, with the new moon hanging above its two towers, it seemed to me more beautifully sublime than any building I had seen in England. In the garden of Christ College is a mulberry tree which John Milton planted when a student here. Erasmus was one of its professors. Samuel Pepys gave his great library to Magdalen College, his alma mater. Trinity is the greatest college of all, and sometimes has one-third of all the students in the University. Henry VIII., the much-married monarch, was its founder. Sir Isaac Newton was educated in it, and became one of its professors, and his statue adorns it now. Lord Byron's statue, very properly refused admis sion into Westminster Abbey, found hospitality here, where he was a student. It has raised more Church dignitaries than any other college here or at Oxford. And its eminent graduates in Church and State are to be counted by hun dreds and thousands. Its quadrangles are surrounded by massive piles of buildings, with rooms for students, apart ments for resident fellows and the faculties ; a city of learn- 184 I RE N^. US LETTERS. ing: a holy quiet filled the courts: it was an abode of thought, inviting to patient study, and that calm enjoyment which the true scholar loves. In the rear of the colleges, on the banks of the narrow river, are delightful walks, shaded by great trees, and into these walks all the college grounds open, so that the students are tempted to exercise in the open air. There are always between two and three thousand young men in the pursuit of education here, and to all appearances they have every appliance for the pursuit of health at the same time. The resident fellows have their lodgings and board and a regular annuity, which they have attained by successful competition in scholarship. So long as they remain unmarried, they retain this fellowship with its emoluments. I asked a janitor if they were not allowed to have a mother or aunt to reside with them. " Nothing in the shape of a woman," was the very decided answer. A lovelier summer Sabbath day cannot be in this world, than the one we had in Cambridge. As the hour for morn ing service approached, the chimes of bells in many an ancient tower began their matin melodies, and filled the air with their holy song. The city seemed full of praise. And at eventide again they gave out their soft and sacred tones, not with the harsh jingling and hoarse discord of rival bells, but in unison and as if they were the voice of many people worshipping the Unseen. And from all the churches and from many chapels the voice of Christian song poured forth upon the ears even of those who walked the streets, and it was in groof that the people were the Lord's. I worshipped in the morning at St. Benedict's, and there heard a spiritual and earnest sermon, every word of which was fitted to do them good who heard it. In the afternoon the annual Uni versity sermon was preached by Dr. Guillemard, of Pem broke College, in the Church of St. Mary. The attendance was immensely small : certainly there were not two hundred people in a house that would seat a thousand. The church service was not read, but, in its place, the preacher made what is called the Bidding Prayer. He said : " Let us pray for the Queen, the Royal Family, the Bishop, Clergy, the A SABBATH IN CAMBRIDGE, ENGLAND. 185 University," and so on, naming all sorts and conditions of persons, and then prayed for them all at once, by saying the Lord's prayer. This is the custom here and at Oxford on the occasion of this sermon. The appointment to preach is given to the several colleges in turn, and is considered an honor to the preacher selected, who prepares himself with great diligence. The sermon now delivered was on the believer being " baptized into the death of Christ," and the learned Doctor stated incidentally that in the primitive times Christian baptism was performed by dipping the head under water, in the case of infants and adults. His language in regard to the efficacy of the sacrament was the same as that used in the Church of England, indicating the doctrine of regeneration therein. Otherwise the discourse was evangel ical and very discriminating against rationalism. He held that the University was founded for the support of Chris tianity, and that its power should be felt in all its relations, in the defence and advancement of the truth of the gospel. He quoted from the New Testament in Greek, again and again, and his pronunciation of that language was the Cam bridge style : thus the diphthong oil he pronounced as we do in our or out; he did not say oo as some of our colleges, making the word tooto instead of touto. In a word, he pro nounced the Greek language as the boys were taught to pro nounce it in the academy at Cambridge, N. Y., when the undersigned was there. This day at Cambridge was very suggestive of lessons for the improvement of our own college system, in a country young indeed, but already able to do far more for its colleges than it yet attempts in the way of culture out of doors and in. It takes time to do many of the things that render these grounds and halls so lovely and so sublime. And every year is precious. It requires aesthetic tastes, and in our practical country and age, even men of education under value the ideal, and despise those embellishments that ad dress only the sense of the beautiful. It is a pity, and the pity is, it's true. Let us hope the time is at hand when we will do better. 1 86 IREN^EUS LETTERS. A MONASTERY AND CONVENT. It was never well to put a monastery and a convent near together. One is for monks, the other for nuns. God said it was not good for man to be alone, and he made woman to be his wife, his lawful companion, the solace and help of his life. But he never made nuns for monks. Neither monas teries nor convents are among the divine institutions. He did ordain families, but the whole conventual system of the Church of Rome has been a war upon the divine econo my, an outrage upon the human race, and a hot-bed of the foulest crimes, of which murder is not the worst. In the lovely valley and village of Interlaken, the fairest spot in all Switzerland, at the foot of the Jungfrau the Maiden ever clad in robes of snow, is a long, rambling, tur- reted building of stone, with a history so romantic and ancient, that its present peaceful, pious, and proper uses make the story almost incredible. This house was once a monastery and a convent : not both in one precisely ; but a thin partition only separated the two, while an underground passage made them easily one. And such was the corrup tion of morals which was the ready consequence of such association of men and women under vows of celibacy, that long before Luther's Reformation began, this den of iniquity was broken up, and in our better days the building presents a livelier illustration of Christian union than any other house of which we have ever heard, in any country in the world. Yesterday I worshipped God in it with a congregation of Scotch Presbyterians : while from another chapel in it came the songs of an English Episcopalian church service: a Swiss-French Evangelical church holds its service also under the same roof, and the Roman Catholics celebrate mass and have their regular and daily service in the principal chapel of this venerable pile. The edifice belongs to the govern ment, which uses many of the apartments for public offices : the wings are well-arranged hospitals, and the battlemented towers surmount the church, which is appropriated to such A MONASTERY AND CONVENT. 187 congregations as wish to have worship in it in their own way. The monastery was founded about the year 1130, more than seven hundred years ago, for the use of fifty monks of the Order of St. Augustine, and was most unfittingly dedi cated to the Holy Virgin. For they had not long been resident in this sunny and charming valley, the very spot for luxurious and idle life, than these self-denying monks procured the establishment, within their walled enclosure, of a nunnery, over which an abbess nominally presided, but with the pro vision that the provost of the monastery was also to be the superintendent of the nunnery. At first the number of nuns was limited to forty, but the number was gradually increased until it included more than three hundred. The nuns were admitted to the Order of St. Augustine, by an easy modifica tion of the rules. So the monks and the nuns became sub stantially one order, and living within the same enclosure, and exempt from all intrusion or control, they had things their own way for a series of centuries. To what extremities of evil such an institution, in such a series of years, would grow, it is more easy to imagine than to portray with a modest pen. The monastery was by-and-by placed by the Pope of the period under the protection of the Empire, and afterwards it was given to the city of Berne, with exemption from all taxes and endowed with great revenues. The lands that paid tribute to the monastery were farmed by the peasantry, and they resented the hard taxes they were com pelled to pay. This brought on wars, in which the valleys of the Grindelwald, Lauterbrunnen, and Interlaken were made red with the blood of a people resisting unto death the grinding exactions of these pampered and dissolute monks, who had the law and government on their side. These anti- rent wars were fearfully bloody and cruel, and always ended in the triumph of the monks and the temporary submission of the peasants. Vast as the income of the monastery was, the prodigality of these rapacious and luxurious monks was so great that they were always living beyond their revenue, and incurring 1 88 IREN&US LETTERS. heavy debts. They spent the money in riotous living, until the scandal of their lives became an offence to the Church and the State, in a period when morals were low enough in both, and neither was very fastidious. It was said that more children were born in the nunnery than in the whole valley around it. None of them, however, lived. Twice the divi sion wall had been destroyed by fire in consequence of the revels to which the inmates abandoned themselves. Offi cial visitations were made, but so powerful had the order become, that it easily defied the authority of a distant Bishop. Then the civil government took hold of it, and reported the terrible state of things to the Court of Rome, and the Pope issued a Bull telling the naughty monks to behave themselves better. They said they would, but they did not. And at last, in 1484, the Pope took all the nuns away, and made over the revenues of the convent to a sister institution at Berne. There a few of them went, and some found husbands to console them when they were compelled to quit the monks. But the monks were not disposed to give it up so. They introduced into their order a system of concubinage, with more shameful proceedings than ever. In 1527, the monas tery of Interlaken this beautiful vale was like Sodom for wickedness, and deserved the doom of the cities of the plain. The house became the seat of riot and disorder, and so great was the scandal that the government was con strained to interfere and break up the establishment. The monks were driven out, being allowed pensions for life, but they did not concentrate themselves again, and the places that knew them once, knew them no more. The ancient walls, the halls that resounded with their un godly revelry, the nests of their foul debauchery, are still here, and the beautiful sunlight shines in upon them as if nothing but purity and peace could ever have reigned in these hallowed precincts. A decrepit woman, feeble with disease and age, was sitting on a bench under the arched portal as I entered, and out of the windows of the hospital, patients, old and young, were looking ; the several chapels A MONASTERY AND CONVENT. 189 were designated by the names of the various Churches that now gather to worship God under these ancient roofs ; happy children with their nurses were playing under the mighty trees that have stood for centuries in the grounds about the monastery, and I could not but lift up my heart, and my voice too, in a devout "thank God," that this fair spot, so sweet, so cool, so near to the snow-white mountains, yet adorned with meadows green and flowers, is not now, as it was once, denied with the abominations of a monastery and a convent. Either of them is evil, and only evil. United they make even this paradise a whited sepulchre, full of all uncleanness. But instead of preaching a warning against the whole monastic system, always corrupt and corrupting, and against "sisterhoods," always evil, and never expedient in Protestant hospitals or schools, let me tell you a little story that this monastery suggests. In a few minutes' walk from Interlaken we come to the ruins of the Castle of Unspunnen, the ideal residence of By ron's Manfred, and the scene of romantic incidents sufficient to form a chapter of themselves. In the latter part of the fifteenth century, when the dissoluteness of the monastery of Interlaken was at its height, the lord of Unspunnen sought to constrain his sister to take the veil at the convent. The brother would thus get half of her fortune, and the convent the rest. But the noble woman knew too well the repute of the institution, and scorned to become a member of such a sisterhood. Yet such a pressure was brought to bear upon her, that she was led to the altar where she was to take the vow, when, perceiving a remarkably handsome young man among the spectators, she remembered the law of the land which permitted the means of escape that she now embraced. She turned to him and offered him her hand in marriage. He had long looked on her with yearning heart, and was swift to accept the offer. They were married without delay, and the lovely maiden, Elizabeth of Scharnachtul, now the happy bride of Thomas Guntschi, of Matten, was saved from the rascally monks. Their descendants still live in the Oberland. 190 IRENMUS LETTERS, CASTLE OF UNSPUNNEN. Only a round tower remains to mark the site and tell the story of the Castle of Unspunnen. Yes, there is a pit that is the vestige of the donjon keep, in which fifty brave and good men languished four years, and were at last delivered from a lingering death. This castle, or what remains of it, stands near Interlaken in Switzerland, and commands the entrance to the valleys of Grindelwald and Lauterbrunnen. For centuries and this was centuries ago it was the most famous and formidable stronghold in this wild country, and history and tradition tell many and fearful tales of violence, rapine, blood, and of love also, about the lords and the vassals that made this cas tle their fortress in the days of old. But neither history nor tradition goes back to the date of its erection, though the site of it and the use of it plainly enough indicate the object of its founder. As I have been travelling through the Swiss valleys and narrow defiles, and over the high ways that divide or connect them, I see that, in times when might was the rule of right, and violence reigned in these regions, these valleys would be independent of each other and often in conflict for the supremacy. Raids would be made by robbers to carry off flocks and herds. The lord of the manor would become a chieftain, and the peasants his retainers to follow him into the domains of his neighbors, or to meet, with fire and sword, his enemies. In the tenth century, the Dukes of Zahringen were the lieutenants of the Emperor, claiming sovereignty over the whole of this country, but the head men of the Swiss valleys, strong in their men and wealth, resisted the supreme author ity and fought for independence. The dukes founded some of the finest cities of Switzerland, and the Zahringen hotel in Frieburg, where we paused to hear its wonderful organ, is named after the founder of the city. He built the castle of Thun in 1182, and began the city of Bern in 1191. The lords of Unspunnen waxed mighty in those days, CASTLE OF UNSPUNNEN. 19! and many of these fertile vales and rugged mountains were under their control, the peasants paying taxes to them, and every district furnishing warriors to fight the battles of the barons. Berthold was the Duke of Zahringen, and Burkard was the Baron of Unspunnen. Deadly foes they were, and many were the fierce fights they had, when, with wild war riors at their heels, they had laid waste each other's lands, spreading desolation in their track. As we read the details of those days of rapine, we see that war then was very like what is going on to-day in the East. Burkard of Unspunnen had no son to succeed him, but he rejoiced in a daughter, his only daughter, Ida, whom he loved, the child of his old age. Her mother was dead. The old warrior was weary of strife and found his only comfort in his daughter, the joy of his heart. She was remarkable for virtue and beauty, being known over the valleys for her charities, and renowned far and wide for the elegance of her person and her manners. The vassals of her father spoke of her as the " fair lady of the castle," and were so devoted to her that every one of them would cheerfully have laid down his life in defence of her rights and her honor. Now it came to pass that, on a time when the lords and ladies of all the lands were gathered at a tournament, and knights, who in battle were foes, now met as friends for friendly contest, a certain brave and gallant knight, Rodolph of Wadiswyl, saw the "fair lady of the castle" of Unspunnen, the beautiful Ida, and was at once smitten to the heart. When he learned that she was the daughter of his master's mortal foe, for Rodolph was a follower and kinsman of Berthold, he knew that it was in vain for him to make known his passion, and he resolved to woo her in the fashion of the day, and in a way not altogether unknown at this day in some parts of the world. He nursed the flame in his own bosom, drew around him a few trusty and valiant friends, of courage and prowess like his own, and in the darkness of the night, that their approach might not be discovered, they pursued their secret march from Berne, by the way of the Lake Thun, and across the southern side of the plain of Interlaken. They were 192 IREN&US LETTERS. now in the enemy's country. But it was not difficult to con ceal themselves in the mountain forests, until a night of darkness and storm made it favorable for them to steal unperceived upon the castle. They scaled its walls. They found the lovely Ida, and with gentle violence carried her off to Berne. She did not find her captor such a monster as his wooing promised, but like the Sabine women, she soon learned to love the gallant knight, and became his willing and devoted wife. But when the old father, the Baron Burkard, knew the wrong that had been done him, and who it was that had done it, the youthful fires broke out in his aged frame, and he roused his vassals to fresh fields of bloody war, to recover his daughter and punish the robbers. The war was one of the fiercest of those fierce times, and both parties were exhausted. The Duke of Zahringen was the first to give in, and he resolved to try the power of conciliation and moral suasion. He went to the Castle of Unspunnen in peace, and present ing himself to old Burkard, found him weeping for the loss of his daughter and longing for her return. The Duke offered his hand to the Baron, who took it cheerfully, and at that moment the daughter and her husband, with their hand some boy, entered and fell at the feet of the weeping old man. He was overjoyed to see them, and making his grand son the heir of his possessions, he died the last of the barons. Walter, the grandson, succeeded to the leadership, peace was made with the dukes, and the castle, in the course of time, fell into the hands of John, Baron of Weissenberg. He fell out with the duke who had plundered his estates in those beautiful valleys of the Simmenthal, which we rode through the other day. The duke raised an army and attempted to surprise Lord John in his Unspunnen fortress, but John was too wary for him, and routed him with great slaughter. Fifty men were taken prisoners, and cast into the dungeon of the castle, where they were kept as prisoners in wretched ness too well known by their friends outside, to suffer them to be forgotten. Four years passed by, and all attempts to rescue them failing, a regular siege was laid and pushed on GOING TO A GLACIER. 193 Vvith such vigor that the proud baron was reduced to terms, and was compelled to give liberty to these captives. The subsequent history of the castle is not of any special interest. Five hundred years ago the monastery of Interlaken, whose disgusting history was written in the last letter, held a mort gage on the property, and it continued to change hands until it finally fell into the hands of the city of Berne, and then into those of Interlaken. But it gradually lost its import ance as the lands became the property of the peasants, and the castle fell into decay. In modern times attention has been drawn to it, and a fictitious interest attached to it, by the fact that Lord Byron is supposed to have adopted it as the site of the residence of Manfred, the misanthropic hero of the tragedy of that name. The scenery of the region depicted by the poet corresponds well enough with this, and it is also stated that Byron wrote a part at least of that pro duction on the Wengern Alp, which is close by, and on the route from Lauterbrunnen to Grindelwald. This is the best pass in Switzerland to see the avalanches, and glaciers are near at hand : the roar of torrents, the crash of falling oceans of snow and ice, the mist and clouds and cold, make the region a fit place for the melancholy ravings of a morbid poet. GOING TO A GLACIER. The grandest of all the Swiss glaciers takes its name from the Rhone, the river that is born beneath it, and then flows on five hundred miles into the sea. When I was at the Rhone Glacier twenty years ago, we could reach it only on foot or on mules, and the bridle-path brought us to the bot tom of the glacier, where we stood and looked up and away to the distant heights, where its turrets and towers glistened in the sun, reminding me of the lines : " The City of my God I see Above the firmament afar ; Its every dome a noonday sun, And every pinnacle a star." 1 94 IREN&US LETTERS. But now, by the new road, the most formidable piece of engineering in the country, we come in a carriage to the same level with these, icy palaces, and look into their portals, and go round about their bulwarks, and survey without danger or fatigue this marvellous spectacle. With the sun blazing upon it, and on the uncounted peaks of mountains rising around it, the sight easily surpasses in beauty and sub limity any other scene in Switzerland. We left Lucerne at 8 A. M., on one of the lake steamers The Rigi was without a cap, and Pilatus had on caps enough for both. It was long supposed that poor Pontius Pilate came to a sad end on this mountain, and that his troubled spirit still haunts it with tempest and lightnings. The story is not now so generally believed, but the storms and vapors continue just the same. And the Lake of the Four Cantons is as lovely and grand and classical as it ever was, despite those mousing critics who would prove that William Tell is a myth. The mountains about this lake rise so suddenly from its waters, the passages from one bay to another are so fortified by nature, that every mile of the lake is intensely interesting. It is very easy to believe that the three Swiss patriots met, in the dead of night, on that sloping ledge to concert measures for the deliverance of their country. And their full length portraits on the wharf at Brunnen show what sort of heroes they were. Tell's chapel tells where he leaped from the boat and escaped from his tyrant Gessler, and forty natives went ashore as we touched, to make a pil grimage to the shrine. When we reached Fluellen, we took a carriage for a three days' journey, and at 1 1 o'clock were on our way to the hill- country. Altorf was reached in a few minutes, where William Tell shot the apple on his boy's head. That there may be no doubt about it, he stands in a rude monument, with a cross-bow in his hand, and a frightful picture presents the tragic scene. The same story is traditional in other coun tries, and it is much better to believe in two or even three Tells than in none at all. At Amsteg, ten miles farther up, we endured a miserable GOING TO A GLACIER. 195 dinner; we were promised a chicken, but it was more like a crow that had died of famine. Now we began in earnest the ascent of the St. Gothard pass that leads over the Alps into Italy. It is a splendid road ; by the river Reusse, that comes roaring and tumbling from the mysterious heights and depths of these glaciers and fields of perpetual snow. As we ascend, we find the beginnings of the railroad that is to scale these formidable walls, pierce the heart of rock, and come out on the Italian side. A whole village has suddenly sprung up of Italian laborers and their families, at work in the tunnel. Not a bit like the Swiss were these black-eyed, vivacious, rollicking sons of the sunny side of the Alps. They can work but two or three hours at a time in the tunnel, so foul is the air in spite of the pumps : then fresh relays of men take their places ; and so the work goes on, to be completed in three years, nine miles through. The enterprise and bold ness of such an undertaking has no parallel in any railroad ventures in the country from which we have come. As we came to the narrow gorge which is known as the Priest's Leap, from the fable that a priest once leaped across it with a maid in his arms, five or six young natives, each with a rock on his or her shoulder, suddenly appeared, and when we had alighted and approached the verge, they let their burdens fall, and we watched them till they reached the water in the abyss. This is a regular entertainment to which all travelers are invited, and the little money the droppers pick up goes a good way in keeping them alive to amuse the next comers. The Devil's Bridge is the most frightful scene on the road, where the rush of waters in the tortuous and rocky channel is so terrible that weak nerves cannot bear the sight of it. Yet in this very spot the Russians and French, and before that the Austrians and Swiss, have fought bloody battles, contending for this mountain pass, as at this moment the Russians and Turks are struggling for the Shipka in the East. We passed the night at Andermatt, and in the morning resumed our upward journey. This village is 4,600 feet 196 I REN ;. US LETTERS. above the level of the sea. Vegetation is scant : pasturage is poor, the inhabitants are few and far between on the mountain sides. Hospenthal is at the fork of the two roads, one over the St. Gothard into Italy, which we now leave, and the other over the Furka, which we now pursue. The ancient mule and foot-path kept the ravine through which the Reusse comes down, but the engineers of the carriage road, why it is not easy to understand, pushed their course along the side of the mountain, doubling the road back on itself, with long loops, and fearfully sharp curves, almost angles, yet making the ascent so gradual that the carriage seems to be nearly on a level as we go up the steep. Steady nerves enjoy the toilsome way. From the edge of the road, solid and smooth, we are looking beyond the precipices below to lofty and snow-clad summits of unnumbered moun tains, some of them wrapped partly in robes of mist, some of them tipped and gilded with sunlight, all of them cold, dreary, desolate, as if they were not needed in the world, and were here stowed away by themselves in solitary gran deur and death-like repose. Four hours and a half of this uphill work brought us to the top of the mountain, and passing over it, by the little inn that offers hospitality to travellers, we descended in a few minutes to the level of the most glorious section of the Glacier of the Rhone. It is not a sea of ice; it is a mighty torrent, tossed by a tempest into the most fantastic forms, and suddenly con gealed ! As Coleridge puts it, " motionless torrents, silent cataracts." Yet even this is not the fitting simile ; for from its surface tall spires of clear, shining ice spring into the air: solid shafts, of irregular heights and shapes: and looking down upon it, as we do from our point of observation, deep chasms, long ravines yawn before us, and reveal the horrors of an ice grave for those who venture to cross this danger ous field. One large section, slightly more worn by the sun and rains than the rest, was tinted with pink and blue, and in the shadows, cast by passing clouds, falling on some of the pinnacles, and the others being in the bright sunlight, THE GREEN VAULTS. 197 showed the most variegated, rosy and greenish hues. Many of the columns were translucent, and of exceeding beauty. This glacier stretches fifteen miles upward between the Gelmerhorn and Gertshorn, and exceeds all the others in the grandeur of its features and the sublimity of its sur roundings. To give the names of all the peaks to be seen from the point whence we are studying the scene, would be like reciting the geography of Switzerland, so many and so familiar are they. While we were on the mountain, we observed the gather ing of clouds, and thought it might rain in the course of the day. Our visit to the glacier being ended, we went back to the Furka inn for dinner. Presently the mists rose from the vale and enveloped the house in gloom. Then it began to thunder and lighten. The rain came down in torrents. The winds blew, and then hailstones came rattling upon the roof. It was almost dark at mid-day. When it held up, and we had made a short dinner, we came down the mountain. It was quite another thing from going up. The sure-footed horses trotted squarely, turned the sharp corners steadily, and in less than two hours brought us safely to Andermatt. The next morning, a fine bright day, we drove down the St. Gothard road, to the boat at Fluellen, and were soon in our rooms at Lucerne. THE GREEN VAULTS. They are called so because they are not vaults and are not green. In other respects the name is as well as another would be. They are rooms on the ground floor of the old palace of the kings of Saxony, in the city of Dresden, filled with curious works of art, jewels of silver and gold, and precious stones, the pride and play of kings for more than three hundred years, a vast museum, the like of which is not to be seen elsewhere in Europe, perhaps not in the world. The morning was wet and dismal when we emerged from 198 IREN^EUS LETTERS our hotel and crossed the square to the SCHLOSS, the name usually given to the residence of the king. An archway was guarded by a man-at-arms, and then the wide quadrangle was passed in the dripping rain, and reaching a small door on the further side, we paid the fee one mark and were admitted into the vaults ! Duke George, the Bearded, in 1539, was the Prince of Saxony Elector he was called in those days and he began to collect and preserve the curious things he could lay his hands on, and his successors in the kingdom have added to them from year to year. Before the American mines were discovered, before America was discovered by Europeans, the Freiberg silver mines were the richest in the world, and the kings of Saxony were wont to convert the fruits of those mines into works of art, either having the silver itself worked up into them, or exchanging it for precious stones. In this way the gold mines of Spain made the Royal gallery of paintings in Madrid the most costly and extensive in Europe, while Spain is now miserably poor. The pictures would not pay her debts, and there is no market just now for paintings such as royal purses only can buy : for kings have too many debts on hand to indulge in the luxury of buying works of art. One of these rooms contains a jewel estimated to be worth fifteen millions of dollars : and they all have an intrinsic value, such as can hardly be said to attach to the most splendid pictures by the greatest artists. A diamond is more easily cared for and is less liable to perish than a painting or a statue, and there is an impression that precious stones become more costly from age to age. I have heard it stoutly maintained that it is a better invest ment to buy diamonds than real estate or railroad bonds. My experience is not large enough to make an opinion of any value. John of Bologna was one of the greatest sculptors of the sixteenth century, and some of his works in bronze are the first to arrest attention as you enter the room. A crucifix only eighteen inches in height shows the hand of the master, and the uninstructed eye discovers its beauty. " The Bull THE GREEN VAULTS. 199 Farnese" is reproduced in bronze, and has a charm that belongs to the original marble in Naples, representing the powerful work of an artist who lived four hundred years before the Christian era. These and many other copies of the noblest works of the early centuries are now studied with admiration, even by those who are familiar with the originals, and as all the royal collections are supplied with copies when it is impossible to procure the originals, why may we not in the United States, and especially why may not the city of New York, possess a gallery in which shall be collected copies of the greatest works in all the European schools of ancient and modern art ? What works in ivory are these in the second room ? Pyra mids, goblets, chains, pillars, groups of girls, goddesses, sea- gods and nymphs, Apollo and the muses, allegories that have lessons to be read ! ! Even the cunning hand of Albert Durer is seen in a group of his exquisite carving : and an Ecce Homo ascribed to Benvenuto Cellini : a monk spent his lifetime on a group of 141 figures in one piece of ivory, and here his patience, if not his genius, appears in his wondrously elaborated work. There is no end to this curiously beautiful collection. Amber wrought into shapes innumerable, corals, shells, mosaics of jasper, agate, lapis-lazuli, cornelian, chalcedony, laid in black marble, in forms of birds, flowers, insects, fruits and all manner of pretty things ; the Saviour and the Apostles ; some of them regarded as the finest specimens of this kind of work. In the middle of this room is a porcelain fire-place, ornamented with biscuit-china, precious stones, pebbles, topazes, moss and eye agates, and Saxon pearls, making a remarkable object that gives the name to the room in which it stands. The art of painting enamel was known to the ancients, the designs being painted on a coating of pigments with a brush, and then fixed by the action of fire. The French have carried the art to perfection, having pur sued it for five hundred years. This is the simplest of the styles of enamelling. The Scripture scenes, the mythology, the portraits of modern and ancient historical personages, 200 1RENMUS LETTERS. the madonnas, are beyond my capacity to recount or to remember, but each one of them is a study, giving pleasure while the eye is upon it, though the sensation is lost so soon as you turn to something more beautiful beyond. If you are not weary of this repetition of things curious, we will pass into the next room, which is painted in green, and so is said to have given the name to the vaults. It is called the silver room, and the vessels of ornament and use that are here gathered, chiefly in silver, would easily furnish a palace, from the baptismal fonts in which the children of the royal family are "christened," to the chalices for the com munion table and the goblets that have served at royal ban quets for centuries. The Genoa filigree work represents flowers and fruits and figures, boxes and vases, every variety of fancy and folly, displaying exceeding ingenuity in con struction, with no great success in producing anything very useful or ornamental. And we are not yet in the great Hall by way of eminence it is called " the Hall of Precious Things," so far does its inventory exceed all that has gone before it. The room stretches the width of the palace, and is literally filled with a wealth of gems and gold and crystal, wrought into objects of use, or of display, or, more than either, of amusement, for it is hardly possible that half of these things were made for anything else but to entertain the maker or them for whom they were made. All the precious stones that are named in the " Revelation," and many more, have been wrought into the form of snuff boxes, spoons, cups, seals, portraits of emperors, and popes, and queens ; a " tower of Babel" has mysterious machinery in it that works a clock and every minute performs some marvel of ingenuity: a Venetian thread-glass jug having an air-bubble between each of the meshes : a dromedary lying by the side of a Moor : Venus carried in a Sedan chair by porters : a ship on which the scene of Perseus and Andromeda is drawn : the rock-crystal goblet of Martin Luther one of so many of his cups ; I begin to fear he was often in them ; and the goblets of so many mighty men are treasured here, we may be sure that THE GREEN VAULTS. 2O1 the time was when drinking was more an art and an enjoy ment than it is now. In one corner of this hall an iron railing protects the most singular specimens of delicate handiwork in the chambers. The court dwarf of Augustus II. in gold and water-sapphire : and an amusing lot of things made of misshapen pearls, put together so as to represent human figures and various animals, David and Goliath, Satyrs, Jonah and the whale, all of them irresistibly funny: carved figures in ebony, so small as to require careful examination to discover the skill required for their construction ; the potter, the knife-grinder, the lace- makers, etc., all done to the life, yet so delicate as to be broken by a touch. The armory room, which is so called because it has no armor in it, is adorned with wood carvings, six by Albert Durer, a cherry-pit on which eighty heads can be seen dis tinctly, if you look through a microscope : a case of pistols about an inch long, warranted not to kill : and as the crown of the whole, we have two real crowns, two scepters, and two coronation globes that were used in crowning Augustus III. and his Queen in 1734. If the blazing jewels are not real, the genuine ones are in the next room into which we now enter. For we have now come into the treasury of the Saxon kings ; to six cases, in which are displayed the largest, most brilliant, beautiful and valuable collection of jewels in Europe. What may be in the palaces of the Orient I do not know. These have been gathered by purchase, by dowries and inheritance, until they are unrivalled : here we see a garniture of rose dia monds, 64 in number, another with 60, a sword hilt with 1,898 single stones, with orders, epaulets, buckles and buttons "too numerous to mention," strings of pearls, necklaces, shoulder- knots, earrings, brooches, hairpins, rings set with rubies, emeralds, sapphires, garnets, and in the midst of this dazzling light are two plain finger rings that once were the property of Martin Luther and Philip Melancthon. These two rings are precious because their owners were useful men. Not one diamond of all the rest has the slightest value because of the king or queen who wore it. 202 IREN&US LETTERS. But I am tired of making out this list, for that is all I can do, and not one in ten thousand of the things has been men tioned. What are they for? What is the use? Are they worth the money they cost ? Vain questions. These works, like the pictures and statues that adorn the great galleries of the world, are fruits of human genius, skill, toil and patience. Rich men have paid poor men for making them, and poor men have been made rich, or at least happy, by the bounty of the rich. Beauty has its use, and the art that produces beauty is the gift divine. Nature is the highest art, and God has made everything beautiful in its season. DRESDEN PICTURES. To find one of the best five pictures in the world, you must certainly come to Dresden. All good judges may not be agreed as to the five, but they will probably all count as one of the elected number the Sistine Madonna Raphael. My uninstructed judgment places this in the middle of the first five, arranged in this order : i. Raphael's Transfiguration ; 2. The communion of Jerome, by Domenichino ; 3. The Sistine Madonna; 4. Murillo's Assumption of the Virgin; 5. Paul Potter's Bull. Artists may smile at this selection, yet the unanointed eye may see with more impartial vision than that of the artist whose rules constrain him to say that a picture ought to please you, and would if you knew what is beautiful and perfect in art. No one may fear to place in the front rank of the world's best pictures this Dresden Madonna, and if you give it the preference before all other conceptions of the Virgin Mary, you are still safe and in the midst of a goodly company like-minded. Certainly Raphael's Marys are the best, and this is his best, so that we are easily brought to the decision that the one we are now admiring has no peer. Having spent some time in the several galleries of London, Paris, Berlin, St. Petersburgh, Dresden, Munich, Vienna, Florence, Rome, Naples, Madrid, Seville, and many other DRESDEN PICTURES. 203 European cities, I am quite ready to believe that no one con tains so many pictures of so little merit, together with a few of such transcendent excellence, as this one gallery in Dres den. Since I was here before the new Palace of Art has been erected, and the paintings removed to it, so that they enjoy the advantage of better light and arrangement than before. The pictures themselves appear improved : and that not by the dreadful process of restoration going on continu ally, but by the more favorable position which they occupy. It is fearful to read in history of such a gallery that a man is employed by the year to restore the works of the old masters : " Fools rush in where angels fear to tread :" and he must be a vain, bold man, who would put his clumsy brush into the master work of Raphael or Correggio, and confound his own coloring with theirs. As well might a rash school boy try to mend the style of Cicero or to restore the lost books of Livy. Let us have the real thing in the melancholy of its ruin, rather than to be confounded with the mixed colors of Michael Angeloand John Smith. Yet this work of re-touching is going on continually in all the great galleries of Europe. You come to a vacancy on the wall, and learn that the picture belonging there has been taken down to be cleaned, which means that some one has got the job of putting it in order. In the course of a few weeks it will appear in its place, radiant with fresh varnish and brilliant as the coat of Joseph. The Director of the gallery has the letting out of this work, and manages to make a profitable thing of it for himself or his favorite artists, who are constantly discovering the necessity of overhauling one or another of the pictures. The obscurities escape such sacrilege, but the celebrities suffer sadly. Here, for example, is the master piece of Correggio, " LA NOTTE." The history of the picture is very brief, for it has had not many vicissitudes : it was painted for the chapel of St. Pros- pero, in Reggio, in 1522-1528: it was thence transferred to the Modena gallery, and was among the hundred pictures bought for the Dresden collection in 1745. Here, it has been preserved with almost sacred care. But it is a matter of fact, 204 1REN&US LETTERS, so far from being denied, it is recorded in the history of the gallery, that this picture was restored by Palmaroli, of Rome, in 1826, and, as if that restoration were not enough, it was done over in 1858 by Schirmer of Dresden. It is alarming positively to be told, as we are by the Director himself, that Palmaroli came here and spent one year restoring the pic tures : in this twelvemonth he restored think of it fifty- four paintings, all of them by men the latchet of whose shoes he could not unloose and among these glorious works which this man put his hand to, and renewed during that awful year, were Correggio's La Notte, and Raphael's Sistine Madonna. Besides this he touched up three great altar pieces in the Roman Catholic Churches ! What a year's work for one man! And he was paid more for the work he did upon Cor reggio's La Notte than the great master received for paint ing the original picture ! Then Schirmer, at that time one of the Directors of the gallery, took hold of this " La Notte" in 1858, and we have it as it came from his hands. What it was when it was the glory of the St. Prospero chapel, no man will ever know. In a beautiful corner room of this vast palace of art, alone in its grandeur and beauty, as if as indeed it is so no other painting in the gallery is worthy to be in the same apart ment, stands the " Madonna di San Sisto." The picture has been so often reproduced in copies, painted, engraved and photographed, that the world is familiar with its features. The Virgin Mary, having the divine infant in her arms, is borne up by clouds ; on her right Saint Sixtus is kneeling and adoring. On the left is Saint Barbara, and at the foot of the picture two cunning little cherubs rest on their elbows and look up. This famous work was painted for the altar of the convent in Piacenza, and it was there more than two hun dred years, undisturbed. Raphael died in 1520, at the age of 37. In the year 1711 Augustus III., then the Crown Prince of Saxony, travelling in Italy, visited this convent, and seeing this picture, desired to obtain possession of it. But it was full forty years before he succeeded. In 1754 he got it for $40,000, the monks keeping a copy, which answers their pur- DRESDEN PICTURES. 205 pose just as well, and the money was very acceptable. Their copy is regarded as the original at the convent, and if the original is restored a few times more, the copy may be equally entitled to veneration. The art of restoring pictures is now one of the fine arts, and has reached a point of perfection beyond which it will hardly pass. It was at first supposed that the only way to restore a painting was, as in the case of a statue, to make anew what was defective, and to harmonize with the original so far as it remains. Now the restorer not only does all this with courage and success, but having found that the paint upon an old canvas is thick enough and solid enough to hold its own when the canvas on which it is laid is removed, the restorer carefully removes the dilapidated canvas from the paint, puts the old paint upon a new canvas, and then supplies the parts that are lacking. If the supplies are large, it is difficult to see why he has not made a painting more new than old. It is pleasant to know that this grand painting by Raphael has suffered less at the merciless hands of the tinkers than many others. It is probable that the heads of the Madonna, the infant, and the saints, are sub stantially the same as the master left them. And it would be very hard to exaggerate the indescribable beauty and glory of this picture. The infant has a head, a face that fairly repre sents a divine child, before whom at this moment all his life and death are present. For then, while a fair-haired boy in his mother's arms, the future was all before him : the shame, the sorrow, the agony : the scourge, the thorns, the cross : the desert, the garden and Calvary : all, all were on his heart when he hung on his mother's neck, or lisped his morning prayer at her knees. And beyond all other pictures of the child Jesus, this one presents him as an infant with years in his soul. As the image every lover of the Saviour forms in his own mind exceeds in majestic beauty whatever human art in marble or canvas can embody, so we are always disappointed with the types of the Man Christ Jesus which the greatest of the old masters have left for our study. It is so in some degree with the Virgin Mary. It does not seem to have come into the mind of any of these old masters that the Virgin was 206 IREN^EUS LETTERS. the only one of all living women who knew that this child was begotten of God ! ! The feeling to be shown in her face would be that of wonder and joy. The desire of all Jewish women had been answered in the birth of this boy, and she was Blessed above all human beings as the mother of Israel's Prince and Saviour. No one of the great Madonnas, the works of Raphael, Correggio, Carlo Dolce, Murillo, or of a hundred others, no one of them attempts to express these, which must have been the overpowering thoughts of her exalted and exulting soul ! Yet this face is full of tenderness, serenity, meekness and love. The sweetness of expression, if sweetness is capable of being expressed, has been as fully developed in this face as in any that was ever put upon canvas. But it is not in the face of the mother that the wonderful power of this work appears. Her figure, buoyed by its own lightness and floating firmly in the air; the adoring old man on his knees, and the bewitching, smiling Barbara on the other side, contrasted with the aged saint : the whole of the great picture in all its parts is so united as to produce the highest emotions of sacred pleasure in the beholder. It is like eloquence stirring to its deepest depths the soul of the hearer. This addresses the heart through the eye. It speaks as clearly and effectively as though it were put into words and they fell on the ear. There are many thousands of pictures in this gallery, and among so many some of wide renown, as paintings that are the property of the world. Several of Titian's best works are here. The greatest masters of the Dutch, the Flemish, the Italian and the Spanish schools are well represented, and a few weeks or months of study in the Dresden gallery will form an important part of one's art education. THE FIXE OLD ENGLISH GENTLEMAN. 207 THE FINE OLD ENGLISH GENTLEMAN. We were dining at Lucerne, in Switzerland. The elegant room was filled with two or three hundred guests. Not far from us, but on the opposite side of the table, were three gentlemen whose conversation it was impossible not to hear, so pronounced was every word they said. The one whose voice was the loudest, was speaking of the great superiority of things at home compared to what we had to put up with in foreign travel. The tone of his remarks, the swell, the self-conceit, the contempt for others' opinion, and the accent also, led me to say to myself, " There's another of those con ceited Englishmen : was there ever such a people to pride themselves on what they have and are, and to despise every body and every thing besides." At this moment one of them asked him : " From what part of America do you come ?" Alas, he was a countryman of my own, and all my specu lations and inferences had gone for nothing, and worse. The tables were turned against me. To the inquiry he answered : " From Boston : you have probably noticed that more Americans who are abroad come from Boston than any other part of America?" " And, pray, why is that ?" asked one of the gentlemen near him. " Because there are more people of wealth and culture in Boston than in any other American city : we have no class called the aristocracy, but the best families, the most refined and the most disposed and able to enjoy foreign travel, reside in Boston." In this strain of vulgar boasting, seeking to convey the impression that he was one of the people he described, this countryman of mine went on till I was heartily ashamed of him, and of my own first impressions as to his nationality. The next day I was at Andermatt, spending the night. A gentleman approached me and pleasantly remarked : 208 IRENJZUS LETTERS. " I think we were at table together at Lucerne last even ing." " Yes," I replied, " you sat next to a countryman of mine from Boston." He laughed, and said, " He was from one of the first families, one of your aristocracy : but it was very character istic, was it not?" "Of what?" I inquired. " I beg your pardon," he said, " but we the English have an idea that you Americans are given to that sort of thing." " And we think," I replied, "just the same of you ; it is six for one, and half a dozen for the other." And so we chatted, coming to the sage conclusion that there are fools in all countries, and a fool at home is twice a fool abroad. At Interlaken we spent a week at the Hotel des Alpes. The company was very distinguished, the " first families" from Germany, Russia, France, and England. I was sitting one evening in the grand salon, on the same sofa with the Prin cess of Russia, with whom I had no acquaintance, and of course we were not in conversation. An English gentleman, a pater-familias whose wife and children were around, came up, and addressing the Princess familiarly, said, " Shall I find a seat here ?" I moved along, and he crowded in between, and began with a series of questions to the lady : " Have you bene to London?" " Which of the theatres did you prefer?" " Did you attend any of the races while in England ?" The Princess gave him brief answers, and indicated that she had the true Russian dislike to England she greatly preferred Paris and the French. He was equal to the occa sion. "I am fond of Paris," he said; "I have spent three winters there while my daughters were pursuing studies, they required instruction in languages, but they were well educated before I brought them to Paris they could follow the hounds with me my oldest daughter will take any fence that I would go over, splendid rider, but they came abroad for languages" and so on, till, wearied with his talk, I left him with the Princess. THE FINE OLD ENGLISH GENTLEMAN. 209 The next morning he came into the breakfast-room lead ing a bulldog perhaps it was a half-grown pup by a chain. It was an ugly-looking beast, that should have been kept in the stable. But he brought him to table, and the vile animal took a seat, on his haunches, in a chair by the side of his master. The wife came in, sat down on the other side of the dog, and pouring milk into a saucer, broke bread into it, and this fine old English gentleman and his wife and the beast ate their breakfast together! As breakfast was served on small tables, each family having one apart, there was no ground for complaint ; but as this English family sat within a few feet of me, the sight interfered with the quiet of my breakfast after it was eaten. It may be civilization for dogs to eat at their master's table in England, though I never saw it in practice there, but it is an insult to the decencies of human society for any man to take a big dog to a public breakfast-room, and seat him at the table. At dinner, when a hundred guests were at one long table, this fine old English gentleman led his dog in, and fastened him to his chair, to the danger of all and fear of many, for a bull-dog is not a reliable person when a stranger comes by. The master ordered champagne, and instead of having it opened by the servant who brought it, he startled the whole company by exploding it himself, and clapping his hand over the mouth of the bottle, sent the' liquor in hissing streams in every direction. These are a few specimens of the manners of this gentle man, evidently, from the appearance of himself, his family, and associates, a man of standing and means ; but supremely selfish, having an utter disregard for the feelings of others, and intent solely upon his own importance. He cared more for that ugly beast of a bull-pup than for the comfort of all the human family, himself excepted. We had taken our seats in an omnibus to ride to the sta tion. An elderly English lady with a maid entered its door, and not wishing to go to the upper end, the lady spoke out, "There's room enough if the people will move up." A lady changed her seat to the other side of the coach and left so 210 IREN&US LETTERS. much room that the imperious woman bestowed her bag upon the seat. The lady who had relinquished her place, finding the window open, wished to return, and I said so to the woman, who did not move. I then took her bag and put it on the floor, saying " The lady is exposed to the draught and wishes to sit out of it." She caught up her bag, replaced it on the seat and positively refused to allow the lady to find a seat on the other side, though she had moved especially to oblige this selfish and unfeeling creature, who, having got what she wanted, did not care whether the delicate and kind- hearted lady suffered or not. We arrived at Baden-Baden from Switzerland. At the German frontier we suffered the usual, useless and cruel annoyance of a baggage search, a custom to be abolished by the millennium, but I fear not before. At the station in Baden an elderly English gentleman was unable to find his trunk and other traps : they were left behind : there was no doubt of that : his rage was amusing : when he had exhausted himself upon the officials, who, being Germans, did not not understand a word he said, he fell upon me : " Are you an Englishman ?" he asked. " No, I am an American." " Then you speak the English," he broke out these, these, these villains" he used double-barreled oaths, sin gle ones would not answer, where I have put those dashes, " these villains have lost my luggage, and here I am with nothing but what is on my back." I said to him, " Did you attend to it on the frontier, when we all had our luggage overhauled ?" " No, I heard nothing about it : did not know there was any examination : rascally treatment : I've been all over the world and never had this thing happen before : meanest country I was ever in." I did not remind him of my standing three mortal hours in Liverpool, in a stifling pen, waiting the pleasure of her Majesty to inspect my linen ; but I said to him that his lug gage could easily be recovered, and by and by he stopped swearing and resolved to try the telegraph. STUDIES IN TORTURE ROOMS. 211 There was no apology for this fine old English gentleman indulging in coarse profanity in the midst of ladies, but there was justifying cause of real annoyance and complaint. He did not understand German, and when the passengers were ordered out to see their trunks opened, knew nothing that was said, and while others were attending to it, he was quietly reading his newspaper. His luggage was therefore detained, and he went on, only to find at the end of a day's journey that he had been robbed of all his goods by the government into whose protection he had come. Such people as I have been writing about, one meets daily in his travels. They serve to illustrate this very obvious remark, that it takes all sorts to make up a world ; and while there are national peculiarities there are also conceited, selfish, dis gusting persons in all countries, not excepting one's own. There is no higher type of cultivated Americans than the Boston type, yet here I meet a traveled ass making the very name of our Athens ridiculous by his vanity and folly. No nation on earth has a more finished civilization than the English : their intelligence, culture and breeding easily place them as a people among the leaders of the world's progress. But the three examples that I have quoted above from my observations of the last few days might be types of the rudest and vulgarest people on the earth. There is no more agreeable person than the true English gentleman. And vice versa. STUDIES IN TORTURE ROOMS. Chambers of torture are not very agreeable school rooms. But I have been in so many of them, that I ought to have learned something besides the uses of these dungeons and pitfalls, and rings and rusty chains, and pulleys, and wheels, and spikes, and screws, and knives, and saws, and hooks, in which and by which men and women have been tortured to death, because their opinion differed from those who had the 212 IREN&US LETTERS. power to starve, or stretch, or flay, or maim, or kill, the victim in their hands. We ought to learn to be charitable toward those who invented and used these terrible instruments of human agony, and with cruel hands applied them to the flesh and nerves of their fellow-men. Even the monster who could sit calmly by and guage the misery of their hapless victims, to know the measure of woe they might endure and yet live to undergo fresh torture, even these monsters may deserve charity. The spirit of the Master, who prayed for his crucifiers, requires of us to be charitable. But this is straining a point. They were men, and so are we who judge them now. If they were men, and yet capable of such crimes, we must be more than men to feel anything short of unmingled detestation when we remember their deeds, and look with horror upon the tools of their trade, and recount the virtues of those who suffered. We found these cheerful implements first at Baden-Baden. There, in the house that to this day is the Duke's royal resi dence, we were led to the chamber of judgment, and saw the pitfall from which none ever returned to reveal the mysteries of the depths below. The Castle of Chillon, on the shores of the lovely lake of Geneva, had its chamber of tortures, which was opened for our entertainment. We have passed by many without looking in upon them. When in search of pleasure it is not well to fill the eye and the mind with sights and thoughts that haunt one trying to go to sleep. But what has moved me to this present writing is the view of the Castle of Salz burg in Austria. No scenery in Europe is more picturesque than this, and the view from the heights, crowned by the ancient castle, is magnificent beyond description. This was once the residence of prince-bishops, who were civil as well as spiritual powers .n the world, and reigned with sceptres of iron and swords of steel over the people of this province. They were in the zenith of their power and pride when the Reformation shook their thrones, and roused them to use those means that Rome knows too well how to use if the prostrate people squirm and turn. Thousands of Protestants STUDIES IN TORTURE ROOMS. 213 were brought as sheep to the slaughter, and suffered linger ing and awful deaths on these heights. The rack on which strong men and lovely women were stretched in agony unspeakable still remains in the chamber of torture, and mutely testifies to the woes that were here endured in witness of the truth as it was and is in Jesus. We have all these chambers of horrors associated with the power of the Church of Rome. In some strongholds of chieftains they have been instruments of vengeance and oppression and extortion. But the Church of Rome is in its nature a persecuting power, and cannot be true to its princi ples unless it uses all the power it has to compel men to believe as it believes. Its traditions all teach this fact. The entire history of the Church is witness that it believes in the right and duty of using force to conquer the convictions or to punish the obduracy of unbelievers. It has often charged these deeds upon the State, but the State has been the tool of the Church when it has shed the blood of martyrs. The Church has that blood in its skirts, and when God maketh inquisition for blood, he will discriminate between the agent and the principal, and will render to every one his due. Protestantism has shed the blood of its enemies. Let it be spoken with humiliation and shame. But such crimes in its history are exceptions, not the rule of its life. Extenuating circumstances might be urged in its behalf, but there is no justification in the sight of God or man for interference with the freedom of conscience. It is even now for an aston ishment that Protestantism was so slow to discover the prin ciple of religious liberty, and to practice upon it in. the treat ment of errorists. Erasmus understood it better than Luther or Calvin. And the death of Servetus at the hands of Geneva, if not of Calvin, will always require of us Protestants to speak with charity of the men who made hecatombs of martyrs, where Protestants have slain only here and there a victim. But when I have seen the relics of the inquisition in Rome, and the more fearful remains of it in Spain, and come to my own chamber from these castles and prisons that still 214 IREN&US LETTERS. retain the memorials of the bloody deeds of former times, I am not so much stirred with indignation towards the Church that encouraged and commanded the cruelties as I am distressed to think that human nature was and is capable of inflicting such wrongs upon its own kind. " Man's inhumanity to man !" That is the awful reflection that fills me with horror, as I know that human nature is the same now that it always was; and what it wrought in the days when the bishops stretched helpless victims on this rack in Salzburg, it is just as ready to do to-day, if the opportunity and the motive combine. There the grand distinction between Romanism and Protestantism stands up gloriously in the eyes of the civilized world. We, who have thrown off the bondage of Rome, have learned \ha.\. the soul of man must be left free in matters of religious faith and worship. They who still follow the lead of Rome have learned nothing since the Reformation. They have lost power, and have gained no knowledge. To them (it is so taught in the last Syllabus of the Pope), to them, it is still an elementary principle of gov ernment that if a man will not believe as he ought, he must be made to. If he cannot be reduced to obedience he must be punished. We have got beyond all such terrible doctrines as that. It was such an idea that begat the Inquisition, and lighted all the fires of religious persecution, and shed the blood of saints through the ages. It is the same doctrine that the Turk holds, as he goes with fire and sword to convert the nations. His onquests have been made in the name of his religion, which is the more dreadful as the vital principle of his religion is enmity to the Cross of Christ. There is but one ism in the whole world worse than Mohammedanism. The worst is Romanism. It is worse than Islam because it boasts the Cross as its glory and defence, but in the name of that Cross wars against the fundamental principle of Christ's religion. It has put the work of man in place of the right eousness of Christ, so that the Cross is of none effect. It has despoiled its followers of the liberty with which Christ makes his people free, and put chains of slavery upon the soul and mind of men. It is a war upon society. Education, liberty. THE LANCE OF ST. MAURICE. 215 improvement, happiness and all that gives brightness and beauty to the age we live in, perish in the embrace of this system which calls itself Christianity, but has neither its form nor power. I noticed this while sojourning in Roman Cath olic countries. They are dead while they live. And they come to life, and rise into the spirit and action of the age only so fast as they are emancipated from the bondage of the Church. France is free. Germany is free. Austria is more than half delivered from the slavish yoke. Italy revives. All Europe feels the awakening, and it may be that with the accession of a new Pontiff, the attitude of the Church toward modern society may be changed. At present she is just as hostile to freedom of thought and liberty of conscience as when she set up this rack in Salzburg. We must be charitable toward men ; but their systems deserve only justice. We may pity the victim of superstition, but the superstition we should denounce and if possible dis pel. And this is the lesson to learn in these fearful schools of ancient torture. May God have mercy on the men who still defend the right to employ the arm of flesh to punish unbelief. But we also pray God to put a speedy end to the damnable doctrine, and so give Christian liberty to mankind. THE LANCE OF ST. MAURICE, AND OTHER SACRED RELICS IN THE VIENNA TREASURY. I am not a relic-hunter or worshipper. If I had a little more credulity, not to say faith, I would be more interested in seeing the precious things which superstition, in the name of religion, preserves with pious care. It is not required of us, who disbelieve and ridicule, to impeach the sincerity of those who receive as realities, and very holy realities, the memorials of those who have suffered in the faith. It is quite likely that they are as devout in their worship as we are in ours. Still it is very hard for a man with a head on his 216 IREN^EUS LETTERS. shoulders to receive as authentic a toe-nail of John the Bap tist, or an arm-bone of the mother of her who was the mother of the Lord Jesus Christ. Such pretensions take us out of the region of probabilities into the possibles, and, without having the evidence, we shall be pardoned for rejecting the claim. Perhaps if we had the evidence, we should be more incredulous still. We are now in Vienna: the brilliant capital of Austria. The Austrian Emperor claims to be the successor of the Roman, and in the great cathedral here, we read on the hand of a statue of Frederick II., the letters A. E. I. O. U. It may seem to be a conceit to put the five vowels on his hand which holds a sceptre, as if he were the king in the world of letters. But his motto was in five Latin words, " Austria Est Impe- rare Orbi Universo ;" but there is very little probability that "Austria is to rule the whole world." It is a relic of Roman pride and ambition to make a motto in words that should include as their initials the five vowels and assert the supre macy of Austria : an empire now scarcely a third-rate power in Europe. But it has a wonderful history, and much of its most wonderful history is associated with this holy lance and a NAIL from the cross on which Christ suffered, which is wrought into the point of the lance ! It is a spear of iron with a blade in the form of a lancet, a long socket with short vertically detached ears. A hole was pierced in the blade, probably during the reign of the Emperor Otho the Great, and a nail of singular form, said to be taken from the Cross of Christ, has been inserted therein. It is likely that by doing so the blade broke in the middle, and as a ligature consisting of thin plates of cast iron proved inefficient, it was found necessary to reinforce it by encircling the fracture with a band of iron. The Emperor Henry III. put over the iron band which covered the broken place and secured the nail (as we have already mentioned) a second band of silver, which for greater security was soldered on both edges, and solidly riveted besides. This silver band bears the following inscription : (on the front): "Clavus Domini, t Heinricus D-Igra Terciis THE LANCE OF ST. MAURICE. 217 Romano Imperator Aug Hoc Argentum Jussit ; (continua tion on the back :) Fabricari ad Confirmatione Clavi dui et Lance(e) Sancti Mauricii ; (and in the centre :) Sanctus Mau- ricius." The lance remained in that state until the accession of the Emperor Charles IV. During the reign of this prince a plate of gold was riveted over the silver plate, laid on by Henry III., so as to cover it entirely. This plate bore the simple inscription in Gothic capital letters : " t Lancea et Clavus Domini." In the course of time, several rivets having become loose, the silver band of Henry III., of whose existence nobody had been aware, became visible. A closer examination showed that this band had been partly cut through a long time ago and that the lower part of the nail of the Holy Cross, which was concealed by the band, had been lopped off. This last alteration of the Holy Lance probably took place under Charles IV. This prince was passionately fond of collecting relics, and spared no effort to acquire them. It is said that at Treves he lopped off with his own hand a piece of the "Holy Cross" preserved there. It is probable that the embellishment of the lance with the plate of gold was the result of the Emperor's desire to cover the silver plate which, being partly destroyed, might not be easily restored, and to conceal from the eyes of the world the operation which had been performed on the nail of the Holy Cross. The new binding of silver wire that replaced the rotten leather straps, also dates from the same time. Who is not acquainted with the important part played by the Holy Lance in the history of the German Empire ? By the discovery of the inscription proceed ing from the Emperor Henry III., wherein this lance is mentioned as being identical with that of St. Maurice, our interest is heightened, as the lance of this Saint was already regarded during the Merovin gian era as an emblem of majesty and power. In the Saxon history which Widukind, monk of the Abbey of Korvei, wrote for the imperial Matilda, abbess of Quedlin- burg, we find that the Holy Lance formed part of the insignia 2l8 IRENSEUS LETTERS. which the dying King Conrad (t 13 Dec. 918) delivered to Evurhard, his brother, to be given to Henry I. According to the Book of Retribution which the learned Luitprand began to write about the year 958, King Henry I. had extorted the Holy Lance from King Rodolph. Luitprand relates also that the Holy Lance had formerly belonged to Constantine the Great, and mentions it while relating a battle fought at Bierten on the Rhine by King Otho I. against his usurping brother Henry. King Otho, separated from his little army by the Rhine and unable to fly to its assistance, dismounted from his horse and fell on his knees together with his people, praying and weeping before the holy nails which had once pierced the hands of our Lord and Saviour and which were now placed in the Holy Lance. It is therefore probable that the holy nail was set in the lance during the reign of Otho I. According to the account given by Widukind of the defeat of the Hungarians on the Lechfeld (955), King Otho fought at the head of his army, carrying the Holy Lance as the standard of victory. After the King had cheered up his little army by encouraging speeches, he grasped his shield and the Holy Lance and led the charge against the foe, thus fulfilling his duty as a brave warrior and a skilful general. What high veneration was paid to this relic, and what im portance was attached to its possession, became evident at the election of Henry II., the Saint (1002), who chiefly baf fled the claims of both his rivals, Eckhard, Duke of Thurin- gia, and Herman II., Duke of the Alemanni, by persuading the Archbishop of Cologne, who, since the death of the Emperor Otho III., had the Holy Lance in his keeping, to deliver this sacred emblem of power to himself. It is now preserved with the Austrian Regalia and other treasures, and visitors are permitted to look upon it with such rever ence as they may feel. If this sketch of the Lance's history is neither intelligible nor interesting, it ought not to be set down as my fault, for I have taken it almost verbatim from the Catalogue of the Treasure house, and would not vouch for the facts, though I THE LANCE OF ST. MAURICE. 219 have no doubt- of their correctness from the time that Otho the Great set the nail into his spear, and so sanctified it as a holy lance. Where he got the nail, or what right he had to claim that it was ever in the hand or foot of the Saviour of men, I do not know, and nobody else knows. But faith in it has wrought wonders : not miracles, but everything short of miracles. It removes mountains. It overcomes the world. It always was and will be the one distinguishing feature of men of achievement, and nothing great among men is done without it. This Holy Lance is neither the better nor the worse for the nail that is in it, but faith in it as the nail that pierced the cross on which the Saviour hung, made the onset of armies irresistible and gave victory to the legions that followed the leader who bore it. So Faith in the cross of the Redeemer, a living, saving faith, a real faith in the truth which that cross teaches and attests, is the only moral force that gives victory to the armies of the redeemed. They believe and therefore they fight on. To-day I saw two gigantic pictures by Rubens painted for the Jesuits of Anvers : one was Loyola casting out devils and the other was Xavier among the East Indians, raising the dead. I do not believe either of them ever did either. But the world knows what power those two men have wielded in the earth in the name of the Cross of Christ. And greater things than these have our humble missionaries done among the pagans of every clime, because they had faith in the Cross of Christ. There is only one piece of wood in the world claiming to be part of the original cross, that is larger than the one exhib ited in this treasury. It is 25 centimetres long and 5 wide. If you will send to Randolph the Publisher, in New York, and get my brother's little book on the " Wood of the Cross," you will learn more of its history than I could give you in a dozen letters. And when you read it you will wonder with me that there is so much to be known about it. In addition to these two most precious relics, the nail and the wood, we are shown a piece of the Holy Table Cloth on which the Last Supper of our Lord was spread : a piece of the Holy Apron with which our Lord girded himself when 220 IREN^EUS LETTERS. he washed the disciples' feet : a chip of the manger in which the Infant Saviour was born : a bone of the arm of St. Anne : three links of the iron chains by which the Apostles Peter, Paul, and John were fettered, and a tooth of John the Bap tist. There are other relics here, but these are the most remarkable. Let us not ridicule the credulity that cherishes these things : we may pity it as superstition, and it is barely possible that we have ourselves some notions just as absurd. THROUGH THE TYROL. The iron has entered into the heart of the Tyrol, and we now go through it by rail. To the lover of the wild, secluded, picturesque, and romantic, it seems almost a desecration of the sacredness of nature to intrude upon the recesses of mountain solitudes, and disturb the peaceful valleys with the rush of the trains and the shriek of the whistle. But, in this practical age, all such sentimental preferences yield to the economies of the time, and we traverse Switzerland and even the Tyrol with railroad speed. The Tyrol is a mountainous region in the southern part of the Austrian Empire, to which it belongs. It touches Italy on its lower border, and has the Alps on its bosom. The people resemble the Swiss in many of their modes and cus toms, and the character of the scenery is not unlike that which we have enjoyed so much in the land of William Tell. They are a livelier lot, more addicted to music, dancing, and smoking ; they drink about the same in quantity and quality, and are just about as poor. They speak the German language in the north, the Italian in the south, and a mixture of both with the French everywhere. Their dress is not as pictu resque as it was once, for the contact with foreign travellers has led them to drop their beautiful costumes and to imitate the outside world in the toggery they wear. Still the men, many of them, stick to the breeches, with stockings from the THROUGH THE TYROL. 221 knee to the ankle, and their big shoes with heavy soles, and a jockey hat set sideways on the head, and a feather or bunch of feathers surmounting the whole, will make a Tyrolese dandy, or, on a dilapidated scale, a peasant. The short gowns of the women, and jackets, bodices I believe they are called, with green stockings, a profusion of silver buttons or medals hanging about them but I give it up, a woman's dress being beyond my art of writing. They are very interesting in their costume, but rarely seen in it in their native villages. When they go wandering over the world, as Tyrolese minstrels, they are greatly admired, and every one supposes there is a coun try where all the men go about dressed as brigands, and the women as if they were at a fete. But take them at home, and they are just about as dirty, and homely, and unattractive as the poor peasants of any other country. The Tyrolese have a musical name and reputation, and with them is associated whatever is picturesque, and rural, and lovely, in an unsophisticated, simple, pastoral people. All of which is as near the fact, as the most of our impressions derived . from the rosy romances of travellers and the flowery pages of poetry. No words will convey an extravagant idea of the beauty and sublimity of the scenery. It is more beautiful and less sublime than that of Switzerland. In an hour after leaving Munich, we reach the pass from which comes the river Inn. We are to follow up this stream into the heart of the Tyrol. A fortress commands the entrance of the valley, and the Schloss and the convent, and the church on the hill, speak to us at once of the religion of the people. Indian corn is raised in greater quantities than we had seen before in Eu rope, and it was dried in a way quite novel. Torn from the stalk with the husks covering the ear, these were stripped down, and the ears hung across poles laid in rack form, up the sides of the houses, from near the ground to the eaves, so that the whole house was covered with this singular dis play of farm produce. Some of the corn was yellow, some white, and the two colors were never mixed while thus sus pended for drying. As we made our rapid journey along the 222 IREN/EUS LETTERS. river Inn, winding up the mountains and surveying the vales, it was easy to say and to feel that we had never passed through lovelier scenes. In the midst of these autumnal harvestings, in which men, women, and children were taking their part, the near mountains were shining in their winter garments of snow, literally bathed in the light of heaven, and looking as though they were at its gates. Often we pass little chapels, with horrible pictures or statues representing the blessed Saviour's sufferings or the Madonna's motherly care. Now and then a cross has been set up to mark the spot where a mortal accident has happened ; and if the natives are thus reminded to be careful in driving, and also to be mindful of their mortality, they may serve some useful purpose. The mountains now begin to assume gigantic proportions and the scenery rises into grandeur. The Solstein shoots up ten thousand feet ! On one side of it the face is almost perpen dicular. It was here that Maximilian I. was saved from awful death by an angel or a chamois hunter, it is not settled yet by which. He was hunting on the mountain, and falling off this precipice, caught on the face of the rock ; and while hanging there, and just ready to fall and be dashed to pieces below, a deliverer appeared, and drew him to a place of safety. The peasants who saw the deliverance ascribed it to angelic interposition. Zips, the huntsman, said he saved the Emperor, but Zips was not a truthful man, and nobody but the Emperor believed him. In the midst of these snow-white mountains, on a lovely plain through which the river rushes rapidly, stands the ancient city of Innspruck. Its palace, university, monastery, churches and schools, and 14,000 people, make a town of wonderful interest in such a region as this. One has to reflect that these countries have a history that covers a thousand years, and often more, before he can realize the growth that has resulted in such fruits as these amid rugged hills and unlettered people. And it is true that in this church in the Tyrol, the Hofktrke, or Dom, or cathedral, we were more inter ested than in any other we have yet seen in Europe. In the very midst of it stands a marble monument of immense pro- THROUGH THE TYROL. 223 portions, on the summit of which is a statue of Maximilian I. in bronze. The sides of the monument are covered with bas- reliefs in marble, representing twenty-four scenes in the life of this Emperor. The exceeding delicacy of this work is astonishing, as it seems to be rather such tracery of sculpture as might be made in ivory, but is scarcely possible in marble. I could not find the Emperor falling down the precipice, and am inclined to believe that the legend is not deemed sufficiently authentic for permanent record with a pen of iron. But far more impressive than this memorial of the Emperor, were twenty-four life-size bronze statues of the illustrious men and women of the Austrian royal house. That they are portraits, there could not be a doubt. And it was with some thing approaching to awe that I stood in the midst of these lines of statues, in armor or in queenly costume, of these cele brated characters, from Clovis, King of France, down to Albeit II. of Austria. In a church too ! They made it very solemn, and I had something of a superstitious feeling, as if the air was filled with the spirits of these heroes of other times. I went back the next day to this church alone, and sat down among the memorials of these men and women, and spelled out the Latin and bronzed inscriptions at the feet of them, and read the names of Godfrey, and his valor in the Crusades, and of women who have made immortal names by their virtues and deeds. And all this in the old church in the heart of the Tyrol. The sacristan was very urgent to unfold the treasures of the Silver Chapel, which he did with evident pride, for it contained a statue in solid silver of the Virgin Mary, and an altar of silver, and ornaments of many names in silver, and this chapel thus enriched is the mausoleum which Ferdinand II. made for his wife Phillipine Welser of Augsburg, of whom we heard and saw many things to assure us that she was the best-favored lady of her time. The chapel is connected with the palace by a private passage over the street, so that the royal family can drop in and attend service at any time with out going out of doors. But the most modern statue in the church is the most 224 IREN&US LETTERS. interesting. It is that of Andre Hofer, the hereof 1809. He was a peasant inn-keeper, and when Austria and France were at war, he put himself at the head of the Tyrolese soldiery and drove the French out of the country. He entered Inn- spruck as a conqueror, and played king in the palace for six weeks, but living as a simple peasant all the while. The next year Napoleon drove him out, took possession of the city, and when he caught Hofer had him shot. The Tyrolese afterwards got his body, and, burying him with all the hon ors, set up this splendid statue to their peasant hero, under the same roof that covers the monuments of the royal line. We made an excursion from the city into the villages and among the farms in the valley. The people were busy with their fall crops. Everybody was at work. The men and women sat on the ground husking corn. The cows were harnessed to wains, in which the harvests were carried home. We called at the church door of the old monastery. It had a magnificent interior. The ceiling was rich with gilt and frescoes. Beautiful paintings adorned the side chapels and the high altar. The spacious house looked as though it were kept for show, and had never been used, so clean, fresh, and glowing was the whole. Such was the appearance, also, of the more splendid chapel in the monastery on the heights at Prague. Tunnels twelve or fifteen of them pierce the mountains up which we climb, as we go by way of the Brenner pass, from Innspruck to Italy. The descent is more rapid and more fearful. We fairly rush amain down. Ruined castles tell of feudal wars. Wolfensteins was a stronghold 600 years ago. A modern fortress at Mittewald puts to shame these ancient towers, which were only castles of cards if powder and ball had been spent upon them. Brixen has been the See of an archbishop these last nine centuries ! The Bene dictine monastery of Seben is near the village of Klausen, and the Capuchin Convent, with the Loretto chapel, rich in treasures of the Church. For this Tyrol has played no poor part in Roman Catholic history. We stop at Botzen, and hasten on to the city of Trent. The Council of Trent every A CHURCH AND A PICTURE. $ 25 one has read of, but every one does not remember that the city in which that famous Council was held is in the Austrian Tyrol. Its former importance as the capital of the Tyrol has indeed passed away, but it is still a magnificent place, with evidence of its ancient greatness in its decayed palaces and ruined castles. Its cathedral is of pure marble. And now it is the favorite resort of princes in the Church, of scholars and titled dignitaries. The Council that held its sessions here from 1 545 to 1 563, a term of eighteen years, had some four hundred cardinals, patriarchs, archbishops, professors, etc., and made its mark in the history of religion and the world. This is the last town of importance we pass through in the Tyrol. We are not long in going hence to Verona, and then we are in Italy. And so we pursue our devious way from land to land, pil grims and strangers, seeking always a better country. Not the Tyrol or Switzerland, where Nature, that is God, has all his mightiest works outdone. Not Italy, where art makes canvas breathe and marble speak. Not the Holy Land, whose acres were pressed by the feet that " were nailed to the tree for our advantage." But a better country, even a heavenly : a city that hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God. Its gates are made of Orient pearl ; Its windows diamond square : Its streets are paved with beaten gold ; O God ! If I were there ! A CHURCH AND A PICTURE. It was the hour of High Mass in the Milan cathedral. We had been led to seats near the great altar, where we could see and hear the service. For, in this vast edifice, those at a distance cannot enjoy anything but the music. 226 1REN&US LETTERS. It is a glorious pile, this wonderful work of human genius, taste, and skill. Many think it the most impressive and sublime of all the sacred edifices in Europe. It is the most beautiful. It is not the most sublime. Charles V. would have put the Burgos cathedral under glass, if he could, to keep it as a thing of beauty to look at. This is more beau tiful outwardly : the interior of Burgos church is more lovely than this of Milan. The cathedral of Seville is the most overwhelming in its effect upon the worshipper, of any house of God in which I have stood. Going into it at noonday, from the brilliant sunshine of a Spanish sky, I exclaimed with devout emotion, " Surely this is none other than the house of God." It is not needful that we worship after the manner of those who build these temples, or to be in sym pathy with their ideas of the ways and means by which the Father is to be approached with the petitions of his children. They are sincere, and God looks upon the heart. So that I sat before this altar and sought to worship in spirit and truth, while compelled to believe that those around me were far out of the way. But the temple is glorious in its architec ture, if not in the holiness of its service. As the warm sun light streamed in through the paintings on the windows, and lay among the arches and illumined the lofty ceiling, whose tracery, at the great distance from which we view it, looks like lace-work under the roof, my eyes would wander away from the idolatry of the Mass to the temple, itself an expression of prayer and praise ! This house stands here to proclaim the pious purpose of them who built it, and of them who cherish it from age to age, as the monument of their devotion. It is not, and no church is, simply a building in which the people are to be taught the way to heaven. This vast cathedral and every church is, or should be, the offering of the people to God of a house in which he will record his name and visit those who draw near unto Him. Four hundred and ninety years it has been in progress of building, for its foundations were laid in 1386, and each suc ceeding year, since the first white marble stone was set, has added to its beauty. It is 486 feet long, and that delicate A CHURCH AND A PICTURE. 227 groined ceiling is 153 feet above the floor from which we look up to it. It is surrounded with glittering white marble pinnacles, each pinnacle surmounted by a statue : number less niches, without and within, are also filled with statues, and Scripture scenes are carved in stone adorning the walls, and the number of the statues is so great that no one tries to count them. Taking a section, I soon counted 1 50, and the proportion of that section to the whole space would make the total number about 10,000. Some have estimated the number to be only 4,000. There are niches still vacant, and room for more stories from the Bible, in stone. The work will go on from age to age, for such an edifice as this will never be perfect ; the only one that is perfect is the house not made with hands. We walked behind the high altar, when a priest who had just been officiating, and was still clad in his vestments for the service, asked if we would descend into the vaults and visit the shrine of St. Charles Borromeo. He was Arch bishop of Milan in the sixteenth century. The fame of his benevolence and piety is still fresh in all Italy. Memorials of him meet the eye in many places besides this, which was his peculiar see. The priest lighted a taper and led the way into the subter ranean chapel. It was a strange and sudden transition from the grandeur of the temple to this cold, silent, gloomy vault. But when the priest lighted the row of candles in front of the solid silver coffin, the chapel in which we stood was all ablaze with silver, gold, and precious stones. He pointed to the many costly decorations of this chamber of death, as if he were the showman of the place, and then seizing the handle of a crank, he turned it round and round, to lower gradually the front side of the coffin. The row of lighted candles shed a ghastly light upon the strange spectacle within. There lay the mummied body of the sainted bishop in his robes of office, all but the mitre which was at his feet, and the grim skeleton skull was slightly raised and staring at us as we stood before it ! What good purpose is to be served by such an exhibition, and why the sensibilities of mankind 22$ tRENMUS LETTERS. should be shocked and disgusted by the exposure of remains of a dead man, it is impossible to say. That the ignorant multitude suppose there is a holy virtue still resident in the relics of the saint was very evident : for a portion of the roof of this underground chapel was open, making a way to the floor of the cathedral above, and, being surrounded by a railing, the people were constantly kneeling around it and praying to the saint in the vault below. This is the super stition of the Romish Church. As ignorance is the mother of such devotion, it would never be permitted to the more intelligent priesthood to disenchant the vulgar herd of their delusion that dead saints may be their intercessors with God. The courteous priest who was acting as undertaker to us, was quite as solemn in his voice and movements as though he were administering the holiest rites of his Church, and I would not do him the injustice to suppose that he thought it a mockery of death to make a show of a mummied bishop and to take the fee of a dollar, as he did, for his services in the tomb. Having extinguished all the candles, he led us up stairs into the cathedral, and in a few minutes I saw him engaged at the altar. We must not be uncharitable, but it is a dreadful draught upon one's benevolence to believe that enlightened men, of the highest mental culture, can put any faith in the efficacy of relics of the dead. And here, in the midst of the richest display of art in the magnificent temple itself and its decorations, with sculpture and painting, these men of letters and thought, full-grown men, continue to show the towel with which the blessed Saviour washed his dis ciples' feet, a rag of the purple robe with which he was clad in mockery, four of the thorns out of that cruel crown, one of the rugged nails that fastened him to the cross, and a fragment of the spear that pierced his side ! It is a sort of sacrilege to record such words, and one feels a relief to turn to the bones of the prophets and to be told that here are teeth from the head of Abraham, Elisha, Daniel and John ! In Munich we saw a case in which was preserved and duly labelled a bone from each one of the twelve disciples of our Lord, and having seen this select assortment, my curiosity is A CHURCH AND A PICTURE. 229 not excited by any subsequent demonstrations in sacred anatomy. "THE LAST SUPPER." Twenty-four years ago I came to the church of Santa Maria delle Grazie in Milan, to see Leonardo da Vinci's greatest painting, and perhaps the most celebrated picture ever made. It is on the wall of the refectory of the Domini can convent attached to the church. It was then fading away, and I wrote of it : " It is now nearly gone, and the next generation will know it only in history." But I have come here with some of that next generation to see it once more, and find it as it was, if anything less dim and indis tinct than then. Two young men who were with me then, are now, I trust, with their Saviour and mine. I remember how deep were their emotions as they looked on this face of the ideal Jesus, the only face in which are blended the majesty and love we would see presented in a portrait of the Man of Sorrow and the King of Kings. Very few persons can say they have seen it twice with an interval of a quarter of a century. It is therefore well to bear this testimony that no perceptible change has come over it in these long years. In the centuries that have elapsed since it was painted on the wall, the room has been used and abused so shamefully that the preservation of the picture is almost miraculous. The storms of heaven and the tempests of war have beaten in upon it. Horses have been stabled on the floor, and ignorant monks have cut a door through the painting itself. Dampness and neglect might long since have destroyed it, but it survives, and more glorious in its ruin than the Par thenon or the Colosseum, it still displays the loftiest and best human conception of the Man Divine. It is not probable that I shall ever see it again. But there is a nobler temple than the Milan cathedral : and this won derful picture is not an image of the Heavenly ! " There the dear Man, my Saviour, sits, The God ! how bright he shines !" When shall I wake and find me there. 230 IREN&US LETTERS. AMPHITHEATRES AND THEATRES. The old Romans I mean the Romans of old were great builders. When we put up a ricketty wooden building that will furnish seats to five or ten thousand people, we think we have done something. But in the amphitheatre of Milan thirty thousand people could have reserved seats around an arena in which an army could stand. When it was flooded with water, mimic naval battles were fought in the presence of the multitude. Its stone seats and terraces in which seats were placed, have been preserved, restored indeed from time to time, so that it is now the finest circus ground, perhaps, in the world. Fetes are celebrated in honor of distinguished visitors with as much splendor as when the builders were the masters of Milan. Frederick Barbarossa laid the city in ruins in the year 1162, and whether the amphitheatre was built before or after, I have no means at hand of ascer taining. At Verona is the best preserved specimen of an ancient Roman amphitheatre. It dates in the reign of Titus, who destroyed Jerusalem. It has therefore stood during all the centuries of the Christian dispensation. It is an ellipse, five hundred and ten feet long and four hundred and twelve feet wide at the middle of it : forty tiers of solid stone rose, one above the other, on which 25,000 spectators sat, every one of whom could see the whole of the wide arena below. It was open to the sky : and in this delightful climate there is less need of a roof than in colder regions where there are more frequent rains. Beneath the tiers of stone seats, which rise 1 20 feet from the arena, there are dens and dungeons for wild beasts, and captives and convicts, and all the prepara tions necessary for " a Roman holiday." In this arena the city was regaled with sports that met their tastes, and these were such as required the shedding of blood. The gladiators who fought to the death made the play in which the people most delighted. A convict sentenced to contend with wild beasts, as Paul did, would get praise for himself, and please AMPHITHEATRES AND THEATRES. 231 the populace, if he fought bravely with a lion from the African desert. And in the dens of this old theatre beasts were held, and the alleys are as perfect now as they were when the hungry lions rushed through them, leaping into the arena for the Christian martyrs whom they tore limb from limb. The sand drank up the blood of the saints, and a modern circus or a troop of mountebanks now make a few hundred people merry where thousands^ once applauded to the echo when some brave fellow's life-blood oozed upon the ground. The Colosseum at Rome had seats for eighty thousand. It is the most imposing monument remaining of Old Rome. Its history is a part of the history of the Church and of the world. Its dedication 'cost the lives of 5,000 beasts and 10,000 men who were killed in the games that amused the people and consecrated the theatre, in the first century of the Christian era! What hecatombs of human sacrifices were here offered! How often the martyrs went up to heaven from this arena in sight of a heathen multitude amused with their dying struggles, but unconscious of the joy that martyrs knew in the midst of agonies unspeakable. I have mentioned these three amphitheatres as the great est examples remaining of the places of amusement which civilized people enjoyed one and two thousand years ago, for the sake of contrasting them with the entertainments of modern times. The ancients did not confine themselves to gladiatorial fights and human sacrifices. They had their stage, on which tragedy, comedy, and music make entertain ment for those who enjoy more artistic and aesthetic pleas ures than the arena affords. Roscius, who was the Garrick of Rome when Cicero was its greatest orator, boasted that he could express an idea more vividly, and with greater variety of form, by signs or gestures, than the master of eloquence could with words. The stage was popular in Rome, and so it was in Athens, when the Olympic games drew hundreds of thousands to see the races. The plays of the great masters, which scholars read in our day with as much satisfaction as they had to whom they were first pre- 232 IRENALUS LETTERS. sented, those creations of Euripides and Eschylus, not to speak of Aristophanes, were performed in the open air, on marble platforms, in the midst of applauding thousands. The performance of any one of them, in a good English, French, German or Italian translation, would empty any theatre in New York, London, Paris, Berlin, or Italy, sooner than read ing the riot act would disperse a mob. They were given in the daytime, when business might be supposed to occupy the people ; and it is doubtful if the best of Shakespeare's plays would draw a crowd in the daytime in New York or London. It might in Boston, where Mr. J. T. Fields's friend says there are not twenty men living who could have written Shakespeare's plays. In ancient Rome, and in other cities, the entertainments in the amphitheatre were often given to the people at the expense of candidates for office, who thus made themselves popular with the masses. Immense sums of money were spent in this catering to the vulgar herd. It paid very well, as it does now, though the money is expended in other ways. Great men, in those days of old, took pride in competing for victory in the arena with common wrestlers and fighters, just as a nobleman now and then rides his own horse in a race, with trained jockeys on the other horses. A few days ago, at Paris, one of the nobility did so : was convicted of cheating, too, and sentenced to abstain from racing for one year ! And this brings us naturally to compare the old-time pastimes with the present, and to ask wherein we have made improvement. Human life is more sacred now in the eyes of all civilized peoples than it was when blood was shed in sport to enter tain the multitude. In Spain the people still love to see blood flow, and if it be the blood of a man or a bull they care very little which, provided it comes in a good square, stand-up fight. But Spain is far behind the rest of the world, and persecutes the Protestant saints, and rejoices in bloody sports. When she learns enough of the Christian religion to let the people worship God as they please, she will also abolish the bull-ring. That peculiar institution is the near- AMPHITHEATRES AND THEATRES. 233 est approach to these old Italian gladiatorial and wild beast fights now left in Europe, and is gradually declining. But when we keep away from partially-civilized Spain, we find the people amusing themselves mainly in three different ways : they may run together somewhat, and the lovers of one sort may take to the others, but, with one or the other of them, the great mass of people who live for pleasure find their delight : they find it in drinking exhilarating bever ages, in frequenting theatres, or in horse-racing. How much intemperance in drink prevailed in the days of Augustus Caesar we may not know. There was enough, no doubt. Bacchus had worshippers uncounted. But no American has any adequate conception of the amount of drinking for the pleasure of it : drinking beyond the wants of life : social and jovial drinking: till he travels in Europe. The statistics of intemperance in the United States show that we are as hard- drinking a people as there is, but we must go to the German beer-gardens in New York, and the haunts of our foreign population, to see how fearfully and freely men drink. And when we travel in Europe the drinking is so largely done out-of-doors, or in such public places as to be always in sight. In Germany it is horrible beyond exaggeration. In many of the railway stations, the only waiting-room pro vided is filled with tables and chairs for the beer guzzlers, men and women. " The inevitable beer-garden" becomes a familiar remark as we visit a palace or a ruin, and find the little tables and chairs inviting us to be refreshed. The Italians drink: the French drink: the English drink beer immensely : the Irish and Scotch their whisky : but the beer drinking of Germany excels them all. One thing I have learned about the theatres and operas in their favor: they begin the evening performance at an early hour in Germany, sometimes at half-past six, often at seven, and get through before or by ten o'clock. This is so far, so good. Of the character of the performances I can speak only from the handbills and reports ; but they are as in the United States, no better, no worse, and often the same. Adelina Patti is coming to Milan next week to open the 234 IREN&US LETTERS. opera season, and she sings in " La Traviata" as the begin ning : what will be the end ? What may be called the legiti mate drama is as dead in Europe as it is in the United States. The million do not care a straw for a moral or sensible play : it is amusement they want, and there is no fun in being instructed. But there are more theatres now than ever, and in Paris and Vienna (I believe) the stage receives partial support from the government as the Church does. It is quite possible that the theatre is more demoralizing at this moment, than the amphitheatre was when the sand was soaked with human gore, and the death of men, women, and wild beasts made the amusement of the populace. The horse race is fast becoming a general popular amuse ment in the United States, but it has not there attained the position it holds in Europe. The British Parliament, the most dignified legislative body in the world, adjourns over a day every year to permit its members to attend a horse race. The American Congress has never yet manifested so much interest in the subject. The pious Emperor of Germany, 80 years old, honors Baden-Baden with his presence when the great horse-races of the year take place. The French Emperor or President always attends, and on Sunday. It is well known in England and France that no race occurs with out the vilest cheating : and when we know that Lord Fal- mouth has pocketed $150,000 this season, by winning bets on horses, it is easy to see that it pays to bribe a jockey with even $25,000 to let his horse get beaten. Nothing is done at Newcastle or at Epsom that is not done on a smaller scale at Jerome Park, and the morals of the people are quite as much exposed to corruption, in the cruel and immoral sport of horse-racing, as they were in the ancient bloody games of the amphitheatre. " Hence we view" that things have improved a little, not much, since the days of the Caesars. There are more good people now, and the wicked people are not quite so fierce and bloody : but the great mass of mankind who want amuse ment, instead of instruction, and who go about to find it, are little better in their tastes or morals than they were two thousand years ago. A CONVENT ON THE SEA. A CONVENT ON THE SEA. " There is a glorious city in the sea, The sea is in the broad, the narrow streets, Ebbing and flowing ; and the salt sea-weed Clings to the marble of her palaces. No track of men, no footsteps to and fro, Lead to her gates." Rogers. Among the hundred islands around and under Venice, not one has a more remarkable history than San Lazaro. The story of Venice is too familiar for recital. The bar barous Huns came down upon Venitia, and the people hid away among the islands of the great lagoon that sets up from the Adriatic Sea. Seventy-two of these islands were so near each other that the houses were separated only by narrow streams. These were soon canals : boats and bridges made them all into one great city : palaces arose with the rising prosperity of the place; a peculiar city, every house in it being accessible by land and water. The remoter islands were sites for public buildings, fortresses and asylums. Float ing in the water, in the far eastern quarter of the great lagoon, is the isle of Saint Lazarus. As far back in time as A. D. 1182, it was used as a hospital for lepers coming from the East. Lazarus was the patron saint of such people, and the island took his name. By-and-by this disease ceased to be a plague, and the island became a desert. And so it remained for centuries : a wilderness in the midst of isles of beauty, as fair a spot as the sun shines on, but with the taint of the leper upon it, and so left alone in the sea. Five hundred years roll along, and a dozen wayfaring men of the East, speaking an Oriental tongue, and wearing the garb of an order of Monks unknown in Venice, came to this city and asked its hospitality. They had a strange story to tell. The hearts of strangers opened to the pilgrims, and they were taken kindly in. Their leader, Mekhitar, was an Armenian, born in Asia Minor. In childhood he was taught by the Monks of Garmir-Vauk. He grew up to be a priest, 236 IR&NEUS LETTERS. and travelling widely in Asia, he preached the Christian religion, especially to the Armenians. His sacrifices and toils in this service were marvellous. At length he went to Constantinople, and, being compelled to leave, he retired to the Convent of Passen, near to his native place. Here he rose to be a distinguished teacher; a wonderful example of heroism in the midst of the plague. Again he appeared in the city of the Sultans, preaching the union of all sects in the Church of Rome. And when they would not listen to his words, he formed a society of men of his way of think ing, and set up a printing press to issue good books among the people of the East. His piety and labours excited per secution, and he fled with his companions, to the Grecian Morea, then under the Venetian government. At Modon a regular order was founded, with a convent and church. But the Turks came down upon the Morea with fire and sword, and drove the Monks of Modon from their home, which was plundered and destroyed. They took refuge on a Venetian vessel and begged a passage to the city long known as the Queen of the Adriatic, and the favorite of St. Mark. They found a welcome in the Republic of Venice. To the new Order of Monks, thus suddenly introduced, the Senate granted this desolate island. There, on the spot where, five centuries before, only lepers had a home, these persecuted and weary wanderers pitched their tents, and were at rest. Some ruins of old buildings remained, and these were patched up for temporary use. In 1740 the new monastery was completed, and the monks were able to pursue with vigor and success the benevolent work to which their lives are devoted. In this calm retreat, on an island every foot of which is covered by their convent and its gardens, in sight of the most pic turesque and strangely beautiful city of the world, these brethren live, labour, die, and are buried. They do not lead a life of idleness. Teaching, preaching abroad, writing and printing, they are spreading knowledge among the Armenians in the East, to whom they send trained men and the books they publish. I have just returned from an excursion to this island mon- A CONVENT ON THE SEA. 237 astery. Descending the marble steps of the hotel that lead into the water, we take our seats in a gondola, the water carriage of Venice. Silently, smoothly and swiftly we are borne out into the lagoon. The sun in the East is lighting up every marble palace, and dome, and pinnacle, and tower. The city, as we recede from it toward the sea, blooms with beauty, and makes real the idea of the poet that it is a flower on the sea. We glide softly to the landing steps at the gar den of the convent. A monk, in the black gown and leathern girdle of his Order, bids us welcome. Kindly he leads us into the house, and presently to the library. It is rich in manu scripts and Oriental books. Portraits and busts, and monu ments of illustrious men, adorn the halls and the walls. An cient coins, papyrus, a veritable Egyptian mummy, copies of all the books ever printed here, are shown. We were led into the printing office, where compositors were busy setting type in the Eastern languages. They use only the old-fash ioned hand presses, and probably never saw one driven by steam power. The room was small, the typesetters few. An air of perfect repose pervaded the place. It would take two months at least to issue one edition of the New York-Observer with this force. As I looked on, I thought of the fits Mr. Cunningham (our printer) would have if things moved at that rate in the office, 37 Park Row. In the refectory, tables were set for about fifty persons: very neatly were they laid, with bread and a bottle of native wine at each plate. All eat here in common, and in perfect silence, while one of the brethren stands in a pulpit and reads aloud the Bible. A notice above the door bids all to be silent and hear the word of God. There are only a dozen resident monks. They receive students from the East, who come at the age of about twelve, stay the same number of years, pursue a course of literature and theology, and then go back to their native countries as priests and teachers. Thirty youths are thus in a constant course of training. The monks also keep up a college in the city of Venice, and one in Paris. Some of them are sent on missionary tours through foreign countries. The works 238 IRsENEUS LETTERS. they publish are in many tongues, and some are of great value. The Armenians are divided in their religious faith, a part adhering to the Roman Catholic Church, to which section these Mekhitarists belong. When the monasteries of Italy were suppressed, this one alone was suffered to go on with its work. All the rest were merely consuming without pro ducing, and so were a burden and a nuisance. This one con sumes little and produces much. When the Monk had shown us through the apartments, he asked us to inscribe our names in the visitors' register. Kings and emperors had written theirs, philosophers and great travellers, poets, our Bryant among them, and Byron, who in one of his freaks, spent six months in the convent studying the Armenian language. As we walked out into the garden, the Father plucked the flowers freely, and gave to each of the ladies of the party a bouquet, as a souvenir of the Convent on the Sea. A CEMETERY BENEATH A CEMETERY. "A waking dream awaits us. At a step Two thousand years roll backward." Rogers' Italy. The city of Bologna is widely known for its sausages, yet no one city of Italy has produced more men of renown in the finer arts. Domenichino's works fairly rival Raphael's. An- nibale and Ludivico Carracci, brothers, were born here and when the latter became too proud to admit his humble parentage, Annibale made a picture of their father on his bench threading a needle, and sent it to his brother. Guido Reni was a native of this city, and few masters have a brighter fame than he : then there were others scarcely less brilliant than they, Albana, Guercino and Lanfranca, and one of the greatest of sculptors, a giant and the maker of giants, Giovanni, or John of Bologna. A CEMETERY BENEATH A CEMETERY. 239 In the Academy of Fine Arts, the works of these and other illustrious men are exhibited, and the city may well be proud of its own productions. It is a very ancient town. Its freshness is the result of a goodly custom that might well be imitated : it is divided into parishes, and once in ten years each parish has a festival ; some in one, some in another year ; at which time every house in the parish is put in good order, cleansed externally, and then decorated with banners, crosses and flowers. Thus the whole city once in every ten years is made as good as new. Its university has been famous since its foundation. It claims to be the mother of all universities, being itself born in 1119, making it more than 750 years old. It had 10,000 students in the year 1216. The city of Prague had at one time 40,000 students in its University, which was founded in 1350. This one at Bologna had female professors, as well as men, and among the lady teachers was Novella, daughter of the learned lawyer Andreas, a woman so beautiful that, when she delivered her lectures to the students, she sat behind a curtain, lest her beauty should divert the thoughts of the young gentlemen from the lessons of law she was laying down. But more remarkable than its 130 churches and twenty convents, and uncounted palaces and its long arcades, is its Campo Santo, the cemetery, which m Italy is the Holy Field, as in Germany it is God's Acre. The dead sanctify the ground in which they lie. To disturb the dead is sacrilege in all lands. We drove to the gate of St. Isaiah, to a covered walk, an arcade, leading in two directions : to the left it went up a long and winding way to the summit of a hill, a mile off, where stands a church that is named from a picture fabled to have been painted by St. Luke : to the right is the walk to the Campo Santo of Bologna, the most extensive, remark able, and interesting in Italy. An ancient Carthusian mon astery, with its corridors and cloisters, its gardens, courts and quadrangles, was converted into this extraordinary mauso leum. In the open ground, under the bright skies, interments are made, but no monuments are there set up. The enclosed 24 IRENsEUS LETTERS. marble halls and low galleries are filled with statues and other monuments of the dead. Rich families vie with each other in the magnificence and costliness of these luxurious memorials of their departed friends. Some of them are exceedingly elaborate and beautiful, the highest skill of modern art being exhausted in their production. Many fam ilies distinguished in letters, in arts, in arms : men of eminence as professors, and women illustrious for their benevolence, are here presented in marble that seems to breathe the names and virtues of their original. These galleries of sculpture are perhaps miles in length, and to walk through them all was more than our strength would allow. Filled with won der and admiration, we were yet to learn a greater wonder than we had seen. In making excavations for this cemetery, it was found that the grounds of the old monastery covered another cemetery, more than twenty feet below the surface, and dating to a period in the distance to which no records refer. Here was a cemetery beneath a cemetery : the dead of one age pressing upon the dead of forgotten ages. As soon as the fact was ascertained, the work of excavation was cautiously conducted, with exceedingly interesting and important results. These results were transferred to the Museum, where I have just been studying them with profound astonishment and instruc tion. The Roman-pagan ideas of the departed are here exhibited, as if the burial were taking place before our eyes, instead of the resurrection of the bones of the dead. Standing upright at the head of perfect skeletons, were grave-stones on which Latin inscriptions, worn and wasted indeed, are dimly visi ble, recording the very name that this anatomy once bore, when it walked these streets and fields three thousand years ago. The skeletons lying flat on their backs, their arms by their side, or crossed on the breast, as the surviving friends preferred, have been taken up with the clay bed on which they were found reposing. Placed in boxes and covered with glass, all the surroundings restored as they were when the A CEMETERY BENEATH A CEMETERY. 24! discovery was made, we are able to read with admiring eyes these records of the dead past, so strangely brought to view. We know that the heathen mythology of the Augustan age, and long before that era, recognized the immortality of the soul, and the pains and pleasures of the evil and the good in the future state. The river Styx was to be crossed by every soul in a boat, which Charon rowed, and each passenger paid him a piece of money called an obolus. In the hand of the dead was placed this coin to pay the ghostly ferryman. And now in the palm of each of these skeletons lies the money. Women still wear the necklaces that adorned them: braclets clasp their wrists, and the silver or golden brooch rests to-day on the breast that has been cold these thirty centuries. Even the rings with which they were buried are visible on the bones of their fingers. A mother and child are sleeping side by side in the same bed of clay. The teeth are as white and perfect as when they last dined. And there were no unsound teeth among them. Cups and ornamented dishes of various kinds, some appearing to have contained food for the dead, were found near to the bones, and now stand by them. One skeleton had its head distorted, and if laid out straight would be seven feet long. But they were mostly of the ordinary size, and all of them preserved as if the clay had some peculiar quality to prevent decay. This discovery was made in 1870, and the explorations have been carried on from time to time, not yet being com pleted. The director of the Museum, Dr. Kminek-Szedlo, was exceedingly kind in bringing the curious phases of this resurrection to my notice. He reads the hieroglyphic inscriptions on the Egyptian coffins and papyrus, speaks so many languages that he is worthy to be the successor of the polyglot Mezzofanti, who was once Librarian here, and whose bust and eulogy perpetuate his fame. It is well known that he was able to speak fluently more than forty languages, and was the greatest linguist of whom the world has knowledge. Dr. Szedlo called my attention also to another revelation 242 JRENJEUS LETTERS. from the earth beneath Bologna, within the present year. In February last a discovery was made of a smelting-house or foundry far below the present surface of the ground. Out of it have already been taken thousands of instruments of iron. Some of them, hatchets, knives, spears, swords or sabres, sickles, &c., are common now. Others are pre-historic, and no one can say for what purpose they were made. If one of them had been found alone in a cave or gravel pit, it would perhaps have been regarded as pre-adamite. And these relics of past ages, in the midst of a city and country where art and learning have flourished without decay for successive centuries, while the people have been all unconscious of their existence under foot, furnish one of the most important chap ters on the short-sightedness of the wisest of living men. In the mtdst of civilization, one entire age of the human family goes into the grave : the earth itself, with no convulsion, in the gradual progress of time, folds itself around and covers over its inhabitants : forests and vineyards, and new cities, flourish afresh over the graves, and dust, and bones of former peoples, and a University with ten thousand students has not a thought that such populations are buried there. Geology has scarcely scratched the surface of the earth it professes to comprehend. There are mysteries ten feet underground that our philosophy never dreamed of. The wash from the hill-sides fills up valleys that once teemed with life and power, and an earthquake in a night may bury a city till the angel of the resurrection wakes it in its unknown sepulchre. In these countries that we call old, I see so much of the work and wreck of time, that it teaches me the folly of making tables of chronology out of layers of rock cr the deposit of mud. The men and women, crumbling skeletons in the Museum of Bologna, were very silent in their new coffins, but mighty eloquent their ghastly, grinning faces were, in telling me that one generation goeth and another cometh : that what is now, has been, and there is noth ing new under the sun. Years ago I copied from an old tombstone in the graveyard of Melrose Abbey, four lines that had been often before repeated by Walter Scott and OUR WINDOWS IN FLORENCE. 243 others, but which are still to be studied for the profound truth that is hid within them; The Earth walks on the Earth glittering with gold ; The Earth goeth to the Earth sooner than it would. The Earth builds on the Earth temples and towers ; The Earth says to the Earth, " All will be ours." OUR WINDOWS IN FLORENCE. Mrs. Browning made the house in which she resided in Florence famous by her " Casa Guidi Windows." Mrs, Jame son wrote m the same house. And, wonderful to relate, I had Mrs. Browning's apartment and Mrs. Jameson's table when I was here ten years ago ! But Casa Guidi is not so well placed for sunlight as we wished, and we therefore sac rificed the sentiment to the advantage of being at home " in mine own inn." It was certainly a pleasant guidance that led us to the Hotel de la Ville, where we have found delight ful quarters. If the windows lack the romance of poetry and art. they look out upon waters, bridges, towers, domes, hills, villas, palaces, churches, and monuments, that together make a panorama of unsurpassed historical interest. If the story were not spoiled in the telling, a volume might easily be made to thrill the reader, by the simplest record of the memories suggested by the view from the windows at which I am writing these lines. The sun has just gone down. An Italian sunset in its highest glory is now before us. Serried ranks of clouds are on fire. They are reflected from the swollen bosom of the Arno, which glows and burns with the last light of day. All the west is filled with broken and dissolving rainbows: piles of purple and orange, and brilliant red hues and violet rays, are heaped up there in masses of rich coloring, a great heaven of beauty and glory, in which the fading clouds float like islands of the blest in an infinite sea. 244 IRENsEUS LETTERS. The house is on an open square, on which stands one of the oldest churches in Florence. Within it are the ashes and the tomb of the man whom Americans will never forget, though they regret that they have such cause to remember him. On a marble slab in the pavement of the chapel, on the left of the high altar, is this inscription : He was one of those few fortunate men who get more fame than is their due. Americo Vespuci followed in the wake of Columbus, and having stumbled upon the coast of the Western Continent, left his name on the whole of it, and it remains to this day, and will to the end of time. More fit ting would it have been to have given the honor of the New World's name to Columbus, as it certainly belongs to him. And here in Florence they not only build a tomb to Ameri- cus and treasure his bones, but they point to the celebrated gnomon of the Duomo as the greatest astronomical instru ment in the world. We are told that this fine meridian was traced as early as 1468 by a physician of Florence, a great philosopher and astronomer, Toscanelli, who corresponded with Christopher Columbus, communicated to him the results of his penetrating researches into astronomical science, and persuaded the great navigator to try the western passage to India ! Thus the Florentines would intimate that the discovery of the Western World is due to the scientific researches of their citizen, Dr. Toscanelli. Therefore, with OUR WINDOWS IN FLORENCE. 245 profound complacency, they garnish the sepulchre of Amer- icus Vespuci and put the laurels of Columbus on the brows of Toscanelli ! Across the Arno, which flows beneath our windows, we see many hills covered with villas, palaces, convents and churches ; but a little tower in the distance, more than all else, attracts my attention whenever I look out on this splendid scene. From the stone on which Jacob slept, a ladder seemed to reach from earth" to sky. And from that lone tower the old astronomer, the prince of seers, by the aid of his telescope, was wont to bring the heavens very near. On it the old man stood to make those observations which we study with no less wonder to-day than his unbe lieving cotemporaries did in 1640. It is well to revise one's recollection of facts when there is a new association by which to fasten them. If you are familiar with Milton's Paradise Lost, you will readily recur to the lines in which he writes that Satan's shield " Hung o'er his shoulders like the moon, whose orb Through optic glass the Tuscan artist views At evening from the top of Fiesole, Or in Val d'Arno, to descry new lands, Rivers or mountains, in her spotty globe." The Tuscan artist was Galileo, to whom Milton came when the astronomer was old and blind, a prisoner here, under the ban of the Inquisition, waiting for death to come and take him above the stars. Galileo was born at Pisa, only a few hours from Florence, Feb. 15, 1564. Neither you nor I believe in the transmigra tion of souls, but we are entertained by striking coincidences. It is asserted that Galileo was born the same day and hour when Michael Angelo died ; and when Galileo died, the year was signalized by the birth of Isaac Newton ! The world never knew three other men, in such a succession, of such transcendent genius. Galileo was but a boy of eighteen when, in his parish church, he saw the chandelier swinging to and fro, and was led to think of a pendulum whose vibra- 246 IREN^EUS LETTERS. tions should be a measure of time. He was only twenty-five when he took his seat as Professor of Mathematics in the University of Pisa, his native place, and there made those discoveries in physics which lie at the basis of his astronom ical system. The leaning tower of Pisa is looked on by travellers as a curious problem, and perhaps Galileo did not know why it was so ; but it leaned just far enough for him to try his experiments with falling bodies, and if the tower never served any better purpose, it was enough that it leaned for him. He knew too much for his own peace, for he proved that an invention of a great man was a sham, and the great man became his enemy and caused the removal of the astronomer to Padua. Here he was Professor for eigh teen years. When he had perfected his first telescope he took it to Venice, and, from the top of the Cathedral of St. Mark, looked into the heavens and discovered the moons of Jupiter. This was in 1609. He was now 54 years old. The fame of his discoveries, and the effect of them upon the received opinions of the world, were abroad in the earth. Science contended stoutly against him. Superstition came to the aid of science and made the fight bitter. How sorely the good man was tried, in the fifteen years that followed these brilliant discoveries, his published letters reveal. And when the Jesuits pretended that religion would be over turned if it were proved that the earth revolves around the sun, the old astronomer for he was now threescore and ten was ordered to present himself at Rome and answer to the charge of teaching doctrine opposed to the faith of the Church. Into the hands of the Inquisition he now was thrown. It is not certain that he was put to the torture, though a sentence in one of his letters seems to strengthen he idea that he was. Probably he was a man of such sensi tive physical organization that he could not face the instru ments of torture ; and without hesitation he admitted that the earth stood still, rather than go upon a wheel himself. That he did sign a written retraction of his opinions is quite certain. But it is not so certain that he said "it does move, nevertheless," when he rose from his knees, as he is reported OUR WINDOWS IN FLORENCE. 247 and generally believed to have said. Be that as it may be, we know that his recantation was not believed to be sincere, and he was condemned and consigned to imprisonment. The intercession of friends procured his release, and he was ordered to remain in duress, under the watch of the Inquisi tion, at Arcetri, adjoining Florence, where the Inquisition was flourishing, and abundantly able and willing to roast a heretic at a moment's warning. The Galli family, to which Galileo belonged, had property there, and the villa which he rented, and where he passed the remaining ten sad years of his life, still remains, and the tower that bears his illustrious name. To his house men of learning and fame made pil grimages, to see the man who had revolutionized the system of worlds. He toiled on in his forced retirement, writing out those works which could not then be published for fear of Rome, but which have since become the property of man kind. Milton, a young and ardent poet, quite as unconscious of his future as Galileo was of his at the same age, came to Arcetri, and looked upon the glorious old man, who could not see him now, for at the age of 74 he lost the sight of those eyes that had often looked into the mysteries of the skies. He closed them here in death Jan. 8, 1642. The men of Florence gave him, as he deserved, a royal burial, and his sepulchre is among them, in the church of Santa Croce, with an epitaph that justly celebrates the greatest astronomer of any age. Galileo's instruments are carefully preserved and kindly exhibited in the great Museum of Natural Science in this city. And when you have looked at, not through, his tele scope, which is a very poor affair compared with what we have in our modern observatories, and have seen the won derful preparations in wax of anatomical subjects, giving the minutest exhibitions of the internal and outer parts of the human body, the most complete and perfect thing of the kind in the world, you may go, as I have gone to-day, to the hill of Arcetri, the tower of Galileo, to the house and room in which he labored, suffered and died. On no other height have I stood and been so profoundly 248 I REN ^E US LETTERS. impressed with sublime associations, as to-day and there. Leaving the carriage at the foot of the last rise of the hill, I walked a few rods up through a narrow alley, and came suddenly upon an open space on the very summit. An ancient, rustic, rambling stone building, a farmer's place apparently, with a rude tower on one corner, crowned the hill. I came to the door, and a smiling Italian peasant woman asked if I would see the interior. Stepping into the court of the house, I found on the walls marble tablets cov ered with inscriptions recording the facts respecting the great astronomer's residence : the care that had been taken to preserve it as it was in his day. All around were memo rials of him and the noble families with whom he and his history are connected. I passed up a flight of stone steps into the study of Galileo ! His microscope, his books, his manuscripts, his portrait painted from life, his bust, letters to him from illustrious men, the chair in which he sat, the large table at which he wrought, paper covered with the drawings that his own hands had made all just as if he had stepped out of his study and ascended the tower. I went up after him. The steps were of wood, and they and the rail ing are rickety with age, but they had held great men, and were not to break down with me. The tower was not lofty, but, being on a hill-top, it commands the whole horizon : and such a heaven above and such an earth beneath, sure in no other clime and land may the eye rejoice in. Not fair Florence only or chiefly is the glory of this scene: though not a dome or tower or palace in its circle of splendor but shines at my feet in this brightest of sunlight : but Tuscany, covered with vineyards and olives, rich in corn and wine, ten thousands of villas crowning and studding the hillsides and plains : the Arno rushing among the walls of the city and coursing through the fields beyond : and the whole cir cuit of mountains on which the sky rests for support the Apennines in the north shutting off the great world of Europe and making, with their sister Alps, the bulwark of Italy. Yet it was not this view that Galileo studied from this old tower. He did not even look that way. Ad astro. SAN MINIATO AND VALLOMBROSA. 249 that. To the stars he went and walked among them, familiar with their paths, nor losing once his way : he was at home when farthest from the earth in quest of worlds till then unknown. Wonderful old man he was ! How patiently he bore the greatest of all afflictions to one who pursues the stars ! How sad his fate to lose the light of those heavens in which by sight he lived ! Milton was young when he came to this blind old man. Milton was blind before he was old. And Milton saw more of heavenly things after he was blind than before. I hope that both of them now, eye to eye, are beholding the invisi ble. SAN MINIATO AND VALLOMBROSA. In full view from our windows is the famous height of San Miniato. It is crowned with a lovely and remarkable church. Its bell-tower or campanile has its history identified with the defence of Florence and the genius of Michael Angelo. When we had come down from the tower of Galileo to sub lunary things, we rode among vineyards and olive groves, villas and gardens, until we struck upon the magnificent boulevard that now leads from the city to the summit of San Miniato. This boulevard reminds me of modern improvements in and about New York City, and the story of it is worth a few lines. When the seat of government, under Victor Emanuel, was removed from Turin to Florence, it set people and rulers crazy with the idea that Florence was to be the greatest city in the world. New houses, new streets, new parks, new everything, sprang into being as if a wand of enchantment was the royal sceptre. To borrow money for all this was easy, for the increase of business was to make everybody rich, and to go in debt has no terrors when wealth to pay it with is sure to come. Among other improvements, this splendid highway, winding up and among these beautiful hills, 250 1RMNMUS LETTERS. was made, with solid stone footpaths on both sides of it, rows of trees planted the entire distance, gardens of exquisite beauty made at intervals, with fountains, walks and seats, marble stairways with costly embellishments, and on the wide esplanade at the summit statues and other adornments, making the way from Florence to San Miniato to rival any route in ancient Rome, and unsurpassed by any pathway in modern times. In a few years the Court moved on to Rome, and Victor Emanuel, pushing the Pope out of the chair of State in which he had no right to sit, established himself in the Quirinal Palace in the city profanely called "the eternal." The King having departed, Florence stock went down. Everything went down but the taxes and prices. All these ''improvements" had to be paid for, or at least the interest on the debts, and the taxes now on real estate amount often to one half of a man's income. I have taken some pains to inquire into the methods and amount of taxation, and have ascertained that Florence and New York are the most heavily burdened with taxation of any two cities within my knowledge. And the parallel is more complete when we know that this is the result of needless, wasteful and unjusti fiable expenditures in the way of city "improvements." Public, like private, extravagance tends only to poverty, and there is very little pleasure in having a thing which costs more than it comes to, and must be paid for. But let us get on, and leave these people to pay for the road: it is a grand one, any way, and we will make the most of it. Years and years ago, five hundred, yes, more than a thou sand years ago, this hill-top was crowned with a church and monastery, and in all the intervening years, since the seventh century at least, it has been a famous holy place to which pilgrims of high and low degree resort. Once on a time the special favor was granted of a full and gracious indulgence to every one who came up here from Florence, on foot, on Fri day, and said a little prayer. And that day became a great day for San Miniato. Miniato was an Armenian Prince in the army of the Roman Emperor Decius, and being accused of being a Christian, he was thrown into the amphitheatre to be SAN MINI A TO AND VALLOMBROSA. 2 5 1 devoured by a panther. But the legend is that the panther would not touch him. The Roman army was at that time encamped on this hill near Florence. Miniato was then boiled in a cauldron, but it didn't hurt him. Then he was hung, then he was stoned, then he was shot with javelins. He sur vived them all, and was all the more a Christian. Then he was beheaded, and that killed him, A.D. 254. I have read of many saints who could not be put to death in any other way than by cutting off their heads. That almost always was fatal. At the time I am now writing of, Florence was as wicked a city as the world knew. The rich and the noble spent most of their time in voluptuous pleasures ; men and women were alike licentious and fond of blood. On Friday they were wont to go on foot, fair women and brave men, on a spree or holiday, making a pilgrimage to San Miniato, where they got the sins of the past week forgiven, and a new permit for the next. All the way booths were set up for the sale of fancy goods and drinks, and the poor made gains by selling to the rich who flirted and revelled, courted and quarrelled, as they came and went on this pious pilgrimage. Charlemagne took great pains to endow and improve this place. Hildebrand, a Florentine bishop, in the nth century rebuilt the church, which is now, with all the riches and reli gion of ten centuries since expended in and about it, one of the most splendid monuments of sacred art and architecture. Its pillars and many of its decorating marbles were brought from ancient Roman edifices, the pagan temples paying tribute to the Christian church; there is no other like this in Italy, arches over the nave joining smaller arches, binding the whole : the crypt being of more importance and splendor than the church, and on the same level with the main floor, the sanctuary being on the floor above, reached by a sump tuous marble stairway. The mosaic over the high altar re minds us of Oriental, barbaric gorgeousness. The whole interior is divested of the sense of solemnity and awe inspired by the simple grandeur of less costly shrines. The nave is wholly given up to the burial of the wealthy 252 tRENsEUS LETTERS. dead, the entire floor being made of marble slabs, grave stones on which epitaphs of affection and respect are inscribed. Many of the slabs are continually decorated with gaudy artificial flowers, which admirably represent the mourning of friends for friends long since forgotten. And all around the church are tombs, with some fine marble monuments. The grave is built up with brick and cement, and the coffin let in, on which the marble slab is then placed and secured. Michael Angelo ought to be the patron saint of Florence, so fond are the Florentines of fastening his name to every thing they can, in and about town. His lightest word and even his look are kept on record for the honor of every object that was so fortunate as to win his notice. One church is called his " Bride." This he called " la bella Villanela." To a statue he said " March," and the command is recorded, though the statue has never moved a step. But the old bell- tower of this church has a right to be called Michael Angelo's, for it bore a conspicuous part in the siege of Florence, which occurred when he was the leading man of science and art in this city. It overlooks the city, and from it the movements of the besiegers could be watched to great advantage. Against it they directed their engines with which huge stone balls were hurled: shaking the tower from summit to base. Michael Angelo had charge of the defences of the city, and, with the genius of Gen. Andrew Jackson, he had woollen mattresses suspended on the sides of the tower, and these protected it from the shock and saved it from destruction. The like result followed the use of bales of cotton at New Orleans, Jan. 8, 1815. In the year of our Lord 1070, Giovanni Gualberto (perhaps John Gilbert), son of one of the noble and wealthy families of Florence, and who had given himself to wild and reckless dissipation, was one of the many pilgrims, on Good Friday, to the shrine of San Miniato. A trip on foot to the top of the hill was a pleasure trip when, as I have said, the beauty and fashion of this voluptuous city made a holiday of it, and went in crowds to get the forgiveness of their sins, SAN MINIATO AND VALLOMBROSA. 253 and to lay in a good stock of indulgences for as many more. It happened that Giovanni's brother Hugh had had a slight unpleasantness with a friend, who ran him through the heart with a dagger ; and, as a matter of course, Hugh died of the wound in less than no time. The murder was no secret, but the fight was fair, and unless Hugh's friends chose to avenge it, the gentlemanly murderer would not be troubled about it. On this road to San Miniato Giovanni Gualberto encountered the murderer of his brother, and proceeded to serve him as his brother had been served; that is, to run him through with a dagger which he drew for that purpose. The un happy man being unarmed, and therefore quite unable to pro tect himself against the steel that was coming dangerously near to his person, fell on his knees before his executioner, and extending both his arms in the form of a cross, begged his enemy to remember that Christ died on that sacred day, and for His sake to have pity on him and spare his life. This wild young man dropped his dagger, embraced his brother's murderer, and together they went up to the church, and kneeling before the crucifix, implored the pardon of their sins. The testimony of tradition is that the wooden image bowed its head in token of forgiveness. And so deeply was the youth affected by the miracle, that he forsook all his evil ways, and became forthwith a monk of the monks in the Convent of San Miniato. These monks proving to be not good enough for him to keep company with, he obtained permission to found another monastery, and this he did in the delicious solitude of Vallombrosa ! What a train of pleasing associations starts with the men tion of that sweet name. It is a valley about a score of miles east of Florence, high among higher mountains, with a tor rent rushing through it : the hillsides are clothed with forest trees, and rich pastures covered with flocks stretch into the valley, which is always green : forests of chestnut, oak and beech are passed on entering: and the road in the autumn is covered deep with the falling leaves. When Milton visited Italy in his youth he was in this valley, as thousands of trav ellers have been since, and from it he drew one of his illustra- 254 IREN&US LETTERS. tions, now familiar as a household word : he says the rebel angels "lay entranced, Thick as autumnal leaves that strew the brooks In Vallombrosa." In this secluded paradise, far from the world's vain strife, the once gay and rollicking John Gilbert came, and drawing to his company a few other like-minded brethren, they began the life of another kind of folly quite as profitless and as little pleasing to God as the one they had forsaken. And by and by the monastery was married to a convent, the abbess of which granted the lands on which the monastery stands. But, as usual, the nuns of San Ilaro so sadly forgot their vows, that they had to be removed, and the relation of the two institutions was dissolved. The founder died long before this divorce, and, to the best of our knowledge, con tinued to lead a quiet and orderly life until his death, which event occurred in 1073, when he was aged 74 years. Two good things are credited to this monastery of Vallom brosa. It is said that the monks were the first to introduce potatoes into Tuscany. That certainly was a blessing. I never read of monks doing a better thing. The other bene faction was the invention of the sol, fa, la, in music. Guido Aretino, a distinguished musical composer, was a member of this order. He first used lines and spaces in writing music, and made what we call " the stave." Deacon Paul, in the 8th century, composed a Latin hymn, which was sung to a par ticular tune, and as it was often repeated, Aretino observed that the music rose on the first syllable of each half line, regularly, so as to make a gradually ascending scale of six notes : he took those syllables and used them as the sounds for the notes : the lines were Ut queant laxis /vsonare fibris Jffra. gestorum jfomuli tuorum, Sofve polluti /abu reatum, Sancte Johannes I SANTA CROCE AND THE INQUISITION. 255 Do was afterwards substituted for the ut, and si was added, so that the scale is read DO, RE, MI, FA, SOL, LA, SI. The beauty of this valley is celebrated, but the season of the year when I have been in Italy has always been unfavor able for a visit, and I have never been to Vallombrosa. But I have been to San Miniato, and the golden hues of the set ting sun are now resting on its gates, and flooding our win dows. SANTA CROCE AND THE INQUISITION. Florence, the beautiful, had never been darkened in my mind by associations with the Inquisition. If I had ever heard or read of that infernal institution, the beloved off spring and pet of the Church of Rome, having its seat in one of the fairest churches in the fairest city in the world, the memory of it had happily faded away. It came upon me as a discovery when I found that in Santa Croce it flour ished five hundred long and dreary years : five centuries of dark and dreadful wickedness done in God's name, wicked ness that frightens mankind to know that such things were, and may be done again, and will be, just as soon as the same unrepentant and unchanging Church gets the power to do its will. The church is the Westminster Abbey of Florence, only so called because it has the monuments of a few great men ; the tomb of any one of whom would make a church or city famous. Here Michael Angelo was brought to be buried at his own request. He died at Rome, 90 years old, and the Romans wished to have him buried there, but the Floren tines smuggled his remains to his native city. In this church he lay in state, and was then laid in the tomb of his family, the Buonarotti. Dante's tomb by Canova is magnificent: 256 IREN^EUS LETTERS. Alfieri's also by the same sculptor ; here lies Machiavelli, the historian and politician, who taught deception and cun ning as necessary to success in public life. More illustrious and worthy of renown than any of them is GALILEO, whose name is written among the stars. Here he was buried, the most of him certainly, though Vincensio carried off the thumb and forefinger of his right hand as the members with which Galileo wrote. The antiquarian Gori stole another finger, which is now to be seen in the Museum of Natural History. The pavement of the church is covered with mon umental tablets to the memory of men and women whose names are quite unknown. In a circle over the main door of entrance is the monogram in stone I. H. S., the familiar letters being the initials of JESUS HOMINUM SALVATOR, "Jesus Saviour of Men." There is a tradition that these letters were first employed in this connection by St. Bernadine of Sienna, after the plague in 1437. He remonstrated with a maker of gambling cards for pursuing such a trade, when the man replied, as thousands of others do who follow injurious catlings, " I must live, you know." But the saint told him he could show him a more excellent way of getting a living. He wrote the letters I. H. S on a bit of paper, explained their meaning, and told the card-maker to paint them in gold upon cards and sell them. They took amazingly, and the man made money and sold no more gambling cards. And this reminds me of a better story still, in which no saint figures, but I had a word in it. In the city of Newark, N. J., I was riding with two ladies of a very devotional turn of mind, and strongly inclined to the Romanized school of church-women. We had occasion to pause for a moment in front of the largest wholesale grocery store on Broad street. Said one of the ladies to the other, " This is a good place ; I love to see such holy feeling mingled with business." " To what do you allude ?" said I, being quite at a loss to comprehend the occasion of their religious emotion. " Observe," she answered, "the sacred letters I. H. S. on every box and barrel." SANTA CROCE AND THE INQUISITION. 257 I saw it was even so ; but, alas, her sentiment was spoiled when I informed her that the man who kept the store re joiced in the name of JOHN H. STEPHENS. Cimabue's portrait of St. Francis, and Giotto's fresco of the death of John the Baptist, are the greatest treasures of art in the church. Among the very earliest works that com mand the admiration of the ages, these have come down to us through six hundred years, and as they were studied with reverent regard by the masters of the I5th and i6th centu ries, we may be sure as there were great warriors before Agamemnon, so great painters wrought well before Rafael or Michael Angelo. But it must be frankly admitted that it requires some artistic genius to discover the marvellous beauties that glorify the early schools of painting, and to the unanointed eye their chief value appears to lie in show ing us by what majestic strides the art advanced in those two hundred years between Cimabue and "the Transfigura tion." The sun was shining brightly and filling the place with warmth and light as we escaped from the cold, dark, damp church into the square surrounded by the cloisters. It was actually a pleasant spot, though the walls were lined with epitaphs, and the rooms associated with the gloomiest periods of human history. For here in this sunny spot was set up the Inquisition, with all its terrors: here, during the years that wore along from 1284 to 1782, the Holy Office, as that most unholy tribunal was called, held its mysterious seat, and in the name of religion enacted crimes that nothing short of Infinite mercy can ever forgive. The Inquisition was not a court existing in one city or country only. It was conceived in Rome, where the Mystery of Iniquity has its hiding place still, and then its cheerful offices were extended to other countries where the civil power, subordinated to the church, would obey when the church demanded that its members should be disciplined in dungeons or in fire. In the gallery of the Marchese Caponi's palace in Florence, many years ago, I saw a 'picture that has haunted me ever 258 IRENMUS LETTERS. since. I do not intend to see it again. It often comes to me in night watches, when visions of distant years and cities stand up before the eyes of the soul, and say, "Here, look on me once more." It is the picture of a woman, sitting on the floor with her hands clasped about her knees, her head sinking upon her breast : a small lamp dying out at her feet gives light enough to disclose the truth that the fair sufferer is in a dungeon, walled up and left to perish ! Who is she ? Is it the horrible fancy of some artist to make a sensational picture ? Is it fiction founded on some domestic tragedy ? No, it is a veritable passage in the history of Santa Croce, a chapter in the chronicles of this beautiful Florence, a page in the annals of the gentle and Christ-like Church of Rome ! ! ! Shall I tell you the story ? THE STORY OF FAUSTINA. She was young and beautiful, in a humble walk of life, endowed with genius, and by diligent study she had fitted herself to give instruction to the youth of her own sex. In Florence, in the early part of the seventeenth century, the morals of priests and people were alike corrupt, and virtue was quite as rare as Solomon said it was among the women of his day. More than four thousand nuns filled the convents. The convents were governed by the monasteries that were swarming with monks. The civil power sought to separate the kindred institutions, so great was the scan dal, but the Church was the superior authority, and monks and nuns had it their own way. Faustina was not a nun. It was no unusual circumstance in those days for the daughters of the proudest families to separate themselves, nominally, from the world by taking upon them the vows of holy orders. Young men fled from the conflicts of business, and wars, and society, to the ease, the plenty and the pleasures of monastic life. The garb of the devotee was merely a cloak for selfish indulgence, and no class of persons had more comforts and luxuries and entertainments than these religious, who merely assumed SANTA CROCE AND THE INQUISITION. 259 the life of seclusion that they might be idle and well fed without labor or care. Such was not the spirit or the purpose of Faustina Mai- nardi. Her early reading had inspired her with a desire to lead the young of her own sex to the higher enjoyments which she herself had found in books and the pursuit of art, and at a very early age she gathered a school in which she taught v/ith the devotion and success of one who is under the influ ence of a higher motive than the pursuit of gain. Young women under her care, in successive years became infused with her love of the beautiful and true ; they sought wisdom, knowledge and skill for the good that was in them, and the joy they give to expanding minds. The priests had their hands upon every thing in those evil times. The holiest places of home were not too secret to escape their intrusion. Then as now the confessional made the priest the ruler in every household. The master of all the thoughts as well as the actions, it is the easiest thing in the world for the priest to become the tryant of the family, and to make the weak, the superstitious and religious, sub missive to his will. Men are not as subject to the priests as women are. In Italy to-day the men do not frequent the confessional. Women are still its dupes and victims. The serpent is creeping into the Church of England and silly women are led captive by the Priest in Absolution, who extorts the secrets of the heart by the awful lie that sin can not be forgiven unless confessed to him. This has been the real Inquisition of the Church of Rome in all the dreadful ages through which her power has been oerpetuated among the families of the earth. Among the learned and accomplished divines who filled the pulpits and ministered at the altars of Florence in 1645, there was one who had won great reputation as a preacher and a director of schools for the young. This fascinating, saintly and distinguished priest, the Canon Pandolfo Rica- soli, had no difficulty in adding to his other very agreeable duties of the same nature, the spiritual oversight of the school of which Faustina was the teacher. It was the sad 260 IKENJEUS LETTERS. but too natural result of this association that she who first sought in the priest a guide and helper, pouring her heart and soul into his ear, as her confessor, should gradually come to make known to him those romantic feelings and passions which would never have ripened into evil had they not been inspired and stimulated by a crafty, designing and unprincipled man. Under his despotic power, her conscience was perverted and she became his tool and accomplice in the corruption of the young and tender minds committed to her care. As their spiritual director he received their " con fessions," and as the innocence of their simple natures was opened into his ears, he poisoned them, and so led them into sin and misery. Alas ! for the depravity of human nature. Shame it is that such a fact should be on record in the annals of any church, in any age of the world. This proud and wicked priest the confessor of these young women, was, by the laws of his church, and in spite of his own deep depravity, such was the power of superstition over him, constrained to confess the secrets of his soul to a brother priest ! How the plot thickens, and the policy and craft of the Church are displayed as we trace the system in its suc cessive steps. The Canon Ricasoli revealed in confession to Father Marius the pleasures in which he was indulging in the school which it was his duty to watch over with pious solicitude : he knew it was very wicked for him to abuse his sacred office, and the confidence reposed in him by the parents of these precious youth. But he had led this bad life with the knowledge that if he confessed his sins in secret he would have absolution : to return to his sins and be again forgiyen. In the weakness of his vanity, it had never occurred to the learned and popular Ricasoli that his stand ing in Florence had excited the envy and therefore the hatred of his brethren, who would rejoice in his downfall. The secrets of the confessional were regarded as sacred even in those times of general corruption, but there was not a priest then, as there is not a priest now, who would not use the confessional for \hzgood of the Chitrch, though the ruin of individuals and families might also be the result. When SANTA CROCE AND THE INQUISITION. 261 'Father Mariushad theeloqucnt Canon Ricasoli in his power, he was not slow in betraying him to his -superiors. At this period, the Inquisition was in full vigor. Father Marius informed against Ricasoli, and he was brought before the dreaded court. Faustina was arrested also and with Ricasoli was accused of corrupting the minds of the young women of her school. If the words of the blessed Master had been addressed to the judges, not one of them could have said a word against this erring woman ; " Let him that is without sin cast the first stone." But the occasion was too good for them to lose the opportunity of shov.-ing zeal for morality, and in an age of general dissoluteness among priests and people they resolved to make an example of the priest and his victim. When we remember the power which a priest now has, and then had, over the conscience of a weak and gentle and confiding woman who looks up to him as her teacher, her father in God and the guide of her soul, it is right to say that the sin was largely his, and that he should bear the punishment which human tribunals would inflict. But the Inquisition never knew the attribute of mercy. It lived only to destroy. Its proceedings were for the most part conducted in secresy the most profound. Into their gloomy chambers Faustina was taken for examination, and the rack would have stretched her joints with torture had she denied the charge. But what had the poor thing to do, except to admit, as she did most freely, that she had been guilty of every thing of which she was accused : she had obeyed the priest whom she hon ored as one who had the Spirit of God, and she now bewailed her sin and surrendered herself to the judges. The Refectory of Santa Croce is the largest hall in the convent. It is in the same state now in which it was in November 1641, when it was the scene of Faustina's condem nation and sentence. At the end of the long room is a paint ing of the Last Supper, by Giotto, admired as one of his best preserved and masterly works. Above it is another picture, the Crucifixion, and at the sides are frescoes of Saint Bene dict and Saint Francis. They have all been on these walls 262 IRJZNEUS LETTERS. more than four hundred years. In the centre of the great hall was raised a platform or scaffold, hung with black dra pery as for the exhibition of a corpse. The Inquisitors were seated in elevated chairs around it. The Cardinal, the chiefs of the Medici family, priests, nobles and dignitaries of the city, filled the room. On the platform in the midst of this assembly the guilty priest, Ricasoli, and the miserable Faus tina were placed : they were dressed in robes painted all over with hideous devils and flames. Then they were made to kneel before the Grand Inquisitor, while a Monk, in a deep sepulchral voice, read aloud the crimes which they had com mitted and had confessed. The sentence was pronounced and carried into immediate execution. Underneath the chambers of the Inquisition, was a row of dungeons where wretched victims were confined to await their trial, and to which those were consigned whose fate was to escape the penalty of death, and drag out a miserable existence in these subterranean cells. No light penetrated them. Air enough was allowed to protract their sufferings. These dungeons are now to be seen in many old castles, and palaces and prisons in Europe. It was not uncommon for a feudal lord to have some of his enemies in dungeons under neath the floor on which he and his family were feasting. I have been in many of these cold, damp, dismal cells, and have wondered how frail women or even strong men could endure a month, not to speak of years, in such a horrid den, with scant food, the stone floor the only bed. Into such a dungeon Faustina was led. It was but six feet long and four or five feet wide. The door was narrow, the walls were stone. She was left with a lamp in her hand and a crucifix on which she fastened her eyes in despair, no. hope. Her pleas for mercy, her agonizing struggle, against her awful doom were all in vain. The pikes of the rude officials would have subdued her had she offered the least resistance to the stern decree. In silence and woe unspeakable she stood in the living tomb, while with swift and cruel hands the opening by which she had entered, was walled up with solid masonry, and she was left to suffocate or starve. The THE CHURCH AND CLOISTERS OF ST. MARK. 263 men who had doomed her to this horrid fate, ministers of God, high priests of Him who died for sinners, sat in their chairs of office, till the work was done, and then went to dinner. The Canon Ricasoli was condemned to the same fate, and the sentence was carried into effect. Scarcely more than two centuries have passed away since these events occurred in this lovely city of Florence. Not a century has yet sped its course since the Inquisition was suppressed. Its infernal work was going on until the year 1782. God grant that it may never be restored ! THE CHURCH AND CLOISTERS OF ST. MARK. We met a fat and flourishing monk as we came out from the pharmacy of St. Mark. He was going in, but surely had no need of medicine; and as we made some remark upon his personal appearance, our Italian cicerone said, with a laugh, " they dine well." When the present government of Italy set aside the tem poral and wretched rule of the Pope, it suppressed the monas teries and convents, applying their funds to religious purposes for the good of the people. The monks and nuns were pen sioned, and in some cases were allowed to occupy rooms in the cloisters they had long inhabited. But their corporate existence being destroyed, they are no longer able to hold property as an order or society, and so will gradually die out. This monastery has a strange fascination. Its history is rich, marvellous and romantic. We have just come from it, full of it. Its walls are covered with the handiwork of artists whose names are imperishable. Its cells are lighted up with the halo of martyrs. From these halls three great and holy men, one the prior of the convent, were brought out, hanged and burnt, because they denounced the foul corruptions of the Church of Rome. 264 I RENAL US LETTERS. And this, too, when Martin Luther was only fifteen years old. The church itself is not large, but it has works of art and monuments that attract attention. The crucifix by Giotto over the front door made him famous as greater than Cima- bue, his patron and teacher. John of Bologna designed the altars and wrought the statue of St. Antonio. Passignano and Jacopo da Empoli, and the beloved Fra Bartolomeo, have left their works upon the walls. These are the walls that resounded with the fiery eloquence of Savonarola, on whose lips the Florentines hung with rapture, or with sobs and wails of repentant anguish ; or, roused to frenzy, they rushed from the house to burn the books and paintings he condemned. The convent is preserved in its ancient state as a Museum and a monument. Its rich library is a storehouse of manu scripts and volumes of priceless value. But the frescoes are the chief treasures. Fra Angelico was a monk of this house and order. So was Fra Bartolomeo. Fra is the short for frater, brother. Angelico's work is lovely even in its decay. What angels he paints ! angelical they are, and he is there fore named Angelico. We find great frescoes by these and other artists of renown in the hall and refectory, and on the walls of the cells. These are little chambers, some ten feet square, with one small window in each, a cold brick floor, and a recess in the wall where once stood a lamp and crucifix. Into one of these cells the proud Medici were wont to retire at times, for a retreat from the luxury of their artistic and elegant life, to spend a few days and nights in meditation and prayer. St. Antonino's cell is here, with portraits, manuscripts, and other memorials. One, and another, and another monk, illustrious in the history of the Romish Church, once lodged in these cells. At the end of the long hallway we enter a room in which is placed a marble monument to Savonarola. It is more than a monument to him. It testifies the decay of Romish power : for the man commemorated in marble, whose portrait and two busts are here cherished as sacred, was put to death by the Church, after being stripped of his robes, and degraded THE CHURCH AND CLOISTERS OF ST. MARK. 265 publicly and officially from her ministry. The next room was his study when he was Prior of St. Mark. Such change has come over the face of things, and the heart of things, in Italy, that monasteries are suppressed by law, and men who were persecuted to death by the Church of Rome are honored, and their execution exalted into martyrdom. Strangers from a world that was discovered while Savonarola was pleading for the Reformation of the Church, now make pilgrimages to the cell hallowed by his prayers and tears; the cell from which he was taken when, with the anathemas of the Church on his head, he was put to death. I am so full of the story that you must read it : I will make it as brief as possible. THE MARTYR OF SAN MARCO. Girolamo Savonarola began to preach in the year (1483) when Martin Luther was born. He was a native of Ferrara, Italy, was educated at Bologna, and preached his first ser mon in the church of San Lorenzo in Florence. As he be came one of the most eloquent men of ancient or modern times, it will encourage the feeble beginner to learn that he made a total failure at the start. His audiences dropped away, displeased with his piping voice and awkward manner. He said of himself afterwards : " I had neither voice, lungs, nor style. My preaching disgusted every one. I could not have moved so much as a chicken." Yet this man afterwards con quered kings by his eloquence, and men sought the crown of martyrdom under the wonderful power of his words. He was the great Reformer preceding the advent of Luther. He came to the front when the corruption of the Church of Rome was so deep, wide and awful that no human tongue or pen, without divine inspiration, is equal to its description. And in this age of the world no decent page can receive the record. Savonarola had the material of a great orator and a great reformer in him and he knew it. Overcoming by severe train ing the obstacles that threatened his success, and filled with the spirit of a saint, a hero, and a martyr, he put his life into the work of reviving the Church and giving free- 266 IREN^EUS LETTERS. dom to the people. He believed in God and in himself. More than this, he believed that God spoke by him as a pro phet when he threatened judgments to come unless the Church repented and despots gave freedom to the oppressed. Apostates, and not apostles, sat in the chair of St. Peter. While Savonarola was acquiring knowledge in the convent at Bologna, and by fasting and prayer, and holy meditation, was being trained for his great mission, the Church was governed by Sixtus IV., profligate, avaricious, and wicked, whose shameless vices filled the young and pious student with hor ror, and stimulated his resolution to lead a crusade in the Church to save the cross. That wretch of a Pope died the year after Savonarola, preached his first sermon. Innocent VIII. succeeded him. The only innocence in him was in his name. Bribery and perjury were the price he paid for the chair. He took an oath beforehand that he would not exer cise the power of absolving himself : and when he was elected he absolved himself from that oath and then gave himself up to all manner of evil, forgiving his own sins and sinning the more. In these mighty ministers of iniquity, sitting in the seat of the high priests in the temple of the Most Holy, claim ing to hold the keys of heaven in their unclean hands, the young enthusiast saw the fulfilment of the visions of St. John in Patmos. Then rose to the throne of the Church a man, a monster, whose name, after the lapse of three hundred and fifty years, still reeks with infamy, as the vilest and most beastly of the sons of men. The pagan emperors of Rome had produced occasional specimens of human beings in whom varieties of vice were developed, as avarice, cruelty, lust, and revenge. But it remained for the Church to beget a son, and raise him to be its high priest and king, in whom dwelt all con ceivable sins and shame, a disgrace to the human family, and an everlasting evidence of what infernal wickedness may be in man abandoned of God to work all uncleanness with greediness. Yet was the Church itself so rotten, hierarchy, priests and people, they hailed as a god the advent of this Titan of sin, when he bought his way to the Papal chair, and THE CHURCH AND CLOISTERS OF ST. MARK. 267 with the infamy of unmentionable vices on his name already, Alexander VI., in the person of Roderigo Borgia, became the head of the Church of Rome. There never was but one good thing possible to be said of him. He was not a hypocrite. Sitting in the temple of God, so called, he professed to be nothing else than the incarnation of Satan, adding to all the vices of which the devil would be guilty, those crimes of which human beings alone are capable. Without disguise, restraint or shame, his crimes were limited only as the ability of the man was less than the will of the monster. He would have plucked the Virgin from the choir of heaven and torn up its streets of gold, to gratify his lust and greed. And this human demon was the head of the Church on earth, and the Church adored him. He was and the Church was then as truly infallible as the Pope is now, or as the Church ever was. Not an attribute of wisdom, truth, and righteousness vests in that Church or its head to-day, that did not, by every right, belong to it when Alexander VI. came to its throne in 1492, and by his matchless wickedness defied God and astounded the world. Among the few, the very few, in the Church who sighed and cried for the abominations that were done in the midst of her was Savonarola, now a monk and preacher in Brescia. The Medici family had reigned in Florence a hundred years, swaying the sceptre in a nominal republic with regal power, surrounding themselves with priceless luxuries, gathering the arts and sciences to the embellishment of their palaces and city, cultivating letters and philosophy, and transmitting their wealth and power to successive generations. To overturn them and restore the government to the people, was the dream of many, and when all other means failed, the pecu liarly Italian system of assassination was attempted. The papal government was externally friendly to the Medici, but, as always, its friendship was hollow and deceitful, Pope, car dinals and bishops, conspired to hire a band of murderers to assassinate the two brothers, Guilianoand Lorenzo de Medici, in the midst of the celebration of the blessed sacrament, in the temple of God. One of them was slain. Lorenzo was 268 IREN&US LETTERS. wounded, but not fatally. The conspirators were seized and seventy of them were put to death the next day. The arch bishop and two of his fellow murderers were hanged out of one of the palace windows. The sympathies of Savonarola were with the friends of popular liberty. Lorenzo, wishing to glorify Florence with the most eloquent as well as the most ingenious and learned men, invited Savonarola to be the Prior of St. Mark, a convent which Lorenzo had founded. He came. But the honor thus conferred did not silence or weaken his denunciation of the sins of the times. No pro phet in the days of Israel's degeneracy ever spoke with more boldness and decision than he. Lorenzo sought to soothe and to win him. Day after day the great man, called the Magnificent, came to the garden of the convent to converse with the Prior, who was accustomed there to teach his breth ren and disciples. When Lorenzo came, Savonarola would retire to his cell. Blandishments were lavished on him in vain. He denounced the vices of the times, and in his fiery zeal the ascetic enthusiast blazed into fanaticism, and he con founded things innocent and beautiful with the sensual and voluptuous. So fervid and irresistible were his appeals that thousands of the Florentines brought their gems of art, splen did paintings, the works of great masters, mosaics and jewels of gold and silver and precious stones, as well as their instruments of gaming, licentious books and pictures, what ever ministered to the passions and aesthetic tastes, and made one grand holocaust, in the public square, and burned them before the Lord! In these funeral pyres, these burnt sacrifices of ignorance and superstition, many books and paintings were consumed that art and learning and genius have never replaced. But these were the faults of excessive and unen lightened zeal. Bartolomeo, one of the finest painters of that or any other age, was so moved by the great reformer's words, that he burned his own magnificent creations, and became a monk in the cloisters of St. Mark. Four years he refused to paint at all, lest he should minister to an unhallowed taste. He was ordered by his superior to resume his art, or the gal leries would now want some of their most glorious paintings. THE CHURCH AND CLOISTERS OF ST. MARK. 269 Savonarola thundered in the ears of the affrighted people that the day of doom was at hand. He read in the Book of the Revelation the plagues that were coming upon Rome and Florence and the whole Church on account of their sins. And then death came to the palace of Lorenzo de Medici, and he sent for the Prior of St. Mark to confess him in his mortal agony. Savonarola yielded to the request of him dying whom he would not obey in the plenitude of his wealth and power. " Dost thou believe with all thine heart?" asked the monk of the dying prince. And Lorenzo said he did. " Wilt thou restore all thou hast taken from others unlawfully?" The spoiler of cities remembered the treasures of art with which Florence was enriched and adorned, but he groaned an unwilling promise. "And wilt thou give back to Florence her liberty and free government by the people?" Lorenzo thought of heaven and hell, his proud spirit revolted at the terms on which absolution was offered, and he refused to answer. The stout-hearted monk went away: left his patron to die unshriven. The Pope heard again and again of the denunciations heaped on his head by the eloquent monk. He warned him to desist. Savonarola replied that he expected death to be the reward of his faithfulness to duty, and it had no terrors. The Pope sent a messenger to Florence with the offer to the Prior of a cardinal's hat. The monk repelled the offer with scorn. Two parties were formed in Florence fighting unto blood, to resist and to defend the reform of the Church which Savonarola preached. Charges of disobedience of papal authority were brought against him. He was sum moned to Rome, but refused to go. Crowds listened to his sermons and with sobs and tears bewailed the sins of the Church and their own sins that had incurred the wrath of God. With his progress as preacher and reformer, he became more and more a fanatic. He had visions of angels and con flicts with devils, and it was said of him, though he was care ful not to say it of himself, that the Almighty condescended 270 IRE N^. US LETTERS. to speak with him face to face! The blessed Virgin was said to have put a crown of martyrdom on his brow, and a dove alighting on his shoulder whispered in his ear. His sermons became rhapsodies. He led the people in public spiritual dances, while they sang hymns and called with loud voices for Christ to come. Signs in the heavens were seen in many places, statues were bathed in sweat, women gave birth to monsters, and the land trembled under the tread of invisible armies with trumpets and drums. The Pope threatened the flaming prophet with the terrors, of the Church. The monk flung back his threats and declared, with truth, and that was the worst of it, that the Pope and his priests were worse than Turks and Moors. There is no faith, he said, no love, no virtue, in Rome. It was true then, it is true now. " If you would ruin your son, make him a priest," exclaimed Savonarola, and the priests were so enraged by his words that they resolved to get him out of the way by fair means or foul. The Pope stirred up the people against the monk whose testimony was terrible. Florence was threat ened with the Papal curse, if it did not stop the preacher's mouth. The magistrates were ordered to send him a prisoner to Rome. They were his enemies and would gladly obey the command. The priests of Florence refused to absolve or to bury any who should listen to his preaching. But so much the more did the multitudes throng the church of St. Mark. The war was now openly declared, and Savonarola was an acknowledged rebel against the Pope and the apostate church. The result could not be doubtful. It was on Palm Sunday, 1498, when the mob, set on fire by the hostile priests, assailed the Convent of St. Mark. They were met by a determined resistance, and some of them were slain. The magistrates interfered and the riot was sup pressed, but Savonarola and two of his brethren, Domenico and Maruffi, were seized and thrust into prison. They were brought to trial and subjected to the infernal tortures of the inquisition to induce them to recant, and submit to the authority of the Church. Savonarola's temperament was unfitted to endure the rack, and as his joints were strained THE CHURCH AXD CLOISTERS OF ST. MARK. 271 and every nerve was wrung with agony his strength failed and he was ready to recant, only to withdraw so soon as he was released for a moment from the torture. One awful night intervened, and the more fearful engines were applied with the same result. "Lord!" he cried in his agony, "take me to thyself." The three holy men were condemned to be hanged and burned. On the morning of May 22, 1498, they were led forth into the grand square of the Signori to die. At daybreak they had given to one another and received the Holy Communion, and their faith was strengthened in the sacrament. The vast crowd was not a mob only. Bishops, and priests and dele gates from the Pope, in their robes of office, stood near the sacrifice. The piazza, was then, as it is now, surrounded by the palaces of the great and the wealthy. The noblest of them all was the Palazzo Vecchio, in which the Gonfalonieri, or superior magistrates, had their official residence. It was after wards the royal house of the Medici. From the windows of this palace the magistrates witnessed the awful scene. As the hour drew nigh a solemn awe fell upon the people. The friends of the martyrs gathered near to them, whispering words of encouragement and mingling prayers with their tears. Vasona, a bishop, once a pupil of Savonarola, stripped them of their clerical garments and pronounced them degraded from the sacred office. But when. the bishop said to Savonarola, " I separate thee from the Church Militant and the Church Triumphant," the martyr with a firm and loud voice said, " from the Militant, but not from the Triumphant : that thou canst not do." And when a friend asked him if he went willingly to his death, he answered : " Should I not willingly die for His sake who willingly died for me a sinful man?" In the midst of the square a scaffold was erected, and as if in mockery of the death of our Blessed Lord, the places for the three were so arranged that Savonarola should be exe cuted in the midst and raised above the others, one on his right hand, the other on his left. Silvestro ascended first and exclaimed "Lord, into thy hands I commend my spirit." Do- 272 IRENsEUS LETTERS. menico took his place, and then Savonarola repeated the Apostles' Creed, and as the words " the life everlasting" were said, they were drawn up by the neck and strangled. Fag gots heaped about the scaffold were now fired and the bodies were consumed, dropping piece by piece into the flames. When the awful scene was over, the ashes were gathered in a cart and cast from the Old Bridge, into the Arno. GOING TO ROME. " All roads lead to Rome," is an old saying. It has a hid den meaning that we will hope is not true. Through many a long year when Europe was laced with railways, the Pope would not suffer his petty States to be disturbed with them, and the road to Rome was worse than in the days of the Caesars. In the year 1853 the best route to the capital was by sea to Civita Vecchia, and thence by coach, forty miles, on a dreadful road. But the march of time has left the .lumbering stages for the mountains, and even the mountains are invaded now by the railway. Over or under we go by rail through the Alps and the Apennines ; the rocks on the seaboard are tunnelled, and, instead of being tossed on the waves, we glide along the caverns, cautioned only to keep heads and arms within, lest they be left behind in the dark. The rail connects Rome with Florence and the rest of the world. It was a dull, dismal, winter morning, the last of November, when we were called out of bed before daylight to get breakfast and be off to the station. And by that per versity of nature so common to his class, the porter who called us mistook our rooms for some still more unfortunate traveller's, and roused us an hour before the time. The pleasures of travel and the delicious climate of Italy are appreciated when one shivers over a cold breakfast by can dle-light, crawls into the court-yard of his Albergo, mounts the omnibus in a dripping rain, and is dragged, with an enor- GOING TO ROME. 273 mous load of trunks, to the station half an hour before the time of starting. The waiting-room has frescoed walls and mosaic floors, with interworked inscriptions, and is as cold as an icy sepulchre. The half hour of waiting is spent in registering luggage, weighing and marking and paying. At last the doors are opened, and rush is made for the best seats. Then you suppose you are off. The time is up, but some important functionary has not arrived : the car-doors are locked : no cord or bell connects you in any way with help if you want it ; you may have a crazy woman or a bandit in the apartment, but there you must stay until the con ductor strangely called a guard is pleased to release you at some distant station. It was twelve minutes by the sta tion time when the gold-laced officials touched their caps to somebody who bustled into the train, and we were off. It is a beautiful journey by rail from Florence to Rome. But we cannot stop for half an hour at every place of inter est, as we did ten or twelve years ago when posting through Italy. Then we explored the quaint and curious old city Montevanchi, and its museum of remains discovered in its vicinity ; the elephant, hippopotamus, and the mastodon once roamed these plains, and found their graves in which they have slept undisturbed certainly for two thousand years. But we did rest at Arezzo a few minutes, where Petrarch was born, when his parents were in exile from Florence ; and the friend of Horace and Virgil, Mecaenas, was born here, and Vasari, and Benvenuti, and Leonardo Aretino. Cortona's walls of gigantic stones have resisted the assaults of war and time, and are just as good as ever. It has a famous grotto, quite as genuine an article as many others in Italy or Judea. It is a curious Etruscan building of huge stones joined without cement, and named the Grotto of Pythagoras. This gentle philospher preached the virtue and duty of toleration, and the ancient Ottomans burned him alive for holding and teaching such a pestilent heresy. The C<?rton- ians of Italy, for the honor of having the philosopher as one of their citizens, took to themselves the shame of putting him to death. Such is history. 274 I RE N^. US LETTERS. The Lake of Thrasymene is skirted by the road, and we talked over the great battle which was fought on its banks by the Carthaginians under Hannibal, and the Romans under Flaminius, B.C. 217. The streams that flow into the lake ran red with blood, and an earthquake was unheeded in the greater shock of battle. I forget how many bushels of rings the victorious Africans took from the fingers of the slain Roman nobles after the fight was over. The old cities and villages we pass seem, from the road, deserted and dying. Decay, like ivy, hangs on the walls and roofs, and the dead past rises to view ; for the time was when every acre of this ground lived with stalwart men, who went out from these dead cities to the conquest of the world. We are approaching Rome. Herds of mottled cattle roam the plains. Ruins, the names of which are buried beneath them, lie in the distance. Miles of ancient aqueducts, on successive arches, seem to be marching across the campagna, over the graves of twenty centuries. It is just possible that some travellers may not be excited on approaching Rome. It is a point with many persons to be never excited. These oxen and buffaloes are not in the least affected by their nearness to Rome. To be insensible here is to be like them. Dr. Arnold writes that the day of his arrival was " the most solemn and interesting" of his life. Niebubr describes his emotions as overpowering. Chateau briand says that the very dust of the city has something of human grandeur. When Luther came to Rome he cried, as he entered her gate, " I salute thee, O holy Rome, sacred through the blood and tombs of the martyrs." None of these thoughtful men came to Rome by rail. But we had this in common with them, that the rush and clatter of the cars did not destroy the sentiment of the approach to the ETERNAL City. We were in such a train of thought when the train rushed into the city, and we were disgorged in front of the Baths of Diocletian. I never look at Italy on the map without an intense sense of wonder. Judea gave law to the world, but Judea's son was the Man Divine. The philosophy of Greece has ruled in the GOING TO ROME. 275 thought of the world, but that was the power of mind in the realm of mind. But Italy, an insignificant peninsula in an inland tideless sea, a tongue of land shaped like a boot, and compared with Europe only, is less than the foot to a man, could and did speak the word which the whole world heard and obeyed ; her armed legions marched forth to the con quest of the nations : her yoke was on the neck of Germany, Helvetia, Gaul and Britain ; and the multitudinous East, with its barbaric wealth and splendor, submitted to her impe rial sway : Africa and Asia, and all the earth, sent streams of gold and fabulous treasures to make rich the cities and citi zens of this diminutive country ; kings and queens were led as captives through the streets of this Imperial Rome, and a hundred temples dedicated to pagan gods were perfumed with sacrifices of triumphant gratitude : here learning and letters, the arts, poetry, eloquence and philosophy flourished in their glory for the admiration and instruction of mankind, as their yet unrivalled remains attest at this day. And when the Christian religion subdued the Empire and mounted the throne, it became the ruling faith of the world, sending out its ministers among the nations, overturning kings and lord ing it over the consciences of hundreds of millions of human beings through protracted centuries, and even now, in its corruption and decrepitude and apostasy, loaded with the sins of simony and uncleanness and murder, and whatsoever worketh abomination or maketh a lie ; drunk with the blood of uncounted armies of saints who in its persecutions it has sent up to the thrones of martyrs : staggering to its doom under the blasphemous assumption of infallibility by which it has insulted and defied the Only Wise God ; even yet and now it stands like the imperial ruins of old Rome, majestic and mighty in its age and decay, destined to be like those ruins longer in perishing than in rising to the summit of its power. It is an event in one's life to come to Rome. Pagan or Papal, Jew, Heathen or Christian, he must be more or less than a man who can come to Rome without emotion. And with these and the like emotions, I drove away from the sta tion to the Hotel Quirinal in Rome. 276 IRENsEUS LETTERS. THE ETERNAL CITY! WHY? Probably there are writers wise enough to tell us why Rome is called the " Eternal " City. Not recalling the reason at this moment, and having no books to help me, I must doubt the fact. So far from being without beginning, it is certain that many other towns antedate it, and its end is nearer to our day than its beginning. The Venerable Bede copies and so preserves, as a fly is kept in amber, a prophecy of Anglo-Saxon Pilgrims, which is in Latin, but in English is too familiar for quotation ; " While stands the Coliseum, Rome shall stand ; When falls the Coliseum, Rome shall fall ; And when Rome falls, the world." The Coliseum is certainly good for another couple of thousand years, if the Romans restore it from year to year, as they do now, but Rome had its fall long time ago, and the Coliseum is a ruin, but the world rolls on, while the Eternal City is no more to the world than the fly on the cart wheel. The city once had four millions of inhabitants. It now has two hundred and fifty thousand ! That does not read much like the life of an eternal city. Its growth seems to be down wards. Once on a time the fortunes of war left it with only a thousand inhabitants. That was in the year 546, when Totila, King of the Goths, captured it, after a long siege, and found the city a desert. When its people were counted by millions, everything flowed into it ; now nothing comes but travellers and Peter's Pence. The Pence will cease, but the travellers will come as the ruins multiply. The visitors bring and leave a great sum of money every year, and the more as they are robbed the more. Prices have doubled in ten years, and travel in Italy, which once was cheaper than in any other part of Europe, is now more expensive. The hotel charges are enormous in Rome, quite as bad in Florence, and need lessly high in all the cities. This tends to the decrease of THE ETERNAL CITY! WHY? 277 travel. The hotels raise their prices as the company falls off. Rome is said to be very unwholesome. There is a positive panic on the subject. If the half be true that is said of peo ple dying here, the city, so far from being eternal, is on its death-bed now. In all the other cities of Italy the traveller is warned against Rome. " The malaria is dreadful in Rome just now," is the constant remark, and those who are on their way to the city are frightened. If they come they are afraid to stay. Fear helps them to be ill. Then there is a hateful saying, " None but dogs and Englishmen walk in the sun in Rome." That saying has killed many men and women, tempting them to avoid the very life of Italy, the warm, glorious, genial sun. Out of the sun is in the way to getting a chill. And a chill is the forerunner of disease. It is not dangerous to visit Rome for a few days at any season of the year. But malaria does prevail in regions round about the city from early summer until frost comes, and invades the walls, except in the most crowded, the filthiest quarters. There no stranger would stay, and the natives are acclimated. The mortality among the settled population of Rome is not in excess of other cities. Mr. Hooker, the banker, Mr. Terry, the artist, and others who have resided here thirty or forty years, regard the city as wholesome as any other. Why, then, do so many travellers sicken and die here, or carry away with them the seeds that afterwards bear deadly fruit. Chiefly, because they are impriident. They do those things they ought not to do, and leave undone many that ought to be done, and no wonder they soon come to say " there is no health in us." The one peculiarity of the Italian climate to be kept ever in mind is, that the contrast between the warmth in sun and shade is far greater than in England or the United States. The sun does not smite by day : the sun is life and health. But the sudden change from sunshine to shade is a rush trom heat to cold, and the check of per spiration is dangerous anywhere. Warm by walking in the sun, we enter a church or gallery : the floors are stone, and stone cold : we are chilled through and through as we stand 278 IREN^US LETTERS. with upturned faces, and aching feet, before paintings that are on the ceiling, or on the high walls above our heads, and we pursue this study of art hour after hour and day after day, till we are worn out, and are obliged to send for the doctor. We are victims of the Roman fever ! So the obituary notice says, and we are added to the long roll of martyrs to the love of art, who could not stand the climate of Rome. This is the short of nine-tenths of the cases of disease and death among the travellers who come to Rome for the purpose of visiting the city. Many come because they are invalids already, and most of these go away better than they came. Some die, and their fate adds to the bad reputation of Rome. But each Italian city to which foreigners resort has its Protestant cemetery, and its monuments are covered with inscriptions that tell us how vain it was to seek for life and health in this lovely clime, when death has marked his vic tim for the tomb. The Florence cemetery is full : and when I was there a few weeks ago, three or four persons were waiting burial while a new cemetery was in preparation. England and the United States have peopled that Campo Santo, and one also in Naples, and this one in Rome, where the pyramid of Cestus stands as it did when Paul was led by it to his execution. Turn to Conybeare and Howson's book on the travels of Paul, and read the tenderly eloquent pas sage in which this monument and these graves are described. But I have strangely wandered from the point. It was to inquire why Rome is called the Eternal City, when it is evi dently dying. The Pope was said to be dying when we arrived. He had been dying for some days, and from hour to hour the event was expected. The first Roman citizen of whom I asked if the Pope was still living, answered : " Living ! if you think he is going to die, you will be con vinced of your mistake : he is not to die this time, I assure you." Yet the doctors were at his bedside continually, and day after day issued a statement of his condition. The Pope and the King were at variance. The King had THE ETERNAL CITY! WHY? 279 taken the crown of all Italy for his own head, with the con sent of the people, and against the will of the Pope. The time was when the will of the Pope would have been LAW alike to King and to people. That time has long gone by and forever. The King was a good Romanist, but the Pope read him out of the Church, and so the King and the Pope were now at war. But the Pope was sick and likely to die, and the King sent daily, and often two and three times a day, to learn how the Pope was getting on. It was said in Rome, and it is probably true, that the Pope and the King were not enemies, except on paper and before the world. It is certain that the King had the offices of the Church admin istered to and for him as regularly as he desired, and, as an excommunicated person, he could not have had this privi lege had it been against the will of the Church. There was some secret understanding between the Pope and the King, and letters frequently passed between them. Perhaps they had private interviews, in the palace of one or the other. The King lived in the Quirinal and the Pope in the Vatican Palace. While the Pope was supposed to be dying, we met the King riding in an open carriage on the Pincio promenade. He was the incarnation of high living, his face was almost purple. We met him again, and the third time, and every time we saw him the more florid was the face of the King. Within a month the King is smitten with mortal sickness. Now the physicians are at his bedside, night and day. The kings of all Europe send messages of inquiry. The Pope is anxious and is among the inquirers. The last sacrament of the Church is administered to the dying. The King is dead : not yet sixty years old, the King is dead. 280 IREN^EUS LETTERS. A MORNING ADVENTURE IN ROME. You have often heard of the SEPOLTE VIVE, the buried- alive nuns of Rome. I have just returned from their convent. It is a strange story that you are to read, scarcely credible in this age of the world, but strangely true it is, and "pity 'tis 'tis true." Leaving the church St. Maria in Monti, where repose in full view the body of a canonized beggar, I walked up the street, and in a moment reached a narrow alley which seemed to lead only to a gloomy arch under which was a painted crucifix, life-size, with two old monks kneeling in front of it. I walked up to these hideous images, and on the left hand, found a flight of stone steps. I went hastily up, for I knew at once, from what I had heard, that these steps led to the doors of the concealed convent of Farnesian nuns, the Sepolte vive, or Buried Alive. Perhaps it was the spirit of adventure, certainly of curiosity, that prompted me to ascend the steps, for I could have had no expectation of gaining admission to this house of living death. Mr. Hare, in his " Walks in Rome," had told me "that the only means of communicating with the nuns is by rapping on a barrel which projects from a wall on the plat form above the roofs of the houses, when a muffled voice is heard from the interior, and if your references are satisfac tory, the barrel turns round and eventually discloses a key by which the initiated can admit themselves to a small chamber in the interior of the convent." I looked in vain for any projecting barrel, but having reached an open gallery above the roofs of houses around, though the walls of the convent rose still higher, I entered a recess, on the walls of which were inscriptions in Latin and Italian, such as, "Who enters here leaves the world behind." " Qui non diligit, manet in morte." In the wall was a copper plate about one foot wide by two feet high, which I supposed covered the opening through which communication was to be had with the interior. On feeling of it, I found it was the A MORNING ADVENTURE IN ROME. 281 side of a hollow cylinder, and evidently made to revolve if necessary. This must be " the barrel " through which the muffled voice of the woman within would come to me, if the oracle chose to reply to my call. I knocked. No answer came, but the hollow chamber gave back a melancholy sound. My sensations at this moment were peculiar, and I began to wish that I had not come, or at least that I had brought with me some companion to share the excitement, if not the perils of this adventure. For the secret of this convent is that the nuns who once enter never come out of the door again, dead or alive ! They never hear from the world out side. No mother's voice or father's love intrudes upon this living tomb in which their hopes and hearts are buried. They sleep every night in a coffin in which they are to be buried, here, when they finally stop breathing. They are told, when one of their parents dies, that some loved one is dead, so that each one is to be thrilled with the sorrow that perhaps her mother or father is dead, but no one knows which one has become an orphan. It is said that they become so enamored of death, that they invade the vaults in which their dead sisters are placed, and fondle the corpses as chil dren play with dolls. They have a death's head on the dinner table, and often lie down in graves prepared with their own hands, that they may be as nearly dead themselves as they can be while yet constrained to live. Around me were the walls of this huge sepulchre, silent as the tomb itself, cheerless, hopeless, the home of madness or despair. It was Christmas day. The sun was shining joyously on roofs below me, and all the glad morning the bells of Rome had been ringing the carols of the Saviour's natal morn. The city was jubilant with the songs of angels, and the churches flung open all their doors to the people who flocked to the choirs and the altars, their hearts the mean while shouting, " Unto us a child is born." But no glad sound of Merry Christmas enters these dead walls : this prL son house of young souls, doomed in the spring time of life to take up their abode in coffins, vaults and tombs. 282 IRENsEUS LETTERS. These gloomy thoughts of mine were destined to a speedy interruption and a sudden conversion. I knocked again, and with greater force; then waited listening. Presently a woman's voice she must have been close by me was heard from the other side of the copper plating, and this is what passed between us : The voice (in Italian). " What do you wish ?" " I wish to visit the convent if it be allowed." The voice. " It is not possible for you to come in." '' I would see the convent, as I have come from a far coun try and have heard much of this institution." The voice. " You cannot come in ;" and then the woman broke out into a ringing, hearty laugh, loud and long. I was taken all aback. It had not occurred to me that they ever laughed inside such walls as these. It was more in my mind that " darkness, death and long despair reign in eternal silence there." But she laughed cheerily at the idea of my being such a fool as to think of coming in there, and we chatted gaily, I laughing in sympathy on the outside, and she within, a thin metallic loose plate between us. The voice. " Do you speak the French ?" " Better than I speak the Italian, but the English is my own tongue." She said she would send some one to converse with me, and in a few moments another voice addressed me in French, and asked if I would walk in and visit the chapel. I said that I wanted to seethe convent, and the mode of life within. She replied that it was impossible, and very soon began to laugh as merrily as her sister had done. When, in her play ful French banter, she asked me, "What do you want to see ?" I said, with equal playfulness, " I want to see you," her merriment broke out afresh, and I verily thought for a moment I had won my way into the fortress by the irresisti ble art. The cylinder revolved, showing me that it was divided into chambers ; it paused and I heard something fall upon the metal bottom. It turned still more, and the open chamber presented itself to me with two keys lying in it. The voice A MORNING ADVENTURE IN ROME. 283 within said, " The larger key will admit you to the chapel, and the smaller will open a door inside of it." The door of the chapel was near to me, the only door there ; unlocking it, I stood upon its marble floor. It was a simple chapel, the pictures and stools and images such as are seen in thousands of Romish churches. But the marble floor was largely made of sepulchral slabs on which were recorded the names and virtues of the nuns who were buried underneath ! How sad was this obituary ! What a mausoleum was here ! How many weary, wretched, aching hearts had rested in this cold bed ! I read the epitaphs, and some inscriptions on the walls, and mused among the tombs on the wreck and ruin of young lives, tortured and murdered and buried here, by the terrible machinery of a Church that, through long centuries, has perpetuated successive living sacrifices of blooming Roman maidens on these altars of superstition, imposture and crime. For what is martyrdom by fire, or the wheel, or the axe, or by lions in the arena, compared with the long- drawn-out agony of a young lady who eats with a skeleton at her side, and sleeps in a coffin and plays with a corpse, and this for years, till sweet death comes in person, and releases her from torment by clasping her in his cold and chaste embrace ! The little key let me into a side chamber, the cell or clois ter of a nun, fitted up as a show or specimen, and perhaps quite unlike the real cells into which the "profanum vulgus," or persons of the male persuasion, may never enter. It was a room about ten feet square, with a chair and table in it : beyond it a closet with a crucifix on the wall, and, still farther, a cell just large enough to hold a person in a chair : and in the wall was a perforated plate through which the nun is reputed to whisper the story of her sins into the ear of an invisible priest who sits in the outer court, and by a pleasing fiction is supposed never to come within these walls. When the Mother Superior gives an audience, it is an affair of state more mysterious than the approach to the celestial Emperor of China. She sits in the midst of her oratory veiled in black from head to foot, and the visitor sees nothing 284 IRENMUS LETTERS. but this statuesque drapery concealing the abbess. Pope Gregory XVI. entered by his divine right to go where he pleased among the faithful, and wishing to see the lady with whom he conversed, he said : " Sister, please to raise your veil." " N<?, father," she answered, " it is against the rules." The Pope asked very much the same question that I did, and got about the same answer. Having penetrated as far into the convent as the rules of the order permit, I returned with the keys, and dropping them into the cavity, the sound summoned the unseen sister to the portal, and she asked me, " Were you pleased with the church ?" I told her that I had been very much interested in what I' had seen, but would be pleased to see more. She laughed again right merrily, and chatted on gaily as if it were a pleasure to have some one to talk with, though he could not come in. I was well assured from what I heard, her tones of voice, her cheerful words, and her right merry laugh, that they have good times inside in spite of death's heads, cross-bones and coffins. I do not believe it is half so bad to be buried alive, as they would have it to appear, and a lady, who was per mitted by special favor to visit the nuns, testifies that they . are ruddy and rosy-looking girls notwithstanding their ghostly employments. Twenty-seven are there now, and I left them with more satisfaction than when I knocked at their inhospitable door. THE STORY AND THE CHURCH OF ST. CECILIA. " I have an angel which thus loveth me, That with great love, whether I wake or sleep, Is ready aye my body for to keep." Chaucer, In former visits in Rome I carried away no image of marble loveliness that lingered so tenderly in the memory as that of TffE CffORClt OF ST. CECILIA. 285 the statue of th e martyr Saint Cecilia. And now, when for the third time, I came to this city filled, above ground and below, in its churches and palaces and piazzas, with the masterpieces of the world's art, there was not a statue or a painting I so much desired to see again' as this. It is across the Tiber, in the church that bears her name. But let me tell you her story. Cecilia was a Roman girl of noble parentage, and lived in the third century. She had great wealth and great beauty, and at the early age of sixteen was married to Valerian. He was a pagan, but was soon converted to Christianity by the pray ers and conversation and holy living of his young wife, who had been brought to Christ before she married. He was baptized before he confessed to her that he had been con verted. But she knew it, and when he returned from his baptism he found her, with an angel, singing praises to God for his salvation. She persuaded his brother, Tiburtius, also to embrace the faith of the gospel, and both of them suffered martyrdom, as they were publicly known as zealous advocates of the new religion which was to overturn the idols and temples of the heathen. The governor of the city, under the Emperor Septimius Se- verus, knew that Cecilia had come into the possession of great riches by the death of her relatives, and he had her arrested in her own house, and condemned to death. In the houses of the wealthy Romans there was a room, adjoin ing the baths, called a Sudartum, into which steam was admitted while the person wishing to take a bath lay on a marble couch. In one of these rooms she was shut up, and the heated steam driven in upon her three days, by which time it would be expected that she was boiled. But when the door was opened, she was as safe as Daniel in the den, or the three children in the fur nace. God had sent cooling showers to moderate the heat of the steam, and Cecilia was the more radiant and lovely for the terrible ordeal she had passed through. She was a singer "of such ravishing sweetness and power that the angels came down from heaven to listen and to join their voices with hers." When the door of the bath was opened she was singing the 286 IREN&US LETTERS. praises of her Saviour, and the coarse men who were to carry off her body were overcome by the melody of her voice. Her deliverance from death was looked upon as a miracle, and the governor was afraid to make another attempt in public to put her to death. A man was sent to cut off her head in the secret chambers of her own house. He struck with the axe three times and did not succeed. The Roman law forbade the victim to be stricken more than three times. The records of her martyrdom say : " The Christians found her bathed in her blood, and during three days she preached and taught like a doctor of the Church, with such sweetness and eloquence that four hundred pagans were converted. On the third day she was visited by Pope Urban, to whose care she tenderly committed the poor whom she nourished, and to him she bequeathed the palace in which she had lived, that it might be consecrated as a temple to the Saviour. Then, thanking God that he considered her a humble woman, worthy to share the glory of his heroes, and with her eyes apparently fixed upon the heavens opening before her, she departed to her heavenly bridegroom." The Christians buried her in the Catacombs, and all trace of the spot and of the remains was lost in the lapse of time. Where her palace stood, the church that bears her name, and in which we are now standing, was built immediately after her death, A.D. 280. More than five hundred years roll on, and the body of the saint was nowhere to be found. Then Pope Paschal I. fell asleep one morning during the service in St. Peter's just think of it, a Pope asleep during morning pray ers while thinking of St. Cecilia, and longing to find her burial place. In a vision she appeared to him and told him where she was lying, by the side of her husband and his brother in the catacomb of Calixtus. The next day why not that day does not appear he was obedient to the vision, and found the lovely saint robed in gold tissue, with linen clothes steeped in blood at her feet. She was not lying on her back, as a body in a tomb, but on her right side, as if in bed, with her knees slightly drawn up, and having the appear ance of one asleep. She was now removed to the Church, THE CHURCH OF ST. CECILIA. 287 which was rebuilt with more magnificence than the first, and the body was laid under the altar. It slept there eight hun dred years more, when the tomb was opened and the body was lying in the same peaceful state, with all the robes of the grave preserved in the freshness of the burial morn. The Pope of the period and all the people hastened to the church and gazed with edifying wonder on the sleeping form. The greatest sculptor of the day made a copy of the figure, and this is the beautiful marble statue which we are now seeing as it lies on Cecilia's tomb, in which are her remains. " It is the statue of a lady, perfect in form, and affecting from resemblance to reality in the drapery of white marble, and her gravitation of the limbs" is such as no living form assumes, but is perfectly true to the attitudes of the dead. The artist has placed this inscription on his work : " Behold the body of the most holy virgin Cecilia, whom I myself saw lying incorrupt in her tomb. I have in this marble expressed for thee, the same saint in the very same posture of body." There are in the church, scenes in the life of the saint, her own picture by Cuido, tombs of illustrious men, and the altar canopy with statuettes of the saint and her companions in suffering for Christ ; but all the interest of the visit centred in this remarkable statue and the room in which the saint was first called to endure torture. The Sudarhtm is a few steps below the floor of the church, a marble-floored apart ment, with appliances for hot water and steam, and we are assured that this is the very same chamber in the palace of Cecilia in which she was three days and nights subjected to the boiling heat, without experiencing any bodily harm. Such is the story. The kindly priest who showed us the church related these incidents with great simplicity, and perhaps believed them all. In the gallery of Bologna we saw the celebrated picture by Raphael of St. Cecilia and her maiden choir. Copies have made it familiar the world over. Cecilia is the muse of music now. Her name mingles sweetly in song, and St. Cecilia's day is more famous in the poem of Dryden than in the Romish Calendar. 283 IREN^US LETTERS. THE BEGGAR'S CHURCH AND THE BEGGARS OF ITALY. A row of beggars stood in front of the church. The church is on the corner of the Piazza Santa Maria in Monti, and, like hundreds of others in Rome and over Italy, has nothing in its front to attract attention. The beggars stood on the steps, and did not beg as I approached and passed through the line into the porch. It was something quite unusual to meet a beggar and not be begged. And they were very ragged, very dirty, very miserable-looking beggars, but they did not beg. I passed them and went into the church. Over the altar is a painting, not of the Saviour, not of an Apostle, not even of the Virgin Mary, of whom there are more pictures than of all the saints in the world. The painting represents a beg gar in the midst of the great Roman Coliseum, giving money to a group of beggars around him, a beggar giving to beggars ! On the left of the altar is a tomb, and in it or in front of it lies exposed at full length, in beggar raiment, in the gown of a wandering pilgrim, with staff and scrip, the body of a man, a mummied man indeed, disgusting with its skinny, dark, dead visage, grinning as if in mockery. His name is Joseph Labre. He was born in Boulogne, France, in 1748, and his parents were not poor. But, at a very early age, he took to a life of vagrant beggary in the name of religion. The rules of two or three holy orders that he entered did not agree with his health, and he heard a voice ivithin calling him to a life of travel in penitence and charity. Through seven years he wandered in Europe, visit ing the most celebrated churches of the Holy Virgin, and in those years it is said that he travelled on foot five thousand leagues. In the year 1777 he went to Italy and took up his abode in Rome, in the largest building in it, even in the Col iseum itself. Sometimes he slept in the porch of the churches, but as he became infirm, he made a hermit's cell in THE B2GGARS OF ITALY. 289 the Coliseum, from which he often sallied out to beg, return ing there to pass the night. In this arena, where the games and fights and martyrdoms in ages past entertained the Romans, Labre held his levees of beggars, and distributed among them the money and the bread he had received from others. Thousands of visitors, coming here, would take an interest in the hermit of the Coliseum, and the romance of the place and the story of the religious tramp who had scoured all Europe on foot, would naturally excite the curi osity of those who found him there, and it was a pleasure to give him something to keep body and soul together. His receipts were large, and if he had been disposed to hoard as a miser he might have made a heap of money. But he got only to give, and at night was as poor as in the morning. It was not far from the Coliseum to the Church of St. Mary in the Mount, and there he resorted to say his prayers. One day he fell on the steps and hurt himself so severely that he did not long survive. Being carried into a house near the church, he died there April 16, 1783. The bed on which he died, and his crucifix, and the small earthly possessions a wandering mendicant might possess, are preserved with pious care in the room that was made holy by his death, and his body, being suitably prepared for the purpose, is laid in his favorite church in full view of the admiring people. In the year 1860 the Pope canonized him, that is, made him a saint, and appointed a day the day of his death^ April 16 to be observed in his honor. It is required of a saint that he be able to stand a trial, which is conducted in due form, though he may have been dead a thousand years. All the forms are observed, and if the verdict is that the man was all right, the Pope issues a decree of saintship. It was attempted recently to make a saint of Christopher Columbus, but he did not pass, though he was certainly a much better man than many others who are invoked in the Church. Columbus gave a new world to the Church and to man kind, but he was no saint in the Pope's esteem. Labre gave the alms he received to beggars like himself, and won the palm of beatitude. By these honors to beggary the Church 290 IREN&US LETTERS. of Rome teaches that it is no disgrace to beg, and that it is a virtue to give to beggars. The vast number of beggars in Romish countries is not caused by the poverty of the people. They are as able to provide things needful as the inhabitants of Protestant countries are, and far better able than they are in many Protestant lands. But it is held to be meritorious to beg, and the tribe of beggars in the cities of Italy are among the worst of the population. They gamble among themselves, and the winner goes off to spend his money in drink, and the loser fastens upon the first victim he meets to beg for more. The native Italian people do not give to beg gars, to any great extent. The money comes from travellers, who find it easier to give a trifle than to refuse. Vallery tells of one of the hospitals in Rome where there are fifty " Sisters" who are nurses, who get drunk, make love, and carry-on gener ally, and all this in the name of charity. In New York the Romish people will fight fiercely to get all the children into their reformatories if the State is to pay for their support, but the same people will let their poor go by hundreds to the Protestant hospitals and never give a cent for their care. The charity of Romanism is a sham. Under the miserable pretence that so much given will pay for so much pardon, works will work out salvation, and heaven can be bought with alms, the Romish Church neglects her own poor and leaves them largely to the tender mercies of Protestants, or to beg on the street from door to door. Two women in the black habit and white cap of some sis terhood have just been to my door with an appeal for alms. As I ascended to my room in the hotel a man in priestly attire was pacing the corridor. I had scarcely sat down before he was in my room begging. We go to a church and run the gauntlet of beggars before we enter, and are beset by them when we come out. There are not half so many now as there were twenty years ago, but there are so many as to make beautiful Italy almost a nuisance. Beggary is the nat ural outcome of Romanism. Beggary will be found to some extent in all lands, but its home and source, its parentage, is the doctrine of the Church of Rome. That Church will beg- JEWS' QUARTER IN ROME. 29! gar any country which it converts. It does well for itself to make a saint of the beggar Labre and worship him once a year. JEWS' QUARTER IN ROME. "It is most absurd and unsuitable that the Jews, whose one crime has plunged them into everlasting slavery, under the plea that Christian magnanimity allows them, should presume to dwell and mix with Christians, not bearing any mark of distinction, and should have Christian servants, yea, even buy houses." The sentiment and morality of the statement whiqh I have quoted are abhorrent to all the right feelings of humanity, but I will prove it to be good doctrine according to the latest decrees of the Church of Rome. It is an extract from a manifesto put forth officially and solemnly by Pope Paul IV., A.D. 1555-59. The Pope is infallible, said the last great Coun cil. Therefore the sentiment I have quoted is all correct. In other words, the Pope made a great mistake, and is not infallible, or that is good doctrine. I think the Pope denied Christ when he issued that awful bull against the Jews. While they were committing that crime, Christ prayed, " Father, forgive them, they know not what they do." Yet the Pope, claiming to be the vicar of Christ on the earth, would deny the children of those Jews, 1 500 years after the sin of their fathers, the common rights of humanity. Christ forgave the fathers : the Pope would visit the fathers' sin upon the children unto thousands of genera tions. And, on this diabolical principle, the Jews have suffered at the hands of the apostasy such cruel wrongs as make one blush for his common heritage of manhood with such a Church. I was wandering in the Jews' quarter in Rome, and came upon a church with this inscription in Hebrew and in Latin : 29 2 IRENMUS LETTERS. "All day long I have stretched out my hands to a disobedient and gainsaying people." A painting represents the Crucifix ion of Christ. And this church was erected by a Jew Con verted to the religion of Rome, and, in the true spirit of his new religion, he put up this sign and these words that they might taunt and aggravate the people who could not but be hold the picture and the text. Pope Gregory XIII. improved upon this expedient, and compelled all the Jews in Rome to hear a sermon every week, while his officers were sent into the Jews' quarter " to drive men, women and children into the church, with scourges, and to lash them while there if they were inattentive." And one of the pious Popish writers says "it was a moving sight to see these besotted, blind, restive and perishing Hebrews, haled, as it were, by the head and hair, and against their obstinate hearts, brought to taste the heavenly grace." This revolting mission work, more like the Mahometan Propagation Society than a Christian Church, was prosecuted relentlessly until the time of Pius IX. He began his reign as a liberal, and its early years were signalized by removing some of the atrocious restrictions imposed on the Jews; Before his day they were confined by night to their section of the town, gates being kept fastened across the streets to keep them in. But their treatment from the time of the Popes becoming the rulers of the city, has been a perpetual stain upon the Church. Far worse have these so-called Christians used them than the heathen did. They were brought as slaves by Pompey, but they became citizens, and rose to office, wealth and power. Some of the Roman Em perors oppressed them severely, but it remained for a Pope to "forbid Christians to trade, to eat, or to dwell with them ; and to prohibit the Jews from walking in the streets, or from occupying any public post, or to build any new synagogues." During the long period of two centuries the Jews were com pelled to furnish every year a number of their people to run races in the Corso during Carnival, as horses do now, " amid the hoots of the populace." The asses ran first, then the Jews, naked, with only a band round their loins, then the JEWS" QUARTER IX ROME. 293 buffaloes, then the Barbary horses. Afterwards they were allowed to commute by paying an annual fine instead of sub mitting to this beastly association. Pope Sixtus V. was kindly disposed toward the Jews, pleading, as his apology for not being hard on them, that they were "the family from whom Christ came." He en couraged them to pursue trades, traffic with Christians, build houses and synagogues ; but all his kindness was lost on his infallible successors, who repealed his laws and made the burdens of the Jews greater than ever before. Innocent XIII. confined their business to trading in old clothes, rags, and iron junk. It is quite probable that the pursuit of this business has become hereditary among them, and hence it is that in London, New York, Warsaw or Rome, the old-clo'- man is a Jew, and the junk shop is kept by one of the same persuasion. All these restrictive laws are now done away, but the Jews continue to dwell in one quarter, and to pursue the same sort of trade, enlarged indeed, but substantially in the same line. They are the scavengers of the markets of the world, the hoarders of the odds and ends of everything: antiquaries in raiment, and working by stealth to dispose of their wares. They deal in diamonds, but they make no sign. They will sell you the most elegant embroideries that the fingers of Oriental women have made, but you will not see the goods adorning shop windows. The seven-branched candlestick may be on the outer wall as a symbol of the religion within, but unless you have cut your wisdom-teeth, you will be as thoroughly done as you would be in Chatham or Wall street, New York. This Jews' quarter in Rome is called the Ghetto, from a Hebrew word, meaning broken, cast off, and is aptly applied to the people and their pursuit. There was a weird fascina tion about their vile streets and shops, and their hang-dog looks, that led me often, and again, to wander in the midst of them. In every city of Europe they have been a mystery to me, and in Rome more than elsewhere. It may be super stition, or it is a deep religious conviction, that these children 294 I REN A? US LETTERS. of Abraham are under a ban of some kind that makes them and their refuge a Ghetto wherever they go. I was visiting the Portico of Octavia, one of the most interesting of all the Roman ruins, for the stories that linger about it make its gorgeous architecture vocal with the music and song of old Imperial Rome: but this splendid portico is in the filthiest part of this Ghetto, and the daughters of Israel have the square for a fish market. I \vrs at the palace of the Cenci, whose gloomy halls and walls are frightful with memories of crimes that years and oceans cannot wash away, and the windows look out on the square where the schools and the chief synagogue of the Jews proclaim the presence and the worship of this peculiar race. David's harp and the timbrel of Miriam and the brazen candlestick, are on the outside, and within, the Urim and Thummim are in symbols and the Holy of Holies, as though God still dwelt in tabernacles made with men's hands, and had not cast off this, his once covenant people. The Cenci palace looks out on this piazza, and cencz, in Italian, is the word for rags or shreds that are cast away. Wherever I went among them, they were sitting in the doors of their little dark and dirty shops, in the midst of heaps of rubbish, woollen and silk, red, white, and blue, all sorts and sizes ; while the women, sad-eyed and silent, were sewing steadily and deftly, converting these ragged remnants of the cast-off clothing of the rich and great into garments more gorgeous, perhaps, than the original. We read in works of fiction of the beauty of Jewish women : and of the Italians, too. But hard work, and poverty and oppression, and dark, damp dwellings, in a few generations, blight all the bloom of beauty, and leave on the bronzed cheeks, and matted hair and sullen brows, and tight-closed skinny lips, nothing to make you believe that the love song of Solomon could ever have been addressed to one of these : "Thou art fair, my love, my dove, my undefiled." But I did repeat, as I stood among these wretched-looking Hebrew mothers and maids, the words of the prophet, for I had them (the words and the women) before me : THE APOSTLE IN ROME. 295 " From the daughter of Zion, all her beauty is departed ; she that was great among the nations, and princess among the provinces, how is she become tributary ! She weepeth sore in the night, and her tears are on her cheeks ; among all her lovers she hath none to comfort her: all her friends have dealt treacherously with her: they are become her ene mies. Judah is gone into captivity, because of affliction, and because of great servitude ; she dwelleth among the heathen, she findeth no rest ; all her persecutors overtook her be tween the straits. How hath the Lord covered the daughter of Zion with a cloud in his anger !" THE APOSTLE IN ROME. I was in Naples when the New York Observer came to me with the admirable paper in it, by Rev. Dr. Rogers, on the journey of Paul to Rome from Puteoli. It was the exposi tion of one of the Sunday School lessons. If any reader overlooks those papers of Dr. Rogers because they are writ ten for the Sunday School department, he misses some of the most interesting and instructive columns of the Observer. I find time, in the midst of travel, to read them, and always with gratitude to the author. But as I was saying : We had been riding out from Naples along the shores of that bay of all bays what wondrous beauty it boasts it was the joy of all Italy when Pliny and Cicero, and Virgil and Horace, lived and wrote it is just as lovely now as it was then and nothing lovelier in the wide earth or sea ha. since been found we had just turned the shoulder of the promontory of Posilipo, and were looking off upon the islands, Capri, where Garibaldi is passing the evening of his days, Ischia and Proscida, when I pointed to Pozzeoli on the coast, and said " That is Puteoli where the Apostle landed on his way to Rome : there began his journey by land : at the Three Taverns and Appii Forum he was met 296 1RENMUS LETTERS. by the brethren, and with them went by the Appian Way to the Imperial City." As we were standing on this projecting point of view, I said to my friends : " This is the site of one of the most lux urious and celebrated residences of the Augustan age : here Vadius Pollio, a Roman of vast wealth, had his villa, and the Emperor himself was sometimes his guest. There was his fish pond, and he fed his fish on his slaves, who were, at his pleasure, chopped up and thrown into the water for his carp to eat: one day when the Emperor Augustus was visit ing him, a slave offended Pollio by breaking a glass, and the master thought to show the Emperor his greatness by order ing the slave to be cut up and thrown into the water for the dinner of the fish. Augustus took the command into his own hands, and ordered all the glass in the house to be pitched into the water, thus giving to his friend a lesson in humanity which he would not soon forget. The story is useful in showing what was the Roman law and practice in regard to slavery in the time of our Saviour and the Apostles. A master could and did kill his slaves at his own pleasure. We must bear these facts in mind when we study the teachings of the New Testament on this much-litigated subject." We were looking off at the bay where Paul landed on his route to Rome. We have seen, in a former letter, that Peter left no trace of his going to Rome, or his staying there, and we cannot find in the writings of any of his correspondents or companions, or in any of his letters of which we have several the least allusion to his having been at any time in that city. Mr. Augustus Hare speaks of " ultra Protestants" doubting that Peter was in Rome. What an "ultra Protes tant" is I do not know, but I do know that a man who be lieves that Paul could live several years in Rome, and write letters to the churches in the East mentioning by name humble, obscure, but good Christian people, and never once name the great Apostle Peter if he were there, or that Peter could be in Rome and become the head of the Church, even its Pontiff, and in his writings make no mention of the city or his work, or of Paul, the prisoner and Apostle, must have THE APOSTLE IN ROME, 297 more credulity than any Protestant whom I ever met. The improbability approaching very nearly to an absurdity. Paul we know was in Rome ; we have his own word for it ; and Paul's word is good authority for all except those who find it in the way of their pet prejudices. Then they say, " That's where Paul and I differ." The ease with which such people dispose of Paul would be amusing, were it not that Paul wrote as the Spirit bade him. To set Paul aside is to reject the Spirit as well. However, all are agreed that Paul came to Rome ; and when we come to Rome also, we are fond of finding where he lived, and preached, and suf fered. The Church of Rome has managed to have places distinctly marked and duly honored which the Apostle made memorable, and, with some little credulity, we may take the most of them as well-enough established. The church of Maria in Via Lata is built upon another church, *now sub terranean, and this lower one is the very house in which Paul was lodged when he was first brought into the city. He lived two years in one house, and it was large enough for the congregations that thronged him and disputed among themselves as to the truth they heard. Chrysostom wrote in his Homily on the Epistle to the Romans : " Though I could celebrate the praises of Rome for her greatness, for her beauty, power, wealth and warlike exploits, I pass these things by, and glorify her most that Paul wrote to the Romans, loved them, came to them, preached among them, and died with them." I have no faith in the Mamertine Prison legends, though I did go down into the dungeon. A little church at the foot of the Capitoline Hill is named "Peter in Prison," for he is said to have shared the dungeon with Paul, and the first chamber we enter below this church is Peter's prison. Dick ens was much affected by the dread and gloom of this place, and the votive offerings hung up in it, daggers, knives, pistols, clubs, tools of murder, with the blood-rust on them : as if murder were atoned for by devoting the dagger to the church. I am so sick and tired of the whole drama of Romanism, that these things excite in me only the sense of the ridicu- 29 8 IREN^EUS LETTERS. lous. But the classic history of these dungeons is intensely thrilling. All the prisons in the world could not, together, unfold such a story as these great tufa rocks could tell had they tongues to speak. These dungeons were the city and State prisons before and during the reign of the emperors ! Catiline's conspirators were strangled here. Illustrious Romans have killed themselves in these pits. Jugurtha was starved to death in one of them. And, in the midst of such history, the Church of Rome infuses the puerile fancy that Peter rested his head against a stone which is now kissed with reverence by the credulous. And the dungeon is next disclosed where Paul and Peter were chained to a pillar nine months ! A spring of water in this dungeon (the church tells us) came in answer to Peter's prayers, but as the spring was mentioned by historians before Peter was born, it was a miracle of the imagination. The Palace of the Csesars is identified by Paul himself as the scene of his labors, his trial, his deliverance, and his great success as a preacher of the gospel. We know where the palace was, and the ruins are before us, vast, majestic, suggestive. Even on this spot, the most distinctly marked, we must guess very freely, and trust largely to the contradic tory speculations of antiquarians; but the household of Caesar we know was within the walls of the palaces that cov ered these grounds, the substructions of which are disin terred, so that the sunlight of the ipth century illumines the chambers that were brilliant with imperial splendors in the first. Paul might have had a large congregation had he preached nowhere in Rome but in the palace of Nero. At the present day, the palace of the Emperor of Russia is said to have five thousand persons in it and in its service. The Roman emperors had far greater numbers of servants, re tainers and courtiers about them than any modern princes have. We find the Basilica, or court room, in which the emperor in person heard law cases that were appealed to him. In this, or in one like it on the same ground, the great Apostle of the Gentiles stood to be tried for his life, the council of twenty judges being presided over by Nero THE APOSTLE Iff ROME. S$9 himself. The witnesses who were to testify to his treason had been brought from the East, and the lawyers of the Jewish Sanhedrim were on hand to demand the condemna tion of the prisoner. But the hearts of all men are in the hands of Him whom Paul served, and Nero gave the prisoner his life and liberty, to the confusion of the Jews and the joy of the Apostle's friends. Beyond the facts we have in the New Testament Scriptures, there is little to be received implicitly in regard to the life and death of Peter or of Paul. Prudentius states that they suffered death together on the banks of the Tiber. Others insist, with equal confidence, that a year elapsed after the death of Peter before Paul was slain. Eusebius, Epiphanius, and others, say that both men were put to death on the 2pth day of June. As I am quite conscious that this letter is far from being worthy of its subject, I will follow it with a graphic passage from Conybeare and Howson's Life of Paul : THE MARTYRDOM OF PAUL. As the martyr and his executioners passed on (from the Ostian gate), their way was crowded with a motley multitude of goers and comers between the metropolis and its harbor merchants hastening to superintend the unlading of their cargoes, sailors eager to squander the profits of their last voyage in the dissipations of the capital officials of the government charged with the administration of the prov inces, or the command of the legions on the Euphrates or the Rhine ; Chaldean astrologers, Phrygian eunuchs, danc ing girls from Syria, with their painted turbans, mendicant priests from Egypt, howling for Osiris, Greek adventurers eager to coin their national cunning into Roman gold, rep resentatives of the avarice and ambition, the fraud and lust, the superstition and intelligence of the Imperial world. Through the dust and tumult of that busy throng, the small troop of soldiers threaded their way silently, under the bright sky of an Italian midsummer. They were marching, though they knew it not, in a procession more really triumphant than 306 iRENsEUS LZTT&KS. any they had ever followed in the train of general or emperof along the Sacred Way. Their prisoner, now at last and for ever delivered from captivity, rejoiced to follow his Lord " without the gate." The place of execution was not far dis tant, and there the sword of the headsman ended his long course of sufferings, and released that heroic soul from that feeble body. Weeping friends took up his corpse, and car ried it for burial to those subterranean labyrinths where, through many ages of oppression, the persecuted Church found refuge for the living and sepulchres for the dead. Thus died the apostle, the prophet and the martyr, be queathing to the Church, in her government and her discip line, the legacy of his apostolic labors ; leaving his prophetic words to be her living oracles; pouring forth his blood to be the seed of a thousand martyrdoms. Thenceforth among the glorious company of the apostles, among the goodly fel lowship of the prophets, among the noble army of martyrs, his name has stood pre-eminent. And wheresoever the Holy Church throughout all the world doth acknowledge God, there Paul of Tarsus is revered as the great teacher of a universal redemption and a catholic religion the herald of glad tidings to all mankind. AGATHA AND HER DISH. I hate to see a priest when I go to a convent of nuns. But the church belonging to the Convent of Saint Agatha, in Rome, is now the property of the Irish Seminary, and it is quite likely that the directors have converted the convent into a boarding school for young ladies. This may have brought a couple of ladies to the convent before me, and I recognized them as stopping at the same hotel, and now in animated con versation with a priestly professor. It is not an unusual cir cumstance for Protestant parents in England, as well as America, to be so foolish and wicked as to place their daugh ters in these institutions. The end thereof is that the daugh- AGATHA AND HER DISH. 301 ter goes into the Church of Rome, and perhaps into a con vent. She is never to her parents what she was before. A sleepy old janitor, who seemed to regard his duty as an intolerable burden, roused himself a little when I rang, and gave a groan of assent to my request to see the convent. As usual, the sight amounted to nothing more than admission to the church and a few rooms around it. " Daniel O'Connell," were the words conspicuous in the midst of an epitaph on a monument which stood in the side- wall. The distinguished Irish Agitator died at Genoa on his way to Rome, bequeathing his heart to the city he could not reach. It was brought here and deposited beneath this monument : which represents the orator in the British House of Commons refusing to take the anti-Roman Catholic decla ration. The vanity that consumed him while living shines in his thought that his heart would be a treasure in a city so full of great men's bones and names. Cardinal Antonelli's family tomb is close at hand, elegantly fitted up at his own expense not long before his death. His palace is near the church. But the church is Saint Agatha's, and, of course, we are to find her, or her remains, or her statue, something to identify her with the house over which she is supposed to preside. On the right side of the high altar, and in a beautiful chapel, stands a gilt statue of the lovely saint, as large as life : her breasts exposed in full view, and she holds extended in one hand a plate on which two balls, to represent female breasts, are lying. One would not know what they were unless famil iar with the tragical story of the Sainted Agatha. I give it in the words of the legends of the Holy Virgins : " Agatha was a maiden of Catania, in Sicily, whither Decius sent Quintianus as governor, He, inflamed by the beauty of Agatha, tempted her with rich gifts and promises, but she repulsed him with disdain. Then he ordered her to be bound and beaten with rods, and sent two of his slaves to tear her bosom with iron shears, and, as her blood flowed forth, she said to him : ' O thou cruel tyrant ! art thou not ashamed to treat me thus ? Hast thou not thyself been fed 302 IRENsEUS LETTERS. at thy mother's breasts ? ' Thus only did she murmur. And in the night a venerable man came to her, bearing a vase of ointment, and before him walked a youth bearing a torch. It was the holy Apostle Peter, and the youth was an angel, but Agatha knew it not, though such a glorious light filled the prison that the guards fled in terror. Then Peter made himself known and ministered to her, restoring with heavenly balm her wounded breasts. Quintianus, infuriated, demanded who had healed her? She replied: ' He whom I confess and adore with heart and lips ; he hath sent his apostle, who has healed me.' Then Quintianus caused her to be thrown upon a great fire, but instantl y an earthquake arose, and the people, in terror, cried, ' This visitation is sent because of the maiden Agatha.' So he caused her to be taken from the fire and carried back to prison, where she prayed aloud that now, having proved her faith, she might be freed from pain, and see the glory of God ! And her prayer was answered, and her spirit instantly departed into glory." On the fifth of February her vespers are sung in this church by the nuns, and the words of the anthem are exceedingly touching and beautiful, as they celebrate the peculiar nature of her sufferings, her wonderful support and final triumph. It is a responsive song between the Apostle and the virgin when he comes to her prison to heal her wounds. In another church I have seen the picture of Agatha repre senting her with her breasts actually cut off and lying at her feet, while the streams of blood are flowing from the ghastly wounds. Here, however, she holds them in the dish, while a new pair present themselves as a miraculous restoration, or rather a new creation, for they could not well be in two places at the same time. But nothing is too much for the faith of ignorance, and in these legends the absurdity only heightens the interest with which they are received. Rome has a litera ture made of it. The highest art has consecrated it with the genius that renders these stories immortal. They are poetry. Not true in fact, but telling to the imagination of all, and to the belief of many, of the constancy with which the young and lovely maidens endured all sufferings, rather than bring dis- AGATHA AND HER DISH. 303 honor upon the name of Christ. We do not believe the legends. But we may well ask ourselves if we have the martyr spirit in the hour of temptation ? - Is the name of the Master so dear, his cause and honor so precious that we, strong men, or brave women, would take joyfully the tortures which delicate maids endured rather than put dishonor upon the Cross of Christ. I frankly confess that, in the midst of these monuments of martyrdom, I often fear that with the age of persecution has also gone the martyr spirit. We are in an age when religion costs no self-denial that tells. We are going to glory on " flowery beds of ease." Yet if the time does come, as it may, when the Master calls for witnesses to the truth, I doubt not that the piety of the day we live in would yield blood as freely as it gives money now. Our songs boast of our willingness to give up all for Him who for us was crucified ; perhaps we would take up the cross and go with it to our Calvary at the Master's call. It was quite dark when I was done with my meditations in front of this strange statue. The grouty old janitor was very impatient to shut up. He led me through long passages where large boxes of plants were standing, beauty and gloom strangely blended in this odd assemblage. Everything in these Romish churches, convents and colleges is strange to us outside. They have attractions for the sensuous and superficial. The more I am in them the plainer is the path from a form of Protestantism that worships the visible, to the Romanism that worships nothing else. All that is here addresses the senses. It is materialism in marble and paint, and incense and music. It once had an elevation of soul that rejoiced in the almost divine imitations by Raphael and Michael Angel o. Now the descendants of those worshippers of beauty adore a tinselled baby in the same church where the genius of the old masters makes the very air luminous with the majesty of art. Romanism, in its second childhood, finds its inspiration in the sight of a gilded virgin holding her breasts in a dish ! 304 IREN&US LETTERS. THE SUNDAY EVENING SUPPER. " Day of all the week the best, Emblem of eternal rest." My pleasantest recollections of childhood are of the Sab bath. Brought up in the strictest school of family religion, and never having a doubt that the first day of the week is the Lord's day, it has always been to me for a wonder that good people of this generation, or any other, should regard the Sabbath as a day of gloom, or a bore. That it was in my father's house a bright, glad, good day, is my recollection of it, and it should be the present experience of all Christian households. I remember reading years ago a New England tale by Mrs. Stowe or her sister, in which the way of keeping the Sab bath in her father's house was ridiculed : the children were described as sitting, up straight reading their Bibles, afraid to smile, while the mirth of all was provoked by one of the youngsters getting hold of a grasshopper and making fun with it. To them the day was a weariness, the house was a prison, and religion irksome. My experience was altogether of another sort. We did indeed obey the old couplet " I must not work, I must not play, Upon God's holy Sabbath day," but we were taught and shown that there are enjoyments for children so much better than mere play, that we did not want anything more entertaining than the occupations fur nished for us, and in which the parents shared. The mornings were short, and the duties were many, before church. We had breakfast later on Sunday morning than on any other, because we were taught that physical rest was one of the duties of the day, and it was right, and perhaps a duty, to lie in bed later. The interval between breakfast and church was employed in pleasant reading and conversation, and the two services of the sanctuary, with the Sabbath THE SUNDA Y E YEN ING SUPPER. 305 school, filled up the greater part of the day. The services were separated by a short intermission only, as the people were chiefly farmers, many of them coming several miles to church, and it was important for them to get home in time to do the chores before nightfall. This arrangement threw the meals out of their usual seasons. We had to do as others did ; we carried lunch to church and ate it between services; and had a light repast on coming home in the early part of the afternoon. This being over, we read and learned the catechism and portions of Scripture, and hymns, which lessons now remain as the most important religious treasures that we ever earned. As the shades of evening gathered, and the candles were lighted, for we had no lamps, and gas was not known, we met in the parlor, and there was what may well be called " the church in the house." The father of the family was the priest, the patriarch, the shepherd of the flock. We repeated the Catechism, and hymns, and conversed with our parents on "the subject of religion." Wonderful, is it not? But we did, and thought it the most natural, proper, and pleasant thing in the world to do. And in the midst of it the father, with a majestic bass voice that could easily be heard half a mile, and the mother, with a soft, celestial air, that now falls on my ear from among the angels, and brings tears like drops of morning dew as I write, and all the children, piping according to the measure of song to each one given, the whole filling the house with music, sang : " My God, permit my tongue This joy to call Thee mine, And let my early cries prevail To taste Thy love divine. For life without Thy love No relish can afford ; No joy can be compared with this, To serve and please the Lord." Each one of us was conversed with, that his peculiar tendencies, habits and wants might be touched with the hand 306 IREN&US LETTERS. of parental love ; the more impulsive checked, the weaker strengthened, the wayward reclaimed, and all fortified with godly counsel, and encouraged with Christian hope. There was never a thought in that circle of boys and girls of con finement, of restraint, of severity or fear. We knew what the Sabbath was, and what it was for, and we enjoyed it as we did every other privilege and pleasure in its time and place. And when we had gone through with the lessons and songs, and the holy converse of that twilight hour, the Sunday Evening Supper came. In those days it was the habit of Christian families and the same good habit prevails now of putting as little labor as possible on the man-servant and the maid-servant and the horses, and there was no needless cooking done in the house. But Sunday was not a fast-day. It should never be. It is a feast-day, a holyday, a holiday, and while the feasting is to be done more on spiritual than carnal things, it is also true that it is well to worship God on that day in the enjoyment of the best gifts of his Providence and his Grace. We always had a good supper on Sunday night. The little children who were wont to wait until the second table, now had their seats with the older ones at the first. The table was lengthened for the occasion. Cheerfulness gave a charm to the feast. The fare was very simple, for six hundred dollars a year and that paid partly in hay, wood and potatoes with no parson age did not permit a family of ten to indulge in many luxu ries. But away back into the first quarter of this century my memory goes, and is greeted with the fragrance and the flavor of that homely meal. Since those times I have supped with Presidents and Prime Ministers, with Poets, Philoso phers and men and women whose names the world will not forget, but there is no evening entertainment which lives in my recollection, a well-spring of pleasure, so joyously as that Sunday night supper in my father's house. It lacked no element of enjoyment. There was no levity, but there was something better, intelligent cheerfulness ; the incidents of the day, the curiosities of rural Christian life, the parish gossip, always exchanged at church on Sunday, and over THE SUNDAY EVENING SUPPER. 307 which we chatted with good humor at night ; there was the boundless store of religious anecdote that my father a finished scholar and a man of the world also possessed, with which he loved to entertain his company, and his children most of all. Thus the Sabbath was a delight. We grew up with the idea as part of our mental experience, not to be questioned, but accepted as the pleasantest truth in the history of a week, that Sunday was the glad rest day from study and labor, when something higher and sweeter than daily toil or sports, was to be ours. As we were commanded to work six days, so we were permitted to rest one day, and spend the whole time in such pleasures as the spiritual part of our natures craved. And when a day had thus been spent, there are no words that more aptly expressed the genuine emotions of child-life than these : " My willing soul would stay In such a frame as this ; And sit and sing herself away To everlasting bliss." Do you ask me what was the effect of such training in after life ? Well, it is not for me to say much about that. But if any one of the large household had grown up with an aversion to the Lord's day, and breaking away from the restraints of religious instruction, had become an unbeliever or a prodigal, I could not have written these lines. But now, when the youngest of them has gray hairs, and part of the group has crossed the flood, it is joy to feel sure that all, parents and children, will sit down together at the Sunday Evening Supper where Sabbaths have no end. 308 IRMNEUS LETTERS. MISERIES OF BEING REPORTED IN THE NEWS PAPERS. Thirty and forty years ago there was more verbatim report ing done in the newspapers, than is done now. So many mat ters crowd upon the press and the people, that there is little room for long speeches, and no time to read them. Some men won wide repute as reporters many years ago. Mr. Gales, of the National Intelligencer, was a distinguished reporter, and a very prominent public man. Arthur J. Stansbury made a name and money by his perfect reports of speeches in Congress. He reported, for the N. Y. Observer, the great ecclesiastical trial, for heresy, of Dr. Lyman Beecher. Henry J. Raymond, founder of the N. Y. Times, was an admirable reporter. He frequently reported public meetings for the Observer ; he was the hardest worker on the press whom I ever knew. Neither Raymond nor Stansbury used shorthand. They wrote the principal words of the speaker, and filled up the sentences afterwards. Some reporters drop all vowels and silent letters, and easily add them in writing out. They make sad blunders sometimes : Dr. Bethune said " the devil sowed tares :" the reporter made him say " sawed trees :" using the right con sonants but adding the wrong vowels. No speaker suffers so many things at the hands of reporters as ministers. The reporter is usually one who is unfamiliar with " the language of Canaan," and a man who could give a political speech with accuracy, is all astray on a sermon. He does not understand the subject, and makes of his pothooks nonsense, when he writes out his notes. He was a very able reporter who was coming down Broadway, and seeing a large sign, " Panorama of Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress," turned in to see it, but was refused admission. He said, " I'm a member of the press, a reporter on the Daily ." Being told that he was a stran ger and could not be admitted ; " Well," said he, " let me see Mr. BUNYAN, he'll let me in." This young man knew every politician in the country, by name, but had never heard of MISERIES OF BEING REPORTED. 39 old John Bunyan, and supposed him to be the proprietor of the Panorama. There is also, at the present day, a propensity to fun, wag gery, amusement, that has sadly interfered with accurate reporting. My own sufferings in this way have prompted this writing. I gave a lecture on the East last winter : and the papers reported me as saying that, while I was in Con stantinople, the Sultan invited me to visit his harem, and that I did so. Some wag did the incident into rhyme. The papers copied it, and now I get copies from distant parts of the country, sent to me by astonished friends, who want to know if it be true? I did not mention the word Con stantinople, sultan, harem, or anything of the kind. I said, when in Egypt, the Chamberlain of the Palace of the Khedive gave me an entertainment in the banquet hall. Out of that the reporter made the story of the Sultan and the harem. Much worse was my experience in speaking of "wit in the pulpit :" the reporter put into my mouth a tissue of words that had no sort of relation to what I said : words that mis represented the purpose and sentiment of my discourse : and now I am getting letters filled with abuse ; one calls me a " liar " and a " mass of stupidity," and destitute of " brains and religion too ," and all this because a well-meaning but incompetent reporter made me say what I never thought of saying, and would not have said if I had thought of it. Monday morning we have a fearful deluge of reported sermons. Some of them are made without even hearing the discourse. A reporter takes two or three churches, and flies from one to another : gets part of one and another sermon : asks what was the text : writes out what he can glean : draws on his fancy for the most of it, and that is the report ! Some pastors in this city have told me that sermons have been attributed to them of which they never said one word ! Others have had the first part of their discourse reported, and the conclusion invented. But this is not the worst. A periodical is now issued, pro fessing to give the sermons of the day : these reports in the 310 IRE N^ US LETTERS. newspapers, thus manufactured, are reprinted as the actual discourses of the living preachers. I have known these reports to be sent to the preacher for his correction ; and, on his declining to perform the impossible task, the horrible jumble of unmitigated nonsense was embalmed in the periodical and sent out to the world. This is a fraud on the religious pub lic, deserving exposure and punishment. Only last week I received a newspaper from a distant city, containing a sharp criticism of a sentiment imputed to Rev. Dr. Duryea : it had been in one of these reports ; but any thoughtful writer would hesitate before he condemned a man for error on the tes timony of a newspaper sketch of his sermon. No public speaking requires greater precision of statement than that of religious doctrine. Yet any youth, of either sex, feels quite competent to give an outline of the profoundest sermon. There are some religious speeches easily enough reported, thin, diffuse, repetitious, hortatory : years ago I was report ing a public meeting in Boston : a distinguished divine was on the platform, speaking ; but he was so slow with his ideas, and fluent of words, that I could easily write out in full all that he said worth reading. A man at my elbow suddenly whispered to me, " Why, he didn't say that !" " No," said I, " but he will in a moment," and, sure enough, he did. The wretched reports of lectures, sermons, etc., that we have, is not the fault of the reporters always or chiefly. They rush from the place of meeting to the office and, writing out their report, deliver it to the managing editor, perhaps at midnight : he cuts it up and down : slashes out what little sense and connection it had, and serves the miserable remainder to the public, to the infinite disgust of the speaker and with no sort of edification of the reader. I personally know able and learned men who will not look at the reports of their own speeches, so mortifying is the picture made of them. Some men will not speak when they are exposed to this fearful penalty. And very few men now think it worth while to follow up an incorrect report with any attempt to THE FIFE AND THE VIOLIN. 311 get the wrong righted. Let it go, they say, it will be sooner forgotten if let alone. It is impossible to give a satisfactory condensed report of a sermon or lecture. A speaker may do the work himself, but any one else will omit what ought to be said, and say the thing that might be left unsaid. And that is the reason why sketches of sermons are so imperfect and often positively bad. They do not give the pith and gist of the preacher's work. They bestow more abundant honor on the parts that lack. They are a failure. You must not believe all you read in the newspapers, for, with the best intentions and the greatest painstaking, mistakes will happen. Especially is this true with regard to reports of public speakers. You may be entertained, and perhaps instructed by the report, but the sermon may never have been heard in a pulpit, and the unhappy preacher would not know it was supposed to be his, if it were not attributed to him in print. THE FIFE AND THE VIOLIN. "The First Child of Rutgers Church," in this city, was the head-line of a letter in the Observer a few weeks ago. The writer, whose name was printed as Pennington, now writes again and says : " I wrote my name so carelessly that a very slight error would make the change. It should have been Remington, and I should have told you that my husband was the Rev. David Remington, of Rye, N. Y., whom you may remember." Remember him ? Indeed I do, with some sweetly solemn, and some amusing associations. He was the palest man I ever saw alive. Some failure in the circulation or nature of the blood (and I think that he died suddenly of an affection of the heart) had caused all the hue of health to fade away from his face, and the pallor, not of death, but of the absence of health, was upon him when I first met him. 312 2REN&US LETTERS. The circumstances were these : I went to a meeting of Presbytery to be examined and taken under its care as a stu dent for the ministry. Another young man presented him self at the same time. Our examination was referred to a committee of two members, Mr. R. was one, who retired with us to a private house, it was in the country and there heard from us a statement of our religious experience and views in seeking the ministry. I was first examined ; and the other candidate being called on, gave the reason that had satisfied him of his duty to become a minister of the Word. It was mainly this : and as he was just from the farm, with no early education, it was given in very rude speech, but with great sincerity and freedom. He said that he had long been fond of fifing; he fifed the first thing when he got up, and fifed at noon, when resting from work, and fifed until he went to bed : he would often go without his meals to have more time for fifing: but when he got religion he gave up fifing, and now he could go all day without fifing at all. This passion, subdued by religion, he dwelt on in a manner to me so absurd that with difficulty I remained becomingly sober. But the unruffled composure and solemn demeanor of Mr. Remington rebuked my "inwardness." As I never had such experience as my young friend, I could not com prehend the apparent approval of it by Mr. Remington as genuine evidence of piety, and was ready to believe that I had made a mistake. We came out of the house to return to the Church. I walked along the country road by the side of Mr. R., and beginning very gently, so as not to get too deep into the matter if he were not in sympathy, I said, " Our young friend seems to have had a strong passion for fifing !" The pent-up humor of the dear good man burst into a merry explosion, very comforting to me : he left the road and took to the crooked rail fence, on which he leaned, while for a few minutes, he indulged in the free expression of the enjoy ment which this singular but sincere experience had afforded. Recovering himself, we resumed our walk, while with rich, mellow and scriptural wisdom, he discoursed to me of the folly of mistaking innocent recreations for sinful pleasures. THE FIFE AND THE V 10 LIN. 313 The young man went back in less than a year to the farm, and I hope that he enjoyed his fife to the end of his days, which were not very long in the land. A few years afterward, I had the acquaintance of a Spanish gentleman of culture, who, to many other accomplishments, added that of being a master on the violin. He was a Romanist in his religion, but being attracted by curiosity, he attended a Protestant revival meeting, became deeply inter ested and was soon converted. After a few weeks or months of great religious enjoyment, he became despondent and fearful that his new experience was delusive. In his despair he sought counsel of a judicious divine, to whom he related the honest attempts he had made to do his whole duty as a Christian, how he had denied himself those things in which he once took great delight, even his violin he had laid aside entirely, not having once had it in his hand since he had re nounced the world, the flesh and the devil. The wise minister said to him: "Your idea of a religious life is derived from your old Roman Church, where, by mor tifying even innocent desires, you hoped to atone for sin and make yourself holy. There is no sin in the enjoyment of your violin. There is no merit in laying it aside. As the man after God's own heart praised Him on an instrument of ten strings, so do you go away and play before Him on a fiddle with four. Whether you eat, or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God. Rejoice in the Lord always, and again I say rejoice." The soul of the new convert was comforted by these words. The veil was lifted from his heart. He resumed his favorite recreation. He grew in the knowledge and love of God. He walked before Him joyfully, a delightful Christian, useful and beloved in the church. You have recently asked me to tell you if this amusement, or that, or the other, is suitable for a young Christian. And you are surprised that I do not give you an answer. I can not prescribe for you, without a divine prescription to me. And as you have access to the same rule of practice which I would consult, it is not needful that I should write more 314 IREN^EUS LETTERS. definitely. It is well to bear this in mind, that to be spiritually-minded is life. I would not play on a fife or a fiddle, if it made me less disposed to sing and pray and pant after the living God. I would not go to a ball, or a play, or a party where the amusements or the company, or the hours, or the surroundings dissipated my religious thoughts and filled me with the love of folly, frivolity, worldliness, and something worse than any of these. I would not go to any place out of the Week of Prayer, that I would be afraid to attend in the midst of it. Ditto of Lent. The innocent amusements of life are favorable to true Christian culture and growth in the divine life. Whatever hinders religious progress is of the devil, and is to be shunned as the plague. It is on this principle that the true Church sets its face against those entertainments which corrupt the tastes, deprave and pervert the passions, excite impure imaginations and desires, and are wholly incompatible with holy living. The nearer the Church comes to conformity with the world, the more popular of course she becomes, and the less is the spiritual power she exerts upon the world. Use the world as not abusing it. Religion heightens every lawful pleasure, and destroys the taste for any other. A merry heart doeth good like a medicine. Music hath charms. And my young friend made a mistake when he ceased to fife ; as the Spanish gentleman did also, when he sacrificed his violin. With such sacrifice God is not pleased. MY FIRST SIGHT OF NIAGARA. It was just before sunset, of a rainy day. In the west, huge masses of cloud were piled like mountains, and the sinking sun bursting from among them, covered them with lustrous glory, such as the full hand of God only can fling on the canvas of the sky. " O, look at the sky," said one of our party, as we emerged from the woods and approached the verge of the precipice. .17 r FIRST SIGHT OF NIAGARA. 31$ " O, look at the Falls," said I, and there they stood, that western sky with its chariots of fire, its glowing sun, its hanging thunder clouds, reflected on the descending torrent sheet, which looked like many mighty pillars, of colors vari ous as the rainbow shows, each pillar perfect in its shape and hue, and ranged in order, a fitting front for heaven! Sure never out of heaven was such a sight ; and never until I see the " rainbow round about the throne," will these eyes look upon the like again. All that my soul ever thirsted after of magnificence and loveliness blended in rarest harmony, was so far transcended in that scene of majesty beauty, that I could have wept in silence, and returned home satisfied, had that been my last, as it was my first sight of the Falls of Niagara. So sensible were we that the vision just now floating before us, was what no pen had ever attempted to portray, and so absorbed had each of us been in its wondrous charms, that we cautiously gave utterance to our emotions, till we found that it was no enchantment, but a scene that each eye had seen, and on each soul had been engraved, to be remem bered among the brightest and fairest of earth's pictures of loveliness and glory. But " glory built on tears" soon perishes. The sun went down behind the heavy clouds, wrapping his golden drapery around him ; the gorgeous tints, that gave such magic beauty to the waters, faded ; and we were standing in breathless stillness fixed, contemplating the solemn grandeur of this great psalm of nature. Now the sober feeling of a felt real ity began to creep slowly over me, and as we moved from point to point to observe the varied features of the view, the shades of evening were around us, and a starless night and no guide soon convinced us that we were lost in the woods of the island, on each side of which the river leaps into the terrible abyss. Taking the island shore as our only guide, we travelled around, and finally reached the bridge over which we had to cross to our lodgings. We had seen the Falls ; and well wearied with our walk and well paid for our toil, we thanked God for bringing us 3 1 6 IREN^EUS LETTERS. safely here, for revealing so much of Himself to us in his mighty works, and begging that we might ever love and adore Him more for what we had just now seen, we lay down in His arms, and were lulled to sleep by the cataract's never- ceasing roar. Refreshed by rest, we rose the next morning, and to our joy the sun was rising in unclouded glory. It was but a few minutes before I was again in the midst of the scene ; but now, how changed. It was new, almost as if I had seen nothing of it before. The bright light of heaven streaming across the brow of the Falls, twining its front with rainbows, and strewing it with diamonds that flashed continually be fore me, gave new beauty to the view. Still, the deep feel ing of sublimity and awe had not yet possessed me, nor did it, till, a few hours after, we were rowed out into the stream below the cataract, and there, in view of every descending drop of that vast torrent, we looked up silent and solemn, feeling (as we had never felt before) our own littleness in the presence of the omnipotent and everlasting God ! This was the scene that I had brought in my soul with me. It had been there for years, and whenever I had thought of the Falls of Niagara, it was from this shell of a boat tottling among the foam and breakers at the base. It is enough, said I to my swelling heart ; O what a God Thou art, from the hollow of whose hand, these mighty torrents flow. These are Thy works ; Thine eye hath counted every drop that ever fell from those heights, and Thine ear hath listened to the music of these Falls since they began their solemn hymn. It is a fitting sight for Thine eye, and this roar might well be the organ-bass to the song of the morning stars. To others it may, but to one who with devout heart has ever knelt while in the midst of the stream and looked up into the broad face of these torrents, it will not be strange that the mind should rise with these clouds of spray, like incense, to the throne of God : and that thoughts of worship and praise should possess the whole soul. In this spirit it was, that Coleridge's Hymn before sunrise in the Vale of MY FIRST SIGHT OF NIAGARA. 317 Chamouni came to me, and I thought how more sublimely beautiful and eloquent the scene before him would have been, had he in the sunlight looked on these live torrents, leaping and dashing amid clouds and rainbows and thun ders ; and breaking around him as if mad in their mighty overthrow and fatal plunge. He looked up toward Mont Blanc, where the torrents had frozen as they flowed " from dark and icy caverns," " Down those precipitous, black, jagged rocks, Forever shattered and the same forever," and as his soul was filled with the majestic grandeur even of that scene, he cries " Who gave you your invulnerable life, Your strength, your speed, your fury and your joy, Unceasing thunder and eternal foam ? Who made you glorious as the gates of heaven, Beneath the keen full moon ? Who bade the sun Clothe you with rainbows ? Who with living flowers Of loveliest hue, spread garlands at your feet ? God ! Let the torrents, like a shout of nations, Answer ! And let the ice plains echo GOD 1" So did the praise of God go up from these torrents, and it was good to let the heart flow with the rushing currents, and, borne along by its own impulses, be swallowed up in the boundless ocean of infinity. Looking up again from the cataract to Him whose presence I felt and whose voice I heard, I could say to Him " Yes ! as a drop of water in the sea, All this magnificence in thee is lost ; What are ten thousand worlds compared to thee? And what am I, then? Heaven's unnumber'd host, Though multiplied by myriads, and arrayed In all the glory of sublimest thought, Is but an atom in the balance weighed Against thy greatness is a cipher brought Against infinity! What am I then ? Naught 1" 318 1REN&US LETTERS. It is no part of my object in this sketch to give a descrip tion of the Falls of Niagara. This is to be had for a shilling anywhere ; but it may be well enough to say that the first views I obtained were of the American Fall from Iris (form erly called, Goat) Island. And now we pass over in the boat to the Canada side, where the view is more complete than is to be obtained elsewhere except by those who prefer with me to play in the boiling gulph below, and look up. The over powering was more real, as I floated beneath the cataract than from any other point of observation, and I think I "left few of them untried. But the view from Table Rock leaves nothing to be desired. There the panorama is entire. The circuit of the Horse Shoe, the central, like a white ribbon streaming in the air, the stately American, less picturesque but more graceful than any other, all pour before you, and words were never made by which to tell the power of this majestic scene. Talk of disappointment with the Falls ! The man must have had a fancy wilder than the winds that roar under this cataract, who ever pictured to himself mag nificence in nature more grand and beautiful than now lives and leaps before him, like a new world springing from its Maker, and rolling in the liquid light and gladness of a new existence. " Is it not strange," said one of our party to me, " that you could have lived in this world so many years, and never have seen this before?" I made no reply, but felt rebuked. I did not know, however, that there was such a world, or I would have come from the ends of the earth to gaze upon it. Now stretch yourself out on the flat rock that projects over the abyss, and close by the side of the rushing waters, look over the brink. The sun lights the small globes of water, myriads of which separate like so many jewels poured from celestial caskets, and you follow them coursing each other, down, down, down, until they and you are lost in the foam ing gulph. You are now, if the wind is fair, behind the spray ; and the sense of height and depth is appalling. Yet the longer you look, the more infatuated you are with the scene, and the less disposed to draw back from the precipice. MY FIRST SIGHT OF NIAGARA. 319 (It is ever thus !) Timid ladies, who screamed with terror when I crept to the edge, and prayed me to come back, were soon cautiously approaching, now side by side with me look ing over, and now so fearless that it took a strong arm and a stern voice to break them away from the awful edge. A single flaw in the rock, from which many a portion has been rent in years past, a single flaw in that rock, and * There are other points from which to view the Falls, and there are other features on which I would dwell, had I not been sensible ever since I began this letter, that every attempt to transfer my own impressions to the paper, has lamentably failed. Often while wandering from cliff to cliff, some new feature of peculiar beauty or grandeur would break upon me and fix my eye, and sitting down on a stone, with pencil in hand, I would try to find words to fasten the sensation in my note-book, with certainly a benevolent desire, that others less favored, might hear of what appeared to me so lovely or so great. Thus, while we were on Prospect Tower, two lit tle birds flew fearlessly into the spray in front of the fall, and sporting in the watery vapor were lost from the sight ; and I tried to get upon paper the thought that was suggested of the soul that fearlessly and confidingly wings its way into the dread abyss of eternity, and when the elements melt and the wild roar of a wrecked world fills the universe with fear, stretches its flight right onward into the bosom of God. A day was thus spent ; then the Sabbath came ; and we worshipped in the great temple not made with hands. Its light was the sun, its music the majestic water-fall, its in cense the gratitude and joy of subdued hearts, its eloquence a "thousand voices," "the noise of many waters," praising God. This was the morning service offered with the rising sun, while a rainbow, a perfect arch, the most lustrous we had seen, was resting upon the deep an emblem of God's prom ise and our hope. In the evening, we selected a retired spot, in full view of the Horse Shoe Fall, and spent a peaceful hour in singing * It fell a few years afterwards. 320 1REXJZUS LETTERS. hyms of praise ; sweet to hear, though we were so near to the waters that our party were obliged to cluster closely, or we were beyond the reach of each other's voices. How full of beauty was the " Star of Bethlehem," with the chorus of this roaring fall " Once on a raging sea I rode, The storm was loud, the night was dark, The ocean yawned, and rudely blowed The winds that tossed my foundering bark." And then the soul responded, with joyful emotions, to that other hymn, " Sweet fields beyond the swelling flood, Stand dressed hi living green," etc. Another day was spent in revisiting points which we had learned to love, and in discovering new features of interest in scenes with which we had supposed ourselves familiar. We could not be satisfied, and the thought of leaving was pain ful. It was good to be here. The presence of God we felt, his power we saw, his glory shone around us ever, and we thought it well to linger in the midst of such emotions, and let them work deeply and indelibly into the soul. I trust they did. Certainly we have conceptions of sublimity and beauty, the handiwork of the Almighty, his floods, his pen- cilings, his voice and his fear, such as we never could have had without coming to Niagara. But we must go down from these heights and enter our own world again, and having once more with reverence and awe looked up at the Cataract from the river below, that the last impression might be that which we had felt to be the strongest, and having cooled my head, for by this time it needed cooling, in the boiling waters beneath the falls we went away. Such was my first, but not my last visit to the Falls of Niagara THE WHITE MOUNTAIN NOTCH, 32! THE WHITE MOUNTAIN NOTCH. A DISASTER IN 1826. From the sea-coast of Maine to the heart of the White Hills, through the Notch, was a ride of three hours only. And such a ride ! The skill of the engineers and the daring of the projectors of the railroad have been greatly exagger ated, but it is one of the most remarkable and interesting routes and roads in the world. No line of railway in Switzer land, and no enterprise in the Alleghany Mountains, afford so grand and picturesque and peculiar views as this. Imagine the outline of a mighty basin, two or three miles across, and a road winding along the side of it, half way from the bottom to the top. Above and around the ledge, or terrace, or cor nice, on which the iron way is made, rise mountains on mountains, the names of which are familiar in American biography. Far below, these hills stretch down into a valley, through which the old carriage-road still takes its neglected way. More than thirty-five years ago I rode through it, and visited the Willey House, the scene in 1826 of a fearful disas ter, familiar now in history. At that time the Crawfords were the famous landlords of the mountains. Many accounts of the destruction of the Willey family have been published, defective in many particulars, and erroneous in others. I learned that Ethan Allen Crawford had a written journal*of his life and times among these hills, with the most authentic and minute particulars respecting this event that has been heard with intense emotion in all parts of the world. I applied to Mr. Crawford for the manuscript, which he was kind enough to lend me. It abounds in romantic incidents by field and flood, and descriptions of remarkable occurrences, such as a life of fifty years in such a region of country could not fail to furnish in rich abundance. His wife is the histo rian, and the delicate touches of her pen, though an untaught pen, discover a heart alive to the wild grandeur of rugged nature around her, and a nice appreciation of the beautiful 322 IRENsEUS LETTERS. and true in the world of feeling, which must have been terri bly invaded when death, in such an awful car, came down upon her neighbors in the Notch. From this narrative, written at the time, and from free conversation with the peo ple of that region, I derived the facts which I am about to relate. The passage through the White Mountains, called the Notch, is about four miles in length, and near the middle there is a spot where the sides of the mountains do not approach so near each other as in the rest of the gorge, but leave a level surface of a few acres, on which the family of Mr. Calvin Willey had settled. The house rested on the foot of one mountain, and in front of it, at the foot of the other, the Saco wound its way. A solitary spot this was, and it seems a wonder that human beings should find an object worth the sacrifice of living in such a lonesome place. The family consisted of Mr. Willey and his wife, a woman of more refinement than would be looked for in this mountain home, five children, the eldest a daughter of about thirteen, and two hired men. In the month of July, 1826, there had been a heavy fall of rain, which had caused a partial slide of the surface of the mountain, and had alarmed this family so that they felt the necessity of making some provision against sudden destruc tion. The sides of the hills are marked with deep furrows down which the ploughshare of Almighty ruin has been driven, when the storm has come so fearfully upon the sum mits as to loosen the soil from the granite base ; and then vast masses of earth, with trees the growth of centuries, and huge rocks, in one awful river of devastation, rush headlong into the gulfs below. Such occurrences, though not com mon, are liable to take place at any time ; and no emblems of death and destruction are equal to the scene that must en sue, if the human race are in the way of this solid cataract. The Willey family had been forwarned by a slight slide in the vicinity, and supposing from the make of the mountain, which rises very suddenly, immediately behind the house, that they were peculiarly exposed in that situation, they pre THE WHITE MOUNTAIN NOTCH. 323 pared a shanty about one hundred rods south of their dwell ing, to which they might retreat when they should perceive signs of coming danger. Near the close of the month of August, the rain came down in torrents, so as to fill the inhabitants of the plains above the Willey house with apprehensions. At this juncture, there were no visitors at any of the taverns, and consequently little passing from one part of the mountains to the 'other. Toward night, a solitary foot traveller was wending his way from the Crawfords' down through the Notch, the storm having subsided. He found great difficulty in working his passage, so fearfully had the road been broken up by the tor rents ; but, thinking he should be able to reach Willey's be fore dark, he pushed on. He succeeded in getting there shortly after nightfall, and was surprised to see no light in the window. A little dog stood in the open door, and re sisted his entrance, but after some persuasion was pacified ; when our traveller entered, and soon discovered evidence that the family had fled from their beds in haste, and that he was now the sole tenant of a deserted house. It was too late for him to seek the family ; and, naturally concluding that they had been alarmed by the storm, of whose frightful fury he had already seen terrible effects, and had gone down to the settlement at the southern extremity of the Notch, he quietly possessed himself of a vacant bed, and slept till morning. What a scene presented itself to the eye of this lone tra veller, when h<* rose the next day ! Thousands of acres of the mountain .>ide, loosed from the moorings that for ages had defied the storm, had come down in one fell avalanche, and lay in wild confusion, like a world's wreck, at his feet. The stream had been driven from its wonted channel, no signs of a road were lefc to mark his way, but the bare mountains on each side were his guide, and he went on over the broken masses that were -oiled before him, expecting to find the Willey family at t3^ house at the lower end of the Notch. Arriving there, he'ikas alarmed, and so were the people of the neighborhood, s a\;n it was known that the Willey family \ 324 1REN&US LETTERS. had fled from their house, but had not been heard of below. The truth burst on the mind in an instant, that the deluge of earth and stone had destroyed them all ! The alarm was spread among the few inhabitants of that region, and they set out without delay to learn the fate of their friends. On reaching the spot where the catastrophe occurred, they sought a long time without finding the least evidence that any of them had perished, until at length the arm of one of the children was seen protruding through a mass of earth, and the dead body was speedily disinterred. Quite at a distance from this spot, another of the children was found on the surface without a wound, having evidently been swept away by the waters and drowned. The sad search was continued, and one after another of the lifeless bodies was dug out, until all but three were found ; the mother and one of the daughters side by side in death, and the rest some in one place and some in another, where they were caught and crushed by the descend ing current, or dashed along on its resistless wave. Three of them were never found. They sleep in their mountain grave; the wild winds sweep over their unmarked sepulchres, and the stranger walks upon the earth that covers them, ten, twenty, it may be, fifty feet below the surface. This brief recital of facts will enable the reader to draw his own picture of the scene of wild dismay that wrapt itself around this household in their last night of life. There is no doubt that they were roused by the sound of che descending torrents, and thinking the shanty which they had constructed the safest place, they fled thither; and the'cC, a miserable group, they huddled in darkness and terror, surrounded with more circumstances of horror than a wild fancy could well conjure, an awful storm of rain, a swollen river roaring before them, and then the awful cataract of roc'^s and trees and earth, a more terrible engine of wrath and woe than the icy avalanche of the Alps, comes pouring down upon them. I climbed up the side of the mountain jyD trace the course of this slide. It commenced, as the uf-^appy victims had supposed it would, immediately above ' beir little dwelling, and just before it reached the house ac sim rock parted the THE WHITE MOUNTAIN NOTCH, 325 avalanche, as may be represented by an inverted ^, one branch of the stream passing to the north of the house and crushing the stable with its dumb tenants, and the other, being the great mass of the slide, pouring to the south, where the fugi tives vainly sought their safety. Had they abode in the house, not a hair of their heads would have been hurt. The building was untouched. It was an ark to which they should have clung, but which they deserted to perish. The house still stands, though unfortunately for the melancholy associa tions that one loves to cherish with such a spot, it has been rebuilt, and is now kept as a small tavern. The family, whom I found there, had but lately moved in, and the good woman told me it was " dreadful lonesome," but she thought she "could stand it." So could I, if there were no other houses in the world to be let. Three of those victims have slept undisturbed fifty-four years. But for the art of printing, their burial would by this time have become a vague tradition, and in a century or two more would be forgotten. Then if the railroad had been run on the line of the Saco river, instead of going up the side of the basin, and the remains of this household and a few kitchen utensils had been found in excavating the earth, over which huge trees had grown, we should have been informed by learned paleontologists that pre-historic man had been found in the bottom of the White Mountain Pass, and the evidence by his side that he was a worker in metals, proba bly a contemporary of Tubal Cain. The printing-press has changed all that. Facts, with their dates, now go on imper ishable records, and theorists have to go behind printed pages to stultify the age we live in. When I was here in 1844 we travelled by stage, at the foot of these mountains. Now I am half way up, and whirling along the side, and looking down upon a vast waving sea of green : many shades of green : making an exquisite picture, and in the autumn, when the various colors come out as the leaves prepare to die, the view is said to be brilliant and gor geous beyond desciption. Observation cars are provided platforms with no sides to 326 JREN&US LETTERS. obstruct the sight, and on these the passengers sit who choose to take the prospect through whirling smoke and cinders, supposing it to be more enjoyable than to sit inside. But, anyway, in or out, the pass is grand, and has to be made before its remarkable beauty and sublimity can be under stood. THE MAN WHO HAD TO WAIT FOR A SEAT IN CHURCH. He writes a grumble to one of the daily newspapers. He says that he went to one of the large uptown, Fifth avenue churches, got there half an hour before the time for service to begin, had to stand by the door and wait, and wait, until the people assembled, and the pewholders were in, and then he was conducted to a vacant seat. He had to stand up so long that he became impatient and cross, and now complains of the practice which is not peculiar to the church he visited, but is the same in all churches that are not free. And he is not a stranger in the city, but had, this Sabbath morning, wandered away from the neighborhood of many churches, to hear a celebrated preacher. Such complaints are rarely made by strangers. A person from a hotel in the city, going to a popular church, expects to depend on the hospitality of the people whose church he visits, and he is thankful when, at the proper time, he is con ducted to a seat. There is no want of hospitality in any of our churches. In many of them the young gentlemen or ganize themselves into a corps of ushers, and take their posi tions in the several aisles, to show strangers to seats with the least possible delay. They perform this gratuitous and thankless service as a religious work, to promote the good of the church and of strangers. In other churches the trustees themselves, venerable men, assist in this office. But why is it necessary ? The few strangers in town, scattered among the several churches, would not require extra aid to find WAITING FOR A SEAT IN CHURCH. 327 seats. The doorkeeper of the house could easily attend to their wants. But the trouble comes of the habit that thou sands of people have, of going about to hear preaching with no settled place of worship. Nine-tenths of all the people standing at the door, waiting to be shown into pews, are resi dents of the city, and ought to have pews of their own. This grumbler, whose complaint has led to these remarks, ought to have been in his own pew in the church where his residence or his views made it convenient and profitable for him to attend. But he is one of thousands in this city who sponge on other people for the " means of grace." This is the way it works. We have tried various ways and means of " supporting the gospel " as it is called. Free churches, open to all comers, first come first served, have been tried, and some, on the same plan, are in operation now. That is one way. The plan has been a failure. Even the Roman Catholic churches, which are supposed to be practically free, exact a rent from the poorest working girls. The Methodists have pewed churches, whereas they formerly repudiated the system. In our Protestant churches the plan is to rent sittings, and from these rents to pay the necessary expenses of the church. And if a family or individual wishes to have a seat in any one of them, and is unable to pay for it, the applicant will be furnished with a good pew, free, or on such terms as he prefers. This is the constant practice in all our Protes tant congregations. No one, outside of those in charge, knows whether you are paying $150 a year for your pew, or only $1.50, or nothing. No family in this city lives so far from church, or is so poor, as not to be able to have a good seat in a Christian church. Thus the gospel is offered with out money to all who wish to hear. And going out into the highways, are visitors seeking those who neglect the sanc tuary, and persuading them to come in, so that no one per ishes, or lives, in want of an offer of the gospel. That is the plan for supporting the church in such a city as this. But we will now suppose that " the man who had to wait for a seat " was to have his way : his idea seems to be, 328 IREN^EUS LETTERS. that, as soon as he arrives at the door of any church in town, he may walk in, select such seat as best pleases him, plant himself in it, and "enjoy the gospel." If he has that right, others have it, and the church is at once given up to squat ters. Who will "hire" a pew if it is thus to be at the mercy of such interlopers as these who go from place to place to hear something new. The plan of sustaining the church by pew rents would break down in a year, if it were practically un derstood that no pewholder can have his own when he wants it. There is no church in this, or any other American city, where a stranger would not be instantly invited to a vacant seat in any pew so soon as his presence was discovered. In Lon don I have stood in the aisle, through the whole service, at the door of a pew in which there was room for two or three more persons, but the occupants would not invite me in, because I was a stranger. Etiquette probably forbade the courtesy. The French are said to be even more particular : at least, I have read of a Frenchman who would not give his hand to a drowning man because he had not been introduced to him. Our pews are reserved until the regular attendants are in them. Then the ushers fill up the vacant sittings with the waiting strangers. If a better plan can be devised, let us have it. Perhaps a convention of those who get their preach ing for nothing every Sabbath, might be held, and a standing committee appointed to suggest a plan to obtain their rights. I can imagine them in session, being called together by my grumbler, at the close of a service which they have attended in other people's pews. The grumbler would take the chair and open the meeting with prayer, thanking God that they are not as other people, and especially as those who build churches, pay for them, and worship in them : and praying that the time may soon come when churches will grow on the street corners and ministers will be fed with manna from heaven, and men may have the means of grace without its costing them a cent. Then he would draw from his pocket a series of resolutions which, being read, would be unanimously adopted ; to this effect : THE GAMBLERS AT MONACO. 329 Resolved, That it is unbecoming a Christian people to sit in their own pews while we want the use of them. Resolved, That the people who pay for the church and its support ought to be satisfied with having had the privilege, and now it is no more than fair that they should stand at the door and wait till we have taken their pews : then, if there are any left, they can come in and be seated. Resolved, That these resolutions be published in \b&New York Observer, provided the editors will pay us for the privilege. These resolutions express the views of that large class of church-goers who have no pews of their own for which they honestly pay. Instead of grumbling because they have to wait for a seat, they should take a pew, or part of one, in a church convenient to their residence: identify themselves with the congregation : go to work as Christian people : and then.only will they get the good of the gospel. THE GAMBLERS AT MONACO. From a sound sleep last night I was awakened by a sudden, strangely startling noise. I thought something had fallen in the room ; I struck a light, and finding everything in its place, went to the front window, opened the shutter, and looked out upon the street. All was silence and darkness. But in the morning (it was now a quarter past one) the body of a man was found upon the sidewalk. He had shot himself through the heart. It made me sad to think that I had heard, and perhaps was the only one who did hear, the sound of that death-shot. The man had come back to Nice from Monaco, ruined by gambling, and, in madness and despair, had made one leap from the hells of Monaco to another from which there is no escape. "It's nothing strange," said my friend who explained the suicide; "they often kill themselves, these gamblers ; and we have the same, or worse, tragedies every year. You noticed the sudden death of a young man last week : the papers said 33 IREN&US LETTERS. he committed suicide, but the facts were carefully concealed. A mere boy, he got in the way of gambling, till his fresh youth was blighted, and he murdered himself before he was 1 8 years of age. " Two years ago a young married couple came here ; they had apartments close by me : the wife had the money, and the man could spend only what she let him have : when she found that he was frequenting the tables at Monaco, she refused to give him more : he was already in debt, and in his desperation he killed her and then himself. The tragedy was hushed up as well as it could be, but it was one of many in the history of the infernal regions next door." This vortex of ruin has had a depressing influence upon Nice, as a winter resort. Thousands and tens of thousands come and enjoy the season ; the numerous and spacious hotels are crowded : and new ones are every year added to the number : but it is said that the growth of the city has been checked, and hundreds of families that formerly made this their home in the winter now seek other climes where such temptations are not presented. A standing notice in the daily papers says that no inhabit ants of Nice are permitted to enter the " saloons of play" at Monaco unless they are members of a Club ! This curious provision is very French. There are several fashionable clubs in Nice, answering to those in London and New York, and here, as there, it is understood that no gambling is allowed. But it is equally well understood that the members may gamble at their own sweet wills. And we have had our own amusement lately, reading in the papers the incidents at the clubs in New York, illustrating beautifully what the world means by a gentleman and man of honor. " The Hea then Chinee" has his pupils and friends in the highest circles of club life at home and abroad. The members of clubs at Nice are free to enter the " salles de jeu" of Monaco, where there is no play but for money, and where the company that run the machine make incredible sums out of the dupes that are drawn into their saloons. So the fly walks into the spider's parlor, and has his life-blood sucked out of THE GAMBLERS AT MONACO, 33* him. This rule of exclusion is merely a pretence : cards of admission can be obtained by any and every body who has money to lose, and the nuisance is just as great now as it ever was. A few years ago these gambling tables were set up in public at most of the great German and French watering- places. Homburg and Baden Baden were the chief cities of play. Public opinion has put them down, though they were the source of much gain to the governments that licensed them. Gambling is not now considered respectable except by the members of our fashionable clubs. This establish ment at Monaco is about the last that is left. I believe one is still licensed in an obscure Canton in Switzerland. And if you ask why it flourishes here in the midst of civilization and Christianity, I will tell you. Monaco is a kingdom, the smallest and most contemptible in the world. It is also one of the oldest, and perhaps the very oldest, in Europe. It dates from the tenth century. On the coast of the Mediterranean sea, at the foot of the Mari time Alps, three or four fishing and trading villages managed, with infinite and foolish sacrifices, to make themselves into a separate State, over which the Grimaldi family has held precarious sway for a thousand years. In the chances and changes that have modified the map of Europe, (in which Nice has been at one time in France, and then in Italy, and now in France again,) the insignificance of Monaco has been its shield. Two of the towns that once belonged to it have managed to get out, and Monaco now stands alone in its glory, the least and the meanest of kingdoms. Its entire population is less than 10,000. It consists of a small town on a remarkable promontory, inaccessible from the seaside, but making a snug harbor which separates the town from Monte Carlo. On this hill a splendid hotel is built, and beautiful villas are springing up. The Prince of this petty domain has a royal palace with splendid gardens around it: he has his castle, and guns and soldiers, and is the equal in position with any of the crowned heads of Europe. To keep up this style and state, he must have money : the taxes that his sub- 33 2 IRENMUS LETTERS. jects had to pay were so heavy as to lead to the revolt and secession of Mentone and Rocca Brun. There was every reason to fear the Monacans would follow the lead of their neighbors, and that some fine morning they might pitch the Prince into the sea so invitingly near. In this crisis the famous man Blanc, who was harvesting the gold of all the fools at Homburg and Baden, obtained a license to set up his tables at Monaco for the accommodation of the silly sheep that would come to Nice, and Mentone and Monaco, to be fleeced in winter. Mr. Blanc and his partners agreed, in con sideration of their license, to pay the Prince an annual sum of $75,000, and also to keep his city lighted with gas, streets in order, drainage perfect, and to make the place more and more attractive for the fashionable world. The climate is delightful, the King lives in Paris the most of the time, and a reign of peace and plenty is enjoyed under the general auspices of a nest of gamblers who make vast sums of money out of their contract with the King. I am told that their expenditures in city improvements and taxes amount to a thousand dollars a day ; and this will help you to some idea of the money that must be lost by the visitors. There are five or six large tables, with as many games of various kinds, at which an indefinite number of people may play, and these games go on steadily, day and night, and the stream flowing, almost without a turn, into the bank, or the bag, of the com pany. Women and men, young and old, English and Ameri can, French, Italians, Germans and Russians, Orientals swar thy and passionless in their looks, all play, all lose, all play again, for it is the nature of this vice (of all vices) that indul gence stimulates the passion, blunts the edge of reason, like the horse-leech cries "more, more," and never says it is enough. Under the guise of Christian charity, many churches in America, and many benevolent organizations, in the spirit of this Monaco company, set up lotteries and raffles to tempt the people to risk a little money in the hope of getting more. So this Monaco company give large donations to religious and charitable objects, hoping thereby to take the curse from MADE WITHOUT A MAKER. 333 their business and conciliate public favor. The principle of their accursed trade, covered with blood and loaded with the misery of ruined families and the souls of its victims blighted in this world, damned in that to come, is just the same as that by which money is won at a church fair. MADE WITHOUT A MAKER. Opening an encyclopedia, in pursuit of knowledge, my attention was drawn to the word protoplasm. I read its defi nition, and then a long and weary essay on the subject. Perhaps you will say the same of this letter. It may be weary, it shall not be very long. The book said that protoplasm comes from two Greek words meaning_/?r.y/ and form, a term applied to the supposed original substance from which all living beings are devel oped, and which is the universal concomitant of every phe nomenon of life. All that is comprehended for brevity under the term life, " the growth of plants, the flight of birds, or a train of thought :" that is to say, vegetable life, brute life, and human life, " is thus supposed to be caused by corporeal organs which either themselves consist of protoplasm, or have been developed out of it." The first living things are called moners, which are made out of pure protoplasm: that and nothing more. You must put a pin there. Not to prick the moner, but to mark the place in the process of getting something out of nothing. Who made the protoplasm is not "supposed." It is supposed that moners are made of proto plasm. When the colored preacher in Alabama spoke of the first man being made of wet clay and set up against the fence to dry, one of his doubting hearers asked out loud, " Who made the fence?" The preacher bade him be silent, for " such questions would upset any system of theology." The author proceeds : moners are " the simplest living beings we can conceive of as capable of existing," and " they 334 IREN&US LETTERS, perform all the functions which in their entirety constitute, in the most highly organized animals and plants, what is comprehended in the idea of life." You see it is becoming interesting. In the simplest conceivable being, all the func tions of the most fully developed man are found. You thought that it required infinite power and wisdom to make a being in whom resides a soul of boundless reach : but now you are told that in a moner don't forget what a moner is the most highly organized system of animal life and func tions exists. Some of these wonderful fellows, the moners, live "in fresh water," " others in the sea." As a general rule " they are invisible to the naked eye," but " some are as large as the head of a pin." Put another pin here so as to see its head. Some " are smooth :" others have " numerous delicate threads radiating in all directions." Sixteen varieties of these curious first things are catalogued. Haeckel has done it. He has also shown that although moners are the " sim plest living beings we can conceive of as capable of existing" and " consist solely of protoplasm," yet protoplasm is not a "simple" substance, but consists of carbon 50 to 55 per cent, hydrogen 6 to 8, nitrogen 15 to 17, oxygen 20 to 22, and only i to 2 of sulphur. Thus it is proved that the simplest of all conceivable beings is composed of a compound including five other substances. You might put another pin there, for it becomes more curiously entertaining as we proceed. We have now seen that the origin of life was, first, pure protoplasm, secondly, moners are made of it solely, and themselves per fectly simple : and now protoplasm made of five totally dis similar constituents rolled into one. According to the plastid theory the great variety of vital phenomena is the consequence of the infinitely delicate chemical difference in the composition of protoplasm, and it considers protoplasm to be the sole active life substance. The author goes on to say that the protoplasm theory received a wide and thorough illustration from the study of rhizopods which Ernst Haeckel published in 1862, and its complete application in a subsequent work " by the same na turalist." " Haeckel," our author says, discovered the " sim- MADE WITHOUT A MAKER. 335 plest" of organisms in 1864, and Haeckel elaborated "the extremest philosophical consequences of the protoplasm the ory." And our author having quoted Haeckel seven times, closes his essay by referring, among other authors, to five several and distinct works by Haeckel. Being by this time in the spirit of inquiry into the origin of things, I sought the authorship of our author's treatise, and, in a list of authors in the beginning of the book, it was assigned to Haeckel ! How like it is to the thing it treats ! Here is protoplasm illustrated. Whenever our author would illustrate any point of importance, he tells us what Haeckel says : and he and Haeckel are one and the same ; just as protoplasm begets moners which are solely protoplasm, and the simplest con ceivable beings, yet solely composed of one substance itself made up of five. And this is philosophy ! A speaker in Congress began by saying grandiloquently : "The generality of mankind in general are disposed to oppress the generality of mankind in general." "You had better stop," said one near to him, " you are coming out at the same hole you went in at." The philosophers of the Haeckel and Huxley school argue in a circle with the same result. Dr. Lundy tells us of a Hindoo picture of a god with his great toe in his mouth, thus having no beginning or end: and the Doctor says that " the toe in his mouth represents his incomprehensible spiritual nature." The circle out of which is evolved the plastid theory of life has the same incompre hensibility that represents its idea of self-existence by an old man kissing his big toe. But is there no point, no moral, no great truth to be devel oped out of this mass of contradiction and absurdity ? What is the necessary deduction from the moner theory of life ? Logically and intentionally the inference is that, in the human being, there is no life that has not the same origin and substance and function with that of vegetables and beasts. These teachers teach that " a train of thought" " is composed of corporeal organs" and comes of protoplasm. Thus man and beast and potatoes are put on the same level, 33 6 IRENsEUS LETTERS. having no functions except corporeal, and with no principle of life that survives the dissolution of the corpus. This is the opinion of many in our day. It is also as old a theory as Epicurus who, in his garden-school at Athens 300 years before Christ, denied the immortality of the soul and taught the doctrine which Democritus had elaborated in his cos mogony, and which was taught by Leucippus of Abdera, a hundred years before Epicurus was born, and held by the wits of Egypt a thousand years before. They called it the atomic theory : that matter is self-existent and originally composed of atoms, each atom having power of motion, and these atoms went whirling about like the bits of glass in a ka^ido- scope, till they stuck together in their present forms. This is as rational and philosophical as protoplasm, and is cer tainly its germ out of which moners and other monsters are developed. How beautiful in contrast is the faith of the Christian. It is revealed to us in the Bible. The Lord God made man and " breathed into his nostrils the breath of life ; and man became a living soul." iNot so did he make a horse or a bird. Materialists, Epicureans, Haeckelians and others of that school, are consistent in putting equal value upon the life of a beast and a woman, or even in esteeming the former more highly if their tastes so lead them. But we who believe that Christ died for human beings only, and that they who are in Him become partakers of a divine nature also, see in man a dignity, sanctity and glory excelled only by the angels and Him " in whom we live and move and have our being." ARGUING WITH A POKER AND A HAMMER. A fearful tragedy commands my pen as I sit down to write this letter. On the banks of the Hudson river, in the midst of a Christian community, and just before Christmas last, the herald of peace and good will, a bloody drama was per formed. ARGUING WITH A POKER AND A HAMMER. 337 Above the village of Kingston and below Saugerties, on the western bank of this goodly river, is a region of country known as Flatbush. Two Christian churches, the one Re formed Dutch, the other Methodist Episcopal, flourish in this rural region. Mr. and Mrs. Rittie were a married pair, in middle age ; he the sexton of the Reformed Church, she an active member of the Methodist. However well they may have agreed on other matters, they were bound to differ on questions of faith and practice that distinguish the two communities, one Cal- vinistic, the other Arminian. How much either knew about doctrine is not stated. Both were very much set in their way. Arguments were frequent and earnest. Words how ever made no very deep impression. The more they argued the more thoroughly convinced they were of the soundness and scripturalness of their respective opinions. Such a result is not unusual. John Knox and John Wesley could not have been more decided in their religious beliefs. It grew worse and worse. Breath was spent in vain. It generally is when disputants are warm, and this man and wife waxed warm, even in winter, when they fought the fight of faiths. It was not a good fight. And it is quite likely that the man usually got the worst of the argument. Certainly he worried the most over it, as would not have been the case had he been the victor in the war of words. Coming home from a hard day's work, he was invited by his loving spouse to go in the evening to the prayer meeting which her church people were holding, within half a mile of their own dwelling. To this kind invitation he replied, "No, Sarah, I am too tired to walk so far to-night : let's go to Swart's," a near neighbor. To which she answered, " No, if you can't go to prayer meeting with me, I am not going to Swart's with you." This she said in a sharp tone. It is affirmed of her that she had " a tongue in her head." People generally have ; and so far as my knowledge of natural his tory extends, husbands have tongues in their heads as well as wives ; yet it is more frequently remarked of women than of men, that they are gifted with this unruly member. They 33 8 IREN^EUS LETTERS. certainly do not enjoy a monopoly of it, though their skill in its use may give them the advantage in linguistic discussion. Being unable to convince the head of the house that it was his duty to go to prayer meeting with her, she went without him. We have no report of the part she took in the meeting, but, being an active, energetic sister, who had walked half a mile to the place, and was considerably excited when she started, it is probable that she exercised her gift of tongue according to her ability and opportunity. She returned home, and Martin, her husband, was yet at the neighbor's, visiting his friends. She might have called there and walked home with him. But such was not her disposition. She retired to their apartment, shut the door, locked it and fastened him out. What business had he to go out visiting while she was at prayer meeting : she would teach him a thing or two. In due time he came home, but the door was shut. He could get into the hall, but not into the room. He knocked and called, but the devout woman was deaf and dumb now. The Calvinist was discomfited. If she had argued with him through the keyhole, it is quite likely he would have given up a point or two of his tenets, for the sake of an armistice. But she scorned to take advantage of his embarrassment, and he made his way to the only refuge, a miserable garret, where, without bed or fire, he passed a bitterly cold night, in darkness, silence and solitude. He nursed his wrath, and that may have helped to keep him warm. Down stairs he came in the morning, and the scene that ensued when this loving pair met at the fireside, is in ferred from the lines and marks left upon their respective heads. The heads of argument seem to have been these. She went for him and began to argue with a poker, giving him a blow over the left cheek bone ; and making so deep an impres sion that the argument was found to fit exactly into the place for which it was intended. He replied with a hammer. Whether he studied up this subject in the midnight medita tions of the garret and came down prepared for this new mode of answering her, does not appear, but he was ready with the hammer and smote her on the head therewith, until ARGUING WITH A POKER AiVD A HAMMER. 339 he supposed he had finished her. Then suddenly a great horror came on him, as the neighbors rushed in and found him standing over the body of his wife. He stepped into the chamber from which she had barred him, and put an end to his own life with a razor. That is a little drama, in a rural village, in humble cottage life, this winter. But it is, in miniature, what has filled cities, and lands, and the world with violence, woe and blood. We are but learning now the principles of toleration, the duty and beauty of letting people have their own way of thinking and believing, if they cannot be converted to a better way by reason and love. I have compared notes on the subject with friends of late, and we agree in this : that the older we grow, the more clearly, intelligently and firmly we hold those opinions we have had from youth upwards, and the more cheerfully willing we are that others should hold opinions opposed to ours. The importance of controversial theology and of contending earnestly for the faith is not questioned; but the folly of arguing with an opponent, disputing with men or women about their religious belief, and emphatically getting excited about it, is so clear to me now, that the tongue seems almost as dangerous a weapon as a poker or a hammer. Reason has far less to do with the guidance of human opinions than we are apt to admit. Education, feeling, exam ple, prejudice, self-interest, any one of these has more power with many persons than logic. The parent who lives a godly life and by the sweetness of his Christian spirit, his habitual kindness to companion, children, servants and friends, illus trates the power of the faith he professes, will more surely convince his household of the truthfulness of his religious opinions, than he will by hammering their heads, or arguing at the table with every guest who does not believe as he does. Train children in the doctrines and duties of the gospel, rising up early and teaching them, show their power in a holy and happy life, patience in trials, energy in useful work, and hope in the worst of times, and children will not depart from the faith of their fathers. It is time to lay aside the poker and the hammer, the spear 34 1R&NJ&U3 LETTERS. and the sword : to hang the trumpet in the hall and study war no more. The world's great conqueror is the Prince of Peace. I cannot convince my neighbors that they are wrong, but I will love them, if they love Him who loves us both. Let us live and let live. And so much the more as we see the day approaching when there shall be neither Greek nor Jew, neither Barbarian nor Scvthian : for Christ is all in all. ANNA DICKINSON ON THEATRES. The theatre has a new champion in the field, Miss Anna Dickinson, who won much fame on the platform as a lec turer and made a dead failure as a player on the stage. But she is not to be put down, and with a remarkably forgiving spirit, she has returned to the platform to advocate the stage. She is so stage-struck that in her delirium she de clares the stage more a power in the world than the press or the church. She takes up the old and long since exploded doctrine, that the theatre is a school of morals, and upholds it as one of- the great reforming agencies of the age, and all ages. Anna is behind the age. All the world knows better, and talks better, and no sensible man of to-day pretends to defend the theatre for such a silly reason as that. Alexandra Dumas, McCready, Edwin Booth, and such as they, know more about theatres than Miss Dickinson, and they tell a very different story. Alexandre Dumas said it is no place for our wives and daughters. He thought little of morals for men, but as it is nice to have women's morals kept as nearly right as may be, he would not have them frequent the play. This was the ground maintained by the great English actor, McCready, whose rivalry with Edwin Forrest culminated in the Astor Place riot of 1849. He pre ferred that the ladies of his family should not frequent the theatre, though thereby he got his money and his fame. ANNA DICKINSON ON THEATRES. 34* Edwin Booth, the greatest of living American actors, has recently given his written testimony that he never permits (Miss Dickinson never permits any man to say that of her) his " wife or daughter to witness a play, without previously ascertaining its character." I never come so near losing patience with others, who have the same right to their opinions that I have to mine, as when they assume and assert that the theatre, as it is and has been, is worthy of the encouragement and support of good men and women. I know that honorable and good men have said so. I have heard preachers plead for the theatre, on the platform surrounded by players. So 1 have read in the purest and best of the daily papers sneers at " educated persons" who denounce the theatre. And, at last, a woman comes to the footlights and declares theatres better than churches ! ! Now I am no bigot, nor purist, and wish to have as wide a charity and as much liberality as any honest man should have. I do not quarrel with a man for holding conscien tious convictions, religious opinions, views of right and duty, quite opposed to mine. To his own Master he stands or falls. I will dine, as my Master did, with publicans and sinners. And if good men will frequent theatres it is their lookout : I do not criticise them for so doing. It may do them no harm. If they frequent theatres, why may not 1 try to show that they are evil, only evil, and that continually? If Anna Dickinson thinks theatres better than churches, and longs to be a play actor, which she never can be, why may I not quote the words of the greatest lady player of the Ameri can stage, Fanny Kemble, who wrote these words : " A business which is incessant excitement and fictitious emotion seems to me unworthy of a man, a business unworthy of a woman. Neither have I ever presented myself before an audience without a shrinking feeling of reluctance, nor withdrawn from their presence without thinking the excite ment 1 had undergone unhealthy and the personal exhibition odious" When she declares it "a business unworthy of a woman," Fanny Kemble utters the thought of the purest and best of 342 IREN^EUS LETTERS. her sex. When I was only ten years old I read in the Latin of Tacitus that the women of Germany were preserved in purity and kept from danger by being excluded from theatres. The evils of theatres are to be learned quite as much from Plato and Aristotle as from the Bible or any other book. Plato says : " Plays raise the passions and pervert the use of them, and of consequence are dangerous to morality." Aristotle held that " the seeing of comedies ought to be forbidden to young people, until age and discipline have made them proof against debauchery." Ovid, a poet so licentious that we had expurgated editions of his works, advised Augustus to suppress theatres as a great source of corruption. But modern theatres are better than the ancient : and are better now than they were twenty-five or fifty years ago. Just so. But they are not pure, never were and never can be. George Ticknor said of the Paris stage : " The old French drama contained often gross and indelicate phrases and allusions, but the tone of the pieces, as a whole, was generally respectable. The recent theatre reverses all this. It contains hardly any indecorous phrases or allusions, but its whole tone is highly immoral. I have not yet seen one piece that is to be considered an exception to this remark. I know nothing that more truly deserves the reproach of being immoral and demor alizing than the theatres of Paris and the popular literature of the day." And the theatres of Paris are to-day just as pure and moral as those of New York. We have the French plays translated regularly and put on our stage, and the nastier they are the more popular, as the coffers prove. Even Anna Dickinson, an unmarried woman, names Camille as a moral play ! ! ! Mr. Palmer, the well known manager of the Union Square Theatre of this city, said to the Tribune: "The American turns his back on the Shakespearean drama in the theatre, not because it possesses too much thought for him, but because its thoughts are too nastily expressed to suit his civilized taste." But the drama of Shakespeare is called the legitimate, and ANNA DICKINSON ON THEATRES. 343 the stage on which his plays are acted is the model school of virtue and manners ! Miss Dickinson declares the stage more powerful to-day in forming the morals of the age than the church ! So idle a remark is scarcely to be reconciled with the possession of one's senses. The stage cannot exist except in large cities. And here, in the largest city on the Continent, it could not survive a year but for the strangers within our gates. The number of people attending theatres is a mere handful com pared with those who go to church. She says she has been fifteen times to see one play. Probably thousands have done the same, and that shows how few people there are who go. And if the opinions of Plato and Edwin Booth, of Aristotle and McCready, of Tacitus and Palmer, of Fanny Kemble and Ovid, are unitedly equal to the opinion of Miss Anna Dick inson, I may be excused for believing, in my innocent igno rance, that on the whole the Church is rather a better school of morals than the play-house. 1 would not be very positive as to a fact that a woman may deny. But having been a somewhat diligent student of history, especially in that department of it which treats of the progress of civilization, religion and morals, through the brilliant periods of Grecian and Roman life and glory, and in the rise of Western Empires and the development of modern art, science and humanity, and along that track of time which has seen the birth, growth, power, and benedic tion of ten thousand institutions to make this world better, purer and happier, to relieve human suffering, to save fallen men and women from the deeper hell of their lost name and their unspeakable shame ; having seen in Italy and in Rus sia, in Spain and Egypt even, institutions of mercy from which flow streams to make glad the desert of the world, I have observed they all had their rise, nourishment, and life in the Church. Not in my Church only, but in every Church that teaches the immortal destiny of man : the life of God in the human soul ! But never, never did I see or hear of one memorial of virtue or benevolence intended to bless poor, sick, dying humanity, that had its origin in that boasted 344 1REN&US LETTERS. school of virtue, called the theatre ! And I challenge all the champions of the stage, without distinction of race, sex, color, or previous condition, to point to any substantial good thing ever wrought by its influence. I speak not of actors, of whom many are good, benevolent men and women. But of the stage as an institution. As long ago as in the time of that poor King Charles I., a man named Prynne made a book containing a list of authorities, almost every name of eminence in the heathen and Christian world, bear ing testimony against the stage: the Acts of 54 councils and synods; 71 ancient fathers; 150 Papal and Protestant authors, philosophers and poets, and the legislative enact ments of Pagan and Christian States, nations, emperors and kings. But in spite of all these testimonies the stage lives. Just as ali other vices live. It is a running sore in the bosom of society. And sores are always running. So long as human nature loves evil rather than good, vice rather than virtue, a lascivious play like Camille, or a dirty opera like Travtata, will have admirers among the sons and daughters of men. But that only pro'ves that the play is carnal, sold under sm. It always was a school of vice. The shores of time are peo pled with the shades of its victims. To reform it is to break it down. Purify the stage, and as it falls its dying cry will be the words of the greatest master of the drama : " FARE WELL ! OTHELLO'S OCCUPATION'S GONE." OUR FRIENDS IN HEAVEN. So many of my friends have recently gone to heaven, it is quite natural that thoughts of them and their surroundings should be frequent. And certainly they are very pleasant. If there was ever a time when religion and death and the life beyond were subjects of sad reflection, to be indulged only as a duty, such a time has passed away. It is now as cheer- OUR FRIENDS IN HEAVEN. 345 ing and agreeable to think of friends (and the more loved in life the more pleasant) enjoying the pleasures of the heavenly state, as to hear from others travelling in foreign lands, rejoicing in scenes and associations that satisfy their longing desires. The wisest and best of Roman moralists and philoso phers enjoyed such thoughts of their friends gone before them into the unseen and eternal, and they anticipated with fond emotions a blissful reunion and refreshment in the society of the great and good. And with life and immortality brought to light by Revelation, what was to those ancient pagans a dreamy speculation scarcely worthy of being called a faith, is to us reality. Our faith is the SUBSTANCE of things hoped for, the EVIDENCE of things not seen. We have thus entered already upon the inheritance, so that we have the good of it and part of the glory, as the heir to a vast estate or a throne enjoys, long before he comes into possession, the reflected honors and pleasures awaiting. Names and faces and forms of friends who have within the past year preceded me into their rest, have been peopling the cheerful chambers of memory this evening. It is a rough night outside, and the day has been a weary one ; but now a soft fire-light fills the room and the study lamp is shaded, so that the silence and shadows invite converse with the spirit ual and unseen. And the departed of the year have joined themselves with the many who finished their course before them, and are now in the midst of worship and feasts and friendship in the mansions of the blest. How pleasant their memories now ! How the heart gladdens with the remem brance of the joys on earth and the hopes of higher in heaven ! Just about twelve years ago (it was Dec. 16, 1859) I had some friends at dinner with me : a larger number than are often gathered at my table ; but they were friends, valued friends, some of them very dear. It was a feast of fat things, and six hours flew away like so many moments, in that feast of reason and flow of soul, making an evening never to be forgotten here or hereafter. And of that dinner company, EIGHTEEN men are now in another state than this, their bodies 340 1R&NMUS LETTERS. mouldering in the ground, their souls gone to God ! ! ! Eigh teen of my companions, associates in business, in the Church, in public and private life, personal friends, eating and drink ing with me in one company, and now all gone ! I stopped just here and went to a drawer and took out a sheet of paper, on which is a diagram of the table and the seat that each one occupied, with his name written in it. The links of memory are brightened, so that their voices, their pleasantries, their very words of wit and wisdom, sparkling and bright, come flashing and shining, as on that glad and genial evening. At my right was the stalwart Edgar of Bel fast, and on my left the polished Dill of Derry ; and just be yond was the elegant and eloquent Potts ; and next to him the courtly and splendid Bethune ; S. E. and R. C. Morse, three years sundered by death, but just now reunited to be sundered never again ; and there was Krebs, himself a host, my companion in foreign travel and a most delightful friend ; and Murray, the " Kirwan " of the Observer, brightening the brightest with the humor of his native isle ; and Cooke, who was with me in Switzerland ; and that wonderful astronomer, Mitchell, who now looks down to study the stars ; and my friend Hoge, with love like that of woman ; and my brother, P. E. Stevenson. [Since I first wrote these lines, my guests have continued to go to heaven ; and I have now to add the names of Prof. S. F. B. Morse, J. R. Damson, James Stuart, Alexander Stuart, Joel Parker, D.D., G. D. Abbott, D.D., John Laidlaiv, and Rev. William Adams, D.D., L.LD.] A brilliant company ; an acquisition to the skies ; stars all of them ; who finished their course with joy, and then entered into the joy of their Lord. It would seem that the earth could not spare all those men, and keep right on. But they are in fitting company, with the Lamb in the midst of them. " There is the throne of David, And there from toil released, The shout of them that triumph, The song of them that feast." And there is a younger company. All these were heroes OUR FRIENDS IN HEAVEN. 347 and prophets and kings, but the children who have gone up there are children always. O blessed thought ! They were with us long years ago, and they are in our hearts the same playful little ones they were when the Father of us all asked them to come to his house. And they are his children and our children forever. That little one to whom David said he should go, is still the child of David, not an infant of days, for there are no days nor nights in heaven, but the saint-child radiant in immortal beauty. " O ! when a mother meets on high The babe she lost in infancy, Hath she not, then, for pains and fears, The day of woe, the watchful night, For all her sorrows, all her tears, An overpayment of delight ?" Heaven's floor is covered with them. Of such is its king dom. They have been going there flying before they could walk, carried there by the angels all these thousands of years. Yours are there. There, did I say? We do not know where the place is, nor what a place is for spirits to dwell in. They may be near us, around us, ministering spirits sent forth to do us good, to strengthen us. They, or thoughts of them, have been so pleasantly with me to-night, that it is good to be here. It would be good, doubtless better, to be with them where they are, and with Him who has them near His face. There is nothing sad, depressing, in such com munion. But it is getting late. The fire is low on the hearth. To-morrow will soon be here ; its duties require fresh life : and as death brings life eternal, so sleep makes new life for the day to come. 34^ 1REN&US LETTERS. WHEN NOT TO LAUGH, Walter Scott, the great novelist and poet, the prince of genial good fellows, as fond of humor and hearty laughter as any man, on his dying bed, said to his son-in-law, " Lockhart, read to me." " What book shall I read ?" asked his son. "There is but one book for a dying man," replied the poet ; " read from the Bible." Walter Scott was fond of fun, he enjoyed humor, was a splendid story teller ; and he was a Christian believer, and his inner sense was enlightened to know and feel the fitness of things, the proprieties of time and place. To ask for a funny story, for something to make him laugh when he was dying, would have been as abhorrent to the tastes of Walter Scott, as to hear a joke cracked at his mother's funeral. Rev. Robert Collyer, in a recently published sermon on " Faith and Fear," closes up with the following story : Talking the other day about some grand, old saints that we had known, we spoke of one now dead, and a brother said, " Did you hear how he died ? He was a long time sick, you know, and in great pain, and when he felt the* end had come, he sent for his two sons. " ' Boys,' he said, ' I am nearly through. I just wanted to see you and say good-bye.' " They sat down beside his bed, and then he said, ' One of you read to me.' "So one of them got the Bible. 'Nay, not that,' the old man said, quietly, ' I don't need that now. I got it all into my heart years ago. My feet are planted on the promises. Everything that Book teaches for me has come clear. My trunk is packed, my ticket all right, and I am just going to start ; but now will you not get something new, pleasant and bright ? I have had a hard struggle with my pain, and would like to laugh just another time. I know it will do me good. ' " And so one of the boys got some bit of sweet humor and read that ; and it was so, that while the light was shining in his eyes at the pleasant thoughts, they changed and caught the light that flashes from the immanent glory, and he was with the angels." Grand old man ! I was glad to hear that story. Trunk packed, ticket WHEN NOT TO LAUGH. 349 made out, feet planted on the promises, just another ripple of laughter after the hard pain, and then the rest that remains. These two stories are in striking contrast. Scott wanted nothing so much as the Bible when he came to die. Collyer's saint wanted no more of the Bible, but something to make him laugh. Collyer rejoices in his saint : we rejoice in the prince of novelists. Scott's was the faith of a Christian : Collyer's that of a pagan. Humor is a good thing. Fun is healthful. We do not play enough, do not laugh enough. There is a time for every thing, and the wisest of men has told us, and God told him to tells us, " There is a time to laugh." So there is a time to dance, and a time to weep, and a time to die. Everything is beautiful in its time. The Lord made it so. Humor and pathos have their dwelling places very near each other, and of them it may be said as Dryden said of wit and madness, " Thin partitions do their bounds divide." Or as Pope said, " What thin partitions sense from thought divide." And some men who are fullest of tears when sympathy with suffering asks for tears, are also overflowing with fun and frolic when laughter is in order. I have a broader sympathy with laughter than Pope, who wrote those familiar lines: " Eye Nature's walks, shoot folly as it flies, And catch the living manners as they rise : Laugh where we must, be candid where we can, But vindicate the ways of God to man." "Alas, poor Yorick," saith Shakespeare in Hamlet. "I knew him ; a fellow of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy." But I confess that when I read that sentence inscribed upon a tombstone, as the best epitaph that admiring friends could suggest and carve for posterity, I felt that it were better to live for something higher than merely to laugh and make others laugh. And as I read on the stone that memorial of 35 1RENSEUS LETTERS. a man of wit, I could not but recite from the same play and the same scene, those other words of the greatest of poets : "Where be your jibes now? Your gambols ? Your songs? Your flashes of merriment, that were wont to set the table on a roar ?" George P. Morris was a poet and a wit and a genial table companion, and he wrote of the Bible in one of his songs : " In teaching me the way to live, It taught me how to die." And my old friend and the friend of everybody who loves green fields and running brooks, and to sit all day in the shade of great trees, fishing or reading or thinking my friend of other days, Izaak Walton, said of the Bible : " Every hour I read you kills a sin, Or lets a virtue in to fight against it." And I love old George Herbert more even than 1 do his friend Izaak Walton ; and Herbert writes: " Stars are poor books, and oftentimes do miss ; The Book of stars lights to eternal bliss." That's my idea, precisely. And when I come to die, much as I have enjoyed Joe Miller and Percy, and those other benefactors of the race who have made us laugh betimes in spite of ourselves ; much as 1 am indebted for health and spirit to do the hard work of life, to the great humorists of this and other days, whose books are looking down upon me from long rows of shelves while I write, and whose covers make me smile when I think of the good things that are within ; yet I say, when I come to die, 1 will not want my friends to take a jest book or a comic paper for a joke to make me laugh as I step into the river. Laughing is very well when dining, not when dying. " Jesus, the music of Thy name Hath overpowering charms ; Scarce shall I feel death's cold embrace, If Christ be in my arms. WITH A PIRA TE IN HIS CELL. 35 I " Then when ye hear my heart-strings break, How sweet the minutes roll, A mortal paleness on my cheeks, And glory in my soul." Read to me from the words of Him who saith, " He that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live." Collyer's saint would have something " pleasant and bright;" Hot the Bible. If you would bring me something pleasant and bright, lift the vail and show me a ''pure river of water of life, clear as crystal," and let me hear the voice that says : There shall be no night there the city hath no need of the sun, nor of the moon to shine in it her light is like unto a stone most precious. It seems to me that is pleasant and bright. The best joke I ever heard would not make me so happy in dying as to hear my Master's words, " Enter thou into the joy of thy Lord." WITH A PIRATE IN HIS CELL. Thirty-six years ago, in the City Prison, called the Tombs, from the Egyptian style and the gloomy look, was confined a man under sentence of death. He was a pirate, bearing the singular name of Babe. It was doubtless a ficti tious name, but the public knew him by no other. I had heard much of this pirate: the papers of the day had startling accounts of his career. His trial in this city had resulted in his conviction under the United States laws, and, after two reprieves, he was now waiting the day of his execution. He insisted strongly that he could produce evi dence to establish his innocence if he had time granted him. Then it was also alleged that the odd name of Babe con cealed the name of a distinguished family in New York, the mention of which, even at this day, would startle the hearer, so well is it known to the religious world. This fact inten sified my interest in the man, and I went to the prison in the 352 IREN&US LETTERS. hope of being permitted to see him, and to try to do him good. The keeper led me to the tier of cells, and the murderers' row, where such as he were confined. He was allowed to sit outside of his cell, but was carefully watched ; and as I came upon the stairs he rose, entered his cell and shut the door. This was discouraging, but I asked the keeper to go to the cell and say to him that "a young minister would like to pay him a visit, if it would be agreeable." The keeper complied, and soon returned with word that Babe would be glad to see me. I stepped through the low portal. He swung the iron door back to its place with a clang, and I was alone with the pirate in his cell. The sensation was novel, and not pleasant. I had often conversed with convicts through the grating of the cell door. I had taught six convicts to read by giving them lessons at the hole in their cell doors, and they had recited to me whole chapters of the gospel, not a letter of which did they know until they were thus taught in prison. -But this was the first time I had been shut in with a convict. He gave me the only chair, while he sat on the bunk. As I took off my hat, he asked me to keep it on, as the cell was cool. Before me was a handsome young man, twenty-two years old; tall, well formed, a model of strong muscular action, with a bright eye and intelligent face, and his whole look and bearing indicated genteel birth and manners. I said : " My dear sir, I have not intruded upon you with any feel ing of idle curiosity; I come as a friend, a Christian friend, to speak with you of your precious soul." " I am glad to see you," he replied, with a clear, pleasant voice. I then asked him what views he had of the future, when he thought of the possibility that he might, before a great while, be called into another state of being. With wonderful coolness, indicating total unconcern, he replied : " My views, I suppose, are the same as yours or those of any other man. My mind is just as much at ease as that of any man in New York, but" and here he clenched both fists and brandished his arms while he said: WITH A PIRA TE IN HIS CELL. 353 " I am just as innocent of the crime for which I am shut up here, as you are, but I am pursued* by a set of blood hounds who mean to get me hanged." He became furious, and I began to fear he was dangerous. As soon as he paused, I resumed : "I did not come to make any inquiry about your guilt or innocence of this particular crime, but to ask you if you have not sins to repent of, and to be forgiven before you can be at peace with God, and be prepared to die and meet Him in judgment." He admitted this general truth, and I preached Jesus Christ the only and the sufficient Saviour. And in the midst of the appeal I said to him, looking into his eye with tenderness: "You have parents perhaps living, I hope pray ing for you now," and he answered : " I have respectable relatives" he did not say parents "living in this city, but they do not know that I am here ; and if I were to die to-morrow, they would not find me out." It was in vain that I urged him to seek reconciliation with those who ought to be his friends. And I had no reason to suppose that he had the slightest inclination to ward the Saviour, whom I offered with earnest words and prayers. It is quite probable that he was the unacknowledged son of a distinguished family, whose influence with the President of the United States procured his pardon. It is certain that he produced no new evidence of his innocence, but he was set at liberty. I never heard of him again. Perhaps, under another name, he resumed his rover-life, and found his death on the seas or on the scaffold. It is very true that, in this gloomy prison, by far the most who enter are from the degraded, ignorant and squalid classes. The slums feed the prisons and the poorhouses. But not all are the sons of the low and wretched. The hand somest boy in college with me, the son of a magistrate of wealth and influence, died in one of the cells in this same prison. A friend of mine, a professor of languages and a superior scholar, with associations as respectable as any, 354 IREN&US LETTERS. died in one of the cells of these living Tombs. There is not a week in the year when there not some often there are several who have fallen from the heights of good society to the depths of sin, shame, misery and the dungeon, from which the gate of deliverance is death. In a great city like this there are tragedies of domestic and social anguish con stantly in progress. Forty dead men lay one morning at the Morgue last week, waiting to be claimed by friends. No friends came. In most cases death was a comfort to survi vors, and oblivion a cover of sorrow and shame. All this is to say that the gospel ought to be always at work in this prison. The Son of Man came to seek and save the lost. Over the doors of Dante's Inferno was written: " Who enter here, leave hope behind." But while there is life there is hope. No other name but Jesus does these lost men good. And that name can, and does. While in this world we shall have constant war with sin and misery. Especially with sin, which is the parent of misery. There are many nostrums prescribed by quack doctors, who call themselves reformers, but they do no good. A drunkard may be saved whom God renews and holds in his right hand. When the Ethiopian can change his skin or the leopard his spots, then will he who has been accustomed to do evil learn to do well. It is Christ who alone is able to save unto the uttermost. What is the use of saying this over and over again : the same old story, Jesus and his blood : the sinner lost and the sinner saved? Well, it is just this: life is wearing along with each of us, and every day brings us so much nearer to its end. To save ourselves and others, to deliver men from the bondage of sin and misery, to get the lost out of the mire of vice and their feet on the Rock of Ages this is the great est of all the works that men or angels can do. A WOMAN'S VIEW OF CRIME, 355 A WOMAN'S VIEW OF CRIME. The quantity of nonsense precipitated by the agitation of questions of reform is something fearful. Happy they who are not compelled to read the many prescriptions of quacks and quidnuncs who discover new theories of vice and fresh remedies for crime, and inflict them on an anxious and cred ulous community. " The world is full of evil," said the poets hundreds of years ago, and thousands of years ago the pen of infinite wisdom and omniscient penetration wrote, " the heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked." Yet there are not a few men and women, in these days of wonderful light and progress, who pretend to find the source of all vice in bad drainage or the state of the stomach. They would cure it like typhus or ague. This quackery has resulted in miserable sympathy for scoundrels as if they were the most unfortunate of the human race. If they become so sick as to commit burglaries or highway robberies they are pitied and petted, coddled and comforted : and if they become murderers they are adopted as children to be nursed by women and soft-hearted men, with jellies and panada. One of the most active of these foolish women has written and published an essay on prison reform, beginning with these words : " All crime can be traced to ignorance, intemperance or poverty." The statement is absurd and false. Yet a vast amount of writing and talking on prison and prisoners, crime and crim inals, is equally shallow and mischievous. The three sources of crime named are indeed prolific, but there are other and fearful sources, including an evil heart, whence proceed evil deeds, even murders, and into these sources or fountains of crime, there does not enter a drop of ignorance, intemper ance or poverty. Men and women of education, temperance and wealth commit crimes. Neither they, nor their fathers nor mothers were ignorant, intemperate or poor. Why 35 6 IRENMUS LETTERS. then does a writer on prison reform lay down a rule that is instantly disproved when crimes are traced to avarice, lust, revenge, ambition, jealousy and pure deviltry ? At the very moment when this wisdom was being written and published, there were in this city and Brooklyn hard by, a number of men under sentence of death for murder : the three causes of crime had nothing to do with any of them. Take Fuchs who, in a fit of jealousy, chopped his friend into pieces. Rubenstein, the Jew, was not ignorant, intemper ate or poor. Neither was his father. Yet he enticed his friend into a cornfield and murdered her deliberately. The Boston murderers, Pomeroy and Piper, were not tempted or driven to crime by any circumstances outside of their own wicked selves. To say, as this prison reform woman does, that ' all crime can be traced to ignorance, intemper ance and poverty," is in the teeth of that precept which reads : " When lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin ; and sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death." That is the philosophy of the whole matter, and put into the quaint words of the old English Bible, sounds professional, but cannot be made more impressive or intelligible. A poor man takes his choice to work or to steal. He chooses to steal. The prison reformer says " the cause of this crime is poverty." Nonsense. Poverty stimulates thousands to hon est work. It is the cause of virtue far more than it is a cause of vice. A good man under the pressure of poverty, and the vast majority of the human family, depend upon daily labor for daily bread, and are hungry when they do not work. If poverty was the cause of crime, the world would be depopulated by the crimes of its inhabitants. Ignorance is not the cause of crime. Scarcely a sane man living, in the darkest land under heaven, is so ignorant as to commit crime in consequence of it, or from want of knowl edge that it is wrong to steal and commit murder. And if the entire population of the United States were taught the whole circle of sciences and arts, so that uneducated men were as rare as angels on earth, there would yet be crime. The Binghamton murderer, Ruloff, wag a prodigy of learn- A WOMAN'S VIEW OF CRIME. 357 ing. Dr. Webster was a Professor in our oldest University. Eugene Aram was a school teacher. And the ignoble army of official rascals, whose thefts in this city, in the canal rings of the State, in the Washington departments and the County Treasuries, are not poor, ignorant or intemperate. The whiskey villains now in prison, and the greater number out, were not drunkards on their own poison, crooked or straight. Intemperance deprives its victim of judgment and con science, inflames his passions, until he is "set on fire of hell." Hence more crimes are traced to this than to any other source. But this is itself a crime. To say that intem perance causes crime is merely saying, what is very true, that one crime causes more. Therefore it is the veriest quackery in reform to lay it down as a great principle that " All crime can be traced to ignorance, intemperance and poverty." It is simply nonsense. Another proposition equally absurd is laid down by the same writer in the same essay. She says : "Prisoners should be sentenced until reformed ': not for ten or twenty years with no regard to reform." This folly has its origin in the common blunder of these sapient reformers that the object of punishment is to reform men. That it is earnestly to be sought for, is very true, but law and penalty are not designed for the reformation of the convict. His reformation is a very desirable object, and all suitable means should be employed for that purpose. But law and penalty are for the protection of society, the preven tion of crime and the just punishment of criminals. If Win- slow is brought back to Boston and convicted of his numer ous forgeries and sent to prison, his reformation is no part of the object in view. God grant that the fellow may be reformed. But the object of the sentence is to punish for gery, restrain pthers from doing the same, and so make it safer for men to rely on the signatures of their neighbors. It was no part of the intent of the law to reform Dolan when it condemned him to the gallows. It was to make the pen alty a terror to evil-doers. Yet the moment that saw him 3S 8 IREN&US LETTERS. justly doomed, these reformers went about with petitions to get his neck out of the halter he so richly deserved. And now for the height of folly. The magnitude of the crime is not to be taken into account in imposing the pen alty ! Ten years or twenty years are not to be a measure of what is due to the law, but the prisoner is to be sentenced TILL HE REFORMS ! ! Pray tell us, Mrs. Reformer, who is to judge of the pris oner's reformation? Will you have a committee of the Prison Association to examine each convict and decide when he is reformed sufficiently to be let out upon society again ? Just imagine Judge Daly on the bench, pronouncing sen tence upon a thief or a murderer in these words : " Patrick O'Halligan, you have been tried and justly convicted of a great crime : under the old law you would have been sentenced to the gallows, or to prison for life, but under the reformed system introduced by the good women who now manage our criminal practice, it is my duty to sentence you to stand committed until you reform. I will appoint one of these excellent women to take charge of your reformation, and, under her direc tion, I have no doubt that a few days will see you turned out a reformed man, fully qualified to do your duty as a good citizen. Begging pardon for having detained you so long, I now wish you good afternoon." And this stuff is now the model talk of prison reform. It is all cant, folly, falsehood, sham, and deserves to be hissed out of philanthropic circles. Yet it is endorsed by religious people in this city. MINISTERS' SONS. 359 MINISTERS' SONS. My attention was recently turned to the fact that a few, and but a few, of the sons of the clergy, in the city, had be come ministers of the gospel. The means of making a pre cisely accurate statement of the facts are not in my possession, and the memory of others will doubtless retain the names of some that I have forgotten. Within the last thirty-five years I have known the sons of Potts, Bangs, Alexander, Skinner, Tyng, Hutton, Chambers, Newell, Knox, Vermilye, who have entered the ministry. But what are these, added to those not mentioned, compared with the multitude of fathers in the Church, whose sons have not entered into their labors, or the service of God in the same calling ? Then I wrote to Princeton and asked Dr. McGill to give me the number of students in the Theological Seminary there, whose fathers are or were ministers, and he wrote me : " As nearly as I can ascertain, we have 24 sons of ministers among the 1 20 on our roll at present, about one in five, a smaller proportion than usual here." A similar inquiry in the New York Union Theological Seminary, brought to me about the same report. To some it may appear that this is as large a number as might be rea sonably expected. The proportion of ministers to the whole population is so small, that a school of one hundred should not perhaps be expected to contain more than one-fifth of its members of the families of one profession. And it is not impossible that we would find it equally true of the legal and medical professions, that the sons do not generally follow the calling of their fathers. But it is also worthy of note that the work of the ministry has an element in it that does not touch the call to any other profession. While it is very true that the hand of God is to be acknowledged in every man's destiny, and He appoints to one man his place, and to another his ; still we, who believe in a divine and specific call as part of the evidence that a man should go into the ministry, do 360 I REN ;E US LETTERS. not ask for such an indication to decide that a young man shall go into trade or any other secular calling. Nor is it true that every man whom God calls obeys. As Jonah fled from his duty, so thousands now-a-days shirk theirs. God does not send a whale to swallow and save them, as he did in the case of Jonah; but we have known many cases in which they who have run away from the work to which they were called of God, have fallen into worse fates, and have bitterly repented their disobedience. If I were required to name two reasons for the few recruits the ministry gets from its own children, I would venture upon the facts that the sons of some are tempted by the chances of worldly success, and the sons of others are dis couraged by the trials they suffer with their fathers. The temptation is presented by the facilities which business offers to the well-educated sons of pastors. Every depart ment of prosperous trade in the hands of a parishioner is an opening for a promising young man who comes with the prestige of his own and his father's good name, so that a pastor is not under the necessity of seeking long and anx iously for a place into which to introduce his son, but places are always open and ready for him. The trials that discourage the minister's son from walking in the ways of his father, are common to the lot of the larger part of the families whose head is a preacher of the gospel. With the many, life is just a struggle to make the two ends of the year meet : old things must not be done away, but all things must be made as good as new, if possible : and to take no thought for the morrow when a flock of children are to be clothed and fed, requires an amount of grace greatly to be prized, if it can be had. Human nature is very imperfect, and it is not wonderful that a bright, observant and thought ful boy should, even with the approbation of his father, turn away from the service that seems so hard, when it ought to be more abundantly alleviated by those who enjoy it. It was never designed of Christ that his ministry should be a life of ease, profit and worldly recompense : but that is no apology for the meanness of those who keep their pastors on MINISTERS' SONS. 361 the shortest possible allowance. I have known the children of ministers to put out, like birds unfledged from the nest, and, before they were fit for it, to try to earn their own living, because they saw their parents unable to provide for them suitable food and clothing. I have had, as a guest in my own house, a rural pastor seeking his runaway soji, who had left home for no reason in the world but to cease being a tax upon his overtaxed parents. We may say, with truth, there is no calling that, on the whole, yields more peace and joy than the service of God in the pastoral work : but it is also true that its peace and joy come not from the reward that is seen, but altogether from the unseen and eternal. The boys cannot see it, and they seek another sort. It is said and proved and felt that there are too many min isters, but it is not shown that there are too many of the stamp the Church needs and desires to have. Perhaps there has been a back-set to the tide that once flowed in upon the ministry, and just now there may be a reluctance to go into the service. But there is not now, never was, never will be a time when a youth of fine promise should be turned away from this work by the glitter of any crown within the reach of a human arm. It is the prize of the highest calling. The rich and the noble of the earth may not be often called. But the mother who dedicates her son to the ministry and gives him to Christ, prays with and for him that he may be called, and sees him pressing through hardships and suffering into the pulpit as a minister of the gospel of the grace of God, seeks for him and gains for him, a crown that fadeth not, and will one day outshine the stars. That is a miserable lie which says that ministers' sons are the worst in the parish. One prodigal from the pastor's own fold makes more talk than ninety and nine apostates from the rest of the church. Because ministers' sons, as a rule, are good, the badness of some is a wonder and the town's talk. The promise is to the believing parent. After the fathers shall be the children. The sons of David shall sit on his throne. It is a kingly honor to be servant of the Most High. And blessed is that minister whose sons are kings. 362 IREN&US LETTERS. A MINISTER WHO WAS HUNG. William Dodd was an English clergyman, born in May, 1729, and educated at the University of Cambridge. He married a woman of extravagant tastes, and in this respect, as in many others, their tastes were alike. After being ordained he was made rector of the parish of West Ham, near London. There he proved to be so elo quent that he was soon called into the city and became one of its celebrities. With his popularity and prosperity he was more and more extravagant and reckless in his style of living. To meet his expenses he engaged in literary work outside of his clerical duties ; he was made tutor of young Philip Stanhope, afterwards Lord Chesterfield : and at length was appointed chaplain to the King. Chesterfield became his best friend : or worst : got him through many troubles, helped him to money, and to his ruin, of course: for, when he wanted more than his patron would give him, he committed a forgery upon Lord Chesterfield for $20,000, was tried, convicted and executed. Great efforts were made to save him. The jury recommended him to mercy. Noblemen, clergymen, and 23,000 citizens of London pe titioned the King to interfere, but the government declined to do so and the reverend criminal, under the law of the times, was hanged at Tyburn, June 27, 1777. Then, as now, commercial business, that exchange which requires the constant use of paper and signatures, was the life blood of social and national prosperity. To tamper with public confidence in the bonds of individuals or cor porations was to taint the blood of the community, poison the springs of wealth, derange the circulation, and damage irreparably the laws of healthful trade. A forger might have personal friends to intercede for him, but government and society looked upon him as a pirate, an outlaw, a thief of the meanest kind, justly meriting the heaviest punish ment the laws inflict. It was therefore held to be the duty of the King to interpose no obstacle, but to let the law take A MINISTER WHO WAS HUNG. 363 its course. The condemned clergyman became very penitent. His "Thoughts in Prison" and " Reflections on Death" are still extant and indicate the sentiments of an educated cler gyman in view of the scaffold. And so he died. Even more emphatically now, than a hundred years ago, the business of men is carried on by the means of paper, and the confidence felt in the genuineness of signatures and the honesty of transactions, is at the basis of daily and hourly intercourse. We give and receive promises to pay, we make our deposits in bank, we take certificates, bonds, mortgages, relying on the honesty of somebody, for not in one case out of a hundred, in the affairs of every-day life, is a man able to go back to the original parties, and know that it is all right. He takes it for granted, because of his confidence in human nature generally, and certain men in particular. And this confidence has become so large and business habits so loose in consequence of it, and greed has grown with the ease of getting, and money has cheapened by its adulteration, as rags take the place of precious metals, until it has now come to pass that crimes like that of Mr. Dodd and crimes in the same line with his, are of daily occurrence to the ruin of individuals and of that trust which society has a right to feel in its representative men. I do not say that all bankruptcies are criminal, though they are always failures to pay obligations honestly due. They are oftentimes the result of misfortunes, the crimes of others, and events that no human foresight could anticipate. But, so far as they come from imprudence, recklessness, greed, haste to be rich, improvidence, inattention, extravagance, speculation, or an over-sanguine temperament, they are criminal and merit punishment by law. All defalcations are crimes. All breaches of trust are crimes. All uses of other people's money without their consent, are crimes. Yet it is not unusual, in our times, to look upon a de faulter in a bank or counting room, as a generous fellow, who intended to put back the money he stole, so soon as he had made enough by gambling to warrant him in turning IREN^.US LETTERS. himself into an honest man. It does not occur to me at this moment that we have punished a defaulter in this city during the last quarter of a century. I have no doubt there have been more than five hundred detected in their crimes. There is a law of the United States requiring the publica tion annually of the names of defaulting officers, with the amounts they severally stole. Since 1865 the law has not been complied with. It is a good law, but it would be better still to put the defaulters invariably into the penitentiary. One year of righteous justice would save the country mil lions of money in the future. When treasurers or trustees are caught in their abuse of trust, they should be sternly held in the hand of justice. And there are men whose names have stood high in the church and whose false pretences have beggared thousands, yet these financiers are clothed in fine linen and fare sump tuously every day, while their victims are hungry and cold. These are serious matters, and big with future ills. It is not desirable to revive capital punishment for crimes against property. Let it be granted that the law condemn ing Dr. Dodd to death was wrong, and was wisely modified. But the crime, and all similar crimes, by which the money of others is taken from them by forgery, or defalcation, or breach of trust, or carelessness, or deception or fraud, ought to be punished as crime, not compromised, covered up, ex cused and so encouraged. Here is the weakness of the public conscience in this dawn of a new century of the Republic. This is the failing link in the social chain at the present day. Men look upon money crimes as venial sins. One hundred years ago, Tweed and Connolly and Sweeny, and all the men who took the people's money for work they never did, WOULD HAVE BEEN HUNG ; Harry Genet and Tom Fields would have graced the gallows (they never graced anything else). How is it now? It is impossible to discover a public feeling that DEMANDS the punishment of official thieves. A hundred years ago the men who let Tweed escape would have been hung, by law or without law. A MINISTER WHO WAS HUtfG. 365 To what is this tending ? Each advancing year increases the desire for wealth, diminishes the security of property, enhances the number, the pay and the opportunities of men holding judicial places, weakens public conscience respect ing stealing, blurs the eighth commandment in the deca logue, magnifies the influence of riches, rewards success in getting money without scruple as to the means, and puts honor on men who should be dressed in striped woolens, breaking stone instead of the laws, in the prisons of the country. Children in school and in the family should be taught "it is a sin to steal a pin, much more a greater thing." I do not wish to see the gallows made the punishment for stealing. But, I would be rejoiced to see a revival of common honesty. Things would then be called by their right names, and trea surers, clerks and trustees, directors and traders, bankers, and all who have the watch and care of other people's money, would understand that the meanest thief in this world, meaner than the sneak-thief who climbs into the window while we are at dinner and steals, meaner than the man who steals his neighbor's sheep in the night, is that professedly honest Christian who has the custody of another's money and puts it to his own use, or the man who abuses the con fidence of his fellow men by forgery or fraud. 366 IREN&US LETTERS. TORTURING THE LITTLE ONES. Two kinds of cruelty to children are so common, that to speak of one and not the other, would leave the subject half handled. You have children perhaps. If not, your neigh bors have. And this matter of caring for children is becom ing so much a matter of business, that we have a Society in this city to prevent them from being cruelly treated. It is an excellent Society. Good men, and all sorts of good men, favor it. None but bad men, and very bad men, would hinder its usefulness. And the two kinds of cruelty to children will be brought to your notice by the fact that there is a treatment of chil dren never complained of by the Society, that makes more misery to children and parents than beatings or hunger. I know a prominent member of the Society for the Pre vention of Cruelty to Children. He is the father of one little girl now about four years old. He doubtless loves her dearly. He thinks that loving her is shown by letting the child have her own way. She has it. She is never restrained, never governed, never crossed, always petted, indulged, and obeyed. The child rules the house. Father, mother, ser vants are all her slaves. What comes of it? Is the child happy because she lords it over the whole family ? So far from it, she cries with passion or pain a large part of the time. She is never contented. She goes from one thing to another in a constant series of searches for something to do that she ought not to do. And when she wants what it is impracticable to get, as the boy who cried for the moon, then she goes into tantrums and screams loud enough to split the ears of the neighbors. Thus the family are annoyed : the neighbors are annoyed : the child is wretched, peevish, fretful, impatient, passionate, dissatisfied with everything, and generally miserable. And she is very disagreeable. It was an ill-natured re mark of Jerrold to a mother who apologized for her child crying in the parlor: "O," said he, " I like to have children TORTURING THE LITTLE ONES. 367 Cry in company, for then they are taken right out of the room." And whenever I visit my friend, and his child sets up a roar, I think of Jerrold, and wish that his observation were in accord with my experience, which it is not. But it is a most mistaken idea that indulgence is kindness. Often it is the greatest cruelty. To impress upon a child the duty of obedience is the first of all lessons. It may be taught before the child is a year old ; and without a blow, or the infliction of any physical pain. It must be taught in very early life, or it will never be learned. To neglect it, and to put off government, until the child is old enough to be reasoned with, is cruel, wicked and silly. This neglect makes infancy and childhood a season of suffering, sows seeds of misery in after life, and perhaps of ruin here and hereafter. Dr. Adams said that parental government is the corner stone of civil government. And when I see the streets of a great city thronged at night with wrecks of young men and young women, whose steps already take hold on hell, I know that most of them are the victims of parental indulgence. They come from households where parents let them have their own way, when they should have been governed. Read the story of Eli and his sons, and tremble as you read. If we must have a Society for every thing, and we have a new one every year let it be an " Anti-letting-children- always-have-their-own-way Society." It will be a mercy to the children. Many will be saved from tears and groans and cries, by being " made to mind," and some will be kept from that place of torment where weeping and wailing have no end. Indulgence in wrong is the gravest cruelty to a child. I wish the new Society would go for its own mem bers who ruin their children as Eli did. He fell over and broke his neck when he heard that his boys were killed, for he knew that their sad end was his fault. So it will be your own fault, if your children perish through your neglect to govern them when they ace in tender years. That is one kind of cruelty. Now for the other. A few days ago, a teacher in a public school, to punish a 3^8 IREN&US LETTERS. child, lifted him by the ears, dropped him, lifted him again and again and dropped him, till the child was seriously, per haps fatally, injured. I have seen a lady lifting a child by the ears and carrying it out of a room to punish it for some trifling offence. We are shocked and disgusted by the recital of brutalities inflicted on children by their drunken parents or infuriated teachers ; but it is quite probable that the amount of cruelty by in judicious and respectable parents, under a mistaken sense of duty, far exceeds the crimes of the ignorant and intemperate. Many parents box the ears of children, striking them a square blow on the side of the head, a dangerous and wicked punishment. The sudden compression of the air within the ear is very apt to be inju rious, and the shock to the brain is perilous to the intellect. The injury may not be perceived at the time, but the founda tion of future and unspeakable suffering and sorrow may be laid by one inconsiderate blow on the temple of a child. More common than this, and equally cruel, is the practice of pulling the ears of children, the most common mode, with some parents, of punishing their own children. Teachers sometimes hold a child's ear while he is reading, and pinch or pull it at every blunder, thus hoping to keep the child's attention fixed for fear of the pain. A worse mode could not be adopted, for the child's mind is diverted to the dan ger and from the lesson, and so he stumbles. Such parents and teachers deserve corporal punishment themselves. The delicate organism of the human ear requires the most gentle handling, and to treat it as a mere cartilage to be pulled for the purpose of punishing, is a piece of inhumanity that reason forbids and religion condemns. Some parents send their children into a dark closet where they are in terror of imaginary goblins. Perhaps this is not as common as it was fifty years ago, but it is not out of use. It is not unfre- quently the cause of idiocy or insanity, and no judicious parent will permit it to be practiced in his house. Nurses often frighten children with tales of terror, threats of bears and big men, to carry them off. A nurse detected in such TORTURING THE LITTLE OttES. 369 crimes should be discharged before night. She cannot be cured. And she must not be endured. Cruel and unusual punishments are forbidden by human law. It is wonderful that parental instincts and human love are not strong enough to restrain the hand of fathers and mothers from hasty, passionate and intemperate violence on their own flesh and blood. A father vents his impatience on the son of his affections. A mother worn with care, wanting to read her novel or go to sleep, beats her babe to make it quiet. But a parent or teacher should never punish a child, in heat or with sudden violence. Such punishment has no moral force in it. The calm, judicial, righteous judgment is as needful in the infliction of pain upon an err ing child, as in the sentence of a prisoner at the bar. If you cannot govern yourself, you are quite unfit to govern chil dren, and if you strike a child in haste or under excitement, you deserve to be whipped yourself. Is the rod to be abolished, and would we condemn the punishment of children when they do wrong at home or in school ? So far from it, the wisdom of Solomon is wisdom yet. To deny the right and duty of punishing disobedient children, is logically to overturn the government of man and of God. And as obedience in society is in order to the highest happiness of the community, so in the family those children are the happiest who are taught and required to obey. Scolding will not make them obedient. Fretting makes them worse. Harshness, severity, cruel pains, loud words, and hasty blows are all wrong. But an even temper, inflexible purpose, unyielding to the entreaties of the child who wishes to do wrong ; these are virtues that dwell in every right mind, and will regulate the government of every well-ordered house. 37 IREN&US LETTERS. MILK AND WATER. Our good people, in this unhappy city, are afflicted with all sorts of impostors, swindlers, thieves, robbers, and even mur derers. Among them, perhaps, the sellers of impure milk are as bad as any. We think of milk as the natural food of our little ones, and when they imbibe a cup of the whole some fluid, we imagine it will do them good. So it would, if what is called milk were milk. It is an emblem of the best, even of heavenly food. The "sincere milk of the Word," we are told, should be "de sired," as if we were "new-born babes," that we " may grow thereby." But it must be "sincere" milk; that is pure, sine cera, without wax, as pure honey is sincere. If the Word has a mixture of error in it, the hearer will not " grow thereby:" it will do him no good, perhaps will be the death of him. So the milk we buy at our doors and use for our selves and families, must be sincere milk, pure, without adulteration, or it will not answer the purpose. And this is what we have had some lawsuits about lately. Our Board of Health has been putting its fingers into the milk cans with some good results. Having been provided with a milk-tester, called a lactometer, they have an easy method of finding out whether milk is mixed with water or not. It is a better test than a great institution used in this city thirty years ago. Premiums were offered for the best quality of milk, and the farmers and dairymen from all the country-side round about New York, came in with their milk pans, and set their milk for the judges to test and taste. The judges would not rely on their tasting faculties, preferring to employ them on liquids whose qualities they were more familiar with than milk. But they had a lactometer, an in strument marked with degrees like a thermometer, and this was to sink into the milk, more or less according to the rich ness, thickness, creaminess of the milk. That is, as milk yields cream, and cream is more solid than milk, these "wise men of Gotham," whose fathers ''went to sea in a bowl," MILK AND WATER. 371 supposed that the milk which had the most cream in it, is of course the richest and best. The lactometer would there fore sink only a little way int.o it, being buoyed up by the thickness of the liquid ; while in the lighter quality it would sink down freely to a deeper depth. On this principle the premiums were awarded. After it was all over, and the happy farmers and the disappointed ones had gone back to their cows and corn, it was discovered by some intermed dling philosopher that cream rises to the top because it is lighter than the rest of the milk, and of course that the milk with most cream in it is lighter than milk with less cream, and the premiums had been given to the poorest milk, and the best had been condemned as the worst! So much for the decision of judges who knew nothing of what they judge. Yet they were as wise as the New York lady who dismissed her milkman ^because, as she told him, "when the milk stood over night, a nasty yellow scum rose on the surface." But the tastes of city people have improved. The women generally know that the " nasty yellow scum," on the sur face of milk, is cream, and the cream is the very cream of the milk. The progress of ideas, the march of knowledge and the improvement in the modes of education, are illus trated by the following fact. A little girl in this city, received among her last Christmas toys, the present of a baby churn, holding about half a pint. Getting this quan tity of milk she churned away steadily until she " made the butter come," and at tea the wonderful pat was displayed and eaten in triumph by the admiring house. So you see that in the city we are learning to do our own work, and if we can not have good butter sent in, we will set the babes to make it, and we will keep our own cows too. Our Board of Health have been pursuing the milkmen with some small degree of vigor. Eight of them were arraigned under the law to prevent the adulteration of things sold. These milkmen are not those who drive about the streets in the morning, usually so early as to wake you up at an untimely hour, or so late as to make you wait half an 372 IREN^US LETTERS. hour after time for breakfast. Whenever did a milkman or a breadman come at the right time ? The breadmen are the more irregular of the two, and this reminds me of one in Philadelphia. He was, as usual, dashing madly through the streets when the celebrated Dr. Chapman was about to cross. The breadman saw the Doc tor, halted his horse suddenly and let him pass. The Doc tor bowed and said, " You are the best bred-man, in town." Milk-dealers keep the article in shops for sale to customers who call for it. They are supposed to have regular supplies from the country. Some of them do, But the milky way is a great mystery. It was proved upon a trial, not long since, that after the milk cans are put upon the rail cars up in the country, (how much water is put into the cans with the milk before, was not shown) the men on the cars help themselves to the milk at their pleasure, supplying the vacancy with water. On its arrival at the city, the cans are conveyed by wagon to the dealer, and on the way thither the driver takes out what he wants and fills up with water, which he carries in pails under the seat for the purpose, and finally the liquid reaches the shop of the retailer, who again waters it to suit his views of trade and duty to himself and customers. These last are the gentlemen, eight of whom were brought to trial on the charge of selling adulterated milk. One of them was arraigned and his was made a test case. The lactometer was the principal witness. Would it lie ? Could it be made to tell the truth ? Its capacity and its credibility were challenged. Experts were called in and put on the stand. Now these experts are becoming a very important and dan gerous set of men. Every man's life may be in the hands of experts. Is this your handwriting ? You say No, and up rises an expert and swears that he can tell to a dead certainty whether the handwriting is yours or not : he is an expert. Your testimony is of very little account, for though you may know, yet as you are not an expert and the other man is, you may find yourself in State prison for forgery because an expert, knows more than you do. And men do not always know their own signature. Some years ago an excellent MILK AND WATER. 373 Christian citizen was charged with forgery. The banker who accused him of forging his name, was handed in the court room, on the trial, a piece of paper with his own name on it, and he was asked if that was his signature. He said it was : examined it carefully and swore positively to it. Then three men rose up and made oath that one of their number, in the presence of the other two, wrote that signature on that table a few moments before, and did it to confound the banker. He acknowledged his error, was at once convinced that he had wrongfully accused his neighbor, withdrew the charge, paid the costs and sought to repair the injury he had done. But, if my memory be correct, the good man died from the effects of the injurious charge. But we neglect these milkmen. Experts proved that the lactometer was infallible as a test of the presence of water : the more water the deeper it would sink. It is made to stand at 100 degrees in ordinarily good milk : one Alderney cow's milk registered 112 and another 120. That was rich milk. Mr. Starr's cows, at Litchfield, gave milk so rich that, in pails 1 5 inches deep, the cream stood four inches thick. If the lactometer sinks below 100, it shows the presence of water. The milkman's milk on trial registered 80: he was convicted and fined $100; the others owned up and were let off on paying $50 each. So the lactometer and the experts were sustained, and the wicked milk-dealers came to grief. 374 IREN^EUS LETTERS. MY VINE: MY POOR VINE! The first house I ever owned was in Newark, N. J. With the house was a garden, and in the midst of the garden stood an arbor, and that arbor was covered by an Isabella grape vine, and of that vine is this story. As the vine was the crown of the garden, I employed an experienced vine dresser, at the proper time of the year, to prune it properly and put it in perfect order for the opening spring. A few days afterward, an amateur gardening friend, one who prided himself in knowing all about plants, from the cedars of Lebanon to Isabella grape vines, came to see me, and my new place. He was delighted ; but as he ap proached the central beauty, he remarked with great wis dom : " This is a very fine vine, but you ought to have had it trimmed !" This was discouraging indeed : but for the humor of the thing, I said, "You know so much more of this than I, per haps you would like to trim it ?" He sprang to the work, as if it were play, whipped out his jackknife, which he always carried to execute everything he could, and at it he went, cutting off all the wood he could find. Sure that my precious vine was spoiled, I hailed without further fear a visit from another friend and relative, who had great contempt for my knowledge of worldly affairs : we walked in the garden, and, entering the arbor, he said, ' You should have had this vine trimmed you never did know enough to " I checked him with, " You always save me the trouble, wouldn't you just go over it now; here's a knife." He took it fondly and, with the aid of a step-ladder, the old gentle man went through it, and left it as naked as Wolsey was when the king deserted him. Now my poor vine was certainly safe from further excision. But a week and an other visitor came to my vineyard. He was from the north ern part of New York, and did not realize the lateness of the MY VINE: MY POOR VINE! 375 season : it was April with us in New Jersey : he admired my new home, and when we came to the vine, so trim and clean and clear, I waited for his pleased expression; but, to my dismay, he exclaimed : "You have forgotten to have it trimmed: it's a splendid vine : it's late to be sure, but not too late to trim it yet." Having given up all hope of fruit from it, after its previous mutilations, I was quite careless about its fate and remarked : " Perhaps you would like to try your hand on it : here is an excellent knife." He seized it with evident pleasure, plunged in medias res instanter, and, in the course of thirty minutes, managed to amputate every bough of promise that had dared to make its appearance on the vine of my affections. The work of ruin was complete. The vine was barren that year. Next year perhaps a little better, but it never recovered the shock of those untimely wounds. My folly, in letting these quacks doctor my darling, was punished by its destruction. Often, when too late, I regretted that, for the sake of seeing to what length ignorance and self-conceit would go, I permitted these good friends to meddle with matters too high for them and, like the little foxes in the song of songs, to spoil my vine. Every man to his own business. Ne sutor ultra crepidam, Let the cobbler stick to his last. " Study to be quiet and to doyour own business" is a divine command, and, like all in structions from the same source, is full of common sense. The church and the world, religion and business, are dis turbed and annoyed and sadly injured, like my garden, with amateurs, pretenders, quacks: men who have new and im proved methods of doing what was well enough done before, but which they would do with patented processes peculiar to themselves, and a vast improvement upon everything that has gone before. My study is strewed with patent venti lators. Every autumn a new man appears with a queer shaped instrumentality, and, casting his eyes upwards at my windows, he says : " I see you've got one of them old-fashi ioned ventilators into there : it 'taint no good, is it ?" " No, it's good for nothing : better out than in." 37<5 IRENsEUS LETTERS. "Wall, now you see here's the thing to do it : I put one of these 'ere traps up to the top and tother into the bottom of the winder : and the wind comes whizzin in to one and goes out tother, and so keeps it fresh and kind o' breezy like all the time : 'spose you try "em." I consent, and he goes at it with a will. He pulls out the old ones : puts in his : and the next fall, perhaps the next month, another man comes along with a new patent venti lator and wants to try it. He tries it. It is very trying to me, but the pleasure of seeing the foolish experiments fail is the compensation. They are all equally bad. The same quackery succeeds in trade, in finance, in medi cine, in the Church. We live in cycles, circles ; what things have been shall be, and there is nothing new under the sun. Yet the world moves. Progress is made because good begets good and truth is fruitful. Conservatism holds fast that which is good, and with it works onward to the overthrow of evil. Radicalism is too impatient, rushes ahead, generally knocks its head against the wall, and would dash its brains out, if it had any. Even' the goose that laid golden eggs, one a day, was less of a goose than the radical who killed her to get all the eggs at once. One of the best books might be made by writing the biog raphy of defunct theories in science. Men have received as settled truths, vast systems of astronomy, chemistry and ge ology, that are now exploded. Yet while those sciences were the faiths of the day, it was quite as much as a man's repu tation was worth to teach otherwise. And to this day no man lives who knows what electricity is, or how the thing works. These facts ought to make men modest, self-dis trusting, and backward about coming forward, when they don't know what they are about. " Fools rush in where angels fear to tread," and many men are ready to try their hands at trimming other people's grape vines, when the regular vine dresser has already done his duty well. So in the Church. With the fullest, simplest and most WHITE AND YELLOW MEETING HOUSES. 377 beautiful instructions, the Church goes on from age to age, the comfort and salvation of all who will rest under the shadow of her wings. And every now and then some new light arises, with a patent right for explaining the rules, and a new way of saving souls. I would let a man trim my vine if he really wanted to, whether he knew anything about it or not ; but to work in the vineyard which the Lord has given me to keep, a man must be thoroughly furnished, and have the proofs of his skill, or he can't come in. THE WHITE AND THE YELLOW MEETING HOUSES. The Old White Meeting House, in Cambridge, N. Y., was the church of the regular line Presbyterians, of whom my father was the pastor. The Yellow Meeting House held the Scotch Presbyterians, of the sub-division known as Anti- Burghers, whose pastor was a noble son of Scotland, Alex ander Bullions, D.D. He and my father were the warmest of friends six days in the week, yes, and seven, but the Jews and Samaritans had more dealings together than did these two friends and their people on the first day of the week. This bothered me when a boy, and it has not become a whit more intelligible since. Dr. Bullions and my father were splendid classical scholars, and they would spend long winter evenings over Greek verbs and Latin prosody, disputing each other with imper turbable good nature, and making the low-roofed cottage ring with their uproarious laughter when one got the other fairly on the hip in a philological wrestle. They formed a club of four or five rural pundits, meeting once a week to read Latin and Greek and quarrel about it. Dr. Watts' dogs did not more delight to bark and bite, than these men did to get their teeth into one another on the pronunciation of a vowel or the inflection of a doubtful syllable. Dr. Mat. Stevenson was one of them : a physician and scholar. Also 378 IRENSEUS LETTERS. Scotch. Very much set in his way. They were discussing the difference in meaning of gens and natio. Dr. S. stood out boldly against all the rest ; till one of them bluntly said to him, " You are the most obstinate man I ever ^Vf see." " I am not obstinate," replied Dr. S. " I always give up as soon as I am convinced." How many just such pliable people I have met since ! Sometimes I think we all have a touch of the slme openness to conviction. But I was speaking of these ministers and their people. Into the mysteries of the diversities of the numerous Presbyterian bodies and souls, my studies in the refinements of ecclesiastical history were never carried so far as to enable me to mention them without reference to book. One of my associates in the office belonged to one of the minor sub-divisions of the Scotch churches, and whenever I have occasion to state the difference between Burgher and Anti-Burgher, Seceder, Associate, Reformed, Covenanters, Cameronians, etc., I ask him, he tells me, I write it, forget it, and ask him again the next time. But this I know, that no warmer friends ever lived than the pastors of those two Presbyterian churches, in the White and the Yellow meeting houses, albeit the views of the Scotch Doctor were such, or rather the rules of his kirk were such, that he and his people had no church fellowship with the pastor and people in the old White church. The Scotch minister was not half as set in the old way as his people. He was intensely Scotch in his brogue, so much so that it was hard for me to understand him when, at the school examinations, he would call out, " Wull, mawster Sawm, wot part o' verb is thot ?" But he was so full of genial good humor, so social in his nature, liberal, learned, large-hearted, loving, that he could not be kept in the strait jacket of any school but that of the one Master. His people quarrelled about the psalm singing : some claimed that only one line should be given out at a time, and others demand ing that two should be read and then sung. He pre vailed with the Presbytery to tell them it was of no impor- WHITE AND YELLOW MEETING HOUSES. 379 tance either way. But more serious was the trouble when he preached before the Bible Society immediately after one of the hymns of the late Isaac Watts had been sung ! For this he was accused, as of a crime, and brought before the judges. He asked " how long a time should elapse, after a hymn had been sung, before it would be fit for him to preach in the same house." I forget what was the result of this dis cussion. But one thing led to another and another, until this righteous old man was for a season laid under an inter dict, so that his lips were sealed that he might not preach the gospel he loved. He was afterwards released, and he died in the triumphs of faith. It was in the year 1746, about 130 years ago, that the Anti- Burghers, to whom Dr. Bullions belonged, had their quarrel with the Burghers, and the one body became two with these respective names. They split on a clause in the oath re quired to be taken by the freemen of certain boroughs, and the inhabitants being called burgesses, those who were willing to take the oath were called Burghers, and those who refused were called Anti-Burghers. The oath expressed "their hearty allowance of the true religion at present pro fessed within the realm, and authorized by the laws thereof." It was contended that the words " true religion at present professed" was an admission that the Established Church was the true religion, and therefore the one party would not take the oath. The contest was very fierce, and went into churches, hamlets, and houses. Friendships, old and warm, went out before the storm that swept over the country. Many interesting stories of the times are handed down. Johnny Morten, a keen Burgher, and Andrew Gebbie, a decided Anti-Burgher, both lived in the same house, but at opposite ends, and it was the bargain that each should keep his own side of the house well thatched. When the dispute about the principles of their kirks, and especially the offen sive clause in the oath, grew hot, the two neighbors ceased to speak to each other. But one day they happened to be on the roof at the same time, each repairing the thatch in the slope of the roof on his own side, and when they had worked 380 IREN&US LETTERS. up to the top, there they were face to face. They couldn't flee, so at last Andrew took off his cap and, scratching his head, said, "Johnnie, you and me, I think, hae been very foolish to dispute, as we hae done, concerning Christ's will about our kirks, until we hae clean forgot His will about ourselves ; and we hae fought sae bitterly for what we ca' the truth, that it has ended in spite. Whatever's wrang, it's per fectly certain that it never can be right to be uncivil, unneighborly, unkind, in fac, tae hate ane anither. Na, na, that's the deevil's wark, and no God's. Noo, it strikes me that maybe it's wi' the kirk as wi' this house ; ye're working on ae side and me on the t'ither, but if we only do our wark weel, we will meet at the tap at last. Gie's your han', auld neighbor!" And so they shook han', and were the best o* freens ever after. It did not remain for Dr. Bullions and my father to " meet at the top" before they were one in heart, soul and mind. They loved at first sight, and so much the more so as they saw the day approaching when they would sit down in the same General Assembly and Church of the first-born, whose names are written in heaven. Yet I have often thought of the solid comfort those two pastors now take in the Church on high, where the wicked, and the ignorant and bigoted and unreasonable, cease from troubling, and the weary sons of thunder are at rest. They sing together the song of Moses and the Lamb, and whether David wrote it, or Watts made a version of it, or Rouse metred it, or Sternhold and Hop kins, or Tate and Brady, or whether they read two lines and sing, or only one, I know not, or what " the players on instru ments who shall be there" will have to play on, is all unre- vealed unless the harps and the trumpets are to be for the use of the saints ; but of this I am sure, that they two those glorious old pastors of the White and the Yellow churches, now enjoy " The song of them that triumph, The shout of them that feast, And they who with their Leader THE MEANEST WOMAN IN NEW YORK. 381 Have conquered in the fight, Forever, and forever Are clad in robes of white. O holy placid harp notes Of that eternal hymn !" Can you tell me what is the use of waiting till we meet at the top before we, who are to be one up there, shall be one ? Let us try it on among those who are of one name, who not only have the same Bible, but have the same creeds and catechisms. Surely there is no good reason why these Presbyterians of many subordinate names, yet all one in the belief of the truth, should not be so related or confederated as to be in substance one, having members indeed, but really and truly one for the edifying of the body of Christ. Some thirty or forty of these limbs are now scattered over the world, waiting for the manifestation of some power to draw them to their several places, so that all, being fitly compacted together, may form a stately temple to the glory of its Head and King. There is no reason for their present dismember ment that will have any force or value in the air of heaven. The White and the Yellow meeting houses will be of the same color in the shine of the Lamb who is the light of the upper sky. THE MEANEST WOMAN IN NEW YORK. She lives in a fashionable quarter of the town. And this is what she did and does. In the name of charity she gave out some dress-making to the inmates of one of the institu tions for reforming and saving women supposed to be lost. When the work was done, and well done, the fashionable and charitable lady was not ready to pay the bill, which amounted to the enormous sum of $12. The same work, if it had been done at a fashionable dress-maker's, would have cost her $25, perhaps $50. She had no complaint to make 382 IREN^EUS LETTERS. of the manner in which the work was done ; but she haggled about the price, and, as she gave out the work in charity, she thought, probably, that the charity should be extended to her and not to the poor sewing woman who had earned the money. One month passed away, and another, and six more, while this wealthy and charitable woman, with one excuse and another, put off paying the poor girl who was seeking to earn an honest living and turn from her evil ways. But she could not get her hard-earned money from this lady patroness. Finally, in despair, she had recourse to the law, by the aid of an agency, and the prospect of exposure, in the character of a fraud, brought the lady to terms and she paid the full amount ! And I have styled her the meanest woman in New York. If any one knows of meaner men or women than they are who defraud in the name of charity, who do wickedness under the pretence of benevolence, let them mention the facts and I will modify the opinion. Further : women, as a general. thing, are so much better than men, more sympa thetic, charitable and liberal, that a business like this is meaner in a woman than it would be in those hard old tyrants called men. When a pious woman of fashion, a leader perhaps in the benevolent operations of the church, first directress of this society, and manageress of that, and treasurer of another ; who thinks nothing of paying $500 for a dress for one evening's wear, and, to be very charitable, employs a poor fallen woman struggling with poverty and honesty, and then neglects to pay her wages, she deserves to be labelled as among the meanest of her sex. Her standing in the church and society only increases her meanness, and draws upon her the aggravated contempt of all rightminded ladies. There is in our city a society, with whose works I have been conversant for ten or a dozen years past, whose records are dark with stories of such wrongs as this. It is a society so humble in its sphere and so righteous in its purposes ; so still and yet so strong, founded in the two great virtues that illustrate the divine character, and therefore that of the best THE MEANEST WOMAN IN 'NEW YORK. 383 of human character, the virtues of justice and mercy, that it commends itself to the hearty sympathy and support of the wise and good. Its object is to " Protect Working Women" in their rights to what they earn : finding employ ment for them, and seeing that their wages are paid accord ing to agreement. This " Protective Union" has its office at No. 38 Bleecker street, just out of Broadway. If you will bear with me, I will tell you a little more of the good it does by revealing, punishing and preventing the oppression of the poor by the rich and mean. Honest pay for honest work is its motto. It tells us that the petty frauds imposed on igno rant, helpless, industrious working women, are innumerable. To expose such frauds and save the suffering from greater suffering, the society hears their complaints, uses the gentle argument of reason and compassion, and when these fail, then the society puts forth the arm of the law, takes by the throat the fashionable lady who defrauds the poor of her wages, and says, in that persuasive language which law only uses, " Pay her what thou owest." It is beautiful to observe how quickly a mean rich women listens to the dulcet voice of a legal summons. " Really, I declare now, do excuse me, but I had forgotten all about it : O yes, that little bill ; yes, yes : let me see, ten dollars, was it ? Certainly." " And the costs, madam." " Costs ? costs ? what costs ?" says the lady, " I thought it cost $10." " Yes, but the costs of the proceedings : the writ, the ser vice, the fees, you see : $5.65 : and the interest on the bill, what's been a running a year now and a little more : it amounts to $16.40." " Well, I will send it around in the course of a day or two." " You had better pay it now and save further costs : an execution will ' " Execution ! you don't mean anybody's going to be hung?" "No, no: an execution is a writ to be served on your goods and chattels, to sell 'em, and get the money to satisfy this 'ere little bill : guess you'd better pay it now." 384 IRENES US LETTERS. And so the lady squirms a while longer and finally pays the bill : the poor sewing woman gets her pay in full ; the society gets its costs ; and the lady gets a lesson. If she tells of it, so much the better, for the lesson is useful to all who are in the habit of defrauding the hireling of his wages or keeping back that which is due to such as have none to help them. In one year, the last year, the society collected unpaid lawful wages for poor women, amounting to $2,544.31, in average sums of about $3.50. It has also, in the last seven years, lent to poor women in small sums to the amount of $2,145.45, and has been repaid by them every cent except about $25 still due ! It has recovered for these women their wages due and refused, $16,411.29, and this is but a fraction of what it has secured for its helpless people in making em ployers faithful to their agreements, for fear of being put through a course of legal suasion. The most common and severest form of swindling poor women, is that pursued by the agents of inferior sewing machines : the old and honorable companies never resort to such measures : but a set of sharpers may trade even in the best machines, hiring them out to women who are to pay $5.00 a month for the use of them, and to own the machine when its price, a very high price, has been paid in these instalments. In case of default for a single month, the agent seizes the machine, declares the payments forfeited, carries it off, and the poor woman is helpless. The society has largely broken up this iniquity, and the best companies now make such liberal arrangements with their machines, that swindlers stand a poor chance of making anything by their operations. The society sends its officers to reason with employers, in behalf ol complaining women, and seeks out the truth, which is not always on the side of the complaint. It often succeeds without using pressure. But when soft words fail, it uses force. Mary Thompson was employed to make a bridal dress, and when the wedding day came, $30 were still due to Mary for her hard work : but she couldn't get it. The bride was married in the dress for the making of which the poor THE GOOD DR. MUHLENBERG. 3^5 sewing woman was not paid ; and the happy husband was not so happy when the bill was soon afterwards presented to him, with $14.50 costs added to it. His bride was dearer to him than he had ever thought. It is pleasant also to hear that a lawyer of our city had a taste of the excellence of his own profession, by being sued for the wages of a gov erness. Being himself a lawyer he managed to stave off the payment of $17.75 until the costs carried up the bill to $32.25, and then he had to pay it all. Verdict, served him right. In many ways besides these, this wise and kind society wields its power for good to those who want it most. It greatly needs pecuniary aid to make it more useful. And they who give even a cup of cold water to those who are laboring in such a blessed work, shall in no wise fail of their reward. THE GOOD DR. MUHLENBERG. " I would not live ahvay." A life-like portrait of the blessed old man, in the volume by Sister Anne Ayres, brings him back as to me he looked, one winter morning, when he came down early and climbed into my fifth-story office. He was quite out of breath when he reached the height, and I waited with some anxiety to know why, for the first time, he had wound his way up the cork screw stairway. Presently he spoke, with a soft, sweet voice, his face beaming with human love and heavenly grace a saint in every line : "Good Friday is at hand, and as I was putting on my clothes this morning I said to myself, ' What a happy thing it would be if all the churches, of every Christian name, would observe it as a day of fasting and prayer ; I will go down to my friend at the Observer office and see if he will favor the idea, and I will take his response as an indication of Provi dence as to the expediency of making the suggestion public.'" 386 IRENsEUS LETTERS. When I assured him of my cordial concurrence in the" thought and our willingness to second it publicly, and to strive earnestly to make the proposal universally acceptable^ the good man wept for joy, gave audible thanks to God, and I thought he would embrace me, so great was his surprise and delight. " Yes," he added, " I confess it. I was afraid you would not help me." From that time onward he was free to speak with me in regard to the good works to which his life was devoted, and I learned to love and revere him more ind more while he lived. He is (not was, for such as he live long after they are buried) a living illustration of the fact that a man may be in the world and not of it; above it while he is in it.: a godly man of action and business as well as of prayer and faith. In him was no guile. He would suffer wrong sooner than do wrong. He was not original ; he had a pattern, and that pat tern was Christ. The volume gives his early life, and shows the steps by which he walked from the Lutheran Church, in which he was bap tized, to the Episcopal, where he was confirmed ; after the minister, Mr. Kemper, assured him that " regeneration does not mean a change of heart." Then he resolved to give up going to the theatre, of which he was rather fond, considering it one of " the pomps and vanities of the world ' that he had vowed to renounce. Of his ministry in this city, his wonderful devotedness to the sick and suffering, his fatherhood of St. Luke's Hospital, and of the homes at St. Johnland on Long Island, the book before me is a graphic, life-like story, every page the record of some good deed done, the whole a record that angels might read with wonder, love and praise. Dr. Muhlenberg was not one of your softly, untempered, half-baked men, afrs.id to speak out and say what he felt. He went one day to the office of a rich friend to ask him, as landlord, to release a poor woman from her rent, which was due. Failing, he begged for a small donation for the widow, THE GOOD DR. MUHLENBERG. 3&7 which was also refused. Then he berated his friend in good set terms, adding : " I would rather take my chance for hea ven with the meanest beggar in New York than with you." It gratifies one's depravity to know that the very best men do and say things that we are chided for, when human nature asserts itself in honest rebuke of wrong. When the elegant church of St. Thomas was going up, south of St. Luke's Hospital, Dr. Muhlenberg sought to have the bells dispensed with, for fear they would disturb the patients in their sufferings. But he failed, and the bells went up, and made their chimes, to the good man's great annoyance. Some years afterwards the Fifth avenue Presbyterian church began to rise on the north side of the Hospital, and nearer to it than St. Thomas. Again the Dr. was full of fears for his suffering patients, and he went to Dr. John Hall, the pastor, to pour out his feelings. He began very gently by congratulat ing him on the progress of the new building, and then remarked, as if incidentally : " And I suppose you will be soon having a bell in the new tower." " No," said Dr. Hall, " we feared it might disturb the patients in your Hospital, and we have concluded not to have a bell." The good old man was completely taken aback, and exclaimed : " Oh, you are more considerate than my own people." I would not make a private party, however pleasant, dis tinguished and memorable, the subject of public remark, but finding a reference to it here, I may. It was one of those episodes in life that old men enjoy with a flavor which youth does not know. For old age has its pleasures, as Cicero and other wise and great men have found. Of this venerable company I was made one, on account of my youth, as the kind and clever note of invitation from the accomplished host himself a host very neatly intimated. Mr. Charles H. Russell sat by the side of Dr. Adams. Dr. Muhlenberg, Mr. W. C. Bryant, Mr. James Brown, Mr. Peter Cooper, Dr. Cal- houn, of goodly Lebanon, and one more, composed the com pany. 388 IREN&US LETTERS. Dr. Adams requested Dr. Muhlenberg to ask the blessing. The patriarch complied in these rhythmical words : " Solemn thanks be our grace, for the years that are past, With their blessings untold, and though this be our last, Yet, joyful our trust that through Christ 'twill be given, All here meet again, at his table in heaven." It was very natural that we should pass from this brief poem and prayer to others by the same author, and I asked Dr. Muhlenberg for the correct reading of a line in his cele brated hymn, " I would not live alway." It is sometimes printed "the few lund mornings," and again, " the few lurid mornings." " Which of these, Dr., is the true reading?" " Either or neither," he replied with some spirit. " I do not believe in the hymn : it does not express the better feel ings of the saint, and I would not write it now." This was a surprise to me, but I was glad to hear him say so. Mr. Bryant took a very cheerful view of old age, and dis claimed any feelings of depression or infirmity with the advance of life. When some pleasantry enlivened the table, Mr. Brown, who sat next to me, and was somewhat hard of hearing, looked up deploringly, and said : " You don't know how much I lose by being deaf." "Aye, Mr. Brown," I replied, "and you don't know how much you gain !" Of those six guests, four have put on immortality. Dr. Calhoun died a few months afterwards. Mr. James Brown followed, hand longo intervallo. Then Dr. Muhlenberg slept with his beloved in St. Johnland. Mr. Bryant had his wish fulfilled in being buried in June among his own flowers in Roslyn. Mr. Peter Cooper I met at the De Lesseps dinner the other night, and his seat was next to mine. It must be wisdom, not age, that puts me with these venerable men. He said to INTERCOURSE WITH DR. ADAMS. 389 me : " I am ninety years old, and do not feel the effects of age." Wonderful old man : useful and honored to the last : un doubtedly the " first citizen" now. Dr. Muhlenberg loved Dr. Adams tenderly, which is not re markable ; but I find in this volume an observation by Dr. A. that is characteristic of both him and his friend. Dr. Adams says: " More than once I have said to my family, when returning from some interview with him, in which he had honored me with a kiss, that I felt as if the Apostle John had embraced me and repeated in my ear some words which had been whispered to him by the Master on whose bosom he had leaned at the supper." When Dr. Muhlenberg rested from his labors, and was not, for God took him, we fondly trusted that some one, in his spirit and power, would take up the work he left. Others do perpetuate the useful charities he founded. But where is the living presence of the model saint and pastor and friend? Who among us now sanctifies the city by a life of supernal beauty in its mephitic atmosphere ? Dr. Muhlenberg left a hoarded heap of gold behind him ! Two gold pieces $40, in all this was his savings to pay for his burial ! All that he had, all that he received, all that he was, he gave to Christ and his friends while living, and died leaving not enough to pay the expenses of his funeral. INTERCOURSE WITH DR. ADAMS. Now that the first gush of public sorrow has subsided, and others have said what was in their hearts of our departed friend and elder brother the late Rev. Dr. Wm. Adams it may not be presuming if another hand should bring a hum ble tribute for his tomb. When he contemplated the resignation of his pastoral charge on Madison Square, to accept the Presidency of the 1REN&US LETTERS. Theological Seminary, he was doubtful as to the line of his duty, and sent for friends to counsel on the great and difficult question. It was not for me to advise such a man ; but when he would have an opinion, I could only say : " It is quite probable that you are called of God to be the President of the Seminary, but it is not necessary that you retire from the Madison Square pulpit. A colleague or assistant may supply your lack of service, when you assume other labors : but such a life as yours will be rounded and complete when you die in the highest office on earth a Christian PASTOR." He resigned from a sense of duty to the people, when he decided to take the Chair, and it is to be presumed he did not regret the decision. With the Apostle he could always say, " This one thing I do ;" and he often spoke, in private, to me in terms of high commendation of those men who spend their strength and time in the work to which they are called, declining to divert their minds or employ their powers in extra labors, however useful and important they might be. He was invited to take part in the Centennial Celebration of the Battle of Lexington, where the first blow of the Ameri can Revolution was struck, and the shot was fired that was heard around the world. He invited me to go with him, to be the guest of his brother-in-law, Mr. Magoon, in Medford, near to Lexington. It so happened that I had at that time the pistol from which that shot was fired : the pistol that Major Pitcairn discharged when he gave the first order to British soldiers to fire on the Americans. Armed with this pistol and its twin, I joined Dr. Adams and went to the bat tle-field. But there was no fighting now. Those three days of social life with him and his friends were ideal days. He loved to take me to houses and hills and churches in that region where his youth and his young ministry were spent : where he first loved and was married : he lived over the scenes of early manhood, when life was all before him and hopes of usefulness were high. He was young again. With his children and theirs around him, and a thousand sweet associations, every moment his loving nature awoke as in the morning of spring, and he was fresh, buoyant and cheerful, as INTERCOURSE WITH DR. ADAMS. 391 if he were on the verge of thirty and not of three score and ten. We were very desirous to have him go to Edinburgh to the General Council in 1877, and it was with the greatest reluct ance that he yielded to the pressing solicitations of his breth ren. He did not like to go away from home. And when he reached London he was thoroughly homesick. He came from the hotel where he was in the midst of friends, and sought for rooms in the private lodgings I was enjoying. Here he met my daughters, and when he gave them each a paternal kiss, he said, " There, that's the first thing like home I have had since I came away." He said he longed to go back, and his eyes were full of tears as he spoke. It was wonderful to see a stately, dignified, elegant old man, full of honors and friends, whom every one was proud to welcome and entertain, so child-like and simple, so full of affection for those he had left behind, that his only care now was to get back again as soon as he could. In Edinburgh it was my lot to be attacked with illness at the house of my kind friend, Dr. Blaikie. The anxiety of Dr. Adams, his sympathy, his tenderness, his attentions, were those of an elder brother or parent. He has told me since that his fears were great that I would not recover. This apprehension was the result of his own great depression of spirits, for it was not shared by any one else. But it brought out the exceeding love of his heart, his overflowing sympathy, and'it endeared him to me more tenderly than ever. How proud of him we all were at that great Council of men from all lands ! If there was one in that assembly of divines, of loftier and nobler mien than Dr. Adams, I did not see him. Some days after the Council dissolved, I was travelling from London to Folkestone, on my way to Paris. Into the same compartment of the rail-car came an English gentle man, whose servant in livery stowed away his travel- impedi ments and retired. The stranger, a fine-looking man, of courtly manners and address, very soon began to converse with me in the manner said to be peculiar to my countrymen. LETTERS. He put questions to me. Having ascertained that I was an American traveller, and from New York, he said to me : " Are you acquainted with the Rev. Dr. Adams ?" When he learned that Dr. A. was a valued friend of mine, he went on to say : " What a splendid specimen of the Christian gentleman he is. I had the pleasure of meeting him in London but a few days ago, and to present him to Mr. Gladstone, who was charmed with him, and expressed to me privately his admira tion of the American scholar and divine." I did not learn my travelling companion's name, until I related the incident to Dr. Adams, who recalled him at once. When the appeal came to Christians in America to send a deputation to the Emperor of Russia to ask liberty of wor ship for dissenters in the Baltic provinces of his empire, we held a meeting of the Evangelical Alliance, and it was easily resolved that such a deputation was to be desired, but as the men must go at their own charges, over the ocean and the continent, where were the men to be found? In the silence that ensued, Dr. Adams came across the room and whispered in my ear, " I will go." I presume it was the only time he ever nominated himself. But the service was not one to be sought, and volunteers were not to be found. He was appointed at once : others followed : the deputation was filled : it went on its mission, and God gave it great success. His benevolence was only equalled by his facility for lead ing others to be generous. They relied so justly on his judg ment that they gave with confidence and pleasure when he endorsed the object. And the amounts of money given by his friends to charitable objects at his indication, can never now be added up ; but, if they could, the sum would be enor mous and astonishing. A foreign missionary lost the sum of $3,000, and Dr. Adams said to me : " Let us make it up to him for the benefit of his children. You raise one thousand, and I will raise two." He easily got his before I got mine, but it was all obtained, and is now bearing fruit. I am very sorry that I cannot lay my hand on his playful note, in February, 1876, asking me to come and dine with INTERCOURSE WITH DR. ADAMS. 393 some young friends and help to keep them in order. Among the guests at that memorable dinner, there was no one, ex cept Dr. Calhoun, missionary from Mount Lebanon, and my self, less than four score years of age. Four of them pre ceded Dr. Adams to the Eternal state. With what graceful dignity, charming simplicity and ease, he sat at the head of his hospitable table on that occasion : drawing each one out according to his measure and manner, and filling up every pause with his own ready anecdote and reminiscence. Only last May I received from Dr. Adams a letter answer ing some inquiries in which he writes of Dr. Muhlenberg and the dinner to which reference is made above. He says : " I was expecting a visit at that time from a relative in Connecticut, more than ninety years of age, who, at this very time, is more elastic than I am. " It so happened that a few days before I had received a very pleasant let ter from the late Richard H. Dana, then past 90, containing a very pleasant message for Bryant, so that I played the part of hyphen between the two great poets. " I have been reading this evening the life of Dr. Muhlenberg, and have been melted into tenderness by many of its incidents. He was a veritable saint, with nothing of asceticism about him, he knew the greatness and the blessedness of self -subjection for the good of others. He was truly catholic in spirit, while cordially attached to his own church. His taste was grati fied by its forms of worship and by the right observance of its Calendar. He left his ' ideal of representative communion* as a legacy with me and , to be carried into execution, and I am reproached when looking upon his sweet and beautiful face, because I have been forgetful of the trust ! More of this hereafter. ' ' I hope I shall be made better by my renewed intercourse with Dr. Muh lenberg in the pages of this work. " Cordially yours, " W. ADAMS." After Dr. Adams had retired from the pulpit, and his suc cessor was settled, I made a sketch, beginning with this illus tration : " If you would know what space you fill in the world, thread a cambric needle, drop the needle into the sea, draw it out again, and seethe hole that is left. That's you." The next week after the notice was in print, he met me with his bright and loving smile and said : " I get letters 394 IREN&US LETTERS. telling me ' I am only a cambric needle in the water, after all.' " Ah me! The simile now seems worse than a mockery. The City, the Seminary, the Church at large, and Dr. Adams not there. The vacancy is great. It will be years many before it is filled. Israel has chariots and horsemen, but where is the man like him who stood at the head of the host ? THE LATE DR. S. H. COX. One of the most brilliant intellects of the American pul pit passed into another sky when Dr. Cox was glorified. More learned men, with more logical, and far more nicely bal anced minds, more useful ministers and leaders, have lived in his day. But we have had no one with his blazing genius, bold and dazzling eloquence, range of imagination, fertility of illustration, astonishing memory, exuberant wit, rapid as sociation of ideas, stores of facts and words from classic authors, and the faculty of expression that combined the sturdy, grotesque eccentricities of Carlyle with the flow and beauty of Macaulay. A meteor streams across the sky, and for a brief moment we rejoice in its light; its beauty and brilliancy disappear, and the stars shine on steadily in their orbits. It is sad to know that so little of what Dr. Cox said remains on the printed page or in the memories of those who survive him. He did not write as he spoke. He would have failed as an author. No reporting did justice to his rhetoric, which, transcending all rules, was a law unto itself, blinding the eyes and ravishing the ears of his hearers. When he was told that Caleb Cotton had said, "Were it not for his Coxisms, Dr. Cox would be a great man," Dr. Cox answered, "Yes, he might have been Caleb Cotton." He did have his Coxisms. They were marked peculiarities of verbal utterances, by which he was distinguished from all MEMORIES OF DR. SAMUEL HANSON COX. 395 the preachers of his time. Having a slight impediment in his speech, which made him hesitate on certain letters, he selected instinctively words with such initials as he could utter readily, and this brought to his lips words and phrases that startled by their novelty, size, and immense fitness to convey the idea ; words that no mortal man but Dr. Cox or Thomas Carlyle would have invented for the place. The Latin and Greek languages were so familiar that he garnished his discourse with their words, to the astonish ment of the people and the bewilderment of the unlearned. A British peasant said to his new pastor ; " You don't give us any Latin, as our old minister did." ' No, I do not, for I did not suppose you understood Latin." "We don't, sir; but we pays for the oest, and we've a right to the best." Dr. Cox's people could make no complaint of him on that score. Who ever heard him make a platform speech with out the E Pluribus Unum ? I was by his side on the platform when he was Moderator of the New School Presbyterian General Assembly in Phil adelphia. He was offering the prayer in the morning, and in the midst of it he said : "O Lord Jesus Christ, thou art the ne plus ultra of our desire, the sine qua non of our faith, and the ultima thule of our hope." Yet so natural to him was this form of expression, that he had no recollection of it afterwards. His friend, Dr. E. F. Hatfield, was by his side also, and remembers the remark able words. It was in this same Assembly that a member from Ohio cast reflections, in debate, on Decorated Divines, when Dr. Cox called him to order, remarking, with gentle humor : " The brother should not speak disrespectfully of Doctors of Divinity ; he does not know what he may come to himself." When Williams College made Mr. Cox Dr. Cox, he decli ned the Degree in a characteristic letter to The New York Observer, ridiculing the title and condemning the dis tinction. My predecessor, Sidney E. Morse, published the LETTERS. letter, of two solid columns. That is the letter in which occurs the phrase " semi-lunar fardels," meaning D.D., the resemblance of the letter D to a half moon suggesting this play. But by-and-by Dr. Cox thought better of it, and was then heartily sorry that he ever wrote the foolish letter. But, what is even more remarkable, he blamed Mr. Morse for printing the letter, saying that he (Mr. M.) ought "to have had sense enough to decline its publication." Mr. Morse often laughed with me over the eccentricity of Dr, Cox's mind in that matter. His memory held whole pages and volumes of poetry and prose, which he could recite with elegance and correctness, astonishing and delighting the favored hearer. Cowper's Task, Scott's Marmion, and Milton were favorites. His memory of dates and names appeared conspicuously in his lectures on Biblical Chronology, and the way in which he handled " Tiglath Pilezer" and his contemporaries would put the modern lecturer to confusion if he were to attempt an imitation. I asked him to come over from Brooklyn to lecture in a course I was conducting, but he refused point blank, because when he had gone on a former occasion the people did not attend ! I assured him there would be no lack of hearers, and he finally yielded to my gentle blandish ments. We walked together to the church where he was to speak, going early to put up some maps for illustration. Though it was half an hour before the time to begin, we met thousands coming away, and the vestry and aisles were so packed that we could scarcely get in. As we were strug gling up, he said to me, " This lecture has been \\-&\\ primed." To which I, " And it will go off well too." And it did. He discoursed on BABYLON. Thirty-five years have passed since that night, but the grandeur of the scene, those hanging gar dens, the palaces, streets and battlements of Babylon the Great rise now in lustrous glory on the memory. How much I do regret that my dear friend, Dr. Adams, whose grave is not yet grass-grown, did not comply with my request to write out the introduction, which he often related in company, to the speech of Dr. Cox in Exeter MEMORIES OF DR. SAMUEL HANSON COX. 397 Hall when he there represented the American Bible Soci ety, before the British and Foreign. Dr. Adams knew it word for word, and that it is in print I do not know. Dr. Cox arrived in London and in Exeter Hall after the meeting was begun, and a tirade against America greeted him as he entered. As the speaker sat down, Dr. Cox was announced as the delegate from the American Society. The terrible denunciation just delivered had excited the in dignation of the audience, and Dr. Cox was received with respectful coldness. But his splendid figure, his gallant, courteous, commanding presence, his irresistible smile, lightened instantly the gloom of the hall, and conciliated the audience. He said something like this : " My Lord, twenty days ago I was taken by the tug Her cules from the quay in New York to the good ship Samson, lying in the stream thus, my lord, going from strength to strength from mythology to Scripture by the good hand of the Lord I was brought to your shores just in time to reach this house, and to enter in the midst of the burning denuncia tions of my beloved country that have fallen from the lips of the gentleman who just sat down. He has reproached that country for the existence of slavery, which I abhor as much as he. But he did not tell you, my lord, that when we re volted from your government, one of the reasons alleged was the fact that your king had forced that odious institu tion upon us in spite of our remonstrances, and that the original sin rests with you and your fathers." [Having adduced the well-known facts of history to prove this position, he continued] : " And now, my lord, instead of indulging in mutual reproaches, I propose that the gentle man shall be Shem and I will be Japheth, and taking the mantle of charity, we will walk backward and cover the nakedness of our common father." The effect was instantaneous and overwhelming. The day was won. And a more popular orator than Dr. Cox was not heard during the anniversaries. The great picture that was made to represent the for mation of the Evangelical Alliance in London in 1846 has, 39 8 IREN&US LETTERS. as its central figure, the person of Dr. Cox addressing the Assembly. His speech on that occasion is considered by those who heard it as the greatest of his whole life. Much opposition was made by the European delegates to the in sertion of the doctrine of future punishment into the plat form then forming. The Americans, insisted upon its intro duction. Dr. Cox was selected by them to make the speech in defence of their views. He spoke and conquered. Be fore his exhibition of the revelation of God's will in his word, his vindication of the faith of the saints, and his vivid illustrations of the harmony and relations of the several parts of the evangelical system, the fears and unbe lief of good men went down out of sight, while the glory of the Lord rose upon the minds and hearts of the Council. It was a triumph of truth to be held in everlasting remem brance. But not in sacred eloquence only was Dr. Cox illustrious. His reading was encyclical, his mind cyclopedic, his tongue fluent, mellifluous and tireless. Tap him on any subject, and the stream came bright, sparkling, refreshing, like a mountain torrent, or a meadow rivulet, or a deep, broad, majestic river, filling the listener with joy, often with amaze ment, always with new impressions. These sudden corrus- cations were the best things he did. His labored prepara tions were actually sometimes dull. I heard him preach two hours before the American Board at Pittsfield, Mass., and the audience were tired to exhaustion. He himself was so mortified by the failure that I pitied him. Just think of that ! And yet the next day there sprang up a question in regard to Popery in the Sandwich Islands, and he went off with a philippic against the Man of Sin, and the woman with a bad name in the Revelation, so full of argument, wit, ridicule, fact, scripture, poetry, chronology, prophecy and pathos, that a great congregation were roused, melted, and convulsed. Such outbursts as these suggested the remark when the November meteoric shower was first observed, that Dr. Cox's head had prgbably exploded. And something very like a meteoric shower it was when MEMORIES OF DR. SAMUEL HANSON' COX. 399 we were assembled in the Academy of Music to receive the Astronomer, Prof. Mitchell, and listen to him on behalf of a projected Observatory in Central Park. The house was filled with the most brilliant, intelligent, scientific and cul tivated audience. Word Was brought that sudden illness prevented the eloquent Astronomer from leaving his bed. This word was sent to me by the Professor, and in despair I went to Dr. Cox on the stage, told him the distressing truth, and implored him to come to the rescue, or the occasion would be lost. The assembly joining in the request, he complied, and when the applause, on his rising, had subsi ded, he said : " To put me in the place of such a man as Prof. Mitchell is like putting a rush-light in the place of Ursa Major." And then he proceeded to deliver a strictly astronomical discourse of three-quarters of an hour, that electrified the assembly: every illustration and allusion of which, including many scripture quotations, were drawn from the science itself, as if it were the study of his life, his only study. Not one man in ten thousand would have been found equal to such an effort in such circumstances. In fact, as Mr. has recently said there are not more than thirty men in Boston who could have written the works of Shakespeare, I will undertake to admit there is not one man in New York who could have made that speech. And thus might I run on into other pages of reminis cence of this wonderful man, the most remarkable man of the last generation in the pulpit of New York. If a merry heart is good as a medicine, how many doctors' bills Doctor Cox has saved me. What noctes ambrosianae I have had with him in the fellowship of the saints whom he drew into that circle of Christian Brothers known as X. A. in New York ! He was its founder ! Its jubilee came this year, and Dr. Adams was appointed to recite its history. But he pre ceded the founder by a few brief weeks to a holier fellowship on high. I do thank God for such men, for their friendship, for genial intercourse, nightly converse, and daily service with such servants of Christ. Their names were long 40 I RE N^. US LETTERS. since written in heaven. The earth seems dim since their light has gone out. And as I close this letter, the thought comes to me with overpowering, but also with exhilarating, almost rapturous effect, that this companion ship will soon be renewed, and into the widened circle will come the wise and the good of all ages and lands. That company will never breakup; that feast and flow will be everlasting. 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