(1C SB LIBRARY 5 SACRED MEMORIES; OB, ANNALS OF DECEASED PREACHERS ork mtb $frfo ork @ast Conferences. WITH A FULL ACCOUNT OF THE RE-UNION SERVICES HELD IN ST. PAUL'S M. E. CHURCH, NEW YORK, APRIL 3, 1868, TOGETHER WITH THE ADDRESSES THEN DELIVERED. B V W. O. SMITH, OF THE NEW YORK CONFERENCE. WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY BISHOP JANES. THIRD EDITION. NEW YORK: CARLTOK & LANAHAK SAN FRANCISCO: E. THOMAS. CINCINNATI: HITCHCOCK & WALDEN. Kntered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1870, BY CARLTON & LANAHAN, in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for the Southern District of New York. PREFACE. THIS volume contains interesting sketches of the one hundred and thirteen ministers con- nected with the, New York and Jsew York East Conferences, who died during the two decades that intervened between the division of the form- er, in 1848, and the Re-union Services of the two bodies in St. Paul's Methodist Episcopal Church in 1868, together with the order of exercises and addresses delivered on that memorable occasion.* When it is considered that this book contains the annals of men who represent all grades of talent and adaptation, such as itinerants, presiding elders, and missionaries; historians, authors, and publishers ; editors of books and periodicals ; presidents of seminaries and col- leges ; delegates to the General Conference ; orators, controversialists, and divines, it cannot fail to interest the general reader. Especially is its adaptation apparent when we add that * The assembly of ministers on the occasion of the Re-union \vas probably the largest ever known in the history of Method- ism on this continent. 4 PREFACE. hundreds are living to whom these men were related by the ties of kindred, while thousands more are still living who became strongly at- tached to them, as they mingled with them in scenes of affliction, social gatherings, and holy communings. And we may still add, tens of thousands more who were awakened, led to Christ, and brought into the Church by their instrumentality, and received the ordinances at their hands. This work is intended as a humble tribute of respect to the memory of those noble and self- sacrificing men whose travels and labors ex- tended over a large portion of these United States and the Canadas, and through a period of more than half a century. But they now " rest from their labors, and their works do follow them." Grateful to that Providence which, we trust, led to and supervised the preparation of this volume, we now commend it to the Methodist public, trusting it will not be an unwelcome visitor to any, but acceptable to all.* W. C. SMITH. POUGHKEEPSIE, N. Y., Jan. 1, 1870. *.* The materials for this volume have been gathered from personal knowledge of the men. interviews and correspondence wiih their relatives and friends, and the Journals and General Minutes of the Conferences. INTEODUCTION " THE righteous shall be had in everlasting re- membrance." Of but few dead men can it be more truly said, "They rest from their labors, and their works do follow them," than of the noble men and devoted ministers whose char- acters and lives are briefly, but comprehensively given in this volume. To those who knew them personally, their memory is as fragrant as the spices in the garden of the Lord. To those who were converted through their ministry, their names are as ointment poured forth. To those who were edified and encouraged by them in their struggles for goodness and for glory, the remembrance of them is very precious. All these classes of persons will thank the author for these memoirs. The book also furnishes very useful instruction to the gen- eral reader. These brief biographies illustrate the radical character of Christian conversions, the fullness of Gospel salvation, the sufficiency of divine grace, not only to sanctify and keep pure, bu* also to sustain and comfort believers through all the vicissitudes of life and death. 6 INTRODUCTION. They also show what Christians can do and suf- fer to save souls when constrained by the love of Christ; how they can endure labor, suffer privation, and poverty, and reproach, and peril, and premature death, and say with Paul, " But none of these things move me, neither count I my life dear unto myself, so that I might finish my course with joy, and the ministry, which I have received of the Lord Jesus, to testify the Gospel of the grace of God." They were all burning and shining lights, and some of them glowed with a special luster. Taken together, they form a galaxy in the firmament of the Church upon which we look with much admira- tion and pleasure. The reunion services of the two Conferences, an account of which is given in this book, were highly interesting and profitable. The large concourse of people present, as well as the minis- ters, felt it good to be there. The addresses furnished in this book, and the statement it con- tains of the other services, will enable many who were not favored to be present to share the en- joyments and benefits of the occasion. But what a record of mortality is here given ! How soon we pass away ! Let it not be said, " The righteous perisheth, aud no man layeth it to heart.' 1 But let us be admonished to be up and doing while the day lasts, for the night cometh wherein no man can work. E. S. JANES. CONTENTS. NEW CONFERENCE. NAMES. 5 . s *~ .2 Is ,a 2."! & Date of Death. < 1' ANDRUS, LUMAN 1810 41 July 22 1851 ft) 43 BAINBRIUGE, THOMAS 1S33 9q March 10, 1862 70 142 BANGS, JOHN 1819 30 Feb. 4, 1849 68 22 BIGELOW, NOAH 1810 40 August 2, 1849 67 29 BLOOMER, EEUBEN H 1835 81 June 1, 1866 60 183 BREAKEY, JAMES W 1858 q April 10, 1867 36 188 BRENNER, FREDERICK W BROWN, OLIVER E 1848 1844 4 13 Sept., 1852 July 28, 1857 34 44 61 89, BUKCH, THOMAS 1805 44 Aug. 22, 1849 VI 25 BURR, BRADLEY L 1851 7 Nov. 16, 1858 11 103 BURROUGHS, CHARLES ....... 1864 May 26, 1864 23 167 CARPENTER, CHARLES W 1814 39 May 10, 1853 61 62 CLARK, LORIN 1825 43 Jan. 29, 1868 90 194 COLES, GEORGE 1819 39 May 1, 1858 86 85 COURTRIGHT, ROYAL 1853 4 August 8, 1857 97 CRAWFORD, JOHN 1789 69 March 7, 1851 90 36 DAVIES, THOMAS 1859 June 7, 1859 88 195 DlCKERSON, JOSIAH L 1835 98 May 16, 1863 67 162 FERGUSON, SAMUEL D 1819 36 Dec. 30, 1855 67 71 FERO, THOMAS E 1855 11 Sept. 2, 1866 40 186 FTSIIER SAMUEL TJ 1826 94 May 9, 1850 55 34 Foss CYRUS 1819 30 Feb. 29, 1849 68 90 Foss, WILLIAM JAY 1858 1 May 16, 1859 22 190 GRIFFEN, BENJAMIN 1811 50 June 20,1861 69 145 HAGANY, JOHN B 1831 34 June 28, 1865 57 168 HAM, JEREMIAH 1836 18 Sept. 8, 1854 47 69 HAND, JOSEPH T 1865 9: Jan. 20, 1867 9,8 176 HOEVENER, CHRISTOPHER H.. HOLMES, DAVID 1845 1826 7 34 Feb. 24, 1852 May 9, 1860 co CO O 45 130 HORTON, GOODRICH 1836 14 Sept. 17, 1850 31 38 HOWE, BEZALEEL 1823 31 June 25, 1854 78 67 HUMPHREYS, HUMPHREY HUNT, AARON 1822 1791 48 67 Sept. 29, 1852 April 25, 1858 67 90 51 88 JEWETT, WILLIAM 1808 49 June 27, 1857 fiS 90 KEBR GEORGE 1844 15 Sept. 8, 1859 87 117 LEE ADDI 1842 15 Dec. 8, 1857 41 95 LEVINGS, NOAH . . 1818 81 Jan. 19, 1849 53 17 MARTINDALE, STEPHEN 1808 52 May 23, 1860 73 127 CONTENTS. NAMES. a if II 4 . i. >^ Date of Death. | I MATTHIAS, JOHN B 1811 K May 27, 1848 -1 11 MEROEI-V, T. F. R 1846 10 Sept. 15, 1856 31 75 MITCHELL, WILLIAM B 1847 11 Oct. 27, 1858 48 99 OSBORX, THEROV 1826 w Aug. 12, 1852 nfi 46 ROBINSON JONATHAN N 1844 M Nov 6 1858 48 108 ROMAINE LEVERETT G 1864 1 Nov 3 1865 95 174 RICE NATHAN 1819 4 r . Feb 21 1864 -> 156 RICE, PHTXEAS 1807 54 Dec 4 1861 7-, 137 RCSK, JAMES . 1851 R April 4 1859 106 SANDFOBD PETER P 1807 50 Jan 14 1857 Y6 73 SEAMAN, RICHARD 1823 41 Nov 6, 1864 80 164 SILLICK, BRADLEY 1822 38 Nov 4, 1860 77 135 SILLIOK. JOHN A 1834 31 July 10, 1865 fiO 179, SMITH, DANIEL 1831 '1 June 23, 1852 46 53 STOCKING, DAVIS 1830 gg Dec. 11, 1858 48 113 TACKABERRT, JOHN C 1827 gg May 19, 1852 59 40 TELFORD, WALTER D 1863 4 March 30, 1867 37 180 TIIACHER, WILLIAM 1797 59 August 2, 1856 7 79 WARD, PELETIAH 1846 1 Sept. 2, 1862 150 WEBSTER, DAVID 1833 16 Jan. 6, 1849 45 94 WELLS, JASON 93 YOITNG, JAMES 1815 n ,-, April 28, 1850 65 3? NEW YOF^K EAST CONFERENCE. ADAMS CHARLES R 1843 88 Feb. 58, 1865 <\ c i 279 BANGS NATHAN 1802 60 May 3, 1862 S4 248 BANGS, WILLIAM M'K 1831 SI Sept. 5, 1852 1 ' Q 11 BARTLETT, C H ARLES 1843 11 Nov. 2, 1854 33 001 BABTLETT, HORACE 1822 36 Feb. 3, 1858 66 ?9fl BLYDENBURG, MOSES 1840 8 Sept. 19, 1848 31 909, BOOTH JOHN F 1855 10 Nov. 26, 1865 "ii 289 BOUTON JAMES D 1835 39, Nov. 29, 1867 55 304 BREWER, WALTER W 1834 :;:; Feb. 10, 1868 303 BULL, MITCHELL B 1803 54 August 6, 1857 79 229 1823 88 June 6, 1856 --,- 225 CHANDLER, T/HEOPHIUJS B . . . CRAWFORD, ELIJAH 1850 1835 16 14 June 20, 1866 Sept. 18, 1849 4" 37 295 207 CBEAGH, BARTHOLOMEW COOK, PHINEAS 1827 1803 25 58 Aug. 10, 1852 May 26, 1861 48 77 210 240 DIXON WILLIAM 1840 9 Aug. 17, 1849 88 204 ELLIS, JOHN 1851 1* Oct. 22, 1863 48 274 FABGKR. JOSEPH 1855 n June 1, 1857 3R 230 FLOY, JAMES 1835 B8 Oct. 14, 1863 07 263 CONTENTS. NAMES. S if ll If r. - ;-?, Dftte of Death. 1 & is GERALDS, THOMAS 1842 >n Oct. 4, 1862 4-7 9fif> GOODSELL, -BUEL 1814 I 1 ' May 4 1863 70 266 GILBEBT, GAD S 1842 94 August 1, 1866 59 292 GILBERT, RAPHAEL 1827 41 June 6, 1863 70 075 GII.DEB. WILLIAM H 1833 ;67 46 301 MARSHALL, JOSEPH D 1827 33 Jan. 9, 1860 56 939 MATTHIAS, JOHN J 1817 41 Sept. 25, 1861 65 941 MILLER, DAVID 181(5 39 Dec. 26, 1855 63 993 NIXON, JOHN 1821 45 Dec. 18, 1859 71 931 OLIN, STEPHEN 1824 "7 Aug. 15, 1851 54 908 PEASE, JOHN M 1834 9,'>, Sept. 29, 1856 45 996 PERRY, JAMES H 1838 94 June 18, 1862 51 956 PIERCE, GERSHOM 1803 62 March 23, 1865 83 988 REDFIELD .CHARLES 1858 3 Oct. 24, 1861 41 947 ROBERTS, ROBERT 1856 9 Jan. 18, 1865 33 985 SEXEY, ROBERT 1820 34 July 1,1854 57 916 SHAW, JACOB 1835 4s April 23, 1861 75 245 SMITH, JOHN G 1832 99, Sept. 30, 1854 45 917 SMITH, SAMUEL W 1834 94 March 16, 1858 46 999 STARU, ORLANDO 1832 17 April 24, 1849 44 9,01 STOPFORD, WILLIAM K 1833 18 June 25, 1852 43 213 SYKES, OLIVER 1806 47 Feb. 11, 1853 75 915 THOMAS, NOBLE W 1803 57 May 12, 1860 7^ 937 TRAVIS, ROBERT 1822 4-. Feb. 10, 1868 71 298 WASHBURN, EBENEZER 1801 5fi Dec. 29, 1857 65 99 WEED, HORATIO N 1845 99 May 11, 1807 54 299 WHITE, NICHOLAS 1813 1s Feb. 14, 1861 75 235 WOOLSEY, ELIJAH 1791 59 Jan. 24, 1850 79 203 10 x CONTENTS. REUNION SERVICES. THE REUNION Page 310 PRELIMINARY ARRANGEMENTS 310 OPENING EXERCISES 312 ADDRESS OF BISHOP JANES 315 ADDRESS or BISHOP CLARK 319 ADDRESS or EEV. MARVIN EICHARDSON 326 ADDRESS OF LABAN CLARK, D.D '328 ADDRESS OF EEV. HEMAN BANGS 329 ADDRESS OF EEV. DAVID BUCK 335 ADDRESS OF EEV. L. S. WEED , 339 ADDRESS OF D. CURRY, D.D 344 ADDRESS OF E. S. FOSTER, D.D 351 EEMARKS OF BISHOP JANES 355 EEMARKS OF FATHER BOEHM 356 PRAYER BY EEV. A. C. Foss 357 BENEDICTION BY LABAN CLARK, D.D 357 NOTE. The New York Conference, at its first session after the Ee- union Services in 1868, adopted the following: EESOLVED, That the Eev. W. C. Smith be added to the Com- mittee on the Be-union Services of the New York and New York East Conferences: and that a report of the proceedings, pre- pared by Brother Smith for publication, be recommended to the favorable consideration of the Committee. SACKED MEMORIES; OR, ANNALS OF DECEASED PREACHERS. NEW YORK CONFERENCE. JOHN B. MATTHIAS. JOHN B. MATTHIAS was born January !> 1T67, in Germantown, Pennsylvania, a post of the British froops, and the field of one of the battles of the Revolution. Thus in his youth was he accustomed to the scenes of our revolutionary struggle, from which his spirit imbibed a most ardent patriotism, and which furnished him with the many stirring incidents with which he used to charm and instruct the social circle, and impress his audience with the value of our polit- ical privileges. His father was a German im- migrant ; a firm adherent to the cause of the Revolution ; a member of the Reformed Dutch Church, and a good man. He died aged eighty- one years and seven months. His son was edu- cated in the German language. At the age of 12 SACRED MEMORIES. eighteen he became a member of the Church, although ignorant of experimental religion. He learned the trade of a ship-joiner in Philadei phia. On the expiration of his apprenticeship lie went to New York. Here he was attracted to John-street Methodist Episcopal Church. John Dickens was then stationed there, " who," he states, "was a plain dressed man, and preached with all his might." A change of preachers was soon made, and, to use his own words, " they took away my thundering John Dickens, and gave us Robert Cloud and Thomas Morrell." He now became a constant attendant at the Methodist Church. On one occasion, when Robert Cloud was preaching, there was a great stir among the people, and many cried aloud for mercy. He, too, was seized with trembling, and partook of -the general alarm. At first he attempted to laugh off these feelings, but could not. At length he resolved not to go among the Meth- odists any more ; but an irfflueiice drew him thither that he conld not overcome. At the opening of a new church in the Bowery, (the site of the present Forsyth-street Church,) by Rev. Thomas Morrell, he became truly awak- ened, and resolved on a new life. He thought that should he cry earnestly to God he would find forgiveness ; accordingly he prayed all one night and the following day. In the evening SACKED MEMORIES. 13 he attended John-street Church: for the first time he kneeled in the congregation. Here he received some light and comfort, but not the witness of pardon which he desired. He spent all that night in prayer. The next day, in the afternoon, as he was descending the stairs to go out, these words' were spoken to his soul : " Thy sins are all blotted out of the book of God's re- membrance." He exclaimed, "Glory to God !" All doubt of his acceptance was now dissipated, and his heart was filled with love to God and man. The year following he married Miss Sarah Jarvis, a member of John-street Church. From his conversion his mind was impressed with the conviction that it would be his duty to preach. Permission was given him to hold meetings for this purpose, and he often went to Fort Lee and to Brooklyn. In this latter place he says, "Many a happy time have I had with that small society." In 1793 he received license to preach. Soon after, he removed to Peeks- kill. Here he was the instrument of a gracious revival of religion. In 1796 he removed to Tarry town, where he lived twelve years la- boring at his trade during the week, and gener- ally preaching three times on the Sabbath. For five years he labored without any perceptible fruit, but fainted not. At length, at an appoint- ment about a mile from Tarrytown, at the house of Glade Requa, the father of a large family, 14 SACRED MEMORIES. both himself and wife, two sons, and a few of the neighbors, were converted to God, and formed into a class. Soon after, some of the most respectable inhabitants of the village were added to the Church. About this time, in 1797, he was ordained Deacon by Bishop Asbury. Being employed for a short time'at Haverstraw, he preached there, and formed a class of nine persons. On visiting them in the spring, he found a gracious work had been in progress. The Presiding Elder, Rev. E. "Woolsey, desired him to form a circuit. Soon a two weeks' cir- cuit was formed, and forty persons added to the Church. Afterward he enlarged it to a four weeks' circuit, which was called Bergen. Aaron Hunt, in consequence of the sickness and death of his wife, was obliged to leave his circuit, and the subject of this memoir was called to take his place, where he successfully labored for five mouths. In 1810 he was recommended to the Annual Conference ; but his Presiding Elder, having young single men sufficient for the work, did not present his application. This dis- appointment well nigh overwhelmed him. In the fall of this year of sorrow, one day, w T hile at his work, he was accosted by a Meth- odist preacher, Jonathan Lyon, with a letter from Rev. Aaron Hunt, Presiding Elder of Rhinebeck District, calling him to take the place of Smith Arnold, who had been forced to SACRED MEMORIES. 15 leave on account of illness. He hastened to the circuit, and was present at the quarterly meeting. "When I met the preachers," he says, "I could have shouted aloud." The Hon. Mr. Tillotson, of Rhinebeck, gave him a horse, and he went immediately upon his long-wished- for employment, being wholly given to the work of the ministry. In 1811 he was recommended to the Annual Conference, was received, and appointed to Chatham Circuit; here he re- mained two years. In 1813 he traveled Sche- nectady Circuit, and was ordained Elder by Bishop M'Kendree. In 1814-15, Albany Cir- cuit; 1816, Khinebeck Circuit; 1817-18, Duch- ess Circuit; 1819-20, Croton Circuit; 1821-22, Stamford Circuit; 1822-24, Cortlandt Circuit. In the fourth quarter of this second year he was sent a missionary to the Highlands on the Hudson, and remained two years. In 1827-28 he traveled Redhook Mission ; 1829, he was a supernumerary on Clarernont Circuit; 1830, he traveled Albany Circuit; 1831-32, Cortlandt Circuit; 1833-34, Duchess Circuit; 1835-36, Huntington Circuit; 1837-38, Huntington South Circuit ; 1839-40, Rockaway Circuit ; in 1841 he became superannuated, and continued in this relation until his death. During the second year he traveled Rockaway Circuit his eye-sight became gradually impaired by a growing cataract ; till at length he became 1C SACRED MEMORIES. unable to guide his horse, and his wife had to accompany him to his appointments for that purpose. At the close of his term on this cir- cuit he received a superannuated relation, and resided at Hempstead, Long Island. Soon after, his eye-sight was almost entirely gone. He sub- mitted to a surgical operation, but obtained no permanent relief. Although the windows had become darkened, and the light of day and the faces of friends had been shut out, yet this grievous affliction never took from him his natu- ral buoyancy of spirit. Throughout the long seven years of his blindness he never murmured or repined, nor was rendered unhappy on ac- count of it. Often he would say to his eldest son, " John, my thoughts are in heaven. I have sweet intercourse with God continually." He never doubted but that he would go direct to heaven when God should call him. About a week before his death he was at- tacked with a paralysis of the left side. It neither was severe, nor appeared to affect his mind. He called to his wife and said to her, " I shall soon leave you ; but we shall not be long separated." The few remaining days that he lived his mind was kept in perfect peace; he would often say, " I shall soon be at rest " " most home." Prayers were offered by friends who came to see him, to which he would respond, "Amen," SACRED MEMORIES. 17 " Glory ! Glory ! " He occasionally asked if the letter had gone by the wires to Pittsburgh, to his son, who was attending the General Con- ference in that city ; and when told that an answer had been received by the same convey ance that he would be at home on Friday ho said, "He will find me dying." His son re- turned but a few hours before he expired. To his family his growing meetne&s for heav- en was apparent. His life at last seemed all praise and prayer. He died at the residence of his son, in Hempstead, Long Island, on the 27th of May, aged eighty-one years and five months. NOAH LEVINGS. Noah Levings was born in Cheshire County, New Hampshire, September 29, 1796. His parents having removed to Troy, he was, at the age of sixteen, apprenticed to a blacksmith in that city. Soon after this, through the instru- mentality of the Rev. Laban Clark, he was hap- pily converted to God. He was licensed to preach December 20, 1817, and in the following May was admitted a probationer in the New York Annual Conference. His successive ap- pointments were as follows : 1818, Leyden Cir- cuit ; 1819, Pownal Circuit ; 1820, Montgomery Circuit ; 1821, Saratoga Circuit ; 1822, Middle- 2 18 SACRED MEMORIES. bury ; 1823^, Burlington ; 1825-6, Charlotte ; 1827-8, New York city ; 1829-30, Brooklyn ; 1831-2, New Haven; 1833, Albany; 1834-5, Troy; 1836-7, Schenectady ; 1838,' Troy Dis- trict; 1839-40, North Second-street, Troy; 1841, Division-street, Albany ; 1842, State- street, Troy ; 1843, Yestry-street, New York city ; and in 1844 he was elected Financial Secretary of the American Bible Society, the duties of which office he continued to fill till hi& death. The early advantages of Brother Lev- ings were quite limited ; but when he felt him- self called to the work of the ministry, he also felt the importance of studious eifort to prepare himself to sustain the responsibilities of his great work. By means of these efforts, co-working with the grace of God in his heart, he became an able preacher of the New Testament, a work- man that needed not to be ashamed. In his ministerial work he was eminently popular and successful. The gentleness of his spirit, and the affability of his manner, greatly endeared him to all who enjoyed his acquaintance. He was a most successful platform speaker ; and as Secretary of the American Bible Society, traveled extensively through the country, plead ing, with uniform success, the Bible cause before popular assemblies, Annual and General Confer- ences, and other ecclesiastical bodies. It was while on one of these extensive tours to the SACKED MEMORIES. 19 southwest that he was arrested in his careeer of usefulness, and stricken down by the hand of death, after traveling nearly four thousand miles during the months of October, November, and December, visiting the Tennessee, Memphis, and Mississippi Conferences. Toward the last of De- cember, on reaching Natchez, he found himself too much enfeebled to prosecute further his mis- sion. The hand of death arrested him on his homeward course on the ninth day of January, 1849, in the city of Cincinnati. His end was peaceful and triumphant. Dr. Levings sustained the ministerial office about thirty-one years. During that time he officiated in eighteen different appointments, preached nearly four thousand sermons, dedi- cated thirty-eight churches, delivered sixty-live miscellaneous addresses, and finally, traveled thirty-six thousand five hundred and thirty-nine miles, and delivered two hundred and seventy- five addresses in behalf of the American Bible Society. He died, as the Christian minister might wish to die, mature in the graces of the Spirit, fresh from the battle-fields of the cross. Those who had been blessed by his ministry accompanied him, with prayers and tears, down to the brink of Jordan ; those who had gone before joyfully welcomed him over. Thus, in the maturity of his strength, and in the height of his usefulness, 20 SACRED MEMORIES. a brother has been called away a standard- bearer in Israel has fallen. CYRUS FOSS. Cyrus Foss was born in Barrington, New Hampshire, in the year 1T99. Before he was of age he came to Dover, in Duchess County, New York, and while teaching school in Beek man, an adjoining town, was converted to God under the ministry of the Rev. Arnold Scofield. Soon after he received a Local Preacher's li- cense, and during the following year was em- ployed, under the direction of the Presiding Elder, on the Goshen Circuit. In 1825 he was received on trial in the New York Annual Conference, and in 1827 admitted into full connection, and ordained Deacon. In 1829 he was ordained Elder, and during that year he was united in marriage to Miss Jane Campbell, of Pawlings, New York. He labored faithfully and successfully in various places until 1842, when his health became so poor that he was returned supernumerary. His strength continuing to fail, he was subsequently placed on the superannuated list, where he con- tinued until the Master of the vineyard called him to his reward. In the beginning of the winter of 1848 his SACRED MEMORIES. 21 health began to decline very rapidly, and it soon became apparent, both to himself and his friends, that his end was approaching. He now found that the Gospel of Christ was the solace of his spirit. Here, on the merit of his Saviour, whose wondrous love in the redemption of man was so frequently the theme of his discourses, his faith firmly rested ; and here it triumphed, af- fording him a tranquillity of soul that was truly astonishing to himself, as well as highly instruct- ive to his Christian friends. One of his last requests was, that he might be affectionately remembered to all his brethren. " Tell them," said he to a brother in the minis- try, " that my belief in the great doctrines of the Methodist Episcopal Church has not suffered the least abatement, but is, if possible, stronger than ever." * Three or four days before his death the weak state of his body brought on an abstraction of mind, from which he did not recover so as to be able again to converse respecting his trust in Christ. Previous to this, however, when he be- lieved the hour of his departure at hand, he ex- claimed to a relative, " This is the happiest day of all my life ! " He died at Carmel, New York, on the 29th of February, aged fifty years. 22 SACKED MEMORIES. * JOHN BANGS. John Bangs was born in Stratford, Connecti- cut, in 1781, but removed soon after to Delaware County, New York. In early life he was much addicted to profanity and vain amusements ; but in these he found no rest to a spirit often troubled on account of sin. He and his wife saw the danger before them ; they fled to God and found mercy. On one memorable Sabbath morning, while engaged for the first time in family devotion, his soul was set at perfect liberty. Soon after his wife found peace, and they retained the sacred treasure unto the end. Brother Bangs, soon after conversion, felt such an ardent desire for the salvation of souls, that he visited from house to house in his neighbor- hood, and exhorted sitwers to flee from the wrath to come. He probably received license to preach in 1806. His labors were arduous and unremit- ting. After toiling in his shop during the week he rode from five to twenty miles on the morn- ing of the Sabbath, preached twice, attended the class-meetings, and then returned in season to resume his toils on the following Monday morning. While thus doing good to the souls of men God blessed the labors of his hands, and gave him an increase of temporal things. But he earnestly desired to give himself wholly to the work of the ministry; and when satisfied SACRED MEMORIES 23 that his call was from God, he abandoned the flattering prospects of this world that he might win souls to Christ. In 1819 he was received on trial in the New York Conference. While a Local Preacher he was abundant in labors ; but now that saving souls had become his appropriate and only work, his zeal was without measure, and his efforts worthy of highest praise. He had many seals to his ministry. During the time he traveled as an effective preacher about three thousand souls were received into the Church by him and his associates in the vineyard of the Lord. For sixteen years he was incessant in his efforts to do good preaching holiness to others, and en- joying its exalted felicity himself. He freely sacrificed ease and earthly interests that he might bring honor to God in the salvation of men. He presented himself, and all that he had, as a sacrifice to the Lord. In 1835 he became supernumerary, and sus- tained this relation during the remainder of life. But while partially worn down by his arduous labors, he was not idle. For several years after he w r as principally employed for the benefit of children gathering them together, obtain- ing signatures to a pledge against intoxicating drinks, distributing books and papers for their benefit, and exhorting and praying for them. Many of the rising generation have thus been 24 SACKED MEMORIES. preserved from vice, and early converted to God. To this work of love Brother Bangs fell a martyr. In June, 1848, his health tailed, but he continued to labor until disabled and pros- trated. He lingered for a few months feeble in body, but strong in an unwavering Christian confidence. He was patient and submissive amid his sufferings, and joyful in hope of heaven. On Sunday, February 4, 1849, he gently fell asleep in Jesus, and the blood-washed spirit entered into rest. Brother Bangs was a man of strong views and feelings, of undaunted courage, of pure inten- tions, and of a tender, warm, and friendly heart. His works follow him, and his record is in heaven. His age was sixty-eight years. DAVID WEBSTER. David "Webster was born in the State of New York in 1804. He professed religion in 1831, and connected himself with the Methodist Epis- copal Church. He was licensed to preach, rec- ommended to the New York Conference in 1833, and received his appointment for that and the following year on New Paltz Circuit. In 1835 he was appointed to Saugerties Circuit ; 1837-8, Montgomery Circuit; 1839-40, Sul- livan Circuit ; 1841-2, Marbletown Circuit ; SACRED MEMORIES. 25 1843-4, Saugerties Circuit ; 1845, Milton and Marl borough ; and in 1846-7, to North New- burgh. At the Conference of 1848, his health hav- ing failed, he received a superannuated relation. Brother Webster was a man of sterling integ- rity, of a meek and amiable disposition, and was much beloved by his brethren in the ministry and his numerous friends. He labored with great acceptability, and was successful in saving souls. Many stars will undoubtedly deck his crown in the day of his rejoicing. He closed his earthly career in Oakland County, Michigan, January 6, 1849, aged forty-five. He died very happy, after having called his family together, and exhorted them to be faithful to God, and meet him in heaven. He has left a wife and five children to mourn their loss. THOMAS BURGH. Thomas Burch was born in Tyrone County, Ireland, August 30, 1778, and was the eldest son of Thomas and Eleanor Burch. His par- ents were members of the Established Church of England, and were much respected by their neighbors. His father, who was a man of supe- rior talents, died when Thomas was quite young, and left behind him many who greatly lamented his death. 26 SACRED MEMORIES. In the year 1801 Brother Burch was awak- ened to a sense of his lost condition under the searching appeals of that eminent servant of God Gideon Ouseley, the successful Irish mis- sionary, who frequently preached on horseback in -the market-places. He immediately gave his heart to God, and was justified by grace through faith iruthe Lord Jesus Christ. Soon after his mother, sister, and brother were made partakers of the same blessing, and they formed a nucleus around which hundreds of others were soon clustered. They all became members of the Methodist Society. On the 5th of June, 1803, he arrived in the United States, and about a year after was li- censed to preach, and, in 1805, was admitted on trial in the Philadelphia Conference. He regularly graduated to the offices of Deacon and Elder, preaching, in the meanwhile, with great acceptance and success. Such was the confidence reposed in him by his brethren, that he was elected a member of the first delegated General Conference of 1812, which was held in the city of New York. Soon after its adjournment he was stationed in Mon- treal, Lower Canada, and continued there, occa- sionally visiting Quebec, during the war between this country and Great Britain. At the close of the war he returned to the United States, and was soon after married to Miss Mary Smith, a SACKED MEMORIES. 27 pious young lady, of an excellent character and respectable parentage. From this time he continued in the itinerant ranks, filling some of the most important ap- pointments, until disease disabled him from laboring efficiently, when, in 1835, he toork a supernumerary relation in the New York Con- ference. In this relation he continued for about six years, when he resumed his efficient service, but was able to continue in it only four years, when he was again returned supernumerary. After the death of his beloved wife, who departed in peace in 1844, he resided on his place at Yon- kers, Westchester County, New York, and con- tinued there until about nine months previous to his death, when he removed to his son's in the city of Brooklyn. During this time he occasionally preached, as his strength would allow, for he always delighted to appear in the pulpit, proclaiming redemption in the blood of the Lord Jesus. His last sermon was delivered about ten days previous to his death. His text was, " For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us." A fit subject for one in his situation ! It is stated that he preached with great freedom and energy, Near the close of the sermon, the man- ner and fluency of his speech producing a 28 SACRED MEMORIES. visible effect upon the audience, while speaking of the " glory which shall be revealed in us," he remarked that he felt his strength failing, but his heart was full of the love of God. His death was sudden, his disease being an affection of the heart. On that day he com- plained of a pain in the breast, and through the persuasion of hi* son he lay down in the bed, with a view to obtain sleep. In this state his son left him alone for a short time, when, after an absence of f character. Although upon a 92 SACRED MEMORIES. stranger he might sometimes have made an un- favorable impression as to his social and friendly qualities, yet a more intimate acquaintance would disclose a candid, noble, and generous nature, while a more true and reliable friend could not be desired. As a Christian, he was distinguished for a marked decision and firmness of character. To know what was right was always with him a leading inquiry. To do what was Bright was a controlling and absorbing effort. Nothing could swerve him from, the path of his duty. Regardless of consequences, ne obeyed faithfully and fearlessly the dictates of an enlightened and Christian conscience. As a preacher, he was plain, simple, and eminently practical, con- stantly aiming at the great ends of pulpit min- istration, the glory of God and the salvation of the soul, and very many are the seals of his minis- try. As a pastor, he was wise, diligent, faithful, and unusually successful, leaving behind him wherever he went a holy influence. As a Meth- odist, he was distinguished for a warm and steady attachment to the Church of his choice, and nothing pained him more than an apparent in- novation upon those usages and high grades of experience which marked her early history. As a Presiding Elder, he commanded the confidence and respect of his brethren. In this position he acted invariably upon the principle of doing unto others as he would that others should do SACKED MEMORIES. 93 unto him ; and although he had his sympathies and friendships, he n'ever allowed these in the least to interfere with what he believed to be the interests of the cause of God. His whole life among us has shown conclusively that he was a candid, honest, conscientious Christian man, who has now gone up higher to receive the rewards of a faithful, devoted, and success- ful Christian minister. JASON WELLS. Jason Wells was born in Petersburgh, N. Y., March 3, 1809, and died in Valley, Stark Coun- ty, 111., October 29, 1857, after an illness of three weeks and five days. When about seven- teen years of age, by the death of his father he became the chief dependence of his widowed mother and five younger children. At an early period in life he was impressed with the neces- sity of giving his heart to God as the best means of securing the enjoyment of the life that now is and of that which is to come. He sought earnest- ly, and soon found, the pearl of great price ; and from that day forward his life was a bright ex- ample of the power of Christianity in renovating and fitting it for earnest usefulness. . Brother Wells immediately connected him- eelf with the Methodist Episcopal Church, and 94: SACRED MEMORIES. was soon after appointed Steward. He lecame an active Chrfetian, and labored with a^eal for the salvation of sinners which gave evidence to the Church that he was called of God to a higher work than merely attending to secular affairs. While a merchant in Coxsackie, N. Y., he was licensed to exhort, and afterward, by the same Quarterly Conference, was recommended to the work of a traveling preacher. He was admitted on trial in the New York Conference in J.839, and for sixteen years continued to discharge with zeal and Christian fidelity the arduous duties of a devoted minister of Christ. His ap- pointments were as follows : Cornwall in 1839, 1840 ; Litchfield and Watertown in 1841 ; Litch- iield in 1842; "Woodbury and Roxburyin 1843; Coeyman's in 1844, 1845 ; Jefferson in 1846, 1847 ; Gilboa in 1848 ; Kortright in 1849, 1850; Windham in 1851, 1852 ; West Stockbridge in 1853, and Amenia in 1854. At the session of the Conference in 1855 his health had so failed that by the advice of his physician he was in- duced to take a superannuated relation. He subsequently removed to Illinois, where he spent the last few years of his life, and where he la- bored with his own hands, though feeble, to ob- tain a subsistence for himself and dependent family. Few men fulfill as faithfully, in all the relations of life, the duties of an active, conscien- tious, every-day Christian as did the subject of SACRED MEMORIES. 95 this memoir. In the pulpit Brother "Wells was earnest, sincere, and eminently practical. He labored as a workman that Mt the responsibility of his high vocation ; and many who have en- joyed the privilege of listening to his preaching will bless God in eternity for its saving power upon their hearts. Brother Wells was twice married. In 1848 he was left with two young children to mourn the loss of the affectionate and devoted com- panion who shared his earlier ministerial trials and successes. In February, 1850, he was unit- ed in marriage with Mrs. Elizabeth T. Williams, of Middletown, Conn. He was a Jfeind husband and an affectionate father. On being asked duringHs illness if he had perfect trust in his Saviour, he replied, "Ne^wer more so." That is a ground of confidence which can never be shaken. ADDI LEE. Addi Lee was born in Stanstead, Canada East, in 1816, and died at Ashland, N. Y., De- cember 8, 1857, aged forty-one years. At an early age the Gospel became to him, through faith, the power of God unto salvation. Shortly after he felt himself divinely called to preach the word of reconciliation, which call was loud- ly echoed back by the Church of his choice ; 96 SACKED MEMORIES. but being naturally distrustful of his own abilities, and possessing a nice appreciation of what a Gospel mrn'ister should be, to discharge the weighty responsibilities of his vocation, he for a time trembled and delayed, but yielded at length to his convictions of duty. In 1842 he commenced the labors of an itin erant minister by traveling the Jefferson Circuit in the Delaware District, under the direction of the Presiding Elder. By the same direction he traveled Prattsville Circuit in 1843. In 1544 he joined the Conference, and was appointed to Kortright Circuit. In 1845 he traveled Jeffer- son Circuit* again ; 1846, Charlotte; 1847 and 1848, Franklin ; 1849 and 1850, Prattsville. In 1851 he was appointed to Bedford-sti'ifet, New York city. This wae his last appointment. His constitution being naturally frail, before the Conference year had terminated his nervous sys- tem became entirely prostrated, and remained BO until a course of typhoid fever terminated his life. The prominent characteristics of this la- mented brother we* conceive to have been faith- fully delineated in the following language, by one who knew him well and is competent to judge, to wit : "He possessed an educated mind ; lie was a logical reasoner; his style was chaste and classical ; his imagination vivid and power- ful ; he could make sin appear exceedingly sin- ful ; his mind was ' like a sea of glass mingled SACRED MEMORIES. 9T with fire.' Above all, he was an earnest Chris- tian ; he was meek, patient, serious, and prayer- ful. He lived for eternity; he died as he lived. When his end was near he said to his beloved wife, who was trying to minister to his comfort, 'If you had a thousand worlds to give me you could not better my condition ; I am filled with the Divine Glory, and if I had the power I would shout it to the ends of the earth.' And having committed his wife and children to the widow's God and the Father of the fatherless, he said, ' I am ready,' and departed to be with Christ." ROYAL COURTRIGHT. Royal Courtright has fallen asleep in Jesus. Our beloved brother was a careful observer of "the first commandment with promise," he was much devoted to his aged, widowed, and invalid mother. He experienced the blessings of re- generating grace in the days of his youth. In 1851 he was licensed to exhort, and was licensed to preach in November, 1852. In 1853 he was admitted on trial in the New York Conference. He, served Cannonsville one year, and was then appointed to Davenport. At the expiration of two years on trial in the Conference, he was duly adniitted into full connection and elected to Deacons' orders. His subsequent charges were 98 SACRED MEMOBIES. Equinunk, Wayne Co., Pa., and Fiftieth-street Church, in the city of New York. He entered upon the duties of this last change with much zeal and great acceptance to the people ; but being compelled by the failure of his health to resign his pastoral charge, he retired to the home of his brother-in-law in Delaware County. He viewed himself as wholly in the hand of the Lord, and when asked a question as to the state of his mind, he said, " I am just as willing to go as to remain; I have no choice." On the 7th of August, 1857, he set out to travel a few miles, in company with a friend, to visit one of the preachers for whom he cherished a peculiar regard ; but the effort was too great for his wasted energies. He stopped over night at the house of Brother John Gregory, of Andes, Delaware County, N. Y. He retired to bed feeling no inconvenience from his ride ex- cept weariness. Between three and four o'clock in the morning it was discovered by his labori- ous breathing that a change had come over him. His traveling companion hastened to his bedside, and inquired whether he was any worse; but that voice which had sent the thrill of holy feeling through so many hearts was now effectually silenced. He continued to breathe a little more than one hour after the family were apprised of the dying condition of SACRED MEMORIES. 99 their honored guest. And though 1 e could not speak, he seemed -entirely conscious of his near- ing the portals of endless bliss, and made signs to thosertright Circuits, and subsequently to Coxsackie and Hyde Park stations. Brother Mitchell was em- phatically a good man. His life was useful and consistent ; his zeal for the interests of the Church untiring ; his anxiety for the salvation of souls earnest and abiding, as hundreds who have been converted through his instrumentality can testify. His piety was deep and genuine ; the kindness of his disposition endeared him \o all, and to none more than to the children of the Sabbath school, where, on the two latter charges particularly, he was known to be a constant attendant and a faithful worker. All the agencies employed by the Qhurch for the diffu- sion of light and truth in the world had a place in his affections ; but in an especial manner did he love the great missionary cause, in regard to which he was conscientious in cairying out the provisions of the Discipline. His liberality (al- ways unostentatious) is doubtless well known on the circuits and stations where he has labored. In him the Church has lost a warm and stead- fast friend, a deeply devoted Christian, a wise and safe counselor, and an indefatigable laborer for the salvation of souls. On the Thursday evening previous to his SACRED MEMORIES. 101 death he preached his last sermon at Staatsburgh (where he had formed a class) from the text, ' If thon hadst known, even thou, at least in this thy day, the things which belong unto thy peace! but now they are hid from thine eyes." He returned home on Friday afternoon, was taken violently ill during the night, and although the intense pain was arrested, still the united ef- forts of friends and physicians failed to check the progress of the disease, and on Monday it be- came apparent that he must die. The sad intel- ligence was first communicated to him by his sorrowing companion, and it was received with calmness and true Christian resignation. Said he, " All is well ! ' My God is reconciled, his pardoning voice I hear ; He owns me for his child, I can no longer fear.' " On Tuesday morning we found him dying. Upon entering his room, he said with a smile, " Brother Mooney, I shall get to heaven before you after all," alluding, doubtless, to conversa- tions held in days gone by. A spirit of weeping came over all present, and tears of mingled joy and sorrow were shed joy, that he was thus anticipating an abundant entrance ; sorrow, that one so useful and so loved should be taken from our midst. He gave directions to his weeping companion concerning his burial, etc., and then expressed a willingness to depart and be with 102 SACRED MEMORIES. Christ, which was far better. Being let down gently irto the ; ' dark valley " he " feared no evil," for Jesus had lit up the pathway. We re- marked, " O death, where is thy sting! O grave, where is thy victory ! " He immediately re- sponded, " Thanks be to God, who giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ ! " O how precious the sweet promises of the Bible were to him during those dying hours ! " O how good! how sweet!" were his exclamations. To his weeping companion, who sat at his bed- side, he said, " You'll meet me in heaven, wont you, dear ? " and appeared pleased with the an- swer, " I shall make it the business of my life." Shortly after we knelt around his couch, and' while Brother Green led us in humble, fervent prayer at the mercy-seat, he responded heartily to every petition. We then sang that beautiful hymn, " I would not live alway," etc. ; and while singing the chorus, " Home, home, sweet, sweet home," his whole soul seemed on the stretch for heaven. As we concluded he threw up his clay-cold arms above him, and with all his strength exclaimed, " Glory ! glory ! " He sank into a peaceful slumber, and all present could trace a sweet smile playing :ipon his coun- tenance. In a few moments he aast his eyes heavenward, and with the most intense gaze continued to look upward. At length he said audibly, " I see light ahead." When speech, SACRED MEMORIES. . 103 failed, as evidence that Christ was precious, he pressed Brother Green's hand. A few long breaths, and amid the tears and prayers of sur- rounding friends our dear Pastor "languished into life," and was " safe at home." " Let me die the death of the righteous, and let my last end be like his." All who were privileged to witness this dying scene learned to prize more highly the religion they profess ; and all felt that it is alone at the bedside of the dying saint we can fully estimate the real value of the religion of Jesus Christ. BRADLEY L. BURR Bradley L. Burr was born in Liberty, Sullivan County, N. Y., December 30, 1817, and died at Leeds, Greene County, N. Y., November 16, 1858, aged forty. He was born of religious parents, both of whom survive him. In youth he was impressed with the uncer- tainty of life, and the necessity of a preparation for eternity by the accidental drowning of an elder brother. In 1838 he was married to MissE. Buckley. In 1839, in a protracted meeting in the Methodist Episcopal Church, he was converted to God. His conversion was cigar and satisfactory, and at once he began to exercise in prayer and ex- 104 SACRED MEMORIES. liortation. He soon felt called to labor for souls, but meeting with some discouragement his zeal abated, and love grew cold. In 1843, at the commencement of a gracious revival, he was among the first to acknowledge his apostasy, and seek mercy. His backslidings were healed, and the candle of the Lord again shone on liis pathway. He often remarked, " I will now do iny duty, and I believe Providence will open my way." His course was onward and upward. Being gifted in singing, prayer, and exhortation, he was very useful to the converts of that revival. He was licensed to exhort, and God blessed his labors. Souls were awakened and converted. In places where the itinerant had not gone he went. At one appointment the revival that took place was the entering wedge of Methodism in that locality. In 1847 he was licensed to preach. Soon after this he removed to Dela- ware County, and while working at his trade through the week, preached Christ on the Sab- bath. He was employed by the Presiding Elder about eighteen months on the Cochecton Cir- cuit, and also one year at Colchester. In 1851 he was admitted on trial in the New York An- nual Conference, and ordained a Local Deacon. He was stationed successively at Colchester, Delhi, Middletown, Norih Blenheim, and Leeds. He was ordained Elder in 1855 by Bishop Ames. SACRED MEMORIES. 105 At Leeds he closed the toils of earth, and ceased to work and live. In September, 1858, he spent some weeks in visiting relatives that he had not seen for some years. On his return to the cir- cuit he commenced a series of meetings at Sandy Plains. For six weeks he labored ardently for the salvation of sinners. Success crowned his efforts ; several were converted, and numbers were awakened. He was arrested by disease, and obliged to abandon his work. His friends supposed he had only an ordinary cold, and would soon be better. " But," said he, " this is my last sickness ; I shall never be any bet- ter. I should like to live for the good of my family, and to do good ; but I am all ready to go." In a few days his disease assumed a danger- ous type, and he was delirious. In this state he remained until released from suffering. He was singing, praying, and preaching most of the time. On the morning of his death he sang, prayed, preached, etc., and for the last time said amen, closed his eyes, fell asleep, and passed away. " God buries his workmen, but carries on his work." His educational advantages were limited, but possessing naturally a good mind, and being an indefatigable laborer, he was acceptable and very useful. He was emphatically a revivalist. Every ye,ar more or less were converted, and on 106 SACRED MEMORIES. some of his charges large additions were made to the Church. Death to him is gain ; but the Church has lost one of her most faithful ministers. JAMES RUSK. James Husk, though born in Ireland, was the son of Scottish parents, who brought him up under the severe discipline of Scotch Protestant- ism. The neighborhood in which the family resided consisted mainly of Catholics, hence Brother Rusk was accustomed from his child- hood " to contend earnestly for the faith once delivered to the saints ;" nor was " the two- edged sword " with which he commenced the " tight of faith " ever sheathed or permitted to rest. He was early converted to God in, a Method- ist meeting held in his father's house. By the rumored threats of the Papists he and his father were frequently driven to secrete themselves in corn-fields and elsewhere until the storm of priestly intolerance had spent itself. In the school, at neighborhood gatherings, every-where, our brother beloved was denounced as "a contemptible heretic, and spurned from society. Who can wonder that James Rusk the synonym of all that is liberal, generous, and SACKED MEMOEIES. 107 good should leave his native land the very day that he was twenty-one years of age in pursuit of a spot where he could worship God according to the dictates of an enlightened conscience ? Who can wonder at his repeated, loud, earnest shouts of thanksgiving and praise in recognition of this civil and religious boon ? He was li- censed to exhort at Pleasantville, and having subsequently become a teacher in the Irving Institute, at Tarrytown, he received license to preach, and was recommended to travel from that Quarterly Conference. He was admitted on trial in the New York Annual Conference of 1851, and sent to Cort- landt, Croton, and West Point successively. Neither place was willing to part with him till his "two years" had expired, which speaks well both of his acceptability and usefulness. His pulpit efforts were characterized by great earnestness, by originality of thought, and terse- ress of style ; the general cast of his sermons were argumentative, but his closing appeals were aimed at the heart, and often overwhelm- ingly effective. He had a terrible dislike to Church innova- tions. " Let Methodism alone," he would often eay, " and it will conquer the world." At the Conference of 1857 he received a supernumerary relation, and was attached to the Cold Spring charge. Here he resided and suffered up to the 108 SACRED MEMORIES. hour of his death, which occurred on tht fourth of April, 1859. He died as he had lived, " not only perfectly resigned," says his Pastor, (the Rev. B. Griffin,) " but desiring to depart, and be with Christ." JONATHAN N. KOBINSON. Jonathan N. Robinson was born in Suffolk County, L. I., September 27, 1816. He was blessed with pious parents ; but at the early age of nine years was bereft of a mother's care. His father was a Deacon in the Presbyterian Church, and a rigid Calvinist. To this last- named fact is to be attributed much of the son's perplexity and seeming indecision on the subject of religion for the first half of his life. About the time of his mother's death he was brought to feel his need of a Saviour, sought mercy at his hands, and obtained a measure of peace ; but, for want of encouragement, soon re- lapsed into indifference and wickedness. From this time until his twenty-first year he was vari- ously, and at times painfully, exercised with reference to the all-important .subject of salva- tion. He now began to attend Methodist prayer- meetings, and went to a class-meeting. These means were blessed of God to his escape from thraldom, and he emerged from a state of bond- age into the light and liberty of the sons of God. SACRED MEMORIES. 109 Impressed with a sense of duty, in the midst of opposition and reproach, he decided that " this people shall be my people," and Joined the Meth- odist Episcopal Church on probation, April 10, 1838. Now his soul prospered, soon his friends ceased to oppose, and he moved smoothly along in the way to heaven. About a year from this time he became interested deeply in the doctrine of entire sanctification, and in the month of September following (while on his way home from the Jamesport camp-meeting) professed to experience this further manifestation of Divine power and grace, in being cleansed from all un- righteousness. His own language upon this point is, " The Lord overpowered me with his presence. God was every-where and in every thing, and with indescribable peace filled my whole soul." A short time after this, while en- gaged in prayer in a grove, Brother Robinson was suddenly impressed with his duty to preach the everlasting Gospel to the perishing sons of men. This was a duty of no ordinary kind, and not until a long struggle had been gone through with, and repeated and* prayerful examinations of his convictions made, could he consent to make known this impression even to his most intimate friends. When he did so, he received unexpected encouragement, and was strongly urged to go directly forward in this great work. He was first licensed to exhort, and then, a few 110 SACKED MEMORIES. days afterward, licensed to preach, March 14, 1840. He was recommended to travel by the same Quarterly 'Conference that licensed him to preach, and urged to enter the itinerant ranks at once ; but wben the Annual Conference held its session his own better judgment prevailed, and he concluded to take one year more for study. In the month of May, 1841, he was re- ceived on trVal in the New York Conference, and appointed, w r ith Z. Davenport, to the New Mil- ford Circuit. His health proved insufficient for the work at that time, and he retired again into the local ranks until the summer of 1844. He was then again received on trial by the New York Conference, and (having been a Local Preacher for four years) elected to Deacon's orders, and ordained by Bishop Janes on the 16th day of June. He was appointed this year to Belle Port and Fireplace, and before -the year closed united in marriage to Miss L. T. Halsey. His subsequent appointments were Hunting- ton South, Farmingdale, and Smithtown Cir- cuits, on L. I. ; Spencertown, Norfolk," and North East charges, on the Khinebeck District. This last named appointment was perhaps his most agreeable field of labor, and here he had marked success. His name and memory will ever be held dear by those among whom he labored during the conference years 1851-52. In the spring of 1853 he was sent to Ellen ville, SACKED MEMORIES. Ill Monticello District. This charge was too heavy for his state of health, and the following Febru- ary he was attacked with hemorrhage of the lungs; nevertheless he was returned the next year, and in July, 1854, the bleeding came on again, and he entirely broke down. " Brother Robinson's early advantages were quite limited, and he never claimed to be a scholar; but his piety was undoubted, and his preaching being earnest and eminently practi- cal, he had many seals to his ministry. He was a good Pastor, and looked well after all the in- terests of the Church. He was a kind and con- siderate husband, and a tender father. His marriage union was blessed with but a single son. *This son had become a most interesting youth at the time of his father's failure in health, and how he should be provided for in life was the great anxiety of his fond parents ; but, in the providence of God, he was suddenly re- moved from this troublesome world by " acci- dental drowning," and we humbly trust safely housed in heaven. At the Conference of 1855 Brother Robinson was granted a superannuated relation, which relation he sustained at the time of his death. His attacks of hemorrhage were frequent, and at different times very prostrating ; but he con- tinued to get about occasionally until the last year of his life. He was at the session of Con- 112 SACRED MEMORIES. ference for the last time in Poughkeepsie, June 1856. During the last few months of life his bodily sufferings were very great, and he often longed to be free; but he complained not, and his soul was ever happy in God his Saviour. Not only did consumption prey upon his lungs, but he was assailed by cancer in the tongue and throat. Among the last entries made in his diary are these : " I believe in God, righteous and true. I love him. He is my God. My weeks are passing painfully and slowly, yet I am often very happy in God. I have had a day of much suffering. O when will it end ! Thanks to God, it is not of the mind, but body. I am a poor sufferer, looking to heaven for rest." In a letter to the writer he said, " I am 1 like a caged bird, fluttering and panting for liberty. O how I shall rejoice when the closing moments come, (if sensible then ! ") In the same letter he said, " My God is my Rock and my salva- tion. I cannot sink, or really complain, while graciously supported, comforted, and blessed by him." About a month later he wrote, " God is my great support. I feel happy in him now. O I should sink if he should leave me for a day ! but he is with me both day and night, and I be- lieve I am almost home." For some days before his death he could not converse, but, says one who ever watched over him, "I know he suffered patiently, and was SACKED MEMORIES. 113 happy in God." About five minutes before his spirit took its flight he twice tried to say halle- luiah, but his mortal tongue had become useless, and God signed his release,. and took him to his desired home on the evening of Xovember 6, 1858, aged forty-two years. "Blessed are the dead which die in the Lord ; that they may rest from their labors; and their works do follow them." DAVIS STOCKING. Davis Stocking was born in Haddam, Conn., September 10, 1810, and died in Sing Sing, December 11, 1858. His parents were both ex- emplary members of the Methodist Episcopal Church before his birth. His father died in 1848, triumphing in the love of Christ. Early religious instruction, thus secured to our brother, was not lost on him. He was the conscious subject of Divine impressions even in his childhood, and when a youth of seventeen, he earnestly sought and obtained of his heav- enly Father the forgiveness of his sins. His rnind was soon exercised on the subject of preaching. He felt a strong persuasion that it was his duty to give himself to the work of the ministry; but a sense of his unworthiness, scanty literary attainments, and natural timidity, cawsed him to shrink from the high and respon- ' 114: SACRED MEMORIES. sible trust. But the great Head of the Church, who had called him, did not allow him to shake off his convictions of duty. They gathered in- creasing strength, until he dared no longer re- sist them. Accordingly, in April, 1830, he was licensed to preach, and in May following was received on probation in the JSTew York Conference, of which he continued a member until his death. His active service in the ministry covers a period of twenty-seven years. The honorable position he occupied among his brethren, his extensive usefulness, and the high esteem in which he was held, warrant a more extended and discriminating notice of his life and labors than can be given in a brief and hastily written memoir. He possessed qualities of head and heart which, without brilliant* mental endow- ments or high intellectual culture, made him a really strong, effective, and admirable man. Good robust sense was manifested in all his utterances, and in all his movements. His character combined practical wisdom, sound judgment, and quick decision, with unusual self- possession and untiring energy. Mild and ami- able in his manners, courteous and unobtrusive, generous and kind, he was every-where respect- ed, confided in, and loved. But the crowning excellence of the man was his unmistakable piety. Whether in the pulpit, in the social SACREIV MEMORIES. 115 circle, in his family, or in the market-place everj-where he gave evidence that he had been with Jesus and learned of him. Few purer or more "harmless and blameless" men have ever lived. His purity, too, was generally, perhaps universally, acknowledged. No aspersions, it is believed, were ever cast upon his honor as a man, his sincerity as a Christian, his faithfulness as a minister. He was appointed to the Methodist Episcopal Church in Hudson in May, 1856, and entered upon his duties with his usual energy and success. In April, 185T, lie was suddenly arrested in his career, and smitten down with pleurisy of the lungs. The severity of the attack abated in a few weeks, and he hoped to recover his health and resume his labors; but, in the mysterious providence of God, this was not permitted. The remaining year and a half of his earthly pilgrimage, with a shattered constitution, he was chiefly confined to his home, and much of the tim to his bed, the subject of intense physi- cal suffering. Unable to preach, or give any at- tention to his public duties, and longing for rest and retirement, as affording the only hope of recovery, he removed to the village of Sing Sing. Hqre, among warm and generous friends, he was made as comfortable as his increasingly wretched bodily condition would permit. His disease became seriously complicated, 116 SACRED MEMORIES. and baffled the skill of his medical attendants. What was for a long time supposed to be an aggravated form of neuralgia attacked his limbs, and gradually wasted his strength. Subse- quent developments, however, showed even more frightful agencies than this at work. For months the head and socket of the right hip were in process of actual decay, and at his death only the debris of the bone remained. This fact accounted satisfactorily for the excruciating tortures suffered by him. ISTeither sleep nor ease could be obtained except by the use of powerful anod} 7 nes, and in some instances, de- spite of these, his agony continued unabated for days and nights in succession. This sad picture has, however, gracious relief. While the hearts of all who visited him were moved with pity in view of his sufferings, they were equally moved with wonder at his patient composure of mind, and were led to adore our heavenly Father for the grace afforded his servant in this extremity. ]S~ot a murmur or complaint escaped hjs lips. Expressions of thankfulness and submission 'mingled ever with his groans. The smile and welcome with which he was wont to greet his O friends when in health continued with him to the end. Just before he ceased to articulate he tried to repeat the verse commencing, " Courage, my soul, on God rely ;" but utterance failed be- fore he completed it, and he quietly fell asleep. SACKED MEMORIES. 117 GEORGE KERR. George Kerr was born in Ireland in the year 1819. His parents emigrated to Canada in 1822, when he was in his fourth year. From childhood he was the suo^ct of strong religious impressions, and when a class was formed in the neighborhood he was often taken by his parents to class-meeting, where his religious impressions were greatly strengthened, and his purposes to be a Christian were often renewed. At the age of -seventeen he was sent upon some business by his father to the city of Mon- treal. There was at that time a revival meeting progressing in that city under the labors of the Rev. James Canghey. He went to the meeting. This was with him an hour of the deepest con- cern. It seemed as though the hand of the Lord had conducted him almost to the altar of prayer. Under a deep sense of sin he went forward, and, after a hard struggle in humble and earnest prayer, he was enabled to rejoice in a sweet and happy sense of sins forgiven. He returned home a new creature, and soon became an accession to the prayer-meetings at home and in the neighborhoods around, and often exhorted the people to seek the Lord. It was in the discharge of these important duties that he became convinced that God had called him to preach the unsearchable riches of Christ. 118 SACRED MEMORILS. At the age of twenty-one he came to the United States. His course was directed to Winsted, Conn., where, after a short time, he received a Local Preacher's license. The next year he was emplo^d by the late Rev. Bar- tholomew Creagh to labor on the Berlin Charge, which had been left to be supplied. His labors here were so entirely satisfactory that he was unanimously recommended, by the Quarterly Conference to be received on trial at the next session of the ISTew York Conference, in the spring of 1844. As a preacher he was interesting, and often eloquent. Many of his sermons were carefully prepared, and delivered with great effect ; and, doubtless, had his health been spared up to the time of his death he would have taken that higher rank in the Conference which his abili- ties as a minister must have won for him. But God had ordered otherwise. "When the bright sun of his intellectual and elocutionary powers was about to ascend to its meridian, a thick darkness of physical disease settled over him. How mysterious are the ways of our God, and how often are the truths of his word illustrated ! " Clouds and darkness are round about him ; righteousness and judgment are the habitation of his throne." During the last three years of his life he re- sided in the city of Hudson, K Y., a superan- SACKED MEMORIES. 119 nuated member of this Conference. Here be was much esteemed, not ojily by the mem- bers of his ow Church, but by the ministers and members of the other evangelical Churches of the city. 4 In the month of June last, thinking a change of air might be of some service to him, and wish- ing once more to see his aged mother and other friends, he visited the home of his childhood, But, alas ! the progress of his disease was not to be arrested, nor even impeded, for a single day. But God was with him. A good Wes- leyan minister, who frequently visited him dur- ing the last few weeks of his life, writes : "About a week before he died I inquired how his mind was sustained. He answered, ' I rest on Christ ; yes, I rest, precious Saviour, on thee. I know thou valt receive me, a sinner saved by grace.' Frequently he would say to- his weeping wife, 'I am almost home.' The last Sabbath of his life, sitting in a chair, he requested to have the door opened that he might look out once more into the open air and view the beauty of the landscape, quietly re- marking, ' This is my last Sabbath on earth. By next Sunday I shall probably be in the land of rest.' On the Thursday preceding Septem- ber 8 he felt indeed that the final hour had come. In the morning, being bolstered up, and much exhausted, he said, about two hours before 120 SACRED MEMORIES.. he died, 'I will lay me down, probably to rise no more till the resurrection morn ; but before I do so, I wish to*id you all a timely farewell.' After taking leave of his other friends, he kissed his little son, an only child, and* breathed a dying parent's prayer ; and then, summoning all his remaining strength, he fondly clung to the neck of his. beloved wife for a moment, sank back upon his pillow, and soon was gone." Thus died our excellent Brother Kerr, in the fortieth year of his age. WILLIAM JAY FOSS. William Jay Foss was born in Verbank, Duchess County, X. Y., November 23, 1835. He was the fourth son of the late Rev. Cyrus Foss, well known for many years as a gifted, earnest, and successful minister of our Church. "Very few commenced life with so decided and varied advantages as did our departed brother. It is also certain that very few so wisely improve the personal gifts and privileges with which their heavenly Father has endowed them. He inherited a superior intellect, at once strong, active, and symmetrical, with an emotional na- ture, warm, generous, and delicate, and a quick, controlling moral sense. Thus furnished, he was ushered into a home circle where the graces of religious and social life had long been * SACRED MEMORIES. 121 cultivated, and where judicious parental con- trol was undisputed. As the legitimate results of these favoring circumstances, his earliest, as his latest developments of character were lovely and harmonious. During his childhood and youth he was unusually pure, amiable, and ex- emplary. He honored his parents, rendering them unquestioning obedience, and evincing an early and remarkably just appreciation of their mutual relations. He was never wild nor in- tractable, consequently his walk was moral, and never contracted vicious habits of any kind. In February, 1852, when about sixteen years of age, and while a student in Amenia Seminary, he joined the Methodist Episcopal Church on probation. He w T as induced to this course by an earnest desire to be a Christian. He com- menced a regular attendance on the means of grace, public and private, but did not feel as- sured of his acceptance with God. In September, 1852, having completed his preparation, he entered the Freshman class of the Wesleyan University. Soon after he was received into full connection in the Church. He however, states, " For the first three years of my college course my religious experience was very unsatisfactory.' 1 While he tried to serve God, and did observe an outward conform- ity to his law, a sense of inward corruption caused him constant uneasiness of mind. 122 SACRED MEMORIES. In October, 1855, while in his senior year, his health failed, and he was obliged tempo- rarily to leave college. While at home he at- tended a protracted meeting, and often exercised in public. In doing this he was encouraged and comforted, and made evident advancement in religion. About this time he was led to investigate the subject of "holiness." He read, among other works on the subject, " Faith and its Effects," by Mrs. Palmer. He says, " Its thrilling pages stirred my soul." When I prayed I could ask for no less blessing than entire sanctification. After severe struggling with doubts and temp- tations, earnest prayer, the most careful study of the Bible of which he was capable, solemn cove- nant upon his knees to obtain the blessing if he was obliged to seek until he died, and a resolu- tion to follow the teachings of the Spirit when- ever, and wherever, and however it should lead him, he says, " I felt I was near the promised land. It was but a few hours after I made this firm, unswerving resolution, that when praying in my chamber alone, on the 15th of December, 1855, about half past six in the evening, i the consciousness of my full consecration, and in the application of the words, ' Now is the accepted time,' faith suddenly sprung up in my heart ; Christ, who before had seemed far off, now ap- peared nigh ; something spake to me in sweet and SACRED MEMORIES. 123 distinct tones, ' It is yours it is, yours.' ' Hold,' cried Satan, ' don't deceive yourself.' ' It is yours,' still louder said the Spirit. I could no longer doubt." In September, 1857, only one year after his graduation, he was engaged as a tutor in the "Wesley an University, and was also appointed to the charge of the Methodist Episcopal Church in Portland, Conn. He joined the New York Conference at its session in May, 1858, and was appointed to Lake Mahopac, where he enjoyed another year of prosperity. His appointment to Cannon-street, Poughkeepsie, fully evinced the confidence felt in his talents, piety, and sound judgment by the Bishop and cabinet. Nor was this confidence misplaced. Those who knew him had no misgivings as to the result. He felt an inward shrinking from the position, but, with usual serenity of mind and composure of manner, he appeared in the pulpit the next Sabbath, May 15, and preached morning and evening. He enjoyed his usual liberty and comfort, and the people were most favorably impressed. They left the sanctuary congratu- latin^eaeh other, and thanking God that, al- though a pastor to whom they were \varmly attached had been removed, another had been sent whose opening labors gave promise of ex- tensive usefulness. They little thought how great trials were in store for them, and he little 124: SACRED MEMORIES. thought that his work among them would begin and end on the same day. He went home with J. P. H. Talman, Esq., after evening preaching, and retired early to his room. During the night he suffered severely from pain in his chest, but refrained from making it known at the time. In the morning, when the family were summoned to breakfast, Brother Foss was ab- sent, and going to his room, Brother Talman, to his surprise, found him too ill to leave his bed. A physician was immediately called, who dis- covered in his patient symptoms of pneumonia in its most aggravated form. All the appli- ances which skill or kindness could suggest c5O were speedily made, and the disease seemed temporarily to yield its deathly grasp. But a sudden and fatal change occurred from some unknown cause, and all present were convinced that his death was near. The suffering of Brother Foss was so great during most of his illness as to prevent conver- sation with him. He was, however, fully ap- prised of his danger, and did not, after the first week, expect restoration to health. Death, however, had no terrors for him, and life had but a slight hold on his affections. He seemed often entirely abstracted from sublunary scenes, and when he spoke his words seemed more like those of a seraph than a man. He uttered a few connected and impressive sentences which SACKED MEMORIES. 125 will best indicate his feelings. To his kind host t who watched his symptoms with almost paternal care, he said, two or three days before his death, "My mind has been busy with the material as- pects of my case, whether I was getting better or worse, and whether my pains could be re- lieved; but," he added earnestly, gazing and pointing upward, "I am raised above all that now; my thoughts are yonder!" His eldest brother approached his bed a few hours prior to his death and asked, " "Willie, do you desire to live?" He replied, "I should like to live for mother's sake, and to be a more faithful minister; but I am not anxious. Some think it strange that young ministers are taken away, but I do not. God can spare me. It is hard for this Church to lose its pastor, but God will send them another." THOMAS DA VIES. Thomas Davies died in the city of New York, June 7, 1859. He was born nqy the town of Shrewsbury, England, in the year 1821, and educated in the bosom of the Wesley an Church. He immigrated to this country with his family in 1849, and soon after was converted and joined the Bedford-street Methodist Episcopal Church, in this city. He commenced at once to labor as a Sunday-school teacher, and soon after was 126 S ACHED MEMORIES. appointed leader of a class, which duties hi. dis- charged with great fidelity and success. In due time he was licensed to exhort, and in 1856 to preach as a Local Preacher. Under the direc- tion of the Presiding Elder he took charge of the Societies at Carmansville and Manhattan- ville, and the year following of King's Bridge and Fordham. In all these places his labors were highly acceptable and useful, and in the latter place he succeeded in building a neat and commodious church. But the labors of these charges, together with his own private business, were more than his constitution could bear, and probably laid the foundation of his early death. Feeling that God had called him to the work of an itinerant minister, he offered himself to the New York Conference at its session in 1859, was received on trial, and stationed on the Da- venport Circuit, within the bounds of the Pratts- ville District. But in the mysterious providence of God he was never permitted to go to the field of labor assigned him. During the latter part of the Conference seSRon he was taken sick, but did not resign the hope of going to his appointment till the very day of his death. Sis soul burned with Christian love and zeal, and the thought of going forth as a laborer in the vineyard of his Lord, to share its toils, its trials, and successes, to him was delightful and all-absorbing. It was SACRED MEMORIES. 127 the ruling theme of conversation with his friends and family, during each day of his last illness, and remained with him to the very end of life. Thus, while buckling on the armor, and eager for the conflict, he was stricken down by death, and taken to his rest. STEPHEN MAKTINDALE. Stephen Martin dale died at his residence in Tarry town, Westch ester County, N. Y., May 23, 1860, after an illness of about two months, aged seventy- three years. He was born on the Eastern Shore of Maryland^n 1788. His father was a Local Preacher, his grandfather a Minister of the Church of England. He was early left an orphan, and was indebted to the fostering care of a sister during his tender age. He en- tered Me itinerant ministry in 1808, under the Presiding Eldes, when he was twenty years old. In the following year he was received into the Philadelphia Conference, and was placed on the Somerset Circuit, on the Eastern Shore. The following were the Circuits, Stations, and Districts, which he filled successively through a period of fifty-three years: Dover and Snowhill, on the peninsula; Morris, Essex, and Bergen Circuits, in New Jersey ; St. George's, Phila- delphia; again on the Eastern Shore, Talbot, 128 'SACRED MEMORIES. Queen Anne, and Kent Circuits ; Newark, New Jersey ; New York city ; New Kochelle, N. Y. ; Troy, N. Y. ; Boston, Mass. ; New York city again ; Bridgeport, on the New Haven District ; "White Plains Station; Rhinebeck District; Long Island District ; Eighteenth-street, New York city, and in Norfolk-street ; on the Pratts- ville District ; Newhurgh District ; New York District ; and Poughkeepsie District. In 1859, on account of the illness of his wife and daugh- ter, he was appointed to Irvington, a small vil- lage near his residence. Thus it will be seen what an extensive range of appointments ho filled for more than half a century, acceptably and usefully. His %miable spirit, and his re- markable equanimity of temper, coolness, and self-possession, made him a safe and judicious spiritual ruler in the Church. Tall and well- proportioned, with a countenance fair ancUpddy, expressive of intelligence and benignity ; a voice whose rich intonations flowed aYid rippled like a brook; action marked by vivacity and grace- fulness ; sentiments genial and truly evangelical, and a diction always correct, and often elegant, he possessed, especially in his early days, and in his prime, a natural eloquence, which made him a popular preacher. He was a sound theo- logian, and remarkably gifted in prayer. " At the beginning of his illness," says Rev. Mr. Matthias, " I inquired of him his spiritual SACRED MEMORIES. % 123 Btate. He turned to me with some animation in his manner, and said, 'Brother Matthias, I can say with the Psalmist, Because he has set his love upon me, therefore will I deliver him. I will set him on high, because he hath known my name. He shall cjall upon me, and I will answer him. I will be with him in trouble. I will deliver him and honor him ; with long life will I satisfy him, and show him my salvation.' " This, then, is your testimony? " said I. " Yes, this is my testimony." "At other times, to any question I proposed on the same subject, he was clear and positive. To his daughter he said, at different times through- out his sickness, that he had a consciousness of deep peace. ' I have,' said he, ' deep peace ; I am not by temperament apt to be ecstatic, but I have perfect, abiding peace;' and would quote portions of the above psalm. To an aged friend who visited him he said, ' I have always believed the doctrines I have preached, and they sustain me now.' His eldest daughter states, that about a week before his death he awoke from sleep with an expression of holy joy in his countenance. Sho inquired why he looked so joyous. ' O,' said he, ' I rejoice with all my hearth ' Why do you rejoice ? ' ' For every thing,' said he. ' O, my child, my work is done.' She then quoted the psalm referred to above. He said, ' I have had all this, and 130 SACKED MEMOEIES. * am satisfied. I believe the doctrines I have preached. I might have done more ; but I did what I could ; I am a sinner saved by grace,' 'From my earliest recollection,' continues this daughter, " I considered my father a perfect Christian a beautiful example; it was this that made me a Christian ; it was his daily walk in the privacy of family and home that preached, and made us love, the religion which he so illus- 7 O trated.' During his long illness he dreaded impatience, and would ask if he were so at any time. Prayer was made for him while he lay, as we supposed, unconscious. It appeared to arouse him, and he seemed to make the attempt to participate in it. About five o'clock on Wed- nesday morning he fell asleep in Jesus." DAVID HOLLIES. David Holmes died in Sing Sing, May 9, 1860, in the sixty-fourth year of his age, the thirty-seventh of his ministry, and the thirty- fourth of his itinerancy. He was the subject of early religious impressions, but was more fully aroused to a sense of his sinfulness through the ministry of the late Rev. ISTathan Emery, and at a camp-meeting at Cow Harbor experienced a radical change of heart. In 1817 he united with the Church at Mamaroneck. He was SACRED MEMORIES. 131 licensed to preach in 1823. In 1824 he was employed to supply the place of Rev. J. B. Matthias, who was appointed to the Highland 'Mission. In 1826 he was admitted on trial by the New York Conference, and appointed to the Jamaica Circnit, where he* labored two years, and over two hundred persons were con- verted. In 1828 he was appointed to Tyring- harn Circuit ; here were only a few conversions. In 1829-30 to Petersburg!! ; in these two years ^he Church more than doubled her membership ; and in the twenty-one following years, in his various appointments, he had more or less re- vivals of religion. But of one circuit he says, "I followed a revival so called; another such would ruin any circuit, and I would not stay to Bee the ruin completed." But though he feared ruin, that circuit still lives, and from the last account was coming " up from the wilderness leaning upon her beloved." In 1853 his health began to fail, and with some difficulty he was able to fill his appointments. " The official brethren, to their praise be it spoken, kindly told him not to exert himself to his injury when unable to preach, but to be with them, and have a prayer meeting, and it should not affect his support ; perhaps he would rally again, and stay his time out, and finish his itinerant labors among them ;" and thus, he remarks, " it proved to be." In 1854 he became a supernumerary, 132 SACRED MEMOHIES. and in 1855 was superannuated. In 1856 his feebleness increased, and in the following year his family became alarmed, fearing his sudden* removal. His physician being called in, in- formed him J;hat, in connection with several other complaints, he had a chronic affection of the heart ; that it had been coming on gradually for years, and that his present danger was the accumulation of water around the heart, making his breathing painfully difficult ; that to recover his health was impossible, but with great care* he might live several years longer. In 1858 he was suddenly brought near the gates of death, but the Lord kindly brought him back to live in the bosom of his family and friends a little longer. He remarks, "It is possible, from the nature of my complaint, that I shall die sudden- ly ; I have reason to expect this ; but I now have time to reflect on the past history of my life, and to look forward to the eternal world ; and, although I see many defects in the past, much to humble me before God, and which needs the blood of sprinkling, yet I can look back on God's providential dealings often work- ing in my "favor. I am fully satisfied with the Church of my choice, her doctrines, discipline, and general economy, which I believe are nigher the apostolic plan than any other in the Chris- tian world. With my feet now firmly fixed upon the rock of Christ's divinity, of experi- SACRED MEMORIES. 133 mental and practical religion, I now stand ; in this faith I now live and expect to die. And what if I should die suddenly ? I trust, through the mercy of God, to stand unmoved, safe on Mount Zion, where many of my more worthy brethren have gone before. I now look back with pleasure at the kind manner in which I have been treated by the Cfrurch ; both preach- ers and people have treated me with no small degree of kindness." Brother Holmes was preacher in charge twen- ty-five years, and was never in the habit of giving things the go-by when there was tangible proof of. the vimation of discipline by unruly members. " How I have escaped scourging in this respect," he says, " God only knows." He further remarks, "Whether I have done much good in the Church or no has caused me much painful reflection. If I have been instrumental of spiritual good to any it will be more fully known in the eternal world ; perhaps I shall have a few stars in my crown in that day. And now that the evening shades have come upon me, and the frosts of sixty-one winters have passed over me, I hope to spend the few remain- 1 ing days of my life in peace and quietude, wait- ing until my last great change shall come." "When he returned home from the last Confer- ence he said, " I shall never attend another." The writer will never forget the look he gave 134 SACKED MEMORIES. the Bishop as he passed before him, remarking, "I have a good hope of eternal life." Brother Holmes was taken ill on the last day of April, but only confined to his bed for three days. He was favored with his reason until the last hour of his life, but with occasional flighti- ness during the last night. He possessed great calmness during h*is illness, which caused his wife to say to him, " Father, how is it that you are so calm when you know that you are so nigh unto death ? " He replied, " You know we do not need dying grace when we are living, but that is given unto us whn we are about dying." The day before his death his wife, finding him weeping, said, " Father, what is the matter ? are you worse ? " He replied, " Jfo, but Jesus died for me." All the night before his death he was singing various hymns, but he repeated, probably twenty times, "There all the ship's company meet," etc. He was somewhat restless during the night, and said r " I want to get up." Being told he was too weak to get np, he said, "Almost home." o his physician he said, " You have 1 come to see an old Methodist preacher cross the flood. I shall get safe over ; Jesus is at the helm." The doctor afterward said, U I had heard of such things before, but had never seen such a death." Not five minutes before his death his wife said to him, "Father, do you SACRED MEMORIES. 135 know rne ? " He turned his eyes to her, and said, " Tes, my dear." His only daughter, standing by, said, " And have you not a word for me, father?" He replied, "Yes, Mary," but was unable to say more. Such was the closing scene of the life of David Holmes. His surviving companion, who had been united to him for thirty-nine years, bears this testimony : He was every day alike, a Christian man, and those who were acquaintedwith him must con- firm this testimony. He was a good, plain, practical, acceptable, and successful minister of the Lord Jesus Christ. BRADLEY SILLICK. Bradley Sillick was born August 23, 1784, in Danbury, Conn., and died November 4, 1860, in Hie 'city of New York, in the seventy-seventh v year of his age. From his childhood he was the subject of deep religions impressions. At the age of twelve he became a Christian and a Methodist. At this early period he was distin- guished for the earnestness of his piety, and the activity of his religious course. Before he reached his twentieth year he became a Local Preacher. To him this relation to the Church was a sphere of usefulness. His labors of love are remembered gratefully by many aged mem- 136 SACKED MEMORIES. * bers of our Church in the region of country where he then resided. In 1822 he joined the New York Conference, .and continued a mem- ber of it till his death. He possessed a strong, warm, emotional nature, controlled by a sense of moral right. His piety was active, vigorous, and enlightened. In the field of labor upon which he entered he always found enough to do, and he M'as in earnest in doing it. He de- lighted in the workto which he was called, and kept before his mind the great object of the Christian ministry the glory of God in the sal- vation of souls. He excelled in the earnestness of his appeals to the sinner's conscience, and the forcible application of truth in powerful exhortation. In the year 1832-3 he was the Pastor of the Allen-street Church, ]S^ew York, during the great revival that marked that period of time, and by his labors contributed largely to th in- fluence of that work. The wisdom of his coun- sels, the purity of his life, his correct example, rendered essential service to many of the sub- jects of that revival, who are now engaged in the active duties of the ministry. He continued to labor in various appointments till 1851. During the last years of his life he resided in ISTew York. Here he was -much esteemed by the minister and people of his own and other branches of the Christian Church. After he SACRED MEMORIES. 137 was made a superannuated member of this Con- ference he entered into business in order to sup- port himself and family, and sustained an un- blemished reputation as a business man. To the close of his life he cherished a warm regard for the Church of his choice. He loved her ministers, her doctrines, and general econo- my. His last illness was painful and distressing, but a divine arm supported him he magnified his Lord in the dying hour. God granted his servant an unclouded intellect to the last hour of .life. He departed this life full of years, con- fidence, and hope. PHESTEAS EICE. Phineas Rice was born in 1786 in the State of Vermont. Pie was converted when about sixteen years of age, and was soon called to ex- ercise his gifts in public exhortation and prayer. His brethren soon marked him as one called of God- to the work of the ministry. In 1807 he was admitted on trial in the New York Conference, and appointed to labor as junior preacher on Granville Circuit. In 1808 he was appointed to Middletown and Hartford. In 1809 he was admitted into full connection, and ordained Deacon. The minute made of him upon the journal of the Conference at the 138 SACRED MEMORIES. time of his admission is highly illustrative of his character : " Phineas Rice : single, traveled two years, a little funny, acceptable, sound in doc- . trine and discipline." He was subsequently ap- pointed to the following fields of labor, namely : In 1809 to Plattsburgh Circuit ; in 1810, New- burgh Circuit ; 1811, Manchester Circuit ; 1812, Newhaven Circuit ; 1813, stationed in New York city ; 1814, Stamford Circuit ; 1815, Hudson Cir- cuit ; 1816, Albany Circuit ; 1817, Chatham Cir- cuit ; 1818-19, Jamaica, L. I. ; 1820, New Wind- sor Circuit; 1821-2, stationed in Albany; 1823^4, New York city ; 1825-6, New Rochelle Circuit ; 1827-30, Presiding Elder of Hudson River Dis- trict ; 1831, New Windsor Circuit ; 1832-4, Presiding Elder on Rhinebeck District ; 1835-8, Newburgh District ; 1839-40, Bedford-street, New York city ; 1841-3, Presiding Elder on New York District; 1844-5, Willett-street, New York city ; 1846-7, York-street, Brooklyn ; 1848-50, Presiding Elder on Rhinebeck Dis- trict ; 1851-4, Poughkeepsie District ; 1855-8, New York District ; 1859-61, Newburgh Dis- trict. Here he closed his long and., successful career in the Christian ministry on the fourth day of December, 1861. From the foregoing statistics it will be seen that the ministry of Brother Rice extended over a period of nearly fifty-five years, and that each year, during all that long period, he was returned effective, md SACRED MEMORIES. 139 received regularly his appointment. He was on circuits sixteen years, in stations eleven years, and in the Presiding Elder's office twenty-eight years, the last being not quite completed at the time of his death. Dr. Rice was a marked man in every respect. His piety was deep, fervent, and abiding. He was eminently a man of prayer. Those who have occupied the same room with him in his visits upon his districts or at Conferences will bear witness how long-protracted were his pri- vate devotions, and how earnest his pleadings with God. At home he had an hour each after- noon consecrated to private devotion. In the pulpit he was always a man of power. Possessing a keen perception of the ludicrous, together with great vividness of imagination, and a peculiar aptness at illustration, his con- ceptions were not unfrequently quaint, and quaintly expressed. There was often a vein of hurnor in his discourses, of which he seemed wholly unconscious ; for. though his audience might be convulsed, he never lost the gravity of the Christian minister. In all his discourses there was a clearly defined line of argument, not unfrequently interspersed with passage^ of deep pathos and stirring thought, rising in their expression to the sublime height of true elo- quence, breaking suddenly upon his audience, and thrilling them with the deepest emotions. 140 SACRED MEMOBIES. The eccentricities of Dr. Rice, whether mani- festing themselves in social life or in the pulpit, were not unseemly, and were indeed often em- ployed to great and good effect, because they were natural. But they were so peculiarly of his own pattern that any attempt to imitate them must result in a sad and injurious failure. No man was truer, theoretically and practically, to the original principles of Methodist itinerancy than Dr. Rice. He was a man of great punctu-. alitv in all his en;ao;ements. Nothing short of ,' ~ " O absolute impossibility could prevent his fulfill- ing all his appointments. He never shrank from any labor to which he was called in the providence of God. He possessed a nobleness of nature which seemed to render him incapable of a mean act. m Dr. Rice was a wise counselor and a true friend. lie never allowed his judgment to be biased by unfounded prejudices. It is the uni- form testimony of those who have been much with him in the bishops' councils, that even the personal unkindnesses which he sometimes re- ceived, in consequence of his motives being mistaken, had no effect whatever upon his action. The preachers on his various districts have always felt that they could confide in both his judgment and his friendship. He was a delegate to each successive Gen- eral Conference from 1820 to 1856 inclusive, SACRED MEMORIES. 141 and would undoubtedly have been elected to that of 1860 had not his failing health and the growing infirmities of age made it impossible for him to attend. The honorary degree of Doctor of Divinity was conferred upon him by the Wesleyan Uni- versity ; but the highest honor that crowned his person or his ministry was conferred upon him by the great Head of the Church, giving him in every place souls for his hire and seals to his ministry. During the last months of his life he was a great but patient sufferer. He calmly con- templated the approach of death ; and so long as consciousness and power of utterance re- remained, he was hopeful, cheerful, and often vivacious. His faith in Christ was unshaken. He was never accustomed to speak much of his own feelings or exercises of mind ; but in the closing scene of his life his testimony was most explicit and heart-cheering. He had t'aken much interest in the erection of the new church in Newburgh, the place of his tesidence. On the day of its dedication, the Rev. C. B. Sing called upon him, and though he had already de- scended far into the dark valley, he listened with deep interest to a recital of the ceremonies of the occasion and the appearance of the house ; then, with deep pathos, he exclaimed, "I have a building of God, a house not made with hands, 142 SACRED MEMORIES. eternal in the heavens." To Bishop Janes he said, " I feel that God loves me. I love Jesus Christ, and I trust in his atonement. I have not as much lively joy as some have, nor as much as I desire, but I shall not be lost. I have no fear. I shall be saved. I have no fear. I have no fear." When the venerable Marvin Richardson, now the senior member of the Conference, asked him if he had any words to leave to that body, " 2so, my life is before them," was his reply. His brethren will feel that this is a precious legacy. Thus passed away 'a great and good man a man eminent for the singleness of purpose with which he lived and labored a man true to his brethren, true to the Church, and true to his God. He rests from his labors, and his works do follow him. THOMAS BAINBRIDGE. Thomas Bainbridge was born in Appleby, England, October 26th, 1792. He manifested a decided seriousness during his more youthful days, eschewing the way of trangressors, and avoiding the company of the wicked and profane. His conversion, however, did not take place un- til his twenty-fourth year. About three years aiter that he became a Local Preacher in the SACRED MEMORIES. 143 Wesleyan Connection. Shortly after entering the ranks of the local ministry in England he came to America. He preached his first sermon in the laud of his adoption for the Rev. William Burnett, who was then chaplain at Bedloe's Island. His preaching at that time will be re- membered as exceedingly fervent, full of love and pathos, admonitory to sinners, and comfort- ing to saints. He joined the New York Confer- ence in 1833, having been previously employed, under the Presiding Elder, as the col^gue of the Rev. Dr. Levings, in New Haven, Conn. He filled his appointments generally with great acceptability and usefulness, was active in the erection of churches, and zealous in promoting revivals of religion. He was also actively en- gaged in the temperance cause. His heart waji with the bondman, and he warmly espoused the antislavery cause. His different appointments during the period of his itinerancy were successively Derby Cir- cuit, Hamden, Winsted, Salisbury, West Stock- bridge and Canaan Circuit, Hillsdale, Spencer- town, Hudson, Forty-first-street, New York city, Harlem, and Richmond. He became superannuated in 1853. Settling in the village of Fordham, Westchester County, N. Y., he built a small place of worship, col- lected together a small membership, organized a Sunday-school, and preached as he was able, 144 SACRED MEMORIES. assisted from time to time by the Local Preach- ers. In his best days Brother Bain bridge was a beautiful singer. His Christian charity was unbounded. He never took up a reproach against his neighbor, and nothing grieved him more than the. prevalence of slander or evil speaking. He was deeply affected by the late war. and was accustomed to say that he only wished to live that he might see the Union restored upon right principles, and the contest triumphantly closed in the suppression of the rebellion. He was a great sufferer for the six months previous to his death, but was calm and resigned. The grave was not shrouded in gloom, nor was death to him the king of ter- rors. For the last few days before his death he geemed completely loosened from the things of earth, and to be perfectly absorbed in the things of God and of heaven. He was taken suddenly worse on Saturday, March 8, 1862, and from that time failed rapidly. On the following Sab- bath J. S. Perry called to see him, and to him he said, " I trust in Christ crucified ; he is my only hope."* From that time he grew rapidly worse, and on Monday morning, at half past two o'clock, March 10, 1862, he sweetly fell asleep in Jesus. SACRED MEMORIES. 145 BENJAMIN GRLFFEN. Benjamin Griffen was the son of John and Esther Griffen. He was born in Mamaroneck, Westchester County, JSL Y., June 6, 1792, and died in the adjoining town of Rye, June 20, 1861, aged sixty-nine years. In early life Brother Griffen was of a lively and cheerful tempera- ment, and won a large circle of friends. When about nineteen years of age he experienced re- ligion, and joined the Methodist Episcopal Church. At a- neighborhood meeting, held in the house of his stepfather, Miss Mary Halsted, his half sister, arose and spoke. As she talked of heaven and $[esus her own heart grew warm, and the words, like good seed, fell upon the heart of her brother, already prepared by a pious mother's culture. While she yet talked, this startling question arose in young Griffon's mind, and demanded an answer, " Shall heaven and hell divide this family ? " The question was too stern, and the impression upon his mind too deep, to admit of evasion or delay, and as that sister, with a joyful radiance upon her counte- nance, sank into her seat, the resolve was taken, and the deliberate answer came almost to the lip, *' No, they shall not ! " With the same de- cision which ever marked his character he went directly to the cross of Christ, and. soon expe- rienced religion. 10 t 146 SACKED MEMORIES. Almost immediately he entered upon the work of his Master. His first attempt to speak in public was at the house of Mr. A. Gales, near his native place. He arose much agitated, and with deep emotion said, " You all know better what to say than I do ; but I warn you all to flee from the wrath to come." Short, but effective sermon ! God set his seal to it. By its instrumentality one man was convicted and led to Christ. This lay serjpon was the germ of a long and useful ministry. Soon after, he was licensed to preach. In 1811 he was received on trial by the Xew York Con- ference, and remained a member of it except a location of five years for fifjy years. The class with which he entered Conference con- sisted of fourteen members, of whom only one survived him Rev. Samuel Luckey, D.D., wt Western Xew York. In a Conference of two hundred and sixty-eight members we have only one remaining who entered the itinerant ranks at an earlier date, namely, Rev. Marvin Rich- ardson. Brother Griffen filled the following appoint- ments : Saratoga, Litchfield, and Stamford Cir- cuits. In 1816 he located, and entered into the dry goods business in Xew York. This he afterward regretted, and in 1821 was readmit- ted to the Conference, and stationed in Troy that and the succeeding year. He then labored SACRED MEMORIES. 147 successively upon Pittstown, "Saratoga, and Charlotte Circuits. In 1829 and 1830 he la- bored on New Windsor, and the two following years on the 'New Paltz Circuit. He was Pas- tor of the Willett-street Church in 'New* York city in 1832 and 1833. His next charge was Kingston and Rondout. Here he remained one year, and was then appointed to the oversight pf Rhinebeck District, where he labored four years. In 1839 and 1840 he was stationed in Brooklyn, where he organized the Centenary Church. The two following years he was Pas- tor of the Bedford-street Church, New York. In 1843 and 1844 he labored at Flushing, L. I., and then took the pastoral oversight of the Wash- ington-street Church, Poughkeepsie. From there he returned to the Centenary Church, Brooklyn, and then had charge of the New York District four years. In 1852 and 1853 he was again stationed at Kingston, and the two following years in Newcastle and Pine's Bridge. Then he had charge of the Church in White Plains. In 1858 he was the Pastor of the Cold Spring Church, and for the last two years of his life he acted as Conference Tract Agent. At the last Conference he was appointed for the third time to Kingston, but never reached his field of labor. In 1853 Brother Griffen was elected Secre- tary of his Conference, and was re-elected an- 148 SACRED MEMORIES. nually to the time of his death. "Writing up the records of the recent session was about the last of his earthly work. He was elected a delegate to the General Conference in 1848, and also in 1856 and 1860. At the last two sessions of that body he was first Assistant Secretary. He was a man of strict integrity. He never sacrificed principle to policy. A pure conscience* was to him above price ; lie never sold it for gain or popularity. Possessed in an eminent degree of these elements of character, Brother Griften rose in the estimation of his brethren just in proportion to the intimacy of their ac- quaintance with him. He never had so dear a place in the hearts of his brethren as in the later years of his ministry. He was an excellent expounder of ecclesiasti- cal law. Few remaining among us are so well versed in the polity of the Methodist Episcopal * Church. As a disciplinarian he was strict, per- haps rigid, following the letter of the law. Brother Griften was a good preacher sound in theology, scriptural, practical, and plain. God has graciously crowned his ministry with success. On his return from the seat of Conference he stopped at the house of his son. in the city of Xew York, and complained of excessive fatigue. The next day he reached his home in Rye, and imme- diately began his preparations for a removal to SACRED MEMOEIES. 149 his remote field of labor. While thus engaged he was taken sick. His painful illness, which lasted five weeks, was borne with great fortitude and Christian resignation. On the third day of his sickness he said to his wife, " My work is done." Shortly before his death he called his wife, and said, " My dear, I am going." "Where?" she inquired. "To heaven. I am going up, up, up, to be forever with the Lord. Halleluiah! halleluiah! halleluiah!" His weeping companion asked, " Father, what shall I do?" ' Follow me, as I have followed the Saviour." He then asked for his son-in- law, Mr. Halsted, who was absent, and then for his daughter. When she came to his bedside, he took her by the hand, and said, " O, daugh- ter, how much you have been upon my mind ! Strive to meet me in heaven." He gave direc- tions for his funeral, requesting that little might be said, " only I am a sinner saved by grace," and expressing a desire that his funeral might be without display, and that his body might be interred in his own plat of ground in the village of 'Rye. He "fell asleep" on Thursday after- noon at six o'clock. Just as the bright June sun was sinking in the west, his sun arose to set no more forever. Rev. P. Rice, D.D., his early companion in toil and his constant friend, preached his funeral sermon, assisted in the services by Revs. Yin- 150 SACKED MEMOKIES cent, Durbin, Floy, and Richardson. His friends gathered to take the final look, and drop their tears upon his coffin, and then all that was mor- tal of Rev. Benjamin Griffen was laid quietly . to rest in the beautiful cemetery close by the shore of Long Island Sound, waiting the sum mons to arise. PELATIAH WARD. Pelatiah Ward was born in Dover, Duchess County, N. Y. While studying law at Pough- keepsie he attended the Cannon-street Method- ist Episcopal Church, and there, under the pun- gent and faithful appeals of Rev. J. B. Merwin, he was awakened to see himself a lost sinner. The, past, with its sins and errors, and the fu- ture, with its responsibilities and consequences, were- before him. He had reached, in a moral view, that point in his history where two ways meet, and from which they diverge one lead- ing to earthly glory and honor, the other to a cross and a crown. While pondering the ques- tion- as to the path he should pursue, he went to hear Professor Mahan preach from the text, "How can ye believe who receive honor one of another?" That sermon decided his course. At its close he rose, went forward to the front of the pulpit, and falling down on his face, asked the prayers of the Church in his behalf. SACRED MEMORIES. 151 Soon after, lie found peace in Christ, and turned his attention to the Christian ministry. He brought to the work abilities of a high order. Nature had lavished upon him rare and choice gifts. He had a presence of unusually fair and noble proportions, which but, indicated the char- acter and proportions of his mind. There was a quickness of conception, a power of analysis, a readiness of utterance, and an eloquence of expression rarely surpassed. He also possessed a feeling, affectionate heart, which made him a special favorite in social life. He was, in the best sense of the term, a gentleman ; full of that kindness and affability which constitutes true nobility ; and with this there was combined great courage. His was the type of character symbolized in the " sea of glass mingled with fire/' or, afte? the model of Him " who was made higher than the heavens," at one moment represented as a lamb, and at another as a lion. In 1846 he joined the New York Conference, and served in succession the following appoint- ments : Duchess, Lee, Salisbury, New Concord, Chatham, Harlem, Yonkers, Yorkville. He was well received in all these appointments, and in some of them eminently successful. In the spring of 1861 he was appointed to Ellenville, and entered upon his work with promise of great success and usefulness. The 152 SACRED MEMORIES. people were just learning to love him as a Pas- tor, when suddenly, under the impulses of those st ran jie and unnatural times, he appeared before them in another and a new relation. The gov- ernment wanted soldiers, and his was one of those generous and determined spirits that said this call must be met. Under the influence of his stirring, and almost resistless appeals, some one hundred and thirty men rallied to the stand- ard within the short period of ten. days. He thought to go with those who thus gathered about him as chaplain of the regiment in which they enlisted, and had the position offered for his acceptance. But such were the attachments formed fur him, and such the confidence in his bravery and adaptation to the office, that with one voice his men clamored for him as their commander ; and when their vStes were cast, without exception, they demanded him as their captain. He felt himself in honor bound to comply, and gave himself at once to the faithful discharge of the onerous duties of his new call- ing. How well he succeeded let the earnest and enthusiastic testimony of those who remain of his brave men determine. Xo statements of less interested parties are worthy of attention. He went with them to the seat of war. He never even left them on furlough to visit his a much-beloved family. He marched with them, and shared their hardships ; and when called to SACKED MEMORIES. 153 face the enemy, he fought at their head until the deadly missile laid him low, and he could do. no more. At the following session of his Conference, such was the love for him of his brethren in the ministry, and'their confidence in his integrity and Christian patriotism in the course he had pur- sued, that they regularly continued his standing with them, and, as. the only way of meeting the case, he was given a " nominal " appointment. We hoped to have him return again, when this dreadful war had been brought to a Success- ful issue, and resume his place in the pulpit and pastorate. But it is otherwise, and we bow in submission. On Saturday, August 30, while engaged in deadly combat with the demon re- bellion, he received a serious wound in the right arm by some fragment from a bursting shell, having the appearance of the point of an old sword. Thus in part disabled, he retired a lit- tle, and used his revolver as best he could with his left hand. . While thus standing in the rear, for the sixth time that day the color-bearer was shot down. Such fatality had attended that position that no one again volunteered to save it from disgrace. At that moment our lines were falling back, and those of the enemy advancing, and the flag, lying between the two, about to be captured, when Ward sprang to the front, and, raising it 154 SACRED MEMORIES. above his head, shouted to his men to stand firm. Within five minutes a Minie ball tore clear through his hips, making a wound an inch in diameter. He fell, but encouraged his men to hold their ground and not to mind him. They bore him off the field ; but while so doing, the bloodthirsty fiend, as if determined to make an end of so brave an opponent, directed a piece of shell that made a fearful wound across the small of his back. Thus mangled, three true hearts, with strong arms, carried him six miles to Centerville. and thence he was taken to the hospital at Alexandria, where, under the best attention that could be given, he lingered until Tuesday evening, September 2, when he yielded up his spirit to God who gave it. Rev. Mr. Van Santvoord, Chaplain of the Twentieth, conversed with him the day he died, and received his assurances of confidence in Christ as his Saviour, and of eternal safety and happiness in heaven when the storm of life wa? over. From the best information we can gather, he maintained his Christian character while in the army. He occasionally exercised his ministerial functions. He rebuked the wickedness of those about him. In the pocket of the tattered coat, in which for three days, through fire and smoke, he had followed the flag of his country, was found the well-fingered pocket Testament, from SACRED MEMORIES. 155 wlych he had learned not only his duty to his God, but also to his country. In the last letter he ever wrote to those he loved most he uttered a sentiment which indi- cates a patriotism unsurpassed in the history of the world : " If I fall, my wife will have the satisfaction of knowing she has contributed a husband, and my children a father, for the sal- vation of the country." May we not say of the departed, " The beauty of Israel is slain upon thy high places." Ye hills of Manasses, " let there be no dew, nei- ther let there be rain upon you, npr fields of offerings : for there the shield of the mighty is cast away as though he had not been anointed. How are the mighty fallen, and the weapons of war perished ! " NATHAN RICE. Nathan Rice was born June 10, 1Y92, in Coventry, Rhode Island ; and died in Washing- tonville, K Y., February 21, 1864. His father died when he was four years old. His mother was a pious member of the Free-will Baptist Church. The fervent prayers of this sainted mother sometimes awakened the subject of this memoir from his midnight slumbers. He was the youngest of seven children. The family 156 SACKED MEMORIES. during his infancy moved to Great Barrington, Mass. The first sermon he heard by a Method- ist minister was from the late Rev. William Jewett. At about the age of seventeen he was led to the Saviour by the instrumentality of the Rev. Phineas Rice, deceased. He joined the Methodist Episcopal Church in Lee, Mass., and continued an active and useful member for ten years. In 1819 he joined the Xew York An- nual Conference with Daniel Coe, John Bangs. Oriu Pier, G. Coles, and S. D. Ferguson. The / o Conference then embraced all the territory in- cluded in the present Troy, Xew York East, and ISTew York Conferences. He was successively appointed to the following fields of labor, name- ly : Delaware, Sullivan, Petersburgh, Granville, Conn., Pittston, Warren, Saratoga, Middle- town, Xew York, Sullivan, Xew Windsor, Phil- lipstown, Bedford, Xew Milford, Huntington, Smithtown, West Hampton, Xorth Hempstead, Woodstock. Marlborough, and Rossville. In 1854, worn down with toil on these distant fields of labor, be was obliged to retire from the itinerant field. Since then, as a superannu- ated minister, he has continued to labor as his strength and health would admit. Part of this ^iiiie he has acted as a colporteur, and part of the time he has supplied pulpits which have been temporarily vacant by the absence or sick- ness of a pastor. To the measure of his ability SACRED MEMORIES. 157 he has spent these years of age and infirmity in doing good. ~No longer able to maintain his position in the front rank of the sacramental host, where he had stood for thirty-five years, he cheerfully fell back, and for the last ten years has formed a part of that heroic rear-guard, made up of veteran warriors. His last battle was nobly Bought, and death is vanquished. Another good man, another good minister, has finished his earthly course ; another star, less brilliant than some, but gentle and pure as any, has hid itself in heaven's own light. Brother Rice was a true patriot. He looked upon the late rebellion as a horrible crime against God and humanity, and anxiously de- sired to live to see it overthrown. Until almost the last hour of his life*he eagerly inquired after the news from the seat^ of war. Our sainted brother was an example of simplicity. There was no display in or out of the pulpit. His method of preaching was plain, direct, earnest, and interwoven with a happy personal experi- ence. His unmistakable aim was to do srood : cj 7 and God honored his ministry with great suc- cess. Many who linger on earth many who are now with him were saved by his instru- mentality. He counted not his life dear unto himself, so that he might win souls to -Christ. On circuits very large, far apart, and sometimes ry rough, he crossed mountains, encountered 158 SACRED MEMORIES. winter storms, and forded rivers, that he might , attain the object of his mission, the salvation of men. Without murmur or complaint he steadi- ly pursued his course. His life of sacrifice and toil is now over. The last river death i& forded ; and the bliss of a great reward, a home unswept by winter storms, is his forever. Kind- ness was a law of his life. He delighted in the welfare of. others. His was a sympathetic na- ture. It is doubted whether he had an enemy. All classes of various denominations, ministers and people, vied with each other in showing their tokens of respect and sympathy during his last sickness. There was a humble, unaffected goodness about him which drew all hearts to- ward him. His attachment to his family w r as a marked characteristic. . Sickness, pain, death could not quench this steady flame. Indeed, the only regret he manifested at approaching death was, that it would take him from his dear children. It was one of the comforting assur- ances of his declining days that they were all the followers of Jesus. And well did they re- ciprocate his love by their tireless ministrations day and night during his sickness. It only remains to gather up a few of the precious words which fell from the lips of our brother as he "still went on and talked," catch- ing glimpses of the heavenly city by the way, and coming up at last to the mount of vision, SACRED MEMORIES. 159 where the calm, unclouded glory shone steadily about him. The arrangements for his funeral and burial were made by himself. He expressed a desire, if it were God's will, to visit the Con- ference once more and see his brother ministers. But in anticipation that he might not be able, he said to me, "Tell the Conference, the relig- ion I have preached for forty-five years sustains and comforts me now. I love my brethren in the ministry. I expect to meet them in heaven." During a visit, one month before his depart- ure, as we were about to offer prayer, we sang, "I would not live alway; I ask not to stay Where storm after storm rises dark o'er the way ; The few lurid mornings that dawn on ns here Are enough for life's joys, full enough for its cheer. "I would not live alway ; no welcome the tomb 1 Since Jesus hath lain there I dread not its gloom ; There sweet be my rest till he bid me arise, To hail him in triumph descending the skies." During the singing his whole cpuntenance glowed with exultant joy, and while the family wept, he shouted aloud the praises of God. At his request, about three weeks before his end, several ministers of his own and other Churches, together with the family physician, met to join with him in commemorating the suffering and death of Jesus. To him it was to be the " last supper." His three daughters were present, and one of his sons had just returned from the army 160 SACRED MEMORIES. to receive the last blessing of a dying father, and then go back to fight for humanity and God. The desire he had for this passover,. the presence of his brethren and family, and above all, the presence of the Blaster, inspired him with unwonted strength. In a peaceful, happy frame, he said, " God's grace is sufficient for me. ' He wonderfully sustains me. The Gospel which I have preached for forty-five years is my comfort and support now. It never gave me more comfort. I have no doubt. I am sometimes tempted, but not overcome. I have been look- ing over that heavenly country ; it looks very pleasant to me. Many are there I have known and loved. I expect to get there and see them. I may recover. I rather think I shall. I have prayed for this, but I have asked in submission to God's will. I should be glad to stay a little longer on account ^of my family. They have been very dear to me. They have watched over me day ami night during my sickness. They have twined themselves around my heart." His emotions overcame him for awhile ; then he resumed, ' I should be glad to stay with them, a little longer, but I leave it all to God. Tor me to live is Christ, to die is gain.' I have had some hard fields of labor long rides, streams to ford, mountains to cross. I have suffered from cold and hunger. I have abounded and been in want; but if I had my life to live over again, I SACRED MEMORIES. 161 had rather be a preacher of the Gospel than President of the United States." These and similar sentences were uttered at intervals as strength would admit. As he was unable to kneel, he sat in his easy chair during the sacra- mental services. When he who had so often ministered it to others, " took the cup " for the last time, the glory within him broke forth in ascriptions of praise to Him who hath loved us, and given himself for us. Stiir nearer his end he said, " I have just thought what a glorious place heaven is. I have listened and could hear the angels with their golden harps. Such heavenly music ! " His voice faltered. He was overcome by his emotions. Then rallying, he continued, " How happy shall we be when we join that innumer- able throng, where they fall down with the four and twenty elders, and worship Him that sitteth upon the throne for ever and ever." On Saturday afternoon, the day before he died, being in great pain, he said, " I cannot last long ; I should like to live a little longer on account of my dear children, but the will of the Lord be done." When asked if his trust was strong in God, " Yes," he answered emphati- cally; "yes, bless the Lord, I am ready to go whenever the Lord wills it. On another occa- sion he said, " I have gained a great victory, I can now give up my children to God." Shortly 11 162 SACRED MEMORIES. before he died, lie repeated several times, "Life's work is done." When so near his end that he could not speak, he pressed the hand of his daughter as a token of recognition and victory. Yes, sainted- father, life's work is done, and well done. All its conflicts and sufferings are over. On Sabbath morning, the day on which he had been accustomed to go to the house of God. his liberated spirit took its flight to the temple of God in heaven, and while earthly worshipers crowded sacred altars and sang of redeeming love, he gazed upon the glories of the Crucified in open vision, and struck the notes of that sweet anthem which shall never end. JOSIAH L. DICKERSON. Josiah L. Dickerson died May 16, 1864, in Spencertown, Columbia County, N. T., aged sixty-seven years. Our deceased brother was born January 20, 1797, in Newton, Litchfield County. Cong. Left at an early age without the counsel and restraints of paternal care, through the grace of God, in his eighteenth year, he was brought to the knowledge of a justi- fied state, and became a member of the Meth- odist Episcopal Church in Bethlehem, Litchfield County, Conn. After being licensed to exhort, the Church, SACKED MEMORIES. 163 seeing in him the promise of greater usefulness, gave him a license to preach. For eighteen years he labored as a Local Preacher, with ac- ceptability and usefulness, in his native county. In 1822 he was ordained Deacon by Bishop Roberts, and in 1835 received the ordination of Elder at the hands of Bishop Hedding, at which time he was received into the New York Con- ference, and successively filled the following appointments: Kedding, Weston andNewtown, Norwalk, Bedford, Tarrytown and Pleasant- ville, Cortlandt, Pawlings, Tyringham, Shef- field, North East, Spencertown, Tyringham, Egremont, and North Hillsdale. His health failing in 1857, the Conference granted him a superannuated relation, in which he continued until the close of life. In Novem- ber, 1862, he was stricken with paralysis ; from this he never fully recovered, yet was comfort- able in body, retaining his mental faculties. On the 16th of May, 1864, he was again stricken with the same disease ; death ensued in a few hours. Brother Dickerson, before he was in- capacitated by physical weakness or prevented by domestic afflictions, was a faithful, and con- sequently a successful, minister of the Gospel. He had the deportment of a Christian gentle- man ; was sympathetic and kind in feeling; of more than ordinary ability in the pulpit, he was well fitted to win and retain the respect of the 1G4 SACRED MEMORIES. people committed to his charge, and instruct and profit them. Amid all the changes and occasional privations attendant upon the itiner- ancy, the painful bereavements that so fre- quently thinned the family circle, the weighty afflictions that befell him in the loss of health, laying him aside from the active work of the ministry, he did not murmur; his trust was in God. From the manner of his decease, we have no death-bed testimony to record. We need none. In the calm and trusting frame of mind he possessed before the fatal stroke was per- mitted to fall, we confidently gather proof that he has entered upon the reward of Christ's faith- ful followers in heaven. RICHARD SEAMAN. Richard Seaman was born April 28, 1785, and died Kov. 6, 1864, aged eighty. When a little over fourteen he left the home of his child- hood, Herricks, L. I., and came to ISTew York, where he became a clerk in a drug store. He immediately commenced the study of medicine, and when about nineteen was a licensed prac- ticing physician. At the age of twenty-one he was appointed resident physician of the alms- house. This early entrance upon duties so re- sponsible was fully warranted by his mature SACRED MEMORIES. 165 judgment and conscientious devotion to his pro- fession. In the fall of 1812, with the deliberation and firmness which strongly marked his charac- ter, he resolved to devote his life to God's service. From this time his professional services were rendered doubly valuable by the solicitude he continually manifested for the spiritual welfare of those to whose bodily maladies he admin- istered relief. As he loved his profession and pursued it diligently, his practice became large and remunerative ; but from the pressure of con- victions he could not allay he was impelled to abandon it to engage in the duties of the Chris- tian ministry. In 1823 he was received on trial . in the NSw York Conference, and was regularly appointed to different fields of labor for twenty- two years', when, in' 1845, through failure of health, he was obliged to take a superannuated relation. He, however, continued to labor faith- fully according to his ability and opportunity until entirely disabled by disease. Several of the Churches in the upper part of this city are largely indebted for their establishment to his self-sacrificing labor and contributions. Though not w r ealthy, his superior judgment, stern in- tegrity, untiring eifergy, and exact business habits made his name a guarantee for the faith- ful performance of any obligation he was willing to indorse. Modest, generous, transparently true, he filled every sphere in- which he moved 166 SACRED MEMORIES. with such dignity and propriety as to win the respect and confidence of all who knew him. His preaching was eminently evangelical and practical, and was thoroughly imbued with his deep personal religious experience. During the last thirteen years he was a great sufferer. His frame was tortured with rheumatism, and he was obliged to use crutches in walking; but during all this time, as he frequently and joy- fully testified, his communion with God was never once disturbed. The death of his wife, in. 1861, who had been his faithful companion for nearly fifty years, severed the last tie which at- tached him to this world. Being asked, soon after that event, where he lived, he replied, " I board with my nephew, but 1 live with the Lord." This was emphatically true, and he only awaited patiently his translation. In Oc- tober, 1864-, his disease increased in violence, and as he saw his end approaching he requested to be removed to the home of his only brother, Mr. S. Seaman, of this city, where, in the midst of his kindred, who loved him tenderly, he gradually grew weaker in body, but more and more joyous, until he passed away to his re- ward exclaiming, " O, my Saviour, how I love thee ! " SACKED MEMORIES. 167 CHARLES BURROUGHS. Charles Burroughs died in Hamden, ~N. Y., May 26, 1864, aged twenty-three. At an early period of his life the Holy Spirit had wrought deeply upon him, and at the age of thirteen, in a family prayer-meeting at his father's house, he gave his heart to God. From that hour he sought to adorn the doctrine of God his Savioui in all things. A few years ago he began to feel that God was calling him to the work of the Christian ministry, and at once he set himself about that cultivation of heart and mind which he deemed a necessary qualification for his holy calling. At the session of the New York Annual Conference in 1864: he was received as a proba- tioner, and stationed at Hamden. He went to this, his first appointment, heavily burdened under a sense of his responsibilities, and many thought that his untimely death resulted from excessive care and anxiety lest he might not succeed in this new and untried field, of labor. He lived to preach only two Sabbaths to his people ; but that short period of labor secured to him their strong attachment, and to this day many of these are accustomed to say, " O that Brother Burroughs could have lived ! " His pulpit efforts displayed marked ability, and gave great promise of coming iisef'ulness. But God 168 SACRED MEMORIES. saw fit to call him to higher scenes of action, and after an illness of only fourteen days, he fell asleep in Jesus. JOHN B. HAGANY. John B. Hagany was born in the city of Wil- mington, Del/, on the 26th of August, in the year 1808. His father was a highly respected, devout, and useful Local Preacher in the Meth- odist Episcopal Church. The son, John B., united with the Methodist Episcopal Church about the year 1828, and was received on trial in the Philadelphia Annual Conference in 1831, and appointed to Talbot Circuit in Maryland. He continued in the active ministry, as a mem- ber of the Philadelphia, ISTew York East, and Kew York Conference, until his death in the summer of 1865. His pastoral life presents ah unbroken career of thirty-four years, during which he rendered with brief and infrequent vacations the most efficient service to the Church in many of her more prominent positions. No man among us was more uniformly acceptable to the people, or retained to the last a more controlling power in the pulpit. He wore well. His ministrations, instead of diminishing in force and attractiveness, cumulated with advan- cing years into a greater depth, breadth, and SACKED MEMORIES. 1G9 richness. Endowed by nature with a strong and quick intellect, he had, by diligent study, judicious reading, and close observation, ac- quired no ordinary degree of mental culture. In the English classics he was thoroughly read, and from his familiarity with them he derived not only the fullness of information always at his command, but also the nervous, apt, and elegant use of language which marvelously dis- tinguished both his extemporaneous and written compositions. Dr. Hagany was not a universal scholar ; but although his range of studies was limited, he mastered what he undertook, and consequently positiveness of conviction marked his opinions and utterances. In theology he devoted him- self mostly to the old English divines and to John Wesley. It may be safely affirmed that the great founder of Methodism had no more enthusiastic student and lover on the American continent than the subject of this memoir. He had read and inwardly digested every thing which that wise and good man had left on rec- ord, and by habitual communion had become fully imbued with his spirit, ideas, and method. He comprehended Wesleyanism its history, doctrines, polity and could define, defend, and preach it with a skill rare and admirable, and with a success amply attested by the precious results of a long and honored ministry. 170 SACRED MEMORIES. As a preacher, Dr. Hagany possessed the ad- vantage of a fine physique, a voice of extraor- dinary compass and sweetness, and of a quiet self-poise which always rendered him a most agreeable and captivating speaker. His au- dience was put perfectly at ease while he dis- coursed to them on the grand themes of the Gospel in thoughts so fresh and striking, and in words so terse and chaste, as to make his in- structions both entertaining and impressive. A pure imagination wove the facts of a retentive memory and the perceptions of a ripe under- standing into ever-varying forms, which, by their fidelity to nature, simplified and illuminated his subjects so as to render them a charm to all who listened. His sermons were rarely thrilling, but always pleasing, and occasionally overwhelm- ingly emotional. Sometimes his pathos would melt and fuse the hearts of an entire congrega- tion into one stream of holy ecstasy and love. But those who knew this excellent servant of God most intimately will cherish not more the recollection of his public services than the mem- ory of his private walk. He was a devout and earnest Christian, without the ostentation^ of su- perior piety. Endued with refined sensibilities, with a keen- sense of personal honor, he was slow to admit strangers to his heart, and, there- fore, to many seemed cold and reserved ; but when once he found a man worthy his confi- SACRED MEMORIES. 171 denee he hesitated not to lavish all his affections upon him, and could neither speak too highly in his praise, nor be too frequently in his com- pany. And it was necessary to see him in a group of such friends to understand and appre- ciate his character fully. There he shone the brightest; as a companion one of the pleasant- est, and as a conversationalist racy and spark- ling, with an apt allusion or anecdote to point each thought, his whole talk suffused and suf- fusing others with an innocent and irresistible mirthfulness. In the gush and flow of compan- ionship, however, he never forgot or forsook the dignity of the minister, nor failed to manifest and maintain toward serious subjects the rev- erence- which is their due. Of late Dr. Hagany had often alluded to dying in the hearing of his friends ; but so habitually cheerful was 1 his temper, and appar- ently perfect his health, that little account was taken of it. He preached on Sunday, June 25, 1865, to his congregation on " Let me die the death of the righteous, .and let my last end be like his." The subject so enlarged upon him that he postponed a part of it to the evening, but because of sickness was unable to preach. He spent Tuesday following in an agreeable visit 'with his friend, Rev. J. B. Wakeley, at Yonkers. On Wednesday he was feeling more comfortable, and in the afternoon, while reading 172 SACKED MEMOKIES. Mr. Wesley's Journal, he met a passage refer- ring to Mr. Jeremiah Seed's Sermons. He got a volume of the " Works," found the passage, called his wife's attention to it, and began to read aloud, when suddenly he was seized with spasm of the heart, the book dropped from his hand, he fell forward, and almost instantly ex- pired. u He was not, for God took him." " He ceased at once to work and live." JOHN A. SILLICK. John A. Sillick was born in Saratoga, K. Y., May 21, 1805, and died at his residence in ^ew York, Jul}" 10, 1865, aged sixty. He experi- enced religion at the age of twelve, but leaving home to learn a trade about that time, and being constantly associated w r ith those who made no profession of religion, he lost his re- ligions comfort, and soon gave up all pretensions to piety. When about twenty-four he visited his father, Rev. Bradley Sillick, who was then engaged in a revival meeting. He returned from that visit powerfully awakened, and began at once to seek for a restoration of the divine favor. The struggle was an earnest one, and while at work, tears streaming from his eyes, and just ready to give up all hope of mercy, faith took hold of the Saviour, and light broke SACRED MEMORIES. 173 upon his darkened mind. With a bounding heart, he ran to tell his shopmates what God had done for his soul. Soon after he felt called of God to the ministry, for which he felt him- self entirely incompetent. Expressing his con- victions, his 'employer, an unconverted man, tried to dissuade him, and offered him the en- tire control of the shop. He accepted the posi- tion, but soon after he was disabled by an accf- dent, and for a time obliged to stop work. This providential circumstance, as he regarded it, led him to the conclusion that he ought to obey God rather than man, and he began to prepare for the ministry. He spent two years at the Wilbraham Academy, and about two years at the Wesleyan University. In 1834 he joined the New York Conference, and was stationed on Burlington Circuit. He remained in the ]S r ew York Conference till it was divided in 1848, when, by the division, he fell in the New York East Conference. In 1854 he was transferred to the New York Conference, and continued his effective labors till 1861, when he took a superannuated relation, and settled at Yorkville, New York city. He was twenty- seven years an effective minister, laboring with acceptability and success on his charges, some of which were laborious, and four years he was superannuated. For years he was afflicted with dyspepsia, 174 SACRED MEMORIES. which affected not only his physical, but at times, more or less, his intellectual powers. In May last he was confined to his room ; but his mind was composed, and for the time being he seemed very happy. Indeed, the last Sabbath in May was to him and his family a memorable Sabbath. During the day we entered his room and found him weeping. After a little he said, '*! am no worse; I am happy ; I have just ob- tained a great victory." But as his disease con- tinued^ to wear upon him he became more or less mentally deranged, and seemed doubtful v O / and despondent till his death. Those who knew him best, and those who saw him frequently dur- ing his last days, can only believe that he is at r^st in that world where physical disease will never more disturb his intellectual powers or the ' ; peace profound which his unfettered soul enjoys." He was a kind, generous, companion- able man, a good preacher, practical, cntertai* ing, and instructive, and no doubt many spirit ual children will be stars in his crown of re- joicing. LEYERETT GOODRICH ROMAINE. Leverett Goodrich Romaine was born in Maryland, Otsego County, K Y., April .12, ISiO. His educational advantages were good o o and well improved. He was blessed with the SACKED MEMORIES. 175 pious counsels and careful training of the late venerable Dr. Nott. These, under God, fixed his habits of thought and of life, and pointed to a future of great usefulness in the Church of Christ. He was converted at Hudson-street, Albany, undei the pastoral labors of Rev. B. O. Meeker. His religious experience was clear, and continued satisfactory to the last. When called to preach the glorious Gospel of the Son* of God he entered earnestlv upon the work, and '' * t his Master crowned his labors and gave him souls as seals to his ministry. In 1863 he was employed as assistant to Rev. C. W. Lyon 011 West Point Charge, then embracing West Point, Buttermilk Falls, and Fort Montgomery. His history in New York Conference is very brief. At its session in 1864 he was received on trial. It is no trifling tribute to his worth when we say that his standing was favorable in the class of promising young men received at that ses- sion. His first appointment was Glenham, on the Poughkeepsie District ; but during the year he was appointed to Cannon-street, Poughkeep- sie, a vacancy having occurred by the removal of Brother M'Lean to Lexington Avenue, New York city. In the sprii^ of 1865 he was ap- pointed to Southfield, on Newburgh District, and then, on the third of November, without a moment's warning, by a collision on the Erie Railroad, his life and labors closed. He leaves * 176 SACRED MEMORIES. no dying teetimony upon which we may dwell and over which we may at the same time weep and rejoice. The record of a short life well spent is all that we have, and, thank God! all that we, in the light of holy truth, can ask. A widow and an infant daughter survive him, cher- ishing his memory, and resting in the promises which God has given especially to the widow *and the fatherless. JOSEPH T. HAND. Joseph T. Hand was born June 26, 1838, near Centreville, Queen Anne County, Md. He de- parted this life at Washingtonville, Jan 20, 1867, aged 28 years. In the autumn of 1855 he was soundly converted, after a struggle of more than a year. How often God tries those he intends for a special work! He immediately united with the Methodist Episcopal Church, and very soon began to be exercised about his duty to preach the Gospel. In 1858 he was licensed to exhort. In this office he .exercised his gifts until June 16, 1860, when he received license to preach. In 1862 he jtas recommended to the Philadelphia Conference as a suitable candidate for the work of the ministry ; but feeling a strong thirst for knowledge, and the necessity of a more thorough preparation for his great work, SACRED MEMORIES. * 177 he withdrew his application and entered himself a student of the Concord Biblical Institute. Here he remained three years, and graduated with great honor. While a student at Concord he supplied a church at Chester, 1ST. PI. Before going to Concord he was a member of the Local Preachers' Association, Eastern District, Philadelphia Conference. He was elected Deacon at the close of his the- ological studies by the New Hampshire Confer- ence, and ordained, April 16, 1865. In the same month he was admitted on trial in the New York Conference, and appointed to the Monroe Circuit. Here he labored with great accepta- bility and usefulness, together with his colleague, Rev. U. Messiter. At the session of the New York Conference of 1866, Monroe Circuit was divided, the Churches at Washingtonville and Craigville being made a separate appointment. Brother Hand was placed in charge. Here, brought into more direct contact with the peo- ple, his earnest and affectionate efforts for their good won him increasing confidence and love. About forty, the fruits of a former revival, were this year admitted by him into full fellowship with the Church. His last sermon was preached Jan. 6th. He came home complaining of headache. Soon his disease assumed a typhoid' form, and in thir- teen days the stout, vigorous, youthful form of 12 ITS SACRED MEMORIES. .Brother Hand fell, a "dissolving tabernacle." During the forepart of his sickness the mind was mostly undisturbed. In the latter part, when reason wandered, there were still lucid moments until near the last. Early in his ill- ness he said to his friends, " I think this is my last sickness." He gave directions for the dis- position of his papers, and for the adjusting of his accounts. He requested that his already bereaved and stricken father might not be in- formed of his illness until his recovery or death, as he was too distant and feeble to visit him. He expressed a submissive desire to live and do something for his Master. When reason reeled from the throne, he was almost constantly en- gaged in singing, prayer, exhortation, or preach- ing. He fancied himself conducting a religious meeting prayed himself, called on those about him to pray, and eluded their delay. At one time he sang, with a loud, clear tone of voice, "A chnrm the record referred to that " from childhood he had an impression on his mind that he should be a minister;" and after his conversion that impres- sion was renewed, and strengthened his heart. He was licensed to preach in February, 1833, two years after his conversion, and for the next two years he filled the office of a Local Preacher. He was received into the traveling ministry as a probationer at the session of the Xew York Conference in the spring of 1835, and appointed to Riverhead, Long Island, X. Y. His subse- quent appointments were : 1836-37, Hempstead Circuit; 1837-39, Harlem Mission. At the Conference for the latter year he was ordained Elder, and appointed to Kortright Circuit, Delaware County, X. Y., but on account of the severe and protracted illness of his wife, render- ing her removal impracticable, he was released from the appointment. From 1840 to 1843 he was at Washington-street Church, Brooklyn ; 1842-44, Danbury, Conn.; 1844-46, Madison- street, New York ; 1847-48, Middletown, Conn. ; 1S48-50, New Bfcven, Conn.; 1850-52, Madi- son-street, Xew York, second time j 1852-54, Twenty-seventh-street, Xew York ; 1854-56 Presiding Elder of Xew York District ; 1856- 60, Editor of Xational Magazine and Secretary SACRED MEMORIES. 265 of the Tract Society of the Methodist Episcopal Church; 1861-63, Seventh-street, New York; 1863, Beekman Hill, New York. Brother Floy was a distinguished man among his brethren. Three times his Conference hon- ored itself by electing him a delegate to the General Conference. His appointments during the twenty-four years of his pastoral life strong- ly indicate the high appreciation that was held of his merits and capabilities ; and it is believed that he never failed to lea^ any charge better than when he came to it. He also took a lively interest in the general affairs of the Church ; was diligent in his attendance on the sessions of his Conference, where his influence was always po- tent. For twenty-eight successive years he filled the places assigned to him by the Church faith- fully and successfully. As a preacher, he was clear, direct, and earnest ; eminently evangeli- cal in doctrine; in exhortation, pungent and ef- fective ; elevated in matter, and rigidly correct in style and manner. His death was sudden, and quite unexpected by either himself or his friends. On the even- ing of Oct. 14, 1863, in his study, with only a son with him, he was seized with apoplexy, and expired almost instantly. His death, so sudden and unexpected, brought sadness to many, who only then realized how much he was beloved. But the circumstances of his demise were not 266 SACRED MEMORIES. comfortless. Quietly, in his own house, and in the arms of a loved and dutiful son, without lin- gering sickness, emaciation, or senility, for his eye was not dim, nor his natural force abated, he rendered up his spirit in the faith and hope in which he had lived. A career, not entirely without its foibles and defects, yet as nearly so as often falls to the lot of erring mortals, waa accomplished ; a character, perhaps not faultless, but elevated far above the common level of hu- manity, had been formed and exercised; and now in the early post-meridian of such a life it ceased on earth to recommence in heaven. BUEL GOODSELL. Buel Goodsell was born in the town of Dover, Duchess County, X. Y., July 25, 1793. Of his childhood and youth we have no special infor- mation other than that at about the age of six- teen he made a profession of religion and joined the Methodist Episcopal Church in the place of his birth. In the year 1814 he was received on trial in the New York Conference, (which then included all the territory now embraced in the New York, New York East, and Troy Confer ences,) and was appointed to the Granville Circuit, in the States of Massachusetts and Con- necticut ; in 1815, Stowe Circuit, Yt. ; 1816, SACRED MEMORIES. 267 Chazy Circuit, N. Y. ; 1817, Middleburgh, Vt. ; 1818-19, St. Albans Circuit, Vt. ; 1820-21, Cb azy Circuit again ; 1822, Charlotte Circuit, Vt. ; 1823-26, Presiding Elder on the Champlain District, including all the territory on the east side of Lake Champlain back to the Green Mountains, and from two to three tiers of towns on the west side of the lake in the State of New York; 1827, Fitchtown, N. Y.; 1828-29, Sche- nectady, N. Y. ; 1830-31, New York ; 1832-33, Troy ; ' 1834-37, Presiding lder on the Troy District; 1838-39, John-street, N. Y. ; 1840-41, North Newburgh, N. Y. ; 1842-43, White Plains, N. Y. ; 1844-45, York-street, Brooklyn ; 1846-47, Willett-street, N. Y. ; 1848-49, Nor- walk, Conn. ; 1850-51, Hempstead, L. I. ; 1852 -53, New Kochelle, N. Y. ; 1854, East Brook- lyn, L. I. ; 1855-58, Presiding Elder of the Long Island District ; 1859-60, Greenpoint, Brooklyn ; 1861-62, Kockaway, L. I. ; 1863, East Chester and City Island, N. Y. He went to his appoint- ment the next Sabbath after receiving it, and preached with great power, greatly exciting the hopes and strengthening the faith of the breth- ren v He returned the next day (Monday) for his family and effects. The latter part of the same week he set out with his wife and daughter in his own carriage for their new home, was ar- rested by disease on the way, called on his friend, L>r, Van Ness, in Brooklyn, where he received 2G8 SACRED MEMORIES. all the attention that affection and medical skill could suggest, and after lingering about a fort- night, amid alternate hopes and fears for the re- sults, he died in great peace and holy triumph on the fourth of May. Brother Goodsell was a laborious, faithful, and successful servant of the Lord Jesus. He had acquired some knowledge of the natural sciences, as also of the Latin and Greek lan- guages, and quite too much to admit of his making an ostentatious, pedantic display of his acquirements. To those who loved and longed for highly intellectual food, and were somewhat fastidious as to its preparation, and the manner of its communication, he might have been more of an apostle had he been more rigidly observant of the rule to express his ideas in as few words as possible, consistent with perspicuity ; but to such as cared only or principally to feel deeply, to be made to weep or to shout, he was a work- man that needed not to be ashamed. He had many living epistles to his ministry, some of whom had preceded him to the better country, even the heavenly ; others are on their w r ay thither. Soon they will all -meet, and having, as we trust it will then be found, turned many to righteousness, he will shine as a star of the first magnitude in the firmament of heaven. SACKED MEMORIES. 260 JOHN KENNADAY, D.D. To the list of sadden deaths occurring of re- cent years among the members of the New York East Conference must be added the name of Rev. John Kennaday. While in the act of delivering an exhortation in the chapel of Washington-street Methodist Episcopal Church, Brooklyn, on the evening of Nov. 13, 1863, he was struck with apoplexy, and after lying in a state of unconsciousness for about twenty-four hours he breathed his last. Up to the time of his death he was actively engaged in the work of the ministry, so that he literally " ceased at once to work and live." He was born in the city of New York, Nov. 13, 1800. In early life he was a printer, devoting even then, how- ever, his leisure ? as far as practicable, to literary pursuits. He was converted under the ministry of the Rev. Heman Bangs, in the John-street Methodist Episcopal Church, Mr. Bangs thus describes very graphically the awakening and conversion of young Kennaday : " It was in John-street, the occasion being a love-feast. Our city (New York) was then one circuit, and we all came together for love-feast into one church, and, consequently, the church was crowd- ed. Among others, a young man arose in the back part of the house, near the gallery, and began to speak. The moment he opened his 270 SACRED MEMORIES. mouth it seemed like pouring oil on Aaron's head ; the odor was such that it seemed to dif- fuse itself all over the congregation, and the fragrance was such that every one seemed to catch it. The inquiry was made, 'Whose sil- very voice is that?" I believe that eloquence which he then manifested, and which seemed to be natural, and easy, and unaffected, continued with him to the last, more or less." In this way did the public life of Dr. Kenna- day begin, and it was prosecuted without abate- ment of energy or zeal for full forty years. In less than a year from his conversion he was licensed to exhort, and shortly thereafter he was employed by a Presiding Elder in New Jersey. Of this ministerial experience he says in his diary : " In every twenty-eight days I preached forty-two sermons, walked one hundred and thirteen miles, and rode one hundred and fifty- two, making in two hundred and fifty-two days three hundred and sixty-nine sermons ; traveled on foot one thousand and seventeen miles, and rode one thousand three hundred and sixty- eight, besides leading classes, attending Sunday- schools, visiting alms-houses, etc." In May, 1823, he was received on probation by the New York Conference. In 1823-24 he traveled Kingston Circuit; 1825, Bloomingburgh Cir- cuit ; 1826, transferred to Philadelphia Confer- ence, and was stationed that and the following SACRED MEMORIES. 271 year at Paterson, K J. ; 1828-29, Newark, N. J. ; 1830-31, Wilmington^ Del. ; 1832, Morristown, N. J. ; 1833, retransTerred to New York Con- ference, and stationed in Brooklyn ; 1835-36, preacher in charge of New York East Circuit, embracing all the churches east of Broadway ; 183T-38, Newburgh, K Y. ; 1839, retransferred to Philadelphia Conference, and that and the following year stationed at Union Church, Phil- adelphia;' 1841-42, Trinity Church, Philadel- phia; 1843-44, second time to Wilmington, Del ; at the close of his pastoral term the Church was divided peacefully, and a new Church organ- ized, called St. Paul's, and for the two follow- ing years Dr. Kennaday was its pastor; 1847 48, again pastor of Union Church, Philadelphia; 1849, Nazareth Church, in that city; 1850,- transferred to New York East Conference, and that and the following year was pastor of Pa- cific-street Church, Brooklyn ; 1852-53, returned to Washington-street Church ; 1851-55, First Church, New Haven, Conn. ; 1856-57, second time to Pacific-street Church, Brooklyn ; 1858- 59, third time to Washington-street Church, Brooklyn ; 1860-61, reappointed to First Church, New Haven, Conn.; 1862, Hartford, Conn.; and in 1863 he was appointed Presiding Elder of Long Island .District, which office he was ad- ministering at the time of his decease. The noticeable fact of this record is the num- 2T2 SACRED MEMORIES. ber of times Dr. Kennaday was returned as pastor to churches that, he had previously served. Of the forty years of his ministerial life twenty- two years, or more than half, was spent in five churches. No fact better attests his long-con- tinued popularity and his power of winning the affections of the people. " As a Christian pas- tor," says Bishop Janes, " Dr. Kennaday was eminent in his gifts, in his attainments, and in his devotion to his sacred calling, and in the seals God gave to his ministry. In the pulpit, he was clear; in the statement of his subject, abundant, and most felicitous in his illustrations, and pathetic and impressive in his applications. * His oratory was of a high order. His presence, his voice, his fluency of speech, his graceful action, his fine imagination, and his fervent feelings, rendered his elocution effective and^ powerful, and gave to his preaching great at- tractiveness and popularity. Out of the pulpit, the ease and elegance of his manners, the vi- vacity and sprightliness of his conversational powers, the tenderness o f his sympathy, and the kindness of his conduct toward the afflicted and needy, and his affectionate notice of and efforts for the childhood and youth of his con- gregation, made him the greatly endeared and beloved pastor." In many respects Dr. Kennaday was the model of a Christian minister. He had the SACRED MEMORIES. 273 pastoral spirit and loved the pastoral work. To preach Christ and watch over Christ's flock seemed his highest joy. There was not a single ministerial duty which he did not perform well. Preaching, exhortation, and pastoral visitation seemed alike easy to him. His readiness and tact never deserted him. An unfailing good sense instinctively suggested to him what was appropriate to each occasion. He was, for these reasons, one of our most available men, for every public service that could be required of a preacher. His ministry in the Philadelphia Conference, from 1839 to 1850, is remembered there to this day as one of extraordinary success ; for it was every-where fruitful of good from its beginning to its close. Sudden death is to the feelings of the living who contemplate it a most painful visitation ; but dying in the act of offering Christ to men as an all-sufficient Saviour relieves sudden death of much of the painful impressions which it otherwise makes upon us. We often say of ourselves, "Happy, if with ray latest breath I may but gasp His name; Preach him to all, and cry in death, Behold, behold the Lamb ! " Just such a death was vouchsafed to Dr. Ken- naday. He did literally " Preach him to all, and cry in death, Behold, behold the Lamb ! " 18 274: SACRED MEMORIES. Like Fletcher of Madeley, he was taken from his pulpit to his death-bed, and thence to his grave. Let us follow him, as he followed Christ. The lesson of Dr. Kennaday's career is an illus- tration of the beauty and joy of a life devoted to the pastorate. Among the Churches his name is as ointment poured forth. But better than all, his name is registered on high with those who have turned many to righteousness, and " shine as the stars for ever and ever." JOHN ELLIS. John Ellis was born in Wales in 1815, and died in the city of Brooklyn on October 22, 1863. He was converted in his twelfth year, and from that time devoted himself with much zeal to the cause of Christ. He began to preach in the twentieth year of his age. He afterward removed to England, where he labored for sev- eral years for the salvation of his fellow country- 'men. From England he came to America, and in 1851-52 was stationed in Cincinnati; in 1853 at In nton ; in 185155 at Gallia Welsh Mission. From 1856 to I860 he was at the Welsh Mission in the city of I^ew York. In 1861 he became superannuated, which relation he continued to the time of his death. multiplied infirmities forbade the at- SACRED MEMORIES. 275 tempt to preach the word, he sought out the flock, and led them into green pastures of Gos- pel truth and experience. It is said by those who heard him in Wales that he was remark- able for eloquence, and attracted crowds to his ministry. Brother Ellis was a man of a meek and quiet spirit, a dignified deportment, and a genial and generous nature. He was a diligent student of the holy Scriptures, his mind was richly stored with theological literature, and his style in the pulpit was clear, eleva40d, and forci- ble. His highest honor was the fidelity with which he discharged his sacred duties, and the testimony of his now scattered people is, that he was to them a faithful minister of Christ. Thus, at the age of forty-seven, he expired far from the scenes of his childhood, affer doing the work of evangelist and pastor, and making full proof of his ministry. His dying testimony was, " I am trusting in the atonement, and all is clear." BAPHAEL GILBERT. Raphael Gilbert, of the New York East Con- ference, died at Whitestone, Queens County, June 6, aged sixty-seven. He was born at Ber- lin, Conn., in 1798. Though circumspect in his moral deportment as he attained to the period of accountability, and always respectful toward 276 SACRED MEMORIES religion, yet he lived without a personal interest in its enjoyment until approaching the period of early manhood. His translation "into the kingdom of God's dear Son" was not a little remarkable. Entirely unacquainted with Meth- odism, and without the slightest intercourse with any of that people, and, indeed, without any of the ordinary facilities of religious instruction, he became deeply impressed with a conviction of the divine holiness and a sense of his own impurity. |is* feelings were deep, and yet he was wholly unable to assign any cause for these impressions. Great tenderness of heart and constant contrition attended him. "JSTot know- ing the Scriptures, neither the power of God," he sought no instruction from the spiritually minded, w r ith whom, however, his intercourse was very limited. Praying and weeping, he sought constant retirement, and continued^for many weeks in this strange course of exercise. On one occasion, after an earnest effort in prayer, he arose from his knees feeling a re- markable transition from sorrow to joy. Even this change was as " a light shining in dark- ness," " and the darkness comprehended it not.'' On stating his feelings to a dear friend, he was told, " You are converted. God has come to you and given you a new heart." In a little time he sought an interview with the Rev. Reuben Harris, the preacher upon the circuit, SACRED MEMORIES. 277 from whom he obtained great encouragement, and under whom he attached himself to the Church. Brother Harris was a man of great simplicity of manners, utterly void of guile. It was fortunate that the young disciple became so early acquainted with one of such purity of character. Young Gilbert soon commenced a course of usefulness, and a deportment which, continuing through all his years, commended him always to the Church. In 127 he was ad- mitted a probationer into the New York Con- ference, and appointed to New Windsor Circuit, on which he continued the following year; in 1829, Wethersfield Circuit; in 1830-31, Essex Circuit; in 1832-33, Woodbury Circuit; in 1834, Stratford Circuit ; in 1835-36, York-street, Brooklyn ; in 1837-38, Seventh-street, New York ; from 1839 to 1842 he remained superan- nuated, through the failure of his health ; in 1843 he was appointed supernumerary to Madi- son-street, New York ; from 1844 to 1857 he again occupied a superannuated position ; in 1858 he was appointed to Wethersfield ; in 1859- 60, Astoria ; in 1861, supernumerary, and taking charge of Astoria; in 1862-63, Whitestone, where his labors were finished. During the seasons in which he held the place of a super- annuated man his labors often exceeded his strength, and it was w T ith no little difficulty that he was restrained. His usual appearance 278 SACRED MEMORIES. indicated comparative health and strength, but a severe affection of the throat and head, and a general debility, often led to sudden prostration, and upon the slightest pulpit effort. During much of the time in which impaired health prevented his labors in the ministry he engaged in business, which he conducted actively, but never to the detriment of his religious zeal, and to an extent so limited as not to entangle him. Through tho^p scenes " where many a mightier has been slain," he passed in safety, never fal- tering in integrity, nor incurring the slightest imputation. At the Conference held in "Will- iamsburgh in the spring of 1863 such was his healthful appearance, and such his cheerfulness, that several of his friends congratulated him upon his improved health. One of his friends said to him, surprised at his seeming vigor, "Why, Brother Gilbert, do you never mean to die?" "]S r o," replied he with a smile, "I do not expect to die ; I expect to fall asleep in Jesus." This expression was remarkably veri- fied as the time came when God took him. He was attacked by a violent cold, terminating in congestion of the lungs, about the last of May, and on the evening of June 5, 1864, without a pang, or the slightest sign of suffering, he so gently slept in Jesus that none knew the hour of his death from that of rest. Through his ill- ness the same calm reliance upon God, always SACKED MEMORIES. * 279 BO conspicuous in his life, was manifest. His joy frequently found utterance in his exclama- tions. *< Halleluiah !" "Victory!" "Victory in the blood of the Lamb ! " were frequent utter- ances while he had strength to speak. Brother Gilbert was an unaffected Christian, humble and ardent in spirit. His eyes seemed a fount- ain of tears, so that his preaching was unusu- ally tender. Pathos, earnestness, and plainness characterized his appeals, while the absence of all guile rendered them impressive. As a friend, he was ardent and reliable. No one familiar with his Christian walk, his industry, and re- ligious care in all things would ever hesitate to say of him, " Mark the perfect man, and behold the upright, for the end of that man is peace." CHARLES R. ADAMS. Charles R. Adams was born May 20, 1816. Having been converted, he felt that his calling was more specific than merely .to general use- fulness, and that it was to preach the Gospel of the Son of God. Brother Adams was appointed to the Essex Charge, Conn., by the Presiding Elder in 1841, received int.o the New York Conference in 1842, and returned to the same charge. His ministry there was greatly blessed, and his memory to 280 . SACRED MEMORIES. ''this day is warmly cherished. In every place where Brother Adams . lived and labored he was more than esteemed beloved, witn an ex- ceedingly tender friendship. His ministry was often crowned with revival and regenerating power. Brother Adams was embarrassed in his ministry by a persistent bronchial irritation, which finally terminated his public labors, and retired him to the superannuated ranks ; yet, as a superannu- ated man, he continued to labor locally, as his strength permitted, to the last. When the field was divided he fell into the i^ew York East Conference, and at its session of 1852 was granted a supernumerary relation in conse- quence of feeble health. Disappointed in his hope of restored strength, he asked for and re- ceived a superannuated relation, in which he remained until his death. The last ten "years of his life were spent in Chicago. A few months he supplied the Church in Lockport, 111. He had a clear scriptural experience, and his testi- mony in social meetings was always profitable. In prayer he was unusually gifted, especially in prayer for seekers of religion. At such times the windows of heaven seemed to open, and he bore the penitent directly to the mercy-seat. Ordinarily the sunshine of sweet contentment, of quietness and assurance, overspread his feat- ures, and showed his interior life was a happy SACRED MEMORIES. 281 one. In his active ministry he was useful, hav- ing the wisdom that winneth souls. He died of an affection of the brain Tuesday, February 28, 1865. Such was his disease that it precluded rational conversation. His letters to his absent family until the very last were full of faith and comfort, radiant with hope, strong in confidence. Occasionally there were gleams of momentary sunshine in his last hours, show- ing that light was on his pathway. We know his manner of life and conversation, and know- ing, have strong confidence that he rests in peace. WILLIAM H. GILDER. William H. Gilder, one of the members of the New York East Conference, and chaplain of the Fortieth (Mozart) Kegiment of New York Vol- unteers, died in Culpepper, Va., Wednesday, April 13, 1864, of small-pox, after an illness of fifteen days. His health had "been greatly im- paired by an attack of typhoid fever, from which he suffered in 1863. During his last visit to New York he remarked to a friend that he was not in a fit condition to return to the army, but that, nevertheless, he would go. His sense of duty to his regiment was so strong that he would not, unless absolutely disabled, absent himself from his post. 282 SACRED MEMORIES. At the time of his death Brother Gilder was about fifty-two years of age. He was the son of Mr. John Gilder, for many years a well- known and leading Methodist layman of Phila- delphia. He entered the Philadelphia Confer- ence in 1833, and was stationed first at Cross- wicks, N". J. The following year he was sta- tioned at Elizabethtown. In 1835 he was sta- tioned at Germantown, Pa. His labors having impaired his health, he was for several years returned in the Conference Minutes as super- numerary, and resided in the city of Philadel- phia, where he was engaged in mercantile busi- ness. About 1840 he established at Philadelphia the "Pearl and Repository,' 1 an independent Methodist paper, to which several of the Meth- odist ministers of the city were contributors. Rev. Dr. Ryerson, of Canada, once pronounced this paper one of the best that came from the States. For some years our deceased brother filled with great ability the position of Principal of the Female Institute at Bordentown, N. J. He afterward became President 'of Flushing Female College, at St. Thomas's Hall, Flushing, L. I. - Under his management this school at- tained an extensive reputation as a first-class seminary. While at Bordentown he established the " Literary Register," which attained a large circulation, and was only discontinued when the cares of the school at Flushing, absorbing all SACRED MEMORIES. 283 his time, prevented his attending to editorial duties. In all,, he was for about seventeen years identified with the cause of education as a practical teacher, holding during this time an effective relation to his Conference, and sharing in a high degree the esteem of his fellow- preachers. Our brother had been identified with the Fortieth New York Regiment from the time of its original organization. He shared in all its campaigns, except when actually compelled by ill health to spend a few weeks at home. He performed the duties of his responsible po- sition with exemplary zeal, and received there- for most gratifying evidences of esteem from the officers and soldiers with whom he was called to associate. On his sick-bed, and before his disease had developed alarming symptoms, he partly wrote and partly dictated a letter to his brethren of the New York East Conference. ^V e were then in session, and it was his hope that his iraternal greeting would reach the seat of the Conference to be read to us ; but before its arrival the Con- ference had adjourned, and he himself had taken his departure to the better world. From the Rev. R. A. Chase, of the East Maine Conference, and Chaplain of the Fourth Regi- ment Maine Volunteers, we have some interest- ing particulars of Brother Gilder's last illness. 284 SACKED MEMORIES. He contracted the disease of which he doubtless died in the regimental hospital. On the 8th of April, in reply to a note from Chaplain Chase, he dictated a few sentences expressive of the stale of his mind: "With the uncertainty of life and death before*me, I desire to express my unshaken confidence in the merits of the atone- ment of Christ as the only ground of my hope of salvation. I am not afraid to die; neither, except on account of my family, have I any strong desire to live. I feel perfectly resigned to the Divine will. I have been endeavoring to trust in Christ and serve him ever since thir- teen years of age. Nor do I ever regret having entered the United States service. I have no depression of feeling, nor any buoyancy. I feel resigned and hopeful. My sky is clear." Not long before he expired he said to his son, u I am in the hands of one whom I can trust ; I feel that I am perfectly safe ;" and when he could no longer speak he intimated by signs that all was well. K his regiment his death occasioned the deepest regret, and at a meeting of the officers it was resolved that his remains should be es- corted to the depot at Brandy Station with every solemnity by the whole regiment. This was ac- cordingly done on the afternoon of the 15th of April, 1864. Thus has passed away a Christian, a patriot, and a true hero. Armed only with the mio-ht SACRED MEMORIES. 285 of meekness and love, ambitious only to fulfill the duties of a Christian minister, he has laid down his life as a willing sacrifice for his coun- try and his God. His pure example remains as a precious legacy to us who survive him. ROBERT ROBERTS. Robert Roberts, the subject of this memoir, was born in a small village in Lincolnshire, En- gland, in the year 1832, and died in the city of Brooklyn, January, 1865. At the early age of fifteen years he experienced religion, and at once became a zealous and faithful follower of the Saviour. He very soon began to feel serious impressions of a call to preach the Gospel. Following these leadings, at the age of eighteen he became a Local Preacher, and four months after this was received as a traveling preacher among the Primitive Methodists. . For four years he traveled until he was received into full connection, and the same year, 1855, he came to this country. He brought with him excellent letters of recommendation from the Primitive Methodists. Providence directed his steps to a small village on Long Island, where he was re- ceived as a member of society, and by his cer- tificate recognized as a Local Preacher. Here the people were edified and profited. Those 286 SACRED MEMORIES. who had a right to judge saw that God was with him, and that he had a gift, and deemed it proper that he should go forth upon this holy calling. A vacancy at this time occurring at Sag Harbor, thither he was sent by the Presiding Elder, where, during the balance of the year, he la- 'bored most acceptably. Here he was recom- mended to the New York East Conference, where, in the spring of 1856, he was received as a probationer, and appointed to Greenport, L. I.; in 1857-58 at Good Ground ; in 1859-60 at Newtown and Middle Tillage Circuit ; in 1861- 62 at New Utrecht, where, at the desire of the Charge, he obtained a superannuated relation, that he might serve them the third year. In each of those places named God blessed his la- bors, and gave him souls for his hire. His last appointment in 1864 was at Cook-street, where he labored until his death. His last sermon was preached on Sunday evening, just two weeks before he died. An unusual solemnity of feel- ing seemed to rest upon him, a premonition that his work was done. His text was, " What- soever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might ; for there is no work, nor device, nor knowledge, nor wisdom, in the grave whither thou goest." At the close of the sermon he ' gave utterance to the following language : " I call heaven and earth to witness that I have set life and death before you." "I this night de- SACKED MEMOEIES. 287 clare my skirts clear of the blood of you all." " I feel to-night as though I were delivering to you my last message ;" then withhe'art melted, and eyes suffused, he bade them meet him in heaven. Prophetic words ! From that church he went home, sick and faint, to die. For two weeks he lingered upon the shore in mortal sickness. U I have a great desire," he often would say, " to get well on account of my dear wife and chil- dren." "I feel fully resigned to the will of heaven. I have no fears for the future. My way is all clear." But O, how did his heart yearn for his dear companion and four little ones ! Yet even this was but temporary. The victory was to be complete. Grace enabled him to yield up his dearest earthly loves, and to turn them over to the hands of Him w T ho hath said, " I will be a father to the fatherless, and a hus- band to the wiBow." For the first night during his illness his wife had left him to take a little rest. About five o'clock in the morning he was taken worse, and asked to see her quickly. She hastened to his bedside. " My dear," said he, " I am worse ; I think I am dying." " Well, * Robert, how do you feel i is it all well with you ? " He answered, " Yes, it is all well ; my way is clear." " O," said the wife to the dying man, how can I give you up ! What will be- come of the poor children?" "My dear, 1 be- lieve God will* take care of you and them, and I 288 SACRED MEMORIES. that you will be able to keep them with you and bring them up." A few questions and an- swers more, and they could be but few, for life was fast ebbing out. " Where, dear Robert, do you wish to be buried ? " " Lay me in the grave- yard at Bay Ridge, by the side of my dear little boy," "And now. my dear, I am going; let me kiss you once more." She leaned down, and the last kiss was given. Ah, that last token of undying love ; how sacred ! He was now entering the cold waters, and they were won- derfully smooth about that time. He praised God until his speech began to falter, when, sum- moning his remaining strength, he exclaimed, " Victory ! victory ! victory through the blood of Jesus !" And then sinking into the arms of death, sweetly slept in Jesus without a struggle or a groan, aged thirty-three years and two months. 9 GERSHOM PIERCE. Gershom Pierce was admitted on trial in the !N"ew York Conference in the spring of 1803, and stationed at Plattsburgh. His appoint-* ments thereafter w^e as follows : In 1804 at Fletcher ; 1805, Niagara ; 1806, Oswegatchic ; 1807, Dunh'am ; 1808, Saratoga; 1809-10, Gran- ville; 1811, Thurman ; 1812, Grand Isle; 1813-14, Cambridge; 1815-16,. Montgomery ; , SACRED MEMORIES. 289 1817-18, Sharon ; 1819, Albany ; 1820, Coey- mans; 1821-22, Chatham ; 1823-24, Granville ; 1825-26, Pittsfield ; 1827, Burlington ; 1828-29, Redding ; 1830-31, Hempstead and Hunting- ton. At the Conference of 1832 he became superannuated, and continued in that relation to the period of his death. Brother Pierce is remembered by the older members of the Conference as manifesting much more than ordinary ability. His intellect, in force and habit, is best described by the expres- sion " long-headed/' He was a devout man, at times a most powerful preacher. His sermons, weighty with thought, fervid with feeling, and in power of the Holy Spirit, made a deep and abiding impression. He died in much peace at Milan, Ohio, on the 23d of March, 1865. JOHN F. BOOTH, John F. Booth was born in the city of Brook- lyn, L. I., June 1, 1829, and died of congestion of the lungs at Greenpoint, L. I., on Sabbath morning, November 26, 1865, after a few days of severe illness. , Brother Booth entered the New York East Conference in 1855, and passed all his itinerant ministry on Long Island. He was appointed successively to the following places: In 1855-56 19 290 SACRED MEMORIES. New Utrecht ; 1857-58, Port Jefferson ; 1859- 60, Sag Harbor; 1861-62, Fleet-street, Brook- lyn; 1863-65, Greenpoint. His ministry was short, but decisive, and was crowned with large success, A circumstance oc- curred on the threshold of his public life that demonstrated the sterling character of the young itinerant. At his first appointment the town of New Utrecht was visited with an alarming epi- demic. The whole neighborhood was stricken with yellow fever, and while all hearts were fail- ing them for fear, this brave and earnest minis- ter clung steadily to his duty, and never deserted his post, until at last, worn out with work and watching, he was ordered by his physician to leave the infected district long enough to some- what recover his wasted energies. Before he was hardly well again, however, he was back with his flock, ready to suffer or to die. And this same spirit of bold daring to do his duty char- acterized him to the end of his ministry. After serving our Churches at Port Jefferson and Sag Harbor with great acceptance and use- fulness, Brother Booth, very unexpectedly to himself, was appointed to the charge of the > Fleet-street Church of Brooklyn, one of the lar- gest societies of our denomination. This ap- pointment was all the more embarrassing because it covered the part of Brooklyn where Brother Booth had spent all his boyhood and young man- SACRED MEMORIES. 201 hood, so that it was with the feeling that " a prophet is not without honor save in his own country and among his own kindred," that he finally and reluctantly assumed this charge ; but no one of its honored pastors ever better fulfilled his mission, or has a more fragrant name among that good people. It was during his pastorate in Brooklyn that his noble patriotism found am- ple development in the care of the sick and wounded soldiers tbat thronged the hospitals of the vicinity ; and so thoroughly did he enter into this work that he attracted the attention of the whole community. He subsequently spent a number of weeks in the service of the Christian Commission, and proved himself so adapted by executive ability, as well as the most delicate and beautiful sympathy with the sick and af- flicted, that the Commission was very anxious to secure his entire time for their service as a gen- eral field agent in the arrangement and dispen- sation of their noble charities. Brother Booth's crowning excellence was his heart-devotion to the young. In the work of the Sunday-school he was a model minister. He acted upon Jthe philosophy of securing the children for God, as the surest way of securing the world for him. The closing year of his life was devoted to the enterprise of building a new church at Green- point, and it was through his utter devotion to 292 SACRED MEMORIES. this work that he became so exhausted that wheu a severe pneumonia seized him he had not suffi- cient vitality to resist the attack, and peacefully yielded to die. As a Christian, Brother Booth's profession was not loud or ostentatious, but re- markably firm and consistent. A few weeks before his death he received a most gracious baptism of the Holy Ghost, and it was in the fullness of .that baptism that death found him. The members of the Conference and brethren of the Churches he served will long cherish his memory as that of a faithful, self-sacrificing, and useful minister of the Lord Jesus. His funeral was very largely attended, and the most abun- dant evidence given of how deeply the commu- nity in which he lived felt his loss. GAD SMITH GILBERT. Gad Smith Gilbert was -born in New Haven, Conn., September 22, 1814. Here he died Aug. 1, 1866, and here he was buried. Brother Gil- bert was blessed with a godly ancestry. His par- ents were pious, and their names stand identified with the whole history of Methodism in this city. Their home was one that religion made happy, and here the Methodist preacher was al- ways welcomed and loved to tarry. In such an atmosphere Brother Gilbert was reared. In his SACRED MEMORIES. 293 early youth he was the subject of converting grace. He soon felt his life's worR was to be a minister of the blessed Gospel ; and his parents, gratified in their highest wishes, educated him for such a calling. But he withdrew himself from his covenant with God, and on the comple- tion of his studies turned to secular pursuits. After a few years he was reclaimed, renewed his consecration, and immediately gave himself up to the work of an itinerant. In 1842 he joined the New York Conference, and was stationed at New Milford. Conn., subsequently at Woodbury and Wolcottville. In 1846, on account of the sickness of his wife, he located,' and removed to Louisiana. While at the South he had charge of the Methodist Church at Opelousas, La. His wife dying he returned, and in 1848 he re- joined the New York East Conference, and was stationed at Greenpoint, L. I. ; afterward at Southport, Conn. ; First Place, Brooklyn, and Rye, N. Y. In 1855 he was agent for the Wes- leyan University. In 1856 he was stationed at "Westville, and then at Port Chester ; Second Avenue, N. Y. ; Sag Harbor, L. I. j^)e Kalb Avenue, Brooklyn. Last year he was reap- pointed to Southport, Conn. ; but by an ar- rangement lie had made to provide a home for his parents, his residence was in New Haven. Brother Gilbert was a man of a noble heart. His self-sacrificing devotion to the interests of 294: SACKED MEMORIES. others, his care of the orphans of a deceased minister, m> affection and solicitude for his par- ents, were beautiful and wonderful in their in- tensity and bountifulness. Aa a friend, he was true, generous, and faithful. He* possessed so genial and kind a humor tha't it laughed in his eye, lighted up his face, and good nature was contagious in his presence. He was a model of hospitality. In his ministry he excelled as a pastor. He drew into the Church, by the influ- ence of his personal intercourse, many of the best families in his charge, who in no otherwise could have been attracted to our communion. He made himself acquainted with all his flock, and was unremitting in his attentions to the sick, poor, and afflicted. Few have established so many strong and personal friendships among his people. He was gifted in prayer. He knew how to hold intercourse with Heaven, and draw blessings immediate upon his own heart. Dur- ing the last year of his life and ministry he grew rapidly in spirituality and enjoyment. He was evidently ripening for heaven. His sickness was not^ong. The last week of his life he shared ^peace and overflowing joy not to be described, but showed how fully happy religion can mak'e a suffering man. -A day or two before he entered into rest he asked his father to pray with him. During prayer the divine presence and o-lorv filled the room. He could not restrain SACKED MEMORIES. 295 his emotions. He shouted and praised God aloud, and said, " This house is as that of Obed- edora, where the ark of the Lord rested. It is the gate of heaven. Heaven has come down to earth ; the angels are here. This disease is drawing my body down to earth, but Jesus is drawing my soul up to heaven. I shall soon be there." And just before his departure he said, with wonder in his tone and face, " Is this dy- ing? It is felicity. O how precious Jesus is! Glory ! halleluiah !" O is it not a noble thing to die as does the Christian with his armor on ! THEOPHILUS BKADBURY CHANDLER. Theophilus Bradbury Chandler died at East Woodstock, Conn., June 20, 1866, aged forty years. Brother Chandler was born at East Wood- stock, March 28, 1826. He was converted to God, and joined the Methodist Episcopal Church at the age of fourteen, under the ministry of Ralph W. Allen. He graduated at the W esleyan University in' 1850, and the same year was re- ceived on trial in the New York East Conference. Providence allowed him but ten years of effect- ive ministry, in which he served the following Churches two years respectively: Thomastori, Haddam, Westville,!S T augatuck, and East Bridge- port. His life was one of many afflictions. 296 SACRED MEMORIES. While in college he was obliged to suspend study one year on account of severe illness. In February, 1853, while stationed at Haddam, Conn., he was called to mourn the loss of an amiable and useful wife by consumption, the same disease which has now laid him by her side. During the Conference years of 1856-58 he was obliged to retire from the regular work, but preached occasionally, and for some months supplied the Mission Chapel in Middletown, Conn. In the spring of 1859 he resumed the effective relation, and continued to labor suc- cessfully for nearly four years, when he was prostrated by hemorrhage of the lungs, and his effective work was ended. For three and a half years he was constantly declining, and was many times brought to the borders of death by attacks of hemorrhage. He fought the disease with a perseverance and hopefulness truly remarkable, and thus prolonged the life he could not save. His nervous system had be- come exceedingly weakened by his ^protracted sufferings, and in his last days he endured more pain than often falls to the lot of those who die of consumption. His physical agony was often extreme ; yet he was able to say in the most trying hour, " If it is the Lord's will that I be made perfect through sufferings, amen to it." He had the most perfect victory over the fear of death, and gave frequent testimony in his last SACRED MEMORIES. 29? days that he was ready to depart. Almost his last words were, when the waves of Jordan had well nigh gone over him, " I am going home to die no more." His remains were taken to the city of Middletown, and interred on the summit of Indian Hill Cemetery, where they await the trump of the archangel. Brother Chandler possessed some rare excel- lences. His mind was quick, his perceptions fine. His taste and sense of the beautiful such that made him delight in nature, and the rarest^ and finest expressions of poetic literature, and a retentive memory, enriched his mind with a variety of select and beautiful passages. Con- stitutionally sportive, kind-hearted, and social, he was eminently companionable ; and a certain playfulness, that never offended, shed around him a bland and pleasant influence. As a preacher he was earnest, glowing, pathetic, but practical and pungent, and had he enjoyed strength and health would have made one of our most popular ministers. He was distin- guished as a pastor by wise adroitness and inno- cent art to ensnare many into the path of life ; and his own sufferings, together with his natural sympathy, peculiarly qualified him to be a son of consolation to the afflicted. His memory, in all the fields of his ministry, is to-day as pre- cious ointment poured forth. His toils and Bufferings are ended in eternal rest and joy. 298 SACRED MEMORIES. ROBERT TRAVIS. Eobert Travis was born in Somers, West- ehester County, December 15, 1795, and died in the city of New York, February 10, 1868, in his seventy-fourth year. He was converted to God in the old John-street Church in 1817, and joined the Conference in 1822, and was stationed on Suifolk Circuit, L. I. He subse- quently filled appointments in Leyden, Mass. ; ^ittsfield ; Burlington, Vt. ; Watervliet, K Y. ; Berne, IS". Y. ; Sullivan, N. Y. ; Haddam, Conn. ; Derby, and Weston, Conn. ; Hempstead, L. I. ; Granby, and Cornwall, Conn. ; Bedford, Duchess Circuit, and Pawlings, N. Y. For three years he acted as agent of the ^Yesleyan University, and for the most part during the last twenty- five years he was in a superannuated relation. During the last year of his life Brother Travis lost both his sons his only children. One was a minister in the Episcopal Church, and the other a lawyer in Westchester County. He was deeply affected by these bereavements. His ministry was not marked by any such special facts and circumstances as to call for record in this place; but his record is with God, and his reward is sure. For many years he was a constant attendant upon the services of our churches in New York city, and his very last service, ten days before SACKED MEMORIES. 299 his death, was in the administration of the holy Sacrament in the Jane-street Church. He died in great peace, and is now, without doubt, among the saved in heaven. HORATIO N. WEED. Horatio N.Weed was born in Stamford, Conn., December 30, 1812 ; died in Essex, Conn., May 11, 1867. He was converted to God some time in the year 1833, when in the^ventieth year of \^x his age. He joined the Ne\x ork Conference in 1845, and during the twenty years of his ministry served the following Churches, namely: 1845-46, Trumbull and East Tillage; 1847, Westport; 1848-49, Guildford ; 1850, super- numerary ; 1851-52, Windsor ; 1853-54, Litch- field ; 1855-56, Stepney ; 1857-58, Burlington ; 1859-60, Cheshire ; 1861-62, Clinton ; 1863, Durham ; 1864-65, Essex. At the Conference of 1866 Brother Weed became superannuated, which relation he held until the time of his death. The subject of this memoir was known to the writer in the brightest days of his minis- try, when his people were pleased to speak of him as the acceptable preacher, the faithful pastor, the affectionate husband, and judicious parent. His piety was rendered impressive by its consistency, and attractive by its amiableness 300 SACRED MEMORIES. For a year or more previous to his death it became apparent to his friends that he was thor- oughly broken down both in body and mind. Under such circumstances it is not strange that his feelings were not always buoyant and hope- ful, for it is not at all times so easy to rejoice when we look at things about us through the dismaying medium of a decayed nature and shattered nerves. They do not like to hear to reason nor to grace. On the first Sunday of March, 186T, Brother Weed listened to his last sermon, partook^f his last sacrament, and felt that he was goifig home to die. When near his end his Pastor proposed the following questions, and received the following answers : " Brother Weed, present indications must lead you to examine the foundation of your hope. How does the Rock of Ages seem to you now?" "Firm, firm," was the reply. The morning preceding his death we informed him that he w r as nearing the end of his voyage. "And now, Brother Weed, the storm having spent its fury, does the heavenly port look at- tractive?" His answer was, "Yes, yes, blessed be the Lord ! " The last struggle soon came, and he was no more among the living. His funeral was numerously attended by the different classes of citizens, and on a beautiful May day, when the trees were all blossoms and SACRED MEMORIES. 301 the air all song on the banks of the beautiful Connecticut, we laid his body in the tomb to await tlfc trump of the last day. THEODORE A. LOVEJOY. Theodore A. Lovejoy was born in Stratford, Conn., February 18, 1821, and died in Water- town, Conn., June 7, 1867. He felt his need of Christ as he saw his room-mate, a Roman Catholic, kneeling in prayer ; and at the age of twenty-one was converted to God in Brooklyn, !N". Y. He soon identified himself with the Methodist Episcopal Church, and in 1847 joined the New York East Conference, continuing a faithful and valued member of the same until his death. His grandfather was a Protestant Episcopal clergyman, and most of his relatives were in that Church. His family designed him for the Protestant Episcopal ministry, and his early education had this in view. It was, therefore, no easy matter for him to be a Methodist, much less to be a Methodist minister. But he was ready for any sacrifice. He loved the work to which the Master called him, and never lost sight of the great object of the Christian minis- try the glory of God in the saving of men. His highest ambition was to be a faithful min- 302 SACRED MEMORIES. ister of the Lord Jesus Christ. He had but two all-controlling principles in his life love of Jesus and love of souls, and hence he *uld not help being a useful minister of the Gospel. His work of love is remembered gratefully by many who were favored with his ministry. He was cheerful, happy, a'nd contented in every field of labor. Brother Lovejoy was a good man affable, sweet-spirited, loving, a man of deep and ear- nest piety. His religion was not an impulse from without, but an inspiration from within; an all-pervading life and power, beautifully uni- form and consistent. He was always the same. All who knew him loved him, and those who knew him best loved him the most. No one ever spoke aught against him. He was modest and unassuming, and only those who possessed an intimate acquaintance with him could know how true and excellent a Christian man and min- ister he was. It was observed, by those who knew him, for some time previous to his departure, that he seemed peculiarly ripe in all the Chris- tian graces. His last sickness was brief and painful, but he was happy in Jesus. With a mind unclouded to the very last, he was not afraid. The close of his earthly work was one of holy triumph. He said, " Tell my brethren of the Conference I SACRED MEMORIES. 303 love them ; tell them to meet me in heaven." To his wife he said, " Dear, it is a glorious tri- umph Christ is near he is precious, very pre- cious." His last words, uttered just as he was passing away, were, " I want to praise him I feel like praising him all the time." WALTER W. BREWER. Walter W. Brewer's name appears for the first time in the Conference Minutes of 1834. For twenty years he received his appointments regularly, and attended faithfully to his minis- terial and pastoral work. In 1854 he was placed upon the superannuated list. He retired with his family to a comfortable home in Hunting Ridge, a beautiful and rural district in the town of Stamford, Conn. As he had strength he preached to the people, and taught in the Sab- bath-school. He strove earnestly to finish the work which God gave him to do. Brother Brewer was an earnest worker for God and man. In the last winter his health, never very firm, gave way, and after a brief ill ness he fell asleep in Jesus. Brother Brewer was a good man faithful in all the relations of life, a zealous minister, and a very industrious pastor. His record is on high, and in the day of reward many will call 304 SACRED MEMORIES. him blessed. An appropriate funeral sermon was delivered by Brother "W. C. Steele, and the remains of our departed brother were interred in the graveyard at Long Ridge. Brother Brewer was a good man, faithful in all the relations of life, a zealous minister, and a very industrious pastor. His record is on high, and in the day of reward many will call him blessed. JAMES D BOUTON. James D. Bouton was born in Roxbury, Dela- ware County, N. Y., November 19, 1812, and died in Gosh en, Conn., November 29, 1867, aged fifty-five years. His father, James Bouton, was born in New Canaan, Conn., February 18, 1764 ; his mother, Sarah Sandford, was born in Redding, Conn., February 18, 1778. They were united in marriage March 9, 1793. About two years after their marriage (now more than seventy-five years ago) this young couple, with but a scanty outfit, started from their home and kindred on a long and difficult journey to seek their fortune, and commence together the battle of life amid the wilds and mountains of New YorE Never was there such a bridal tour. Pursuing their tedious journey for many days, guided by blazed trees, sometimes cutting and bridging their way as they went, frequently up- SACRED MEMORIES. 305 setting their wagon with all its contents, then repairing and reloading, they pushed their way along. The young mother of but seventeen, with her infant in her arms, was sometimes obliged to walk, and at other times would mount the back of one of the horses, (with har- ness on,) and ride over rough places and dan- gerous streams. At length they reached their destination, and located in Roxbury, Delaware County, N". Y. They were among the iirst settlers of the town, and were fully acquainted with the hardships, toils, and privations incident to frontier life. They were converted, and joined the Methodist Episcopal Church, and remained consistent members of the same for nearly half a century, when they entered into rest. Early in the his- tory of Methodism in Delaware County tlieir home became the head-quarters of presiding elders and circuit preachers for all the regions round about. Here Ostrander, Sandford, Jew- ett, Rice, Martindale, Richardson, and many others, always found a cordial reception and a hospitable home. David Sandford, their eldest son, became^ a minister and missionary in the valley of the Delaware forty years ago, where, by incessant labor, he soon broke down, and barely reached his home and friends to die. His name still lives in the memory of many who \rnre won to 20 306 SACRED MEMORIES. Christ by his instrumentality, and is as ointment poured forth. James Daniel, the subject of this sketch, blessed with pious parents and a Christian training, became the happy subject of convert- ing grace at the age of seventeen. Feeling himself moved by the Holy Ghost to preach, he at once applied himself to study and prepara- tion for the ministry. The Church, satisfied with his gifts and graces, as well as the genu- ineness of his call, accordingly licensed him to preach. He was admitted on trial in the New York Conference in 1835, and appointed to the following charges : 1835, Deposit Circuit ; 1836, Jefierson Circuit. (During this year he was united in marriage, by Rev. P. L. Hoyt, to Miss Sally M. Johnson, of Sidney, X. Y., Nov. 3.) In 1837-38, Delaware Mission ; 1839^0, Kort- right Circuit ; 1841-42, Delaware Mission ; 1843, Catskill and Durham Circuit ; 1844, Durham Circuit ; 1845, supernumerary ; 1846-47, Ori- ent. In March, 1846, he lost his companion, after a long and painful illness. She died in Brattleborough, Vt. In August 4, 1847, he was united in marriage, by Rev. Y. Buck, to Miss Harriet Kniblo, of Eoxbury, X. Y. In 1848-49 he traveled Xew Utrecht and Grav;esend Circuit ; 1850-51, Hunting-ton South ; 1852-53, Patchogue; 1854-55, Huntington. In Jan- uary. 18^, his second w r ife died suddenly, SACRED MEMORIES. 307 leaving three small children, the youngest but ten days old. In December, 1855, he was united in marriage, by Kev. S. Landon, to Miss Sarah J. Wing, of West Goshen, Conn. In 1856-57" he was stationed at Rockaway ; 1858-59, Jamaica; 1860-61, North Fifth-street, Brooklyn, E. D. ; 1862-63, West Goshen, Conn. ; 1864, Cornwall Center ; 1865-66, Ridge- field ; 1867, superannuated. During his last sickness, which continued for about one year, he suffered much, but patiently. He was first prostrated by bilious fever, from which he so far recovered as to be able to preach a few times, when inflammatory rheumatism set in, and completely racked and prostrated his once strong and manly frame. Other diseases setting in, the. case became so complicated as to baffle all medical skill. But his soul was calm and peaceful, and his conversation on the sub- ject of his preparation for death and prospects for eternity were such as to afford the strongest assurance that all was well, and that to die would be everlasting gain. He rests from his labors, and his works do follow him. Brother Bouton preached not himself, " but Christ Jesus the Lord." One of his last utter- ances were, u Had I the privilege of again preach- ing Christ I would be more earnest than ever. O the salvation of souls ! the salvation of souls ! " His peace of mind during his protracted sick- 308 * SACRED MEMORIES. rcess was uniform and constant ; " it flowed as a river." Once, however, he seemed utterly cast down. His mental agony was great. It was the hour and power of darkness, the last assault of the enemy to carry the shattered fortress. But the " eternal God " was his " refuge." At the close of this severe conflict he exclaimed, " O come and praise the Lord with me, for I have got the victory ! O halleluiah ! " To his friends he said, "I have realized during my sickness a depth of enjoyment I never knew before." Of his children he said, " Bring them up to be good, and fitted for heaven ;" and then repeated, with dying accents, " It is all impor- tant ; it is all important" He left a widow and six children, with a large train of relatives, to mourn his loss. They are still living at the date of this writing. He never sought popular places nor special appointments, but always went to his fields of labor cheerfully, and cultivated them diligently. Many of these fields were large and exceedingly laborious. His crown will not be starless. When the an- gels shall reap the harvest he will doubtless come, bringing many sheaves with him. The words of Rev. Seymour Landon, an intimate friend of the deceased, will be a fitting conclu- sion to this memoir. " There is good reason for saying that .Brother Bouton was a dutiful son, a faithful brother, a SACRED MEMORIES. 309 devoted husband, a tender and judicious father, an exemplary and blameless Christian, a good preacher, and an excellent pastor. He was always acceptable and successful wherever ap- pointed. " Brother Bouton was remarkably gifted in prayer and exhortation, and was a good preach- er. He was ' abundant in labors,' and no doubt is entertained by those who knew him best that he shortened his days by overwork. Nor did he labor in vain, nor spend his strength for naught. He was more than ordinarily success- *ful in winning souls to Christ. This was true of him during his entire ministry, both in the New York and the New York East Conferences. Pie was remarkably happy, and promotive of happiness, in the domestic and social circle. He was thrice married, and had children by eacli marriage, and yet I was told by one who had the best opportunity to know, that there was never an unpleasant word spoken nor feeling entertained in the entire family. He governed his house well, and so he did those portions of the Church that were at any time under his pastoral care. Peace and harmony, unity and love, reigned wherever he lived. So far as I know lie was universally respected and beloved while living, and is as universally mourned and lamented as dead." RE-UNION SERVICES, AT the annual sessions of the New York and New York East Conferences in 1867 it was de- cided to hold a re-union during the following sessions for the purpose of affording the mem- bers an opportunity of renewing acquaintance, and of interchanging fraternal greetings and congratulations. A Joint Committee of Ar- rangements was appointed, consisting of Revs. Drs. M. D'C. Crawford, W. H. Ferris, and R. S. Foster, of the New York Conference, and Rev. Dr. D. Curry, and Revs. W. C. Hoyt and G. W. Woodruff, of the New York East Confer- ence. Under the supervision of this Committee, and in accordance with its programme, the re- union was held in St. Paul's Methodist Epis- copal Church, New York, on Friday, April 3, 1868. At ten o'clock the New York Conference assembled in the session room of Dr. Crosby's Church, opposite St. Paul's, and the New York East Conference in the lecture room -of St. Paul's, and at a quarter past ten o'clock both Conferences proceeded in procession from their respective assembly rooms, and met in front of SACKED MEMORIES. 311 St. Paul's ; tbe New York, beaded by Bisbop Clark and Eev. M. Richardson, a venerable man of God who had completed his sixtieth year in the ministry of the Methodist Church, and with- in the bounds of the New York Conference; and the New York East, headed by Bishop Janes, who supported Rev. Laban Clark, trem- bling under the honors of nearly threescore and ten years in the Methodist ministry. The Con- ferences passed into the church by two doors, each body occupying one side of the body of the house. Nearly an hour before the time appointed for the services the galleries of the church were filled with ladies and gentlemen, and immedi- ately after the Conferences entered every avail- able place in the church w^s occupied, and St. Paul's was crowded. On the platform of the pulpit were seated Bishops Janes and Clark, Rev. Henry Boehm, of the Newark Conference, the companion of Asbury, who entered the traveling ministry in 1798, and who has still rmich of the fire and vigor of youth, although in his ninety-third year; Rev. M. Richardson, of the New York, and Rev. L. Clark, D.D., of the New York East Conference, and the vice-presidents of the meet- ing, Revs. E. E. Griswold, E. W. Smith, J. Z. Nichols, and S. Yan Deusen. The altar was occupied by Revs. Drs. Curry, Foster, and the 312 SACRED MEMORIES. other members of the Committee, by the Secre- taries of the two Conferences, President Lind- say, of Genesee College, and Dr. Carlton, of the Book Room. Many visiting brethren from other Conferences were present, and were seated with their friends of the New York bodies. The pre- siding Bishops and the patriarchal fathers be- hind the pulpit, the venerable brethren in the altar, the two large bodies of ministers, and the immense audience, presented an imposing ap- pearance, and in itself made the re-union a com- plete success. Bishop Ames was detained by official business, and could not take the part assigned him as presiding officer, and Bishop Janes was substi- tuted in his place. The exercises wA*e opened with a voluntary, admirably executed, by the choir, How beautiful upon the mountains, followed by the hymn commencing, And are we yet alive, And see each other's face, which was read by Rev. J. B. Wakeley, and sung by the entire audience, led by the choir. Rev. S. Landon, of New York East Conference, then offered an appropriate and affecting prayer, when Rev. Charles Fletcher read the following selections from the Scriptures: Psalm cxxxiii; John xiv, 1-6 ; 2 Tim. iv, 1-8. Bishop Janes SACRED MEMORIES. 313 then announced that the Secretaries would read the "Memoriam," when Eev. J. W. Chadwick announced the names of the members of the New York Conference who have died since the division of the Conference in 1848 : 'JOHN B. MATTHIAS, DAVID WEBSTER, NOAH LEVINGS, JOHN BANGS, CYRUS Foss, NOAH BIGELOW, THOMAS BDRCH, JAMES YOUNG, SAMUEL U. FISHER, GOODRICH HORTON, JOHN CRAWFORD, LYMAN ANDRTJS, CHRISTOPHER H. HOEVENER, JOHN C. TACKABERRY, DANIEL SMITH, T HERON OSBORN, FREDERICK W. BRENNER, HUMPHREY HUMPHREYS, CHARLES W. CARPENTER, BEZALEEL HOWE, JEREMIAH HAM, SAMUEL D. FERGUSON, T. F. RANDOLPH MERCEIN, "WILLIAM THACHER, PETER P. SANDFORD, WILLIAM JEWETT, OLIVER B. BROWN, ROYAL COURTRIGHT, ADDI LEE, AARON HUNT, GEQRGE COLES, WILLIAM B. MITCHELL, JONATHAN N. ROBINSON, BRADLEY L. BURR, DAVIS STOCKING, JAMES RUSK, WILLIAM JAY Foss. THOMAS DA VIES, GEORGE KERR, DAVID HOLMES, STEPHEN MARTINDALE, BRADLEY SILLICK, BENJAMIN GRIFFEN, PHINEAS RICE, THOMAS BAINBRIDGE, PELATIAH WARD, JOSIAH L. DlCKERSON, NATHAN RinF, CHARLES BURROUGHS, RICHARD SEAMAN, JOHN A. SILLICK, JOHN B. HAGANY, LEVERETT G. ROMAINE, REUBEN H. BLOOMER, THOMAS E. FERO, JOSEPH T. HAXD, WALTER D. TELFORD, J. W. BREAKEY, LORIN CLARK, J. WELLS. 314 SACRED MEMORIES. Eev. G. W. Woodruff, in behalf of the New York East Conference, then read the following roll of the members of that Conference who had died since its organization : MOSES BLYDENBURGH, JESSE HUNT, ORLANDO STARR, . WILLIAM DIXON, ELIJAH CRAWFORD, ELIJAH WOOLSEY, EZRA JAGGER, STEPHEN OLIN, WILLIAM K. STOPFORD. BARTHOLOMEW CREAGH, WILLIAM M'K. BANGS, OLIVER STKES, ROBERT SENEY, JOHN* G-. SMITH, CHARLES BARTLETT, DAVID MILLER, PARMELE CHAMBERLIN. JOHN* M. PEASE, SAMUEL W. LAW, JOSEPH FARGER, MITCHELL B. BULL, EBENEZER WASHBURN, HORACE BARTLETT, SAMUEL W. SMITH, JOHN* NIXON. JosfepH D. MARSHALL, W. W. BREWER. NOBLE W. THOMAS, NICHOLAS WHITE, JACOB SHAW, PHIXEAS COOK, JOSEPH LAW, JOHN* J. MATTHIAS CHARLES REDFIELD, NATHAN* BANGS, JAMES H. PERRY, THOMAS GERALDS, BCEL GOODSELL. RAPHAEL GILBERT, JAMES FLOY, JOHN ELLIS, JOHN KENNADAY, WILLIAM H. GILDER, ROBERT ROBERTS, CHARLES R. ADAMS, GERSHOM PIERCE, JOHN* F. BOOTH, T. B. CHANDLER, GAD S. GILBERT, H. N. WEED, T. A. LOVEJOY, J. D. BOUTON, ROBERT TRAVIS, Eev. Dr. G. S. Hare, of the Xew York Con- ference, then read the hymn, Oue family we dwell in Him, One Church above, beneath, etc., SACKED MEMORIES. 315 in which the entire audience united with the choir, and filled the house as with the voice of many waters. ADDRESS OF BISHOP JANES. Bishop Janes then said : The Committee of Arrangements have been pleased to allow the Bishops and Messrs. Richardson and Bangs each fifteen minutes in which to address you, and the other speakers each ten minutes ; so the audience will not expect long or labored ad- dresses. They have been pleased to request me to occupy the first few minutes in conver- sation. At the close of the New York Conference in 184:8 that body was divided, and two organized Conferences were formed. From that time to the present we have not been together as Con- ferences. We are met at this time in the form denominated a re-union. A re-union implies a previous one. What was the union that existed between us before the division? We were most ardently united in the brotherhood of Christ. We were also laborers together in the ministry of reconciliation, not merely laborers in the same work, but laborers together in that work with each other, and helping each other. We had, therefore, not only the fellowship of dis- cipleship, but also the fellowship of labor. In 316 SACRED MEMORIES. these respects we have not been divided. Our hearts have been as intimately knit together, our fellowship as sweet and strong since we have been working side by side, as when we were working together. Our re-union, therefore, is simply a social re-union. We have come to- gether, as we were wont to do annually, to look upon each other's face, to shake each other's hands, to bow together in prayer before the Infinite, and unite in thanksgiving and praise. And I trust and pray that this social meeting to-day, being religiously improved, will be a source of great pleasure, and of much encour- agement and comfort to all our hearts. We cannot, if we would, avoid referring in our thoughts to the circumstances at the time of our separation. We cannot keep from our minds the history that has been made since that event, and almost instinctively our thoughts go forward to the future. We cannot, in the few minutes we are permitted to occupy, amplify these sub- jects. It is due, however, I think, to the occa- sion that we should make one statistical com- parison. At the time of the separation there were 47,678 members ; at this time we have over 73,000 members. At that time there were 294 ministers, now there are more than 500. Such has been the progress these twenty years, and if we would take time to give you pur mis- sionary and our Sunday-school statistics it would SACKED MEMORIES. 317 be found that in those departments our progress has been equally, satisfactory. My feelings incline me to recur a little more distinctively to the lists of those brethren who were with us at that time, but whose bodily presence is lacking at this time. What a com- pany of men ! what a ministerial power ! The patriarchal, wise, good, long-honored Nathan Bangs ; the profound theologian, the able min- ister, Peter P. Sandford ; the loving and beloved Bartholomew Creagh ; the courteous, practical, useful Martindale ; the intellectual, scholarly, self-reliant Floy ; the eccentric, but intelligent and really godly Phineas Rice ; the eloquent, the popular, the successful Kennaday ; the majestic, mighty, learned, but humble Olin. But time would fail me to refer to Seney, and Jewett, and Matthias, and Hagany, and a multitude, or many, at least, of other men of eminence and worth, whose record is on high, but whose memory should be cherished on earth. And then another class, Mercein, and Foss, and Law r , who were in the morning of their ministry, who were yet blossoming, and passed away before their maturity, and upon whose memory rests the fragrance of the Rose of Sharon. How many of our brethren who then stood with us in these ranks, whose names we have not even called, will be stars of the first magnitude in that beautiful cluster which these Conferences 318 SACRED MEMORIES. are placing in those spiritual heavens where they that have turned many to righteousness shall shine as the stars for ever and ever. I ex- press it as my conviction that we have in the ministry at this time, in the fathers, in the brethren, and in the young men, as much wis- dom, as much qualification for the work, as much devotion to it as there was at that period, and I believe that there is no backsliding in the Churches either ; so that the present day is as good as the past, and I look forward to our fu- ture with the highest hopes, with the liveliest anticipation ; and I will conclude by saying that I trust these two New York Conferences appreciate their position, and will feel the pe- culiar responsibility that rests upon them from their geographical location in this great city and the surrounding cities this center of many in- fluences, and this place of general power. Let me have your attention I cannot en- large ; the watch will not stop for me to talk. I have in my heart to live and die with you. I received my natural birthright and my spiritual birthright within your Conference bounds. 1 commenced my public Methodistic career, also, within your limits, and I shall be happy, if God orders so, to die with you, and have my grave with you ; and yet I feel, from my position, that I am just as likely to die in China or India, or, like Coke, on the ocean. But wherever I give SACRED MEMORIES. 319 up my spirit I intend to have a union with you in heaven, at the throne of God. At the conclusion of Bishop Janes's address Bishop Clark was introduced^ ADDRESS OF BISHOP CLARK. It is fitting, in my present official relations to the New York Conference, that I should extend to you, brethren of the 'New York East Confer- ence, the friendly, fraternal, and Christian greet- ings of the body over which I am presiding. Twenty years ago the old New York Confer- ence having become too unwieldly for manage- ment was divided, aifd the 'New York East Con- ference was established as a Conference in itself. I am here, brethren, to assure you, on behalf of the New York Conference, though you havo been separated in ecclesiastical relations, you have not been separated from them in sympathy and in brotherly love. There are many ties, in- dividual as well as Conference, that bind us to you in affection. Those ties, instead of growing weaker, have become stronger and stronger with passing years, and I am sure that I speak but the unanimous sentiment of my brethren of the New York Conference when I assure you, breth- ren, that our tender, warm, and earnest sympa- thies are for you, and how ardently we rejoice 320 SACRED MEMORIES. in your prosperity, and pray that your pros- perity in the future may be like that of the past, only still greater. To me, brethren, this is a scene of ve^r deep and solemn interest. With this session of the New York Conference I shall complete a quarter of a century of my ministry. Twenty-five years ago, trembling and halting, I came before the Conference and presented my name for admission. I look back over the past. I look at the record of my class a class of eighteen that commenced with -me, one ex- cepted, who was received only for transfer-r- and I rejoice that, through mercy, thirteen are in tbe effective work of the ministry. Two have located, one has diedf one or two of them have been laid aside ; but we present thirteen, seven of them still laboring in the bounds of the New York Conference, in the effective min- istry. I look back over this quarter of a cen- tury with mingled emotions. I rejoice in what God has done for us and through us. I rejoice in the manifestations of his grace, and in the triumphs of his Gospel through the ministry of his word. Several items 1 had sketched down, intending to present, but nearly all of them have been presented by my colleague who pre- ceded me. The noble men connected with this body ! As the names struck upon my ear as they were announced by the respective Secretaries, SACRED MEMORIES. 321 O what memories came up in my heart, as I have no doubt they did in the hearts of each one of you ; memories that can never die ; memories that are linked in holy affection with those champions of the cause of Christ that fought the battle well, and triumphed at last. I see on that list, as announced for the New York Conference, sixty had ceased from their labors, -gone to their reward ; and for the New York East Conference fifty-three, making a sum total of one hundred and thirteen who, during the last twenty years, ceased to labor and have gone to their rest. O how suggestive to our living brethren ! How full of instruction is the lesson which this record presents ! How it im- presses upon our hearts and minds the duty of living and laboring for God the few years that remain unto us. In the details of the comparative statistics there were two or three things, additional to those already presented, of great interest to my own mind. In 1848 I find there were in the New York Conference 25,769 members. In the New York East Conference 21,373, making a total of 47,152. Passing on through the period of the twenty years of our separation, I find the respective returns for the past year give the following results in each : In the New York Conference 37,446 members, in the New York East Conference 35,312 members : the two Con- 21 322 SACRED MEMOKIES. ferenees having run pretty equally in their race. May they continue in all coming time to be generous rivals in the field of enterprise for God ! Holding firm this grand center, and making $e triumphs of the cross glorious amid its wealth and wickedness, may they also send out influences for God and humanity that shall permeate the whole life of the Church, and ex- tend to the farthest limit of the globe. During the centennial year, when we were recounting the triumphs of God wrought through the agency of Methodism, I had almost feared that there would be begotten in the minds and hearts of the people a spirit of self-laudation. I Ihink we were in imminent danger of it, for the fact is. brethren, we ourselves had not com- prehended the magnitude and grandeur of the successes with which God had crowned our la- bors. We as a people, as a Church, had not comprehended the greatness of the work God had committed to us, and the responsibilities resting upon us ; and when we woke up and looked at this work, and entered its details, and summed them up, there was great danger that a spirit of laudation and of pride would be ex- cited in the minds of the people, and I am not sure we have wholly escaped from it. Rather should an overwhelming sense of responsibility rest upon us, holding, as we do. in our hands the destinies of so many millions of immortals. SACRED MEMORIES. 323 If there is one danger in the Church imperil- ing its future I speak here earnestly, thought- fully, and advisedly I say if there is one source of danger imperiling the future efficiency of the Church, it is in the decline of spirituality, the loss of the old spirit that inspired the hearts of our members, and blazed forth in the ministra- tion of our fathers ; and I say here to-day, with the deep and solemn conviction resting upon my heart, that when the Methodist Church loses this spirit she loses the chief element of her power. And is there no danger of this ? I am not stand- ing here to sound an alarm, but to awaken thought, to turn soberly and squarely in upon ourselves, and look with clear, scrutinizing eyes upon the condition and prospects of the Church. Have not some of us come almost to feel that this going to the little place of prayer,, and pray- ing loud and earnest, and having, if you please, as the world would term it, a stormy meeting the sound of praise, the shout and the voice of thanksgiving have we not almost come to con- sider it as bordering upon disorder ? have we not come to look upon it very much as our sister denominations looked upon us thirty, forty, fifty years ago ? and do you not recognize, brethren, in that spirit the simple but strong element of the success of Methodism in this country ? It was a source of spiritual power that took hold of the hearts of the great mass of the 324 SACRED MEMORIES. people ; went down to the unintelligent and un- cultivated, (and they in all countries, and under all circumstances, constitute the larger portion of the population ;) went down to that class and took hold of them, warming their hearts and baptizing them with the Holy Ghost. When- ever the Methodist Church loses this spirit and tone, I don't care what else she may have she may have her splendid edifices of worship, her colleges and seminaries of learning I don't care what other appliances she may have, when the Methodist Church loses this divine, indwelling Spirit she is shorn of strength. A Church that would live, thrive, and grow must have a firm hold upon God, and a deep sympathy with the toiling, sorrowing masses of humanity. The Church that loses this may have every refine- ment and every elegance, and abound in wealth ; but its maximum of growth and power is al- ready attained. !No longer will wild, wayward, wicked boys be converted at her altars, to grow up into merchant princes, large-hearted men, princely in their munificence, as well as in their commercial enterprises. Any Church that loses this power has already reached the maximum of its growth ; nay, has already passed into its decline. For it is in the order of the laws of Providence that the wealthy shall decrease, shall go down, while the poor and the strug- gling are to go up. SACRED MEMORIES. 325 That is the history of all families, and of all men ; and if the Church of God would preserve her integrity, would preserve her power of ex- pansion and growth, would maintain her hold upon the great heart of humanity, and be able to wield it and mold it anew for God and the cause of Christ, it must preserve its connection with the sympathies of this great mass. We have reason to thank God that this revival work, this regenerating power, has not yet departed from the Church. In the providence of God, brethren, my circuit of travel has been wide, and I have been called to visit various portions of our work in almost every part of our own country, and I rejoice to be able to bear testi- mony this morning to the revival power that exists in the Church in all parts of the land. These converts are literally gathered from the world. Over six thousand five hundred conver- sions are reported for the New York Conference during the past year. May the Revival work never die out in the Church ! May that Church the Church to which w y e have consecrated our hearts, our lives, and our all move on, and on, and on ; just and generous to all Christian bod- ies laboring in the cause of God and humanity, and yet aiming to achieve her own glorious mis- sion given to her by the grace of God.- The hymn commencing, "Go preMkmy Gospel, saich the Lord," 326 SACRED MEMORIES. was then read by the Rev. William H. Boole, and sung by the congregation. At its conclu- sion the presiding officer introduced the Rev. Marvin Richardson, senior minister of the New York Conference. ADDRESS OF REV. M. RICHARDSON. I rise this morning, not for the purpose of making a speech, but simply to offer a few apologies for not making one. In the first place, I am not able to make a speech. Since last July I have not been out of the precincts of the city of Poughkeepsie till last Tuesday morning, when I started to visit this place. I have not been able to preach a sermon during the year, to give an exhortation, or to make an address. A part of the time I have not been able to visit the church on the Sabbath day, and have b^gn confined a part of the time to my bed, and to my room ; but I had a great solici- tude to visit my Conference this spring. It is my sixtieth Conference. I have never been ab- sent. I also had the disposition to be present on this re-union occasion, and it affords me great satisfaction to think that God has so far sus- tained me, not only that I have the pleasure of looking over this noble body of ministers, but for other considerations. I jrave attended dif- SACEED MEMORIES. 327 ferent ministerial conventions : the General Conference for a number of years in secession, the conventions of other Christian denomina- tions, but my eyes have never beheld a sight like this a collection of between four and iive hundred Methodist ministers in one body. I am highly gratified when I see the providence of God opening the way, extending the work, raising up workmen competent to promote this blessed cause. I have been gratified with an- other fact : I have had the privilege of meeting my old friend Dr. Clark, eight years older in the ministry than myself.* He joined the 'New York Conference in 1801, and I know some- thing of his hard labor in the early part of the ministry. You recollect Buckland and Whiting- ham Circuits, and I am glad that GR)d has pre- served him to this day. My debility is such that I cannot give utterance to the feelings and the impressions of my mind. I never expect to see At tl'iis point Father Clark, rising, advanced toward Father Richardson, the latter advancing. These two veterans took each other by the hand, then trhowing their arms around each other, stood and wept in silence for a momeut in the presence of the vast assembly. Entirely unpremeditated, a more fitting symbol of the deep feeling which marked this re-union service could not have been given. A wave of influence that was in- describable, accompanied with divine power, seemed to roll over the whole audience, making the scene deeply affecting, and a fitting type of the glorious re-union iu that land where " there shall be no more death." Dr. Clark has since entered into rest. He died November 28, 1868. aged 90. 328 SACRED MEMORIES, you again, brethren. I am just upon the bor- ders, ancl very likely, in the course of another year, you will hear that I am gone. Dr. Clark will be gone, and then all your old men in the New Yoik and New York East Conferences will have left you ; but, thank God ! there are young men coming up. Praise God for that! Now you will accept my apology, if you please, and excuse me from any further remarks. The presiding officer, Bishop Janes, invited the attention of the congregation to a few re- marks by the venerable Laban Clark. ADDRESS OF REV. LABAN CLARK, D.D. It is seventy years since I embraced Method- ism. I embraced it as the cause of God, and I still believe it will be to the interest of Christ and his kingdom upon the earth, and if we are faithful to the charge we shall carry on this blessed work to a glorious consummation. It is sixty-eight years since I commenced my public labors, and I have labored and toiled with a great deal of satisfaction ; and I have not con- sidered the sufferings and the labors to be too much if I could extend the kingdom of Christ, build up his cause, and promote pure relig- ion in the world. I love the religion of Jesus Christ, that heartfelt, soul-cheering religion that SACKED MEMORIES. 329 gives evidence of acceptance of God, and gives us boldness to come to the throne of grace and claim the promise of the Saviour. O be faith- ful, then, to this high calling ! Do not forget the holy doctrine of Methodism, the witness of the Spirit, the evidence of our being born again, the glory of this salvation. I- recollect it was said of my class by the president of a co.lege many years ago : The Methodists will, after a while, become more contemplative, more modern and orderly. I told him that so long as we held the doctrines that we now do we can never sink down into that state of indifference. " What doctrine ?." he inquired. I replied, " The wit- ness of the Spirit." He did not know what that meant. The Spirit of Christ bears witness with our spirit that we are born of God. Bishop Janes, on introducing the next speaker, said, " The next name that we call is one that has been associated with our Conference for many years, and will be for many years to come. This name is honored in many that have borne it, and are still bearing it." He- man Bangs was then introduced. ADDRESS OF REV. HEMAN BANGS. I ought to be excused from speaking. I am all alone. I have nobody with me. I have not a single man with me on the right hand or the 330 SACKED MEHOEIES. left not one. Here are three men older in the ministry than myself, and before me are a great many younger. But I am here alone, the only effective minister left of the old New York Con- ference when I joined it. I believe that there is one other living to-day, Dr. Samuel Luckey. I don't think I ought to make a speech. .1 ought to stand here and let you look at me. I can't get under way in fifteen minutes, cannot get fairly warmed up, and I can't talk very well until I get warmed up. Well, I might as well tell my experience as any thing else. I first found the Lord in 1800, sixty-eight years ago. I joined the Church in 1808. It .was something to be a Methodist then. My parents did not like them very well, and they were not willing, as I was a lad, that I should join, and I did not join until some time after- ward. How many Methodists do you think there were then in the United States of Ameri- ca? One hundred and fifty-one thousand in the whole connection. There are more Methodist ministers to-day on this floor than there were in the connection at that time. In 1815 I joined the old New York Confer- ence, extending then from New York to Quebec. All the Canadas have been cut off; since, the Troy Conference, and part of Oneida, and then we are divided into two. . I have received and filled fifty-three appointments since then. I SACRED MEMORIES. 331 stood one year supernumerary on the Minutes, and then I had charge of a large Church, and preached all the year, with the exception of a month or two. I have attended every Confer- ence aince I joined. I have never missed a Con- ference, and never niissed being there when it opened, nor neglected it a day, in my life. I have been stationed twenty-five years in cities. I have been Presiding Elder (such as I am and have been) for seventeen years. I have traveled nine years on circuits, and have been in the agency of the University to get up a college for the boys here. You would not have had it, I reckon, if I had not done it, and we should not have had you here. I spent two years in get- ting it up. That makes the fifty-three years. I finished up my fifty-third year last Sabbath with three sermons, one love-feast, one sacra- ment, without any help, two Quarterly Confer- ences, and a ride of fourteen miles, and eight of them in a buggy without any back to the seat. I was able to be up at four o'clock Monday morning, and took the stage and rode eleven miles, took the ears and traveled one hundred and twenty-two miles up to Tuesday. I then started for this Conference, and I am here to- day just as fresh for battle as I ever was in my life. Now I said I had better not speak, but to stand here and let you look at me. I am a monument of God's grace and mercy. I do not 332 SACKED MEMORIES. understand it. I do not understand myself. God has put the machinery here in motion, and he keeps it in motion, and for what purpose I do not know ; but I suppose it is right to keep it going as long as it is oiled up well. I sometimes think that I ought to step out of the way, and let some of these younger and learned men take my place. I have been afraid "sometimes that I have blocked up the way. If I go out of the active trav- eling ministry I am going into the Sabbath- school and teach an infant class, if I live. Long ago I gave all I am and all I have to God, and never took it back. I believe there is a heaven. God has blessed me wonderfully. I was look- ing over a little record, and I find, in connec- tion with my colleagues, we have taken, on the circuits and stations where we have been, ten thousand persons into the Church. (Turning to Brother Eichardson,) We had thirteen hundred converted and joined the Church in this city in one year. In two years about twenty-one hundred. Now I am free to-day by the grace of God. I am free from envy, from jealousy, and, by the grace of God, free from the love of the world. I do not begrudge any man his money, nor his popularity, nor his influence, nor his standing in society, nor any thing else. Now go ahead as fast as you can. You may out-top me, you SACRED MEMORIES. 333 may run over me, if you have a mind to ; I shall not put one single block in your course. Go on, go on ! I don't care how much learning you get, or how much applause you get, or how much you do. I shall rejoice in it all. I was brought up in the woods, and could not go to school, but felt the need of education and learn- ing, and I said my children shall not labor under the disadvantages I have had, if I can possibly avoid it. I got a thousand dollars one day by a patch on my coat. I was pleading for the University. I said I am determined my children shall have an education if I have to wear a patched coat, and in that way they gave me a thousand dollars, and I thank God that my children have been educated, and other men's children too, and I rejoice in it. But I hope we shall attend to Father Clark's admoni- tion. We want the form, but we must not lose the power. I am happy, and I hope to live in glory. My wife has gone up since we parted Conferences, and six of my children are there, and four more on their journey. There are now, I believe, but five persons living that were in the old New York Confer- O ence when I joined. Only five four besides my- self. The four are, Laban Clark, Marvin Rich- ardson, Samuel Luckey, and Theodosius Clark.* Fathers Bangs and Lnckoy have both entered into their eternal rest since the Re-union. 334 SACRED MEMORIES. If I live two or three years longer I shall begin to be an old man. I don't trouble myseli about it. I don't trouble myself about to-morrow. I live happy to-day, and let to-morrow take care of itself. The reverend gentleman closed with God's blessing on all. Rev. A. D. Yail then read the hymn com- mencing " Jesus, the name high over all." Bishop Janes said he was requested to read part of a letter from an afflicted and aged mem- ber of the New York Conference. Brother Ira Ferris,* addressed to his Conference : " I have been a member of the New York Conference forty-five years. Eight years before the Troy Conference was cut off; and before the New York East Conference was formed, I spent eleven years within its bounds. This is the first time I have been absent from the Conference session during my connection with you. As I am now laid aside by sickness, and confined to my room, with no prospect of again meeting with my brethren in session, I send them my Christian salutation and brotherly love." After describing his severe affliction, he con- cludes with these words : " I crave your earnest prayers, expecting to hail you all, together with the loved brethren who have gone before, at the throne of God, washed in the blood of Christ." * He has also entered into rest. SACRED MEMORIES. 335 ADDRESS OF REV. DAVID BUCK. Rev. David Buck, of the New York Confer- ence, was introduced, and spoke as follows : MR. PRESIDENT, FATHERS, AND BRETHREN: Re-union is a sweet, precious word, pregnant with thought and burdened with reminiscent ideas. Understood in a religious sense, it im- plies previous disseverance, separation, and a state of isolation and loneliness. The truths of sacred history, corroborated by individual ex- perience, force upon us the conviction that sin, the great bane of the race, sundered the ties that bound us to God and his family, disfran- chised, disinherited, made us aliens, strangers, and foreigners, enemies to God and to our own happiness ; it rendered us poor, homeless, and friendless ; sent us away from Gfld's presence ; left us amid darkness and fear, without any help from Heaven, in danger of eternal death to pursue our way to the eternal world through a land of snares, pits, and woes ; but a brighter day dawned. It w T as the day of our return, of our reception, of our adoption into the family of God, and of our re-union a day of bright- ness and of glory,- when the sun of righteous- ness first shone upon us with healing in its wings ; a day when the kingdom of God came with power; when God and Christ, salvation and heaven, and all that is sweet, and precious, 336 SACRED MEMORIES. and blessed, became ours. Into this family, thus reunited and reorganized, the great Master came, as he had a right to do, and choosing one here and one there, and another yonder, accord- ing to his will and pleasure, as to persons and numbers, and inspiring them with a quenchless love for souls, and a spirit of apostolic ardor and moral heroism, said, " Go, prepare yourselves for the tight to which I have called you ; put on the girdle of truth, the breastplate of right- eousness, the shoes of the preparation of the Gospel of peace ; take the shield of faith, the sword of the Spirit, the helmet of salvation, and last, though not least, the mighty weapon of prayer. Thus clothed in panoply divine, like men in uniform, go forth to war ; unfurl your blood-stained banner, the banner of your im- mortal commmnder. Before it and above it ele- vate the cross of your divine Master, the cross by which you are to conquer ; seize the royal standard, and bear it forth into the heart of the camp of your ememies, proclaiming death to treason and traitors, death to rebels, and to all the hosts of sin and hell, but liberty, peace, happiness, and heaven to all penitent and sub- missive captives. Thus from our midst there went forth origi- nally a band of men. though but a handful. The first New York Conference of which we hate any statistical records embraces six circuits, SACRED MEMORIES. 337 which were manned by twelve traveling preach- ers and one Presiding Elder, whose names were, Jesse Lee, Presiding Elder ; Matthias Swain, James Covel, Nathaniel B. Mills, Aaron Hunt, John Allen, George Eoberts, Lemuel Smith, Menzies Eainor, Robert Green, John Bloodgood, Daniel Smith, and William Lo- see. These twelve apostles of the New York Conference, impelled by a love and zeal that knew no limit but that of their own earthly ex- istence, went to their fields of conflict. While they expected the victories of the cross, they knew that but little awaited them save hard work, poor fare, and constant and severe trials. They returned annually to their Conference gatherings, suspending active labors to look each other in the face, exchange friendly saluta- tations, compare notes, report the state of the work among them, receive their appointments for the coining year, and then, uttering their hurried farewell and mounting their horses, started off on a new campaign, sweeping over the plain, going through valleys, plunging into and fording rivers, climbing the mountains, penetrating the forest, and opening new paths for the onward march of incoming laborers, whose numbers, continually increasing, became at last a mighty host, made up of men of re- nown, of mark, and of power men eminently fitted for the work and for the time, such as 22 338 SACRED MEMORIES. Garrettson, Phoebus, the Bangses, (two in heav- en, and the other left with us for awhile longer,) Washburn, Emory, Woolsey, Draper, Merwin, Sandford, L. Clark, Stead, Ware, Ostrander, Rice, Jewett, Richardson, Martindale, the Luck- eys, Goodsell, and how many m<3re we have not the time to tell. On they go in their westerly march until their increased numbers and en- larged boundaries calling for a separation, by the act of the General Conference of 1832 a di- vision is effected, resulting in the organization of the Troy Annual Conference. Working with equal ardor, their numbers increasing still more rapidly than before, the veteran host receiving constant accessions to their ranks of new re- cruits, go forward in their work until the body, becoming again too large and unwieldy, is by the act of the General Conference of 1848 once more cut in twain, the old body retaining its former name, and the new one, distinguished by the addition of a single word, for the first time the New York East Conference appears in his- tory. Divided by conference boundaries and in conference relations, they still unite in feel- ing, in faith, in sacrifice and effort. The body, now existing in two bands, enters upon a new and a still more glorious career. Baptized by the spirit of their fathers, and intent only on saving souls, they hasten to their work, to the cities and villages, large and small, visiting the SACRED MEMORIES. 339 seaports within their boundaries, spreading out over Long Island, sailing up the Sound, gliding up the Connecticut and Housatonic, exploring the inland counties and towns of the States of Connecticut, Vermont, and Massachusetts; going up and down both sides of the Hud- son, through Westchester, Duchess, Columbia, Schoharie, Delaware, Greene, Sullivan, Ulster, Orange, and Rockland Counties, on they sweep over hill and dale, plain and valley, shouting to each other ffom the hill -tops, cheering and ani- mating each other in their work by the messages* and assurances received of increased success, and of multiplied victories, until after the separation of twenty years, along all their lines and through all their ranks is heard ringing out the cry, " Re-union, re-union ! " and lo ! we find two of the commanders-in-chief of the great American army, with the generals, colonels, captains, lieu- tenants, #nd privates of the New York and New York East drawn up in rank and file within the quiet, sacred roof of St. Paul's on this day of grace April 3, in the year of our Lord 1868. ADDRESS OF REV. L. S. WEED. Rev. L. S. Weed, of the New York East Con- ference, said : I am here as a learner to-day, my brethren, 340 SACRED MEMORIES. and one of the lessons I have been trying more thoroughly to learn is this : that the chief end of man is to glorify God and enjoy him forever. My heart was touched with the beauty of that thought when the honored Secretaries of our Conferences announced the solemn roll-call of our dead. Heroic men ! They walk the streets of that city to-day whose pavements are of gold transparent as glass. I read in French history of one who, though a nobleman by birth, en- listed in the ranks of the common soldiery. Preferment was offered him, but refused. His impulse was love of country, not of glory. On many a well-contested field he earned the title they gave him, "' The bravest soldier of France ;" and when at last he fell, it was decreed that al- ways in the original muster his name should be called, and in response one of the oldest soldiers should step to the front and answer, "Died on the field of battle. 1 ' We do well to remember them to-day. We do well to remember that as they took part in the toil they share in the tri- umph ; that though they rest from their labors their works do follow them. Yes, Servants of God, well done ; Your glorious warfare's past ; The battle's fought, the race is run, And ye are crowned at last. Thank God ! I am lea-rning, too, that the suggestions of SACRED MEMORIES. 341 this moment are rich with the proofs that Chris- ^tianity is a supernatural force. Within these later years many books have been published in the interest of what men call "positive philos- ophy," that is to say, a philosophy that puts the intellectual above the moral in all the forces of civilization, and then in the esteem of some puts , mere mechanical causes, such as climate, soil, and food, above intellection itself, substantially deifying the geography of the earth and making it the great disposer of human destiny. I have often wished, when reading such pages, that philosophers thus writing might be touched with a little of the old Methodistic experience of the* grace of God, and thus come to learn the mighty truth represented here to-day, that in reckoning up the agencies that give shape to human char- acter, and civilization, and destiny, the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven must have pre- eminently its place. Why, sixty years ago all" that territory now covered by these two Confer- ences had but forty active ministers and less than nine thousand members. Forty years ago there were only eighty -five active preachers and less than thirty thousand members. Twenty years ago we had grown some. There were two hundred and fifty-seven ministers, counting out the superannuated ministers, reporting a mem- bership of about forty-eight thousand members, and an aggregate benevolent contribution for 342 SACEED MEMORIES. the year 1848 of about twelve thousand dollars. Twenty years have passed, and on taking the. statistics of last year (and those nineteen years have pushed out into the same territory) we find returns of more than four hundred active minis- ters, reporting seventy-three thousand members, with an aggregate collection of more than one hundred and ten thousand dollars. Add to this the churches built, the debts paid, the princely centenary contributions of the last fwo years, the thousands upon thousands of happily con- verted souls, some of whom are in other Churches, some of whom are in distant places, 1 some with the sainted over the river, and you have to this extent tangible factors in a Christian civilization to which the history of the world gives no parallel. But by what power . have these high conditions of progress and of civilization been struck into being? Are they 'the product of the schools of topography, cli- mate, soil, or food ? No, no ! Their original cause is supernatural : the power producing these conversions, producing the glory of the higher life, is the Holy Ghost. And gathered here to-day, where suggestions of what God has wrought sweep in upon us from the dis- tant years as the waves of the sea upon the shore, our hearts, like the eternal anthem of the deep, so swell to heaven their song of praise, SACKED MEMORIES. 343 All hail the power of Jesus' name ! Let angels prostrate fall ; . Bring forth the royal diadem, And crown him Lord of all. And this retrospect removes*all our anxieties for the future. We of the* East, who come to strike fraternal hands with you of the West to- day, do but symbolize by this act the great heart of the world. China, Japan, and all the East on one side, and Western Europe on the other, are stretching their greetings across our conti- "uent; and as with us so with them, this city is to be their final place of meeting. This is to be the entrepot for all the world. Commerce, as never before, will throng our bays and rivers, and must have wharves ; magnificent ware- houses are to line all our shores; merchant princes are to crowd these streets; the din of an exhaustless industry is to swell through all the air ; the wealth, the luxury, and the v 7 ice, too, of this metropolis are to overflow the nar- rowness of its limits; rural towns and villages will be compelled to take in upon themselves much of the life of this city, whether it be good or bad ; and sometimes with tearfulness I have asked myself, What shall be the issue ? how can we lift this great future out of the mire of worldliness, and kindle it with the glowing fervors of a millennial spirit? I look on your faces, ye men of God; I pass in vision before 344 SACRED MEMORIES. me the victories you have won, and the forces you represent, and I think of those who shall come after you, touched by the same spirit of heroic resolve at any and every sacrifice to spread scriptural holiness over all these lands, and my question is^inswered. I look out again on the march of events ; I listen to the tread of coming millions that are to overflow all our borders, but no dread now strikes my soul ; the voice of God sounds forth from heaven like the trump of battle, " They that be with you are more than they that be with them." Already, all through our circuits, and stations, and Con- ferences I hear the shout of the coming victory, " The kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our Lord and of his Christ." O, my Saviour, let that day of triumph come ! Rev. A. S. Hunt read the hymn commencing, "Zion stands with hills surrounded." SPEECH OF BEV. DR. CURRY. Eev. Dr. Curry was the next speaker, and on rising said : The whole occasion, the scenes around us, the exercises that have already taken place, have brought me into a condition that would be de- scribed by a certain class of psychologists as a kind of superior state, lifting one out of his im- SACKED MEMORIES. 345 mediate sensible surroundings to contemplate, not phantasy, but some of those realities which lie just outside of our sensible observations. It has been teaching me to read some of those les- sons which we find, not printed in the books, but lying between the lines or read just down below the lines the deep, far-reaching realities of the things that we have to do with. I have never suspected myself of being much of a hero worshiper, and yet I confess that the presence I feel myself surrounded with to-day not so much this material presence that I look upon and have heard, but a deepen one has brought upon me somewhat of a feeling of deep devotion. I could wish that it had been so presented as to have wrought in me a real inspiration somewhat in harmony with the greatness of the occasion round about me. I am fully convinced that there is inspiration in the presence of greatness, and a man that is susceptible of it will be made greater by associations of an exalted character. The very fact of our corning together, two bands formerly one, had in itself some influence to impress our minds with a sense of something a little out of the immediate range of things; but when the roll call came, not as we heard it each in our places yesterday, but that part omitted a class that had passed into a higher order- when they were made to pass tripping before us and we again shook them by the hand in our 346 SACRED MEMORIES. heart, it were not strange that, under those cir- cumstances, we feel inspiration, and are brought into communion higher and more exalted than our every-day affairs of life bring us into. I confess, too, that I am inclined to the notion that the place where we are the fact that we are assembled to-day in the city of New York in this re-union service is not without its sig- nificance. There is a spot within our city, sacred above most other sacred places, where American Methodism was born and cradled, and where, thank God ! it is cradled yet. God forbid that in obedience to the demands of mammon that spot should be desecrated from its own sacred uses ! May it ever be kept as a memorial of the days gone by and for the days yet to come. Now I have been compelled, as I have heard my brethren running over this sub- ject, to let my own mind run out, and to con- verse with those men of the past and with their deeds. From that point as a basis Methodism struck forth ; fif&t in the immediate vicinity, for it took hold upon New Rochelle and upon Long Island. It was presently at White Plains; it was taking root in the midst of the com- munity round about in the scattered popula- tions ; it reached out by and by, under Freeborn Garrettson, all the way up the Hudson River, along Lake Champlain, and possessed the ground at its first campaign. Jesse Lee carried it from SACRED MEMORIES. 347 New York up into New England, and consti- tuted a kind of local Methodism there ; which, however, bore strong flesh marks of its parent- age that it received in this locality, and bears them yet most nobly, a scion from the parent stock tlfat we are a little proud to recognize to- day. Another band more heroic still, whose names have not been heard among us to-day, Hezekiah Calvin Wooster, Elijah Woolsey, James Colman, and others, soon to be followed by Bangs, and Sawyer, and Case, and Dunham, pressed through the Black River country, beset by savages, and planted the standard of Meth- odism in.the dominion of Canada, and Canadian Methodism to-day is New York Methodism, a noble scion of the parent stock. We hold, un- der God, this central position, brethren, and fcave committed to us a very high responsibility, not only in regard to this position, but, as I first spoke, in regard to our parentage, the men that we have succeeded, in whose places we stand, whose duties, begun and carried forward by them very nobly in their day, have devolved upon us at this time. Their names have been mentioned before us to-day, and we have communed with them in our hearts and in our memories. They were men fitted by God for their times men that the times themselves, under God, had prepared for the work which he had ready for them to do, 348 SACRED MEMORIES. the one responding most faithfully to the other. In his name they went forward doing their work. We have known them, and the older part of this congregation received the Gospel from them. I would have liked if it could have been possible for us but we cannot cover all the ground possible in such a case to have gone over in our minds the mighty men that we read of in the books, and that our parents told us about in our younger days. I have thought of Billy Hibbard, Seth Crowell, Nicholas Snethen, Aaron Hunt, and a catalogu^ longer than I dare attempt to mention. I remember the men from whom I heard the Gospel in my own youthful days, mighty and- able men, and faith- ful in their work. Now, while we dwell thus in our thoughts upon these our fathers who have gone before us, and whom we delight 1$ think of, and with whom we expect a re-union by and by in some one of the groves of Para- dise, where we will have a re-union larger and longer than earth could afford ; while we think of these men we are brought to contemplate ourselves, and ask what manner of men we are and what we are about. I have no disposition to glorify either the past or the present, or to expect larger things than rationally may be expected from the future. While I feel hum- bled under a sense that we have done less than we should have done, I am very comfortable in SACRED MEMORIES. 349 the conviction that the scepter has not departed from Judah, the light has not become dim, the power has not departed, the mighty Samson has not been shorn of his locks, but there is still power in the Methodist ministry to accomplish yet further the work which God has given us to do in this locality. Let us look out upon the lines in the rear and in the front; let us be taught and encouraged by their pure example, and range ourselves accordingly, and go after them, conquering and to conquer. But from such a position as we occupy to-day we can hardly fail to look forward. We are at one extreme of time's rollout there is before us a vista opening, far-reaching as the coming ages, and infinitely full of future arid great re- sults. Now I would say a word to these coming generations. We hail you! we are waiting for you ! or, rather, we are in our positions prepar- ing the way for you! We promised, as our fathers devolved upon us very great responsi- bility when they appoin* }d us to this work, to give to those who come after us the heritage of labor, a heritage to work in that shall tax their utmost power, which shall demand of them that they shall rise high, reach far, and strike wide, in order to accomplish the work which we shall give them to do. We are not going to finish it; we shall rough"hew a great many of our plans that you have afterward to finish. AVe shall 350 SACRED MEMORIES. mark out a great many fields into which you are to go and accomplish the work. In the remarks that the brother just before me made, he cut right into the line of thought that I had been meditating upon. There is a mighty conflict before us, such as the world has not known before a conflict not of brute force, nor of gross, brutish infidelity, but with an an- tagonism, deep, far-reaching, yet material of the earth, earthy with which the power of spiritual life is called to grapple, and which shall be grappled with and overcome simply by that mighty energy which in the beginning was God's manifestation in the world in the form of Meth- odism. What is it? Christianity in earnest. Not only must there be eloquence and a pure Christianity, simple and undefiled, but it must be nerved with all the mighty power of faith, and all the energy that distinguishes \he Amer- ican mind, accomplishing the work of turning back the tide of sin, less by the simple power of argumentation and erudition than by the melt- ing, burning influence of holy love, transforming individual hearts, and uniting those hearts to each other in indissoluble bonds, until the world, redeemed and exalted in the persons of individ- ual believers, shall become Christ's salvatien re- vealed by the power of the Holy Spirit SACRED MEMORIES. 351 ADPKESS OF DR. FOSTER. Rev. Dr. Foster on coming forward said : I came more than a thousand miles to be present at this re-union- came with unabated and wearisome travel through days and through nights to reach this place. I did not come, how- ever, to make any remarks. I had no thought that I would be expected to say any thing to- day. When 1 left the city on a painful mission, I had hardly the hope that I should be per- mitted to be here at all. I said to the brethren who had invited me to take part, " You will provide some other brother to fill my place." I came expecting that the place would be filled, joined the procession at the corner of the street as it was passing over to this house, and yet I am not sorry that I am here at this desk to say a few words. This occasion has been one of very mixed and very precious emotions to my soul, more, perhaps, than to any one in this as- sembly. I have been mingling with that spirit- ual concourse that I almost believe to be within the w r alls of this temple to-day. Four days ago J sat with the circle of all my natural brothers and sisters around the coffin of my mother. That was a re-union at the grave's mouth. All of you know that within a little time^l have been walking at the margin of the grave, on the high land, looking out into the glory that is inef- 352 SACKED MEMORIES. fable, following mj own glorified child into the presence of God, and I have seemed to-day to be one of that spiritual concourse of those great and glorious men that have passed away, young and old, having finished their work. Glory to God ! I do not know that I can control my thoughts or emotions so as to say any thing of the few things that have been passing in my mind touch- ing the present. .It occurred to me that a word might be fitly spoken concerning the present attitude of the Xew York and ]S"ew York East Conferences to each other and to that great mother of us all, our common Meth- odism. And the thought passed into rny mind as I looked over this concourse, and back over the line of thirty years of ministerial life, of the nature of that union which cements and binds the" hearts of Methodist preachers together. I have the conviction that there has never arisen an organism upon earth, there never has appeared an institution, uniting men together so closely and so unspeakably as Methodism has united together its ministry. I doubt much if, with a large part of Methodist preachers as I have known them for these thirty years and more, there is any tie upon earth closer, sweeter, and more saured than that which binds them to- gether. I am conscious for myself that though I think I have had an ordinary share of attach- SACRED MEMORIES. 353 ment to my natural relationships, the tie which has bound me to ray Church and to my spiritual brethren has been intense, sacred, and sweet, and I believe stronger than the natural ties of life. I think I can say that with a certainty that it is true. I believe that among the many causes that have made Methodism so great and so efficient I will venture to use the adjective, so glorious as I believe Methodism is, and has been, no one cause has been more effective to that result than the unity and sacredness of the tie that binds us together as brethren. I believe that spirit of sympathy and love and mutual interest in a common work, cultivating a common ground, laboring in. a common cause, having common lines of attachment and connection throughout the extent of Conferences, has made us to be more emphatically a community of brethren than any that has existed upon the face of the earth. Long may it be before there shall be any weakening of these bonds ! far be the day from us when Methodist preachers will feel that they stand separate and alone ! May it be forever that we shall be a band of brothers, having common interests and common sympa- thies and feeling for each other's woes ! I wanted to say this to the New York East Con- ference. I say it as the utterance of my own heart, and, 1 believe, as the utterance of my 351 SACRED MEMORIES. Conference. I am clear in the conviction that at no time in the history of our existence as a body (and I believe it is true of yourselves) has there been with us a more intense and blessed faith in the integrity and eternity of Methodism than there is to-day. I believe, moreover, that there has never been a time when there was a more unbroken, a more unswerving, a more deathless loyalty to every thing that belongs to our institution. We feel in sympathy with every idea of progress, every thought of improvement, every advancement to increased enlargement and power in every direction that may be born out of the struggling mind of this generation, or that may come up in the generations to come ; but underlying all our sympathy with progress, and improvement, and change, is the unswerving and eternal loyalty to Methodism as it has been handed down from the fathers. I believe that we have as much confidence in the future ol our Church, in its piety, enlarged zeal, efficiency, usefulness, and destiny to overcome all impedi- ments, and sweep out over the whole land, as was ever felt by any of her sons in any period of her history. I give yon to-day greetings and salutations from our Conference, and assure you that in time to come, as in the time past, you may expect to see us at our posts working pa- tiently, earnestly, lovingly, without bigotry, variance, or hatred, in love and charity for all SACRED MEMORIES. 355 Christian people, but toiling by day and by night to build up the walls of this beautiful Zion until the Master shall put the top stone upon it with shoutings of grace unto it. Bishop Janes said : " I think we may infer, from what the last speaker has said, that he, like myself, has recently stood where heaven and earth met, where young disciples of Christ, in their dying hour, were in such communion witli God, and were in such oneness and fellow- ship to the spirits of the just made perfect, that the family was really united, both those in heaven and those on earth. It seems to me that we have here to-day an actual connection not only with the present and the past, but the present and the future. There are those here present to-day who hardly belong to the present of earth; they stand in advance, and it seems to me that they are an actual, appreciable link be- tween us and those to whom reference has been so affectionately and touchingly made by sev- eral to-day. Our Father Clark hardly belongs to us. He is only a loan to us of God for a lit- tle period beyond his natural time, and, I have no doubt, for a special usefulness. He has spoken to us to-day apostolic words. I believe his utterances have been very much like those which Jesus would have given if he had stood here in his place. We have with us a yet older man, one who will be ninety-three years of age 356 SACKED MEMORIES. in a few days, a man who commenced his min- istry in 1798. I believe I should disappoint this congregation if I did not give them the op- portunity to see his venerable form, and to re- ceive his blessing. Shall I ask him to speak for five minutes?" Loud responses of " Yes, yes." REMARKS OF FATHER BOEHM. The venerable Henry Boehm came forward, and said his heart was full of love, and it pro- duced a very comfortable feeling. He was re- minded of the fact, when Jesse Lee's name was mentioned, that he took care of him for weeks in his last sickness, and he remembered that the room from which he departed in peace and tri- umph was unearthly. Many a time he (the speaker) took Bishop Asbury off his horse and carried him into the church, where he often preached while in the midst of intense bodily pain. He rejoiced that there was a living spirit in Methodism still, and while the holy influence existed, he had no fear of vulgar and hidden infidelity. About fifty years ago he (Mr. Boehm) met with a minister who said, when he found we preached the doctrine of holiness, that it is the privilege of Christian believers to be sanctified SACRED MEMORIES. 357 throughout soul, body, and spirit : " I wonder if such devils that preach such doctrine can have forgiveness." Rev. A. 0. Foss led in prayer, after which the congregation united in singing the doxology. Rev. Laban Clark, D.D., pronounced the benediction. THE END. Opinions of the Press, " This volume contains interesting sketches of one hundred and thirteen ministers connected with the New York and Xew York East Conferences who died during the two decades that intervened be tween 1848 and 1868. It will be found deeply interesting to many thousands to whom these noble men ministered, and with whom they mingled in the social walks of life.'' Christ. Advocate. " The general reader will find in these pases muoh to instruct and guide to usefulness in the Christian life." Northwestern Christ. Adv. "As illustrations of the power of grace, especially in the toils and struggles of the itinerancy and in the ordeal of death, these records will possess more than a mere local interest. '' 8. S. Journal. " Many will be the fragrant memories which this interesting volume will inspire. Says Bishop Janes : ' They were all burning and shining lights, and some of them glowed with peculiar luster. Taken together they form a galaxy in the firmament of the Church upon which we look with much admiration and pleasure.' " Guide to Holiness. "This is an interesting and valuable book." Highland Democrat. " This is a work which the years of experience and scholastic taste of the author have doubtless made as faithful as it has pleasant." Pouf/hkcepsie Daily J', " The author is entitled to much credit for the labor he has be- stowed upon this work, which we are inclined to believe will have an extensive sale. We would earnestly commend it to the religious community.'' Pouyhlcefpsie Morning News. "These brief biographies will be found exceedingly interesting, not only to the immediate friends, but to the Church and country at large. It should have a wide circulation." National Tern. Advocate. " This volume contains many precious names, and suggests many valuable lessons. It by no means lacks variety, as it presents men of all grades of talent and various work, such as itinerants, mission- aries, historians, authors, etc. It will be a welcome book to many we are sure." Ladies' Repository. " This is a novel collection of biographical sketches of deceased ministers. Among them are some well-known names Coles, Foss, Ilagany, Jewett, Levings, Eice, Sandford, Martmdule, Bangs, Floy, Olin, Stocking, Kennaday, Perry, etc., etc." Sing Sing Republican. '' When it is considered that this book contains the annals of men who represent all grades of talent and adaptation, such as itinerants, presiding elders, and missionaries ; historians, authors, and publish- ers ; editors of books and periodicals ; presidents of seminaries and colleges; delegates to the General Conference; orators, controver- sialists, and divines, it cannot fail to interest the general reader." Fbughkeepsie Daily Eagle. " Eev. Mr. W. C. Smith has done a good service for the Church in his ' Sacred Memories.' The author has thus given permanent form to those floating and transient records. His fist of worthies is nu- ' merous, and includes many famous names." Methoditt. " A more interesting work of the kind we have never met. We cheerfully recommend it to all families." PeeJcskill Advertiser. " I am glad the ' Memorials ' are published. All treasures of that kind are too sacred to be lost. They will make up a part of the fu- ture history of the Church, and I doubt not of the record of heaven." DR. W. H. FEKRIS. " To those who knew them personally their memory is as fragrant as the spices in the garden of the Lord. To those who were con- verted through their ministry, their names are as ointment poured forth. To those who were edified and encouraged by them in their struggles for goodness and lor glory, the remembrance of them is very precious. All these classes of persons will thank the author for these memoirs. Taken together, they form a galaxy in the firma- ment of the Church upon which we look with much admiration and pleasure." BISHOP JANES. " I take great pleasure in recommending to our ministers and mem- bers the perusal of the volume of ' Sacred Memories' of deceased ministers in the New York and New York East Conferences, by the Eev. W. C. Smith. Tn this memorial volume the great and good Methodist ministers of other clays live again, and we seem to see and hear them as in our youth. The reading of this volume will inspire the heart with deep glowing emotion and gratitude.'' J. B. DURBIN. "In issuing your 'Sacred Memories' you have done^the Church a real service. When obituaries are received in our Conferences I have said to myself, ' Is this the last ? Are these tributes to the memory of the good to lie in the archives of the Conference never to be read ? ' You have answered my inquiry by bringing out these sketches of the lives of the faithful to fuller view." C. C. NORTH. " The 'Sacred Memories ' is an excellent book, and ought to be in every Methodist family and Sunday-school in our entire Connection. Let the wealthy give it to the poor. It does me good to read it." DANIEL DREW. '"" I have just risen, greatly profited, from the reading of the ' Sacred Memories.' It should be read by every layman and minister of our Church. I should be pleased to say to my friends in the old Pratts- ville District : Brethren, this book speaks to you of the life and death of men who to many of you were spiritual Fathers, if not Apostles ; such men as Eice, Jewett, Ferguson, Martindale, Breakey, Mitchell, Lee, Bangs, and others, ' who counted not their lives dear unto themselves.' Brethren, order the book, read, and lend it." WM, Goss. " Having read most of the notices of the illustrious men whose obituaries make up this volume, I cannot but express my pleasure at this effort to perpetuate their memory. Not only their names, but the record of their devoted lives and triumphant deaths should be as 'household words.' " JOSEPH LONGKING. A GENT'S WANTED. The largest commissions allowed. Those desiring the Agency of the book will address the Author at No. 11 Jane-street, Now York. BOOKS FOR SUNDAY-SCHOOLS, 805 Broadway, New York. STORY OF ANNA THE PROPHETESS. By a Sabbath-School Teacher. 18mo. CTORY OF ANANIAS AND SAPPHIRA. By WILLIAM A. ALCOTT. 18mo. V::T3 JEW AMONG ALL NATIONS. Kight Illustrations. 18mo. THE KINGDOM OF HEAVEN Among Children; or, Twenty-five Narratives of a Rcgligioitf Awakening in a School in i'omerauia. From the Germaa. by CHARLOTTE CLARKE. 18mo. MOUNTAINS OF THE PENTATEUCH. Conversations on the Mountains of the PentMeuch, and th Scenes and Circumstances connected with them in Holy Writ ISmo. LIFE DF JOHN BUNYAN, Author of the Pilgrim's Progress. By STEPHEN R. WicKKVa Six Illustrations. Ibruo. 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