IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
BY
SAMUEL OSGOOD, D.D., LL. D.,
AUTHOR OF "THE HEARTH-STONE," ETa.
New and Enlarged Edition.
Why should we fear, youth's draught of joy,
If pure would sparkle less!
Why should the cup the sooner cloy,
Which God hath deigned to bless!
Who but a Christian, through all life
That blessing may prolong!
Who through the world's sad day of strife
Still chan t his moning ong! 
KB.L.
NEW YORK:
E. P. DUTTON AND COMPANY,
713 BROADWAY.
1877.
t1  Sones 
Copyright,
SAMUEL OSGOOD
1876.
* D.
*..!. ~
* *e e 
- 4,  
TO
THE CLASS OF 1832,
(HARVARD UNIVERSITY, )
IN REMEMBRANCE OF PLEASANT YEARS TOGETHER,
AND WITH EVER DEEPENING AFFECTION,
CDIO  Madamt is  ttitattB,
THEIR CLASSMATR
v-K
BY  
PREFACE.
THE papers that make up the substance of this
volume, aim to treat the chief stages in human life,
in connection with their attendant lessons and experiences.  Thus the volume seeks to do for our
pilgrimage what " The Hearth-Stone" sought to
do for the household.  It is written in a similar
vein, with an equally practical and religious purpose, and the author will think himself very happy
if he is allowed to attend as a companion by the
way, the many kind readers who have admitted his
former book to their homes.
The introductory chapter was an after thought
of the writer, during the leisure of his summer vacation, and may be omitted by all readers who do
not care for such personal reminiscences. Perhaps,
however, to not a few, these introductory sketches
may give the key note to the whole, and win to the
I-)     -I Ivy* A
* - 
PREFACE.
survey of life in general an attention quickened as
well as sobered by each reader's personal remembrances.
If this volume makes one young man more
thoughtful, or one old man more cheerful, nay if it
leads one pilgrim to go on his way more bravely
and faithfully, with sober memory as the guide of
his sanguine hope, the author will be repaid for a
service that has cost him not a little care, however
simple his work may seem. If his style seems
sometimes too plain and hortatory, let readers allow him to be content with directness and usefulness, if at the expense of more stately elaboration.
He is encouraged to believe that these essays will
meet with some sympathy, because each of them
embodies an actual experience, either personal or
professional
To the above Preface to the first edition of this book,
the author needs only to add the remark, that after going
through several editions, it has been for some years out
of print, and that the friends who wish to see it again
will find some fresh notes of the author's experience and
thought in later years in the closing chapter now added.
NEW YORK, November 1, 1876.
6 
PAGN
COmPANONS BY THE WAY.  AN INTaODUOTORY S   c,.            9
1. School Days,............                      18
2. College Life,...........            29
3. A Village Church,...........           40
4. City Experiences,..........               58
GOD'S BiLsiNG ON THE JORN,.....                           67
CHInHOOD,......                    81
T1  SONG THAT NV,......  91
Yo,.................                       10
T TRU  FE,..........                      121
MANOOD AND rrS BUSs,..........             135
Losses AND ANXI,...........   149
THE TRU  RST,......    163
MDDLE-AGE,............ 177
CLOUD AND Fm,...........                         191
OLD AGE,................ 207
.   
4. Abroad,............      336
5. Studies,........... 341
6. The Outlook,..........              358 
(tompauious by ttt man.
AN I.NTRODUCTORY SKETCH. 
" Come then, my friends, or sad or smiling,-whether
On you life's load weighs heavier day by day,
Or blessings over new like summer weather,
With flowers adorn, with fruits enrich your way,
We go to meet the coming day together.
Then live we, walk we happy while we may.
to, wnen our children mourn that we are past,
To cheer their souls our faithful loves shall last."
GOETS, 
COMPANIONS BY THE WAY.
In Aktt. f
A  YEAR ago during the summer vacation, I prepared for
the press a volume of essays upon home-life under the
name of" The Hearth-Stone."  The kind reception of this
book has led me to think of another of somewhat kindred
purpose.  These " Mile-Stones" are intended to mark the
leading points and passes of our pilgrimage, as "The
Hearth-Stone" aimed to note the chief experiences of our
abiding place. The pleasant summer time has come once
more, and with it a short season of leisure that is made all
the more cheerful by some occupation that is not hardship.
Before approaching the graver topics to be treated, may
not author and reader have a little chat together upon old
scenes and friends by way of Preface, with the hope of
making the circle more close and social? This is peculiarly the season of reunions, and few persons are so engrossed in business as not to find a few days' leisure for revisiting the old homestead, or running away to some country resting-place.  Right heartily the summer resting time 
12        MILE STONES IN OUR LIVE-JOURNEY.
chimes in with the winter's merry-making and the genial
crackling flame of the Christmas log seems to be discoursing of these happy hours in the country under the
greenwood tree. This book that may not make its appearance until the winter holidays, will not be any less fitting
because it brings a summer garland upon its front.
Every man is largely a debtor to his companions, and
in revising these unambitious essays that undertake to
give some practical views of prominent passages in human
life, I see in every page some traces of the kindness and
wisdom that have never in one form or another ceased
their sympathy and their counsel. Take from a man all
the knowledge and strength that he has received from associates, and you strip him of himself, and take his inmost
life away. Before using our own eyes, we first see through
the eyes of others; and however mature our vision, there
will always be some subjects that we study better by
hearty sympathy with others than by any proud philosophy of our own. It would be a somewhat interesting study
for any man to trace his character, his habits and opinions
to their source in his personal associations, and ascribe
each dominant tendency to its cause. The grave-digger
in Hamlet makes the groundlings in the pit shake their
sides with laughter as he strips off garment after garment,
and at last his rotund figure, robbed of its lendings, stands
out in its own sorry dimensions. Far sorrier would be the
plight of any man who could limit his experience to his own
intuitions and throw off all dependence upon the fellowship
of friends and the gathered wisdom of his race. A young 
COMPANIONS BY THE WAY.
man does not of himself know the whole of youth, nor does
any old man exhaust the whole meaning of age. Young
and old can be wise only by breathing the atmosphere of
good society and good books, and rounding their own narrowness by such high communion. Surely were it not for
such helps, even a task like the present, which seeks to
treat but cursorily of very various stages and experiences
of life, would have been dismissed as presumptuous. It is
not presumptuous in this connection to give some desultory
reminiscences of companions that may be recognised by a
friendly knot of readers, and may, perhaps, start kindred
retrospection in others. Our reader will be in the better
mood to think of the lessons of the great pilgrimage if our
chat together may jog the elbow of his own memory, and
move him to illustrate the way-marks of the journey by
scraps from his own unwritten journal.
I.-SC OI O O L DAYS.
It is not well for a man ever to forget his childhood,
and it is a sad and sterile experience that parts company
with young hopes.   To many of us the old play-ground
that we have set aside as the haunt of folly, may teach a
lesson deeper far than what our worldliness is proud to
call wisdom. In a late trip to MIassachusetts, I re-visited
familiar scenes of boyhood and youth, and our school and
college days rose as freshly to mind as if they were of yesterday, and the absentee had been a middle-aged man only
in dreams. I stood upon the old battle hill whose north
13 
MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
ern slope, reaching to the river, was our play-ground thirty
years ago, and it was not difficult to people the place with
shapes far different from those that meet the eye. Then
from the hill-top with its modest little monument to Warren and his fellow martyrs, down to the shore of the Mystic, the land was a great pasture, unbroken, except by one
or two little cottages. Now it is covered with houses, and
the pebbly beach of the river which was our perpetual delight, has been possessed and hidden by wharves and factories that are usually called improvements. That stately
school, fitly the pride of the whole neighborhood, stands
upon the bed of an old pond, and scores of urchin republicans now learn to read and spell where frogs croaked to the
evening stars, and turtles basked in the noonday sun. The
tall obelisk that now crowns the hill is itself far less a wonder
than the great landscape which it displays from its summit. Within thirty years the whole vicinity has changed;
and whether we eye the dome of the observatory at Cambridge, the score of railways that stretch their iron web
in every direction from the Pilgrim city, or the steamers
that ply through the harbor, the proofs are clear that the
new powers have invaded those old haunts, and the nineteenth century has encamped a host more powerful than
the British invaders about that old battle ground.
A river is a famous playmate, and is quite ready to
join in almost any game. The Mystic, notwithstanding
its utilitarian metamorphosis, seems now in the gleam of
sunset to give a look of familiar recognition, as if beneath
all his new cares and burdens, remembering his old play
14 
COMPANIONS BY THE WAY.
fellow, with whom, years ago, he used to swim and row,
and fish and skate, and lounge and dream. He was a ver satile companion, whose resources never were exhausted.
His moods were as many as a poet's, and changed with
every sky, and wind, and tide. Nothing could be more
cheering than our Mystic, when the full tide, flooding his
green banks, gave his bright' face the look of inspiration;
and when the tide was out, and the dark flats were laid
bare, his face seemed emptied of its glory, like poor Cow per's, when deserted by the genial muse, and left to the
mud and ooze of Acheron. Yet even this gloomy aspect
of the river was not without advantage. His bare shores
were a mine of wealth to many a fisherman on the lookout for shell-fish, for bait, or for his table. Then, moreover, the tide never left the channels wholly bare, and two
threads of deep water never failed to mark the deep bed
of the river with their silver, so that this son of Neptune
slept like a sea-king. Adventurous boys, the writer among
the number, would sometimes swim across the channel to
explore the great central bed, not without ample reward
in the brave store of fish of various kinds, and sometimes
of rare size, that were stranded upon the bank, or imprisoned in the little basins. In full tide our river bore noble freight upon its bosom, and harbored creatures of no
mean pretensions in its waters. The hulls of huge vessels from the shipyards of Medford came floating by us on
the way to their ocean home, and we surely thought that
the great leviathan had come, whenever a stray seal lifted
his cynical nose above the surface. There were some per.
15 
16        MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
sonages that seemed to have a peculiar relation to the
river, and to be as much a part of it as the fish or the
banks. There was an old man, an ancient mariner indeed, who seemed to have a secret understanding with the
stream, to know every turn and eddy of the tide, the haunt
and likings of every fish, and the place and use of all
kinds of bait.  I can see the old fisherman as plainly as
the day now, although years ago he was hooked by the great
fisher of men; and I can never see a perch or a flounder in
the market, without thinking of S, the fisherman of
the Mystic. To children there is something weird and im.
posing in all kinds of special knowledge or power, and S.
shared this prestige with another odd character, who
made his appearance about twice a week in a skiff from
the opposite bank of the river, usually well laden in summer with apples or some kind of farm produce. He was
a cross man, and report said that the little keg in the bottom of his boat was not intended for water only, yet we
were always glad to see him starting out from the creek on
Chelsea shore, and pulling with his adroit oars for our
beach. We never could make him out satisfactorily, being especially puzzled by his uncertain distribution of apples, and boys are like men in taking "omne ignotum pro
mirifico," so that this familiar oarsman stands even to
this day among the mythical personages of our annals.
On the bridge which crossed the river, we used to watch
the great throng of Eastern travel, and felt that we were
quite in the world, as we counted their number and variety. The bridge is comparatively quiet now, and the 
COMPANIONS BY THE'rAY.
incessant lines of stage-coaches have yielded to other con veyances, that make small account of the horse's speed.
We cannot meet now in an evening walk the characters
whose step we used to mark in our rambles over that thoroughfare. We held our breath, with admiration, many a
time, as we looked upon a man of foreign mien and dress,
who used to distance all competition with his angling rod,
and drew huge bass from the river, as if they were minnows. He was said to be the Russian consul of Boston,
and I must confess to a certain involuntary respect for the
empire of the Czar, that dates from that early knowledge
of the prowess of one of his subjects. There was a memorable traveller over the bridge, whom we used to eye with
equal interest but less admiration. He was a tall man,
with long hair, and a stooping, awkward gait, yet a very
fast walker, who seemed to ignore the use of the horse,
and put himself upon his own independent footing. He
was thought to'be immensely rich, and to be the solitary
lord of a whole island near the Chelsea shore. His walks
are now over, the drawbridge to his lonely domain is dismantled, and through a deep cut in the high back of his
island, the locomotive thunders along with its huge burdens, and whistles democratic defiance at the dust of the
old proprietor, and at every remnant of feudal despotism.
Beyond our river the Chelsea shore rose by a graceful
slope to a considerable hill, over whose shoulders towered
the summit of another and distant hill that seemed to our
boyish eyes the very limit of the horizon. When leave
was granted one holiday week to pass a day with a play
17 
18        MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
fellow whose father's farm was at the foot of that height,
the little journey rose into the grandeur of travel, and
Ledyard himself never felt more proud of his marches.
To crown the whole, when our adventurous little company
scaled the summit, looked out upon the vast ocean, then
descended the opposite side, bathed in the sea surf, and
came back laden with a goodly store of luscious berries
and strange shells, never was Alexander more proud of his
conquests; although, as we saw the big sails in the offing,
sweeping towards foreign lands, we knew that we had not
yet quite compassed the globe, and could not share his
chagrin that there are no more worlds to conquer.  The
river and that distant hill had appeared to bound our uni
verse, and childish as the illusion seemed, it is one that
every age of life in some way repeats, and as long as we
live we are crossing some last stream, or climbing some
final obstacle, only to find broader waters and higher obstacles rolling and swelling before our path. Sad blow to
our childish romance! our Ultima Thule has fallen into
the hands of speculators, and the stately hill, with its
graded house-lots, figures among the fancy-stocks of the
land market.
The better philosophy that is now gaining ground is
rescuing childhood from contempt, and finding traits of
Providential wisdom in the play-spirit that makes so much
of the poetry of our early years.? urely we can never
work well when we forget to play; and I verily believe
that some of the worst traits and coarsest vices of our nation come from over much worldly care and utter neglect
I 
COMPANIONS BY THE WAY.
of healthful sports that stir without inebriating the blood
and nerves. In childhood, the force of nature educates us
in spite of ourselves, and every genial playground is a
monitorial school to teach the muscles, senses, and faculties, their offices. Our circle of playfellows has disappeared, and many of them have gone to their graves; yet
mature years have but deepened our conviction of their
power, and our charity for their defects. Looking back
now with a keener eye for character, it is not difficult to
remember traits of enterprise and daring that needed the
arena only to make their possessors famous.'Almost every
boy was distinguished for something.   The biggest dunce
at books was the chief hero among horses, and with his
critical eye and firm rein made the rest of us fall abashed
into the background as he rode proudly by. Not a few
sprightly natures that were very wizards in inventing
sports for our Wednesday and Saturday afternoons, could
not summon a single spell to their aid when called up for
recitation. The great wonder is, that boys are preserved
safe in limb and life in spite of their reckless pranks. What
one of us now would, as of old, venture at any moment's
offer to extemporize a fast gallop upon any chance steed
without waiting for the saddle; and who of us, who have
kept up our acquaintance with salt water, can look without a shudder now to those high wharves and buildings
from which we used to jump and dive in the merriest
sport? Surely there is a guardian angel over the bones as
over the heart of childhood; and call the benign power
"Nature," or some more winning name, we must all own
19 
20        MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
its ministry, and be thankful for its blessing. There is
something in the Catholic "Hymn to My Guardian Angel" that comes home to every school-boy's experience,
and which he need not be ashamed to repeat in mature
years:
"Thy beautiful and shining face
I see not, though so near;
The sweetness of thy soft, low voice
I am too deaf to hear.
"I cannot feel thee touch my hand
With pressure light and mild,
To cheek me as my mother did
When I was but a child.
"But I have felt thee in my thoughts
Fighting with sin for me;
And when my heart loves God, I know
The sweetness is from thee.
"Ah me! how lovely they must be
Whom God has glorified;
Yet one of them, 0 sweetest thought I
Is ever at my side."
No man, indeed, who has a keen memory, will take a
wholly roseate view of boyhood and its associations, for
too many of its passions and strifes have stamped themselves upon the very threshold of his career. Yet time
never fails to bring out a meaning, deeper than we of old
knew, and it is surely no small part of manly wisdom to
buy experience with the small coin of childish humors and 
COMPANIONS BY TIE WAY.
follies, instead of postponing the purchase until fortune
and character may be given in exchange.
From the old battle hill, I can see the site of the
school house where two or three hundred boys were
gathered together to be whipped and taught as their fa thers were before them. A new edifice, indeed, has taken
the place of our school, yet upon its statelier front I can
see, as if drawn in the air by a strange pencil, the outline
of that ancient building with its round belfry, whose iron
tongue held such imperial command of our hours. It
costs no great effort to summon back one of those famous
Examination Days that absorbed the anticipation of months
and made the week almost breathless with anxiety. There
shines the nicely sanded floor, which the cunning sweeper
had marked in waving figures, to redeem it from association with any vulgar dust.  There sit the School Committee, chief among them the trim chairman, upon whose
lips, when he pronounces the final opinion of the board,
the very fates seem to rest their judgment. There too, is
the throng of parents, kindred and friends, who have come
to note the performances of the boys, to look pity upon
their mistakes, and to smile sympathy upon their successes.
Should the presidential chair fall to his lot, no prouder
and more radiant day can come to the school-boy, than
when, with new clothes and shining shoes, he stands forth
to speak his well-conned piece, and wears away among
the admiring crowd, the ribboned medal that marks his
triumph.
Our school.masters were great characters in our eyes,
21 
M22    LE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
and the two who held successively the charge of the gram
mar department, made a prominent figure in our wayside
chat, and to this day we can find some trace of their influence in our very speech and manner. They were men of
very different stamp and destiny.'he first of them was a
tall fair-faced man, with an almost perpetual smile. I always
felt kindly towards him, though it was not easy to decide
whether his smile was the expression of his good-nature, or
the mask of his severity. Hie wore it very much the same
when he flogged an offender, as when he praised a good
recitation. He seemed to delight in making a joke of
punishment, and it was a favorite habit of his, to fasten
upon the end of his rattan the pitch and gum taken from
the mouths of masticating urchins, and then, coming upon
their idleness unawares, he would insert the glutinous
implement in their hair, not to be withdrawn without an
adroit jerk and the loss of some scalp locks. Poor fellow!
his easy nature probably ruined him, and he left the school,
not long to follow any industrious calling. When, a few
years afterwards, I met him in Boston, with the marks of
broken health and fortune in his face and dress, the sight
was shocking to all old associations, as if a dignity quite
sacerdotal had fallen into the dust. His earthly troubles
have long been ended, and I take some pleasure in recording a kind and somewhat grateful feeling towards one
whose name I have not heard spoken these many years.
His successor was a man of different mould, a stern, resolute man, his face full of an expression that seemed to say
that circumstances are but accidents, and it is the will that 
COMPANIONS BY THE'"AY.
makes or mars the man. He was not in robust health,
and it seemed to some of us, who were thoughtful of his
feelings, that were it not for this he would have been likely
to pursue a more ambitious career, and give to the bar the
excellent gifts that he devoted to teaching. He was a most
faithful teacher, and his frown, like the rain cloud, had a
richer blessing for many a wayward idler, than his predecessor's perennial smile.  He has borne the burden and the
heat of the day for many a long year, with ample success, and
when he falls at his post, it will be with the consciousness
of having done a good work for his race, in a calling far
more honored by Heaven than any of the more ambitious
spheres that perhaps won his youthful enthusiasm. Well
says the noble Jean Paul Richter: "Honor to those that
labor in school-rooms! Although they may fall from notice
like the spring blossoms, like the spring blossoms they
fall that the fruit may be born."
There are two other personages that have much to do
with every youth's education, and whose names are household words in every New England home. The doctor and
the minister figure largely in every boy's meditations,
and in our day, the loyalty that we felt towards their professions had not been troubled by a homceopathic doubt or
a radical scruple. In our case, it needed no especial do
eility to appreciate these functionaries. Our doctor was a
most emphatic character, a man of decided mark in the
eyes alike of friends and enemies. He was very impatient
of questions, and very brief yet pithy in his advice, which
was of marvellous point and sagacity. He lost his brevity,
23 
24        MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNE'.
however, the moment that other subjects were broached,
and he could tell a good story with a dramatic power that
would have made him famous upon the stage. Hle was
renowned as a surgeon, and could guide the knife within a
hair's breadth of a vital nerve or artery with his left hand
quite as firmly as with his right. This ambi-dexterity
extended to other faculties, and he was quite as keen at a
negotiation as at an amputation. Hle was no paragon of
conciliation, and many of the magnates of the profession
appeared to have little liking for him, and sometimes
called him a poor scholar, rude in learning and taste, but
lucky in his mechanical tact.  But he beat them out of
this notion, as of many others, by giving an anniversary
discourse before the State Medical Association, which won
plaudits from his severest rivals, for its classical elegance,
as well as its professional learning and sagacity. It was
said that the wrong side of him was very wrong and very
rough. But those of us who knew him as a friend, tender
and true, never believed that he had any wrong side.
Certain it is, that they who grew up under his practice,
have been little inclined to exchange the regular school of
medicine, with its scientific method and gradual progress,
for any new nostrums of magical pretensions.
Our minister had the name of being the wise man of
the town, and I do not remember to have heard a word in
disparagement of his mind or motives, even among those
who questioned the soundness of his creed.  His voice has
always been as no other man's to many of us, whether
heard as for the first time at a father's funeral, as by me 
COMPANIONS BY THE WAY.
when a child five years old, or in the pulpit from year to
year. He came to our parish when quite young, and when
theological controversy was at its full height. A polemic
style of preaching was then common, and undoubtedly in
his later years of calm study and more broad and spiritual
philosophizing, he would have read with some good-natured
shakes of the head, the more fiery discourses of his novitiate, whilst he might recognize, throughout, the same
spirit of manly independence, republican humanity, and
profound reverence that have marked his whole career.
There was always something peculiarly impressive in his
preaching. Each sermon had one or more pithy sayings
that a boy could not forget; and when the thoughts were
too profound or abstract for our comprehension, there was
an earnestness and reality in the manner which held the
attention, like a brave ship under full sail that fixes the
gaze of the spectator, though he may not know whither she
is bound or what is her cargo, sure enough that she is
loaded with something, and is going right smartly somewhere. It was evident that our minister was a faithful
student and indefatigable thinker   When the best books
afterwards came in our way, we found that the guiding
lines of moral and spiritual wisdom had already been set
before us, and we had been made familiar with the well
winnowed wheat from the great fields of humanity. Every
thought, whether original or from books, bore the stamp
of the preacher's own individuality; and many will indorse
the saying, that upon topics of philosophic analysis and of
practical morals, he was without a superior, if not without
9
25 
26   MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
a rival, in our pulpits. It is a great thing for young
people to grow up under happy religious auspices, and religion itself has a new charm and power when dispensed
by a man who is always named in the family with reverence and tenderness. The world would be far better, and
Christian service would be much more truly valued, if
there were more just and emphatic tribute paid to efficient
pastoral labor. Our well known minister has now a more
conspicuous station; but he cannot easily have deeper influence than when pastor for a score of years over a united
parish, and one of the leaders of public opinion upon all
topics of high importance. It is well that the new post is
in such harmony with the previous career; for the head
of a college, according to our old-fashioned ideas, should
be a minister, and he should always abide in due manner
by the pastoral office.
Our town, although but a suburb of the great city, was
not unvisited by the noted personages of the land, and
Presidents, Governors, Senators, &c., astounded our boyhood with their presence. I remember creeping into a
very small place to catch a glimpse of Webster as he stood
up to give his oration at the laying of the corner-stone on
Bunker Hill, and the tones of his majestic voice chimed
well with the massive strength of his brow. Never were
our people more moved than when our own representative
Everett, gave us the first specimen of his charming oratory
not long after he bore his classic laurels from the Professor's chair of ease into the dusty arena of political life.
He appeared first in the procession, and astonished us by 
COMPANIONS BY THE WAY.
so youthful looks in a man of such name. He was not fai
from thirty, and his cheek was full of color, his eye bril liant, his hair curling, and to some of us who had not then
gone far in the Classical Dictionary, he seemed like a Pe ricles started into life from his marble sleep to charm our
day. His oration was upon the death of Adams and Jef ferson; and if school-boys had been umpires, the palm of
sovereign eloquence would have been given him by accla mation. It may be a small thing to say about so eminent
a personage, but one who was in youth a neighbor, may
testify of him that no man, probably, has ever figured in
our public affairs who has said so few unkind words, and
done so many kind deeds as he.
The Navy-yard gave our town some peculiar features,
and whilst robbing us of our wharf lots, it added something to our social privileges. There is much to like in
Navy officers; and in point of manners and intelligence,
the better part of them equal any professional class, in
spite of their frequent temptations to idleness and frivolity.
The school in which some of us were prepared for entering
College, was composed chiefly of the sons and daughters
of Navy officers, and of course there was no small infusion
of romance and chivalry in the studies and recreations.
Our master, fresh from College, was one of those who
have a charmed manner, and who seems to have won the
world's favor by the same power that carried the day with
our wayward wills. His ready sympathy and strong sense
and fine face disarmed all opposition, and a word or a look
would subdue the wildest boy or soothe the most fidgety
27 
28        MILE STONES IN OUPR LIFE-JOURNEY
girl. Two of us remained under his care after he left the
school, and recited to him at the Marine Hospital across
the river, where he pursued his medical studies. It was
strange place to frequent, and we learned many things be
sides our Latin, Greek, &c. It was like a great ocean
beach, upon which the wrecks of every clime were washed.
There were gathered together in that house of mercy the
sick and feeble from every race under the sun, from the
chattering Italian to the phlegmatic Swede, from the
Malay, whose eye seemed looking for a chance to aim a
dagger under the ribs, to the amphibious Sandwich
Islander, who amazed us by playing the fish on the water
and under the water. Youth leans readily to an ideal
philosophy and a spiritual faith quite in contrast with the
startling materialism that is apt to hover over such a haunt
of bodily suffering, mental eclipse, and frequent dissolution. It was well that our minister had schooled us in the
argument for spiritual realities, and that our early years
were lighted by a torch proof against the damps and darkness of such a Golgotha of disease and death. Some
classes of disease were stern moralists, then, and these
poor waifs of the sea taught the laws of health and obedience more eloquently than our worthy College Professor
whose lectures upon Preserving Health, strange to say, were,
in our time, given to the Senior Class, when it is too late
to rob vice and folly of their victims. Those months were
full of study and progress, small as was the class and busy
as the teacher was with professional cares. One of the
two scholars has passed away, and under circumstances 
COMPANIONS BY THE WAY.
that have given him a martyr's name.   The other scholar,
and the master, are now near neighbors in the great city;
and not long ago the doctor, who presided at the banquet
of American Physicians, and the minister at his side, who
was called to speak in behalf of his own profession on that
occasion, bandied merry words together over those old
days of pupilage, when the doctor was master, and the minister the scholar. I met the physician but a few days ago,
and we came part of the way into the country together.
His hair is far from keeping its coal black hue, but his
eye is about as bright as ever, and the amenities still
hold their place upon his tongue now so honored as oracle.
II.-COLLEGE LIFE.
It is not easy for a stranger to understand the feelings
that have long prevailed among a large portion of the
people of Massachusetts, towards their chief seminary of
learning, Harvard University.   The oldest college in our
land is, of course, in some measure, a matter of pride to
every liberal American; yet to the Massachusetts men of
the Old School, Harvard College is one of the articles
of their creed, and the fundamentals of their allegiance.
Those of us who were brought up under the auspices of
Conservatism in politics, and Liberalism in religion, im.
bibed this sentiment with daily bread and the common air.
It seemed a prodigious safeguard to have this stronghold
of learning near us, and the youth who could win entrance
to its privileges and have the endorsement of its name
29 
30        MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
upon his professional career, was looked upon as one of the
favored of earth, and the elect of heaven. Things have
changed somewhat now, and the age of steam and cottonspinning has made sad havoc with academic habits and
dignities. Wealthy parents do not wait as often, as of
old, to give their sons a thorough intellectual training before sending them into the world, and not a few prominent
graduates cheapen their Alma Mater by sinking their literature and profession in some kind of stock-jobbing. Yet
to this day, old Harvard has no small company of faithful
disciples, who look upon her blessing as beyond that of
pope or council. Imagine our feelings twenty-two years
ago this August, when entering the charmed seat of letters
that we had so long looked at from afar with such reverential eyes. We mustered seventy-two, an unusual number for a Freshman class in those days; and so great was
the occasion to our juvenile eyes, that it did not seem a
strange thing that signs and wonders should appear in the
heavens. The brilliant Aurora that mounted to the very
zenith the eve of our admission, and from East to West
formed an arch of flashing light, appeared to us a not unworthy sign of the mysterious world of lore which we were
entering. More than one of the seventy-two devoutly believed that all human knowledge was stored up within
those walls, and that the student need only go far enough
to find human knowledge open into divine wisdom within
that shrine.
It must be confessed, that college life soon throws cold
water upon the novice's fond enthusiasm. A boy who has 
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studied mostly by himself, and goes to college with the
idea that his fellow-students have come there for a thor ough education, and that to be a good scholar is, of course
the main thing, will find himself for a time strangely mis taken.   Appreciating reverently  the endowments  there
made to learning by the faith and public spirit of ages,
and not a little subdued by the kindness, and, perhaps, the
self-sacrifice of parents and friends in securing him his po sition, he is amazed to find that nothing is so unpopular
among the stripling throng as faithful study, and nothing
more in favor than a free and easy contempt of industry
and its honors. The strangest thing of all is, that the
best scholars are very likely to fall in with the idlers in
crying down plodding fidelity, and to use the rich stores
of learning reserved from. their elaborate preparatory training, to eclipse their studious rival's recitations, and at the
same time to throw contempt upon his drudging care. We
must not judge, however, too harshly this wayward temper
of youth. Young blood generally has some redeeming element even in its follies, and the objection to devoted study
comes quite as much from love for a brave, generous spirit,
as from wilfulness or indolence. The hard-worker, who
was at first decried as a spiritless dig, soon overcomes the
prejudice, if he is found to have a brave and hearty purpose back of his work, whilst the contemptuous idler sinks
into insignificance as soon as his poverty of motives and
ideas is discovered. A great change comes over the dispositions of students when the first illusion of their novitiate
passes away. Even the doubtful code of college populari
31 
MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
ty demands that every youth shall have some positive object, and that if indifferent to the fixed routine of study,
he must find a substitute in some taste, or art, or science
f his own. This demand shows its working more and
more as the years pass. With us the clique of idlers became less and less, until at last it was not easy to find any
companion, of any sort of consideration, who was not
making his mark upon the class at large, as well as upon
his own mind, by some elect pursuit of his own. Not a
few of our fellows, who stood at great discount in the scale
of general scholarship, learned, in some one study, some
branch of natural history, or chemistry, or belles-lettres,
to surpass some of the very first names upon the rank list.
In fact, the whole development of intellect and character
during college life, is as rich a lesson as any taught in the
manuals; and no books in the library had contents more
strange and occult to our understandings, than the seventytwo volumes which we brought with us under our caps and
jackets, or in the hidden man of the mind and heart, to be
interpreted in the school of life.
As a theatre for the exhibition of character, our college
was indeed a University, and our class in itself was no
poor exponent of the mixed elements of humanity. It is
a favorite amusement with some to read over the names of
the old set on the catalogue, and gossip about their various
characteristics.   Destiny, from her mysterious urn, has
assigned very different lots to our different classmates, and
a third part of them are no more with us in the world.
As life appears to us now, and as we have learned more of
32 
COMPANIONS BY THE WAY.
our own infirmity and of the force of circumstances, we
take a more kindly view alike of the excellencies and of
the foibles of our comrades, and we can smile at many traits
that used to irritate us. A Theophrastus or La Bruyere
need not have gone beyond our border to find subjects for
a volume double the size of his own.   One man (man is
the favorite word for student), appeared to be an ingrained
dandy, to whom the tailor's fashions are the sovereign
ritual, whilst another, from the very same preparatory
school, would be an utter sloven, not seldom accused, on
especial occasions, of robbing  the washerwoman of her
regular spoil, and putting on a soiled shirt for a Sunday or
holiday. We had devotees who did not scruple to warn
the indifferent, and to exhort the believing by the most
enthusiastic religious appeals, not without reliance upon
supernatural conversion and authority from mystical visions; other classmates we had, who would not call it
slander to reckon them among the doubting Thomases and
careless Gallios of the class.   We  had some men who
were glib speakers and poor writers, and others, who held
the easy pen of an Addison, yet were seized with more
than the dumbness of Zacharias when called to take part
in extempore debate.   We had some prosers that could
never even take a joke, and some drolls who could not
help looking a joke when  not speaking one.   A  metaphysician might have puzzled himself much, by trying to
analyze the varieties of wit and humor among our fellows,
and perhaps some specimens of roguishness might have been
found that have escaped the pen of Dickens or Thackeray
33
2* 
34        MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
Our most mischievous rogue soon finished his collegiate
career. and entered a larger field of enterprise. He was a
genius in his line, and his room was a complete magazine
of mischief. ie kept on hand a variety of fulminating
powders of his own manufacture, and often a half-dozen
bomb-shells, filled with water and tightly corked, would be
hidden in his fire, to astound the unwitting visitor with the
innocuous yet emphatic explosion of cork and steam. His
room communicated with the cellar by a trap-door, which
allowed the occupant free exit and ingress. If his door
were watched, no sound or sight indicated the inmate's
participation, and some eager proctor, bent on personal investigation of the premises, would be very likely to find the
perpetrator of the mischief quietly seated in his studychair, conning his book with the puritanical gravity so
habitual to his long face and straight hair. Every bold
prank that startled the faculties of the vigilant Parietal
Board was supposed to originate in him, whether the bell
was tolled at midnight with no hand visible at the rope, or
the Commons' knives and forks disappeared, or a hogshead
of molasses was  emptied of its sweets in the Commons'
kitchen, or the College pump was blown up by a shell.
Our droll rogue was of wholly another complexion, with a
face capable of as many funny wrinkles as there are leaves
in Punch's Almanac, and with powers of legerdemain and
ventriloquism that might have made his fortune in that
craft. He went through his course without censure, al though chief source of all the milder practical jokes, and 
COMPANIONS BY THE WAY.
it is not easy to see in the man of science and the grave
citizen now, our funny comrade of bygone years.
The contrast between the early indications and the
final developments of character, is one of the marked points
of student life. Not seldom the sedate and almost austere
youth becomes a gay and even a dissipated man, and not
seldom the frivolous, reckless boy settles down into an
earnest and even severe manhood. Among our fellew-students in the various classes, how many strange metamorphoses have taken place!  Among us, the prettiest boy of
our Freshman year came first to mount the judge's bench;
the most bashful youth took the lead in matrimony; and
more than one gay sauce-box has donned the black coat
with proper grace, and won high name in the pulpit. In
the class before us, a famous feud broke out between the
plainer and the more dashing fellows, the plebs and the
patricians of our academic polity, in connection with the
Hasty Pudding and the Porcellian Clubs. A vehement
radical led the plebs, and a youth of aristocratic bearing
and lineage headed the patricians. Strange, yet not unaccountable transformation! the radical now impresses conservative order upon a host of operatives under his rule,
and the aristocrat is the Coryphcus of extreme reform,
advocating the rights of black and white, male and female
outcasts from the elect circles, with a splendid eloquence
that might well win plaudits from the hardest-faced Toryism or Hunkerism.   One remark may be fitly made in
regard to the development of youthful character. It relates to the wortli of mere amateur culture, in comparison
35 
36        MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
with a devoted life-purpose.   The  most brilliant  men
amount in the end to verylittle, if they are so little bent
upon some chosen work, as to think more of shining in
general, than of shining with a true man's light upon some
chosen path of service. In our early college years our
horizon was luminous with the splendor of certain men,
especially in classes before our own, who were the observed
of all observers, and the predicted chiefs in literature or
the professions. The air seemed charmed by their presence,
and every ear was erect when they spoke. They were
often engrossed too much with their own shining, to think
of the prosaic task of being a useful light to others; and
with very few exceptions, these men have wholly disappointed the anticipations of friends regarding their career.
Life needs an object, as well as a subject, and the more
humbly and devotedly the object is chosen and pursued,
the better for the strength of the intellect, as well as for
the health of the affections. Many a plodding worker,
with a single eye to his vocation, has won a position and
evinced powers far beyond the lot of the most brilliant
rhetoricians, who were in the sunshine of admiration when
his name was unknown. Transformations of moral char.
acter no less signal, are to be observed, and if any one fact
is more important than another, to be pointed out to young
men, it is the invincible power of a faithful ruling pur pose to mould and transfigure the whole character, giving
to unpretending worth an energy, and in the end a high
enthusiasm, that abide by a man when youthful blood has
calmed its pulses, and youthful sentiment, if left merely 
COMPANIONS BY TILE WAY.
to itself, has turned out to be the emptiest of chimeras.
It was a happy circumstance for the future of our class,
that the practical spirit was so dominant, and whilst our
fellows had their full share of genial fellowship and lite rary taste, we were, most of us, led to look early to some
chosen object in life. From various causes, whether from
the example of a few leading companions, or from the ex cellent ministrations of the College Pulpit under the two
Wares and Palfrey, or from the influence of the churches
and ministers under whom we were educated at home,
theology was the favorite profession with us, and no class
on the catalogue of late, has equalled ours in the number
of names italicised as ministers. Nothing in professional
life has been happier with us, than this association of its
cares with the hopes and affections of our youthful days.
Our classmates in other professions undoubtedly share the
same satisfaction, and the charm of our meetings is in the
harmony of variety, which different tastes and pursuits
bring to the genial circle.
I have been this summer upon a flying visit to Cambridge, and it seems almost a sacred duty, as well as a
high pleasure, to make at least a yearly pilgrimage to the
old shrine of faith and learning. It is pleasant to have
uch assurance that in this changing world, some of the
ancient landmarks remain, and to refresh our careworn
minds by the sight of scenes and friends so cherished.
Time has dealt very gently with our good mother, and her
years are marked by progress without decay. The new
arts and sciences have come to lay their trophies at her
37 
38        MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
feet, in the treasures and appliances of the Scientific School
and the Observatory, and the old Puritan worthies still
keep their places in the buildings reared by their bounty,
and the books and professorships founded by their piety
and patriotism. We miss many of our familiar teachers,
yet not all have gone; and it is cheering, indeed, to find
our own President, who took office in our Freshman year,
still vigorous as ever, and although no longer in the chair,
as ready in speech and keen in thought as any man in the
assembly.   There is nothing under heaven more cheerful,
as well as more venerable, than a ripe and genial old age;
and compared with the hearty, sagacious, reverential words
of the old man, the usual round of jokes seemed fiat and
unprofitable. College Green was greener than ever, and
the saplings of our day had shot up into tall and stout
trees. As we were called into the procession, our place
seemed to be somewhat too near the gray heads of the
elder classes; yet we took comfort in this grave feeling by
walking with very elastic step, and saying, valorously, that
forty is not quite the prime of life, and that we never felt
younger than now. I suppose that men always think of
themselves and their early companions most frequently in
the form and feature of youth; and in this sense, as well
as in others, early impressions are the most enduring. We
are probably a somewhat careworn set of middle-aged men;
yet to each other, we are very much the sa-me as twentytwo years ago, when we sang Auld Lang Sync together in
a brotherly circle, and with clasped hands wished each
other a "God Speed" upon the great life-journey at hand. 
COMPANIONS BY THE WAY.
A man cannot revisit the place of his education without
some very wholesome impressions; and our firm, yet benign Alma Mater, never so thriving as now, puts to all her
children some very searching questions as to their discipline and career, since leaving her favored halls. If some
unworthy sons may be permitted to counsel their venerable mother, may they not hint to her the prevailing danger
in the whole country, of sacrificing the old spiritual
faith to the new science and arts, and of placing the study
of physical laws above that Word which made the world,
and dwelt on earth in the Man Divine? We all share,
especially all theologians and preachers, in the blame of
this state of things; and the age itself is prone to count
all value at the cash price, and of course prize lucrative
utilities above the goods that are beyond price. Must we
not believe that science itself, for her own true light and
life needs the consecration of faith, and that our material
civilization is but a whited sepulchre when divorced from
the Spirit which builds up the kingdom of God upon the
earth? I know well the difficulty of combining religion
with education, especially where there are so many rival
sects contending for the palm; and it is a fact, that in our
day, sectarian presses attacked one of the college preachers for advising some of our class upon the subject of religion, and inviting them to become communicants of the
church. Yet Christianity demands a positive place in
every scheme of education, and no obstacles should be allowed to shut it out.   In common with not a few friends
of Harvard, we hope to see an attractive chapel ere long
39 
MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
upon College Green, and an earnest attempt to kindle a
living Church spirit among the students upon a broad
Christian platform. In shunning the Pharisee's traditions,
and the Essene's mysticism, we must remember that the
Sadducee's worldly conservatism may be a poor exchange
for either of those superstitions.   Yet the ancient faith
still lives among those hallowed walls, and no new inscriptions shall blot out from our allegiance the old motto,
" Christo et Ecclesiae."  In some way, not very clear to us
now, the new science and the old faith shall join hands.
Surely the learned scholar, and Christian sage now in the
Presidential chair, is as well entitled as any man to consecrate this union, and his administration will tend, in no
small degree, to bring it to its consummation at Cambridge.
III.-A VILLAGE CHURC H.
Our theological course of three years at the Divinity
school in Cambridge, seemed in many respects like a continuation of the four years' collegiate course. The greater
liberty allowed us, did not by any means amount to a
complete emancipation from authoritative discipline, and
the summons of the bell to prayers or recitation, was about
as imperious as before our emancipation from the undergraduates' restraint. We had eminent and faithful instructors, excellent companions, and all access to the best books
and the best society. Yet after this is said, it must be
allowed that something is lacking towards the best man
40 
COMPANIONS BY THE WAY.
agement of theological education among us. It is not well
to build the school of the prophets directly within the
shadow of the classic halls, where an over critical under standing is so prone to lord it over the heart of faith, nor
is it always expedient to continue college associations into
theological studies. But the gravest of all objections to
our present method of educating ministers, lies in the ab sence of that church feeling and pastoral life, without
which, Christianity itself is but a name, and the New Tes tament but a sealed book. We tried in our day to make
up for the deficiency, and to guard against the cold scholastic spirit, by doing our part in the real work of life.
We each tilled our own garden, and made presents of our
own flowers and melons to friends. We did some missionary service, and in jails and prisons we sought out the sad
and benighted. We collected the statistics of benevolence,
and had reports and debates upon questions of the day.
We were no strangers to elevated society in parlors as well
as in students' rooms. Still a great want remained, and it
is felt more or less in all theological schools. I have
heard the most eminent mind in the Baptist Church, Dr.
Wayland, declare himself decidedly opposed to most theological schools, on account of the want of pastoral training,
and the predominance of the critical over the devout spirit
But every human institution is imperfect, and, it may be,
that the defect of which we are speaking, is only a fair
share of this imperfection.   It is certain, however, that a
wholly new mneaning attached to religion, the moment that
it presented itself to us in the warmth of p:arish syimirathy
41 
42        MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
and in the earnestness of practical usefulness.   Our life
among the churches threw a new light upon what we had
read in books. Perhaps the larger number of graduates
from theological schools settle down at once into the pas
Loral office, whilst others, like the writer, pass a year or
two in travel and miscellaneous professional service
These Wander-years, as the Germans would call them,
are of inestimable value, alike in securing experience,
nealth, and literary resources for the pulpit. They must
rnd, however, at last, and regular pastoral care must
begin.
No subject, except perhaps the Slave question, has
been handled more frequently of late than that of parish
life, especially in respect to its trials, and at least a half
dozen books have been sent out within two or three years,
claiming as much sympathy for the clerical martyr and his
consort, as is claimed for Uncle Tom and Aunt (hloe.
These books probably do good, and will accomplish much
towards correcting the faults and mistakes of that ruling
ecclesiastical polity in this country, the individual church
and its people. The little sketch that I shall try to pencil
in these few lines, does not ask for a place in the public
portfolio, but will answer its purpose if it meets the eyes
of friends not indifferent, and is then forgotten.
I remember well, shortly after returning from the West
at the close of my Wandering-years, receiving a visit from
a most excellent friend, Henry W, who was unable,
from illness, to fulfil an engagement in the town of N,
New Hampshire, and asking me to take his place for a 
COMPANIONS BY THE WAY.
Sabbath.  He, poor fellow, never, I believe, stood in the
pulpit again, and the parish that would otherwise probably
have been his, became mine for five years. It was on Sat urday, in the middle of June, 1837, that I first visited
N, and taking the cars to Lowell, glided up the
Merrimac in a wheezy little steamboat, that was soon to be
displaced by a railway. It was easy to see, on Sunday
morning, that the people who gathered together in that
little Grecian temple, under the trees of the rural cemetery, were indeed a parish, and not merely a chance assembly of individuals. There sat the venerable Squire and
his portly, sagacious lady, with interest evidently almost
parental, in the welfare of the church. There was the
young Squire, not son but partner, and likely, it seemed,
to be son-in-law to the former. There appeared the keen,
sensible face of the Member of Congress, the leading politician of the neighborhood, and ere long to wear a Scnator's
laurels. There too was the worthy Superintendent of the
Sunday School, with kindness and reverence overflowing
his face and eyes, to say nothing of his excellent wife, who
with himself managed to do an amount of good in the
course of a year, quite sufficient to do honor to a parsonage.
There was the bookseller, with his temper so sanguine
whether for a new publication, or a new political move
and there was the editor, with all the cares of the village
paper upon his thoughtful and somewhat anxious face.
There was the postmaster, with his military honors; and
there the cashier of the bank, with his mild yet scrutinizing look.  Other characters equally marked, and after
43 
44        MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
wards to be very important personages in our pastoral
round, were in their places, and not least among them, apueared a goodly proportion of youth and children, the fu ure hope of the flock. There was an air of self-respect,
mutual kindness, and Christian reverence about the congregation, that was quite impressive. The singing was
hearty, and in good taste, under the direction of a tall
chorister, who evidently magnified his office, and fulfilled
its duties with a right good will that extended itself to the
other memnbers of the choir.
Nothing human is perfect, and of course our parish
had its faults, faults that were the theme of much perplexing thought, and vehement exhortation, on the part of the
pastor. Yet, as the world goes, they were a kindly and
earnest congregation, not negligent of worship, not slow in
good works.  Surely, so far as their conduct to their pastor was concerned, all that he can say is, that their forbearance and good-will were wholly beyond his claims or
deserts. With great individual independence, and exemption from merely ritual or dogmatic rigidity, we enjoyed a
very genial and hearty church life together, and social affeetiois seemed to flourish quite in proportion to the growing love for the sanctuary and its services. The great
point was to interest the young people, and they answered
encouragingly to every appeal. Among them, one grea
truth was exemplified, which is made of little account in
our scholastic training, the truth that the power of religion
in a church, depends as much upon the receptive and devotional element in the people, as in the intellectual or active 
COMPANIONS BY THE WAY.
element. A company of docile children, or impressible
young people, or a few really devout men and women in a
parish, have an effect over the pastor and the whole sphere
of church life, which cannot be estimated in language.
The Divine Word, like the luminary to which it corresponds, has its virtue drawn out by the lowly plant, more
than by the flinty rock, and the gifts of God in nature are
constantly illustrating the gospel doctrine, that divine
grace is given in the measure of human need and yearning. In looking to my first parish, I must own that I feel
a profound gratitude, especially towards those waiting,
lowly minds, who blessed the pastor more than any courtly
patronage could do, simply by allowing him to serve them,
and by expecting of him that direct usefulness, which is a
minister's highest duty and richest blessing. In some
cases, the sick and the dying evidently exercised, directly
or indirectly, a commanding influence upon the whole congregation, even as some herb almost too lowly to meet the
eye, will gather from the sun, and earth, and air, a healing
and diffusive grace, that is not to be found in the rose's
beauty or the oak's strength.
Many a baptism and communion in that embowered
church comforted the worshippers by the assurance of new
zeal and sympathy among the people. A very genial,
social life prevailed; and the quite frugal and republican
manners of the community combined with the good example of the chief citizens to keep up a style of visiting and
entertaining, quite in contrast with the usual petty ostentation and exclusiveness of small places. It was a
45' 
46        MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
cheering time when the parish came in a body to visit the
minister. He lived in priestly isolation, a bachelor; yet
his lot was not desperate. A kind neighbor lent him for
the occasion a large house adjacent to his lodgings, and
the young people of the parish made it a bower of flowers
from the produce of their gardens, whilst the notable
housekeepers loaded the tables with all manner of good
cheer for young and old. The evening was auspicious;
the whole congregation came with their most cheerful
looks, and the occasion, in its social cordiality and Christian tone, was one that Fenelon himself would have thought
worthy of his smile and his benediction. Not a few guests
came from neighboring parishes in town, and this was one
of the least of the indications of the good feeling that prevailed between the various congregations and their pastors.
I have never seen a more neighborly state of society than
that which prevailed in our village alike among pastors and
people during those years. We freely co-operated together
in all matters of public spirit, especially education; and
one of the most welcome reminiscences of parish life in the
country, is connected with the teachers and scholars of the
schools, all of whom I knew quite well, from those in the
brick temple of learning in the centre of the town, to those
in the wooden ten-footer in the outskirts.
There is in many quarters a disposition to underrate
the population of our manufacturing towns. But a fair
observation must satisfy any candid man, that these towns
certainly in New England have their full share of intelligence and character. I mingled very freely with the opera 
COMPANIONS BY THE WAY.
tives of every grade, and had a considerable number of
them in the parish. It is simple truth to say, that I have
never known a more exemplary class of persons.  The
oung men were very desirous of improving alike in knowledge and principles, and no appeal to them for help in any
good word or work was unanswered. I have kept especial
account of a little knot of young men who used to meet
together for conversation and inquiry, and it has been
very cheering to note their respectability and progress.
A few weeks ago I met one of this set at Springfield, Mass.,
and found that he had risen gradually from his subordinate
place in the mill, to the charge of a manufacturing establishment of a thousand operatives. The whole retrospect
of those years, in the manufacturing village, is eminently
cheering in respect to the fortunes of enterprising and
capable young men. Wherever situated, the American
youth who croaks over the obstacles in the way of his
rising, and gives himself to despair and idleness, is too
chicken-hearted to use success even if forced upon him.
I do not care to say with what feelings that little
Church was resigned for another charge, and how many
wistful yearnings have, from time to time, been sent back
to those years of comparative retirement. The neighboring city and large towns never seemed more attractive and
edifying than when revisited, for a few days, after a season
of hard work in the country. How delightful was the
elect circle of brethren that met together every two months
for professional sympathy; and each man went back with
double heart from this chosen fellowship, always very sure
47 
48        MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
of preaching an uncommonly living sermon the next Sunday. What a privilege it was to join occasionally a conversational club in Boston, where the choicest spirits spoke
freely their best thoughts, and Channing himself was a frequent guest. He was emphatically kind and encouraging
to young men, and he used to inquire as earnestly about
my unpretending charge, and listen as respectfully to my
poor words, as if humanity were to him the same every
where, and whatever is worth doing at all, is worth doing
well, whether in a small sphere or a large one. In that club
the progressive spirit prevailed, and not a little of the transcendental philosophy figured in the conversation.   Behind
none of the most zealous reformers in his zeal, and earnest
as any transcendentalist for the spiritual worth of every
soul, Channing never failed to show his strict allegiance
to the gospel, and on one occasion maintained, at considerable length, his conviction of the permanent ministry of
Jesus Christ to the human family, and of his actual presence with believers, especially at the season of communion.
A familiar poet has told us that,
"Lands intersected by a narrow frith,
Abhor each other. Mountains interposed
Make enemies of nations, who had else
Like kindred drops been mingled into one."
and sad to say, not long after my leaving, that village was
divided into two jealous towns, on account of the little
stream that flowed so tranquilly through its domain, and
preached peace with every ripple as it turned the mill 
COMPANIONS BY THE WAY.
wheels that created the general wealth. In trying to locate
the new town-house, the citizens quarrelled, and preferred
having two town-houses to giving the prerogative to the
rival side of the river.   In a few years, however, the old
good neighborhood, confirmed by not a few inducements
from mutual interest and public pride, returned, and a city
charter was the reasonable pretext for uniting the two sides
of the river into one efficient community.  Great indeed
was the joy when this was done; and I am not ashamed
to say, that when word came to me of its consummation
last year, I felt much disposed to run to the door, to an nounce the fact to the people in the street, and was obliged
to sober the enthusiasm by remembering that a policeman
lived opposite, and that New York cares too little even
about its own affairs to care very much about other places,
great or small.
It is a great privilege to go from time to time to the
old place, and hunt up the scenes and friends that cannot
be forgotten. The cemetery in which our church stands
has many voices to the visitor's memory, that chime well
with the whisper of the winds through the trees that overshadow the graves. A large portion of the congregation
that I met in the church the first Sunday there, that has
been spoken of, have gone from their habitual seats, and
laid down to their rest under the green sod. The good
Squire and his wife, the former not long after the latter,
have gone in the peace of a firm faith, and their names
are pointed out to the young as household words, in every
family where the ihusbandcl's neighborly kindness, and the
49 
50        MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
wife's careful thought, are as fresh as the day. This
couple were more than legislators to the community in
which they lived, since social influence is stronger than
written law, and the peacemaker, and the housewife, who
give the true tone to the whole neighborhood, scatter good
seed that lives long after they have gone. The young lawyer, too, has gone to his rest.  F      was my most intimate friend and a constant helper, a man of keen intellect,
fine taste, acute, and in some respects, morbid sensibility,
an accomplished scholar, a graceful writer, a learned and
able lawyer, an upright and influential politician. He
overworked his powers in codifying the State laws, and
sought in the air of Spain, the Mediterranean, and Egypt,
the health that he was never to find. We used to hunt
the first spring flower, the Epigma Repens, together, and
that fragrant and unobtrusive plant, in its fragrance, in its
early bloom, and its tenacious grasp, is no inapt memento
of F's gifts, and his fate.  I shall never forget the
one political idea that was most prominent in his creed.
He always maintained that the first danger to this country
was in the centralization of government and influence, and
that just as surely as great sums of money are placed in
the hands of the Cabinet or Congress, to be disbursed for
pet local enterprises, just so surely will all manner of pec ulation be fostered, and Washington will become a nest of
manceuvring jobbers. Every year of the nation is but il lustrating the justice of this idea, by revealing some new
depth of the knavery and covetousness of public men.
Not far from the grave of this young lawyer, rests the 
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dust of the Senator who has been already named. Just
as great wealth was poured into his lap, and he was made
the leader of the dominant party in the national Senate
with any office in the gift of the Cabinet apparently open
to his grasp, he was stricken down speechless and ere long
died.  He was an accomplished man, a very shrewd observer of character, far more cautious than sanguine, a cool
and sagacious calculator of political probabilities, and probably, at the time of his death, the most influential public
man in the State. HIe was a courteous and agreeable parishioner, instructive and genial in conversation, and although very little of a devotee or enthusiast, he was very
ready to assert the necessity of religion to human nature,
and to sustain by his presence and means its public institutions. There was somewhat of a sarcastic element in
his nature, and he was the last man whose name I should
have associated with the vagaries of the New Spiritualism.
Yet I have heard of quite an elaborate communication to
his old pastor, professing to come from him since he left
the body, and without stopping to discuss the philosophy
of spiritualism, it is enough to say that if my shrewd and
somewhat cynical friend indeed dictated that letter from
the spiritual world, he has singularly changed his tone.
There is much that is very marvellous in the late letterwriting and tab]e-tipping movements, but I should yalue
far more such a return of my intelligent friend's spirit, as
comes to me from revisiting the favorite haunts of our
walks and talks, in the woods and by the river side, than
any of the revelations of the new magic. It is probably
51 
52        MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
true that the alleged communications from the spiritual
world which are now so prominent, will be found to illustrate the power of the mind in acting upon itself, and in
mistaking its subjective impressions for objective realities.
A volume might be written upon the Pythian element in
our nature, which would throw light upon many other ora
cles than that of Delphi. We will not turn from oui
musing in the cemetery, however, to follow these specula.
tions. The thought uppermost in mind, is, of course, the
great instability of human life, for in less than twenty
years, a large company of persons well known to me, have
gone here to their rest, and the names upon the grave
stones win an easier recognition, than many names that
now mark the living worshippers in the church. Yet the
world does not stop its motion, however many or conspicuous are her sons and daughters who cease to be. The
little river runs in front of the cemetery as merrily as ever,
and turns thousands of spindles, quite as eager as ever in
the whirl for gold. There too, in the distance, Old Monadnock lifts his bald head to the heavens, indifferent as
fate itself to the beauty of the ever-returning stars, and
to the sighing of the restless winds, and to the toil and
trouble among the pigmies who worry themselves to death
in his valleys. Along new roads of iron, fresh crowds
hurry to and fro upon their round of pleasure or business,
and a new generation of children come to church to learn
their catechism under the guidance of grave elders who
were children or youth twenty years ago.. Under such im pressions a man feels himself within the grasp of an inex 
COMPANIONS BY THE WAY.
orable destiny, that seems hurrying him away in its fated
march, utterly indifferent to the joy or sorrow, life or
death, of the individual, and careful only that laws and
races shall be preserved. What is life, and what is death,
without a Comforter beyond the world, beyond nature and
man- a Comforter who can lead us to Hiim, who cares for
each soul with a parent's love, and through the wreck of
matter and the fall of nations, will preserve unto life eternal the soul that trusts in His love? Such a Comforter
speaks from the Word in that sanctuary, to that dust in
the cemetery.
I V.-C ITY E X P ERIEN  CES.
Each community, like each individual, has a character
of its own that cannot be measured by size or figures, and
it is very obvious, that if the Apostle Paul should make
the circuit of American cities, he would have a word for
each of them, quite as characteristic as any that he addressed to the Galatians or the Romans, to the people of
Corinth or Ephesus. Surely he would find occasion for all
his insight and sagacity, in dealing with our two chief
Northern cities, Boston and New York, and perhaps in
some respects the intermediate thriving little metropolis
of Rhode Island, might task his acuteness and tact quite
as much as any place ever visited by him in his mission
through the empire of the Coesars. If most communities
are proud of certain distinguishing traits in their manners
53 
54        MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
and institutions, the Rhode Islander carries the individuality a step farther, and believes in every man's being a manner, institution, and character to himself. Bostonians and
New Yorkers, of the genuine stamp, are not very difficult
to be defined, and their dress and furniture indicate their
distinctive characteristics tolerably well. But gather together fifty regular Rhode Islanders, select them if you
please, any day, out of Westminster, or Benefit, or Water
street, in Providence, from the men over forty years old,
and you will have about as many original characters as
you have individual specimens. The idiosyncrasy is not
confined to the ruder sex, but walks in silk quite as emphatically as in broadcloth. Enter a choice coterie of
knowing women, generally having a large and valuable
proportion of those who have never consented to narrow
the largeness of their sympathies and ideas by any domestic fetters, and you will find that Roger Williams has
daughters as well as sons who scorn all subjection to
priestly prescription or social tradition.   More than one
affable matron will broach, with full confidence, her own
theory for the reorganization of society, no matter what
Plato or the Pope may say to the contrary; and more than
one eloquent maiden will set forth a system of metaphysics
emanating from her own intuitions, no matter what Emerson may whisper with his honeyed persuasion, or Carlyle
may growl with his savage humanity. No extreme of political conservatism appears to take away the least of a
genuine Rhode Islander's individuality of thinking and
acting. The solid Chief Justice, who was called by the 
COMPANIONS BY THE WAY.
thorough-going radicals, the very Jeffries of judicial con servatism and rigor, no sooner quits the bench and enters
his study, than lo! the severe magistrate has become the
most adventurous of metaphysicians. Hle is ready to show
how time and space exist, and the universe is made, ever
anew by man the microcosm. The Pan-Idea of the Rhode
Island Chief Justice, exhibits speculative daring enough,
to make a regiment of the common order of political radicals scamper with affright, if they do not first fall down
dizzy with the vain attempt at comprehension.
A stubborn individualism has been, in some respects,
the strength, and in other respects, the weakness, of Rhode
Island. It has raised up many remarkable characters, and
given a peculiar life to private enterprise; but it has stood
much in the way of proper public spirit, and of efficient
associate effort, until of late.  Of late, a new  day  has
come over the State, and apparently from the very tendency that has so long worked in the old direction. The want
of due conciliation led to the recent sad feud, and this very
fend led to a kind of combination and sense of citizenship
that have widened into a broader and better public spirit,
than before was known, and which has in fact taken at last
some of the bitterest political antagonists within its larg
embrace. Probably none of the old States of the Union ha
improved so much as Rhode Island within ten or fifteen
years. Schools, Libraries, Academies, Art, Industry, Collegiate education, all have taken a new start; and there is
apparently no place in the whole country that secures to a
right-minded citizen a larger average of social, literary and
55 
56        MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
religious privilege, than the city of Providence I can say
from pretty thorough experience and observation, that no
man who has taken root there among books and friends,
pleasant scenery and good institutions, willingly seeks
another home.
Perhaps the last thing expected to come from the
threatened civil war was such a result as actually came.
There was a fearful state of feeling for about a year of my
residence there. It was a strange and startling transition
from the peaceful village of N         to the rule of martial
law. We indeed had our soldiers in the country, and
I had there taken my turn as chaplain in asking HIeaven's blessing on the brigades before their attack upon
the collation, or the summons to the sham fight. The
commander of our crack company in N   -, an artillery
corps a hundred strong, had heard real bullets whistle
during the war of 1812; yet in spite of his frequent desires to bleed for his country, he was a most pacific Christian
man, and his voice had been trained to its sonorous pitch
more by the exhortations of the Conference Meeting than
by the passions of the camp. It was very evident that
playing soldier is a very different thing from being soldier,
and that during that crisis in Rhode Island, so far as the
feeling was concerned, men were now quite ready to meet
a bloody crisis. The scenes in the streets, the troops,
bayonets, cannon, munitions, were not the worst of the
evil. The greatest sufferers were those, who from their
homes, waited the fearful tidings that were anticipated.
The alarm bells that made the night more than dismal, 
COMPANIONS BY THE WAY.
struck more panic into the wife and daughter in the house
than into the armed man in the street or field. But a
trifle was needed, a chance discharge of a musket, or a
spark of fire upon a field-piece, to have' kindled at once a
civil war, whose extent and horrors no man could calculate.
But no such mishap occurred. The revolutionary passion
cooled and died out without the convulsion of a fatal crisis.
" Nothing," says a keen Frenchman, "succeeds so well as
success; " and notwithstanding all the rhodomontade to
the contrary, Rhode Island has been uniting and consolidating her resources since that time, under laws that appear to have the countenance of leading men from both the
old belligerent parties. Probably the old Charter of King
Charles never did the State more good than in the convulsions of its final gasp.
Merciful Hleaven sent to some of us a blessed anodyne
to the war fever, in the arrival of the librarian of Brown
University with a great collection of choice books fironom
Europe. Professor Jewett, with his ten thousand tomnes,
did more to calm some troubled spirits, than the Paixhan
guns and the Horse Guards.  The College Library became
a charmed place of resort, and supplied in the classics and
modern languages all the deficiencies left by the admirable
English Library of the citizens' Athenaum.  The President's emphatic figure was no unusual sight among the
books. It needed few words only to prove the weight of
his mind.  He is the Cromwell among our College digni.
taries-a sturdy Independent, in religion utterly opposed to
every form of iriestcraft iin America, and touching witli ihc
3*
57 
58        MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
feeble hand the springs of anti-prelatical Protestantism
among the Missions of India.  He is an academic radical,
yet a firm disciplinarian, and leads off the collegiate revolution, now going on in the land, by bringing into the field
to cope with those old cavaliers of letters, the Classics,
those pugnacious Roundheads, the gases, metals, mechanic
powers, and the whole rank and file of physical science and
art, determined, as he is, to educate boys to do the head
work of the manufacturer, engineer, merchant and mechanic, as well as the learned professions.
It is sometimes as hard to regulate a parish as a State,
and more than one minister has found the dogged independence of Williams too strong in his descendants to
move parishioners to that cohesive zeal which does as much
for the edifying of the church, as for the comfort of the
pastor. With one minister whom we well knew, the great
question was, how to mould the stanch individualities at
the heads of the pews into a homogeneous active body.
The men were indeed faithful to whatever they undertook,
always true to their word, abounding in the business virtues,
not wanting in liberality of purse, yet strikingly wanting in
what Bushnell calls churchly life, especially ils regard to the
Christian ordinances. Their creed was, in some respects
more from Zeno, with his stout will, than from St. Paul, with
his devout faith; and it became a pressing question how to
win them to warmer church feeling, to kindle the sentiment of Christian communion, and to nurture that evangelical tenderness, which is as essential to the welfare of a
congregation, as to the peace of the soul. Kind Heaven 
COMPANIONS BY THE WAY.
helped him out of the difficulty, by raising up a new parish
from the teachers and scholars of the Sunday School.
He tried to do what he could for the men, and certainly
he had for them great respect and affection; but his hope
for the devotional life of the church was in great part from
the young, and the comfort and aid which he found from
them alike in social and religious relations, gave new
strength to his own labors, and in due time wrought a
change in the whole sphere of the parish. As much was
accomplished in the Sunday School room as in the church,
and no scenes of pastoral life are more gratefully remembered, than the cheerful and earnest reunions of scores of
young people at the parsonage for social fellowship and religious instruction. Thus, what he could not do of himself, he tried to do by new recruits; and in some cases,
they who were proof against the minister's appeals, surrendered their indifference before the little host of their
own children that were brought into the field. It was reserved, however, for the next minister, an admirable
scholar-an exquisite writer-to do a work far more remarkable, and not attempted before.   Surely he must
have great powers of persuasion, who could induce those
units of manly independence to coalesce into something of
ritual unity, and say litanies, psalms, and collects together
quite after the old church method. Our good old deacon,
whose love for this church and its people was a part of his
very life, was opposed to having the Commandments set up
in the sanctuary, as the pastor desired, because it looked,
he said, so much like Episcopacy. What would he say,
59 
60        MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
could he see the reading desk and prayer-book that are
now fixtures of the altar? But whatever the outward fixtures are, we may be sure that there are other fixtures of a
deeper kind that abide through all administrations. I can
never think or speak of the city of Roger Williams and of
the people thore best known, without remembrances that
make the changing years more blessed as they pass. Here,
in this rural nook, from among the trees, the waters of
Long Island Sound are full in sight, and many of the white
sails that flit by in the distance will not cease their course
until they are furled in front of familiar counting-rooms,
and watched by the passers by on the Weybosset Bridge, so
often trodden by our own and our friends' feet.  Nearer to
the writer's shady arbor, now some more lively mementoes
of that city are to be found. Two sprightly girls are
gamboling upon the lawn, with a greyhound for a playfellow, who remember Providence with a birthright affection, and who cannot be induced by any of the wonders of
the new home in the greater city to renounce their first
love.
The greater city-our huge, tumultuous, impassioned
New York-the home of all faiths and practices, creeds
and characters-what shall we say of it, who have tried to
scrutinize its ways carefully, and who, in spite of our many
misgivings at too prevalent faults, must in truth confess
our great attachment to the place and people so hospitable
to us as strangers, and so friendly to us, now strangers no
more. Probably few thoughtful men ever came to New 
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York, or to any like enormous city, of their own accord,
from a more tranquil and stable home. There is something at first desolate in the aspect of a great city to a
visitor who has been used to live in a community where
most of the people are acquaintances, and no small portion
of them are his friends. The open ocean or the unbroken
forest, hardly gives a greater sense of loneliness than the
presence of a vast crowd of strangers, to whom we are so
utterly unknown, that if we dropped down in the street,
the incident would be of no especial interest to any body,
except, perhaps, to some newspaper reporter on the lookout for items for his chapter of accidents. It is usually
some prevailing train of circumstances not of his own devising, that brings the quiet provincial to the great city in
the current which draws such vast and heterogeneous numbers into the remorseless whirlpool.   Yet ere long the
novice begins to be reconciled to the throng. He is no
longer made dizzy by the swaying crowd, and the hum of
the busy streets seems to him little more than the swell
of the sea to the sailor, or the murmur of the forest to the
backwoodsman. He forms a kind of general acquaintance
with the city and people, whilst he has friends enough at
home and abroad to assure him that he is a man among kindy men, and not a solitary unit in the general mass. Many
of our satisfactions depend upon contrasts, and the contrast between the view of the great crowd of strangers and
the recognition of our own acquaintances, gives us a mingled pleasure quite peculiar from its union of novelty with
familiarity, very much as when friends journey together
61 
62        MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
in foreign lands, constantly enjoying new scenes with old
affections.
Our better sensibilities are more in danger in the great
city than we can well define. The amount of misery in
the general crowd, and in cases making an especial appeal,
creates a draught upon the sympathies that threatens
either to craze a man with solicitude, or to harden him
into desperation and indifference.   I have lived years
in a community where the sum total of poverty and suffering could be easily measured, and quite effective relief
could be given at once to every needy family.   In our
neighborhood there was one town so thriving, that charity
had to go begging for objects of its bounty; and after a
public festival, the managers were unable to think of a
single family in the place who would not feel themselves
insulted by the bestowal of the dainties remaining from
the feast. In New York, such a fact seems the most monstrous of absurdities; for there every stray rag or bone
has a claimant, and misery has legions that no man has
numbered, and no man can fully relieve. The necessity
of discriminating between honest want and knavish pretension, where begging is a trade, and imposture is a profession, lays a perilous snare for the conscience, by affording
selfishness the easy excuse of deceit. But do our part as
well as we may to relieve suffering, we cannot do every
thing; and there is a constant array of sufferers before our
eyes, that must harrow the sensibilities, if they do not
harden the heart. In fact, the problem is still unsettled
as to the fate of the heart in a great city. Not the least 
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of its perils is the frequency of dramatic and romantic ap peals to the feelings by the theatre and the opera, the
newspaper and the novel, that tend to make real want re pulsive in comparison with the more fascinating victims of
the plot or the story.  Yet God is every where, and the
man who tries to keep within his love, and to do good to
his neighbor according to opportunity, will find that Divine
Providence rules over city as over village, and the dews
of heavenly grace are ready to descend upon both.
One experience has struck me since living in the great
city, which has not been remarked upon with sufficient
emphasis. It is the sense of the absolute need of religion,
not merely as a source of spiritual life and hope, but as a
safeguard against the craving excitement and perpetual
unrest of the current world of business and pleasure. A
man needs here the rest of a divine faith, as much as he
needs the cooling water or the soothing pillow. It is very
clear to me that all thoughtful people are conscious of this
want, and that their decided attachment to church worship,
especially to its directly devotional elements, is proof of a
craving for the peace that is not of this world. It is not
uncommon to hear New York spoken of as a very irreligious city; but a fair inspection will reveal among the
riegular, and especially the American, residents, as large
a proportion of devotional sentiment and practical benevolence, as any large community in the land can show. It
would be a dismal confession of shallowness and conceit,
for a man to call any great city truly Christian; but truth
and candor forbid our joining in the poor disposition of
63 
64        MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
many critics, to purchase self-complacency by the wholesale condemnation of neighbors.
Without God and Christ, and the Divine Spirit, wha
are we in the great tumult, the fearful play of fortune,
character, life, death? The heavenly mercy never deserts
us, and always offers some blessing suited to the peculiar
trials of our position.  He who sent Jesus Christ to Jerusalem aiid Capernaum, and Paul to Antioch, Corinth,
Athens and Rome, has not deserted his people, nor shut
up his grace within any village walls. A man of devout
disposition will feel his heart drawn more tenderly to the
mercy-seat,,and more into harmony with the great masters
of the devout life, from the very tumult and unrest around
him.  Every sorrow has its providential remedy; and to
those who live in cities there is balm in Gilead, and a
Divine Physician there. Surely, he who wishes to appreciate the majestic Quietists like a Kempis, Fenelon, and
other peers who have learned so profoundly the peace that
is in Jesus, will find himself quite as much quickened and
subdued into a congenial temper, by seeking that rest
divine near to the mighty heart of the great city, as when
within the calmest rural retreat under shady arbors that
offer tranquillity, yet tempt indolence.
The season of respite from the usual round of labor
now closes, and the writer puts by his errant pen for
toil less a pastime, and, perhaps, more a utility.   Let
not the reader call him an idler or egotist, for passing
some of these leisure days in reminiscences of scenes and 
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friends that seemed to present themselves of their own
accord, to be sketched. If his own mood shall seize others
with a kindred fit of retrospection, they will be in better
frame to survey for themselves the landmarks of their
career. Is it out of place for him to wish his friends and
readers a happy life-journey, whose Mile Stones draw ever
nearer the Eternal Home?
FADmL, CONN., Augu8t 30, 1854.
65  
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tat
19
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SC$ 
Now that the sun is beaming bright,
Implore we, bending low,
That He, the Uncreated Light,
May guide us as we go.
No sinful word, nor deed of wrong,
Nor thoughts t_at idly rove,
But simple truth be on our tongue,
aud ir our hearts be love
Ai,t grant that to tnine honor, Lord,
Our daily toil may tend;
That we begin it at thy word,
And in thy favor end.
ST. AMBROSE. 
GOD'S BLESSING ON THE JOURNEY.
IT is well for a man to keep sacredly his own birth-day,
and to give serious thought to the tenor of the momentous
life, whose beginning he celebrates. There is a place for
festivity, the most genial festivity in the occasion, and in
a thoughtful, affectionate family, the least child will learn
to welcome the little round of anniversaries, that bring
the greetings in due turn to each member of the home circle. But the festivity is vain, and worse than vain, if it
does not spring from a cheerful sense of the solemn meaning of existence, and the gift of life is not held in reverent
trust from Him who is the Father of our spirits. We begin
these thoughts upon the life-journey by asking his blessing
upon our career. What better topic can we have than
that of prayer, not a separate prayer for some single bless
ing, but the prayer that cares for all our needs, and lays
them all before the mercy-seat.
Human life is a constant want, and ought to be a constant prayer. 
MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
It is a constant want, certainly. Who is not always
wanting something?   They that have no mnoney, want
some; they that have much, want more. The beggar begs
ilead at the prince's kitchen; the prince hunts the world
through in search of a new pleasure. The captive weeps
for the free air, and his own home; the conqueror, whose
chattel he has become, weeps that there are no more worlds
to conquer. Life is surely a constant want.
Nor does any superiority of culture or character, take
from life this attendant. In fact, the best mind has the
most wants, and in place of every foolish whim or base ap petite renounced, many refined tastes and aspirations are
sure to come. The Christian, by the very fact of his faith
and purpose, wants more and better things than any world ling possibly can. He is content with a frugal table and
limited purse, yet he claims an ever increasing interest in
all true goods; with an undying yearning he wants what ever is pure and lovely under God's providence; nay, he
wants God himself, the Infinite and Eternal Good, for his
Friend and Comforter.
So Christ came, not to do the Stoic's work for man by
blunting the sensibilities, but to carry out the  Creator's
work by quickening every sense and faculty, to make life
a constant prayer for a blessing ever enlarging. The word
of the Messiah calls man to receive, in the whole compass
of his being, the good that God's love provides. The
word is: "Ask, and it shall be given; seek, and ye shall
find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you." Remember
this saying as we continue our meditation.
70 
GOD'S BLESSING ON THE JOURNEY.
What does this teach, but a prayer as comprehensive
as life itself-a prayer in word, indeed, but more than
that-one in thought and action also. Let us think of
it in its chief points of duty and privilege.
It begins with asking. " Ask, and ye shall receive."
Then the method of discipline which the earthly parent
adopts, the Heavenly Father has ordained. The child of
man learns by asking, and it is so also with the child of
God, in that discipline that does not end with childhood or
youth. The prayer of asking is commended to us then by
the most obvious of analogies. Whatever good we want
from God we are to ask for, especially that good which is
peculiar to his own being and action, the good that is
moral and spiritual-the light for our guidance, the
strength for our path, the peace for our trial.
But does any one say that the analogy breaks down
just in the most essential point? The parent does not
know what a child wants, and therefore needs often to be
asked, but God knows all our wants, and therefore needs
no asking. The objection is plausible, but not sound. It
is not merely the parent's ignorance of a child's wants that
requires the expression of the want, but it is the parent's
desire for an obedient, respectful temper in the child.
Right asking is of itself an action having a moral quality,
and entitling the asker to benefits not otherwise appropriate. It acts at once upon the disposition of him who
asks, and upon the administration of him who gives.
So, then, we claim for the prayer of asking, an effect
71 
72        MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
twofold-or, in the language once metaphysical but now
popular, an effect both subjective and objective-acting
upon man and upon God. It acts upon man. Intellectually speaking, what habit strengthens and invigorates the
faculty more than the habit of reducing our vague thoughts
and feelings to distinct forms? By words, in fact, we learn
to think; and he who does not speak or write his mind, becomes a vain dreamer. It is not, of course, merely audible
language that we insist upon, but distinct, clearly conscious
prayer, spoken or unspoken. It collects the thoughts, and
quickens the attention, to bring a definite prayer before the
mercy-seat.   They who slight this fact, and substitute
meditation for prayer, will soon substitute reverie for
meditation, and let reverie run wild at the mercy of every
idle fancy.
Morally, it acts upon man. It makes him feel the benignant and solemn presence of God, thus to review his
own wants before him, and implore the Almighty to grant
him the good he needs. To speak to a fellow-creature
brings him near to us, and of itself is an act so expressive,
as often to call for no little conflict with our timidity. To
bring our petition before the Infinite and Eternal One
with any kind of seriousness and reverence-how can it
but subdue the will and rebuke the passions, and confirm
the faith and exalt the affections?
But is this all? Is man helped by prayer, solely by
the effect of it, as an exercise of his thought and feeling?
The Bible does not read so- nor the best experience teach
so -nor a judicious philosophy intimate so. Nay, prayer 
GOD'S BLESSING ON THE JOURNEY.
loses its power as an intellectual and moral exercise, if
pursued merely as such, and the devotees of a cold ration
alism soon weary of the spiritual gymnastics that aim only
to stir their own faculties. The gospel teaches the power
of prayer to win good from God, and the experience of all
ages and lives illustrates the truth of the doctrine. But
look to the very nature of things-the nature of the soul,
and the attributes of God. Are not all the best gifts of
Heaven contingent upon some act of man? The earth is
the Lord's, and the fulness thereof; but must not man sow
and reap and garner, in order to enjoy the harvest? Nay
the simplest and most essential gifts, light, water, air, man
truly enjoys, only when he truly uses. Shall any earth.
born philosophy presume to say, in the face of revelation
and experience, that in the mysterious region in which
God moves, this law of conditionality so entirely ceases,
that no thought nor effort of the soul can win any peculiar
blessing from the Father of our spirits? Absurd idea 
Far better the philosophy of the Bible, which says, draw
nigh unto God, and God will draw nigh unto you. Then
lift to God the asking prayer. Let our word breathe our
want and win his blessing. Our word to man bears something from us, and brings something from him. Our word
to God-it shall not be in vain, and may win the kindest
return, when unanswered to the ear or to the impatient
sense.  Let the word of prayer begin with our first conscious want, rise with our growth, and deepen with our experience. So we understand the life-prayer in its first and
most obvious form- asking.
4
73 
74        MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY
This first leads to the second, and implies it. Asking
is, in fact, a form of seeking, and suggests all forms. Depending upon God, craving his blessing, not in the pride
of our own self-will, we are to search out the true way of
life. Seeking it of God, we find. The living prayer of the
true seeker, has a twofold virtue, acting upon his own
mind and upon the paths of Providence. It acts upon the
mind of the man. HIe who seeks for any good, real or
imagined, is successful very much according to the spirit
in which he seeks, whether pure and wise or the reverse.
The common proverb says, that necessity is the mother of
invention. Say rather, that desire is the mother of invention, and the vision is always keen in the direction of the
ruling love. See the gold-hunter - what perils of man and
nature he braves to win the shining dust, and what trifles
to a common eye, are, to his sharp sight, signs of the precious ore. See the angler with his line, the hunter with
his gun, the naturalist in search of bird, insect, or mineral,
how sagaciously each finds the path to what he seeks.
Nay, the very inventive genius that has changed the face
of the earth, and marked lands and oceans with its triumphs, what is it but the result of the desire of material
goods, so characteristic of modern times? The inventor
is a seeker, and the useful arts all are his findings. These 
are well, but not the best. A man may have them all and
be wretched. The great discovery, is that which opens
the path of divine peace and strength. He finds it, who
seeks it by studying devoutly the mind of its Maker, and
has his way in God as he walks the highways and byways 
GOD'S BLESSING ON THE JOURNEY.
of life. No man has exhausted this discovery, or learned
to see the paths of usefulness and enjoyment which every
day brings near. The sense for them is keen, as our sense
of God's love is tender. We understand a fine estate, by
knowing the mind of the proprietor, and all is clear as we
walk through the grounds and halls in his company. Who
shall presume, without devout communion with God, grate ful sense of his wisdom and love, to learn the true uses of
his wonderful domain? Who can seek wisely the ways of
life without the Divine Guide?
Nor does the good stop here, with the effect on the
seeker's own powers. Providence helps him with peculiar
aids. We are not among those who are fond of dogmatizing upon particular Providences, or presuming to know
all of God's meaning in any of the events of life. Much
less are we in favor of interpreting our times as if our own
community or fortune were the chief thing in view of the
Most High. But, certainly, without such presumption, we
may acknowledge a providential hand in shaping the ways
of life, in some measure, according to the seeker's aims.
This is certainly Christian doctrine, and a faith which
every trusting mind craves for its best peace and power.
Who shall gainsay it?  What philosopher of history pre
sumes to shut God out from the lead of events?  What
observer of life in all its varied opportunities, dares to assert any fatality so rigid, as to exclude the working of the
Infinite Spirit? Nay, let a man study his own life, and
remember how peculiarly events have been ordered for
him, how he has been led to the most important measures
71 
76        MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
of his experience, how strangely strength has come from
disappointment, and good from trial, how many times
great results have depended upon influences from nature
from human feeling, from some word or impression that
might be wholly providential. Experience will then be
ready to answer to the gospel doctrine, and, whilst not
disparaging human effort in choosing the way, will say
after all, that our way is to be sought in God, and to be
found of him. God is in history, or history is the Bible
of Atheism. God is in the paths of life, or life is without
God in the world. No business nor profession is well,
without this trust to guide its work and to dispose its
gains. The business and profession common to all-our
calling of God as the creatures of his power and the subjects of his kingdom-falls at once, if we lose hold of his
guiding hand.
So we interpret the promise to the seeker, that his
mind is readier for the true way, and the true way is
readier to his mind, by the living prayer of devout seeking.
Nor is this all. Our Lord's words have a cumulative
force, and each previous word blooms out in its successor.
He that asks, receives light to begin his seeking; he that
seeks, finds the path leading to some gate of heaven; he
that knocks, shall see the gate opening to him.
How often we meet with some barrier that crosses our
path and baffles our progress. Every study and enterprise
is full of such obstacles, and he that has pursued any far 
GODrS BLESSING ON THE JOURNEY.
reaching plan, has been stopped by some closed gate-way.
The path of the Christian, that noblest study and enterprise, meets such a barrier in every great stage of his journey.  He finds intellectual difficulties that he cannot solve,
trials that he cannot clear up, aspirations that are marked
by reality. He needs not merely to go onward, but to go
inward, and learn for himself the truth and peace within
the kingdom. What shall open the door? We will not
condemn reading, or study, or meditation, as means of
clearing up the great mysteries of our being; we will not
jest at the pretensions of the powerful priesthood that has
claimed to hold the mystical keys, and promise the light
of heaven to those who seek it in obedience. But above
all there rises the office of a life, true, earnest, trusting, in
word, in thought, and work, relying upon God, and craving
his blessing. Such life is a constant prayer, and knocks
not vainly at heaven's gate, even while on earth.
Its power is twofold-upon man and upon God. It
acts upon man, by opening within his soul the faculties
that make him most receptive of heavenly influence- upon
the reason whose eye yearns for the eternal light, upon the
conscience and affections which crave the infinite rectitude
and love. What, in fact, is the noblest intellectual act,
but an opening of the mind to divine things? Intuition,
what is it but seeing into the divine verity, and what nurtures the power so well as devout faith and striving?9  He
of the disciples had most of it, who had most love, for he
vho leaned upon the Master's bosom, spake most rapturously of the heavenly glory in Him revealed.
77 
78       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
Opening thus the soul of man to the divine kingdom,
the devout life, as it stands striving at the gate, opens the
divine kingdom also to the soul. The two influences combine in one, even as in the expanding lily, the bursting bud
and the descending sunshine work together in opening the
flower to heaven, and heaven to the flower. It is certainly
true that we are surrounded by an unseen realm of spiritual reality, and that it is opened to us only as we grow into
it. There are discrete degrees, or degrees of quality, and
concrete degrees, or degrees of quantity, said one of the
greatest of spiritual philosophers. We open concrete degrees, simply by advancing-we open discrete degrees by
rising, and can enter a new quality of being, only by living
up to it. This is the law of the opening of heaven to man.
When we stand at the gate, yearning for a clearer sense
of God's love, craving clearer light on prevailing evil,
yearning for a solution of the dark problem that most perplexes mind and heart, desolate under some bereavement,
crazed by some doubt; let there be no despair if the gate
seems closed upon us, and we knock in vain.  It shall not
be always in vain. If seeking and asking prevail not, let
lowly persevering obedience, that prayer without ceasing,
strive at the gate, and some good angel will appear, and
he door will be opened, and light will break through.
Every enigma will not, indeed, at once be solved, and door
beyond door may appear unopened before us. Yet enough
of the heavenly kingdom will be opened to cheer away
despondency, and to confirm faith and hope 
GOD'S BLESSING ON THE JOURNEY.
We end our meditation as we begun. Life is a constant want, and should be a constant prayer. Continuing
in every word and way and work, lifting man to God, and
winning God to man.
Thus let the great journey begin, and thus let it go
on. Thus beginning, it will give youth noble aim and
needed power, without chilling its generous fervor or taking away a single pure joy. Thus continuing, it will lead
manhood to an experience better than the much knowledge
with much sorrow which constitutes worldly wisdom, and
will secure to age a peace deepening as futurity draws
near.
Raise, then, the great life-prayer. With all our asking,
above the vast host of eager desires and clamorous passions, let the heart ask God for the best gift, that consecrates every other -even the wisdom from above. With
all our seeking, above and within the numberless paths
that life reveals, seek the way that does not deceive.
Through all startling changes and dazzling opportunities,
gates of knowledge and power, look most earnestly to the
gate that opens heavenly influence, and let progress be a
growing revelation.   Life itself then becomes prayer.
Rooted and grounded in love, the deeper its humility, the
higher its joy. The asking, thirsty roots of its being, send
up vigor to the branches that wave in the light of heaven.
Each birthday will then be more peaceful than the previous, and however encompassed with clouds and darkness,
the eye of faith cannot be cheerless.
79 
80        MILE STONES IN OUR L]FE-JOURNEY.
"Lead, Kindly Light, amid the encircling gloom,
Lead Thou me on I
The night is dark, and I am far from home        Lead Thou me on I
Keep Thou my feet; I do not ask to see
The distant scene,-one step enough for me.
"So long Thy power hath blest me, sure it still
Will lead me on
O'er moor and fen, o'er crag and torrent, till
The night is gone:
And with the morn those angel faces smile
Which I have loved long since and lost awhile." 
w 
"A canm   s mann in a small letter, yet the best copy of Adam, before he tasted
of Eve, or me Apple; and he is happy whose small practice in the world can only
write his character. His soul is as yet a white paper unscribbled with observations of the world, wherewith, at length, it becomes a blurred note-book. He is
purely happy because he knows no evil, nor hath made means by sin to bo acquainted with misery. He arrives not at the mischief of being wise, nor endures
evils to come by foreseeing them. He kisses and loves all, and when the smart
of the rod is past, smiles on the beater. The older he grows he is a stair lower
from God. He is the Christian's example and the old man's relapse; the one imitates his pureness and the other falls into his simplicity. Could he put off his
body with his little coat, he had got eternity without a burden, and exchanged
but one heaven for another.
BISHOP EARLE. 
CHILDHOOD.
OUR childhood, instead of being a passing stage, is a
permanent experience of our life, and gains interest with
years. Before we know it, we flit by this first Mile Stone
of our journey; yet we are always looking back to it, and
never without seeing fresh flowers blooming among the
mosses of its time-worn surface. Because St. Paul said,
"When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as
a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man,
I put away childish things;" he is generally regarded as
disparaging the mind of childhood, in order to honor the
superior wisdom of manhood. But a single glance at the
connection will show the error of this view. St. Paul, in
the maturity of his powers and the fulness of his experience, is declaring the peerless worth of love as the light
of the earth and the foretaste of heaven. Looking forward to the glories of that blessed state where this spirit
shall have full life, and see God no longer through a mirror darkly, but face to face; he speaks of his present power
of mind as preliminary to that full vision, even as child 
84        MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
hood in its simplicity is preliminary to manhood in its experience. Childhood, therefore, in its way, is just as honorable as manhood in its way, and each has a worth not
only in itself, but also as a step to something higher. In
this spirit, let us now look upon childhood and consider
what it is, how it should be treated whilst it lasts, and
how prepared for the time when it ceases and graver cares
come. This paper will be one of a series, running at intervals through the volume, on the Circle of Human Life,
or the Ages of Man interpreted by the Gospel.
The Nature of childhood, what is it? It is simply
itself, and not any thing else.   The child is not an angel,
as sentimentalists dream; not a fiend, as dogmatists have
declared; but a mingled and undeveloped creature, a man
ungrown, with all the powers and passions of humanity existing, but not brought into consciousness with the natural
and the spiritual forces in the bud, yet with the natural
more forward than the spiritual, and needing guidance far
wiser than its own.
Whether good or bad, whether well or ill trained, a
child will be a child, and not man or woman; for God and
nature have ordained a law over the mind quite as imperious as that over the body, and they who try to defy that
law, find it easier to spoil the child into a foolish precocity
than to ripen him into premature wisdom. Let the child
be a child,-speak, think, and judge as such, in all simplicity. We have no doubt that such was the case with
St. Paul himself in his early years, so genial and earnest 
CHILDHOOD.
his whole development seems to have been; and it is gen  erally the ease, that all truly healthy culture starts from a
true beginning.
Regarding the first ten years of life as the period of
childhood, we remark that the child's traits are chiefly
these three; sensuousness, imitation, unconsciousness, or
impulsiveness. He is sensuous; we do not say sensual,
for this word is a libel even upon the earliest years, since
however much the infant lives in the world of the senses,
the senses themselves start elevating thoughts, and stir
beautiful affections in the little creature so dependent upon
sight and touch for impressions.
Compare for example the appetite of a child for food
with the appetite of a gluttonous man. Give a branch of
red cherries, or a ripe downy peach to that playful, curly headed boy, and the feast is to him a lyric poem in which
the merriest fancy waits on the revel of his lips. Compare him, then, with some bloated gourmand over his
loaded table, and you see all the difference between healthy
senses, and the low sensuality that makes a god of the
belly.
The child is imitative, and very prone to do as others do
around him. He is unconscious-unconscious of his own
powers and affections, speaking and acting as the impulse
moves him, without the trouble of comparing various
thoughts or reconciling inconsistencies of conduct. Ideas,
feelings, and purposes come and go like visitations from
some involuntary source; so that his mind is as much the
85 
86        MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
play-ground of its own emotions and associations, as the
sky is the play-ground of the clouds.
"Gay hope is theirs, by fancy fed,
Less pleasing, when possest;
The tear forgot as soon as shed,
The sunshine of the breast."
For the first five years, this unconsciousness generally
continues, and it is the office of the second five years of
childhood to bring the impulses under some self-command,
and educate the mind to habits of reflection and coherence
without breaking down its naturalness.
Such is childhood in its most conspicuous traits; but
why try to analyze and define them, when we see the original so clearly before us, and we all know so well the young
life so busy with the senses, so dependent and imitative,
so impulsive and spontaneous?2
The practical question comes, how is this period to be
treated, or what is the religious nurture of childhood?
Our reply is exactly in accordance with its own nature,
and the nature of religion. Is the child a sensuous, imitative, impulsive creature? then bring religion in such a
way that he can see and feel it, without ceasing to be a
child, or being spoiled into a little mope or bigot. Does
he live very much under the influence of his senses, and
little in the power of abstract ideas? then make religion a
plain fact to his senses; let God's mind be shown in his
works; let Christ's mission, character, and deeds, be set
forth simply and plainly to the perceptions in simple nar 
CHILDHOOD.
rative and expressive illustrations; let morality be made
a specific discipline; and above all, let the elders of the
family show clearly in their own temper and manners, that
religion is something sacred and beautiful, something as
much a matter of fact as the pleasant sunshine or the
daily bread.
Again, is the child imitative, and proving thus by this
very instinct that he was not made to lead, but to follow,
and seeming to be looking around him for some standard
of conduct, as much as to say, " I am not sufficient for
myself; I cannot go alone; show me what I shall do,
and I will do it?" What is plainer than that right habits
should be clearly set before him, so that imitation may
lead him in the true paths, and doing as others do, he may
do what is right. Think of this wisely, and it may put a
check upon our petulance or worldliness, yet it should not
interfere with our proper ease or naturalness to know
what open eyes are watching us. Artificial solemnity, a
put-on sweetness, or make-believe devotion, will not do,
and our children will soon find us out in such tricks. Let
us have a true, reasonable, cheerful reverence and good
will, and act accordingly in a sensible, consistent way, and
they will know it, and their ready instinct of imitation
will win from our heart and manner the grace that they
need. There is a great deal too much baby-talk and babyacting among elders; and some people try to make a
child's toy of religion itself. Away with such folly. In
all simplicity, but with full heart and wisdom, present
Christianity before our children as it lives in our own expe
87 
88        MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
rience; and while we teach them to say their prayers in
certain words, teach them also by our own example, by
making devotion a family habit, in which each child who
can read a sentence shall take an active part, and so be one
of God's children with us. The main point at issue is
not the imitating a certain manner, but the catching a certain spirit, and be assured that there is no conviction so
deep, no aspiration so tender, that something of its
power may not reach and nurture the unreflective and impulsive creature so susceptible of every magnetic impression.
Is there not also a way of presenting religion to the
child, as being an impulsive as well as a sensuous and imitative creature? A being so subject to moods of wilfulness, may be won to visitations of a gentle spirit, and the
expulsive power of a new affection may put away the evil
impulse that for the time has mastered the heart. Think
of this fact seriously; remember how often we ourselves,
with all our reflection and self-control, are possessed, apparently, without our own will, by some dismal fancy or
petulant humor, and we fight against it in vain, until something occurs to change the scene and the mood; and then
make charitable allowance for the wayward impulses of
childhood. Instead of fighting against the evil spirit in
something of its own obstinacy, try to touch another chord,
to overcome evil with good, and charm away the dark visitant, as David's harp charmed away the gloom of the
moody Saul. Great is the power of a genial, dignified religious temper, in working thus upon the impulsive nature 
CHILDHOOD.
of the child, and winning a wayward humor to reason and
good ill.
To reason-can a child be expected to be reasonable?
Yes, eminently so, but not to enter into abstract reasoning.
He is reasonable who has a sense of what is right or
proper, whether he can define or explain it or not; whilst
he is a reasoner, who can state the grounds of his conviction in connected, logical propositions. According to this
definition, the child can be reasonable without being a
reasoner, nay, from the very dormancy of the logical faculty, he seems gifted often with a singular insight into character and conduct. Put a case of action clearly before an
unsophisticated child, and you will find yourself frequently
amazed by the sense of right, the keen intuitive judgment
of the little umpire. You will find your own motives seen
into in the same way by young critics who have never
taken lessons of Lavater or Spurzheim. Let this faculty of
insight be sacredly cherished; and instead of perplexing
the brain with abstract propositions or dry deductions,
let the facts of life, whether religion, history, or nature, be
brought before the child, and the reason will strengthen
its intuition long before the time for reasoning has come.
Our Saviour understood this well; and when he called
young children to him and blessed them, he left with them
an impression of himself stronger than any argument,-an
impression upon their reason in its quick insight long before they could reason upon his words. Let us all do likewise, and present the facts of life before the abstractions
89 
90        MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
of philosophy to the young mind, and so we train it to the
best philosophy at last.
Thus we believe in making a religion a fact to childhood, alike in view of its being sensuous, imitative, and
spontaneous.
But the Future, the training for the cares to come,
what shall we say of this? Who can help thinking of
this, when we look thoughtfully upon children at their play,
in the mood of the poet, as he returned to the old schoolhouse, about which a new generation was gamboling:
Alas, regardless of their doom,
The little victims play!
No sense have they of ills to come,
Nor care beyond to-day.
Yet see how all around them wait
The ministers of human fate,
And black misfortune's baleful train.
Shall we sadden them with constant homilies, on care, and
pain, and disappointment, and vice, and crime, and sin,
and death, and hell? No, not so; but deal with the soul
as God would have us deal with the body-preoccupy it
with what is good and true, and useful, so shall it best contend against the world's trials, when they come. Begin
from the first with recognizing the child as a religious
being, a subject of the divine government, and to be brought
up in its truths and affections. Take this stand, and your
whole course of nurture is a preparation of the child for
maturity. You will preoccupy the mind with a genial,
e 
CHILDHOOD.
pure and reverent, liberal Christianity, just as you try t6
preoccupy the veins with wholesome blood, and the lungs
with wholesome air. The same method will enable you
to meet speculative questions which are sometimes started
by children, and which cannot be answered by any reasoning simple enough for their apprehension. Preoccupy
them with a just faith in God, in Christ and immortality,
and their reason will have a due sense of those august
truths long before they can reason them out. That judicious writer on Home Education, Isaac Taylor, remarks
that each season of life is preceded by a period of thoughtfulness, when the mind, in spite of its follies and passions, " tries its strength upon those insoluble problems
which sages have so often professed to have disposed of,
but which still continue to torment human reason, even
from its earliest dawn. There are indications sometimes
of a crisis of this sort in the fifth year; still more decisively in the tenth or eleventh; and again in the eighteenth.
It is at these moments that the soul comes to a stand, for
an instant, and asks, whither am I going? "
Let such states of perplexity be met by whatever arguments or illustrations may serve; but in childhood,
surely the best answer is the positive truth set forth in the
life or in words that carry life with them, the life of faith
and love. The verses or hymns that breathe the spirit
of filial trust, Christian affection, persevering obedience,
heavenly hope, will carry the perplexed soul through such
a time of misgiving better far than Paley's Evidences or
Butler's Analogy, or all the abstract metaphysics ever
9; 
92        MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY
written, and admirable enough in their way. We believe
much in this power of verse to preoccupy the mind with
truth; and in doing it, we follow the hint of Providence
and fall in with the child's ready instinct for rhythm. The
spring-time of life, like that of nature, may fitly begin in
song, and musical words with a loving spirit fitly ushers
the child into a sense of the meaning of that moral kingdom, which the graver seasons of life are to develop by so
many labors and trials.
With all due sense of the infirmity and exposures of our
nature, nurture the child within the divine kingdom, and
preoccupy his mind with right impressions. Then childhood shall be happy and reasonable, cheerful and reverent.
If the future on earth is denied, kind heaven will continue
the discipline in another world, and the memory left here
below will of itself be a blessed hope. Full is this blooming earth of the graves of children; and as it rolls through
the blue ether, with the din of its passions and the hum of
its business, and the song of its joy, there rises to the ear
of HIeaven the plaintive cry of bereaved parents more constant than the drumbeat of martial empire. Let that
plaintive cry lose its anguish and not lose its depth by the
comfort of a heavenly faith, and let us write on the sod
where you plant the violets of remembrance, words like
these:
Hlere rests one of few years and few sorrows.
Living he did God's work, and dying does it still I
Living, he opened new springs of love on earth,
Dying, he wins new hearts to Christ and heaven. 
CH[LDHOOD.
The dust is not the saddest grave of childhood, but its
saddest grave is the heart that outlives its own early days
only to renounce their childlike spirit, and bury their inno cence in a living sepulchre. O beware of this! and by a
true, progressive life, let the child's heart still beat on in
the bosom of the man. Forsake nothing that has been
simple, confiding, loving. Take one of the ruddy apples
which the exuberant harvest gives, divide it, and see in its
core the very mark of the blossom in which, last spring, it
began. Think of this, and in the core of your mature being,
cherish the blossom of your own spring-time, and enter the
kingdom of heaven like a little child. This was in the
apostle's thought, when looking forward from his present
reasoning, believing, yet somewhat darkling estate, he contemplated the great transformation that should complete
his progressive being, and bring out his early intuitions
and mature questionings into the fulness of the heavenly vision, where, no longer seeing through a mirror darkly, he should see face to face in the spirit and the presence of that love which is the end of all faith and hope.
Into that presence, Father in Heaven, lead us with
joy and with trembling.   More and  more, as earthly
guardians fall and earthly homes are broken, we need
the love that is eternal, and the mansions that do not
decay.
93  
Et 5-ng tIn  utt  Ers 
0 human heart I thou hast a song
For all that to the earth belong,
Whene'er the glun chain of love
lath linked the, the heaven above.
b human heart I what deed of thine
Jonld ~  -,  kingdom so divine?
0 human heart I that singest still
Thb-,,,,..t+,nin~ good, misreckoned ilL
S. F. ADAMS. 
THE SONG THAT NEVER TIRES.
WE are all of us at some time singers, and however dull
our ear or poor our voice, we cannot help singing forth, in
some way, the feeling that is in. us. Perhaps one of the
best proofs that the instinct of song lies in our very nature,
is in the fact, that many who have no music for others,
have enough of it for themselves, and the sweet voice
within the heart itself disguises to them the discord of
their lips. Most of the chief Mile Stones of our life-journey are passed with a song. We go through our infancy
to the sound of nursery rhymes, and as we enter the grave,
faith sings her requiem over our dust. The workman
cheers his task with some stirring strain, and the marriage
feast is not complete until some song or hymn consecrates
the union by the harmony of voices.
This season at which we are now writing, has surely
been a time of singing with us, in our great city; and in
more ways than one, our people have kept up the festive
tone which the old Church in some manner sanctions, wil
5 
98        MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
ling to prolong the carols of Christmas into the very
threshold of the Lenten Fast, and make her children the
more ready to go into the shade, from satiety of the
world's garish light. The glee of the Carnival, in some
measure, reaches through the earth, and few persons are
there so sad or so secluded, as to have no cheerful notes
ringing in their ears. I would carry out the remarks upon
childhood by illustrating the Christian element in song, not
as a passing sound, but as a permanent force. In other
words, I would speak of true life as a continuous song,
alike in its spirit, form, and object.
0 sing unto the Lord a new song, said the Psalmist.
We repeat the words, and trace them up to the true spirit
of the divine kingdom. The lyric sentiment that breathes
itself out in music, is but one of the forms of that universal fact of inspiration that pervades all nature, and culminates in the human soul. We are not speaking now of that
supernatural inspiration peculiar to the great prophets of
the human race, but of the gift within the usual order of
Providence. Every creature, in the measure of its faculties, was made to be moved by a spirit greater than itself.
The insect of a day, flutters out its brief span in a glow
f animal spirits passing its own power; bird and beast,
in their larger care and forethought, obey an instinct high
er than their knowledge; and man, made in his Maker's
image, is called to keep his soul ever open to the heavenly
breath that created him. Man in all ages, and under all
manners, customs, and creeds, is the most inspired of be 
THE SONG THAT NEVER TIRES.
ings, and feels most deeply the movings of a force within
him, but not of him. This force makes him rejoice in
lyrical sounds and actions, in songs and hymns, festive
dances, warlike marches, and every form of music and
eloquence. The Old Dispensation is full of it, and the
stern lawgiver himself, more than once poured forth his
devotion in a solemn song, and strung first the mighty harp
which the Psalmist so perfected. What shall we do with
this element under the Christian dispensation? Shut it
up, as some try to do, within its ancient channels, and
allow it to move only in the words of the old Hebrew
Psalms? Or shall we put it under ban altogether, as
others try to do, and aim to reduce man to a calculating
machine, or a logic mill, without enthusiasm, without po etry or song?
Not so; but we will do with the lyrical element in our
nature, with the faculty most open to inspiration, just what
the Psalmist indicates and God himself decrees. Cherish
it most sacredly, and make it animate the whole domain
of life, instead of inditing a few hymns or framing choral
dances. The new song was to show forth salvation from
day to day, and thus be a daily spirit instead of an evanescent word. In the Gospel, the same idea is constantly recognized. Jesus came to incarnate the Word that breathed
into nature all its harmonies, and the New Testament ends
with the new song of the redeemed around the eternal
throne. The gospel begins with the song of the angels at
the birth of Christ, and calls on all men to live lives in
harmony with that heavenly strain. It opens to us at once
~: 
99 
100       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
the heights of the divine kingdom, and bids us open the
deeps of our own being to its promised spirit. It concerned
itself less with nicely chosen words, and balanced verse,
and cunning instruments, because it worked in a mightier
material, and subdued men themselves into its mouthpieces
and instruments, unatil life itself began to move to the
hymn of heavenly love.   It is an essential fact of Christianity, that it calls upon men to receive the divine spirit,
as breathed from the Father through the life of the Messiah, and regards them as truly living, or fully born, only
when they are possessed by this spirit, and are thus not
their own, but God's.
This idea is, indeed, capable of being perverted into
the wildest fanaticism, and of making people rave like
madmen in the name of religion. But to deny it, is worse
than to pervert it, and the soberest practical obedience is
its most consistent declaration. What does it mean but
simply this, that, under the Christian dispensation, we are
to start with a filial spirit that shall run freely and faithfully through the whole of life, and breathe a cheerful
loyalty through all its thoughts, desires, and labors. Look
to every word of our Saviour's, look to the words and deeds
of every follower true to his kingdom, and we are at littl
loss to understand how the Gospel interpreted the Psalm,
and the new song declared the true salvation from day to
day.   A  true life is the new song, for from beginning
to end it is moved by the Spirit, and so follows a divine
inspiration.
I: 
THE SONG THAT NEVER TIRES.
Starting from such a source, the new song must take
its appropriate form, and through all its changes of tones
and times, it must not lose sight of its inspiring theme.
In all variety, it must keep its essential unity, and in
cheerful faith and good will move onward still in the march
of life. The exact form of our experience, we cannot control, any more than we can control our stature, our talents
or-our skies. Every man has an air of his own, and must
expect to keep its characteristic in whatever he does, however good or bad in his purposes, well or ill disciplined in
his habits. It is in his own way that he is called to serve
God, and in his own way take his part in the psalm of life.
True principle and true discipline, instead of crushing his
individuality, will bring it out, and so make him more
truly himself, in reconciling him with God.
We cannot expect to change our temperament or our
circumstances at will, but we may rule our tempers, and
use our circumstances, so as to conform our lives to the
right spirit, and bear a true purpose to the end. We cannot say to what heights or depths of experience we shall
be called by the allotments of Providence, but we may in
good measure say how we shall receive what comes to us,
may never be giddy when on the high places of joy, and
never despair when down in the deeps of sorrow. The new
song, which the Divine Comforter inspires, keeps the same
essential spirit throughout all these variations. From the
same inspiration comes the Jubilate and the De Profundis,
keeping humility in gladness, and trust in affliction:
101 
102      MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
O come, let us sing unto the Lord,
Let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation,
as in that other strain:
Out of the depths have I cried unto Thee, 0 Lord I
Lord, hear my voice; let thine ear be attentive to the voice of
my supplications.
Marvellously the life of Jesus keeps the essential unity,
and the same love that said, "Now  is the Son of Man
glorified, and God is glorified in him," also said, "if it be
possible, let this cup pass from me," and " Father, into thy
hands I commend my spirit." Such perfect consistency we
may not expect, but surely we gain in peace and wisdom
as we approach it, and through all the changes of our
many-toned life, whether festive or mournful, keep the
same theme, and rule our spirits in the same heart of faith
and love.
What times we shall fall upon, it is not for us to decide; but it depends upon us in a great measure how we
shall time our plans and steps to events as they come.
Without such timing, feeble and broken is the psalm of
life-far indeed from the new song that declares salvatio
from day to day. Too hurried sometimes in our fever of
impatience, too sluggish sometimes in our easy indolence,
we go from one extreme to another, and, exhausted by
foolish haste, we sink into imbecile torpor. Wiser and
happier is he who keeps a healthy pulse through all vicis 
THE SONG THAT NEVER TIRES.
situdes, and has a time for every thing, and every thing in
its time. Then a true method regulates the countless
cares and labors of our lot. Then a round of habits, orderly, but not slavish, free, yet not capricious, wins life
into its cycles, and hours, days, months, years, move on
recurrent yet progressive, like the verses of a hymn which
keep their appointed measure, yet swell as they continue,
and concentrate force as they advance. Happy the man
whose life, thus timed and toned, chants from day to day
the new song of faith and love.
He draws ever nearer the true object of life, and harmonizes all his powers and opportunities into conformity
with his master purpose. This is the crown of all, the
hardest and noblest task, to subdue into practical harmony
the various and conflicting elements of our condition.
Most thoughtful men have the idea, and all earnest men
have the aspiration, but only the thoroughly devoted make
the realization of a true spiritual order in the whole
method of life. In youth certainly we often dream of
maintaining a noble ideal above jarring passions and base
expedients. But the world is apt to be too strong for our
aspiration, and finds in our own hearts too ready allies of
its devices. Then we give in to the prevailing follies, re.
new our ideal only in romances or reverie, and allow life
to be as vulgar and prosaic as our visions are proved to be
impracticable. But no man can substantiate any claim to
true culture, much less to Christian fidelity, who is willing
thus to give up his fairest hope and blind himself to his
103 
104       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
bright star, because so many bewildering meteors flash
along his path. The true man walks still by its brightness, until the illusions disappear;-lhe keeps up the just
tone of his spirit, and gradually subdues all discords into
peace.
Is the discord in himself or in his circumstances, he
does not despair of abating it. Is it in himself? What
man, who has ever aspired to wisdom and self-command,
has not found himself challenged by some rebel within the
camp, who says, " I defy you, 0 imperious conscience or
master will, and if all others agree, I will not?"   What
man, who has ever won wisdom and self-command, has not
met the challenge bravely, and made of the very rebel a
submissive servant-yes, made anger the spur of justice,
pride the ally of self-respect, and even indolence the helper
of just tranquillity.  Let each man have a keen eye on
the rebel passion or habit in himself, that makes the rudest
jar against the harmony of his life, and not be content
until the rebel is trained into the general order and swells
the general strain.
They that may triumph tolerably well in such self-discipline, may complain of the sad discord between their
mind and their circumstances, and live in a continual warfare of the desire against the deed, the wish against the
opportunity. Hiere is the grief of the noblest souls, an
ideal which no reality equals, and which common life insults. Each heart shares the bitterness in its own waycomplains of stinted fortune, or uncongenial society, or ill
requited kindness, or limited education-complains of 
THE SONG THAT NEVER TIRES.
some special disappointment that leaves a dark mark upon
the memory, or of some abiding grief that clouds and mars
the whole course of years. Let every man look well to the
chief point of incongruity between his lot and his wishes,
and strive to bring it into harmony with his master pur pose; he will find himself surprised at the triumph in store
for him, if he perseveres. Let him try to subdue the re fractory circumstance to his own mind, and the effort cannot be utterly vain; let him, in respect to whatever incongruity is inevitable between his wish and his lot, try to
subdue his mind to his circumstance, and a deeper peace,
a diviner harmony may spring from the victory. The common people whom he befriends may school him into better
feelings than any fellowship of wits;-the drudging labors
that he performs cheerfully may develope nobler energies
than any dainty leisure;-the sacrifices that he bears patiently may nurture within him purer affections than the
rarest ministry of the beautiful arts;-a brave purpose
amidst the difficulties of his position, may do more to consolidate his character than a library of ethical abstractions;-fidelity constant and judicious in the trials of his
business, or the griefs of his family, may reveal more moral
beauty than Italy can unfold, and tell him more of the
divine kingdom than any oratory can convey. Not at
once, but at last, a true heart will subdue all things to
itself, bring all jarring elements into the general harmony,
and make every faculty and every circumstance join its
voice in chanting the new song to the Lord.
5*
105 
106       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
Thus we meditate upon the new song or a life inspired
by God's love, expressing itself in melodious form, and
harmonizing all powers and opportunities into conformity
with its aim. Is this too much to ask of us in this per
plexed, working-day world, where we are beset with sc
many cares and temptations that threaten our temper, and
break our time, and divide our thought? No man surely
will be willing to state the opposite, and say that there is
nothing lyrical in life, and the new song is for angels, and
not at all for this world. The most practical men best
exemplify our meaning, for they start with the most cheerful purpose, and bring all their faculties and chances into
harmony with their aim. By all work that is earnest,
and all prayer that is fervent, the end is sought, and
every genuine life passes into deeper concord as it advances.
When you work, 0 man, sing the new song of heavenly love, and make your work lighter and stronger for the
strain. Take labor as the allotment of divine mercy, and
use its discipline in such a way as to work out your powers into just play, and your opportunities into just order.
It is God's method of our discipline, and every man is a
crude discordant creature, until he sets himself to a worthy task, and works himself into true shape and temper.
Toil on cheerfully, and the cares that once threatened to
make you slave shall make you master, and they shall
sing to you of your triumphs, instead of groaning to you
of their exactions. Your work shall open to you God's
purpose in your being, and help you in your prayers. 
THE SONG THAT NEVER TIRES.
Life has its crowning joy, when most pervaded by the
sense of God's presence and grace-when daily experience
chimes best with hymn and prayer. We sing the new song
most blessedly when we yield up our wills to the Divine will,
and the Infinite Mind guides us, the Eternal Word moves
us. 0 how poor all our definitions are, when compared
with thie least personal experience of the Divine life within.
What is the rhythmic joy of all nature, but the varied expression of the Creator Spirit, the uncreated Word that is
ever speaking from God and of God. There is rhythm or
song throughout the universe-in the recurrent order of
the seasons-the cycles of the stars-the  beat of the
pulse-the step of the feet-the surging of the seas-the
undulation of light and sound, as well as in the music of
measured verse and song. Man can do nothing without
touching upon this great law of creation; and the recurrent roll or dash of the most utilitarian machinery, the
march of the most prosaic procession, combines with epic
and psalm to illustrate the recurrent and progressive order
which God has sanctioned throughout his universe. If the
lowest creatures so feel the impress of this harmony, what
must that mind be from whom it comes, and of whose infinite peace and blessed order, our holiest experience, our
most rapturous joy, gives but a faint reflection. If God's
words spoken in his works, spoken in the Scriptures of
revelation, and in a measure in every writing of true wisdom and eloquence, have such inspiration, beauty, harmony-what must the Word itself be, the original of all that
is loveliest in sound, or feeling, or thought. Glory in the
107 
108       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
Highest, that the Word has been so clothed in humanity
and dwelt among us. Behold and reflect its glory, and
with heart and life sing the new song:
Worthy is the lamb that was slain to receive power, and riches,
and wisdom, and strength, and honor, and glory, and blessing.
Blessing, and honor, and glory, and power be unto Him that
sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb for ever and ever.
Let the hymns that are taught to happy childhood be
imbued with this strain; and let youth, manhood, and age,
swell its volume by tbeir greater compass, whilst they
must deepen its tone by their deeper and sometimes darker
experience. 
IV. 
0 Life I how pleasant is thy morning,
Young Fancy's rays the hills adorning I
Cold-pausing Caution's lesson scorning,
We frisk away,
Like school-boys at th' expected warning,
Tojoy and play.
Wo wander here, we wander there,
We eye the Rose upon the brier,
Unmindful that the Thorn is near,
Among the leaves.
BURNS.
Straight forward goes
The lightning's path, and straight the fearful path
Of the cannon ball. Direct it flies and rapid,
Shattering that it may reach and shattering what it reachea
My son! I the road the human being travels,
That on which BLESSING comes and goes, doth follow
The river's course, the valley's playful windings,
Curves round the cornfield and the hill of vines,
Honoring the holy bounds of property!
And thus secure, though late, leads to its end.
SCHILLER. 
SYOUTH.
THE philosophy that hb come from thrones is a sad one,
and savors far more of the school of Heraclitus the weeper
than of Democritus the laugher. They who have every
luxury to satiety, and every honor to weariness, to whom
fortune can add little happiness, and to whom disappointment seems very treason, have not generally had very
cheerful lives, and the ascetic confessors of crowned heads,
have not found much reason to call the story whispered by
royal lips, any happier, to say the least, than that which
has been said with more trembling by the untitled or the
poor. Ecclesiastes, the preacher, in order to give point to
his book on the vanity of the world, takes his stand in the
palace, builds his pulpit upon the throne, and in the name
of Solomon, the most magnificent of kings, discourses of
the follies of mankind. Yet, in every point, he redeems
satire from skepticism, and uses folly as a foil to show better the worth of heavenly wisdom. In the closing chapter,, 
11 2      MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOTJRNEY.
as he thinks of the happiness of youth, he quits the vein
of satire altogether, the cynic becomes not a little of an
enthusiast, and he bids the young enjoy themselves to the
full, only remembering to temper their joy with devout
judgment, as in their Creator's presence.
Here, then, is our subject, so cheerful, yet from the
saddest book in the Bible.   Youth:   Its rejoicing in privileges.
Its remembering of responsibilities.
Its rejoicing. Rejoice, 0 young man, in thy youth.
Why? For many reasons that can be specified, as well as
for the reason that need not be specified, the reason, that
youth cannot well help rejoicing, and the young man's
heart cheers him because it is young-full of fresh life
and overflowing spirits. It was said by Rousseau, that the
period between the twelfth and the seventeenth year is the
only time when man is absolutely happy; inasmuch as it
is then only, that his forces of body and mind much exceed his desires. Surely. at this season, or perhaps during
the whole time from ten to twenty, there is more lpower on
hand, in proportion to the demands made upon it, than at
any other time.
But even this exuberant strength must have a serious
meaning, and its spontaneous joy is intended to be the
germinating time of great purposes. Rejoice, then, 0
young man, in the days of thy youth, and let thy heart, in
its glad fulness, cheer thee, yet remember that all power 
YOUTH.
brings responsibility, and even for this joy, God will call
thee to judgment.
Without dividing these remarks into two separate sections, I will follow the two lines of thought through the
chief spheres of youthful experience, and show how it is,
that responsibility walks hand in hand with privilege.
Among the foremost pleasures of youth, stands the growing consciousness of personal liberty. Each year, after
the dependence of childhood ceases, some new drops are
poured into the thrilling cup of conscious freedom. The
feeling with which the man throws his first vote or first
signs his name to an agreement in his own right, is as nothing compared with the feeling with which the boy first
roams the street unattended, or ranges the country with
his horse, or gun, or fishing-rod. This sense of liberty
brings out a great and noble instinct, which God has put
into the soul. Rejoice in it, 0 young man, and let thy
heart cheer thee with the high sentiment of freedom, which
has made nations great, and genius noble. But remember
that fearful danger lurks in thy very joy, and that God
holds thee responsible for the use of thy liberty. You
are no longer to be led by the hand of your parents, and
are therefore called to take hold of the hand of God. You
no longer depend implicitly upon the will of men, and are
therefore prepared to lean upon that will, subjection to
which, is the only freedom. Your liberty will become
miserable wilfulness, unless it follows law, even the true
law of life, as declared in nature and by the Gospel.
113 
114      MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
Learn this truth early, the earlier the better. When you
are tempted by your own impulses, or unprincipled companions, to mistake self-indulgence for dignity, or wilfulness for manhood, remember that you enslave yourself in
the very delusion of your boasted liberty, like the poor sot
who is dreaming of grasping a sceptre, while he drains the
cup that is to drag him down to the dust. Yes, it is true
-all emancipation from outward restraint becomes new
servitude, unless it is made the occasion of higher allegiance. The body, emancipated from leading-strings, is
lost, unless its freed limbs move in harmony with its own
laws, and the laws of the universe. The mind, too, is lost
unless it finds a higher authority than that which it puts
off with the dress of childhood, and learns self-government
with its independence.
Youth is the time to think seriously, religiously, of
this great truth, and exalt and strengthen its conscious
liberty, into the confidence of faith, and the steadfastness
of law. Sadly it forgets this, and homes without number
are made wretched, because young men mistake license for
freedom, and make utter shipwreck of themselves by
launching wildly upon the great sea of life, without compass or pilot, at the very time when God and conscience
call them to choose the sufficient guide. Happy-happy
the youth who makes so little of this mistake, that he can
correct it, and taught wisdom by a sip of folly, learns that
the best liberty, is the truest obedience and the most reverent conscientiousness.   Rejoice, then, in thy conscious
freedom, 0 young man, and let thy heart cheer thee, and 
YOUTH.
walk in the ways of thine heart, and the sight of thine
eyes, but remember that God will bring thee to judgment
for this, and his sentence will not fail to arrest you, if you
make liberty license instead of law.
Another of the peculiar pleasures of youth lies in the
sense of growing power. Childhood is hardly conscious
of its own energies, and the mind works with a certain
spontaneousness that takes as little thought of itself, as
the healthy blood takes thought of its own tides. But
gleams of consciousness ere long come, and at the age of
eleven or twelve, certainly as early as fourteen, there is
something like a distinct conviction of the youth's characteristic powers.   The leading tastes, and talents, and dispositions, begin to show themselves with some definiteness,
and the youth takes vast delight in the consciousness of
his resources. He perceives, compares, judges, fancies,.
schemes, and has the feeling, that within his mind,  as
within a tent, lie great forces encamped, and from time to
time, they are putting on their armor, and each going out
into the field. This experience is occasion for rejoicing,
since God has attached to every faculty a peculiar happiness in its own activity, and as the insects of a day spread
with joy their gossamer wings to the sunshine, so the soul,
the immortal Psyche, takes vast delight in pluming and
trying her pinions for her unending flight.  Rejoice, 0
young man, then, in the sense of growing power, but remember, 0 sacredly, religiously remember, that for this
ver,, privilege God will hold thee to judgment. Regard
115 
116       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
those powers, not with pride or conceit, but with humility
and fidelity. Yes, let each faculty, as it rises in the morning
of its day into distinct consciousness, bow down before its
Maker and its God, and consecrate itself to a true life-service. Without this, power is weakness, and talent is vanity. Remember that every gift brings an obligation, and
as the gift first opens into consciousness, let it open into
true service.
Remember this, young man, or you are nothing. You
are to be weighed by God and man in the measure of your
usefulness. No matter who or what you are, or who your
father is, or who your connections are, or what your wealth
or poverty may be, whatever your talents or position, the
main point in your destiny turns upon this question, "Do
you mean to be useful or do you not - do you mean to serve
God and your time faithfully, and do a good work in the
world, or do you mean to cumber the ground by a life of
conceit, selfishness and folly? " He who begins otherwise
than with a purpose to be faithful, begins wrong, and
strays worse the farther he goes in that wrong path. Shun
it, and take the right way. The lives of the strong and
the great of this world urge upon us this truth. Look to
the graves of late greenest among the dust of the great in
both hemispheres. Think of the great captain of our
mother country, with all his prejudices, so faithful in peace
and war to his sworn allegiance. Think of him, our own
great statesman, but a little while ago laid in the grave in
presence of thousands who thronged that village home, and
read in the oak and the flowers on his coffin, fit ciphers of the 
YOUTH.
strength and beauty of his mind. With all his frailties,
and it would be strange if a man made on so large a scale
should not have some, he began life with the idea of service,
and his youthful aspirations and his maturest thoughts,
are all stamped with that idea. He grew up with the idea
that his mind was to be a working force, and the very
same feeling which beat in his heart when he heard with
tears his father's promise that he should go to college,
came out in all the great acts of his life, and gave tone to
his dying words. If in any acts of his life, he fell from
this great allegiance, his own conscience became his severest
judge, and his weakness, as well as his power, teaches the
majesty of true service. Higher, deeper, than any standard of worldly greatness, is the rule of the gospel. The
Master bids us all measure obligation by privilege, and
calls on the young to give all their powers to the service
of the divine kingdom. Rejoice in your power, 0 young
man, be it much or little. Remember to use it well- to
choose religiously and to follow faithfully your worldly
business or profession, and above and within all other vocations, keep in mind that we are all called of God in Jesus Christ.
Once more, and to sum up all, it is one of the pleas
ures of youth to possess a certain indefinable enthusiasm,
which gives the character a peculiar charm, and which
throws over life an unspeakable freshness and delight. Rejoice in this-feel the beatings of a young heart, and do
not for worlds surrender that generous ardor, for a chilling
117' 
118      MIILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
worldly prudence, which is bad enough in an old man, but
more monstrous than decrepitude itself, in youth. Have
your enthusiasm, have hearty hopes and warm friendships,
and be willing to dream some overfond dreams. But remember that God holds thee to judgment for this-remember
that this very exuberance of feeling is the substance from
which your best affections and principles should be formed,
the exuberant sap which should shape and mature the
trunk, and leaf, and fruit of a manly character. To let it
go out in youthful lusts and unhallowed passions, would
be like draining the young plant of its juices, to distil
them into draughts of madness, instead of leaving them
in their own appointed channels.   Be pure, be true, be
faithful, and your very enthusiasm will harden into strength
and grow into virtue, and bloom into lasting nobleness.
Yes, follow God's bidding, and you will find, that as years
gather over you, and your emotions are less susceptible,
they lose their impulsiveness without losing their power,
and the enthusiasm of the youth is consolidated into the
honor, fidelity, and good-will of the man.
And this leads us to the main point of our thought,
the need of making youth a season of direct religious obligation. Sad it is, when this susceptible time passes, and
the affections are not led to God, and the acquiescence
of childhood in what is taught as religion, is not confirmed,
by the youth, on his own personal responsibility. It is
never too late, indeed, to repent and believe, but it is none
the less certain, that a man cannot by subsequent amendnent, ever make up for the loss of early religion, for the 
YOUTH.
loss of that early fidelity to God, which breathes the fresh
fervor of young enthusiasm into faith, and twines all the
pleasant associations of the morning of our days with the
truths and hopes of Christianity. Think of this, 0 youth,
think of this, 0 parents, and do not pursue your too fre quent error, of consigning the most formative of all periods
of our moral life, to the giddiness of the passions and the
dissipations of the world. The Christian church needs the
young within its fold, to give it freshness and beauty; the
young need the church, to subdue their wilfulness, and to
nurture their enthusiasm into a heavenly faith and hope.
Think of this, youth whose eye rests upon this page, and
deem your education all incomplete, until you have learned
enough and schooled your feelings enough, to take your
stand among intelligent believers, and sit in token of your
settled faith and your avowed need, at the table of commu
nion to which the gospel calls you. Think of this, parents,
and by your example and counsel, establish your children
in healthful, reasonable, quickening religious convictions,
and lead the way to the fold of the good shepherd. This
course is the prevention of all skepticism, by a spirit above
the power of every denying argument; it is the cure for
all disappointment, by the peace and love that cannot dis.
appoint.
Seriously, now, and without any straining or pretension-what good on earth is so great, as a cheerful, large,
steadfast Christian faith and purpose in youth, establishing
every blessing by a duty, and exalting every worthy sentiment into a principle?  What better security against
ii9 
MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
the chances and changes of the world-what better safeguard of just influence and abiding welfare-what better
preservative of that which makes youth so fresh and hopeful?
There is something in youth, that of itself leads us to
adore the ineffable goodness of that majestic Being, who
knows no declining years, and whose bliss ever rejuvenates
itself in blessedness unspeakable. The nearer we approach
to God, we perpetuate our early joy and breathe the youth
immortal. Do not the truest men partake somewhat of
this privilege-the men who, by purity of life, and heartiness of affection, and fidelity in well-doing, have confirmed
into principles the best enthusiasm of their early days,
who have led liberty up to law, and power to allegiance,
and impulse into conviction? Have they not about them,
to their latest years, a freshness and charm that the world
cannot give? Do they not carry into the winter of their
days, the sweet balms of summer flowers? have they not
struck in the fairy tints of early fancy? have they not
opened, within the breaking cistern of earthly feeling, a
channel into that living spring whence gush the fountains
of immortal youth?
At best we are a frail generation, yet how much good,
the good God offers us. The youths shall faint and be
weary, the young men shall utterly fail, but they that wait
upon the Lord shall renew their strength, they shall mount
up with wings as eagles, they shall run and not be weary,
they shall walk and not faint. The best philosophy, most
confirms this blessed faith.
120 
C — 
What is this that stirs within,
Loving goodness, hating sin,
Always craving to be blest,
Finding here below no rest?
What is it? and whither? whence I
This unsleeping, secret sense,
Longing for its rest and food
In some hidden untried good?
'Tis the soul! Mysterious Name I
Him it seeks from whom it came;
It would, Mighty God, like Thee,
Holy, holy holy, be I
FuRma 
THE TRUE FIRE.
THE events that decide a man's destiny are not often those
which figure most largely in his external experience, and
are most frequently spoken of by his friends. We all have
our own secret history, whose honor or shame can be fully
known only to ourselves. At some point in the great journey, whether sooner or later, we meet some one of God's
messengers who reveals himself to us alone, and our character takes its turn for good or evil, according to our reception of his message. The fire still burns that of old
shone upon Moses in Hioreb, and the voice still speaks
that called to the child Samuel in the temple.
It was at the most momentous point of his life tha
this visitation came to the great Jewish lawgiver, as h
was tending the flock of Jethro in the solitudes of Horeb.
The Divine presence appeared to him in a bush which
burned without being consumed, and at once compelled
him to listen to the voice that spoke, and became to him of
itself a most expressive symbol of the light of the God 
124       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
speaking.  "Yes," this heroic man could say to himself
as he gazed, "yes, there is a fire that can burn without
burning out; my hopes for my name and race are not to
die away with the youthful heats that mature years have
now cooled; my aspirations for some nearer presence of
God are not always to waver with the lights and shades of
nature and fortune; there is a glory uncreated which is
to be made known; here it shines upon my poor vision,
and by this bush, now bright with the heavenly shekinah,
my faith is fixed, that God will be a burning, abiding light
to his people, and they are called to be burning, abiding
lights of his kingdom."
The passage presents two subjects intimately connected
and illustrating each other. It affords an emblem of God's
revelation to man through that Word of nature and Scripture, which never fails; it affords, too, an emblem of man's
revelation of God through the light of a true life which
never dies out. Intimately connected the two subjects
are, for we cannot speak wisely'of what God has revealed
without looking for its marks into the experience of men,
and we cannot speak wisely of the experience of man without considering God's work within his soul. We take a
branch of the second subject, the light in man's own life,
and treat the first, the light of revelation, only as it may
be connected with it. We would meditate now upon a
true life-purpose, or the fire that a man should carry within
him ever, that he may do his work well, serve his neighbor,
save his soul, and show forth the glory of his Creator.
This true fire burns, but does not burn out; it lights and 
THE TRUE FIRE.
warms every sphere of life, whilst it is fed from a d. vine
and unfailing source-unfailing as the immortality of
which it is the pledge.
The true fire that burns without wasting away is lighted
within the soul, when the will of man is brought into just
contact with the love and truth of God.   It is lighted
whenever a man feels that there is a spirit within him,
and that this spirit is bound by its own being as well as
by heaven's law, to live in the divine presence and be
faithful to the divine kingdom. Then the true life-purpose
is kindled, and needs no change but progress to give
healthful glow to every faculty and work of existence.
This is the proper central fire of a man, having its seat in
that power of will which gives him his personality, fed by
all the affections that ally him with his neighbor and his
God, spreading in all the lines of influence which heavenly
wisdom decrees. Without something of this fire in him,
man ceases to be man, and is baser than the grossest savage who gropes so dimly after God as to bow down to an
idol in the name of religion, and so misinterprets the law
of rectitude as to sacrifice his own life to revenge a wrong
to his brother or kinsman; for such a savage, after his
rude fashion, tries to be faithful, and is above the utter infidel's degradation. With much of this fire in him, man
draws near the Father, and more approaches that perfect
Son, who said, " My Father worketh hitherto, and I work,"
and in every thought and feeling served the living God.
Is this rightly called the true fire, and will it burn
125 
126       MTLE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
without burning out? That surely is the true fire which
best warms and lights the life. What does this better
than an earnest, faithful purpose, rooted in good will and
branching into true uses?   Some leading passion may
seem to give out more heat, and probably superficial observers might ascribe to passionate men more fervor than
to faithful men. But it is by confounding smoke and
blaze with vital warmth, like the simple child that sees
more power in the crackling thorns that his play-fellows
kindle upon the beach, than in the calm, clear light that
shines out from the ocean rock, true emblem of a good
man's deeds, as the former is in Solomon's view fit similitude of the laughter of a fool. If there be any leading
passion not governed by a faithful purpose, it consumes
the man, and makes a victim of its votary. If the leading
passion be guided by fidelity, then it becomes the intense
fidelity that so marks the greatest heroes of history, and
the truest servants of God. In either case, then, the faithful spirit is the true fire.
Do any persons have misgivings as to all fervor of
character, and in their regard for sober, practical judgment, speak as if all zeal must needs have an element of
%olly destined ere long to burn out if it burns at all? ilow
great the mistake, for nothing can be more sober and practical than an earnest purpose; nothing surely so favors
healthy life as the active force that gives mind and body
its vital glow. It is better far for a man to live the full
life of his nature, with every faculty awake to its own
office in its own time, than to doze existence away in the 
THE TRUE FIRE.
sluggard's torpor, or the worldling's coldness of heart. The
natural life needs glow for its own vigor and permanence.
The spiritual life follows the same law, and its vigor is as
abiding as its fire is bright and full. Errors there may be,
indeed, on each side; and if some men are so sluggish as
not to kindle their light, others may be so vehement as to
allow their light to burn out. There is moderation in all
things, and true moderation helps the very point that we
would urge, by securing the deepest and most abiding fervor of which man is capable. What is moderation but
such a measuring of times, forces, and intensity, as to
secure the most efficient power on the whole. The truly
moderate man is the most fervent of all men, for he best
measures his resources, and instead of wasting his fire,
keeps it for its true uses. For want of moderation, many
a man who thinks that he has too much fire, is actually
content with too little. Many a man who thinks himself
a martyr to a noble cause, because he has exhausted himself upon a single idea or in a single extravagant heat, has
actually lived too coldly, instead of too fervently, and has
neglected the affections and duties that would check his
extravagance and revive his spirits. Many a man thinks
himself a marvel of studious zeal, because his brain is in
a fever one day or night in the week, and therefore worn
out from exhaustion all other days.   Many a sepulchral
devotee who has worn himself to mere skin and bone by
his zeal in fasting and prayer, has burned his light down
to the socket by too little fire, instead of too much; for
he has lighted but a single lamp of sacrifice, instead of
127 
128       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
kindling the whole constellation. Had the fire been broader
it would have been abiding, and the wasted devotee would
have been the affectionate, active, cheerful Christian, burning the lamp of love and joy, as well as of penitence and
self-denial.
The worldling makes the same mistake, only in a dif
ferent way. Many a man in this great city, who thinks
that he lives too fervently for his health of body and
mind, and who really seems to lose strength with years,
needs more fire instead of less, to give him true life. His
zeal is too narrow, and the fire burns out, because it does
not touch the best resources of his being. He lives for
the world and its business, not for God or his neighbor,
too little for the best welfare and enjoyment even of his
own family.  Let him live a broader life, and it will be a
healthier one. If worn by worldly care, let him find solace
not in torpor or sensuality, but in the tastes that refine
and elevate the intellect, and in the affections that soothe
and edify the soul. Yes, there is many a man who systematically makes of our sacred Sabbaths, days of stupid
indolence, because of his over-exhaustion during the week,
who would awake on the morrow far more refreshed after
a day of social kindness, worthy conversation, and rational
worship. Follow the method of Providence in the order
of nature, and we shall find in due alternation of action a
refreshment far better than torpor.   When daylight fades,
other lights burn on high for us, and the world without is
but an image of the world within. Follow the method of
Providence, and we may show a broader and more lasting 
THE TRUE FIRE,
light, instead of finding only ashes after a narrow and
wasting flame from mad intensity in some single quarter.
The danger, I repeat it, is not of too much fire, but of too
little, and the most self-controlled man is in the depth of
his being the most fervent, and his nature, so full orbed,
warms his great resolves and his quiet charities from the
same vital source, like the globe itself, which tempers its
salubrious springs and its volcanic torrents from the same
central heat.
This fire acts upon every. sphere of life, upon all just
powers and all worthy actions.
Our powers, both of body and mind, feel its influence.
The body needs a master, and its forces and appetites are
very much what the,central purpose makes it. Let the
will be earnestly and wisely faithful, every nerve and limb
and sense feels its spirit, and is informed with something
of its fire. The lusts that burn out the bodily life, and
the sloth that would not have it burn at all, are both rebuked; and this marvellous structure, this mystical tree,
which physiologists have regarded as living only by the
slow fire in its red arteries, glows with its true fervor and
shines with its true light-active, not fevered-calm, not
dull, repeating in its branching nerves and vessels the
miracle of HIoreb, and obliging the beholder to pause as
before the work of God.
Every faculty of mind feels the influence, and truly
lives only as it is animated by the central purpose that
beats and glows at its heart. The intellect is wise and
6*
129 
130      MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
wakeful by learning to look at all things in nature and
Providence with an earnest, faithful eye, and a man of ordinary powers animated by this spirit, becomes a far wiser
man than the brightest genius bewildered by vanity, or
driven to and fro by passion. The affections are inspired
and fixed by the same spirit, and they give their steady,
healthful glow to every element which they control.  Even}
the imagination, that daring power that is thought to mock
at all control, is invigorated and enlightened by the master purpose, and is loftier and happy in its creations from
its solemn recognition of the work of life and the great lifegiver's glory.  Yes-Faithful is the word that can be
written on the forehead of all the great creative minds.
The visions of Milton, Dante, and their peers, were all
based upon the ground of truth and virtue. They did not
presume to frame new worlds before owning at heart the
primal law which God, from the beginning, laid beneath
the foundations of this globe. The faithful man, whatever
his sphere, may find fellowship and encouragement in their
pages, and their great thoughts may soothe him as he goes
to his pillow as benignly with their light as the stars that
look from heaven into his window. Wherever the imagination ceases to feel the true inspiration of fidelity, its fire
is a consuming curse, and Lucifer, the Fallen-that is
the name of this recreant son of the morning.
Thus the powers in all their compass are animated by
the true-life-purpose; i and must it not follow, that all the
work of our sphere has heart from its heart? We all have
many things to do, some in themselves agreeable, some 
THE TRUE FIRE.
disagreeable, some likely to be done with alacrity, others
in the most reluctant if not drudging spirit.  Bear to
our chief calling the fire of our earnest purpose, and
all our labors will have something of its cheerful motive, if
all are not at once animated with its radiant glow, and a
,man becomes efficient in detail even as he is resolute and
fervent at heart. He need not wait until the globe is
fashioned anew to make industry attractive to him by
adapting it to his passions, for his master purpose subdues
his passions to his work, and all the branches of his calling repeat in no mean way the miracle of Horeb, flaming,
but not consumed.
Is it presumptuous to speak so strongly of man's power
to carry fire in his heart, and to infuse it into every branch
of life? Is it ascribing to man's will, the work that belongs only to God's Infinity? Not so, for all true force is
from God, and man wins true fire only as he finds his way
to its Infinite fountain. The fervent purpose, central in
the character, is what it is, by trusting in a power beyond
itself, and by being nurtured from a divine and unfailing
source. God it is who has given us our will, with its mysterious power of volition according to the image of his own
creative fiat; God it is who has benignly added helps to
our natural power, opened the truths and graces of his
kingdom all around us, and bade us work out our destiny
in a faith that makes his Providence work with us. The
fire within burns not merely of itself, but is fed by every
word from the mouth of God, and in Jesus, the Incarnate
131 
132      MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
Word, it finds its true and abiding life. In Christ, and
the whole train of Divine Providences of which he is the
consummation, the love of the Father draws near to us,
encourages us, revives our failing fervor by its heavenly
breath, and reanimates our fainting spirit by its sacred
warmth. The whole gospel system is enliveningr regenerating. As a man strives to obey its law, and breathe its
spirit, he works his own nature into truer life, and brings
near to his soul the heavenly fire.  The humblest disciple
who tries to use his lowly gifts in faith and obedience,
proves this truth by his abiding power, and has deepening
peace. The illustrious heroes of faith have proved it in
the most noted chapters of history, and their souls pervaded by the calm, unfailing fire that came and comes from
heaven through Christ and the Spirit, have acknowledged
the miracle of ioreb as a fit type of the divine manifestation, and have repeated it in their own experience. Hence
to the great and the lowly has proceeded the most enduring energy in this world, and hence has sprung the living
witness of Life Eternal. A faithful purpose rooted in the
love of God, and branching out into blessed uses, sending
up its lambent flame into the nurturing airs of heaven, this
is of itself promise of immortality; for this fixes the heart
on God and Christ, and surely it is life Eternal to know
Thee the only true God and Jesus Christ whom Thou hast
Bent.
Let not the topic rest in any generality, however exalted or subduing. Let each man examine himself and his 
THE TRUE FIRE.
ways by the principles illustrated. Is it true that the
chief test of character is in the central purpose that acts
upon all the faculties and works; that the true fire burns
without burning out, that it pervades every branch of life
when this purpose is not wilful, but faithful, and is kept in
constant allegiance to the Divine kingdom-is this true?
Then what are we? Much we are that we ought not to
be; too little we are that we ought to be. Feeble as the
true fire may have been, who of us will say that he knows
nothing of it? Who of us will say that he has not been
strong and peaceful as he has tended it well? Who of us
will not say that he judges all men according to the evidence of its presence, and thus sanctions like judgment upon
himself?
Early in life-yes, as soon as the mind knows any
thing of its powers, nay, before personal responsibility begins, and as soon as a child is consecrated in baptism, or
made the subject of a thought or prayer, be this the pressing wish, that a faithful purpose should be lighted within
his soul, and kept under a living nurture.
And as the years roll on, and scenes, friends, plans and
feelings change with time, when maturity brings its grave
cares, and threatens to chill all enthusiasm into cold worldliness or drudging habit, let the fire be kept ever burning,
that age may renew and brighten the best promise of
youth. Let it be ever kept burning in such fulness and
measure as to kindle every faculty, and shine unto perfect
day Turn ever like the lawgiver towards the symbol of the
133 
l134      MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
present God. Wisely one of our modern sages speaks to
each of us the lesson of his own faithful life:
"Before thy sacred altar, heavenly truth! I
I bow in age as erst I bowed in youth.
Still let me bow, till this weak frame decay,
And my last hour be lighted by thy ray." 
VL
nlnoban  its Nines. 
"But who on earth can long abide in state?
Or who can him assure of happy day?
Sith morning fair may bring foul evening late,
And least mishap the most bliss alter may?
For thousand perils lie in close await
About us daily, to work our decay.
That none, except a god, or God him guide,
May them avoid or remedy provide."
SPENSBR.
"The greatest man is he who chooses the right with invincible Resolution;
who resists the sorest temptations from within and without; who bears the heaviest burdens cheerfully; who is the calmest in storms, and whose reliance on
Truth, on Virtue, on God, is the most unfaltering."
CHANNING. 
MANHOOD AND ITS BUSINESS.
WE treat now of manhood, the third stage in the circle
of life under survey. If childhood is the time of unconscious development, and youth the time for conscious preparation, manhood is the time for responsible, efficient
action-action amid the realities of this busy, aggressive
world. At present, we treat so much of the subject as
relates to its early years, especially to the third decade, or
the period between twenty and thirty, reserving middle
age and old age, each for separate consideration. Our
topic, then, in this paper, is Early Manhood, or Beginning
Life for Ourselves.
The gospel has surely been the strength of true man
hood, and from the pen of one who was every whit a man
judicious, patient, courageous, unflinching, we take a sentence wholly to our purpose. Hear it, as if from the
apostle Paul's own lips, and from the Spirit which gave
him his fire.  "Watch ye, stand fast in the faith, quit you
like men, be strong." 
138       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
Let the first application of the words, be to the most
obvious fact that meets us at the threshold of active life.
I mean, our own chosen work, our business. Whatever
our position or means, we all have a work to do in life, and
that work must embody itself in some special vocation.
The youth feels this fact, and his whole training, when judicious, will have an eye to it. But the man, just taking
hold of his business on his own account, and he only, can
see it in its vast responsibility, and feel the great difference between acting under guardianship, and acting for
himself. Probably, to most men, the transition, notwithstanding all its attendant hopes and plans, has peculiar
trials and perplexities.  The first approach of the great
world, is a rude shock to delicate sensibilities and unaccustomed faculties. Before, you had your tasks planned for
you by others, and these bore the responsibility of the result, and stood between you and the world. Now, you
must plan for yourselves, bear the brunt of success or
failure, and stand on your own feet amidst the crowd.
Before, you were learning how to manage a boat in a calm
bay, with ready retreat from the storm. Now, you must
out to sea, with your own hand upon the helm, your own
eye upon the sails, and you must take tempest or calm as
it may chance to come. Trying period for most young
men, rudely jarring all the cherished dreams of their years
of study or apprenticeship, and waking them from rosy
fancies, into the cold clear light of this working-day
world.
Shrink not, but be brave, and you will win something 
MANHOOD  AND  ITS BUSINESS.
better than those golden dreams. You will grapple with
stern reality, and not let it go, until it yields you more
than ideal blessing. Quit you like men, be strong in your
purpose and your work, and your business shall bless you.
You need all your judgment, your patience, your courage,
your energy, to begin your work well. I need not undertake, in addressing a circle of well-informed readers, to
lay down minute rules for the successful transaction of
business; but as to the main principle, I can have no
doubt, and I rely upon your experience, to confirm my
doctrine. In this world, every man must work his way to
true success, and faithful efficient work is the great, the
main chance of welfare. Take hold of your business, thern,
meaning to work manfully, and do the best in your power,
to meet your responsibilities and bring out your resources.
Do you start with capital? work, or you will lose it by your
folly, or disgrace it by your inefficiency. Have you no
capital to start with? why be disheartened, for is not a fair
character, with intelligence and energy, capital enough for
you-nay, in this country of boundless opportunities, is
not poverty itself an excellent tonic for a young mani's
stomach, and one too, that has braced our strongest men in
the outset of their career?
This rule only, will I lay down for the conduct of a
man beginning his business or profession for himself.
Take the best opportunity within your reach, and use it so
faithfully and efficiently, as to make a good mark on your
own character, and the men with whom you deal. Then
that present opportunity will not fail to open into somne
139 
140       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
thing more, and your growing usefulness will give you
growing influence and welfare. Woe to the man who takes
the opposite course, and treats the world of business as if
it were all sham, and as if men were to stumble or to belie
themselves into success. With all its pretences and chicanery, business is a tremendous reality, for it is the great
daily work of the world, and not even the Quixotism of the
sentimentalist who expects fortune to come to him by friendship, is greater than that of the shiftless adventurer, or
tricky schemer, who thinks that luck, not labor, makes the
man, and that character is no element of capital. The
great law of gravitation pervades all worlds, and in the
long run things tend to their just level. The great law of
practical life is, that he who would win and keep an honorable position, must balance himself there by efficient action, actual influence, and positive usefulness. This is the
doctrine for merchants, and all artisans and artists-the
doctrine for all professional men, all statesmen and rulers.
Do your work well, whatever it is, and even the world's
sober judgment will justify God's own truth, and measure
your dignity by your usefulness. Be strong, by choosing
wisely what to do, be strong, by doing well what you have
chosen, and the step from youth to manhood shall be a rise
not a fall.
But the business of life is not to be measured by what
we call our vocation. It covers the whole ground of action,
and reaches into all the springs of emotion. Our work
must have an object, and the object is poor and unsatisfac 
MANHOOD AND ITS BUSINESS.
tory, unless it takes hold of our affections.  Here is the
second point of consideration for manhood. Quit you like
men, and be strong in your affections, and you will be
stronger in your work.
In youth, the affections fill a large place, and boyish
friendships, affinities, intimacies, do much to-shape and
color our early years. He surely is a most unfortunate or
selfish man, whose subsequent life is not happier, because
of friends made in the days of school, or college, or count ing-house preparation.  But in manhood, the affections pass
out of the airy region of sentiment, and connect themselves
with the gravest reality. One great affection, which in its
dawning, flushes the whole horizon with its golden light,
and makes of every generous youth a hero in his dreams,
and gives the hue of romance to every gentle companion,
shows in manhood its serious providential purpose; and
that golden light, heaven-born as it is, however colored and
refracted by earthly exhalations, ere long forms itself into
an aureola around some elect countenance, and guides man
to the choice which creates for him a home, and gives him
new and powerful objects to strive for, and live for. Let
this aspect of manhood be sacredly considered, and let the
thought of God, who founded marriage, and of Him who, at
Cana of Galilee, renewed its consecration, save the subject
from trifling caprices, and from mercenary calculation. Seriously, and with the whole compass of his nature, with his
mind, heart, and conscience, as well as with his taste and
temperament, let man choose upon whom to set his affections, and there rest them, with all loyalty and truth.
141 
142      MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
There is judgment in this relation, as in every other matter of feeling, and he who plays the fool, by mistaking caprice for conviction, or prudence for wisdom, may just as
well, nay far better, play the fool upon any other ground.
Woe to the man who sells himself for money, and plays
Judas to his own soul, for pieces of silver. Woe to the
man who slaves himself to a trifler, or who befools himself to a pretty toy, or who sells himself to a virago or a
dolt, and wastes his affections upon heartlessness. Home
rests upon a basis of reality, and that reality may be accursed, for the very reason that it should be blessed. It
is not for me to go into the particulars of a subject of
such peculiar delicacy, full as the Bible, and the ancient
pulpit, may be of instructions in reference to it. Let a
man, however, clearly understand from the outset, that his
character and destiny are very closely in his wife's keeping, and that it is not easy for him to live wisely with a
fool, or devoutly with a flirt-that it is hard for him to seek
the substance, when her idol is show; it is hard for him to
aspire, when the prevalent mediocrity is her only standard.
Strong indeed, let me say it in all plainness, strong is the
man who has a good wife   not an angel, for we are not
talking sentimentalism, but
"A Creature not too bright or good
For human nature's daily food;"
a sensible, affectionate, refined, practical woman, who
makes a, man's nature all the stronger, by making  it more 
MANHOOD AND ITS BUSINESS.
tender, who puts new heart into all his worthy striving,
gives dignity to his prosperity, and comfort to his adversity. He who is content with any thing less than the elements of sterling character in the guardian of his home,
makes the saddest of mistakes, and commits his welfare to
the most fickle of chances.   Life must, perhaps, have
some illusions, but among them this choice cannot be, for
a sham-home is no illusion, but the most sad and tremendous of realities. Let a true home, alike in its foundation
and superstructure, make man strong, by giving true rest
and spring to his affections.
We  believe that society is sadly out of joint in this
matter of marriage, and that the follies of women in respect to it, are pretty nearly equal to the vices of men.
As long as our daughters are brought up to such languid
health and inordinate expectations, such impersonations of
exaction without equivalent usefulness, we must expect
marriages to become less in proportionate number, and
congeniality of age. The majority of young men will be
unable to marry to their mind, and the nuisances of hotel
and boarding-house life will be continued, with its attendant discomforts and vices. A race of sensible, hearty,
practical young women, can correct the evil, and estab
lish a new era of genuine homes. Many a good fellow
who now pines in the attic of a seven-story hotel, or in the
closet of some monster boarding-house, would rejoice in
the good time coming, and make a true man of himself, in
finding a true wife and a true home.
This is God's own school of energy, and it is so effi
143 
144      MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
eient, that its weakest inmate wields a world of power, and
as a man takes his own child into his arms, and feels the
soft touch of that infant cheek, he is ten times the braver
for his toil and endurance, than when he had only himself
to care for. Wise, indeed, is he who works the power of
such great affections into the leading purposes of life, and
within all his business and his ambition cherishes the motive force of an earnest heart, loyal to the great objects
for which life is providentially ordained.
It is said that one of the followers of Bruce, after
that patriot king's death, had his heart embalmed in a golden casket, and carried by the standard-bearer &lways in
the thickest of the battle. When the conflict was most
desperate, the standard-bearer was ordered to throw the
casket into the very midst of the hostile ranks, and the
Scotch soldiery were called to the rescue of the heart of
their great king from hostile hands. Their charge was
then invincible. Every true life wields a still greater
power, for it feels a living heart drawing it with irresistible force into every position of duty, and is strong for its
work by the might of its affections.
This cannot be, man cannot be truly strong in his affections, or in his work, unless he is strong in his faith
for faith deals with the only ultimate and enduring facts
and gives the foothold that lasts when others fail. Manhood's contact with reality may be a sore trial to faith,
and the world asks us to surrender all higher allegiance to
its own claims, and sacrifice our faith to its sight. Many 
MANHOOD  AND ITS BUSINESS.
seem to do this, but the truly strong, instead of doing
this, do the very contrary, and instead of allowing the
world to subdue their faith, they make their faith subdue
the world. Above all local and temporal interests, they
place the divine Government and Providence.    They
never allow labor or anxiety to crowd out the thought that
God is, that he is love, and the soul is dark and dead when
false to his spirit, and away from his presence. Let us not
regard this position as an ascetic or Quixotic one. Nay, it
is the most practical course that can be taken, resting upon
the fact of all facts, and looking to the good of all goods.
Does the world press upon you with its hard realities?
then be all the more earnest to make religion a reality, and
the first of realities. How sad it is to see a harsh and
chilling materialism closing in all round us, and the spiritual faith and generous hope of our childhood and youth,
all shut out. Let it not be so. Keep a place for faith in
the central plan of life, and show the perfection of your
business efficiency, by making a serious business of religion.  In your own soul, say humbly yet confidently:"Indeed I must strive and scheme in this hard and aggressive world; but it is not my master, not my God. I will
labor for objects which Providence itself has made sacred,
and by principles which justice, honor, nay, humanity and
faith, do not forbid. Day by day, I will turn myself towards the Eternal Father, who ordained all toil, and even
in the hard pressure of competition, I will not forget Him
who promised mercy to the merciful." This spirit has
been shown in a true manhood, and faith has then gained,
7
145, 
146       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
instead of losing power, by wrestling manfully with the
cares and temptations of the world. The first spontaneous
trust of childhood, confirmed by the fervor of youthful
feeling, has consolidated itself by the strength of manhood,
and so the character becomes trusting as it becomes resolute, mingling the two elements into the heroism that
makes the true man.
We make a sad mistake, if we do not learn in season
to rest life upon a basis of devout trust, as well as of resolute labor. God has given the soul, as well as the body,
two feet for the walks of her pilgrimage, and true progress
is made as they duly interchange their work and their rest
together. We cannot know our own being, or God's love,
until we use well these gifts, and by mutual faith and action, with cheerful and alternate step press on to the work
of our divine calling. The world may say that pleasure is
the cure for care, and that self-indulgence refreshes the
fatigue of self-exertion. God knows us better, and whilst
not frowning upon any innocent joy, he holds the cup of
refreshing to every act of true service, as he interchanges
the grace of devout faith with the striving of loyal labor.
The pilgrim under his guidance, goes indeed from grace to
-race, and from strength to strength.
More of this union, instead of less, we should see, as
faith is more rationally settled, and life is more generously
and substantially built upon it. As a matter of culture,
merely, faith should go with enterprise in maturing the
true character. Strength is hard, dry, and brittle, unless
it is rooted and grounded in love, and stretches upward in 
MANHOOD  AND  ITS BUSINESS.
faith. Apart from such nurture, strength loses its best
vitality, and does not draw to itself the living waters, the
genial dew and sunshine needed for its higher life. We
must trust in something above ourselves, if we would be
strong, and the stoutest forces of the soul, as of the body,
come from the mildest influences. H-eroism springs from
filial faith and affections, even as bone and sinew are formed from warm blood in the arteries. The manhood of our
time needs this influence, for it too often mistakes hardness for strength, and self-sufficieincy for dignity- sets up
its own right arm as the great reliance, and makes of the
world its God. Sad the result, even when the most splendid success is granted; sad is the life that gains the world
and loses the soul, that puts the golden cup to the lip,
and finds no living water there. Sad indeed, when reverses
come, and the poor man, bereft of his idols, cries, like
Micah:  "Ye have taken away my gods, which I made,
and what have I more."
Then keep a place for faith, in the midst of worldly
cares, and make it clear to yourself, and to those around
you, that you do recognize a power and a good above this
world. Form your plans upon this basis, order your busi.
ness and your home upon this idea. Take your place in
the Christian Church according to your own honest convictions, and with a stout hand help bear the ark of a generous and holy faith along your pilgrimage. You will give
religion itself, a more cheerful and vigorous expression,
and your own deepened peace and power, will more than return the blessing you give. Faith shall bear her witness of
147 
148       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
things unseen, in the midst of your turmoil and temptation. When in the fever of hot strifes and competitions,
she will point out to you the only steadfast good. When
weary with toil and care, you go to your pillow, and the
din of the world still rings into your ear, and your brain
itself is crowded with eager anxieties, as your busy streets
are crowded with people, and sleep refuses to refresh you,
then faith will come to you, and put under your head the
pillow of heavenly mercy, and smooth your furrowed brow
with her gentle hand, and lull you to rest with peaceful
visions of the Father in heaven, and the Saviour whom he
sent to call you to himself. Your childhood and youth
shall be more than a bright 7"eon; they will live and beat
anew in the heart of a manly faith and affection. 
Co~t   an   ~niictits. 
PASTOR ANIMARU.
Orme, wandering sheep, 0 come I
I'll bind thee to mny treasl,
Il' bear thee to thy homie,
Ind lay thee down to rest.
1 saaw thee stray forlorn,
And heard thee faintly cry,
And on the tree of scorn
For thee I deigned to die  What greater proof could I
Give, than to seek the tomb?
Come, wandering sheep, 0 come!
FROM THFP SPAxts. 
LOSSES AND ANXIETIES.
MANHOOD must needs have its anxious times, and there
is no man of mature years who cannot remember some
emergencies that have driven him almost mad with anxiety. Such seasons stamp themselves upon his memory, and
not seldom come back to him in all their original vividness
in his dreams. I propose to treat of this experience of our
life in the present paper.
In simple language, taken directly from the common
business of a rural people, our Saviour, in the parable of
the Lost Sheep, illustrates one of the great facts in life,
and its effect upon man. The fact is the existence of risks,
and the effect is anxiety. We cannot but feel anxious at
the prospect of losing any thing precious to our interests
or affections, and no small portion of our time and thought
is occupied with such anxiety. The habits of society have
signally changed, since the words of the parable were
spoken, and few persons live so simply that their fortunes 
152       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
depend upon the safety of a single flock, or the care of a
few pieces of silver. Yet amid the complex affairs in
which men are now engaged, the laws of life remain essentially the same. Risks surely have not ceased, nor has
anxiety abated. It is important that a topic so much discussed in the street and felt in the house, should have'its
place with the moralist, and be considered from a Christian
point of view. Many a furrowed face and troubled heart
prove the need of such consideration.   Many a wasted life
and ruined name bear witness to the danger of false risks
and morbid anxiety.
Remark first of all the fact, that there must, of necessity, be a large element of risk in the lot of men. By our
nature and position we are obliged to form most of our
plans, and do most of our work subject to contingencies
upon which we cannot calculate with positive certainty.
There are truths which are so certain as to admit of no
rational question; and on the other hand, there are notions
so false or so absurd, as to rank at once among impossibilities. But the practical affairs of men belong mostly to
neither of these extremes, but to the broad region of probabilities between absolute certainty and absolute impossibility. There we make our calculations and conduct our
enterprises, studying probabilities as wisely as we can, and
hoping by a due balance of contingencies to secure a fair
return.
Yet what practical man does not every day make some
allowance for risks from casual circumstance, knowing that 
LOSSES AND ANXIETIES.
he is not wise enough to foresee all that will happen tc
him, nor strong enough to carry to the end every thing
that he has begun precisely according to his plans. The
whole domain in which we live is full of contingencies.
Nature-man-the times, are to our limited vision full of
uncertainties. Who can tell what a single day may bring
forth? Every day we watch the sky, and read the signs
of health and prosperity, or the reverse in its changes.
Many a life and many a fortune depends upon heat or cold,
storm or calm. If the face of nature to us is so fitful, who
shall estimate the fickleness of man, or calculate with entire accuracy his opinions, passions, vices, virtues? Society, business, religion, are constantly exhibiting unexpected developments of character, and nothing but a supernatural gift of discerning of spirits can prevent constant risks from this source of contingency. When we
consider the complex tide of affairs which are called the
times, whether political, commercial, or moral, who can
presume to calculate with certainty its changes? Who
does not feel that we are always afloat upon a changing
sea, and good or ill is constantly appearing from unexpected quarters? Let any man judge by his own experience; consider how much his own mind and fortune have
been effected by contingencies, and how much he is now
engrossed by the risks of his position; and we all see at
once how large is the casual element in human affairs.
The question comes to us, what shall we do in this
state of things, or what is the proper conduct for mein as
7*
153 
154      MLLE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
subject to contingencies. It is very obvious that God has
placed us where we are, and it is in vain to ask to have
the laws of existence repealed to suit our wishes. To be
free from risks, we must ask to be all wise and almighty,
or else to be reduced to utter nothingness, alike unable to
gain or lose, to enjoy or suffer. Some men there are, who
seem to aspire to these conditions, and to escape from the
common lot on the one hand by rash adventure, and on the
other hand by cowardly shrinking. Some men dare risks
as if they could never lose; others shun them as if they
could never gain; as if the shepherd should leave his sheep
in the fields or mountains, confident that none of them can
possibly be lost; or, on the other hand, fretted by losses,
should say, " I will keep no sheep at all; I will give up
my flocks, and so be rid of this annoying anxiety.
The two classes of men may be seen in every community and profession, the rash and the timid, the fast and the
slow. At different stages of life, the same man may illustrate both dispositions, and he who at twenty-five was a
dashing schemer, at fifty may settle down into a pattern
of timid prudence. Both classes are in error, and false to
the true law of life. He who encounters risks as if he
could not lose, intent only on the prizes of fortune, spoils
his mind, and is likely to ruin his position: spoils his
mind by blinding his eyes and fevering his heart with the
gambler's madness; and is likely to ruin his position by
bringing down upon him some of those contingencies which
he overlooks, and which sooner or later end every game.
ster's career. He, on the other hand, who will have noth 
LOSSES AND ANXIETIES.
ing at all to do with the risks of life in fear of loss, must
ask to give up life itself; for life cannot be held without
constant risks.  It is obvious that he cannot enter into any
business-cannot do any work for the body or the soul; for
what is there that a man can undertake without exposing
himself to more or less disappointment? To shun risk is
plainly impossible, and many who seek to do it only mul tiply the evils which they would avoid.  He who says, "I
will keep no sheep, for I may lose some of them," loses the
pleasure and profit of his flock, and is very sure of finding
or borrowing some trouble far greater than anxious and
kindly search for the lost one.
The sluggard who does nothing, because he is afraid of
doing wrong,-the gambler who discourages every enterprise, because men are fallible,-the egotist, who thinks to
be secure by being wrapped up in himself, afraid of the
world, and shy even of family and friends-these classes
of men show no enviable exemption from the risks of life.
Assured of drawing none of the prizes in what they call
the lottery of life, they are very likely to prove that a man
may have a sad blank without drawing at all; nay, that he
must have a blank in himself and his whole being, if he
does not commit himself to the proper labors, sympathies
and enterprise of his lot. He who hid his talent in a nap.
kin was of this class, forgetting that somebody might steal
it even there-forgetting that every talent not used is virtually lost, and he always multiplies dangers who will
brave none.
155 
MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
We most certainly believe that there is some providential adaptation between the powers of man and his position. Not content with tracing out the fitness -between the
eye and the light-the ear and sound-the elastic motion
of the body, and the element upon which it moves-we may
reasonably look for some harmony between our intellectual
and moral faculties, and the contingencies amid which we
live. Every being under the providence of God is adapted
to its peculiar element; and the light of nature and revelation teaches us to regard man as amply endowed for his
larger sphere of exposures.   In this light we would interpret the risks of our lot, and the anxiety which they produce.   Such interpretation will show that the very lot
which fevers so many into madness, and frightens so many
into sluggishness, is intended to be the school of a benignant discipline, the means of calling out our best powers,
and securing the deepest peace.
What so well trains the judgment, and schools the
affections, and stirs the energies, as a due sense of the exposures amidst which we live? The leading faculty of
mind needed for practical life is sound judgment. God
has placed us in circumstances that imperiously demand
the discipline of this faculty. The world is indeed full of
good books that move thought, and of fair scenes that move
the fancy. But more powerful than these is the appeal of
life in its constant exposures-its never-ceasing hopes and
fears. It says to us all, " Your lot is cast upon an eventful tide; study its movings for yourselves; see if there is
156 
LOSSES AND ANXIETIES.
not some law to its changings; look for some rule of probabilities that shall on the whole be a safe guide through
contingencies." Let a man follow this appeal, and he will
not only keep his eyes open to the fair prospects of success
or warnings of danger, but, in view of his own talents, disposition, and opportunities, he will form some method of
action, which shall embody and carry out his principles
into an habitual policy, and which shall save him from being for ever at the mercy of accidents. By a sound judgment he will regulate the risks of his lot; and, like a good
pilot, if he cannot control winds and waves, he will have a
ready way of meeting them and using them. HIe will keep
out of many hazards into which others recklessly run, and
will face many dangers at which others stand aghast. iHe
will guide his affairs with a careful wisdom, that shall save
him from extreme courses. Hie will, as far as he may,
choose the sphere of action in which contingencies and certainties are so mingled as best to stir enterprise and promise returns-always insisting upon certainty enough to
warrant the attempt-always expecting some contingencies
to stand in the path of success. To find this sphere is the
part of practical wisdom, whatever the business or profession. The practical merchant is he who thus wisely interprets the laws of risk in business;-the practical Christian,
whatever his calling, is he who is willing to see life as it
is, and never be weary in well-doing, whilst trying to apply
Christian truth and love to the various circumstances and
wants of souls,-neither a desponding drone, nor a flighty
dreamer, but modestly sure of some fair success in his
157 
158       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
application of Christianity in view of the probabilities of
life.
Thus a sound judgment regulates risks, not merely by
meeting those that come, but by fixing the true method of
planning and of living. It will teach the shepherd how to
keep his sheep, as well as how to seek the one who has
strayed from the flock. It will powerfully affect the fact
of risks, and always the feeling which they produce. Anxiety depends in a great measure upon our habits of thought
or attention. He who thinks wisely of the exposures of
his position, and trains himself always to see the main
point at stake, will be rid at once of a legion of borrowed
fears, and will accept a just anxiety as a benignant warning of danger and stimulus to effort; just as we are to
regard the pain of a wound or disease, as proof that the
sentinels are true to their post, and the nerves, vigilant
watchers, cry "Qui vive" to the intruder, and warn the
lord in the citadel that peril is near. What a vast amount
of morbid anxiety would be cured at once by sounder habits of thought. How many hearts and homes, instead of
being filled with sighs and groans, at what cannot be
helped, and had better be left alone, would be scenes of
cheerful content under essential humiliation, and cheerful
activity under encouraging duties.
Add to sound judgment fortitude, and we are still
nearer the true solution of the risks of life: fortitude, when
in rest, patient; when in action, courageous; bearing well
what must be borne, daring well what must be done. No 
LOSSES AND ANXIETIES.
life is so quiet as to be able to dispense with this old car
dinal virtue.   Its patience we need under a thousand
annoyances that can be helped only by being borne;-its
courage we need under countless trials that will conquer
us unless we conquer them. Who will repine that Providence aims to temper us in each trial by so various experiences? One of our wise and good men has said, that a
man ought to be mortified once a fortnight to keep him
properly down; and we need quote no authority to prove
the need of a constant discipline to call out our courage
and fit us for emergencies.
To judgment and fortitude, add persevering fidelity,
or constancy, to our great life-work, and, so far as this
earth can solve it, the problem of contingencies is solved,
and man is wiser, and better, and stronger for the risks to
which he is exposed. Always at work at his post, judiciously, patiently, courageously, he will not be put down
by every casual disappointment. He will learn something
from every contingency, and win something from every
loss. Never rash, never cowardly, he will learn prudence
from other men's folly, and enterprise from other men's
timidity. Many opportunities in which he trusted may
and will disappoint him, but in his case the old proverb
will prove true, and one door will not be shut unless another door opens. He must expect to be exposed to haz.
ards, and to feel anxiety whilst life lasts; but hazards will
more and more reveal an eternal trust beneath them all
159 
160       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
and his anxiety will be a healthy vigilance instead of a
restless fever.
Has not God been teaching us this doctrine all our
lives by all our experience, reading, and observationteaching us the need of judgment, fortitude, labor, from true
power and peace? We want all the discipline that we
have, and all we can get, alike for ourselves and for those
whom we guide. Well may we be anxious for those whom
we guide. Is our anxiety wise? Something of it undoubtedly is not well placed, and often in our laudable
desire to provide well for children, we pamper wants that
are misfortunes, and many a lamb is lost by being unwisely petted. The great point of anxiety should be that life
may be true, and the mind may be best prepared for its
duties. More of this anxiety would abate the fever of
gain, and give motives strong against loss. The child in
danger is always, on that account, the most cherished, and
the little invalid is the centre of all thoughts. The whole
family watch the sufferer's pulse and breath; and the
hardy man, as he comes from his day's toil, weeps for joy,
when he finds his boy or girl smiling upon him, and for
the first time after sickness, taking gifts playfully from his
hand Blessed anxiety-more blessed when it is concerned for the entire well-being of the child, and forgets
not that there is a loss worse than sickness and death!
Let us accept the risks of our lot, and not shrink from
its true anxiety. Let God be the interpreter of the one
and the comforter of the other. A faithful self-examina 
LOSSES AND ANXIETIES.
tion in these respects will give ground for very pungent
thoughts. The main risk is in not meeting the main duty
of our being; and the chief anxiety should be, lest we are
false to our post, under the kingdom of God. A true solicitude for ourselves is the best guide to true regard for
others; and as a man is a lover of the true fold, he will
be anxious to win others to its peace. So the whole topic
of social responsibility opens. Who shall comprehend-or
who deny it. Every day we own it, as we think of peril
or loss to others. We think less of the ninety and nine
fleets upon the ocean, than of the one lost navigator so
nobly sought for in the frozen ocean-less of the thousand
ships, those white-fleeced flocks of a commercial people,
that are safe on their course, than the one missing vessel
so eagerly waited for now. This is well, and such solicitude is not selfish, and we are ready to make sacrifices
for it, if necessary. But for society all around us-for
our nation-for the world-for ourselves, there are worse
exposures than these. Remember Him who came to save
the lost. Remember Him to learn compassion to the erring. Remember Him to know that from all things mutable and contingent, a true life e4uces good eternal.   He
who came to be to us the Resuirection and the Life, came
also to be the Good Shepherd of souls.
16i  
CA
tn
4 " 
Rest is not quitting
The busy career
Rest is the fitting
Of self to its sphere.
'Tis the brook's motion
Clear without strife,
Fleeing to ocean
After its life.
'Tis loving sad ierving
The Highest, and Best!
'Tis onwards I unswerving,
And that is trye rem
GOETHEL
I love my God, but with no love of mine,
For I have none to give;
I love thee, Lord; but all the love is thine,
For by thy life, I live.
I am as nothing, and rejoice to be
Emptied and lost and swallowed up in thee.
MADAME GuYON. 
THE TRUE REST.
AFTER anxiety, we yearn for a season of peace, and glad.
ly we turn from the wilderness of danger, to the shrine of
true rest, with thanks to God that so many such shrines
have stood along our pathway, and that we may, if we will,
bear one with us in the ark of our Exodus.
We are a restless and egotistical people, impatient of
delay, and quite prone to glorify our own will, as if nothing
could be impossible to a force that has already done so
much. Perhaps it is precisely for this cause, that the
words of great devotees sometimes have for us such soothing power, and, weary of all this proud trust in ourselves
we sigh for a rest better than the world and our own
strength can give, and say from our own hearts in response
to the great devotee's psalm:  "My soul, wait thou only
upon God; for my expectation is from him."
We consider now somewhat particularly the subject of
mental quietude, as a practical blessing and power. We 
166       MIiLE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
may have time to speak somewhat of its nature, its influ
ence, and its direct claims upon our attention.
Christian Quietude - the word recalls at once, to a
scholar's mind, the noted controversies, in former times,
between rival schools of theologians, who made the term
Quietism, itself, the rallying cry of the most impassioned
strifes. We will not try to revive that question, or show how
Bossuet and Fenelon, with their illustrious followers, differed
as to the precise degree of efficacy belonging respectively
to the active and the passive states of the soul. The heart
is essentially the same in all ages, and we may as well interpret it through our own experience, as by borrowing the
costume of a former age. There is a yearning for rest
within us, that often seizes us in the midst of our most engrossing cares, and when our busy men say, as they often
do, that they are looking to some calm rural home as a
final retreat from care, they express a want which no
change of abode can satisfy, and which cannot be fully
satisfied, until the sonl finds her rest in a peace not of this
world.
What is Christian quietude? It is not a mere negation, surely? a mere cessation of care and effort? for this
is indolence- one of the tempers most foreign from the
Christian mind. The Psalmist speaks as if there were
need, not of less, but of more earnestness, when he calls
the noblest and deepest power of his being, his soul, to
wait upon the Lord. The soul, that power which is in us,
but which we little comprehend, and too little use, is thus 
THE TRUE REST.
summoned to her high office, as servitor before the throne
of God, as if there were a blessing which she only can
win, and her service were none the less earnest, because
with bowed head, and veiled face, she waits the will of her
Lord.
Such waiting is at once a check upon egotism and upon
impatience, by showing that our will is not supreme, and
even when suppliant before the supreme throne, it must be
content to wait its appointed time. What rebuke there is
in the language of true devotion, upon our too habitual
egotism. We are apt to begin life, and allow our children
to begin it, as if self were the centre and sovereign of the
universe, and we had a right to complain, if we are disappointed by not having our own way.   The better wisdom
bids us take at once the waiting attitude, as if it were,
from the beginning, a matter of course that our will is
secondary, and God's will is to be awaited. Taking this
ground, the soul has the quietude of reverence, and her fit
ful fever is soothed by obedience to the eternal law, and
trust in the infinite love.
So rebuking the spirit of egotism, the true quietude
also rebukes the spirit of impatience. It bids man bide
his time, as a creature in whose discipline delay is an essential element, and for whom God has decreed that the
harvest of success shall not come at once with the blossom
of desire. More than any other being, man must wait for
what he wishes, for while the insect of a day tastes all the
bliss of its little life whilst one sun is shining, man is
doomed, as well as blessed, to an infinite domain, and what
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168      MILE STONBS IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
ever his successes, his three-score and ten years find him
waiting still for a good inexhaustible.   Does his ambition take merely a horizontal range, and measure success
by the surface of lands or goods possessed, he must wait
on time to enlarge the quantity of his possessions, for time
is the great power in the market-place, and they are the
wisest in their own generation, who await its developments
most judiciously. Has he the nobler desire which measures success, not by quantity, but by quality, and yearns
for a higher and deeper mental and moral life, still he must
wait, for wisdom comes not in a day, nor does the peace of
God, without alloy or misgiving, reward a single work or
prayer. This willingness to wait upon God's own time for
the desirable measure of worldly success, and especially
for -growth in the moral and spiritual life, is a great source
of quietude.
Such, in brief, is the nature of Christian quietudenot indolent, but calling the soul to an earnest service, and
subduing egotism into reverence, and soothing impatience
into calm waiting.
Mark now the practical power of this frame of mind,
and we shall see that it is needed quite as much in our own
every-day life, as in any devotee's seclusion-that, in fact,
it is more imperatively necessary for a busy man, likely to
fail of its control, than for a recluse, so ready to sink into
its stillness.
What power there is in the very act of waiting, or in
the patient mind-power in controlling the faculties them 
THE TRUE REST.
selves, and in securing external results. When impatient,
we are not our own master, and in our very eagerness for pow er, we fret away the most efficient of all forces. Note the
effect of a single fit of impatience upon the thoughts, when
at some unexpected delay, or brief disappointment, we
worry ourselves into a temporary fever, and for the time
are beside ourselves. Carry out the same infirmity into
the temper of a life, and how its health is broken, and its
force languishes. For some spasmodic effort, there may
be a convulsive struggle, that looks like energy without
limit, but the result soon shows that the force is evanes cent as convulsive, and it is not thus that the great work
of our being is to be done. Nor is it thus that the best
external results are to be secured.  Our field of action is
broad and long, and unless we can wait for some fruits to
ripen, and the true hour to mature, we can neither have
our best resources nor do our best work. As a dweller in
time, man is called to be a patient waiter, and so his quietude is a power of mind and of achievement.
Not merely in waiting, but in waiting upon God, there
is power. The temper which subdues the petty pride of
egotism, fixes surely the lowly strength of faith, which is
mighty in the measure of its confidence, and says, " because I am weak I am strong, and my strength is perfected in weakness." We feel its force whether we contemplate God as a sovereign ruling by laws, or as a spirit asking our love and offering us his own. Are there laws over
nature and over life, laws over the earth and over the
body, laws over the unseen spheres and over our souls,
169
8 
i 70      MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
how can we hope to win true power over the realms without us, or the kingdom within us, except by learning these
laws, and waiting for their forces to guide and crown our
work? In every step we wait the aid of the gravitation
that holds the globe together, and in every book that we
read, we wait on the laws of vision and memory to guide
us to knowledge. The highest of all laws is the law of
the spirit of life, which presents God to us as the infinite
and eternal Mind calling us to personal communion with
himself. How know God at all thus, and secure aught
of the power that comes from such knowledge, except by
waiting reverently upon his will? It is high; we cannot
attain unto it, any more than scale the skies, or bring
down the drops that sparkle in the rainbow, or catch the
sun's glory in the clouds. Wait, reverently wait, and the
heavenly grace will come to you. Your sharp, critical
understanding, your self-sufficient will, your impulsive
passions will not lift you to the mercy-seat, nor bring the
heavenly mercy down. Wait with all the faculties of oui
being, reverent and recipient, and God will not leave u;
without a witness of himself.   When  we are hardest
at work, let the will be still waiting for a power beyond
its own; when we are studying or meditating, let though
crave a wisdom higher than itself; when our affections ar
earnest, and those dearest to us move our hearts most tenderly, let human love wait upon the love that is divine,
and so fill its vase of alabaster with a divine sweetness,
that shall shed fragrance through all the house. Let
work, and thought, and love, all thus breathe the spirit of 
THE TRUE REST.
prayer, and the prayer which they favor shall return the
favor with' large increase, and hours of devotion shall be
rich in influences over all the life. So my soul wait thou
upon God, and let thy expectation be from him.
Shall not the crowning blessing be a growing consciousness of communion with God, through the opening
of all the faculties into the divine kingdom, and the union
of our life-plan with the method of his Providence? Do
all that we can to discipline our minds wisely and arrange
our affairs efficiently, we need after our method has been
well fixed, to pervade the whole with a devout seeking
spirit, just as if the whole were but the path in which we
look for God's blessing to come, the Jacob's ladder on
which good angels come and go. H[ow far a perfect plan
of life would bring a man's soul into direct communion
with God, bringing to his mind a heavenly wisdom, to his
affections a holy joy, and even transfiguring his body and
his senses by a divine light and health, we will not presume to say. But this we know that the best work and
the best lives that the earth has seen, give us cheering
glimpses of such communion, and prove that in his highest
energy, man appears more as the recipient of a grace from
on high, than as his own master and the sole arbiter of
his own mind and deed. Even the most vulgar form of
heroism, that of the battle field, proves that we need to
be possessed by something beyond ourself to put forth
our best energies; and the soldier, as he goes into the
fight, on fire with the martial enthusiasm, inspired by waving banners, and sounding trumpets, and beating drums,
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172      MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
gives some illustration of tnb higher and calmer enthusi
asm of the true soldier of the cross, who fights'to the last
the good fight of faith, looking to a cloud of heavenly
witnesses, and moved by the living witness within his own
heart. The orator never speaks well until he is possessed
by his subject, and his very tones show that the truth by
which he would master the audience, has first mastered
him. When earnestly pleading a worthy cause, what mau
jestic repose sometimes comes over him, as if he less
poured forth the volume of words, than were borne along
upon its swelling tide; and some aged patriot's face which
when unmoved seemed rough, and furrowed, and dim, is
all lighted up with meaning, as when the seamed and pebbly bed of a river is flooded by the rising waters, and the
dark earth itself appears to flash into crystalline light. A
true life is of itself the most sacred of words, and he
who speaks it in deeds must needs be possessed by what
he utters, and wait reverently on God for the spirit of
truth. Hence the truest men, whether their sphere has
been conspicuous or obscure, have always had a large
leaven of quietude in their composition, and have trusted
most even when they have dared the most. The most finished culture herein meets the most unsophisticated piety,
and the illustrious Fenelon, the very paragon of refinement and taste, consecrating an intellect of Grecian beauty by a faith of Christian tenderness, at once poet, statesman, moralist, theologian, orator, spoke of the light of
God within the soul, very much like George Fox, the
English farmer; and the Archbishop of Cambray, in his 
THE TRUE REST.
purple, reasoned of holy quietude very much like the grazier of Leicestershire, in his suit of leather. The reason
is obvious, for all who would find God's kingdom, must be
like little children, and whatever their gifts, they must be
willing for the crowning blessing to wait upon the Father
of light and love.
If these things are so, and Christian qietude thus
gives the strength of patience, the peace of faith, and the
joy of conscious communion with God, is it not w-I +t,
make more account of it in our plans of discipline and
life?  Say for ourselves" 0 my soul, wait thou only upon
God, for my expectation is from him."
Let us be careful to silence all repining, to put down
the fret and worry of mind that so often disturb our peace,
and let us turn the soul thus freed from annoyance, in
calm and earnest waiting upon the blessing of God. Even
when we are sorely beset, even so perplexed with cares as
hardly to know which way to turn, then still all complaining, and in the clear exercise of our reason wait serenely
upon God to give us the light we need.  He will not desert us, for he will not forsake the lowly, and to the upright light shall arise in the midst of darkness.
Let our general method of living partake of the same
disposition, and aim to unite quietude with efficiency in
every sphere. Let the household prove the worth of its
union, and the ornament of a meek and quiet spirit crown
its economy, and soothe its trials, and dignify its cares.
Let children learn to be still in due season, and let pa
173 
174       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
rents be their worthy teachers, by subduing their own
temper, as well as dealing in just precepts of obedience.
Then the house shall be quiet without being dull, and a
peace not of this world shall calm its labors, and deepen
its affections, and interpret its destiny. Let the place of
business, as far as it can, be regulated on the same princi ples, in a true order, at once noiseless and efficient, like
the mechanism that works all the better for the oil that
stops its creaking. A man is surely more fitted for a post
of great care by the most peaceful and self-controlled
temper, and by it he saves a world of needless excitement,
and concentrates all his forces upon his work in due me thod. Nothing is gained by fretting and scolding in the
house-nothing is gained by cursing and swearing under
the irritations of business. In both spheres the true man
or the true woman will yearn for a Christian quietude, and
say-" O my soul, wait thou only upon the Lord, for my
expectation is from him." Well indeed is it in the midst
of our cares, to wait upon him who holds all things under
his care, and whose spirit is peace ineffable, keeping the
worlds in motion without haste and without jar.
Week by week God's own voice calls us to our rest
~rom his church on our way.  Should we not insist espe cially upon the need of quiet waiting upon God, when we
enter his sanctuary for meditation and prayer? We go to
church to listen to accustomed words from human lips in deed, but these words are naught to us, unless we interprec them reverently, and make them means of self-examination and worship. Common-place as this remark may 
THE TRUE REST.
be, how sadly we slight its truth, and rob the sanctuary of
its due honor, by degrading it into a theatre of flippant
criticism, or a resort of indolent formalism. Some of us
probably are not only indifferent to the true spirit of wor ship for ourselves, but are willing to intrude upon the just
privileges of others, by disturbing the just quiet of the
place after worship has commenced. We surely call it a
mark of bad breeding to go to a dinner party some time
after the appointed hour, and disturb the guests seated in
their places, by the necessity of finding accommodations
for us. Is it any less a discourtesy to come late to church,
and interrupt the order of service, by the noise of Our
feet, and the bustle of our movements? Nay, is it not
adding irreverence to discourtesy, and breaking in upon
the due quietude of the sanctuary, by negligence or indolence? We ought to think of this seriously, and if each
of us will look to our own ways properly, a great annoyance will cease, and new incentives to peaceful devotion
will here be given. In the sanctuary let us be willing to
bring our common remembrances, and needs, and aspirations, and differ as we may in our experience, let us wait
on God for the blessing that we all alike do need-more
of his light and peace, for more of the wisdom that can
guide us through this perplexing world-more of the faith
that can keep us true to heaven, in spite of all enticing
pleasures and perplexing cares. The best mark of a
Christian congregation is a certain serene earnestness, a
certain aspect of the ministrations and the demeanor,
which says beyond mistaking, that they who come together
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176       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
thus, seek a blessing above themselves or any human pow.
er, and while they accept all available privileges of man's
devising, they look beyond them to the giver of all good
the Father of Spirits, for grace and peace. More of this
spirit let us cherish, and new power as well as comfort
will come from its holy quietude. An attraction deeper
and stronger than we can well explain, will draw us to the
house of prayer, and a still small voice will speak to us
more nearly and benignly, as the years go on, and never
desert us, though the earth quakes and the thunder rolls.
With sacred constancy as the Sabbaths advance, let us
reverently meditate upon the changes of human life, which
must come even without our bidding, and which are well
met only when calmly awaited. The greatest of these
changes is of God's appointing, and if we wait on him
truly here, we can without fear resign ourselves to his holy
will. Then, my soul, wait thou upon God, for in life and
death, and worlds to come, my expectation is from him.
In drawing nearer him thou shalt better know thyself, and
find thine own true life in finding his presence.
Sitting thus devoutly at the foot of the cross, in the
holy quietude of the sanctuary, we bear the blessing with
us in our journey, and each bird of passage that we meet
will tell us of the ark of rest, as well as of the wilds of
our wandering. 
'Xl 
"My Crown is in my Heart, not on my Head,
Not decked with diamonds and Indian stones,
Nor to be seen: my cr % a is called Content;
A Crown it is that seldom kings enjoy."
SHAKESPEARE.
"It is not perhaps  much  thouu,a  oi, bnt it  certainly a very important lesson, to learn how to enjoy ordinary life, and to be able to relish your being without the transport of some Passion, or gratification of some Appetite. For want
of this capacity, the world is filled with whetters, tipplers, cutters, sippers, and
all the numerous train of those who, for want of thinking, are forced to be ever
exercising their feeling or tasting."
STRELE 
MIDDLE-AGE.
MIDWAY upon our journey, at high noon we now stand,
with morning and evening looking at us from either
side, and tempering with their cheerful retrospect and
tranquil prospect the toil and heat of the day.   The
middle age of life is now our topic. It is a season too
little spoken of either by the moralist or the preacher,
each of whom apparently, in order to preserve the parallel
between life and the year, notes only four seasons, and
passes from childhood, youth, and manhood, at once to
treat of Age. Strange, indeed, that the time more marked
than any other by fulness of privilege and weight of duties
and not without the gravest of perils, too, should be com
paratively neglected; as if life, instead of being a continued and progressive history, were but an idle romance
whose interest ceases as soon as the hero is married and
established. After that, the burden and the heat of the
day are to come, for surely the fourth and fifth decades are 
MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
the very prime of our earthly being, and between thirty
and fifty, our best work is likely to be done or neglected.
If childhood is for unconscious development, and youth for
conscious preparation, and manhood for beginning the
world for oneself, middle-age or maturity is for preserving
fidelity, and it must test the sanguine plan by efficient performance. Putting on the armor is one thing, but wearing it well is another thing, and it is the noonday of life
that shows whether we wear it bravely or not. In view
of the great work thus to be done, how natural the prayer
of the Psalmist-" 0 my God, take me not away in the
midst of my days." The prayer has its deepest significance, when we implore God not only to take us not away
from life itself, but also to take us not away from the usefulness without which life is worse than death.
Let us then, with all earnestness, consider Middle
Age, its Experience, its true Temper, and just Progress.
Maturity is especially to be marked as the season of
experience, when the world must show most of its colors,
and we must look at them with an eye somewhat disenchanted of early illusions. Our doctrine on this point is
simply thus: "Let us win experience without paying the
sad price of worldliness, and let us learn to see things as
they are, that we may do our part the better among the
realities of our sphere."
The whole of life, indeed, is experience, and we are
always learning something from the cradle to the grave.
Yet that knowledge is more worthy of the name which
180 
MIDDLE-AGE.
comes when the passions have calmed their first fever,
when the reflective powers have been awakened, and the
main facts of the world have come upon us in all their
reality. How eventful even in the most ordinary lot must
this experience be! Not without many cheering lessons
'and privileges indeed, yet always in the case of generous
minds, with a large alloy of disappointment and chagrin!
So many large expectations baffled, so many promises falsified, so much empty profession, so much utter deceit, such
vice in the garb of refinement, such hypocrisy under the
cloak of religion-what man, who has reached the noontide of life, as he thinks of these things, does not smile
bitterly as he compares the reality with the ideal of his
early dreams? Our experience of ourselves, too, is not all
bright, for it shows us the difference between our aspirations and our deeds, and not unfrequently mocks very
noble plans by very poor achievements; nay, confounds
very generous sentiments by very feeble conduct.
All too ready we are to call such experience of itself
wisdom, instead of the stepping-stone of wisdom. Too
ready we are to glide into the ways of the world, and give
up what was best in our aspirations as the illusions of an
untutored fancy.  Hiere is one of the pressing dangers of
mature years-the danger of utter worldliness at the very
time when the world should be most effectually overcome.
How many yield to it, who of us will presume to say?
Mark the altered tone of the man of the world at forty, as
he makes light of what he calls his dreams at twenty.
Note the change in the very expression of his countenance
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182       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
so vacated of light from above, and shining only with
earthly prudence and desire. He may call his knowledge
wisdom, but Heaven calls it folly. What folly so great as
to doubt of virtue and to deny God, and treat life as a
monstrous lie from beginning to end, or a mean expedient
from first to last.
Far otherwise the true man uses the experience of mature years. The more he detects the world's cheats, the
more he seeks the reality which it vainly counterfeits.
The more he sees of heartlessness and deceit, the greater
is his respect for the rectitude and kindness which are
thrown by the contrast into such bold relief. The more
clearly the saddest realities of life dawn upon him, the
more determined is his purpose, and the more efficient his
measures to guard against them, just as the brave pilot
watches tide and wind, not to yield his vessel to them, but
to guide it safely upon his own chosen course. Blessed is
experience when so used! when the knowledge of vice and
misery gives strength to conscience and tenderness to compassion, when acquaintance with the mighty energies enlisted in the world's cunning crafts lends enterprise and
vigor to virtue,-when smooth-faced worldliness in its best
success wakens the sense of a welfare beyond its gift.
Blessed this experience more than all, when God's own
hand is seen in the affairs of men, when his own grace is
felt in the heart, and the fatal taste of the tree of know ledge is cured by the immortal fruit of the tree of life.
Such experience makes one a man of God, not a man of
the world.  Sad is the noon of life without its coming 
MTDDLE-AGE.
happy, happier far even than the rosy morning, when noon
is cheered by such trust, and the heart of faith beats
more firmly than ever beneath all the realities of the
world.
Such experience cannot but act upon the temper, and
we now speak of the temper most congenial with middle
age. When in the midst of life, so balanced between extremes, a certain equilibrium of character would seem appropriate.   By his providential discipline, God calls us
then peculiarly to an evenness of temper without monotony, or in other words, to equanimity without indifference.
In early life, something of impulsiveness and mutability
may be expected, and the first enterprise and struggle of a
noble manhood cannot reasonably be expected without
some alternate chills and fevers of the blood. But in the
midst of our days, God's providence calls us to a more
equable frame of mind. He seeks to temper our wills to
a just medium by experience of success and disappointment, as the smith tempers iron by fire and water. He
educates the judgment to some due sense of the average
aspect of things, so that we are not to be cast down by a
reverse, as if a passing cloud were a permanent eclipse, or
made giddy by some new pleasure, as if a gleam of sun shine were promise that darkness should be no more. He
interprets to us the varied play of our own emotions, our
glees and glooms, our elasticity and oppression, and so
touches the many tones of this harp of a thousand strings
that we may know pretty well its compass, and the tune
isa 
184       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
and time of its notes. All this discipline should give us
Christian equanimity, and keep us far from worldly indifference.
Mark  the distinction between Christian equanimity
and worldly indifference. The man of the world, nay, the
positively unprincipled man, may win by experience a certain composure, and may look on the chances of life as
calmly as the practical gamester watches the play of cards
or dice. He may cater to his vilest passions on system,
and follow the basest lusts with a deliberate method. Fearful, indeed, are the vices of mature years in their very deliberation. A profligate of forty or fifty is a far more
wretched and contemptible creature than a wild scapegrace of twenty, since he has used the very experience and
discipline which should bring wisdom and sobriety, to minister to folly and shame. With all his keenness and composure, he will not escape retribution. He is playing with
an awful power that is serious when it seems to jest, and
he who makes of himself a whited sepulchre, cannot stop
the work of moral corruption and death, by the fair outside. When his course is smoothest, it may, like the river
on the very verge of the cataract, be nearest the fall.
Surely he who reasons most keenly on false premises, must
one day come to the end of his reckoning, and figure himself out a deliberate lie and sin. The composure of deliberate vice is not equanimity, nor can we speak more favorably of the mercenary coldness that freezes the whole
current of our being, and calls the icy death philosophic
calmness. 
MIDDLE-AGE.
No. Christian equanimity is the balance of all pow
ers, thoughts, affections, upon their true centre, which is
God, and the fidelity which God approves. It is the harmony of our whole being in its healthy action. Folly may
mistake it for dulness, but wisdom sees in it the fulness
of life. Its love is no wasting fever of the blood, but the
healthy beating of a heart true to all worthy affections and
duties-a love more deep, more true, yes, before God more
lovely than any of the fitful impulses that set youthful passions on fire. In the calm, loyal, considerate affection of a
true home, tender without fitfulness, and constant without
monotony, the human heart shows more of its divine richness than in all the parade of passion that makes the staple
of romances. So, too, in the steadfast fidelity with which
the heads of a true family pursue the even tenor of their
way, never swerving for a moment from their fixed aim,
the best welfare of those committed to their charge, there
is more true heroism than in all the protestations of disinterestedness and the oaths of eternal friendship, that so
dazzle the youthful imagination. God himself is the great
exemplar of an even mind. He holds the mighty worlds
in such noiseless equilibrium;-lHe melts the prismatic
colors into this sweet, uncolored sunshine, emblem of his
own mind;-lHe who combines all thought, all emotion,
all power, sits serene upon his throne, gives his signet of
quietude to his divinest messengers, and more than in wind
or tempest or earthquake, speaks in the still, small voice
of peace.
0 learn of God equanimity without indifference
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186      MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
learn of Him, the Infinite Love, how to be even tempered
without being unfeeling. Look up to the calm heavens;
to the marvellously balanced stars; to the divine repose in
the face of Jesus, and pray for the true spirit of maturity,
-say, "0 my God, take me not away in the midst of my
days, until I have learned it, and when I have learned it,
let me live to breathe into others its surpassing peace."
In its train comes progress, such as belongs to the noon
of life-progress without instability. Too much of the
boasted stability of many men comes from sheer obstinacy,
and they escape the charge of fickleness, by not moving at
all, except in a narrow and monotonous round, thus falling
into a morose conservatism, as bad as reckless radicalism,
and boasting of being finished because they have ceased to
improve, like the English town which was called the most
finished of any in the kingdom, because no house had been
built there for a hundred years. The true man will shun
instability, by having decided principles, which of themselves commit him to generous progress, and because he is
on a good substantial road, he will ever press on.
It is one of the most cheering views of life, that we
may always be improving, and especially cheering is it,
when we are in the very midst of the gravest work of
existence. This fact is not always seen, and a distinguished
poet, in apologizing for the haste in which his autobiography hurries over the events of his life after the thirtieth
year, the time of his marriage, says: " Comedies and romances usually terminate with the marriage of the hero, 
MIDDLE-AC1E.
and most biographies should also. The strange and event.
ful period, the period of psychological development which
makes a narrative entertaining, then chiefly ceases, and it
is the contest and onward striving, not station and attainment, that most interest in communication."  This principle may do with romance readers, but not with sober students of the book of life. The thick of the battle comes
at noonday, and if we are cowards then, the morning triumph but emphasizes our defeat. Great things indeed
have been done in youth and manhood. Colburn confounded the mathematicians at six, and Pascal was a philosopher at sixteen; De Vega wrote plays at twelve, and
Pope says of himself:
"I lisp'd in numbers, for the numbers came."
To take examples of more substantial power; Pitt was
premier of England at twenty-four, and Napoleon was the
conqueror of Italy at twenty-seven. Yet these are excep.
tions, and the rule of life assigns its chief triumph to the
meridian, or after the meridian. Even the greatest poets,
whose imagination is supposed to be one of the illusions
of youth, have borne their noblest fruit late in life. Dante
began his immortal poem in the very meridian, and Milton
won his place at the great Italian's side, when nearly threescore; and our chief moralists and statesmen have used
their early years but as the basis of their noblest erections.
Our Webster made his greatest speech at forty-eight, and
after forty, our Channing began the campaign that gave
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188       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
him his spotless fame. Measuring life by it moral worth
we call that the most critical time for progress, which is
to decide whether a man is to keep or break the promise
of his starting, whether he cherishes to the end his best
convictions, or is broken down by base lusts, or consumed
by unholy ambition. True to his better genius, every man
may expect, surely, deeper experience of religion, wider
openings of spiritual life, as years ripen his sensibilities.
Press forward ever- be ever a learner in the school
of life-learn more clearly and deeply by what you already know, and make the stern facts of the world, serve
you as texts in the wisdom that is divine. Remember
that in life, as in warfare, the shortcomings of the outset, may be made up by a braver purpose in the sequel.
Many a noble life is a Marengo, the defeats of the morning
covered by the triumphs of the day, and cheered by some
new purpose, even as those battered legions were cheered,
by the advancing plumes that told them of the approach
of their chief and his peerless guard.   "The  battle is
completely lost," said the most courageous officer to his
general, " but there is time to gain another." So Marengo
was won. Improve not merely by reading and thinking,
but by acting, and let action give point to books, and life
add fire to thought. Improve not merely in your capital
of knowledge, but also in your method of living. Look
well to it, that your method leads you upward as well as
onward, and with all your anxious striving, you lean more
upon God, and bring his blessed Spirit to be the solace of
your worn and weary will. Then noon will have a bless 
MIDDLE- AGE.
;ng deeper than the spontaneous joy of the morning, and
in firm experience, and calmed passions, and fixed habits,
and devout aspirations, you will find that you have put
your feet upon a path that God himself hath made for you
-even the way of the upright, that shineth more and
more unto the perfect day. Somewhat for yourself in
sense of such mercy, but more for others who lean upon
you, you will say:  "0 my God. take me not away in the
midst of my days."
Such is the burden of our thought concerning the middle-age:
Experience without worldliness.
Equanimity without indifference.
Progress without instability.
The subject under consideration has interest for allfor the young, since their meridian is near, for the aged,
since their meridian is a fresh remembrance- but for
many, perhaps for most of us, because it is noon with us
already. Our sun has climbed to the zenith, and will not
change much until it sinks towards evening. Be it so.
Blessed be God for this favored time of life. Let us hold
stoutly on to all the good to which heaven has called us,
and with brave, cheerful heart, work while it is day. It is
high time for us to know, and make others know, on what
ground we stand, and bear our open resolute testimony to
every worthy principle and good institution. We have no
years to waste, no excuse for folly or vice now. In God's
name press bravely on, and whenever the hour calls for
fidelity, let not the man be wanting to his post. Instead
189 
190       MILE STONES IN OUTR LIFE-JOURNEY.
of less heart, put more heart into our work, and with full
experience, and calm judgment, and clear conscience, grasp
the helm of our destiny. Instead of less faith, let us
have more, more of God in our purpose and our trust
Let truer, deeper life bring us nearer the Father, and so
interpret, not so much for continued existence, as for purer
living, the prayer for length of days, that we may serve in
the noonday heat, the benign Master whom we hailed with
our morning song. More than for the breath of life itself,
strive for that spirit, without which, what we call our life,
is but an animated death 
X.
1Eou  an~  
Night's sad cadence dies away
On the yellow moonlit sea;
The boatmen rut their oars and say  "Miserere, Dxine I"
Morn's glad chorus swells alway
On the azure, sunlit sea
The boatmen ply their oars and say,
" Te laudamus, Domine I "
COLERIDGE, altered. 
CLOUD AND FIRE.
PHEs Mile Stones on our way seem to come nearer to gether now, and as we look back upon them in the distance,
some that were wide apart when we passed them, come
into almost the same line of perspective, so that the stone
that was covered with summer vines and flowers, seems to
stand by the side of the stone that was bared to our gaze
by winter winds, or half covered by winter snows. What
man of us who has passed the middle age needs to be told
that life is full of vicissitudes, and that upon our journey,
as upon the great Hebrew Exodus, the angels of God appear sometimes in cloud, and sometimes in fire.
That ancient story of the Hebrew wandering relates
one of the chief facts in the history of the human race,
and suggests thoughts for the guidance of every man's career. However much or little we may interpret the past
through theological eyes, nay, looking merely from the
secular historian's point of view, we must regard the Exodus of the Israelites, from Egypt to the promised land, as
9 
194       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
one of the great events of civilization, and the law which
they bore with them, we must consider as the groundwork
of all ethics and jurisprudence. At present, we dismiss
the historical relations of the event, and speak of its moral
significance for each individual life.
There is great moral beauty in the story of that forty
years' march through the wilderness. No wonder that so
many hymns, and prayers, and sermons, have for ages regarded it as the most significant emblem of the journey of
life. Poetry has illustrated, and not created, the expressiveness of that simple narrative. Onward the great company went, providentially guided through all their devious
wanderings. Their sanguine hope was sobered by a hallowed memory, as, seeking a new home, they bore with
them the bones of their great ancestor, and so their future
was consecrated by their past. By day, the cloud guided
their march, by night, the pillar of fire. Interpret these
images wisely, and the Exodus of Israel becomes a lesson
for us all when we think of
The Cloud by Day;
The Fire by Night;
And the Sacred Relics borne through Cloud and Fire
homeward stilL
The Cloud by day! In the bright daytime-the hours
auspicious and hopeful-would we walk wisely, we are not
to roll the eyes in giddy rapture over the broad landscape
and the blue sky, but look rather for the cloud that offers
its warning or its promise.  There is wisdom,n and peace in 
CLOUD AND FIRE.
the disposition that takes this view, and tempers hope with
caution in the bright hour. Miracle apart, the dark spot
in the horizon, generally marks something of importance for
our guidance, and the little sailor of the air, that bears in
its bosom the wind or the rain, has greater practical significance than all the fields of transparent azure through
which it floats. Is it not so with human life? When all
things go well with us, and it is bright day, may we not
wisely look round for signs of some darker visitant than
the flashing sunbeam-think soberly of the omen of our
exposure or disappointment, the monitor of our danger and
our duty? So thinks the good pilot always, whatever be
his ship or sea. The sagacious statesman so regards his
own position, thinks less of the crowds that dog his steps
and shout his name, than of the wily foes who would
thwart his plans, or the foolish friends who might cajole
him into folly. The great leaders of nations, from the day
of Moses to that of Washington, have known how to see
and follow the teachings of the guiding cloud.   Never
beguiled into ignorance or presumption by success, sobered
by the honors that make weaker heads drunk, they have
heard the warning before the danger came, and the pillar
of cloud has been the angel of their deliverance.
The man of business reads the same lesson in his peculiar province, and cautiously watches the skies, which to
the thoughtless, promise only blessing. He studies the
doubtful fortune of trade, and looks for the cloud, when,
to less observant eyes, the whole horizon is flooded with
golden light.
195 
196       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
The Christian moralist, taught by the study of history
and observation of mankind, never parts company with this
same caution. For himself, and for others, he never will be
thrown off his guard by appearances of prosperity without
bound, or of virtue beyond fear. The watchman's trumpet he keeps ready for its uses, and the very tones that
speak the "All's Well," carry vigilant warning in their
sound. But why single out specific classes of persons?
Who is there whose experience is not full of such teaching? whose life is not deeply marked by passages that
teach the wisdom and the necessity of looking well to the
cloud, and making a guide of what might else be a judgment? The significant thing that we need most generally
to observe, stands in contrast with the horizon at large,
and tells us of trials to come. When we think that we are
doing well, there is some hint for us to do better, even to
make that well secure, and to prevent the giddy successes
of to-day, from becoming the bitter disappointments of tomorrow.
A just self-discipline will make this truth a part of our
habitual thought for ourselves and our children. It is
harder to think soberly for our children than for ourselves,
so much do we enjoy making them' happy, and so strongly
do we desire to protect them, even from the thought of
trials. But the best kindness seeks for them an honest
discipline, for life as it is and must be.  It is unkind to
blind them to the truth of things-unkind not to teach
them the lesson of the cloud-pillar-not to train them to
see divine leadings in the shades, as well as the lights of 
CLOUD AND FIRE.
human life. It is well to make childhood and youth happy, but its present happiness is rather fretted away, than
secured, by constant indulgence, and certainly future years
of care and exposure cannot but be the worse for expectations wholly extravagant, and energies wholly unschooled.
;Let children learn early to see that their will is neither
God's law, nor the world's, nor the household's. Let them
learn to own the divine uses of self-denial, discipline, the
subjection of impulses to principle, of clamorous desires to
well-considered good. Let the very air which they breathe,
be laden with the spirit of faith and patience. Let the
love, that beams upon them in its thoughtful cheerfulness,
express the true character of the life opening upon them,
and so shade hope with wisdom. Is it not well, nay, essential, to educate children in view of either extreme of
fortune? to prepare them for self-reliance, however many
their friends, or brilliant their prospects?   Wretched,
surely, the policy that makes affluence the occasion for enfeebling the energies, just as if high privileges did not
rather increase, than lessen, the demand for the best powers. The son, however fair his prospect of wealth and
friends, is poorly off, if he cannot use fortune wisely, and
bear reverses bravely. The daughter, however radiant in
beauty or grace, however protected against want, is the nobler woman from being schooled in the utilities and the
temper, that can dignify reduced fortune by self-reliance,
or adorn a brilliant position by good sense and energy
Let the annals of courts and commerce within our own
times, inpress upon us the worth of an education which is
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198       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
adequate to either lot, and which, in the brightest day,
looks warily towards the cloud-pillar, and accepts God's
hand in its guidance.
But is not this teaching a gloomy philosophy, to insist
on caution when present prospects are bright, and to speak
of the cloud, when the sunshine seems a sufficient guide?
Not gloomy, but the reverse, for this philosophy gives the
most cheerful view of divine providence, and calls out tle
most elastic energies of man. It brings God's love to bear
upon our perils, and invigorates the soul when most tempted to slumber away its force in false security. It gives
depth to our happiness, and drives despair from our adversities.  He who learns caution, when courage is tempted to
be presumption, will the more abound in courage, when
caution is tempted to become cowardice. Sobered into prudence by the pillar of cloud, he is all the more ready for
fortitude, when night brings the pillar of fire. In short,
the very spirit that takes from pleasure its giddiness, takes
from trouble its frequent despair.
So think of the Pillar of Fire, whenever we need its
light in darkness, as we all must do. Every day little
vexations come, and in every life great griefs appear
There are probably times in every one's experience, when
the burden is too great, apparently, to be borne, and relief
would be hailed as a mercy, if Heaven should take life
itself away with the pressure. Such seasons, whatever
their circumstances, leave their mark, and it is well, if
they sign their cross upon us in blessing. Little blessing 
CLOUD AND FIRE.
comes, if grief brings despair instead of resignation. We
sometimes hear people speak of being discouraged, and
with tones and looks in keeping with their words. There
is no such word in the Christian vocabulary, and the saddest psalm or prophecy, ends ever in jubilee or blessing.
The very essence of faith, to say nothing of hope and
charity, forbids despair. We may indeed, and often must,
abandon particular plans, and be baffled in important undertakings.  Yet even these should show us something encouraging, either in themselves, or their lessons.  Life is
always a militant estate, and to use defeats well is as im.
portant as to follow up victories. Every true man's diary,
reveals HIeaven's mercy in many an apparent discomfiture,
and when read with the commentary of years, the record
proves that a defeat may be a true victory, the spur of an
energy not to be put down, or the incentive of a devotion,
winning peace and power from humility.
Certainly we owe much of what is best in our experience to the true use of seasons that have seemed peculiarly hard, and which interpret the night of our own Exodus by the pillar of fire. Every man has trying times in
his business or profession, and is much the better or worse,
as he bears them well or ill. Every home has its days of
tribulation, and the relations of its members depend much
upon their use of the ordeal, for their union or estrangement
must needs connect itself closely with the result. The
critical periods of history have been times of trial, and the
leaders of science, freedom, faith, virtue, have been those
199 
200       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
who have followed the fiery pillar through a night that has
filled feebler hearts with despair.
All mental and moral conflicts especially illustrate this
truth. Speak not merely of the militant heroes of Christian history, but of our own ordinary stature of experience.
Our religion, or what we ought to call such-the sum total
of our thoughts, feelings and purposes, regarding God and
his providence; does not whatever is deepest in it come
most fitly under the emblem of the cross, that chosen syimbol of peace through conflict? Many a man not fond of
using theological terms, and not technically called religious, can tell from his own experience, that God's love
comes to cheer him as he strives well through darkness and
struggle.  In every Pilgrim's Progress, the Valley of Humiliation is on the road to the Delectable Mountains.
Some there are, indeed, who break down at that passage,
and sink into despondency when they should be cheered by
humility into new faith and hope. Be of good cheer always, the Divine voice says. There will be some light to
guide us out of the shadowy valley, and God's providence
does not war with his creative hand by denying the hope
native to the human heart.   God has put into our natures
a spring of courage, as also a spring of caution, and life is
arranged so as to call ever for the action of both.
As Creator, and as Redeemer, too, he calls for all our
courage. The courage, which is a natural instinct, he
would confirm by heavenly grace.  Surely Christ came to
quicken this power anew by renewing the affections that
make a man brave, and revealing the aims that make the 
CLOUD AND FIRE.
prospect always cheering. His own Gospel, Heaven's love
in his life, so fully incarnated, was the fire-pillar in a dark
night, and its warmth and light have not ceased to bless
us. In some way good will come; believe it-the light
will shine on our path as shall seem best to God, and be
best for us, if not always as we may desire. Within the
mind surely, and in the outward condition, the good angel
shall come. When has it been otherwise to a true seeker?
What lesson is taught more decidedly by the best experience than the wisdom, as well as the power of a hope that
never fails?
So life should interpret the old Exodus, and hold up
to us the pillar of fire by night, as the cloud by day; thus
rebuking the poor frivolity which swings to and fro between gloom and glee; thus illustrating the reasonable
equanimity taught by our blessed Exemplar in word and
deeds.
Cautious, courageous by fire and cloud, onward still
from bondage to promise,-bearing with them Relics of
sacred Remembrance, the company divinely guided went
on in hope. Dwell a moment upon this last image presented-memory, not the enemy, but the friend of hope.
With us, as in that eventful march, one treasure can
never be left behind, unless we are utterly heartless and
ungrateful-one treasure that need not be shut up in any
funeral urn, nor appear in visible form —the treasure of
sacred remembrance-the memory of wisdom or goodness
passcd away-a trust as hallowed as was the dust of their
201 
202       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
great ancestor to the Hebrew heroes in their march. In a
man so strong and resolute as Moses, how interesting this
spirit of tender retrospection appears in view of his indomitable enterprise. The great lawgiver, in presence of
the remains of Joseph, and bearing with the ark of promise
the urn of remembrance! Fact virtually renewed always
when a right mind meditates upon the tombs of the faithful. Wisdom does not lead us to borrow any creed of despair from the dust of heroes, or the ruins of empires.
Whatever has been well done, teaches even in its crumbling monuments the worth of well doing; and a true heart
gathers treasures ever increasing from the riches of memory. What in fact is mightier as a progressive force, than
the influence of the wise and earnest men who have lived
for their race and their God? What is the Christian
Church itself, but the great companionship that keep sacred
the Divine Master's memory, and unite remembrance and
hope in a life reverent and progressive? Forward for ages,
that great company has journeyed, cautious and courageous, as cloud and fire have been witnesses of God's presence in light and darkness, bearing with them the mystical
body of Christ, and pausing at stages in the march to commune with the spirit of Him who died that men might
live. In all its solemnity, what power and peace there is
in this commemoration! It brings near to us the heart of
Christ, and connects with his death and rising all the loved
and lost who have trusted in his name. Such remembrance, instead of leading us to languid and indolent 
CLOITD AND FIRE.
reverie, gives a high companionship, refreshing and quickening the soul for striving and progress.
More and more, I must confess it, the Communion service has beauty and meaning More and more it allies
with itself whatever has been best in experience, and whatever is most blessed in hope. More and more it is enriched as enlarged studies interpret the good minds of the
Church universal, and as our own life deepens its own peculiar revelations. Hlow much of our wisdom, strength
and inspiration, comes from remembrance?  The sages
and benefactors of our race who have blessed us by their
eloquence and heroism-the companions who have cheered
our homes and friendly circles by their kindness and fidelity-who can part with these treasures without renouncing
his birthright and forsaking God, the giver of such good?
Sometimes in our career, regret is so bitter and overwhelming, as to make us pause and shrink from further
toils and cares, now that so much of the joy of life has been
taken away. Who has not sometimes been ready to say,
with the classic poet, in view of some sad bereavement,
"Alas, how much happier to remember thee than to converse with others." But heavenly mercy teaches us a
truer spirit, and turns mournful memory into a cheerful
hope.  Consecrated by Christ, remembrance is the handmaid of progress, and the light that shines over its treasured dust, cheers the faith to the land of promise.
How wonderfully, even in merely earthly limitations,
God enlarges his promises as life goes on, and kindles new
interest even from the wreck of fond hopes! Study the
203 
MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
plan of Providence; and how full of benignity it appears,
as each season and age brings out its peculiar hope. Within
and above all lesser promises, the great hope rises supreme,
and has its august manifestation in HIim whose life was the
light of men.
Before us, 0 Beloved of the Father, be thy spirit and
truth, shading our gladness with sacred thought-cheering
our grief with blessed faith, joining in one precious union
all worthy memories with the remembrance of thyself!
The years are pushing us forward without asking our consent, and startling us ever with the sight or the story of
changes. We hardly can recognize how we ourselves are
changing, until perhaps some sudden shock strikes those
next us, or when we are led to compare our present self
with the self of some time long past. We look at an old
picture or friend long absent, or revisit some old homestead, and in some face or tree or building, we find a
tongue to tell us how rapidly we are passing on and away.
So let it be! God does this for us, and not we ourselves;
the change is well, unless marred or hurried by our sin.
So let it be with us, as with our fathers! Onward still;
whether by cloud or by fire, follow the living God, and in
our smiles and our tears raise the old psalm of blessing to
IHim whose mercy endureth for ever.
"Weep, 0 my soul! yet in weeping be still;
Not like the worldling's wild sorrow be thine;
Even thy tears flow at God's holy will:
Weep then, my soul, but in weeping be still,
Weep as seems good to thy Father Divine.
204 
CLOUD AND FIRE.
"Smile, 0 my soul! I but in smiling be still,
Not like the scorner's proud smile shall be thine:
Even thy joys wait on God's holy will.
Smile, then, my soul, but in smiling be still,
Smile as seems good to thy Father Divine.
"Smiles, tears, He appoints, we strive to be still;
Storms rage, and for peace in vain do we pine:
Yet moves on triumphant his mighty will.
Thou too, 0 my soul, at last shall be still,
Still in thy home with thy Father Divine."
205  
(B
9
um 
"As I approve of a Youth, that has something of the Old Man in him, so I are
no less pleased with an Old Man, that has something of the Youth."
CICERO.
Depart awhile, each thought of care,
Be earthly things forgotten all;
And speak, my soul, thy vesper prayer
Obedient to that sred call.
For hark I the pealing chorus swells;
Devotion chants the hymn of praise
And now of joy and hope it tells,
Till fainting on the ear, it says          Gloria tibi Domine,
Domine, Domine.
LYRA CATHOLICA. 
OLD AGE.
WHEN evening comes, and dim shadows gather over the
earth, we look gladly to our homes, in whose cheerful light
and friendly faces we see the whole day reflected, and find
new and serener comfort given.  Happy is the evening
whose light is brightened by the face of some guest who
has been the tried and loyal friend of years, and whose
presence is at once a charming remembrance and a radiant
hope. So was it with the two disciples on the day of the
resurrection, when, in their walk to Emmaus, they invited
their mysterious companion home with them, and found
their risen Lord revealed to them in the guest of their
frugal table. Rich and sacred lesson, to guide our thoughts
upon the Evening of Life. As our Sun sinks from its meridian, and the shadows fall more heavily, and labor pauses
in its task, what comfort and power is there in the presence of the most tender and constant friend, of Him sent
by the Father to keep us ever in his love! He walks in
darkness who walks without God in the day of life, and 
210       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
in double darkness, unless, as the day declines, he wins
him to still nearer companionship, and so repeats the invitation-" Abide with us, for it is toward evening, and
the day is far spent."
Here is our subject in this paper the evening of life
-its true Light, Peace, and Power, a subject coming
home most seriously to us all; for although few of us may
rank among the aged, all of us, however young and sportive, make a sad mistake, if we forget that the sins of youth
are visited upon age, and that a true life is of itself the
only good art of winning a happy age. We would treat
this subject cheerfully, more cheerfully, perhaps, than any
other, for each season is of God's making; he who made
the evening and the morning called them both good, and
surely nothing on earth is fairer than a peaceful, spiritual
old age.
Consider first its true light, or the proper wisdom
which should come with age. Of course it is no time
then to begin to be wise, for if the true light has never
shined upon a man's pathway before, it will not be likely
to shine upon him merely because the world's light is
waning. Use life well, study its facts, employ its opportunities, shun its temptations, meet its dangers, appreciate
its blessings, as they come, and it will not fail to teach
heavenly wisdom. Of worldly prudence we are not speaking now, for this generally comes of itself, without respect
to fidelity or character, and the worn-out profligate of
threescore can commend self-control as the best expedient, 
OLD AGE.
and the broken-down defaulter can praise honesty as the
best policy. Not of worldly prudence, well as it may be
in its place, but of that higher wisdom we are speaking,
which finds a divine purpose in our existence, and studies
experience by the light of God. We need this always,
but especially in age, when our life becomes like a book
of remembrance, and memory is a garrulous babbler, unless
her facts are ranked in true order, and led forward to the
music of cheerful hope. The life of a faithful man is a
Scripture written by the hand of God, and to be interpreted only by God's own love. All its labors and perplexities, all its pleasures and triumphs have a meaning in
themselves, and as parts of a providential whole.   We
are wise as we discern this meaning. Glimmers of it we
may have all along our career, but when we pass the fifth
decade, and enter the last score of the allotted term of
usual age, we are sadly in the dark without its shining.
Then most of our earthly experience is a remembrance,
and we are benighted, unless we can carry with us from
the past a light that does not fade.
In the walk to Emmaus, Jesus interpreted to the two
disciples those Scriptures which recorded at once the history and the hopes of their race, and made the past shin
upon the present and future.  Their hearts burned within
them as they listened, for he told them that their own
lives touched directly the great plan of Providence, and
He who came to be the Light of the World, had been the
light of their life. Blessed revelation, not confined to
them alone, not limited solely to the Jewish books thus
211 
212      MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
unfolded! Abide with us, Messenger of Heaven, Incar.
nate Word, and open the book of our lives, and show how
Chronicle and Prophecy meet together there, and every
ffliction has a lesson, and every remembrance a hope, and
every labor a reward. Abide with us not as a stranger
for the first time received, but as a familiar friend new
welcome and interpret to us our experience, that we may
interpret it to others!
Pleasant and profitable should be the talk at the evening of life; and such it must be when the calm, cheerful,
wisdom of the Master is its guide, and touched by him,
every reminiscence opens some bright prospect, and the
bread broken in his spirit quickens anew the sources of
joy. How much we do need him to save us from the
worldling's desolation, when he sees his boasted light fading, and the world becoming to him " a banquet hall deserted," with vacant seats for company, expiring lamps,
and smouldering ashes, and empty cups for cheer. Even
the shrewdest worldly prudence is a miserable solace, and
the most successful man of the world, as he fights over his
battles, or talks over his times and fortunes, is but a hollow-hearted, benighted chatterer, unless a light from above
shines upon his experience, and he has something of the
spirit of him at whose word the hearts of the two disciples so burned as they walked to Emmaus. Such is the
true wisdom for age, and they who would have it at evening, when other lights fail, must seek it at morn and
noon, when other lights shine. 
OLD AGE.
And how can it abide with us, without bringing cheer fulness in its train? There is no cheerfulness worth nam ing, that does not spring from the light of God's love in
the soul, and therefore our Saviour, who most manifests
that love, is the most cheering of all companions for the
evening of life. We need his genial spirit always alike
to give us patience in trial, and true joy in our blessings,
for all our years, however youthful, call for some resignation, and tempt us to some discontent. But when solemn
monitors tell us that the daylight is fading, and our vigor
lessening, and our labors must be lighter, and our familiar
pleasures fewer, and the great night is not far distant,
then especially do we need Christian cheerfulness to give
us patience under the change, and to make a willing offering of the exacted sacrifice. See God as Christ reveals
him in the earlier seasons of life, and we shall not fail to
see him during its closing years. He whom we sought
as Guide, will stay with us as Comforter, and his glory
will shine out at sunset even more blessedly than at noonday.
Our Saviour does not only teach us cheerful patience
under the privations of age, but he enables us to win from
them peculiar blessings, and make each loss open into a
gain. With the gospel before us, with God's love and
life's meaning so revealed, why mourn at the passing of
years? God has made every thing beautiful in his own
season. Does the frame lose something of its elasticity, remember that infirmity does not belong to age alone, and
that temperate old age, in its moderated force, has a calm
213 
214       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
pulse and subdued strength most congenial with its quiet
pursuits and reflective temper. Do the cares of business
press so heavily as to call for young energies to come to
the relief of overtasked age, remember that each season
has its own appropriate work, and that age has in ripened
judgment a full compensation for the decline of muscular
vigor. Do what are usually counted as the pleasures of
life fail the aged, remember that the purest pleasures cease
only with rational life itself, and that in the gift of treasured remembrances and reflective wisdom, and moderated
passions, and ripened faith, serene, deep enjoyment of nature, man, and God, age may have full recompense for all
the fleeting joys of youth and manhood-more than recompense surely for the loss of all those pleasures which tempt
excess more than they offer happiness. Is death near to
age-so near as to give uncertainty to every hour, and
thrust its spectral head into every scene? Say, what
season is free from death? Remember that more, far
more persons die young than old, and that death deals
gently with the aged, alike in the manner of his approach
and in the solaces which God has commissioned Christ to
bear in that visitant's footsteps, that he may be the king
of terrors no more, but the usher of the soul to the cherished company gone before. No. Mourn not over the passing
years, but fill them with true affections and worthy works,
and God will bless us even to the last. The interest of
life will not cease; and instead of doting petulance, ol
what is quite as bad, shallow frivolity, a cheerful sense of
God's love will go with us to the last, and open fresh com 
OLD AGE.
fort as the night shades come on. Even that charming
sense of novelty which gives such zest to youthful curiosity, will not cease; for how can the knowledge of God and
his providence be exhausted in our span of years?   Nay,
the more we know, are we not earnest for still more, and
does not a cheerful religious spirit enjoy the best attribute
of genius itself, and see the universe as an ever new and
ever opening revelation of divine wisdom and love? Who
will not seek the Father betimes in his chosen Messiah,
and welcome anew the Divine guest as night draws near?
Abide with us, 0 Christ, in thy holy joy, for it is toward
evening, and the day is far spent.
Need we say that such light and peace cannot come
without bringing power with them? We need power at
every season, yet never more than when bodily strength
begins to fail. He who makes our strength according to
our day, has not left the close of our day to helplessness.
He is ready to give full balance for the force withdrawn
by the new power granted. Piety, which is the safeguard
of youth, is the old man's staff and stay. Let him lean upon it, and he leans upon what is divine. Let him lean upon
it with all his mind and heart, and his mind and heart
will be strong enough to make up for the decline of muscular force. Resting upon God in all the maturity of the
judgment, and all the calmness of confirmed experience,
and with all the confidence of affections not bound to the
earth, age rests upon the Rock of ages. The work to be
done it cannot but do, and in some form of cheerful activi
215 
MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
ty, useful by advice, if not by continued labor-useful by
peaceful example, if not by more obtrusive service, the
aged man stands ever at his post of duty, and awaits his
Lord's bidding.
Strong for action according to his vocation, he is strong
in believing, and in that grace which comes to him through
faith.  Joy and crown of a true life-new childhoodsecond morning of our being, so exemplified in the experience of the ripest men! A return to youth, not merely
by the strange renewal of young remembrances, but a regenerating of the affections, a renewal of that spontaneous
trusting reason so beautiful in childhood?  Blessed old
age, so entering the kingdom of heaven like a little child,
and winning youth and childhood to itself by its holy wisdom and loving counsel! Nearer God than ever, it partakes more largely of His grace, and all past experience
and labor, all thoughts, affections, purposes, seem but to
have been shaping the mind and heart into a vessel for
holding the precious effluence from above. The disputing
reason, the impulsive feelings, the daring will, all seem to
kneel down then in faith before the mercy-seat, and be
ennobled by the service and exalted by the obedience.
Imagination itself, before so wayward and sometimes rebellious, becomes the servant of faith, and true to the Infinite
Creator, joins him in creating the new heavens and the
new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness. The noblest
genius ever seen on earth joins with the simplest piety in
the invitation to God's Beloved-" Abide with us, for it
is toward evening, and the day is far spent." The thinner
216 
OLD AGE.
the veil of this earthly tabernacle, the more need of the
light that can chow the Divine glory and the eternal world
through its perishable material.
What can be more practical and cogent than our present topic-Age and its Preparation? Take it to yourselves, children and youth, for your parents' sake and your
own. Deal gently and reverently with your elders, as you
hope to be dealt with, if your years are as many. Begin
to live not as for the present pleasure, but as for the term
allotted by your Creator, and judge all your conduct by
its bearing upon the whole. Do not waste your years in
folly; do not spend your strength on vanity; do not, by
exhausted health and perverted passions, sow in youth the
seeds of a bitter harvest in age.  "It is a most amazing
thing," says the grave John Foster, " that young people
never consider they shall grow old. I would say to young
women, especially, renew the monition of anticipating every
hour of the day." Exchanging his habitual solemnity almost for jesting, he adds: " I wish we could make all the
criers, watchmen, ballad-singers, and even parrots, repeat
to them continually, you will be an old woman, you will,
you will." We would not be so extreme as this, but surely we must say to all youth, seek God in a sober wisdom,
and cheerful temper, and devoted purpose in your day of
strength, and he will bless you with his brighter presence
when the evening comes. You, too, who are in the high
noon of life, and too prone to measure your security by
your gains, remember that gold is not God, and nothing is
more melancholy than the grasping covetousness wo habit
10
217 
218       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
ual to the old age of a life given to godless gains. Use
your means and rule your care under the Master's guidance, and he will be your guest when your working-day
ends.
Some in my circle of readers allow a more direct appeal, for their evening is already coming on. Little favored indeed would any circle or company be without such
presence, and the charm of childhood itself is never complete, without some counterpart of venerable years. And
art itself, as the interpreter of nature and of God, finds no
completeness in its grouping, unless youth and age combine in the beauty of the scene. It is not well to think
sadly that we are growing old, for such is our lot during
our whole lifetime, and the man of sixty does not feel
older than the youth of eighteen. Probably the truest
life has least painful consciousness of age, and takes every
season as a progressive blessing. Yet they who have entered their probably last score of years, have a work to do
appropriate to their season, and right faithfully should
they do it. Touching examples from classic and Christian
sources urge the appeal. What beauty in the group pre
sented in Cicero's charming dialogue on Old Age, where
he presents the venerable Cato, at more than fourscore,
ustructing and delighting such brilliant young men as
Scipio and Lelius, with his cheerful philosophy of living,
and welcoming the day that shall take him from this
earthly tumult to the great company of souls, and especially to his dear son, as noble a man as was ever born.
What higher beauty, when the sage's desire is strengthened 
OLD AGE.
into the Christian's trust, as in home scenes that we all
have known, and which make the old man's festival, at
eighty, more beautiful than the play of rosy children, who
gambol at his feet. Wisely let the elders interpret their
years as a revelation from the Father-cheerfully let them
bear their privations, and use their privileges-piously let
them lean upon the divine arm, and walk in peace towards
the curtain that hangs before the dark valley, already quivering as if to rise. He whom God sent to be their guide,
has passed through that gloom. Let him not be a stranger. Elders, slight not your Saviour-slight not his dying love- say now with new earnestness, and in response
to every early impression of his gospel: "Abide with us,
for it is toward evening, and the day is far spent."
It is late autumn now with nature, as I am writing,
and the leaves lie withering at our feet. It seems like autumn with mankind, and the tree of life itself has been
dropping its fairest fruit and foliage, so treasured for years
The earth stands now, as if at one of the evenings of her
great day, and the night shadows were falling upon an entire age. Our fathers have fallen, and are falling. Can
we not almost hear the muffled drum beat of a mighty nation, circling the world with her great soldier's funeral
march, and keeping company with the word that our great
civilian is no more? It is evening now; but instead of
complaining, raise gently, joyfully, humbly, the Christian's
vesper hymn, responsive to the matin song, and as the daylight dies, welcome anew the bringer of light uncreated
and undying. Join, join our souls with the dying, prayer
* ~
4, eW,,.
~,
219 
220      MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
of the mighty!  Say:  "Abide with us, Beloved of the
Father, for it is toward evening, and the day is far
spent."
"My heart doth feel that still He's near
To meet the soul in hours like this,
Else - why, 0 why, that falling tear I
When all is peace, and love, and bliss! I
But hark I that pealing chorus swells
Anew its thrilling vesper strain,
And still of joy and hope it tells,
And bids creation chant again       Gloria tibi Dominel
Ie 
4,
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in
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My Father's hope! my childhood's dream I
The promise from on high!
Long waited for! its glories beam
Now when my death is nigh.
Blest scene! thrice welcome after toil  If no deceit I view;
O might my lips but press the so#)
And prove the vision ruet
Its glorious heights, tts wealthy plains,
Its many tinted groves,
They call! but He my steps restrains,
Who chastens whom He loves.
T,YRA APOSTOLIOA 
PROSPECT AND RETROSPECT.
EVERY man is looking forward to some coming good, and
a large part of his happiness is from anticipation. From
the very outset of his journey, his eye is fascinated by
some distant object, and no amount of disappointment is
sufficient to rid him of the fascination. Nay, the loss of
one fond prize, serves but to sharpen the desire for a
fonder prize, and throw added enchantment over the distance. God has ordained that it should be thus with us,
and that by many an illusive chase, we shall strengthen
our faculty of enjoying substantial good.   "He,' says
Coleridge, "is the best physician in the treatment of ner
vous diseases, who is the most ingenious inspirer of hope.'
Our Creator then, is the greatest of physicians, for he is
ever treating life's fitful fever, that chronic disease of mankind, with the medicine of hope. Poor indeed is the man
who enjoys only what he possesses, and has nothing to hope
for. Says Shakspeare: 
224       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
"True Hope is swift, and flies with swallow's wings,
Kings it makes gods, and meaner creatures kings."
Let us be willing to bless this charmer, although we have
so many times been deluded by the charm.
The leader of the hosts of Israel, and the giver of their
laws, had guided his people from the land of their captivity to the land of promise; and now, without being permitted to set foot upon the long sought Canaan, he was to die.
He had freed them from the Egyptian yoke, led them safely across the sea and the desert; he had preserved them
amidst the perils of famine, and disease, and the enemy,
and from the far worse moral perils of discord and idolatry. Forty years he had sought to prepare them, by the
hard ordeal in the wilderness, for their home in the happy
land. He had tried to imbue them with reverence for the
One God, the God of their fathers, and for the law given
by his hand. Now, on the plains of Moab the hosts were
encamped, the desert passed-the  foe conquered.   All
was joy and hope. The tents of Israel, that had been
borne through so many perils, and pitched in the desert,
often among murderous tribes, were now spread in peace.
On one side rose the mountains of Abarim-on the other
side rolled the long looked for river.  From the peaks of
those mountains, the banks of that sacred stream were visible, perhaps its waters could be seen gleaming in the light,
like a screen of silver, between the wanderers and the land
flowing with milk and honey: 
PROSPECT AND RETROSPECT.
"Sweet fields beyond the swelling flood
Stand dressed in living green."
Who should be so happy in all that host as their leader? On the shores of the Red Sea, so safely crossed, his
'joy was overflowing, and his voice and his sister'Iiriam's,
had led the thanksgiving song of the redeemed nation:
"Sing ye to the Lord, for he hath triumphed gloriously,
the horse and the rider he hath overthrown." Now a happier day had come, and should not his strain be yet more
joyful? Were not the deserts, with their fires, and serpents, and more savage enemies, far behind? and was not
Canaan now in sight?
Far otherwise than joyful, was the lawgiver now. In
much sadness he made the proclamation: " Hear, O  Israel,
thou art to pass over Jordan this day."  He knew the impulsive and superficial character of his people.   Their past
errors taught him their future dangers.   He knew that
prosperity was a harder trial than adversity, and that
many who cross the desert in safety, find their ruin in gardens of peace and plenty. He knew that the day of triumph is ever a day of trial, and instead of gay festivals,
he appoints a solemn meeting; instead of songs of jubilee,
he utters serious counsel; recalling the sober lessons of
experience, he repeats the law with especial adaptations to
their future position. He embodies in a poem his most
important lessons, and intrusts it to the charge of the elders of the nation. It is a rebuke of the people's sins,
yet a rebuke minigled with the heartiest encouragement
225 
226       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
the whole breathing a sadness that would be overwhelming,
were it not for the deep faith and hope that rise above the
tones of mourning. This poem was the swan-song of the
great prophet. His mountain-throne of triumph was his
tomb. He died with a benediction upon his lips. It had
been decreed: " Thou shalt see the land, but thou shalt
not go thither." His eye, as it was closing, rested upon
the tents of Israel in the plains beneath- on the sacred
river and the promised land, which the Lord showed to
him, from Gilead on the east, to Dan on the west-from
northern Naphtali, to the south, and the plain of the valley of Jericho, the city of palm-trees.
Thus died the man whom God had raised up to do a
work, second only to that of Jesus Christ. His fate is
that of all his race. He saw the land but was not permitted to go thither. No man, in this world, is to see the full
result of his own labors. Each, whatever his success,
must die with the land of promise only in sight.
Learn now the lesson of the great lawgiver's history in
its relation to things present and to come.
Observe its application to the most obvious forms of
human enterprise- the sphere of ordinary business. He
who labors from morning to night to hoard up wealth, never finds his Canaan of content. He has been dreaming
of the time, when care and fatigue shall be at an end,
when wealth shall bring leisure, and leisure satisfaction.
A land of promise has been ever before him. But when
he approaches the long sought home of rest, new cares and 
PROSPECT AND RETROSPECT.
new labors rise before him. Long before the six-score
years allotted the lawgiver, the stern decree that he must
die finds him still toiling, still unsatisfied.  He looks upon
his cherished treasures, and knows that they are to pass
into other hands. With sore misgiving, he questions the
future: "1 What use shall be made of the goods which I
have earned? May not temptation lurk amidst the very
bounty I bequeath?"  Happy indeed for him, if, in view
of the Canaan opening, not to him, but to his children, he
can be assured that from himself- alike from his word
and example, a law of integrity and fidelity has gone forth
which will be a safeguard through plenty as through privation.  Happy the parents, who  having brought their
children to a position of competence, leave them with a
good education, a sound mind, and an earnest heart, that
can make them equal to either fortune. No heritage, however large, can be fatal, if the sense of responsibility be
transmitted with the sense of privilege. No heritage can
be small, that carries with it a noble remembrance, and an
example of energy. Sad indeed the land of promise without such guidance- sad for those who are guides to its
border, and for those who survive to enter into its domain.
The same principle may be applied to all those who
have labored not solely for themselves and for their children, but for the future welfare of their country and their
race; to all the lights and leaders of our race, to the patriots who have striven for their nation and died before
227 
228       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
the hour of triumph, or lived to see new perils in the na.
tional prosperity-to discoverers in art and science, who
have met with envy and ill will from the very ignorance
and prejudice which they would cure-to moralists and
philanthropists who have found their blessing returned by
cursing from the vice which they would reform, and the
darkness which they would enlighten-to teachers of pure
religion, whether those who were sent originally to reveal
the true Light to the world, or those who strove to revive
its brightness in opposition to the despot who would
darken, or the denier who would quench, its glory. Read
history superficially, and as we meet with the names most
honored, we say, "these men were successful; they did
their work and had their reward." Scan their lives more
critically, and we find that they had not crossed the
threshold of their hope, and the aureola that gilds their
fame, has most of its radiance from the gratitude of posterity.
Still farther we are ready to carry the idea of the text.
The noblest kind of progress is that which is estimated by
its kind rather than by its degree, and which looks to elevation rather than to mere extent. Every right-minded person desires to grow up in true mental and moral stature
He desires to be wise in the knowledge of himself and of
God, and whatever God has made. We have all looked
more or less earnestly, in our young enthusiasm or our
mature sobriety, for a virtue untarnished by a fault, or a
peace of mind untroubled by a doubt or fear. This is the 
PROSPECT AND RETROSPECT.
upper land of promise. In this we cannot but believe, and
towards it, unless we are utterly unfaithful, we must ever
press. Do we find it?
We surely trample upon the gospel, unless we believe
in perfection and happiness as the proper end and aim of
the human soul. Nay, in a true mind, this faith is as in destructible as faith in God's goodness.
Perfection!-we do not find it on earth. The best
men have the clearest sense of their own deficiencies. The
best workman sees most the incompleteness of his work.
The greatest artist, whether poet, painter, orator, is least
satisfied with his own production, and laments the vast
distance between his aim and his doing-between his reali ty and his idea. The wisest and most fervent Christian
is humblest of men, is sure indeed that he is on the right
road; yet counts himself, like Paul, not to have apprehended or seized the mark, but to be still pressing on.
Happiness!-who finds it here below?  Yet the truest
man believes in it more and more. Nay, seeks for it in a
faith ever calmer as life is teaching him to distinguish between the shows and the substance of things. His hope
is no hectic fever of his soul, but it is the throb of its most
healthful pulses. The leaders of humanity up the heights
of the spiritual life have never despaired. Leaving to
others the cheering lessons of their example, they have
urged their followers to begin where they ended, and, passing within the veil, they have trusted there to know things
not seen by earthly vision.
The topic that we have treated has decided connee
2219 
230      MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
tions with the season of life now under consideration, and
with the century in which we live. We are just passing
beyond the summit of the nineteenth century, and are thus
prompted to look behind and before. How can we help
thinking of the many benefactors whose lives and labors
have tended to make our own future, and that of our race,
so auspicious. The men who begun this century at twenty years of age, are now over three-score and ten. Fifty
years form a very significant portion of the individual's
experience and the nation's history. It embraces the active period of a life extended to what is usually called the
limit of age-the period from twenty to seventy. They
who at the opening of the century were just coming upon
the stage of affairs, are now passing away. A land of peculiar promise was before them. The new generation, then
just reaching their majority, were led in this country towards a future by one whose name may, in some respects,
be connected with that of Moses, and who died just as our
century began. Our Washington was their leader, and he
did not live long enough to realize the greatness of the
heritage which his fortitude and wisdom did so much to
win for others. Chief of his country's armies in the wars
of liberty, in time of peace, firm guardian of her laws, he
saw the nation freed from the foreign yoke, and subject to
a civil order based upon the convictions of the people.
The duties of the soldier and magistrate faithfully dis-. -
charged, he sought repose in his peaceful home. But the
quiet shades of Vernon proved as the hill of Abarim.
Rumors of wars disturbed his retirement, and when the 
PROSPECT AND RETROSPECT.
peril of war was over, faction clouded his horizon, and the
last hours of the great patriot were not without anxiety as
to the solution of the momentous problem of free institutions. Constitutional liberty was the theme of his anxiety
and his prayers. He looked to the land, but was not permitted to go thither into its fairest regions. His people
were to cross the river and enter a realm of untried plenty.
He was not to go with them, and Vernon was the Pisgah
upon which our lawgiver died. And now the generation
that followed him is passing away. Eventful indeed has
been their history-not ignoble their work. Who in the
most general way would undertake to tell the lessons of
the last fifty-four years, without overflowing gratitude to
the Ruler of events for the men raised up to be our benefactors? Calm reflection now should check the violence
of party prejudice, and recognize the hand of Providence
in each of the two great lines of influence that have shaped
our national destiny.  How large is our heritage through
the labor and enterprise of the statesmen, pioneers, navigators, inventors, orators, poets, moralists, divines, who have
conspired to bless the nation and the home? The old
world has not withheld its bounty, and its leading minds
are now a portion of our inheritance.
One by one, our guides and guardians have been passing away-some of them lamented by the millions-some
of them known only to the little circle whom they have befriended, and by those blessed in their death with a benediction as worthy in the sight of Heaven, as if pageants
231 
232      MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
and marble spoke to the world of their honor. Who is
there among us who will not now cherish tender thoughts
of the benefactors who have led us to this hill of vision
and who have gone, or are going, from our side?
Fair, indeed, the future before us-fairer, perhaps, and
more exciting than any ever before promised to mankind.
What is to come of it-of all this working of powerful
principles, of liberty, order, education, in connection with
those mighty material agencies, which human invention
has bestowed upon man? A half century to come, like
that which has lately passed, to what will it bring us?
The imagination asks no fictitious theme, but reels in
wonder before the omens of simple truth. Sober history
is enthusiastic prophecy.
Yet be quieted, our souls. Pass on cheerfully, resolutely, but still expect no exemption from the universal
lot. Who of us can reasonably expect to realize what we
have promised to ourselves in life? We are all engaged
in some pursuit which we hope will lead to peace and comfort. Many work hard with head or hand, or both, in the
hope of one day living at ease, free from the imperious
command to toil. But, believe it, we shall never find the
promised land of leisure or contentment. We must in
some way strive as long as we live, whether compelled by
necessity or by desire. Many look to future riches, towards
which they have been travelling through a forty years
wilderness of privation and fatigue. The pleasant region
seems near at hand. The desert is passed, there rolls the
long-sought river, and beyond, the fields smile with plenty. 
PROSPECT AND RETROSPECT.
"Joy, joy, is the cry.  Let us enter into rest.  Let us
and our children cross the waters and revel in plenty."
But no. Thou shalt not go over, nor enter the land flow ing with milk and honey, where pleasure comes, and not
care. You shall have care and anxiety to your dying day,
quite as much anxiety in keeping and using your gains, as
in winning them. You shall die as upon Abarim, on the
verge still of a promising future, and your joy in the
prospect will not be without misgivings as to the lot of
those who come after you, lest their triumphs may have
more peril than your trials.
Yet nevertheless press cheerfully on and do our part
faithfully. We are debtors enough to the past to be creditors to the future. Grateful for all that has been done
to bless us, we repay the obligation by benefits to those
who come after us. For our own individual souls, we are
shaping a boundless hereafter. Let this fact teach us the
coherence of all time, whilst we take heed lest any narrow
notions of individual isolation may lead us to repudiate
our relations to our neighbor or our race. Our home and
kindred-our community, our church, our nation, nay all
humanity has a future connected in some measure with
our own. Let the memory of those who have blessed us,
guide us in view of'things to come.
The world to come! Thither a greater than Moses
is the guide of the faithful. He who died on Calvary
opened to his followers a new earthly future, which he did
not enter.  He is the great interpreter of all earthly hople
233 
234       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
-the solace of disappointment, the consecration of success. Hie offers not indeed to stay the flight of time, or
give every fair prospect its earthly fulfilment. The Canaan that he opens is the realm in which he with the Father dwells. Hionor to all them who have enlarged the
surface of human life, and been the leaders of humanity
in its onward march.  Glory unto the Eternal Father for
the gift of him who came to open the depths of the spiritual world, and whose swan-song was not like the ancient
lawgivers, and did not treat of earthly conquests and
fears, but was a prayer of immortal trust, a call to heavenly mansions. Let each dying year be soothed by his
word, and let its requiem speak of the hope that does not
die.   The land of promise is never found, because the
soul's true home is not on earth, and all our seeking, as it
is true, serves but to lead faith towards the unseen and
eternal world. The true ideal is not a dreamy fancy, or
ever-wandering plan, but it rests upon a spiritual faith.
From that world came the archetypes of all things fair on
earth-to that world all true hope and effort lead. By
our disappointment and our success, it is the part of wisdom to learn at once patient waiting and filial trust. Human life is not a master delusion. Jesus our guide, the
gravest experience responds to the most enthusiastic
youthful confidence. Thus the noblest of aged men of our
time have passed away. The Holy Spirit has put the new
song of the redeemed into their hearts, and the disappointments of past life seem but as the withered blossoms
which fall that the fruit may ripen. 
"41ti
TIJIX 
Into the Silent Land!
Ah I who shall lead us thither?
Clouds in the evening sky more darkly gather,
And shattered wrecks lie thicker on the strand! I
Who leads us with's;-'le hand,
Whither, O whither,
Into the Silent Land?
0 Land I O Lana
For all the brokea-heartd,
The mildest herald by our fate allotted,
Beckons, and with inverted torch doth stand,
To lead us with a gentle hand
Into the land of the great departed,
Into the Silent Land I
VON SALIS. Translated by Longfellow. 
DEATH.
AT the tombstone we now stand, that last way-mark of
our earthly life. There standing we read the words of
gospel faith, from that apostle who was snatched from the
darkness of Pharisaic prejudice by him who is the Resurrection and the Life: " 0 death, where is thy sting?  0
grave, where is thy victory? " These are the words not
of a dying man, excitable by overwrought nerves, or enraptured by delirious visions. They come from a man in
the fulness of active life, and the very master-spirit of the
greatest enterprise ever undertaken on earth, an enterprise
that struck at the empire of the world. Nothing can be
more practical, nay more business-like in its bearing than
this letter of the apostle Paul to the church at Corinth,
that metropolis of commerce between the East and the
West-that New York of old, in which the merchandise,
the people, the manners and creeds of all nations combined their pride and their misery. Advising them how 
238      MILE STONES IN OUR LIPE-JOURNEY.
to settle their disputes, remove their scandals and adjust
their church offices and affairs, the apostle rises in tone as
he proceeds, and closes with those sublime passages on the
paramount worth of charity, and the truth of the immortal life, which reach their climax in the words just quoted.
Hiere, as everywhere, the truly practical man shows himself to be the fervent spiritualist, and in the midst of his
labors contemplating death and eternity, not to disparage,
but to cheer his work.
Let such a spirit guide us now in our meditation upon
death in its practical bearing. We have been considering
the Circle of Life, and now in a few papers upon the close
of life and the future state, we are but completing the
theme. Now our topic is Death.
Death as a fact Natural and Providential; as demanding
preparation, general and special; as to be met soberly
and hopefully when it comes.
In common with many theologians, even of opposite
creeds, we regard death as an event quite in the order of
Nature and Providence-not in itself, but only in its incidental fears and penalties, as an extraordinary arrangement for the punishment of mankind. Our race were evidently born to die, and the very structure of the body,
the increase of population, and the relation of human life
to outward circumstances, compel us to believe that, from
the very first, man was not intended in his bodily organization to be an exception to the usual course of nature.
The coal that burns so cheerfully in our grate, bears marks 
DEATH.
of wood and foliage that died years before man was crea ted; and the. stones of our houses, often embed shells
whose tenants breathed out their life before earth was
eady for man's dwelling. When he came, there is no
proof either in reason or revelation, that he was to escape
the universal lot of decay. It was decreed that he should
die if he sinned, but this dying was, we believe, not nat ural death, but a spiritual decline, such as sin ever brings
and salvation removes. The death which Jesus came to
do away, was not the ceasing of bodily life, since Christians must die as surely as other men, but it was that decline of faith and love which deadens the soul to God and
immortality. Taking the Christian view, we are to accept
death as a fact of nature, and by a right spirit make it
also a fact of Providence which reveals the will of God,
as well as the laws of matter.
The physiologist has his place in the investigation of
this great change, and has much to tell us of the phenomenon of life and death. Yet he can go very little into
the deeps of the subject, and whilst the race of shallow
materialists pretend to hunt out the mystery of our being
on the point of the dissecting knife, the true man of science calls their philosophy empty chattering, and stills his
voice into devout silence, as he contemplates this wonderful structure tenanted or untenanted by its soul.   The
higher it ascends in the scale of being, the more devoutly
does science look above material laws to an overruling
mind, and see a Providence within and above nature.
The Christian begins where science ends, and interprets
239 
240      MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
the facts of nature by the mind of the Creator. If without God's will not even a sparrow falleth to the ground,
surely without his will no rational creature dies, and death
so intertwines itself with the uses of life, and with the
whole economy of the universe, that we must consider it
eminently as a providential as well as a natural fact.
As we cross the threshold of the subject, then, be
ready to regard this great change as among the ordained
events of our being, and instead of shrinking from it as
from a sentence of execution passed upon us in God's anger, on account of original sin, let us accept it as part of
his benign plan from the very beginning.  "0  death,
where is thy sting?"  Not in the fact of death itself, but
in the fact of sin, the only fatal sting is found, for by this
sting the soul's peace is poisoned, and her vision is darkened to the light of God and heaven.
If death be thus one of the ordained facts of Nature
and Providence, it is reasonable to prepare for it upon the
same principles as for any other great change or transition.
Each season of life has its beginning and close; nay each
year is born at its beginning, and dies at its ending, so
that every thoughtful man conducts his affairs in view of
his yearly account. He not only endeavors to manage
his business upon judicious principles in general, but he
has also an eye to rounding off the concerns of the year in
particular, that the past may be without remorse and the
future without fear. Now our earthly life itself is but a
great year in our existence, and the change that comes at 
DEATH.
its close, is but one of a series of changes which begin
with our birth. Prepare then for death, as we prepare for
every great transition, as we prepare in youth for manhood, or in manhood for age, by a life true to every obligation and duly mindful of the change to come.
This principle rebukes at once the superstition that
regards preparation for death as something ghostly or
magical, wholly apart from true living, and the philosophical indifference that is content to set death down as but
one among the fatalities of nature, about which we are to
give ourselves no concern, because we cannot help them.
Strangely the superstition still haunts the world, that the
service of God is something separate from practical rectitude, and that actual usefulness is no preparation for
meeting Him at last. "Prepare to meet thy God," is a
command that should be heard not merely in books of devotion, and chambers of sickness, and sanctuaries of faith,
but in all the active scenes of life, in our places of business and enjoyment, in our pleasant home and quiet meditations.   "Prepare to meet thy God,'  by the faithful
use of every power and opportunity intrusted to you. See
God's signature on every faculty of our mind, and every
day of our existence, and do not defraud him of the reasonable service due from what is his own. Say not that
it throws a gloom over life to have this service constantly
in view, for we cannot use life for its true worth, unless
we interpret its meaning through its Creator's will; and
our best happiness as our just responsibility is of his ordaining. The recollection will many a time rebuke our
11
241 
242       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
worldliness, and spur our sluggishness, but should it not
far more frequently cheer away our despondency, and renew our strength, to be assured that we are called to serve
Him who is so merciful to every infirmity, and so encouraging to every effort as our Father in Heaven? Remember that under his kingdom all fidelity is true service, and
worthy living is preparation for worthy dying.
And yet however purely and devotedly a man may try
to live, death is a change so peculiar and so solemn, as to
call for some preparation peculiar to itself. No man can
be so conscious of rectitude as not to feel a decided need of
forgiveness, or so clear in his spiritual vision, as to have
no desire for an assurance better than his own thoughts.
In various modes this need has been supplied, and by the
gospel only has it been fully supplied. Law of true life,
the gospel is also the true preparation for death. In Jesus
Christ it brings God's love so near that the soul may cling
to it in faith, with full assurance of pardon, and in him
the immortal life is so revealed, as to be no more an opinion but a fact. The sting of death is sin, and the strength
of sin is the law.  He who took away the rigid law, and
breathed the spirit of life in its stead, and brought immortality to light, has taken away that sting. Know Jesus
and trust in him; follow him in his mission and in his
cross, by the practice of his charity, and in the worship
of his church; and then we find that his gospel is working into our whole mind and heart a power able to overcome the grave. He sadly neglects his duty and interest,
who overlooks this fact. We call him an unjust man who 
DEATH.
lives so unmindful of dissolution, as to make no just provision for those to whom he owes property or protection,
and it is one of the essential duties of an honorable citizen, to leave his affairs in such a state that his family and
neighbors shall not needlessly suffer by his death. Does
the duty end with care for worldly goods, and is it not every
man's solemn obligation to think as much of God's testament for his soul, as of his own will and testament for his
property?   Central in the providential  plan of  God,
stands the mission of Jesus, as the mediator between the
visible and the invisible worlds. Central in that mission
stands his death of sacrificial love, and as central in his
gospel and his church, stands the command to keep that
death in remembrance. Remember Christ loyally,, if we
would share the peculiar comfort which his death imparts,
and every approach to the table of communion shall be,
far more than you may be conscious of it at the time, a
season of preparation for the last hour. Without gloom,
without any sepulchral chills, the spirit of the Master will
come near to you in blessing, and if you receive him worthily, his peace will follow you through every trial. We
cannot have too much philosophy, yet we need more than
philosophy, we need the gospel with its grace, to give
life beyond theory, and a victory over death.
Draw still nearer the solemn subject, and consider the
very presence of death, that time when the word comes to
us, " This night or this day, thy soul will be required of
thee."  How should we ask and strive to meet that hour?
243 
244        MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOUP.NEY.
Much of its circumstance must be wholly beyond our con.
trol. In an hour that we think not, the Son of Man cometh, and the time and the anode of our dissolution are not
set down in any horoscope that we can read. Yet generally men may have warning when their time has come, and
they always should have warning when friends can give it,
that the last hour may not be lost to charity and faith.
Surely as civilization becomes Christian, and deeds of
violence cease, death approaches with gentler step, and
sends more reliable word of his coming. The views and
habits that we usually cherish, will in great part decide
our temper and bearing in his presence, and in this as in
every emergency, the true character will be likely to show
itself. If it is not always true, that the ruling passion is
strong in death, and the brave are sometimes timid, and
the timid are sometimes brave in the last conflict, it is
true that the ruling principle may be expected then to
show itself when disguises fail. It is not best to insist
much upon the importance of appearing well, since if it
is well with the soul the bearing cannot be otherwise. Yet
there is a natural self-respect, which may justly move a
man to give honorable testimony of his convictions, and
fold his mantle in peace around him as he falls. The noble
wishes to die with a dignity worthy his name, and the same
instinct appears in the poorest laborer. Old Siward, the
Northumbrian, cried out from his death-bed to be clothed
in mail, and armed with his sword and battle-axe, that he
might die like a brave soldier; and we have accounts from
the survivors of the English war ship Centaur, that many 
DEATH.
of the crew who had labored incessantly during days of
cruel suspense, attired themselves in their best clothes,
when assured that the sea must be their grave. Apollo dorus carried to Socrates a cloak and tunic of fine wool
for his dying dress, and Mary of Scotland, and Charles
of England, went to the scaffold in their stateliest array.
Such externals a Christian man may think little of, yet he
will not be indifferent what witness he leaves behind him
as he goes from the world. I have known a circle of
friends who formed themselves into a society to pray for a
happy death, but no such narrow society is needed, since
every true prayer spoken or unspoken has the same aim,
and every church is virtually such a circle.
In all simplicity and truth, in all tenderness and wisdom, we should pray to meet the last hour. Away with
the hard stoicism that is ashamed of every natural sensibility-away with the ghostly cant that presumes to scorn
this earth which God has made, and to hurry the approach
of the fatal messenger. Let the soul be wholly honest
and true at the last hour of its earthly witness. While
life lasts, it is not without great blessings to every sane
mind. We read that during the prevalence of a malignant fever, a venerable minister found an old man sick
with the disease in a subterranean stable among rags,
without any other furniture than two saws and a hatchet,
which he could no longer wield.  "Courage, my friend,"
said the priest; "God is about to show you favor to-day,
for you will leave a world where you have known nothing
but troubles." "What troubles?" answered the dying
245 
MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
man, with feeble voice.  "You are mistaken; I have lived
very content, nor have I ever complained of my lot. God
be praised for having given me life, and for closing my
days, that I may join him. I feel the moment-it has
come, father, adieu!" Let us, who are so much more favored, be not less grateful. Be not afraid to say, that
there is much in this life worth living for, and that the
eye is to close upon blessed privileges, precious friends,
glorious works of God and man. Let the regret not sink
into repining at the good we leave, but rather rise into
gratitude that we have enjoyed it so long. Let life come
before us in solemn review, and all its mercies unite their
testimony in praise of that sovereign love that has watched
over us, and is to watch over us still.
In that love we can, if we will, be strong, and strengthen others. It is our only dependence then, for however
wise or affectionate our friends may be, they cannot go
with us where we then are going, and there will be a sad
sense of loneliness and desertion, if we cannot lean upon
one who can and will go with us, and will make the dark
valley light with the glory of his presence. Humbly, yet
earnestly, in lowly confidence rest upon the everlasting
arm-contemplate Jesus as he was on earth, and as he is
ow with God-seek the Father in him, and him in the
Father, and our dying whisper may swell with its feeble
breath the strain that in every age has repeated the apos
tle's jubilee: "Thanks be unto God, who giveth us the
victory through our Lord Jesus Christ."
The experience of mankind is after all a secret histo.
246 
DEATH.
ry, and every day's sunshine falls upon scenes of faith and
sacrifice that the world knows not of. The great emer gencies of nations do but call out reserved powers, always
alive in obscurer scenes. How touching is that passage
of the Reign of Terror, when the sisters of a religious
house went to their death calmly, singing praises to God,
and the hymn became fainter, not sadder, as each voice
was silenced by the axe, until the Superior alone contin ued the strain, and the infuriated mob were awed by her
tone whilst it lasted, and appalled by its pausing, when the
slaughter was complete. Yet without the magic of such
common sympathy, and the inspiration of such historic
heroism, many a lonely sufferer lifts the voice of praise
and prayer as bravely as that army of martyrs, and as acceptably to God. Every hour multitudes are passing
away, whose last thoughts are not for themselves, but for
those whom God has committed to their charge. This
parting, and not physical pain, gives death a sting to the
Christian. Probably most persons suffer far more many
times during life, than in the pains of dissolution. Hunter, the celebrated physician, so long observant of others,
turned to a friend during his own dissolution, and said:
' If I had strength to hold a pen, I would write how easy
and how pleasing a thing it is to die." Not pain of body,
but of mind, may be the sting of death to a soul whose
sin is forgiven, and to whom  life has ties all the closer,
because of the love cherished, and the sacrifice made. In
a way that we know not, God can take away the sting, and
his goodness, which suits its ministry to each season of
247 
248       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
our being, will not leave us desolate at the last hour. In
Him put our trust.
Thus we meditate upon death as a fact, as an event to
be prepared for, and as a trial to be met. It implies a
morbid state of mind always to be haunted by its presence, and to have our pleasure dashed, and our enterprise
enfeebled by its spectral vision. Yet it is equally morbid
to try to shut out the thought, and to live as if this world
were all. Let death teach us wisdom, and give us peace
and power too. Let it show the pleasures and cares of
the world in their true proportions, and rebuke our vain
strifes and anxieties. Let it calm all the fever of our
passions, by the promise of its rest, and stir the best energies of our being by its limit to our labor, and its crown
to our fidelity.
Learn to live as if we were to die, and we shall die as
if we were to live the life eternal. 
AIX 
" In legitimacy of conclusion, strong and unexceptionable Is the argument from
Universality of belief, for the continuance of our personal being after death.
The Bull-calf butts with smooth and unarmed brow. Throughout animated Nature, of each characteristic organ and faculty there exists a pre-assurance, an instinctive and practical anticipation; and no pre-assurance common to a whole species, does in any instance prove delusive."
COLERIDGE.
" And lo I above the dews of night
The vesper star appears
So faith lights up the mourner's heart,
Whose eyes are dim with tears
"Night falls, but soon the morning light
Its glories shall restore;
And thus the eyes that sleep in death
Shall wake to close no more."
W. B. O. PEABODY. 
IMMORTALITY AS FACT.
OUR life, whilst we are on earth, is of itself a fact far
greater than any of our opinions about it; and every
thoughtful man, as he reflects upon his own experience and
consciousness, upon what he has felt and thought and done,
is more and more convinced that his being is, after all,
a mystery constantly surprising him with its developments.
We have been surveying the Circle of Life from birth to
the grave; and has not the feeling been growing within us
that each season brings with it a revelation of ourselves,
of that interior self which we can never exhaust, and
which passes our understanding, however much we may
try to understand it? So striking has this truth been to
some of the chief thinkers of our race, that they have supposed our whole life to be but a remembrance of a pre-existent state, and that all our new notions are but the old
ideas revived. Wiser far it is to interpret the progressive
development of our being here as promise of more perfect
development hereafter, and to regard the fact of the pres 
252       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
ent life as no less mysterious than the fact of futurity
Who will review his own career, and say that it is more
strange that he should live hereafter, than it is that he has
lived here? Does not our whole existence in its successive
stages tend forward still, and does not the hope that lights
the grave begin at the cradle, and gather brightness as the
years increase?
Of the Future Life, we treat in this meditation: —
the Fact, the Form of the Fact, the Appreciation of the
Fact.
The Fact of the Future Life-how do we prove it, by
what class of evidence or method of argument? Every
thinking man has many a time exercised his mind upon
the subject; and our philosophers, from Pythagoras downward, have been piling up volumes of high discourse on
the immortality of the soul. Yet who of us does not see,
that the fact is far deeper than all reasoning about it, and
that its roots are not touched by the critic's pruning-knife
or the logician's spade? The fact is part of the organic
being, and the providential training of the human race,
standing among those first truths which have their best
evidences in themselves. Try to prove it logically, and
still the best proof is better than our logic; try to disprove it logically, and our chain of reasoning refutes itself
when touched by living experience, as the iron rod which
man lifts against heaven, becomes a conductor for the
divine spark.
More or less clearly the truth of immortality has al 
IMMORTALITY AS FACT.
ways been held by man, and the peculiarity of the Chris tian religion was not so much in stating it as an abstract
idea, as in bringing it into full light and true life. The
fact of Christianity itself is therefore the fact of the im mortal life, since Christianity accepts all the light of Na ture, and concentrates all other proof in its own divine
witness. Does any one ask, how Jesus proves the doc trine of immortality, and to what class of evidence we
assign most value, the evidence of miracle, or of reasoning,
or of inspiration? we reply that we can make no such dis tinctions, that Christianity is to us a living whole in Christ
himself, and the gospel is in every part the glad tidings of
eternal life, as truly as there is clearness in every part of
a diamond, and attraction in every fragment of a magnet.
To Jesus Christ it was given to present our humanity in
its perfect state and true destiny. In him the soul has
its true consciousness of God and immortality. His own
life, in such communion with the Father, was and is the
living proof of the gospel. He spake with authority, and
not as a scribe. Go to him as he asks us to do, and we
learn of him the fact of eternal life. That life was in him
a conscious possession, and it went out in all his words
a-d Works; was sealed by his death, and crowned by his
rising body and the descending Paraclete. I will never
attempt to prove the future state from the gospel, until I
attempt to prove that the sun is bright, or that the blossoms of spring are promise of the fruits of autumn.   I
accept Christianity as the central fact of God's providence;
and instead of trying its doctrine of futurity by less evi
2 5',-D 
254       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
dence, I would use the greater to confirm  the less, and rejoice to see every deep yearning of the soul and every
generous aspiration of the mind, and every sacred lesson of nature so met and fulfilled in him, who is the Resurrection and the Life.
Sit at the feet of the great teacher, and straightway all
other worthy teaching becomes luminous. The analogies
of nature, interpreted by him, illustrate God's plan for
the soul's welfare, and up the ascending scale of natural
transformations we trace the way to the spiritual world.
The metaphysical argument from the very being of the
spirit has new force, when by the Word of Christ that
spirit comes into clearer consciousness, and experience becomes the heart of reasoning. The moral argument drawn
from the survey of life as a discipline under Divine Providence, and requiring retributions here and hereafter, is
taken by him out of the region of speculation, and speaks
as with the trumpet of judgment in every serious Christian conscience. So in the fact of Christianity, all other
evidences of the fact of immortality have their consummation; and the life of Christ, whenever truly discerned, is
the light of men.
In him the Father's purposes shine forth as clearly as
does the perfection of our humanity.   He  is the living
proof, that God has created at least one order of beings to
receive his favor and to glorify his goodness, not solely
within the limits of earthly existence, but through life
eternal. So in Christ, the mind of God and the needs of
mankind, combine their testimony to the fact of futurity. 
IMMORTALITY AS FACT.
The question now comes as to the form of the fact,
Paul stated well what all have asked or thought, when he
said, "How are the dead raised up, and with what body do
they come?" The answer may be satisfactory without being
specific upon every point, since even in the near realities
of this present world, we are not allowed to see precisely
the form of the future until it comes, and every man's fortune and mental development show results that are a surprise to himself. As we do not presume to know all about
our appearance and destiny hereafter on earth, we cannot
expect to know all about the future of the soul and its position hereafter.   Enough,  however,  we  may  know  to
silence denial, and to confirm faith by rational anticipations as to the two chief points-the future person of man,
and the sphere of his existence, or the spiritual being and
home.
All existence of which we have any knowledge has
some form; and God himself, although his essence is infinite, and therefore indefinable, manifests himself through
the various forms of creation, and especially through his
Son. He made man in his own image, and gave the
human body a form corresponding with the faculties of the
mind. What form the soul within us has to the All-discerning eye, we cannot say, without claiming his attributes; but we have reason to believe that it has either
some form, or the capacity of developing such. There is a
natural body and a spiritual body, says the apostle, and
the sages of the world have said the same. Why not follow at once the Word of Inspiration and the hint of na
255 
MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
ture, and believe that the soul bears the germ of the spirit
ual body, which, after death, is to be developed in accordance with the nature of its faculties, and the elements of
its future sphere, by the power of God? Accept this view,
and we shun two extreme errors; we are saved from the
pantheism which asserts immortality only in name, and destroys all personal identity by merging man's being in
God's infinitude; we are saved also from the materialism
that knows no future existence apart from this present
bodily fabric, and places all hope of immortality solely
upon the resurrection of the body. So man is secure of
personality without sinking into materialism, and has hope
of a future that shall continue his conscious existence
without continuing his physical limitations. The form of
the spiritual body is a subject fairly within the domain of
philosophical analogy, but does not belong to the positive
ground of Christian faith.
The idea of continued personal existence raises the
question, where-or what is the place of future abode?
Where is the world of spirits? That there is a world to
us invisible, is as obvious as that there are beings to us
invisible. God is every where, yet we do not see him.
Christ and the spirits in fellowship with him, still live,
yet we do not see their abode. Our Saviour, when on
earth, had communion with heaven; yet the everlasting
gates were not revealed to the eye, nor was the undying
anthem heard by the ear. Where then is the spiritual
world? It is quite enough to say, in answer to all infidel
denials of a spiritual state, that we see but a small portion
256 
IMMORTALITY AS FACT.
of the universe with our senses, and that the portion of it
most important to us here, the domain of our thoughts and
emotions, we perceive not by the senses, but by our con
sciousness. The finer and more powerful elements of
nature are least tangible; and such forces as electricity,
magnetism, and the odic current, are so subtile and mysterious, as to seem transitional elements, between the material and the spiritual worlds.   It is enough to disarm
such gross infidelity to affirm that nature, instead of denying, gives analogies in favor of a spiritual world, which
must be the interior life of the universe, as the soul is the
interior life of the body.
This analogy has been developed with great fulness by
various philosophical writers in all ages, and by none with
so much system and persuasiveness as by Swedenborg. In
him we see the universe exhibited as the external of the
spiritual world, all the orbs of creation having their invisible atmosphere of life, each having its own heaven, and
God being the sun and centre of all.   Isaac Taylor has
comprehended all theories of the spiritual world within three
classes. The first of these makes out the home of souls to
be within the present visible world, upon some purer
planets or central suns. The second regards the spiritua
world as all around us, and pervading all existence, espe
cially surrounding every orb. The third theory regards
the home of the soul as to be provided by a transformation of the visible universe into a more glorious creation,
or by the end of this world, in order to the rise of a new
creation, with new elements, and new and higher expres
257 
MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
sions of omnipotence and intelligence.   These  theories
show possibilities, and may develope probabilities. However wanting in positive proof either of them, or any combination of them may be, they present analogies for the
service of faith, and show the folly as well as the sin of
the godless view of the universe that denies the soul a
lasting home in some mansions of the Heavenly Father.
So then we speak of the form of the fact of the future
state, affirming the continuance of personal consciousness
with such organism as God may give, and in a sphere of
being provided by him, and we leave the particulars alike
of the spiritual body and the invisible world in the region
of pious contemplation and scientific analogy.
To bring the whole subject down from the abstract to
the practical, let us now look at it for ourselves, and speak
of our just appreciation of the fact of futurity; not of the
future state as a motive, for that will occupy a paper by
itself, but of the way to make the fact a reality to us. If
a man die, shall he live again? In our creed, and with
our best convictions, we say with more than the patriarch's
light, yes, he shall live again; and sometimes to us, as
worldly as we are, the unseen world is the reality, and this
earth is but the shadow. But generally it is not so, and
we live as if immortality were a fancy, and heaven a fond
dream. How shall we rebuke such worldliness, and make
futurity an ever-present fact?
How do it except by treating it as a fact in our conduct, until it shall make itself a fact to us by its spirit?
25,8 
IMMORTALITY AS FACT.
Work and wait. As we work for the true aim, that aim
shall be clearer; and as we wait upon a heavenly power,
that power shall draw ever nearer.
Work as under the divine kingdom, and its reality will
constantly grow upon us Does not all faithful earthly
service illustrate the worth of religious obedience?  Upon
the stormy ocean, with death upon the waves and mutiny
in his fleet, Columbus was true to his noble queen, and hermajestic smile was then as near to his sense as when he
knelt before her a poor suppliant repelled in scorn from
other courts. In dark times, with cold and famine in his
camp, with murmuring among his countrymen, and the
threat of a traitor's doom from the repudiated throne, our
Washington kept his allegiance to his country, and her
approving countenance was as clear to him as when he laid
his sword at her feet, and took the oath of fidelity as the
chief magistrate of her constitutional law. Even so in our
relations to the Divine Sovereign and the spiritual world,
every act of obedience fixes the attention, and clears the
vision. Working for the life eternal quickens the faith
which is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of
things not seen.
And the more we work, the more reverently we wait;
for much as we may do to make heaven near, we only put
ourselves in a position to allow its spirit to approach us.
We knock at the gate, that it may be opened to us. There
is a life which we do not form, but which we can only re.
ceive. That divine life was manifest in Christ in its fulness; and its influence, through him and all means of
259 
MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
grace, still flows through all worthy faith, affection, work
and prayer, into the souls of men. We live not by bread
alone, but by every word that proceedeth from the mouth
of God.  That Word is proceeding still from the Infinite
Wisdom and Goodness, still from the heavenly world and
the eternal throne.  Receive it; receive it by every receptacle in our spiritual nature, by all thought, feeling, fideliity, devotion, and the life of God and heaven within our
souls shall interpret Christ's saying, " As I live, ye shall
live also."
Futurityeternity-is  not the thought too glorious
to be cherished by our poor nature? There is not presumption, but humility in the faith. In lowliness we
most truly secure the good of the present life, and the
mind is exalted by adoration of him who lights the earth
for our path and fills it with plenty.' We live now only as
we receive his bounty. So live the life eternal; and even
now, accepting God's free Spirit, we may pass from death
unto life. Reverently accept it. If we feel a reverent
and lowly gratitude when we lift our eye to the heavens,
and know that the gentle ray which touches so benignly
its delicate nerve has been on the way from its remote star
ages before man came into being, more reverent and lowly
be our gratitude when the soul's vision is touched by th
light uncreated, and the God who has filled the visible
world with his bounty, opens to us the glory of his unseen
and eternal home.
"This world I deem
But a beautiful dream,
Of shadows which are not what they seem:
260 
IMMORTALITY AS FACT.
Where visions rise,
Giving dim surmise,
Of the things that shall meet our waking eyes.
"But could I see,
As in truth they be,
The glories of Heaven that encompass me;
I should lightly hold
The tissued fold
Of that marvellous curtain of blue and gold.
"Soon the whole,
Like a parched scroll,
Shall before my amazed sight uproll;
And without a screen,
At one burst be seenThe presence wherein I've ever beene
261  
14!1tR 5vWIIVAOM
'AX 
Eternity! Eternity!
How long alt thou, Eternity!
Yet onward still to thee we speed,
As to the fight the impl)atient steed,
As ship to port or shaft from bow,
Or swift as couriers. )'meward go.
Mark well, 0 man, Eternity.
Eternity! Eternity 
'drw long art thou, Eternity!
As in a ball's concentric round
Nor starting point nor end is found.
So thou, Eternity, so vast,
No entrance and no exit hast.
Mark well, 0 man, Eternity.
TERSTEEGEN.  Translated by C. T. Brooks 
IMMORTALITY AS MOTIVE.
TuERE are some passages of our career in which the fact
of the future state comes out from its shadowy mystery,
and startles us with its solemn reality. A thoughtful
man cannot enter upon any momentous enterprise without
some intimations of the bearing of his conduct upon his
spiritual welfare, and no man who has not wholly imbruted his soul by beastly sensuality, can do a marked wrong
without some instinctive sense of the judgment to come.
Over all the mile stones of our journey, stands the majestic presence of Eternity, like the mighty heavens, while
lights and.shades are the emblems of its decrees. Fully
convinced as we may be of the fact of the future state,
we may fail, however, even by the very greatness of the
fact, to feel its power duly as a motive. The spiritual
world is too often allowed to remain at a vast distance, a
magnificent, but very remote reality, like that starry way
above our heads, milky in color from the dim light of un          12 
266       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
numbered suns, whose whole radiance thus beheld, gives
us less guidance than a lamp in the street through which
we walk, or a taper in the chamber of our vigils. No
small portion of the thought and labor of theologians has
turned upon this very point, and of old and of late the
great question has been, how most effectively to bring the
powers of the world to come to bear upon the present life.
The old priesthoods and the new radicalisms have had the
same end in view. Whether by prayers over the mystical
wafer, or by manipulations in the mesmeric circle, they
have tried to call forth spirits from the vasty deep, and
prove each in their own way, that human life opens into
the unseen spheres. The ages of faith have not passed,
change as they may in the character of their faith. There
is faith enough in every living heart, to give great interest
to the inquiry how ought a reasonable person to live in
view of the fact of the future existence? This is our
topic now-the Future Life as a Motive, or more particu
larly,
The Reality of the Motive,-the Nature of the Mo.
tive,-the Urgency of the Motive.
The Reality of the Motive!  How can the Immortal
Life be a fact without becoming a motive? It cannot be,
unless the future life be so disconnected from the present,
as to exclude the very idea of any influence proceeding
from our actions and character here into our lot hereafter.
Even supposing such total disconnection, and regarding
the resurrection merely as a physical change, without any 
IMMORTALITY AS MOTIVE.
moral accountableness, like the transformation of a creeping worm into a winged moth, without the transmission of
conscious identity, the change, if it could be foreseen, could
not be contemplated without great interest, although in
that case the chief motive would be in the mind of God,
the active agent, and not in man, the passive subject of the
transformation. That ultra form of theological doctrine,
which comes very near this belief, and which looks to the
fact of the resurrection, to make all men at once holy and
happy, without respect to their character in this life, does
not wholly exclude the idea of motive from its creed, since
its champions maintain that the prospect of such boundless
joy, and the conviction of such infinite love must needs
subdue repining, and awaken gratitude and obedience.
But take what we regard as the Christian view of the future state, in connection with the present life, and the fact
of a conscious and responsible continuance of being, is the
motive that crowns every other, and subjects all aims to
the one master aim.
The very nature of things leads us to believe that our
future in all its extent, hereafter as well as here, must depend upon our conduct as truly as upon God's power.
There is something in conscience itself which declares the
eternal sacredness of the right, and bids us accept it for
our present and future trust. The very sense of personal
identity moreover implies such continuance of personality
hereafter, as to connect the mind here with the mind hereafter, by a bond which God himself cannot break without
breaking his promise of a personal immortality.  Allow
267 
MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
as much as we may for the regenerating power of divine
grace here and hereafter, the individual's own will is not
destroyed, and the responsibility of its own acts still re
mains. So obvious is this truth becoming, and so import
ant is it to every earnest appeal to men, that it is finding
favor with the sects once inclined to deny it, and those
two extreme classes of dogmatists, those who maintained
on the one hand, that some are to be saved and some to
be lost hereafter, without reference to their works, and
those who maintained on the other hand, that all are to be
saved without retribution hereafter, without reference to
their works, are disappearing; and the leaders of both these
extreme sects are preaching moral accountableness here
and hereafter.
The Bible is very clear upon the point, and from beginning to end it holds man responsible for the deeds done
in the body. In the Old Testament, the fact of the spiritual world is less distinctly set forth, yet is constantly
implied, and although often identified with the continued
national existence of the Jewish people on earth, the accountableness of each man in the future is declared perhaps all the more powerfully to a sensuous and ignorant
people, by being associated with such temporal and material imagery. But when we come to the Divine Teacher
himself, we find every word and act imbued with the doctrine of responsibility to the heavenly throne and the unseen world. All the parables in their visible figures, and
all the discourses in their spiritual truths, rest upon futurity as the great fact and the great motive. There is in
268 
IMMORTALITY AS MOTIVE.
the very mien of our Saviour a solemnity like the majestic shadow of the coming judgment: there is in his tone
a deep authority that speaks of justice as well as mercy,
and holds all men accountable for their talents, whether
many or few. Say if we will, that most of his declarations regarding future judgment are figurative expressions
borrowed from temporal affairs, and therefore not to be
applied to the future state; does not the same shallow
reasoning apply equally as well to the promises of peace
and blessing hereafter, and destroy the motive of grateful
hope as well as that of rational fear? Reject from the
Bible as merely figurative, and not referring to the future
state all material imagery, and we take the life out of the
whole book; we have the body without the spirit, the blue
sky without the eternal heaven. In the most expressive
imagery, borrowed from external objects, as well as conveyed in direct and unequivocal words, our Saviour declares the accountableness of man to God for his deeds.
His very mission to save men from sin, implies the doom
of sin unrepented of, and his condemnation of wickedness
around him, in its very tone, proves that he distinguished
between guilt and misfortune, and in God's own name arraigns the transgressor.  Nay his most gracious offers of
privilege, his call to men to receive eternal life, have a
startling earnestness about them, which proves that men
have a part of their own to perform, and what is offered in
mercy must be received by fidelity.
On the ground of reason and revelation then, there is
269 
270       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
reality in the motive drawn from the future state, and we
are solemnly called of God to live in view of the world to
come. We proceed now to inquire into the nature of that
motive.
We cannot take the course so prevalent, and regard
this motive as very different in kind from all other good
motives. Much less can we contrast the present and the
future state so sharply as to consider contempt for this
earth, as in itself any preparation for heaven. We cannot
regard the spiritual life as demanding a nurture essentially
dilferent from the nurture of all pure affections, nor can
we believe that salvation means any thing much more mysterious in kind than the true health and peace of mind,
which we may begin to know here. We do not believe in
the mere ritualist, who hangs the whole of our hope upon
receiving a consecrated wafer, which has become heavenly
food under his hands, nor are we persuaded by the extreme dogmatists of a now very limited class, to rest our
only hope upon the transfer of an innocent sufferer's merit
to our account, without any reception of that spiritual life
which is the reconciling and the atoning gift. We do not
cherish the best of our earthly affections by such means;
we do!rot recognize God's present love, nor nurture pious
gratitude by such means. As pure mind and heart must
be essentially the same in all worlds, we are moved to judge
of God's nearer presence by what he shows of himself
now, and of true life hereafter, by the truest life here.
The plainest sense, and the most direct philosophical argument from the very essence of mind, would lead us to 
IMMORTALITY AS MOTIVE.
this view of the nature of the motive. Is not this view
wholly confirmed by the example and word of Jesus?
What can be more clear than that Jesus came and
labored, and died and rose to throw open the spiritual
world to the affections and practical use of mankind. The
Heavenly Father whom he reveals, is the God whom our
own hearts yearn for. The divine life which he lived is
the consummation of our highest ideas of what is good and
pure, true and lovely. He won the hearts of his disciples
to himself by imbuing their devout reverence with the tenderest affection, and when he went away from them, he
tried to have them continue in the same feeling towards
him, just as if he, their friend and Redeemer, were with
them still, and heaven were but the completion of their
earthly fellowship. Mark his words and bearing at the
most solemn moments of illumination-as at the Transfiguration, when souls departed came from the unseen state
and stood by his side-or as at the table of communion,
when he desired that he might be always remembered there
even as when with them in the body;-note the words of
the Cross, in which with his dying breath he so tenderly
commended his mother to his beloved disciple's carenote his bearing after the resurrection, when, notwith
standing the mysterious change that was transforming his
body, he kept the same heart for his friends, and said,
"peace be with you," to his disciples, and called to the
true-hearted woman who had followed him to death,
" Mary," and  drew that reply  " My  Master," which
proved that the heart is essentially the same in both
271 
272       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
worlds, and its best affections have truest life beyond the
grave. Nay, more; that witness of Jesus gaining strength
and beauty in all ages; that promised Spirit, which men
call Comforter, given in his name, what has it been doing,
but always testifying of the community of life between
the two worlds, calling men to follow the gospel of love,
and win peace unspeakable by all worthy affections and
faithful obedience?
Christ then joins his word with the evidence of our
reason, to prove that the motive to be drawn from the
future state resembles in kind, however it may differ in degree, from the motives that give the present life its purest
peace and joy.
So obvious and practical in its nature, is not the urgency of the motive clear? Our plainest reasoning, our conscience, our honor, our affections, move us to live for the
future, whilst we are in this world; and what greater
madness can there be, than to shut from our view the infinite future beyond?  Shut it not from view;  but like
practical Christian men, give attention to its solemn interests.
Is there any thing to fear in the developments of futurity? Yes, much to fear, although there should be more
to love-much to fear, unless we can, by true life, rise
above fear into love. True to the gospel and to the Christian consciousness in all ages, we must preach the retribution of God against all evil doers. There is judgment
against the wicked, although he may escape the penalty 
IMMORTALITY AS MOTIVE.
of human laws, or drug remorse to sleep by vicious arts
and excesses. He who oppresses the feeble, robs the poor,
despises the widow and orphan, watches in order to ruin
the innocent, pampers his passions on human misery, train ples upon God's image in man, or profanes God's name
and word, shall not go unpunished. There is terror in
God's majesty for the wilful offender, and fear is most
salutary when it wakens penitence, and so inflames the
love which alone can east out fear.   Among  men not
wilful offenders, there is a chastened fear of God which
always remains after the fear that hath torment departs;
a devout awe in view of the Almighty, and All Holy One,
a shrinking from the very thought of arraigning his goodness or slighting his law, a godly fear that clears the very
fire of love from its clogs and ashes. Let no man be
ashamed to say that he fears God, for the fear of the Lord
is the beginning of wisdom. Fear him if we are doing
wrong, because we offend the very love that is trying to
bless us, and which wounds us to reclaim us from transgression.   Fear him if we are trying to do right, for he
whom we serve is not our equal, although we call him
Father; and our loyalty cannot be true, unless its very
love be mingled with reverent awe which leads our loftiest
virtue to bow with trembling before the mercy-seat.
Such fear is the minister of that sacred love, the crowning motive flowing from the spiritual world. God is love,
and we are prepared for his presence the more we partake
of that which is the essence of his being.  Here the glory
of Christianity opens upon us who believe that the whole
I, )*
273 
274       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
of life should rest upon a spiritual basis, and that heaven
opens around and within us now whenever we practically
accept God's love, and breathe it into all the uses of our
sphere. True heavenly-mindedness only can interpret the
real urgency of the motive flowing from the unseen realm
where God dwells, and where the spirits of the just are
with him. He that seeks this frame of mind cannot be
proud, cannot arrogate aught of the blessing to his own
personal merit. His highest joy is in being willing to receive what God so freely gives.  He does not presume to
originate or create that sacred fire which inflames every
worthy affection, or that heavenly water which refreshes
the soul's inmost life. His best faculties are to him but
receptacles of blessing; and the more deeply he enters
into heavenly peace, the more he adores the might of
heavenly love.   Over  the retributions of God, he acknowledges the rule of the Divine goodness, and he cannot
but believe that there is a love deeper than any abyss of
woe.
Who does not sometimes feel the force of this motive,
and oftener deplore its absence? Is it true that God has
created us in his image, and called us to live in his love
and truth, and sends out precious influence to win us and
keep us within his kingdom? Then what manner of persons ought we to be? What becomes of our petty pride
and insatiate vanity, our repining, our petulance, if we
will but recollect ourselves, and cherish the sweet temper
and friendly service proper for the subjects of a divine
kingdom! What becomes of our poor selfishness, if we 
IMMIIORTALITY AS MOTIVE.
bear in mind the bounty that has blessed us with enjoy,
ment and hope! The faith, which is the substance of
things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen, instead
of being a ghostly spectre, horrifying us with sepulchral
terrors, becomes a cheering, benign angel of God, throwing
over all our labor and trial and joy here the light of ife
eternal. Such words, indeed, shame our unworthy living,
and it may seem presuming even to speak them. But
frail as we are, are we ready to abjure all part even now
in the power that comes from the unseen world, and to
shut the everlasting gates that open more blessings than
we can number to us and the children of men? No. We
will not part with our birthright. Strive and pray for
greater fidelity-for more of that true spirituality which is
at once practical and devout-which makes life strong and
beautiful as it brings heaven near-which moves men to
be heartier and braver as they are wiser and purer-which
translates all prayer into action, and all action into prayer,
that God's will may be done on earth as in heaven.
Here, readers, we approach the close of our course of
thought on the Circle of Life, which has occupied us in
most of these pages. Circle we call it, because it begins
and ends in God's Providence, and the same great events
are constantly recurring. Yet strictly speaking, nothing
returns to its beginning, and the path marked out for us
by our Creator is towards infinite progression. Forward
in time we are tending, pilgrims of a countless multitude,
most of whom have gone from sight into the unseen world.
If we are alive to true humanity, our heart must beat in
275 
276      MAiLE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
sympathy with the vaster humanity that now lives beyond
the grave-if we are alive to friendship, its holiest affections cannot fail to have some cherished objects there-if
we are alive to God and the Beloved of God, we shall feel
the attraction of their hallowed presence-chamber within
the veil. Along the advancing ranks, from the unseen
portion of the company to the portion at our side, living
influence even now comes to us and bids us beware of all
unfaithfulness, and enter into life eternaL 
qe
5
m
tr;I
U-3 
Mine be Sion's habitation,
Sion, David's sure foundation:
Form'd of old by ligbt's CREATOR,
Reach'd by Him the MEDIATOR.
Peace there dwelleth uninvaded,
Spring perpetual, light unfaded:
Odors rise with airy lightness;
HIarpers strike their harps with brightness;
None one sigh fwr pi Asure sendeth;
None can err, and none offendeth;
All partakers of one nature,
Grow, JURIST to equal stature.
Home celestial! Home eternal I
Home uprear'd by power Supernal! I
Home, no change or loss that fearest,
From afar my soul thou cheerest;
Thee it seeketh, thee requireth,
Thee affecteth, thee desiretho
Grant me, Saviour, with thy Blessed
Of thy Rest to be possessed,
And, amid the joys it bringeth.
Sing the song that none else singeth.
HILDEBERT, A. D. 1133 Translated by Neale 
HOME EVERMORE.
IN our meditation upon Immortality as a Motive, I spoke
of the influence coming from the vast array of Humanity,
that has passed into the spiritual world. We give the
whole of this meditation to a fuller consideration of the
subject. God himself is ever bringing it near to our affections, by removing our own companions by the way to
the eternal spheres, and thus planting the amaranths of
immortality among the decaying flowers that bloom along
our path, and climb upon our Mile Stones.
When a tyrant ruled the land, and the march of his
minions was wet with the blood of the faithful, the
thoughts of the early Christians turned gladly towards
the eternal throne, comforted indeed as they contemplated
the great multitude who had passed from the trials of
earth to the triumphs of heaven. Not to that primitive
age, nor to such tribulation, has the same disposition or
the same need been confined. We are so constituted that
whether happy or sad, we cannot live wholly absorbed in
things present, nor be unmindful of the unseen world. 
280       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
Our nature forbids it. Creatures of memory and of
hope, we must in some measure remember all events and
persons who have had power over our lives, and we must
interpret the future somewhat in the light of the past the present hour cheered or darkened by the things that
have been or promise to be. A man may try to stifle the
disposition, or hide the need of living above the present,
by cutting himself off from all human associations, or by
drowning his thought in the deluge of worldly cares. Yet
even in the lonely wilderness, the solitary is still haunted
by the faces that he has known, and they that have gone
from the world to the unseen land, seem to hover around
him, and things unseen become the greatest of realities to
him. Hle too who seems engrossed with the pressure of
secular affairs, has his part in the invisible. He is driven
on in his career by a force of habit or association, whose
origin is among things invisible: he is attracted by visions of future success or ease, which have not and may
never have any visible fulfilment. Nay, the mightiest
men of action have been possessed by some dominant principle or influence entirely beyond themselves or their position. The Alexanders and Napoleons have been influenced by historic examples, that live only in the intellectual horizon. Better counselled, better cheered, the heroes of Christian history have lived and labored, as surrounded by heavenly presence, as members of a family
part on earth, part in heaven.   Every true household
shows the working of the same spirit, and we look upon
all as belonging to our home, and as having relations with 
HOME EVERMORE.
us now, who have been taken from our side, and -called to
the unseen mansions.
What nature craves, the gospel sanctions and teaches.
Our Saviour revealed the eternal world as the soul's true
home. They that were with him, and who lived after him,
rejoiced in that heavenly household to which he called
them, and deemed it a breach of faith for any Christians
to be as strangers and aliens in that spiritual commonwealth opened to their love and communion.
What nature thus craves and the gospel urges, the
Christian Church has never failed in some measure to recognize. There may have been, there doubtless was, much
narrowness in the ideas held concerning the spiritual
world, and the claims to its blessings. Yet what beauty
alike among the lowly and the strong, in the cottage and
the church, what beauty and power too have been given to
human life, from its associations with the heavenly company on high. Indeed there are few occasions in which a
Protestant feels himself more disposed to fall in with the
spirit of the Ancient Church, than in respect to the festivals which open this month of November, in which we
are now writing.  The Ancient Mother, in many things so
stern and ungenial, seems quite winning and amiable, as
she calls her children to close the ecclesiastical year with
the feasts of All Saints and All Souls. We cannot ask
the Saints to intercede for us, nor are we taught to pray
for the souls of the faithful who have gone from the earth.
Yet to us not without instruction, comfort, and incentive, is
our thought of the heavenly company who have gone to
281 
282       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
their rest, left to us their example, and call us to their fellowship.
We need to think of them surely, and the thought
which meets this need cannot but have power, great power
over us. Consider its influence first in enlarging and elevating our views. That great multitude not to be numbered, of all nations, kindreds, people, tongues, around
the eternal throne!  Meditate upon them, and how can we
have a bigot's creed or a worldling's scorn? All exclusive nationality, clanship, caste, speech, there disappear, or
if any traces of their influence remain, they remain only
to add to the beauty of that divine union in a harmony
more perfect from its unity of spirit in diversity of gifts.
The feuds of sect, often more bitter than those of nation
or clan, are not found there. The various kindreds and
tongues that divide the theological world, do not convene
their councils or prepare their anathemas. In one great
kindred of filial love all unite; in one language of spirit
and truth all join. There is the man of the ritual who
trusted so much in the baptismal water and the sacramental wafer to impart divine life, and whose walk was nearer
to God than any mere ritual could lead him; there, too, is
the man of the doctrine who made a secondary thing of
the outward form, and who trusted to be saved by imputed
righteousness, not, however, without earnest striving for
the righteousness which he claimed not as his own by
merit, but as of faith; there, too, is the man distrustful
of ceremony and dogma, trusting in the power of good 
HOME EVERMORE.
works, and yet by a faith working in love, saved from the
perils of a proud and superficial morality. Thus the
Churchman, the Puritan, and the liberal Christian little
inclined to take the ground of either, are there. They
stand in near companionship as they speak, not in the old
tongues of technical theology or sectarian habit, but in
the language of that heavenly grace, which is better than
the tongues of men and of angels; beyond the gift of
prophecy, the understanding of mysteries and all knowledge.
How can it be otherwise with the great communion on
high? The lives of the faithful, the word of Christ, the
nature of the eternal life, warrant our saying, To what
narrow border of Christendom, or to what great hierarchy
have those qualities been confined, that give the soul peace
and have promise of heaven? Go for the standard, not
to Papal calendars or Puritan codes of discipline, but to
the Master. We cannot acknowledge any narrow standard,
such as opens heaven to the Dunstans and Dominics, and
closes its gates against the Fenelons and the Howards of
Christendom. Do we ask who form the company of the
Blessed?  The Beatitudes are the reply, and the blessings
of the Sermon on the Mount have their consummation in
the Heavenly Zion. The meek, the merciful, the pure in
heart, the peace-makers, they and such as they, are blessed.
To what kindred or tongue, nation or people are they limited? They who were Christlike in the world, amid its
stripes and separations, shall they not be more so, nearer
the Master, nearer each other, as partial vision is enlarged,
283 
MILE STONES IN OUR L(FE-JOURNEY.
and no longer seeing through a glass darkly, they know
even as they are known? Enlarging indeed is such a contemplation, and exalting too. It has all the elevating influence coming from the study of the gifted minds who
have adorned our race, whilst it throws a divine light upon
their earthly experience, and connects the brightest pages
of human history with aims eternal, and with life in heavenly mansions. We are morally and spiritually elevated,
not so much by our labor as by the use made of our
inheritance. If we stand high it is because the toil, sufferings, virtues, wisdom of so many generations have
placed us there, and the work of ages has combined to
give us our home, our culture, our vision. Who so base
as to be willing, were the thing possible, to renounce his
share of the great heritage of humanity, his birthright in
the great domain of time-to cut off that stream of living
water that flows to him through the great channel of life,
beginning in God, and flowing through the ages, its golden
sands enriched by all that has been good, and true, and
lovely in the world? View history thus, how exalting is
the survey. How much more so when we connect its developments with the spiritual world, interpret the treasures of earth in their relations with the treasures of heaven! The wisdom that has here communed with the Divine mind, the love that has here soothed the sufferer, and
yearned to rest in God, have not died. They live, and
Cherubim and Seraphim, the angels of light and love scorn
not their presence. The lowliest virtue and the sublimest
intelligence there dwell transfigured. In one edifiee, Im
284 
HOME EVERMORE.
perial Rome gloried in gathering all the. treasures of the
world's faiths, and in the temple reared by Marcus Agrippa, collected all the symbols and idols of the dominant religions of mankind, from the monstrosities of Egyptian
superstition, to the beautiful creations of Grecian taste,
and the stately forms of Roman heroism. Alone of the
old temples that of the Pantheon has been preserved, and in
the seventh century it was dedicated to the memory of the
saintly names of the Christian church.  "The capital of
Paganism," writes Count de Maistre, "was destined to
become that of Christianity, and the temple which in this
capital concentrated all the forces of idolatry, was to unite
all the luminaries of faith." To a better, a nobler, loftier
temple even than that thus purified, the spiritual Christian
looks-even to one that gathers the faithful of all creeds,
and nations, and kindreds. Is the study of what has been
noblest in man on earth exalting? Look to the heavenly
company, and how is the view exalted, as well as enlarged?
Does intellectual greatness most win our reverence? Then behold its consummation, not its apotheosis,
but its Divine adoption: not its pride claiming to be
God, but its reverence, the more exalted as it is more
filial. Aye, genius itself, true to its sacred mission, not
groping its way in feeble reasonings, but seeing truth in
the light divine-not fashioning its conceptions of the
lovely from things perishable and fragmentary, but from
open vision of the Divine Archetype itself! Even the
genius for action is there yet in being, and in more potent
energy. For the highest action even in this world is mo
285 
286       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
ral and spiritual, and survives the body. The mind builds
the home of charity, or gathers the nations into peace and
order, before the hand touches the stone, or the arm of the
law arrests the offender. The nearer that men approach
to the Almighty will, the greater the power and the sphere
accorded to them. Not in ignoble indolence do men live
the life eternal. Theirs indeed is peace, but what peace
is so great as the serenity of earnest and harmonious action, even the peace of Him who said, "t My Father worketh hitherto and I work," the peace that beams out from
the works of the Father, and from the face of Him in
whom the Father stood revealed?
We must not dwell more upon this theme-the power
of the heavenly company to enlarge and exalt the views.
Theirs is another ministry, and one still dearer. It is to
attract and quicken the affections in part towards themselves, indeed, but none the less towards God through
themselves. The order of Providence is that the longer
we live, the larger and closer is our relation with the unseen world-the greater the company of those who have
gone from us, leaving their mark on our minds, and their
memories  in our keeping.   Poor indeed the  lot, and
wretched the spirit of him who counts friends and benefactors only among the living.  They that have gone in
peace care for us, and we ought to care for them. They
care for us, because Christ did and does; and they that
are near him are like him. Nay, is it not one of the
characteristics of a perfected mind, to care more ever even 
HOME EVERMORE.
for scenes and persons connected with its own early development? A wise man thinks more earnestly and tenderly
of his early horne, the fields of his sports, the companions
of his pastime, the parents and friends who counselled
him, than he did when he was himself a child. The more
we advance, the more we interpret and dwell upon the beginning, so that the analogies of human interest here below would seem to teach us that there is no Lethe rolling
between us and the better land, to shut the living from the
memory and regard of the departed.
But God is our teacher, and in Christ he has opened a
school for the heart which can reach depths that no human wisdom can penetrate.   Many a rough nature learns
a lesson of faith and love there, which it is sometimes too
proud to confess. God opens to our minds and hearts a
high and holy realm of contemplation, to which few are
wholly indifferent. As we contemplate that goodly conmpany, so vast, so imposing, and yet so winning in some aspects that come near to each soul, a feeling arises, half of
earthly friendship, half of heavenly communion, mingling
all that has been fairest in memory with all that is loveliest in hope; so that we cannot say as we linger whether
the power that attracts us is of man or of God, until our
fidelity unites both elements in one, and by a sacred humanity we are drawn nearer to the Father, and both loves
unite in one.
The affections are thus engaged, and so too are they
quickened. Looking thus upward, we feel the power of
all worthy examples. The life that once animated them
287 
MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
seems still to enforce them, and the annals of virtue and
devotion seem to live anew as sacred preachers cf fortitude, comforters of grief. The source of that power which
comes from communing with the faithful in the unseen
world, we need not be too anxious to analyze. How the
departed act upon us, we may not say with dogmatic certainty, until we can say with the same certainty how the living
act upon us, sometimes to lead us to God, sometimes to
sink us in sin.  Who is not willing to own a power above
the ken of a sensual philosophy, in the influence that has
come to him from those whom he no more sees in the
world? Who has not found in some sacred remembrance,
in the cherished image of some benefactor, a ministry to
his soul passing the aid of any abstract precept, passing
the range of the material understanding?   God works
upon us more and more by the ministry of the departed.
In our homes they meet us in how many influences, in the
sanctuary they speak to us often how mightily. In hymn
and gospel we hear the words of souls now departed, in
prayer and meditation we use their wisdom, and utter their
love. The ministration is more effectual, as we connect
what they have done in the world with what they are now
above the world.
We do not deem ourselves now as occupying the region
of dreamy sentiment or idle musing. Active force comes
from the thoughts we have been urging-power to cheer
and animate the will, as well as to enlarge and elevate the
views, and to engage and quicken the affections. To do
288 
HOME EVERMORE.
well the various works of life, we need to know well the
great work of life. Who shall teach us, if not they who
have done its work faithfully, and gone to their rest? As
we seek them, they come near to us, and their words live
for us, and their deeds act for us. The world's time-servers
will rot meet our want.  They may show us how to look
upon the expedients of the hour, but they know nothing of
the great and solemn interest of life.  In transient disappointments, we need associations that lead us beyond the
transient to the eternal-in present perplexity we require
counsellors, from whose spirits beams the brightness of the
eternal light. When we feel pain or sickness, we would
feel also the assurance that they bore all this and more in
peace. When we are on the verge of that gulf which to
the senses is darkness or void, shoreless, cheerless, when
things earthly are fading away, and friendly hands here
below do not help us, do we not need the solace of that
great company who  can make us feel-not alone-but
amond brethren, more in number, than we leave —Him
chief in the company who went to prepare a place for the
faithfil?  Read soberly the annals of the strong of the
earth) whether among the lowly or the illustrious, and then
say, confidently, that man is never so strong, in life or
death, as when cheered and strengthened by faith in unseen power, and communion with invisible minds.   Christ
meets the want in his promise to be with his own.  The
promise is fulfilled in all agencies that repeat his gospel
and bring the Comforter near.
Take hobme this doctrine each of us in the measure of
289 
290       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
our experience and needs. In some of the ancient church.
es, I have read that there was a beautiful custom of calling
upon the most venerable person present, to begin the service at the festival of All Saints, in remembrance of the
departed, and of varying the age of the individuals succeeding, until the last sentence was spoken by a little
child; thus expressing the great range in the ranks of the
faithful, so commemorated in summoning age and childhood to celebrate its various benefactors. Not thus in
form, but in true spirit, elders and youth respond to the
truth inculcated. In our own circle let all, from venerable age to lisping childhood, light the memorial taper to
cheer with its light the tombs of the beloved that stand
along our pathway.
How much of the influence that has made and is making us what we are, comes from the invisible company?
Let any one of mature years think of his relations with
the unseen world-think of all who have tried to help him
in word or deed, in his early home, or in his varied intercourse with the world, through books that have nourished
his soul, or deeds that have made clear his pathway. Does
he not find himself rebuked for his too habitual worldliness, and addressed by a power that is attractive, ineffably
winning even in its solemn rebuke? Is not earthly lifeI will not say despised, because of its baseness-is it not
by this spirit redeemed from its frivolity, and consecrated
anew as the gateway of heavenly mansions?
Let not youth shrink from the contemplation. In that
great and innumerable company there are those whose 
HIOME EVERMORE.
presence may win the young heart to dwell with home affection upon the unseen land, not there, alone and desolate, but among friends. In every circle, and surely among
our circle of readers there is some child who bitterly needs
such solace, to take the sting from the bereavement that
has quenched to the vision a light and love which God has
kindled in a parent's face. Life will have purity and power as that image is remembered. To how many such remembrance at once rises, perhaps of some devoted mother,
or cherished wife, or darling daughter, of whom it is not
too much to say:
"Another hand is beckoning us,
Another call is given;
And glows once more with angel steps
The path that leads to heaven.
"0, half we deem she needed not
The changing of her sphere,
To give to heaven a shining one
Who walked an angel here.
We will not leave the topic without recognizing the
stern moral which it urges by the very pathos which it
moves. Do they that pass from the world still act upon
it? Are they remembered-does their example and spirit
still speak? No man liveth to himself, or dieth to himself.  What is our example-what our spirit-how are
we living-how shall we be remembered? They in this
world, who are the happier and better because of our living in it, are witnesses that we have some hold upon the
291 
29 2      MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
higher world. Our lives may repeat the beatitudes, and
by blessing others we may win a place among the blessed.
Thus the heavenly company point a stern moral, as
they hold out a cheering hope. Power and peace meet in
their benediction and their appeal 
.i3                 t
'IIAX 
Happy those early days, when I
Shin'd in my angel-infancy I
Before I understood this place
Appointed for my second race;
Or taught my soul to fancy aught
But a white celestial thought; -
When yet I had not walked above
A mile or two from my first love;
And looking back at that short space,
Could see a glimpse of his bright face;
When on some gilded cloud or flower
My gazing soul would dwell an hour,
And in those weaker glories spy
Some shadows of eternity;
Before I taught my tongue to wound
My conscience with a sinfull sound;
Or had the black art to dispense
A several sin to every sense;
But felt through all this fleshly dress
Bright shoots of everlastingness.
O how I long to travel back
And tread again that ancient track!
That I might once more reach that plain,
Where first I left my glorious train;
From whence th' enlighten'd spirit sees
That shady city of palm-trees:
But ah! my soul with too much stay
Is drunk, and staggers in the way.
Some men a forward motion love,
But I by backward steps would move;
And when this dust falls to the urn,
a that state I came, return.
IIENRY VAUGHAN. 
THE GREAT CYCLE.
WE have travelled some distance together, kind reader,
and have taken notes of various aspects of human life,
from its beginning to its close. We have not bounded
our vision by our footsteps, and have had some glimpses
of the everlasting hills, and now our journey ends with
their ethereal heights in the enchanted distance. Lest the
guide might of himself be too tedious, he has secured the
company of some of the sweet singers of our great Israel,
and as we started upon each stage of our pilgrimage, we
have had a strain or two of song to cheer the way. The
sweet poem of Vaughan, "The Retreat," that makes our
closing motto, expresses a sentiment that we must all of
us at some time have felt, as we reflect upon our career
We cannot help casting a glance behind us as we journey
on, and it is an essential law of every sound mind, that it
shall revert constantly to its own experience, and like the
revolving wheel of a chariot, turn constantly back to itself,
as it goes forward. We must return to ourselves thus 
296       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
whether we choose or not, for we can no more rid our selves of the orbit of our being, than we can rid ourselves
of being itself. Our own will can do a great deal for us,
but it cannot do every thing, and even when the will strives
the most bravely, it can only strive upon a path or tide
which God has fixed for us. We may guide the horses,
but we do not make the highway; we may ply the oar or
tend the sail, but we do not create the tides or the winds.
It is well for us, as we close these meditations, to think
somewhat seriously of the orbit in which we are placed,
and remember that the strongest man is moved by a higher
power, when he is apt to think that he is but moving himself. At the outset of our career we are tempted in the
giddy pride of young blood to suppose our will to be every thing, and when we have travelled far, and are perhaps weary and dispirited with fatigue and disappointment, we are tempted to regard our own will as nothing,
and to sink down into utter fatalism. Combine our young
enthusiasm with our mature experience wisely, and we
shall see the sweep of our own will, and of God's agency
also in the great cycle of our being.
There is surely something more than our own volition
in the power that so binds our past and future with our
present, and gives a retrospective turn to our most sanguine anticipations. Not only in his repentance does the
wayfarer, like the returning Prodigal, come to himself,
but also in all his just obedience and healthful progress.
More than in a literal sense the pilgrim is ever returning
to his starting-place, and whether his path be upon the 
THE GREAT CYCLE.
globe or any other sphere, he who starts from the East, if
he goes far enough towards the setting sun, finds himself
at the East again, with his evening hymn welcoming the
morning dawn. The evening star that shone so mildly
upon his twilight musings, will become the morning star
that flames in the forehead of some distant sky, that meets
him in his course, and Hesper may kindle into the Phosphor, whose dawning he implores:
Let those have night, that love the night:
Sweet Phosphor, bring the day:
HIow sad delay
Afflicts dull hopes! sweet Phosphor, bring the day I
The first and most familiar application of this principle to human life may be made to our remembrance of our
own early days. It need not be argued, for it is plain
enough, as before set forth, that our childhood is never so
fresh to us as in old age, and that every true life in some
way repeats the prophet's words: " He  shall return to
the days of his youth." What the psychological law of
this fact may be, we are not anxious now to set forth, since
we are concerned only with illustrating its truth.   It may
be that first impressions last the longest, not merely bccause they were made upon a fresh and sensitive surface,
but because constant retrospection has been all the while
deepening the image, just as the object longest held before
the silvered plate, takes the strongest picture under the
sunshine; and surely childhood is always in the sunshine
as it stands within the chamber of memory, and is always
13*
297 
298       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
thus deepening the transcript of itself.   But whatever
may be the explanation, we may be sure of the fact, and
the wisest and the simplest men cannot but recur to their
early days. We have already quoted Gray's charming
Ode on revisiting Eton College, so full of touching reminiscences, and we may borrow a still stronger illustration from Goethe, who so prided himself upon his artistic
coolness, and who yet could speak of his early days, in
such tender strains as this in the Inscription to Faust,
that wonderful creation which embodies so much of the
meaning of our modern life:
"Once more, sweet visions, are ye floating hither  Forms, who of old oft gladdened my dim sight?
Shall I now hold you, beautiful, together?
Yearns my heart still for that illusion bright?
Nearer ye throng I Let not your beauty wither,
,s from the misty cloud it bursts in light.
How with the joy of youth my bosom springs,
Breathing the magic air shook from your dewy wings I
"Old days of gladness in your train come sweeping,
And shades of loved ones start up all around,
Like some old tale which set our young eyes weeping,
First Love and Friendship come. Each inward wound
Now bleeds afresh; the old complaint unsleeping,
Laments life's mazy course with echoing sound,Names the good spirits, who, when joy shone o'er me,
Smiled round me one short day-then took their flight before me.
"What I possess now seems no longer real,
But in the Past I live, in my soal's first IdeaL" 
THE GREAT CYCLE.
We suppose that the same law of our being moves the
more diverse natures, and that the play of the memory
like the beat of the heart, is pretty much the same in this
majestic demigod of the German Parnassus, as in the lowliest reader of his verse. With us all, life, as it travels
on, recurs ever to its beginning, for it has received its appointed orbit from the same hand that formed and guides
the spheres.
But this recurrence to our early days is but one form,
and perhaps one of the most superficial forms in which
the orbit of our being indicates its revolving movement.
We look back in our better moments, not so much to a
certain period of time past, but to a certain spontaneous
experience, and, to a true believer, childhood has its chief
attraction in the retrospect, as revealing so much of God's
image in the instinctive play of the spiritual faculties.
We were made originally in the divine image, and the
most extreme teacher of the doctrine of the Fall of Man
and Original Sin, although it be Augustine himself, will
not deny that there are in our nature some traces of that
primitive constitution or selfhood, which came from the
Creator's own hand. As we go on in a true life, and
through repentance and faith win spiritual peace, we can.
not but attach more importance to the earliest gleams of
the divine light within; and thus the farther the pilgrim
travels, the nearer he is to his first home, and in coming
truly to himself, he comes nearer to his own soul. Surely
all that strengthens the mind, or quickens the affections,
299 
MILE STONES IN OUp LIFE-JOURNEY.
or in any way improves the man, faithfully interprets him
to his own consciousness, and introduces him to himself.
A great many writers, as already remarked, have spoken
of the fact, that when we meet with any exalted truth or
noble sentiment, we are apt to receive it as a familiar
thing that we seem to have met before, in spite of plain
evidence to the contrary. With some minds of no mean
philosophical pretensions, the inference has been that our
souls have lived in a pre-existent state, and that thus all
experience appears like a reminiscence of that state. A
noted American theologian has startled the sober orthodoxy
of his brethren in New England, by insisting upon the
reality of a pre-existent state, in order to justify God in
bringing the human race into this world under a curse,
which in his view can be only cruelty and injustice, unless
all those thus born under wrath have sinned somewhere
before this earthly probation. But we prefer the poet's
version of the psychological fact, and Dr. Edward Beecher's dialectics are far less persuasive to us than Wordsworth's verses:
"Our birth is but a sleeping and forgetting:
The soul that rises with us, our life's star,
Hath had elsewhere its setting,
And cometh from afar:
Not in entire forgetfulness,
And not in utter nakedness,
But trailing clouds of glory do we come
From God who is our home."
But without yielding either to the poet or the theolo.
300 
THE GREAT CYCLE.
gian, why is it not enough to say, that every noble truth
and sentiment that excites this sense of reminiscence, by
appealing to the soul that God has given us, reveals the
true oi inmost man to himself, and developes vague instincts and dim intimations into conscious sentiments and
positive convictions? It is very certain that the farther
we advance in true culture, in wisdom, virtue, faith, devotion, the more this feeling grows upon us, and the pilgrim,
instead of going into a far country, seems to be entering
more fully into his own home, and getting acquainted with
himself. The ripe apple is but the blossom matured; the
sturdy oak is but the acorn unfolded; and so the best development of a cultivated mind is but the bringing out of
its own powers, under providential influence, or in other
words, the coming of man to himself.
But where is our need of God, and what becomes of
religion in this view of the great cycle? If life appears
thus to turn upon itself, what need of the Divine Mind
and the Eternal Ruler? Much need every way; for if
we study the orbit of our being wisely, we see at once that
whilst like the rotating globe on which we live it is turning ever upon itself, this movement, like that of the globe,
is part of a majestic economy that rolls each sphere loyally
about its central orb. The soul is drawn by its primeval
nature, by its own inmost wants, by the revealed Word and
the Holy Spirit towards God, the Parent of its being, and
the Sun of its Righteousniess.  In fact its most signal experience of the spiritual life is called by a name expres
30 i 
302       MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
sive of its true birthright, regeneration, or the new birth.
Thus the soul lives its true life, and is fully born when
born of God, and becomes his child, not merely by creative
power, but by redeeming and renewing love. It comes to
itself in coming to God. It cannot live truly for itself
until it moves in its due path about the Divine Light, and
turns each phase of its being to the heavenly warmth and
radiance. In its power, as well as in its weakness, the
soul needs God, and bears? witness of him. True to Him,
we have growing experience of his own attributes, and of
his sufficiency for our peace. We have true life only as
we live in Him. The Mission of Christ was an approach
of the Father to men, and an opening of the souls of men
to the knowledge of the Father. They that received him
had life, even the life of the sons of God. As they beheld
his glory as of the only begotten of the Father full of
grace and truth, they read their own being in that divine
light, and saw that God's love is man's true life. All
Christian experience but developes that great truth, and
shows that man can come to himself and know the full capacities of his own being, only by turning to God in a
filial faith and living obedience.   However brilliant his
genius or vast his knowledge, no man can find out the best
that is in him without seeking God, and without God he
who thinks to gain the whole world loses his own soul.
True growth is thus an awakening; true progress is thus
a returning-not in a monotonous and servile round, but
in a revolving ever advancing cycle, like the vine climbing
towards the light, in an ascending spiral, that turns ever 
THE GREAT CYCLE.
upon itself, and bends its ripened clusters towards its pa
rent root.
The state of mind thus cherished by a true relation
between the soul and God, is the true life which the gospel
so commends. It is the life eternal that may be begun
here on earth, and into which every true believer passes
from the death of sin. Who of us shall presume to define what this eternal life is, when the deepest philosophers
are utterly at loss to define what time is? As, practically,
we may say that we measure time by succession, or by the
passing of objects, or events, so we may say, practically,
that we can estimate eternity by our experience of the
Absolute Good, or of those truths and affections that live
without decay, uniting the intensest vitality with the deepest tranquillity, like the God in whom they have their being. Perhaps all of us, however frail, who have tried in
any measure to be faithful to our calling, have had some
gleams of this experience, when we have been lifted above
all chances and changes into that ethereal current, in which
the soul is not utterly absorbed and annihilated, as the pantheist dreams, but lives and moves in God, as the gospel
teaches, all the more alive to its own being from having
its life in Him, the Infinite and Eternal Love. The most
spiritual and exalted minds of our race have had most of
this experience, and in their seasons of fullest inspiration
they have felt themselves consciously drawn away from
their own self-will into the sweep of that eternal cycle, in
which the creature freely moving, yet divinely moved,
earnest yet tranquil, enters upon the eternal state, and in
303 
MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
terprets better than any dogmatic argument can possibly
do, the prayer of the divine Saviour for the fulfilment of
the great Atonement:-" That they all may be one: as
thou, Father, art in me and I in thee, that they also may
be one in us: that the world may believe that thou hast
sent me."
The very clod beneath our feet may, if we will but listen to its oracles, teach us a far deeper lesson than any
base materialism can give, and may expand into a far
larger wisdom many a dogmatic champion of the schools.
How many and what mysterious currents of influence act
upon that little piece of clay on which we tread! To say
nothing of the magnetic and electric properties which may
act upon some of its particles, we know very well that
each of its atoms feels something of the attractive force
that sweeps the spheres in their cycles, moons around
earths, earths around suns, and probably suns and systems
about some distant central orb, perhaps the chosen presence chamber of the Eternal Word. If the dust bears
witness of such a majestic cycle whose times rise into
eternities to our limited understanding, what shall we say
of the soul and the recurrent yet progressive cycles of its
divinely ordained orbit? Surely the dust that goes to the
dust as it was, falls not without bearing by its analogies
some witness of the spirit and its union with the God who
gave it.
So then in closing these notes of our life-journey, we
take our stand upon the rock that cannot change, although
304 
THE GREAT CYCLE.
every mile stone on our way may crumble into dust. We
measure life not by the course of years, but by the charac ter of its experience, sure as we are that quality as well
as quantity must enter into our numbering of our days.
The object is not to travel fast, but to travel wisely and
well. We need in this impatient age, and in our fretful,
restless country, to look carefully to the dominant temper,
and in our vagaries of folly and passion to orient ourselves
by the true light. There is something in that word " orient" 1 that we Americans need to study, for it tells us of a
clime and a wisdom that we are apt in our bustle and haste
to forget.  To us, the children of the impatient West, it
speaks of the East, and of the divine light that there
dawned upon the nations. The East has been the providential school of the divine life, and its commissioned
prophets have borne witness that a profound rest of the
soul in God is the essential mark of all true power, and
that they who walk with God have a peace that the world
can neither give nor take away. Do we not yearn for
more of that true leaven with which God of old blessed his
chosen servants, and with which the Divine Son was sent
to bless the world? Does not our best culture show some
relentings of our rebellious pride, and some fond and filial
yearning towards the birthplace of our best faith, the home
of our deepest humanity?   Certainly by what is best
as well as by what is worst in our American temper, we
are called to check our unrest, and calm our passions,
and quicken our faith in the still yet living waters that
flowed of old from Siloa, and flow ever from the oracles
8 0 ! 
306       NMILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
of God We complete our own lives and round the orbit
of our own being, whilst we complete the circle of civilization by bringing our own Occidental energy into reconciliation with the true Oriental faith. Our race, like the individual man, is stronger and wiser by tempering self-will
with loyalty to God's will. The race, like the individual,
can enter the kingdom of heaven only by being converted
and becoming as a little child. Let our indomitable energy ally itself with spiritual faith, and the Star of the
East will shine upon us without eclipse in the path of its
empire Westward.
In some respects I am as ready as any man to glory in
our country and its institutions. Nay,I think that we
honor our country even when we most candidly criticise
its failings, because we use the liberty which is our noble
birthright, and thus recognize our blessings in exposing our
defects. Certainly nothing can exceed the folly of the
prevalent disposition to measure power and prosperity
solely by quantity, count our strength by number, and estimate our progress in the main by speed. We are undoubtedly the fastest people on the face of the earth, but
it by no means follows that we are the wisest or the happiest. A man may travel fifty miles an hour, but if he is
upon a bad or foolish errand, the faster he travels so much
the worse for him, for he is sooner at the accomplishment
of the wrong. We spoil every thing by hurry, whether it
be the dinner that we devour without quiet digestion, or
the land that we exhaust by impatient tillage, or the health
and strength that we waste in our haste to be rich, or in 
THE GREAT CYCLE.
the mind and heart that we fret and fever away by the
constant round of excitement. In the opinion of some
medical men we are wearing ourselves out as a nation, by
our hurry and intensity,-too eager to get a living to be
willing to stop to live. The statistics of insanity show
an alarming increase of that fearful scourge, and ten
thousand pale and anxious faces are writing their sad
commentary upon our temper and habits. I am not fond
of croaking, and believe on principle in the power of a
cheerful heart. Precisely because of this power, I insist
upon the need of a more tranquil faith, and more peaceful
and steadfast method. We may all rejoice in the prosperity of our country-in the vastness of our domain-in the
numbers and intelligence of our people, and nevertheless
remember that we are but human, and are exposed to all
the perils that have been the wreck of nations in the old
world. Whether for a nation ol for an individual soul,
true progress is to be measured by the character formed,
not by the distance travelled. Not without meaning we
close our notes of the Mile Stones on our way with those
hallowed words that Jesus, the great Mediator between
time and eternity, as well as between man and God, spoke
when he embraced all men and all nations in his parting
prayer:
ZbiLs is  itt  ttrnaI, tbat t t m[gbt noo tb,tt itt  nIu ttxut
'ot, ant ltsuz E;trist, htotm tbou bast zgnt.
307  
XVIII.
F ftt REtERttS
A FEW CLOSING REMEMBRANCES. 
OCTOBER.
Ay, thou art welcome, heaven's delicious breath!
When woods begin to wear the crimson leaf,
And suns grow meek and the meek suns grow brief,
And the year smiles as it draws near its death.
Wind of the sunny south! oh, still delay
In the gay woods and in the golden air,
Like to a good old age released from care,
Journeying in long eternity away.
In such a bright, late quiet, would that I
Might wear out life like thee, mid bowers and brooks,
And dearer yet the sunshine of kind looks,
And music of kind voices ever;
And when my last sand twinkled in the glass,
Pass silently from men, as thou dost pass.
BRYANT.
It becomes
A man, if aught delightful to his soul
He hath received, to bear a grateful mind;
Kindness gives birth to kindness; in the heart,
When grateful Memory holds its seat no more,
The Man to every generous sense is lost.
SOPHOCLES. 
AFTER THOUGHTS.
A FEW CLOSING REMEMBRANCES.
TWENTY-TWO years ago in the summer of 1854, I arranged for the press the papers that make up the substance of this volume, and introduced them with an
introductory sketch of "Companions by the Way."   I
remember well the day when that sketch was finished,
the last day but one of summer, and just before the close
of vacation, when the stern call to work was sending its
whisper before into those last hours of play. Those
years have brought so many changes in thought and
affairs, in life and history, as to make the book an old
stoyt, and perhaps to hint the wisdom of letting it alone,
or of trying to make it over anew. But there are notes
of places and persons enough in its pages to move friends
to ask for its republication, and there are records of experience and conviction that speak best in their own
proper words and would be weakened, if not falsified, by
being written over under new conditions. Therefore the 
312      MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
author, without claiming any especial importance for his
efforts, or expecting any great number of readers, complies with the request for a new edition and adds these
familiar remembrances of the later years.
If it is an awkward matter, and may seem an ungracious
task, to venture upon personal reminiscences after dealing
with general topics of high interest, it is well to remember that the simplest is likely to be the best way out of
trouble, and that any sincere and truthful remarks upon
the drift of the last score of years, will be sure to rise
above personality into principle, and to open private experience into generous fellowship. Certainly we are all
travelling on together, and more and more we are made
to feel how much we share each other's lot, and our fate
is bound up with that of our race. I cannot recall the
cherished companions, to whom this volume was dedicated
in 1854, the class of 1832 of Harvard University, without associating the nation and the world with their personal career, since they have served upon so many fields
of peace and war, and done good work in so many spheres
of science and art, letters and religion. We meet now even
more regularly and loyally than then so long ago, and on
the last Wednesday of every October we dine together,
as many as are able to follow the welcome call, to see the
old faces, and to sing the old songs; to shake hands with
the living, and to remember tenderly the dead, who now
number more than half of the seventy-one names cred 
AFTER THOUGHTS.
ited to us on the Triennial Catalogue.   Many names
on that list have already risen into historical importance,
and with these sober years and gray heads, the end of
usefulness has not yet come with  the surviving.   The
two class-mates who last left us, the Rev. Oliver C. Everett and Dr. Stephen Salisbury, were gentle and faithful
souls whose lives are a lesson to us all, and I name them
here tenderly.
Those of us who have lived in the great cities cannot
live to ourselves only, and even our country rambles and
restings are sure to keep us face to face with the eventful
scenes and significant persons that are constantly shaping our experience.   I cannot tell a long story now,
even if I had one to tell, and I must be content with
writing down a few remembrances of conspicuous aspects
of recent life, that may perhaps interest old friends whom
I do not see now as often as is desirable, and be of some
use to young people who sometimes ask counsel of years
graver than their own. For these I wish to make these
pages instructive, even if I fail to make them entertaining.
I.-UNDER THE TREES.
Within the last twenty years, we Americans have been
thinking of country life as never before, and private gardens and public parks are memorable marks of the progress of rural taste. It was very sad, that Andrew J.
Downing, after laying out so well the public grounds in
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314     MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
the city of Washington, in 1851, lost his life the next
year in the river Hudson, and there is comfort in believing that the banks of this river, in their homes and surroundings, will be a lasting remembrance of the founder
of American landscape gardening. Happily his mantle
fell on Frederick Law Olmsted, whose tour in 1855
through Europe, with an especial eye to parks and ornamental grounds, prepared him to take charge in 1856 of
what was to be our New York Central Park, for which
he made the accepted plans in 1857. That enterprise
has told upon the taste of the whole nation, and in nothing have our people improved so much as in appreciation
of natural scenery, and in the method of keeping the
charm of nature under the hand of art. We have become a nation of travellers at home as well as abroad, and
every beautiful region in our land not only attracts hosts
of summer visitors, but warrants the building of public
houses for guests. In one way and another we all live
part of the time under the trees, and it would be well if
there could be a general and judicious comparing of notes
as to the best way of doing it.
But experience here in the woods has, in some respects,
had little variety, and may not on that account be worth
telling. Our home has been these twenty-seven summers
upon this little hill that overlooks Long Island Sound,
and the only change of place that we have made here in
that time, has been in buying the eight acres next below 
AFTER THOUGHTS.
the cottage in which we were boarders, and in building
the house which has sheltered us for nineteen summers
after due enlargement for children, grandchildren and
kindred. Our friends generally, and people at large, do
not like such stability, and not a few sell their country
places and wander at their sweet will, and sometimes to
their sour discontent, into new quarters or rambles, when
the summer heats begin. I prefer a fixed home with liberty of course to leave it a while, whenever duty calls, or
wholesome pleasure invites.   It seems to me, that the
advantages of this course far outnumber those of the
wandering life.   For ourselves, we  can say  that for
twenty-seven years we have found health in this air and
in those waters, and, in a frugal way, we have found in
this quiet old village the characteristics of country and
seaside combined.   There is a fine beach for bathing,
there are beautiful drives and sightly walks, with neighbors near at hand, and with a thriving and growing city
within a smart half-hour's drive.
This place itself is somewhat distinguished over other
American places in the fact that it does not grow much, if
any, and that a new house is seldom built among our
well-to-do people, whilst most of them  constantly improve their grounds. There is far less business here, at
the old centre, than in 1779, when the British troops
landed from their ships, and burned the town to ashes.
Yet the old character remains, and the solid citizens date
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316      MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
their pedigree years before New York grandeur began.
The minister of the Prime Ancient parish, as it was
called, lives in the parsonage that was left to the church
by the nephew of Roger Sherman. He has had such predecessors as the Rev. Andrew Eliot, President Humphrey,
and Professor Lyman Atwater; and the parish dates from
the coming of Roger Ludlow, in 1639, whilst the line
of clergy began with the Rev. John Jones, an Oxford
graduate, who, after a long ministry here, died in 1664,
the year that saw New Amsterdam accept the English
flag, and take its present name of New York. The Episcopal church here has a record of more than one hundred
and fifty years; it gave to King's Chapel, Boston, its last
rector, the Rev. Henry Caner (1747-1776); it had the
service of the first Episcopal clergyman ever ordained in
this country, the Rev. Philo Shelton, and now with two
parishes it prospers under the charge of two clergymen,
one of whom is a poet and scholar, and the other, in the
next village, is a muscular Christian, a bold thinker, with
a liking for sea and land adventures.
If asked to state what are the advantages of having a
summer home in a place like this, fifty miles from the
great city, I can truly say to men who are occupied most
of the year with business or professional cares, that it
seems to me the best thing in the world. A parish minister can be here under the trees, and at the same time
within call of his people, and he has the satisfaction of 
A'TER THOUGHTS.
being always at their service, and they always know where
to find him if sickness, or death, or occasions less sorrowful make his service essential. Then there is health of
body and mind in the quiet of this country life, as contrasted with the excitement of cities, and the dissipation of
the great watering places. The true life depends upon
the just combination of constancy, with change, and he
who lives most of the year in the great city has stir and
strain enough to make him need an interval of tranquillity,
such as settled country life gives. In fact, you may have
virtually four separate seasons by a good combination of
town excitement with country rest. In the winter, and
the weeks before it, and after it, the work is hard, and
the excitement is unceasing; then comes spring, when you
can lighten your work a little, and run now and then
into the country, and spend some days there when not
kept at your post; then comes the summer vacation with
its full rest; then the autumn call to go to work again
with at first lighter, and then heavy care, as the busy
season opens, and the world and the church are in full life
again. I have found great satisfaction, as well as health,
in this division of the year, and twenty years of close
parish work, without any serious interruption by sickness
or travel, were a fair commentary upon the wisdom of
such method. Then, too, you secure good opportunities for
study by this course, and you can find time during your
spring and autumn retreats, and your summer rest, to take
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318      MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
with you into the woods the important books of the year,
as well as enlighten and edify yourself and your parishioners by studying some of the great masters of thought.
There are certain points of economy that are to be
looked to in choosing and carrying on a country place;
but without discussing these at length, I will only say
with prudence you can be sure of having solid value
for the money that you spend, and that with a good righthand man to manage the place, such as has served us here
for near twenty years, you need not have much to worry
you. You will have abundance of vegetables for the table, as much fruit as you are willing to cultivate with care,
plenty of milk for winter, as well as summer, and a play
ground for yourself and your children to your heart's content. In fact, the out-door school is the best for the little
ones, and the true kindergarten is under the trees with
the real objects about them to name and to study, and the
merry birds to pitch the tune for their songs. The day
is not long enough for these little ones, that make play of
work and work of play, and hardly know the difference
between the two, whilst kind mother nature looks on benignly to see the muscles swell, and the senses brighten.
As to the influence of the country upon the mind of a
student, or upon any thoughtful man, there is a great deal
to be said in various directions. It is not wise to say that
the fields, and trees, and rivers are sufficient companions
of themselves, and that it is the part of wisdom to forget, 
AFTER THOUGHTS.
or try to forget, the town and its people, mankind, and
their life in the green woods. You cannot do this if you
try, and the pastoral poets, who make so much account
of fellowship with nature, always show that they have
been schooled in society, and that they carry society with
them at heart into their retreats. In fact, when you go
into the country and quit the present excitements of the
town, you have the town before you more vividly than
when in the midst of its pressure, you have not time to
consider current events and persons, because new experiences crowd them out. But under the trees you recall
your social experiences. Events and persons appear before you, with peculiar distinctness, and nature seems to
be the camera which reflects unbidden the images in your
memory, and sometimes tells you of what you thought
that you had forgotten. For a time you find this office of
nature most exacting, and she does not allow you to leave
the busy world, whilst she saves you from new distractions.
It is not true then, as a recent Pessimist philosopher
has said, that the modern rural tastes are proof of the
cursedness of our social life, because delight in the country implies hatred of the town; for the town is ever present in the country with every one who has had recent experience of its stirring life, and one charm of the rural
retreat is pleasure in watching, or remembering the distant agitation, without being in the midst of its whirl.
This nature, indeed, which is so ready a medium for our
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320      MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
memory and thought, and so ready to write out before
our fancy the secrets of our minds, is by no means a passive material like paper, but has a charming life in every
vein and leaf. Her kingdoms of plants and animals are
not company enough for us, but they are a marvellous
companionship that deepens and exalts other society; and
as with the persons who please us most, such as bright
children and genial women, the great charm is not so
much in what they say and do, as in the exuberant spirits
in which they say or do it; so it is with the spontaneous
life that beats at the heart of nature. In the town all in
comparison seems to be planned and mechanical, and life is
set to clock work, and its business is done with calculation;
but among the trees an involuntary genius seems to rule,
and these mysterious creatures, the flowers, the grasses,
the vines, the birds are moved by a spirit of which they
are not conscious, and you feel its power over your spirits.
Whether we know it or not, this experience has much to
do with the charm of nature, and in spite of the great
shock which has been given to the spiritualist school of
pastoral philosophy and poetry by the new theory of the
play of atoms, and the explanation of all growth by mechanical agencies, the spiritualist thinkers are regaining
the lost ground, and bringing the atom itself to establish
the fact of the ever present and ever active force, that
lives in nature and joins nature to God. Here, within
these recent years, the masters of the new science have 
AFTER THOUGHTS.
been carefully read and considered, not without some
perplexity of mind, and some disturbance of the old faith.
But the trouble is not lasting, and the result is to lead
us to discern in nature the rising path to higher life, and
to delight in every feature of the landscape that hints of
the aspirations of man, and the condescension of God to
his needs.
I have hardly dared to tell how constantly the land scape here, with its inclosure of groves, and its distant
view of the sea, insists upon suggesting visions of history
and life, and how inevitably the prospect has shaped itself
into a grand abbey, with its chapel and cloisters, with
stones older than Muckross, and roof higher than Westminster, in which every sacred truth has its record, and
every worthy act has its monument. But so it has been
and is. I do not ask others to accept my notions as their
own, or to see the spirits of the great men of literature
and heroism, where I see them. I am willing to say
that for me, more and more these trees seem to be like
cathedral arches, and to take to their keeping, upon every
hill and rock, the names that deserve best of mankind,
and bring heaven near. God himself does not disdain
to own his temple, nor frown upon the cliff that is sacred
to his name, and the rock that bears the Cross, which these
cedars have furnished, and the native woodbine has been
so eager to clothe with beauty.  He prepares us by the
rising steps of nature for the Incarnation in which earth
21
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322      MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
and heaven, humanity and divinity meet together, and
that sequestered grove is the shrine of meditation and
prayer, that throws light upon the whole temple.
It is not idle dreaming thus to give historical and spiritual sig,nificance to the landscape, but a real power goes
from the practice. Cut the name of Shakespeare or
Dante, or Milton, or Wordsworth upon a mossy rock,
and let some of the natural growths of the ground, the
clematis, the woodbine, the bittersweet or honeysuckle
embroider and illuminate it, and the man himself is presented to you as an objective presence. He is there, and
you no longer rack your own brain to bring his image
forth from its secret chambers. This fact comes out this
week, which recalls the death of Dante, September 14,
1321. Put a wreath above his name, as our child who so
loves nature has done, and take his great poem to the
place, and see how he rises before you in his blessed sadness, and he helps you to interpret his trials and your
own, and points the way from Purgatory to Paradise, as
where the spirit of St. Bernard was his guide towards the
Beatific Vision where
Within the deep and luminous subsistence
Of the High Light, appeared to me three circles
Of threefold color and of one dimension,
And by the second seemed the first reflected
As Iris is by Iris, and the third
Seemed fire that equally from both is breathed.
O how all speech is feeble and falls short 
AFTER THOUGHTS.
Of my conceit, and this to what I saw
Is such,'t is not enough to call it little!
0 Light Eterne, sole in thyself that dwellest,
Sole knowest thyself, and, known unto thyself
And knowing, lovest and smilest on thyself!
That circulation, which being thus conceived
Appeared in thee as a reflected light,
When somewhat contemplated by mine eyes,
Within itself, of its own very color,
Seemed to me painted with our effigy,
Wherefore my sight was all absorbed therein.
These words breathe the life of the old Catholic faith,
I know, but they come to us through the father of our
modern letters, and our new times that rejoice in this liberty cannot well do without his religion.
II. - ON THE PAVEMENTS.
It is pleasant always to go from the pavements to the
shade of the trees, and in due time it is pleasant to go
back from the trees to the pavement. The city is the
centre of human life and where men most congregate,
they ought to find God in the midst of them. It is hard
indeed to live as we ought to do in the great crowd, and
those of us, who have passed the most of our time for more
than a quarter of a century in New York, need not any
stern moralist to tell us in what a world of care, and
trouble, and temptation we have been. Such a multitude
of interests and excitements, such intensity of motive, and
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324      MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
such incessant pressure of care, who can try to recall all
this flood of affairs and experiences without wondering,
that he ever could stand it at all, and that he has come
out of it with a whole head! Yet there is another side
to the picture, and we must not forget that if the city
makes many calls upon our time, it encourages the habit
of organization that brings the many particulars into one
system; that if the pressure upon us is intense and incessant, the encouragement may be as intense and constant,
if we make the best of our position and bring into play
all the best helps of business and society, the refinements
of culture and art, and the incentives and comforts of religion. The forces that assail a man there are many and
strong, and ever at work, and he must be many sided,
strong and unfailing. It is a great thing to know how to
live there in the face of all these difficulties, and they who
go through the ordeal unscathed, should thank God humbly, and show their gratitude by encouraging and helping
others who are more tried and tempted.
We have had so many changes of times and fortune,
that it has been very hard to know what to depend upon
in the great city.   And even  the seasons of apparent
prosperity have unsettled principles, broken up old neighborhoods and brought on frightful reactions. The saddest aspect of the city now, as contrasted with twenty
years ago, is the diminution of the middling class of residents, and there have been times when this class seems 
AFTER THOUGHTS.
almost to have been driven out by the increase of luxury,
taxation, and rent in order to make the way for the dom ination of the extremes of the rich and the poor. There
has been promise of improvement in this respect of late,
and there is good reason to believe that more steady times,
sober thought, and moderate living, will bring back some
of the thousands of families whose modest tastes, and frugal habits, and serious temper, make them good citizens,
and earnest helpers in all good works and institutions.
The war fever, with its financial craze that went into
every circle and movement, did a great deal to demoralize
our people; and even our churches were led by the pride
of caste and the swell of ambition into extravagances that
are now regarded with surprise, and repented of with deliberation. Dives is called to bring his chariots and his
coteries within the small space that is marked off as the
charmed district, whilst the less favored children of God
are left in the larger part of the city to the uncertain
mercies of missionary chapels. Old Rome only keeps her
trust unbroken and cares for all, with jurisdiction as expressive as it is imperial. Her catholicity, in this respect,
is finding acceptance elsewhere, and old Trinity Church
has not yet bowed the knee to the new snobbishness that
sacrifices the many to the mode, and such movements as
bear the name of St. Augustine and St. Chrysostom are
in the line in which those old saints loved to walk. Good
Doctor 3Iuhlenberg and his associates have not toiled in
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326      MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
vain; and St. Luke's Hospital and the Holy Communion
Church are blessings to all, and Christ is ever near where
the churches meet together thus in charity and in prayer.
Nor must we forget how much all churches, who open
their doors freely to all comers, even if it is for the
evening service only, are doing for those who seek
them. The pewed churches are, in some respects, free
gifts, and in the course of the year, thousands and tens
of thousands enjoy their eloquence and their music without any return. Those of us who have year after year
spoken to crowded assemblies at the evening service,
and who are constantly meeting the hearers who were
not parishioners, have reason to believe that the minister of the regular city parish does not limit his labors
to the proprietors of the pews. A hard working body
our clergy on the whole are, and they need their summer rest to save them from utter wreck. Their work
apparently on the whole prospers, and the pulpit and the
religious press of our city are pillars of strength and
fountains of light to the nation. The remark is sometimes received with derision, but it is none the less
true, that institutional religion has its centre and stronghold in New York, and whilst ideal thinking prevails
elsewhere, here the church as an institution, has its
strongest defences, and for years it has been a power
throughout the land. The spirit of the world is strong
here, but it is not unchecked. There are indeed not only 
AFTER THOUGHTS.
persons but congregations where the commercial temper
supplants all spiritual loyalty, and the church consists
only of a financial committee, a treasurer, and a smart
man who is hired to preach as long as his preaching pays.
But this is not the principle of the leading churches, for
they recognize in the pastor a certain official power, and
they help him to success by keeping loyally open the
path of his usefulness. Those who have done their work
under such encouragement, and retired when the years of
moderated vigor come, should own gratefully the kindly
auspices under which they have labored, and not be impatient of the law that gives to every man his day, and
calls him to quiet places when the evening shadows fall.
It may be that the man, whose pulse no longer beats with
the electricity that belongs to the metropolitan pulpit, may
find as large a field in the calm studies, wide fellowships,
various labors of pen and voice that retirement brings.
One who has had three parishes in widening circles of
numbers and labor, and done his best for them each in
spite of defects and shortcomings, does not rightly complain at finding himself at last in the largest of all parishes
though it may look as wide as the wide world, and he may
seek not wholly in vain for the church that is without sect,
and the brotherhood that is without bigotry or uncharitableness.
The state of things in New York city is apparently
more hopeful than for many years, and the superior men
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328      MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
there seem to take more interest in public affairs. These
men have been very remiss in this respect, and the wealth
of the city has been lacking in refined taste and far-seeing enterprise. lMiany men of affluence have lived and
died there in our time without making any mark of noble manhood upon their generation, or leaving any lasting
memorial of faith or humanity. There has hardly been any
dominant public opinion which embodied the sober sense
and general conviction of the educated classes and acted
upon the mind of the multitude. Our colleges and universities there have had little of the heart of the community,
and in society at large money has lorded it too much over
intellect and culture. Perhaps the break between the old
residents and the resident population has come in part
from the influx of strangers who knew nothing of old
New York, and cared as little as they knew. The new
times may change all this; and the lessons of the war and
the wreck of the public treasury by monstrous frauds, and
the dread of further outrages in this direction, may combine with a better culture, and truer taste, and gentler humanity, and more earnest faith, to bring together the heterogeneous elements of our city life; and under the lead
of our powerful journals, schools, and churches, they may
give New York a nobler position before the world than it
ever had.
Certainly it is a very pleasant place to live in; very
healthy with its boundary rivers and fine parks and plen 
AFTER THOUGHTS.
tiful water, and generally mild climate; very winning in
its social tone, so tolerant, so genial, and, in its best circles,
so charitable and devout; so orderly in its characteristic
citizenship, and so safe from fire and from tumult. I may
be laughed at for saying what I do, that I found more
roughness in Paris and London in a month, than I have
found in New York in over a quarter of a century. There
are streets here, undoubtedly, which it is not safe to frequent; but where in London can a gentleman walk in the
evening without being grossly offended if not rudely assailed? I have never been robbed, to my knowledge, in
New York, but I cannot say as much for the country,
where hen-roosts and orchards are sometimes plundered,
and there is little if any police. We have suffered indeed
from monstrous abuses; and the taxation, which all pay
who own houses or hire them, is frightful. Let this be reformed, and the rule of expense be moderated, and no city
homes can be more desirable. The schools, colleges, art
galleries, literary and historical societies, are gaining in
magnitude and character, and when all these privileges
shall be duly organized, and wisely used by our people, and
brought within the range of the common lot, our healthful and beautiful city will be the comfort of its inhabitants,
and the delight of strangers, as well as the pride and
strength of the whole nation.
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330     MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
III. - OUR FLAG.
No matter how retired or studious a man's life may
have been for the last twenty years, there is one thing
that has been sure to meet his eyes, and be very clear and
vivid, as he looks back upon his path. We Americans all
know that we have a flag, and we have all more or less
suffered for it. The national heart was undoubtedly in
our people before, but they never felt its beating fully, till
the blow was struck at the life of the nation, and with all
our habits of peace, our love of industry and our instincts
of good neighborhood and humanity, we found ourselves
at war, because war was made upon us by an insurgent
section. It is not well now to try to revive the old
quarrel, but one may fairly venture upon a passing reference to the great struggle from a non-partisan point of
view; and only good can come from speaking a candid
word of the part taken by men of moderated temper and
conservative principles, and of the part which they are
now called to take in the reconstruction of the national
order.
The war has been the tragedy of our civil history, and,
to a great extent, the tragedy of our domestic and personal life. Miost of us have suffered in heart and fortune
sadly by the conflict, and it has left us overburdened with
debt; and our young country finds herself under a load
of taxation and embarrassment, that was thought to belong 
AFTER THOUGHTS.
only to the oppressed and superannuated nations of the old
world. Had the result of the strife been foreseen, it would
not have been begun, and even the mad pride of South
Carolina would have shrunk aghast from the vision of
impoverishment and ruin, that have followed the assault
upon a national fortress. Had the result been foreseen in
the other quarter, certain provocations would have been
withheld, and whilst the conscience of our serious people
would never have consented to the extension of slavery,
there would have been more caution and forethought in
dealing with the evil. The doctrinaire school of reformers, who took it for granted that the world goes by opinions, and who seemed to think that a declaration of the
rights of man secures to them their rights, would have
thought better of the grounds of solid progress. They
would have seen that true liberty is not merely an opinion,
but a power, and that bondage is not cast off by a word,
or even by a nominal law, but by new conditions of liberty and new characters of intelligence and motive. The
Rousseau theory of naturalism which makes it out that
human nature is perfected by being let alone, that civilization is a grand blunder, and that historical continuity is
the lineage of tyranny, has done a great deal of mischief
amongst us, and it went from the early visions of Jefferson, the philosopher of the Old Dominion, to fever the
brains of the idealists of New England. These men
have learned wisdom in a sober school of experience, and
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332      MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
they see now that we cannot jump out of history any
more than out of nature, that races have their historical
roots, and that civilization comes in the historical line of
law and education, without break or repeal. The African
cannot be made Anglo-American or German by vote
alone, and he must be what he is, and keep a subordinate
place, until trained for something better. We are all seeing the fact, that the slave spirit may remain after emancipation is declared, and that demagogues in the name of
liberty may rule as malignly, and perhaps more wastefully, than the old masters. Better sense of the need of
education to secure liberty, and of the dependence of the
backward race upon the advanced race for guidance, would
certainly have moderated the rancor of the assault upon
Southern institutions. yet might not have changed the final
result.
It is important now alike for the just understanding of
the great conflict, and for the true success of the present
peace, to discern clearly the two points at issue between
the parties at strife, -the one point being the sovereignty
of the states, the other point being the continuance and
extension of slavery. The first of these had more to do
with the logic of the dispute, and the second entered more
into its motive. The question of jurisdiction was more
one of reasoning and of pride, whilst the question of
property was more one of interest and passion. He
surely was a sagacious statesman who tried to separate 
AFTER THOUGHTS.
these two points, as far as Charles Francis Adams did, and
to suggest a way by which the southern point of honor as
to jurisdiction could be saved without opening the new
area of freedom to the inroads of slavery. But the suggestion was of little avail, except perhaps in showing in
advance the temper that we need now in the work of reconstruction. The slave power died of its own madness,
and of the sycophancy of the demagogues and money
makers, who played into its hands, and led its leaders to
believe that their audacity would be safe as it struck at a
peaceful and industrious people. Slavery is gone, and
God be praised for overruling the madness of men to
the glory of His Kingdom. It is gone and in a way that
its friends expected as little as its enemies. Those of
us who never favored aggressive measures, but who believed in evolving the spirit and acts of liberty by the
method of civilization, not by revolution, but by evolution,
saw revolution accomplished without our design. We
only refused to consent to the extension of slavery, and
when the flag was assailed, we stood by it as the standard
not only of the nation, but of civilization and humanity.
We could not and would not see our birthright of AngloAmerican nationality lost, and whilst some preachers went
to the war as chaplains, or as soldiers, more kept to their
post and preached and prayed, and wrote for the triumph
of the nation, and for its firm and benign rule over the
whole land and people. Some of us suffered not a little
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334      MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
loss of friends and power, whilst all the while we were
earnest for peace and good will, and we never forgot that
the brave men who fell on both sides in battle were our
countrymen, and that their wounds were ours and their
children were precious to us, and to share with our own
the blessings of the nation.
The end has come and now let us have peace. It is
well that the two great parties who now seek the control
of our government have set forth platforms so just and
comprehensive in this respect, and so full of hope and
strength for the states that seceded. It is well that men
of culture and character are candidates for the highest
office. What is wanted as much as anything, is a comprehensive, far-seeing, and earnest public opinion under the
lead of men above partisanship, and beyond suspicion of
self-seeking. This high council of the nation may not be
definitely organized, yet it may none the less exist, and
speak and act. The professional men of the country, not
excepting the clergy, the solid business men, the professors
of ethics and social science, the weighty representatives of
the permanent industries of the nation, the conductors
of the great journals and reviews, all ought to belong to
this fellowship, and constitute an outside senate that will
strip the mark from all villainy in high places, and by a
just public economy give light and strength to every worthy principle and measure. The present aspects of our
American religion promise well for such tendencies, and 
AFTER THOUGHTS.
the great denominations that have territorial extension,
as well as moral force, are gaining in union and influence.
The Methodists, the Presbyterians, the Episcopalians are
rising national forces, and the Roman Catholics, whilst
their priests are to be carefully looked after in their relations with our public schools, are not to be set aside as
aliens, nor is their wholesome influence over unruly people, and dangerous socialist tendencies to be ignored.
We are not indeed to confound church and state, yet we
may nevertheless defend, and  nurture civic institutions
by moral and religious principles, and regard the nation
as the body of which the church is the soul. The Holy
Spirit rejoices in all the good fellowship of man, and
is ready to breathe into them the breath of divine life, as
when the City of God arose from the ideas and institutions
of the old Law and Temple in the vision of Augustine,
and Hildebert saluted the Paraclete as "Melodia civium
gandentium," the melody of joyful citizens. We have
heard something of that melody in the hymns of our people, and we shall hear more of it, when they all rejoice
together under the old flag, and march to the same airs
of liberty and union.
Fourteen years ago, in 1862, when our conflict was
most intense, a stone cutter on the way to the war carved
in deep letters on the cliff overhanging our road, the
words  "God  and our  Country."   He won honors  in
battle, and had an officer's commission in keeping with
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336      MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
his merit. The inscription remains and means more than
ever now. When I look at it, I often think of what has
happened to interpret that saying. A single remembrance
speaks volumes, and I can hardly believe what I know to
be true, that the two groomsmen at a marriage which I
was called from the country to perform in my own house
in the city, the summer before the war, the two groomsmen, I say, were afterwards strangely associated with the
two war presidents; and one of them, afterwards in this
service, wrote the life of General Grant, and the other
in a fit of melo-dramatic madness took the life of Abraham Lincoln. That blonde bride is in her grave, and
seldom have the marriage bells had more eventful echoes
in their sound. Yet the church bells still ring in the
nation's jubilee, and God and our Country ring out in
their notes.
IV.- ABROAD.
Our American people at large seem to have gone or to
be going to Europe, and a considerable part of them are
ambitious to go round the world. A considerable proportion of travelled Americans have written and published
letters from abroad, and whilst the writer acknowledges
his share of that often infirmity, he is not weak enough
now to venture to do it over again; but he aims only to
give a few notes of the impressions left upon him by a
visit of less than a year, at the time of life when experi 
AFTER THOUGHTS.
ence has sobered enthusiasm, and the study of books has
made it as instructive as it is charming to compare the old
world itself with what has been said and sung about it.
They are not wise who expect that voyages or travel
will take them out of nature, or away from mankind and
from the old Adam that marks man everywhere. The
American finds in Europe much of what he left at home
and most of all he finds himself and his kindred and essentially familiar ideas and usages in the lands from which
his fathers came. Yet the old world, because it is old,
differs from the new, and a thoughtful observer sees at
once, that things are more taken for granted, and manners
and habits are far more fixed there than here. It is acknowledged abroad more than with us, that every one
cannot do everything, that there is a limit to a man's
reasonable expectations and powers, and in spite of the
shaking of old dynasties and the rise of dashing upstarts,
the sense of caste is very strong; and most people seem
to expect to live and die in the rank, and generally in the
calling, of their fathers. There is an acquiescence in position, however lowly or lordly it may be, that is quite in
contrast with our new America, where every boy may expect to be president and every girl may dream of being
the president's wife, or sharing a millionaire's palace,
purse and equipage. The comely young woman, whom
you see with her mother digging the hard soil with the
mattock at Interlachen, has the look of mild acquiescence
22
337 
338      MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURN'EY.
quite as much as the soldier who rides to the daily drill
over the Rhine at Cologne, or is trained at the guns in
the mountain fortress of Kdnigstein. The baker, who
sells you his gooseberry tarts near Westminster Abbey, is
as easy at his counter, as the dean in his stall or the
bishop on his throne. The landlady at the Grosvenor
Hotel in old Chester, accepts her position as graciously as
the Duchess at Eaton Hall, and in both of them you see
the heritage of time and the traits of loyalty that long
ages have settled. If life in its lower estate there may
run in dull ruts, in the higher plane it moves in stately
paths or flows in graceful channels, where the waters may
none the less dance and sparkle because the way is worn,
a bound is set, and mud and rocks and quicksands do not
interfere.
This characteristic of the old world appears in the predominance of institutions over individuals. With us the
individual, the personality is everything; and the very
sanctuary of worship is likely to bear the name of the
man who preaches there, and who may be praised for the
eloquence of his prayers as well as his sermons. There
the man is second to the institution, and in the Church of
England you can often hardly tell one voice from another
in the drawling rhythm of song and prayer, and sometimes
of sermon.- Mr. Moody was a marvel, because he stood
out so bravely as a man in preaching and in prayer, and
much of Spurgeon's success comes from his bold individu 
AFTER THOUGHTS.
alism in face of the uniform cut of manner and tone
which marks the rank and file of the regular clergy.
Even when thinking is bold, manner may be monotonous,
and no one can appreciate the reform now introduced into
the English pulpit by such stirring preachers as McGee,
Bishop of Peterborough, who has not observed the prevailing monotony of the English clergy. This fault does
not of necessity come from the use of a liturgy, for the
liturgy may be read with vital expression, and may give
the devotional rest and comfort that help fervent utterance, when the preacher has his own word to say, whilst
there can be no doubt that the great length of the service in the Church of England tends to take the life out
of his voice, if he is obliged to be the reader, and to substitute rapid gabble for articulate expression. The liturgy,
like all other institutions, requires life in the minister to
save its constancy from stagnation; yet take it as it is
actually rendered with the average fidelity, it cannot be
charged with deadening devotion. It embodies the organized faith of ages, and the English homes that have
been nurtured under its influence need not shrink from
comparison with any other homes in Christendom.
Institutions may be called the art that rises in history,
for they show the heart and mind and work of communities and centuries; and they are history embodied.
It is well to interpret all art somewhat in this way, and
to regard poems and pictures, statues and buildings, as
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340      MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
being quite as much expressions of history as are laws
and schools and letters. Europe becomes peculiarly interesting when interpreted in this way, and art is evidently gaining power by presenting the main points of
history in living personality. It is no longer the sycophant of kings, as at Versailles, or the master of ceremonies of Sacerdotalism, as in so much of sculpture and
painting of Rome, but it is the interpreter of God and
humanity as they appear and speak in time. There is a
union of calmness and force in its great works, that remind you of the Word and Spirit that give peace and
power to everything that is divinely human.   The  culture that is thus presented is not assailing, but befriending religion in many ways, and especially by teaching
that the great things have been done by struggle, that
every victory is won by sacrifice, and we who set up the
statues of saints and sages and heroes, must not condemn
ourselves by forgetting their valor. It is well for Italy
to see Dante in visible form at Florence and Naples, and
to trace from him to Cavour the lineage of liberty. It
is well for Germany to set up Hermann and Luther in
bronze before the nation, and not to forget Goethe, and
Schiller, and Humboldt, and Stein. Bunyan and Baxter
are out of prison, and with Cromwell and Milton, among
the great teachers in England, they speak to the eye as
never before.  France is revising her record and giving
her metal and her marble to do honor to principles, and 
AFTER THOUGHTS.
men that her kings and emperors set at naught. She
sends the statue of Lafayette to America, and sets up the
grand figure of Liberty in the harbor of New York.
To an American, especially to a New Englander, Eng land is the great attraction abroad, and to an American
of Puritan origin, her church is more interesting than all
foreign churches. One asks many questions as to the
Church of England, but the main question is, how stands
the old quarrel, and how far is the son of the Puritans
called upon in honor to turn away from that mother
church, in respect for the fathers who came out of it to
find a new home and church on these shores. The reply
cannot but be explicit for a man of a comprehensive
mind and a generous temper. Instead of Laud and
Strafford, the English Church now presents Tait and
Gladstone as the leaders of clergy and laity, and it is
not only in the breadth, but in the height of her communion, that her excellence lies. She secures the liberty
of her bolder thinkers and encourages the charity and
piety of her most earnest devotees. Lord Falkland and
Provost Whichcote of two centuries ago would find her
friendly to their aspirations, and John Wesley would
never have been cast adrift by the present leaders of her
opinion. It is surely a great reach of intellectual and
spiritual emancipation, when you can, under the auspices
of this Church, range from the charming scholarship of
Dean Stanley to the grave eloquence of Canon Liddon,
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342      MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
go from the Platonic culture of the Master of Baliol to
the ascetic discourses of the Warden of Clewer, and have
the influence of bishops like Trench, with his rich learning, and Wilberforce with his vigorous statesmanship, and
whose latest comers have presented such varieties as the
liberal Richard Temple, and the conservative Harold
Browne. Nor is the English Church let down by the
fact that she has been able to spare such men of power
as Newman and Manning, the latter the most wide awake
prelate that I have seen. A New Englander who goes
to England with experiences of the narrowness of sectarianism, and the uncertainty of individual purposes, and
the necessity of institutional order and historical faith,
cannot but be impressed favorably by the aspects of the
church of his fathers. He who sees the undoubted fact
that at home and abroad the choice of people for themselves and their children, must be between the organized
historical church in some of its leading forms, and what
is called Free Religion without creed or law or clergy,
cannot but look with hope and affection upon the Church
of England. That her method is not perfect, and that
her system needs reform, her clergy and laity know perhaps better than any outsiders, and their humility is not
their weakness. But imperfect as in some respects the
administration of Church affairs may be in England, her
Church has order as well as faith, and to men who have
had experience of the caprice of opinion, atld the inso 
AFTER THOUGHTS.
lence of voluntary lords over congregations and clergy,
there is something very winning in impartial law.
It is not strange that a descendant of one of those pilgrims who went from the south of England and whose
kindred had worshipped centuries ago in Salisbury and
Winchester Cathedrals, should find peculiar attraction in
that region- not strange that after visiting at Bemerton,
Hurst, and Brighton the churches of George Herbert,
John Keble, and Frederick Robertson, he found the old
birthright restored to him, and that he left England for
France at heart within the church of his fathers, at once
sure that he had not deserted the humanities of the new
times and that he had a deepened sense of the worth of
the old catholicity. There was not a little in the character and culture of the English dissenters,1 especially of
the Liberals, whom he saw so pleasantly, that tended to
favor the English Church. Their genial homes and their
personal accomplishments were proofs of their affinity
with the old faith and manners. A broad church liberal
like Charles Beard, not only expressed much of a devotee's love for the ancient shrines, but publicly protested
1 George Herbert Curteis, in his Bampton Lecture of 1872, speaks thus
of the Unitarians of England:  "In personal character many Unitarians
represent the very highest type of Christian manhood. In ability and
learning, their ministers are often on a par with our own. To theology
they not unfrequently make valuable contributions. In ecclesiastical
matters, their tendency is rather towards the Church of England than
away from her."
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344     MILE STONES INS OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
against assailing their rightful endowments, and a scholarly pastor like Thomas Sadler and a profound theistic
philosopher like James Martineau had as much of the
English liturgy in their worship as their doctrines and
their position would allow. An American who had given
commemorative discourses upon such old English reformers as Wycliffe and Milton, and such new men as Milman
and Keble, Robertson and Maurice, as well as upon the
evangelical German leaders, Schleiermacher and Rothe,
need not be thought capricious or inconsistent for finding
so much to please or instruct him in quarters, ecclesiastically so wide apart in England, or for remembering so
gratefully the kindness he everywhere received.
V.- STUDIES.
Not only for the importance of the thing itself, but to
meet the wishes of earnest young men who have entered
upon new ethical and theological studies, I may venture
to give a few notes of the men and principles that have
had most to do with what has been wisest and best in experience. It is as false and foolish to say, that a man
ought to think and act and live from himself alone, as it is
wicked to say that he ought to live for himself alone;
and the great champions of individualism refute themselves by their study of the great masters, and by their
delight in docile followers. We New England boys of a
half century ago, lived in a time of rising independence, 
AFTER THOUGHTS.
and we saw in our days every yoke of authority laid
aside, and in time the protest against precedent was carried out into the assertion of the absolute supremacy of
the private conscience and the individual soul. Yet the
new liberty but changed the leadership without snapping
the leading strings. Those of us who were not radicals
by temperament or training, need not be ashamed to own
our guides.
Where should a Massachusetts boy find his model man,
his guiding thinker and his constant friend, but in his
pastor? I have spoken of our pastor in the introduction
to this volume, and I can now say, that he, whose voice
I heard when a little child in the burial service that
prayed for God's blessing upon us as fatherless, was my
adviser and friend to his death, a period of more than
fifty years. He was a master of practical wisdom as well
as of speculative philosophy, a judge of human nature,
and no novice in the world's prudence and thrift. His
mind was logical, ethical and judicial, rather than emotional, esthetic and executive. Perhaps his best power
came out in the pulpit, where his remarkable manner
gave weight to his remarkable words, and both manner
and words told together in certain sentences that hearers
can never forget, and which often give point and force to
the close of his sermon, as when an arrow is shot to
its mark by a strong hand from the bowstring. James
Walker died December 23, 1874, aged eighty years, after
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346      MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
some years of retirement and of limited bodily vigor,
but without loss of mental power. His conversation was
never more keen and witty than in his later years, and
the last time that I saw him, although suffering somewhat
from a local difficulty, he was full of interest in life, and
he spoke with much emphasis of the great struggle in
Europe between the human mind and the old despotism,
with hearty indorsement of the liberating champions,
strong for Bismarck and Germany against Antonelli and
Rome. A few months before, his old parishioners and
friends had sent him some beautiful and original pieces of
sculptured silver work in commemoration of his finished
fourscore years. The gift was carried to him on a lovely
Sunday morning in August, with bright and sweet flowers
from his old parish in Charlestown. This act seemed to
round his life in its fulness, and the silver cup and plate
now are lasting memorials of him in King's Chapel, Boston, where he was last called to be preacher, and where
they are seen on the communion table at Christmas,
Easter, and Whitsunday.1
Dr. Walker represented the ethical and philosophical
elements in our early Christian life, and his preaching
1 I cannot but associate him with the two other friends of early days,
who bore also the name of Walker, and also a fourth of the name,
Timothy Walker, of Cincinnati, to whom I am indebted for much kindness.  Our family physician, William  J. Walker, died first, and our
schoolmaster, Cornelius Walker, lived until last year, the same tough
personality to the last. 
AFTER THOUGHTS.
was the dominant influence in our town, and it had influence in the whole neighborhood. Many cool headed men
thought him a safer guide than Dr. Channing, who was
more of an enthusiast for ideas, and who brought new elements of reform and progress into the pulpit and literature of Massachusetts, not without serious alarm to the
large class of weighty men who, like his class-mate Judge
Story, had been liberals in religion and in some respects
radicals, whilst they were stiff conservatives in society and
politics. Dr. Channing was surely a great power in those
days, and his influence is too large a subject to be dwelt
upon in this hasty sketch. I will only say of him now,
that his widest and most lasting work is seldom recognized- his persistent union of the idea of dignity of human nature with the positive faith in Christ as a divine
person and the prevailing mediator. Strong individualist
as he was, and so jealous of the interference of associations with the individual soul, as to be little of a churchman, he dwelt earnestly upon the reconciliation of the
sects, and the reunion of Christendom under the reign of
Christ.   Vehement  as he was against the  Calvinistic
dogma of the total wreck of human nature by the Fall,
and earnest champion as he was for the existence and
force of the moral sense in man, he never encouraged
self-dependence apart from divine grace, and we find in
his pages many intimations of convictions not unfriendly
to the old Catholic view of man, as needing God's grace
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348     MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
not merely to forgive his sins, but to meet his aspirations
and to help his endeavors after that divine life which
came from God to Eden, and was offered anew and fully
in Christ.   Before this century closes, William Ellery
Channing, with all the limitations in his range of learning
and his reach of thought, will be honored as one of the
heralds of the Catholicity that is to be wrought out
through the union of the priestly, the evangelical, and the
liberal elements in the Church of the living God. He
held to the end to his connection with Christ and the
church; in his last discourse among the Berkshire hills,
he prayed for the coming of the kingdom of the Son, and
those of us who have received from his hands the cup of
communion, will never forget how devout he was in its
administration, and how full of love for the risen Lord.
The studies that made the most mark upon our set
at the Cambridge Theological School were more in the
ethical, literary, and philosophical than in the dogmatic
and ecclesiastical line. I remember in a careful study for
an essay on Sir James AIackintosh, how strong was the
impression that Bishop Butler's sermons on Human Nature made upon me in vindication of the Moral Sense,
and how much Coleridge's "Aids to Reflection" did to
back up this impression, and also to throw light on the
relation of the pure reason to the truths of religion, and
the graces and virtues of Christianity. The poets, too,
came in for their share of influence, and Goethe and 
AFTER THOUGHTS.
Wordsworth were read with much delight, as interpreters
of the harmony of the universe, and of the need of living
in the serenity and earnestness that become the great temple in which we are, and of opening into our religious
life the freedom and beauty and grandeur of nature, and
of the noblest art.
The theologian who did most to correct the subjective
one-sidedness, and the ideal sentimentalism of our school
life, was Olshausen, who was first introduced to me by my
steadfast friend, James Freeman Clarke, at Louisville,
Kentucky, and whom we studied many a morning and
evening together, and commented upon and translated his
learned and devout pages. Olshausen impressed me much
by his habit of gathering up the meaning of Scripture
texts under dominant principles, and even more by his
philosophy of matter and spirit, body and soul, and the
Incarnation and the Church, in which the material and the
spiritual elements and forces were so combined and reconciled. Hle taught me to see as never before the realism
of Christianity, and the way of shunning the dreamy subjectivity of transcendentalism, and of believing in the Incarnate WTord, the Enduring Church, and the immortal life
without sinking into materialism. I never can forget the
benefit, and have had Olshausen's works always at hand,
although later thinkers and scholars may have interfered
with his former place in the library.
In the first term of parish life, for several years, De
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350      MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
Wette was a favorite author, and I studied him much and
translated his two volumes on "Practical Ethics." His
value was in the freshness and comprehensiveness of his
critical learning, his recognition of the devout as well as
the ethical side of religion, and perhaps not least of all in
his distribution, according to the method of Fries, of the
faculties of the mind into Wissen, Glauben, and Ahnung,
knowing, believing, and aspiring, a division which gave
room for the facts of science, the ideas of theology, and
the mysteries of religion. Every guide was then a helper
who relieved us from the prosaic moralizing and meagre
theology of the time, and encouraged us to preach and to
pray, as if there were a soul as well as understanding in
man, a spirit as well as a letter in revelation, and God
were with us now in the church as well as of old with his
chosen prophets in his law. I was sorry not to go to
Basle, to the grave of De Wette, for he was friend as
well as teacher, and we had corresponded together. He
was a gentle and brave spirit, and had suffered much for
conscience sake. He lives now in his works, and his
translation of the Bible is likely to be a lasting monument of his learning and truthfulness.
Then as the range of care and enterprise increased,
there came more ambitious studies for public uses, and the
preacher who had a large parish in a university town was
moved to do what he could to instruct the young people
in the personages and principles of church history with 
AFTER THOUGHTS.
proper consultation of original sources. What a world
was opened in the old fathers and the modern reformers!
Of the old fathers, Augustine made the most mark upon
me, and his flaming sense of the work of God's grace
upon man, his sagacious recognition of the continuity of
history and the essential unity of the race, his generous
interpretation of nature in connection with the scriptures,
and his broad vision of the new city of God that was
changing the face of the world, and building the new
Jerusalem upon the broad foundation of the Roman
empire, all these made the saintly Bishop of Hippo a
light and power with the novice at his books; and still
the spell remains in these latter years, when I see from
my window, here under the trees, the spire of the church
that bears his name, and I sometimes give a lecture upon
his life and his work. With such ancient studies, the
new scholars and thinkers were heard, and to none of
these do I owe more gratitude than to Frederick Maurice,
especially to his "Kingdom of Christ" and his" Religions
of the World," with their profound insight into the institutions and ideas of the historical church, and the adaptation of its truth and grace to all the needs of man. At
the same time the arts of industry and education were not
neglected, and the student, fond as he was of Keble and
Williams, and of the restorers of ancient devotion, was no
stranger to the workshops, and the schools and the university, little claim as he may have had to a leading place there.
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352      MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
In this great city of New York the scene afterwards
changed, and men and affairs threatened to crowd out
study, but the work went on, and if the stirring town was
too aggressive, the quiet country was more soothing, and
books and the pen had new charm when you could play
the peripatetic, and stretch your legs at will at intervals
of weariness with reading and writing. Acquaintance
was still kept up with the current thought of Europe and
America, and time was found for a great subject such
as Dante, who began modern thought, or Schleiermacher,
who has tried to keep it within Christ's grace, for Goethe,
who saw the universe in its beauty, or Hartmann, who
unveils its pain and death; and weeks and months were
pressed for time and thought to study and write upon them
with an approach to fidelity. Historical studies of home
subjects came in for their share with lectures and addresses
upon events and personages of New England and of New
York. Learned and accomplished scholars were at hand
to help all generous studies, and no man who has lived and
worked with any earnestness in our city for the last twentyfive years, can fail to be grateful for the kind fellowship of
society and liberal gift of information through word and
books. Scholarship has been to me comprehensive, catholic indeed, in New York; and Liberal and Evangelical,
Congregationalist, Presbyterian, Methodist, Episcopalian,
and Roman Catholic, Jews and Christians, have been
friends and brothers in this companionship of letters. It 
AFTER THOUGHTS.
is a good thing to have regular and organized help in
study, and I recall with never lessening satisfaction the
results of such help in two conspicuous instances. Happy
were the ten years or more that ended somewhere about
1850, when a score of New England clergymen who were
not willing to abandon the gospel and church for the new
light of rationalism, combined together in the Union Pastoral Association, and met once a month for conversation,
deliberation, and worship. The men and their gifts were
various, but the spirit was one. Edward B. Hall and
Ephraim and Andrew P. Peabody, Frederick D. Huntington and J. I. T. Coolidge, Frederick H. Hedge, and
George Putnam, S. K. Lothrop, T. B. Fox, and James
W. Thompson were of the number, and their names in,
dicate the comprehensiveness and the temper of the association. It was a great loss to have this companionship
broken by death and distances, and great is the satisfaction in the virtual renewal of its privileges after twenty
years, by new fellowship with a company of scholars who
are humane, thoughtful, and progressive as were the old
set, and with little difference except in more positive and
historical church institutions and convictions.
But why urge so earnestly especial associations, when
life itself in pastoral circles is constant association, and a
man has always enough to study around him, and he
ought always to find motive enough to think seriously,
and to work bravely. When the vicissitudes and charac
23
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354      MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
ters of parish life are taken out of the sphere of private
gossip and personal caprice, and lifted into the sphere of
Christian faith and church communion, great is the transformation; and they help on its better spirit alike by
their sacrifice and their cheer. It is well to do what we
can to bring about this result by elevating sociality into
religious purposes, instead of letting religion down into
personal frivolity. If church clothes and ways may be too
stiff and stately, parlor clothes and ways may be too easy
in some respects, and too costly and conventional also;
and it is a grave question whether anything is gained by
the new familiarity in religious affairs, which regards a
picnic as the Pentecost, puts a tea-table in place of the
Eucharist, and is eager to bring dances and plays as near
as possible if not into the sanctuary. Much is done by encourag,ing the people to bring the education of their children within positive church influences under their pastor.
The Sunday school should be the children's church, and
with hymn and prayer, thoughtful instruction should be
mingled, and they should be led to take part in public
worship, and to feel the cheer and the power of the associations and influences that go with a wise church order,
and open to the child's soul the heavenly graces that were
owned in Baptism, and that introduced him to his place
in the Kingdom of God. The evening Sunday service
is full of opportunity for such instruction and influence,
and no seasons of my pastoral life are more precious in 
AFTER THOUGHTS.
remembrance than the years which redeemed the Sunday
evening from empty seats and indifference, and cheered
the gathered people with sweet music, and Scripture lessons and psalms, called them to join in responses, and
encouraged the preacher to bring out things, new and old,
from his studies, and to combine to the best of his ability
the stores of culture, whether from history, literature, art
or science with the truths of religion.
I cannot leave without mention one author to whose
thoughts I have probably given more study the last twenty
years or more, than to any other man's, and whom I can
name more fitly now as he treats so much of matters
greatly agitated in our time, especially the relation of religion to the church and the nation. I remember bringing Richard Rothe's three solid volumes of "Theological
Ethics" into the country long years ago, and beginning
the introductory essay of some two hundred pages with
amazement, that a man of known sense could possibly be
so obscure and dull. But he held me closely to him for
some weeks, and I have read him more or less ever since.
His book is regarded by many of the best scholars as the
most thorough and valuable work ever written upon the
subject, and as the most important contribution to theology in our time. He is apparently more prized in Germany than any other recent author who has positively
Christian convictions, and everything that he left on
paper when he died, in 1868, has been published, and
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356      MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
even his fragmentary notes have been edited. I have
here on my table the last of these publications, the first
volume of his devotional evening instructions to theological students (1834-37), a book full of tenderness and
wisdom. I have written out my studies of his mind in
full elsewhere, and I will only say now how precious he
has been as an interpreter of the source of virtue as well
as duty in God and Christ, and with what insight and
breadth he brings the whole range of life within the power
of Christian faith and love, and especially how strongly
he insists upon the state or the nation as divinely ordained, and as the coining sphere of Godly manhood.
Germany in one respect has taken him at his word, and
he who in his lifetime was regarded as a dreamer in his
idea of having the church consummated, and perhaps absorbed in the nation, is now found to be the prophet of
the present German empire, with its state church, and
perhaps its state that may claim too imperiously to be the
sufficient church. The recent development of affairs in
Christendom has not led me to accept this view of the
church and the nation, and surely in our America nothing
could be worse for us, than undertaking to make over the
church to the national government, or even to slight the
institutions of the church and the clergy with the intention of putting the mind and conscience of the people
wholly into politics. We need reform sadly, every think ing man knows, but our experience in leaving even so 
AFTER THOUGHTS.
much of education within the control of politicians, warns
us to beware of taking religion away from its spiritual
foundations and functions, and making it over in any
way to secular powers. The more independent and positive our American Church is, the better her influence over
the nation, the stronger her moral power in civil reform.
England is seeing this evidently, and her church is striving
to win the people by spiritual methods, in view of the
dangers that threaten her civic relations; and as matters
are now, the Church of England more and more seeks
jurisdiction within her own authorities, and less and less
depends upon court power. Her gain of strength the last
forty years has been from her own spiritual life. It is
tribute enough to Rothe's rendering of civic virtue to
affirm with him the insufficiency of merely ceremonial
service, and the danger of merely sacerdotal sway over
religion. Patriot as he was, and loyal son of a father who
served Frederick the Great, he loved his nation with a
Christian heart, and he had a more living sense of Christ
as the present Saviour, than any of the theological leaders.
of his time. We need his ethics of patriotism here in America, and we can have this without accepting his theory of
the consummation of the state in the dissolution of the
historical church, or of the making over of its functions
to an ecclesiastical commission, or a committee of devotion.
The heavenly powers, of course, enter into all fidelity, and
inspire all virtue and sacrifice; but they have their own
357 
MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
scriptures and ministry and shrines, and those who have
watched the course of affairs in America, and tried to
find and to give divine peace and motive, must confess
that the church has its own hallowed sphere, and that
there in a peculiar sense the tabernacle of God is with
men. To me the historical church has been the best
teacher, and in her various forms, from the Puritan pastor of my childhood to the studies and companionships of
these sober years, the church has been teacher and comforter, with a liberty ever enlarging, and thought and
purpose ever more inspiriting. Rothe had the superstitions of Rome so constantly before his eyes after his long
residence there, that he saw no security against Romish
bondage except in the state. Many men who have seen
the Pope, and lived in Rome, are still glad to keep the
two great words together, Christ and the Church.
VI. -THE OUTLOOK.
Those of us, who have reached threescore years have
no great cause to be anxious as to what is to happen to us
personally in this world, as our career is so far run, and
the end is near. But for our children and grandchildren,
for our country and our race, there are many perplexing
questions which it is hard to settle, and which now cloud
the prospect. These late years, that now pass in review,
have been full of changes and disappointments to communities and families, and although a man who has lived all 
AFTER THOUGHTS.
the while on the same hill-side in summer and in the same
street in winter, and loved the same books and held essentially the same faith, and followed the same habits of
pen and voice, has no reason to complain of a broken life;
yet there have been great breaks in the life of us all who
have learned that we are in the same boat with our neighbors, our nation, and our race. In fact the map of the
world within that time has been changed, and the actual
and prospective lines of civil and religious domination
have been vastly altered. In our own country there is
hardly a man in power who was heard of twenty years
ago, and the men who are now up for the highest offices,
with a single exception, were not conspicuous enough to
be named then in the very generous cyclopedias and dictionaries of the time.
The local communities that I have personally known
have signally changed. My native town, Charlestown,
has become a part of Boston, and after preaching in St.
John's Church there on the eve of the annexations in
1874, I heard the chimes of old Christ Church bells, that
seemed to celebrate the union, and to recall the days when
to me, a child, those bells were the only voice to speak of
the mother church of our Puritan race. The village of
Nashua is now a thriving city, centre of lines of railroad,
and with a funded debt noted upon the price current honorably.  The city of Providence has gone from 25,000 inhabitants to near 100,000, and with great loss of citizens
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360      MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
by death, and of property by misfortune, her career is
prosperous; and if we judge by the permanence of her
present mayor in office, who was one of our Bible-class,
and Sunday-school boys, her policy is settled and her basis
sure. New York has nearly doubled her population and
vastly magnified her territory, and in spite of the knavery
that has robbed her, and of the dangers that threaten her
trade and her order, the city was never so fair to the eye,
and so hopeful in the essentials of prosperity, however
checked in her imperial pride. There the tide of business rolls on, and although the particles constantly pass
away, the stream flows on very much the same, and is
likely to flow for ages.
It has been not easy for industrious and intelligent men
always to earn a fair living in the great city, and wary
thinkers and observers say that our children are to have a
harder time than we have had. But sunshine as well as
cloud has its surprises, and light breaks upon the darkness when night is deepest. If one asks anxiously what
evil is coming, a brighter spirit may ask what good is
near? It is vain to try, however, to hide the fact, that the
present time is not especially fruitfil in optimists, that
there is a tone of sadness in the most vital literature and
art of our time, that the cultivated classes are not particularly merry now, and that many careful thinkers see
breakers ahead. Mr. W. R. Greg may not be one of the
wisest of men, but he is surely one of the keenest observ 
AFTER THOUGHTS.
ers, and the most candid of writers; and he treats not
only of England, but of Europe and America, when he
sees "Rocks Ahead" in the political supremacy of the
lower classes, the decline of industry and the divorce of
intelligence from religion. Professor Huxley is not especially cheering in what he lately said at Baltimore of
our prospective two hundred millions of people in 1976,
under the despotism of universal suffrage, and from Professor von Laveleye of Liittich, who is a corresponding
member of the Institute of France, we have a tract
dated Nbrdlingen, 1876, which points out the pressing
danger to civilized nations from three prominent assaults
upon the religious idea which is so essential to morality
and even to civilization,- the tendency of natural science
to rest in materialism and to deny God and immortality;
the incessant pursuit of wealth with the attendant habits
of luxury; and thirdly the new socialism, which accepts
the rising philosophy of material force, denies all spiritual realities, and threatens to set up its own rule of
might. So calm and candid and profound a thinker as
the younger Fichte, so called not from his youth, for he
was born in 1797, but from contrast with his father, the
great philosopher of that name, wrote in the last work of
his that we have seen, the Letters to Dr. E. Zeller on the
latest movement of German speculation, with the preface
dated Spring, 1876, shortly before he died: "It is not so
much the unbelief which is in the first instance to be corn
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362      MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
plained of. This is only the symptom and working of a
deeper evil; of the increasing decay of all ideal dispositions, of occupation and satisfaction with the sensuous,
phenomenal, and perishable. In practical relations, this
appears in a soul-corroding luxury, which, according to
necessary laws, ends in Pessimism; in art an empirical
realism which selfishly feels only after consequences; in
science, in great discoveries and actual achievements of
exact investigation, besides a collection of empirical material in fragmentary individual researches, and in dislike
of all guiding speculative ideas, an overestimate of the
value of such unconnected, peculiarly fruitless results, in
short an empiricism without ideas, whose last result can
be only a theoretical materialism, which followed consequently threatens to end naturally in moral nihilism. If
this is unquestionably the characteristic of the present
temper of the world and the age, then the future, left to
itself, must expect only more advanced developments of
it. And thus it is to be feared, that we are gradually approaching an abyss, which hides within itself conditions,
which historically the Roman empire presented under the
rule of the Caesars. There, as now, great intellectual
culture and many sided susceptibility towards the aesthetie
beautified enjoyments of life were combined with frightful self-seeking and reckless cruelty. Over all swept a
deep feeling of the worthlessness of all earthly existence,
which looked to death by suicide as the ready resort, when
pleasure is exhausted, and sorrow or want invade.." 
AFTER THOUGHTS.
This is a somewhat dark picture of our time, but there
is much truth in its drawing and coloring, and the prospect before us is surely not all sunshine and roses. It is
evident that ideal principles are at a discount now, and the
age moves by the facts of nature and the science which
these facts teach, and by the forces which this science can
bring into the field. We are not to quarrel with this
disposition, but rather try to carry it up into the higher
sphere, and to acknowledge all the facts, to rise from them
into the higher science of God and the soul, and to win the
force that this high science bestows. We are disposed to
quarrel with our age for not being practical and energetic
enough. Our young people seem to me to be too nervous
and fidgety, in danger of being distracted by over-excitement; they are too self-indulgent and exacting, with desires
far in excess of their achievement; they are unsettled,
and in peril of losing the loyal convictions that are the
ground of all peace and power, whether in private or
in public life.
As to the present shaking of the old faith and rise of
materialism, it is not well to be timid, much less despairing.
The new science undoubtedly makes many infidels and
destroys many old traditions; but it is not necessarily
atheistic or materialistic. If the theory of Evolution is
so explained as to lose God in material atoms and agencies, it is perverted from its just bearings; and the Christian man who traces the work of God in the ages of
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364      MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
Creation, and in the eons of progress, may rejoice in the
Incarnation and the Church as the crown of creation, and
the complete manifestation of God. It cannot be denied,
however, that there are two systems of nature that now
are held in high quarters, that are disheartening and demoralizing. We may illustrate them by the atheism of
Haeckel, and the Pantheism of Schopenhauer and Von
Hartmann. Few serious thinkers will agree with the
monstrous atheism of Haeckel, who ascribes all movement and organism, all thought, feeling and will, all life
and personality, to atoms and mechanical forces. The present tendency among intellectual adventurers and speculative free thinkers, lies the other way, and the pantheistic
movement that Spinoza headed two centuries ago, has
borne fruits very different from what he seems to have
anticipated in the pantheistic Pessimism of the present
day which ascribes all conscious life to an unconscious
and almighty power, and finds no personal Providence, no
mercy before the throne of Sovereign Law. It may be
as the younger Fichte before his death, recently wrote,
that this school of thought has culminated, and is now declining, yet its power is still great, and it is making converts still.
These new fatalists profess indeed a code of mercy,
and claim to be examples of genuine and self-sacrificing
humanity, in virtually accepting the creed of Buddha,
which declares that a sense of the inherent wretchedness 
AFTER THOUGHTS.
life, and of the blessedness of being out of it, should lead
men to pity and to help each other in the sympathy of
common misery. So it is that Pessimism preaches its doctrine of the Cross, and does not disdain to consecrate the
great sorrow of mankind by beautiful art, whilst it offers
not redemption from sin and death, but the redemption
which is death forever. It is said that Richard Wagner
holds the pessimist philosophy, and that he believes in
music as the prelude of the Nirvana, where pain and personality are lost in the unconscious all. If so the Passion Trilogy of Bayreuth, which emperors and princes
lately thronged to hear, resembles in a measure the Passion Play of Ober-Ammergau in the near mountains, with
the difference that the Passion Trilogy holds out in its
music of the future nothing of the Redeemer whom those
mountain peasants set forth upon the cross. But names
and theories must not blind us to the excellences of men,
and to the movements of humanity. Wagner's music may
be prophetic of a pathos of sacrifice and faith deeper than
his theory, and it may exalt the worship of the church
of the future more than he believes. Such notions cannot
satisfy the soul nor meet the facts of history, or the wants
of society. These system makers may say, for example,
that love between man and woman is the one sin, whether
without law or with law, and that to live and to have
children is treason against mankind, and that the world
is now on its last legs, and had better be left to die. The
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366      MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
world is old and shaky and childhood died with Greece,
they say. They do not believe it when they come to the
real test. Hartmann has lately married, and he writes of
his charming wife and of his playful child, from his Berlin home in the midst of the gardens. That child is
young as childhood ever was in Greece, and our boys and
girls are as merry as the little ones who bowed down for
father Abraham's blessing, or they who laughed and wept
by turns when they heard old Homer's song. Life is and
will be in spite of what we say, or write, or dream, and
this two yearling girl who is running about the room, or
gamboling among the flowers and chickens, and who the
other evening cried out at the moon, and began to climb
up the piazza pillar to get to it for a plaything, has a
dominant force of blood and nerve and brain and soul,
that will keep the world going better than the dry philos-?
ophers whom such as she make no scruple of pulling by
the nose in her glee and her dash.          t
Life is a great fact and a great force, and so is God.
Reason of him as we may, or deny or limit his being and
attributes, and he is the same -not only within nature,
but above it, not only immanent, as the new thinkers are
so fond of saying, but transcendent, or above nature, even
He whom the heaven of heavens cannot contain. Without Him the future is a blank, as the past is an enigma
and the present a desert.
It may be true as Uhlhorn, Fichte and various other 
AFTER THOUGHTS.
writers have hinted, that the present age in many respects
resembles the Rome of the Cesars, but it does not follow
that all is dark in our future on that account. The empire
of the Cesars was the external condition of the rise and
progress of the universal Kingdom of Christ, and as a
recent author has truly said, the Christian era began virtually with the accession of Augustus, nearly thirty years
before our Lord's birth. If the luxury and superstition
of the empire called for the Redeemer's coming, the Roman
language, roads, and law, prepared the way of its triumph.
Now that the twentieth century, since Octavius became
Augustus Caesar, has begun, and we find a new, more universal empire of civilization opening upon us with dangers so alarming, we may as well look for the favorable
conditions of this civilization, and see in its new science
and arts, its new forces and combinations, helps for the
coming Kingdom of God. When has there been such a
preparation for the rule of piety and humanity, for the
opening of nature to man, and of man to God. To say
nothing of the fact that the speech of the Anglo-German
race is mastering the literature and business of the world,
consider the startling fact that the nations of the globe
have but one arithmetic, which is the language of trade,
they sing and march by pretty much the same music,
which is the language of feeling, and they carry the burdens of industry by the same engines, and send the tidings of correspondence by the same flashing wire. Who
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368      MILE STONES IN OUR LIFE-JOURNEY.
shall be the Augustus Csesar of this new Universal Kingdom, and who shall be the high priest of this new fellowship of nations and men?
Our reply is prompt, sufficient, and decisive. The God
of our fathers will be with us as with them. Let us favor
all science, whether physical or social, all art, alike the
industrial and the beautiful, all association, whether
domestic, neighborly, national or cosmopolitan. Let us
preach the principles of peace, and set forth its code of
reconciliation between nations. But how can there be
any unity, any faith, any progress, any blessing without
the living God, who is above all, in all, and moving all to
the Supreme Good?
The most familiar of truths is the grandest of powers,
and the spring of all the best hope and progress. It was
spoken at our Baptism, in guardian promise, and deepens
in tenderness at every Communion; it is sung in the
Gloria in Excelsis, with the pathos of its sufferer, and
the jubilee of its victor; it runs through the Te Deum,
which is the anthem of civilization as well as the hymn
of worship, and no words that are heard among men
mean more to our time than the clause, Likewise the
Holy Ghost the Comforter. That Friend be with us when
we meet and when we part.
WALDSTEIN, FAIRFIELD, Conn., September 16, 1876.
JUN 2. I 4'L c-,