1891-1892
On April 26, 1891, the new Tabernacle was opened. There were three
dedication services and thousands of people came. I was fifty-nine years
of age. Up to this time everything had been extraordinary in its
conflict, its warnings. I found myself, after over thirty years of
service to the Gospel, pastor of the biggest Protestant church in the
world. It seems to me there were more men of indomitable success during
my career in America than at any other time. There were so many
self-made men, so many who compelled the world to listen, and feel and
do as they believed--men of remarkable energy, of prophetic genius.
Everywhere in England I had been asked about Cyrus W. Field. He was the
hero of the nineteenth century. In his days of sickness and trouble the
world remembered him. Of all the population of the earth he was the one
man who believed that a wire could be strung across the Atlantic. It
took him twelve years of incessant toil and fifty voyages across the
Atlantic. I remember well, in 1857, when the cable broke, how everyone
joined in the great chorus of "I told you so." There was a great jubilee
in that choral society of wise know-nothings. Thirty times the grapnel
searched the bottom of the sea and finally caught the broken cable, and
the pluck and ingenuity of Cyrus W. Field was celebrated. Ocean
cablegrams had ceased to be a curiosity, but some of us remember the day
when they were. I kept a memorandum of the two first messages across the
Atlantic that passed between Queen Victoria and President Buchanan in
the summer of 1858.
From England, in the Queen's name, came this:
"To the President of the United States, Washington--
"The Queen desires to congratulate the President upon the successful
completion of this great international work, in which the Queen has
taken the deepest interest. The Queen is convinced that the
President will join with her in fervently hoping that the electric
cable which now connects Great Britain with the United States will
prove an additional link between the nations whose friendship is
founded upon their common interest and reciprocal esteem. The Queen
has much pleasure in thus communicating with the President and
renewing to him her wishes for the prosperity of the United States."
The President's answering cable was as follows:
"To Her Majesty Victoria, Queen of Great Britain--
"The President cordially reciprocates the congratulations of Her
Majesty the Queen on the success of the great international
enterprise accomplished by the science, skill, and indomitable
energy of the two countries. It is a triumph more glorious than was
ever won by any conquest on the field of battle. May the Atlantic
telegraph, under the blessing of Heaven, prove to be a bond of
perpetual peace and friendship between the kindred nations and an
instrument designed by Divine Providence to diffuse religion,
civilisation, liberty and law throughout the world. In this view
will not all nations of Christendom spontaneously unite in the
declaration that it shall be forever neutral, and that its
communications shall be held sacred in passing to their destination,
even in the midst of hostilities.
"JAMES BUCHANAN."
It is interesting to compare the elemental quality, the inner character
of these national flashes of feeling, that came so comparatively soon
after the days of the revolution in America. It was a sort of prose
poetry of the new century. This recollection came back to me, on my
return from Europe, upon the opening of the new Tabernacle, a symbol of
the eternal human progress of the world. Materially and spiritually we
were striving ahead, men of affairs, men of religion, philosophers,
scientists, and poets.
I was present in 1891 at the celebration of Whittier's eighty-fourth
birthday. He was on the bright side of eighty then. The schools
celebrated the day, so should the churches have done, for he was a
Christian poet.
John Greenleaf Whittier was a Quaker. That means that he was a genial,
kind, good man--a simple man. I spent an afternoon with him once in a
barn. We were summering in the mountains near by. We found ourselves in
the barn, where we stretched out on the hay. The world had not spoiled
the simplicity of his nature. It was an afternoon of pastoral peace,
with one who had written himself into the heart of a nation. How much I
learned from that man's childlikeness and simplicity!
If he had lived to be a hundred he would still have remained young. The
long flight of years had not tired his spirit, for wherever the English
language is spoken he will always live. He was born in Christmas week, a
spirit in human shape, come to earth to keep it forever young. He was
the bell-ringer of all youthful ages. And yet he remembered also those
who for any reason could not join in the merriment of the holidays. To
those I recommend Whittier's poem, in which he celebrates the rescue of
two Quakers who had been fined £10 for attending church instead of going
to a Quaker Meeting House, and not being able to pay the fine were first
imprisoned and then sold as slaves, but no ship master consenting to
carry them into slavery they were liberated. The closing stanza of this
poem is worth remembering:--
"Now, let the humble ones arise,
The poor in heart be glad,
And let the mourning ones again
With robes of praise be clad;
For He who cooled the furnace,
And smoothed the stormy wave,
And turned the Chaldean lions,
Is mighty still to save."
The new Tabernacle more than met our expectations. From the day we
opened it, it was a great blessing. It seated 6,000 persons, and when
crowded held 7,000. There was still some debt on the building, for the
entire enterprise had cost us about $400,000. There were regrets
expressed that we did not follow the elaborate custom of some
fashionable churches in these days and introduce into our services
operatic music. I preferred the simple form of sacred music--a cornet
and organ. Everybody should get his call from God, and do his work in
his own way. I never had any sympathy with dogmatics. There is no church
on earth in which there is more freedom of utterance than in the
Presbyterian church.
[Illustration: THE THIRD BROOKLYN TABERNACLE.]
We were in the midst of a religious conflict on many sacred questions in
1892. There came upon us a plague called Higher Criticism. My idea of it
was that Higher Criticism meant lower religion. The Bible seemed to me
entirely satisfactory. The chief hindrance to the Gospel was this
everlasting picking at the Bible by people who pretended to be its
friends, but who themselves had never been converted. The Higher
Criticism was only a flurry. The world started as a garden and it will
close as a garden. That there may be no false impression of the sublime
destiny of the world as I see it, let me add that it is not a garden of
idleness and pleasure, but a vineyard in which all must labour from
early morning till the glory of sundown wraps us in its revival robes of
golden splendour.
What a changing, hurrying world of desperate means it is. What a mirage
of towering ambition is the whole of life! I have so often wondered why
men, great men of heart and brain, should ever die out, though they pass
on to live forever under brighter skies.
In January, 1892, Congressman William E. Robinson was buried from our
church, and in February of the same month Spurgeon died in England.
Though men may live at swords' points with each other they die in peace.
This last forgetfulness is some of the beautiful moss that grows on the
ruins of poor human nature.
Congressman Robinson was among the gifted men of his time. His friends
were giants, his work was constructive, his pen an instrument of
literary force. He landed in America with less than a sovereign in his
pocket, and achieved prominence in national and State affairs. I knew
him well and respected him.
There is an affinity of souls on earth and doubtless in heaven. We seek
those who are our kindred souls when we reach there. In this respect I
always feel a sense of gratitude, of cheerfulness for those who have
passed on. My old friend, Charles H. Spurgeon, in February, 1892, made
his last journey; and I am sure that the first whom he picked out in
heaven were the souls of Jonathan Edwards and John Calvin--two men of
tremendous evangelism. I first met Spurgeon in London in 1872.
"I read your sermons," I said to him first.
"Everybody reads yours," he replied.
Spurgeon made a long battle against disease; the last few months in
agony. His name is on the honour roll of the world's history, but for
many years he was caricatured and assailed. He kept a scrap-book of the
printed blasphemy against him. The first picture I ever saw of him
represented him as sliding down the railing of his pulpit in the
presence of his congregation, to show how easy it was to go to hell, and
then climbing up on the opposite railing to show how difficult it was to
get to heaven. Most people at the time actually believed that he had
done this.
In this same month Dr. Mackenzie, the famous physician, died, and my old
friend, the Rev. Dr. Hanna of Belfast, the leading Protestant minister
of Ireland. Out of the darkness into the light; out of the struggle into
victory; out of earth into Heaven!
There was always mercy on earth, however, for those who remained. Mercy!
The biggest word in the human language! I remember how it impressed me,
when, at the invitation of Dr. Leslie Keeley, the inventor of the "Gold
Cure" for drunkenness, I visited his institution at Dwight, Ill. It was
a new thing then and a most merciful miracle of the age. It settled no
question, perhaps, but intensified the blessings of reformed thought.
There were questions that could not be solved, however, questions of
industrial moment that we almost despaired of. The tariff was one of
them. I felt convinced that the tariff question would never be settled.
The grandchildren of every generation will always be discussing it, and
thresh out the same old straw which the Democrats and Republicans were
discussing before them. When I was a boy only eight years old the tariff
was discussed just as warmly as it will ever be. Like my friend Henry
Watterson, of Kentucky, I was a Free Trader. Politics were so mixed up
it was difficult to see ahead. Cleveland was after Hill and Hill was
after Cleveland; that alone was clear to everybody.
For my own satisfaction, in the spring of 1892, I went to see what
Washington was really doing, thinking, living. It had improved morally
and politically, its streets were still the trail of the mighty. A great
change had taken place there.
A higher type of men had taken possession of our national halls.
Duelling, once common, was entirely abolished, and a Senator who would
challenge a fellow-member to fight would make himself a laughing-stock.
No more clubbing of Senators on account of opposite opinions! Mr. Covode
of Pennsylvania, no longer brandished a weapon over the head of Mr.
Barksdale of Mississippi. Grow and Keitt no more took each other by the
throat. Griswold no more pounded Lyon, Lyon snatching the tongs and
striking back until the two members in a scuffle rolled on the floor of
the great American Congress. One of the Senators of twenty-five years
ago died in Flatbush Hospital, idiotic from his dissipations. One member
of Congress I saw years ago seated drunk on the curbstone in
Philadelphia, his wife trying to coax him home. A Senator from New York
many years ago on a cold day was picked out of the Potomac, into which
he had dropped through his intoxication, the only time that he ever came
so near losing his life by too much cold water. Talk not about the good
old days, for the new days in Washington were far better. There was John
Sherman of the Senate, a moral, high-minded, patriotic and talented man.
I said to him as I looked up into his face: "How tall are you?" and his
answer was, "Six feet one inch and a half;" and I thought to myself "You
are a tall man every way, with mental stature over-towering like the
physical." There was Senator Daniel of Virginia, magnetic to the last
degree, and when he spoke all were thrilled while they listened. Fifteen
years ago, at Lynchburg, Va., I said to him: "The next time I see you, I
will see you in the United States Senate." "No, no," he replied, "I am
not on the winning side. I am too positive in my opinions." I greeted
him amid the marble walls of the Senate with the words "Didn't I tell
you so?" "Yes," he said, "I remember your prophecy." There also were
Senators Colquitt and Gordon of Georgia, at home whether in secular or
religious assemblages, pronounced Christian gentlemen, and both of them
tremendous in utterance. There was Senator Carey of Wyoming, who was a
boy in my church debating society at Philadelphia, his speech at
eighteen years demonstrating that nothing in the way of grand
achievement would be impossible. There was Senator Manderson of
Nebraska, his father and mother among my chief supporters in
Philadelphia, the Senator walking about as though he cared nothing about
the bullets which he had carried ever since the war, of which he was one
of the heroes. Brooklyn was proud of her Congressmen. I heard our
representative, Mr. Coombs, speak, and whether his hearers agreed or
disagreed with his sentiments on the tariff question, all realised that
he knew what he was talking about, and his easy delivery and point-blank
manner of statement were impressive. So, also, at the White House,
whether people liked the Administration or disliked it, all reasonable
persons agreed that good morals presided over the nation, and that
well-worn jest about the big hat of the grandfather, President William
Henry Harrison, being too ample for the grandson, President Benjamin
Harrison, was a witticism that would soon be folded up and put out of
sight. Anybody who had carefully read the 120 addresses delivered by
President Benjamin Harrison on his tour across the continent knew that
he had three times the brain ever shown by his grandfather. Great men, I
noticed at Washington, were great only a little while. The men I saw
there in high places fifteen years ago had nearly all gone. One
venerable man, seated in the Senate near the Vice-President's chair, had
been there since he was introduced as a page at 10 years of age by
Daniel Webster. But a few years change the most of the occupants of high
positions. How rapidly the wheel turns. Call the roll of Jefferson's
Cabinet? Dead! Call the roll of Madison's Cabinet? Dead! Call the roll
of Monroe's Cabinet? Dead! Call the roll of Pierce's Cabinet? Dead! Call
the roll of Abraham Lincoln's Cabinet? Dead! The Congressional burying
ground in the city of Washington had then 170 cenotaphs raised in honour
of members.
While I was in Chicago, in the spring of 1892, there came about an
almost national discussion as to whether the World's Fair should be kept
open on Sunday. Nearly all the ministers foresaw empty churches if the
fair were kept open.
In spite of the personal malice against me of one of the great editors
of New York, the people did not seem to lose their confidence in the
Christian spirit. Both Dr. Parkhurst and myself were the targets of this
brilliant man's sarcasm and satire at this time, but neither of us were
demoralised or injured in the course of our separate ways of duty.
In the summer of 1892 the working plans of what the newspapers
generously called my vacation took me to Europe on a tour of Great
Britain and Ireland, including a visit to Russia, to await the arrival
of a ship-load of food sent by the religious weekly of which I was
editor. Some criticism was made of the way I worked instead of rested in
vacation time.
Someone asked me if I believed in dreams. I said, no; I believed in
sleep, but not in dreams. The Lord, in olden times, revealed Himself in
dreams, but I do not think He does so often now. When I was at school we
parsed from "Young's Night Thoughts," but I had no very pleasant
memories of that book. I had noticed that dreamers are often the prey of
consumption. It seems to have a fondness for exquisite natures--dreamy,
spiritual, a foe of the finest part of the human family. There was Henry
Kirke White, the author of that famous hymn, "When Marshalled on the
Nightly Plains," who, dying of consumption, wrote it with two feet in
the grave, and recited it with power when he could not move from his
chair.
We sailed on the "New York," June 15, 1892, for Europe. This preaching
tour in England was urged upon me by ties of friendship, made years
before, by the increased audiences I had already gained through my
public sermons, and of my own hearty desire to see them all face to
face. My first sermon in London was given on June 25, 1892, in the City
Temple, by invitation of that great English preacher, Dr. Joseph Parker.
When my sermon was over, Dr. Parker said to his congregation:--
"I thank God for Dr. Talmage's life and ministry, and I despise the man
who cannot appreciate his services to Christianity. May he preach in
this pulpit again!"
On leaving his church I was obliged to address the crowd outside from my
carriage. Nothing can be so gratifying to a preacher as the faith of the
people he addresses in his faith. In England the religious spirit is
deeply rooted. I could not help feeling, as I saw that surging mass of
men and women outside the City Temple in London after the service, how
earnest they all were in their exertions to hear the Gospel. In my own
country I had been used to crowds that were more curious in their
attitude, less reverent of the occasion. Dr. Parker's description of the
sermon after it was over expressed the effect of my Gospel message upon
that crowd in England.
He said: "That is the most sublime, pathetic and impressive appeal we
ever listened to. It has kindled the fire of enthusiasm in our souls
that will burn on for ever. It has unfolded possibilities of the pulpit
never before reached. It has stirred all hearts with the holiest
ambition."
So should every sermon, preached in every place in the world on every
Sunday in the world, be a message from God and His angels!
The sustaining enthusiasm of my friend, Dr. Parker, and his people at
the City Temple, preceded me everywhere in England, and established a
series of experiences in my evangelical work that surprised and
enthralled me.
In Nottingham I was told that Albert Hall, where I preached, could not
hold over 3,000 people. That number of tickets for my sermon were
distributed from the different pulpits in the city, but hundreds were
disappointed and waited for me outside afterwards. This was no personal
tribute to me, but to the English people, to whom my Gospel message was
of serious import. The text I used most during this preaching tour was
from Daniel xi. 2: "The people that do know their God shall be strong
and do exploits." It applied to the people of Great Britain and they
responded and understood.
In a more concrete fashion I was privileged to witness also the
tremendous influence of religious feeling in England at the banquet
tendered by the Lord Mayor at the Mansion House on July 3, 1892, to the
Archbishops and Bishops of England. The Archbishop of Canterbury, the
Bishop of London, and the diocesan bishops were present. The Lord Mayor,
in his address, said that the association between the Church and the
Corporation of London had been close, long, and continuous. In that
year, he said, the Church had spent on buildings and restorations
thirty-five million pounds; on home missions, seven and a half millions;
on foreign missions, ten millions; on elementary education, twenty-one
millions; and in charity, six millions. What a stupendous evidence of
the religious spirit in England! A toast was proposed to the "Ministers
of other Denominations," which included the Rev. Dr. Newman Hall and
myself of America, among other foreign guests. To this I responded.
Before leaving for Russia I met a part of the American colony in London
at a reception given by Mr. Lincoln, our Minister to England. We
gathered to celebrate the Fourth of July. Mrs. Mackey, Mrs. Paran
Stevens, Mrs. Bradley Martin, and Mrs. Bonynge received among others.
Phillips Brooks and myself were among the clerical contingent, with such
Americans abroad as Colonel Tom Ochiltree, Buffalo Bill, General and
Mrs. Williams, A.M. Palmer, Mrs. New, the Consul-General's wife, Mr. and
Mrs. John Collins, Senators Farwell and McDonald.
While travelling in England I saw John Ruskin. This fact contains more
happiness to me than I can easily make people understand. I wanted to
see him more than any other man, crowned or uncrowned. When I was in
England at other times Mr. Ruskin was always absent or sick, but this
time I found him. I was visiting the Lake district of England, and one
afternoon I took a drive that will be for ever memorable. I said, "Drive
out to Mr. Ruskin's place," which was some eight miles away. The
landlord from whom I got the conveyance said, "You will not be able to
see Mr. Ruskin. No one sees him or has seen him for years." Well, I have
a way of keeping on when I start. After an hour and a half of a
delightful ride we entered the gates of Mr. Ruskin's home. The door of
the vine-covered, picturesque house was open, and I stood in the
hall-way. Handing my card to a servant I said, "I wish to see Mr.
Ruskin." The reply was, "Mr. Ruskin is not in, and he never sees
anyone." Disappointed, I turned back, took the carriage and went down
the road. I said to the driver, "Do you know Mr. Ruskin when you see
him?" "Yes," said he; "but I have not seen him for years." We rode on a
few moments, then the driver cried out to me, "There he comes now." In a
minute we had arrived at where Mr. Ruskin was walking toward us. I
alighted, and he greeted me with a quiet manner and a genial smile. He
looked like a great man worn out; beard full and tangled; soft hat drawn
down over his forehead; signs of physical weakness with determination
not to show it. His valet walked beside him ready to help or direct his
steps. He deprecated any remarks appreciatory of his wonderful services.
He had the appearance of one whose work is completely done, and is
waiting for the time to start homeward. He was in appearance more like
myself than any person I ever saw, and if I should live to be his age
the likeness will be complete.
I did not think then that Mr. Ruskin would ever write another paragraph.
He would continue to saunter along the English lane very slowly, his
valet by his side, for a year or two, and then fold his hands for his
last sleep. Then the whole world would speak words of gratitude and
praise which it had denied him all through the years in which he was
laboriously writing "Modern Painters," "The Seven Lamps of
Architecture," "The Stones of Venice," and "Ethics of the Dust." We
cannot imagine what the world's literature would have been if Thomas
Carlyle and John Ruskin had never entered it. I shall never forget how
in the early years of my ministry I picked up in Wynkoop's store, in
Syracuse, for the first time, one of Ruskin's works. I read that book
under the trees, because it was the best place to read it. Ruskin was
the first great interpreter of the language of leaves, of clouds, of
rivers, of lakes, of seas.
In July, 1892,1 went to Russia. It was summer in the land of snow and
ice, so that we saw it in the glow of sunny days, in the long
gold-tipped twilights of balmy air. In America we still regarded Russia
as a land of cruel mystery and imperial oppression. There was as much
ignorance about the Russians, their Government, their country, as there
was about the Fiji Islands. Americans had been taught that Siberia was
Russia, that Russia and Siberia were the same, one vast infinite waste
of misery and cruelty. Granted that I went to Russia on an errand of
mercy, and as a representative of the most powerful nation in the world,
nevertheless I contend that the Russian people and their Government were
hugely misrepresented. There was no need for the Emperor of Russia to
give audience to so humble a representative as a minister of the Gospel
unless he had been sincerely touched by the evidence of American
generosity and mercy for his starving peasants in Central Russia. His
courtesy and reception of me was a complete contradiction of his
reported arrogance and hard-heartedness. There was no need for the Town
Council of St. Petersburg to honour myself and my party with receptions
and dinners, and there was no reason for the enthusiasm and cheers of
the Russian people in the streets unless they were intensely kind and
enthusiastic in nature. When the famine conditions occurred in the ten
provinces of Russia a relief committee was formed in St. Petersburg,
with the Grand Duke himself at the head of it, and such men as Count
Tolstoi and Count Bobrinsky in active assistance. America answered the
appeal for food, but their was sincere sympathy and compassion for
their compatriots in the imperial circles of Russia.
In the famine districts, which were vast enough to hold several nations,
a drought that had lasted for six consecutive years had devastated the
country. According to the estimate of the Russian Famine Relief
Committee we saved the lives of 125,000 Russians.
As at the hunger relief stations the bread was handed out--for it was
made into loaves and distributed--many people would halt before taking
it and religiously cross themselves and utter a prayer for the donors.
Some of them would come staggering back and say:--
"Please tell us who sent this bread to us?" And when told it came from
America, they would say: "What part of America? Please give us the names
of those who sent it."
My visit to the Czar of Russia, Alexander III., was made at the Imperial
Palace. I was ushered into a small, very plain apartment, in which I
found the Emperor seated alone, quietly engaged with his official cares.
He immediately arose, extended his hand with hearty cordiality, and said
in the purest English, as he himself placed a chair for me beside his
table, "Doctor Talmage, I am very happy to meet you."
This was the beginning of a long conversation during which the Emperor
manifested both the liveliest interest and thorough familiarity with
American politics, and, after a lengthy discussion of everything
American, the Emperor said, "Dr. Talmage, you must see my eldest son,
Nicholas," with which he touched a bell, calling his aide-de-camp, who
promptly summoned the Grand Duke Nicholas, who appeared with the
youngest daughter of the Emperor skipping along behind him--a plump,
bright little girl of probably eight or nine years. She jumped upon the
Emperor's lap and threw her arms about his neck. When she had been
introduced to me she gave "The American gentleman" the keenest scrutiny
of which her sparkling eyes were capable. The Grand Duke was a fine
young man, of about twenty-five years of age, tall, of athletic build,
graceful carriage, and noticeably amiable features. On being introduced
to me the Grand Duke extended his hand and said, "Dr. Talmage, I am also
glad to meet you, for we all feel that we have become acquainted with
you through your sermons, in which we have found much interest and
religious edification."
Noticing the magnificent physique of both father and son, I asked the
Emperor, when the conversation turned incidentally upon matters of
health, what he did to maintain such fine strength in the midst of all
the cares of State. He replied, "Doctor, the secret of my strength is in
my physical exercise. This I never fail to take regularly and freely
every day before I enter upon any of the work of my official duties, and
to it I attribute the excellent health which I enjoy."
The Emperor insisted that I should see the Empress and the rest of the
Imperial Family, and we proceeded to another equally plain,
unpretentious apartment where, with her daughters, we found the Empress.
After a long conversation, and just as I was leaving, I asked the
Emperor whether there was much discontent among the nobility as a result
of the emancipation among the serfs, and he replied, "Yes, all the
trouble with my empire arises from the turbulence and discontent of the
nobility. The people are perfectly quiet and contented."
A reference was made to the possibility of war, and I remember the fear
with which the Empress entered into the talk just then, saying "We all
dread war. With our modern equipments it could be nothing short of
massacre, and from that we hope we may be preserved."
My presentation at Peterhoff Palace to Alexander III. and the royal
family of Russia was entirely an unexpected event in my itinerary. It
was in the nature of a compliment to my mission, to the American people
who have contributed so much to the distress in Russia, and to the
Christian Church for which this "hardhearted, cruel Czar" had so much
respect and so much interest. It was said that in common with all
Americans I expected to find the Emperor attired in some bomb-proof
regalia. Perhaps I was impressed with the Czar's indifference and
fearlessness. Someone said to me that no doubt he was quite used to the
thought of assassination. I discovered, in a long conversation that I
had with him, that he was ready to die, and when a man is ready why
should he be afraid?
The most significant and important outcome of this presentation to the
Czar was his pledge to my countrymen that Russia would always remember
the generosity of the American people in their future relations.
Everywhere in St. Petersburg and Moscow, the Russian and American flags
were displayed together on the public buildings, so that I look back
upon this occasion with a pardonable impression of its international
importance. There was a suggestion of this feeling in an address
presented to us by the City Council of St. Petersburg, in which a
graceful remembrance was made of that occasion in 1868, when a special
embassy from the United States, with Mr. G.V. Fox, a Cabinet officer, at
its head, visited St. Petersburg and expressed sympathy for Russia and
its Sovereign.
Returning from Russia, I continued my preaching tour in England,
preaching to immense crowds, estimated in the English newspapers to be
from fifteen to twenty thousand people, in the large cities. In
Birmingham the crowd followed me into the hotel, where it was necessary
to lock the doors to keep them out. What incalculable kindness I
received in England! I remember a farewell banquet given me at the
Crystal Palace by twenty Nonconformists, at which I was presented with a
gold watch from my English friends; and a scene in Swansea, when, after
my sermon, they sang Welsh hymns to me in their native language.
Some people wonder how I have kept in such good humour with the world
when I have been at times violently assailed or grossly misrepresented.
It was because the kindnesses towards me have predominated. For the past
thirty or forty years the mercies have carried the day. If I went to the
depot there was a carriage to meet me. If I tarried at the hotel some
one mysteriously paid the bill. If I were attacked in newspaper or
church court there were always those willing to take up for me the
cudgels. If I were falsified the lie somehow turned out to my advantage.
My enemies have helped me quite as much as my friends. If I preached or
lectured I always had a crowd. If I had a boil it was almost always in a
comfortable place. If my church burned down I got a better one. I
offered a manuscript to a magazine, hoping to get for it forty dollars,
which I much needed at the time. The manuscript was courteously returned
as not being available; but that article for which I could not get forty
dollars has since, in other uses, brought me forty thousand dollars. The
caricaturists have sent multitudes of people to hear me preach and
lecture. I have had antagonists; but if any man of my day has had more
warm personal friends I do not know his name.