Mr. Moore, writing in _The Congregationalist_ on “The Benediction
of a Statue,” says:
The man was only one of the thousands that have stopt for a
moment or two at least in front of the Phillips Brooks statue
during the past week. He was a working man of about fifty, with
a strong, square-jawed, bronzed face. He had evidently come over
to look at the statue during the noon hour, for he had on his
blue flannel shirt and carpenter’s overalls. He gazed a moment
and then brushed his eyes rather furtively.
“How do you like the statue?” he was asked.
“It’s fine, but isn’t quite Phillips Brooks. It’s a strong face
like his, but I sort of miss the light in the eyes. It isn’t as
kind-looking as Phillips Brooks.”
“You knew him, then?”
“Yes, I knew him well. I have talked with him many times. He
always spoke to me on the street. He used to always ask about
the wife and baby, and now--the wife has gone on beyond, too.”
He took a last look at the statue and then hurried away, for it
was almost one o’clock. Just then a colored man of about forty
joined the group.
“Know him? Why, I knew him as well as I know my wife. I used
to be charman of a house just a few doors away from his on
Clarendon Street. He always said, ‘Good-morning, John,’ to
me when he met me, as he was going over to the church in the
morning. Of course, when I knew him he was older than the statue
shows him. He never spoke to you like he was saying, ‘I’m the
rich Mr. Brooks.’ He treated you just like you was as good as
him.”
Two messenger-boys stopt for a moment. “Who’s that man?” one
asked the other.
“Why, that’s a great preacher that used to preach in that
church. They say he was an awfully good man. They say he could
preach like anything, and yet he was just as common with folks
as anybody.”
An intelligent, rather elderly Hebrew was criticizing the statue
very severely to several people, but he said: “I used to go to
school with him. He was certainly a wonderful preacher and a
very, very good man. He surely deserved the best statue Boston
could ever put up for him. But I dislike the background and the
other figure in this very much.”
(1303)