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TUFTS 
 
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JAMES TUFTS 
 
 A MEMORIAL 
 
 EDITED BY 
 JAMES HAYDEN TUFTS 
 
 PRINTED FOR THE EDITOR BY 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO PRESS 
 1902 
 
 D 
 
/V.VTIT3\ 
 
To MY FATHER'S FRIENDS 
 
 IN 
 GRATEFUL RECOGNITION 
 
Contents. 
 
 The Life-Story — James Hayden Tufts ii 
 
 I. The Stock ii 
 
 II. Birthplace and Early Home 26 
 
 III. Study, Failure of Health, and Early 
 Attempts to Work 52 
 
 IV. Monson 76 
 V. Later Years 102 
 
 The Ripened Years — The Rev. George G. 
 
 Phipps - 135 
 
 Address of the Rev. Edward Allen Reed 136 
 
 Memorial Read at the Annual Meeting of the 
 Monson Congregational Church by Edward 
 F. Morris 1 4 1 
 
 Minute Adopted by the Hampden County Asso- 
 ciation ■ 144 
 
Illustrations. 
 
 Portrait Presented to Monson Academy, 
 
 Frontispiece 
 
 The Parsonage at Wardsboro, Facing page 26 
 
 The Home at Monson, Facing page 88 
 
 From a Photograph, Taken at About the Age of 
 • Eighty, - Facing page 102 
 
I. 
 
 The Stock. 
 
 James Tufts was born in Wardsboro, Wind- 
 ham county, Vt., November 2, 1812. Accord- 
 ing to the records of the Wardsboro church, 
 which were kept by his father, the pastor, 
 he was baptized "James Browning Tufts." 
 "James Browning" was the father of Marga- 
 ret Browning, wife of William Tufts and grand- 
 mother of my father, and it was no doubt from 
 him that the name was taken, but in the bap- 
 tismal record the " Browning " is written in 
 above the James Tufts, as if inserted later, and 
 for some reason it was apparently never used. 
 I can find no record of it in any other family 
 documents, and I doubt whether my father 
 ever knew that he had once possessed a middle 
 name. At any rate, he habitually used the 
 form James Tufts, Jr., so long as his father 
 was living. 
 
 In seeking to understand the marked individ- 
 uality, strength, positiveness of temperament, 
 quaintness, and capacity for wide and varied 
 friendships which appeared in the character 
 we are to trace, it will be necessary to consider 
 
12 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 briefly both the stock and the soil from which 
 it sprang. 
 
 On his father's side James Tufts was wholly 
 of Scotch-Irish blood ; on his mother's, he 
 came from Massachusetts families who for the 
 most part came across from England in the 
 decade 1630-40. The general character of 
 the Scotch-Irish immigrants is well known, 
 although New England saw few of them as 
 compared with, states farther south and west. 
 The name "Tuffs," as it was spelled by the 
 immigrant, is quite probably of Norse origin, 
 but whether it came with the Danish invaders 
 of England or, as is more probable, with the 
 Norwegians who harried the coast of Scotland 
 and Ireland, is uncertain. A Tofi appears in 
 the list of those who sailed for Britain from 
 Iceland about A. D. 1000, and various spell- 
 ings of this or a similar name appear among 
 Scandinavians at the present day. The large 
 frame and blue eyes which appeared often in 
 the family would not, at any rate, belie a Norse 
 descent. But the straight brows, large nose, 
 strong lower jaw, and general ruggedness of 
 outline and features, which belong to the older 
 British races as contrasted with the softer, more 
 regular and rounded outlines of the Anglo- 
 
JAMES TOFTS 13 
 
 Saxon, were conspicuous in the family, and 
 showed that the main strains of blood were 
 from the Gaelic. The struggle for existence 
 which accentuated certain traits of Celtic 
 character did not cease when Saxon and 
 Briton had fixed approximately their respect- 
 ive limits. The families of southwestern Scot- 
 land, crossing the channel back and forth, 
 under economic, political, and religious pres- 
 sure, or maintaining their faith and their homes 
 amid frequent hardship or even persecution, 
 were strengthening for centuries the ruggedness 
 of character which accompanied the rugged- 
 ness of feature. Their religious convictions, 
 sharpened by contrast with the Anglicanism of 
 their Saxon neighbors, and later with the Ro- 
 man Catholicism of Ireland, were held with 
 great pertinacity, and could on occasion be- 
 come the stern and intense faith of the Cove- 
 nanter or the Cameronian. The Tuffs's and 
 Foote's may have been among the Presbyterian 
 colonists located in Ulster under James I., 
 although there is a tradition that they were 
 forced to leave Scotland by the efforts of the 
 English to compel conformity after the Res- 
 toration. At the opening of the century 
 many of the Ulster colonists found their situa- 
 
14 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 tion sufficiently uncomfortable to make them 
 look longingly toward the new country. A 
 few out of the many came to New England, 
 settling Londonderry and Antrim in New 
 Hampshire, Pelham and Rutland in Massa- 
 chusetts. Among the emigrants who came 
 about the decade 1725-35 were John Tuffs, 
 born 1704, and his wife, Agnes Foote, born 
 1707. Family tradition asserts that the pa- 
 rents of the young woman were averse to their 
 daughter's leaving home for the new country, 
 but apparently their objections were overcome, 
 for her bridal portion came with her in a wedge 
 of gold, and bought a fertile tract of meadow 
 in the frontier settlement of Brookfield, Mass. 
 Brookfield had suffered severely in the 
 Indian wars, and the settlers were mainly 
 grouped on a hill (Foster's Hill) after the usual 
 custom. A fort was standing near the spot 
 where the young couple located their home- 
 stead, but apparently the house which John 
 Tuffs built, and which is still standing in a 
 good state of preservation, was the first dwell- 
 ing in that more exposed portion of the 
 town.' 
 
 ' About half a mile east of the present village of West 
 Brookfield. 
 
JAMES TUFTS 15 
 
 Little is known of the family that lived in 
 the old homestead except the names of the 
 children who came into the home, grew to man- 
 hood and womanhood, and married — ^William, 
 Thomas, Sarah, Anna, Mary, John, and Betty. 
 In 1756 John, the immigrant, was enrolled in a 
 Brookfield company which was probably en- 
 listed for the expedition against Crown Point. 
 The son, William Tuffs, marched August 9, 
 1756, to relieve Fort William Henry, and 
 served in each of the three following years. 
 The attachment of the family to their fellow- 
 immigrants was shown by the fact that at least 
 four of the children — William, Mary, Sarah, 
 and Betty — married into Scotch-Irish families, 
 in Rutland or Warren. John, the youngest 
 son, remained upon the farm, and with him 
 the father and mother until their deaths — 
 "Agnes' Foote Tuffs," February 26, 1788; 
 "Mr. John Tuffs," February 27, 1795, aged 
 eighty-one and ninety-one, respectively. A 
 living grand-daughter of John Tuffs II. re- 
 lates that her mother recalled a vivid im- 
 pression of the dignified old lady, who used 
 to have her tea served in her own room, 
 
 ' The stone in the old cemetery at West Brookfield reads 
 "Agnus." 
 
1 6 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 and was thereby invested in the minds of the 
 children with much superiority, and who 
 quoted Scripture passages in exceedingly broad 
 Scotch. 
 
 William Tuffs, my father's grandfather, 
 showed military tendencies, as has already 
 been stated. In the three campaigns of 1757, 
 1758, and i7S9i about LakeChamplain, he must 
 have acquired a considerable military experi- 
 ence.This was the school in which so many of 
 the colonists gained their training for the strug- 
 gle with England, and the campaigns about 
 Lake Champlain.in which William Tuffs partici- 
 pated, if not so brilliant as the expedition 
 against Quebec, taught the colonists that Eng- 
 lish generals were not always remarkable for 
 military ability. 
 
 Upon the 17th of November, 1763, the late 
 soldier was married to Margaret, daughter of 
 James and Elizabeth Browning, of Rutland. 
 "Browning" is in form an English name, and 
 the family was probably of the lowland Scotch 
 — or perhaps of the English settlers in Ulster. 
 The father and mother were received into the 
 Rutland church from the parish of Ardstraw, 
 Ireland, about ten miles from Londonderry. 
 James, William, and John Browning were among 
 
JAMES TUFTS 17 
 
 the Protestants who memorialized William and 
 Mary from Enniskillen, which, like London- 
 derry, was a storm-center in 1688-89. James 
 Browning, the immigrant, may have been a 
 son of one of these. His oldest son was 
 born "ip garrison" in Rutland, 1723. Joseph, 
 a brother of Margaret, married Sarah, a sister 
 of William Tuffs, and it is at least possible 
 that the families may have been neighbors in 
 the old country. Margaret was born Decem- 
 ber 10, 1 73 1, and was thus six or seven years 
 older than her husband. The young couple, 
 with aid from the parents, bought a large tract 
 in the adjoining town of New Braintree, on 
 what is still known as Tufts' Hill. Here were 
 born three sons, James (my father's father), 
 September 30, 1764; William, and John. The 
 family were apparently thrifty and prosperous, 
 but nothing of interest is known concerning 
 them until the outbreak of the Revolution 
 called for the services of every citizen, and 
 especially of those who had learned the lesson 
 of war. 
 
 As has been shown by recent discussion, the 
 Scotch were even more ready to separate from 
 England than were the English colonists. For 
 a thousand years their ancestry had been 
 
1 8 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 engaged in a contest in which, in spite of 
 occasional rallies under a Bruce or a Wallace, 
 they had on the whole been crowded steadily 
 to the wall by the Saxon. England's short- 
 sighted selfishness and religious intolerance 
 had driven out the Ulstermen. A similar com- 
 mercial policy was again undertaken against 
 the colonists, and the Scotch found an oppor- 
 tunity to fight upon more equal terms. William 
 Tuffs (or Tufts, as the name appears on the 
 state rolls) was commissioned by the council 
 May 31, 1776, as first lieutenant in Thomas 
 Whipple's company. An entry of uncertain 
 meaning appears on a return dated August 17, 
 1776, "showing that Lieut. Wm. Tufts will- 
 ingly complies with orders to march but 
 declines taking his commission until further 
 orders." He later appears as second, and then 
 as first, lieutenant of Captain Ezekiel Knowl- 
 ton's company, Colonel Dyke's regiment, and 
 served for three years or more, dying October 
 I3> 1783, in his forty-sixth year, of " camp 
 disease," presumably contracted in his army 
 life. It is probably on account of his com- 
 mission that in the power of attorney given 
 by the widow to her husband's brother John 
 we read, estate of " William Tuffs, Gentleman," 
 
JAMES TUFTS 19 
 
 and then read, "John Tuffs Yeoman." The 
 widow Margaret makes her mark, instead of 
 signing her name, in this document. She was, 
 however, without doubt a capable woman 
 and ambitious for the future of her sons; else 
 we should not find the eldest a year later mak- 
 ing his way to Leicester Academy ' and then in 
 1785 to Providence College, and supported 
 through his course by the farm at home. His 
 journeys were made on the family mare, and 
 fromletters written to him by his brother it may 
 be inferred that many of the farm products, 
 including butter and flour, found a market in 
 Providence. 
 
 During all his college course the family let- 
 ters are addressed to him as James Tuffs, but his 
 name was printed in the catalogue as Tufts, so 
 it seems probable the change in spelling was 
 made at about this time. Soon after gradua- 
 tion, in 1789, my grandfather began a diary 
 which he kept for two years, and the first page 
 seems worth transcribing, notwithstanding other 
 accounts of traveling in that day. The orthog- 
 raphy occasionally suggests that the day of 
 the spelling school was not yet: "Dec. 7. 
 
 ■He was in Leicester; it is not certain that he attended 
 the academy, which opened that year. 
 
20 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 Set out from home on my way to Provi- 
 dence, where I received incouragement for a 
 school in Jersey, waited there for a passage to 
 York until the 17th Dec. when I went aboard 
 of Capt. Brown's Packet, came to Newport 
 the same day with a fair wind, and on the 
 1 8th sailed to Newlondon, a flourishing Town 
 situated on the River Thames. Tarried there 
 two days by reason of the winds being con- 
 trary. On the 2 1st set out for New York, 
 arrived there in three days, paid Thirty nine 
 shillings for my passage. Set out from N. 
 York on the 25th after meeting with a consid- 
 erable loss, came to Philadelphia in the stage, 
 tarried in the City that Night and nixt day, on 
 the 26th set saill in Capt. Bowen's vessel for 
 
 . Was four days on the water, the wind 
 
 being ahead." 
 
 The winter and spring were spent in teach- 
 ing in Bowentown and Greenwich, with no 
 important incident except the "mezels." He 
 apparently had success in his work, but he was 
 evidently considering plans for the future, and 
 on May 22 writes : " Feel some uneasy as to 
 my situation and employment in this place 
 &c. May God direct me to choose that pro- 
 fession and calling which shall be most for his 
 
JAMES TUFTS 21 
 
 glofy, for which end I desire to live." "Sun- 
 day, May 23d. Went to meeting, but there 
 was no one preaching; saw the great need of 
 faithful minnisters." Quite probably this may 
 have suggested forcibly his future life-work. 
 At any rate, we find the next entry but one 
 dated at Providence, where he arrived July 
 22: "On 23d I concluded to go to Franklin 
 and study divinity with Mr. Emmons, which 
 was my principle end in leaving the Jerseys, 
 being convinced that it was my duty to employ 
 my time in that way which should be most 
 likely to glorify God, and do the greatest 
 good to mankind, without any particular 
 regard to my worldly interest." " I came to 
 Mr. Emmons on the same day and agreed to 
 study with him." "Sat. 31 of July. Finished 
 the reading of Mr. Edwards' treatise on God's 
 last end in creating the world." 
 
 Of the intellectual and theological atmos- 
 phere which the young student would find in 
 the Franklin parsonage there will be mention 
 in the next chapter. Unfortunately the diary 
 has no further entries until May 9, the follow- 
 ing spring, when he "set out from home to go 
 to Saratoga Springs for my health ; felt feeble 
 and dubious whether I should be able to per- 
 
22 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 form the journey." What the malady was is 
 not stated, except that there is mention of a 
 " pain in the breast." At Saratoga he found 
 people " of almost all denominations and dis- 
 orders." " Never was I at a place where there 
 was such a number of disordered persons, 
 many of them in great distress, which was 
 very melancholy." The water, however, proved 
 beneficial, and he "felt some melting of heart 
 toward God, that he had through his blessing 
 brought me hither, and that there was a pros- 
 pect of my getting help." Three weeks were 
 spent there in a family "more agreeable than 
 I expected to find in that country," and then, 
 after recording the journey home, the diary 
 closes with brief notices of a license to preach 
 and of sundry services conducted. 
 
 In 1795 my grandfather received a call to 
 become pastor of the church in Leicester, 
 Mass., and also a call to the newly organized 
 settlement of Wardsboro, Vt. The latter was 
 accepted, and on November 4, 1795, the ordi- 
 nation took place upon the doorstep of a 
 settler's house, the Rev Nathaniel Emmons 
 making a three-days' journey on horseback to 
 preach the, ordaining sermon for his former 
 pupil, from the text, "I seek not yours but 
 
JAMES TUFTS 23 
 
 you." The first minister of the town was, as 
 such, entitled to a tract of land set apart by the 
 first proprietors, but this proved to be of little 
 value. Fortunately the young minister was 
 able to bring some money with him. With 
 this he bought one hundred and sixty acres in 
 the center of the town, and built him a house 
 facing the common, and adjacent to the site of 
 the meeting-house. For a time the house was 
 shared with the village doctor, also a bachelor, 
 but in 1807 the minister was married to Submit 
 Flagg Hayden, of Grafton, Mass., and the 
 minister's house, serving also as post-office for 
 three towns, became one of the centers of the 
 life of the town. 
 
 The minister's wife, my father's mother, 
 bore one of the most striking of those names 
 by which our Puritan ancestors were wont to 
 differentiate the feminine from the masculine 
 virtues. I have seen no record that " Submit " 
 has ever been used as a man's name. Appar- 
 ently, however, she did not feel hopelessly 
 handicapped thereby, for she was a very act- 
 ive and positive force in the household, with 
 a keenness, alertness, and vivacity which formed 
 a fitting counterpart to the solidity, massive- 
 ness, and dignity of the minister. 
 
24 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 Submit Flagg Hayden was born in Grafton, 
 Mass., April 1 8, 1777. She was the daughter 
 of Daniel Hayden and Submit Flagg, who 
 later moved to Berlin, Vt., where they died 
 aged ninety-three and ninety-four. Her father 
 was fifth in descent from the immigrant John 
 Hayden, who received a grant in Dorchester 
 in 1632. Edmond Goodenow (the "Confi- 
 dence," 1638), Jonathan Fairbanks (Boston, 
 1633, a pioneer of Dedham), and William 
 Ames (Braintree, 1641) were other ancestors.' 
 Her mother was daughter of Eleazer and Hul- 
 dah (Chandler) Flagg, proprietors of Grafton. 
 Eleazer, born in Concord, was the third of that 
 name in direct descent from Thomas Flagg, 
 who came to Watertown in 1637. 
 
 Some mutual friend who recognized the 
 needs of the Wardsboro situation made my 
 grandparents acquainted, and they were mar- 
 ried February 2, 1807, making the journey 
 from Grafton to Wardsboro in a sleigh. Six 
 children were born into the home — Submit 
 Flagg, Eliza, Nancy, James, John, and Fanny — 
 all of whom grew to maturity and left families 
 of their own. Except for occasional ex- 
 changes, or rare journeys of a longer sort, the 
 father never left the home upon the green of 
 
JAMES TUFTS 25 
 
 Wardsboro Hill. He was laid to rest among 
 the people to whom he had ministered as 
 active pastor for forty-one years, and as spir- 
 itual father and friend until his death. This 
 was caused by a gall stone, August 11, 1841. 
 The mother remained in the parsonage at first 
 with her son John, and, after his departure for 
 the West, with Mr. Barrett, who bought the 
 farm, until 1864. Then, with much regret, she 
 left the home of fifty-seven years, and spent 
 the last years of her long life with her daughter 
 Nancy (Mrs. Marshall Newton), of Newfane. 
 She died August 22, 1870, at the age of 
 ninety-three. 
 
III. 
 
 Birthplace and Early Home. 
 
 " I LOOK back a great deal to my life in 
 Wardsboro, and I should like to go there once 
 more, but I probably shall never go to Ver- 
 mont again." So my father wrote the No- 
 vember before he died. The memories of his 
 native town ; of his father and mother ; of the 
 church and its deacons ; of the farm life and 
 school days; of the trainings and musters; of 
 the protracted meetings and revivals ; of the 
 boys and girls who grew up and went out; of 
 the sunrises and sunsets ; of the cool breezes 
 and clear skies in summer and the deep snows 
 in winter ; of the neighboring ministers who 
 came on exchanges and brought news of sur- 
 rounding towns ; of the quaint and original 
 characters which were to be found in a town 
 of pioneers ; of the deep seriousness of the 
 New England religious experiences — all these 
 remained clear and vivid, though doubtless 
 idealized by the fifty years which had passed 
 since he had ceased to call Wardsboro home, 
 and the seventy years since he had left the 
 town for school. No one who heard him re- 
 26 
 
The Parsonage at Wardsboro. 
 
JAMES TUFTS 27 
 
 call these memories, and who noted the value 
 that he attached to them, could doubt that the 
 early experiences had determined to an un- 
 usual degree the permanent bent of his char- 
 acter. School, college, and seminary, reading, 
 study, and conversation, enlarged his ideas 
 and brought new material, but the parts of 
 this which he valued, and the aspects of it 
 which he incorporated into his own structure, 
 were decided largely by the early influences. 
 His religious experiences found most natural 
 expression in the language of the early days, 
 and some of the democratic spirit which made 
 him want to know everyone, and which led 
 him to make acquaintance with his seatmate 
 on the train or his neighbor at a public gath- 
 ering, was fostered, if not created, by the life 
 of his early years. 
 
 Wardsboro, rising high on the eastern slope 
 of the_ Green Mountains, commanding a mag- 
 nificent prospect over the surrounding country, 
 had a fertile soil, in spite of its rocks and hills. 
 It was settled at about the close of the revolu- 
 tionary war by an intelligent and energetic 
 class of young men, many of them soldiers, 
 and it may have been partly due to this that in 
 my father's boyhood not only the usual infantry 
 
28 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 company had its training days, but a company 
 of cavalry and one of artillery were recruited in 
 part from the town. At the time of my father's 
 birth the town had reached its maximum popu- 
 lation of about 1,150, and this was maintained 
 approximately until about the time of the Civil 
 War. Since then it has declined in actual num- 
 bers, and far more in relative standing in the 
 county. For in the earlier days the men of 
 the town were not those who had been left 
 behind in the movement to the city. They 
 were those who had struck out for themselves. 
 The energy and enterprise which had led them 
 to clear the forests, to build homes and church 
 and schools upon the hillsides, had been further 
 developed by the greatest force on earth for 
 the purpose — the opportunities and responsi- 
 bilities of a new soil, and of free political 
 and religious institutions. The aristocracy 
 which lingered in the older settlements of 
 New England found less and less of support 
 with each migration westward. Even the 
 dignity of the minister, the doctor, and the 
 squire was far from that which prevailed in 
 older communities. The atmosphere of the 
 town was decidedly democratic, and my father 
 breathed in the democracy. 
 
JAMES TUFTS 29 
 
 Another marked characteristic of the New 
 England mind, which Came to the fore in many 
 guises, was the control of life by principles, or 
 by motives other than the inclinations. It fell 
 in with this natural bent when the Puritan was 
 taught that man's chief end is to be found in 
 God's glory, not in his own development, or 
 even in his own salvation. But, even apart 
 from its theological or definitely ethical aspects, 
 the tendency showed itself in the attitude that, 
 if a thing was to be done, it should be done 
 without regard to feelings, and without tem- 
 porizing or seeking for possible alleviation of 
 unpleasant features. One of the Wardsboro 
 settlers was on his deathbed, and, to relieve 
 faintness, someone held a camphor bottle to 
 his nostrils. But if dying was the thing which 
 was to be done, the patient wanted no tempor- 
 izing, and so he brushed aside the hindrance 
 with the exclamation : " No, no ; I shall never 
 die so !" 
 
 It was, however, the religious life which was 
 the dominant interest in my grandfather's 
 household, and to a considerable degree in 
 the town. The church services were, of course, 
 the most important event in the week. Prac- 
 tically all the families of the town climbed 
 
30 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 the hill, Sunday morning. At noon the women 
 went over to the parsonage, sat around the 
 great fireplace, took down pipes from their 
 places around the chimney — on one occasion 
 my fun-loving uncle bored holes and screwed 
 the pipes to the wall, greatly to the mystifica- 
 tion of the good ladies when they attempted 
 to take them down — and after a genial smoke 
 replenished their foot-stoves, and returned to 
 hear the subject of the morning continued with 
 an " Improvement." Parenthetically it may be 
 said that the services at Wardsboro were by 
 no means so long as was often the custom, 
 especially at an earlier date. The sermons 
 could scarcely have averaged much over half 
 an hour, to judge from the manuscripts. The 
 prayers, however, were undoubtedly compre- 
 hensive, and in the days before stoves were 
 introduced the effort to include all the phases 
 of experience must often have placed a strain 
 upon the piety of the hearer. On an exception- 
 ally cold day one of my grandfather's shivering 
 parishioners remarked ruefully on coming out 
 of meeting: " There were two or three places 
 in that prayer where the parson might have 
 stopped just as well as not." The respectable 
 men of the town, if not active members of the 
 
JAMES TUFTS 31 
 
 church, were at least regular attendants upon its 
 services. "Protracted meetings " and revivals 
 from time to time increased the influence of reli- 
 gion upon the general life of the community. 
 
 The religious life of the town, as it appears, 
 not only in the sermons of the time, but in my 
 grandfather's and father's diaries, and in the 
 "Relations" (of religious experience) pre- 
 sented by candidates for admission to the 
 Wardsboro church, combined two elements 
 which seem at first sight difficult to reconcile. 
 On the one hand, there was a strongly intel- 
 lectual elemenl in the theology and preaching. 
 The Puritan's abstinence from any open ex- 
 pression of affection or emotional life, in the 
 family or elsewhere, governed also the exter- 
 nal religious manifestations. On the other 
 hand, the content of religious experience 
 seemed to be placed almost entirely in feelings 
 and emotions. The Christian seemed to attach 
 chief importance to his " warmth " or " cold- 
 ness;" his "brightness" or "darkness," his 
 "sensibility" or his "sloth" and "languor." 
 
 The prevailingly intellectual interest appears 
 very strongly in the published sermons of 
 Nathaniel Emmons, with whom my grand- 
 father studied theology. The doctrines of 
 
32 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 sovereignty, sin, grace, election, and reproba- 
 tion were analzyed and defined witii the acute- 
 ness of an able metaphysician, biit it would be 
 difficult to point out a passage which voices 
 the aspiration or sympathy, the struggle or 
 confidence, of a human heart. The sermons 
 preached on Wardsboro Hill had no such 
 power of analysis, or relentless audacity of 
 logic, or subtlety in distinctions, as marked 
 those of Mr. Emmons, but the method was 
 largely the same. Even when dealing with the 
 most serious themes, a sort of impersonal and 
 objective attitude is maintained. The pro- 
 nouns " I " and "you " do not occur. This im- 
 personal and objective mode of considering the 
 fate of sinners doubtless has not merely the 
 scientific interest which prompted Spinoza to 
 a similar treatment of human actions and de- 
 sires ; it has also a psychological justification. 
 It is as if the preacher, while cherishing no 
 scruples against the free use of the term "sin- 
 ners," and counting it his duty to declare 
 boldly and repeatedly the future punishment of 
 the wicked, yet refused to touch the veil of 
 reserve which no man can tear from his fel- 
 low's personality, if he is to meet him on terms 
 of mutual respect thereafter. 
 
JAMES TUFTS 33 
 
 If now we try to explain how this intellectual 
 treatment of Christianity and such a reserved, 
 impersonal attitude could comport with the 
 emotional type of piety which manifests itself 
 in the diary or personal cori-espondence, we 
 may find some suggestions in two considera- 
 tions. First, the general fact that there was little 
 place accorded to emotional expression in any 
 of the other fields — -art, music, family affec- 
 tion — had a certain tendency to check emo- 
 tional expression, or to turn it inward and make 
 it seek relief in connection with the religious 
 imagery. A more specific theological reason 
 is found in the fact that a prominent theme 
 of preaching and religious experience was the 
 salvation of the soul. Seldom, if ever, has 
 " salvation " been conceived in so individual and 
 subjective a sense. One of my grandfather's 
 sermons, which he preached at several funerals 
 in the group of towns that constituted the ^arger 
 parish of the senior minister of the county, 
 was from the text : "I must work the works 
 of Him that sent me while it is day." The 
 "work," and the only work, referred to in the 
 sermon is the work of preparing for death. A 
 third factor which co-operated with the two 
 just named was the psychology, common to 
 
34 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 nearly all the theology of the time, in which 
 feelings or " affections " were identiiied with 
 the will, under the common term " heart. " It 
 is, of course, perfectly true that adoption of a 
 great principle or cause, followed by steadfast 
 fidelity at the cost of struggle and sacrifice, 
 will enlist the sympathies and afford the basis 
 for enthusiasm and emotional response, especi- 
 ally under the influence of social sympathy or 
 of musical and other artistic conditions. In the 
 soul, which, after a crisis of bafifling perplexity 
 as to truth or conduct, flings itself in single- 
 hearted faith upon some person or principle of 
 action, or which engages with absorbing in- 
 terest in objective tasks, the emotional accom- 
 paniment of love is normal. But to attempt to 
 get the emotional condition by itself was ab- 
 normal. The average New Englander had no 
 genuine personal crisis growing out of real dif- 
 ficulties in either his view of the world or his 
 course of life. The Christian view of the 
 world was generally accepted as a matter of 
 course. 
 
 There was, however, one exception to this. 
 The doctrines of divine sovereignty in the 
 baldest form, and especially of "reprobation," 
 were not so generally accepted without a strug- 
 
TAMES TUFTS 35 
 
 gle. There was therefore a genuine psycho- 
 logical reason for holding that it was well 
 to emphasize these doctrines in preparation 
 for special religious interest. They brought 
 the hearer to a consciousness of opposition 
 between his natural feelings and the supposed 
 divine law. As Emmons puts it : " There is 
 no divine truth which is more directly suited 
 to discover the hearts of sinners to them- 
 selves than the doctrine of reprobation : It 
 never fails to awaken their native enmity to 
 the divine character." Where this conflict was 
 not aroused the feeling of " conviction of sin," 
 in the case of children or of those whose lives 
 had been moral, was related almost entirely to 
 the inner feelings. If, as was believed, the 
 "heart" is "totally depraved," and if the 
 actual choices or purposes could not be fairly 
 said to be a continuous series of wicked acts, 
 the depravity was naturally sought in the af- 
 fections. The young girl in the Wardsboro min- 
 ister's household, who felt that her " whole life 
 had been one continued scene of wickedness," 
 undoubtedly referred almost entirely to her 
 supposed want of ardent affection for God. 
 The diaries and letters that bewail wickedness 
 seem in like manner to refer to the " languor" 
 
36 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 or " inconstancy " of their " holy exercises." 
 The great use made of Solomon's Song in in- 
 terpreting religious experience was in accord 
 with the other tendencies noticed. The reli- 
 gious imagination, seeking for some means of 
 raising its emotional level, cut off largely from 
 finding in daily duties a genuine religious work, 
 found a congenial imagery in the beautiful 
 love poem. 
 
 As has been intimated in the last sentence, 
 the religious life and feeling of the period did 
 not assume the form of showing men the 
 moral and spiritual value of their daily work 
 and common relations, as husbands and wives, 
 fathers and children, neighbors and citizens. 
 I cannot discover in any of my grandfather's 
 sermons any allusion which would in any 
 respect enable one to judge whether they 
 were preached in the first or the nineteenth 
 century, in Vermont or in Palestine. Every 
 illustration is drawn from the Scriptures, every 
 image is that of the biblical writers. The re- 
 ligious life was lived largely in a world by itself. 
 It was, in a sense, too sacred a stream to 
 mingle its waters with the currents of daily life. 
 
 And yet it would be a shallow appreci- 
 ation that should stop with the abstractness. 
 
TAMES TUFTS 37 
 
 the separateness, the unduly intellectual and 
 emotional elements in the religious life of my 
 father's native town. These were, after all, 
 the " defects of its qualities." The very sepa- 
 rateness of the religious experience fixed 
 attention on its reality and its importance. 
 The "other world" with its transcendent 
 values gave a tremendous significance, even if 
 with distorted emphasis, to the life of prepa- 
 ration. The mind which on the Sabbath had 
 looked upon life sub specie aeternitatis — from 
 the point of view of eternity — was gaining a 
 larger grasp than the mind which lives only 
 in the moment. To enter into the scope of the 
 supposed divine plan for the world, even if the 
 plan were rather narrowly conceived, was yet 
 to measure one's self up against the universe, 
 and to experience something of the broaden- 
 ing of capacity and elevation of soul which 
 find expression in the meditations of Plato or of 
 Augustine, of Spinoza or of Edwards. To look 
 upon God's glory as the chief end, and upon 
 the supreme love of God as the highest blessed- 
 ness of humanity, was to set up a strong coun- 
 ter-influence against pettiness and selfishness. 
 To make the salvation of souls the aim of life, 
 even if the " soul " was considered abstractly, 
 
38 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 and failed to include a large part of the human 
 character, sympathies, joys, and aspirations, 
 was yet, after all, to give a motive higher than 
 economic gain or sensuous enjoyment. It was 
 democratic, for it gave dignity and worth to 
 every life. And to do justice to the minister 
 who has been quoted above in another con- 
 nection, I will reproduce a passage from the 
 sermon which Mr. Emmons preached at my 
 grandfather's ordination — a passage which 
 seems to me to express what was felt more or 
 less consciously in that far-away life of Wards- 
 boro Hill. The text was, " I seek not yours 
 but you," and the preacher continued: " To 
 desire the salvation of souls is to desire their 
 future and eternal good. This great and ex- 
 tensive desire, therefore, must natufally lead 
 the minds of ministers to view their people in 
 the light of eternity. And this view of their 
 people must necessarily raise them all to a 
 level. I do not say, sink them to a level, but 
 raise them to a level ; because it always raises 
 men, even the smallest and lowest men, to 
 view them in relation to eternity. In this view 
 all souls are equal. The soul of the child is 
 equal to the soul of the parent ; the soul of 
 the subject is equal to the soul of the ruler ; 
 
JAMES TUFTS 39 
 
 the soul of the servant is equal to the soul of 
 the master; and the soul of the poor is equal 
 to the soul of the rich. Eternity levels all 
 distinctions and raises all immortal souls into 
 infinite importance." 
 
 This sketch is not intended as a history of 
 theology, but I think it is impossible to appre- 
 ciate all sides of my father's character — the 
 side which appeared in his letters and diaries, 
 as well as the side which appeared in his few 
 sermons and his talks upon religious subjects — 
 without recalling the religious atmosphere of 
 his early years. 
 
 The town was of course not wholly absorbed 
 by its religious experiences. There were train- 
 ings and town-meetings, day schools, spelling 
 schools, and singing schools, ball games and 
 quoits on the green, and the never-failing 
 interests of farm and family life. The minis- 
 ter's children shared in all these as actors or 
 spectators. Thanksgiving, Fourth of July, 
 and Fast were the great days — aside from 
 "Training" — but the minister's household 
 never knew when Christmas came, and Easter 
 would doubtless have been looked upon as an 
 adjunct of popery. 
 
40 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 Of the life in the minister's household, as 
 well as of the character of the minister — 
 " Priest Tufts," as he was called through all 
 the county — my father has given some sug- 
 gestions which I have supplemented by my 
 mother's recollections: " For over forty years 
 Mr. Tufts's house was regarded as a hospitable 
 house for good people, and especially for 
 ministers, who often remained there many 
 days. 
 
 " Mr. Tufts was six feet in height, with a 
 large frame, dark eyes and complexion, heavy, 
 overhanging brows, long massive face, a strong, 
 heavy voice, a slow, measured, and positive 
 gait. He had a solemn, earnest manner that 
 commanded attention, and was especially im- 
 pressive and appropriate at funerals. His 
 sermons were not brilliant, but methodical, 
 biblical, earnest, and impressive, closing with 
 an 'Improvement' or 'Reflections,' mostly 
 extemporaneous, which were pertinent, often 
 eloquent, always solemn, and not easily for- 
 gotten. From about twenty years after his 
 settlement to the time when it was thought 
 desirable to have a colleague I do not recollect 
 ever hearing any suggestion made of any 
 change. As I look back upon his long minis- 
 
JAMES TUFTS 41 
 
 try of forty-two years, and upon those of the 
 others in the county who had long pastorates, 
 I am satisfied they were all men of good judg- 
 ment, good sense, exemplary piety, and con- 
 siderable resource, though none of them bril- 
 liant. The brilliant men, as I remember, never 
 stayed long in a place. 
 
 "For some twenty-five years the post-office 
 was kept in our house. The salary was ten dol- 
 lars a year, but the chief benefit came in the 
 extra reading it afforded. This made it grati- 
 fying to us children, though it added much to 
 the duties of the minister's wife, as not only 
 were the duties of the office to be attended to, 
 but, inasmuch as it was the post-office for three 
 towns, many long letters were to be read to 
 those receiving them. Letters containing tid- 
 ings of death called for pastoral sympathy, 
 and Mr. Tufts always invited all who delayed 
 to stay to dinner or tea — of course never 
 thinking, as his wife remarked, that it made 
 any work for the housekeeper. 
 
 " Exchanges with neighboring ministers .were 
 common, especially in the summer and fall 
 months, and we boys — my brother and I — 
 soon associated the horses with the ministers 
 themselves, some always having plump horses. 
 
42 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 Others lean and poor, and one always a gay 
 and handsome horse. The ministers in asso- 
 ciation voted not to go and come on the Sab- 
 bath when exchanging pulpits, unless in case 
 of sickness in the family. But the minister's 
 family and the people always looked forward 
 to an exchange as an event of interest. It 
 broke the monotony of life in those- quiet 
 times. The ministers, too, would bring the 
 news of the surrounding towns." As indicat- 
 ing the extent of the hospitality practiced at 
 the parsonage, my grandmother wrote : "I 
 had the pleasure of forming an acquaintance 
 with seventy-one ministers' wives, all at our 
 own home, with two or three exceptions, and 
 with probably more than double that number 
 of ministers" — a breadth of acquaintanceship 
 which would bear comparison with that of 
 most households of today. 
 
 Of the wife and mother of the household 
 my father has left this sketch : 
 
 " During the war of the Revolution and 
 immediately after, till the Constitution was 
 adopted in 1789, money was so scarce that the 
 common schools were a good deal broken up 
 or suspended, or kept only a short time each 
 year. Parents taught their own children more 
 
JAMES TUFTS 43 
 
 or less, and the clergymen had some pupils, 
 especially young teachers, for a short time. 
 My mother, who commenced teaching at fif- 
 teen, in 1792, often remarked she never at- 
 tended school over two years, and three months 
 of that was with Dr. Crane, of Northbridge, 
 who taught many pupils in his family. But 
 she had an acute, strong mind, retentive mem- 
 ory, was quick to learn, and was regarded as a 
 well-educated woman during her life. She 
 had also the reputation, in her native town of 
 Grafton, of a superior teacher, receiving at 
 first fifty cents a week, and more each year, 
 to one dollar and fifty cents a week, when, as 
 she remarked, she was ' ashamed to ask any 
 more, as no other teacher in town received 
 over a dollar a week.' She was a born teacher, 
 with a natural gift to preserve order, inspire 
 enthusiasm, and interest her pupils. When the 
 new methods of teaching came around, in the 
 time of Horace Mann, she often remarked she 
 had used 'the same methods in her schools 
 long before.' She always instructed her own 
 six children so as to keep them in advance of 
 scholars of their age. She was familiar with 
 grammar and arithmetic, so as to assist pupils 
 in those studies till she was over eighty years 
 
44 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 of age. When Colburn's arithmetic came out, 
 which was at first quite a puzzle to most teach- 
 ers, she would go through readily all the ex- 
 amples at sight, and explain them intelligently. 
 She was proficient in technical grammar, or 
 ' parsing,' as it was called, in Young's Night 
 Thoughts and Pope's Essay, when to parse well 
 such authors and interpret them required real 
 scholarship. She understood well the history 
 of the country, and the theological questions 
 of the day. If her husband was to print a ser- 
 mon or anything else, she was the one to look 
 it over and see that the grammar and orthog- 
 raphy were correct. If her husband had pu- 
 pils, as he sometimes had, she did most of the 
 instruction, and was always a great assistance 
 to the young teachers and the young ladies in 
 the parish." 
 
 A reminiscence of my father's adds another 
 sidelight. The minister was very generous, 
 while the minister's wife, with a large family 
 to provide for upon the salary of 1^266.66, 
 was naturally careful, and was often sorely 
 puzzled to understand the rapid lowering of 
 the beef in the barrel, from which my grand- 
 father had taken supplies surreptitiously for 
 the needy members of his parish. 
 
JAMES TUFTS 45 
 
 The books in the household were, of course, 
 mainly theological ; Hopkins's System, Em- 
 mons's Sermons, Dwight's Theology, Jamieson's 
 Sacred History, h.\xs\.in's View of the Church, Ad- 
 ams's View of Religion, Faber's View of the 
 Prophecies, The Confession of Faith of the 
 Church of Scotland, were the more impor- 
 tant. Kaimes's Elements of Criticism was about 
 the only secular work. There was a public 
 library kept in the house for some time, but 
 probably light literature did not abound in 
 that. 
 
 My father's boyhood had not many striking 
 incidents. A rather delicate infant — "one 
 of the four feeblest I ever knew raised," his 
 mother wrote — he grew strong and vigorous in 
 the clear, bracing Vermont air, and with the 
 healthful outdoor life upon the farm. His 
 only serious sickness in his early years oc- 
 curred in June of his fifth year. It was a se- 
 vere attack of scarlet fever and "canker rash." 
 " You ought not to want the child to get well," 
 said the blunt Dr. Wheeler, "for if he does 
 he'll be deaf and dumb." A blister was ap- 
 plied to the back of the neck, but it gangrened. 
 His mother wrote : "We steamed him a great 
 
46 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 deal ; got two large bullfrogs and held them 
 alternately at his mouth." Just what thera- 
 peutic value was attributed to bullfrogs by the 
 professional or lay theory of the time I am 
 I unable to say, but by the aid of, or in spite of, 
 \ all the patient recovered. He never had the 
 unusual degree of strength which belonged to 
 his brother John, but he was an athletic, quick, 
 energetic boy, and the strength and endurance 
 which he gained upon the farm and in tramp- 
 ing about the hills stood him in good stead 
 for the long walks which he took in after-years. 
 One who knew him as a boy writes: "He 
 always stood well in character and intelligence, 
 just quaint enough to be interesting." 
 
 Of his early teachers I have never heard him 
 speak, but in the autumn of 1829, when seven- 
 teen, he attended a "select school" intheneigh- 
 boring village of Townshend, taught by Mr. B. 
 F. Foster, a recent graduate of Amherst College, 
 who "proved a very superior instructor." Some 
 of the older scholars studied Brown's Intel- 
 lectual Philosophy. My father boarded with 
 Deacon Owen for one dollar per week. " It may 
 seem to some," my father wrote fifty years 
 later, "that the teaching fifty years ago would, 
 of course, be shallow and unsatisfactory; but, 
 
JAMES TUFTS 47 
 
 from my recollection, the English branches 
 were taught substantially in manner and 
 method as they have been since. Such instruc- 
 tion as Mr. Foster then gave in the school 
 would now, I think, be regarded by intelligent 
 people as good instruction." 
 
 At the close of this school my father made 
 his first venture as a teacher. He did not pass 
 through the usual progressive series, beginning 
 with a small school in the summer, and thus 
 acquiring confidence for the large winter 
 schools, when the young men and women, as 
 well as the boys and girls, were in attendance, 
 and likely to make trouble for the teacher. 
 He took his first plunge with a winter school 
 of fifty-five, at Wardsboro " City" in the winter 
 of 1829-30. 
 
 "The school committee had been disap- 
 pointed in the teacher engaged, and they were 
 willing to risk me. The winter schools were 
 usually taught by mature men and experienced 
 teachers, and were not easily governed, so that 
 my sisters rather discouraged my undertaking 
 so large a school. But I was strong, ambi- 
 tious, and enthusiastic, and did not have the 
 least fear of any trouble — though it is now a 
 wonder to me how I got along so well, igno- 
 
48 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 rant and inexperienced as I was. I soon inter- 
 ested the older pupils in their studies, so they 
 made no trouble, and I succeeded in waking 
 up the younger scholars, so that all things 
 went along smoothly, and I taught a much, 
 better school there the next winter. I pro- 
 cured the first blackboard ever used in this 
 school, and I had the pupils draw maps. I 
 also got a carpenter to turn me out a six-inch 
 globe — on which my sister painted the conti- 
 nents — which I used. Many other little im- 
 provements, which came from Horace Mann, 
 of Massachusetts, I somehow caught and intro- 
 duced. At the close of the school the pupils 
 showed so much enthusiasm and life and real 
 progress that there was great gratification 
 among the parents." 
 
 This first success was followed by others, 
 and by an increase of salary. " I received $i i 
 per month for my first school, and 'boarded 
 around,' $12 the next winter, and $\t the third 
 winter (in a school of seventy-two pupils at 
 Jamaica, Vt.) , which was about as much as the 
 best teachers of winter schools in the country 
 then received in Vermont." The intervals 
 between these schools were spent in work 
 upon the farm, or, in the summer of 1832, at 
 
JAMES TUFTS 49 
 
 school in Montpelier. Here he lived with his 
 mother's parents, who had a farm in Berlin, 
 adjoining Montpelier. 
 
 Meanwhile an event had occurred which in- 
 fluenced him to broaden his plans, which hith- 
 erto had not looked very definitely toward any 
 professional career. As a child he had, of 
 course, lived in a religious atmosphere, but in 
 those days it was not supposed that a child, 
 however nurtured, could become a member of 
 the household of faith without a decided 
 crisis, involving a certain definite period of 
 conviction of sin, followed by absolute sub- 
 mission to divine sovereignty, and then, after 
 a time, by an experience of more or less confi- 
 dent joy, when the penitent " indulged a hope" 
 of pardon for sin. What the philosopher 
 Hegel has called the "power of the negative" 
 was never more practically applied, and there 
 is no doubt that the tremendous emphasis 
 upon the antithesis between sin and penitence, 
 between darkness and light, produced strong 
 and decided characters. It was therefore 
 assumed in my grandfather's family that the 
 children were unregenerate, and an outburst of 
 youthful desperation on my father's part when 
 he was about seven years old was regarded as 
 
50 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 a confirmation of the doctrine. My grand- 
 mother wrote the story in the third person. 
 " It happened that a mother was trying to in- 
 struct a son ; she tried to persuade him to do 
 right, and told him the consequences of being 
 wicked. He replied with a sigh, ' I wish that 
 bad was good, and good was bad' — a true rep- 
 resentation of every unrenewed heart." 
 
 It was in connection with a four-days' " pro- 
 tracted meeting" in June, 1832, that my father 
 passed through the experience from which 
 he dated his Christian life. The Rev. Alberoni 
 Kidder, of Eau Claire, Wis., who was a boy 
 with my father, writes concerning the event: 
 " It was a revival of great power, when most of 
 the young people of the town became inter- 
 ested. James and John Tufts, Samuel Kidder, 
 and I were of the converts. Your grandfather 
 was of the strictest sect, a Calvinistic predes- 
 tinarian, and made that doctrine very promi- 
 nent in his preaching; asked his converts on 
 uniting with the church if they were willing to 
 be lost if it was God's will ; yet under his 
 ministry many noble Christian men and women 
 were trained for useful lives in the church. He 
 warned us all of the danger of deceiving our- 
 selves." 
 
JAMES TUFTS 51 
 
 On November 20, 1831, my father, with 
 thirty-four others, was received into church 
 membership. Twenty-five others, including 
 John and Fanny Tufts, were received at later 
 times within the year. The church now 
 reached its high-water mark with a member- 
 ship of 148, and a deep impression was made 
 upon the life of the town. For my father it 
 meant further study, with a possibility, at least, 
 of the ministry as a profession. He had 
 already dipped into Latin and Greek at'Mont- 
 pelier. A minister who made a somewhat ex- 
 tended visit at the parsonage had given him 
 some instruction. But, fortunately, at just this 
 time a new school was opened which offered 
 stimulus and opportunity for college prepara- 
 tion. This was Burr Seminary, at Manchester, 
 to' the northwest from Wardsboro about twenty- 
 five miles, and upon the "other side of the 
 mountain." With a consciousness of powers 
 which, if untrained, were yet urging toward 
 development, with great physical vigor, and 
 with eager anticipations of the untried fields 
 before him, James Tufts, at the age of twenty, 
 entered upon the new chapter of his life. 
 
III. 
 
 Study, Failure of Health, and 
 Early Attempts to Work. 
 
 Burr Seminary was opened for instruction 
 May 15, 1833, witli the Rev. Lyman Coleman 
 as principal, a scholarly man of fine character, 
 for whom my father always cherished a great 
 respect. It was the plan that the students 
 should partially support themselves by manual 
 labor, but there was difficulty in finding re- 
 munerative work. Some chopped cord-wood 
 at 37^ cents per cord; one worked in the 
 potato field and realized 72 cents during the 
 term. My father worked about two hours a 
 day in a cooper shop provided by the seminary, 
 and learned to make pails, but I cannot say 
 how much he received. The students were 
 recommended "to dispense as far as possible 
 with tea and coffee, and adopt for the most 
 part a vegetable diet." From a letter which 
 says, "It is thought our board will not be over 
 one dollar per week," it may be presumed that 
 the recommendation was carried out in the 
 commons. Prayers were conducted in the 
 morning at half-past four o'clock in summer 
 
 52 
 
JAMES TUFTS 53 
 
 and at five in winter. A fellow-student, Mr. 
 T. K. Wright, has given some reminiscences 
 of the early days, under date of September, 
 1901 : 
 
 "Sixty-eight years ago last May a large 
 number of men and boys came together for 
 the first time at Burr Seminary. Their ages 
 ranged from twelve to twenty years. Promi- 
 nent among them all stood James Tufts. In 
 scholarship, Christian character, and manli- 
 ness he was reckoned among the first. In 
 exhibitions, rhetorical or oratorical exercises, 
 he was always assigned a prominent part. In 
 short, he was a young man whose influence 
 among other young men was uniformly good. 
 From his beginning at Burr Seminary, even to 
 the time of his death, the testimony of his 
 fellow-men respecting him would be that he 
 had been a useful member of society, a man 
 of ability, of integrity, and of uprightness. I 
 feel his loss, for he was a genuine good 
 friend." 
 
 My father remained at Manchester as stu- 
 dent and then as teacher until November, 1835. 
 He kept a diary during this period which indi- 
 cates much concern for his religious life. But 
 there are indications that the quaint, practical 
 
54 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 good sense, which was later so marked a char- 
 acteristic, did not attribute all languor of the 
 religious emotions directly to perversity of 
 heart, for we find him proposing as a question 
 for consideration at the Saturday evening 
 meeting, "The guilt of indulging the appetite 
 so as to render it impossible to keep awake in 
 meeting." The questions proposed by others 
 at the same meeting were : "Why is the num- 
 ber seven used oftener than any other ? " and, 
 " Will this earth be burned lip at the last 
 day?" Of greater interest are entries like the 
 following: "Begin to feel more and more the 
 obligation to preach to the heathen. Ought I 
 to go ? " 
 
 At vacation time my father usually walked 
 home, e. g.: "December 3. Arose at two this 
 morning. Studied about two hours and started 
 for home on foot at half-past five. Took din- 
 ner at Torrey's ; arrived home about six." 
 The summer vacation of 1834 was varied by a 
 trip with his father to New Braintree, his 
 father's birthplace. They passed through 
 Amherst and attended the commencement 
 exercises, which began at 9 A. M., and "con- 
 tinued five hours without intermission." It 
 indicates a mind and body less Susceptible to 
 
JAMES TUFTS 55 
 
 fatigue under oratorical efforts than is common 
 at the present day, that the exercises are 
 called "interesting." 
 
 During the year 1834-35 my father, as pre- 
 viously stated, taught the English department 
 at Burr Seminary. He also carried on the 
 studies of the freshman year of college, and 
 expected to enter Yale in the autumn of 1835. 
 The studies of freshman year at that time 
 would correspond very nearly to those of the 
 fourth year of a good high school today. In 
 Latin, Livy and Horace were read, which are 
 now usually college subjects, but, on the other 
 hand, geometry was not completed in freshman 
 year, and there was no requirement in physics 
 or modern language. Just before the close of 
 what my father had regarded as his last term 
 of teaching in Manchester, it was decided that 
 he should remain for the autumn. "August 
 23, 1835. Have been much cast down the past 
 week on learning that I must go to teaching 
 again." The principal was very anxious to 
 have him stay, and this, combined with the 
 financial pressure, finally prevailed. It was 
 therefore December 2 when he arrived in 
 New Haven, took his examinations upon the 
 studies of freshman year and of the first term 
 
56 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 of sophomore year, and after several days of 
 lonesomeness settled down to work. 
 
 His college course was cut short, not only 
 at the beginning, but also at the end. For in 
 the spring of senior year he felt obliged to 
 undertake a school in order to pay the bills for 
 which neither his previous savings nor his 
 father's resources were sufficient. He always 
 felt that he did not have a fair start as compared 
 with some of his classmates, and for some time 
 had to work very hard. In June, however, he 
 writes home : " I find it quite easy to keep up, 
 when I am on fair footing." He practiced the 
 maxim, which he used so often in his later 
 teaching, " Be sure and review thoroughly," 
 and, although he did not rank among the first 
 ten, he was "a member of the Phi Beta Kappa 
 Society and was assigned a dissertation at 
 graduation. In writing and speaking he early 
 took a leading position. One of his treasured 
 possessions was a copy of Shakspere, " pre- 
 sented by the president and fellows of Yale 
 College, April, 1836, for excellence in com- 
 position." His prominence in speaking was 
 indicated by his election as a senior to the 
 presidency of the Linonian Society, a position 
 then regarded as one of the most honorable in 
 
JAMES TUFTS 57 
 
 college. Among the men whom he encountered 
 in the debates of Linonia was the late William 
 M. Evarts, who was in the class of 1837. He 
 was much younger than my father, but already 
 showed the power of masterly analysis and 
 statement which made him so eminent later; 
 and the last article which my father published 
 was a short reminiscence of Mr. Evarts. The 
 curriculum of those days was confined almost 
 exclusively to Latin, Greek, and mathematics 
 until senior year, when logic, rhetoric, Stewart's 
 Philosophy of the Mind, and Paley's Moral Phi- 
 losophy were pursued. The instruction in these 
 latter subjects was not very stimulating. 
 Acquaintance with the history of thought, or 
 ability to discover and state the problems of 
 the world and of life in such a way as to 
 awaken thought, were not regarded as indis- 
 pensable. There was, however, one man in 
 the college of real philosophical ability and of 
 great personal power — Dr. Nathaniel W. Tay- 
 lor, professor of theology. Although not 
 accepting those points of doctrine in which 
 Dr. Taylor differed from the older theology, 
 and rejecting utterly the theory that " happi- 
 ness" is the end and motive of all action, my 
 father was nevertheless greatly impressed by 
 
58 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 his preaching, and stimulated by his original 
 mind to grapple with many philosophical prob- 
 lems. " It shows a taste for those [philosophi- 
 cal] studies, that, although nothing was said 
 about Hobbes in college, I got his treatises 
 and read a good deal in them." Locke, Hume, 
 Reid, and others were read in this or the fol- 
 lowing year, and conversation or debate with 
 his friends fixed the salient points. For then, 
 as afterward, his mind worked best under the 
 stimulus of conversation or of preparation for 
 public utterance, and the friends of his own 
 class or of other classes were a very important 
 part of his course. 
 
 One of these friends, with whom he main- 
 tained a lifelong interchange of thought and 
 sentiment, Judge H. P. Hedges, of Bridge- 
 hampton. Long Island, contributes the follow- 
 ing respecting their college life : 
 
 " Your father and myself entered Yale Col- 
 lege in the sophomore year. He was a hard 
 worker in college, fond of study, of debate ; a 
 good writer, deep thinker, and forcible speaker. 
 Even at that early day he had that hoarseness 
 of voice that followed him through life, born 
 of some bronchial malady. In spite of that, he 
 was so eminently known to be an excellent 
 
JAMES TUFTS 59 
 
 speaker that at a Whig political meeting, I think 
 in our junior year in New Haven, where prac- 
 ticed and reputable speakers had declaimed, 
 the students called so loud and long and uni- 
 versally that, without premeditation, he rose 
 and made an excellent and appropriate address, 
 closing with an allusion to the Green Moun- 
 tains of his native state as the birthplace of 
 freedom here (as mountains were everywhere); 
 and, if Liberty died off the earth, she would die 
 there last. When he closed, the plaudits of 
 the audience attested their high regard for 
 his speech. I was also a Whig and present at 
 this meeting. Your father and m3'self saw 
 politically eye to eye. In the debating society 
 your father was active, and an ardent and in- 
 terested speaker. Rodman, Gold, E. Strong, 
 Nooney, your father, and myself were all fond 
 of athletic sports. We walked, worked, played 
 quoits, etc., much more than the average of 
 our class, and the six named, I think, all lived 
 to be over eighty years old. Gold is eighty- 
 three, and I am almost eighty-four years old. 
 This speaks for itself. Your father was what 
 I call thorough — he did with his rnight what 
 his hand found to do. His soul was not in one 
 place and his body in another. If he had to 
 
6o JAMES TUFTS 
 
 thrash a refractory student, which rarely he 
 would most reluctantly have to do, he did it 
 thoroughly. He was no inefficient character 
 floating with the tide. He was a positive force, 
 and ever working for the good of mankind. 
 
 " In our junior year we roomed in North 
 Middle College, he in 79 and I in 76. Prox- 
 imity of rooms, mutual fondness for exercise, 
 like politics, like literary proclivities, brought 
 us often and much together. I admired his 
 entire sincerity, simplicity, and nobility of 
 character. Knowing him thoroughly, I had 
 the greater friendship for him. His solid, 
 sterling virtues dilated the more on acquaint- 
 ance. My inexperience, my youth, my raw- 
 ness, called for thought and sympathy and 
 aid, that his greater age and great heart could 
 supply. His strength and my weakness, I be- 
 lieve, consolidated a friendship lifelong here, 
 and I believe to be renewed and endure in the 
 spirit land and the spirit life through unend- 
 ing ages. 
 
 " His hate of sham, intolerance of pretense, 
 and earnestness of purpose endeared him to 
 men of like stamp, but not to the frivolous or 
 vain. He was a good scholar ; solid, not showy. 
 My memoranda show that his marking was 
 
JAMES TUFTS 6i 
 
 in junior appointments 82 for first dispute. 
 In senior year he took the same appointment. 
 As a writer his work was higher than as a 
 classical scholar. He had little power to 
 skim, much to dive. 
 
 "This paper, written by the hand of friend- 
 ship, is, I judge, the opinion of his classmates, 
 and is surely that of 
 
 Yours truly, 
 
 H. P. Hedges." 
 
 Another classmate, Hon. T. S. Gold, of 
 Cornwall, Con., wrote on the occasion of my 
 father's eightieth birthday: 
 
 " His energy was manifested in the study of 
 conic sections as well as in debate, and none 
 of us would have risked a physical contest 
 with him. I well remember his sonorous voice 
 echoing through the halls of old South Middle 
 in the early light of the summer morning, as 
 he rehearsed the demonstrations, Q. E. D. I 
 count first among the pleasures of my life the 
 friendship of so many good men — and among 
 them all no one, in my regard, outranks James 
 Tufts." 
 
 My father kept a very accurate itemized ac- 
 count of his expenses while in college. His 
 
62 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 total expense for the two years and one term 
 was ^678, of which ggo was for traveling ex- 
 penses, $75 for books, tld'j for clothing, 1844 
 for societies. He was, by training, economical, 
 but does not seem to have been forced to deny 
 himself the thing for which he cared most — 
 association with his fellows upon conditions of 
 self-respect. In the spring of his senior year, 
 however, he felt obliged to teach again, and 
 this time his lot fell in Fairfield, a dignified 
 and beautiful village, where he remained for 
 two years. He came to New Haven to gradu- 
 ate with his class, receiving his degree August 
 16, 1838, and appearing on the com-mence- 
 ment program with a dissertation, " On the 
 Influence of Ambition upon the Educated 
 Mind of Our Country." This dissertation was 
 a thoughtful paper, designed to show that a 
 desire to gain reputation and to appeal to the 
 popular taste was injurious to the cause of 
 deep scholarship and thorough learning. 
 
 The two years in Fairfield, aside from the 
 work of teaching, were notable chiefly for the 
 friendships formed — friendships both with 
 persons and with books. The first money re- 
 ceived for tuition bought two large volumes of 
 selections from the British Poets, and these 
 
JAMES TUFTS 63 
 
 were not merely read, but also made intimate 
 companions. My father seems to have been 
 fond of quoting Pope's epigrams before this 
 — the old-fashioned parsing probably was re- 
 sponsible for the first acquaintance ; and, next 
 to Shakspere, Pope always remained a favorite, 
 chiefly, I think, on account of his intellectual 
 acuteness and epigrammatic expression. Phi- 
 losophy as well as poetry was read, and at 
 this time was written the only article of a dis- 
 tinctly scholastic sort which my father ever 
 published. This was a critical review of Saw- 
 yer's Critical Exposition of Mental Philos- 
 ophy, a work which afforded to the reviewer 
 an opportunity for discussing the ethical theo- 
 ries of the "New Haven theology." The book 
 took essentially the position of Paley as regards 
 the motives of human action and the grounds 
 of obligation, and the review sharply opposes 
 this attempt to resolve all the moral distinc- 
 tions and motives into pleasures and pains. 
 While not affording an adequate test of philo- 
 sophical attainment, the review shows distinct 
 promise and, as might be expected, marked 
 dialectical ability. If the conditions of edu- 
 cation at that time had suggested such a career, 
 or if his health had permitted him to go on 
 
64 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 with his theological studies, my father might 
 very probably have continued work along 
 philosophical lines. In later years he seemed 
 to require the stimulus of discussion or of 
 preparation for speaking in order to study and 
 write, and when he wrote it must be something 
 brief, incisive, and capable of final formulation 
 in a short time. He did not like to tie him- 
 self down to a long piece of continuous work. 
 But this impatience of the steady, monotonous 
 work of the investigator, and this eagerness to 
 bring his results to the forum of discussion, or 
 to the minds of others, although to some degree 
 rooted deep in his character, were undoubtedly 
 greatly developed, first by his ill-health, and 
 then by his work as a teacher, which left little 
 leisure for continuous research, and emphasized 
 personal contact rather than impersonal specu- 
 lation or investigation. 
 
 Of the many delightful personal friendships 
 formed in Fairfield with the families of his 
 pupils and with others, my father's friendship 
 with Mr. Henry G. de Forest was particularly 
 worthy of mention. Mr. de Forest was a 
 member of the class of 1839 at Amherst Col- 
 lege, and spent his vacations in Fairfield. In 
 all externals and antecedents the young men 
 
JAMES TUFTS 65 
 
 strikingly contrasted. The one was of rather 
 delicate physique, and showed in his finely cut 
 features the legacy of his French ancestry, and 
 in his manner the courtesy and refinement 
 which are fostered by advantages of birth and 
 breeding. The other, robust and energetic of 
 , body and mind, had the ruggedness and quaint- 
 ness of the Scot, and always maintained in his 
 manner a degree of the " non-conformity " 
 which characterized the Puritan. There was 
 also a difference of eight years in their ages ; 
 but in spite of — or the more because of — all 
 differences, the fineness of mind and spirit in 
 the one, and the originality, forcefulness, and 
 broadly human quality of the other, afforded 
 the basis for a lifelong attachment. Visits 
 and letters were interchanged, and many a 
 "margin" in the form of a book or a journey 
 — the margin which often means to the man 
 whose tastes outrun his resources, just the 
 difference between existing and "living" — 
 owed its possibility to the delicacy and kindness 
 of this friend. I had seen enough of Mr. de 
 Forest to appreciate my father's words on 
 receiving tidings of his death in 1889: "The 
 world seems poorer to me, now that he has 
 gone." 
 
66 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 In April, 1840, my father left Fairfield for 
 Andover to carry out the purpose which he 
 had cherished since leaving home for Man- 
 chester, eight years before. A very affec- 
 tionate letter from his father, received just at 
 this time, shows that he had hoped, ever since 
 he had baptized his oldest son, to see him enter 
 the calling of the ministry. Arriving at 
 Andover, my father resolved to make up the 
 work already covered by the first-year class 
 since autumn. He engaged a tutor in Hebrew; 
 in other subjects he could work privately, and 
 before long he was able to enter with great 
 satisfaction upon the regular work of the class. 
 
 The year 1840-41, spent at Andover, was in 
 some respects the happiest of my father's life. 
 Moses Stuart, B. B. Edwards, Leonard Woods, 
 and Edwards A. Park were an unusual group 
 of instructors ; the student body was large in 
 numbers, and included many strong and vigor- 
 ous minds. The theological seminary of today 
 finds it difficult to maintain its position with- 
 out the support of a university, but it may be 
 doubted whether in 1840 there was anywhere 
 else in this country so vigorous an intellectual 
 life as on Andover Hill. Students from the 
 University of Vermont had received from James 
 
JAMES TUFTS 67 
 
 Marsh the ferment of a new philosophical 
 principle, and were known as " Coleridge men." 
 Disciples of Dr. Taylor, of New Haven, were 
 enthusiastic for his standpoint. Carlyle and 
 Emerson were eagerly read and discussed. 
 Two years of study and reflection since his col- 
 lege course had prepared my father to take a 
 vigorous part in philosophical and theological 
 discussions. He often recurred in his last 
 years to a famous debate on the question, 
 "Does Edwards's doctrine- of the will lead to 
 fatalism ? " in which interest rose so high that 
 two adjourned meetings were necessary to sat- 
 isfy the thirst of the society for metaphysics, 
 and to free Edwards, as championed by my 
 father, from the charge of fatalism. 
 
 For about a year my father enjoyed this op- 
 portunity for enlargement, feeling, as he said, 
 "a giant's strength," when suddenly, in the 
 spring of 1841, the crash came which changed 
 his whole career, and indeed for a long time 
 seemed to make any work impossible. All at 
 once his throat became inflamed, and he " lost 
 his voice," so that he could speak only in a 
 whisper. Accompanying this was a serious 
 mental depression, although it is uncertain 
 whether this was a part of the direct results of 
 
68 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 the systemic disturbance, or whether it was the 
 result of the disappointment in plans which was 
 produced by the loss of voice. In after-life 
 he attributed the throat trouble to insufficient 
 nutrition. Owing to a temporarily bad con- 
 dition of his teeth, he limited his diet to a very 
 small range of food, and that of a not very nu- 
 tritious sort. He had felt so well and strong 
 that he did not think of any danger until the 
 blow fell. A sea voyage was advised, and sev- 
 eral trips were made from Gloucester with fish- 
 ermen for mackerel and halibut. The sea air 
 relieved the local irritation somewhat, but no 
 pronounced change was effected, and it was a 
 sad and discouraged man who in August 
 climbed old Wardsboro Hill, to find that dur- 
 ing his last voyage his father had died. 
 
 The decade from thirty to forty is a no less 
 critical and formative period in the lives of 
 most professional men than the decade from 
 twenty to thirty. In the early period habits of 
 study are formed ; in the latter falls usually 
 the decisive test as to whether the man will 
 satisfy himself with the standard set by his pre- 
 vious training, or will press on to creative work 
 and seek to widen his horizon. It tests the 
 capacity for independent achievement, as the 
 
JAMES TUFTS 69 
 
 earlier tested that for learning. A check at 
 the beginning of this period is a serious thing ; 
 a series of checks, continuing through the 
 whole period, thwarting every successive at- 
 tempt to pick up the broken threads and weave 
 some pattern — even if not the original design 
 — could not fail to leave its permanent impress. 
 In spite of all that my father was afterward 
 enabled to accomplish, he always spoke of his 
 life as crippled and broken ; he never had the 
 same confidence in his ability, and never dared 
 to plan for large things. To use his own 
 metaphor, he did not dare to steer his ship upon 
 the broad seas ; he must make short coasting 
 trips, and never venture far from port. " I gave 
 up all hope of anything but small, short work 
 fifty-seven years ago," he wrote in 1898. 
 
 The external history of the decade may be 
 briefly told. He recovered the use of his voice ; 
 studied further at home ; was licensed to preach 
 by the Windham County Association at 
 Newfane, February 7, 1843, and ordained at 
 Wardsboro, September 24, 1844 ; preached for 
 a time at Chillicothe, O., but found his throat 
 still too weak for continuous use, and, after 
 some study at Lane Seminary, returned to Ver- 
 mont. In 1845 he was invited to teach the 
 
70 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 classics at Castleton Seminary, an institution 
 whicii covered the field of a high school or 
 academy, and also the first year of a college 
 course. The classes in the classics were not 
 large ; the students were earnest, and letters 
 written at this time speak of occasional preach- 
 ing and show a fair measure of good spirits. 
 After two years, however, he felt obliged to 
 give up on account of the same chronic sore 
 throat, and returned home again disappointed 
 and discouraged. While staying at home he 
 was elected (1848) superintendent of schools 
 for Windham county, without any effort on 
 his part, and was at first disposed to decline 
 to serve ; but he began to visit the schools, and 
 the occupation was doubtless a blessing. 
 
 Repeated failure had come to exercise a 
 depressing influence. In a letter to his sister, 
 written in December, 1849, he dwells upon 
 the past eight years: " I have been bound in 
 fetters. Sometimes I feel reconciled to my 
 prison and fetters, and then I catch a glimpse 
 of other days and hopes and the spirit strug- 
 gles in vain to rise, like the caged bird that 
 beats its wings against its bars when it sees 
 
 the clear blue sky I do not find it easy 
 
 to keep from sitting down, and being and do- 
 
JAMES TUFTS 71 
 
 ing nothing. I have looked, and started, and 
 stgpped, and given up so many times. I seem 
 good for nothing. Years pass ; life and vigor 
 wasted, not in working, but in contending 
 against fretting disease and nothingism, as 
 
 Carlyle would say I am not apt to tell 
 
 over my doleful strains. It is of no use. 
 Everyone has sorrow enough, and if people 
 were all blabbing their sorrows, they would 
 only niake the matter worse." Referring to 
 the same period in a letter almost fifty years 
 later, he said : " It is wonderful that, after all, 
 I have lived so long and enjoyed so much, 
 under such limitations. Those were dark days 
 — no visible prospect, and I had been on the 
 shelf most of the time for ten years then. If 
 James reads the letter [the letter from which 
 the preceding quotations were made J, he will 
 prize more health and a fair start, and see a 
 little what a sad life I had for one who had 
 had such health and hopes. But I began to 
 gain then." 
 
 The work of visiting schools gave an op- 
 portunity for outdoor exercise ; for my father 
 had no horse, and walked from school to 
 school over the hills of Windham county, save 
 for an occasional "lift" by a passing wagon. 
 
72 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 It also gave a wholesome diversion, and en- 
 abled him to feel that he was of some use. 
 For he did not stop with the mechanical part 
 of his duty. He tried to have the right word 
 of stimulus, of encouragement, or of sugges- 
 tion for both teachers and scholars. He con- 
 sidered it to be the function of a superintend- 
 ent, not merely to observe the condition of 
 the school or to indicate in general terms the 
 ideals of good schools, but to show the specific 
 means which parents, teachers, and children 
 might take to reach the end. He took every 
 opportunity to talk with parents and influen- 
 tial men about the schools. Addresses were 
 issued to teachers and to children. Teachers' 
 institutes were conducted, and frequent contri- 
 butions made to school journals. All these 
 various activities soon made the Windham 
 county superintendent known beyond the 
 bounds of the county, and he was prominently 
 mentioned for state superintendent, although 
 he deprecated the suggestion, feeling uncertain 
 how long his health would allow him to con- 
 tinue work. He also published in the local 
 papers and in the Vermont School Journal brief 
 reports of the schools visited. The schools 
 were indicated only by a number, but it must 
 
JAMES TUFTS 73 
 
 have been easy for those immediately con- 
 nected to identify their schools, especially when 
 the comments were as realistic as the follow- 
 ing: 
 
 " School No. 52. A new house, large and 
 convenient, though seats for younger scholars 
 too high. When several rods away, heard the 
 loud, shrill voices of teacher and scholars. 
 Children hurry out at recess like a flock of 
 sheep ; manners rude and uncouth. The 
 teacher, full of energy, resolution, and enthusi- 
 asm, has a clear head, and drills the scholars 
 on hard points till they can understand and 
 explain them ; has a loud, shrill, resolute 
 voice, which she uses both in teaching and in 
 scolding : ' Boys, don't let me hear that whis- 
 pering again.' — ' Joseph, take your book there 
 and go to studying.' — 'Susan, put up that 
 string.' — 'Stop there, sit up, and go to study- 
 ing in a minute.' — ' May I leave my seat ?' — 
 ' No ; sit down.' — ' Girls, what are you doing ? ' 
 — 'Boys, stand on the mark; don't show any 
 of your spunk here.' — ' Stop that whispering, 
 I say.' Says she has not punished a scholar 
 yet, but I remarked that I thought a little 
 whipping and less talking would be better 
 for her and the scholars, too This 
 
74 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 teacher, too, might make more use of her 
 influence in moral training, as she evidently 
 has a great deal of good nature, and uncom- 
 mon originality and fertility of mind, as well 
 as a fluent tongue and strong lungs." 
 
 Not all of the reports are so vivacious, but 
 they all aim at something specific, and show 
 the qualities of frankness, directness, uncon- 
 ventionality, conciseness, and originality which 
 made their author so welcome a visitor and so 
 interesting a speaker throughout his life. 
 
 After two years of this work my father kept 
 a "select school" in Wardsboro in the hope of 
 benefiting the young people of the town, and 
 in the autumn of 185 1 went to Northampton, 
 Mass., to teach in a classical school for boys 
 conducted by his classmate and lifelong 
 friend, L. J. Dudley. While at Northampton 
 in the autumn of the next year he was visited 
 by his old college friend Charles Hammond. 
 Mr. Hammond was then principal of Monson 
 Academy, and had been asked to go to Groton. 
 He loved Monson Academy, where he had him- 
 self studied, and where he had been principal 
 for seven years, and when about to leave be- 
 thought himself of his old friend Tufts for his 
 successor. The decision to undertake the 
 
JAMES TUFTS 75 
 
 duties of principal at Monson was made Octo- 
 ber 17, after a good deal of hesitation and with 
 many misgivings, for the diary of that autumn 
 has frequeot entries, such as " tired," " health 
 poor." Work was not to begin until Decem- 
 ber, and the intervening weeks were spent in 
 a visit to New York, and in rambling over the 
 Wardsboro hills. November 27 he left the home 
 where his mother still lived, and where he had 
 for eleven years been welcomed with the un- 
 failing sympathy and hospitality of the head 
 of the house, his brother John. The latter 
 was a man of great strength of body and mind, 
 — farmer, school-teacher, and state senator — 
 upright and unselfish, who a few years later 
 moved to Geneseo, 111., where he lived until 
 his death in 1885. 
 
IV. 
 
 MONSON. 
 
 " I CAN hardly realize I have been here now 
 on the forty-ninth year. I came reluctantly, 
 after deciding not to come ; but it has proved 
 well. I was greatly blessed in the school, 
 both in numbers and in religious interest," so 
 my father wrote just before his last illness. 
 "It proved well," for here at last he found the 
 opportunity to do work that was more than 
 a fragment, and that brought out his capaci- 
 ties. 
 
 There are two main classes of teachers — 
 teachers of subjects, and teachers of boys and 
 girls or of young men and women. We think 
 of the one as classical scholars, or as teachers 
 of science or mathematics. The great men in 
 this class are remembered for their mastery of 
 their subject, their contagious enthusiasm for 
 learning, their clearness in exposition, their 
 appreciation for whatever is fine in literature, 
 or significant in nature, or profound in philos- 
 ophy. The correspondingly conspicuous men 
 of the second class interest us by their per- 
 sonal interest, by their ability to discover the 
 76 
 
JAMES TUFTS 77 
 
 strength and weakness in individual charac- 
 ters, to stimulate the sluggish, encourage the 
 timid, train the superficial to habits of thor- 
 oughness, and inspire in the thoughtless a 
 loftier and more serious purpose. No strong 
 teacher would fall wholly in either class, but 
 there is a difference in emphasis, and probably 
 no one would hesitate to place James Tufts in 
 the second class. I do not think any of his 
 students thought of him primarily as a classi- 
 cal teacher, although he taught the classics 
 well. He could in my boyhood conduct reci- 
 tations from nearly any part of the texts used 
 in preparation for college, without having any 
 text before him, and no error in construction 
 or rendering passed unchallenged. But I d©' 
 not think that his interest in the classics 
 purely as literature was so great as, for instance, 
 that of Mr. Hammond, who was both his pre- 
 decessor and his successor at Monson. Latin 
 and Greek were interesting to him chiefly as 
 agencies for training a mind and forming a 
 character. If they seemed not to be the best 
 agencies for some boy or girl, he looked for 
 something else that might be better adapted. 
 He never forgot that most of his students 
 "would walk the paths of common life, and 
 
78 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 that their spirits must find a culture not too 
 remote from their situation. "What's the 
 use of such a boy's studying Latin?" was a 
 question he not infrequently raised in the case 
 of someone whose gifts were apparently in 
 other directions. He always believed in great 
 thoroughness; the indirect discourse and the 
 other complications of syntax were to be made 
 so familiar as to cease to terrify ; the suggest- 
 ive or epigrammatic phrases from Vergil and 
 Homer were keenly appreciated, and often on 
 his lips in appropriate quotation — in fact, 
 when I was in college, I used to say that I was 
 made aware of his approval for any of my 
 youthful successes only by the. presence of an 
 unusual amount of Latin or Greek quotation 
 in the next letter; and yet, after all, it was not 
 to his familiarity with syntax or to his love for 
 apt phrase that he owed his influence. It was 
 to a friendly word here, a book loaned there, 
 a suggestion of an essay to this one, or of a 
 history to that ; a sympathetic word for the 
 boy whose early advantages had been slight, 
 a brusque word to the careless, a good-natured 
 laugh at — or rather with — the blunderer; but, 
 above all, to the atmosphere, which he seemed 
 to make all-pervasive, of earnestness and vig- 
 
JAMES TUFTS 79 
 
 orous achievement, of seriousness and responsi- 
 bility. 
 
 His main reliance in the control of schools 
 had always been upon diverting the surplus 
 energy of young men into lines of productive 
 activity. Debates, themes, historical reading, 
 were made to supplement the regular curricu- 
 lum. An exceptionally bright or mature boy, 
 feeling dimly his awakening powers, was en- 
 couraged by private help to push on in advance. 
 Unconventional and original himself, he did not 
 like to see anyone, from the little child in the 
 first grade up to the mature young man, suffer 
 from routine or the supposed necessities of 
 system. Finally, he brought to his work in 
 Monson the convictions as to the supreme value 
 of the moral and religious life, which had 
 their origin in his boyhood home and had been 
 fostered by his education for the ministry. 
 
 For a man of this character Monson Acad- 
 emy in 1852 offered a field for great useful- 
 ness. About ninety students were in attendance, 
 coming from all parts of Massachusetts and 
 Connecticut, and the number rose steadily un- 
 der my father's tenure of the principalship until, 
 in 1856-57, the number of different students for 
 the year reached 228, and the attendance for 
 
go JAMES TUFTS 
 
 the autumn term 157. Of the 228 in attend- 
 ance in 1856-57, 158 were from towns other 
 than Monson, and many of them were prepar- 
 ing for college. In referring to the number 
 of students from other towns, it is not intended 
 to imply that such students were any better 
 than those from Monson, but only to show 
 that the academy was widely and favorably 
 known. 
 
 When my father began work, the school, 
 thanks to Mr. Hammond's ability and the help 
 of many of its friends, was rising from a tem- 
 porary depression to more than its former effi- 
 ciency and success. The students were earnest. 
 Many of them were unusually mature — men 
 and women rather than boys and girls ; the 
 photograph of a class which graduated soon 
 after suggests a group of college seniors 
 rather than a group of students from a second- 
 ary school. In most cases their presence at 
 school involved careful economy, if not abso- 
 lute sacrifice, for themselves or their parents. 
 They came to learn, and they were ready to 
 give appreciation and response to a man who 
 sympathized with their purpose and trusted 
 their sincerity. It would be invidious to speak 
 of any in particular, but I have heard my 
 
JAMES TUFTS 8i 
 
 father dwell often upon the honesty, manli- 
 ness, intellectual power, or literary sense of 
 this one and that, as he followed their subse- 
 quent careers in the pulpit, on the bench, in 
 political life, in positions of trust, in literature, 
 as teachers, or, what was not less important in 
 my father's view, as wise, honorable, and faith- 
 ful citizens or fathers and mothers. These ca- 
 reers show that the young men and women of 
 the academy might well call out the best pow- 
 ers of a man who could not only see the 
 present and actual, but also discover the yet 
 unrealized possibilities, and thereby aid to 
 make them realities. 
 
 This power of discovery my father seems to 
 have possessed, and I find frequent allusions 
 to it in letters from those who studied with 
 him. One, the head of a large and successful 
 school, writes : " Mr. Tufts has always been to 
 my mind, a remarkable instance of a man dis- 
 cerning and drawing out what was best in a boy 
 or girl. The terrible lack in many institutions 
 at present seems to me to be the lack of this 
 personal element." Another, who later in col- 
 lege and seminary had studied under some 
 of the most eminent of New England edu- 
 cators, wrote : " Somehow, if I could have 
 
82 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 remained yet longer under your tutelage — 
 who understood my peculiar weaknesses, and 
 gifts also, so thoroughly — it would have en- 
 abled me in the end to have done a better 
 life-work than I have accomplished. For not 
 all of my college instructors appreciated my 
 needs, and therefore did very little to develop 
 the very elements I most required for suc- 
 cess. But I always appreciated and have 
 often thoughtfully recalled your own fatherly 
 helpfulness and training throughout my happy 
 academy days." 
 
 The same note occurs, with others, in the 
 address given by the Rev. C. C. Carpenter in 
 presenting to the academy the portrait of his 
 former teacher, on behalf of the students of 
 '52-'S9- The characterization in this address 
 seems so true that, although it has appeared 
 in print, it is here reproduced : 
 
 " Well do I recall the time when Mr. Tufts 
 first came to take charge of this academy. 
 Especially do I remember a certain disquietude 
 which some of us felt over the change of teach- 
 ers ; for we were in the midst of our prepara- 
 tory studies, and a change of administration 
 seemed somewhat like swapping horses in the 
 middle of a stream. But we were not long in 
 
JAMES TUFTS 83 
 
 learning that our fears were groundless, and 
 that we were to continue in good and capable 
 hands. For Mr. Tufts had a genius for teach- 
 ing (and I use the past tense simply because I 
 refer to by-gone days) ; as a prime qualifica- 
 tion of a teacher he had, I think, something 
 more than a touch of the gift which was called 
 in New Testament times 'the discerning of 
 spirits.' He saw at a glance the good possi- 
 bilities of a boy; and he knew a blockhead by 
 intuition, and could tell him in the dark. The 
 boys and girls, for the most part, who came 
 under his charge were fresh from innocent 
 country life, not knowing their own capabili- 
 ties, or what resources of power and worth 
 were hidden in their unconsciousness ; and 
 never, I think, have I met a man who so 
 quickly appreciated the germs and beginnings 
 of character in these raw and undeveloped na- 
 tures, or who was as wise in stimulating these 
 latent qualities into activity. Having once, 
 with his clear insight, perceived what it was 
 possible for his pupil to become, Mr. Tufts 
 spared no pains to bring about the desired 
 result. His method was simple, and the only 
 one which ever had great success in any sys- 
 tem of education. It was by drilling, by itera- 
 
84 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 tion and reiteration of facts and principles and 
 words. His motto seemed to be, 'Precept 
 upon precept, line upon line, here a little and 
 there a good deal.' In this way he domesti- 
 cated thoughts and sentences in our minds, 
 so that we can never forget them. Why, I 
 sometimes think that whole layers and lobes 
 of my brain were directly created by his per- 
 sistent hammering. 
 
 "Nor can I forget that Mr. Tufts combined 
 with his earnestness a large share of geniality, 
 a very necessary element in every successful 
 teacher's character. In fact, he was committed 
 by his temperament to good nature. Indeed, 
 I am sure our venerated teacher would never 
 have succeeded on the tragic stage; he wore 
 too light a buskin. I remember that when, on 
 occasion, he essayed to correct us for our short- 
 comings or peccadilloes, though he began with 
 scowling brow and imperious tone, we soon 
 discovered that he could not keep it up ; for 
 the contracted forehead would relax, and the 
 hard words melt into smiles ; and, before we 
 were half aware of it, he had succeeded in 
 laughing us out of our blunders much more 
 effectually than would have been possible by a 
 severer method. It was this geniality, I think. 
 
JAMES TUFTS 85 
 
 which imparted to the relations of teacher and 
 scholar an atmosphere of kindliness and friend- 
 ship ; since it naturally hesitated to ' make 
 mountains out of mole-hills,' and allowed the 
 trivial episodes and side-issues of school .life, 
 which had little or no bearing on real charac- 
 ter, to slip away into forgetfulness. It is a 
 great thing for a teacher to be able to dis- 
 criminate between the harmful and the harm- 
 less, and this the natural sympathies of our 
 teacher qualified him to do." 
 
 There are two or three entries in his diary 
 which have an interest in this connection : 
 "Feb. 12 (1853): Some unpleasant things in 
 school, noise, etc. Rules for ego in reproof: 
 I, Caution. 2, Prayer. 3, Mirth. 4, Sun will 
 shine." This last was a common remark with 
 my father to signify that probably a given 
 trouble would not prove so serious as to dis- 
 turb the solar system. " March 4. Trouble. 
 Rules — I, Seems greater than it is. 2, Will 
 seem less, perhaps nothing, .... Reproof. 
 Invariable rule, cool, and ask explanation, which 
 will in a thousand cases disarm hard feelings." 
 Very soon occur entries recording an especial 
 religious interest during which many in the 
 school made public confession of faith and 
 
86 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 entered upon a life of higher and larger pur- 
 pose. Two or three who had been somewhat 
 troublesome, finding themselves not in har- 
 mony with the more serious and earnest spirit 
 in the school, did not return for the summer, 
 and there was no further trouble of any conse- 
 quence. Periods of special religious interest 
 recurred nearly every year, and many felt that 
 they owed to Monson Academy not only the 
 intellectual quickening which furnished the 
 tools for greater efficiency, but also that truer 
 estimate of life's values, and that steadfast pur- 
 pose to carry out the higher ideals, which 
 measure the real life. The religious interest 
 was not of an emotional or sentimental sort. 
 I have often heard my father say that no 
 school exercise was ever interfered with, no 
 lesson ever passed over or slighted. Students 
 were taught that the first step in the ser- 
 vice of God should be greater diligence in 
 business. And if recent psychology is correct 
 in suggesting the possibility on the part of 
 young people of confusing religious feeling 
 with other emotions, there was a sound reason 
 for the request which was made — it was left 
 entirely to the students themselves to accede 
 to it or not — that the young men should not 
 
JAMES TUFTS S7 
 
 escort the young women to and from the 
 weekly prayer-meeting. 
 
 The seven years of academy life passed with 
 few outer incidents. The two most important 
 events of the period were marriage and the 
 purchase of the house which continued to be 
 home until the end. 
 
 On March 21, 1855, my father was married, in 
 Brooklyn, N. Y., to Mary Elizabeth Warren, by 
 his friend, the Rev. R. S. Storrs. My mother, 
 the daughter of John Parker and Lucy May- 
 nard (Wheelock) Warren, was likewise a native 
 of Wardsboro, where her father, a graduate of 
 Dartmouth Medical School, was the town phy- 
 sician. She was born August 9, 1823, and 
 was a pupil of my father during one of the 
 terms in which he taught at home. Later, 
 after a year at Mt. Holyoke (1844-45), she had 
 studied and taught at Castleton Seminary, 
 1846-47, when my father was there, and had 
 also been associated with him at Monson 
 during the year 1853-54. During 1854-55 she 
 taught in Orange, N. J., and after the marriage 
 to my father she continued to teach at Mon- 
 son until the summer of 1858.. 
 
 For the first three years after their marriage 
 my father and mother boarded in the families 
 
88 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 of Mr. Albert Norcross and Deacon Andrew 
 Porter. March 22, 1858, they moved into the 
 house which became familiar to so many 
 friends during the forty-three years that fol- 
 lowed. About a hundred acres of land were 
 connected with the place, and the intention at 
 first was to sell off the land as opportunity 
 should offer ; but, whether because opportunity 
 did not offer or because of a love for land, in- 
 herited from boyhood days, the land was not 
 sold. At first only a small portion was culti- 
 vated, and a few cows were kept ; but later, 
 after teaching had come to occupy less time, 
 the farm was developed and became an im- 
 portant interest. The house itself was con- 
 siderably enlarged in i860 by the addition of 
 a south wing, and again, a few years later, by 
 the enlargement of dining-room, etc., to pro- 
 vide for the large family which it was then 
 sheltering. Thus improved, it had many sunny 
 as well as shaded rooms, and my father be- 
 came increasingly attached to it. 
 
 Another purchase, made in 1854, became 
 closely associated with my father in the minds 
 of Monson people. This was a Morgan mare, 
 bought on a visit to Vermont, and known in 
 the family as Kate. She carried her master 
 
The Home at Monson. 
 
JAMES TUFTS 89 
 
 on her back to Saratoga, to Vermont, and 
 over Monson hills, proving an important faetor 
 in preserving his health. My father rode at a 
 trot or a walk, never at a canter. He sat very 
 firmly in the saddle, and could ride long dis- 
 tances without fatigue ; but his arms rose and 
 fell with the motion of the horse in a way that 
 was often amusing to the observer. He found 
 great satisfaction in Kate, until her sad death 
 at the burning of his barn in 1868, and after 
 that he used three of her colts successively. 
 The youngest, after a somewhat vivacious colt- 
 hood, served the family faithfully and well 
 until the ripe age of twenty-eight. My father 
 was not fastidious about the appearance of his 
 vehicles ; but he did thoroughly enjoy a good 
 horse, and, although he did not "race," I have 
 the impression that it contributed something 
 toward his self-respect that, when his horses 
 were in their prime, he was not often passed 
 on the road. The mettlesome and skittish 
 temper of colts and the large element of 
 uncertainty in their future suggested to his 
 mind striking analogies with the character and 
 possibilities of boys and girls, and many will 
 recall forcible and humorous illustrations 
 drawn by him for the benefit of teachers or 
 
go JAMES TUFTS 
 
 parents, from his experiences with those inter- 
 esting animals. 
 
 For a little more than six years my father 
 continued his work in the academy, varied by 
 vacation trips to New York or Vermont or 
 Saratoga. - The school was in a prosperous 
 condition, although its slight endowment, as 
 compared with that of similar institutions, laid 
 a heavy burden upon the teachers, and the 
 annual reports to the trustees called attention 
 to the increasing difficulties of maintaining 
 standards equally high with those of richer 
 academies. In the winter of 1859 my father 
 had a severe cold, which affected his throat. 
 A visit to New York afforded some relief ; but 
 this proved only temporary, and the spring 
 was a time of great depression, "wearisome 
 days and nights." "This was one of the se- 
 verest strokes of my life, struggling so hard 
 against disease, and suffering so much. Still, 
 I had great inward peace. I have learned 
 something in the long school of affiiction — 
 eighteen years this spring (1859) since my 
 throat first troubled me — in which I have 
 been so often laid low, my plans all frustrate, 
 till I have learned to have no plans of my 
 own." 
 
JAMES TUFTS 91 
 
 At last he became convinced that it was not 
 wise for him to attempt to continue, and on 
 June 7 "formally notified the committee that 
 I must give up the school — atrial. I think 
 it is best." He started on horseback for 
 Saratoga, and one of the trustees remarked 
 that he never expected to see that man return 
 alive ; but this time there was rapid improve- 
 ment, and he returned in time to be present at 
 the "exhibition." 
 
 In conversation shortly before his death, the 
 question was raised as to whether it might not 
 have been better if he had asked for a leave 
 of absence for a term instead of resigning. 
 He replied that very likely it might have been, 
 but that at that time such arrangements were 
 not common, and he did not think of asking 
 it, nor the trustees of offering it. The trustees 
 were deceived by the prosperous condition of 
 the academy, and thought this would continue 
 of itself ; but, after the students then in attend- 
 ance had completed the course, the numbers 
 greatly diminished, and it was not until 1863, 
 when a fund of ;g 15,000 was raised, and Mr. 
 Hammond induced to return, that the decline 
 was arrested and the institution restored once 
 more to an influential position. 
 
92 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 As regards my father, it is, of course, futile 
 to speculate as to whether it would have been 
 better for him to remain. The fact that, for 
 the remaining forty-three years of his life, he 
 enjoyed almost uninterrupted good health 
 might be regarded as in itself almost a suf- 
 ficient answer, if this is contrasted with the 
 condition of his health before coming to 
 Monson. He was also enabled to be helpful 
 to many boys and young men in his own home. 
 And yet, one can but feel that it was unfortu- 
 nate that his work in the academy should have 
 been cut off so soon. I know by personal 
 acquaintance something of his work when 
 teaching in his home, and I must depend on 
 the words of others for an estimate of the 
 conditions in the academy ; hence it is easily 
 possible that the latter may be idealized, and 
 some unfavorable aspects be unknown. But, 
 unless I am entirely deceived, the seven years 
 in the academy were the most useful and fruitful 
 of my father's life. Private teaching, it is 
 true, may be thought to give greater oppor- 
 tunities for personal influence, and the teacher 
 is more independent in ways and means. The 
 needs of the exceptional student can be bet- 
 ter discerned and better met. And yet there 
 
JAMES TUFTS 93 
 
 is a value both for teacher and for student in 
 the institutional life. Too intimate associa- 
 tion and too individual treatment have their 
 disadvantages. Just as the religious life gains 
 in power by the organization of a church, and 
 the development of justice is furthered by tfee 
 organization of courts — even though personal 
 piety and private justice might often reach 
 their ends more simply and directly — so 
 school and college bring into the foreground 
 the value and dignity of education. The per- 
 sonal power of the teacher is stimulated and 
 reinforced, not only by the individual pupils 
 before him, but by the traditions of the past 
 and by the strength of the community. For 
 the institution is the constant, visible em- 
 bodiment of the value which the com- 
 munity places upon education. The. teacher 
 in an institution, therefore, like the preacher 
 from the pulpit, or the judge upon the bench, 
 speaks with more than personal authority. In 
 the case of a subordinate teacher, or even of 
 a college professor, this may permit, or even 
 require, such an absence of responsibility or 
 initiative as to dwarf the teacher's originative 
 activity, and make him almost a cog in a ma- 
 chine. But the headship of an institution — 
 
94 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 even though it was not a large one — involved 
 no important restriction, and afforded the 
 opportunity for both development of power 
 and wide usefulness. 
 
 ,As already intimated, when the position in 
 the academy was given up, my father turned 
 to private teaching. Three or four boys were 
 placed in his care the first year, and from that 
 time until 1876 there were nearly always from 
 four to eight boys or young men in his home. 
 After 1876 there were fewer, usually one or 
 two, until 1890, making about one hundred 
 in all. These were of all ages arid of diverse 
 character and ability. The boy from the best 
 of homes, and the boy from no home ; the 
 boy who was backward and needed patience, 
 the boy .who was a geriius yet undiscovered ; 
 the young man who wanted to be prepared for 
 college in the shortest time possible ; the boy 
 whom his parents could not control ; the boy 
 who could scarcely find hours enough in the 
 day for work, and the boy whose acuteness 
 was directed wholly to evading work ; the 
 normal boy , the peculiar boy , the good- 
 natured and careless boy, and, in some cases, 
 happily few, the mean or vicious boy — all 
 
JAMES TUFTS 95 
 
 these came for longer or shorter periods, and 
 all except the last found, I think, something 
 in the teaching and life which helped them. 
 Some remained a very short time, one for 
 five years. Some found recreation in hunting 
 or fishing or boat-building; others paid their 
 tuition wholly or in part by work upon the 
 farm. There were few rules, much out-of- 
 door life, and a variable amount of study. 
 President Seelye of Amherst once remarked 
 that it was among the few private schools for 
 boys in his acquaintance where he did hot pity 
 the boys. 
 
 Some boys, sent by parents or guardians be- 
 cause difficult to manage, never fitted into the 
 life of the home. These probably carried away 
 few pleasant memories and no affection. I am 
 inclined to think that the proportion of such 
 may have been greater than in the academy. 
 To teach such students was not a very reward- 
 ing task, and I do not think my father was 
 particularly adapted to it. But, on the other 
 hand, many of the students, not only the more 
 mature and studious, but those in whom a gen- 
 uine and manly nature was in its effervescent 
 period, throwing off froth and foreign elements 
 and working clear in the process, cherished a 
 
96 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 very kindly and lasting feeling toward their 
 teacher, and were glad to return often in after- 
 years and tell of their work and progress to 
 one who was deeply interested in their welfare. 
 Not to speak of any who are still living, the 
 late Eugene Field maintained until his death a 
 confidence that his old teacher wanted to know, 
 not only his actual performance, but his ideals 
 and hopes for future achievement. 
 
 A word may be added here in supplementa- 
 tion of what has already been said regarding 
 my father's methods of teaching and discipline. 
 He combined in a rather unusual degree the 
 two principles of thoroughness and progress. 
 There was great insistence upon repetition and 
 review. A hesitating translation was never 
 accepted. " Read your reviews until you can 
 read them just as smoothly and as fast as you 
 can read English," was the oft-repeated maxim. 
 "Don't be satisfied with telling your scholars ; 
 make them repeat it to you themselves, until 
 they not only get it right, but can say it with- 
 out stopping to think," was his advice to 
 teachers. But he had also a great abhorrence of 
 the consequence which sometimes follows upon 
 a one-sided insistence upon review and drill ; 
 namely, that a student becomes tired, thinks 
 
JAMES TUFTS 97 
 
 he is making little progress, and settles down 
 into a sort of "jogtrot" or even a "slow 
 walk," instead of being ready for a burst of 
 speed when the road is smooth. He believed 
 that the principle of requiring students to mas- 
 ter difficulties for themselves might be over- 
 worked, particularly in the early stages of 
 study in a given subject. Hence he was accus- 
 tomed to explain difficulties, to clear away 
 many obstacles in advance, and to encourage 
 the student to push on, even if not every 
 minute point was exhaustively investigated. 
 Many things become clear after a time, and 
 many faults may be outgrown if we can only 
 maintain a healthy progress. The skilful 
 teacher may sometimes steer past a snag ; it 
 isn't good economy to stop the ship and dig 
 up every stump that is in sight in the channel, 
 much less to spend time in seeking for those 
 that may be hidden. " It isn't worth while to 
 spend all your time trying to split tough 
 knots," was another phrase by which he fre- 
 quently expressed the same principle. This 
 last metaphor was often applied to conduct as 
 well as to studies, and was sometimes supple- 
 mented by another simile, drawn from the field 
 of horsemanship: "You can get a colt so 
 
98 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 fretted by constantly holding him in and 
 twitching the reins that he'll either 'bolt,' or 
 get discouraged and balk." Agreeably to this 
 he used to urge teachers, particularly teachers 
 of young children, "Get your scholars along," 
 " Make them think they can do something," 
 "Don't quiddle." "Quiddling" was indeed 
 particularly offensive, and I think few of his 
 students, or of the Monson teachers whose 
 schools he. visited, will fail tO' recall some 
 instance of his expressed aversion to this 
 "idol of the theater." 
 
 In the case of boys who were not vicious, 
 but only difficult, he held that it was better to 
 "engineer them along," and avoid situations 
 which might make a collision inevitable. It 
 was not that he believed in dodging an issue, 
 squarely presented, but rather that he had so 
 much confidence in the underlying good sense 
 of man or boy, if it could be reached, and so 
 much confidence in the persuasive power of 
 good humor or a kindly laugh, that he grew 
 more and more averse to action that might 
 leave hard feelings behind. 
 
 There is little to chronicle in the years of 
 private teaching. A great joy came into the 
 household with the birth of a son, James 
 
JAMES TOFTS 99 
 
 Frederic, April 28, i860, and the forty-seven 
 years of the father seemed to intensify the 
 affection with which he watched for seven 
 months the unfolding promise of a perhaps too 
 rapidly developing child. It was only for seven 
 months, however, and, on a Sunday morning 
 (December i, i860), after less than a day's 
 illness, the little boy was gone. The second 
 son, James Hayden, was born July 9, 1862. 
 
 In other respects likewise the years of pri- 
 vate teaching saw a mingling of the pleasant 
 and the unpleasant, of joy and pain. Until 
 about 1876 there was usually a good number 
 of students. Some money was expended in 
 enlarging the house, and then in building a 
 house for a tenant who should carry on the 
 farm, and a few dollars were laid by. The 
 first occasion that called for these was not a 
 "rainy day," however, but a "fiery night." 
 On November 18, 1868, the barn, sheds, and 
 small tenement were burned, with two cows, 
 the mare Kate — I think we all cared more for 
 her than for all the rest together— grain, 
 apples, tools, and twenty tons of hay. There 
 was suspicion as to the author of the fire, but 
 no proof. The catastrophe — for such it seemed 
 brought out at once the sympathy of the 
 
100 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 townspeople, and aid was given toward the 
 new structure, which was completed the follow- 
 ing June. Two years later a lesser misfor- 
 tune occurred. Someone — we were afterward 
 informed that it was a boy who was in the 
 home at school — let down the bars through 
 which a fine pair of oxen wandered on to the 
 railway, where they were killed by a train. 
 
 More serious losses were the death of the 
 aged mother, August 22, 1 870, in her 94th year, 
 and the ill-health of the wife, which began 
 about this time and continued for many years. 
 This involved protracted absences from home 
 on her part, and long periods of partial or com- 
 plete helplessness, attended by much suffering. 
 It was an anxious period, for, in addition to 
 the main cause for foreboding, there were many 
 difficulties in providing properly for the boys 
 who were studying, and who furnished the only 
 income with which to meet the many expenses. 
 During one of my mother's absences, upon 
 Christmas day, 1874, my father met with a fall 
 which might easily have been even more serious 
 than it proved. A ladder, on which he had 
 just stepped to descend from the roof of his 
 house, slipped, and caused him to fall nearly 
 twenty feet to the frozen ground, breaking two 
 
JAMES TUFTS loi 
 
 ribs, and the left arm near the shoulder. 
 Happily the accident left no permanent ill 
 effects beyond a slight stiffness in the left 
 hand. 
 
 But illness and anxiety and accidents did 
 not fill the entire horizon during these years. 
 Frequent visits to relatives and friends gave 
 relief and refreshment ; after some eight years 
 of more or less complete banishment from the 
 activities of life, my mother began to gain in 
 health, and shortly before my father reached 
 the age of three-score and ten, which I have 
 taken as a convenient limit for this chapter, 
 occurred the first of three notable occasions 
 on which neighbors and friends expressed 
 their good-will. In March, 1880, upon the 
 twenty-fifth anniversary of their marriage, my 
 father and mother welcomed, with surprise 
 and delight, a large company of Monson neigh- 
 bors, who filled the house, bringing not only a 
 very generous reminder that this was a silver 
 wedding, but an overflowing cordiality which 
 remained as a treasured memory long after 
 the silver had been transmuted into agencies 
 for making the home more comfortable and 
 beautiful. 
 
Later Years. 
 
 The last fifteen or twenty years of my 
 father's life, if not filled with the conscious- 
 ness of strength in which he exulted in early 
 years, or with the feeling of active achieve- 
 ment which belonged to his work in the 
 academy, had yet distinct values of their own. 
 Released for the most part from confinement 
 to private teaching, he could serve his fellow- 
 citizens in various ways — in the church, the 
 schools, on the library board ; he could meet 
 his friends, or exchange letters with them ; he 
 could contribute his word at the various gather- 
 ings of farmers, teachers, and ministers which 
 he attended; he could read and occasionally 
 write ; he could help many a boy or girl and 
 keep himself young in heart thereby. There 
 were many petty ills and vexations, especially 
 in connection with his farm, which for the 
 last ten years was rented ; there were accidents, 
 and in the last few years my mother's health 
 was again poor ; but, on the other hand, his own 
 health was almost uniformly good, and the 
 later years were brightened by many excep- 
 
From a Photograph, Taken at About the Age of Eighty. 
 
JAMES TUFTS 103 
 
 tional expressions of sympathy and good-will. 
 They were cheered by the greetings of friends 
 and the increasing consideration of fellow- 
 townspeople and former students. They were 
 vitalized by some degree of participation, how- 
 ever slight as measured by early hopes, in the 
 intellectual, religious, and educational progress 
 of the times. " I have not done much, yet my 
 life has been spared, so I have accomplished 
 something, although much limited, and the peo- 
 ple here think me useful still, especially among 
 the young."" 
 
 His relations to the young were occasioned 
 partly by his service upon the school commit- 
 tee of the town. At an earlier period (1861-63) 
 he served one term of three years, but his 
 more important service began in 1878. He 
 served from this date continuously until 1890, 
 when the town engaged a superintendent. For 
 about half of this period he was chairman of 
 the committee and wrote the annual report, 
 and during the whole period he served upon 
 the visiting sub-committee, and was assigned 
 the care of several schools. As the law re- 
 quired the committee to make three visits to 
 
 " From a letter written just before his eighty-eighth birth- 
 day. 
 
104 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 each school every term, the roads over Mon- 
 son hills grew very familiar during the twelve 
 years, and the faces of a large number of 
 Monson children likewise. For it is scarcely 
 necessary to say that the visits were never 
 merely formal. We used to hear who were 
 the bright children in all the schools visited, 
 and the opportunity to say a word of encour- 
 agement, usually fixed in the mind of the 
 hearer by a homely illustration from farm or 
 roadside, was seldom, if ever, omitted. Know- 
 ing nearly all the parents, he took an added 
 interest in seeing the children and noting 
 their characteristic qualities. 
 
 In his talks to children, as in his addresses 
 to older audiences, he did not rely wholly 
 upon the impulse of the moment. In his 
 earlier years he had formed the habit of put- 
 ting down thoughts or suggestions under suit- 
 able topics. He used to write out abstracts 
 o'f sermons heard and books read, and to make 
 note of occurrences in daily life, or of histori- 
 cal incidents which could be make to kindle 
 interest or enforce a truth. I do not think 
 that in later life he ever referred to these 
 notes ; but his mind had by this time formed 
 the habit of reading and observing with a view 
 
JAMES TUFTS 105 
 
 to the educational or moral bearing of what he 
 heard or read or saw, so that he found " ser- 
 mons in stones." When preparing for any 
 sort of public occasion, he seldom did any 
 writing. He preferred to work over his ideas 
 while walking about, and was in the habit of 
 getting his sentences into shape by repeating 
 them half aloud. As he was moving about 
 the house or in the field, apparently engaged 
 upon some other business, and perhaps making 
 remarks or giving directions regarding it, we 
 would suddenly hear some fragment of a ser- 
 mon or address, impressively uttered, but pro- 
 ducing upon the youthful mind a decidedly 
 incongruous effect. 
 
 His talks to children were very likely to be 
 upon moral lines, and in one of his reports he 
 urged teachers to lay stress upon moral train- 
 ing. "'But,' says one, 'I send my child to 
 school to learn arithmetic and grammar, and 
 not to hear preaching.' Very well, but if a 
 child is cruel, selfish, and mean, must it all be 
 overlooked? Will simply reading, writing, 
 and arithmetic make good citizens ? May not 
 children excel in these branches and still have 
 bad manners, bad characters, and be bad chil- 
 dren generally, and growing worse, too, all the 
 
io6 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 time ? You might as well say that in raising 
 a crop of corn the farmer has nothing to do 
 with the weeds, but only to see that the corn 
 grows. In some schools, and in some children, 
 the weeds are so prominent there is little corn 
 to be seen, and what little there is will never 
 come to anything unless the weeds can be 
 checked." 
 
 As regards methods of teaching and the 
 training of teachers, my father was always glad 
 to see a teacher using new methods, if they 
 worked. He was confident that the person- 
 ality of the teacher was far more important 
 than any devices or special methods. If a 
 new method interested the teacher, well and 
 good ; but, as he was wont to say of M. Sauveur 
 and the so-called " natural method," a teacher 
 who put such enthusiasm and unwearied energy 
 into the work would succeed with any method. 
 It was largely because of his own distinctively 
 personal quality as teacher that he looked with 
 disfavor upon any tests which might reduce 
 the value attached to this qualification. In 
 opposition to a proposed law requiring a 
 normal-school training or its equivalent for all 
 teachers in the public schools, he wrote a let- 
 ter for the Springfield Republican, in which he 
 
JAMES TUFTS 107 
 
 urged that such a law would shut out many 
 who prove the best teachers, while, on the 
 other hand, " the professional training, how- 
 ever desirable, cannot at best impart all the 
 elements of a good teacher, or the most im- 
 portant elements, such as ability to govern 
 and awaken enthusiasm, tact, skill, and com- 
 mon sense, without which no normal training 
 will be of much account." 
 
 His interest in the schools and in the young 
 did not cease with the termination of his offi- 
 cial duties. He made occasional visits to the 
 schools in the village and to the academy, up 
 to the year of his death, partly because he 
 thought he might be of some use to the chil- 
 dren of the town he loved, and partly because 
 he had an unquenchable interest in young 
 people. He could not be content to belong 
 only to the past. He wanted to live in the 
 present and future as well. And so it was that, 
 up to the very winter before his death, he 
 always had some boy or girl coming to his 
 house more or less frequently to read over 
 hard passages in Latin. The boy or girl con- 
 ditioned in the entrance examination to the 
 high school was often told, "Come down, and 
 I'll help you," and the hospitable front porch 
 
io8 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 welcomed a good many at various times for 
 this purpose. Or, in other cases, he would take 
 occasion to call, when in the village, at this or 
 that house, and spend a few moments in read- 
 ing over the lesson for the next day. 
 
 Naturally, his interest in the academy was 
 especially strong. In the winter of 1 880-81 he 
 acted as principal in the interim between the 
 departure of a principal and the securing of a 
 successor. " I found it very pleasant," he 
 wrote in his diary, " except when I had a cold — 
 very natural, but a little sad, remembering the 
 past." And of the many expressions of kind- 
 ness which he had received, I think none 
 touched him more than the thoughtfulness and 
 affection which teachers and pupils of the 
 academy showed in bringing him, on his eighty- 
 eighth birthday, an easy chair. 
 
 In connection with his educational work it 
 seems appropriate to notice my father's con- 
 nection with the library. He was associated 
 as a director from its beginning. He scarcely 
 missed a meeting to the close of his life, and 
 used to relate with great glee how one fellow- 
 director, some fifteen years previously, had said 
 that he thought Mr. Tufts might be able to 
 serve one term more, but scarcely more than 
 
JAMES TUFTS 109 
 
 that, as he would not be able to get out in the 
 evening. In the early history of the library, 
 when it occupied quarters in Day's block, my 
 father gave a course of lectures on English his- 
 tory in its reading-room. To aid in the selec- 
 tion of books and to be associated with the body 
 of fellow-citizens which had charge of its affairs, 
 was always a source of great satisfaction. 
 
 The library enabled him to satisfy his own 
 taste for reading, and so helped materially to 
 occupy and cheer the later years. He had 
 always been especially interested in history and 
 biography, and a naturally tenacious memory, 
 rendered more retentive by the habit of mak- 
 ing notes, already referred to, furnished him 
 with many interesting anecdotes and illustra- 
 tions for conversation or public speech. 
 
 It was to the work of the ministry that my 
 father's early hopes and ambitions had turned, 
 and he was glad to have an occasional oppor- 
 tunity to preach. His sermons were logical, 
 and written with a well-defined plan. In fact 
 the modern tendency to conceal the " skele- 
 ton" seemed to him to lead easily into an ab- 
 sence of any organization of the material, and 
 so into what might be a "good talk," but not 
 
no JAMES TUFTS 
 
 a sermon. The same forceful and homely 
 illustrations from common life, which were so 
 frequent in his educational addresses or re- 
 marks, were employed in the pulpit. The dif- 
 ference between a sermon and an essay was 
 always insisted upon, and he aimed to make 
 direct appeal to the reason and conscience. 
 
 His brief ministerial experience was, how- 
 ever, productive of many lifelong interests and 
 pleasant acquaintanceships. He was a mem- 
 ber of the Hampden Association of Ministers, 
 and of the Connecticut Valley Congregational 
 Club. A regular attendant and frequent 
 speaker at both, few faces were more familiar. 
 He took almost a boyish delight in the fact that 
 to the very last he was heard with attention and 
 appreciation, due no doubt in part to the brev- 
 ity and conciseness of his remarks, and in part 
 also to the quaint humor which often emerged. 
 
 In his home church at Monson he was 
 always a regular attendant, not only upon the 
 Sabbath, but upon the midweek prayer meet- 
 ing, and the minister usually assumed that he 
 must be ill if he was not in his pew. For a 
 number of years he served as superintendent 
 of the Sabbath school, and for many other 
 years as a teacher. 
 
JAMES TUFTS in 
 
 In his theological beliefs he remained con- 
 servative, as measured by present standards, 
 although the prevailingly practical character 
 of his temper never permitted him to make 
 prominent the theological subtleties of the 
 early New England orthodoxy. Indeed his 
 criticisms upon modern views were almost 
 always not upon any positive tendency, but 
 upon the leaving out of something which 
 he considered important. The "gospel," to 
 him, meant "salvation by grac6," and he was 
 much more inclined to emphasize than to 
 interpret the doctrine. One of his friends re- 
 lates that, after reading a sermon from the 
 text, "The Son of man is come to seek and 
 to save that which was lost," he remarked: 
 " I couldn't see that, according to the sermon, 
 anybody was lost, so there was nothing to save, 
 .... and there wasn't much Son of man in 
 it, either." He never entered thoroughly into 
 the problems of recent biblical criticism, feel- 
 ing sure that the fundamentals could not be 
 disturbed, and feeling, too, perhaps, though 
 not definitely so formulating it, that no new 
 restatement of doctrine or new interpretation 
 of the Scriptures could be to him a substitute 
 for the structures into which his own life-values 
 
112 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 had been built. And into my father's view of 
 truth entered as a powerful motive the old 
 religious life on Wardsboro Hill, which had 
 given form and language to his first expe- 
 riences. Only what touched in some way this 
 note could wake the deepest chord. This was 
 reinforced by the religious atmosphere of the 
 college where "those everlasting truths we 
 heard seemed to lie at the foundations of all 
 institutions as of all character." He took 
 much satisfaction in the old hymns and ver- 
 sions of the Psalms, and committed many of 
 them to memory to repeat when awake at 
 night. And after all, when we reflect that the 
 next generation, or at any rate the next century, 
 will outgrow our systems, and look with conde- 
 scension upon our beginnings in biblical criti- 
 cism, are we not tempted to think that our 
 present formulations are not, as such, supremely 
 important? We find ourselves in sympathy with 
 Plato, not because we believe in the independ- 
 ent existence of abstract ideas ; or with Augus- 
 tine, not because we accept his formulation of 
 foreordination and freedom ; but because we 
 recognize the human spirit seeking to discover 
 and make vital the real values of life and the 
 deepest meaning of experience in the con- 
 
JAMES TUFTS 113 
 
 cepts of its own time. My father's experience 
 found interpretation chiefly in the symbols of 
 his earlier life ; but it will take more than one 
 generation to determine just how much of that 
 earlier formulation can be omitted and how 
 much must be retained in an adequate view of 
 human life and divine purpose. That the 
 experience which found expression in the 
 theology of that day represented some of the 
 permanent values which enter into the life of 
 the spirit, few sympathetic students of human 
 history would question. 
 
 The third great element in the later years 
 was friendship. My father had always liked 
 people, and made friends ; but during his later 
 years this side of his life seemed to come into 
 larger and richer significance. He was very 
 fond of making short journeys to Boston or 
 Springfield or New Haven or New York or 
 Amherst, or more rarely to Vermont, to see 
 old friends. When he returned from any 
 gathering, educational, religious, agricultural, 
 or general, the first account rendered was 
 always of those whom he had met. And if 
 by any rare chance he had failed to find any 
 old friend, he almost always had struck up an 
 
114 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 acquaintance with someone, and discovered a 
 basis for friendly interchange of thought or 
 reminiscence. It used to be a common re- 
 mark with us that no one from Vermont could 
 appear with whose ancestry my father was not 
 familiar. The leisure of the later years made it 
 possible to correspond with a large number of 
 friends, and even to make new friendships. 
 For when my father read of the achievement 
 of this or that man, he would frequently re- 
 mark : " I used to know his father [or other 
 member of the family]; I guess I'll write him 
 a letter." 
 
 This liking for people showed itself in the 
 taste for biography, already alluded to. 
 Another characteristic manifestation of it, 
 which every visitor to the Monson home will 
 recall, was the collection of pictures of eminent 
 men which covered one whole wall of the 
 sitting-room. It was a widely representative 
 collection — varying from the "Five Reform- 
 ers" to Cardinal Newman, from Milton to 
 Carlyle, from Bismarck to Livingstone, from 
 Washington to Charles Sumner ; but I have 
 fancied that my father's broadly human inter- 
 est would have easily found points of contact 
 with nearly all of them. 
 
JAMES TUFTS 115 
 
 As he was so fond of meeting and greeting 
 friends, fellow-townspeople, and acquaintances, 
 so he found great pleasure in their kindly 
 appreciation and cordiality. As other men find 
 their chief satisfaction in the consciousness of 
 power over men, or in the organization of a 
 great business, or in the anticipated recogni- 
 tion by posterity of discovery or invention or 
 scholarship, or in elegant appointments, or in 
 public office and honors, my father found his 
 in the cordial word or recognition of friends 
 and others; and while receiving these he for- 
 got the great disappointments of his "crippled 
 life," as he so often called it. 
 
 It was, therefore, not a mere passing event 
 — ^it meant a support, and in a deep sense an 
 evidence that his life had not been in vain — 
 when on several occasions he was given espe- 
 cial proofs of the kindness and esteem of his 
 former pupils, and of his townspeople and 
 other friends. One of these occasions — the 
 twenty-fifth anniversary of his marriage — has 
 been already mentioned. Another occurred 
 in 1883, in connection with a reunion of acad- 
 emy students. At this reunion a large number 
 were present who had been students during my 
 father's principalship — the Rev. Julius Ward, 
 
Ii6 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 the president of the alumni, a strong friend of 
 my father and of the academy, whose life-work 
 was cut short by death ; Miss Julia Eastman, 
 who contributed the poem ; the Rev. C. C. Car- 
 penter, who spoke, and contributed a hymn ; 
 the Rev. G. G. Phipps, who brought a song ; 
 and many others. In connection with the reun- 
 ion an oil portrait of my father, painted by Mr. 
 J. Harvey Young, of Boston, was presented to 
 the academy, and now hangs in the chapel 
 with those of Principals Colton and Hammond. 
 An extract from Mr. Carpenter's words in pre- 
 senting the picture has already been given. 
 It was with very deep and genuine emotion 
 that my father replied, and I think few, even 
 of those who knew him best, suspected how 
 much it meant to him. 
 
 '.' I never thought, indeed, kind, friends, to 
 look upon so many of your pleasant, familiar 
 faces again this side of the river ; and it has 
 been the crowning joy of my life to greet you 
 here today, looking still so youthful and so 
 well, so full of inspiration and enthusiasm. 
 And I know, too, I look upon the faces of 
 noble men and women who are doing well the 
 work of life ; and I bless God for the sight. 
 And may we not hope now that this day will 
 
JAMES TUFTS 117 
 
 serve not only to revive pleasant memories, but 
 to give us some new inspiration for the daily 
 duties and trials of life, and an impulse, too, 
 in the higher life we strive to live?" 
 
 To one, at least, the day was such an in- 
 spiration. The sight of the men and women, 
 the thought of what they were doing, and the 
 consciousness that so many called him teacher 
 and friend, clothed life ever after for him with 
 more of beauty, and softened many a re- 
 membered disappointment or present annoy- 
 ance. 
 
 From Miss Eastman's poem, which inter- 
 preted so finely and strongly the significance 
 of the day, the following passage referred to 
 my father : 
 
 Instructor, Friend, whose face once more 
 
 Beams on us as it beamed of yore, — 
 
 He who has wrought, through lengthening life. 
 
 Brave work amid the battle strife ; 
 
 Calmest in council, loyal, true, 
 
 Keeping one steadfast aim in view ; 
 
 Firm for the right, incisive, strong. 
 
 Granting no quarter to the wrong ; 
 
 Yet swift to greet the lost who fain 
 
 Would seek the Father's house again, — 
 
 The prodigal, whose wanderings o'er, 
 
 Came to himself and God once more ; 
 
 Leaving his stamp on many a one 
 
 Toiling today beneath the sun. 
 
 Our friend who, past the doubts and fears. 
 
 Garners the harvest of the years. 
 
Ii8 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 Another occasion which gave expression to 
 the kindness and cordiality of friends was the 
 celebration of my father's eightieth birthday, 
 Nov. 2, 1892. The celebration was held, 
 appropriately, in the academy. A large num- 
 ber of Monson friends, and some relatives from 
 out of town, were present. Mr. and Mrs. 
 Norcross, who have so often voiced in song the 
 joy and grief and hope of Monson, contributed 
 music. The Rev. F. S. Hatch, pastor of the 
 Congregational church, had written to a large 
 numberof my father's friends, and their letters 
 were read, and afterward treasured as a legacy 
 of friendship and esteem. A purse of ^260 in 
 gold was presented. This gift, as being an 
 offering of friendship, was regarded as, in a 
 sense, sacred to the ends of friendship, or, at 
 least, as not to be used for the common needs 
 of daily life. It made possible many a journey 
 to visit some friend, and many other comforts 
 and satisfactions that would not have been en- 
 joyed without it. 
 
 Nor was the generosity of Monson people 
 exhausted in this expression. Eighteen months 
 later, when, by what was believed to be an en- 
 tirely accidental substitution of saltpeter for 
 salt, nearly all of a valuable herd of cows were 
 
JAMES TUFTS 119 
 
 poisoned, a subscription of §355 was quickly 
 made up ; and the outlook was brighter, not 
 only for the gift, but for the sympathy and 
 generosity which were back of it. 
 
 When calling to mind my father's friend- 
 ships, it seems fitting to notice particularly 
 the democratic, broadly human character of 
 his interests and likings. This was on the 
 whole, perhaps, his most conspicuous charac- 
 teristic. He had, of course, specially con- 
 genial associations with professional friends at 
 home and abroad. Among these were Mr. 
 Hammond, his friend in college, who returned 
 to the academy a few years after my father 
 resigned, and remained as principal until his 
 death, the other principals and teachers of the 
 academy, the four pastors — Kittredge, Sum- 
 ner, Byington, and Hatch. Numerous friend- 
 ships dating from college or seminary days 
 were a refreshing influence. But he was by no 
 means limited to these. He liked men antj 
 women, boys and girls, and appreciated force- 
 jEul, intelligent, and sensible characters wher- 
 ever he found them. When some of the family 
 were one day speaking of the scenery about 
 Monson, he remarked , very characteristically, 
 that he thought more of people than he did 
 
120 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 of scenery, and would rather converse than 
 drive. He had not the slightest degree of the 
 " professional " feeling, on which some clergy- 
 men or teachers half-unconsciously rely to 
 maintain self-respect in the presence of wealth 
 or power. The college graduate was not 
 thereby invested with any halo for him. His 
 sympathies were continually going out to the 
 boy or girl who could not go to college, or 
 even graduate at the high school. In July, 
 1899, he wrote two brief articles in encourage- 
 ment to those who had not been so fortunate 
 as to be among the graduates of the season 
 just then closing, and whose school days were 
 cut short. He reminded them of the increased 
 opportunities now offered through libraries and 
 the press ; but, above all, he emphasized the 
 fundamental value of character rather than ac- 
 quirements. 
 
 An article on "Teaching as a Profession," 
 published in the Springfield Republican of De- 
 cember 13, 1899, ^"^d reprinted with additions 
 in the Palmer Journal of January 26, 1900, 
 gave, perhaps, the best expression to this 
 strongly democratic valuation of life. The 
 article was called out by an address in which 
 it was maintained that the occupation of a 
 
JAMES TUFTS 121 
 
 teacher ought to be ranked among the "learned 
 professions," in order that teachers might re- 
 ceive recognition and honor not now accorded 
 them. My father's article, in the first place, 
 questioned the alleged fact that teachers are 
 not respected and honored as much as they 
 deserve ; in the second place, denied that, if 
 the above were true, it could be remedied by 
 merely calling teaching a profession ; and, in 
 the third place, urged that, when the finest 
 and noblest spirit of the age is seeking to 
 serve the public in unobtrusive ways, it is not 
 fitting for teachers to be reaching for honors 
 and distinctions. In support of the first point, 
 the writer appealed to his own experience : 
 " Having had myself considerable experience 
 in teaching, in many places, and in many 
 schools, for seventy years, I can cheerfully say 
 I have uniformly received all the appreciation 
 a reasonable person would care for, as well as 
 the gratitude of both pupils and parents, which 
 is far preferable to any noisy applause. And 
 I think the same is true of teachers gener- 
 ally." 
 
 Some might, perhaps, object that my father's 
 experience had been exceptional. There are 
 conditions in the cities and in the larger, as 
 
122 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 well as the smaller, institutions which do not 
 tend toward the dignity and due recognition 
 of educational work. But upon the second 
 point — the remedy proposed — I think there 
 can be little question of the soundness of the 
 following : " But, admitting teachers do not, as 
 a class, receive so much recognition or honor as 
 they deserve — what then ? Would their con- 
 dition be improved by having their names en- 
 rolled among 'the great professions of the 
 world'? How is it in these great professions ? 
 Do men always receive all the honor they de- 
 serve ? Do they receive honor 'simply for 
 their profession, or rather for their character 
 and their work ? Clergymen in New England 
 formerly received much honor as clergymen ; 
 but that day is past, while clergymen still re- 
 ceive honor and respect as men, for what they 
 are, and what they do, as sensible, unselfish, 
 earnest Christian teachers and guides, which is 
 quite as well for clergymen and people, too. The 
 clergymen who look to their profession rather 
 than to their character and their work for 
 recognition in this day are to be pitied, and 
 so are teachers. Able lawyers, too, receive 
 honor, but very little simply as lawyers, but 
 according as they are learned and useful men. 
 
JAMES TUFTS 123 
 
 seeking the welfare of the people and the state. 
 So of physicians. They do not at all depend 
 on their profession or their diploma to give 
 them success, but upon their skill in practice 
 and an unselfish, honorable life. 
 
 " It is late in the day to be encouraging teach- 
 ers to look to their profession rather than to 
 their work for recognition. Those who do so 
 will as surely be disappointed as is the doctor, 
 or lawyer, or clergyman who looks to his pro- 
 fession for recognition rather than to his char- 
 acter and his work. If your character and 
 your work do not commend you, what can 
 your profession, if you have one, do for you ? 
 You must go begging, as many do. 
 
 "There is, too, something unreasonable, if 
 not absurd, in this appeal to teachers to strive 
 for outward honor by belonging to a profes- 
 sion to be established, as if this would add 
 anything to their character or ability. The 
 calling of teachers, at the North especially, is 
 of itself respectable anyway, and the stand- 
 ing of the teacher in his calling must depend 
 on himself, what he is, and what he can do. 
 Simply belonging to a profession will not make 
 the weak teacher strong, nor the simple teacher 
 wise or successful, any more than belonging 
 
124 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 to the profession of a clergyman will make an 
 unwise clergyman wise or a weak clergygian 
 strong. Teachers must be content to be judged, 
 as other people are, for what they are and 
 what they can do. The weak will be weak and 
 the strong will be strong just the same, 
 whether they belong to a profession, so called, 
 or not. As the witty poet tells us : 
 
 Pyramids are pyramids, though sunk in vales, 
 
 And pigmies are pigmies still, though perched on Alps. 
 
 If pigmy lawyers, pigmy doctors or clergy- 
 men could become large and strong merely 
 by belonging to a profession, it would be a 
 nice thing; but, as this cannot be, the pig- 
 mies must remain pigmies still, and pigmy 
 teachers, if there are such, must remain pig- 
 mies, whether they belong to a profession or 
 not, except perhaps the profession, the being 
 ' perched on Alps,' would make their weakness 
 more conspicuous." 
 
 On the third point he said : 
 
 " For teachers to be reaching out for extra 
 honors seems needless, and hardly in accord 
 with the spirit of the times, where so many of 
 the best-educated ladies of culture and refine- 
 ment, with little or no compensation, are de- 
 voting their lives quietly and patiently to the 
 
JAMES TUFTS 125 
 
 education and improvement of the poor in our 
 cities, to say nothing of so many missionaries 
 who leave all in their native land to spend 
 their lives among the heathen. The good and 
 great work which our teachers are silently ac- 
 complishing in our schools is so generally 
 recognized by the people whose good-will is 
 desirable that teachers may well rejoice in 
 this silent approval and unheralded praise of 
 their patient services, having no need to go 
 into any scramble for higher or outside honors, 
 which are so uncertain, capricious, and unsat- 
 isfying, as those who receive them will testify." 
 
 It was a great satisfaction to my father that 
 both bodily and mental vigor remained prac- 
 tically unimpaired until his last brief illness. 
 Until the connection of Monson with Palmer 
 by an electric road was effected, three or four 
 years before his death, he would not infre- 
 quently walk from Palmer, a distance of four 
 miles. He would run to catch a train or to 
 keep someone from waiting. A striking evi- 
 dence of this general health and strength was 
 afforded by the rapidity with which his wounds 
 healed after the assault made upon him Sep- 
 tember 26, 1896, when he was nearly eighty- 
 
126 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 five years old. He had nearly reached his 
 house, at about half-past seven o'clock in the 
 evening, on his return from a trip to Boston, 
 when he was assaulted by someone from the 
 rear. Several blows were struck on the head 
 with some heavy weapon which cut the scalp 
 severely and made him fall to the ground. 
 The aim was doubtless robbery, and this, as 
 well as the regard in which my father was 
 held in Monson, made it probable that some 
 tramp had made the attack. In view of the 
 severity of the blows and the general shock, 
 we were very agreeably surprised to see the 
 rapidity with which the effects passed away. 
 It seemed to some of us, however, that after 
 this there was a slight affection, not so much 
 of the physical organ of hearing as of the 
 mental response. It showed itself in a certain 
 degree of slowness in " catching the drift," if 
 a new topic was introduced, or an unfamiliar 
 name spoken. 
 
 This did not interfere with conversation, or 
 with the enjoyment of public discourse. Visits 
 to friends and gatherings of various sorts were 
 continued to the last winter. At the fiftieth 
 anniversary of his graduation he had been 
 asked to speak to the alumni at Yale, and he 
 
JAMES TUFTS 127 
 
 had been one of the very few present in 1898 
 at the sixtieth. In June, 1900, Burr Seminary 
 at Manchester, Vt., where he studied and 
 taught, had an important celebration, and my 
 father was urged to attend. He was suffering 
 at the time from an attack of eczema, which 
 made him hesitate about starting, and inter- 
 fered somewhat with his enjoyment of the occa- 
 sion, but he was much delighted at the sur- 
 prise he was able to give, both by his physical 
 vigor and by his speech at the reunion, " when," 
 as he wrote, " they were expecting to see only a 
 feeble old man." 
 
 In writing, as well as in travel and occa- 
 sional speaking in public, there was no indica- 
 tion of infirmity. Several articles on educa- 
 tional, religious, and political subjects were 
 contributed to the press. In politics, as might 
 be expected from a son of Vermont, my father 
 had been successively Whig, Anti-Slavery, and 
 Republican of pronounced type. He had also 
 been deeply interested in foreign missions. 
 But he was unable to agree that conquests by 
 force of arms are to be hailed with acclama- 
 tion as the most effective means of carrying 
 the gospel. His long experience had led him 
 to distrust the value of seeming victories for a 
 
128 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 principle won by force, and to distrust all 
 externals in comparison with the moral appeal 
 to character. In an article on "Imperialism 
 in the Pulpit" he deprecated the utterances 
 which seemed to him of at best very dubious 
 propriety, and which seemed likely to divert 
 from the simple and fundamental teachings of 
 Christ. Another article, written not long 
 before his death, on "Teaching as a Profes- 
 sion," which seems to me in many respects the 
 best my father ever wrote, has already been 
 referred to. 
 
 As he grew older, he clung with greater 
 attachment to the house where so many years 
 had been spent. The suggestion was often 
 made that he might sell the farm and be rid of 
 the inevitable vexations and responsibilities 
 attending its care. But he used to say, "I 
 don't believe I. should live long, if I should 
 break up here ;" and it was probably better that 
 he could stay. It was also a source of satis- 
 faction in the last years that the family could 
 be together in Monson in the summer. The 
 two grandchildren, born in 1893 and 1895 
 (Irene and James Warren), of whom the 
 younger bore his name, were often taken for 
 drives and to the blacksmith shop, and, with a 
 
JAMES TUFTS 129 
 
 genuine appreciation of the superior values of 
 the country and of grandparents, inquired 
 plaintively: " Why do we have to go to Chicago 
 every winter?" 
 
 There was evident mellowing and ripening 
 during the last few years ; a greater tolerance 
 for others' views, a greater recognition of the 
 fallibility of human judgment, a disposition to 
 place a lower estimate on the importance of 
 measures or theories, in comparison with the 
 more fundamental value of sympathy and of 
 character. " I let it all be," came to be a 
 frequent expression with reference to petty 
 causes of vexation which would once have 
 seemed more important. 
 
 The last winter showed signs of failing 
 memory for recent names, but still there was 
 little sign of general infirmity. On the day 
 following his eighty-eighth birthday he went up 
 into the woods on his farm with the oxen and 
 cart, and got a load of bark and chips, unaided. 
 "The oxen are so spry and fast one has to be 
 wide awake to keep up with them." 
 
 As has already been noted, this birthday, 
 the last of his life, was the occasion of a gift 
 from the teachers and scholars of the academy. 
 Mr. Butterworth, the principal, with a number 
 
130 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 of the scholars grouped around, presented a 
 spacious, comfortable chair, and spoke, in a 
 manner which seemed to my father "beautiful 
 and appropriate," of the latter's relation to 
 education and to the academy. That boys and 
 girls representing the third generation of 
 Monson pupils and friends should " remember 
 an old man" was particularly gratifying to him. 
 It was in the academy that he found his 
 opportunity. It was a gracious and beautiful 
 thing that his last birthday should be remem- 
 bered by the representatives of the institution. 
 The final illness began in a sudden attack of 
 jaundice, March i8. After a week there 
 seemed to be considerable improvement, so 
 that during my vacation, which fell in the last 
 week of March, my father walked to the village, 
 and conversed with great interest concerning 
 his early life and later experience. On Sun- 
 day, the 31st, he attended church service for 
 the last time, and began after that to grow 
 gradually worse, although he went down to the 
 village, and the physicians did not apprehend 
 a fatal termination to the disease. It was not 
 until Friday, April 26, that he ceased to come 
 downstairs. He suffered little except the 
 general discomfort. Strength failed fast on 
 
JAMES TUFTS 131 
 
 Sunday. On Monday morning he heard and 
 seemingly appreciated a letter which was read 
 to him. A half-hour later, with no warning, 
 he fell peacefully asleep. 
 
 The Rev. F. S. Hatch, who had for several 
 years been pastor of the Congregational church, 
 and a highly valued friend, had resigned his 
 pastorate early in the winter to enter upon 
 work in India. Thinking of this, shortly be- 
 fore his death, my father had expressed the de- 
 sire that the Rev. E. H. Byington, of Newton 
 Centre, who had preceded Mr. Hatch at Mon- 
 son, and the Rev. Edward A. Reed, of Holyoke, 
 with whom he had long been associated in the 
 Hampden Association of Ministers, should be 
 asked to conduct the funeral services. Both 
 these friends were able to be present. Mr. 
 Byington read from the Scriptures and offered 
 prayer at the house. The main services were 
 held in the church, which was filled with the 
 people of the town and of neighboring towns, 
 the academy students attending in a body. 
 Mr. Byington spoke especially of my father's 
 work as a teacher. The speaker himself died 
 suddenly, scarcely a fortnight later, and hence 
 it is not possible to reproduce his discrimi- 
 nating and thoughtful words. The sympa- 
 
132 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 thetic appreciation by Mr. Reed is printed at 
 the close of this sketch. " Rock of Ages" and 
 other favorite hymns were sung by Mr. and 
 Mrs. Norcross, and in the "I know that my 
 Redeemer liveth," sung by Mrs. Norcross, 
 there was, to one who knew my father's inner 
 life, a deep-sounding chord of unison with his 
 experience. For, as with Job, external losses, 
 especially of health, had been the occasion of 
 inner disappointment, perplexity, and struggle ; 
 and, in spite of the seeming frustration of aims 
 and hope, confidence in God had remained 
 to preserve and support the deeper life of the 
 spirit. The funeral march from Chopin, that 
 day at ' least, told softly, yet majestically, 
 the story of a life in which time had now 
 ceased and only the eternal remained — of a 
 life simple and dignified, striving with various 
 forces seeking expression, then rising to se- 
 renity and strength. Six friends — Dr. Fuller, 
 Mr. E. F. Morris, Mr. F. E. Morris, Mr. Rufus 
 Cushman, Mr. L. C. Flynt, and Mr. G. C. 
 Flynt — laid the body to rest upon the hillside, 
 on a beautiful afternoon, the first of May. 
 
 The last long letter which I had received 
 was written on his eighty-eighth birthday. 
 It seems to express so well my father's last 
 
JAMES TUFTS 133 
 
 thoughts and valuations that I reproduce some 
 of it here : 
 
 " It is a mild, summer-like day for my eighty- 
 eighth birthday, and we have been sitting on the 
 piazza this forenoon, as in September, receiv- 
 ing also some birthday greetings of those 
 passing by. 
 
 "It seems a longtime to look back upon, 
 and also a short time, since I was a boy in the 
 old homestead at Wardsboro, where so many 
 were entertained for so many years, of the 
 family and others, too. As I look back over 
 my life, so crippled, being cut off from larger 
 fields of usefulness, I have endeavored to do 
 small work, especially among the young, 
 though it has not brought me in much income. 
 But I have lived here, and we have entertained 
 much company, and I have much to be thank- 
 ful for. I have been reading a sermon by 
 McKenzie on 'Illusions.' He says his life 
 has been fortunate and happy, but not accord- 
 ing to his dreams or hopes or plans. ' I am 
 glad that life was not made after any pattern 
 of mine, but after God's design. I had a pat- 
 tern once, but not this.' And so most of us 
 might say. I was a strong man, and had high 
 hopes, yet few were so entirely disappointed 
 
134 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 as I was. But I look back on manj' mercies and 
 compensations, as I am now about through. 
 
 "I notice of late my pulse is weaker and 
 more irregular, reminding me the end is near. 
 I shall not pass many more milestones in my 
 pilgrimage. I enjoy very much witnessing the 
 great on-go of life around us, and, above all, 
 of the kingdom of Christ, which is sure to 
 come." 
 
Song of the Ripened Years. 
 
 To THE REV. JAMES TUFTS, ON THE HAPPY ANNI- 
 VERSARY OF HIS Eightieth birthday, November 
 2, I893. With Love and Gratitude from a 
 Pupil of 1857, George G. phipps. 
 
 Four-score of gladsome years 
 
 We count tonight, 
 Ripe with both joys and tears, 
 
 With love and light ; 
 Years blest with heartfelt peace, 
 Years rich in soul increase. 
 Sweet years, whose hopes ne'er cease. 
 
 Nor memories blight. 
 
 Dear father, here we press 
 
 Around thy feet ; 
 Gathered, with fond caress 
 
 Thy birthday greet ; 
 While soft our hearts recall 
 Departed faces, — all; 
 With ours, their blessings fall 
 
 Upon thee, sweet. 
 
 What then, tho' locks turn gray. 
 
 Love ne'er grows old ; 
 Though cares and trials sway. 
 
 Faith's cables hold. 
 In purple splendors bright. 
 Life's sun but sinks from sight 
 To blend with heaven's own light 
 
 Its clouds of gold. 
 
 13s 
 
At the funeral services, held May i, the Rev. 
 Edward Allen Reed spoke substantially as fol- 
 lows : 
 
 " My friends : I consider it a privilege to 
 be here today, and to have some part in these 
 services, these expressions of reverence and 
 affection for the good man who has gone from 
 us. We called him ' Father Tufts,' and I can 
 truly say that he was like a father to me — 
 greeting me frankly and warmly when I 
 first came into our Hampden conference thirty 
 years ago, and greeting me just as warmly 
 when I returned after an absence of some 
 years. The news of his death brought to me 
 a sense of personal loss, a feeling of real sad- 
 ness, that at our association, our conference, 
 the Congregational Club, and other gatherings 
 where we had so often enjoyed his fellowship, 
 we should see his face no more. When it was 
 told me that it was our friend's desire that I 
 should take part in these services, I felt hon- 
 ored and humbled — honored to be thus re- 
 membered, and humbled at the thought of my 
 own unworthiness and inability to speak of 
 him as he deserves to be spoken of, to ex- 
 press the feelings of our hearts. Let me refer 
 136 
 
JAMES TUFTS 137 
 
 briefly to some of the qualities which dis- 
 tinguished our friend, which, I am sure, were 
 vividly impressed upon all who came into any 
 close personal contact with him. 
 
 " First, sincerity. We always felt, in all our in- 
 tercourse with Father Tufts, that we were deal- 
 ing with a perfectly transparent man — one 
 who had nothing to conceal, who was abso- 
 lutely truthful. We could give him our confi- 
 dence without the least fear. This sincerity 
 seemed a part of his personality. You felt it 
 in the grasp of his hand, you saw it in the 
 expression of his face, and recognized it in 
 the tones of his voice. Whether he agreed 
 with you or not, you knew where he stood. 
 He was no time server, but every inch a man 
 — frank, open, courageous. 
 
 "And this sincerity, which appeared in every 
 part of his daily life, was conspicuous in his 
 religious experience, and the expression of his 
 convictions and hopes. His faith in Christ 
 was childlike in its simplicity, warmth, and 
 completeness. He loved the Bible, and 
 nothing in our discussions and various exer- 
 cises pleased him more and aroused him to 
 most clear and forceful speech than some fresh, 
 reverent exegesis of the holy Scriptures. 
 
138 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 "Another characteristic of Mr. Tufts, ex- 
 hibited during all of my acquaintance with 
 him up to the very last, was what I shall 
 call intellectual vigor. He never ceased to 
 think, to study, to learn. He was deeply in- 
 terested in all educational and theological 
 questions ; I may say, in all questions affecting 
 the welfare of society. His conversation was 
 always instructive, edifying. He was one of 
 the most stimulating and acceptable speakers 
 ever heard at our ministerial gatherings and 
 conferences. He never could be induced to 
 speak unless he had something to say. His 
 remarks were fresh, original, and forceful, and 
 he had a vein of quiet humor which was simply 
 delightful. Mr. Tufts was naturally conserva- 
 tive in his disposition and views, and nothing 
 could move him from those fundamental truths 
 and principles which he had accepted after 
 patient study, and which had been often veri- 
 fied in his own experience ; but he never shut 
 his eyes to new light, nor refused to treat 
 courteously and candidly opinions which 
 seemed opposed to what he believed to be the 
 truth. He welcomed all truth with rare hos- 
 pitality. Men grow old when they cease to 
 learn ; but it is possible for the soul to keep its 
 
JAMES TUFTS 139 
 
 youth, and we shall remember him as youth- 
 ful and progressive to the end. 
 
 " Let me speak of one more trait of this good 
 man's character to which you will all bear wit- 
 ness, his kindliness of heart. We sometimes 
 meet, in men of strong intellectual power, a lack 
 of sympathy and a cold exterior which repels 
 us. Father Tufts had a winning personality. 
 You felt drawn to him at once. Young people 
 were not afraid of him. As we look over this 
 large congregation today we see many young 
 people, and we know why they are here. They 
 are here to show their respect and affection for 
 one who actually loved them and ever sought 
 to do them good ; who never lost sympathy 
 with youth nor judged it harshly. 
 
 "He was active in the work of this church, 
 ever rejoicing in the conversion of souls and 
 the power of the kingdom of God. My friends, 
 I feel how inadequate these poor words are, 
 but they are honest words. We have listened 
 to the blessed words of the ScriptXires, which 
 tell us of the glorious resurrection and the life 
 eternal. I trust that we believe these words, 
 that we believe that the Lord Jesus meant pre- 
 cisely what he said when he told us that he 
 went to prepare a place for us, that he would 
 
140 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 come again, and receive us unto himself. We 
 believe that the one whom we knew, and hon- 
 ored, and loved here is now with the Savior 
 whom he loved and worshiped — that he has 
 entered into the paradise of God. Let us be 
 grateful for such a life. Let us keep in sym- 
 pathy with those who have gone before us in 
 the faith and fellowship of the gospel." 
 
At the annual meeting of the Monson Con- 
 gregational church Mr. Edward F. Morris read 
 the following memorial : 
 
 "To know something of the personality of 
 good women and good men constitutes an im- 
 portant part of our goodly heritage. We re- 
 member those whose acquaintance we have 
 come to value, whose uniform optimism, faith, 
 and zeal have been to us hope, joy, and inspi- 
 ration. In time of discouragement to take the 
 hopeful view ; in time of weakness to know the 
 source of strength; in time of darkness to see 
 the coming light ; in time of doubt to stand on 
 sure and confident foundations, has been char- 
 acteristic of many of the saints of God. The 
 ability to do this has been realized through 
 his abounding grace, and we join them in 
 ascribing to him the glory. 
 
 " In that spiritual commonwealth for which 
 we look, the tabernacle of God shall be with 
 men, and He shall dwell among them, a social 
 condition of such high perfection as to exceed 
 our present comprehension ; but we attain some 
 perception of what it might imply in associa- 
 tion with strong, aggressive character, formed 
 after his pattern, devoted to his service, liv- 
 141 
 
142 JAMES TUFTS 
 
 ing here a life of exuberant faith and love. 
 Notwithstanding all the imperfections and frail- 
 ties of the best examples of Christian disciple- 
 ship, we offer the fervid petition, ' Make us to 
 be numbered with thy saints in glory ever- 
 lasting.' They are truly blessed, resting from 
 their labors, and their works following them. 
 
 "Reflections such as these spring up spon- 
 taneously within us, as we affectionately and 
 thankfully remember our highly esteemed and 
 well-beloved brother and father, the Rev. 
 James Tufts, who passed on from the church 
 militant to that triumphant, April 29, 1901. 
 For nearly fifty years a resident of this com- 
 munity, during thirty-eight of which he was a 
 member of this church ; for a long time a mem- 
 ber of its advisory committee ; for some years 
 superintendent of its Bible school, frequently 
 called upon to do ministerial and pastoral 
 service for our people ; for seven years princi- 
 pal of Monson Academy, and for many more 
 an enthusiastic and efficient instructor of youth; 
 for a long time identified with our public schools, 
 whose fame as an educator was known through- 
 out our state, whose sympathetic interest in 
 young people continued until his latest years, 
 who was a painstaking servant of our public 
 
JAMES TUFTS 143 
 
 library, who lived with our fathers and with us 
 so sympathetically and usefully, who became 
 old so slowly, and who passed on so trium- 
 phantly — as to all of these considerations the 
 limits of this memorial do not allow extended 
 allusions. When informed of his decease, 
 there came to mind words spoken thirty cen- 
 turies ago, ' Know ye not that there is a Prince 
 and great man fallen this day in Israel?' 
 
 "It was as a Christian teacher thatour brother 
 excelled. He aimed to prepare his pupils well 
 for expected courses of higher education, but 
 especially for their life-work. Greatly inter- 
 ested in their intellectual accomplishments, 
 their character was the object of his deepest 
 solicitude. They can never forget his earnest 
 words, public and private, by which he sought 
 to turn their feet into ways of wisdom and 
 paths of understanding. The breadth of his 
 sympathy was the secret of his power. The 
 loss to this church and community is great; 
 but, if it were less, his memory would be less 
 precious. 
 
 "It is better, since 'It is God's way. His will 
 be done,' that our brother has departed to be 
 with Christ, and with so many whom he loved 
 and served on their earthly pilgrimage." 
 
By the Hampden Association of 
 Ministers. 
 
 The members of Hampden Association 
 desire to express their sense of loss in the 
 death of its most aged and venerable member, 
 the Rev. James Tufts. He united with Hamp- 
 den East Association February 2, 1854. He 
 died at his home April 29, of the current year. 
 
 Although ordained to the ministry, and for 
 a few years devoting himself to preaching the 
 gospel, he early felt that he could best serve 
 the Master as a teacher of youth, and to this 
 vocation he chiefly gave his life. His honest 
 and sincere nature, his great kindness of heart, 
 his warm-hearted and devout Christian char- 
 acter, engaged the esteem, the confidence, and 
 the affection of all who knew him. Although 
 living to reach the age of nearly four-score 
 and ten years, he retained his faculties of body 
 and mind, and until the near close of his life 
 was physically and mentally vigorous in an 
 eminent degree. Many prominent men who 
 came under his influence as their instructor 
 testify to his great excellence and worth, and 
 his brethren in the ministry appreciated and 
 144 
 
JAMES TUFTS 145 
 
 will long cherish his wisdom, his loyalty to the 
 truth, and his genuine and humble piety. 
 
 The Association desires to express the sym- 
 pathy of his brethren with the family of the 
 deceased brother, while grateful for his long 
 and active life, for the influence which he was 
 permitted to exert on the minds and hearts of 
 so many in their early days, and for his noble 
 record of usefulness, which will long remain 
 as a precious memorial. 
 
 Passed by Hampden Association of Congre- 
 gational Ministers, July 9, 1901.