FOUNDERS' DAY ADDRESSES (DREW THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY) BV 4070 .D74 F68 1903 LIBRARY OF PRINCETON SEP 2 2 ^^^^ THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY BV 4070 .D74 F68 1903 Drew University. Alumni Association. Founder's day addresses OUNDERS' DAY ADDRESSES ^ ^ ^ I* ocr 27 190; C^ Delivered on the occasion of the observ- ance of the Thirty-fifth Anniversary of the Founding of Drew Theological Seminary of the Methodist Episcopal Church, the i6th of October, igo2, Madison, New Jersey. REW THEOLOGICAL SEMI- NARY was opened for students in 1867. Its graduates now, after thirty-five years, number about a thousand, and are to be found in every land. It was a very gracious sugges- tion of the universally loved and honored President of the Seminary, Rev. Dr. Henry A. Buttz, that on the occasion of the observance of the thirty-fifth anniversary of the founding of the Seminary, the exercises be under the direction of the Alumni Association, and that the speakers be from among the rapidly increasing host of graduates. The men chosen to represent this goodly company of faithful ministers of Jesus Christ were: Rev. Henry Graham, D.D., a member of the first class graduated in 1869; Rev. John D. Hammond, D.D., Secretary of the Board of Education of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, of the class of 1875, and Rev. Charles Fremont Sitterly, Ph.D., S.T.D., Professor of Biblical Literature and Exegesis of the English Bible, in Drew Theological Seminary, of the class of 1886, who, together with the President of the Seminary, were the speakers. Founders' Day, October 16, 1903. The addresses which they delivered on that occasion are given this wider hearing, in the confident expectation that thereby the Kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ will be advanced. EZRA SQUIER TIPPLE, President Alumni Association. New York, May, 1903. Address of Welcome in Behalf of the Faculty REV. HENRY A. BUTTZ, D.D., President of the Seminary. WE are profoundly grateful to the Alumni Association for their kindness in giving us their presence, and in providing so de- lightful and profitable a program for this occasion. It is the thirty-fifth anniversary of the formal opening of Drew Theological Seminary, and as such it was deemed by the Faculty of sufficient importance to ask our Alumni to take it into their charge and to make all the arrangements necessary for its celebration. For the readi- ness with which they acceded to our request, and for the successful arrange- ments which they have made, I desire, on behalf of the Faculty, to give them our sincerest thanks. It would have been a pleasure to me to have attempted something of a review of the history of the Seminary for these thirty-five years, but the occasion belongs to the Alumni, and it is fitting that my words should be few. The sixth day of November, 1867, was regarded at the time, and is still recognized,, as a remarkable day in the history of Theological educa- tion in the Methodist Episcopal Church. At that time there were assembled in Madison many of the distinguished men of our Church to celebrate the opening of Drew Theological Seminary. The gift by which its benevolent founder, Mr. Daniel Drew, established it — half a million of dollars — was at that time one of the most munificent which had thus far been given to an educational institution. The widespread publicity which had been given to this gift, and the importance of the movement on the part of the Church to establish near the city of New York a Theological Seminary, marked the event as an historical occasion. The morning exercises were held in the Presbyterian Church, which had been generously tendered by its trustees for that purpose. The afternoon exercises were held in Mead Hall, which, at that time, was the central building, and the place in which, until quite recently, most of its exercises have been held. It will be impossible at this time for me to speak in any adequate manner of the progress of the Seminary in building or equipment during the past thirty-five years. Nor may I attempt to give credit to the noble men of the Faculty and board of trustees who have made the Seminary what it is. Names historic in the Church, which at once come to your minds, have wrought here. We are the inheritors of the struggles and achievements of a past which is glorious both in the men who have labored and the monuments which they have left to us. Since the founding of the Seminary, thirty-five years ago, it has touched, in a measure, the whole world. One thousand men, less two, have formally graduated from the institution and received its diploma. Over four hundred have taken part of their theological course here ; so that, during this period, about 1,450 ministers, or about one-twelfth of the ministry of the Methodist Episcopal Church, have pursued their studies in this Seminary and have gone forth from here to their life work. The influence which has thus been exerted cannot be computed. That the Seminary has been permitted to take such an important part in the onward movement of the Church of Christ is a cause of profound gratitude to God. Although we have not thus far entered the field for additional endow- ment in the interests of the Twentieth Century Movement, we think the time for hesitancy has now passed. The gift of ten thousand dollars by Mr. J. W. Pearsall during the past year, to establish a department of applied Christianity in the city of New York in connection with this institution, we believe is a pledge of what may yet be done. The trustees of the Seminary, those loyal guardians of its interests — both its officers and its members — are in hearty sympathy with the effort to make this institution worthy of the age, and worthy of the Christ in whose cause we toil. Our entrance into the city of New York for special study in sociological and philanthropic interests, which has been authorized by the trustees, marks, we believe, a new era in the history of the Seminary, and one which will bind us more closely to that great metropolitan city, and also promote the larger work for which the school has been established. It is customary at these fall gatherings to give a simple statement of the past year of the institution. With our last class we graduated fifty-six in the regular course, besides those who went out having pursued special courses in the Seminary. During the past twelve months twelve students have entered the foreign missionary service. We have received for this term about seventy new students — with probably more to come. The total number of students will be at least one hundred and eighty, keeping fully up to our last year's registration, and, perhaps, going beyond. Dear Brethren of the Alumni : We welcome your presence with joy. You are the product, under God, of the Seminary's past; you are the hopes of its future. Upon you, we who labor here in promoting the interests of the Seminary largely rest for its future advancement. The loyalty of the Alumni to the institution in the past has been abundantly illustrated ; no more loyal body of men to the service of the school can be found. We rejoice in your achievements; in the positions of influence and responsibility into which you have come. Worthily you have borne the burdens of the Church which have been placed upon you. Worthily you will bear them in future years. You are to represent us to the world. As Paul said to the Corinthian Christians : " Ye are our epistle written in our hearts, known and read of all men." You speak for us by your voice, your influence, your character. We welcome you as the embodiment of the Seminary spirit. There is a spirit in our institution which constitutes it chief value to the Church. There are traditions here which we hold in precious memory. The spirit which animates the school is that of consecration to the work of Christ. This spirit, we believe, fills not only our places of prayer and praise, but fills our lecture rooms and animates the teachings of our Faculty. This spirit has been with our Faculty from the beginning. The honored names who have served this school during the years that are past illustrate it, and I assure you that the same spirit characterizes the Faculty upon whose shoulders at this time has been placed the responsibility of Drew Theological Seminary. The men who now fill these chairs are worthy successors of the men who filled them in the past. Noble men have toiled here. Great sacrifices have been made here. Great lives have been lived and inspired here, but we need a fresh impulse which we hope to come to us from this day. We give cordial welcome then on this auspicious day to the Alumni of the Seminary. Thirty-five years of history affords a fitting time for such a gathering. The graduates of this Seminary are found in the East and in the West, in the North and in the South. They are found in the educational fields and mission fields of the Church; in official and in the pastoral life, and, we believe, they have secured the confidence of the Church by their loyalty to their work and to the Kingdom of God. In all our aspirations and expectations you form, my dear brethren, a central part. Without you we cannot succeed. With you, and the blessing of God, success is assured. A thousand welcomes to you, then, on this joyous occasion. God's Unusual Men for Unusual Work HENRY GRAHAM, D.D., Albany, N. Y. GOD chooses men for special work, and has done so in all ages. And they are fortunate men to whom God gives a big task. They are God's men — doing the great things that he wants done on earth. There is no such honor as to be trusted by God with a big task, and backed by God while doing it. God has chosen unusual men in all ages to do unusual things. It needs an unusual man to do unusual things ; and God's man is always an unusual man. The old prophets were unusual men, having experiences, and doing deeds outside of the ordinary. God selected them, and assigned them their tasks. John the Baptist was preeminently God's man, chosen and endowed for a special and great work, outside the range of ordinary human ex- perience. The apostles were unusual men, upon whom extraordinary responsi- bilities were laid. Luther was God's unusual man, chosen to do a great and unusual work. The world may never see another like him. Wesley was one of God's unusual men, to whom a great task was com- mitted, and he justified the confidence which God reposed in him. God's choice of men for unusual work is not limited to ministers, although every minister chosen of God for His work ought to be an unusual man. George Washington was God's chosen man for a special work in the world's history. Abraham Lincoln was most manifestly God's chosen man for a great and terrible crisis, and a man who more conscientiously and faithfully did God's work has not appeared in human history. God puts His spirit on men in other spheres, and singles them out for unusual work. Mr. Moody cut loose from the ordinary in early manhood, and did some of the unusual work that God wants done. Many more in various avocations have been selected by God to step out of the humdrum path of life to meet experiences and do work from which others are excused. In all these cases there will be two marks by which we can distinguish the genuine from the counterfeit. First, they will be markedly God chosen. There will be an impulse to their work which they clearly recognize as coming from God. And second, the work to which they are impelled will be peculiarly work that God wants done. And unusual men are needed to-day as much as ever. Some unusual things greatly need to be done, and it will need unusual men to do them. Three things can safely be said about the unusual work that God wants done and the unusual men who are to do it. 1. First, men must not undertake this unusual work until God bids them do so. A man cannot be a great man and do a great task simply because he wants to do so. Men have appointed themselves to the office of Messiah. The fifth chapter of the book of Acts gives us an account of some who called themselves to this lofty position, but they were " brought to naught." In all subsequent ages men have made the same attempt, with the same result. Even in our own times persons are advertising them- selves as Christ Jesus, and gaining some followers. Don't try to be an apostle, unless God marks that out as your destiny. Don't try to be a prophet, and foretell future events, until the Divine Spirit comes upon you. Don't try to write a new Bible until God inspires you to that work. Don't try to revise the Bible we have until you are satisfied, beyond any possible doubt, that God has marked out that great task for you. Don't try to reform Christianity unless God bids you do so. Don't try to establish a new church in the earth. There are a great many churches now. Don't try to organize a new religion for the times. When God wants a new religion for the times. He will establish it in a way that men will not mistake. Don't try to be a second Luther. Don't try to be a second Wesley. Don't try to be a great man, and do unusual things, simply because some other man was great, and did unusual things. Don't try to preach the Gospel until God calls you to that great work. All this is dangerous presumption. To attempt these unusual things in cold blood is to invite failure. There must be unusual inspiration for unusual tasks. 2. The second thing that may be said is that men can safely undertake the unusual when God bids them do so. If they may not go till they are sent, they may go when they are sent. It is always safe to undertake what God tells them to undertake. God will see them through. Moses, you remember, shrank from his task and said, " Who am I, that I should go unto Pharaoh, and that I should bring forth the children of Israel out of Egypt?" But God said, "Certainly I will be with thee." When they tried to silence Amos the prophet, he answered : " I was no prophet, neither was I a prophet's son ; but I was a herdman, and a gatherer of sycamore fruit ; and the Lord took me as I followed the flocks, and the Lord said unto me, Go, prophesy unto my people Israel. 10 Now, therefore, hear thou the word of the Lord." God's prophets must assert themselves, and not let men push them aside. The Czar of Russia offered $30,000 for the best portrait of himself, and nearly a thousand pictures were offered. When the committee were hang- ing the pictures in the gallery they noticed a picture leaning against a post. One of them said : " There is no use hanging that daub." I beg your pardon," said the artist, who was watching over the fate of his picture ; " I painted that picture, and I claim the privilege of hanging it in the proper light, and at the proper distance, and then you can judge of it." The com- mittee saw the justice of his demands, and hung the picture to good ad- vantage, and when the award was given that picture took the prize. God's prophets must assert themselves, whoever may oppose. Bishop Fowler begins his great lecture on Abraham Lincoln with the sentence: "God's prophets have the right of way." I have already spoken of that great man as God's man, chosen for a great crisis. He knew that God chose him for his work, and that God was behind him, and that was " the hiding of his power." He knew it. General Daniel E. Sickles tells an incident that lets us into the very secret of Lincoln's heart. " It was on the fifth day of July, 1863," said General Sickles, " that I was brought to Washington on a stretcher from the field of Gettysburg. Hearing of my arrival, President Lincoln came to my room and sat down by my bedside. He asked about the great battle, and when I told him of the terrible slaughter the tears streamed from his eyes. I asked him if he had doubted the result. He said 'No.' Then he continued: 'This may seem strange to you, but a few days ago, when the opposing armies were converging, I felt as never before my utter helplessness in the great crisis that was to come upon the country. I went into my room and locked the door. Then I knelt down and prayed as I had never prayed before. I told God that He had called me to this position; that I had done all that I could do, and that the result was now in His hands; that I felt my own weakness and lack of power, and that I knew that if the country was to be saved, it was because He willed it so. " ' When I went down to my room I felt that there could be no doubt of the issue. The burden seemed to have rolled off my shoulders, my intense anxiety was relieved, and in its place came a great sense of trustfulness, and that was why I did not doubt the result at Gettysburg. And what is more. Sickles,' he continued, ' I believe that we may hear at any moment of a great success by General Grant, who has been pegging away at Vicksburg for so many months. By to-morrow you will hear that he has won a victory as important in the West as Gettysburg is in the East.' " Then turning to me, he said : ' Sickles, I am in a prophetic mood to- day, and I know that you will get well.' " The doctors do not give me that hope, Mr. President, I said ; but he answered cheerfully, ' I know you will get well. Sickles.' " We all know that Lincoln's prophecies of that day came true. The next II day brought the news of the fall of Vicksburg, and General Sickles is yet living : and the world is beginning to recognize the fact that this great man cheerfully undertook the great task that God imposed upon him. and in all those trying times worked under Divine direction. When God bids men undertake some unusual work for Him. they need not — they must not hesitate. Obedience urges them forward. Loyalty to God enjoins it, and His command is a guarantee of success. Whittier, the prophet-poet of our country, in his poem on Ezekiel, says : " Yet shrink not thou, whoe'er thou art, For God's great purpose set apart, Before whose far-discerning eyes. The future as the present lies ! Beyond a narrow-bounded age Stretches thy prophet-heritage. Through heaven's dim spaces angel-trod, And through the eternal years of God ! Thy audience, worlds ! — All things to be The witness of the truth in thee ! " It is disastrous to hesitate when God calls us to the unusual. Men have rejected a call to preach, and mourned over it all their lives. Laymen have neglected some great opportunity, and never been happy afterward. 3. One thing more. Men may ask for an invitation to do something of consequence. There is no harm in doing so. Peter said : " Bid me come unto Thee on the water ;" Christ answered, " Come." and Peter got an ex- perience quite out of the ordinary. The apostle says, " Covet earnestly the best gifts." Perhaps men will not get them if they do not covet them, but it will do no harm to try. Not every one is capable of unusual experiences, but perhaps you are, and it is worth while to put it to the test. Modesty is an excellent virtue, but men must not let it keep them from doing what they are capable of doing. Peter was not noted for his modesty. He was ready for anything, and God accepted him for large things. David was not noted for his modesty. While the army of Israel was shivering in the presence of the giant Goliath, this young man said: " Thy servant will go and fight with this Philistine ;" and God took him at his own estimate and gave him the victory. The men who do great things are the men who are looking for great tasks. A man seldom does a great thing by accident. The man of genius is generally the man who has a genius for God and hard work. The great inventors were generally looking for the things they found. The men who discover new planets and comets are they who sit long nights at the little end of the telescope. Faith in God must be supplemented by faith in ourselves, if we ever accomplish much. A man never does any great thing unless he thinks he can; and the man to whom God has committed a great task has a right to believe that he can accomplish something. God's appointment is a guarantee of his ability. To doubt himself is to doubt God. 12 Let men fit themselves for something, and stand readj- — and see what will come of it. God wants men — great men, men He can trust, men who will undertake great things for Him, men He can give a great task, and depend on them to do it. And He has generally chosen trained men for the greatest undertakings. The two great characters of the Old and New Testaments, who molded Judaism and Christianity — Moses and Paul — were both trained men. In two great crises of the history of the church two great men arose — Luther and Wesley — both thoroughly trained men. Men must get ready for the unusual. It is more apt to come if they get ready. The great explosion that deepened the channel of the East River is not forgotten history. General Newton worked for many long years placing explosives in the bed of the river, and when all was ready it was only the work of a moment to deepen the channel. He was simply storing up divine power for a great explosion — when all was ready. And then something unusual happened. We have plenty of small explosions. The Fourth of July is made boisterous by them. Cannon are fired, and rocks are blasted everywhere; but this was the great explosion of the century. And it followed long years of preparation. May we not lay our plans to do something for God that is worth while, and see what He will do with us? But we must stand ready for any- thing — any hardships, any storms. If you want to draw lightning from the skies, go out into the storm, and send up a kite as Franklin did. It may not strike you if you do this, but it is more apt to do so than if you climb onto an insulated table in a back room, with blinds closed and doors locked. If you want divine power to do something unusual, stretch your hands heavenward for it. Don't hide from it, but invite it. Too many do not put themselves in the way of divine power. They do not dare to go where the unusual happens. God can never use for any unusual purpose those who are afraid of storms, and hardships, and burdens. The great men whom God has used for great things were not relieved from the hardest experiences. I have already referred to Peter. His life was full of the unusual. He preached at Pentecost, and three thousand were converted. That was unusual. I would that we had such unusual meetings to-day. We need such preachers. We need such hearers. Peter spoke before the household of Cornelius, and the Holy Ghost fell on all them that heard the word. That was unusual ; and I wish we might have the same results to-day. We surely need preachers who can command divine power after this fashion ; and we also need hearers who will respond to it after this fashion. The report comes down to us that Peter suffered himself to be crucified, head downward, rather than deny his Lord. We do not know whether this tradition is true or not ; but it is an unusual thing to have such a report get 13 out about a man, whether true or otherwise. There must have been some- thing unusual about the man. The most of us will never be troubled with any such traditions. We are too ordinary — too commonplace for any such experience. And yet such men are needed to-day as much as in the days of the apostles — men who will dare and do anything for Christ's cause. A story comes down to us from the early ages of Christianity, which Gibbon dignified with a place in his history. When Christianity was struggling for the mastery over the barbarism of the Roman empire, an unusual man flashed for a moment on the scene, and did an unusual thing, which produced unusual results for the cause of Christ. Christianity was already the accepted religion of the empire, but the cruel amusements of the Colosseum had not yet been abolished. After a victory over the Goths, the Romans met for a gladiatorial show in the arena, where men were put up to butcher each other " to make a Roman holiday." The exhibition had commenced, and the gladiators were advancing toward each other with drawn swords, when a rude, roughly-clad, bareheaded, barefooted man rushed in between them and called on the people to cease shedding innocent blood, and not to requite God's mercy to them by murder. But the people shouted, " Back, old man ; on, gladiators ; " and the old man was pushed aside. He stood his ground, however, and exhorted them to cease from sin, until the people and the rulers all shouted, " Down with him ! " Then the gladiators struck him down, and the people showered stones upon him, until he lay dead in the midst of the arena. After this the people had leisure to look, and they saw that he wore the hermit's garb, and they knew that they had murdered one of God's courageous saints, who had been inspired to cry out in an unusual manner against a great sin. And from that day, the record tells us, there were no more contests in the arena at Rome, and these bloody exhibitions were soon abolished all over the empire. In like manner Savonarola cried out against the evils of his day in the streets of Florence, and met a similar fate. There are great evils to-day that need crying against unto the death — crying against in a way that will startle polite society — evils that will not go out but by prayer and fasting, and something out of the ordinary. And it calls for unusual men to do such work. God has unusual work that needs to be done in these days — as in all days — and whether we are the ones who can do this work, He only knows. We can at least be ready, and the man who is ready usually gets the job. The stone that killed Goliath was not the first stone that David had thrown. There is no suggestion in all this that preachers of the Gospel indulge in sensation — cheap sensation. God does not employ mountebanks to do his unusual work. 14 I only suggest that men make the most of themselves for God and His truth. The best work of the Christian ministry is unusual enough to satisfy the holiest and loftiest ambition. It is surely enough in the time of old age to look back over a ministry that has led several hundreds, perhaps some thousands, of persons to forsake sin and lead holy lives. There is nothing ordinary about that. And how it cheers the declining years of a man of seventy to have a Chris- tian woman now and then say : " Thirty, forty years ago you said some- thing which led me to consecrate myself to God anew, and I have been a better Christian ever since " ; or to hear some strong man say : " Many years ago some words of yours led me to accept God's call to preach the Gospel." There are some lofty compensations in these things for small salaries, many hardships, and much unjust criticism. The Christian minister ought to be the proudest, happiest man on earth. The students of this Seminary have had the rare opportunity, from its earliest history, of coming into close personal touch with some unusual men, and this is as grand an institution as there is on earth for finding unusual men and setting them at work for God. Some unusual men have already gone out from this Seminary, and I trust God will send out many more to do His great work. An Educated Ministry and Christian Education JOHN D. HAMMOND, D.D., Nashville, Tenn. WE are here to celebrate Founders' Day. Though not present when the great work we are commemorating was done, it was my privi- lege to know Drew Seminary intimately for three years shortly after its foundation and to become the seventy-ninth Alumnus on a roll which now numbers 998. I am tempted to spend the time allotted to me in reminiscences strongly tinctured with egotism. A host of memories come thronging upon me at this time which are connected with the early history of Drew, and which are hard to be resisted. Considering myself as a type (and the more unworthy the type the better) it may not be unappropriate for me to narrate how Drew Seminary found me and some- thing of what it did for me. In the fall of 1871 I was appointed to the Roswell Circuit in the North Georgia Conference. This circuit covered the two large counties of Cobb and Milton. The chief distinction of the former is that it is said to have been the home of President Roosevelt's mother in her young days. Though in possession of an A.B. diploma from the university of my native State, I had received no training in Bible study, and knew scarcely anything of Church history or of the science and art of preaching and pastoral work. Though my ministry was to a plain country people, I felt a painful lack of such training and knowledge as were needed in order to do them fair service as a Christian teacher. My compensation was not such as to justify me in providing myself with necessary intellectual helps. Of the seven churches composing the circuit some were small houses built of logs, while others were country school houses borrowed for the monthly Sunday ser- vice. At one, a parishioner and leading steward surprised me at my first appointment by cantering briskly up to the door on the back of an ox all bridled and saddled. I afterward learned that his remarkable ox was equally at home between the shafts of the family buggy. Amidst such sur- roundings I began my ministry with only such preparation for public speaking as had been gotten by a few timid efforts to escape fines at my college society by filling my place on the debate. My college training, though of much value in the long run, was of but little practicable ad- vantage to me in the beginning, so far as I could see. The feeling of need for special training grew on me and became oppressive as the weeks and months rolled by, until one day my eyes fell on a notice in my Con- 17 ference paper, signed by Dr. Charles F. Deems, in which it was proposed to give a scholarship at Drew Seminary to some young man of specified qualifications from the Methodist Episcopal Church South. I lost no time in applying. In this I met with discouragement from older ministers, most of whom held that the true preparation for preaching was preaching, and that the way to learn how to do a thing was to do it, profiting by mis- takes and advancing by experience. While waiting to hear from my application I attended the Conference of my district, and heard inspiring sermons from the Bishop who presided, and from others, and felt the revival spirit which rested on the Conference. The result was that I re- turned to my circuit feeling that I could preach and that perhaps, after all, my desire for a theological education was prompted more by scholastic ambition than by a love for souls. My mind was fully made up to with- draw my application, but just then a good Providence settled the matter for me beyond all question. On my study table I found a letter from Dr. Deems, stating that out of a list of many applicants my name had been selected. I was cordially received at the Seminary. Bishop Foster, though recently elected to the Episcopacy, was still serving as professor. Presi- dent Hurst was at that time just being recognized throughout the Church, North and South, by reason of his broad Christian scholarship. He was one of the most popular and beloved teachers I had ever known. His gentleness and strength combined not only to win to him all hearts, but also to give him dominion over all minds. They have been providentially reproduced by the man who was at that time Instructor in Hebrew and New Testament Greek, who afterward became his successor, and whose long and successful administration has been a chief factor in making Drew Theological Seminary one of the strongest evangelical centers of ministerial training known to modern times. My experiences at Drew broke down provincial prejudices which were the unavoidable results of my early and limited surroundings. It was here that I learned to know " no North and no South " in Christ's kingdom. What men and women there were to teach me the Christian tolerance I so much needed to learn ! First and foremost were my teachers and my fellow students ; then those noble women of the McClintock Association, such as Mrs. Julia Sewell and Mrs. Clinton B. Fisk ; those princely laymen, such as Mr. Joseph S. Spinney, Mr. George J. Ferry, and General Fisk; those Christly pastors the Tuttles, father and son, Drs. Burr and Landon, and many others whose names can not be mentioned here. Especially helpful to me were my associates amongst the students. These men received me as a brother beloved. I can not forget my first experience meeting with one of them. It was after a Sunday evening's service when, lonely and home- sick, we had drifted together, and he proposed a walk. He said : " I had been taught from childhood to regard all slave-holding Southerners as coarse and immoral ; I now confess my fault and express my joy at hav- ing come to know at least one, whom I take as a type of the many, whom I can respect and love as a Christian brother." Then came the counter con- fession : " As the son of a Southern slave-holder, left destitute by the for- tunes of war, with the old homestead in ashes, I had come to look upon i8 all Northern people as fanatics and self-constituted regulators of other people's affairs; but I now acknowledge my fault and express my joy at having come to know one, whom I take as the type of the many, and whom I can respect and love as a Christian brother." We were thus drawn to- gether, became room-mates, and have since met with nothing to interfere with a true and lifelong friendship. God's ways are not our ways. High on His throne in the heavens, above all human prejudice and strife, He beholds the children of men and considers their deepest needs. The land was still bleeding and the two great branches of Methodism being in strained relations to each other were disqualified, thus far, for their mission of " peace on earth and good will to men." He did not seek to heal the breach by bringing together two great opposing councils, each stiff with dignity and bristling with un- answerable arguments, but he picked up a crude, awkward circuit preacher of a slave-holding ancestry, out of the bloody vestiges of the horrible car- nage about Atlanta, set him down by the side of a fire-eating abolitionist from a Northern State and said, " Be class-mates, room-mates, friends ; and, in learning to respect and love each other, learn also that larger respect and love which become the opposing sections of a common country and a common Church." Thus was He content to sow, in humble soil, the seeds of a great purpose and to wait patiently for the harvest. In each of my professors, as if by instinct, I discerned that broad catho- licity and that patient and gentle bearing toward the ignorant and the erring, both as regards individuals and sections, which have ever been characteristic of this Institution. I did not at the time fully appreciate the influence of such lives as those of Foster, Hurst, Strong, Miley, Kidder, and Buttz ; but as I have watched their widening and deepening influence, and that of their worthy successors, on the Church during the large part of the last half century, operating through the ministry of a thousand Alumni, and of a nearly equal number of such as came but could not remain to com- plete the course, I have come to look upon them as master workmen set apart for the building up of Christ's kingdom in this land. Of all the goodly company of those whom I knew, at least by sight, of the founders of Drew Seminary, I will not omit to mention Mr. Daniel Drew himself. I remember him as he sat during one commencement occasion by the side of the now Sainted Bishop Janes, too modest to take any part beyond that of a silent spectator of the great and growing work which his liberality had set in motion. He was a man of rugged character. It took a great nature to be able to see, thirty-five years ago, the propriety of putting half a million dollars into an institution for the education of Methodist ministers. When we reflect that Mr. Drew was not what we should now call an educated man, that his vast fortune had been won by hard struggling against unceasing financial foes, and that the tide of educational beneficence had not set in in his day, we are filled with admiration for the faith which prompted his great gift. In all these succeeding years one thing more than all others has been increasingly manifest, and that is that Methodism, more, perhaps, than any other Church, is obligated to make this nation Christian, and that to 19 do so she must bring to bear on it all the power which will result from union — not only union within her own borders, but union, offensively and defensively, with every Christian force in the land. So far as Methodism herself is concerned, it is not an impossible task to bring about this union. It may take the form of organic union or of federation or of a triple al- liance. Which it shall take is not for me to say at this time. From its foundation this government has been plainly intended by Providence to stand out amongst the nations of the earth as preeminently a Christian na- tion. And this it has ever striven to be, though, like Laocoon, amidst the awful and ever tightening serpent folds of Demagogism, Anarchism, and un- regulated immigration, with its consequent evils of Sabbath desecration and the saloon power. Methodism adapts herself equally to all classes by her doctrinal freedom, her missionary spirit, and her itinerant system. She is equally suited to the work of ministering to the older sections of our country, and also to that of going before the advancing and ever enlarging communities which are filling up the great West. An ecclesiastical organ- ization which, during one short century, has been able to so adjust itself to this democratic new world as to bring into its communion some five or six millions of people from all grades of society, and to furnish Presidents, Cabinet officers. Senators, Congressmen, Governors, and Judges to the people, has thereby demonstrated its peculiar fitness to become, in the high- est spiritual sense, a national Church. Both sections of Methodism have, since the division of 1844, shown a vitality which could only have resulted from the indwelling spirit of God ; and, although there have been occasional instances of friction, they have in the main worked together to the com- mon end of building up the moral and religious life of the nation. You, with characteristic faith and daring, have astonished the Christian world by your proposed $20,000,000 twentieth century thank-oflfering, which you are even now bringing to a successful completion ; while we have already raised a similar offering, for education alone, amounting to more than $2,000,000, about $1,500,000 of which has already been paid. With a noble zeal for the helpless African population of the South, you have, for the past thirty-five years, been pouring your millions into that section for the evangelization and education of the negroes. We, in our poverty, and laboring under peculiar disabilities, have been also doing what we could in the same field. Side by side we are vying with you in the work of Western Church ex- tension, while shoulder to shoulder and heart to heart we are working with you to defend the Christian Sabbath, to break the saloon power, and to maintain and enlarge Christian education. The best results of an educated ministry are not to be found in the eloquent and learned exposition of the great truths of theology so much as in the Christian education of the whole people. A Gospel which does not stimulate the intellect is something less than the pure Gospel of the Son of God. Jesus said to Pilate, as He still says to all those who are in au- thority : " To this end was I born, and for this cause came I into the world that I might bear witness to the truth." Again he said : " Ye shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free." It is but a poor conception of the Gospel to suppose that it is ministered merely to save the people 20 from their sins. This is only its negative side. It fails in its mission unless it also saves them to the truth. We have too long acquiesced in the doc- trine of the Mystics, that religion is an inward and supermental condition by which God and the higher realities are known independently of the ordinary truth-getting processes — something which can be prayed into a man and kept in him only by a diligent use of what we are wont to call " the means of grace," such as psalm singing, public and private prayers, and the sacraments. Undoubtedly these things have their divinely ap- pointed place to fill, but if left to themselves, however diligently they may be used, they are more than likely to produce a superficial and fanatical type of piety. A ministry modeled after the Wesleyan type, and seeking to adjust itself to the twentieth century civilization, can as poorly afford to limit itself to this conception of grace as it could to that of the high church- man or the Romanist.