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BY RUFUS ELLIS, MINISTER OF THK KIHST f IIlUrH. irnUi) an gippcntiii, CONTAININO Thk Action of First Church on the Occasion of the Death ok Mr. Everett, AND THE Address ok the Pastor at the Public Funeral, Thursday, the 19rH of January. BOSTON: PRESS OF JOHN WILSON AND SON 1865. ■7> EDWARD EVERETT. BoRS 11th April, mdccxciv. Died 15th January, mdccclxv. S E R M N. Psalm viii. 5. — "And hast crowned him with gloky and honor." There is an exaltation of man, wliich is a forgetting of God. Born of irreverence and of folly, it can issue only in mischief. What is the ray without the sun 1 what is the branch without the vine ] what is the creature without the Creator ? what is the Son with- out the Father? — God's image, when God himself is withdrawn 1 I need not say that this is not the spirit of the Psalmist. He is celebrating the Divine Majesty, the nightly heavens, with the moon and stars which God has ordained ; and, at first, in the presence of such sub- limities, his soul is overawed, and man seems to him utterly insignificant : but soon he takes courage, with looking, it may be, upon a fair and noble fiice, or upon some form of majesty and beauty, and the being w^hich he had almost been ready to despise becomes radiant wdth divine light, — a splendid illustration of the power and love which pervade the world, and are best mani- fested in the mind and heart and bodv of man. The words of the Psalm are strong beyond our Eng- lish rendering of them. " Thou hast made hhn," we read, " a little lower than the angels ; " but the Psalmist sang, '• A little lower ilian God^ And, from first to last, the Bible speaks very bravely, and, if it were not the Bible, there are those who would say, with a certain audacity, of man. He is made in the image of God ; he is not merely a creature, but a son of God ; his na- ture and his capacity supplying the ground for that stern and persistent arraignment of him as a sinner, which makes the book so solemn ; for that steady prophecy of his redemption, which, as a line of light, threads the pages of Scripture, and makes them one, from Genesis to Eevelation. There is a revering and religious study of human nature and human character. The Eternal Light is not yet revealed, save in symbols and types, until it becomes the life of men. When dust w^as fashioned into man ; when, in the fulness of the times, after those long and w^eary though needful ages, whose record of vegetable and animal existences is w^ritten only on the rocks, man became a living soul, with speech for God and speech for his fellows, and knowledge and love and peace and the hope of immortality all infolded in his wondrous being, looking upward, looking forward, the w^orld's high priest, heaven's prophet from the first, — lo, at length the true light, an imperishable being in a perishing form ! Nature reveals God, but only to the soul of man. Only so much of that mystery as is already written ujjon our minds and hearts are we able to decipher, lentil the great astronomers come, there is no true celestial mechanism for man. God tells his thought to a favored soul, and then we find it in the universe, and praise the Creators wisdom, wrought into his works, — the crystal, the sunbeam, the sun. And the mind of man brings to hght no wonder so wondrous as the mind itself, though it were the humblest human intelligence. " Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings Thou hast 2^^rfected praise:' The argument for the divine attributes is radically incomplete until our own being has testified. " Doth God care for oxen ? " asks the earnest apostle to the Gentiles. Nay, it is upon man that he expends himself ; no creature between God and man is the teaching of the highest rehgion, the mystery of ages and generations, the revealed fact of the gospel ; and when we speak m the truest and highest strains, I do not say of what man is, but of what he was created to become, it may seem to the world that the good matter which we are inditing is a Messianic Psalm, though indeed we have regard only to our com- mon humanity. How this humanity, even in its ruins, witnesses for God, — reason, conscience, aspiration, affection, marvellous even then, — how indestructible is the moral nature ! how ineffaceable the moral image ! And thus far in the divine providence there have always been those to w4iom He has given most abun- dantly of the gifts which He denies altogether to none. He groups his children about one and another son of man. His revelations are through persons, his teachings through examples ; and, to our great joy and edification. He places before us those w^hom we can revere and love. There are w^ho tell us, that the age of great men is passed, and that we must reconcile ourselves hence- forth to ages of mediocrity, as to a new divine order ; that, at all events, by lifting up, if not by dragging down, we shall all find one level, — it maybe a very high one. Now, let us lift up men all we can ; let us try to instruct and inspire them unto individual manhood ; let us beUeve also, that, where princes fail us, there will be a certain mind and heart of the whole people, which, under the divine providence, shall devise and execute great things : and yet may God still grant us princes, heroes, giants, — crowning a portion of the sons of men with slorv and honor ! We do not want an earth with- out mountains, — a dead level w ith no peaks towering to heaven to welcome the morning splendor, to detain the lingering ray. The words, " Let us now ^jraise famous men,'' are written in the Apocrypha ; but they are good scripture nevertheless. There must be some w^ho are like cities set upon a hill. Toyalty needs to be guided, not eradicated. There is a grain of truth even in the Romish superstition of saint-worship. We want persons, not abstractions ; examx^les, not precepts ; truth incarnate, the body and the blood, the human word and w^ork, all the way onw^ard and upward, from the hum- blest of earth's children, through sages, seers, prophets, apostles, to that Express Image of the Divine Person, who, to meet this necessity of our being, was found in fashion as a man, bone of our bone, flesh of our flesh. Need I say, in this connection, that the highest ex- amples are instances of truth and love 1 and that, for this reason, the lowliest life may be more significant than the most exalted, the widow with her mite more than all the rich devotees of Jerusalem ? Whenever a singular fidelity does get before the world, from some hiding-place of love, it accomplishes a huge work ; but we must remember that in the providence of God this is not often the case, because, doubtless for some good end, He hides away his most splendid jewels, to bring them forth in the great day. Some of the grandest and sweetest moral qualities are of too private and domestic a character to be greatly useful as examples ; but, though the unknown good are hidden from us, God makes their graves as He made the grave of Moses, and their names are written upon the palms of his hands who knoweth all souls, and gathers about his throne alike the small and the great. Let the preacher use such examples of the humble, so far as he may be able, remembering Him who is no respecter of persons ; and let him not fail to testify out of his wide observation to the strength which is made perfect in weakness, and that some of the highest seats in heaven shall be filled by the lowliest of earth. jNevertheless, in order that a life may impress itself upon the world, it must be pro- jected in grand proportions ; it must stand forth of itself ; and it must not be needful for us to set upon a pedestal of our own making, the figure towards which we would turn the eyes of men : indeed, their gaze must already have been arrested and occupied, or the words that we may speak will have no power to detain them. The illustration must demand its sermon ; not the sermon its illustration, iind so even in the house of God, and on his day who is King of all the earth, not through might, not through wisdom, but simply through an omnipotent love, we must praise famous men, — those who have been crowned, in very high 8 degrees, with the glory and honor that are from God. They may be representative even when they are not exemplary ; tliey may praise God even when they mean not so, and are not truly wise ; as, alas ! is the case with so many, that we can hardly be thankful enough when power and love meet together to complete a human being, and wc find that our poet, artist, orator, states- man, was a good man. .My friends, I must try this morning to interpret and to fix the impression of a life which, in the providence of God, has been crowned with glory and honor before our own eyes. On the last Lord's Day, I spoke to you with such words as my grief left me, of a seat never unoccupied, save for a sufficient cause, — I said to you, Edward Everett is no more ! You already knew what I tried to tell : tidings so mournful need no herald. Not our city alone, his own city ; not our State alone, his own State, — but the whole Nation has mourned for him as nations do not always mourn for rulers ; even as of old " the children of Israel wept for Moses m the plains of Moab thirty days." I need not remind you of the touching events of the past week. The air still vi- brates with that sad and solemn music ; I hear it still, as when that sacred earth sank through the white robe of snow down into its kindred earth. I need not tell you how old and young, people of all classes and condi- tiuus, came forth, on that nineteenth day of the month, to follow all that was mortal of their great citizen to his grave. It was good to move in that solemn procession, and yet so hard to come back to home, to church, as on this day. and look in vain, and with eyes wondering as 9 well as sad, for the vanished form. But though we scarcely know how to reconcile ourselves to our loss, in a day which is not famed for great men, we will take up, as we may be able, the parable of his life. Happily for me, it does not need to be illuminated by the hand of genius. Edward Everett was born in the neighboring town of Dorchester, on the eleventh day of April, 1794; and when, before the dawn of the last Lord's day, the 15th of January, he breathed his last, nine months and four days had been added to his threescore years and ten. He was the third son and fourth child of the Rev. Oliver Everett, who had been pastor of the church on Church Green, in this city, for a little more than ten years, until the 27th of May, 1792, when, on account of insufficient health, he resigned his charge, and removed to Dorches- ter. I cannot, in this short hour, undertake to relate with any minuteness the story of this life, whose be- ginning and whose earthly ending I have set before you. I shall best secure the practical end which alone I propose, by passing rapidly from point to point of a career of which it would be hard to say, whether it Avas more distinguished by variety, and a certain encyclo- paedic character, than by the beautiful finish of each part. The tradition of his brig-ht bovhood is still livin«r and fresh. They say that he wore a sober look, but kept a merry heart, — a certain playfulness, which, as his nearest friends will tell you, never forsook him to the last. If you will run your eye down the list of our medal scholars, you will find his name amongst the bovs of what was called the North School in the year 1804, 2 10 iiiid on the record of the Latin School in the year 1806. You might have seen him also, during the former of these years, at a school in what, until quite lately, was calfed Short Street, now the lower part of Kingston Street, where, for a little while, he was a pupil of Dan- iel Webster. The spot is scarcely more than a stone's throw from this house. His preparation for college was finished at Exeter Academy ; and he became an undergraduate of Harvard in 1807. I met, on the day of his funeral, one of his classmates, who eagerly asked me to secure for him, in some way, a place in the church ; and he spoke, with an enthusiasm which age had not chilled, of the boy whom he recalled as they gathered in the college-yard for the usual examination, — his curls clustering about his fair brow ; the broad white collar turned back upon his shoulders ; every thing about him boylike, except his mind, and the light by which it beamed through his eyes, and the. plastic power by which it moulded his fine, classic face, — a boy to be heard from. Nay, in his case, prophecy became history almost as soon as it was uttered ; and, even in my day, one of the first things they told you of Cambridge was the story of that marvellous young scholar, a graduate at seventeen, and reading at eighteen to the chief lit- erary society of the University a striking poem, written a year before. Pass on a little, and you might have found him, perhaps some of you did find him, in this very church — I wish it had never been altered, the old was bet- ter — on the 21st of October, 1814, delivering an address at the funeral of llev. John Lovejoy Abbot, 11 who was for a short time pastor of this religious soci- ety. The audience will tell you that the speaker is the minister of the church in Brattle Square, our sister church, as the phrase was then. I have that address, and, though not ordinarily curious in pamphlets, I shall keep it. I find that Mr. Everett preached as a candi- date to the society which I have just referred to, on the 10th of December, 1813 ; was ordained on the 9th of February, 1814; and that he relinquished the place on the 5th of March, 1815 : a parochial ministry of only thirteen months, — brief episode, — sounding, when the elders tell us of it, almost like a dream in a life destined to be secular in its works, whilst conscientious and rev- erential in its aims ; and yet to come back at last, as to a first love, deepened, enlarged, uplifted, — to come back in spirit, if not in form, to the gospel's richest words, his last public utterances. The preacher is again a student, now, at a foreign university : a traveller also beyond the seas, journeying even to Greece, seeking for the beautiful in nature and in art, for men of letters and science, preparing for a brilliant university career as professor of the world's richest language and literature. Mr. Everett's work and fame, as a lecturer upon Grecian learning and art, would have been work and fame enough for many men who are accounted diligent and ambitious ; but a way was to be opened for him into a larger world than Cam- bridge and Boston supplied. In 1824, he took his place before a delighted ■ community as a great master of elo- quence. The occasion was a meeting of the Phi Beta Kappa Society of Harvard College ; the inspiration was / 12 the presence of La Fayette ; and the result was a rhetori- cal triumph, of which each succeeding effort has been almost, if not altogether, a repetition. He struck then the key-note of his life. We find him next, no longer professor, but legislator in our Nation's Congress ; and the work comes to him, as it is very hkely to come to men who have brains and hands and tools, and are willing to use them ; the work, though not always the wages ; and he finds time also — he had more of that than most men — to labor for the literature of a country, always so dear to him, as a con- tributor to the " North-American Review," of which he had been during some four years editor. In Congress, at this period, he was most honorably known for his exertions in behalf of the American Indians, the treat- ment of whom must be sadly reckoned amongst the great national sins of which w^e have never repented, and in which, I fear, we are still deeply involved. . Ten years of congressional duty having been com- pleted, the next four years are given to the governorship of our Commonwealth ; and, during that period, our State gained the great iron highway which binds the Hudson River to the Atlantic, the Board of Education, Normal Schools, scientific and agricultural surveys, and the movement towards a revision of the criminal law. He lost his election as governor, at last, by only one vote, and that, I am proud to say, on account of his zeal in the cause of temperance. But less than two years of comparative rest intervened between this term of honorable service and his establishment as our min- ister at the Court of St. James ; that, technically and^ 13 truly, and to good purpose ; but also, as the noble and much -honored representative of American culture in our mother-land. A few years more, and the ambas- sador is again in the midst of us, the head of our ancient university, — a position which proved less satis- factory to him than might have been expected, partly because the office, in that day at least, involved much routine work and police service, which must have been especially burdensome to a man who must do the least thing as thoroughly as the greatest. Scholar though he was, in every drop of his blood, he must have felt a deep sense of relief in escaping from that dignified drudgery, — that mediaeval and monastic life, — to find himself presently our national secretary of state, and directly thereupon one of our United-States senators. His Cuban letter, and his speech upon the aff"airs of Central America, belong to this period, and are splendid monuments to his statesmanslilp. I use the word de- liberately, because some have questioned his claim to this quality. Failing health drove him from his post at Washington ; but we soon find him again restored, and in the harness, his desire, perhaps we can hardly say his hope, being to rekindle the fires of patriotism through the length and breadth of our land, and to re- store the old landmarks, by reviving a fresh enthusiasm for the Father of our Country. You know the success — a success only rivalled by himself — which attended that grand movement, dating from the 2 2d of Feb- ruary, 1856, — I had not thought it was so long ago, and how truly, from that day forward, Mr. Everett has been spending his strength, or building himself up from 14 weakness and weariness, in the service of his country : striving at first to avert the catastrophe, which, beyond most of us here, and against the impressions of many of us here, he knew to be impending, and, when the fatal hour struck, losing not a moment to spring like a true soldier to his post, ready to do battle for the Govern- ment against all comers, though they were old friends. Glorious last years ! Let them control the interpre- tation of whatsoever in the past may have offended or perplexed any. The expounders of Scripture say, that we must follow, in our exposition, what they call the analogy of Scripture, and let one part limit the rest. Let these last illumined scriptures be our guide, and in- terpret for us the entire record of our friend. Read, too, in this connection, the oration pronounced at Cam- bridge, on the 26tli of August, 18'2-i. Let the orator remind you again, that " no strongly marked and high- toned literature, poetry, eloquence, or philosophy ever appeared, but under the pressure of great interests, great enterprises, perilous risks, and dazzling rewards. Statesmen and warriors and poets and orators and artists start up under one and the same excitement. Thev are all branches of one stock. ... It is as truly tlic sentiment of the student in the recesses of his cell, as of the soldier in the ranks, which breathes in the exclamation, — ' To all the sons of sense proclaim, One glorious hour of cromhd life Is worth an age without a name.' " What a grand illustration of the speaker's words is siii)plied by his own utterances, during these four 15 troubled years ; by his admirable expositions of the right and wrong in our great struggle ; by his most successful efforts to justify to the world a conflict so terrible ; by his masterly and tender pleas for justice to the sufferers, for charity towards the erring, for the good which alone overcomes evil ! We can hardly speak extravagantly of the service which he has ren- dered to our country in these years. His words were weighty. He spoke not as a politician or partisan or office-holder, but as a citizen whose public services and liiah character entitled him to be heard. He under- stood, as few men did, the thoughts and feelings of both parties in this contest. May we not apply to him what Merivale, in his " History of the Romans under the Empire," tehs us of Cicero, that "he really swayed the commonwealth, not by the splendor of office or the terror of the impcrium, but by the influence of his character and the charm of his genius " ] He was mag- nanimous enough to admit, that he had been too much inclined to concessions and compromises. Let us hope that this magnanimity will find its counterpart in the hearty admission, on the part of all who have ever questioned it, that he was thoroughly conscientious in his fears as to the inevitable results of the agitations of the last twenty years, and that he understood the tem- per and plans of the South better than the majority of persons at the North. I may be permitted to allude, in this connection, to an interview which I had with him as the time drew near for the execution of John Brown. I had inquired of him about the possibility of his ob- taining a commutation of Brown's sentence, simply as a .6 matter of public policy ; leaving out of sight the ques- tion, whether the convicted man should be regarded as a criminal or an enthusiast. He had already thought deeply and tenderly of the matter ; " but," said he, " it is impossible : the Southern people would suffer nothing of the kind at the hands of their governors ; few men here understand the condition of excitement which pre- vails there ; few men there understand the agitation here ; and, if any one simply describes things as they are, he is called timid, and his word is criticised as be- neath the demands of the hour." Time has proved that he spake as one who knew. You know the last : the eloquence of love and pity that clothed the lips for which death was already preparing his fatal seal ; the gospel light that beamed from the eyes that were soon to be closed for ever; and that, Avhen the final summons came, he was found clothed in the strong and beautiful armor of his Lord. I have necessarily told but the least part of my story. I have crossed no threshold. I cannot do so, were it only out of regard to that exceeding sensitiveness of our friend, which never allowed him to bring much into the outer world what was dearest and holiest, a sensitive- ness which was sometimes mistaken for coldness. But, even without this partial and feeble showing, I should be entitled to ask those before whose eyes he has lived his lon^ life, whether there is not very much here to be thankful for, and very much to take example from. Every good and perfect gift is from above, and comes from I Tim who crowns us with glory and honor; and here was a marvellously gifted man. To move the 17 world in which he lived, by the living, spoken word, — that, so it seems to me, was his calling-, pnrsued from boyhood to age ; and he was nobly furnished forth to discharge it. He was capable of much else ; much else he did admirably : but this was his special function amongst men. His intellect was vigorous, various, judicial, and judicious too, singularly discerning of the boundaries beyond which, in things secular or sacred, useful knowledge becomes useless, and wise thoughts become guesses and speculations ; his imagination was at once active and chastened ; his memory almost a miracle, both for its quickness and its retentiveness ; " his doctrine dropped like rain, his speech distilled like the dew ; " his voice was low and sweet, his presence winning and commanding. Only yesterday, one told me of the impression which his spoken word, of which she did not comprehend a letter, made upon her, when, as a very little child, she looked up into his youthful face from one of those pews. We are apt, through some strange fallacy, to think of fine speakers as of persons who have not much to say ; their flowers without stems, their branches without stock and root, their " sheeny vans " bearing up and bearing on little more than nothingness. Because the solid are often very dull, we conclude that those who certainly are not dull can- not be solid. And, if you turn to the orations of Mr. Everett, you will not, indeed, find yourself carried be- yond your depth and his ; you will not find metaphysical puzzles, or sayings too hard for a mere hearer to com- prehend : but you will find the soundest sense set to the sweetest music, abundant and various thought, a 18 plenitude of facts, always pertinent, always exact, — you Avill wonder whence they all came. When common things must be said, as they often must be, they are said in a plain way. We are not carried about, hither and thither, to find at last only what might have been shown us at first, — English wisdom and knowledge, with a musical utterance to which the stammering Englishman seldom attains ! Not an explorer, discoverer, pioneer, certainly, in the realms of thought ; too various, versa- tile, many-sided, to be that, he has yet deserved, what so many have in our country without deserving, the praise of high and thorough scholarship, — scholarship that would have been, and has been, recognized abroad as well as at home : and, as I have already intimated, he won, during the few short months of his secretaryship, the well-merited reputation of a vigorous originality, and gave to the nation a diplomatic word Avhich is des- tined to be very serviceable in time to come. Until the last years, rather a fascinating than a thrilling orator, he nevertheless carried his point when there was a point to be carried : so, conspicuously, in the Mount- Vernon enterprise, in his great charity addresses, in his effort for the people of East Tennessee ; in his masterly war sermons, in which mercy and truth meet together ; in that last appeal, which shall prove eff'ectual in so many ways, — though we dare not think of the cost, and that his hfe went with the gift. He seems not to have been so well fitted for debate, and for the collisions of party politics. He did not like to take blows, and liked still less to give them. He could not bear to be assailed in ])ublic ; and this was not strange, when the 19 assailant was one who was swift beyond the rest to commend his word in private. He could not avoid seeing the other side, even when it made him a poor advocate of his own. Tlie new evils which his cantion, and knowledge of the world's history, compelled him to anticipate, made him tolerant — over -tolerant, I think — of old mischiefs ; bnt when, in the marvellous provi- dence of God, it had become plain to him that country, liberty, humanity, were at stake in an elemental struggle, then, leaving it for others to make out his consistency, and to interpret old words, and to explain him to old friends, — believing that death and life were set before him and his, he chose life: and he shall live in the new life of our land, wearing, amongst the foremost, the crown of glory and honor. Let us thank the gra- cious Giver, who so endowed, — the mighty Helper, who so strengthened him. I said that, with much to be thankful for, there was also much to take example from, in this life. There are those who, forasmuch as God is good and helpful, suffer Him to do for them abundantly, in all ways save in that high Avay by which He would make them workers with Him, and sufferers with his Son. Living indolent and self-indulgent lives, they may be wonders, but they are not examples ; oftener, they are only beacons to warn us lest we make shipwreck. Mr. Everett was emphatically a worker, — a man of iron industry; I should say, one of the most persistent and thorough men that ever wrought. Doubtless he had great powers ; but he used them, — I fear that he over-used them. No slenderly endowed but ambitious student M^as ever more laborious than he. 20 and, of course, his great faculty was always growing greater. Industry was a part of his genius, and the best part, as it ever is. There was something quite ad- mirable in the methodical diligence which enabled him to be complete in the smallest matters ; in the hand- writing, for example, of a note to a friend as much as in the rounding of a period : even as the little flower goes forth perfect as the mighty planet, from the crea- tive hand. Compare the discourse preached in this church, to which I have referred, with the oration de- livered ten years later, and you will see how the young man had grown, as young men do not grow who scoif at the diligent, and content themselves with a boy's fame, and with the fruits that can be gathered by those who only stir the surface of a rich soil, and never lay their hands to the plough, day by day, to drive the share deep and give the ground no rest. What he found to do, he did with his might. Was it a humble work ] It did not matter : it was well done. You may not have noticed, that some of the books used in our over-praised schools seem to have been written to puzzle and mis- lead the pupils. Mr. Everett found this out, and might often have been seen, in his home, doing the work of a primary-school teacher ; and I am sure that it was never better done. I love to dwell upon this thoroughness, because the world is so full of ragged work, and raw edges, and lame performances ; because, in our hurried way of life, small things are so much neglected, and that by those who have only the shadow of greatness for their excuse. T call him o-reat in a serviceable and human way ; his greatness, of a kind to be followed ; a leader, and yet not out of sight and reach. 21 And what was given to him as truth, he translated into life. It was a good and living and growing tree, and it brought forth rich fruit ! Conscience, faith, hope, love, were in him, and went forth from him. Conscience was in him, and he obeyed that monitor. I am not compelled to seek apologies, to-day, for a areat bad man. He ceased to be a Christian minister ; but he did not cease to be a Christian man. AVhat political assailant ever dared to deny, by so much as a hint, that his life was exemplary and sweet ? His moral quality was so excellent, that he can afford to have the truth told about him. Even those who may express the wish that he had manifested, his life long, the outspoken bravery of these last years, will see rea- son to admit that he was far more conscientious in his caution, which was constitutional, and in his seeming timidity, which was an exceeding physical sensitiveness, than many who found fault with him. The event has proved that he foreknew more than his critics, and, ac- cordingly, having foreseen the evil, as they did not, was better prepared to meet it than they were. It is a note- worthy fact that the man who was thought by some to be so over-cautious before our war began, never spoke of it doubtingly — no, not in a solitary instance — after that time ; was never found to vacillate between cheer- ing or desponding utterances, as the tide of battle surged this way or that, as some who had been brave talkers did. Does not this show that he had taken high counsel all alons^ 1 I am told that after the first S'veht disaster of the war, the battle at Bull Run, he read through the disheartenino- and disgraceful details care- 9'> fully, quietly, and laid aside the sheet with the simple ejaculation, " The Lord reigncth ! " Faith, too, was in him : so much of it, that his vig- orous intellect confessed, that, of things hoped for, this must be the substance, — that of things not seen, this must be tlic evidence. He could not abide men who came resolving mysteries. He lived in trust, not stirring much the highest themes : believing that trees thrive best when their roots are not bared to the ele- ments, and to the rough tread of the husbandman, he did not love to translate beliefs into opinions, religion into theology, or willingly set himself to discuss themes that are so much hidden ; he disliked novelties in re- ligion, and preferred the light of the stars to any meteoric splendors ; old paths, old truths, old prayers, old hymns, old tunes, were very dear to him ; he was a genuine New-Englander, and yet had none of that New-England shamefacedness — the result, perhaps, of a re-action against Puritanism — which hinders so many noble men — pity that it should ! — from saying their prayers in their families, or from coming to the table of the Holy Communion. He believed in public worship. T hope that I do not violate any sanctuary privilege, in reading to you a very few lines from a note, touching this matter, which he was so kind as to address to me : " There is no w^eather, in this climate, which furnishes a decent excuse for a man in health, living as near as I do to the church, for absenting himself. But I wish no excuse, as I go from inclination. Two short seasons in the week, for tlie brain to rest, is very little. The time spent in the church is pleasantly and profitably passed." 23 An old-fashioned worshipper, truly ; one who was will- ing in the house of God to rest his brain, and to uplift his heart ! For that twice coming of his, Avhich you know to have been habitual, I am more grateful than I can tell you. I am glad that the second service lasted as long as he had need of it ; I hope it will last out my time, though it will revive the sense of our loss to come here, and look in vain for one who never failed us. Hope and love, too, were in him : hope for the world, — you will find it everywhere in his speeches ; love which, at home, was most devoted and habitual, and which went forth, in every good cause, seeking to in- spire efforts for social improvement, — for the elevation, in all ways, of the plane of man s life. As his voice was ready to plead for charities, so his hand was open to bestow them, and that in quiet and undemonstrative, as well as public ways. But I must come to an end : the speaker, though not the theme, may well have become ere this a weariness to you. Three short weeks ago, we were gathered to ask what the New Year might have of mercies or of trials, and how the hoping or anxious heart might best stay upon God. He was with us then. One sorest trial has already come, and in an hour when we looked not for it. The land mourns. It has no great men to lose ; none who, being able and willing to do justice to all, can, in the end, make even their enemies to be at peace with them. The church mourns ; for the church, also, has none to lose : it is at best, in these days, but a little flock, and can ill spare such a one from its fold. I will not pretend that the burden of this sorrow has yet 24 been lifted from my heart ; nay, I think that we shall all come to feel it more and more. And yet I know that God is good, and that great and small go forth only at his word, and that we had no right to look for more service from one who had already filled the days — yes, the hours — of more than half a century with labors. I can almost hear him saying to us, in the words of the old Book which he loved : '' I go the way of all the earth ; he thou strong, therefore, and shotv thj- self a man ! " — a man to serve thy country, to minister unto thy fellows, to stir up the gift that is in thee, to do justly and love mercy, to improve the passing moment which is thine, to be faithful in small things as in great, to follow Christ, to worship God. Let us be still, — that, in the stillness which the Lord hath made, we may hear the word of this solemn hour, and it shall not be all loss to us, that he who was crowned with glory and honor on earth, has been crowned, as we trust, with immortality in heaven. 25 APPENDIX. ADDRESS. We are on our way to commit to the earth all that was mortal of a great and good and justly famous man ; a man so great, so good, so famous, that the honors decreed for him by the head of the nation will be most gratefully rendered, and that to the very letter of the decree, " at home and abroad, wherever the national name and authority are recognized." We have paused for a few moments, and laid down our bur- den within these consecrated walls, — so familiar and dear to him who has gone from us, — that we may acknowledge the Giver of Life, the Father of him who is the resurrection and the life, the best and the only comforter. It is for this that we are here ; believing that our burden will be lightened, for hands which are so ready to hang down, if only we can obtain help from God. And yet, before we seek the refuge of prayer, in the name and the faith of Christ, a word must be spoken to this great company — a word from heart to heart — of him whom you revered and admired and loved ; for I am sure that the most halting speech, so it be sincere, will do more justice than silence to the spirit of this hour, so solemn and yet so rich in memories and in hopes. In these few and swiftly-passing moments, I cannot tell the story of this grandly completed life, as full of works as of days, from its boyhood, mature as manhood, to its age, vigorous as youth. I may not attempt 4 26 any analysis of this fine intellect, or try to explore with you the hiding-places of this great power. I shall undertake no delineation of a character which was always most admired by those who were brought nearest to it ; and which, like some of the works of the most conscientious artists, was most finished where it made the least show. We are on our way to a grave, and our words must be few, and they may be very simple ; for, uppermost in our minds and abounding in our hearts, are proud and grateful thoughts of the departed, which the tongue of the most unlettered might tell. What is it, friends, that has made this man so very dear to the people ? I do not say to scholars, to the few, but to the people ; yea, their foremost citizen in these times, when God has made " a man more precious than fine gold, even a man than the golden wedge of Ophir." Why is the announce- ment of his sudden death by the President of the United States only the utterance of a nation's sorrowing heart ? I answer, — you answer, — not merely because he was your scholar, and a ripe and good one ; not merely because he was your orator, — one of the most eloquent and instructive ot men, your chief speaker for every grand and good occasion ; not merely because of his life-long service to letters and to the education of the people ; not merely because of his labors for the State, at home and abroad, in ordinary times, honor- able, admirable as he ever was in these things ; but because, in the hour of sore trial, and when the nation's very life hung in the balance, and patriotism was something more than an idle word for the trifler to ring changes upon, he has proved himself to be, first, last, only, and altogether, a patriot, — an American indeed in whom was no guile, resolved, at all costs to himself of old friendships, if need be, of old prejudices, our costliest possessions, to do his whole duty to the land and the people of his afi"ections, as to the mother that bore him and nourished him, and led him up to his grand and serviceable 27 manhood. I mean no disparagement of former services ; nay, where some might criticise, I should justify ; and yet, on this day of his solemn burial, I say honor to this large, this regal soul, which could not sacrifice itself to obsolete ideas, or go about with the dead burying their dead, or crush the throb- bing life of to-day under any old traditions : honor to him who could see that old principles may demand new methods, and that the wisdom of yesterday may be the folly of to-day. During these grand historic years, — years in which many an hour has been worth whole months of commonplace exist- ence, — with the rest of the nation, he has been passing through the refiner's fire ; and you have found, dear friends, to your joy, — for nothing refreshes and delights us so much as to be able to reverence and admire and love, — you have found that the finest gold was in him ; that he was more than your great scholar, more than your great orator, more than your trusted statesman and diplomatist ; that he was your great citizen and your brother-man, your country his coun- try, your political faith his political faith, — not a man to babble garrulously of foreign despotisms, but a lover and a servant of our republican institutions ; his heart throbbing with your hearts, and alive with sacred national memories, and precious hopes for humanity sighing to be uplifted and redeemed. How manly, how consistent, how steadfast, how unwearied, has he been, in all his glorious speaking and doing, from the first moment when our nation's life was assailed, to that day so fatal to us, but so honorable to him, when, weighed down as he was by sickness, and already entering into the deatii-shadow, he asked help in such elo- quent words for those who, as we hope, are ceasing to be our enemies, in the name of that holy and sweet charity which St. Paul, inspired by our Lord, hath taught us, saying, " If thine enemy hunger, feed him." So he took up, in the time of his age, and for his last public act, the sacred office which 28 he had laid down in youth, and was found at the last a gospel preacher. When the history of our nation's regeneration shall be written, — and it will be an illuminated record ; when victory and peace, which are as sure to be ours as that the sun burns in the heavens, shall be the reward of patient struggle, — no name shall shine out more brightly upon the page, or be pronounced more thankfully by the lips, than the name of him for whom we both rejoice and mourn to-day. In these last great years, we have seen the beauty, we have breathed in the fragrance, of the fair, consummate flower of a noble plant. Never has the bright sun of his life shone with such refulgent brightness as when it neared the setting, but was even more a giant than when it climbed the morning sky. And all this strength was blended with so much gentleness, all this earnest speech was so free from bitterness and wrath, all this public virtue was bound up with so much private worth and household love and Christian faith ! Alas that his day must needs come ! Strange, when so many only cumber the earth, and eat and drink, but do 7wt die to-mor- row ! Alas ! that we are here and without him, with only this sacred dust, — precious, indeed, in our sight, and to be borne away most tenderly, and yet so sadly reminding us that himself is gone. Alas ! for our necessity is still so great, and our counsellor was so wise and so noble, so pru- dent and so charitable, so thoroughly furnished for the hour. Would, we say, that God, who hath an eternity to give from, had given more time to him who knew so well how to redeem time ! And yet, my friends, who are we that we should reply against God ? and hath the Christ been so long time with us, and have we not yet learned to trust utterly in tlie Divine Providence, — in Him that taketh away, as well as in Him that giveth ; in Him who said by the lips of his own dear Son, " Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone; but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit"? 29 Let us rather give thanks for tlie life in the light of which we have lived, and which God hath crowned with glory and honor and immortality, for its years of devotion to the things w^hich are highest and holiest: stricken, bereaved, let us bow reverently and submissively to the Divine decree, and have no will but that Will which is for ever Love : let us have faith that, with His blessing who appoints for us our works and our days, and meteth out our span with an unerring wisdom, there shall come forth life from this death, beauty from these ashes, life and beauty for earth as well as for heaven. Being dead, he doth yet speak to us, if only we have open ears, more eloquently than even he, worthy to be named with the most famous masters of speech since the world began, could speak to us, being yet alive. But why do I say, " being dead " ? seeing that the righteous live for evermore, seeing that their reward is with the Lord, and the care of them with the most High ; and that, below and above, He giveth to them a beautiful kingdom, and a glorious crown, and an abiding ministry. Honor to the dead ! and what fitter honor can we pay to the dead than by consecrating ourselves, about these remains, to that dear country, whose holy cause he who is gone can plead no longer, in the name of Humanity, of Christ, of God ? to whom, in death and in life, be glory for ever and ever ! Amen. A meeting of the Standing Committee of the First Church was held at the office of Messrs. J. E. Thayer and Brother, on Monday, the sixteenth day of January, 18G5. The Chairman, Thomas B. Wales, Esq., with appropriate remarks, announced the recent decease of the Hon. Edward Everett. On motion of N. Thayer, Esq., it was — 30 Voted, That Messrs. G. W. Messinger and S. L. Abbot be, and hereby are, requested to draw up resolutions expressive of the sorrow of this Committee for the decease of their late valued friend and fellow-worshipper, Edward Everett, and report the same at an adjourned meeting of this Committee. On motion of G. "W. Messinger, Esq., it was — Voted, That the Clerk be, and hereby is, directed to invite Messrs. J. Putnam Bradlee, Turner Sargent, Edward Austin, George W. Wales, Edward Frothingham, Samuel H. Gookin, George 0. Shattuck, and Joseph L. Henshaw, to unite with this Committee for the purpose of making arrangements for the obsequies of the late Hon. Edward Everett, at the church in Chauncy Street, on the 19 th instant. The meeting then adjourned, to meet at the same place on Tuesday, the 17th, at 1, p.m. At a meeting of the Standing Committee and of members of the congregation of the First Church, held on the seven- teenth day of January, A.D. 1865, — Thomas B. Wales, Chairman, and George 0. Harris, Secre- tary, — a Committee, consisting of George W. Messinger and Samuel L. Abbot, appointed at a previous meeting, submitted the following preamble and resolutions, which were unani- mously adopted : — Whereas it has pleased the All-Wise Disposer of events to remove from us, by sudden death, our esteemed fellow-worshipper and beloved friend, Edward Evekett, — And whereas we wish to put on record an expression of our sense of the great private worth which distinguished him no less than his pu])lic virtues, therefore be it — Resolved, That by his decease the members of the First Church and Congregation have lost one strongly endeared to them by the association which has bound them together as worshippers for many years jjast. Resolved, That we gratefully recall the constant interest which 31 oui' departed friend took in the welfare of our venerable society, — an interest which he manifested to the last, by his regular attendance on the oiRces of the sanctuary. Eesolved, That we shall always hold his example in precious remembrance, as of one, who, while he dignified our nation, espe- cially in her hour of trial, by his unselfish patriotism, humanity, and generous devotion to the cause of republican liberty, was no less distinguished for the humility, purity, and Christian excellence of his private life. Resolved^ That these resolutions be placed on the records of the First Church, and that a copy be transmitted to the family of the deceased, with the assurance of our most tender sympathy in this hour of their heavy bereavement. George O. Harris, Secretary. It was then Voted, That the Clerk cause a copy of the foregoing resolutions to be published in the " Daily Adver- tiser," '^Journal," and "Transcript;" and, further, a Sub- committee, consisting of Messrs. G. W. Messinger, T. B. Wales, and J. Putnam Bradlee, were appointed to make the necessary arrangements at the church for the funeral cere- monies : and all proposed to be then present, and render their assistance on that sad occasion. The meeting then adjourned, to meet at the vestry, on Chauncy Street, at 10 o'clock, Thursday morning. The Standing Committee, with the members of the con- gregation invited to join them, convened at the vestry, on Thursday, as adjourned. J. Putnam Bradlee was there chosen to act as marshal inside the house ; and the other members disposed themselves as assistants, to conduct to their appro- priate seats the Officers of the State and City Governments, and of Harvard University, Judges of the Courts, Officers of the Army and Navy, and delegations from numerous societies and associations, that attended the funeral ceremonies, fillina: the lower pews of the house. 32 Sunday, Jan. 22. The Standing Committee met on Sunday, immediately- after divine service in the afternoon, and, by unanimous vote, requested the Chairman and Clerk, Messrs, Wales and Harris, to call on the Rev. Rufus Ellis, and, thanking him, in the name of the Committee, for his eloquent and appropriate discourse upon the life and character of the late Mr. Everett, to request a copy of the same for publication, together with his address on the day of the funeral, to be appended, thereto. Geo. 0. Harris, Clerk. THE LIFE, SERYICES, AND CHARACTER OF EDWARD EVERETT: % 3txman PREACHED IN THE FIRST CHURCH, JAN. 22, 1865. BY RUFUS ELLIS, MINISTER OF THK FIKST ClirKCH. Wiit\} an '^ppenliti, CONTAINING The Action of First Church on the Occasion ojc the Death ok Mr. Everett. AND THE Address of the Pastor at the Public Funeral, Xhuesday, the 19th of January. 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