M-IT708 
 P28 
 1884 
 
 Part on 
 
 Address delivered at the 
 sixteenth anniversary of the 
 Presbyterian Hospital. 
 
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5 
 
 9 4574 
 
 DDKESS 
 
 i 
 
 DELIVERED AT THE 
 
 Sixteenth Anniversary 
 
 PEESBYTERIAI HOSPITAL 
 
 REV. JOHN R. PAXTON, D.D., 
 
 IN THE 
 
 West Pkesbytebiajs" Ghueoh, 
 
 December ljf, 188 4. 
 
 NEW YORK : 
 TROWS PRINTING AND BOOKBINDING CO, 
 
 201-213 East Twelfth Street. 
 1884 
 
 wzKp.v, g" 
 
ADDKESS 
 
 DELIVERED AT THE 
 
 Sixteenth Anniversary 
 
 PRESBYTERIAN HOSPITAL 
 
 REV. JOHN R. PAXTON, D.D., 
 
 IN THE 
 
 West Pkesbytekian Church, 
 
 December lJf, 1884- 
 
 NEW YORK: 
 TROWS PRINTING AND BOOKBINDING CO., 
 
 301-213 East Twelfth Street. 
 1884. 
 
^THE NEW YORK 
 PUBLIC LIBRARY 
 
 824574 
 
 ASTOR LENOX AND ! 
 JTli-DEN FOUNDATIONS jj 
 R 1918 
 
 W-COLLEOTIOf* 
 
ADDRESS. 
 
 Mohammed and all prophets of religion, all priests of ^science, 
 all doctors of philosophy, all benefactors of mankind, must still 
 go to Mount Sinai. The) 7 must march past it, salute it, and stand 
 at attention, until, from its solemn top, encircled with fire and 
 smoke, they receive orders for the line of march to the Prom- 
 ised Land. 
 
 No modern engineering has been able to build a highway for 
 the nations of the earth, that cut off Mount Sinai, and left it for- 
 saken, forgotten, out of use. Nay, there is no highway to any 
 Promised Land of civilization and progress, of public welfare 
 and private worth, that does not still run hard by Sinai. Moses 
 survives, Mount Sinai has not ceased to burn, and the decalogue 
 still powerfully affects the destinies of mankind. 
 
 But Mount Sinai gives us no hospital. In the flight from Egypt, 
 woe to the foot-sore, woe to the exhausted, woe to the sunstruck 
 Israelite. There was no ambulance corps, no field hospital, no 
 surgeon and stretcher-bearers. He perished in the wilderness, 
 a carcase that fell by the way ; for only the well kept up on the 
 march, only the strong survived to enter the Promised Land. 
 We are debtors to the Jews. The Monotheistic faith, a spiritual 
 worship, a Sabbath Day, the sacredness of human life, the fam- 
 ily, enduring laws, we owe to the Jews, but not the hospital. 
 Drive the lepers out of the city, unpitied and un cared for. 
 Hide in the tombs, and seek your food by night like a wild beast 
 of prey, you poor creature of Gadara, for there is no help for 
 you in the synagogue, no refuge, pity, or medicine for your 
 
mind diseased in all the land. It was that way in all the world; 
 no hospital anywhere in Judea, or in Greece, or in Rome. The 
 wise God had revealed himself to the Jews as justice and right- 
 eousness. The unknown God had given Greece some tokens of 
 his presence in wisdom and beauty, and in Rome he was recog- 
 nized in virtue, valor, and order. But nowhere had the Divine 
 Nature been disclosed as pre-eminently a God of tenderness, coin- 
 passion, and love. But patience : the Son of Mary, whom we 
 adore as the Son of God, is even now on his way to the forlorn 
 outcast of Gadara, the land of Zabulon, Galilee beyond Jordan ; 
 the people which sat in darkness are about to see a great, new, 
 strange light. Jesus has left Nazareth, taken in John's baptism 
 by the way, returned from the wilderness, and now a new voice 
 is heard on the earth. At last the lame and the lepers, the 
 blind and the deaf, the wounded and diseased, have found a 
 Healer, a Helper, an Advocate and Friend. Humanity is born, 
 Philanthropy has been added to the vocabulary of mankind, the 
 first Hospital has received its charter, and henceforth the bruised 
 reed and smoking flax must neither be broken nor quenched. 
 For Jesus Christ is on his travels through Galilee, from Decapolis 
 to Jerusalem, not only teaching in the synagogue, but healing 
 all manner of sickness and disease among the people. Let 
 the blind man at the temple gate take heart of hope. Let the 
 impotent man at the pool of Bethesda wait in patience, not for 
 the moving of the waters, but for the coming of Jesus Christ, for 
 it shall be well with both of them now, and for all the blind and 
 bedridden after them, in every land, when Jesus comes. Brother 
 men, we are grateful to God for Mount Sinai ; we are grateful to 
 God for all men who have advanced the world, enriched the world, 
 adorned the world ; grateful for all poets who have sung to us, 
 for all scientists who have enlarged the boundaries of human 
 knowledge, for all philosophers and artists who have made us 
 wise, and refined our sense of the beautiful. But above all and 
 before all, we are grateful for Jesus of Nazareth, who enriched 
 the world by the disclosure of a new nature in God, and added 
 the new religion of humanity and love to mankind. 
 L The first hospital ever established on this earth, was in an inn, 
 
somewhere on the road leading from Jerusalem to Jericho. 
 Jesus Christ founded it — by the word of his mouth. A certain 
 Samaritan was its first patron and benefactor, and a wounded 
 man, picked up on the highway, robbed and half dead, was its 
 first patient. True, it was a long time before the second hos- 
 pital was erected and endowed ; but the idea had been born, the 
 duty was known, the will was ready, but how to perform was 
 not yet clear, while a Pagan Csesar ruled the world. When St. 
 Paul was stoned at Lystra, and left for dead outside the city, or 
 when he was scourged at Thyatira, there was no police to ring 
 for an ambulance, and no hospital where his wounds could be 
 dressed. When Eutychus, in Troas, fell asleep under Paul's long 
 preaching, sitting in a window, and fell out, and was taken up 
 for dead, there was nothing to be done, noplace to receive him— 
 nothing, except for the apostle whom Eutychus had mortified 
 by going to sleep under his sermon, to leave off and go down 
 and restore him to life : a generous and magnanimous act, I must 
 say, by the preacher he had insulted by falling asleep. Csesar 
 and his proconsuls cared for the living and the well, but made 
 no provision for the wounded and the sick. Csesar gave the 
 world laws, walls, roads, aqueducts, but no place for Eutychus 
 of Troas. No hospital with an accident ward, and surgeon in 
 charge to set a broken bone, or bandage a bleeding wound. 
 When Julius Csesar fell at the base of Pompey's statue, in the 
 senate chamber, the capital of the world could not furnish its 
 foremost man, its greatest conqueror, that timely aid to stop his 
 bleeding wounds, which we now extend to our meanest citizen, to 
 our lowest man. Rome had temples and statues sublime enough 
 to make an atheist pray. Rome had fountains and baths, gal- 
 leries and gardens, arches and amphitheatres, columns and porti- 
 coes, palaces and public buildings, that make all modern works 
 of man look mean, little, ignoble, and ugly. But though there 
 was everything for the living, and solemn rites too for the dead, 
 there was absolutely nothing, no provision made, no care given 
 to the maimed, the blind, the unfortunate, and the sick. But, 
 patience ! the hospital is on its way. The good Samaritan has 
 already set a wounded man on his own beast and brought him 
 
to an inn. Patience ! Jesus Christ has ascended, but St. Paul 
 has arrived at Antioch. Patience ! the new religion of humanity 
 is on its way to Pome. The bruised reed shall soon be cared 
 for — the smoking flax shall soon cease to be quenched. The 
 hospitals of every land are not the children of science, or the 
 product of advancing civilization, but the sole creations of Chris- 
 tianity. 
 
 Therefore, what place more appropriate than a Christian 
 church to consider the hospital, and what subject more congen- 
 ial to a Christian pulpit than the duty of Christian men and 
 women caring for the sick and wounded, the destitute and infirm, 
 in these hospitals and asylums, which owe their existence to 
 Jesus Christ? 
 
 We are met together to-night to commemorate the Sixteenth 
 Anniversary of the Presbyterian Hospital of this city. "We are 
 here to bless God for its foundation ; to thank Him, in the name 
 of afflicted and suffering humanity, for the pains it has cured, for 
 the wounds it has healed, for the sick it has restored to health. 
 We are here to rejoice together over the record of its past service, 
 over its present efficiency, and to take counsel together for en- 
 larging its capacity, increasing its usefulness, and extending the 
 sphere of its beneficent ministry in this great city. We are 
 here to remember with gratitude the Christian men and women 
 of our Presbyterian faith who originated, it, established it, and 
 with large liberality started it on its career of steady progress. 
 Especially do we recall one name among its founders, the name 
 of a man who rendered this city more than one notable service, 
 a man who gave to this hospital more than a million and a quar- 
 ter of money if we rate the land at its present value, and yet his 
 generosity, only surpassed by his modesty, refused to the hospital 
 his own name. " Let it be called the Presbyterian Hospital ! " 
 Why ? you may ask. Is it because only Presbyterians are re- 
 ceived into its wards ? Not at all, but simply because it was 
 founded and endowed by Presbyterians, and is still almost ex- 
 clusively maintained by Presbyterians. 
 
 It is only Presbyterian in name — as Mount Sinai is Jewish, 
 as St. Luke's is Episcopalian — for its doors are wide open to all 
 
7 
 
 comers alike. It makes no distinctions on account of race, reli- 
 gion, or color. It is a hospital of humanity in its services to the 
 sick and wounded. It is Presbyterian in name because Pres- 
 byterians established it, support it, are proud of it, and mean 
 to maintain it by their gifts, by their sympathy, by their care 
 and prayers. In a word, it is our own child, and we know what 
 Scripture says about a man who does not provide for his own. 
 For my part, I like the name. It's a good name ; it's a venerable 
 name ; it's a name that smells sweet in any community ; it's a 
 name that no one need be ashamed of in any company ; it's a 
 name that stands for an honorable and God-fearing ancestry on 
 both sides of the sea ; it's a name with a history in wars for lib- 
 erty, in defence of truth, in struggles for rights of free conscience 
 and noble service to mankind ; aye, I glory in the name of 
 Presbyterian, for that means no weathercock of a man, blowu 
 about by every wind of doctrine, but a man with a conscience 
 for truth and set four square to all winds that blow. Let the 
 banner over our hospital continue to be blue, and the old apos- 
 tolic name — Presbuteros — continue to adorn it. But dismiss 
 forever the notion so erroneous, so mistaken, that there is any- 
 thing sectarian or exclusive in the use or service of the hospital. 
 Nay, all sufferers are welcome at its doors, to its Christian care, 
 with the consolations of religion ministered by those of their 
 own faith, whether Protestant teacher, Jewish rabbi, or Romish 
 priest. The other day I walked through its wards, and on its 
 beds I saw the black man, the Italian, the Bohemian, the Irish- 
 man ; all classes, all races, all colors represented. Understand, 
 then, that our hospital invites all, receives all, cares for all, only 
 limited by its capacity and means. During the last year, among 
 those treated in the hospital six hundred and ninety-three were 
 .Roman Catholics ; and of the eight hundred and forty Protest- 
 ants treated, of all names and sects, not one in ten was a Pres- 
 byterian. That shows how sectarian we are. Why, the truth is, 
 we are not denominational enough. "We lack a proper Church 
 pride. We do not have enough esprit du corps. We are too 
 catholic, too diffuse in our charities ; we weed other people's 
 gardens, and sometimes neglect our own ; we care for the vine- 
 
yards of other people or churches, and our own vineyard have 
 we not kept: for there is no Church in this land has done and 
 is doing so much for unsectarian charities and causes. It is 
 high time we looked after a vine of our own planting. By Pres- 
 byterian I mean the Reformed Churches- — whether known as 
 Dutch Reformed, or Congregational, or Presbyterian. 
 
 And now we can cordially congratulate the President and 
 Board of Managers of the hospital on the success which has f ol • 
 lowed the movement, to endow beds in the hospital for the use 
 of churches and chapels, contributing a certain amount. It has 
 met with a generous response, quite beyond the expectations of 
 the Board. The plan is this, in brief, that any Reformed or 
 Presbyterian Church contributing five thousand dollars will con- 
 trol a bed in the hospital, free to any person the church may 
 name to occupy it, who shall be a proper patient, according to 
 the rules of the hospital. In the past year two beds have been 
 endowed : one by the Madison Square Presbyterian Church, in 
 memory of George W. Lane ; one by the West Presbyterian 
 Church, for the benefit of Faith Church ; and the pastor of the 
 Faith Church told me recently that that free bed endowed in 
 the name of his church, and always at his service, had helped 
 him greatly in his work, and proved a rich blessing to his con- 
 gregation. 
 
 And thirteen churches on. this island have begun within the 
 year endowing beds. The management of the hospital is easy in 
 its terms. Any number of years may be demanded in which 
 to complete the endowment. One church began last year with 
 twelve dollars of the five thousand. True, some of the aged in 
 that church may not be here to use that free bed, or rejoice over 
 the consummation of the good work, at that rate of payment. 
 But patience and perseverance conquer all things ; the poor we 
 have with us always, accidents will happen in the next gener- 
 ation, and people will be ill and wounded, infirm and diseased, 
 then as well as now, and bye-and-bye that church will have a 
 free bed. A good beginning will have a good end. Anyway, 
 it is most gratifying to the trustees of the hospital to see the live- 
 lier interest and warmer sympathies of the Churches, in the 
 
9 
 
 work of the hospital, since this movement of endowed beds was 
 started. I tell yon, we all like to have something we can call 
 our very own, whether a house on the avenue, a coat to our 
 back, or a bed in a hospital. ISTo American worthy of the name 
 takes easily to a poor-house, or to pauper treatment. If he 
 does, farewell to self-respect, to industry, to honest work for 
 honest pay; he joins the increasing army of tramps, and hates a 
 hospital as lie does hard work. But when a man is a member 
 of a church or a chapel which has a bed in the hospital, when 
 he pays his stipend and respects himself, then, if he meets with 
 an accident, or his child has need of a surgeon or experienced 
 nursing, he can go to the hospital and lie down on a bed he has 
 a right to occupy, for which he has helped to pay, and can ac- 
 cept its service or ring for his attendant, as if in his own house. 
 Verily these endowed beds, by the different churches, are — who- 
 ever originated the idea — an inspiration from heaven, and ad- 
 mirably adapted to the spirit of American independence, and 
 will do vast good. I trust and hope that every Reformed and 
 Presbyterian church in this city will begin at once to endow, 
 full or in part, as soon as possible, one or more free beds in this 
 hospital for the use of its poorer members. For while " the hos- 
 pital is designed to be the agent of the Presbyterian Church in 
 her organized charity for the benefit of the sick and suffering 
 among the poor of all classes, it is likewise meant that the 
 Presbyterian Hospital should be the special asylum for those of 
 our own ' household of faith,' needing its care." See to it, then, 
 that your church has an endowed bed, or a bed in process of 
 endowment, in the hospital, and that the offering on Hospital 
 Sunday be designated as given for this object. And just here, 
 what can a rich man do, in the way of charity, nobler in itself and 
 more enduring in its benefits, than to endow a bed himself in the 
 hospital for the sum of five thousand dollars? Verily, it would 
 be a heavenly use of money, a kind of visit by proxy to many 
 sick and afflicted. Sure it would be the very next thing to car- 
 ing personally for a wounded man on the street, setting him on 
 your beast and taking him to your home. Yes, it would be five 
 thousand dollars well laid out by any rich man, making the world 
 
 824574 
 
10 
 
 better, and easier, and kinder for many a forlorn and unfortunate 
 one, and making the gate into heaven, for the rich man's soul, 
 wider than a needle's eye. "Inasmuch as ye did it unto one of 
 the least of these my brethren, ye did it unto me." Then make 
 haste, and endow a bed with your superfluous wealth. And one 
 day coming, when you may need them sore, the intercessions and 
 gratitude of the sufferers who have been nursed in it and healed 
 on it, will plead like angels to the ear of God for room in the 
 gate, that your soul may go through into the Heavenly City on 
 high. Last year one gentleman connected with my church en- 
 dowed a bed for the benefit of Faith Church. I hope and pray 
 that his good example be imitated this present year by one or 
 more of the wealthy members of this church and of other 
 churches. 
 
 And now, another matter, very briefly. The hospital must be 
 enlarged by a new building, which will provide among other 
 things a separate ward for accident cases, and a private ward 
 for children. The fact is, the hospital is cramped for room. It 
 has outgrown its plant ; the demands upon it are in excess of its 
 capacity and ability. It has land enough, but a new building, 
 which will cost $150,000, is imperatively needed. I am happy 
 to say that this new building is already within sight, and will 
 surely be erected this coming year if we do our duty. A lady 
 of this city whose name is withheld, but whose good deeds and 
 the splendid gifts of her family will, as Emerson says, sing them- 
 selves in this city — this lady has given $50,000 toward the 
 new building, on condition that $50,000 more be obtained within 
 a specified time. Now here is the opportunity of wealth. Here 
 is the chance to build yourself a monument more enduring than 
 marble or brass. Here is a way open by which you may lessen 
 the labor of lawyers and the perplexity attending right disposition 
 of wealth, namely, by becoming your own executor in part, and 
 aiding to build the new wing to the hospital. Buy an interest, then, 
 in the other world by the right use of that mammon which this 
 world so often uses unrighteously. Dispose of your money your- 
 self. Make it enrich and adorn your own soul by the good you 
 compel it to do, instead of hiding it and hoarding it, and nurs- 
 
11 
 
 ing and fondling it, until it becomes a monster, immense, terrible, 
 insatiable, to destroy you at last. Aye, here is our open door, 
 onr present grace, our shining opportunity to do something with 
 our money that we may be sure will bless the world more even 
 than it will benefit our heirs. Here is a chance, not to be passed 
 over lightly, of doing a generous and noble action that will smell 
 sweet in this city, and become an inspiration to others in doing- 
 good long after our names are forgotten. Remember, please, 
 that you and I are worth only what we have done, have shared, 
 have used, have given, and not what we have amassed and de- 
 vise in a will. The water in a well only keeps sweet so long 
 as it is constantly used. The soul in a man only keeps sound, 
 and safe, and sweet, so long as it does good, sheds light, dis- 
 penses bounty, and gives forth courage, kindness, truth, and love. 
 What I have is outside me, apart from me, be it stocks and 
 bonds, be it houses and lands, be it coupons and rent rolls. 
 What I am is inside me, it lies down with me at night, it rises 
 up with me in the morning, thieves cannot steal it, poison can- 
 not endanger it, fire cannot consume it, time destroy it, nor the 
 grave imprison it. I keep it here, I take it with me there. 
 What I am. O that men were wise, and cared less for what 
 they have, and more for what they are. Sow here is our chance 
 to bless this city for generations to come, and to lay up treasure 
 in heaven. Then let us avail ourselves of this lady's splendid ben- 
 efaction of $50,000 by subscribing the amount required to com- 
 plete this building. And the hospital will remember you with 
 pride and gratitude, while all the poor, and wounded, and sick 
 who shall be cared for and restored within its walls in long years 
 to come, will rise up at the Judgment, like so many angels and 
 ministers of grace, to defend you. And with one glad voice 
 they shall say to the Son of Man upon the throne of his glory : 
 '* When we were an hungered he gave us meat, when we were 
 strangers he took us in, when we were naked he clothed us, 
 when we were sick he provided for us." Thereupon you shall 
 hear the angels sing all around you. Thereupon you shall see 
 the saints waving you gracious welcome. And a smile upon the 
 face of the King on his throne shall send beams of light, and 
 
12 
 
 joy, and love tingling through your disembodied spirit. And 
 as you are accompanied to the right hand of the Judge by these 
 ministering angels, upon your astonished ears shall fall these 
 sweetest of all gracious words : " Come you blessed of my Father. 
 Inasmuch as you did it unto one of the least of these my breth- 
 ren, you did it unto me. Enter into the joy of thy Lord." 
 
 Oh, charity ! Oh, sweet charity ! Oh, love to God, as shown in 
 love to man. Surely this is better than all burnt-offerings and 
 sacrifices. Then give your money, build the new wards of this 
 hospital, that you may soothe some sorrow, heal some wounds, 
 minister to some sick, in this sad world of pain and woe. For 
 " though genius cannot discern God, goodness proves him," and 
 along a road over which passes the most beautiful life of the 
 world to-day, I see on either side hospitals and asylums, reform- 
 atories and infirmaries. And under them all, back of them 
 all, over them ail, I see the sign of the Cross. Yes, my soul, 
 facts are our answers to skeptics, deeds are our eulogists of Chris- 
 tianity, for the argument of Jesus Christ is always an action, 
 his philosophy unresting and unwearied beneficence. The hos- 
 pital is one of our proofs ; accuse its sufficiency if you can, kiss 
 the hand that built it if you can't. 
 
 For behind every bed in the long wards — on which lies a mis- 
 shapen child, a wearied and worn woman, a sick or wounded 
 man — I see, with my mind's eye, a tall figure in a seamless robe. 
 His solemn hands, in which are the prints of nails, are stretched 
 out in blessing. In his eyes there is divine compassion ; on his 
 face the tender smile of the good and loving God. 
 
 And all around me, above the groans of the wounded, the 
 sighs of the sick, the moans of the suffering, I hear white angels 
 singing " A bruised reed He will not break ; the smoking flax 
 He will not quench." 
 
 By thy friends, O Jesus Christ, we still know thy worth. 
 By thy works thou art still justified in the world. 
 
 True, the pool of Siloam has disappeared, evaporated, per- 
 ished ; true, the inn between Jerusalem and Jericho has crum- 
 bled back into dust, and been scattered upon the viewless winds ; 
 true, the clay and the spittle, which were thy only surgeon's 
 
13 
 
 tools, O Christ, have passed away, been transformed a thousand 
 times. 
 
 But, what of that ? thon art still here, the contemporary of this 
 age, abreast of the latest born time. Thy Cross still stands, and 
 throws its redeeming and healing shadow upon the successive 
 generations of men. 
 
 Thy voice is still heard above all the uproar, confusion, and 
 strife of tongues — sweet, persuasive, authoritative. 
 
 And thy Church and thy Hospital are still here — both taber- 
 nacles of thine ; both incarnations of thy Divine Spirit ; both 
 continuing thy healing and saving work in all the world. The 
 Church, ministering to souls diseased, for whose cure thou didst 
 die; the hospital ministering to the distressed and afflicted in 
 thy dear name, who once in Judea spent thy days in labor and 
 thy nights in prayer, for the health of the body and the salva- 
 tion of the souls of men—healing disease as well as savins: the 
 lost, communicating health as well as imparting salvation. 
 
 We bless thee, we adore thee, we salute thee, Founder of the 
 Church, creator of the Hospital, Jesus of JNazareth, Son of Mary, 
 and Son of God, in whose name is done every noble deed by 
 which we strive to help our brother men. 
 
COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY LIBRARIES 
 
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