SERMONS AND ADDRESSES

BY THE LATE

RL Rot. Edwaid Randolph Welles. S.T.D.

;)wi L,x")

Third Bishop of Milwaukee.

WITH PORTRAITS AND MEMOIRS,

EDITED BY HIS SON,
THE REV. EDWARD SPRAGUE WELLES.

'In Quietness and in Oonfldenoe shall be your Strength.'

MILWAUKEE, WIS.:
The Young Churchman Co,, Publishers.
18S9.

With Sincere Affection,
This Volume is Insceibed by the Editor to
LINDEN H. MOREHOUSE,
Whose untieing and unselfish interest in the Cathe-
deal of Milwaukee and in all woeks tending
" to God's Gloey and the Edification of
His Church " endeared him beyond
words to his Friend and Bishop,
EDWARD RANDOLPH WELLES.

PREFATORY NOTE.

IT was the invariable rule of Bishop Welles to preach from
manuscript, though he frequently extemporized in the
course of delivery, to accommodate his discourse to the need of
the hour or place.
His manner of preaching was most simple, with the single
gesture made with the f ore-finger.
In the following selection of Sermons and Addresses, which
is necessarily limited, it is purposed to present as far as possible,
the scope and discrimination of the Bishop's mind ; to let his
words answer, for themselves, all questions in regard to matters
of doctrinal and polemical interest ; also to give what'may
prove helpful to lay readers in the Diocese and elsewhere.
The higher purpose of the whole Volume, undoubtedly, is to
give the key-note of the Bishop's life. With rare power and in
sight, the Bishop of Chicago, in the memorial sermon on Bishop
Welles, told the motto and purpose of that life :
'"In Quietness and ln Confidence Shall be Your
Strength.'— Isaiah xxx., 15.
" Hung upon the walls of his library, in letters of gold, these
words were very familiar to him, who, for fourteen years, dis
charged the duties of the Apostolic office in this Diocese ; they
may express the inner realities of his life and point us to the
true measure of his greatness.
" This motto, which my departed brother had before his eyes
daily, in sickness and in health, is a revelation of his inner life.
It furnishes the key-note of his character as a man and a
Bishop. * * * Where, if not before the Throne, did
he learn the lesson of quietness and confidence ? Ah, there let
us find the secret of his silent fortitude, his loving patience, his
incessant activity, his beautiful cheerfulness, his;;serenity of
soul, when storms raged and the strife of tongues was like
thunder in the air.
* %L J,; :£ % * ^i * %
"Not without manifold infirmities, not without that life-long
conflict common to all, between the old Adamic nature and the
nature begotten of the Holy Ghost in baptism, did he journey

iv PREFATORY note.

from the font to the grave, but as a man and as an ambassador
of Christ, he was always and everywhere dominated by honest
desire and endeavor to do the will of his Maker and Redeemer.
Transparently true of him was the language of S. Paul, ' For to
me to live is Christ.'
" When I speak of my departed brother having trained him
self to such a relationship to the Divine will through the long
disciplines of frail health, bereavement, and official trials, I
would not desire to convey the impression that by severe re
action from abounding evil, he had taken refuge in the dreamy
splendors of mysticism.
" I can imagine, that had his lot been cast in that dark epoch
at the close of the fourteenth century, when political and
ecclesiastical corruption threatened the very foundations of
society, his face might have been found among ' the calm sweet
faces of the Benedictine monks,' in holy retirement from the
hopeless disorder of l& God-forgetting age."

The sacredness of the spoken word was a living principle in
Bishop Welles' entire ministry. Amid the restless and garish
preaching so common today, the disciplined enthusiasm, which
was his, and the intense sympathy of a nature, to whom the
Gospel was very real, made the Bishop preach what he indeed
believed. "Thou, O God, hast made us for Thyself, and our
heart is restless until it rests in Thee."
The memoir brings together three whose willing hands
and loving, staunch hearts sustained the Bishop throughout his
life, and who now count it a joy to pay this tribute.
It is felt that'ifriends of the Bishop will be glad of this
memoir ; perhaps with materials at hand, some day, it may be ¦
expanded into a Life.
The Journals kept by the Bishop in his youth and early
manhood; are full, and reveal a depth and poetic richness which,
in his humility, he hid even from those most intimate with him.
When he was elected to the Episcopate of Wisconsin,* some
friends in the East wished to present Bishop Welles with
a set of Episcopal vestments of cope and mitre.
His answer was, that his work in the Diocese was other than
* Tlie name of the Diocese was changed to that of Milwaukee In 1887.

prefatory note.

restoring the use of the ancient vestments of this office, greatly
as that was to be desired. But he believed and prayed that the
customary Episcopal habit, because so secular in its origin,
would soon give place to the vestments of the Princes of His
Spiritual Kingdom who, for the High Priest of the older Dis
pensation, commanded " Holy garments to be made for glory
and for beauty."
It was God's will, however, that Bishop Welles should wear,
at his last Confirmation, the ancient vestments which he so truly
held to be a part of ouf Catholic heritage ; and that, too, with
an association very dear to him, as the cope came from a
church erected by Dr. Pusey, whose bust was before the Bishop
in his study, whose character he has been thought to resemble
in humility and entire freedom from affectation, and whom he
fondly venerated as " one of the noblest examples of conse
crated learning, who has left to the Catholic Church an endur
ing heritage of saintliness."
A second portrait represents the Bishop in the vestments he
wore at his final Confirmation.
One very dear to him has said : " I have known only two,
one person besides Bishop Welles, who seemed ready to take
up the joys of Paradise without any change from the manner
and mode of their life on earth. He seemed ripe for Paradise."
As a Bishop of the Church Catholic, he will be clad forever
in the outward and beautiful vestments of his high office. For
on earth he was all glorious within, " So merciful that he was
not remiss ; so ministering discipline that he forgot not mercy"
(Consecration office). And so, " when the Chief Shepherd shall
appear," may this stainless Prelate and dear Father in God " re
ceive the never fading Crown of Glory," and may it be his
supreme joy at that supreme moment to bring with him the
Flock over which the Holy Ghost had set him "to feed the
Church of God which He hath purchased with His own Blood."
Amen.

CONTENTS.

page.
Portraits, Prefatory Note, nr.
Memoir—
Youth and Early Manhood— Bev. W. T. Gibson, D. D. ix.
Parish Priest at Red Wing, Minn.— Hon. E. T. Wilder, xvi.
Bishop of Milwaukee— Bev. S. S. Burleson. xxvi.
SERMONS.
parochial sermons.
I. The Pastoral Call and Duty, 1
II. Government of the Tongue, 12
III. The Reward of Selfishness, 21
IV. Dogmas, 29
V. The Blessedness of the Churchly Inheritance, 38
. VI. The Church's Relation to Labor, 45
VII. Apostolical Succession, 54
VIII. Advent— Likeness to Christ, the Object, the Priv
ilege, the Glory of the Christian, - 63
IX. Easter— Life Through the Risen Christ, 72
X. Whitsun Day— The Promise of the Comforter, 82
XL Trinity— The Trinity in Unity, 95
XII. The Faithful Departed, - 106
OCCASIONAL SERMONS.
I. On the Assassination of President Lincoln, 115
II. The Unity of the Church, - 121
III. Sixteenth Anniversary and Farewell Sermon at
Red Wing, Minn., - 134
IV. Some Elements of Ministerial Success, - - 144
V. The Lambeth Conference of 1888, ¦ 159

Vlil *' CONTENTS.

ADDRESSES. PAGE.
I. " Via Crucis, Via Lucis," - 183
II. Self Discipline in Obedience to Authority, 187
EXTRACTS.
EXTRACTS FROM SERMONS.
Seasons for Frequent Communion, 199
Nature and Ministry of Angels, 805
Human Relationship Exalted by the Incarnation, 206
In the World— Not of It, 307
No Room for Christ, 207
Lent, 207
Free Churches, 209
Imitation of Christ, 209
Preparation for the Blessed Sacrament, 310
Counsel and Advice of the Clergy, 211
The Real Presence a NeceBBary Sequence of the Incarnation, 311
Future Punishment and Life Eternal, 212
The State of the Departed, 213
EXTRACTS FROM CONCILIAR ADDRESSES.
The Fourth of July Service, 217
The Support of the Clergy, 219
The Free Church, 221
Self-Denial of the Clergy, 222
Lenten Observance, 224
The True PariBh, 225
True Conception of Responsibility, 226
Sacrilege of Renouncing the Priesthood, 227
The Disregard of the Lord's Day, - 228
The Dead in Christ; Archbishop Tait and Dr. Pusey, 229
General Convention of 1883, - 230
The Work of the Church : Its Needs and Hindrances, 231
Surpliced ChoirB, - 235
The Holy Eucharist, - 235
Parochial Missions, 236

MEMOIRS.

YOUTH AND EARLY MANHOOD.

By the Rev. W. T. Gibson, D. D.

Edward Randolph Welles, second son of Gardner
Welles, M. D., and Paulina Fuller Welles, was born on the 10th
of January, in the year 1830, at Waterloo, where his parents
resided, a half-shire -town of Seneca County in the State of
New York.
His father, who came from an old Church family in Connect
icut, was a physician of wide reputation for professional skill
and good judgment, was one of the curators of Geneva Medical
College, and took high rank in the medical societies to which
he belonged. We remember him as a man of exceedingly ami
able and gentle nature, with a keenly humorous, but kindly
appreciation of the peculiarities of his fellows. We believe he
was one of the few physicians of those days who could hardly
be said to have an enemy.
Edward's mother was a native of Massachusetts, who came
into the Church in her early life, and was a very intelligent,
refined and gentle lady, whose happy influence was most marked
in moulding the character of her sons in accordance with the
obligations and privileges of their baptism.
There is doubtless such a thing as a heredity of goodness
also, which Divine Providence seems to have had in view in
the institutions and laws of His chosen people Israel. It can
be only in this sense, or for this reason, that a true meaning
. can be attached to Wordsworth's line, " The Child is father of
" the man."
The same design of Providence was carried into the Holy
Catholic Church of our Lord Jesus Christ, intended to be the

MEMOIRS.

Nurse and Home of all Christian families, which He hath re
deemed unto Himself to be a " peculiar people, zealous of good
works." When it has had free play in the life of a nation, as in
England now for several centuries, it has [Tealized the Divine
promises " unto the third and fourth generation," and has
raised up out of its blessed surroundings of infancy and youth,
great numbers of noble Christian men, of as high a type of
moral excellence and'intellectual superiority as was ever illus
trated in any age or country of human history.
The old precept to " train up (or catechise) a child in the way
he should go," had the promise attached to it fulfilled in this
household. As a genial writer in the Literary Churchman has said:
"Thank God that He has made our life all one. Childhood
grows into youth, and youth into manhood, and manhood is a
childhood for eternity. 80 that all good habits formed early
and retained, go forward, and are carried on in the spiritual ac
count. Samuel the child, becomes Samuel the judge, and Samuel
the prophet, and takes his place in the ranks of the loyal and
obedient, to whom God's will has become their will, and he joins
at last in the unceasing hymn,—" The goodly fellowship of the
prophets praise Thee." Sweetly and strongly, indeed, did the
boy of whom we are writing illustrate these simple but most
pregnant words. When the " Evangelical lady " to whom Mr.
Gladstone alluded in his review^of a recent famous romance,
on Being congratulated upon the " sensible conversion " of her
son, replied, that " Divine '-grace would find very little to do in
her son William," let us hope that it was her motherly instinct
protesting against the doctrinal disparagement of Christian
training, and a confession that the Baptismal Gift may work
from the beginning upon levery " member of Christ, and child
of God, and inheritor of the kingdom of Heaven."
The writer first became acquainted with the subject of this
sketch at the close of the year 1844,' when we retired from the
editorship of a newspaper in Geneva to take a position as
classical teacher, and afterwards as Principal of the Waterloo
Academy, an institution at that time of a high order, under the
old'regime, with special relations to^the Regents of the Univer
sity, and before it had become merged into the public school
system of the state.", The'.. teacher (as all;' earnest teachers do)
formed the warmest attachment for a pupil who seemed to be

EARLY YOUTH AND MANHOOD.

full of the enthusiasm of learning. There was absolutely
nothing in the nature of taskwork in his studies; all was eagerly
and steadily performed con amore. He entered into the spirit
of everything and enjoyed the beauties and the poetry of the
classics as thoroughly as he learned rules and grammar. He
had the advantage, indeed, of quite a number of fellow students
of similar ambition, though he was facile princeps of a class of
fifteen or twenty, nearly all of whom entered shortly after at
Hobart or Hamilton, some of whom have attained high places
in life. Young Welles especially delighted in one exercise of
which we made much use, that of written translations both from
ancient languages into modern, and from modern into ancient.
It was a pleasure.to observe the great pains he took even with
the merest minutiae, to get the most finished translation that
could be made of the speeches in Sallust and Csesar, or difficult
passages from Virgil and other authors. This exercise is a far
better discipline for imparting command of language with
philological accuracy than the usual attempts of boys at
" original compositions," which, of course, become necessary in
later years of college.
Without going further into details which would transcend
our restricted space, these habits will furnish the sufficient key
to what his college course would be. He remained at the
Academy until he was prepared for the sophomore year, upon
which he entered at Hobart in 1847, thus graduating in 1850.
One of the pleasantest reminiscences of these school-days
is connected with S. Paul's Church, of which the Rev. D. H.
Macurdy and the Rev. Edward Livermore were successively
the rectors, who made this one of the most famous parishes in the
diocese, both for its parish school as well as its splendidly organ
ized Sunday School. Both of these beloved clergymen were quiet
men of refined and scholarly tastes, but their sermons were
an education to that people, and took hold of both heart and
understanding, while their pastoral work and intercourse with
all classes seated them in the affections of their congregation
to a degree that was scarcely realized until after their depart
ure. It was the former who baptized the writer, and the latter
who baptized the first of the writer's children, and it was from
both that he, as well as the subject of this memoir, first learned
the true Catholic principles of the Church and the Book of Com
mon prayer, at that time so scantily recognized in ordinary par-

Xii MEMOIRS.

ish teaching and practice. The latter had the habit of cate
chising the whole school together before the close of each ses
sion, and the text book was one that has not since been much
improved upon, " Beaven's Help to Catechising." Our boys from
the Academy formed one of the classes in this school, and re
mained steadily under this instruction up to the very time of
their departure for college. Such was the training that was
found to be full proof against the temptations of college and
later life. It was not a cramped and perverted boyhood,
moulded into an unnatural and gloomy pattern, such as we
have often seen under Calvinistic training ; but as we often
witness in our boy choirs of to-day, along with perfect subordi
nation and order in the strict performance of duty, there was
also free play for the flow of animal spirits— the love of fun
and muscular activities, and the life of our boys, both out of
doors and in, was one of general happiness and good nature.
His college course was marked by evidences of unusual
maturity and thoughtf ulness, as well as gentleness and purity
of character. It goes without saying that he would be indus
trious, punctual and thorough in his work. His reverence and
sincerity were shown in his compositions, and many of his trans
lations from the German and the Greek evince a subtle and
delicate poetic taste. It was while he was in college that his
mother died (in 1849.) This event seemed but to intensify the
earnest, religious tone and character of his thoughts. His jour
nal, or diary at this time, shows in a wonderful way how the
Lord leads His chosen ones through the path of sorrow. No
young man could have felt a deeper love for his mother.
Among his papers is found a copy of verses, " To My Mother "
—that " Departed,' dearest, sainted one, "
owning that there was "nothing of good" in his character or
efforts, of which, under God, " she did not sow the seed ." The
subject of his Commencement oration the next year shows the
permanent spiritual effect of such an experience in his case.
It was, Via Crucis, via Lucis— an unusual topic, it must be
admitted, for a Commencement piece. It was at the same
Commencement that the Rev. Dr. Clarke, whom he afterwards
induced to become a professor at Nashotah, in his diocese,
delivered the Master's oration.
Shortly after his graduation he one day entered the office

EARLY YOUTH AND MANHOOD. xiii
of a prominent lawyer, a relative by marriage, at Waterloo,
with the remark that "whatever life work he might finally
undertake, it would do him no harm to study the science of
law, for a while." The lawyer expressed a very decided assent
to that proposition, not much believing, however, that he would
make it his vocation for life.
At the end of about a year of study, he informed his pre
ceptor that, after much reflection upon the subject, his convic
tions of duty were impelling him to give himself to the ministry
of the Church. That gentleman says of him, " He was a model
man in all the relations of life, quiet, peaceful, deliberate, self-
poised and firm in his convictions when formed."
It was during this period, that for the sake of his health, he
occasionally accompanied the writer in a topographical survey
of Seneca County, which he was then engaged in making for
the late John Delafleld, Esq., President of the State Agricultural
Society, and the father-in-law of the present Bishop of Maine.
This involved, of course, a good deal of driving and walkiDg in
the open air, during one of the pleasantest summers of our
recollection, and the confidences and companionship of that
period cemented the previous friendship into a mutual love
that has lasted through life. We shall never forget the amused
expression of his most kindly countenance, on a certain occa
sion, as we rushed out of a neighboring farmhouse to the spot
in the center of a railway track at its intersection of a highway
where we had left our theodolite, expecting to find it demolished
by a train that had just shot by without warning. Though at
some distance off, he had heard the rumbling, got beforehand
with us, and rescued our treasured instrument, though it took
some moments to convince us of the reality.
It will be seen from the depth of his character that Mr.
Welles was not apt to act from impulse. We regard it rather
as a mark of his deliberate and thorough way of coming to
final convictions of duty, that he was not confirmed until in his
twenty-third year, on the 7th of March, 1852, by Bishop De
Lancey, to whom he was presented with ten others in S. Paul's
Church by the Rev. Mr. Livermore.
In the autumn of that year, he entered the family of the
Hon. John Magee, formerly a member of congress, and a
very prominent and influential citizen of Bath, in Steuben
County, as tutor to his children. While here, he was admitted

XlV MEMOIRS.

a candidate for orders, Oct. 1st, 1853. He studied more or less
under the direction of the Rev. Dr. Wilson, then a professor in
Hobart College, who, long before the Training School was
founded at Geneva, had prepared many of the graduates of
Hobart and others for the ministry, among whom we may be
permitted to mention the names of Bishops Neely and Paret,
the Rev. Drs. Hayes, Clarke, Barrows, Parke, and many others
including the writer of this notice, and whose instructions and
personal kindness can never be adequately rewarded in this
world. Mr. Welles remained at Bath till the summer of 1854, and
he always spoke and wrote of this sojourn as among the pleas-
antest recollections of his life. Those who know anything of
the history of this village and its foundation, will at once
recognize the propriety of associating it, as to the culture and
tone of its society, with such historical interior towns of the
state as Geneva, Cazenovia and Cooperstown. The winter of
1852-3 was an annus mirabilis, for an Indian summer protracted
far into January, and the walks and drives in the mild hazy
atmosphere among those majestic mountains, with the mar
vellous displays of the aurora borealis in that season, would
not be likely to fade from one's memory.
During this period he also had the happiness of renewing
intercourse with two college friends, the Rev. R. N.Parke, then
doing missionary work at Addison, and Rev. N. Barrows at
Corning, assisting them in Sunday School work, as well as by
lay reading on occasion.
In November, 1S54- he went to Vicksburg, Miss., to take
charge of a school for young ladies, at Bishop Green's request, a
Bishop for whom Mr. Welles ever afterwards cherished great
veneration, for his kindly and saintly character. His school
enjoyed fine Success, and his services were greatly appreciated
by the people, with many of whom he formed warm and en
during friendship. Yet those were days of much political ex
citement, and the relations of North and South were greatly
strained. We have seen a printed circular letter in which Mr.
Welles at this time was obliged to vindicate himself against a
bitter, not to say scurrilous, article in a Vicksburg paper, based
upon a casual remark he had let fall in company, to which the
editor chose to apply a political construction. The letter shows
a manliness and courage in expressing some opinions not pop-

EARLY YOUTH AND MANHOOD.

ular in that latitude, especially on the repeal' of the "Missouri
Compromise," which even surprised'.some of his friends, but
which, after all, thus early showed the stuff_ of which he was
made, that enabled him to " stand like an anvil" amid the strife
of tongues in the early days'of his episcopate.
In the summer of 1856, Mr. Welles returned to his home at
Waterloo, where he remained until the opening of the new
Deveaux College at Suspension Bridge in May, 1857, in which
he accepted the position of a teacher, which he occupied until
Sept. 28th, 1858. During this period, on Dec. 20th, 1857, he was
admitted to the diaconate with Jedediah Winslow, at Trinity
Church, Geneva, by Bishop DeLancey,' Rev. Dr. Bissell, now
Bishop of Vermont, preaching the sermon. Mr. WELLEsMuring
his diaconate, besides his college duties, officiated pretty regu
larly at the churches in Lewiston, Suspension Bridge and Lock-
port. In thelast mentioned place he formed the acquaintance of
the late ex-Governor Hunt, who ever held him in high esteem.
In the summer vacation of 1858 (in June) he made a trip to
the West in company with his father, and while visiting an old
college friend at Bed Wing, Dr. A. B. Hawley, was induced to
hold a Sunday service. Soon afterw.ards the congregation or
ganized a parish and sent Mr. Welles a call,; which he received
and accepted shortly after his return to Deveaux. Bishop De
Lancey ordained him Priest at S. Paul's, Waterloo, Sept, 12th,
1858, and on the 28th of the same month he left for Red Wing,
where he held his first services as Rector of Christ Church, Oct.
3d, 1858, which proved to be the beginning of one of the most
efficient and successful pastorates of our day.

PARISH PRIEST AT RED WING, MINN.

By Hon. E. T. Wilder.

On Christmas day, A. D. 1857, the few churchmen, and others
who sympathized with them in the movement, of Red Wing,
Goodhue County, Minnesota, — then little more than a hamlet —
met for consultation with a view to some sort of organization
for future church work. Church services had theretofore been
holden in the place two or three times only.
At this meeting, A. B. Hawley, M. D., a graduate of Hobart,
a classmate and devoted friend of the Rev. Edward R. Welles,
then a deacon in Western New York, strongly recommended Mr.
Welles as specially fitted for a point like Red Wing, where the
first stone in the foundation for church work was yet to be laid.
His recommendations were so favorably received, that he was
authorized to open a correspondence with Mr. Welles upon
the subject.
In June, A. D. 1858, Mr. Welles came to Red Wing and
held his first service in the West. At this time Minnesota was
but a missionary field, a part of the immense territory under
the jurisdiction of Bishop Kemper, of blessed memory.
Goodhue County was sparsely settled. Its inhabitants were
largely pre-emptors, and with few exceptions, poor. Its lands
were still, to a great extent, government lands. There was no
church organization, or church edifice, on the river in Minnesota
south of Hastings.
Mr. Welles visited different parts of the territory, with
the calm, deliberate purpose of judging for himself, of the
future of the church within its limits. With the clear, practical,
discriminating good sense, which, in after life, became so con
spicuous, he saw, as few men of his years and associations
would have seen, that this field was literally a "land of promise."
After full consideration, he accepted the invitation of his Red
Wing friends to identify himself with them in their work for
the Master and His Church.
He returned to New York, was ordained Priest by Bishop

PARISH PRIEST AT RED WING, MINN. xvii
DeLancey, September 12th, 1858, and on the 3d day of October of
that year, commenced, at Red Wing, his work as a Priest, in
this new field.
Everything was in chaos. There was not even the shadowy
foundation of a "Mission Station." At once he took the pre
liminary steps for the organization of a Parish. Such organi
zation was perfected on the 26th of October, of that year, under
the name of Christ Church, Red Wing, Rev. Edward R.
Welles, Rector. At that date the Parish numbered seven
communicants only, all of whom, save one, were women.
In sketching the life and labors of Mr. Welles from this
point on to the time when he was transferred to another, and
a broader field, it is well nigh impossible to speak of him except
in direct connection with the fruits of his work.
His labors as Rector were so still and undemonstrative, the
stream of his Parish life ran so quietly and smoothly, that his
merits as a Parish Priest were seen and appreciated only by
results, so closely was his life blended in the life of the Parish.
Indeed, the history of the Parish for sixteen years, is his biog
raphy for the same period.
For a year and more, services were held in a hall rented for
that purpose. In the meantime a large and valuable lot was
secured, and a church built at a cost of $3,000— which, as a free
church, was consecrated November 29th, 1S59— the first church
consecrated by Bishop Whipple.
The congregation having outgrown this church, it was
removed to the rear of the church lot, and on the 24th day of
June, 1869, the corner-stone of the present Parish Church was
laid, the address being made by the late Bishop Armitage.
whose successor, in the providence of God, Mr. Welles was
destined to become.
And here the question will present itself, where in the his
tory of the American Episcopate can another such succession
be found? Kemper, Armitage, Welles !
That church (except the tower), was completed at a cost of
$24,000, and was consecrated December 19th, 1871.
There is an incident connected with this consecration worthy
of record, as indicating in a significant form the influence which
Mr. (now Doctor) Welles had secured over his people. The
Parish had never received missionary aid, nor outside help,
save only a few comparatively small gifts from the personal

XV111 MEMOIRS.

friends of the Rector. When the new church was completed,
ready for occupancy, there remained an unpaid debt of $8,000.
Having raised and paid toward it $16,000, all the members of
the Parish felt that they must now, for a time, rest upon their
oars. With this feeling, arrangements were made with the
Bishop, not for a consecration, but for an opening service. At
a vestry meeting holden a few days before the time appointed
for that service, after the conclusion of the business for which
it was called, Dr. Welles, in his quiet, suggestive way asked
" Is it not possible for us to provide, in some form, for this
$8,000 of debt, so that the church_can be consecrated ?"
Not a member of the vestry had any faith in a movement
of the sort. All believed that a " breathing spell " was a neces
sity, and so expressed themselves. Yielding, however, to his
wishes, and perhaps unconsciously imbibing alittle of his faith, it
was determined to make the effort, yet with the feeling that the
task was well nigh hopeless. In this effort, Dr. Welles, in per
son, co-operated, and to the surprise of all, Dr. Welles excepted,
in less than two days the unpromising task became an accom
plished fact. x
This, and many other things akin to it, was his work, the
results of his personal influence; and yet the public never heard
of them from his lips, except as the generous work of the
Parish. The growth of the Parish from the date of its organization,
until Dr. Welles ceased to be its Rector, was steady and uni
form. Statistics are dry, but to the thoughtful reader they of
ten times give facts, not only in a compact form, but with an
emphasis that words do not express. It has already been stated
that at the date of the organization of the Parish— October, 1857
— it numbered seven communicants only. The following table
will show the number of communicants, the number of bap
tisms, the number of confirmations, and the amounts of con
tributions for purposes outside of the Parish annually, as re
ported to the Diocesan Council.

PARISH PRIEST AT RED WrNGt, MINN.

XIX

a ° ">
O tu S
..2 m

°3 . a
o g

Contributions for outside
1 purposes during the year.

June, 1859 

7
44 45
223729382439
47 3253
472638
29

2717121010 2
19
26
35 12 8
20 19
3412

8
36
53 64
71 79
8193
103138
147128*152 168187
192

$ 11 25
32 25
57 75
145 25
143 00
295 07
247 34
544 80

" 1861...'...., 

" 1S62 
" 1*63 

" 1864 

" 1865 
" 1866 
" 1867 

" 1868 

644 41

" 1869 ..., 

" 1870 
" 1871 
" 1872 
B8J 66
804 26
" 1874 
7S7 60
1,1H8 82
Total 
557
263
$7,456 98
*Notb. — The diminished number of communicants in A.
D. 1870, ae compared with 1869, is explained by the fact that
during that year the Parish of Christ Church, Belle Creek,
was organized, to which thirty-nine of the communicants of
1869 were transferred.
This steady increase of contributions for outside purposes,
was a source of special gratification to the Rector. With him
it was an unquestioned truth that the spiritual life of a con
gregation, was indicated, not by its contributions for parochial
purposes, but by its contributions for missions and other out
side work.
The growth and prosperity of the Parish, as thus summarized,
was largely, very largely, due, first to the personal labors of Dr.
Welles, and second to his exceptional ability in organizing
work for others. Inside the church walls he had few equals,
and outside no superiors.
It has recently been said of him by one of our senior Bishops
— " Take him all in aU, he was the best Parish Priest I ever
knew." One leading idea with him was, that everybody should have
something to do, that every member of the Parish should, in
some direction, be a co-worker with him.
His discriminating good sense here, as elsewhere, was shown
in his choice of the agent for any particular duty. Rarely, if
XX MEMOIRS.
ever, were his suggestions in this regard unheeded ; and that,
too, without a feeling that he was imposing a burden, for he
taught, and for a time at least, his teaching was accepted, that
the Rector could not, and should not, be expected to do every
thing. There were in all directions, harmony and co-operation,
sympathy and affection between Rector and congregation, the
legitimate fruits of his personal characteristics, his saintly life
and his Churchlyjteachings.
Next after the daily service, Dr. Welles' most efficient in
strumentalities were the Parish Aid Society, the Guild, including
a Parish Library and Reading Room, and the Parish School.
With bim the daily service was a prominent feature in Parish
work from the beginning. In his first anniversary sermon,
preached on the second Sunday in Advent, A. D. 1859 (the first
Sunday after the consecration of his Church), he said : " But I
must express my earnest hope and prayer, that with the free
Church it will soon be the wish and desire of the congregation
that we should have daily service. For daily service the Book
of Common Prayer makes provision. The Church in her ful
ness—the Church of the Apostles— the Church as she came from
the hands of her Divine Master, was to be the daily teacher
and comforter of the people in all circumstances and conditions
of life. The Church is the House of Prayer, and here should
the prayers of the congregation be offered. Daily and freely
should the Church doors be opened, consecrating those interests
which are blended with the cares and pleasures of each succeed
ing day. * * * * Who can doubt that daily prayer in
the Church would bring down a blessing upon the Parish ? It
is not meant that public prayer shall take the place of private
devotions, but that the one shall strengthen the other."
On the next day, December 5th, the daily service was inau-
guratedin connection with the opening of the Parish School. All
these agencies were in existence, when Dr. Welles left the
Parish. By him the Parish School was always regarded as
second only, in importance, to the daily services.
He was untiring in his efforts to make the school all that
he desired; not simply a school of merit as such, but an efficient
agency also in the Christian training and culture of its pupils.
In this he was eminently successful. Not a few of those who
have since become zealous and active workers in the Parish, and
later in other localities, reached the Church through this chan-

PARISH PRIEST AT RED WLNG, MINN. XXI
nel, and trace their religious life back to their school days in
Christ Church Parish School. The school was never self-Sup
porting. Sleepless vigilance, and "a faith that never doubts,"
were indispensable to its continued existence. Dr. Welles'
tenacity of purpose in this direction, was in precise keeping
with the supreme importance which he attached to this instru
mentality. In a sermon preached by him on the evening of the
day on which his new Church was consecrated (December 19th,
1871), he said :
" When the Sunday School was organized, I did not care to
see it harden, a3 Bishop Doane, of New Jersey, once phrased it,
into brick and mortar, for one of my dreams of pastoral life had
been an endowed Parish School, including in its instructions all
the children of the Parish, and leaving for the Lord's Day a
gathering of the children in the Parish Church, for brief cate
chetical exercises and instruction. * * * Of the great benefi
cence in any Parish of a well conducted school, I have no man
ner of doubt. I wish I could feel that the appreciation of
Church education was advancing as it should advance. * * * *
No Parish can be strong in the true sense of that word, until
its members are strengthened in the Eaith by a knowledge of
Church principles; and the best manual of Church education is
the Prayer Book, with its scriptural lessons and evangelical serv
ices interwoven into the daily life of the school room. For the
future of the Parish, for work to be done here for Christ and
His Church, when we are sleeping with the dead, I am striving
to place the Parish School upon a firm and lasting foundation."
Dr. Welles was never content that his work for any cause
should be pushed into ruts. He was always looking forward
for, and seeking out new channels for work for himself and for
others. An illustration of this is furnished by a quotation
from his farewell sermon. In that sermon he said : " Had I
remained your Pastor, I had thought during the next year to
devote myself especially to two objects :
I. Soliciting for the Parish School, subscriptions in the na
ture of an endowment fund ; and,
IL Providing some means by which an annual increase of
two or three hundred volumes could be made to the Parish
library. These two objects, among the many pertaining to the
interests and growth of the Parish, which claim your attention,
I especially commend to your thoughtful consideration and

XX11 MEMOIRS.

liberal care. In all that relates to the prosperity of the Parish,
each one of you should feel that the general prosperity is his
own prosperity."
Great injustice would be done Dr. Welles should a notice
of his labors, however brief, be confined to his work within his
Parish. Few men have been more thoroughly imbued with the
missionary spirit than he. It was a part of the web and woof of
his Christian character. As indicated before, it was this fact that
largely contributed to his location in Minnesota. Early in 1859,
Mr. Welles began his work in the field outside of his Parish.
An occasional service at Cannon Falls was held by the Rev.
Mr. Wilcoxson, the missionary located at Hastings. With that
exception, this broad section was wholly unoccupied by the
Church. In the spring of that year, Mr. Welles made ar
rangements for services at Wabasha, and soon thereafter at
Lake City, in Wabasha County. For some time thereafter, it
was not an uncommon thing for him to hold his service at Red
Wing on Sunday morning (leaving his evening service to a lay
reader), drive to Lake City for service at 3 P. M., and thence to
Wabasha for service in the evening— a distance of nearly forty
miles as then traveled, and that, too, over a road not, at all
times, the most desirable.
In the meantime he established mission stations in his own
county, at St. Johns, on the Cannon, at Belle Creek, at Wells
Creek, at Wacouta, at Frontenac, at Florence, at Zumbrota and
at Pine Island.
During these years, and in part, at least under his immediate
supervision, Parishes were organized and churches erected at
Wabasha, Lake City, Cannon Falls, Belle Creels, Zumbrota and
Pine Island, and a church built at Frontenac. In this broad
field, Dr. Welles was aided at different times by the following
gentlemen, then candidates for, or in Deacon's orders, and all
of whom were subsequently ordained to the Priesthood, viz. :
C. P. Dorset and S. S. Burleson, of the Diocese of Milwaukee ;
R. E. Denison, oE the Diocese of Pennsylvania; J. E. Lind-
holm, of the Diocese of Massachusetts ; Daniel Flack, of the
Diocese of Western New York, and S. Wardlaw, W. J. Carley
and S. P. Chandler, who have gone to their rest— the latter but
a few days in advance of his venerated friend.
Mr. Chandler— familiarly known as "Father Chandler"— a
local Methodist minister, who had been brought into the Church

PARISH PRIEST AT RED WING, MINN. XXlH
through the influence of Dr. Welles, upon his ordination to the
Diaconate, took immediate charge of the station at Belle Creek,
and by him, under the guidance of Dr. Welles, this general
work was extended to Hader, Wanamingo, Cherry Grove and
Kenyon. In the progress of time, Rectors were called to the
charge of five of these Parishes. In the meanwhile, Dr. Welles
had organized these stations in Goodhue County into what he
termed a " convocation," which, first at one point, and then at
another, gathered for worship four times a year, and at which
there was always a celebration of the Holy Communion. From
these convocations, Dr. Welles was never absent if possible
to avoid it ; and if absent, he took special care that his place
was judiciously filled by another.
As Dr. Welles anticipated, these services were, in many
directions, of great value to these scattered children of the
Church. It brought them together. Not infrequently they
came ten, fifteen and even twenty miles to attend them. It
helped to create a feeling of brotherhood. It gave them
broader and clearer views of the Church and of its methods.
Without these "convocations," it would have been difficult,
perhaps impracticable even, for Dr. Welles to have kept the
fires burning in all these widely severed stations. But his
ability for work — for organized work — in which others, some
consciously and others unconsciously co-operated, seemed equal
to any emergency ; and this was the more remarkable, that
everything was done so quietly and with so little apparent
effort. In A. D. 1865, Dr. Welles was elected Secretary of the
Diocesan Council, and in A. D. 1866, when the Diocese for this
purpose was districted, he was appointed by his Bishop, Dean
of the Southern Convocation. To the first of these offices he
was thereafter elected, and to the other appointed annually so
long as he remained in the Diocese. In A. D. 1865, and thence
on until be became a member. of the House of Bishops, he was
elected a Deputy to the general convention.
The order of this quiet Parish life, in 1874, was suddenly
broken by the announcement of the election of Dr. Welles to the
Episcopate, by the Diocese of Wisconsin. To no member of his
flock was this intelligence so startling, and, for a time, so full of
sorrow, as to him whose future was thus so directly touched.
In addition to all the other considerations naturally involved in

XXiV MEMOIRS.

the grave question thus so unexpectedly forced upon him, were
those growing out of the failing health of Mrs. Welles. Deliber
ately, prayerfully examining, reviewing and re-reviewing the
subject in all its varied forms, he, in this as in all things else,
yielded himself to what to him seemed the path of duty, accept
ing the great. trust, sent to the Vestry his resignation as Rector
of his Parish, to take effect on the 27th day of September, A. D.
1874. The Vestry accepted this resignation by the adoption of the
following preamble and resolutions :
Whereas, By reason of his election to the Episcopate of
Wisconsin, the Rev. Edward R. Welles, D.D., has presented
to us his resignation as Rector of this Parish, to take effect on
Sunday, September 27th, 1874.
Resolved, That with mingled emotions of pride and pleasure
at the deserved honor conferred upon our Rector by that elec
tion, and of sadness and sorrow over this irremediable loss to
us, and to our people, we hereby accept the resignation afore
said. Resolved, That we congratulate the Diocese of Wisconsin
upon what we are sure time will prove the wisdom of its choice
confidently hoping that an early future will show a Diocese as
lovingly devoted to its Bishop, as this Parish from its organiza
tion has been, and is, to its first and only Rector.
Resolved, That we hereby tender to Dr. and Mrs. Welles our
best and kindest wishes, and the best and kindest wishes of all
the members of this Parish, and that our Father in Heaven
will bless and keep them and theirs in time and in eternity,
shall be our daily prayer.
In A. D. 1860, Dr. Welles married Miss Mary Sprague, of
Fredonia, N. Y., a graduate of St. Mary's, N. J. Mrs. Welles
was not only a lady of education and refinement, but was pos
sessed of all the instincts of a true and noble woman. In the
best sense of the term, she was in all directions a help-meet
worthy of such a husband. A meek and humble daughter of the
Church, she sympathized with, and aided him as best she could,
in all his hopes and plans, for the growth and extension of the
Church. Christ Church Rectory was ever the home of a bright
and generous hospitality. The fruits of this marriage were
four children. Edward S., now of Milwaukee, a Priest in the
Church of God ; Samuel G., now at Oxford ; Pauline, now at

PARISH PRIEST At RED WING, MINN. XXV
Kemper Hall, and Harriet, who, with the mother, was " on the
other side, " awaiting the advent of the husband and father as
he joined them in Paradise. Mrs. Welles was the victim of that
fell destroyer, consumption, and was taken home, 1874, shortly
before the consecration of her husband to his high and holy
office. Dr. Welles, as Rector of Christ Church, Red Wing, held his
last service September 27th, A. D. 1874. It was a service long to
be remembered. Sorrow was in every heart and tears in every
eye. The predominant thought was not so much that the Parish
was losing an honored and beloved . Rector— nor yet that the
future of the Parish, as compared with the past, was enshrouded
in the mists and clouds of doubt and uncertainty, as that each
individual in the congregation was thenceforth to drift farther
and farther away from a warm-hearted, personal friend— from
one who for long years, by his unselfish and sympathetic nature,
had reached the hearts alike of the old and the young, the rich
and the poor, the happy and the sorrowful.
It is thus seen, though this chapter touches only upon a few
of the more prominent points in the history of his Rectorship,
that the life of Dr. Welles, during these sixteen years, was one
of unremitting and unselfish devotion to his Master's work; but
the silent influence of his daily life, of his personal example, of
his kindly relations with all, whether of his flock or not, of his
sympathizing nature, of his undoubting faith, of his apprecia
tion of the dignity and importance of the priestly office, who can
appropriately describe? An infallible record, which in the
future will be opened to us, can alone give us this history in its
simplicity and its entirety.

BISHOP OF MILWAUKEE,

By Rev. S. S. Burleson.

On the night of the 17th day of June, A. D. 1874. the light
ning flashed the following message from Milwaukee, Wis., to
Red Wing, Minn.: Milwaukee, June 17, 1874.
Rev. Edward R. Welles, D. D.: — You are unanimously
elected Bishop of the Diocese of Wisconsin this evening.
James deKoven, Lewis A. Kemper, Wm. Adams, Wm. Bliss
Ashley, A. D. Cole, J. A. Helfenstein, D. Worthington, Angus
Cameron, Wm. P. Ten Broeck, J. B. Doe.
This message was delivered on the following morning. It
was startling to the man to whom it was addressed. He had no
vaulting ambition, no desire for eminent station in the Church.
To have sought it by any means, would have been, in his eyes,
sacrilege. He reverenced all offices which had their warrant
from the Son of Man, and could not understand how men
could dare to seek them of their own mind, or to decline them
when "it seemed good to the Holy Ghost" to call.
In the true spirit of great, manly humility, Dr. Welles
thought and prayed for two weeks. Letters of pleasant con
gratulation and earnest urgency came daily into his hands.
The answers to these letters tell how deeply the spirit of the
man was moved. His thought was like that of Moses when
he said: " Who am I that I should go unto Pharaoh, and that I
should bring forth the children of Israel out of Egypt?" And
we may well believe that the question was answered with the
same Divine assurance, fresh in its utterance, though sounding
down the generations of the history of God's Church: " Cer
tainly, I will be with thee. "
To indicate the urgent manner in which Dr. Welles was
importuned to accept the election, we subjoin a few, selected
from many letters— letters whose writers are well known in
the Diocese and General Church, as earnest-hearted men of God

BISHOP OE MILWAUKEE. XXVli
deeply solicitious for the honor and purity of the Bride, the
Lamb's Wife.

Milwaukee, June 18, A. D. 1874.
Rev. Edward R. Welles, D. D.
Reverend and Bear Brother :— It is with great satisfaction
and hearty thanks to our Heavenly Father, that the under
signed, a committee of the 28th Annual Council of the Diocese
of Wisconsin, are permitted to inform you that on Wednesday
evening, the 17th inst., in by far the fullest convention ever
held in the Diocese, you were unanimously chosen to be its
third Bishop. If perfect harmony, after a brief season of pain
ful discord in a heretofore united Diocese, may be regarded as
an indication of the special presence and guidance of the Spirit
of our Lord, we can but consider this result, which is marvel
lous in our eye's, as manifestly His work, and a clear expression
of His will that you should be placed over us as our chief pas
tor. The unexampled unanimity with which, at an anxious
crisis in our proceedings, your election was made, and, that too,
in the first ballot after your name was proposed, and the uni
versal satisfaction with which the announcement of it was
hailed, both by the clergy and laity of the Diocese, seems to
warrant the conviction, that, under your leadership, the Church
in this Diocese will, by God's blessing, be not only restored to
its wonted unity and peace, but enjoy great prosperity.
Praying our Lord to guide you to such a conclusion as shall
most glorify His Name, and edify His Church, we remain, with
sentiments of great respect and affection, your brethren in
Christ and the Church, ,
Wm. Bliss Ashley,
A. D. Cole.
And others of Committee.

Milwaukee, June 23, A. D. 1874.
Reverend and Dear Brother :— At a meeting of the Standing
Committee of the Diocese of Wisconsin, holden on the 18th inst.,
I was instructed to express to you their gratification that you
had been chosen to be our Bishop, and their earnest hope that
you would accept the office thus tendered to you, in the Name,
and, as we can but think, by the inspiration of the Spirit of
our Divine Lord and Master. ******

XXvili MEMOIRS.

Greatly desiring to see you, and hoping ere long to have that
pleasure, I am very truly and respectfully,
Your brother in Christ and His Church,
Wm. Bliss Ashley,
President Standing Committee.

Milwaukee, June 19, 1874.
My Dear Dr. Welles. .-—Let me join my own most earnest
and loving prayers to the many you will receive from our
Diocese, that you may be led by the Holy Spirit to see your
way clear to accept the call to be our Bishop. I have had the
possibility (never, to my own mind, the probability), before me
for some months past, that I might be the one on whom the
Diocese might, to some extent, harmonize, and I know how
fearful and crushing must be the burden that now rests upon
you, in deciding on your duty. But never, as it seemed to me,
could men see more clearly the guidance and control of the
Holy Ghost, the Comforter, than in this election. For the sake
of the suffering Church, for the comfort and cheer of the thou
sands of loving hearts, who are waiting in anxious suspense
for the joyous news of your acceptance, and for the love of the
dear Saviour, Who, seemingly is calling you to bear this heavy
cross, I pray you to accept.
I believe that you will be universally met, and welcomed,
and sustained, by grateful, rejoicing hearts ; and that, under
your wise care, the wounds already closed, will speedily heal,
so that not even a scar remains.
Assuring you of my own most hearty, loving desire and
prayer for your acceptance, I am most truly,
Your brother in Christ and the Church,
Lewis A. Kemper.

Racine College, June 20.
My Dear Dr. Welles:— You have received, of course, the
telegram, the letter of the committee, and, I dare say, before
this letter reaches you, you will have met Mr. Ten Broeck,
who, with Mr. Cameron, was appointed by us to wait on you.
You have, I dare say, followed in the papers the sad contro
versies which have agitated us, and thrown a Diocese, hitherto
tolerably united, into conflict.
Underneath it all have been grave and serious questions, as

l'.ISHOP OV MILWAUKEE. xxix

well as some personal troubles. We all went to the Council
after many and earnest prayers, with the most entire reliance
on Almighty God, that He would guide us aright.
The contest lay, as no doubt you know from the papers, be
tween Dr. Kemper and Mr. Brown, of Cohoes. The clergy
elected the latter ; the laity would not confirm it, even after he
had been four times elected. Thus we were at a dead-lock, and
there seemed nothing to look forward to but a long and heating
contest, or an adjournment of the election.
I had personally, unto Dr. Kemper, made before the Council
began, an effort at conciliation, and our recommendation of
Mr. Brown was intended in that way ; but neither the former
nor the latter was successful. Now, however, there seemed a
readiness on both sides, and when the committee of conference
met, you were finally adopted by us all ; and then, as you know,
you were unanimously elected.
My object in mentioning these particulars, is to assure you
of what seems to us all, most striking, that if ever there was an
election which seemed marked by the voice and call of God, it
was yours. Not discussed beforehand, unanimous where there
had been so much division, unsought in any way, welcomed
with so much thanksgiving, one can only feel that it was an
answer to the many prayers that have been offered, in very
many places, and by numberless hearts, that God would guide
us aright.
No doubt the Diocese will involve many labors and cares.
There are difficult and important questions to be met ; but for
you there is this most blessed thought, that all men, of all views,
will unite in supporting you, and that God has surely called
you to it.
I pray that your duty may seem as clear to you as it does to
us ; and that He Whose all-perfect wisdom is our only stay, will
counsel, comfort and guide you. For this I shall not cease
to pray. For myself and my brethren here, 1 must add that we
all shall join you, with all our hearts and power, in your work
in the Diocese, if you come to us, as we feel you must.
Yours very affectionately, Jas. deKoven.

Minneapolis, Minn., June 18, 1874.
My Dear Brother ;— Tbe telegraph announces to us this

XXX MEMOIRS.

morning the fact of your election to the important Episcopate
of Wisconsin. Whilst Wisconsin is to be congratulated, 1 do
not think you are but to be earnestly prayed for by your breth
ren, that God will give you grace and strength for the great
work He has called you to undertake.
What is a gain for Wisconsin, is a loss to Minnesota. But I
think we should rejoice to give you up to this greater work, and
to feel honored that Minnesota can furnish one so well qualified
to lead in the work of the sister Diocese. It will be severing
dear ties, to break from your beloved flock at Red Wing, and
from our Diocese, but when God calls, we can only hear the
voice, and follow where it leads.
You will be remembered in our prayers, dear brother, and
may God help you in the great work before you.
Ever your loving brother,
D. B. Knickerbacker.
Faribault, June 18, 1874.
Dearest Brother ;— You know how long I have carried you
in my heart, until you and Minnesota were one. You do not
know that I often thought no fitter person could take my
Bishop's staff, when I lay it down. When I reached Minneapolis
on my way home, I heard of your election to the Bishopric of
Wisconsin ; at once it took a load off my heart for them. I said,
" God be praised." I am sure your wise and loving administra
tion will heal all their divisions, and that in unity and love, it
will be a second Minnesota. It costs me much to give you up,
for you have been the best of fellow-laborers ; and I could
almost say, " I have none like-minded with you."
But, then, it is for the Lord, and I say, " go, and God go with
you." It will be a joy to have you so near, and I think we can
arrange some missionary work together. One thing, this is
your old home, and always will be ; and in no heart will you
have a warmer place than in mine. Of yourself, I have not
spoken. You will find it hard to give up home, parish, every
thing, to feel weak, and have to give counsel to all. * * * Do
come over next week Monday, if you can. God bless you.
Yours ever,
H. B. Whipple.

Cohoes, N. Y., June 23, 1874.
My Dear Brother : —I congratulate you with all my heart on

BISHOP OF MILWAUKEE.

your election as Bishop of Wisconsin. The unanimous vote
which you received seems to promise a full and speedy restor
ation of harmony and peace to that sadly divided See.
May you be long spared to teach and guide the dear flock of
Christ, soon to be committed to you.
I have just heard from my old classmate, the Rev. Dr.
deKoven, that motives of conciliation and love had led his
friends to cast their votes for me. The same pure thoughts and
wishes will constrain them to hold you up in your holy toil.
But, chief of all, the Holy Spirit, Who controlled the choice of
the Council, will give you wisdom and strength to do the hard
work He has laid upon you. With earnest prayer that God
may prosper you in all your undertakings, I am truly yours,
J. H. H. Brown.

By the pleading in these letters, and many others which our
space will not permit us to insert, Dr. Welles was induced, after
a prayerful consideration of the subject, to send his letter of ac
ceptance to the special committee. As an indication of his
conception of the Episcopal office, and the singleness of heart
in which he entered upon the discharge of its sacred duties,
we insert the letter of acceptance in full.
LETTER OF ACCEPTANCE:
To the Committee of the 28th Annual Council of the
Diocese of Wisconsin:
My Dear Brethren : — Without any abatement of self-distrust,
but after consultation with my reverend Diocesan and others,
to whose unanimous judgment my personal convictions are
constrained to yield, I would signify, through you, to the
Church of Wisconsin, my acceptance of the choice which has
fallen upon me to be their Bishop. Never for a moment, dur
ing all these da/s of my anxious and prayerful thought have I
lost sight of my own weakness; but to the eyes of others, ac
ceptance is the way of duty, and though I cannot bring, as so
many named in your Council could have brought to the service
of the Church in your Diocese, the large results of scholarly toil
and theological research ; yet if the General Church shall ratify
your choice, and I shall be consecrated to the office of a Bishop,
I will share with every brother in the Diocese the zeal and
earnestness in labor and in love which will be ours, if we are

xxxii MiiMOms.

Christ's. Should God permit me to sustain and continue the
work of those beloved and stainless men, who have occupied
this See, it will be a slight thing to have consecrated to such a
service, all that I have, and all that I am. As the years pass on
— be they many or few wherein we shall be fellow-laborers— if
interest and zeal in Mission work shall be deepened in our
hearts and manifested in our lives; if Free Churches shall mul
tiply, and daily service and frequent Communions increase ; if
Parish Schools and homes for Christ's poor, and brotherhoods
for Christian works shall increasingly minister to sound Chris
tian culture, and genuine Christian charities, and in all such
blessed service all hearts be united in love for our dear Lord,
and in love one towards another, we may regard it as a token
that God's blessing has crowned our labors. Pray for me, that
the Great Shepherd and Bishop of our souls may help me to be
a faithful Pastor in His Church, and a true and loving co-worker,
with everyone who labors for the extension of Christ's work
upon earth.
With sentiments of deep affection and esteem, I am your
brother in the cause and Church of Christ,
Edward R. Welles.
This acceptance called forth ajgreat many letters of happy
felicitation and plighted loyalty. There was an expression of
hopefulness which was universal throughout the Diocese. The
God-speed of many voices cheered on the man who had, in such
self-distrust and meek reliance upon God, consented to take
into his hands the staff of Kemper and Armitage. It was a
badge of honor, but the responsibility was such as might make
the strongest quail.
But throughout all this season, whose events called forth all
that was best and strongest in the man, the dark shadow of a
coming sorrow was brooding over him ; a sorrow which was to
sunder the ties of his home life, and send him on his way, with
only the hallowed memories of that home, and the blessed hope
of a coming re-union, to comfort and cheer. The wife of his
bosom was dying. And in the certainty of coming bereave
ment, the newly elected Bishop must hide the presage of sor
row, and seem to rejoice in the joy of his friends and well-
wishers. But the chastening power of that sorrow is indicated
by him, on the first page of his first conciliar address, where he
says : " It pleased our Heavenly Father, that the discipline of a

BISHOP OF MILWAUKEE. XXX111
holy sorrow should consecrate with intenser feeling, the weeks
of immediate preparation for this sacred solemnity (his conse
cration). And when, by the laying on of Apostolic hands, I was
set apart for the high and holy office of a Bishop in the Church
of God, in the very depths and poignancy of grief, I felt how
entire in this ordering of Providence, was the dedication of
myself, body and soul to the cares, trials, labors, and responsi
bilities of the Episcopate, knitting up the broken threads of
home life in the duties and affections of the Diocese, I give
you all that a loving heart and a ready, untiring hand can
bring. "
In this spirit he bowed before God in submission on the
morning of October 12th, when his partner in the holy estate of
matrimony entered into the rest that remaineth to the people
of God ; and, by the help of the Holy Ghost, the Comforter, he
went and entered into the bonds of a new love, to which he had
been called by a longing Diocese ; and on the morning of the
25th day of October, consummated that holy union which was to
go on for fourteen years, in work for Him Who is the Heavenly
Bridegroom. The new Bishop reached his Diocese on Saturday, November
14th, and was warmly welcomed by the clergy and laity of the
city of Milwaukee. His first official act was performed on the
following day by preaching, celebration of the Holy Commun
ion,' and the ordination of the Rev. Edward H. Rudd to the
priesthood. From that day onward, he lived and labored in
the spirit of the charge given him by the Bishop of Minnesota,
at the time of his consecration :
" Brother Beloved :— You are to-day to be consecrated to the
high and holy office of a shepherd, ruler, and Bishop of the
Ch urch of God. For long years you have been my fellow-laborer
in missionary work. Through all these years our hearts have
beat as one, in plans and work for our dear Lord. Had it been
the will of God, I could have wished that you had still worked
with me until He gave to you my Bishop's staff. A nobler her
itage is yours, to follow in the footsteps of the apostolic Kem
per, and the saintly Armitage. I know your timid heart, and
that, like holy men of old, you shrink from such an office. Fear
not, the Lord Who calls you will go with you. His grace is
sufficient for thee.
"I dare not tell you that you are called to a life of ease and

XXXIV MEMOTRS.

comfort. It is hard to lose the clinging loves, and the blessed
ties, of a pastor's life. It is hard to bear great burdens, to lead
others, where you would rather follow, to teach when you
would be a learner, to feel the loneliness of official trust, and
have no refuge but to cry as a child to God. It is hard without
means, to lay great plans for missions, schools, and homes of
mercy, to work bravely when there are so many fellow-disciples
of whom you must say, as S. Paul said : ' Demas hath forsaken
me, having loved this present world.' It is hard to hear con
tentions and strifes, to see alienations and heart burnings, and
to know that you are to heal them by the love of Christ. It is
hard to bear an office from the Lord Jesus Christ, and have
men esteem it only as it makes for their party, to know that
your own children in the Lord are striving to see who shall own
their spiritual Father. It is hard to give up home, ease, com
fort, wife and children, to be a wanderer until God gives you
another home. It is hard to enter upon work where the only
change which can come to you is in death, that whether the
field is barren or fruitful, whether the way is rough or smooth,
yet here you must work until you die.
"You will find it hard, and many a time there will go up from
your poor crushed heart, an agony of prayer to Jesus Christ,
Yet for all its cares and crosses, the love of Him, Who sends
you, can make it the happiest life God ever gave to man. Is
there any joy in this sinful world like the joy of leading wan
derers home ? Is it not enough to thrill your heart, that you
are chosen to feed the flock which He has purchased with His
blood ? Fear not ; out of your weakness, Christ can make you
strong. You bear with you the love of every brother who
shares in this holy office. Your comfort is that you are sent by
Jesus Christ ; your consolation is the joy of the Holy Ghost ;
your'guide is the Revelation of God, and your watchword is
the Catholic Faith. May I not ask you not to forget us who
are gathered here. Think of yourself as waiting for the com
mission of your Saviour. Hear Him say, ' I am with you
always.' '• If trials come, look up where all is peace ; if the way is hard,
look onward to the end ; if divisions come, heal them by love ;
if heresies enter the flock of Christ, plead, and weep, and pray,
and stand as a rock by the truth as it is in Jesus. Remember
as the motto of your life, the best bishop is the truest father ;
onsecrate all you have and are to Jesus Christ.

BISHOP OF MILWAUKEE. XXXV
" Make it your meat to do the will of Him, Who sends you ;
whether the world goes well or ill, work on bravely, lovingly>
and fearlessly, and your work, which seems to you so poor, will
be builded on the Rock and so will last forever. Amen."
Concerning the theological status of the Diocese just previ
ous to, and at the time of the election of BishopWELLES.it may
be said, as it is of a certain period of Old Testament historyi
that " There were giants in the earth in those days."
Certain questions had arisen and been discussed with a force
and clearness which had not then, nor has since, been equalled
in the American Church.
The questions alluded to, were such as involved the true con
ception of our Blessed Lord as present in the Holy Eucharist;
a true conception of the Priestly office and function in the for
giveness of sins, and a true conception of our rightful heritage
in the Church of Catholic life and practice. Preeminent
among those who held the advanced view on these subjects,
were the then Warden of Racine College, the president of Na
shotah House, and the Dean of the Cathedral at Milwaukee.
Opposed to them as leaders, were the then professors of
Nashotah House, and rectors of Grace Church, Madison, and
St. James' Church, Milwaukee. In the treatment of these ques
tions, as has sometimes been the case before, the warfare was
carried on in some measure through the public journals.
While this is allowable, within certain limits, when a man
is honest enough to sign his name in full at the foot of his pro
duction, it is quite another thing when attacks are made co
vertly, and statements are mis-stated. The result of the heated
debate in the first Council called to elect a Bishop after the
death of Bishop Armitage, was the defeat of the Rev. Dr.
deKoven for that office ; for although he was elected by the
clergy, he was rejected by the laity; and adjournment was
made without choice.
When men get thoroughly ashamed of themselves, they are
apt to behave fairly well for a while. And so it was that when
Dr. deKoven announced the name of Edward R. Welles as
the one selected by the committee of ten, sent out for the pur
pose of agreeing upon a single name to be balloted on, there
was such a unanimity of thought and action as indicated that
every man had just discovered what was the proper thing to do.
In nominating Dr. Welles, Dr. deKoven said : " He is a

MEMOIRS.

man of large and varied experience ; a devout and earnest
Churchman ; a man who has shown his zeal for the Church, in
the fact that for seventeen years he has been content to do
hard missionary work in that Diocese ; that his work, under
God's blessing, has so prospered that he has not only the charge
of his Parish Church and a large Parish School, but keeps up
daily services and undertakes also the supervision of a number
of Missions. I have heard it stated as fourteen, but the exac;
number we are not certain about. He is a man who has had
great business experience, has been the secretary of the Diocese
of Minnesota ; has represented it in General Convention ; and
that which to us all is the highest recommendation, has the
warm love and earnest affection of the Bishop of Minnesota,
whom, I suppose, we regard as one of the best and noblest
Bishops of the Church in this country. For his Churchmanship,
his earnestness, his devotion, his missionary labors, in behalf
of the Committee of Conference, I nominate to this Convention
the Rev. Edward R. Welles, D. D., Rector of Christ Church,
in the town of Red Wing, Minn."
From that day there has been little of contention, whether a
man must have a low or high conception of holy things, in order
to be considered as in good form.
There is a question which came preeminently before the
American Church, during the Episcopate of Bishop Welles,
and with which he was largely identified. It is a question of
world-wide interest, as involving the rights of the Church
Catholic in the persons of her Bishops. We allude to what is
known as the Cathedral question. This question has, from time
to time, during the existence of the Church in this country,
presented itself under different forms, and is to-day a vital
question in the Church in the land. It may be long before it
is finally settled; it may appear in varied forms; but the
power, and the rights, of those who receive the Holy Ghost for
the office and work of a Bishop in the Church of God, must
finally be proclaimed, understood, and acknowledged, as essen
tial to the unity of spirit and the bond of peace. It was not
really a strife of men as against men ; it was a difference of
conception, and of action under that conception, concerning
the appointments of Almighty God. In the Diocese of Wiscon
sin, it appeared in the form of the Cathedral question. The
length and breadth of this question is such as to demand deep

BISHOP OF MILWAUKEE. XXXV11
and careful study, and an action in accordance with the re
corded and traditional status of the Episcopate in its Diocesan
rights, in the days of the primitive Church. That there was a
Cathedral system in the earlier ages of the Church, is patent to
every reader of history. The reestablishment of it must needs
be upon a true and proper basis. To fail of this, would be to
introduce an element which could not fail to be harmful in its
operation, and subversive of the best interest of the Church.
When it is said that the Cathedral question came prom
inently forward during Bishop Welles' Episcopate, it is not to
be understood by the reader that it originated then. On the
contrary, it had its beginning in the Diocese much earlier ; even
as far back as the time of Bishop Kemper. It was agitated in
the Diocesan Council as early as the year 1865. There had been
much ?discussion of it before Bishop Armitage came to the
Diocese in 1867. He declared the fact of such discussion, and
the apparent intention of adopting the Cathedral system, as be
ing one thing which strongly influenced him to come to the
Diocese as Bishop. "
In the year 1868, the Diocesan Council memorialized the
General Convention on the subject ; asking for such legislation
as would admit of the establishment of the Cathedral in the
city of Milwaukee, for the Diocese of Wisconsin. The memorial
was drawn by the Rev. Dr. Adams, and signed by Bishop
Kemper, Bishop Armitage, forty-five priests and fifty laymen
of the Diocese. " This memorial enunciates the See principle,
enlarging upon, (1) the Bishop as the successor of the Apos
tles, (2) the city as the place of the Bishop, (3) the Bishop's
Church or Cathedral, as the mother Church of the whole Dio
cese ; and the Bishop's residence as the centre of his work, the
very focus of all influences whereby the propagation of the
Gospel can be organized, pressed on, facilitated."
It was presented in General Convention by Dr. Adams, and
such legislation was had as would give to the Diocese full
authority to establish a Cathedral, and act upon the See prin
ciple. This action of the General Convention was the first ever
taken by that body in this direction. As there was no prece
dent to follow, in developing the Cathedral idea in this country,
it was necessarily a thing of rather slow growth. It could not
be modeled after the English plan, for that would give a Church
which is not a Bishop's Church at all, but a Dean's. The only

xxxviii MEMOIRS.

exception to this operation of the English system, is the Cathe
dral of Truro, the last established before this writing, by the
present Archbishop of Canterbury, in which there is a return
to the Primitive Cathedral system. We will state in this con
nection, that there has been a recent revision of the statutes of
Litchfield Cathedral, looking in the same direction. So the
American Cathedral system, in its incipiency, must be experi
mental, and the organization merely of a tentative character,
until experience, through change, had indicated that which
must be permanent.
The whole Diocese was ready to express a grateful apprecia
tion of the Cathedral plan, though very few seemed to know
what that plan was. Even the wisdom of Bishop Kemper
seemed at fault here. Instead of taking initiatory action himself,
he committed it to Bishop Armitage, who felt his way, as best
he could, in the manner and method of establishing the first
American Cathedral. It is not strange that this formative pro
cess went on to the end of Bishop Armitage's life.
When Bishop Welles was called to take up the reins of
government in Wisconsin, he inherited this undeveloped work.
For four years he continued the policy of his predecessors. He
would have done so for a longer time, but was forced into
action by the undue and disrespectful haste of some of the
clergy of the Diocese. It was such an act that obliged the
Bishop, in 1878, to offer as a counterpoise for the consideration
of the Council, a canon which was left among the papers of
Bishop Armitage, in his own hand- writing, and which had
been formally considered and agreed upon by a committee of
the Council of 1873.
But before the committee could report, in accordance with
the resolution constituting it, Bishop Armitage died, and the
whole matter was left in abeyance until such time as legislation
might be desired. The charge so often made, that Bishop
Welles precipitated " the Cathedral War " upon the Diocese,
has never been true. And it is due to his memory to make a
comparatively full and orderly statement, of the leading facts
of the Cathedral controversy in the Diocese of Wisconsin.
From the time of his consecration in 1874, to the Diocesan
Council of 1877, the Bishop was holding tentatively in accord
ance with the policy of Bishop Armitage, with reverent regard
to his memory, the Cathedral status and work. At this Council,

BISHOP OF MILWAUKEE. Xxxix
the Rev. Dr. Egar proposed a canon entitled " Of the Organiza
tion and Unity of the Church in the City," (see Journal of 1877,
pages xxii., xxiii. and xxi v.,) which was referred to the .Committee
on Canons. The design of this canon was to supersede the See
principle and Cathedral organization, by the establishment of
a city chapter, in which all authority should be lodged. The
adoption of this canon proposed would have been a complete
nullification of Cathedral existence, even in a concurrent way.
At the Diocesan Council of 1878, the Bishop used the follow
ing language in his address : " This is the Cathedral work as
it stands to-day. My judgment is to let it develop itself by a
natural growth, patiently guided and regulated by the best
wisdom we can bring to bear upon it, but not to cast it, by
hasty legislation, into any iron system. And this was the
judgment of Bishop Armitage." But at this same Council of
1878, the Bishop calls the attention of the body to the fact of
the appointment of a committee by the Council of 1873, to con
fer with Bishop Armitage as to the organization of the Cathe
dral, and to the further fact that the committee had agreed
upon the proposed canon printed on pages xxxv., xxxvi. of the
Journal of 1878. But in relation to that document, the Bishop
goes on to say (page xxxvii.) : "I ask that there shall be no legis
lation in respect to this at the present time. I will myself ap
point the officers, that the canon may be put in operation as
soon after the Council as I can arrange to do it. The Cathedral
chapter, so organized, will have abundant time and opportunity
to consider fairly, and test experimentally, all the provisions of
the canon, and to suggest and make such improvements, as, in
their wisdom and experience, may seem best; and then the
canon will be presented to the Council for its consideration,
and, if approved, be adopted as the permanent organization of
the Cathedral."
On the 10th day of December following, the Bishop, in ac
cordance with the plan presented by him to the Council of the
Diocese, appointed the persons to hold office until such a time as
the Bishop and Diocesan Council should put into operation a
Cathedral canon. Of those appointed, the Rev. Dr. Keene, and
Rev. W. H. Throop declined to serve, in reference to whose
declinations,' the; Chapter, at a subsequent period of its session,
put upon record its '• expression of great regret at the declina
tions of the reverend Rectors of St. John's Church and St. James

xl MEMOIRS.

Church, Milwaukee, asking them to reconsider their action,
and take part in the work of the Chapter."
Let it be remembered, that at the canonical time for holding
the Council of 1878, the Bishop was dangerously ill. The Coun
cil met, and adjourned to meet again on the 19th day of Novem
ber. On the 26th day of June, the Bishop was able to leave
Milwaukee, and on the 4th day of July, sailed from New York
for England.
About the middle of September, a letter appeared, ostensibly
written by twelve laymen of the three parishes in the city of
Milwaukee, addressed to the three Rectors of said parishes, de
siring "to learn the true status of the so-called Cathedral in
Milwaukee, whether it is in accordance with the See system ;
and whether anything can be canonically, or otherwise, done, or
undone, to relieve the Bishop, and to realize the hopes which
once existed in the city and the Diocese, of establishing a har
monious and efficient organization of the Church in this city."
In apparent answer to this ostensible letter, there appeared
a pamphlet over the signatures of the three Rectors, and en
titled: "The See Principle and the Cathedral Church in the
Diocese of Wisconsin." One of the most remarkable features
of the pamphlet was, that the style of it was so very similar to
that of the letter which called it forth, that a careful observer
might be forced to conclude that the twelve laymen must have
written it themselves.
The first knowledge the Bishop, who was in England, had of
the pamphlet, was by a letter from Dr. deKoven in these words:
" My dear Bishop :—I can only write a line to say that
Doctors Fulton, Keene, and Mr. Throop have printed a pamphlet
against the Cathedral, which seems to me most wicked.
"It is full of honeyed words for yourself, but really is an ar
raignment of the work of Bishop Armitage and your own.
" I suppose it will have been sent to you. If not I will beg
Spalding to have one reach you at Waterloo.
'' Whether amongst us, we shall make an answer before your
return, I do not know.
" No one can answer it but yourself. As it represents you as
an unwilling, or rather willing, but deluded or unfortunate vic
tim of the Cathedral, I can scarcely write with patience of it."
On October 12th, Dr. deKoven wrote" again :
" In regard to matters in Wisconsin, I believe you have only,

bishop of Milwaukee. xli
clearly and distinctly, to state to your Diocese what you want
in regard to the Cathedral, to have your people, clerical and lay,
rally around you. The fact that the three city Rectors have felt
it necessary to represent you as weighed down by the Cathedral,
and as an unwilling captive who needs to be delivered, is proof
that they know this.
" Whatever you think to be best, nine-tenths of the;Diocese
will gladly accept. * * My dear Bishop, I welcome you back
with all my heart, as many more will also. God will bring
peace and good even out of the storms, and sure victory to the
right. Ever affectionately your son in Christ, Jas. deKoven."
A prominent layman of the Diocese wrote, just after the
Rectors' pamphlet was issued : " We, here at home, miss you
greatly now. We are loyal as ever, and we only look to our
leader for such strength as he only can give in such an emer
gency—not, however, forgetting the great Head of the Church,
from Whom we must all seek our strength."
But, meanwhile, the pamphlet was being sent by busy hands
into every portion of the Diocese, to sound the war-cry for the
laymen in the city whose hearts were " so ardently longing for
peace." The dear Bishop, far away in England, striving in pa
tience for restoration of health, must have had recalled to his
mind the words spoken to him by Bishop Whipple in the con
secration sermon : " It is hard to bear an office from the Lord
Jesus Christ, and have men esteem it only as it makes for their
party; to know that your own children in the Lord are striving
to see who shall own their spiritual Father. * * * If trials
come, look up where all is peace ; if the way is hard, look on
ward to the end ; if divisions come, heal them by love ; if heresies
enter the flock of Christ, plead, and weep, and pray, and stand
as a rock by the truth as it is in Jesus. Remember, as the motto
of your life, ' the best Bishop is the truest father.' "
Those who knew Bishop Welles in his daily life, and could
best judge of the motives from which he acted, can well under
stand how such an injunction, at such a time, would be stamped
upon his heart and life, with the seal of God the Holy
Ghost. The man who has such an imprimatur, will work ten
derly towards men, but loyally towards God. If he has an in
heritance of responsibility for Holy Church, he views it first on
the God-ward side. Receiving his fatherly office by the Spirit

Xlii MEMOIRS.

of the All-Father, he will " do always the things that will please
Him." The Bishop received a copy of the pamphlet just before
he sailed on his return voyage, and, in prayerful sorrow, pondered
its unjust arraignment of his work.
And his sorrow was the more intense, from the fact that
some of those same laymen were among those who had been
active in the matter of memorializing the General Convention,
for the establishment of the Cathedral system as one of the
most desirable agencies in Diocesan work. He had just had the
privilege of attendance on the Second Lambeth Conference, and
through it, had come to be quickened to a fuller realization of
the great mission and duty of the Church of God, through the
office and work of her Bishops, and of their great responsibility
in the teaching of all nations.
And so with a vision of faith akin to that of the Beloved
Disciple in Patmos, he returned to his work, arriving in the
Diocese on the 30th day of October, but little more than two
weeks before the time appointed for the adjourned session of
the Council.
It is not necessary to say that the Bishop was hurt. It goes
without saying. Had any asked him, " What are these wounds
in thine hands ? " he might well have answered : " Those with
which I was wounded in the house of my friends." The pam
phlet of the city Rectors had not been answered. It did not
enter into the heart of this Father in God, to war with his own
children. He had learned to " endure hardness as a good soldier
of Jesus Christ." And herein was his great strength. With the
derived patience of the Man of men, he went calmly on. The
Council met on the 19th of November. During the session, an
answer was made to the pamphlet of the three city Rectors.
It was from the pen of Dr. deKoven, and it was made with the
Bishop's knowledge and consent. It was an unsparing exposure
of misquotations from history, misconceptions of primitive
usage, and malicious subtlety in logical deduction, contained in
the pamphlet. It defended the Bishop against the charge of the
diversion of means from the missionary fund for the support of
a Cathedral staff, and enumerated, and sustained, the principle,
that a Cathedral Church, in its inception and work, must be, to
the fullest extent, Diocesan in its character, and not merely
urban, or local. There was great skill shown, both in the pam
phlet and in the answer. But the answer was a refutation of
tbe pamphlet.

BISHOP OF MILWAUKEE. Xliii
It was at this Council, that Dr. deKoven did his last work
for the Diocese. On the morning of the 21st, he rapped at
the door of the Bishop's sleeping room, and asked permission
to enter. The Bishop, who had not yet arisen, gave the per
mission. The Doctor entered and said : " Bishop, 1 did not close
my eyes last night. This strain and worry is more than I
am able to bear. I must go home. I do not believe that I
shall be able to come to a Council again." The words seemed
almost prophetic ; for before the next Council, he was, in the
words which he used concerning Bishop Armitage, in answer
to the Rectors' pamphlet,— " at rest, where the Church is no
longer militant. In Paradise there are no Parishes and only
One Cathedral, which needs no candle, neither light of the sun,
because of the resplendent radiance of the Lamb without spot
or blemish." With all the high sensibility of a loving soul, he was loyal to
his Bishop and to the Church. In his death, on the 19th of
March following, the Bishop mourned the loss of a dear friend,
and faithful counsellor. But still it was a joy to his heart to
be able to give such a man to the rest of the people of God.
At the Council of November 19th and 20th, 1878, the Bishop,
in his Address, refers impliedly to a charge made in the pam
phlet of the city Rectors to the effect, that the Cathedral con
gregation was twenty times greater burden upon the Bishop's
time and strength, than that of any other Parish in the Diocese,
in these words : " I have no more care or responsibility for the
detailed work of the Cathedral congregation, than for any other
in the Diocese, and it makes no more drafts on my time."
Such was -the spirit of opposition on the part of the city
Parishes to the organization of the Cathedral, as a Diocesan
and general work, that they made charges of a most extraordi
nary character. Some of these charges appeared in a letter
signed at a meeting at the office of Finches, Lynde &
Miller, February 15th, 1879, only a month before the death of Dr.
deKoven, in which they gravely repeat the charge, that " diver
sion of the general missionary funds of the Diocese was made,
to defray the expenses of the Cathedral staff, and the necessary
expenses of the Cathedral work. " This letter was, in the main,
a reiteration of the charges made in the pamphlet of the city
Rectors. In reply to this charge, the Bishop published in the Wiscon-

Xliv MEMOIRS.

sin Calendar for April, a full statement of all the appropriations
made for twenty years past, showing conclusively that the
funds had, during all that time, been appropriated in strict
accordance with the direction of the Board of Missions.
An amusing feature of the laymen's letter was a very indefi
nite charge against the Bishop, concerning what he was going
to do. Th6 Bishop frankly admitted, that against such a charge
he was not able to make a defense. But he asked the baptized
and communicant signers of the "Letter," not to hesitate to
correct the errors into which they had unfortunately fallen, in
this matter of giving their signature without knowledge of facts
stated over them.
A letter was published in response, by three laymen, dis
claiming all intention of charging the Bishop with being par
taker, indirectly, in the theft which the letter impliedly charged
But a careful reader of the letter cannot escape the conviction
that the " blunt " was its chief point. The letter of the three
laymen, disclaiming this, insists upon the right of direction in
canon, ritual and official ministration as in the people, quorum
magna pars fui. To quote from this letter concerning the
purpose of the one signed at the meeting, at the office of
Finches, Lynde & Miller: "The whole pith and purpose of
the laymen s address, was to protest, and to present statements
of fact and of argument against the proposed Cathedral Chapter,
as unnecessary, undesirable and dangerous in itself, and in its
natural and logical development, and against the way it was at
tempted to be established as unauthorized and arbitrary. * *
It was also a protest against attempts to lead our people
back to the doctrines, practices and institutions of the dark
ages, in the name of progress, by whomsoever such attempts
should be made."
Let the reader bear in mind, that at the last Council before
these words were penned, the Bishop had earnestly asked that
no legislation should be had, and no attempt made to cast the
Cathedral organization into any iron form ; but that only a
tentative and experimental course be followed, to determine
what was wisest and best for final adoption.
But a year before this, those very laymen had sought to cast
it into an iron form, through the canon of Dr. Egar, and to
make themselves, and their fellows in the City of Milwaukee
the sine qua non of all action for the Diocese, or rather to pur-

BISHOP OF MILWAUKEE. xlv
loin an institution which was intended to be Diocesan, and re
strict its action and influence for local aggrandizement.
The dark ages never conceived a darker design for marring
the beauty and staining the purity of the Bride of Christ.
No matter, from their point of view, if some of the signers
of the " Laymen's Address " were unbaptized and non-com
municants. There is no recognition by the world of the deep personality
involved in the words, "As the Father hath sent Me, so send I
you." The mission is universal in its outreach; and action un
der it must needs involve, on the part of the chief Pastor and
successor, in fact, and in right, of the office of the Apostles, the
consideration, that his office is for the whole of the Church in
his Diocese, and not for local honor and emolument.
It was with a true apprehension of the organic life and
character of a Diocese, that Bishop Welles entered upon his
work. Into that work, he brought a measure of unselfishness
which was rare as it was beautiful. Willing to spend and be
spent, he turned not back when misunderstanding of his
motives, and misjudgment of his action, came into the lot of
his trial. No one who did not know him in the quiet of his
private life, can estimate, in any true measure, the calm steadi
ness of purpose which moved him onward in the discharge of
the present duty, and in his outreach to the things beyond.
Conscious of weakness, he yet knew his strength. The key note
of his endurance sounds in the words of S. Paul : " I can do
all things through Christ, Which strengtheneth me." Standing
by his coffin, and looking back through the years, one who had
known him well could understand how
" He went about his work — such work as few
Ever had laid on head, and heart, and hand,
As one who knows where there*s a task to do,
Man's honest will muBt Heaven's good grace command.
Who truBts that strength, will, with the burden grow,
God makes us instruments to work His win,
If but that will we can arrive to know,
Nor tamper with the weights of good and ill."
One day the writer of this said to him : " Bishop, do you
know that twenty millions of dollars are arrayed against you,
in this work of the Cathedral organization and development ?"
He raised his eyes, slowly, and with a steady look, as of a faith
which seemed to behold things afar off, quietly answered : " Yes ;

Xlvi MEMOIRS.

but what are twenty millions of dollars, compared with the
duty of a Bishop of the Church of God?" The sublime con
ceptions of such a faith, are the spies which bring back the
Eshcol pledges, to assure of the fruition of the coming days.
Such faith is sweeter than knowledge, for it is knowledge ful
filled. The man who allows earth's tinsel to outshine Heaven's
pure gold— who allows the near hillocks of time to rise up and
overtop the distant mountains of eternity, cannot behold the
glory from afar. But he who takes God at His word, and
endures " as seeing Him Who is invisible," abides not in the
shadow of the cloud of doubt. And so with this " member of
Christ " this " child of God," this •' inheritor of the kingdom of
Heaven." As child, and youth, and man, and priest, and
bishop, his humility, and faith, (because they were so true)
never realized how grand they were. On one occasion the
writer said to him, half in jest, half in earnest : " Dean, we shall
want to make a Bishop of you, somewhere, some day." With
an expression of pain and of reverent awe upon his face, he
replied : " Oh 1 1 hope not ; my ambition is to live and die in this
parish." These words, spoken, as they were, in private, with all the
earnestness of truth, show the loyalty of the man to the present
duty which God had laid on him. They are an index to his
character and course of action, in all official stations to which he
might be called.
An answer to the charges in the letter of the three laymen
appeared in the Calendar for May, 1879.
At the beginning of the answer, the Bishop says :
" A Diocese, like every other corporation, has its distinctive
life, its habits of thought, its traditional mode of looking at,
and dealing with, the problems of work that come before it.
Views change slowly, and should do so. Sudden revolutions,
whether in Church or State, are undesirable, and usually there
is a conservative spirit of self -protection, which rises up against
them. " Changes have to be made from time to time, to meet the de
mands of the hour ; but they need to be made with caution and
deliberation. The opposition with which changes are generally
met, helps to secure this ; and while, if factions are conducted
on the ' rule or ruin ' principle, opposition may do harm, yet,
ordinarily, it results in good. Measures are, in consequence of

BISHOP OF MILWAUKEE. xlvii
it, carefully scanned ; the motives in proposing them are con
sidered ; principles are established ; and the final action is apt
to be wise, according to the light and wisdom with which an
investigation has been conducted.
" In coming into a Diocese, therefore, it is necessary that a
Clergyman, and especially a Bishop, who intends to ' sow the
fruit of righteousness in peace,' should familiarize himself with
her traditional action ; should study her modes of thought ;
should examine her legislation, and understand the character of
the men who have impressed themselves upon her life.
" To do this, is with most strangers a spontaneous impulse of
courtesy and respect ; but it should be more ; it should be, and
will be with thoughtful and conscientious men, a matter of
principle as well ; for if one be not so actuated, he is apt, in pro
portion to his influence or position, to disturb that harmony of
action which is essential, above all things, in religious matters.
" This comprehension of the organic life and character of a
Diocese, as evinced by the past, is as necessary to a new-comer,
as that he should understand the conditions of the present; and
that he should know the men with whom he will have to act,
and by whom he will be more or less influenced.
" Impressed with these views, your Bishop, when coming into
the Diocese and undertaking his duties, has endeavored to
understand her life and legislation, comprehend the work she
has undertaken, and the part she has to act in the sphere
assigned her, in this portion of the Church of God.
" He has not tried to revolutionize her life according to his
own judgment or self will ; but in company with those she has
trusted and honored, who obey her canons and respect her fair
fame, he has endeavored to put himself into full sympathy
with her, and to carry on her life, which, in his judgment, has
been both Scriptural and Churchly.
" He believes he will be found, as he certainly desires to be
with Bishop Kemper and Bishop Armitage, and in harmony
with the men who were associated with them, and who held up
their hands in the good work they did in their day and genera
tion. "In view, then, of the questions agitated at the present time,
and of the charges and imputations freely made of innovation,
and of deviation from old paths, your Bishop thinks it best, in
order to avoid misapprehension, to reproduce some of the dec-

xlviii MEMOIRS.

larations and actions of the Diocese, and of her Bishops, in
regard to certain of the points at issue."
The Bishop then proceeds to speak of the action of the
Diocese, as expressed in the Memorial to the General Conven
tion of 1868, wherein the Council makes the representation
" that the Episcopate is the Missionary order of the Church, and
has been so constitutionally from the beginning, Bishops being
not only successors of the Apostles, but themselves Apostles;
the one order having the direct and immediate commission and
command to ' go into all the world, and preach the Gospel to
every creature.' * * * Bishops, therefore, or Apostles, are,
and ought to be, the leaders of the Church in every onward step
and progress ; the pioneers of all our work in the conversion of
the world to Christ, according to their name, Apostles— the first
sent forth into new spheres of Christian Missionary enterprise."
The committee to draft this Memorial had been appointed in
the year 1866. The Bishop called attention to the fact, that this
action was in consequence of a Resolution offered by Mr. Jas.
Kneeland, one of the signers of the letter which called forth the
city Rectors' pamphlet.
The lay element appointed and serving on this committee,
were Messrs. Jas. Kneeland, Winfield Smith and John P. Mc
Gregor. Bishop Kemper, in his address of that year (1866) says :
"I still venture (perhaps from long habit), to view the
whole Diocese as Missionary ground, and shall probably con
tinue to do so while bodily and mental strength are bestowed.
This view of duty I must urge as an apology for not calling
your attention to a Cathedral, and Episcopal residence, or a
fund for the support of your Bishop.
"I confess I have neither time nor inclination, to give much
serious thought to these and kindred subjects, although I shall
cordially concur in any efforts in relation to them, which you
may please to put forth."
In Bishop Armitage's Address in 1869, occurs the following :
"By common consent, Milwaukee was to be made the See of
the Diocese of Wisconsin, and my residence was virtually fixed
in this city, by the offers and resolutions which followed my
election in your last Convention,
"Accordingly, in our earliest consultations, the Bishop [Kem
per] assigned to me the organization of Church work in this

BISHOP OF MILWAUKEE. XliX
city, in reference to its Diocesan relations. Much of my time
has been given, and must still be given, to the effort to
strengthen the Church in this centre."
In his Address to the Council of 1869, Bishop Armitage says:
"I may be expected to speak of the progress of the work en
trusted to me by the Bishop (Kemper) and virtually, by the
Convention, on my first coming to the Diocese ; viz. : the estab
lishment of the See Principle, the gradual erection of Milwau
kee into the See of Wisconsin. * * * With the Bishop's
(Kemper) approval in every important step, and with his kind
confidence throughout; I have done what I could under the very
peculiar difficulties of the task; and can report, at least, an out
line traced, though the filling in may be far in the future. * * *
" As Clergy and people learn to appreciate the Church's Mis
sion, and work, apart from Parish organization, and the possi
bility of its being carried on, by and under the Bishop, not only
without interference with Parishes, but even for their help and
benefit, more will be done, not only in Milwaukee, but in other
cities, on the principle of the See— the plan which seems new,
because it is a return to the old, — which will make its way, not
only because of primitive precedent and authority, but because
it is commended by practical common sense." *
In 1873 Bishop Armitage says : "I shall never see it (the
Cathedral system) all worked out, but I know that some will
by-and-by ; and it is worth living for, and dying for, to lay the
foundations of it all. * * * No Parish can be interfered
with, or anything but helped, by a genuine Cathedral work ;
and I ask only for the time necessary to show it, to secure the
admission of that fact, even from those who doubt whereunto
this will grow."
Such were the mind and spirit of the two predecessors of
Bishop Welles in the Episcopate of Wisconsin, and the work
came to him as a holy heritage.
His conception of it is clear in his own words: "Your
Bishop, in coming into this Diocese, cannot have read its mind
and purpose amiss ; he cannot see that he has acted otherwise
than his predecessors have done, and the Council has authorized
* These words of Bishop Armitage sound like prophecy when we realize the
fact, that Wisconsin was the pioneer m Cathedral action in 18f>8, and that at tbe
close of the tenth year of Bishop Welles' Episcopate in 1884, seventeen Dio
ceses and six Missionary Jurisdictions had formed Cathedrals, and six other
Dioceses declared in favor of the system ; making a number of twenty-nine out of
sixty Dioceses and Jurisdictions.

1 MEMOIRS.

(and declared to be the ancient and right way), in continuing
this work, in taking the lead in forming it, in assigning persons
to the care of it."
Concerning the charge of innovation in the matter of Sister
hoods, the Bishop quoted from the Address of Bishop Kemper,
to the Annual Council of 1866, the following words :
"Whatever may be the zeal and devotion of the Clergy, (and I
thank God, that no Bishop can be surrounded by a more faith
ful band of fellow-workers,) our progress depends mainly, al
most exclusively, indeed I may say, under God, upon the hearty,
active, personal cooperation of the laymen and women of the
Church. It is theirs to hold up, and strengthen, the feeble
hands of the Clergy, * * * to give, so far as their proper in
fluence can effect it, their sons as standard bearers of the Cross ;
tounite(underproper circumstances and regulations),in Christian
brotherhoods and sisterhoods, through whose agency most effect
ual comfort and consolation can be imparted to the distressed
and the dying. In these, and many such like ways, are you,
dear brethren of the laity, called on by the Master and the
Church, to help for ward the blessed work which, remember, the
Lord has entrusted to us all."
Bishop Welles quotes, also, from the Annual Address of
Bishop Armitage in 1869: " Of city mission work, of ^.sisterhood
devoted thereto, of Church Schools and of a Diocesan office, I
hardly dare call attention to the beginnings we have ; but any
one of them only lacks hearty cooperation, and means of sup
port, to make it what we would own with pride. " *
With these declarations on the part of Bishop Kemper and
Bishop Armitage, sustained and legalized by the Diocese, as
appears in the note below, is it not evident that this work, too,
was an inheritance that came to the third Bishop of Wisconsin ?
Would not the Christian conscience of a thoughtful man,
?There is reason to think that in these words, Bishop Armitage was recurring
to the fact of his previous correspondence with some English Sisters, in refer
ence to their purchasing the property known as Kemper Hall. And this is the
more apparent from the Record pages 77 and 78 of the Journal of 1868, as fol
lows : "Whereas, this Convention has learned with pleasure, that an Associa
tion of English Sisters ie preparer! to assume the purchase and charge of Kem
per Hall, if "satisfactory arrangements can be made for their reception; therefore,
Resolved, that this Convention extends a hearty welcome to these self-denying
laborers in our Redeemer's cause, and that the members of this Body pledge
themselveB to earnest and personal efforts, to aid the Sisters in building up at
once, under the supervision of ortr Bishops (Kemper and Armitage) an inBtilu-
tion for the education of girls, in the highest branches of human learning
suited to their sex, and in the faith and practice of this Church," etc.

BISHOP OF MILWAUKEE. 11
realize a responsibility to God and the Church, for the develop
ment of work thus passed on from holy hands to holy hands,
and endorsed by the legislative action of the Diocese? And
are not these facts, and these thoughts of true responsibilty, an
overwhelming answer to the charges of revolutionizing, inno
vation and self-sufficiency, deviation from old paths, alleged
against the Bishop in the letter of the three laymen, and ma
liciously continued, or ignorantly repeated, even now ?
At the Annual Council of 1879, the Bishop delivered his Ad
dress in lieu of the customary Council Sermon. In the Address,
he used these words, in which, be it remembered, for the first
time, he advised legislation upon the subject of the Cathedral :
" An all-important question to be considered at this Council
is that of Cathedral organization. As your Bishop, I desire to
speak plainly and frankly to you on this subject. The Ordinal
of the Church in its office of consecration, places the Bishop
over the Diocese in which he is to preside as the father and
pastor of the flock. It requires him to be an example to God's
people, in patience, humility, holiness, in all Christian graces,
but especially, as I would note in this connection, in that zeal
and desire for the extension of God's kingdom on earth, which
shall make him the Chief Missionary of his Diocese. The
powers inherent in his office, the authority he wields, are all from
God, and to be used for His glory, and for the extension of His
Church. The Bishop needs his home to be the centre of unity
for his Diocese, and a kindly hospitality. He needs his Diocesan
office where the official papers of the Diocese may be gathered,
arranged, systematized; he needs his band of helpers that he may
as Chief Missionary, work effectively where he sees the need of
mission work ; he needs his Church— a Church forever and en
tirely free, wherein, through the ministry of his Cathedral staff,
he may arrange and secure an unbroken round of services —
daily morning and evening prayer, Sunday and Holy day Com
munion at the least ; better still, if there could be each morning
a Celebration of the Blessed Sacrament* The Bishop's Church
should surely be one patterned after.the Prayer Book, as regards
the continuous service of prayer and praise, and the Bishop
should feel that from that Church a beneficent influence might
go out to pervade the Diocese.
* Daily Celebration of the Holy Communion has been continued at the Cathe
dral since the Advent of 1879.

Ui MEMOIRS.

" As I said in my last Address, ' My judgment is to let it de
velop itself by a natural growth, patiently guided and regulated
by the best wisdom we can bring to bear upon it, but not to cast
it by hasty legislation into an iron system.' * * ' To put this
plan into operation in the tentative way which I propose— the
wisdom of which I think all will undoubtedly acknowledge— it
is necessary that the Bishop should appoint the first Chapter.
If I can gather around me in this Chapter, clergy and laity in
whose wisdom, experience, and love for Christ and His Church,
I have unwavering confidence, I look forward to the time when
I can present to the Council a perfected plan of Cathedral or
ganization.' " It will be seen by these declarations, and by my words and
acts in forming the Chapter, that the Canon was tentative, not
final ; that it was then designed, at this Council, to propose the
Canon in an amended form, and that whenever a Canon should
be agreed upon by the Bishop and the Council, this temporary
Chapter would pass out of existence. Nothing more surprising
— more utterly unreasonable can be imagined, than the fierce
assault made upon my action ; and surely to have influenced the
Diocese, it was not necessary that the circulars containing this
attack should have been sent to all parts of the country.
"My object in organizing the Chapter was threefold: To
assist me in the care and supervision of this valuable property ;
to advise with me in regard to the precise work of which the
Cathedral ' was the centre and the very focus;' to counsel with
me in regard to the perfected Canon in contemplation. The
last of these offices it has performed ; and I lay before you, at
this Council, a Canon, by no means perfect, but, I trust, to some
extent, perfected, and I ask for it, at your hands, patient consid
eration. Two or three principles contained, I deem essential to
any Cathedral organization. One is, that the Bishop should
have the nomination of those who are to work with him ;
another,, that the Church should be Diocesan ; another that the
Bishop should have the veto power upon the acts of the Chapter,
so that he may guide and control the work for which he is
responsible. A fourth point is that the legislation expressed in
the Canon shall be as little and simple as possible. The less
there is connected with formulating and setting into operation
even the essential departments of this work, the wiser and
better. Time and experience will indicate what is most needed.

BISHOP OF MILWAUKEE. liii

" There are many reasons for desiring an early organization
of the Cathedral Chapter, if it can be secured with the confi
dence of the Diocese.
******** *
" One thing more must be kept in mind throughout. The
Cathedral, to be of any value, must be always contemplating
work— hard, honest work.
* * * * *****
"No true Bishop will ever seek to lord it over God's heritage.
No devout and reverent Priest will ever make his own self-will
the measure of his duty. No layman worthy of the name, will
ever refuse personal effort and a free-will offering for the sup
port of his Pastor and the work of the Church, because every
thing in the Parish and in the Diocese is not in strict ac
cordance with his will, or fancy, or desire. And surely no
Parish will refuse to do its allotted, constitutional, Canon
ical work in that Diocesan body of which it is a constitu
ent part, unless unreasoning prej udice holds sway. But al ways,
whenever and wherever such prejudice controls, there trouble,
and shame, and inefficiency ensue, and then comes confusion,
and every evil work. Where one is really seeking to live and act
in accordance with the will of God, personal feeling is subor
dinated to the higher claim of duty. If in all the work upon
which we are now entering, there is the one wish to do God's
work in the way most pleasing to Him, then our labors will be
crowned with blessings. No legislation in the Diocese should
be taken that does not secure the hearty approval of the three
constituent parts — the Bishop, and a large majority of Clergy
and laity. It is far better to work on in the old way, than that
by any present legislation one element should be tyrannized over
by another ; or that there should be in any mind a well-founded
grievance. No teaching can possibly be more pernicious than
that which inculcates division between the members of the
One Body, and no teacher more harmful than one who sows
dissension, and says that there are divided interests in the
Household of Faith.
" Another principle is that Christians should be very careful
to cultivate a respect not only for law, but for the officers who
are appointed to carry out the law.
" No organization can long maintain itself, which makes
little of those who express its will— least of all the Church, if it

Hv MEMOIRS.

makes little of those whom God has set in it, to be subject to
His guidance, and to express His will in it and through it.
"Another principle, and it seems strange one should ever
have occasion to enunciate it, so evident it must appear, is:
That members of the Church should not bring out matters,
which concern the Parish or Diocese alone, to the notice of the
general world. A brother Bishop has spoken words which I
heartily endorse. Offenses must needs come, 'but why,' he
says, ' must they be submitted to a public who can neither ap
preciate nor adjudge them? Is it not, before a Christian,
Churchly conscience, an unlawful use of the mail, a perversion
of the press, to thrust into notice the differences and distrac
tions of the Parochial or Diocesan Households of Faith ? The
good sense of the Church and the love of peace should, as far
as may be, let these things abide where they belong.'
" And now, Brethren, I commend you unto God in all the
work for which you are gathered here.
" If we desire nothing but the glory of God and the exten
sion of His Church, then our labors will be in a spirit of love ;
and that Wisdom which is from above, pure, peaceable, gentle
and easy to be entreated, will give us a right judgment in all
things." The Canon, read by the Bishop in his Address, was presented
by the Rev. Dr. Adams on the afternoon of the first day of the
Council, and was referred to the Committee on Canons,
Following the reference, was a Report of the Committee on
Privilege ; and then, immediately, the Rev. Dr. Fulton pre
sented five proposed Canons of the Cathedral which were
referred to the Committee.
Immediately, the Rev. Dr. Egar proposed two Canons on the
Cathedral and Council of the See ; he was followed by Mr.
Moses M. Strong, who proposed a Canon on the Cathedral
property, and all were referred to the Committee on Canons. It
seemed, in some respects, to recall the condition of the Light
Brigade and their charge at Balaklava, as described by Tennyson
in his memorable lines :
" Can(n)on to right of them,
Can(n)on to left of them,
Can(n)on In front of them,
Volley'd and thunder'd."
At the evening session of the Council, it was " Resolved, that

BISHOP OF MILWAUKEE. IV
the Canon presented in the Bishop's Address be taken up by the
Convention, discussed and passed upon, section by section."
And by vote of the Council, such consideration was made the
order of the day at ten o'clock the following morning.
The forenoon of the following day was consumed in dilatory
pleas, on the part of those opposed to the Canon. This obstruc
tive action aroused the indignation of those favorable to the
legislation, and they determined to push the matter to a con
clusion. Before the opening of the afternoon session, the
B ishop asked one of his Clergy to state to him, the present con.
dition of the mind of the body of the Clergy. He was an
swered that three courses were possible : First, an indefinite
postponement of the whole matter ; second, the putting of the
Can on upon its passage and forcing it to adoption' ; third, the
ap pointment of a committee of fourteen, with the Bishop as
chairman, to which the proposed Canon and all Canons
relating to the subject, should be referred ; and that all further
consideration of the question be postponed to the next Council.
The Bishop considered for a moment, then said : " The way
of peace is always the best way. I will choose the committee."
The Clergyman said : " Bishop, the first man whom you will
appoint on that committee, will be the Rev. Dr. Fulton." He
answered : " It most certainly will."
The Council was called to order, and Mr. H. G. Winslow, of
Racine, offered the resolution for the appointment of a com
mittee of fourteen, " to act with him," the Bishop, " in framing .
a Canon, or Canons, for the organization of the Cathedral, to
be presented to the next Council."
This was the critical period in the legislation of the Council
of the Diocese, and the culminating point of what has been so
often called, " the Cathedral war." *
On the evening of this day, the Rev. F. Durlin, on the invi-
* The Presiding Bishop Smith, of Kentucky, wrote privately to Bishop
Welles at this time :
" I have just been reading what the Living Church says of your manner of
presiding in a difficult Convention. From the notice I have taken of you in our
House (of Bishops), I can easily believe it.
"I have before read a more extended report of what you said of Dr. deKoven.
I know not whether it wiU surprise, or delight you most, when I say, that in all
those respects in which you set him before us (in your Address), 1 have always
greatly admired him. In that very exceptional small and able corps, Pusey,
Manning and Newman, I have long since ranked him fourth.
" Speaking of Dr. deKoven, I can fully understand and highly appreciate, his
answer to the insolent letter of the R. C. Archbishop Spalding. I knew Spald
ing well, when Priest and Bishop in Kentucky."

Ivi MEMOIRS.

tation of the Bishop, preached, in the Cathedral, the sermon at
a Memorial Service for Dr. deKoven.
It was a singular sermon, leading the hearer along in anx
ious questioning, until the peroration was reached ; when, after
having enumerated many instances of what the world calls
defeat, the preacher closed with a beautiful and eloquent tribute
to the memory of James deKoven :
"But, remember, we did not know him, never should
have known him, except for his defeat, and defeat, and defeat.
The world, in its blindness, would not, could not, cannot let such
a man alone. He is sure to be assailed on all sides, with all the
weapons of its savage warfare. Oh, how the blind Giant will
rage against the unresisting meekness, and purity, and love,
and holiness of such an one.
" He won a great immortal victory ; and he won it as all the
Saints have and must, by and through the world's victory over
them. " But, you say, the world had no quarrel with James deKoven,
did not oppose, did not fight against, did not defeat him ; the
Church did that ; he suffered defeat in the house of his friends.
Yes, but the weapons that were used against him, were the
weapons of this world. They were forged in its fires, sharp
ened on its files,' and wielded with the strength of its own vin-
dictiveness. " A man must be tried in all ways, and in every way here,
before we can know certainly whereof he is made. And the
last severe test comes when he meets his foes ; in his manner of
conducting the battle, and even more trying, his behaviour to
wards them after their defeat, and his own defeat,— especially
the latter. And so, how could we ever have known James
deKoven, our brave comrade in arms, except he had had that
great ' fight of afflictions ' with the world, and except he had
suffered defeat? Defeat? Yes, but a victory only possible to
be won thus 1 A victory such as the Truth, and the Faith, and
the Church have not won almost since the flames of martyrdom
were quenched. ' I have overcome the world.' Beloved, if we
carve those words on the marble reared to the memory of
James deKoven, they will be true words there, and they will
forever point to the source and origin of his marvellous power,
the matchless strength and symmetry of his character, the lofty

BISHOP OF MILWAUKEE. Mi
heroism of his life, and the sweet, fascinating spell that will
cling forever to his name and memory."
Does the reader think of another life as he reads these
words ? Comes there not to him, from Faith Hill, in the ceme
tery at Forest Home, Milwaukee, the echo of those words of
the great Apostle to the Gentiles : " I have fought a good fight ;
I have finished my course ; I have kept the faith," and of those
words of the Ma3ter, " I have overcome the world? "
At the Council of 1880, having met several times during the
year, the Committee of Fourteen, by their chairman, Dr. Adams,
presented a Canon " Of the Cathedral," which was referred to the
Committee on Canons, and on motion of the Rev. E. R. Ward,
the consideration of the Canon reported by the Committee of
Fourteen, was laid on the table indefinitely.
At the Council of 1881, no definite action was had upon the
subject of Cathedral Canon, or organization, it being expected
and understood, that the Committee on Revision of Constitu
tion and Canons, appointed to report in 1882, would insert in
their report the necessary provision, embodying the expressed
will of the Council in regard to the Cathedral.
At the Council of 1882, the Bishop, in his Address, made a full
and exhaustive review of the subject of the Cathedral, from the
time of the initiatory action to memorialize the General Conven
tion, extending through the Episcopate of Bishop Armitage,
and his own Episcopate to that date, in which review the sub
ject is fully treated. *
The Committee on Revision of Constitution and Canons had
* "At a recent Council, Bishop Welles gave a full account of the movement
looking to the establishment of a Cathedral, showing that he could not justly be
charged, either with forcing the subject npon the Diocese, or with having been
the first to move in the matter . Having shown all that had been accomplished,
Bishop Welles went on to express the hope, that now whatever steps were
needed, might be taken by the Council to perfect, and thoroughly carry into effect
the plan, so that the Cathedral might be organized in all its fulness of detail,
and, so far as possible, endowed with organic life and efficiency. *****
" The withdrawal of the three Rectors from the Council, either in contempt of
the body or in disgust at its action, is not a very dignified proceeding. Such a
course savors more of the petulance of an angry child denied a plaything, or of
discontented politicians unable to carry a point and nominate a favorite( than of
Christian men, members of a religious assembly, sulkily withdrawing from a
body because they are outvoted, and in a hopeless minority.
" We could sympathize with the most earnest expression of their disapproval,
and respect the refusal to have any share in the plan or the management of a
scheme which they so much dislike. But we imagine that we express a very
general sentiment, when we say that the Bishop of Wisconsin is entitled to great
credit for the manner in which he has successfully brought into active and effect
ive operation a Cathedral that is a Cathedral, and that the Rectors of the three
Parishes in Milwaukee that withdrew from the Convention wiU not gain much
credit by their attempt at secession."— The Standard, N- T,

lviii MEMOIRS.

reported articles XIII. and XIV. of the Constitution, and Title
IV., Canon III., upon the subject of the Cathedral, which were
adopted and embodied.
At the close of the Council, the Bishop made a brief addressi
the only one of the kind ever made by him. In it he refers to
the Constitutional and Canonical establishment of the Cathedral
by unanimous vote of the Council, and says : " In your recog
nition of the Cathedral, in the brief article in the Constitution,
and the short Canon, everything that I desire ba3 been ac
complished. I look to you, my brethren of the Clergy, and you,
my brethren of the laity, to aid by your sympathy, and yo ur ad
vice, in the work I have before me, in the matter of Cathe
dral organization. It is the Bishop's Church, and therefore the
Church of every Clergyman, and every layman of the Church in
this Diocese. I anticipate the happy day, when, the debt of
$12,000 on the Cathedral being paid, and the Chancel built, with
appropriate seats therein for every Clergyman in the Diocese,
tbe Bishop with his Crown of Presbyters, and representatives
from every Parish and Mission in the Diocese, gathered in the
Church, the Cathedral of Wisconsin, may be solemnly conse
crated. God grant' that it may come in our day ! "
In the year 1884, the tenth year of the Bishop's consecration,
a Jubilee Service was held in the Cathedral on All Saints' Day,
and the debt upon the Cathedral and Cathedral Hall was ex
tinguished, thus fulfilling, in part, the earnest prayer of the
Bishop's heart, in his closing Address at the Council three years
before. At the session of the Council in 1883, the Bishop, in his
Address, referring to the growing Churchly character of the
Cathedral Service and work, uses these words :
" And when, in the spirit of the Church, we multiply the forces
at our command, and with methods and teachings consecrated by
ages of reverent use, do the Master's work,— though that work
may not come into public notice at once, and may not gain the
popular applause and commendation, which at times are given
to efforts of a more pretentious character, — we may be assured
that results will be manifest in the deeper earnestness of indi
vidual Christian lives, in more reverent and general regard for
the Holy Communion, and a constant increase in all kinds of
good works.
" But the obligations of the disciple are not fulfilled even

BISHOP OF MILWAUKEE. Ux

when there is strict and conscientious attention to the duties
of the Parish, if the work ends there. A most vicious spirit it
is which at times pervades Parishes. The vice of Congrega
tionalism, or independency, which, in this connection, is but
another name for selfishness, the spirit which, so long as one's
own wants, spiritual or temporal, are satisfied, recks little
whether the world around perishes or not. The antidote for all
this is the Missionary Spirit. If our hearts are warm with
Christian zeal, then we will pray for the success of Mission
work, talk about it, and, as God has blessed us, give for it.
Every Parish, every Mission, every congregation, should throw
itself into this work with all its might."
A pleasing incident in the work of this Council, was a sus
pension of the Rules, and a presentation to the Bishop of a
Pastoral staff from his clergy, by the Rev. Dr. Wright. The
staff was planned by the Rev. Dr. Hopkins, was unique in
^design, and beautiful in workmanship. It was a testimonial of
the love and loyalty of his Clergy, in recognition, by them, of
the patience of his rife and character, as a tender and true Father
in God. It was intended by them as a surprise to their spiritual
head, even as the child joys in the secrecy of the preparation of
his or her Christmas gift, for an honored and beloved parent.
But it pains us to record, that this loving purpose and action
was not a secret to the Bishop, but had already come to his
knowledge in a very painful way. For he received, anony
mously, and with evident malice prepense, on the part of the
sender, a Milwaukee paper, containing both a communication,
in regard to the proposed presentation of the staff, and an un
ci vil editorial, both in ill accord with the character of gentlemen ,
and the obligations of Christians. Some men, who, no doubt,
profess and call themselves Christians, and listen and respond
to the petition that all such " may be led into the way of truth,
and hold the faith, in unity of spirit, in the bond of peace, and
in righteousness of life," had wickedly taken it upon themselves,
as laymen, to cast stones at their Father in God, and to flout at
the action of the Clergy in presenting the staff. They even went
so far as to demand, presumptively, a right to take part in that
which was intended to be done only by those in Holy Orders,
following the ill example which was set for men in the days of
Korah, Dathan and Abiram.
But, contrary to the purpose, and despite the malice of these

Ix MEMOIRS.
persons, it was a joy to the heart of the Bishop, to receive this
token of the love, and loyalty of his sons in the Lord.
In felicitous language, he commented upon the symbolism
of design shown in the staff, tracing the historic continuity of
the Church, in her Apostleship from the days of Gregory the
Great, to the death of the saintly and martyred Armitage. To
the donors, and to all of truly Catholic spirit in the Diocese, it
has been a pleasure, that this badge of holy office, and token of
awful responsibility was, for five years, borne in thankful love
to God, and to his children in the Church, by our departed
Shepherd. There are men in society, who never can be gentlemen ; they
have not the capacity. They can not attain to a true concep
tion of the gentlemanly character. They have not, and, not
having, can never understand, or appreciate, the high sensibility
through which the heart of a delicate nature is often caused to
quiver, and bleed, by the low and coarse touch of those who
are but seeking food for derision and a mark for mirth. There
are petty persecutions and insolences, which tell as deeply and
fatally upon the life of a sensitive soul, as would the assassin's
knife upon the body. There is many a martyrdom for Christ
and for His Church, which does not, indeed, know the stake and
fagot, the cross, or headsman's sword ; but which is no less
real, through the secret and hidden pain which tells so fear
fully on the inner life of a gentle soul, which suffers, and dies,
and makes no sign.
The writer of this has in his possession, articles from tbe
public print,* and anonymous letters, which would kindle the
glow of indignation in the cheek of any honorable man, and
should make the authors blush for shame ; for such attacks
were the iron that entered deepest into the Bishop's soul.
In the words of one who knew and loved the Bishop, " this
steady stream of obloquy, falling on the public ear like the in
cessant pi apping of Barnes Newcome's talk, has its effect on
nerve, and brain, and fibre. Constant dropping wears away
the rock ; continual ramming at a man's heart will affect,
though it were brave as the heart of a lion." And these are the
* The happy way the Bishop often turned these annoying matters, was re
markable. Once an eastern Church paper was shown him, in which with more
fervor than truth, three specific charges were made against him. " I should say,
in answer," he laughingly remarked, "what l^uvier did to the definition of the
crab as a little, red fish that crawled backwards. ' It is a very good definition,
except, the crab isn't red, isn't aflxh, and does not crawl backwards.' "

BISHOP OF MILWAUKEE. lXi
hidden causes of things in the life, which medical science can
not correctly diagnose, and which its remedies cannot heal.
The wounded dove covers the hurt with her wings ; the
stricken hart flees to the water brooks, and the Christian gen
tleman, who is wounded in the house of his friends, hides the
secret pain from the eyes of all but Him, Who is the Living
Water, and Who, in the hour of mortal pain, said : " I thirst."
But such is the portion of the great-hearted servants of
Jesus Christ, until the end of time. It is in fulfilment of the
Master's assurance, " In the world ye shall have tribulation ; "
and the heart going on its way with the sickening sense of
being misunderstood, finds its comfort in the further assurance,
" Be of good cheer, I have overcome the world."
The Council of 1884 was the tenth anniversary of the Bish
op's elevation to the Episcopate. On the second day of the
Session, the Rev. Dr. Kemper offered a Resolution, seconded by
the Rev. Dr. Ashley and adopted by a rising vote :
" Resolved, That this Council hereby offer to the Bishop, as the
tenth anniversary of his Episcopate approaches, the assurance
of their sincere love and loyalty ; of their deep sympathy with
him in all the trials and disappointments that belong to his
high office, and of their prayers for God's blessing upon him and
his work."
In his Address, the Bishop gave the summary of growth in
ten years in the Diocese :
" These ten years have been to your Bishop years of ceaseless
work and very great anxiety, and not few nor inconsiderable
were the hindrances which at times were put in his way, and
the burdens which were added to his necessary cares ; but the
burdens and hindrances have been as a feather's weight when
put in the balance against the confidence, the interest and the
active sympathy which, all through the Diocese, have given him
helpful assurance of readiness to cooperate in the Church's
work, and, by the grace of God, the work of the Diocese has
prospered and grown. In 1875, the census of those counties of
the state comprising the Diocese of Wisconsin shows the Diocese
to have contained a population of 845,293 ; in 1880, the popula
tion was 890,618 ; and the estimated population at present is
about 920,000, the increase being about 8 per cent, for the nine
years. The number of communicants in the Diocese reported
in 1875 was 3,358 ; in 1883, 4,789, being an increase of about 45

lxii MEMOIRS.
per cent, against the increase in population of 8 per cent.
The Parishes and Missions reported in 1875 numbered' 80 ; in
1883, 108 ; being an increase of 35 per cent.
" There have been built in the Diocese, during these ten years,
thirty-two Churches and Chapels, and eleven Rectories, and at
Watertown, Mineral Point, Racine, Elkhorn, Janesville, Portage
and other places considerable improvements have been made in
Church property, in interior decorations, repairs and desirable
changes. There have also been built in this time, S. John's
Home, Milwaukee, and S. Luke's Hospital, Chippewa Falls."
On the 27th day of September, 1884, the Standing Committee
of the Diocese sent out a circular to the Clergy and congrega
tions, relating to the Tenth Anniversary of the Consecration of
Bishop Welles. All were asked to give their prayers and their
alms in behalf of the Cathedral, that all indebtedness thereon
might be cancelled on All Saints' Day. The Bishop preached a
Memorial Sermon on Sunday, October 26th, and on Friday, the
81st, the Vigil of All Saints, began the Jubilee Services. The
Bishops of Springfield, and of Tennessee, were present on the
occasion. The preacher was Bishop Seymour. In his Sermon
he traced the history of the American Church from the time of
Bishop Seabury, showing, by the light of history, the continuity
of the Church in its Ministry, Sacraments, and Ritual, from the
earliest days until the present.
The Feast of All Saints on this year, was made memorable,
in the history of the Diocese, by the fact that it witnessed the
liquidation of the Cathedral debt, by lifting the mortgages
which had encumbered the property since 1868, and the solemn
presentation of them on the Altar. It was a glad and happy
season, to those who had borne the burden through the long
term of years, looking forward in hope for the consummation
that day reached. The preacher of the Sermon was the Bishop
of Tennessee. He dwelt on the function of a true Cathedral, and
congratulated the Diocese on the success which it had attained,
One pregnant sentence was : " A Bishop who plays Cathedral in
a Parish Church, will fail, and deserves to fail."
On the 14th of December, the Bishop read in the Cathedral,
the letter of resignation of the Rev. Dr. Spalding, as Dean of the
Cathedral. The Bishop had refused, repeatedly, to accept Dr.
Spalding's resignation, and consented, only on being convinced
that tbegood of Dr, Spalding's health required that acceptance be

BISHOP OF MILWAUKEE. lxiii
made. For years, Dr. Spalding had stood bravely by his Bishop,
through good report and evil report ; and in a spirit of loyalty,
had often borne the reproach of things for which he was not to
blame. The Diocese of Milwaukee will ever owe a debt to
Dr. Spalding, for his courage and steadfastness in times of
the greatest trouble and uncertainty.
At the Council of 1885, the Bishop, in his Address, after
speaking of the Jubilee Services at the Cathedral, and his thank
fulness for the then present condition of the Cathedral property,
goes on to say :
"In a few years, by the help of God, the debt will be removed
from that portion of the block on which the Chapel, and School,
the Clergy House, and Church Home stands, and then the Dio
cese of Wisconsin will be in possession of a property of great
value, and of an organized work as real in its character and as
churchly and Catholic in intention and manner, as can be found
in any Diocese in the land. * * *
" The opening of the Church Book Store in Milwaukee is
one of the gratifying and important events of the year. If an
interest is felt and manifested all through the Diocese, great
good will be accomplished through this agency. An acquaint
ance with the store will show that it is controlled by one who
knows what a Church book store should be, and whose busi
ness management will commend it to all who deal there. The
stock of Church books for the family, the study, the closet, the
Sunday and Parish schools, will always be full. Abundant
provision will be made for the Advent and Lenten seasons,
and for Christmas and Easter. If there is an appreciation of
this work, we may, in a few years, have an excellent Church
publishing house in our midst, and be enabled to do incal
culable good in the way of Church instruction and extension.*
It may seem to the reader, that an undue prominence has
been given in this portion of the Memoir, to the Bishop's course
of action in reference to the Cathedral organization and de
velopment. Such a thought would be natural to one unac
quainted with all the environments of the Bishop's position.
There would not have been this fulness of statement, had the
*After the Church Book Store of The Toung Churchman Co. had been in
operation two years and more, the Bishop used this happy phrase :
" Good books are nseful and patient Missionaries j and I am convinced that
many such are doing their work in our midst to-day, because of the existence of
The Toung Churchman Company,"— Council 4.ddre«f, 1887.

lxiv MEMOIRS.

writer not known that the one great point on which the memory
of Bishop Welles needs vindication, in the minds and hearts of
many who may read these pages, is this Cathedral question.
It is important that the reader should know how much, and
what manner, of work was inherited by him in this thing. To
make the matter clear it was needful to go into the history of
the legislation of the Diocese, and the action of its three
Bishops. This statement will serve, to the candid reader, as an
apology for treating of this matter to an extent which other
wise would have been undesirable.*
It will be apparent to many, that if any man in modern
times ever had a true conception of the Episcopate, with its
weight of duties and responsibilities, that man was our late
Father in God, Edward Randolph Welles. As one set to
rule and feed the flock of Christ, he must be both to himself, and
to his people, not only the Chief Missionary, but the Chief
Pastor of his Diocese.
In the Spirit of the Master, he must go out into the highways
and hedges, must travel the wilderness and prairie to seek for
the Master's scattered sheep, and to call to the knowledge and
grace of a Saving Faith, those who know not God. In his pri
mary Address, the Bishop said :
" We all know that in this city, hundreds, it may be thou
sands, are perishing for lack of knowledge ; that in crowded
alleys and close rooms all about us, there are people who lie in
a darkness more dense than that of the heathen who know not
God. * * * It is a part of a Bishop's work, aside from those
functions, which, in an especial manner, pertain to the Episco -
pate, to ' rescue souls for whom Jesus was Incarnate ; to guide
to Him men who scarcely know that He died and lives again ;
to comfort the penitent ; to heal the broken-hearted ; to sym
pathize with the unhappy ; to bring souls to Christ.' "
But in his See city, the duty was plain to his own heart, that
he must be the Chief Pastor of his Diocese ; and in his Cathe
dral, by doctrine, worship, and ritual, establish and conserve
that which was best and truest, for the development of the
spiritual life in the Parishes and Missions of his Diocese.
*In the " History of Milwaukee," an extract is given from a Sermon, preached
and published in his Diocese at the invitation of Bishop Bedell, of Ohio, on the
Cathedral question. This Sermon is an instance of many extra-diocesan calls
to set forth the system which Bishop Wellbs was working out. It will be
impossible in this volume to publish any of these Sermons, through lack of
space.

BISHOP OF MILWAUKEE. 1XV
If there be a need of the Cathedral system, the need must lie
in this very thing. The system is not one for domination, but
for example in work and worship and subordination through -
the example. The Cathedral is the Church of the Diocese. If
the principle of Ecclesia Docens is true of the General Church,
that of Cathedra Docens must be so in Diocesan limits. To in
sure unity, such as God requires in the Body of Christ, there
must be loyalty unswerving in Parishes and Missions, to the
principles of the Cathedral, and its work. The bane of Par
ochial Congregationalism must be neutralized, and made in
nocuous. It is true, that the work of the Parishes, as such,
must go on unrestrained in all things lawful ; but looking for
uniformity in ritual, and worship, to the example of the Bishop
in his Cathedral Church, to show forth as the representative
of Jesus Christ, such example to the flock, calls, indeed, for the
wisdom that is first "pure, then peaceable, easy to be entreated,
full of faith and good works, without partiality, and without
hypocrisy." So sure as the promise of Christ is true, " Lo, I am with you
always," will He guide the hearts and minds of His under-
shepherds, if they seek to Him in humble prayer. And guidance
by them of those to whom they are sent, is the duty of their
office, and acceptance of that guidance, is the duty of the flock,
Clergy and laity, in each Parish and Mission.
It is known to many, that Bishop Welles took great inter
est in, and endorsed the work of Parochial Missions. These
Missions strive to accomplish in the Church's way, that which
is sought to be done by the Revival system in Sectarian
Bodies. The seasons of Advent and Lent, by their very spirit
and design, are fitted as no others can be for such work. And
it was this knowledge, which caused the Bishop so cordially to
adopt and encourage the holding of Parochial Missions in his
Diocese. In this the Cathedral Church set the example, and
the Missioners were called by the voice of the Bishop.
It was with the Bishop, a John-Baptist realization of the
coming of the Lord, and the need of a preparation for the King
dom of Heaven. He would awaken the wilderness echoes, with
the warning which called men to Christ at the first, would teach
them to desire Him ere they beheld Him.
The Parochial Mission may be called an experiment, but an
experiment of faith ; a faith in the power of Jesus to open the

lxvi MEMOIRS.

blinded eyes, and unstop the deaf ears, a faith whose continuous
realization was the life " that I now live in the flesh, I live by
faith in the Son of God, Who loved me and gave Himself for
me." The result at the Cathedral was such as to secure the
Bishop's approval, and cause him to commend the adoption of
the Parochial Mission system, as a proper way and means of the
promotion of Christ's Kingdom.
The Bishop's constitutional habit of thought upon holy
things, was such as to lead him ever to seek to connect the new
with the old. He thought, with reverence, upon fasting and
prayer, as the way of preparation for holy work ; the examples
of Moses and Elijah, of John Baptist, and the Son of Man, stood
before his mind as proofs of this need ; he could not but con
clude that manhood's need then, is manhood's need now ; and
so he exhorted his Clergy to seek, by this means, in retirement
from the world for a season, an increased measure of the Spirit of
the Living God, to help them in the work of reclaiming the wan
dering, and calling sinners to repentance. In other words, he
advocated Retreats for the Clergy, and impressed the use of
them, by precept and example. Through and by this, there has,
as we may say, been established in this Diocese as an outgrowth
of the Cathedral work, an Annual Pre-Lenten Retreat of the
Clergy. This Retreat has always had the personal supervision
and thought of the Bishop. It is not too much to say, that
many Priests of the Diocese have gone back to their work from
the Retreats, with hearts newly kindled, and the lines of duty
more clearly defined. " The liberal soul shall be made fat, and
he that watereth shall be watered also himself."
The Bishop realized, in a marked degree, in his own thought
and action, the expansive power of the increased spiritual
life, as related to the great work of Missions. He sought to
impress this upon the heart of his Diocese. In his Council
Address of 1887, his last before the final breaking down of his
health, he says :
" The real strength of the Diocese is in the increase of spirit
ual life in individual souls, that so the life of the congregation
is inspired with a holy purpose ; in the case of any disciple,
when once the love of God becomes the dominant principle, all
coldness, and neglect, and delay, pass out of sight, and then
giving, and doing, in the Church, ior the Church, are matters of
privilege. * * * AH work in the congregation, of whatever

BISHOP OF MILWAUKEE. lxvii
kind or character it may be, whether of the Auxiliary or of a
more strictly Parochial character, must always have Church
Missions or Church Extension in view. There must be in all
our methods of work, a recognition of the underlying fact, that
the true ecclesiastical unit is the Diocese, and not the Parish.
That congregation is always the strongest in everything that
is Churchly and enduring, which is furthest removed from
Parochial selfishness. A great and vital principle determines
the character of our ecclesiastical system— determines it, I
mean, as to its reality. Whatever it may be in name, real
power is regulated by adherence to the principle of Diocesan
unity. Departure from that principle entails loss and weak
ness in the Parish, and in the Diocese. The recognition and
application ensures strength in the congregation ; it nourishes
growth and expansion, and ministers to the real character and
strength of the Diocese. Every baptized child of God should
desire to extend the Church, and to help make manifest,
throughout the length and breadth of the Diocese, its conserva
tive Catholic life. In all that pertains to the work of the
Church, the thought of extension should incite to prayers and
alms." From the time of his ordination to the Diaconate, Bishop
Welles understood the principle expressed in Ecclesia Docens,
as including the Mission of the Church in every sphere of life,
especially in that of the education of the young. This was
evidently his thought, when a tutor in DeVeaux College, and
when he came to the Diocese of Minnesota, to take charge of
the Parish at Red Wing, he established, as soon as possible, as
an integral part of his work— the Parish School. That school
was sustained continuously during his entire Rectorship, and
the strengthening of the Parish by it, in every way, made an
indelible impression upon his mind.* It is not strange, that the
result of this should have been seen in his attachment to the
schools of his Diocese ; and that his love for the Christian edu-
* In his first Address as Bishop, occur these words : " My mind goes back
to one among many weU remembered instances of Church work, accomplished
by this instrumentality. A little boy, a member of the Parish School, induced
his parents to come with him to Church. As I pronounced the Absolution, I saw
that while they sat unbending in their seats he, between them, was reverently
kneeling. I knew no parents' heart could long resist the pleading of a child's
devotion, and was not surprised, when a short time after this, they desired to
prepare for Baptism and Confirmation; and now that is a household of faithful
workers in the Church,

lxviii MEMOIRS.

cation of the young, should have made him the earnest friend
and advocate of all effort in that direction. It brought him into
closer relationship with both teachers and students, and inten
sified his influence in each school of his Dioee.se, in which he
had either advisory power, or official direction. His sympathy
and fellow feeling with students, was a marked feature of his
character. The memory of his own school life seemed to dwell
with him in such force, as to lead him unconsciously into the
lives of all students who came into touch with him.
Remembering the injunction to S. Peter, " Feed my lambs, "
he seemed, as it were, to carry the young in his heart. There
is, in all his Council Addresses, constant and affectionate refer
ence to the Schools of the Diocese, including Nashotah, Racine,
Kemper Hall, Bor du Lac and S. John's, Delafield, and ths Cathe
dral Parish School. His influence in these schools deepened, in a
marked degree, especially during the later years of his Episco
pate. He was held in fond veneration by teachers and students
alike, and the words of the students' organ at Racine, in the
notice of the Bishop's death, are truly affectionate and dis
criminating.: " His kind face and words won the love of every boy who
knew him, and by his ability to remember something of each
one, he made them feel that they held a distinct place in his
mind. In truth, he was their ideal Bishop ; and even those
who saw him only as he was with us in our chapel services,
instantly felt that deep respect which he always commanded.
As one in writing of him has already quoted, ' the peace of God
was in his looks ' —not in his looks only, but throughout hi3
whole life, amid the trials and anxieties of his great work, the
peace of God was felt diffusing its blessing on all with whom
he came in contact. "
At Nashotah, he seemed, as it were, to revive and to recall
the genius and spirit of James Lloyd Breck. In Racine Col
lege, the Bishop felt the deepest interest from the beginning,
kindled, doubtless, to greater intensity by the warm and loving
welcome, and transcendent loyalty, of that gallant and knightly
soul, James deKoven.
When Dr. deKoven died, the Bishop took charge of the
College, for the time being, so that it became, in a manner, an
inheritance from his departed friend.
A Priest of this Diocese said, not long ago : " When the Life

BISHOP OF MILWAUKEE. ljtix
of Bishop Welles is written, as it will be one day, his constant
remembrance and thought of the schools of the Diocese, can
not be too plainly shown. On every visitation, he seemed to
carry them in his heart, ever thoughtful of the welfare of them
all. No other proof is needed of this, than the constant and
affectionate reference to the schools in his Council Addresses,
and in the Calendar."
It may have been his loyalty to the memory of James de
Koven, that gave him special interest in the welfare of S.John's
Academy, Delafield. Such interest he surely manifested, and
the prosperity of the school, at this time, is due largely to his
wise advice, and fatherly oversight. One of his last conversa
tions with the writer, was of the need, in this school, of in
creased accommodation for pupils, and the expressed conviction
of its great value to the Diocese, under its present direction, as
an agency for training young men in true Christian manliness,
to the honor of God in His Church ; and almost his last official
act in his Diocese, was the Confirmation of a class of boys in
this school.
The fact that Kemper Hall was a memorial of the first
Bishop of the Diocese, would, of itself, have commanded the
Bishop's loving regard. But the intimate relation into which
he was brought, during the first years of his Episcopate, with
this school, by reason of its financial difficulty, and his long con
tinued oversight of it, intensified an interest which could not
have ceased to be life-long.
In 1878, at the Lambeth Conference, he said, in a debate on
Sisterhoods : " It is only a question of time as to their general
acceptance. Both in New York and BostoD, I, myself, have
examined the actual work of the Sisters, and my firm judgment
is, that the need of Sisterhoods will make itself increasingly felt,
in the Educational and Charitable works of the Church."
This judgment of his, was confirmed by the lapse of
years ; and the Sisters of S. Mary, on taking charge of Kemper
Hall, found in their Bishop an earnest, faithful friend. There
were those who, with unreasoning prejudice, looked upon the
Sisters with suspicion, and treated them with scorn. Cruel
aspersions were cast on the Bishop for giving them support in
their work. We refer to this, only as indicating the persecu
tion that the self-denying must suffer for righteousness' sake.
But the work at Kemper Hall has gone on, winning gradual

1XX MEMOIRS.

respect from its enemies ; and the time will come, when the
wish of the Bishop respecting the Sisters, and the School, shall
be realized. Speaking of their taking permanent possession of
Kemper Hall, as their centre of western work, he says, in a
private letter: "In my judgment, this ranks as one of the
most important events of my Episcopate."
In the Council of 1886, the Committee, to whom was referred
so much of the Bishop's Address as related to Kemper Hall, re
ported the following Resolutions, which were adopted :
"Resolved, That the Council has heard with great satisfaction
of the disposition made by the Trustees of the Memorial Sehool
to the first Bishop of Wisconsin, and desires to place on record
its sense of indebtedness to the Sisters of S. Mary for the
earnest work they have done in the past, amid so many dis
couragements. "Resolved, That we rejoice in the fact that arrangements have
been completed which guarantee their permanency in the Dio
cese, and we pledge them our earnest co-operation and support
in the educational work in which they are engaged.
"Resolved, That the Secretary be instructed to transmit a copy
of these resolutions to the Sister in charge at Kemper Hall.
L. H. Morehouse,
J. M. Evans,
Sam'l. Eales."
This action of the Council, endorsing the policy of the
Bishops, commits the Diocese irrevocably to the support of
Kemper Hall, as a prominent Diocesan Institution.
During the time of the Bishop's Rectorship at Red Wing, he
sustained the service of daily morning prayer in the Church.
In those earlier days, there was no railway communication in
Minnesota. The travel was by steamboat on the Mississippi.
One morning a steamer landed at the -levee, about the time
that the Church bell rang for service. A lady passenger, hear
ing the bell, asked what it meant, and was answered, that it
was the bell of the Episcopal Church, ringing for morning
prayer. She asked the captain how long the boat would remain
at the levee. Finding that it would be two hours, she went to
the Church, and attended the service. On going out from the
Church, she asked one of the parishioners, the Rector's name.
Years afterwards, when he had come as Bishop to Wisconsin,
and was planning the erection of S. John's Home, Bishop

BISHOP OF MILWAUKEE. IXxi
Welles received, one day, a letter containing a cheque for
$3,000.00, and recalling the incident of that morning service in
the Church at Red Wing, years before. The writer asked that
the Bishop use the money enclosed for any work, to which he
desired to apply it. It was used in the erection of S. John's
Home. This charity for the aged Mothers of the Church, was
always dear to the heart of the Bishop, and one of the sweetest
evidences of the depth of his Christian and fatherly love.
In his letter of acceptance, the Bishop had said : " If the
General Church shall ratify your choice, and I shall be conse
crated to the office of a Bishop, I will share with every brother
in the Diocese, the zeal and earnestness in labor, and in love,
which will be ours, if we are Christ's." It is a joy to many, to
feel how faithfully this promise was fulfilled. There was in
him, a deep sympathy with, and loyalty to his Clergy in all
their trials. Never had Priests of God a more faithful Father,
or more tender friend. In silence, and with secrecy, his hand
helped to ease the weight of many a burden. From his own
means, which were never large, it was not seldom that he gave
to relieve the needs of his Clergy. Only the day of God will
reveal the extent of his Christian love in this regard, when the
Master shall say, ' Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of
the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto Me.' "
It was not only to the Clergy that his love went out. Almost
every layman in the Diocese had felt the grasp of his Bishop's
hand, and the love of his Bishop's heart. It is written of the
good Shepherd, " He calleth His own sheep by name ; " and as it
is written, so it was fulfilled in this Chief Pastor of the flock.
It was proverbial in the Diocese, that the Bishop always re
membered a countenance, and never forgot a name. This fact
assured his people that he bore them in his heart. The recipro
city of love's great law, called for a return, and in thousands
of cases it was faithfully made ; and to him this was God's great
recompense, for much that he was called on to endure. It was
singularly pleasant to see how large a portion of his correspond
ence, was with children, boys and girls, and little ones. Many
of them will treasure, in their after life, the letters written by bis
hand, as being blessings, for which God's holy Name be praised.
At the Council of 1887, which was virtually the last one at
which he presided, and made a full and regular Address, he
spoke pregnant words on two questions which were, and are,

lxxii MEMOIRS.

occupying the mind of the Church; viz.: the attendance at
Celebrations of the Holy Communion for prayer, and meditation,
and worship ; and the change of the name of our Branch of the
Church Catholic.
" Dear Brethren of the Clergy and Laity," his Address be
gins : " I greet you to-day with a heart full of gratitude to Al
mighty God, our Heavenly Father, for His loving kindness. He
has mercifully preserved me during the various chances of
enforced journeyings, and restored me from a state of serious
weakness, to a most benign condition of increasing health and
strength. From my place of rest and quiet, I often thought of,
and dwelt upon, the changes which the years have wrought in
the Diocese, since I came to be your Bishop. One by one, men
high in position and revered throughout the Church, have
rested from their labors, and the places which once knew them
so well, know them no more in earthly toil. The secret of the
Saints was surely with such devout souls as deKoven, and Cole,
and Kemper, and Lance, and Livermore, not to mention others
of the brethren, who, in these years, have fallen asleep. The
teachings of these saintly men bear fruit perennially. I am
sure that throughout the Diocese there has been, in the last
decade, a general and wholesome spiritual growth. The more
frequent Celebrations of the Holy Communion attest a deeper
appreciation of the Church's precious doctrine of the Real
Presence of our dear Lord, in the Sacrament of His Body and
Blood. We cannot over-estimate the wondrous power of that
great Sacrifice. We cannot, with our poor faculties, measure
or rightly value the gift that is vouchsafed to the soul that
devoutly and faithfully communicates. The highest act of
worship on earth, the hour of special heartfelt devotion to the
Incarnate God, is surely the time for us to make our prayers
with a greatly quickened faith. At the Altar in the Cathedral
chapel, morning after morning, prayer is made for the Diocese,
and may we not believe that for the sake of the Holy Sacrifice
which we there continually offer before God, our prayer will be
answered ?
" In many Parishes there is now weekly and Holy Day Com
munion. There are three daily Celebrations in the Diocese.
When we recall the words of the Master, that, in receiving His
Body and Blood in Holy Communion, we are made sharers of
His life, with what gratitude should every true disciple note the

BISHOP OF MILWAUKEE. lxxiii
increase in frequency of this service of Eucharist. For, if there
is one doctrine more plainly taught in Holy Scripture than
another, it is this most blessed one of the spiritual Presence of
Christ in the Sacrament. Can we doubt that as this precious
truth is more fully grasped by the disciple, the soul will be filled
with a holy zeal in the service of God ; that the offering which,
in the Prayer of Consecration, we individually make—' Here
we offer and present unto Thee ourselves, our souls and bodies'
—will be a great and blessed reality, and the assurance of
the Divine Presence will strengthen and comfort the child of
God, in the life of devotion and consecration.
" In the early years of my ministry, I sought in my mission
ary work to establish it as a custom at all the stations in my
jurisdiction, that the entire congregation should remain during
the Celebration of the Holy Communion, for I felt that no
words of man could so preach the Gospel of the Crucified
Saviour, as does the Eucharistic Office. I could conceive of no
better preparation on the part of the baptized child for Con
firmation and Holy Communion, than attendance upon the serv
ice as a devout non-communicating worshipper. And where
can the humble Christian, the devout penitent, the striving
soul, find such an atmosphere for prayer and supplication, for
spiritual communion with Jesus, as before the Altar and at the
very hour of the great Oblation? I have in mind a devout soul,
who, troubled and perplexed for a long time in regard to the
Holy Communion, found great comfort in remaining during the
service, and at length, peace and joy, as an earnest communicant .
And many a time, I doubt not, would the service and the ser
mon gain immeasurably in influence and effect, if non-com-
municants remained in prayer and meditation during the Divine
Liturgy. Many more would leave the house of God, at such a
time, in a frame of mind conducive to spiritual growth and less
inclined to worldly gossip and frivolous criticism. * * * *
"THE NAME QUESTION.
" It will be remembered that on the third day of the session
of the General Convention which met in Boston, in 1877, the
Rev. Dr. deKoven read the preambles and resolutions offered
and passed in the Convention of Wisconsin touching the change
of name, and the appointment of a constitutional commission
to which that and other proposed changes might be referred.
It will be remembered, also, that Dr. deKoven, in his speech

lxxiV MEMOIRS.

said : ' I hope that we may call ourselves ' Protestant Episcopal '
just so long.as it actually represents our condition.* Let us be
true, whatever else we are. It may be in accordance with our
state of mind, to give a name to our Church which represents
one feature in our manifold organization, and which represents
one feature alone. It may suit our present condition to describe
ourselves in that process whereby, in the course of its history,
the Anglican Church washed its face ! That may suit our
present condition ; but I believe that the day will come when
this Church will demand, not that an accident of its condition,
not that a part of its organization, should represent it to the
world, but that its immortal lineage, which dates back to the
time of our Saviour's sending the Holy Ghost upon His Church,
shall truly represent it, and that we only have a right to exist
as we are a true member or branch of the Holy Catholic Church,
protesting against Roman error and holding with all our hearts,
in the words of the Lambeth Conference, to that faith which
alone can be preserved in its purity and its integrity, as it is
' taught in the Holy Scriptures, summed up in the Creeds, held
by the primitive Church, and affirmed by the undisputed General
Councils.' " The name question is now fairly before the Church, and it
will be settled in a spirit of fairness and justice. The time will
surely come, it may be sooner or later — for in a matter of this
kind a few years are of little account — when the American
Church will put aside that misleading title, but she will not do
it until there is a general and hearty concurrence in the change.
This is not a party measure; its success will be no party triumph.
It is simply a manifestation of the Catholic nature of the Church,
an assertion of what we all believe ,that to be a Catholic is not to
be necessarily a Roman ; that we are Catholics because we are
baptized into the Catholic Church, and that branch of the
Church, of which we are members, descends from and retains all
the essential elements of the one Church of Christ, and the
name of the Church is the one name enshrined in the Creeds.
And when, in some future General Convention, the final vote
shall be taken, and Diocese after Diocese shall record its affirm
ation, it will be a matter of grateful joy to the Bishop and
deputies of this Diocese to recall the fact that a deputy from
Wisconsin, in behalf of the Diocese of Wisconsin,, was the first
to propose this change to the General Convention."

BISHOP OF MILWAUKEE. lxxv
There is every reason to think, that these questions will
come up for consideration and action at the next General Con
vention ; and these words of the Bishop are put on record in
this Memoir, to indicate his habit of fashioning his judgment
by careful consideration, in anticipation of the time when
necessity for action should come to him.
We have now reached the period of time, at which the work
of Bishop Welles was substantially finished. Just before the
20th of January, 1887, he confessed his inability to contend
longer against failing health, or to continue for some months>
the work of his office. So he left his Diocese to seek restoration
in the climate of Florida, his brother, Dr. Samuel R. Welles.
journeyed with him, and remained for some time, giving the
loving care of a brother, and the skill of a physician, to
induce, if possible, an early return of strength to the "poor,
worn-out" body and toil-worn mind. The Bishop remained
some months at the hospitable homes of both the Rev. Lyman
Phelps, and at the Southern home of Bishop Whipple. His
letters, during this season, were filled with pleasant and cheer
ful descriptions of the country, and climate of Florida, and of
the enjoyment he felt, in respite from labor, in the Sunny South.
It was not until nearly the close of the winter, that he could
speak with decided confidence of renewed health.
He returned to his home on the 2lst day of May, and took
up his work. His friends trembled for the result of his applica
tion. It seemed as if he were working beyond his strength, but
with the spirit of a man who feels that he has a great work to
do, and but little time to do it, he went on steadily with his
labor of love. To the suggestion of friends that he should, in
some way seek relief, either by asking for help from other
Bishops, or by the election of an assistant to bear the burden
for him, he quietly answered, " Not this year."
At Christmas time, he officiated in the Cathedral, but soon
after, was obliged to suspend his labor, and keep his rooms
until after Mid-Lent, when he tried to resume his work, but was
obliged to return to the Clergy House. He had overtaxed his
strength ; but on Palm Sunday he tried to stand again at the
post of duty, administering Confirmation at S. Paul's, S.
James' and S. John's Churches, Milwaukee, and, on Easter
Day, at the Cathedral. He could do no more, and grievous ill
ness followed. His attendant physicians, at this time, were Dr.

lxxvi MEMOIRS.

Wm. Fox, of Milwaukee, and Dr. S. B. Sperry, of Delafield,
Wisconsin. To both of these gentlemen and to Dr. Wylly,
who attended him in the South, Bishop Welles was deeply
attached. In the early part of May, he rose from a sick bed with an
earnest purpose of continuing his work, but was able to do
but little.
On Monday morning, May 2nd, had come a message an
nouncing the^death of the Rt. Rev. Dr. Brown, Bishop of Fond
du Lac. Bishop Welles was just convalescing, and the news
was a great shock. He was not able to attend at the burial of
Bishop Brown, but on the morning appointed for it, a
Memorial Celebration of the Holy Eucharist was offered in the
Bishop's Oratory, his son officiating, the Bishop and the writer
being present, and receiving. In his final and informal Address
to his Council a month later, the Bishop says : " My relation
to Bishop Brown was that of brotherly affection ; in all my own
cares of administration, I found him a sympathetic and wise
counsellor ; and in all the important work and movements in
his Diocese, I was deeply and prayerfully interested. * * *
In the death of Bishop Brown, not only his Diocese, but the
whole Church in the Northwest, has sustained a sore and
grievous loss ; and very grave is the responsibility resting on
the Clergy and laity of the Diocese, to choose one to take up
the work of this heroic Bishop, and continue in his Spirit, to
develop the many interests which he fostered, and which tell,
at once, of his Catholic Spirit, and undaunted courage."
At the Cathedral during May, the Bishop confirmed supple
mentary classes from S. James' and S. John's Churches, and
classes from Christ Church and S. Luke's, Milwaukee.
On the 24th of May, he attended the Commemoration
Service, and administered Confirmation at Kemper Hall, Ke
nosha. The following letter will explain a very pleasant occurrence
connected with the Bishop's proposed departure for England :
Diocesan Office, Milwaukee, May 28, 1888.
My Dear Mrs. Bearding :— It does, indeed, give me pleasure
to thank you, and, through you, the many kind friends in the
Diocese, who have united in presenting me, on the eve of my
departure for the "Lambeth Conference," a beautiful set of
robes, including rochet, stoles, and cassocks, and to express the

BISHOP OF MILWAUKEE. lxxvii
grateful appreciation such acts of love and sympathy always
bring to the heart of Your friend and Bishop,
E. R. Welles.
On the 29th, the Bishop Confirmed a class at Sussex, and on
the 30th a class at S. John's Academy, Delafield. This was his
final visitation.
His last official acts were on Sunday, June 3rd, when he blessed
the Memorial Bell at Christ Church, Milwaukee, of which his
son was Pastor ; and on Wednesday, the 6th, with a face
resplendent with the joy and beauty of another life, he deliv
ered, what, perchance he knew, was his last Address to the
Diocese. It had been in his mind to sum up, in a measure, the work of
his Episcopate at this time. But he was; not well enough to
attempt any formal address. With the condition of the Cathe
dra] he had reason to rejoice. Two years before he had said :
" In the financial report made (at the close of the first year of
Dean Mallory's incumbency) to the Cathedral congregation,
there is an item of interest in regard to expenditures which I
wish to commend to the Diocese. The Parochial, or Congrega
tional expenditures for the year, as reported, are 83,810.26 ; the
Diocesan, $1,032.15 ; the general, $107.99. In a total of $4,940.40,
all of which came through the offertory, the congregation con
tributed |1,140.14 for objects in the Diocese or General Church,
nearly one-quarter of the offerings for the year being given to
the work of the Church outside the Cathedral. This I consider
a good example for every congregation in the Diocese."
The report to the Council of 1888, was 508 .Communicants in
the Cathedral. In 1872 there were 171 reported.
The voluntary offerings, as found in the report of the Treas
urer of the Council and Board of Missions for the year ending
June, 1888, of the Cathedral and Parishes of Milwaukee, may
be given :
All Saints' Cathedral . . . $426.24 S. John's  $ 36.77
S. James'  206.96 S.Paul's  254.57
In his final Address, Bishop Welles says :
"The year present has been one of very marked results.
The zeal, energy, and persistent labors of the Clergy are appar
ent everywhere. Nothing can be more admirable than their
tone and spirit. With the increase of vested choirs, and the
multiplication of services, the work of the Church is deepening

lxxviii MEMOIRS.

throughout the Diocese. Early Eucharists were almost univer
sal on Easter morning. In many of the congregations in the
Diocese, there is an increasing desire to add to the dignity and
devotion of the Celebration of the Holy Communion, and one
manifestation has been the disposition for the entire congrega
tion to remain during the Divine Office, and not to impair its
solemnity by an unauthorized departure from the church, los
ing the precious teaching of the Liturgy, losing the great
opportunity of intercessory prayer, and losing that Benediction
of the Peace' of God which passeth all understanding. The real
power of the Historic Church, is the firm conviction that she is
supernatural, that the Sacraments she administers were com
mitted to her by Almighty God, and we cannot overestimate
the preciousness of our Baptism into Christ's Church, nor the
unspeakable value of that Sacrament, wherein He comes to us,
Who feeds us with His Body and Blood. "
On the conclusion of the Address, the Council took recess,
that each member might say " good-bye " to his Bishop, and bid
him God-speed. More than ever before, did he look the Bishop,
in his gentle and lovable dignity, that last hour among his
children, as he, their dear Father, passed through their midst,
to begin his journey abroad. Going on by easy stages, he
reached his birth-place, Waterloo, N. Y., on Saturday after
noon. He passed a quiet Sunday in his old home. On Monday,
he left for New York, and on Tuesday, June 12th, sailed in the
steamship Arizona for England, accompanied by his sons, and
the Bishop of Indiana. The weather was pleasant during the
passage, and the Bishop greatly enjoyed the voyage ; the more
so, because of the opportunity afforded of recalling, with the
Bishop of Indiana, the memory of the old days of pioneer work
in the Diocese of Minnesota. Landing at Liverpool on the
morning of the 21st, the Bishop, with his sons, went directly
to Stuffynwood, Derbyshire, Mid-England.
This was the home of Mr. and Mrs. Paget, who had cordially
invited " the Bi3hop to make their home his headquarters, dur
ing his sojourn in England."
It had been the Bishop's intention to travel considerably in
England, should his health permit. He had spoken to the
writer, of a determination to visit Doone Valley, Exmoor, and
see the Doone Slide and Bagworthy Pool, descriptions of which
he had greatly enjoyed, in listening to "Lorna Doone," during
his convalescence.

BISHOP OF MILWAUKEE. lxxix
At the opening sessions of the Lambeth Conference, the
Bishop was present for four days, but found his attendance
greatly fatiguing.
On invitation, he attended a banquet given by the Lord
Mayor to the Bishops. During the remainder of his stay, at
that time, in London, he was the guest of the Archbishop of
Canterbury, at Lambeth Palace. The final service of the Con
ference, was in S. Paul's Cathedral, London. Though convinced
that attendance upon it would be very fatiguing to himself, the
Bishop could not forbear the enjoyment of attending the serv
ice, the like of which had never before been seen in England.
At the conclusion of the function, the Bishop was greatly ex
hausted, and returned immediately to Stuffynwood, where,
during the residue of his stay in England, all that loving hands
and hearts could do, was done to give him pleasure, joy and
peace. From Stuffynwood, he went, for brief visits, at Baslow with
Dr. and Mrs. Branson, uncle and aunt of the late Rev. E. R.
Ward, visiting Chatsworth and Haddon Hall ; and at the house
of Dr. Kirby Kittoe and family (formerly of this Diocese), he
spent a week, in Oxford. He enjoyed meeting the Rev. Dr.
Bright, the Rev. Dr. Paget, Father Benson, and others. He
saw considerable of the University life, entering his younger
son as an undergraduate at this time.
From Stuffynwood, he also went up frequently to London,
to consult physicians of eminence in regard to his health.
With the exception of these visits, and a short attendance at
the final sessions of the Conference, he passed the time of his
sojourn in England at Stuffynwood. Many incidents, during
his stay, brought vividly back to himself, and the friends
around, the thought of the Patriarchal days. For many years,
a Bishop had not been seen at Stuffynwood and the surround
ing country, but the traditions of the olden time lingered
among the people, and many, both at Stuffynwood, and in his
journeyings, came to him for the Apostolic blessing, and de
parted, rejoicing that they had been thus privileged.
On Sunday, September 16th, at the request of the Bishop of
Southwell, Confirmation was administered by Bishop Welles
in the Church of the Holy Trinity, Shirebrook, to 36 Candidates.
The Bishop was habited in the ancient vestments of cope and
mitre, and the service was deeply impressive in its character,

1XXX MEMOIRS.

It was his last ministration in this office of the Church, and one
which will long be remembered by those present, because of
the venerable and apostolic appearance of the Bishop, as Well
as the earnestness of his address to the Candidates before and
after the Sacrament of Confirmation.
The last official act of the Bishop's life, was a Celebration of
the Holy Eucharist at S. Chad's Chapel, on the estate at Stuffyn
wood, on the eve of S. Michael and All Angels, September 28th.
To those receiving, the thought that he was ready "to depart
on the morrow, and that they should see his face no more," gave
to this service an unusual solemnity. The household had
learned to love him during his sojourn among them ; and his
final words of Benediction, came as an unction from on high to
their waiting hearts. One of them writes: "Since news has
come that the pure, gentle, kind Bishop has entered into rest,
Stuffynwood has been a house of mourning."
On the afternoon of the 29th, the Bishop set sail in the
steamer Alaska, from Liverpool, on his return home, accom
panied by his elder son, and his old and tried friend, the
Bishop of Indiana. He reached New York City on the morning
of Sunday, October 7th, and departed the same day for Waterloo,
arriving there greatly fatigued by the journey, about 11 o'clock
on the 8th.
It was thought that a few days' rest would recruit his strength
and admit of his going on to his Diocese. On Sunday, October
14th, he received at the hands of his son, the Holy Communion,
and which was indeed his Viaticum. A large opal picture of
the Reredos of S. Paul's Cathedral, London, was used for an
Altar piece.
On Wednesday, the 17th, serious symptoms made their ap
pearance, of a character new in the case, and calculated to
excite grave apprehension in regard to the Bishop.
On Thursday, S. Luke's Day, he was to have had a Celebra
tion of the Holy Eucharist, but the sensitiveness of his stomach
would not admit of his receiving. In the afternoon he signed
officially his letter to the Standing Committee, which was read
in the Cathedral by Dr. Ashley, on the day of the Bishop's burial.
On the morning of Friday, the 19th, the Bishop was told that
it was considered that he could not recover. During the day he
arranged matters of business, and other matters of a more per
sonal character, with the calmness and deliberation which had

BISHOP OF MILWAUKEE. Ixxxi

marked his life, and did not fail him when his mortal hour
drew near. During the afternoon, his weakness became great,
but his mental faculties remained unimpaired.
From time to time, he would speak of his condition, and gave
direction concerning the service of his burial. There was no
shrinking back with fear of the inevitable, but a calm joy fulness
of on-looking, as to a condition of enlarged being with Christ,
the Master. His was, indeed, the faith that overcometh the
world, and this faith strengthened more and more, as the lamp
of this life burned lower. His dying words were the recital of
the Nicene Symbol, with affirmation at the close : " In that
faith I have lived, in that faith I die."
It was the soul's testimony, not to men only, but to Him in
Whom he had endured. The fight of afflictions may gather
around such a life, but cannot quench the calm courage which
looks on to the end, and hears the voice of the Master in His
promise " to him that overcometh."
To the Litany of the Dying, which was then recited, he
made full and touching responses, and as the Commendatory
Prayer was read, he was breathing his last. There was no
change during the final hours in manner, voice, or act ; the
Bishop looked into the face of the King of Terrors, as he would
into the face of a friend. The quiet and natural gentleness,
which so many remember as marking his life, marked preem
inently his death. As he had walked with his friends, so he had
walked with God ; and then with his friends he walked with
God, and was not, for God took him.
He passed to the rest of the People of God at 15 minutes
past 12 o'clock in the early morning of Saturday, October 20th,
dying at his birthplace in the midst of his family, concerning
which he said: " If I could have chosen myself, I would have
had it so."
On the morning of Sunday, the 21st, a Requiem Service, the
Celebration of the Holy Eucharist, was held in the room where
he died, his son officiating, and his sorrowing relatives receiv
ing comfort from the Master, in the nearest approach that mor
tal man can make to the Being of the Living God, on this side
the grave.
On the afternoon of Monday, a service was held at the
house, by the Rector of the Parish at Waterloo, the Rev. Dr.
Doty, of Rochester, and the Rev. Dr. Brainerd, of Auburn, assist-

lxxxii MEMOIRS.

ing. It was a comfort to the family in their sorrow, that the
Hon. E. T. Wilder, of Red Wing, Minn., a Parishioner and firm
friend of the Bishop during the whole of his life as a Parish
Priest, was also present, and accompanied them to Milwaukee.
Meanwhile, tidings of the Bishop's death had gone over the
land. On the arrival of the train from the east, at midnight, on
Tuesday, at the Northwestern Depot, in Milwaukee, the great
body of the Clergy, and many of the laity, were at hand to re
ceive all that was mortal of their revered Father in God. Clad in
cassock and biretta, they bore the body, by frequent relays, al
lowing no vehicle to be used. Through the streets, the.dark
robed procession wended its way, while the Cathedral bell was
sobbing over a sleeping city, the sorrow of a widowed Diocese.
Among those, thus bearing the body of their Bishop, were
some who had known him from the days of his Diaconate; and,
in the bonds of a friendship cemented by years of trial, had
learned to know, as no others could, and love the gentle and
fearless soul, which had passed to the joys of its waiting rest in
the Paradise of God.
A brief service was held on arriving at the Cathedral. A
watch of the Clergy was set by the coffin, which was continued
unceasingly, through frequent reliefs, until the hour of burial
on Thursday. Vested in surplice and stole, one member of the
watch stood at the head of the coffin, while the other kneeled at
the foot ; and through the long hours of day and night, was
heard the continuous voice of prayer and thanksgiving for the
state of the Church Militant, and for the state of the Church
Expectant. On Wednesday morning there were two early Requiem Cele
brations of the Blessed Sacrament in the Cathedral. On Thurs
day, the day of the burial, the early Requiem Celebration at 7
o'clock, was by the Bishop's son, at which about 200 made their
Communion, many of whom were old time friends of the Bish
op. There was a second Celebration by the Dean of the Cathe
dral at 8 o'clock, and a third by the Bishop of Minnesota at 9
o'clock, at which large numbers received.
At 11:30 o'clock, the long procession of Bishops, Clergy and
Choristers, entered the Cathedral at the main door, and passed
to the Chancel and choir, the Bishop of Chicago reading the
sentences ; the large, vested choir chanting the Burial Anthem.
The Rev. Dr. Ashley read the Lesson, and the Letter of the
Bishop to the Standing Committee.

BISHOP OF MILWAUKEE. lxxxiii
In the High Requiem Celebration, the Bishop of Springfield
was Celebrant, the Bishops of Western Michigan and Chicago,
Gospeller and Epistoler. It was a choral service— the one the
choir had prepared to welcome the Bishop on his return from
abroad. To describe the grandeur of this service, its teaching
of the Resurrection, its power to soothe the heart aching at the
vision of death, its clear testimony that the Blessed Sacrament,
in prayer for riving and departed is the true comfort and so
lace, as it is the joy and glory, of such a time, is not for hu
man words. Even the organ seemed instinct with life to
recognize the altered conditions, and to breathe forth tones
of higher and deeper joy in fervent Alleluia,
" For all the Saints who from their labore rest."
Using the words advisedly, one could say it was a grand
Christian burial.
From the Cathedral, the cortege took its way to Faith Hill,
in Forest Home, where the place for the Bishop's rest had been
given with delicate consideration by the Trustees of the Ceme
tery. *
The Bishops of Minnesota and Indiana— tried friends of the
olden time — read the Service at the grave. The Choir sang
Bishop Welles' favorite hymn, "Lead, kindly Light." Then
the Benediction from the Bishop of Minnesota, and this stain
less Servant of God was " at rest." And on this, the 25th of Octo
ber, the fourteenth anniversary of his consecration to the high
and holy office of a Bishop, the Pastoral Staff, badge of his
office, was borne back to the Cathedral, draped with the badge
of the sorrow of a mourning Diocese.
All the services, in each and every feature, were what the
Bishop would have wished ; and preached, as no other words
could do, the grand, sustaining truth of the "Communion of
Saints " in the Catholic Church.
" Angels, and living Saints, and dead,
But One Communion make ;
All join in Christ, their Living Head,
And of His love partake."
This Memoir shall be closed with words from the Church
* " It is hoped, sometime, when the Chancel to the Cathedral shall be built,
that the body snail lie in a crypt thereunder, which was the Bishop's desire."—
The Calendar.

IXXXIV MEMOIRS.

Eclectic, words written by that life-long friend of Bishop
Welles, who already has told of his youth and early manhood,
and whom the Bishop chose, with the venerable President of
the Standing Committee of this Diocese, to present him at his
consecration to the office of a Bishop in the Church of God :
" Never before were the expressions of grief and tributes of
sorrowing affection at the loss of a Bishop more widespread,
more deep and unaffected, than in the Diocese of Wisconsin on
the death of Bishop Welles. The Calendar for November is
a striking witness of what a marvellous hold, a saintly and lov
ing Father in God will gain upon the hearts of a whole people,
who personally knew him, and to whom they were almost all
personally known by name. Such a character is like the ' oint
ment poured forth,' of which the aroma pervades the whole
Church. There can be no mistake about the genuine testimony
of love and admiration, and gratitude to God for His faithful
servant, that shines out in the multitude of letters received at
his funeral, as well as in the action of the various Parochial and
Diocesan bodies.
" Dr. deKoven's beautiful speech in nominating Dr. Welles
for Bishop, fourteen years ago, and the unanimity of his elec
tion, all the laity and sixty-nine of the seventy-two Clergy
voting for him, were but the forecast of what was expected and
what has been realized — an administration of singular devo
tion, zeal, urbanity and integrity, fulfilling, as closely, perhaps,
as it is ever given to mortal to do, the requirements of the
Ordinal, to be 'a wholesome example in word, in conversation,
in love, in faith, in chastity and in purity.' Oh, what are all
technical, ecclesiastical, party differences, in comparison with
this standard ! As infidelity, with all its opposition, has an
unerring sense of the transcendent superiority of the Faith of
the Gospel, so the world recognizes in a true Christian character
something it cannot gainsay. Thus the secular press of Mil
waukee, says : ' His official work in Milwaukee publicly illus
trated the grace of a splendid sustained unselfishness, in con
templation of which all the world ought to profit,'* in days when
the idolatry of covetousness takes on the dignity of a religion."
" Lord, all-pitying Jesu, blest,
Grant him Thine Eternal Rest. "

*Thc Evening Wisconsin, Milwaukee.

PAROCHIAL SERMONS.

THE PASTORAL CALL AND DUTY.
Preached at Christ Church, Red Wing, Minn., Oct. 3d, 1858, on his
acceptance of the rectorship of the Parish.
Therefore came I unto you, without gainsaying, as soon
as I was sent for : I ask therefore for what intent ye have
sent for me ? — Acts x. 29.
There is not in Scripture-record a more beautiful and
touching story than the narrative — in the Chapter from
which the text is taken — of the interview of S. Peter and
Cornelius. "Unheard by all but angels' ears, the good
Cornelius," the devout and God-fearing man, lifts up his
voice in prayer to Him in Whose service his alms and
devotions continually minister. A heavenly messenger
coming in, assures the faithful soldier that his devotions
are not unregarded, and that God will vouchsafe to him
the full revelation of His Truth, and guide him into the
way of Eternal Salvation. In a distant city upon his ter
raced roof, S. Peter, in the midst of prayerful communings
with God, beheld a heavenly vision and learned the divine
lesson of Christian love, that God is no respecter of persons,
but in every nation he that feareth Him and worketh
righteousness is accepted with Him. Strangers in the
flesh were the soldier and the saint, but true brethren in
dearest love ; and already their words of prayer, swelling

PAROCHIAL SERMONS.

high, mingled before the Throne of Grace, as now their
united strains of rapture praise, brighten their high and
heavenly estate with perfect happiness.
Who of earth can tell the course of prayer ? In silence
and alone, some earnest heart may turn to God, a prostrate
penitent beseeching pardon for the past, and heavenly
grace, a parent praying for an erring child, a sister for a
wayward brother, a Christian soldier for the household of
the faith, and not a word is lost !
Miles northward of us in the depths of primeval forests,
a rivulet trickles from its mossy bed, marking a line of
light beneath the shadows of the trees, murmuring on over
pebbly bottoms ; and now a swollen brook mingles its cur
rent with the resistless flow of that mighty river,* which
here rolls southward, the liquid highway of a Nation's
commerce. As thus in nature there is no waste, but very little
rill, aye, every drop of rain has its appointed place, and its
appointed work in perfecting the vast end and design of
man's material weal and happiness, so in the Kingdom of
grace, every sincere thought, devout word, and earnest
work has its enduring ministry of good.
The prayers of Cornelius were not unheard, nor were
his alms unheeded. They were his memorials before God,
and the light, which in answer \o these devotions was
kindled at Csesarea, now lightens the gentle world.
Obedient to the heavenly vision, when the angel which
spake unto him was departed, " Cornelius called two of his
household servant's, and a devout soldier of them that
waited on him continually, and when he had declared all
things unto them, he sent them to Joppa."
The prominent feature in the character of Cornelius
disclosed in this incident, is Faith manifested and testified
*The Mississippi.

THE PASTORAL CALL AND DUTY. 3
by obedience ; that Faith which is the source and parent of
all the deeds that issue in Eternal life. His alms and his
prayers evidenced his goodness and his sincerity ; and when
the Angel bade him send for Peter that he might learn his
ivhole duty, his ready obedience showed that the motive
which prompted his good deeds was not merely instinctive
or impulsive, but that the principle of Faith controlled his
actions, that he possessed an earnest, submissive and reliant
spirit, hence he was the recipient of the grace and blessing
of God ; and from his darkened mind it pleased omni
scient Power to lift the veil that shut out the sunlight of His
will, and to direct him what to do in order that he and his
family might be saved.
The Faith of Cornelius was answered by the ready love
of S. Peter. The spirit which influenced his Divine
Master determined the course of the Apostle. That love
which passeth understanding, whereby God sent His own
Son into the world to redeem mankind, that love which
we may trace in every word and act of the Saviour during
His earthly pilgrimage, has been in all ages of the Church,
the type of the highest forms of human love. Nowhere
do we find nobler manifestations of its purity and its
strength, than in the lives of those who bore the Gospel
tidings of Salvation to the nations sitting in darkness-
No where is evidenced a more cheerful and ready acceptance
of the solemn, responsible and perilous duties of this mis
sion, than in the case of the Apostolic preachers. When
Peter received the summons, he delayed not, his heart was
in the work ; as God's ambassador he came unto Cornelius
with the words of salvation which I have chosen for my
text : " Therefore came I unto you, without gainsaying, as
soon as I was sent for : I ask therefore for what intent ye
have sent for me ?"
In reply, Cornelius related unto him the heavenly

PAROCHIAL SERMONS.

appearance and the mission of the Angel, concluding with
the assurance, " Now, therefore, are we all here present
before God, to hear all things that are commanded thee of
God." The spirit which had influenced Cornelius to call
for S. Peter, prepared his mind meekly to receive the
words of divine truth, that heavenly grace which had been
vouchsafed him, enabling him to appreciate his needs and
his necessities, filled his mind with a grateful sense of God's
mercies, and made him an earnest listener and active
recipient of the truths of Christianity. These truths
S. Peter declared boldly and fully unto him, clearly
expounding the Gospel scheme of redemption and salvation ;
and when he saw that his words were gladly received by
his auditors, he commanded them to be baptized, and thus
engrafted them into the visible Church of Christ.
Cornelius evidenced his faith and obedience, by sending
for, and welcoming, the Apostle as the Minister of Christ,
and the conduct of S. Peter fully justified this acknowl
edgement. As the preacher of the Gospel of love, he came
without gainsaying, as soon as he was sent for ; as the
minister of the mysteries of Christ, he received men into
the congregation of Christ's flock.
The consideration of this narrative suggests thoughts
peculiarly appropriate to the circumstances of our first
meeting as pastor and people. At your call, I have come
hither to minister unto you in sacred things. I regard the
expression of your desire to establish the ministration of
the Church in your midst, as the evidence of a spirit of
Christian faith and zeal. Like Cornelius, you wish to
hear the things that are commanded of God. In His Name
I stand here to speak to you, and may He, the Infinite and
the Wise, give me grace now and ever, to speak the word of
Truth, the Gospel of the blessed, with the bold earnestness
and with the earnest affection of S. Peter.

THE PASTORAL CALL AND DUTY.

As the basis of all after-work, let us first inquire by
what authority I come ? When the Jews said unto our
Saviour, "By what authority doest thou these things !J"
wretched cavillers as they were, their question recognized
the connection and interdependency, between the exercise
of power and the possession of authority ; and although, on
account of their faithless, unbelieving hearts, the Saviour
vouchsafed no reply to them, save only a question and a
condemnation ; still, in the institution and commission of
the ministry of His Church, He fully established the prin
ciple. The principle is one that underlies the frame-work
of all social and political institutions. The connection is
neither arbitrary nor changeable, it is the basis of all priv
ileges, and the security of all rights. The child obeys the
parent, the government receives the ambassador, the people
acknowledge the execution, because of 'the inherent right,
or the delegated power of the one who exercises authority.
The ministration of Baptism to the Counelian family by
S. Peter, is not only a recognition of the authority of the
Apostle in the Church of Christ, but it proves clearly that
that Kingdom which the Son of God founded, when He
brought life and immortality to light, was regarded as a
visible, organized society, into which it was necessary to
be received by baptism, before the inestimable benefits of
Christ's Redemption could be enjoyed.
The Church of Christ was not then, nor is it now, an
independent voluntary society, but one whereof men are
obliged to be members, as they value their everlasting
happiness. It is spiritual, because founded in opposition to
the Kingdom of darkness, and yet an outward and visible
organization with public rulers, and a public confessioh of
faith, and visible sacraments ; a kingdom, universal both
with regard to time and regard to place, and divine in
respect to its Founder and its objects ; and thus, since vis-

6 PAROCHIAL SERMONS.

ible, universal and divine, it must possess a public mmistry
and perpetual vitality, a divine authority ; and its officers,
for themselves, for the doctrines they teach, and for the
power they claim, must show a divine commission and an
unbroken succession.
"No man taketh this honor unto himself," says S. Paul
(Heb. v. 4), "but he that is called of God, as was Aaron."
The Apostle is speaking of the Christian ministry, of our
Saviour's priesthood. His words are plain and easy to be
understood. Whoever officiates in divine matters is to be
set apart, to have a priestly commission, and a consecration
derived from divine institution ; for the original of all
authority in the Church, is from God and from His Son,
Who is its supreme head.
Christ breathed on the Apostles, and they received the
Holy Ghost for the work of the ministry ; by prayers and
the imposition of hands they conferred the ministerial
authority upon the first preachers of Christianity, from
whom, through successive generations of the ministry,
the sacred office has been transmitted to our day. Hence
the authority of all who minister at the altars of our
Church, a perpetual priesthood, the interpreters and wit
nesses of God's will and His kingdom, "the Class," says
an earnest and thoughtful man, " which God has appointed
to unite all others : which, in as far as it fulfils its calling
and is indeed a priesthood, is above and below all rank, and
knows no man after the flesh, but only on the ground of
his spiritual worth, and his birthright in that kingdom
which is the heritage of all." Commissioned by the
Church of Christ, I come to you as the minister of God's
mysteries and mercies, the preacher of His Gospel.
The Christian scheme of salvation presents, in their
freeness and their fulness, the riches of Divine mercies and
love. The Church is the visible organization to perfect

THE PASTORAL CALL AND DUTY.

all aims and ohjects of this love, union, philanthropy and
brotherhood among men ; and all these ends are to be
obtained, through loyalty to Him Who is man's salvation
here and hereafter, and Whose body is the Church. My
duty therefore is to preach unto you Christ and the Church.
Not simply a system of moral-teaching, for there is no
salvation in that alone. There are no good news for strug
gling, sinning men, in the dialogues of Socrates or in the
wisdom of Plato, and still therein we have the perfection
of philosophic morality.
Christianity is not a system of refined speculative
conceit for the enlightened few, nor an exclusive revelation
for the Pharisaical elect, but an universal Gospel for all
the sin-stricken, suffering and oppressed of earth.
The Church is not a voluntary society, to-day organ
ized, to-morrow disbanded, dependent upon the fancies
and caprices of men ; but an universal, perpetual king
dom, with its unchanged and unchangeable creed, its
divinely commissioned ministry, and its appointed work
of human regeneration. It is God's agent to do His work
on earth ; and in the prosecution of this work, within this
kingdom and in obedience to its laws, you, with me, are
co-workers and fellow-laborers. He Who commissioned us
to preach, bids you take heed how you hear, and warns us,
one and all, by the example of the unprofitable, servant,
that with the privileges of our Christian calling, we
inherit most solemn responsibilities.
Thus the Church is no exclusive organization. The
divine lesson of S. Peter's vision is that God is no re
specter of persons, that all men are the inheritors of the
blessed privileges of His kingdom, that He unto whom all
power is given in heaven and in earth, has purchased
for all mankind the rights of sons of God, that all
who through obedience become living members of His

PAROCHIAL SERMONS.

Church, sons by adoption, will find in His love and
in His power, the ground of all their right, and all
their strength, and all their duties here on earth. Nor is
the Church exclusive in her teachings. Regardless of the
passing excitement, the political turmoils, the miscalled
reforms of the day, she preaches noiv the same great truths,
in their fulness and in their extent, which Apostles uttered
in the streets of Jerusalem, while Calvary was yet crimson
with their Master's blood, and Apostolic men taught the
citizens of an Empire, whose social and political systems
were inherently cruel, base and tyrannical. She turns not
aside to waste her energies in the discussion of those much-
vaunted abstract rights, which have ground and root only
in the ever-changing opinions of men, in the new needs of
political leaders, or in the wild theories of empyrical specu
lators. She takes no partial ground. She pleads for no
caste or rank, but bases all her teachings upon that fact
which underlies all moral, social and political rights, that
Jesus of Nazareth died for all men. She points out to all
the way of joy on earth, of rest and happiness in heaven.
What, my brethren, are all the schemes and projects
of modern reform, divorced from Christianity and un
blessed by the Church, but a reproduction of the barren
philosophies of heathen antiquity ?
What are the strivings after social reforms and moral
perfection through the instrumentality of societies and
associations and leagues, but the attempts of weak and
sinful and erring men to realize for themselves and in
their own way, that spiritual freedom, which, in a higher
and sublimer sense than unsanctified humanity can ever
attain unto, God has promised and will surely give, to every
faithful member of His kingdom, the Church ?
He Who brought life and immortality to light in His
Bible, directs ; by His Church He guides mankind into

THE PASTORAL CALL AND DUTY. 9
the ways of peace and happiness. He designates those
graces and virtues which are to be cultivated by men to
insure peace in .this life and a blissful hereafter. He
assures us by His holy apostle (I. Cor. vi. 9, 10) that the
unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God, neither
fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate,
nor abusers of themselves with mankind, nor thieves, nor
covetous, nor drunkards, nor extortioners.
Here, placed within the reach and power of every man
who has ever listened to the Gospel tidings of salvation,
we have the cure for all the ills of the social system.
Communion with the visible, universal Church of God,
His kingdom upon earth ; individual holiness ; entire sub
jection to the will of our King and Saviour ; these are the
requirements and the conditions of the perfect state.
This is the Gospel of Christ, not simply moral teaching ;
but with the Bible — the Book of the purest and highest
morality — a living interpreter, the Church with her priest
hood, her ordinances, her sacraments, a divine influ
ence penetrating and permeating political and social life,
and wherever the lusts and passions of men withstand
it not, realizing in the true freedom of the one and in the
purity of the other, the blessedness of the Kingdom of
Heaven. Repent and be baptized, was the keynote of S. Peter's
Whitsuntide sermon. The Church caught and re-echoed
the sublime utterance, and through successive ages, ever
teaching the necessity of repentance, of personal holiness,
it has been growing an d spreading, ' 'ci vilizing, harmonizing,
uniting this distracted earth."
In the communion of the Church, the teacher and the
taught are joined in mutual duties and solemn responsi
bilities. In humble reliance upon God, we are to do all
things with the prayer and hope, that all our efforts and

10 PAROCHIAL SERMONS.

all our toil may be sanctified to the glory of His holy
name, and the furtherance of His blessed Gospel.
Not, as to Cornelius, are the words_ of Gospel truth
novel to your ears.
And some there are among you, whose early lives have
been nurtured and nourished by the tender care of the
Church, to whom the soothing and sublime strains of her
liturgical services are familiar and inestimably dear. To
preach the Gospel of Christ as received and taught by the
Church, the pillar and the ground of divine truth, as
explained in the Prayer Book and in the Homilies, in her
articles and in her offices, shall be — God aiding me — my
earnest endeavor and my earnest work. In this endeavor
and in this work, I feel that warm hearts are ready to
sympathize and to co-operate.
A toilful work oft-times it may be.
Disappointments and trials, and cares and vexations,
are before us, but the Cross of Christ is the standard
which we are to bear painlessly onward ; and the love of
God will be our stay and our strength here, and our abun
dant reward hereafter.
A great and good man (Dr. Arnold, of Rugby), now
gone to his rest, has taught us that life is no sluggard's
paradise, but a battle ground, ordained from of old and
by God Himself ; where there are no spectators, but the
youngest take sides, and the stakes are life and death.
With the consciousness of this fully roused in our minds,
comes the appreciation of the solemn earnestness of all
the thoughts, and words, and acts, of this our mortal life.
We feel that upon this battle ground our place is
taken. We shall experience, if already we have not felt,
that it is no vain figure by which we are named soldiers
of Christ's Church militant, and our life called a warfare.
In this contest are we, as pastor and people, now confed-

THE PASTORAL CALL AND DUTY. 11
erate. Mutual forbearance and mutual affection, by God's
blessing, will strengthen the ties that the relation in
which we are placed, of its own blessed nature doth en
gender. Let us, in reliance upon the love and grace of God, help
one another, striving to show forth in the example of our
daily lives, the fruits of a genial, hopeful, loving religion ;
a religion which sanctifies and beautifies all the relations
of life, and all the offices of social intercourse ; an earnest
zeal, a manly piety, which outroots from the heart all
that is wrong, and base, and mean in act or word ; that
makes one kinder and better at home and abroad ; loving
and gentle in the family, frank and honest in the office or
the shop, and above all, the very bond and support of these
domestic and personal virtues ; more earnest and energetic
in the requirements of Christian worship, and the offices of
Christian charity.
And may He Whom we strive to serve give us grace so
to Serve Him, that when the toils of the Christian life are
passed, we may enter upon the joys of the Christian rest.

II.
GOVERNMENT OF THE TONGUE.
Preached at Christ Church, LocUport, N. Y., July 18th, 1858, and'
again at Kemper Hall, Oct. 5th, 1884.
But I say unto you, That every idle ivord that men
shall speak, they shall give account thereof in the Day of
Judgment. — S. Matthew xii. 36.
The text contains a warning and a declaration ; a
solemn warning against the use of idle words ; a clear and
explicit declaration of judgment therefor, which is thus
expressed in the next verse : " For by thy words thou shalt
be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned."
The thoughts of men are secret and hidden from human
eyes. Their deeds may likewise be so ; as those acts
of charity, which, when the left hand doeth, the right
hand knoweth not of ; or those vile plottings of Satan
which are wrought in darkness, and concealed from light.
But spoken words must find an open ear, a ready listener,
or their utterances are like the passing winds which men
regard not. They carry an influence from the lips of him
that speaketh, to mould and shape the life of him to
whom they are spoken ; and when we appreciate this real
moral element in words, we shall feel the solemn earnest
ness and force of this warning of our Saviour, and
assurance of our Judge, that every idle word that men shall
speak, they shall give an account thereof in the day of
Judgment. In the day of Judgment — it is the declaration of Him

GOVERNMENT OF THE TONGUE. 13
Who shall then sit upon the throne of Judgment — shall
men give an account for the words which they have
spoken. This definite assurance of final judgment, con
nects the consideration of the text in our first inquiry as
to the importance of the subject under consideration, with
that solemn question into which all the serious thoughts
and reflections of men are resolvable ; the question of
human salvation.
And this, whether we choose it or not. It is an inevi
table necessity of our spiritual nature. For since the time
when the Anointed of the Lord brought life and immor
tality to light ; when the glad tidings of Gospel Truth-
like the waves that cover the sea — began their ceaseless
onward flow ; and the Gentile nations receiving the teach
ings of the Church of Christ, and catching the light of
the testimony, came one by one to enroll themselves be
neath His banner, Whose, in the fulness of time, all the
Kingdoms of the world are to become ; in all these ages of
the Christian Church, the question as to the manner and
means of man's salvation, has been the depth-theme of
human inquiry ; the question about which all considera
tions which regard man's eternal interests have centered.
We cannot if we try (and dare we try ? ), put aside
this question, and live as if our eternal salvation were not
the real and true end of living. Can any man in whose
ears the Apostolic injunction, " Work out thy salvation
with fear and trembling," has sounded, as it were, from
the days of infancy, go to his farm, or his shop, or his
office, or his place of business, wherever it may be, and in
the enjoyments of success, or the perplexities of care, for
get that this life is an earnest, and a real, and a solemn
thing ; and all the more solemn, and real, and earnest, be
cause it is a life of brief endurance, and of preparation ?
He may, it is very true, in manifold ways, evidence by

14 PAROCHIAL SERMONS.

outward show an apparent neglect and f orgetf ulness ; but
that mystery of boyhood, as an able delineator of youth
ful character has termed it ; that strange privilege of be
ing at once sinful and light-hearted ; that mingling of
the pure and impure in the same cup without polluting
the whole draught, which would seem to result from the
unconsciousness of the heinous nature of sin, in the
youthful mind ; this inscrutable mysterious privilege at
taches not to man's estate.
In manhood, the consciousness of unrepented sin
presses upon the memory like a "dark loathsome bur
then," because man knows that every act of sin imperils
his eternal salvation. There is no forgetfulness. Mo
ments of feverish relief and wild delight in the courses of
deepest guilt, may occur ; as the lightnings flash along
the sky, only to deepen the intensity of midnight gloom,
and lurid darkness. The man who commits an act of sin,
has woven a black and hateful thread in the innermost
web of life. Perchance the eyes of others may not see it ;
he can never forget it, and hence when, with good reso
lutions and earnest endeavors, he is striving to walk in the
pathway of Christian duty, and Satan tempts and tries him
with the remembrances of past sins, he feels that it is no
vain figure, by which the Christian life is called a war
fare, and he, a soldier of Christ's Church militant.
From the font to the grave, he must struggle against
evil thoughts, and vicious habits. But he labors not unaided
and alone ; the instructions of his Saviour point out the
way of safety and salvation ; His warnings remind him of
that day when He shall come to judge the world in
righteousness, and minister true judgment unto the peo
ple. A holy example and words of comfort are his in
every emergency of life ; and when, to fit himself for
daily duties, the earnest Christian would strive to guide

GOVERNMENT OF THE TONGUE. 15
his words with discretion, he must remember the solemn
warning of the text, while he adopts the prayer of the
Psalmist : Set a watch, 0, Lord, before my mouth, keep
the door of my lips (Ps. cxli. 3.).
It reminds us, in the words of the Psalmist, That God
is about our path, and about our bed and spiest out all our
ways. Truly, it is a solemn warning ; for the temptation
it is directed against, is to be resisted throughout the
whole circle of our waking hours ; as often as we join the
loved ones at home, or mingle in the business or innocent
pleasures of the world.
A moment's reflection will impress this upon our
minds, and clearly prove to us how intimately connected
with the great work of our salvation, is the earnest
endeavor to make the words of our mouth alway acceptable,
in the sight of Him Who is our Strength, and our
Redeemer. Since the day when our first parents listened to the
deceitful words of Satan, and, taking the forbidden fruit,
" ate mortality, misery and destruction to themselves, and
their whole posterity," the greatest crimes, and most hein
ous sins that have been committed by men, have been
enacted under the deceptive influences of evil -words ; the
fallacies, and falsehoods, and wicked, vain promises of
those who have perverted language to base, unholy uses.
For since language is the vehicle of thought, and words
are the signs of things, names come naturally enough to
pass for things themselves. For objects — to quote South's
idea — " cannot by their own natural bulk, pass into the
apprehension, but are taken in by their ideas. These ideas
imprint themselves, after an immaterial manner, in the
imagination. Thence they pass into the intellect, and are
expressed by names invented by the mind, for the com
munication of its thoughts to others. So that, as concep-

16 PAROCHIAL SERMONS.

tions are the images or resemblances of things to the mind
within itself, in like manner are word's, or names, the
marks, tokens or resemblances of those conceptions, to the
minds of them whom we converse with." Hence we see
the fatal imposture, and lying deceitfulness of that saying,
attributed to the French Diplomatist, " that language is
given us to conceal our thoughts." In what an atmos
phere of rank pollution would the next generation grow
into being, if we believed this vile doctrine, and lived in
accordance with such belief. In the place of confidence
and intimacy, friendship and affection ; distrust and jeal
ousy, ill-will and envy, would be the fruits of social inter
course. The very- thought is impious ; arraying language
on the devil's side in the great struggle between good and
evil, between truth and falsehood.
From this general consideration of the inestimable
importance of the warning contained in the text, we would
naturally infer that it was not meant, especially and only,
for those in the high places of earth, where, amid the
clamor, and madness, and conflicts of the ambitious and
the worldly, (it is the sad experience of all times), false
hoods and calumnies are penned and spoken, and the
highest intellectual endowments, and the disciplining
influences of education, are so often made subservient to
the base, unholy purposes of making evil appear good,
and good appear evil ; it does not even lead us so far away
from our daily walks, as to be our safeguard only against
the vices of malicious speaking, slandering, and bearing
false-witness ; but it is a voice of warning for all sorts and
conditions of men ; for all times and circumstances of
life ; it appeals to children and parents, to brothers and
sisters, to servants and employers, to minister and people ;
a word of holy and solemn caution for our guidance in all

GOVERNMENT OF THE TONGUE. 17
the relations and courtesies of daily life, in the family, and
in the parish.
Language is a divine capacity, a gift to be received
with thankfulness, and used, as all God's bounties and
mercies should be, to His eternal praise. Now, it is not
only for the evil things which they utter, ,their words of
malice and blasphemy alone, that men shall hereafter be
called to judgment ; but for every idle word that they shall
speak, are they accountable.
The etymology of opyov, the word which in our text is
translated idle, is the key to a full and proper understand
ing of the verse. A, the Greek negative, and epyov,
signifying labor, or toil, make up the word. Therefore
are men required to give a strict account of their incon
siderate and unreal words ; those useless, objectless words
which would seem to be something more than unprofit
able, and less than mischievous.
What now, as a practical consideration, are some of
the ways in which we may be guilty of indulging in idle
ivords ?
First, idle ivords are spoken by those who indulge in
vain jestings, and sarcastic criticisms.
In his exhortations to holiness, S. Paul warns the
Ephesians against foolish talking and jesting. The con
nection in which the monition occurs, shows what great
importance the Apostle attached to it ; for his argument
is, "do ye none of these things ; for ye were sometimes
darkness, but now are ye light. Walk, therefore, as
children of light" (Eph. v. 8).
Now, no man, who criticises the faults, or the foibles
of others, with foolish sarcasm, and jesting, will long
resist the temptation of indulging in bitter, and ill-natured
remarks ; of giving currency to slanders, and evil reports ;
and, even if he does not defile himself with tale-bearing,

18 PAROCHIAL SERMONS.
there is great danger that he will, very probably, desire
rather to be thought witty in conversation, than that he
will always strive to be strictly, and really, truthful.
It was in view of this very danger, that an English
Divine, whose genial humor has made his name a house
hold word, in his later years expressed a similar warning,
and in all sincerity, and earnestness, regretted the appear
ance of irreverence in many sayings which had resulted
from his habit of jesting. Genial and joyous humor is
the solace of many cares, and oftentimes the minister of
gladness and reviving spirits ; but he, whose gift it is,
should guard carefully, lest its perversion should change
an element of good, into an evil, and a torment.
Second, again, what but idle words, if indeed the term
is not too mild, are used by those who feign the varied
excuses, and indulge in the specious pretences of social
courtesy. Like all good things, and because a good thing,
sociality must be kept honest, and free from all taint of
deceit ; or that which is, in its nature, and of right should
be, the bond of domestic virtues and social happiness,
becomes a temptation and a snare. It is, I fear, the
experience of not a few, that their entrance upon a course
of deceitful and untruthful practices, was through the
way and gate of the idle icorcls of society.
What must be the impression upon the minds of the
young, when they come to realize how much there is, that
is idle, and vain, and frivolous, in the words of those
whom they meet in society, and whom they have heretofore
sincerely respected ? Is there not danger, that they will
insensibly fall into like habits, and, through the influence
of what are falsely called minor deceits, become entangled
in the meshes of habitual lying, and falsehood ?
A curse is pronounced upon him who putteth a bottle
to his neighbor's lips ; is the crime less, of one, who, by

GOVERNMENT OF THE TONGUE. 19

wicked, selfish neglect of the rules of truth-speaking, by
careless, idle words, and objectless language, destroys in
the mind of an associate, his confidence in the sanctity of
truth, and by his influence, causes his lips to utter perverse
things — directs the way, perchance, which may result in
the wretched fate of the liar and the blasphemer ?
Third, another, and, for our present purpose, a last
instance, is the case of those who give opprobrious party
names, that they may bring discredit upon principles and
motives which they dare not openly attack. The sacred
name of Christian, was an idle word upon the lips of the
people of Antioch. For the disciples were called — not
called themselves — but, as Trench shows, were called
Christians, first at Antioch. And those alien from, and
opposed to, the Gospel (Acts xxvi. 16), heathens and
revilers, thought by a nickname, to bring discredit upon
the Christian scheme of salvation. Now, as then, men
know and appreciate the force and operating strength of
words and names ; hence, a party name, if designed to
misrepresent, is not only a dangerous weapon, but an odious
lie, in the mouth of one who uses it with evil intent.
The practice of using nicknames as applied to parties,
especially in the Church, cannot be too strongly repre
hended, and discountenanced. The one who, in the heat
of party zeal, seizes upon a name as a token of ridicule,
or a badge of disgrace, should remember that, not with
his teeth, but with his tongue, does the serpent inflict the
poison of his bite.
Since, now, the use of idle ivords is so grave an error,
and fraught with consequences so solemn, it becomes us
to guard most carefully against this most vicious practice,
this dangerous temptation, Deceit. We should remember
that words are the witnesses, as it were, of moral truths ;
that their abuse and perversion is a sin so grievous, that

20 PAROCHIAL SERMONS.

Isaiah denounces the severe prophetical " woe upon them
that call evil, good, and good, evil ; that put darkness for
light, and light for darkness ; that put sweet for bitter,
and bitter for sweet ;" and the words of the Prophet are
in no sense idle words. S. James impresses upon the
Christian converts the necessity of bridling the tongue ;
for "if any man offend not in word," the Apostle de
clares, "the same is a perfect man, and able also to bridle
the whole body" (iii, 3.).
In conclusion, let me commend this subject to your
serious consideration, in the language of one who has
made the study of English words a subject of highest
Christian interest. Says Dean Trench in one of his lec
tures on words, " Words do not hold themselves neutral
in the great conflict between good and evil, light or dark
ness which is dividing the world ; they are not content to
be, the passive vehicles, now of truth, and now of false
hood. We see, on the contrary, that they continually
take their side ; are some of them children of light, oth
ers children of the world, or even of darkness ; they beat
with the pulses of our life ; they stir with our passions ;
they receive from us the impressions of our good, and of
our evil, which, again, they are active, further to propa
gate among us."
Must we not own then, my brethren, that there is a
wondrous and mysterious world, of which we may hitherto
have taken too little account, around and about us ? And
may there not be a deeper meaning than hitherto we have
attached to it, lying in that solemn declaration which
succeeds the warning conveyed in the text, " By thy words
thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be
condemned ?"

III.
THE REWARD OF SELFISHNESS.
Preached at Waterloo, X. Y., September, 1863, and at S. Paul's,
Milwaukee, June, 1879.
But Abraham said, "Son, remember that thou in thy
lifetime received thy good things, likewise Lazarus evil
things; but now he is comforted, and thou art tormented."
— S. Luke, xvi. 25.
It is well for us. at all times, and especially in seasons
devoted to retirement and self-examination, to cherish the
thoughts naturally suggested by this text, for it implies a
remembrance which affects our eternal interests. As we
hear and heed this warning, shall be the issues of the life
hereafter. For we, like that son of Abraham to whom these words i
were spoken, have received good things in this life; and
the individual application of the words, most useful and
most to be desired, would be the conscientious answer to
the question, "Does my remembrance of the benefits and
blessings of God keep pace with the ever-recurring expres
sions of His goodness ? "
In the parable, our blessed Saviour shows us what
sighs and what sufferings are, in the world of torments,
reserved for those who in this life forget the extent and
the nature of their obligations — forget that they are living
in a world which God in goodness and in justice guides
and governs; for the piteous appeal for but a moment's
remission of suffering, is the cry of one whose condemna
tion, from the lips of Abraham, connects the punishment

22 PAROCHIAL SERMONS.

he is now enduring with the sins of a life of f orgetf ulness,
faithlessness, and, consequently, of selfish indulgence.
Herein shall we find the true interpretation of the
character of Dives. And this want of faith in God, issuing
in selfishness of life, it is, which binds, as the link of
natural consequences, the tearfulness of his present pains
and the abundance of his former good things.
The great S. Gregory says that never any sentence of
Holy Scripture entered more deeply into his soul than this
text; for he could not but fear lest prosperity and exalta
tion in this life should make him forgetful of his love and
obedience to the Giver of all good gifts, and neglectful of
the duties which alone can fit men for the life to come.
And it is a sad truth in human experience that many who
have most freely received are yet, least of all disposed
freely to give their hearts and their lives to Him in whom
they live and move and are.
Now, it was not because he received good things in this
life that Dives was tormented in the life to come; for
faithful Abraham himself — he who uttered these words
of remembrance — was one whose life on earth was blessed
with an abundance of good things. He was very rich in
cattle, in silver, and in gold (Gen. xin. 2). It was not,
therefore, because Dives was rich and blessed in life — for
surely, if that were a reason for condemnation, Abraham
himself would have been subject to the same sentence, for
he in this life received good things; but he, in the strength
of a living faith in God, so used his riches that, at the
last, he could recount his stewardship with joy. His
opportunities and privileges were so improved that not
only they did not hinder, but even helped him forward,
and secured for him, as the consequence of his good things
on earth, that good which is enduring and eternal.
As it was not in the mere possession of wealth that the

THE REWARD OF SELFISHNESS. 23
condemnation of Dives rested, so neither was it a ground
of punishment that he had gained his riches in an undue
or improper manner — by such ways and means as the soul
of God abhors; for it is plainly said that he received good
things, and we have no reason to infer that he had heaped
up wealth by rapine, or deceit, or hard-heartedness.
Nor was he miserly in his love and idolatry of gold,
unlike the wicked and slothful servant, who hid his
master's talent. The account of his manner of life (in the
xixth verse of this same chapter), marks him as a man who
by the world would have been esteemed generous ; hospit
able he undoubtedly was to his friends, a large and ready
patron, a type of that great class of indulgent epicureans
of whom it is commonly said, among men, "they are, in
their way, liberal and generous."
Here are only negative qualities of character, one
might say, and yet, evidently, somewhere here we shall
find the elements of positive evil, for the connection is
clear that because of the way in which Dives used the
good things which he received in this life, he was punished
in the next.
What was it, therefore, that brought him to the mis
erable condition in which the parable represents him,
vainly supplicating a remission of his torments ?
What was the ladder by which he went down to hell ?
Why did the good things which he received entail a
future so unlike the rest and blessedness of Abraham,
who was also in life the recipient of abundant blessings ?
In the sermon on the Mount, the Saviour sets forth a
distinction which will aid us in understanding in what
spirit Dives received his good things.
Our blessed Lord is speaking of those who perform
religious duties to be seen of men ; and in that they are

24 PAROCHIAL SERMONS.
seen they have their reward ; for they receive this notice
of their fellows as a full and complete satisfaction.
Now, in this spirit, Dives received his good things,
esteeming them only in and for themselves, making them
all-in-all, and regarding them entirely for selfish ends.
He held them in the light of a reward for his own industry
and shrewdness, and so claiming in their use the right of
an irresponsible proprietor ; rather than regarding them,
as all the blessings of life in truth are, as pledges of God's
further favor; not simply as regards His giving and our
having, but the full blessedness of the gift to us, if in the
using, they minister to a service of love and obedience, and
are ever held with strict ideas of faithful use and future
accountability. As when the people of Israel emerged from their
wilderness journeyings, the Reubenites chose their lot in
Gilead, on this side Jordan, and it was rightly judged that
they should not thereafter claim a part in the land of
Promise ; even so they, who make this life all-in-all, and
receive their good things here, in that in hope and desire
they look no further, can but naturally anticipate that
end of life which was the rich man's ; for he thus received,
and thus esteemed his blessings, and therefore he was
tormented. It is then all in the choice which we ourselves make,
whether we will receive our good things here alone, or
here and hereafter also ; in this life only, or in that too ;
in purple and silk and sumptuous fare, and the delights of
the world, and the festivities and frivolities of life, or in
a conscientious stewardship here, and in the rest and com
fort of Abraham's bosom after we die.
Whether we will in spirit and act say, " Lord may I so
receive, that I may be received, and may no present good
make me forget the good which is eternal."

THE REWARD OF SELFISHNESS. 25
Now, the mind of Dives, the spirit in which he
regarded his prosperity, and by which he shaped his life, ,
may be gathered from the emphasis which Abraham
places upon the words, " thy good," and " thy life ;"
showing thereby that he made these things which God
had entrusted to his care as a steward only, the agents and
means of his own selfish pleasures ; that he esteemed
that life which our merciful Father gives us as a season
of preparation, as if there had been no other life but it.
Surely Dives in the day of his pleasure and pride made no
reckoning as to the other life, and yet what a fearful
reckoning there was to be.
Can we wonder that they who make his choice here,
shall have his portion hereafter ? That they who all their
life long forget God, the Giver of all good gifts, and shut
up all their desires, and hopes, and labors within the brief
limits of earthly life, should be reminded in the depths of
their despair that their own wilful, wicked neglect and
f orgetf ulness of things unseen, stamped upon their earthly
life the sad and mournful truth that the good things they
had received had been with them the all-in-all of living;
forgetting as Dives forgot, until too late, that as it is not
all of life to live, so neither is it all of death to die ?
"It is sad enough," says Dean Trench, "to have the
world and our place and meaning in it as an unsolved
riddle to us, the burden of the mystery weighing on us
with the weight that sometimes threatens to crush out the
life of our spirits ; but it is a far sadder thing yet, when
all this ceases to be a riddle or mystery to us at all — not
because we have read it in the light of faith — not because
that has made all things plain — but because we have
renounced all hope, all care, all desire to have it solved at
all ; have put aside all questions as to our spiritual nature
and our immortal destiny, and are looking only to the

26 PAROCHIAL SERMONS.

world, being resolved to make it yield what it can yield,
after its kind, in the shape of pleasures, or honors, or
riches, or enjoyments, to shut in our spirits within the
limits of these earthly things ; to mind them, to acknowl
edge and trouble ourselves with nothing beyond."
As a natural consequence of forgetting God, Dives had
neglected the offices of good will and charity, which per
tained to his position as a man of wealth and influence,
in that he did not remember Him Whose blessings
were showered upon him. We wonder not that he passed
by scornfully and carelessly the wretched Lazarus, the
famished suppliant at his very gate; for he who forgets
that as a steward of God, he holds and possesses all things
on earth with which he is blessed — wealth, influence,
opportunities, learning, health — any endowment or any
acquirement whereby good can be done to others ; the man
who ignores this idea of accountability, and, in spirit and
action, re-echoes the impious boast — my arm and my
strength hath gotten me these good things ; will be sure
to forget that not for ourselves only and our own use are
we the recipients of God's blessings and mercies, and that
this accountability reaches out very far.
It is not in supplying the temporal and material wants
of the poor, the suffering, the wretched, that we fulfil to
its extent the law of Christian charity, but helping all
who need sympathy, and kindly words ; the ignorant are
to be instructed, the sick to be visited, the weary to be
cheered, the desponding to be comforted.
If Lazarus in his wants received neither care nor
attention, it was the fault of Dives, at whose door the
wretched man was lying. God gave the rich man enough
to supply abundantly his own uses and the wants of
Lazarus, too ; and every man receiveth that he doth receive,
what kind soever it may be, at the hands of God, that he

THE REWARD OF, SELFISHNESS. 27
may be, in God's name, the dispenser of charities and
kindness and blessings.
But he in the parable received all the good things of
life to and for himself alone. His receivings ended in
himself; for he made his own selfish will the end of all
his strivings and of all his cares; and so, of course, his
good things were all in this life. He cared for the body
and the things of the body, but had not a thought for the-
immortal soul. He was prodigal in all those expenses
which ministered to appetite and earthly pleasures, but
oh! what a miser in the offices of devotion and works of
mercy and ministries of charity, which are the delight and
life of the soul.
Nor was he, in the meantime, without reminders of his
duty: the blessings of God; the good things which he
had received; the writings of Moses and of the prophets;
and the instructions and warnings which the men of God,
in all ages, had uttered. "Would God," saith Moses,
"that all men would bear in mind that there is death and
a judgment, a heaven and a hell." And all the prophets
reiterate the solemn warning, and blend with their
exhortations affectionate entreaties. If he had listened to
their teachings, they would have taught him all, as
regarded his duties and his dangers, that an angel from
heaven, or one risen from the dead, could have taught
unto his brethren.
But, in the flush and glory and pride of life, he put
aside these inspired teachers, and what they might have
taught him, was called to his mind at a time when it was
too late to heed the warnings against which he had so
wilfully closed his ears.
It is easy to see, in the issue of his life, how the un
coiled folds of selfishness snared his steps and dragged
him ever downward. In the thought that there is no life

28 PAROCHIAL SERMONS.
but this, no good to be sought but the things of earth;
himself, his own vain desires, the gulf that swallowed up
everything that he receives; remembering neither God in
heaven, nor Lazarus on earth; forgetful of his soul and
its immortal needs, and careless and reckless of the future
in his life of selfish indulgence, we may see the road which
surely leadeth downward, and in his fate we may conceive
their torments to whose piteous supplicating cry shall
only be given Abraham's answer, "Son, remember that
thou in thy lifetime received thy good things."
To him the answer came too late, but it was his own
perversity that kept him life-long from heeding the words
which might have saved his soul, and that, his own
miserable folly was the sorrow's crown of sorrow. While
it was time he would not listen, but his warning may do
others good if they will lay it to heart, for with all of us
there is greater need of a right disposition that we may
heed, and remember and obey the truth, than of an expo
sition whereby we may understand it.
To Dives the now of the text was the hour of torment,
the day of redemption was past ; there was no far-off
glimmering of light for him whom the blackness and the
darkness encompassed.
With us now is the accepted time. God grant that we
may make it the hour of salvation. Now, the issues of
eternity are deciding, and we are making our choice, that
choice which must be ours forever — choosing for God or
choosing against Him ; to be ever with Christ, or to be ever
separated from Him.
Let us remember in time, that we be not reminded
when it is too late.
Let us make such return in offices of Love, and Faith,
and Charity, for the good things of life which we have
received, that our commendation may be from the lips of
our blessed Lord and Master, " Well done, good and faithful
servant ! Enter thou into the joy of thy Lord."

IV,
DOGMAS.
Preached at Christ Church, Boston, 1877.
_ By their fruits ye shall know them. Not every one that
saith unto Me, "Lord, Lord," shall enter into the kingdom
of heaven; but he that doeth the will of My Father which is
in heaven. — S. Matthew, vii. 20, 21.
Be not wise in your own conceits. — Romans, xii. 16.
The spirit of the age — if it is that which finds express
ion in many popular lectures, essays, and books — is setting
in strongly against all dogmatic teaching in matters of
religion, while it exalts human opinion, and magnifies the
wisdom of one's own conceits. It has become fashionable,
in popular literature, to jeer at creeds and catechisms as
things not merely unnecessary, but rather antagonistic to
genuine religion and piety. Many men talk and write as
if religion is not a faith or belief at all, but a state of
feeling — a frame of mind — a sentiment that refuses defi
nition; as if the essence of the Gospel is its morality, and
its great triumph a pure and simple humanitarianism.
In Kaulbach's justly celebrated cartoon of the Refor
mation Era, we have, at a glance, a rationalistic view of a
great period in modern history, and a rationalistic idea of
its teachings for future ages. This wonderful composition
of a great artist records the triumphs of intellect in the
various efforts of men, the discoveries and awakenings of
mental life in the sixteenth century; but in a manner
painfully significant of the generally accepted results of
that era. The central figure of the picture is, as of right

30 PAROCHIAL SERMONS.

it should be, Luther, with an open Bible, held aloft; upon
one page the motto, "Thou shalt love thy neighbor as
thyself," the other page, with evident intent, left blank,
as if that one commandment that regards our neighbor
were the sum and substance of God's revealed Word and
Will; the entire teaching of the Gospel, that all else of
revealed religion is not better than a blank; that all we of
earth have to do with, regards the relation of man to man,
leaving entirely out of view the relation of man to God.
If it were possible to love our neighbor truly, without
loving God, this might afford a fine platform of good
works. If there were no Incarnation, the enthusiasm of
humanity alone might be a grand thing.
History tells us how the Religion of Humanity divorced
from the Gospel, accomplished its work of Liberty,
Equality, and Fraternity, in that Reign of Terror which
history details as the first great French Revolution.
But the Incarnation of the Son of God, the Incarnate
Life, the Death upon the Cross, the Resurrection from the
Dead, the Ascension to God's Right Hand — all these facts
of Gospel history require an historic faith ; they necessitate
Dogmas, and dogmatic teaching, as a part, and an essential
part, of the religion of the Son of God. He was speaking
of religious teachers — pointing out how to distinguish the
false from the true — when our blessed Lord uttered the
words of the text, " By their fruits ye shall know them.
Not every one," etc. Now, if we take the words as applied
to the life and teachings of the Church of Christ, we have
a Divine rule of judgment, even the mind of the Head of
the Church, as regards the Christian dogmas. For let us
note, first, that in the passage of which this text is the
ending, our Lord is speaking of false teachers, and how to
prove them.
It is a subject of the deepest practical interest to us

DOGMAS. 31

all ; for the religious world is filled with teachers of every
phase of faith, and every shade of doctrine.
In the words, "Ye shall know them by their fruits,"
we have the divine rule of judgment. If we take it by
itself, it is hard of application ; for while we may think
the fruit good, and the harvest abundant, the question,
after all, is, are they so in God's sight ? While in one
sense, and to a certain degree, we may prove a man by his
works, it still remains to decide, how are we to prove the
works ?
It is this difficulty which the latter part of the text
solves. It is by the will of God, that the words and works
of men are to be tested and proved. Thus we look at
some man, and wish to judge whether he is one whose
teaching and example are likely to do us good. We ask,
first, what are his works ? However they may appear to
us, there is only one way of testing them. We lay them
beside God's revealed will. We try them by God's word.
If we fail to do this, we make the very mistake that is so
common at the present day ; we do not apply the second
proof. For, while it is true, that by their fruits ye shall
know them, it is also true, that their fruits are to be tested
by their agreement with the Will and Word of God ;
otherwise, whatever seems to any individual man to be
earnest and zealous work for God, and in its results to be
doing good, must be altogether good. If it is fair on one
side, he does not think it needful to examine it on the
other. He is not careful to try it on every side by God's
Word and God's Will. For instance, men meet with
powerful, impressive, exciting preaching or writing. It is
good on one side, i. e., on the side of its power and effect.
But do men always try it on the other side ; that, namely,
of its soundness, and accordance with the truth ? This
preacher is able to stir the heart in a marvellous manner.

32 PAROCHIAL SERMONS.
But how many who listen to, or read his words, stop to
ask, are his doctrines such as are founded on a sober, wise,
reverent interpretation of the Word of God? Is his
teaching, the teaching of one who is careful, himself, to
base his instructions on Holy Scripture, as held and
taught by eighteen centuries of Christian wisdom and
piety ?
These are days, surely, when we all have need to be
reminded, that "Not every one that saith unto Me; Lord,
Lord," "but he that doeth the will of My Father which is
in Heaven," is rendering acceptable service ; that it is not
any word spoken with every appearance of zeal ; but it is
the word which God would have men speak, that signifies
obedience. Now, if men were careful to call to strict
account, with questionings of this nature, the words of
many accepted teachers, and the works of many popular
systems, they would realize how, in the keeping of the
vaunted Liberalism of the present day, all distinctive
religious truth, all sound dogmatic teaching is melting
away into mere religious sentiment. From how many of
the thousand pulpits of the land — the very watch-towers,
as they should be, of Christian Faith — do the people hear
positive, definite statements of Divine Truth ?
Take the prime article of the creed : the statement
that Christ is perfect God and perfect man ; "conceived of
the Holy Ghost ; born of the Virgin Mary."
Now, I do not suppose that one can doubt that
hundreds of Christian teachers, not avowed Unitarians —
but such as are bound by this system to accept the Cath
olic faith, will put aside this article of the Creed on this
subject with dislike of its definiteness, and that hesitancy,
which, to a doubting world, is unbelief; while, at the
same time, they avow that the sentiment of confidence
in Christ is all that is needed to guide the Christian

DOGMAS. 33

instincts, and to raise and refine the Christian character.
But, let us soberly ask, what is this sentiment of confi
dence, if it has not the foundation of doctrinal statements
to rest upon? If Christ is not a Person in the Godhead,
confidence in Him, hope from Him, prayer to Him, is only
idolatry. But, once accept the statement of the Creed,
and the doctrine which the Church Catholic has taught
for eighteen hundred years — the especial subject of each
year's Christmas teachings — that Christ is God, and the
feeling of confidence in Him, the impulse to seek Him in
prayer, is not a mere romantic sentiment, but the very life
of faith. Goulburn calls it "the echo in the human heart of the
deep-seated relationship which, in very truth, subsists
between the Divine Man and ourselves."
In Dr. Newman's "Apologia" occurs a sentence which
should have the fullest assent and consent of every
Churchman — aye, of every orthodox Christian: "From
the age of fifteen," he says, "dogma has been the funda
mental principle of my religion. I know no other religion.
I cannot enter into the idea of any other sort of religion.
Religion as a mere sentiment is, to me, a dream and a
mockery. As well can there be filial love without the fact
of the father, as devotion without the fact of a Supreme
Being." This illustration suggests a remark, which shows how
simple, and yet how all-inclusive, the principle of the
dogma is, as applied to all religious faith. The statement,
"There is a personal God," is a dogma: the foundation of
all dogmatic statements. Take the duty of acknowledging
God by prayer; and you cut away the ground of this duty,
if you do not explicitly admit that God sees and hears
every one when he prays. So that the dogmas, "God is

34 PAROCHIAL SERMONS. *
omnipresent," "God is omniscient," are the foundations
upon which prayer rests.
Now, it is true that the word, "dogma," has not a
pleasant sound. We speak of a dogmatic man as one who
is positive and obstinate in his own opinion; but, if we
stop for a moment to consider, we shall see that dogmatic
teaching, as applied to Christian doctrine, is the entire
elimination of individual opinion from revealed truth. It
is the transmitted heritage of dogmas in the Church of
Christ, as embodied in the creeds, that makes it possible
at all times to apply the test of the text, the will of God,
to the words and works of men.
Now, the creeds of the Church are the summaries of
essential truth. Until one's attention is called to it, he may
not realize how this character of the creeds is continued
directly from the Word' of God. The New Testament is
the fountain of Christian theology. Its inspired writings,
whether in the Gospels or Epistles, afford the very highest
type of simple dogmatic teaching. The Evangelists adhere
strictly to their character as witnesses ; they make it their
sole business to record facts in all their naked simplicity.
How seldom a sentiment, or reflection, or moral! No
recommendation of opinions or inferences of their own;
but a plain record of facts.
Take the Epistles of the New Testament; how entirely
doctrinal and practical their letters are! Nothing can be
more evident than the combination here indicated. It is
plain that these inspired teachers regard the doctrines of
the Gospel as that which must ever give vitality to
Christian living. In one place S. Paul says that the
Church is "the pillar and ground of the Truth." And
then the Apostle tells what that Truth is which the Church
is set upon earth to attest, maintain and uphold; and lo!
nothing metaphysical, or sentimental, but a creed — the

DOGMAS. 35

dogmas of Christ's Incarnation, Resurrection, and Ascen
sion. God was manifest in the flesh; justified in the Spirit;
seen of angels; preached unto the Gentiles; believed on in
the world; received up into Glory. And when in the
beginning of I. Cor., xv., the Apostle would state succinctly
the Gospel which he had preached to the converts at
Corinth, he includes it all in the enunciation of three
facts: the Death, the Burial, and the Resurrection of the
Saviour. Hence, the creeds of the Church embody the facts of
inspired record, put into the form of creeds in those early
days, when the Church was one, and could act with united
authority. And so, when day after day, and year after
year, we stand up to make our profession of the faith in
these often-used words of the Creed, we help to keep in
mind, and hold up before others, the divine test of all
Christian teaching.
The creeds deal wholly with objective truth, because,
so do the Gospels and Epistles. And yet the creeds
preserve all saving truths. For example, we profess, in
the creed, to believe that Christ was crucified, dead and
buried. Accepting this fact, we also accept the doctrine
based upon this fact; "Justification by faith." We may
regard this doctrine from S. Paul's point of view, or we
may look at it from S. James' side, and maintain with
him, that the faith which saves, is a faith vitalized by good
works. The fact that " Christ died for our sins," we hold as
an article of the creed ; it is no matter of opinion at all ;
it is a dogma which the Church teaches to the little child,
so soon as he can learn. Upon this dogma we base our
views and opinions, guided therein by Scripture, as we are,
in the moulding of our daily life with reference to this
fact. In like manner all the Articles of the Creed — that

36 PAROCHIAL SERMONS.
which a Christian ought to know and believe to his soul's
health — are statements of fact. Some are past matters of
history and evidence, as the Crucifixion and Resurrection ;
others present, such as the existence of the Holy Catholic
Church ; and others yet, future, as the General Judgment
and the Resurrection of the body.
It is this character of the Christian dogmas, which
involves the necessity of the Christian Church, as a visible
society, to spread and maintain them ; and of institutions
like the sacraments, to perpetuate their memory.
And so the Church, by her Creeds recited in the public
congregation, by portions of the Word of God, read again
and again as lessons for the people, by her offices for
Baptism and the Holy Eucharist, is maintaining the
"faith once delivered to the saints;" and furnishing, as
regards the words of men, that test which the language
of the Saviour makes the standard of final judgment.
Amid the fluctuations of opinion, and the questions
raised by modern controversy, the duty of the Church is,
in the apostolic spirit and manner, to bear witness to the
great facts of the Gospel. Her whole office is wrapped up
in the announcement, and in the ministration of these
facts. Churchmen may, at times, be tempted, to share the
impatience of the old, the tried, and the well-established
in religion, which prevails so painfully all about us. The
only safety is, in conquering the temptation.
We hold to the Creed, because it contains the funda
mental principles of the Gospel, — its dogmas — the oldest
and best established truths in existence. We hold to the
visible order and polity of the Church, because without
such a society, the truths, not merely of opinion, but of
. fact, could not be set forth, embodied and proclaimed, to
the end of time. We hold to the Sacraments, not only

DOGMAS. 37

because of their inestimable spiritual benefit, but since
they perpetuate so strikingly the memory of these divine
facts. In connection with the Blessed Sacrament, of which
we are now about to partake, how plainly its memorial
character is set forth in the Catechism, in the answer, that
the Lord's Supper is "ordained for the continual remem
brance of the Sacrifice of the Death of Christ, and of the
benefits which we receive thereby."
Not only, therefore, is this Sacrament for the spiritual
food of Christians, but a memorial of the Death of Christ.
As the sacrifices offered by the Jewish Church of old,
were types of that one real Sacrifice which was yet to
come, so also the Eucharistic Sacrifice of the Christian
Church, is for a continual memorial of the same to the
end of time ; the blessed story of the Death of Christ for
the sins of men, so repeated, that its comfortable teachings
reassure the doubting, warn the impenitent, comfort the
faithful, help the weak-hearted, and proclaim, in language
that speaks to every human heart, the glorious Gospel of
God's Love.

V.
THE BLESSEDNESS OF THE CHURCHLY INHERI
TANCE.
Preached in All Saints' Cathedral, Milwaukee, 1876.
Blessed are the eyes which see the things that ye see.
For I tell you that many prophets and kings have desired
to see those things which ye see and have not seen them, and
to hear those things which ye hear and have not heard
them.— S. Luke x. 23-24.
The estate of the first Christians, was surely one of
great blessedness.
From the beginning, until the herald-tones of the
Baptist uttered the prophetic notes of preparation in the
wilderness of Judea, the lives of Saints and holy men had
been anticipatory, as regarded the fulness of Divine
blessings. They " all died in faith, not having received the
promises, but having seen them afar off, and were per
suaded of them, and embraced them, and ;confessed that
they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth." Heb.
xi. 13. The golden ages of Gentile nations were in periods
remote and long past : on the other hand, the chosen
people of God were taught to look forward to theirs ; an
era of prophecy fulfilled and glories realized.
From Adam to Malachi, the sublime series of prophetic
utterances was made known to the people of Israel, and all
the great stages of their national existence were accom
panied by effusions of prophetic light.
Trials and tribulations, enslavements and toils,

THE BLESSEDNESS OF THE CHURCHLY INHERITANCE. 39
captivities and sore burdens were, it is true, at all times in
their national existence, needed to keep alive in the minds
of the chosen people, a sense of their inheritance of
blessedness. The chastisement and discipline of severe
sufferings, fitted the true Israel of God for the accomplish
ment of that work, to the conscious performance of which
they did not willingly rise.
In all its chequered and eventful records, the history
of the Hebrew nation was a continued prophecy, wherein we
may see the divinely laid foundation for the superstructure
of the Church of God, in the knowledge and communion
of which consists our blessedness, whereof the Saviour's
words in the text are an eternal assurance.
The history of the Jewish people was a prophecy of
blessedness to come.
Accompanying the call of Abraham, was the prediction
that in him all families of the earth should be blessed.
Moses formed Abraham's descendants into a people ; gave
them laws, was their leader and their guide ; but ever
announced himself as only the type of Him Who was to
come — the Messiah — a Prophet like unto Him. David
reigned, but the glories of the monarchy were interpreted
in their reference to the future King. After the return
of the people of Israel from their grievous national
captivity, the words of prophecy took a bolder range, and
in the widening circles of predicted blessings, embraced
Gentile and Jew.
Again, in the history of the Hebrew nation we see a
preparation for this blessedness.
The fountains of their national life gushed forth at
the command of God, and henceforth flowed onward in
appointed channels.
The call of Abraham, the wonderful series of provi
dences that brought the ancestors of the Jewish people

40 PAROCHIAL SERMONS.

into the land of Egypt ; their bondage on the banks of
the Nile ; the birth, and life, and works of Moses ; the
preservation of an entire people in the direful chances of
defeat and captivity; surely, in these events, we may
recognize an Almighty power, and a divine purpose.
In its early stages, the Hebrew Government was a
pure theocracy. The distinguishing feature and basis of
national life was ever Religion. The pride of Grecian
civilization was Athenian intellect and philosophy. The
glory of the Roman people was their invincible prowess,
and their imperial colonies. But every thought and hope
of the Jewish nation, in collective and in private life,
attached, in some way, to the Revealed Word of God.
Their festivals, their heroes, their poetry, their legends,
have all a sacred character.
Their national code was full of the details of the
worship of God, of Him Who was revealed to them as the
Inspirer of right and holy thoughts, and the Fountain of
all goodness. Their ordinary, daily employments were
touched at every point by the ceremonials of religion ; for
the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob, was the one
and only object of supreme and governing love.
Among the races of idol worshippers, in whose midst
they dwelt, and by whose snares and temptation before
the time of their great captivity the people of Israel were
so often beguiled, human infirmities aud vilest passions
were deified : and in the gods of pagan mythology, were
personifications and examples of all that was base, and
despicable, and licentious in the lives and practices of men.
The religious systems of these heathen nations, were
either philosophic schemes, which only the educated few
could apprehend, or vile superstitions, at which intelligent
men sneered, and whose tendencies were ever to drag
their votaries to a lower depth.

THE BLESSEDNESS OF THE CHURCHLY INHERITANCE. 41
The God of Hebrew worship was the embodiment of
wisdom, and purity, and love, and justice. The Hebrew
Scriptures set forth a simple, plain, comprehensive rule
and plan of daily life, just as intelligible to the humblest
Galileean peasant, as to the wisest Rabbi of Jerusalem.
It was no mere intellectual scheme, which left a void
between religious worship and individual morality ; but a
revelation which taught that the will of Jehovah was the
rule of human life, His approbation the motive and
support of all holiness, and Faith in Him the Power that
raised men above their natural weaknesses.
As the consequence of an objective Faith, and a divine
unalterable Rule of daily life, the devotional spirit of the
Jewish Scriptures is ever expressive of a heartfelt sense
of infirmity and sin. It is that peculiar spirit of prayer,
that real communion with God, with which a Christian,
in his best moments, has the truest sympathy. The best
hymns of Greece are only mythological pictures ; the
literature of Rome hardly produces anything that can be
called a prayer ; while the Hebrew Psalms have ever
entered into, pervaded and moulded the devotions of the
Christian Church.
Nor need we wonder at this adaptiveness of the Jewish
Psalter. For, to the people of Israel, was entrusted the
Divine Revelation, enshrined in symbols and ceremonies,
whereby it might be preserved until the time of its devel
opment in a purer and more heavenly form.
Their religious feelings were all directed to something
in the future.
All the circumstances of their national life tended to
fix their thoughts on One Who was to come. ,
From the time of the prophet Malachi, for four
hundred years, the voice of prophecy was never once
heard.

42 PAROCHIAL SERMONS.

As the darkness which comes just before daylight, was
this trial time of Hebrew faith. The gloom was dense,
and all pervading ; but there were many true hearts whom
it overshadowed. Multiplied calamities developed noble instances of faith
and heroism.
The patriotism of the Maccabees is a consecrated
service in the annals of nations.
At length, in the fulness of time, the Messiah came.
The City of God, whose foundations were laid from of
old, was now in very deed to be builded ; and this was the
Blessedness for which type, and figure, and symbol, and
prophecy, had prepared the children of God.
To whom, then, pertained this Blessedness ? Not all
who saw the Saviour were blessed in the sight ; for eyes
of malice and hatred were often fixed upon His Sacred
Person. Not all who heard Him were blessed in the
hearing ; for many of His gracious words fell upon ears
deafened by sinful obduracy. They only were blessed,
whose vision was spiritual ; who saw in Jesus of Nazareth,
the Incarnate God ; who recognized in His work on earth,
the completion of God's gracious plan of Redemption, and
who sought Salvation in the way of His appointment, in
the communion and ordinances of His Eternal Kingdom,
the Church.
For what was it that Kings and Prophets had desired
to see ? His Advent ! What had they yearned to hear ?
His Blessed Words ! The Words of Him Who came ;
not to destroy, but to fulfil ; Whose gracious errand was
to perfect, not to abrogate, the Church of God ; for in the
perfecting of the Church, was all prophecy fulfilled.
There never had been but one Church ; there never was
to be but one. From the days of Abraham its existence
had been that of a visible, historic organization.

THE BLESSEDNESS OF THE CHURCHLY INHERITANCE. 43
With Abraham the covenant was made. The seal was
definite. The conditions were explicit. All who received
the seal, were thereby made parties to the covenant. In
the covenant, tney were in the Church. No other mode
of entrance was provided. No other body or society was
organized. It was a ceremonial Religion, but its cere- ,
monies were prophetic and typical. Now, what David,
and Isaiah, and all the faithful of the olden dispensation
had longed for, was the coming of Him Who should fulfil
all prophecy ; become the embodiment of all types of
figures ; put an end to all animal sacrifices by the Sacrifice
of Himself ; change the seal, but leave the divine covenant
untouched ; abolish the Levitical priesthood, and the
sacrificial services of the Temple, but send forth another
priesthood, and ordain another service, to minister, and to
be ministered at His Holy Altar, until He shall come at
last to bid to the Marriage Feast on High, His Spotless
Bride, His Glorious Church.
Very great, and very precious was the privilege of all
to whom was vouchsafed not only the sight of the Sa
viour's Person and the hearing of His Words, but spiritual
insight, and a true knowledge. For we well know that
the blessings which might have accrued to all the men of
that generation, many, by their own perversity and
wickedness, changed into grievous burdens.
There were inhabitants of Capernaum, of Bethsaida,
and of Chorazin, who were just as wicked, and just as
faithless, as thousands are now. His townspeople of
Nazareth expelled Him from His native city. The
inhabitants of Gadara besought Him to depart out of their
coasts; and at the great Paschal Feast, the whole Jewish
nation shared in the fearful sin of the Roman official, who,
in a peculiar sense, was the Crucifier of the Lord of Glory.
But all these were blinded, and seeing did not perceive

44 PAROCHIAL SERMONS.

the great things which God had done for them, and hear
ing did not understand His messages of love and grace.
The blessedness of which the text speaks is for those
whose eyes were opened, and their ears unstopped; who
saw — in the life of Him who went up and down the world
with words of truth and gracious deeds of healing, who
preached the Gospel to the poor, who stooped to every
need, and had a heart for every woe — who saw in this, the
glory as of the Only Begotten of the Father; and, more
than that, saw in that glory a note of His mystical Body,
the Church ; recognized in the labors of His mission
among men, the blessed heritage of toil, which is ever the
Church's work on earth.
Surely, theirs was a great blessedness who entered first
into the estate of Christian belief. They came from the
Temple, for the veil was rent, and the glory of the inner
Sanctuary had passed away forever. They came from
pagan lands, for they had grown weary of gods who are
the work of men's hands. They came from the schools of
sages; they had found nothing in their vain philosophies
to supply the deep cravings of their nature. They came
as doves flying to the windows — Jew and Gentile, Greek
and barbarian, bond and free — and were one in the com
munion of the Church of the Living God.
A blessed home to them was the Church of the
Saviour. Its sacraments and services, like blessed bonds,
bound heart to heart. And as they passed on to Glory,
the blessings they had known became the heritage of
others. And so the sacred deposit of blessed truths, from
age to age, in the Church's line descends. And so to us
has come, in apostolic guardianship, the faith once
delivered to the saints.
In the strength of this faith may we all be strong to
live and work for Him.

VI.
THE CHURCH'S RELATION TO LABOR.
Preached at S. Mark's, Philadelphia, Nov. 4, 1877.
And Simon answering said unto Him, Master, we have
toiled all the night. — S. Luke v. 5.
One of the marvellous cartoons of Raffaelle represents
the scene recorded in this morning's Gospel.
We look out upon the glassy lake, the vista of the
waters and mountains recedmg into the dreamy infinite of
the still summer sky. From the shore, we seem to listen
to the hum of an eager multitude, who had pressed upon
Him to hear the Word of God, and whom He taught out
of the ship. All things around are sleeping quietly
beneath an eastern sun. In front, birds of the mountain
and the lake — even fantastic fishes gleaming in the water
in silent awe — confess the power of Him Who sits there
in His calm, God-like beauty. His eye ranges over all
that still infinity of His own works, over all that mingled
grouping of human life which, like every congregated
multitude, represents the varied interests, and strivings,
and cares, and disappointments, of the busy world.
With wonderful vividness, the artist sets forth in
this picture, the blessed truth of the Gospel of God's love ;
that Christ is the One Divine, central figure for this
world's ever-changing panorama to group itself about ;
teaching that, as in Him all life has its source and foun
tain, so in the recognition and confession of His Divine
power, all the interests of life are harmonized; that
because of this life's weary hour, He is the Inspirer of all

46 PAROCHIAL SERMONS.
needed truth, revealing in His Bible to every age, abysses
of wisdom as the times require, and the circumstances of
life demand : yet ever with that which men call new,
vindicating all which is ancient and eternal : and justifying
His own dealings with man from the beginning.
And this surely is the Gospel of God's love : that He,
Who in the fishing boat sat and taught, was the speaker
to man, simply as man : The Friend of publicans and
sinners : The stern Foe of Scribes and Pharisees : The One
with Whom is no respect of persons. Such is the Master,
and His disciples are evidently such as recognize this
gracious truth. For we, said Simon Peter — the spokesman,
and in many ways the representative, of the men whom
the Master was now gathering about Him, to send forth
as His ministers and the preachers of His Gospel — "we
have toiled all the night."
They were men of toil, then, whom He was gathering
about Him ; and labor, in the persons of working men,
was taught to feel the sympathy and care of its Divine
head; and the lesson given for all time that all those
interests of society which grow out of work — work of
the brain, or work of the hand — are best cared for in
the way and spirit which the Master taught and pictured.
And this, because He was the Friend of man as man : Who
recognized the virtues and nobility of true manhood
wherever found; and Whose disciples, whether from among
the rich or the poor, the learned or the unlearned, the
cultured or the simple, were not called because of earthly
rank, or station ; but because of the Spirit which was in
them; and where, if we call in array before us, all the
sages and teachers of the world, its philosophers, and
benefactors, where but in Jesus of Nazareth will we find
the One to whom, without qualification, may be given the
title of The People's Friend?

THE CHURCH'S RELATION TO LABOR. 47
Applied to one of the great practical questions of the
day — it may be the greatest of these questions — what a
mighty solvent the Gospel of Christ becomes, as He Him
self taught and practiced it.
Within the last ten years, what is generally known as
" the labor movement," has manifested its power to change,
not only the aspect, but the character, of society. It is
not in the great cities of our own land only, nor in our
own land alone; but everywhere among nations ranked as
civilized, that questions affecting labor and capital are
engaging the thoughtful attention of the best minds.
The great development of labor in a few years past, the
demands upon it, the products from it, the industrial
relations of nations and peoples intensified by commercial
ties, will account in part as material causes, but not
altogether, for this movement.
There is what may be called a moral cause — especially
in our own country and in Prussia — resulting from the
educational interests and progress of these years, and the
increase of popular instruction in the direction of technical
studies and schools.
Technical instruction enables men who read, to think
logically and with directness upon the craft or science in
which they are engaged; and the whole temper of the age
is favorable to thought, let it run into what theory or
practice it may choose. The theory unfortunately devel
oped by the current literature upon industrial questions is,
to a great extent, sceptical in its nature, i. e., questioning,
as to the existing order of things, what is unquestionable
as well as what is questionable; and the practice, it is to
be feared, which will be regarded as the best corrective of
acknowledged wrongs, will be that of political agitation
and organization.
In so far as this practice has been tried in our own

48 PAROCHIAL SERMONS.

land, it has resulted grievously. Instead of bringing labor
and capital nearer together, it has set them farther apart.
In so far as the labor movement becomes a political move
ment, it has seemed naturally to follow that only defiance
is offered to the capitalist and employer, while manual toil
is made a badge of combination, excluding all other classes
from reach and sympathy.
In England and on the continent it has been demon
strated, and it will inevitably be true in this country, that
just as soon as a party takes control of a movement like
this, generous purposes turn to selfishness ; great principles
to meanness ; and love of truth and right, to love of power
and profit.
Not in partisan or political organizations, but in
domestic and sanitary economy ; in co-operative associa
tions and industrial partnerships combining capitalists
and laborers, not separating them, we shall, with more
certainty, find the social means of improvement, and true
progress in the world of labor.
But these means can never fully suffice. No effort to
raise an individual, none to raise a class, none to make
better our weak humanity, but needs a spiritual motive,
and a spiritual guidance. Unless society is a mere human
contrivance ; unless man is self-made, and self -governed,
he must seek other counsel than his own, for his reform.
For no one can show, that in political organization, in
social means of progress and reform, in moral teachings
even, there is a Gospel to men ! What good news is it to
the crowded dwellers in tenement houses, and alleys of
large cities ; to the toiling artisan crushed by the compe
tition of others, or degraded by his own evil habits, to tell
him that he can be free, if he can make himself free ?
To bid him claim equality and brotherhood upon the
ground of abstract right ?

THE CHURCH'S RELATION TO LABOR. 49
What he needs, is the real Gospel of God's love ; that
Word from Heaven which tells all men that their freedom,
their brotherhood, rests upon the everlasting ground of all
human right and duty ; the mighty, universal fact, that
Jesus of Nazareth died for all mankind ; that we are free,
because He made us free ; that we are brethren, because
He has made us the sons of God.
Looked at apart from Christ, each race, each class, each
individual of mankind, stands separate and alone; owning
no more brotherhood to each other than beasts of prey.
But in Christ, all that is individual in humanity converges.
It is joined into one family in Him.
In any movement that regards the amelioration of
individuals or classes among men, whatever may be the
material motives and helps — whatever may be the social
or political means — the secret of all real and enduring
progress will be found in the recognition of the Gospel of
Christ as the basis of all reform among men; that which
supplies the spiritual element acting upon the individual,
quickening his sense of duty, uplifting him to his real and
lasting interests, and reconciling his life here with his life
hereafter. For, it is in the individual reformation that all true
reform finds its living germ. It is through the individual
that the Gospel works upon society, like leaven, leavening
the whole lump. From the beginning it has been so.
From the days of the Master to the present hour, the work
of the Church of Christ has been, in this way, one long
service, social and spiritual; and because it has lodged the
seed in the individual soul, it has made permanent and
beneficent its reforms. It has relieved distresses, redressed
wrongs, and stopped abuses, where only they can be stopped
with effect — and yet when, we cannot deny it, it is almost
impossible to reach them — at their source.

50 PAROCHIAL SERMONS.
There are many grave aspects of the labor movement,
which, as concerning present and pressing duties, appeal
only to the dwellers in populous communities and large
cities. But there is no community in the nation, there is
no parish nor congregation, where a recognition of the
claims of an active Christian discipleship, carried into
practice, will not act beneficently in the direction indicated.
The Church, in her own Divine organization, and
kindled into loving activity by the spirit of the Master, is
large enough for all the work to be done in her name.
If every parish — i. e., the members of every parish,
large or small, in city or village — were, to the extent of
their ability, with the means and advantages in their
power, to make efforts and ventures for the Church as the
home of all, they would be helping, in a most blessed way,
to solve the problem which, day by day, is growing in
vastness and importance.
Free churches help to solve the problem; for the free
church principle, honestly and heartily carried out, is con
tinually preaching the gospel of equality and brotherhood:
our equality in the sight of Him Who is no respecter of
persons, but Who accepts everyone who worketh righteous
ness; our brotherhood in Him Whose discipleship is the
bond and badge of a world-embracing fraternity.
Endowed schools, homes for the friendless, guilds and
hospitals, suggest ways in which this work may be carried
on. But ways there always will be — manifold, and present,
and effective — wherever there are disciples of Christ who
appreciate the privilege of ministering to others in their
sickness, their loneliness, their poverty, their sorrows; who
can sympathize with the yearnings and strivings of such
after better things.
If there are, in our midst, within our knowledge, those
who are the hungered and athirst, the stranger and naked,

THE CHURCH'S RELATION TO LABOR. 51

the sick and imprisoned, with whom the great Head of the
Church has been pleased to identify Himself, they are
surely entitled to the interest of the Church, and every
one of her members.
Whenever a human being is striving physically, intel
lectually, or spiritually to rise to a nobler and a better life,
he surely is worthy of a helping hand from such as have
learned at the Saviour's feet, that we all are brethren.
It is not mere almsgiving that can do the work here.
For there may be almsgiving without sympathy and the
sympathetic element. Something implying kindness of
heart and real feeling, is what is needed. Compassion is
kind, blame and even rebuke is kind from one who loves ;
almost anything is kinder than indifference.
To the wants of men, to their sufferings or their sins,
the Church, if true to herself, cannot be indifferent. She
is the Body of Christ. She is the ingathering of souls for
whom Christ died. She is the echo of the Master's voice
speaking to the sinful, the sorrowing, the heedless and
wandering ; and she speaks, not only by the words of her
Liturgy, and the utterances of the living preacher, but by
the lives and actions of all her children.
Sympathy with the world — the living present — has
ever been a note of the Church of Christ.
The world is what it is, not what it has been or should
be, and if the Church is to do it good, she must feel for it
as it is, with all its actual capacities and infirmities.
There is not in the land, to-day, an influence which can be
so powerful for good among all classes and conditions of
men, as the Church.
The Prayer Book is a boon to any individual, or family,
or community ; not only for purposes of worship ; and as
inculcating a spirit of reverence in religious expression ;
but as a means of culture and education, representing, as

52 PAROCHIAL SERMONS.

it does, the best tone and character of our language, and
literature. The Church, and the Church only, wears in this land
the majesty of an unbroken faith. It only — in our parted,
severed Christendom — is the representative to this nation,
of an united, historic Christendom, the pledge of unity,
the hope of victory.
To carry this faith to the faithless and indifferent ; to
lead the careless and wandering to the Church as their
home, that they, in their own persons, may realize and
receive the benefits of her services and sacraments ; this
is the work of members of the Church.
If any disciple of Christ feels what the Church has
done, or is doing for him, he should be ready with a kind
word, and, if need be, a self-denying act, to help some
other in the way. A cheerful greeting, a word of sympathy
or inquiry — as simple, it may be, as the cup of cold water,
and as easily given, but the expression, in speech or act,
of a kindly feeling — is oftentimes the word that gives
hope and strength to some struggling soul, to be measured
only by the results of eternity. As Religion is for daily
life, the sympathies of religion have to do with the busi
ness and labor of daily life.
The every-day interests of life concern the soul, as
well as the body. They furnish the school in which some
of our deepest religious lessons are set us, lessons full of
fidelity and charity.
In them, the character is formed ; in them, the moral
nature is disciplined and matured.
Whenever we turn our backs upon work such as this,
we lose great opportunities. Whenever and wherever the
Church, realizing this obligation, makes good, in the living
service of her members, her calling as the Body of Christ,

THE CHURCH'S RELATION TO LABOR. 53
all spiritual energies, all missions and ministries, will wake
to fresh life ; and, to the extent that we do our duty to
the Church, will her divine beneficence be abundantly
manifest.

VII.
APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION.
Preached at an Ordination in All Saints' Cathedral, Milwaukee, 1885.
I give thee charge in the sight of God, Who quickeneth
all things, and before Christ Jesus, Who before Pontius
Pilate witnessed a good confession: that thou keep this
commandment without spot, unrebukable, until the appear
ing of our Lord Jesus Christ. — I Timothy vi. 13-14.
These are the words of an apostle addressed to his
son in the faith, whom he had ordained and consecrated,
to be the chief Pastor of the Church in Ephesus.
In this record of Holy Scripture, we have four facts
bearing upon the subject, to which I would invite your
attention this morning : The importance of the doctrine
of Apostolical Succession in relation to the faith which
the Church is appointed to teach, and the work she is
commissioned to do.
I would note, first, the delegation of authority by an
apostle, " I give thee charge;" second, the solemn nature
of that act, "In the sight of God, and before the Lord
Jesus Christ ;" thirdly, the personal responsibilitj" attaching
to the one who receives the office and authority so dele
gated, "That thou keep this commandment without spot ;"
and fourthly, the duty of transmitting to others, that
which has been received, that "this commandment" maybe
kept until the appearing of the Lord Jesus Christ.
This "charge" given by an inspired apostle, to one
whose office was evidently that of a chief pastor in the
Ephesian Church, was, we cannot hesitate to affirm,

APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION, 55
according to the institution of Christ. It implies very
clearly, a ministry ordained in due and solemn form, by
succession from the apostles, and so from our Lord Himself,
as an integral pari of that visible Church of Christ upon
earth, to which Christian men are to be joined. It sets
forth strongly, the very great responsibility resting upon
a mmistry so ordained, and by the terms in which this
personal responsibility is announced, it plainly implies the
transmission in this ministerial line from apostles, through
those who succeed to apostolic authority, of special gifts
of grace, in order to the carrying on in the Church of the
supernatural work of Christ, by His Spirit, until the time
of His coming to judgment.
There is, evidently, something more here than a merely
outward appointment. S. Paul had received special grace
for the work of the ministry. That grace he, as God's
chosen minister, conferred by ordination on Timothy,
accompanied by the exhortation, "keep this commandment
until the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ," which very
plainly implies that the Bishop of Ephesus is to transmit
what is rightly held to be the grace of orders, to others
after him. Thus we find in the text, the statement of the
doctrine of Apostolical Succession ; the transmission by
those who have themselves in succession received the grace
of Orders, and the authority to transmit it from its one
original source.
While in many minds there is grievous misapprehen
sion as to this doctrine, large numbers, even of Church
people, fail to appreciate its very great and real importance ;
fail to recognize that our continuity through it with the
Church of the Apostles, and so with the Great Head of the
Church Himself, gives us firm standing ground, and the
covenanted assurance of the Divine Presence in Sacraments
and ordinances.

56 PAROCHIAL SERMONS.
Because men have failed to see the real bearings of this
doctrine, they have been led to scorn it as childish, and to
denounce it as uncharitable. And yet, no Christian who
desired the unity of the Church of God,, but knows that
this doctrine, of necessity, stands in the front of all ques
tions respecting Christianity. And no one who considers
the relation of means of Grace to personal holiness, but
must feel the importance of some assurance as to the
continuity of the grace of orders, through Apostolical
Succession, from Him Who appointed and ordained the
Sacraments, to the one who administers Holy Baptism or
celebrates the Eucharist.
And if, in this age of great mental activity, there is to
be a right adjustment of the respective claims of authority
and reason, there must be first an acknowledgment of this
doctrine : for it is connected in its natural issues, mediately
but inevitably, with the very belief in a supernatural
system at all ; and such a system, the Church of Christ,
with its ordinances and Sacraments, is, in this world.
An essential element of this system is the Ministry,
which was invariably appointed by the Apostles, as a
historic fact, in each Church. The office of the mmistry
bears directly upon the work of the Church of Christ in
the saving of the souls of men ; and therefore the doctrine
of the Ministry, and of the succession, as necessary to the
proper validity of the Ministry, is of living importance.
For it is not as an alternative of merely human exped
iency, between an outward government of the Church by
one or by many : not as an unspiritual dispute about a
bare outward fact or ordinance, repelling devout minds by
its utter remoteness from all that their souls feed upon
and cherish; not as any thing of this kind, is this
doctrine presented ; but as one link in the process of

APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. ' 57
bringing" about a real and living union with Christ,
through His Church.
So viewed, it cannot be surely any matter of uncon-
cerning facts, or of words ; but is a vital doctrine.
In Holy Baptism, in the Lord's Supper, in the declara
tion of Absolution, in any office or ministration whereby
God has graciously vouchsafed, by His own appointment,
supernatural gifts and divine graces, the doctrine of the
Ministry is one of the greatest practical moment, as
touching the reasonable and comfortable certainty of God's
gifts of truth and of grace, which can be transmitted and
conferred, only by continual miraculous interpositions, or
by a ministry in divinely appointed succession from those
whom the blessed Saviour, in person, ordained.
The value of all outward acts, or institutions, depends
upon the validity of organization, and the authority of the
one who acts. If the one who administers a divine
ordinance does not claim any authority beyond his own
personal fitness, and the consent of those to whom he
ministers, he practically teaches that sacraments and,
ordinances are valueless, other than as signs, or motives
of the man's own will, and that the conditions of salvation
rest absolutely within the individual soul itself. Hence,
the great practical depreciation of sacramental grace.
Belief in an Apostolic Ministry — that belief which is
involved in the doctrine of the One, Holy, Catholic, and
Apostolic Church of the Creed — implies a belief in the
continued existence, and continued need of supernatural
gifts in the Church of Christ.
Christianity is not a philosophy only ; the Church of
Christ is not a school of morals only ;. Religion is not sim
ply and merely, a change of feeling or sentiment, or will,
growing out of personal desire and determination ; for,
while it is true, that the Gospel in its adaptation to the

58 PAROCHIAL SERMONS.
needs of human salvation, includes within itself, as
elements or conditions, all these things, it is, beyond all
these, and, indeed, as the cause and foundation of all of
them, first a revelation of supernatural truths which
claim, not opinion, but faith ; and next, a supernatural
dealing with the souls of men, whereby they are trans
formed by God's invisible work and operation, yet through
their own will and moral nature, into a new and restored
moral being.
Hence it is, that belief in the Apostolical succession,
fixes that belief in a supernatural revelation of truth, and
a supernatural gift of spiritual life ; a living, hearty belief
in the Grace of God.
The practical results of such a belief, are many. It
strengthens the faith in the reality and benefit of those
outward ordinances, which God has ordained as means of
grace in His Church. It connects these ordinances, in
their reception, with the daily life, its trials and tempta
tions, its varying needs ; in their administration, with a
corporate body — established and continued in the world by
God Himself — the appointed witness to God's revelation,
and the appointed channel of God's grace ; ordained for
the purpose, both of extending itself by new conversions,
and of tending and keeping its members already made,
and through their joint Christian lives, of glorifying God.
This is belief in the Church which we profess in the
Creed. That in order to convey spiritual gifts to men,
God has been pleased to institute upon earth, a Church —
"the Kingdom of Heaven"— "The Body of Christ."
That in this Church, there is an order of men, set apart
by divine ordinance from their fellow Christians, as minis
ters of these spiritual gifts ; not lecturers on Christian
morals ; not expounders of an individual theory of theology;
not self-elected officers of a voluntary religious society ;

APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 59

not teachers, simply and only, because they think them
selves called to preach to others ; but men, to whom God,
by His appointed instruments, has entrusted certain
authority and powers ; a message of truth to be delivered,
and gifts of grace to be dispensed ; ministers of the Word
and Sacraments ; that this ministry is exercised, not
because the man has taken upon himself to perform its
offices, but because he has been called, as was Aaron, in
the way of God's appointment. And this way is by an
ordination, transmitted in the line of Bishops reaching
back to Timothy, the first Bishop of Ephesus, and Paul,
the Apostle, who consecrated and commissioned him, and
their associates.
Bound up in this doctrine of a lineal, Apostolical
Succession, are all the comforting doctrines of union with
Christ, through a reverent partaking of the ordinances of
His Church ; of growth in grace, conditioned upon a
conscientious and childlike obedience ; for, while it is not
for a moment claimed, that in this succession there is an
infallible pledge, either of succession of Faith, or retention
of spiritual life to every individual member of the Church,
there is, even to the weakest, a strong outward safeguard ;
and to the true disciple, there is a covenanted assurance,
and to the world, the pledge that neither faith, nor life,
can perish and die in the Church of God.
On the ground, then, of the precious truths of which
it is both the seal and the safeguard, the doctrine of
Apostolical Succession is one which commends itself to
the thoughtful attention of all Christians, and to the
hearty acquiescence of every member of the Catholic
Church. The system, of which it is a part, must be held in a
spirit of charity — a willing sympathy with everything that
is good and Christian in all religious communions about

60 PAROCHIAL SERMONS.
us — remembering always, as Dr. Mahan once said, that
" while God ties us who are in His Church to sacraments
and ordinances, He never ties Himself." There must be,
also, a temper ready to make allowance, as for the preju
dices of others, so also for our own.
Held in this spirit, there is no doctrine of the Word of
God, which may be the living spring of a more humble,
earnest, and holy type of Christian life, and character.
It is ever reminding the disciple, of his entire reliance
for salvation upon the merits and mediation of Christ,
applied to his soul through Christ's own channels of
grace. It is ever speaking to the reverent worshipper, of
a divine voice and presence in the services and sacraments
of the Church ; of the real priestly office in the Declara
tion of Absolution, or Remission of sins ; of the Spirit's
regenerating work, when the Minister baptizes, with water
in the Triune Name ; of the touch of an Apostolic hand
in the sacred rite of Confirmation ; of feeding upon the
Body and Blood of the Saviour, when, at the Altar, the
elements of Spiritual Life are ministered by one whose
authority is derived from those who trace their Apostolic
lineage back to the upper chamber in Jerusalem.
We know that it is not possible for a man, of himself,
to put away both guilt and sin, and of his own strength
to lead a Christian life ; that one cannot attain to the new
creation in Christ, without coming to Holy Baptism. We
are assured in the Word of God, that when thus added to
the Church of God, we are placed in a state of salvation ;
that we become partakers of Christ, by sacramentally
eating His Flesh, and drinking His Blood.
We read in the Holy Scriptures, that men were ordained
by the Saviour Himself, to be the stewards of these
mysteries, and the Ministers of this Gospel ; that by the
Apostolic rule, the gift so given to the Ministry, in per-

APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 61
petuity, is given by the laying-on of hands of the Apostles,
or of one delegated in succession by the Apostles.
Surely, then, it is not a superfluous or trifling inquiry;
it is no exaggeration of a merely unimportant question of
preference as to Church government; it certainly exhibits
no want of charity towards others ; for every one who has
found, or would find, a home in the Church, to inquire,
with all seriousness, whether this Divinely-ordained system,
with its creeds, and services, and ordinances, and sacra
ments; with its deposit of faith; its ritual; its spiritual
gifts and graces, is brought home to ourselves or no, by
the possession of an Apostolic Ministry.
Assuredly, it cannot show any reverent value for truth,
to depreciate the value of such a gift. Nor can one who
is a true disciple of the Lord Jesus Christ, except through
a misapprehension of the doctrine itself, ever contrast it
slightingly or contemptuously, with that of which it is
really the support and strength — evangelical religion, and
deep personal holiness.
Every doctrine which relates to the visible Church of
Christ is of vital interest to all who realize the importance
of the ordinances and Sacraments which Christ has insti
tuted in His Church, to their soul's salvation; who bring
to the consideration of every duty expressed in the Word
of God, a reverent spirit ; and who would, in faithful,
unquestioning obedience, keep His commandments.
And above all, this doctrine of the ministry is to be
regarded as a matter not of setting up one class above
another ; not of unduly thrusting man between God and
the soul ; but of obediently cleaving, with steadfastness,
to the Gospel plan for man's salvation, as itself, indeed,
relating to a subordinate, but to an integral portion of
that divinely ordered Kingdom, into which we are brought
by Holy Baptism ; instructed by Scriptural and Apostolic

62 PAROCHIAL SERMONS. .
Creeds ; comforted by services of prayer and praise ;
strengthened by Confirmation, and nourished into, life
eternal by mystical union with Christ in the Blessed
Sacrament of the Eucharist.
And in considering these offices of the ministry, we
are to regard them, not in the light of merely outward
acts, but as the faithful fulfilment of that human agency,
whereby God has provided for continuing in His Church,
real, sober, heart religion ; as no matter of censorious
condemnation of others, but as one part of the outward
means, in the humble and conscientious use of which, we
hope to be saved.
The doctrine of a rightly ordained ministry, is an
outwork at least, and an important one, of the Doctrine
of Grace. It enters very largely into that question, which
in these years is agitating the entire religious world — the
question between individualism and the Church.
And to all of us who hold the doctrine in sincerity
and truth, it is the seal and security of our being within
the reach of the ordinary plan of our Heavenly Father, for
the salvation of souls.

VIII.
ADVENT.
Likeness to Christ — The Object, the Privilege, the
Glory, of the Christian.
Preached at Grace Church, Madison, 1883.
Christ the firstfruits; afterward they that are Christ's at
His coming. — I Corinthians, xv., 23.
In the chapter from which these words are taken, the
Apostle connects the Saviour's Resurrection with the
General Judgment ; and the Church, in her Advent services,
following the analogy of S. Paul, connects with the com
memoration of His first Advent the second coming of the
Lord; and in this season (which the Church has appro
priated directly to the consideration of His lowly and
humble birth in Bethlehem), by the spirit of her services,
she carries our minds and our thoughts onward to the
contemplation of that second Advent, when, in majesty
and glory, He shall come to judge the world — shall come-
to receive unto Himself that which is His own, the Bride
made ready for His coming, and prepared for the Marriage
Supper of the Lamb.
How wonderfully, in the history of her blessed Lord
and Master, can we read the Church's history. She is the
perpetuated image of His whole existence. As He leads,
she humbly follows. Christ the first; afterward they that
are Christ's, is the rule, not of the Resurrection only, but
of all things.
He came first in lowliness, and His Church began in

64 PAROCHIAL SERMONS.
lowliness ; He was visited with the Holy Ghost in Jordan,
and She on the Day of Pentecost ; He labored in weariness
and watchings, and had not where to lay His head till the
Cross became His pillow ; She, too, was long a houseless
wanderer, solemnizing her holy mysteries in sepulchres,
and scorned by the souls She would have shed her blood
to save ; He, after His day of martyrdom, ascended in
power to Heaven ; and She, after hers, became mighty
upon earth. Yet, as His victory is to our eyes invisible,
so is much of her glory ; and as His triumph is, in a
manner unfinished, because unseen, so is She, in a degree,
far more, as yet, imperfect, ineffectual, incomplete. But
He shall once more ascend in visible, public supremacy ;
and then shall her enthronement be public, and her
triumph consummate also.
Thus, though Christ be divine and the Church human,
the destinies of both are truly linked by bonds no strength
shall ever sunder.
"To follow the Lamb whithersoever He goeth is her
office, her privilege, her glory, for everlasting" (Butler).
To strive to be like Christ, then, is the office and privi
lege of Christians in the Church on earth ; to be like Him
shall be the everlasting glory of the redeemed and
ransomed of the sons of men when He shall come to take
them to Himself, and they shall see Him as He is.
It is the office of the Church to seek to be on earth,
what her divine Lord was, among men ; the Teacher, the
Guide, the Comforter of the sinful and the sorrowing; and
this, because the Church is His body, not an organization
from or by men.
Her founder is the Son of God. Her strength is in
His presence. From Him are her powers derived. In
virtue of His promise — "I am with you alway" — is that

advent. 65

inheritance, of which faith and hope make her the blessed
possessor. In the past she contemplates the origin, in the future,
the fulfilment of her joy; in both alike one unaltered
author and channel of mercies. In Him, Who is the same
yesterday and to-day and forever, she beholds the sure
foundation of her own stability through time and eternity.
Her present work, therefore, should be the copy of His
earthly life. As He was, in its true and highest sense, the
Friend of man, so should the Church be man's friend and
her sacred courts, his home.
The distinctive character of ages may vary in different
eras, and yet that worldly, careless, selfish spirit which
met the affection and entreaties of, the Saviour with
neglect, and scorn, and even bitter hatred, meets the
Church now in her work.
Persons are living all about us, forgetful of God,
neither caring or striving for holiness of heart, pursuing
worldly and selfish ends, oftentimes, without a thought of
the divine law, or of the divine love. Among just such
persons Christ lived and labored. And the Church must
make His loving, patient spirit her own, or she cannot
win men to His service. He must be her all-in-all. She
must obey and teach His commands ; ministering, in His
spirit, the ordinances and sacraments He instituted ; and
His presence with her must be a sense, not merely a
sentiment. It is not the empty cry, "the temple of the Lord are
we," but a solemn realization of that great truth which
S. Paul urged upon individual Christians, that each and all
of us, by holy Baptism, are temples of the living God, —
members of the one body of which Christ is the Head —
that gives character to our profession of faith in God, and
furnishes an imperative reason for Christian holiness,

66 PAROCHIAL SERMONS.

manifest in personal piety and godliness ; and for Christian
love shown forth in personal energy and zeal.
All about us are orders and societies of human devising.
Men grappling with forms of evil ; proclaiming schemes
of fraternity and social union ; striving, they claim, to
reform and redeem the world.
And yet the Gospel and the Church are the charter and
the society which, in its revelation, purpose and organiza
tion cover all this ground, and embrace all these objects.
Christ's work on earth was a daily work. He went in
and out among the people. At the marriage feast and at
the graveside, in joy and in sorrow, in homes of want, of
sickness, of mourning and of death, He sympathized with
all the changes and chances of humanity, and ministered
to all its needs. And never until the Church of Christ, as
the daily ministrant to individual wants, lives in the
hearts and the minds of her children, will she be doing
her true work ; inheriting and using her birthright and
heritage. But what the Church is, she must be in and through
her members.
If we realize our position as sinners in God's sight, if
we feel that our lost estate is real, and salvation through
Christ real, then, to us, the Church and the holy sacra
ments are realities likewise. Our hope is in the Cross.
Our refuge is in Christ.
Now the gifts of Him Who suffered on the Cross for
us, the means of grace instituted in His Church, are
something more than mere forms which we may receive
or neglect as we see fit. In these divine ordinances are
the sources of divine strength. That strength we need to
be faithful disciples.
For the Church's work is not the work of one. It is
a common work. We each need the other's prajrers,

ADVENT. 67

sympathies, and help. And yet, not only for each other's,
but for Christ's, sake, should we do all.
If we only have the will to work, each in his own
vocation, God will find the work and show the way.
If only we are true to ourselves, and to God, the
influences which He has sanctified in the transformation of
human hearts, will mould and shape our own.
Not only is this our office, but more blessed, it is our
privilege. And can there be greater, than to carry, into
all the relations of life, a hearty, Christian sympathy ; to
believe, and to act upon the belief, that the Church is the
home and refuge of all ; that her love, like the love of
Christ, embraces all for whom He died ? Christ was poor,
and yet He would make all men rich ; and whatever may .
be our earthly condition, if the love of Christ warm our
hearts, we can make all with whom we associate, richer
and happier for our coming and our presence.
For kindly words, like deeds of mercy, are full of
blessedness. Let every word of sympathy be spoken, and
every deed of charity be done, for the sake of Him Whose
ministries were all of mercy and charity, and the spirit of
the word and of the act will be of untold value to the
sorrowing, suffering soul.
But that, which on earth is the object and the privilege
of the individual Christian life, shall be in Heaven the
glory of the Church triumphant, when the Saviour shall
present it to Himself a glorious Church. When the issues
of the Judgment Day are passed; when the condemnations
of Divine justice, and the welcoming words of infinite
love, shall have been spoken; when, in the presence of the
Son of Man, Whose glory fills the heavens, the redeemed
of all ages shall stand, then shall the prophetic fore-
shadowings of the text be fulfilled; for they that are
Christ's shall, in that day, see His glory, and be like Him ;

68 PAROCHIAL SERMONS.
for they shall see Him as He is, and they shall be like
Him forever and ever.
The objects and the privileges of the Christian life are
in time; its glory is in eternity.
And He, Whom then we hope to be like, gives us now
the earnest of His Spirit, that we may perfect on earth the
work of preparation. And it is a blessed and comfortable
thought for such as, in the midst of many weaknesses and
many infirmities — of temptations, often, but not always,
resisted — are striving, with smcerity of purpose, to do His
will, to walk in His truth, that God their Saviour is to be
their Judge and King.
When once we realize the truth, that He is to be our
Judge, who came to be our Saviour ; .that He Who suffered
more for man than human nature can comprehend; Who
was from the beginning our Creator, and became our
Redeemer; that He is the Disposer of the destinies of
eternity; then shall we feel the richness and the fulness,
the consolation and the strength, of the Christian faith —
that He Who suffered all for us will deny us nothing, if
only we go to Him in confidence, and penitence, and love.
He Who created all things, can re-create the deadened
energies of man. He Who made the soul can regenerate
man's spiritual life. He Who made the mind can purify
and ennoble mental endowments. He Who gave life to
the dust, can give to the body, so made out of dust, life
eternal in the skies.
And it is by His strengthening graces, vouchsafed in
answer to our earnest prayers — by the precious Food of His
own Body and Blood — that we, the baptized members of
His Body, are enabled to live, on earth, the life which fits
us for His coming and His life.
Our whole spiritual life must rest on faith in God our
Saviour; that, through the activities of that faith, the

ADVENT. 69

daily preparation for the coming of God our Judge may
be carried on and perfected.
It is by use that all things are tried — by constant
exercise that all things are developed and proved.
To nothing more than to the Church's system does
this truth apply. An insight into the blessedness of all
her means of grace, an appreciation of her discipline
which is heartfelt, while, at the same time, it satisfies the
highest reason, comes to her docile and obedient children.
By faithful walking in her appointed ways, their ex
cellence is realized; they are known to be the best and
unfailing channels of the abundant grace of God, which is
supreme over all.
As the experiences of life multiply, there is ever found
one sure Aid to meet them, one Voice in harmony with
gladness and sorrow, one wise Counsellor in all perplexities
and changes. But only by constant exercise — by common
using — does this satisfying knowledge come.
In small things, as in great, must the Church's order
be tried. So tried, it will be found to supply strange
comfort, with strange fitness, for many an hour of trial.
The Advent season, upon which we are just entering,
is peculiarly one of solemn thoughtfulness and prayer.
Advent, by most of us, is too little heeded. The Church's
Advent teachings point to a consistent adaptation of our
daily lives, to the ever-changing conditions of human
needs. In view of its solemn teachings, prayer and abstinence
are its order; that so we may profitably meditate upon the
realities of God's judgment ever at hand, and for which
we are ever to be ready.
God give us grace to be, each in the station of life to
which He has called us, obedient children, and not un
worthy examples of the wise teachings of the Church.

70 PAROCHIAL SERMONS.

The life of Christian obedience is not a life of easy,
effortless attainment. Conscience again and again startles
us with its accusations. Let us never forget that He Who
has given us that conscience — an ever present monitor,
His presence, in the still, small voice — bids us by these very
accusations to come to Him that He may cleanse from all
sin. In view of godly resolutions and faithful efforts to
walk in newness of life, how often are we assaulted with
fierce temptations !
Remembering that He, who passed victorious through
human temptations, sympathizes with every human
struggle, we have the assurance that in sincere and
prayerful communion with Him, our weakness will be
made strength. We know from Scripture and from
experience, that the human heart is desperately wicked,
and that he who says that he has no sin deceives himself ;
but, that if we confess our sins, God is faithful and just
to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unright
eousness. Not only toilsome, but entirely hopeless, would be the
work of human preparation for an heavenly inheritance if
we had not the grace of Regeneration, which is ours in
holy Baptism ; and the strength of spiritual aid, in the
divine Food of the Altar, of which we are permitted to
partake. Tbe spiritual life is one of resignation of the soul in
prayer to God.
He is God, and can do all things. He is your Saviour
and will do all things for your salvation from sin, and
your perfection to holiness.
The spiritual life is one of faith ; faith in the Incar
nate Life and in the atoning Blood of the Son of God ;

ADVENT. 71

faith in His power to make you perfect in His eternal
likeness. For, if ever beholding in Him a personal God and
Saviour, you believe in Him with all your heart, and wor
ship and serve Him in sincerity, He will give you strength
to resist the weapons of your spiritual adversary ; and the
light of God's love will brighten your earthly pathway
until you come to that hour when the Apostle's f oreshad-
owings shall be gloriously realized — Christ the first,
afterwards they that are Christ's — for all that abide in
that presence and that home, shall shine forever as the
brightness of the firmament.

IX.
EASTER.
Life Through the Risen Christ.
Preached at S. Luke's, Racine, 1883.
For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be
made alive. — I. Corinthians, xv. 20.
" In Adam all die ;" that is the inevitable experience of
the present, the lesson of six thousand years of human
life and death. In Christ shall all be made alive ; that is
the Gospel of God's love, which faith, apprehending,
receives, and by which it lives and acts.
Man's present life is darkened by the certainty that he
must die. To be told that the soul may escape from sin
and rise to righteousness, does not suffice ; evidently our
body also must be delivered from the bondage of corrup
tion, if we would personally attain the liberty of the sons
of God. Hence the earnestness of human questionings
even on the threshold of the grave.
Some remedy for death — some bodily immortality — is
a necessity for us, being what we are. Otherwise, our
faith fails of its consummation : and goodness, in the
creature, comes to a dark end as the grave receives the
cold, lifeless body, and we bury it from our sight, earth to
earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust.
And so when the Gospel comes to men as the evangel
of God's love, the immortality which it preaches is the
assurance of a continued life, the renewal of our spiritual-

EASTER. 73

ized humanity — body and soul — in deathlessness and
purity. Such entire renewal is demanded by that faith in God,
which is the spring of righteousness in man ; a faith
which carries us beyond the bounds of the life we now
live, to that higher and eternal life which our nature
craves ; which assures us of that power that not only
sanctifies our souls, but delivers our bodies from the bond
age of corruption. For, surely if the knowledge of God,
and of our future life, is to be any better than an opinion,
or a mere philosophy, it must have power for our hereafter.
The barrier of death, must be found by a sure and trusting
faith, to be such as may be really passed by us.
The resurrection of the body, no less than the immor
tality of the soul, must be an accepted article of faith.
This is that knowledge of Christ which, as an apostle
teaches us, stands next to the pure knowledge of God.
" That I may know Christ," he writes, " and the power of
His resurrection, if so be that I may attain unto the
resurrection of the dead."
The experience of life teaches us all, that in earthly
matters, whatever we really think and earnestly believe, is
a power; but in such a Gospel there is a power of God,
which is not only wisdom from Him, but righteousness
and sanctification, even the redemption of the body — i. e.,
a power, moral and divine.
We are distinctly taught in the New Testament that
it is a divine, as well as moral, progress, whereby the soul
of man rises out of a state of sin into righteousness. It
is divine, for it is God's work in the individual soul, called
by the Apostle a new creation; it is moral, for the con
nection of faith with righteousness is that of a divine
principle with human action.
At the beginning, there is the power of God accom-

74 parochial sermons.
panying the faith in God, and through the whole course
of the rising new life there is this co-operation: the higher
law of the Divine power and purpose within; while with
out, there is the moral law of effort and habit in continuous
activity. So that the soul, once alive to God, through
Jesus Christ, may grow, morally and spiritually, in
conformity to His image, Who is Himself the image of
the invisible God — the First-born before the whole new
creation. This renewal in righteousness, after the Creator's image,
is described as being made free from sin; as putting off
the old, and putting on the new; and it is spoken of as
making ourselves more and more such as Christ was, after
His rising from the grave; that "like as Christ was raised
from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also
should walk in newness of life." Our spirit, thus, may be
life, because of righteousness, even now; the body remain
ing, meanwhile, subject to corruption and death.
But, then, the divine work of man's entire renewal has
the distinct promise of our bodies, also; the fulfilment of
which, in due season, S. Paul says, is sure. These bodies,
now instinct with life — the earthly tabernacles of spiritual
natures— must, indeed, pass through death; for corruption
has begun in them already. But He, Who raised up Jesus
from the dead, will also quicken our mortal bodies by His
Spirit which dwells in us. This bodily renewal of man is
as truly a divine work as the spiritual creation.
It is that which is done for us. No co-operation of
ours could help restore1 the body from death. All that we
know of the means of that restoration is told us in Christ's
own sayings, as to our having a marvellous union with
His body. This, in the language of S. Paul, is termed
being planted together with Him. While this renewal is,
essentially, a divine work, the present moral work in the

EASTER. 75

soul is spoken of by the Apostle, as an earnest of the
salvation of the body, also. That salvation is the final
deliverance of the body from the power of death. All
born into this world inherit, physically, a certainty of
death, which affects the whole career of life. In holy
Baptism we are transplanted, to use the imagery of Scrip
ture, from the old Adam into the new Adam — and this is
a divine change for both body and soul — rescuing, at
length, the soul from sin, and the body from death.
It is not sought at. this time, or in this connection,' to
inquire into the general application of the merits of the
Incarnation to the race of man. God alone knows how
sin can be extinguished in a human soul, and death be
reversed for a human body. Christ's life and death were, we
know, for all mankind ; an expiation for all human sin
fulness, that Incarnate life and sacrificial death.
Passing by the question of the general efficacy of the
redemption, what concerns us individually is, the question :
How can I make available to my own life in death, the
death and life of the crucified, risen Saviour ?
There is no more assured fact in the history of the
world than that Christ died, and then returned from the
grave to die no more. And there is no such witness to
any fact in human history, as the continued commemora
tion of the Sacrament of His death bears to the death
itself. It commemorates the death upon the cross, at the
same time that it nourishes in individual souls, the life
which He, the risen Saviour, gives. That life is first given
us in Holy Baptism, when the child of Adam becomes a
member of Christ, and the inheritor of Adam's mortality
becomes the recipient of Christ's immortality.
Formed out of the dust of the earth, and animated by
the inspiration of God, man is the connecting link between
God and nature, and holds of both. As a natural being,

76 PAROCHIAL SERMONS.
he has his place in the great chain of creation just like all
other beings. As the highest, most perfectly organized
of animate creation, he differs, of course, only in degree,
not in kind, from all other animals.
On the other hand, as a spiritual being he is the child
of God, made in His image, after His likeness, born by
Water and the Holy Ghost into divine sonship ; and on
this side he breaks away from nature and soars above
things finite. In that he is self-conscious and self-deter
mining, a reasonable and responsible free-agent, the form
of his being is one specifically distinct from that of any
natural existence ; for, in his Baptism he has that which
by nature he cannot have.
It is a just reproach against mediasval monasticism,
that it treated animal life as a snare and a curse ; the body
as the prison, not the home of the soul ; and attempted to
uproot all feelings and habits grounded in our material
nature and condition. But in our day there are those who
account the knowledge which the five senses impart to
man so certain and so valuable, that any spiritual nature
lying beyond their ken, has been doubted or denied.
Now the spiritualism of the monastic theory and prac
tice, never wrought so grievously, either as regards
individual life or the faith of men — though great,
undoubtedly, was its mischief — as has the materialism of
our day. For this materialism is certain to deaden the
conviction of man's immortality as a Christian doctrine,
i. e. the identity and responsibility of each individual
beyond the grave ; the spiritual body and the undying
spirit reunited identical and indissoluble. It tends to
break the connection between this life and a future
judgment ; to make men careless, not only as regards the
first, but also the second advent. Placing man's whole
being in his merely natural existence, which links him to

EASTER. 77

the animal creation, it loses sight of that immortal element
which binds him to the divine.
According to this view, man is simply an object of
physical science, and his origin is to be sought in the chain
of the progressive development of nature, in which the
higher species are continually evolved out of lower by a
principle called natural selection. Dignify this principle
as men may by philosophic terms ; ennoble it as they may
seek to by their vaunted inductions ; it is essentially con
ceited in its assumptions, and degrading in its conclusions.
The spiritual element in the nature of man, the super
natural, or intra-natural, is cast out because it has been
already denied an existence in the universe.
The word, God, is retained, but as the expression merely
of an impersonal power.
All things of earth, man included, are swept in under
the control of a vast system of passionless, inscrutable,
unchanging law. According to the theory of development,
or selection, man is but the choicer animal. Life is but a
traveling from birth to grave; no vision beyond the earth,
no hope beyond mortality; manhood, developed from the
lowest stage of animate being, consigned, after a few years
of existence in this highest state of developed life, to a
hopeless burial.
And this, in the name of science and philosophy, men
offer as a better way for the regulation of the individual
life, for the nurture and training of home and family, for
the building up of national character, than the teachings
of the Christian religion, the influences of the Gospel of
the Son of God, and the assured hope of immortality.
In accordance with its own premises and assumptions,
this theory degrades mankind to the level of the brute ;
sees no divine image, no spiritual element in these bodies
of soulless clay ; turns from the records and experiences

78 PAROCHIAL SERMONS.

of ages, to pursue its studies as to the universe and man's
relation to the universe — nian's present and future — in
fossils or specimens ; recognizing in this world of awful
reality only the work or play of blind, meaningless forces.
And then it asks men to deny, deride and reject Holy
Scripture ; to give up their faith in revealed truth, and in
a God of love and truth, Who created man in His own
image, after His own likeness : and in thus flinging away
faith and revelation, to do despite to the divine Saviour,
Who took upon Him man's nature, and has given to as
many as believe on Him power to become the sons of God:
Who is ever teaching us in His Incarnation and in His
Gospel the mystery of man's twofold life, his kingship on
earth in eminency, in privilege and in responsibility : and
his heavenly inheritance, through sonship under God, of
immortal life.
Man, formed from the dust of the ground to be in
creation and physical organization the very roof and crown
of earthly things — into whose body so created the Lord
God breathed the breath of life that he might be a living
soul — man, so wonderfully and marvellously made, is asked
to disbelieve the record which his heavenly Father has
given him, and accept in its place this uncertain fancy and
theory of the dreariest conceivable fatalism.
In the midst of the manifold trials and temptations of
human life, it is a fearful venture for any man to let go
his hold of the faith of the Christian ages ; to supplant
reverent belief in God's revealed Word by an acceptance
of these ever-changing and unsatisfying speculations of a
materialistic theory, which, in the study of man, would
view him simply as an object of physical science : over
looking or denying that gift of a spiritual or immortal
life such as no other creature was gifted with or can attain
to ; that gift in which our immortality lies secure ; for

EASTER. 79

that which we call death is but an event in life, the
putting off the corruptible body, that, in the resurrection,
the spirit may take on its own nature, its own body, its
own life.
And this is the blessed hope and promise of life, which
the Gospel assures to the race made in the image and
likeness of God, redeemed by the death of Him Who is
the kinsman and brother of every human being, and
assured of life eternal by the resurrection of Him Whose
rising from the grave the Easter festival commemorates.
It disposes of a thousand questions of the hour, when
once the spiritual nature within us, wielding its marvellous
might, has grasped the full significancy of this Easter
doctrine ; has risen to this divinely revealed truth, of the
unearthly and the future ; that God is the God of the
living, not the dead — hence, that in my flesh I shall see God.
When we consider what a power faith in the doctrine
of the resurrection, as taught in the Word of God, becomes
in the human soul, when honestly received, we do not wonder
that this doctrine has ever held the foremost place in the
Gospel. Utter it with the Apostles' reality of faith — I believe
in the resurrection of the body and the life of the world
to come — and it is a power in full action.
It rouses the drooping and fainting spirit of man to
that life of faith which is a new life in God.
It brightens the way by which the trusting disciple
passes from earthly life to that rest in the Paradise of God,
which is the prelude of an immortality in the image and
presence of the Divine Son.
No one of us can hold this faith with any earnestness
of grasp, and not realize, in every hour's experience of
life, what an inestimable gift and grace it is.
In the bright and joyous scenes of life, in the hushed

80 PAROCHIAL SERMONS.
room of sickness, by the new-made grave, in the after
hours of memory and meditation, at all times, it is God's
voice of comfort, telling those who know full well the
sorrows and disappointments of the present, the certain
joys and the assured blessings of the future. What, in its
best estate, would human life be without this confirmed
hope of immortality, this union of the spiritual body with
the ever-living soul? Chequered as each human pathway
is with the shadow of many cares and many crosses, how
the gloom would deepen, and the burden grow in weight,
if, when the weary pilgrimage of life were ended, we were
to lie down and die without a hope beyond the grave !
It is no mere vain tradition, no mere philosophic
speculation, which the great festival of Easter has handed
down to successive generations of Christians, but an
assured fact; and based upon this fact, the all-inclusive
doctrine of the Gospel of Christ — the resurrection of the
body, that, of which if not true, S. Paul says, preaching
and faith alike are vain.
But vain, surely, will the preaching of this doctrine be
to any one of us, if there be not in our hearts such faith
in the risen Jesus, as leads us to put away our sins by
repentance; to cast our care in simple trust on His cross,
and so follow after Him in a daily life of holiness and
self-denying love, that we may have a place and part in
the triumphal hosts of the redeemed, and the unending
glories of the resurrection.
In that great day when the end cometh — the end of all
things earthly and transitory — when, in marvellous array,
angelic hosts shall gather round the judgment throne of
God, shall the garnered dust of earth's myriad graves —
consecrated by tears of hopeful sorrow, put on the glorious
investiture of incorruption.
In the midst, Christ the firstfruits, afterwards they

EASTER. 81

that are Christ's at His coining. His, in that they brought
to the foot of His cross, for their sins, a true repentance;
for His sufferings, the service of love and life; and for
pardon, an unreservmg faith. For we know, assuredly,
that as we make His cross the refuge and rescue for our
sins, our shelter and our shield in death, so will its blessed
shadow mark our grave as the gate of everlasting life, and
we shall see Him, Who, dying on the cross for our sins,
rose again for our salvation; we shall see Him as He is,
and be with Him for ever and ever.

X.
WHITSUN DAY.
The Promise of the Comforter.
Preached at the Church of the Annunciation, Philadelphia, 1883 ;
and at Shirebrook," Derbyshire, England, 1888.
Nevertheless, I tell you the truth; it is expedient for you
that I go away: for if 1 go not away, the Comforter will not
come unto you; but if I depart, I will send Him unto you. —
S. John, xvi., 7.
More than once in our Lord's last discourses, in the
upper room and in the Garden, His words give us a
glimpse of the Apostles as vivid as if the Evangelist had
described their reception of His parting words. It is
so when He says: "These things I said not unto you at
the beginning, because I was with you. But now I go
My way to Him that sent Me, and none of you asketh Me,
'Whither goest Thou?' but because I have said these
things unto you, sorrow hath filled your heart."
Do we not see the grief and anxiety upon the faces of
the Twelve, even if they give no utterance to them ? Does
not the Lord read them, and so begin His next sentence
with a strange and strong assurance, which, at another
time, He would not have felt necessary? "Nevertheless,
I tell you the truth. It is expedient for you that I go
away: for if I go not away, the Comforter will not come
unto you; but if I depart, I will send Him unto you."
* Tho last sermon preached by the Bishop, on the occasion of a Con
firmation, in the Parish Church at Shirebrook.

WHITSUN DAY. 83

No wonder that our next glimpse through the Lord's
words, after He has defined the Comforter's works in a
few phrases, which then they could not understand, shows
them troubled and perplexed. He tells them, "I have yet
many things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear them
now." They seem to me to be still halting at that
mysterious utterance, "It is expedient for you that I go
away." He was wont to comfort and relieve them. But
now, when He sees them grieving at the prospect of His
leaving them, He tells them that it is better for them that
He should go.
How could that possibly be ? He promises a Comforter ;
but what Comforter could take His place with them?
What could be better, dearer, happier than the companion
ship with Him which they had enjoyed? What could
ever make up to them the loss of that? Who wonders at
Mary Magdalene's ecstacy, when, after His death and
burial, she once more heard Him speak her name? He
will not suffer her to touch Him, because He has not yet
ascended. The old relation between His disciples and Jesus of
Nazareth is not to be renewed. No longer will He be a
man among men. For forty days He is with them, from
time to time, in His risen body, coming and going suddenly
and mysteriously, and so He accustomed them to think of
Him always close at hand, although invisible, and thus
bridged over, as it were, the transition from His presence
in the flesh to His presence in the spirit.
When they saw Him ascend out of their sight, never
again to appear to them on earth in the body, the mystery
had been made plain to them, so that they rejoiced and
praised God. And when the Comforter came to them,
they all understood that this was the renewal of their old
companionship with their Lord, under new and more

84 PAROCHIAL SERMONS.
precious conditions. They would not see Him in human
form, nor, indeed, would they see Him with their bodily
eyes at all. But they knew and believed that He was, and
would ever be, present with them in the Spirit; that, as He
had said, He would not leave them comfortless ; He would
come to them.
He had now come and would abide with them forever.
And as soon as they came face to face with their work,
which He had given them to do — both for their own sal
vation and for the conversion of the world — that strange
saying in the upper room vindicated itself day by day,
and hour by hour. It was indeed expedient for them that
He should go away.
Precious as had been His human companionship,
marvellous as had been their privilege in it for those three
years, it was not to be compared to this constant spiritual
presence and companionship vouchsafed them by God the
Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost, through
the agency and operation of that third person of the
Blessed Trinity, who, on the day of Pentecost, revealed His
part and power in the salvation of mankind.
You remember how sometimes in the Gospel story, the
disciples were distressed by the absence of their Lord.
When He was in the mount of Transfiguration, and the
disciples could not. heal the lunatic boy ; or when He re
mained on the shore and the disciples encountered the
storm without Him, there was proof of the insufficiency,
if I may use the word, of His presence in the world in a
human form. He could be but in one place at a time
like any other human being. And if that necessary
restriction was now and then felt, even when the disciples
were so few, and when they formed one little company
living together, how could they go into all the world with

WHITSUN DAY. 85

His Gospel ? How could men be won to the service of
the Lord whom so few could ever see or know ?
It was a necessity that He should reclaim His omni
presence, and that instead of living in the world as a man,
He should become invisible ; and yet as really present to
every disciple of every age and clime, as He had been to
His Apostles and followers in Judaea and Galilee.
When they went out to teach all nations, they did not
leave Him, their Lord and Master, in Jerusalem. He went
everywhere with them. They felt His loving presence
constantly, and that their work was His work, and
that they were but instruments which He was using.
Surely, it was expedient for them that He should leave
them when He did, so that He might become their ever-
present, omnipresent Lord, from Whom no distance of
earth or time could ever remove them. They must have
grown to feel that even if the Church did not require His
spiritual presence instead of His life in the flesh, it was
expedient for them, even if they had remained in their
own land. In the lives of their own souls were felt the
restrictions of His human form. They could not always
be with Him, nor He with them ; and sometimes their
need of Him might be sorest in His absence. He could
not be always meeting the wants of so many individual
hearts and lives even when they were with Him, nor could
they always claim His thought and time for themselves.
I do not suppose that we could overstate the blessedness
of those who saw and heard Him, and companied with
Him from day to day. And yet, it is only in the line of
several of His sayings to suppose that these very men,
after the Comforter had come, regarded their lives with
Christ in the Spirit, as more blessed than had been their
knowledge of Him as Jesus of Nazareth.
Their highest privilege, it is true, was to have had such

86 PAROCHIAL SERMONS.
a foundation for their faith ; but, believing, their Lord
was even more to them than He had been on earth — a
constant presence in unwearied love, in ever ready sym
pathy, in unfailing wisdom, in irresistible power, in all
the attributes of His Deity joined to the sweet perfections
of His humanity. Their patience and their toils were
marvellous ; and the heathen who despised the Jewish
malefactor, as they thought Him, and did not know that
He was the guide and stay of every one of His disciples
who had faith to realize His presence, were drawn within
the charmed circle of Christian truth by the lives of men
who lived as they did, and taught what they did, because
they knew that Christ was with them.
I need spend no words upon Christ's presence by His
Spirit in the Church, in its sacraments and ordinances. I
know you are all instructed and ready to believe that ; and
that you will not think that I neglect it, or disregard it,
when I press you rather upon your own inner life in the
Spirit. That great blessing is in the Church for all her
children. For each one of us the all-important question
is : Do I make this spiritual gift and grace my own ? Is
my religion personal ? Am I a living member of Christ
in the Church ? A fruitful branch of the vine ? Is my
inner life truly and really a walking with God ? Is Christ
the companion of my days and hours ? Have I the sense
of His constant presence with me by the Spirit ? We
cannot be too careful in the matter of self-examination as
regards our life in the Spirit.
At times we all of us, I suppose, think how blessed it
would be to have the Lord for the companion of daily life,
as He was long ago to the first of His disciples and saints.
How we would bring to Him our sins, and cares, and needs,
and be sure of His sympathy and help as often as we
sought them. Now, Jesus said that He would give His

WHITSUN DAY. 87

disciples something better than that ; a spiritual presence
and intercourse that could be universal, and also, closer
and more constant. And the disciples found it even as
He had said. And this it is which He offers in its fulness
to every baptized, confirmed communicant, member of His
Body, the Church ; a life with Him, filled with His pres
ence, guided by His wisdom, supported by His sympathy.
He offers to be the closest, dearest and most intimate of
friends and companions ; to walk with us, to share our lot.
He offers to dwell in our hearts, to comfort us in our
sorrows, to rejoice with us in our joys. I do not know
what language can describe the blessedness of a life which
is indeed a life with Christ ; not one that only knows Him
at set times and in particular ordinances^ but one which
never loses sight of Him, which prizes special occasions of
service and sacrament all the more, because the habit, the
instinctive, unconscious habit, is to keep close to Him
that one may the more value the times of nearer and
special communion with Him. With that habit we shall
be growing in spiritual communion with our Lord —
winning Him more and more to share our thoughts and
labors, and making prayer to Him more and more the
•atmosphere vital to our soul ; that so we love Him above
all things, making His Word and Will more and more the
standard of our lives, and turning to Him incessantly in
our secret thoughts, as to our best, and closest and dearest
friend — one Who is always ready and waiting to be
gracious. If there were nothing else to love in the Church, we
might well cling to her for preserving among us the
truth, that God is always waiting to be gracious ; that the
differences between times and seasons of which we some
times speak, are always of our own making, and in our
selves and not in Him. And further, that to everyone

PAROCHIAL SERMONS.

admitted by Baptism into the Christian covenant, the
loving presence of Christ by the Spirit is pledged. The
intimate companionship between Christ and the believing
soul, of which the Word of God is so full, may be realized
by every baptized Christian if he will, and the Lord is
always ready to do His part, even if we are unready. He
knows His own sheep, He says, and calleth them all by
their names.
And who is there among His baptized children, who
does not know the Lord's eagerness and patience to win
him to walk with Him through life ? I think that most
of us need more thought of Christ in our Christianity —
more of the personal Saviour, instead of contenting our
selves with intellectual knowledge, and faith in the
Saviour's and in the Spirit's work for us.
Think for a moment of the relation of the first disciples
to their risen Lord. After He had ascended, they might
reason and talk about what we now call conscience, con
version, sanctification, and so on, having like occasion
often so to do.
But such words and things could never be mere
abstractions to them ; they were always full of Christ
their Lord. They might speak of their conscience, or
their heart, as the Apostle calls it ; its checks and remind
ers did not originate there, but were from their Lord.
They might discuss growth in grace, or they might rejoice
in special occasions and seasons of special fervor and
spiritual happiness ; all were Christ's works and gifts,
continued tokens of His love and care sent them from
God's right hand.
Now, would it not be better for us to find the personal
Saviour in like manner in every part of our spiritual life
and being ?
The conscience, for example, is no doubt a faculty in

WHITSUN DAY. 89

the human soul, and in moral treatises it may be no more.
But in our lives as Christian disciples, should we not in
the care and nurture of our spiritual nature, ever strive to
hear in the voice of conscience the voice of God ; knowing
that its calls, reproofs, awakenings,, warnings are His ;
that His Spirit is striving with us in them ; that it is the
chief means by which the Blessed Companion of our pil
grimage, as He longs to be, is guiding us in the way.
Which is better or more helpful? To think of our'
consciences coldly and scientifically, to accept it merely as
one of our faculties, and to follow it only as a matter of
duty ; or to consecrate it to the love of God by training it
in accordance with His will, that we may ever hear in its
secret impulses the voice of Him whom our soul loves ; to
find in it, constant guidance and watchfulness of our ever
present Saviour.
This is only an instance; no more. I need not — and
cannot— separate the faculties of the soul, or try to show
how each one. in its own way, can become the means of
our Saviour's communication with the individual soul. It
would be beyond human power to do it thoroughly.
Passions, affections, wills, intellects, all parts of our
spiritual, moral, mental natures are the instruments of
God the Holy Ghost, as well as the objects of His divine
operations. And then, outside of ourselves, Providence, no less than
grace, supplies Him with the means of communicating
with us, and changing us, and sanctifying us. What an
oft-repeated warning by our conscience may have failed
to do for us, is often done by some providential discipline.
The heart that would not learn the love of Christ, in spite
of all His gracious calls, is often turned to Him by the
providential withdrawal of its idols.
I have nothing new or unfamiliar to yo.u to say about

90 PAROCHIAL SERMONS.
Grace and Providence, the two great means and modes of
God's dealing with human souls. You know of them.
You have learned them by more or less experience. What
I plead for is, that you should bind them to the ever-
present Saviour in your thoughts and habits ; that, realizing
the love of Jesus for His own, and that He offers to be
more to you by His Spirit even than He was to those who
companied with Him on earth, you will feel Him present
and loving, in every change and chance of Grace and
Providence, from the greatest to the least. And I would
have you learn to believe that, as He holds out to you, as
the crown of heavenly blessedness, His presence and com
panionship for eternity, so He offers them to you already
in this life ; that, knowing you as His own, He wants you
to know Him and to see Him, and to feel and hear Him,
every hour you live ; to feel yourself sustained, guided,
accompanied by Him, to be in His loving presence as in an
atmosphere, whether you are conscious or unconscious of it.
And when I speak of Him — His presence, His love, His
companionship — I mean no distant Lord, far up in the
Heavens, away from us and our affairs ; but I mean Jesus
Who dwelt among us in the flesh ; Who was made
man for us ; Who lived our life ; Who can be touched
with the feeling of our infirmities ; Who died for us, and
having risen again and ascended to His own place, ever
liveth to make intercession for us. I mean that loving
Saviour, Who, when He left His own upon earth, to be no
more a man with men, sent forth His Spirit to abide with
them, by Whom and with Whom, He Himself, the same
yesterday, to-day and forever, vouchsafes His loving pres
ence and companionship to everyone who will accept it
and prize it.
And, Brethren, as you look back over your lives, or
even over the day past, can you not recall proofs enough

WHITSUN DAY. 91

that if you are not thus walking with your merciful God
and Saviour, it is your own fault and not His ? Has He
not shown you in every way that He desires it ? Has He
not offered it to you over and over again ? Whence come
the restraints, the convictions, the admonitions, the
reminders which have prevented your falling away from
God and good ? Whence the awakenings, the calls, the
good impulses, the fixed purposes and principles which
have brought you as far as your present point upon the
way of life ?
It seems to me to be a help to it to identify, as the
Lord surely meant us to do, the operation of the Holy
Spirit in our hearts and lives with His own loving pres
ence. It seems to me that in our human lives the more
we can hold fast to the Incarnate Son of God, the more
we can bring ourselves to see God in Him, the more we
can imagine — and it is no fiction to do it, saintly and
holy people in all ages of the faith have done it — the more
we can imagine Him as close at our side, loving and caring
for us, guiding and protecting us, even more perfectly
than He did His first disciples. And as this conviction
grows into the habit of daily Christian discipleship, the
more easily and constantly we shall obey the motions of
His good Spirit, and more carefully shall we walk in His
footsteps, and grow in meetness for His coming and His
glory. I dread the distant and the dim in religion, in this age
— the dream of spirituality which carries the dreamer
away from the substantial humanity of Christ and of His
Gospel — which would lead a life of obedience apart from
the ordinances and the Sacraments which Christ has bid
den us to observe. I rejoice with you that the Church
holds us to this immutable truth: that we, as members of
the Church, made such in our baptism, are members of

92 PAROCHIAL SERMONS.
His body, of His flesh and of His bones, as an Apostle
teaches, continually made to feel His presence and His
Spirit. This Presence, to be available in our individual life,
must be a personal possession. The Church holds these
blessings for all. God forbid that we should ever drift
away into that wretched condition which seeks them apart
from the Church, and even denies their possession to the
Church. Within the sacred fold of the Good Shepherd,
blessed, as a whole, with His tender and unwearied care,
it is the duty of each one, for himself, to know the Shep
herd, and to be known of Him, in the ever-growing
experience and trial one of the o'ther, in the vicissitudes
of this earthly discipline.
Now, the idea of the Christian life as one spent in the
loving presence and companionship of our Saviour — as
an intimate personal relation to Him — as the spending of
our days and hours with Him always with us — seems to
me one, that if we once grasp, cannot fail to elevate and
strengthen and help us. We want the living Christ; not
the Author of our religion only, nor the Lord Who bade
us occupy until He comes again, but the Saviour, who said,
"I will eome to you and abide with you;" "Without Me
ye can do nothing;" "Except ye abide in Me, ye cannot
bear fruit."
We want — every one of us — the personal Saviour,
foremost and first among our friends and intimates; the
sharer and companion of our lives, as they are: only, the
nearest and dearest of them all. He is always waiting to
be gracious, always ready with His divine sympathy and
help. And how ,are we meeting His advances ? I suppose
that almost everyone of us can recall occasions, when His
soul was filled with the sense of the Saviour's loving

WHITSUN DAY. 93

presence. In sickness, in sorrow, sometimes we seem
almost to hear His voice. And sometimes in worship we
may have known that ecstacy for a time. The Church,
our wise and blessed guide, restrains us from exalting
these happy moments into evidences of spiritual life, the
lack of which would show us to be without life, if so
considered. They are special favors of our dear Lord,
granted now and then as He sees to be good for us, and
withheld again by the same unerring wisdom. Christ's
presence does not produce a life of continued ecstacy.
Ecstacy is not for us in our state of probation ; but we
may have peace, quiet confidence, and loving , trust ; a
knowledge of our Lord's love which is the result of experi
ence of it, and which enables us to rest in it, instinctively,
as the little child counts on his mother's love, or, to take
the Saviour's own image, as the sheep comes to know the
shepherd, and to follow whithersoever he leadeth.
How may we attain to this ? First, by making it the
end and aim of life ; understanding the importance, nay,
the absolute necessity of attaining unto it.
As Churchmen we know that it is no folly to talk
about degrees or kinds of the Divine Presence. He is
omnipresent certainly, but so was the Lord God when the
cloud filled the Tabernacle, or the Temple, betokening His
special presence there. And so we look for the Lord our
Saviour in the house which is called by His Name — with
the gathered two or three — in all the ordinances and official
acts of His Church and Ministry ; but above all in that
Sacrament wherein we are made members of His Body,
and in that other Sacrament of His dying and undying
love, wherein He feeds the souls of His faithful disciples,
who feel the moments to be the most precious moments
of earthly life, when Christ meets them at His own Board
and gives them Himself to be their spiritual food and
sustenance.

94 PAROCHIAL SERMONS.
Let us be very careful and very sure, to hold Christ
before the eyes of our faith in every public approach to
Him, in every solemnity of His Church. And then bind
together these occasions by an unbroken remembrance
and consciousness of the Saviour's loving presence.
Leave Him not in Church or Chapel. He will go with
us wherever we go, to duty or pleasure, to study or recrea
tion, to company or solitude. We may learn to feel Him
always at our side, as His Saints have done. We may
learn to turn to Him habitually, instinctively, in any
need, with any passing thought or feeling, in any sudden
joy or care, just as we would to some dear human friend
with whom at intervals we open our hearts for sympathy.
Cultivate the habit and practice of ejaculatory prayer.
Call the dear Lord to your side by a word or sentence now
and then, which shall tell Him your need at the moment.
Commit to memory His own Word, that He may find it
in your souls, to teach you its unexpected meanings and
applications. In your private prayers ask Him always to
abide with you, with full confidence that He will do so;
that He is with you; that He is watching for you; that
your sin will grieve Him; that at no instant can you turn
to Him — no matter what the emergency — that His patient,
loving, long-suffering, divine, and yet human, heart will
not beat with true sympathy and instant care for your
soul, which is, and longs to be, His own.

XL
THE TRINITY IN UNITY.
Preached at S. James' , Milwaukee, 1880.
Go ye therefore and teach all nations, Baptizing them in
the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy
Ghost. — S. Matthew, xxviii., 19.
In these solemn words Christ commissioned His Apos
tles. The language bears the impress of divine authority.
As the Baptismal formula, it is by His prescription, a
perpetual standing law to His Church, designating the
character of the allegiance which we profess in the
sacrament of the Font ; importing that whereas we are
Baptized in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and
of the Holy Ghost, we are thereby baptized into the
Faith, the service, and the worship of the Holy Trinity.
In issuing this commission, the Saviour assumes the
authority which pertains to the Creator and Lord of the
soul. The character in which He speaks to His ministers, is
that of tbe co-eternal Son of God, one of the equal
Persons in the Trinity ; and He sends them forth to build
the Church upon this eternal foundation — Faith in the
Triune God. Upon this Rock the spiritual building was
to rest. The nations of the world were to be baptized in the
name of three Persons, in the same manner, and therefore
in the same sense, as in the name of One.

96 PAROCHIAL SERMONS.
Whatever honor, reverence, regard is paid to the
Father in this solemn rite is evidently paid to all. As
the object of adoration, as the source of grace, there is in
the triple personality, one only God.
The outward act respects all Three ; the inward mean
ing and signification must do the same.
The very wording of the form indicates not only
sameness of nature, but also unity and equality, without
any note of distinction more than that of a personal
relation. It is not the joining together of two creatures and one
Creator ; it is not in the name of the Holy God and His
two faithful Servants, but the One living and true God in
the distinct personality of Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.
This is surely the doctrine implied in the text, and the
entire Revelation of Scripture evolves and confirms this
belief. Belief in the Divinity of God the Father is the basis
not only of revealed, but also of natural religion. It is
the universal Creed of humanity.
As regards the second Person in the Trinity, every
book, almost every chapter of God's Revealed Word, is
instinct with the Divinity of the Messiah. Not only in
the rapt vision of the Evangelic Prophet, and the eagle
flights of S. John, and the clear logical arguments of S.
Paul ; but even in the Law, the Prophets, and the Gospels
there is a vitality, expressive of the Godhead of Him by
Whose spirit the whole Scriptures were animated and
inspired. Let any person in whose mind there are doubts as to
the Divinity of Christ, read carefully one of the Gospels,
noting the assertions therein, which Jesus of Nazareth
makes of Himself.
Take, for instance, the x., xi., xix., xxv. and xxviii. chap-

THE TRINITY IN UNITY. 97
i
ters of S. Matthew ; and you will find plain and
unequivocal affirmations, that Christ is Almighty ; that
nnto Him "all power is given in Heaven and in earth."
That He will give to all who sacrifice temporal interests
for His Name's sake, the blessing of Everlasting Life.
That He will sit on the Throne of His Glory as the Christ,
the Son of the Blessed, to judge with final judgment the
gathered hosts of earth. That in comparison with devo
tion towards Him, all human affections are to be esteemed
second and inferior; and that wherever the Gospel is
preached, and with all who meet in His Name, He is ever
present ; promising to all who believe and obey, the bliss
of unending life with Him in Heaven.
Can man, of his mere manhood, prescribe the terms of
human Salvation ? And are not all the promises attached
to these commandments of such a nature as nothing short
of Omnipotence can realize ?
Nor may one say that the effect of His words is
exaggerated. Not a sentence of all that He spoke on earth, but
carries on the face of it, His intention that it should make
an indelible impression on every one who heard it, or to
whom it should be made known. He puts the weight of
eternity upon every word he speaks — " Heaven and earth
shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away."
Are we to doubt expressions of language, and explain
away the gravity of truth, when in the words of Christ
we are brought face to face with a mystery, which is
universally felt to be the most solemn that can affect the
heart and soul of man?
The words which He spoke are to be weighed by every
human being for life or death. The service to which He
called His disciples was a life service. There was no cer
tain promise in this world but the cross ; the crown He

98 PAROCHIAL SERMONS.
defers to another life. Surely the crown of everlasting
life can be at the absolute disposal of God only. But
Jesus of Nazareth alleges the gift to be entirely in His
hands. He promises it to the righteous as His gift. " Who
ever shall do these things for My Name's sake shall inherit
everlasting life."
The redemption of such a promise can be effected only
by the omnipotence of Him Who has promised, and such
omnipotence is a proof of Divinity. The consciousness
of this Divinity is manifest in all the teachings of the
Saviour. He testifies of realities, in the midst of which He had
reigned as God. There was nothing abstract or separate
from Himself, in the doctrines which He taught.
They were to Him simply facts of Himself ; the
Revelation of which, as the knowledge of the True God
and of His Kingdom of Everlasting Life. He came down
in His Incarnate state to communicate to mankind.
Men do not often realize, until they are shadowed and
benighted in the darkness of misbelief and practical in
fidelity, to what an awful precipice the denial of the God
head of Christ brings them. They fail to read in the
history and punishment of the Jews, the eternal condem
nation that passes upon all who in their spirit deny the
Lord, Who bought them with His blood.
" The Jews beheld Christ exercising uncontrollable
power over nature. They felt His spiritual power over
their own souls. They listened to doctrines, which it
needed no philosophy to tell them could be exemplified
only by human nature — their own and the heathen alike
— by human nature every where sustaining the cross of
shame and suffering." They did not say that He was
mere man. They asked Him who and what He was, and

THE TRINITY IN UNITY. 99
whose authority He bore and represented. He told them
He was God as well as man ; the God of Abraham, Isaac
and Jacob, the I AM of eternity ; the future Judge of the
universe. For that they crucified Him, because, as they
rightly said, He made Himself equal with God. Him they
crucified Whom, in the blindness and bigotry of their
hate, they had denounced as the Prince of evil : " Said
we not truly Thou art a Samaritan and hast a devil? "
And when any system of human fashioning rejects
that article of the Christian Creed,1 which professes faith
in Christ as God ; by this rejection it solves the mystery
of the mission of the Holy One, as the Jews sought its
solution in the judgment hall and upon Calvary. No view
other than that delivered to and by the Church — the pro
fession in the Creed that Christ is God, of the substance
of His Father ; begotten before all worlds ; that He is
man of the substance of His mother, born into the world
— can make intelligible the facts of the life of Christ.
The Faith of the Church explains every prophecy,
which, during the long ages of Israel's expectation, sus
tained the hope of a nation by the reiterated promise of a
Saviour's birth ; and the Gospel record of His life and
death, as interpreted by the Church, completes by fulfill
ing the canon of Messianic prediction.
When, on the other hand, men follow the wild vagaries
of Arius or Socinius ; when they try to bring down to the
test of a narrow, human philosophy a question which, in
its very nature, is above finite reason — just as the compre
hension of our own spiritual being is above it — they are
seeking rest in a compromise between truth and falsehood,
which is, of all half-truths, most hopeless ; for it is leading
them ever onward upon a troubled sea of mistiness and
doubt. All systems of misbelief in this direction have made

100 PAROCHIAL SERMONS.
the incomprehensibility of the mystery of Christ's Incar
nation a stumbling-block to its reception as a truth. As
if He who made us — each one of us incarnate spirits —
could not Himself become Incarnate in human form ! We
are all incarnations of created spirits — emanations from
the Source of all spiritual being. Christ was the Incar
nation of the All-creating, Eternal Spirit Himself.
Surely, language cannot define more explicitly and
unequivocally the character of God, as the Creator of all
things, than the words which S. Paul applies to Him Who
has made peace by the blood of the Cross : "For by Him
were all things created that are in heaven, and that are in
earth ; visible and invisible ; whether they be thrones, or
dominions, or principalities, or powers ; all things were
created by Him, and for Him, and He is before all things,
and by Him all things consist" (Col., i., 16, 17).
It is because of the irresistible testimony of Holy
Scripture, to the fact of the Incarnation, as the basis-truth
of human salvation, that the Church puts forward a fact,
and not a mere feeling, as the ground of man's justification
by faith. It is not the mere faculty of faith that she urges ; but
belief in the objective matter of faith she makes the
requisite of salvation.
She lays stress on faith in no abstract sense whatever ;
but faith in Jesus Christ, as the Son of God, offered for
us upon the Cross. This is the faith of the Creeds ; this
was the faith of the Apostolic Church.
The Christian Priesthood went forth, bearing, in the
commission to disciple and baptize the nations of the
world, the authority of God, received from the lips, and
with the blessing of Christ, the Word of God, the King
of Angels, the Lord of Hosts, the Majesty of Heaven, the
fulness of Infinity, the Disposer of the destinies of eternity;

THE TRINITY IN UNITY. 101
of Him before Whom every knee shall bow, and Whose
glory every tongue shall confess.
Belief in the Divinity of Christ must ever be the
cardinal doctrine of the Christian Church ; for it carries
with it and works out the whole scheme of salvation.
Christ Himself made it the Rock of the Faith. "Whom
do ye say that I am?" was His inquiry of the apostles.
And in S. Peter's answer we have the substance of the
Creeds : " Thou art the Christ, the Son of the Living God."
From this point the Catholic Church has never shrunk
or receded. During the widespread Arian heresy, people
began to say, " I believe Jesus Christ was the Son of God,
in a certain sense." Forthwith, the Church of the Apostles,
full of their spirit, and possessed of their hereditary mind,
in the Council of Nice, instantly intensified her Creed :
"God of God, Light of Light, Very God of Very God;
begotten, not made ; by Whom all things were made."
Thus the reverent faith of Christendom bowed down
before the incomparable majesty of the Incarnate God.
And the position of the Church was then, and has been
ever since, firm and unyielding ; because the Rock whereon
she stood was that upon which the blessed Saviour had
planted her.
With equal reason that Christ cannot be a mere man —
as one of us — so neither can the Holy Ghost be regarded
as a property or quality only of the Father.
We arrive at this conclusion, when we remember that
the Holy Spirit is described in Scripture as the immediate
Author and Worker of Miracles ; the Inspirer of prophets
and apostles ; the Searcher of all hearts, and the Paraclete,
the Comforter./
To lie to Him, is the same thing as to lie to God.
Blasphemy against Him is unpardonable. To resist Him,
is the same thing as to resist God.

102 PAROCHIAL SERMONS.
He is God, and knows the mind of God as perfectly as
'a man knows his own mind, and that in respect of all
things, even the deep things of God.
The bodies of men are His temple, .and, by being His
temple, are the temple of God. He is joined with God the
Father, not only in the solemn form of Baptism, but in
the Invocation for Grace and Peace, and in the authori
tative mission and vocation of the Priesthood. It was the
Holy Ghost Who said, " Separate Me Barnabas and Saul;"
and from these evidences of Divinity and personality, we
believe in God the Holy Ghost.
"Not only are we enabled to bring testimony for the
Divinity of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit ; but, in a
great number of instances, we shall find that the very
same things are said, in different places of Scripture, of
all the three Divine Persons, and the very same actions
ascribed to Them. The whole Trinity is said to be eternal,
holy, living, true; everywhere present; to have made man;'
to instruct and illuminate him ; to lead us ; to speak to us ;
to be with us ; to give authority to the Church ; to
sanctify the elect ; to perform every divine and spiritual
operation, and to raise the dead ; and in the three Persons
there is one God, from everlasting to everlasting." (Bishop
Home on The Trinity.)
Many seem to apprehend that the doctrine of the
Ever-blessed Trinity, as implied in the words of the text,
and abundantly confirmed by the testimonies of Scripture,
is a mere speculative doctrine — of no particular effect or
importance in the religious life.
Now, the doctrine of most importance to every human
being, is that of his Redemption from sin and sorrow ;
from death and hell ; to righteousness and joy, immor
tality and glory.
Of such Redemption, what account do the Scriptures

THE TRINITY IN UNITY. 103
give ? Plainly, the union of the three Persons of the
Trinity, in the execution of the gracious scheme of human
Salvation. And what is Christianity but a manifestation of the
three Divine Persons, as engaged in the great work of
man's Redemption ; begun, continued, and to be ended by
them in their several relations of Father, Son, and Holy
Ghost ; Creator, Redeemer, Sanctifier ; three Persons in
One God.
If there be no Son of God, where is our Redemption ?
If there be no Holy Spirit, where is our Sanctification ?
Without both, where is our Salvation ? And if these two
Persons be anything less than Divine, why are we baptized
in the Name of the Father, and of the Son,. and of the
Holy Ghost ?
There is always great danger that in our consideration
of eternal truths, we shall allow our minds to be diverted
by selfish thoughts and influences.
There is ever a tendency, and a temptation, to make
individual experiences, rather than doctrinal teachings,
matters of meditation. Now, it is not of the greatest
practical importance to others, to know in what way the
messages of God's love have affected us — of less use to us,
are the thoughts and speculations of others upon the
various philosophic questions which have grown, as it
were, out of the promulgation of the Gospel.
To a greater or less degree, the experiences and medita
tions of earnest souls, will ever enter into practical
theology. To their consideration we owe much that
strengthens us for the active duties of life. But theology
is by no means the record, simply, of a religious sentiment
in man ; its details are not exclusively those of sinful man
striving upward to his God ; but it is first, and principally,
a record of a Divine Revelation from God, of what He

104 PAROCHIAL SERMONS.
has announced to men of His Being; of what He has
taught us of His attributes ; of His manifestations of
Wisdom, and Love, and Righteousness, and Truth.
In the consideration of Christian doctrines — as of that
of the Ever Blessed Trinity — we should learn to measure
the value of truths, which are revealed to us in Holy
Scripture, by the utterance which they contain of God's
Glory ; for it is only thus that we will make them, in deed
and in fact, practical truths. It is what God has declared
of Himself ; the Revelation of His downward looking
upon men, that must be taught to give permanency and
value to religious teachings.
It is for this reason that every time we meet together
in the Church for divine service, we repeat the symbol of
faith ; rehearsing in plain, concise language, the divine
plan of Salvation.
That it was the Son of God Who took our nature upon
Him, and in that nature, made a full and sufficient obla
tion, satisfaction, and atonement, for the sins of the whole
world. It was the Father Who accepted such oblation, satis
faction, and atonement ; and in consequence forgave those
sins. It was the Holy Spirit, Who came forth from the
Father and the Son ; and through the preaching of the
Word, and the administration of the Sacraments, by His
enlightening, healing, and comforting grace, to apply to
the hearts of men for all purposes of pardon, sanctifica
tion, and salvation, the merits and benefits of Christ's
Atonement. That in these Holy Persons, there is One God ; and
that upon this belief the Church is founded.
When, on the other hand, human experiences are
substituted for God's Truth, it is as if men would till the

THE TRINITY IN UNITY. 105
lower fields, and yet cut off the upper springs, the fertil
izing stream from above.
But the profession of a true Faith will not profit one,
in the conduct of whose life the fruits of good works are
not seen. For in the perfection of Christian character,
these are indissolubly united. "Without holiness no man
shall see the Lord." It is the utterance of One, Who,
requiring the fruit of gopd works, gives us strength and
ability to bring them forth. He has provided for us the
precious Blood of the Lamb, and offered us the assistance
of the Holy Spirit, that we may be enabled to serve the
True and Living God, in Whom we believe.
And may He Who has given us Grace, by the confession
of a true faith to acknowledge the Glory of the Eternal
Trinity, and in the Power of the Divine Majesty to wor
ship the Unity, keep us evermore steadfast in His Faith
and Love ; that when His Kingdom is come, and His Glory
shall appear, we shall be prepared to behold His face in
Righteousness.

XII.
THE FAITHFUL DEPARTED.
Preached at All Saints' Cathedral, Milwaukee, All Saints' Day,
1886.
Blessed are the dead which die in the Lord from hence
forth ; yea, saith the Spirit, that they may rest from their
labours. — Bevelation, xiv., 13.
The Church's year is drawing to its end. S. Andrew's
Day is the next festival she keeps for saint or martyr ; and
her year begins with the commemoration of him who was
the first Apostle of Christ.
To-day we gather up the memory of all the saints
mentioned in Holy Scripture, who are not included under
any one of the special commemorations of the calendar —
a fitting conclusion of the Church's holy seasons of Fast
and Festival. She has dwelt through the year on the
lives of the saints, and she has now gathered them into
her bosom, and they are at rest.
Another feature of this Festival, and that which
makes it unspeakably precious to the Christian heart is,
that to-day we commemorate, not only the recorded saints
of the Word of God, and the nameless ones of all ages
who led saintly lives, and have gone to their reward ; but
as many as we have ourselves ever loved and lost.
So wide is the scope of All Saints' Day, that it
embraces the memory of our own saintly departed ones;
and in our secret hearts we may well — on such a day, and
at the altar of their Lord and ours — set their precious
memories specially before us, bless God for their holy

THE FAITHFUL DEPARTED. 107
examples, and pray for grace, so to "follow them in all
virtuous and Godly living, that we may come at last to ,
those unspeakable joys which God hath prepared for them
that unfeignedly love Him," and with them be partakers
of His Heavenly Kingdom.
Now, when we think of those who are departed, that
they may rest from their labors, the first thought, very
naturally, is, Where are they? The answer of the Church,
as the interpreter of Holy Scripture, is, that they are in
Paradise: not yet in Heaven; for S. Paul says that with
out us they shall not be made perfect. We are told, too,
that the penitent thief, on the day he died, went some
where where our Lord was. The Saviour called that place
Paradise. He did not mean Heaven, and the presence of
God the Father; for, after His Resurrection, He said to
Mary, "I am not yet ascended to My Father; but go to
My brethren, and say unto them, 'I ascend unto My
Father and your Father, to My God and your God.' "
In the Apocalypse vouchsafed to the beloved Disciple,
the souls of the saints cry, "Oh Lord! how long?" show
ing that they are still waiting for something to complete
their joy. We are told, "when we depart, we are with
Christ, which is far better."
Again, "when we are absent from the body, we are
present with the Lord," meaning, evidently, some time
before the Resurrection, because then we shall have our
bodies. It would appear, therefore, that after death the souls
of the faithful are to be in full enjoyment of Christ, and
by no means in a state of unconsciousness.
For a soul to be insensible cannot be ; its very life is
perception. How the soul does perceive in the other
state, we do not know ; nor does it matter to us. We
must say with S. Paul, " I cannot tell, God knoweth."

108 PAROCHIAL SERMONS.
We know no more of it than a child before birth knows
what this world is ; or a man born blind knows of color.
But that the Saints in Paradise are at rest, we do know ;
and from the words of S. Paul — in Heb. xii., 22, 23 — we
may infer that they are in a place full of light and
heavenly vision ; a place where mysteries may be heard
and learned, far above mortal ears ; a glorious place where
souls are happy without the body.
In the parable, it is said that Lazarus was carried by
the angels into Abraham's bosom ; and the Saviour would
not speak of this, and of the thief being in Paradise, if it
did not mean the place of departed spirits ; since it was in
this sense that the JeAvs understood the words.
There is preserved in an ancient burial service, the use
of one of these terms : "the good souls after death go
into the region of the godly, released from their bodies ;
into the bosom of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and of all
those who have pleased God, and obeyed His will from the
beginning of the world. Where all sorrow, and grief,
and mourning, are banished."
As Paradise is the blissful home, so rest is the blessed
portion of those whom the holy Church throughout the
world this day commemorates ; the faithful departed — the
Saints of God.
S. Paul speaks of the Saints unseen, as of those who
sleep in Jesus.
We call our burial grounds cemeteries, or sleeping
places ; because there we lay the beloved ones to sleep on
and take their rest. But let us not think of them as
sleeping silent and alone in the grave where the body is
buried, but as entered into their rest ; the glorious, angelic
rest of praise and adoration in the Paradise of God. And
what a rest for wearied humanity ! from bitterness of
soul and burden of wrong ; from unkindness and disap-

THE FAITHFUL DEPARTED. 109

pointments ; from withered hopes and desolation of heart !
They rest, too, from the weight of the body of our
humiliation ; from its sufferings and pains. Their last
sickness is over ; they shall never again bear the tokens of
coming dissolution. No more, for them, the hollow eye,
the sharp lines of distress, the hues of fading loveliness.
Never again shall they know weariness or weakness ; their
broken words are changed into the perfection of praise,
and their sighings and weepings into chaunts of bliss.
They rest, also, from their warfare against sin — against
all its strength, and subtleties, and snares. Satan can
tempt no more ; the world cannot lure ; self cannot
betray. They have wrestled out the strife with the unseen
powers of the wicked one, and they have won the mastery.
There is no more inward struggle ; no sliding back again;
no swerving aside ; no danger of falling ; for they rest
from the bufferings of evil in themselves.
There is nothing in our earthly warfare which is such
a burden for the earnestly-striving, faithful disciple, as the
consciousness that evil dwells in his inmost soul ; unholy
tempers, bad thoughts, wicked imaginations shooting
across the mind, flashing out in unguarded moments,
responding to temptations from without.
How often, groaning under this oppressive weight,
trembling as a man weary and breathless, grappling with
a foe from whom there must be deliverance, or there will
be death, has S. Paul's cry of agony been pressed from the
heart, " 0 wretched man that I am ! who will deliver me
from the body of this death ? "
But never is this hard, solemn problem solved, until
all the griefs and fears, and trials of mortal probation are
swallowed up in the grave. The sin that dwelt in the soul
died when, through death, the saints of God entered into

110 PAROCHIAL SERMONS.
the rest of Paradise. It is only when they have passed
from earth, that sin and death have no more dominion
over them. They escaped as a bird out of the snare of
the fowler ; the snare was broken, and they were delivered.
It is in the change that we call death, that the unclothed
spirit passes beyond the affections of decay. There is no
weakness, nor weariness, nor wasting away, nor wandering
of the burdened spirit ; it is disenthralled and lives its
own life, unmingled and buoyant. When the coil of this
body is unloosed, death has done all, his power is spent ;
thenceforth and forever the sleeping soul in the Rest of
Paradise and the bliss of Heaven, lives mightily unto
God. Nor have we any reason to believe that in the inter
mediate state there is any loss of personal identity. Dives,
who is represented in the Parable as being in Hades, which
bears the same relation to Gehenna, or the place of everlast
ing punishment, as Paradise does to Heaven, both recognized
Lazarus, who was in Abraham's bosom in Paradise, and
was himself recognized. And surely we may, in reliance
upon God's Word, cherish the belief, that while the faith
ful departed are ever reaching onward in spirit to the day
of Christ's coming, and in that holy waiting, adore as the
brightness of Paradise ever waxes into the perfect day,
they are not unmindful of us of earth, and of the varying
chances of our Christian warfare.
They await us now — the holy ones of God — the jewels
which from the beginning He has been gathering. They
await us in the enjoyment of that Rest which is glorious,
and only less perfect than the glory of His Kingdom,
when the new creation shall be accomplished.
As the lesson of the Church's commemoration of the
faithful departed, to which she invites us by the services
of All Saints' Day, let us dwell often upon these thoughts..

THE FAITHFUL DEPARTED. Ill
We should not fear death ; for death is a pledge of Rest,
and a prophecy of the Resurrection ; nor should we mourn
and wail for those who have fallen asleep in Jesus, for
they rest in Paradise. But we should learn to fear life
with all its snares, and chances, and trials, and well we
may weep for the living, the thoughtless, careless living ;
for the living have yet to die.
And if the passing of the soul away from earth is
awful, even to the saints of God, what must it be to those
whose vivid consciousness of evil deeds anticipates the
condemnation that awaits their appearing in God's
presence ? We should not fear death ; for, though we
cannot hide from ourselves that it is a strange and awful
thing, alien from a living spirit — that it is a something
against which nature struggles, and in struggling suffers
agony ; still, we must acknowledge that life, and all that
it contains — thought, and speech, and deed, and will — is
more yet to be feared.
Only let us fear life, and we shall not be afraid to die.
Fear it, in that we realize that in life is the unending
warfare of good and ill; that in every hour of it we are
growing better or worse. It is the fearless trifling with
life and its vast powers, capacities, probation, and respon
sibility, that should make us tremble.
And how can we but fear, in view of the chances and
changes of this mortal life ! Who can foresee the trials
and temptations, the swervings and fallings, which may
come upon him before the hour of death? Who can but
fear his own heart's treachery? And who that is in
earnest will not heed the apostolic exhortation: "Work
out your salvation with fear and trembling"? It is fear-
fulness in life that robs death of its most poignant fear.
Not that it is other than a dread presence to the living
soul, and fearful to the flesh. The utterance of a faithful

112 PAROCHIAL SERMONS.
 I
missionary of the Cross, upon his deathbed, was, " Brother,
it is an awful thing to die ; unspeakably awful to appear
before God ; the best preparation falls unutterably short."
And yet, a life of preparation — earnest, faithful, and in
the fear of God — is that whereby the darkness of death is
pierced with rays of living light, and the gloom of its
dread presence softened with the radiance of eternal peace.
Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord. In them
the work of the new creation is well nigh accomplished.
They have passed within the veil, and there remaineth
only one more change for them — a change full of fore
seen, foretasted bliss.
Let us weep not for them, but for ourselves, weak and
sinful that we are ; burdened with a dying body ; beset by
temptations ; often overcome, and weeping often in bitter
ness of soul ; struggling on with fainting hearts — and may
it ever be with faithful though fearful ones — toward that
dark shadow beneath which they have passed.
Let us therefore be much in thought with them that
are at rest. It is well for us to carry about in the activi
ties of daily life the memories of those who are now in
Paradise ; to recall the words and lessons which holy lives
impressed upon our hearts, for such memorials strengthen
the will, purify the heart, and often, like words of prayer,
revive the fainting soul.
But especially to-day, and at the altar, let their memo
ries be cherished, for on this occasion the Holy Eucharist
is verily to us, the Communion of Saints. It was in the
breaking of bread that their eyes were opened to read
' aright the wondrous story of the Cross of Christ. It was
their strength while they lived, and their last blessed
support upon the bed of death. They were strengthened
in their last temptations by it, and it bore them up when
their feet touched the waveless tide of the dark river. It

THE FAITHFUL DEPARTED. 113
was the last means by which they approached near Christ,
and with its holy dew upon their lips, they entered into
the rest of Paradise.
Let the same Eucharistic Feast be now our chiefest
joy ; that, at the last, we may experience its full blessed
ness of strength and consolation, and go hence in the
comfort of a reasonable, religious, and holy hope.

OCCASIONAL SERMONS,

i.
A SERMON ON PRESIDENT LINCOLN'S ASSASr
SINATION.
Preached in Christ Church, Red Wing, Minn., on Easter Sunday ,
1865.
The Lord is King — be the people never so impatient.
He sitteth between the Cherubim — be the earth never so
unquiet. — Psalm xcix, 1. Prayer Book Version.
Never in the history of our land has the mind of the
Nation been so surcharged with sorrow and dread ; with
forebodings so inexpressibly fearful as upon this morning.
Never has its pulse beaten quick with such unwonted
emotions, as those which now stir to its prof oundest depth
the heart of this whole people.
Sunday after Sunday from the many pulpits of the
land, the solemn theme of death and of eternity, suggests
words of entreaty and exhortation. It is the great, the
perpetual burthen of their discourse, to whom is committed
the preaching of the Gospel of Christ. From age to age
it is the one tremendous monotone ; it is ever the same,
for the consequences of that sin which brought death
into the world are ever the same ; unchangeable, though
with endless repetitions and variations in transmission;
unchangeable as eternity itself. Men listen, and yet,
week after week, many there are who go out from the

116 OCCASIONAL SERMONS.
House of God with scarcely a thought of the message they
have listened to, so fixed, as to be wrought into the woof
¦ and texture of the questionings and habits of daily life.
But only a few hours ago, events, stamped in blood
and crime upon the darkest page of our country's history,
became the preacher to this Nation. Of those figures of
rhetoric which a great master of that art characterized as
" the graces taught in the schools — the costly ornaments
and studied contrivances of speech" — we have nothing
here, only the stern and awful logic of cause and effect.
The Assassin and the Death ; these are facts so disastrous
and so afflictive, that a nation reels and bows itself in
bitter poignancy of grief.
As if to augment the contrast between the excitement
and fulness of life on the one hand, and the perishable
tenure of its glories on the other, the blow which staggers
belief, the intelligence we find so hard to credit, comes at
a time when the national heart is beating quick with
tidings of victory ; when Hope had plumed her wing for
that flight which, already anticipated, was carrying our
hearts onward to the blessedness of peace and quiet.
Thousands and thousands throughout our land, had, in
anticipation, blended their Easter anthems with feelings
of gratitude to Almighty God, that in His good providence,
the day of a restored Nationality seemed dawning upon
our long-stricken country.
How dark the cloud may be which is now lowering so
ominously above the Capitol, He only knows Who holds
in His hands the hearts of rulers and the destinies of
nations. Under any circumstances, the death of a Chief
Magistrate, during his term of office, is an event which
naturally would startle the nation. If, day by day, from
the chamber of sickness, there should come the dispatched
history and progress of disease, there would be a deeper

president Lincoln's assassination. 117
emotion in all our hearts when the long expected
announcement of death followed, than in any other
instance of mortality, except where personal interest and
attachment existed. The daily records of death are
crowded with names. Every obituary may be the index
of hours of sickness and agony. It suggests to the imag
ination, hosts of weeping friends, and the varied sorrows
of acquaintances. We read them not unfeelingly — yet
without deep emotion.
But how our spirits were stirred within us — how sad
and heavy were all our hearts, when we heard the sad
intelligence which yesterday flashed grief and woeful
astonishment through the land. At the time, when, more
markedly that at any period since his first inauguration,
the President was drawing to himself the hearts of this
whole people ; when, day by day, the blessed tokens of
conciliation and love were becoming again the badges of
sundered States, the nation is startled by rumors so ter
rible in their nature, that while we wished not to believe,
we could not, from the moment we had heard the report, '
throw off the incubus which weighs so sorely and so
heavily upon us. Whether ills and calamities, sorer than
the sorest afflictions of the past, may not grow out of the
results of this fearful crime, we hardly dare ask ourselves.
Death has read a terrible lesson to us. But whatever
may be wrought for our weal, or for our woe, beneath the
shadowing cloud which now is dark and gloomy enough,
the rescue and the refuge of the Christian patriot is at the
foot of the Cross of Christ ; his weapon of defense from
"those evils which the craft and subtilty of the devil or
man worketh against us," are words of earnest, faithful
prayer. And he who in the true Christian spirit feels that all
countries are prospered, only in proportion as they make

118 OCCASIONAL SERMONS.
God their guide and governor ; who is impressed with the
solemn conviction,[that He, Who sanctifies affliction to the
individual heart, can soften and heal the heart of the
nation in the hour of its calamity, will surely neither for
get nor fail to make his morning and evening supplica
tions more fervent, more earnest than heretofore, to the
Lord of all ; that in His mercy He may overrule the
machinations of wicked men ; that He may direct the
councils of the state ; that He may give wisdom and
judgment to those in whose hands, as far as men may
dispose, the shaping of events may be ; that He may
inspire them with the profound, practical conviction, that
they are the ministers and vice-gerents of Him Who is the
Prince of Peace, and that it is at once their duty and their
privilege, to carry on the work so nobly begun by him for
whom a nation mourns, tending to the blessed consumma
tion of the hopes of the people ; that the skill of our
great Captains, and the long-enduring patience and
unswerving courage of the armies of the Union, may have
their high and ardently-coveted reward.
In God only in this hour of darkness, is our hope and
strength; for, be the people never so impatient, He is the
King of all the World ; be the earth never so unquiet, He
sitteth between the Cherubim.
At first, it might seem inappropriate that the draped
flag of the Republic should hang this day above the Altar,
when that Altar is vested in festal white, and radiant with
Easter flowers and the sacred vessels. But as the service
has proceeded, all hearts must have been impressed with
the wonderful adaptiveness of the Liturgy, to the unlooked-
for coincidence, of grief so penetrating and universal, and
a Service of high and holy joy ; a nation's sorrow embalmed,
as it were, in the anthems and lessons of the Church's

president Lincoln's assassination. 119
most joyous festival, and yet, not an inharmonious strain,
not a discordant note.
Nor is it strange ; for in the presence of death we learn
the preciousness of the doctrine of the Resurrection. At
the grave-side, as at no other place, the lesson of Easter is
carried as a sublime conviction to the heart. And this is
true, whether the heaped-up earth may cover the mortal
remains of the chief ruler of a great nation, or the child
of some rude, peasant home; whether a single mourner, in
solitude, muses in the silent acre of God, upon the glories
of that day when God shall make all things new, or whether
a nation stands hushed and awed into grief, at the narrow
portal, within which the impersonation of its magisterial
power and dignity has passed forever from the sight of
men. At the grave-side we learn how the bright and
glorious Easter sun has shone upon, and dissipated the
gloom and sadness of the burying-ground ; for it is through
the grave and gate of death, that we pass to the joyful
Resurrection of the dead.
There is a vision of spiritual blessedness which greets
us everywhere on the morning of Easter Day. Read in
the light of the Easter sun, how all things remind us of
our heavenly heritage. The children that we love are
transfigured, as it were, in its rays of brightness and of
glory. "To-day," one has truly said, "we may forget that
they are children of this world, born to earthly pleasures,
earthly occupations, earthly sorrows, and earthly sins."
We may regard them only as having been, once for all,
baptized into the death of Christ, signed with His precious
cross, made heirs with Him of the unending glories of the
better world. The friends that we mourn — upon their
graves the Easter sun is shining, and theirs and ours is
the certain hope of the Resurrection of the dead. "If
they sleep with Christ, their sepulchre, like His, is in a

120 OCCASIONAL SERMONS.
garden now. Oh ! sow it plenteously with holy thoughts ;
for it is, in truth, a kindly soil for faith, and hope, and
love, and each spotless desire and heavenly affection of the
heart." Manifold are the blessings and the privileges which
are the heritage of the Resurrection. The greatest blessing
and privilege of all, are to be found there in the pledges of
His love and the memorials of His death, Who died, and
was buried, and rose again, for us. Though risen, He is
spiritually there. In. the gloom, on Friday night, a great
stone was placed at the mouth of the sepulchre, and a seal
was set upon it. But very early this morning, the seal
was broken, and the stone rolled away, and a vision of
angels announced to the wondering disciples that their
Lord was risen, and now "are we bound to praise God for
the glorious Resurrection of His Son, Jesus Christ our
Lord; for He is the very Paschal Lamb Who was offered
for us, and hath taken away the sin of the world; Who,
by His death, hath destroyed death, and by His rising
again hath restored to us everlasting life ; and, therefore,
with angels and archangels, and all the company of
Heaven, let us this day laud and magnify His glorious
Name." And, bearing in our hearts our country's deso
lation, let our prayers be very earnest when we kneel at
the Altar, that He, Who guided through wilderness wander
ings the ways of His chosen people, may be, in this, our
hour of need and darkness, the Lord our God.

II.
THE UNITY OF THE CHURCH.
Preached at the Consecration of S. Luke's Church, Hastings, Minn.,
Jan. 10th, 1871.
That they all may be one ; as Thou Father art in Me, and
I in Thee ; that they also may be one in Us ; that the world
may believe that Thou hast sent Me. — S. John, xvn., 24.
Knowing, as all do who are gathered together to-day,
the necessity which restricts to the peculiar duties of the
Episcopate, the labors of our revered and toil-worn Bishop,
"there is, growing out of the very intensity of the love we
all bear him, a cheerful acquiescence in that which other
wise were a great disappointment, that any other than he
should be the preacher on this" most happy occasion.
We shall miss in this hour his words of Christian love
and greeting ; but we can thankfully rejoice in his presence
with us, and earnestly pray our Heavenly Father, that his
life may long be spared to guide in an united and prosper
ing Diocese, that work whose present success, so far as
human instrumentalities are concerned, is largely due to
his unremitting care and unselfish devotion, inciting ever
more and more to hopeful toil, all who have labored under
him in the Lord.
Of hopefulness in Christian work, a consecration
service always speaks. It always tells of self-denying
labor for the cause of Christ ; and more, and better than
all, by the sequence of its Scripture lessons, it consecrates
•every memory of past heroism and self-sacrifice, by the
inspiring thought, that as in the temple consecration,

122 OCCASIONAL SERMONS.

there was the manifest and visible assurance of the
unity of the people, and Church of God ; so now, when in
His providence, a House of Prayer is solemnly set apart,.
there is in the whole spirit of the consecrating service,.
such an inculcation of duty to be faithful in love, and
demonstrative in obedience, to the Faith and Order which
our Lord ordained and fixed with the perpetuity of His
promise, that it gladdens every loyal heart, with the
blessed vision of that approaching day, when, in the
Unity of His Body, the Church, the Lord's yearning
prayer shall be realized.
To that subject, "The Unity of the Body of Christ,'r
I would ask your present thought and meditation, as
suggested by the words of our blessed Saviour, written in.
the xviith chapter of S. John's Gospel at the 24th verse r
" That they all may be one ; as Thou Father art in Me,.
and I in Thee ; that they also may be one in Us ; that the
world may believe that Thou hast sent Me."
This divine plea for the unity of the Church, was;
offered by the Incarnate Lord to the Eternal Father, on
that night of sorrow, in which the Son of Man was
betrayed into the hands of sinners. It is the consecra
tion prayer of His own Sacrifice, of His one oblation of
Himself. The words are the first utterance of the great
prevailing Intercession.
Strange and mysterious were they ; full of a mystery
beyond thought ; overflowing with a love beyond concep
tion ; their every syllable touching the deepest things of
God Himself, and in His relation with His people. The
voice of the Son to the Father ; the interceding of the
Great High Priest before the Mercy Seat ; the pleading of
God with God ; this it was in all its mystery, that broke
the still sadness of that night much-to-be-remembered to*
the Lord.

THE UNITY OF THE CHURCH. 123
The unity of His Church, then, has some mysterious
connection with His great sacrifice ; a true and intimate
connection with His eternal Priesthood, wherein He makes
the oblation of Himself, and becomes our intercessor.
These words of prayer spoken on earth were the
beginning of the abiding pleading in Heaven ; uttered in
the body of our blessed Lord's humility, they are still the
utterances of the body of His glory, as there stands in
the midst of the throne, in the innermost glories of
Heaven, a Lamb as it had been slain.
We read in these words, what is the continuous yearn
ing of our Lord for His Church on earth. He has willed,
and prayed, that, knitted together by His life, that Body
should be the extension of His incarnation ; the ordinary
channel of His redeeming power, His saving grace. He
has vouchsafed to speak of it, as it were, as if essential to
His own completeness ; the fulness of Him that filleth
all in all.
He has constituted it to His glory, that "now unto
the principalities and powers in heavenly places, might be
known through the Church, the manifold wisdom of God."
And for all these ends it was, according to His own
will, essential that it should be one ; essential that, knitted
into Him and quickened by His life, it should partake of
the oneness of the Divine nature ; of the oneness of His
incarnate Person. The Church was to be one, because
God is one ; one — so speaks S. Paul — one body, one spirit,
one Lord, one God and Father of all.
This was, in figure, foretold by Ezekiel, even as its
completion is described by S. John.
It was historically foreshadowed in the selection of
one family as the stock of the chosen people, clearly indi
cated by gathering all the religious affections of the

124 OCCASIONAL SERMONS.
nation around one city, and confining their highest
religious services to one temple.
That Temple Service embodied and ever proclaimed
God's primal law of Unity in His Church. In its ordained
magnificence it taught the Unity of ritual — the subor
dination of the individual will, to the expression of the
aggregate devotional life of the Church of God.
Ever a service of profound solemnity and divine
grandeur, for its associations were with the Mount that
burned with fire, when God Himself vouchsafed His awful
presence in the midst of men ; with the passage out of
Egypt, when the Israelites were baptized unto Moses in
the cloud and in the sea — the great national baptism that
constituted them a National Church ; it was not until the
great day of consecration, that all national associations
and all ritual beauty were embalmed in the liturgy of the
Temple. No one can read the inspired record of that solemnity,
without feeling that nothing in our churches themselves,
or in that which adorns them, which beautifies the place
of holiness, which gives character and effectiveness to the
services of the Sanctuary, is a trivial matter ; for the
Hebrew service was given after a heavenly pattern, and
the realized glory and magnificence of the Jewish Liturgy,
belong of right to the Christian Church.
In fact, their ancient forms were filled out and made
complete in Christ, and by the illumination of the Holy
Ghost. The long-typified death of the Lamb of God,
commemorated in the Eucharistic Service of the Christian
Church, took the place of those bloody sacrifices which
formed the central act of the temple worship.
And here we pass in thought from the consideration of
the unity of Ritual in its mere objective relations, to that
profounder truth, the unity of doctrinal life and teach-

THE UNITY OF THE CHURCH. 125
ing, which the ritual of the Church Catholic, accepted in
a right and reverent spirit, is ever proclaiming. That
ritual is but the outgrowth, under modifications of time
and place, of the Eucharistic Liturgies prefigured in the
Mosaic ritual, where the sacrificial principle prevailed as
the all-controlling element of worship. But according to
the express provision of Jehovah, the bloody sacrifices of
the Jewish Church were confined to the Temple service.
It is wonderful how much hinges on this provision in
the history of the Jews. It was a continual preparation
for the eventual overthrow of the system itself, when, in
the fulness of time, the Lamb slain from the foundation
of the world, was offered on the Cross. There was no
apparent provision in the Law, for other places of worship
than the Temple ; but gradually and very naturally, there
grew up local temples, or synagogues, all over the land.
In these they worshipped every Sabbath day, and at Jerusa
lem once a year.
And thus a system of worship grew up, of which the
Temple sacrifices were the base, indeed, but in which the
Law ' and the Prophets were read, and prayers offered,
without the blood of calves and of goats. It was the
temple Liturgy without its offerings of blood, yet deriving
its character from the sacrifices and altars of Mount Zion^
and animated by their great principle. These synagogues
our Lord frequented, in the days of His flesh, with His
disciples, and it is through the connection of the syna
gogue service with the primitive Liturgies, that when
to-day we engage in the solemn service of the Altar, we
are connected, not only in spirit, but by liturgic associa
tion, with that Divine ritual, which nearly three thousand
years ago was the consecration service of the Temple.
For out of that ritual, was composed the Sabbath evening
service of the synagogue. According to this service, the

126 OCCASIONAL SERMONS.
Eucharist was instituted, and whoever compares the
primitive Liturgies with that office, will see that they are
of common origin, and, in part, identical.
When the end of Christ's personal Ministry approached,
knowing that all things which the counsel of God had
determined concerning Him were about to be fulfilled —
having just obeyed the law by celebrating the Passover —
and thereby fulfilling an eminent type and prefiguration
of His own sacrifice and death, He began to fulfil the
divine decree by offering up Himself for the sins of the
world, which offering was fully completed and rendered
effectual when He yielded up His life on the Cross. He
made this offering in a mystery, that is, under the emblems
of Bread and Wine. In Scripture, offerings are frequently
called gifts. To bring gifts, and to make offerings to God,
are equivalent expressions. And what an offering was that
when the Incarnate Lord took Bread and Wine ; and
having blessed, gave to His disciples, saying, " This is My
Body; this is My Blood." There is no need, my brethren,
for us to go behind these words, remembering, as the
Apostle bids us to remember, that we, too, have an 'altar.
In offering these His gifts of Bread and Wine, did the
blessed Saviour sanctify Himself for our sakes ; and
for the endless good of men, devoted Himself an expiatory
Sacrifice under the symbols of Bread and Wine; that
ever in this Memorial made before God, we might plead
with Him the meritorious sacrifice and death of His dear
Son ; for the forgiveness of our sins ; for the sanctifica-
tion of His Church ; for a happy resurrection from death ;
and a glorious immortality with Him in Heaven ; and,
that, in the unity and fruition of this blessedness, all who
love Him may be one. "For their sakes I sanctify
Myself, that they also might be sanctified through
the Truth. Neither pray I for these alone,, but for them

THE UNITY OF THE CHURCH. 127

also which shall believe on Me through their Word ; that
they all may be one, as Thou Father art in Me and I in
Thee ; that they also may be one in Us."
Who of us, brethren, can rise in thought and appre
ciation to the importance of this theme — the Unity of
the Church of Christ.
It filled the latest earthly thoughts of our blessed Lord.
It was the object of His latest earthly longings.
It was the subject of that marvellous intercession which
was at once the close of the petitions of His humiliation,
and the anticipation of the pleading of His glory; and
it is now the yearning of His loving heart, while He
intercedes for His Body on earth, and pleads the merits of
His sacrificial death for us, the purchase of His love ; and
in the Commemorative Service of that death may we plead
and pray, as nowhere else we can, for Christian unity;
For, it is now, as it was of old: "I in them," is the strength
of all unity.. The presence of Christ, vouchsafed and
maintained in Sacramental Life through orders and ordi
nances and faith, was clearly the cementing power of the
Church's first unity ; and it is the only, but the sure, hope
of a restoration of unity in these latter days.
For in this sacrament, the Church has ever vindicated
the awful functions of her commissioned Priesthood, in
the line of their succession from the Incarnate Lord. In
the service of the Altar, she is ever showing forth the
death of her Lord and Master, and it is to this service and
sacrament, that the special promise of His indwelling is
attached : "He that eateth my Flesh and drinketh My
Blood, dwelleth in Me, and I in Him ;" and the pattern of
the Church's unity, the spring and principle of her
organic life and spiritual oneness, He places\ in the
unsearchable mysteries of the Divine Nature Itself ; " I in

128 OCCASIONAL SERMONS.
them, and Thou in Me ; that they may be made perfect in-
one." This unity of which the Lord so spake, can be no mere
abstraction ; no mere convenient expression for community
of hopes, or even of affections, though, of course, imply
ing and including both ; no mere negations of points of
difference ; no mere compromise ; no mere vague, indefinite
good will.
It is a real attribute of an actual life, of which itself
is the very essence.
It is something to be seen of the world, in the living
organization flowing through history, with its supernal
current of truth and grace. For, in the very first defini
tion of the Church — the manner of cohesion in One, as
written for us by the Holy Ghost Himself — she stands
forth, clearly lined in Pentecostal beauty and unity ;
"They continued steadfastly in the Apostles' doctrine and
fellowship, and in breaking of Bread and in prayers."
This, and this only, was the Church of Christ r
abiding in the faith taught by the Apostles ; accepting"
the order and discipline practiced by the Apostles ; con
tinuing in the daily offering of Common Prayer ; and
consecrating their Brotherhood of order and discipline, of
holiness and devotion, in the perpetual presentation and
reception of the blessed Eucharist.
It is not, then, a mere arbitrary conclusion — the guess
of these latter days — but the witness of the Spirit of God,
and the corroborate testimony of the Church, while for
centuries she was one and undivided, that the essentials of
true unity are:
(1) The true Faith ;
(2) The true Succession of the Ministry, whereby the
Priesthood of Christ is continued upon the earth;
( 3 ) The true Sacraments, the pledges and the chan-

THE UNITY OF THE CHURCH. 129

nels, as it were, of the one, only source of unity, the
Presence of Christ in His Church, and with His disciples.
I cannot conceive a question more solemn and far-
reaching in importance than that which naturally follows:
What, then, is our duty as children of the Church, and
how can we best labor for peace and unity?
All around us are Christian bodies, representing wealth
and numbers, earnest personal devotion, and unwearying
and prayerful zeal ; and is not this vast, active religionism
of Our land, unconsciously feeling after the missing links ?
Note in the past twenty years the progress of all that
pertains to Christian aesthetics and ritual, in the various
Church organizations in America: a mere fictitious sur
rounding, it is true, as regards organic unity ; but an
unquestioned expression of desire on the part of some.
And then, further still, what is the nature of the teaching
demanded by the indifferentism of our material age, and
the unsettled condition of the young mind, owing to
defective religious training?
That duty I believe to be plain. For all yearnings
after Christian unity, for all inquiries after Christian
truth, God has made provision in His Church. And in
His Church it is our appointed lot to live and labor; to
win to the communion of the Church those who are living
without her fold, is the blessedness of our calling. And
it is the only way in which we, with conscience clear before
God, can strive and work for Christian unity; and, while
in all our teachings we must not abstain from impressing
on every mind within our influence, the unalterable things
which concern the doctrine and discipline of the Church,
we must never forget, as one of our own Bishops has
wisely counselled, " that such teaching will be a failure, if
its form be merely intellectual, and its spirit polemic."
It is fearfully mutilated as soon as it is severed from the

130 OCCASIONAL SERMONS.
inward and spiritual, the power unto salvation, the life and
death application to the living soul. We cannot teach the
living Church scholastically ; the word and the work must
be the impulse and the affinity of lives devoted, in all sin
cerity and humble reliance upon God's Spirit, to the
furthering of that among men, which Jesus began both
to do and to teach.
Though the roots are deep down in long centuries,
the tree must have blossom and fruit perennial. It must
be known by its fruits. Christian work must supplement
the doctrinal teaching of the Church. A realization of
our mission — as members of what in the Creeds, each, for
himself, says: "I believe to be the Church, One, Holy,
Catholic, and Apostolic " — to all classes and conditions of
men, will minister to that life, by which we shall vindicate
before the world our claim as a pure branch of the
Catholic Church, and do most effectually our share in the
work of a restored Christian Unity.
For what are the involved duties of that mission ?
The Gospel, must be preached. The Sacraments must be
administered. The flock must be gathered into the Fold.
The lambs must be tended and fed. Sin must be pursued.
Sorrow must be consoled. Ignorance must be instructed.
Sickness must be tended. Vice must be reclaimed. There
must be ministers. There must be schools. There
must be churches. There must be homes for the poor
and the friendless. There must be a working Church ;
not only working Bishops, Priests and Deacons, but a
working laity ; working men and women and children.
There must be many who will deny themselves for the
sake of Christ and His Church ; deny themselves in pleas
ures, in amusements, in luxuries, that they may give more
of their time, of their money, of themselves to God.
And then the number of free churches will multiply ;

THE UNITY OF THE CHURCH. 131
and in more parishes, will be heard and heeded, the call to
daily prayer, and weekly and holy day communion ; and
parish school houses will be built under the shadow of
parish churches, and homes for the gentle charities of
Christian love ; making our beneficence a part and por
tion of the Church's daily life ; and so a conscious
Brotherhood of loving, and definite purpose, enfolding the
Church's life of doctrine and discipline, of order and
devotion, will point men unerringly to the Household of
Faith. The testimony of the saintliest lives that earth has
ever known, is, that the soul conformed to the image of
the Crucified, grows more like Christ by what it does. It
strengthens by continual work.
The calling of the Christian is to do good to all men.
In this calling are the germs of salvation. The work is
life-long. It involves sacrifice ; it requires Faith ; it
demands love ; it calls, day by day, for fervent prayers.
I cannot speak from this pulpit of the needs of the
age for Christian heroism, for self-denial and self-sacrifice,
without giving expression to a feeling, which I hold
among my most earnest convictions ; that no parish in the
Diocese can point to truer examples, few congregations
to instances so marked, of unselfish devotion in their
pastors, than are to be found in the lives and services of
those who have ministered at this Altar.
One, who was in past years your Pastor, has gone to
his reward.
In the comparatively few years allowed to his earthly
ministry, he wove into the records of his priesthood, as
many manifested traits of zeal, patient endurance,
unshrinking devotion to the right, readiness to bear in
love whatever burden was laid on him for his Lord's sake,
and faithfulness in duty, as are often noted in the life of

132 OCCASIONAL SERMONS.

any weak and erring servant of the Lord. His acts, in
pastoral relation and social intercourse, were the instincts
of a gentle, genial nature, guided by the culture of a
devout and dutiful Christian life.
In the work of the ministry, he was never ashamed of
the Gospel of Christ ; nor did Mark L. Olds ever know
ingly, as I firmly believe, shelter an actual cowardice, as to
the teaching and position of the Church, under any of the
indefinite, popular expressions of the day. He wrought
ever as in the great Task-Master's eye ; and when God
took him to Himself, a peaceful death crowned a life of
heroic self-denial.
Blessed, surely, in living and in dying, is the life
of Christian heroism and self-sacrifice. Work for
Christ, ministers to that store of treasures which we
take with us when we go hence. Such work, the offer
ing of loving hearts, we note in the fitness and beauty of
this House of God.
Nor do we doubt, that grateful prayers, and renewed
vows of entire self-consecration to the activities of a holy
life, mark this epoch of joy and gladness in your parochial
history. May God's blessing rest upon the Brother under whose
faithful care, the work of the parish is manifestly deep
ening, and spreading in interest and effectiveness.
Cheer his heart ! Cheer the heart of your chief Pastor,
by showing forth in daily work, the love you bear the
Saviour in His Church. Keep well and truly, festival and
fast. Fling open wide and free to all, the portals of this
House of God. Exhort to new life and stronger faith,
each his brother, with fervent zeal. Let all whom you
can influence, feel that the Church is the Home of all
bowed down with sin and shame ; the refuge and rallying
point for unity ; the divine adaptive to a world's unrest.

THE UNITY OF THE CHURCH. 133
God grant that all our work, in and for the Church,
may testify of Christ ; then shall His blessing consecrate
it all, and ours shall be the words and works, the faith
and earnestness, the power and beauty, of a Living
Church.

III.
THE SIXTEENTH ANNIVERSARY AND FARE
WELL SERMON.
Preached in Christ Church, Red Wing, Minn., the 17th Sunday
after Trinity, September 27th, 1874.
Finally, brethren, Farewell ! Be perfect, be of good
comfort, be of one mind, live in peace ; and the God of Love
and Peace shall be with you. — 2 Corinthians, xiii., 11.
It will be sixteen years next Sunday, since I held my
first service as Rector of this parish. Many events of the
years between that day and this, are numbered among the
forgotten things of life ; but all the circumstances of
that first service in Philleo Hall, are as fresh in my
memory as if it were last Sunday morning, instead of the
first Sunday in October, A. D. 1858, a morning, so many
years away, when we entered upon the relation — to-day to
be severed — of Pastor and people.
I recall the plain, upper room ; the simple stand,
prayer desk, lectern and pulpit in one ; the congregation,
with so few exceptions, entirely unacquainted with the
Prayer Book ; with yet an earnestness in every part of the
service, musical and responsive, and an attention to the
Word read and preached, which were bright forecastings
of our many years of mutual interests and labors ; all
this comes back to me to-day ; and I thank God for His
abundant mercies, and loving kindnesses, to His people.
And now, as I give back into your hands the trust you
then committed unto ane, it is with the pleasant conscious-

SIXTEENTH ANNIVERSARY AND FAREWELL. 135
ness, that time, which tries all men, and all their work,
has knitted us more firmly together, and given character
to our labors, in results which bespeak permanency and
endurance. The full history of sixteen years in this, or any parish,
can never be written out. Those spiritual labors of
which, in their passing, we take so little note, only as they
concern our own individual life ; the continual round of
services ; the administration of ordinances and Sacra
ments ; the Baptisms ; the Confirmations ; the Holy
Communions, where, into faithful and loving hearts, the
Eternal Spirit came to comfort and to bless ; the bridals
and burials ; the Word of God read and expounded ; all
these are things of which one can speak only for self.
When I contrast the Church building in which we are
gathered to-day, with the rented upper room where we first
met, I realize how your prayers, your love, and your self-
denials, are wrought and builded in enduring stone, and
fashioned in forms of beauty, befitting the house of prayer.
When we contrast the Sunday school of eleven mem
bers with the school which, on each succeeding Lord's
Day, is gathered here for worship and instruction, we see
an evidence of gain and growth.
The parish enters upon its seventeenth year, in the
midst of so great and marked growth and prosperity in
the business interests of the city, that its own possibilities
of work and growth are greatly increased. When the
organ is purchased, the tower and spire completed, and
furnished with a bell and clock; when, flanking the
church, upon Fourth Street, a parsonage is built upon one
corner of the church lot, and a building for parish and
Sunday school and chapel purposes upon the other; the
present parochial school building being used for mission
purposes in some distant part of the city, and the present

136 OCCASIONAL SERMONS.
parsonage being converted into a church hospital and
home (and all this can be more easily done within the
next ten years, than within the last six years has been
accomplished the work you have done); when all this is
done, it is not simply that you may have abundant reason
for parochial pride and congratulation, or that you may
point to the clustered buildings on your church lot, as
magnificent and imposing, and nothing else ; but that you
may feel that in that center, with its daily devotional and
educational life, with mission and charitable work on
either hand, is the place from which your pastor oversees,
guides, and accomplishes the work, which, with your
sympathy and aid, he is striving to do.
Without that sympathy and aid, all pastoral strivings,
if not in vain, are very greatly weakened in efficiency and
results. The growth of this parish, at any particular era,
and in the aggregate, has been proportioned to the earnest
zeal and working capital in the congregation.
Since I came to be your minister, there have always
been those in the parish, who did not satisfy themselves
with knowing that it is a Christian's duty to glorify God
by activity in His cause; nor with talking about it, merely;
nor with feeding a religious sentiment, until it becomes
sentimentalism — with meditation undeveloped into dutiful
obedience; but persons who, in some way, and continually
are, doers of work, in and for the parish; who are willing
to give time and strength and money; who do not wait to
be sought out, and asked to do ; but try to find oppor
tunities to do something for the Church. There have
always been such workers in this parish, and their work
has always been in strict sympathy and accord, with the
pastoral plan and system of work.
Self-willed workers are always a great hindrance to
parish growth and prosperity ; and that spirit of carping,

SIXTEENTH ANNIVERSARY AND FAREWELL. 137
rather than just criticism — the spirit, or, rather, principle,
of indulged individualism, out of which self-will is sure to
grow, is just as reprehensible in the parish as it has of late
shown itself to be dangerous in the general Church.
From such individualism this parish has been remarkably
free. I have not, it is true, in all things pertaining to
parochial work, received the sympathy and co-operation
which I had hoped for; but no plan or proposition has
ever met with any factious opposition.
There have never been, and I see no reason that there
should ever be, any parties in the parish. The confidence
which you have so generously given me, will, I am sure,
be just as freely extended to my successor, and rightly so ;
not only for individual worth and deservings, but upon
general principles ; for your pastor — we may, I think,
fairly assume — will always desire that which is for the
good of the parish. And if, in the future, any of his
plans may chance not to accord with the judgment of
some of you, be always ready to give a fair trial to that
which comes to you as- his matured thought; for, rest
assured, that no man of wisdom or Christian love, will
ever seek to force the application of principles, or the
development of a cherished plan, in the face of plain facts
and circumstances, which, without changing the prin
ciples, have destroyed the usefulness of the plan.
In maintaining this unity in the parish, and mani
festing its reality in a very general and generous co-oper
ation in all parish work, you have developed another
element of parochial power ; and that is, a liberality which
has been intelligent, consistent, systematic and constant.
Take your offerings for various missionary purposes.
They date from the organization of the parish. They
have steadily increased in amount ; and, in some instances,
I know, and in very many I hope, your giving is in

138 OCCASIONAL SERMONS.
accordance with a system, based upon information of
missionary work and needs ; and as truly a matter of
conscience, as prayer, or the reception of the Holy
Eucharist. I have striven faithfully, in all my ministry, that
whatever is included in that mighty term, the Missionary
Spirit, might be inwrought, and felt, as a motive power,
in the heart and conscience of the parish. It has never
been my desire, that your offerings should simply indicate
the impulse of a generous heart; but should be the
systematic, conscientious, and proportioned devotion of
worldly substance, to the glory of Christ, and the extension
of His Church.
That which was the commendation of Cornelius the
Centurion — which emblazoned his name more lastingly,
and gloriously, then Latin heraldry did any other name in
the long roll of that noble, Roman family — the Spirit's
witness that his alms, and his prayers, went up together
before God ; that commendation, in the case of any indi
vidual Christian, or any parish, is a word of praise far
removed from any of the formal utterances of human
approbation. Piety practiced in solitude, like the flower that blooms
in the desert, may give its fragrance to the winds of
Heaven, and delight the unbodied spirits that survey the
works of God, and the actions of men ; but it bestows
no assistance upon others ; and however acceptable in the
sight of God, and rewarded by the consciousness of His
favor, it is only when its fruits are continuous and cheer
ful deeds of Christian beneficence, when devotions and
charities are its memorials before God, that the full
blessedness of individual piety is known ; that blessedness,
which we all may realize, when the Saviour's beatitude, —

SIXTEENTH ANNIVERSARY AND FAREWELL. 139
"It is more blessed to give than to receive" — becomes a
living, daily, impulse in our Christian discipleship.
That which the Gospel aims to do, is to deepen in
¦every human breast, the principle of love to God ; and to
nourish, in the regenerate soul, this implanted germ of
piety and holiness, till it becomes a divine energy, mould
ing all the affections and desires, and shaping the whole
life. The active exercise of this principle, is the best
¦evidence that other means of grace have been profitably
used; and it is, of and in itself, one of the means of
grace ; for an abundant, spiritual blessing is ever vouch
safed to those who strive faithfully, even in the lowliest
sphere, to be co-workers with Christ.
The demand, which Christ and His Church make upon
•every baptized member of the Heavenly Kingdom, is that
of personal devotion, and personal ministry.
We are to be prayerful, that we do not forget the
nature and the aim of all Christian work. We are to live
¦ever in the Master's Eye, that we grow not proud and
self-seeking in the way of. our discipleship ; for all
Christian work, to be of an enduring and beneficent
nature, must have its roots and strength in the spirit of
self-distrust, and a consequent reliance, through prayer,
upon the power, and the love of God. That which we
crave and desire as His gift and grace, we must, in the full
recognition of our stewardship, use for His glory, the
extension of His Church, and the good of His brethren ;
for, it is a truth of mighty significance and import in the
matter of personal religion, that all the gifts of God,
health, intellect, wealth, social position, influence and
leisure, heighten and intensify His claim for personal
service. All that the Church can do, she does, that this com-

140 OCCASIONAL SERMONS.
prehensive truth may hold its rightful place in the economy
of Christian discipleship. Her year of Festival and Fast,
is a continuous unfolding of God's character of infinite
love. To meet and respond to that love, she would have
us regard as the clearest duty, and the highest privilege,
of our regenerate humanity. In her offices of devotion,
she provides most fully for the development of that part
of man, which, still in its decadence, bears the most
universal mark of divinity. It is in the service of the
Altar, which is the heart, and the inspiring idea of all
devotional life — the highest act of Christian worship —
amid the mysteries of Redeeming love, which, with angels
and archangels, we adore, that she teaches, as nowhere else
she can, the divine Gospel of human brotherhood ; and, in
the moment when above all others we adore His goodness,
and magnify His grace, and consecrate to His service our
selves, our souls and bodies, we learn the obligations of
that kinship which knits us in deeds of Christian love to
the least of these, His brethren.
These obligations, as regards our connection with the
General Church, in its domestic and foreign missionary
work, make it necessary that we should learn from such
publications as Home and Abroad, and The Spirit of Mis
sions, the nature, the extent, and the needs, of the work ;
and then with our prayers, and our alms at Epiphany and
Easter, help to carry on the conquests of His Cross.
As regards our own Diocesan missionary work, each
year invokes more earnest prayers, and more liberal offer
ings. It is a pauseless work ; and if the Church is to keep
pace with the growth of the State, it will be through the
increased devotions, and the larger givings of the self-
sustaining parishes.
In the parish itself, in the future as in the past, it is

SIXTEENTH ANNIVERSARY AND FAREWELL. 141
the blessed law of Christian growth, that work produces
work. Had I remained your pastor, I had thought,
during the next year to devote myself especially to two
objects : (1.) Soliciting, for the parish school, subscrip
tions in the nature of an endowment fund; and (2.)
providing some means, by which an annual increase of
100 or 200 volumes, could be made to the Parish Library.
These two objects, among the many pertaining to the
interests and growth of the parish, which claim your
attention, I especially commend to your thoughtful con
sideration, and liberal care.
In all that relates to the prosperity of the parish, each
one should feel that the general prosperity is his own
prosperity. No one in the parish is without his own
special influence, and his own peculiar power ; nor has
any one been left in ignorance, in what ways that ministry
for the general good is to be discharged.
"All may contribute to the common welfare, by means
of an open and steadfast maintenance of their high pro
fession. All may stretch forth a hand to encourage some
timid companion, or to bestir the laggard conscience of
some heedless one, by means of a bold adhesion to Christ,
and fidelity to His cause. All may assist in elevating the
prevailing tone, by striving to live in unity and godly love.
All may resolve not to judge one another, but to judge
this rather: that none put a stumbling-block, or an occa
sion to fall, in his brother's way. All may stimulate a
devotional feeling in their neighbors, by means of their
own heartiness and decorum in the public services. All
may do much by encouraging their spiritual head both by
word and endeavor, when his course is approved by [them,
or, when needful, by being considerate towards him, and
remembering how different from theirs, is the relation in
which he stands to many questions."

142 OCCASIONAL SERMONS.

All may afford a practical acknowledgement of mem
bership in the body of Christ, by taking an interest in
what is done in the parish ; and whether it be parish or
Sunday school, guild, library or missions, manifesting his
sympathy and favor, by what he gives, or what he does ;
that in the continued growth, and prosperity of the parish,,
all may share in blessedness and happiness ; and be drawn
closer to one another, in bonds of unity and love.
Commending you to the continued favor and blessing
of the Great Head of the Church, I can only, in general
terms, thank you, one and all, for }rour generous co-opera
tion in parochial labors, and your unwearying kindness
and love to me and mine.
Time would fail me, if I thought to speak of individual
acts. One departure only will I make, and in that I
speak, as for myself, so for the parish, when I express, in
as far as the sincere acknowledgment can do, our very
great gratitude to the organist and chorister, who, for so
many years, with all who in these years have aided them,
have cared, with so much faithfulness, and so much devo
tion, for the music of the Church. For this I shall cherish
ever a pleasant and thankful memory.
And of all the sixteen years of life in Red Wing, the
store of pleasant, and of blessed memories, is very large,
which I shall carry with me as I go from this parish to
another home, and another sphere of labor.
I am sure that your sympathies, and your prayers, will
be with me in my new and great responsibilities ; as you
may rest assured that my fervent supplications will be for
the continued prosperity of you, and yours. May we all
in our lives and labors draw nearer to the God of love and
peace. "Nearer to God," is the unchanging motto of the
saintliest life. A spiritual life, pervaded by the worship

SIXTEENTH ANNIVERSARY AND FAREWELL. 143
of God, in spirit and in truth, is our true life. Away
from the life of the flesh, and the love of the world, the
Church is ever calling you, to walk, like one of old, with
God. And if, in the spirit of S. Paul's admonition, in
perfectness of life, and in the comfort of God's words ;
in peace with all men, and single-mindedness with God,
you approve yourselves as His disciples, then, of a truth,
as your Divine Guide and Friend, shall the God of love
and peace be with you.
Now, the God of peace, that brought again from the
dead, our Lord Jesus, that great Shepherd of the sheep,
through the blood of the everlasting covenant, make you
perfect in every good work to do His will, working in
you that which is well pleasing in His sight, through
Jesus Christ, to Whom be glory, for ever and ever. Amen.

IV.
SOME ELEMENTS OF MINISTERIAL SUCCESS.
Preached before the Students of the General Theological Seminary,
New York, in Trinity Chapel, May 29th, 1881.
Make full proof of thy ministry. — II Timothy, iv., 5.
When God made man upon the earth, He created an
immortal being, and placed Him in this world on probation,
for His eternal kingdom.
From the day when Adam began to dress the Garden,
and keep it, on to the highest development of the latest
generation of His children, that one grand purpose of
probation never can be lost sight of. The pride of our
first father, and his desire of independence, may continually
re-appear, and tempt men to forget that purpose; but God
never can, never will. Every revelation from Him, every
gift, every disclosure of the wonders of His creation, every
permitted step of human progress, every providence over
single souls, every circumstance of human life and expe
rience, from the rise and fall of empires to the joys and
sorrows of a single heart, are all ordered with unceasing
reference to man's discipline in preparation for a future
state. "The world passeth away, and the lusts thereof,"
is inscribed on all we see, or touch, or anticipate, in this
life. A man may heap up riches, or get himself a name.
Soon, the utmost they can do for him will be to build a
tomb to his memory, and then both memory and tomb will
crumble away.

SOME ELEMENTS OF MINISTERIAL SUCCESS. 145
A dynasty may strengthen and transmit a throne of
power; a race may rear an empire, and bear its conquering
eagles far and wide ; but the day will come when destruction
will lay waste their palaces, and desolation brood over
their ruined walls. Were they, then, reared in vain?
Surely not. For in their growth and decay, human souls
had their probation. From the monarch on the royal
throne, to the captive in the dungeon, each single heart,
in its own place of God's appointment, with whatever light
God gave it, worked out its destiny.
All these human schemes failing or succeeding ; all
human progress, human achievements, whether conscious
of God or not, are accomplishing His design ; providing
an innumerable, infinite variety in human life ; so that
each soul may have its own peculiar and fit discipline, to
test and try it before the everlasting awards.
Consonant with t/his fact, is another : that God, in His
infinite Wisdom, has so ordered the changes and chances
of human probation, that in all ages of the world, men
chosen by Him, Patriarchs, Prophets, Apostles, Priests,
have been commissioned and sent, to be co-workers with
Him. In the fulness of times the Incarnate God commis
sioned ambassadors from His Court and Kingdom. They
were to bear witness to Him, Who "came, not to be
ministered unto, but to minister." Commissioned by Him,
it must needs be, in unbroken lineage ; and a class, which,
in as far as it realizes its vocation, and is, indeed, a priest
hood, will continue, in self-denying, loving zeal, to accom
plish in the world that which " Jesus began both to do,
and to teach," and thus fulfil its calling, of the ministry
and agency of God.
For a successful ministry is one, which not so much
combines certain elements of personal achievement, as one
which meets the divine approval, on account of its carry-

146 OCCASIONAL SERMONS.
ing out the Divine Will, in the circumstances, and
surroundings of human probation ; and on account of its
having fulfilled, or made full proof of, the ministry, or
embassage, committed by Divine Wisdom to human
hands. Prominent position, large salary, great eloquence, a
numerous congregation, even many converts, do not supply
the real test. Fruits — though not always visible, and a
certain success, ordinarily follow faithful effort. " Seest
thou a man diligent in his business ? He shall stand
before Kings — he shall not stand before mean men."
" They that turn many to righteousness, shall shine as the
stars for ever and ever."
But that is God's matter. Of stewards, it is not
required that they shall be successful, in the world's
acceptation ; but " that a man be found faithful."
What the success has really been, will not be known
till the judgment ; we are assured — in all departments of
duty — " There are last which shall be first, and first which
shall be last."
It is my purpose at this time to speak upon some of the
elements of ministerial success, which, if individually
possessed, are, at the same time, clear and distinct evidences
of ministerial faithfulness.
And, without controversy, the first element, essential
to real success, is personal knowledge of God, through
Christ, Who must Himself be to the minister an actual
person ; the Man of the ambassador's counsel.
The minister of Christ must think of the Master as
the one Person of supreme authority ; having a will, a
purpose, a preference about everything that concerns His
business. We know that it was the Saviour's meat and
drink, when about His Father's business, to do His
Father's will. The Ambassador of Christ must know His

SOME ELEMENTS OF MINISTERIAL SUCCESS. 147
will ; and to know it must seek Him casually and con
stantly in oral and mental petition ; praying always with
all prayer and supplication ; and specially, and particu
larly, in Holy Communion; he must so practice the
presence of God — as a devotional writer expresses it — as
to constantly realize it.
Like Enoch, and other ancient Princes of God's people,
he must walk with God. God shall be unto him a near
and dear friend ; more real and actual than any and all of
the things that are seen; more important to be pleased
than all the whole world; more powerful, for either assault
or defense, than aught of earth.
One shall be saturated, so to speak, in his whole being
with a sense of the Divine Personality; so that the devo
tion of a soldier to his chief, of a subject to his ruler and
government, shall be but a faint type of the ministerial
loyalty to Christ and belief in His kingdom.
He shall believe that God was in the Church, reconciling
the world unto Himself; and has committed unto the
ordained Priesthood the ministry of reconciliation. He
shall believe, with a realizing faith, that Christ is with
His servants to the end; that, like Moses, he can endure
" as seeing Him Who is invisible."
This brings success. This is the victory that over
cometh the world, even our faith.
Herein we may find the realization of that Word of
God : one can do all things through Jesus Christ, Who
strengtheneth him.
This seems to have been one of the objects of the
Incarnation. It is, at least, one great end served by it.
"God was manifest in the flesh;" and as one looks at the
image of the invisible God, in Whom dwelleth all the
fulness of the Godhead bodily — as one looks unto Jesus,
the world gets very small, and insignificant, and helpless,

148 OCCASIONAL SERMONS.

and God's greatness grows upon the vision; and one comes
to understand the raptures of apostles and early disciples,
and perceive hov; just here is the patience and the faith of
the saints.
A. second element in ministerial success is entire self-
consecration. The ambassador of God must come to look upon him
self as given up to this service, and henceforth to know
nothing among men but Jesus Christ, and Him crucified.
As expressed in the Ordination Service, he must give him
self wholly to this office; and, as much as lieth in him,
apply himself to this one thing, and draw all his cares and
studies this way. He must feel always that his will is
subordinated to God's will; and, in all ministerial matters,
discharge his trust according to official direction ; for,
since he seeks for personal intercourse with the Saviour,
through prayer, and Holy Eucharist, and other Church
offices, he looks for official direction to that Church
authority, which the Saviour ordained and instituted in
His Church.
The Church is Christ, representatively ; visibly mani
fested — not concealed — in Sacraments, or Sacramental
rites. The Church is the Body of Christ ; the fulness of Him
that filleth all in all ; and the faithful Christian is to hear
the Church, as hearing Christ.
Every Christian is to look to the authority above him,
as to Christ. In ecclesiastical administration, it is clearly
the Will of Him, Who has appointed divers orders in His
Church, that the due recognition of authority should not
be lost sight of ; that layman, candidate, Deacon, Priest
and Bishop, should never forget the ordained relation of
subjection and responsibility ; ever submitting in love,
ever ruling with diligence ; all looking to the Church in

SOME ELEMENTS OF MINISTERIAL SUCCESS. 149
general councils, and in historic consent, as the interpreter
of the Will and Word of God. The point of administra
tive authority — as regards the work of the clergy — is not
enough considered, nor sufficiently realized. The promise
of obedience to the Bishop, and other chief officers, is in
entire harmony with the spirit of Church authority. It
will be noted that the promise is to obey a person, not
merely a law ; and in all departments of Church life, the
person, acting within the limits of authority, represents
the law.
Very clearly and distinctly in the writings of the early
Fathers, is the principle of Church authority brought out.
In many passages, and in language, plain and unequivocal,
we have, for instance, the mind of the early Church, that
Episcopal direction meant something warmer and more
personal, than would seem to be generally accepted in our
day ; it indicated the relation of Father and children. It
implied a recognition, that, in the successors of the Apos
tles, the Great Head of the Church was ever present in
His Kingdom ; and that His were not empty Words, "He
that receiveth you, receiveth Me ; and he that despiseth
you, despiseth Me ; and he that despiseth Me, despiseth
Him that sent Me."
I am disposed to press this point, earnestly ; for I
believe that the non-recognition of this principle, jeop
ardizes the fulfilment, or full proof, of the ministry, for
it tempts the servant of Christ to do his own will, and
not the Will of Him that sent him ; and so to act in a
separated, and isolated manner.
Nor is the harm only to the individual himself.
The Church is paralyzed in its energies, and suffers from
lack of unity in its action. The Bishop neglects Catholic
nsage, rules personally and is in great danger of "lording
it over God's heritage." The Priest conceals his Church

150 OCCASIONAL SERMONS.
matters as much as he can, and ignores the Bishop's
advice and direction. The Deacon seeks no guidance from
the Priest, in whose care he is placed ; but acts as inde
pendently as he can, without coming under serious
criticism. The candidate for Holy Orders is restive under
proper restraint, and the layman forgets that word of
God, which bids him to obey them who are over him in
the Lord.
The Bishop's position in the Church of God, is clearly
defined in the inspired word and in the canons of the
Church. His authority and responsibility are distinctly
set forth.
If the Priest does not reverently obey his Bishop, and
other chief ministers, who, according to the canons of this
Church, have the charge and government over him, follow
ing, as the Ordinal phrases it, " with a glad mind and will,
their Godly admonitions, and submitting to their Godly
judgments," how can it be expected of the Deacon, the
candidate, or the layman?
The Divine Rule is that of obedience. Departure from
that rule brings certain confusion. Great harm has come
to the Church of God, because of human wilfulness tak
ing to itself the cloak of inability through conscientious
conviction, to obey the rules, and the rulers, in the
Church. Whenever, and wherever, obedience for Christ's sake
is the rule of individual action, the Church becomes an
orderly and effective household like that above, and the
Divine Will is practically recognized ; "every good gift
and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down
from the Father of lights ;" " for He gave some apostles,
some prophets, some evangelists."
The realization of the personality of Christ, and the
habit of seeking Divine direction in individual matters,

SOME ELEMENTS OF MINISTERIAL SUCCESS. 151
through prayer, and the Sacraments, and Sacramental
rites — and, in official matters, through the Church author
ity, and its constituted officers — leads to another constant
element in a successful ministry ; and that is a confirmed
principle of self-abnegation.
This is made a rule and habit of life much more
easily, if the Presence of God, and His constant govern
ment and guidance, are subjects of continual thought and
recognition. The Saviour is the example ; and He lived such a life,
and seems to have designated it for those whom He sent
to represent Him. "Whoever will come after Me, let him
deny himself, and take up his cross daily."
Self-abnegation implies several things :
First, Not to use our ministerial charge to serve per
sonal ends, either for ambitious purposes, or pecuniary
emolument. When one needs his position, more than the
position needs him ; when it is of more use to him, than
he to it, he is not fulfilling his ministry. This condition
of things is a snare, and will bring woe ; as declares the
Prophet Ezekiel, "Thus saith the Lord God unto the
Shepherd ; woe be to the Shepherds of Israel that do feed
themselves ; should not the Shepherds feed the flocks ?
Ye eat the fat, and ye clothe you with the wool ; but ye feed
not the flock."
Second, Self-abnegation implies faithfulness and dili
gence in exhortation, and warning, and in all official duties.
One must not consult his own ease or comfort ; or ever
fall into habits of sloth. The solemn realities of the
eternal world must ever press upon him ; as when the
Apostle of our text, who was so unwearied in well doing
that his life of devotion seemed to invite, and to make
truly appreciable, the Benediction of the Holy Spirit ;

152 OCCASIONAL SERMONS.
" Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord ; even so saith
the Spirit, for they rest from their labors."
The Ambassador of God must be like the great Apostle,
most abundant in labors ; for no one can dare to be sloth
ful in his ministerial work, who, knowing the terrors of
the Lord, persuadeth people, because the love of Christ
constraineth him. And it is well also to keep in mind,
when one is tempted to idleness, or to forgetfulness of the
awful sanctity of the Divine Commission, the warning
words of the Prophet of old ; "and it shall come to pass at
that time, saith the Lord, that I will search Jerusalem
with candles, and punish the men that are settled on their
lees ; that say in their heart, The Lord will not do good,
neither will He do evil."
Third, Self-abnegation implies care, not to fall into
the habit of preaching or ministering, with the object of
becoming popular, or to please men.
Against this form of self-seeking, the Prophet of old
remonstrated, because it evinced painful lack of the real
ization of momentous issues of the time of probation.
" And seekest thou great things for thyself ? Seek them
not. For behold I will bring evil upon all flesh, saith the
Lord, but thy life will I give unto thee for a prey, in all
places whither thou goest." — Jer. xlv., 4.
Against the success of any such effort, utterly wrong
in principle, the Saviour warns the clergy most earnestly ;
" Woe unto you when all men shall speak well of you, as
did their fathers of the false prophets." And His Apostle,
so loving in will and deed, ready even to be accursed for
the sake of his brethren in the flesh, declares, " If I yet
pleased men, I should not be the servant of Christ ; " and
shows in another place, that one is only to please his
neighbor for " his good to edification," and not with our
own good for an object.

SOME ELEMENTS OF MINISTERIAL SUCCESS. 153
Fourth, Self-abnegation implies that one will not
expect compensation for faithfulness, from the world,
but from God only ; finding it, for the present, in the
sense of His approval.
Indeed, in helping to do this very difficult thing, it is
well to notice that there is a hint — if we may so speak —
in one of the Saviour's sayings, that earthly reward
actually lessens the heavenly, S. Luke, xiv., 12: "When
thou makest a dinner or a supper, call not thy friends, nor
thy brethren, neither thy kinsmen, nor thy rich neighbors,
lest they also bid thee again, and a recompense be made
thee. But when thou makest a feast, call the poor, the
maimed, the lame, the blind, and thou shalt be blessed, for
they cannot recompense thee; for thou shalt be recom
pensed at the resurrection of the just." And in conformity
with this idea, God said to Abraham of old: "I am thy
shield, and thy exceeding great reward."
We cannot, for one moment, doubt that when any
commissioned servant of God gets to seek, or to be satisfied,
with any other reward than that which his Lord and
Master promises, the proof of his ministry will certainly
not be full.
And, lastly, self-abnegation implies that one is not to
be discouraged, or turned aside from duty, by any form of
worldly persecution.
The Lord has warned us, and it is a most important
thing for His disciples to remember, that persecution is
sure to come in some form, and at some time, if one per
sistently does his duty.
To our 3elf -indulgent minds and wills, it seems a para
doxical saying, that persecution is one of the rewards of
dutiful obedience, as it certainly is, also, one of the tokens
of nearness to the Master. "If they have persecuted Me,
they will also persecute you ; if they have called the Master

154 OCCASIONAL SERMONS.
of the house Beelzebub, how much more they of His
household?" S. Matthew, vi., 11. "Blessed are ye when
men shall revile you, and persecute you, and say all
manner of evil against you falsely, for My sake. ' Rejoice
and be exceeding glad; for great is your reward in Heaven;
for so persecuted they the prophets which were before
you." And this marks, too, the character of that separateness
from the world and worldly ways, which is sure to come
to those who do their duty, and live rigidly the Church's
life of self-denial, and devotion.
" Blessed are ye when men shall hate you, and when
they shall separate you from their company, and shall
reproach you, and cast out your name as evil, for the Son
of Man's sake ; rejoice in that day ; for behold, your
reward is great in Heaven." And S. Paul, in the spirit
of his Lord, with an experience which brought him very
near that Lord, and an observation of marvellous power,
declares, "and all that will live godly in Christ Jesus,
shall suffer persecution."
Woe unto the ambassador of Christ, in whose life are
found none of the tokens of nearness to that Saviour,
upon Whose back were ploughed long furrows.
The world is no better disposed toward faithful Christ
ians, than it has ever been ; and it is true now — as of old
— that even those who give up houses, brethren, sisters,
father, mother, wife, children, or lands, for Jesus' sake and
the Gospel's, must now, in this time, receive " the hun
dred fold," which the Saviour promises, with persecution.
There seems no other conclusion than that the minis
ter of Christ, who expects to do his duty, to live in
accordance with God's will and Word, must learn to
entirely abandon the world, as regards its guidance and
control in the actions of his ministerial life. He is not

SOME ELEMENTS OF MINISTERIAL SUCCESS. 155

"to disregard its influences ; for the world about him is to
¦each individual minister his living present ; but the world
must not have control of his judgment, in things spiritual.
No one can be free from blame, who exercises the
•office which is his as an ambassador and servant of Christ,
in deference to any essentially selfish, or worldly dictation;
who yields his spiritual leadership to the clamors of preju
dice, or the combinations of wealth ; who — in parish and
diocese — abandons the oversight and care of God's poor ;
proves recreant to the divinely imposed trust, of doing
¦God's work in the way He has pointed out, or by his own
worldliness or self-seeking, changes entirely the character
•of that ministry, which is a servantship in Christ, for the
good of all men.
The minister of God — whatever may be his order —
must, under the pressure of the ages past, in harmony
Tvith the Catholic life of the Church of Christ, make all
"with whom he comes in contact, feel "the power of an
¦endless life." He must find his strength in God, and in
Him alone ; and never invite the woe denounced to those
who "go down to Egypt for help," Isa. xxxi., 1; nor incur
the condemnation which is his, "who trusteth in man,
;and maketh flesh his arm." — Jer. xvii., 5.
I never see young men preparing for the holy ministry,
.but that my first thought is the wish that I could impress
npon them, the experience their seniors have gathered in
a long course of ministerial work ; and yet I know this
is not God's will or way. He, for His own reasons,
•chooses "the weak things," imperfections, unwisdom,
the foolish things ; and as soon as one begins to modestly
realize that he has made some progress towards a condition
of usefulness, God removes him — to make way for another
-course of inexperience.
He Himself says, "My strength is made perfect in

156 OCCASIONAL SERMONS.

weakness." And so the. "treasure is left in earthen ves
sels," that the power may be of Him. At no time do I
feel more keenly than when called upon for a duty like
that I am discharging to-day, how utterly insufficient is
human advice, and how vain its encouragements.
If the words I have uttered from a full heart, with
warm and sincere interest and affection, can influence any
one of you to draw closer to your Saviour, where alone is-
strength ; to act more rigidly under Church authority,
which is Christ's authority ; not doing your own will, but
seeking to know His, that you may do it ; to more utterly
abandon yourselves, your pleasures, your wilfulness ; to
give up expecting anything from the world, or even from
the Church, in the way of present recognition or reward ;
to be content with the lowest place, and the smallest
salary, only that you may work effectively ; to be recon
ciled to misconception, loss, mortification, to anything, so
you can entitle yourself by conscientiousness, singleness
of purpose, and entire self-abnegation — in will, at least —
to say with the Apostle, "I fill up that which is behind of
the afflictions of Christ in my flesh for His Body's saker
which is the Church ; whereof I am made a minister,
according to the dispensation of God ; " if, in anywise
this results, I shall be more than satisfied.
I close by repeating and applying to you, God's word
to Abraham, who kept so close to Him as to be called the
friend of God ; the word spoken to him at the time He
sent him out, not knowing whither he went, any more than
you know your future to-day : " Fear not ; I am thy
shield and thy exceeding great reward."
But he, who in one of the most solemn moments that
can ever come to him in this life, makes answer that he
trusts that he is inwardly moved by the Holy Ghost to
take upon him this office and ministration, to serve God

SOME ELEMENTS OF MINISTERIAL SUCCESS. 157
for the promoting of His Glory, and the edifying of His
people ; that he thinks in his heart, that he is truly called,
according to the will of our Lord Jesus Christ, cannot
prepare for, or regard, this sacred office as a mere profes
sion ; nor can he connect with its exercise, thoughts of
•ease, promotion, human aggrandizements or ambitions.
He, Who, through the orderings of His providence,
and the workings of His Holy Spirit, chooses and sends
ns, even as He was chosen and sent, calls us to an office,
which, in dignity and awful responsibility, stands pre
eminent among the callings and offices of the sons of
men. There is no honor that man can receive, greater than
to be sent by the Lord Jesus, to seek and to save men ; to
go as His messenger, ambassador, steward and minister.
There are no motives to human action more constraining,
no rewards more certain or more glorious, than those
which He associates with His holy ministry.
If we feel this, the greatness of that honor will not
fill our hearts with unseemly pride ; but, humbling us
with a sense of deep unworthiness, will send us to that
Lord, with ever more and more earnest prayers for His
mercy and guidance, and for the power to be ever useful
instruments in His hands.
No one, upon whose heart is impressed the truth, that
God has chosen and sent him as His minister, can ever
regard his holy calling as one among the professions of
men, to be exercised with regard to personal advantage, or
in view of the judgment of men.
Only the feeling, and the mastering convictions that
the Lord has called us, and sent us, can put us in the con
dition and attitude for effective work in the sacred office.
This knowledge, and this certainty, we must have as
an individual assurance: that, as the minister of the Lord

158 OCCASIONAL SERMONS.
Jesus, I am His servant and representative, whom He has-
chosen, and ordained, and sent to do His work, He being
ever present to give effect to the words, and acts, of His
minister and messenger.
To deepen in our hearts this blessed truth — to make it
more effective in our daily lives — is the object of meetings,.
and meditations, such as have gathered us together at this
time. At the Altar this morning, let our prayers be very
earnest, that through His Holy Spirit, God may be with us,.
and abundantly bless, to our growth and grace, these hours-
of prayer and self-examination, of reading and listening,.
of silence and meditation.

V.
THE LAMBETH CONFERENCE OF 1888.
After the crucial parts of this sermon, written at his
request and for the specific purpose of embodying his
mind on the subject, had been read to the Bishop in the
week just preceding his entrance into rest, he expressed
the desire to accept as his own, the responsibility for the
views herein taken of the work of the Conference, and to
this end dictated these words :
I have arranged that a sermon on the Lambeth Con
ference be prepared for delivery in the Cathedral, and for
publication in The Calendar, giving expression to my
own views of the importance of this great gathering, and
of the lessons of thankful encouragement, in view of an
event, which takes its rank among the great and influen
tial epochs of Anglican Church History.
On this subject, full of the deepest interest to your
Bishop in every way, I had indeed looked forward to
addressing the Diocese. God has willed, however, that
this opportunity should not come to me, and that I should
not be with you at this time.
It will be a comfort to me to believe, that with me,
the Diocese will behold in the noble and Catholic spirit
animating the procedure of this great Anglican Confer
ence, an earnest of the work now at the door of the
American Church. May we, her members, go from
strength to strength, and unto the God of Gods appear in
Zion ! "For the Lord God is a Light and Defence. The

160 OCCASIONAL SERMONS.
Lord will give grace and worship, and no gobd thing shall
He withhold from them that live a godly life."
"Instead of thy fathers shall be thy children, whom thou mayest
make princes in all the earth." — Psalm xlv., 16.
These words conclude, and crown, the Psalm in which
they are found ; a Psalm, in a marked measure, descrip
tive of the Catholic Church of the Creed. As verse
follows verse, in its rare melody, one learns of the endur
ing majesty which was to be a note of the Chuch, of her
gifts of grace in her Sacraments, of her duty to mankind,
and the duty of mankind to her, and of her mission in a
world weary with sin.
Its impassioned strains touch a responsive chord in a
Christian heart. For, filling with the vision of Christ's
Kingdom, the Psalmist's heart bubbleth up with a good
matter. " My tongue," he exclaims, "is the pen of a
ready writer. Thou," oh, Church of Christ, " art fairer
than the children of men."
Centuries after, another, full of the reality of this fair
vision, terms Christ's Kingdom His Spouse and Body, the
Church, the fullness of Him that filleth all in all.
Follow with me, for a moment, the prophecy of this
Psalm, in the light of the Church's life and purpose.
" Grace is poured into thy lips ; " and the Church
answers the Psalmist, even the grace of the Blessed
Sacrament of Christ's Body and Blood.
" Thy Throne is for ever and ever ; " yea, verily ; for
the King hath promised to be with the Apostolic princes
of the Church, always, even unto the end of the world.
God "hath anointed" the Son of Man "above His
fellows ; " even so, and the God-Man breathed on the
Apostles, and sent them even as the Father had sent Him ;
and whosoever received them received Him, their Head
and King.

THE LAMBETH CONFERENCE. 161
"Forget thine own people and thy father's house,"
is the Psalmist's behest ; not to the Church of the Jews,
but to the Church which was to be ; not for Judea only,
but for Samaria, and for the uttermost parts of the, earth.
" Behold what manner of love the Father hath bestowed
on His Church, that we should be called the sons of God ;
for to as many as receive Him, be they Greek or Jew, •
Barbarian, Scythian, bond or free, giveth he power to
become citizens of a Kingdom which knows God as the
Father of all, and every man — Negro, Indian, Savage —
every man as a brother.
Of the Church, " the King desires her beauty," her
very best. She can know no divided service. Her key
note, the word of the King, "My son, give me thy
heart," " I am the Lord, and worship thou Me."
As the veil is lifted, before the straining eyes of the
Psalmist is imaged, the grand and beauteous ceremonial
procession of the Church of the Ages.
"Multitude which none can number
Like the stars in glory stands,
Clothed in white apparel, holding
Palms^ of victory in their hands. '
Patriarch and holy prophet,
Who prepared the way of Christ,
King, apostle, saint, confessor,
Martyr, and Evangelist.
Saintly maiden, godly matron,
Widows who have watched to prayer."
Wherefore exultantly bursts from the Psalmist's lips,
the truth, "The King's daughter is all glorious within;
her clothing is of wrought gold."
Let us, then, give honor to God; for the number of the
redeemed shall be made up, and the marriage of the Lamb
shall come; and His wife must make herself ready. She
shall be arrayed in fine linen, clean and white.

162 OCCASIONAL SERMONS.
God commands the service of His sanctuary to be
beautiful. God ever wills to be worshipped in the beauty
of holiness. It is not far to go into the heart, to know
that on earth, in Paradise, in Heaven, the great purpose of
the Catholic Church is worship. And worship is giving
the beauty — the very best — to God ; Who, for example,
commanded holy garments to be made for the glory and
beauty of His service; and Who foretold of the Kingdom
of Christ, that "from the rising of the sun even unto the
going down of the same, incense should be offered unto
His Name, and a pure offering."
If there is one thing that the Anglican Communion
thanks the Reformation for, it is the nearer return, in
1549, to the lines of the early or Primitive Church. To
the life and practice of the early Christians, the Church
points us, so we can not be amiss in trying to enter into
what the early Church thought, when she recited this
Prophet's Psalm. It spoke to her in the language of the
heart, of the purity and moral beauty that was to mark
the course of the Church, in rooting out a sensual heathen
ism, rotten to the core ; it spoke of the grace, the eternity,
the universality, the joyousness, of the Kingdom of Christ
Jesus, the unspoken thought of the Psalm, anointed with
the Holy Ghost, and with power, as High Priest of the
Church. To Him, as Man, all power had been given in
Heaven and earth, by which He sent the Apostles to be
Princes, in a kingdom which was to set nothing by rank,
or race ; which, in spite of diametrically opposing the
world, and so coming in for a full share of its hatred and
scorn, it was the Father's good pleasure to give to twelve
Galilean peasants.
Mighty in the strength of the ascended Lord, fervid in
the Holy Spirit, the early Church entered a warfare with
sin, Satan, and Death, which will end when the kingdoms

THE LAMBETH CONFERENCE. 163
of this world become the kingdoms of the Lord and of
His Christ.
Markedly parallel to the early Church, is the American
Church to-day, in this, that the future is her greatest
possession. Both Churches alike have to face the' master fact of
life, change. Humanly speaking, the work of the whole
Church hung in the balance, while early Christianity
faced this fact of change. Her members, for their allotted
time, were born into change. It hedged them about.
Nothing else was certain.
The great kingdoms which Daniel had beheld in
visions of the night, made proud boasts. There was a
heathen city called the Eternal City, which proudly said :
"While stands the Coliseum,
Rome shall stand ;
When falls the Coliseum, Rome shall fall ;
And when Rome falls, — the world."
To-day, too, men wander about the ruins of what
called itself, the unchanging East.
But in the Christian Kingdom, the heart has ever
sought rest in the eternal and unchanging. To bear her
up in the mighty struggle, the Church on earth is pledged.
She would count on something that will not change,
something ever new, ever vigorous, ever lasting.
' ' Crowns and thrones may perish,
Kingdoms rise and wane,
But the Church of Jesus
Constant will remain."
Christ sent forth the twelve to prepare mankind for
His coming again. One by one the Apostolic Fathers
passed to their rest, until, at the close of the century, one
only of the original twelve is left, — S. John — of whom
Jesus, as the sun rose on the waters of Tiberias, had said,

164 OCCASIONAL SERMONS.
"If I will that he tarry till I come." The current belief
of S. Paul and the early Christians was, that Christ's
second coming was very near. Almost as a pledge of its
nearness and fulfilment, then, must the early Church have
prayed for the life of S. John. For every reason, the
thought of losing him was hard to bear. His life-
lesson — love — had been learned in bygone years from
Jesus of Nazareth, the Master of . his love. Intense
must have been the joy of the faithful in Ephesus, to
gather about the Altar in the early morning, while S.
John celebrated the Holy Eucharist. The morning came,
when for them on earth it was their final Communion
with their beloved Disciple, and he, last of the twelve, was
gone to the rest of Paradise.
At such an hour, change faced the early Church with
force. With a full heart, she turned to the days of S.
Peter and S. James; and last of the twelve, S. John, all
apostles who, to S. Paul even, seemed to be pillars of the
Church. How can the building go on when these pillars are
removed ? Is it true, that all the fire and enthusiasm
will go out of the Church, now that Christ and the Twelve
are passed beyond the vail ? Will Christianity be, after
all, as learned Gamaliel had rather thought, like the
religion of Theudas, who, boasting himself to be some
body, was joined and obeyed by a number of men who
were scattered and brought to naught ; or like Judas, of
Galilee, in the days of the taxing, whose followers were
all dispersed ?
To the early Church, S. John, as a link to Pentecost,
had been a grand stay through the change and terror of
war and earthquake. And against the false teaching that
Jesus is not God, and that Father and Son are not one,
he wrote his marvellous Epistle. How an early Christ-

THE LAMBETH CONFERENCE. 165
ian would miss so holy a man, one can imagine, who
could have turned in fond memory to Seabury or Hobart,
or Kemper, or other Fathers of the Faith — Apostles in the
American Church.
But the early Church never hesitated in her course.
Instead of her Fathers, were her children, whom she
made princes in all lands, beginning with S. Paul and S.
Matthias, S. Timothy, S. Titus, Archippus, Demetrius and
the Bishops of the seven Churches in Asia.
Then, as now, when irreligion and religionism offer a
stone instead of bread, the heart-cry of humanity is for
something, that, like a true friend, will be always the
same. If the Church — the Throne of God — is, in the Psalm
ist's words, for ever and ever, and for all mankind, there
must be in her an unchanging Order. The human heart
will not rest on a thing ; its only rest must be on a person.
If the Church of God is to soothe the heart of the world
amid change and death, she must have in the world an
unchanging and eternal office. For if the Church is the
Body of Christ, in partaking of the Divine Nature she is
in eternity, here on earth. And the office that Christ
Himself appointed, when on the Apostles He breathed
the Holy Ghost, must last on. The early Christian saw
as we see, that the individual Bishop may pass from earth
to the Church in Paradise; but the Apostolate with which
alone Christ promised to be to the end, can never die.
" The King is dead ! long live the King ! " is the
legend of earthly governments even. Differing absolutely
from all earthly or human governments, in dependence
upon the continuity of her chief officers, is the Kingdom
of Christ. " Nulla Ecclesia sine Episcopo." "There
can be no Church without a Bishop," said Ignatius of
Antioch, the Bishop and Martyr of the first century.

166 OCCASIONAL SERMONS.

The Church on earth could not exist without Christ,
her Head, pleading for her at God's right hand ; and
without His representative, the historic Episcopate on
earth. Between Him in Heaven, and them on earth, is an
absolute continuity of succession.
The Episcopate, then, is undying. Beloved, it is more ;
it is, in more senses than one, everliving. As in the
early Church, as in the Church of the ages, as in the
Church to-day, God means the universal Episcopate to be
the living centre of cohesion, for the Church of the living
God. "What I want you to notice," as now writes Dean
Church of S. Paul's, " since historic Christianity began to
act on society, as unprecedented as characteristic is the
power of recovery which appears in society in the Christian
centuries. It is because the historic Episcopate is a
living, recovering fact."
And to-day, brethren, whether we consider the work of
the Church outlined by the 45th Psalm, or whether we
regard the interior power of the old Church, to renew her
youth in new lands and amid changing conditions of life,
the recent Conference of Bishops of the Anglican com
munion points the two-fold lesson.
Standing in S. Paul's Cathedral, in the heart of the
greatest city the world knows to-day, at the final service
of the Lambeth Conference, gazing at the grandest func
tion the English Church has witnessed for centuries, one
could say, "this is Catholic Christianity;" not a cut, dried
and sapless Unitarianism ; not the working of a Calvinist
clock, wound up to run one heartless way through
eternity ; nor is it the silver-plating theory which would
make faith consistent with gross sin, and the Atonement,
as it were, an encouragement to sin.

THE LAMBETH CONFERENCE. 167
Not these things, but rather Catholic Christianity, the
living truth that centres about the Person of the Incarnate
Head of the Church, which is the One Body, as essential
in its Oneness, as the One Spirit and One Faith ; and
which, through the Spirit, is sustained sacramentally by
the Incarnate life of the God-Man, carried into all lands
by His representatives on earth, the Bishops of the Catholic
Church. ' ' One only way to life,
One Faith delivered once for all;
One holy Band, endowed with Heaven's high call,
One earnest, endless strife,
This is the Church th' Eternal framed of old."*
Hardly in the history of Christianity, has there been a
grander fulfilment of our text, than in the Lambeth Con
ference of 1888; when, to the faithful in Christ Jesus,
went forth the letter which seemed good to the Holy
Ghost and to them. (I quote their official utterance.)
" Bishops of the Holy Catholic Church, in full communion
with the Church of England, one hundred and forty-five
in number, all having superintendence over dioceses, or
lawfully commissioned to exercise Episcopal functions
therein, assembled from divers parts of the earth, at
Lambeth Palace, in the year of our Lord 1888, under the
presidency of the Most Reverend Edward, by Divine
Providence Archbishop of Canterbury, Primate of all
England and Metropolitan, after receiving in the Chapel
of the said Palace the Blessed Sacrament of the Lord's
Body and Blood, and uniting in prayer for the guidance
of the Holy Spirit, took into consideration various ques
tions which had been submitted to them affecting the
welfare of God's people, and the condition of the Church
in divers parts of the world." *Lyra Apostolic a.

168 OCCASIONAL SERMONS.
Instead of the Apostolic Fathers, with whom we are
one in the blessed communion of saints, at Lambeth were
gathered, in conference, their successors and spiritual
children, whom the Church has made Princes in all lands.
In attendance at the Conference, were Princes of
Christ's Kingdom from the lands of England, Ireland,
Scotland, Japan, Africa, Sierra Leone, Canada, Jamaica,
China, India, Honolulu, Niger, Antigua, Barbadoes, and
the United States.
How the Anglican Church hath shown that she is not
a decaying but a recovering society, will be seen by the
following figures : One hundred years ago, if a Lambeth
Conference had been called, 50 Bishops could have been
summoned in the whole Anglican Communion; fifty years
ago, 74 Bishops; thirty-five years ago, 110 Bishops; and
twenty years ago, when the first Conference was called,
144 invitations were sept, 76 Bishops responding. Ten
years ago, the second Conference was convened, with 100
Bishops out of 173 in the Anglican Communion; while
this summer, invitations were sent to 209 Bishops, the
large proportion of nearly three-fourths responding, by
attending the third Conference of Bishops in the great
library of Lambeth Palace.
In thus noting that for the hundred years past, a new
Bishop has been consecrated, on the average, every eight
months, in the Anglican Communion, making an increase
of 160 for the century, it is well to remember that our
Episcopate and membership, here in the United States, is
almost entirely made up of native Americans. The in
crease of the Roman Catholic Episcopate and following
in this country, for example, is mostly gained by immi
gration of Roman Catholics from Ireland, Germany,
Poland, etc., with a small proportion of native Americans.
In 1870, Dr. Dollinger, one of the greatest living

THE LAMBETH CONFERENCE. 169

authorities of the Roman Catholic Church, in fact, of
Christendom, withdrew from the Roman Communion,
because he could not conscientiously accept the modern
Dogma of Papal infallibility. In the general interests of
Christendom, the learned Doctor reads and writes year by
year. When asked what he thought of the recent Lambeth
Conference, he does not hesitate to make the remarkable
statement : "Nothing of equal importance in the history
of the Anglican Communion has taken place for, at any
rate, more than two centuries. The spectacle of an
assembly of 145 Bishops, dealing with burning questions,
and deliberating with perfect freedom, could not but have
a considerable effect throughout Europe — throughout
Christendom'. As it is, the Lambeth Conference showed
the world that the Anglican portion of the Church, is
much more than a merely national communion ; from
this point of view great importance is to be attached to
the presence of so many American prelates."
In 1867, of the American prelates nineteen were in
attendance ; when Bishop Whitehouse, of Illinois, preached
before the Conference.
In 1878, nineteen also attended; when Bishop Stevens
of Pennsylvania preached at the closing service in S.
Paul's; twenty-nine of our Bishops — something less than
half of the American Episcopate — attended this summer,
Bishop Whipple preaching before the opening session in
Lambeth Chapel.
• Barely more than a century ago, Apostolic hands were
laid on our first Bishop Seabury, in the little upper room
at Aberdeen, in Scotland.
At the begining of this century, John Marshall asked
for information, if there was any longer an Episcopal
Church in the United States ? There did seem reason in
his question. With but half a dozen, and not all able-

170 OCCASIONAL SERMONS.

bodied, Bishops, the Church was nearly choked by the
intense hatred of powerful sects, or utterly dispirited by
such members as had no real idea of her system.
As late as 1820, it was apparent how the Church's
growth had been stunted, by the godless treatment the
English Government, in days before the Revolution had
forced the English Church into.
Up to the time of the Revolution, we had no chief
pastor among us. Our Priests had to go to England for
ordination. In 1820, there were only eight of our
Bishops to cope with such a work and mission, as fell to
the Church in America. But God was in the midst of
her ; she was not removed, God did help her, and that
right early.
It gradually became known, that essentially the
Church was Catholic, not English. Her character and
position came out, so that in 1867, forty-three American
Bishops were invited to Lambeth ; and to-day, all Ameri
can territory (Alaska excepted), is under the jurisdiction
of the American Episcopate, numbering sixty and six.
The vitality of the Episcopate in the spread of Christ's
Kingdom, is the lesson this all gives; vital is the Episco
pate in its age, for Christianity is not older ; vital in its
continuity, for a Church without a Bishop was not
dreamed of, till 300 years ago ; vital in its youth, for
Christ endued the Apostolate with the power of generating
itself unto the end.
The English Press accorded the Conference of 1888 a
place of deeper importance than to either of its predeces
sors. It is not too much to say, that this Conference
made a profound impression on the whole of England.
The reception of the Bishops from other lands, was
hearty in every quarter of England. Due recognition was
given them by the Lord Mayor of London at a dinner on

THE LAMBETH CONFERENCE. 171

July 4th. The Archbishop of Canterbury seemed to make
-every endeavor for the comfort and welcome of his
brethren, in which he was splendidly seconded by the
English Episcopate. All the great Church societies had
Conference meetings. At Cambridge University, at York,
Ely, and Durham Cathedrals, special features were
arranged, while individual invitations came from the
length and breadth of England.
It was through such means of intercourse, that a
prominent physician, and most thoughtful layman, Sir
James Paget, of London, stated of the Conference, that to
his knowledge, " it made a great impression by the dignified
adherence to historic lines on the part of the Bishops.
The Conference made a profound impression in the
Metropolis ; in fact, on the laity of England. The fact
was fully recognized on all hands, that the Bishops met
and acted as an historical body, conscious of their position."
The official arrangements of the Conference were for
three public services, and for the sessions of the Confer-
-ence, in the Library of Lambeth.
The Archbishop received about 100 of his brethren,
publicly, in Canterbury Cathedral on the eve of the Con
ference. Seated just before the Altar, on the throne of
massive stone, given by Ethelbert, the Saxon King — to
Augustine, the first Archbishop of Canterbury, 1200
years ago, with the chaplain bearing his primatial staff,
just beside the throne, the present successor of Augustine,
Primate of the English Church, delivered his allocution,
or address of welcome, "to the Bishops assembled at the
-chair of Augustine, 30th of June, A. D. 1888." He wel
comed them " from all continents, and seas, and shores,
where the English tongue is spoken, to the chair which
.speaks of unbroken lines of government, and law, and
faith."

172 OCCASIONAL SERMONS.
A noble sight to see princes of the Church from all
lands in procession up the nave of Canterbury ! Within
sight of the grand Cathedral, stands the little Church of
S. Martin, where Augustine celebrated his first Eucharisfc
in England. This Church and the Cathedral in their memories,;
carry one back, (in the Archbishop's words), to " unbroken
lines of government and law and faith," to Augustine and
his great successors, Anselm, a'Becket, Parker, and Laudr
grandest of all, and Moore, who consecrated Bishop
White, of Pennsylvania.
The evening before the Conference began, the Dean
and Chapter of Westminster welcomed the Bishops in an
opening service at the great Abbey. It was a choral
service, as all the public services were, and beautifully
rendered. The sessions of the Conference were in the great
Library of Lambeth Palace, just across the Thames from
Westminster and the Parliament buildings.
The Encyclical Letter was the official utterance of the-
Bishops to the Faithful, embodying the results of the
discussions and committee work. It is generally conceded
to be a dignified and well-considered document. One
phrase it contains, especially noteworthy, which affirms-
" the work of the Church to be the application, and exten
sion, of the blessings of the Incarnation ; and her teaching,.
the development of its doctrinal issues, as contained in
the creeds of the Church."
In a strong manner, the Encyclical deals with moral
issues, notably with purity and the sanctity of marriage X-
and also with definite doctrinal teaching.
Of the resolutions formally adopted, two may be cited :;
"The Bishops assembled in this Conference declare
that the use of unfermented juice of the grape, or any

THE LAMBETH CONFERENCE. 173
liquid other than true wine diluted or undiluted, as the
element in the administration of the cup in Holy Com
munion, is unwarranted by the example of our Lord, and
is an unauthorized departure from the custom of the
Catholic Church."
Then in regard to Prayer Book revision : " Inasmuch
as the Book of Common Prayer is not the possession of
one Diocese or Province, but of all, and that a revision in
one portion of the Anglican Communion must therefore
be extensively felt, this Conference is of opinion that no
particular portion of the Church should undertake revi
sion,, without seriously considering the possible effect of
such action on other branches of the Church."
This resolution will refer rather to the future ; as
placing the Magnificat, and Nunc Dimittis in( our Prayer
Books, was a restoration, rather than revision.
While granting the deep influence the Encyclical is
sure to have, it would be wide of the mark to compare it
in importance with the meeting itself of the Bishops who
came from every land, in the mind of that unity which is
sure to be strength, if based on the faith once delivered to
the saints.
The indirect were, very probably, the most beneficial
results of the Conference. For example, the mutual help
and sympathy of the Bishops, and their coming into con
tact with the daily work of the English Church; and
many think the English Bishops will gain from their
American brethren a more fatherly view of their office.
They are very learned — the Bishops of Durham (Light-
foot) and of Oxford (Stubbs) being men of European
reputation. The representative newspaper of England deemed the
marked progress of this Conference, as compared with its
predecessors, due to the growth of toleration and common

174 OCCASIONAL SERMONS.
sense; "but," The Times continues, "we may also attribute
some considerable share in the happy result to the nu
merous admixture of American prelates, whose ideas are
purged from pedantry by the associations of new and
democratic communities."
The Conference tended to make plain what an accepted
authority like the Encyclopaedia Britannica states : " That
the Church of England, and likewise the Anglican Com
munion, claims to be a true and Apostolical Church;
teaching and maintaining the doctrines of the Apostles;
and that she never was identical with the Church of Rome,
which Church, before the Reformation, in ecclesiastical
documents she described as the Curia or Court of Rome."
The Prayer set forth when a Lambeth Conference was
first spoken of, is, "that Thy Holy Spirit may lead into
all truth, Thy servants, the Bishops now to be gathered
together in Thy name. Grant them to do such things as
shall tend to Thy glory, and the good of Thy Holy Church;
that the true Catholic and Apostolic Faith, once delivered
to the saints, being maintained, Thy Church may serve
Thee in all godly quietness."
Dr. Dollinger, from whose authoritative words we
quoted above, well says, " that the unfortunate attempt,
by one in the Lambeth Conference, to recognize non-
Episcopal ordination and to unsettle so fundamental a
principle as the mdispensableness of the Episcopate to the
transmission of the ministerial character and commission,
by its complete failure, supplied a useful illustration of
the genera] temper of the Conference. It was ' the pass
ing shadow which enables us the better to do justice to
the beauty of a landscape.' "
In fact through all, more grandly than one dared
hope, did the body of the Bishops respond to their Cath
olic heritage. When one of their number entered a pro-

THE LAMBETH CONFERENCE. 175
test in the public press against the Encyclical Letter,
because it had nothing against the full resolution of
Catholic life and practice, he was left entirely alone. Ten
years ago, he might not have been alone in his unhappy
notoriety ; but, thank God, my brethren, that it is so ; the
days are passed, when Princes of the Kingdom would help
strip the King's daughter of her glory within, and all her
heritage of beautiful and splendid ritual.
The final service of the Conference at S. Paul's, when
the Blessed Sacrifice was pleaded at the High altar, and
the great body of the Anglican Episcopate were there,
means something.
The Reredos of S. Paul's, how can words describe its
grand power ! "Sic Deus Dilexit Mundum," is its legend ;
and in marble and fair alabaster, are carved the God-
Child resting in His Mother's arms, the crucifixion, entomb
ment, resurrection ; and on the summit, the ascended
Saviour. It is the text translated into marble, which
translated into English is, "So God loved the World."*
For, my friends, that Reredos is more than beautiful.
Through its position in the most important English
Cathedral, and through the attendance in that Cathedral
of the majority of the Anglican Episcopate, the seal of
approval is set on devoting the best of art, and sculpture,
and beautiful work, to the worship of Almighty God.
The fact of this Reredos in S. Paul's, dashes aside, let us
hope, for ever, from the Anglican Communion, that
wheedling and selfish Protestantism, which, with Judas,
would envy the costly ointment poured on Jesus' feet, and
say, "Could not this have been sold, and given to the
poor?" * In his final Conciliar Address, Bishop Welles said that the Reredos at
S. Paul's Cathedral was worthy to he called the Oxford Movement in
marble.

176 OCCASIONAL SERMONS.

At this High Celebration in S. Paul's, the Archbishop
of Canterbury was celebrant. The Altar and Reredos
came out more grandly than ever, as the body of nearly
one hundred and fifty Bishops, with attendant chaplains,
passed through the vast concourse in the nave, up into the
choir, as the white-robed choristers sang the Conference
Hymn —
"The Church's one Foundation."
The Celebration was semi-choral. Of the High Cele
bration at S. Paul's, the great composer, Gounod, said,
that "he knows none to excel it." The Archbishop took
the eastward position at the Altar, used the mixed chalice,
and the ablutions were taken immediately after the Te
Deum, which ended the great function. This concluding
service of the Conference of 1888 will have an untold
influence, for more reasons than one, on the Anglican
Communion. In his opening address before the Primary Conference,
in 1867, the then Archbishop of Canterbury stated, "that
the Bishops merely proposed to discuss matters of practical
interest, and pronounce what was deemed expedient, in
resolutions which might serve as safe guides to future
action." " Thus," he added, " it will be seen that our first
essay is rather tentative and experimental, in a matter in
which we have no distinct precedent to direct us." He
more than made it plain, that the meeting of Bishops was
only for conference.
That the Conference of 1888 is more than was in the
minds of the originators of the idea of a decennial meeting
of Bishops of the Anglican Communion, it is hardly
necessary to say, if anything has been said. It is simply
in the nature of things, that the utterances of a body of
Bishops, of whom any communion could afford to be
proud, will have deep-set authority.

THE LAMBETH CONFERENCE. 177
The Bishops at Lambeth could not help influencing
their Communion, even if they had wished not to do so.
Men and deeds always have carried further than mere
words. A. life of earnestness behind a simple utterance,
gives the halo of authority. Well may the Bishops say,
"Ebenezer, hitherto hath the Lord helped us." And if
these Conferences go on during the decades of the cen
turies before us, what may not the Anglican Communion
be called to in God's good time?
Like a revelation to the Bishops of America is the daily
work of the English Church. It must have a profound
effect, through them, on their dioceses. , In the selfless work
of brotherhoods and sisterhoods innumerable; in the
multiplication, restoration, and beautifying of church and
service alike, especially the deep importance attaching
more and more to the Eucharistic service, which the
Church ordains for each Sunday and holy day; in the
great offerings for missions; above all, in hand-to-hand
work among the very poor, the outcast, the suffering,
England's Church is proving her name.
Since that memorable day nearly half a century ago,
when, in the House of Lords, a great Radical, Earl Grey,
told the Bishops in the Prophet's words, "that they must
set their house in order," this recovery has gone on with
mighty power. Nor does it depend, as some imagine, on
endowment. New churches, new hospitals, new schools, spring up
on every hand. Twenty years ago a little iron church
was raised at Kilburn, to begin Church work in that part
of London. To-day, a great brick church, S. Augustine's,
costing $100,000, with a beautiful interior of 1,500 seating
capacity, stands as the result of faithful, unendowed
work, in the iron church. On Sundays, S. Augustine's is
full. About the church are now gathered such blessed

178 OCCASIONAL SERMONS.
works, as schools which care for 4,000 children ; a hos
pital, orphanage, under the charge of S. Augustine's
Sisterhood of 200 ; a clergy house, and large clothing
stores for the poor. During the current years, the bap
tisms at S. Augustine's mount up to 2,000.
The vicar's explanation of such great results in the
brief time since the present Lambeth Conference, is the
daily Eucharist which, beginning the first morning in the
upper room of a dwelling near the site of the church,
has never ceased.
If you will bear with me for a moment longer, there
are four scenes in Lambeth Chapel which might well be
pictured as a parting souvenir of this Conference at
Lambeth. Lambeth Chapel, scene of so much that both gladdens
and saddens our Mother Church ! If it had a tongue, it
could tell of centuries of English Christianity. Within
its walls, 400 Bishops have been consecrated.
It is said that at Rome during the reign of Mary of
England, the death of each Bishop of the English Church
was chronicled, in the hope that with the death of the last
of the succession, would die the Church of England.
But in this Lambeth Chapel, the spell was broken,
when, after Elizabeth ascended the throne, on Sunday,
Dec. 17th, 1559, the devout and learned Matthew Parker,
Priest and Doctor, was consecrated by Bishop Barlow and
others, in the presence of Bishops, Priests, noblemen and
commoners, 68th Archbishop of Canterbury. "O, what a
scene was that !" writes one. " How memorable the act
which saved to England's venerable Church that ministry
of grace and power, which Christ had ordained. And,"
he adds, "weighing my words with care, there can be no
more doubt, that these four prelates who consecrated
Parker were lawful Catholic Bishops, than that Anselm,

THE LAMBETH CONFERENCE.. 179

or Augustine, Ignatius or S. John were partakers of the
Apostolic ministry."
And in Lambeth Library just at hand may be seen
to-day, the full sworn record of Parker's consecration.
Forty-five years after, an absurd fable, about Bishop Scory
laying his hands on Parker at the Nag's Head Tavern, in
London, was started by a Jesuit named Holy wood. But
any Romanist, who adheres to historic truth, like Dr.
Lingard, utterly rejects this lie in the face of nine inde
pendent documents, which to-day attest the fact and
validity of the consecration.
After this scene of Parker's consecration, the chief
danger to the English Church, turning from the plotting
of Romanists, came from the insubordinate and contempt
uous spirit among the Puritans, which, gathering bile,
culminated in 1640, in a most violent attack on Arch
bishop Laud. Laud believed in the English Prayer Book.
He believed in the English Church ; nay, more, he was one
of the first to grasp the missionary work of the English
Church, and the idea of a great Anglican Communion.
God only knows how different the state of the Church
might be, to-day, if, in 1636, Land had been allowed to
develop his plan for an Episcopate in North America !
In many quarters, Churchmen have been influenced,
even up to our day, by the Puritan view of Archbishop
Laud. Just the other day I read of a great Presbyterian
authority, who held Archbishop Laud to be narrow-
minded, unscrupulous, haughty, vindictive, blindly ritual
istic and cruelly despotic. This writer may have taken
Macaulay for his authority. At any rate, he seems to
have been ignorant of the fact that Archbishop Land was
Prime Minister and Executive of the laws of England,
as they were in his day, as well as Primate of the Church.
Perhaps this writer forgot, too, that in the beginning of

180 OCCASIONAL SERMONS.
the seventeenth century, the English order of Divine
Service was being stripped of its beauty and solemnity by
Calvinists. In place of a beautiful worship, was substi
tuted a service, cold, bare, protestant. The old ornaments
of the Church fell into disuse, the Altar was turned into
a table, and clerical vestments turned aside. Churches
were in decay, and the sermon and extempore prayer were
made the features of public worship in the Church whose
acknowledged heritage is the Prayer Book.
Against the rage and wild vituperation of Calvanism,
stood alone that grand Archbishop, like a rock on the
eternal sea. Just before going to prison and death, he
knelt at the foot of the Altar of Lambeth, which he loved
so well. On the 6th of January, 1645, the Archbishop was
condemned to be hung. On the same day, the Book of
Common Prayer was abolished by order of Parliament.
The mode of execution of the Archbishop was changed
from hanging, to the sentence of the block. And when
Laud was beheaded, the champion of the Catholic Church
of England fell. But he saved the English Church.
"That we have our Prayer Book, our Altar, even our
Episcopacy itself, we may, humanly speaking, thank
Laud." In dying, he laid the foundation for a future age
to build upon ; and the Catholic character of the Lambeth
Conference, nay, even the possibility of this Conference,
is due to this noble and heroic martyr.
Another scene in our souvenir of the Conference,
would be the Consecration, in Lambeth Chapel, of Bishop
White and his companions, a century ago.
But last in its memories, would be the memorable sight
of the Conference of 1888.
All the Bishops are gathered there for the Blessed
Sacrament of the Altar. Clad in their vestments, are

THE LAMBETH CONFERENCE. 181
Princes from all lands ; some just entering their work,
others midway, and some, old heroes ; who, fighting the
good fight, have kept the faith, and nearly finished their
course. The Communion Service goes on, until they
reach the Confession of the Faith of Nicasa. With one
exception, all turn to the Altar, and to the window above
it, on which is pictured the Crucified. One can not
describe the thrill of emotion, as the words of the Creed
go on : "God of God, Light of Light, Very God of Very
God." That Creed was recited by men who believe it. All
heart-burnings, all differences, and discouragements, pale
before this corner stone of the Anglican Communion, the
Faith of Niccea, and the Faith of the Undivided Church.
To have heard the recitation of that Creed, by those men,
in that chapel, was the memory of a life-time. With it
still ringing in her ears, the Church may face the future
with calm strength.
For whether the Church of England with her past
and present, and the Church of America with her future,
shall become perfectly united in one great Communion, is
known only to God ; but this they both are, and in God's
mercy shall be, while the Faith of Nicsea stands, Catholic
and Apostolic !

ADDRESSES.

"VIA CRUCIS, VIA LUCIS."
The Conclusion of Graduation Address, Hobart College, 1850.
A pure, spiritual, holy truth, the Philosophy of the
Cross, was sent from Heaven. It was a glorious truth,
sanctified by the agony of the Garden, and the shame of
the Cross. ***** ****
Thus, the mission of the Church was as glorious as her
origin. She was established in the midst of contending
systems, to purify them of their errors, and to change and
elevate man's heart, and engage his noblest efforts, that
she might triumph in this earth. The struggle was an
arduous one, but the triumph was complete. We may not
say that it was the noblest of the triumphs of the Faith ;
for there are tears of penitence and lives of holiness. Still,
it was a noble triumph, and it is written on an immortal
page, even the souls of men.
From the Temples and Altars of the living God, the
ministers of truth went forth into the world, to plant the
Cross in the fields of learning, and philosophy, and art.
Their names were in the Book of Life. The reward was
the promise of Eternal Rest, and gladly they sealed with
martyr's blood, their belief in the divinity of their mis-

184 ADDRESSES.

sion. Unlike the triumphal march of insatiate ambition,
the progress of the Church was traced in records of glory,
and improvement.
She came where men had listened to the speculative
wisdom of the world, to theories beautifully bright, but
ideal and unsatisfactory ; and she substituted the germ of
Divine Life for these cold, unsatisfying speculations.
She revealed the errors and sophistries of heathen
philosophy. She passed within the brazen gates, where the dream
of the poet was embodied in matchless sculpture, and the
glory of the idol worshipper carved in beauty ; 'and, sweeping
away the vestiges of Pagan idolatry, proclaimed the glory
of the Living God ; and, purifying the genius of art,
created with pencil and chisel, divine beauties, which filled
the mind of man with ideas of Heaven.
She subdued the soul's exaltation of self ; and preached
to men in the place of their imperfect laws, the Divine
code which the great Law-giver of Israel received from God;
she substituted history for vain tradition ; she moulded,
in accord with a lofty type, the wisdom and intellect of
man, demanding for herself the firstlings of his thoughts,
and the homage of his heart.

The Christian Church, gathering around herself the
folds of her Divinity, stood unmoved amid the shocks and
crash of crumbling empires. The Spirit which sustained
her, when battling with the sophistries of philosophy,
deserted her not, when she stood forth to struggle with
the force of Northern invaders.
Ignorance and prejudice have long viewed the Church
in the Middle Ages in its abuses alone; and the clergy,
seen only in their faults, have been represented as an

"VIA CRUCIS, VIA LUCIS." 185
ignorant and depraved, or ambitious and unscrupulous
body. Historians, either regarding as an era of chaotic
confusion, the period succeeding the classic literature of
the Roman Empire, or contrasting its gloom with the
literary splendor of their own times, have stigmatized it
as the "Age of Darkness."
Zealous inquiry and research have but just succeeded
to former apathy; a reaction has taken place, and the
liliddle Ages have assumed that excellency and importance
which is their proper due. Regarding the trustful confi
dence, in the language of authority which pervades its
writings, defenders may more truthfully pronounce it the
"Age of Faith."
The Church, even in that age, restrained the lawless
ness of the northern invaders, and the wild energy of their
barbarian freedom. Among all classes — from castle hall
to peasant home — she diffused the benignant spirit of a
Divine Religion. She enforced the purity of the marriage
vow, and elevated woman to that lofty position to which
Christian morality pointed.
The Church preserved in her monastic homes, amid
the superstitious contempt of the age, the classic volumes
of antiquity, and thus kept bright the link that binds us
to the glorious past. And, amid all the errors of a later
age, she has left us "one reward, one evidence," of her
Faith and Hope : those " gray heaps of deep-wrought
stone," which uprear their majesty in Christian temples,
shadowing f orth, dimly indeed, but as gloriously as human
art could hope, the greatness of their eternal archetypes,
Divine Truth and Beauty.
But abuses and corruptions had defiled the purity of
the Church, and speculation had been substituted for
revealed Truth. Errors had sprung up — errors in the
Church. She lost her glory and her purity, until God-like

186 ADDRESSES.

men diverted the Cross of its human appendages, unsealed
the Holy Book which policy had closed, and, unfolding
its gracious promises, established in the world's history
the great epoch of modern times.
Who can estimate the blessings of the Reformation ?
Although some, who bore the name of Christ, departed
from the faith to embrace heresy, the Church was restored
to her primitive purity, and the Philosophy of the Cross
found in the reformed clergy, the defenders of Apostolic
Faith, and the bold and holy exponents of pure Catholicism.
The Church "has kindled on the shores of tbe ever-
troubled ocean of mistiness and doubt, that lofty beacon
light, which, supplied with the holy oil of the sanctuary,
shall never go out, but burn, and flame, and blaze, in a
celestial splendor, until her Divine warmth and illumina
tion shall have dissipated error, and shall have animated
and attracted to herself, all the tempest-tossed and perish-
ing."

II.
SELF-DISCIPLINE IN OBEDIENCE TO AUTHORITY.
Delivered before the Brotherhood of Gethsemane Parish, Minneap
olis, Dec. 10th, 1882.
My Right Reverend Father and Brother* Officers and Mem
bers of the Gethsemane Brotherhood, and —
Christian Friends: In the midst of many and
pressing duties, I accept the invitation to address you this
evening with real pleasure — f or, from its inception, I have"
watched with personal interest the work of this Brother
hood. Real success in all work of this nature will depend
upon the realized fact, that the principle of action is
always self-sacrificing obedience to rightful authority ; for
that self-discipline, which is a necessary factor in true
success, will always he found in cheerful submission to
law and its appointed exponents and administrators.
All who, during the visits of the Bishop of Lichfield
to this country, had the pleasure and the profit of meeting
and conversing with him, will recall how he lost no oppor
tunity, especially in the presence of the young, of urging
upon Christian disciples the idea of obedience — submission
to authority — and self-discipline in submission. He would
often speak of the glory of England in those days, when
the power and virtue of obedience seemed so eminently a
characteristic of the British people. He felt that the
* Bishop Whipple, and the Rev. Dr. Knickerbacker, now Bishop of
Indiana.

188 ADDRESSES.
diminution of this, in individual or national character,
was something greatly to be deplored, and in regard to
religious character he urged that the disciple of Christ, in
all that pertained to his discipleship, is not to act accord
ing to his own will or interest, but to obey the voice of
authority, because it is, to the true disciple, the voice of
God. And I may add that it certainly was to him, whom
the Rev. Dr. Craik referred to as the illustrious Selwyn,
when, as President of the House of Deputies, he gave
utterance to the welcome of the American Church — it
certainly was to him that that noblest of the Church's late
martyrs, Bishop Patteson, looked for the thought, the
example, and the impulse of his own career ; and surely
that noble career, closing with a glorious death, was an
illustration of the same spirit and virtue, self-sacrificing
obedience to authority.
I must clear the matter of all personal surroundings
at the outset, by saying that I am not speaking here as a
Bishop wishing to establish or strengthen Episcopal or
Church authority, but, as a baptized member of the great
Christian Brotherhood, seeking, in a few words, to set
before you a principle which is for myself as well as for
you ; nay, for the chiefest Apostle as much as for the lay-
reader or catechist.
We are all servants together. The submission of one
grade in the ministry to the one above it — of the catechu
men to the catechist — is only incidental, only an instance
and need of the application of the principle ; and this
because in the very nature of our Christian discipleship,
we are members of a great organized body. Holy Baptism
makes us members of this body. The baptismal vow is
the Sacramentum, the military oath ; it pledges us to fight
manfully under the banner of Christ against the world,
the flesh and the devil, and so makes us Christ's soldiers.

SELF-DISCIPLINE IN OBEDIENCE TO AUTHORITY. 189
That the Church is an army in the sense that it is an
organized body engaged in warfare, we have no room to
doubt. Before the world was made, the conflict between
good and evil began. For His own inscrutable purposes,
God permitted His new world to become the battle-field ;
shall we not say the final battle-field ? And the two
standards were here set up ; and the fight has gone on
since the fall and the first promise of redemption. The
Son of God came to be our Leader and Captain. He over
came Satan in His own sacred life and death, and gave to
men the power to be conquerors likewise, each in his own
life and death. While some, who have lost the unity of
the Body, attempt now-a-days to make out that this power
is an individual gift altogether — bestowed on each soul by
itself, without regard to its relations to other souls— we
have not so learned Christ.
We believe in the Holy Catholic Church, His Body, of
which we are and must remain members ; and we hold
that our salvation, which is at once the redemption from
the enemy and the strength to conquer, comes to us in
and through the Body, by virtue of our membership in it.
So, then, our belief requires us to regard ourselves, not
simply as individual and solitary contestants, but as soldiers
in an army ; and we have the right to look for the support
and strength of organization. It is not that we are
fighting in our places, and others in theirs, whether
known to us or unknown, without unity of design and
action ; but wherever any one stands, the whole army is
represented there, in him, and depends on him, at that
point, for its efficiency and victory.
Sad indeed are the divisions of the Church, and the
miserable sectarianism which has resulted. These are the
causes of the world's losing sight of the grandeur of the
array of Christ's followers, against the powers of darkness.

190 ADDRESSES.

But we must never allow ourselves to forget it. No
thought, no fact is more strengthening and encouraging.
The Church is the army of Christ, and He is our omnis
cient, almighty Leader.
He is directing the war, with no shadow of uncertainty
as to its result. As every soul is to be tried and tested by
a period of service, individuals and nations and generations,
failing in their own duties, are permitted to suffer defeat ;
but in the grand result this will be found to have been
temporary and limited. Our Lord brings good out of evil
and makes the wrath of man to praise Him. I never
doubt that He gives His grace and help to souls apart
from His Church, and makes them sharers in the warfare,
and rewards them according to their service.
He, and He alone, knows the nature of that service,
and He to Whom it is rendered will surely reward it in
righteousness. For ourselves, there is one abiding fact;
the Church is His army, and we are soldiers in it, and
some are called to be officers in it. Let us think most of
our own work, and how we may, through it, give the
greatest strength to the whole body.
When the Centurion of Capernaum, as explaining his
own readiness to obey, said to the Saviour, "I am a man
set under authority, having under me soldiers ; and I say
unto one go, and he goeth ; and to another, come and he
cometh ; and to my servant, do this and he doeth it," he
gave to all Christian disciples, the rule of living and
working in accordance with the mind of Christ, and in
obedience to His own repeated words of direction and
guidance. The illustration that he used, natural and
characteristic as it was, was a strong expression of that
faith which proceeds from true Christian obedience.
The great strength of individual character is in
unshaken faith in the Lord ; and in this connection there

SELF-DISCIPLINE IN OBEDIENCE TO AUTHORITY. 191
will always be found a clear conception on the part of the
individual, that the Lord has given him his place in the
warfare, and that there he is to fight valiantly ; that he is
there the representative of the whole army, with responsi
bility for that precise place and work. It is nothing to
him, save as a member of the body, what another does in
his place. He also is under authority, and the system and
organization of the Church, wherever and whenever fairly
tried in parochial life and work, may be relied on to
provide the corrective that is needed.
There is no need of confusion, of invading one another's
offices. Let every one feel his own relation and responsi
bility to the whole Body of the Lord, and then, in his own
appointed place hold himself obedient ; exercising authority
and submitting to authority, as one conscious of individual
responsibility. From the chiefest Apostle to the humblest
disciple, all are on one level, fellow sinners saved by the
same salvation ; brethren in the same faith and hope,
passing on together to the same judgment. And no man
can be ignorant that his work in the Church, and his
office in the Church, whether higher or lower, more or less
important, is the Lord's choice and gift of an opportunity
for him of working out his salvation ; of a test and trial
of his love and obedience ; and that he will be rewarded
or punished according to his use of it.
When S. Paul charges his son in the faith — Timothy,
Bishop of Ephesus — to endure hardness as a good soldier,
the stress is laid not on the hardness, but on the being a
soldier. A man would probably be a poor soldier, who
would obstinately insist on making his lot as hard as
possible. A good soldier does not go to look up hardships,
but endures those that come to him, in the way of duty,
heartily and cheerfully. He keeps himself in condition to
undertake without hesitation, at whatever cost to himself,

192 ADDRESSES.

whatever will serve the good cause, and whatever he has
orders to do.
We need this spirit greatly in the Chureh to-day. I
testify to you from many years' experience, and out of
that wider experience which a Bishop has to get, that,
while the Church in these days has in her ranks noble
men and women, devout and godly children, who count
not their lives dear unto themselves, if they can set forward
the Master's work by personal sacrifice, it is not, alas, the
prevailing tone of our Communion. In every parish, in
every congregation, there is work undone ; in every region
there are fields uncared for ; not because we have not men
and women who might do the work, but because we have
not those who are all penetrated with the conviction, that
the cause is greater than themselves, and worth all
sacrifices. As there is no office which even approaches in dignity
and awful responsibility that of the Lord's messenger,
ambassador, steward, minister; as there is no honor that
man can receive greater than to be sent by the Lord Jesus
to seek and to save men; so there are no motives to human
action more constraining, no rewards more certain, or
more glorious, than those which the Lord Himself asso
ciates with that work of the Church, which is the common
heritage of all her baptized members.
" The whole world lieth in wickedness, and the Son of
God hath come." His divine work, begun by His incarna
tion, and perfected by His atoning death, His mighty
resurrection and glorious ascension, and by the coming of
the Holy Ghost, is to end when the last enemy shall be
put under His feet. His divine work has reached to our
day and land, and claims us as its instruments.
The salvation of the souls for whom He died — salvation
from sin, always remember, and not alone from sin's pen-

SELF-DISCIPLINE IN OBEDIENCE TO AUTHORITY. 193
alties — no words can express the distance between the
highest aspiration of human desire and ambition, and this
gracious purpose and work of God. Who can dwell upon
it, even for a moment, and not feel that to be a helper in
it, is worth any sacrifice or labor? Who can place his own
ease or comfort or dignity in its light, and not feel utterly
ashamed to have brought them into the comparison?
What hardship, what toil, what care, what self-denial, is
worthy to be thought of for an instant, as a hindrance to
our setting forward the Kingdom of our Lord among men?
Who can wonder that He should have required us to for
sake father and mother and all that we have ; to deny
ourselves and to take up the cross ; to follow Him in
humiliation and contradiction of sinners, in suffering and
in death if He choose it for us, for the Kingdom's sake?
Words like these, we must remember, are spoken again
and again by the Saviour to His disciples; not simply to
those who were commissioned to be His ministers, but to
all who named His name and avowed themselves His
followers. And this should deepen in every faithful,
devout heart the conviction that the child of God places
himself in the Lord's hands, to be used in His work just
where and when and as He chooses; and, in the doing of
that work, is to live only in Him and for Him. Such
profession of faith in Christ involves more than the duties
of personal religion. If we are serving a living Master, if
in that service we find the guarantee of eternal safety,
then our obligations extend beyond the mere individual
salvation. The words which the Saviour places upon our lips,
teach us that it is God, "our Father," Who so loved the
world that He gave His only begotten Son ; and the
"lifting up" of that Son made His cross the refuge and
the rescue of a sin-stricken world. It was not until the

194 ADDRESSES.

Saviour came to men in human form, warmed their hearts
and their homes with the sympathy of human love, sat
down in the midst of the joys and the sorrows of lowly
dwelling-places, ministered to the wants of the sick, the
sinful, and the outcast; nay, not until, for their sakes, He
was " lifted up " upon the cross, did He draw unto Him the
hearts of men. What is the lesson here as to the duty of
every disciple of Christ, who would walk, day by day, in
the light and love of his Saviour's presence ? Is it not by
personal influence, interest, and sympathy, to seek to win
to the service of Christ some one who has not, as yet,
realized its blessedness ?
The work which Jesus began to do was a work of per
sonal ministration ; that work must His Church, untiringly,
carry on ; and it is the duty of every disciple, in his own
sphere of life, to walk in the footsteps of the Master, that
so the work of the Church may be wrought and accom
plished. Can we, as the disciples of One Whose name was
called Jesus, because He came to save His people from
their sins, be insensible to the duties and the privileges
which that discipleship imposes ? Can we expect that any
more in our day than in His, the sin and misery which are
in the world will seek salvation, before a human sympathy
is exerted to draw it to a Saviour ?
A few years since, that wise and thoughtful prelate,
the Bishop of New York, considered this matter in one of
his Convention addresses. He was speaking of free
churches, and used language of this kind : It will he of
little use to build free churches and chapels, and throw
open the doors, and make proclamation — standing afar
off — that all may enter who choose. The very ones you
would reach, are too distant to hear, or, if they dimly
hear, to heed. They do not half believe in you; you must
go to them ; you must be tender and patient with them.

SELF-DISCIPLINE IN OBEDIENCE TO AUTHORITY. 195
The great want in the active, aggressive work of the
Church, in most of our parishes, is the ministry of personal
attention and kindness; painstaking, well-considered per
severing on the part of the devout members of the
congregation. Church growth, beyond a certain point, must ever be
the result of systematic labor in the parish, wisely and
lovingly conducted. Many a one there is, a stranger to
the worship of the Church, timid about entering her
doors, who would gratefully respond to kindly overtures
brought by a friendly visitor, by one who had made business
relations, or neighborhood acquaintance, minister to
spiritual interest. When Sunday morning dawns upon a
weary, careworn family, it makes a mighty difference
whether there have been visits from some earnest, loving
disciple of Christ, which left in that family the feeling
that they have relations with the place of worship, that
they have friends in the Church who will be hoping and
expecting to see them there ; or, whether the holy day
wakes them to darkness and apathy, with no ties connecting
them with the place of worship, with no blessings which
they owe to the piety and goodness of the Christian people
worshipping there ; with no happy thoughts of what they
have enjoyed and bright anticipations of what they may
enjoy there ; with nothing, in short, but dull, weary
images of the fretful, sinful world around them.
In one case the Sunday will break upon that family
like a Heaven upon earth ; calm and bright with rest and
holy refreshment. In the other case there will be, per
haps, a gloomy sense of better things far out of reach, no
moral energy to rise up and go forth in search of them,
the present condition accepted as the unavoidable lot ; and,
to them, the blessed day will be no better, but probably
much worse than common days.

196 ADDRESSES.

We cannot doubt that very many, especially young
men, and, families where every hour of life is a battle
against care and poverty, stay away from the House of
God because those among whom they are living, with
whom they are more or less associated in business and
labor, never invite or encourage them to come to Church.
They have gradually seemed not to care about their spir
itual condition, for others have seemed not to care about
it, or them.
None the less can we doubt that considerate, persever
ing, systematic personal attention is the thing necessary
to awaken self-respect, hope and good desires ; that
personal aid and counsels must lift them up to better
things, and, by the blessing of God, be the means of lifting
them upward and onward.
Nor can we doubt that in many communities and
neighborhoods Church missions could be established and
developed if only faithful disciples were ready and willing
to undertake the work. It is to further work of this kind
that your Brotherhood exists, an organization pervaded
with the spirit of the Church, and in that spirit doing the
Church's work. Nothing to me is a more hopeful sign of
the Catholic life and practice of the Church to-day, than
that revival which is indicated by the existence, in so many
parishes, of guilds and brotherhoods, in varieties of organ
ization, and for the accomplishment of various kinds of
work. In the general Church we may note too, the
revival and increase of the Church's orders — sisterhoods
and fraternities, and the growth of the missionary spirit ;
and on every hand very encouraging and very blessed are
the tokens of the vigorous life of the American Church.
How gloriously, in this Diocese of Minnesota, are the
earnest prayers and hopes of sainted ones realized, in
works of mission zeal, charity and education ; and what

SELF-DISCIPLINE IN OBEDIENCE TO AUTHORITY. 197
a goodly example of the life and work of the American
Church do we see in this Diocese, in this parish and in
this Brotherhood. And in the future annals of our Church
history, we will find closely associated with the Apostolic
Kemper and that faithful Priest, James Lloyd Breck,
the names of the first Bishop of Minnesota and the first
Rector of Gethsemane Parish, the honored founder of this
Brotherhood.

EXTRACTS FROM SERMONS.

REASONS FOR FREQUENT COMMUNION AND
PROPER PREPARATION.
1864.
At length we reach the time when we may expect to
have frequent Communion restored to us. Calvin says,
somewhere, that the Communion ought to be celebrated,
at least, every Sunday. Remark this, at least. If it should
be every Sunday, at least, what should it be at most?
At most must be to take it as. the early Christians did,
according to Calvin ; and that comes out, too, clearly
enough from the Acts of the Apostles; every day, from
house to house.
Each of you may have remarked that rare Communion
gives, I know not what strange and extraordinary idea of
the Communion, of the preparation which ought to
precede, and of the emotions which follow it. On the
contrary, frequent communion makes us understand much
better the true character of this Sacrament; and it is
impossible that daily Communion should fail to put us in
perfect possession of that true character ; for it teaches us
to connect the Communion, with all that there is most
simple in Christian Life, just as a repast is one of the
simplest things in ordinary life.
But, whether there should be a daily Celebration or
not ; certainty, in seeing in the Communion the simplest

200 EXTRACTS FROM SERMONS.
expression of our Faith, we shall profit by it most ; we
shall gather from it the greatest fruit ; and it is thus
that it will nourish our souls most effectually, with the
Flesh, and with the Blood, of Jesus Christ !
Surely, the subject of Frequent Communion, is one
which should be commended to the serious and thoughtful
consideration of every devout disciple of Christ ; for there
is a principle involved in the frequency, or rarity, of the
Celebration of this holy ordinance. It depends upon the
manner in which we esteem the Sacrament, whether we
shall desire often to partake of it, or be content with less
frequent reception. If the true, right view of the Euchar
ist were generally entertained, I doubt not that its
celebration, upon all Sundays and Holy days, throughout
the year, would be universally desired.
The Lord's Supper is not a mere commemorative rite ;
if it were so, if the whole design of the Sacrament were to
affect us with a picture of our Saviour's Passion, this
design would doubtless be carried out more effectively by
a rare, than by a frequent, communion. For it is a law of
the mind, from the operation of which we shall strive in
vain to exempt ourselves — that the impression which is
constantly repeated, gradually loses its force. But the
Eucharist is not, merely, a commemoration, but an actual
channel, or vehicle, of grace to the soul. It stands on the
same footing in this respect, with prayer, reading of
Scripture, and public worship : only it takes precedence of
them all, as the instrument of a higher Grace, and a
means of a closer communion with God.
It is the plain and natural interpretation of the record,
in the Book of the Acts of the Apostles, which first speaks
of the organic life of the Church of Christ, that, as means
of grace, Common Prayer with the Holy Communion was
the rule and practice of daily life. Breaking bread from

EXTRACTS FROM SERMONS. 201
house to house, is universally accounted, I believe, to
signify household and neighborhood gatherings for prayer
and the Eucharist. We must remember in this connection,
that the idea of daily service and daily sacrifice, was, by no
means, foreign to the minds of the early Christian disciples.
From the establishment of the Jewish Church, God
commanded a lamb to be sacrificed daily, morning and
evening ; and this continued for 1500 years. That lamb
ante-typed the Lamb of God ; and it kept in remembrance
the promise and prophecy, that He would one day come
into the world, and be offered in sacrifice for its sins.
And that daily worship helped to prepare the world,
for His first advent. Sacrifice, and all the solemn services
of true Religion, so far as they relate to this world, have
always been designed to keep the death of Christ in
remembrance; and also, that He would first come to save,
and then to judge all mankind.
Every time the Priest of the Jewish Church shed the
blood of a lamb, he was reminded of the Blood of the
Lamb of God, slain from the foundation of the world.
And, by faith, he, and the people, prospectively partici- ^
pated in the Blessing which His Blood was to secure. In
the fulness of time Christ came ; the type was fulfilled.
On the solemn night before the Crucifixion, the Passover
ended. It passed over from Sacrifice to Sacrament.
Thus, when of old the Priest slew the Lamb, he was
reminded of Christ's coming to suffer; so now are the
minister and people reminded, every time they see the
Bread and Wine set forth, that the Lamb of God has
come, and died. And by it, the Church pleads with her
members, and all the world, to come and join in this
remembrance of their Crucified Lord, saying, by one of
her Apostles, "For as often as ye eat this Bread, and
drink this Cup, ye do show the Lord's death until He come."

202 EXTRACTS FROM SERMONS.
We live by the Faith and life of the Son of God, Who
has given Himself for us. His Gospel and His Sacra
ments are life to us ; and our worship and obedience to
them increases our spiritual life. It is God's new means
in Christ for raising us from the ruin of the fall, and
death in sin, unto a new creation in Christ, and a new
life in God.
Every time we truly commemorate our Lord's Death,
we receive from Him the infinite Gift of Eternal Life ; and a
new capacity is given us by the Holy Ghost, by which we
are able to do things for God, and offer ourselves as a
living Sacrifice to Him. But are there no conditions ?
Yes, the Apostle teaches us that that gift is ours ; and
that capacity is renewed and strengthened, in proportion
to the Love and Faith of the worthy receiver — worthiness
in His sight Who tries the reins, and requires truth in
the inward parts. It is God's own means for elevating
our nature, and enlarging our capacity, and making us
like Him.
In the Sacrament of Holy Baptism, we are new-born;
but as all created life will die, unless it is sustained by
constant supplies of food, therefore the other Sacrament
was instituted, to continue the life of the second Adam,
which we receive when we are born again. Infinite con
sequences are pending, on our continuing to show forth
Christ's death in this memorial Sacrament.
Of great moment are all questions as to the frequency,
or rarity, of our receptions.
That there was a daily Celebration among primitive
Christians, is accounted a fact by many eminent and learned
Church historians and commentators. That our own
branch of the Church provides for the Holy Communion
on each Sunday and holy-day throughout the year, is
dent. For in each Sunday and holy-day service, Christ,

EXTRACTS FROM SERMONS. 203
the Sun of Righteousness, is presented in some new aspect,
either of His life or great work of human salvation ; and
the Collect, Epistle, and Gospel, are connected with the
office for the Holy Communion, and arranged with ref
erence to a particular aspect, so as to throw its shadows
across the whole week, and impart it to the spirit of the
worshippers. By thus bringing it before their minds, it
impresses it, along with Christ's death, on the heart, so as
to impart supernatural strength by giving His life to us.
Neither prayer, nor praise, nor the Word preached,
though powerful to move the heart because they are
among the means of salvation, can make that impression
which the Blessed Sacrament does. No other means of
grace can stamp the seal of His Truth and example on the
heart as the consecrated Bread and Wine do.
The Eucharistic office is designed to transmute, into
prayer and praise, the doctrines and spirit of the Gospel,
Epistle, and Collect; to prolong them into the following
week, thus enabling us often — continually, as it were — to
appropriate to ourselves all the benefits of our Lord's
Death and Resurrection, and the gift of the Holy Ghost
which followed. The great end of Christ's Priesthood
was to thus give Himself to those whom He chose out of
the world.
It is the grandest truth of Christianity. It is, in prac
tice, the highest act of Christian worship. Is the Weekly
Communion a too frequent showing forth of Christ's Death?
Is it too often to testify to a godless world, that you be
lieve in, and love, Him, and that you look for His Second
Coming to Judgment? — too often to have renewed in us
the grace received in Holy Baptism, which is constantly
wasting by the contact with the world, the flesh, and the
devil ? — too often to receive the life of God, and to have our
capacity enlarged to be made like Him ? Or, too often to

204 EXTRACTS FROM SERMONS.
have increased in us, that Divine power which is finally to
raise our bodies, and change them into the likeness of our
blessed Lord's own glorified Body ?
It is not vivid impressions that we seek for in the
worship of the Church, or in reading the Bible ; but
lessons of duty and means of grace.
If all we sought in the Eucharist, were a certain
natural sensibility to the death of Christ — which death
the ordinance is appointed to show forth — its yearly
Celebration would be sufficiently frequent. Its object
would be accomplished — a sublime religious picture. But
we seek much more in the Eucharist than to look at a
picture and be touched by it. We seek to be fed in that
Holy Ordinance ; to be spiritually nourished, through the
Elements of Bread and Wine, with that Flesh which is
meat indeed, and that Blood which is drink indeed. It is
true that weekly Communions would demand higher
aspirations than are usually cherished by communicants ;
and higher aspirations involve stronger efforts and harder
struggles, and these efforts and struggles are a tax upon
the will — which the will, perhaps, is not quite ready to
obey. But why this reluctance ? If any one of us be
honestly bent, not merely on reaching a very fair average
standard of excellence, but on perfecting holiness in the
fear of the Lord, the reluctance very soon vanishes.
Frequent Communion is then willingly embraced as a help ;
not declined out of a mistaken conception of, or false
homage to, the Sacrament.
Between a holy, humble earnest Christian life and the
Holy Communion, there is a natural correspondence.
Aside from its awful consecration, how simple is the
Sacrament of the Altar — this marvellous Mystery of Grace !
One lesson here we cannot overlook ; the design of the
blessed Saviour that the genius of His Religion, as

EXTRACTS FROM SERMONS. 205
expressed in its highest ordinance, is to sanctify all the
actions of human life, even down to the humblest and
most necessary. To do this, is to breathe the atmosphere
of the Holy Communion, and to have, in our daily lives,
such consistent agreement with it, that there shall not be
anything unsuitable, or ill-matched, between the one and
the other. If thus striving to sanctify all the common
actions of daily life, we will feel attracted towards a
frequent reception of the Holy Communion as one great
means of furthering our object.

THE NATURE AND THE MINISTRY OF ANGELS.
1859.
The sympathy of angelic beings with human nature
may, from its solemn mysteriousness, less affect our
thoughts and influence our lives, than as a revealed doc
trine of the Word of God it should.
It is not incredible ; because, like so many of the
common experiences of daily life, we do not fully compre
hend it.
The mysteriousness of our being and existence here
on earth is, by no means, confined to influences which we
esteem without and beyond our personal experience, and
individual nature. * * * What love that
human heart can feel, what service that man can render,
is any adequate tribute of affection and thankfulness, for
a love so Divine in its all-embracing scope ; so human, so
tender, so earnest in its deep-revealing sympathies ?
Who are we, that they who wait upon the Courts of
the heavenly King should heed our wants ? succor ns in
the hour of danger ? sorrow for our sinfulness, rejoice in
our penitence ?

206 EXTRACTS FROM SERMONS.
HUMAN RELATIONSHIP EXALTED BY THE
INCARNATION.
1859.
It is true that all human affections must be subordinated
and inferior to the love of God; but he who reads aright
the divine story of Christ's Incarnation, sees that the truth
and purity and fervor of human affection are all left us
unbroken. Nay, more, that their ties are permanently
fastened by linking them all in one blessed bond to the
love of God made visible in Christ.
The exaltation of the natural relations of humanity by
the Incarnation of our blessed Saviour, makes them high
and sacred elements in His holy Religion. Bound together,
as we are, in life, by all the variety of human connections,
wherein the better and tender affections of the heart find
their peculiar sphere of exercise, in the manner of His
Incarnation, in His Advent among us, in simplicity of an
ordinary life, Christ selected a position such that these
bonds and affections might be purely and unaffectedly set
forth. That in His life, as by His lips, He might teach
us in what light we are to regard the ties of family, that
they may minister to our highest and enduring happiness.
Thus, there is a natural holiness which grows out of the
home and the family. Love is the affection which ennobles
all these relations; and what lesson so recurring in the
Gospel of Christ as that the perfection of love is the per
fection of the holiness and happiness of Heaven. Thus,
through the love and tenderness and purity of mothers
and sisters and wives — through the strength and courage
and wisdom of fathers and brothers, pastors and teachers,
we can come to the knowledge of Him in Whom alone the
love, the tenderness, the purity, the strength, the courage,
the wisdom of all these dwell for ever and ever in perfect
fulness.

EXTRACTS FROM SERMONS. 207
IN THE WORLD, NOT OF IT.
Separation from the world is not separation from its
duties, its innocent enjoyments, or its courtesies ; much
less does it consist in any singularity, any affected precjse-
ness, any distinctive cast of manners and deportment.
And yet separation is real, is total, and is felt to be so
by the faithful themselves, and by the world around
them.

NO ROOM FOR CHRIST.
1862.
It is a mighty honor, but it is a terrible responsibility
to have a Brother Who is the Eternal Son of God. It is a
fearful thought that in disgracing our own nature, we
disgrace His ; that every sin against ourselves, is now an
insult to Him Who hath identified Himself with us.
When He, Who would not take on Him the nature of
angels, has taken into Himself our manhood, how terrible
becomes the guilt of wilfully counter-working His merciful
condescension, by debasing what He has designed to honor,
by finding no room for Him in the heart which He has
cleansed for His indwelling.

LENT.
1864.

It is a sad and grievous thing, that so many who
profess and call themselves Christians, should be ignorant
of the ancient and Apostolical sanction of the Lenten
season. A greater occasion of sadness and of grief, that so
many in the Church should desire to get easily over it,

208 EXTRACTS FROM SERMONS.
without entering at all into its distinctive work ; who are
even inclined to question the fitness of the Church's
appointments, when they see how an honest and sincere
keeping of Lent will break in upon their accustomed
ways, and break up, for a season at least, many habits
which have in them much more of worldly conformity
than of religious strictness.
It is enough for present purposes, that, however men
may feel about it, in the Church or out of the Church,
the stars fulfil their courses, the sun performs his annual
journey, the moon duly reflects her light, at the vernal
equinox, and so surely as her beams fall on the earth, they
designate the day of the Church's Easter commemoration,
which great festival the religion of eighteen centuries has
taught the faithful to preface with penitential discipline,
with the period of abstinence, self-humiliation and special
devotion. It is enough for us who are members of the Catholic
Church, whose heritage of faith and discipline has been
preserved to us by the Churchly system, that we are
answerable for a willing and hearty submission to its
power. To the willing and unwilling alike, the season
comes for the purpose of accomplishing its work in the
world, in the Church, and in each separate soul. * * *
Men go out into the world with the truth of religion
written upon their hearts, acknowledging the eternal
scope and infinite importance of the laws of His King
dom ; yet, when it comes to the street or the counting-
house, or the office, the duties of home, the cares of life,
the ordinary claims of business, they put all those things
which God has revealed to them as the expressions of His
Will, right in the balance against earthly interests. * *
Lent, therefore, has no new duties, only a new zeal to
perform the old duties. * * * The man who is indis-

EXTRACTS "FROM SERMONS: 209
posed to the observance of Lent, whose spirit is reluctant
to admit the claims of fasting, more earnest prayer, self-
examination, self-restraint, as personal duties, will find
little difficulty in making out a dispensation from all.
And so the season will pass away, and none of its blessed
tokens be impressed on his inmost soul.

FREE CHURCHES.
1865.
Many causes have combined to nourish and foster
this forgetf ulness, to bring about the sad results manifest
in the lukewarmness and inefficient labors of the Church
in our day. But no error has wrought more grievously in
Western Christendom for the last years, as regards the
practical daily working of the Church, than that un-
churchly principle which has closed the doors of the
House of God to the poor, by placing a money value upon
its sittings, introducing worldly distinctions into the
Home of our .Father, and practically denying that the
Gospel may be preached as of old without money and
without price ; that whosoever will, may come and take
the Water of Life freely.
Fling open wide and free to all, the portals of this
House of God, that words of prayer and praise like incense
may ascend to Him Who is the Father of us all.

IMITATION OF CHRIST.
1870.
For He Who made Holy Baptism a pre-condition of
entrance into His Church, Himself meekly bowed His

210 EXTRACTS FROM SERMONS.
head to the pouring on of water; He Who, by His Divine
consecration, gave to the elements of Bread and Wine
their spiritual nature, Himself ate and drank with His
disciples. He required of us nothing which Himself did
not first perform. He fulfilled in deed, as well as taught
in word, all righteousness. He was not like those teachers
of pagan lands, who look serenely upon a life of whose
toils and sorrows and trials they know nothing; nor like
those hypocrites in the Gospel, who loaded other men
with heavy burdens, such as themselves would not touch
with one of their fingers. He imposed nothing upon His
disciples which He did not first bear upon His own
shoulders. His own life of prayer, fasting, self-denial,
and unwearied labor for the good of others, was the exem
plification of His precepts and His doctrine; and, if we
would be His disciples, ours must, of necessity, be a living
faith !

PREPARATION FOR THE BLESSED SACRAMENT.
1872.
No care can be too great in preparing for this Holy
Feast ; for as a worthy recipient you obtain these bene
fits ; you secure God's favor and love ; you are sustained
as God's heir of the promises ; you know that thereby you
are being fitted for the kingdom of Heaven ; your soul is
fed therewith by the Body and Blood of Christ.
Frequent self-examination by the rule of God's Holy
Commandments is necessary. It is best to have some
little book to guide you in preparing for the Holy Com
munion, such as "Steps to the Altar," "The Earnest
Communicant," "Thoughts on Personal Religion," "Holy
Living," or the " Sacra Privata."

EXTRACTS FROM SERMONS. 211
COUNSEL AND ADVICE OF THE CLERGY.
1872.
Then, in regard to the counsel and advice of the
clergy, you should realize that you can go at any time to
your pastor and find in him a friend. The home of the
Parish Priest is the home of all his flock ; none should be
a stranger there, for who can better advise, direct, plead
with, and intercede for those over whom he has a spiritual
care ? It is plainly the design of our Blessed Saviour that
His Priests should be true pastors to His flock. As pastors,
then, their duty is to encourage the zealous, arouse the
lukewarm, warn the erring, administer to the sick and
needy, comfort the sorrowing and afflicted, and befriend
the stranger ; and your special duty is to aid in such holy
works by your example and approval.

THE REAL PRESENCE A NECESSARY SEQUENCE
OF THE INCARNATION.
How weak, beloved, is any presentation of the doctrine
of the Incarnation, which turns from the Altar and leaves
out of view that Holy Eucharist, which is the ever-present
witness in the "Church of that sacrifice on Calvary of the
Incarnate Lord; that would present a shallow view of the
truth, a bare doctrine, a system of morals.
And how can one who acknowledges the Incarnate
Lord as his King and Redeemer, turn from the presence of
that loving Lord, when He bids him feed upon His Body
and His Blood! Surely such an one is leading an outside
life, playing with but the surface of things, never having
brought himself in contact with inmost realities.
For, when any human being has looked down into the
depths of his own weakness and wickedness, then he will

212 EXTRACTS FROM SERMONS.

know that not amendment of life, nor tears of sorrow,
nor penitential contrition — that none of these, nor all
together — can reach human needs, or remove the stain of
sin, nor give peace for the past, or confidence for the
future; that only in the Lamb of God is there strength or
pardon or peace.
And at the Altar we do, in lowly adoration, confess the
Incarnate Redeemer to be our God and our Lord.

FUTURE PUNISHMENT AND LIFE ETERNAL.
1869.
From the Word of God we learn, in plain and direct
language, that no hope is left in the grave, but what is
carried from the present world; that there is a night in
which none can work, and that the unjust and filthy will
remain such, without future change (Eccl., ix., 10; S. John,
ix., 4; Rev., xxii., 11). It is plainly revealed that the
judgment, the punishment, are everlasting — eternal, with
out end. No doctrine is more certainly declared in the
Volume of Inspiration, none expressed in language more
clear and decisive, and He has revealed it Whose Name is
Love. If the text, "God is Love," will bear such con
struction, then there is another text of a contrary tone,
quite as positive, which demands an opposite conclusion.
Moses and S. Paul, both, declare that " God is a con
suming fire." The announcement belongs equally to the
Law and the Gospel. If, because God is love, judg
ment must terminate in mercy ; then, because God is
a consuming fire, His mercies here and hereafter will all
terminate in wrath.
This shows the absurdity of one-sided reasoning on so
solemn a subject. * * * All will be judged in accord-

EXTRACTS FROM SERMONS. 213
ance with the light they have had. As regards that large
class of human beings who are without actual personal
sins, or who know not the Gospel of Christ, or who have
no individual responsibility, as little children, idiot per
sons, and all of immature age, we know that the love of
God in Christ assures us of their salvation ; that their
future is unlike, in the fulness of happiness, to that of
those whose lives have been unintermitted scenes of temp
tation and sorrow, and who, by God grace, through much
tribulation have, we can not doubt, won the crown of Life.

THE STATE OF THE DEPARTED.
1865.
The Church has ever taught, with the teaching of the
Word of God, and of the Creed, that the Faithful
Departed pass from this world, not to Heaven, but to
Paradise ; there to await the Resurrection of the Body,
and the Life of the World to come. This truth is mani
fest as Scriptural by our Lord's Words, "This day
shalt thou be with Me in Paradise ;" by the apparition
of Samuel to Saul ; by the appearance of Moses and
Elias on the Mount ; by the cry of the souls under
the Altar; by the mention of the spirits in prison,
to whom Christ preached ; by that of the saints who
appeared in the body after the resurrection of Christ ; by
the general truth that God is not the God of the dead but
of the living ; by the representation of Abraham, the rich
man and Lazarus in their unseen abodes, while the brethren
of the rich man still lived on earth ; by the assurance
that believers absent from the body are present with the
Lord ; that to depart and be with Christ is better than to
jive and labor here, and that even when to live is Christ,

214 EXTRACTS FROM SERMONS.
and therefore joy, yet to die is gain ; and by the descrip
tion of the great multitude without number whom S.
John saw with white robes and with palms, while in the
vision as well as in fact, the Resurrection was still afar off.
The Church accordingly, in the most solemn moment
which could be chosen for the utterance of her faith con
cerning the dead, in the commendatory prayer at the
moment of departure, in the last words of earth which
are to reach the ears of the dying, recites to Almighty
God, her knowledge that with Him do live the spirits of
just men made perfect after they are delivered from their
earthly prisons."

In the moment of death, S. Stephen's eyes were
opened ; and he beheld the brightness of the City of our
God, the House of our Father, and the Glory of Paradise
revealed to his ardent upward gaze, and in the down-shin
ing of that radiance, his face became as the face of an
angel. Since that hour, millions have died in the Faith in
which the first of the noble army of martyrs fell asleep ;
and their last utterances, reiterated thousands and thou
sands of times, have been of the blessedness of Christian
hope, the joy of a believing heart, the whispered welcome
of angels, the song of seraphs.

The life in the intermediate state is not that in an
unknown companionship. Nor can we conceive it to be a
solitary life. Solitariness would imply punishment ; and
that is contrary to the very idea of Paradise.
The only separation which we can conceive as existing
after death, is that which results as a moral necessity ;

EXTRACTS FROM SERMONS. 215
from the existence in this life of goodness and wickedness
commingled, and of lives penitent and impenitent brought
to a close by death.
The impenitent, those dying in their sins, are gathered
together, as it would seem, in a place which, from the lan
guage of Dives in the parable, he feared his brothers
would come to if they did not amend their lives, and
which was a place of suffering, there to await the final
condemnation of their rebellion in life-long wickedness
against the goodness, the love, the mercy of their Heav
enly Father.
In the blessed abode of the Redeemed, the Paradise of
God, is the rest and refreshment of all who fall asleep in
the Faith and love of Christ their Saviour.
There, until the general resurrection, awaiting the
brighter glories of that day when God shall make all
things new, the immortal spirit, reunited ?to a spiritual
body, shall enter into those heavenly joys which are the
heritage of all to whom in the last day, the Great King
shall speak His priceless words of commendation.

To invite the living believer and to gladden the dying
saint, what thoughts better suited than those which are
the conclusions of this brief and imperfect meditation ;
and I see not but that as the sure teaching of the Word
of God, we may cherish them.
The life in Paradise is an immediate continuation
of the present life. And in our departure from this
world, there is no loss of consciousness. All who in
this life have served God with a service, holy and
acceptable, who have lived in the blessed communion and
fellowship of a Saviour's love, who have striven, amid the
hindrances and discouragements common to a weak, selfish

216 EXTRACTS FROM SERMONS.
nature, to make their membership in Christ a living service
and a loving bond of unity and affection, are in the region
and home of the blessed, accessible to each other, and are
reunited in such mutual knowledge and recognition, as
henceforth and forever are to exist in perfectness, without
even the shadowings of that doubt, or distrust, which, at
times, will darken the purest of earthly sympathies and
affections. A blessed thought it is, if cherished in a patient, hopeful,
loving heart, for the sick and the sorrowing, and the worn
and wearied, that beyond the horizon which bounds and
limits mortal vision, there is a life in which the full
development of all the pure and spotless affections of the
soul, is provided for ; in which the memories of the past,
linking the heart to the sundered ties of home and kindred,
will brighten with the glow of present recollection, amid
the unspeakable raptures of reunion and recognition .
But not more blessed than solemn, are these thoughts.
For into the Paradise of God, there enters nothing that
defiles. Within His House and Home are gathered the
pure, the sainted, the holy ones of all ages and climes.
For this companionship must we be fitted, if we would
attain unto the inheritance of the saints in light — be fitted
by living unto God now in the activities of a holy life ;
that so we may live unto Him, in the blessedness of the
life to come.

EXTRACTS FROM CONCILIAR ADDRESSES.

1875.
Whatever may be the trials of the future, whatever
cares, with burdening weight, may weary or distress, if
only we keep a living faith in the Almighty, and do all
things in His name and for His glory, His blessing will
surely rest upon us, and His promised Presence will be our
stay and guide.
THE FOURTH OF JULY SERVICE.
1876.
Wherever practicable, I hope that the service author
ized for the Fourth day of July will be used in our churches.
The present is a memorable year in our country's annals.
Christian patriotism is never unmindful of the bonds of
country and of the ties of national brotherhood; and, in
view of all that within one hundred years our fathers and
brothers have wrought, and suffered, and gained, and held,
for Liberty and Law, for Right and Conscience, we are
constrained to say, in the spirit of the great Apostle, "We
are citizens of no mean country." We need not close our
eyes to that which grieves and shames us, as Americans;
but we may consistently and heartily thank God for our
birth, or purchased birthright, in this Nation. There, are,
it is true, for us, as American citizens, manifold causes
for grief and shame, for sorrow and contrition.
F orgetf ulness of God has led men into sin; but it has not

218 EXTRACTS FROM CONCILIAR ADDRESSES.
forfeited the nation's inheritance. For, notwithstanding
the lawlessness, irreverence, infidelity, blasphemy, wicked
ness, which mark individual lives, which soil the purity of
homes and communities, and deface the nation's fair fame,
the great heart of the Republic beats true to those prin
ciples of loyalty to duty, and upholding the right, which,
one hundred years ago, were accepted and enunciated as
the foundation principles of the government then inaug
urated; and many — very many — of the noblest of those
men to whose fortitude in chances of war, and wisdom in
the councils of state, we owe, under God, our independence
and our constitution, were devout children of the Church.
In the Church, Washington, Hamilton, Jay, Madison, and
many others, their compatriots and associates, learned the
lessons which made them so strong and patient and wise
in those days of trial and conflict; and the Church's lessons
are the same to-day; and, because of her unchanging life
and divine mission, we may be hopeful for our country;
for this goodly heritage of ours — this American Republic —
is a gift from the Lord to the Nations of the West; and
let our hearts be strong in the assurance that His Church
is here — a real, living Brotherhood — to do His work and
fulfil His purposes in and for this Nation. In her dis
tinctive Divine character she is accomplishing this mission;
she has a definite Faith to teach ; and every passing year
of our national life brings out more clearly the need of
such a teacher.
With free churches and daily services, frequent
Communion, Homes of Mercy, Brotherhoods and Sister
hoods, Parish and Diocesan Schools, Orphanages and
Hospitals — having all these, the Faith she teaches, and
the work she does, will vindicate to the nation the Catho
licity of our Anglo-Saxon Church; and what that Church
has done in our mother-land, energizing the advances of

EXTRACTS FROM CONCILIAR ADDRESSES. 219
civilization, the triumphs of freedom, the discoveries of
science, the gains of political experience, she can do for
this land and nation, by showing the people that ours is a
branch of the Catholic Church, God's Kingdom of Life
and Light among the kingdoms of the earth; and while
thus, in the Church's spirit, doing the Church's work, we
minister to individual growth in grace, we shall realize
the blessedness of the unchanging motto of a holy life—
ever nearer to God. In the midst of things transitory,
present and pressing, the Church is ever calling us to
walk, like one of old, with God; and if, in the spirit of
the Apostolic admonition, in perf ectness of life and in the
comfort of God's Word, in peace with all men, and single-
mindedness with God, we approve ourselves as His disciples,
then, of a truth, as our Divine Guide and Friend, shall the
God of Love and Peace be with us.
May He guide the deliberations of this Council, making
us to be of one heart and one mind, desiring the pros
perity of His Holy Apostolic Church ; and may we all go
forth from this brotherly conference with hearts refreshed
by sweet communings, and with spirits stronger and
braver to battle for the Lord.

THE SUPPORT OF THE CLERGY.
1877.
The time spent in visitations, this year, has left me not
as much space as I might desire for other duties, and yet I
feel that I have learned very much as to the condition of
the Diocese, from these frequent visitations. Very many
facts, as to troubles and embarrassments resulting from
scanty stipends, are known to the Bishop only from
personal observation, or in response to direct inquiry.
The clergy, as a general rule, bear in quietness and

220 EXTRACTS FROM CONCILIAR ADDRESSES.

patience the hardships which come from inadequate pro
visions for support. But a great and real trial is to be
found in the fact,— also, that it is a fact, for it is a very
sad and shameful one, — that many vestries and mission
officers seem to regard any difficulty in the way of collect
ing subscriptions or pew rents as good and sufficient
reason for their being excused from making up to the
Pastor his pledged salary.
Nothing to me is more dreadful, — nothing betokens a
more fatal misconception of the pastoral relation, than to
hear those who bear office in the Church speak of him
who is over them in the Lord, — who ministers to them
in things spiritual, as of a man hired to do a certain
amount of work, whom they can, at any time, discharge,
and so obtain a just relief from contract, and a full
release from moral obligation.
There is a great neglect as to duties, — a carelessness as
to obligations,— an unwillingness to make any sacrifice of
time, or thought, or care, on the part of many of the
officers of parishes and missions, which place impassable
barriers in the way of Church growth. I know not how
these evils are to be remedied, until, at the annual parish
meeting, there is an attendance really representing the
congregation, and persons are selected for wardens and
vestrymen of irreproachable character — of real, living
interest in the Church, who are regular attendants upon
her services — anxious to understand their duties, and ready
to perform such duties in a spirit of conscientious regard
for the sacred relations of Pastor and people.
A better administration of her affairs would be the result.
Evils which hinder and perplex would be greatly abated, and
many a hard-working Priest of the Lord would be cheered
and comforted by friendly counsel. Everything which
tends to encourage the man of God in the varied labors of

EXTRACTS FROM CONCILIAR ADDRESSES. 221
his holy calling — to stay up the hands of the long-endur
ing warrior, is a much-needed element.
Factors of great importance in this work are the
prayers, the sympathy, and the real, loving interest of
Christian men and women. It is so easy and so natural
to see mistakes in others, and so pleasing to our self-con
ceit to recount them, that the temptation is a strong one
to find fault with him, who, in his own person, bears the
burden of cares as manifold and conflicting as are
parochial interests, and does his work subject to the
scrutiny of many eyes, and the criticism of many tongues.
To help the Clergyman, not by fault-finding, but bywords
of counsel and sympathy, by manifesting an appreciation
of devoted labor ; surely it is a privilege thus to share in
the work pertaining to the office of the Ministry. If we
are to do well the work committed to us, we — your Bishop
and your Clergy — need the prayers, the sympathy, and
the love of every member of the Church in this Diocese.

THE FREE CHURCH.

1877.

If, in addition to the Parish School, with its systematic
training and nurture of the young in the teachings and
ways of the Church, we have the Free Church, the daily
services and frequent Communion, of one thing we may
rest assured, that we are striving to make the Church the
daily guide and the unwearied teacher of men. If we
would allow the Church to come to men as the Prayer
Book provides that it shall come, — as the teacher of our
children ; as the home of all who are baptized into the
Fold — of all who, in the Sacrament of the Font, are trans
ferred from the kingdom of the world to the Kingdom of

222 EXTRACTS FROM CONCILIAR ADDRESSES.
Christ, ministering to every man and teaching every man,
without respect of person, and only on the ground of his
individual birthright in the Kingdom; bringing out
practically this great and blessed fact, that the Church of
the living God, as the pillar and ground of the truth, is a
daily witness for God, in the daily care of her baptized
children ; in the daily Lesson from the word of God ; in
the daily recital of the Creed ; in the daily offering of
thanks and praise — it would be, in a living and real
sense, the daily guide in things spiritual. It would be
gloriously true, that for all the Church asks from men, and
for all she gives to them or does for them, she would have
the warrant of His commendation, Whose Incarnate Life
was one of daily ministries to human wants.

THE SELF-DENIAL OF THE CLERGY.
1879.
Whatever may be the thoughtless extravagance of the
laity, the clergy should be models of self-denial and
simplicity. It is hard, I know, to preach moderation,
contentment and humility, to those who are without, when
members of the Church are avaricious, giddy, fettered by
worldly rules, giving gladly, in self indulgent luxury,
dollars, where, as of constrained necessity, they give pennies
for Christ. But the task is harder still if the priest of the
Lord is not, in his own life and his own home, one who is
self-denying for Christ's sake. At a time when honest,
philanthropic men are seeking, in human brotherhoods, to
realize a kingdom of love and charity on earth ; just as, on
the other hand, the apostles of unbelief are seeking to win
men to a system of blank, dreary atheism ; and fill their
minds with a bitterness and hate that threaten our streets
and homes with destruction as sudden and complete as the

EXTRACTS FROM CONCILIAR ADDRESSES. 223
fury of the whirlwind or the desolation of the volcano ;
there is a work which the clergy can do as patterns and
ensamples to the flock, in the manifestation in their daily
lives of all those graces of the Gospel which preach it most
effectually and effectively to men. Why is it that -men
say they have lost faith in the Bible ? Why do they
claim that human brotherhoods are better than the Church
of God, and aver that they can minister to the wants of
men without the Gospel and without the Saviour ? It is
because of the inconsistent lives of those who profess and
call themselves Christians. If those who preach the
Gospel deal with the Word of God in the spirit of the
rationalist, if those who at the Altar solemnly consecrate
themselves to God's service, are in their daily lives examples
of levity, self indulgence, unfairness, bitterness and evil
speaking, can we wonder that scepticism boasts its con
quests, and that men try to live without professing faith
in Christ their Saviour ? What men call infidelity is
oftentimes the protest of an honest nature against the
insincerity of Christian preachers, who mutilate the Gospel
they profess to teach ; and the hypocrisy of Christian
disciples, who do not live the life that they have sworn to
live. The age in which we live calls for the plainest
preaching of the Gospel, and the most outspoken declaration
of the Faith once for all delivered to the Saints. We, my
brethren of the clergy, are the ambassadors of God and the
priests of His Kingdom. Your membership in that King
dom, my brethren of the laity, is not a matter of individual
choice or preference. Baptized into the Church which is
the Body of Christ ; sealed in your membership by the rite
of Confirmation ; nourished and sustained by the precious
Sacrament of His Body and Blood in your life of Christian
discipleship and personal holiness, you are His in a sense
which consecrates your whole life to His service, and

224 EXTRACTS FROM CONCILIAR ADDRESSES.

impresses upon every thought and word a responsibility
measured only by the issues of eternity.
I am made to feel at times that communicants of the
Church do not always remember that they are a royal
priesthood, especially when I listen to their criticism upon
the life and labors of their pastor, and know in my inmost
heart that what they call want of success and failure in the
ministry is largely owing to the selfishness, neglect or open
hostility of those members of the Parish who should be
faithful co-workers with their pastor and priest. Point me
to a Parish which, year after year, is faithful in all its
duties ; where all canonical requirements are conscien
tiously regarded ; where the salary of the Pastor is
promptly paid ; where the services of the Christian year
are valued ; Festival and Fast gladly kept ; and the Holy
Communion often administered ; where everything per
taining to a proper ritual is cheerfully observed ; where
the church building and all material fabrics are reverently
cared for, and I know that in that congregation are devout
men and women who love the Church because it is the
Kingdom of their dear Lord, and who pray and labor for it
with a devotion and sincerity and faith wholly unworldly
and unselfish ; and it is in such congregations and under
such influences that the spiritual building, priceless and
precious beyond words to express, grows into the perfect-
ness of saintly character.

LENTEN OBSERVANCE.
1880.
In calling your attention to this wise enactment of the
Church, I wish to impress upon your minds the precious-
ness of the privilege which is ours in this season of com
mon devotion, retirement, and self-examination, that so

EXTRACTS FROM CONCILIAR ADDRESSES. 225
the Lenten Fast, which is near at hand, may be in practice,
as in principle, a feast and , refreshment to our individual
souls. The preaching of the Gospel of God's love,
becomes, at this time, by the very nature of Lenten devo
tions, a more earnest and affectionate entreaty, in the
Saviour's name, to the wandering and neglectful. The
blessedness of sacramental union with that Saviour in
Holy Baptism ; the waiting for God to be gracious in
pardoning love and absolving grace ; the life of faith
nourished in prayer, in reading and meditating upon God's
Word, and above all in receiving His Body and Blood in
the Holy Communion, these are the themes of Lenten
devotions and meditations. In the home, and in the
individual life, there should be a prevailing influence of
glad submission to the Church's intimation of fasting and
prayer, of retirement and self-examination, of penitential
abasement and supplication ; while in the church and
congregation, an attendance as unbroken as possible upon
sacred services, a regular reception of the Holy Eucharist,
and an attentive, prayerful hearing of the Word, should
mark a glad observance of the Church's season of reviv
ing. Let us all bring to the glad Feast of Easter, hearts
purified by the work of the Holy Spirit in the blessed
discipline of Lent, and let the sincerity of our self-denying
love for Christ and His Church, be shown in the offering
we place upon the Altar as a token of our zeal for the
Church's work.

THE TRUE PARISH.
1881.
I wish it might be the condition of the consecration
of every church henceforth in the Diocese of Wisconsin,
that it should be forever free ; and I wish it might be in

226 EXTRACTS FROM CONCILIAR ADDRESSES.
the mind of all who build houses to the glory of God,
that under the shadow of the church might always stand
the Parish school-house, and next to that, the Parsonage.
I have thought, sometimes, that in missions and new par
ishes it would be better to build the parsonage first, gather
the faithful there for worship, and the church building
would be sure to come — the offering of loving hearts.
We need so greatly the place for the Christian training,
day by day, of the baptized children of the Church, and
the home for the pastor and his family. I do not see how
business men can overlook the worth of the parsonage as
a parish investment ; nor how fathers and mothers can be
so insensible to the inestimable value of a Christian school
for the care and training of their children.
It seems to me, if the self -consecration of the Eucharist
were real, and the hearts of all who feed upon the Living
Bread were a living sacrifice, we should realize, in many
parishes and missions, the Church's ideal, the chapel and
school-room beneath the shadow of the church spire-cross,
the home of the pastor hard by, the daily service in the
chapel brightened by the presence and voices of the chil
dren, the Sunday and Holy Day Communion, and the
Sunday School with its faithful teachers and careful pas
toral oversight and catechisings.

TRUE CONCEPTION OF RESPONSIBILITY.
1881.
For myself, God helping me, I shall try to discharge
the duty of my weighty and responsible office as before
God and not before men ; to say and do what I am con
vinced is best for the ultimate welfare of the Diocese,
which is the Bishop's parish. This I shall try to do in
the spirit of the purest love and most tender patience and

EXTRACTS FROM CONCILIAR ADDRESSES. 227

forbearance, looking to you, my brethren of the clergy
and laity, with confidence in your sympathy and support,
as I shall look to God for His blessing upon my singleness
of purpose and unwearied effort to do my duty ; praying
that I may ever have an eye single to God's glory, and
that our joint work may be to do His Will ; knowing
that He will surely bless our endeavors and prosper the
work of our hands, if only in a spirit of entire self-
consecration to Him, the endeavor and the work are pros
pered and wrought.

SACRILEGE OF RENOUNCING THE PRIESTHOOD.
But there is one subject on which I feel compelled to
speak in this connection, for I am greatly distressed at
what I regard a very great, and, I fear, may be a growing
evil in the Church — the apparent readiness with which
consecrated Priests of the Lord abandon their sacred calling
and engage in secular life. It is a solemn moment for
any man to declare voluntarily in the public congregation
that he trusts that he is inwardly moved by the Holy
Ghost, to take upon himself this office and ministration, to
serve God for the promotion of His glory, and the edifying
of His people : but when one says that he is so moved, and
receives at Apostolic hands the awful commission, "Be ye a
faithful dispenser of the Word of God and of His holy
Sacraments," and then, from any motive less than an
overwhelming necessity, abandons or even relaxes his work
in the ministry, he does it, certainly, at the very great
hazard of his own soul's salvation.
There may be hardness — need of great self-denial ; but
is not the ministry to be, to men, a spectacle of self-sacri
ficing devotion? Are we faithful to our vows, if the whole
soul be not to that extent in the work, that we count it

228 EXTRACTS FROM CONCILIAR ADDRESSES.
joy to suffer for the Master's sake ? If our ministry be,
verily and indeed, a labor of love, then trials and disap
pointments will act as stimulants to further efforts, and
more entire devotion. All about us are multiplied and
multiplying evidences of the world's selfishness, extrava
gance, luxury and utter indifference to God's Will and
Word. In a quiet, self-sacrificing and devout life there
is a divine protest against worldliness ; and the faith and
zeal of the Clergy must lift them to that plane of holy
living, to that agreement with the mind of Christ, which
accounts all things of earth as dross for the love of God,
and the glory and honor of doing His work.

THE DISREGARD OF THE LORD'S DAY.
1882.
We see it not only in the forsaking the assembling
together of those who are in name the people of God, but
in the growing spirit of irreverence which counts the
desecration of that hallowed day as a light thing ; and yet
it certainly will be true that in any individual life which
despises this primal ordinance of a loving Father, there
will be moral disorder. The man or the community that
thinks least often of God, and least reveres His Will, will
in life and conduct depart farthest from what is pure and
holy and of good report. " Time comes to all men alike.
It comes unceasingly. Hence Eternal Wisdom chose the
day of rest, and set it apart by the highest possible sanc
tion — Divine example — that God and His worship might
be forever kept before men, demanding obedience and
bringing blessing."
We cannot have a pure religious life without a reverent
regard for God and His holy day. There can be no home

EXTRACTS FROM CONCILIAR ADDRESSES. 229
life worthy of the name, if Sunday is not known ; and
with godless homes, communities and states will soon
become mere aggregations of men and women, feeding and
herding together like cattle. A paragraph lately appear
ing in the public prints, in regard to the journeyings and
actions of the President of the United States on the
Lord's day, brings to every thoughtful mind a feeling of
profound sorrow and sadness. In view of the awful sins
of drunkenness and profanations of the Lord's day, with
the sickening train of impurities — murders, violence of all
kinds — how needful, dear brethren of the Clergy, to eschew
in our preaching all earthly philosophies and vain specu
lations, and minister to those committed to our care, the
true Word of God ; for the only cure for moral disorder
is the Word and the Sacraments. This is the power unto
salvation, the life and death application to the living soul,
of the grace of God announced and administered.

THE DEAD IN CHRIST:
Archbishop Tait and Dr. Pusey.
1883.
When, gathered together before the Altar, as repre
sentatives of one Diocesan family in the great Catholic
Kingdom, we bless God's Holy name for all His Servants
departed this life in His faith and fear, it is very natural
for us to recall the names of those who, well known in the
General Church and in the Diocese, have since our last
meeting, gone to their reward ; and to thank God for
their good examples.
During the year, two great leaders in Israel have fallen
asleep. Their names have entered into history, to be
preserved among the noblest in the magnificent array of
heroic and glorious characters in England's Church ; one,

230 EXTRACTS FROM CONCILIAR ADDRESSES.
the 93d successor of Augustine, the first subject in the
Kingdom and the Primate of all England ; the other, the
Regius Professor of Hebrew, at Oxford. Preferment and
honor awaited one, life long ; obloquy and misrepresenta
tion marked, for years, the patient endurance of the other.
How wide apart, year after year, their aims and modes, as
it seemed to the world ; nor can we wonder that it should
seem so, when we remember the beginning of their lives
at Oxford, forty years ago, when one was suspended from
his office as preacher of the University, by the voice and
act of the other, as one among the impugners of the
preacher's doctrine. And yet, how marvellously were
they united in their deaths ; for, above the graves of these
_ two Princes of the Church, the Christian mind of England
realized the blessed truth, that Catholic revival is an
accomplished fact in the National Church. There have
not been since S. Paul journeyed westward, even to the
bounds of the Roman Empire, that he might preach the
Gospel in the islands beyond Spain, forty years more
eventful in English Church history, than those which
include the lives and labors of Archbishop Tait and Dr.
Pusey. The Primacy of the one, has placed the Anglican
Communion in her rightful position as the head of west
ern Christendom ; the life of the other, has given to the
Catholic Church, one of her noblest examples of conse
crated learning, and an enduring heritage of saintliness.

GENERAL CONVENTION OF 1883.
As far as the general work of the Church is concerned,
the tone of this last great triennial gathering, tells of a
prevailing growth and revived life all through our borders,
the result, undoubtedly, of that awakening spirit of Cath
olicity which was met, a few years since, by unreasoning

EXTRACTS FROM CONCILIAR ADDRESSES. 231
bitterness, suspicion and prejudice, but which has so far
won the victory of truth and patience, that earnest and
faithful souls are to-day doing their work, with the assur
ance that the great heart of the Church beats responsive
to every individual manifestation of self-denying love and
active zeal. While the prevailing spirit of the Church is
full of encouragement and hope, there are causes of grave
and. serious apprehensions, as to unfaithfulness on the part
of some of the Church's teachers, in regard to the duties
of building Up the Body of Christ in the most holy Faith.
And yet, I believe that the abnormal and unchurchly ten
dencies of rationalism, Socinian heresies and human
speculations, which appear in some of the pulpits of the
Church, will certainly wither, shrivel up and die in the
warmth of Catholic ritual, and the glow of hearts and
lives all ablaze with the spirit and work of the living
Church, striving and working so effectively because of the
great Catholic revival ; for there is a sense in which the
Church's influence is, to-day, greater than at any period
in her history in this land, as an influence for good,
because she has a deep and true realization of her position
as the Church of God, and has recovered, and is using, so
much of her divine heritage that in the troubled period of
the sixteenth century was put aside, and, lo ! these many
years, has been lost sight of and neglected.

THE WORK OF THE CHURCH: ITS NEEDS AND
HINDRANCES.
1884.
In connection with the manifestation of Christ in all
our preaching, too much importance cannot be given to
the ritual of the Christian year. That which is especially

232 EXTRACTS FROM CONCILIAR ADDRESSES.
needed in our pulpits to-day, is entire harmony between
the words of the preacher and that which the people listen
to from the lectern and the Altar — the Lessons, the Epistle,
and the Gospel. The system of doctrinal teaching, which
is the necessary condition of spiritual edification, of a
sound and healthy growth in the nurture and admonition
of the Lord, is that which is clearly marked out in the
great festivals and fasts of the Church. It is teaching
and emphasizing the Gospel foundations of the Incarna
tion, Atonement, Resurrection, and Ascension, and the
descent and work of the Holy Spirit. We cannot give
ton much care to a proper observance of all the Church's
days and seasons; we cannot make too glorious the joyful
or solemn services of the house of God, which com
memorate these great events in, or connected with, the
Incarnate Life. The world would rob us of our heritage,
and despoil the King's daughter of all the glory of her
divine home and lineage.
There is a worldly element in the Church which affects
to despise all the accessories of worship, sometimes arrays
itself in bitter hostility, claims that the wealth and worldly
influence represented in the pews shall dictate the utter
ances of the pulpit, demanding that the priest and pastor
shall be lost sight of in the popular preacher, and that
passing events and popular themes shall be the subject of
Sunday discourses; that all that is distinctive in "the teach
ings of the Word of God and of the Church of God shall
be avoided, and that as men go to listen to a popular
orator or lecturer, so when they go to church they must
hear only that from the pulpit which is pleasant to the
ear. Every Bishop has, again and again, heard from ves
tries and officers of parishes, the request that, in supplying
a vacancy, some one would be sent whose preaching would
please the people. May God, in His mercy, avert from the

EXTRACTS FROM CONCILIAR ADDRESSES. 233
Church this degradation of the divine office of preaching.
A teaching Church must have faithful preachers — men
who are not afraid to declare the whole counsel of God; to
follow in their plain expositions of the Word the circlings
of the Christian year, giving prominence to that which the
Church of God, in all ages, has testified to as of supreme
importance: the Incarnation, with its clear and manifest
teachings on the Divinity of the Son of God; the Atone
ment, with all its lessons of comfort, strength, and grace;
the Resurrection and Ascension of 'the Lord Jesus Christ;
and the descent of the Holy Spirit, connecting with these
great facts of the Creed, all that which is a logical and inev
itable consequence, the unchangeable character of human
responsibility, the assured day and universality of judg
ment, the certainty of everlasting reward and of eternal
punishment. There is something appalling in that unreal, superficial,
heretical preaching, which is forced upon our attention, as
one of the characteristics of the so-called popular religion
of the day; this profanation of the sanctity of the pulpit,
this degradation of place and Word, which should be
always sacred because of the messenger and message from
God to His people, the depravement of the pulpit into a
mere show-place of human oratory, where he, who should
be the Lord's prophet, panders to the selfishness and self-
indulgence of the flock that he is appointed to guide and
teach and influence.
In the case of any clergyman of the Church who
neglects the Church's system of teaching, and selects the
subjects of his sermons from political or secular events, or
decides from mere individual feeling, there is very great
danger that he will soon pass from that which may at first
be colorless as regards Christian doctrine, into open and
avowed latitudinarianism — rationalism — heresy. The value

234 EXTRACTS FROM CONCILIAR ADDRESSES.
of the Church system is that her liturgic worship, her chosen
Collects, her appointed Lessons from Holy Scripture, her
Eucharistic readings of Epistle and Gospel, all overshadowed
and consecrated by her reverent spirit, will, if conscien
tiously adhered to, lead the preacher into a right choice of
subjects, and guide him into a right spirit of exposition.
Every departure from the system of the Church is a
loss to individual character, and a weakening of belief and
worship ; but in regard to preaching and the preacher, it
is the sure precursor of individualism and, it may be, of
heresy. Our safety — the safety of Priest and people — is
in living and working in the life and way of the Church ;
and in no portion of the Church's noble heritage in this
our land, is there a greater opportunity and more pressing
necessity for work, than in our own Diocese. For where
the Church comes, there Christ is, in His Word, His
Ministers, His Sacraments ; and great are the privilege
and blessedness which may be ours, of sending Christ by
our prayers and our alms into every city and place whither
He has not yet eome. And yet, by the sin of spiritual
selfishness, any individual disciple may lose the privilege,
and turn the blessing into a burden.
God hasten the day when in all things pertaining to
her life and work, the Church may more fully realize and
more abundantly manifest the preciousness of her divine
heritage ; flinging open wide and free the portals of the
House of God, that all may feel that the Church is the
home of man, God's free and gracious Kingdom of Peace
and Rest; keeping well and truly Festival and Fast;
looking to it that all our work in and for the Church,
patient, self-denying, unwearied, may testify of Christ —
His the message, His the Gospel, His the way — then shall
His blessing consecrate it all, and make divinely precious
each offering and service of our love and life.

EXTRACTS FROM CONCILIAR ADDRESSES. 235
' SURPLICED CHOIRS.
1885.
The multiplication of surpliced choirs is another
hopeful sign in the Diocese. *****
I anticipate, with satisfaction, the increase of surpliced
choirs in the Diocese, feeling that not only in the more
churchly rendering of the service is there great gain from
this increase, but that there can be no better guild organi
zation than this, for boys and young men in the
congregation. As regards the music of the Church, we have a great
deal to recover and restore; for the prevalence of the
quartette choir and the spirit in our congregations which
seeks and sustains that peculiar kind of music, has greatly
perverted, and in many cases utterly destroyed, the devo
tional character of sacred hymnody. May the great Head
of the Church hasten the day, when the vested choir, and
a simple choral service, may be common in the Church.

THE HOLY EUCHARIST.
I have noticed all through the Diocese within the past
few years, and markedly this year, a growing care and
reverence as regards the services of the House of God, and
especially in all that pertains to the Celebrations of the
Holy Eucharist. In very many churches, there were two
Celebrations this year on Easter Day. The early Celebra
tion, weekly and holy day, is becoming more frequent in
the Diocese, and the true character of this glorious service is
more generally recognized and esteemed. In that which
pertains to the Church's ritual, I believe that we are the in
heritors from the English Church of all that is adjudged law
ful in that Communion ; and I shall always, with pleasure,
commend and approve such Scriptural and Catholic usages,
as I believe to be our birthright in the Church of Christ.

236 EXTRACTS FROM CONCILIAR ADDRESSES.
PAROCHIAL MISSIONS.
1886.
The Mission at the Cathedral* was an occasion of
intense interest. Weeks of thorough preparation on the
part of the Cathedral clergy preceded the preaching of the
Mission sermons, and unremitting and unwearied work
has been kept up since the mission, so that the experiment,
for such it was with us, has been a fair one. I was
present at all the evening services, and at most of the
other classes and instructions of the Mission ; and I can
bear witness to the Scriptural and evangelical nature of
the teachings. The doctrines of the Church, the prac
tices of the Church, that which, in its comprehensiveness,
is our precious Prayer Book heritage in the Catholic
Kingdom, was unfolded with great clearness in the
instructions and sermons of the Mission, and brought
home with mighty power to the hearts of a multitude.
There was neither vagueness nor doubt nor uncertainty as
to the essentials of Christian discipleship, but a clear
unfolding of the Word of God in regard to the Incarna
tion and all that flows from it — the continuance in the
Church of the gifts which are ours because of the Incar
nation, and the blessedness of the Presence of the Holy
Spirit in Baptism, Confirmation and the Holy Eucharist.
Fidelity of teaching was manifest in the declaration of
the whole counsel of God, and the mind of the Spirit as
revealed in Holy Scripture was brought to bear upon the
individual conscience, and the need of self-examination,
confession, contrition and absolution, as a preparation on
the part of the unbaptized for Holy Baptism, on the part
of the unconfirmed for Confirmation, and for all who

? Conducted by the Rev. Fathers Maturin and Toibert, S.S.J.E.

EXTRACTS FROM CONCILIAR ADDRESSES. 237
desire to be faithful communicants, was plainly and firmly
declared. There could be no mistaking of mere sentiment
or emotion for the quiet, deliberate action of the con
science, and the strengthened energy of the will. In its
character and operation, the Mission was thoroughly
Churchly. There was no attempt to create an atmosphere
of emotional enthusiasm and contagious feeling, but to
connect awakening with instruction, and to point steadily
to obedience as required in the Word of God, as taught by
the Catholic Church, and transmitted in the offices in the
Book of Common Prayer ; and so in the hearts of those
who attended the Mission, there was a quickening of
deadened consciences, and a deepening of spiritual life,
and the work was blessed to many souls. I shall be glad
at any time to confer with such of the clergy as desire
Mission services in their cures, for I have great faith in
the good results of a Mission well conducted.

Beloved, the roll of saintly names is growing year by
year. The Church in Wisconsin has reason for devout
gratitude, that God has given to us such lives as we can
recall,- when we review the history of the Church in this
state. Bishops, priests, doctors, saints — let us look to
them in reverence and love, and may their examples help
us in more unselfish devotion to His service, Who gave
them strength to be faithful unto death, and Who will,
in like manner, make us strong, if there is entire conse
cration to His service, and if, through ill report and good
report, we weary not in well doing. Commending you
unto the guidance of His Holy Spirit, I pray that in all
things you may have a right judgment, and that the work
of this Council may be for the glory of God, and the
extension of His Church.
the end.

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