YALE UNIVERSITY
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DIVINITY SCHOOL

ILULOAM £.„ K1A[L1L®(EK, ©„ © ,

SECRETARY OF THE AMERICAN TRACT SOCIETY.

Memorial

OF

REV. WM. A. HALLOCK, D. D.,

FIRST SECRETARY

OF THE

American Tract Society.

BY MRS. H. C. KNIGHT.

AMERICAN TRACT SOCIETY,
150 NASSAP^SIIiBPffVSgW, YORK.

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER I.
The Early Home   • --   page 5
CHAPTER II.
Life in Andover  •  ...  13
CHAPTER III.
First Labors in Tract Work --  23
CHAPTER IV.
Formation of the American Tract Society  32
CHAPTER V.
Development of. Tract Work — Marriage — Home  — - — 43
CHAPTER VI.
Fruitful Activities  ¦¦  52

4

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER VII.
Enlarged Labors — Close of the Journal --   64
CHAPTER VIII.
Colportage; and Conflict  76
CHAPTER IX.
The End: Portraits. by Co-Workers and Friends  86

MEMORIAL

OF

REV. WM. A. HALLOCK, D. D.

CHAPTER I.
THE EARLY HOME.
In the bold and rugged town of Plainfield, in the
western part of Massachusetts, settled chiefly by farm
ers, Rev. Moses Hallock was ordained pastor of its
newly -formed church, July n, 1792.
In summer the whole region is clad in living green.
On the south, lies Cummington, the birthplace of our poet
Bryant. Westward rises Mount Greylock twenty miles
or so. Eastward in the clear air Monadnock lifts its
hoary head, while towards the north, the Green moun
tain range stretches far away into the state which bears
its name. Ninety pounds were voted for the setdement of the
new minister, " with forty-five pounds for two years, to
be increased five pounds a year until it reached sixty
pounds, when the sum becomes stationary." We be
lieve, however, the sum* became stationary long before
reaching its legal limits ; " the settlement and salary to

6 DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
be paid, one quarter in cash, the other three-fourths
in farm produce at cash prices."
If this seems meagre, let us remember that wood in
the forest was but twenty cents a cord, and other needs,
fewer and simpler than now, were no doubt at corre
sponding prices.
On receiving a gift of sixty young apple-trees for the
orchard of the new parsonage, " The trees arrived safely,"
writes Mr. Hallock to the generous donor. " I received
them with gratitude and set them out with more care than
if they had been purchased with my own money. I can
think of nothing of the same value which would have
been so acceptable. The ground was ready to receive
them ; but I should not have bought any, for it seemed
imprudent to increase my debts. May I ever, with
humility, ascribe the supply of my wants to the Divine
care. I hope, sir, the limbs of these trees will hereafter
bend to meet the innocent hands of some millennial
people. Did I know this, it would put a tenfold value
on them. I am willing to plant for them to eat. When
I think of the happiness of the millennium, my soul
runs forward to anticipate the joy. But though it
tarry, .my dear brother, let us wait for it, for surely it
will dome."
Mr. Hallock was a graduate of Yale College with
his only brother, Rev. Jeremiah Hallock, who nearly
at the same time was settled in Canton, Conn. Though
sixty miles apart when sixty miles was a slow and toil
some journey, the brothers never failed of a yearly
meeting. From a paper written to a grandchild of his

THE EARLY HOME. 7
life-long and well-beloved deacon, we find that Mr.
Moses Hallock " used to visit his brother once in two
years, and the road which he travelled passed the house
of Deacon Richards, so he always called there on his
way and they both prayed together ere he went on his
journey. His brother also visited him once in two
years, and when he returned home Mr. Hallock used to
walk by the side of the wagon as far as your grandfather
Richards', where they both called, and the three prayed
together and shook hands and parted. Was not that a
delightful way to live ?"
Jeremiah usually came to Plainfield in September,*
often bringing their aged father"with him, which led
Moses to call August the happiest month and October the
gloomiest month in the year. They were the sons of a
godly English ancestry, early rooted in the eastern part
of Long Island. When their venerated father died
at eighty-five, the most precious legacy which he
wished to leave was "one word" received from his
father, to be transmitted to the latest generation : "Re
member there is a long eternity."
The young pastor of Plainfield brought Margaret
Allen of Chilmark, Martha's Vineyard, to be wife and
help-meet in the new home. At the beginning of his
ministry over this little church of fourteen members, God
poured out his Spirit, and "in consequence of this
glorious work," the record runs, " seventeen joined the
church in one day." Again we find that '' another
effusion of the Holy Spirit entered into almost every
part of the town, and in some parts with great power."

8 DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
A little later, "thirty-one persons joined the church,
twenty -four of whom adorned the aisle at one time."
Six such ingatherings are recorded ending in 1828,
when sixty-six came into the foldj swelling the number
to three hundred and forty-eight during his ministry—
a truly blessed ministry of forty years, the harmony
existing between him and his people never having been
interrupted or broken; rather year after year, there
were an ever-increasing confidence, cooperation, and
friendship. His theology was the theology of the Bible. This
was the book which he studied and over which he
pored and prayed to the end of his days. In the stead
fastness and hold of his reliance on its truths as from
God was the hiding of his power. He found in it, and
loved, the "doctrines of grace" clustering around the^
work and offices of Christ, and these he preached and
practised with believing earnestness to the end of his
days. To kindness and courtesy he united sincerity,
frankness and humility, with a deep and heartfelt inter
est in the welfare of everybody around him.
As the years went on, four sons and one daughter
came to fill the home with glad activity, William,
Gerard, Leavitt, Homan, and Martha, the only sister.
Partly to supply an educational want, partly to meet
the exigencies of a growing family, the pastor became
teacher, receiving scholars under his own roof. For
many years he was rarely without them. Three hun
dred and four young people thus came under his ex-

THE EARLY HOME. 9
cellent training : one hundred and thirty-three of whom
entered college ; fifty became ministers of the gospel,
seven went as missionaries to foreign lands, while others
entered into various callings, which they adorned by
public and private worth.
Many had their education at a cost little over a dol
lar a week ; those especially who were poor and aiming
at the ministry, received not only a father's sympathy
and counsel, but pecuniary aid as well. Some began a
religious life under his instruction; others frequently
assisted him in pastoral work; all acknowledged the
elevating power of his practical piety. But one of this
large number died while an inmate of his family, and
this was the only death which occurred in his house for
forty years.
It is interesting to recall the names of those who
went abroad at that early day to lay the foundation ot
Christian institutions in pagan lands, receiving as they
must have done some of their best lessons in practical
wisdom as well as their warmest impulses in Christian
consecration in the humble parsonage at Plainfield.
We find Rev. James Richards in Ceylon, and his
brother William at the Sandwich Islands, sons of a
beloved deacon of the pastor ; Levi Parsons and Pliny
Fiske exploring Palestine and bringing it nearer than
ever before to Bible readers; Jonas King laboring in
Syria and in Greece ; William Ferry among the Amer
ican Indians, and Homan Hallock, missionary printer
in Smyrna. Mr. Hallock cherished habits of more familiar inter-

10 DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
course with his children than was perhaps common at
that time. He early led them to consider their inter
ests identical with their parents'. As soon as the sons
were old enough to think and act, he consulted them
about the various . labors of the farm, leading them to
plan and carry out their plans, as if everything depend
ed upon their own foresight and diligence.
The thrift and self-reliance which dignified this pas
tor's home are happily illustrated in the father's reply
to his eldest son, who on one occasion wished to relieve
the family purse by seeking aid to pursue his studies
from some charitable fund for this purpose.
"Letters from you are always welcome, my dear
son, but your present request for 'credentials' will
not be so readily granted. Children should not beg
bread so long as their parents have enough. It is now
nearly six years since I entered you and your brother
Gerard at Williams college. I had given you to the
Lord, and I believed he would support you. He has
so wonderfully prospered us, that all your expenses
were paid in good season and without the least per
plexity. ' The barrel of meal wasted not, neither did
the cruse of oil fail.' His kindness continues. Beg of
the Lord continually, but ask not of man till you are
suffering from want. If your name is already given as a
beneficiary, take the first opportunity of having it erased."
" It has long delighted me," said the good man on
another occasion, " to see what interest my children
take in each other. Each child is, as it were, a parent
to all the rest. I hope and trust this mutual love will

THE EARL Y HOME. 1 1
continue. It is very pleasant. It is useful. It is hon
orable. May we, parents and children, love the Lord.
There is enough in Christ to make us all happy, if we
have a holy relish for what is provided for us."
Nor is this touch of farm-life without a tender inter
est: "I lately went," he wrote, "into the forest where
William and I gathered the dry wood for winter. I
went to the brook where we drank, and to the tree that
had fallen over it, on which we sat and ate our cold din
ner together and acknowledged God."
It was from a home like this that the subject of the
following sketches came to take his place and do his
part in forming and fostering one of the great Christian
institutions of the century — the American Tract Society.
With such a nurture, we might naturally expect to
find this eldest son of the pastor early entering the
church fold.
Not so, however ; partly, perhaps, because children
were not then thought capable of apprehending the
nature of either the sacraments or the vows of the
church ; partly because " conversion " was beset with a
greater degree of ideal distress and deliverance than
the common experience of most children in Christian
families was able to reach. Short of this many a thought
ful and earnest young person has suffered years of delay
to go by, shorn of the help and strength which the com
munion and fellowship of the church would have afford
ed them. William looked for a marked and sudden change in
his inner life, which never came, and he reached man-

12 DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
hood " secluded from the hopes and privileges of the
child of God." Indeed, he gave up his early classical
studies, feeling that they would be not only no benefit
in this world, but would rather " enhance his misery in
the world to come;" relinquishing study, he devoted
himself to the labors of the litde farm.
At twenty, through much heart-searching, fasting,
and prayer, a desire for a college course again sprang
up in his mind. His father joyfully cherished it, per
ceiving in it, with a father's discernment, the " new life"
of his beloved child. He resumed his neglected stud
ies, entered Williams College, and in 1819, at the age
of twenty-five, graduated with the highest honors of his
class. Doubting, fearing lest he had never been " savingly
converted," he yet steadily set his face towards the the
ological seminary at Andover, even then expecting
from without that confirmation of his hopes which only
personal steadfastness in faith can ever make sure.
It has been said that " men of every class who have
done something creditable ought, being trustworthy
and honest men, to write their lives with their own
hand." However doubtful a latitude this might give,
we have a journal of Mr. Hallock, kept during a period
when events most shape and impress the character,
which gives a more vivid portrait of the man and his
time than the truest pen of another could do.
As far as the journal goes, it is only supplemented
by occasional statements intended to bring into brighter
relief the events which are recorded.

LIFE IN AND OVER. 13
CHAPTER II.
LIFE IN ANDOVER.
William A. Hallock entered the seminary at
Andover, November 3, 1819. A question of duty soon
confronted and deeply agitated him. " I owe to Christ
and his cause the full consecration of all my powers, yet
I have never publicly consecrated myself to him. All
through my four years of college I have never avowed
myself his. Is this reserve for ever to continue ? I will
go now to the professors of the seminary, tell them my
story, and ask their counsel as to my duty."
"Andover, Jan. 16, 1820. Sabbath morning. This
day I have devoted to fasting and prayer, that God will
prepare me to come out from the world ; that he will
assist my parents in their consideration of the letter I
have written them, to give me such an answer as shall
be for his glory.
"Feb. 13. Sabbath. The last day of January I re
ceived letters from my father and mother and sister.
The spirit of tender concern which their letters breathe,
and the earnest desire which they express for my spir
itual welfare are very affecting. Eight days ago I com
municated to Brother Richards my desire of uniting
with the church. On Tuesday I consulted Professor
Porter, the friend of my uncle, Rev. Jeremiah Hallock,
and my father. Yesterday I met the officers of the

14 DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
church, and conversed with them with great freedom,
and to-day I have been propounded.
" March 3. This day is set apart in the seminary as
a day of fasting, humiliation, and prayer. The occasion
renders it highly interesting to me, as I expect this
afternoon to enter into covenant with a holy God to be
his for ever. I desire to feel that the privilege is un
speakably great, and the transaction unspeakably sol
emn. Since I was examined, I know not that I have
seen a moment when I wished to undo what I have now
done. " And now, glorious Redeemer, do thou prepare my
heart so to give myself away as to have thy gracious
acceptance. Thou wilt be my Judge. Be now my
Advocate, my Sanctifier, my all.
" Sabbath evening. When I proposed joining this
church, I expected to be alone, but there were ten who
united with me: Brothers Prentiss and Pigeon, and
eight from the academy and the neighborhood. Rev.
Dr. Woods preached from the text, ' What mean ye by
this service ?' The discourse was very appropriate, and
the communion season an hour of peculiar solemnity.
Thus have I taken the vows of God upon me, and I
cannot go back. Blessed Redeemer, keep me as in the
hollow of thy hand. May I come off conqueror through
Him that loved me and gave himself to die for me.
"March 27. This day has brought interesting in
telligence : the death of Hon. Peter Bryant. The mis
sionaries Fiske and Parsons have safely arrived at Smyr
na. Brethren Winslow, Spaulding, Woodward, and

LIFE IN ANDOVER. 15
Scudder, with their wives, have arrived at Ceylon, and
their labors on the passage were so blessed to the crew,
that on their arrival all but one were hopefully convert
ed. Rev. Mr. Meigs' interpreter has professed faith in
Christ. The members of Mr. Meigs' school are calling
on him and inquiring for the way of salvation. Mr.
Farrar, the treasurer, has received from a benevolent
donor good news as to a new building for this semi
nary. Four have obtained a hope in Hamilton college,
and seven are inquiring ; twenty have a hope in Union,
and thirty inquiring ; one hundred have been admitted
to the church in Stillwater. Such is the news of Zion's
prosperity which has greeted our ears in one day ; we
hear good news also from several other colleges. Light
seems to be dawning in Dartmouth, Bowdoin, and Brown
University. " April 29. I have been reading the life of Samuel
J. Mills. What is my duty? Oh, help me to devote
myself, my God, to thee. Give me faith; give me zeal;
give me prudence ; give me strength.
"June 15. The spring vacation of six weeks I
have spent very pleasandy, and I hope profitably, in
visiting Martha's Vineyard, the birthplace of my mother.
Her father's farm in Chilmark, the western town of the
island, lies on the south side, where the broad Atlantic
rolls its perpetual waves, nearly opposite the island of
' No Man's Land.' In this visit many narratives which.
entertained me at my mother's knee were made real.
Among my relatives on the island are the descendants
of the Missionary Mayhews of five successive genera-

16 DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
tions, whose name is embalmed in the annals of the
churches. "Andover, Jan. i, 1821. The Lord's Supper was
administered yesterday, and this evening I have attend
ed the Concert of Prayer. I have just heard from my
parents and sister and brothers, and have much occa
sion for thankfulness that the descent of my parents in
the vale of years is so peaceful and happy, and that I am
enjoying all the blessings of this seminary. My brother
Gerard, my classmate and roommate in college, is pass
ing his second year giving instruction in the academy
at Amherst. "March 18. Rev. Mr. Cornelius preaches in the
chapel to-day. God is sparing my life to enjoy pre
cious privileges. My studies are delightful and inti
mately connected with my usefulness as a minister. My
class is now on the subject of Moral Agency. I recite
frequentiy to Professor Gibbs in the Greek of the New
Testament, and have been much occupied in preparing
a dissertation for the Society of Inquiry, on the ' Influ
ence of Heathen Religions on Moral and Intellectual
Character.' I have also the privilege of membership in
a literary society, composed chiefly of gentiemen resi
dent here, besides other societies, and all the public
exercises of this institution.
"Plainfield, May 5. Gerard, still Preceptor of
Amherst Academy, has made us a fine visit of three
days. Our own family, father, mother, four sons and
one daughter,, breakfasted by ourselves this morning.
It was entire. Death has as yet made no breach in it.

LIFE IN ANDOVER. , 17
We sang the Farewell, and united in committing our
selves into the hands of a kind and guardian God.
Shall we ever meet again ? God only knows.
" May 18. President Moore and lady dined with us
to-day. He brought an official letter requesting me to
be a candidate for the place of Tutor Porter in Williams
College the ensuing year. I know not what my answer
should be. I intend taking the counsel of my father
and brother Gerard, and the professors at Andover.
May my course be directed from on high.
"July 1. In the week now closed I attended the
General Association of Massachusetts at Haverhill.
Dined at Mrs. Atwood's in company with the profes
sors of this seminary, Rev. Sereno E. Dwight and wife
of Boston, and Professor Gibbs. There are many
charms attached to the former residence of Harriet
Newell. " I have concluded not to accept the proposition to
spend my next year as tutor in Williams College.
" I have been writing a dissertation on the question,
' Whether the Doctrine of a Future State of Rewards
and Punishments is Taught in the Old Testament,' for
the ' Christian Spectator,' and have just finished an ab
stract of the same, to be read at the ensuing examina
tion. I have also written a dissertation on the ' Priest
hood,' to be read before a literary club of which I have
been elected a member.
" I am a little burdened with societies — Secretary of
the Rhetorical, Secretary and Treasurer of the Lock-
hart Musical Society, Treasurer of the Auxiliary Cor-

18 DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
ban, and Committee of Recommendation, Purchasing
Committee of the Atheneum, Vice-President of the So
ciety of Inquiry, treasurer of another society, agent also
for purchasing German books. They do not all make
a great demand, but they occupy some hours every
week. " Gerard has just written that he intends to leave
teaching, and to spend the ensuing year with me in this
seminary. My brother Leavitt has relinquished the
idea of obtaining a public education. My brother Ho
man, I am informed, will enter Amherst College this
fall. In the welfare of these brothers I have a deep
interest. What greater blessing could I receive than
to see them all the devoted servants of Christ ?
" I have been doubting where to spend the coming
vacation. I might take a school; I" might spend it
journeying; I am invited to spend it in Hallowell,
Maine, where all my expenses will be borne. I have
been requested by one of the trustees of Amherst ' Col
legiate Charity Institution ' to hold myself ready for a
tutorship there. I have no expectation of going to
Amherst — a school will wear me out and encroach upon
the, ensuing term ; journeying is too expensive. I have
determined to pass the vacation in Maine, where health
and experience in labors for Christ may be acquired. I
shall be at no expense, and spending my time in reli
gious meetings, visiting for religious purposes, etc., will
be beneficial as preparing for usefulness both in an in
tellectual and moral point of view. I desire to leave
myself in the hands of God, and cheerfully to follow the

LIFE IN ANDOVER. 19
indications of his providence. My heavenly Father,
thou seest my needs, supply them out of thine infinite
fulness. . "October 4. Arrived at Hallowell to pass my
vacation assisting the Rev. Dr. Gillette. I have found
some hearing ears, especially among those who do not
enjoy the stated ministrations of the sanctuary. I have
often found it pleasant, and never irksome, to speak in
the name and for the cause of Christ ; and have only to
regret that I have no more heavenly ardor in promul
gating his truth.
"November 4. I leave Hallowell with regret.
Christian friends have been numerous and affectionate.
They have laid me under great obligations. May the
blessing of God rest upon them evermore.
"November 6. Sloop Liberty, twenty-five miles
from Pordand. I left Bowdoin College Wednesday
p. m., called a moment on Rev. Asa Cummings, North
Yarmouth ; dined at Rev. Mr. Whittemore's, Falmouth;
arrived at Pordand, three p. M. ; called five minutes on
Rev. Dr. Payson, nine thousand copies of whose Ad
dress to Seamen are now in the press of the New Eng
land Tract Society ; took tea at Mr. Cutler's, and heard
Granville Mellen's eloquent address before the Mechan
ics' Association.
" At nine p. M. the sloop left the wharf, and never
shone a brighter moon. In the morning the rising of
the sun from mid-ocean was beautiful. The sea was
smooth as glass ; before sunrise the red rays, reflected
from the western sky upon the water, gave its whole

20 DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
surface the hue of a mellow purple. At length the sun
rose out of the mighty deep in full splendor. The
White Mountains of New Hampshire appeared like a
white-capped thunder-cloud in the west, towering above
everything else. Such a morning I never beheld ; but
even all this beauty became tiresome for the lack of one
thing — wind. Fearing what would come next, the cap
tain made sure of a harbor at Cape Porpoise. I had
taken my berth at nine, but the wind becoming fresh
from the southeast, at one I rose, went on deck, and
saw that a storm was inevitable. At three I was set on
shore six miles from Kennebunk. I walked ten miles
before I saw any signs of sunrise, and at York the rain
and the United States mail-stage overtook me together.
The rain fell. in torrents; the wind blew almost a gale;
the waves dashed terribly on the shore. The ferry at
Portsmouth was dangerous. I reached Newburyport
in safety, rejoicing all the way that I was neither amid
the foaming billows nor confined at Cape Porpoise ; and
after a pleasant Sabbath arrived at my room.
" Bartlett Hall, second story, southeast corner, An
dover, November 17. A great class of almost sixty
juniors has just arrived. Rev. Prof. . Porter is at the
South for health. Last evening my class received a
license from the professors to preach in the seminary.
Thus I am now to enter on this great work to which I
have been looking forward. May. I quit myself like a
man. "November 19. Gerard has this day arrived to
spend one year in this sacred seminary; I have been

LIFE IN ANDOVER. 21
very anxious that he should be here. I hope that,
through the grace of God, all his religious privileges
here will be the means of advancing his spiritual in
terests. " March 16, 1822. The present is a season I wish
long to remember. Gerard has been deeply interested
in religion, intent upon it, earnestly desiring to be fitted
to be useful in the ministry, and for the kingdom of
heaven. He has laid aside his books — all but his Bible,
and Henry Martin, Davies, and kindred works; he
wanders in the woods, and wherever he can find retire
ment. He is tender, he is earnestly inquiring. The
Lord be praised.
" Another student now on this sacred hill is deeply
impressed. Many brethren are quickened, and some
in the academy are serious. There are also some hope
ful appearances in town. Oh that God would come
and work wonders here, as he has in many places in
our land. New Haven and Pittsfield have been blessed
with almost a constant revival for some months.
"Andover, April 26. I yesterday returned from
the meeting of the Londonderry Presbytery, by whom,
with fifteen others, I was licensed to preach the gospel.
The occasion was one of deep solemnity. Brother
Shed and I, as a committee, have just received a
letter from the Hon. Mr. Bardett of Newburyport, in
reply to our acknowledging his kindness in furnishing
us with the new seminary building (Bartiett Hall) which
we now occupy. He expresses much friendship, humil
ity, and desire for the spiritual welfare of the seminary.

22 DR. WILLIAM. A. HALLOCK.
" As to the coming vacation, I have no doubt that
it is my duty to spend it in Hallowell, and can only
commit my way to God, praying him to make me
useful. " May 6. Monday morning at nine o'clock, I sailed
from Boston in the schooner Sea-Flower, and in thirty-
one hours she lay to by the wharf in Hallowell.
"I preached while in Hallowell and the vicinity,
written sermons on twenty-two occasions, and assisted
or took the lead in eight other meetings ; in all thirty.
"Andover, June. Having returned here, I have
everything to be thankful for, except that I have been
no more faithful. I regret to leave friends in Maine.
Now I feel that a life of activity in public labors is
better than that of a student in the preparatory course."

FIRST LABORS IN TRACT WORK. 23
CHAPTER III.
FIRST LABORS IN TRACT WORK.
"July 26, 1822. Dr. Justin Edwards, secretary of
the New England Tract Society, while riding on horse
back to visit his people, stopped and called at my room,
to say that the Society, having had no agent for two
years, is in a very low state and needs reviving, and that
it must have some one from the senior class to engage
for a time in its agency. ' We have been looking over
the class,' he said, ' and according to the best light we
have, we think it may be your duty to labor for a time
in this department. We wish you to think of it and
seek for light and direction from above. My duties
are pressing. Good morning, sir.'
"September 16. I have resolved, immediately
after closing my three years' course in the Theological
Seminary, to visit my parents and then engage in the
service of the Tract Society. My success in furthering
its work must depend on the aid that shall be given
me from above.
" Brother William Richards, my classmate and fel
low-townsman, is soon to leave me and his country for
the Sandwich Islands ; and my class are to separate to
the four winds, many of them on missionary ground.
. "September 26. Thus rapid time has finally closed
my connection with the dear Theological Seminary.
My three years have been happy; but I cannot feel

24 DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
that I have made such acquisitions of divine and human
knowledge as I ought. I am now but a child in theology,
a child in knowledge, and a child (if indeed I am a
child) in piety. But my hours, however improved or
misimproved, are gone, never, never to be mine again.
I am thrust into the field, and I have only to implore
the divine blessing, and go forward.
" This is the most gloomy day of my life. I have
been into the chapel, where we have met every morning
and evening for devotion, and those vacant seats, which
I and my scattered classmates are never to occupy
again — speak a language such as no tongue can utter.
Dear Richards, the friend and companion of my child
hood and youth ! I sung with him most lovingly and
harmoniously at the concert last evening ; and I have
sung by his side in college and seminary, morning and
evening, for seven years; he has prayed with me, and
told me my faults; he has been my friend, a friend
more faithful than a brother ; and we have been togeth
er in trouble and in joy. But we sing together no
more, we part ; God make us faithful, and let us meet
again — in heaven !
" Brother Brigham, with whom I have roomed in
love these three years, will go to-morrow first to Ken
tucky a few months, and then on a mission to South
America ; and my other classmates are dispersing in all
directions. But I must take courage, inquire into the
state of the Tract Society, and do what I can to supply
its wants. "October 15. Left Andover on foot to visit the

FIRST LABORS IN TRACT WORK. 25
neighboring churches and raise funds for the Tract
Society. " November 21. Returned to Andover with $419 15,
having visited about thirty churches in the vicinity, my
travelling expenses being just thirty-four cents / — all for
tolls at bridges and turnpike gates. Have become deep
ly interested in many pastors and churches, whose kind
ness has laid me under obligations of lasting gratitude.
" December 24. I have now remained in Andover
more than a month ; written a sermon for my agency ;
a circular to the Christian public; a circular letter to
the agents of depositories ; an article on ' Auxiliary So
cieties ;' another inviting friends to furnish matter for
new tracts ; selected the ' Conversion of Mrs. E. Emer
son,' ' The Splendid Wedding,' etc., for new tracts, and
spent one Sabbath in Dracut and one in Methuen.
" December 25. Left Andover on the business of
the Society, and visited about twenty towns, in which
the cordial cooperation of pastors and their people laid
me under special obligations.
"January 31, 1823. Have remained in Andover
sixteen days, writing a sermon, making a list of life-
members, sending circulars to every town in Massachu
setts, and writing four articles for the ' Boston Recorder.'
Spent one Sabbath in Boxford ; walked home Sabbath
evening ten miles in damp snow and took a severe cold."
" Took a third tour in Massachusetts for collecting
funds, visiting about seventy churches (including five
within the boundaries of New York), receiving for the
Society about $800.

26 2?^?. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
" I cannot express the sacredness and tenderness of
the tie that binds me to the hearts of the pastors and
churches, men and women, old and young, by whom
the above sums were contributed to this blessed cause.
Most of them I shall never see again on earth ; but I
expect to meet them with mutual joy and thanksgiving
in a brighter and better world.
" Brother Brigham's mother and relatives received
me as if I had been an old friend. At Canton I sup
plied the pulpit of my revered uncle, Rev. Jeremiah
Hallock, whose praise is in all the churches.
" Visiting my parents at Plainfield, I had great pleas
ure in supplying my father's pulpit, and he could
hardly consent to my tarrying only for one Sabbath.
Martha is devoted to the service of Christ, Leavitt
seriously considering the duty of publicly professing
faith in him, and Homan, a member of the freshman
class in Amherst College, was one of twenty-two hope
fully converted in a revival the past winter. News
has just been received that Rev. James Richards, riiis-
sionary in Ceylon, has died in the triumphs of faith.
"June 2, my birthday. A good Providence has
preserved me another year, and I can truly say it has
been crowned with loving kindness. All that I have
done for the Tract Society has been a joy, every pain
I have been called to suffer for it, though sometimes
travelling on foot by night amid the chills and snows of
the New Hampshire hills, is sweet.
"A letter now lies on my table urging me to go
to Maine and attempt to build up a church in Farming-

FIRST LABORS IN TRACT WORK. 27
ton. I am also requested to consider the state of the
church at Buckland, Mass. A hint is also received-
from New Marlborough. But at present my path is
plain, though I hope by-and-by to be stationed in the
ministry. "September 24, 1823. It is now a year since I
began labor for the Tract Society. I have been con-
stantiy engaged from the time I rose in the morning
till late at night. Besides preparing and . circulating
9,000 copies of our Annual Report, and the Christian
Almanac, a somewhat extensive correspondence has
been constandy maintained; new tracts have been se
lected, proofsheets revised, etc. Four young men of
the seminary are now secured to devote their coming
vacation to the circulation of its works.
" I have visited New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore,
and Washington, with a special view to the issuing of
the Christian Almanac in each of those cities ; confer
ring freely with the officers and friends of the Tract
cause in reference to its interests in those cities and
throughout the land and world.
" Returning to Boston, I found Gerard engrossed in
establishing a weekly religious newspaper, ' The Boston
Telegraph.' "Andover, December n. I returned this day from
a tour through Boston, Salem, Newburyport, etc., to
increase the funds of the Society. In Boston had a
delightful visit with Mr. John Tappan, preached twice
for brother Green, conducted a meeting in Park Street
Church, and dined at Thanksgiving with Mr. David

28 DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
Hale and my brother Gerard. Also visited Salem and
Newburyport. Collected in the tour about $ 550.
"March 13, 1824. Since the above date, I have
been engaged in revising the series of tracts, correcting
all the new editions from the press, procuring cuts,
making inquiries of paper -makers so as to get this
costly article on the best terms, writing for the religious
newspapers, and maintaining a somewhat extensive
correspondence. " I have now almost completed the revision of the
first five volumes of tracts, and am proceeding with the
other two, when I expect to select new tracts, publish
the ' Proceedings of the First Ten Years ' of the Soci
ety, the Annual Report, and the Christian Almanac for
1825. "December 18. I yesterday returned from a jour
ney to my father's, to attend the annual Thanksgiv
ing. I had the happiness of meeting the entire family
circle. We formed a perfect union of sentiment and
views. Religion was uppermost with us all.
" In the evening we sat together, and told to each
other, from the oldest to the youngest, what we hoped
God had done for our souls. I gave my father assis
tance in preaching and other religious meetings, and
spent two days in collecting facts in the history of the
late deacon Joseph Beals, as material for a tract, 'The
Mountain Miller.' "
The new agent is already imbued with the spirit of
the stirring Annual Report of the Society issued a few
months before he entered its service, in which Mr.

FIRST LABORS IN TRACT WORK. 29
Edwards eloquently urged the ease with which it might
speak to millions at the same time ; the great amount
of good which it could do by small means ; the seal of
God's approbation upon the work already begun. "And
who." he asked, " knowing that a single tract put in
operation all the Bible Societies of Russia, Sweden and
the neighboring countries, could fail to expect, when
he stands on Mount Zion, to see the multitude which
no man can number vastly augmented through this
humble instrumentality " ?
The mother of the modern popular tract was Han
nah More, whose " Cheap Repository Tracts," written in
plain language and simple story, were widely circulated
and read in England the latter part of the last century.
The formation of the Religious Tract Society in Lon
don soon followed — 1792 — to give such reading to the
masses. Private efforts for this object sprang up a few
years later in several parts of our own country. Rev.
Dr. Proudfit of Salem, New York, wrote a series of
small books which Gen. Stephen Van Rensselaer and
others in Albany provided funds to print and circulate
especially in the new frontier settlements.
Rev. Jedidiah Morse, of Charlestown, Mass., also
printed an edition which were sent in small parcels to
new settlers in Maine, Kentucky, and Tennessee.
In 1803, Governor Samuel Phillips of Massachusetts,
through the persuasion of his friend, Dr. David Tap-
pan, Professor of Theology at Harvard College, gave a
thousand pounds, five-sixths of the interest of which

30 DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
was to be spent in circulating "pious books " in Ando
ver, his native place ; and three thousands pounds for
" a more general distribution of like pious books." From
this fund Baxter's Saint's Rest was put into every family
in Andover, whose influence, Dr. Justin Edwards said,
" was like that of a gentle revival of religion throughout
his parish."In 1812, Professor Porter of Andover, having
bought a small religious book at a very high price,
turned over in his mind how to lessen the cost of such
books, as lessened they must be for general reading.
He brought the subject before a small circle of friends,
who met at his study every Monday evening to con
fer upon the subject of church work. A plan was pror
posed, which, striking them favorably, they endorsed
by generous subscriptions. Funds were readily ob
tained from others discerning its wise provisions, until
by the time of its public approval at Boston, May,
1814, more than two thousand dollars were subscribed
and more than two thousand already spent in further
ance of the object. The new organization bore the
name of the " New England Tract Society," subsequent
ly changed to " American Tract Society." Its planning
and printing were done in Andover, with a book de
pository at Boston.
In 1 82 1 it issued its first edition of the Christian
Almanac, prepared by Rufus Anderson, then a student
at the seminary, and in 1824 it ventured on a small
monthly magazine. Both before and after this time,
small Tract Societies sprang up in New Haven, Hart-

FIRST LABORS IN TRACT WORK. 31
ford, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Vermont, Cincinnati, as
well as in New York, showing the widespread mental
and spiritual need which such publishing societies were
seeking to supply.
The New York Religious Tract Society was founded
in 1812. In its sixth year, works in French and Span
ish were added to its list of publications. A " Female
Branch " was also formed, with Mrs. Divie Bethune at
its head. Tract work soon became the popular, if not
the only channel of active Christian usefulness for the
women of the church at that time, upon which they
entered with characteristic ardor and fidelity.

32 DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.

CHAPTER IV.
FORMATION OF THE AMERICAN TRACT
SOCIETY.
" From the time of becoming thoroughly enlisted in
tract work," writes Dr. Hallock, " it was the great and
legitimate object of my efforts to extend its influence
throughout the United States. My mind was upon
every movement which had any bearing on this grand
end, whether favorable or unfavorable. I felt the over
whelming embarrassment of a location in a retired,
country village like Andover, and became convinced
that the seat of the Society must be removed to Boston.
It was, however, too painful a subject to be laid before
the gentlemen of Andover most interested in it.
" Meanwhile officers of the New York Religious
Tract Society, which for several months had been be
coming active, conceived the idea of a National Institu
tion in New York ; and a committee, consisting of Mr.
Arthur Tappan, Dr. James C. Bliss, and Rev. Charles
G. Sommers, were appointed to address the American
Tract Society at Boston, and. propose to them to remove
their whole establishment to New York, and become
the National American Tract Society.
" Their letter dated November 12, 1824, was brought
to my room by my friend and counsellor, Rev. Justin
Edwards, our Society's secretary, who dropped it on my

FORMATION OF THE SOCIETY. 33
table saying, ' There is a letter from New York. They
wish us to remove the American Tract Society on there
and let it become the National Society in New York.'
" At these words, the blood rushed through my
veins from the crown of my head to the sole of my foot.
Providence seemed to have gone before me, and it
appeared to me in a moment that the concentration of
tract work in New York was what God designed.
"The Committee directed an answer inquiring
whether, in case of a removal, the people of New York
would build a house for the Society's accommodation,
and would retain its auxiliaries, depositories, members,
etc. The reply was sufficiently satisfactory as to their
kind and liberal intentions; and on the nth of January
a public meeting of our Society was held in the vestry
of the Park Street Church, Boston, when the letters
were read, and the subject fully discussed by Rev. Drs.
Edwards and Woods, Hon. Samuel Hubbard, Jeremiah
Evarts, S. V. S. Wilder, Henry Hill, and others, and
the subject was referred back to the Executive Com
mittee, then consisting of Rev. Drs. Edwards, Church,
Codman, and Fay, and Esquire Blanchard.
" That committee met on the following day, and
unanimously 'Resolved, That William A. Hallock be
and hereby is appointed permanent Agent of this Soci
ety, with a salary increased to $800' — showing that the
committee had relinquished the idea of a removal. On
my return to Andover, I was greeted with congratula
tions that the whole subject was put to rest.
" It was not put to rest, however, in my own mind ;
Dr. Hallock. C

34 DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
on the contrary it was assuming a constandy growing
importance, and after one Sabbath I expressed to Mr.
Edwards my most decided impression that the Execu
tive Committee should give the whole subject further
consideration. A special meeting was then called, when
I presented a written statement of the clear indications
of Providence that the subject referred to the Commit
tee demands their most serious consideration."
" I begin with the embarrassments connected with
the location at Andover, namely: that of 125 deposito
ries, only thirty-seven can obtain tracts as conveniendy
from Boston as from New York ; and of those thirty-
seven, only two can obtain supplies at Andover as con
veniently as at Boston ; that only one-ninth of the popu
lation of the country is naturally'associated with Boston,
and only one-twentieth of the territory east of the
Mississippi ; that much delay, risk and expense attend
the transmission of tracts from Andover, an interior
town, to the different parts of the United States ; that
the great mass of the Christian community have now
no access to the fountain-head of the Society, and no
city has the stimulus and benefit of having its location
among themselves. The stereotyping, the engraving,
and the circulation of the Society's Magazine must all
be done at a distance ; we have no market for procu
ring paper, and the town being so small, the interests
of the printers, papermakers, and Executive Commit
tee are so interwoven as to embarrass the concerns of
the Society; while in a large city there might be a
great saving in the publishing department.

FORMA TION OF THE SOCIETY. 35
" ' That further embarrassment arises from the Socie
ty's connection with the Theological Seminary mainly
representing one Christian denomination; that in case
of the removal by death or otherwise, of one man, Rev.
Justin Edwards, now of Andover, whose aid on the
Committee is a very principal argument for the present
location, few would consider the Society more safe as
to the evangelical character of the tracts, than if located
in the city of Boston or New York.
" ' We have considered the embarrassments of the
present location a reason for collecting large funds for
establishing local depositories throughout the country ;
and if the Society can be essentially freed from these
embarrassments, ought we not to lay the whole state of
the case before the Christian public, that all may give
understandingly ?
" ' God now seems opening the way to relieve the
Society, and give it opportunity greatly to extend itself.
Shall it not be permitted to improve this opportunity ?
" ' The present is a most important crisis in the tract
operations of this country. A National Tract Society
is, without doubt, to be formed, and it is of vast impor
tance to do all we can to give it a truly evangelical
character. There is an excitement in the public mind
in favor of national societies. A friendly proposition is
now made to this Society by the Society in New York,
on the acceptance of which may depend the character
of tract operations in our country for the long future.
" ' One argument, which seems to me to outweigh all
suggested at the public meeting of the Society, is that

36 DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
by uniting these societies in a National Institution, we
may, to all human view, promote a union of feeling and
of effort among Christians of various denominations.
" ' Another argument of surpassing weight is that, to
human view, the Committee may now, by one act of
theirs, be the instrument of enlisting the great body of
Christians throughout all our territories in circulating
our truly evangelical series of tracts.
" ' This Society has given the most sacred pledges to
the Christian public that it is laboring for the whole
country. If, when a National Society is to be formed,
we refuse to unite on principles such as we ourselves
would wish to propose, do we redeem our pledges ?'
" The Committee, as the result of their deliberations,
sent me the following communication :
" ' To Mr. Wm. A. Hallock, Assistant Secretary ot the Amer
ican Tract Society :
" ' The Executive Committee hereby authorize and
commission you to go to the City of New York, and
conduct in their behalf a correspondence with the Com
mittee of the New York Religious Tract Society.
" ' Wishing you the. guidance and blessing of God,
we affectionately commend you, and the important in
terests in which you are engaged, to his infinitely wise
and good disposal.
"'J. EDWARDS,
" ' Clerk of Ex. Com. Am. Tr. Soc.
" ' Andover, January 27, 1825.'
" Thus instructed, I immediately wrote to the New
York Religious Tract Society, proposing that they be-

FORMATION OF THE SOCIETY. 37
come a Branch ; and February 3 I visited that city. I
found there a burning love for the tract work enkin
dled in the hearts of officers and friends to whom God
had given large means. Almost daily meetings were
held for consultation and prayer at the house of Dr.
Bliss, on the corner of Broad and Garden streets, in
which. Messrs. Arthur Tappan, Moses Allen, Richard
T. Haines, and Marcus Wilbur, largely participated)
besides several distinguished clergymen. The neces
sity of a building large enough to accommodate the
new Society was deeply felt, and several generous sums
were already promised for it. Under these circum
stances, viewing the tract cause as one, whether in
Boston or New York, having evidence that there was
in the latter city the proper spirit and all the requisite
qualifications for conducting a National Society, I
paused in my efforts for the Society at Boston, and did
all I could to organize a National Society in New
York. " It was a striking providence that March and a part
of April of this year (1825) was the season immediately
preceding the losses by the cotton speculation, and was
perhaps the most prosperous commercial period in the
history of New York city. Within three months after,
her losses were immense, her commerce depressed, and
to have raised $20,000 for a Tract House would have
been, to all human view, utterly impracticable. This
was unknown to us, but was known to an unerring
Providence; and let. his hand be gratefully recognized
in the event.

38 DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
"A meeting was called March n, at the City Hotel,
at which $12,500 were immediately subscribed, and a
draft of the Constitution for the new National Society
was read and approved. It had been digested with
great care, and was in some respects unlike any one
that had preceded it.
"While its object was 'to diffuse a knowledge of
our Lord Jesus Christ as the Redeemer of sinners, and
to promote the interests of vital godliness and sound
morality, by the circulation of religious tracts calculated
to receive the approbation of all evangelical Christians,'
in order to 'promote in the highest degree these ob
jects, the officers and directors shall be elected from
different denominations of Christians ; the Publishing
Committee shall contain no two members from the
same denomination, and no tract shall be published to
which any member of that body shall object.'
" Dr. Milnor, with Dr. Spring and many others in
different parts of the country, supposed a union to pub
lish the Bible without note or comment was about as
far as Christians of different denominations would go.
He felt far from sanguine that they could unite in a
Publishing Society of this character ; yet he expressed
great willingness to do his best in making the attempt.
"Immediately after the meeting, letters were ad
dressed to the principal Tract Societies of the country,
inviting them to send delegates to meet the. Executive
Committee of the Society on Tuesday, the 10th of May,
to confer together and take measures for the final
organization of a National Society.

FORMATION OF THE SOCIETY. 39
" By the last of March, the subscriptions having been
raised to $20,000, I left New York for Andover, where
I wrote the Annual Report of the Society at Boston,
brought up the correspondence which had been neg
lected, and returned to New York to attend the meet
ing of delegates. The union of members of different
denominations was a delicate affair. The meeting came,
however, to an harmonious result, and the crowded and
delightful anniversary of the next day, when the beloved
and eloquent Summerfield "made a most effective ad
dress, which was the last that ever fell from his heav
en-inspired lips, calmed the minds of the doubting, and
gave the friends of the Society fresh courage.
" Returning home to attend the anniversary of the
Society at Boston, May 25, Drs. Milnor, Spring, and
Sommers, delegates from New York, were present and
took part in its exercises. On the following day the
meeting for business was attended by the religious
strength of New England. Full and free discussions
took place, when, through the influence of Jeremiah
Evarts, Esq., Rev. Dr. Edward D. Griffin, and the
delegation from New York, a definite resolution to be
come a Branch of the Society at New York was intro
duced, and after three hours of animated debate, con
ducted with great ability, was carried without a dissent
ing voice. Thus everything was happily adjusted.
" I soon returned to New York and began my la
bors for the new American Tract Society, of which I
had been elected Corresponding Secretary and appoint
ed General Agent. Dr. Justin Edwards was made a

40 DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
member of its Publishing Committee, with Dr. Milnor
of the Episcopal church, Dr. Gardiner Spring of the
Presbyterian church, Dr. John Knox of the Reformed
Dutch church, Rev. Charles Sommers of the Baptist
church, and Rev. John Summerfield of the Methodist
Episcopal." " It is a great consolation," wrote Dr. Hallock on a
later review of this period, " that in looking back on the
intricate way in which I have been led in Tract Society
arrangements, I see no important steps taken which I
could wish to retrace. My proceedings on my first offi
cial visit to New York were somewhat rash, particularly
in engaging at once in the formation of the new Socie
ty ; but on that rashness, if such it must be called, de
pended, under God, the whole character and history of
tract operations in this country perhaps for years to
come. " In looking back on the working of my own mind
in relation to the formation of the new American Tract
Society, I seem to have been driven by a more than
natural impetuosity. The concentration of effort on the
plan which has now been realized seemed to me vastly
important, as enlisting the whole body of evangelical
Christians throughout all our territories in circulating
the most truly evangelical, devotional, and excellent
series of tracts ever issued ; and I felt that I must, and
it would seem that I actually did pursue it, in Divine
strength, with all my might.
" Thus far the hand of the Lord seems to have been
most visibly and kindly interposed. What he designs

FORMATION OF THE SOCIETY. 41
for the future I know not. I would not distrust his love
or his mercy, nor yet would I trust presumptuously that
his providence will always direct events in a manner so
animating and cheering. In the most affectionate, kind,
and cordial meetings of our several Committees, such a
spirit of prayer, of dependence on God for a blessing,
and such ardent love for the souls of men, and desire to
promote their salvation appear, as to give great assu
rance that the Lord is still with us, and that if we pro
voke him not to wrath, his kindness will still follow us."
Mr. S. V. S. Wilder of New York was chosen Pres
ident of the new organization.
Mr. Wilder had already identified himself with simi
lar work abroad. Some years before, while in London,
he dropped one evening into a small church where
Rowland Hill with Thomas Burder and others were
holding a missionary service. The contribution-plate
not reaching the back pew in which he sat, he sent it a
ten-pound note, which proved the means of introducing
him to the officers of the British Bible and Tract Soci
ety. On being asked if their tracts could be circulated
in Paris, where he was then residing, he at once directed
that ten pounds' worth be sent to his address. The
large box arrived at the customhouse, where it was
seized as contraband, and he was summoned to account
for it. " Nothing political or revolutionary," replied
Mr. Wilder, handing a copy of the books to each one
present. Thus suddenly enlisted in tract work, his
interest in it never flagged.
Visiting Mount Calvary near Paris, the scene of an

42 DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
annual Papal festival, he was on the point of being ar
rested by a gendarme, with a mob at his heels, for dis
tributing " those vile books." " No vile books at all,"
said Mr. Wilder, turning round to his assailants with
stately courtesy of manner. " I am distributing the Life,
Death, and Resurrection of our blessed Lord and Saviour
Jesus Christ. Will you allow me to present you with
one, sir, and one to all your attendants ?" The men,
thus unexpectedly confronted, accepted the books, and
suffered the polite and generous stranger to pass on
unmolested. The busy merchant was no less a busy Christian.
Mr. Wilder laid the corner-stone of the Tract House
on its present site, corner of Nassau and Spruce streets,
May 26, 1825, surrounded by a large and enthusiastic
crowd.

DEVELOPMENT OF TRACT WORK. 43

CHAPTER V.
DEVELOPMENT OF TRACT WORK— MARRIAGE
—HOME.
" 1826. My brother Gerard," writes Dr. Hallock,
" having left the ' Boston Telegraph,' received propo
sals from Sidney E. Morse to become joint editor of the
' New York Observer.' He has completed the contract
and comes to New York. It is seven years since we
roomed together at college, and he is now to share
with me my snug quarters in a corner of the Tract
House. " August 26. I have just returned from a visit of
three weeks to my parents. For the sake of my health
I took a horse at New Haven, visiting on the way the
bereaved family of my venerated uncle, Rev. Jeremiah
Hallock, who departed this life June 23, 1826, aged 68.
This dear uncle was eminendy a man of God. Bating
all my partiality to him, he gave me evidence of higher
attainments in piety than I have perhaps ever elsewhere
observed. His annual visits at my father's almost made
the house a little heaven below. Never shall I forget
suddenly opening a chamber-door, and finding him and
my father on their knees pleading with God for my own
salvation, the floor before them bearing testimony to
their flowing tears. He always prayed that he might
not outlive his usefulness ; and having faithfully labored

44 DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
in the ministry forty years, the same period, as he said,
through which Israel was detained in the wilderness, he
rested from his labors.*
" I also spent a night at New Marlborough, Mass.,
with my Andover roommate, Brigham, who, I rejoice
to say, is about to come to New York as Corresponding
Secretary of the American Bible Society.
" I found my parents well and happy. Spent one
day with my father in the most confidential intercourse,
as we were repairing fences in the sugar orchard, which
was one of the happiest days of my life.
" October 17. I have received a note from my
brother Homan, stating that he is to sail for the island
of Malta to superintend the mission press there estab
lished. I cannot but esteem it a privilege and an honor
thus to have one member of my dear father's family on
missionary ground.
"June 2, 1827. My birthday. I am, as usual, deluged
with business, pushing the>day often far into the night,
and wholly occupied with the tract cause from the be
ginning of the month to the end of it. The Society
prospers greatly, its receipts having been $30,000 du
ring the year ending May 1, and its issues 3,000,000 of
tracts. Little did I expect, when coming to this city,
that such would be the results of its second year.
" August. Left New York for New London, Nor
wich, Boston, Andover, and Plainfield. In each of the
two former places organized a tract society, in Ando-
* See Memoir of Rev. Jeremiah Hallock, issued by the
American Tract Society.

DEVELOPMENT OF TRACT WORK. 45
ver secured one or two agents for the Parent Society,
and at Plainfield made an agreeable visit to my parents,
who are now in the midst of a revival of religion.
" Monday, May 24, 1828. Visited Boston as a del
egate. Addressed the Tract meeting Wednesday even
ing ; and attended a meeting of the Committee, at which
they agreed to give up Rev. O. Eastman, their Corre
sponding Secretary, to become General Agent for the
valley of the Mississippi.
" I am convinced that it is my duty to leave the
crowded Brickxhurch, where I am delightfully situated,
with near a thousand members, under the pastoral
charge of Rev. Dr. Gardiner Spring, and join the en
terprise in the Bowery church for those more desti
tute. "March, 1829. I have preached in most of the
churches in the city which unite in supporting the So
ciety, and obtained donations to the amount of about
$7,000. I also spent a fortnight in Albany and Utica,
in which two places $1,800 were raised, and a week in
Hartford with Mr. Charles Hosmer, secretary, raising
$1,100; all with reference to the valley of the Missis
sippi. This object at the present time excites the deep
est interest. Brother Eastman left this city, Nov^iber
17, as General Agent for that vast field. Three others
are laboring near the Ohio river, and two more in New
Orleans and vicinity.
" Rev. F. Y. Vail has lately secured in Connecticut
ten subscriptions of $500 each, in response to a propo
sition from Hon. Mr. Tallmadge of Litchfield to give

46 DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
$500, provided ten in that state would do the same pre
vious to March 1, 1829 — the whole of which $5,000 is
now secured.
" Harlan Page, our Depositary, felt and urged, with
the consent of us all, that the bearer of a tract or book
must open his mouth and labor for the salvation of in
dividuals. We are now making a vigorous effort to
supply every family in this city, at least monthly, with
a tract, accompanied by kind personal efforts for the
salvation of souls. I have taken the responsibility of
the Fourteenth ward. I think if this pkn can be thor
oughly carried out in this city, it will set an example
which will give an impulse to tract operations through
out the country.
" Six weeks ago Gerard was applied to by Mr. Ar
thur Tappan to leave the 'New York Observer' and
become editor of the ' New York Journal of Commerce.'
This daily business paper was established more than
one year since with reference to the morals of the city,
on the ground of excluding advertisements of lotteries,
theatres, and ardent spirits, and being printed without
any infringement on the hours of the Sabbath, while it
should be a paper of high standing as a journal of com-
mer^ and a vehicle of the news of the day. Mr. Tap-
pan has paid nearly $20,000 for its establishment, and a
further capital of $20,000 is now raised by him and oth
ers to carry it forward. "Norwich, Conn., Nov., 1828.
" My respected and very dear Parents : I
write from the house of Charles Lathrop, Esq., who was

DEVELOPMENT OF TRACT WORK. 47
the classmate and roommate of my father in Yale Col
lege. He has long been clerk of the county courts, and
is a deacon and pillar in the church. He remembers
you with much interest, and Mrs. Lathrop says he has
often said he had no classmate he so much wished to
see, and he now sends you his kindest regards.
" Last August I formed a large tract society in Nor
wich city, and then called on Rev. Dr. Strong of Nor
wich town, and proposed forming a ladies' auxiliary in
his parish. He gave me the names of three young la
dies whose cooperation would be desirable, one of whom
was Miss Fanny Leffingwell Lathrop, a daughter of
your classmate. I thought of this family with some in
terest, and spent with them the Connecticut Thanks
giving. Their oldest daughter married Rev. Miron
Winslow, and has long been an active missionary in
Ceylon. They were with Rev. James Richards there,
and attended him in his death. Fanny is the oldest
child remaining at home, and has three younger sisters,
the whole family being devoted Christians. The moth
er, a sister of William Leffingwell, a retired merchant of
New Haven, is an intelligent lady, and merits, as fully
as any one I know, the high and honorable appellation
of a Christian mother, in all the sacred and pleasant
import which that term ought to convey, and ever does
convey to a child favored with such a mother as mine.
Fanny is active in promoting the benevolent objects oi
the day. Her character is decidedly domestic; her
pleasures, cares, and labors, being chiefly at home,
'where she is happy in the circle of her intimate friends.

48 DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
She is neither a poet nor a singer, but has sound dis
cretion and intelligence, and I think an unusual sense
of propriety ; and verily, if I would undertake to say
what there is in herself or the family that could be con
sidered an objection to a connection with them, I know
not what I could mention. I have endeavored to think
of all the various hints my father has from time to time
suggested as to what constitutes the true excellence of
female character, and I surely know of no young lady
in whom I believe you would more fully confide."
"Sept. i, 1829 [his wedding-day], I went to Nor
wich with Gerard and his wife. We met the beloved
family where I have spent many of the happiest hours
of my life, with pleasant anticipations of the scene before
us. On the same day our cousin, Rev. George B. Whi
ting, and his expected companion on a foreign mission ;
Rev. John C. Brigham, Secretary of the American Bi
ble Society ; Rev. Seth Bliss and lady, Rev. Mr. Ever
est, Miss Frances M. Caulkins, and among other friends,
Hon. Samuel Hubbard of Boston, joined us. The ven
erable Rev. Dr. Strong performed the marriage ceremo
ny, offering two prayers very solemn and appropriate.
On the morning of the following day we bade farewell
to this estimable circle of Christian friends, who from
the first have omitted nothing which could be for our
happiness or endear them to us, and took our departure
to visit my parents at Plainfield, stopping at Canton,
where we visited the grave and copied the epitaph of
my revered uncle, Rev. Jeremiah Hallock. We spent

MARRIAGE. 49
ten days at Plainfield most agreeably. The interviews
with my revered father were most delightful and refresh
ing. He spoke of them frequently as a source of satis
faction, and the day before we left, as we were at din
ner, said, ' This young man seems to me quite as much
like brother Jeremiah as like my son.' Returning, we
spent the Sabbath in Bolton, at the residence of S. V. S.
Wilder, Esq., President of the American Tract Society,
and I preached in his new evangelical church.
" New York, Oct. 4. Thus far I surely find a
very great addition to the happiness of life in a cordial,
sincere, single-hearted, unpretending, affectionate, devo
ted companion, who as yet has caused no painful emo
tion to enter my heart, but a sense of the sacred respon
sibility to be faithful to her in all things for the present
and the future life. I desire to receive her as a blessing
lent from God.
"January 1, 1830. This first date of the new year,
my dear parents, I devote to you. I intended to have
written you on Thanksgiving day, but I was in Balti
more, where, and in Washington, Georgetown, and Al
exandria, I labored for the tract cause three weeks. I
therefore have seen no Thanksgiving day this year,
whereas, two years since, I spent one at Mr. Lathrop's
in Connecticut, and another here the following week.
My dear wife understands the conduct of household
affairs, and seems to me to be all that can be desired in
a faithful, affectionate wife. My numerous friends here
have manifested every expression of Christian confi
dence, and indeed she has most evidently strengthened

50 DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
my hands in fulfilling all my public and official respon
sibilities. She is active in our Bowery church, supply
ing, with Mrs. Dr. Peters, about 150 families with the
Bible and tracts, and joining the ladies of the church in
making garments for destitute Sabbath - school chil
dren. " June 2. During the time of the anniversaries the
past month, we have had the pleasure, for the first time
since I came to this city, to see my dear father and
mother here. They tarried with us eight days, and
made a visrt exceedingly agreeable to us, and appa-
rentiy not less so to them. At the same time we had
the pleasure of a visit from father and mother Lathrop,
so that our four parents met each other here, and our
two fathers very agreeably revived the friendships of
classmates and roommates in Yale College.
" March 13, 1831. We were called to part with our
honored father Lathrop.. My dear wife and I were in
formed that he was more feeble, and went with all the
haste that a snowstorm, cutting off the usual convey
ance by land or water, allowed ; we arrived the morn
ing after the burial, to sympathize with a mourning
widow and fatherless children.
" Though externally attentive to the duties of reli
gion, he had no evidence of vital piety till about the
year 1807, when he was led to feel its importance by
perceiving in his oldest daughter, now Mrs. Winslow
of the Ceylon Mission, a serious concern for her soul's
salvation. In April, 1808, on the day when this daugh
ter was twelve years old, both parents were enabled,

HOME. Si
with her, to consecrate themselves to the Redeemer by
a public profession of their faith in him.
" He seemed to feel more than most men the import
of the resolution of Joshua, ' As for me and my house,
we will serve the Lord ;' and the seasons of morning
and evening family worship were evidently among the
happiest seasons of his life."

52 DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
CHAPTER VI.
FRUITFUL ACTIVITIES.
" New York, April 12, 1832. My dear parents : Our
precious little daughter, Martha, is dying in her moth
er's arms ! I cannot tell you how sorely grieved we
are to part from her ; but God so comforts and sup
ports us, that we can say from the heart, 'He deals
graciously with us.' When returning wearied from
my daily toil, her sweet smile and the loving pat
of her littie hand on my face were a real refreshment
to me.
" Five o'clock, p. m. At noon the dear child sweetly
breathed out her spirit to God. I took her littie hand
in mine and we commended her to her Saviour as she
took her everlasting flight.
"May 13. I have just been on a visit to the prin
cipal churches from Utica to Buffalo, especially to enlist
them in the work of systematic tract visitation. We
have made arrangements for supplying some twelve or
fifteen counties in Western New York with tract visita
tion to every family monthly, accompanied by personal
labors for individual souls. Five members of Auburn
Theological Seminary are engaged for five counties.
One man has engaged to supply a county of 3,000
families monthly for a year, another to furnish the
tracts for another county for three months ; others to

FRUITFUL ACTIVITIES. S3
visit and organize counties into districts, etc. I find in
Western New York, many decided friends, and many
places almost destitute of faithful preaching and other
means of grace. The moral desolations of this wide
field cause my heart to bleed. I wish I could stay and
labor here for months.
" Brother Eastman has accepted the appointment of
Visiting and Financial Secretary. We hope to adopt
a resolution at the coming anniversary to proceed im
mediately and systematically in supplying our whole
country ; contributions have been coming in from vari
ous sources : the churches seem awakening, and, all in
all, I think I have never seen a period of so deep inter
est in the tract cause.
"June 2. It gives me great joy that we have
been able to appropriate $5,000 for foreign and pagan
lands. I am now writing duplicate letters to all the
principal foreign missionary stations supported from
this country, and I hope God will open the way for
yet more liberal appropriations in time to come.
"July 7. I have had much satisfaction in being
elected a member of a ministers' meeting, a delightful,
harmonious, confidential circle, who love the Lord Je
sus. We meet weekly at each other's houses, and pray
and converse in order on important topics. I have
gready needed ,such brotherly intercourse ever since I
have been in the city. My labors so utterly engross
time and thought, that I need such Christian fellowship
on subjects connected with the general prosperity of
the Redeemer's kingdom."

54 DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
For forty-eight years Dr. Hallock attended this'
gathering of " Christian Brethren," always anticipating
with pleasure the recurrence of the Saturday evening
hour, and receiving therefrom much stimulus and cheer
in his Christian life. He and Rev. Dr. Cox were for
many years the oldest members of " Chi Alpha," and
they left it for their home above on the same day.
"July 4, 1833. For some weeks past we have been
quite a missionary family. Brother and sister Hutch-
ings, soon to sail for Ceylon, and sister Harriet with
Rev. Mr. Perry, her expected husband, destined for
the same mission, have met under our roof. We held
frequent prayer-meetings and were full of business.
The interviews were very cheering and delightful.
"July 24. Brother and sister Hutchings left us for
Boston to take ship for Ceylon. They were truly
happy in thus consecrating themselves. Elizabeth
showed unswerving attachment to the great mission
ary cause, and trust in God. We feel thankful to be
thus identified with the work of foreign missions. May
God give us more and more a true missionary spirit.
"June 12, 1834. This is a day of great interest in .
tract work. The facts in our 9th Report are of over
whelming interest. God speaks to us to go forward,
and the churches echo, Go forward. God help us to
do it. I never felt such courage to labor; never that
grace and glory to the church were so near at hand.
To recount God's blessings would be endless. I might
mention :
" 1. The wide opening fields for tract labor, espe-

FRUITFUL ACTIVITIES. ,55
cially in pagan lands — the manifest voice of God calling
on us to enter them, and his blessing descending. Also
the interest awakened for supplying the South and
other portions of our own country with our precious
volumes, as the ' Saint's Rest,' etc., a work which we
have stewly approached, but to which I could not but
attach great importance even before I had completed
my Theological course of study.
" 2. The cooperation of Brothers Eastman and
Woodbridge in presenting the cause to the churches,
and the interest everywhere awaking in this work.
" 3. My own health and vigor, which render labor
pleasant, and enable me, I hope, to make each hour's
effort more successful than ever before.
"June 23. Last night we closed the eyes of
our dear little William A. Hallock, Jr., in death. Pre
cious babes, sweet and lovely as you were to us, and
sore as is our loss, we would not call you back. The
Lord's will be done !
" On arriving in the city from a short journey, I
was called to our dear brother Harlan Page, whose
recovery from an illness that began in May was now
hopeless. He had given up all wish to remain, was
enabled to triumph in view of approaching- death, and
breathed out his soul to God on the morning of Sep
tember 23, 1834. It having been judged best that his
body should be interred in Coventry, Conn., his native
place, I accompanied it, where it was committed to the
ground amid a large concourse of sympathizing rela
tives and friends.

56 DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
" At the request of the widow, I prepared a funeral
discourse, and on Monday evening, after my return,
preached it, in connection with an address from Rev.
Wm. Patton, in his church on Broome street, where
Mr. Page for some years had superintended a large
Sabbath-school. *
" I was immediately requested to preach the same
sermon on Sabbath evening at Rev. Dr. Spring's
church. The following Sabbath I delivered it to a
crowded house at Rev. Mr. Downer's church, and also
to the Brainerd church. On succeeding Sabbaths, I
repeated it in nine other churches in this city. On
most of those occasions I was requested by clergymen
and others to prepare a sketch of his life for the press ;
and this, by the divine blessing, I hope to do, believing
that it will exert a most salutary influence in inducing
Christians to labor for the salvation of individuals, to
whom, in the providence of God, they have access. I
can truly say that during nine years in which we
were associated in labors, I do not know that I ever-
passed an interview with him long enough to have
any interchange of thought and feeling, in which I
did not receive from him an impulse heavenward —
an impulse onward in duty to God and the souls of
men. "November. Oliver R. Kingsbury, a nephew of
Harlan Page, has been induced to assume the labors
of Assistant Treasurer as well as Assistant Secretary of
the Tract Society. The editorial and foreign depart
ments, and the duties of the general agency, not other-

FRUITFUL ACTIVITIES. 57
wise designated, are assigned to me. Raising of funds,
etc., to Brother Eastman. I am now devoting myself
almost entirely to bringing up the arrears of the Pub
lishing Department in hope of accomplishing much for
Christ. " December 7. I have just resumed a Bible class
for men, nineteen having joined, and have transferred
the superintendence of tract visitation in the 9th ward
to a faithful brother within its bounds, still retaining the
superintendence of the 14th ward.
"May 3, 1835. I have completed the 'Life of Har
lan Page,' and desire to commit it to God. It cost me
much labor.
" June 1. Our anniversary seasons have been emi
nently spiritual. The two foreign missionaries, Rev.
Mr. Abeel from China and Mr. Sutton from Orissa,
where the temple of Juggernaut is located, have done
much to kindle a new missionary spirit.
" October. It is ground of special gratitude to God
that the 'Memoir of Harlan Page' is gaining a large
circulation, the first edition of 2,000 being sold in nine
or ten weeks, besides an edition published by Leavitt,
Lord & Co. It is also being reprinted in London.
" December 28. My dear mother : Brother Leavitt
has just told us of your sickness, and we bless God that
you are prepared for sudden illness or for death. It
is all of grace, rich and glorious grace. We all hoped
to see you yet, many times more in health, and now
rejoice in the hope of meeting you in heaven.
"Never did a mother do more for her children,
Dr. Hillock. 8

58 DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
and I believe God has heard your prayers and blessed
your efforts -for us. Ten thousand times do I, your
first-born, and we all, thank you for all you have done
for us in infancy, childhood, youth, and all the way to
the present hour. I bless God that whether living or
dying, you are his, prepared for all his will, and that
all he does with you will be in mercy. We shall cher
ish your memory while our lives last, and I hope thou
sands saved by your efforts and those of your husband
and children will bless God for ever that you have
lived. The Lord prepare our dear father and all the
family for all his will concerning you."
"Jan. 7, 1836. My venerated mother, Margaret
Allen Hallock had a shock of paralysis, Dec. 16, after
which she was unable to speak, but retained her reason,
knew her friends, manifested great calmness and resig
nation in view of death, and on Tuesday, Dec. 27, left
this world, aged 75. All that this mother did for me,
her first-born, is more than can be recounted. Her toil
for the temporal welfare of her household was unceas
ing, and words of Christian love and counsel distilled
continually from her lips. From my earliest recollec
tion, I knew when she retired, morning and evening, to
her consecrated room for prayer. Her steadfast confi
dence in God, and hope in death, are vividly impressed
on my mind, as are the numerous hymns she taught me
and the tunes in which she sweetly sang them, espe
cially when we all joined her in family worship. Once
when I was alone ploughing in the field, thoughts of
eternity and my sinfulness made my tears flow. When I

FRUITFUL ACTIVITIES. 59
went in at noon, ' William,' she said, ' I have had very
uncommon feelings about you this morning. I realized
that you were in the presence of God, that he was
watching over you, and that I could commit you to
him. I hope he has mercy in store for you, and that
I shall see you a joyful believer in Christ ?'
"My dear mother combined great industry, econ
omy, and real, kindness. She sympathized with the
suffering Greeks, Poles, and those in pagan darkness,
almost as if their temporal miseries and eternal sorrows
were before her eyes ; always was she striving in some
way to contribute to their relief. Her children and
friends rise up and call her blessed ; her husband also
and he praiseth her. An appropriate sermon was
preached by Rev. Mr. Jennings."
Mr. Hallock's journal brings us to. the development
of the Tract Society as a great national agency, not
only for publishing religious works, but also for finding
readers for them. Throughout the country, especially
in the cities and larger towns, there was begun and
carried on with more or less efficiency, for many years,
a work of monthly tract distribution from house to
house, "resting," said the Committee in 1829, "on the
grand principle recognized on every page of the New
Testament and enforced by the whole history of Christ
and his disciples, that the gospel is a message, which
it is the duty of the followers of Christ to carry and
deliver to all who have it not."
In New York, under the eye and with the heart

60 DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
of the Society in its warmest impulses, it was carried
out with great thoroughness. The city was divided
into districts, mapped carefully out with the number of
families living in them ascertained and recorded. Each
district was put under a superintendent, who, with his
assistants, was to visit each family once a month, carry
ing the same tract to each — " The Institution and Ob
servance of the Sabbath," for March ; " Kittredge's Ad
dress on Intemperance," for April ; " The Dairyman's
Daughter," for May, as once the record runs.
"At a meeting of his co-workers in the 14th ward,
Harlan Page," we quote from his Life, " laid the sub
ject of direct, faithful, personal, persevering effort and
wrestling prayer for particular persons solemnly and
earnestly before them, depicting the spiritual wants of
the ward, and the condition of hundreds of families
who absented themselves from the stated means of
grace, and who, unless by their efforts, would never
probably have the offer of salvation pressed upon their
attention. He then inquired of each distributor whether
there were not in his district some one or more for
whom he felt special encouragement to labor. It was
made a subject for prayer and heart-searchings with
each distributor, till one fixed his mind on one person,
another on two, and another on three or more; and
by the thirty-six distributors eighty-eight persons were
thus selected as special subjects of their prayers and
endeavors. This gave them, as will be readily con
ceived, a new impulse in their work. They saw a dis
tinct object before them, important as eternity. They

FRUITFUL ACTIVITIES. 61
went to the throne of mercy. They went to the sub
jects of their affectionate solicitude, and their mouths
were filled with arguments. Access was easy. The
Spirit of God seemed to go before them and to go with
them." Personal work animated with such a spirit could
not fail of being effective. A digest of its principles we
find printed on a sheet for the visitors' report :
" Begin your work in your closet. Feel the value
of the immortal souls whom Providence has placed
within the district assigned to you, and pray God to
bless your efforts for their spiritual good.
" Read every tract before giving it, that you may
know its value and be able to speak intelligently of it.
" Try as far as possible to ascertain the spiritual
needs of every family in your district, and omit no
opportunity of personal religious conversation, or of
aiding the Bible cause and Sabbath-schools, or of per
suading them to attend on the public worship of God."
The monthly meetings of the distributors we may
well believe to have been " memorable occasions," with
such men as Arthur Tappan, A. R. Wetmore, Moses
Allen, Mr. Hallock, or Harlan Page in charge of them.
" We are glad this work," said Mr. Frelinghuysen,
" has not been added to the long list of laborious ser
vices which we put upon the Christian ministry, but
that it is" voluntary lay work, which must elevate the
standard of piety, and illustrate the fidelity of Christian
character." " Another result conspicuously gratifying," says one

62 DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
from a distant city, "is that every church feels the
influence of the work in causing people to flock to
them for instruction. The language of the tract is not
'Go to this or to that place of worship,' but simply 'Go
to the house of God and to the Bible, and see if these
things are not so.' " ¦
A method of church extension as apostolic and as
catholic as could well be devised.
Death and a biographer might have brought to light
others, who, like Harlan Page, illustrated the fervent
zeal with which this personal, steadfast, concerted work
was then carried on. It required wisdom and tender
ness, as well as courage and self-denial; and these a
great spiritual urgency often inspires.
The wide spread religious awakening which took
place at this period, notably in the City of New York,
was due, no doubt, in part to the amount of religious
truth thus pressed upon the attention of men, when
religious reading from other sources was yet scant
and cumbrous. It was long before the day of Illus
trated Christian Weeklies ; religious newspapers of any
kind were few, and the daily papers had not admitted
Sunday sermons and revival news.
The value of tract work at that time, in reaffirming
the central truths of Christianity in short and pointed
papers to a great and rapidly-growing country, can
hardly be over-estimated. And readers there were
many, as we may infer from the circulation of Mr. Hal-
lock's " Life of Harlan Page," which reached more than
112,000 copies. It was also translated into Swedish
and German.

FRUITFUL ACTIVITIES. 63
Of his tract, " The Mountain Miller," 260,000 were
issued : this was also reprinted in London and Liver
pool, and translated into French, German, and Tamil.
Another popular tract from his pen, " The Only Son "
(Rev. Dr. Jonas King), reached a circulation of 370,000;
and still another, " The Mother's Last Prayer," has
been more widely read than either.
Dr. Hallock's other works were a Life of Dr. Justin
Edwards; one of his father, Rev* Moses Hallock;
sketches of Dr. J. O. Brigham, of Arthur Tappan, and
of the Mayhews of Martha's Vineyard.

64 DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
CHAPTER VII.
ENLARGED LABORS— CLOSE OF THE JOURNAL.
" Sept. 13, 1836. The work of supplying our coun
try with standard evangelical volumes has formed an
era in the operations of the American Tract Society.
The 'Saint's Rest,' 'Baxter's Call,' and the solemn ap
peals of Doddridge, Bunyan, Flavel, and Alleine have
been so much blessed for the salvation of men and the
quickening of Christians in various parts of the land,
that there is a great call for them, without the means of
meeting it. If Christians rest, the adversary does not.
Of the 8,000 books now on the trade-list of the country,
more than one-half are novels or works of injurious
tendency. If the friends of God and man do not bestir
themselves to furnish what is useful and salutary, others,
for gain, will cherish every depraved appetite. It is the
wish of the Society to provide aliment for the soul, and
thus help to supplant poisonous literature. Fourteen
volumes are already published as an evangelical library,
and a number of others are in progress. Nothing but
means is wanting for the Society to furnish families,
churches, and associations throughout the country with
a standard Christian library of fifty or one hundred vol
umes on all the great subjects pertaining to man's high
est temporal and eternal good.
" At a meeting of the Committee, held September
30, 1836, the list of subscriptions for $50,000 to increase

CLOSE OF THE JOURNAL 65
the number of volumes in the Society's Depository was
presented, from which it appeared that the whole sum
which we needed and asked for is raised. The Com
mittee then devoted a little time to grateful acknowl
edgments to God, and prayer for his continual guid
ance and blessing.
" The above noble effort was begun in March, and
finished September 30. For the last five weeks I was
almost wholly devoted to it. My heart was warmed
and cheered continually by the Christian liberality and
love shown by God's people for this great work."
"October 23. I spent last Sabbath, my dear and
honored father, with Brother Arms, in New Jersey, and
preached for him. He feels greatly indebted to you for
his clerical instruction, and loves you very much.
" We shall always be very thankful for your kind
ness to our little daughter Harriet— letting her come
out early to your kitchen fire, playing with her, and
praying for her — and for all you have done for her and
her mother during their visit. The Lord reward you,
dear father, and prepare you and us all for his holy
will. "Jan. 1, 1837. Very many blessings during 1836
have we to recount. Our precious little daughter, who
was feeble, is now full of life and vigor, laying, by her
attractions, perhaps too strong a hold upon our be
reaved hearts. Sister Charlotte Lathrop, who seemed
on the borders of death, has been raised up to comfort
able health, and sailed in November for the mission to
Southern India. Thus Mother Lathrop has had the

66 DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK,
privilege of consecrating her fourth daughter to mis
sions in India.
"January 9. This day the Lord has given us
another daughter. A few months since, it seemed that
we should soon be again childless, and now we are the
parents of two children among the living. To Thee,
blessed Redeemer, do we consecrate both them and
ourselves for life or death. Our choice perhaps would
have been a son, to take the place of our litde William,
but we are glad God has chosen for us. He can raise
up ministers and missionaries without us, and if my
name in my branch of the family is to be extinct, so
let it be. We lift up our Ebenezer, and say, ' Hitherto
hath the Lord helped us. To him be the praise.'
"July 17. My venerable father, at the age of
seventy-seven, sleeps in Jesus. Tidings first arrived
that he was ill, and immediately after, that he had de
parted. How should I rejoice again to see him, and
converse with him on a multitude of topics. Above all,
to thank him for all his kindness, fidelity, and wise
counsels, and render him that respect and filial love
which perhaps never a father more justly claimed.
" November 30. More and more deeply am I im
pressed with the heavy loss we all have sustained. Such
men as my father, and his brother Jeremiah, with their
father, I believe are rarely found — men of such integrity
and honesty of character, such true humility, meekness,
and trust in God. Few sons, I am persuaded, have
found a father's heart always so warm and tender, and
yet so firm, warning and admonishing with a frankness

CLOSE OF THE JOURNAL. 67
that I feel must give him joy in heaven. Every year
when I have visited him of late, I have confessed to him
my short-comings, and thanked him for all he had
done for his children. He has felt that in the conduct
of his children he had nothing to forgive, and that he
must ask God to pardon his own unfaithfulness. Bless
ed man of God, Farewell.
" April 1, 1838. This day, the Sabbath, has been
one of thanksgiving to God, especially that three heads
of families found by Mrs. Hallock and me amid the
highways of sin, have publicly professed Christ, and sat
down with us at his table.
" On the second week in January, when there was
preaching in the church every evening, notices of it
were printed, and we visited several streets, entering
every dwelling, inviting people to attend.
"I have alluded to these cheering details because
these feeble efforts seem to have constituted an era in
my life. I never before have so taken individuals on
my heart, and persevered in efforts for their salvation,
in every way identifying my interests with theirs from
week to week; nor have I done anything which has
been to me such a source of spiritual joy and spiritual
growth. I verily believe that this one principle of
action, faithfully carried out by the whole church of
God, would speedily lead to the conversion of the land
and world.
" I think 1838 will be remembered with 1831 as a
year of revivals. The one thousand laborers in the
Tract Visitation in this city are putting forth a powerful

68 DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
agency : seventy-seven individuals found by them wan->
dering in sin were reported last month as giving evi
dence of piety. Many Christians are very useful, and
find their highest joy in seeking out and laboring for
such individuals. Mrs. Hallock and I have done more
in this way than ever before, and are learning the blessr
edness of the service. In watering others we have been
richly blessed.
" November. Mr. Cook came to New York to buy
books. Arriving at the setting in of a severe snow.
storm, he stayed with me two days, and we devoted
ourselves to a full and most interesting discussion upon
the character and influence of the Society, combining
personal efforts with tract visitation and volume circula
tion in all their bearings in our own and foreign lands.
A fire was kindled in our hearts which will expand and
glow as eternity rolls on.
"June, 1839. Our Fourteenth Annual Report, just
going to press, shows that the foreign correspondence
has been large, and that a deep interest has been awa
kened, far and wide, in foreign and pagan lands.
" Rev. R. S. Cook was elected additional Secretary
at our last anniversary : I to devote myself to the Pub
lishing and Foreign Departments; Messrs. Eastman
and Cook dividing between them the raising of funds
and the awakening of the churches. Mr. Cook's talents,
energy, and zeal are happily adapted to meet the wants
of the Society, and may his faith and love be abundant
ly owned and blest by God.
" October. I am now preparing our book of So-

CLOSE OF THE JOURNAL. 69
cial Hymns, and also ' Flavel's Fountain of Life,' on
the very topic, ' Christ Crucified,' which I feel the deep
est interest in inculcating. It has given me more full
and rich views of Christ, and rendered all said of him
in Scripture very precious. Other volumes claim atten
tion ; new tracts are called for ; the Children's depart
ment of our publications greatly needs months of labor ;
and the Foreign department claims much correspond
ence. Many calls at the Tract House devour time,
and I feel like hanging as a littie child on God for
wisdom. "Our fifteenth Annual Report (1840) shows that
God is still opening before us wide fields of usefulness
at home and abroad, demanding great gratitude and
redoubled energy for the future.
" The presence in our family of Miss F. M. Caulr
kins, who is revising the Society's books for the young,
and of my brother Secretary, R. S. Cook, has been
cheering and stimulating, especially in family worship.
"Jan. 3, 1 841. At the coming in of the New year
I have written, as usual, to Plainfield friends, but am
reminded that I have neither father nor mother. What
choice friends are a godly father and mother ! What a
motive to be useful, that I might gladden their hearts.
I was indeed a part of themselves ; this they felt beyond
what I knew.
"Thanks that our Committee love the truth, and
apparently love it equally, though they are called by
different names. We are all agreed that our one work
is to diffuse the great evangelical and saving doctrines

70 DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
of the cross. On this point I see more and more clearly
the wisdom of the catholic structure of this Society.
"June 4, 1848. Our eldest daughter, Harriet, has
this day united with the church. For more than a year
she has had hope in Christ.
"June 2, 1850. On this my fifty-sixth birthday, my
youngest daughter, Frances, has joined her parents and
sister at the table of the Lord. Great occasion have we
to thank the Lord that he has thus inclined the hearts
of both our children to his service. I believe it is to be
attributed much to the influence of their mother and our
religious relatives and friends. At Plainfield, three years
ago, they found a decided religious influence, three of
their cousins having professed Christ. The children's
prayer-meeting there, the youths' prayer-meeting here,
with all the influences of the Sabbath-school, seem to
have been effective means of their spiritual good. Our
pleasant family worship has also doubdess had its influ
ence. "May 18, 1851. On the 15th instant our venerable
mother Lathrop, whose home has been with us in New
York for sixteen years, peacefully slept in Jesus, at the
age of seventy-nine. Few women have been more
honored or blessed : eight children all pious, and four
of her five daughters missionaries in Ceylon. We
praised God for what he has done for us through her,
and for what we had been enabled to do for her. In all
the years when she has been most of the time with us,
I recollect no expression to her or from her that I could
regret, or that gave pain to any one."

CLOSE OF THE JOURNAL. 71
The close of his Journal closes the door to the inner
life of Dr. Hallock, through which we have caught
bright glimpses of his reverent filial love, his tender do
mestic affections, his unsparing diligence, and his devout
trust in God.
His children grew up with no memory of harshness
or injustice. His uniform and judicious kindness ear
ly led them to revere their parents and to respect
themselves. Their endearments rested his weary mind,
and he often showed a touching gratitude for their sim
ple expressions of love and care for him. The family
nurture was preeminendy a Christian nurture.
" The influence of my father's conversations with his
friends and fellow-helpers, who used to. visit us — while
we, seated by his side or perhaps on his knee, were si
lently listening — was a beautiful education," said one of
his daughters. " His cheerfulness, his enthusiasm, his
keen appreciation of what pleased him, his supreme
loyalty to his great work, impressed us with a noble
ideal of Christian character. We loved what he loved,
and the interest which we took in the things which so
heartily interested him was a constant source of pleasure
to us. I could indeed hardly wish for anything better
for my own children than the unconscious influence in
the formation of character of such visitors as used to
frequent my father's house when we were children."
And there are still those who remember the cordial
hospitalities of the small and pleasant house in Greene
street, where Dr. Hallock spent the busiest and happi
est period of his life. When no longer a desirable lo-

72 DR. WILLIAM. A. HALLOCK.
cality, and it passed into the hands of strangers, "could
its walls echo the words of prayer and praise which have
ascended thence, nothing impure or unclean could dwell
there," said one; "nay, rather, people would be wooed
and won into the kingdom of heaven."
" My idea of an earthly paradise," writes a daughter
of Mr. Gerard Hallock, "was the homes of the two
brothers (Gerard and William) side by side in Greene
street, with the garden-gate always open, over which
hung the most luscious grapes. Through this gate I
often made uncle an early morning call, as I heard him
sawing wood. When he heard my step, he would stop
his work, and looking up with a cheery smile, say, ' I
do this for exercise ; it makes a man robust and ready
for a good breakfast.'
" He was scrupulously neat, and no trace of dusty
work was ever seen when he appeared at table with his
bright 'good-morning.' His house was made appar
ently of brick, but it must have been rubber, such
numbers were welcomed there and entertained at his
hospitable board — D. D.'s, colporteurs, etc., any and all
who were interested in missionary or philanthropic ef
fort. Here he presided with marked generosity and
thoughtfulness, ever kindly considerate of the wants of
wife and children, while attentive to the entertainment
of his guests.
" The hour of family prayer was delightful. After
reading the Scriptures, making his clear and interest
ing comments, he with the daughters would sing some
familiar hymn, each taking a different part. Singing

CLOSE OF THE JOURNAL. 73
was an act of devout worship; he always raised his
eyes heavenward, and an expression of glorified peace
seemed to illuminate his features. Then, before kneel
ing in prayer, he would frequendy say, ' Sweet music !
beautiful !' Often he said to me, ' What a good wife I
have, and daughters too !' " His love for children was
remarkable, and he was, in his leisure moments, ever
ready to show an interest in their childish sports. •
A co-worker writes : " I was five years at the Tract
House, and saw Mr. Hallock daily, often several times
a day, in his room and my own ; and his unvarying
kindness, gendeness, and patience with me, I shall never
forget. We said Mr. Hallock in those days, and I well
remember how very modest he was when the other title
was conferred. I recollect a very pleasant Thanksgiv
ing dinner to which I was invited in Greene street, with
others, and a very charming evening visit, when Mr.
Cook was among the guests. Those were happy days.
I enjoyed my occupations, and feel an indebtedness to
Mr. Hallock that I cannot express."
A letter, dated 1844, from Mr. D. Fanshaw, the old
printer of the Tract and Bible Societies, has been pre
served, from which we quote the introduction of a new
chair into the busy home.
" Respected madam : I have sent you, as a New
Year's gift, a very comfortable chair, which you may
lend to your husband in the evenings. His more than
wire and whalebone frame is fast giving way under the
dreadful pressure of the whole tract work, which he
will carry, instead of apportioning it among others, and
Dr. Hallock. IO

74 DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
taking charge of the helm only, as wise managers do.
If one of his own children were to work for his benefit
and glory, beyond her strength, he would feel it his
duty to reprove her for it. When he gets home I think
he will be found to have been a great transgressor of
the command, ' Take no thought for the morrow.'
" I send the chair to you, not to Mr. H., for he is so
fearful of anything like a present, that I would not risk
distressing him for the value of many such, nor would I
in this way approach him, if I wanted anything from
him. No, no. I have no favors to ask; if I had, I
should much sooner pave the way for it by quarrelling
with him, for he would be sure to heap coals of fire on
my head if I did."
" I have no idea of ever wanting any favor from him
again; I have received so much already that I can
never cancel my obligations, and have no desire to do '
so, for to me gratitude is a delightful feeling. The time
is rapidly approaching when he will know how approv
ingly he was looked upon by the Ruler of events for
his noble attempts to protect an injured brother. Till
then may every blessing and comfort which a close
communion with his Maker can procure be his lot
and yours."
No man was ever more thoroughly at home in his
work; and his home during this period of its enlarging
activity and usefulness throbbed with the buoyant and
dauntless spirit which animated him.
The Tract Society was developing beyond his high
est expectations. He was alert to see and to seize every

CLOSE OF THE JOURNAL. 75
suggestion and opportunity for increasing its influence.
Its catholic basis brought a wide constituency, which
he was conscientiously careful to preserve. In revising
old books, or in providing new ones, he spared no pains
to make them true to the compact upon which it was
founded. Divine truth accepted by all the great Chris
tian bodies left no occasion for faultfinding on the part
of any ; and if eliminations of differing views were some
times complained of, the verdict of the Christian public
still acquiesced in them.

76 DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.

CHAPTER VIII.
COLPORTAGE, AND CONFLICT.
The advent of Rev. R. S. Cook into the official
circle of the Tract Society gave new breadth and spring
to its influence.
While pastor at Lanesboro, Berkshire county, Mass.,
during a temporary loss of voice, he tried the experi
ment of substituting the printed page for the living
preacher. This work in New York had attracted his
attention and heartily interested him. Its development
and success suggested a similar work in his own parish,
which soon extended beyond his parish and town to the
entire county. Again and again had he sent for the
Society's books, and of the result of his efforts in circu
lating them he thus speaks : " I believe that the Lord
has employed this instrumentality in effecting more
good, present and ultimate, than all my labors as a pas
tor could have accomplished. It is not too much to
say that most of the precious revivals enjoyed in that
county during the last winter were greatly promoted
by this enterprise. I have heard of many conversions
by this means, and know of some directly resulting from
books which I had given.
" Nearly seven thousand volumes have been circu-
. lated, including more than one hundred libraries."

COLPORTAGE, AND CONFLICT. 77
And what was true of this locality was true of many
others. " In my ministry," adds a New Jersey pastor, " I
have endeavored never to lose sight of this means of
influence. I have made it an object, as far as possible,
to have every family supplied with plenty of religious
reading. In but a few years I have distributed more
than fifteen hundred volumes."
" On several accounts," adds another, " I consider
the volume circulation as among the most valuable of
all the brotherhood of benevolent objects."
Mr. Cook, with characteristic energy, presented this
phase of the Society's work — furnishing sound and well-
selected religious reading for school, family, and parish
libraries — in Hartford, Providence, Boston, and other
large towns, awakening an interest respondent to his
own. In the annals of that day, we read of " six hun
dred volumes circulated in Dr. Codman's parish, Dor
chester;" "1,200 in Rev. Mr. Steam's congregation,
Canibridgeport; 1,800 in Charlestown ;" "6,175 in Prov
idence;" "in Factory Village, 1,665;" "Newport, 300."
There were multitudes, however, in this rapidly-
growing country, outside and far beyond any means of
moral or religious improvement whatever. If the "vol
ume circulation" was important in New England and
in New York, and needed pastors and friends to pro
mote it, how much more needy were the spiritual
wastes elsewhere ! These, from the first, the Society
took into account, and how to reach them was but a
question of ways and means.

78 DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
History repeated itself. When Calvin and Farel
quitted France, and many of their comrades perished
in the flames, other means were found to nourish the
faith and increase the number of believers. In Basle,
a free city on the other side of the Rhone, they set up
a printing press whose sheets were dispersed far and
wide. The intrepid and indefatigable Farel hid them
in the packs of pious pedlers, and eastern France had
the living word. Whittier's little poem the " Vaudois
Teacher " aptly describes the spirit and the methods of
this simple itineracy.
The men were called colporteurs, a French term for
pious book-bearers, implying personal effort for the spir
itual good of those who traded in their wares. Knox
in Scotland, Howell Harris in Wales, English Non-
Conformists, Moravians and Wesleyans in the same way
carried religious truth to ignorant neighborhoods and
isolated homes, creating intelligent Christian communi
ties out of much raw and unpromising material.
The Tract Society resolved upon using such an
agency. Unfolding its plan before a meeting at Boston,
a gentleman promptly offered $150 a year for the sup
port of one colporteur, the offer to hold good for life.
Twp young men from Maine and New Hampshire
offered their services and were soon commissioned to
go, one to Kentucky, the other to Illinois.
The next year twenty-seven were sent, and in the
fall of that year — 1842 — a special meeting was called at
the Broadway Tabernacle, New York, to lay before the
Christian public the enlarging fields of usefulness open

COLPORTAGE, AND CONFLICT. 79
to the Society both at home and abroad, needing only
a systematic cooperation of the churches to enter upon
and occupy them.
The meeting lasted two days. Stirring papers on
colportage were presented by Mr. Cook. Mr. Hallock
urged the claims of its work in foreign lands, where
seventeen hundred of its publications in more than a
hundred tongues were already circulated at different
missions, while evangelistic labors in Russia, Finland,
Sweden, Prussia and France had been greatly strength
ened by its grants.
For all this, $40,000 for the Home field, and $40,000
for the Foreign field were imperatively and immediately
needed. " And will Christ's redeemed people excuse them
selves ?" asked Mr. Hallock, at the close of one of his
papers. " Thou, blessed Lamb ! who didst Thyself come
down to die, hast commanded us to bear the cross and
follow Thee, 'always abounding' in thy work. Shall
we render no voluntary service to spread the knowl
edge of thy blessed name and save the souls of men ?"
Pastors and laymen, who took part in the delibera
tions of this meeting, endorsed in the strongest terms
the objects laid before them, and commended the Soci
ety anew to the hearty and generous support of the
Christian public. This did much to draw attention and
increase both interest and confidence in the great or
ganization which offered itself as a custodian for the
larger charities of the church.
As for colportage, henceforda its growth was steady

So DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
and rapid. By its fifth year, one hundred and seventy-
five men were in commission. And since a thorough
supervision was indispensable to the safe and successful
prosecution of the work, Rev. Seely Wood, a Western
man, was appointed superintendent of its Western
branch, and Rev. Mr. Vail of the Southern.
" The peculiar field for colportage," says Mr. Hal
lock in. his Nineteenth Annual Report, " embraces the
absolute destitutions of the country existing in our great
cities ; on the numerous islands along our coast ; in the
lumber districts of the East; on the frontiers of the
North ; on the extended mountain ranges dividing the
East from the West; among the barren pines stretching
for a thousand miles to the Gulf; around the bayous
and savannas of the South ; in the forests and along
the borders of the ocean prairies and lakes of the West ;
among the millions of Romanists and the 2,500,000
Germans and other foreign emigrants."
Truly a broad field. We read of a " Bethel boat ;"
log-cabin prayer-meetings; embryo Sunday-schools;
Pilgrim's Progress in emigrant wagons; Saint's Rest
among the pineries ; Sabbath Manuals and Temperance
Documents on the Mobile Lighters and in frontier
"Dug-outs," and many a library in more stationary
quarters. These colporteurs were sappers and miners of* the
great Christian army, making a way for the permanent
occupation of gospel institutions.
While most of them were plain men, German and
French as well as English, some were students from

COLPORTAGE, AND CONFLICT. 81
our colleges and seminaries, spending their vacations in
Christian work for the small pecuniary help it might
afford them, while gaining what was more and better, a
practical and efficient training for the ministry.
Dr. Mark Hopkins felt the value of this. Dr. Net-
tleton, he used to say, once having been at a loss to
know what to preach upon, gave as a reason that there
was in that place " no state of things ;" there being a
vast difference between preaching to people with a
certain end in view, and preaching on a subject or any
subject at large. Theological students from the pha
lanx of colporteurs understood people when they reached
parishes to preach to.
The American Messenger, lineal descendant of
the American Tract Magazine, a popular monthly sheet,
having reached a circulation of 200,000 copies, kept its
readers posted in colporteur work, thus keeping alive
their zeal in supporting it. An edition in German was
called for and issued for the large German population
coming to our shores. The Christian Almanac, was
enlarged, and adorned by the best quality of wood-cuts.
In 1852, an illustrated paper for the young was
projected, called The Child's Paper, in paper and
execution much superior to any child's paper then in
existence. It gained swift recognition and a wide circu
lation—in 1869, before it had a host of followers, 355,000
copies. Though for many years under the literary
editorship of Mrs. H. C. Knight of Portsmouth, N. H.,
its articles passed under the eye of Dr. Hallock. He
was editor of every work issued by the Society. Emen-
Dr. Hallock. II

82 DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
dations of old works were made according to his judg
ment, and new manuscripts were submitted to his care
ful reading and revision. In his correspondence with
authors, not always an easy or cheerful task, he was
frank, prompt, and courteous ; even if their own self-
appreciation did not always coincide with his views,
they felt he was considerate and conscientious in form
ing them.
Every book and paper issued were also read and
approved by the Publishing Committee, consisting of
six clergymen, no two of whom were from the same
denomination, and nothing was published which any
member could find fault with or object to. For forty-
five years, Dr. Hallock attended every meeting of this
committee held monthly at the Tract House, when the
fullest expression of opinions was sought and given.
The catholic basis of the Society was scrupulously
adhered to and rigidly guarded. In spite of grave fears
in the beginning, its catholicity had wrought marvel
lously well, binding together in one compact and effec
tive body earnest men from all branches of the
church* and all parts of the country, willing to hold in
abeyance minor differences of religious opinion "in
order to diffuse," according to the terms of agreement,
" a knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ as the Redeemer
of sinners, and to promote the interests of vital godli
ness and sound morality by the circulation of books
calculated to receive the approbation of all evangelical
Christians." The union seemed a marked success. Crowded audi-

COLPORTAGE, AND CONFLICT. 83
ences met at its May anniversaries to listen to the fervid
recitals of its frontier agents, or the grateful testimony
of a foreign missionary to its helpful beneficence in far-
off lands, or the best utterances of our ablest men
eloquently advocating its wise and educating ministry,
Meetings in Western and Southern cities were also held
from time to time by its agents and friends, to root the
Society's claims in the intelligent sympathy and co
operation of growing Christian communities.
Dr. Hallock not only conducted the correspondence
of the Publishing Department, but the large foreign
correspondence with mission fields in nearly every
part of the world fell to his charge.
"Its magnitude would amaze one now, with our
sub-division of service," said a gentleman who knew
the burdens he bore, and bore with such a wholesome
heroism. These years of the Society's ever-widening useful
ness were years of faithful toil to the man whose force
of will and power of concentration chiefly controlled it.
He loved the work ; he believed and rejoiced in it.
"This tree of knowledge is a grand and goodly
tree," used to be a favorite expression of one of the
Society's oldest and stanchest friends — "a grand and
goodly tree, which bears twelve manner of fruits, yield
ing her fruit every month ; and the leaves of the tree
are for the healing of the nations."
Meanwhile, a little cloud no bigger than a man's
hand, but with ragged edges and portentous look, was
rising in the moral and political sky, and gusts from the

84 DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
"irrepressible conflict" filled the air with vague alarms.
Middle-aged men, inheriting from their fathers a still
vivid sense of the blood and cost by which our national
life was born at all, and our national government estab
lished to . preserve that life for coming generations,
shrank from a new strife. Slavery had been accepted
and was protected by the Constitution, and to disturb
the settled order of things seemed fraught with name
less peril. Not that slavery was right, or any the less a
strange anomaly among a free people, but it was here,
and had regulations which outsiders were bound to
respect. Nor was it until slavery took measures to
extend its area, that any wide agitation began. As soon
as the general government was called upon to act in refer
ence to it, the people of every state shared in the respon
sibility of that action, and the subject was fairly before
the tribunal of the people, no longer to be ignored or
disowned or silenced or put down. Not a house or
hamlet but had its mind made up, and every Christian
body was called upon to show its colors, the Ameri
can Tract Society, with its large constituency north
and south among the rest.
To satisfy both was plainly impossible, and to tem
porize is always a hard road to travel. It was charged
with mutilations and suppressions in its issues, some
of them made, it was asserted, in the interest of slavery.
A committee was appointed to examine the truth of
this charge, and nothing was found but those revisions,
abridgments and changes, which hymns as well as
books undergo to fit them for larger uses, without

COLPORTAGE, AND CONFLICT. 85
infringing the rights or betraying the sentiments of their
authors. Its silence upon a subject, widely regarded as of vital
importance, was considered a grave matter. Its officers
and counsellors held to the words of the compact, to
circulate only that which was " calculated to receive the
approbation of all evangelical Christians," while many
of its friends discerned, as they thought, that in the
interests of " sound morality " there had arisen one of
those tidal waves of righteousness which sweep away
our beaten tracks of sight and endeavor, however long
or successfully we may have pursued them.
Such times are the times which try men's souls.
The numerous papers produced by the heated discus
sions of that day, which now seems so far away and
long ago, with the embarrassments, alienations and
heartburnings following them, are a part of the great
tribulation through which our nation passed to a cleaner
and truer life. No one felt more keenly than Dr. Hal
lock the painfulness of the situation ; and when the war
finally broke all truces, no one welcomed more heartily
the hour that struck for freedom, and for ever put to
rest all controversy on a subject which had so long
embittered and endangered our national unity.

86 DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
CHAPTER IX.
THE END.
The year 1859 was marked by pleasant changes in
•the family circle.
Fanny, Dr. Hallock's youngest daughter, married
Mr. John E. Johnson, who came to reside for a time
beneath his roof. A few weeks later, his eldest left for a
home but a few streets away, the wife of Mr. Rufus Park.
As children were born in his household, the relation
of grandparent opened a new spring of delight. It
was sometimes droll to see the grave secretary at play
with a baby on his back, or cooing baby lingo to a
smiling little one on his knee ; or if sickness overtook
the cradle, to see his loving efforts to soothe the rest
lessness or hush the moanings of the little sufferer.
In the spring of 1867, death stepped over the thresh
old and took the patient and gentle wife. "This is
not dying," she said, " it is living." Every expression
of her feelings was in the tone of " I am going home."
The word dying was not spoken by her ; she seemed
not to think of it. The way was never in view, only
its glorious goal.
" Perhaps I ought not think about meeting friends
in heaven," she said to her sister, "but only the Lord
Jesus ; yet to-night I cannot help thinking of father and
mother, brother Charles, and Harriet, and Charlotte,

THE END. 87
and Joanna — yes, I know they will come with open
. arms to receive me."
Dr. Hallock's letter to Dr. and Mrs. Spaulding at
Oodooville, Ceylon, informing them of his loss, again
opens the window of this Christian home.
" New York, Sabbath Evening, March 17, 1867.
"Dear brother and sister Spaulding: Must I say
it ? — my dear wife has written you her last letter. Last
Sabbath evening at half-past eight she ' went home '
with peaceful unwavering trust, to the arms of her
Redeemer. The keynote of her life was love of mis
sions ; and perhaps to none, at home or abroad, was
she more attached than to both of you. Her almost
idolized elder sister, Mrs. Harriet L. Winslow, devoted
herself to the mission in Ceylon, amidst much opposi
tion from friends around her; and I believe you two
alone survive of the heroic ' Indus band ' — Messrs.
Winslow, Scudder, Poor, Spaulding, Woodward, and
their wives, who sailed in 1819, when Mrs. Winslow
wrote that she wished to send home the joyful news by
writing on the moon, 'A Revival at Sea.' You
watched over Mrs. Winslow at her death; you wel
comed Mrs. Hallock's three younger sisters, Charlotte,
Elizabeth, and Harriet Joanna, as missionaries in India ;
and the graves of three of her sisters are under your
eye at Oodooville, where you expect your bodies will
also rest till the resurrection.
" I too, before I knew anything of any of the above
named, felt a deep interest in the mission in Ceylon.
James Richards of Plainfield, in the Green mountains

88 DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
of Massachusetts, one of the five members of Williams
College who about 1 808, under the haystack, ' prayed into
existence American Foreign Missions,' as Dr. Griffin
said, was son of a deacon of my father's church, and
his noble wife Sarah Bardwell was from a neighboring
town. I saw them married and depart for their mission
in Ceylon, where their bodies also rest under your own
eye. •' Wonderfully did God guide my path. My life
work is in the Publishing and Foreign departments of
the Ameriean Tract Society; but two or three years
after we had organized it at New York in 1825, I
preached in Norwich city to organize an Auxiliary
Society and obtain funds ; when I was told that in Nor
wich town little would be done by gendemen, but if I
would call on some of the ladies, probably thirty or
forty dollars might be raised. The name of my dear
wife was then given me among others ; and for thirty-
seven and a half years she has been the light of my
dwelling, and the joy of my heart, ' my helper in Christ.'
" She was ever ready to join in efforts to sustain
feeble churches, maternal associations, female prayer-
meetings, and in everything whereby good could be
done and my usefulness increased, or my heart cheered
and strengthened for the work of God. Her good
mother, widowed soon after our marriage, was with us
sixteen years till her death ; the visits of her younger
sisters before leaving for India were sweet hallowed
seasons; our two surviving daughters early joined
themselves to God's people, and with their four littie

THE END. 89
ones, all with or near us, were a constant balm to her
spirit, till the hour of her departure. She was the de
voted mother of six children, the first two and the last
two of whom died in infancy. When her arms were
emptied and her heart desolated the second time, by
the death of a beautiful son one year old, bearing his
father's name, I marvelled to hear her calm but firm re
quest, knowing how happy she had been in dressing
him every morning : ' Well, I must wash and dress him
once more.' In training her surviving daughters, she,
like her mother before her, seemed ever to dread the
intrusion of any unhallowed thought. She shrunk from
the slightest approach to even the confines of vice.
' Avoid it, pass not by it, turn from it, and pass away.'
" Every day of my life I have been thankful to God
for giving me such a loving, genial, cheerful, buoyant
and to me fascinating companion; such a mother of
my children ; such a whole-souled, discreet, calm, judi
cious friend and counsellor in the toils and trials, the
sorrows and joys of my pilgrimage. With instinctive
wisdom and unswerving fidelity did she fulfil the obli
gations she saw to be devolving upon her in the varied
relations she was called to sustain.
"What can I do but thank my compassionate Sa
viour for the gift, and that he gave her to me so long.
'I shall go to her; but she will not return to me.' May
her prayers be answered in a gracious guidance and
support from on high till I join her in the songs above.
" Your affectionate brother and fellow-laborer,
"WILLIAM A. HALLOCK."
Dr. Hallock. 12

90 DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
Every associate both in private and public life bore
tribute to her Christian worth.
Dr. Hallock afterwards married Mrs. Mary A.
Lathrop of Brockport, N. Y., the author of seven in
teresting volumes for the young, published by the
Tract Society. She became the cheerful companion
and strong staff of his declining years.
Invitations to his " Golden wedding " on September
26, 1872, bewildered and surprised his friends.
Mr. Hallock used sometimes playfully to call the
Tract Society his first wife ; with this key the summons
plainly was to attend the anniversary of his first espousals,
which had taken place at Andover fifty years before —
a striking illustration of the hold which it had on his
¦strong and tenacious nature. The work had become
a part of his being, wrought into the very fibre of his
earthly life.
Among the guests of this festal occasion, Mr. East
man, Mr. Kingsbury, Moses Allen, Mr. Wetmore and
Rev. Mr. Hallidav of early days, were there, to recall
with tender and grateful feelings the personal consecra
tions and Christian fellowships, which had been so
richly blest for human good.
From the letters of those who could not be present
we quote these words by Dr. W. R. Williams of New
York: " Fifty years unbroken and successful service in the
work of one of our great religious societies is more
than falls to the lot of many of Christ's laborers. In a
world of change and death it were idle to wish that

THE END. 91
these should be supplemented by fifty more years. But
if this cannot be expected or desired, it is allowed us to
hope and pray that, for many times fifty years, the
influence exerted may continue, under God's blessing,
in the usefulness of the Society you have long and
warmly loved. 'Justin Edwards' and 'Harlan Page'
and the ' Mountain Miller,' and your own good uncle
and father, though no longer in the body among us, yet
by character and principles are still living and effective
among the laborers and witnesses of the American
Tract Society. Your own pen has aided to give to
these worthies their prolonged career and their widely-
expanded currency.
"And when the biographer shall have gone to join
in person the friends whom he has commemorated, it
will be the joy of your friends who yet tarry behind on
the earth to think of the great work of your earthly career
as still moving onward. The blessed Saviour give you
light in the evening of the earthly day, and crown the
grace of the long past with the eternal glory of the
heavenly future."
A city pastor writes as follows :
"I regret exceedingly that circumstances prevent
me from being present this evening to participate in the
fiftieth anniversary of your labors for the American
Tract Society. This is a most remarkable service both
as to length of time and abundant fruits, and furnishes
the occasion of congratulation and gratitude to God.
You have been a most faithful and devoted servant, as
thousands in the church below and above can testify,

92 DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
and great will be your reward. I preserve, as a valua
ble relic, a commission signed by your hand more than
thirty-five years ago, to labor as colporteur under the
auspices of the American Tract Society."
Mr. Glen Wood, superintendent of colportage at
Chicago, exclaims from his Western post :
" My impulse is to rush to the cars and make sure
to be at the fiftieth anniversary of our beloved father's
labors for the cause of God ; but the pressure of duties
holds me here irresistibly.
" I recall with profound interest the occasion, thirty
years ago, when a few friends were assembled in the
parlors . of a member of the Executive Committee to
congratulate yourself and other officers of the Society
upon the sending out of the first band of colporteurs,
of whom I had the honor to be one.
" How has that little band increased and multiplied,
until it is counted by hundreds, and its fruits shake like
Lebanon. I look over the vast prairies and forests of
the great Northwest, and I see now annually gathered
into the churches here as the immediate results of the
labors of colporteurs, more souls than the most san
guine expectations of my early manhood contemplated
as a satisfactory result of a long and successful life's
work. "What hath God wrought! And your eyes see
the glorious results, and your heart enjoys, even while
yet in the flesh, the dawn of the day when righteous
ness shall cover the earth even as the waters cover the
sea."

THE END. 93
A favorite nephew thus speaks of a journey made
with him at fourscore years or more :
" I recall with pleasure the trip that Uncle William
and I made to the eastern part of Long Island in search
of our ancestral footprints : the tender regard which he
ever felt for those ' dear old saints ' was something
beautiful. He did not know that he himself had more
than attained ' unto the days of the years of his fathers,'
and was the very embodiment of those ancestral virtues
which he reverently admired; but it was true, and I
studied them in him even more than in those crumbling
stones and yellow records. He had the zeal of youth,
and lived over again the early sacrifices of the godly
men in that lively way peculiar to him, never to be for
gotten. " Once as we walked, he was recounting the timidity
of his own early faith, the doubts that encompassed his
limited horizon. ' But now,' said he, as he turned and
looked off with beaming face from the hill we had al
most surmounted, ' there is not a doubt, not one. It is
bright, all bright as this summer sky; all is sure in
Christ !' No boy could have been more buoyant than
he when at eighty he climbed over those Litchfield
hills ; nature always made him young !"
Before this, Dr. Hallock had retired from active
duty, Rev. W. W. Rand, long his beloved associate
in literary labor, having succeeded him in the "Publishing
Department, while Dr. J. M. Stevenson assumed the
charge of the Foreign Field and Colportage, and
Rev. G. L. Shearer of the Financial Department. As

94 DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
Honorary Secretary, Dr. Hallock was still the revered
"father" of the large company of co-workers, who,
each in his lot and place, round out this great institu
tion. It was hard, at first, to let go his hold on the respon
sible trusts of the Tract House and see others fill his
place. Its vast interests had grown up under his vigi
lant eye and indomitable energy, and habits of toil
like his do not easily yield even to waning strength.
It cost him a struggle to stand aside; but when the
situation was fully accepted, a sweet and tender spirit
breathed its mellow richness through his soul, and life
peacefully ebbed away, till at last he fell asleep, Oct. 2,
1880, aged 86. "Blessed rest
Whose waking is supremely blest."
All his early associates were gone. Mr. East
man with a lifelong identity of official interests, had
died a few years before. After nearly twenty years of
faithful service, Mr. Cook, with failing health had with
drawn from the Society and spent his last years in an
other field of effort. Mr. Wilder, Dr. Milnor, the Tap-
pans, his brother Gerard, and, last in the long list, Dr.
William Adams, under whose ministry he had sat for
nearly thirty years, had passed into the unseen and
eternal. The sudden death of Dr. Adams, a few
weeks previously, deeply affected him, and though
he was swiftly following, he carried with him a sore
sense of bereavement to the end. A sincere friendship

THE END. 95
had existed between them with recollections dating
back to their early days at Andover, when Dr. Adams'
father was principal of Phillips Academy, often extend
ing his cordial hospitalities to the students of the Theo
logical Seminary on the hill. An official bond also had
united them. Dr. Adams having been for twenty-two
years a member of the Publishing Committee of the
Tract Society, they had discussed its issues together
through the most trying period of its history.
Each recognized and revered the excellences of the
other; the great preacher- felt grateful and helped by
the devout and appreciative spirit of the strong man
who sat humbly before him, while Dr. Hallock listened
with love and profit to the old Bible truths so familiar
to him through the robust .handling of Baxter and
Flavel, yet ever new under the felicitous expositions of
his beloved pastor and friend.
The forecasting and exactness which characterized
him as a business man shone conspicuously in his writ
ten wishes concerning his burial. His body rests in
New Haven, Conn., by the side of his wife and four
children, in the same plot with that of his brother
Gerard, with this simple inscription in his own words
on the marble above :
William Allen Hallock, D. D., forty-five years
Secretary of the American Tract Society. Born Plain-
field, Mass., June 2, 1794. Died Oct. 2, 1880.
His eldest daughter Harriet (Mrs. Park) from early
girlhood showed the ardent love for work which char
acterized her father. Every branch of service in her

96 DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
church as she grew up was gladdened and quickened
by her helpful presence. Her pastor used playfully to
call her the "Hur" who held up his hands. A long
career of active usefulness seemed open before her,
upon which she entered with joyful alacrity.
But this was not the divine plan for her. Scarcely
over the threshold of her married life, her feet were
set in a narrower and harder way. A disorder of the
heart slowly developed itself which confined her at
home. Under the sharp discipline of pain, for eighteen
years, she bore the rare fruit of true acquiescence in
the divine will. Fulfilling the duties of wife and mother
with loving exactness, her patience and self-forgetful-
ness filled the house with their sweetness, and helped
others bear for her and with her the heavy weight of
her sufferings. And while she felt herself shut out from
" doing good," it would have surprised her to find how
many precious lessons in the heavenly life were borne
from her sick-room, as by unseen messengers, into
wider circles and to unknown friends.
She was taken to see her father before his death,
and bade him a "good night," which was soon suc
ceeded by the "good morning" of a brighter and
longer day.
Three months of increased bodily distress followed, .
which made her long for the final relief. And when
it came, on the 15th of January, 1881, it was sweet
to go where the inhabitants shall no more say, " I am
sick."

THE END. 97
" The briefest portraiture of Dr. Hallock's character
must note three marked traits," said Dr. Stevenson at
the burial service, " singleness of purpose, force of will,
persistency in work.
"Of no name preserved in history, described in
biography, or embalmed in poetry — of no living states
man, civilian, or divine — can it be said with more truth
or firmer emphasis, ' This one thing I do,' than of him
in the work to which he gave himself — the preparation
and circulation of the essential truths of the gospel by
the press ; his object the glory of Christ, his purpose to
win souls, his instrumentality printed truth. To this
one thing he devoted all his energies, and from it never
swerved. No calls to other forms of Christian labor
pressed upon him in the earlier years of his public life,
no less laborious or more lucrative department in the
Master's vineyard had for him the least fascination or
turned his thoughts for a moment from his chosen task.
The claims of social life, the calls of civil society, the
sacred duties of home and family were all discharged
with scrupulous fidelity, but without forgetting for one
hour the single aim of his being. With the fixedness
of the needle to the [pole, with the certainty and the
inexorableness of the law of gravitation, his eye, his,
mind, his heart was ever upon this one thing.
" Other men of equal or greater endowments have
diffused their energies, and, to our vision, weakened
their influence, by giving attention to a great diversity
of plans in their work for Christ. It may be to the
Omniscient mind that this diffused energy is not lost
Dr. Hallock. I 3

98 DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
but conserved, and by him directed to his high purposes
in ways we cannot comprehend. But our sainted father
let no divided interest thwart his purpose or divert his
thought from the one aim of his being — the preparation
and circulation of saving truth by the press.
"To this concentrated purpose must be added a
second trait — a force of will rarely equalled, in our
observation never surpassed among cultured Christian
workers. A will meaning ever to be directed and gov
erned by the will of God.
" When fully convinced of the rightness of a given
course of action, and assured of its tendency to pro
mote the cause of Christ as committed to him, the
obstacles which would have appalled common minds
had no power to shake his purpose, or weaken his
resolve, ' This one thing / do. Others may judge for
themselves. Every man must give account of himself
to God, but as for me I cannot otherwise !' As Luther
was urged on to Worms, as Paul passed up to Jerusa
lem, so Dr. Hallock allowed no timid fears or hesitating
and dissuading friends to check his resolute execution
of what to him was clearly a duty.
" If this resoluteness of will sometimes seemed to
take too little account of the judgment and will of .oth
ers, it arose from no conscious imperiousness of pur
pose, but solely from the undoubting conviction that
what was clear to him must be right in the sight of
God, for, with this forceful will was still connected the
most childlike simplicity of character and the most
transparent sincerity and humility of heart.

THE END. 99
"And this leads to the third noteworthy trait in
the character of Dr. Hallock: a conscientious persis
tency in work — a persistency which no failures in plans
or accumulation of discouragements could affect.
" It must be that the man who shall mark out a
lifework for himself of so difficult a nature, and in a
path so little trodden as was his, when he chose it,
shall meet unexpected obstacles and at times be over
whelmed with responsibilities ; but with Dr. Hallock
these were brushed aside with the ease of an ancient
habit. Labor in his chosen vocation was the joy of his
being, and unceasing persistency the sum of his life.
With a physical system developed and matured in the
bracing air of New England farm -life, with a constitu
tion flexible and tough as tempered steel, an intellect
stalwart, acute, and trained to activity, unending labor
seemed no toil to him — This one thing I do. Of his
long and happy domestic life, his affectionate and de
voted children, his personal consecration to Christ, his
nearness to the cross in the closet, the prayer-meeting,
and the Committee-room, his love for Foreign Missions,
his wide views of the kingdom of Christ, and his utter
Consecration to its extension, his entire life was proof
and embodiment.
" Now combine this singleness of purpose, this reso
luteness of will, and this incessant and efficient labor in
one person, baptize him with the Holy Spirit and with
fire, consecrate him for 50 years to the most glorious
work, next to preaching the gospel with the living
voice, to which man or angel was ever called, and

ioo DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
what may not such a man accomplish towards the
evangelization of the world? Such a man was our
revered father, Rev. William A. Hallock, D. D."
His associate, Mr. Rand, said at the funeral,
" The career of Dr. Hallock is a fine illustration of
the truth that when God has some grand work to be
done, he prepares and furnishes the man for that work.
Father Hallock's lifework was, to found the American
Tract Society, shape its character and sphere, develop
and mould its growth. For this great work he was
peculiarly endowed, not only with the natural qualities
just described, essential to success, but with what was
equally important, a thorough religious training from
childhood up, and such a spiritual experience as brought
his whole after-life under the power of the unseen world
and of the doctrines of grace. Without any morbid
views about sanctification, he had that practical conse
cration that kept him day and night at work for Christ.
Leaving the seminary at Andover fifty -eight years ago
full of missionary zeal, he plunged with characteristic
ardor and self-sacrifice into tract work as agent for two
years of the New England Tract Society at Andover.
In this work he soon learned the necessity and wisdom
of three things: i, the formation of a National Tract
Society to combine all the local societies ; 2, that it
should be a Union Society, including all evangelical de
nominations; and 3, as the result of conference with
Christians in New York, that it should be located in
this metropolis. After earnest and prayerful confer
ence with the leading men of the existing society in

THE END. ioi
New York, this Society was organized May, 1825, and
the Society at Boston became its most efficient auxili
ary. He was chosen Corresponding Secretary of the
new Society, and was reelected for forty-five years. For
several years he was sole Secretary, and though as the
work expanded many others were associated with him,
he still retained the Publishing and Foreign Depart
ments in his control.
" And what was his work ?
" To examine with care every manuscript, tract, and
book^offered for publication, and select the best. To
submit them for perusal to the Publishing Committee,
and revise for the press, with the author's aid, such as
were adopted, and then see them through all the pro
cesses of publication. In 1845, for example, he selected,
prepared for the press, and issued 200 publications, large
and small, besides reading 100 that were declined, and
arranging for 100 new ones published by the aid of the
Society at missionary stations.
"He conducted all the correspondence relating to
these publications at home and. abroad, including in his
letters to missionaries all grants in aid of their work.
When the 'American Messenger' was commenced he
was the principal editor, and put both it and the ' Child's
Paper ' to press, reading all the proofs of book, paper,
or tract, with care. Very few men could have accom
plished the amount of work he performed, and that
from year to year, with but few and short intervals of
rest even towards the last. His industry was prodi
gious — the wonder of those around him, their stimulus

102 DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
and their despair. He subordinated everything to his
work. Many a weary mile he threaded the city streets
to confer with authors, with donors, the Committee, or
influential friends. Denying himself many social en
joyments, his home-hours early and late were devoted
to work. At the Tract House ever busy, in conference
with his associates, . supervising all the manufacturing
work, remaining long after all others had gone home,
for those hours of Uninterrupted work he loved so well,
and often protracting his labors far into the night. His
great task was accomplished not so much by brilliant
talents, as by shrewd good sense and indefatigable
work. " And what were the results ?
" The Tract Society stands to-day as his monument,
more enduring than brass and more precious than fine
gold. When he laid down the burden he had so long
and so well borne, fifty years after finishing his studies,
he had seen the Society advance from stage to stage of
growth — from issuing a few hundred tracts and an al
manac, to a list of 4,000 publications, of which 880 were
volumes. " The publications aided in foreign missionary fields
were nearly equal in number, though not in size. He
had helped to organize in turn Systematic Tract Distri
bution, the Volume Enterprise, the system of Colpor
tage, and the Periodicals of the Society. He had done
much to place the Society in the front rank of publishing
houses of the nation. He had infused much of his spirit
of self-consecration for Christ's sake into all the work and

THE END. 103
workers of the Society. He had seen its models imi
tated and its methods followed by many others at home
and abroad ; had watched the issue and circulation of
450,000,000 of books, tracts, and papers ; and had him
self found time to write four volumes and five tracts, of
which more than 1,400,000 have been published. The
most important of these is the Memoir of Harlan Page,
of which 113,500 have been printed, and which has
done more to promote living for Christ than almost
any other book.
" In 1870, at the age of 76, he was elected Honorary
Secretary, and relieved of the burdens he had borne so
long and so well. With what intense gratitude and joy
he contemplated the work God had empowered him to
originate and help forward ! What region of the earth is
not full of his labors ! What Christian in America has
not derived some benefit from the publications of the
Society ! What American community anywhere is not
the better in some way for its influence ! What does
not our country and the church and the world owe to
the Institution he so loved ! By his quiet and unob
served toil he has accomplished what very few are ever
so favored and happy as to do. His early associates*
revered and honored men, have gone before him into
glory — Milnor and Spring and Knox and De Witt and
Mcllvaine and Brigham and Anderson and Sommers,
and a great host of God's elect ; and very recently Dr.
Adams, his life-long friend, his former pastor, and his
fellow-laborer for many years. It is but a few short
weeks since Dr. Hallock ventured from his home of

104 DR- WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
sickness to attend the funeral of this beloved friend,
whose presence and whose half-inspired words of Chris
tian condolence we so miss here to-day. But now they
are both in the presence of Christ, welcomed by their
former beloved companions in the kingdom and pa
tience of the saints with what unutterable delight!. And
not only by those known and loved here will he be
welcomed there, but by untold multitudes here un
known, from the East and the West and the North and
the South, brought to Christ or aided in His service by
the Society he founded and the books he edited. Hap
py beyond compare the man who serenely rests from
such labors, in the sure and blessed fruition of such re
wards. May his spirit of consecration, of diligence, of
singleness of eye to the glory of Christ, characterize the
Institution he loved to the end of time, and be an inspi
ration to all who serve his Lord and ours."
At the same service Rev. William M. Paxton, D. D.,
said : " We live in the present, but we are always
facing the future. ' Memory,' said another, ' presides
over the past, duty over the present, and hope over the
future.' As to the past, ' God requireth that which is
past.' As to the present, he says, ' Now is the accepted
time.' As to the future he says, ' Hope thou in God.'
We are assembled this morning to look back upon the
past, and think what this dear father in Israel has been
in his life and work, and to look forward to the future
and think what he is now when he has entered into the
joys of his Lord.
" Dr. Isaac Taylor says that ' every man living in

THE END. 105
a state of grace is a perpetual miracle.' This was true
of Paul : ' By the grace of God I am what I am.' There
is no accounting for the life and work of such a man
as Paul, except upon the supposition of a divine influ
ence working in him and making him what he was.
Circumstances could not make such a man; education,
civilization never wrought such results; unbelief is
dumb before the problem of such a life. Hence Paul
himself stands out as the highest proof of Christianity,
just because he is the most conspicuous illustration of
the grace of God.
" The same is true in a measure of the life of Dr.
Hallock. Nothing but a divine influence could make
such a man; self-interest could never produce such
consecration; the world's motives could never beget
such singleness of purpose, nor can human society
mould such purity of character or such a spirit of self-
sacrificing devotion. His life and work stand out be
fore us to-day as a proof of the- reality of religion, and
an illustration of the grace of God in its moulding and
constraining power.
" As we look back over the history of his busy life,
we are impressed,
" First, with the manner in which God prepares the
man, and shapes the work of his life for him.
" In his youth he hesitated long about joining the
church, because of a self-jealousy as to the reality of
his religious experience.
" When a student about completing his theological
course, his longings were for the missionary field, but
14

106 DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
when his friends and companions were offering them
selves for this great work he held back in opposition to
all his impulses from a sense of his own unworthiness.
' When he had finished his studies and was casting about
for some humble sphere of labor, he caught at the sug
gestion of a tract agency made by one of his teachers,
and accepted at once this humble office. He refused
to ride in the stage because it would be expensive to
the littie society which he proposed to serve. He de
clined the offer of a horse because his feed might, cost
something to the ministers with whom he might lodge.
Hence he started out on foot, traversed several of the
New England states, urging his cause, and gathering
subscriptions, and returned after some weeks' absence
with .encouraging additions to the treasury, at a cost for
expenses of 34 cents ! When we think of all this, and
remember that from this humble beginning he ad
vanced step by step through long years of persevering
devotion, until out of this 'day of small things' has
grown the great American Tract Society which is now
shadowing with its beneficent influences this whole con
tinent, we cannot but see how clearly God prepared
the man for the work and the work for the man. This
is our impression as we look upon the divine side, but
as we look again upon his history, we are impressed,
" Secondly, with the human element in the work of
God in the world. His life illustrates how much may
be accomplished by entire consecration to a single
work. " Every one who was acquainted with Dr. Hallock

THE END. 107
knew how completely his whole life was bound up
within the idea of the Tract Society. He lived for
nothing else, he knew nothing else. He lived and
wrought with incessant toil and unflagging energy for
the glory of God and the salvation of souls, through
the word of truth printed and circulated by the Amer
ican Tract Society. He had many able and valued
helpers, but he inspired them all with his spirit, and
wrought into them all his one idea, and it is doubtless
to this, under God, that we must attribute the wonder
ful success and wide-spread influence of this great insti
tution. " Thirdly. Again, the life of Dr. Hallock illustrates
the special teaching of God's Spirit as a preparation for
a specific purpose.
" It was a work well worth the labor of any man, no
matter how high his endowments or how extensive his
attainments, to write the ' Life of Harlan Page;' but
perhaps no other man on this continent could have
written it. There was a correllation between the
author and the subject. Harlan Page was a miracle of
grace, and to Dr. Hallock was given the spiritual eye-
salve to see the peculiar work of God upon his soul,
the qualities of heart to appreciate the riches of grace
in his experience, and the simplicity of heart and of
style to tell the story with the greatest effect. Had the
life of Harlan Page been written in a stilted style it
would have lost its charm ; had it been treated with a
philosophic criticism it would have created no interest ;
had it been composed in a style adorned with rhetorical

108 DR. WILLIAM A. HALLOCK.
prettiness, it would have robbed it of its power ; but as
written by Dr. Hallock it has been one of the most
potent influences for good that has ever issued from
the American press. Thousands of souls ascribe their
conversion to this little volume. It has stimulated
Christian work in all our churches, and has been one
of the chief influences in disseminating far and wide the
idea of dealing with men personally, and of aiming to
convert individuals. I doubt not but that this little
book has been the forerunner that has prepared the
way for the great work of the Young Men's Christian
Associations in this country.
"But time will not permit us to dwell at length
upon the character and influences of this blessed man.
With all his force and influence he was one of the
humblest of men. He had no assumption. The
thought of his own reputation or of getting glory from
men seemed never to enter his mind. It was most
refreshing to see his humble simplicity. It always
-made me feel better to know that there was such a man
living in the world. It was my privilege to know him
best in his later years. Like the Green Mountains in
which he was born, his old age was green and beautiful,
and now ' he has come to his grave in full age, like as
a shock of corn cometh in his season.'
" In conclusion let me say how much he was loved
and appreciated by his brethren in the ministry. He
was a member of the ' Chi Alpha,' an association of
ministers well known in this city. It seemed to be a
perfect delight to Dr. Hallock to attend that meeting,

THE END. 109
and it was a joy to his brethren to see him there. Next
to Dr. Cox, whose funeral occurs to-morrow, he was the
oldest member of the association, and it was most inter
esting to see the tender affection with which he was
always welcomed, and the honor which was spontane
ously accorded to him by his loving brethren. Blessed
man ! he now rests from his labors, and his works do
follow him."
A body of earnest, believing men have left the field,
" but it is a joy," said Dr. Williams, " to think of the
great work of their earthly career as still going on."
The personal efforts made in the wards of New
York city by officers and friends in the early days of
the Tract Society, to bring people within the pale of
Christian influences and institutions, was carried vigor
ously and systematically forward from the first. There
was no lapse or neglect in the great enterprise. So
large had the work become to meet the needs of a
great and growing city, in 1864 it was incorporated
into a separate institution, taking the name of the
"New York City Mission and Tract Society." Its
missionaries, chapels, Sunday-schools, reading-rooms,
cheap lodging-rooms, improved tenement-houses, day
nurseries, workingmen's clubs, and temperance socie
ties, form a network of reforming and redeeming agen
cies second to no similar work in the world.
The spirit of Harlan Page and his biographer is not
dead, but lives in a thousand forms of personal yearn
ing and endeavor to lift men to God and better things.
While this vigorous offshoot is doing its brave

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