USA > Connecticut > Litchfield County > Torrington > History of Torrington, Connecticut, from its first settlement in 1737, with biographies and genealogies > Part 55
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want ever applied to him for relief of real necessities, and went from his door without abundant reason for leaving many thanks behind ?
He had constitutionally, a remarkable susceptibility to impressions from a view of the wants and woes of mankind. But there was something beyond nature in all this. His uncommon benevolence towards the needy was not so much an instinct as an enlightened, evangelical sympathy. And I know not where to look for a brighter practical exemplification than he furnished, of the import of the sacred injunction, 'Be ye kind to one another, tender hearted.' His house was the abode of hospitality alike to the friend and the stranger ; and his heart the seat of good will to his people and the world.
On no subject did he seem to meditate and converse so much as upon re- vivals of religion, and the ultimate diffusion of the light of the gospel among all nations. The beauty of the church in the millenium, the peace and happi- ness of the world which it will secure, and the consequent glory of the son of God, filled his eye, fired his soul, animated his prayers, and led him not only to advocate and rejoice in the great benevolent operations of the present age, but cheerfully to give up a beloved son as an instrument to facilitate the arrival of that blessed period by traversing the distant forests of the west, and by en- countering the perils; alas to that dear missionary ; the perils of the deep. And when the tidings of the death of that son, who fell a sacrifice to the cause of humanity, were brought to his ears, there was witnessed as noble a demon- stration of personal piety in the striking expressions of resignation which he poured forth from his heart, as there was of paternal grief in the tears that gushed from his eyes.
His popularity as a preacher, and his great influence with his ministerial brethren, instead of generating elation and arrogance, were connected with an uncommon degree of self distrust and humility. While others were ready to applaud his talents and ingenuity, he was meditating on his own sinful- ness and ready to smite on his breast with the abashed and abased publican. And here I cannot do better than to recite two or three sentences from a note received last Saturday from your pastor, informing me of the de- cease of our reverend friend. " Of himself," says the letter, "he often remarked with emphasis, that he could not find the man on the face of the earth to whom he could say, 'stand by thyself, I am holier than thou.' No subject would seem to awaken his apparently torpid sensi- bilities, as he drew near the close of life, like the mention of Christ's kingdom from the efforts now made for its advancement. And his sense of his own unworthiness seemed to arise chiefly from the reflection that he had done no more in this service when in the vigor of life. On asking him at my last in- terview with him, if he felt ready and willing to depart, his characteristic re- ply was, 'No objections.'
What he was as a preacher, it is less necessary for me minutely to describe, because very many of us often heard him while in full vigor, and none can be ignorant of his high eminence in the pulpit. Still it may be interesting to ad- vert a few moments, to some of the peculiar traits to which that eminence was in a great degree owing. His mind was more distinguished by the clearness of its perceptions, and the quickness of its operations, than by its comprehension or profoundness, although it was not deficient in these respects. It was culti- vated less by extensive reading than by independent reflection. His was an uncommonly original mind. In his views of truth, he depended on nothing but the word of God ; and with the whole of it, and especially with the his- torical parts of it, he had a more minute and familiar acquaintance than any
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other minister within my knowledge, one individual only excepted. A large proportion of the texts which he selected were short, and such as most other ministers would have overlooked as containing nothing worthy of special atten- tion ; and the plans of his sermons were at once exceedingly simple and strik- ing, and yet such as with all their excellence, almost no other man would have thought of. Still they were not far fetched nor forced. His inferences, whether derived from the Bible and constituting the main points of discussion, or derived from the body of the sermon itself and constituting its close, while they would have been made by almost no other preacher, were when stated by him obviously just in the estimation of the merest child.
His original manner of treating subjects sometimes seemed to border on oddity, and his expressions were too often of a nature to awaken a smile, and sometimes to excite our laughter. This it must be admitted was a defect. But we have good reason to believe that when momentary levity was excited, it was never an object at which he aimed, but the undesigned effect of the presentation of his own thoughts in his own peculiar manner. Or, if he ever aimed for a moment at the ludicrous, it was but for a moment. With a con- summate knowledge of the intimate relations between the passions of laughter and weeping, it was often the case that no sooner did he perceive that he had awakened a smile than by a sudden transition to some relevant but unexpected remark, he caused the assembly to be at once bathed in tears.
He excelled most men also in the power of description ; and this was of great service to him in the pulpit. When he described God, or the creature, the saint or the sinner, heaven or hell, so vivid were his own apprehensions of the sub- ject set forth, so ready was his imagination to stretch its pinions and soar, and such was his command of language ; not indeed the most classical and refined, but fully adequate to express the precise shade of the thought that glowed within him, that whatever he undertook to portray was as distinctly apprehended by his hearers, as if he had delineated all that he had in view on canvass immedi- ately before their eyes.
He derived great advantage from his skill in illustration. In this happy art, the vast body of the ministers in his day were lamentably deficient. They had little to do with reference to the common business of life, and the analogies found in the physical world, in order to impart to their hearers clearer notions of spiritual things. They did not so extensively as is the case at the present day, allude like their Lord and Master to the field of nature, and the every day occurrences of common life and thus familiarize the mind to religious truths through the medium of resemblances which natural objects sustain to them. Theology was not only made a distinct science that bore no relations to any other, and was incapable of borrowing useful exem- plifications from any other. But Mr. Mills was a diligent student of nature, a careful observer of men and things ; and never was he more successful in the pulpit than when, for the purpose of conveying notions of sacred truth to the minds of his audience, he seized upon some analogy derived from some familiar occurrence, or from some object palpable to the senses. If the justice of God in his dealings with men was to be illustrated or defended, he reasoned from what all admit to be equitable in human courts and human families. If God's long suffering and compassion towards guilty men were to be set forth in an af- fecting manner, then he would depict before the assembly the obstinacy of a wayward child and the parent all in tears expostulating, beseeching, hoping and waiting long for the ultimate return of the young offender to duty. Multitudes of us can never forget how in other years, he held and charmed us, and caused
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our tears to flow by the vivid representation of these and thousands of other simple but striking analogies, for the purpose of giving us clearer conceptions of the character and dealings of God, the wonders of redeeming mercy, or the recklessness of the hard hearted, obstinate perishing sinner.
Another thing which contributed to his eminence in the pulpit was, if I mis- take not, the habit of speaking extemporaneously. How early in his ministry he commenced this practice, I have not been able to learn. Owing to the failure of his memory, he was necessitated to write out his sermons, during several of the last years of his labors ; and when he resorted to this course, there was evidently less animation, originality and force than he had long been accustomed to exhibit. But when for a long series of years before, he only sketched the leading topics of his discourses on paper, having wrought out all the subordinate matter in his mind and treasured it in his memory, and stood before the listening throng, and gave them the whole influence of his eyes, and received in return the kindling influence of his gaze, and his attention was untrammeled by his notes, so that he could allow both excitement and range to his imagination, then it was that he disclosed the full majesty and power of his noble mind ; then it was that the genuine Samuel John Mills was seen and felt to be a great man in Israel. Nor am I alone in this estimate of him as a com- manding speaker and preacher. There are hundreds before me, who from their own recollected emotions, excited by his instructive voice, are ready to concur with me. And perhaps it is proper for me to say, it has long been currently reported as a declaration of the late distinguished Governor Griswold, that if eloquence consists in completely enchaining the attention of an audience, Mr. Mills was the most eloquent preacher he had ever heard. "
It is doubtless true that the great theme in his conversation was revivals of religion, and he delighted in being present in such meet- ings, and participating in the preaching, and particularly because it was judged in those times to be very essential to a successful revival, as is indicated in his account of the revival of 1799, to preach most earnestly the doctrines of God's "Sovereignty and distinguishing grace," and that these were best calculated to break and humble the sinners' heart, so that he would be capable of valuing the mercy of God as offered to those who were appointed to be saved. It is quite evident that if in any one point of doctrine Mr. Mills excelled this was it, and he preached it with all its objectionable features. It did not matter to him how angry men became under such preaching, for he charged them with being angry with God ; not with the interpre- tations the minister gave but with God, and that it was a very strong evidence of their very great hardness of heart and the greater need that they should be humbled under just such arbitrary dictation of the Almighty ; and he also believed that such manifestation of re- sistance was indicative of hope of final conversion. One example, as given by Dr. Charles Woodward, is illustrative, and is confirmed by his own account of the revival, and from many other sources.
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" A young woman who offered herself for admission to the church in 1818, said at her examination, that she had thought little of God until she was awakened, when her feelings against his government rose to such a degree that, if possible, she would have torn him from his throne ; and from that the transition was so great that she beheld him in every thing, and was willing to be damned, if he decreed it. Mr. Mills pronounced the experience 'glorious. '"'
A woman now living uniting with the church about the same time was asked as she now says, " If she was willing, if it should be for the glory of God, to go to hell forever ?" Upon an affirmative answer, from which her heart revolts with a shudder to the present day, she was judged acceptable, and received. Another person who, nearly at the same time, became much exercised as to a religious life, when the feeling of rebellion against partial grace subsided, she became persuaded that she had committed the unpardonable sin ; that she had " grieved the Holy Spirit," and that was the end of it, and thus she has remained to the present time, although her life is as exemplary as any person in the town.
It is a matter of rejoicing that the first Congregational council that was held in America, while standing on old Plymouth rock, voted unanimously that it did not hold the doctrine of " fatalism."
The only remark necessary in these days is that Father Mills's heart was vastly larger than this point in his theology.
Mr. Mills as a writer, it is evident even from his account of the revival, given, was very able and competent in regard to any question of theology or of grace, as held in those times ; and could make as close, clear and definite discriminations and observations, as religious thought demanded or allowed, and hence had he directed the energy of his mind to theological discussion as he did to the saving of men, he might have had a lasting name in that direction.
REV. SAMUEL J. MILLS, JR.,
Was born April 21, 1783, in Torringford society, and was the seventh child of Rev. Samuel J. Mills, pastor of the Torringford church more than fifty years, and who was a very remarkable man in many respects, being great in goodness and love for the salvation of man. Young Samuel's mother was noted also for symmetry of character, excellency of judgment, and largeness of Christian love and sympathy toward all men, and it might be expected that such a scion, reared under such favoring circumstances would eventuate in some great
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and noble end. Torringford is a very advantageous place to be reared and educated in, if nature's grandeur may have any power to mould and fashion the mind and enlarge the heart of the intelligent beings to whom the infinite has subjected all created things. From the old parsonage where this man was born, the view extends in every direction over the surrounding country to the distance of between ten and thirty miles, revealing a large portion of the intervening valleys and hills, and this scenery was the topic of frequent remark by the father ; it having been that which charmed him the first time he was in the place ; and it is very possible that this scenery had much to do in fixing upon the mind of young Mills that enlarged interest which he afterwards manifested, for the salvation and well being of the whole world. The childhood and youth of this man were chiefly spent under his father's roof amid these surroundings in the possession of the most faithful instructions which were of the best kind, both as to intellectual and heart cultivation. When quite a child, his mind exhibited no common sensibility to the concerns of religion, and was easily and some times deeply affected with the importance of them, and the advantage to be secured by a careful attention to the teach- ings of the divine word. These impressions however were not as carefully cherished as they probably would have been but for the prevailing opinion of that day that nothing availed toward salvation without first experiencing a marvellous and almost miraculous change of heart, which change young people were supposed, as a general rule, to be nearly incapable of properly entertaining. But when, in 1798, the religious interest in his father's parish began to be recognized by special meetings and an unusual attendance on their meetings by the community, he being at the age of fifteen, was moved, with many others, by the anxious inquiry whether the great provisions of the gospel were likely to avail any thing in his behalf. The inquiry was not whether he would accept the abundant provisions of the gospel for the salvation of all men but whether the very limited provisions of salvation included him, as well as some others." To ascertain the right to answer this inquiry almost drove him to distraction and infidelity. In regard to this point his Memoir gives some light.
" But such were his views of his own sinfulness, so severe his distress, and so bitter his opposition to God, that he would sometimes ' break out in expressions of unyielding rebellion.' With nothing was his dissatisfaction more painful, than the discriminations of the divine favor in showing mercy to those who were around him, while he himself was apparently left to obduracy and ruin. He had beheld many of his companions in years and in sin, together with an elder
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brother, a sister and a niece of his mother, all residing under the same roof, and all that remained of his father's family, rejoicing in hope, and united to the visible church, while he himself obtained no relief from his agony, but remained in ' the gall of bitterness and the bonds of iniquity.' Such was his state of mind for many months, and such it continued, when the revival began to decline, and when it was gone. Two full years he remained in this dismal frame of mind, still refusing to bow at the footstool of mercy ; and to adopt his own sentiment, ' at heart still cursing the day in which he was born.'"' I
This language is peculiar yet in perfect accord with the doctrines held at that time. Here he is represented as greatly distressed two years, because he obtained no evidences that he specially was included in the number of the elect, while others received those evidences, and yet he is represented as "refusing to bow at the footstool of mercy." The question was not whether he was willing or not, but whether there was any " footstool of mercy " for him to bow to, for, if he was not of the elect, then there was no such place for him, and his will- ingness to curse the day he was born was the soundest wisdom pos- sible. This was seen by Dr. Spring, and hence he says (page 16), " It is far from being indispensable to our cordial acquiescence in God's character and government, to be persuaded that we are inter- ested in his mercy." This was the precise question, Did the mercy of God include Samuel J. Mills Jr .? He had no assurances that it did and hence he said to his mother : "O that I had never been born ! O that I had never been born ! For two years I have been sorry God ever made me." All the theological discussions in the universe could not change the soundness of this logic ; and it was not until months after, that Mr. Mills, by taking a very different view of the mercy of God ; until he by dwelling upon the goodness of God as sufficiently large so as to include him, at all risks, that he dared entertain a hope of salvation. And this case was not an isolated one, for that which he experienced many others passed through in that revival in 1798 and 9, according to the account given by Father Mills, wherein it is indicated that the dread horrors of despair abode upon the trembling penitent for months, because he could not tell whether he was included in the covenant of mercy or left out ; and it was also thought that the genuineness of the conversion depended on the greatness of the horrors experienced.
After nearly three years of dreadful suffering in mind, this youth, not quite eighteen years of age, became a trusting and obedient servant of the gospel of promise, and henceforward walked in hope.
1 Memoir by Rer. Dr. Spring, p. 12.
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When Mr. Mills entered into this hope, he was attending school at Litchfield ; and the first intimation his father had of any change arose from an observation he made that " he could not conceive of any course of life in which to pass the rest of his days, that would prove so pleasant, as to go and communicate the gospel salvation to the poor heathen."
Thus did the spirit and ambition to help a ruined world, take possession of this young man's heart and life, as soon as he appre- hended the benefits of the gospel in his own personal well being, and from that time onward, ever, they were his guiding stars until his life work was ended.
" It is somewhat remarkable, that from this same hour, he never once lost sight of this great thought. Though but a youth of seventeen, he discovered a zeal in the missionary cause, an eagerness in the pursuit of missionary intelli- gence, and an enlargement of thought in his plans to become acquainted with the true state of the unevangelized world, which left little doubt that he was chained to this purpose by a superior power.
It was a heart yearning over the miseries of perishing millions, that first led him to think of acquiring an education with a view to the gospel ministry. Having consulted his parents, and unfolded all his purpose, which should God permit, was no less than to devote his life to the cause of missions in foreign lands ; and having received their approbation and their blessing, he resolved on measures for changing his course of life. The spirit of God came over him like Elisha in the field. While toiling at the plough, was his heart touched with compassion for the heathen world, and he bid adieu to his farm, to obtain an education on purpose to carry the gospel to millions who perish for lack of knowledge. Thus in a retired field in Litchfield county, was the King of Zion beginning that grand course of operations which have produced such a mighty revolution in the American churches, and which bear so intimate a relation to the progressive glories of his kingdom. Having put his secular concerns into other hands, and having previously connected himself with the church, under the pastoral care of his father, Mills became a member of Williams college, in Massachusetts, in the autumn of 1805. As a scholar, he was of respectable standing, but as a youth who "walked with God," and whose uniform deport- ment evinced that he was devoted to interests superior to his own, he shone as a light in the earth.
Ardent and matured as his piety was at more advanced periods, it may be said of him, that he began his career very much as he ended it. At this early period his piety was of that strong, vet fervent ; that unostentatious, yet practi- cal and efficient kind, that gave the highest evidence that he was a child of God. Engaged in pursuits, in which many a godly youth is allured from duty, by the glare of science and the love of fame, he not only retained his integrity, and made sensible progression in holiness, but by a deportment so circumspect and kind, that even the enemies of religion could not but respect him ; and by a consistency and sweetness of character, which gave so much lustre to vital piety, that his friends felt the reproach of his example, did he become the means of conversion, steadfastness and zeal, and will be long remembered as a distin- guished blessing to the seminary of which he was a member."
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There are some characteristics here revealed that are worthy of imi- tation, and history reveals the satisfying fact that whenever and wherever followed they always bring their reward of usefulness, success and honor. Having committed himself to a life for the purpose of spread- ing the gospel news, there was to him no honorable way to be pur- sued but to fulfill the engagement to the utmost of his ability as if assured all the time of certain success, and yet not caring as to the success in regard to personal honor if only duty should be done. Such negation of self while moving as if inspired by the highest am- bition of honor is the richest glory of man, and is the spirit that makes martyrs for country and religion and every thing in life. To him there was no charm in anything except it was in the line of life which he had chosen and to which he had devoted all his powers, and to be unfaithful to such an engagement was a thing too humiliat- ing to be entertained by one destined to a life in a future state of being.
Then also if the life he had engaged in, had any foundation in realities as he himself and thousands of others professed to know, it was reasonable that he should pursue that life with as much energy, and determination and forethought, as any business engagement that could be presented to the necessity or ambition of men. This re- veals the secret of his life ; one perpetual onward movement in the same line, as though there could be no other possible way for him to move, and as though he never once stopped to think, whether there could be any other way, and yet as knowing all the time that life to him would be an utter failure except he should attain the end for which he had started.
It is not surprising therefore to learn that, "to him nothing had charms so powerful as the glory of his Redeemer and the salvation of men. The conversion of a sinner from the error of his way, the deliverance of one immortal being from the indescribable consequences of sin, was to his benevolent mind enough to compensate a thousand fold for the loss of all the laurels of a Cæsar. While he was a member of college, there was a revival of religion in the institution, of which he was the chief instrument ; and afterwards there were not a few of his fellow students in the ministry, who owed their hopes of heaven, and their usefulness on earth, to his instrumentality. Nor should it be forgotten that quite many of those beloved men whom the American church has been permitted to send into the se- clusions of the wilderness of this country, as well as those who went
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