USA > Georgia > Bibb County > Macon > Georgia Baptists: historical and biographical > Part 31
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Thornton's health was usually good, even to robustness. In person, he was rather below the ordinary height, stout and built for strength, and he early became corpulent. In Novem- ber, 1854, he had a paralytic stroke, which attacked him soon after preaching at White Plains. From this attack he never fully recovered. Though he soon got able to go about, he never regained his former distinct utterance, and never more under- took to preach. He continued, however, to labor in the Mas- ter's cause, and became the faithful, zealous and efficient super- intendent of the Sunday-school at Phillips' Mill, where he had been the revered and eloquent pastor. It was a most affecting sight to see the profound preacher, upon whose lips large con-
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gregations had so often hung, now devoting himself, with pain- fil and labored and often indistinct articulation, to the instruc- tion of children. Yet, even thus, he was doing good and mag- nifying his office. Stricken and afflicted as he was, he was more deeply seated in the affections of his brethren than when he preached with the greatest power. There was a pathos in his broken utterance and an eloquence in his tottering form that was never felt when his words flowed most sweetly, and his per- son swelled with the majesty of his sublimest conceptions .*
A second paralytic stroke in April, 1856, closed his useful life. He died the day after the attack, without having been able to speak. Once he tried to say something to his wife, but failed. A pencil was put in his hand, but he could not use it, and the dying thought is known only to God. Was it a farewell token of affection to those he loved so well ? Was it a last testimo- nial to that sovereign grace, whose fullness he was so soon to enjoy ? For months he had known that his life hung by a thread, and, expecting that his death would be sudden, he lived daily watching for the Master's call.} I saw him twice within a short time before his death, and on both occasions he requested me to preach at his funeral, and made known to me the text he desired me to use. It was characteristic both of his theology and his experience : "I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed unto him against that day :" 2d Timothy, i. 12. He directed his grave to be covered by a plain slab, inscribed only with his name and the simple expression of his confidence in Him whom he believed : "I shall rise again."
At the next session of the Georgia Association the following mention was made of him by the committee on deceased min- isters, the report being written by H. H. Tucker, D. D., then President of Mercer University : " Endowed by nature with a mind of remarkable power, he had enriched it with large stores of that knowledge which is above all knowledge most useful to a preacher of the gospel. If his intellectual endowments
*The last time he met with the Board of Trustees of Mercer University will never be forgotten by those who were present. As he entered the room, the members simul- taneously rose to their feet and pressed around him, endeavoring in vain to restrain their,tears. It was the last time some of us ever saw him .- [AUTHOR.
+Rev. N. M. Crawford.
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were not varied, they were certainly profound. Some one has remarked, that 'a man of one book is always to be dreaded.' If thorough acquaintance with a human production so arms a man for the conflicts of life, what must be the power of him whose one book is the Bible ? Brother Thornton was emphat- ically a man of the Bible. Few other books claimed his atten- tention ; yet he had one other favorite. The writings of the learned John Gill were his constant study. Perhaps few men have ever made themselves so thoroughly familiar with the vol- uminous works of that author as the subject of this notice. As might be inferred from what has just been stated, brother Thornton was a zealous advocate of the precious doctrines of grace. There are those who love these doctrines, but who preach them in a form half disguised, as if to apologize for what some are pleased to call their severity. Brother Thorn- ton preached them boldly. The most startling issues to which they give rise he did not avoid, nor half avoid, but stated them fully and fearlessly, and met them with surprising ability and ease. Perhaps the most remarkable feature in his preaching was the apparently effortless manner in which he explained and defended, with irresistible argument, the great doctrines of the cross. He has gone to his reward, but we dare to believe that he has not changed his theology. Grace was his theme while among us, and grace is his theme now that he is among the angels." Fine as this eulogy is, its best quality is its truth.
If Thornton had always, or generally, been in private what he so generally was in the pulpit, it would have been impossible to overstate his power for good; but, unfortunately, he was not so. His character was not round, but full of points, and, unhappily, evil was often prominent. As before said, he was often rude and coarse, frequently light, and sometimes petu- lant. He was firm even to obstinacy, and sometimes exhibited this disposition on light and improper occasions. Mr. Mercer was, perhaps, the originator of a saying which became prover -. bial. On one occasion, when Thornton had announced his posi- tion, (an unwelcome one to some of the brethren, who wished to remonstrate with him,) Mr. Mercer overruled them, and said, " Brother Vince has got his mule in him, and it is not worth while to say anything to him." But, after all, from an intimate ac-
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quaintance with the men, I am convinced that Thornton was no1 a whit more obstinate than several of his compeers, who escapec the reproval, and frequently joined with others in speaking o. " brother Vince's mule." They had more of the suaviter in modo but just as immovable in fixedness of purpose. Yet, with al. his foibles, faults and eccentricities, every one had confidence in Thornton's piety, and was willing to make allowance for the perversities of his nature and the defects of his training ; for. through all was seen the depth of that work of grace which sc often and so richly cropped out above the defects of his earthly nature.
I have spoken of his occasional coarseness, yet I have seen him frequently in the presence of ladies, and never have I ob- served in him, at such times, any deportment unbecoming a gentleman in the most refined society. Mingled with his other elements, he had a native regard for the feelings of others, which led him to avoid what he believed would be offensive. I have never known a man in whom so many opposite qualities contended for mastery.
It is said that, to find out a man's true character, you should travel with him. If this is true, Thornton stood the test ad- mirably. I took several journeys with him, both in public and private conveyances, and I never traveled with a more pleasant companion. He was always willing to conform to the wishes of his fellow-travelers, and if, at any time, he had a preference, after stating the grounds of it, he would leave the decision to the others. He had an unfailing fund of anecdote, grave and gay, pathetic and humorous, to beguile the tedium of the road, and not unfrequently the full gushes of his deep religious expe- rience would enrich the hearer.
A few personal reminiscences and anecdotes may be of use in illustrating his many-sided character :
" I saw, for the first time, Vince Thornton, (as he was then called, and continued familiarly to be called to the day of his death) when he was in college in 1822. I was then but eleven years old, and being timid and shy, was very unfavorably im- pressed by his rude and boisterous sporting. I did not see him again till the summer of 1843, two months after I united with the church at Antioch, in Oglethorpe county. A general meet-
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Dott ing brought Thornton there. I was very powerfully attracted . Wed off by the excellence of his sermons. From that time our inter- course was frequent and our friendship uninterrupted. At that ,all ce the meeting an incident occurred illustrating one of his peculiar traits. One day, Jonathan Davis, then in the zenith of his power and popularity, had preached a most impressive sermon on the text, 'Knowing the terror of the Lord, we persuade 30 July men.' After that sermon, the pastor, B. M. Sanders, exhorted and invited mourners to come forward. Thirty or forty pre- sented themselves. Recess was taken for dinner, and Thornton was appointed to preach in the afternoon. He tried to beg off, jeen ob g & her ers, but of course Sanders held him to the appointment. He took for his text, 'Who shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect ?' His first words were, " God has an elect people," and then went on to preach on the doctrine of election, a sermon, as I thought, of unsurpassed ability. At its conclusion, brother I Sanders exhorted again, but it required much effort to get only jies uld five or six to come forward. As Thornton came out of the church, he said to a friend, 'I told you how it would be; I knew I would put out all of Jonathan's fire.' In fact we had reason to believe that he selected his theme because he suspec- ted that the fire of the morning had been, as he said, 'all fox- fire.'
" Fifteen months afterwards, I was brought into collision with Thornton at the Association, held that year at Antioch. He held the appointment as preacher of the missionary sermon. The difficulties which, six months afterwards, led to the organization ad, of the Southern Baptist Convention were then approaching a pe- crisis. Thornton rose in the body, on Saturday morning, and after graphically explaining the condition of things, and pre- in dicting the coming rupture, emphatically expressed the opinion that no money could be raised to be sent to the Nothern board, en and moved that the missionary sermon be dispensed with. The Association remained silent, and the moderator was about to en m- put the vote, when I, though one of the youngest, and per- sonally acquainted with but few of the members, rose and made a short but warm speech in opposition to the motion. Brother Stocks and others followed on the same side, and the motion failed. Thornton, however, was excused from preaching. W. T.
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· Brantly was appointed in his place, and succeeded in spite ‹ the predictions, and, probably, partly in consequence of them, obtaining a very large collection. After the session in which th vote was taken, I was surprised at being approached by se' eral brethren who thanked me for my course, particularly : they said, no other member would have dared to oppose Thorı ton. Westaid together that night and occupied the same roor and he was most cordial in his bearing towards me. This worthy of notice merely because he was considered by som impatient of opposition.
"Some years afterwards, he floored me in the Association abou as badly as I did him in the foregoing instance. I had made motion in which I felt great interest. Some opposition wa made, but it was evident that the body was with me. Thorr ton, who was moderator, waited till the debate appeared to b closed, and then, instead of putting the vote, he left the chai and made a speech in opposition to my motion. I saw that th effect was instant and decided, and though I made the bes fight I could, my motion was lost. I regretted the result, bu thought no more about it. During the recess for dinner, : brother told me that Thornton was looking for me, and pres ently I met him. He wanted, he said, to apologize for his inter ference, and to express the hope that I would not be hurt with him. Of course I replied that no apology was needed, wher no offense had been intended or received. But I mention then incident as showing his tenderness towards the feelings of those whom he liked. i P d
" Riding in a carriage with him and J. Q. West, after the As- g sociation at Warrenton, in 1850, had adjourned, driving rapidly, 1 we passed the blackest negro, I think, I ever saw, glossy, jett black, making a perfect contrast with his ivory teeth. As usual, t on the breaking up of public meetings, we were in a jovial mood.d Thornton, who saw the negro first, was affected by his ludi- P crous appearance, and addressed him with a boisterous laugh, calling him 'snow-ball.' Sitting where I was, I could see the poor negro was mortified, and I immediately said, 'Brother Thornton, you ought not to have spoken to the negro in that way. You have hurt his feelings, which, perhaps are as tender as either of ours.' He sobered down at once: ' Well,' said he,
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eg 'it was wrong, I am sorry for it; and, if I could meet him „i again, I would ask his pardon.' And so he would, in all hon- thesty and humility. Indeed, I have never known any one who sepreceived reproof more kindly than Thornton, when adminis- tered in kindness.
" I will mention one incident, illustrative of his conscientious- omness and fixedness of purpose. Like most of our ministers, he was in the habit of smoking. While preaching to the church om in Madison, he staid one night with the family of Dr. J. The doctor was not at that time a member of the church, but hi's bom de : wa wife was regarded as one of the best women in the community. After dinner, knowing that the doctor, who was absent, smoked, asked the lady for a segar. There were none in the house, and or the minister went to his room. A few minutes afterwards a beservant knocked at the door, and coming in, handed him a haindozen segars neatly rolled up in brown paper. Upon inquiry, theit was found that the mistress had sent the servant to the gro- bestcery, Sunday as it was, to buy the segars for her much-loved butpastor. The conviction at once crossed his mind that, through r, aja desire to accommodate his taste for, at best, a useless luxury, resta good sister had been induced to give her countenance to a ter-desecration of the Lord's day, and he determined that he rith would never smoke again. The segars, unopened, were laid on ben the dressing table, and left there; and Thornton used tobacco theno more.
hose "At one of his regular appointments, he had preached (no un- usual thing with him,) a sermon full of the strong meat of the As- gospel. Some one reported it, of course very imperfectly and dly, probably incorrectly, to the Methodist preacher in charge at jet the place, and it was soon whispered around that next Sunday nal, hod. gh, the ker hat ier the preacher would answer Thornton's sermon. Preach he did, and commented on the 'Baptist doctrine' with all his ndi- power, though he was far inferior in talent to the Baptist. Of course it was taken for granted that Thornton would reply. A week of excitement followed, and the town was all agog for a hot theological discussion. When the Baptist pastor arrived Saturday evening, the brother with whom he put up reported what had occurred, and told him it was expected he would re- ply to the Methodist preacher the next day. Thornton said noth-
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ing. The next morning the church was crowded, and every one was full of expectation to see how a man of Thornton's known ability, and somewhat irascible temper, would meet the unprovoked attack made upon him in his absence. After going through the usual preliminary service, the preacher quietly took his text, 'Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy.' Never was a congregation more disappointed, never were a people more reproved, never the brethren better pleased! The Meth odist preacher was conquered, and nobody ever again spoke o his onslaught but to laugh at it. Thornton's sermons were not attacked again in that place.
"In the early history of Mercer University, there occurred & difficulty between the President, Otis Smith, and the "Resident board" of trustees, (afterwards substituted by the Prudentia Committee,) of which B. M. Sanders was chairman. Thorntor sustained Smith, who was a connexion by marriage and an in- timate personal friend. The strife was bitter and protracted The result was that Smith left the institution, and Thornton. in disgust, resigned his seat both in the board of trustees and the executive committee of the Convention. The alienation between him and Sanders was complete, and continued several years. At length Thornton was re-elected both to the trustee- ship and the committee. Gradually he and Sanders resumed their personal intercourse, and the old wound was healed. Soon afterwards, Sanders was prostrated by the disease of which he lingered until his death. During his illness, Thornton one day said to me, ' I can never be sufficiently grateful that brother Sanders and myself have become reconciled, for if he had died while we were alienated from each other, I should never have forgiven myself for allowing so good a man to die without being my friend.'
"Thornton was destitute of ambition. Instead of seeking, he shunned, ' pre-eminence.' He was several times, against his will, elected moderator of the Georgia Association. The first time he seriously offended his friends by his speech on taking the chair. He began by saying most ungraciously, 'Brethren, I do not thank you for the office, for I do not want it ;' and then there was nothing in the few remarks that followed, or in his manner, to take away the sting. But, at the close of the
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meeting he reinstated himself by his few words of farewell. He said, 'Brethren, when you elected me your moderator, I did not thank you ;. but I thank you now ; not that I value the office, but the kindness and affection and confidence, which prompted you to vote for me, are to my heart above all price.' And he spoke to them in a strain of tenderness which melted all hearts.
"Thornton was not a student. His sermons for the most part were studied while riding on his plantation or to his appoint- ments. In this way he had the analysis and the train of argu- ment firmly fixed in his mind; but, for the filling up and the clothing of the thought in words, he relied much on the inspi- ration of the hour of preaching. But that rarely failed him ; never in my hearing. His sermons (for I have heard him preach more than once on the same text,) on ' Who shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect,' and on Romans viii. 2, preached at the Georgia Baptist Convention, at Griffin, in 1848, were fair specimens of his preaching.
" What he was as a preacher, his contemporaries know and appreciate, but posterity will have no other memorial of him than may be found in the imperfect accounts that his brethren may leave, for he wrote nothing. I do not think that he ever wrote an article even for the periodical press. Various causes conspired to produce in him a disinclination to write, but per- haps the strongest was a natural indolence, which inclined him to take his ease, except where action seemed to promise some definite result. If he had taken pains to cultivate the art of writing, I believe his written style. would have equalled what Dr. Tucker so happily calls ' the apparently effortless manner' of his preaching. But as he did not take the necessary pains, it is, perhaps, fortunate that he wrote nothing, for he has left nothing to impeach the universal testimony of the generation that knew him, who, with one voice, pronounce him unsur- passed as a preacher among the men of his day. For myself, whenever I recall the sermons I have heard him preach, I think of Luke's description of Apollos : 'An eloquent man, and mighty in the scriptures.'"
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HON. THOMAS STOCKS.
At the earnest solicitation of the author of this work, Judge Stocks (as he is generally called,) furnished the following rem- iniscences of his own life and times, which the reader will find deeply interesting. Though not a minister of the gospel, his name is so identified with the history of our denomination in the State for the last forty-five years, as to render this sketch not only desirable, but necessary. He says: "I was born the 1st of February, 1786, in an Indian fort, near my present resi- dence, in Greene county. The Oconee river was then the line between the whites and the Creek Indians, who were so trou- blesome as frequently to drive the whites into forts. Every neighborhood, from Skull Shoals to Montpelier, below Milledge- ville, was protected by moving into these forts. The men worked in squads, a few days on each farm, and had to put out sentinels to protect them from surprise while at work. While most of the men were thus employed, the Indians frequently attacked the forts, but were invariably repulsed, a few prudent men and the women defending them successfully. Some of the women were good marksmen, and as brave as Julius Cæsar. This state of things continued until the lands lying between the Oconee and Apalachee rivers were ceded to the United States government.
" During such intervals as the Indians were not particularly troublesome, Colonel Jonas Fauche, with sixty dragoons, was stationed at our fort, and every day spies were sent out to look for Indian signs ; for, in those days, you could not travel with- out leaving signs that could be followed on horseback. In those times, there were no schools in the country, and not one child in ten knew the alphabet at ten years of age. One of Colonel Fauche's men took a liking to me and taught me my letters, and to spell a little. Very few men were able to send their sons off to school, and but few got any education whatever. My father died in 1796. I was brought up by my uncle Heard, who took good care of what little property was left me, but neglected my education.
"In 1807, I married and settled where I now live. In 1813, I was elected to the State Legislature, and served in the House
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of Representatives eight years, and in the Senate twelve years, consecutively-eight years of which time I acted as President of the Senate. In 1815, I was elected one of the Judges of the Inferior Court of Greene county, which office I held thirty-two years in succession.
" In 1826, I was convicted of sin, under Jack Lumpkin's preaching. My wife had been a member of the church several years. After passing through many and sore conflicts, it pleased God to reveal His Son in me as my Saviour. No one who has never experienced that feeling can ever be made fully to under- stand it, but he that has felt it in his heart knows that it is God's work, and not man's. In 1829, I attended the Baptist State Convention at Milledgeville, when Rev. H. O. Wyer in- Formed that body that Josiah Penfield, a deacon of his church n Savannah, had bequeathed to the Convention the sum of $2,500 00 for the education of young men having the ministry n view : Provided, said Convention would raise an equal amount, which was done by those in attendance, thus securing Penfield's egacy. An executive committee was appointed to carry this bject into effect, of which I was one. It was determined to tart a Manual Labor School at the village of Penfield, which vent into operation under Rev. B. M. Sanders, and I am grati- ed to say no institution within my knowledge, with the same heans, has turned out so many useful men. The pulpit, the bar nd the bench show this.
" When the project for a college at Washington, Wilkes ounty, failed, I was opposed to the elevation of Mercer In- itute to a University, because I feared the original object, eological education, would be lost sight of. When, however, ne executive committee had decided on that step, brother San- ers and myself saw the importance of purchasing the Malone act of land adjoining Penfield, which we did for $2,500 00. Then the Trustees of the University took charge, we tendered hem the land below cost, which they gladly accepted. The llage was enlarged, and about $5,000 00 was raised by the est sale of town lots from the Malone tract, leaving three hun- 'ed acres unsold, which was afterwards sold at fine prices. " You ask me to give you my recollections of the Baptists in rmer days. I knew only one Baptist preacher till I was
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twelve years old-an old brother Heflin. He was then the pastor of Shiloh church, not far from where Penfield is now located. He preached monthly. At least half the congrega- tion walked to church. I have seen from thirty to forty rifles brought to church, and when preaching commenced the men stood sentry, for fear of Indians, till the services closed. My recollection is that Mr. Heflin was a model preacher. He con- tinued in charge there till his death, after which Mercer, Mar- shall and James Matthews visited the church. The Baptists of those days were singular in one respect : they hardly ever had churches in villages or towns, the church in Washington, Wilkes county, being the first that I knew of. The custom was to have preaching once a month, and two sermons in succession were always expected, if there was more than one preacher present. I never heard of a Sabbath-school till I was grown, and never was in one till brother Sherwood was pastor in Greensboro.
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