USA > Massachusetts > Middlesex County > Woburn > Proceedings 1892 at the two hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the incorporation of the town of Woburn, Massachusetts > Part 3
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The committee having the arrangements in charge consisted of the church and parish committees com- bined. The personnel was as follows : -
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[Sunday,
CHURCH : Deacons, Gawin R. Gage, Alvah Buckman, Joseph G. Pollard, Charles E. Richardson, A. B. Wyman, Edward E. Thompson, Abijah Thompson, Oliver F. Bryant, and Messrs. John K. Murdock, Fred. J. Brown, W. A. Prior, E. P. Fox. PARISH, Deacons Pollard and Bryant, and Mr. Luke Warren Fowle.
The choir was made up as follows: -
SOPRANOS : Mrs. M. H. Cotton, Miss Lena H. Brown, Mrs. Flor- ence W. Crosby, Miss Clara M. Fox, Mrs. H. E. Smith, Miss Florence E. Barrett, Miss Lillian M. Brooks, Miss Grace M. Cummings, Mrs. C. M. Strout, Mrs. T. Benton Tidd, Miss Emily H. Brown, Miss Ida Ellard, Miss Rhoda Converse. ALTOS : Mrs. L. Kathrine Cummings, Miss Anna H. Johnson, Miss Mary Cooledge, Miss Alice H. Safford, Mrs. C. Willard Smith, Miss A. Josephine Lang, Mrs. H. M. Eames, Mrs. F. J. Brown. TENORS : Messrs. E. G. Preston, E. H. Lounsbury, G. F. Bean, H. M. Eames, John L. Parker, Z. W. Atwood.
BASSES : Messrs. Geo. S. Cutler, M. H. Cotton, Alfred Richard- son, J. W. Fox, Charles M. Howe, Abijah Thompson, Warren P. Fox, C. Willard Smith, Fred J. Brown, Philip M. Brown. Waldo P. Cutler.
MORNING SERVICE.
The audience which attended the morning service numbered fully twelve hundred people, and was seated by a corps of ushers under the lead of Mr. J. Grafton Murdock. He was assisted by Messrs. Harry E. Marion, Chester R. Smith, I. Warren In- gerson, Chauncy B. Conn, Willard K. Fowle, Daniel B. Dimick, Stillman Shaw, Peter Miller, Edward Hart, Wallace Conn.
Upon the platform were : Rev. Dr. March ; Rev. W. J. Murphy, of North Woburn ; Rev. C. F. Her- sey, of Burlington ; Rev. S. R. Dennen, of Newton ;
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Rev. Jonathan Edwards, of Wellesley Hills ; Rev. Cyrus Richardson, of Nashua, N. H .; Rev. J. W. Wellman, of Malden.
The exercises began with an organ prelude at 10.15 A. M. by Mr. Hall, the selections being " Toccata in G" by Cutter, and " Marche Relig- ieuse " by Guilmant. This was followed by the " Gloria " from Mozart's 12th Mass. Rev. C. F. Hersey, of the Burlington church, invoked the Divine Blessing and read the Sixty-seventh Psalm. The audience and choir sang the hymn commencing,
" Oh, where are kings and empires now, Of old that went and came ?"
Rev. Dr. March read the Old Testament lesson from Ps. xliv. : 1-4, and Ps. xlviii : 1-3, 8-14, and the choir rendered the " Pilgrim Chorus " by Verdi : -
" From afar, gracious Lord, thou didst gather Thy flock, on these shores of the ocean ; Thee they owned as their God and their Father ; And when left in the wild waste forlorn, Still they served Thee, with steadfast devotion. Hear the cry which their children are sending, With the accents of penitence blending : Save thy people from peril and scorn. Oh, let peace bend its iris arch o'er us, Gentle breezes and waves with our voices Sing of light, love, and freedom in chorus, Till the Eden of old is renewed.
Ah ! our sins would call down thy displeasure,
But thy goodness our sad heart rejoices ; Be thy mercy displayed without measure, And by mercy our souls are subdued."
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Rev. Jonathan Edwards, of Wellesley Hills, and a former pastor, read the New Testament Lesson from Eph. iv. One of Dr. March's hymns, to the air of " Duke Street," followed, entitled " The Church in the Wilderness."
O Thou, to whom in forest shades Our fathers sung their Sabbath song, With hands firm grasped on battle blades And hearts for deeds of daring strong ;
We sing to thee in peaceful days, Where they stood armed for truth and right ;
We sing our song of grateful praise, Where they did sing in danger's night.
With high resolve their hearts were stored, On duty's post they fearless stood,
When famine spread their frugal board, And foemen thronged the trackless wood.
1
They built thy house in troublous times ; They made thy word their law of right ;
And now to earth's remotest climes, 'T is ours to send that cheering light.
Help us to keep that sacred truth, Which kept them calm in peril's hour ; In ripening age and tender youth, Give us the faith which gave them power.
Rev. W. J. Murphy, of the North Woburn church, offered prayer, and another original hymn was sung to the inspiring notes of " Lenox."
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Rev. DANIEL MARCH, D. D.
October 2.]
Sing loud with gladsome voice, Lift high the joyful sound, While silently and strong The measured years move round. Let organs roll and cymbals ring, And trumpets peal and voices ring. 1
Our fathers, in their day, Felt God was ever nigh, And we more blest than they, Should lift our praises high. Let trumpets sound and cymbals ring,
And old and young with gladness sing.
Their days were dark as night, And hardships pressed them sore ; Our days are calm and bright, Peace reigns from shore to shore.
Let organs roll and cymbals ring, And old and young united sing.
God keep us safe and sound, And guard us with his hand,
While circling years roll round, And millions throng our land. Let organs roll and trumpets peal, While we our vows of service seal.
Rev. Daniel March, the pastor, then delivered the following sermon : -
Ps. xliv. I. - "We have heard with our ears, O God, our fathers have told us, what work thou didst in their days, in the times of old."
Two hundred and fifty years ago, the fourteenth day of last August, according to the calendar of time then in use with our fathers, this first church in Woburn was formed. The sacred and significant service was held under the shadow of the primeval forest, on the borders of the great and unexplored wilderness of
53
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the New World. The wolf and the wild bear shared with the savage in the range of the wood and the fetterless freedom of untamed and wandering life. Our fathers came in compliance with the ancient command to "subdue the earth and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth." They began their work by building the one holy spiritual house which is the bulwark of national strength, and round which they and their children should dwell in quiet homes and settled habita- tions.
In the order of time, this was the twenty-fifth Congregational church founded in America, the twentieth in the State of Massa- chusetts, eighteen of which remain to this present and two have fallen asleep. It has maintained the soundness and the sim- plicity of its first faith and order through all the changes in society and the conflicts of opinion in the most progressive age of the world's history. It was thought by some to be too radical in the assertion of freedom in the days of its youth, and others sometimes think it too conservative in its advanced age. A wiser and more candid judgment will say that it did not run before it was sent at the start, and after two and a half centuries of toil and travel it still keeps even step with the foremost in the race. If we set our ear to the whispering gallery of time and catch the faintest murmurs that come down to us from our fathers' days, we shall learn some lessons which will help us to combine the ardor and hopefulness of youth with the strength and sobriety of age. Our sacred commemoration of our fathers' days will make us thankful that they, with all their mistakes and imperfections, transmitted to us a larger liberty than they learned to enjoy themselves, and they built for us upon foundations broader and deeper than they could measure at the time. The elegant mansions and comfortable homes of our time are the fair outgrowth of the rude cabins in which the first settlers made their board and bed. The spacious sanctuary, with cushioned seats and summer warmth in winter time, is the refrain of the song the forefathers sang in the fireless church and the frosty air.
The little band of seven, who had struck out from the mother church in Charlestown, strong in muscle and sound in faith, to build new homes in the wilderness, had come only ten miles
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from tide water line. But to them it was a perilous and weari- some journey, costing them more toil and hardship than a thou- sand miles by palace car or ocean steamer cost us in our day. The wood had no road, the stream had no bridge, the swamp had no solid footway for the traveller. Fallen trees and dense thickets and miry bog made weary work for man and beast, whether in the sunshine or the shade. Before the eventful day of the organization, a little space of ground had been cleared where the church of the wilderness was yet to be built. At the time appointed, elders and messengers from seven neighboring churches made their way through the wood, fording bridgeless streams and following wild paths that few had trodden before them to find the place of the solemn meeting. With them had come a civil magistrate of the colony to sanction and encourage the sacred enterprise and to see that all things should be done decently and in order so that the Commonwealth might receive no harm. To be in season for the long service of many hours they made the journey the day beforehand. They came on horseback, following each other in single file through the wood or scattering right and left of the uncertain track in search of a better. Sometimes in climbing the stony hill or crossing the miry swamp they dismounted as much from a regard for their own safety as from mercy to the beast on which they rode. It was the hottest and sultriest of summer days, and mosquitoes were out in full force to forbid the balmy sleep of the night. The venerable company made the woods ring with loud voices and merry laughter as they followed each other and told the story of their toils in the wilderness, or reasoned high of " free will, fixed fate, foreknowledge absolute," and grace divine to answer all demands of human need. On their arrival they dismounted with spattered boots and soiled coats, and perspiration stood out in beaded drops upon brows which had throbbed with mighty thoughts and keen debate on the journey. The weary horses were tied to the trees for the night, and the weary riders were taken into log cabins to receive the best fare that first settlers in the woods could give. The evening meal was sanctified with thanksgiving for the good providence which had guided them on the journey, and with prayer for safe keeping in the night. The low roof, thatched with pine and hemlock boughs, diffused
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a pleasant fragrance through the narrow room, and the timber walls, matched with mud and moss, kept the bears and wolves out and the mosquitoes in. The weary messengers slept the sleep of the just and rose early to prepare for the solemn duties of the day.
We are not told whether the morning was clear or overcast with clouds, nor do we know whether the service of the day was held under the trees in the open air or in some rude cabin or barn built by the first explorers of the ground. But in either case the grave worshippers were not assisted in their devotions by the surroundings of modern taste, comfort, or refinement. The interlacing arms of the ancient forest took the place of frescoed ceilings and climbing arches ; the fallen leaves and the green grass made the carpet for their sturdy feet to tread upon ; the yellow sunlight streaming through the foliage supplied the colored windows, and the murmur of the wind in the forest was the organ accompaniment of their strong voices as they sung the psalms of faith and victory. And they had a very deep and awful sense of the importance of the transaction in which they were engaged. To prepare themselves for the high responsibility which they were to bear, they listened for the space of four or five hours to the preaching, and they joined in the prayer of one of the venerable fathers in the ministry who labored to set forth the principles of the kingdom in long discourse, and to keep back nothing which it might be profitable for the little band of brethren to hear.
Then the seven men stood before the assembled elders and declared their faith, one by one, with confessions of the utmost humility and unworthiness to be accepted as witnesses for Christ and his Church in the wilderness. At the same time, with equal earnestness, they avowed their firm and solemn purpose to hold fast their profession in the face of every temptation. With the strongest expression of self-abasement and of entire surrender to the will of God in all things, they pledged their mutual faith and word of honor to walk together in all the commandments and ordinances of the Lord, with love and a good conscience toward all men. They solemnly renounced all errors and divisions, all falsity and unrighteousness and self-seeking, and agreed before the Searcher of all hearts and in the presence of human witnesses
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Dea. GAWIN R. GAGE.
October 2.]
to live soberly, watchfully, prayerfully together, according to the light which God had already given forth or might thereafter cause to shine forth from his providence and his word; and so they would continue to do, amid all the hardships and deprivations of the wilderness, until death should give them happy entrance into a better life.
Their descendants of a later day gave a more full expression to the spirit and meaning of the first covenant made under the shadow of the ancient forest. They promised to lay aside all wrath and envy and evil speaking, and to live as brethren in the spirit of brotherly kindness and confidence and charity, avoiding all jealousies and suspicions and risings of heart, ever exercising patience and generosity and meekness toward each other and toward all men. They engaged to be diligent in their appro- priate calling, faithful in promises, truthful in speech, blameless in life, and to labor with mutual co-operation for the advance of the kingdom of Christ and the coming of a reign of righteous- ness and peace in all the earth.
So the first seven men, constituting this Church of Christ two hundred and fifty years ago, covenanted together in the bonds of faith and fellowship with each other while the warwhoop of the savage was still heard in the wood, and the wolf and the bear broke the stillness of the night with their long howl. The elders and messengers, in the name of the churches which they repre- sented, accepted the vows of the banded seven and gave them the right hand of fellowship with hearty pledges of confidence and sympathy. Renewed and lengthened exhortations followed the tokens of fellowship, and the evening shadows were deepening in the forest when the closing prayer was rounded and completed with the loud AMEN. The weary fathers felt that good work had been done for the new town and for all mankind that day. To us, seeing it from this side of two and a half centuries, it is greater and better far than it could have seemed to them. Their faith and foresight were manifest in the fact that they set the kingdom of God first, and they trusted that all needed wealth and knowledge and power would come too, in the fulness of time. Another sultry night in the cabin homes, another sacred hour of morning prayer and song, and the reverend elders were mounted and on their way back to take up the toil in their own field and
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to tell their own people a new story of God's wonder-working providence in the New World.
The members of the new church were faithful to their vows to maintain the ordinances of the Lord's house in the wilderness. They showed such diligence in their efforts to secure a pastor who should break to them the bread of life that before the year had closed an engagement was made, and Thomas Carter was ordained the first minister of the first church in Woburn. The service of ordination was regarded as one of the most sacred importance by the fathers, and it was observed by them with as much solemnity as the organization of the church. The same elders and messengers of the neighboring churches came again on the long journey through the wood when the withered leaves of autumn strewed the ground, and the searching winds of Decem- ber had begun their winter song. The prospective pastor was set to preach and pray before the elders and the people for the greater part of the short day, and then he was put severely to question as to his qualifications for the ministry and his motives in entering the holy office.
When all was done, the young church, zealous for their liberty, would not permit any professional or prelatical consecration of their minister. Two private members, in the name of the rest, rose up reverently and stepped forward and laid their hands upon his head and said, solemnly, "We ordain thee, Thomas Carter, to be pastor unto this church of Christ." And so he was ordained and installed most effectively for the forty-two years of his min- istry over the church in the wilderness. The meagre records of the early time tell us little more of the life and work of the first minister than that he was a " reverend, godly man, apt to teach the sound and wholesome truth of Christ," and that the church grew in numbers and was greatly prospered under his long min- istry. He was a quiet, modest, retiring man, cherishing the studious habits which he had acquired in the English University of Cambridge, living in peace with all men, ruling his own house well, and passing rich with eighty pounds a year.
It would be interesting and instructive to us all, in this stirring time of change and progress, if we could go back and trace in minute and personal detail the history which followed the forma- tion of the church. But the records of its doings for one hun-
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dred years have been lost beyond recovery. We can now only gather up such general impressions as come from the known character of our fathers and the deeds that were done in their days. We know from many sources the truths which they be- lieved, the institutions which they founded, the manner of life which they led. They wrote their history, not on monuments of marble which time can efface, not on the sands of the shore which the waves can wash away, but in the living hearts of mil- lions who should come after them, in the growing character of the mightiest nation that is yet to be, in the quickening thoughts which makes and marks the progress of the ages for all mankind.
The oldest record left in the hands of the church is dated Dec. 4, 1755. At that time a call was given to Mr. Josiah Sher- man to be a colleague with Rev. John Fox in the ministry of this church. From that time onward to the settlement of Mr. Chick- ering in 1804, there is little found in the records which gives us the spirit of the time through which the country and the world were passing. The pages are taken up mainly with accounts of calls of councils for the settlement and the dismission of minis- ters, choice of deacons, admission of members, marriages, bap- tisms, deaths, and dismissions. Several calls were given to ministers who did not accept, and some years were passed without a pastor, but the preaching was never interrupted.
The few hints we can gather from the church records proper and from other sources show that through all the dark and peril- ous times of Indian wars and the Revolution, the church held its ground and made commendable progress in numbers and unity and strength. They had some differences on questions of minor importance, but they adjusted them quietly among them- selves without break of the original body. Cases for discipline sometimes came up for action, and the decision was always on the side of sound morality and good order. They had corre- spondence with neighboring churches on questions of doctrine and discipline, and they stood firmly for the old ways of the fathers, and in the main with good temper and sound discretion. They were quick to respond to the call for help in protecting the forest settlers who were exposed to attack when rumors came that Indians were on the warpath and that the rude homes of the wilderness had been burned and the people murdered or carried
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into captivity. They were not less responsive to the call for men to take the field during the long contest for national indepen- dence. The members of the church were on the march and in the camp ready for action from the firing of the first gun at Lex- ington to the last at Yorktown. The same patriotic spirit trans- mitted from father to son and from mothers to daughters manifested itself in support of the sacred cause of freedom and union in the greater contest of our own time. In the highest and truest sense it was a national church at its organization, and such it continues to this day.
As early as 1807, when the present century was well begun, and England was sending out its first missionary to China, this church was represented by delegate in forming and sustaining the first missionary society of Massachusetts. At the same date it organ- ized a charitable reading society for the purpose of collecting a library for the use. of the congregation and town. From that time onward to the present day, it is more easy to trace its con- tinual growth in resources and membership, in spirituality and power. After sending out the four colonies of Wilmington, Bur- lington, North Woburn, and Winchester, it still continued to grow like the banyan at the main trunk and to cherish the same life with the branches. The additions to the church, so far as can be ascertained, for one hundred and forty years show a continued advance after all the removals by death, dismissal, and colonizing. Beginning with the settlement of Mr. Sherman, in 1756, the mem- bers received during the several pastorates, so far as I can ascer- tain from the records, were as follows : -
During Mr. Sherman's pastorate of nineteen years . IO6 .
During Mr. Sargeant's pastorate of fourteen years .
· 62
During Mr. Chickering's pastorate of seventeen years During Mr. Bennett's pastorate of twenty-five years
· 164
· 760
During Mr. Edwards' pastorate of eight years
. 158
During Mr. Bodwell's pastorate of four years .
86
During Mr. Dennen's pastorate of three years
96
During Mr. Kelsey's pastorate of three years . 76
During the present pastorate of nineteen years
687
This bare catalogue of names serves to show that the fire lighted by the fathers in the ancient forest has continued to burn, and its light has gone out to the ends of the earth. The men
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Dea. JOSEPH G. POLLARD.
October 2.]
who laid the rude foundations in the wilderness were wise build- ers, and their successors who took up their work and carried it on improved upon the original plan and continued to do better work in their time. We have great reasons to thank God for a good ancestry and also to take courage in the hope that those who come after us will be better and stronger than we. In trying to improve upon the work of our fathers, we do not necessarily find fault with theirs. If our successors do better than we do, they will have just as little reason to think lightly of our work. To us all it is the honor and the success of life to take our place in the ranks of the grand army of the living that are ever on the march, meet the perils, the toils, and the sacrifices of our day as they come, and then leave others to fill up the ranks when we fall out and continue the grand march to glory and victory.
It means much that here in this New World of the West, two hundred and fifty years ago, there was instituted a sacred brother- hood whose grand aim was to put away all wickedness and misery from the face of the earth and to bring the greatest possible strength and peace and joy to every human soul. When con- querors were treading down the nations of the Old World, and corsairs were plundering on the seas, and prisons were crowded to stifling with the persecuted, and priests were presiding in the dungeons of torture, the exiles of the wilderness were laying the foundations of a better kingdom and bringing in a better hope for all the nations. And here this sacred association of men and women has stood through two and a half centuries of change and conflict, through the most eventful period of the world's history, and never swerved from its first high and beneficent intent, never abated a jot or tittle from its first far-reaching hope. All the while it has adhered to its first divine charter to bear witness for God and to take an honorable part in the best work for man. It has never laid down its high commission; it has never faltered in its faith; it has never ceased to work and give and pray that righteousness and peace, truth and liberty, may fill the earth.
Not many associations of men in this new country of ours are two hundred and fifty years old. Some that are oldest are least worthy of honorable mention. Some that make loudest procla- mation of their worth to the world had much better keep silence.
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But the continued existence, the growing power and purity of a Christian church for so long a time deserve to be celebrated in sacred song and public thanksgiving and the best speech that human lips can command. All people alike, citizens, patriots, friends of mankind, have reason to join heart and soul in such a celebration. For the church has no reason for its existence in this world save that which is essential to the happiness, the wel- fare, the highest interests of all mankind, in all time, to the ends of the earth.
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