USA > Massachusetts > Essex County > Salem > The pastor's jubilee : a discourse delivered in the South Church, Salem, Mass., April 24, 1855, by Brown Emerson, D.D. on the fiftieth anniversary of his ordination : with an appendix > Part 5
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path of your earthly journey, I found a new father, a new mother, and a new home, and speedily became convalescent of my sickness.
And I have yet another right to be here. The son of a clergyman of your neighboring town of Beverly, reared among the clerical associates of my father. himself the intimate friend of your father-in-law, and predeces- sor and colleague. Dr. Hopkins, as well as of yourself. I have sympathies with clergymen. such as the sons of the clergy can alone possess ; and that such sympathies exist. your moderator, (Mr. Huntington, ) himself of that honored lineage. will join in testimony.
And I here take occasion to say, that no impressions of my earlier days are more vivid than those created by my parents, in their frequent men- tion of the kindness and sympathy extended to them by Mr. and Mrs. Hopkins, at the time of the misunderstandings between my father and the parish of which he was the minister, and which resulted in a dissolution of his connection with it. Specially eloquent was my mother. during all her long life, when she spoke, as often she did. of the devoted friendship, the most seasonable and the unremitted kindness, and the practical sympathy extended towards her by Mrs. Hopkins. I remember this excellent woman most vividly ; and I desire to be grateful that I had, when under your roof, frequent opportunity of acknowledging her friendly offices to my father's family. And most cordially and heartily do I here repeat those acknowledgments. and renew my thanks for much and oft-repeated and excellent counsel given to me by you, sir, in those carlier days of my resi- dence here. - counsel, the value of which I know and feel, and which helped to make me to be a passably useful member of society. And though it may seem strange that, reared amid such goodly advice and such whole- some influences. I did not grow to the stature of perfection in humanity. even to the perfectness of the patterns before me. it is to me no small source of joy and thanksgiving that I am no worse than I am.
But my more special associations with your parish were as a member of your choir ; and I well remember that, urging down all the objections raised by that native modesty and bashfulness (!) which have been, through all my life, my strongest characteristics, [laughter, ] your pastor persuaded me to take a place in yonder gallery. How well do I remember that second Sun- day of that month of June ! How weil do I remember and recall the features and the form of every associate with whom. for so many years, I raised my voice in singing the praises of God in this His holy temple ! some of whom yet survive and are here, though many have passed the
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outer bounds of life, and, I trust, are now joining with saints and angels in the nearer presence of the Holiest, in that
"Undisturbed song of pure concent, As sung before the sapphire-colored throne, To Him that sits thereon, With saintly shout and solemn jubilee ! "
Several of them remained members of the choir for many years; for in those days a permanent service there was much more connnon than it is now, and both "young men and maidens. old men and children, praised the name of the Lord" in the house of the Lord. I myself have. during nearly forty-five years, taken my place at church among the " singing-men and the singing-women," always believing it to be " a good thing to sing praises unto the Lord " in ". His holy temple ; " and so I shall probably continue to do, until choral Young America crowds me out.
I believe I shall be pardoned. - nay, it may perhaps be pleasant. - if I make some little particular reference to the choir as it was at that time, even to the naming of names. First of all, and " toto vertice supra"- " head and shoulders above all of us"-was our excellent leader, the late Judge Eames, who died a few years since at Brooklyn, -a good law- yer, a sound scholar, and skillful musician.
Among the gentlemen were Palfray. Sprague, Brooks. Batchelder. Bancroft, Safford, J. Harris Jewett. D. Warner. H. Towne. (all now deceased. ) John Jewett. C. Warner. Hood. Foster. and Towne and Towne and Towne, (brothers. ) and Oliver, and two Hooks. (now living.) Of Elias and George G. Hook. I may here say. that about the time of which I speak (1819-23) they were beginning to turn their attention to the truly great art of organ-building. - an art in which they have since attained so great and so highly deserved a celebrity. Of the Townes. it may also be added, that, whilst good old Salem has passed away from its ancient municipal form of town-government and become a city. your singing choir has constantly kept up its organization of Townes, and lots of them, - fathers and sons, -have always been, and now continue to be, tenants of the musical end of this house. Sic semper sit !
Of the ladies who were there. there can be no impropriety in making mention, since most, if not all. of them, long since grew tired of their maiden names, and taking advantage of the law, and of good custom, in such case made and provided, and by " benefit of clergy," changed them for others. There were then a Williams, -eminent in voice and skill. - a Jenks, an Eames, two Brooks, a Felt, a Mann, (among the women
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singers, ) a Gould, a Lang, a Saunders, and five Mansfields. I believe that but three of these ladies are dead. There was yet one more, whose name I do not utter, because, when questioned by her to-day, at home, as to my intent to make reference to the old choir by name, I gave my word of promise and honor that she should go uncalled for. I will, therefore. only say that, from among the many worthy ones there, I really believe I helped myself to the worthiest, and have journeyed the journey of life with her. down to this present time of speaking. You may guess the name if you please, and believe me when I assure you that, from my own experience, I have every reason to believe that a good Cook will not fail to make a good wife.
Yet, retracing my steps a moment. I must beg permission to make more special reference to two gentlemen, between whom and myself, there con- tinued the closest relation of personal intimacy for a very long period of years, and until interrupted by death. - death that spares no loves, that heeds no friendships, that stops at no tears, that listens at no ery of sorrow. These were the late Hon. Warwick Palfray, Jr., formerly editor of the Essex (now Salem ) Register, and whose family is still of this parish ; and the late John Harris Jewett, Esq., a former business partner of Deacon Eliphalet Kimball, once of this church, and lately deceased at Malden. Both of these gentlemen were prominent as members of the choir, constant at rehearsals, and always found on the Sabbath in their appropriate places. They were of much skill as musicians, and of good and telling voice. That of Mr. Jewett was specially attractive, -rich, sweet-toned, and man- aged with a degree of taste and skill which could only be the prompting of a feeling heart. But, above all this. both were true men, full of the best spirit, faithful. loving, and loved. As I east my eyes to those seats, I see them now rising in their place to send forth the voice of song. I see cach feature, and the form and manner of each. I hear the sound of each several voice, and to my mind's ear come their utterings of the choral harmonies of God's praise. But now, alas, the voices of both are hushed by the palsying touch of death: Yes,
"Lost are those dear companions of my tuneful art ; Cold is Cadwallo's tongue ; Brave Urien sleeps beneath Lis craggy bed, And here we mourn in vain !"
But their name dieth not with us, and a blessed thing it is that such men do not, and cannot pass from our memories. They live with us, and in us,
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while we live, and happy will it be for us, if we ourselves can so live in the memories of those that shall survive us.
Why doth cach form that deeply buried lies. So loved, so honored, stand before our eyes ? Why doth the stricken spirit fondly trace The cherished features of each manly face ? Is it that Heaven, in mercy to our love, Sends their pure spirits from the realms above ?
Is it that He, who will'd that we should part, Deigns that they come to cheer the sorrowing heart ?
It must be so, - in answer to our prayer, Lest we should turn our mourning to despair.
Kind Heaven doth bless us ; - from the realins of day,
Bless'd Memory comes with all her bright array ;
She, with her magic wand, dispels the night, That shuts the parted from our longing sight ;
She shows the face, the form, the man, so true, That the heart leaps, enraptured at the view. H. K. O.
But they, and all that sang with them, have vacated their accustomed seats, and your eyes, my dear sir, rest on other features, and your ears lrear the song of other voices. So, too, have changed the instrumentation of that day; for in place of Howard's clarinet. and L' Ouvrier's violin. and Towne's violoncello, stands youder stately organ. the workmanship of the Hooks just mentioned, and touched by the fingers of one of the multi- tudinous Townes of the choir. Changed, also, is the manner of the psalm and hymn tunes, and a more sober, solemn, and devont style, in fitter accordance with the great temple-worship, has taken the place of the rambling, jerking. and illy constructed fugue tunes which abounded. and were even admired in the former days. I have no sorrowing at their departure, -specially none when I hear, in their place, the solemn tones of Dundee, and York, and Barby, and JJordan, and Martyrs, and the thousand other rich chorals of the English and German school.
But it is quite time that I close; and tendering to you, my dear sir, and to your excellent wife, my most cordial thanks for the many wholesome counsels given me in the days of my sojourning beneath your roof, and expressing my great gratification that you honor me with your friendship. I close with the fervent desire that all who have here en earth been privi- leged to sing the praises of God in His lower temple of praise, and all who, though but listeners to the song, shall be there gifted with voice as well as heart, may unite in one outpoured and o'erpowering hymn of praise, so full, so rich, so high, and so accordant, that
"Even the windows of God's own pavilion, Shall open wide and drink the harmony."
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Rev. JAMES M. HOPPIN. Pastor of the Crombie Street Church, followed Gen. Oliver. Mr. Hoppin said :
I can recall, Mr. President, no such rich associations of the past, as those who have preceded. I am also one of the " green saplings" to which a speaker alluded, whose fruit is not so sweet as that of the old trees, and I surely would enter into no feeble competition to-night. But I can truly say, that all the deepest and best feelings of my heart have been called out. One of the circumstances which have made my residence in Salem a happy one, has been the friendship of my venerable father in the ministry. I have more than. once gone to him for counsel in a profession which, at its very beginning, in its first week, requires as much wisdom as in its last week. That counsel has never been refused, and our intercourse has been most harmonions, and to me profitable. Alnost the first direct per- sonal meeting which I had with Dr. Emerson was when he sat as Moder- ator of the Council by which I was ordained, and as a poet says that when the mind is most awakened and excited, then impressions are most deeply fixed, -they strike in, as it were, -it is, sir. as Moderator that I always in- voluntarily think of Dr. Emerson, and shall always probably do so, -as Moderator, -as wisdom made calm and serene, and wiser still by age. Such an age, sir, seems to me the best type of a " finished life" which this world can afford. There may be finished lives among scientific men, and men of business; but the old age of a life spent in the highest service of God, and developing continually under the holiest influences, is a finished life, and a fortunate life, beyond all that the ancients, or even the author of the " de Senectute" ever conceived. It has a holy light. a light from above. upon it, which never entered the classic imagination. This scene, sir, this evening, has opened to me a new and singular revela- tion. I had always supposed that triumphs, and rejoicings, and ovations. were for the great men of the world, the statesmen, conquerors, and scholars, and that the humble minister of the gospel was to have his reward hereafter, and ins erown in another world. But I have now seen the crown of spontaneous love and admiration placed upon the head of the minister of Christ even here, as a kind of foreshadowing, it is hoped, of that which fadeth not away.
This occasion, sir, has been called by many of the speakers a jubilee. It is a jubilee, in which all is joy ; but the joy, to my mind. is of a high and spiritual character, and mingles with thoughts eternal. With all the interests hanging upon the preaching of the Gospel for fifty years, this scene is arched over by solemn and far-reaching realities. But how joyful in
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many aspects ! There is a cheering and glorious truth about such an old age itself. so spent. that it is to be renewed. All the signs of age -the white hair, the diminished vigor- are to be swept away. And this renewal is nearer at hand than to any other time of life. It is like the serene and starry night, after the day, drawing to the dawn of the new and everlasting morning.
The poet Sonthey has characterized a true old age in some lines on the holly tree :
" So serious should my youth appear among The thoughtless throons, So would I seem amid the young and gay More grave than they, That in my age as cheerful I might be As the green winter of the holly trec."
An earnest youth and a cheerful old age -this is a short picture of life. than which nothing can be more beautiful. And where, my friends. if you should search the world, could you find this picture more living than in our venerated friend whom we delight to honor ? His youth was spent in serious thoughts and grave toils. He has now the cheerful old age of faith and hope. Might I draw the lesson from the living example here : Might I entreat youth here to consecrate themselves now to the service of the Lord, that their old age may be cheerful and green.
Rev. ROBERT C. MILLS, Pastor of the First Baptist Church, was next called upon, and spoke substantially as follows :
Mr. President: I shall say anything, in response to the call now made on me, under much embarrassment. I have promised a lady, who sits beside me, that if. at this late hour, (after ten o'clock. ) another should arise to speak. I would retire with her from the meeting. How I can make any remarks and keep my promise it is not easy to say. Yet, as I am up, I will leave the question undeesled for a few moments.
I have, sir, been deeply interested in the exercises of this day and evening ; and now in word, as I have before in feeling, can add my con- gratulations to the many which this pastor and society are receiving on the present rare occasion. The most prominent impression made on my own mind, while participating in these services, has reference to the entire life of a servant of Jesus Christ. I have not been able to confine my atten- tion to what the aged and venerable pastor before us has recounted and suggested as having transpired during the half century, the close of which
:
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we are to-day commemorating. Long as his life has been, and pleasant as is its review, that life is not in the past, nor is its pleasantest portion there. Hope is better than experience. To any view but that of a faith resting on the Gospel of our Saviour, either he has almost lived through his allot- ment of existence, or what may be in the future is dark, or at best dim and uncertain. That. however, acquaints us with the plan of life which Christ has prepared for those of us who turn from sin to Him. Taught, as I conceive, sir, by the New Testament, to stretch my view over the limits of the present life. I have been thus employed, as I have thought of the grand remainder and the nobler form of life which the Master has in reserve for his servant who stands among us to-day, not far frem the goal of so many as four-score years. The veil is lifted far enough to excite our rejoieings at that elevation of Christ's servants to eternal life and glory which he has purchased for them by first becoming, in mysterious self- abasement, one of them in this humble. careful. painful, fleeting life. This is my congratulation of my venerated friend to-night.
I may add. sir, that I regard the revered pastor of this flock with the highest respect. It is a rare thing for an aged man to have passed through all the scenes of life in such a way as, by general consent, to receive from his fellow-men the award of a blameless character. Every one is an imperfect man ; and what he does must also bear the representa- tions and interpretations of all who observe, or who choose to discuss it. It is, then, a wonder that one of us ever has conceded to him a character so untarnished as this community accords to him whose long-continued minis- try we are to-day reviewing. It is only by the help of God that any man can do this ; and a similar case .* in another part of this State. excited the reverence and gratitude which my acquaintance with this pastor has renewed. I thank God. for the sake of our common nature, that neither the voice of justice nor the tongue of slander brings against him the charge of deviation from the proper course of an honest and truc man.
All this, and what more much kindness can add to it. have I found him to be during the years of my residence in this city, while employed in humble labors in the same department of duty as he has occupied. His fellows can confer on no man higher honor.
But this is not all. Some men have no power to attach their fellow- men to them. They leave them in indifference towards them, or even repel them. With these we are content to close our connection when this life separates us. There are others whom we have here known so pleasantly
. Rev. Thomas Rand, of West Springfield, an aged Baptist minister.
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that we do not feel willing to think our connection with them is forever ended, even when death occurs. Thus. Southey, who has just been quoted by another. somewhere mentions the death of a friend whom he would love to meet in the other world. This, I am confident. is the feeling of many towards him who has been so long spared to be a minister in this house. With such let me claim to be numbered, while with them I join in the prayer that the day may be as distant as their pastor desires, when we shall have left to us only the hope of thus enjoying his presence and society.
Rev. EPHRAIM W. ALLEN, Pastor of the Howard Street Church, being called upon, said :
At this late honr. Mr. President. it will not be desirable to say many words. A fair and beanteons wreath has been woven this evening to adorn the brow of this venerable pastor. After all that has been done, I have not one flower to offer. I can only attempt the hutuble office of, as it were, pressing it, lovingly, into shape, so expressing the sincere affection of my heart for him who is to wear it. And, as this is the hour for the free expression not only of thought but also of feeling, it will be permitted to me to say, that one reason for this attachment is to be found in the syn- pathy which he has shown in the time of sorrow -that time when, if ever, words and signs of affection have a peculiar significance and power. For. since my coming to this city, it has happened to me to know what bereave- ment is. While the pain occasioned by it was yet in its freshness, no voice was more soothing than his, no heart manife-ted a more tender regard ; and it is a regard which has never been intermitted, but it has rayed out in a thorsand forms of encouragement and cheer, drawing me towards him, as the magnet the iron, which
" Attracts it strangely with unclasping crooks, With unknown cords, with unconceived hooks, With unseen hands, with undiscerned arms, With hidden force, with sacred, secret charms."
It is, then, with a gush of gratitude that I, the latest in our peculiar fold, salute the earliest, and utter in his hearing-in yours-in that of this great assembly-in that of Him who is above all -the prayer that. when our ministry is ended, we may ascend to that world where we and all that are faithful to the end shall be crowned with fairer wreaths than any that human hands have ever made.
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Rev. ALEXANDER J. SESSIONS, of Melrose, formerly Pastor of the Crombie Street Church in Salem, succeeded Mr. Allen. Mr. Sessions said :
The words of the great dramatist. which I first met in my reading-book at school, have been running in my mind :
" All the world's a stage :
And all the men and women merely players."
They are not an unsuitable text for the occasion, and the more so since we draw near to its close. Vast numbers, then, play the part of mere attend- ants upon the stage-serving men and waiting women, door-keepers, carriers, and runners. Then there are a great many who come in only to swell the jubilant choruses of other people's songs, or to lengthen out the funeral train of the honored dead- women who pine in poverty, and men that are jostled about the street. Others make themselves prominent by their skill in acting, rather than by the importance of their part. A few are great, both by virtue of their powers and the place they fill, half dividing attention with the hero of the piece himself : as Iago in his cunning vil- lany, or Ophelia in her sorrow and disheveled tresses. Most come and go at uncertain intervals ; suddenly appear and suddenly vanish. But the chief character among the dramatis persone is more steadily before the eyes, as in the thoughts of the great auditory, gathering in himself the interest of the play, and making other actors revolve about his person.
Now the chief character here to-night. has been upon the publie stage for fifty years, -for fifty years! Appearing in much the same costume, he has ever sustained the same part. His tread has been a manly tread. His representation has been a representation of truth, of uprightness, of benevolence, of piety. We are here to crown him with a living wreath. Parents and children crown him ; young men and maidens, parishioners and citizens, ministers and laymen.
By and by the curtain shall fall. - the curtain shall fall! The foot- lights shall be put out -lights which may here stand for the lights of our own hearth-stones; and the lights of the vast theatre shall all go out, - lights symbolizing the stars, which now grow dim to the eyes of age and of youth; and that night shall settle down upon actor and audience, to which no to-morrow shall succeed. But the lessons which the chief character here hath taught us, the sentiments imprinted by him on the hearts of unnumbered assemblies. and of different generations, shall remain ; and God himself shall crown him, where the trees are always green, and the waters forever flow !
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The venerable Rev. DAVID T. KIMBALL, who was settled over the First Parish in Ipswich, October 8, 1806, more than forty-eight years ago, next said :
Mr. President: At this late hour I design to occupy only a few moments.
The present is to me an occasion of great interest, as I commenced my pastoral labors soon after my brother, whose fiftieth anniversary we now celebrate, commenced his, and have been a witness to the ability and faith- fulness of his ministry, and the consistency of his Christian life. Contrary to my uniform practice, I absent myself from the meeting of the Essex North Association. now held in my native town, for which I have officiated as clerk more than forty years, for the purpose of enjoying this rare occasion.
The place where I stand is to me solemnly interesting. For in that sacred desk, in several instances, on the Lord's day. I sat by the side of the venerable man with whom this, my brother, was associated in the days of his youth, in the pastoral office. And for the space of almost fifty years I was accustomed to preach in that desk on exchange with its now vener- ated Senior Pastor.
I congratulate you. my dear brother, that you have so long, and with so much acceptance and success, dispensed the gospel here; and it is my sincere and ardent desire that you may continue to do it with increased success for years and years to come, and that great may be your reward in Heaven.
I congratulate you, my friends of this church and congregation, in your present happy state, under the united ministry of two pastors, who, with their different gifts and graces, adapted to the different tastes and char- acters of their hearers, and in great harmony of spirit, are carrying on the work of God among you. I rejoice in the evidence you give that you regard an aged pastor, who has faithfully devoted the best of his days to the service of your souls, as justly entitled to an honorable support, while dividing his labors with a young brother. I cannot restrain my joy that you are giving your sanction, publicly and efficiently, to the sentiment that a pastor who has devoted his talents and his life to the spiritual good of a people till he lias numbered his three-score years and ten, has a just claim to a liberal support from them during his remaining days. In this you are a happy model for the churches and religious societies of this county, of this commonwealth, of New England, and of our country, who may be favored with diligent and faithful pastors for nearly or quite half a century.
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