USA > Missouri > Centennial history of Missouri (the center state) one hundred years in the Union, 1820-1921, Volume I > Part 106
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The New Conditions.
"These lawyers of a former epoch have passed forever out of our view. The electric currents of their minds flash no more; and their voices are silent. This and the next gen- eration will not see their like. Our commercialized civilization does not breed them; and if it did the pharisaism and artificialism of the times would not cultivate them. They were, however, monument builders; and they gave Missouri a high place among the bright sister-
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hood of states. It has always been and ever will be true that the standards of our profes- sion can best be gauged by the lawyers who stand out in the community preeminent for their learning, honor and moral courage. Like a flawless, high-grade mirror, they give back no distorted image. Their reflection makes others see their own lineaments by comparison ; so that they must strive to grow into the likeness of great men, or sink away into obscurity. When there is only mediocrity at any bar it is apt to degenerate into mental dwarfage, for lack of ambition stimulated by example.
"The best specific any community can formulate for the extermination of the growing pest of shysters is to foster and support only the nobler breed of lawyers.
Days of the Hand Picked Lawyer.
"In those days the lawyer, as a rule, was 'hand picked,' not machine made. I have known some lawyers of whom it was said 'they could neither read, spell nor write,' who were quite formidable, if they could get beyond the court to the jury, with the applause of the onlooking, hungry-eyed rabble. But their notoriety came from committing assaults and batteries on grammar and rhetoric in the very temple of justice! The conception the ancients had of the real lawyer was that he should be an educated man .. I knew lawyers of the old school who were as familiar with Plato, Aristotle and Lovingus as they were with Littleton, Coke and Blackstone, who comprehended the arguments of Demosthenes, Tully and Cicero as they did the rationale of the opinions of the great jurists of England and America. They regarded the law as a science, and its practice as the noblest calling that ever appealed to the ambition of the intellectual man. They had few books, but they mastered them. Believing with Lord Coke that 'out of the old fields cometh this new corn of modern jurisprudence.' they put to practice what Montesquieu said, 'when I discovered my first principles everything I sought for appeared.' Thus they solved the many intricate questions growing out of the passing from territorial to state existence, the tenure of land titles emanating from Spanish grants and national government, and the power of the legis- lature territorial and state, to enact certain statutes. If the lawyer or the judge could not find a precedent, they adopted the motto of the pick axe on the dial, 'I will find a way or make one.'
"Today we have multitudes of lawyers and judges who expend their time and energies in hunting up some allied case through the reports, from the tomes of the Inns of Court in London to Biscay and Bombay, from New England to New Mexico, and from Amster- dam to 'Ubedam.' And if they do not find one 'ipsissime verbis,' on all fours with the case in hand, they are all at sea. Such men are mere floaters, not swimmers. Like a man with palsy, they live half dead.
"One hundred years ago, the shyster was almost an unknown 'cuss' in Missouri. There is something about our boasted civilization that breeds the shyster. I suppose this stands to the law of natural creation. There are more flies than eagles. A single maggot will generate myriads of flies. The fly has such a vile stomach, it finds in the offal, the ex- crescence of overwrought civilization, so much to feed and batten on; while the eagle that nests in the lofty cedar top, or its aerie, spreads wing on the upper air, and the game on which it feeds is harder to catch, with more power of resistance. Hence it is that we have swarms of shysters today who 'rescue a gentleman's estate from his enemies and keep it themselves'; who enter into copartnership with the client with the concealed purpose of becoming the surviving partner. To rescue the profession from such ravishers is the knighthood of the true lawyer's calling.
Ethics of the Shyster.
"There are lawyers who must have learned their ethics from pious old Peggy Lobb, who enjoined on her hopeful son, Paul, when he was leaving the parental roof to go out into the world: 'My child, stick to your sittivation in life; read your Bible, study you kitty- chism, and talk like a pious one, for people goes more by what you says than by what you does. If you wants anything that is not your own, try and do without it, but if you can't do without it, take it by insinivation, and not bluster, for they as steals gets more and risks less than they as robs, for of sich is the Kingdom of Heaven.'
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"In reading anew the other evening the travels of the Israelites in Egypt, the thought occurred, that if the good Lord, in sending the afflictions of bloody water, bloody murrain, locusts, flies and lice upon the Egyptians to compel Pharaoh to let the Israelites depart from the land, had only sent upon them swarms of shysters to foment among them petty strifes, and despoil them of their jewels, flocks, cattle and corn, in the way of fees, old Pharaoh, at the first onslaught, would have exclaimed: 'I give up; go Moses, and don't stand upon the order of your going.' Thus Pharaoh might have escaped the cataclysm of the Red Sea, being better occupied in throwing the shysters into the Nile !
"As tonight we lift the veil from the sepulchers of the sturdy pioneers, who trampled down the wild briars and bull nettles, and opened the primeval forests to let in the light of a higher civilization, who struggled so long and hard to break through the chrysalis of territorial existence, to breathe the inspiring sense of statehood, let not the fact be un- recognized that one of the great factors in bringing about the long wished for consumma- tion were the lawyers of one hundred years ago. I could crave no brighter halo for the sunset glow of life than to witness the crowning of the brow of my native state with the Centennial wreath.
CHAPTER XXX
THE RELIGIOUS LIFE
Colonial Theology-The Coming of John Clark-Church Bells Barred-First Protestant Churches Built in Missouri-Presbyterianism's Foothold-Dr. Niccolls' Centennial Ser- mon-First Protestant Church in St. Louis a Public Enterprise-Catholic Diocese of St. Louis-Coming of Bishop Dubourg-Culture One Hundred Years Ago-Rosati's Constructive Carcer-The First Cathedral-A Catholic Census-When Rev. Mr. Potts Was "the Rage"-Archbishop Kenrick-"The Rome of America"-Baptist Church Building and City Planning-The Pulpit and Literature-Religious Journalism-Ante- bellum Church Architecture-St. Louis an Archdiocese-The Prayerbook Church-Dr. Montgomery Schuyler's Career-Some Notable Pastorates-A Hero of the Cholera- Dr. Hutchinson on David and Uriah-The Tallest Steeple-Far-reaching Influence of Dr. Eliot-Dr. Post and Congregationalism-Judge Philips on Presbyterianism in Cen- tral Missouri-War Experiences-The Kenrick Lectures and The Newsletter-Mc- Cullagh's "Great Controversy"-Father Ryan, Orator and Wit-Religious Intolerance Exceptional-Dr. Niccolls on Progressive Catholicism-Bishop Tuttle-The New Cathe- dral-Religion and Good Works-The Y. M. C. A .- The Provident Association-A Layman's Monument-Missouri's Moral Standards.
All the churches named and unnamed have wrought together for the moral and spiritual uplifting of the city. It is not claimed that all have seen the truth with equal clearness and fullness, or from the same angle of vision. There have been vain rivalries among them, divisions that were disastrous and shameful. misconceptions and separating prejudices, but all, according to their light, have stood for liberty of conscience, for freedom from ecclesiastical tyranny and for the authority of the word of God. They have persistently upheld the claims of eternal righteousness, and have called upon men to live in view of their relations to God and an endless future. We have no arithmetic by which to compute the value of their ministries, or to sum up the riches they have secured for the city. They have taught men to see the invisible world, to lay hold of its wealth and to labor for the coming of the kingdom of God. In the midst of the evil tendencies of a great and growing city, the greed for gain, the love of sensual pleasure, the demoralization of luxury, the oppressions of the strong and the despair and sorrow of the weak and poor, all of which degrade man, they have sought to remind him of a nobler and higher life, to tell of God's redeeming grace and of the glorious future to which that grace was calling him. They have endeavored to keep open the channel of communication between earth and heaven, and to persuade men to live as the children of God .- From the sermon of Rev. Dr. Samuel J. Niccolls on "The Ministry of Religion," in St. Louis, Centennial Sunday, 1909.
When Americans came to settle in Missouri before the purchase of Louisiana territory the Spanish governor informed them officially that the law required every resident to be "un bon Catholique." Then he proceeded to put some very general questions as to spiritual opinions. Tradition has it that the questions as translated were to this effect :
"Do you believe in the Almighty God; in the Holy Trinity; in the true Apostolic Church ; in Jesus Christ, our Saviour?"
The American applicants readily answered that they did so believe. The com- mandant concluded by declaring the answers were satisfactory, and that the new- comers were evidently good Catholics and could remain. It is not of record that
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otherwise desirable Americans were turned back from Missouri because of their religious convictions.
Major Holcombe concluded from his researches that "the first Protestant minister who set foot in Missouri" was John Clark, a Scotchman. He described Clark as "born and bred a Presbyterian, became a Methodist, then a Baptist. With another Methodist preacher, they baptized each other." Clark, at the age of twenty enlisted in the British navy. He was taken prisoner and was con- fined at Havana nineteen years. Going back to England he had several conversa- tions with Wesley. This was his preparation for missionary work in the Mis- sissippi Valley.
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Clark, for some years, lived on the Illinois side, crossed over by night and held his meetings. The Spanish governor waited until he thought the preacher had about completed his round of visits among the American Protestant families and then sent him word he must leave within three days , or he would be im- prisoned as the teaching of the Protestant faith was in violation of the Spanish laws. The Rev. John Clark would smile, hold a farewell service and go back to the Illinois side, to repeat his missionary trip a little later. The liberality of Gov- ernor Trudeau was put to a rather severe test when Abraham Musick called at government house and boldly asked for a permit to hold Baptist meetings in his house out in the country. The governor denied the petition and quoted the law. Then looking significantly at the sturdy Kentuckian, he added :
"I mean you must not put a bell on your house and call it a church or suffer anybody to christen your children except the parish priest, but if your friends choose to meet in your house to sing, pray and talk about religion, you will not be molested, provided you continue, as of course you are, a good Catholic."
First Protestant Churches Built in Missouri.
Five miles west of Cape Girardeau stands one of the first, if not the first, of Protestant churches built in Missouri, and, for that matter, west of the Mis- sissippi. It is McKendree chapel. The material is yellow poplar logs. The dimensions are forty by fifty feet. The church was built by Jesse Walker, who established Methodism in Missouri, and years later in what was to be Chicago. The original structure fell into almost ruins but a Methodist with reverence for the historical sentiment, William R. McCormack, repaired and restored it. Methodist conferences were held in this historic McKendree chapel in 1819, 1821, 1826, and 1831. John Clark, the eccentric Scotchman, preached in this chapel. According to one biographer, Clark came to America in 1778, enlisted in the Colonial army, was captured by the British, escaped, rejoined the army and fought to the end of the Revolutionary war. He then entered the ministry, traveled on foot through Tennessee and Kentucky, holding great revivals, crossed the Mississippi at Cape Girardeau and held what, probably, was the first revival in Missouri. John Oglesby and Robert R. Witten were two other pioneers who held services in this church. Bishop George, Bishop Roberts and Bishop Soule pre- sided over the early conferences held in McKendree chapel.
The earliest Protestant meeting house is credited by some historians to the Baptists. In 1806, two years after the transfer at St. Louis, the Bethel Baptist church was built near Jackson in Cape Girardeau county. It was made of logs
CENTENARY METHODIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH, FIFTH AND PINE STREETS, IN 1859, AND DR. McANALLY'S CHRISTIAN ADVOCATE OFFICE ON PINE STEET
Rev. Dr. D. R. McAnally, Methodist
Rev. S. B. McPheeters, Presbyterian
EMINENT MISSOURI PREACHERS OF THE CIVIL WAR PERIOD
Vol. 1-61
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THE RELIGIOUS LIFE
and was standing a half century later. Rev. David Green, a Virginian, organized the society. He died three years later. When the Missouri Baptists, recruited to a mighty army, wanted to place a monument of this first pastor of the first non- Catholic church between the Mississippi and the Pacific they could not find the grave.
Cumberland Presbyterians organized in Pike county. They formed their first presbytery with four ministers. The denomination spread locally with such strength that Cumberland Presbyterianism was called by a historian "The es- tablished church of Pike county."
Good natured controversy as to "the first Protestant organization having continuous life west of the Mississippi" arose near the end of the Missouri's century of statehood. H. M. Blossom thought the First Presbyterian church of St. Louis held that record, dating from 1817. Rev. J. E. Dillard, however, called attention to the fact that Fee Fee Baptist church, in St. Louis county, had been in continuous existence since 1807, having been started in that year at what is now known as Pattonville, by Rev. Thomas R. Music, of Virginia.
The Rise of Presbyterianism.
The pioneer of Presbyterianism in Missouri was a Connecticut man, Rev. Salmon Giddings. Appointed a missionary, he rode horseback 1,200 miles, in winter, arriving in April, 1816. As his chief means of support Mr. Giddings conducted a school for girls on Market street opposite the court house. The missionary spirit prompted him to go among the newcomers in Missouri and to gather them into congregations. In this way he organized twelve Presby- terian churches. He got together in his school room a number of Missourians and organized a society to distribute Bibles. It is told of one of the churches Salmon Giddings organized that the pastor who was installed over it, Charles S. Robinson, a Massachusetts man, was at one time "entirely out of money and out of food for his family, but just when his need was greatest he found a silver dollar imbedded in the earth, which sufficed for all his wants until a more per- manent supply came."
"The Ministry of Religion in St. Louis" was the subject of a sermon, con- taining much interesting history, which Rev. Dr. Samuel J. Niccolls preached in the Second Presbyterian church on Centennial Sunday in 1909. With the sole exception of Rev. Dr. M. Rhodes, of St. Mark's Evangelical Lutheran church, Dr. Niccolls had held his pastorate longer than any other Protestant minister in St. Louis. Of the start and rise of Presbyterianism in Missouri, Dr. Nic- colls said :
On April 6, 1816, Rev. Salmon Giddings crossed the river after a journey of over twelve months from New England, and on the next day preached to a small congregation, his first sermon. He found the city without a Protestant minister, and himself an unwelcome herald of the Gospel. Rumors had been circulated unfavorable to him. An article entitled "Caution" had appeared in the Missouri Gazette of that day, warning the people against him, and declaring that he was an emissary of the famous Hartford Convention; but, unmoved by the report and with that quiet persistence which characterized his subsequent ministry, he began his work. He was a consecrated man of blameless life, sterling common sense, patient, persevering and of indomitable will. He was ceaseless in his activities, preaching
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not only in the city, but in the outlying settlements. The first church organized by him was at Belleview settlement, in Washington county; the second at Bonhomme, October 16, 1816.
In St. Louis he started a school, from which he supported himself in his ministry. On November 23, 1817, he organized the First Presbyterian Church, the first Protestant church in St. Louis. At its organization it consisted of nine members, and its two male members, Stephen Hempstead and Thomas Osborn, were chosen ruling elders.
On December 18th, of the same year, the Presbytery of Missouri was organized in St. Louis by the authority of the Synod of Tennessee. Its territory was wide enough, for it included all that part of the United States west of the meridian line, drawn across the Cumberland river. There were but four members of the presbytery-Salmon Giddings, Timothy Flint, Thomas Donnell and John Matthews.
At that time there was no resident minister in the State of Illinois, and the total mem- bership of the presbytery did not exceed 200. Yet from this feeble beginning, there grew twenty-nine presbyteries and three great synods, including a membership of more than 180,000 persons.
In 1832 St. Louis claimed to have a population of 7,000. Allowing for western boasting. it had probably 6,000. In that year a second church, under the ministry of Rev. Dr. Hatfield, was organized, through a colony from the First church. This organization was subsequently dissolved and its members returned to the mother church.
In the same year, 1832, the synod of Missouri was organized in the First church of this city. It was the year of the great plague, the visitation of cholera, which brought death and lamentation to so many homes. The death rate was over twenty each day. The min- isters present at the organization of the synod remained in the city, preaching daily the offers and consolation of the Gospel, and as a result there was a widespread revival of religion, which left a permanent effect upon the moral and spiritual life of the city.
In 1838 the present Second church was organized by a colony from the First church, and Rev. William S. Potts, D. D., was called to be its first pastor. From this time on the number of churches increased rapidly with the increasing growth of the city. My limited time forbids even a mention of their origin, location and names. It is enough now to say that the present number of all branches of the Presbyterian church, including missions in the city, is fifty-three, distributed as follows: Presbyterian church, United States of America, thirty-eight; Presbyterian church, United States, seven; United Presbyterian church, four; Reformed Presbyterian church, three; Cumberland Presbyterian church, one.
But, while the Presbyterian church represents numerically the largest of the divisions of Protestantism, it is very far from including the chief religious forces that have wrought for the advancement of the city. The Baptist church began its labors in the territory while it was yet a Spanish province, but its first church in St. Louis was organized on February 18, 1818. The Methodist circuit riders were engaged in their self-denying labors in the new territory as early as 1810, and in 1820 the first Methodist church was organized in St. Louis. The first Episcopal church was organized in 1819. Out of this organization Christ church has grown. The first United Presbyterian church in St. Louis was organized in 1840, and there are now four churches of that order in the city.
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Church Building and Good Citizenship.
When the nine pioneers organized the First Presbyterian church in Novem- ber, 1817, they drew up and signed an agreement or covenant to watch over each other and to regulate their lives in a "spirit of Christian meekness," and to maintain the worship of God in their homes. Church building has always been linked with good citizenship in St. Louis. Business men have aided such enter- prises on the broad principle that a city cannot have too many or too fine churches. The congregation worshipped in the room where Mr. Giddings carried on the school to support himself. When the time seemed favorable, financially, for the building of the First Presbyterian church in St. Louis, the little congrega- tion had the substantial sympathy of the whole community. A public meeting
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THE RELIGIOUS LIFE
was held to start the subscription paper. Alexander McNair, who became the first governor of Missouri, was the chairman of that meeting. Thomas H. Benton, afterwards the thirty years senator, was the secretary. When the paper was passed around Catholic business men put down their subscriptions freely. The largest contribution was $200, given by Matthew Kerr. In the class of $50 subscribers were three of the most prominent members of the old Cathedral parish. John Quincy Adams, who became President, sent a subscrip- tion of $25. The site for the church, the west side of Fourth street, near Washington avenue, was purchased for $327. When Salmon Giddings died 2,000 people, half of the population of St. Louis, attended the funeral.
Impressions in 1837.
One of the early Presbyterian ministers of Missouri was Rev. Dr. John Leighton. He came to St. Louis in 1836. Dr. Leighton left this recollection of the beginning of his pastorate:
"My first impression was of surprise that the good people of the church should have located their place of worship away beyond the town and outside of the population. I glanced to the west and the south, and beyond the unpaved street on which I stood. I could see little but an unreclaimed flat, covered with stagnant water, with here and there a clump of brush. Here, thought I, is another proof that Presbyterians are the 'Lord's foolish people,' for the sake of a cheap lot, building their church where few of their neigh- bors would care to follow them. The house itself was a very unpretending one, inferior to many of the wooden churches we now have in the rural districts, and was surmounted by a belfry not unlike what we see upon factories. That house subsequently underwent changes within and without, which were thought to be elegant improvements befitting the condition of the little town. The pulpit was brought down from its perch midway between the ceiling and floor; and the roof was crowned with what in courtesy was called a steeple. But while the church was a very unpretending building when I first saw it, we must not infer that the worshipers within it were all plain, unpretending folk.
"Just about one year from that time, in the spring of 1837, the following scene might have been witnessed: On a Sabbath morning a lady, dressed in heavy silk, advanced up the street, having behind her a train of extraordinary length. This appendage was sup- ported and borne by two colored boys, one hand of each holding up the train, and the other hand of each carrying this one a fan, and that one a hymn book. When the door of the church was reached the train was dropped, the fan and the book were passed to the hands of the lady, and the pages went their way."
The Diocese of St. Louis.
The existence of the diocese of St. Louis dates from July, 1826. But St. Louis was the residence of a bishop many years earlier. Louis William Valen- tine Dubourg was consecrated bishop of New Orleans in 1815. The ceremony took place in Rome. Almost immediately Bishop Dubourg asked to have the diocese divided and a new see of St. Louis created. The church documents of that day refer to St. Louis as situated variously in Upper Louisiana, Louisiana Superior and Alta Louisiana. Before action was taken on Bishop Dubourg's petition, the proposition was withdrawn. From New Orleans came the informa- tion, through church channels, that such a rebellious spirit prevailed among those in control of the cathedral of New Orleans, it would not be safe for Bishop Dubourg to take up his residence there. Investigation showed threats were being made "that the bishop would be shot in the streets of New Orleans if he
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dared set foot on its soil." In the church correspondence of that day New Orleans was referred to as "Vera Nova Babilonia"-a new Babylon. In order that Bishop Dubourg might reside within his diocese, the proposition to make a see of St. Louis was withdrawn.
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