USA > New Jersey > Essex County > Orange > The First Church, Orange, N. J. : one hundred and fiftieth anniversary, November 24 and 25, 1869 > Part 5
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From a contemporary publication, (Historical Sketch of Opinions on the Atonement, 1817,) a
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goodly octavo volume, I quote as follows : "Error spreads, and the great interests of the Redeemer's kingdom are compromised. Gentle measures have been tried, and have failed. It may be thought the Theological Seminary will correct the evil, and no doubt it will counteract the operations of error- ists ; but its progress will be slow ; and it is even possible the Hopkinsians may obtain its direction, for an unwise policy, called peaceful, has already given Mr. Spring, Dr. Richards, and Mr. Hillyer a seat in the board."
Such was the published estimate, at that date, of Dr. Hillyer, and yet through all the bitter strifes of twenty years later-with the exception of a single year-he retained his seat in the Seminary board. Sadly must he have felt the alienations and sus- picions of the period of the division of the Presby- terian church, and gladly would he have welcomed the era of peace and union that has dawned at last.
But with all the clouds that gathered over and around him, he was not left without more than the consolations of a peaceful conscience. He lived to note the growth and extension of the church in this
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and in other lands. He saw the introduction of Sabbath Schools. He participated in the formation of Bible, Missionary, and Tract Societies, the glory of the age. He was rewarded by witnessing revival after revival, which gathered harvests of souls into the church over which he watched with such devo- tion and fidelity.
The close of Dr. Hillyer's ministry brings us down to a period within the memory of those who yet survive, and who can recall his farewell words and counsels of peace. Of his immediate succes- sors, White and Hoyt, the memory of many of you keeps a fuller and fresher record than can be traced by the pen. The last-named of these was my class- mate and friend, and in his unassuming manner, sound sense, thorough scholarship, and devoted piety, it was always safe to confide. I might pay a warmer tribute to his worth, if I was at liberty to open the record of personal afflictions and private sympathies.
We have now passed hastily through the succes- sive stories of the historical structure with which this church is identified. We have simply caught
7
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glimpses, as we have looked forth from the win- dows, of the scenes on which the generations gazed that have passed on before us. Shall we not now go and look to the east and to the west, to the period that preceded the founding of the church, and to that future that expands dimly but grandly over our horizon ?
Surely one cannot walk along the crest of these three last half centuries, without pausing at either end, and regarding the contrast which a view from each presents. The founders of this church stood in immediate proximity to scenes and events of deepest interest in Presbyterian history. Less than a half century before, New York was a Dutch colony, and on the whole Atlantic slope, Presbyte- rianism had scarcely a foothold or a name. Con- gregationalism-with a leaven of Presbyterianism, represented by such names as Colman and Stod- dard, and the father of the elder Edwards-was the established church in Massachusetts and Connecti- cut. Episcopalians and Quakers, and a few scat- tered Baptist churches, were asking for a measure of toleration that would exempt them from the
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society or town tax for the support of ministers on whose services they did not find it edifying to attend. By a stretch of usurpation, Lord Corn- bury, vieing with the bigotry of the Stuarts, had secured in New York the state establishment of the Episcopal church. He had thrown into a New York prison-and kept him there for weeks, releasing him only on the payment of exorbitant costs-Francis Makemie, the Father of the Amer- ican Presbyterian church ; and he had done this for the mere crime-with which he was charged-of preaching a Presbyterian sermon in a private house in Pearl street. At Jamaica, L. I., he had thrust out the Presbyterian minister, to make room for an Episcopal incumbent, with no better right than the authority of bayonets. Among the founders of the Orange church there must have been some few, at least, on whose memories outrages like these had left a deep and still vivid impression, and who needed not to go to the Old World to find how little religious liberty was understood or practiced by men in power, even on this continent.
But almost as fresh, too, on the page of memory,
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were traced the leading facts of that more than romantic, that terribly tragic story which for nearly two consecutive generations had constituted the record of Presbyterianism in Scotland and Ireland. The founders of this church may well have con- versed with those who shared the siege of Derry, or listened to battle songs or gospel messages,
" By Cameron thundered, or by Renwick poured In sweetest strain."
It can scarcely be, that in their childhood some of them had not heard the story of bloody Claver- house and his dragoons; or of Richard Baxter arraigned, to be insulted by the monster Jeffries for deeds of Christian service for which we honor him; or of English prisons filled with men like Joseph Alleine, or John Bunyan, of whom the world was not worthy ; while the caustic but well- dissembled irony of Defoe's "Shortest way with the Dissenters," and the unreasoning bigotry and excitement that characterized the period of the trial of Sachevernell, and the national convulsion that resulted from the attempt to restore the Stu-
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arts to the English throne, were things of yester- day. If we could have seated ourselves by the fireside of the more intelligent and thoughtful of the men who first stood forth here to profess them- selves the Lord's freemen, we might have heard them speaking now of the victories of the great Marlborough, and now of the Indian wars at the North and the South, and still again of Presbyte- rian exiles from Ireland seeking a refuge on these shores, and the probabilities that attempts would be made here to deprive them of their religious rights. Perhaps the conversation turns on Corn- bury's iniquities, and the vain attempt of the Pres- byterians of New York city to secure themselves a charter of incorporation, in which they were opposed and defeated by Trinity Church; and per- haps they expressed no idle or shallow fear that the time might come when ecclesiastical usurpation would reach its long arm across the ocean, and lord it over the consciences of men who had hoped to find a safe asylum here. However this may be, nearly one hundred years before Connecticut laws allowed equal liberty to all sects, and more than
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that, before Massachusetts adopted the principle, these fathers of the Orange church, inheriting the principle for which the Scottish martyrs before all others had suffered and contended, that every church has a right to choose its own pastor, and manage, in subordination to the common interests, its own affairs, embodied in their organization and vindicated in their practice the great central truth of ecclesiastical autonomy, so strangely overlooked for generations, but on this soil never to be lost sight of again.
With something of fear and trembling they gathered up the lessons of the past. The clouds were still piled up on the eastern sky, which spoke of the tempests of wrong and outrage which the preceding generation of Englishmen had felt in their full severity. What a future might still be before them they could not tell, but they had abun- dant reason to be jealous of their rights, and guard with vigilance their sacred trust.
But where do we stand to-day, and what is the prospect that opens before us ? The feeble one has become a host. The Presbyterian church in
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this country, divided once and again, is at length reunited. Its history is enriched with grandest names. Turn over its pages, and you shall meet there the portraits of Makemie, Dickinson, Burr, Edwards, Davies, Witherspoon, Mason, Griffin, Blackburn, Alexander, Miller, Richards, and scores of others, the very mention of whom brings up before us all that is venerable in char- acter, or high and pure in purpose, or command- ing in eloquence. Where there was a feeble sapling once, swaying with every blast, there stands now a broad trunk, with its roots strong and deep in our own American soil, but with branches spreading out their sheltering shade over a continent. The Presbyterian church in this land is, in respect to numbers, intelligence, moral influ- ence, educational institutions, one of the most pow- erful organizations in the land. If it is faithful to its trust, faithful to the pledge given over and over again in the history of its past endeavors, the gen- erations that follow you here shall witness a future for it, so cheering, so sublime in achievement, so extended in influence, that the contrast of its germ
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and development shall make romance seem tame, and invite upon it the benedictions of angels and men. It will expand its field of effort with the country's growth. It will apply its energies with a self-denying zeal. In all the centres of arts, and and commerce, and social life, it will be found at work, originating churches and institutions that will regenerate society, and stand as witnessing monuments of God's truth, till the grand work of human redemption is complete.
With such a prospect the actual history of this church links that day of small things, when its fathers, feeble in means and small in numbers, laid here the foundations of many generations. Look to the past, and then to the future, and you will feel that you stand upon a Pisgah. Close by you on the one side is the weariness and desolation of the desert; on the other is Canaan promise, and the near and ever nearer advent of that Jerusalem which is from above, which is the mother of us all. We breathe the purer air of a higher life. We look down upon periods of strife and division, and lament our errors. We look upward and invoke
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the grace that will perfect our union, by the same influences that cement and secure the eternal union of the blessed.
It is well that we may meet for our commemora- tive task at a day like this. It lends inspiration to the occasion. Our fathers would have rejoiced to see this day, and been glad. How their silent benedictions seem to distil upon us, as in our thanksgivings we recognize the grace that has triumphed over division, and made the reunited church what it is to-day! If those who have toiled here, and borne the heat and burden of the day -who have been associated with the trials and the hopes of the past-could appear among us, with what radiant spirits, with what hearty God-speeds, would they greet us, swelling our joys while they fulfilled their own !
They are not with us in person-however their spirits may hover near. They will not come back to us, but we shall go to them. And what a lesson to inspire us to high endeavor, that we may recount what their feebleness has achieved, and may say, as we do to-day, that over these graves, these hal-
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lowed scenes of prayer and praise, these spheres of toil and trial, there waves the banner of a reunited church, there gather associations and memories that make the ground we tread seem holy, there come thronging clouds of witnesses whose pres- ence in thought we could not and would not banish.
V.
POEM
BY
ANSON D. F. RANDOLPH.
"Remember the days of old ; Consider the years of many generations,"
DEUT. 32: 7.
0
POEM.
-
ICTURES OF OTHER PERIODS : these to-night I bring to place before your waiting sight; And here the Present shall its sunlight cast Upon the lengthening shadows of the Past : Each varied hue, and interblending part, Have power to please, and elevate the heart ; And all combined make one harmonious whole, To stir the pulses of the grateful soul.
Behold a picture of the days of eld, When these broad lands the Fathers first beheld ; And by the waters of Communipaw The Burgomaster first the Yankee saw, And little dreamed, as then their trade began, That he was dealing with the Coming Man, Whose restless feet but touched New England's shore, And thence departed to return no more, But ever onward with resistless sway, From age to age would Westward make his way ;
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His hand the waste and desert soil subdue, And build the City where the Forest grew ; The Church and School plant firm in every vale, Where late was found the Indian's fire or trail ; That one by one there slowly might arise New States, as stars, to bless the Nation's eyes,- From where the waters of the Hudson rolled, To San Francisco's opening Gate of Gold !
Where the Passaic like a silver thread,
Winds through the marshy meadows to the Sound, Your Fathers, by the Great All-Father led, Planted the seeds, whose fruitage here is found. Stern in their will, of simple faith and pure, They for His cause would any ill endure :
His was the World-dare any one expect
To rule the State, save only His elect ? Such was their creed-a life and not a name, And here to found their perfect State they came :
Who would might come, in peace securely dwell, And sow and reap, or freely buy and sell Under just rule-so did their laws denote- While none but Saints should have the right to vote !
Just to themselves, to others they were true ; The Indian at their hands no outrage knew ;
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They took his lands and paid as they agreed, And had from him a primal title deed For these fair lands, that from the river shore Break at the mountain ; full many a score Of miles of wood and undulating plain, And valleys low, by purchase did obtain, And this the price : if there be brokers here, Who put our house-rent higher every year, Give your attention, lend me now your ear, And I in verse the price will here relate, Of this great sale of Orange Real Estate ! Fifty double hands of powder, and one hundred bars of lead ; Twenty ankers of good liquors, or equivalent instead ; Twenty coats and twenty pistols, and of swords and kettles ten ; Fifty knives ; ten pair of breeches for the most distinguished men ;
Full eight hundred feet of wampum, and four barrels of good beer,
And three troopers' coats :- I'm sure you do not think the pur- chase dear ;
But rather that your fathers were unwise, They did not buy, and hold it for a rise !
From river's marge back to the mountain's foot, They built their homes, the cottage and the hut ; The rich, a house in length but thirty feet
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And twenty wide, found ample and complete ; While for the poor, two rooms, or three at best, Met every want, if God became the guest. No brocatelle in gilt and carvéd wood,
Made of the home a most essential part ; No mirror on a sculptured mantel stood-
The uneven walls were bare of works of art. The whitened floor, and simple oaken chair, The dresser and the shining platters there, The chest of drawers, with common oblong chest, And spinning wheel at motion or at rest, With table polished by the scrubbing broom,- These were the features of the living room ; In next, the bed where wearied ones laid down, To sweeter sleep than he who wears a crown ; While near the shelf, on which the Bible lay, God's angel stood to guard them night and day.
They little knew of other lands and men, Nor sought for knowledge deemed beyond their ken ; They saw no wicked spirits in the air, Nor tracked the hated Indian to his lair ; While day by day they went the common round Of duty, and God's blessing sought and found. Beside the church they reared the public school, And ruling self, could others wisely rule ;
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The good protect and hold the bad in awe, Not by the Civil but the Higher Law ; Forsook some errors of their earlier days, And walked in broader and more liberal ways ; The rights of conscience fully did accord, Nor held the Church as greater than its Lord ; While evermore their life this truth displayed, That God, not man, is first to be obeyed !
Unlettered men ! whose names are known to few, Ye builded broader than ye thought or knew : While wary Statesmen and ambitious Kings Worked out their problems, aimed at meaner things, Spread to the world each wide embracing plan, Regardless of the sacred rights of man, Ye in the forest, all to them unknown, Assumed a power still greater than the throne; As stone by stone, with none to make afraid, Those deep foundations were securely laid, On which your children at a later date Should rear the fabric of a nobler State !
Full fifty years each Sabbath day had seen, With shining faces and becoming mien, The settlers here to Newark take their way, There in God's house the solemn vow to pay. But now in numbers slowly stronger grown,
8
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They would build up a meeting of their own, True to their Order, firm as Plymouth Rock, And wholly made of Congregational stock ; For oh, most sad to think and sad to say, The Newark Church had gone another way ; While loving Cambridge, honoring Saybrook too, It long had sought this special work to do- T' absorb Westminster, with those lights full orbed- But in th' attempt had been itself absorbed !
'T was but the law ; such effort could but fail, The right must ever in the end prevail ! That which succeeds within a narrow bound, In wider circles oft is wanting found. This Order on New England's sterile soil, Bears goodly fruit, repays the patient toil ; The tree transplanted into broader fields, Grows sickly, and but little fruitage yields, Till grafted on the Presbyterian tree, (As has been shown in many a learned D. D.,) It has a life that winter cannot kill, While summer heat new juices doth distill : And if it will not thus consent to grow,- But I forbear : the Mountain church you know Tried it full long-but failed to make it go. If there be friends of this old Order here,
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I trust their duty has been made so clear That here and now their grafting may begin, While we are waiting to receive them in !
Look now, my friends, behold with thankful eyes, The Mountain Temple of the Lord arise !
No skillful Architect had drawn his plan- No estimates had skillful builders made ; No keen trustees been set the work to scan, Or borrow money in the Marts of Trade ; The ladies had not even held a fair To buy the carpets and the pulpit chair, Or named committee, say of three or five, To fan their funds and keep the flame alive When men refused to give, and that outright, As trade was dull and money very tight : But rare Old PIERSON, type of those who wrought The work of God, because they knew they ought, Nor stopped to parley, wasting half their day In frequent asking if the work would pay ;- He and his friends on holy purpose bent, Their little skill and cheerful labor spent. The axe and wedge apart the timber tore, The noisy saw divided it again ; The augur made its round and perfect bore,
While swiftly moved the ready smoothing plane,
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Till all was done, and God by them was praised, In those rude walls they by His help had raised. Would that I had the pencil and the skill, The Opening Service fitly to portray ; How would your eyes with tears of gladness fill, Your hearts leap up as theirs to sing and pray. The gray haired sire, the bronzed and stalwart son, The stooping mother and the bashful maid, With little children, quiet now and staid, Had in their places gathered, one by one. No organ peal disturbed the solemn air, No anthem ushered in the opening prayer ; First on the ear, stretched to its true intent, Broke th' full voice of him whom God had sent : They at its summons rose with reverent mien,
The head bowed low, the heart too full for speech, While on the wrinkled face there might be seen A look that compassed heaven in its reach, As from the preacher's lips there outward went Words that on wings of praise were heavenward sent, And when he ended with his full Amen ! From trembling lips it faintly rose again.
The time would fail, were I to linger here, And in detail portray each passing year ; How from the East, sound in the faith, to claim
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Their loving homage, DANIEL TAYLOR came- For thirty years these paths of duty trod, Fearless of man, but in the fear of God : As poor man's friend, and to th' oppressed a shield, To might, as wrong, was never known to yield, While he with zeal made known the Gospel plan, And all the " wondrous ways of God to man." When from the East far to the South and West, The restless foot of Whitefield onward pressed, Then when the spirit of the Lord came down The labors of the toiling ones to crown, Here in the Mountain were His wonders shown, In quickening saints, in turning hearts of stone, And TAYLOR saw the glory of the Lord, And years of waiting brought the large reward. In patient service thus he kept the Faith ; The good fight fought : triumphant was in death ; And this his praise: When with the dead he slept, His memory green was by his people kept.
I ask you now to look again, and see What was, what is not, what again should be ; The PARSONAGE, early reared by willing hands, With ample marge of wood and meadow lands ; Whereto in time a youthful pastor* came,
* Rev. CALEB SMITH.
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With her whose fathert bore an honored name, Whose praise in all the churches could be found, Whose zeal for God no limit knew or bound, Whose weighty words and cogent argument With vital force straight to the conscience went, While clear in doctrine, ever apt to teach, With sweetest grace could simplest Gospel preach.
Trained in such school, by such a master taught, The second pastor learned to shape his thought, And hither came, in all the grace of youth, Its ardent zeal, and glowing love of truth.
About that Parsonage of those days long gone, What memories cluster, and what scenes are drawn ! What else we see, where'er our steps may roam, We find no simpler, see no happier home. Could those long fallen walls articulate, And all their prisoned secrets here relate, Or on the canvas, with the pencil throw The scenes they witnessed in the years ago ;- Of grief or joy, of love or hope deferred, All then withheld, all that was there conferred,- The secrets told, the errors full confessed, With trembling lips, or sobbings unsuppressed,-
+ Rev. JONATHAN DICKINSON, of Elizabethtown.
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POEM.
Your hearts would alternate 'twixt hopes and fears, One moment sanguine, and the next depressed, And laughter come unbidden on your tears ! Yet there the round that every morning brought The press of care, some useful lesson taught ; And there the Pastor wisdom daily learned, Which to account he in the pulpit turned ; While in his own he would his people show A Christian Home, the sweetest spot below, Not free from ill, that is the common lot,- How could he serve if here he had it not ?- Where every joy might have a keener zest, No state that did not bring with it content, Since all that came was timely, for the best, And by the loving Lord in mercy sent.
I pass the scenes wherein you might behold The new and larger church supplant the old :- Look on the people fasting, and at prayer That God would come their well-beloved to spare,- Then turn once more, where slow the funeral train Winds to the grave, and leaves the dead again. The Pastor's work was done: he had possessed The promised land, and entered into rest. Ah ! well they loved him : precious memories kept, Though side by side he now with TAYLOR slept ;
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And here to-day your love with theirs is shown, In fitting words, and monumental stone !
The Mountain Church was wise to understand No field's well ploughed without a guiding hand,- And so with decent haste set out to find One true in furrow, and of ready mind To do the work: and, strange though it may sound, They thought he in New England must be found. There straight, with letters to the Fathers, went A brother, on this purpose fully bent. Not type of some who in this later day
Hunt for a Pastor, knowing not the way : Their trials sore, and disappointments keen, You have, my friends, too often, often seen. No easy task, in these swift days of ours, To find a man possessed of all the powers,- The power to preach, with ampler powers to talk, Of pleasing manners and a graceful walk ; At funerals good, at parties full of life, With just the woman for a pastor's wife ; Who sage advice from no one will refuse, And raise the funds by filling up the pews.
Not such as this your fathers went to seek, But one in doctrine sound, in spirit meek : They hated error, and no honeyed speech
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Would answer, if he failed the truth to preach. Yet, to be honest, I should here relate He must speak well, and they were free to state That they New England's drawling tone did hate. At length in CHAPMAN what they sought was found, A Pastor good, a preacher wise and sound. He came when ominous signs along the sky Foretold those days that noble souls would try ; He heard the voice that 'cross the ocean went- "You shall not tax if none may represent !" He read in mystic lines on chest of tea The Captions of the Charter of the Free, And saw the flash, and heard the signal gun, That shook the world on plain of Lexington.
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