USA > New York > Old New York : or, Reminiscences of the past sixty years > Part 13
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33
39
COLUMBIA COLLEGE.
for her operations, and that great educational test, sound, practical, and available instruction, we feel assured her richly endowed board of professors fully comprehend, the better to rear up the moral and intellectual greatness of the American nation.
More than two centuries ago, Milton, in strong accents, told the world, in his tractate on educa- tion, when referring to the physical sciences, that " the linguist, who should pride himself to have all the tongues that Babel cleft the world into, yet if he have not studied the solid things in them as well as the words and lexicons, he were nothing so much to be esteemed a learned man, as any yeo- man or tradesman completely wise in his mother's dialect." Yet ages have rolled on since this orac- ular declaration, while the monition of this great scholar has passed by unheeded. But Oxford now knows that languages alone will not save her, though aided by Aristotle, and Cambridge has found that more than the calculus is demanded at her hands.
I have repeatedly listened to the verbal re- marks of those two illustrious graduates of old Columbia, Gouverneur Morris and De Witt Clin- ton, on the subjects most important in a course of collegiate instruction for the youth of this country. Morris urged, with his full, flowing periods, the statesman's science, government and the American constitution ; Clinton was tenacious of the physi-
40
HISTORICAL DISCOURSE.
cal and mechanical sciences : both concurred in opinion that a professorship of cookery was indis- pensable to secure health and longevity to the people. But these philosophers had only recently returned from their exploratory tour to the West, as canal commissioners, to decide upon the ronte for the Erie Canal, and, though at times enlivened by the society of Jemima Wilkinson, must, as I conjecture, have fared indifferently at that period in their journey through that almost untrodden wilderness.
From the period when the Abbe Hany unfold- ed the theory of crystallography, we may date the introduction, in a liberal way, of the physical branches of science in academies and universities ; and with the chart of Bacon's ontlines ever before us, the mighty fact of Milton is best understood, that acquaintance with things around us will best enable ns to comprehend things above us ; thus studying the visible, the better to learn and ad- mire the invisible. What, then, is to be the na- ture of the intellectual repast a collegiate system is to set before its scholars, seeing great diversity of sentiment prevails ? The spirit of the times declares it, and a vast and rising republic demands it. Let the classies be not shorn of their proper dimensions, and in the discipline of her Anthon and her Drisler, they will neither lose symmetry, nor become amorphons. Let geometry and her
41
COLUMBIA COLLEGE.
kindred branches prefer her claims to considera- tion by her erudite Hackley, and her adjunct, the renowned Davies, of West Point celebrity : let natural philosophy and that science which seems to inosculate with almost every other, chemistry, be developed in all their relations, by those ardent disciples, McCulloh and Joy : let that adept in teaching, her recently elected Leiber, expound constitutional law and public and private rights ; and while God and nature have established an eternal difference between things profane and things holy, let the fountain be ever open from which flows that wisdom imparted by your vener- able instructor, MeVickar, for the benefit of in- genuous youth in all after life.
In the range of human pursuits, there is no avocation so grateful to the feelings as that of un- folding wisdom to generous and susceptible youth : philosophy to the mind is as assuredly nutriment to the soul, as poison must prove baneful to the animal functions. Whatever may be the toil of the instructor, who can calculate his returns ? In the exercise of his great prerogative, he is deco- rating the temple of the immortal mind ; he is re- fining the affections of the human heart. Old Columbia, with her fiscal powers, adequate to every emergency, with the rich experience of a century, with the proud roll of eminent sons whom she has reared, and who have exerted an
42
HISTORICAL DISCOURSE.
influence on the literature and destinies of the commonwealth ; these, without the enumeration of other concurring circumstances, are enough to encourage comprehensive views of blessings in store : and that heart and head will co-operate effectively in the reformation of abuses which time had almost made venerable, and delight in the glorious undertaking, fortified in the councils of a benignant Providence, of rearing to full stature a University commensurate with the enlarged poli- cy that characterizes New York, is the prayer of this generation, and cannot fail to be of the future, to whom its perpetuity is bequeathed.
There are few of my anditory who have not been struck with the increase, both in numbers and in architectural display, of our ecclesiastical edifices. When this Society was an applicant for incorporation, the Roman Catholic denomination had one place of worship, situated in Barclay street, and organized in 1786 : they now have thirty-nine. The Jews of the Portuguese order, the victims of carly intolerance by the inquisition of Portugal, and who first came among us prior to the time of old Gov. Stuyvesant, had but one synagogue for upwards of a century : they now, with the Germans, have eighteen. The Epis- copal denomination had seven churches, they now have forty-nine. The Baptists had three, they now boast thirty. But I can proceed no further
43
JOHN PINTARD .- CHURCHES.
in these details. When I published an aeeount of New York and its institutions in 1832,* we had one hundred and twenty-three places of publie worship : our aggregate at this time approaches three hundred, of which we may state that sixty are of the Dutch Reformed and Presbyterian de- nominations, and forty of the Methodists. As I dismiss the ehurehes, I am also compelled to omit almost all notice of the departed worthies of the various denominations with whom I have been personally acquainted, or heard as pastors of their several floeks. Our worthy founder, John Pintard, was extremely solicitous that we should give minute attention to the American ehureh, and preserve faithful records of her progress. Had we labored severely in this species of inquiry, we might have had mueh to do, and I fear have proved dere- liet in many things, which, as a Historical Society, ealled louder on our time, and for our devotion.
Early instruction and reading while a boy, gave me something of a bias towards matters pertaining to churches and their pastors : my repeated visits to my father's grave, in Ann street, when I was not yet seven years old, led me to church yards and to epitaphs, and I had collected, when seareely able to pen an intelligible hand, quite a volume of those expressive memorials of
* Brewster's Edinburgh Encyclopedia.
44
HISTORICAL DISCOURSE.
saddest bereavement. I state these facts, lest in what I have to say, in a brief notice of a few of the earlier clerical worthies of this city, you might apprehend, from my personal reminiscences, that I was half a century older than I actually am.
Christopher C. Kunze was the first clergyman I ever cast eyes upon. He was of the Evangeli- cal German Lutheran Church. He officiated in the old stone edifice corner of Frankfort and Wil- liam streets ; he was the successor of Muhlen- burg, who afterwards was the president of the convention that ratified the Constitution, and speaker of the House of Representatives. His political career is rendered memorable by his cast- ing vote in behalf of Jay's treaty. As little is said of Kunze in the books, I may state, that he was a native of Saxony, was born in 1744, edu- cated at the Halle Orphan House, and studied theology at the University of that city. Thence he was called in 1771 to the service of the Lu- theran churches St. Michael and Zion's in Phila- delphia. In 1784 he accepted a call from the Evangelical Lutheran church in William, corner of Frankfort street, as stated. Here he officiated until his death in 1807. He held the professor- ship of Oriental Languages in Columbia College, from 1784 to 1787, and from 1792 to 1795. While Kunze occupied his ecclesiastical trust, a struggle arose to do away the German and substi-
-
45
C. C. KUNZE.
tute the English language in preaching. With assistance, Dr. Kunze prepared a collection of Hymns, translated into English : they were the most singular specimens of couplets and triplets I ever perused, yet they possessed much of the in- tensity and spiritualism of German poetry. This was in the fall of 1795 .* Dr. Kunze was a scholar somewhat after the order of old Dr Styles, and deeply versed in the fathers, in theology. He was so abstracted from worldly concerns and the living manners of the times, that like Jackcy Barrett, of Trinity College, Dublin, he practically scarcely knew a shcep from a goat, though he might have quoted to your satisfaction Virgil and Tibullus. He reared the moral and intellectual structure of Henry Stuber, who wrote the contin- uance of the life of Franklin, and who then sunk into the grave by an insidious consumption. Kunze was versed in astronomy, and was some- thing of an astrologer. He was quite skilled in numismatics, and you can appreciate the value of the rich collection of medals and coins which his family placed at the disposal of our Society. Kunze died fifty years ago, and in his death we lost one of our great scholars, and a worthy man. He held a newspaper controversy on the Grego- rian period of the century 1800, and published a
* Published by Hurtin & Commardinger. New York : John Tiebout : 12mo, 1795.
46
HISTORICAL DISCOURSE.
Sermon entitled " King Solomon's great saerifiee," delivered at the dedieation of the English Lu- theran Zion Churel, October 4, 1801. It demon- strates his eommand of the English language.
There is associated with this movement of the English Hymn Book for the Lutheran Church, a transaction wlieli ean hardly be overlooked. It is eonneeted with our literary history. The growth of our native population, after the war, produced an inereased demand for tuition as well as for preaching in the English tongue ; and while the Lutheran Catechism found a translator in the Rev. George Strebeek, and Luther's blaek-letter Bible yielded to James's, (the English,) the Ger- man Theatre, with Kotzebue at its head, was now beginning to find among us readers, and aetors in an English dress ; and William Dunlap, and Charles Smith, a bookseller in Pearl street, (after- wards better known for his invaluable Military Repository, on the American Revolution,) and the Rev. H. P. Will, furnished materials for the aet- ing drama from this German souree, for the John street Theatre ; so that in New York we had a foretaste of Kotzebue and Sehiller ere they were subjected to the eritieism of a London audience,
* This accomplished man, after but a short stay in New York, returned to Europe, where, in 1799, he published in London, in two volumes octavo, a Translation of Knigge's Practical Philoso- phy of Social Life.
45
47
JOHANNES D. GROS.
or were embodied in Thompson's translations of the German Theatre.
It was just about this period, 1795-'6, that Dominie Johannes Daniel Gros, a preacher of the Reformed Dutch Church of Nassau street, (where Gen. North erected a beautiful mural tablet to Baron Steuben,) having discoursed both in the German and English tongues, retired from the field of his labors, left the city, and settled at Canandaigua, where he died in 1812. He had been a pupil of Kern, and he became the instruc- tor of the accomplished Milledoler. His praises were on every lip, and here and there is still a liv- ing graduate of Columbia College, who will tell you how, under those once ornamental button- woods, he drilled his collegiate class on Moral Phi- losophy, while the refined and classical Cochran (like our Anthon of these days) unfolded the riches of the Georgics, and Kemp labored to ex- cite into action his electrical apparatus. It may not be misplaced here to state, that it became ob- vious to the worshippers of this denomination of Christians, that the increase of the English lan- guage among the population induced a correspond- ing decline of the Dutch tongue, and that in order to secure the durability of the congregation of the North Dutch Church, it was requisite that divine instruction should be imparted in the now fast increasing popular language. Accordingly, the
48
HISTORICAL DISCOURSE.
pulpit of the North Dutch Church was, in 1764, supplied by the Rev. Dr. Laidlie, who preached the first sermon in English in that church in the month of March of that year. The alternate use of the Dutch and English languages was contin- ued for a long while.
There seems to have been a mutually active spirit among our Hollanders and their descend- ants, to preserve their cohesion by their early adoption of the English language, and the laying aside, but for occasional use, their native tongue, as well as with our German residents, in calling early into service the English specch, for religious devotion ; but the year 1764 is memorable for the movements of these different bodies of Christian worshippers in urging the importance of a stronger hold among the people by employing the English tongue in their devotional exercises. The Rev. Johannes M. Kern, who by the consistory of Hei- delberg was sent thither, arrived in New York in 1763, when he assumed the pastoral office in the German Nassau street Church, which had been erected on the very site where the old American Dramatic Company a few years before held their theatrical performances. The surviving daughter of this earnest clergyman is still among us, in strength of mind and body, in the ninetieth year of her age, and preserves the records of her fath- er's ministry. The Christian charities which en-
PILMORE .- ASBURY. 49
riched these denominations, and the harmony which obtained among them, is demonstrated by the fact that Kern was installed by the ministers of the Collegiate Church. The Lutherans seem to have been the more tardy sect in seeking the ad- vantages of English preaching for the benefit of their flock. The last of our theological wor- thies who used the language of Holland in the ministry, was the Rev. Dr. Gerardus Kuy- pers, of the Dutch Reformed Church. He died in 1833. But I forbear to trespass upon the interesting Memorial of the Dutch Church, re- cently published by our learned Vice-President, Dr. De Witt.«
I was well acquainted with Joseph Pilmore and Francis Asbury : the former with Boardman, the first regular itinerant preachers of this coun- try, sent out by John Wesley : Pilmore was a stentorian orator. The latter, Asbury, was dele- gated as general superintendent of the Society's interest, and was afterwards denominated Bishop ; they were most laborious and devoted men, mighty travellers through the American wilds in the days of Oglethorpe. Pilmore finally took shelter in the
* See that valuable record, "A Discourse delivered in the North Reformed Dutch Church, (Collegiate,) in the city of New York, on the last Sabbath in August, 1856. By Thomas De Witt, D. D., one of the Ministers of the Collegiate Reformed Dutch Church. New York, 1857.
3
50
HISTORICAL DISCOURSE.
doctrines of episcopacy. Asbury was by no means an uproarious preacher. A second Whitefield in his activity, in his locomotive faculty a sort of Sinbad on land : wrapt up in ample corduroy dress, he bid defiance to the elements, like the adventurous pioneer, journeying whithersoever he might. He had noble qualities, disinterested prin- ciples, and enlarged views. He has the credit, at an early date, of projecting the Methodist Book Concern, that efficient engine for the diffusion of knowledge throughout the land, and second to no other establishment of a like nature among us save the Brothers Harper. No denomination has stronger reasons to be grateful to individual effort for its more enlightened condition, its increased strength, its literature, its more refined ministry, and the trophies which already adorn the brows of its scholars, than has the Methodist Church to Francis Asbury. Pilmore and Asbury were both advanced in life when I knew them. Pilmore sustaincd a wholesome rubicundity ; Asbury ex- hibited traces of great care and a fixed pallor, in the service of his Master.
I will close this order of the ministry with the briefest notice I can take of Thomas Coke, the first Methodist Bishop for America consecrated by Wesley himself, in 1784, and identified with the progress of that society, both in England and in this country. He was just fifty years old when I lis-
51
THOMAS COKE.
tened to him in the summer of 1797. He was a diminutive creature, little higher than is reported to have been the pious Isaac Watts, but some- what more portly. He had a keen visage, which his aquiline nose made the more decided, yet with his ample wig and triangular hat he bore an impresssive personnel. His indomitable zeal and, devotion were manifest to all. An Oxford scholar, a clever author, and glowing with devotional fer- vor, his shrill voice penetrated the remotest part of the assembly. He discoursed on God's provi- dence, and terminated the exercises with reading the beautiful hymn of Addison, " The Lord my pasture shall prepare." So distinctly enunciatory was his manner, that he almost electrified the au- dience. He dealt in the pathetic, and adepts in preaching might profit by Coke. Though sixty years have elapsed since that period, I have him before me as of yesterday. Thus much of Asbury and Coke, legible characters, whole-hearted men, the primitive pioneers of Methodism in this broad- cast land.
I should like to have dwelt upon the character of another great apostle of the Arminian faith, Thomas F. Sargeant. He was cast much after the same physical mould as our John M. Mason. He had little gesticulation, save the occasional raising of the palms of his hands. He stood with an imposing firmness in the sacred desk. A mas-
52
HISTORICAL DISCOURSE.
ter of intonation, his modulated yet strong and clear utterance poured forth a flood of thought characterized by originality and profundity on Christian ethics and Christian faith, winning admi- ration and securing conviction. He was free from dogmatism, and aimed to secure his main object, to render religion the guiding rule of life. His blows were well directed to break the stubborn heart. He was a great workman in strengthening the foundation of Methodism among us. He filled with acceptance every pulpit to which he was in- vited, but what was of more importance to a needy and a struggling congregation in those days, he filled every pew : but I desist from further details.
I introduce Bishop Provoost in this place, be- cause I think our Episcopal brethren have too much overlooked the man, his learning, his liberal- ity, and his patriotism. He had the bearing of a . well-stalled Bishop, was of pleasing address, and of refincd manners. He imbibed his first classical taste at King's College, and was graduated at Peter House, Cambridge. He became skilled in the Hebrew, Greek, Latin, French, German, and Italian languages, and we have been assured he made an English poetical version of Tasso. I never listened to his sacred ministrations but once, in Old Trinity ; he was then advanced in years. He was quite a proficient in Botanical knowledge, and was among the earliest in England who stud-
53
SAMUEL PROVOOST.
ied the Linnean classification. I long ago exam- ined his copy of "Caspar Bauhin's Historia Plan- tarum," whom, on a written leaf affixed to the first volume, he calls the prince of botanists, and which MS. bears date 1766. As Lieut. Gov. Colden was the first expositor of the system of Linnaeus in the New World, and which he taught on the banks of the Hudson almost immediately after it was announced by the illustrious Swede, there can be little doubt that harmonious discussion on so novel and fertile a theme must have often engaged the mental powers of these distinguished disciples of natural knowledge. He was to the back-bone a friend to the cause of revolutionary America ; and I believe it is now granted, that there was scarcely another of that religious order among us who was not a royalist. I ought to add, that a portion of his library was given to our Society by C. D. Colden, his son-in-law, who furnished me with the MS. of his life, a few days before his death, and to which I ventured, with the approba- tion of Mr. Colden, to make additional facts con- cerning the Bishop's attainments in natural sci- ence.
Our enlightened founder, John Pintard, was personally known, during a long life, to a large majority of the citizens of this metropolis, and was universally consulted by individuals, of almost every order, for information touching this State's
54
HISTORICAL DISCOURSE.
transactions, and the multifarious occurrences of this city, which have marked its progress since our revolutionary struggle. Persons and things, indi- vidualities and corporations, literary, biographical, ecclesiastical, and historical circumstances, muni- cipal and legislative enactments, internal and ex- ternal commerce, all these were prominent among the number ; and his general accuracy as to per- sons and dates made him a living chronology. During a long period of his memorable life, our learned associate, Dr. Mitchill, held the same dis- tinction in the walks of science. Pintard's life was not, however, solely retrospective : he had the capabilities of one whose vision extended far ahead. Witness his remarkable estimate of the growth of this city, in inhabitants and in extent, dating from about 1805, and comprehending a period long after his death. The fulfilment is so striking with the facts as he prognosticated, that the statistical writer cannot but marvel at the precision of his data and the fulfilment of his cal- culations. See, further, his earnest co-operation with De Witt Clinton, Stephen Van Rensselaer, C. D. Colden, Thomas Eddy, R. Bowne, and others, in bringing together that first mass mecting in behalf of the Eric Policy, held in the Park, when the requisites for such assumption jeoparded almost life, and cut off all political advancement. Look at his enlarged views to promote the interests of
55
JOHN PINTARD.
that church to which he so early and so long had claims as an exalted member, in effectually secur- ing the noble Sherrard bequest for the Theological Seminary, and his successful application to George Lorillard for the twenty-five thousand dollar fund for a professorship : canvass his merits for the organization of many of the libraries which now enrich this city, and the cheerful aid with which he united with the late benevolent William Wood, in furtherance of a hundred other public objects. Examine for yourselves the records of the office of the city inspector, and learn the obstacles he en- countered to establish that department of the city institutions, for the registry of births and deaths. But I will no longer tire you.
Pintard's astonishing love and reverence for the past was no less remarkable. The men of the Revolution were his idols, and perhaps his longest attached and most important of this class were Willett, Jay, Fish, and Col. Trumbull. He often conversed with me of his acquaintance with Wash- ington, Jefferson, Madison, Geo. Clinton, Rufus King, and Hamilton, but I am left to infer that with some of these his personal associations were limited. As a deputy agent under Elias Boudi- not, as commissary-general for prisoners, he was fully conversant, from observation, with the hor- rors of the jail and the Jersey prison ship, and he never touched that subject that he did not revive
56
HISTORICAL DISCOURSE.
reminiscences of Philip Freneau, the scenes of the old Sugar House, the hospital practice conducted by Michaelis and Nooth, and others, on the Amer- ican prisoners in the old Dutch Church, (now Post Office,) then appropriated to medical accom- modation, as well as for other purposes, by the British army. It is familiarly known to my audi- ence that our State legislature, during the session of 1817-'18, passed a law, prepared by the Hon. Henry Meigs, for the disinterment of the body of Montgomery in Canada, for re-burial under the monument in St. Paul's Church, N. Y. Soon after the passage of the act, I waited upon Mr. Pintard on some subject connected with the His- torical Society, and found his mind worried. " You seem, sir," said I, "to be embarrassed." " Somewhat so," replied he ; "I have just re- ceived an Albany letter requiring specific informa- tion : they are at a loss to know where Montgom- ery's bones lie. . I shall be able soon to give them an answer." It is almost needless to add that Pintard's directions led to the very spot where, within a few feet designated by him, the remains of the patriot were discovered.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.