USA > New York > The diocese of Western New York : a history and recollections > Part 19
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* Most of these pamphlets, I think, were sent from Philadelphia.
+ Journ. W. N. Y. 1853, p. 47.
CHAPTER XXX
HOBART COLLEGE AND DIVINITY SCHOOL
L N a former chapter (XI. p. 154) I have given a brief account of the founding of Geneva, now Hobart College, under Bishop Hobart, and its beginning of act- ual work in 1826 under its first President, Dr. Jasper Adams. This is not the place to give the history of the College in general, but some account of it belongs properly to the story of the Diocese.
The College began its work with an endowment amounting alto- gether to about $70,000. Of this, $12,500 had been given by the New York Society for the Promotion of Religion and Learning, as an equivalent for their annual grant of $750 to the "interior branch" of the General Theological Seminary removed from Fairfield to Geneva ; $8,000 by the same Society as the amount of the " Sherred Legacy" for Theological Education ; $5,000 by Bishop Hobart, the " Charles Startin" fund left to him to be used at his discretion (or for his per- sonal benefit) ; and sundry subscriptions and gifts amounting to about $45,000. On this insignificant foundation it existed somehow, and did a small but excellent work for thirteen years, when the State came to its relief with an annual grant of $6,000, which help came to an end in 1846 by the adoption of a new State Constitution which was construed to prohibit such grants to colleges. The first Presi- dent, Dr. Adams, resigned after two years' service, and the office, after being declined by the Rev. Dr. John C. Rudd, was accepted by the Rev. Richard S. Mason, D.D., (March 3, 1830,) who had been for two years Rector of Trinity Church, Geneva. He was an able
and faithful officer, but the wretchedly small means of support which the College possessed did not enable him to do any great work. Even the tuition fees of the few students were hypothecated, as it were, by certificates for free tuition issued in order to obtain the earliest sub- scriptions for endowment. The citizens of Geneva, beyond the little flock of Church people, were not disposed to help the " Hobart" enterprise even for the sake of helping the village ; and it was generally represented in Western New York as a " bigoted"
REV. DR. MCDONALD.
REV. DR.ADAMS.
PRESIDENT MASON.
Ã…BNERJACKSON,D.D.,LL.D.
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institution from which good Christians ought to keep their sons away, although in fact the actual "Church" influence and teaching in it were of the mildest possible character.
Dr. Mason's resignation in August, 1835, left a vacancy of a year in the Presidency, its duties being performed by the Senior Professor (of mathematics), Horace Webster, LL.D., (known to the students of his day by the endearing title of " Old Fess,") who in one capacity or another-and most of the time in more than one-was the sheet- anchor of the College through the trials and vicissitudes of twenty- two years. With him (a few years later), and entitled to equally grateful remembrance by all old Hobart men, was the Professor of Latin and Greek, David Prentice, LL.D. (known in the same affec- tionate way as " Old Davie,") as different as possible in every way from Professor Webster, but as unselfishly devoted to the best inter- ests of the College and of every one of its students. In January, 1836, the Rev. Dr. Henry J. Whitehouse, then Rector of S. Luke's Church, Rochester, was elected President, and at the same time a vigorous effort was made by the people of Rochester (mostly the Church people, I presume) to have the College removed to that city. An addition of $70,000 was subscribed to its endowment for that purpose ; but the undertaking failed, and on its failure, and possibly for other reasons (the impending division of the Diocese being sup- posed at the time to be one), Dr. Whitehouse declined, and the vacancy was finally and most happily filled in August of the same year by the election and acceptance of the Rev. BENJAMIN HALE, D.D., a graduate of Bowdoin in 1813, and Professor of Chemistry in Dartmouth College. He remained President for twenty-three years,-years of such continuous labour, and ungrudging sacrifice of all personal comfort and interest, as have seldom been given to the accomplishing of any good work.
Those who had the happiness to know Dr. Hale personally, even as his students, will agree with me that it would be hard to say too much of his many excellencies of character. The phrase " a noble- man of nature " has often been well applied, but never more aptly than to him ; like Bishop De Lancey, he was a gentleman, in the very best sense of that much abused word, " through and through." One can hardly say more of one who is also a Christian through and through. He was an accomplished scholar in many studies besides
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those which he had chiefly taught, and he had the rare gift of making his scholarship attractive to all those who were fortunate enough to come under his personal teaching. But these were, after all, lesser things. The great thing was the absolute faithfulness with which he devoted himself to the hard and often ungrateful work given him to do,-the building up of a small and unpopular institution of the Church under almost every conceivable disadvantage, with little indeed of the help he should have had from others, and an amount of indifference if not of active opposition most disheartening to one who would count no cost too much to give to the service of Christ and His Church.
The College up to this time had entered in ten years 136 students, and graduated 40-not an encouraging beginning. In the next ten years, to 1846, 187 were entered and 62 graduated ; which was only a little better. It was really the small number of students which mainly caused the exodus to larger colleges, especially to Union, which had then the reputation of a much easier course-Geneva standing then, as she has ever since, for the exaction of thorough study in the few things she did teach, notably in classics and mathe- matics. In 1837 her course was enlarged, and her work materially advanced by the acquisition of Theodore Irving as Professor of His- tory, Modern Languages, and Belles Lettres, and two years later of Edward Bourns and Henry L. Low as Tutors. All three subsequent- ly became clergymen, and all were not only of great personal excel- lence but specially, though very differently, notable for scholarship and aptness in teaching. These six gentlemen (for they were all true gentlemen) made up a Faculty out of all proportion, not in number indeed, but in ability and efficiency, to the endowments of the Col- lege, and the help which it had from the Church people of the Diocese. They had serious difficulties to contend with, all, perhaps, related more or less to the primal want of what would be called now-a-days "financial backing." There was always a want of effective discipline, for which the Faculty were not always to blame. Many of the students were mere boys, and unfitted to encounter the semi-independent habits of American college-life of that day,- such as it was at any rate in all but New England colleges, in which, by the way, the relations between Faculty and students were by no means so pleasant and courteous as they always were at Hobart.
19I
HOBART COLLEGE
In 1838 the grant from the State put the College comparatively at ease as to means of support, and under Dr. Hale's able administra- tion, its number of students had doubled, and its standing as to scholarship became well established, Then the loss of almost its entire income aside from tuition fees, by the withdrawal of State aid, seemed at first a crushing blow. It was, on the contrary, the begin- ning of a new and much better life, though reached by slow and pain- ful steps. The Faculty was reduced for a time to four ; the President, one Professor (Dr. Webster) and two Tutors, all receiving salaries on which they could barely live. In fact, for several years Dr. Hale received no salary, his brothers being happily able to tide him over this time of distress. But the question was brought home to Church- men in the State and especially in the Diocese, as it should have been years before, whether they would maintain and build up the College, or let it perish. And this involved another question, which to this day has never been set at rest,-whether it was worth while to sustain it on any other than the original foundation laid by Bishop Hobart, which had been practically weakened, as it has since been again and again, in the hope of thus conciliating the good-will of those who had no interest in it as a Church institution. Up to this time there had been very little distinctive Church character in its religious instruction and worship ; the latter consisting only of daily " Family " Prayers in the nominal chapel, (the anatomical lecture-room of the " old Med- ical College,") of the briefest and most unliturgical character. Aside from Dr. Hale's personal influence, there was hardly anything to make the students Christians in actual life, much less Churchmen.
Under the guidance of Bishop De Lancey (and perhaps I should say of Dr. Hale also), a really new era was begun in 1847 by estab- lishing the Daily Service, and by making over a small building for recitation rooms into a simple but appropriate and attractive Norman chapel, the details of which did great credit to Dr. Hale's architec- tural taste and knowledge. The immediate effect of this change on the students was remarkable. I remember that coming back in the Spring of 1848 from a year's absence in a New England College (after two years at Hobart) and meeting the students in chapel, I could scarcely believe myself among the same body of men, seeing a comparative interest and reverence much beyond anything which the old way had ever known. From that time on there was a marked
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improvement in the whole character and life of the students as a whole ; not that there was not much to be desired both in conduct and discipline, but that the better element was decidedly uppermost, which had never been the case before to my knowledge .* Bishop De Lancey sums up what was done at this time very mildly in his Address of 1847.
"By the new arrangements [as to Faculty]," he says," the contin- ued efficiency of the College is amply secured ; and by some improve- ments in its system, it will doubtless render increased aid to the relig- ious training and education of the youth entrusted to its care. This Institution . . now thrown almost entirely on the patronage of the Protestant Episcopal Church, may emphatically be called a Church College. By introducing a Liturgical Service, by stated public worship and instruction on Sundays in the College Chapel, and by the lectures of the Startin Professor [Dr. Hale], it is believed that a most healthful influence will be exerted on the minds of all the students, without infringing on any of their conscientious views and opinions, and the children of Episcopalians be imbued with a knowledge of the principles, and a taste for the services, and an attachment to the time- honoured forms and doctrines and usages of the Church to which they belong. The College merits, as it will need, the full and cordial patron- age of Churchmen. If the Clergy and Laity of the Church will second its renewed efforts by the patronage within their power, by an earnest interest in its behalf, by upholding its claims as an Episcopal College, and by vindicating it from the obloquy unjustly cast upon it by ignorance and error, . it will most effectively aid the intelligence, the education and the piety of Churchmen."
The Convention responded by the resolution already referred to (p. 180 supra), expressing their conviction that the College should be maintained, as it had been founded, as an Institution of the Church.
Another result of the change of 1847 was soon seen in an increase in the Ministry of the Church from the Alumni ; five of the class of 1848 (one-third of the whole number) and four of 1849 (out of ten) becoming Candidates for Orders, and these, as a rule, the best men of their respective classes. And this result continued, with some
* In the fall of 1848, the students (mostly in my own class) subscribed a con- siderable sum for a chapel organ, which was not obtained then; but three years later the effort was renewed successfully, and it fell to me (then one of the "Divinity Students") to buy the organ, see to having it put up, and become temporary organist until a better was found. The students joined heartily in the chanting, which was antiphonal, and on Sundays included the Psalms for the Day.
HOBART COLLEGE
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HOBART COLLEGE
interruptions, for many years. In 1848 the Candidates for Orders numbered twenty-four, thirteen having been admitted that year.
The "Hobart Professorship" of Latin, founded in 1852 partly by subscription and partly by the S. P. R. L., added $30,000; and some- what earlier an annuity in permanence of $3,000 from Trinity Church, New York, and other benefactions, placed the College once more on a working basis. As a condition of the Trinity Church gift, the Col- lege was made free as to tuition, and in honour of its founder took the name of "Hobart Free College," shortened in 1860 to "Hobart College." I could not begin to give here in detail the many, long- continued and finally successful efforts of Bishop De Lancey through which, mostly, these results were attained. For the actual existence of the College to this day, as well as for the good work which it has done for the Church and the State for half a century past, we are indebted, under God, chiefly to him, and next to him, to the labours and self-denial of BENJAMIN HALE.
Professor Bourns (T. C. D.), equally memorable for his fine class- ical scholarship, his single-hearted devotion to duty, and his oddities of person and manner, resigned in 1845 to become somewhat later the President of Norwich University, receiving in 1851 the well- merited degree of LL.D. from Hobart. He was succeeded in 1848 by the Rev. Henry L. Low, another fine scholar and innate gentle- man,' only too refined and sensitive for the unavoidable disciplinary work of his office, as well as too amusingly absent-minded for any public duty,-yet one whom no one could know without loving him. The Rev. Charles Woodward, another accomplished scholar and lov- able man, gave his help for a short time as Tutor, in the greatest stress of the College's need, and the next year the chair of Mathe- matics was filled by Major David Bates Douglass, LL.D., U. S. A., who came from the Presidency of Kenyon College to give us the great benefit of his services, for the last year, as it proved, of his life ; a life in which he had been widely known and highly honoured for his services in the Army (beginning on the Niagara Frontier of 1812- 14) and as engineer and architect of the great public works of New York. At the same time came as Tutor for four years one of the best and brightest graduates Hobart ever sent forth, the late Rev. Dr. Joseph Morison Clarke of the class of '47. Benjamin Hale, Jr., of '48, and William Paret and Henry A. Neely of '49, were also Tutors for a time. In 1850 there were added to the Faculty two who
24
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DIOCESE OF WESTERN NEW YORK
through many years rendered invaluable service to the College and to the Diocese in many ways-William Dexter Wilson and Kendrick Metcalf. The former, during a six years' country pastorate in the Diocese, had become known as an original and forcible writer in Theol- ogy and Ecclesiastical History, and also as a remarkably successful teacher in preparation for the Ministry, having had several students under his care, with Bishop De Lancey's approval, in his country parish. In coming to Geneva he was able to carry on that work in a somewhat larger way, and the unsatisfactory condition of the General Theological Seminary at that time made the Bishop anxious to avail himself of Dr. Wilson's services, through which two such men as the late Bishop Whipple and Dr. Theodore M. Bishop had already been brought into the Ministry. A small class or school in Divinity was therefore formed in Geneva in the spring of 1850, under the Bishop's direction, with Dr. Wilson as the principal teacher, but with some help also from President Hale and Professor Metcalf. It began with eight students, two of whom, Osgood E. Herrick and Julius S. Townsend, were ordained Deacons in 1851 ; two more came that year, and seven were ordained in 1852, Joseph Morison Clarke, William Paret, Charles W. Hayes, James A. Robinson, Henry A. Neely, Henry C. Stowell, and Napoleon Barrows. John G. Webster received Orders in 1853, William T. Gibson and Robert Horwood in 1854, H. Gaylord Wood in 1856, and Edward Randolph Welles in 1857. There were a number of others under Dr. Wilson's instruc- tion during the years up to 1858, but the above names are enough to show what sort of work was done in this temporary school. The Bishop himself took the instruction in Liturgics and Homiletics, and in criticism of theological essays assigned by him ; and no one who was fortunate enough to be his pupil in those studies could recall them without the deepest gratitude for that privilege.
A word ought to be said of Dr. Metcalf, affectionately remembered to this day by many later Hobart students (to more than one of whom he was a generous personal benefactor) ; but these reminiscences are already drawn out at too great length. Looking back through half-a- century on the great and good work of Christian training wrought in Western New York in those days,-great in quality if not in amount,- I cannot help feeling more deeply than ever the wonderful Providence of God which placed the guidance of it all in the hands of such a man as WILLIAM HEATHCOTE DE LANCEY.
CHAPTER XXXI
BISHOP DE LANCEY IN ENGLAND ; DE VEAUX COLLEGE
HE Conventions of 1849 and 1850 were both held in Trinity Church, Geneva, the day after the College Com- mencement, which had been changed from the first Wednesday in August to this time to give opportunity for a fuller attendance of the Clergy and Laity of the Diocese. The experiment was quite successful,* some fifty clergy- men and a large number of laymen attending the Commencement ; but it was soon found impracticable to keep the terms up to the dog-days of August, and the Commencement was gradually brought back to July, and finally to June.
In the Journal of 1850 (p. 51) will be found a very interesting Report from a Committee, (written probably by the Chairman, the late Hon. Stephen A. Goodwin of Auburn,) on the use of the Insti- tution Office, taking the ground that the rights of the Rector in a Par- ish can be acquired only by Institution. An accompanying pream- ble and resolution recommended the invariable use of the Office on the ground of doubt as to the legal position of a Rector not instituted. The Resolution was postponed for two years and finally dropped ; I presume in consequence of the publication in 1850 of Judge Murray Hoffman's great work on "The Law of the Church," in which the opposite ground was taken. The Institution Office has seldom been used since that time, but its discontinuance is probably due more to the short and uncertain tenure of pastoral relations than to any other cause.
A resolution was adopted at the Convention strongly recommend- ing the Clergy to obtain subscriptions in their parishes for the pro- posed "History of the Church" by the Rev. Dr. Samuel Farmar Jarvis, prepared at the request of the General Convention. I fear that the resolution had about as much practical influence as such reso- lutions usually have.
At the Convention of 1851, in S. Luke's, Rochester, the Rev. Dr.
Except that we marched to the Commencement of 1849 in a pouring rain, for the first time in the history of the College.
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DIOCESE OF WESTERN NEW YORK
Gregory presented a Report reviewing the "Plan of Subscription" for building churches adopted by the Convention of 1840 (see p. 140 sup.), and recommending the substitution of a plan which should do away with all "property in seats." The subject was recommitted to the next Convention, when the Hon. Joseph Benedict from another Committee read a fuller report tending more directly to the adop- tion of the free-church plan. This was no longer a mere theory in the Diocese, having been successfully adopted in several parishes, notably in Dr. Gregory's, S. James, Syracuse, and Mr. Benedict's, Calvary, Utica. The Convention does not seem however to have been pre- pared for such a radical change, and the resolution of the Committee was modified, on the motion of Governor Seymour, to recommend only the building of churches free from perpetual or even long leases of seats .*
The Bishop announced in a Pastoral of May 22, 1852, his accept- ance of an appointment by the House of Bishops as one of the two Delegates from the American Church (the Bishop of Michigan being the other) to attend the conclusion of the third Jubilee of the Vener- able Society for the Propagation of the Gospel, in London. He sailed accordingly on May 29, accompanied by Mrs. De Lancey, the Rev. Dr. Van Ingen, and the Rev. Walter Ayrault. The Rev. Dr. (afterwards Bishop) Wainwright, Secretary of the House of Bishops, met them in London. The Bishop was absent till Oct. 2. He gives in the Journal of 1852 (pp. 32-58) a full and exceedingly interesting narrative of the whole summer abroad, which it is hardly possible to transcribe here, but which will be found well worth reading again. The Jubilee Service in Westminster Abbey on June 15 was attended by sixteen Bishops from England, Scotland, America, Jeru- salem and the East Indies, and a congregation of 2,000, of whom 1,000 were communicants. The Bishop of Oxford (Samuel Wilber- force) was the Preacher ; Bishop De Lancey at the Evensong of the same day in S. James, Piccadilly, where another great congregation gathered. The next day was a commemoration of the two great Church Societies (S. P. G. and S. P. C. K.) in S. Paul's, attended by twenty Bishops and the City authorities in state ; Bishop M'Coskry being the Preacher. This was followed by a great reception of the Bishops by the Lord Mayor at the Mansion House.t On the 17th
* See Journ. 1851, p. 57, and 1852, p. 67.
t Where Bishop M'Coskry, as he told me, was announced as "My Lord Bishop of My-chicken !"
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THE BISHOP IN ENGLAND
the Bishops visited Winchester, where the Bishop of Michigan preached at the Cathedral, and in the afternoon both responded to addresses of welcome at a public meeting under the presidency of the Dean .* The next day came the S. P. G. welcome to the Bishops in its rooms at 79 Pall Mall, reported quite fairly in the Appendix to the Journal of 1852, pp. 14-21. At this meeting £500 was given by the Society towards the erection of a Free Hospital in New York for English emigrants. The next day, the 19th, was a commemoration of the Queen's Accession, at Fulham. Following this Bishop De Lancey preached at Paddington, S. George's, Hanover Square, S. Andrew's, Holborn, S. Augustine's and the Cathedral, Canterbury, S. Martin's-in-the-Fields, Farnham Palace at an Ordination in which he united by special request, (and on the Fourth of July, the first such act of intercommunion by an American Bishop,) and at various churches in the country, especially for Keble at Hursley (where the Bishop was the guest of his cousin Sir William Heathcote), Ripon Minster, and in Scotland and Ireland. At Oxford occurred the presentation of the great Alms-Basin to the American Church from members of the University, the same now used at the services of the General Convention. About 400 " Bishops, Noblemen, Clergymen, Masters, Tutors and Fellows" took part in the presentation in Exeter College gardens. On the 23d, at Oxford, the Bishops and Dr. Wainwright received the honor- ary degree of D. C. L. " amid vociferous manifestations of enthusiasm on the part of all present." In these proceedings, the Bishop says " it was peculiarly gratifying to us to witness the cordial and marked
* I cannot leave out Bishop M'Coskry's account of this reception, though his telling of it cannot be reproduced. The Dean, a very old and infirm man, una- ble to speak extempore, had brought a neat little speech which he thought he had learned by heart. In the excitement of the occasion he had utterly forgotten it, and did not dare either to read it or to extemporize. He began-" The Ameri- can Bishops ! we are glad to meet them." An awful pause after the hearty cheer- ing. "The American Bishops! we are glad to meet them !" (" Hear him ! Hear him !" from all parts of the Hall, and another silence.) The poor Dean turned in despair to the " American Bishops" with "My Lords, I'm seventy !" Bishop M'Coskry hardly needed his colleague's adjuration to "save the day." "Mr. Dean," he responded amid tumultuous cheers, "I am not surprised that words have failed you on this occasion. It is no light thing for a Mother to wel- come home a Daughter !" " And then," added the Bishop, " I thought they would take the roof off." See the mild report in Journ. 1852, Appendix, p. 10.
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