USA > Pennsylvania > Dauphin County > History of the sesqui-centennial of Paxtang Church, September 18, 1890 > Part 9
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ADDRESS OF MR. JOSHUA WILLIAMS.
ADDRESS OF MR. JOSHUA WILLIAMS.
Mr. MODERATOR, FATHERS, AND BRETHREN: The text which suggests itself as a proper one for the remarks I may have to indulge in on this occasion, is this, " If a man bloweth not his own horn-verily it shall not be blowed !" But introduced as a Minne- apolis man in connection with St. Paul, I may say first of all that the only regret I have to-day is that there are no St. Paul men here! We have a high regard for St. Paul. We would not be worthy to be counted among the " descendants " to-day if we had not. But while St. Paul is distinguished enough, in descendants, or numerically,-he got badly left ! [Laughter.]
Mr. Moderator, I begin to believe "there is some- thing in a name." As you have announced, I am a grandson of the Rev. Joshua Williams, D. D., whose name is on your roll of honor to-day. He had a grandfather whose name was Joshua. That Joshua had a son whose name was Louis. This Louis was the father of the Joshua we honor to-day ! [General laughter.] That Joshua had a son Louis, who was my father, [increased laughter,] and a Judge of the Supreme Court of Minnesota said of this Louis: "He was the finest specimen of a Presbyterian elder I have ever seen." His son is here, and his name is Joshua.
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[Laughter and applause.] I have a son at home whose name is Louis! I have another one whose name is Charles Rittenhouse, but he is of no account in this connection ! [Merriment and suppressed laughter.] But there is ground, you see, to hope ; that like they did in the beginning of the Gospel by Matthew, the Joshua's and Louis's are going on to beget one another to the end of the chapter! [General laughter.]
Did I say that my Charles Rittenhouse was of no ac- count here? (Remember my text!) I beg his pardon. My wife, Martha Rittenhouse, had a "grandfather," too. And although his name has not been mentioned yet from this platform, it has been in private, and it is perfectly legitimate to mention on this occasion. His sleeping dust awaits the resurrection morn in yonder cemetery a little farther down the valley-at old Derry. And in that sacred edifice rehabilitated and beautified, I understand, as Paxtang has been by the generous and tender ministries of those whom I have the honor to address, is to be found a memorial window, dedicated to my grandfather, and another one to my wife's grandfather, Dr. William Simonton. His daughter Jane, well known to you, Aunt Elizabeth Espy, and to you, Miss Clark, and sister of Judge Simonton, married the Rev. John Hughes Rittenhouse. These were the parents of my Charles Rittenhouse's mother, the woman whom I delight to call my wife.
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Do you wonder that I acknowledged intense interest in the events of this day? "Are you Israelites? So am I."
Now, my friends, you have heard from nine churches, all descendants from yonder old Paxtang mother, and perhaps it was supposed when this programme was made out, that these organizations were all the deseend- ants there were of these grand old people, but it is not so. The descendants of the Rev. Joshua Williams, D. D., founded a church in Minneapolis, one year be- fore the church represented here to-day by Dr. Cham- bers was organized, viz: in 1857. There were not eighty-three members at this organization-I believe that was the number at the first organization of Pine Street church - there were eight members. Two of these eight were your children, viz: Louis and Joseph Williams, sons of Rev. Joshua Williams. You will re- member how Paul, in the Bible, undertakes to show how that Levi paid tithes in Abraham when Melchise- dek met him ? "Much more," by the same token I prove to you, that while the Pine Street church was so neatly characterized by Dr. Chambers as your grand daughter, the Westminster church of Minneapolis is legitimately, with emphasis on the adjectives, your great-grand-daughter. The eight members at her or- ganization were the two sons of Joshua Williams I have mentioned, with their wives, two daughters of Louis, making six, and two others, Mr. and Mrs. Andrew Oliver, by the way, Pennsylvanians, too.
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Westminster has grown to over one thousand mem- bers; "the small one has become a strong nation." The General Assembly has been comfortably entertained by her. Out of her have come several church organiza- tions, while existing churches have received valuable additions, notably the First Church, to which I now belong, the oldest organization in Minnesota, has been greatly strengthened in this way; that Judge (Vander- burgh,) I referred to awhile ago, whom my respected friend Dr. Erskine here met at the last General Assem- bly, is of the First Church, with other good men and true. So you see your influence is extending far and wide. I have thought it worthy of the occasion to re- hearse these facts, which show how much better God's people " builded than they knew," and to suggest how sublime is everything connected with the interests of the kingdom of God and of Christ. We have all heard of that humble woman who gave "two mites" once upon a time. I do not believe it is possible for any of us to have anything to do in promoting the cause of Jesus Christ without being honored. It is the sure way to achieve a glorious immortality.
But I must not detain you with an impromptu and desultory speech. My sympathies are with this audience. I regard it an honor to be here-did not know how much of a providence there was in my coming to Pennsylvania "at such a time as this." Have been up the Cumberland Valley with my cousin-
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in-law, Dr. Erskine, and I guess he or Uncle Josiah Espy and the Rutherfords are to blame for putting me into a position so trying to the well-known modesty of we westerners ! Now, seriously, I wish you all God- speed, and let us all be true to our glorious Presbyte- rian heritage, for situated as we are in Minnesota, amid a large foreign population, I believe no church is so well adapted, both in doctrine and polity, to make of these heterogeneous foreigners patriotic and true American citizens. Our beloved country needs the Presbyterian church. I thank you. [Applause.]
Moderator STEWART. One thing is very certain, that if names are scarce, there is plenty of blood, and both blood and names are good. It is with very great pleas- ure that I introduce now to you the Rev. Dr. Nathan Grier Parke, who will speak to us upon the "Charac- teristics of Early Presbyterian Preachers "-none of recent date.
ADDRESS OF REV. NATHAN GRIER PARKE.
CHARACTERISTICS OF EARLY PRESBY- TERIAN PREACHERS.
I would very much prefer to speak to you this afternoon looking into your faces, but I am afraid. Daniel Doughterty tells us that on one occasion. when making his maiden speech in the city of Phil- adelphia, he lost himself, or lost his subject, and fainted and was carried off-the best thing he could do. Now I do not want to faint, and I therefore, have, as a security for not making an entire failure, some manuscript in my hand.
In the arrangement of subjects to be presented on this occasion, it has fallen to my lot to speak of "the characteristics of the early preacher," of whom it is assumed I must know something, having "come down from a former generation." But as a matter of fact, Mr. Elder, the second pastor of the Paxtang church, and his ministerial associates were in advance of me about a hundred years. I know something of them and of their times as do all who know anything of the history of Pennsylvania. They made their mark on the times in which they lived, and some of them had no little to do with making the times. Still I am not sure but the "committee on the programme " made a mistake in asking me to speak of these worthies who
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are not here to-day to speak for themselves. My dis- position is to glorify the present rather than the past. Solomon, whom we still give credit for some wisdom, tells us that they make a mistake who say "the former times were better than these," and on this subject I am heartily in accord with Solomon. We believe the age in which we live is socially, politically, educationally, and religiously the best age in the history of the world. And we believe further, that in our estimate of the times that are past, and the men that figured in them, we must make allowance for the "enchantment that distance lends." We do not suppose that the Scotch- Irish preachers who were the Presbyterian pastors in this part of Pennsylvania a hundred and fifty years ago were superior to the Presbyterian pastors of 1890. Neither do we suppose that the elders associated with the ancient worthies were superior to the Presbyterian elders of 1890, including the President of the United States and the Governor of the Keystone State. These optimistic views of the age in which we live will not prevent us, we trust, from doing justice to the early preachers.
1. It is conceded by all who knew them that they did love to have their own way, which they honestly believed was the right way. If they were not auto- cratic they leaned that way. And, belonging, as they did, to the church "militant," they did not hesitate to contend earnestly for the faith that was according to
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the Westminster Confession. As they did not all think alike on some subjects, they not unfrequently had "lively times" in their ecclesiastic meetings. One of them is represented as praying in Presbytery that "the Lord would keep them right, for he knew they were very determined " and difficult to change when once they set their heads.
With them orthodoxy was their doxie and hetrodoxy was your doxie. If alive to-day, they would be op- posed to revision. As the result possibly of the law of heredity, their successors in office in this part of Penn- sylvania are like them in this regard. They are not clammering for revision. The degenerate sons of noble sires in New York and the northern part of Pennsyl- vania are the men who vote for revision.
2. They did not believe in the doctrine of falling from grace, but some of them, we are sorry to say, practiced it. And under the circumstances in which they were placed, we are not surprised at this. God does not promise to keep those who go in the way of temptation. But in every house where they entered, the bottle, not a "little brown jug," but elegant decanters, were set out, and they were invited and expected to drink. At weddings and funerals and at all social gatherings, preachers and elders, and deacons were expected to take a sup of good brandy. And it was good, no doubt, as compared with what is now sold for "good brandy." A minister on the Eastern Shore of Mary-
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land, a hundred years ago, was tried and condemned by his Presbytery, not for making brandy, but for making brandy that was so poor it would freeze. In my father's cellar, when I was a boy, there were several barrels of brandy, and he took his brandy as regularly as he took his coffee, and he was a preacher. The wonder to me is not that occasionally a preacher fell from grace, but that there were any sober men among them.
3. These early preachers did not preach "twenty minute sermons." Sermons two hours long were not uncommon among them. The people went early to church, taking their children and their dinners with them, and they reached home in time to milk the cows, and eat a bowl of bread and milk before it was dark, except on sacramental occasions.
4. These early preachers were frugal men; from prin- ciple or from necessity, possibly from both. Yet they probably lived as well as most of their people-preach- ers generally do. They rode on horse-baek, and that exereise gave them appetites for plain food. Their salaries did not tempt them to luxurious living. In my own father's family I know a good deal of time was lost in the morning picking the bones out of smoked herring, but it was in a measure made up at supper-there were no bones in the mush and milk. Living in this frugal manner, these early preachers escaped bronchitis, lived to a good old age, taught their
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children economy, and were able to send their boys to college. And thus they furnished the country with its lawyers and judges and politicians and statesmen.
5. Apparently these men never tired in their work. We do not read that they ever asked for vacations in which to rest. Their congregations usually supplied them with a few acres of land on which they recreated in plowing and sowing and reaping and cutting briars and picking stones. They were not afraid of working with their hands. This kind of recreation was very much less expensive than summering in the mountains or by the seaside, and possibly as helpful.
6. These preachers had very much less help in their work than the preachers of to-day. Sunday-schools, societies of Christian Endeavor, W. C. T. U.'s, and Y. M. C. A.'s they knew nothing of. They visited their congregations personally. They trained the parents and the children in the catechism. They preached the truth intelligently, simply, earnestly, and fearlessly. And many of them, in addition to their pastoral work, superintended the secular education of the young men of their congregations. There may have been Aarons and Hurs who held up their hands by their prayers, but they did not do it by active church work.
7. These early preachers were thoroughly educated men. And as educators made their power felt on the side of civil and religious liberty. Most of them had their diplomas from representative universities in Great
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Britain, and their families became training schools for young men who were preparing for college. They established academies that grew into flourishing col- leges. The Old Log college of Bucks county, as is well known, was the seed from which the university of Princeton grew. The Puritan, and the Dutch, and the Scotch-Irish preachers of a hundred and fifty years ago, were the founders of many of our great universities. They grew out of a demand for an educated ministry. They so preached as to inspire our people with a love of education, and with a love of liberty. All that Macauley and Choate have said of these men who came to these shores " to find a church without a bishop, and a State without a king" was truthfully said. Washington ac- knowledged their help in the Revolutionary war. The patriotism of the pastor of this church is a matter of history, and he was only one of many. There were no doubt tories among the preachers when the colonies were struggling for liberty against the mother country. There is a black sheep in every flock, but they were not found among the Presbyterian preachers who resolved to hang together or hang separately.
8. There was not much that was emotional in their religion. Their preaching was not sensational and their theology was not effete. In their view, reli- gion was largely a matter of training, and they re- garded their work as largely in this line. They aimed to promote family religion, and in this they were suc-
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cessful. They secured family worship in the home, reverence for parents, the observance of the Sabbath and knowledge of our formulas of Christian faith. While they preached the truth intelligently and per- suasively, they did not hesitate to declare the whole counsel of God, although it invoved the duty of telling men of the wrath and curse of God pronounced against sin. In the pulpit they only feared God. Under their preaching and teaching, God's people were built up in their most holy faith, and sinners were converted to God. They did not preach much science, but they did preach the glorious Gospel of the blessed God, and under their preaching men and women grew up, who, under God, were able to lay the foundations of the civil and religious institutions that are the glory of our land. If we may judge trees by their fruit, the religion of these early preachers, was a good kind. There is no discounting religion that develops such Christians.
9. We believe these preachers, while called to endure " hardness as good soldiers," had a good time. They were happy in their work, fully as much so as the preachers of this age, possibly more so. They were not installed on wheels, with notice to be ready at any time to move. They took their vows at their installa- tion as our young people take their wives-until separ- ated by death. They did not have luxurious homes and fat salaries and elegant churches, but they had that which glorified the home-the presence of God-
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intelligent Christian homes. They were sustained in their work. Their people respected them and loved them, and made them welcome to their homes, and looked up to them as Job's friends in the days of his prosperity looked up to him. When sent as delegates to the General Assembly, they were not provided for at the hotels. They were hospitably entertained in private homes, where nothing was esteemed too good for them. And the testimony that comes from these homes is that, in entertaining these preachers, they not unfrequently entertained angels unawares.
I have not felt called on in presenting this subject to speak of the wives of the early preachers, for whom I have a profound respect. Allow me, in conclusion, briefly to refer to them. They showed faith and courage and good judgment when they consented to take the position of preacher's wives, without much coaxing or persuasion, and when they engaged to love, honor, and obey their husbands, they lived up to their engagements. They were for the most part keep- ers at home, and in the absence of their husbands they looked after the children, and the chickens, and the cow, and other things. They seldom penned poems, but they often "penned pigs." They rarely made music on pianos, but they often made music on spinning wheels. Their hands were not remarka- ble for softness, and whiteness, and smallness, but they had brain, and muscle, and loving hearts, and good
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common sense, and these they bequeathed by the law of heredity to their children.
They did not often appear on the public platform as speakers or as presidents of benevolent societies, but they were careful that their husbands should "appear well in the gates." It is related of one of the early preachers, who was a little absent-minded, that on one occasion he left home to attend Presbytery, with the charge from his wife, to put on a clean shirt every day until he returned; and so he did, but he did not remember to take any off-the result was, his coat was a little tight when he came home. Men who serve the public as preachers and Congressmen have not much time for their children, and if their children amount to anything, it is because they have faithful mothers.
We honor our fathers to-day, and very many of us certainly some of us, have special reason to honor our mothers, whose loving Christian care has been to us a perpetual benediction. May God's richest blessings rest on the mothers of the land, whose quiet influence, next to that of the church, has made it what it is. We can construct scales that will weigh a single hair -you cannot construct scales that weigh a flood of light. [Loud applause.]
Moderator STEWART. You have had the pleasure of looking into the faces of some of those who have descended from the early Paxtang preachers. I now give you the pleasure of looking at a sermon which
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was preached by the Rev. John Elder in Paxtang, December 31, 1738. It was his ordination sermon. I am not disposed to question the accuracy of the statement of Dr. Parke, that those old preachers preached two hours. They were able to do it. But this sermon was no doubt preached within half an hour. These pages you see (holding them up) are small, and there are only twelve of them,-and I read by the watch one of them in three minutes; and the handwriting was not familiar to me either ; so it must have been preached in less than half an hour. I do not understand why. Perhaps the Presbytery was present, and thought they would not care to have a long sermon. The pastors were present and did not care for too much preaching .*
We are present to-day to hear-and it will be a pleasure-about the country church, as well as the early ministers, who were to a very large extent missionary pastors. It is therefore with great pleas- ure that I give place to the Governor of this Com- monwealth,-and, what is more to the point to-day, an elder in the Presbyterian church; and, what is perhaps more to the audience to-day, a trustee of the Paxtang congregation. Governor, elder, and trustee, James A. Beaver, will now address us upon the "Importance of the Country Church." [The Governor was greeted with hearty applause.]
*This sermon is printed in the Appendix.
ADDRESS OF GOV. JAMES A. BEAVER.
IMPORTANCE OF THE COUNTRY CHURCHI.
LADIES AND GENTLEMEN : I supposed that it was to be my pleasure in coming here to-day, and in saying a word about the country church, to visit the familiar surroundings of this historic spot. I have been here before. It is a great pleasure in driving in this direction to look at this beautiful and quiet old landmark. I have occasionally come here to worship, and so have been familiar with its approaches and surroundings; but when I came to-day and found that we drove by a road altogether different from the one which is usually traveled, and saw as we ap- proached the church flags flying and guide-boards announcing Sharon, Paxtang, and Rutherford avenues, eighty feet wide, I said to myself, is it possible that the profane hand of progress has been laid upon the country church ! When I ascertained later that it was proposed to clip a little here and there from the edges of these beautiful grounds in order to make these avenues regular and the plot symmetrical, it seemed to me it was only another evidence of what the country church has done in contributing to the suc- cess of the community and in stimulating its progress and thrift.
But it is not the country church of to-day of which we are to speak, and it is not of the importance of
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the country church of to-day of which you expect me to say anything. If you were to ask me, is the country church important ? I would answer it very briefly. Is a mother an important factor in a well regulated family ? The statement of such a proposi- tion answers it. Without her there is no family; there can be no family life; no social life; no home. And so if you were to put the question, is the country church, or has it been, an important factor in this Commonwealth and in the country ? You answer the question by asking it. A fuller answer has been given by the filial messages to which we have listened, from the loyal daughters of this ancient church who bring their greetings of affection and gratitude to this Sesqui-Centennial home-coming.
But the committee of arrangements has not asked a question. They affirm a fact and ask me to tell, briefly and pointedly as I may, in what way the country church has shown its importance. Any one who has been in the habit of coming here, or who has made but a casual visit; any one who has fre- quented the historic churches of this valley and of the neighboring valley across the river, and the ancient churches of many other fertile valleys through- out the Commonwealth, will realize and recognize the importance of the country church historically. This building and its surroundings; yonder churchyard with its ] quiet inmates ; Donegal, Upper Pennsborough,
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Lower Pennsborough, and other well-known churches of eastern Pennsylvania, are, to a large extent, the source and the center of the history of Pennsylvania, and without them, and the influences which radiate from them, our history would be largely a blank.
It was through the country church that the history of the region has been written. This is quite as true- of the Lutheran and other denominations as of the Presbyterian ; for in some of the German churches the records of baptisms, marriages, and deaths were much more faithfully kept, and have been more carefully preserved, than among the churches of the Scotch- Irish and their descendants. The people who first inhabited Pennsylvania, coming as they did from Scot- land, from Ireland, from Switzerland, from France, and from Germany, with a view of securing the freedom of worship which they failed to enjoy at home, naturally and almost necessarily founded and organized a church as soon as they had secured a new home. They were largely an agricultural people. They settled upon their little farms, were busied with the effort to secure a livelihood, led isolated lives, and endeavored to rear their families in the fear of God. They little heeded the history they were making and were not concerned about recording it. Whatever has come to us of their living and of their doing has come largely through the history of these churches which they founded. There is no phase of the country
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