About this Book

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1896 edition. Excerpt: ... CHAPTER III THE YOUNG MINISTER Seminary life at Newton -- Influence of Dr. Hackett -- Pastor of the Jamaica Plain Church -- Letters -- Called to Clarendon Street -- Criticism of Robertson on baptism -- The Church Unity Society examined THE time for special preparation for life-work had now arrived. In 1860 Gordon entered the theological school at Newton. Located on a commanding hilltop, the institution buildings afforded one a view of real beauty. An undulating country of meadow and pasture, not yet built over with the suburban villas of Boston merchants, stretched in all directions. The faint blue top of Monadnock could be descried in the north, while the flashing dome of the state-house sent its reflection into the west or summer afternoons. Contiguity to Boston brought the new-comer into new climates of opinion. Speculation and the standing discussions of New England were in the sixties, however, brushed aside by portentous public events. The nation was entering into the valley of darkness. The remission of sin which it had hoped to find in interminable compromises was to come now in the blood of a thousand battles. Walking into Boston to browse among the old book-stores of Cornhill, Gordon is attracted by a vast crowd about the entrances to Tremont Temple. He asks the cause of the gathering, and is told that they are mobbing Phillips within. At another time he goes in to see the immense night parade organized during the first Lincoln campaign. As he stands at the gates of the Common, an unending stream of torches pours past him over the historic slopes. He can think only of the vast musterings in Milton. We find him eagerly reading Gasparin's new book, "The Struggle of Christianity with Slavery," and later, with every one else in the...