Nashville union and American. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1868-1875, 1872-11-15
THE OLD SOUTH CHURCH.

In the hurry and confusion of the tele-
graphing from Boston during the terrible
scenes of Saturday night and Sunday il is
not surprising that we should have received
conflicting accounts as to the details of the
great fire which has suddenly snatched
from Chicago the palm Of pre-eminence in
disaster. 1t was long uncertain whether
the ''Old South Church, had or had not
disappeared. 1t still stands. The loss of
this ancient edifice would have been in
some sort national calamity. Not that
the Old South Church could possibly be re-
gsrded IS model of architecture. 1t is
simply a venerable New England meeting
house of the Hanoverisn days. But its
rather ungainIy tower and steeple, its
double galleries, its high pews, and its lofty
pulpit surmounted with the sounding board
of the olden time, are associated with
the shines that tried mems SOULS" and
bear witness of the Revolutionary
temper of old Massachusetts to genera
ton not wholly in harmony with the spirit,
nor wholly LOYAL perchance to the plinci-
pies, of the fathers. The society of the
Old South Church was one of the oldest
Congregational bodies in Massachusetts,
and its first building for public worship was
GIeCted OLlhu bnO yO6lo dSsOI
in 1869. This was destroyed, we believe,
by fire a coupe of generations later, and in
1929 the house which now stands in its
place was consecrated, or, to use the New
England phrase, dedicated" to divine
worship. 1t was used from the first as the
place in which to preach the annual election
sermon delivered, according TO Massachu-
sets custom, before the Governor and his
Council upon the assembling of the ''Great
and General Court" which degenerate
moderns call the Legislature. As the fer
ment of the popular mind increased under
Bernard and Hutchinson it was found that
Faneuil Hall was not always adequate
to the accommodation of the angry Cit
zens bent On getting their thoughts and pur-
poses understood by e,roysl government,
and the .'Old South" became a rallying-
point Of public opinion. There it was that
in March, 1772, Joseph Warren lifted up
to himself the hearts of the people by his
high and passionate words on the snnivers-
airy of the "msssacre," as they called it, of
the citizens in State street by Capt. Pres
colts soldiery two years before. 1t was a
striking and remarkable scene, of which eye
witnesses, both British and Colonial, have
left us stirring pictures. Three years after
wards the same voice rang out in accents
as free and bold under the same roof for the
last time, and the speaker in that same year,
IT'S, sealed with bis life on Bunker Hill
the sincerity of his patriotic passion. 1t is
| not to the credit of our British kinsmen
| that during their occupation of Boston,
while invested b. Washington with
the FIRST Continental army, they wreaked
their wrath upon the rebel meeting house
by converting il into riding school. The
pews we're burnt for firewood; the floors
| were broken and choked with earth and
sand. They made the ''0ld South sta
bic, az they made Faneuil Hall theater.
We b ave seen in our own days at the South
how easily the troops of government may
merge all the ordinary sense Of right aid
wrong in the belief that rebels have pC
rights which loyal men need respect. Ii
| 1882 the "Ols South" was restored and re-
fitted. When sturdy Samuel Adams had a
little difference with the Anew South" con-
gregation, to which he had previously be
lUnged, he left tha' body and Joined him
self to the 'Old South" and his strong, rug
ged face and his ample scarlet coax are
part and parcel of the best traditions Of thu
edi6ce which have been brought By the IRE
of 1872 into such imminent peril.