The central Presbyterian. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1856-1908, 1875-08-25
For TIE CENTRAL PRESBYTERIAN.
THE LETTERS OF A CULROss SPY.
LETTER 9.

LETTER y.
Dear Sit may be well in the present
letter to mention two or three clergymen
who have made themselves conspicuous in
the late convulsious of this country. The
number mentioned must be very limited,
though as many could be found as would
fill spacious apartment in the Crystal
Palace. But we doubt whether their busts
will ever be honOred. by niche in Prince
Albert's Toy; for toy could not hold sueir
big divines. The father of Frederic the
Great was smitten by a passion for tall
Greuadiers. He hunted all over Prussia,
and was crazy with delight when he found a
man six feet and four inches high. Gene
raj Scott would have suited him to the life,
but that native of Dinwiddie, Va, has lately
deceased at West Point, military Institute
which had much to do in bringing on the
beligerency between North and South
Some of the American divines are not quite
so lofty as the Prussian Grenadiers. Bishop
Potter, of New York, is busy in making
nuns; Bishop Elliott in mending the pcrce
lain fragments of the Episcopal Church !;
Whittingham, of Maryland, in holding forth
every Sunday on ApOstolcity; Bishop Coke
in scribbling verses about the chimes of
church bells, whilst their clergy are engaged
in explaining the new rites of Puseyism, one
of which is that the communicant must take
the bread of the Eucharist into the palm OF
his hand. There are not few puerilities in
vogue Just now in this once manly country.
Old men have turned boys, instead of boys
growing up to be men. Some find their gos-
pei in the Geological Periods, some in West
India emancipation, and others in General
Howard's Bureau. DR.. Mason used to find
it fresh in his Bible. And alas, alas, we
fear that some of them are beginning to de-
tect it in the three Worlds of Dante, or in
the writings of Kant, SpinO0a, Hegel, Fichte
and Schelling; as if there were something
very subtle in the Divine system. Some of
the clergy have sent in most ardent petit
ton to the Government that the German
language may forthwith be introduced into
the curriculum of West Point. DR.. Spring
is one of the petitioners. Psntheism may
be consequence of this request, after using
for a long time the nOstrums of .Prelacy.-
Literature, we admit, is something better
than being taught to fight. The cadets will
no doubt become fully posted up in the
Sculpture, Painting and Architecture of
Germany, in the fables and dramas of Les
sing, in the village stones of Auerbach, in
the word pictures of Wieland, in the Odes Of
Klopstock, and the idyls of Goethe. They
will enter into the great Walhalla of Ludwig,
First King of Bavaria. And as the civil
war here is over, the United States will need
a superb Hall for the heroes who figured in
the battles, and the first niche will be as
signed to Lee and Jackson.
But there are few tall divines still left
in the American Church. The Culross Spy
will hunt up one or two of them for your
ediGcation. The fame of Henry Ward
Beeeher, you know, has crossed the Atlantic,
for he took trip to EOgland during the
war, after selling off more pictures than were
ever executed By Luke the Evangelist who
is said by some to have been an artist. We
do not know the exact instant at which Hen
ry was born, for the Spy is not the Arch
bishop of Canterbury to hold watch in his
hand to mark the moment when Prince has
lust honored the world with his presence
We presume that he is of New Eogland Ori-
gin, and understand that when young he
settled at Indianapolis. In the swamps o.
Indiana he excited little interest, but after
getting to Brooklyn he became notorious
among the Israel of that lex, without dis
tinction. Chalmers was distinguished, bu
Barnum is notorious. He (Beecher) figured
in the Kansas troubles. Not that he wen
in person; but envy of his great abilities pro
mulgated report that he was sharp in send
ing out rifles to the scene of conflict. Blu
this is incredible, for minister swims in
sea of divine love, and were the rumOr tru
it would make him a shark or crocodile
He announced himself as Reformer, no
of the sixteenth but of the nineteenth cen
tury. Calvin and Luther attacked abuse
of the Church, but Beecher, with Poet Pier
pont and Quaker Whittier, attacked abuse
of the State. The war ragged, but tn
Brooklyn divine never sought, and of cOurS
never found the post of danger. But wha