Litchfield enquirer., 1880-01-15
A Christmas in old Connecticut.
FEY REV. THEODORE L. .5oUYLER
NEw PRESTON, Ct., Dec. 25, 1879

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 NEW PRESTON, Ct., Dec. %, 1879.
 That great preacher and poet Dr. Horace Bushoell in his famous Speech for Counecti cut" describes remote parish in. Litchfeld county made up of the corners of three townships and the ragged ends of twice as many mountains and stony sided hilIs."s But, out Of this nook among the mountains of northwestern Connecticut, have come forth President Day of Yale, the Hon. Elisha Whit tlesey, several scores of noted divnes and civilians and no less man than Dr. Bushnell himself. The old-fashioned wooden house in which Bushnell spent his boyhood is few rods from the building in which l am scrib-- bling this Christmas screed.~-That .mill-dam accrOss the East Aspetnck rizer,s which can see from my window, was built by him when he was sturdy rustic youth fitting for college Dr. Bushnell spent many of the later Summers of hls life in wonder Lake Waramaug-a de- lghtful resort for rowing, riding, and rich mountain scenery.A &&A4-S < '-s # E-
 I have run up hither to spend my Christmas with Rev. Henry Upson at New Preston. whose family school for boys gives pleasant home to my own dear lad, among others. In Summer. this is a region of rare picturesque ness and beauty-when Mount Tom is array edi his gari iture of green, and Mount Wyan tenock is a mass of verdant glory. This, morning they are ghostly white in their man. tie of snow. But indoors we have abundance of glow and good cheer ;<and when thefe:Up- son Sen1nary Literary Society" held its Christmas Eve festival, there was no lack of mirth or nlinstrelsy. The cultured neighbors gathered in last night to enjoy the entertain ment; for if these hilsides do not yield great harvests of grain, they do produce rich crops of brGins. ..g ..f
 This whole region is historic with the names of famous men, Horace Bushnell was cradled among the memories which make these noun tains like the mountains round about Jerusa- lem. In fact the early name given to this township was 1Judea,' and it was afterwards changed to Washington" A few miles east of us is the town of Bethlehem, where the cele- brated Df. Bellamy conducted his revival work thirty yesrs before the Revolutionary war. Six miles from Brother Upsons school is the rural town of Warren. That place gave birth to the Boanerges of American revivals, Charles G. Finney. To my mind he was the < most powerful preacher to the conscience since Jonathan Edwards. Five miles from here on the road to Ltchfield is Milton, the quiet parish in which my Princeton fellow student Rev. George Harrison now labors In that pulpit the famous Dr. Nettleton preached sixty years ago. And .he parish lies close against the great historic parish of Litchfeld, where 'Dr. Lyman Beecher shone for sixteen
 
 gentleman who was at the entertainment last evening, tells me that he used to hear the elder Beecher up in yonder old church on the hill, when he was the king of the New En- gland pulpit.
 President Day of Yale College was born in this village of New Preston--and Dr. Taylor. the father of "Taylorite theology" was born at New Milford, about nine miles away. This region is also the birthplace of the early tenn perance reformation. The first temperance sermon in Connecticut Chat was ever printed) was delivered by Dr. Ebenezer Porter-in 1906 in the Congregational church of Washing ton, pretty village within thirty minutes drive of me. The sermon was called forth by the discovery of a man lying deadin the snow with a bottle of whiskey at his side. Dr. Por- ter afterwards went to Andover Seminary and the village of Washington. is now well knowd by "The Gunnery" school located there, which pr. Holland describes in his novel of "Artfur Bonnicastle." It was also within a dozen miles from here that Dr. Lyman Beech CT first delivered the immortal 'Six Sermons against Intemperance," in 1926. Those dis courses still rank among temperance efforts as rensic arguments for~the American %Unlon. Would that all our leading pulpits would un- timber the artillery of Gods Word against strong drink, and deliver such broadsdes as used to ring among these mountains!
 But holiday is no time for inditing long epistles to the press.- Let my pen have holi- day too yfor the Christmas dinner. is beginning to send it's savory perfumes through my friend Upson's house. Before this letter reaches it's readers, the knell of the departing year will have sounded. God send us alfa "happy New Year.! And may it's 'crowning joy and bless ing be-a glorious outpouring of His Holy SrNir nhi haa, If fho 1op6 p6 N