Milford chronicle., 1893-04-28

myself Of but three ministers OF the gOSpe
now preaching here who were preaching
when 1 came to Brooklyn. Most Of thI
pulpits around me have changed seven O
eight times since my arrival.
Sometimes the pastorate has been brie
for one reason and sometimes for another
reason. Sometimes the ministers of th'
gospel have been too good for this world
and Heaven has transplanted them. Some
times they changed places by the decree o
their denomination. Sometimes they caml
with great blare of trumpets, proposing K
carry everything before them, and got ex
tinguished before they were distinguished
Some got preached out in two or three
years and told the people all they knew
Some with holy speed did in a short time
work which it takes a great many year.
to do.
! Whether for good or bad reasons a Brook
/ lyn pastorete is characterized by brevity
not much of the old plan by which min
lister of the gospel baptized an infant, theI
received him into the church, after he had
| become an adult married him, baptized his
children, married them and lived on long
enough to bury almost everybody but him
self Glorious old pastorates they were
Some of us remember them-Dr. Spring
Peter Labaugh, Dominic Zabriskie, Daniel
Waldo Abram Halsey. When the snow
melted from their foreheads, it revealed the
flowers of an unfading cOronal. PastOrates
of 80, 40, 50, So years continuance.
Some of them had to be helped into the
pulpit or into the carriage, they were so old
and decrepit, but when the Lords ehariots
halted one day in front Of the old parson-
age they stepped in vigorous as an athlete,
Of Ifru
through the gates of the sunset we all cried
out, My father, my fatherl the chariots OF
Israel and the horsemen thereof"
/ remark again, Brooklyn pastorate is
characterized by its happiness.
BROOKLYN A PLACE FOR HAPPINESS.
No city under the sun where people take
such good care of their ministers. In pro
portion as the world outside may curse, a
congregation stands close up by the man
whom they believe in. Brooklyn society
has for its foundation two elements-the
Puritanic, which always means quiet
Sabbath, and the Hollandish, which means
a worshipful people. On the top Of this an
admixture of all nationalities-the brawny
Scot, the solid English, the vivaeious Irish,
the polite French, the philosOphic German,
and in all this intermingling of population
the universal dominant theory that man
can do as he pleases, provided he doesn't
disturb anybody else.
A delightful climate. While 1t IS hard
on weak throats, for the most of us it is
bracing. Not an atmosphere made up of
the discharged gases Of chemical factories
or the miasms of swamps, but coming
painting right off 5000 miles of Atlantic
ocean before anybody else has had a chance
to breathe It'll All through the city a so
ciety of kind, genial, generous, sympathetic
people How they fly to you when you are
in troubled How they watch over you
when you are sick! How tender they are
with you when you have buried your deadl
Brooklyn is good place to live in, a good
place to die in, a good place to be buried in,
a good place from which to rise in beau
tifuI resurrection.
In such a city have been permitted to
have "a years Of pastorate. During these
years how many heartbreaks, how many
losses, how many bereavementsl Hardly a
family of the church that has not been
struck with sorrow, but God has sustained
YOU in the past, and he will sustain you in
the future I exhoTt you to be Of good
cheer. o thou of the broker heart Weep
ing may endure for a night, but joy cometh
in the morning." / wish over every door
of this church we might have written the
word sympathy for all the
young
We must crowd them in here by thou
sands and propose radiant gospel that
they will take on the sp0!r We must make
this place so attractive for the Young that
young man will come here'sses you fh
morning, put down his hat, brush h4--4isfa
back from his forehead, unbutton his over
coat and look around wondering if he has
not by mistake got into heaven. He will
see in the faces of the old people not the
gloom which some people take for religion,
but the sunshine of celestial peace, and he
will say, "Why, wonder if that isn't the
same peace that shOne out on the face of
nv father and mother when they lay dy-
ing?'
Aud then there will come a dampness IN
his eyes through which he can hardly see,
and he will close his eyes to imprison the
emotion, but the hot tear will break through
the fringes of eyelashes and drop upon the
coat sleeve. He will put his head on the
back of the pew in front and sob, Lord
God of the old people, help meP' WeOught
to lay plot here for the religious capture
of all the young people in Brooklyn.
THE sYMPATHIEs OF BROOKLYN.
Yes, sympathy for the old. They have
their aches and pains and distresses. They
cannot hear or walk or see as well as they
used to- We must be reverential in their
On dark days we must help
them through the aisle and help them find
the place in the hymnbool. Some Sab
bath morning we shall miss them from
their place, and we shall say, Where is
Father So-and-so today?" and the answer
will be: what, haven't you heard? The
Kings wagons have taken Jacob up to the
palace where his Joseph is yet alive"
Sympathy for business men. Twenty
four years Of commercial life In New York
and Brooklyn are enough to tear ones
nerves to pieces. We want to make our
Sabbath service here a rescue for all these
martyrs of traffic, a foretaste of that land
where they have no rents to pay, and there
are no business rivalries, and where riches,
instead of taking wings to fly away, brood
over other riches.
Sympathy for the fallen, remembering
that they ought to be pitied as much as
man run over with a rail train. The fact is
that in the temptations and misfortunes of
life they get run over. You and in the
same circumstances would have done as
badly; we should have done worse perhaps.
If you and had the same evil surround
lngs and the same evil parentage that they
had and the same native born prOclivities
10 evil that they had, you and should have
Keen in the penitentiary or outcasts Of sOci-
ETY.. no" says some self righteous man,
II couldn't have been overthrown in that
way" You old hypocrite, you would have
been the first to fall
We want in this church to have sympa-
Thy for the worst man, remembering he :
a brother; sympathy for the worst woman,
she is q sister. If that is not
she gospel, do not know what the gospel
IS. All, yesl sympathy for all the troubled;
ior the orphans in their exposure; for wild
1whood with its weak arm fighting for
bread; for the household which erst re-
sounded with merry voices and pattering
Ieet, now Hwfully still-broad winged sym
rathy, like the feathers Of the Almighty
warm blooded sympathy, everlasting sym
which shows itself in the
yrasp of the hand, in the glittering tear OF
5he eye, in the consoling word Of the mouth
sympathy Of blankets for the cold, Of