Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1895-03-23
Rev. Joseph Cook.


ing OF the Rev. Joseph Cook from public
attention. 1t says he has declined In In
tellectual reputation, 1t is said, while his
audiences have dcreriorated in character
He is not the prophet he was fifteen years
ago, when at the apex of his fame. Then
he swas as cloud Of smoke by day In
leading the way from ignorance to culture
"A final arbiter of all vexed questions.
Some who went to hear him departed to
SCOT, but everybody listened. Now his
listeners are few.
This Is not surprising Cook was first
of all an egotist He was dogmatic and
arbitrary. He endeavored to insist that
the young men who were coming to the
front in the Congregational church should
entertain his views Of theology. He was
especially self.constituted conservator of
the old fashioned orthodoxy, dogmatic,
pupnacious, oflicious. The tide Of pro
Qress swept by him, and now his name
occasionally bubbles to the surface OF
affairs, only to remind us Of the transition
period between the old and the new
theologies when he stood for time, like
Old Dame Darlington battling the At
lantic ocean with her mop and endeavored
to beat back the rising tide of modern
thought and hope, and aspiration. The
writer never heard Mr.. Cook lecture but
once, and never cared to hear him again
His offensive egotism Disguised the audi
ence, and was the occasion of scathing
criticism from the keen pen of Editor
Tenney OF the Brunswick Telegraph, who
never had much patience with pompous
or pretentious people. II there were any
elements of wisdom outside of Mr.. Cooks
Uranium the audience in question was
not permitted to suspect it. A man may
honestly believe that he knows it all, but
it is never wise, either by manner or word
to endeavor to impress the fact upon
Others Few Americans are born without
some innate elements of self esteem, how
ever successfully they may be concealed,
and didactic addresses, either from the
pulpit or the platform, have never been
specially popular in the United States
The average audience stubbornly re-
fuses to grow enthusiastic over the utter
ances of any self-annointed sage, whose
remarks, or the manner of delivering
them, are calculated to impress and OPP
press the listener with sense of his own
infinite mental inferiority. Mr.. Cook lee
tured from the heights of Olympus, and
those who were permitted to sit shivering
the cold valley below, and listen to his stem
torian tones, went away with the feeling
that they had contracted intellectual
rheumatism from the fogs that sur
rounded them. 1t is a decidedly disagree
able sensation, especially to self satisfied
college student, soon to go forth to world
ly conquest, and busily employed in
evolving the great thoughts to be en-
balmed in graduating Grafton. When he
takes his subdued and chastened spirit to
bed with him. he may be better man,
but life will never look quite the same to
him again.
1t may be said in truth of Mr.. Cook
that, with all his dogmatism, his love of
controversy, and his offensive mannerisms'
he is man of scholarly attainments, and
unquestioned ability. He simply belongs
to an era in religious thought that Is pass
ing away, and whose echoes grow fainter
and fainter with the changing seasons.