The daily morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven, Conn.) 1894-1907, 1900-10-08
REV. DR.. MUNGER RESIGNS
that it has not come sooner.

| down my office when l should reach
| the age of seventy, and had Intended
to do so last spring, but as l reflected
! that no time would be so inopportune
as the summer for the church to take
such action as would be necessary, |
| decided to wait until the autumn.
1t is the happy feature of the step l
am taking and one that makes it easy
| for me, that l am lead up to it simply
| and solely by the passage of time NO
| reason could be clearer or more divine.
| Whatever mistake one may make as to
| entering the ministry, there can be no
mistake in closing it at three-score and
| ten. ] do 1t with less regret, because
so far as / am aware, there is no rea-
| son growing out of our relation that
| you should desire it's close. If there
were lack of cordiality on either side,
| it would be a sad ending of a lifelong
| ministry, but since time alone is the
| determining cause, the event is re-
| deemed from all personal feeling, and is
| to be accepted as issuing from the very
| will of God.
! 1t is hardly necessary for me to state
| the reasons why a pastor should re-
sign his office at the age of seventy,
but some of you who are far off from
that age may not understand why one
in ordinary health and apparent
strength of mind and body should take
this step. 1t is enough to say that by
! universal consent it is the age when it
is wiser in all respects for men to lay
down the responsibilities that belong
to positions which are of such a nature
as to call for the exercises of all their
faculties while at their highest point of
efficiency. This period ends at seventy
with the vast majority. There are eX-
ceptions but he who oversteps the mark
incurs the risk of great mistakes, the
worst of which is his own insensibility
to them. But even IL pastor who
overstays the limit escapes this blind
mistake, and is for time tolerated In
it, he has no right to suffer himself to
be overtaken by conditions inevitable to
himself that unfit him for his work and
weaken his ministry It should there
fore be a point of honor with him not
to drag his parish along his descend
ing path. The parish is not made for
man, but man for the parish The vi
tally and efficiency of a church will
not rise above the level of these quail
ties in the pastor, and when he falls off
in them 1t is time for him to take him
self out of the way. To cover an en-
tire generation with ones ministry Is as
much as one should attempt; that |
have transgressed this limit lends en-
phasis to my resignation If any of
you, out OF mistaken kindness should
urge delay, I beg you in truer kindness
not to attempt to involve me in
steadily growing mistake, and so turn
my twilight into darkness.
You already understand my resigna-
ton is final, but do not ask for im1ne-
diate action on your part unless you
should see fit to make it such. There
fore l Will continue to serve you as
pastor until January, when / request
you to join with me In calling a coun-
ell to advise you as to your action upon
this letter. If however it should be
more convenient for you to delay action
until a later date, even to the close of
the fiscal year in May, [ will endeavor
to meet the duties of my place as in the
past, but with somewhat fuller depend
ence upon my very competent assistant
My dear friends I send you this let
ter with two-fold feeling, the strongest
seriousness in this formal closing up of
my life as a minister of the gospel of
God in Jesus Christ. It has been a hap
by life, because from first to last I have
believed in this gospel and in the minis
try of it, and never more fully than
to-day. But while my ministerial life
has been happy because of an unfail-
ing enthusiasm in 1t, and also because
of kindness almost never disturbed on
the part of those to whom have min
istered, l am increasingly burdened by
a sense of it's inadequacy and defect I
end 1t with no decentralization, and
I have little desire to review 1t, except.
for the love and friendship the years
brought with them Every man,
think, must leave his life with God and
hope 1t may not have been in vain. 1t
has at least gone into the life of the
world where even mistake and defect
may serve to fill out the divine plan.
To count on more is to go beyond sure
desert. Hence l close my ministry
without real sadness over the past and
with an ever-growng hope and glad
ness as I look into the future.
1t is probable that I shall remain
among you, and hence l need not an
tictpate the breaking of a single tie be-
tween us, but rather that the freedom
into which I shall come will strengthen
our friendship and make me more fully
than ever before your friend and serv-
ant in the love of God and in the grace |
of our Lord Jesus Christ.
r. T. MUNGER.
Rev DR.. Munger is native of CEN |
raj New York and graduated from Yale |
college in the class of 1851. He then |
studied theology at Yale and after COM |
oleting part of the course there he fin |
shed in Andover. His first pastorate !
was In Dorchester Mass. He next had |
a passionate in North Adams, Mass. He |
,ame from North Adams to New Haven |
% become pastor of the United church.
ie has done considerable literary work |
md has published several books, the
asst one being a biography of Horace |
Bushnell. He was elected a member of
he Yale corporation in June, 1887, and
las since been a member of the corpor-
ltiCn.