The Newtown bee., 1901-07-12
THE HOME CIRCLE.
THE OLD PARSONAGE. A SERMON BY BEV F. A. JOHNSON, PAS TOR OF THE FIRST CONaREGATIONAL CHURCH, NEW MILFORD.

TOR OF THE FIRST CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH, NEW MILFORD.
 Text, Judges 16: 3O And the house fell"
 Our theme, to-day, is ''The Old Par
 sonage." You may think it was
 difficult to find Scripture text to fit such theme; and so it was. Yet the above text is not inappropriate with
 out wrenching it from it's significance
 in the Scripture narrative. It refers
 to the dramatic scene in their triumph
 when the lords of the PhflistineS met
 to sacrifice to their god, and "Samson
 took hold of the two middle pillars
 upon which the house stood: and he
 bowed himself with all his might and
 the house fell," and great was the
 wreck and ruin that followed. And so
 this past week our modern Samsons,
 brawny, laborious men, have taken
 hold upon beam and support of the
 building so familiar to us all, and the house fell and the place that had so long known it will know it no more forever.
 There is always
 SOMETHING PATHETIC IN THE DE-
 SEDUCTION OF AN OLD BUILDING.
 However necessary it may he to remove it, and however glad we may be to say farewell to it, yet the building has done it's work, and filled it's place in making the history of the town. It is like an old man whose active life is over. He may soon pass away, but he has done good work and left his inn press on the world, and though new men and new methods may prevail, we can never undo, and should never forget the achievements of those whose day Of performance is over.
 It was full time for the old parson- age to die; in fact it had outlived it's usefulness by many years; and in the past year it seemed to realize this fact itself, for here bit of plaster would fall, and then one of those remarkable blinds would loosen on it's hinges; then window would fall out of its place before an ordinary gale. Finally the chimneys began to fall and clog the drafts that give health and warmth to the house; and at last one of the solid outer doors drops from its hinges. The old house in all it's parts seemed to be singing a swan-song, "I am dying, dying, why not hasten my end before I do you some greater harm.''
 And this up-to-date parish has met the challenge manfully; has raised the funds and laid It's plans for better things; and then it called the Samsons to their work and the building fell, and we say to it a joyful farewell, yet a farewell tempered with sorrow, for the old parsonage was interwoven with the most sacred experiences of many here. Dr AmOry H. Bradford once said, in effect, that the homiest house in community is the parsonage. Other houses are the homes of our family; so this, in sense, is the home of our family, but many persons look to it with home feeling, for it has welcomed them in times when the storms of the world beat heavily upon them: to some it is the only place as- with a homelike sympathy, Surely it should ever be a Christian nome, and that means much to many drifting about amidst the cold and )utfeting storms of the world. So. while we shall not see the old build- ng any more, we can never forget cenes which have transpired within ts walls, scenes which have had a 'owerful and lasting influence on our ives.
 IN AN OLD TOWN LIKE THIS very estate bears it's share in making ; he history of the town. So I have raced the record of this property ( ack to 1900, that we may note the \ ast of plot of ground of such present lterest to this congregation. V In October, 1900, this land was made c