The Birmingham age-herald., 1902-11-29
The Lad Rlshop Thompson.


 "Churchmen throughout the country are lamenting the death of the Right Rev Hugh Miller Thompson, bishop Of the diocese of Mississippi" remarked a prom inent member of the Episcopal church.
 Bishop Thompson was long regarded as one of the greatest men in the church in the United States. and was surprised when I looked through the encyelopeoias not to find his name. Extended sketches there are of many mediocre clergymen' but not line of one of the greatest theo- Iogians of the centuries.
 "The Rev. Dr. Warner occupied the pulplt at Trinity church in New Orleans last Sunday and paid an eloquent trip- ute to the dead bishop and it was as just as it was eloquent. Bishop Thomp- son was rector of Trinity for seven years, and the congregation Sunday was made up of those who had listened to the voice of the great man and had known him personally and loved him.
 "Dr. Warner said in part: His was an extraordinary personality. His head was indicative of his character. It might have been the emblem of the lion of the tribe of Judah. Intellectual force, men tai activity. clearness of vision, saneness of judgment, all were his, and were all applied to the problems that came before him for solution.
 we have been accustomed to call him one of the most original thinkers in the church. It Is difficult to recall now quite so original mind Many there are 4,, OratOriCal in manner, but few. If any, Of more vir- ility in fibre of thought, and few with the downright homely. terse use of the English language with which he illus trated and illumined. instead of conceal ing or mystifying. his message.
 As a preacher he was in the front rank of his day. Men and women crowd ed to hear him in the little chapels scat tered here and there on the shores or the gulf, and among the hills of his great diocese; but not more eagerly or with more appreciation than did vast as- sembiages in England's great Abbey and in other churches and ministers Of the old and new worlds.
 With a large-minded tolerance un- tainted by the slightest air of patronage, he hated all shams and falsehoods with mighty hatred. No one ever questioned his loyalty to the church of his ministry yet he numbered among his friends, and warm friends at that many of other com mnnions 1 do not know who they were. but I doubt not that he had some enemies. Few public men who do any thing for their generation escape that. The bishops Irish blood was not milk, and the flashing scimltar of his wit and scorn for the ugly, the untruthful the unworthy and the mean in society, in politics and in the church, often evoked stormy opposition.
 The truth seeker and the truth speak CT of all ages has been forced to battle for his right to think and speak. He has expected to bear and has borne bruises and hurts.
 Bishop Thompson had his share of that heritage of unrest which Is the dover of the ages to the thinking man. But it never disturbed his serenity nor aroused his bitterness. nor cast a shadow upon his influence
 ." It would be difficult to range Bishop Thompson in any one of the schools of thought which are supposed to obtain in the American church today. If to be a low churchman is to lay stress upon ex- perimental religion, he was a low church. man. If to be a high churchman is to value highly the sacranents and apos- tolic ministry, he was high churchman. If to be a broad churchman is to free ones self from traditionalism and to measure the actual results of scientific investigation in any field as a fresh rev. elation of God, then he was a broad churchman.,"