The Carolina Spartan. [volume] (Spartanburg, S.C.) 1898-1913, 1902-04-30
4 9HE4T 8F0pF GoYE.
By Bishop Warren A. Gambler.


around New York.
Henry Ward Beecher, Richard )
Storrs, Charles F. Deems and I. DE
Witt Talmage. The last of them /
passed away in Washington city
few days ago, and retrospect OF
them may be useful.
No principle OF classification would
Justify c-ouping them together eX
cept that they all appeared about the
same time. No men were ever more
unlike.
Ry far the ablest Of them was
Henry Ward Beecher. His was CO.
lossal brain. In his day no intellect
appeared among the public men OF
America superior to the mind OF
Beecber. He was nol man Of schol-
arship. uor one Of very accurate IN
formation. There is no saying what
he might have attained if he had
been a careful student. But he was
an orator, aiming always at immedl
ate effects, and generally absorbed IN
pressing some reform. For success
in such career his remarkable brain
furnished without much study all
that was necessary. In his earlier
days he was a man of simple faith
and in those days he was almost IT.
resistible. In his latter days he
seemed 10 believe very little, and Z"
have no fixed faith in anything long
at time. His creed was in state
of fiux. and underwent the most Ire
ouent and rapid changes. His pull
pit power wac diminished and his
pulpit utserances were often contra
dictory with each other Within the
limits Of fortnight. He rarely hit
in tho same place long at time, and
his blows became Ineffective.
Richard S. Storrs was a far differ
ent man. To the graces OF an orator
he added the studious habits OF the
scholar, and he brought only we'll
beaten oil into the sanctuary. His
sermons, delivered without notes,
might have been printed as they fell
from his lips, and then they would
have been more perfect than the care-
fully written pages Of most men. He
was always orthodox, and he never
was sensational. He delivered
strong, steady blows in furtherance
OF fixed convictions.
Charles F. Deems was Methodist
preacher, who from North Carolina
went to New York after the war, and
became pastor of the church OF the
Strangers, where Commodore Cor
nelius Vanderbilt with his southern
wife worshipped. Doctor Deems, in
fact, created the Church OF the Stran-
gers. He was man Of evangelical
faith, captivating utterance and Of
almost infinite industry. He was
without Beecher's genius and without
the scholarship of Storrs-a nervous,
ready speaker Of great power, never
theless. t
DIR. Talmage was utterly unlike
and Of them. He was less inteiieet-
uaT than any of them. He was or
thodox, but hearing or reading his
sermons you never thought OF his Or
thordoxy or his heteordoxy. He
treated simple, commonplace truths
in a bright, scrappy, illustrative
style, and he delivered what he had
to say theatrically. One will seek in
vain to find an original thought or a
dull line in all his thousands Of SER
mons, and he literally printed thou
sands OF discourses, for he and the
newspapers got on amazingly we'll to-
gethe. OF course there was a same
ness about his sermons. They seem
ed to have been manufactured pro-
ducts from raw materials drawn from
scrap-books and encyclopedias Of illus
trations." They bore no mark OF
either LEARNING or profound medita-
ton. Yet they interested and profit
ed many thousands. When he died the
other day the hearts OF multitudes
were bowed with grief.
The work OF DR.. Storrs will outlast
that of all the others. Plymouth
church is an isolated organization
which seems to care for none Of
Beecher's views. Since the great
preacher went away they have had
the rationalizing Lyman Abbott and
the orthodox Hills as their pastors
The church seems to care little for
what is taught from it's pulpit il only
the pre- cher Glis what he teacher
in bright and interesting way. Or
thodoxy is nothing and heterodo1y is
nothing, but a pleasing sermon is all
and is all.
The Vanderbilts worship no more
where Deems preached, and the pas
tor of the "Old Commodore" has had
no successor.
When Talmage's church burnt
down there was not left enough life
and zeal in the congregation to build
it, and he removed to Washington
where he died without pastorate, a,
the last, | believe.
But Storrs labored in the great