Life of Rev. Thomas Brainerd, D.D. : for thirty years pastor of Old Pine Street Church, Philadelphia

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I? PRINCETON, N. J- '^*

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BX 9225 .B78 B7 Brainerd, Mary Life of Rev. Thomas Brainerd, D.D.

Preface

The present work was commenced at the urgent request of several of Dr. Brainerd's friends, and prepared chiefly for their gratification. It is a venture in a new field, and has been written under many disadvantages, with frequent interruptions from impaired health and family changes, which at one time would make writing difficult and at another impossible. Removed from all the associations of the past, and without the opportunity of asking counsel or assistance from any one, it will not be surprising if errors of judgment and defects in execution should be apparent; but the writer is encouraged by the belief that the personal friends, for whom it is designed, will not become severe critics. The generous contributions from Dr. Brainerd's ministerial brethren constitute the chief attraction of the book, and will be heartily appreciated by his friends, as they are here most gratefully acknowledged by the writer.

Vi PREFACE.

The chapter on the Division of the Presbyterian Church was written before the Reunion ; and, in the simple narration of facts, the writer has aimed to avoid everything approaching to acrimony or bitterness, as none certainly existed in the heart of the subject of this biography.

The oblivious wave of time closes so soon over those who fall in its current, that it is hoped this imperfect effort to rescue the earnest life of a man who made it his daily prayer that " the world might be the better for his living in it" — may not be wholly in vain. ^^ j^

Philadelphia, March, 1870.

OOE^TENTS.

Chapter I. Paoe

Ancestry — Birth — Childhood 9

CHAPTEK II.

School Life — Leaving Home 1 2G

CHAPTEPv III.

Teaching — Eeading Law 36

CHAPTEK IV.

Andover Theological Seminary — Correspondence — 1828-1832. 52

CHAPTEPv V.

First Pastorate at Cincinnati — Editorship — Correspondence

—1831-5 77

CHAPTEPv VI.

Ecclesiastical Controversies 97

CHAPTEPv VII.

Cull to Utica — General Assembly at Pittsburg 113

CHAPTEPv VIII.

Life iu Philadelphia — Division of the Presbyterian Church... 136

(Tii)

viii CONTENTS.

CHAPTEK IX.

PAOE

Personal Characteristics — Events of Pastoral Life — Anecdotes. 171

CHAPTER X.

Family Changer — ^^''isit to Europe — Shipwreck 197

CHAPTEPv XL Church Building — Literary Publications 221

CHAPTER XII.

Juhh Brown— The War 248

CHAPTER XIII.

Quarter Century Sermon and Festival 263

CHAPTER XIV.

Current Events — Anecdotes 296

CHAPTER XV.

Fourth of July, 186G— Reception of State Flags 345

CHAPTER XVI.

Death at Scranton, Pa. — Funeral Services 357

CHAPTER XVII.

LIFE

REV. THOMAS BRAINERD, D.D.

CHAPTER I.

ANCESTRY — BIRTH — CIIILDUOOD.

THE Genealogy of the Brainerd Family was published in 1857, by the Rev. David D. Field, D.D., of Stoekbridge, Mass., in a volume of three hundred pages. Dr. Field was for twenty-eight years pastor of the churches of Iladdam and Higganum — the Homestead of the Brainerd family. He gives abundant proof in these historical records of the respect and affection in which the family were held, many of whom were reared under his own eye as members of the churches to which he ministered. Eight years later, in 18G5, the publication of the "Life of Rev. John Brainerd," by the subject of the present biography, led the author to single out, for personal and family considertions, one particular line of ancestry, from which is now drawn a still more direct lineage with reference to the parentage of the Rev. Thomas Brainerd.

For the information of such as have seen neither Dr. Field's Genealogy nor the Life of Rev. John Brainerd, it is proper to state, briefly, that a little boy, eight years of

2 ■" (9)

ago, named Daniel Brainerd, came over from Exeter, England, in the 3'oai' 1641), with the Wyllis family, who settled in Hartford, Conn. At the age of twenty-one, in company with twenty-seven other young men about his own age, Daniel Brainerd went thirty miles heloAV Hartford, and selected a tract of land twelve miles t<quare, comprehending equal portions on each side of the Connecticut River. The name of Haddam was given to the new settlement, and Daniel Brainerd located his estate about two miles above the present village of Haddam ; and his property has remained with his descendants nearly two hundred years, to the present generation. He aided to found the first cliurch of Haddam, which he served as deacon. Dr. Field says of him : " He became the proprietor and settler of Haddam about 1662, and was a prosperous, influential, and very respectable man — a justice of peace in the toAvn, and a deacon in the church."

In 1664, Daniel Brainerd married Hannah Spencer. He had eight children. His youngest son, Hezekiah, was the father of the missionary brothers, David and John Brainerd. James, the second son, was the ancestor of Rev. Thomas Brainerd. He was born June 2d, 1669, and was' married April 1st, 1696. He had a large family of children ; the third child, Gideon, being the next in descent in relation to the subject of this memoir. Gideon Brainerd was born March 4th, 1700. He married Sarah Seldon, and left five children. His third son, Eliaktm, born 1732, married (first) Eunice Doane, June 7th, 1753, Avho left one child, Jesse Brainerd, born March 4th, 1754 — the father of Rev. Thomas Brainerd.

In a quiet, shaded grave-yard, on the hill near Haddam, the ancestors and descendants of five generations sleep side by side. Of no place in our country, besides a New England village, could this be said ; and only here before the last half century. The enterprise and ijumigration of

BIRTH. 11

fifty years have scattered the descenrlaats of the Pilgrims through the length and breadth of this vast country.*

Jesse Brainerd married Mary Thomas, daughter of Ebcnezer Thomas, May 23d, 117G. They lived in Haddam until the fall of 1803, when they removed to Leyden, Lewis County, New York. Eleven children were born to them before their removal, and one afterward.

Thomas Brainerd was the youngest of these twelve children, and' was born June 17th, 1804, — the year after his father's removal to New York. He was called " Thomas," after the family name of his mother. Being four years younger than the first child above him, and nine younger than the second, he was emphatically to his parents, the child of their old age. His father was a grave, silent, reflective man, — of a thorough Puritan type; severe in his views of duty, and stern in his adherence to principle.

® The following inscriptions were copied by Rev. Thomas Brainerd himself from the tombstones of his own direct lineal ancestry of four generations, as they rest side by side, in the same grave-yard at Iladdam. The occurrence is as uncommon as ii is interesting.

" H^re lyeth ye body of Deacon Damel Braixerd; aged 74 years. Who died April 1, 1715."

"Here lies interred the body of Deacon James Brainerd, who died Feb. 10th, 1742 ; aged 73 years."

'•In memory of Captain Gideon Brainerd, who died Scj)t. 25th, 1767; in ye C8th year of his age."

" Hark, what a solemn sound, Let friends attend ye cry; Come children view ye ground, Where you must shortly lie."

"In memory of Deacon Eliakim Brainerd, who died June 17th, 1815; aged 84. 'Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord.' "

Jesse Bhainerd, of the fifth generation from Daniel Brainerd, was interred in Lewis County, New York, in 1837, aged 84, after a residence there of thirty-four years.

Occupying a new country, Avhere every provision of necessity and comfort were wrested from the wilderness by hard labor, and where " laborers were few," the children of a family were early accustomed to share the toil and responsibilities of their parents. A sketch of the early life and training of Thomas Brainerd cannot be better furnished than by a transcript of his own narrative, in stating the influences which bore upon the early character of David and John Brainerd. In adlit-rence to the plan of making this memoir, as far as possible, an autobiography, no apology is needed for introducing it here.

In the memorial sermon preached by the Rev. Albert Barnes, on the death of Dr. Brainerd, he says : " In respect to his own early training, I cannot be wrong in supposing that his account, in his life of John Brainerd — in accordance with the general course of family discipline in New England — was derived from what occurred substantially in his own father's house."

When writing this sketch for his book. Dr. Brainerd said repeatedl}' in his home circle, that he had drawn a true portrait of his own family training, — while reproducing and perpetuating the century model of other days.

"We had enforced on us in early life, with too little effect, we fear, many of the principles which formed the characters of David and John Brainerd one hundred and fifty years ago.

"A boy was early taught a profound respect for his parents, teachers, and guardians, and implicit, prompt obedience. If he undertook to rebel, his will was broken by persistent and adequate punishment. He was accustomed, every morning and evening, to bow at tiie family altar; and the Bible was his ordinary reading-book in school. He was never allowed to close his eyes in sleep without prayer on his pillow.

" At a sufficient age, no caprice, slight illness, or any

CIIILDnOOD. 13

condition of roads or weather, was allowed to detain him from church. In the sanctuary he was required to be grav^e, strictly attentive, and able on his return at least to g'ive the text. From sundown Saturday evening- until the Sabbath sunset, his sports were all suspended, and all secular reading- laid aside, while the Bible, the New England Primer, Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress, Baxter's Saint's Rest, etc., were commended to his ready attention and cheerfully pored over.

" He was taught that his blessings were abundant and undeserved, his evils relatively few and merited, and that he was not only bound to contentment, but gratitude. Ho was taught that time was a talent to be always improved; that industry was a cardinal virtue, and laziness the worst form of original sin. Hence he must rise early, and make himself useful before he went to school; must be diligent there in stud}', and be promptly home to do ' chores' at evening. His whole time out of school must be filled up by some service — such as bringing in fuel for the day, cutting potatoes for the sheep, feeding the swine, watering the horses, picking the berries, gathering the vegetables, spooling the yarn, and running all errands. He was expected never to be reluctant, and not often tired.

" He was taught that it was a sin to find fault with his meals, his apparel, his tasks, or his lot in life. Labor ho was not allowed to regard as a burden, nor abstinence from any improper indulgence as a hardship. His clothes, Avoolen and linen, for summer and winter, were mostly spun, woven, and made up by his mother and sisters at home; and, as he saw the whole laborious process of their fabrication, he was jubilant and grateful for two suits, with bright buttons, a year. Rents were carefully closed and holes patched in the 'everj^-day' dress, and the Sabbath dress always kept new and fresh.

" He was expected early to have the ' stops and marks,' 2*

U LIFE OF REV. THOMAS. BRAIN ERD, D.D.

the 'abbreviations,' the 'multiplication table,' the 'ten eoniniandnients,' the ' Lord's Prayer,' and the ' Shorter Catechism,' at his tongue's end.

" Courtesy was enjoined as a duty. He must be silent among his superiors. If addressed by older persons, he must respond with a bow. He was to bow as he entered and left the school, and bow to every man or woman, old or young, rich or poor, black or white, whom he met on the road. Special punishment was visited on him if he failed to show respect to the aged, the poor, the colored, or to any persons whatever whom God had visited with infirmities. He was thus taught to stand in awe of the rights of humanity.

" Honesty was urged as a religious duty, and unpaid debts were represented as infamy. He was allowed to be sharp at a bargain, to shudder at dependence, but still to prefer poverty to deception or fraud. His industry was not urged by poverty but by duty. Those who imposed upon him early responsibility and restraint led the way by their example, and commended this example by the prosperit}^ of their fortunes and the respectaljility of their position, as the result of their virtues. He felt that they governed and restrained him for his good, and not their own.

" He learned to identify himself with the interests he was set to promote. He claimed every acre of his father's ample farm, and every horse and ox and cow and sheep became constructively his, and he had a name for each. The waving harvests, the garnered sheaves, the gathered fruits, were all his own. And besides these, he had his individual treasures. He knew every trout hole in the streams ; he was great in building dams, snaring rabbits, trapping squirrels, and gathering chestnuts and walnuts for winter store. Days of election, training, thanksgiving, and school-intermissions were bright spots in his life. His loiit^ wintcv ev^cning-s, made cheerful by sparkling" fires within, and cold clear skies, and ice-crusted plains, and frozen streams for his sled and skates, were full of enjoyment. And then he was loved by those whom he could respect, and cheered by that future for which he was being prepared. Rolig-ion he was taug-ht to regard as a necessity and luxury, as well as a duty. He was daily brought into contemplation of the Infinite, and made to regard himself as ever on the brink of an endless being. With a deep sense of obligation, a keen, sensitive conscience, and a tender heart, the great truths of religion appeared in his eye as sublime, awful, practical realities, compared with which earth was nothing. Thus he was made brave before men for the right, while he lay in the dust before God.

" Such w^as Haddam training one hundred years ago. Some may lift their hands in horror at this picture, but it was a process which made moral heroes. It exhibited a society in which wealth existed without idleness or profligacy; social elevation without arrogance; labor without degradation ; and a piety which, by its energ}^ and martyr endurance, could shake the world.

" We are not to suppose that boyhood passed under these influences was gloomy or joyless: far from it. Its activity was bliss ; its grov\^th was a spring of life ; its achievements were victories. Each day garnered some benefit; and rising life, marked by successive accumulations, left a smile on the conscience, and bright and reasonable hopes for the future.

" We might have desired that this Puritan training had left childhood a little larger indulgence, — had looked with interest at present enjoyment as well as at future good, — had smiled a little more lovingly on the innocent gambols, the ringing laughter, the irrepressible mirth of boyhood ; and had frowned less sevei'ely on Imperfections clinging to human nature itself. We might think that, by insist-

16 LIIE OF REV. THOMAS BRAIXERD, D.D.

ing too much on obligation and too little on privilege, — too much on the law and too little on the gospel, — too much on the severity and too little on the goodness of the Deity, — the' conscience may have been stimulated at the expense of the affections, and men fitted for another world at an unnecessary sacrifice of their amiability and happiness in the present life.

" But in leaving this Puritan training, the world had ' gone farther and fared worse.' To repress the iniquity of the age and land, — to save the young men for themselves, their country, and their God, — I believe we shall gain most, not by humoring childhood's caprices and sneering at strict households, strict governments, and strict Sabbaths; but by going back to many of the modes which gave to the world such men as John Hampden, William Bradford, Jonathan Edwards, Timothy D wight, and David and John Brainerd :" — may we not now add, and Thomas Brainerd'^

At intervals, during his whole life, Mr. Brainerd would get up great zeal for " keeping a journal," but he never persevered long in it. Fragments of "journals" are found among his papers, sometimes recording events of some interest, but from their disconnected character of little avail for a biography. The recollections of his early life constitute the most interesting of these items.

[extract from journal.]

" I was born in Leyden, Lewis County, T^ew York, June 17th, 1804. My father emigrated from Haddam, Connecticut, to the above-mentioned town, one year before my birth. His family consisted of a wife and ten children. He had buried one little girl, named Mary, who died young, in Haddam. He journeyed up the country (as it was then called) with an ox team, and commenced clearing- tliu laud uii which ho at present resides. He had many difficulties to encounter; but being well instructed in the art of subduing a new countr}^ he comfortably maintained his family, and added to the amount of his possessions. He purchased a farm of about one hundred acres, and for eleven years was as prosperous in pecuniary concerns as any of his neighbors. I was the twelfth child; and", though I was soon deprived of an excellent mother,"

if iti :if Hf. if. A^

[Here several leaves are torn out.]

" When I first commenced going to school I was three years old. I was a little, plump, cherry-cheeked urchin, very vain of my juvenile attainments. The first day I attended school the boys put me into a spring of cold water; and as I then wore a frock, in emerging from the pool I must have made a grotesque appearance. I do not affirm positively that I remember this transaction ; it may have been told nie so often by others, in my infantile j'cars, that I may be mistaken, but I seem to recollect it.

" Being the youngest of the family — the favorite of my mother — my time passed in an uninterrupted series of childish enjoyments during several of my earliest years. I was much interested in the pursuit of knowledge ; and in the schools which I attended saw none of my age before me. My advancement elicited praise from my friends, and I usually gained the approbation and affection of my teachers. Penalties were not necessary to urge me on or restrain my faults. I had a pride of character which kept me aloof from boyish pranks. I could not bear the thought that my parents should suppose me capable of being a bad boy in school.

" Unhappily for me, about this time a teacher was employed of no great abilities or acquirements ; indiscreet and superficial, but vain in the highest degree of his station. A ferule was placed in the hands of a lad, who was directed to give it to the first he saw whisper ; and in default of finding such, he was to be punished himself. This, of course, was offering him a reward for tattling; and like most other informants, whether pedagogic or governmental, when he could not find crimes he could cause them. By a system of chicanery which would hardly find a parallel, even among the unprincipled informants for the Inquisition, he made a friend of another lad, — suffered him to whisper and whispered with him Avith impunity. They conspired against me, and determined, as I had never been puljlicly flogged, that I should escape no longer. They therefore commenced a conversation about their lesson in my hearing, making false statements, apparently in ignorance as to the amount necessary to be studied. The plot succeeded. I kindly attempted to set them right, and for a reward of ray benevolence was tendered the obnoxious ruler. I protested, wept, promised, screamed, but it was unavailing. I stated the circumstances — showed that I had no evil intention in the premises — but my master was inflexible. I tried to establish the fact, that although I had, perhaps, violated the letter, I had not the spirit of the law. The cruel man was deaf to the voice of reason. In short, I was punished for no crime.

" This was the first time I had been chastised in school; and oh ! that some kind influence had prevented it ! That punishment has been a curse to me. It laid the foundation of nearly all my folly and sin. Before, I was jealous of my reputation, was desirous to be thought the best boy in the school ; but now I was disgraced, shamed, mortified ; and 1 recklessly plunged into all the wild, rude excesses of childhood. I no longer sought the studious and sober for playmates, but delighted to mingle with the most rude and noisy spirits in the neighborhood ; and cared little what I did, provided I could have gport and

fun.*

I

"At the ag^c of six, a little boy near my father's, named Lorenzo Wolcott, to whom I was much attached, Avas taken sick and died. I was unahle, at that time, fully to understand the meaning of death. I was told that Lorenzo was to be buried in the ground, and that I should see him no more. I wept bitterlv the morning he died; thought much on what this thing, death, could mean ; attended his funeral, and was a real mourner

" So much was I affected by what I had seen that my tears flowed long after my return from the grave. The thought that I should see him no more was indescribably painful. My dear mother sympathized with me ; kindly told me that only his body was buried ; that what constituted the thinking part of little Lorenzo was in heaven, to which place I should go if I Avas a good boy till death.

" This made a deep impression on my mind ; I can never forget it. From six to fourteen years of age I was subject to almost continued convictions of sin. Under almost every sermon which I heard I resolved to lead a new life."

This fragment was written in 1828. His later records, "few and far between," refer more especially to his religious emotions and purposes. They resemble, in character, portions of David Brainerd's Diary. Inheriting the family constitution, with a tendency to the same nervous depression, they are imbued with the somber rather than the bright shades of Christian experience. It has been said by those who knew Mr. Brainerd, that he was too conscientious; and marked as great sins the natural infirmities of his disposition. Dr. Beecher has protested against

■*■ This " reilhssucss" extended frrni the age of six to twelve.

g-ivin<r to the world the effects of d\'spepsia in good men, with its hypochondriac famil}^ of cv'jls.

Rev. William A. Stearns, President of Amherst College, a classmate of Mr. Drainerd's, says, in reply to a letter from him containing some lament over his ))hysical and mental trials : " Of 3'our two great burdens, the first you have in common with us all ; and in the endurance of the second, you are not alone. But it is a comfort that neither 'a bad stomach,' nor anything else bad, can enter heaven with us. Such a state of freedom, as Dr. Beeclier says, ' it Avill take a good while to get used to it ' "

As the youngest and cherished child of a large household, Thomas was allowed many indulgences to which the older children had been strangers, — such as going with his father and elder brothers to the neighboring towns of Lowville, Boonville, and Utica, when business called them there.

When he was about two years old his mother found him in a tub of water, nearly drowned. While playing in the water, he had lost his balance and fallen in. As he was " born out of due time,' so he claimed the privileges of babyhood be\'ond the ordinary season. He distinctly remembered being " ifea??ec?,"at nearly three years of age ; and of being taken by a sister twenty-two years older than himself, to sleep in her room for this object. Of his rebellion in the night, and his indignation when offered a biscuit in lieu of his customary indulgence, he retained a lively impression. He threw the biscuit across the room, with all his small strength, and saw it roll into the fireplace, among the asparagus boughs, which in summer occupied the place of the winter fire; upon which his sister thought proper to admonish him of the sinfulness of the act, both in view of the temper exhibited on the occasion, as well as the waste of throwing away " a nice biscuit for which some hungry child would be so thankful."

At the age of three and a half years he commenced attending school, — trudging cheerfully through miles of snow with his brothers and sisters. The district school was a long distance from his father's house, and was only kept during the winter. In a new farming country, all the boys were needed to work on the farm in summer. His school days were seasons of great enjoyment, and he never regarded his lessons as a burden or a drudgery.

Most of the events of his early life here recorded were gained from his own lips. He was accustomed to amuse his own children with the rehearsal of stories concerning his childhood, to which they were never weary of listening; while the excitements of sheep-shearing and of making maple-sugar in the early spring, almost rivaled in interest the adventures of Robinson Crusoe, with bis young auditors.

Clearing away the snow for the sugar works, — building the great fires to boil the sap, — and especially " camping out" over night, to watch both the sap and the fire, — furnished abundant occasion for pleasant excitement to these New England boys.

Thomas was once sent by his father to find and bring back a ram that was addicted to running away. After bringing the animal home, he tied him by the neck in the back part of the barn, which was built on a side-hill, so that while the entrance was on a level with the ground the back windows overlooked a height of ten or twelve feet. No sooner was the ram left to himself than he leaped from the window, and hung suspended by the neck. One of the elder boys coming in to dinner told his father that the ram was hanging from the barn window. Thomas, comprehending at once the situation, said, " He knew the ram could not be dead, for he had not hung there more than an hour!" The shout of laughter from the circle of older boys with which this declaration was greeted, greatly disconcerted

'6 the young- hangman ; but he escaped all rebuke from his father ; while from his brothers he met the frequent inquiry concerning the time necessary to kill a man or beast by hanging.

While Thomas was still a small boy, he became the proprietor of a nice leather-covered trunk, in which he was so much interested that he went over to the village several times to watch the progress of its manufacture. A good trunk, in which to keep his clothes and juvenile treasures, was, at that time to a boy in the country, a great possession; and he prepared to bring it home, when finished, with magnified views of its value.

One of his father's near neighbors, a Baptist preacher and farmer known as " Elder Clark," had a fine new wheelbarrow, and Thomas concluded that nothing but this wheelbarrow would serve his purpose. He went over to see Mr. Clark, whom he found working in the field. Going up to him with great confidence, he said : " Elder Clark, will you please lend me your ^vheelbarrow to bring home my new trunk ?"

Mr. Clark leaned on his hoe a minute in silence, and then replied: "Why, no, Thomas; I think I can't lend you the wheelbarrow."

The refusal was so unexpected, and such a disappointment to him, that for a moment little Tom neither spoke nor moved. But, boy or man, he was never the one to give up an object upon which he had set his heart.

"Elder Clark," said he, " doesn't the Bible say, ' from him that Avould borrow of thee, turn not thou away ?'"

Mr. Brainerd said he remembered throughout his life the twinkle of the eye and the twitching about the mouth with which Mr. Clark received this quotation from the small boy before him. It produced, however, the desired effect ; for, after another short pause, wath an effort at gravity, Mr. Clark replied: " Yes, Thomas, the Bible does say that; and I think I must let you have the wheelbarvovv this time if you will be careful of it." He went on his way rejoicing', as well in the success of his appeal as in the means of procuring his new treasure.

A brother nine years older than Thomas, who took a deep interest in his progress and improvement, says of him : " He was a very active boy and always in a pleasant humor. I never knew him quarrel with his playmates and young friends. He was early ver}^ fond of reading, and seldom sat down without a book or a slate. When he was twelve years old he had read through Rollin's Ancient History, Robertson's America, Goldsmith's Greece and Rome, with many other volumes of travels and voy ages as well as stories. He seemed never to forget anything he read. He inherited from his father one trait, — to do with his might whatever he undertook to do."