ESTIMATES
"He was a bold thinker because he sought for the truth. Near the end of his life, he said playfully, to one of his friends, as the two were fishing in the wilderness, 'It is my joy to think that I have sought most earnestly and supremely to find and to live by the truth.' He was broadminded and many sided, because he would look at the truth from every point of view. He was careless of traditions, because he sought solid standing place for his own feet. He was independent of others, because he must satisfy the consuming hunger of his own soul. When he found the truth, he applied it fearlessly to himself and to other men, to principles, institutions, and dogmas. He abhorred shams and conventional phrases in argument, because he believed so strongly in realities. What offended others as irreverent, often not always betokened his higher reverence for what he received as positive truth. He was also manly in the expression and defense of his faith. However he might appear to others, in the sanctuary of his inner self, there ever dwelt a prayerful, magnanimous, loving spirit toward God and man." - President NOAH PORTER, D. D., Memorial Sermon in Chapel of Yale College, p. 8.
WE devote this chapter to various tributes and critical estimates of Bushnell, confident that it is through the man that our readers will get at the theologian, or perhaps he led to forget the latter in the former. We have referred in the previous chapter to Professor Phelps' article in the "Christian Union," now "The Outlook."
"Three years ago it was my privilege to spend the major part of a summer vacation with this rare man in the Green Mountains. Some impressions which I received of his mental structure, and of his theology, and of his religious character, deserve recording. . . . Few men have ever impressed me as being so electric with vitality at all points as he was. He was an enthusiast in his love of rural sights and sounds and sports. In little things as brimful as in great things, he seemed the beau ideal of a live man. The supremacy of mind over the body was something wonderful. . . . The abandon of his recreations in the howling-alley, where he was a boy again, and his theological talks of a Sunday evening, told the same story. 'Dying, and behold we live,' recurred once and again in listening to the conversations in which he was
356
sure to be the centre and the seer, I have never heard from any other man, in the same length of time, so much of original remark. One could not long discourse with him, even on the common things and in the undress of life, without discovering the secret of his solitude in the theological world. That solitude was not in him, as it is in some men, an affectation of independence. It was in the original make of the man. Nothing struck him as it did the average of men. He took in all things, and reflected back all things, at angles of his own. He never could have been a partisan. With many of the tastes of leadership, he could never have led a party or founded a school. Still less could he have been a follower of other leaders.
"It was obvious that his own ideal of his life's work was that of discovery. When he had exhausted his power of discovery, his 'insight,' as he was fond of calling it, he had lost some of the prime qualities of power in communication.
"On the whole, he made upon me the impression of a mind still in movement on the central theme of the Christian faith; not doubtful so far as he had discovered, yet not resting in ultimate convictions. . . . He held himself to be substantially at one with the great body of the church in all that they really believed of the 'faith in Christ.' Yet whether he was so or not concerned him little. Truth lay between him and God, not between him and the church. The reception of it by other
357
minds was their affair, not his. Such, as nearly as I could gather it from his fragmentary conversations, was his theory of the true work of a theologian; rather of his work as a theologian; for he was very gentle in his criticisms of the work of other men. He had his own telescope, and they had theirs; that the instruments differed was no evidence that both might not be true; the field of vision was very broad, I am confident that he has gone from us with no such idea of his own dissent from the faith of his brethren as they have. And the sense of that dissent, I must confess, grew dim in my own mind when I came near to the inner spirit of the man. That was beautifully and profoundly Christ-like, if that of uninspired man ever was. Be the forms of his belief what they may have been, he was eminently a man of God. Christ was a reality to him. Christ lived in him to a degree realized only in the life of devout believers. I had heard him criticized as brusque in manner, even rude in his controversial dissents. Scarcely a shade of that kind was perceptible in him at that time. The gentleness of womanhood breathed in his few and cautious expressions of Christian feeling. The charity of a large fraternal heart characterized his judgments of men. His whole bearing was that of one whom time and suffering had advanced far on towards the closing stages of earthly discipline. . . .
"What shall we say of such men in our theological classifications? Where shall we locate them
358
in the schools? It will never do to set them aside as heretics, and leave them there. They are not heretics, in any invidious sense of the title. If faith means character, if 'the faith in Christ' be anything more than the most lifeless of ossified forms, such men are believers beyond the depth of venerable creeds. So much the worse for ourselves, and for the formulas which we revere, will it be, in the ultimate and decisive judgment of mankind, if our faith cannot find a place for such believers near to our hearts, because near to Christ."
Professor Phelps' letter is of interest as coming from one of pronounced orthodoxy. Dr. Bartol's, which follows, shows how well the "comprehensiveness" of Bushnell took in both men.
DEAR MRS. BUSHNELL, No images and recollections of more delight could return to me than are suggested by your note. The first I saw of Dr. Bushnell was in the pulpit of Park Street Church, as he delivered his sermon on "Barbarism the First Danger;" and I think he was the earliest to make a picture of what America showed of barbarity, although his canvas was copied, and this feature of our society and institutions became a brand more conspicuous, especially in the matter of slavery, as Sumner described it in after-time. The preacher seemed a real divine and diviner, applying great principles to actual things with, matchless sagacity, and a force too great for
359
Satan himself to ward. Such was the revelation in him of power, both to see and to say, that this Boston community, which then so moved all together it could carry but one rider at a time, was eager as one man for his voice, and willing to travel at his touch. Accordingly, he was sought with repeated invitations from Liberal quarters to expound Orthodox views. The Divinity School in Harvard University, and the college proper, begged him to fill special anniversary occasions in their service; and certainly his Phi Beta Kappa oration in Cambridge, for originality, simplicity, and splendor, either as spoken or on the printed page, has scarce, if ever, been surpassed in the land. I soon found, in the close personal acquaintance, which grew between us, that all his public ability had its roots in as rare a private worth. Never were honesty and ingenuity in any intellect more singularly blended, and, as it were, chemically combined. Born as he was to a creed, he could take nothing on trust. Outward authority, for a mind so active and penetrating, could never suffice. Necessity was laid on his nature to rationalize every doctrine or form. What he could not make acceptable to sound judgment and conscience, he would either waive or drop. He told me he had many questions hanging on pegs, to take down in turn as their time should come. He laid out his best theological strength to prove that no fit objection could arise to the old articles of Trinity and Atonement, rightly understood. I found him
360
never a Calvinist. He revolted from the notion, now so much discussed, of everlasting punishment. The great humanity of his heart could in no sectarian stress be made a sacrifice on the altar of a cruel God, which was no God to him. His various essays on "Christian Nurture," perhaps his most important contribution to the Church, have the true relish of that paternal goodness which is the richest common property of God and man. But his keen discrimination in defense of opinions he would retain as essential to Christian faith is, since the days of Jonathan Edwards, without a parallel. Possibly his explanations sometimes, like the subtitles of German metaphysics, escape the perception of the general reader, diverge from the track of the common sense, and are acute to excess. As we differed on points of dogma, it is natural for me to suppose that where I could not be persuaded, he failed. But his piety was pro-founder than even his dialectic skill. When he was my guest, it was some book of mystic devotion he chose, for recreation, to take up. It was no weak votary that religion had in this man. He had it in him to be an artist, architect, road-builder, and city-builder, as well as scholar; and well is your Hartford Park called by his name. I have never known faculties so manifold in better order and under discipline more strict, or in evolution more effective and exact. They were the Lord's armory, in mighty and unwearied use for his cause. In our many walks, nothing, in streets
361
or buildings, Common or Public Garden, but was caught by his eye and had improvements suggested from his thought. In conversation, never was wit so sharp and more kind. In hours of weakness and ill health, with his chronic cough, there was wondrous content, always good cheer and to spare. An ill-tempered or envious word never fell from his lips on my ear; and that eye was so piercing and benign, I feel its admonition and blessing on me still! The countenance, in its inward expressiveness, strongly resembled that of Channing. It had a play and vivacity all its own.
Playfulness I should call one of Dr. Bushnell's marked traits, seldom, if ever, exploding aloud. A native refinement kept him from public shouting or private noise. But some ghost of a smile seemed ever to haunt his face. If the remark was incisive which he was about to make, the wreath of good-humor was always the more protective and soft. The geniality began in his mind, and went through the expression of his features into his unconscious manner and slightest gesture. Indeed, it was his very atmosphere. The boy never quite left the man. Something even of the look of the babe was in the virile glance and tone. We threw stones off the shore, to see which of us could send them farthest or skip them best. He took me, one day, from his own house to Talcott Mountain; and no lad of fifteen was ever more decidedly out on an excursion, and to have, innocently, a good time. A wild nature in him, so sweet and good it would
362
have been a loss wholly to overcome it with any grace, leaped like a fountain and ran like a roe. . . . Riding with him one day in the cars on the way to Nahant, he left me awhile with a clergy-man, rather of his own way of thinking, who very pleasantly tried to convert me. When Bushnell came back, he inquired of the reverend minister, "What have you been doing with my friend Bartol?" "I have not been doing anything but laying out the Presbyterian creed to him," was the reply. "You mean that you have been putting a shroud on it, I suppose; for that's what they do when they lay things out," rejoined Bushnell, with that laugh which always began in the gray eyes, and only left its last audible ripple, like a wave striking the shore, in his mouth. "Can a Calvinist be a Christian?" one evening, in company in my parlor, Father Taylor, the Bethel pastor, asked him. "Of course he can, and is," very soberly he answered. "But," said Taylor, "what if the Lord some day should come round to these saints in heaven, put there by arbitrary election and no merit of their own, and propose to turn that end of the stick round, by his own equally pure will, into the other place, would they be just as good Christians then?" Bushnell responded, with that flash of sympathy and twinkling glance, which showed that no denominational considerations hindered his appreciation of a fair hit, at whosever’s cost the jest might be. His tenderness of heart blended and was wrought into his strong
363
sense, for a lightning-rod to carry harmless to the ground what might else become a crashing and destructive bolt of wrath. During the controversy, starting at Hartford because he had brought the ordinary construction of total depravity, election, and regeneration into doubt, which dates the truly romantic period of his history, I admired the pungency, turned by love into utter gentleness, . . . with which he said he desired to put his opponent into "an attitude of comprehensive repugnance," meaning that in the strife was no personal hate. I think he had no capacity, with all his eminent powers, for enmity. Goodness and wisdom were the elements that amounted to genius in him, by both being so great. He preached in my pulpit on "Unconscious Influence." He exemplifies his own doctrine, at least for his and your friend, C. A. BARTOL.
Of like interest is a letter written to Mrs. Bushnell by the Right Rev. Thomas M. Clark, D. D., bishop of Rhode Island, who was rector of a church in Hartford for several years during Bushnell's pastorate.
PROVIDENCE, R.I., April 26, 1878.
MY DEAR MADAM, About twenty-five years ago I had the privilege of knowing your husband in Hartford. No one could be brought into frequent contact with him, and not feel that he was in the presence of a man born to lead and not to
364
follow the thought of his times. He never seemed to talk with the view of impressing you with a sense of his mental or spiritual superiority; neither was there in him any affectation of humility or habit of self-depreciation. He could not help being conscious of his own peculiar powers; but one who heard him chatting in the bookstore (his favorite lounging-place after the work of the morning was over), with all sorts of people, upon all sorts of subjects, the news of the day, the doings of public men, the affairs of the city, in which he took a special interest, politics, farming, mechanics, inventions, books, or whatever else might turn up,-would probably go away without suspecting that he had been in the presence of one of the profoundest thinkers our land has ever produced. No one could help being interested in what he said; for although he was not much given to wit and humor, he had a clear, incisive, original way of putting things that could not fail to attract attention. . . .
Few men ever enjoyed the art of mental creation more thoroughly. While he was writing his great work on "The Supernatural," I used to visit him at his study on Monday mornings, for the purpose of hearing him read over the chapters, which he had written during the previous week. It was to me a rare intellectual treat, and I wish that I had noted down at the time some of the comments with which he illustrated his work. I also wish that I could have sketched his picture
365
as he sat there in his chair, somewhat uneasily, as was his wont, with his flashing dark eye and mobile face, that seemed to respond so vividly to the thoughts that flashed from his brain. When speaking under high excitement, his whole frame was set in motion, and he seemed to gesticulate with all parts of his body. I have heard him speak with some contempt of the technical graces of oratory, and yet he was a very effective speaker, all the more so because he evidently forgot all about externals in the deep absorption of his subject.
It would be useless, in such a brief sketch as this, to attempt anything like a thorough analysis of Dr. Bushnell's mental characteristics, and it is a work that would require an abler pen than mine. I will simply note down a few things, as they occur to me, among the general impressions, which my former intercourse with him has left imprinted on my mind. While he was etymologically a radical thinker, inasmuch as he was accustomed to go down to the roots of things, and his temperament always urged him forward in the pursuit of truth, his instincts were very conservative. He was very impatient of shams, and, at the same time, very cautious in exposing them, lest he might do damage to the truth of which they professed to be the presentment. This conservative instinct sometimes led him to qualify his positions in such a degree as might seem to weaken their force, and he would hold himself in check, and give prominence to the arguments of his adversary, in order that he might
366
not appear to disturb the equilibrium of truth. By some he was regarded as a subverter of old ideas, and even as a reckless and unchaste innovator and heretic; but he was really very tender of all received dogma, and never broke away from the standards except under moral compulsion. I once told him that I thought of preaching a course of sermons on a topic which, twenty-five years ago, we had not learned to handle as intelligently and freely as we do now; and I shall never forget how he brought down his hand with an emphatic gesture as he said, "I would not preach a sermon on that subject for ten thousand dollars!"1 Not that he was afraid to do it, but he thought the time had not come for its thorough ventilation; and if he once threw open the door of his mind, it must be to let the wind circulate freely.
I always thought that he was more sensitive to criticism, and suffered more under reproach, than most people supposed; with his organization, martyrdom in any form would have been a peculiarly severe ordeal. He never coveted reproach or pain, and yet he would have gone to the stake rather than sacrifice his convictions, perhaps not with a loud song on his lips, but none the less firmly for that. . . .
Dr. Bushnell was a man of marvelous versa-
1 Probably a subject pertaining to eschatology. Once when asked why he had not preached a sermon on the Resurrection, he said: "I do not wish to throw away my influence on other subjects by preaching on that."
367
tility. Those who know him only by his theological writings have no conception o£ the range of his mind and the variety of subjects that he had investigated. He was skilled in mechanics, and has given the world some inventions of his own. The house in which I once lived was warmed by a furnace, which he devised, when such domestic Improvements were comparatively new. He could plan a house, or lay out a park, or drain a city better than many of our experts. He was as much at home in talking with the rough guides of the Adirondacks as he was in discussing metaphysics with theologians in council. If he had gone into civil life, he would have taught our public men some lessons in political economy, which they greatly need to know. If he had been a medical man, he would have struck at the roots of disease, and discovered remedies as yet unknown. . . .
Dr. Bushnell had a large amount of individuality; the man impressed you, and it would have required an effort to insult him or trifle with him. He had a way of puncturing bubbles, which might well make certain people shy of him. There was nothing in his manner that seemed to claim veneration, as is sometimes the case with "distinguished divines," no majestic sweep of the hand, or orotund proclamation of wise sayings, or assumption of superiority in any form; but you felt yourself to be in the presence of a real man, and a man of bulk, not large in stature, but great in spirit.
368
I hardly need to add that he was a devout disciple and believer, not one who merely speculated about religion, but also received it into his heart, and lived accordingly. He had all the spiritual power, as well as the farsightedness, of a prophet; everything pertaining to God and Christ and immortality burnt under his touch; it was a live coal that he placed upon the altar. However he might speculate, he never allowed anything to come as a veil between him and his Saviour; he saw eye to eye, and knew whom he believed. Very respectfully and truly yours, THOMAS M. CLARK.
It has been a special characteristic of the New England ministers that they have fostered all the interests of the towns in which they are settled. The separation of Church and State was only formal until the churches of the "Standing Order" were swamped in a multitude of sects, and the ministry lost its permanence and became a migration from parish to parish. Before this change, the minister was the leading man in the community, and shaped its affairs often down to the most practical details. Dr. Bushnell was a notable illustration of this clerical supremacy. Its chief sign in him is the Public Park, crowned by the State Capitol. He early noticed in the centre of the city a territory of about thirty-five acres that had never been put to good use, and was a deformity in shape and occupancy, and after years of effort carried
369
out his plan of transforming it into a park. The following action of the City Government, taken just before his death, tells the full story of his long-strife: -
"Whereas, The Park laid out by the city in 1854 has not received any name;
"And whereas, The plan of using the land lying between Elm Street and the Little River for a public park owes its origin and successful execution, in a large degree, to the foresight, to the able and earnest advocacy, and the influence, freely and with generous persistence exerted in public, in private, and through the press, of Horace Bushnell;
"And whereas, It is wise and fitting that the name of a citizen standing foremost among those who have achieved enduring fame in the field of intellectual effort should be associated with the public works of the city, in which his manhood's life has been spent, to which he has been devotedly attached, and for whose adornment, improvement, and general good he has been ever ready to give his time, his influence, and the riches of his genius;
"Now, therefore, in recognition of a reputation in whose honors the city of his adoption shares, and of labors for the public good whose results will add to the happiness and welfare of every citizen;
"Resolved' That the public park now commonly called 'The Park' be and hereby is named 'Bushnell Park.'"
But the creation of the park was not his greatest service to Hartford. He himself treated it
370
even playfully. When asked where he would have his statue placed, he replied, "Under the bridge." Rev. Joseph Twichell, a warmly loved friend and his frequent companion in the Adirondacks in summer vacations, says that "Bushnell lies back of all that is best in the city. . . . He quickened the men who have made Hartford what it is. . . . After hearing him on Sunday, men would say, 'I've heard a great sermon, and I'm going to make my week mean something.' "Mr. Austin Dunham, a prominent citizen, said that "in nothing had Dr. Bushnell done so much for the prosperity of the city as in making men; he taught them to think large thoughts and to use their minds." His relation to his city is well described by Rev. N.H. Egleston in a letter to the "Hartford Courant:" -
"It is his distinction that not only by an unequaled professional eminence has he benefited this place and forever linked its name with his own, but by the force of his genius he has been a benefit to the city in so many and such important relations. What interest of Hartford is not today indebted to him as a benefactor? Do we speak of schools? The fathers of those who are now enjoying our unsurpassed appliances for public and general education know well that the city is indebted to no one more than to Dr. Bushnell for the new impulse given to its schools, now more than twenty-five years ago, which lifted them to their present grade of excellence. Do we speak
371
of taste and culture? Who has been a nobler example and illustration of both, or who has by his just criticism and various instructions so aided in their development? . . . And so, if we turn to the business interests of the city, who of its older residents does not remember how, years ago, at a time when the impression had become prevalent that Hartford had reached its growth, -that it was declining while other cities were outstripping it in trade and business, and the younger and more enterprising were beginning to remove to other and, seemingly, more promising fields of activity, - Dr. Bushnell lifted himself up in that crisis, and asserted not only the ability but the duty of the city to prosper, and how, as it may be truly said, he woke the city to new life, and gave an impulse to its business interests which has been felt to this day? And so, not to speak of other illustrations of the fact, this many-sided man has made himself felt in this city in every direction, and in respect to every worthy calling and interest, as no other man has ever done. Hartford has felt him, feels him today everywhere. It may be doubted whether another instance in our own history is to be found of a man impressing himself in so many ways, and with such force, upon a place of any such size and importance as this. Hartford is largely what he has made it."
The following letter, of recent date, from the Rev. Dr. Washington Gladden, reveals an even more interesting side of Bushnell's history, by showing
372
how he stood related to an entire generation of young ministers in New England. It is no exaggeration to say that had it not been for the relief he brought to them on theological questions, many of the ablest young men in Congregational pulpits could not or would not have remained in them: -
"My acquaintance with Dr. Bushnell began in the early summer of 1867. Not long before that, a young minister in Illinois had been refused ordination because, as the council reported, he was tainted with Bushnell-ism, whereupon I wrote to 'The Independent,' defining Dr. Bushnell's theory of the Atonement, as I understood it, and saying that if that was heresy, I wished to be considered as a heretic. The letter gratified Dr. Bushnell, and he wrote me a few very hearty words about it. I was soon to be installed as the pastor of the First Congregational Church in North Adams, and I wrote, inviting him, if his health were equal to the task, to come and preach the installation sermon. At first he hesitated, fearing his presence might compromise me, but I reassured him, and he came and spent about a week with me. The sermon was that noble one on 'The Gospel of the Face' in 'Sermons on Living Subjects.' I think it was then first delivered; he was to use it a little later, on a similar occasion. He was at that time quite frail; his cough was often exasperating, and he spoke with some effort, but the vigor and pungency of the thought and the dignity and sweetness of the personality made a profound
373
impression upon the audience. I shall never forget the electric tingle that went with some of his quiet sentences: 'Fire is the greatest analyzer in the world, and its product - ashes. Analysis requires dead subjects, but the Gospel is not dead and ought not to be killed.' 'One may preach a formula and know nothing about Christ, nothing but what is verbally stuck in his head or pigeonholed in his memory. But the real Christ is what a man may be; what he shall signify in a man's heart; what he is in feeling and faith and guilt and bondage and everlasting hope and liberty that makes a sinner free. It wants a Christed man to know who Christ really is, and show him forth with a meaning.' The ministers present were not all quite free from suspicion of Dr. Bushnell, but as for the sermon, like the Sanhedrim confronting the good deeds at the Beautiful Gate, 'they could say nothing against it.' President Hopkins was one of the most attentive listeners. 'Is not that the Gospel?' some one asked him. 'Nothing else is the Gospel,' was his quick reply. "In the days that he tarried at the parsonage among the Berkshire Hills we had many pleasant walks and drives together; the mountain air invigorated him, and the mountain scenery stimulated him, and the wit and eloquence of his talk was memorable. I ought to have written down those talks while they were fresh; they are mostly gone from me now, and I shall not bring them back until I see him again. His presence in the
374
house was a benediction; we were young housekeepers, and all was simple and primitive, but he fell into our ways, and was as much at home with us as he would have been in a palace. He was up early in the summer mornings and out for a walk; once when he came in, he said, 'I've found the place for your park,' and exhorted me to go to work at once and get the town to secure the site. It was indeed the very place for a park, and if the thriving city of North Adams could have it now, it would be a boon to her people. But my faith was not strong enough, and North Adams lacks its Bushnell Park. A year or two later he came again and spent a few days with me at the time of the Williams College commencement. He was now still more enfeebled in body, but his mind was as wakeful and alert as ever. All sorts of intellectual achievements were thronging his imagination; how many were the things he wanted to do! To the larger tasks he knew himself to be unequal, but he turned from them with no deplorings; he could wait! Sermon making was not yet quite beyond him, though he sometimes thought so. Themes for sermons were always coming, like doves to his windows. 'I've got a subject for you,' he said one morning at breakfast, '"Our Advantage in Being Finite;" will you write on that some day?' It matters very little whether I did or not; for strength was given him afterward to beat out the fine gold whose nuggets he had been gathering in the mountain twilight. In the
375
'Sermons on Living Subjects,' it bears the pathetic annotation, 'Written for Yale College Chapel, but not delivered.'
"To tell the story of my indebtedness to this great friend would take more room than is left here, but I must say that I could not have remained in the ministry, an honest man, if it had not been for him. The time came, long before I saw him, when the legal or forensic theories of the Atonement were not true for me; if I had not found his 'God in Christ,' and 'Christ in Theology,' I must have stopped preaching. Dr. Bushnell gave me a moral theology and helped me to believe in the justice of God. If I have had any gospel to preach, during the last thirty-five years, it is because he led me into the light and joy of it."