markable degree. He had a
commanding figure, keen eye, handsome features, and a clear distinct
voice; but so diffident was he that he seldom looked about over his
congregation and rarely made a single gesture. His simple rule of
homiletics was, have something to say, and then say it. He stood up in
his pulpit and delivered his calm, clear, strong, spiritual utterances
with scarcely a trace of emotion, and the hushed assembly listened as if
they were listening to one of the oracles of God. His best sermons were
like a great red anthracite coal bed, with no flash, but kindled through
and through with the fire of the Holy Spirit Bashful, too, as he was, he
denounced popular sins with an intrepidity displayed by but few
ministers in our land. In the temperance reform he was an early pioneer.
For Albert Barnes I felt an intense personal attachment; he was my ideal
of a fearless, godly-minded herald of evangelical truth; and he had
begun his public ministry in Morristown, N.J., the home of my maternal
ancestry, and in the church in which my beloved mother had made her
confession of faith. When our Lafayette Avenue Church was
dedicated--just forty years ago--I urged him to deliver the discourse;
but he hesitated to preach extemporaneously, and his sight was so
impaired that he could not use a manuscript. At the age of seventy-two
he was suddenly and sweetly translated to heaven. Over the whole
English-speaking world his name was familiar as a plain teacher of God's
Word in very spiritual commentaries.

A half century ago Dr. William B. Sprague, of Albany, was in the front
rank of Presbyterian preachers. His fine presence, his richly melodious
voice, his graceful style and fresh, practical evangelical thought made
him so popular that he was in demand everywhere for special occasions
and services. He was a marvel of industry. While preparing his
voluminous "Annals of the American Pulpit," and conducting an enormous
correspondence, he never omitted the preparation of new sermons for his
own flock. With that flock he lived and labored for forty years, and
when he resigned his charge (in 1869) he told me that when removing from
Albany, he buried his face and streaming eyes with his hands, for he
could not endure the farewell look at the city of his love. When I first
heard him in my student days I thought him an almost faultless pulpit
orator, and when he and the young and ardent Edward N. Kirk stood side
by side in Albany, no town