His
blessing on its world-wide work, and to the triune God be all the praise
and all the glory.

As I witnessed the birth of the Young Men's Christian Association, I
also saw the birth of a kindred organization, the "Society of Christian
Endeavor." Many years ago an absurd and extravagant statement was widely
afloat, claiming that I was the "grandsire" of this society. The simple
truth was that Dr. Francis E. Clark, its heaven-directed founder, had
seen in some religious journals my account of the good work wrought by
the Young People's Association of the Lafayette Avenue Church, and he
recognized the fact that its chief purpose was not mere sociality or
literary advancement, but the spiritual profit of its members. He
examined its constitution and reports, and when he constructed his first
Christian Endeavor Society in the Williston Church of Portland, Maine,
he adopted many of its features; and my beloved brother Clark, in his
public addresses, has generously acknowledged such obligation as he was
under to our Young People's Association (now in its thirty-fifth year of
prosperous activity). It has always been a source of grateful pride that
it should have furnished any aid to the origination of one of the
foremost spiritual instrumentalities of the century. As any attempt to
describe the sublime grandeur of Niagara would be a waste of time, so it
would be equally futile for me to describe the magnificent extent of the
Christian Endeavor Society's operations and the immense spiritual
results that have flowed from them. There is no civilized speech or
language where its voice is not heard; its line has gone out to all the
earth, and its words to the ends of the world. It has done more than any
other single agency to develop the life and to train for service the
energies of the youthful members of the churches It has yet still wider
possibilities before it, and when the hand that planted this mighty tree
has turned to dust its boughs will be shedding down the fruits of the
Spirit on the dwellers in every clime.

One of the most striking improvements that I have witnessed has been in
the sanitary condition, both physical and moral, of our great cities.
The conditions in New York, when I came to the pastorate of the Market
Street Church almost fifty years ago, would seem incredible to the New
Yorkers of to-day. The disgusting depravities of the Fourth Ward,
afterwards made familiar by the reformatory efforts of Jerry McCa