acle. I was not surprised. I had received a
private note from her once expressing her kindly feeling toward our
Church and promising, in the event of her decease, to leave some
remembrance to us. She always had a presentiment that her life was to be
short, and this always had a very depressing effect upon her. Her grief
for her husband's death hastened her own. She loved him with all her
heart. She was a good woman. Mr. Beecher was a kind and loyal friend to
her in her obscurer days. In those days Mr. Beecher brought her over
from New York and put her in care of a Mrs. Bird in Brooklyn. Until she
went abroad she was helped in her musical education by these friends.
She attended Mr. Beecher's prayer meetings regularly. Everyone who met
her felt that she was a noble-hearted woman of pure character and sweet
soul.

On February 9, 1890, I preached my first sermon since my return from the
Holy Land in the Academy of Music. It was expected that I would preach
about the country of sacred memories that I had visited, but I was
impressed with what I had found on my return in religious history of a
more modern purpose. They had been fixing up the creeds while I was
abroad, tracing the footsteps of divine law, and I felt the importance
of this fact. So I chose the text in Joshua vi. 23, "And the young men
that were spies went in and brought out Rahab, and her father and her
mother, and her brethren, and all that she had."

I did not read the newspapers while I was away so I was not familiar
with all the discussion. I understood, however, that they were revising
the creed. You might as well try to patch up your grandfather's
overcoat. It will be much better to get a new one. The recent sessions
of the Presbytery had been divided into two parties. One was in favour
of patching up the old overcoat, the other in favour of a new one. Dr.
Briggs had pointed out the torn places--at least five of them. He had
revealed it, shabby and somewhat threadbare. Presbyterians had
practically discarded the garment. Why should they want to flaunt any of
its shreds? So I agreed with Dr. Briggs, that we had better get a new
one.

The laying of the corner stone of the new Tabernacle took place on the
afternoon of February 11, 1890. It was a modest ceremony because it was
considered wise to defer the festivities for the dedication services
that were to occur in the church itself in the spring. The two tin boxes
placed in the corner stone contained th