X«cd™^r-:X^e.-^^--^^@.

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BX 9225 .B3 R6 1905
Robinson, Charles Edward,

1835-
Maltbie Davenport Babcock

ijjCeuccouLA ^^9--/

Malthie Davenport Bahcock

A Reminiscent Sketch and Memorial
By Charles E. Robinson, D, D.

God's endless love ! What ivill it be
When earthly shadoius fiee aivay.
For all eternity's bright day

The unfolding of that love to see !

M.D.B.

New York Chicago Toronto

Fleming H. Revell Company

London and Edinburgh

Copyright, 1904, by
FLEMING H. REVELL COMPANY

New York: 158 Fifth Avenue
Chicago: 63 Washington Street
Toronto: 27 Richmond Street, W
London: 21 Paternoster Square
Edinburgh: 30 St. Mary Street

7<? Katharine Tallman Babcocky

Wife of

Maltbie Davenport Babcock,

This book is affectionately dedicated by the devoted

friend of them both.

Charles E. Robinson.

This is the death of Death, to breathe away a

breath
And knozv the end of strife, and taste the

deathless life.

And joy without a fear, and smile without a

tear
And work, nor care, nor rest, and find the last

the best. — M. D. B.

Preface

THESE pages are not designed to
afford a philosophic study of Dr.
Babcock's Hfe, nor an analysis of the
sources of his remarkable power, but just
what the name given them indicates. They
took shape first in the form of a biographical
sketch, which the writer was requested to
prepare for the students of Auburn Theolog-
ical Seminary, while there two years ago,
during the year of Professor Hoyt's absence
in Europe; his lifelong intimacy with Dr.
Babcock and his family being the reason for
the request.

The earnest desire expressed by many
friends to have this sketch put in more per-
manent form, is the excuse for its publica-
tion. To do so required its enlargement
7

8 Preface

sufficient to reach the proportions of this
Httle book.

As it was not thought best to eliminate
the personal features of the sketch, several
claiming that it was just what they wanted,
it has taken the shape and title of " A Rem-
iniscent sketch " of a life too attractive and
beautiful, too noble and helpful to have no
memento. Now that it is prepared it seems
wholly inadequate.

It is impossible to write of Dr. Babcock in

terms less than superlative. To do so would

lead one to incur the chiding of his other

friends. The quotations appended at the

end of the volume, are not only to give the

pathetic tributes to his memory, but to show

that those who wrote them came also under

the same spell of his short but memorable

career.

C. E. R.

Pelham Manor ^ N. T,,
September, igo4>

A SECOND edition of this sketch
having been called for, it gives me
opportunity to make acknowledgment
that the verses by Dr. Babcock appearing in
this volume are reprinted by permission of
Charles Scribner's Sons, from their publica-
tion entitled " Thoughts for Every Day Liv-
ing ; " and also that the Sunday-School Times y
the Golden Rule Company, and the Inde-
pendent have generously granted me free use
of those verses of Dr. Babcock's for which
they have copyrights. I am also indebted to
the Brown Mernorial Church of Baltimore
for the material ♦* In Memoriam."

Charles E. Robinson.
Pelham Manors N, T,,
April, igoS'

Contents

I.

CHILDHOOD .

II

II.

COLLEGE DAYS

19

III.

SEMINARY LIFE

29

IV.

LOCKPORT

47

V.

BALTIMORE

71

VI.

HIS WORK IN THE SCHOOLS

AND COLLEGES .

.

89

VII.

NEW YORK

.

109

VIII.

IN MEMORIAM

.

135

10

I

CHILDHOOD

When I was a child — / spake as a child, I un-
derstood as a child, I thought as a child, — Paul.

And thy brothers, the help and the contest, the

working whence grew
Such result as from seething grape-bundles the spirit

strained true :
And the friends of thy boyhood — that boyhood of

wonder and hope
Present promise and wealth of the future beyond the

eye^s scope.

— Browning.

At about four years of age.

CHILDHOOD

THE remembrance of Maltbie Bab-
cock's childhood, takes me back in
thought to the earlier period when I
first met his mother before her marriage. I
seem to be once more at Hamilton College,
sitting in the window of my room in " Mid-
dle College, South Hall Third front middle."
I see again the lithe girlish form of a young
lady, who with elastic step is crossing the
campus. It was Miss Emily Maltbie, who
was going from the residence of her late
grandfather, Ex-President Davis of the col-
lege, where his widow a notably brilliant and
attractive woman was then residing, and
where Miss Maltbie was passing the summer,
to call on Mrs. President North on the south
side of the college grounds.

Soon after that I was presented to her,
13

14 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

and subsequently was permitted to be very-
intimate in her family at Syracuse, after her
marriage. It would require a separate article
to pay any adequate tribute to the rare quali-
ties of mind, heart and soul of the mother of
Maltbie Babcock. Her memory is an inspi-
ration not only to her children, but to all
who knew her, and who came within the
wide circle of her intense spiritual life.

Mr. Henry Babcock, her husband, was an
attractive, charming man, socially promi-
nent in Syracuse. In his youth at school
at " the Homer Academy," he became an
intimate friend of him who is now the
eminent missionary at Beirut, Syria, the
Rev. Henry H. Jessup, D. D.

Mr. and Mrs. Babcock lived with Mrs.
Babcock's mother, the widow of the Rev.
Ebenezer Davenport Maltbie, at one time pas-
tor of Hamilton College Chapel. Mrs. Malt-
bie's residence was in a quite stately house,
situated in the centre of a large lawn on
James Street, corner McBride Street, in one of

Childhood 1 5

the most attractive quarters of the city of Syra-
cuse. It has since been removed to a lower
part of the lot, and now faces McBride Street,
and although somewhat reduced in size, its
lovely interior, as the home of Mr. Howard
N. Babcock, Dr. Babcock's oldest brother,
still shows what the place once was.

It was the home of quiet, cultured, refined
women, hushed to specially low voices, and
silent step, because of the presence for many
years of an invalid cousin, a woman of much
beauty, but who never left her suite of
rooms, and was rarely seen, save by her
nurse, and at certain hours of the day by
some of the members of the family. Mrs.
Maltbie, with her tall form, dignified pres-
ence, in white hair and widow's weeds, and
her turban-like cap of white lace with its
long lace strings, and with a look of other
worldliness in her saintly " slow wise smile,"
gave an added charm to the strange quiet of
the house. Her two daughters, trained to
the greatest reverence for her, never thought

1 6 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

of questioning her judgment or author-
ity.

The introduction of a boy hke Maltbie
into that house, followed in successive years
by other boys and girls, full of life and child-
hood's enterprise, entirely reversed the order
of that quiet household. Maltbie was a boy
to be reckoned with. And this venerable
stately Mrs. Maltbie, accustomed to the un-
questioning veneration of her children, found
this " human boy " an astounding revelation.
His merry voice ringing through the house,
his unvelveted tread, his mischievous pranks,
some of which he dared to play upon his
grandmother even, and his startling, unin-
vited intrusions upon the heretofore silent
sanctity, and almost awe-inspiring mystery
of the sick-room, brought a new life into the
still house ; and they all delighted in it, even
the invalid.

Into this refined home, where to know
Mrs. Maltbie well was almost like a liberal
education to any young man privileged to

At about fourteen years of age.

Childhood 17

be intimate there, Maltbie Davenport Bab-
cock was born August 3d, 1858. His child-
hood was very attractive. He was a robust,
independent boy ; sometimes willful, very
merry, often full of mischief, and from the
first he showed a great deal of character. In
his boyhood he was a leader in sport, a mas-
terful boy. He came to be early a fine singer,
and a very proficient player on several mu-
sical instruments, notably, the organ, the
piano, and the viola.

When he was about fourteen years old he
organized an orchestra, composed of boys
about his own age, and when such things
were not as common as they are now; he
also arranged the music for it. At sixteen
he was a recognized champion baseball
player, being specially noted as a pitcher.
During his ministry his reputation as an
athlete, and his taste for athletic pursuits fol-
lowed him. The boys of the town, as well
as those of his parish, would involuntarily
get up their muscle as they saw him coming

1 8 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

near, assuring themselves that what he did
not know about athletics was not worth
knowing.

In that boyhood he was clean of speech,
and made short work of rude fellows of the
baser sort. A story is told that when a big
boy, on the baseball grounds, was persist-
ently annoying and bullying the younger
ones, and defihng the air with his profane
and unchaste speech, Maltbie took him by
the nape of the neck and the seat of his
trousers, and flinging him over the fence,
hurled after him the familiar phrase " Over
the fence is out." He was, at that early age,
a very successful Sunday-school teacher, and
a woman who had a class next to his, used
to say that she could hardly keep her atten-
tion on her lesson and her own class, she
was so eager to hear what " that Babcock
boy " was saying to his class, and to note
the deft ingenious way he managed his rest-
less pupils.

II

COLLEGE DAYS

Oh, the xvild joys of livings the leaping from rock up

to rock —
How good is man^s life, the mere livi?ig how fit to

employ
All the heart and the soul and the senses forever in

joy !

— Browning.

This is my Father'* s world.
Dreaming, I see His face.
I ope my eyes, and in glad surprise
Cry, " The Lord is in this place.''

— M. D. B.

II

COLLEGE DAYS

IN the autumn of 1875 he entered
Syracuse University. He was there
also the leader of an orchestra, the
leader of a glee club, captain of a base-
ball nine, and in the front rank in his class.
At the same time he was so much a part
of the social life of Syracuse, that he was
wanted in all directions by adults and young
people alike. A social function was hardly
considered a success if he could not be pres-
ent. Even then his mental alertness, and
the multiform character of his work were
very noticeable. One day I said to him,
knowing how well he stood in his studies,
in the midst of all this social diversion,
" Maltbie, how do you contrive to do it all ?
When do you study?" "Why, Uncle
Charlie," a title expressive of family in-
21

22 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

timacy and not of blood relation, " you
know that the University is a long distance
from home. I almost always walk home
alone, and as I carry my books with me I
generally have my lessons by the time I
reach there." At that early period in his
life, he had acquired the habit, which was so
characteristic of Carlyle, of grasping what
was on the book's page without exactly
reading the words. He could tell, in giving
one passing glance at a shop window, what
was there on exhibition, sometimes naming
as many as forty or fifty different articles.

His nervous energy, which to quote Dr.
Purves's reference to him, " was the symptom
of the intensity of his life," led him to leave
the social and college round on his first long
vacation to spend his summer on a farm, as
a " farmhand." He desired to get as near as
possible to nature's heart; he knew that
there was entirely another side of life, than
the one he was leading as a favorite in col-
lege and in society, and he wanted to be

College Days 23

familiar with it. He was sure that there
was much interest and happiness to be
found in hfe, away from what was regarded
as essential in conventional society. A
typical Irishman and he were the only
" hands " on the little farm. Life was quite
primitive — the work was the hardest, the
diet the simplest. Instead of becoming
homesick and disheartened, he found a cer-
tain relish and enjoyment in adjusting him-
self to circumstances.

Pat was an unfaiHng source of interest and
entertainment to him, as, for years after-
wards, he became to those to whom Maltbie,
with inimitable drollery would recount that
summer's experience.

The young collegian was boon compan-
ion, and inspiring instructor to the ignorant
Irishman. Finding him utterly in the dark
about the moon's phases, and ignorant of
the source of its brightness, as he was also
of all the movements of the heavenly bodies,
Maltbie turned the corn-field into a lecture

24 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

room on astronomy. At one time Pat stood
for the earth, and Maltbie revolved around
him as the moon, turning to him now a full
face, and then a quarter, and so on. At an-
other time, Maltbie's hoe was stuck in the
ground to represent the sun, and the rake
illustrated the earth's distance from it, and
was made to circle around it. Meanwhile,
Pat leaning on his hoe, smiled on the beam-
ing face of his young professor in astronomy,
and with a mild expression, out of regard to
the feelings of his conscientious comrade,
but wholly inadequate to express his feelings
he said, " Phwat a big thing an eddycation
do be." The summer outing was an entire
success, and the now brown and stalwart
young fellow returned to Syracuse, with a
stock of health and of stories which seemed
never failing. More than one boy in sub-
sequent years, under the fascination of
Maltbie's recounting the humorous and
strenuous incidents of that summer, followed
his example, as some of the farmers in that

College Days 25

region may remember, but alas ! they missed
Pat and Maltbie alike.

By the time he came to his senior year, he
had made such an impression upon his rela-
tives and family friends, with respect to his
diversified gifts, that his own family became
greatly perplexed by their suggestions, as to
what he should be and what he should do in
life. There was a distinguished army officer,
a resident of Syracuse, and a friend of the
family, who was sure that this brave, stal-
wart, fine appearing young fellow should be
a soldier. A cultured relative opposed that
suggestion. Why ! he was born for a bril-
liant literary career. A prominent lawyer,
and a close family friend was certain that
they would make a great mistake if they did
not put him in the law. There was not a
department in law in which he would not be
eminently successful, especially as an advo-
cate. An uncle well known in political
circles, and a member of Congress thought
they should enter him on a life of public

26 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

service. A well known organist pointed to
his remarkable musical gifts, not short of
genius, and marvelled that they could not see
a something perhaps greater than Mendels-
sohn in him; not merely a musician, but
one having all the essentials to a great com-
poser. But the pastor said that, without
question he should be a minister of the
gospel.

It is an interesting fact in considering his
unique personality, that undoubtedly he
would have been eminently successful in any
one of these lines of service. Both his
parents inclined very decidedly to that last
thought of his calling. But at the same
time they did not wish to constrain him to
select that profession, lest his strongest
motive should be to gratify them. I was at
that time the pastor of the First Presbyterian
Church of Rochester, and Maltbie was a
frequent and welcome visitor at our home,
and already almost as a son to us. His
parents wrote me, urging me to use my in-

College Days 27

fluence to help him to decide his profession,
especially looking towards the ministry. We
invited him to spend the Thanksgiving of his
senior year in the University at Syracuse,
with us at Rochester, and with him another
attractive, scholarly, devout, musical, and
socially delightful young friend, then a stu-
dent at Auburn Theological Seminary and,
now, its distinguished Greek professor who
knew what Maltbie's parents and we desired
to secure. They roomed together, and before
the visit was over Maltbie had decided for the
ministry.

Ill

SEMINARY LIFE

But when I became a man I put away childish
things. — Paul.

Then onward through sunshine and storm and night

No tarrying here, my soul;
Thou musty if thou read thy chart aright

Push steadily on to thy goal.

— M. D. B.

Do it now.

— The lifelong motto of M. D. B.

Ill

SEMINARY LIFE

FROM that moment, " this one thing I
do," characterized him. Everything
in his Hfe about which there might be
a question, in such a profession, but which
had never been questioned in his glad, free,
social life, he dropped without any hesitation
or boggle over what he should give up.
There was no talk about " giving up any-
thing." He felt that in his decision he had
taken on, and had taken in so much more
that was delightful and glorious.

The first day that he reached Auburn
Seminary, quoting the phrase commonly ap-
plied to the inmates of quite another institu-
tion at Auburn, he said, with characteristic
humour, " Well, fellows, I have been sent up
for three years."

He showed his self-mastery in this new
31

32 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

life. He was heart and soul with the fellows
in their gatherings, and yet no social
pleasures, no indulgence in appetite, no
temptation to late hours were ever allowed
to unfit him for his work. Classmates, with
occasional simple and harmless midnight
spreads, used to be almost provoked at him.
" Oh, come, don't go off to bed now, just
at the cream of the evening. Stay and make
a night of it." — " No, fellows, the work to-
morrow demands my best physical condi-
tion."

His very unusual musical gifts at the organ,
piano and viola naturally gathered around
him all the musically inchned in the seminary,
and without any question he was their leader.
The devotional music uniformly good in
that Institution took on it new qualities
of fitness, sweetness, and power. There was
that unmistakable precision, movement, ring
which reveals a director. A seminary quar-
tette was organized, by which music of a
high order was so well sung, that the quar-

Seminary Life 33

tette was wanted to sing, here and there, in
Auburn, and in surrounding towns and cities
for the benefit of missionary societies, etc.
Their concert given in the First Presbyterian
Church at Rochester, to aid the Mission Band,
to an audience distinguished for its size,
quaUty, and genuine hearty appreciation, is
still recalled with pleasure in that church.

With his love for athletic sports, and
conscious of the theological students' need
of a virile frame, and quickened heart-throbs,
his eye readily discerned the opportunities
for boating on the lovely Lake Owasco.
Those who accompanied him will never for-
get the rowing on that lake, the songs, the
hilarity and good cheer, which he never
failed to start, calling out in others their per-
haps latent capacities for enjoyment and hu-
mour. One young man, whose pastor wished
him to decide to enter Auburn, and who
gave him a letter of introduction to Maltbie,
found the spirit, enthusiasm and consecration
of that coterie of fellows, a delight to him,

34 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

and a ride with them on the lake, among
other very interesting things, joining his own
exquisite tenor to their harmonious voices,
while they now floated on the lake, and now
almost flew, as they plied their oars, helped
him to decide to be one with them in his
theological studies.

Maltbie Babcock had early learned what
Paul meant by " keeping his body under,"
not to impoverish it, for he had a magnificent
physical frame, muscles like iron, and form
sinewy, athletic and graceful ; but he " kept
his body under " to give it its best, the con-
trol of his higher nature, as the basket is kept
under the balloon that it may rise with it.
His fellow students came to regard their as-
sociation with him at that period of their
lives, as among their choice privileges. Their
affectionate reference to him, when at the
Alumni gathering at the Commencement
after his death, and at the twentieth anniver-
sary of the graduation of their class in 1902
showed how vividly they recalled what he had

Seminary Life 35

been to them. But when he graduated, in-
stead of appearing on the Commencement
platform with an elaborate effort to display
his gifts, his oration was simply a manly sum-
mons to a consecrated hfe.

At the close of his junior year, he was in-
vited to supply the pulpit in a little farming
community not very far from Syracuse, where
the small church had been sometime without
a pastor, and the good people were hungry
for religious services. They welcomed his
advent heartily, and he at once threw him-
self with enthusiasm into the work. He
seemed to be everywhere. There was not a
house at " the corners," or in the surrounding
country, which he did not visit, and where he
did not win, at once, all hearts by his frank,
genuine interest, his sincerity and his marked
personality.

The little church building was soon filled
on Sabbath mornings. Farmers accustomed
perhaps to tones of voice in the pulpit, and
methods of presenting truth, which suggested

36 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

and helped on the tendency to summer
somnolence, waked up. Their boys, who it
may be during the service, had willingly kept
guard of the horses in the sheds surrounding
the church, and may not have thought that
the preaching had in it anything for them,
were in the galleries with interested faces
and alert minds. Here was a very cultivated
young gentleman, evidently accustomed to
move in what they may have called higher
circles, who knew all about farming — who
understood their lives, who spoke their lan-
guage, and who had found his way to their
hearts. It was no perfunctory service for the
sake of getting his hand in, and securing the
summer's stipend. He had the same eager
earnestness to catch men, which through sub-
sequent years gave such power to his min-
istry.

One Sunday, while he was there, quite a
number of his society friends in Syracuse
got up a party to drive out and hear him
preach. Without really intending it, and

Seminary Life 37

with no thought of being irreverent, it was
nevertheless somewhat of a Sunday lark.
As they drove along, they amused them-
selves over what would be his astonishment
to see them enter the church. They
prophesied that they would make him
laugh. They had no idea how far the
spirit of his work was in his very blood.
They found the church full, with the ex-
ception of two empty pews in front. They
filed in before that audience, and that sur-
prised preacher with illy concealed smiles.
But to the young minister it was his op-
portunity to let them know how the love of
his work possessed his soul, and to help
them into a new and better religious life.
He was quickened to unusual earnestness
and power in preaching, and these city
friends who had come to smile remained to
pray. And some of them who had won-
dered why he, so fitted to shine in and adorn
society, and to make a great success in the
world, should enter the ministry, found out

38 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

then. It was wholly characteristic of him ;
with the keenest sense of humour where
humour was in place, himself the very soul
of wit, he was, from the first, no trifler, and
he rose to the height of the occasion.

All who knew him, while he was in the
seminary, agree that his course was notable
for his varied gifts, his personal magnetism,
and his methodical habits. His room was a
model of neatness, order and the display of
excellent taste. There was something al-
most like genius in his ability to take the
commonest things, and combine them to
produce the most artistic effects. With
little or no expense, he made his study in
the seminary building attractive enough to
satisfy the most refined and exacting taste.
He could have turned a woodshed into a
bower of delight. Later in life, while at the
manse in Baltimore, he had a workshop,
where during a severe and prolonged illness
of Mrs. Babcock, when it was necessary for
him to be in the house, he made very pretty

Seminary Life 39

little desks and cabinets, highly finished.
His carpenter tools he had arranged on the
walls of his workshop like pictures. His
plumbing tools, and many other implements
for working in iron, were hung in a way
to suggest that some artist in iron, from
old Nuremburg, had strayed there. I am
not sure but that he had a shoemaker's
kit, for there seemed to be nothing which
he could not do, and in a masterly manner,
from mending a shoe to painting a picture,
from playing a jewsharp, which he could do
in a fascinating way, to the most bewilder-
ing and delightful harmonies, from any
form of attractive speech, to an enthrone-
ment of pulpit power. Like Henry Drum-
mond, whom he seems to have resembled in
many ways, he could wear nothing that did
not seem to be in " good form." His artistic
taste showed itself here, as elsewhere. He
was always most fittingly dressed for every
occasion. The outing apparel, which in
others might be ungainly and slouching, in

40 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

him always took on, in the same strange
way, an air of elegance, even to his bathing
suit; which as he came from the water
seemed to emphasize his manly bearing.

His industry, during his seminary course,
was a marked feature of his student life.
His notes of the lectures of his teachers were
even then a prophecy of what he was to be
in thoroughness. His annotating his books
was a special feature of his study. He de-
veloped a system, then, of collecting mate-
rial, gleaning from all fields, which was one
of the secrets of his success in later life.
After he entered the ministry, he carried out
that plan very fully. In general, instead of
taking the time in the morning to read the
newspapers, he would give a sweeping glance
over them, marking with a coloured pencil
such editorial articles as he deemed of serv-
ice to him, and his wife, or later on his
secretary would cut them out, and place
them in order in the various pigeonholes
designed for them. When he was in Balti-

Seminary Life 41

more, being requested to give, in a very-
short time, a lecture on Calvin, to the stu-
dents of Johns Hopkins University, he
wondered where he should get the material
for it, but found in his collection, the result
of years of accumulation, that he had already
about all that was necessary, as a basis to
work on, in preparing the lecture. It was
during the vacation of the Middle Seminary
year, that he spent two weeks with us at our
then summer home, at Washington, Litch-
field County, Connecticut. The young people
who were gathered there that summer, the
spirit of the place, the lovely scenery, and
the opportunities for fishing and boating on
the Wauramaug Lake, for baseball, and for
croquet on the village green, and for music
in almost every house around the green, into
which the social hfe ebbed and flowed, with
the most charming freedom, and the uncon-
ventionaHty of true culture, were just suited
to him, and he gave himself up to it with a
zest pecuhar to him. His enjoyment in, and

42 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

enthusiasm over such outings were conta-
gious. There, as everywhere else, he fasci-
nated the hearts of his friends. He was
continually surrounded with a raft of admir-
ing young people. They had been waiting
for him. He was already like a brother to
our sons, and through them, the others had
come to anticipate eagerly his arrival. The
carriage conveying him from the station at
the foot of the hill to the house on the green
was filled with welcoming fellows, and as it
appeared, it was hailed with a shout. A
college song was started, and he reached the
house amid a resounding chorus. Within
ten minutes he had doffed his travelling suit,
and had donned his outing clothes, and was
at the piano. It was an old instrument,
happily accustomed to hard usage. As he
sat there, with one boy leaning on his
shoulder, another seated on the lid of the
piano, with his banjo, another leaning on the
piano, facing Maltbie, with a most joyous re-
sponsive face, and two others thumping the

Seminary Life 43

time in each other's sides, as they sang
" Mike Higgins gave a par-r-ty " or some
rollicking college song, while a bevy of
merry girls encircled them, his voice reso-
nant, clear and stirring, his face radiant with
good cheer, and with the unmistakable
mark about him of high breeding at perfect
liberty, too well-born and at ease to think
about manner, it presented a picture which
we have delighted to recall again and again,
and which cannot be effaced.

Some of the boys had never seen just such
a Christian before, happy and radiant of soul,
not despite his being a Christian, but because
he was one. He was the best pitcher in
baseball that they had ever seen, " curv-
ing " the ball with matchless skill, the best
swimmer, the best singer, one who could get
music out of any instrument, and the droll-
est, the most fascinating fellow they had
ever met. They gained their first deep re-
Hgious convictions then. One of them, who
was seven miles away, when Sunday came,

44 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

and Maltbie was to preach, walked the entire
distance to hear him, and declared that he
would have walked twice that distance rather
than to have missed him. Others, boarding
on the hillsides five, four or three miles
away, joined him, making quite a procession
to hear the young minister, and listening to
him, in that country church, as if for their
life, and declaring, at the close of the service,
not only that they had never heard such a
sermon as that before, but also frankly con-
fessing that they would like to live more
Christlike lives. That visit made ineffaceable
impressions. Persons who have never seen
him since, have cherished, through all these
years, the brightest memories of it. Only
this summer, 1904, a man from Albany who,
with his family, was there then, and who
never repeated his visit, asked a mutual
friend, what had ever become of that re-
markable young Babcock ; learning only
then, that it was he, who in the fullness of his
powers, was the famous preacher of the Brick

Seminary Life 45

Church, New York. He had never forgot-
ten him, and had often wondered through
the years, into what marked personality he
had developed.

He graduated from Auburn Seminary in
the spring of 1882.

IV
LOCKPORT

For we preach not ourselves , but Christ Jesus the
Lord : and ourselves your servants for Jesus' sake, —
Paul.

Be strong !
We are not here to play, to dream, to drift ;
We have hard work to do, and loads to lift.
Shun not the struggle ; face it, ' Tis God's gift,

— M. D. B.

IV

LOCKPORT

UPON his graduation from Auburn
he was called at once to the First
Presbyterian Church of Lockport,
N. Y. It was a church then, as it is now, of
great importance in Western New York. A
field which would demand of any young man
his best, and many feared that he was too
young to undertake such a responsibility. It
had been for many years the pulpit throne
of a very remarkable man, Dr. Wisner. A
man whose wit and humour, and sympathy,
whose intellect, evangelical spirit and per-
sonal power triumphed over an unpromising
personal appearance, fairly making it, in
some fascinating way accessory to his wide-
spread influence and reputation. It was go-
ing to be hard for a young man, just out of
the seminary to follow him and his im-
49

50 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

mediate and popular successor, Dr. Free-
man.

While some feared for the young preacher,
those who knew him best were convinced
that he was called of God to the position,
and would be upheld. His methodical
habits, his real ability, his unfailing en-
thusiasm, and his genuine spirituality, all
were used by the Spirit of God. It was a
period of great joy. He had perfect health,
a most interesting and inspiring church, a
very appreciative people, and the conscious-
ness of having entered upon the chosen work
of his life. He magnified his calling. There
was nothing in the world equal to it. All
these things combined to fill his cup to over-
flowing, for that cup was held up to the un-
failing source of all fullness. He never
thought of relying upon his physical
strength, nor his tact, nor his mental re-
sources to carry him through. He had clear
definite views of his own insufficiency, and a
very decided personal reHgious experience.

Lockport 5 1

Friendship with Jesus Christ was a great
reahty to him, even then in his early min-
istry. The poem " Companionship," which
he wrote later in life, he was working out in
his first ministry in Lockport.

No distant Lord have I,

Loving afar to be.
Made flesh for me, He cannot rest

Until He rests in me.

Brother in joy and pain^

Bone of my bone was He,
Now, — intimacy closer still

He dwells Himself in me.

I need not journey far

This dearest friend to see,
Companionship is always mine,

He makes His home with me.

I envy not the twelve.

Nearer to me is He ;
The life He once lived here on earth

He lives again in me.

Ascended now to God,

My witness there to be,
His vvritness here, am I because

His spirit dwells in me.

52 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

0 Glorious Son of God,
Incarnate Deity,

1 shall forever be with Thee
Because Thou art with me.

He adopted a certain phrase for his rule of
life, which has become identified with him.
" Do it now/' Whatever it was, nothing
was to be deferred, to be put off. He de-
termined to keep ahead of his work. One
can always tell those who are over rather
than under their business, ahead and pulling,
rather than behind and dragged. In supply-
ing the pulpit in Lockport, before he was
called, he had preached nearly all the ser-
mons which he had prepared in the semi-
nary. After his first Sunday, as pastor, he
found that he had but two sermons which he
had not preached there, and he made up his
mind that he would keep two sermons ahead
of him, while in that parish, a plan which he
carried out. No one but a minister can
quite understand just what that involved in
the first pastorate. He seemed to come at

Lockport 53

once, into the power to hold his work well
in hand. Like successful merchants, or pro-
fessional men, who know how to centre all
the lines of their interests in their office, and
have them radiate with vitalizing power to
the farthest reach of those interests, who, no
matter what the new claims which throng
upon them, with each new day, are never
upset nor confused, but always ahead of
their work : so Maltbie Babcock, from the .
start kept in advance of his work. He never \
seemed harassed nor hurried, and never
driven. He kept the reins in his own hands, j

He began, at once, systematic visitation,
as well as systematic study. He had no
such narrowness as to confine his pastoral
visits to the poor alone ; as if the rich had
so much in their wealth, that they needed no
pastoral care nor oversight. He had no
such snobbery as to limit his visits to the
cultured and wealthy. He had a profound
sympathy for the poor and lonely, for those
who were " under the wheel."

54 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

Any one under his care, however plain,
unattractive or common was an object of his
affectionate interest, and perhaps, because he
might be plain, unattractive and common to
others. To the uncomely parts of his parish
he paid more abundant honour. He was on
the alert to see how much could be made
out of unpromising material. He found it
most fascinating to note the change wrought
in such an one, under the influence and
mastery of Jesus. He neglected no one,
poor or rich. An incident in his early
pastoral work comes to my mind. I relate
it without any hesitation, because it reflects
very much credit, in the result, on the
parishioner himself. He was a very well-
to-do elderly man, in prominent business
circles ; very reserved, and supposed to be
inaccessible to religious influences. The
young pastor sought him out ; for this very
reason he did not propose to neglect him.
He went to him, as one in need of redemp-
tion. With the tact which he possessed by

Lockport 55

nature and by grace, he urged him to con-
sider and yield to the claims which Christ
had upon him. The proud man was an-
noyed that he should approach him on this
subject, and curtly and coldly strove to close
the interview, as if he were intruding upon
him. But his pastor with calmness and
self-possession explained to him that he was
in the discharge of his holy business, just in
that act, and firmly though courteously in-
sisted that he should be so recognized as a
Christian minister, and not as a boy. The
offended parishioner was obliged to grant
this, but he was so thoroughly annoyed and
irritated that he ceased attending church,
though his wife and some of the family were
members of the Church, and not only did
not withdraw but were entirely in sympathy
with the earnest young pastor. As months
passed by, and this prominent man did not
return to the congregation, there were some
who thought that it might be wise for the
young man to own that he had intruded

56 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

upon him, and to seek to bring him back.
Mr. Babcock declined to do this, simply be-
cause it would discredit the work as a Chris-
tian minister, which he came there to do.
He had entire faith that God would take
care of this matter, and that He would bring
it around all right in time. A half year
passed away. One Sunday after Mr. Bab-
cock had returned to the manse from the
morning service, he saw this man walking up
and down, nervously, in front of the gate.
Finally, he opened it, and with rapid step
pressed to the door, and rang the bell. Mr.
Babcock answered it himself, and ushered
him into the privacy of the study. There,
the troubled man at once apologized for the
rude way he had treated his pastor, owned
that he had done what was just right, and
acknowledged that he, his parishioner, had
been all wrong, and that he had not had a
happy day since then. He expressed a de-
sire to be a Christian, and asked Mr. Bab-
cock to pray for and with him. Then he

Lockport ^y

said, after prayer, " I want you to go with
me to my house, where I wish to have it
understood that I reinstate you as my
pastor. I would hke to have you offer
prayer there ; and if the way be clear I wish
to confess my faith in Christ at the next
communion." I give this case in full, that
his fidelity in his early ministry and his
method of dealing with men may be clearly
illustrated.

It was. while he was in this pastorate that
he sought and won the hand of Miss Kath-
arine Tallman, the daughter of Judge Tall-
man of Poughkeepsie, thus forming a union
in marriage, singularly close and beautiful,
and blessed to the end, through the unusual
combination of joy and sorrow ; and few
ever suffered more and few ever enjoyed
more in their united Hves.

His first illness, a very serious case of
nervous prostration, and his only one until
the last, the fatal Mediterranean fever, at
Naples, and separated from that by nearly

58 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

sixteen years of perfect health intervening,
was in the third year of this pastorate.

That illness involved six months of great
anxiety for his people, his friends and his
family. Four weeks of that time, just pre-
vious to his removal to the care of Dr.
Jackson, he spent at our house, the manse of
the First Presbyterian Church, Rochester, N.
Y., where, what little I could do for him, in
direct personal care, seemed peculiarly grate-
ful to him. It will hardly be thought strange
that then, we were more closely knit together
than ever, and that a brooding paternal love,
always felt for him, deepened and rooted
through that experience. May this inade-
quate tribute to his memory be regarded as
the outgrowth from that root.

It was a year of great trials. His own
serious illness, the loss of their httle child at
birth, his wife's loss of health, never com-
pletely restored ; the death of her mother and
grandmother, two very interesting and beau-
tiful women, and objects of the tenderest af-

Lockport 5 9

fection, all compressed within the limits of
that year, made it one never to be for-
gotten.

In seven months Mr. Babcock was com-
pletely restored, as the result of the success-
ful treatment at the Jackson Health Resort,
Dansville, N. Y. But the trials showed their
influence, through God's grace, in deepened
religious life, heightened spirituality and in
broadened affections. Before that time he
had been indifferent almost, except to his
very nearest, to the expression of his really
affectionate nature. In his early life, his
society and college friends opening their
hearts to him, as they always did, sometimes
almost passionately charged him with not
loving them as they loved him, which is often
the experience of leaders in college. The
fact was that he was never willing to be tied
to any one person, except in his home, where
his love was complete. He chummed all his
friends, not one alone. But from that ex-
perience, he grew rapidly in the power, I may

6o Maltbie Davenport Babcock

say purpose to express, in a fine and manly
way, most attractive to those whom he loved,
and who loved him, the great deeps of affec-
tion in his soul. This was the only time he
had ever been ill, until the Mediterranean
fever ; so absolutely robust had he ever
been, so perfect his health, that his friends
heard with incredulity of his illness. It
was impossible to associate anything of the
kind with him. He realized after that, prob-
ably better than any one else, the necessity
of taking the most intelligent care of his
health; for while he seemed fresher, and
more physically alert than ever, he took the
greatest pains to keep his body in the
best possible condition. He was there-
fore consistent and conscientious in tak-
ing his vacations, and in making the most of
them. Those who were permitted to be his
companions, at such times, recall them as
among the most charming and delightful out-
ings of their lives. Music, fishing, sailing,
driving, private dramatics, droll charades, golf,

Lockport 6 1

tennis, unique rollicking entertainments, and
roaring fun, were all surrounded with and il-
lumined by an all pervading Christian spirit,
which made the passage from the greatest
fun to evening prayers as natural and as un-
forced as possible.

It was while he was at Lockport, that he
came to a clear idea of what his vacations
should be. He was very fond of the sea.
But the average seashore hotel had no attrac-
tions for him. With a few chosen friends,
he and his wife hired a plain, quiet farm-
house at Duxbury, near Plymouth, Mass.,
engaging the owner of the house and his
wife to take care of them. This they held
for a number of summers, until he bought
land at Wiano, on the south shore of Cape
Cod, where he built a very pretty cottage.
Duxbury was the centre of a unique vaca-
tion life. There was not a thing connected
with living on the seashore, which he did not
master; that was his way. He could not
content himself without knowing all that

62 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

there was to be known of the region, wher-
ever he was. He could sail a boat as well as
a skipper. He became a skilled fisherman.
He learned the habits of the different kinds
of fish. He became thoroughly familiar
with the history of that region. The salient
points of character in the fisherman of Mas-
sachusetts Bay, and of Cape Cod he thor-
oughly appreciated and enjoyed ; he was hail
fellow with them all. He and those with
him, regularly attended and contributed to
the little church. He did not take his parish
cares with him, but he was as intensely and
as joyously a Christian, in all his summer
outings as at home. And at night after
games and frolics, that flashed and scintillated
with wit that cannot be recalled now, so
subtle and constant, the evening prayers,
reverent and tender, more unique even than
those of Robert Stevenson — pulsating with
the joy of life, were something never to be
forgotten.

It was in these vacations that he gave

Lockport 63

loose rein to his dramatic talent. No one
could listen to his preaching, with his uncon-
ventional way of stating truth, without notic-
ing that vivid dramatic gift of his, all uncon-
sciously used. But in his vacation, sur-
rounded by trusted friends, he gave free play
to this native talent in charades, and humor-
ous recitations, and the telling of dialect
stories in an inimitable way. There is a
photograph which caught him and his party
in the droll representation of various kinds
of invalids, with him as the country doctor.
He is not, in that picture, Maltbie Babcock,
at all. He is the other man ; he is merged
wholly into the character of the absorbed,
kind, and faithful country practitioner. He
is dear old " Weelum McClure," save that
Ian Maclaren's delightful creation of that
character came afterwards. He never at-
tempted the type of minister which Dickens
so caustically delineated — if the reality ever
existed, for he loathed it, and turned away
from it, to the representation of those carica-

64 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

tures among the Germans, Irishmen, French-
men, or backwoodsman, which, while most
amusing, presented inherent, sturdy, manly
qualities. When he went back to the " Pat "
of his early farm experience, he was no
longer the lithe, graceful, beaming faced
Maltbie Babcock ; he was instead, in face,
figure and tone of voice Pat, just Pat. At
the right time and in the right place he
dearly loved a good story ; and many a time,
my first greeting on entering his house, was
his ringing cheery voice from the hall above,
" Uncle Charlie, I have a new story for you."
In one sense, it was this dramatic power that
made him such an excellent musician, or
artist, or shoemaker, or carpenter, fisherman
or sailor, whatever he undertook.

In later years, while at Baltimore, he was
accustomed, after the hard strain of the win-
ter's work, and before the pressing demands
which the month of June always makes upon
the city pastor, to go to Florida, for two
weeks of tarpon fishing, a great fish to be

Lockport 65

found only in those southern waters, hard
to catch, and very gamy. To haul one in,
and safely land him, required the utmost
skill, patience and strength. The effort, after
hooking him, is full of excitement, and suc-
cess arouses the greatest enthusiasm. Dr.
Babcock became a successful and noted tar-
pon fisher. He was while there, a tarpon
fisherman; on his boat everything in plan,
talk and work turned towards tarpon. He
was dressed for his calling. One would not
dream, who did not know him elsewhere,
that he was the thorough musician, the
charming man of society, the platform de-
fender of great causes, the distinguished
preacher of Baltimore. He was bound to
catch that tarpon ; he studied his ways ; he
learned his moods ; he took advantage of
his tricks and landed him ! The fishermen
of Florida bays and inlets never forgot him,
and constantly quoted him.

In his study at Baltimore, there hung
upon the walls, a half of a huge tarpon, cut

66 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

lengthwise, properly prepared and mounted
on a cedar slab, a trophy of one day's suc-
cessful fishing, its silver scales as brilliant as
if burnished metal. If his letters to the
Baltimore papers on this sport, and describ-
ing his " catches," and the general experi-
ence of fishing in Southern waters could be
gathered and published, they would form a
volume which would be well-nigh as popular
as anything of his now printed.

It was in this way that he took his first
tour abroad, accompanied by his devoted
wife and a few intimate friends. It was a
golden summer of delight wherever they
went. His letters written en route to his
people in Baltimore and printed in their
church paper. The Brown Memorial Monthly ^
reflect his discernment, his mental grasp, his
felicity of expression, his understanding of
the heart of things, and his ever present con-
sciousness of the heavenly horizon to such
a degree, that it is to be hoped that they
too, like his last letters from abroad while

Lockport 67

with the Auburn Seminary party, to his Men's
society of the Brick Church, New York, may
be put in permanent literary form. They
deserve such preservation. He had an in-
satiable desire to get to the core of every-
thing. On shipboard, he went everywhere.
Any suffering passenger, in second cabin or
steerage, he helped and comforted. He got
acquainted with the engineers, even the
stokers looked for his coming with an ap-
preciative smile. It was this same dramatic
or imitative talent of his that enabled him to
make the most of his German and French.
What little he had of those languages was
through the college instruction in modern
languages of years ago ; and college French
and German does not take one very far into
the intricacies of conversation. But he util-
ized his few phrases and idioms, to an aston-
ishing degree ; a word, a phrase with a shrug
of the shoulders, a characteristic turn of the
head, seemed to take him a good way, in
making him understood, to the homesick sec-

68 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

ond cabin or steerage passenger, who looked
for his coming with longing, and hailed him
with delight. It was in the same way that
he went through the Steel Mills, and into
the coal mines, when visiting us in Scranton.
One of the young, skilled officials of the
Steel Mills conducted him through, and said,
afterwards, that he took in the whole system
with remarkable celerity and comprehension
of mechanic law, and put himself in friend-
liest accord with the men. The next day he
invited a member of my family to go with
him through the mills, and explained the
whole process as clearly as if he had been to
the manner born, while in every shop the
men greeted him as an old friend, so quickly
had he the day before established a basis of
comradeship with them.

It was the experiences of that third year
in his first pastorate, which caused his people
of Lockport, who appreciated and loved him
more than ever to see that it would not be
wise to insist upon his remaining there.

Lockport 69

They agreed with all his other friends that
the call which came from the Brown Me-
morial Church of Baltimore, Md., in 1887
was of the Lord's directing.

V

BALTIMORE

I press towards the mark for the prize of the high
calling of God in Christ Jesus. ^^ — Paul.

0 Lord I pray
That for this day

1 may not swerve
By foot or hand
From Thy command.

Not to be servedy but to serve.

This too I pray
That for this day
No love of ease
Nor pride prevent
My good intent
Not to be pleased, but to please.

And if I may
Vd have this day
Strength from above
To set my heart
In heavenly art
Not to be lovedy but to love.

— M. D. B.

BALTIMORE

NOW in the second parish, with
the results of his systematic and
thorough study, with deep expe-
rience in sorrow, with his rapidly developing
gifts, and greatly increased powers, he en-
tered at once upon a career of usefulness and
influence through fourteen years of service,
in every way remarkable.

Here his poetical gift was awakened. He
had read largely in the seminary, and in his
first parish, in the best poetry. He specially
delighted at this period in Wordsworth, later
he was devoted to Tennyson, and during the
long horseback rides of his journey in the
Holy Land, just before the end, he learned
" In Memoriam " by heart. Nearly all his
poems, which are in the Memorial volume,
" Thoughts for every-day living," were
73

74 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

written in Baltimore. Here also he put
forth his first musical compositions, which
attracted marked attention, and were re-
garded, under the circumstances, as quite
wonderful. A year and a half after his
death, the organist of the Brick Church,
New York, who had followed Dr. Babcock
from Baltimore, gave an organ recital to the
special musical friends of Dr. Babcock, in
which only his compositions were played.
Here, in this parish was more clearly re-
vealed than ever before, his power over
young men. It was a power indeed, a pas-
sion with him which fairly dominated him.
The Johns Hopkins University afforded
him a great field for the exercise of this
power. A room was set apart for his use.
Special hours were appointed for his recep-
tion of students. It became, in a good
sense, like a confessional. It was the
waking of many men to a new hfe. They
flocked about him, they followed him. He
visited The Hill School at Pottstown every

Baltimore 75

other month, Robert Speer going the
alternate months. The opportunity there
afforded him for preaching and influencing
boys, at the most impressionable age, was
greatly appreciated by him, and responded
to by them. Hundreds of them were lifted
up to nobler ideals and nearer the Christ, by
him. He went again and again to Yale,
Princeton, and Harvard for similar service.
All this will be more fully described in the
chapter on " His Work in Schools and
Colleges."

There was developed within him, while in
Baltimore a more intense desire than ever to
save men. He seemed to feel to the full the
immensely strong figure of Jude's " Others
save with fear — pulling them out of the fire,
hating even the garment spotted by the
flesh." No firemen of to-day, trained to
daring feats, to save his fellow men from the
flames, in most dangerous places, ever felt
more the exhilaration, in the supreme mo-
ment of rescue, than this man, on fire with a

76 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

holy passion to deliver souls. He showed
peculiar aptitude for personal work with
men. While, I think, he never had an
evangelist in his own church, it was not
because he doubted the efficiency of good
ones, for he had great sympathy with, and
admiration for Mr. Moody ; but because he
did not need them. His church was always
in a quickened condition. Although he had
his own clearly chosen methods of work, he
never claimed that they were the only ones.
He rejoiced in the success of those who
worked on different lines from his own. All
modes of reaching men, such as Salvation
Army work, Rescue Missions, Young Men's
Christian Associations, or Young Women's,
and Christian Endeavour Societies enlisted
his hearty sympathy. He was a very popu-
lar delegate to great Christian Endeavour
Conventions. His presence, specially at
Cleveland, and at London, England, where
he went simply to be a delegate, made a
deep impression. There are those who can

Baltimore 77

never forget their association with him at
such times, particularly on the steamer, on
the way to the World's London Convention.
There never was any Union movement in
Baltimore for the deepening and broadening
of the religious life, and the increase of its
effectiveness, in which he was not one of
the inspiring leaders. A unique Christian
worker, Mr. Todd Hall, the Baltimore
detective, was once in Scranton addressing
the Young Men's Christian Association, on
a Sunday afternoon, at the Lyceum Theatre.
When it was announced that Dr. Babcock
would address them, on the next Sabbath,
Mr. Hall, moved irresistibly, cried out, " Oh,
I say, fellows, he's a daisy." He became
one of the most prominent religious leaders
in all that region. He was looked upon as
a special feature of Baltimore. The entire
city, of all denominations and associations
held him with mingled pride and love. The
Rev. Henry W. Luce, from my charge in
Scranton, and now for a number of years

78 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

supported by that church as a missionary in
the Shantung Province, China, wrote of Dr.
Babcock recently — " I was so interested in
the book of his letters from Palestine to the
Men's Association of the Brick Church, that
I could hardly lay it down until I finished it —
you may remember that you once gave me
a letter of introduction to him. I found him
at his home in Baltimore. I think that I
never spent a few hours in any one's pres-
ence, whose influence left such a clear and
abiding impression upon me. The music,
the conversation, and above all the spirit of
the man still abide in my heart. I sat down
at his desk and the * Do it now ' motto, which
he had written and pasted on the rim of his
desk cover, has often been a reminder to
promptness. And above all, was his frank-
ness, and his power to make you feel it. So
God blesses the earth with His children."

He had no one method of reaching people,
but perhaps no one ever used his pen more
effectively than he, for this purpose. He

Baltimore 79

wrote many letters daily to different mem-
bers of his parish, about their spiritual needs,
but in no stereotyped manner. Each note
was sui generis, pervaded with his strong,
cheery religious life, and marked by his easy,
attractive style. There was not a member of
his congregation, but what was aware of his
personal interest in him, and affected by it.
As a result of this faithful work, there were
constant additions to his church. After his
death it was wonderful, except to those who
knew his real Hfe, to find how many people
whom society, so called, and the great world
knew not, held him as their dearest friend.
As Ian Maclaren refers to the other persons,
than the twelve " who emerge like pictures
from the shadow in the gallery, like unad-
dressed letters in a biography, like initials in
a diary — they are persons of whom we only
get glimpses, or whose acquaintance with
Jesus is barely mentioned. There is this un-
known, whom we can only call * the goodman
of the house,' who rivalled Joseph of Ari-

8o Maltbie Davenport Babcock

mathea in the offices of friendship — affording
Him his choicest room wherein to keep the
feast." So men and women in the humblest
ranks of Hfe, had cherished notes from Dr.
Babcock, brief, but characteristic and vitaliz-
ing, which in his delicate thoughtfulness he
had sent them ; or they recalled memorable
visits, or some spoken word, which will never
be forgotten. He would have scorned to
make these expressions of interest and of con-
sideration, to the favoured few alone. As the
sun gives to each blade of grass all it can hold
I of his light and heat and life, as if it were the
j only blade of grass, so he had the charming
■ way of giving to every one he met, rich or
poor, learned or unlearned, something of his
very self, and at the time, the very best of
himself. While a man of reserves, and in
another sense of reserve, he never held back
the best or most brilliant thought that came
to him, in conversation, as if it were too good
or too valuable for the time, and only to be
used for some great occasion. If some spe-

Baltimore 8 1

daily select circle were having him at dinner,
with a choice " bill of company," as well as
of fare, or gifted friends had secured him for
some long planned outing, or for some charm-
ing drive, and supposed that they were get-
ting what was denied ordinary mortals, they
were greatly mistaken. He knew where and
when that little club of working girls, in his
congregation, took their lunch, or where
those struggling college boys were boarding
themselves, or where those clerks were in
their small and cheerless hall bedrooms of
dreary boarding-houses, and he would drop
in on them, with a way and manner as at-
tractive as when with those who held them-
selves as forming the choicest circles of the
city, and which they can never forget. He
was the ideal friend of the young man. One
of his Baltimore " boys," WilHam Forman
Clarke, paid a tribute to his memory which
shows how the young men of his parish came
to regard him.

" How great and powerful in the sight of

82 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

God must be the man, who during so short
a period of life on this planet can do so much
good. And he above all others was a man !
His laugh, his gesture, his music, his preach-
ing, all sent a warm flow through your body
and soul. He was but a man, and yet such
a man ! Where shall we find one such as
he." Like the fabled man of the bedia-
monded coat, which dropped jewels wherever
he walked, Maltbie Babcock gave his best at
each time, frankly, freely, joyously. This
was one of the sources of his power as a
pastor. He was truly, and not professionally,
a friend of every one in his parish. Very
few men of his age could write to men over
seventy, as he wrote to one who had retired
from active life, to the quiet of his last illness.
I quote from a letter in the " Thoughts for
Every-day Living." " It is a comfort to look
back and think what good friends we have
been, and then to make a jump into the fu-
ture, and know that there, the real summer
season of friendship comes. I hope that you

Baltimore 83

are fairly comfortable, though I hardly dare
to, for it is no joke letting go of our tools as
they wear out. But you are God's workman,
and some fine day, He will give you a new
kit, and set you at tasks, in which, and of
which you will never weary. I love to think
of our unchanged friendship, and that though
we may not be cronies on the back piazza, or
in the garden much more, if any more in this
world, we shall be in Paradise, which after
all, is God's garden — with no serpent." To
another, whose little child had died he sent
a most comforting letter, in which were these
words : " Always think of me as your friend,
and take advantage of my friendship ; what
are we here for, but to love and help one
another ? " He thought and felt far into the
heart of things. He had sacred intuitions of
sorrow. A parishioner, receiving such words
as these, would cherish them forever. " Per-
haps the richest of God's earthly gifts is an
accepted sorrow. Do not lose this one.
Accept it. Say, < Speak, Lord, for Thy serv-

84 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

ant heareth/ and He will tell you some things
worth all it cost to hear them. I cannot say
what, but you will know."

Here, in Baltimore, there came to him,
also, a deeper and more unique spiritual life,
giving to his humour, his table-talk, his rec-
reations, his prayers and his preaching an
indescribable power. He knew where the
sources of spiritual life were, and daily re-
sorted to them. He slept soundly through
the night, like one who made a business of it,
and as if to lie awake was a neglect of a God-
given opportunity to " knit up the ravelled
sleeve of care." But he did not waste the
morning hours. The hour before breakfast,
after his toilet, was his special hour to be
alone with God and His word ; not for study,
that he took up later in the morning, but for
worship, for communion and for intercessory
prayer for his large congregation, and for
special cases that lay on his great sympathetic
heart. It was here, through this direct per-
sonal contact with the heart of God that he

Baltimore 85

became charged for the day, to give off, as
he did constantly and joyously, the fullness
of God, which his Heavenly Father imparted
to him so freely.

Perhaps he evinced his gifts as clearly as
anywhere in his table-talk or conversation.
He would press on daringly, eagerly into
some dark subject, his thought rushing out
into the darkness Hke a rocket, and then sud-
denly bursting into corruscations, explosions,
like the supreme moment of the rocket's
sweep, lighting up the darkness, and filling
his companions with wonder at his bold and
brilliant flights of fancy. And yet those
who were nearest to him and who saw the
most of him felt, I think, that nowhere did
the depth, breadth and power of his nature
so reveal itself as in prayer. His prayers
were never the same. In one way they were
like the chameleon which takes its colour from
what it feeds on. They reflected the en-
vironment, and gave voice to the feeling and
spirit of the moment, wherever he was.

86 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

Whoever followed him then, whether friends
at the family altar, or the great congregation,
felt as if they were brought into the presence
of the Almighty, and near to the heart of
God.

Church after church essayed to draw him
away from Baltimore. Two churches in
Philadelphia, three in New York, one in
Washington, two in Chicago, and others
wanted him, but for all those glad, fruitful
years, he remained at his post, apparently im-
movable. He sought no change. He was
as far as possible from putting himself in the
way of calls. He tried to avoid them.

No one was happier, or merrier than he.
No one drew more delight from song of bird,
colours in nature and pencillings of leafless
trees against the sky than he.

" Now behold the Master's drawing
Clear against the cold, gray sky ;
Not a trace of warmth or colour,
But fine feasting for the eye."

All the phenomena of natural life minis-

The Park Presbyterian Church, Baltimore, Md., was
the fruit of a most successful mission of the Brown Me-
morial (church under the ministry of Dr. Babcock.

On the death of Dr. Babcock its name was changed to
"The Babcock Memorial Church.'' its Church edifice
was erected by the devoted friends of Dr. Babcock in the
Brown Memorial and Babcock Memorial Church at the
cost of about $00,000 and dedicated Dec. i, 1903.

Baltimore 87

tered to his joy. And no man enjoyed men,
best of all to him, more than he. After his
death, Robert Speer, in an article in the June
number of the Record of Christian Work of
that year, paid a most exquisite and appre-
ciative tribute to these, as well as to other
qualities of his rare nature.

His music was a wide, deep channel
' through which he poured the strong emotions
of his soul. Seated at his organ, with his
wife at the piano, or the reverse, he revelled
in the grandest compositions of the great
masters.

No commonplace music found recognition
there. He was familiar with the best, the
noblest harmonies. Through these, or
through his own delightful improvisations,
he would Hterally " Pour out his soul within
him." It was unquestionably one of his
modes of worship. His profile at such times
bore an expression of aspiration pecuHarly
impressive.

VI

HIS WORK IN SCHOOLS AND
COLLEGES

Go

Right

On

Working.

— M. D. B.

// // not growing like a tree

In bulk, doth make man better be ;

Or standing long an oaky three hundred year.

To fall a log at last, dry, bald, and sere :

A lily of a day

Is fairer far in May,
Although it fall and die that night —
// was the plant and flower of Light.
In small proportions we just beauties see ;
And in short measures life may perfect be.

B. JONSON.

VI

HIS WORK IN SCHOOLS AND
COLLEGES

A SKETCH is not necessarily a frag-
ment, or a part of an object. It
should aim to present an entire out-
line. Imagination delights to fill in the
details. Imperfect as this sketch must neces-
sarily be, it would be still more so if there
were no reference to Dr. Babcock's work
with the students in school and college.

University preachers are comparatively
new features in academic life, and have
come to be important factors in it. To the
work of the University chaplain were added
the visits of lay speakers and preachers dis-
tinguished for their special gifts in influenc-
ing young men.

The Hill School at Pottstown, The Hotch-
kiss School at Lakeville, Conn., and Harvard,
91

92 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

Yale and Princeton Universities, among other
institutions of learning, have been quick to
appreciate and to take advantage of this new
movement to bring the ablest and most con-
secrated Christian preachers and lay speakers
in contact with their students. In this way
hundreds, not to say thousands of young
men have been awakened to the life in
Christ. It was impossible that Dr. Babcock
should be left out of such work. By " na-
ture and nurture" he was pecuharly fitted
for it. He was not only the boy's and the
young man's man, but hero; and few men
ever influenced their lives so forcefully and
fruitfully as he.

This sketch of him cannot therefore leave
out this important department of his activity
as a Christian worker. But as this was on
fields where I had not walked with him, and
desiring to secure some testimonies at first
hand, I have written to The Hill School at
Pottstown, Pa., and to Harvard and Yale
Universities for some direct impressions of

Schools and Colleges 93

his work there. The long summer vacation,
and the consequent absence from the univer-
sities of those to whom I appHed, have pre-
cluded anything but brief descriptions from
that source. The Rev. Anson Phelps Stokes,
of Yale, wrote : " I remember very plainly
Dr. Babcock's last sermon in the college
chapel here. It was on ♦ power.' He traced
the use of the word through the New Testa-
ment, and the sermon was certainly a very
strong one. I happen to call to mind two
remarks which I overheard as I passed out
of the chapel. One student said, ' That was
the greatest sermon I ever heard.' The
other replied, * Yes, and would he not make
a great actor ? ' Both were impressed with
the power of the man, and one called at-
tention to a certain dramatic element in
his preaching. It is beyond question that
Dr. Babcock was considered by the students
one of the most virile, direct and helpful of
the Yale preachers. He was also specially
approachable by the men, and he always

94 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

was glad to avail himself of any opportunity
for personal interviews with them."

The Rev. Dr. Francis G. Peabody, of Har-
vard, wrote : " You ask me for some remi-
niscence of the impression made by Dr. Bab-
cock through his preaching to students of
Harvard University. Under the system of
religious administration at Harvard, Sunday
evening worship is led by ministers of the
various communions and from all parts of
the country, so that those who are regular
attendants are likely to hear the most com-
manding voices of the American pulpit.
Dr. Babcock, in his short career, preached
twice in our chapel ; and the response to his
message on the part of our young men was
almost without precedent or parallel. I shall
never forget the throng of youths who
crowded towards him at the end of each
service to express their gratitude. His accu-
; rate understanding of the habit of mind pre-
! vailing among educated youth, his entire
■ freedom from professionalism of manner and

Schools and Colleges 95

material, his personal vigour and charm, all
combined to make him singularly winning ;
and he seemed to me the ideal of what a
preacher to young men should be. I re-
member also, as a part of the same impres-
sion, his own expressions, in both instances,
of the peculiar joy he had in this college
preaching, and the sense of unconstrained
contact with young minds. He was a most
unusual combination of the boyish and the
mature, the spontaneous and the reflective,
the jubilant and the sympathetic ; and these
varying moods penetrated his sermons and
gave them a peculiar appeal to the tidal
Hfe of youth. Many young men who thus
listened to him at our university will, I be-
lieve, date not only their keenest impressions
of reHgious truth but their confidence of the ;
reality and simplicity of religion from the <
Sunday evenings with him in Appleton j
chapel."

Dr. John Meigs, principal of The Hill
School, Pottstown, Pa., where Dr. Babcock

96 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

went on alternate months with Robert E.
Speer, for several years, gave me the follow-
ing exceedingly interesting account of his
work in that institution : *• Of no man can
Paul's words, •' All things to all men,' be more
aptly used than of Maltbie Babcock. It was
true of him by reason of the force of his
own nature, but more true because of that
law which he himself characterized as • Nature
plus Nurture.' It was profoundly true be-
cause of the diversity and richness of his
gifts, which betrayed the lover of Nature,
* the living garment of God,' and of all forms
of physical activity, as well as the poet, musi-
cian and artist. He was all these by nature ;
but how much more by nurture !

" These gifts were combined in a radiant,
magnetic personality that defies analysis.
His employment of his rare powers seems
even more marvellous than their possession.

" Self-effacement, that the face of Christ
might more truly appear in his life, was the
law of his service. Necessarily conscious of

Schools and Colleges 97

power, to him it was the power of God work-
ing in and through him ; delighting in the
exercise of his gifts, he seemed ahve only to
the sense of the goodness of God who made
him a servant for Jesus' sake. And yet, con-
tradictory as it may appear, the kindling,
quickening radiancy and joyousness of his
speech and countenance might easily have
suggested, to those who knew him not, the
very * abandon' of self-confidence, while
those who really knew his soul found ever
in this only the irrepressible joy of one who
knew in whom he had believed, and was,
therefore, confident.

" In no field of work did he make more
distinctive use of his many and varied gifts
than in his intercourse with boys and young
men. His intense vitality and enthusiasm
kept him ever young. His power of imagi-
nation instantly grasped their point of view
and enabled him to put himself in their
places ; to think their thoughts after them ;
to enjoy their sports, to feel their struggles,

98 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

to know their temptations. There was no
professional ' tang ' about him ; no peculi-
arity of manner or idiosyncrasy of personality
to baffk or repel, but, from the first instant
of meeting, there was everything in manner
and form and speech to attract and charm
the young. Boys forgot their shyness and
reticence before this minister of grace, whose
habits indicated the man, whose habiliments
revealed the gentleman, and, instinctively,
gave him the freedom of the city, of their
hearts and minds.

" He sometimes visited schools and preached
to the boys who, from year to year, eagerly
looked for his return. We can see him
seated, for the first time, at a table with a
group of young fellows. Expecting to see
a typical clergyman they look at him critic-
ally and find nothing characteristic of ♦ the
cloth.' He opens conversation with some
casual, friendly remark, and in the common
courtesies of the table indulges in pleasant-
ries, tells an interesting story, makes them

Schools and Colleges 99

forget themselves, and has them spellbound
before five minutes have passed. One story-
after another is told, each one more interest-
ing than the last, until the boys at other
tables look around to observe and share the
merriment. But it is not all fun. As nat-
urally and spontaneously as he has narrated
the amusing anecdote does he gUde into the
recital of some strong, stirring incident of
human hfe (alluding, perhaps, to its Christ-
ward side), as one might speak of an event
of moment to any other dear, intimate friend.
The young boy feels no self-consciousness,
no embarrassment, no recoil, as if he were
being forced into the courts of heaven * vi et
armis,' but tingles with glad surprise to find \
new and obvious connection between human
and divine Hfe.

" Once, in giving an account of his expe-
rience with a black leopard in the Jardin des
Plantes in Paris, and of how nearly he lost
his arm by his impulsive kindness in feeding
the dangerous brute, he described the treat-

loo Maltbie Davenport Babcock

ment he underwent at the surgeon's hands.
As he showed the scar on his hand where
the leopard's claw had caught him, he swiftly
turned the conversation from the exciting
channel of adventure into the serious one of
application, and, in effect, preached a little
sermon to those boys that will long be re-
membered by his hearers. He was like his
Master, who ever preached from the common
events of life, and took the flower in the field,
the bird in the air, the cloud in the sky, the
seed in the ground for His texts.

'' On the occasion of his first visit to the
school he arrived in time for evening prayers,
Saturday night. After the brief service he
stood for almost an hour before the boys
and told them of a recent fishing trip for
tarpon. As interesting as his vivid portrayal
of his exciting experience in landing the fish
was the sight of those boys listening with
eager faces, some with open mouths, to that
wonderful narrator. With what power and
dramatic art he told that story ! Those who

Schools and Colleges loi

listened felt as if they too were struggling
with the great fish, as with the perfect imita-
tion of a man with the rod in his hand he
described how he played with ito One saw
by the intense expression of his face that he
was living over the experience again in im-
agination; and, as he narrated it, he por-
trayed the whole scene before his audience.
As he moved from side to side, one could see
the fellows involuntarily move, too. They
would not lose sight of a gesture or an ex-
pression of his mobile countenance. Was it
any wonder that a man so in touch with
the things most dear to boys' hearts should,
on the following morning, hold them in the
hollow of his hand, as he preached to them
on the great theme of ' Overcoming ' ? He
baited their attention, drew them to him,
and, literally, fished for them as he had for
the tarpon, and caught them as he had
the fish, — always supremely and tirelessly a
* fisher of men.'

" One of the secrets of his power in preach-

I02 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

ing to boys and young men was that very
dramatic instinct which made him, all un-
consciously to himself, portray, by gesture
and expression as well as word, the thoughts
of his mind. Once in preaching of the two
men in the Bible, one of whom said • I go '
but went not, and the other of whom said
* I go not ' but went, he gave, as a picture of
the man who was quick and ready with his
words, the formal salutation. Putting his
heels together and straightening himself up,
he said in quick military fashion, as he saluted
with his hands to his forehead, * Aye, aye,
sir,' and then went on to describe the boy
always quick to assent but impotent to do.

" Maltbie Babcock used his singular gift
of word-painting and dramatic recital to reach
the naive mind of youth, who understand the
concrete but are often repelled by the ab-
i stract. Always assuming, or assuring them
of the sonship of his youthful hearers to the
Father, he never preached in theological or
doctrinal terms. His theme was life, and

Schools and Colleges 103

life controlled and guided by Jesus Christ as
the only life worth living. He made straight-
forward appeals to the hardihood and man-
hood of young men. He made them feel
the glory of strife and struggle, the impo-
tence and ugliness of sin, and the misery of
an invertebrate life and character. His was
the red-blooded, robust gospel, the over-
coming and conquering hfe. * It made brutes
men, and men divine.'

" Two weeks before sailing on his own
last voyage he preached in the school from
the text * There go the ships.' His words
bore largely upon three lines of thought —
the port, the cargo, and the pilot. Who
that heard him that night will ever forget
his description of each man standing at the
wheel of his life, of the different pilots of
ambition and lust, selfishness and dishonesty,
cowardice and hypocrisy, who came up to
ask for a turn at the wheel, and his earnest
appeal to those young lads, just starting out
upon the voyage of life, to let Jesus Christ,

I04 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

the true pilot, the only one who knows each
rock and reef and peril of the voyage, take
the wheel of their lives.

"He did not yield to the temptation to
preach only to the multitude, ignoring the
individual. He was as willing to take time
to listen, in private, to the recital of his
temptations by some weak, wayward boy, or
of his intellectual difficulties by some thought-
ful and sincere lad, as he was to walk the
streets of the great city with some despairing
man in the last throes of a struggle for self-
mastery, past midnight and on into the early
morning hours of dawning light and triumph.

" Great as was his power as a preacher,
greater was his influence as a friend in mould-
ing the lives and characters of the youths who
knew him, by reason of his own elevated and
consistent practice. His standards of con-
duct for himself were most rigorous, his
generosity and charity to others were well
nigh boundless. Not a few great preachers,
seen under the searchlight of daily inter-

Schools and Colleges 105

course, lessen or lose their influence because
of reservations and discrepancies between
dictum and deed. Not so with Maltbie
Babcock. While he won his young hearers
by his gifts and ideal personality, and held
them with his strong and direct preaching,
he fashioned and formed them through his
noble and flawless daily life."

" Keep but God's model safe —
New men will rise to take its mould."

This chapter would not be complete with-
out this contribution from Mr. Robert E.
Speer, who not only knew Dr. Babcock very
well, but is himself also one of the foremost
of successful workers among boys and young
men in schools and colleges.

" I think Dr. Babcock died on the thresh-
old of his work for young men, especially
for students. From his pastorate in Balti-
more, aside from his remarkable work in
Johns Hopkins University, he had gone out
a little to the colleges and universities ; but

io6 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

he was just coming into a larger activity in
this sphere from his pastorate in New York
when he passed on. And yet he had already
done a great deal. In half a dozen colleges
and schools he was known and loved, and
his visits were looked for with eager expec-
tation. In some of these, his first visits had
swept all barriers away, and given him a
place of fullest admiration and regard in the
hearts of the young men. In one, at least,
his unconventional, fresh style was a little
starthng, but on his second visit, he won his
way, and was voted by the graduating class
that year, either the most popular, or next
to the most popular preacher of the year.
But such words do not describe his place and
spirit. It was not popular that he sought to
be, but spiritually helpful and creative. And
young men felt this, and realized that they
were hearing a man who lived the high and
radiant life, and longed to win them to it.
The same qualities which gave him power
with other classes, gave him power with

Schools and Colleges 107

young men. The genial, leaping joy; the
hopeful, confident note of moral victory ; the
piquancy and intellectual zest of his way of
putting things ; the warmth and reality of
his own acquaintance with the Saviour ; the
nobihty and unflinching fidelity of his prin-
ciples and ideals; the ability to relate the
truth and power of the gospel to the com-
mon temptations and ordinary life of young
men — these were only a few of the charac-
teristics that made him simply fascinating to
many young men. He knew their hearts,
and he was bent upon winning them to the
pure and Christlike life. One of his ser-
mons which had a never failing charm for
young men was on * Overcoming.' This
message of positive strength and good cheer,
beyond all clouding, awoke in young men
and boys those ' intimations of immortality '
which it takes much sin to slay, and the
light came back upon the skies of life again.
And his own rich life assured young men
that the highest life is the widest and fullest.

io8 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

He could talk to them of any subject they
chose. He could tell them of music, of art,
of tarpon fishing, of poetry, of politics, and
most of all, and this was the subject he
chose, of Christ. Of course he had his own
church work to do, and he reached multi-
tudes of young men there ; but even larger
doors were opening before him among the
thousands of students of our land; and he
was but beginning a great work here, where
the field is whitest to the harvest, and the
grain to be gathered of value unsurpassed.
There is no other class which puts reality
to as severe a test. That he met their test-
ing, and commended himself to them as gold
was but one of the many evidences that,
with him, the Refiner's work was done, and
he could pass on."

VII
NEW YORK

Whose eye foresaw this way ?

Not mine.
Whose hand marked out this day ?

Not mine.

A clearer eye than mine,

'Twas Thine.
A wiser hand than mine,

'Twas Thine!

Then let my hand be still

In Thine,
And let me fnd my will

In Thine !

— M. D. B.

From a portrait taken November, 1899.

VII

NEW YORK

WHEN his call from the Brick
Church, New York, came, so
brought that even his own people
at Baltimore, at last, most reluctantly con-
fessed that the directing hand of Providence
was apparent in it, he sought the counsel of
several friends, and kept the matter open be-
fore God. The entire city of Baltimore was
stirred with a strong desire to retain him.
Committees from the faculty of the Johns
Hopkins University and from the students,
from the Ministers' Union and from many
churches, and from various boards in the city
waited on him, beseeching him to decline the
call. The prominent citizens of every pro-
fession, and of every creed, and almost every
race, strongly urged him to stay with them.
Ill

1 1 2 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

But when he became convinced that he was
being led, they finally yielded, virtually say-
ing, " The will of the Lord be done."

At the time that the committee of the
Brick Church prosecuted the call, and went
to Baltimore to meet Dr. Babcock and the
session of the Brown Memorial Church, and
pressed the claims of the great needs of New
York City, Dr. van Dyke accompanied
them. It was a memorable meeting. Dr.
van Dyke afterwards said, that while he
never had had any reason to doubt the love
of his people for him, he had never known
any minister loved as Dr. Babcock was
loved by that people. The session broke
down and sobbed. Dr. Babcock was com-
pletely melted. Dr. van Dyke was deeply
moved. The chairman of the committee of
the Brick Church said afterwards that he
would not wish to be present again at any
meeting so harrowing to one's feelings.

How can one describe that one year in
New York City ! It is a story that cannot

New York 113

be told. Crowds waited on his every public
utterance, eager, awakened and devout. Old
men and young, old women and young, and
children, who specially loved him, were
closely drawn to him, and held by him. The
children who always know, unerringly felt
that he was their friend and lover. He had
a sort of free-masonry with them that cap-
tured them and captivated them. A little
incident that came to the knowledge of the
family, after he had gone, particularly in-
terested and gratified them.

A little fellow living in that quarter of the
city, but not in that congregation came home
one day in a state of great enthusiasm and
excitement, and we will let him tell the story
in his own words. " Mother, I have had the
time of my Hfe ! O I have had a bully time !
I've been to a fire ! " " But, my son, I told
you that you must not go to a fire, without
some older person to go with you." " Well,
that's just what I did — I was standing on the
curb and watching a big fire engine go tear-

114 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

ing by, and wishing I could go too, when a
man stopped, and said to me, * Little man,
would you like to go to that fire ? ' and I said,
* You bet I would ! ' and he just took my
hand and said, * Come with me,' and while
we were going, he told me all about fire
engines, and some grand stories about fire-
men saving people's lives from burning build-
ings, and everything ! " " Well, my boy, who
was it ? " ♦* Why it was that minister at the
Brick Church." The story is cherished be-
cause it was very like him.

His personal appearance, as the great
preacher in the Brick Church must be con-
sidered as a part of his power. It was
masterful and most attractive. Few souls
were ever more perfectly embodied. Dr.
Ford of Sidon, Syria, who saw him only
one night, as the Auburn Seminary party
stopped there, en route for Beirut, wrote of
him as follows, " The Hfe and soul of the
party was Dr. Maltbie Babcock, of the Brick
Church, New York, successor to the Rev. Dr.

New York 1 1 5

van Dyke. He is a man of overflowing
spirits and fun ; tall, bright, sociable, un-
assuming, and consecrated. I can see why
he has justly conquered, so quickly, a high
place in the ranks of the distinguished
clergymen of the great metropolis." A
leading physician in Naples, called to see
him at the hotel, before he was taken to the
hospital, where he died from Mediterranean
fever, was profoundly impressed with his
physique. He referred again and again to
his magnificent physical frame, his muscular
power, and humorously said that he should
little relish having such a man attack him on
a dark night in the streets of Naples. With
this, one must have in mind his personality,
protean, and magnetic, giving him an influ-
ence that pervaded whatever place he en-
tered. His presence was felt all through the
house. It was hardly necessary to say " He
is here." I recall a description given by one
of his family, of an unexpected visit he
made at the old home in Syracuse. Having

1 1 6 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

to go to Rochester from Baltimore, to give
an address, he took an early train the next
morning, reaching Syracuse before six
o'clock. The dear old house stood " silent
and aware." No one had as yet risen.
There was not a nook nor corner of that
house with which he was not perfectly
familiar, and it was therefore easy for him
to make a noiseless entrance. He opened
the piano and began to play. Every one
up-stairs was awakened. There was no mis-
taking the touch, his music was a part of his
unique personality. In a few moments his
brothers and sisters were leaning over the
stair rail, crying, in joyful excitement —
" Maltbie ! It is Maltbie ! " It was this
strange, almost mysterious personality which
made it impossible to report him. No
verbatim speech ever quite conveyed what
he said, as he said it. As the scientific,
botanical analysis of a flower does not pre-
sent the flower itself, for the beauty and the
fragrance have escaped, the analysis being

New York 1 1 7

secured, at their expense ; so no report of
his address or sermon held that, which
was so much a part of what he said ;
his way of saying it. Dr. Purves said,
after his death — " Maltbie Babcock im-
pressed all who met him, or heard him, by
the vigorous outflow of hfe, which he com-
municated to friends and hearers. It seemed
to be the personality of the man which took
hold of them, and held them fast. His
mental acuteness made truth sparkle as he
uttered it. He analyzed it, illustrated it,
turned it over before you, that you might
see it at different angles. He often dazzled
by his brilliant suggestions ; yet his discourse
was not a mere display of truth. He was
always practical. He put his own spiritual
hfe into his teachings, that he might put the
latter into his hearers. He aimed to make
his people feel and then live the truth. His
was a life filled with spiritual reality, giving
itself, in word and act for and into the life of
others. Of course this was magnetic; and

1 1 8 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

in this age when practical religious vitality-
is both appreciated and needed, his influence
was expanding more and more." Can any
of those who heard him, forget his pulpit ap-
pearance ? The doctor's gown which he
wore, after he went to New York, was
peculiarly becoming to him, serving to set
off more distinctly his broad shoulders, and
the poise of his noble head ; tall, athletic,
sinewy, graceful in form and gesture, it was
a pleasure simply to look at him. His fine
face was the mirror of his soul, as he spoke.
Some public speakers might as well wear
veils or visors closed, so far as their faces
are to be considered as factors in conveying
impressions of what is said. Not a muscle
moves, except in the mechanical exercise of
speaking. There is not a flash of the eye,
not a flush on the cheek, not a turn or
quiver of the upper lip, one of the most
expressive features of the face, in moving
discourse. But when Maltbie Babcock was
in the pulpit, he turned a radiant face to-

New York 1 1 9

wards his waiting people. It was not dull
and passionless at first, waiting to warm and
glow as he moved on, under the spell of his
thought. Before he uttered a word, the ex-
pression of his face was sympathetic, antici-
pative and prophetic. He captured the
attention and warm sympathy of his hearers
at the outset. When he began to speak
his voice added to the charm. Professor
Fagnani said of his voice, " It was a great
gift, a wonderful organ, clarion-toned, and
thrilling Hke a trumpet call." No one who
ever heard it can forget it — vibrant, power-
ful, sympathetic, perfectly under his control,
and adapting itself to all his varied moods.
He selected his hymns with the greatest
care, making them the prelude to his theme.
This was a peculiar characteristic of his pred-
ecessor. And some of his people said on Dr.
Babcock's first Sunday at the Brick Church, " I
shall never be quite satisfied unless our new
pastor shows that fine cultured discrimina-
tion and worshipful feeling which were so

I20 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

apparent in Dr. van Dyke's selection of his
hymns." When that first service was over
they said, " I am content, it was perfect."
The selection from the Scripture was read
with singular clearness and reverence, with a
flood of light let in, now and then, on a
difficult passage, by his illuminating accent,
or emphasis. But it was his prayer before
the sermon which opened all the gates of
one's heart and brought one unresisting to
the very altar of God. Every Sunday it was
a new prayer. There were no worn ruts of
trite expressions. Each sentence was as
new and fresh as his own rich experience in
secret prayer, that morning, before the
service. Joy, thankfulness, reverence, con-
fession, and childlike confidence, implicit
faith, vehement holy desire, intense sym-
pathy with, and appreciation of the wants
of the congregation, and a quick and quick-
ening understanding of his office as an in-
tercessor, all had their place and expression
in that thrilling prayer. Had there been no

New York 121

sermon following it, one would have felt a
Divine blessing, and would have gone away
filled. It is a source of great regret, that
there was no one to take down a steno-
graphic report of his prayers and of his
sermons. For while nothing, in the way of
a report, however full, could convey what he
said, as the hearer saw him say it, yet as one
did not ordinarily see him, while he prayed,
a full report of the prayer might revive the
strange thrill of reverent feeling, provided
there was the same spiritual atmosphere
from the evident presence of the spirit of
God as when the prayer was offered. And
now that the notes of his sermons prove to
be indecipherable, the sense of loss grows
upon us. The few fragments preserved in
that precious book, " Thoughts for Every-
Day Living," prepared by Mrs. Babcock and
Miss Sanford, are so illuminating. Single
sentences and phrases bulk so large, they
send such flashes of light into the dark re-
cesses of things never told, that our hearts

122 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

ache for a volume of full reported sermons,
with all the lack they would inevitably have,
of the way he spoke them.

It was not surprising that his church, on
Fifth Avenue, was thronged. That was not
a strange thing for that church, at the morn-
ing service, under the inspiring ministry of
Dr. van Dyke, but the latter rarely preached
at the second service, towards the close of his
pastorate. But at Dr. Babcock's afternoon
service the church was as packed with eager,
devout hearers, as in the morning. It was
at an unpropitious hour, few people were in
the habit of going to any church at 4 o'clock
p. M. The tired faithful workers in the mis-
sions, those saints, ordinarily counted on to
break up the waste places of the second
service, were at that time at their mission
schools. He had settled, most satisfactorily,
that problem of the second service usually
so puzzling to the paster. The Rev. Dr.
Daniel H. Martin wrote for the Intellige^icer,
after Dr. Babcock's death a very able article,

New York 123

from which I quote, to give his impression
also of Dr. Babcock in the pulpit.

" What were the elements that entered
into the great popularity and success of this
young preacher ? He had a combination of
rare qualities not frequently given to any
one man ; well-born, athletic, a fine musi-
cian, a clever poet, the instincts of an artist,
a clear thinker, a powerful and persuasive
orator. Added to all this was a certain in-
definable personal magnetism, which gave
him power over the individual in conversa-
tion, or over an audience in preaching.
Men were charmed with him, women were
entranced with him, and children loved him.
He was a pure soul consecrated to Christ.
When he stood up to preach, all the quahties
that I have named did their part in sending
the truth home to those who listened. But
there was not the slightest trace of self-con-
sciousness in the preacher. You forgot the '
messenger, in the intense interest created by
the message. The preacher used no manu-

124 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

script, and gave you the impression of one
who was complete master of the situation.
The bigger the audience, the less tremour
and the more confidence there was in his
voice. His thoughts were not tethered to
notes of any sort, and what is the more re-
markable, there was no sophomoric declama-
tion about the sermon, as though it had been
memorized in the study. As you sat in the
pew you felt yourself listening to a man
whose soul was a reservoir of truth bursting
for outlet. His words came like a torrent,
with no thought concerning the polish or
finish of sentences, and yet, devoid of art,
they were in the highest sense artistic. Epi-
grams flashed and illumined whole para-
graphs ; single sentences made their dent
upon the memory ; you felt that the speaker
had been sitting at the feet of Truth, and
had absorbed and digested in his own ex-
perience, that which he was giving out for
our consideration. His attitude was ever
that of the soldier who had serious business

New York 125

on hand, even the King's, and it required
haste. There was blood-red earnestness
from the time the text was spoken to the
abrupt * Let us pray ' at the end. No won-
der God so wonderfully used and blessed
the efforts of such a man. He had gotten!
beyond the place where he was in bondage, ■
either to vanity, or ambition for the applause '
of men. Hence no fear of criticism, nor of ^
breaking over the bounds of conventionaHty
kept him from being his own sincere self,
and declaring the whole counsel of God.
The charm of his preaching is what Freder-
ick Robertson, whom he is said to have re-
sembled, would have called the ' reality of it.'
He laid hold of the intuitions of the soul and
spoke to their most earnest questionings.
Not only was his message fresh and up to
date, it was always Scriptural and spiritual.
He was essentially a man's preacher. Great I
multitudes of men were in attendance upon
his ministry every Sabbath. And he knew
what was in man, and believed that God had

126 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

put every man here for the purpose of
working out a plan of God, that every man
had within him the power of the endless life.
There was no wonder that great throngs
hung upon the words of this prophet of
God. They found their problems answered^
their thirst refreshed, and they left the pews
with the feeling that life was after all an
earnest and purposeful thing, and that they
were commissioned to build up the world,
by building up so much of it as lay within
the development of their own characters."

He aimed to bend everything to his
special enduement of power for his work as
a minister of the gospel. He never hesi-
tated a moment over questions of policy.
Like Paul he held tenaciously to the doc-
trine of Christian liberty. But he had more
delight in waiving his use of that liberty,
than in exercising it, if his use of it might in
any way interfere with his usefulness.
Knowing so well his native dramatic power,
and his great enjoyment of good comedy

New York 127

and tragedy, I asked him if he ever went to
the theatre. " Never." Bearing in mind his
dehght in the best music, and his famiHarity
with many scores of celebrated compositions
in opera, oratorio and orchestral music, I
said, " How about the opera ? Do you never
go ? " " Never." Any one, who knew him
well, would not have to ask why. I knew
that it was Paul's reason. But Mr. Trum-
bull, in the Sunday- School Times, after Dr.
Babcock left us, related two incidents which
explained and illustrated his reason, and
which I here quote. " When lunching one
day with some business men. Dr. Babcock
was offered a cigar, and a hope was ex-
pressed that he would join the others in a
social smoke. Instantly his face lighted up
with one of his winning smiles, and he said to
the speaker : * Thank you very much for your
kindness. But you know I have a profes-
sion that means more to me than anything
else in the world. I guard it very jealously.
I am liable to be called out at any time of

128 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

night or day, in the service of my profession,
and if I were called suddenly to the bedside
of some one who was dying, it wouldn't
seem just right, would it — if I had the odour
of tobacco in my clothes and on my breath.
So you will pardon me won't you, if I don't
join you in this.' "

At another time one of the wealthier
members of his congregation offered him
the use of his box at the opera, through the
season, and instantly this reply came : " I
can't thank you enough for the kindness
you are showing me. But you know how
a surgeon, in practicing his profession, is not
only obliged to keep his hands and linen
free from dirt, but he must keep himself
aseptically clean as well. Now, in my pro-
fession, I have to be even more careful than
a surgeon, and so I must be careful about
things that might do harm in even the most
indirect way. You will understand per-
fectly, I know, why I cannot accept the
great kindness you are offering me, though I

New York 129

do thank you for it from the bottom of my
heart."

Through all the hurry, pressure, claims
and calls to public work and pastoral care,
and he called on every member of that great
church in that year, he moved in an atmos-
phere of great peace of mind, getting evi-
dently nearer daily to the great source of Hfe
and power. One evening or late afternoon
in that last January of his earthly life, we
stood for quite a while on the corner of Fifth
Avenue and 37th Street, watching the whirl
of the great city's life. The Waldorf-
Astoria, lighted to its crown, glowed just be-
low us; across the corner was his church;
just back of us was his home, made most at-
tractive and beautiful by the combined ex-
quisite taste of both him and his wife. I
said to him, " Maltbie, are you at home here,
are you happy in your work ? " "I love
it," came the instant reply. It was then
that I had a memorable experience in the
manse, in this my last visit with them. His

130 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

invitation to be with them at that time, was
characteristic. A concert was to be given
in New York, which he knew I would
specially enjoy, and he wrote to me, then at
Scranton, Pa., ** Come down next week to
the concert. You put up with us, and we
will put up with you." While there and
resting in my room, he came in. I had just
been thinking with regret, of my inabihty to
be present at the Retreat held in the
November previous, by the New York
Presbytery, where he and Robert Speer took
a very prominent part among the speakers.
And I asked him, if, then and there, we
could not have a reminder of that time, so
blessed to those present — if we could not
have a little Retreat in that room, he giving
me the Hne of his thought on the former
occasion. He cordially consented, and in
about fifteen minutes returned and began, in
a quiet but very thrilling way, a mono-
logue on Habakkuk's prayer. While we
were moving out into the depths of

New York 131

his subject and his treatment of it,
the door opened and Mrs. Babcock en-
tered. They were so thoroughly one, that
it never for a moment seemed Hke an intru-.,
sion, to arrest the flow of thought and feel-|j
ing. On the contrary, it seemed to increase
it. She sat down on the arm of his chair,
and putting his arm around her, he went on
with the rich exposition of his theme, all of
us deeply moved by the intense spiritual
character of that service. The direction of
his thought, and the prayer he offered, were
certainly the result of Christ's being in him,
with great power.

Soon after that came the end, that voyage
to the Holy Land with the Auburn Seminary
party. Letters were received from Gibraltar
telling of the delightful voyage, with humor-
ous sketches of droll incidents. The full ac-
count of the trip is given most graphically in
his published letters to the Men's Society of
the Brick Church. One of his last letters
was written to me, from the camp near

132 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

Shechem, in the Lord's land. He referred
particularly to the death of our eldest son,
one of his most intimate friends; and the
last sentence which he ever wrote me, was
this : " I had such a happy dream of you
and Ed last night. What a good time we
shall have way ahead." Within a few short
weeks he had entered into that life. He was
" way ahead." That he should have been
taken is one of the mysteries hidden in God's
most holy will. But his life is full of most
animating lessons. It was like a benediction
to know him, to love him, and be loved by
him. There is a benediction in recalling,
even in this imperfect way, these remi-
niscences.

Lord, let me make this rule,
To think of life as school,

And try my best

To stand each test,

And do my work,

And nothing shirk.

Should some one else outshine
This dullard head of mine.

New York 133

Should I be sad ?
I will be glad.
To do my best
Is Thy behest.

If weary with my book
I cast a wistful look

Where posies grow,

0 let me know
That flowers within
Are best to win.

Dost take my book away
Anon to let me play,
And let me out
To run about?

1 grateful bless
Thee for recess.

Then recess past, alack
I turn me slowly back.
On my hard bench.
My hands to clench,
And set my heart
To learn my part.

These lessons Thou dost give
To teach me how to live,
To do, to bear,
To get and share.
To work and play,
And trust alway.

1 34 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

What though I may not ask
To choose my daily task ?

Thou hast decreed

To meet my need.

What pleases Thee,

That shall please me.

Some day the bell will sound,
Some day my heart will bound,

As with a shout

That school is out

And lessons done,

I homeward run.

— M. D, B.

VIII
IN MEMORIAM

This is the death of Deathy to breathe away a

breath
And know the ejid of strife, and taste the deathless

life.

And joy without a fear y and smile without a tear
And worky nor carey nor rest, and find the last the
best. — M. D. B.

VIII

IN MEMORIAM

I AM permitted to quote from the many-
tributes to Dr. Babcock, gathered in the
Brown Memorial Monthly of June, 1901.
The article written for the Evangelist hy the
late distinguished pastor of the Fifth Avenue
Presbyterian Church, New York, Dr. George
T. Purves, who so soon, in another mystery
of Providence, followed him, an article from
which I have already quoted, closes as fol-
lows : —

"In the personal relations of life he fasci-
nated the hearts of his friends. He had the
sprightHness of a boy with the maturity of a
man. He was full of humour and fond of
healthy play, yet retained the spiritual tem-
per of a servant of God. He had also an
artist's soul. Music was a passion with him ;
137

138 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

song and poetry a delight. He loved the
beautiful in nature. He had keen, quick in-
sight, and could put his vision of truth into
epigrammatic phrases that were as suggestive
as they were terse. His enthusiasm was
contagious ; his mind was ever active ; his
nervous energy was the symptom of the in-
tensity of his life. His genuineness of char-
acter, his sincerity and naturalness, made him
peculiarly lovable to those who knew him.

" And so we mourn with hosts of others,
the strange Providence which has taken from
the church this noble instrument of good.
To the sorrowing wife, in the distant land,
we offer our tender sympathy. We thank
God, however, that she was with him to the
end ; and we doubt not that others of that
party, who started joyfully on the long-
planned journey, were also there to aid and
comfort. We remember also that heaven is
as near to Italy as to America ; that the
Saviour, whom he loved and served, was as
close to him in Naples as He would have

In Memoriam 139

been in New York. We turn our thoughts
to the joy into which he has entered, to the
loftier song in which he has now joined ; to
the music of the harps of gold by the
crystal sea. He went to see the Holy Land ;
he has gone to the land of hohness itself.
He went to trace the footprints of the Lord
on earth ; he has gone to the real presence
of the Christ. He went to the Jerusalem
where Jesus was crucified ; he has gone to
the Heavenly Jerusalem where Jesus is
glorified. While friends and people mourn
his absence and his seemingly untimely end,
he has reached already his reward and has
won his crown. His life has not ended. It
is only the preparation for the life that has
been finished and has gone into larger
service in the world beyond the gates.
Noble fellow workman ; thou hast but gone
before the rest of us a little while."

The Presbyterian Journal had an excellent
editorial, from which I quote these words :

" A complete analysis of Dr. Babcock's

140 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

life and character would be difficult to give.
He was one of those few men whose worth
transcends estimate. Worth is often con-
spicuous by a single talent. Such was not
true of him. He was a man of many sides,
attractive in physique, pleasant in manner,
with a soul that reflected God.

<• Real worth is always a composite. It is
never a segment, but always the circle. Dr.
Babcock was a clear thinker, a fluent
speaker, and one who knew the proper
relations of things. And yet he was more
than all these. God shone through him.
Goodness, with him, was not a thing apart,
it was himself. His place many can take,
few can fill. Why God took him is the
most mysterious of all. All Providence
touches the infinite, and the wisdom of this
lies beyond rational conjecture. This world
needed him much, but the other needed him
more ; and here it becomes us to be silent.
His influence will pass into a thousand lives,
and only cease at the judgment. Im-

In Memoriam 141

mortality begins with life. Death intensifies,
but cannot destroy. Some day things will
be made plainer. Until then we must wait."

A copy of the minute adopted by the session of
the Brick Church, New York City, upon the death
of our pastor, the Reverend Maltbie Davenport
Babcock, D. D., who departed this life at Naples,
Italy, on the eighteenth day of May, igoi.

During a century and a third of our eccle-
siastical history, but thrice has the pastorate
been terminated by the death of the pastor
in office. The Reverend Doctors John
Rogers and Gardiner Spring had each more
than lived out the full tale of threescore
years and ten ; each had been for fifty years
the minister of this people, when God called
him away — full of years and honours, his
successful work well rounded out. But the
active pastorate of Dr. Babcock lasted but
little over a year. He came to us under cir-
cumstances strikingly indicative of the guid-
ance of the good hand of God. He was the

142 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

unanimous choice of officers and people —
there was no second choice — nor was there
an instant's hesitation as to his being the
man we needed. The Presbytery of New
York too was so convinced that Dr. Bab-
cock's great heart and devoted service were
needed in this city, that they adopted the
unusual course of appointing a committee to
urge upon him the acceptance of our call.
Even then his coming would have been well
nigh impossible, but for the influence of the
Divine spirit strengthening him to sever
heart-ties stronger than bands of steel ; con-
vincing him that sacred duty beckoned him
away from all the associations of an ideal
home, and devoted people, and a great work
well maintained, to come among strangers ;
to enter a harder field ; to assume heavier re-
sponsibilities. The same Divine influence
overruled the opposition of the church and
the City of Baltimore — indeed, moving the
people, who loved him, not to refuse consent
when his duty seemed clear to him that he

In Memoriam 143

should go. He came to us — a man !
< Great-heart ' in every sense ! Tall, strong,
full of life ; with an eloquence all his own ;
with that subtle influence we call ' personal
magnetism/ for want of a better name. He
came trusting us, and holding nothing of
himself in reserve — accepting us with all the
trust and simpHcity of a child. Although
he went in and out among us for the brief
space of a single year, he has left an indelible
mark upon the church, the Presbytery and
the Greater City. His arduous duties were
performed with supreme devotion, and,
withal, so systematized that it was well said
of him he would have been successful as the
head of the greatest business organization.
But it is not our crowded services nor the
magnificent success, with even greater audi-
ences, at the Ecumenical Conference, or
People's Institute, that most clearly marked
him as a man of God in the highest sense of
the term. These count for much, and many
have been the souls won for the Master

144 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

without more personal contact than the
Divine Influence emanating from his pulpit
presence ; but his greatest work has been
upon individual Hves, to whom he has minis-
tered in season and out of season, by day and
by night, imparting to the feeblest something
of his own vitality and faith, demonstrating,
by his very look, his love of God and assured
trust in Him, while winning and holding
both strong and weak by his tactful minis-
trations. How many have been led to the
Saviour by this personal influence, how many
have been steadied in their faith and drawn
back from the brink of temptation by his
hand, we may never know here. His soul,
too, was attuned to music, his life itself a
hymn of praise. From Dr. Babcock we
have gained a clearer vision of what must
have been the personal influence of the Man
Christ Jesus, when he walked the paths of
that Holy Land from which our pastor was
called to walk with Him the streets of the

In Memoriam 145

New Jerusalem and beside the still waters of
the River of God.

This is far from being a formal minute and
impossible to frame as a resolution. The
sense of our loss is too recent, the shock of
the blow too great for measured words. We
can only bow before the unsolvable mystery
of his death at forty-two, in the midst of so
great a work, and the greater need for such
a man as he. But we can at least turn away
in humility from a contemplation of the
Providence which has bereft us, and with
one accord unite in thanks to God that this
church was permitted to have such leader-
ship and we such a friendship through all
too short a year."

The Funeral Service at Brick Church

(Prepared by Dr. H. M. Simmons at the request of the
pastor of the Brown Memorial Church.)

Not in the experience of generations does

146 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

it fall to the lot of a loving people to pay-
tribute to the virtues of a departed servant
of God in such significant terms, as char-
acterized the two great gatherings in Balti-
more and New York commemorating the
life and death of our beloved brother and
former pastor. Who of all the Hving has
ever witnessed ceremonies so unique and yet
so befitting, as were observed by these two
great cities, widely distant, yet through this
common sorrow bound by the indissoluble
ties of human sympathy and affectionate
interest. Why these outpourings of rended
hearts from every quarter? Because the
ascended was more than the pastor of
Brown Memorial Church — more than the
minister of Brick Church. Endowed with a
multanimous nature and possessing rare
personal comeliness, he had won thousands
through his complex personality ; but the
secret of his magnetic power was embodied
in his fervid heart-love for humanity. The
Fatherhood of God, and the Brotherhood of

In Memoriam 147

Man was an ever regnant principle in his
every act and thought.

In this funeral service as in the memorial,
it was as though the absent one before his
departure had expressed a wish which had
been sacredly observed. Such was his
power over men while in the body, that
even in death no service was too sacred, no
act too trivial for those who would do
honour to the character of him who stamped
every opportunity, every obligation with the
seal of fidelity. And so with one mind, one
heart, the thread of one common purpose
running throughout, the arrangements for
the funeral obsequies had been perfected.
They bore the tender impress of woman's
hand, of that one, for whose bleeding heart
the prayers of the Christian world ascend —
the devoted wife. For the order of funeral
service was really the crystallization of Mrs.
Babcock's own suggestions, who of all others
knew best the innermost recesses of that
great heart which had throughout the years

148 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

beat in perfect unison with hers. As if to
harmonize with the ever-memorable Memo-
rial service in Baltimore, so were the funeral
arrangements in New York. Impressive
were they, yet happily free from those dark,
dismal funereal rites which tend only towards
depression. Instead, victory was the key-
note; triumphant strains were exultant
throughout. As an orderly plan in the ar-
rangements, fifteen hundred cards of admis-
sion had been issued to the Brick Church
congregation and painstaking provision
made for the Baltimore attendants. In this
connection it is worthy of note that the
most kindly and thoughtful consideration
was shown our people, by those in authority.
Both official and informal recognition of
this fact has been communicated to the
session of the Brick Church. Through the
courtesy of the Pennsylvania Railroad, a
special car was placed in service for the
Brown Memorial people. Before the hour
appointed the large edifice was entirely filled

In Memoriam 149

and many were gathered upon the streets
outside. The floral decorations were em-
blematically significant. The purple and
black were relieved by a profusion of green
and white flowers. The front of the gallery
was hung with wreaths of white roses ; the
rear of the platform was banked with palms,
and great banks of spiraea were heaped up at
either side of the reading desk. Nine larger
wreaths of rhododendrons were arranged
around the side galleries. A large wreath
of roses, violets and lilies of the valley was
the tribute of the ushers. The casket was
placed immediately in front of the pulpit, at
the head of the centre aisle. The space in
front of the platform, at either end, and be-
hind the casket, was so banked with syringse
blossoms that the effect was as if the casket
were resting in a garden of syringaes. The
floral pieces were placed at either end of the
casket. The floral decoration on the casket
was a wreath of laurel, placed there by mem-
bers of the family. The wreath was tied

150 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

with a large knot of purple ribbon, the ends
of which fell upon the black silk gown, which
the doctor wore in the pulpit of the Brick
Church and which, at Mrs. Babcock's sug-
gestion, was thrown over the casket as the
flag is thrown over the coffin of a soldier.
The seats on either side of the middle aisle
were reserved for the family, the honourary
pall-bearers, members of the New York
Presbytery, delegations of clergymen from
denominations other than Presbyterian, and
the members from Brown Memorial Church.
The funeral party entered in a column of
twos. At the head was the Rev. Dr. Henry
van Dyke of Princeton University, Dr. Bab-
cock's predecessor as pastor of the Brick
Church. With him walked the Rev. Dr.
Charles Cuthbert Hall, President of Union
Theological Seminary. Then came the Rev.
Dr. Wilton Merle Smith, pastor of the
Central Presbyterian Church ; and with him
our own pastor. After them came the Rev.
James N. Farr, formerly assistant pastor of

In Memoriam 151

the Brick Church and now pastor of Christ
Church, affihated with the Brick Church.
With him walked the Rev. George S. Web-
ster, pastor of the Church of the Covenant,
also affiliated. After the clergy came the
four honourary pall-bearers from Brown
Memorial Church, — John P. Ammidon,
James A. Gary, William A. Hanway, H.
M. Simmons, — followed by the honourary
pall-bearers from the Brick Church. Fol-
lowing these were the members of the
family. As the procession moved along the
aisle. Dr. van Dyke, who conducted the
services, recited appropriate passages of
Scripture, the organist playing an improvisa-
tion. As the participating clergymen took
their seats upon the platform one could not
but observe the unusual fact that all were
comparatively young men in the ministry —
classmate, companion in travel, affiliated
ministers, predecessor in the Brick Church
pulpit and successor in the Brown Memorial
pulpit. " Ten Thousand Times Ten Thou-

152 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

sand," one of Dr. Babcock's favourite
hymns, was sung by the congregation, the
choir leading. Dr. van Dyke then arose and
with evident emotion said :

" Let me tell you, as simply as possible,
the form of these services. Dr. Cuthbert
Hall will offer prayer. Dr. Wilton Smith,
who was with our brother on that journey
through the Holy Land, will read the Scrip-
tures and the Rev. Mr. Stone, pastor of Dr.
Babcock's old church in Baltimore, will pro-
nounce the benediction. There will be no
address, not because there is nothing to say,
but because of the wish of her whose wish
with us to-day is sacred. But what need of
an address ? One does not light a candle to
find a sunbeam. This is a family funeral.
We are all mourners here, because we loved
Maltbie Babcock. And then it was his wish
that there should be no address. Some two
years ago he and I were talking, and he
asked if there was anything peculiar in the
services of this church. I told him there

The Christ Church Memorial Buildings
334-344 West 30th St. bet. 8th and 9th Aves.

Christ Church is affiliated with the Brick Presbyterian
Church, New York City, and the fruit of one of its most
successful missions. These " Memorial Buildings '' com-
bine a church to " commemorate the loving and faithful
service of Henry Van Dyke, D. D., LL. D., Pastor of the
Brick Church 1883-1900, during whose ministry, and under
whose leadership, Christ Church was organized as an in-
dependent congregation, June, 1888.'' Also a Church
House with many rooms and appliances for Church work,
erected originally in memory of Randolpli M' Alpine 1870-
1893, and rebuilt and enlarged, in fulfilment of the pur-
pose, and in "grateful remembrance of the ministry of
Maltbie Davenport Babcock, D. D., Pastor of the Brick
Presbyterian Church 1 900-1 901."

The entrance to the Church House is at the right of the
Church- proper, it is in the style of the domestic gothic
of Oxford, and is really an L of the Church House which
is a five story building completely screened from the street
by the high ridge of the Church roof.

In Memoriam 153

was not, except that we omitted addresses at
funerals. And then he said : * I am glad of
that. I have never made a funeral address
and I don't want any made for me.' So
there will be no address."

The scriptural reading by Dr. Smith, and
the prayers by Dr. Hall and Dr. van Dyke
were full of pathos, and stirred the emotions
of every one present. One of the most
affecting features of the service was the ren-
dering as an anthem, those immortal lines
" Emancipation," penned by Dr. Babcock.
The music was composed for the occasion by
Mr. S. Archer Gibson, aforetime organist of
the First Presbyterian Church of Baltimore.
The solo part was effectively sustained by
Mr. M. R. Faville, formerly precentor of the
First Presbyterian Church of Cortland, N. Y.
After the singing of another of Dr. Bab-
cock's favourite selections, " For all thy
saints who from their labours rest," the
benediction was pronounced by Mr. Stone
and the funeral party retired from the

154 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

church to the music of an improvised reces-
sional.

Baltimore's Tribute

The field for fourteen years of Dr. Babcock* s
ministry.

** The memorial service held in Baltimore
on the afternoon of June 2d, was a rare
tribute to Dr. Maltbie Davenport Babcock
as a preacher and as a man. Jew and
Gentile, Catholic and Protestant, black and
white, gathered to do honour to the broad-
minded and great-hearted man whom they
loved as probably no other minister has
ever been loved in Baltimore. The largest
auditorium in the city, the Music Hall, was
thronged by an audience numbering about
4,000. Three college presidents and five
representative ministers of different com-
munions were the speakers. The testi-
monies referred to different phases of Dr.
Babcock 's many-sided character. Here are

In Memoriam 155

some significant sentences from the ad-
dresses :

" Rev. J. T. Stone, successor to Dr. Bab-
cock as pastor of Brown Memorial Church,
presiding, said : * His great power lay in his
Christlike thoughtfulness for others. Dr.
Babcock's life is fittingly symbolized by the
vine planted on our church wall years ago by
Dr. and Mrs. Babcock, and which has sent
out its tendrils, climbing higher and higher
year by year, until now it covers the whole
building. His life was an inspiration to all.
It was a broad life, ever ready to cover the
defects of others.' President D. C. Oilman,
of Johns Hopkins University, spoke espe-
cially of Dr. Babcock's influence on young
men. ' To many a young man within the
sound of my voice Dr. Babcock was like Hope-
ful in Pilgrim's Progress, releasing them from
doubt and despair with the key of promise.
Bright, playful, forceful in diction, his great-
est power was this — he knew how to reach
hearts.' Rev. Oliver Huckel, of the Asso-

156 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

ciate Congregational Church, spoke of Dr.
Babcock's unusual and varied gifts. * What
a many-sided man he was — musician, poet,
artist, athlete, preacher ! Every phase of his
versatile Hfe was radiant with his own inde-
finable, magnetic, buoyant and magnificent
personality. He was a living exponent of a
full-rounded Christianity.'

" President J. F. Goucher, of the Woman's
College, spoke of Dr. Babcock in his relation
to student life. * He was a man of clear vi-
sion. He saw much more than the average
man. He looked on men, not as lawyers,
physicians, mechanics merely, but he saw in
each one individual possibilities. He was a
specialist in applied Christianity — and here
was the secret of his power with students.
Wherever he went he inspired to the highest
effort.'

" Rev. A. C. Powell, rector of Grace Epis-
copal Church, spoke of Dr. Babcock as a
minister of the Gospel. * He had a subhme
love for God and a sublime love for man.

In Memoriam 157

Of all professional men the minister must
embody his own teaching in his own charac-
ter. In a marked degree did Dr. Babcock
attain and discharge an ideal ministry among
men.'

" President Patton, of Princeton, spoke of
Dr. Babcock as a preacher to college stu-
dents. * There are not many great preach-
ers, and there are fewer great college preach-
ers. Dr. Babcock was one of them. He was
a master of speech. He had a marvellous
synthesis of feeling and will, and an unusual
concentration of thought. The secret of his
power lay in his desire to make men better
and their lives brighter. Attractive physic-
ally, touching life at many points, knowing
young men, acquainted with their phraseol-
ogy, he was always sure of a sympathetic
response from a student audience.'

" The last speaker, Rabbi Guttmacher, of
the Madison Avenue Temple, closed the me-
morial service with a brief but remarkable ad-
dress. He said : ' This large assemblage,

158 Maltbie Davenport Babcock

representing our entire community, without
distinction of class or creed, is its own spokes-
man on this occasion. Baltimore is within
these walls. Here are gathered educators,
jurists, artists, merchants and artisans, and
yet our sentiment is one. We mourn the
loss of one who used his great powers of
heart and mind in the service of man. In
Lessing's great dramatic poem, " Nathan the
Wise," we find a conversation between a
Jew and a Christian, in which the latter'
praises the good and noble qualities of Nathan.
The Jew, in answer, says, " That which makes
Nathan in thine eyes a Christian makes him
in mine an IsraeHte." Blessed be God for
the life of such a man, for the fragrance of
his memory. In the words of the rabbis :
* May a memory of his righteousness be a
blessing forever and forever.' "

" Two of Dr. Babcock's hymns were sung
to his own music. A memorial church, to be
called by his name and costing ^50,000 is to
be erected immediately to perpetuate Dr.

In Memoriam 159

Babcock's inspiring influence in Balti-
more."— B. U. Congregationalist.

Babcock Memorial Church

Baltimore, Md.

We are sure no one has heard anything
but joyful willingness from our people at the
proposed change in the name of our church.
True we have all learned to love that name
" Park," because some very happy experi-
ences have been found in its walls. But we
love the new name far more, because we
shall be continually reminded of the un-
selfish hfe of a devoted Christian man. At
the meeting of the congregation on June 12,
called to legally accept our new name, Mr.
Scovel was asked to act as chairman, and
Mr. Warren Search as clerk. A unanimous
vote authorized our trustees to see that our
charter was amended so as to read the " Bab-
cock Memorial Presbyterian Church." Mr.
A. S. Niles offered his services to see that

i6o Maltbie Davenport Babcock

the change in the charter was correctly-
made. The congregation then adopted this
resolution which was presented by Mr.
Scovel.

Resolved that, — " In the change of the
name of our church from the ' Park Presby-
terian Church ' to the ' Babcock Memorial
Presbyterian Church/ we recognize the
peculiar appropriateness of this action.

♦' Dr. Maltbie D. Babcock was the divine
agent in founding and fostering this work
which has been so graciously guided and
prospered by the Master. None could have
been a more loyal friend and patron than he.
The present building was an answer to his
earnest appeal. The completed edifice, to
be erected in his honour, will be a testimonial
of many friends' gratitude for a life lived so
fully for them here, one which is being Hved
now even more abundantly in his home
above.

" The first name was his gift to us, because
of the great natural beauty of our neighbour-
ing park. The second name we believe to
be God's gift to us, because of the great
spiritual beauty of that noble soul, not long
since touching and lifting us, now forever
abiding in and inspiring us.

" Closely intertwined with his love and
effort for our church was an equal devotion

In Memoriam i6i

from his truly sympathetic life-comrade. To
her also we owe a debt of gratitude which
can only be acknowledged.

" Our message to her of our deepest sym-
pathy, our heart-thrilling pride in our new
name, and of new consecration to his and
our Master, passes beyond words, and shall
be interpreted by the Spirit of Peace who
leads through testing to triumph, through
Christ to Eternal Life."

on Theological Seminary-Speer Library

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