Y 1834 WALTER SCOTT had regained the cyclonic energy of the Mahoning evangelist. Surging up from the burning core of his purpose, rather than from any physical source, this energy licked up bodily weakness with hungry flame. To call men to Christ, in order to increase the church, purify the church, unite the church, and bring the kingdom was a flaming passion. To feed this passion every opportunity was seized, every device was utilized.

      Of Scott one does not ask in the next ten years, "Are you editor or author, teacher or educational theorist, evangelist or minister?" He was all these things, at the same time, and in equal degree. If we single out some phases of his work as evangelist and as editor in 1834 and 1835, it is not because he was idle in the Carthage church, or in training young ministers, or in nurturing his children, or in managing his printing office, or in writing a book.

      On March 9, 1835, Scott set out to spend six weeks in the bluegrass region of Kentucky, which he called the "Garden of the Republic." He was accompanied by twenty-four-year-old L. H. Jameson, a student of his. Their first stop was at Georgetown, where Barton W. Stone, in 1826, had launched his magazine, the Christian Messenger, and where for nearly twenty years he had served as minister to the church of his own creating. Stone had been living, since 1834, in Jacksonville, Illinois. The Georgetown church of [144] about 300 members was one of the richest fruits of the "Christian connection."

      On riding into this citadel of the Kentucky movement, Scott became aware again of the diverse origin of the Disciples. There were the independent "churches of God" or "churches of Christ" such as Forrester's, the "Christian churches" of Stone, and the "Restoration" of Campbell. These three movements of reform were like three ships:

      "The Christian," . . . as originally fitted out, had more sail than ballast. "The Church of God" had more ballast than sail, and so moved forward hardily till, meeting with "The Restoration, " she hoisted an additional sail, and now the three ships are all along to Jerusalem in a league of peace and amity.¹

      In company with John T. Johnson and B. F. Hall, Scott visited the flourishing Baptist institution, Georgetown College, which was busily turning out surveyors for the mobile American frontier.

      At Lexington, Scott relived memories with James Challen, who had moved there just the year before, and the two of them, together with Jameson and J. T. Johnson, visited Henry Clay and the celebrated soldier, Colonel Richard M. Johnson, brother of John T. Johnson.

      Describing an incident of the following morning Scott said:

      We all arose early in the morning to see the steam car as it passed along the Franklin and Lexington rail-road under the knoll on which brother [Darwin] Johnson's mansion stands. In due season it was seen in the distance approaching through a clump of trees that skirted [145] the road in that direction. it came furiously and looked as if a steam boat were trying it successfully on land. When it passed opposite to the company I was lost in supreme wonder at the sublimity of human invention and the genius of mankind.. . . We could see it for almost a mile from the eminence on which we were standing; but it puffed and panted, and rattled only for a few minutes until it buried itself deep in the neighboring wood through which the road wends in the direction of Frankfort, and we saw it no more.²

      These were incidentals of the Kentucky visit. The real business was evangelistic preaching. This began at the very beginning in Georgetown. Scott's fame had preceded him, and expectation was running high. In his first sermon he was little better than mediocre, but in the evening his hearers were transported. His sermon far surpassed all that his best friends had hoped. L. H. Jameson reported:

      His theme was the struggle of the Messiah against the reign of sin, and the glorious victory of the Son of God. The after-part of the discourse was a continued series of most eloquent passages. One passage is fresh in my memory still. He undertook to describe the casting out of the Prince of Darkness. Satan falling as lightning from heaven. Hurled from the battlements of light down to eternal darkness, and interminable woe, by the all-powerful hand of the Son of God. Then was heard the glorious song of redemption, through all the heavenly clime. Ten thousand times ten thousand, and thousands of thousands of angels, on harps of gold, responded to the glorious song, and filled the heaven and the heaven of heavens with such a strain of praise as never before had greeted the ears of the first-born sons of light. The appearance and manner of the speaker was fully up to his theme. He made us see and hear what he was describing.³ [146]

      How many hundreds of times such scenes were to be repeated in the next few years is now lost beyond record. Thrusts across the Ohio into Kentucky were frequent and powerful. Dashes to the Reserve, into Indiana and elsewhere, followed one another at a dizzy rate. His three thousand converts in three years on the Reserve became a pattern for the years. "As many as one hundred converts within a month was not unusual, and, on some occasions, nearly that number in a few days; and he often baptized the converts with his own hands." This kept up for over thirty years.⁴

      Because of his lyrical temperament, Scott's delivery in the pulpit was uneven. He was never a poor preacher, but sometimes he was mediocre. Nearly always he was superior and sometimes he was sublime. One who knew and heard them both compares Walter Scott and Alexander Campbell:

      Campbell never fell below the expectation of his hearers, Scott frequently did; but there were times when he rose to a height of eloquence which the former never equaled. If Campbell at times reminded his hearers of Paul on Mars Hill, commanding the attention of the assembled wisdom of Athens; Scott, in his happiest moments, seemed more like Peter on the memorable Pentecost, with the cloven tongue of flame on his head, and the inspiration of the Spirit of Truth in his heart.⁵

      At such times audiences gave themselves over, body and soul, to the power of his silver voice.

      So fixed and intense became the attention, that the entire audience would unconsciously sway to and fro, as waves at the will of the wind, with every gesture of the speaker; if he cast his eyes upward, his hearers seemed gazing up into heaven; now a glad smile would [147] light up every face, and anon every eye would be dim with tears; and, at the close of some marvel of description, a deep murmur or sigh might be heard.⁶

      The secret of this power defies analysis since it was itself the result of a creative synthesis of intensity, preparation, poetic language, lucid organization, descriptive power, flexible voice, and the intangibles of his own personality.

      "His voice was one of the richest I ever heard, suited to the expression of every emotion of the soul."⁷

      said William Baxter, "his language reminding me of the finest passages of Milton."⁸

      "Scott did not forget that the mind must be enlightened, and the judgment convinced, and few men were clearer or more convincing in their exhibitions of truth; but when that was accomplished he drove right at the heart."⁹

      Undoubtedly one of the secrets of his power lay in his vivid descriptions. Those who heard, saw his message. Once, when he had described a scene on the Highlands of Scotland, a member of the audience reported, "He made his hearers see it; for my own part, I distinctly heard the notes of that wild music, and clearly and distinctly saw the tartans stream as up the warriors pressed to meet their beloved chief."¹⁰

      Multitudes were awakened under his preaching. Bitter enemies became ardent advocates in an hour. The complexion of whole communities was changed in a week. As a speaker, Scott attained an eloquence and wielded a power which he could never recapture with the pen when he sat in sober moments at his desk. The tenuous, glowing quality of his speech could never be impaled on a stenographer's pencil or framed [148] in cold print. It was in itself a thing of the hour, but in its impressions and effects, a thing of a lifetime.

      His prayers also were works of creative art. A. S. Hayden, who often heard him, says of them: "His prayers in public, from a tender heart, melted all hearts around him."¹¹

      The cumulative effect of such preaching and praying in so many places over so many years was to create for Scott a veneration and tender esteem of the warmest sort."¹²

      During the fall of 1834 and most of 1835 the Carthage editor was drawn into a discussion of the slavery question with Nathaniel Field, an ardent abolitionist, of Jeffersonville, Indiana.

      William Lloyd Garrison, from his editorial chair in Boston, was whipping this issue into a fury. The very first number of his Liberator, on January 1, 1831, had proclaimed war to the death upon slavery. His ringing words had caught like a spreading prairie fire:

      I shall contend for the immediate enfranchisement of our slave population. On this subject I do not wish to think, or speak, or write with moderation. No! No! Tell a man whose house is on fire to give a moderate alarm.. . . Tell the mother to gradually extricate the babe from the fire into which it has fallen--but urge me not to use moderation in a cause like the present--I will be as harsh as truth and as uncompromising as justice--I am in earnest--I will not equivocate--I will not excuse--I will not retreat a single inch,--AND I WILL BE HEARD.¹³

      The slavery problem was, even at this early date, a red-hot question, and it was also much larger than the American scene. The English House of Commons had, [149] in fact, passed an act on August 28, 1833, abolishing slavery in the British Empire. Twenty million pounds sterling was voted to compensate the planters for their loss. A transitional apprenticeship of seven years was to prepare the slaves for their coming freedom.¹⁴

      Cincinnati was a focus of slavery agitation and the most important station on the underground railway. It was there that the stormy Beechers were living, and at this very time Harriet Beecher was making her observations from north of the Mason-Dixon line which were to result in her incendiary Uncle Tom's Cabin.

      The position of Walter Scott in this bitter contest was a moderate one, for he condoned neither slavery nor its violent abolition.

      In the summer of 1834, fervent Mr. Field wrote him a letter which he did not answer, and this slight provoked, September 20, 1834, the following detonation:¹⁵

      Brother Scott, Dear Sir:--I addressed you a letter sometime ago, requesting an expression of your views upon the subject of slavery as it is at this present time tolerated by some of the professed restorers of the Ancient Gospel. I must confess that I have fears that the leaders of the reformation are wanting in moral honesty as well as moral courage.. . . Of what avail will our reformation be if it is understood to sanction slavery? . . .

      The disciples in this part of the country are beginning to throw off their cowardice and their man-fearing spirit, and to speak out boldly upon this subject. Silver Creek has resolved to hold no correspondence with associations that sanction slavery. Our church at this place, of seventy members, has resolved not to break the loaf with slave-holders, or in any way to countenance them as Christians. . . .

      If you will not open your batteries upon this citadel of the devil, I have but one request to make of you, and [150] that is to publish this over my signature (for which I will pay the usual price) and erase my name from the list of your subscribers, and forward your account to this office for payment, as I can no longer conscientiously wish you God speed.

	Yours, in the hope,
NAT. FIELD.

      To this ultimatum, the editor of the Evangelist answered:¹⁶

      Beloved Brother: I have erased your name from the list of my subscribers. But that you may know that I am not enslaved to you, or the contents of your letter, . . . I have published it free of expense.

      Having done so, permit me to ask who authorized the Silver Creek Association to legislate on slavery?. . . Who ordered your church of 70 members at Jeffersonville to make laws for herself? . . .

      Asking that harsh epithets be avoided, and pointing out that abolitionism left unsettled the question of what to do with the emancipated Negro, Scott went on to observe:

      In the meantime know, beloved brother, that there are men holding slaves at this moment who are as kind masters and as good Christians as any man in the Silver Creek association, or in your Church of 70 members at Jeffersonville. Who then, I ask again, commanded you to separate yourselves from Church communion with those men, because they have had entailed on them an evil which they could not possibly anticipate and now cannot correct. As well sir, might the brethren of Ephesus have repudiated religious intercourse with the Church of Jerusalem, because she could not or did not, rid herself of circumcision and slavery to the Law of Moses. [151]

      The Manumission of our slave populations can be accomplished now only by a means which, heaven alone knows--I know it not.

      I am no friend to slavery, like you and the good men to whom I have alluded I deprecate its commencement, I deplore its continuance and tremble for its issue; but I am silent because I think to speak would be folly.. . .

	In Jesus Christ,
	Your Brother,
WALTER SCOTT.

      January, 1835, brought the following retort from Dr. Field:¹⁷

      Brother Scott: I perceive from your reply to my letter, in the October No. of the Evangelist--that you are the apologist for slavery, and are willing that it shall go hand-in-hand with the principles of the Ancient Gospel, and be interwoven with a church ostensibly primitive in its faith and practice.. . .

	Adieu brother Scott,
NAT. FIELD.

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      Walter Scott's reply was delayed until the February issue. At this time he took the position that, since all religious questions are dealt with by Scripture, and slavery was neither introduced nor abolished by Scripture, it is not a religious question; that Christians, being but a small part of the population, can free their slaves without solving the national problem; that the violence of abolitionism was both dangerous and unnecessary; and that this evil, being of political origin, could be removed only by constitutional political methods. At the conclusion of a long letter, he wrote:¹⁸ [152]

      Let us imitate Great Britain; let bills be preferred in the slave State Assemblies, and the citizens of these States go to the polls; and, in this as in every other political question, let the majority rule. The majority in the American commonwealth will rule; it ought to rule.

      The Lord bless you and direct you in all things.

	As ever, yours in Christ Jesus,
WALTER SCOTT.

      Nathaniel Field thought he had caught the Carthage editor in an anomaly: "The church need not be better than the political government." In Scott's letters he could see nothing but an evasion amounting to collusion with the supporters of slavery. So he wrote:¹⁹

      Brother Scott:--I have read your reply to my last letter, with mingled feelings of mortification and regret; I AM unable to decide whether it is a burlesque or an evasion. . . .

      Against the logical deduction of my most offensive position you have not protested--but you have evaded the question of slavery so far as the church is concerned and have shifted the whole sin upon the shoulders of the government. . . .

      When these positions are carried out it follows as a corollary that the church may participate in national crime, with impunity, provided she has had no agency in making the laws that originated it; and that the church need not be better than the political government.

      That you, Brother Scott, may yet feel that it is your duty to oppose this dark system of iniquity is my earnest and devout prayer.

	Your Bro. in Christ,
NAT. FIELD.

      Walter Scott, in his reply to this letter, reaffirmed his thesis: "I assert that the government and not the [153] church of Christ is to be blamed for slavery. She did not originate it. She did not propose it. She did not decree it. And she cannot annul it."²⁰

      Distinguishing between sin and evil, on the assumption that sin is a violation of the will of God revealed in Scripture, he continued:

      Sin and evil are not always convertible terms; for although all sin is evil, not all evil is sin.. . . In the natural world, disease and pain are evils but not sins, because they are not violations of law. In the political world sorrow of mind, degradation, and servitude are evils and not sins.. . . Slavery is radically a political, not a religious evil.²¹

      Scott showed further, by quoting the whole of Paul's Epistle to Philemon, that "Christians did hold slaves and were not reproved for it by the apostles and first teachers of Christianity." This, however, does not constitute a defense of slavery. "Slavery does not derive its authority from the Scriptures. It was in existence before the Scriptures were written and is to be referred to the state and not to the church for its authority."²² Field, in arguing that Scott's position was proslavery because it was not abolitionist, was as unjust as the opposite argument was fallacious, that is, that Scott was abolitionist because he was not for slavery. There were more than two positions to be reckoned with; antislavery and abolition were not identical, as Dr. Field thought.

      "You have so mistaken the state of the case or the question that you have dared me to a viva voca defense of slavery as practiced in the United States!" wrote Scott. "I will not defend slavery in any state, it is a political evil; and to defend it would be like [154] defending evil of any other kind at least." In the same letter, Scott states:

      The fact is, the government must be made to act in this affair if we would cure it; and all attempts to remove the disease by any other means, is so much time lost. These fretful and fitful societies which are got up by the enthusiasts of the free states are no way adequate to the greatness of the enterprise. They only provoke the slave holders by their impudence and their ignorance and so rivet the chains of the slave more perfectly upon him.. . . Let the governments of the free states, who desire the emancipation of the slaves, make appropriations of money equal to their immediate removal; let the U. S. Government make appropriations, and I am bold to say that their overtures will be listened to.²³

      In June, 1835, there was a final exchange between Dr. Field and the Carthage editor. Thus Field wrote:

      Every word and every sentence of your writings will be construed by the slave holder favorable to the system which pampers his pride and fills his coffers. Now you may believe it or not, but I firmly believe that you will be eulogized south of the river Ohio as the champion of slavery.²⁴

      In replying to Field, Scott said, among other things:

      I am sorry you do not discriminate more accurately between the maxims of mere morality and those of an enlightened and commendable expediency; the morality of an action is its lawfulness, which can easily be determined even by minds of the obtusest mould, nothing more being necessary than a Thus said the Lord.²⁵

      An anonymous, but far more circumspect, critic of Scott wrote, over the pen name of "Liberator," that the Federal government would not tackle this question [155] because it was overawed by the slave states; that the slave states would not tackle it because of vested interest; and that the free states could not legislate for others.

      Needless to say, Walter Scott's position did not prevail on a national scale, but beside that of Alexander Campbell, through the pages of the Millennial Harbinger, it did leaven the brotherhood of Disciples to such an extent that that body was not divided by the Civil War. And comparing Great Britain's legally voted, compensated liberation with America's violent emancipation, who will contend that the abolitionists were absolutely right and that the antislavery moderates of Scott's sort were hopelessly wrong?

      In the same year, Walter Scott joined with Alexander Campbell, Barton W. Stone, and J. T. Johnson to edit The Disciples' Hymn Book. Stone, who preferred the name "Christian" to "Disciple," was not consulted on the title of the book, and Thomas Carr, one of his advocates, wrote him from Liberty, Iowa, on July 21:

      What we object to is the title of the book. By this some think that A. Campbell wishes to affix the name Disciple to the great body of Christians in the West; and to be assisted by you. We believe here that the name Christian is the only appropriate name for the members of Christ's Church.²⁶

      Stone replied: "I am sorry the dear brethren among us seem to prefer the name Disciple and Reformer to the name Christian. I am confident it will do us injury. It keeps up a distinction which ought not to exist among us." Following this protest, the title was changed in all except a few advance copies."²⁷ [156]

      These mild differences were to blossom, five years later, into a fully flowered controversy on "the Name," with Alexander Campbell contending valiantly for "Disciple" as more proper and "distinctive," against his father, Stone, and Scott, who thought "Christian" more universal. Scott had earlier used the name "Disciple" himself, but he was soon won to Stone's side of the debate and contributed his own share to a verbal tug of war which ultimately enlisted hundreds, generated searing heat, and left the Reformation so hopelessly divided as to name that the confusion has carried across four generations.

      The three ships of the Reformation may have got together on the way to Jerusalem, but all was not to be peace and amity. Quarrels broke out among the officers over what the fleet should be called and over who should be admiral. When these men of effective speech hurled the fiery darts of their words upon one another there were severe wounds which did not quickly heal. [157]

[WSVGO 144-157]