Born: Virginia, 1808.Died: Charleston, Ill., 1888.
Born: Virginia, 1808.
Died: Charleston, Ill., 1888.
In early manhood he was a schoolmaster and a merchant, and accumulated some property. Meanwhile, he was preaching some, and the conviction grew in him that he ought to be wholly consecrated to the work of the Christian ministry; hence, to this work he gave his life and in it spent most of the means he had acquired.
He came to Illinois in the pioneer days. While yet a schoolteacher he would often ride horseback to his appointments, preach Saturday evening and twice on the Lord's Day, then ride most of the night to begin his school work Monday morning. Later his preaching-tours were so extended that two or three days' riding was required, and on these trips as often as necessary he swam his horse through swollen streams.
"Uncle Tom" Goodman was one of the most intense men. His was the material of which heroes and martyrs are made. He was never kept in his bed by sickness a whole day in his life until his last illness, that lasted only three days. He never voted, but when Mr. Lincoln was a candidate for the Presidency in 1860 the conscience of the preacher was sorely tried, such was his admiration for the great man. To have stipulated a term of ministerial service for a named amount of money would have been to Mr. Goodman well-nigh an act of sacrilege. It was said of him that if one would quote from memory or read a passage in the New Testament, he could at once name the chapter and verse. In his preaching he often became so impassioned with the love of the truth and his desire for the salvation of people that he dashed little flecks of foam from his mouth like a mighty warhorse in battle.
He conducted the funeral of Thomas Lincoln, the father of Abraham Lincoln, a few miles southeast of Mattoon, where the sacred dust of the paternal progenitor of the great Emancipator lies entombed. Thomas and Nancy Lincoln were members of the Christian Church.
Mr. Goodman, with patient and well-directed aim, humbled himself through his life; so God has highly exalted him.