The crowning glory of the nineteenth century was in the achievements of its humanists and in the rise of a new order of reformation.

      The time was when power controlled politics, when rank could bribe scholarship, and when wealth monopolized genius. But the epoch of which I speak witnessed the rise of men who, with the highest interests of humanity in their hearts, were free to work out reforms which in earlier periods could have been reached only through a Gethsemane and a cross. And hence, along with those who have pleaded the cause of the poor, the orphaned and the enslaved; side by side with Victor Hugo and Dickens, with Kingsley and Shaftesbury, with Lowell and Whittier, and all the great humanists of the age, do we place those who stood for great religious reforms, and who pleaded for redemption from the tyranny of creeds and the bondage of sectarianism.

      Those who have carefully read the books and published lectures of Isaac Errett, who followed for years the course of his thought and feeling as expressed in his editorial utterances, or who passed under the full spell of his eloquent and luminous speech and have witnessed the far-reaching influence he exerted, will understand why his name is so prominent in our history and his memory so precious to all our people.

      The first period of our movement was a period of war. Most of the preachers were fighters. Their inspiring model and leader, Alexander Campbell, was himself a great debater. But, controversy is not conducive to great spirituality. The fierce contention of that day had its reflex influence upon many of the advocates of our movement. It seduced them into the occupancy of a position, and the manifestation of a spirit, unscriptural and sectarian. It drew their attention from the "essential [392] and vitalizing truths of Christianity, and fixed it upon its mere accidents." Later on, this spirit developed unholy strife within, and men fought as if they thought Christ had died to prevent the organization of missionary societies; that the cross was the only hope of the cause as against instrumental music; that the organ was the great beast of revelation that was certain to lead to awful apostasy; and in their effort to get away from Babylon they ran far beyond Jerusalem. The whistling soloist of a New York church, a few months ago, startled the religious world into nervous apprehension. But these heroic guardians of the purity of public worship and sanctity of the primitive order had precedence over the New York whistler by nearly half a century; for they, to avoid the use of the instrument, had permitted the whistling of tunes to guide the spiritual tones of devout worshipers in the sanctuary. Reference to this fact is made in a Standard editorial of Apr. 30, 1870.

      Matters of opinion and prejudice they made tests of fellowship, and felt called of God to detect unsoundness and to anathematize and expel all heretics.

      All this had a most blighting influence on our cause and tended to a narrowness, bigotry and selfishness that threatened with all the ills of sectarianism. But the mighty Errett, standing above the partisan plain, with the masterful genius of a great reformer, wrought transformation, guided the thoughts of his brethren to higher things, and rallied them to the standard that makes men forget their quarrels and think only of Him who died to save us all. One of his contemporaries, not long ago, said, "When I think of him in this holy work, I can but associate him with the great apostle to the Gentiles rescuing the cause of truth and of Christ from the ruinous influence of Judaizing teachers, and blind and bigoted legalizers."

      His relation to Alexander Campbell seems to me like that of Samuel to Moses. Campbell, like Moses, delivered men from a fearful bondage, from a tyranny that was blighting their souls and blasting every hope; but, like Moses, he could not prevent them after his death from relapsing into a condition of demoralization and distraction. (Our enemies prophesied that with the death of Campbell our movement would disappear.) And, as Samuel was needed to unite and restore the scattered and demoralized tribes of Israel, by a revival of their religious faith and the reawakening of their reverence for holy things, so Isaac Errett, the Samuel of our movement, finding the people divided among themselves, growing sectarian and harsh, by inspiring a new faith and a new hope, lifted their minds and hearts from that which was accidental and incidental to that which was vital and eternal. He shifted the emphasis from that which was legal to that which was spiritual, from the mere letter of the law to the living, loving Lord, and awakened a brotherhood to new life and power. He advocated going on to perfection.

      Alexander Campbell spent most of his time in his later years insisting upon

J. M. VAN HORN.

the "ancient order of things." It was in the very nature of things that it should be so. The church of Christ is the organization of the religion of Christ. Her ordinances are the administration of the gospel of Christ, and as churches were multiplying, organization and administration were pressing needs; and the question of the ancient order as to the officiary of the church, the place of the Lord's Supper, the design and memorial significance of baptism, and other questions of like character, occupied the attention of the ministry. But Isaac Errett, in the beginning of his leadership, went back to the "Declaration and Address" of 1809, and developed its fundamental idea--that of Christian unity on the apostolic basis of "one Lord, one faith and one baptism."

      With this plea for union there was no offer of compromise on anything to which the Lord has bound us. Well aware of the popular clamor for liberality and charity in order to union, he [393] said: "Be as liberal as you please with what is your own, but be careful how you attempt to give away what is not yours, but God's. There is nothing that is merely human which we ought not to surrender, if need be, for the sake of union, but we can not yield God's command, or the truth of the gospel, for these are divine." He pointed to failures, by such compromise, which have become historic, and insisted on the catholicity of every truth essential to unity. He appealed to his brethren to "declare the whole counsel of God," if they would be "free from the blood of all men," and to stand by every jot and tittle of the gospel "though the heavens fall."

      But with all this, the great plea, as he presented it, was so free from

T. A. ABBOTT.

sectarian bias and denominational prejudice, and was so imbued with the spirit of Christ and Christian brotherhood, that it won the hearts of all lovers of Christian union and went ringing round this world of ours until it has become almost universal. He felt, as we all feel, that the world can not be won for God until the work of Christian union is accomplished. And, inscribed upon his banner, unfurled in the great paper he founded and established, the Christian Standard, waving over every pulpit he occupied, and far-flung in every controversy of his day, were the words of his Master: "That they all may be one; as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us: that the world may believe that thou hast sent me" (John 17:21).

      He, more than any other man, was the champion of our missionary societies and educational enterprises. Though some effort had been made in this direction before his advent to power, still some strong opposition had been raised against the formation of societies and associations within the church from which the brotherhood has not even yet entirely recovered. Some one has said: "It was Isaac Errett, more than any other, who led us to break up our camp life and really occupy the land." He saw and pointed out that organized forces were necessary to permanency, solidity, unity and the conquest of the whole world. What other earthly interests are doing more to unify and solidify our movement than our missionary organizations, to which all other organized interests must be auxiliary? Besides, this was a revival of the spirit of 1809.

      The Restoration movement was born in a missionary environment. The first ministers were sent of God and went like the apostles to proclaim the gospel wherever they could get a hearing. Alexander Campbell said: "The church is, and of right ought to be, a great missionary society. Her parish is the whole earth, from sea to sea and from the river to the last domicile of man." And with the mantle of the immortal Campbell on his shoulders, Errett would have been untrue to his leadership if he had not led the way to organized effort for the spread of the gospel.

      He advocated the forward movement of the consecrated sisters who formed, in 1874, the Christian Woman's Board of Missions. But for his counsel and advocacy, it might have been delayed half a century. He, more than any other, led the following year to the organization of the Foreign Christian Missionary Society. He inspired the movements which to-day are the glory of our brotherhood.

      If, a million and a quarter strong, we were without colleges and missions among the benighted of the earth, our numbers would be our shame. These institutions are our pride and our glory. They were planted, however, not without prejudice on the part of those who sought to bind us by a narrow literalism. Errett advocated liberty under Christ. That wherever Christ has not bound us, we are free.

      Though a great preacher, it was as a writer that he exerted his widest influence in this direction, and the weekly periodical he gave us was the mightiest instrument of his power. Through his paper he reached so large a constituency that his lofty ideals of liberty [394] under Christ, that liberty that calls for the freedom of every righteous power, and his plea for co-operative effort, quickened into new life and activity tens of thousands, and the whole brotherhood now look with pride on our organized agencies for which he so nobly and self-sacrificingly contended.

      Finally, Isaac Errett was himself a great contribution to our movement. He was great in what he did, but greater still in what he was. He had an impressive and imposing physique, a massive and powerful frame. He literally wore it out in the service of our cause. He had a great mind, possessing the insight of genius, which Carlyle calls "co-operation with the real tendency of the world;" this he put under tribute to our movement.

      With the optimism of a great reformer, he had the ability to inspire others to believe in his cause, and in him as its noblest exponent. He laid this upon the altar of his church. Emerson has said, "A true soul will turn and draw to itself the best side of every other soul that will let itself be true." Errett's soul was true, and became a center around which revolved the very best of the thousands who knew him.

      A many-sided man, he touched life at every point. He had the insight of a seer, the heart of a philanthropist, the courage of a crusader, the constructive ability of a statesman, the enthusiasm of a reformer, the zeal of a missionary, the pen of a journalist, the tongue of an orator, the consecration of a martyr, and the integrity of a saint. And yet no power that was his, no endowment that he possessed, was withheld for himself. And as he put himself into all he did for the making of the movement whose institutions will outlive us all, the great forces of his being will continue to live and move until the last triumph of the truth has been won, and the last soul has been redeemed and begun to sing hallelujah to our God.

[CCR 392-395]