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[Front Cover]
IN MEMORIAM – Samuel Joseph May
[Inside Cover]
IN MEMORIAM – Samuel Joseph May
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SAMUEL JOSEPH MAY
Born in
Died in
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“And
I heard a voice from Heaven, saying unto me, Write, Blessed are the dead which
die in the Lord from henceforth: yea saith the Spirit, that they may rest from
their labors; and their works do follow them.”
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Another
hand is beckoning us,
Another call is given,
And
glows once more with angel steps
The path which reaches Heaven.
* * * *
Sweet
promptings unto kindest deeds
Were in his very look;
We
read his face, as one who reads
A true and holy book;
The
Measure of a blessed hymn
To which our hearts could move;
The
breathing of an inward psalm,
A canticle of love.
* * * *
Fold
him, O Father, in Thine arms,
And let him henceforth be
A
messenger of love, between
Our human hearts and Thee.
Still
let his mild rebuking stand
Between us and the wrong,
And
his dear memory serve to make
Our faith in goodness strong.
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INTRODUCTORY
At a meeting of the members
of the Unitarian Congregational Society of Syracuse, held after morning service
in the Church of the Messiah, on Sunday, July 9th, 1871, a committee,
consisting of Rev. S. R. Calthrop, Mr. C. D. B. Mills, Mr. D. P. Phelps, Mr. H.
N. White, Mrs. Mary E. Bagg, and Mrs. Rebecca J. Burt, was appointed to prepare
and publish a memorial pamphlet embracing the funeral obsequies of the former
pastor of the Society, Rev. Samuel J. May.
In the performance of that
duty, the committee have not thought it advisable to use more of the very
abundant matter in their hands, than is included in the following pages. They
were inclined at first, to add some of the very many appreciative and glowing
tributes to Mr. May's life and character which his death spontaneously called
out, from both the religions and secular press.
The occasion seemed also to
invite a somewhat detailed account of his pastorate in
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with his people, if possible
stronger and more tender than before.
But upon reflection it was
felt, that a rounded Christian life like Mr. May's – so beautiful and complete
in all its full proportions, called at once for a faithful and loving
biographer, and that any attempt on the part of the committee to anticipate in
this memorial of his death and burial, any material part of that biographer's
proper work, would be inappropriate. By whomsoever the story of his life shall
be told, we may rest assured that his pastorate in Syracuse, and the noble work
which he here did for his parish, for the community about him, and for the
world at large, will receive the attention which it deserves.
And yet the committee have
deemed it very proper to go so far beyond the limitation thus marked out for
themselves, as to incorporate in this memorial, the very full obituary notice
of Mr. May which appeared in the Syracuse Daily Standard, on the Monday
morning after his death; a notice which for its brief comprehensiveness, its
thorough appreciation of the work he had done and of his exalted Christian
character, and for its loving tenderness of spirit and expression, seemed to
make it the fitting article for the place we give it.
The committee have also to
express their obligations to the several daily papers of the city, and to the Christian
Register of
The death of Mr. May was
quite sudden. Although he had been ill for several weeks, he felt much better
again,
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and spoke hopefully of
dismissing his nurse, and of visiting
His death occurred at so late
an hour on Saturday evening, that but few persons knew of it until announced,
as it was, in several of the churches after morning service next day.
These announcements were
generally accompanied by spontaneous, heartfelt tributes to his exalted
character and pure, noble life.
The whole community were
deeply impressed; and as soon as it became generally known, large numbers of
persons – people of all conditions in life – called at the house of his
son-in-law, Mr. Alfred Wilkinson, with whom he had lived, not only to express
their respect and sorrow, but that they might once more look upon that face,
which in death retained the same beautiful expression of love for all his kind,
which made it everywhere and always in life, a welcome presence, shedding
heavenly benedictions upon all around him. And so, to the day of his funeral,
friends from far and near, those who knew him well and those who
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only knew of him, came there,
impelled by a common sorrow, which had cast its dark shadow
only knew of him, came there,
impelled by a common sorrow, which had cast its dark shadow over all their
homes, and made deep wounds in all their hearts.
Gerrit Smith came from
Peterboro, notwithstanding his own illness, and also wrote: “Mr. May was the
most Christ-like man that I ever knew. He made Christ his pattern, and how
successfully, was proved by his never-failing gentleness, meekness and
sweetness. Heaven is more desirable to me now that my dear Mr. May is there.”
The city papers of Monday
morning, contained long and glowing tributes to his worth, one of which, from
the Daily Standard, we reproduce.
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SAMUEL JOSEPH MAY
Not in this community alone,
where the kindly face of our departed friend and teacher was so familiarly
known, and his reputation so tenderly cherished, but also in many different
sections of the land, where he had worked in holy enterprises, and attached to
himself zealous circles of friends, will the announcement of the death of
Samuel J. May be received with profoundest sorrow. In common with a host of
loving ones, impressed with the sublimity of the character we would depict, and
the worthlessness of words in its serene presence, we would offer our tribute
of respect to the memory of him who, through goodness, rose to greatness,
uniting the courage of a Knox and the ardor of a Howard with the dear
simplicity of the Vicar of Wakefield. The life we would sketch was unusually
prolonged and essentially earnest, crowed with activities and crowned with blessings;
and it is, therefore, difficult, in a limited space, to compass a comprehensive
survey of its usefulness, or even to detail many of the facts which gave it
significance; nor does this, indeed, seem necessary in a region which
sensitively vibrated to its touch, and is imbued with regard for its efficacy
and reverence for its spirit. We trust,
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however, that we may be
enabled, while outlining its course, to emphasize a portion of its virtues and
to extract there from something of the secret of its power.
Samuel Joseph May was born in
Joseph May, the father,
designed to study for the ministry, but was prevented from doing so by the
breaking out
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of the Revolutionary war. He
engaged in business pursuits, was Colonel of Militia in the famous “Boston
Cadets,” and Secretary, for forty years, of one of the earliest organized
Marine Insurance Companies in the country, and was highly esteemed for his
integrity, exactness and charitable energies. He lived until 1841, dying at the
age of eighty-one. As related to the religious bias and labors of his son, the
most interesting feature of his career was his connection, for nearly half a
century, with King’s Chapel, as one of its Wardens and most tenacious
supporters. King’s Chapel, left without a priest, by the flight of its tory
incumbent, invited the Rev. James Freeman to conduct, as a Reader, its
services. At the close of the Revolution, he was solicited to become its
Rector, but upon applying to the Bishop for ordination, was unable to subscribe
to the Thirty-Nine articles, as well as to certain observances of the Episcopal
establishment, and being tinctured with the reputed heresies of Priestley, was
denied the sacred rite. His congregation, nevertheless, endorsed his views, and
themselves installed him. Thus was instituted the first Unitarian Church in
America, to which Dr. Freeman ministered until his death in 1835, and Col. May
gave his consistent aid, and from which Samuel J. received inspiration and
instruction of the value of his early religious education Mr. May had the
liveliest appreciation. He held it as one of the chief blessings of his life
that he was not devoted to the tenets of a stern creed and the terrible
imaginings it imposes. He was a Liberal Christian, almost by intuition; and
hence experienced none of the pangs with which the conflict between the dogma
of vengeance and the gospel of love tortures so many souls.
Mr. May received his
education, preliminary to entering college, at the
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years in
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ical and devotional course of
reading; but they peremptorily dictated
nothing except personal purity and righteousness, the diligent improvement of
our advantages, and fidelity to our highest sense of the true and the right.
They enjoined it upon us to examine every subject brought to our consideration
thoroughly, and as impartially as we were able in the various lights thrown
upon it by the religious and theological writers of opposite sects, and to
accept such conclusions as should, after such an examination, seem to our minds
correct–remembering our responsibility to God alone, for the use we made of our
opportunities to learn, and of the powers He had given us to judge of the true
and the right.”
As indicative of the effect
of such counsels upon himself we continue our quotation from the discourse
delivered in the Church of the Messiah, in 1867, upon the occasion of his
reaching his seventieth birthday: “Thus encouraged I entered upon the inquiry
after true religion, fully persuaded
that it was the ‘one thing needful’ for all men; and longing to be a minister
of it to my fellow beings, so many of whom seemed to me to be ‘living without
God in the world.’ I was soon more than
ever convinced that Christianity was the true religion; but that a strange
theology had been foisted into its place in Christendom; substituted for it in
most churches. It seemed to me self-evident, that Christianity was to be learnt
from Jesus Christ: that he must be the best teacher of his own religion; that,
if he be, as most Christians profess to regard him, ‘the author and finisher of our faith,’ nothing should
be appended to the Gospel as he left
it; not even on the authority of Paul, Appollos, or Cephas; certainly not on
the authority of St. Augustine, John Calvin, or the Pope, should anything be
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prescribed as essential,
which is not perfectly consistent with the teaching of the Master. It seemed to
me then, as it seems to me now, the highest impertinence, and most egregious
presumption, in any Doctor of Divinity, Assembly of Divines (especially those
who believe that Jesus was a superhuman being, aye, the very God), to prescribe
a Creed, as comprising the essential faith, which is nowhere to be found in the
words of the Master.”
Thus holding to personal
purity of life, and placing himself in the attitude of a seeker after truth,
under the All-Father, he commenced the work of the ministry, serving as supply
at
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seemed to have many encouraging
prospects; but receiving a simultaneous call to
He lived in Brooklyn fourteen
years, bringing a feeble church into a state of efficiency, impressing his
personality upon his neighbors, and being prominently identified with every
good work to which he could put his hand. Besides fulfilling the ordinary
duties of his parish, he edited a paper called The Liberal Christian, was a member of the School Committee of the
town, and did much to raise the standard of education in the state, giving
lectures on the subject, and calling the first convention ever held to consider
the question of popular education. He early took ground in favor of a less
austere and more rational use of Sunday, against exclusiveness in the
administration of the Lord’s Supper, and against ritualistic methods in the
church, discarding in a short time after his ordination the gown and bands then
universally worn; but an aged man having scruples about baptism, and believing
on Scripture grounds that immersion was necessary to the validity of the rite,
he consented to gratify his desire by entering a river with him,
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but addressed the meeting on
coming out to the effect that a drop of water was sufficient to baptize a man
whose heart was really consecrated, an ocean otherwise having no potency. At
this time as always, his characteristic doctrine was that no form, or service,
or profession, makes a man acceptable to God, but only the denying of all
ungodliness and living soberly, righteously and piously in all the relations of
life–in an adherence, so far as possible, to the precept of the Golden Rule.
At Brooklyn Mr. May became
actively interested also in the various reforms to which he afterwards gave so
much of his thought and strength, and to which we shall hereafter allude, as a
biography of him without including something of them would be singularly
incomplete. On the first of June, 1825, he married Lucretia Flagge Coffin,
daughter of Peter Coffin, a merchant of Boston; Charlotte Coffin and had issue
by her as follows;–Joseph, died in infancy; John Edward, now in business in
Boston; Charlotte Coffin, wife of Alfred Wilkinson, of this city; Joseph,
minister of the Unitarian Church in Newburyport, Mass.; and George Emerson,
engaged in mercantile pursuits. The wedded life of Mr. May, was, we need not
say, beautiful in the blended being of kindred souls–redolent with the perfume
of affection, and blossoming in the sweetest charities. Mrs. May, known,
honored, and loved in this community, has but recently passed away. Gentle in
disposition, retiring in manners, yet highly cultured, firm in purpose, and
thoroughly sympathizing with the aims of her husband, her kindly influence was
felt in every circle in which she moved, and her supreme confidence in the
righteousness of his labors sensibly nerved him to persevere in their behalf.
He resigned from
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of general agent of the
Massachusetts Anti Slavery Society, in which he continued eighteen months,
lecturing, writing and arranging conventions. Late in 1836, he was installed
over the church at
In 1842, the position of principal
of the Normal School for female teachers at Lexington having became vacant
through the illness of the incumbent, Hon. Horace Mann, then Secretary of the
State Board of Education, urged the place upon Mr. May, and he accepted it,
removing immediately to Lexington and assuming control of the school; but,
within two years, the former principal recovering his health, Mr. May, though
honored and useful in, and attached to the position, resigned in his favor,
feeling it to be the right
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of his predecessor to be
reinstated. He was then invited to the charge of the
While Mr. May lived in
Lexington there arose, in Boston, the famous Theodore Parker, then the leading
thinker of the now so called Radical theologians. Parker was, as is well known,
though the minister of a Unitarian parish, completely ostracized by the clergy
of
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lief that every man must be
fully persuaded in his own mind and had a right to speak his thought. He wrote
to Mr. Parker, expressing his sympathy with him and proposing an exchange of
pulpits. Herein the broadness of that charity, which was the crowning grace of
our friend’s character, thus early declared itself. Only two other Unitarian
clergymen were as true to the principle of free thought as this. The result of
Mr. May’s proffer was a friendship close, affectionate and firm, which endured
so long as Mr. Parker lived.
At the conclusion of his
temporary engagement with the
In 1843, Mr. May made a
journey to
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candidate and then to become
its pastor–with what unanimity the following letter attests:–
Dear Sir:–The meeting, of
which we advised you, was held today, and, on the other side, is a copy of a
resolution which was unanimously adopted. In our society there is no diversity
of opinion in respect to yourself, and we hope that you may not see cause to
regret your coming among us. Will you be so kind as to advise us when we may
expect to see you here?
John
Wilkinson,
Hiram
Putnam,
Charles
F. Williston,
To Rev, Samuel J. May Trustees.
This call Mr. May accepted
and preached for the first time as pastor of the church sometime in the April
succeeding. The church, to which he was thus called, was as yet in its infancy,
although its membership embraced some of the strongest men of the village. It
was organized in 1837, embracing among its founders such names as E.F. Wallace,
John Wilkinson, Hiram Putnam, John Newell, Parley Bassett, Aaron Burt, Joseph
Savage, J.L. Bagg, D.P. Phelps, D.J. Morris, B.F. Colvin, C.F. Williston, James
G, Tracy, M.M. White, E.J. Foster, Coddington B, Williams, Stephen Smith, Jared
H. Parker and H. N. White. The Rev. J.P.B. Storer, a highly intellectual and
much loved clergyman, had been its pastor from 1839 until his death, of heart
disease, in the summer of 1844. Originally worshipping in a little wooden
chapel on East Genesee street, on or near the site of the present Seymour
Block, it had, in 1843, removed to a new and pleasant edifice on its present
lot which, with additions and enlargements, lasted until it was destroyed by
the falling of the spire in 1852, the present church being completed in 1853.
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It was not to be expected
that a new-coming Unitarian minister would receive a cordial welcome from the
clergymen whose opposition had much tried the less resolute heart of his
predecessor. Nor did he; but to such opposition he was already accustomed, and
for it was fully prepared. He took up his ministerial work with good heart, and
met the sermons occasionally preached in denunciation of his theological
position with pretty constant expositions of what he found objectionable and
abhorrent in the popular creeds; and it was not long before his utter geniality
conquered the hearts, if it did not change the convictions, of his Orthodox
brethren. With the late Dr. Adams, who had strongly denounced him, he, at last,
contracted a friendship, sincere if not very demonstrative, and the good
Doctor, upon his death-bed, sent for him and they had a long conference, a fact
to which Mr. May was accustomed to refer with truly Christian pride.
Of his pastoral labors we
need not speak at length. In the hearts of his hearers they are forever
enshrined. Under his watchful care, the church has steadily and gradually grown
into a power in our midst. He has gone out and in among its members for
twenty-six years, blessing their children, marrying their young men and
maidens, committing their dust to solemn sepulture–by all of them respected,
loved, venerated as it has been the fortune of few pastors, in this age of the
decadence of respect for the ministerial office, to be honored. Not a great
pulpit orator, he was yet a singularly clear writer, with terse and vigorous
sentences often infused into the plainness of a narrative style. He rose ever
to the eloquence of earnestness, and none might doubt the sincerity of the
thought which guided his pen. In every house of his parish he was a welcome
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guest; received rather with
the warmth of regard which marks the affinity of blood. Thus strong in the
pulpit and loved on the hearth stone, he filled the years of his usefulness in
the ministry until the lengthening shadows of his life compelled him to decline
its further responsibilities. On the 15th of September, 1867, he
tendered to the church his resignation, –which was accepted on the 7th
of October, with resolutions of the deepest respect and affection, a liberal
annuity being voted him to take effect when his successor should be installed.
This was accomplished on
“Thus it was, dear friends,
that an acquaintance commenced twenty-four years ago last month, which led to
my settlement with you in April, 1845, as your minister. What sort of minister
I should probably be, you were fairly warned, for during my visits, in 1843,
and again during the four weeks that I preached to you as a candidate, in
November and December, 1844, I lectured in the city twice on the immediate
abolition of slavery; once, on the paramount importance of an improved system
of popular education; and once, if I remember correctly, on the great
expediency, if not duty, of total abstinence from the use of any intoxicating
drinks. Therefore, if you have been much disappointed in the character of my
ministry here, you must blame your own want of discernment and not any
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concealment on my part.” It
may well be added that while it was a bold undertaking for a minister in this
State, a quarter of a century ago, thus unreservedly to identify himself with
these obnoxious reforms, in this church no root of bitterness was planted by
the efforts of its pastor; on the contrary he nurtured and tended the seed of
his own sowing within it, and from a fruitful soil it sprang up and bore
abundant fruit. No church can claim greater credit for efficient humanitarian
labors than the Unitarian Society of Syracuse. He educated it up to his own
standards.
We have said that any sketch
of Mr. May’s life would be singularly incomplete without an allusion to his
connection with the great reforms of the day. Herein he was a pioneer and
acquired a national reputation; his philanthropy was of the purest and most
enlarged type; but we may do little more than allude to it; for, even if our
space did not forbid a larger reference, we know that there are many intimately
associated with him in various progressive movements who will do him fuller
justice than we may hope to do, and who will be swift to bear their testimony
to the worth of his counsels and the completeness of his consecration. He was
among the apostles of the gospel of anti-slavery. His disgust at the abuses of
slavery, incited by personal observation of its enormities, developed, under
the inspiration of William Lloyd Garrison, into an undying hostility towards
the institution of barbarism. So early as 1830 he preached anti-slavery
sermons, to the annoyance of his good friends, Dr. Channing and the Rev. Henry
Ware, Jr., and to the alarm of his father. He defended Prudence Crandall
against an indictment, under a modern
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nearly two years of the
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men to whom, under God, the
nation is indebted for its deliverance from the burden of its sin.
Mr. May had become interested
in the question of peace while at College, by listening to addresses from Dr.
Noah Worcester, and steadily bore his testimony against the necessity of war according to the convictions he then
acquired. In 1826 he formed an Auxiliary Peace Society in Brooklyn, to
co-operate with that of Dr. Worcester; and being elected chaplain of a
Connecticut regiment, he declined the honor, telling the Colonel “he could not
pray that they might do the very thing they would be mustered to do–but only
that they might beat their swords into plow-shares and learn war no more.” The
first pamphlet he ever published was an “Exposition of the Sentiments and
Purposes of the Windham County Peace Society,” in 1826. It is believed,
however, that his sentiments upon this subject became somewhat modified when
secession culminated in treason and the nation rose to its feet to confront the
foe in its own household.
At an early day, also, he
became opposed to capital punishment. Being waited on by a sheriff to be
present at the execution of an atrocious murderer, he enquired if the condemned
desired him to attend, and upon being told that he was invited on behalf of the
State, he answered that he would not attend; he would go if the criminal
requested it, as the sympathizing friend of a very wicked brother, but would in
no way seem to countenance the State in doing what he thought the State had no
right to do. The conversation which followed so impressed the Sheriff that he
declined to act as the executioner. Against judicial murder Mr. May remained
constantly opposed during the rest of his life, preaching and writing against
its enormity.
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In May, 1826, he attended the
Boston Anniversaries and was present at a meeting of the Massachusetts
Temperance Society, as also at a meeting of Unitarian ministers called to
consider the subject of temperance. He had not previously regarded it as wrong
to drink wine in moderation, but was so
much influenced by these discussions that he determined to discountenance the
use of all intoxicants,–“lest he should cause his brother to offend.” Returning
home he received the hearty sympathy of his wife, and soon called public
attention to the subject. He personally visited every retailer of liquors in
the town, to ascertain the amounts of liquor sold, and from the overseers of
the poor, physicians and others, learned something of the disastrous effects of
the traffic. The result was the adoption, under his leadership, by many
individuals, of the rule of Total Abstinence and the formation of a society
having its principles in view of his labors in this city in this direction we
all know personally. He was one of the staunchest friends of this reform,
joining a number of organizations pledged to its support, and one of his last
public addresses was in its advocacy, before the Syracuse Christian Union, the
address being published by its request in this journal.
Latterly he had become much
interested in the demand of Woman for Suffrage and interested himself in its
enforcement with all the fire of his youth of the immense labor all these
reforms necessitated, of the travels, the correspondence, both foreign and
domestic, of the numbers of speeches delivered, we have no reliable data. We
know, however, that his activities were severely taxed to the very end, and
that he had laid out an amount of work, literary and otherwise, which would
have appalled an ordinary man of half his years. It is certainly to be
regretted that an autobiography, which he had in contemplation, remains in an
unfinished state. Mr. May had published much of a secu-
[Page 29]
lar and religious cast; but
little of it, however, in permanent form. His last publication was a pamphlet
entitled “A Complaint against the Presbyterians and their Confession of Faith,”
which is very perspicuously written and is valuable as giving evidence of the
maintenance of his life-long views of the goodness of God.
To write of Mr. May as a
citizen is a grateful task. He was a minister who came out of his pulpit to
mingle with his fellow men, bringing the meditations of the closet and the soul
of good-will to bear upon the social problems which beset us all. He came to us
when we were a village; he lived among us to see our population quintupled–a
fair and prosperous city. He was as public spirited as philanthropic. No improvement
but had his sanction, no charity but had his encouragement. The Franklin
Institute, the Historical Association, the Orphan Asylum, the Home, the
Hospital, all called him their friend. No differing creed could deter him from
giving his aid to a noble enterprise. At our public meetings he was often
present, whatever their object–provided only it was commendable. His charities
flowed in all directions–towards the Indians of our Reservation, the homeless
boys who wander along our great artery of inland navigation, the victims of
self-imposed or heaven-sent wretchedness at our doors.
We have spoken of Mr. May’s
interest in the cause of popular education, elsewhere; it was here signally
exhibited and, we believe, fully appreciated. Those of us, who were at school
twenty years ago, remember how often his genial face beamed in upon our
studies, and his words of advice encouraged us in our pursuits. Many of us then
learned to love him–a love which has not been diminished by constant acts of
kindness and of countenance since received. In 1864 he was elected, from the
fourth ward, member of
[Page 30]
the Board of Education and by
successive and unanimous re-elections continued therein for the ensuing six
years. During the last five years of his service he was President of the Board.
He was faithful in attendance at its meetings and judicious in his selection of
its committees. He was thoroughly acquainted with the discipline and the
studies of the schools, and with the character and qualifications of their teachers.
He gave much of his time to a personal inspection of the schools, not only of
his own ward, but also of the whole city, and his was ever a welcome presence
in the school room. He was greatly interested in the High School, and to him is
largely due the erection of its present magnificent building, and the
comprehensive range of studies there pursued. He strenuously opposed corporal
punishment, here as everywhere, and to no man in the country may greater credit
be awarded for the gentler modes of correction which have nearly banished the
fools cap and the birch from systems of education. As a memorial of his labors
the “May School” was named in his honor by his associates–and, we believe, he
would ask for no more suitable monument. Nor should we forget the interest he
manifested in the education of the very little ones, the “Kindergarten” system
particularly commending itself to his judgment, as a promising advance upon the
arbitrary methods yet in vogue.
And now, as we write our last
words, we would if possible have our pen touched, as by an angel, to fitly note
the gracious character itself of which the record we have sketched is but the
outward expression; but words are cold and speech is lifeless here. There was
no man of truer convictions, of more generous impulses, of a nobler
self-abandonment than he. His charities were as countless as the
[Page 31]
dewdrops glistening on the
meadows of morning; his sympathies as pervasive as the objects as the objects
towards which they could be directed. A zealot’s bitterness; a reformer, he had
not the reformer’s caustic tongue; a theologian of pronounced views, he had
none of the theologian’s regard for sect. True to his own flesh and blood, he
was yet everybody’s friend. Simple in his habits, confiding in his nature,
sometimes imposed upon through the very excess of his philanthropy, no man but
respected him for the possession of the most sterling qualities of head as well
as of heart. Now that the asperities of the conflicts in which he was engaged are
hushed in the triumph of nearly all the principles for which he contended, we
believe there is no man living who will cherish an envious or a hostile feeling
over this new-made grave. Utterly free from envy himself, he paid most generous
tribute to the talents and the good works of his fellows. In the fullness of
years, with intellect unimpaired, with affections undiminished, with a record
lustrous for its accomplishment and beautiful in its spirit, with the regard of
all who had heard of him, and the veneration of all who knew him, he has been
gathered to the fathers, and taken his place among that goodly company who “by
pureness, by knowledge, by long suffering, by kindness, by the Holy Ghost, by
love unfeigned, by the word of truth, by the power of God, by the armor of
righteousness on the right hand and on the left, by honor and dishonor, by evil
report and good report,” have entered into the rest of the faithful to use his
own words, he had learned life’s lesson, and had gladly turned the page to see
what there is on the other side. Upon us his life falls like a benediction,
gracious and gentle, from the hands of the Father Supreme. May it be given us
to live as in its presence, and to assimilate in our characters something of
its essence!
[Page 32]
SOCIETY TESTIMONIALS
MEETING of THE MEMBERS of THE CHURCH of THE MESSIAH
A very largely
attended meeting of the members of the Church of the Messiah and of that
Society, was held Monday evening July 3d, to take action in regard to the death
of the late Rev. Samuel J. May.
Dr. Lyman Clary was
called to the chair, and Mr. P. H. Agan was made Secretary.
Mr. C. D. B. Mills
moved the appointment of a committee of three to draft resolutions, and the
motion being carried, the Chair appointed Messrs. C. D. B. Mills, D. P. Phelps
and P. H. Agan as such committee.
The committee
subsequently reported the following series of resolutions:
Resolved, That in the death of Rev. Samuel J. May, our Society
has lost from our midst a widely-known, greatly gifted and loved religious
teacher; one endeared to us by many and most tender associations, who was,
through years reaching back to the very beginnings of our existence as a
religious society, its faithful, most affectionate and devoted pastor, and who
has laid us all under a debt never to be repaid, but always to be most
gratefully and tenderly remembered.
[Page 33]
Resolved, That in his death our community has lost one of
its most public-spirited, philanthropic and generously useful citizens,
magnanimous and self-sacrificing without end—and humanity itself the
world over has lost a warm and untiring friend of him it may be truly said, he
was a brother to all mankind.
Resolved, That the exalted virtues of our departed friend, so
marked, so bounteous and so rare, deserve well to be celebrated and kept in
perpetual record, and we rejoice that we may hold and commend these as the
legacy he has left us, inestimably rich and precious, the imperishable
possession and sacrament to be appropriated for quickening, before which all
may well feel incited to seek to attain something of that high self-sacrifice
and untiring devotion to human kind for which he was distinguished.
Resolved, That we tender our warm sympathies to the stricken
family, the descendants and all the kindred of our brother, invoking for them
the kind consolations and supports of Heaven in this their hour of sorrow, and
we point them not without joy to the assurance that a soul that has wrought so
faithfully and signally well, has, beyond peradventure, gone to its large
reward.
Resolved, That we hereby authorize and instruct the trustees of this
society, in conjunction with a committee of three, to be appointed to act in
concert with them, to cause to be placed in the walls of the church, a tablet
suitably inscribed to the name and memory of Mr. May.
Resolved, That a committee of five be appointed in behalf of our
society to take, after conferring with the family of the deceased, and in
consonance with their wishes, such steps as may be deemed requisite for
providing for the funeral services.
Before the resolutions
were put to vote, short and feeling addresses were made by Messrs. C. D. B.
Mills, C. B. Sedgwick, S. R. Calthrop, D. P. Phelps, and H. L. Green, of the
society, and on invitation, by the Rev. E. W. Mundy, and Charles E. Fitch.
While none of the addresses were labored, all bore testimony to the moral and
intellectual
[Page 34]
worth of the deceased,
a worth indeed whose eulogy cannot find expression in words. The following
committees were then appointed:
To prepare and
decorate the Church for the funeral:
H. N. White, J. H. Clark, O. V. Tracy, Mrs. Church, Mrs. E. A. Putnam, Mrs. E.
P. Howlett and Mrs. D. F. Gott.
On the tablet: Mrs. Dr. Clary, Mrs. W. B. Smith, and Mrs. O.
T. Burt.
To confer with the
family concerning the arrangements for the funeral: E. B. Judson, C. B. Sedgwick, C. F. Williston, C. D.
B. Mills and J. L. Bagg:
The funeral was
announced to take place from the Church of the Messiah, on Thursday, July 6th,
at 2 1-2 P. M., and the meeting adjourned.
SOCIETY of CONCORD
The
following resolutions, adopted by the members of a Jewish congregation, are so
honorable to them, and express so feelingly the common sentiment which pervades
all classes of the community, that we make them an exception, and give them a place in this
memorial.
At
a special meeting of the Society of Concord, in Syracuse, held at the vestry
rooms on the evening of July 5th, the death of the late Rev. Mr. May was
announced, and a committee on resolutions appointed, consisting of Messrs.
Jacob Straus, I. Henry Danziger and Bernhard Bronner. The committee reported
the following preamble and resolutions, which were unanimously adopted by the
meeting:
Whereas,
it has pleased our Almighty Father to call hence to a better life in heaven our
esteemed fellow citizen, the Rev. Samuel J. May, be it therefore
[Page 35]
Resolved,
That in the death of the Rev. Samuel
J. May, the State has lost one of its most eminent citizens, the community one
of its truest philanthropists, the church one of its most liberal pillars, and
mankind at large the noblest specimen of a man, who devoted his life to all
that is pure and holy in the eyes of God and man.
Resolved,
That while we bow in humble
submission to the decrees of
Resolved,
That this Society in a body, attend
the funeral obsequies of the lamented departed.
Resolved,
That these proceedings be placed on
our record and published in the daily papers of the city, and that a copy duly
engrossed be handed to the bereaved relatives of the deceased.
[Page 36]
FUNERAL SERVICES
PRIVATE SERVICES
On
the morning of Thursday, July 6th, there was a private service at Mr.
Wilkinson's house. Rev. Frederic Frothingham read appropriate passages of
Scripture. Rev. W. P. Tilden prayed, and Mr. A. Bronson Alcott made an address
of indescribable beauty, delicacy and tenderness. Not long afterwards the
household reassembled to listen to the reminiscences of Mr. George B. Emerson,
Rev. W. P. Tilden, and others. Mr. Emerson spoke of his early and ever-growing
love for Mr. May, of their college-life, and of the delightful Sunday evenings
which he had spent with him at
[Page 37]
REMAINS REMOVED TO THE CHURCH
In
accordance with a very generally expressed wish that it should be so done, the
body enclosed in a metallic casket, was, at 10 o'clock, removed to the Church
of the Messiah, which loving hands had fittingly decorated, and placed before
the pulpit, from which he had spoken so many faithful and earnest words. The
doors of the Church were opened, and from that hour until the time appointed
for the service, great numbers of persons of all classes, conditions and
creeds, came forward to take a last look of that benevolent, loving face, and
pay their last respects to the venerated friend.
Every
seat in the church that had not been reserved for the family and pall-bearers
was occupied some time before the hour appointed for the services. The porch
was crowded, and the stairway and yard outside were also filled with the old
and the young, the rich and the poor, all eager to join in doing honor to the
name and memory of the beloved dead. On either side of the alter were seated
the city and other attending clergy, and in slips in front were the members of
the Board of Education, of which Mr. May was for several years President.
Inside of the altar sat four aged pall-hearers, who were personal friends:
George Wansey, Captain Hiram Putnam, Joseph Savage and E. B. Culver. At ten
minutes before three o'clock the family and friends entered the church preceded
by the officiating clergy and other pall-bearers, -- Mayor F. E. Carroll, E. B.
Judson, C. B. Sedgwick, James L. Bagg, Dr. H. B. Wilbur, Hon. Dennis McCarthy,
Dr. Lyman Clary and N. F. Graves. The pulpit was occupied by Rev. S. R.
Calthrop, William Lloyd Garrison, Bishop Loguen, C. D. B. Mills and Rev. T. J.
Mumford.
SERVICES AT THE CHURCH
As the procession
entered the church, the organ, at which
[Page 38]
Prof.
Ernest Held presided, gave forth a voluntary, after which the choir sang
“Cast thy
burden on the Lord,
And He will
sustain thee and comfort thee,"
Rev. S. R. Calthrop
then offered prayer.
Infinite Father, God of light and love, we are
assembled here today to thank Thee for everything. We bless Thy name for the
beautiful world Thou has given us. We thank Thee for all the kindly relations
between man and man, and for the tender family ties that Thou hast given us.
Here, in the midst of tears, we bless Thee for death; for that beautiful angel
of Thine whom Thou dost send to each of us in turn, saying, with silent and
gentle voice, "Son or daughter, come up higher!" And so, O Father,
while many hearts shall feel a weariness today, and all shall feel that
something noble has gone out of the world, we, nevertheless, with the spirit of
him who lies here, bless Thy name that Thou hast received him to Thyself. He
loved Thee in this world, and did try with all the might that was in him to do
Thy will here. He saw Thy face here, and rejoiced in it, and would that all men
would rejoice in the same. Father we bless Thee for the benediction of his life
and thank Thee that Thou didst put it into his heart to be such a one. In the
name of him who lies silent before us, we bless Thee for the true and beautiful
influences that taught him to be a Christian and a true man. Above all, in duty
to him, we thank Thee for the beautiful manifestations of love that he saw in
Jesus Christ. We thank Thee for all that Jesus was to him personally. We thank
Thee that the shadow of that beautiful cross fell on his life, a mingled
command and benediction and that he took it up and carried it all his days. We
thank Thee, Father in heaven, that as Jesus was so he strove to be in this
world; with humble heart, never thinking that he had obtained, nevertheless,
pressing toward the mark ever. We thank Thee that Thou didst put it into his
heart to love the poor that Jesus loved; that he did take up the cause of the
oppressed as a precious legacy from the Master's hand; that he desired ever, as
Jesus did, to go about doing good; to put down the kingdom of wrong, and to
[Page 39]
establish the kingdom of right; to minister to the poor, the
fatherless, the oppressed and them that had no helper. We thank Thee for the
large, noble heart of this man, who said that all mankind was his brother. We
pray Thee, dear Father, that, as the light has been so plainly manifested
before us, we may be led to love it more ourselves, lest town and country may
feel shrunken because one just man has gone. O, Father, send down his spirit
upon us, and grant that we may take up the work just where he laid it down,
with thanksgiving to Thee that we are for Thy sake, and for Man's to do it. We
thank Thee for all these things, in the name of him who was the leader, the
teacher, the brother of him, who has gone up higher.
Rev. T. J. Mumford, of Dorchester, Massachusetts, one of Mr.
May's early students, read appropriate selections of Scripture.
The
Rev. Mr. Calthrop gave out, and the choir sang the 376th hymn.*
While thee I seek, protecting Power!
Be
my vain wishes stilled;
And may this consecrated hour
With
better hopes be filled.
Thy love the powers of thought bestowed;
To
thee my thoughts would soar;
Thy mercy o'er my life has flowed
That
mercy I adore!
In each event-of life, how clear
Thy
ruling hand I see!
Each blessing to my soul more dear,
Because
conferred by thee.
_______________________
*This
Hymn, and all the other Hymns read and sung during the services, were favorites
of Mr. May's, and were selected for the occasion on that account.
[Page
40]
Addresses
were then made by Mr. C. D. B. Mills and others, as follows:
ADDRESS of MR. MILLS
We
are here together today, friends, to testify to one common grief. All are
mourners, each one carries in his bosom a sense of personal bereavement.
We have come, not as is often the wont, as outside
friends or neighbors, to gather around a stricken family in the hour of their
sorrow, to offer our respect to the memory of a deceased acquaintance, and
perform the last offices for one who, however well regarded or even in general
way esteemed, was of no near relation or special importance to us. No, we are
here ourselves as one bereaved family. Our several households have been
entered, our several circles broken, our community, society itself, has
suffered a deep, an irreparable loss, and every heart feels the pang of the
separation. All ages grieve, the children with the adults, for this brother was
not less dear to the heart of tenderest childhood than to the intelligence, the
affection of maturest years. If only those who were simply friends were to
speak on this occasion, sympathizers, not mourners, I think no lips would be
opened here to day. And beyond the bounds of this large congregation, there is
another, far larger, ungathered, unseen to the eye, but one with us in feeling,
in sense of the deep and overbearing sorrow.
For
a great soul has departed, one widely related and deeply knit to human hearts,
wherever seen and known. What a generous nature was his, that went out in
devotion and love to all his kind, that was friend to humanity, and drew in
warmest sympathy and ceaseless kindly office to all
[Page
41]
subjects
of suffering, or of want or of sorrow! His love was universal, and it never
chilled, never wearied. Nothing could discourage or alienate him, or reduce his
faith in the good possibilities. The instances of his fine benefactions, his
aid by counsel and by hand, for most part silent and unknown save to the
subject and himself, in our city alone, no one now can begin to enumerate, and probably
in full they will never be known to any. Many and many a one he has saved from
sense of friendlessness, from the hard pressures, from discouragement and
surrender to the fearful temptations. He kept open door, he spread bountiful
table, freely inviting all the poor and heavy laden, and none who came went
empty away. We hear that of the Indian Logan, chief of the Mingoes in the last
century, sitting quietly in his home, and refusing all participation in the
wars which his countrymen waged against the whites, the red men were wont to
say as they passed the cabin, There dwells the friend of the white man. I think
that through all these years, upon the door of that house on yonder slope,
might have been written, Here dwells the friend of all men.
This
man has left no real estate behind, but I deem the estate he does leave is far
more real than any lands or structures that earth affords. He has left no iron
safe well filled with bonds, with scrips of stocks accounted of such value
among men, but the stocks he transmits are far more precious and enduring,
deposited in stronger safe,--the human heart. So rich a man, leaving such
legacies of wealth, not for one or for few, but for all, has never died from
our midst before.
His
charity beginning at home and doing all possible in the humble every day
relations, did not stop there. His benevolence was diffusive and wide reaching
as the race.
[Page
42]
The
broad humanities of his soul brought him inevitably into connection with the
great reforms of the time, particularly the Anti-Slavery, Temperance and
Woman's Rights. One of the very first to espouse the cause of the slave, as one
here present* doubtless will tell you, more fitly and fully than I can, he
labored with unswerving devotion and at great personal cost to the end. His
earnest unsparing appeals, his urgent, hearty incitements to duty, have been
among the most effective in this memorable anti-slavery conflict. And when at
length emancipation came, he was alert to meet promptly its responsibilities;
he gave freely his energies and his substance to provide for the education and
enlightenment of the newly freed. Any enterprise that sought the improvement of
man found in him a cordial friend and helper; he labored for prison reform, for
peace, for popular education, for the reclamation by kindliest methods of
juvenile offenders, for the interests of the working man, just wages to all, to
man and to woman alike for all faithful performance. And with all this he was a
most untiring and devoted preacher and pastor, an honor to the denomination to
which he belonged, a constant powerful worker everywhere in behalf of religious
enlightenment and emancipation, for a true and liberal faith, and most of all a
noble worthy life.
But,
a warm quenchless benevolence and spirit of generous self-sacrifice, were not
our brother's sole characteristic. He held in blending with them other
qualities which went to temper and perfect them, and built up one harmonious,
balanced, perfect character. With all the fine sensibilities, the tenderness,
affection, and deeply sensitive nature of woman, he united those traits, which,
essential to all strength
*
Mr. Garrison.
[Page
43]
and
completeness, belong more particularly to the severer temperament of man. He
had stern, unblenching courage. He knew not shrinking or fear. In presence of
danger or overawing threat he could be, he always was, as upstanding and
unmoved as a soldier. In his urgent advocacy of the cause of the slave, he was
not seldom brought into relations of exposure, sometimes of imminent personal
peril, yet such a thing as intimidation or surrender was never in his thought.
I have seen him when assailed,
“Patient and meek he stood;
His foes ungrateful, sought his life—
He labored for their good."
“The sandal tree, most sacred tree of all,
Perfumes the very axe which bids it fall."
And
to more dangerous influence, bland seductions dissuasions of friends, that
would tone down his zeal and withdraw him from undivided devotion to this path,
which to him was the path of duty, albeit beset with many thorns, his ear was
deaf. His heart loving and tender everywhere, here was steel. Such fine poise
and blending of the different qualities, such happy union of the elements that
make up fullness and strength of character, is very seldom found.
It
did not seem to us that he could ever die. His aims implied an unending
activity among us, and his labors were part of the plan of the world; they took
hold on the forever. The familiar beaming face, the musical accents of the
voice--we counted upon them as confidently to be ours at short intervals as the
rising of the sun or the courses of the seasons. Why should so loved and
inspiring a sight, so indispensable to our own life and quickening, ever go a
way?
[Page
44]
And
yet we knew also that death must come.
"By cool Siloam's shady rill,
The lily must decay."
And
this lily of human life, the lily man, fairest of all the blooms that ever put
forth from the bosom of the earth, --this must full quickly fade and perish.
Death has taken this fine flower also for its own, and we can see and know it
no more. We have now henceforth to speak in the past tense. The wistful,
anxious thought asks, Why; asks, Where, O where brother, art thou gone, but the
eternities are silent.
We
know that his life had solidity with the foundation of the heavens, that he
cannot drop out of the universe, that wherever worlds are with their laws of
justice, beneficence, love, there he dwells at home; that wherever and whatever
he be, he is in the bosom and warm embrace of the infinite Love. For his spirit
here was lovingly set to the music of the skies, he was wedded to the
everlasting.
Too
grateful we cannot be that he remained with us so long, that for more than a
quarter of a century our city has had the light of that saintly presence,
pouring its benignities into all eyes, shedding the dawn of worthier ambitions,
some touch of nobler aspirations and better resolve into every heart. Who will
not give thanks for all that had to do with introducing him here, the religious
society that invited, the friends that encouraged, the influences that
determined his choice? Who will not bless those ancestors, the John May that in
youth migrated and settled at Roxbury, the Sewalls and Quincys of the olden
days, that they so wed, so bore and reared offspring, that in due time there
might be such parentage to fruit in such a son? Who not bless that quiet, but
most ster-
[Page
45]
ling
and accomplished mother, leaving so deeply the stamp of her affection upon him;
that kindly father, "warden of King's Chapel," who with such care and
skill guided the tender years, watchful to encourage, not to cross or mar the
generous instincts, to bring out to full and perfect bloom this delicate, noble
flower? We all had stake there, my friends, and the following future lay
wrapped up in those childhood days, largely in the nurture to that little boy
of the courtly, but tender and loving father.
But
an end to eulogy. It easily becomes excessive and in effect harmful, resting
absorbed in the person rather than regarding the character, dwelling in the
history rather than the idea, the reality greater than history, which transcends
all. This mortal has put on immortality. We have to do now with the ethereal.
Samuel J. May was of worth to us most especially, not for what he historically
was, but for what in him was hinted, for the intimation we saw there of the
infinite and unseen. There was symbolism and the worth was in the thing behind
the symbol. Any scripture, the highest and largest, is but a fragment of the
universal volume. The divinest souls that have lived were but, broken lights
through which shone, somewhat refracted and diffracted withal, a little ray, a
tiny beam of the effulgence and the beauty of God. Jesus was but a hint of the
unexplored and unimagined possibilities.
It
was to intimate to us something of this that our friend came. He was sent from
God. It was a repast to which we were invited, furnished in most bountiful
profusion, every nourishment, every delicacy. Our brother gave himself to
us, in mystic sense his own body and blood, all that he had or was, that we
might eat not to enjoy and to slumber, but to gather strength wherewith to rise
up and
[Page
46]
do.
It was an evening's entertainment at the house of a friend, where the
conversation of the guest that had dropped in was so fine, we were transported,
lifted and ravished away; the long hours were beguiled, and ere we were aware
the night was spent. We deemed that an angel had spoken to us, and so it was.
"He spoke and words more soft than rain,
Brought back the age of gold again;
His actions won such reverence sweet,
As hid all measure of the feat."
But
our stranger guest, mysteriously coming, mysteriously disappearing, has gone,
and we look for him farther in vain. As the lightning, which appeareth in the
east, shineth unto the west for the instant, so also is the corning of the son
of man. That memorable evening is past, the crisp morning is upon us, and we
are bidden, man, woman, each for most part alone, forth and abroad to translate
and to realize.
God's
volume of revelation and of message is never closed. We have read of these
things in books, great deeds, saintly divine lives, souls that made earth
celestial, have heard them celebrated in poetry and song, treasured them in our
imagination and beheld them as of days more glorious, more blessed than ours.
They were not to be in the realities of our experience. They were of the
romance that glowed in the ages long departed. But this man, modest,
unassuming, claiming nothing, professing only to be a humble follower of Jesus;
treading at remote distance in his footprints,--in respect to the great
qualities, in sweetness, poise, love and self-sacrifice, certainly approximated
if he did not equal that Master, who to his thought was peerless. The life
seemed to itself so unsufficing, so infinitely short of its own ideal. Yet we now
can see, remembering withal
[Page
47]
the
human limitations, that here again the heavens have bended to the earth.
I
have heard that this earth is ameliorating, that however slowly, surely,
consuming if need be untold æons of time, it is moving to its destiny; to
become purified and ripened, finely fit for the abode of man. That the
volcanoes are becoming extinct, are less numerous and less violent today than
of old, that the nether explosive fires are burning out. That compensating,
absorbing agencies are at work, neutralizing the poisons, and rendering more
wholesome and life-sustaining the air. Recent science tells us that certain
fragrant essences, that fine blooms like the narcissus, heliotrope, mignonette,
lily, cooperate with the strong angels phosphorus and electricity, to sweeten
and vitalize the atmosphere, nay that they may disinfect the marsh, and swallow
and transmute the poisonous emanations. One loves to think there must be
constant advance and increase, more ozone in the air today, more life in the
sunbeam.
So,
on the moral earth too, is amelioration. Blooms of saintly souls through all
the ages have purified and enriched this atmosphere, absorbed the poisons and
exalted the vital conditions. Human affection has been purer and sweeter since
Jesus lived and loved, and the upward way grows easier, since so many true have
pressed there with eager feet, enduring the cross, despising the shame.
We
also are called to work in the same glorious line. Each one of us, however
narrow his sphere, may do somewhat towards the grand accomplishment. Each may
be at least a humble lily of the valley, to help to renew and recover some
little district of this still much infected domain.
Consecrated
by this grave, reverting to the luminous life we see here,--closed now but also
unclosed, transplanted, transfigured, a star in .the skies henceforth,--alas
for us if
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48]
we
feel not the heavenly quickening, if we rise not this day to a higher devotion,
a larger fervor of noble living than we had ever known or even thought before!
ADDRESS of WM. LLOYD GARRISON
If
I have ever coveted that rare gift of speech, whereby the deep emotions of the
soul are enabled to find something like, an adequate expression, I do so on
this occasion. But, alas! by no command of language can I hope to do any
justice to my feelings or to your own. We are participating in common, in a
great bereavement. These mourning children have lost one of the best of
fathers, one of the wisest of counsellors and guides. I have lost a most
affectionate and unswerving friend, an early and untiring coworker in the broad
field of freedom and humanity, a brother beloved incomparably beyond all blood
relationship. Syracuse has lost one of its most useful and esteemed citizens;
the nation one of the worthiest of its sons; the world one of the purest, most
philanthropic, most divinely actuated of all its multitudinous population. In
him all the elements of goodness, mercy and truth were so equally blended as to
form a character as perfect and beautiful as it is in the scope of ages to
produce. What could surpass his habitual gentleness and tenderness of spirit,
the modesty of his nature, his self-abnegation, his moral intrepidity, in times
of fiery trial, his inflexible adherence to fundamental principles, his ready
espousal of every righteous cause, in conflict with a corrupt overmastering
public sentiment, his compassionate sympathy for every phase of human
degradation and misery, his generous disposition to relieve the necessities of
the poor and needy, his varied labors to establish the kingdom of righteousness
in the earth? Like Job, "he was a perfect and upright man, one who feared
God,
[Page
49]
and
eschewed evil; so that when the ear heard him, it blessed him; when the eye saw
him, it gave witness to him; because he delivered the poor that cried; and the
fatherless, and him that had none to help him. The blessings of him that was
ready to perish, came upon him; and he caused the widow's heart to sing for
joy. He was eyes to the blind, and feet was he to the lame, and the cause which
he knew not, he searched out." Never was portraiture more accurately drawn
than this; and if our departed friend had been the first to sit for it, it
could not have been more strikingly exact in all its lineaments. Some of his
other distinguishing characteristics are felicitously portrayed by Wordsworth,
in his description of the "Happy Warrior," as one
"Who comprehends his trust, and to the same
Keeps faithful with a singleness of aim;
And therefore does not stop, nor lie in wait
For wealth or honor, or for worldly state;
Whom they must follow: on whose head must fall,
Like showers of manna, if they come at all;
Whose powers shed round him in the common strife,
Or mild concerns of ordinary life,
A constant influence, a peculiar grace;
But who, if he be called upon to face
Some awful moment to which heaven has joined
Great issues, good or bad, for human kind,
Is happy as a lover; and attired
With sudden brightness, like a man inspired;
And, through the heat of conflict, keeps the law
In calmness made, and sees what he foresaw;
Or if an unexpected call succeed,
Come when it will, is equal to the deed;
Whom neither shape of danger can dismay,
Nor thought of tender happiness betray;
Who, whether praise of him must walk the earth
For ever, and to noble deeds give birth,
Or he must go to dust without his fame,
And leave a dead, unprofitable name,
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50]
Finds comfort in himself and in his cause;
And, while the mortal mist is gathering, draws
His breath in confidence of Heaven's applause;--
This is the happy warrior; this is he
Whom every man in arms should wish to be."
Such,
in the very letter and spirit, was SAMUEL JOSEPH MAY. Witness half a century of
active participation in all the leading reforms of the age! Witness the
temptations, trials, sacrifices, perils to which he willingly subjected himself
in the service of the enslaved millions at the South, until it was granted unto
him to see their fetters broken and to join with them in singing the song of
jubilee!
It
is now more than forty years since I made his acquaintance, and happily secured
his friendship, the value of which to me, subsequently, proved to be beyond all
price. I shall always gratefully remember that he was among the very earliest
to take me by the hand, and bid me God speed in my labors for the immediate and
unconditional abolition of American Slavery. In his printed" Recollections
of the Anti-Slavery Conflict," he generously acknowledges his deep
indebtedness to me on hearing my first lectures on slavery in Boston, in the
autumn of 1830--adding that they gave a new direction to his thoughts--a new
purpose to his ministry. However that may have been, I am sure that I have felt
far more indebted to him; for, without his encouraging words and zealous
cooperation, I should have lost much of the inspiration that enabled me to
battle persistently against all opposing forces. At that time, the pastor of a
small Unitarian church in Brooklyn, Conn., and the occupant of the only
Unitarian pulpit in that State, he had no slight cross to bear, no
inconsiderable amount of theological odium to confront on account of his
alleged doctrinal heresies; and he therefore might have plausibly pleaded
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that
he had already as heavy a load as he could well carry, without espousing any
other disreputable issue. But it was not in his nature to consult expediency
where duty was plainly revealed; nor to measure the amount of proscription he
was willing to bear for righteousness sake. If it must be so, he was ready to
be branded as a fanatic or an incendiary, as he had been a heretic. No
"son of thunder" was he, indeed, but eminently a "son of consolation;"
yet to the mildness of a John, he united the firmness and moral courage of a
Paul, when called to meet the solemn issues of the times. Avoiding all
violations of good taste, and wisely circumspect in his utterances, he
nevertheless could speak in such tones of rebuke and warning as to make the
ears of hardened transgressors tingle, and at the same time was quick to
perceive where simple entreaty might be effectually substituted for harsh
impeachment. He had no taste for controversy as such; no man disliked it more.
"As much as he lieth in yon, live peacefully with all men," was with
him a favorite apostolic injunction; and he continually overflowed with the
milk of human kindness. But he felt none the less sensibly the obligation to
"declare the whole counsel of God," as revealed to his own soul,
whether men, would heal or whether they would forbear. What he sought to know,
was the truth; what he stood ready at all odds to maintain, was the right. If
he was a heretic, he had still unwavering faith in God; if he was on any
occasion a disturber of the peace, it was only in the sense in which prophets
and apostles, saints and martyrs have been; if he stood in a minority,
sometimes alone, it was because he could not be tempted by any consideration to
go with the multitude to do evil. His standard of judgment was very simple,
and, so far as speculative theology was concerned, broadly catholic. “I ask
not," to quote his own language,
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"what
may be a man's profession or faith; I ask not what may be a man's creed or
system of theology; I ask only whether he gives unequivocal evidence of his
fidelity to God, and his love of the Father, by his fidelity to the right, and
his love of the brethren, especially his poor brethren." And,
truly, in the light of such an example as he set, of such a life as he lived,
how worthless is every sectarian shibboleth! Men are to be known by their
fruits, not by their profession; and what a prolific fruit-bearer was here!
"For modes of faith let graceless zealots fight;
His can't be wrong whose life is in the right."
If
ever there was "an Israelite indeed, in whom there was no guile," he
existed in the person of him whose mortal remains lie before us. I can conceive
of no society beyond the grave, however pure and exalted, into which he may not
enter, and be received as a worthy guest--aye, as a brother beloved, and a
member of: the household of saints "in good and regular standing."
Let it be remembered that if the same averment had been made of the great
Founder of Christianity in his day, it would have been deemed shocking impiety
by all who made any pretensions to soundness of religious faith; for was not
he, also, a heretic--aye, of the worst type? Had he not eaten with publicans
and sinners? Did he not audaciously impeach the piety of priest and Levite, and
recognize as worthy of imitation and praise a hated, heretical Samaritan? Had
he not been convicted of blasphemy? Had he not a devil?
For
myself--raising here no- question as to whose theological opinions are sound or
unsound--I feel that, as the fearless advocate of liberty of conscience, as
against all dogmatic authority and ecclesiastic rule, Mr. May is entitled to
our common gratitude; for', however dissimilar we
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may
be in our scriptural interpretations or religious convictions, he contended for
us all equally as for himself. Like the Apostle, he regarded it as a small
matter to be judged of man's judgment. Like that same heroic spirit, he inculcated
the duty of proving all things in an independent investigation, everyone for
himself; taking care to hold fast that which is good. Like a greater than Paul,
he asked, "Why judge ye not of yourselves what is right?" Perhaps to
no one in our country is the cause of free inquiry, in its broadest
signification, more indebted than to this world-embracing friend and brother.
Mark
Antony lamenting over the dead body of Cæsar, exclaims:
"The Evil that men do lives after them;
The good is oft interred with their bones."
Of
the truthfulness of his first assertion there can be no question. The evil that
men do survives their earthly existence, and not unfrequently goes down from
generation to generation. But by what law of Providence does it happen that the
good is ever buried with their bones? Believe not the statement. Evil has no
such advantage over good. The same conditions, the same chances, the same
limitations apply to each; but what a difference in quality! For,
"Only the actions of the just
Smell, sweet, and blossom in the dust."
Yes,
even in the dust they blossom, and bear fruit abundantly for the nourishment of
a long line of posterity. Beautifully has the great master of poetry illustrated
this diffusive power of goodness in the oft-quoted couplet--
"How far the little candle throws its beams!
So shines a good deed in the naughty world."
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And
it retains its lustre long after the removal of the mind that conceived and the
hand that executed it.
What
one of the multitudinous goal acts of our beloved friend, what one of the many
grand testimonies uttered by him with such boldness and fidelity, can possibly
become extinct in his grave? These have entered into the general life of the
community; they have widely affected the popular conscience and heart; they
have greatly lessened, and will continue to lessen, the sum of human sorrow and
wretchedness; they have powerfully contributed towards shaping the destiny of the
nation. "Though dead, he yet speaketh;" and his spirit still walks
abroad in all its quickening power.
With
what zeal and persistency did he give himself to the cause of popular
education, with all its far-reaching consequences, from the primary school to
the university! How well he comprehended its priceless value to the millions,
its indispensable necessity to the maintenance of free institutions! As the
natural sequence to his anti-slavery labors, how deep was the interest he
evinced in the instruction of the benighted freedmen of the South! No one ever
responded more warmly to the Divine mandate, "Let there be light,"
than himself.
To
that most blessed and fundamentally important movement which seeks the
abolishment of the drinking customs of society, he gave an early adhesion and
an earnest support. Alas! that these pernicious customs still prevail so
widely, carrying with them a legion of evils! Yet, had it not been for the
temperance reformation, the land would have been given over to intoxication
beyond all reasonable hope of recovery. It has brought sunshine and joy, and
health and happiness, to tens of thousands of homes, and
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saved
millions from the liability of going down to drunkards' graves. It has greatly
diminished insanity, pauperism and crime, strengthened private and public
virtue, accelerated the general prosperity, and augmented the national wealth.
Still, it needs all possible encouragement and support; for the obstacles
thrown in the pathway of its complete success continue to be of a formidable
nature. The departure, therefore, of one whose example and testimony were so
efficient in its behalf, is a very serious loss.
"Blessed
are the peacemakers; for they shall be called the children of God." If I
mistake not, the very first reformatory movement which challenged the attention
and won the advocacy of Mr. May, was that for the promotion of universal peace.
This must have been nearly half a century ago, at the very commencement of his
ministerial career. Aside from the teachings of Jesus, to no one probably was
he so indebted for his deep-seated convictions on this subject, as to the
venerable Noah Worcester, of blessed memory. His whole being seemed to be
permeated with the divine element of peace, as was the Savior whom he loved and
revered so profoundly, and whose example he constantly held up as worthy of all
imitation. His spirit was ever attuned to the angelic song, "Glory to God
in the Highest; on earth peace; good will towards men." Peace radiated
from his countenance--found fitting cadence in the music of his voice--made
fragrant his daily walk and conversation. While he clearly saw that, in the
Divine Providence, war had both its admonitory and retributive uses, he saw not
less clearly that
"Were half the power that fills the world with
terror,
Were half the wealth bestowed on camps and
courts,
Given to redeem the human mind from error,
There were no need of arsenals or forts.
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The warrior's name would be a name
abhorred;
And every nation that should lift again
Its head against a brother, on its forehead
Would wear forever more the curse of Cain."
That,
just prior to his being summoned hence, he was permitted to hear of the
ratification of an honorable treaty of peace between Great Britain and the
United States, whereby all their grave difficulties are to be amicably settled,
must have given to him inexpressible gratification, causing a feeling kindred
to that of aged Simeon, when he exclaimed, "Lord, let now thy servant
depart in peace; for mine eyes have seen thy salvation." In view of all
the circumstances, it is the most cheering event in the history of
international arbitration, and cannot fail to exercise a salutary influence
upon the nations of the earth in the bloodless adjustment of their variances
with each other. In that ease, it will be a long stride towards the goal of
universal peace, which, whenever reached, shall be the fulfillment of the
inspiring prediction--
"No more shall nation against nation rise,
Nor ardent warriors meet with hateful eyes:
Nor fields with gleaming steel be covered o'er,
The brazen trumpets kindle rage no more;
But useless lances into scythes shall bend,
And the broad falchion in a ploughshare end.
Then palaces shall rise; the joyful son
Shall finish what his short-lived sire begun;
Their vines a shadow to their race shall yield,
And the same hand that sow'd, shall reap the field."
Farewell--at
the longest, a brief farewell--friend of liberty, of temperance, of peace, of
universal brotherhood, of equal rights for the whole human race, without
distinction of clime, color, sex or nationality!
Farewell,
lover of God and of man, without partiality
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and
without hypocrisy--ready for every good word and work--benefactor of the poor
and outcast, succorer of the hunted fugitive slave, sympathizer with the widow
and orphan in their distress, rescuer of the wandering and lost, strengthener
of the weak, and lifter up of the bowed down!
Farewell,
sweetest, gentlest, most loving and most loved of men!
"Gone to the Heavenly Father's rest!
The flowers of
And on thine ear the murmurs blest
Of Shiloah's water softly flowing!
Beneath that Tree of Life which gives
To all the earth its healing leaves!
In the white robe of angels clad;
And wandering by that sacred river,
Whose streams of holiness make glad
The city of our God forever!
Gentlest of spirits!--not for thee
Our tears are shed, our sighs are given;
Why mourn to know thou art a free
Partaker of the joys of Heaven?
Finish'd thy work, and kept thy faith
In Christian firmness unto death;
And beautiful as sky and earth,
And Autumn's sun in downward going,
The blessed memory of thy worth
Around thy place of slumber glowing!"
ADDRESS of BISHOP LOGUEN of THE AFRICAN M. E. CHURCH
I
would not tax your patience for one moment were it not for the intimate
relationship that has existed between this dear friend and myself for over a
quarter of a century. I had commenced laboring for my people here--the colored
race--a few years before the Rev. Mr. May came to this
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village,
as it was then. It was a dark place,--no friends, no encouragement, a solitary
wilderness for the colored man. I began my labors as a poor boy, teaching
school here; and I shall never forget the joy that our dear friend brought me
when I made his acquaintance. From that hour until his death, I never met him,
in the darkest moment, or amid the most fearful trials of my people, but that a
ray of sunlight would strike my breast from his countenance.
While these friends have been speaking of him, I have
been thinking of all the oppressed and afflicted he has relieved and comforted.
Those who have known him as long as I have, can say that there are no words
that can exalt him as a man and as a brother of humanity. He was a brother to
all. I feel like weeping with his friends and his children. He was as dear to
me as anyone could be. Never did I go to his house for counsel, or for help in
vain. Enemies were prowling around, but he was always true and always ready to
befriend and welcome me to his table, to his study, and to his fireside. He was
truly a friend to humanity, everywhere, and under all circumstances of life. As
one of the colored race I can testify heartily that he was a brother to us as
well as others. If I could say all that was in my heart I would say much more; but
you have heard much. Being the only one of my race to stand here, I thought I
must say a word about the kind heart and noble life of the dear brother lying
before us. Oh! you know that a man who, twenty years ago, would prove a brother
to my hated, oppressed, and enslaved people, would prove a brother to all. I
can only say, God bless you my dear friends, his children and relatives, follow
in his footsteps.
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ADDRESS of REV. W. P.
TILDEN, of
It
has been said that love will always bear one word more, if it be said in
simplicity and sincerity, though I should hardly dare attempt to say that word
now, after all that has been said, did I not stand here as the representative
of others, as well as to speak a simple word for myself. The brief notes I hold
in my hand, will explain what I mean. Just before I left
My DEAR Mr. TILDEN:--I write a line to express my
earnest hope that you will represent the Association, as they have asked you
to, at the funeral of Mr. May. If I could go, I should accompany you, for not
only is my personal feeling for him very tender and near, but I recognize so
strongly his eminent service to our cause, that I should be glad by my presence
to express it.
I hope if you go, you will say something publicly to
testify to his connection with the association and his efficient service. He
has been acting as a missionary, ever since he left the charge of his society,
with only such interruption as his health or other engagements made necessary;
and the peculiar respect he had won all through the State in which his work was
given, and his rare faculty of saying just the right word--enabled him to do
what no one else could have done so well. He was our counsellor, and he was for
the societies in his "diocese" (as he used to call it,) an adviser,
an inciter to zeal, and a dear friend. If I were still Secre-
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tary of the Association I should feel that one of my
best supporters was gone.
Ever
truly yours,
CHARLES LOWE.
The other note is from Mr. Shippen, who says;
In requesting you to represent this Association at the
funeral of Mr. May, I heartily accord with all that Mr. Lowe has just written,
and hope that at Syracuse you may express, in behalf of our Association, as
well as of the brotherhood of the ministry, our deep gratitude for the noble
and faithful life of our beloved and departed brother. To many of us he was a
father, rather; by his benignant and gracious presence illustrating to our
hearts that tenderness and loving kindness toward the humblest and least of
men, which our faith rejoices to ascribe to the Infinite Father as his dearest
attribute.
Please express, especially to the family and friends,
our heartfelt sympathy.
Very cordially yours,
RUSH R. SHIPPEN.
First
let me express to the dear family of our departed brother our heartfelt and
cordial sympathy, the heartfelt sympathy of the whole denomination. For who is
there among us all that did not know and love your dear and honored father? And
yet we have no word of condolence, but rather of congratulation, thanking God,
with you, today, that through his loving kindness you have been blessed with
such a noble father.
As
to brother May's connection with the Unitarian Association, it would hardly be
proper for me to say a word today, were it not that in his own heart he traced
much of the love he bore for his fellow-men, and the interest he felt in
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the
great reforms of the age, to their principles early engraven upon his heart;
and the secret of his success as a preacher I am certain was that he so
thoroughly, clear down to the depths of his soul, believed every word that he
preached. It was that which touched people's hearts when they heard him. They
said, here is a man who really believes what he teaches; when he speaks of the
fatherhood of God, and when he speaks of the brotherhood of man we know that he
believes it, and therefore we are ready to listen to him and bid him God speed
in his work. Yes, brother May had a deep and living conviction of the simple
truths of Unitarian Christianity. And, oh! how simple they are! --the
fatherhood of God; the sonship of humanity ; the brotherhood of the race; sin
its own sorrow; holiness its own sweet and blessed reward; the upper mansions
opening right out of this world; human love beginning here to be perfected
beyond. These were the truths that in earliest childhood took hold of his
heart; that was the source of his theology--to call God Father; that was the
source of his philanthropy. He really believed that God was his Father; he
really believed that man was his brother, and he sought to live that out. That
was what made his philanthropy so broad. It was color blind; and it is the only
kind of blindness that I know of that indicates a clear vision. He could not
see anything of the distinctions made by man in any of God's creatures--it was
the Divine image he saw everywhere. And so whenever he saw a human being there
he saw his brother, a child of the same Heavenly Father.
I
would if I had time, tell you how well dear Brother May was loved in other
places besides Syracuse, and in other States besides New York. You have enjoyed
him here now for twenty-six years. It seems to you, I suppose, as if nobody
loved him as you did. I tell you that where-
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ever
he went, there were those that loved him just as well as you. It was my
privilege to be one of his parishioners thirty years ago, when he went fresh
from the anti-slavery field of labor, and settled at South Scituate. I was then
a young man working in a carpenter shop, yet I longed for the Christian
ministry; yet how should I get into it? God knows whether I ever should,
although I rather think he would have found a way for me--if brother May had
not come like an angel of God, and taken right hold of my hand, hardened with
toil, and clasped it, as only dear brother May could clasp a hand, and aided me
with his counsel and sympathy. Oh, think how many have been clasped by that
dear hand, and how many hearts have been cheered by that clasp! .When he came
to Scituate he drew us all to him by this strong human sympathy. He carried our
sicknesses and bore our sorrows. And it was wonderful that, while he was so
deeply interested in all these various objects of philanthropy, his personal
interest for every individual in his parish was so deep and constant. Mr.
Garrison has called him a "son of consolation." Oh, he was that
indeed. Seldom do we see united that deep and tender sympathy, and that moral
heroism which made him ready to do and dare for any cause, that he believed to
be the cause of God and humanity.
I
want to emphasize one thought before we go hence, that has already been
mentioned sweetly and hopefully, that is, that our brother is not dead. God
does not let him die even here. His influence will live in our hearts long to
enkindle within us something of the light that shone through him for God and
humanity. Of all the men that I have ever known, I do not recall one who has so
fully, as I think, realized the words of the poet--
"I live to hold communion."
But
it is because our brother lived those glorious truths, that
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now
that he has risen, he has taken up all our hearts with him.
The
271st Hymn was then read by Rev Mr. Calthrop and sung by the choir:
Awake, my soul! stretch every nerve,
And press with vigour on:
A heavenly race demands thy zeal,
And an immortal crown.
A cloud of witnesses around
Hold thee in full survey:
Forget the steps already trod,
And onward urge thy way.
'Tis God's all-animating voice
That calls thee from on high;
'Tis his own hand presents the prize
To thine aspiring eye;
That prize with peerless glories bright;
Which shall new lustre boast,
When victors' wreaths and monarchs' gems
Shall blend in common dust.
Prayer
was then offered by Rev. Frederick Frothingham, of Buffalo, after which the
choir sung,
Nearer, my God, to thee,
Nearer to thee:
Even though it be a cross
That raiseth me,
Still all my song shall be,
Nearer, my God, to thee,
Nearer to thee.
Though like a wanderer,
The sun gone down,
Darkness be over me,
My rest a stone,
Yet in my dreams I'd be
Nearer to thee.
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There let the way appear
Steps unto heaven;
All that thou sendest me
In mercy given,
Angels to beckon me
Nearer my God, to thee,
Nearer to thee.
Then with my waking thoughts,
Bright with thy praise,
Out of my stony griefs,
Bethel I'll raise
So by my woes to be
Nearer, my God, to thee,
Nearer to thee.
Or if on joyful wing,
Cleaving the sky,
Sun, moon, and stars forgot,
Upward I fly,
Still all my song shall be,
Nearer, my God, to thee,
Nearer to thee.
Rev.
Mr. Calthrop announced the close of the services, and said that those
especially who had been unable to gain admission to the church, would be glad
to know that there were to be short services at the grave, to attend which they
were most cordially invited. He pronounced the benediction.
FROM THE CHURCH TO THE CEMETERY
The
casket was brought from the church between two rows of Sunday school children,
stationed on the right and left from the church entrance to the hearse, all
dressed in white, presenting a beautiful sight. The procession was formed, and
the long line of carriages moved through James and Salina streets to Oakwood
Cemetery.
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AT THE GRAVE
On
arriving at the cemetery, the procession passed up the winding roadway to the
place of burial, the Sunday school children again forming in two lines. A large
number of people had congregated, and after the casket was taken from the
hearse, brief services were held, commencing with the children singing:
"In the sweet by and by,
We shall meet on that beautiful shore."
Remarks
were made by the Rev. Mr. Calthrop, President Andrew D. White, of Cornell
University, Rev. Mr. Mumford, and the Rev. E. W. Mundy.
REMARKS of REV. S. R. CALTHROP
When
an Egyptian king died, his body lay in state before the assembly of the people,
who were called upon solemnly to pronounce their verdict on his character. If
that verdict was
adverse, he was buried apart, as unworthy of honorable sepulture; if favorable,
he was buried, amid the tears of the people, among the sacred sepulchres of the
kings.
We
are assembled here, to pronounce our last judgment on the clay that lies before
us. Here, among the leafy trees, the joyful light, and the thousand sweet sounds
of summer, the dust will lie. But where shall we bury him in our hearts?
Already judgment has been passed in other places. This morning his nearest
kindred,--those who had known his innermost life,--gathered, and with one voice
declared, that this was the truest, kindest, faithfulest friend, father, man,
their eyes had ever seen. With sweet, cheerful converse, they delighted to
recall every word he had spoken, every thing he had done. 'Twas not a funeral,
it was a beautiful commemoration service, which made their hearts glad.
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Their
verdict was, "The memory of the just is blessed." This afternoon a
mourning crowd gathered, of their own accord, in the midst of the busy day,
publicly to do honor to one who had fought a good fight, and finished his
course. Their verdict was, "O, God, we thank Thee that this man has
lived." And now we, too, are gathered together, to declare, under the eye
of Heaven, what our thought is. Everyone is free to speak. We are not afraid to
hear the testimony of any man on earth. Is there any here present; who can say
that this man's ear was ever closed to any single cry of distress, of
loneliness, of oppression, of poverty, of any human misery? That any just cause
ever languished for lack of his help? Was there ever one a stranger, that he
took not in; naked, that he did not strive to clothe; sick and in prison, that
he did not visit? Whenever I came down the hill, from a visit to that most
hospitable house, if I chanced to meet any specially forlorn man or woman going
up, I was instantly sure whither they were bound. When going home, last Monday,
after our church meeting, I got out of the car with an Indian. As we were
walking the same way, I thought I would try an experiment, and see if this
chance-met stranger knew anything about Mr. May. I inquired. "Oh,"
said he, "the best friend our nation ever had. I had a deaf and dumb boy
nine years old. Mr. May got him into the Asylum in New York. They said, he only
nine years old,--none under twelve can come in. But Mr. May said, ‘Indian boy,
Indian boy,'--He must come in." I wonder how many hundreds of just such
tales could be told. Yes, our verdict is, "We will bury him among the
kings because he hath done good."
Already
the whole country, through the press, begins to pour in its tribute from all
quarters. There was a time when men spake all manner of evil against him
falsely, for Jesus'
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sake;
but already the cause is swallowed up in blessing. The verdict of America is,
"The nation honors him, and weeps his loss."
One
more verdict, and we have done. There is another assembly before which our
friend is now standing. The general assembly and church of the first-born;
Jesus, bringer in of the new covenant. God, the judge of all men, and the
spirits of just men made perfect. Can we not already, in faith, see that joyful
welcome, and hear that last grand verdict pronounced, "Well done, good and
faithful servant, enter thou into the joy of thy Lord!"
And
now what a lesson this life teaches as to where a true ambition lies. I would
invite all brave young American men to ponder it well. Here, in America, we all
stand, in one sense as equals. Here we have no Dukes, Earls, Marquises or
Lords; whose very names are supposed to give their possessors a right to stand
before other men. And yet, the thing, for which alone these names, otherwise worthless, ought
to stand, is here. Here lies one whose
name no outward titles ever
adorned, and yet the honor is all his own. Here lies one, who was Duke or Leader in the cause of man. Earl of
justice, Lord of the glorious dominion of love and good will. Whose wishes
these coronets to be placed on his
brow, let him go and do likewise. Young friend, you like him, can win them, if
you love and hate the things he loved and hated; he hated no man, he hated only
the vice that degrades men, the intemperance that imbrutes men, the oppression
that enslaves men, the sin and selfishness that destroy men. He loved the truth
that enlarges, the justice that strengthens, and the love that blesses men.
This is the word, which he, being dead, yet speaketh to you, to me, and to all
men.
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REMARKS of PRESIDENT WHITE
"My
Friends :--Here lies before us all
that was mortal of the best man, the most truly Christian man I have ever known; the purest, the
sweetest; the fullest of faith, hope and charity; the most like the Master.
For
nearly thirty years he has blessed us--for all these years his very presence
has been a benediction to us.
I
think that the first characteristic of our dear friend, which rises in the
remembrance of us all, is his kindliness, his tenderness and love toward all
God's creatures. How well do I remember its first revelation to me. Nearly
thirty years ago, as a child in one of your public schools, I was upon a boat
crowded with children on our way to celebrate the national anniversary. Into
our midst came a man whom most of us had never before seen. He spoke, and
instinctively we loved him. He "suffered little children to come unto
him." Had his creed been recited to us by unfriendly lips, it would have
doubtless scared us; but the man was Mr. May, and his kindliness and goodness
have never been clouded from that day to this.
But
this quality was not mere geniality. It deepened and broadened into a great
stream of Christian charity--charity to the distressed immigrant, to the
African, to the Indian, to Jew and Gentile, to Catholic and Protestant, to
those who differed from him, to those who reviled him. Another striking
characteristic was his courage. A few years since I was for a few days in
London, hurrying homeward. The July riots had just taken place in New York, and
I feared that they would spread to other cities, and in that case Mr. May's
very nobleness would draw upon him the blind fury of the mob. Expressing dread
of this to an
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English
lady, formerly a resident of Boston, she said, “Have no fear of Mr. May. He is
one of the most courageous men I have ever known. I saw him withstand the old
mob against anti-slavery, and I know him."
There
are those here who know this quality in him. Many of you can doubtless recall
with me how, for rescuing a slave, fellow citizens of ours were dragged from
court to court over this State, and how thrilling it was when another great,
good citizen* stood up and said publicly in that storm, “Why persecute those
men? Samuel J. May and I did the deed."
Another
characteristic was his patience. Few know how this was tried; not merely by the
poor and needy, but by every man or woman with this or that plan of
regenerating the universe; by that most trying class, whose poor glimmering
spark of genius is smothered in half knowledge or absurdity or conceit. For all
these his time and patience were limitless.
And
to those who refused to work with him, refused to recognize him as a brother,
refused to return the civility of his call, who thought it their duty to hold
him up to public reprobation, and to misrepresent him--for those there was
never a word of reproach. I heard him speak plaintively of this once, but not
at all bitterly.
We
who have grown up here, whether in other creeds or not, know something of this.
Let any young man, no matter of what church, speak, no matter on what subject,
and he was sure to see Mr. May in the front ranks of his audience, encouraging,
looking on the bright side, strengthening him during his effort, counselling
him after it.
____________________
*
Gerrit Smith.
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And
all these and a host of other good qualities were real, and they were real
because they were rooted in Christianity.
The question has been
asked, was Mr. May a Christian?
My
friends, there are certain parts of the Scriptures which no criticism will ever
touch. Biblical students may remove this or that addition to the original text;
but the Sermon on the Mount--the "First commandment, and the second which
is like unto it,"--the depiction of pure religion and undefiled by St.
James,--these shall stand forever, for they are based upon eternal verity.
Judged by these--judged by every utterance of the Founder of
Christianity--Samuel J. May was one of the purest and most perfect of
Christians.
When
the Sermon on the Mount was read this afternoon, it seemed prophetic of the
man. It was not--" Blessed are the pure in heart--who accept the
thirty-nine articles;" not, " Blessed are the peacemakers--who
subscribe to the decrees of the Council of Trent;" not, "Blessed
are ye when men shall revile you--provided ye agree to the Westminster
catechism ;"--no. The blessings of that greatest of utterances since the
world began, were without human test, and they fell upon our friend in full
measure, and his life was the radiant witness of them, and we all saw them.
Yes,
my friends, he was the best Christian man we have ever known. Had our Lord come
on this earth again and into these streets any time in these thirty years, he
was sure of one follower. Came He as black man, or red man, or the most
wretched of white men, came He in rags or sores, this, our dear friend, would
have known Him and followed
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Him,
no matter what weapons, carnal or spiritual, were hurled at the procession.
To
him came the words of the Master he so fully believed in, "Inasmuch as ye
have done it unto the least of one of these, ye have done it unto Me." To
us come those other words, brushing away all formulas, “By their fruits shall
ye know them."
My
friends, I account it among the greatest of blessings that it was given me to
know this man, and I shall always rejoice that on the last afternoon of his
life I spent a most delightful hour with him, and bore away his blessing.
REMARKS of REV. T. J. MUMFORD, of DORCHESTER, MASS.
Born
in Beaufort District, South Carolina, where four-fifths of the inhabitants were
slaves, the son of a slaveholder, until I was twenty years old, I believed in
slavery as a divine institution, and carried a bible in my pocket to defend it
against all comers. When the faithful hands of noble Quaker women removed the
sacred veil which had concealed the monstrous features of the system, and I saw
clearly at last that it was not of celestial, but infernal origin, I soon lost
all faith in my religious teachers, who seemed to declare that man was made for
the church and not the church for man. I was almost drowning in a sea of
skepticism, when Samuel J. May came to the town in Western New York where I
lived.
As
soon as I saw his radiant face and heard his sweet yet earnest voice, I felt
drawn to him by a mighty magnetism. It became my first desire to share in the
blessed work that he was doing, to follow him, although with feeble
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steps,
and a great way off, in going about doing good. Since that day, all of my life
that I can look back upon without regret and shame, I owe to the inspiration of
his example and the power of his encouragement. No other friend has exerted
such an uplifting influence upon my spirit. Therefore, I could not resist the strong
attraction which has drawn me here today. There are many other things which I
should find relief and joy in saying, but these threatening clouds admonish me
to be content with reciting a hymn which expresses what is in all our minds and
hearts.
Calmly, calmly lay him down!
He hath fought a noble fight;
He hath battled for the right;
He hath won the fadeless crown.
Memories, all too bright for tears,
Crowd around us from the past;
He was faithful to the last,
Faithful through long, toilsome years.
All that makes for human good,
Freedom, righteousness and truth,
These, the objects of his youth,
Unto age he still pursued.
Kind and gentle was his soul,
Yet it had a glorious might;
Clouded minds it filled with light,
Wounded spirits it made whole.
Huts where poor men sat distressed,
Homes where death had darkly passed,
Beds where suffering breathed its last,
These he sought, and soothed, and blessed.
Hoping, trusting, lay him down;
Many in the realms above
Look for him
with eyes of love,
Wreathing his immortal crown.
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REMARKS of REV. E. W. MUNDY
Friends
:--We might remain until the
midnight, telling of the worth of Mr. May. But his deeds speak more potently
than any words which we can utter, and our poor rhetoric is wholly inadequate
to set forth his virtues. His life has been an uninterrupted beneficence. Want
and sorrow never appealed to him in vain. His presence diffused continual
blessings. When the unfortunate and the suffering in our city had exhausted
every other means by which to obtain relief, they knew that after all else
failed, they could go to Mr. May, and that he would open some way for them. In
the activity of a long life, he has been counsellor and friend to us all; and now
at his grave there come calmness and cheerfulness and high resolve into our
hearts, as we look for the last time upon the dear dead face.
To
the younger clergy of this region Mr. May has been a constant friend. He has
appreciated our difficulties; he has understood our perplexities; he has
cheered and strengthened us by his wise suggestions and by the contagion of his
irrepressible hopefulness. We have called him Father for the love that we bear
him, and now there is left to us the inheritance of his example, his spirit and
his work. His influence descends upon us as a perpetual benediction.
Today,
as hour after hour the people passed along that they might look once more upon
the features they loved so well, there came with the crowd an Indian. For a
moment he stood quiet, and then the hard brown face broke into tears, and he
sat down and sobbed like a child. That bereaved Indian expressed the feelings
of us all. White people and black people and red people, learned and ignorant,
old and young, poor and rich, Catholic and Protestant and Infidel,--we have a
common sorrow, and drop our tears upon the grave
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of
one who was a common friend. He knew neither sect nor color, nor nationality;
but he saw in all men his brothers, and his ear was ever open to their words
and his hand ever extended in their aid. The fresh generosity and beauty of his
life is well symbolized in the fragrant flowers which loving hands have brought
to his tomb, and the maturity and perfectness of his work is strikingly
suggested in the ripened wheat sheaf which lies upon his coffin. His work is
well done. His earthly life has been well lived. And his death was peaceful and
bright as the setting of the sun.
The
last day of his stay on earth, was one of pleasure to him and to the friends
who saw him; and with the disappearing twilight he passed into the glory of the
other world. As sung by the poet,
"He sat in peace in the sunshine
Till the day was almost done,
And then at its close an angel
Stole over the threshold stone."
"He folded his hands together,
He touched his eyelids with balm,
And his lost breath floated upward,
Like the close of a solemn psalm."
THE END
A
hymn was sung, when the casket was deposited in the grave. The children then
came forward, each one dropping a bouquet upon the bosom of their late and
beloved pastor, friend and guide, as they passed. The services closed with a
BENEDICTION BY MR. MILLS
So
this mortal puts on immortality; this corruptible puts on incorruption. That
which was sown in weakness is raised in power.
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Man,
born of woman, is of few days. Like the flower of the field he fadeth, and full
quickly goeth to decay. Man, the offspring of the skies, his being quenchless,
is heir to the immensities and the forever.
This
our brother, whose mortal remains we now commit to the keeping of the grave,
has ascended, and become seized of his estate. For well on earth, had he read
and learned his horn-book for the skies.
As
he enters there, beaming, devoted, and loving--all worlds open to receive him,
angels rise up to greet him, the infinite bosom itself warms to welcome, to
embrace him.
So,
may we too live, that when to each of us, one after another, the hour shall
come, we also may find death to be birth, and time but the door, that opens to
us the eternities of God.
In Peace