given to change do rise up to unhinge the wellestablished churches in this land from these principles, it will be the duty and interest of the churches to examine whether the men of this trespass are more prayerful, more watchful, more zealous, more patient, more heavenly, more universally conscientious, and harder students, and better scholars, and more willing to be informed and advised, than those great and good men who left unto the churches what they now enjoy: if they be not so, it will be wisdom for the children to forbear pulling down with their own hands the houses of God which were built by their wiser fathers, until they have better satisfaction.'

Later (1859), in an "Address at the One Hundred and Fiftieth Anniversary of the General Association of Connecticut," Dr. Hawes says, respecting the faith of the First Church in Hartford, "Slight deviations there may have been, but never such as to shake or mar the fundamentals of its faith, its first faith. Always Calvinistic, always holding the great essentials of New-England orthodoxy, it has never swung from the foundations on which it was built by Hooker and Stone, nor been carried about or disturbed by any of the many winds of doctrine that have swept over the land."

Notwithstanding this adamantine firmness of faith, Dr. Hawes was as tolerant of the differences and divergences of other men from himself as one of his cast of character could well be. To those who were moving towards the light he was conciliatory and sympathetic; but with those who, in

these days of illumination, were receding, as he thought, from the great central truths into darkness, he had little patience. His contentment in Christ was too great to allow of that speculative unrest which causes to some so much discomfort. He was blessed with too-frequent revivals to leave room for much vacillation and uncertainty about his creed. He was not properly a schoolman, except where Christ is the Master. "Nothing," he Nothing," he says, “will settle a wavering mind like a spirit which delights to sit at the feet of Jesus."

This Hartford pastor adhered strongly to the Congregational polity. He believed that it was more simple and effective, more ancient and biblical, than any other; that it tends more to intelligence, to freedom from all hierarchical oppression and political entanglements, and to that civil and religious liberty which the gospel inculcates.

After attending a meeting of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in 1831, and observing the long processes of discipline from the session to the presbytery, from the presbytery to the synod, and from the synod to the General Assembly, he made this brief entry in his journal : "Too long a team: I should not like to be harnessed in it." Later, he lost all satisfaction in the "Plan of Union," where both the parties came under the bands of presbytery, and by which some two thousand churches originally Congregational are now included in the Presbyterian unity. He thought it too much like the old English statutes for marriage, by which the twain were made one; but the one was always the man.

But his fellowship of the various evangelical denominations was catholic and most cordial. "If there is any one thing," he said, "for which Congregationalism is distinguished, it is its unsectarian, its broad, catholic spirit towards other branches of the Christian Church."

He felt the need of a little more ecclesiastical and doctrinal unity, especially in his later years. In his discourses before the Congregational Board of Publication in 1859, he says, "We are a large, a growing, an enterprising, and a progressive denomination. What we want is a little more ballast, a little more steadiness of helm in working the ship; in a word, more organic unity, more compactness of association, of creed and order. If you ask how this can be effected, it is not for me to mark out the plan. I believe it to be practicable; and I have the strongest conviction of its great importance to the purity, growth, and spiritual influence of our denomination. I have hoped I should live to see it. Let this be done in the true spirit of Christian concession and love, and done so it must be, if done at all, and I should be almost ready to exclaim with Simeon of old, 'Now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace.

CHAPTER XVII.

Dr. Hawes as a Preacher and Philanthropist.

ROM the time when Dr. Hawes first decided on

the Christian ministry, preaching was the uppermost thought with him. This, more than any thing else, formed his character, and gave its impress to his people, and, so far as he was able, to the times in which he lived. "To be accounted worthy to preach the gospel," he wrote, "is the highest honor for which I pant, - the only object for which I would spend my strength and life." This was his noblest ambition.

"Go preach the gospel" came as a commission from the Master, directly from heaven; and to obey was with him both a necessity and a delight. He might fail; but he felt it was divinely decreed that he should try. This feeling was as a fire in his bones, and would burn and blaze out. He began lay-preaching almost as soon as he commenced his preparation for college; and he continued it, as he had opportunity, while studying and teaching, as well as in his vacations. While engaged as an assistant in Phillips Academy, he wrote to a friend, "School-keeping is not my chosen employment:

it is foreign to the great object of my life; and I cannot, therefore, be happy in it."

His attention was early drawn to the apostle Paul as a model; and of one of his first written sermons he says, "I have lately been meditating a discourse on the character of Paul as a preacher. It has been running in my mind all day; and has so seized my thoughts, that I cannot get rid of it." A few days later he writes, "If I succeed in drawing his character as a preacher, I cannot but hope it will be of use to me as well as to others. It seems to me that in this respect he is perfect. It is a more difficult task than I imagined; but I love him more than ever, and feel more desirous to imitate him in zeal, fidelity, and plainness in dispensing the Word."

The analysis of the character of Dr. Hawes as a preacher discloses the following as regulative and formative ideas:

First, he felt that the great object of the gospel is the restoration of men, as sinners, to God and holiness, through Christ. The first sermon that he preached in the seminary was on "The Dominion of the Heart over the Intellect," from Luke xxiv. 41: "They believed not for joy." "In composing this sermon," he says, "I often offered up the prayer, that my simple object in every discourse I write might be to win souls to Christ, and to feed his sheep and lambs."

Next to this came his feeling of dependence for success in preaching on the efficacy of prayer. He never left his study to preach without prayer. He never went to a lecture or prayer-meeting, when