Читать книгу The Bay State Monthly. Volume 2, No. 6, March, 1885 - Various - Страница 2

By Rev. S. Leroy Blake, D.D

[Pastor of the Calvinistic Congregational Church, Fitchburg.]

This is not a biography, it is a sketch; possibly I might say it is an outline. At any rate the life of our subject can not be written till other chapters are added, and the end comes. May it be long delayed.

The intense culmination of forces in the busy period of a man's life renders it fruitful in material for a sketch. What a successful man, of marked force of character, has done, may be an incentive and an encouragement to others. Perhaps this was Longfellow's chief thought when he penned the "Psalm of Life:"

The lives of great men, and conspicuously that of the subject of this sketch, prove that, in this country, a boy need not be born with a silver spoon in his mouth, nor with a brilliant speech on his lips, to reach eminent success, and be held in high honor; but that the noblest results of a life of industry and frugality, and the highest honors any worthy ambition can crave, are within reach of the boy who has energy, courage, integrity of purpose, and purity of character. By their native energy some of the most conspicuous men of our time have made their way against obstacles which would have been too much for less sturdy wills. Whatever deficiencies there may have been in their early training were largely atoned for by native energy and force of character. Because this is all true of the subject of this paper, we tell the story in the hope that some other struggling boy may take courage from his example.