THOMAS WENTWORTH HIGGINSON.
PATRIOT AND MAN OF LETTERS.
HOMAS WENTWORTH HIGGINSON is one of the group of men of whom their countrymen should be most proud. He has taken a noble part in the battles on behalf of freedom, which the last half-century has seen, and everywhere has borne himself with a nobility, a devotion and a courage worthy of all praise. The man who was driven from his church because he preached the freedom of the slaves, who sat with Parker and Phillips under indictment for murder for their part in attempting to rescue a fugitive slave, who was colonel of the first regiment of freed slaves mustered into the army of the United States, who bravely fought and patiently suffered for the cause of the Union; surely this man, if he had no other claims upon our respect and attention, should hold a high place in the hearts of his fellows.
Colonel Higginson is a native of Cambridge, Massachusetts, and in 1847, when he was twenty-four years old, became pastor of a Congregational Church in Newburyport, Massachusetts. Here his anti-slavery preaching allowed him to remain but three years. From 1852 until 1858 he was pastor of a free church in Worcester, after which he left the ministry and devoted himself to literature. During all this time his activity in the anti-slavery agitation was frequently getting him into trouble, and, with his friends who participated in the attempted rescue of Anthony Burns, he was discharged from custody only through a flaw in the indictment. He took part in the organization of the bands of free-state, emigrants to Kansas, and was personally acquainted with John Brown. With his regiment of colored troops, he took possession of Jacksonville, Florida; but was wounded in 1863 and was compelled to resign from the army. He has been an earnest advocate of equal suffrage for men and women and of the higher education for both sexes. He has served in his State Legislature and as a member of the State Board of Education.
Colonel Higginson’s contributions to literature consist largely of volumes of essays that originally appeared in the “Atlantic Monthly” or other periodicals, and historical and biographical work. Some of his best known books are “Atlantic Essays;” “Young Folk’s History of the United States;” “Young Folk’s Book of American Explorers;” “Short Stories of American Authors;” “A Larger History of the United States;” “The Monarch of Dreams;” and “Brief Biographies of European Statesmen.” Besides these, he has translated his “Young Folk’s History of the United States” into German and French for publication in those languages, and has also published a number of English translations of modern and ancient classics. Colonel Higginson is one of our most popular writers, particularly upon American history, and his service to the cause of American letters has been no less distinguished than his share in the great victory which made our country in truth the land of the free.
“A PURITAN SUNDAY MORNING.”[¹]
FROM “ATLANTIC ESSAYS.”
[¹] Copyright, Geo. R. Shepard.
T is nine o’clock upon a summer Sunday morning, in the year sixteen hundred and something. The sun looks down brightly on a little forest settlement, around whose expanding fields the great American wilderness recedes each day, withdrawing its bears and wolves and Indians into an ever remoter distance—not yet so far removed but a stout wooden gate at the end of the village street indicates that there is danger outside. It would look very busy and thriving in this little place to-day but for the Sabbath stillness which broods over everything with almost an excess of calm. Even the smoke ascends more faintly than usual from the chimneys of the numerous log-huts and these few framed houses, and since three o’clock yesterday afternoon not a stroke of this world’s work has been done. Last night a Preparatory Lecture was held, and now comes the consummation of the whole week’s life, in the solemn act of worship. In which settlement of the great Massachusetts Colony is the great ceremonial to pass before our eyes? If it be Cambridge village, a drum is sounding its peaceful summons to the congregation. If it be Salem village, a bell is sounding its more ecclesiastic peal, and a red flag is simultaneously hung forth from the meeting-house, like the auction-flag of later periods. If it be Haverhill village, then Abraham Tyler has been blowing his horn assiduously for half an hour—a service for which Abraham, each year, receives a half pound of pork from every family in town.
Be it drum, bell, or horn that gives the summons, we will draw near to this important building, the centre of the village, the one public edifice: meeting-house, town-house, schoolhouse, watch-house, all in one. So important is it, that no one can legally dwell more than half a mile from it. And yet the people ride to “meeting,” short though the distance be, for at yonder oaken block a wife dismounts from behind her husband; and has it not, moreover, been found needful to impose a fine of forty shillings on fast trotting to and fro? All sins are not modern ones, young gentlemen.
We approach nearer still, and come among the civic institutions. This is the pillory, yonder are the stocks, and there is a large wooden cage, a terror to evil-doers, but let us hope empty now. Round the meeting-house is a high wooden paling, to which the law permits citizens to tie their horses, provided it be not done too near the passageway. For at that opening stands a sentry, clothed in a suit of armor which is painted black, and cost the town twenty-four shillings by the bill. He bears also a heavy match-lock musket; his rest, or iron fork, is stuck in the ground, ready to support the weapon; and he is girded with his bandolier, or broad leather belt, which sustains a sword and a dozen tin cartridge-boxes.
O the silence of this place of worship, after the solemn service sets in! “People do not sneeze or cough here in public assemblies,” says one writer triumphantly, “so much as in England.” The warning caution, “Be short,” which the minister has inscribed above his study-door, claims no authority over his pulpit. He may pray his hour, unpausing, and no one thinks it long; for, indeed, at prayer-meetings four persons will sometimes pray an hour each—one with confession, one with private petitions, a third with petitions for Church and Kingdom, and a fourth with thanksgiving—each theme being conscientiously treated by itself. Then he may preach his hour, and, turning his hour-glass, may say—but that he cannot foresee the levity to be born in a later century with Mather Byles—“Now, my hearers, we will take another glass.”
