H. Ballou 2d.
Of all the worthies in this company of church leaders of which we are speaking, not one of them is entitled to a higher place than Hosea Ballou, D. D., or "2d," as he was called before the doctorate was conferred upon him. A rare man was he, a clear-headed and closely logical thinker, an untiring student, one of the soundest of preachers, and humblest and noblest of men. We have no fear of using language too strong in our statement of his character, its pre-eminence and worth. An editor of a volume of his discourses has given it, on the title-page, from Laman Blanchard:—
"His thoughts were as a pyramid up-piled,
On whose far top an angel sat and smiled,
Yet in his heart was he a simple child."
He was of Guilford, Vt., born there in 1796. His parents were Baptists, but the thoughtful and studious boy, before the age of nineteen, had embraced Universalism. He began early the study of Latin and Greek, and gave much attention in later days to ecclesiastical history. He was pastor in Stafford, Conn., and in Roxbury and Medford, Mass. He was for some years one of the editors of the "Universalist Magazine," and afterwards of the "Quarterly," a publication which under his supervision was a most creditable addition to the literature of the Christian Church. His most valuable contribution to this literature is his "Ancient History of Universalism," the result of long and patient research in a new field of inquiry, and which proved to be a work of acknowledged merit. It settled at once and for all time the loose statement that Universalism was a new doctrine, not known to any extent in olden times. Some of the brightest lights in the Christian Church are recognized as its early advocates. Harvard University, of which he was for some years a trustee, conferred upon him its honorary degree of D. D.; and Tufts College, for which he had anxiously pleaded and diligently labored, elected him her first president. "His scholarship," writes another, "was not only general and varied, but exact in details, and frequently astonishing by its minute acquaintance with things and events out of the ordinary channels of information; and his knowledge was so unostentatiously held, and kindly and modestly imparted, that it required special inquiry to elicit it, and seemed but natural to him. His gentle manners and readiness to impart information, and his mild and loving spirit, won for him the esteem of all who became acquainted with him, so that their admiration of the scholar and teacher were often lost in their affection for the friend."
Two brothers of Dr. Ballou, Levi and William S., were for years preachers and pastors in New England. William resided in the West for a time, where he died in 1865. Levi was pastor of the Universalist Church in North Orange, Mass., for nineteen years. Clear-minded, gentle, and yet forcible men were they, making good proof of their ministry.
Rev. Edward Turner was for years one of the ablest ministers in the Universalist Church. He was born in Medfield, Mass., July 28, 1776, and was in early life sent to the school of the celebrated Hannah Adams and her sister. In 1786 his family removed to Sturbridge, Mass., and in his seventeenth year he was at Leicester Academy. He was educated under "orthodox" influence, and used to say that he "held the minister in such fearful reverence that he would jump over the wall to hide himself if he saw that he must meet him on the road." The towns in the section of Worcester County in which he lived were among those where Universalism was first preached. Oxford, especially, was one of its strongholds, the first Convention having met there when he was ten years old. In such a neighborhood he could not have lived long without hearing something of the "strange doctrine," but all that is known is, that he is said to have been a Universalist as early as his sixteenth or seventeenth year. He began to preach in 1798, when, at the age of twenty-two, he preached his first sermon at Bennington, Vt. He first appears in the public records of the Universalists in 1800, when it is stated that a Letter of License was given him by the General Convention. From this time until 1824 his name appears in the records nearly every year. He is mentioned in the records of the Convention for 1803 as of Sturbridge and also of Charlton, from which it is inferred that both these towns had societies of which he was pastor. In 1809 he removed to Salem, Mass. Here he remained till June, 1814, when he accepted a call to Charlestown, Mass. In March, 1824, he accepted an invitation to Portsmouth, N. H., where he continued till the spring of 1828. He was afterwards minister in Charlton, his old home, and at Fishkill Landing, N. Y. In 1841 he removed to Jamaica Plain, to a home left by a son-in-law, where he passed the remainder of his days. He was twice married. He occasionally preached up to the last. He was present as one of the bearers at the funeral of his old friend and co-worker, Mr. Ballou, June 9, 1852, and departed this life Jan. 24, 1853.
With the opinions of the elder Ballou in regard to future (or no-future) punishment he had no sympathy; and an estrangement somehow grew up, which led him to connect himself, later in life, with the Unitarians, instead of remaining with those in the Universalist ministry, such as H. Ballou, 2d., the Streeters and Skinners, Rev. L. Willis, Thomas F. King, and others, whose opinions coincided with his own. A severe illness in 1811 wrought a marked change in him. Before this he was quite robust and erect, afterwards he appeared more feeble. Previous to this sickness, like Mr. Ballou, he had been exclusively an extemporaneous preacher, and is said to have been one of the "rousing" sort,—live, vehement, electric; but from this period his whole manner changed, and his ordinary preaching became subdued, languid, what is called "moderate," at times, perhaps, even heavy. Dr. E. G. Brooks, in an excellent biographical notice of him, says:—
"He had immense latent power. At times, when kindled by some great occasion, or stirred by opposition or some peculiar circumstance, this came out. Then he preached with all his old fire, and sometimes rose into impassioned and commanding eloquence. 'All the fountains of the great deep' within him 'were broken up,' and thought and feeling came in a flood. Rev. Russell Streeter writes me, 'On Convention occasions he was, on the whole, second to no one.' My parents tell me that he was 'sometimes very animated.' They speak particularly of one sermon in Portsmouth, called forth by some bitter outbreak of opposition, when he preached with surpassing effect. Others report similar instances. Doctrinal sermons in abundance he preached, but even those most argumentative and most sharply controversial were flavored with a religious meaning and reasoned to practical ends. He never preached a sermon that was merely doctrinal, but always made dogmatic discussion subordinate to moral impression. Though in a mistaken estimate of duty, as we believe, he separated from us, his name can never be taken out of our records as one of the worthiest of our early heroes, nor his work cease to be an occasion of gratitude and honorable pride to us, nor his reverent and saintly character fail to be one of the most precious portions of our denominational inheritance."[39]