Mr. Leonard was a writer of rare accomplishments. Had he chosen literature for a profession, and cultivated more fully his rare poetic gifts, his name might have been prominent among the writers of the country.
He was an enthusiastic lover of nature, and delighted to dwell in her outer temple. He had a sunny nature, and wherever he lived, won hosts of friends by his geniality and radiant joyousness of heart. The truest, most cultivated and intelligent of all denominations welcomed him to their companionship, and recognized the purity of his life, the elevation of his thought, and his rare intellectual endowments.
Rev. Abraham Norwood began preaching in Annisquam, Mass., and was ordained in 1833. He had been a student with Rev. Sylvanus Cobb, in Malden. He was a member of the Congregationalist Church in early life; but, finding himself dissatisfied and troubled with his theology, he gave much attention to the study of the Bible, and became thereby a firm believer in Christian Universalism. He had a clear and vigorous intellect, and great aptness in setting forth his opinions. He was settled in South Dennis and Marblehead, Mass., in Fiskville, R. I., in Canton, Mass., and in Salisbury, from 1845 to 1855. He then went to Meriden, Conn., and acted as State missionary, with rare fidelity, for six years. He was widely known in Connecticut, and, after the close of his regular ministerial labors, served the town of Meriden in several positions of trust. He was warmly interested in education, and a faithful and devoted laborer in the Temperance cause. Besides his work as a preacher and pastor, he wrote and published two books,—"The Book of Abraham," and "The Pilgrimage of a Pilgrim." While marked with the quaintness of the author, they are direct and telling in their setting forth of Christian truth.
Rev. Charles Spear was a remarkable man; a printer by trade, a philanthropist by nature, a self-sacrificing Christian by divine grace. He was quiet and unostentatious, but persistent as fate in his work. He was a Massachusetts man. He commenced life in humble condition, and his constant liberality to every object and form of distress kept him poor. His high religious zeal and strong philanthropy forced him into the ministry, and into ministrations especially connected with human degradation and suffering: the abandoned, the outcast, the down-trodden, the intemperate, and especially the prisoner, were his parishioners. His absence of mind, forgetfulness of self, and disregard of (if not inability in) pecuniary matters, often subjected him to painful embarrassments when from home; but that Providence on which he relied for aid as for guidance, always provided friends and means to deliver him. Mr. Spear's work on Capital Punishment, and his larger one on the "Titles of Jesus," are readable and valuable books. Besides these, his literary labors produced "Voices from Prison," and a periodical called (like himself) "The Prisoner's Friend," extended through several years. Had he belonged to almost any other denomination than the Universalist, he would have been much more widely known and more highly praised during life, and his death would have been announced and his funeral attended with greater eulogy and higher honors. Previous to his death he had been chaplain in the St. Elizabeth Hospital in Washington, D. C., where he died in April, 1863. His wife was a faithful helper in his hospital work. His funeral services in Washington were attended by a Presbyterian (Dr. Sunderland). The body was removed to Boston for burial.
Rev. James W. Putnam, who died in Danvers, Mass., where he had been a beloved and successful pastor, was a man of admirable qualities. He was just past forty when he departed. Rev. Dr. Miner said of him, in an address on the funeral occasion, that he had known the deceased twenty-four years before, when a pupil in New Hampshire,—a boy in years, but a man in character:—
"As a pastor for sixteen years in one parish, where he constantly grew in strength, in the affections of his people, in the opportunities for public usefulness, serving not only his parish, but the town, the sure test of his worth is to be seen. His character was so well rounded, so complete, so efficient in all particulars, that no one trait seemed to predominate over another. He was very modest and unassuming. When Tufts College conferred an honorary degree upon him, it was so unexpected that, though he saw the statement in the papers,—saw his own name,—he did not suspect that it meant himself, but some other person! He had given the highest evidence of his hold upon his people. Twice he represented the town in the legislature, an experience which often breaks the pastoral relation and sows the seed of disaffection. But he came back from that official service to a united parish."
His settlement in Danvers was his only one. Calls to other parishes with strong financial inducements were declined. He felt that the pastoral relation should be broken as seldom as possible, a consideration which, if more generally regarded, would be of great blessing to many churches.
Rev. James W. Dennis was pastor in Stoughton, Mass., for ten years. He was justly and highly esteemed. Much afflicted with a painful and fatal disease, he had great conflict of mind because of his inability to meet all his duties as he desired; the sympathies of his people were strongly enlisted in his behalf, and they shared with him in some measure his trials. He died in the triumphs of the unfailing hope of the Gospel, and was buried by his friends of the church in the cemetery which his own words had helped to consecrate. "It was an affecting sight," writes one, speaking of his funeral obsequies, "and a sure testimony of the profound esteem in which he was held. Little children, tearful women, and strong men were bowed in deepest grief. I shall never forget the appearance of one old patriarch who approached the coffin with tottering steps, laid his hand upon the head of the deceased, and then placing it upon his own forehead, turned away with an expression of the deepest sadness, as though he had lost a treasure never to be replaced in this world. I saw him again at the cemetery, standing at the door of the sepulchre, with eyes suffused, his gray hairs fluttering in the wind, and his head bowed in the attitude of prayer." Mr. Dennis died in 1863, aged thirty-eight.
Rev. Henry B. Soule was of Dover, Duchess Co., N. Y. He was another instance of "the pursuit of knowledge under difficulties" in his youthful days. He was determined to educate himself, and through much anxiousness and privation and toiling he found his way in 1835 to Clinton Liberal Institute in New York, where he was afterwards a tutor. The next year he was encouraged to prepare for the ministry by his kind and honored friend, Rev. S. R. Smith. His first work as a pastor was at Fort Plain, N. Y. He was subsequently at Troy, Utica, and in 1844 removed to Boston and became assistant pastor with Rev. Hosea Ballou. Here he proved himself adequate to his position. His sermons were forcible, well arranged, and calculated to convince the understanding and enlist the affections. A year's pastorate in Gloucester was a happy one. Then he was minister in Hartford, Conn., where his first sermon was preached to forty-one, his second to sixty-four hearers, and his last to a crowded house. In 1852 his ministry in Lyons, N. Y., commenced. At the end of its first month he had suddenly departed,—a victim of that fearful disease, small-pox. But his bright life shed its radiance back upon many souls who had been blest by his ministries, and his name has since been an honored one in our churches. His widow, who survived him, has won an honorable reputation in our church by her literary publications, and by her devotion to our missionary interests under the auspices of the Woman's Centenary Association, of which she was the first president, and in whose employ she has for three years labored faithfully as a missionary in Scotland. An interesting biography of her husband was prepared by her and given to the public in 1852.
Rev. Obadiah H. Tillotson, of New Hampshire, was an active worker in the ministry; a successful pastor in Worcester, Mass., Hartford, Conn., Northfield, Vt., and in other places. He departed this life in 1863. He was a ready speaker, and was ardent and resolute in his ministerial work. "His ability," writes a friend, "as a public debater was signally shown in a protracted discussion (in Worcester) with a religious opposer who was put forward to defeat him if possible. Four nights the contest went on, and the result was a complete success. He more than met the expectations of his friends, and the opponent afterwards acknowledged that of all his contests (and he was a gladiator) Mr. Tillotson was the strongest opponent he had ever met. There was much of sunshine in his soul, and it beamed out upon others in his social life. For a time he studied and practised law, but his old love for the ministry returning, he entered it again with renewed zeal, and continued earnest and faithful in its work unto the end."