On the 16th of March, 1862, our church edifice was dedicated to the worship of Almighty God, Dr. Asa D. Smith, of Dartmouth College, delivering the dedication sermon, and in the evening, my brilliant and beloved brother, Professor Roswell D. Hitchcock, gave us one of his incisive and inspiring discourses. The building accommodates eighteen hundred worshippers, and in emergencies, twenty-five hundred. It is a model of cheerfulness and convenience, and is so felicitous in its acoustics that an ordinary conversational tone can be heard at the opposite end of the auditorium. The picture of the Church in this volume gives no adequate idea of the size of the edifice; for the Sunday School Hall and lecture-room and social parlors are situated in the rear, and could not be presented in the photographic view. I fear that too many costly church edifices are erected that are quite unfit for our Protestant modes of religious service. It is said that when Bishop Potter was called upon to consecrate one of the "dim religious" specimens of mediaeval architecture, and was asked his opinion of the new structure, he replied: "It is a beautiful building, with only three faults: you cannot see in it—you cannot hear in it—you cannot breathe in it."
I need not detail the story of my happy Brooklyn pastorate; for that is succinctly given in the closing chapter of this volume. Our home-life here for the past forty-two years has been a record of perpetual providential mercies and unfailing kindness on the part of my parishioners and fellow townsmen. Brooklyn, although removed from New York (for I cannot yet twist my tongue into calling it "Manhattan") by a five minutes' journey on the East River Bridge, is a very different town in its political and social aspects. New York is penned in on a narrow island, and ground is worth more than gold. It is therefore piled up with very fine apartment houses for the rich, or tenement houses for the poor to more stories than the ancient buildings on the Canongate of Edinburgh. Here in Brooklyn we have all Long Island to spread over, and land is within the reach of even a parson's purse. A man never feels so rich as when he owns a bit of real estate, and I take some satisfaction in the bit of land in the front of my domicile, and in the rear, capable of holding several fruit trees and rose-beds. Oxford Street has the deep shade of a New England village. We come to know our neighbors here, which is a degree of knowledge not often attained in New York or London. The social life here is also less artificial than at the other end of the bridge. There is less of the foreign element, and of either great wealth or poverty; we have neither the splendor of Paris, nor the squalor of the by-streets of Naples. The name of "Breucklen" was given to our town by its original Dutch settlers, but the aggressive New Englanders pushed in and it is a more thoroughly Yankee city to-day than any city in the land outside of New England. My old friend, Mayor Low, urged the consolidation of Brooklyn with New York on the ground that its moral and civic influence would be a wholesome counteraction of Tammany and the tenement-house politics. For self-protection, I joined with my lamented brother, the late Dr. Storrs, in an effort to maintain our independence. Ours is pre-eminently a city of homes where the bulk of the people live in an undivided dwelling, and I do not believe that there is another city either in America, or elsewhere, that contains over a million inhabitants, so large a proportion of whom are in a school house during the week, and in God's house on the Sabbath.
[Illustration: THE LAFAYETTE AVENUE CHURCH.]
One of the glories of Brooklyn is its vast and picturesque "Prospect Park," with natural forests, hills and dales and its superb outlook over the bay and ocean.
I hope that it may not be a violation of propriety to say that the Park Commissioners in this city of my adoption bestowed my own name on a pretty plot of ground not far from my residence; and its bright show of flowers makes it a constant delight to my neighbors. Last year some of my fellow-townspeople made an exceedingly generous proposition to place there a memorial statue; and I felt compelled to publish the following reply to an offer which quite transcended any claim that I could have to such an honor:
176 SOUTH OXFORD STREET, JUNE 12, 1901.
MESS JOHN N. BEACH, D.W. MCWILLIAMS, AND THOMAS T. BARR.
My Dear Sirs,
I have just received your kind letter in which you express the desire of yourselves and of several of our prominent citizens that I would consent to the erection of a "Memorial in Cuyler Park" to be placed there by voluntary contributions of generous friends here and elsewhere. Do not, I entreat you, regard me as indifferent to a proposition whose motive affords the most profound and heartfelt gratitude; but a work of art in bronze or marble, such as has been suggested, that would be creditable to our city, would require an outlay of money that I cannot conscientiously consent to have expended for the purpose of personal honor rather than of public utility. Several years ago the city authorities honored me by giving my name to the attractive plot of ground at the junction of Fulton and Greene Avenues. If my most esteemed friend, Park Commissioner Brower, will kindly have my name visibly and permanently affixed to that little park, and will direct that it be always kept as bright and beautiful with flowers as it now is, I shall be abundantly satisfied. I have been permitted to spend forty-one supremely happy years in this city which I heartily love, and for whose people I have joyfully labored; and while the permanent fruits of these labors remain, I trust I shall not pass out of all affectionate remembrance. A monument reared by human hands may fade away; but if God has enabled me to engrave my humble name on any living hearts, they will be the best monument; for hearts live on forever. While declining the proffered honor, may I ask you to convey my most sincere and cordial thanks to the kind friends who have joined with you in this generous proposal, and, with warm personal regard, I remain,
Yours faithfully,