Ana səhifə

Life and Letters of Rev. Aratus Kent Introduction


Yüklə 1.75 Mb.
səhifə9/48
tarix24.06.2016
ölçüsü1.75 Mb.
1   ...   5   6   7   8   9   10   11   12   ...   48


Years rolled away and 2 days since I again visited Elk Grove, and entered that log-house. The tavern has become a sanctuary and its whitened walls and temporary accommodations presented an aid and comfort.

It was an Ecclesiastic meeting, Six of your missionaries were there and 4 of them have the prospect of being soon installed as pastors. Twelve or fourteen churches represented there were organized by their instrumentality and all within the district which once constituted my missionary field. It was then a moral waste, for we could gather at that time from the whole area but six individuals to organize The First Presbyterian Church.

It was a Communion season. They had come together to break bread. The company of disciples were enlivened by the return from his journey of the Pastor of this church and 2 of those leading men who once stood aloof were office bearers in the church and brought in the sacramental elements.

My eyes affect my heart and when called to administer at the Lord’s table I could not but exclaim, What hath God Wrought.

The labours of your missionaries have, with God’s blessing, produced these results; and that it is a genuine work of God’s spirit I will cite another incident to prove.

At the house where I spent the night found one of those converts in alot of pain and distress. She had suffered long, but she was cheerful. I saw her sometime since when she was full of apprehension that she might be deceived. But now her doubts were all removed and she had no choice whether to live or to die. Her feelings were similar to those of a coloured woman who said to me last week on her sick bed: “If my Lord would but come for me, I would hardly look back to see whether earth’s iron gate were shut after me.”

If there be one of your patrons who doubts whether his contributions to Home Missionary Society are well appropriated I would that he could have been at that communion table. For myself I can say that the most splendid Gothic structure with it marble and cushioned seats and curtained pulpit and silver toned organ could never yield me the exquisite please I enjoyed in one hour spent in that sanctified tavern.

A. Kent


_________

Galena, Ill., Oct. 23, 1847

Dear Br.,

I have just returned from another tour (to Beloit & to Stephenson Co. where our Presbytery met) and was disappointed at getting no answer to my letter of enquiry which I perceive you have had published (and in which there is a typographical error- “If my Lord would come for me”- makes the sentiment beautiful- “comfort me” spoil the sentence.) I think if your mind laboured as mine has done with the question which you have sprung upon me you would not long delay an answer.

We have dismissed from our Presbytery Brs. Norton and Waterbury. And we have need that God should strengthen the things that remain and are ready to die.

Br Henry[?] was with me 2 weeks since. He has been very ill for 2 months, and I suppose from fear of giving others trouble - I have urged him to stay with me but he declines. One night he went went, after preaching, to find a lodging with his brother and at the lights went out he laid him down on a pile of manure (supposing it hay) and from the dampness he caught cold which brought on the sickness and has prostrated for the time his iron frame. I have urged him to come over and explore this region where I suspect he could accomplish more than at Dubuque, but he fears to do so without your direction. Please advise him if you judge best to spend some weeks exploring Northern Ill. and perhaps some in Wisconsin.

Yours affectionately,

A. Kent


[Margin] I regret that I cannot copy and remodel this whole communication.

____________

Galena, Nov. 17, 1847

Rev. & Dear Brother,

The subject of our correspondence has been long now before my mind to demand of me a definite reply. After vacillating from one side to the other according as various reasons and influences have operated I have gradually inclined to one side until the conclusion has been reached that the providence of God seems to me to foresee my acceptance of this agency, which in flattering terms you have repeatedly pushed upon me.

At the same time I regard it in light of an experiment and consent to spend 3/4 of the time for one year, reserving 1/4 to serve my own people, because they utterly refuse an immediate divorce, in the present internal posture of our affairs. Our church having been greatly reduced by the diversion of members not only to the 2 churches in town but also by great numbers having gone to churches which have started into being within 2 or 3 years in this vicinity.

The project they have hit upon is to employ a young man as an assistant for the present and Mr. Neil has already been informally invited to serve them and he has taken it into consideration, which will [put] Elizabeth in a state of destitution, which must be supplied to quiet Br Downer.

I have come to this decision under the full view of responses to which I shall be subjected.......[a long passage is illegible due to faded ink]

[On verso] I break the seal to say that Br. Neil has refused to preach for us and I know not how long I may struggle to supply our people.

A. Kent


__________

Galena, Feb. 14, 1848

Dear Br.

A considerable time has elapsed since I wrote signifying my decision to engage in the work which you suggested and I have also declared the decision to my people, and this situation is one of no little embarrassment in the struggle it will involve to sustain 3 Presb. Churches. They depend in me for present supply and I cannot break away from them without some previous notice. It seems to me therefore important that I should understand the views of your Committee more in detail that I may have time to make arrangements without unnecessarily prejudice to other interests.

I should not however have written you but I thought possibly my letter has not been received or had been overlooked amidst the many letters you receive, for I believe that it is some three months since I wrote.

Yours, etc.,

A. Kent

_________



Galena, March 16/48

Dear Brother,

I have received your letter requesting me to give some account of Northern Ill. with a view to publication. But I cannot think that I ought to attempt any such thing short of a year from this time. It would certainly be out of place for me to appear in your report again until I have something to say.

I feel greatly embarrassed also from the position in which I have been left for some months.

I was requested by Br. Badger to accept an agency for your society and assumed that when I has consented to serve, the further preliminaries would be settled. I examined the question of duty and decided to engage in your service and was obliged of course to notify my people of the fact and since that time hence waited for a commission, until my friends here as well as myself are wondering but what is the cause of the delay. I anticipate a good many unpleasant things in such an agency and not the least that some will be willing enough to say ye take too much upon you ye sons of Levi, especially if I begin to move before I have a formal commission. I have had one such rebuff already which is quite enough to serve me for some time.

I wrote on the 14 of Feb. to remind Br. Badger of my embarrassment but as yet have heard no response, and began to think that perhaps objections has come in from some of the Br. on the field, which led your committee to hesitate about the expediency of the measure. And I travelled over the ground last fall in order to give the Brethren the fullest opportunity to object of they should see cause. And if such objections exist I have a little field, formerly occupied by Br. Littlefield which I have been cultivatng this winter and to which I can retreat with the hope of being both useful and happy.

But a decision I must be allowed to insist on as soon as shall comport with the convenience of your respected Committee.

The people here will depend on me as long as they can and that without the prospect of pay or usefulness or at least the prospect is but dim.

I have written in great haste but hope that amidst the press of business you will not over look their considerations.

Yours affectionately, A. Kent

P.S. I thank you for naming Mr. Atterbury. I hope you will continue to think of us. Dr. Newhall’s wife was buried today and I have not communicated with him.

___________

Galena, Ill., April 8/48

Dear Br.


We seem not to understand one and oother and I will explain.

In the first letter of Br. B. I was told that if I would consent to asct as your agent, the details would be made satisfactory afterwards and in his second letter the same thing was repeated. I offered my consent to the society in reply to which I heard nothing more until I received your last inviting me to provide something for your annual report, and in that you gave me no details except some suggestions about the limits of my field to the south.

I then wrote espressing my surprise and embarrassment that I had waited 3 or 4 months and had received no details and no commission, expressing my unwillingness to act until I received a formal commission, and giving (hastily indeed) some reasons for this unwillingness.

In your last of March 22 you supposed I have received all the necessary details and then add, “Please to make then (i.e., other details) the subject of special inquiry and we will do our best to answer them.”

Now I begin to see where the misunderstanding is you have taken for granted that I understand fully the very thing and the only thing on which my mind laboured. I have no trouble about raising collections for your society, for I feel willing to preach on that subject whenever it seems to me to be a duty, and I think I can raise enough or nearly so to pay the agent.

I have no trouble about the salary for if you give me too much I can refund it and if you give me too little for the support of my family (which you will not be apt to do being yourselves dependent on the same means of support) I can fall back upon the income of my patrimony which is devoted to purposes of general benevolence and which you will not feel at liberty to draw upon, and here I might throw in a few words to show that our accustomed economy will not sustain us when I am away from home more of the time.

I have a sick wife and 5 children to provide for at an expensive age, one 22, one 18, one 14, one 13, one 10 and one 8 years old, and within 24 hours this week I had 5 of your missionaries together with 3 of their wives, along with 3 horses. I have to practice hospitalityand make no complaint, and only glance at other things to show that my expenses will not be lessened by the agency. But I am entitled to a living while I labour for H[ome Missionary Society] and if it is not furnished by H. Society, it will still be within my reach.

I have but little trouble about the limits of the field, though I still think that I can do more good by confining my labours to the 14 northern counties. But I do not intend to be obstinate. But the one thing that bothers me is that you do not define my position further. The details I expect were in your report on the duties of an agent. I supposed that in my commission you would instruct your agent to do certain things, so that when he was thought to be taking too much upon himself he might produce his credentials. I have read over the duties of an agent in your last report, but I imagined that the details to which you refer would be a more particular enumeration of an agent’s duties.

I would gladly be excused from giving an opinion of Br. Gilbert's probable usefulness. He is a good Br., so dar as I know, and I know nothing to his prejudice, but a lamentable destitution of energy. He can preach well and I should think that if he were to fall in with a substantial working church who would stand by and encourage him, he might yet do well. But he is not fitted to guide a ship in a storm, and hence is nothing else at Buffalo Grove. You may smile at my illustration, but if we could place him under an exhausted excercise and supply him with pure oxigen [sic] or let him breathe ether, he would become efficient.

Agents duties: Let me explain my embarrassment by an illustration. In approving a missionary's application I suggested that he should visit some out-posts more and rewrite his report and give you a more detailed account. He was quite displeased and intimated that I was wanting in sympathy for poor missionaries. The only thing I dread is this treading on the toes of good men, and I thought it would aid me to have instructions as much in detail as might be.

A reason (which you perhaps do not appreciate but which has greatly influenced my judgement) for confining my labours to the 14 northtern counties is that the rail road and canal going through them will occasion a rush to northern Ill. for the next five years. This will require attention of an agent to take advantage of circumstances and act promptly. Dear Br., I hope I have given you a clear view of my difficulties and embarrassments.

Yours affectionately,

A. Kent

__________



Galena, May 29, 1848

Rev. & Dear Sir:

I have just reached home after an absence of 19 days and while I regret having taxed your patience with writing so long a communication I am happy to say that it is quite satisfactory, for it gives me the authority to which I can appeal and upon which I can fall back when I have occasion to say things to missionaries and churches which they will not like to hear. Indeed the suggestions will be of great use in guiding my agency.

In respect to salary, $500 will be sufficient to cover our annual expenditures (for we mean to practice economy as a virtue), and I do not wish anything more than a support. My eyes are very weak and I cannot write or read much at present. I am apprehensive that I shall not be able to cover much during the long hot days of summer, for several days past I have rode from 5 to 9 and laid by during the middle of the day.

I have made you some trouble in removing my embarrassments, but I will give you a brief summary from my journal as a specimen of my way [of] operating.

I have travelled during the last 19 days 300 miles (98 of which was along the banks of Rock River), visited 32 families and 8 ministers, preached 10 times to 7 different congregations destitute of the regular administration of Presbyterian preaching, distributed a respectable quantity of tracts and bound volumes, and engaged 4 or 5 persons to undertake the work of systematic monthly tract distribution in the country which will serve 100 families. I have also visited the 2 departments of the high school at Geneseo and addressed the pupils and prayed with them. I have moreover spent 2 days at Beloit, during which time we appointed 2 professors for the College and took measures to move forward boldly in the great and responsive effort of establishing that infant institution on a permanent basis.

You will not expect so minute a report ordinarily, but I thought you would be interested in what has greatly interested me.

I obtained one subscription for the “Home Missionary”. His address is Dea. J. Powers, Gap Grove, Ill., and the dollar which he paid I expended in paying my expenses at the tavern in Dixon, Lee. Co., whence I spent Sabbath (May 21), and I accomplished something for I not only preached twice in the Methodist Church, but I shamed some of the people and obtained a standing invitation to partake of the hospitality of God : and that may be of use to me as I pass the river at that point in future journeys. That 120 cents, together with 20 cents for toll there, was all that I expended during the trip including 4 times crossing Rock River. If you will therefore send the Dea. your paper for one year without charge to me, I will charge nothing for expenses on my first trip as your agent.

Yours, etc.,

A. Kent


__________

[Freeport, Ill., July 26, 1848]

[Salutation missing]

There is a beautiful spot in the prairie on the side of a grove, where a discreet and devoted missionary of good abilities may find a home and a hearty welcome. It is in the immediate vicinity of 2 intelligent families who know the heart of a stranger and who will not suffer him to want any good thing. It is an eminently healthy situation and one to be desired for its prospective natural advantages. It is presumed from present appearances that the population on that prairie will increase 50 per cent annually, and the assurance is boldly given that such a preacher will secure a congregation of 150 at his regular Sabbath appointment. Where is the hardship of Home Miss. life when such a fields lie neglected for want of labourers?

There is another center of 5 or 6 miles distance where a Presb. Church is organized, and where such a minister might gather another congregation equally large in the afternoon of the same Sabbath, and where he might obtain 50 or 100 Dollars for his services. Such a minister might reasonably expect, with God’s blessing, in 5 or 10 years to build two strong churches where is chaos, (or at least at one of those points).

Should the missionary be a single man, one family offers to furnish board and a study without charge.

I dare not mention the locality lest it should induce men to throw churches in there who cannot find a support at the East, and who come out to this country without commission as encouragement from your committee.

We wish all who come to fall in with existing ecclesiastical organizations, whether Congregational or Presbyterian, and not disturb the peace of the churches and wound the feelings of the old settlers by requiring us to conform to their views.

The field I have described is Waddam’s Grove251[251] 15 miles west of Freeport and 35 miles east of Galena, and, next to Freeport, is the most populous precinct in this populous and wealthy county. Its county (not Freeport) is building 100 brick houses this year.

If Mr. Geo. Clark is still in the city, Mr. Hallock will be pleased to show this to him. If not, I shall have relieved my own mind by making this statement.

Yours truly,

A.K.


________

[Not in Kent's hand]

Galena, Aug. 14, 1848

To the Secretaries of the Am. Home Miss. Soc., New York

Dear Brethren,

The Rev. Charles A. Behrends, an ordained minister of the German Reformed Church, having lately come among us to labor at Galena & other places on the vicinity among our German population & there being a necessity of obtaining some missionary aid in order that he may be sustained in his work. We wish to make a few statements in respect to his mission here to the Executive Comm. of the A. H. Miss. Soc. through you.

There must be in this city between five & six hundred Germans. It is proposed that Bro. Behrends also labor at “Small Pox” - a precinct eight miles east & at Tete de Mort in Iowa, six miles west, where Bro. Henry has heretofore preached, coming a distance of sixteen miles. At Small Pox there are two hundred Germans & at Tete de Mort about a hundred more. This excludes the Catholic Germans. Altogether about a thousand Germans can be reached, more or less, directly by this Mission. The prospect is, too, that Tete De Mort will be exclusively settled by Germans ere long.

Many of these Germans at all these points have been connected hitherto with the “Reformed” & “Lutheran” Churches. They will probably unite as in other places in an “Evangelical” Church : to induce those who give satisfactory evidence of piety : to unite in a church organization & there is a disposition to do so.

The congregations at all these points are very encouraging. Sixty attended on the first Sabb. Bro. B. preached here : and eighty the next. Bro. Henry has had here in the winter season : as many as a hundred & forty & a hundred & fifty. At Small Pox Bro. B. had sixty yesterday : and at Tete de Mort : Bro. Henry had a congregation of seventy or eighty before the Bishop forbade the Catholics to attend & now has forty or fifty. Many more will attend these places when the appointments become settled & regular.

Yesterday Bro. Behrends requested a subscription to be taken up by those willing to sustain Evangelical preaching : $43 was subscribed in the city congregation & $24 at Small Pox. At Tete de Mort nearly $50 was subscribed for Br. Henry. Altogether something on $100 will be raised in the three places. In a year or two they will do a great deal better. The last year & present are difficult years in respect to raising subscriptions among an emigrant population owing to lands coming into market, etc. etc.

Bro. Behrends comes to us from Pennsylvania having been ordained by Lebanon Classes of the Ger. Ref. Church at Palmyra 13th of May. His theological studies during the past year have been persued at Mercersburg, but previously at Arnhem in Holland in a theological school which grew out of the ejection of certain ministers by the National Synod in 1834. We have confidence in him as an Evangelical, pious, & devoted minister of Christ. He has commenced his work energetically in this city & his prospects of usefulness are promising. The Germans have hitherto been almost entirely neglected, and as their number and importance increases, it is very important that they be supplied with suitable ministers. We think Bro. B. such a one & calculated to do a work exceedingly needed among them. In additon to his Sabbath labors here in the forenoon & at Small Pox in the aft, he has commenced a Wednesday evening prayer meeting & a friday evening lecture. At the latter service some infidels attend.

Now : Brethren: can you not pledge to this Misision $300 for the coming year? You know something of the importance of this point as a commercial city rapidly increasing in population, wealth, etc., etc. The Germans form a doubly interesting & exceedingly important portion of our population. They are in the main industrious, prudent, orderly artisans & offer peculiar opportunities of usefulness to a faithful minister of Christ. We are persuaded that upon no field in this vicinity occupied either by American or foreign emigrants could your liberality be more wisely bestowed & we hope that this earnest appeal may not be in vain,

Geo. Magoun (2nd chh.)

F. Henry (Dubuque)

Monday afternoon. I concur fully with the views expressed and had previously arrived at the same conclusions with respect to the man and the field so far as opportunity had been afforded me but I thought better to defer action for 2 or 3 weeks that we might know more of the man and he more of the public and their ability and had made provision to supply him in certain necessities (He has a wife and 4 little boys). I know no reason however to defer action.

Yours, A. Kent

p.s.: I has a long conversation upon his religious views and regard him truly pious.

[not in Kent’s hand]

As Bro. Henry happened to be present coincidentally we have requested him to join us in this testimony & recommendation. He will write further on the subject in his next report.

Bro. Behrends commenced his labor July 30th, a commission had better last from that time or the first Sabbath in August.

I think it proper to say further that Bro. Behrends does not share at all in the speculative High Churchism which as is very well known prevails at Mercersburg to some degree. He was advised by Don Schass not to apply for aid to the A. H. M. Soc. : but he choose to do so from a liberal evangelical sympathy with the denominations who sustain the Soc. He is in the New England sense an evangelical man.

G. M.


_____________

Napiersville, Aug. 29, 1848

Dear Br.

On my return from Chicago I wish to say things which I shall be in danger of forgetting if they are not passed on.

1   ...   5   6   7   8   9   10   11   12   ...   48


Verilənlər bazası müəlliflik hüququ ilə müdafiə olunur ©atelim.com 2016
rəhbərliyinə müraciət