Log College Press is the Place to Find American Presbyterian Psalters and Hymnals

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Have you visited our Compilations page lately? It is the home for many interesting works by denominations or groups of authors, but today we are highlighting the assembled psalters and hymnals which represent the sacred song utilized in the praise of God by American Presbyterians. This project is ongoing, but we invite you to check out what is currently available.

Psalters

  • The Psalms of David in Meeter [Kirk of Scotland] (1650)

  • The Book of Psalms [UPCNA] (1871)

  • The Book of Psalms: The Scottish Version Revised, and the New Versions Adopted by the United Presbyterian Church of North America [UPCNA] (1871)

  • The Psalter of the United Presbyterian Church of North America [UPCNA] (1887)

  • The Psalms: A Revision of the Scottish Metrical Version With Additional Versions [RPCNA] (1888)

  • The Psalter: With Music [RPCNA] (1890)

  • The Psalter, or, Book of Psalms: A Revision of the Metrical Version of the Bible Psalms, With Additional Versions [RPCNA] (1893)

  • The Psalter With Music [UPCNA] (1900)

  • The Psalms in Meter [Joint Committee] (1905)

  • The Psalter, or, Book of Psalms: A Revision of the Metrical Version of the Bible Psalms, With Additional Versions [RPCNA] (1907)

  • The New Metrical Version of the Psalms [Joint Committee] (1909)

  • The Psalter With Responsive Readings [UPCNA] (1912)

  • Psalter Hymns: For Use in Families, Sabbath Schools and Bible Classes, Young People's Societies, Prayer Meetings, and Union Services [UPCNA] (1912)

  • The Book of Psalms: Rendered in Metre and Set to Music [RPCNA] (1912)

  • The Book of Psalms: Rendered in Metre and Set to Music [RPCNA] (1920)

Note that the first Psalter employed by the RPCNA (besides the 1650 Scottish Metrical Psalter which it inherited - which is true for all branches of American Presbyterianism as well) was produced by William Wallace Keys in 1863, and is known to history as the Keys Psalter.

Hymnals (including Psalter-Hymnals)

  • [Isaac Watts] Psalms, Carefully Suited to the Christian Worship in the United States of America: Being an Improvement of the Old Versions of the Psalms of David; Allowed, by the Reverend Synod of New York and Philadelphia, to be Used in Churches and Private Families [PCUSA] (1787)

  • [Isaac Watts] Psalms, Carefully Suited to the Christian Worship in the United States of America: Being an Improvement of the Old Versions of the Psalms of David; Allowed, by the Reverend Synod of New York and Philadelphia, to be Used in Churches and Private Families [PCUSA] (1787, 1794)

  • Psalms and Hymns Adapted to Public Worship, and Approved by the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in the United States of America [PCUSA] (1830)

  • [George Fleming] Psalms and Hymns, Adapted to Public Worship, and Approved by the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in the United States of America [PCUSA] (1834, 1835)

  • Sacred Harmony: A Selection of Plain Tunes Adapted to the Use of the Psalms of David [Associate Reformed Synod of New-York] (1834)

  • Devotional Hymns Adapted to Social, Private and Public Worship [Old School PCUSA] (1842)

  • Church Psalmist, or, Psalms and Hymns: For the Public, Social, and Private Use of Evangelical Christians [New School PCUSA] (1843)

  • Parish Psalmody: A Collection of Psalms and Hymns For Public Worship (1844)

  • The Presbyterian Psalmodist: A Collection of Tunes Adapted to the Psalms and Hymns of the Presbyterian Church in the United States of America [PCUSA] (1852)

  • Hymnal of the Presbyterian Church [PCUSA] (1867)

  • Psalms and Hymns For the Worship of God: Approved by the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in the United States, at Its Meeting in Memphis, Tennessee, November, 1866 [PCUS] (1867)

  • The Sacrifice of Praise: Psalms, Hymns, and Spiritual Songs Designed For Public Worship and Private Devotion, With Notes on the Origin of Hymns (1869)

  • The Presbyterian Hymnal [PCUSA, music and words] (1874)

  • The Presbyterian Hymnal [PCUSA, words only] (1874)

  • The New Psalms and Hymns [PCUS] (1901)

  • Bible Songs: A Collection of Psalms Set to Music For Use in Church and Evangelistic Services, Prayer Meetings, Sabbath Schools, Young People’s Societies, and Family Worship [UPCNA] (1901)

  • The Book of Common Worship [PCUSA] (1906)

  • The Psalter Hymnal: The Psalms and Selected Hymns [UPCNA] (1927)

Note that other hymnals are available on individual pages, such as Archibald Alexander, A Selection of Hymns, Adapted to the Devotions of the Closet, the Family, and the Social Circle (1831); Leonard Woolsey Bacon, Congregational Church-Music; With 150 Psalms and Hymns (1854); Nathan Sidney Smith Beman, Sacred Lyrics: or, Select Hymns, Particularly Adapted to Revivals of Religion, and Intended as a Supplement to Watts (1832) and Sacred Lyrics, or Psalms and Hymns Adapted to Public Worship (1841); Louis FitzGerald Benson, The Hymnal (1895) and The Chapel Hymnal (1898, 1910), as well as others; Henry Augustus Boardman, A Selection of Hymns: Designed as a Supplement to the “Psalms and Hymns” of the Presbyterian Church (1861) and Hymns of Praise (1867); George Buist, A Collection of Hymns for Public and Private Worship, Approved by the Presbytery of Charleston (1796); Thomas Cleland, Evangelical Hymns, For Private, Family, Social, and Public Worship (1831); Henry Sloane Coffin, Hymns of the Kingdom of God: With Tunes (1910); William Coombs Dana, A Collection of Hymns: Supplementary to the Psalms and Hymns of Dr. Watts (1859); James Gallaher, New Select Hymns, Designed to Accompany Watts’ Psalms & Hymns (1835); Edwin Francis Hatfield, Freedom's Lyre: or, Psalms, Hymns, and Sacred Songs, For the Slave and His Friends (1840), The Church Hymn Book, With Tunes; For the Worship of God (1872), and The Chapel Hymn Book, With Tunes; For the Worship of God (1873); Robert Pollok Kerr, Hymns of the Ages For Public and Social Worship (1891); Willis Lord, Hymns of Worship: Designed For Use Especially in the Lecture-Room, the Prayer-Meeting and the Family (1858); James Lyon, Urania: A Collection of Psalm-Tunes, Anthems and Hymns (1761); Lowell Mason, Church Psalmody: A Collection of Psalms and Hymns, Adapted to Public Worship (1831), and more; James Ormsbee Murray, The Sacrifice of Praise: Psalms, Hymns, and Spiritual Songs Designed For Public Worship and Private Devotion, With Notes on the Origin of Hymns (1869); Samson Occom, Hymns (1773 and A Choice Collection of Hymns and Spiritual Songs (1774, 1785); Charles Seymour Robinson, Songs of the Church: or, Hymns and Tunes For Christian Worship (1862, 1864), Songs For the Sanctuary: or, Hymns and Tunes For Christian Worship (1865, 1867), Psalms and Hymns, and Spiritual Songs: A Manual of Worship For the Church of Christ (1875); Philip Schaff, Hymns and Songs of Praise For Public and Social Worship (1874); Gardiner Spring, The Brick Church Hymns, Designed For the Use of Social Prayer Meetings and Families, Selected From the Most Approved Authors and Recommended by Gardiner Spring, D.D., Pastor of Said Church (1823); Nathan Strong, The Hartford Selection of Hymns From the Most Approved Authors (1799); Thomas DeWitt Talmage, Many Voices; or, Carmina Sanctorum (1891); Robert Ellis Thompson, The National Hymn-Book of the American Churches (1893); Henry Jackson Van Dyke, Jr., The Church Psalter: One Hundred and Four Psalms Arranged Under Subjects For Responsive Reading (1891); James Patriot Wilson, Sr., Hymns For Social Worship, Collected From Various Authors (1817); and Samuel Ramsey Wilson, Hymns of the Church, Ancient and Modern, For the Use of All Who Love to Sing the Praises of God in Christ, in the Family, the School, or the Church; With a Discourse on Music as a Divine Ordinance of Worship (1872); among many others.

There is much matter here for those who wish to explore how early American Presbyterians offered “the sacrifice of praise, the fruit of lips” (Heb. 13:15) in the sanctuary. The questions raised by the regulative principle of worship about the content of song to be used (inspired psalms or uninspired hymns), as well as the propriety and practicality of instrumental accompaniment, are dealt with in a whole other body of literature to which we have alluded in the past. This collection on the pages of Log College Press is drawn to a great extent from the Louis FitzGerald Benson Collection of Hymnals and Hymnody at the library of Princeton Theological Seminary, as well as from a variety of other sources. We continue to add more literature related to psalmody and hymnody often so be sure to check back here periodically as our collection grows.

What's New at Log College Press? - December 20, 2022

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At the close of 2022, Log College Press is staying very active as we continue to expand the site and make accessible even more literature from early American Presbyterians.

Last month, in November 2022, we added 582 new works to the site. There are currently over 17,000 free works available at LCP. Today we are highlighting some of the new free PDFs available as found on our Recent Additions and Early Access pages, two features provided to members of the Dead Presbyterians Society.

Some highlights at the Early Access page:

  • Two works by Thomas Cleland, A Familiar Dialogue Between Calvinus and Arminius (1805, 1830); and The Socini-Arian Detected: A Series of Letters to Barton W. Stone, on Some Important Subjects of Theological Discussion, Referred to in His "Address" to the Christian Churches in Kentucky, Tennessee, and Ohio (1815);

  • Abraham Brooks Van Zandt, God's Voice to the Nation: A Sermon Occasioned by the Death of Zachary Taylor, President of the United States (1850);

  • Cornelius Van Til, The Defense of the Faith (1955); and Christianity and Barthianism (1962);

  • John Murray, The Reformed Faith and Modern Substitutes (1935-1936); and The Application of Redemption (1952-1954) [a series of many articles which served as the basis for his 1955 book Redemption Accomplished and Applied];

  • Geerhardus Vos, A Song of the Nativity (1924, 1972) [a Christmas poem]; and

  • early sermons by Francis James Grimké, Our Duty to the Poor — How We Observed It on Christmas (1881); Wendell Phillips: A Sermon Delivered Sunday, Feb. 24, 1884, at the Fifteenth Street Presbyterian Church, Washington, D.C. (1884); Our Future as a People (1890), each of which was contributed by a reader.

Some highlights at the Recent Addtiions page:

Also, be sure also to check out the quotes we have been adding at our blog for DPS members: Though Dead They Still Speak, including John Holmes Agnew: The Lord Loves the Gates of Zion; B.B. Warfield on Theological Study as a Religious Exercise and on What it Means to Glorify and Enjoy God; William H. Green on How the Child of God May Rightly Undergo Frowning Providences; John Murray: To the Calvinist Who Once Struggled With the Arminian Idea of Free Will; E.C. Wines: Christ is the Fountain of the Promises; James Gallaher on the Difference Between Calvinism and Fatalism; William S. Plumer's Suggested Guidelines for Making Family Worship More Profitable; Elizabeth Prentiss on Dying Grace; and T. De Witt Talmage: The Sabbath a Taste of Heaven.

We appreciate hearing from our readers if they find matters needing correction, or if they have questions about authors or works on the site, or if they have suggestions for additions to the site. Your feedback helps the experience of other readers as well.

Meanwhile, please feel free to browse the many resources available to our readers in print and in digital format. There is a lot to explore, and many Presbyterian voices from the past to hear. We look forward to seeing what the Lord has in store for Log College Press in 2023. Thank you, as always, for your interest and support, dear friends, and best wishes to you in the New Year!

Introducing the Century Club at Log College Press

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Among the nearly 2,000 authors found at Log College Press there are at least three centenarians (Arthur Judson Brown [1856-1963, 106]; William Rankin III [1810-1912, 102]; and George Summey [1853-1954, 101]), as well as at least three authors who were 99 years old when they entered into their eternal rest (Littleton Purnell Bowen, David Caldwell, and Maria Fearing). But the Log College Press Century Club which we are introducing today has to do with something a little different.

To be a member of this club, there must be at least 100 works by (and sometimes about) the author on their particular pages. At this point in time, there are 27 such individuals in the LCP Century Club, as follows:

There are some other prolific writers who we anticipate may join this club at some point in the future, such as Isabella Macdonald Alden, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Finley Milligan Foster, Robert Jefferson Breckinridge and Cleland Boyd McAfee, to name a few. As the Lord gives us strength and ability, we continue to add works by these and many other writers. We still have our work cut out for us, especially, for example, with respect to T.L. Cuyler, who penned over 4,000 separate published articles. Meanwhile, if viewed as a snapshot of our most prolific authors, the LCP Century Club invites readers to explore a representative cross-section of early American Presbyterianism. We hope you will take this opportunity to see what’s available among these prolific writers’ pages (as well as those not-so-prolific), and to enjoy a visit to the past, which we trust will be a blessing to you in the present.

What's New at Log College Press? - November 15, 2022

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As the year winds down, Log College Press remains in high gear as we continue to expand the site and make accessible more and more literature from early American Presbyterians.

Last month, in October 2022, we added 494 new works to the site. There are currently over 16,000 free works available at LCP. Today we are highlighting some of the new free PDFs available as found on our Recent Additions and Early Access pages, two features provided to members of the Dead Presbyterians Society.

Some highlights at the Early Access page:

Some highlights at the Recent Addtiions page:

  • Philip Schaff edited both The American Church History series and A Select Library of the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church (first and second series). All of the above has now been added to Log College Press (approximately 23,000 pages of material);

  • Working for the Presbyterian Board of Publication, William M. Engles edited the 12-volume British Reformers series, which has now been added to his page;

  • The full run of The Penn Monthly Magazine under Robert E. Thompson’s editorship (13 volumes);

  • Dozens of works by Theodore L. Cuyler, Benjamin M. Palmer and Thomas DeWitt Talmage;

  • Joshua L. Wilson’s 1845 first sermon on witchcraft; and much more.

Also, be sure also to check out the quotes we have been adding at our blog for DPS members: Though Dead They Still Speak, including George Howe on the importance of a well-educated spiritual ministry; E.S. Ely on the duty of civic rulers to "kiss the Son"; Alexander Proudfit on the Biblical qualifications for public office; and Robert D. Wilson’s life plan to defend the Old Testament.

We appreciate hearing from our readers if they find matters needing correction, or if they have questions about authors or works on the site, or if they have suggestions for additions to the site. Your feedback helps the experience of other readers as well.

Meanwhile, please feel free to browse the many resources available to our readers in print and in digital format. There is a lot to explore, and many Presbyterian voices from the past to hear. Thank you, as always, for your interest and support, dear friends.

New Resources at Log College Press - June 15, 2022

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If you are a member of the Dead Presbyterians Society at Log College Press, you may have noticed some interesting new material added to the site. If you are not yet a member, perhaps the list below will whet your appetite.

In the month of April 2022, we added 650+ new works as well as 23 new authors. In May 2022, we added 512 new works and 40 new authors. At present, on Log College Press, we have over 14,000 works by over 1,900 authors.

Often we list the most interesting material first at the Early Additions page to give our members a sneak preview. Some works there at present include:

  • Articles by John Murray on The Theology of the Westminster Standards and The Fourth Commandment According to the Westminster Standards;

  • Correspondence by Robert J. Breckinridge to President Abraham Lincoln;

  • William B. McGroarty’s 1940 study of the history of The Old Presbyterian Meeting House at Alexandria [Virginia], 1774-1874;

  • Louis Voss’ 1931 survey of Presbyterianism in New Orleans and Adjacent Points;

  • A fascinating 1860 article by William S. Plumer titled Mary Reynolds: A Case of Double Consciousness;

  • David Ramsay’s 1789 Dissertation on the Manners of Acquiring the Character and Privileges of a Citizen of the United States; and

  • In 1848, a London edition of Matthew Henry’s famous commentary of the Bible (which was completed by other hands after his death after Henry finished his comments on Romans) was published which includes notes from Charles Hodge on Romans and notes from John Forsyth on the exposition of James (written originally by Samuel Wright).

Also, of note among many titles at the Recent Additions page:

  • Charles Paschal Telesphore Chiniquy (1809-1899), Fifty Years in the Church of Rome (1886) — Chiniquy was a Canadian-born Roman Catholic priest-turned Presbyterian minister who wrote about the errors of his former ways and the dangers of Roman Catholicism;

  • Reviews by John Forsyth of various volumes of William B. Sprague’s Annals of the American Pulpit — Sprague’s Annals are widely considered to be his magnum opus and Forsyth’s reviews are a valuable introduction to this remarkable set of biographical sketches;

  • David Holmes Coyner (1807-1892), The Lost Trappers (1847, 1855) - Coyner, a Presbyterian minister, wrote this volume as a true narrative of the wanderings of trapper Ezekiel Williams, who, according to Coyner, led twenty trappers up the Missouri River to the Rocky Mountains in 1807. One year later, seventeen of the twenty had died, and the three survivors decided to separate. Two started for Santa Fe, getting lost in the Rockies until they met a Spanish caravan bound for California, while Williams journeyed home by canoe on the Arkansas and Missouri rivers, though he was taken captive for a time by Indians in Kansas. Dismissed as fiction by some, modern scholarship has confirmed the factual basis for Coyner’s account;

  • David Joshua Beale, Sr. (1835-1900), Through the Johnstown Flood (1890) - This is a remarkable account of a major 19th century natural disaster by an eyewitness who lived through it;

  • Alexander McLeod, The Constitution, Character, and Duties, of the Gospel Ministry: A Sermon Preached at the Ordination of the Rev. Gilbert McMaster, in the First Presbyterian Church, Duanesburgh (1808) - This sermon by one noted Reformed Presbyterian minister at the ordination of another represents an important ecclesiological statement on the gospel ministry;

  • Eulogies on President George Washington by William Linn, David Ramsay and Samuel Stanhope Smith;

  • John Todd, An Humble Attempt Towards the Improvement of Psalmody: The Propriety, Necessity and Use, of Evangelical Psalms, in Christian Worship. Delivered at a Meeting of the Presbytery of Hanover in Virginia, October 6th, 1762 (1763) — This sermon on song in worship preached during the colonial era is a fascinating read;

  • William Edward Schenck, The Faith of Christ's Ministers: An Example For His People: A Discourse Commemorative of Benjamin Holt Rice, D.D., Preached in the First Presbyterian Church, Princeton, New Jersey, on Sabbath Morning, July 20, 1856 (1856);

  • Many works by Theodore L. Cuyler, J. Addison Alexander, James McCosh, Thomas De Witt Talmage, Henry Van Dyke, Jr., and numerous novels by Isabella Macdonald Alden, a prolific Presbyterian author, known best by her pen name, “Pansy,” written for young people primarily;

Also, take note of some works recently added to our Compilations page, such as:

  • The Constitution of the Presbyterian Church in the United States of America Containing the Confession of Faith, the Catechisms, the Government and Discipline, and the Directory For the Worship of God (1789);

  • A Narrative of the Revival of Religion, in the County of Oneida [New York], Particularly in the Bounds of the Presbytery of Oneida, in the Year 1826 (1826);

  • The Testimony of the United Presbyterian Church of North America (1858);

  • Overture on Reunion: The Reports of the Joint Committee of the Two General Assemblies of 1866-7, and of the Special Committee of the (N. S.) General Assembly of 1868 (1868)

  • The Confessional Statement of the United Presbyterian Church of North America (1926) — This document dramatically changed the worship and government of the UPCNA; and

  • Many psalters published by UPCNA and the Reformed Presbyterian Church of North America (RPCNA).

There is much more that is new to explore on these and other pages at Log College Press, and of course all that is new is old, so if you appreciate old treasures, please dive in and enjoy. We are always growing, and dusting off antique volumes for your reading pleasure.

De Witt Talmage: Seek the God of the Pleiades and Orion

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Seek him that maketh the seven stars and Orion (Amos 5:8).

Some of Thomas De Witt Talmage’s sermons are so rich in word-pictures that they appear to us as a bright as the night sky far away from any electric lights. A case in point comes from his discourse on “The Pleiades and Orion” in New Tabernacle Sermons (1886).

A country farmer wrote this text—Amos of Tekoa. He plowed the earth and threshed the grain by a new threshing-machine just invented, as formerly the cattle trod out the grain. He gathered the fruit of the sycamore-tree, and scarified it with an iron comb just before it was getting ripe, as it was necessary and customary in that way to take from it the bitterness. He was the son of a poor shepherd, and stuttered; but before the stammering rustic the Philistines, and Syrians, and Phoenicians, and Moabites, and Ammonites, and Edomites, and Israelites trembled.

Moses was a law-giver, Daniel was a prince, Isaiah a courtier, and David a king; but Amos, the author of my text, was a peasant, and, as might be supposed, nearly all his parallelisms are pastoral, his prophecy full of the odor of new-mown hay, and the rattle of locusts, and the rumble of carts with sheaves, and the roar of wild beasts devouring the flock while the shepherd came out in their defense. He watched the herds by day, and by night inhabited a booth made out of bushes, so that through these branches he could see the stars all night long, and was more familiar with them than we who have tight roofs to our houses, and hardly ever see the stars except among the tall brick chimneys of the great towns. But at seasons of the year when the herds were in special danger, he would stay out in the open field all through the darkness, his only shelter the curtain of the night, heaven, with the stellar embroideries and silvered tassels of lunar light.

What a life of solitude, all alone with his herds! Poor Amos! And at twelve o'clock at night, hark to the wolf's bark, and the lion's roar, and the bear's growl, and the owl's te-whit-te-whos, and the serpent's hiss, as he unwittingly steps too near while moving through the thickets! So Amos, like other herdsmen, got the habit of studying the map of the heavens, because it was so much of the time spread out before him. He noticed some stars advancing and others receding. He associated their dawn and setting with certain seasons of the year. He had a poetic nature, and he read night by night, and month by month, and year by year, the poem of the constellations, divinely rhythmic. But two rosettes of stars especially attracted his attention while seated on the ground, or lying on his back under the open scroll of the midnight heavens—the Pleiades, or Seven Stars, and Orion. The former group this rustic prophet associated with the spring, as it rises about the first of May. The latter he associated with the winter, as it comes to the meridian in January. The Pleiades, or Seven Stars, connected with all sweetness and joy: Orion, the herald of the tempest.

Talmage goes on to say:

In the first place, Amos saw, as we must see, that the God who made the Pleiades and Orion must be the God of order. It was not so much a star here and a star there that impressed the inspired herdsman, but seven in one group, and seven in the other group. He saw that night after night and season after season and decade after decade they had kept step of light, each one in its own place, a sisterhood never clashing and never contesting precedence. From the time Hesiod called the Pleiades the "seven daughters of Atlas" and Virgil wrote in his Aeneid of "Stormy Orion" until now, they have observed the order established for their coming and going; order written not in manuscript that may be pigeon-holed, but with the hand of the Almighty on the dome of the sky, so that all nations may read it. Order. Persistent order. Sublime order. Omnipotent order.

What a sedative to you and me, to whom communities and nations sometimes seem going pell-mell, and world ruled by some fiend at hap-hazard, and in all directions maladministration! The God who keeps seven worlds in right circuit for six thousand years can certainly keep all the affairs of individuals and nations and continents in adjustment. We had not better fret much, for the peasant's argument of the text was right. If God can take care of the seven worlds of the Pleiades and the four chief worlds of Orion, He can probably take care of the one world we inhabit.

Truly, what a great comfort it is to place our trust in the One who creates and governs the stars, as well as the Earth upon which we live.

In your occupation, your mission, your sphere, do the best you can, and then trust to God; and if things are all mixed and disquieting, and your brain is hot and your heart sick, get some one to go out with you into the starlight and point out to you the Pleiades, or, better than that, get into some observatory, and through the telescope see further than Amos with the naked eye could—namely, two hundred stars in the Pleiades, and that in what is called the sword of Orion there is a nebula computed to be two trillion two hundred thousand billions of times larger than the sun. Oh, be at peace with the God who made all that and controls all that—the wheel of the constellations turning in the wheel of galaxies for thousands of years without the breaking of a cog or the slipping of a band or the snap of an axle. For your placidity and comfort through the Lord Jesus Christ I charge you, "Seek Him that maketh the Seven Stars and Orion."

Our preacher continues further:

Oh, what a mercy it is that in the text and all up and down the Bible God induces us to look out toward other worlds! Bible astronomy in Genesis, in Joshua, in Job, in the Psalms, in the prophets, major and minor, in St. John's Apocalypse, practically saying, "Worlds! worlds! worlds! Get ready for them!" We have a nice little world here that we stick to, as though losing that we lose all. We are afraid of falling off this little raft of a world. We are afraid that some meteoric iconoclast will some night smash it, and we want everything to revolve around it, and are disappointed when we find that it revolves around the sun instead of the sun revolving around it. What a fuss we make about this little bit of a world, its existence only a short time between two spasms, the paroxysm by which it was hurled from chaos into order, and the paroxysm of its demolition.

And I am glad that so many texts call us to look off to other worlds, many of them larger and grander and more resplendent. "Look there,' says Job, "at Mazaroth and Arcturus and his sons!" "Look there," says St. John, "at the moon under Christ's feet!" "Look there," says Joshua, "at the sun standing still above Gibeon!" "Look there," says Moses, "at the sparkling firmament!" "Look there," says Amos, the herdsman, "at the Seven Stars and Orion!" Don't let us be so sad about those who shove off from this world under Christly pilotage. Don't let us be so agitated about our own going off this little barge or sloop or canal-boat of a world to get on some "Great Eastern" of the heavens. Don't let us persist in wanting to stay in this barn, this shed, this outhouse of a world, when all the King's palaces already occupied by many of our best friends are swinging wide open their gates to let us in.

There is a reason why the Scriptures call us to look heavenward, at the celestial. In the words of John Calvin, “Job's intent here is to teach us to be astronomers” (commentary on Job 9). Although given dominion over this beautiful blue globe, and called to till the ground and give a good account of our stewardship, we who are created in the image of God are called to not be satisfied with the earthly and temporal, but to long for the heavenly and eternal. We are called to seek the God of the Pleiades and Orion. Read Talmage’s full sermon on this topic and many more here, and pause to meditate upon not only the wonders of creation, especially in the skies above, but to ponder the love of our God for such as we.

When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars, which thou hast ordained; What is man, that thou art mindful of him? and the son of man, that thou visitest him? (Ps. 8:3-4)

New Year's Wishes From Log College Press

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“So teach us to number our days, that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom." — Ps. 90:12

At the close of 2021, we at Log College Press wish to thank you, our dear readers, for your support and encouragement.

In years past, we have highlighted New Year’s sermons and meditations by Samuel Davies, Francis James Grimké, Benjamin Morgan Palmer, Henry Augustus Boardman, George Barrell Cheever, Elias Harrison, Erskine Mason, Gardiner Spring and others. This year we turn the spotlight on a message from Thomas DeWitt Talmage: Standards For the Measurement of Life: A New Year’s Sermon (1899).

How do evaluate or measure our mortal existence? That is a question for all of us, and an appropriate one at the close of one year and the beginning of another. Based on the text from Genesis 47:8 (“How old art thou?”), Talmage asks us to consider whether we are using a good standard to measure our time spent on this earth. As he notes, there are wrong ways to measure our time, and a right way. There are some, he says, who measure their years by the money they make, or the joys or sorrows they experience. “They say, ‘The year 1866, or 1870, or 1898 was wasted.’ Why? ‘Made no money.’” But hear how Talmage concludes the matter.

I remark again: there are many — and I wish there were more — who are estimating life by the good they can do.

John Bradford said he counted that day nothing at all in which he had not, by pen or tongue, done some good. There have been men who have given their whole life in the right direction, concentrating all their wit and ingenuity and mental acumen and physical force and enthusiasm for Christ. They felt in the thrill of every nerve, in the motion of every muscle, in every throb of their heart, in every respiration of their lungs, the magnificent truth: “No man liveth unto himself.” They went, through cold and through heat, foot-blistered, cheek-smitten, back-scourged, tempest-lasht, to do their whole duty. That is the way they measured life — by the amount of good they could do.

Do you want to know how old Luther was; how old Richard Baxter was; how old Philip Doddridge was? Why, can not calculate the length of their lives by any human arithmetic. Add to their lives ten thousand times ten thousand years, and you have not exprest it — what they have lived or will live. Oh, what a standard that is to measure a man’s life by? There are those in this house who think they have only lived thirty years. They will have lived a thousand — they have lived a thousand. There are those who think they are eighty years of age. They have not even entered upon their infancy, for one must become a babe in Christ to begin at all.

This is a good day in which to begin a new style of measurement. “How old art thou?” You see the Christian way of measuring life and the worldly way of measuring it. I leave it to you to say which is the wisest and best way.

As 2021 comes to an end, and we look ahead to 2022, we encourage our readers to consider Talmage’s message about how we measure our days, and to meditate upon the words of the Psalmist above. We are excited about the growing number of resources available at Log College Press to aid in the study of spiritual devotion, the Christian life, church history, Christian biography and much more. And we are grateful for the input of all those who continue to support and encourage us in our endeavors. May the Lord bless richly bless you and yours in the coming New Year!

19th century American Presbyterians on recognizing loved ones in heaven

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Have you ever considered the question of whether we will recognize loved ones in heaven? It is a topic considered and discussed specifically in larger works by English Puritans (such as Thomas Watson and Richard Baxter), and by Dutch Puritans (such as Wilhelmus à Brakel) - but at least three American Presbyterians have written full-length books on the subject. And among the resources available at Log College Press is an article by J. Gray McAllister.

Aikman, William, Heavenly Recognitions Title Page cropped.jpg

If you have an interest in this issue, be sure to check out the works referenced above. According to the light given to us from Scripture, there is hope and comfort in the doctrine that the saints will know one another in heaven.

Life's Golden Lamp: A Devotional

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A devotional prepared by Robert M. Offord (a minister in the Reformed Church in America and the editor of the New York Observer) in 1888 and published in 1889 is a remarkable resource. This writer was combing the bibliography of B.B. Warfield some time ago when it first came to his notice. A daily devotional by Warfield based on Hebrews 2:13 for January 13 — How Shall We Escape, If We Neglect So Great Salvation? — is included. The volume is titled Life’s Golden Lamp For Daily Devotional Use: A Treasury of Texts From the Very Words of Christ. 365 ministers contributed devotional meditations for every day of the year, and many of them were American Presbyterians who are found on Log College Press. Some ministers outside America were included, such as Charles Spurgeon and Adolph Saphir, both of London. Some were at the time serving as American missionaries in foreign lands. All of the contributors were generally Reformed and Calvinistic. Life’s Golden Lamp represents an anthology of Scriptural passages and devotional literature from around the world by men who were actively serving the kingdom on earth in 1888-1889.

In recent days, we have circled back to this particular devotional, and thus, many other extracts from this volume have been added to the site. The number of LCP author contributors is remarkable. Work is ongoing to identify all the Presbyterian ministers whose devotionals are included, but here is a partial list so far:

Each daily devotional includes a poetic composition, and the signature of the author of the devotional meditation. The whole volume is worth consulting, but we draw your attention to the fact that this 1889 yearly devotional contains at least 50 contributions by Log College Press authors, many of whom are luminaries of church history. It is a work that is filled with the sweet savor of Biblical piety, and we highly commend it to your consideration.

The Almond Tree in Blossom: A Tribute to the Godly Father of T. De Witt Talmage

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Thomas De Witt Talmage — “the American Spurgeon,” one of the most famous preachers in American history — was the youngest son of David T. and Catherine “Catey” Van Nest Talmage. Born in New Jersey, where his father would serve in the state legislature, the son was raised in the Reformed Church (David served as a deacon in the First Church of Raritan), and that is where Thomas began his ministry before being called to serve in the Presbyterian Church.

Engraving of the 1833 Leonid Meteor Shower by Adolf Vollmy (1889), based on the painting by Karl Jauslin.

Engraving of the 1833 Leonid Meteor Shower by Adolf Vollmy (1889), based on the painting by Karl Jauslin.

Thomas once gave an account of his father’s experience traveling between work and home of an event that astronomers still talk about today. The horse that David Talmage was riding was named “Star.”

My father was on the turnpike road between Trenton and Bound Brook, coming through the night from Trenton, where he was serving the State, to his home, where there was sickness. I have often heard him tell about it. It was the night of the 12th and the morning of the 13th of November, 1833. The sky was cloudless and the air clear. Suddenly the heavens became a scene never to be forgotten. From the constellation Leo meteors began to shoot out in all directions. For the two hours between four and six in the morning it was estimated that a thousand meteors a minute flashed and expired. It grew lighter than noon-day. Through the upper air shot arrows of fire! Balls of fire! Trails of fire! Showers of fire! Some the appearances were larger than the full moon. All around the heavens explosion followed explosion. Sounds as well as sights! The air filled with an uproar. All the luminaries of the sky seemed to have received marching orders. The ether was ribbed and interlaced and garlanded with meteoric display. From horizon to horizon everything was in combustion and conflagration. The spectacle ceased not until the rising sun of the November morning eclipsed it, and the whole American nation sat down exhausted with the agitations of a night to be memorable until the earth itself shall become a falling star. The Bible closes with such a scene of falling lights — not only fidgety meteors, but grave old stars. St. John saw it in prospect and wrote: ‘The stars of heaven fell unto the earth even as a fig tree casteth her untimely figs when she is shaken of a mighty wind.’ What a time there will be when worlds drop! Rain of planets! Gravitation letting loose her grip on worlds! Constellations falling apart and galaxies dissolved!

David Talmage also served as sheriff, and worked to promote education in New Jersey. He lived a long and fruitful life (1783-1865). When he died, Thomas delivered a commemorative sermon titled “The Beauty of Old Age,” based on Ecclesiastes 12:5: “The almond tree shall flourish.”

An almond tree in blossom.

An almond tree in blossom.

Thomas spoke of how his father shined so brightly even in old age. Even as the almond tree blossoming is a picture of the same.

Finally, I notice that in my father’s old age was to be seen the beauty of Christian activity.

He had not retired from the field. He had been busy so long, you could not expect him idle now. The faith I have described was not an idle expectation that sits with its hands in its pocket idly waiting, but a feeling which gather up all the resources of the soul, and hurls them upon one grand design. He was among the first who toiled in Sabbath-schools and never failed to speak praise of these institutions. No storm or darkness ever kept him away from prayer-meeting. In the neighbourhood where he lived, for years he held a devotional meeting. Oftentimes the only praying-man present before a handful of attendants, he would give out the hymn, read the lines, conduct the music, and pray. Then read the Scriptures and pray again. Then lead forth in the Doxology with an enthusiasm as if there were a thousand people present, and all the Church members had been doing their duty. He went forth visiting the sick, burying the dead, collecting alms for the poor, inviting the ministers of religion to his household, in which there was, as in the house of Shunem, a little room over the wall, with bed and candlestick for any passing Elisha. He never shuddered at the sight of a subscription-paper, and not a single great cause of benevolence has arisen within the last half-century which he did not bless with his beneficence. Oh! this was not a barren almond-tree that blossomed. His charity was not like the bursting of the bud of a famous tree in the South, that fills the whole forest with its racket, nor was it a clumsy thing, like the fruit in some tropical clime, that crashes down, almost knocking the life out of those who gather it, for in his case the right hand knew not what the left hand did. The churches of God, in whose service he toiled, have arisen as one man to declare his faithfulness and to mourn their loss. He stood in the front of the holy war, and the courage which never trembled or winced in the presence of temporal danger induced him to dare all things for God. In church matters he was not afraid to be shot at. Ordained, not by the laying on of human hands, but by the imposition of a Saviour’s love, he preached by his life, in official position, and legislative hall, and commercial circles, a practical Christianity. He showed that there was a such a thing as honesty in politics. He slandered no party, stuffed no ballot-box, forged no naturalization papers, intoxicated no voters, told no lies, surrendered no principle, countenanced no demagogueism. He called things by their rightful names; and what others styled prevarication, exaggeration, misstatement, or hyperbole, he called a lie. Though he was far from being undecided in his views, and never professed neutrality, or had any consort with those miserable men who boast how well they can walk on both sides of a dividing-line and be on neither, yet even in the excitements of election canvass, when his name was hotly discussed in public journals, I do not think his integrity was ever assaulted. Started every morning with a chapter of the Bible, and his whole family around him on their knees, he forgot not, in the excitement of the world, that he had a God to serve and a heaven to win. The morning prayer came up on one side of the day, and the evening prayer on the other side, and joined each other in an arch above his head, under the shadow of which he walked all the day. The Sabbath worship extended into Monday’s conversation, and Tuesday’s bargain, and Wednesday’s mirthfulness, and Thursday’s controversy, and Friday’s sociality, and Saturday’s calculation.

Through how many thrilling scenes he had passed! He stood, at Morristown, in the choir that chanted when George Washington was buried; talked with young men whose grandfathers he had held on his knee; watched the progress of John Adam’s administration; denounced, at the time, Aaron Burr’s infamy; heard the guns that celebrated the New Orlean’s victory; voted against Jackson, but lived long enough to wish we had one just like him; remembered when the first steamer struck the North River with its wheel buckets; flushed with excitement in the time of National Banks and Sub-Treasury; was startled at the birth of telegraphy; saw the United States grow from a speck on the world’s map, till all nations dip their flag at our passing merchantmen, and our “national airs” have been heard on the steeps of the Himalayas; was born while the revolutionary cannon were coming home from Yorktown, and lived to hear the tramp of troops returning from the war of the great Rebellion; lived to speak the names of eighty children, grandchildren, and great grandchildren. Nearly all his contemporaries gone! Aged Wilberforce said that sailors drink to “friends astern” until half way over sea, and then drink to “friends ahead.” With him it had for a long time been “friends ahead.” So also with my father. Long and varied pilgrimage! Nothing but sovereign grace could have kept him true, earnest, useful and Christian through so many exciting scenes.

He worked unweariedly from the sunrise of youth to the sunset of old age, and then in the sweet nightfall of death, lighted by the starry promises, went home, taking his sheaves with him. Mounting from earthly to heavenly service, I doubt not there were a great multitude that thronged heaven’s gate to hail him into the skies — those whose sorrows he has appeased, whose burdens he had lifted, whose guilty souls he had pointed to a pardoning God, whose dying moments he had cheered, whose ascending spirits he had helped up on the wings of sacred music. I should like to have heard that long, loud, triumphant shout, of heaven’s welcome. I think that the harps throbbed with another thrill, and the hills quaked with a mightier hallelujah. Hall, ransomed soul! thy race run — thy toil ended. Hail to the coronation!

Like an almond tree in blossom — which does so in winter, as Thomas notes (see “The Almond-Tree in Blossom” in his 1872 Sermons) — David Talmage served God well in old age, and the tribute that his son left for him is an encouragement to others, young and old, that one can hold on the starry promises, and shine all the brighter, not only in the noon-day of life, but also towards the end our days, even in the darkest of nights.

American Presbyterians in Europe

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St. Augustine, when he speaks of the great advantages of travelling, says, that the world is a great book, and none study this book so much as a traveller. They that never stir from home read only one page of this book. -- John Feltham, The English Enchiridion (1799)

Like many today who might be itching to travel again, American Presbyterians in the 19th century also sought the benefits of a long voyage, and Europe was one particular favorite destination. Among the life experiences of authors found at Log College Press, trips to Europe are a recurring theme, and our Travelogue page highlights this.

The letters, journals, books and poetry that resulted from such trips are a valuable historical record of life on one side of the pond as viewed through the eyes of residents from the other side. In today’s post, we take a closer look at these memorials of their experiences.

  • James Waddel Alexander — J.W. Alexander traveled to England, France, Switzerland, Germany, the Netherlands, Scotland on a six-month tour of Europe in 1851. He met Adolphe Monod in Paris. Later, in 1857, he returned to Europe and met Charles H. Spurgeon in England, and Thomas Guthrie in Scotland, while also visiting France, Germany, Switzerland and Belgium. His reports on these travel experiences are recorded in Forty Years' Familiar Letters, and also in James W. Garretson, Thoughts on Preaching & Pastoral Ministry: Lessons from the Life and Writings of James W. Alexander.

  • Joseph Addison Alexander — J.A. Alexander spent a year in Europe (1833-1834). Time was spent in England, France, Switzerland, Germany, and Italy. From diary extracts given in H.C. Alexander’s The Life of Joseph Addison Alexander, we learn many fascinating details about the people he met, and the poems he wrote, inspired by his European travels.

  • Henry Martyn Baird — Baird spent much of his childhood in France and Switzerland, and then after graduating from the University of New York, lived in Greece and Italy during 1851-1853, and studied at the University of Athens. Besides his many written studies of the French Huguenots, he authored Modern Greece: A Narrative of a Residence and Travels in that Country (1856).

  • Robert Baird — Baird visited Europe many times as recorded in H.M. Baird’s biography The Life of the Rev. Robert Baird, D. D. (1866). Baird himself wrote about his travels in Visits to Northern Europe (1841) and Old Sights With New Eyes (1854). His travels also enabled him to write with personal knowledge about Protestantism in Italy.

  • John Henry Barrows — Barrows’ world travels, detailed in A World Pilgrimage (1897), included England, France, Germany, Greece and Italy.

  • Robert Jefferson Breckinridge — R.J. Breckinridge was appointed by the PCUSA General Assembly to serve as its representative in Europe, leading to a trip to England, France, Germany, Switzerland and Italy. His travels are detailed in Memoranda of Foreign Travel (1839 and, in 2 vols., 1845).

  • George Barrell Cheever — Cheever’s journey though the French-Swiss Alps is recorded in Wanderings of a Pilgrim in the Shadow of Mont Blanc and the Jungfrau Alp (1848).

  • Theodore Ledyard Cuyler — Cuyler’s travels through England, France, Denmark, Germany, Sweden, Norway, Greece, and the Czech Republic, are recorded in From the Nile to Norway and Homeward (1881).

  • George Duffield IV — Duffield’s travels were published in the Magazine of Travel during 1857, and later republished in Travels in the Two Hemispheres; or, Gleanings of a European Tour (1858).

  • Henry Highland Garnet — Garnet traveled to Europe in 1851, including England, Ireland Scotland and Germany. His speeches from some of those locations are found here.

  • Stephen Henry Gloucester — Gloucester, pastor of the Lombard Street Central Presbyterian Church in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, visited England and Scotland in 1847-1848. The record of his trip, and letters which he wrote home, can be found in Robert Jones, Fifty years in the Lombard Street Central Presbyterian Church (1894).

  • Charles Hodge — From 1826 to 1828, Hodge traveled to Europe, studying in Paris and and wrote a handwritten journal of his experiences (primarily in Germany) available to read here. See also A.A. Hodge’s The Life of Charles Hodge for more on these travels, including letters written to home.

  • Alexander McLeod — McLeod visited England and Scotland in 1830. His experiences are recounted in Samuel Brown Wylie’s Memoir of Alexander McLeod (1855). Wylie’s own trip to Europe in 1802-1803 is also discussed in this volume.

  • James Clement Moffat — Moffat recounts his experiences in the summer of 1872 in Song and Scenery; or, A Summer Ramble in Scotland (1874).

  • Walter William Moore — Moore recounts his experiences in England, Scotland, France, Germany, Italy and the Netherlands in A Year in Europe (1904, 1905).

  • James W.C. Pennington — The “Fugitive Blacksmith’s” s travels to England, Scotland and Germany are detailed in Christopher L. Webber, American to the Backbone: The Life of James W. C. Pennington, the Fugitive Slave Who Became One of the First Black Abolitionists. He was the first African-American in Europe to be awarded the degree of Doctor of Divinity.

  • Samuel Irenaeus Prime — Prime’s travels were recorded in Travels in Europe and the East: A Year in England, Scotland, Ireland, Wales, France, Belgium, Holland, Germany, Austria, Italy, Greece, Turkey, Syria, Palestine, and Egypt, 2 vols. (1855, 1856).

  • Joel Edson Rockwell — Rockwell’s journey through France, Germany, Italy, England, Scotland and Ireland is chronicled in Scenes and Impressions Abroad (1860).

  • William Buell Sprague — Sprague writes in the preface to his Visits to European Celebrities (1855), “In 1828, and again in 1836, I had the privilege of passing a few months on the continent of Europe and in Great Britain. In both visits, especially the latter, I was more interested to see men than things; and I not only made the acquaintance, so far as I could, of distinguished individuals as they came in my way, but sometimes made circuitous routes in order to secure to myself this gratification.” See also his Letters From Europe, in 1828 (1828).

  • Thomas De Witt Talmage — A world traveller, Talmage wrote Great Britain Through American Spectacles (1885); From the Pyramids to the Acropolis: Sacred Places Seen Through Biblical Spectacles (1892); and The Earth Girdled: The World as Seen To-Day (1896).

These are some of the men at Log College Press who spent time in Europe, and their writings often tell us about life abroad, and often inspired them in various ways, just as travels inspire us. It is human nature to want to travel, and if we are limited in our ability to do so at present, we can at least turn to others who have done so and be inspired by them.

Devotionals for a New Decade

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A good way to start the New Year in 2020 is just the way 19th century American Presbyterians started it - with a yearly devotional. Here are some options available for use at Log College Press:

Other devotional works to take special note of:

  • James Robert Boyd - Daily Communion With God on the Plan Recommended by the Rev. Matthew Henry, V.D.M., For Beginning, Spending, Concluding Each Day With God (1873); and

  • William Henry Fentress - Love Truths From the Bible (1879).

These resources will enrich your 2020 spiritual walk just as they enriched the lives of Christians in centuries past. Blessings to you and yours from Log College Press!

Sermon Illustrations by an American 'Prince of the Pulpit'

Like Charles Spurgeon in his Lectures to My Students, Thomas De Witt Talmage (1832-1902), dubbed 'The American Spurgeon' by the newspapers, has left us a remarkable resource on the topic of sermon illustrations. 

"Points;" or, Suggestive Passages, Incidents, and Illustrations, From the Writings of T. De Witt Talmage, D.D. was published in 1874 and its contents reveal the preacher's remarkable ability to paint a picture with words and give his hearers substance to ponder. 

BIBLE ILLUSTRATIONS. -- There is hardly a beast, or bird, or insect, which has not been called to illustrate divine truth. The ox's patience, the ant's industry, the spider's skill, the hind's sure-footedness, the eagle's speed, the dove's gentleness, and even the sparrow's meanness and insignificance.

PEARLS FROM GREAT DEPTHS. -- I have been told that the deeper the water the larger the pearl. I don't know how that is, but I do know that from the greatest depths of sin the Lord Jesus Christ sometimes gathers up His brightest jewels. Paul was a persecutor, Bunyan was a blasphemer, John Newton a libertine, the Earl of Rochester was an infidel; and yet the grace of God went plunging down through the fathoms of their abomination, until it found them and brought them up to the light. 

JEWELS OF GOD'S GRACE. -- The geologist tells you that the brightest diamond is only crystallized carbon, or, as I might call it, charcoal glorified; and so it is with souls that were coal black in the defilements of sin - by the power of God's grace they are made God's jewels for ever.

DON'T WORRY. -- Don't worry because God made you different from others. Don't worry because you don't have the faith of that man, or the praying qualities of this, or the singing qualities of another. It were as unwise as for a carnelian to blush deeper because it is not a diamond, or a japonica to fret all the colour out of its cheek because it is not a rose. God intended you to be different.

THE BEAUTY OF GOD'S CARE FOR US. -- More beautiful than any flower I ever saw are the hues of a bird's plumage. Did you ever examine it? The blackbird, floating like a flake of darkness through the sunlight; the meadow-lark, with head of fawn, and throat of velvet, and breast of gold; the red flamingo flying over the Southern swamps, like sparks from the forge of the setting sun; the pelican white and black - morning and night tangled in its wings - give but a very faint idea of the beauty that comes down over the soul when on it drop the feathers of the Almighty.

There are many other "talking points" for ministers to be studied and considered. They may serve as inspiration for more. Rather utilizing a table of contents in the front of the book, look instead for the index of topics at the back of the book. It is a resource that can benefit 21st century pastors as it did their counterparts in the 19th century. 

The World Was His Audience

Thomas De Witt Talmage (1832-1902), the son of a missionary to China, began his pastoral career in (what is currently) the Reformed Church of America before joining the Presbyterian Church. He went on to become world-famous as a preacher, with newspapers reprinting his sermons and numerous volumes published all of which were read by an estimated 30 million readers in his day. His sermons were commended by Charles Spurgeon, and his ministry was compared to that of both Spurgeon and George Whitefield. 

But his first sermon almost didn't happen after the manuscript he had written for it slipped under a sofa just at the appointed time for him to deliver it. He recounts the story in his autobiography T. De Witt Talmage As I Knew Him (this volume was edited with concluding chapters and published posthumously by his third wife), pp. 19-21:

But the first sermon with any considerable responsibility resting upon it was the sermon preached as a candidate for a pastoral call in the Reformed Church at Belleville, N.J. I was about to graduate from the New Brunswick Theological Seminary, and wanted a Gospel field in which to work. I had already written to my brother John, a missionary at Amoy, China, telling him that I expected to come out there.

I was met by Dr. Ward at Newark, New Jersey, and taken to his house. Sabbath morning came. With one of my two sermons, which made up my entire stock of pulpit resources, I tremblingly entered the pulpit of that brown stone village church, which stands in my memory as one of the most sacred places of all the earth, where I formed associations which I expect to resume in Heaven.

The sermon was fully written, and was on the weird battle between the Gideonites and Midianites, my text being in Judges vii. 20, 21: 'The three companies blew the trumpets, and brake the pitchers, and held the lamps in their left hands, and the trumpets in their right hands to blow withal; and they cried. The sword of the Lord, and of Gideon. And they stood every man in his place round about the camp; and all the host ran, and cried, and fled.' A brave text, but a very timid man to handle it. I did not feel at all that hour either like blowing Gideon's trumpet, or holding up the Gospel lamp; but if I had, like any of the Gideonites, held a pitcher, I think I would have dropped it and broken that lamp. I felt as the moment approached for delivering my sermon more like the Midianites, who, according to my text, 'ran, and cried, and fled.' I had placed the manuscript of my sermon on the pulpit sofa beside where I sat. Looking around to put my hand on the manuscript, lo! it was gone. But where had it gone? My excitement knew no bound. Within three minutes of the greatest ordeal of my life, and the sermon on which so much depended mysteriously vanished! How much disquietude and catastrophe were crowded into those three minutes it would be impossible to depict. Then I noticed for the first time that between the upper and lower parts of the sofa there was an opening about the width of three finger-breadths, and I immediately suspected that through that opening the manuscript of my sermon had disappeared. But how could I recover it, and in so short a time? I bent over and reached under as far as I could. But the sofa was low, and I could not touch the lost discourse. The congregation were singing the last verse of the hymn, and I was reduced to a desperate effort. I got down on my hands and knees, and then down flat, and crawled under the sofa and clutched the prize. Fortunately, the pulpit front was wide, and hid the sprawling attitude I was compelled to take. When I arose to preach a moment after, the fugitive manuscript before me on the Bible, it is easy to understand why I felt more like the Midianites than I did like Gideon.

Besides an exercise in humility, what lesson did Talmage learn? 

"This and other mishaps with manuscripts helped me after a while to strike for entire  emancipation from such bondage, and for about a quarter of a century I have preached without notes—only a sketch of the sermon pinned in my Bible, and that sketch seldom referred to." 

A taste of his eloquence is found in the story above. Among his numerous published sermons, many can now be found on his author page and our Sermons page at Log College Press. Of Talmage, Spurgeon said: "His sermons take hold of my inmost soul. The Lord is with the mighty man. I am astonished when God blesses me but not surprised when He blesses him."