Part 25 (1/2)
Dr. Talmage admired the Scottish-American immensely, having formed his acquaintance while crossing the ocean. Five or six years later, during the winter of 1899, the Doctor met him in one of the rooms of the White House. He tells this anecdote in his own words, as follows:--
”I was glad I was present that day, when Mr. Andrew Carnegie decided upon the gift of a library to the city of Was.h.i.+ngton. I was in one of the rooms of the White House talking with Governor Lowndes, of Maryland, and Mr. B.H. Warner, of Was.h.i.+ngton, who was especially interested in city libraries. Mr. Carnegie entered at the opposite end of the room. We greeted each other with heartiness, not having met since we crossed the ocean together some time before. I asked Mr. Carnegie to permit me to introduce him to some friends. After each introduction the conversation immediately turned upon libraries, as Mr. Carnegie was then constantly presenting them in this and other lands. Before the conversation ended that day, Mr.
Carnegie offered $250,000 for a Was.h.i.+ngton library. I have always felt very happy at having had anything to do with that interview, which resulted so gloriously.”
Dr. Talmage's opinions upon the aftermath of the Spanish war were widely quoted at this time.
”The fact is this war ought never to have occurred,” he said. ”We have had the greatest naval officer of this century, Admiral Schley, a.s.sailed for disobeying orders, and General Shatter denounced for being too fat and wanting to retreat, and General Wheeler attacked because of something else. We are all tired of this investigating business. I never knew a man in Church or State to move for an investigating committee who was not himself somewhat of a hypocrite.
The question is what to do with the bad job we have on hand. I say, educate and evangelise those islands.”
As he wrote he usually talked, and these words are recollections of the subjects he talked over with me in his quieter study hours. They were virile talks, abreast of the century hurrying to its close, full of cheerfulness, faith, and courage for the future.
He was particularly distressed and moved by the death of Chief Justice Field, in April, 1899. It was his custom to read his sermons to me in his study before preaching. He chose for his sermon on April 16, the decease of the great jurist, and his text was Zachariah xi, 2: ”Howl fir tree, for the cedar has fallen.” Many no doubt remember this sermon, but no one can realise the depths of feeling with which the Doctor read it to me in the secret corner of his workroom at home. But his heart was in every sermon. He said when he resigned from his church:--
”The preaching of the Gospel has always been my chosen work, I believe I was called to it, and I shall never abandon it.”
During this season in Was.h.i.+ngton we gave a few formal dinners. My husband wished it, and he was a cheerful, magnetic host, though he accepted few invitations to dinner himself. No wine was served at these dinners, and yet they were by no means dull or tiresome. Our guests were men of ideas, men like Justice Brewer, Speaker Reed, Senator Burrows, Justice Harlan, Vice-President Fairbanks, Governor Stone, and Senators who have since become members of the old guard. It was said in Was.h.i.+ngton at the time that Dr. Talmage's dinner parties were delightful, because they were ostensible opportunities to hear men talk who had something to say. The Doctor was liberal-minded about everything, but his standards of conduct were the laws of his life that no one could jeopardise or deny.
A very prominent society woman came to Dr. Talmage one day to ask the favour that he preach a temperance sermon for the benefit of Sir Wilfrid Laurier, whom she wanted to interest in temperance legislation. She promised to bring him to the Doctor's church for that purpose.
”Madame, I shall be very glad to have Sir Wilfrid Laurier attend my church,” said the Doctor, ”but I never preach at anybody. Your request is something I cannot agree to.” The lady was a personal friend, and she persisted. Finally the Doctor said to her:
”Mrs. G----, my wife and I are invited to meet Sir Wilfrid Laurier at a dinner in your house next week. Will you omit the wines at that dinner?”
The lady admitted that that would be impossible.
”Then you see, Madame, how difficult it would be for me to alter my principles as a preacher.” In May, 1899, Dr. Talmage and I left Was.h.i.+ngton and went to East Hampton--alone. Contrary to his usual custom of closing his summer home between seasons, the Doctor had allowed a minister and his family to live there for three months. Diphtheria had developed in the family during that time and the Doctor ordered everything in the house to be burned, and the walls sc.r.a.ped. So the whole house had to be refurnished, and the Doctor and I together selected the furniture. It was a joyous time, it was like redecorating our lives with a new charm and sentiment that was intimately beautiful and refres.h.i.+ng. I remember the tenderness with which the Doctor showed me a place on the door of the barn where his son DeWitt, who died, had carved his initials. He would never allow that spot to be touched, it was sacred to the memory of what was perhaps the most absorbing affection of his life. He always called East Hampton his earthly paradise, which to him meant a busy Utopia. He was very fond of the sea bathing, and his chief recreation was running on the beach. He was 65 years old, yet he could run like a young man. These few weeks were a memorable vacation.
In June, Dr. Talmage made an engagement to attend the 60th commencement exercises of the Erskine Theological College in Due West, South Carolina. This is the place where secession was first planned, as it is also the oldest Presbyterian centre in the United States. We were the guests of Dr. Grier, the president of the college. It was known that Rev. David P. Pressly, Presbyterian patriarch and graduate of this college, had been my father's pastor in Pittsburg, and this a.s.sociation added some interest to my presence in Due West with the Doctor. The Rev.
E.P. Lindsay, my brother's pastor in Pittsburg, had also been born there, and his mother, when I met her in 1899, was still a vigorous Secessionist. Her greatest disappointment was the fact that her son had abandoned the sentiments of Secession and had gone to preach in a Northern church. She told us that she had once hidden Jefferson Davis in her house for three days. Due West was a quiet little village inhabited by some rich people who lived comfortably on their plantations. The graduating cla.s.s of the college were entertained at dinner by Dr. Grier and the Doctor. There was a great deal of comment upon the physical vigour and strength of Dr. Talmage's address, most of which reached me.
A gentleman who was present was reminded of the remarkable energy of the Rev. Dr. Pressly, who preached for over fifty years, and was married three times. When asked about his health, Dr. Pressly always throughout his life made the same reply, ”Never better; never better.” After he had won his third wife, however, he used to reply to this question with greater enthusiasm than before, saying, ”Better than ever; better than ever.” Another resident of Due West, who had heard both the Booths in their prime, said, ”Talmage has more dramatic power than I ever saw in Booth.” This visit to Due West will always remain in my memory as full of suns.h.i.+ne and warmth as the days were themselves.
We returned to East Hampton for a few days, and on July 4, 1899, the Doctor delivered an oration to an immense crowd in the auditorium at Ocean Grove. This was the beginning of a summer tour of Chautauquas, first in Michigan, then up the lakes near Mackinaw Island, and later to Jamestown, New York.
In the Fall of 1899 we made a trip South, including Nashville, Memphis, Chattanooga, Birmingham, and New Orleans. One remarkable feature of Dr.
Talmage's public life was the way in which he was sought as the man of useful opinions upon subjects that were not related to the pulpit. He was always being interviewed upon political and local issues, and his views were scattered broadcast, as if he were himself an official of national affairs. He never failed to be ahead of the hour. He regarded the affairs of men as the basis of his evangelical purpose. The Spanish war ended, and his views were sought about the future policy in the East. The Boer war came, and his opinions of that issue were published.
Nothing moved in or out of the world of import, during these last milestones of his life, that he was not asked about its coming and its going. His readiness to penetrate the course of events, to wrap them in the sacred veil of his own philosophy and spiritual fabric, combined to make him one of the foremost living characters of his time.
Dr. Talmage was the most eager human being I ever knew, eager to see, to feel the heart of all humanity. I remember we arrived in Birmingham, Alabama, the day following the disaster that visited that city after the great cyclone. The first thing the Doctor did on our arrival was to get a carriage and drive through those sections of the city that had suffered the most. It was a gruesome sight, with so many bodies lying about the streets awaiting burial. But that was his grasp of life, his indomitable energy, always alert to see and hear the laws of nature at close range.
We were entertained a great deal through the South, where I believe my husband had the warmest friends and a more cordial appreciation than in any other part of the country. There was no lack of excitement in this life that I was leading at the elbow of the great preacher, and sometimes he would ask me if the big crowds did not tire me. To him they were the habit of his daily life, a natural consequence of his industry.
However, I think he always found me equal to them, always happy to be near him where I could see and hear all.
In October of this year we returned to Was.h.i.+ngton, when the Pan-Presbyterian Council was in session, and we entertained them at a reception in our house till late in the evening. The International Union of Women's Foreign Missionary Societies of the Presbyterian and Reformed Churches were also meeting in Was.h.i.+ngton at this time, and they came. At one of the meetings of the Council Dr. Talmage invited them all to his house from the platform in his characteristic way.
”Come all,” he said, ”and bring your wives with you. G.o.d gave Eve to Adam so that when he lost Paradise he might be able to stand it. She was taken out of man's side that she might be near the door of his heart, and have easy access to his pockets. Therefore, come, bringing the ladies with you. My wife and I shall not be entertaining angels unawares, but knowing it all the while. To have so much piety and brain under one roof at once, even for an hour or two, will be a benediction to us all the rest of our lives. I believe in the communion of saints as much as I believe in the life everlasting.”
In November, 1899, Dr. Talmage installed the Rev. Donald McLeod as succeeding pastor of the First Presbyterian Church in Was.h.i.+ngton, and delivered the installation address, the subject of which was, ”Invitation to Outsiders.” There had been some effort to inspire the people of Was.h.i.+ngton to build an independent Tabernacle for the Doctor after his resignation, but he himself was not in sympathy with the movement because of the additional labour and strain it would have put upon him.
As the winter grew into long, gray days, we were already planning a trip to Europe for the following year of 1900, and we were antic.i.p.ating this event with eager expectancy as the time grew near.