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FROM Niagara we struck eastwards for a few days’
visit to Mr. D. L. Moody, who was taking a kind of holiday at
Northfield. Northfield, in the west of Massachusetts, is Mr. Moody’s
birthplace; a quiet New England village, very beautifully situated,
commanding a fine view of the Connecticut River and Valley and the
mountains beyond. I call it a village, speaking in the English
fashion, but in America it is a town, or rather a township. It is
seven miles in length; that is to say, there are houses dotted over
seven miles, mostly embosomed in trees, and with the appearance of a
sparse city suburb. About a mile from what may be called the centre
of the town is a plain but bright-looking wooden house, with its
screen of fine maple trees in front—the summer home of the great
evangelist. A little higher is a smaller and plainer house—Moody’s
birthplace and the residence of his old mother. When I was last
here, nine years before, there had been built by Mr. Moody, a few
hundred yards from his house, a large college, with accommodation
for some sixty girls. It was designed for the teaching and training
of young women, so as to fit them for situations of usefulness—as
teachers, missionaries, or otherwise. That was the day of small
things; the change from then to now is enormous. Instead of one,
there are now five large buildings and six or seven smaller; a fine
park of some two hundred acres has been acquired, and its well-kept
lawns and undulating surface dotted with trees make it a charming
campus for the academical buildings spread over it. Instead of
sixty, there are now three hundred young ladies. And four miles
away, on the other side of the Connecticut River, is a similar
college for young men. A similar group of buildings, large and
small, provides accommodation for three hundred. It happened that
while we were there the pupils had just assembled for the work of
the session. These buildings represented an outlay of about a
million dollars, a large part of which arose from royalties on the
sale of hymn-books. Mr. Moody was engaged in a great effort to raise
a capital sum, the income of which would provide for the expenditure
of the two colleges. And being one of those men who do not begin
what they do not see their way to finish, he will doubtless, at no
distant period, succeed in obtaining Ids desire.
Mr. Moody, we cannot help thinking, has followed a sound policy in
having his colleges separate, each for a single sex. There are many
questions at the present day about the higher education in America,
both of men and women, and one of these is, whether it is right to
allow both sexes to study together at the same college, and to be
members of the same classes. For our part, we have a decided
conviction that it is not. Anything that tends to obliterate the
distinctive qualities of the sexes must be injurious. We cannot but
think that this evil result must take place when they study in the
same rooms and hear the same lectures—medical lectures, it may be,
on subjects of delicacy. We conceive, therefore, that in separating
the two schools, Mr. Moody has not only done right, but set a good
example to his countrymen.
The colleges are conducted on the principle of self-help. Each
student pays a sum of money, but not the whole sum expended on him.
In the male college every youth has to give two hours’ labour on the
farm. In the college for girls there are no servants; the work of
the house is done by the young women themselves.
Mr. Moody differs from nearly all the evangelists we have known in
his intense concern for the permanent outcome of his labours, and
his most careful endeavour to prevent the spirit kindled at his
meetings from evaporating in temporary excitement. These colleges
are one proof of his desire to build up, to establish Christian
habits of life, to set young men and young women to work that will
exercise and develop and strengthen feelings that might otherwise be
fitful and evanescent. And the great aggressive enterprise with
which he is now grappling in Chicago is another evidence of his love
of complete and solid work. He is training an agency for going out
to the highways and the hedges, for pervading all of Chicago that is
neglecting the things that pertain to its peace, and constraining
such to come in that the house may be filled. With all his
evangelistic ardour, Mr. Moody has no sympathy with fanaticism. His
singular Christian shrewdness gives a wide berth to fads.
At Northfield Mr. Moody takes his holiday. The fashion of it is
rather peculiar. I asked the man that takes charge of his horses how
often they were out. Sometimes, he said, he will require a
conveyance at five in the morning, and two or three times during the
day, and perhaps till late at night. He would be out before
breakfast to confer with workmen about something needed for the
schools. The forenoon would be occupied in answering a great
correspondence and despatching letters with reference to his
engagements and his institutions. In the afternoon, perhaps, he
would be acting the peacemaker at some parish meeting, trying to
settle an angry quarrel about a public road that threatened a bitter
law plea. In the evening he would be away to Mount Hermon to preach
to “the boys.” On the Sunday, he would preach in the church which he
has built partly for his schools and partly for the neighbourhood,
gathering a great congregation round him. In the intervals of
employment he would be bright, cheerful, full of fun. He is now the
great man of the place, yet is as neighbourly and unaffected and
brotherly as in the days when he was a school-boy or a worker on his
mother’s farm. Nor does he seem a whit more elated by the marvellous
influence he has acquired the world over, and the blessed work he
has done. Only an instrument in other hands. No man would sing more
heartily the 115th Psalm, or more cordially take for his motto, Laus
Deo.
We are yet more than three thousand miles from home; but I am tired
writing, and “it is fit the spell should break of this protracted
dream.” From Northfield to New York we had a peep of New England,
particularly Northampton, Hartford, and Newhaven, much regretting
that we were obliged this time to pass over the great cradle of the
American republic. At New York we tarried but a day. There had been
rain for a week, and there was rain still, and the newspapers were
having leaders, “Will it ever stop?” Worse than that, there had been
a terrific storm at sea, and the coast-line of New York State had
been fearfully injured. It was a gruesome prospect to take to the
sea in such weather; but, much to our satisfaction, we learned that
the storm had been confined to the shore, and did not extend to the
ocean. On a Saturday morning we got on board our old ship the
Funiessia, and were met by a warm and excellent friend, General
Swyne, whose acquaintance we had made in the train between Victoria
and Winnipeg, who presented us with a charming basket of fruit, and
a bundle of illustrated journals and magazines, to refresh mind and
body by the way. Half an hour after leaving New York we were
involved in mist; we had to cast anchor in the bay, and did not get
it lifted for forty-eight hours; but when we did get off we pegged
steadily away. At last the welcome shores of old Ireland greeted us,
and by-and-by the Mull of Cantire and the green fields and white
cottages of Arran. On a gloomy forenoon we sailed up the Clyde all
the way to Glasgow. The first thing that caught my eye was a
placard—“The late Dr. Somerville.” So he, too, had gone where we
should see his beaming face no more. |
