He had learned how to weep with them that weep, and rejoice with them that rejoice. One needed but to see him in the asylum, or the prison, or standing before an object of distress by the road-side, or uttering the sympathies of his broad heart at the pillow of the sick to be convinced, without argument, that there is such a thing as disinterested benevolence.

"His faith did not overlook the present world, in its concerns for the future; and while he struggled, and wept, and prayed for the sinful soul, he did not forget the suffering body. Nor was he content with knowing the sorrows of those who came in his way: "The cause that he knew not he searched out.' He was emphatically the good Samaritan. His expansive benevolence embraced the whole human family; not that he cherished the wild speculation that all mankind should be regarded alike; but warming his charity at the fireside of his sweet home, he bade it expand till it overleaped all national boundaries, and natural and artificial distinctions. He was not of those who content themselves with elevated views and warm sympathies, and who say to the shivering brother, 'Be thou warmed and clothed.' His beneficence knew no limits but his ability. As he received presents wherever he went-and his brethren, knowing his worth, would not suffer him to be deficient in his allowance-if he had husbanded what he received, he would have accumulated money. But his resources were expended as fast as they were received, and he died poor. Indeed, to those who walk by sight, he did not seem to have a proper regard for the wants of his family; and when he approached the borders of the grave, the sight of his helpless children, whom he was soon to leave fatherless, sometimes induced self-reproaches, connected with a gloomy despondency in view of the future, which, however, were instantly banished by the recollection of

some sweet promise of Scripture, and a view of God's tender relation to the fatherless and the widow.

"7. He was liberal in his views. Never compromising or disguising the truth, warmly attached to his own Discipline, and firmly persuaded of his own doctrines, he was, nevertheless, as far from narrowness and bigotry as the east is from the west. He delighted to hail every Church that bore the banner of the Savior, under whatever uniform or name; and to the image of Christ his heart and hand turned as the needle to the pole. He looked with joy upon the prosperity of sister Churches; and notwithstanding he felt a deep interest in the welfare of his own department of Zion, he never could be accused of proselyting: his great aim was to bring honor to Christ, souls to heaven, and glory to God. But although he felt so little concern to attract converts into his Church, the people would follow him in flocks, as sheep follow a shep

herd.

"8. His character was harmonious. We have heard of many a good man whose home was no paradise. Bigelow was to his family what he was to his congregation. Indeed, his spirit is said to have been, if possible, even more sweet and fragrant at the fireside than in the pulpit; and his prayers at the family altar were as fervent as those which were audible to the multitude. In short, his words and his works, his inner and his outer life, his public and his private character, were alike lovely and accordant.

"Did you know Bigelow?' said the writer to Chief Justice L. 'Yes,' he replied; and it is one of the greatest regrets of my life that I did not know him bet

ter.

Had I never known him, I should have loved him for the effects of his apostolic labors and holy example. We were a rude people when he was among us, and we never appreciated his worth.' That he had his faults

and imperfections, we do not deny; but they were almost lost amid his excellences. Let the poet look out upon the plain or the mountain, the gorgeous sunset or the thundering cataract; but let me look upon a good man. The artist may mold matter into forms of enrapturing beauty, and make us feel their elevating and purifying influences; but what is the marble Moses of Michael Angelo, or the cold statue of his living Christ, compared with an embodiment of the Hebrew law and the spirit of Jesus in the sculpture of a holy life? Goethe said that he was not half himself who had never seen the Juno in the Rondanini palace at Rome. Well, then, may we say, that he knows not to what race he belongs who has never gazed upon such a man as Bigelow. If an angel were to move among us in celestial sheen, with what sublimity would he inspire us! But how much more is it to see moral majesty and beauty beaming from human clay!"

CHAPTER XXXV.

HENRY B. BASCOM.

BASCOM was emphatically a western man.

Early taken to the head waters of the Alleghany, and reared amid the wild scenery of his forest home, his mind took its hue and coloring from those deep glens and craggy mountains; and the native bent which was given to his genius, from the sublime and picturesque scenes around him, grew with his growth and strengthened with his strength. But though reared in the west, and identified with its numerous interests, and its rapidly-expanding prosperity, he was not contracted in his views. His mind seemed to have been framed upon the same grand scale, in which the Creator had constructed the broad prairies, and mighty rivers, and towering mountains of the west. The whole country, from where Atlantic surges wash the rocky, sterile shores of New England, to where the Pacific's blue waters lave the golden sands of California, was his home, and he embraced the whole in his broad catholic sympathies. With him there was no north, no south, no east, no west; and in this respect his mind had a Websterian cast-massy, boundless in its sympathies and aims; or, like to that of the immortal Clay, whose friend he was during his whole life, he rose above all sectional views, soared beyond all sectional lines, and embraced his entire country in the arms of his benevolence.

As Webster, and Clay, and Calhoun were types of a race of statesmen, which have passed away from the political world, so may we say of a Fisk, Olin, and Bascom,

they were types of a race of preachers, which, as the rare products of an age that is passing, may take a century to produce their like again. We would not be sectarian, though we thus confine our comparison to the Methodist Church; and yet, for solid learning, deep piety, and sublime eloquence in the pulpit and on the platform, we know not their superiors in any age that is past, as exhibited in any of the Churches of the land. They may not have excelled in Biblical learning, or devoted piety, or pulpit eloquence, according to the standards of the great master minds of some other Churches, but, according to our judg ment, none excelled them in a union of all these.

However pleasant and perhaps profitable it might be to indulge in such a train of thought, and pursue it so as to resolve, as far as possible, the distinguished traits which characterized these great minds into their elements, and thereby form an analysis for the study of the youth of the present day—a model upon which future character might be constructed-we must forego that pleasure, and proceed at once to the subject of our chapter.

At one

There was something very remarkable in the youth of Bascom. Very soon after his conversion, which occurred at a camp meeting on Oil creek, he gave evidence, in the relation of his religious experience and prayers, of a power and eloquence unusual to boys of his age. time he went from home to attend a quarterly meeting at Franklin. His singular appearance, with his fox-skin cap and rude backwoods dress, attracted the attention of every one present; but when, at love-feast, on Sabbath morning, he rose and spoke of his conversion and the love of a Savior, every heart was thrilled, and as the rough exterior sparkled with the light and fire of the soul within, the people wondered more at the boy than they had before been surprised at the rusticity of his appear

ance.