Ohio History Journal

ISAAC NEWTON WALTER

PIONEER PREACHER OF OHIO.

 

BYRON R. LONG.

 

The writer while yet a small boy, rummaging among the

books in an old library came across a volume of thrilling interest.

The title of the book was "The Pioneer Preacher," written

by a blind man who served his country in conspicuous places,

first as a pastor and then over a period of about twenty

years as chaplain of the Senate and House of Representatives

in the Congress of the United States.

This versatile man's name was William H. Milburn. The

book consisted of lectures that were delivered before the Lowell

Institute. Because of their historical character, and the fact

that they were in a style simple and graphic, they grasped the

attention of an eager boy and held it through to the end.

On account of the nature of the task I have set for myself in

writing this sketch, my mind reverts to this book and to one of

the lectures with the title "Rifle, Ax and Saddle-Bags"; par-

ticularly to the last portion of it. The author used these terms

as symbolical of phases in the pioneer life of America. The

ax representing heroic effort of men who went forth to subdue

the forests and to clear them away that states and cities might

grow and fields spread to receive the seed of future harvests.

The rifle to represent the phase of early life in the western

world which meant defense against savage life that should

attempt to prey upon homes and fields. The saddle-bags sym-

bolized another phase which was important beyond measure

to that period and to all periods of the movement of man through

this world.

Let me quote the language of the book here: "I see

approaching another class with many traits common with the

men of the ax and rifle, yet many different. They, too, are

of large build and robust strength; they, too, have nerves that

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188       Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.

never thrill with fear. Sun and storm have bronzed them; hun-

ger, frost and loneliness are to them familiar acquaintances.

Gaunt poverty keeps even pace with them as they ride, and

shall accompany them until they reach the last stage of their

journey, -the house appointed to all living. -Wherefore are

they in the wilderness- for they have neither rifle nor ax?"

The answer to the last question is written in the fruits of

lives given unselfishly and that tell the story of an American

civilization more glorious than any other that has had place on

the face of the earth.

Mr. Milburn in 1855 delivered an address before a company

of writers and publishers in the Crystal Palace, New York City,

in response to the toast "The Clergy" in which he pays his

respects to the class that braved the forest wilderness in procla-

mation of the everlasting gospel. He said in the course of this

address: "They were the first to penetrate the wilds of the

new countries, carrying those precious commodities, -books.

Their training, as itinerate ministers, began in the saddle, and

in lieu of holsters they carried saddle-bags crammed with books

for study and for sale; for the church economy held it a duty

of the minister to circulate good books as well as to preach

the word.

"Let me change the figure. Although they were graduates

of Brush College and Swamp University they were always the

friends of a wholesome literature. Picture then, a young itin-

erant, clad in blue jeans or copperas homespun; his nether ex-

tremities adorned with leggings; his head surmounted with a

straw hat in summer, a skin cap in winter; dismounting from

the finest horse in the settlement, at the door of a log-cabin,

which may serve as a school-house or a squatter's home, carefully

adjusting on his arm the well-worn leather bookcase. See him

as he enters the house of one room, where is assembled the

little congregation of half a dozen hearers,- backwoods farmers

and hunters, bringing with them their wives and little ones,

their dogs and rifles. The religious service is gone through

with as strict regularity as if it were in a cathedral. At its

close our young friend opens the capacious pockets of his

saddle-bags displaying on the split-bottom chair, which has

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Isaac Newton Walter.                189

 

served him as a pulpit, his little stock of books, to the eager

gaze of the foresters. * * *

"Thus day after day did the circuit-rider perform his double

duty of preacher and book seller. This plan was designed to

work as a two-edged sword, cutting both ways; to place a

sound religious literature in the homes of the people, and (as

the books were bought at a considerable discount) to enable

men whose salaries were a hundred dollars a year (and who

rejoiced greatly if they received half that amount) to provide

themselves with libraries."

William Cullen Bryant was in the company that listened to

this address and to him a fine compliment was paid.

In the body of the book after giving a glowing description

of Henry Bidleman Bascom, one of these forest graduates

who became a Chaplain of Congress, a Doctor of Divinity,

the President of a University and an honored Bishop in the

church of God; he goes on to say: "These men had the wilder-

ness for a college; their theological seminary was a circuit; and

lessons enough in pastoral theology did they get. Their text

book was the Bible for, more than any others I have known, they

were men of one book. Their commentaries and works of exe-

gesis were their own hearts, and the hearts of their fellow

men which they prayerfully and devoutly studied. They were

'workmen who needed not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the

word of truth!'

They went their way singing the old hymn, familiar to their

time:

'No foot of land do I possess,

No cottage in the wilderness;

A poor wayfaring man,

I lodge awhile in tents below,

And gladly wander to and fro,

Till I my Canaan gain;

There is my house and portion fair,

My treasure and my heart are there,

And my abiding home'."

President William Henry Harrison said of these men:

"Who and what are they? I answer they are ministers who are

technically denominated 'Circuit Riders,' a body of men who,

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190       Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.

for zeal and fidelity in the discharge of the duties they undertake,

are not exceeded by any others in the world. I have been a

witness of their conduct in the western country for nearly

forty years. They are men whom no amount of labor tires, no

scenes disgust, no dangers frighten when in the discharge of

duty. To gain recruits for their Master's service they sedulously

seek out the victims of vice in the abodes of misery and

wretchedness. The vow of poverty is not taken by these men,

but their conduct is precisely the same it would have been

had they done so. Their stipulated pay is barely sufficient to

enable them to perform the duties assigned them. With much

the larger proportion of these men, the horse that carries them

is the only animated thing which they can call their own,

and the contents of their saddle-bags, the sum total of their

earthly possessions.

"If, within the period I have mentioned, a traveler on the

western frontier, had met a stranger in some obscure way,

urging his course through the intricacies of a tangled forest,

his appearance staid and sober, and his countenance indicating

he was in search of some object in which his feelings were

deeply interested, his apparel plain but entirely neat, and his

little baggage adjusted with peculiar compactness, he might be

almost certain that the stranger was a preacher, hurrying on to

perform his daily task of preaching to separate and distant

congregations, and should the same traveler, upon approaching

some solitary, unfinished, scarcely habitable cabin, hear the praises

of the Creator chanted with peculiar melody, or the doctrines of

the Savior urged upon the attention of some six or eight indi-

viduals with the same.energy and zeal displayed as in an address

before a crowded audience of a populous city, he might be

certain without enquiry, that it was the voice of one of these

ambassadors of Christ."

How much our country owes to the work done by these

brave men has not been estimated neither indeed can it be.

The matter used in the foregoing has merely served as pre-

liminary to the subject matter which is to be used for the his-

torical sketch here recorded.

The character to be described herein was one of the circuit-

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Isaac Newton Walter.                191   riders to which reference has been made and, although his name is unfamiliar to this generation, the period from 1825 to 1850 in the state of Ohio, especially throughout the central portion of the state, held no name in greater reverence. The writer became familiar with the name of the man early in life, by hearing the

story of his singular power and beautiful character told by a grandmother who sat under his eloquent preaching on many occasions during the period above mentioned. He had been dead but three years when the writer was born and having died in the zenith of his fame the story of his career was fresh in

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Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publication.

 

the minds of those who related the incidents of his remarkable

life in my childhood ears. Afterward I read the story of his

life written by a longtime friend. That book is out of print and

it is doubtful if a half-dozen copies can be found. The copy

which has furnished much of the data for this sketch belongs

to a grandson now living in Columbus and who is one of the

city's well-known business men and a member of one of Frank-

lin County's most highly respected families.1

This sketch will be interwoven with the story of the religious

denomination to which he adhered and which during the period

covered by his brilliant ministry gained a strong hold on the peo-

ple over large areas both in the eastern and western part of our

country; but which, through misdirected zeal coupled with the

zeal of another denomination differing but little in its doctrinal

tenets, has never grown to any very noticeable dimensions;

1Six children were born to Rev. Walter and wife, four of whom

lived to maturity. Their names were Isaac N. Jr., John P., Mary and

Sarah A.

Mary and Sarah both lived to great age and reared larged families.

The two boys grew to manhood but died young.

Mary was married to Mr. F. A. Sells of Dublin, Ohio, and became

the mother of three sons and five daughters, most of whom lived their

lives in Columbus. One of these sons and two of the daughters together

with the widows of Walter and Francis A., still reside here. J. H. at

91 Winner Ave. and with him his sister Lydia. Mrs. Charles M. Wam-

baugh resides at the Lincoln. Mr. Howard Park married a sister.

Sarah, the second child, married Joseph Cathcart and was the

mother of five children, one son and four daughters. The four daughters

are still living. Elisabeth married a Mr. Phillips and resides on East

High street in Springfield, Ohio, in the property which was the home of

her grandfather Walter. The other three daughters live at the Locusts,

Fairview Road, Cleveland, where their mother died in 1913 at the age

of eighty-three years, retaining her faculties perfectly till the end.

In this quaint old home are kept the precious heirlooms of the

family. Here are many volumes of their grandfather's library. The

saddle-bags used by him in his long journeys across the mountains,

many articles of furniture, the record which he kept of marriages,

funerals, sermons preached, conversions, baptisms and miles traveled.

Beautiful life-sized oil paintings of the great preacher and his wife

painted by a noted artist while Rev. Walter was pastor of the church

in New York city. Most of the library has been given to Antioch

College.

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Isaac Newton Walter.               193   numbering at this time about 100,000 members in both Northern and Southern conventions, whereas the Disciples of Christ who are like them in points of doctrine and practice save in a few- non-essential particulars have grown to number 1,400,000.2 Isaac N. Walter was the son of John and Mary Moore

Walter, and was born on Lee's Creek, Highland County, Ohio, January 27, 1805. His ancestry is but meagerly chronicled but enough is known to establish the fact that they were English-   2 The last census given out by Mr. Carroll of the census bureau gives the Christians a membership in the United States of 113,000, and a commendable percent of gain within the last twelve months. Vol. XXIV - 13.

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194       Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.

born. As runs the usual story, his paternal great-grandfather

with two brothers, settled in Philadelphia at an early period in

the history of America, and here his grandfather was born Feb-

ruary, 1727. Having reached mature years this grandsire re-

moved to Chester County, Pennsylvania. Here John Walter,

Jr., the father of Isaac N. was born in 1758, and lived there

until 1784 when he removed to Grayson County, Virginia.

Three brothers of this family participated in the war of the

Revolution. Joseph, the youngest of the three, losing his life

while serving with a baggage train.

In 1790 John Walter, Jr., was married to Mary Moore

Alsop at that time a widow, who became the mother of the

subject of this sketch after their removal from Virginia to

Ohio which occurred in the year 1797. Their life in Ohio began

in an Indian camp the year following the establishment of

Wayne County, out of the then Northwest Territory.

"Wayne County was established in the year 1796. It in-

cluded all the North Western Part of Ohio, a large tract in the

Northeastern part of Indiana, and the whole territory of Michi-

gan. Also a part of Illinois and Wisconsin, bringing within its

border Ohio City, Sault St. Marie, Mackinaw, etc. In the year

1798 the Northwest Territory had a population of five thousand

free male inhabitants of full age."

This was a very small planting of human life for so large

an acreage. Life in the new land was a lonely experience

for the young couple; but they, like others, lived in the spirit

of prophesy that saw a blossoming wilderness.

Chillicothe was thirty-three miles to the east of them and the

village of Cincinnati sixty-seven miles to the west which, three

years after this in 1800 had a population of 700. John Walter,

the father, was a self controlled, courageous man, and though

overtaken with misfortune just before removing to Ohio by

which he was bereft of nearly all his belongings, he is said

to have borne it with utmost confidence that he would reestablish

himself once more. The mother of Isaac was a woman of

peculiarly strong and beautiful character. Her son recalls her

motherly care and never fails to credit her with laying the

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Isaac Newton Walter.                195

 

foundation of whatever his own life revealed of power and

influence.

"I remember full well," these are his words, "her mild and

expressive countenance, her speaking eye, her gentle yet firm

words of instruction, * * * and in later years she released not a

mite of her watchful care, but threw around me the shield of

good counsel and encouraged me in the hour of severe trial and

discouragement. I shall never forget her, nor cease to feel her

influence urging me on in the holy duties of life. Other objects

may fade from my memory but my mother, never."

The father and mother were Quakers, the mother a full

member of the sect, the father a member only in the respect

that he was brought up in the tenets and practices of that faith.

Long after the father's death and when the son had become a

minister and came to Dublin, Ohio, to serve the church in that

village, the mother became a member of the church there and

when the summons came to her late in life she was buried

from the Dublin Church and her body lies at rest in the village

cemetery.

The attractive character of Isaac N. Walter which marked

his manhood years and which begot in him almost mesmeric

power was manifest in his childhood as well. An impressive in-

cident is related which occurred while his father was yet inn-

keeper on one of the traces leading from Chillicothe to Cincinnati

and other points to the west. Isaac was only about a half

year old when one day a Scotchman of dignified bearing, haling

from Edinburgh, came to the Ohio Country and passing this way

stopped for refreshment. Just as he was about to leave, he

took the babe in his arms and asked the mother what she

would call him. She replied "Isaac" for my oldest brother.

The traveller took from his pocket a French coin and placed it

in his hand and said, "I christen him Isaac Newton Walter," and

then handing him back to his mother said, "Madam, take special

care of this boy; rear him in the nurture and admonition of the

Lord, for he is to be a preacher of the everlasting Gospel,

and thousands will rejoice in the judgment day in the fact that

he was ever born."  Whatever may be our thought concerning

prediction of this kind, this one was blessed with fulfillment.

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196      Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.

As the boy grew he began to show very early the traits that

were to have marked development in the future of his career.

His life in the wildwood among Indians, and with impending

dangers on every hand begot in him a fearlessness that stood for

much in the days when he became a defender of the weak and

a pronounced enemy of superstition and oppression.

He early developed leadership, both physical and intel-

lectual. His father died when he was eleven years of age and

left him in the care of his loving mother and dependent to no

little degree upon his own personal resources. For the strenuous

battles he had to fight he marshalled all of his inheritance of

brawn and brain supplementing them with determined effort to

make them mean all they might for human helpfulness.

No man in all this western world, of the kind of graduation

that Mr. Milburn mentions in forewords, did more with his

opportunities than did Isaac N. Walter. His talent and love for

public speaking found early expression. With no more than

two years of schooling under a trained teacher he went forth

to make his "merit known;"

"To mould a state's decrees

And shape the whisper of the throne."

He was in the best sense a self-educated man. While he

knew no university as do the youth of our time, nor libraries

like the ones that wealth builds for ornamentation of cities,

still he was not bereft of sources of information for the world

of nature and of man were open to him and these attracted him

mightily.

He heard the songs of birds, the music of waters, and the

murmurings of the forest. Fields, lakes and rivers, the moun-

tains and valleys between, were to him great spokesmen of the

divine mysteries which he knew would more and more unfold

even to the limit of his capacity to drink in their meaning and to

translate this meaning to an eager, waiting world.

I have spoken of his attractiveness. This, undoubtedly

accounted for his great influence over vast audiences that he

addressed from time to time in country places and before

cultured audiences in large cities. This was a quality of youth

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Isaac Newton Walter.                197

 

which developed and as he grew older became the touch-stone

of his success.

His biographer relates that "his young friends would gather

about him with all the confidence of brothers and sisters and

acquiesce in his plans for their youthful amusements. Indeed, he

appears to have been an umpire among them. His ardent

affection and lively imagination gave a warmth and life to the

social party that no other one could supply. The secret of all

this was his quick intuitive intellect; his manly frankness, and

his warm, lively flow of spirit."

In 1823 he became interested in religion in a way he had

not known up to that date. A revival was on in a Methodist

church near his home. His heart responded to the appeals

made, and he took a step that proved the initial one in the

direction of a purpose and mission that was to control his

life. From that time he began to ponder over the teachings

of Scriptures and the various differences existing among churches

and denominations that professed to be followers of the same

great teacher.

He had at this time reached the age of eighteen and as yet

the dogmas of churches had received but little consideration.

The divided state of the church, however, could not escape his

notice and he began to wonder why it was. He was soon to

discover that these denominations or separate parties each had

certain beliefs that were different from the others, very slight

to be sure, but sufficient to cause them to worship in different

churches, to employ different ministers and to carry on propa-

ganda from wholly separate camps. It was the same question

that has proposed itself to the simple minded people in heathen

lands, when missionaries with different names and methods

have gone to win men to Christianity. They have asked, "What

is Christianity? Is it what one teaches as a Presbyterian, or

another teaches as a Baptist or Congregationalist." The result

of all this in heathen lands has been to change the whole program

of missionary labors.

This man at the beginning of the 1₉th century was asking

these questions here in Ohio.

In the year following his conversion and while these ques-

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198      Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.

tionings were giving him no little concern, he came in contact

with a body of men whose distinct purpose was the promulgation

of the idea that denominational names are the cause of division

among Christians and that no creed is legitimate other than the

Bible. Living in a family of Quaker antecedents, and being

converted in a Methodist revival, and realizing that there were

a great number of other sects with various names, made him

ponder as aforesaid, so, that when he met the man with the new

light representing the new movement which would countenance

no name but Christian for the followers of Jesus and no creed

but the Bible, he was ready to listen to what he had to say.

The new light appealed to him and after careful meditation he

decided to give himself to the new propaganda.

Here we may well pause to give a little attention to this

movement which at that time was gaining much headway, East,

West and South.

The year 1793 is memorable in the world's history. All

Europe was in the throes of revolution. The year opened with

the execution of Louis Sixteenth in France and the Reign of

Terror spread to many cities and provinces. An old order was

dying, giving place to a new one, but the journey to the new

was through rivers of blood. New forms of thought in politics

and religion were gaining sway in the minds of men everywhere.

America had just emerged from a mighty conflict and was ex-

perimenting with a form of government the varied character

of which men had never before dared more than dream about.

A few great men with the modest Washington at their head

were bearing the responsibility of this experiment. While

changes of political character were making, the religious life

of Europe and America was also feeling the effects of the tide-

waves of thought that were bearing men to higher standing

ground of freedom.

Methodism which, through John and Charles Wesley,

Fletcher and Whitefield, had challenged the English Church in

the matter of its exclusive right in distributing ministerial

orders, had been a growing power since Wesley had withdrawn

from the Moravians in 1740. It was not until the year 1793,

however, that the Methodist ministers were allowed to administer

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Isaac Newton Walter.                199

 

the Sacrament on English soil, although that privilege had been

granted in America from the time that Asbury was made the

first Bishop in 1784.

At the time of Asbury's ordination there was another

pioneer preacher who was his rival for the Bishopric. His

name was James O'Kelley. O'Kelley was the leader of a

movement opposing the authority and life tenure of the bishops.

Disappointed, as has been claimed, in losing the appointment

of bishop and failure in winning success in his opposition he

withdrew from the general Methodist Conference and in 1793

formed an organization known as the Republican Methodist.

This body afterward took the name Christian and led away

from the Methodist denomination a company to the number

of about 6,500.

A little later than this a similar movement was led by Abner

Jones, a Baptist, of Lyndon, Vermont.

About the same time, Barton W. Stone, David Purviance,

William Kincaid and others, Presbyterians in Kentucky, formed

the center of schism in the Springfield Presbytery which re-

sulted in a separation. These three movements became known

to one another and a convention was called which resulted

in the organization known as the Christian Church - advocating

liberty in matters of religious thought and practice, with no

name but Christian, no creed but the Bible, and with character

the only test of fellowship.

This group of people claim to have established the first

religious newspaper in the United States, if not in the world,

and the first college in America (Antioch) to graduate a woman

on the same platform with a man. The paper is still published in

Dayton, Ohio, under the caption "Herald of Gospel Liberty."3

And Antioch College, whose first president was Horace Mann,

is still in operation at Yellow Springs, Ohio, with Honorable

Simeon D. Fess, a member of Congress, its President-Rev.

George D. Black its Acting President.

 

3The Herald of Gospel Liberty, now printed at Dayton, Ohio, is

the successor of the Gospel Herald of Walter's time, and is in the line

of succession to the original paper first published very early in the

century in New England.

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200       Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications. The Christians were called "Christians," the word being pronounced by giving the long sound to the first i in the word. They were nicknamed "New Lights," as were the Presbyterians in an early day in New England. The Disciples of Christ, a body of people organized nearly a quarter of a century later, were also called Christians in many sections and were nicknamed Campbellites after Alexander Campbell, their founder, to dis- tinguish them from the first named. During the early part of the 19th century this movement gave promise of remarkable

spread through the country; its largest growth in any one state, however, being in Ohio, where almost every movement was being experimented with. The men who were associated in this free and independent religious undertaking were men of exceptional intellectual and spiritual vitality. Their platform was such that the utmost freedom was felt in their declaration of the truth as they gath- ered it from the Holy Book. They recognized no over-lords in religion; they hated intolerance and bigotry, and oppression

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Isaac Newton Walter.               201

of every sort. They stood for the free course of the word.

As before said they would accept no creed. The Bible was

their rule of faith and practice. Every man had freedom to

read and interpret as his mind could grasp the meaning. As a

result of this liberal attitude they became the object of attack

and persecution. The doors of other churches were closed

against them. They preached in dwellings and barns and in the

mild seasons of the year sought the groves, "God's first temples,"

and there the people heard them gladly and heeded in large num-

bers the calls that were marked with deep fervor and strange,

remarkable eloquence. They were of the Wesley and Whitefield

type, and stirred the multitudes in ways that produced peculiar

results among the listeners. People were prostrate before them.

That strange phenomenon known as the "jerks" was of frequent

occurrence. Withal, the simplicity of their social and religious

life would brook no irreverence and at no time did the people

make light of these, at that time, unexplainable happenings.

Into the midst of conditions like this young Walter came

with keen discernment and spiritual simplicity to perform his

work of a Christian minister. The new movement caught him

up and transplanted him into the soil of freedom of religious

thought and expression. From that time he knew the liberty

with which the Spirit makes free.

In 1824, when he was nineteen years of age, he was married

to a most excellent woman, Lydia Anderson by name, and in 1825

at Charleston, Clark County, not far from the present city of

Springfield, he was ordained to the Christian ministry by the lay-

ing on of hands of those who had preceded him in the priestly

office. At this service Benjamin Brittain, Daniel Long, Abraham

Aldrich, and George Zimmerman officiated. He had preached

many times before this, but now began a ministry which was to

continue twenty-five years, full of marvelous power. In 1826 he

located in Dublin, Franklin County, and organized the Christian

church of that village. Here also he taught school for a period,

but soon relinquished that work to give his whole time to preach-

ing; traveling on foot and horse-back over the counties of Clark,

Champaign, Union, Delaware, Licking, Franklin, Ross and

Fayette.

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202      Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications. In June of 1827 he started on his first extended journey from home which was to be repeated many times in the next quarter of a century. On this journey he traveled through Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Maryland, preaching continu- ously all along the way. He was absent three months, taking no rest, riding the distance of more than 1,000 miles on horse- back. On the 26th of November of this year he started on the second Eastern trip and traveled as far as Newark when his horse gave out and he had to return home. Early in December he once more left his home. In his account of this trip he speaks of passing through Columbus just as the Legislature was assembling. He mentions the splendor in which the members of the Legislature were living and how in contrast it seemed to the

simple life of the circuit riders and yet, he says further: "I would not exchange station with any of them, nor even with a king on his throne". He returned from this second visit to the East in March, 1828, and proceeded immediately to meet his appointments in the counties of Franklin, Clark, Licking and others. In this year he writes: "We, as a body of people, are despised at the present time, in this priest ridden part of the world, nevertheless, I anticipate the day * * * when malice, superstition and deceit shall be purged from the professed fol- lowers of the Lord Jesus, and love without dissimulation reign predominant. * * * In many places in the West, bigotry and prejudice are exerting their unhallowed influence in pro- moting discord in the religious community; and in their train of

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Isaac Newton Walter.              203

wickedness, they are fostered by those who cease not daily to

declare that the Holy Scriptures are not sufficient to govern

the people of God harmoniously."     At the close of this

writing he says: "I faintly see in the coming future, the banner

of peace waving high in the air; its gentle vibration fan my

soul; before and behind I see crowds of wearied pilgrims march-

ing gently along; their countenances shining like the mild sun-

beams of the vernal morn". How strange it seems that just 85

years after these words were uttered, in the same month of the

year and almost on the very spot and in a building erected by

the people who are the lineal descendants in flesh and religious

faith of those who set forth the new idea, these Christians were

joining themselves with the people of two other denominations

in the village to form one church.

It will be interesting to again pause in the narrative to

describe this event which shows the progress made in the church

life of America in this period a little short of a century.

Through all of these years three denominations had carried on

their work in the village of Dublin, Ohio, and maintained three

respectable church buildings. Three ministers served the people

most of the time; three Sunday Schools were kept in motion, a

small proportion of the people attending one or another, but

most of the population indifferent to what was doing in any of

them except to ridicule or condemn their unseemly rivalries and

bickerings. Of course, there were times when the people would

have refreshings and talk over the folly of the waste of it all

and speak of a time when they might work together. One day in

June, 1912, a cyclone visited the village and wrecked two of

the church buildings, leaving the Christian, the most substantial

of the three, standing. For a few months the people worshipped

together in this church and as they sang together and prayed

together and studied the Bible together the spirit of unity and

friendliness grew apace, till one day they said we will be one. A

great leader of men -Dr. Washington Gladden -was invited

to tell them about the faith and practices of the Congregational

Churches and they were convinced that it presented a basis on

which they could unite. This they decided to do, and on March

4, 1913, the day Woodrow Wilson was inaugurated President of

• 17
 

204      Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications. the United States, these three churches, the Christian, the Methodist, and the Presbyterian, became one with a declaration of faith that would have entirely satisfied Isaac N. Walter could he have been on the scene to witness the happy union. Within six months the one united church had twice as many members as all three brought to it. And the spirit of good-will was in con- trol. The prophecy of Walter had been fulfilled. The period in which Rev. Walter was active was one in which it was thought theological ideas should be vigorously de- fended in the pulpit and elsewhere. There was scarcely a com- munity that was not familiar with the debates carried on between

the champions of the various camps of believers. Doctrines such as the Trinity, Atonement, Baptism and others received attention in undue measure and controversy was the stock in trade of the ministry. While Rev. Walter was of gentle, courteous disposition, indisposed to quarrel, he nevertheless felt it incumbent upon him to defend the faith, as he entertained it, against any and all who made light of it or were disposed to discount its reasonableness and truth. One of these occasions may be alluded to as repre- senting the character of proceedings and typical of the numerous happenings that kept whole communities constantly on tiptoe

• 18
 

Isaac Newton Walter.               205

In June of the year 1833 a Christian church was dedicated in

Rockingham County, Virginia, and Walter preached the dedi-

catory sermon. In this sermon he touched upon the leading

views of these "New Lights" as they were denominated. The

Unity of God, Sonship of Jesus, the name Christian for his

followers, the Bible as the one and only rule of faith and practice,

and Christian character the test of fellowship. The sermon was

strong and convincing, but as usual, excited criticism in the people

who had been trained to see these matters in another light and

so a Rev. Lyon, minister in the M. E. Church of Virginia, chal-

lenged Rev. Walter to debate. Lyon was a much older man

and of wider experience, but he proved no match for the younger

man, and as a result the community was influenced in the direc-

tion of the new enterprise.

As we look back to-day and try to discover any justification

for such proceedings we are nonplussed. While the same differ-

ences exist, and perhaps always will, we find it impossible to

quarrel very much about them. It may have been a part of the

cycle of religious and social experience which is necessary to the

larger and more permanent fellowship of life. Who knows?

Whatever may have been its purpose and utility at that time

we are satisfied that for our time it would be the climax of

absurdity. A tolerant mood is the mood of our age and men

find very little time to engage in splitting hairs over questions

of casuistry.

This man, in the main, was bent upon a loftier task than

that of merely defeating another man in argument. He took

his mission more seriously.

In the year 1833 he received a call to become the pastor of

the First Christian Church of New York City. Previous engage-

ments extending to February, 1834, prevented his going to the

new field until that time. During the intervening months he

visited and held meetings in Philadelphia, Washington City,

Baltimore, and many small places; some of them in country

districts.

He took up the work of a pastor in the metropolis with

much trepidation and many forebodings, but within three months

he had imparted new hopes to his people so that a member of his

• 19
 

206       Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.

 

congregation writing to a friend in the West could say; "His

success in so short a time has surpassed all our expectations. The

congregations are increasing and will soon overrun the capacity

of the church". In the following summer on a vacation trip

he returned to his beloved Ohio and filled in his time visiting

churches in Chatham, Utica, Hebron, Newark, Mt. Vernon, and

Pleasant Grove. Returning to New York he was invited to

preach in Philadelphia and in Wheeling, West Virginia. In the

latter he spoke from the Court House steps to a multitude of

people.

At the end of his first year's pastorate in New York a very

glowing account of his success is given by the Public Press.

Attention is called to one of his services on a Sunday evening

when he spoke on "The Unity of God, the Sonship of Christ and

the Holy Spirit" in opposition to the doctrine of the Trinity. The

report says; "He began at 7 o'clock and closed his discourse at

ten minutes past ten. One hour before the time the seats were

filled and when he began preaching every aisle and every part

of the house was densely crowded and hundreds had to go away,

not being able to find standing room".

His sermons aroused the giants of orthodoxy all over the

city and many replied and then came to hear what Walter would

say subsequently. The excitement grew until the church in which

he spoke was entirely insufficient to house the audiences. All of

this time he kept up his pastoral duties, attended social meetings,

gave weekly lectures in the vestry, kept in close touch with the

Sunday School.

The nervous strain was great. Relief was secured by fre-

quent trips out of the city. Journeys to Ohio were numerous.

In April, 1835, he traveled from New York to Central Ohio to

preach the funeral of Rev. Joseph Thomas, a minister who was

known as the White Pilgrim because of his custom of wearing

white garments the year round. At this time he visited Dublin

where he had lived for six years and where he was to spend

some of the last years of his life. He says of this visit: "I

visited every house in the village and then repaired to the bury-

ing ground attached to the chapel to visit my mother's grave.

When I entered the gate many sensations moved me. I walked

• 20
 

Isaac Newton Walter.               207

silently and softly along over the graves of others till I found

the place that contained her body. I stopped and gazed on the

sacred spot while nothing broke the silence of the hour save the

sighing of the evening zephyr. And while standing there I called

to mind the many times she had wept over the follies of my

youth; the many godly admonitions I had received from her, as

the spiritual fruits of a heart that prays to God for the salva-

tion of a child, and in the midst of my thoughts, I kneeled by

the head of the tomb, wet the cold earth with my tears, and

prayed that 'my life might be as righteous; that my last days

might be as his' ".

After spending many days among the churches of Ohio,

preaching and baptizing converts, he returned again to New

York. Thus the years were spent, doing the work of a shepherd

over a growing parish in the city and traveling to and fro among

smaller churches in villages and country places wherever he was

invited; occasionally being called to preach in Boston, Portland,

Philadelphia, Baltimore, Wheeling and other cities. His life

was one full of work, and hundreds of people were led to accept

Christ under his eloquent and earnest efforts.

In February and March of 1839 a series of meetings in New

York resulted in a great revival. Tammany Hall in that day had

a bad reputation and it is not yet entirely free from such. It

was a meeting place not only for scheming politicians, but also

for those who scoffed at religion and made bitter attacks upon

the Church and the Bible. One of the frequenters of the place

addressed a letter to Walter during these meetings in which he

said, among other things: "I have listened with intense interest

to your preaching of the Gospel, which has produced in my mind

pleasing and sublime contemplations. I have looked with admira-

tion and surprise upon your respectable and attentive hearers

and I feel constrained to say that I never witnessed before in

any church such profound solemnity, such reverential awe, as was

manifested by the people during the late session of your meet-

ings." This Tammany letter-writer subscribed himself, "Moral

Philanthropist".

The strain of the work began to tell on him and in May,

1840, he was compelled to relinquish it. His first thought was of

• 21
 

208       Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications. his home and friends in Ohio, and so toward the West he set his face but at Buffalo, in the home of Israel C. Ely, he was taken with chills and fever. It was not until mid-summer that he was able to leave Buffalo. In August he met with the Central Ohio Conference of Christian Churches and helped to plan for future activity, but it was painfully evident that he must desist from strenuous effort and take an extended rest. During some of this time he had his residence in Dublin where occasionally

he would talk to the people without any attempt to give himself to vigorous pulpit effort. Kind friends ministered to him and his health began to return and with it an anxiety to be active in the field again. He had become interested in the cause of education and tem- perance and the remaning fifteen years of his life were to find him writing and speaking as his health would allow in advancing these interests. On the 7th of March, 1841, he preached a ser-

• 22
 

Isaac Newton Walter.               209

mon in the Church of Dublin in which he gave an example of

his thought and feeling touching the temperance reform. His

words are strong, forceful and unmistakable. He says: "It is a

cold time in religion here and no doubt one cause of so much

indifference among the people is the establishment of a death

office in our village, generally known as a groggery. Here the

intoxicating poison is sold, and drunk by the poor unfortunates

of our population. In this office men are prepared to fight, swear,

gamble and abuse their families in the most shameful manner.

I pray God the time will soon come when the public will frown

these places of wretchedness and abomination from the land; for

of all places they are to be dreaded most. If I were to attempt

a description of them, I would say they are the grand mints in

which the stamp and superscription of the old dragon are made

in letters of burning fire on the heads and hearts of lost men

and women. They are the forts of the devil; the mustering

places of Satan's armies; the campaign country of Lucifer's

allies; the pest-house of earth; the abode of blood. Over them

the fallen angels flap their wings of death ! Through them shrink

the souls of the pit, whose grating teeth and glowing eyes hor-

rify the virtuous spectator! The bursting fires of the nethermost

hell light up the features of those unfortunate victims who in-

habit these regions of despair! May the Lord enable his ministers

to set their faces against the vice of intemperance.  I have

waged an eternal warfare with all makers and venders of ardent

spirits and everything that can intoxicate. I am determined to

have no compromise with ministers or laymen who use it un-

righteously, till the demon is exterminated from the earth. This

course, I know, will cause me to meet with opposition, but I do

not care. I desire the world should know my views on this sub-

ject. And I am determined by the grace of God, that the

broken hearted wife shall never hear from the drunken husband

that, 'When your ministers leave off drinking then will I become

a sober man'. I speak unto wise men; judge ye what I say".

On the evening of the 15th of that month he addressed the

people of Hebron, twenty miles east of Columbus, on the sudden

and unexpected death of William Henry Harrison, whose words

are quoted at the beginning of this article. His health improv-

Vol. XXIV - 14.

• 23
 

210       Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.

ing, he continued his journey into the East again, beginning

formally his campaign in the causes above named, education and

temperance.

It was apparent to him, as it is to all men at any time,

that education is elementary in any movement that considers the

welfare of mankind. He felt that any good cause must have

wise, efficient advocacy and the more it had to do with liberating

the mind and souls of men from fear and superstition, the

greater the need of trained minds and hearts in the apostleship

of that movement.

Some of the ministry were with him as he plead for a school

of learning for the training of young men. Others were luke-

warm and still others stood in forcible opposition. Obstacles

like these must be thrust aside or trodden over. In all of this

effort Walter stood foremost and advocated the forward step and

formulated resolutions that were adopted in most of the Con-

ferences over the country. This work brought feebleness again

and the part he took in pushing the cause was taken from a sick

bed and with the use of the pen writing letters and inditing

arguments and resolutions. Arising from his bed he again pushes

the conquests and visits churches both East and West. At this

time the fame of the man had grown and multitudes gathered to

hear his addresses on temperance and to give encouragement to

the task of educational reform he had espoused. Neither was

he neglecting the evangelistic note for which his preaching was

marked and hundreds were brought to espouse the faith as he

went from place to place.

Along with all this enthusiasm the matter of a religious

newspaper was talked of and a project was set on foot for

starting such an enterprise in the West.  The outcome of

this agitation resulted finally, in the establishment of a publish-

ing house and the publishing of a paper known as the Gospel

Herald. It was printed bi-weekly at New Carlisle, Ohio, Rev.

Walter being its first editor. This was in 1843. In 1845 the

place of publication was changed to Springfield, Ohio⁴ and Isaac

4Mr. Walter removed from New Carlisle to Springfield when the

office of the paper was taken there; and that became his permanent home.

The property is still occupied by a grand-daughter.

• 24
 

Isaac Newton Walter.               211

N. Walter was still retained as editor. The paper became a

means by which he could convey his message to thousands where

only a comparative few could get it from his eloquent lips. A

few of the themes treated by the editor follow: "Prophetic

Style", "The Misionary Cause", "Temperance", "Trials of the

Ministry", "The Christian Martyrs of the First Century", "The

Importance of an Educated Ministry", "War", "Slavery". Some

of these utterances rank with the best things that were being

said in that day and will stand the test of our own time as to

matter and style of writing. He took advantage of his oppor-

tunity and privilege to make the editorial page speak clearly

also on theological questions that were being debated by the

clergy of the time and especially in defending the body of people,

whose servant he was as editorial writer for their medium of

church news and propaganda of doctrine.

In answer to an attack made by Rev. Cole, Editor of "Cross

and Journal", a Baptist periodical in which the charge was made

that the Christians were joined with the Unitarians in denying the

divinity of Christ; he writes, "Brother Cole speaks as if it were

an established fact that the Unitarians and Christians agree in

denying the divinity of Christ. But it is for my brother to prove

that either denomination denies that proposition. This he can not

do. We probably deny his notion of Christ's divinity, but,

should it appear that his idea is founded in an ignorance of the

Messiah's true nature, which is altogether possible, then what

does our difference from him import? Why, simply that we have

been more fortunate in finding the truth than he. The Christians,

as a people, admit the divinity of the nature, character, office,

doctrine and fullness of Jesus Christ. They only deny that he is

the supreme and unoriginated being called God. * * * We

deny the self-existent creator died on the cross. Surely no man can

believe the ever-living and unchangeable Father died". In speak-

ing of a charge brought against the Theological School conducted

by the Unitarians at Meadville, Pennsylvania, he continues:

"The brother does not seem to know that in this school there

are no test questions of opinion. Freedom of thought is not

crushed by authority. To send out slaves to a sect is not its

purpose but rather to send out a class of men so enlightened as

• 25
 

212      Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.

to look through the narrowness of sectarianism and to preach

and practice that universal truth which, to all men is the power

of God unto salvation. Accordingly, the library of this institu-

tion is composed of the best works, not of one but of all denom-

inations, among whom superior minds have grown up. Thus

it has the gleamings of many constellations while the sunlight of

revelation is first of all".

During his occupancy of the editorial sanctum he was on the

road a great deal in response to calls to fill pulpits and make

addresses in near and distant places, and when we think of the

absence of convenient ways of travel that we enjoy now, we

may imagine what it meant to move from one place to a distant

place in the country.

The journeying to and fro that he accomplished seems

astounding. On his fiftieth birthday, the year before he died,

recalling the events of his thirty years' ministry he related that

he had traveled a sufficient number of miles to girdle the earth

a little over six times; he had crossed the Allegheny Mountains

fifty times; preached eight thousand, two hundred and forty-three

sermons; attended one thousand, eight hundred and twenty-nine

funerals; baptized three thousand, three hundred and ninety-two

converts; received eight thousand, nine hundred and seventy-

one into church membership; prayed with one thousand, nine

hundred and seven sick persons and married one thousand and

fifty-two couples.⁵

He was truly a circuit rider with a record. He felt that the

call to preach was louder than any other and so when these

calls came, he was ready to heed them, nursing his strength

all the time that he might be able to endure the demands on

his already worn and tired body. In these journeys he would

go to New York and Boston in attendance upon conventions

and conferences and in these places he came in contact with

men of great eminence; men who are known to this generation

as lights in the sky of literature and of religious and scientific

scholarship. He knew William E. Channing, James Freeman

5The statement given above is taken from the carefully kept record

mentioned in another note. It is in most beautiful handwriting, such as

is rarely seen in our time.

• 26
 

Isaac Newton Walter.                213

Clark, Ezra Stiles Gannett and many others famous at that time

and they all knew him to honor him.

In a notable address in which Thomas Chalmers of England

and William E. Channing of New England are compared and

contrasted he says of Channing: "To quicken frigid indifference

into healthy life Channing nobly appeals to the consciousness

possessed by every man of a capacity for high moral culture

and for lofty spiritual progress."

"Peruse his piercing scrutiny of the character and conduct of

Napoleon, the self-styled child of destiny. See how calmly the

Christian philosopher divests the warrior genius of the false

glitter which had dazzled the vision of infatuated multitudes,

and presents the self-made monarch in his blood-red garments

at the bar of outraged, insulted, suffering humanity, and bids

him listen, with trembling awe, to the echoes of the voice of

conscience; vindicating the violated law of love * * *. On

every page of Channing breathes the spirit of an earnest seeker

after truth. Exploring the depths of the human soul, in quest

of the pearl of virtue, and calmly removing the rubbish that ob-

structs his way until his eyes are greeted by the precious treasure

which never fails to reward his search * * *. He is a gentle

poet, with classic grace and loving songs, winning men to wor-

ship at the shrine of virtue and of beauty; winning even the

warrior himself from the love of contest to the love of truth."

Reading such utterances at this time when three quarters

of a century have passed since they fell from the lips of the

orator makes us pause and wonder whether these times in which

we live are succeeding as well in producing the kind of men the

world must have if she is to be redeemed from   sordid ma-

terialism and ghoulish greed.

Isaac N. Walter had some of the vision of a seer and an

imagination which could color thought-expression in such a

way as to charm and captivate the auditor, while along with it

all went such an Apollo like handsomeness of figure and such

purity of character as to make of him a veritable human magnet.

His appreciation of great men reacted and imprinted great-

ness on his own character. This he reflected wherever he went

so that men could say of him as truly as he said of Channing

• 27
 

214      Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.

that he "allures by the infinite beauty of divine love causing

the dark continents of vice to quail before what he styles the

unspeakable grandeur of a human soul."

In the summer of 1847 he was constrained to relinquish

the position of editor, although he continued to the time of his

death to contribute liberally the products of his pen. He de-

voted himself from this time as his strength permitted to the

work he loved above all other, that of a preacher and lecturer.

Disease preyed upon him and made it impossible for him to heed

but a small proportion of the calls that came. The character

of the work done, however, lifted the standard of thought and

conduct in the churches and communities throughout Ohio and

surrounding states. The crowds who listened to him came to fix

their attention upon the questions of missions, education, tem-

perance and universal social welfare.

On the 27th of August, 1848, he preached to the prisoners

in the Ohio Penitentiary. At that time there were four hundred

and thirty-four confined within its walls, of whom eight were

women. Four hundred were present to hear him together with

the prison officers and a large number of visitors. He relates of

this occasion, "Among the prisoners were gray haired fathers,

middle-aged men and youth. During my discourse many appeared

to be deeply affected. No doubt they thought of home, the

associations of former days and the loved ones they had left

behind; others appeared hardened and lost to all the feelings of

humanity. As their hope of regaining character was gone they

were indifferent to the subject of religion; although I have no

doubt in many bosoms deep feelings of guilt were felt when they

looked back upon the scenes of the past. I think upon the whole,

that my visit to the penitentiary in Columbus will be attended with

good."

In October of this same year he was present at a conference

of churches in Raleigh, North Carolina, and delivered an address

on temperance of which an editor of the city paper wrote: "It

was our privilege last evening to listen to the Rev. Isaac N.

Walter of Ohio deliver one of the rarest and at the same time

most effective temperance addresses we have ever heard. The

reverend gentleman was a perfect master of his subject and held

• 28
 

Isaac Newton Walter.              215

 

the large audience enchained for nearly two hours-at times

melted to tears by the pathos with which he described human

depravity and human misery; and then borne onward by his

resistless eloquence and stirring appeals to their sympathy and

their judgment, and anon entertained by his rich fund of anec-

dotes and naive and happy illustrations. Such a practical and

matter-of-fact address so illustrated and enriched must tell,

we think, with effective benefit wherever delivered when aided

by the pleasing manner and graceful oratory of the author."

The address here described was delivered before the Grand

Division of the Sons of Temperance. On the following after-

noon he delivered another address on the same subject standing

at the corner of what was called Grog Alley and Market Street,

known to be one of the worst locations of the city. His friends

feared for his safety but he was fearless. A large audience as-

sembled composed of the principal business men of the city to

which were added all the grog sellers and their patrons. He

mounted a store box and poured forth a torrent of argument

that held the people in awe and sent them away thinking in a

way they had never been used to.

His tour through the southland was full of this kind of

activity and resulted in good to the people and to himself,

although it drew upon his vital force and warned him that

he must have a care.

In Raleigh he met Dorothy Dix, reformer, philanthropist

and writer of juvenile books. Miss Dix was born in the same

year as Walter but lived on thirty years after he had ended his

work. He writes in his journal about her, "She appears before

the legislative assembly with memorial in hand, praying for an

appropriation of one hundred thousand dollars to erect an

asylum for the insane *      * *. In the providence of God she

is the voice of the maniac; the poor, crazed beings confined

in cells and stalls, cages and waste rooms, in the poor houses

of the state. She is the voice of revelation of hundreds of

wailing, suffering creatures who are shut out from all healing

influences and from all mind-restoring cures."

On his return from the South in 1849 he filled appointments

in Virginia and Maryland, stoping awhile in Baltimore, preach-

• 29
 

216       Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.

ing in the Unitarian church, presided over by Rev.

Burnap, a noted preacher of his time. He arrived home again

on the 22nd of January, having been absent nearly a half year.

He had scarcely arrived home till calls began to reach him from

all directions. The people of the South began to urge him to

come that way again and after spending a few weeks in Ohio he

determines on another journey to the East and the South.

In the meantime the year 1850 arrives, which proved to be the

opening of the last six years of his useful and eventful life.

On the first day of January, 1850, he writes in his journal

as follows: "This day I enter upon another year. How rapidly

time flies. It waits for no man and yet how thoughtless, how

careless earth's thousands are with reference to its improve-

ment. It will end the existence of many who count much on

living long and accomplishing much appertaining to this life

and this, perhaps, is my last year. I may not see it close. I

trust that while I am permitted to stay I shall be of more

service to my fellowmen than I have been heretofore."

In April he was at his home in Springfield but making

ready for the more extended campaign. He visited the places

over the central portion of Ohio where little groups of people

had become associated in the propagation of the new doctrine.

Mechanicsburg, Woodstock, Milford, West Jefferson, Granville,

Hebron, Nelsonville. In the last named place he was very

courteously treated by the Methodist minister and expresses his

very cordial appreciation of the same, since it was a very unusual

thing to extend courtesies of church fellowship at that time.

In all these towns mentioned and many others, he was

encouraged to express himself as very strong in the belief that

flourishing churches would grow up in these settlements. They

began, but did not thrive and to-day not one of them has a

Christian church. The failure of the Christians to become

one of the strongest bodies in Ohio is doubtless the result

of bad management. Larger towns, with the exception of a

very few were neglected entirely and when a church came

to be erected in a village it was usualy placed on the outskirts

or a half-mile in the country. Then there was no efficient

pastorating. It was not an unusual thing for a church to have

• 30
 

Isaac Newton Walter.               217

 

two preachers at the same time, alternating their services two

weeks or a month apart, neither remaining on the ground

except over Sunday or, when a special revival was on, they

would both be present. Sometimes these meetings would con-

tinue over a period of two or three or, at the greatest, four

weeks; one would preach and the other would exhort. But such

work can never build up a strong, virile organization of any

kind and so the denomination failed to grow strong in point

of membership and was never stronger than it was at the first

blush of the new flower of religious liberty. The people heard

great preaching but few of these preachers were wise and

proficient leaders and organizers of men.

On this trip East and South he visited the city of Wash-

ington and spent awhile in the Houses of Congress and speaks

in his Journal of the absence of senatorial dignity with the

men who had been sent there to make laws and to represent

the various sections of a great country. He says: "The House

was a scene of confusion and disorder and but little more than

one-third of the members were present. It is painful to witness

how the glory has departed from our National Legislature."

How much these words sound like strictures that are made even

at the present. During this sojourn the interest in education

was growing among the people whom he addressed from day

to day.

Graham Institute had been established in the South and all

that it needed, as he said, was the loyal support of the people

whose children were to make the citizenship of the future. The

school is still in existence but with little more strength than

marked it in the beginning.

This sojourn was also distinguished by the great assemblies

of people who came to hear him as he passed from place to place.

These assemblies were reckoned up in the thousands. The story

of his pilgrimage is not unlike the narrative of the journeys

of St. Paul and the early Apostles. His absence from home

on this itinerary covered a period of more than a year. He

speaks of it as one of the most interesting campaigns of his

life.

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218       Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.

In 1851 the church in New York invited him to take pastoral

charge once more and after earnest solicitation he yielded and

left Ohio to take up the work in October of that year, leaving

his family in the Ohio home for the time. The church had

gone through many and varied experiences since he had served

them before. Some of these were beneficial and some were not.

A new and more commodious structure had been erected for

carrying on the work of the church. For the short time that

he remained as shepherd of the flock, he gave himself as a

true pastor and in letters to his wife speaks of the poor and

wretched that he ministers to and how he suffers with them

as he goes in and out among them. He also mentions other and

contrasting phases of life found in the parish. Referring to the

customs of the so-called refined or fashionable society, he says:

"Things, with reference to custom in the social circle, are differ-

ent in some respects to what they were during my former

residence here. Then it was customary to spend the after-

noon with a friend, take tea at the usual hour and return home

at nine o'clock. But now the custom is, when we are invited

to a social party, to go at eight or nine o'clock and remain until

two or three in the morning. Now to all this, with all the non-

sense connected, I enter my solemn protest. I will not submit

to it, for I must consult my health and the laws of nature which

are the laws of God and are never to be infracted by the customs

of society. This way of visiting and eating late suppers is

directly opposed to the laws of physical, mental and moral health

and therefore opposed to the best interest of community life."

He inveighs further against these extravagances but the words

quoted are sufficient to show the attitude of his mind to such

things.

In this sojourn with the people of New York he again

breaks out in his characteristic way in bitter hostility to the rum

traffic. He made himself familiar with the justice courts, or

Tombs. Here he possessed himself of facts that filled him with

indignation. The year's record showed commitments to the num-

ber of 21,747, of which 19,700 had been the result of intemperance

and the remaining 2,000 were children of drunken parents who,

thrown upon the world without guardian or protector, had com-

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Isaac Newton Walter.               219

mitted depredations for which they had been arrested and put in

prison. In an address given at this time he says: "The halls

of justice are in sight of the City Hall where the Board of

Aldermen meet to counsel and to attend to the municipal regu-

lation of the city and to grant licenses to men to keep drinking

slaughter-houses which are the means of sending 19,000 drunk-

ards to the Tombs in a single year and the whole cost of crime

growing directly or indirectly from the traffic is $750,000 per

annum; while the revenue brought into the municipal treasury

from these houses of death is about $45,000." He proceeds

with an unanswerable argument in support of the law then, and

still, in operation in the state of Maine. "I hope every state in

the nation will agitate this question until the legislators will

have to pass similar laws putting down the rum power all over

the country. There is a fearful responsibility somewhere. Who

are responsible and to what extent? We admit that the inebriate,

who brings disaster upon himself by his own voluntary act is

deeply responsible, but are there no others to be held accountable?

In every case, where effects are not half so direful, the civil

law and the moral law also, holds those responsible who in any

way are aiders or abettors and punishes them as particeps

criminis. *  * *

"If you place poison in a spring, where persons are accus-

tomed to drink and drinking thereof they die, you are held

guilty of murder by law. If a man by deception, induces

another to take arsenic or prussic acid by which death results,

he is just as responsible as though he had secretely mixed

the deadly draught. What difference is there in the sight of

all righteous principles, between poisoning by prussic acid and by

alcohol? Yet in one case the law condemns and punishes while

in the other it legalizes and sanctions. The liquor dealer claims

to act under license granted by the City Council. But who made

the City Council? The people-yes, the people. There is where

the chief responsibility lies. The people must be burdened with

the responsibility of electing the right kind of men to office.

The sentiments of the masses must be cast in the right mould;

the standard of feeling and action on this, as on all other ques-

tions of moral reform, must be elevated in the public mind, and

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220       Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.

there is where the true reformer and philanthropist must direct

his labors."

I mentioned before that the last fifteen years of his life,

though given to the church as editor and evangelist, were given

also to his country and the world in strong and efficient service

in advocacy of temperance and educational constructiveness.

During that period the Christians were planning for an institu-

tion of learning in the west that would be to the western country

what Harvard and Yale had been to the east. It was an am-

bitious undertaking and was begun with sun-lit vision and most

commendable zeal. Isaac N. Walter was one of the factors in

that movement and lived to see it gloriously launched and watched

it through four years of brilliant promise. But fate was to

declare against it in time and while the piles of brick stand in

mute architectural splendor, its glory is but a memory.

When Antioch College was founded at Yellow     Springs,

Ohio, in 1850 and opened its doors to students in 1853, there

was no institution of learning in Ohio, save Ohio University

at Athens and Miami at Oxford, that gave better promise

of success and both of these were state institutions. Ohio was

nearly fifty years old; Miami as a university, was about twenty-

five; Western Reserve, then located at Hudson, Ohio, about

twenty-five; Marietta fifteen; Oberlin Institute, seventeen, be-

coming a college in 1850. Ohio Wesleyan, sixteen, the Female

Institute was inaugurated 1853, Granville Literary and Theo-

logical Institute had been in existence nineteen years, becoming

a college in 1856, the year of Walter's death, Hiram, the school

of the Disciples, starting the same year as Antioch as an academy

and becoming a college twenty years later, in 1870, the same

year that the Ohio State University at Columbus had its be-

ginning.

The loftiest ideals were entertained by the founders of Anti-

och. No finer or brainier company of men could be found

anywhere than were back of the launching of this "Harvard of

the West." So bright did the future appear that the Hon-

orable Horace Mann, successor of John Quincy Adams in the

Lower House of Congress at Washington and nominee of the

Free Soil Party for Governor of Massachusetts, by far the fore-

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Isaac Newton Walter.               221 most educator of his time and the peer of the greatest in any time, was drawn from a career that promised everything po- litically, to become the first president and to give the last seven years of his precious life in service to the institution. Here for the first time in history, no limitations were placed upon students. Color, sex, nor previous condition of servitude created any bar to entrance or graduation on the same platform. The curriculum was as exacting as in any institution east or west.

Walter had helped to fight the battles that ended in the establishment of this institution and on the day of Horace Mann's induction into the office of president, October 5, 1853, he made the address for the board of trustees and placed the keys of the college in the hands of the great educator, to be held by him until, exhausted in the summer of 1859, he passed from earth, Walter having preceded him to the grave three years. The words quoted below are probably a part of the address that he gave at that time:

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222       Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.

"Education,--few words are of greater import, for, in

the broadest sense all men, under all skies, are fashioned by

education. It embraces the entire system of influences which

accounts for the various forms of opinion, sentiment and char-

acter which, in great variety, are spread on the canvas of his-

tory and on the face of society. It is not merely that education

shapes the common mind, but it gives form and activity to every

mind whether common or extraordinary. To us education stands

on the universal ground of human development. * *  * Man

is greater than any public calling or mere worldly interest for

which reason he should be educated beyond the bounds of his

vocation. The fact that he is a man, a citizen, and we might

add, an immortal intelligence, is ample reason for this. * *  *

We would that every person were rightly and nobly educated;

then would every one be knowing, virtuous, and religious.

"The fact that our Republic has no pillars but the popular

will; that all the governmental influences of the nation are

from the nation's mind; and the fact that ignorance, and con-

sequently crime, is imported en masse to our shores, must render

this subject peculiarly important to the American people." These

words show the trend of his thought on this important subject.

Among papers discovered there are journal entries and let-

ters referring to Antioch College, sufficient to fill a long chapter.

It is to be regretted that the people among whom he and other

men of great intellectual mould spent their lives, and for whose

prosperity they gave their fine talents, should have been so

unmindful of the laws that govern in all departments of social

existence. Antioch College is a mournful example of what has

taken place all over the land with the denomination that launched

her. The Christians faced a marvelous opportunity but let it

slip. The world in which they sprang up as in a day, moved

too rapidly for them and before they were aware the tidal wave

of progress had gone out to sea and left them stranded on a

barren shore. Walter's work was done while the tide was in.

He died before the wave receded. But while he lived he wrought

a valiant task and it is due to the fact of the unbusiness like

methods and illogical position taken religiously, on the part of

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Isaac Newton   Walter.             223

 

the people he tried to lead into higher paths, that his name is

not known over a wide area.

He was far in advance of the people whose cause he

expoused as was true of Horace Mann. Words that he spoke

then are replete with significance in our own time, and will have

to be heeded before right relations shall prevail among the

nations of the world or among the people of any single nation.

His words on slavery were not harsh words as against the people

who suffered it and prospered by it in the South, nevertheless

he abhorred it and opposed it with might. But he appreciated

the side of the South-land as well as that of the North. Could he

have foreseen the war that was to break over his beloved country

within four years after his death, his words would have been

stronger than they were.

His horror of war found utterance many times. Among

these utterances is the following extract from an address de-

livered doubtless at the time of the Mexican War:

"War is foolish. It settles no difficulties; it determines but

little except the comparative brute force of the parties. It costs

by far more than it comes to, in treasure, life, character and

everything. When all the slaughter is finished, the parties are in

statu quo, excepting the waste of men, money and morals, and

the questions in dispute have to be settled by negotiations.

*  *  * War is cruel. It is wholesale butchery. One battle-

field calmly surveyed with its severed limbs, its streaming blood,

parching thirst and dying agonies, were enough one would think,

to wake the voice of the civilized world against it. But go from

the scene of strife to the thousand anxious homes of the men

who are dying on the field. See the widowed mother, orphan

children, wretched friends, then tell us if war is not cruel as the

pit. War is wicked. It engenders and fosters all the baser

passions of the soul. It shuts up the channels of kindly feelings

for our fellowmen. It blunts every sensibility and weakens every

virtuous principle. It involves wrong-doing toward men and

rebellion toward God." How sensitive we of to-day are to the

deep truth of the foregoing!

As the last lines of this sketch are being written in the month

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224       Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.

of March, 1915, the writer is reminded that just sixty years have

passed since Isaac N. Walter started from his Ohio home to Terre

Haute and Sullivan, Indiana. The distance from Terre Haute

to Sullivan is ten miles. The roads were well-nigh impassable

and the weather was extremely disagreeable. The journey was

made on horseback. A chilling March northwester, pierced to

the very bone and blew steadily in the face of the traveller.

The already worn and enfeebled constitution could not endure

the exposure. Here the seeds were sown that culminated in his

death. He lingered on through the year and till July of the next

year but never was well again. During the year he would attempt

to preach but it was painful.

He took up his residence at the Sanitarium in Yellow

Springs where he received treatment, visiting Cincinnati to consult

with leading physicians there and to enjoy the gentle compan-

ionship of Rev. A. A. Livermore, D. D., a great Unitarian divine,

author of a commentary and afterward President of the Theo-

logical Seminary at Meadville, Pennsylvania.

During the months of 1856 he seemed to improve some and

preached twice in Cincinnati but that was his last effort of that

kind. On June 30th, of this year he started for New York,

saying to his family that he felt better than he had for many

weeks. There was no thought but that he would return in due

time but it was not to be so. He arrived in Columbus at 1O

A. M. and spent the day assisting his oldest son in his plans for

engaging in business in the city. At eight o'clock he retired to his

room to write to his wife. While at his task he felt a tickling

sensation in his throat causing him to cough. Immediately his

mouth filled with blood and he barely had time and strength

to call a boy who hurried for a physician. Dr. Robert Thomp-

son was at his side during the night. In the morning two severe

hemorrhages in quick succession brought to a close this great

and good career. He was a member of the Masonic fraternity

and this order assisted in the burial in Green Lawn Cemetery,

at that time miles from the city. There the body of this brave

pioneer preacher has been lying for sixty years and the stone

obelisk that marks his grave has been passed by thousands,

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Isaac Newton Walter.                    225

unmindful that the dust of a real hero and prophet of God

lies so near the beaten path.

Since he was buried Columbus has grown from a population

of twenty thousand to one of more than ten times that number

and Green Lawn, the city of the dead, has spread to a vast area

compared with what it was then, so that instead of being far in

the country, the city of the dead and the city of the living touch

each other:

At his going a loving friend wrote:

"Ah! Well may Zion's Watchmen weep,

The tower he kept who now may keep,

So faithfully, so well?

With zealous eye and ready tongue,

He saw and warned of coming wrong,

And sought all foes to quell.

Teacher alike of age and youth,

Firm champion in the cause of truth,

Lover of all his race;

How many hearts will throb with pain

When his death knell and funeral strain

Shall reach their dwelling place.

'Known by the noblest and the best,

From North to South, in East and West,

And loved wherever known.

Grief like the ocean's heaving surge

Shall sway the soul, as swells the dirge,

That speaks the loved one gone.

For northern hills have given him fame,

And southern groves have blessed his name,

An instrument of good.

He made the eastern shores rejoice,

And western wilds have hailed the voice

That waked the solitude.

"He lives, as live the truths he taught,

Not yet their full fruition wrought;

Eternity alone.

Life's varied page shall all unroll,

Revealing many a ransomed soul,

Bright stars in Walter's crown."

Vol. XXIV -15.

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