Show BEECHER Though a great preacher Beechers greatest lame will not come from his services to the cause of Christ It will be for his intellectual powei pure and simple that he will be remembered When aftergenerations speak the name Beecher the utterance will call to mind the brilliant and daring thinker and the gifted orator rather than a minister of the gospel Forty years ago Henry Ward Beecher was a light of the Church When he was mortally stricken he was an intellectual in-tellectual torch Those forty years wrought a great change While his intellectual power increased with years his faith failed The fervor and ardor in the service of the meek and lowly Nazarene which in the outset of his ministerial career inspired his sermons ser-mons and gave an almost irresistible magnetism to his efforts faltered fal-tered waned and finally died altogether and its place was occupied by mental force alone Skepticism appeared ap-peared and established an empire over the great speaker which but grew stronger with time and when he passed away he was more feared by the Christian than he was by the unbeliever The dark gloom which enshrouded a portion of his life when friends fell away from him and it seemed as though he must go down before the stormhad a hardening effect on the man His mind divorced itself yet further from the trammels of modern heoldgy and he spoke bolder words and thought perhaps thoughts bolder still In his death one of the mighty of the earth has passed away He was an intellectual giant and as such his loss will be felt wherever has been set the impress of civilizations seal I |