tower, they were obliged to call Colonel Conwell to come and superintend the management of ropes and pulleys.  Then the deep, rich tones of the bell rang out over the surprised old town the triumph of faith.’  An unordained preacher, he had entered upon his first pastorate, and signalized his entrance upon his ministry by building a new meeting-house, awakening a sleeping church, inspiring his congregation with his own enthusiasm and zeal.”

At last he had found his work.  With peace and deep abiding joy he entered it.  Doubts no longer troubled him.  His heart was at rest.  “Blessed is he who has found his work,” writes Carlyle; “let him ask no other blessedness.”

CHAPTER XVI

HIS ENTRY INTO THE MINISTRY

Ordination.  First Charge at Lexington.  Call to Grace Baptist Church, Philadelphia.

For this work he had been trained in the world’s bitter school of experience.  He had learned lessons there of infinitely more value in helping humanity than any the theological seminary could teach him.  He knew what it was to be poor, to be utterly cast down and discouraged, to be sick and suffering, to sit in the blackness of despair for the loss of loved ones.  From almost every human experience he could reach the hand of sympathy and say, “I know.  I have suffered.”  Such help touches the heart of humanity as none other can.  And when at the same time, it points the way to the Great Comforter and says again, “I know, I found peace,” it is more powerful than the most eloquent sermon.  Nothing goes so convincingly to a man’s heart as loving, sympathetic guidance from one who has been through the same bitter trial.

He was ordained in the year 1879, the council of churches, called for his ordination, met in Lexington, President Alvah Hovey of Newton Seminary presiding.  Among the members of the council was his life-long friend, George W. Chipman, of Boston, the same good deacon who had taken him a runaway boy into the Sunday School of Tremont Temple.  The only objection to the ordination was made by one of the pastors present, who said, “Good lawyers are too scarce to be spoiled by making ministers of them.”

The ordination over, the large law offices in Boston were closed.  He gave his undivided time and attention to his work in Lexington.  The lawyer, speaker and writer ceased to exist, but the pastor was found wherever the poor needed help, the sick and suffering needed cheer, the mourning needed comfort, wherever he could by word or act preach the gospel of the Christ he served.

His whole thought was concentrated in the purpose to do good.  No one who knew him intimately could doubt his entire renunciation of worldly ambitions, the sacrifice was so great, yet so unhesitatingly made.  Buried from the world in one way, he yet lived in it in a better way.  Large numbers of his former legal, political and social associates called his action fanaticism.  Wendell Phillips, meeting Colonel Conwell and several friends on the way to church, one Sunday morning, remarked that “Olympus has gone to Delphi, and Jove has descended to be an interpreter of oracles.”