In the ’70’s and ’80’s in Brooklyn and in New York there were merchants who had prospered, but by Christian methods—­merchants who took their religion into everyday life.  I became accustomed, Sabbath after Sabbath, to stand before an audience of bargain-makers.  Men in all occupations—­yet the vast majority of them, I am very well aware, were engaged from Monday morning to Saturday night in the store.  In many of the families of my congregations across the breakfast table and the tea table were discussed questions of loss and gain.  “What is the value of this?  What is the value of that?” They would not think of giving something of greater value for that which is of lesser value.  They would not think of selling that which cost ten dollars for five dollars.  If they had a property that was worth $15,000, they would not sell it for $4,000.  All were intelligent in matters of bargain-making.

But these were not the sort of men who made generous investments for God’s House.  There was one that sort, however, among my earliest remembrances, Arthur Tappen.  There were many differences of opinion about his politics, but no one who ever knew Arthur Tappen, and knew him well, doubted his being an earnest Christian.  Arthur Tappen was derided in his day because he established that system by which we come to find out the commercial standing of business men.  He started that entire system, was derided for it then; I knew him well, in moral character A1.  Monday mornings he invited to a room in the top of his storehouse in New York the clerks of his establishment.  He would ask them about their worldly interests and their spiritual interests, then giving out a hymn and leading in prayer he would give them a few words of good advice, asking them what church they attended on the Sabbath, what the text was, whether they had any especial troubles of their own.

Arthur Tappen, I have never heard his eulogy pronounced.  I pronounce it now.  There were other merchants just as good—­William E. Dodge in the iron business, Moses H. Grinnell in the shipping business, Peter Cooper in the glue business, and scores of men just as good as they were.

I began my work of enlarging and improving the Brooklyn Church almost the week following my installation.  My first vacation, a month, began on June 25, 1869, the trustees of the church having signified and ordered repairs, alterations and improvements at a meeting held that day, and further suspending Sabbath services for four weeks.  I spent part of my vacation at East Hampton, L.I., going from there for two or three short lecturing trips.  I find that I can never rest over two weeks.  More than that wearies me.  Of all the places I have ever known East Hampton is the best place for quiet and recuperation.