Ill

LYMAN   BEECHER

The  story  of  Lyman  Beecher  has  a  three-fold  value.
We  see  in  him  the  first  half  of  the  nineteenth  century.
Probably  more  than  any  other  minister,  and  quite  as
much  as  any  public  man  like  Webster,  he  made  a  large
part  of  the  life  of  his  time.  ( i )  His  own  varied  ex-
perience mirrors  the  social  life  in  our  first  national
period.  (2)  His  lectures  and  articles,  and  to  a  cer-
tain extent,  his  sermons,  express  the  earnest  and  some-
times fierce  religious  and  theological  controversies  that
marked  the  American  churches.  (3)  And  no  other
preacher  so  fully  illustrates,  I  think,  the  place  and  in-
fluence of  the  pulpit  in  the  development  of  the  higher
life  of  America.  Of  these  three  things  I  shall  first
speak,  and  then  attempt  a  portrait  of  the  man  and  the
preacher.
I

The  Social  Life  of  His  Time

When  Lyman  Beecher  was  settled  in  his  first  church
at  East  Hampton  —  the  eastern  end  of  Long  Island  —
the  life  of  the  people  was  very  simple  and  primitive.
There  was  more  respect  for  position  than  now,  but  no
barrier  between  groups  of  people.  The  standing  order,
as  it  was  called,  still  held  in  his  native  State,  Con-
necticut.    The  Congregational  Church  was  the  State

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LYMAN  BEECHER  4I

Church,  its  ministry  supported  by  public  taxes.  The
minister  was  socially  the  first  person  of  the  town,  and
in  all  occasions  and  functions  where  a  particular  order
was  designated  the  minister  was  placed  first.  And  yet
the  Church  and  Society  were  thoroughly  democratic
in  the  sense  that  each  one  had  equality  of  opportunity.
