nd was beginning to
feel the inroads of the up-town migration, when my excellent
predecessor, Dr. Isaac Ferris, left it to become the Chancellor of the
New York University. Although most of the well-to-do families were
moving away, yet East Broadway was full of boarding houses packed with
young men and these in turn packed our church on Sabbath evenings. Of
the happy spiritual harvest-seasons in that old church, especially
during the great awakening in 1858, I have written in the chapter on
Revivals. I was as eager for work as Simon Peter was for a good haul in
fishing, and every week there, I met on the platform the representatives
of temperance societies: The Five Points House of Industry, Young Men's
Christian Associations, Sunday schools or some other religious or
reformatory enterprise. These outside activities were no hindrances to
either pulpit or pastoral work; and, like that famous English preacher
who felt that he could not have too many irons in the fire, I thrust in
tongs, shovel, poker and all. The contact with busy life and benevolent
labors among the poor supplied material for sermons; for the pastor of a
city church must touch life at a great many points. Our domestic
experiences in early housekeeping were very agreeable. The social
conditions of New York were less artificial than now. Pastoral calls in
the evening usually found the people in their homes, and I do not
believe there were a dozen theatre-goers in my congregation. After a
very busy and heaven-blest ministry of half a dozen years, I discovered
that the rapid migration up town would soon leave our congregation too
feeble for self-support. I accordingly started a movement to erect a new
edifice up on Murray Hill, and to retain the old building in Market
Street as an auxiliary mission chapel. A handsome subscription for the
erection of the up-town edifice was secured, and the "Consistory" (which
is the good Dutch designation of a board of church officers), convened
to vote the first payment for the land. The new site was not wisely
chosen, and many of my people were still opposed to any change; but the
casting vote of one good old man (whom I shall thank if I ever encounter
him in the Celestial World) negatived the whole enterprise, and it was
immediately abandoned.

A few weeks before that decision, I had received a call to take charge
of a brave little struggling Presbyterian Church in the newer part of
Brooklyn. I sent for the officers, and