ightful and blessed by God. No other congregation has
ever been called to build three churches, and I hope no other pastor
will ever be called to such an undertaking.

"My plans after resignation have not been developed, but I shall preach
both by voice and newspaper press, as long as my life and health are
continued.

"From first to last we have been a united people, and my fervent thanks
are to all the Boards of Trustees and Elders, whether of the present or
past, and to all the congregation, and to New York and Brooklyn.

"I have no vocabulary intense enough to express my gratitude to the
newspaper press of these cities for the generous manner in which they
have treated me and augmented my work for this quarter of a century.

"After such a long pastorate it is a painful thing to break the ties of
affection, but I hope our friendship will be renewed in Heaven."

There was a sorrowful silence when I stopped reading, which made me
realise that I had tasted another bitter draft of life in the prospect
of farewell between pastor and flock. I left the church alone and went
quietly to my study where I closed the door to all inquirers.

If my decision had been made upon any other ground than those of
spiritual obligation to the purpose of my whole life I should have said
so. My decision had been made because I had been thinking of my share in
the evangelism of the world, and how mercifully I had been spared and
instructed and forwarded in my Gospel mission. I wanted a more
neighbourly relation with the human race than the prescribed limitations
of a single pulpit.

In February, 1893, I lost an evangelical neighbour of many
years--Bishop Brooks. He was a giant, but he died. My mind goes back to
the time when Bishop Brooks and myself were neighbours in Philadelphia.
He had already achieved a great reputation as a pulpit orator in 1870.
The first time I saw him was on a stormy night as he walked majestically
up the aisle of the church to which I administered. He had come to hear
his neighbour, as afterward I often went to hear him. What a great and
genial soul he was! He was a man that people in the streets stopped to
look at, and strangers would say as he passed, "I wonder who that man
is?" Of unusual height and stature, with a face beaming in kindness,
once seeing him he was always remembered, but the pulpit was his throne.
With a velocity of utterance that was the despair of the swiftest
stenographers, he poured forth