WILLIAM MAXWELL BLACKBURN, D. D., LL. D.1

BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE SOCIETY

Dr. Blackburn was born near Carlisle, Indiana, December 30, 1828; graduated from Hanover College in 1850 and took his theological course at Princeton. After seventeen years in the pastorate, for thirteen years he occupied the chair of Biblical and ecclesiastical history in the Theological Seminary of the Northwest-now McCormick Theological Seminary, at Chicago. A short term of three years in the pastorate at Cincinnati intervening, he was president of the University of North Dakota for one year, and in 1885 took charge of the Presbyterian Synodical College at Pierre, South Dakota, continuing there till the time of his death, December 29, 1898, rounding out a fruitful life of seventy years. He received from Princeton the honorary degree of Doctor of Divinity and from Wooster University that of Doctor of Laws.

The ancestors of Dr. Blackburn were of Scotch-Irish blood. Tradition says that the family was of those who, under the persecutions of the time of Mary Stuart, left Scotland and joined the Huguenots in France in their struggle for religious liberty -a struggle seemingly disastrous in outcome, but vindicated in history as triumphantly glorious. Escaping from their pursuers, it is said that they crossed the English Channel in an open boat, and, about the time of the massacre of St. Bartholomew, returned to Scotland. Falling under the influences that were making for the settlement of the New World they came to America and settled in eastern Pennsylvania, members of the Pennsylvania colony. From there they extended their borders south and west into Virginia, Kentucky, Tennessee and beyond. The famous pulpit orator, Dr. Gideon Blackburn, of Georgia, belonged to the Virginia branch, and from Kentucky came Governor Luke Blackburn and United States Senator Joseph Blackburn. The

grandfather of William Maxwell Blackburn, William, had his home in Kentucky, but, being opposed to slavery, came north and settled in the valley of the Wabash in Indiana. He was killed not long after at a house-raising and left his widow, a very superior woman, in that new country with a large family of chidren, of whom the second son, Alexander, became the father of the subject of this sketch. The mother was Delilah Polk, of the same general family as that of President Polk. She was of Kentucky birth and grew up amid the surroundings of Daniel Boone. Her father, Charles Polk, was born at Detroit, Michigan, whither his mother, made prisoner by the Indians in Kentucky, had been taken in midwinter, and his father did not see the boy until he was about two years old. Then the mother bore him on horseback back to Kentucky. Those were heroic days and produced heroic men and women; though not more heroic than these days of ours where conditions exist like those of that time. Not more than twenty-five years ago, I was with a party which rode in the bitterest of winter weather from the Rosebud Agency to Fort Sully, in South Dakota, and one of that party was an Indian woman who rode on horseback with the rest, having her fiveyear-old daughter strapped in her blanket upon her back. Often the child cried from the cold, and every member of the party suffered from frost, but the mother never made complaint. There are heroic men and women in these days!

The Blackburns and the Polks were thrifty and well-to-do, and belonged to the better educated class of farmers and business men. Alexander Blackburn and Delilah, his wife, bravely attacked the rugged conditions of pioneer life incident to building up a home and fortune for themselves and their children. They moved from the Wabash Valley when the eldest son, William Maxwell, was four years of age, going with an ox team a distance of two hundred and fifty miles into northern Indiana and making their home near La Porte. Probably but few of the incidents of that journey were permanently remembered by the boy, but the impressions made upon him could not easily be effaced. There was the long and slow journey; the encampment at night by stream and near rich meadows where the tired oxen grazed; the restful play at evening about the camp fire with the little brother. two years younger, who doubtless cried often and often was left

to cry, because mother was busy with the evening meal; then there were the rivers to cross and a part of the way a new country to traverse, while there were roads to cut through thick timber and other difficulties to overcome and trails to meet before they reached the rich prairie land known as Rolling Prairie in "the edge of some of the finest timber that ever grew." There they made their new home. Strong of character by inheritance, the circumstances of early pioneer life developed additional strength. And to this there was added the life-giving spirit of a true religious experience, so that in this pioneer home was ever a glad, joyous household. It was a good place for a boy to grow to young manhood. One writer has fitly characterized this home. as "cheerfully religious," the words "cheerfully religious" being used with intention, for he goes on to say, "I was never in a home where the religious life was so prominent and yet never saw a more joyful home," and in the games of youth the "father and mother romped with all the enthusiasm of the youngest." It was here, in walks with his parents, that the future doctor of divinity and enthusiastic student of geology early learned to love the study of nature. His ready wit and sturdy character, so marked in later life, grew naturally, as does a plant in rich, weli watered and carefully tended soil. There was nothing left to chance, and yet it is also true that but few boys needed less of supervision and guidance. His body grew healthy and robust in the life of a farmer's boy. The farm in those days was in a wheat growing region. The sickle gave place to the cradle and this to the famous McCormick reaper, one of the first three, it is said, manufactured by Cyrus McCormick. In the sowing and the reaping and then in threshing the grain, at first with an oldfashioned flail, and in marketing the result at Michigan City or New Buffalo, on the lake twelve miles away, the boy did his full share.

It is probable that he attended school when opportunity offered, but undoubtedly his earlier study of books was at home under the direction of his parents. His father is spoken of as a remarkably well educated man and a great reader, and as having taught school as occasion demanded. That Dr. Blackburn did not lack for early advantages is evidenced by the fact that at seventeen years of age he began to fit for college, and that he

graduated with honors shortly after reaching manhood's estate. At college he was a hard-working student, a ready debater, and early evidenced the clear logic and mental grasp of later days. After graduation a year was spent in teaching school, a winter. term at La Porte and a summer term at Constantine, Indiana. His professional studies occupied the following three years, and we find him ordained as an evangelist and preaching at Three Rivers, Michigan, before reaching the age of twenty-five. Shortly before ordination he was married to Miss Elizabeth Powell, who, after treading life's journey fifty-five years with him, survived her husband but a few months, dying March 7, 1899.

The young preacher was always a student; he studied men and books and soon began to write. In his early pastorates his efforts at authorship were largely biographical and show the trend of his study; and out of these studies or were they but an indication of the larger selection already made-the study of church history came to have for him attractions, and this became his chosen field.

In 1862 he spent some months in travel and study in the mother country. He also went to the continent and was in France, Spain, Switzerland and the Netherlands, where he devoted himself to careful study of the causes and events of the Reformation, that he might the more correctly interpret the farreaching results of that religious upheaval. On his return there was published, during a pastorate of four years at Trenton, New Jersey, other biographical studies-lives of John Calvin, Ulric Zwingli, William Farrel, Aonio Palario, the great Swiss reformer, and a history of the Huguenots under the title "Coligny and the Huguenots," in two volumes; all of which appeared in rapid succession. When it is remembered that to the exacting responsibilities of a city church were also added the absorbing study of history in the life of the Christian church and the growth of doctrine, one is astonished at the amount of work accomplished. It is only when a powerful mind works effectively and without waste that such results appear. A partial list of the product of Dr. Blackburn's pen gives thirty-three titles to his credit. While still a pastor at Trenton he was offered the presidency of his alma mater. This he declined, though fully appreciating the honor of the call. It was rather as a student of

church history than in general administrative ability that he felt his power. In June, 1868, he was elected to the vacant professorship of ecclesiastical and church history in the Presbyterian Theological Seminary at Chicago. He entered upon the duties of the chair at once, and threw himself with all the zeal and the training of years of special study into meeting the needs of the position. The place had found the man and the man had found his place. It was as when a machine complete, made for a specific purpose and perfectly adjusted, falls into the steady stroke and regular beat of the accomplishment of that for which it was made. Dr. Blackburn enjoyed his work and worked with all his might. The amount of work he accomplished at this time is marvelous. Occupying the chair of a most important professorship, he assisted in making good vacancies in other chairs, supplied one or other of the city churches, delivered ecclesiastical and historical lectures outside, and made frequent contributions to periodicals and reviews, and made a steady advance in the preparation of his historical works. His "History of the Christian Church" was published about the time of his withdrawa! from the seminary. It is well understood that this resignation was one of the attendant results of the David Swing heresy trial. Dr. Blackburn did not hold to Professor Swing's views, but defended the man in his right to hold these without being branded as a heretic. No one now remembers this trial-we do not know what it was about and wonder what was gained by it. Though Professor Swing was acquitted, he was virtually driven out, and the spirit of intolerance prevailed. With this Dr. Blackburn was not in sympathy, and resigned. Death came and further weakened the faculty, and it was years before the seminary could recover. Long before this Dr. Blackburn's reputation as an author and an authority in his chosen field had been settled. Not only in this country, but in Europe as well, his name was favorably known. A British review of the history of the Huguenots says: "In this work the author has gone to many fountain-heads and set them before the reader in all the distinctiveness of a dramatic picture. If there had been no authentic work on this most interesting subject written on this side of the Atlantic, here is one by an American author that admirably fills the needs," and of his "History of the Christian Church," one of our foremost American