Preacher Beecher

The Man. * In 1813 there was born to the Rev. Lyman Beecher, a small contradiction, who was christened, after due consideration, Henry Ward. He was a contradiction because, although the son of a pious, even a studious clergyman, he spent his very early youth in moody or riotous behavior; his school work was invariably bad, his appearance and disposition uncouth, his only talents those of a buffoon. Later, still a contradiction, he spent his days in disseminating simultaneously the word of God and a most horrible scandal.

When he left his college education behind him at Amherst, he married and became a minister. A little man with a juicy, passionate face, he charmed the women of every congregation before which he preached. Men, as a rule, did not like him. After a period of years he found himself at Plymouth Church, Brooklyn, the pastor of a flock of golden sheep, from whose charge he derived a yearly income of $20,000, even now a generous stipend for any preacher. No doubt Henry Ward Beecher deserved such recompense for his services; he was called the most eloquent preacher since St. Paul; women fainted when he shouted and roared. Not content with the homage he had already received, he must enlarge his influence; with this in mind he began to publish in a religious weekly, the Inde-pendent,* containing sermons or other miscellaneous notions. Scandal. On the staff of the Independent was a young man, one Theodore Tilton, whose wife was '"an ideal mother; a woman of wide reading and fine literary taste . . . affectionate disposition."

To this man Preacher Beecher seemed as splendid almost as God. To Preacher Beecher, Theodore Tilton's idolatry was comforting; even more comforting was the idolatry of Elizabeth Tilton. Often he would go to see this lady. Some times her husband was present; more, often not. At last Elizabeth confessed to Theodore a monstrous thing. Theodore Tilton, afterwards, was not so ready to bow down to Henry Ward Beecher; finally, after resentments had smouldered and gathered for five years, he brought suit against the clergyman for alienation of his wife's affection.

There began then an uproar in the U. S. press such as can scarcely be imagined in these days when even the finest flower of the clergy cannot presume to the importance which then belonged to Henry Ward Beecher. The parishioners of Plymouth Church supported their leader, who before a court met specific charges of adultery with a stupid sarcasm. Finally after 112 days of trial, Mr. Beecher's jury disagreed and he was allowed to go free. There was, however, little disagreement in the minds of the public. For the name of the greatest preacher since St. Paul was substituted the name of the greatest libertine since Casanova. Newssheets printed lecherous and, strictly speaking, libelous cartoons; people sang a merry and perhaps not indecent little rhyme: A famous American preacher

Said "The hen is a beautiful creature!"

The hen, hearing that, Laid an egg in his hat;

And thus did the Henry Ward Beecher.

After his trial and tribulations Preacher Beecher went back to his pulpit where for a few more years he continued to function. Theodore Tilton went to France; there he was playing chess when a newspaper man handed him a cable which said, "BEECHER DEAD. INTERVIEW TILTON." For a long time Mr. Tilton stared out at the streets of Paris, gay with spring. Then he turned back to his chess board and said to the man he was playing with, "I beg your pardon ... is it my move?" The Book. To fit a name which is now not well remembered, even as a legend of ridiculous shame, Author Hibben has patched together, out of old letters, old sermons, the remembrances of friends, a figure which is that neither of scarecrow nor monster but of a man, whose absurdities are entirely comprehensible, whose pretensions are more pathetic than laughable. Equipped with the abilities of a reporter as well as those of a biographer, Author Hibben has been able to preserve the plush and walnut of the period in which Preacher Beecher flourished; to make his people move about stiff and surprising but none the less actual, like the preposterous people of an antique tintype, brought suddenly to life. The Author. A graduate of Princeton in 1903,* Paxton Hibben has served in the Army, the diplomatic corps, has received a Russian decoration and written two other books--one about Greece, one about Russia.

*HENRY WARD BEECHER--Paxton Hibben-- Doran ($5.00). *Established in 1848. Mr. Beecher was editor 1861-63. The Independent is still being published, in Boston. TIME, October 3, 1927 *Not to be confused with its President, John Grier Hibben, second cousin, once removed.