those who renewed their vows beside that calm
prostrate figure have never ceased to miss his
gracious presence.

We seem to have drifted to sermons, though
sermons were a small part of Dr. Coit in the
chapel. The liturgy more than sermons was
his unfailing delight and the medium of his
teaching. No other man ever seemed to me so
perfect a living voice of the Prayer Book. In
regard to his reading, let me quote from a
letter of Dr. Hall Harrison appearing in the
"Churchman:" "As a reader of the church



112 MEMORIES OF A GREAT SCHOOLMASTER

service and administrator of the Sacraments,
Dr. Coit could not be surpassed. His voice was
clear and sweet toned and well modulated.
His enunciation was distinct, his pronunciation
and accent cultivated and refined, and his em-
phasis always correct, yet never excessive ; so
he furnished to one generation of students
after another, through his long rectorship of
nearly forty years, a perfect model and ex-
ample of the good reading which befits the
gentleman and scholar." His mind seemed
in perfect tune with it all, and overflowed
with bits of the Psalms and lines of our beau-
tiful hymns as if they were his own. Even
now, sometimes on a Monday morning, I seem
to hear his voice once more, announcing in the
old way the hymn,

" Awake, my soul stretch every nerve,
And press with vigor on,"

or

" Direct, control, suggest this day
All I design or do or say."

In my first year, when the Doctor still lived
in the house with us, we often began with the
second verse of the hymn, now number 489,

" Happy birds that sing and fly."

One of the favorites for a dark morning was



IN THE CHAPEL 113

" Christ, whose glory fills the skies,"

sometimes besinninof with the second verse,

" Dark and cheerless is the morn."

Many a dull heart was aroused by the morn-
ing hymn, and under our leader no opportu-
nity was given to sink back or fall into listless
gazing ; hardly was the note of the " Amen "
concluded before the Psalm was announced and
we heard the Doctor's voice in clear tones:
" The Heavens declare the glory of God."
Generally a short selection was made from the
Psalms of the day, but there were special ones
which we had again and again. How these
Psalms seemed to speak his own mind ! I still
recall those far-off mornings with the snow
driving without and our fingers numb with
cold. With almost grim appropriateness came,
^' Are your minds set upon righteousness, ye
congregation?" We often had the first Psalm,
" Blessed is the man that hath not walked in
the council of the ungodly;" the thirty-ninth,
" I said, I will take heed unto my ways, that
I offend not in my tongue;" on a beautiful
morning the nineteenth, " The heavens declare
the glory of God, and the firmament showeth
His handy-work : " the fiftieth Psalm sometimes
came with admirable fitness, " The God, even



114 MEMORIES OF A GREAT SCHOOLMASTER

the most mighty God, hath spoken and called
the world from the rising of the sun unto the
going down thereof," as also the sixty-third,
" God, Thou art my God, early will I seek
Thee;" the ninetieth and ninety-first came
with frequent regularity, " Lord, Thou hast
been our refuge from generation to genera-
tion," and "Whoso dwelleth under the defence
of the Most High," and the one hundred and
thirty-ninth, " Lord, Thou hast searched me
out, and known me." But I cannot call back
that voice again by dwelling on these Psalms
in fond memory, though its echoes are still
part of our life ; and with them in our ears
more and more truly may we still sing,
" Praise the Lord, my soul, and all that is
within me praise His Holy Name ! "

The love that boys developed for the Church
service at St. Paul's was remarkable. I re-
member in my second form year sitting at
table next to a boy who had been brought up
to a different form of worship, and yet de-
clared that he should hereafter always go to
a service like ours. I afterwards learned of a
great many such, yet I never knew of any
pressure by word or deed brought to bear on
any one to forsake the way of his fathers. Not



IN THE CHAPEL 115

the smallest slur was cast on fellow Christians
who differed in forms or doctrines. When as
a man at college I sought advice on questions
of so-called churchmanship, the Doctor said,
after discussing various phases of it in and
out of our communion, " But you will not
forget, after all, that the great division is be-
tween the bad and the good."

That, however, a love for more than the
forms of the Anglican Church grew up in the
hearts of the boys, there were many substan-
tial j^roofs. It is not amiss to note here that,
during his rectorship of forty years, more than
fifty St. Paul's men have entered the ministry
of the Church, and a fact most pleasing to
recall is the great number of men returning
to the school to read with the Doctor, and to
spend the best years of their lives working
with him, some indeed actually to take root
in the chapel.

The day is not far off when an adequate
account of the work of the first generation at
St. Paul's school may be written ; but I am
sure that I shall be pardoned if I recall a few
typical scenes in that chapel.

It is Thanksgiving Day; many old boys are
up for the day ; we have all had a bracing



116 MEMORIES OF A GREAT SCHOOLMASTER

hour on the ice, and now at our very best we
are joining in a hearty service. An alumnus
is the preacher; it is his first sermon at the
school and most of the boys know him for
an "old boy," and note the Doctor's special
interest. No one but a member of a great
school can appreciate the pride of a boy at the
performance of a graduate. There was no
disappointment as we heard the sane and
inspiring teaching from the one hundred and
forty-fourth Psalm, " Blessed be the Lord my
strength," ending with the words, " That our
sons may grow up as the young plants ; and
that our daughters may be as the polished
corners of the temple ; that our garners may
be full and plenteous with all manner of store ;
that our sheep may bring forth thousands and
ten thousands in our streets ; that our oxen
may be strong to labor; that there be no de-
cay, no leading into captivity and no com-
plaining in our streets. Happy are the people
that are in such a case ; yea, blessed are the
people who have the Lord for their God."

Dr. Coit lived to see many of his boys
in the school pulpit, sometimes as chosen
preachers on high occasions.

The school music was always a delight to



IN THE CHAPEL 117

him ; a peculiar delight indeed, when the voice
of Auo^ustus Swift to the music of his friend
and schoolmate led the choir in what has be-
come the school anthem, " Oh pray for the
peace of Jerusalem." As Mr. S^vift sat on
the same side of the chapel as Dr. Coit, while
I sat opposite, I had a fair view of them both,
and I shall not forget the evident apprecia-
tion of the Doctor as Mr. Swift proceeded for
the first time in the solo, " I was glad when
they said unto me, we will go into the house
of the Lord." The composer of this, as well
as of much of the music sung at the school,
sat at the organ which he has played since boy-
hood. These two, boys and men together in
that choir ! What more suitable reward to their
master ! What more beautiful heritage to leave
their school, their friends, and their country
than those songs in the House of God ? My
dear friend and master of that choir, their
sound has gone out and will still go out into
all lands, wafting the Breath of Life.

Dr. Coit had the instincts of an artist. In
many details he deferred to those who were
better equipped ; yet he was a sympathetic and
moving spirit in all that was true and fine in
art.



118 MEMORIES OF A GREAT SCHOOLMASTER

When the school had manifestly outgrown
the old chapel, he said once to me, " If I had
fifty thousand dollars I could easily spend it
on a suitable chapel." He never asked one
penny for his work at the school, but the
alumni learned that he would like to have a
new chapel, and they promptly started under
the leadership of W. S. E. to raise one hun-
dred and twenty-five thousand instead of fifty
thousand. This building was the joy of his
later years, and he entered into every detail
with characteristic thorouo^hness. I remember
going into the chapel with him to see the first
window. He asked me to place a chair for
him and he sat down and studied drawing
and coloring with careful and critical atten-
tion. The windows were all planned under
his personal direction, as indeed was much of
the detail of our beautiful chapel.

But we must not leave too soon the old
chapel that he so filled with memories. There,
too, there was art, and somehow every line
spoke of the man ; indeed, he himself stood
there before us as the very essence of the art
of God. Do you not see him as he walked to
the pulpit with his surplice grandly gathered
about him? Yet the picture of this saintly




THE CHOIR



IN THE CHAPEL 119

man in the old chapel would not be complete
without recalling- that hour so fraught with
fear, the examination in sacred studies. How
simple, yet how perfect the art in the setting !
the bishop fully robed, very often Dr. Shat-
tuck, with any other dignitaries that could be
obtained, some of the older masters, with Mrs.
Coit and perhaps another lady, the whole
school in the body of the chapel, and the Doc-
tor himself the centre. Somehow it seemed
like the last judgment. Each boy was keyed
to the highest pitch, for it was either " make
or break." The Doctor calmly passed the
questions without hesitation or interruption ;
there was no prompting, no second chance ; an
answer from the catechism for the younger
boys, the Te Deum, the Gloria in Excelsis,
the Lord's Prayer in Latin, and other parts of
the Liturgy for the older, each answer practi-
cally perfect, or, "Will you take it up, next?"
These examinations were always opened and
closed with prayer, and the effect of them can
only be appreciated by one who has sat there
waiting for his freedom or his doom ; no
doubt a splendid tonic for the whole body as
well as for the individual, though for certain
ones the taste was not sweet.



120 MEMORIES OF A GREAT SCHOOLMASTER

This examination in the chapel may stand
as a striking illustration of the Doctor's
methods for creating high scholarship. Here
his reverence for holy things, his intolerance of
slipshod doctrine, and his insistence on accu-
rate scholarship, had their meeting place. In
that trying hour the retina of the soul of many
a boy has received an indelible impression.

No single school worth anything can hope
to pass along every boy to his best interest;
and here was a system that showed up the
willful sluggard and the faint-hearted, and
soon brought home the fact to himself and to
his people that he was out of place in this
school, while there was always the upward
pull toward the very highest aims with the
ever ready sympathy and help to the weak.

But where the Doctor led supremely was
in prayer. Slow the spirit that never rose to
those prayers in morning chapel. Do you not
now hear the words, —

" Lord God, giver of all heavenly increase.
Who by Thy spirit's might dost confirm the
first efforts of feeble souls ; Encourage in the
hearts of these Thy children every good in-
tent, and carry them from strength to strength;
cleanse their consciences, and stir their wills



IN THE CHAPEL 121

gladly to serve Thee, the Living God. Leave
no room in them for spiritual wickedness, no
lurking place for secret sins. . . ."

" Help us this day to make one onward step,
to resist some temptation, to do something
in Thy service. Save us from stagnation of
evil, idle habits, from the defilements of bad
thoughts ; from shutting our ears to the voice
of conscience. ... In Thy own good time make
of this Place what it ought to be, a home for
all goodness, purity, and truth, a sanctuary
for Thine ancient faith and worship and a
light to this and future generations."

" Look upon us and hear us, Lord our
God, and assist those endeavors to please
Thee, which Thou Thyself hast granted to us ;
as Thou hast given the first act of will, so give
the completion of the work : Grant that we
may be able to finish what Thou hast given
us to wish to beofin. . . . Give to us who are
older largeness of heart, a patient and forgiv-
ing spirit, and faithfulness and courage. Give
to those who are younger steadfastness and
true manliness, and a living conscience, and
the will to obey it. . . . Give us all truthful
lips and discerning hearts, that we may scorn
whatever is low and base, and follow after such



122 MEMORIES OF A GREAT SCHOOLMASTER

things as are lovely in Thy sight. Make us
gentle and forbearing to all around us, unself-
ish and humble, doing to others as we would
they should do unto us . . . and help us daily
as we grow in age, like our Divine Lord, to
grow also in wisdom and favor with God and
man."

" Thou, Who f ormest the light and bring-
est back the morning, causing Thy sun to rise
on the evil and on the good, scatter the dark-
ness of our souls by the knowledge of Thy
truth, and lift up the light of Thy countenance
upon us."

" ' Man goeth forth to his work and to his
labor until the evening.' Grant unto us,
Lord, for the discharge of our duty towards
Thee and towards each other, a wise and pa-
tient understanding, a charitable and pure, a
devout and courageous heart ; a soul full of
devotion to do Thee service."

" Help us now in our poor attempts to serve
Thee, and teach us how to pray and what to
pray for as we ought. . . . Give us the settled
purpose to do thy will. . . . May there be
no unclean thought or word or deed among
us here. Put far away from us all lying lips
and the deceitful tongue. . . . Help us to work



IN THE CHAPEL 123

and do our duty, not from fear of man but to
gain our heavenly prize."

" Lord Jesus, Good Shepherd, Who didst lay
down Thy Life for the sheep, defend the
purchase of Thy Blood. Feed the souls which
are hungry and athirst without Thee. Seek
for the lost, convert the wandering, bind up
that which is broken. Put forth Thine Hand
and touch the head of each one, that all may
receive the joy of the Holy Ghost."

" Form us, we beseech Thee, after Thy Di-
vine Image, that we may despise those things
which are low and base, and follow after such
things as are lovely in Thy sight. Open our
eyes to see things as they are that we may love
those things which are worthy to be loved. . . .
Give stability to the weak and double-minded.
Give principle to those who lack it . . . those
of us who approach Thine Altar to receive the
Bread of Everlasting Life, may we work for
Thee, bear one another's burdens, rebuke vice
and win others to Thy service by our life and
words."

" We pray Thee to bless each member of
this household. May no wrong motive, secret
sin, or waning zeal in any one of us incur Thy
just displeasure."



124 MEMORIES OF A GREAT SCHOOLMASTER

" Have mercy, Heavenly Father, on all who
are hardened through the deceitfulness of sin,
vouchsafe them grace to come to themselves,
the will and the power to return to Thee, and
the loving welcome of Thy forgiveness."

" Preserve us from the sins which do most
easily beset us, and enable us this day and ever
to walk worthy of our Christian calling."

As these sentences of his prayers come back
to me and I look over the little notebook in
which he wrote them all, he seems very near ;
as if his spirit was still hovering about the
place he loved, and would still in these prayers
lead up to the throne of Heaven the hearts of
generations of boys still to come. Prayers there
are for all days and all occasions of school
life, every word of which seems so familiarly
part of this man, that I know not where to
begin or where to stop. Enough, however, of
these prayers have been recalled to bring his
voice to our ears and his fervent love to our
memories.

Is it the last night before the Christmas
holiday ? Did you ever feel anywhere exactly
the same kind of suppressed and holy joy that
came upon you as you went into the chapel,
blazing with the light from myriad candles,



IN THE CHAPEL 125

and festooned with hemlock? Perhaps you
had helped cut the branches from the snow-
clad woods, or had eaten cookies and apples
at " Greens " in the basement of the school-
house in reward for serving " cash " to the big
fellows who made up the long ropes of ever-
green. Be that as it may, every boy sang
on that nig-ht with all his soul : —

" Saviour source of every blessing,
Tune my heart to grateful lays ; "

and many have carried all through their lives
some sentence of the prayer : " We bless
Thee for Thy goodness in the past ; we trust
Thy care and providence for the future, and
we beseech Thee to extend Thy favor and pro-
tection to the days of rest which are before us.
Bless the work of this school, undertaken for
Thy glory and continued in Thy fear. Make
it in deed and in truth a Christian school, that
none who come here may go away unimproved,
that none may be afraid or ashamed to be Thy
faithful servants. . . . Help us to obey our
parents. . . . Kindle now in the heart of each
member of this household from oldest to
youngest the honest purpose to do right . . .
and do Thou crown our work with good suc-
cess. . . . Accept our thanksgiving for all Thy



126 MEMORIES OF A GREAT SCHOOLMASTER

goodness to us . . . and grant that, using all
Thy gifts to Thy glory, we may please Thee
both in will and deed and finally by Thy
mercy be everlastingly rewarded."

But it was not all joy, that going away :
there came a " last night " that was indeed
a "last night," when, as a "sixth," one knelt
and covered one's face to hide the tears. As
the Doctor prayed for the "place," for "those
whom we love," for us all to " see the fruits
of our labors, and own in all Thy Hand from
whom Cometh every good and perfect gift,"
the words seemed to burn into one's soul. " To
Thee we commend every member of this house-
hold, that Thou wouldst bless and keep them
now and evermore from all harm both to the
body and to the soul. God, the protector of
all that trust in Thee, without Whom nothing
is strong, nothing is holy; increase and mul-
tiply upon us Thy mercy, that Thou being
our ruler and guide, we may so pass through
things temporal that finally we lose not the
things eternal. Grant this, Heavenly Father,
for Jesus Christ's sake our Lord. Amen."
The prayers of Dr. Coit seem to me to voice
his greatness of soul in eternal accents.

More than at any other place did his great



IN THE CHAPEL 127

soul shine out before the altar. He gave
this service its true place as the centre of
Christian worshiji, and to have served with
him there was indeed a privilege. The spirit
of the prayer of humble access and of thc^
words of consecration recited by him is still
a vivid memory of my early life. This is the
place where some of us love to recall him,
before that altar laid with the " fair linen
cloth" that he was wont to handle, on which
were worked the words with the quaint appli-
cation in which he often indulged, " Amice,
commoda mihi tres panes."

Was it not fitting that our master and priest
shoidd end his hfe work in the chapel and be-
fore the altar ? And so it came to pass early
one Sunday morning while he was kneeling to
receive the sacrament. Most alarming to us
who had never known him to be faint was the
fact that he was so overcome as to be obliged
to leave the chapel. Like the great Thring
he was last seen by his boys going out in pain
from the service of the Holy Communion ; both
ripe in years ; but both still in the fullness of
power. I love to think of these two, the one
in England, the other in America, so devoted
from youth till death to the rescue of the



128 MEMORIES OF A GREAT SCHOOLMASTER

boys' school from the old hard traditions.
These men, so different in their characters,
were alike in some peculiarities and in all their
aims and general methods.

" No school has a right to exist that is not
supplying the place of a well-ordered home to
every boy," was an axiom both at Uppingham
and at St. Paul's. The two leaders gave the
strength of their splendid manhood, and laid
down their lives, that in scholarship, manners,
and morals, truth, purity, and justice should
prevail, and that the individual should have
his due.

What a glorious end ! Work to the last !
Once only did we see that form faint from its
labor ; and surely it is fitting that now every
one who comes to the altar in our chapel shall
see again that calm strength and dignity
breathing out from the enduring marble figure
of our priest, master, and father ; a true em-
blem of his purity and steadfast faith.



CHAPTER VIII

THE SUNDAY EVENING HYMN

Many will aoree that a man who has done a
noble work is a great man, but none have ex-
actly the same memory or make exactly the
same estimate of his greatness. As I look back
over twenty years of intimate relation with
Dr. Coit, more and more reverently do I
cherish my own particular memory, and the less
inclined I am to discuss its correctness. What
may be called his faults seem to have turned
out to be virtues ; but all I dare trust myself
to say or to write are these memories of his
sayings and doings among us. For character-
izations I shall quote others older and wiser.

Perhaps in no one thing is the Doctor more
distinctly recalled than in our old custom of
" the Sunday evening hymn."

At half-past eight the school bell rings, and
straightway from every quarter the inhabit-
ants of the colony begin to pour into the big
school-room. As Sunday evening has been in
later years a time of general visiting, many



130 MEMORIES OF A GREAT SCHOOLMASTER

boys have been out of their places ; but each
is soon at his desk, and lower schoolers, sixth
formers, masters, and ladies find standing room
as best they may, while the Doctor himself
goes to the master's desk. If there is a bishop
or other notable person at hand who has won
our attention by his sermon in chapel, he too
is " in attendance." (The Doctor was always
" royalty " before his boys, and this public
attention at " the evening hymn " we consid-
ered a great honor to any man.) Calmly and
apparently seeing everything without looking,
the Doctor stands waiting till all have risen.
Then a voice, the voice that has so long given
the key-note to our music, wakes an echo from
every boy, as we join with full volume in
those words so familiar to St. Paul's men : —

" Now the day is past and gone,
Holy God we bow to Thee !
Again as nightly shades come on,
To Thy sheltering side we flee.

" For all the ills this day hath done,
Let our bitter sorrow plead ;
And keep us from the wicked one,
When ourselves we cannot heed.

" Rav'ning, he prowls Thy fold around,
In his watchful circuitings ;
Father ! this night may we be found
Under the shadow of Thy wings.



THE SUNDAY EVENING HYMN 131

" O ! when shall that Thy day have come !
Day ne'er sinking to the west ;
That country and that holy home
Where no foe shall break our rest.

" Now to the Father and the Son

We our cheerful voice would raise,
With Holy Spirit joined in one,

And from age to age would praise."

(This hymn, I believe, had been carried from
Dr. Muhlenberg's school at College Point. In
the early days of St. Paul's, the boys stood
about the piano in the old "front study" and
sang to the Doctor's accompaniment.)

Then follows the Lord's Prayer while we
are still standing. And then in a voice of
which one never wearied, so perfectly did it fit
the occasion and the words, follows the bene-
diction, —

" Unto God's gracious mercy and protection we com-
mit you.

The Lord bless you and keep you.

The Lord make His face to shine upon you, and
be gracious unto you.

The Lord lift up his countenance upon you, and give
you peace, both now and evermore. Amen."

If the day had been more than usually fa-
tiguing, can you not distinctly recall how he
would stand, and say, as a signal for begin-
ning at the fourth verse, —



132 MEMORIES OF A GREAT SCHOOLMASTER

" O, when shall that Thy day have come " ?

And as soon as it was all over, this Sunday-
strain, lifted, as it were, by the mighty shout
of the hymn and the gentle words of the
blessing, how we, boylike, pushed forward to
say " good-night ! " In a mass we stood before
him, each waiting for his turn ; and then the
lonsr line stretched out around the room to
every master and Mrs. Coit. It will always
be a marvel how at the end of his Sunday he