life which could be felt. Deeper by far than its power to
fascinate was its power to awaken affection. I had never
been unmindful of my attachment to New York since I
first knew it, but I was hardly prepared for the feeling
awakened in me by a personal incident which occurred
some years ago in passing through the city. I had but an
hour between trains, but as I passed from one station to
another I took my way by the church. It was partly torn
down to make place for the tower of the Metropolitan
Building. This I had anticipated. But on going up Park
Avenue to No. 57, my old home, I found that this also,
with two adjacent houses, was in ruins through a caving-in
of the street incident to the excavation for a tunnel. Thus
dispossessed of my personal holdings in the city, though
held only by the title of sentiment, there came upon me a
sudden but veritable attack of homesickness, that unmis-
takable mark of local affection.
" Dr. Hitchcock said that he did not believe that there was a person in the con-
gregation who would not say farewell in great bitterness of personal bereavement
and sense of loss. He had advised Dr. Tucker to go, because he thought he would
serve his generation more in giving to the world thirty or forty Christian minis-
ters each year than by remaining in the most successful pulpit.
" Mr. Dodge said that he felt that he had lost the presence of a personal friend
which could not be replaced. He hoped Dr. Tucker's influence would long remain
in the church, but the bereavement at this parting was very great.
"Judge Theodore Dwight remarked that the announcement of Dr. Tucker's
resignation came upon him like a thunderclap. He could say with all the warmth
possible that he sincerely deplored the loss which the church sustained."
CHAPTER VI
THE PROGRESSIVE MOVEMENT IN THEOLOGY
I HAVE said that one of the chief motives for leaving the
pastorate to enter upon the educational work of the min-
istry was the desire to study more closely into some of the
questions which were becoming the problems of modern
Christianity. Of course the large and inclusive question
was that of the effect of the impact of the modern world
upon historic Christianity. Would it detach Christianity
from its own past? The answer to this question had
already been made decisively in the negative by both
branches of the Christian Church, but their answers dif-
fered. Although the Roman Catholic Church had not
then pronounced officially upon those tendencies in mod-
ern thought which were afterwards to be anathematized
under the term "modernism," its attitude of resistance
was unmistakable. The attitude of the Protestant churches
varied from that of suspicion, or open resistance, to that
of investigation, and in some cases of immediate hospital-
ity. The Protestant mind which was most distinctively
Protestant was from the first sympathetic with modern
thought, and it proved to be the controlling element in
the various churches. It was able to withstand if not al-
ways to arrest reactionary tendencies. It was also able to
influence the modernizing process to such a degree that it
did not become revolutionary or merely divisive. It gave
rise to no new sects or denominations. It was carried on
in all the existing denominations with more or less sharp-
ness of controversy, but nowhere to the breaking point.
THE PROGRESSIVE MOVEMENT 91
The term which best expressed the character of this
modernizing process as it went on in the churches was the
term "progressive." It was, in fact, actually in use as a
theological term long before it found so conspicuous a
place in politics. In 1885, a series of editorial articles ap-
peared in the "Andover Review, " which were published
the following year in a book under the title of "Pro-
gressive Orthodoxy." The part of the title which seemed
to the authors of the book to call for explanation was the
term "orthodoxy." They put this term forward in protest
or challenge against the exclusive claim to progress in
behalf of heresy or schism. They said in the introduction:
"We are not insensible to the reality and worth of char-
acter in the sphere of thought. . . . The word 'orthodox'
designates theological character. . . . There is a collective
and a continuous Christian consciousness. Our recognition
of this relation of the new to the old is expressed in our
motto, ' Progressive Orthodoxy.' "
The progressive movement covered three distinct
though related forms of investigation and research — the
technically theological, having to do with the method of
the Divine working in and through nature; the critical,
employed upon the Scriptures and the early Christian
literature; the humanistic, concerned with the problems of
human environment and human destiny. It was this last
subject of investigation and inquiry upon which my own
personal and professional interest centered. However, I
trace briefly the course followed in each section of the pro-
gressive movement, though in so doing I anticipate some-
what the results gained. It will thus become evident that
the claim in its behalf at the first was justified — that the
movement was not revolutionary but progressive.
92 MY GENERATION
The first effect of the progressive departure in the field
of strictly theological inquiry was to bring about a change
in the prevailing conception of God. It changed the em-
phasis from the thought of His transcendence to that of
His immanence. The conception of God must be affected
by the advance in our understanding of nature. As an
English churchman of the evolutionary school has re-
cently said — "We found that when 'all creation wid-
ened on man's view' our souls widened and deepened in
response; Nature was a vaster home for man, but man
was more at home in it not less but more."^ In this sense
true scientific progress is always reflected in theological
progress. The scientific advance from Newton to Darwin
presupposed a corresponding theological advance. The-
ology could not accept and appropriate, as in the astro-
nomical discourses of Dr. Chalmers, the science of as-
tronomy, and ignore or dispute the new science of biology.
If the one science seemed to make God greater in the
sphere of His working, it was reasonable to expect that the
other science would bring Him nearer in His work, and
into more intimate relations with the physical conditions
of human life. If the one science proclaimed the tran-
scendence of God, the other, it might be assumed with
equal certainty when once it had wrought out its sure
conclusions, would reveal God as immanent, a pervasive
presence in the universe, acting through agencies and
under laws beneficent in their purpose.
I think that biological research has already passed the
stage of emphasis upon the immoral or unmoral "struggle
for existence," and has begun to show that the evolution-
ary process as applied to the lower forms of life has an
» The Spectator, January 19, 1918, p. 56.
THE PROGRESSIVE MOVEMENT 93
ethical significance in the fact that its cardinal principle
is not destructive but constructive, working through the
method of social cooperation. "Altruism," says Professor
Vernon Kellogg, of Leland Stanford, reviewing a dis-
cussion with a German biologist at German Headquarters, ^
" or mutual aid, as the biologists prefer to call it, to escape
the implication of assuming too much consciousness in it,
is just as truly a fundamental biologic factor of evolu-
tion as is the cruel, strictly self-regarding, exterminating
kind of struggle for existence with which the Neo-Dar-
winists try to fill our eyes and ears, to the exclusion of the
recognition of all other factors." Still more explicit is the
contention of Dr. William Patten, of the chair of Zoology,
Dartmouth, in a monograph on "Cooperation as a Factor
in Evolution": ^
When we realize that evolution is the summation of power
through cooperation, that what we call "evil" is that which
prevents or destroys cooperation, and "good" is that which per-
petuates and improves cooperation; when we realize that the
"struggle for existence" is a struggle to find better ways and
means of cooperation, and the "fittest" is the one that cooper-
ates best — we shall then realize that science and religion and
government stand on common ground and have a common pur-
pose. Until this basic truth is recognized there can be no common
goal for intellectual endeavor; no common rules for individual
and social conduct; no common standard of what is right and
what is wrong; and no common knowledge of that which creates
and preserves and that which destroys. . . . The extent to which
cooperation is attained depends on the extent to which "right-
eousness" is attained; for cooperation cannot take place except
the right things are brought into a definite time and space rela-
1 Atlantic Monthly, 1917.
^ Reprinted from the Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society, vol.
LV, 1916.
94 MY GENERATION
tion to one another. The chief service of cooperative action,
therefore, consists in the conveyance of the right kinds of power
to the right times and places for further cooperative action.
I think it may be said that to the degree in which scien-
tists and theologians have entered upon constructive
work in their respective fields, there has been a marked
decrease in agnosticism. Not only has a different temper
of mind been created, but results which can be mutually
recognized have been secured. The so-called conflict of
science and religion is a conflict among the uncertainties
created by new conditions, which relaxes if it does not
disappear, as the things in dispute emerge into the light of
clear definition.
The most sensitive feature of the progressive movement,
viewed in its effect upon the religious mind, was the appli-
cation of the principles of historical criticism to the Bible.
Here lay the severest test of its spiritual value. There
were definite reasons for this sensitiveness regarding the
treatment of the Scriptures. The Bible was throughout the
Protestant churches the recognized source of authority,
not only so recognized but cherished with affection and
pride. There was no outward reason for revolt against its
authority as there was against that of the Church, for
the authority was self-imposed. And the danger from the
revolt of reason was well-nigh removed by the allowance
of perfect freedom of private interpretation. The one point
of common insistence was its infallibility, which in the
popular understanding and acceptance meant the equal
authority of the Bible in all its parts from cover to cover.
Furthermore, the Bible had acquired a distinct and
peculiar sacredness from its history. It was the book of
the martyrs and heroes of the protesting faiths. Men had
THE PROGRESSIVE MOVEMENT 95
suffered and died that it might be free, unbound, eman-
cipated from all ecclesiastical control. It had thus gained
a sanctity from its associations almost equal to that in-
herent in its words. And to this historic sanctity was
added the sentiment attaching to its use from generation
to generation at the family altar, and in the closet of
devotion. For all devotional uses Bacon has said, "those
doctrines (are) best and sweetest which flow from a gentle
crush of the Scriptures," not from the too severe pressure
of analysis.
But the Bible has its place in a world of facts, and in
this world it can hold its place only by conforming to the
established rules of evidence. It was diflBcult for many
minds to accept so simple but so sweeping a conclusion.
It was hard for them to acknowledge that faith, like
poetry according to Robert Frost, "must lean hard on
facts, so hard at times, that they hurt." Without doubt
faith under the pressure of modern criticism was forced
to lean hard upon facts, so hard that they did hurt. It
would be as unintelligent as it would be unfeeling to
overlook or make light of the pain which the critical
handling of the Scriptures brought to many devout and
intelligent believers. But as the results of Biblical crit-
icism have become evident, the gain to faith has also
become evident. It is with no little spiritual satisfaction
that we now see that Protestantism has in hand a Bible
which it can hold in consistency with its own well-defined
principles. A Bible exempted from the tests of historical
criticism would not have been a Protestant Bible. Few
will now deny the inconsistency of affirming the right of
private judgment in respect to the interpretation of the
Scriptures, while at the same time forbidding the exercise
96 MY GENERATION
of this right in the investigation of their origin and his-
torical order. From the Protestant point of view, it must
be as necessary to ask what the Bible is and how it came
to be, as to ask what it means. It is also beginning to be
understood that we are indebted to the historical criticism
of the Bible for a clearer perspective of revealed truth.
The progressive nature of revelation has been determined
and established by the knowledge of the periods of pro-
gress, and of the persons and instrumentalities made use
of for the disclosure and outworking of the Divine plan.
And a further gain is beginning to be felt, even more
clearly than it can be seen, in the growing sense of the
unity of the Church. So long as the Protestant mind was
in bondage to the literalism of the Scriptures, it was fruit-
ful in divisions and subdivisions of the Church. Protestant-
ism had become in too large a degree the religion of the
sects. It lacked that freedom and confidence and power
which can come only from the sense of the wholeness of
Christianity. Historical criticism did more than any other
one thing to relegate the separating tenets of the sects to
their proper place. The new conception of the Bible has
already given a new conception of Christianity, larger,
simpler, and more unifying.
The distinctive characteristic of the progressive move-
ment, though in some respects the least capable of defini-
tion, was its humanistic impulse. It carried religion, and
even theology, farther out into human relations. It took
account of the individual in his human environment. It
viewed him more definitely as a social being, a part of a
vast but closely fitting social organization. It followed
him into those classifications into which modern society
had divided itself, chiefly as the result of the new economic
THE PROGRESSIVE MOVEMENT 97
conditions. It refused to obey the mandate of the old
political economy, and leave the individual to the fortune
of the market-place. It assumed the right to know the
reason, for example, of the contentions of capital and
labor, and the right no less to take part in the whole
economic conflict according to its social significance. The
movement early acquired the name of social Christianity.
There was in this projection of religion into the new
relations and conditions of modern society, no such dis-
turbance of religious faith as was caused by the applica-
tion of the critical method to the Bible. But it disturbed
the conventional religious sense, and broke in upon many
religious conventions. The charge was brought against
the movement that it secularized religion. The religion of
the previous generation had become largely introspective.
The proof of its reality rested in certain experiences. It
sent the religious man to his closet. It also sent him out
into the "byways and hedges"; it was a religion of charity
as well as of experience. But it did not send him into the
shop or the factory. It was not a type of religion fitted to
understand or to meet the problems involved in the rise
of industrialism. It virtually accepted the prohibition
written over the doors of the new workshops — "No ad-
mittance." It was bold to the highest degree of sacrificial
courage in its missionary zeal, but it shrank from contact
with the growing material power of the modem world. It
saw the religious peril of materialism, but not the religious
opportunity for the humanizing of material forces.
The progressive movement also ran counter at this point
to the prevailing religious philosophy. The philosophy of
Protestantism was altogether individualistic, while that
of Catholicism, though taking far more account of the
98 MY GENERATION
individual in his religious or non-religious environment,
was by no means socialistic in the modern sense of the
term. The long reign of individualism had produced its
own habit of mind, dominant alike in politics and religion.
This habit of mind was naturally unsympathetic with
the social tendencies of modern thought. It could not
understand the significance, hardly the meaning, of a
rapidly developing class consciousness under the advance
of industrialism. Least of all was it able to appreciate the
religious effect of those associations which were gradually
alienating large numbers within the industrial commu-
nities from the services of the Church, and even from its
influence.
In carrying out its humanistic impulse, the progressive
movement did not stop short of the attempt to humanize
the current theology. The current theology as expressed
in the creeds was not sensitive to the human demands
made upon it. The creeds had been for the most part pre-
pared to meet errors existing at the time, and then con-
sidered most dangerous. They were unnecessarily explicit
at points which had lost their first importance. In certain
other instances conclusions and inferences, logical but
now unreal, had been allowed to stand. This was especially
true of the doctrine pertaining to human destiny. It is
hardly too much to say that the current Christian the-
ology had reached an impasse at this point. It affirmed the
necessity of personal salvation through Christ, but it
recognized no sufficient means or provision for the per-
sonal knowledge of Christ. Various "apologies" had been
written to soften or evade the issue, but the issue remained.
It still challenged theology to find a solution at once log-
ical and real, capable of harmonizing the teachings of
THE PROGRESSIVE MOVEMENT 99
Scripture and the rational instincts of faith. I shall
necessarily have much to say of this issue when I discuss
the Andover controversy.
So far as the progressive movement reached the stage
of open conflict, two Seminaries were directly involved —
Union in its attempt to liberalize the doctrine of Scripture,
and Andover in its attempt to humanize, or in the term
then used, to Christianize the doctrine of human destiny.
Among individuals who stood forth resolutely in behalf of
theological progress, especially in this last phase, note
should be taken of Theodore T. Munger and Washington
Gladden. Dr. Mimger was a disciple of Horace Bushnell,
and carried over his conception of moral education into
the problems of destiny. He was a prophetic voice in the
early stages of theological discussion in his generation.
His "Freedom of Faith," published in 1883, with an in-
troductory essay on the l^^ew Theology was a direct and
forceful stimulus to the progressive movement. Dr.
Gladden, by profession a journalist as well as a minister,
was more clearly and actively identified wuth the problems
of applied Christianity, but his efforts to humanize social
and industrial conditions had their initiative and con-
stant support in the humanity of his theology.
CHAPTER VII
The Andover Period
1880-1893
ANDOVER AS A STORM CENTER AND AS A WORKING CENTER
I
The Opening Phase of the Andover Controversy
II
The Andover Movement and the Reugious Public
III
Andover as a Working Center during the Decade of Conflict
IV
The Andover Trial and its Results
CHAPTER VII
THE ANDOVER PERIOD
I
The Opening Phase of the Andover Controversy
When I returned to Andover in 1880, fourteen years after
graduation, I found few changes in the outward or inward
Hfe of the Seminary, and no sign of the impending contro-
versy. The anticipated reconstruction to which I have
referred did not assume controversy as a part of its pro-
gramme. There had been nothing in the history of Andover
Seminary to warrant such an assumption. On the con-
trary, it was to be assumed that Andover would continue
to take its part in such advances and adjustments as
would still entitle it to a place in theological leadership.
Nothing could have been more unexpected than any ex-
hibition of a reactionary spirit at a time when the theo-
logical world was to be called upon to meet its own issues
in the new era of progress. As one of my colleagues re-
marked at a judicial session of the Board of Visitors, "I
had supposed that Andover, with its origin, and history,
and traditions, was a good institution for the advance-
ment of Christian doctrine." The "Andover controversy"
was not out of time; it was simply out of place. It belonged
elsewhere. That it should have fallen upon Andover re-
quires a brief word of explanation.
The Andover controversy was not altogether a theolog-
ical controversy. So much should be intimated at the out-
set. Personal influences were at work in its inception and
throughout its continuance. It would be improfitable to
102 MY GENERATION
recall in detail this underlying fact, but the fact remains
in evidence that the disturbing influences were confined
from first to last to a group of persons whose activity and
persistence were entirely out of proportion to their num-
bers or representative character. The group had its head-
quarters in the Congregational House, in Boston, but
whether directed from Boston or Andover was not always
apparent. It was an influential group, but more influential
than representative. It did not represent any considerable
number of the alumni of the Seminary or any large pro-
portion of its constituency in the churches; and after the
early period of suspicion and alarm it steadily declined in
influence. It can hardly be said to have been at any time
responsibly related to the Seminary. The Faculty then in
service was a thoroughly united body; and the Trustees,
with a single exception, were equally united. To under-
stand how it was possible with such an origin for the
controversy to be so long continued, and to be carried
out into issues which required for their settlement a pro-
tracted legal conflict, one must have some knowledge of
the peculiar constitution of the Seminary as a corporate
body.
The general catalogue of the Seminary, covering its ex-
istence till it was removed to Cambridge, refers to it as
a "Theological Seminary in Phillips Academy." The refer-
ence was accurate. Phillips Academy, founded in 1778,
had like most of the educational foundations of the time
a distinct religious intention. In 1795 a special foundation
was established in the Academy for divinity students.
It was therefore in strict accordance with the original
design of the Founders that the Trustees applied to the
Legislature in 1807 for authority to receive additional
THE ANDOVER PERIOD 103
funds for the purpose of theological instruction, Madam
Phoebe Phillips and John PhilHps, Esq., the daughter-in-
law and grandson of the Founder, having obligated them-
selves to provide suitable buildings for the accommoda-
tion of sixty students, including a hall for lectures and a
library. The following year a fellow-townsman, Samuel
Abbot, established a chair of instruction in Christian
Theology. Steps were taken looking to the establishment
of other chairs thought necessary for a theological curri-
culum. Meanwhile the movement on Andover Hill had
awakened the interest and to a degree the suspicion of a
section of the same religious body, but holding somewhat
modified views of Calvinism. There was danger of the
establishment of a rival school. The danger was averted
by the incorporation, after much discussion and some
minor compromises, of the promotors of the rival scheme
into the Andover Foundation under the title of "Associate
Founders." These Associates contributed the funds, ample
for the time, for three additional chairs of instruction, and
the funds for an additional building. But the contribution
was not unencumbered. It carried with it the acceptance
of a board of oversight, known as the "Board of Visitors,"
three in number, nominated in the first instance by
the Associates to serve with them during their lifetime,
and thereafter to be self-perpetuating. These Visitors, in
the language of the Associate Founders, "were to be the
guardians, overseers, and protectors of our Foundation."
Their special functions were to preserve unaltered and
intact the articles of Association, including the Creed,