"His honesty nobody has ever questioned. If he hit hard, he hit where he believed hard hitting was warranted and indispensable. It is fortunate for the world, perhaps, that he took a liberal side in theology. Had he been a Calvinist, he would have been as uncompromising as any one of those Puritan inflexibles who drove Baptists into Rhode Island and Quakers into eternity; had he embraced Catholicism, heretics would have fared the worse for it, and he could hardly have found his fitting place anywhere short of the college of cardinals, with its possibilities toward the chair of St. Peter. By the same qualities that make him a terror to his enemies, he binds his followers to him with hooks of steel."[53]
[Illustration: Thomas J. Sawyer. F. T. Stuart Boston.]
Rev. THOMAS JEFFERSON SAWYER, D. D., was born in Reading, Windsor Co., Vt., Jan. 9, 1804. His father was one of the earliest settlers of the town, having removed with his father's family from Pomfret, Conn. The son enjoyed very good advantages for acquiring a common-school education, and at the age of eighteen had gained such a mastery of the branches then taught in such schools as to become a teacher, in which capacity he served three or four months every year until he entered his profession. He entered Middlebury College in the autumn of 1825, having completed his preparation after he was twenty-one, and graduated in 1829. As there were no theological schools to aid him, he went to study with Rev. William S. Balch, then at Winchester, N. H., who was soon called to Albany. Mr. S. remained in Winchester through the winter, preaching occasionally, reading the Iliad of Homer, and studying such theological works as he had opportunity to find.
In April, 1830, he went to New York, and took charge of a small society there in Grand Street. The chapel in which he preached had been built and was for several years occupied as an Episcopal church. It was afterwards purchased by the Universalists.
In 1832 Mr. Sawyer entered upon his ministry with his people in a new place, a church on Orchard Street. The church was built three or four years before by a small society of the Reformed Dutch Church, from which the property fell into the hands of two enterprising builders who had been the contractors for it when it was erected. It was rented to Mr. Sawyer for two years. He was then a young minister of scarcely two years' standing in New York, and had entered the ministry only two years and a half before. He had been married six months and had no cash investment. Four members of his congregation became his security for the payment of the rent, and he in turn pledged for their security the whole income of the church,--pew-rents, collections, and all. Under the circumstances he was assuming quite a responsibility. The income of the society had been small, and its receipts now were not equal to the rents alone. Besides, Universalism in New York had suffered greatly through the defection of Abner Kneeland, and the consequences of his lamentable course were still fresh in the memory of all. Divisions and heart-burnings still existed, and the prospect was not greatly encouraging to the new adventurers. Yet it was seen that, if success was to be realized, a new movement, as independent as possible of the old issues, must be made. Hence this piece of wise policy in securing a new location, and beginning church-life under new auspices. It was a bold step, but a good Providence had directed it. Mr. Sawyer writes of it:--