Hampden Sydney College - Kaleidoscope Yearbook (Hampden Sydney, VA)

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which men have come from the ends of the earth to see-the bronze and marble reminders of the men who have forever associated the name of Yirginia with eloquence and virtue and valor. No vis- itor who had come from a distant state or a land beyond the seas to look upon these memorials of the great Yirginians of former days felt that his visit to Richmond was complete till he had seen and heard the man who, though an hum- ble minister of the Cross, was by com- mon consent the most eminent living citizen of a commonwealth which has always been peculiarly rich in gifted sons. lt was his privilege to preach to a larger number of men whose com- manding influence in public life. in the learned professions, or in the business world, had conferred prosperity and honor upon the State than any other spiritual teacher of the time. He was more frequently the spokesman of the people on great public occasions than any other man whom Richmond has delighted to honor. He was more fre- quently the subject of conversation in the social circle than any other member of this cosmopolitan community. In every community where he once ap- peared his name was thenceforth a at present to speak of these things. I allude to them only in order to empha- size the fact that the explanation of this preeminence in public esteem lay largely in the character of his work in the pulpit. ' That was his throne: there he was king. In attempting to comply with the request of the session of his church to say something to-day in regard to this out- U household word. lt is not my province I d standing feature of Dr. Hoge's work, a feeling of peculiar sadness comes over my heart. It will be many a long day before any man who knew him can stand in this pulpit without a sense of wistful loneliness at thought of that venerated figure, with its resolute attitudes and ringing tones, which for fifty-four fruitful years I9

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r. 1boge as a llbreacber. BY XVALTER XY. MOORE. OF UNION Sl-EMINARY,X'lRLi1NlA. EW men in any walk of life have ever so deeply impressed an entire com- munity with the power of a noble personality as the lamented servant of God whose virtues and labors we commemorate to-day. Certainly no minister of the gospel in all the history of this ancient commonwealth was ever accorded a position so eminent by the public at large. This popular estimate was deliberate and exact. The people knew him. For more than fifty years, through storm and sunshine, in peace and war, they had studied his character and watched his work, and they have rendered their verdict, that Moses D. Hoge was a man, a strong, wise, high-minded, great-hearted, heroic mang that through all these years of stress and toil and publicity he wore the white Flower of a blameless life, and that he preached the gospel of the grace of God with a dignity and authority and tenderness, with a beauty and pathos and power which have rarely if ever been surpassed in the annals of the American pulpit. Long before the close of his consecrated career he had taken his place in public interest even by the side of those stately memorials in this historic city 18

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stood in this place as Gods ambassador, laying the multitude under the enchant- ment of his eloquence, diffusing through this sanctuary the aroma of his piety, and lifting sad and weary hearts to heaven on the wings of his wonderful prayers. As some one has said of the death of another illustrious preacher, we feel like children who had long sheltered under a mighty oak, and now the old oak has gone down. and we are out in the open sun. We hardly knew, till he fell, how much we had sheltered under him: his presence was a protectiong his voice was a power, his long-established leadership was a rallying center for the disheartened soldiers of the cross. XYe do not murmur at the dispensation which has taken him from us, But oh for the touch of a yanish'd hand, And the sound of a voice that is still. There were certain physical features of his preaching which are perfectly familiar to all who have heard him even once, and which will be remembered by them forever, but which can not be made known by description to those who have not. VVhen he rose in the pulpit, tall straight, slender, sinewy, commanding, with something vital and electric in his very movements, yet singularly deliberate, and, lifting his chin from his collar with a peculiar movement, surveyed the people before him and on either side, with his grave, intellectual face and almost melancholy eyes, no one needed to be told that there stood a master of assem- blies. The attention was riveted by his appearance and manner before he uttered a word. As soon as he began to speak, the clear, rich, and resonant tones, reaching without effort the limits of the largest assembly, revealed to every hearer another element of his power to move and mold the hearts of men. To few of the world's masters of discourse has it been given to demonstrate as he did the music and spell of the human voice. It was a voice in a million, Flexible, magnetic, thrilling. clear as a clarion, by turns tranquil and soothing or strenuous and stirring, at the speaker's will, now mellow as a cathedral bell heard in the twilight, now ringing like a trumpet or rolling like melodious thunder through the building, with an occasional impassioned crash like artillery, accompanied by a resounding stamp of his foot on the floor, but never unpleasant, or uncontrolled or overstrainedg no one ever heard him scream or tear his thro-at. Some of his cadences in the utterance of particular words or sentiments lingered on the ear and haunted the memory for years like a strain of exquisite music. As you listened to his voice in prayer there ran through its pathetic fall a vibration as though the minister's heart were singing like an aeolian harp as the breath of the Spirit of God blew through its stringsf, It was a voice that adapted itself with equal felicity to all occasions. When he preached to the whole of General D. H. Hill's division in the open air, it rang like a bugle to the outermost verge of his vast con- gregation. VVhen he stood on the slope of Mt. Ebal in Palestine and recited 20