Have you ever wanted to travel to far-away places? Or perhaps you have traveled, and taken pictures and written a diary or journal of your experiences. So have a number of our authors here at Log College Press. Thus we have developed a Travelogues page to highlight the writings of American Presbyterian ministers about their journeys, and in some cases, the fascinating people they met along the way.
Here you can read about Robert Baird's impressions of the West Indies and North America, his visits to Northern Europe, and his guide to the Mississippi Valley; or son Henry Baird's recounting of his experiences in Greece; or accounts of Robert Jefferson Breckinridge's travels through France, Germany, Switzerland and Italy; or a record of William Pratt Breed's travels through England in 1884; or Henry Van Dyke, Jr.'s journey through the Holy Land; or Andrew Shiland's trip across the United States in 1892 to attend the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church (USA); and more. Also of interest is William Buell Sprague's visits to and impressions of European "celebrities," including Rowland Hill, William Orme, William Wilberforce, William Jay, Ernst Wilhelm Theodor Herrmann Hengstenberg, Thomas Hartwell Horne, Charles Simeon, Edward Bickersteth, and Thomas Chalmers.
Not all travelogue writings by our authors are fully available at our site yet. Charles Hodge spent two years studying in Europe (1827-1828), and wrote his Journal of European Travels, which exists in manuscript form at the Princeton Theological Seminary archives, which has been digitized, and in digital form on Logos (see also Paul C. Gutjahr, Charles Hodge: Guardian of American Orthodoxy, beginning with the chapter titled "The Trip to Europe"). J.G. Machen spent time in Europe during World War I, and returned later to hike in the Alps, about which we have some writings from his hand, courtesy of the PCA Historical Center. George William Pilcher's edition of Samuel Davies' diary of his travels to England and Scotland in 1753-1755 is available at our Bookstore page. The letters of James Henley Thornwell from his two trips to Europe are available on our site from Benjamin Morgan Palmer's The Life and Letters of James Henley Thornwell.
A quote attributed to Augustine, but not sourced, is given by John Feltham in The English Enchiridion (1799): "St. Augustine, when he speaks of the great advantages of travelling, says, that the world is a great book, and none study this book so much as a traveller. They that never stir from home read only one page of this book." If so, take advantage of these travel journals by our Presbyterian ministers, and travel the world via Log College Press.