William Robinson's Long-Lost Letter

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We must always remember when we turn one eye upon ourselves and our guilt, blemishes, vileness, and loathsomeness, we must let the other eye be fixed upon Jesus Christ! — William Robinson

William Robinson is one of the most influential colonial American Presbyterian ministers about whom we know so little. He was born in England, the son of a well-to-do Quaker physician, around the beginning of the 18th century, and after falling into the sins of big city life in London, made his way to America to work as a teacher, before a conversion experience led him to become a student for the ministry at William Tennent’s Log College. Samuel Miller tells the story of that experience in his biography of John Rodgers:

He was riding at a late hour, one evening, when the moon and the stars shone with unusual brightness, and when every thing around him was calculated to excite reflection. While he was meditating upon the beauty and grandeur of the scene which the firmament presented, and was saying to himself, "How transcendently glorious must be the Author of all this beauty and grandeur," the thought struck him with the suddenness and force of lightning: "But what do I know of this God? Have I ever sought His favor or made Him my friend?" This happy impression, which proved, by its permanence and effects, to have come from the best of all sources, never left him until he took refuge in Christ as the hope and life of his soul.

Marker located at the Historic Polegreen Church in Mechanicsville, Virginia (photo by R. Andrew Myers).

An alumni of William Tennent’s Log College; Robinson was called to succeed William Tennent as pastor of the Neshaminy Presbyterian Church, but declined the call; he was a leader of the Great Awakening, and a friend of George Whitefield and Gilbert Tennent; he served as moderator of New Brunswick Presbytery; and he preached the first Presbyterian sermon in central Virginia (July 6, 1743), and paved the way for the ministry of Samuel Davies, who wrote of him that "The work was begun and mainly carried on by that favored man, Mr. Robinson, whose success, whenever I reflect on it, astonishes me.” Davies also said:

Probably Mr. Robinson, during the short period of his life, was the instrument in the conversion of as many souls as any minister who ever lived in this country. The only circumstance relating to his person which has come down is that he was blind of one eye [as a result of scarlet fever]; so that he was called by some “the one-eyed Robinson.”

It was his dying wish that Davies would be sent to minister to the people of Hanover County, Virginia, where Robinson had preached three years before, and accepted a financial gift from his grateful hearers only with the proviso that it would go to support Davies’ theological education. He died on August 1, 1746, just six years after his ordination to the ministry, and his funeral sermon was preached by Samuel Blair. But although the stories of his travels throughout Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina and his ministry in Delaware, are fascinating to read, and his role in the education and missionary efforts of Samuel Davies was key to bringing the Great Awakening to Virginia, we have nothing to read that was written by his own hand — or so it was thought until very recently.

James P. Williams is an American Baptist minister who was serving as pastor of four Baptist churches in England from 2007 to 2010. While cleaning one of those churches, he discovered a letter from William Robinson to his [unnamed, female] cousin in England dated June 16, 1741. The letter is transcribed in his book Light the Fire Again: Eighteenth-Century Light for the Twenty-First Century Darkness, which tells more fully than has been done before the story of Robinson’s life and ministry. The letter rejoices in the news that Robinson had received that his cousin was born again. He tells her about reports he has heard from George Whitefield concerning revival in England, and gives a report on revival throughout the northern colonies:

…here has been such Surprising Effusions of God’s spirit in the ministry Especially under Mr. Whitfield & our new Brunswick Presbytery in which are the famous Tennents my dear brethren, that all New England, the Provinces of York, the Jersies, Pensilvania, and Maryland are filled with Convinced & Converted souls, many are the thousand Brot to Christ and on the way Children, youth & aged persons, rich & poor, Black & White, tis no Great Matter here to preach unto Five Thousand People, for my Brethren to preach 3-4 or 5 times a day.

It is a letter that practically drips with the sweet savor of the gospel. In all his rejoicing of the communion in Christ which he now shares with his cousin, and in all his descriptions of revival, Robinson is concerned to give God the glory rather than himself or even those brethren of whom he speaks so highly. Robinson: “I cannot tell what great things God has done for ME, what honors conferred on me a poor ignorant wretch. Oh that I may be humble and thankful.” The work of both conversion and revival is by the hand of God, and brings Robinson to a humble adoration of the One who has merciful done and continues to do great things among the people on both sides of the pond. The whole letter takes up a handful of pages in transcription, and Williams helpfully includes a summary of its highlights as well. The life story of Robinson is given in Light the Fire Again with a view towards inspiring 21st century readers to catch the flame that stirred Robinson, Whitefield, the Tennents, Davies, Jonathan Edwards and others in the 18th. We are most grateful to Williams for finding Robinson’s letter and sharing its contents with this generation. May that spark contained within, by the grace of God, help to light the world again today!

Two Letters on the Death of Mrs. Mary Augusta Palmer

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It was on November 13, 1888 — after 47 years of marriage to the Rev. Benjamin Morgan Palmer — Mrs. Mary Augusta Palmer entered into her eternal glory. The grief that her husband endured was tremendous. Among the many who wrote letters of condolence to him was the Rev. Theodore Ledyard Cuyler of Brooklyn, New York.

In his autobiography, Recollections of a Long Life, pp. 221-221 — which, while writing, he received news of the death of Rev. Palmer — he had this to say:

As my readers may all know, Dr. Palmer, through the Civil War, was a most ardent Secessionist, and as honestly so as I was a Unionist….Soon after my visit to New Orleans, my old friend was sorely bereaved by the death of his wife. I wrote him a letter of condolence, and his reply was, for sweetness and sublimity, worthy of Samuel Rutherford or Richard Baxter. As both husband and wife are now reunited I venture to publish a portion of this wonderful letter — both as a message of consolation to others under a similar bereavement and a s tribute to the great loving heart of Benjamin M. Palmer.

First, we turn to Rev. Cuyler’s letter, which can be read in Thomas C. Johnson, The Life and Letters of Benjamin Morgan Palmer, pp. 529-530:

176 South Oxford Street, Brooklyn, December 21, 1888

My Dear Dr. Palmer: I have just received, through the relatives of Mrs. Professor Rogers, the confirmation of the report that your beloved wife had been taken home to her rest and her reward. When I heard the report a fortnight ago I did not credit it — as I had seen no notice of it in the Presbyterian.

To you — my beloved brother! who know so well where the ‘Eternal Refuge’ is, and how to find the ‘Everlasting Arms,’ I need send no fraternal counsels. But my own dear wife joins me in heart-felt sympathy and our sincerest condolence.

I have known what it was to give up beautiful and beloved children — but the trial of all trials has been spared me; and to you the journey of your remaining days will be with these words on your lips.

‘Each moment is a swift degree
And every hour a step towards Thee.’

May the richest and sweetest spiritual blessings fill your soul — ever ‘unto all the fullness of God!’ And your ministry be most abundant in the Lord!

Please present our kind regards to your children and believe

Ever yours in Christ Jesus,
Theo. L. Cuyler

For Rev. Palmer’s letter in reply, we may turn to Rev. Cuyler’s autobiography again, pp. 222-223, or Johnson’s biography, pp. 526-527:

Truly my sorrow is a sorrow wholly by itself. What is to be done with a love which belongs only to one, when that one is gone and cannot take it up? It cannot perish, for it has become a part of my own being. What shall we do with a lost love which wanders like a ghost through all the chambers of the soul only to feel how empty they are? I have about me, blessed be God! a dear daughter and grand-children; but I cannot divide this love among them, for it is incapable of distribution. What remains but to send it upward until it finds her to whom it belongs by right of concentration through more than forty years?

I will not speak, my brother, of my pain — let that be; it is the discipline of love, having its fruit in what is to be. But I will tell you how a gracious Father fills this cloud with Himself — and covering me in it, takes me into His pavilion. It is not what I would have chosen; but in this dark cloud I know better what it is to be alone with Him; and how it is best sometimes to put out the earthly lights, that even the sweetest earthly love may not come between Him and me. It is the old experience of love breaking through the darkness as it did long ago through the terrors of Sinai and the more appalling gloom of Calvary. I have this to thank Him for, the greatest of all His mercies, and then for this that He gave her to me so long. The memories of almost half a century encircle me as a rainbow. I can feed upon them through the remainder of a short, sad life, and after that can carry them up to heaven with me and pour them into song forever. If the strings of the harp are being stretched into a greater tension, it is that the praise may hereafter rise to higher and sweeter notes before His throne — as we bow together there.

How poignant these words are, by he who was encircled by a rainbow, and what a tribute not only to the devotion of a husband, but also to the love of two precious saints. As Rev. Cuyler intended — who himself wrote God’s Light on Dark Clouds, after the loss of two infant children and a 22 year-old daughter, and many other words of comfort — may these words of wisdom and solace be an encouragement to others who have known grief and loss.

A letter from Caledonia, and more by Archibald Stobo

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As one of three ministers from Scotland who helped to promote the spiritual interests of the settlers who founded the colony of Caledonia, or New Caledonia, on the Isthmus of Panama in the late 1690s, Archibald Stobo and his colleagues dispatched a letter to the Moderator of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland dated February 2, 1700 giving an account of the colony shortly before it was abandoned the following month. It was primarily authored by the famous Covenanter minister Alexander Shields, signed by each minister of the newly-formed Presbytery of Caledonia, and reproduced in Francis Borland’s account of what is now known as the Darien Scheme, or Expedition. We have added this letter to Stobo’s page on Log College Press recently. Also included by Borland is an extract from Stobo’s letter to Borland which briefly gives an account of the famous storm that caused Stobo to be stranded in Charleston, South Carolina, where he took up his home and embraced a life in America, never to return to Scotland. Alexander Shields also never made it home to Scotland, having died of the “malignant fever” at Port Royal, Jamaica in 1700 [this writer once lived there, but Shields’ grave is unmarked]. So Borland’s memoir of the Darien expedition is a most important resource.

These first-hand accounts from Stobo and friends are valuable to students of both church history and world history. As we have noted before, Stobo was involved in both the founding of the Presbytery of Caledonia, in Panama, in 1699-1700, and the first presbytery in the Southern United States, Charles Towne Presbytery, or the Presbytery of James Island, in 1722-1723.

Also of note on his page is the affidavit that he and Reformed Baptist William Screven signed in 1705 in case involving the Anglican suppression of Protestant dissenters in 1704, a subject which Daniel Defoe wrote about.

We know of additional writings by Stobo and hope to add more in the future. Meanwhile, take time to read of Stobo’s experiences in Caledonia and Charleston. He is a pioneer Presbyterian that we are glad to highlight here at Log College Press.

S.J. Cassels: Our frail tabernacles should make us value that Good Land

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In the months before Presbyterian minister and poet Samuel Jones Cassels passed away in Savannah, Georgia at the age of 47, probably of tuberculosis, he was very busy with his pen, writing a number of articles for the Southern Presbyterian Review, including one which was published posthumously.

The editors of SPR published a bit of his correspondence after his death which tells us something of the sufferings of this saint, and his longing for heaven. In a letter dated April 20, 1853, Cassels wrote:

Rev. and Dear Brother, — I am gratified that there is prospect of having another article published. Not that I desire to appear so often before the public, but because I am so shut out of life by infirmity. Ah, my Brother, few know my daily sufferings. As the Apostle said, “I die daily." The pen is the almost only means of a little diversion from bodily pain. Whenever I can be so absorbed in thought as to forget the body, I have ease, sometimes exhilaration. But, for the most part, I only struggle and struggle with the decays of my frail tabernacle. But I should not thus speak, lest I seem to murmur, — for I can feebly testify, that in all my afflictions, no good word of God has failed. For the past week, I have been much afflicted; and yesterday, — fell sick, and is very sick to-day. Oh, how such things should make us value that good Land, where thorns and thistles grow not, tears are not shed, and sin has no existence!

You will find the article hastily written , and of course disfigured by bad-spelling , bad punctuation, and bad grammar, it may be. — Anything of this kind you may see, please correct, as if it were your own. I have had to erase much for the same reason. Please see that the proofs are correct.

Yours in the Gospel, and in the hope of a blessed immortality.

S.J. Cassels

On June 15, 1853, Cassels entered into that Good Land, and all his bodily sufferings came to an end. No more thorns and thistles! Only blessed peace and immortality in the presence of his beloved Savior.

Presbyterian Presidential Correspondence

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Did you ever write a letter to the White House? At Log College Press, we are developing a growing body of correspondence between American Presbyterian ministers and U.S. Presidents.

  • John Ewing, Ashbel Green and William Marshall to George Washington - These were among the signers of a 1797 joint letter of appreciation to Washington.

  • Samuel Miller to George Washington - We have letters from Miller to Washington from 1793 and 1795. Miller would later preach a 1799 sermon on the occasion of Washington’s death (not yet available at LCP).

  • Samuel Miller to Thomas Jefferson - We have seven letters from Miller to Jefferson from 1800 to 1808. Miller was once an enthusiastic supporter of Jefferson, but the two men experienced a breach in their relationship when Jefferson declined Miller’s request to recommend a national day of fasting and prayer. More can be read about this in Mark A. Beliles, The Selected Religious Letters and Papers of Thomas Jefferson (2014).

  • Samuel Miller to James Madison - We have two letters from Miller to Madison dated 1822 and 1835.

  • William McWhir to George Washington - McWhir was for ten years principal of an academy at Alexandria, Virginia, of which George Washington was a trustee, and whose step­children he taught. Two letters from McWhir to Washington are available to read here.

  • William Linn to Thomas Jefferson - William Linn, along with John Mitchell Mason, was deeply concerned about the prospect of Jefferson becoming President during the election of 1800. We have one 1798 letter from Linn to Jefferson.

  • Hugh Henry Brackenridge to Thomas Jefferson - Brackenridge was a Presbyterian jurist, novelist and scholar who corresponded with Jefferson. Two letters of his are included here from 1801 and 1813.

  • Ezra Stiles Ely to Andrew Jackson - Ely was an admirer and a confidant of the Presbyterian Jackson, and advised him during the Peggy Eaton affair. We have four letter from Ely to Jackson from 1825 to 1830.

  • Phineas Densmore Gurley to Abraham Lincoln - Gurley was pastor of the New York Avenue Presbyterian Church in Washington, DC, where Lincoln regularly attended (but was not a member). We have twelve letters from Gurley to Lincoln from 1861 to 1865. Gurley would later attend Lincoln’s deathbed and preach his funeral sermon.

  • Stuart Robinson to Abraham Lincoln - Robinson wrote to Lincoln twice in 1864 and 1865 concerning the suppression of his newspaper during wartime.

  • William Jennings Bryan, Sr. to Woodrow Wilson - Bryan served as Secretary of State under Wilson; both men were ordained Presbyterian ruling elders. We have his 1915 letter of resignation to Wilson.

We hope to continue to build on this material which provides a fascinating insight to our understanding of early American Presbyterian church-state relationships, not only in principle but in practice.

A Day in the Life of a Young Rural 19th Century Pastor - J.W. Alexander

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In 1827, James Waddel Alexander was a young Presbyterian minister in the midst of his first pastorate at the Village Presbyterian Church in Charlotte Court House, Virginia. In a July 3, 1827 letter in which he answered John Hall’s question about how he spent his time, we are given a wonderful snapshot into his life at this time:

He is my plan for days which I spend at home, not always adhered to. Rise at 4; shower-bath; dress; shave; a walk or exercise in the garden; family prayers at 6; breakfast 1/4 before 7; read Scriptures; a lesson in Hebrew; Greek Testament in course with commentaries; cursory reading of Greek Testament; English Bible; preparation for sermons; theology; German; I have luncheon at 11, dinner at 2 1/2; after dinner I expatiate, read every thing,* ride, walk, lie on the grass, &c.; tea at 7; family worship at 8; bed at 9.

* Earlier in the letter he describes reading “the works of Rapin, Pascal, De la Houssaye, in French; Mastricht, Mark, Witsius, in modern Latin; and Calvin, Dwight, and McDowell, in modern English.”

There are so many spiritual and other insights to be gleaned from reading the Forty Years’ Familiar Letters of James Waddel Alexander, D.D., edited by his correspondent, John Hall. We not only learn about the man but we see snapshots of life in his day that reveal glimpses of an America that has changed immensely in two centuries. The time period covered by these letters is 1819 (200 years ago exactly) to 1859. Alexander went on to other pastorates and other more urban settings. But this sample of the time he spent in rural central Virginia is a special window into a time in his life and a time in America’s past that is perhaps not to be repeated, making his letters even more of a treasure.