What's New at Log College Press? — September 1, 2023

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Dear Friends,

As summer draws to a close, we wish to give an update on what’s been happening at Log College Press. Our virtual shelves are filling up with old Presbyterian books, articles, poetry and manuscripts. We recently reached a milestone of sorts - there are now over 20,000 works available to read at Log College Press.

In a year of celebration and remembrance, we have previously paid tribute to John Witherspoon’s 300th birthday (Feb. 5, 1723); Thomas Murphy’s 200th birthday (Feb. 6, 1823); the 100th anniversary of Robert P. Kerr’s passing (March 25, 1923); the 250th anniversary of Joseph Caldwell’s passing (April 21, 1773); the 150th anniversary of William H. McGuffey’s passing (May 4, 1873); A.A. Hodge’s 200th birthday (July 18, 1823); the 150th anniversary of Gardiner Spring’s passing (Aug. 18, 1873); the 150th anniversary of Thomas Smyth’s passing (Aug. 20, 1873); and we are looking ahead to the 300th birthday of Samuel Davies (Nov. 3, 1723). These anniversaries are reminders of the rich heritage of American Presbyterianism, and how these men have contributed in their own ways to shaping our history. As we like to say, there is no time like the present to study the past.

Meanwhile, to return to the here and now, members of the Dead Presbyterian Society have special access to certain features on this website, which include the Early Access and Recent Additions page, as well as the DPS quote blog, and the Log College Review. We wish to draw your attention to notable works of interest that have added recently.

Some highlights at the Early Access page:

  • Samuel Davies, Travel Diary (1753-1754) — A kind and helpful supporter of our work noticed that some handwritten manuscript journals have been digitized by the Union Theological Seminary in Richmond, Virginia, including Davies’ diary which covers a portion of his trip to Great Britain to raise funds for the College of New Jersey (Princeton).

  • William Henry Foote, Journal (3 volumes, 1794-1869) — This is a remarkable manuscript journal (written in beautiful penmanship) which covers almost the entirety of Foote’s life, and includes newspaper clippings, family history, ecclesiastical records (some pertinent to the founding of the Presbyterian Church, C.S.A.), and much more.

  • Francis Alison, Peace and Union Recommended (1758) — A notable sermon preached by an Old Side divine at the opening of the synod at which the Old and New Sides were reunited.

  • David Bostwick, Self Disclaimed and Christ Exalted (1758) — A powerful sermon on the words from John 3:30: “He must increase but I must decrease.”

  • Jonathan Dickinson, A Sermon, Preached at the Opening of the Synod at Philadelphia, September 19, 1722 (1723) and A Vindication of God’s Sovereign Free Grace (1746).

  • Samuel Finley, The Curse of Meroz; or, The Danger of Neutrality, in the Cause of God, and Our Country (1757) — A notable patriotic sermon preached during the French and Indian War.

Some highlights at the Recent Additions page:

On the Log College Review:

  • Reviews by Jonathan Peters: Review of Francis R. Flournoy, Benjamin Mosby Smith: 1811-1893 (1947) [2023], and Review of William E. Thompson, In Stonewall’s Long Shadow: James Power Smith, Aide de Camp (2020) [first appeared in The Confessional Presbyterian 18 (2022)].

Meanwhile, please feel free to browse the many resources available to our readers in print and in digital format. We appreciate hearing from our readers if they find matters needing correction, or if they have questions about authors or works on the site, or if they have suggestions for additions to the site. Your feedback helps the experience of other readers as well. Thank you, as always, for your interest and support. Stay tuned for more good things to come.

Fourth of July Celebration at Log College Press

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If your cause is just — you may look with confidence to the Lord and intreat him to plead it as his own. You are all my witnesses, that this is the first time of my introducing any political subject into the pulpit. At this season however, it is not only lawful but necessary, and I willingly embrace the opportunity of declaring my opinion without any hesitation, that the cause in which America is now in arms, is the cause of justice, of liberty, and of human nature. — John Witherspoon, The Dominion of Providence Over the Passions of Men: A Sermon, Preached at Princeton, on the 17th of May, 1776. Being the General Fast Appointed by the Congress Through the United Colonies (1777)

It was five years ago today that Log College Press was founded on July 4, 2017. (See what this site looked like early on [as of January 19, 2018] via the Wayback Machine here.) Thanks to the support and encouragement of our dear readers, we have come a long way since then.

We have now published 7 books, and 10 booklets. Log College Press now has over 15,000 works by over 1,900 authors available to read on the site.

On this date in past years we have highlighted men who served the cause of civil and religious liberty, as well as books by our authors which celebrate the cause.

This year we take note of our authors which share a birthday with Log College Press and the United States of America:

At Log College Press we have much cause to celebrate, and we give thanks to God for the labors of godly men and women who have gone before in service to the cause of Christ and freedom. We also recognize how far this country has fallen from its ideal as epitomized in John Winthrop’s “City on a Hill” (1630).

Our national sins are great. It was in 1778 that Jacob Green famously said: “Can it be believed that a people contending for liberty should, at the same time, be promoting and supporting slavery?” And it was in 1832 that James R. Willson pointed out our great need as a nation to acknowledge our dependence upon and submission to God, and to kiss Son specifically, alluding to Ps. 2:12 and quoting Ps. 9:17, when took note of the great omission by our Constitutional Founding Fathers who chose not to honor God in our national charter: “Was it a mere omission? Did the convention that framed the constitution forget to name the living God? Was this an omission in some moment of national phrenzy, when the nation forgot God? That, indeed, were a great sin. God says, ‘the nations that forget God, shall be turned into hell’” (Prince Messiah).

Though far from where we as a nation ought to be, yet there is cause for remembrance of and thanksgiving for the blessings of the past as well as the mercies of today. As William B. Sprague once said, “LET THE DAY BE OBSERVED, BUT LET IT BE OBSERVED RELIGIOUSLY” (Religious Celebration of Independence: A Discourse Delivered at Northampton, on the Fourth of July, 1827 (1827)). That is to say, with respect to this civil holiday (as distinct from a religious holy day), we ought to celebrate its noblest ideals, exemplified in America’s fight for freedom and independence, with proper solemnities, in an appropriate Christian manner, but in humble acknowledgment of how far we as a people have still to go, by the grace of God, to arrive at those ideals.

To understand civil and religious freedom aright, we believe it is important to study God’s Word first, but not to neglect the study of history as well. Primary sources from the past are a valuable tool in promoting reformation and revival in the present. Our topical page on Church and State is one particular relevant resource. We thank our readers for their interest in and support of this project by Log College Press to make accessible what Presbyterians who have gone before had to say on this and other important matters. To God be the glory, as we we celebrate another Independence Day, and a birthday besides.

The Family Altar

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As chairman of the Executive Committee of Publication of the Presbyterian Church in the United States (PCUS), James Power Smith wrote the preface to a valuable work on family worship titled The Family Altar (1915). This has recently been added to Log College Press.

The Family Altar contains Scripture readings, hymn selections and suggested prayers for each day of the week, over a period of four weeks, as well as special occasional prayers from men such as Edward Reynolds of the Westminster Assembly, Henry Van Dyke, Jr., James Isaac Vance, Russell Cecil, Richard Clark Reed, William Marcellus McPheeters, and James Russell Miller.

Smith writes:

The daily worship of the household is of early origin. The Hebrew patriarchs builded their altars where they pitched their tents, and there called on the name of the Lord. The disciples of Jesus in earliest Christian times had "the church in the home." It has a natural foundation and reason, in the unity of the family, the close and tender relations of the household, and the sanctity and love of the Christian home; suggesting and inviting the family acknowledgment of mercies and petitions for Divine presence and blessing. Upon the family altar, continued through the ages, has rested the blessing of God.

It honors God, the giver of all our good, the source of all our happiness. It makes the home a sanctuary for God's dwelling. It binds the household together in a more hallowed love. It pleads the grace of Covenant promise. It instructs and unites all hearts in the truth and grace of Christ. It builds a wall of defense against the error and evil of the world around us. It bears witness for God, our Saviour, to the stranger within our gates. It devotes the day to the highest service and sweetens all the hours. It plants in every heart sacred memories to be profitable and happy in all the following years. It brings down from Heaven that blessing of God which maketh rich, and He addeth no sorrow with it.

Be encouraged to take up the duty and privilege of family worship by this valuable aid published over a century ago. Daily family mercies received should lead to daily family prayers and thanksgivings. To God be the glory!

J.P. Smith Describes a June Day

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This is the month (halfway through the year) for commencements - which signify both endings and beginnings. In his collection of inspirational meditations titled Brightside Idyls: Every Week of the Year, Southern Presbyterian minister James Power Smith has this to day about a June day.

A Day in June.

Not many things are as bright and fair as a day in June. It must have been a June day of which George Herbert sang:

"Sweet day, so cool, so calm, so bright,
The bridal of the earth and sky.”

Spring has come to its crowning day, and nature opens all its richer beauty of greenery and flowers. If it is "the leafy month of June," it is also the month of sweet perfumes, the month of bees and birds, of long, balmy days and of fair, green landscapes. It was our American Lowell who wrote:

"And what is so rare as a day in June,
Then, if ever, come perfect days.”

It is well the schools open their doors at the coming of June, and send the throngs of boys and girls out into the lanes and fields. Books are well, but freedom and play are also well. Now must come the happy parties, with their well-stored baskets, to find a picnic place under the trees, be side the streams, and spend a long holiday in joy unrestrained. School days for profit and training, and June days for fishing and ranging and boating to the heart's content.

What a time it is for commencements! Examinations are all over, and diplomas are awarded, and degrees won, and these bright June days great companies of youth will leave the colleges for good. What a serious time Commencement Day is! It is the ending of so much: school days, book learning, mind training, long years of discipline and education; yet it is the commencement of more. It is the threshold across which they pass from narrow school to the great out-door of free and self-directed manhood and womanhood. Flowers and sheepskins, sermons and appeals, final frolics and silent hand-clasps, tearful home travel, and then come commencements indeed.

What would the world come to if the forces that battle were not reinforced by the June commencements! What a splendid infusion of young life! What a grand addition to the powers working for progress and uplift are the ambitions and hopes of the young! We lay the old warrior down to rest and cover him with laurels, and then turn to meet the young soldier coming on the field and crown him with the roses of June. Long may he Stand, strong and brave, win battles in his own breast, and then win battles for his brothers and for the world. All the future of the home, and the State and the church depend on the army of young men and women who come to their commencements in June.

Just as it was in 1904 when this was written, so it is in our day. Commencement days in June mark new beginnings for students and families in the 21st century too. We wish congratulations to those who have passed this milestone after years of study and hard work, along with their families, and it is our prayer for all the students who are graduating that you will continue to seek God’s glory in all of your endeavors, and be richly blessed in the service of your King.