LINCOLN
DREAMS
The
President remarked that the news would come soon and come favorably, he
had no
doubt, for he had last night his usual dream which had preceded nearly
every
important event of the war.
I
inquired the particulars of
this remarkable dream. He said it was
in my department – it related to the water; that he seemed to be in a
singular
and indescribable vessel, but always the same, and that he was moving
with
great rapidity toward a dark and indefinite shore: that he had had this
singular dream preceding the firing on Sumter, the battles of Bull Run,
Antietam,
Gettysburg, Stone River, Vicksburg, Wilmington, etc.
Gen. Grant remarked, with some emphasis and
asperity, that Stone
River was no victory – that a few such victories would have ruined the
country,
and he knew of no important results from it. The
President said perhaps he should not altogether
agree with him, but
whatever might be the facts, his singular dream preceded that fight. Victory did not always follow his dream, but
the event and results were important. He
had no doubt that a battle had taken place or was
being fought, and
Johnston will be beaten, for “I had this strange dream again last night. It must relate to Sherman; for my thoughts
are in that direction, and I know of no other very important event
which is
likely just now to occur.”
Great
events did indeed
follow. Within a few hours the good and
gentle, as well as truly great man who narrated his dream was
assassinated, and
the murder which closed forever his earthly career affected for years,
and
perhaps forever, the welfare of his country.
Gideon Welles, in the Galaxy
Courtesy
Wheaton College Christian Cynosure
 MR.
MOODY IN ENGLAND
Mr. Spafford, recently returned from
England, gives us the following information concerning his work. When Mr. Moody was preparing to leave this
country about a year since, he corresponded principally with two men
who were
to make arrangements for him and assist him in his work in the British
Isles.
When he landed at Liverpool, a letter
was placed in his hands stating that both of these men were in their
graves.
A stranger, with all the human aid on
which he had in a measure relied cut off, he felt that this was a voice
of God
to him telling him not to make flesh his arm. He
went boldly forward, but was looked upon him with
suspicion. The Christian, a paper
with scarcely
eleven thousand subscribers, was the only paper that dared to mention
him or
his work. From facts subsequently
brought out, it appeared that the people feared that Mr. Sankey, his
companion,
and that Mr. Moody also, were actuated by mercenary motives.
Still they went prayerfully and
earnestly to work, and had precious meetings, which were not without
fruit. They could not, however, unite
the ministers in cordial co-operation with them, and after a while Mr.
Moody
said, “We will go to New Castle; if we cannot unite the clergymen there
in a
general effort for salvation, I will go home.” God heard prayer; the
clergymen joined Mr.
Moody in working for the salvation of souls, and a great outpouring of
the Holy
Spirit followed.
From this time on, the
obstacles to successful work seemed removed. The
tide had turned. The
papers,
both religious and secular, were glad to publish anything concerning
their
meetings.
The most striking
manifestation of God’s power in bringing about union Christian effort,
was at
Edinburgh. That city, in which
intellectual attainments were at a premium, and where intellectual
pride had
run strong partitions between different sects, was fused into one
glowing flame
of love to Christ and an outpouring of God’s Spirit came like a
Pentecostal
shower.
Mr. Moody’s prayer in public soon after
he started out in the Christian warfare was, “O! Lord, make us humble.” We believe it is his prayer still.
A memorial fund for him was started by
a friend, and before he heard of the movement, had reached one thousand
pounds
more or less, (from $4000 to $5000). As
soon as he heard of it he told the manager of the enterprise that he
would not
take one cent of the fund. His work had
been too precious to allow even a suspicion that he labored for gain,
to rest
upon it.
The circulation of The Christian, the
paper which first aided him in his work, has increased from 10,000 to
40,000
since last June.
From the
Christian Cynosure Courtesy of Wheaton
College Archives
COLLEGE SECRET SOCIETIES
 Hon. William M. Evarts
…Mr. Evarts is the son of Jeremiah
Evarts, whom the American churches have canonized for his piety,
patriotism and
ability.
This Mr. Evarts was United States
counsel along with Caleb Cushing at the Geneva Arbitration. He is, we believe, the second Alumnus of
Yale, chosen trustee by the Alumni with whom he is the most popular of
all the
graduates. He is said to have belonged
to “The Scull and Bones” Senior secret society at Yale, and his disgust
at what
he saw and experienced doubtless has strengthened his purpose to
recommend as
he does the “suppression” of college secret societies…
From the Christian Cynosure
Courtesy Wheaton College
Jeremiah
Evarts
BARBARISM IN YALE COLLEGE
Related By An Eye Witness
An alumnus of Yale College, speaking of
the election of Wm. M. Evarts,
for whom he voted, as trustee, remarked
that
Evarts was a member of “The Skull
and Bones,” and well knew from
experience the
nature of the college secret societies which he recommended the
trustees to
suppress.
“Did you,” I asked, “belong to any of
those societies in Yale?”
“No, he replied; “but I have witnessed
their initiations. The college Seniors
were invited to witness from a gallery, the initiations of the lower
classes.”
He said the “Skull and Bones” was named
from the circumstance that a delegation, armed with a literal human
skull and
cross bones knocked and rattled the same against the doors of their
candidates
elect, at midnight, which was their time of meeting.
My informant then described the
different modes of initiation which he had witnessed.
The candidates were gathered after night, by members
dressed in a
grotesque costume, furnished by a New Haven Jew who dealt in such
things; and
if on the way to the hall, which commonly led by the college
restaurant, the
candidate treated his conductor to an excellent supper, it lightened
the
savageness of his initiation. But if he
was poor or “stingy” he was put through without mercy.
I told him that a friend of mine, the
son of a wealthy banker in Indiana, was not tossed in the blanket, or
“hazed”
at all. “That must have cost him one
hundred and fifty dollars,” was his reply. I
then saw how the immense sums spent in night
entertainments by these
societies are procured. The wealthy are
let off for money; while the poor furnish at once the amusement and
money by
the man degrading initiation which the wealthy pay to get rid of.
The candidates he said, were brought in
blindfolded, and put in a sort of man-cage at the end of the hall; from
which
when the orgies began, they were taken by operators who ran them at
breakneck
speed the length of the hall; where the blinded and befooled wretch was
put
into a simple dry goods box; pad-locked down close, and then, with rope
and
tackle, jerked suddenly to the top of the hall, which was in this case,
some
twenty or more feet. Suddenly the
bottom of the box was jerked out and the candidate came down sprawling
upon a
large sail-cloth blanket, rigged with poles at the edges, in the hands
of a
dozen or twenty stout and practiced fellows, who tossed him nearly back
to the
box he came from, till they were satisfied, and the master of
ceremonies says,
“That’ll do.”
Another interesting ceremony was
lashing the candidate to a machine in the wall of the room; head,
shoulders,
arms, body, legs and feet, and then by joints in the same bending his
head and
feet as near together as practicable and whirling him round and round
an axle,
head over heels, till giddy and near swooning. Another
was, to place the hoodwinked candidate in a
shallow box on
wheels and running him at full speed, the length of the hall, over
sticks of
lumber about two inches square which had the effect of jolting and
throwing him
around so as to require all his strength to hold on.
If in all or any of these delightful college
performances the
candidate does not wince or beg off, but goes through with the stoicism
of an
Indian, or utters witty remarks, he is a brave fellow; but woe to the
wretch
whose weak constitution or acute sensibility makes him to flinch!
“But,” said I, “suppose one refuses to
go at the summons of one of these literary societies!”
“If he says, ‘I go to the Gamma Nu,’ and
treats them respectfully,” was replied, “he is let off.
But if he simply refuses they double teams
on him, and perhaps hit him over the head with a sort of paddle like a
policeman’s club.”
“And is it possible,” I continued,
“that citizens of New Haven are aware of this system of extortion,
rowdyism,
night feasting and general deviltry.”
“Many of them have witnessed these
initiations. Dr. Bacon has witnessed
them.”
“And yet,” I replied, “Dr. Bacon, in a
letter to the Boston Congregationalist, came down on a New
Haven daily
which published the fact that a student had the bones of his fore-arm
broken
while being initiated and was taken home in a carriage, with an
affected lordly
contempt, and spoke of the secret clan, the ‘Delta Gamma,’ I think, as
a
harmless debating club.”
The object and end of this training,
horse-play, buffoonery and midnight sport with human souls and bones,
is, to
extort money to run the concern; to handle, subjugate, tame and
intimidate
human beings, made in the image God, to hold night revels and feasts;
and to
mingle enough of the awful, mysterious, and mock-solemn (for in the
midst of
this devil’s balderdash, honor is appealed to and oaths and obligations
administered) to generate in many an infidel heart-loathing of the
solemn
ceremonies of religion; and confound the ideas of morality and religion
in all.
One thing particularly struck me. The
candidate while lashed tight to his
stocks, in a horizontal position, had the hood-wink removed from his
eyes,
permitting him to see, by dim and awful gas light, a huge glittering
sword, of
tin perhaps, but looking like steel, suspended over his throat; and, in
the midst
of some awful threatening words, let fall and striking on some
obstruction
within an inch of his naked neck.
And these, on the word of a gentleman
whose veracity needs no endorsing where he is known, are the secret
societies
of Yale College, which have undermined, eaten out and squelched the old
societies, Linonia and Brothers in Unity.
from the
Christian Cynosure September 25, 1873
Courtesy of Wheaton College
TOPICS OF
THE TIME
Hazing
Freshmen -- … “Hazing” is a sort
of college rowdyism practiced on timorous freshmen.
It is both a nuisance and an outrage, and several
institutions
have been compelled to pass laws against it. It
has been sometimes fatal, often injurious, and
always begets
ill-will, though carried on, as the Ann Arbor students represent, with
‘good
feeling,’ and as an ‘athletic sport’. No
institution ever gained reputation from allowing
the custom. – The Christian Cynosure May
14, 1874
 OUR
COLLEGES AND SECRET SOCIETIES
Wheaton,
Ill., Dec. 26th, 1873
…the faculty of Wheaton College are a
unit in favor of the rule adopted by the trustees prohibiting
membership in
secret societies, either in the College or outside.
We object to the secret orders, not merely as
societies which are
secret, but to the secret religious ceremonies which they all practice,
more or
less, from the largest to the least. Such
rites, practiced by members of a body taken
promiscuously from the
community, professors of religion, and men making no profession, is
nothing less
than a moral and religious system in which personal
piety is not required, nor general justice, but only fealty to a clan.
We regard the whole system, therefore, as
opposed to true religion and just government, and of course, hostile to
God and
man.
J. Blanchard
President
Wheaton College
From
the Christian Cynosure
|
After
the war, George
Whitfield Hemenway attended Wheaton College and graduated from its
Commercial Department in 1868. His sisters Ellen and Ellma also
attended Wheaton, as did his sister-in-law Louisa D. (Cook) Hemenway,
wife of his oldest brother Edwin, and Mary and 
George
was unable to do physical farm work
after the War. He was permanently disabled as the result of his injury.
Rumor had it that he had been shot in the back at Perryville. An abcess
developed on his back and hip due to the extreme hardship and exposure
he endured on the campaign. No antibiotics existed in those days to
treat him. The abscess would spread to his leg and he would walk with a
cane for the rest of his life. 
Chester
A sketch has been preserved of a
discourse delivered in New England by one of the Indian converts and
preachers
of that worthy missionary, 
