Let us now look into John Chambers's inner life,—of the heart as well as the intellect. We have seen how the vigorous and lusty twig which grew up in the classical academy of Baltimore began to bend away from certain statements and formul? in the Westminster symbols, as then interpreted to him, which gave the afterwards robust and widespreading tree a tremendous inclination. "As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he." John Chambers's convictions shaped his message and colored all his preaching. There were probably reasons, other than those merely intellectual, for the young man's tremendous antipathy to the idea that the fullness of the Christian life and the message of Jesus could be compressed into the mathematical statements made at Westminster during the days of the British Commonwealth.
When I was a student at Rutgers College, New Brunswick, New Jersey, from 1865 to 1869, I was asked, as an incoming freshman, by the president, Rev. William H. Campbell, D.D., LL.D., concerning my religious training. I told him how much I owed to John Chambers in Philadelphia. A bland light overspread the full expanse of that face, so seamed with thought and studious toil and which nothing but warm affection could call handsome. Indeed, it seemed as though every wrinkle was smoothed out, as a prairie-like smile suffused its whole area. Then, laughing heartily, he said, "Well, I can remember when he had orthodoxy taught him with the sole of a slipper." Evidently then, according to the accepted and supposedly wholesome custom of the times, the future preacher received at intervals[43] what was expected to be a physical aid to faith, though in reality the result was the reverse of what was expected. Whether the slipper was applied to the lad before or after intellectual defection, its use induced reaction. Whether, as is probable, the correction by leather came from the employer to whom the apprentice was bound, or from the schoolmaster is not known. The boy would not accept Westminsterism whole, certainly not as then interpreted.
Above all, this young Irish-American lad had a big, warm heart. As he read the Scriptures for himself he was early filled with that idea, which afterwards he infused into the lives of thousands, that the gospel is a glorious message to the individual, that the Christian life is a Way, as well as a belief, that there are elements in religious life and experience which do not submit to exact definitions, and that the mercy of God is the largest factor of the Divine life toward wrong-doing man. In this the time of his youth, as well as all through his life, he felt deeply rather than thought coolly. Whether we must ascribe most or all of the results to the towering personality of his teacher, John Mason Duncan, and of his long continued training at a most susceptible age under so forceful a master, certainly, whatever our philosophy of the known facts may be, he was filled with an antipathy to creeds. In a time and climate of theological severity, and amid the rancor of controversy, he was, among his clerical brethren who set higher value than he did, upon "the form of sound words" or logical formulas, verily a pilgrim and stranger upon the earth. He rejoiced to see by faith the day we live in, even the work of the General Assembly, and of the Synods and Presbyteries of 1903.
Ever hoping and praying for the day to come when the creeds, especially of the Presbyterian body of churches, in which he had been educated, would be revised, he lived and[44] "died in faith, not having received the promises, but having seen them and greeted them from afar". The change of theological climate, the revision of the Westminster symbols and the simplification of theology into which we, in this twentieth century have come, even the work of the General Assembly, that met in New York in 1902, and in Los Angeles in 1903, was what he in hope long ago looked for. He believed in expressing forms of faith in the language of living men, not of dead ones, for he ever taught not only that God was, but that He is.
To recapitulate, John Chambers left the classical academy in 1818, after five years' instruction. He remained seven years longer in Baltimore, active in church life and work. During this time, he was occupied also in business, thus earning his livelihood, for he had learned the trade of a jeweler. During these years, his life was made rich and joyous by one who had crossed his path, and who was to be to him his beloved wife, Miss Helen McHenry. She was the first of three noble specimens of womanhood who were to light his household fire, irradiate his home, double and share his joys and sorrows. How often and how tenderly did "our pastor" refer to "the partner of his life", the beloved "companion of his bosom!" What a refining power, what a potent influence, stimulating to marital purity and mutual "love that lightens all distress", was his steadfast example. It was his frequent felicitous use of passages from the Song of Songs, that so impressed one boy's mind that, despite his vow, registered in college, never to write a "commentary", he composed and published "The Lily Among Thorns".[6]
[6] The Lily Among Thorns. A Study of the Biblical Drama entitled The Song of Songs. Boston, 1889.
Let us look at the heredity of his affianced. As early as 1735, Francis McHenry, an ordained minister of the[45] Presbyterian church came from Ireland to America and was associated with Gilbert Tennant in the Deep Run, or Neshaminy, churches in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, and also in the beginnings of the Log College, which by direct evolution became the great Princeton University.
His grandson was Francis Dean McHenry, a shipping merchant of Baltimore, whose daughter Helen was born in September, 1805, when the boy in Ohio was nearly seven years old. When he met her in Baltimore, he had the lover's "three T's" or elements of success—propinquity, opportunity, and importunity. Those who knew John Chambers in later life will not marvel why he won her, rather might they wonder how any maiden could resist the urgency of the warm-hearted and handsome youth, who was the largest and handsomest of the Chambers family. As matter of fact, she made capitulation in due time and was led to the altar.
It was but a very short time after John Chambers had reached the first stadium in his successful career and was an ordained minister, that the marriage took place in Baltimore, March 14th, 1826.
The young preacher brought his bride to Philadelphia and enjoyed just three years and six months of wedded happiness with the companion of his youth. Those who remember Mrs. Chambers speak of her beauty and animation, and of her whole-hearted sympathy with her husband's work, but her life was destined to be brief. The first child born of the union was John Mason Duncan Chambers, whom the happy father joyfully named after his spiritual father, under whom his soul life had opened and ripened in Baltimore. His second child, a daughter, Helen Frances Chambers, now Mrs. James Hackett, living at Pomfret Centre, Conn., still survives him.
[46]
John Mason Duncan Chambers, born March 15, 1827, married Miss Emma Ward of Winchester, Virginia, in October, 1851. He died November, 1857, leaving three children, of whom Helen McHenry is the only survivor. She is married to Mr. George Lothrop Bradley, of Pomfret Centre, Conn., and Washington, D. C.
Helen Frances Chambers, born April 25, 1829, was married July 17, 1849, to Mr. James Hackett, of Baltimore. Their one surviving child, Helen McHenry Hackett, married George F. Miles. With Mrs. Hackett, these two grandchildren are the only descendants of John Chambers.
The pastor, elect and ordained, brought his bride to Philadelphia and took a house on Thirteenth street, bel............