The remains of Joseph R.T. Gordon, son of Major Jonathan W. Gordon, of the Eleventh U.S. Infantry, were interred at Indianapolis, on Friday, with impressive military ceremonies.
The remains were brought on by Cap. Patten of the 6th Indiana. [Ninth Indiana regiment, December 13] (Ninth regiment, December 13)
Full text of "A funeral sermon, on the death of Joseph R.T. Gordon, who was killed in the battle of Buffalo Mountain, December 13, 1861"
I hold it true, whate'er befall ;
I feel it, when I sorrow most ;
' Tis better to have loved and lost
Than never to have loved at all.
INDIANAPOLIS : JOURNAL COMPANY, PRINTERS.
My Dear Elgiva, Viola, and Eliza :
I dedicate to you this little memorial of
your dear brother Joseph. His love once filled our home and our
hearts with the light of happiness ; and his death has left us in dark-
ness and sorrow. His life was an act of devotion to duty, which he
warmed and brightened by the light of a love, as gentle and gener-
ous as ever gladdened the earth. He met his death in the sir-
cere endeavor of a true soul, " to act in a better manner the part
assigned " him, " in the great tragedy of life."
He is gone; but you will remember him — remember how he
loved you, and labored for your happiness ; and so love each other.
Learn from his beautiful life always to prefer duty to pleasure.
Learn, from his noble death, that it is better to die in the path of
duty, than to live out of it.
" Little children, love one another."
Your Father, J. W. GORDON.
J±
l/
FUNERAL SERMON,
ON THE DEATH OF
JOSEPH E. T. GORDON,
WHO WAS KILLED IN THE BATTLE OF BUFFALO MOUNTAIN,
DECEMBER 13, 1861.
DELIVERED BY
REV. A. L. BROOKS,
'•I
PASTOR OF THE
/
FOURTH PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH,
INDIANAPOLIS, IND.,
JANUARY 5, 1802.
EI SOU
"A plow is coming from the far end of a long field, and a daisy
stands nodding and full of dew-dimples. That furrow is sure to
strike the daisy. It casts its shadow as gaily, and exhales its gentle
breath as freely, and stands as simple, and radiant, and expectant
as ever ; and yet that crushing furrow, which is tearing and turn-
ing others in its course, is drawing near, and, in a moment, it whirls
the heedless flower with sudden reversal under the sod." — Selected by
Joseph R T. Gordon, from H. W. Beecher, as the first gem of a " Collec-
tion of things Useful and Beautiful, commenced July 18th, A. D. 1860."
SERMON.
DO THAT WHICH IS GOOD, AND THOU SHALT HAVE PRAISE OF THE
SAME. * * * * RENDER, THEREFORE, TO ALL THEIR
DUES ; TRIBUTE TO WHOM TRIBUTE IS DUE ; CUSTOM TO WHOM
CUSTOM ; FEAR TO WHOM FEAR J HONOR TO WHOM HONOR.
[Romans xiii., 3d, 7th.
The principal subject in these passages is unquestionably
the reverence and obedience of the Christian citizen for the
justly constituted civil Government. The Christian religion
imposes no duty more certainly than that of obedience to the
rightful authority of the State. It imposes that duty by the
solemn declarations of condemnation and wrath upon the dis-
obedient. But while these texts enforce the duty of a loyal
citizenship, they also assure us of the praise and honor that
are due, and shall be given to all those who do their duty.
There are circumstances, also, which will secure to the sub-
ject, who, with a pure and unaspiring loyalty, devotes his
powers to the preservation of the authority and prosperity
of the State, the special praise and honor of all good citi-
zens.
These simple truths premised, I now proceed to pay a trib-
ute of praise and honor to one of the youthful and beloved
citizens of this great and good Government, who has, in sin-
cere and disinterested patriotism, given his life, in the fearful
sacrifice of war, for the preservation of the Government
against a rebellion, in its irrational atrocities, unparalleled in
the history of the race.
Joseph R. T. Gordon was but a youth, not yet eighteen years
of age. He was no titled chieftain, on whose bronzed features
and stalwart form the scars and stars of war had become a
fixed habit. He had but little taste and limited discipline to
inspire him with martial zeal and courage. He was no titled
statesman, or famous civilian whom a heartless w T orld is so
proud to honor and follow. He was no marvellous genius of
the sacred or the sinning arts, to be embalmed in the songs,
or immortalized in the monuments of time. He was known
to but few; and by those but to be loved for his simple and
unostentatious virtues; — for his manly integrity and filial de-
votion; — clear and comprehensive intellect, and moral worth.
His hatred of wrong and oppression, and his patriotism were
no sinister and hollow-hearted boast of the aspirant for place
and power; but the diamond flashes of a soul fixed in the
golden settings of imperishable truth and right. He knew
no guide in his youthful zeal for the respect and love of his
kind, but conscience and truth. The tribute which we offer
to his memory at this time, is not the common and expected
service of an undiscriminating precedent, nor a yielding to
the clamor of party zeal in behalf of a votoprif^ leader; but
the heartfelt admiration and gratitude of a great people for
the manly virtues and noble patriotism of an unpretending
youth from the ranks of the people. Its sincerity and earn-
estness are the more to be appreciated, as it is so spontaneous
and irrepressible.
Joseph Reeder Troxell Gordon was born January 3d,
A. D. 1844. He was a very slender child in his infancy, and
brought up to boyhood with great care and many fears lest
the forces of his natural constitution would never rally to
strength and maturity. He early indicated more than com-
mon powers of mind, especially in the particularity of his
observations of whatever came under his notice. It w T as this
fact, in his future development, which made him of such essen-
tial service in his connection with our army. At two years
of age, lie discovered — what many artists have failed to no-
tice — that the step of the elephant is differeut from that of
any other dumb brute, and precisely like a man's. His child-
ish descriptions of passiug events were always reliable in the
general and in the particular. He was, early in his childhood,
accustomed to systematic employment of his time. His aid
in, the domestic economy was most remarkable, at a very early
period of his childhood; and, as early as in his eighth year, he
was charged with the sole expenditure for the table of the
family; and has preserved in his own hand the monthly ac-
count of current expenses of his father's family, until the
family was broken up — an instance most remarkable of his
thorough discipline, filial love and precocious character.
During his thirteenth year, he became very much interested
in the labors of his father upon the great political issues of
the day, especially the questions arising upon the repeal of
the "Missouri Compromise;" and, with unwearying assiduity,
devoted himself to reading, and copying, and carefully arrang-
ing the public documents of the Government for his father's
aid in his work. He has preserved many hundreds of pages
of this work, carefully arranged, filed and classified- — a mon-
ument to his industry and discipline, more valuable than the
triumphs of political ambition, or of the strife for wealth.
From the commencement of the great political battle of
1856, he became a steady and an interested reader of the po-
litical news of the day; and was earnest to fully understand
the real issues involved in the battle. He acquired a knowl-
edge, greatly in advance of his years, upon the political econ-
omics of the contending parties of the time. This familiarity
with current political history he maintained to the last. In
the last political struggle, he fully comprehended the dangers
in which the country was involved; and, though a minor, gave
his mind and his heart to the success of Mr. Lincoln, with a
zeal that has found its highest manifestation in the cheerful-
ness with which he has sealed his faith with his blood.
His habits of reading were not exclusive. He was rather
choice than miscellaneous in his reading. He was fond of the
older poets; of History; and read, with peculiar pleasure,
Virgil, Horace, and the Illiad. During the time he was con-
nected with the University, his standing in the classical de-
partment, was always with the first; and in deportment with-
out a blemish. In Mathematics he stood fair, and in the natural
sciences, especially in Geology,* high. In composition and
debate he had but few superiors. His talents and character
won for him, the esteem and affections of the whole faeulty,
and of his fellow-students.
His filial love and devotion, I have no power to exagerate,
if I can adequately portray them to you. His love for his pa-
rents was so marked and unwavering as to have won universal
admiration. The circumstances of his home early made him
a companion of his mother, to whom she was accustomed to
express her joys and griefs with the greatest freedom, and
with the most lively appreciation by him. His father's con-,
nection with public life, necessarily took him much from home,
and Joseph became his mother's affectionate, dutiful, consid-
siderate and devoted friend. At the period of life when the
sports of boyhood, the sights and excitements of a city, the
love and favoritism of his associates, and especially the in-
fluence of their unrestrained liberty and freedom from all care,
would naturally have made him impatient of any restraint,
such was his love for his parents, and especially for his mother
when alone, that he never sought his own pleasure when it
was in his power to contribute to the immediate comfort of
home. He readily took on the habit and character which a
fond and faithful parent would impress. He most cheerfully
and uncomplainingly encountered all the vicissitudes of the
family, at whatever cost to his plans or his pleasures. He
was tender, gentle, and delicate in all his manner and address
to his mother; reverent and admiring of his father. He took
deeply to his heart every word of disrespect and violence
thrown at his father, in the heat of political strife; and gave
himself heart and hand to the vindication of the principles by
* He studied Geology at home, of his own choice. It was not one of bis
University studies. — J. W. Gordon.
•which he felt his father was controlled. He made the most
zealous and untiring efforts to minister to the happiness and
comfort of the family, that his father might feel at liberty to
devote himself to the labors of the sphere he had chosen.
And when sickness, pale and remorseless, began to prey upon
the strength and beauty of his mother's form, he became more
and more a staff and a comfort to her. He performed his
studies at her side, learned to discover and anticipate her
wants, to minister to them with a fidelity and satisfaction to
her most grateful and affecting. As the fearful disease
showed itself more insatiable and relentless, he multiplied his
devotions; and, as month after month wore away, he became
more and more gentle, affectionate and hope ful . No weari-
ness of watching disturbed the equanimity of his temper.
No self-denial was required, that he felt, save as a new intense
on the altar of his holiest devotion. He read to her from the
records of current events, as she was able to bear it ; read to
her from the Sacred Scriptures, in whose light she had walketf
so confidently for many years; and from the weekly issues of
the religious press. He helped her in her great feebleness,
to bear the sacrifice of his father from his home, for the de-
fence of his Government in its imminent peril. He com-
manded every impulse to follow the fortunes of his father in
the battles of his country, while this altar of sacrifice remained
to consume his filial love. By night and by day, mid hope
and fear, with anxieties without and watchings within, he
brought every resource of his being to the accomplishment
of the sacred trust he so cheerfully assumed, of the minister-
ing spirit in her lingering decline. He smoothed the path for
her down the declivities of the grave, removing every stum-
bling-stone, and cheering her in every dark, distressful hour.
Gentle, as the touch of angels, was his hand as he lifted her
wasted form, or wiped her pallid brow of death's chilling
dews. Sweet, as the breath of June, was all his air and mien
in that chamber where she so long held her timid intercourse
with the spirit world. He was the light of love in her eye,
when she had cheerfully yielded the husband of her youth to
6
the call of her country— bleeding from the stab of treason.
He was the joy of her heart, when the air was filled with
shouts and sighs of war, to which he that was her strength
and pride was gone. Watchful, as a guardian angel, he sat
by her pillow through the still nights, that creep so slowly
through their tedious hours, to all save him that burns the in-
cense of love. We would challenge every power of thought,
and every emotion of soul, to praise and honor the filial love,
that turns from every path of youthful pleasure, from every
hour of idle leisure, with a devotion, pure and sacred as earth
ever shows, to take the cares, allay the griefs, and bless the
love of a mother's dying days. Faithful as the shadow to
the substance, and beautiful as an angePs ministry, was his
love to the sainted mother, who now rehearses his numberless
deeds of affection, before the great and admiring hosts of
heaven.
His patriotism was not an impulse — a giving way before
the excitements of military display. He had never been fa-
miliarized with the excitements of noisy and reckless scenes.
He was calm and thoughtful by nature ; but from early boy-
hood had learned to comprehend and enjoy his home, under
the blessings and protection of this benificent Government.
He was faithfully taught to revere the personal and religious
liberty of the Government, to compare his own with monar-
chical liberties. He felt keenly the shame which our nation
has suffered for its enormous system of fraud and oppression
upon the colored people of the land. W T hen but thirteen years
of age, he refused utterly to obey the demands of the ''deputy
marshal" of this State, to aid him in the arrest of a fugitive
slave. To him it was a moral wrong — a violation of the spirit
of the Gospel; and no fear of the possible consequences could
humble him to a violation of his conscience. He was edu-
cated deeply and earnestly to deplore the encroachments of
the institution of slavery upon the liberties of the Govern-
ment, and to revere and love the men who would resist these
encroachments.
In the excitements of 1856, he received the impression that
civil war was imminent, especially if the South should be un-
successful in the election; and from that to his death, had
most heartily sympathized with the Government in its peril.
His enlistment was under circumstances to prove to the world
his devotion to his country; for he was fond of study, and
desirous of an education. The Hon. Cassius M. Clay, of
Kentucky, with whom he was somewhat familiar, and who had
discovered and admired the many traits of worth and real
greatness in him, had made ample provision for his educa-
tion, at his own expense. The door was wide open for him
to realize his highest ambition in this respect. But, in con-
versation with an intimate friend of his, and of his family, he
said that "he firmly believed that he carried, in his constitu-
tion, the seeds of the disease that had laid his mother in the
grave; and that, if he succeeded in acquiring an education, the
chances were against his living to use it with any good to his
country ; and he preferred to serve his country with what
powers he now possessed, in the time of her emergency, rather
than to trust to the future with such a contingency." His
enlistment was duly considered; and all its possible contin-
gencies cheerfully accepted. When he received his father's
consent, conditioned, as it was, upon the irresistible convic-
tion to Joseph's mind, that under the circumstances — his
youth — his prospect for an education — the hopes of his father
that he might live to represent and vindicate his labors with
the coming generation, it was his duty : He received it as
the grateful assurance of heaven's blessings on his solemn
purpose. His motives for joining the army are most satisfac-
torily expressed in his own words, in an unfinished letter, ad-
dressed to his father, and found on his person, after he was
carried off the field of battle. In this letter he says :
" You seem to be at a loss, my dear father, to understand
my motive for volunteering ; but, I think, if you will remem-
ber the lessons, which for years you have endeavored to im-
press upon my mind, that all will be explained. When you
have endeavored, ever since I was old enough to understand
you, to instruct me, not only by precept but by example, that
8
I should prefer freedom to everything else in this world; and
that I should not hesitate to sacrifice anything, even life itself,
upon the altar of my country when required, you surely should
not be surprised, that I should, in this hour of extreme peril to
my country, offer her my feeble aid."
0, noble utterance of a loyal heart ! Worthy of our high-
est praise and honor ! He felt his youth and inexperience ;
but inspired with the holy cause, he felt competent to follow
and execute the commands of the officers over him. He en-
dured the hardships of the camp, of the tedious march, of
personal privation, with the equanimity of experience and
age.
In his actual service, he was early found to possess those
qualifications of mind and heart, which fitted him for the
most important and dangerous duties of the battle field.
His bravery was, when we consider his age and his habits of
life, incomprehensible, but for the light of the motives that
led him to the field. He felt his cause was just; and every
power he possessed, even life itself, must be laid upon its altar.
It will be rarely recorded of any who survive or fall, in all
this terrible war, that he equalled the courage of that beard-
less boy. See him start out at night on those bleak moun-
tains, and dark ravines, sometimes alone, sometimes with
comrades, with the assurance that in almost every thicket,
and behind every log, the remorseless enemy was wait-
ing to shed his blood. See him lead out the scouting
party oftentimes of men double his years; and, with most
fearless heart, put himself into the very midst of the en-
emy. His commanding officer, General Milroy, in his letter
to Joseph's father, conveying the intelligence of his death,
and transmitting his remains, pays him the following tribute
of praise, which I am here permitted to make public. He
" He died as only a brave soldier can meet death, in the
front rank of the battle ; and ' in the imminent deadly breach.'
He had charged up with the foremost of his Regiment, to the
enemy's works ; and with his deadly Minnie had coolly dropped
a rebel soldier on the inside; and re-loaded, and again pulled
trigger with equally deadly effect upon a second traitor, at the
instant a traitor ball pierced him through the brain, as you
will see. I deeply mourn with you the death of this truly
noble boy. Brave almost to a fault, generous as the sun, dif-
fusing joy and animation in every circle in which he moved.
His amiability, afiibility and bravery had endeared him to the
whole of his Regiment; and dearly will the Ninth remember,
and make treason atone for his death, before the war closes.
Having been a member of my military family since the com-
mencement of the present campaign, his many amiable qual-
ities had endeared him to me as a son ; and his death has
created a vacuum in that family which cannot be filled.
" I soon discovered, after my last arrival in Virginia, that
his intelligence, activity and bravery better fitted him as a
scout than an orderly, and accordingly detailed another to
perform the more immediate and onerous duties of orderly;
and permitted him to accompany and to lead scouting parties
almost daily; and he became familiar with every mountain,
valley and path around the enemy's camp ; and had met them in
and upon nearly all of them to their cost. But few soldiers
have met death and danger so often as he has, for the time he
has been in the service."
His General says further : " The day before he was killed,
he was with a scouting party of fourteen, who were ambus-
caded, and fired upon, by a large body of rebels ; and seven
of his companions fell at the first fire — three of them within
three feet of him. The rebel leader sprang out, and demand-
ed of Joseph to surrender, but received for reply the contents
of his Minnie rifle."
From other sources we learn that the evening before the
engagement in which he lost his life, he expressed to the
Adjutant of his Regiment, the strong conviction that he should
be killed; and made all desired disposition of his little effects,
and requested, in case of his death, that his body should be
sent to his father. But his brave young heart did not quail
as the muster-roll challenged him to the field of battle and
10
death. There was no palor on his blooming cheek — no trem-
bling in his limbs — no tears in his eyes ;. but, brave and noble,
as a heart of flesh can be, he faced and fought the foe. A
companion in arms in that terrible charge says, he "was lit-
erally as brave as a lion, and as gentle as a lamb. He fell
early in the action, and close to the enemy's works. He was
the pet of the Regiment, and no death could have occurred
that would have caused more heartfelt sorrow among officers
and men than did his."
But the beloved, the noble youth has fallen. And, while
we deplore the loss of one so brave, so gifted, so worthy of
his patriot ancestors, with whom he now sleeps in the grave,
on which the " dews of heaven weep," and the stars have set
their loving watch till the resurrection morn, with a martial
poet of the Greeks, in his praise of their fallen youthful
braves, we will say of the loved and lost one :
" How glorious fall the valiant, sword in hand,
In front of battle for their native land."
His clear mind, his filial love, his patriotic heart, his deeds
of noble daring for his country's life, will live as long as the
heart can hold the memory of Virtue and Truth. The poet
says:
" But strew his ashes to the wind,
Whose sword or voice has served mankind.
And is he dead whose glorious mind
Lifts thine on high ?
To live in hearts we leave behind
Is not to die.
Is't death to fall for Freedom's right?
He's dead alone that lacks her light,
And murder sullies, in heaven's sight,
The sword he draws.
What can alone enoble fight? —
A noble cause."
My friends, I commend to you the character and the deeds
of the valiant youth whom we delight to honor. He boldly
gave himself to the battle and the death, which we fear awaits
11
many thousands more ere our land shall welcome the return
of peace. The war cloud gathers blackness and tempest still.
Our noble patriots are falling by scores, and hundreds under
the fatal infections of the camp ; and by the fearful shots of
war. The peril to our benificent and glorious Government to
very many minds is as imminent as ever. From a new and
unexpected quarter, the threat of battle is sending fear through
the land. It is possible that necessity will require the doub-
ling of our army in the field, and on the sea. Shall our Gov-
ernment be forced to the hateful work of drafting, while we
have a million of r.oble youth in the land? Will the men of
this Innd — youthful and middle aged — withhold their service
from the most beneficent and Christian Government on earth,
when challenged to save it from the grasp of the most wicked
and remorseless tyranny that ever forged a chain for human
limbs, or plied the faggot to human conscience ? The battle
that is waged against this Christian Government is to break
the power of the condemning conscience of the people, against
the most inhuman, blasphemous, wicked and God-defying vil-
lainy that ever dared to lift its horrid front among the children
of men. Its success would be a greater calamity, a more ap-
palling curse to this fair land and the Christian world than to
extinguish all constitutional liberty, and ask the vanquished
king of Naples to the reconstruction of his throne among us.
Let your minds conceive the thought of an empire on the
American continent, whose fundamental principle should be
the divine right of the stronger to imbrute the iveaker portion of
the race. Conceive the immaculate Jehovah who gave his
eternal Son a ransom to deliver the race from the power and
dominion of sin, and to establish a kingdom of purity, liberty,
and grace among men, attempting to push forward the con-
quests of his kingdom, by the establishment of an empire in
which his own subjects; nay, children, regenerated by his
spirit, and sanctified by his truth, and made heirs of his eter-
nal fullness and glory, are denied their immortality, offered
in sacrifice to the most beastial impurities, and employed to
propagate the guilt of a damning traffic in the bodies and souls
12
of men. It was to aid this Christian Government in resisting
just such an empire as this, in its attempt to overwhelm us in
ruin, that the youthful hero, whose memory and virtues we
honor at this hour, laid aside his ease and earthly hopes, and
went out to the field of battle and of death — " a sacrifice of
nobler name, and richer blood" than ever lay on treason's
hated altar. And as the battle rages, we ask who of all his
youthful companions will make his place good? Who will
take up that death-dealing weapon, which has fallen from his
hands, and bear it with like bravery in this most holy and glo-
rious cause. Let not the thought of your youth make you
weak and irresolute in the hour of peril. To the noble youth
of the State, I commend the virtues and example of the la-
mented dead. In the words of the poet, I take the liberty to
say :
" Leave not our sires to stem the unequal fight,
Whose limbs are nerved no more with buoyant might;
Nor lagging backward let the younger breast,
Permit the man of age, (a sight unblest,)
To welter in the combats foremost thrust,
His hoary head dishevelled in the dust,
And venerable bosom bleeding bare ;
But youth's fair form, though fallen, is ever fair;
And beautiful in death the boy appears—
The hero boy who dies in blooming years:
In man's regret he lives, in woman's tears,
More sacred than in life, and lovelier far,
For having perished in the front of war."
JOSEPH E. T. GOKDON,
DECEMBER 13th, 1861.
BY
MAEY B. NEALY.
Wail, wail, wail,
Ye winds, in the leafless trees !
For the dear young soul, we loved so well,
Floats up on your mystic breeze.
Clash, clash, clash,
war ! with your iron hail ;
For, since his brave young heart is cold,
What man of ye all would quail ?
Weep, weep, weep,
Father, and Sisters now ;
For never again shall a noble flush
Sweep over that pale, pale brow !
Strike, strike, strike !
Ye men with iron nerve :
When ye think of the deeds of this brave young boy,
How could ye ever swerve ?
3
14
For that young life of his
Five foemen's spirits fled ;
But, alas ! alas ! when the day was won,
He lay in the trenches — dead ! >
0, brother to our son,
And friend of our riper years,
It almost seemeth that ye were one,
And these — a Mother's tears !
"Weep, weep, weep,
Father, and Sisters now ;
For never again shall a noble flush
Sweep over that ravished brow !
And weep, my own brave boy,
This friend of thy bright young years ;
For never the death of a dearer joy
Shall drown thy heart in tears.
Toll, toll, toll,
With muffled throats, bells !
For the passing away of as bright a soul
As any on earth that dwells.
So young, so true, so brave —
Earth, unfold your breast !
And give him a sunny and flowery grave ;
And, Heaven, give his soul thy rest.
December 20th, 1861.
A TIME TO ALL THINGS.
Home, 1} o'clock A. M., \
December 9th, 1856. J
Dear Joseph:
The wise man says, "there is a time to all things."
Learn not from this that there is a time for evil deeds, or
words, or even thoughts. It is not so. There is no time for
doing wrong. Here, the wise man is teaching a moral, not an
immoral lesson ; and must be understood as saying, "there is
a time to all just things — to what are right : — and to nothing
else."
Do not forget this. You know by experience, that there is
something for all times. No moment goes by, that has not
some duty, peculiarly its own, to be done. A perfect life,
therefore, requires that everything be done at, and in its own
time : and for this reason : If you put off the duty of the
present hour till the next, it cannot then be done ; for that
hour's duty will then be present, claiming to be done, and it
will have the best right to be done in its own hour. What
right has any hour to put off its own load, and expect another
hour to take it up and carry it ? It is so, too, with different
periods of life. Little children have to grow, and be thought-
less, and innocent, and happy in their innocence. If they are
not happy in their innocence, then they never will be happy
and innocent again. If they are not thoughtless, then they
never will be thoughtless again. Childhood is to each of us
our Eden before the fall. The naming sword will never per-
mit us to return to it again, when our innocence is once lost,
and we are turned out. Life has no other hour after we have
passed from the flowery walks of childhood, that can carry us
back to them again, and enable us to re-live them. Next
comes Youth — life's seed time. It has its duties; and its
trials. The boy's life is the beginning of the man's. If the
It)
boy fails to do his duties, and store his mind with the germs
of knowledge, and virtue, the man must naturally fail to do
his duties, and the whole burthen of duties, left undone in
youth, and manhood, will fall with a crushing w T eight upon
decrepit old age. You know, if the farmer does not sow his
wheat in the fall, he will reap no wheat the next harvest ; and
have no bread for winter. So it is with the youth of our years,
my son. If you sow not the good wheat of knowledge and
virtue now, your manhood will be crowned with no harvest of
plenty and honor ; and your grey hairs will go down in want,
and poverty, and wretchedness to an unmarked, and, it may
be, a dishonored grave.
Now, first of all, Joseph, learn that there is not in youth,
or manhood, or old age, a single moment that has not its
duty — some act that is right and good — to be done. Hence,
you see, if, instead of doing what is thus right and good, you
do what is wrong and bad — tell some false story, or make a
lie — you first cheat the right and good deed out of itis time ;
and lose all that you would have gained in doing it. But that
is not all. The wicked deed — the false word or story — does
more ; it not only steals the time from the right, but it pre-
pares the boy or girl to do other wrongs and tell other false
stories, until life becomes altogether false, and all duties re-
main undone. This makes the extreme bad man, whose end
is always infamous — often terrible.
Dear Joseph, that you may do everything in its own time,
and have no hours, nor days, nor period of life loaded with
the duties of others, left undone, I have written this long let-
ter from my heart of hearts. I ask you to think of the les-
son I have thus given you ; and if you approve it, try and
follow the line of conduct it points out. I have written only
for your good.
In my next I will try and point out your duties, in connec-
tion with their appropriate times. I shall be glad to have a
letter from you ; but more so, to see you do your duties, in
their own times, and well.
Yours truly, J. W. GORDON.
OF PURPOSES
Home, October 10th, 1857.
Dear Joseph:
My time has been so much employed, *in matters
of business, for a long time past, that I may seem to have
neglected — it may be — to have forgotten you. It is not so.
In every condition, and under every circumstance in life, no
one object has been more upon my mind, or close to my heart
than yourself — your education — your well-being and happi-
ness, both now and hereafter. The truth is, you are always
present to my thoughts — sometimes as a source of fear and
sorrow — at others, of hope and delight. You will, therefore,
not think me over solicitous for your development, and the
adornment of your soul with every useful study and habit.
I have already written you a letter in reference to your
appropriation of time to useful and virtuous purposes. I de-
sire now, to fix in your mind the idea of the necessity of ac-
quiring the habit of directing your mind to a purpose. Of
course the purpose must first be formed, and then the pursuit
maintained, until it becomes the habit, both of your mind and
body ; for all practical businesses require both mind and body.
Of course, also, the purpose ought to be such as becomes a
man to entertain and pursue ; or the habit will fall short of
developing virtue — manhood, the only end to be sought as
ultimate or final by a true man.
In the first place, then, of purposes, or designs : There
must necessarily be many, in the life of a man, each of which
will in its turn, claim your attention, tax your energies, mould
your habits, tinge your character, in a word, make you more
or less virtuous — more or less manly. What is to be done ?
18
Shall you take up the affair, the purpose, of to-day, and of
every day of your life, merely on its own account ; and pur-
sue it simply because it is the thing of the time ? Or shall
you not rather form some ulterior purpose, that shall em-
brace, shape and absorb all the occasional purposes of your
life?
In reference to moral questions, and all questions are so,
shall you not say first, and labor to the last to make it good :
" My first purpose, — the great, all embracing purpose of my
life — shall be to do everything which is right for me to do."
Within this rule, all other purposes, proper to be thought of
by you, will be found to lie ; under it, to be modified and con-
trolled.
In determining this general rule, you determine no less in
favor of others than yourself; for whatever it is right for you
to do, will conduce most to promote the well being of others —
the world at large, and will most develope and exalt your own
manhood. Nay, further, it will most honor your Creator ;
for His will is the Right which you purpose, under this rule,
to do. Thus, it is the best selfishness ; the best socialism ;
and the best religion, in the world, to do right. It meets
both extremes — the one and the all — the individual and the
universal, and embraces, and fitly unites the middle.
" But what is right for me ? " you will ask. It is not a
little difficult — if at all possible — to answer your question.
It merits a trial, however, and I will take care that if my an-
swer is not final and absolute — it shall at least, tend to lead
you toward the final and absolute, and not away from it.
All morality is born of knowledge ; and knowledge is truth
in the mind. It implies a knower. And wherever there is a
truth and a knower brought together, until the knower's con-
sciousness recognizes the truth, there, knowledge is born.
Truth is its father, the conscious soul, its mother. The wise
mind, is fruitful of knowledges — the foolish, barren. The
children of the former rise up to bless it— the latter is cursed
with everlasting sterility and nothingness.
The whole universe is, to the mind of a being who knows
it, only a great truth. It is so to the mind of the Creator.
19
We become more and more like Him, as we more and more
know the truth which makes His consciousness.
The Eight for you, implies knowledge co-extensive with
your abilities and opportunities ; and, then, that you should
be industrious to the extent of your capacity; just to the ex-
tent of your relations ; religious to the extent of your faith ;
and truthful in all things.*
I will write soon on the subject of the right.
Yours truly, J. W. GORDON.
* While in Western Virginia, I wrote to Joseph a letter which, I think, con-
tains a better definition— more practical — of the relatively right which each
human being ought to observe in his conduct and life, than this ; and, there-
fore, place it here :
"Grafton, Virginia, June 28th, 1861.
********
And now, my dear boy, do right. Have a purpose in life ; and pursue it
with a will. Let no other man deter you from doing what you know or be-
lieve to be right. Pleasure, pastime, everything will end in disappointment
and pain, if sought at the expense of your own self-approbation. In a word,
labor to know what is right always; and remember that what you believe to
be so, at the time you are required to act on any subject, is right for you, at
that time, whatever it may be absolutely, or in the opinions of others, or even
of yourself at another time.
I am, as always, yours truly, J. W. GORDON.'
NEW YEARS-1861.
Indianapolis, Indiana, ^
25 min. before 12 o'clock midnight, V
December 31, 1860. J
Joseph R. T. Gordon —
My Dear Son: I begin this letter in the year
1860; not, probably, to finish it before the beginning of the
year 1861. If I do not, it will become the bridge, over whose
arch, I shall walk, in conscious thought, from the year that
" is passing and will pass full soon " to the next, which is now
as rapidly advancing toward us. I shall pass this bridge with
joy; for my heart is full of the light of my love for you — a
love which anticipated your birth, and gave you to my hopes
and arms, in the rapture of dreams, in the bright beauty of
innocent childhood ; and which has ever since remained to me
amid the rough bufFetings of the world, the surest talisman
against despair.
The bells tell me the old year is dead ; and the new one
born. It is now 1861. You have been carried a-past the
mile-stone that marks the beginning of a new mile in the
journey of life, in one of the cozy sleeping-cars on Time's
railroad. I have been watching our progress ; and thinking
of the past, the present, and the future of you, my fellow-
voyager. It is a good time to think of such things, but al-
ways better one should do it for himself than for another.
1st. What of your past ? What have you done — ill or
well — good or bad ? What have you failed to do of good, that
you have had time and opportunity to do ? How much have
you grown — ill or well — in the right or wrong direction?
What good purpose have you followed, making its practice
easy by confirming custom into habit ? Or what bad habit has
21
neglect, or evil intent, or easy consenting goodness of heart
strengthened and confirmed, until it has become more and
more your lord and master ; and capable of more and more
easily thwarting your resolutions in favor of a nobler and
higher life? If you find yourself still little advanced in
knowledge, and virtue, and little built up and strengthened
and confirmed in manly and virtuous habits, whose control
over your life becomes more easy and complete every day ;
and if, further, you find that the neglect of duties, and the
following after idle pursuits, and the vain dissipation of your
time and powers upon idle books and vain company, have al-
together made the steady pursuit of those studies which you
once designed to pursue, more difficult than ever before, and
when you do attempt still to pursue them, their acquisition a
matter of less facility and satisfaction, than at some time in
the past, then, I think, you will agree with me, that it is high
time to break off such courses as have thus far led only to
evil — present and prospective ; and to direct your powers to
such studies and labors as you design shall form the business
of your life. I invite you, therefore, to search out the ene-
mies of your progress in the past ; classify them according to
the degree of their power to work you evil, which you have
learned, if you have reflected upon their and your past ; and,
then make war — a war of extermination — upon each and all
of them, dealing your exterminating blows to each in a degree
of severity corresponding to its power of evil to you. This
I know, is a difficult task ; but it is as necessary as difficult.
Its difficulty arises from the fact that any habit of the mind
or body which has great power over us, destroys our capacity
to master and control it, just in the ratio of its own increase
of strength ; and this it effects in two ways : 1. By the aug-
mentation of its own power, which makes it a stronger power
to contend with. 2. By the diminution of your powers of
the mind, or body, or both, which you must bring against it,
and which leaves them, therefore, less capable for the conflict.
Nevertheless, all habits, whether of mind or body, must be
destroyed sooner or later, if their tendency be to evil ; or
4
22
they will ultimately destroy both mind and body, and them-
selves therewith ; for, in this respect, vices are like parasitic
growths upon the body of any living being. They destroy
themselves in working out, as they do, the destruction of the
life which feeds their life. Every moment lost, therefore, in
assailing an evil habit or passion, renders its extirpation more
difficult, until at last all effort ends in idle resolves. An evil
habit, which if attacked with manly resolution to-day, would
succumb and disappear with ease, will, perhaps, be able to
laugh at a stronger resolution to-morrow; and the day after
will carry its miserable thrall to the grave ; or — which is still
more to be dreaded — to infamy.
2d. The present, then, is the time to abandon bad habits ;
and begin to form good ones. It is the only moment in which
such efforts have any promise of success. If it be painful and
difficult to succeed to-day, it will be still more so, if not quite
impossible, to-morrow. Every hour of neglect, and worse,
of indulgence, carries you toward the coast of the Impossible,
where all the sons of men whose motto has been, or shall
hereafter be, " I can't," have been, and will continue to be,
stranded and lost. There sleep the fools who have idly played
with the white sea foam of passion or appetite to-day, to be
whelmed beneath its more than stygian blackness to-morrow ;
and an echo — half in sorrow, half in scorn — ever comes out
from the rocks of that fatal shore, as if to warn the shoal of
coming victims to their own follies and crimes, still repeating
the fool's motto, " I can't."
You must, then, direct your powers backwards at the foes
which tend to drag you backwards and downwards until you
become the bondman of the flesh — the slave of passion and
appetite ; and forwardt toward the friends that beckon you
upwards toward the True, the Beautiful, and the Good — those
grand Idealisms which have been the pilot stars set out in
Heaven to conduct mankind to its eternal glories and beati-
tudes. These friends and foes are alike near and within your
own nature. All other friends, all other foes, are as nothing
for help or hurt to your life and soul, in comparison with
23
with those which contend "upon the arena of your own heart,"
for its direction, and empire. The battle of the Universe is
fought in the heart of every man and woman, wherein all the
powers of Hell and Heaven contend for the possession of the
field. The human will in each sits arbiter, "to judge the
strife," and sways the contest as it lists. And herein lies the
dread power of the will— the origin of Right and Wrong—
of praise and blame — of responsibility.
3d. In the future, I ask you not to dissipate the strength
you have on unworthy objects. Limit your efforts to the
preparation of yourself for that business in life you intend to
follow. Bring your powers to a single point. By means of
the fire-glass, which concentrates the sun's rays, fire is kin-
dled therewith. If you would kindle the world, and make it
blaze with new ideas of use, beauty or goodness, or even with
admiration for yourself— a worthless object— you must con-
centrate your faculties upon some point serviceable to men,
and honorable in their opinion. In the selection of a business,
I would recommend only that it be some pursuit in which the
exercise of your faculties as an instrument, a means — which
professional service always is— should, if possible, conduce to
the development of yourself as the end ; and, indeed, the
highest and only true end of all intellectual effort and train-
ing worthy of the name of education.
And now, my dear son, I invite you to run with me another
stadium in the race of improvement and life. I am, in the
course of time and nature, seemingly much nearer to the goal
than you ; but we know not which of us shall reach it first.
Nor, if we make it a race of improvement and virtue, a gen-
erous strife and emulation as to which shall best run and most
excel therein, need we care ; for he, whose life has been so
employed, must be secure against evil, not only in this state
of being, but in all others beyond, to which death may con-
duct him.
I wish you a happy New Year ! and many happy new years,
when this new year and other unborn years shall have become
old ones ; and that you may so live that each new year's dawn
24
may meet you a wiser, better, happier man than its predeces-
sor, and, with new firmness of heart, making new resolves to
strive more earnestly than ever before for something in life
more excellent still, than you may have known. So shall the
first dream of my heart for you become reality, and, in life or
in death, I shall be content.
I am yours truly, J. W. GORDON.
PORTRAITS.
Fort Independence, Boston Harbor. Mass., \
August 25th, 1861. J
Dear Children :
This is the second Sunday I have spent here. I
have taken my quarters at the Fort, and live wholly here.
I have all your pictures with me ; and keep them setting
up before me, on the table where I work. So, my dear chil-
dren, I think of you all the time. I am sure you will think
often of me. I want you to think, also, af what I am going
to tell you; and, if I never see you again, you will thank me
for it. I have been brought to think of what I shall tell you,
by your own dear pictures, as they stand before me — all in-
nocence and sweetness. It seems to me like the little girls
who made these beautiful shadows upon the glass for me to
look at, when I cannot see themselves, must be innocent and
good. There is not the mark of any mean word or wicked
deed upon the face of any one of your pictures. You look
to me like you had always been good and loving to each other,
and to every one else.
Let me tell you what your dear, innocent pictures make
me think of. It is this : It is said that, a long time ago,
there lived a great painter, who spent his whole life in paint-
ing portraits. He could paint portraits accurately, and de-
lighted to do it. Once he desired to paint the prettiest,
sweetest, happiest face in the world. So he went about look-
iug after it. At last he found a bright-eyed, happy, innocent
child, and painted its face, as the prettiest, sweetest, happiest
face he had ever seen. He was then a young man himself,
when he painted that picture ; and every one thought it the
26
most beautiful picture in the world. It was so innocent — so
pure — so happy — God's image, without a stain or a shadow.
Now, after a long time, when the painter had grown to be
very old, he still kept on painting portraits ; and one day-
concluded that as he had painted the prettiest, sweetest, hap-
piest face in all the world, when he was himself young and
happy, he would before he died seek out, and paint the ugli-
est and most miserable face he could find. He would, in this
way, leave the prettiest, most innocent and happy face, and
the ugliest, most wicked and unhappy face, in all the world,
side by side, in strong contrast with each other. He accord-
ingly sought out and found the ugliest, most wicked and un-
happy face he had ever seen, and painted it, and set it up be-
side the portrait of the beautiful, innocent, happy child, whom
he had painted when he himself was young and happy.
Every one felt startled and pained by the contrast. It was
like placing an angel just from Paradise, on whose path no
shadow had ever fallen, by the side of a fiend from the infer-
nal pit, whose life had been passed amid the darkness, and
crimes, and sorrows of that unhappy world. The one was,
indeed, the picture of a good angel — the other of a wicked
one. But people would continually ask whose pictures these
were. Every one desired to know that. And whose do you
think they were ? My own dear children, will you believe me
when I tell you, that both these portraits were drawn for one
and the same person ; that the pretty, innocent, happy child,
whose face was so much like an angel's that people almost
mistook it for one, grew to be that ugly, wicked, unhappy
man, whose face was so horrid, that people thought it the face
of an infernal fiend ? It was really so.
The change, from the beautiful and innocent child, to the
horrid and wretched man, all took place in a few years. A
short lifetime was long enough to change the sweetest crea-
ture in the world to the foulest — the happiest to the most
wretched. Would you believe such a change possible ? If
any one of you could only be convinced that you would change
so, and become so ugly and wicked, would you not rather die
27
now, than live to see yourself become so hateful? I am sure
you would. You could not endure the thought of so horrible
a change from what you are, without a wish to die sooner
than undergo it. I could not, much as I love you.
Now, what produced the change ? What made the pretty
child grow up into the ugly man ? There must have been
some cause for so sad a change ; and you ought to know what
it was. I will tell you what it was. It was a course of wick-
ed words and deeds, that did it all. It may have begun to
take place very early in life. The first shade cast upon the
bright, sunny face of the beautiful child, may have been the
shadow of some false story, or some naughty act of disobedi-
ence, or expression of ill temper, that seemed so trifling as to
leave no stain at all. But, although unseen by human eyes,
it did leave a stain which the eye of God saw, and which the
child's conscience both saw and felt. The next falsehood, or
evil deed, darkened the first shadow, and the next made it
darker still. Another, and another followed, until the beau-
tiful soul became overcast with the blotches and ugliness of a
thousand crimes ; the light of innocence and happiness passed
away forever, to make room for the darkness, and guilt and
wretchedness that supplanted them. It is in this way that all
ugly, wicked, wretched people are made. Little children are
never very ugly ; and they are almost always so innocent and
good, that we love to see them, and love them, because they
really are lovely. God is good to all children; and, having
made them innocent and happy, has given them bright eyes,
and dimpled features, that all who see them may feel and
know that they are happy and sinless — happy because they
are sinless. But the child's features are all soft and pliable
to the influence of the soul, which acts constantly upon them
and changes them, so that they constantly express its charac-
teristics more or less distinctly. If the child grows up in in-
nocence, it will have a face that will tell it to all the world, in
plainer language than words, and as true as the soul of inno-
cence itself. Be good, therefore, and your faces will ever
bear witness to your goodness before men, as your consciences
28
will before yourselves and God. On the other hand, be wick-
ed, false, vile, and your light will become darkness ; your
faces, the indexes of the characters you form, will become
ugly ; and all the world will at length learn and know how
wicked you have been. I hope I shall never shudder to look
on the picture of one of you, when I shall place it by the
side of the beautiful ones now before me. Be good children,
and then you will grow brighter and happier always ; and,
even when you become old, the light of childhood's innocent
beauty will still adorn your features ; for the beauty of happy
childhood will only have ripened into that of thoughtful old
age. Remember, whenever you are tempted to do wrong,
that wrong is the ugliest of the soul ; and that, sooner or
later, the soul impresses its own features on the body. If the
soul is hateful — loathsome, it is not in human power to pre-
vent the body from becoming so. Remember, my dear chil-
dren, the story of the painter, and his two portraits. Do
not live so that you may become ugly in crime and guilt, and
their attendants shame and sorrow, as you now are beautiful
in innocence and goodness, and their attendants honor and
promotion.
I wish you to keep all my letters ; and read them often. I
am sure' they are written for your good ; and, I think, will
tend to produce right habits of thougnt and action, if you will
only remember them.
jjc^c % %. %. %$:*%.
I ask you to write me a pretty letter ; and that you love
one another.
I am yours truly, J. W. GORDON.
IMMORTAL LIFE.
Fort Independence, Boston Harbor, Mass., \
September 8th, 1861. /
My Dear Children :
It is Sunday evening again ; and I again sit down
to talk to you for a short time. I wish you were here to talk
to me, that I might see your happy faces, and we could both and
all be happy again together. But although I cannot be with
you in person, yet you know that I am in heart and soul. You
do not see me, yet you know that I am still living, and that,
although absent from you, I still love you, and labor to make
you happy ; and prepare you for usefulness, by securing to
you the advantages of a good education. Now, dear children,
why do you believe that I am still alive, that I love you, that
I am thinking of you, and working for you? Is it because you
once saw me, and know that I did labor for your happiness, and
wished you to become wise and good ? If that is the reason,
then, you can believe that your dear Mother is still living,
still thinking of you, still watching over you, and caring and
praying for your welfare and happiness ; for you know how
good she was, in all the offices of kindness and love while she
staid with you. She has not changed in her heart more than
I. She is only absent, like I am from you — perhaps not so
far off as myself. She is still your Mother, ever loving, and
watching over your goings and comings, and caring for your
welfare and happiness as if she was present with you. Now,
if you can believe that I am doing all I can for you, you can
just as easily believe that your Mother, who was always kinder
than I, is still alive, and doing all her loving heart can prompt
for your safety and happiness.
But you may say : " We could believe all this if Mother
5
30
could only write to us and tell us so, as you do ; or, if Mother
had not died." But, my dear children, if I had lost both my
hands, and could not write, you would still think I was living
to love you ; and, even if my tongue was cut out, so that I
could not talk to you. All this would make no difference.
It is not, then, because I can still write and talk to you, that
you think I still live and love you. You would believe it just
as much if I could do neither — if my hands and tongue were
both dead. So you see, that hands and tongue are no part of
your father ; for you would think me none the less your liv-
ing, loving father, if I had neither. It is not, then, my writ-
ing a letter to you, that makes you believe that I am still
alive ; nor even my having hands to write with, and a tongue
to talk with. If my tongue and hands were dead, you would
still think of me as your loving father. So that you see, af-
ter all, that my hands and tongue are no part of me ; but only
my instruments, given me by the Great and Good Being, who
created us all, in order that therewith I might write and speak
to you.
My hands, indeed, are no more a part of me — of my soul —
my very self — whom you love and call father, and think of as
father, than my pen is. Both are my mere instruments ; and
I may lose both at any time, and still live to love you. Now,
there is no difference in this respect between my tongue *and
hands, and my ears and eyes. Tongue, hands, ears, eyes, in
a word, all the organs of this body of mine, are only instru-
ments given me by my kind Creator, any one or all of which,
I may lose, and still remain the same living, loving soul you
love, and call Father. True, I could not communicate with
you after such a loss, as now before it ; because you have no
means to receive communications, except such as can only be
addressed by these organs of mine. But when you shall
have lost your bodily organs, then you and I will have become
alike again — both spirits — and then we shall be able again to
communicate to each other, our loves and our hopes, our joys
and our sorrows, far more easily, and plainly, I trust, and
31
pleasingly also, than we can now do, by means of words either
spoken or written.
Now, if you can only remember what I have said — that my
hands, tongue, eyes, ears, and all my senses may be destroyed;
and I yet live, and be none the less your father than before
I lost them ; then you will know of a truth that this body of
mine is not me, but only my instrument ; for, if this body
was me, then every time I might lose a finger, or a hand, an
eye, or an ear, I should cease to be myself, and be only a frag-
ment of myself. But you never think of a person who has
lost his or her thumb or finger, as any less the person after
the loss, than he or she was before it happened. You know,
for instance, that your Grandfather has lost his thumb ; but
you know that he is still your Grandfather, just as much as
he was before he lost his thumb. So you think ; and so he
both feels and knows ; and so, in fact, he is. If, then, the
loss of a part of the body, leaves the soul still alive and per-
fect, why should it suffer more from the loss of another part,
than the first ? In truth it does not ; but as your Grandather
could never write so well after, as before, he lost his thumb,
so each new loss of the same kind destroys in a degree the
soul's instruments for communicating its thoughts and feelings
to other souls in bodies, until, at last, when the whole body dies,
the medium of communication between the soul whose body is
thus dead, and other souls whose bodies are not dead, is alto-
gether destroyed. So it is with your Mother and you. She
is still your living, loving Mother, as truly to-night as she
ever was in her life before ; but her instruments for telling
you so, are lost to her— dead. But you know that the instru-
ment and its owner are never one and the same. The one
owns the other ; and the owner is always greater and above
the thing owned. For instance, the owner always has power
to direct, control, and use the thing owned.
I would be just as good a penman without my pen as with
it ; but I could not write a word without it. So, when you
shall have learned to play on the piano, the house may take
fire and burn down, and destroy your piano ; but you will still
32
be none the less musicians than you were before you lost your
instrument. Just so it is with your dear, absent Mother.
She has only lost the instruments by means whereof she once
filled your little souls with the music of a Mother's love and
goodness. But you know that love and goodness are no part
of the body, any more than sound and music are part of the
piano. Love and goodness come from the soul, just as the
tune comes from the soul of the musician. The piano, or
other instrument, is but his means of giving it utterance — ex-
pression. There are thought, passion, soul in the music ; but,
when the sound has died away on the instrument, there is
neither thought, passion nor soul in the instrument. The tune,
with all its stirring and delightful combinations, is immortal ;
but the instrument on which it was once sounded may at any
moment become ashes. So is the soul which formed and gave
life to the tune. It lives forever ; and none the less, after the
body which was once the instrument, on which it sounded ill
or well the anthem of life, has been resolved into dust, than
before.
I am sure you will think of these things; for, by doing so un-
til they become plain and familiar to your minds, you will be
able to learn and know of a truth, and hold as your best
and noblest possession, the truth that each soul must 7ieeds be
immortal ; and that the friends whom we now miss, as dead,
are only absent. The medium of communication between
them and us has been destroyed. Death has cut the tele-
graphic wires — their poor human nerves — on which their
loves, and hopes, and fears were once transmitted from them
to us, as ours were from us to them. Let us, then, rest in
the faith which, in me, is knowledge, that, when it shall be for
our advantage, the great Creator will re-establish communica-
tion between us, and the loved and lost, whom, not as dead,
but absent only, we mourn ; and, again, the love which we now
miss will return, and fill our hearts " with lightning and with
music." Till then, let us rest in hope.
* * * # ^ * * >jc *
I have tried to get you to think of your Mother ; because
33
I know, if you will, you will be as good and loving to each
other as she always desired you to be ; and that you will obey
your Grandfather, and Grandmother, and your Uncle James,
heartily.
* * * ******
Write to me often ; and always think of me, as I am
Yours truly, J. W. GORDON.
WE MUST HAVE FAITH.
Fort Independence, Boston Harbor, Mass., )
September 15th, 1861. /
My Dear Children :
I have been thinking of you all week. It has
brought Sunday again, and now I will talk to you about what
I have seen and thought of, so that you may have some ad-
vantage from it as well as myself. I have no other thing to
think of, or labor for, but your welfare and happiness ; and I
hope that, although I cannot see you any more, you will still
believe that I am thinking of you almost continually, and of
what is best for you. It is on this account that I have writ-
ten such long letters, in order to get you to thinking about
yourselves, and how important it is to do right.
I do not know that you can understand my long letters. I
hope, however, you can. If you cannot, at first, you will
when you get older. I ask you to keep these letters, and
read them once every month, or so; and think of what I say
in them; and you will soon understand them, and will be paid,
I think, for your trouble. I am sure they will aid you to
think of what most concerns you to understand ; and what is,
unfortunately, least understood by most people.
I hope you will remember what I wrote you last week,
about your Mother's being still alive and watching over you,
although you do not see her any more. I think you will both
understand and believe what I told you on that subject. I am
sure it is true ; and feel that it is necessary to our happiness
to think so. Nor is this the only case in which we must hold
as certain what we cannot see, or feel, or know anything about
through our senses. You think that I am just as much alive,
and just as much interested in your welfare, as if you saw
me every time you go to breakfast, dinner, or supper, as you
35
used to do, when your Mother got our meals ready for us,
and called us to them with such loving words and sweet wel-
comes.
I know you trust me, and think that I will find you a place
to live, and books, and a teacher, so that you may learn to be
wise, and good, and happy. Nor shall your trust in me be
ill placed, if I live.
Well, just as you trust me, so you trust others whom you
do not see. You trust the people of China for tea ; and the
people of the South for sugar and coffee ; and, when you get
these articles, you feel perfectly confident that there is no
poison in any of them. Now, you have never seen these peo-
ple ; but you still believe that they exist, and that they will
not put poison into your tea, sugar and coffee. You not only
believe that they exist and act ; but, also, that their lives are
subject to, and controlled, like yours, by a sense of right and
wrong ; in other words, that they will naturally and habitually
prefer to do you good rather than harm — to give you tea, su-
gar and coffee, without poison, to nourish and strengthen you,
rather than with poison, to injure and destroy you. And just
so it is with other things that you do not see.
When you go to bed at night, you do not feel afraid that
any one will hurt you while you sleep. On the contrary you
feel perfectly certain that all the people in the world, whether
you know them or not, will suffer you to sleep safely until
morning. You feel and almost know that there is some un-
seen power that controls all people ; and makes them prefer
to allow you to sleep securely, rather than to disturb and hurt
you. Nor do you feel any less certain when you lie down,
that you will wake up again, and find day-light and sunshine
instead of darkness and night. You trust some Being whom
you have never seen to bring back the sun in the morn-
ing. You know, too, that you can trust that Being just
as well as if you saw Him every day, moving the sun
round the heavens, to give you day-light and darkness. So
you have to trust some Being whom you have never seen,
to enable you to wake up again in the morning, when you
go to sleep at night ; for it is even more wonderful, if vou
36
will only think of it, that, when you lie down in sleep
and forget everything — even that you yourselves exist —
you should, without any difficulty or trouble, be able to rise
up in the morning, and think again of what you were doing
when you went to sleep ; and take it up again, where you left
it at night, and finish it, just as though you had never been
interrupted by night and sleep at all. The truth is, my dear
children, we all have to believe a great deal more than we can
see, or absolutely know by our senses — seeing, hearing, tast-
ing, smelling and feeling — to exist. We must have faith in
what is beyond us, and above us. We must believe in what
is greater than we are ; for we have to rely on such a power
continually, whether we will or not. We have to trust our-
selves to the goodness and greatness of such a power all the
time ; for without it we would not be able to " live, move, or
have our being" for a single moment. He gives us air to
breathe, or we would die at once. He gives us light, or we
should be unable to enjoy any of the beautiful and glorious
sights of the universe. In a word, He gives us all that we
have, or can conceive of, as necessary to our happiness as rea-
sonable beings.
But you may, perhaps, say: "The air, and light, and all
those other good gifts of this great Being, are mere matters
of course — exist everywhere as matters of necessity." Not
so, however, or they could not be taken away from anywhere.
They would always be found wherever we may be called to go.
But they are not. Bad men can shut off the light, and, there-
by, all that is beautiful to sight, from their victims, whenever
they have the power, as they frequently do. Wicked men
have often done this ; and in some parts of the world are do-
ing so to-day. So they can shut off the air, and kill the poor
people over whom they have the power, out-right. The light
and air, then, do not exist as necessary and absolute bless-
ings, dependent upon themselves only for existence ; but they
are dependent upon some power greater than, themselves,
which gives and controls them — giving them in one place,
and withholding them in another. We must, then, believe in,
37
and rely upon what we do not, and cannot see. We must trust
ourselves wholly to the wisdom and goodness of some Being
greater than we can comprehend, and better than we can con-
ceive of ; and it is all the same whether we acknowledge our
trust in Him or not. The wickedest man trusts Him as much
as the best, and, indeed, more ; but he is too wicked and mean
to acknowledge his trust in Him ; or even that He exists.
Now, let me tell you how I was led, at this time, to think
of our daily and hourly trust in the power, wisdom, and good-
ness of some Being whom we do not, and cannot see, or know
anything about by our senses. It was in this way : The other
morning, as I was going up the harbor, in a little boat, I
passed through among a great many large ships, that were all
lying at anchor there. Seeing them all lying still, though the
wind blew strong against them, and the waves beat upon them,
I asked myself: "What holds these vessels in their places ? "
I said in answer : "Their anchors." Then I looked, and saw
an anchor-chain going down from the bow of each ship into
the sea ; but I could not see the anchor nor the bottom of the
harbor in which it had taken hold of the firm earth, and there-
by held the ship, so that neither the winds nor the waves could
move it out of its place, nor drive it against the shore. Then
I said to myself: " These ignorant sailors trust themselves to
that which they do not, and cannot see, and of which they
can know nothing at all, except by faith. They have, per-
haps, never been down at the bottom of the sea ; but they
believe, nevertheless, that the sea has a bottom, and that they
may rely on it to hold their anchor, so that their ship may
rest securely, notwithstanding the winds and the waves. It
may be that no strong diver has ever told them that the sea's
bottom was firm ground. They believe it, however; because
they deem that some firm bottom is necessary to contain the
water of the sea itself. Without something more than water,
they could not believe that the sea could remain together.
Now, just so it is," said I to myself, "with each man and each
woman in the world. Every human soul is, like a vessel float-
ing on the great sea of the universe. It must have an anchor
6
38
to hold it, and prevent its dashing against its fellows, or against
the shores, and going to ruin. What is its anchor? What
chain holds it? And what is the bottom of that sea in which
its anchor fastens, and holds it securely from harm and ruin ?
The anchor of every human soul is Hope; its anchor-chain
Faith in the Unseen Container of all things — the Great Being
who fills and sustains the whole visible and invisible universe.
Every man, or woman, who is worth anything to himself, or
herself, or the world — every one who is safe from going to
ruin for a single moment, must be anchored by an undoubting
trust in the Great and Good God, whose nature is the bottom
of our sea — the bounds and shores of our universe. All our
actions have relatio to Him; and none the less so even if we
deny that He exists. We may never think of Him at all, yet
thoughtlessly we must rely upon Him; or, thinking of Him,
and denying Him, we must still rely upon Him; or, last and
best, we must think of Him, reason about Him, and His wis-
dom, goodness and power, and trust Him with a perfect knowl-
edge of His nature, just as the man who has gone down to the
bottom of the sea trusts it, when he throws his anchor into it,
with a perfect knowledge of its nature. The Thinker is the
diver who goes down, and up, and every way to God, through
' the visible and invisible things of creation.' Such would I
have you, my dear little girls. Any human being who does
not thus go to his or her Creator, falls short of his or her
privileges — falls below the end for which he or she was cre-
ated. Our true birth-right and happiness is thus to know
God, and trust Him wisely and entirely."
You owe this long letter to my seeing the ships at anchor.
If you understand it, both you and I shall be happy in it —
you in reading it, I in writing it. Read it over often, and
think of it ; and you will understand it. Since Joseph has
volunteered, I am more anxious for you to become well edu-
cated than ever before; for poor Joseph will never become a
scholar now.
Write to me often.
I am vours truly, J. W. GORDON.
GOD-THE OBJECT OF FAITH.
Fort Independence, Boston Harbor, Mass., }
September 22d, > >. J
My Dear Children :
I desire to write you a letter every Sunday,
while I am separated from you. It is almost as pleasing for
me to talk to you thus on paper, as to speak to you face to
face. True, I miss your happy faces, and your answers to
me. But, then, I try to make up for these by thinking
how you would answer me if you were here. I think, too,
how happy we shall be when we do meet, and how you will then
pay me up for all my talk to you, in these long letters, by
your sweet smiles, and pretty questions to me, and answers
to my questions. In the meantime, however, you must write
to me often — once a week any how.
I have written several letters to you from this place — three
long ones. The first of these was upon your own sweet, in-
nocent, pictured faces, as they smiled upon me when I wrote,
and as they smile upon me now. I wish you always to re-
member that letter, for it will help you shun every wrong
word and action. It shows you that it is wicked conduct that
spoils innocent and beautiful faces ; and how it spoils them.
Nothing else can do it.
The second long letter related to your Mother, and the cer-
tainty of her still being alive; and of her living forever. I
think this is the greatest and most ennobling thought in the
whole reach of our minds ; for it gives every other valuable
thing in the world, a new and higher value than it could oth-
erwise possibly have. But for it, I would regard my life as
worth something less than nothing at all. It makes the glo-
rious thoughts of all the good and gifted people of all times.
40
sure of everlasting remembrance. Try, then, io think of it
until you both feel and know that it is true — that you will liv
and love, and think, and grow wiser, and stronger, and better,
and happier forever.
The third long letter I wrote you, had relation to the ne-
cessity that every human being is placed under of believing
and trusting in something or some being whom we cannot see,
or know anything about by the senses. Without such a trust,
all our actions would be as wild and foolish, as the discon-
nected and broken talk of crazy people. A man or a woman
who has no such trust, is either crazy or idiotic.
I said before, that there may be people who deny that they
have any such trust; but they deceive themselves, and con-
tradict their denials in almost every act of their lives. It is
only the fool who "has said in his heart there is no God;' ;
and, then, his actions always prove that he is a fool — I mean
an absolute fool. Many who say, " there is no God," with
their lips, believe in their hearts that there is a God, and
prove their faith in Him by their lives — by every action of
their lives.
If you will remember, whei speaking of immortality, I
compared our stay in these bodies of ours, to that of the tele-
grapher in his office. As long as his battery and machine
will work, and the wires connect his machine with others in
different parts of the world, he can both give and receive in-
telligence to and from those others. But, if the wires be-
tween him and them are once cut off or destroyed, he cannot
communicate his thoughts and wishes to them any more, nor
receive theirs from them. Two telegraphic offices, without
any wire between, would be for each other just as though
they did not exist at all. They could have no communication
at all. The wires alone enable the two offices to give each
other the news in their respective neighborhoods. So it would
be if the machine at either end of the line was broken — the
connection would be broken also. So it is with our nerves.
They are the telegraphic wires which connect our minds with
the minds- of others. The optic nerve — that is, the nerve of
41
the eye — puts our mind in connection with the color offices of
the whole world. By means of it we are enabled to see, and
distinguish all that is beautiful, or ugly in nature, or art, so
far as color and form are concerned. But, if this optic nerve
should get cut off, as sometimes happens, then we should be
cut off from all the objects of sight. A green field, a beauti-
ful flower, or a fine painting, would have no beauty for us.
There would, then, be no connection between them and our
minds. The same may be said, truly, of every other nerve
and its objects. Thus, if you destroy the nerve of hearing,
music would be as nothing to him who had undergone the
loss. Music might, indeed, still exist; but not for him whose
nerve of hearing had been destroyed. The connection be-
tween him and the musician would be broken — the wire that
connected them cut — their connection destroyed. So., too, of
all the rest.
But even if all the wires, which once connected one tele-
graphic office with another, were destroyed, neither of the
offices themselves would necessarily be destroyed thereby.
Their utility, as telegraphic offices, would, indeed, be de-
stroyed. But the telegrapher in each would not necessarily
be affected thereby. He would remain just as able to read a
dispatch, or send one off, if he had the means by which to
send it, as he was before the wires were broken. Now, this
is just what may happen with any one of us. We may lose
all the nerves which connect us with the outward world —
either in receiving intelligence from it, or imparting intelli-
gence to it; and still, after we have been thus cut off from the
world, and the world from us, we may live on in the body —
the mind's telegraphic office ; and there is no reason, which I
can now think of, why the mind should be impaired in its es-
sential nature and faculties, by thus insulating it. By insu-
lating the mind, I simply mean the separating it from all the
objects of sense — as the things we see, hear, taste, feel, and
smell. So, the telegrapher may go out of his office, and thus
voluntarily cut himself off from all connection with the wires
that come to, or go from the office.
42
So you see that there must be an office, machine, and wires
connected with another office and machine at the other end of
the wires, before any dispatch can be sent from one end of
the line to the other. But there must be something more.
There must be a telegrapher at one end of the line at least,
before any dispatch can be sent ; and, before any good can
result from the dispatch, there must also be a telegrapher at
the other end of the line to receive and read it. The two
offices, machines, and the wires between them might stand
forever ; but without two intelligent beings to send and re-
ceive messages — one at each office — no dispatch would ever
travel along the line to any valuable purpose.
Now, this is just what we find in relation to ourselves and
the outward world, whether that outward world consist of
people, or of things — of living beings, or of dead matter.
There must be some intelligent being in us, and some other
intelligent being out of, and beyond us, before dispatches can
pass between us. Now, in this material world, there must be
our bodies — the offices of these intelligent beings — where both
are human — the brain, in each, with the nerves going out from
it, serving as the machine and wires by means whereof they
can send their wishes back and forwards to and from each
other. You cannot even think of a telegraphic dispatch, con-
taining some idea, some expression of intelligence, without
thinking, at the same time, that some being, possessing intel-
ligence like yourself, sent it. If any person should tell you,
that a dispatch which you had just received, was sent by no-
body; that it was framed by chance; or that it framed and
sent itself, you would laugh at him for his folly. You know
better. You know that, when you receive a dispatch in your
own language, it must have come from some other person
speaking that language. Nothing is plainer to your minds.
It would not be so plain if you received a dispatch in the
Latin language ; for, not understanding that language, you
could not understand it. But the letters being the same as
your own, you would still believe that some person familiar
with those letters, had been at the other end of the wires, and
43
sent you the message. If, however, a dispatch should come
to you in the Greek language, you would still have less reason
to believe that it was sent to you by some intelligent being
than in the case of the Latin dispatch; for the letters would,
in that case, be unfamiliar to you. But if some scholar whom
you knew well to be so honest that you could believe him,
should translate for you, these messages, from the Greek and
Latin, into your own language; and you should find them to
contain some message to you, you would then have just as
little doubt that it was sent to you by some intelligent being
at the other end of the wire, as you had in case of the mes-
sage that came to you, in the first instance, in English. And
the same would be true of all the dispatches you might re-
ceive in a whole life-time. You would always believe that
each dispatch came from some person, and would never think
it came to you by its own mere motion, or by chance ; for
you know that there never was a thought without a thinker, nor
an act without an actor. All this is so plain and familiar in
regard to telegraphic offices, and their operations, that you
never think of the contrary as possibly true. It is still plainer
when applied to two persons engaged in writing; and plainer
still when applied to the same persons in conversation. Yet
the principle is precisely the same in all three instances.
But, if you will only think a moment of all the ideas you
have received through your senses, and which have, there-
fore, been sent to you from some other being, you will find
that by far the greatest of them all are ideas arising from
facts and systems of facts which no man has created; and,
indeed, which no man could possibly create. All that you
have seen of the great universe ; the rising and setting of the
sun, moon and stars ; the blowing of the winds, and the flow-
ing of the waters ; the singing of the birds ; and the results
of the still higher and nobler desires, and powers of your own
natures, you know were not made by man. But you still feel
and know that there is, in each of these things, an idea — a
system of ideas — proceeding from an intelligent purpose and
design. If this were not so, then you would not have a new
44
thought — a new idea — every time you saw a new star, a new
flower, or heard the song of a new bird in the woods. I am
sure, however, you do have a new idea every time you see,
hear, taste, smell, or feel anything new in nature. Now, this
new idea does not owe its existence to your seeing the thing
from which you derived it. The type of the idea would have
existed in nature, just as much if you had never seen it ; or,
if you had never had eyes with which to see it ; or, indeed,
had never been born. So it would have existed, if no other
human being had ever seen it, or been born to see it; for
you know well that no human being has any power to create
such facts as those which you see everywhere in nature ; and
from seeing which you get a large part of your ideas —
thoughts. Thus, you are led both to feel and know that there
must have been some Being, intelligent and powerful, who
made these great facts of nature which you see and hear
every time you open your eyes and ears. When you exam-
ine these facts still more closely, and find that they all have
relation to your senses and mind, and tend to your education,
development and perfection ; and, at the same time to your
own pleasure and happiness, you conclude that this wise and
powerful Being is also as good as He is manifestly wise and
powerful. He has made all nature, as it were, one great dis-
patch to you, long before you were born — designed for your
education and happiness. The regular round of the seasons —
Spring, with its merry streams and blushing flowers — its
bright blue skies and soft fleecy clouds, floating between you
and the blue heaven, while their racing shadows sweep over
the fields for you to chase in joy and gladness, as I once
chased them when a happy child ; Summer, with its golden
harvests, its great yellow moon, and merry corn-reaper's song ;
Autumn, with its rich fruits, and sombre skies, and dull, ray-
less sun ; and Winter, with its bleak fields, shrouded in snow,
and its fierce winds, now piping like the shrill fife, and now
like the deep solemn organ, speaking to us in a thousand im-
pressive voices of the end of life, the grave and its sleepers,
is all but one system of ideas which some greater Being than
45
man has telegraphed to each of us. The wisest men and
women read these grand dispatches most and best. They
have written out many of them for us, so that we can read
and understand them also. They have printed them in great
books, to which some new ideas are added every year, by those
who read these dispatches more thoroughly, than those by
whom they were first-written out. These books are the books
of the sciences, which every scholar keeps upon his shelves.
Chemistry, Botany, Astronomy, Geology, Anatomy, Physiol-
ogy; in a word, all the sciences we know anything about, are
but translated dispatches sent to us in an elementary form by
some powerful, wise and good Being, whose thoughts they are.
If there be intellegence in these books of the sciences, as
written out by the profoundest and most faithful students of
nature, it all comes from that great Being, and exists in na-
ture as He created it, in a more perfect form than in any book.
When you get older, and study these books, and learn what
wonderful wisdom they contain, you will find new reason to
admire and adore the Author of systems so wise and complex,
yet so complete and harmonious.
The Great Being who made Heaven and Earth, and all
things that are in them, you know, is not man. He is the
same Being that we all trust, in all our actions, without seeing.
He is above, below, and around us all. He is God. Think
of Him, and honor him always ; for he is your Creator, Pre-
server, and Redeemer.
Yours truly, J. VV. GORDON.
APPENDIX
KILLED.
Major J. W. Gordon, of the 11th Regulars, learned yester-
day that his son, Joseph, a gifted and noble boy, was killed
in the battle in Western Virginia last Friday. The dispatch
conveying the sad intelligence came from Col. Moody, so there
is no consolation left in any doubt of its correctness. Joseph
enlisted in the 9th regiment as Col. Milroy's Orderly, and we
believe retained that position under Col. Moody when Colonel
Milroy took the command of the brigade. He participated in
the battle at Greenbriar, where his coolness and courage were
conspicuously displayed, and in all the service of the camp
and field he showed himself a soldier, and a man, in spite of
his youth and inexperience. The loss of this brave and noble
boy falls with double weight on Major Gordon, following as it
does so closely on the death of his wife. He will receive the
sympathy of the whole community in his great grief. — Indi-
anapolis Journal,
[prom an Indianapolis journal correspondent.]
Young Joseph Gordon, son of Major J. W. Gordon, was
literally as brave as a lion and as gentle as a lamb. He fell
early in the action, and close up to the enemy's works. He
was the pet of the regiment, and no death could have occurred
that would have caused more heartfelt sorrow among officers
and men than did his. He had a very narrow escape the day
before. Two companies were sent out to repair a bridge over
Greenbriar River, so that the army could more readily cross
over. He was one of fourteen men sent in advance of these
two companies, as an advance guard. Soon after they had
crossed the first branch of the river, they were fired into by
about one hundred of the enemy, who were concealed in the
bushes about fifty yards from them. Seven of the fourteen
47
fell, killed and wounded. A rebel officer immediately came
out from his hiding place, waved his sword, and called on them
to surrender. Young Gordon, in answer to the summons, at
once raised his gun and fired at him. The rebels, knowing
there were one hundred and fifty men but a short distance be-
hind, did not stop for farther parley, but quickly made way
with themselves. Our young friend came out of this little
skirmish unharmed. He was reserved to die on a broader
field in defence of his country, and after, as his comrades say,
he had made at least one of its enemies bite the dust.
IN MEMORIAM
I am pained to have to record the death of my friend
Joseph R. T. Gordon. He fell at Buffalo Mountain, Va.,
gloriously fighting the battles of his country. He was but
seventeen, and though so young, fought with the bravery and
coolness of a veteran. He spent his last night in Indianapolis
with us. A few weeks since he sent us from his camp as me-
mentoes of his regard, an evergreen and laurel. These, with
mournful pleasure, we will plant above his grave, as fitting
emblems of his career. True patriot, brave flfoung soldier, ~*
dear friend, farewell, farewell. — Hayderts 31iscellany, Janu-
ary 4, 1862.
OBSEQUIES.
The remains of Joseph R. T. Gordon, son of Major Jona-
than W. Gordon of the Eleventh United States Infantry, were
interred yesterday. The deceased, as has been before an-
nounced, was killed at the recent battle of Buffalo Mountain,
in Western Virginia. His remains were brought to this city
by Captain Patten of the 9th Indiana Regiment, arriving here
early yesterday morning. The body was conveyed to the
residence of Alexander Graydon, Esq., 180 East Ohio street,
from which place the funeral procession, after services by
Rev. A. L. Brooks, of the Fourth Presbyterian Church, moved
yesterday afternoon to the cemetery. The remains of young
Gordon were placed in a vault with military honors by Capt.
Wilson's company of the Nineteenth United States Infantry,
who made a splendid appearance as they marched with re-
versed arms through the streets. The band made solemn and
48
impressive music, and the entire cortege was one of the most
imposing we have ever seen. The coffin was wrapped in the
American Flag, and the hearse containing it was followed by
a long procession of military officers and privates on foot, and
relatives, friends and acquaintances in carriages.
At the place of interment the ceremonies were impressive.
The military performed their solemn rites with a precision
that did them great credit. The platoon firing of Capt. Wil-
son's company was very accurate, which, after their long
march with reversed arms through the cold, was scarcely to
be expected.
After the military ceremonies were concluded, Rev. Mr.
Brooks thanked the officers and men of the Nineteenth Regi-
ment for the esteem for their fellow soldier they had mani-
fested, and for their kind service on the solemn occasion. He
then pronounced a benediction and the assemblage dispersed,
the military to their quarters and the civilians to their several
places of abode.
The corpse of young Gordon will remain in the vault where
it was placed yesterday for some days, when it will be removed
and buried. — Indianapolis Journal.
THE END.
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS
013 211 261 7
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