Acres of Diamonds: Our Every-day Opportunities
misunderstanding and jealousy. His Easter services, for example, years
ago, became widely talked of and eagerly anticipated because each sermon
would be wrought around some fine symbol; and he would hold in his hand,
in the pulpit, the blue robin’s egg, or the white dove, or the stem
of lilies, or whatever he had chosen as the particular symbol for the
particular sermon, and that symbol would give him the central thought
for his discourse, accented as it would be by the actual symbol itself
in view of the congregation. The cross lighted by electricity, to
shine down over the baptismal pool, the little stream of water cascading
gently down the steps of the pool during the baptismal rite, the roses
floating in the pool and his gift of one of them to each of the baptized
as he or she left the water--all such things did seem, long ago, so
unconventional. Yet his own people recognized the beauty and poetry of
them, and thousands of Bibles in Philadelphia have a baptismal rose from
Dr. Conwell pressed within the pages.
His constant individuality of mind, his constant freshness, alertness,
brilliancy, warmth, sympathy, endear him to his congregation, and when
he returns from an absence they bubble and effervesce over him as if he
were some brilliant new preacher just come to them. He is always new to
them. Were it not that he possesses some remarkable quality of charm he
would long ago have become, so to speak, an old story, but instead
of that he is to them an always new story, an always entertaining and
delightful story, after all these years.
It is not only that they still throng to hear him either preach
or lecture, though that itself would be noticeable, but it is the
delightful and delighted spirit with which they do it. Just the other
evening I heard him lecture in his own church, just after his return
from an absence, and every face beamed happily up at him to welcome him
back, and every one listened as intently to his every word as if he
had never been heard there before; and when the lecture was over a huge
bouquet of flowers was handed up to him, and some one embarrassedly said
a few words about its being because he was home again. It was all as
if he had just returned from an absence of months--and he had been away
just five and a half days!
VI. MILLIONS OF HEARERS
THAT Conwell is not primarily a minister--that he is a minister because
he is a sincere Christian, but that he is first of all an Abou Ben
Adhem, a man who loves his fellow-men, becomes more and more apparent as
the scope of his life-work is recognized. One almost comes to think
that his pastorate of a great church is even a minor matter beside
the combined importance of his educational work, his lecture work, his
hospital work, his work in general as a helper to those who need help.
For my own part, I should say that he is like some of the old-time
prophets, the strong ones who found a great deal to attend to in
addition to matters of religion. The power, the ruggedness, the physical
and mental strength, the positive grandeur of the man--all these are
like the general conceptions of the big Old Testament prophets. The
suggestion is given only because it has often recurred, and therefore
with the feeling that there is something more than fanciful in the
com-parison; and yet, after all, the comparison fails in one important
particular, for none of the prophets seems to have had a sense of humor!
It is perhaps better and more accurate to describe him as the last
of the old school of American philosophers, the last of those
sturdy-bodied, high-thinking, achieving men who, in the old days, did
their best to set American humanity in the right path--such men as
Emerson, Alcott, Gough, Wendell Phillips, Garrison, Bayard Taylor,
Beecher; men whom Conwell knew and admired in the long ago, and all of
whom have long since passed away.
And Conwell, in his going up and down the country, inspiring his
thousands and thousands, is the survivor of that old-time group who used
to travel about, dispensing wit and wisdom and philosophy and courage to
the crowded benches of country lyceums, and the chairs of school-houses
and town halls, or the larger and more pretentious gathering-places of
the cities.
Conwell himself is amused to remember that he wanted to talk in public
from his boyhood, and that very early he began to yield to the inborn
impulse. He laughs as he remembers the variety of country fairs and
school commencements and anniversaries and even sewing-circles where he
tried his youthful powers, and all for experience alone, in the first
few years, except possibly for such a thing as a ham or a jack-knife!
The first money that he ever received for speaking was, so he remembers
with glee, seventy-five cents; and even that was not for his talk, but
for horse hire! But at the same time there is more than amusement in
recalling these experiences, for he knows that they were invaluable
to him as training. And for over half a century he has affectionately
remembered John B. Gough, who, in the height of his own power and
success, saw resolution and possibilities in the ardent young hill-man,
and actually did him the kindness and the honor of introducing him to
an audience in one of the Massachusetts towns; and it was really a great
kindness and a great honor, from a man who had won his fame to a young
man just beginning an oratorical career.
Conwell’s lecturing has been, considering everything, the most important
work of his life, for by it he has come into close touch with so many
millions--literally millions!--of people.
I asked him once if he had any idea how many he had talked to in the
course of his career, and he tried to estimate how many thousands of
times he had lectured, and the average attendance for each, but desisted
when he saw that it ran into millions of hearers. What a marvel is such
a fact as that! Millions of hearers!
I asked the same question of his private secretary, and found that no
one had ever kept any sort of record; but as careful an estimate as
could be made gave a conservative result of fully eight million hearers
for his lectures; and adding the number to whom he has preached, who
have been over five million, there is a total of well over thirteen
million who have listened to Russell Conwell’s voice! And this
staggering total is, if anything, an underestimate. The figuring was
done cautiously and was based upon such facts as that he now addresses
an average of over forty-five hundred at his Sunday services (an average
that would be higher were it not that his sermons in vacation time are
usually delivered in little churches; when at home, at the Temple, he
addresses three meetings every Sunday), and that he lectures throughout
the entire course of each year, including six nights a week of lecturing
during vacation-time. What a power is wielded by a man who has held over
thirteen million people under the spell of his voice! Probably no
other man who ever lived had such a total of hearers. And the total is
steadily mounting, for he is a man who has never known the meaning of
rest.
I think it almost certain that Dr. Conwell has never spoken to any one
of what, to me, is the finest point of his lecture-work, and that is
that he still goes gladly and for small fees to the small towns that are
never visited by other men of great reputation. He knows that it is the
little places, the out-of-the-way places, the submerged places, that
most need a pleasure and a stimulus, and he still goes out, man of well
over seventy that he is, to tiny towns in distant states, heedless of
the discomforts of traveling, of the poor little hotels that seldom have
visitors, of the oftentimes hopeless cooking and the uncleanliness, of
the hardships and the discomforts, of the unventilated and overheated or
underheated halls. He does not think of claiming the relaxation earned
by a lifetime of labor, or, if he ever does, the thought of the sword of
John Ring restores instantly his fervid earnestness.
How he does it, how he can possibly keep it up, is the greatest marvel
of all. I have before me a list of his engagements for the summer weeks
of this year, 1915, and I shall set it down because it will specifically
show, far more clearly than general statements, the kind of work he
does. The list is the itinerary of his vacation. Vacation! Lecturing
every evening but Sunday, and on Sundays preaching in the town where he
happens to be!
June 24 Ackley, Ia. July 11 *Brookings, S. D.
“ 25 Waterloo, Ia. “ 12 Pipestone, Minn.
“ 26 Decorah, Ia. “ 13 Hawarden, Ia.
“ 27 *Waukon, Ia. “ 14 Canton, S. D
“ 28 Red Wing, Minn. “ 15 Cherokee, Ia
“ 29 River Falls, Wis. “ 16 Pocahontas, Ia
“ 30 Northfield, Minn. “ 17 Glidden, Ia.
July 1 Faribault, Minn. “ 18 *Boone, Ia.
“ 2 Spring Valley, Minn. “ 19 Dexter, Ia.
“ 3 Blue Earth, Minn. “ 20 Indianola, Ia
“ 4 *Fairmount, Minn. “ 21 Corydon, Ia
“ 5 Lake Crystal, Minn. “ 22 Essex, Ia.
“ 6 Redwood Falls, “ 23 Sidney, Ia.
Minn. “ 24 Falls City, Nebr.
“ 7 Willmer, Minn. “ 25 *Hiawatha, Kan.
“ 8 Dawson, Minn. “ 26 Frankfort, Kan.
“ 9 Redfield, S. D. “ 27 Greenleaf, Kan.
“ 10 Huron, S. D. “ 28 Osborne, Kan.
July 29 Stockton, Kan. Aug. 14 Honesdale, Pa.
“ 30 Phillipsburg, Kan. “ 15 *Honesdale, Pa.
“ 31 Mankato, Kan. “ 16 Carbondale, Pa.
_En route to next date on_ “ 17 Montrose, Pa.
_circuit_. “ 18 Tunkhannock, Pa.
Aug. 3 Westfield, Pa. “ 19 Nanticoke, Pa.
“ 4 Galston, Pa. “ 20 Stroudsburg, Pa.
“ 5 Port Alleghany, Pa. “ 21 Newton, N. J.
“ 6 Wellsville, N. Y. “ 22 *Newton, N. J.
“ 7 Bath, N. Y. “ 23 Hackettstown, N. J.
“ 8 *Bath, N. Y. “ 24 New Hope, Pa.
“ 9 Penn Yan, N. Y. “ 25 Doylestown, Pa.
“ 10 Athens, N. Y. “ 26 Ph<oe>nixville, Pa.
“ 11 Owego, N. Y. “ 27 Kennett, Pa.
“ 12 Patchogue, LI.,N.Y. “ 28 Oxford, Pa.
“ 13 Port Jervis, N. Y. “ 29 *Oxford, Pa.
* Preach on Sunday.
And all these hardships, all this traveling and lecturing, which would
test the endurance of the youngest and strongest, this man of over
seventy assumes without receiving a particle of personal gain, for
every dollar that he makes by it is given away in helping those who need
helping.
That Dr. Conwell is intensely modest is one of the curious features of
his character. He sincerely believes that to write his life would be,
in the main, just to tell what people have done for him. He knows and
admits that he works unweariedly, but in profound sincerity he ascribes
the success of his plans to those who have seconded and assisted him. It
is in just this way that he looks upon every phase of his life. When he
is reminded of the devotion of his old soldiers, he remembers it only
with a sort of pleased wonder that they gave the devotion to him, and
he quite forgets that they loved him because he was always ready to
sacrifice ease or risk his own life for them.
He deprecates praise; if any one likes him, the liking need not be
shown in words, but in helping along a good work. That his church has
succeeded has been because of the devotion of the people; that the
university has succeeded is because of the splendid work of the teachers
and pupils; that the hospitals have done so much has been because of the
noble services of physicians and nurses. To him, as he himself expresses
it, realizing that success has come to his plans, it seems as if the