William ellery channing biography of martin

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In 1819 he delivered a discourse at the ordination of Mr. Jared Sparks in Baltimore, which marked an important epoch in the history of Unitarianism in this country, as it led to a controversy in which was enlisted, on both sides, a very high degree of ability. The power of Channing’s eloquence was greatly enhanced by his presence, in the pulpit and elsewhere.

But Channing’s judgment on every subject certainly had singular weight, not only from its intrinsic worth, but because it was not eagerly put forward. The sun had just set, and the clouds and sky were bright with gold and crimson. It was as though people could feel directly his benign sincerity. As many Congregationalist ministers did during the revolutionary period, Stiles advocated republican values without fully considering their consistency with orthodoxy.

With Dr. Channing it was the reverse. This article abides by terms of the Creative Commons CC-by-sa 3.0 License (CC-by-sa), which may be used and disseminated with proper attribution. Other important tenets were the belief in human goodness and the subjection of theological revelation to the light of reason.

He rendered important aid to his friend, Dr. Tuckerman, in the establishment of the ministry for the poor. Dr. Channing did not care to be called Doctor, but he still less cared to make an ado about it. It came in as a kind of reserved force that decides everything. Channing, besides attracting great attention by his occasional discourses and other contributions to our literature, was identified with many of the prominent benevolent projects of the day.

. There was a kind of suppressed feeling about him, far more touching than any other manifestation could be.

It was, indeed, altogether a most remarkable thing—his conversation; and yet I do not know that I would have purchased it at the price he paid for it. Here he made many valuable acquaintances, among whom were Wordsworth and Coleridge.

From England he passed into France, and thence through Switzerland into Italy.

In 1824 he took a young associate, Ezra Stiles Gannett. His father, distinguished alike for his intellectual and moral qualities, was graduated at the College of New Jersey in 1769, and subsequently settled as a lawyer in Newport, his native place. No being was ever more simple, unpretending, and kindly-natured than he, and yet no such being surely was ever so inaccessible—not that he was proud, but that he was venerated as something out of the earthly sphere.

He did nevertheless participate in another discussion group which included Alcott, Hedge, and Ripley.

Channing feared for the often fiery young men of the Unitarians’ second generation of ministers, who—following Emerson—would discard wholesale their own churches’ liberal Christian tradition. .