James Freeman  Jared Sparks

James Walker (1794-1874)

James Walker James Walker

Should there be found anyone to ask, “Who was James Walker?” there are many to answer, “He was the man who first made me believe that religion is a real thing: in my college days the strength of his logic and the majesty of his earnestness took my mind and heart captive.”

Others, whose memories go back further, will reply, “More than all men else, he was a ‘son of consolation’ when my house was left unto me desolate.” And they will add:

He built up a strong parish from slender beginnings. His church in Charlestown stood like a light-house to warn the young, from far and near, of their perils. Wherever he preached, he was listened to as if men saw in his every look and word the unmistakable credentials of a ‘great ambassador.’ In the house of the people he was simple as a child, yet profound as a philosopher; at one moment overflowing with pungent humor, his countenance the next moment eloquent with pathetic seriousness.

He was a man unrivalled in sententious conversation, one who in later life drew toward him the mingled homage and respect of the learned men around him in other chairs of the college which he honored successively as professor and president; the man on whose counsel the student pre-eminently relied when his mind was vexed with those problems which concern themselves with the conduct of life or the choice of a profession. And he lived to grow old. He went gently to his rest with the benedictions of pupils following him from their widely scattered homes, with the gratitude of the broken households who yet survived to revere the pastor who had served them more than thirty years before.

Never devoid of catholicity of spirit, the vehemence of the youthful theologian became more and more mellowed by a wide course of reading and through the experience of life, until at last we saw in him an impersonation of the apostolic “meekness of wisdom,” the like of which, in this world, we can scarce believe that our eyes shall rest upon again.

James Walker was born in Burlington, Mass., August 16, 1794. He was fitted for Harvard College (which he entered in 1810) under Mr. Caleb Butler, preceptor of the Groton Academy. He delivered the second English oration at his graduation in 1814. Among the classmates gathered before him, when he appeared as their class orator that year, were the late Rev. Dr. Greenwood and the historian Prescott. Upon leaving college, he spent a year at Exeter, N.H., as an assistant teacher in connection with the memorable Dr. Benjamin Abbot, principal of Phillips Exeter Academy. The two subsequent years he passed in the pursuit of his theological studies at Cambridge, graduating in the class which first left the Divinity School, in 1817.

After declining an invitation to settle in Lexington, Mass., he was ordained as the pastor of the Harvard Church in Charlestown, Mass., February 11, 1818. During the twenty-one years of this ministry (which was a ministry to the social and educational interests of the town as well as to his own parish) he was challenged again and again to come forth as a leader upon conspicuous occasions. He was one of the founders of the American Unitarian Association, and served for many years on its Executive Committee. In 1832 he was chosen to address the citizens of Charlestown upon the one hundredth anniversary of Washington’s birthday. His ringing voice, bidding men be of good cheer, carried courage to many a faint-hearted church and its youthful minister upon the day of ordination. The pages of the Christian Examiner bear witness to his zeal in every good word and work. Besides many contributions at other periods to its pages, he was its sole editor between the years 1831 and 1839.

He retired from his auspicious ministry in Charlestown, July 14, 1839, that he might become Alford Professor of Natural Theology, Moral Philosophy, and Civil Polity in Harvard College. The public foresaw his illustrious career at Cambridge (for his name had been suggested in some quarters as a candidate for president as early as the date of the lamented President Kirkland’s resignation in 1828). But we cannot wonder that his devoted parish clung to him to the very last, and interposed every possible solicitation to compel him to decline this invitation to the Alford Professorship. Nor were they wholly alone in their regrets. In the many homes in which Dr. Walker was enthusiastically welcomed, when he made an exchange of pulpits, there must have been those among old and young whose hearts sadly testified that this summons, “Friend, go up higher,” betokened their being left, far more than before, beyond the range of his voice or the clasp of his hand. After leaving the impress of his character upon many successive classes who were brought into more familiar relations with him than often happens at college, at the expiration of fourteen years (in 1853) he was transferred from the professor’s chair to the office of president, which latter post he filled with signal ability during the ensuing seven years, until in 1860 his impaired health counseled his resignation. But this event did not remove him from all concern in the interests of the college which he had loved so intensely all his life—the college toward which he had long since taught the eyes of Charlestown boys to look wistfully. To its councils he had been called thirty-five years previous as overseer; of its corporation he had been a member for nineteen years, before he became its president. And now, after a brief respite, we find him once more, for ten years, a member of the board of overseers.

He survived his retirement from the presidency more than fourteen years. He had so meekly borne the honors with which men had crowned him that these later years of comparative retirement were not rendered insipid from lack of excitement, but were, as he alleged, among his happiest, save only that a portion of them were overshadowed by the death of the wife who for nearly forty years had been the companion of his studies and the eager dispenser of his hospitality. Mrs. Caroline Walker (daughter of Dr. George Bartlett, of Charlestown, Mass.) died June 13, 1868, aged seventy.

On his eightieth birthday, August i6, 1874, through the happy instigation of his lifelong friend, Rev. Dr. Samuel Osgood, of New York, a beautiful cup and salver were presented to him by friends who had known and loved him in Charlestown, Cambridge, and elsewhere. A few weeks previous he had the rare felicity of welcoming at his dinner table, upon Commencement Day, seven of his surviving classmates.

Dr. Walker edited “Reid’s Essay on the Intellectual Powers, abridged, with notes from Sir William Hamilton,” and Dugald Stewart’s “Philosophy of the Active and Moral Powers of Man.” In 1840 and for three consecutive years he delivered courses of lectures before the Lowell Institute upon Natural Religion, which excited a very deep and wide-spread interest.

In 1863 a memoir of Hon. Daniel Appleton White, of Salem, Mass., was printed, which Dr. Walker had prepared at the request of the Massachusetts Historical Society; and in 1867 he prepared a memoir, for the same society, of President Quincy.

The fervor of his patriotism was attested alike at the beginning and at the close of our gigantic Civil War. In 1861 he published a kindling discourse, delivered in King’s Chapel, Boston, upon “The Spirit Proper to the Times.” The oration which he delivered in 1863, before the alumni of Harvard College, remains in its massive simplicity an inspiring memorial of his patriotic counsels.

He published a series of his sermons immediately after his retirement from the presidency of the college, and another series was published shortly after his death under the title Reason, Faith, and Duty.

He died at Cambridge, December 23, 1874, and his remains rest in Forest Hills Cemetery.