The Rev. Tillotson Bronson, D. D. [At page 340 of our last volume, we announced

the death of the Rev. Tillotson Bronson, D.D. late principal of the Episcopal Academy at Cheshire, Connecticut, and editor of the Churchman's Magazine. In the December

number of that work, we find the following interesting memoir of that eminent divine, which we take much pleasure in transferring to our pages.]

FEW men have sustained a higher character for talents and learning, or those amiable and excellent qualities which adorn human nature, than the lamented individual who is the subject of this memoir. For a long period, he maintained a prominent station in the church, and in the respect and affections of all who knew his worth. The life of a literary man is, for the most part, too uniform and retired in its course, to afford incidents of such magnitude as to excite any deep interest or admiration, beyond the circle of friends and associates, where his virtues, his attainments, and his talents are exhibited, without the restraint which modesty, and perhaps constitutional diffidence, may produce in a wider scene of action. His labours, which are chief ly performed in retirement from the world, are indeed of a character calculated to qualify him for no small degree of usefulness, and to gain the love and respect of the society and friends among whom his hours of relaxation are passed; but though, as an author, it is possible that he may be brought into notice and regard, by successful efforts to instruct or to amuse, yet he has little chance of being known and admired in another age, however great his talents or profound his learning, unless he should be so fortunate as to be called to stations, where his name becomes inseparably associated with institutions, which are important and permanent in their character, or to grades of office which connect the recollection of his powers with VOL. XI.

[VOL. XI.

the communities over which he has presided, and benefited by the wisdom of his measures, and his success in accomplishing them.

If to the pursuits of literature, the duties of an instructor or divine be added, his course of life is scarcely less uniform, or less barren of those great incidents, which are calculated to excite interest and attract attention. In either case there is the same series of services from day to day, and year to year; and perhaps all that can be said of them, is, that they were performed with ability and faithfulness, and were attended with a degree of success equally useful to the public and creditable to himself. But his reputation in both departments is often temporary, liable to great vicissitudes from casual and unimportant circumstances, and always dependent upon the continuance of popular favour, than which nothing is more capricious and inconstant.

The great and good man who is the subject of this memoir, was not, either in his character as a scholar, instructor, or divine, an exception. The stream of life has rarely flowed with a more quiet, equable, and peaceful course. Few vicissitudes occurred which were calculated to disturb its tranquillity. And the leading events in which he was interested, had their origin in the opinion which his brethren had formed of his attainments as a scholar and divine, rather than in those direct exertions which, but for his great modesty, he might have made with a view to his own advancement.

Dr. Bronson was born at Plymouth, in the year 1762. His father was a respectable farmer, a man of strong powers of mind, well acquainted with the doctrines of the Bible, and if we are not misinformed, from an early period a communicant in the Episcopal Church. His earlier years were

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this period on his ministrations. And his occasional returns to these scenes of his labours, after the lapse of thirty years, continued to be a source of mutual pleasure and satisfaction.

In the year 1795, he was called to the rectorship of St. John's church, Waterbury. This seems to have been the most interesting and useful scene of his ministrations; and it was the one to which he recurred with the most pleasing recollections. During the whole period of his rectorship, which was about ten years, the parish was united and prosperous; and we have reason to believe that he was, in that situation, an instrument in the Redeemer's hands, of perparing many souls for the inheritance of eternal life. Several circumstances concurred to render his removal from Waterbury expedient, particularly his appointment to conduct the Churchman's Magazine, which was then published at New-Haven. He accordingly resigned his rectorship in the spring of 1805, and immediately removed to that city. He continued the editor of that very useful and respectable paper between two and three years, when, in consequence of an animated controversy, in which the doctrines and government of the church were assailed by several eminent Presbyterian divines in the city of NewYork, at the earnest solicitation of the Rev. Dr. Hobart and others, the convocation consented that it should be removed to that city. His connexion with the work terminated with that event. In the volumes edited by him, he has left a lasting testimony to his talents and learning as a divine. They have been long before the public, and deservedly held in the highest estimation. It has been generally considered the most able religious journal which had then issued from the American press. It became more directly controversial after its removal to NewYork, but it may be questioned whether it ever promoted the interests of the church so effectually as under his editorship. After two or three volumes had been published, it went into other hands; and not long after, it ceased to be published, in consequence of some embarrassment on the part of the per

son upon whom the pecuniary responsibility depended.-The work had been discontinued for several years, when a new series of it was commenced in Connecticut, in 1821, under the auspices of the convention; and after the publication of three volumes, it was again discontinued, on account of the limited extent of its patronage. But the want of a work of the kind was so generally felt, that the clergy in convocation resolved upon reviving it again: and Dr. Bronson was once more appointed to conduct it, by the unanimous suffrage of his brethren. This, and the fact that the work soon received the patronage of more than a thousand subscribers, shows the opinion which his brethren, and the church generally, entertained of his abilities as an editor. Though at an advanced age, and with a constitution in some measure broken by long and close application to the business of instruction, he seemed, on this new expression of the confidence of his brethren, to renew his strength; and he entered again upon the duties of an editor with great alacrity, and though he was almost unassisted, he continued to throw into the work a large proportion of original articles, on subjects connected with the various departments of Christian theology. It required, however, a degree of application beyond his years; and the labour of conducting the work, added to his other duties, gradually undermined his health, until he sunk under the power of a disease to which sedentary men, in the latter periods of life, are so often victims. The work contains much useful and valuable matter; but it could scarcely have been expected, that at his time of life, in conducting a work like this, he would be, in all respects, able to keep pace with the spirit of the age.

Previous to his having become an editor in 1805, he had published very little-only a few articles in the journals of the day, and one or two occasional sermons. Notwithstanding his close application to the business of instruction, not less than seven or eight hours being daily passed by him at the academy, he found time to write many articles for the magazine in prose and

verse, to arrange the whole matter for the work, and though at a distance of thirteen miles, to superintend the press, Though he was never considered an orator, yet such was the opinion entertained of his talents as a writer, by his brethren, that he was several times called by them to preach on important occasions. He was selected by the standing committee to preach the discourse at the opening of the convention, which was called soon after the death of the venerable Bishop Jarvis. How well he acquitted himself on that interesting occasion, is too generally known to require more to be said now, than that the sermon was ordered to be printed by the convention, and to be distributed gratuitously among the parishes in this diocese,

Soon after the election of the distinguished prelate who now presides over the church in this diocese, the Right Rev. T. C. Brownell, D. D. LL. D., he was again selected, as chairman of the standing committee, to deliver the address in behalf of the convention, recognizing him as their diocesan. With what dignity and deep feeling, as the organ of the convention, he discharged that duty, will not be forgotten by those who witnessed the solemnities of that day, so interesting and auspicious to the diocese of Connecticut.

Towards the close of the year 1805, he was elected, without opposition, by the Protestant Episcopal Convention of this state, to the office of principal of the Episcopal academy at Cheshire; upon the duties of which he entered immediately on his removal to Cheshire. He found the academy in a depressed condition: it had very few students, and its reputation was to be established by his exertions. His known talents and acquirements soon attracted a considerable number of students to the institution from this state, and after a few years, from distant parts of the Union. The academy gradually assumed a degree of respectability which had then been attained by no similar institution. The number of students for a long period ranged from eighty to one hundred, the greater part of whom were pursuing a classical course, preparatory to entering college,

or upon

the study of the learned professions. A considerable number completed their classical course at the academy, and many of those who were designed for the ministry, remained and pursued the study of theology under his direction, in every department of which he was able, but he excelled in ecclesiastical history and the criticism of the Greek text. His attainments in the latter were evinced by the numerous criticisms on different passages of Scripture, published in the volumes of the magazine which he last edited. Those who have received their education in part, or wholly, under his instruction, are diffused throughout every part of our country, and many of them hold important stations in the community. A large proportion of the clergy of the Protestant Episcopal Church received their first instructions in literature, and the first direction of their thoughts, in relation to the great business of proclaiming the glad tidings of salvation to a ruined world, at the academy, over which he presided with great honour to himself and usefulness to the church.

The original founders of the academy had a distant view to its becoming a college. Such was its prosperity within a few years after he was placed at its head, that the convention resolved to petition the legislature of the state for the power of granting degrees. The feelings of Episcopalians were deeply excited on the subject. The measure was carried, we believe, unanimously, in the convention; and a committee was appointed to prepare a petition and bring it before the legislature. Several circumstances concurred to excite strong hopes of its success. There was a fair majority in the lower house for granting collegiate powers, but the bill was lost in the senate, Some ineffectual attempts were subse quently made. During the vacancy of the Episcopate, however, which occurred in 1813, and continued for several years, no efforts were made to obtain a charter for a college; but the clergy never lost sight of the object, and after the consecration of our present bishop, it would have received immediate attention, had not the loca,

tion of the General Theological Seminary at New-Haven directed their efforts to the founding of that institution. It was not long after the removal of that_institution, before the subject of an Episcopal college was again agitated, and the measure for obtaining it was unanimously resolved upon by the convocation. These facts have been here mentioned, because they grew out of the prosperous condition of the academy, and were to a considerable extent dependent on the influence which Dr. Bronson exerted from time to time, and the arguments which he so often used with his brethren, to convince them of the practicability and necessity of founding an Episcopal college in this state. He had the happiness of living to see the object which he sought with so much patient and anxious solicitude, and which he deemed so important to the interest of the church, through the great exertions of the bishop and several of his clergy, obtained under more favourable circumstances than he had ever anticipated; and the college itself in full operation, and prosperous to a degree which left him no doubt of its permanency, respectability, and usefulness. There were some circumstances connected with this measure, which perhaps were not agreeable to his views; but no one rejoiced more sincerely in its success.

During a period of more than thirty years, he was regularly appointed to some of the most important offices in the gift of the convention. The office of trustee of the Episcopal academy at Cheshire, was held by him almost from its commencement. His brethren frequently honoured him with the appointment of delegate to the General Convention, and for more than twenty years he was regularly chosen to the office of standing committee; and such was the opinion entertained of his prudence, penetration, and judgment, that when ever business of great consequence was referred to a committee, he was uniformly selected to be one of the number. It is an evidence of the confidence of the church, that he was generally elected to the various offices which he held, with very little opposition, and that they were continued, with perhaps

not one exception, until he declined a re-election. At the time of his death, he was a trustee of the General Theological Seminary, and of Washington College. He was chosen an honorary member of the Connecticut Academy of Arts and Sciences, the same year in which he was appointed principal of the Episcopal Academy, and not long after, the degree of doctor of divinity was conferred upon him by Brown University.

Dr. Bronson was twice married. His first wife died not long after his removal to Cheshire, and his second survived him but a few days. By the former he had four, and by the latter two children, all of whom are living. They have lost a parent, than whom none was more affectionate and indulgent, or more faithful in imparting the instruction necessary for usefulness in life, and in teaching the principles of religion by precept and example.

He enjoyed almost uninterrupted good health until within the last year and a half. It was owing to his temperance in all things, and to his regularity in exercise, that his naturally firm constitution was so long unimpaired. Before the first attack of the disease which finally terminated his life, he had never been confined to his house by sickness, or under the care of a physician. The disease with which he was afflicted was the stone, which, though it occasioned him some paroxysms of distress, it never interrupted the discharge of duties, with the single exception of a violent attack, in the month of April last, which continued for more than ten days, and from which very serious apprehensions were entertained that he could not recover. He had suffered considerably and constantly from this complaint for more than a year, but its character had not been before ascertained, though he found his strong nerve relaxing, and his vigorous frame gradually giving way under its constant and oppressive influence. He seemed convinced that his work was nearly done. His interest in the welfare of the church had never glowed with a purer flame than at this period, but he felt it necessary to relax his exertions, and leave to other hands those efforts for the pros