The Life of Adoniram Judson

The traveller who visits Malden, Massachusetts, one of the picturesque suburban towns of Boston, may find in the Baptist meeting-house a marble tablet, bearing the following inscription:

An old wooden house embosomed among the trees is still pointed out as the birthplace of Adoniram Judson. His father, who also bore the quaint, scriptural name of Adoniram, was a Congregationalist minister, born in Woodbury, Connecticut, in June, 1752. He was married November 23, 1786, to Abigail Brown, who was born at Tiverton, Rhode Island, December 15, 1759. Soon after his marriage he settled in Malden, Massachusetts, and here his eldest son, Adoniram, was born.

The boy was very precocious, learning to read when he was only three years old. While his father was absent on a journey, his mother conceived the idea of teaching her child to read, in order that she might give her husband an agreeable surprise on his return. She succeeded so well that upon his father’s return he saluted him by reading a whole chapter in the Bible.

His affection for his father must have been deeply tinged with awe; for the elder Adoniram was a stern man, and very strict in his domestic administration. One who saw him in his later life, when he was over seventy years of age, says:

“He was, as I remember him, a man of decidedly imposing appearance. His stature was rather above the average. His white hair, erect position, grave utterance, and somewhat taciturn manner, together with the position he naturally took in society, left one somewhat at a loss whether to class him with a patriarch of the Hebrews or a censor of the Romans. He was through life esteemed a man of inflexible integrity and uniform consistency of Christian character.”

To the influence of such a father perhaps were due the stately courtesy that characterized Mr. Judson’s social intercourse throughout his whole life, and the dignity of style which pervaded even his most familiar letters.

His father stimulated his ambition to the utmost. He seems early to have formed the hope that his boy was to become a great man, and he took no pains to hide this expectation; so that even in childhood Adoniram’s heart came to be full of worldly ambition, which in subsequent years had to be nailed to the cross. For if a man can sink the desire to be great in a passion for doing good, then his greatness really begins. “No man,” says Carlyle, “rises so high as he who knows not whither he is going.”

The family lived in Malden until Adoniram was about four and a half years old. During that time his sister, Abigail Brown Judson, was born, to become the companion of his childhood and his life-long confidante. She still survives him; and in the old homestead at Plymouth, at the age of more than ninety years, awaits a reunion with that brother of whose “affectionate tenderness” she has still a “vivid recollection.” She remembers hearing her parents relate how even in those early childhood days in Malden, when her brother was only four years old, he used to gather together the children of the neighborhood to play church, he officiating as minister; and that even then his favorite hymn was the one beginning, “Go preach my Gospel, saith the Lord.”

In January, 1793, the family removed to Wenham, Massachusetts, a village about twenty miles north-east of Boston. Here Adoniram lived until he was twelve years old. Here his brother Elnathan, who became a surgeon in the United States Navy, was born May 28, 1794. Here, too, when Adoniram was eight years old, his sister Mary was born, and died six months later. The loss of this little sister must have marked an epoch in his boyhood, for memorable is the hour when the keen ploughshare of sorrow tears up the fresh turf of a child’s heart.

Wenham, too, was the scene of many of the following reminiscences, for which we are indebted to the pen of Mrs. E. C. Judson:

“Adoniram was about seven years old, when, having been duly instructed that the earth is a spherical body, and that it revolves around the sun, it became a serious question in his mind whether or not the sun moved at all. He might have settled the point by asking his father or mother; but that would have spoiled all his pleasant speculations, and probably would have been the very last thing to occur to him. His little sister, whom alone he consulted, said the sun did move, for she could see it; but he had learned already, in this matter, to distrust the evidence of his senses, and he talked so wisely about positive proof, that she was astonished and silenced. Soon after this, he was one day missed about midday; and as he had not been seen for several hours, his father became uneasy and went in search of him. He was found in a field, at some distance from the house, stretched on his back, his hat with a circular hole cut in the crown, laid over his face, and his swollen eyes almost blinded with the intense light and heat. He only told his father that he was looking at the sun; but he assured his sister that he had solved the problem with regard to the sun’s moving, though she never could comprehend the process by which he arrived at the result.

“He was noted among his companions for uncommon acuteness in the solution of charades and enigmas, and retained a great store of them in his memory for the purpose of puzzling his school-fellows. On one occasion he found in a newspaper an enigma rather boastfully set forth, and accompanied by a challenge for a solution. He felt very sure that he had ‘guessed riddles as hard as that,’ and gave himself no rest until he had discovered a satisfactory answer. This he copied out in as fair a hand as possible, addressed it to the editor, and, with no confidante but his sister, conveyed it to the post-office. But the postmaster supposed it to be some mischievous prank of the minister’s son, and he accordingly placed the letter in the hands of the father. The poor boy’s surprise and discomfiture may be imagined when he saw it paraded on the table after tea. ‘Is that yours, Adoniram?’ ‘Yes, sir.’ ‘How came you to write it?’ Silence. ‘What is it about?’ Falteringly, ‘Please read it, father.’ ‘I do not read other people’s letters. Break the seal, and read it yourself.’ Adoniram broke the seal and mumbled over the contents, then placed the letter in his father’s hands. He read it, called for the newspaper which had suggested it, and after reading and re-reading both, laid them on the table, crossed his hands on his knees, and looked intently into the fire. Meantime Adoniram stood silently watching his countenance, speculating on the chances of his being treated as a culprit, or praised for his acuteness. But the father woke from his reverie, the subject of conversation was changed, and the letter never heard of afterward. The next morning Adoniram’s father gravely informed him that he had purchased for his use a book of riddles, a very common one, but, as soon as he had solved all that it contained, he should have more difficult books. ‘You are a very acute boy, Adoniram,’ he added, patting him on the head with unusual affection, ‘and I expect you to become a great man.’ Adoniram seized upon the book of riddles joyfully, and was a good deal surprised and disappointed to find it the veritable arithmetic which the larger boys in Master Dodge’s school were studying. But then his father had praised him, and if there was anything puzzling in the arithmetic, he was sure he should like it; and so he prepared to enter upon the study with alacrity.

Keep reading