G13 



fMuhlenber^. 



Obituary Notice of the Rev. Dr. Charles Porterfield Eraiith. By F. A. 

 3Iuhlenberg. 



(Read before the American Philosophical Society, March 16, 1SS3.) 



Both SficrecT and profane history is largely made up of biography. It is 

 true, great events are also therein described, as intimately connected with 

 the life oi man ; but human beings themselves have ever been a more in- 

 teresting study, than the changes produced by their agency. Man is the 

 most luminous point, in the prose, or poetic narratives, found in the litera- 

 ture of all nations. His successes, his triumphs over obstacles, material 

 and spiritual, as well his reverses, have been handed down, to successive 

 generations, to imitate or avoid. Nations, civilized or uncivilized, have 

 exalted through their bards, historians and orators, the fame of those, most 

 eminent among them, in the varied departments of human enterprise or 

 ambition, and have deposited these accounts in their archives, that the 

 memory of their noble deeds might thus be perpetuated. The intuitions 

 of the race have thus prompted them to pay a proper tribute to the divine 

 and eternal in men. Thus the example of those most distinguislied for 

 their virtue, their learning, their benevolence, their skill, has always 

 been a beacon light, to " allure to brighter worlds, and lead the way.*' 



Such principles have, no doubt, influenced this venerable and honorable 

 Society, to adopt the rule of having an Obituary Notice on the decease of 

 one of its members. In accordance, therefore, with the wishes of this 

 Society, and by the request and appointment of its honored President, 

 we have prepared the following sketch of our lately deceased, much be- 

 loved, and illustrious member, Cliarles Porterfield Krauth. 



The subject of our sketch was born in the town of Martin sburg, Va., 

 March the 17th, 1823. His flither was the Rev. Charles Philip Krauth, at 

 that time pastor of the Lutheran Churches of Martinsburg and Sliepherds- 

 town, Va., and his mother's maiden name was Catherine Susan Heiskell, 

 of Staunton, of the same State. Charles Philip Krauth was a native of 

 Pennsylvania, having been born in Montgomery county, and was care- 

 fully educated in private in Greek, Latin and French by his father, who 

 had emigrated to our State from Germany, in the capacity of teacher 

 and organist, being a member of the German Reformed Church, whilst 

 his wife was a Lutheran, and a native of this country. After the comple- 

 tion of his preparatory studies, under his father, having a preference for 

 medicine, he pursued, for a time, his medical studies, as a pupil of Dr. Sel- 

 den, of NorfoUv, Va., and attended one course of lectures in the University 

 of Maryland. From a conscientious change of views as to his duty, he 

 abandoned medicine for the ministry, became, first, pastor of the churches 

 in Virginia already mentioned ; then in 1827, of St. Matthew's Lutheran 

 Church in this city, whence he was transferred, in the year 1833, to 

 Gettysburg, Pa., to become "Professor of Biblical and Oriental Litera- 

 ture," in the Theological Seminary of the Lutheran Church, there located. 



