30 REV. JONES VERY, IN MEMORIAM ; 



its simplicity, and then turning round and fixing upon you an earnest 

 look, as if he would show by his piercing glance that there was a 

 depth in his thought concealed from superficial minds by its very 

 transparency. There was something in his manner at such times 

 that I find quite indescribable, but it was very impressive. If I should 

 walk these fields to-day (as I often do in spirit), I should always feel 

 that he was walking by my side, and testing unconsciously my sense 

 of the depth of meaning hidden under our familiar phrases, by his 

 extraordinary manner of pressing homely truths upon the attention. 



Speaking of these walks in the pastures, leads me, by a natural 

 transition which will presently appear, to say a word of our friend 

 as a preacher. I think I never heard him but once, and that it was, 

 if I remember rightly, at the East Church. As I recall his face and 

 manner in the pulpit and the drift of his discourse, I am strongly 

 reminded of the look and natural religion of Greenwood ; and the 

 beautiful photograph of Very which lies before me, so singularly ex- 

 pressive of saintly simplicity and unselfish translucency to the soul 

 of goodness, brings Greenwood still more strikingly to my remem- 

 brance. And I recall the description given of his ideal preacher in 

 the " Task" beginning, "I would describe him simple, grave, sincere." 



But the fact I was going simply to recall was, that among all the 

 numerous sermons I have heard from my boyhood in Salem, that was 

 the only one in which I ever heard any reference to the beauty and 

 glory of our old town pastures, upon which Jones dwelt with great 

 enthusiasm. 



As preacher, however, I suppose he never would have brought 

 himself by his manner sufficiently en rapport with the mass of 

 hearers. 



Not that he was wanting in geniality. He had a fondness at once 

 for flowers — those children of Nature — and for children — those 

 flowers of Humanity. 



And in closing this imperfect paper, I may apply to our beloved 

 friend, as true in the spirit with regard to him, the beautiful lines of 

 the German poet Uhlancl, on the " Death of a Country Pastor." 



''If to departed spirits Heaven e'er grants 

 Leave to revisit these their earthly haunts, 

 Not in the moony night wilt thou return, 

 When only sorrow wakes to weep and yearn ; 

 No ! when a summer morning greets the view, 

 When not a cloud-speck stains the expanse of hlue, 

 When high the golden harvest rears its head, 

 All intertwined with flowers of blue and red,— 

 Then wilt thou through the fields walk as erewhile, 

 And greet the reapers with a pleasant smile." 



Charles T. Brooks. 

 Newport, Dec. 11, 1880. 



