CHAPTER VI 



CAPACITY, CHARACTER AND TRAINING 



In view of what has been learned regarding Jona- 

 than Edwards, his ancestors and his children, his 

 grandchildren might have found some excuse for 

 presuming upon the capacity and character which 

 they inherited. In their veins was the blood of 

 famous lines of noble men and women ; the blood 

 of Edwards, Stoddard, Pierrpont, and Hooker was 

 thrilling in their thought and intensifying their 

 character. They had inherited capacity and char- 

 acter at their best, but they did not presume upon 

 it. If ever inheritance would justify indifference 

 to training, it was in the case of the grandchildren 

 of Jonathan Edwards, but they were far from indif- 

 ferent to their responsibility. 



It must be understood that the "family of Jona- 

 than Edwards" includes not only his descendants, 

 but the men who married into the family and whose 

 childi-en became descendants of Mr. Edwards. At 

 first this may not seem the proper interpretation, 

 but there is no other that is legitimate. In the 

 case of the "Jukes" Mr. Dugdale includes in the 

 family both the men and the women who married 

 into the family, biit in the case of Mr. Edwards 



(413 



