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FREE CHURCH STALWARTS.

CADBTOY AKD HARTUBY.

IMPRESSIVE MEMORIAL SERVICE.

(From Our Special Corretponaent.)

LONDON, Oct. 28

Death has been busy among the patriarchs, for autumn is the season wkich [tries, and we have just lost two captains of industry the names of whom are also firmly knitted into the annals of the religious life of our time. Mr. George Cadbury, whose model industrial settlement 'of Bournrille is known the world over, and Sir William Hartley, the Liverpool jam magnate, died within the same week. The former was a tower of strength to the Quaker connection and Sir William Hartley to the Methodist. At the open air funeral service at Bournville—it is a fine custom of the Society of Friends to hold such services thus—'Dr. Henry T. Hodgkin delivered an impressive address. '"He was a man whose religion was his life, whose life was his religion," said Dr. Hodgkin. "No barrier did he allow to grow up between him and any other ■man through success or wealth. His employees knew that he was a man first and employer of labour second. He was a man of vision. AH through his life he was dreaming noble dreams, not fox himself, but for others. Hβ dreamed of a garden city. He dreamed of a factory where employer and employed should be as friends, labouring together in mutual confidence in the service of men. He dreamed of a college where men and women of all lands and from all Churches should live and study together. He dreamed of homes for the children and for the cripples, where joy could be given to the joyless. He dreamed of a great paper that wouJd rise above passion and prejudice, and stand for purity of life, and peace and justice in the world. In the last months of his live his dreams travelled to far-off China, and within a few months of his passing he made it possible to build a college for women in the far West of China. Yet he was a man of purpose. The causes he espoused were not fitfully helped. Persistently he pressed on against obstacles, and in spite of misunderstanding. Though a strongly convinced Quaker, he was eager to help Anglican and Free Church causes, and especially laboured tor all that united the Free Churches, or the still wider Christian fellowship. It seemed as if none lay outeidc his great heart. The world was his parish. He had a universal spirit. Can any epitaph ,be more worthy than this, "He loved ! greatly'?"'

It was a remarkable gathering that assembled to do honour of this great Christian leader. Greyhaired pensioners or the industry which he had in a great part founded in Britain—for he wa* the I pioneer of the cocoa trade—delegates from countless organieatione, religious, •ocial ph.lanthropic and industrial sat together. There were ministers and pastors of many creeds; famous Free Churchmen; Rabbw: teachers and leaders of men; civic dignitaries; organisers of great modern movements in the eocial sphere; prominent reformer*and pioneers On one part of the green stood the villa™ of em D V nd Al ar ° ,lnd Were thousand!

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Permanent link to this item

https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/AS19221228.2.99

Bibliographic details

Auckland Star, Volume LIII, Issue 307, 28 December 1922, Page 6

Word Count
520

FREE CHURCH STALWARTS. Auckland Star, Volume LIII, Issue 307, 28 December 1922, Page 6

FREE CHURCH STALWARTS. Auckland Star, Volume LIII, Issue 307, 28 December 1922, Page 6