FOREWORD THE HE world of my childhood has passed away. Puritanism, with its virile asceticism, its restrained but lofty and concentrated fervor, is not only obsolete but misunderstood. Puritan Andover, once a leader in missions, theology, and religious life, by clinging too long to ancient good, has in great measure lost its ascendency, and is at last wisely turning to new fields of labor. There are few left now, of the world that is gone, to interpret Puritan Andover to the new world of to-day. No formal interpretation is attempted here; the memories of an Andover childhood, as they have been sifted by fourscore passing years, are plainly written down, in the hope that these simple facts of our every-day life may carry with them some message warm from the heart of that once living and vigorous age. S. S. R. |
