METHODIST REVIEW. MAY, 1895. ART. I.-FREDERICK MERRICK. THE REV. FREDERICK MERRICK, ex-president of the Ohio Wesleyan University, was born at Wilbraham, Mass., January 29, 1810, and died March 5, 1894, a little more than eighty-four years old. He was born in the same house in which his ancestors for some generations had been born and had died. They were of the old Puritan faith and training, intelligent, religious, content with the quiet life of a New England village. Dr. Merrick's father was a farmer, and the son spent the early years of his life on the farm, working in the summer and going to the common school in the winter season. Sedate and industrious in his habits, the young Merrick, at the age of seventeen, entered a store as a clerk, and soon showed such qualities that, before reaching his majority, he was admitted to a partnership in the business. His training here gave him the skill and accuracy which afterward made his financial services so invaluable to the university, and which might well have led him to large commercial success. Though of a Congrega- But God had other plans for him. tional family, he was converted in a soon felt the call to a higher vocation. the Christian ministry he entered the Wesleyan Academy, near his own home at Wilbraham, and afterward continued his studies at the Wesleyan University, Middletown, Conn. He did not remain to graduate, having, upon the nomination of President Fisk, been elected in his senior year to the principalship of the Conference Seminary at Amenia, N. Y.; but the 23-FIFTH SERIES, VOL. XI. university afterward conferred on him the honorary degree of master of arts. His leaving college an undergraduate was honorable to him; but he felt through life that he had lost something of the nice linguistic accuracy that comes from a complete university training. At Amenia he had a remarkable success as a teacher and administrator, and thus early settled in his own judgment, and that of the Church, that his true vocation for life was not in the pastorate, but in the school. IIe was then twenty-six years of age, and had already the characteristic self-command and the look of reserved power which gave him so large an influence over others. After two years' service at Amenia he was elected, again upon the recommendation of President Fisk, to the chair of natural science in the Ohio University, at Athens, O. He was then in the prime of his manly vigor and enthusiasm. He was tall and lithe; his features were striking; he had dark eyes and a noble mass of dark hair, which reached back above his brow and which he never lost, but which the snows of many winters at last turned into a crown of glory. His bearing was self-collected and courteous, and his presence commanded notice in any assembly. Professor McCabe, who was then a student at Athens, says that in those days a group of the greatest lawyers in Ohio-Hunter, Vinton, Stanbery, and "Tom" Ewing-practiced in the courts of Athens County; and when it was known that these were to speak the courthouse was sure to be crowded. On one such occasion the young McCabe was asked by a distinguished visitor, "Who is that beautiful young man sitting within the bar?" "That," he replied, "is the newly elected professor of the Ohio University." Professor Merrick came to Athens in the palmy days of the administration of the distinguished Dr. William H. McGuffey. Both the State universities-the Miami and the Ohio-were then in the control of the Presbyterians. Professor Merrick was the only Methodist in the faculty, the first Methodist that had held such a position in the State of Ohio; and his coming was an epoch in the history of Methodism in Athens and of the Methodist Church in Ohio. The young professor brought success with him. His department was then almost new in college studies, and his enthusiasm made it and himself popular. Many marked men came under his instruction-among them the beloved and honored Dr. McCabe, who afterward, for nearly fifty years, was his colleague in the Ohio Wesleyan University. After four years' service at Athens Professor Merrick resigned his chair, in order to enter the pastoral work in the Ohio Conference; and in September, 1842, he was appointed pastor of the Methodist Church at Marietta, another of Ohio's many college towns. This was his only year of pastoral labor. In the spring of this year, 1842, the Ohio Wesleyan University was incorporated, though not yet opened for academic work. It began its history with the grounds, an empty building, large debt, and was in want of everything. To supply these wants, to secure money, books, appliances, and, finally, students, the Ohio Conference in 1843 appointed two agents, one of whom was Professor Merrick. From that date until his death he remained in the continuous service of the university--for two years as agent, for fifteen as professor, for thirteen as president, and for twenty-one as professor emeritus and lecturer on natural and revealed religion—a consecutive period of fifty-one years. This was a noble and useful life. Said Dr. Moore, of the Western Christian Advocate, at the funeral : Not until the needle scorns the pole, and gravitation is robbed of its power, and God abdicates the throne of the universe, shall a life like this fail of its purpose. All about us behold the proofs that his life failed not of his purpose-laboratories, library, chapel, endowments, alumni, students, patrons, friends, and the fire falling from heaven to show the work approved of God! His great and prolonged services to the university and to the Church make it proper that the historic pages of this Review should give some record of his life and of his life work. It is fortunate, however, that the inadequacy of this brief sketch will, at an early day, be compensated by a worthy biography from the pen of his endeared friend and chosen biographer, the Rev. Dr. John C. Jackson, of Columbus, O. The aggregate results of the first year's agency for the university were not very great; and the agents, with others now from the North Ohio Conference, were continued in their work. Yet in 1844 the board of trustees thought it safe to open the school. The first faculty consisted of a nominal president and four active members, of whom two resigned at the end of the year. At the beginning of the second year, 1845, the board filled the vacancies. Professor McCabe was elected, on Professor Merrick's recommendation, to the chair of mathematics; and the late Bishop Harris, then pastor in Delaware, O., was elected to a place in the preparatory department. The board also established a new chair of natural sciences; and Professor Merrick was appointed to this position, and was put in charge of the school for one year, until Dr. Thomson, the president elect, should assume his place. This chair of natural sciences Professor Merrick occupied for six years. There was no apparatus, no laboratory for experimentation; but the skill of the professor showed itself superior to mere mechanical appliances. With native ingenuity he extemporized the necessary illustrations, or made his oral instruction so vivid and realistic that it served as a substitute for the physical experiment. The "boys" caught up his oft-repeated phrase-and it was a longcontinued saying of theirs-"It is sufficient to show." In 1851 he was transferred to the chair of moral philosophy, which he occupied for nine years more. In 1860, after President Thomson's resignation, Professor Merrick was elected president of the university, and held this position for thirteen years. 1867 he traveled in Europe, spending some time in Rome, whence he came home with greatly impaired health. For a year he was prostrated, and he never regained his full strength; but he held bravely on to his work for seven years longer. In 1873 he resigned the presidency, and, in accordance with his own preference, he was appointed lecturer on natural and revealed religion, with the rank of emeritus professor. This position he held for twenty-one years. For the larger part of this period he had regular class work, delivering courses of lectures on natural theology, evidences of Christianity, and international law. He kept up his work in the university as long as his physical strength held out; but five or six years ago he relinquished all academic duties. In As an educator, Professor Merrick was not encyclopedic in his learning, nor yet a specialist in the subjects which he taught. His manifold duties did not permit him an exhaustive knowledge of the matters of modern science or modern thought, but he had an acquaintance with them adequate for class work; he was a competent instructor, he was skillful in exposition, and he had the untiring zeal of a true teacher. Above all, he was |