LETTER OF
The GOSPEL TRUTH CHARLES G. FINNEY
1870
To Lewis Tappan
1870
[Published in Lewis Tappan, The Life of Arthur Tappan (New York: Hurd & Houghton, 1870), Appendix 8, page 421.]
LETTER FROM REV. C. G. FINNEY.
In a letter to the compiler from Mr. Finney, of a recent date, he says: "I regard Arthur Tappan as one of the best men I ever knew. He was as modest as he was good. I am happy to hear that you are preparing a sketch of his life. Will you lay aside all fear of being accused of too highly appreciating a brother, and let the church have the whole portrait? Tell us all about his appropriations for Christ and humanity, and the opposition he met with on that account. Do you know that he paid the expense of getting up and running Sabbath-schools, by the students that left Lane Seminary? Mr Streeter, one of them, mentioned the fact here at a public meeting two years ago, and said that until Mr. Tappan's death, the matter was, by his request, kept secret. Mr. Streeter spoke of the amount given as considerable. You are aware that just before I was invited to Oberlin, he was urging me to come West long enough to take that class through a course of theology. To furnish rooms and whatever was requisite, and he would defray the expense.. . . . Many have since 'given much of their abundance,' but who among them as privately and of course as unostentatiously pledged his whole income for church and humanity. The magnificent donations of Peabody and others do not compare relatively with Arthur Tappan's. I see that Joshua Leavitt is requested to write a history of the anti-slavery movement. He will do as well as any man unacquainted with the influence of Oberlin on the whole Northwest. The fact is that Oberlin turned the scale in all of the Northwest. No man can tell the story right unless he knows this. Although Arthur Tappan failed to do for Oberlin all that he intended, yet his promise was the condition of the existence of Oberlin as it has been. God bless you.
"C. G. FINNEY."