Talk:Henry van Dyke Jr.

Untitled
I recently bought a Harper's Magazine article published in 1880 by a Henry van Dyke. Does anyone know if this could be the same person?

WFD It very well could be he was a prolific writer and was well thought of in his time.

I've seen "Parable of Immortality" (sometimes called "Gone from my Sight") attributed to Van Dyke all over the place...but sometimes to other authors as well. (e.g. Bishop Brent and Col David Marcus). I'm unable to find the poem or essay in the works that have so far been added to Project Gutenberg, though Van Dyke was prolific, and assuredly there are hi books that haven't appeared there yet. Does anyone know for certain that this is his, and can cite the collection it first appeared in?

I haven't time to research it, but it seems there must be an error in the article: if it's the same Henry van Dyke it doesn't seem likely, unless he was remarkably precocious, that he was born in 1852 and "[enumerated] his sentiments in an 1860 sermon entitled 'The Character and Influence of Abolitionism'" at the age of 8. Celad (talk) 11:47, 19 March 2010 (UTC)


 * Henry van Dykes father had the same name, and lived from 1822 to 1891 (see NNDB). I previously deleted the following from this article because I thought it pertained to the father.  I might have been wrong about some of the information. MissionInn.Jim (talk) 13:44, 11 June 2010 (UTC)


 * Van Dyke's "Essays in Application" (1905) was quoted by Jack London in the dystopian novel "The Iron Heel". London disliked Van Dyke's ideas, but paid him the compliment of predicting that his writings would still be remembered six hundred years into the future and be cited by a Twenty-Sixth Century writer as "an example of bourgeois thinking".


 * Specifically, London took issue with van Dyke's statement "'The Bible teaches that God owns the world. He distributes to every man according to His own good pleasure, conformably to general laws.'"


 * This London considered as similar to the statement of the Charleston Baptist Association in the 1830's, which justified slavery on theological grounds.
 * Van Dyke supported slaveholders and was against abolition prior to the Civil War, enumerating his sentiments in an 1860 sermon ( He gave this sermon when he was eight years old!!? ) entitled "The Character and Influence of Abolitionism" that was printed in the New York Herald. He set forth four main points in his arguement to undermine the abolitionist cause: "'Abolitionism has no foundation in the Scriptures. Its principles have been promulgated by misrepresentation and abuse. It leads, in multitudes of cases, and by a logical process, to utter infidelity. It is the chief cause of the strife that agitates and the danger that threatens our country.'"


 * Van Dyke saw slavery as supported by scripture in both the Old and New Testament and as a healthy economic system for the South. He viewed the abolitionist movement as a force that was tearing the Union apart as well as blaspheming the Christian religion by attempting to use it to demonstrate the sinfulness of slavery.

Reply, with further details
Henry Jackson Van Dyke, Sr., was born in Abington, Pennsylvania, 2 March 1822. He was educated at the University of Pennsylvania, graduating there in 1843 and later graduating from Princeton Theological Seminary in 1846. He was ordained by the Third Presbytery of Philadelphia in June of 1845 and installed as pastor of the Second Presbyterian Church at Bridgeton, New Jersey, where he served from 1845-1852. He was next called to pastor the First Presbyterian Church of Germantown, PA, but only served there briefly, 1852-1853. His his final and longest pastorate was at the First Presbyterian Church (Oddly, later renamed the Second Presbyterian Church) of Brooklyn, New York, 1853-1891. He died in Brooklyn on 25 May 1891. Honors conferred during his life included the Doctor of Divinity degree, awarded by Westminster College of Fulton, Missouri, 1865. In 1876, he served as Moderator of the 88th General Assembly of the PCUSA, as it met in Brooklyn, NY, just seven years after the reunion of the Old School and New School divisions of that denomination.

The Special Collections Department at Princeton University houses the Henry Van Dyke Family collection, which include materials by Henry Jackson Van Dyke, Sr. His papers include manuscripts of sermons (1844-1891), essays, speeches, Bible lessons, and theological notes. The correspondence subseries contains many letters to Van Dyke from clergymen, parishioners, friends, and family, often regarding the controversy caused by his publication of The Character and Influence of Abolitionism, the Reunion movement in the Church, and matters of the General Assembly. Men such as N. C. Burt, Howard Crosby, Cyrus Dickson, William H. Green, James O. Murray, E. D. Prime, and Nathaniel West are representative of Van Dyke's correspondents. Searches on the Web tend almost entirely to only produce results dealing with his son, a well known author and poet of his era, who was theologically a moderate liberal. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Wsparkman (talk • contribs) 17:52, 6 December 2014 (UTC)

External links modified
Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified one external link on Henry van Dyke Jr.. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20100104032601/http://www.pabook.libraries.psu.edu/palitmap/bios/van_dyke__henry.html to http://pabook.libraries.psu.edu/palitmap/bios/Van_Dyke__Henry.html

When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.

Cheers.— InternetArchiveBot  (Report bug) 15:41, 2 November 2017 (UTC)