In the preceding June I had received my freedom suit of clothes--blue
coat, bright buttons, black trousers, and buff vest. They were made by
Daniel Cross, of Fitchburg, and, when in 1884, I visited that town, and
found him still engaged in the business, I ordered a dress suit from
his hand.
III
CHANGES AND PROGRESS
As I pass in this record from my childhood and early youth to the
responsibilities of life, I am led to some reflections upon the changes
in opinions and the changes in the condition of the people in the more
than half-century from 1835 to 1899. At the first period there was not
a clergyman of any of the Protestant denominations who questioned the
plenary and verbal inspiration of the Scriptures, including the Old and
New Testaments. The suggestion could not have safely been made in any
New England pulpit that there were errors of translation, and yet the
Christian world, outside the Catholic Church, now accepts a revision
that changes the meaning of some passages and excludes others as
interpolations. The account given in the first chapter of Genesis of
the creation of the world and of man was accepted according to the
meaning of the language used. At the present moment there is not a
well-educated clergyman of any denomination who would not either treat
the account as a legend, or else explain the days as periods of
indefinite duration.
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