John White Chadwick

Chadwick was born in Marblehead, Massachusetts in 1840. He left school at age 13 and was apprenticed to a shoemaker for several years.^[1] In 1857 he opted to further his academic learning, and entered the State Normal School in Bridgewater, Massachusetts.^[2] After graduating in 1859, he attended Phillips Academy in Exeter, New Hampshire. By then he had chosen to become a minister, and enrolled in Harvard Divinity School.^[3] He graduated in July 1864. In December of that year, he was ordained and installed as minister of the Second Unitarian Church in Brooklyn, New York.^[1]

Chadwick's sermons attracted attention, and he developed a reputation as a radical preacher of Unitarian doctrines.^[4] His beliefs were in part shaped by his long friendship and correspondence with the radical Unitarian minister William Channing Gannett.^[5]

In 1876, Chadwick published his first book of poems and would continue to write poetry over subsequent decades. In 1885 he was elected Phi Beta Kappa poet at Harvard.^[4] For the occasion, he read his poem "A Legend of Good Poets".^[6] The following year he preached the alumni sermon at Harvard Divinity School.^[4] In 1888 he was awarded an honorary A.M. degree from Harvard.^[1]

He remained at the Second Unitarian Church until his death in Brooklyn on December 11, 1904.^[7]

In addition to contributing articles to Unitarian journals,^[4] Chadwick was a prolific author of books, producing over 30 in his lifetime.^[8] They consisted of his sermons and other theological writings (which were published in a series), historical and biographical monographs, and volumes of poetry. His best-known collection was titled A Book of Poems. First published in 1876, its tenth edition was released posthumously in 1905 by Little, Brown and Company.^[9]

His list of books include:

• Way, Truth, and Life: Sermons by N. A. Staples (Boston, 1870)
• The Great Salvation: A Sermon (New York, 1876)
• A Book of Poems (Boston, 1876)
• Thomas Paine: The Method and Value of His Religious Teachings (New York, 1877)
• The Bible of To-day (New York, 1878)
• The Faith of Reason: A Series of Discourses on Leading Topics of Religion (Boston, 1879)
• The State of the Nation: A Sermon (New York, 1879)
• Some Aspects of Religion (New York, 1879)
• An Educated Will (New York, 1881)
• The Man Jesus: A Course of Lectures (Boston, 1881)
• Belief and Life (New York, 1881)
• Origin and Destiny (Boston, 1883)
• In Nazareth Town, a Christmas Fantasy, and Other Poems (Boston, 1883)
• A Daring Faith (Boston, 1885)
• The Good Voices: Poems (New York, 1885)
• Birth and Triumph of Cupid, with verses by J.W.C. (New York, 1885)
• Gnostics and Agnostics: A Sermon (Boston, 1886)
• The Two Voices: Poems of the Mountains and the Sea (New York, 1886)
• The Revelation of God and Other Sermons (Boston, 1889)
• Charles Robert Darwin (Boston, 1889)
• Evolution and Social Reform (New York, 1890)
• The Power of an Endless Life and Other Sermons (Boston, 1891)
• Evolution as Related to Citizenship (New York, 1892)
• Seeing and Being and Other Sermons (Boston, 1893)
• George William Curtis: An Address by John White Chadwick (New York, 1893)
• Old and New Unitarian Belief (Boston, 1894)
• Power and Use (Boston, 1896)
• A Life For Liberty: Anti-Slavery and Other Letters of Sallie Holley (New York, 1899)
• Theodore Parker, Preacher and Reformer (Boston, 1900)
• Women of the Bible (New York, 1900)
• William Ellery Channing: Minister of Religion (New York, 1903)
• Later Poems, by John White Chadwick (Boston, 1905)