He united with the church of Christ in Yale College at the age of twenty two, when he was tutor, and for nearly half a century has adorned the doctrine he then professed. As to his religious principles, they were those of our Pilgrim Fathers, in which he had been educated. He loved and revered the Puritan doctrine and the Puritan character. Nor did he adopt his principles merely from traditional authority or hereditary attachment. His great mind could receive nothing for truth, without inquiry and evidence. So thorough had this investigation been on his part, that there were few abler theologians than he, even among the clergy. Hence he was intelligent, earnest and steadfast in his religious opinions. Without bigotry, with the most catholic spirit, with hearty love for all of every name who love the Lord Jesus Christ in sincerity, he was himself a Congregationalist and a Calvinist of the school of Edwards, Dwight and Scott. These views he adopted because he believed them to be taught in the Scriptures, and to accord with his own religious experience. He felt that by the grace of God he was what he was. He was a man of prayer; and he prayed with all prayer, in the closet, the family, and the Christian assembly. He had great confidence in its efficacy, and believed the promises made to it. He was clothed with humility, that most fundamental of Christian virtues. Indeed his modest, unassuming, unobtrusive spirit and manner, impressed all who became acquainted with him; it made his greatness still greater, and lent to it its peculiar charm, its crowning glory. He maintained the strictest integrity and uprightness in all his public, private and professional transactions. He scrupulously adhered to truth, fulfilled his promises, abstained from any which he could not fulfill, would not sell his conscience for office or emolument, and discouraged what seemed to him to be groundless litigation. He was remarkably kind and benevolent in his disposition, and free from the malevolent passions. He was mild, courteous, and benignant in his deportment, compassionate and tender towards the unfortunate and distressed, condescending and affable to all--not appalling even the humblest. He lent a charm and a dignity to the society in which he moved--of which he was always fond--which he illuminated and enlivened by his capacious mind and his high conversational powers. Nor will it be deemed an improper invasion of the sacredness of domestic grief, if I say, that he was a model of parental and conjugal love, tenderness and fidelity.