Barnes, Albert
BARNES, ALBERT: Presbyterian; b. at Rome,
N. Y., Dec. 1, 1798; d. at West Philadelphia Dec.
24, 1870. He was graduated at Hamilton College,
Clinton, N. Y., in 1820, and at Princeton
Theological Seminary, 1823; was ordained pastor of the
Presbyterian church at Morristown, N. J., 1825;
was pastor of the First Presbyterian Church,
Philadelphia, 1830-67, when he resigned and was made
pastor emeritus. He was an advocate of total
abstinence and the abolition of slavery and worked
actively in the Sunday-school cause. In 1835 he
was brought to trial for heresy by the Second
Presbytery of Philadelphia upon ten specifications
(given in E. H. Gillett, History of the Presbyterian
Church, revised ed., ii, Philadelphia, n.d.,
pp. 473-474), but was acquitted. Appeal was then
made to the Synod of Philadelphia (1835) and he
was suspended from the ministry until he should
repent of his errors. He appealed to the General
Assembly of 1836 and the decision of the Synod
was reversed. The agitation still continued and the
trial was one of the active causes of the disruption
of the Presbyterian church in the United States in
1837 (see
Presbyterians)
and Mr. Barnes was a leader of the New School party;
yet he lived to rejoice in the reunion in 1870. His
Notes on the entire New Testament and on
portions of the Old (Notes Explanatory and
Practical on the New Testament, 11 vols.,
Philadelphia, 1832-53; revised edition, 6 vols.,
New York, 1872; Isaiah, 2 vols., 1840;
Job, 2 vols., 1844; Daniel, 1853; The
Book of Psalms, 3 vols., 1868), designed
originally for his congregation in Philadelphia,
were eminently fitted for popular use and more
than one million copies were sold; they are not
original, but show much patient and conscientious
labor. Other publications were
Scriptural Views of Slavery (Philadelphia, 1846);
The Church and Slavery (1857);
The Atonement in its Relation to Law and Moral
Government (1859);
The Way of Salvation (1863);
Lectures on the Evidences of Christianity in the
Nineteenth Century (New York, 1868);
Prayers for the Use of Families (1870);
Life at Three Score and Ten (1871).