Thomas Forsyth 1871-1894

FORSYTH, PENNOCK

Posted By: Sharon Elijah (email)
Date: 7/21/2018 at 07:22:08

3 May 1894 - West Branch Times

THOMAS B. FORSYTH was born at Colliersown, Rockbridge Co., Va., Aug. 9th, 1871, and died at the home of his sister Mrs. O. C. Pennock, on April 16th, 1894.

Thus in the bloom of his early manhood and with the apparent prospects of a long honorable and useful career. He was summoned hence to the power and more exalted service in the heavenly kingdom.

It is not necessary that we utter words of eulogy over his grave, nor would it be in harmony with his own wishes. The dead are not affected by the praises or denunciations of the living. It is the character of the man that exerts the influence while the man lives and the memory of that character that is potent for good or evil after his demise.

The impressions made upon our mind by contact with the living are what we retain after his death and only posthumous words spoken for or against have little weight. Still there is always comfort, and more or less satisfaction in thinking upon the good traits of character being displayed by one we have lost, and whom we respected or loved. And especially is there comfort when we have evidence that the departed was fully ready for the change, had hope in death.

Brother Forsyth had the greatest confidence in the promises of God with respect to the safety and well-being of the future. His light did not go out in darkness but simply unfolded into the larger and more perfect light of eternal day. With him the sinking behind the horizon of time was but the ascending into the clearer heavens of eternity.

Christ was his trust and joy, the one object of his being, and it mattered not to him whether he should be permitted to serve, for a while, in the earthly mission of the church, or should immediately be transferred to the worship of the Savior and the fellowship of the Saints in the courts of bliss.

With the apostle he could say: "But if I live in the flesh this is the fruit of my labor; yet what to choose I want not. For I am in a strait betwixt two; having a desire to depart and be with Christ which is far better."

In life he was modest and unpretentious. Never obtruding himself upon others nor making any loud or boastrous demonstration of his religious professions but he was always steadfast and reliable, ever ready to do what he could and never remiss in the performance of known duty.

Every one who came into his presence felt the influence of a superior moral character, and on leaving him had to say "Tommie is a good boy," his religion shines upon his countenance and evidences itself in his entire deportment."

How gentle, how kind, how affectionate, how ready to do, or suffer; what is the secret of that moral magnetism, that silent power and sublime trustfulness which make men acknowledge that here is a Christian though he is a man of few words, and never tries to make persons think him superior to others? What is that secret? It is a personal consciousness that christian faith is a living reality. That Christ is only served by incorporating into the life his spirit, and emulating his example, letting the being and the doing of the witness the faith and character. He was raised within the fold of the church, and from his earliest years had desires of Christian fidelity, tho' he did not personally become associated with the church until Sept. 1891, when he became a member of the Presbyterian church of his native town. On removing to Iowa in Oct. 1892, he transferred his membership to the Presbyterian church of West Branch, to which he belonged on the day of his death.

He was preceded to heaven by his mother, and will doubtless in God's own time be followed to the land of light and bliss by his aged and honored father and the three brothers and six sisters who are left to cherish his memory.

May God give the bereft ones the comfort of his grace. G.F.