Inspirational Quotes by Charles Henry Parkhurst (American Clergyman)

Charles Henry Parkhurst (1842–1933) was an American Presbyterian clergyman and social reformer. An eloquent speaker, he was celebrated for blowing the whistle on the political corruption and the associations between politicians, police officers, and others who violated the law within New York City’s Democratic Party-controlled government.

Born in Framingham, Massachusetts, Parkhurst graduated from Amherst College in 1866 and served for three years as the principal of Amherst High School. He studied philosophy and theology at Halle and Leipzig in Germany. After serving for five years as a Presbyterian minister of the Congregational church at Lenox, Massachusetts, Parkhurst was appointed the pastor of the Madison Square Presbyterian Church in New York City, a post he held until 1918.

Parkhurst’s sermons in 1892 condemned the political corruption of the New York City government, and he became president of the Society for the Prevention of Crime. His statements led to the exposure of political corruption in Tammany Hall, the Democratic Party political organization that unduly shaped New York City and New York State politics. Social and political reforms ensued after many civic organizations and newspapers joined Parkhurst’s endeavor. His preaching influenced the climate of reform in other American cities, as well.

For the next two decades, Parkhurst remained a successful minister, occasionally speaking about morals in government, but confining himself mostly to pastoral affairs.

Parkhurst died by sleepwalking off the porch roof of his home Atlantic City, New Jersey. His notable works about social and political reform include Our Fight with Tammany (1895) and My Forty Years in New York (1923.) His volumes of sermons are The Sunny Side of Christianity (1901,) A Little Lower than the Angels (1908,) and The Pulpit and the Pew (1913.)

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