Before Creed and Deed

 

Felix Adler

The young Felix Adler spoke at his father's temple (Emanu-el) on October 11, 1873.  This was an occasion of note, and the New York Times duly reported it on October 10 under the caption "City and Subsurban News":  

Rev. Dr. Felix Adler will preach at the Temple Emanuel, Fifth avenue and forty-second street to-morrow, at 10 A.M. (https://nyti.ms/4qUz461)

Adler's lecture, "The Temple of the Future," often referred to as the Temple Address, did not meet with universal acceptance by the Temple congregation (see Howard B. Radest, Toward Common Ground, pp. 13-15).   Indeed, in the aftermath of the lecture, Adler removed himself from consideration as a rabbi for Temple Emanu-El and seemed to be without a career.

The next Times report on Adler suggests, at least, a career as a public speaker.  On Monday, February 9, 1874, Adler spoke at Lyric Hall on Buddhism:  "The Life of Buddha---Lecture by Dr. Felix Adler" (https://nyti.ms/4gYH9C9).  The third and final pre-Ethical Culture lecture reported by the Times was datelined "Ithaca, Tuesday, June 30, 1874" and published the next day (https://nyti.ms/4xaCnHu).  While the lecture on Buddha seems likely to have been open to the public (Lyric Hall was a popular venue for lectures and other public events), the Ithaca lecture was reported as Adler's "inaugural" lecture, being given as a member of Cornell University's faculty, Professor of Hebrew and Oriental Literatue and History, noting that:  "The Professorship was established during the last term on a foundation of $20,000 given by Mr. Seligman, New-York."

The Cornell lecture touched on history, philosophy, psychology, and philology.  Of note for its contemporary relevance is the following passage:

Absorbed in the interests of the present, we forget too often that there was a yesterday, that there will be a to-morrow.  Consciousness of what we owe to the past, or what we hold in trust to the future, will sanctify our national life.  The duty of guarding, preservings, and if need be, correcting the national spirit belongs to the universities. [Emphasis added]

Adler did not come to the attention of the Times again until 1877, in the spring of the first "season" of the new New York Society for Ethical Culture.