It was that church which suggested to Emerson the leading thought in one of his most famous poems, "The Problem." In those days, when people were to be married the law required notice to be given of their intention by proclaiming it aloud in the church three Sundays in succession.

So just before the service began, the old town clerk would get up and proclaim: "There is a marriage intended between Mr.John Brown of this town and Miss Sarah Smith of Sudbury," and there was great curiosity in the congregation to hear the announcement.

The town clerk in my boyhood had been a wealthy old bachelor for whom the young ladies had set their caps in vain for two generations.
One day he astonished the congregation by proclaiming: "There is a marriage intended between Dr.Abiel Keywood"-- which was his own name--"and Miss Lucy P.Fay, both of Concord." That was before I can remember, as his boys were about my age.
Doctor Ripley, the minister in Concord, was an old man who had been settled there during the Revolutionary War and was over the parish sixty-two years.

He was an excellent preacher and scholar, and his kindly despotism was submitted to by the whole town.

His way of pronouncing would sound very queer now, though it was common then.