In 1839, he began the study of theology under advice of Alonzo Potter (afterward bishop of Pennsylvania), and prepared for orders.

While he was occupied in duty here, fishery failure and potato blight brought a severe famine upon the people (1846), during which Lowell's medical training proved to be especially useful.

In 1873 he became professor of the Latin language and literature in Union College, Schenectady, New York, and discharged the duties of that department for six years.

[1] Lowell's publications are The New Priest in Conception Bay (Boston, 1858; new ed., illustrated by F. O. C. Darley, 1863), Fresh Hearts That Failed Three Thousand Years Ago, and Other Poems (1860), Antony Brade, a Story of School-Boy Life (1874), Burgoyne's March, the poem at the Saratoga county centennial celebration at Bemis Heights (1877), and A Story or Two from a Dutch Town (1878).

One of his most striking productions, "A Raft That No Man Made", is an imaginative story, which a year or two after its publication was almost exactly paralleled by the actual experience of a portion of the crew of the Polaris.