HE portrait of Father Taylor has been already drawn by some master hands. Miss Martineau, who visited America in 1835, thus gives a full description of him, and pourtrays his original and remarkable power: "Of the last class of originals,-those who are not only strong to form a purpose in life and fulfil it, but who are driven by pressure of circumstance to put forth their whole force for the control of other destinies than their own-there is no more conspicuous example than Father Taylor, as he is called. In America there is no need to explain who Father Taylor is. He is known in England, but not extensively. Father Taylor is the seaman's apostle. He was a sailor-boy himself; and at twenty years old was unable to read. He rose in his calling, and at length became full of some religious convictions which he longed to express. He has found a mode of expression, and is happy. He is one of the busiest and most cheerful of men; and of all preachers living, probably the most eloquent to those whom his preaching suits. So it would appear from events. I heard him called a second homely Jeremy Taylor; and I certainly doubt whether Jeremy Taylor himself could more absolutely sway the minds and hearts of the learned and pious of his day than the seaman's friend does those of his flock. He has a great advantage over other preachers in being able to speak to his hearers from the ground of their common experience; in being able to appeal to his own sea-life. He can say, 'You have lodged with me in the forecastle; did you ever know me profane ?' You have seen me land from a long voyage. Where did I betake myself? Am not I a proof that a sea-life need not be soiled with vice on land?' All this gives him some power; but it would be little without the prodigious force which he carries in his magnificent intellect and earnest heart. "It seems as if his power was resorted to in desperate cases, like that of a superior being; such surprising facts was I told of his influence over his flock. He was requested to visit an insane man, who believed himself to be in heaven, and therefore to have no need of food and sleep. The case had become desperate, so long had the fasting and restlessness continued. Father Taylor prevailed at once: the patient was presently partaking of 'the feast of the blessed,' with Father Taylor, and enjoying the 'saints' rest on a heavenly couch.' From carrying a single point like this to redeeming a whole class from much of the vice and woe which had hitherto afflicted it, the pastor's power seems universally to prevail. "Mr. Taylor has a remarkable person. He is stoutly built, and looks more like a skipper than a preacher. His face is hard and weather-beaten, but with an expression of sensibility, as well as acuteness, which it is wonderful that features apparently so immovable can convey. He uses a profusion of action. His wife told me that she thought his health was promoted by his taking so much exercise in the shape of action in conversation as well as in the pulpit. He is very loud and prodigiously rapid. His splendid thoughts come faster than he can speak them; and at times he would be totally overwhelmed by them, if, in the midst of his most rapid utterance of them, a burst of tears, of which he is wholly unconscious, did not aid in his relief. I have seen them streaming, bathing his face, when his words breathed the very spirit of joy, and every tone of his voice was full of exhilaration. His pathos, shed in thoughts and tones so fleeting as to be gone like lightning, is the most awful of his powers. I have seen a single clause of a short sentence call up an instantaneous flush on the hundreds of hard faces turned to the preacher; and it is no wonder to me that the widow and orphan are cherished by those who hear his prayers for them. The tone of his petitions is importunate-even passionate; and his sailor hearers may be forgiven for their faith, that Father Taylor's prayers cannot be refused. Never, however, was anything stranger than some particulars of his prayers. I have told elsewhere* how importunately he prayed for rain, in fear of conflagration,—and, as it happened, the Sunday before the great New York fire. With such petitions, urged with every beauty of expression, he mixes up whatever may have struck his fancy during the week, whether mythology, politics, housewifery, or anything else. He prayed one day, when dwelling on the moral perils of seamen, 'that Bacchus and Venus might be driven to the end of the earth, and off of it.' I heard him pray that members of Congress might be preserved from buffoonery. Thence he passes to supplication, offered in a spirit of sympathy which may appear bold at another moment, but which is true to the emotions of the hour. 'Father, look upon us. We are a widow!' 'Father, the mother's heart thou knowest; the mother's bleeding heart thou pitiest. Sanctify to us the removal of this lamb!' "The eloquence of his sermons was somewhat the less amazing to me from my feeling, that, if there be inspiration in the world it arises from being so listened to. It was not like the preaching of Whitefield; for all was quiet in Father Taylor's church. There were no groans, few tears, and those unconsciously shed, rolling down the upturned face, which never for a moment looked away from the preacher. His voice was the only sound,- -now tremendously loud and rapid, overpowering the senses; now melting into a tenderness like that of a mother's wooings of her infant. The most striking discourse I heard from him was on the text, 'That This is the incident referred to. It is found in Society in America, the English edition, vol. ii. p. 254: American, vol. ii. p. 70. "For many days preceding this fire, the weather had been intensely cold, the thermometer standing at Boston 17 degrees below zero. On the Sunday before (13th of December, 1855), I went to hear the Seamen's friend, Father Taylor, asihe is called, preach at the Sailors' Chapel, in Boston. His eloquence is of a peculiar kind, especially in his prayers, which are absolutely importunate with regard to even external objects of desire. Part of his prayer this day was, 'Give us water, water! The brooks refuse to murmur, and the streams are dead. Break up the fountains; open the secret springs that Thy hand knoweth, and give us water, water! Let us not perish by a famine of water, or a deluge of conflagration; for we dread the careless wandering spark."" |