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 PK. GTTHRIE. 
 
 FATHER MATHEW. 
 
 ELIHI; BURRITT. 
 
 JOSEPH LIVESEY.
 
 THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 Dr. Guthrie. 
 
 Father Mathew. Elihu Burritt. 
 Joseph Livesey. 
 
 BY 
 
 JOHN WILLIAM KIRTON, LL.D., 
 
 Author of" Buy your man Cherries," " Happy Homes, and How to Make 
 them," $c. $c. 
 
 CASSELL & COMPANY, LIMITED 
 
 (.ONDON, PARIS, NEW YORK 6- MELBOURNE. 
 
 [ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.] 
 
 1885.
 
 HV 
 
 CONTENTS 
 
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 ^ DR. GUTHRIE 5 
 
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 w FATHER MATHEW ... 25 
 
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 ELIHU BURRITT 65 
 
 x JOSEPH LIVESEY 9.5 
 
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 4G1459
 
 DR. GUTHRIE, 
 
 SCOTLAND'S TEMPERANCE WORTHY. 
 
 IT is a remarkable fact that the two things with 
 which Dr. Guthrie's name is most widely known, 
 Temperance and Ragged Schools, should both have 
 had their origin in what appears at first sight to 
 be very insignificant circumstances ; but so it was, as 
 appears from the account he gives of how they came 
 about 
 
 " It is rather curious, at least to me," he says, " that 
 it was by a picture that I was first led to take an 
 interest in Ragged Schools, a picture in an old, obscure, 
 decaying burgh, that stands on the shore of the Firth 
 of Forth. I had gone thither with a companion on 
 a pilgrimage ; not that there was any beauty about 
 the place, for it had no beauty. It has little trade ; 
 its deserted harbour, silent streets, and old houses, 
 some of them nodding to their fall, give indications 
 of decay. But one circumstance has redeemed it 
 from obscurity, and will preserve its name to the 
 latest ages. It was the birthplace of Thomas 
 Chalmers. I went to see the place (it is many
 
 6 THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 years ago), and going into an inn for refreshments, 
 I found the room covered with pictures of shepherd- 
 esses with their crooks, and tars in holiday attire, 
 not very interesting. But above the chimney-piece 
 there stood a large print, more respectable than its 
 neighbours, which the skipper, the captain of one of 
 the few ships that trade between that town and 
 England, had probably brought there. It represented 
 a cobbler's room ; the cobbler was there himself, 
 spectacles on his nose, an old shoe between his knees, 
 that massive forehead and firm mouth expressing 
 great determination of character, and below his bushy 
 eyebrows benevolence gleamed out on a number of 
 poor ragged boys and girls, who stood at their lessons 
 around the busy cobbler. My curiosity was excited, 
 and in the inscription I read how this man, John 
 Pounds, a cobbler in Portsmouth, taking pity on the 
 poor ragged children, left by ministers and magis- 
 trates, and ladies and gentlemen, to run the streets, 
 had, like a good shepherd, gathered in the wretched 
 outcasts ; how he had brought them to God and the 
 world ; and how, while earning his bread by the 
 sweat of his brow, he had rescued from misery, and 
 saved to society, not less than five hundred of these 
 children. I felt ashamed of myself for the little I had 
 done." 
 
 Subsequently Dr. Guthrie paid a visit to the town 
 of Portsmouth, and while there he says, " I went to a 
 place I have great interest in, St. Mary's Street. I
 
 DR. GUTHRIE. 7 
 
 went along that street till I came to a very, humble 
 part of the town. I paused at the shop of the man 
 in whose history I felt so deep an interest. I went 
 into the shop. It was a cobbler's shop. I think it 
 was about ten feet long and seven wide, and there 
 worked the poor cobbler. Before that man was laid 
 in his grave he was the means of saving not fewer 
 than five hundred children from eternal ruin, and 
 making them useful members of society ; and he did 
 that without fee or reward, without praise, without 
 pay, without notice ; but that man has run into 
 celebrity since he was laid in his grave. The man 
 I refer to was* John Pounds, the founder of Ragged 
 Schools. There was a poor cobbler who had his 
 shop running over with children. He was to get 
 .nothing for it. Yet he used to entice the boys 
 to come in ; and if a boy happened to be Irish, 
 he might have been seen holding a smoking potato 
 under the urchin's nose in order to get him to come 
 to school." 
 
 Such an incident clearly teaches that we should 
 never despise small opportunities, or feeble means, if 
 we wish to accomplish any good in the world ; inas- 
 much as, in all directions, we can find how true it is, 
 that if we want a field in which to labour, we can find 
 it anywhere. 
 
 Again, when speaking of the circumstances by 
 which he was induced to give his attention to the 
 Temperance cause, and in which he was able to accom-
 
 8 THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 plish so much good, he says, " I take peculiar interest 
 in the cabmen, whom I take to be second cousins to 
 the carmen of Ireland, to one of whom, in a good 
 measure, I owe it that I am an abstainer. It is 
 twenty-two years since I first visited Ireland. I went 
 with Mr. C. J. Brown and Mr. Bridges as a 
 deputation. In this journeying we reached a town 
 called Omagh, whence we had to travel through 
 a mountainous country to another place called Cocton. 
 The day was one of the worst possible, with bitter cold 
 and lashing rain. Half-way there stood a small inn, 
 into which we went, as a sailor in stress of weather 
 runs into the first haven. These were the days, not 
 of toast and tea, but when it was thought that the 
 best cure for a wet coat and of a cold body was a 
 tumbler of toddy, and we no sooner got within the 
 inn than the toddy was ordered. We took our toddy, 
 and, no doubt, in moderation. But if we, with all our 
 wraps on, were in an uncomfortable state, far more 
 uncomfortable was our half-ragged carman ; if we 
 were drenched, he was drowned. Of course, we felt 
 for our courteous and civil driver, and we thought 
 what was sauce for the goose was sauce for the 
 gander, and we offered him a glass ; but the carman 
 was not such a gander as we, like geese, took him 
 for ; to our perfect amazement, not one drop of the 
 toddy would he touch. He said, " I am an abstainer, 
 and will take no toddy." Well, that stuck in my 
 throat, and it went to my heart and (though in another
 
 DR. 
 
 sense than drink) to my head. That and other cir- 
 cumstances made me a teetotaler." 
 
 It was in the old, quiet Scottish burgh of Brechin that 
 Thomas Guthrie was born, on the I2th of July, 1803, 
 and it was there he chiefly spent the first twenty-seven 
 years of his life. In his writings he indicates what a 
 strong hold the place had on his affections to the last 
 Every year he visited it several times, and enjoyed the 
 kindly welcome and salutations which he always 
 received from group after group as he met them. 
 Among other things he says, " I remember when a boy 
 there was not a working man who had a watch. 
 There were only two gold watches, and they were the 
 wonder of the place ; but now the working men have 
 all their watches." 
 
 He was the twelfth child, and the sixth son, of 
 David Guthrie. His mother's maiden name was 
 Clementina Cay. Thirteen children were born to 
 them, of whom ten grew up. It is impossible to 
 overstate the influence which his mother exercised 
 over him. He never spoke of her but with profound 
 reverence ; nor is this to be wondered at when, as one 
 says, he was not unmindful of the source from which 
 he and his family originated, as may be gathered from 
 the following statement. "Through my ancestors, 
 so far as I can trace them," said Dr. Guthrie when 
 writing about his forefathers, " I can claim to be the 
 seed of the righteous, a higher honour than the ' blue 
 blood ' some boast of, though why noble blood should
 
 io THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 be called ' blue ' which is venous or polluted blood, I 
 have yet to learn." 
 
 Like many other noble men, he could trace much 
 of the influence which governed his life to his mother. 
 The following is his own testimony : 
 
 " It was at my mother's knee that I first learned to 
 pray ; there I learned to form a reverence for the 
 Bible as the inspired Word of God, that I learned to 
 hold the sanctity of the Sabbath, that I learned the 
 peculiarities of the Scottish religion, that I learned 
 my regard to the principles of civil and religious 
 liberty, which have made me hate oppression, and 
 whether it be a pope, or a prelate, or a patron, or an 
 ecclesiastical demagogue, I resist the oppressor." 
 
 While yet an infant he had quite a serious illness, 
 and was brought back, very unexpectedly, from the 
 very gates of death, and when a boy he had a narrow 
 escape from death by accident, when wading across a 
 swollen river with another boy on his back. Getting 
 dizzy and falling off, the boy lost his presence of 
 mind, and striking out with his hands and feet, and 
 bellowing like a madman as he lay floating, fast in the 
 grip of Guthrie, on the top of the flood. It was with 
 the utmost difficulty they both were able to reach the 
 shore. 
 
 On another occasion, during his ministry at Arbirlot, 
 he went down to the sea-side among the rocks at 
 Arbroath when the waves were running, as it is said, 
 " mountains high," and missed his footing. That
 
 DR. GUTHRIE. ii 
 
 very day he had fortunately had the heels of his boots 
 armed with iron, and it came to his mind like a flash 
 of lightning that by pressing his heels firmly he might 
 catch against a piece of the rock and be saved ; he did 
 so, and was plucked from the jaws of death as by a 
 miracle. 
 
 On another occasion, while playing with his 
 brother Charles with a gun, not knowing it was loaded, 
 and snapping the flint and pointing it at each other, 
 to their horror it went off, but fortunately the charge 
 lodged deep in a wall. 
 
 Books for the young were comparatively scarce 
 when Dr. Guthrie was a boy. Almost the only one 
 interesting to the young mind was the " Pilgrim's 
 Progress." But, as he adds, the case is so different 
 now, that " with the variety and piquancy and at- 
 tractiveness of books nowadays, provided for 
 Sabbath use, there is no excuse for people, whether 
 old or young, seeking relaxation in museums or 
 public gardens or Sunday excursions, or saying that 
 the Sabbath is a weariness, and wishing it were over. 
 As for the plea set up for Sabbath walks and 
 excursions for the sake of health by the working 
 classes, there is no truth in it. If women would spend 
 less on finery and men on whisky and tobacco, they 
 could spare an hour or two every day for more than 
 all the relaxation which health requires ; Sabbath 
 keepers have happier homes and longer lives than 
 Sabbath breakers."
 
 12 THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 When only four years old he was sent to what 
 might be called an infants' school ; the fees were helpful 
 to the teacher, a good Christian man. Having learnt 
 his letters, and some small words printed on a fly- 
 sheet of the Shorter Catechism, he was then passed 
 into the Book of Proverbs, which was the usual 
 method in those days, and one which it would have 
 been well never to have given up. Speaking of 
 this in after life, Dr. Guthrie says, " That book is 
 without a rival for beginners, containing quite a re- 
 pository of monosyllables and pure Saxon 'English 
 undefiled.' .... While learning the art of reading 
 by that Book of Proverbs, we had our minds stored 
 with the highest moral truths ; and, by sage advices 
 applicable to all the ages and departments of life, the 
 branch, while it was supple, received a bent in a 
 direction highly favourable to future well-doing and 
 success in life." The patience, prudence, foresight, 
 economy which mark the " canny Scotch," and which 
 so often help them to rise in the world, he says, are 
 largely due to their thus being engrained in youth and 
 childhood with the practical wisdom enshrined in the 
 Book of Proverbs. 
 
 At the age of twelve he had to leave home for 
 college. Speaking of the time when he had thus to 
 start out for a city he had never seen, and where one 
 day he was to be known so well, he says, " That event- 
 ful morning when we first left a father's house, and 
 as the gates of that happy sanctuary slowly opened
 
 DR. GUTHRIE. 13 
 
 for our departure, amid tears and many a kind fare- 
 well, watched by a father's anxious eye, and followed 
 by a mother's prayers, we pushed out our bark on the 
 swell of life's tempestuous sea. That day, the turning- 
 time of many a young man's history, the crisis of his 
 destiny, may have exerted an influence as permanent 
 on our fate as its impression remains indelible in our 
 memory." It was no easy task to accomplish in those 
 days. There were no steamboats, railways, and only 
 few stage coaches. Lads were very glad of a life 
 in a carrier's cart to help them on their way. His 
 lodgings, including cost for coals, attendance, and cook- 
 ing, only came to 53. or 6s a week ; the usual fare for 
 living was tea once, oatmeal porridge twice a day, 
 and for dinner, fresh herrings and potatoes. Butchers' 
 meat only was indulged in about twice during the 
 whole of the first session at college. No wonder, he 
 tells us, that " six of us had a common table, and we 
 used to make up for the outlay of occasional suppers by 
 dinners of potatoes and ox livers, which we reckoned 
 cost us only three half-pence a head. Sydney Smith," 
 he adds, " might joke about a Scotsman cultivating 
 the arts and sciences on oatmeal, but the struggle 
 which many an ambitious lad makes to fight his way 
 on through college is a feather in the cap of our 
 country." It will thus be seen he was not ashamed 
 to own the humble position and honest struggles of 
 his early days. 
 
 Like another eminent man who rose from a very
 
 14 THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 humble position (Dr. Carey, the famous missionary) 
 Dr. Guthrie believed in the importance of plodding, 
 "the genius of plod." On one occasion he said, "I 
 would remind you that there is no royal road to 
 knowledge ; all must work to learn knowledge as well 
 as to learn trades ; learning is only to be got by work, 
 and-you may think me rather professional, but I will 
 give you an illustration how difficulties are got over 
 by hard perseverance. A minister who had got no 
 memory was asked how he was able to get his sermons 
 by heart. ' Why,' replied he, ' I just sit down 
 doggedly to it.' The young men who attend these 
 apprentice schools must just do the same ; for, as Sir 
 Joshua Reynolds said, ' it is not given to man to 
 attain excellence in anything but as the effect of 
 labour.' Some young men believe they have genius ; 
 but I believe every man of genius on this platform 
 will agree with me, that the finest genius is like 
 the richest soil, if you do not manure it, it will 
 run out. If knowledge cannot accumulate in the 
 mind, a man will soon find himself at the end of 
 his thread." 
 
 Before he was sixteen he had finished his four 
 years' curriculum of literature and philosophy, and 
 left college at the age when most youths nowa- 
 days are about entering it. Among other things for 
 which he was thankful, he says, " My father was 
 prudent enough to keep me veiy short of money, and 
 always required me, at the close of the session, on my
 
 DR. GuTiikiE. 15 
 
 return home, to account for every penny I received. 
 And for this, which I may have thought hard at the 
 time, I now bless his memory." Altogether it took 
 him eight years to run his college course, and two 
 additional years before he was licensed to preach, and 
 after that he was five years before he obtained a 
 presentation to a church. Fifteen years of his life 
 were spent at no small cost ; and even then he had a 
 "starving" rather than a living, as he calls a minister's 
 profession. 
 
 Meantime he had to enter the bank, in which he 
 passed " two busy but not lost years." He considered 
 these as not the least valuable part of his training and 
 education. 
 
 Once, when speaking in Dundee, he referred to 
 these early struggles in the following graphic manner. 
 " I don't intend to give you any learned discussion on 
 commerce. The truth is, that is rather out of my line, 
 and I won't meddle with it in that way ; not that I 
 am altogether ignorant of commerce, either. I don't 
 want any of you to understand that I was a banker 
 two years, and Mr. David Milne, formerly of the 
 Union Bank, said when I left that profession (for if 
 nobody will praise me I must praise myself), that if I 
 preached as well as I banked, I would get on re- 
 markably well ; so you see I am not so ignorant of 
 these things as one of my brethren with whom I was 
 sitting one day. He took up a newspaper and began 
 reading ; when he came upon ' Sound ' intelligence,
 
 16 THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 which you Dundee people all know means the ships 
 that pass through the 'Sound,' 'Why,' says he, 
 " what do they mean by Sound ? Is it intelligence 
 that may be relied on ? " 
 
 Nor was his knowledge confined to this subject, as 
 he plainly goes on to say, " Neither am I so ignorant 
 of agricultural affairs. At least I have been in the 
 habit of testing the agricultural knowledge of my 
 brethren in the Church by asking them how many 
 teeth a cow has in her front upper jaw, and they don't 
 know a bit about it ; they don't know that a cow has 
 no teeth in her front upper jaw at all. Some of them 
 guessed half-a-dozen, and some of them a whole dozen. 
 They were all as ignorant as an old friend of mine in 
 the city of Brechin, who wished to have a first-rate cow. 
 He accordingly gave 12 or 15 for a handsome 
 one, thinking, that she was in the flush of her milk and 
 the beauty of her youth. But a wag went up to him 
 afterwards and said to him, "Dear me, look, Mr. 
 Smith, she hasna a tooth in her upper jaw. You have 
 been fairly taken in. Instead of buying a young milk 
 cow, she is a venerable grandmother." 
 
 On the 1 3th of May, 1830, he was ordained the 
 minister of Arbirlot ; five months after, he married the 
 lady to whom he had been engaged for some years. 
 It might have seemed to the aspiring mind of the 
 ardent young man like going out " into the wilderness " 
 to be sent to that small seaside village rather than 
 to the greater work and larger responsibilities which
 
 DR. GUTHRI&. 17 
 
 afterwards came upon him. But it proved, as such 
 places have often done before, that obscurity is the best 
 training ground for the world's prophets, teachers, 
 leaders, and worthies. One thing we do know, so far 
 as Guthrie was concerned, he learnt lessons by that 
 sea-shore, while watching its thousand aspects during 
 those seven years, which can be traced everywhere in 
 his writings and speeches. As we look at those 
 pictures of real beauty and grandeur, we feel we 
 are kept constantly in sight and hearing of the sea, 
 and that they are the reproduction of mind of one 
 who has often watched and waited for the lessons they 
 suggest. 
 
 There are times in the history of most men, when 
 they are called upon to take their stand against what 
 they know and feel to be wrong, let the consequences 
 be ever so serious to their own welfare and comfort. 
 Happy is it for that man, and well it is for that nation, 
 when such a bold and firm stand is taken, and they are 
 ready to bid defiance to what they deem to be the 
 forces of evil. Dr. Guthrie had to do this on several 
 occasions. Speaking of this kind of experience he 
 remarked, "I have had enough of fighting in my day. 
 I thought I was done with it. I look upon it as a 
 serious calamity when the civil and church courts 
 come into collision. We may come to yield to what 
 we think wrong in spiritual matters. I have no desire 
 to be placed in the position I was before, when, in 
 going to preach at Strathbogie, I was met by an 
 B
 
 1 8 THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 interdict from the Court of Session, an interdictto 
 which, as regards civil matters, I gave implicit 
 obedience. The better the day the better the deed, it 
 is said ; and on the Lord's Day, when I was preparing 
 for Divine Service, in came a servant of the law, and 
 handed me an interdict. I told him he had done his 
 duty, and I would do mine. I was present with Dr. 
 Cunningham and Dr. Candlish in the Court of 
 Session, and saw the presbytery of Dunkeld brought 
 to the bar for breach of interdict, and I heard the 
 Lord President of the Court of Session say, that on 
 the next occasion when the ministers broke the inter- 
 dict they would be visited with all the penalties of the 
 law. The penalties of the law were to get lodgings 
 free gratis in Calton jail. That was my position on 
 that Sabbath morning. That interdict forbade me, 
 under the penalty of Calton jail, to preach the Gospel 
 in the parish church of Strathbogie. I said, the parish 
 churches are stone and lime, and belong to the State ; 
 I will not preach there. It forbade me to preach the 
 Gospel in the school-houses. I said, the school-houses 
 are stone and lime, and belong to the State ; I will 
 not preach there. It forbade me to preach in the 
 churchyard. I said, the dust of the dead is the 
 State's ; I will not preach there. But when those 
 Lords of Session forbade me to preach my Master's 
 blessed Gospel and offer salvation to sinners anywhere 
 in that district under the arch of heaven, I put that 
 interdict under my foot, and I preached the Gospel,
 
 DR. GUTHRIE. 19 
 
 I defied them to punish me, and I have not been 
 punished down to this day." 
 
 It is impossible not to admire the courage and 
 fidelity to conscience with which Dr. Guthrie separated 
 himself from his church and congregation, rather than 
 swerve from the path of duty, especially when it is 
 remembered that he was at the time in the receipt of 
 600 a year. This, however, he calmly resigned 
 without a murmur, and gave up without remorse. It 
 must have been a deep conviction which led him to 
 take this step, or he would not have said, " I am no 
 longer minister of St. John's. I understand that this 
 day there has been a great slaughter in the Old 
 Assembly, and among the rest my connection with 
 the Established Church has been cut, or rather, I may 
 say, / have cut it myself. I know they have resolved to 
 declare my church vacant. They may save themselves 
 the trouble" Noble words, and a striking testimony 
 to the courage of the man, giving, as it does, a clear 
 indication that he was made of that kind of material 
 which, alas ! is not too plentiful in this world, but of 
 which it would be well for the world if it could secure 
 a larger supply, and turn it to as good an account, as 
 subsequent events in the history of Scotland amply 
 furnished proof. 
 
 It is often found that those people who do little or 
 nothing to benefit their fellows themselves are very 
 apt to cover their own defects, by charging others with 
 being " crotchety," " men of one idea," or " carried
 
 2O THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 away with a hobby," and so on ; but careful inquiry 
 will invariably result in its being seen that those who 
 are earnest about one thing are generally earnest about 
 other subjects which they find obstructs the general 
 well-being of the people. It was so with Dr. Guthrie. 
 While his name is associated in some minds with the 
 work of ragged schools, it is also identified with others 
 with that of the great movement in which he and 500 
 others left the Church of their fathers, rather than 
 sacrifice the sacred rights of conscience ; preferring 
 rather to thus suffer with the people of God than to 
 live in luxury, by surrendering their convictions at the 
 shrine of worldly patronage. To some people, how- 
 ever, he is better known as an ardent Temperance 
 advocate, both in and out of his pulpit, where also 
 he was noted alike for his eloquence, power, and 
 success. 
 
 It may naturally be asked why Dr. Guthrie was 
 such a warm advocate of Temperance, and so deter- 
 mined an enemy to the liquor traffic. Let us hear 
 what he has to say himself : " Seven years of my 
 ministry were spent in one of the lowest localities of 
 Edinburgh, and it almost broke my heart day by day 
 to see, as I wandered from house to house and from 
 room to room, misery, wretchedness, and crime ; the 
 detestable vice of drunkenness, the cause of all, meet- 
 ing me at every turn, and marring all my efforts. If 
 there is one thing I feel more intensely than 
 another it is this, that drinking is our national curse,
 
 DR. GUTHRIE. 21 
 
 our sin and shame, our weakness. I speak the words 
 of truth and soberness when I say that this vice 
 destroys more men and women, bodies and souls, 
 breaks more hearts, ruins more families than all other 
 vices put together. Nor need I speak of the multi- 
 tude of lives it costs. Nothing ever struck me more, 
 in visiting these wretched localities, than to find that 
 more than half of these families were in the church- 
 yard. The murder of innocent infants by drunkenness 
 out-Herods Herod in his slaughter of the innocents of 
 Bethlehem. I appeal to every missionary and every 
 minister who visits these localities, whether the great 
 obstacle that meets him at every corner is not drunken- 
 ness. I believe we will in vain plant churches and 
 schools, though they be as thick as trees in the 
 forest, unless this evil is stopped." . 
 
 Dr. Guthrie was once travelling in the Highlands 
 of Scotland with his wife. Speaking afterwards of 
 that visit, he says : " We ought to show sympathy for 
 the poor Highlanders ; but I am sorry to say I saw too 
 much evidence of drinking. I remember that at the 
 inn where we were staying we were very much dis- 
 turbed by the rioting and noises of some drunken 
 parties. On one occasion the door opened, and in 
 came a fellow reeling, and most uncommonly polite 
 for the Highlander is polite, even when he is in drink. 
 He bowed, and called me ' My lord,' which I am not, 
 and Mrs. Guthrie ' My lady,' and was bowing and 
 scraping in the most polite style, when in came the
 
 22 THE WORLD'S WORKERS, 
 
 servant girl, and, taking him by the shoulders, turned 
 him out with a dexterity which showed she was well 
 accustomed to that kind of thing. Drink is a curse to 
 the Lowlands, and to the Highlands too." 
 
 It requires a great deal of moral courage to stand 
 alone, but Dr. Guthrie was evidently not wanting in 
 that commodity. " I remember/' says he, " very well 
 the first great party I went to with the resolution of 
 making my first appearance as a teetotaler. It 
 required almost as much courage on my part as I 
 would have required to go up to a battery of cannon. 
 Nevertheless, / did what I thought was my dtity, and I 
 rather delighted to go in such a capacity, for this 
 reason : that I had a good opportunity of practically 
 exhibiting the principles of total abstinence, and if 
 there happened to be somebody present who did attack 
 me, I rejoiced to have an opportunity of pummelling 
 him." 
 
 That he was able to make good his position at all 
 times may be readily inferred if we take into account 
 what he was in the habit of calling his four good 
 reasons for being an abstainer. " My head is clearer, 
 my health is better, my heart is lighter, and my purse 
 is heavier ;" and to a man having so much to do as he 
 had, a clear head, a sound body, a light heart, and a 
 full purse were no small advantages. 
 
 Dr. Guthrie was once invited to speak at a tem- 
 perance meeting, when he gave the following portrait 
 of himself, much to the amusement of the audience :
 
 DR. GUTHRIE. 23 
 
 " I am not come," he said, " for the purpose of speak- 
 ing, and I can assure you that I will not trespass upon 
 your time ; and indeed I would not have come, but it 
 being a total abstinence meeting, I wished to give it my 
 countenance, although I am afraid that this will be of 
 very little benefit to you. A friend of mine has told 
 me that a person who was asked to describe Dr. 
 Guthrie said that he was a hard-favoured man, with a 
 voice like thunder. I am therefore afraid that his 
 countenance will not do you much good." 
 
 Sometimes he vindicated his practice in the fol- 
 lowing manner : " I am not a teetotaler because I 
 was coming to like the drink, as a lady supposed who 
 said to Dr. Miller, ' I am sorry Dr. Guthrie has got to 
 bad habits, and has been obliged to become a member 
 of the teetotal society to keep him from being 
 deposed.' " 
 
 At other times he would humorously give some 
 of his reasons in favour of water drinking in the fol- 
 lowing way : " I could stand here from morning to 
 sundown, and from sundown to sunrise, occupying, if 
 I had physical power, every hour and every minute of 
 that time telling the evil these stimulants have done, 
 and I will defy any man to occupy five minutes by 
 telling me the good they have done. Everybody 
 knows I have been talking everlastingly all the winter 
 through. I have done, I believe, double the amount 
 of public work of that of any minister in Edin- 
 burgh, and yet people have said to me 'You
 
 24 THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 are looking remarkably well ; you are looking ten 
 years younger. How is that ? ' ' Cold water ' is my 
 answer." 
 
 Dr. Guthrie was one of the founders of the Free 
 Church Temperance Society, and he also assisted in 
 the formation of the Scottish Society for the Sup- 
 pression of Drunkenness. In connection with that 
 society he published their first tract, entitled " A Plea 
 on behalf of Drunkards, and against Drunkenness," 
 and other tracts. In 1857 he published "The 
 City : its Sins and Sorrows," which created a pro- 
 found sensation. Over 50,000 copies have been 
 circulated. 
 
 The following extract from this book illustrates 
 very vividly what a deep hold the lives of little 
 ragged children had upon his sympathy : 
 
 " Look," he says, " look at the case of a boy whom 
 I saw lately. He was fcut twelve years of age, and 
 had been seven times in gaol. The term of his im- 
 prisonment was run out, and so he had doffed his 
 prison garb and resumed his own. It was the depth 
 of winter, and having neither shoes nor stockings, his 
 red naked feet were upon the frozen ground. Had 
 you seen him shivering in his scanty dress, the misery 
 pictured on an otherwise comely face, the tears that 
 dropped over his cheeks as the child told his pitiful 
 story, you would have forgotten that he was a thief, 
 and only seen before you an unhappy creature, more 
 worthy of a kind word, a loving look, a helping hand,
 
 DR. GUTHRIB. 25 
 
 than the guardianship of a turnkey and the dreary 
 solitude of a gaol. 
 
 " His mother was in the grave. His father had 
 married another woman. They both were drunkards. 
 Their den, which is in the High Street I know the 
 place contained one bed, reserved for the father, his 
 wife, and one child. No couch was kindly spread for 
 this poor child and his brother a mother's son, then 
 also immured in gaol. When they were fortunate 
 enough to be allowed to be at home, their only bed 
 was the hard, bare floor. I say fortunate enough, 
 because on many a winter night their own father 
 hounded them out. Ruffian that he was, he drove his 
 infants weeping from the door, to break their young 
 hearts and bewail their cruel lot on the corner of 
 some filthy stair, and sleep away the cold, dark hours 
 as best they could, crouching together for warmth like 
 two houseless dogs." 
 
 That it is very much easier to be a teetotaler 
 nowadays than it was in Thomas Guthrie's youth- 
 ful times, may be gathered from the following 
 account, where he says : " When I was a student, there 
 was not, I believe, an abstaining student within the 
 University, and not one abstaining minister in the 
 whole Church. I did, indeed, know one minister who 
 was practically a total abstainer, but my worthy 
 friend's total abstainence was because he thought he 
 could not stand drinking." On another occasion he 
 said : " A minister of the Gospel, a. clever man in
 
 26 THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 his way, said to another friend of mine the other day, 
 'Become a total abstainer? Is there any reason why 
 I should have my hands tied behind my back in case 
 I should fight ? ' This is not a fair analogy. The 
 ground I take up is that the mischief the drink does 
 is so many thousand times greater than the good it 
 does, that on the principles of Christian expediency 
 and love of humanity, men should give it up. ' Tie 
 your hands behind your back' is not' an analogous 
 case at all. Here is an analogous case. You see a 
 man going about with a long beard. Some say that 
 long beards are good for preventing colds and chest 
 complaints, therefore the beard is a very good thing. 
 Now, the truth is, I see my friends with beards strok- 
 ing them with manifest delight, so that it is plain it 
 is not the danger of cold, but because they think them 
 ornamental, that they wear them. Supposing the 
 beard shaving to go on as it does, and every tenth 
 man who used the razor to cut his throat supposing 
 that, what would you say ? I would preach in favour 
 of beards from the pulpit. I say it would be the duty 
 of every man to wear a beard, and never to handle a 
 razor, if it could be proved and demonstrated that 
 every tenth man that handled a razor cut his throat. 
 If I can prove that something like the same propor- 
 tion of evil is done by the use of strong drink, that 
 something like the same proportion destroys by it 
 character, household comfort, domestic happi- 
 ness, and bodies and souls, is there a man
 
 DR. GUTHRIE. 27 
 
 among us that would not say, 'Be done with 
 drinking ? ' " 
 
 At a dinner-party his wine-glass stood untouched 
 before him. A lady noticing this, said, " Doctor, why 
 don't you take your wine ? " He replied, " I do not 
 care for it" " Are you unwell ?" "Oh, no!" "Then 
 why not take it ? " " Well, I don't want it." " Doctor," 
 said another lady, "I see your wine is standing un- 
 touched." " I know it." " Why not take it ? " " Well, 
 the fact is I am a teetotaler." " Dear me, Doctor, I 
 never heard you were a drunkard ! " " Nor have I 
 been one, but in my visitations through the closes and 
 alleys of Edinburgh, seeing the evils that drink is 
 doing, I thought it was more my place instead of 
 saying go and be a teetotaler, to say come and be a 
 teetotaler." 
 
 At another time he said : " I have thought it would 
 be a capital plan if any of you who have saved 
 money by going to the Corn Exchange instead of the 
 public-house and I am sure that many in this house 
 have done so would give that saving to me for the 
 purpose I have indicated, I am sure it would be a 
 ten thousand times softer pillow to lie on to think 
 that you had given a shilling or a sixpence, and to 
 know that you had done something to save a child 
 from ruin, than to lie next morning with what the 
 man called a ' rivin ' headache." 
 
 Replying to an objector once, he remarked : " I 
 would rather see in the pulpit a man who is a total
 
 28 THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 abstainer from this root of all evil drink than a man 
 crammed with all the Hebrew roots in the world." 
 So firmly assured was he of the ultimate prevalence 
 of the principles of temperance that he went so far as 
 to say on one occasion that "in the course of another 
 generation the man who shall sit down to his bottle 
 of wine or his tumbler of toddy will be as rare as 
 those creatures, the Megatheriums, which remain to 
 us the strange specimens of another and, let us be 
 thankful, a past generation." 
 
 Nor was he without good reasons for these 
 opinions, as may be gathered from the following 
 illustration, where he says : " When you get religion 
 dying, drink is like a fungus growing upon a rotten 
 tree. When religion begins to revive, along with it 
 revive temperance and total abstinence societies. 
 There is a remarkable connection. The moment a 
 revival appeared, in many places the public-houses 
 began to shut up. 
 
 " I have before me a number of young men, who, 
 in God's providence, are not only to tell on the rising 
 generation, but who are to be placed in the most 
 influential positions which any man could occupy to 
 influence effectually the community. I look upon 
 one divinity student as worth a hundred old grey- 
 haired ministers. The reason why I set them above 
 the ministers is just because the large body of the 
 ministers are advanced in life. So I look upon such 
 divinity students as are before me as the best recruits
 
 DR. GVTHRI&. 29 
 
 that can be got in the cause of temperance. I have 
 great pleasure in seeing so many men who care to fill 
 the pulpits of our country, and mould the habits of 
 the rising generation in our beloved land, in favour of 
 total abstinence, and this all the more when I look 
 back on the old divinity students. I don't say that 
 the students of that day were dissolute and immoral 
 men : far from it There were black sheep among 
 them, no doubt. Even among divinity students there 
 were suppers, and if there were suppers there were 
 tumblers, and if there were tumblers there was toddy, 
 and I don't know, in regard to them, whether, as there 
 were tumblers, there was tumbling ; but it was a 
 very likely thing." 
 
 It may be encouraging to some timid beginners to 
 know that one who became so famous as a pulpit 
 orator did not at first appear to realise his own gifts. 
 When once asked what his own opinion was, he 
 frankly said : " I always feel greatly dissatisfied with 
 my own performance ; though, at the same time, when 
 I heard some others preach, ' Well,' thought I to my- 
 self, ' I could do better than that.' " In a letter he 
 wrote to a young minister respecting his own first 
 sermon, he said : " I remember when I broke ground 
 at Dun leaving the Church happy that I had not 
 stuck. I thought that was a great step, a great 
 achievement, and that now, having got a beginning 
 made, I would by-and-by get in with the rest. I 
 remember being troubled in a way you don't seem to
 
 3O THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 have felt. I did not know exactly what to do with 
 my hands. I would have felt it to be a great relief if 
 I could, consistently with decorum, have put them in 
 my pockets ! As to my eyes, I don't know how I 
 managed with them." 
 
 It is a grand thing to believe in possibility to 
 have the conviction that something can be done to 
 make the world better, and that as sure as we act in 
 harmony with its promptings we shall succeed. 
 Such, evidently, was Dr. Guthrie's idea when he 
 observed, in urging the claims of the ragged 
 children : " Keeping out of view the depravity of 
 human nature which is common to all, these (ragged) 
 children are very much what you choose to make 
 them. The soul of that ragged boy or girl is like 
 a mirror. Frown upon it, and it frowns upon you. 
 Look at it with suspicion, and it eyes you in the 
 same manner. Lift your arm to strike, and there is 
 an arm lifted against you. Turn your back, and 
 it turns its back on you. Turn round and give 
 it a smile, and it smiles again in return. It will 
 give smile for smile, kindness for kindness." 
 
 In illustration of this, he tells us that one day he 
 was asked to come downstairs. On doing so, he found 
 some girls who were about to be sent out abroad by 
 a society which had been formed for that purpose. 
 He found that they had got over the fears they once 
 had entertained upon the subject, and were then 
 ready to proceed to their distant home. " Along with
 
 DR. GUTHRIE. 31 
 
 the girls," he says, " I saw a boy, the brother of one of 
 them, who had come to Edinburgh to bid her fare- 
 well, and commit her to the care of God. He was a 
 remarkably fine-looking lad, a pretty shepherd boy. 
 He looked as if he had never snuffed the smoke of 
 Edinburgh before. You may fancy, when I saw him 
 standing before me, a plaid across his breast, a bonnet 
 on his head, long yellow locks flowing over his 
 shoulders, shoes on his feet fitted to stand the wear of 
 the heather, and in his hand a shepherd's staff, and 
 two as pretty roses blooming on his cheeks as ever 
 you saw, you may imagine how my heart leapt with 
 joy when I was told : ' That's one of your Ragged 
 School boys.'" 
 
 On another occasion he gave the history of a real 
 hero in the following graphic manner : " We have 
 ragged scholars that are cutting down the forests in 
 America. We have them herding sheep in Australia. 
 We have them in the navy ; and what do you think ? 
 There was an odd thing in this way : we had a com- 
 petition among boys in the navy, and the Ragged 
 School boys carried off the highest prizes. We have 
 them in the army too. Just the other day I had in 
 my drawing-room one of my ragged scholars. What 
 was he doing there ? you ask.' Well, he was just 
 standing beside a very pretty girl, dressed like a 
 duchess, with an enormous crinoline, and all that. 
 There he was, and on his breast he carried three 
 medals. He had fought the battles of his country in
 
 32 THE WORLDS WORKERS. 
 
 the Crimea. He had also gone up the deadly marcn to 
 Lucknow, and rescued the women, and the children, 
 and the soldiers there. And was I not proud of my 
 Ragged School boy when I saw him with his 
 honours ! " 
 
 Take another illustration to which he referred 
 with equal joy. "One of our boys, a very little 
 fellow, but uncommonly smart, entered the lists, and 
 carried off a prize against the whole of England and 
 Scotland by his answer to the question, ' Give the 
 history of the Apostle Paul in thirty words ? ' Now 
 listen to the answer. It looks like as if it had gone 
 through a Bramah press, it is so well condensed : 
 Paul was born at Tarsus, and brought up at Jerusa- 
 lem. He continued a persecutor till his conversion, 
 after which he became a follower of Christ, for whose 
 sake he died.' Now, could any of you have done half 
 so well ? " 
 
 When sixty-five years of age, and while reviewing 
 his past life, Dr. Guthrie said : " People should shine 
 as lights in the world, but not put the candle in a 
 draught or doorway. It is better, no doubt, as they 
 say, to wear out than to rust out ; but the weights of 
 a clock may be made so heavy as to damage the 
 machinery, and make it run down before its proper 
 time. We have no more right to shorten our own than 
 another's life, and the duty of self-preservation which 
 instinct teaches is one which the Bible enforces. A 
 knowledge of the ordinary rules of health ought, there-
 
 DR. GUTHRIE. 33 
 
 fore, to be regarded as one of the most useful branches 
 of education ; and considering how easily they may be 
 acquired, and how many diseases are spread and lives 
 lost through the neglect of them, it is astonishing that 
 they are not taught in all our schools. Were these 
 rules learned to be practised, and were people to 
 observe moderation in all things abstaining es- 
 pecially from every cup stronger than that which 
 cheers, but not inebriates and were our working 
 classes as well fed, clothed, and housed as they might 
 be were they to abstain from the use of expensive and 
 dangerous luxuries, thousands of lives would be saved, 
 thousands of accidents and diseases avoided, and the 
 three-score years and ten would probably prove not 
 the ordinary limit, but the ordinary average of human 
 life as many living beyond that period as died before 
 it/' 
 
 "Remember," he said on another occasion, "this 
 world is not for enjoyment ; it is for employment. 
 This earth is not for wages, but for work. Earth for 
 the work, heaven for the wages. Earth for employ- 
 ment, heaven for enjoyment. Earth for toil, heaven 
 for rest." 
 
 In March, 1872, his health began to fail. On 
 August 2$th he preached his last sermon from the 
 text, " The just shall live by faith." Gradually he 
 sank, and about ten o'clock on the Sabbath, February 
 23rd, 1873, he fell into a broken sleep, and a few hours 
 after quietly passed away to the better land. He
 
 34 THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 was interred, amid the most impressive demonstration 
 ever known in Edinburgh, on the 28th of February in 
 the Grange Cemetery. All over the world the news 
 of his death was received with profound grief by every 
 one who had any knowledge of his works of faith and 
 labours of love It may not be without interest to 
 say, that among other things which gave interest 
 to his life is the fact that, holding as he did such 
 sentiments as we have briefly sketched, and living 
 with such a firm desire to be of some service to 
 his fellow-men, it is not surprising to find that Dr. 
 Guthrie was in the habit of expressing his con- 
 victions in strong and emphatic terms. Among 
 the most favourite of the quotations with which 
 he was wont to press home his appeals were these 
 words : 
 
 " I live for those who love me, 
 
 For those who know me true ', 
 For the heaven that smiles above me, 
 
 And awaits my spirit too ; 
 For the wrong that needs resistance, 
 For the cause that lacks assistance, 
 For the future in the distance, 
 
 And the good that I can do." 
 
 May the young 1 readers of these pages be imbued 
 with the same deep earnestness which distinguished 
 the life of THOMAS GUTHRIE. 
 
 {Our Fortieth of Dr. GuthrU is front a Photogrdfh 6yf> Mofat, Edinburgh.)
 
 FATHER MATHEW, 
 
 IRELAND'S APOSTLE OF TEMPERANCE. 
 
 ONE day, while Mrs. Mathew was sitting at the 
 dinner table, surrounded by her large family 
 of boys and girls, she exclaimed, as with not a little 
 natural mother's pride she looked at her army of 
 handsome, healthy boys, " Is it not unfortunate ? I 
 have nine sons, and not one of them to be a priest ! " 
 The boys glanced at George, who had been "intended" 
 for that office, but he simply blushed and fixed his 
 eyes steadily upon his plate, as if he did not wish to 
 notice what had been said. The silence, however, was 
 soon broken by Theobald starting from his chair, and 
 saying, with a voice full of emotion, " Mother, don't be 
 uneasy, I will be a priest." His mother expressed 
 her delight by folding him in her arms, and covering 
 him with kisses, while she in other ways manifested 
 her gratitude and delight. From that moment his 
 influence over his brothers, which had been very great 
 before, became even more recognised, and gathered 
 strength as the years rolled by, though, strange to say 
 two of them became distillers, while he was equally
 
 36 THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 well known all over the world as the Apostle of Tem- 
 perance. 
 
 As a child, Theobald Mathew manifested many of 
 the features which marked his character as a man. 
 From his earliest days nothing seemed so natural to 
 him as the desire to make others happy, or to give 
 them pleasure. What at first was a mere habit in the 
 child became the ruling passion of the man. From 
 the day of his birth, which took place on the iSth of 
 October, 1790, at Thomastown House, near Cashel, 
 in Tipperary, he was the favourite child of his 
 mother. There was something so sweet and engaging 
 in him, that it drew his mother's heart towards him, 
 while his love for her was manifested in a hundred 
 child-like ways. The result was, that by his brothers 
 and sisters he was scornfully called " the Pet," because 
 he preferred sitting by his mother's side, rather than 
 passing the time away in play with them. Young 
 " Toby," as he was called, was rather averse to the 
 rude sports in which they liked to engage, and though 
 his brothers frequently accused him of " being tied to 
 his mother's apron-strings," yet they had to own, that 
 if they wanted any special indulgence from their 
 mother, he was always ready to coax from her any 
 little thing which would aid them in their enjoyment. 
 Nothing gave him more pleasure than to see the 
 relish with which they despatched some of the sweet 
 morsels he was able to secure for them] from time to 
 time.
 
 FATHER MAT HEW. 37 
 
 Among other things in which Theobald also de- 
 lighted was plum-pudding. He used to tell a story 
 how that on one Christmas he quietly hid beneath 
 the cushion of a great old-fashioned chair the silver 
 spoons which had been used with the plum-pudding. 
 Great was the surprise of all the servants at the un- 
 accountable -disappearance of the plate. No one 
 seemed to know what to think of the matter. All at 
 once Theobald confessed, with some pride, that he had 
 put them away in a safe place, so that they might be 
 ready at hand when the next Christmas came with 
 its customary pudding. The result was that instead 
 of waiting for Christmas, which was then, of course, a 
 year distant, the young favourite was promised a 
 plum-pudding every Sunday, a promise which was 
 hailed with a shout of delight, as may be readily 
 imagined. 
 
 Although he had three brothers older than himself, 
 it was singular how he seemed to lead them, as if by 
 natural right. They obeyed him as a matter of 
 course. There was a something about him which 
 drew them towards him, and led them to feel he was 
 born to lead. He was never known to have uttered 
 a bad word, or even one of doubtful meaning, and a 
 harsh or unkind word was never known to have 
 dropped from his lips. Neatness and order, both in 
 his dress and the arrangements of his home, always 
 marked his life. To find anything out of its right 
 place gave him annoyance, and offended his sense of 
 
 461459
 
 38 THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 order and regularity. A striking incident of this is 
 given in his early age. One day he happened to see 
 in the breakfast-parlour a pair of silk stockings on the 
 back of a chair before the fire, where they had been 
 placed to "air" before being worn. His disgust was 
 such, that he took them off the chair, and flung them 
 in the fire, where they were soon destroyed. A keen 
 search was ordered to be made for the missing articles, 
 every one wondering what had become of them. At 
 last Toby was asked if he had seen them. " I did, and 
 burned them too," was his reply. " Burned them ! 
 Why did you do such a thing, you bold boy ? " was 
 the next question. " They had no right to be in the 
 breakfast-parlour : that was no place for them," he 
 replied sturdily. "Toby is right," said Lady 
 Elizabeth Mathew, his grand aunt ; " they should not 
 have been put there." The loss of the stockings was 
 recompensed by the lesson the servants had given 
 them from the lips of the child, as her ladyship 
 owned at the time. 
 
 Nor was Theobald deficient in either moral or 
 physical courage when it was needed, though they 
 might call him "Miss Molly" at home. He had 
 heard from some source that there lived about half- 
 a-dozen miles from his father's house a gentleman 
 whose reputation was so bad, that more than one 
 village gossip in the blacksmith's forge, or the kitchen 
 hob, was willing to " take her Bible oath " that he was 
 gifted with a tail, though his horns could not be seen,
 
 FATHER MATHEW. 39 
 
 and therefore he was " the ould boy himself, all out." 
 Many of the servants in the house fully believed these 
 strange rumours, and they seized fast hold of the lad's 
 imagination, so he resolved to try and see whether 
 
 Mr. was such a really bad character. So one 
 
 morning he started off early on his pony, and galloped 
 away to the gentleman's house, and remained seated 
 for hours on his pony's back, hoping to satisfy his 
 curiosity, but he had his labour in vain. A few years 
 after, however, he met the same gentleman, and had 
 the opportunity of convincing himself that however 
 bad he might be inside^ he was no different from others 
 outside. 
 
 When he reached the age of twelve, Lady 
 Elizabeth, his constant friend, decided to educate 
 him at her own cost. So she selected a school for 
 him at Kilkenny, to which he was sent. But his 
 love of home was so strong, that he yielded to an 
 uncontrollable desire to see his parents and family 
 during the Easter festivities, and without letting 
 any one know he set out on foot, and walked between 
 thirty and forty miles, and at the end of the day, 
 footsore and tired, he arrived, and was received in 
 the arms of his delighted mother, who could not hint 
 a word of reproof as she clasped him to her breast 
 
 Having passed through his preliminary studies, 
 he was sent to the College at Maynooth, where he 
 matriculated on the i8th of September, 1807; but 
 he was not destined to finish his scholastic career
 
 4O THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 there, inasmuch as, owing to his having violated one of 
 its rules, and rather than run the risk of an expulsion, 
 he left it in 1808. Had he gone through the usual 
 course in the classes of the College, he might have 
 become an ordinary priest, and even wore a bishop's 
 mitre, but in all human probability the world would 
 never have heard of the name of Father Mathew, the 
 Apostle of Temperance. After leaving Maynooth, he 
 went to Dublin, and on Easter Sunday, 1814, he was 
 ordained, and his mother's long-cherished ambition for 
 her beloved son to see him a priest was fulfilled. 
 
 He delivered his first sermon in his native county, 
 at Kilfeacle. It so happened that he read and ex- 
 plained the Saviour's words, " that it is more difficult for 
 a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven than for a 
 camel to pass through the eye of a needle/' Among 
 his hearers was a stout, rich village magnate, who was 
 much struck by the young preacher saying that it 
 was not the possession of riches that was wrong in the 
 sight of God, but the way they were used. Meeting 
 the preacher after the sermon, the gentleman said, 
 :< Father Mathew, I feel very much obliged to you for 
 trying to squeeze we through the eye of a needle." 
 The old gentleman was at that time fat enough even 
 to have blocked up the Camel's Gate at Jerusalem. 
 Father Mathew's first mission was in Kilkenny, and 
 soon after his arrival there a striking change was 
 visible. The Friary, as it was called, became crowded 
 by the poor and rich. His fame spread rapidly, and
 
 FATHER MAT HEW. 41 
 
 his virtues were upon every tongue ; his personal 
 goodness and the sterling qualities of his heart, 
 combined with his wonderful zeal for the spread of 
 religion, became recognised as the main secret of his 
 growing power for good. From there he went to 
 Cork, where he was to become even more renowned 
 as a temperance reformer. 
 
 His fame soon began to be noised abroad, and he 
 might be seen from early morn till late at night 
 engaged in his duties. To help him to discharge 
 them better, he began to learn the Irish language. This 
 enabled him to talk and listen to the natives with ease 
 and comfort. One Sunday morning he had been 
 attending to his duties from six o'clock until after ten, 
 and as he had been also engaged up to eleven the 
 previous night, he was both weary and hungry. Just 
 as he was about to leave four sailors rolled in, and 
 asked him to hear their confessions. " Why did you 
 not come at a more seasonable hour ? " he asked, for 
 the moment feeling angry. " I can't hear you now ; 
 come in the morning." The sailors turned to go, when 
 a poor woman quietly came and touched him, and 
 said, "They may not come again, sir." This was 
 enough, and running after the sailors, he succeeded in 
 bringing them back, and heard their confessions. 
 Not content with this, he gave them some breakfast, 
 and then sent them on their way rejoicing. He after- 
 wards thanked the poor woman " through whom," he 
 said, '" the Holy Ghost had spoken to him."
 
 42 THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 After he had been three years in Cork there was 
 a terrible outbreak of malignant typhus fever. 
 Father Mathew, among other things, wanted to 
 ascertain how a young man was doing ; so he climbed 
 over a wall at five o'clock in the morning to gain the 
 tidings, rather than disturb the keeper of the lodge 
 and his family. The invalid who was thus so much 
 the object of his interest lived for many years to tell 
 the story. 
 
 Father Mathew was very remarkable for his use of 
 time. His favourite proverb was, " Take time by the 
 forelock, for he is bald beJund" To do this he 
 generally rose about fi-ve o'clock, and sometimes, when 
 needful, earlier. He seemed to have the right 
 moment for everything. He was punctual to the 
 minute in his appointments, and often surprised his 
 friends with the amount of work he performed. One 
 day he was asked how he managed to rise so early ; 
 he answered, as pointing to a workshop, " If I were a 
 
 cooper, and bound to Mr. , I should be up as 
 
 early, so as to be at my work at the appointed time, 
 
 and thus become pleasing to Mr. , my master. 
 
 But I have a higher calling, and I serve a better 
 Master ; and am I to be less desirous of pleasing that 
 Master than I should be to satisfy Mr. ? " 
 
 His heart was full of sympathy with the poor, and 
 he always treated them with tenderness and great 
 respect. He used to say of them, " They will be as 
 high in heaven as the highest in the land." Often he
 
 FATHER MAT HEW. 43 
 
 relieved their distress. He also delighted to help 
 those who had seen better days when under a cloud, 
 and he did it in such a way, that often it was not 
 known even for years who had come to their relief. 
 The clerk of his chapel, who frequently had to do 
 these things, quaintly used to say, " Look, sir, here is 
 my notion on the subject : if the streets of Cork were 
 paved with gold, and if Father Mathew had entire 
 control over them, and could do what he liked with 
 them, there would not be a paving-stone in all Cork 
 by the end of the year." 
 
 Ever on the look-out to do good, it was no wonder 
 his power over the people became great. Said a lady 
 one day to another of the priests : " Oh, Dr. Collins, I 
 have just been listening to a sermon from Father 
 Mathew, and I have been greatly edified." " My 
 dear," answered the priest, " his life is a sermon'' This 
 was strictly correct, and although keenly alive to 
 wrong and insult, and to benefit and kindness, he 
 ever endeavoured to act up to another of his favourite 
 maxims : " A pint of oil is better than a hogshead 
 of -vinegar" Although naturally excitable, he con- 
 trolled his impulses, and, to use his own words, "he 
 struggled hard with the bitterness of the moment," 
 and gained the victory over self. The " oil " proved 
 the peacemaker. He had all the qualities of a great 
 heart, throbbing with the most tender, generous, and 
 holy emotions. 
 
 After he had been about twelve years in Cork, he
 
 44 THE WORLD'S WORKERS, 
 
 had become most popular among every class and 
 creed. As a preacher his reputation had been 
 gradually advancing, mainly because he always 
 avoided anything of a sectarian or bigoted spirit. 
 For the orphan he specially laboured. " I never," he 
 once said, " meet in the street a ragged child, asking 
 me for charity in the name of God, that I do not 
 think I see the infant Jesus with outstretched hands, 
 and hear the petition for human mercy emanating 
 from the lips of the Divinity." 
 
 Another passage from one of his charity sermons 
 gives us, as it were, the key to his whole life. He 
 says, " Mercy ! heavenly mercy ! Had the Deity never 
 spoken, had He never revealed, by prophet or apostle, 
 that mercy was His will, its innate excellence, the 
 high honour it confers upon us, the delicious, the 
 ineffable pleasure we enjoy in its exercise? would be 
 sufficient to point out to us the necessity of this in- 
 dispensable duty." 
 
 Of his untiring exertions during the terrible 
 cholera visitation in 1832 we have not space to tell, 
 except to say, that he threw himself into the midst 
 of its peril with an unselfish devotedness which 
 astonished every one. Where the plague raged in all 
 its horrors, he might be seen going from house to 
 house, administering help from his own resources, 
 until he was left without a shilling. " Give, give, give," 
 so he preached, and so he practised ; and when 
 he gave his last mite he gave it in the name
 
 FATHER MATHEW. 45 
 
 of God, confident that God would send him more 
 to give. 
 
 A lady was one day driving out of the chapel a 
 party of children, because they were making too much 
 noise. "Why are you driving those children out?" 
 he asked. " They were disturbing the congregation ; 
 and I must say, Father Mathew, I wonder how you 
 can tolerate them going in and out as they do." " My 
 dear madam, you must remember the words of our 
 Divine Redeemer, who said, ' Suffer the little ones to 
 come unto me, and forbid them not, for of such is the 
 kingdom of Heaven! If they come from curiosity now, 
 they will come to pray another time ; and you cannot 
 tell what impression is made upon the mind of the 
 very youngest child that enters the House of God." 
 The lady was perfectly satisfied, and never again 
 interfered. 
 
 He had wonderful success as a peacemaker, and 
 delighted in healing up breaches between families. 
 His visits under such circumstances were those of an 
 angel, and few could resist his pleadings. " I declare," 
 said one after Father Mathew had left him, " I believe 
 that man has some extraordinary power about him. 
 I had not the best feeling towards him, on account of 
 something that annoyed me ; but, sir, I do assure you 
 the moment he grasped me by the hand there was 
 an end to my anger. I can't tell what it is, but if 
 we lived in another age, I should be inclined to say 
 there was magic in it." To which the friend replied :
 
 46 THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 " Would that we had more of such rnagic and such 
 magicians in these days ! " Yes, the magic of kindness 
 \vas never better manifested than in the life of Father 
 Mathew, as he went about doing good to rich and 
 poor, and in this way securing the confidence of all 
 classes and creeds in the city where he laboured. 
 
 For some years he acted as one of the governors 
 of the Cork Workhouse, where the scenes he witnessed 
 and the sad stories he heard stirred his heart to its 
 core. One of the Board of Governors with him was 
 an earnest, honest Quaker, named William Martin 
 " the grandfather of the temperance cause," as he was 
 called. Long before Father Mathew had even the 
 slightest idea of taking any part in the movement, 
 William Martin had made up his mind that of all 
 others, Theobald Mathew was the man best suited to 
 make it successful. He never failed, when a good 
 opportunity occurred at the Board meeting, to remark, 
 as some case of a more distressing character came up 
 for consideration, " Strong drink is the cause of this." 
 And having secured the sympathy of his hearer, he 
 would add, " Oh, Theobald Mathew ! if thou would 
 only give thy aid, much good could be done in the 
 city." 
 
 Few nowadays can understand the difficulties 
 which stood in the way of these early pioneers of the 
 Temperance movement. Most people regarded them 
 as fanatics of the worst kind. Everybody believed in 
 moderate drinking, while total abstinence was looked
 
 FATHER MATHEW. 47 
 
 Upon as the dream of a madman, and downright 
 flying in the face of Providence. That was the kind 
 of argument, as it was called, with which they were 
 assailed. But still they persevered. Among the most 
 noted, in addition to William Martin, was the Rev. 
 Nicholas Dunscombe, a Protestant clergyman, and 
 Richard Dowden, a prominent member of the 
 Unitarian body. These, with a few working-men, did 
 the best they could, but being of a different religious 
 persuasion to the bulk of the people, their efforts were 
 regarded with the suspicion that something in the way 
 of proselytising was intended. The result was that 
 the cause made slow progress ; but still they worked 
 away, hoping better things. 
 
 " Oh, Theobald Mathew ! if thou would but take 
 the cause in hand," was the constant appeal of Wil- 
 liam Martin, "thou couldst do such good to these 
 poor creatures." These words haunted the kind and 
 tender heart of Father Mathew. But it was some 
 time ere he made any sign, though he was thinking 
 seriously of the subject. It was not until he was in the 
 forty-seventh year of his age that he solemnly began 
 to face it. He had witnessed the dreadful doings of 
 drink among all classes. To use his own words, "he 
 had seen the stars of heaven fall, and the cedars 
 of Lebanon laid low." In the prison, madhouse, 
 workhouse, hospital, everywhere he had gone, he 
 had met with its track marks. " But was not 
 religion sufficient to meet the evil ? " " Had it not
 
 48 THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 produced greater results than this required ? " But 
 those addicted to drink did not come within the 
 house of God. What could be done ? he asked, as 
 he sat in the midnight hour musing. Was there a 
 remedy in the Total Abstinence movement ? Would 
 it, could it, ever be adopted to any extent to meet 
 the case. Everything seemed against such a proba- 
 bility. Look at the social drinking customs of the 
 people, the example of moderation which he and 
 others had practised ; think of the great fact that 
 hundreds of people, including many of his own 
 personal friends, were engaged in making and selling 
 such drinks what would become of them ? these and a 
 host of other inquiries crossed his mind, still the appeal 
 came : " Oh, Theobald Mathew ! if tkou would only 
 give thy aid, what good thou would do for these 
 poor creatures." The responsibility was too awful, the 
 risk too terrible, the possibilities of success too impor- 
 tant, the shame of a failure too grave, to allow him to 
 trifle with such convictions. In prayer, on his knees 
 before God, he sought for guidance and counsel how 
 to act and what to do. The answer came, and he 
 arose convinced that, for the sake of the people, he 
 ought boldly to join the crusade, and place himself in 
 connection with the movement, and do all he could 
 to advance it among the people. Having thus made 
 up his mind, after long, careful, and prayerful delibera- 
 tion, he resolved to act promptly. Like Caesar, 
 having crossed the Rubicon, he resolved to go forward.
 
 FATHER MATHEW. 49 
 
 So he decided to send at once for William Martin to 
 come and see him. 
 
 It was in the month of April, 1838, that William 
 Martin received a message from Father Mathew, ask- 
 ing him to call at his house in Cove Street that even- 
 ing. Somehow William had a kind of idea that his 
 long looked-for desire was about to be realised. At 
 the appointed time he went, and was met at the door 
 by Father Mathew, with a face radiant with kindness 
 and good humour, with these words, " Welcome, Mr. 
 Martin ; welcome, my dear friend. It is very kind of 
 you to come to me at so short a notice, and so punc- 
 tually too." To which the honest Quaker replied, " I 
 was right glad to come to thee, Father Mathew, for I 
 expected that thou had good news for me." " Well, 
 Mr. Martin, I have sent for you to assist me in form- 
 ing a Temperance Society in this neighbourhood." 
 " I knew it ! " said William. " Something seemed to 
 tell me that thou would do it at last." It was decided 
 by them to hold a meeting on the following Tuesday, 
 and the good Quaker went on his way, exclaiming, 
 " Oh, Father Mathew ! thou hast made me a happy 
 man this night." 
 
 When it became known in Cork that Father 
 Mathew had decided to take this step, many ridiculed 
 the idea of his joining the " fanatics." Some said he 
 had lost his senses ; others laughed and sneered. 
 But the meeting, though a small one, was held. 
 Father Mathew took the chair, and gave his reasons 
 D
 
 5o THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 for coming to such a conclusion, and then taking a 
 pen to sign the pledge, he said, in a voice heard by 
 all, and remembered by many for years after, " HERE 
 GOES, IN THE NAME OF GOD, THEOBALD MATHEW, 
 C.C., Cove Street, No. i." Sixty others followed, in- 
 cluding some who proved staunch friends to the pro- 
 mise, made that eventful night the loth April, 1838. 
 It is impossible to describe the joy of William 
 Martin, and the satisfaction of others which followed 
 that meeting. Nor did they for a moment dream of 
 the extent to which its results would reach. Suffice 
 it to say, that from that time Father Mathew became 
 public property. Day by day he had to pass through 
 an amount of work, both of body and mind, he never 
 anticipated, or it might have appalled even his self- 
 sacrificing spirit. In three months from that date 
 25,000 others had followed his example ; in five 
 months, 131,000; in less than nine months, 
 156,000 ; and long before he died more than 2,000,000 
 received the pledge at his hands ; and although 
 it is true much of this work proved very temporary in 
 its character, yet, so long as it lasted, it was a clear 
 gain to the cause of human welfare, and had it only 
 lasted for a week, it would have been a profit of a 
 week's sobriety, and that alone would have made it 
 well worth the doing. With many thousands, how- 
 ever, it proved permanent, and there are valuable re- 
 mains to be seen even now all over Ireland, England, 
 and America, of the broad marks which Father
 
 FATHER MATHEW. 51 
 
 Mathew scored on the world's face, as the result of 
 his apostolic labours. 
 
 Having thus started, Father Mathew had to go 
 on. The result was that a new society, over which he 
 was appointed president, was formed. At the second 
 meeting 330 more names were added to the roll. The 
 old school-room was soon found to be too small to 
 accommodate the large numbers who flocked to the 
 meetings, and the Horse Bazaar, a building capable 
 of holding 4,000 persons, was at once rented for the 
 purpose of the Temperance Association. It was 
 there, that in a dimly-lighted building the Temper- 
 ance cause was rocked and nursed, until it became a 
 sturdy infant, and at length drew attention to what it 
 was doing. Owing to the earnest appeals of Father 
 Mathew and others who helped him, by January, 1839, 
 the roll had increased to 200,000. 
 
 The following is a copy of the pledge which was 
 taken : 
 
 " I promise, with the Divine assistance, as long as I shall 
 continue a member of the Teetotal Temperance Society, to ab- 
 stain from all intoxicating drinks, except for medicine or sacra- 
 mental puposes ; and to prevent as much as possible, by 
 advice and example, drunkenness in others." 
 
 The movement rolled on with a mighty sweep 
 from that time. Limerick was the first place he 
 visited on his missionary labour. After four days' 
 labour, 150,000 took the pledge at his hand. At 
 Waterford in three days 80,000 more were added,
 
 52 THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 and at Maynooth 35,000, including eight professors 
 and 250 students. In 1843 he crossed to England, 
 where, notwithstanding riots and other opposition, 
 600,000 signed during his short stay. 
 
 An amusing incident occurred one day at his own 
 house in Cove Street at a dinner-party. One of the 
 party, a most rigid abstainer, thought the flavour of 
 the water was rather suspicious, and glanced at the 
 servant, whose nose was more than usually red, while 
 another could not refrain from tittering. At last 
 Father Mathew put his glass to his lips, but at once 
 replaced it on the table, saying, "John, what a strange 
 taste and smell the water has ! What is the matter 
 with it ? You must have had spirits in the jug." 
 " Oh, yes, sir, I had to polish the tins, and whisky is 
 very good for brightening them. Unfortunately, I 
 put it into this jug." The younger guest inwardly 
 chuckled at the excuse ; but Father Mathew only re- 
 marked that " it was all right/' and that he would 
 not trouble him for any further explanation. 
 
 He also used to say, " Now, there are some 
 people, and sensible people too, who assert that plum 
 puddings cannot be made without alcohol, but that 
 is as fine a pudding as I ever tasted, and there is not 
 of whisky in it, is there, John ? " " Oh, no sir ; not 
 a drop," was the invariable reply. 
 
 It may be also interesting to notice some of the 
 results which followed the extraordinary success 
 which attended these labours. In the first place, it
 
 FATHER MAT HEW. 53 
 
 was found that just in proportion as the numbers 
 of those who signed the pledge increased, the taxes 
 upon malt and whisky decreased. From the time 
 Father Mathew signed the pledge down to 1842, 
 there was a total loss of 795,677, but there had been 
 such an increased consumption of other exciseable 
 articles, that not only was that amount made up, but 
 there was a gain of 90,823. One who was competent 
 to speak said : " The scale kicked the beam, not on 
 the wrong but on the right side. The nation's books, 
 though the whisky-traders dealt so little with her, 
 were not the worse, but the better. Tea and sugar 
 yielded an increase of 10 per cent. A draper in the 
 poorest part of Dublin bore testimony that his trade 
 had increased sixteen-fold since the whisky was 
 abjured. Crime and violence were most sensibly 
 lessened; and on all hands, 'and on every side, the 
 revenue was recouped for the absence of the blood- 
 stained coins of the traffic. Incomings increased, 
 outgoings decreased, two signs evident of well-doing, 
 whether for the pocket of the citizen or for the coffers 
 of the nation." 
 
 A Royal Commission also reported that "not a 
 single teetotaler out of the millions was implicated in 
 the guilt of blood-shedding ; the convicts were all 
 whisky-drinkers." While those who were hanged for 
 murders before the movement commenced numbered 
 66, in 1845 only 13 were so sentenced ; in 1839 there 
 were 916 transported, in 1845 only 428 ; in 1839 there
 
 54 ' 1HE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 were 12,049 committed to gaol, in 1845 only 7,101 
 The key to the whole mystery may be traced in 
 the following significant facts : In 1839 there were 
 12,296,000 gallons of whisky charged with duty to 
 the amount of 1,434,573, but in 1845 there was only 
 6,450,137, which realised a duty only of 860,15 1. 
 
 Referring, as matters often did, to such facts, he 
 once said : " I do not know but that there are distil- 
 lers or brewers listening to me. I have such in my own 
 family. One member of my family, in Cashel, a 
 distiller, now manufactures, I am glad to say, as 
 much in a week as would supply his customers for a 
 year. That is a great falling off from other days. I 
 am rejoiced at this ; for when the glory of God is in 
 question we should not mind the ties of flesh and 
 blood." That it was serious to some of them may be 
 gathered from the following letter from a member of 
 the Mathew family, who wrote in 1843: "Every 
 teetotaler has gained morally and physically by the 
 movement ; but my immediate family have been 
 absolutely and totally ruined, by Father Mathew's 
 Temperance Mission." 
 
 A gentleman was one day complaining of Father 
 Mathew's severity towards distillers, and saying that 
 they had so much money invested in the business 
 that it could hardly be expected they would give 
 it up ; to which Father Mathew said that such men 
 had no right to prosper by the ruin of others. He 
 then told them that one day he was met by a very
 
 MATHEW. $5 
 
 rich distiller, who asked him, rather imploringly, how 
 he could deliberately plot the ruin of so many un- 
 offending people, who had their all invested in distil- 
 leries? In reply, he said: "A very fat duck went 
 out early one morning in pursuit of worms, and after 
 being out all day, she succeeded in filling her crop, 
 and on her return home at night, with her crop full 
 of worms, she had the misfortune to be met by a 
 fox, who at once proposed to take her life to satisfy 
 his hunger. The old duck appealed, argued, implored, 
 and remonstrated. She said to the fox, ' You cannot 
 be so wicked and hard-hearted as to take the life of a 
 harmless duck merely to satisfy your hunger.' She 
 exhorted him against the commission of so great a 
 sin, and begged him not to stain his soul with her 
 innocent blood. When the fox could stand her cant 
 no longer, he said, ' Out upon you, madam ! with all 
 your fine feathers, you are a pretty thing to lecture 
 me about taking life to satisfy hunger. Is not your 
 own crop now full of worms ? You destroy more 
 lives in one day to satisfy your hunger than I do 
 in a whole month ! ' ' 
 
 When his relative wrote to him, and said, " If you 
 go on thus you will certainly ruin our fortune," his 
 answer was, " Change your trade ; turn your premises 
 into factories for flour. At all events, my course is 
 fixed. Though heaven and earth should come together, 
 we should do what is right." Such unselfish and dis- 
 interested conduct is worthy of imitation at all times.
 
 56 THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 Like other earnest temperance reformers, Father 
 Mathew by no means confined his efforts to this one 
 thing. He was an earnest advocate of law and order, 
 and protested with the most ardent manner against 
 "secret societies"; and on several occasions he availed 
 himself of the occurrence of some terrible outrage to 
 give the people warnings. "My dear friends," he 
 said, "I caution you not to join them [secret societies], 
 whatever name they bear. If any of these emissaries 
 address you, at once disclose the matter to your clergy- 
 man or to the next magistrate, for these bloodthirsty 
 wretches only seek to betray you, and, having effected 
 their object, they would then go to a foreign land, 
 there to live on the blood-money." How wise and 
 wholesome these counsels were, the events of the past 
 few years abundantly confirm. 
 
 During his stay in London several amusing inci- 
 dents occurred. We can only find space for two. At 
 a large party Father Mathew tried to make a convert 
 of Lord Brougham. " I drink very little wine," said 
 Lord Brougham; "only half a glass at luncheon and 
 two half glasses at dinner ; and though my medical 
 advisers told me I should increase the quantity, I 
 refused to do so." " They are wrong, my lord, for 
 advising you to increase the quantity, and you are 
 wrong in taking the small quantity you do ; but I 
 have my hopes of you ; " and after a pleasant resist- 
 ance on the part of the noble lord, Father Mathew 
 invested him with the ribbon and medal. "I will
 
 FATHER MAT HEW. 57 
 
 keep them," said Lord Brougham, "and take them to 
 
 the House, where I shall be sure to meet with Lord 
 
 the worse for liquor, and I will put them on him." He 
 
 did so, for on meeting with Lord , who was so 
 
 noted for his drinking habits, he said, " Lord , I 
 
 have a present from Father Mathew for you," as he 
 passed the ribbon quickly over his neck. " Then I 
 tell you what it is, Brougham : I will keep sober for 
 this night," a vow which he performed, as much to 
 the amazement as amusement of his friends. 
 
 On another occasion he met with the Duke 
 of Wellington, and while conversing with him, 
 said, " I ought to claim your Grace as one of ours." 
 " How can that be, Father Mathew ? I am not a 
 teetotaler, though I am a very moderate man," replied 
 the duke. " Oh, but you are a temperance man, your 
 Grace ; for if you had not so cool a head, you would 
 not have been the illustrious Duke of Wellington/' 
 was the quick reply. 
 
 A poor woman one day asked Father Mathew to 
 intercede with the Duke of Wellington to get her son 
 released as a recruit, who had taken the " shilling " 
 while drunk. He had no money to buy the poor 
 fellow's discharge, but, acting on the impulse of his 
 own generous nature, he wrote an earnest appeal to 
 the " Great Duke," stating that the man was the only 
 support of his mother and six children. By return of 
 post, he had the joy of receiving the following short, 
 but satisfactory, answer: "Field Marshal the Duke
 
 58 THE WORLD'S WORKERS^ 
 
 of Wellington presents his compliments to the Very 
 Rev. Mr. Mathew : he could not refuse his application, 
 and has directed the discharge of the soldier he desired." 
 
 During one of his visits to Westminster, the Times 
 newspaper tells us, that " after giving the pledge to 
 the second batch. Father Mathew said that while he 
 was below he had heard one person say to his neigh- 
 bour, ' What a shame it was that a Protestant should 
 receive a blessing from a Catholic priest.' Now, since 
 he had been in England, he had everywhere received 
 the blessings of the Protestants, and he was proud 
 of it. If a blessing did them no good, surely it could 
 do them no harm. Since he had been in the country 
 he had got half a million of blessings from the Pro- 
 testants. He was daily saluted with ( God bless you, 
 Father Mathew ! ' ' God speed you, Father Mathew ! ' 
 and such-like earnest expressions. There certainly 
 could be no evil in a blessing, come from where it 
 would." 
 
 It was in this generous, large-hearted spirit that 
 he everywhere carried on his work, and it would be 
 well if we had more of it manifested by others in the 
 world day by day. 
 
 In 1846 and 1847 Ireland was visited by a 
 terrible famine, through the blight on the potatoes. 
 Previously the country had on several occasions 
 suffered in that way, but this was the most fatal 
 of all. Father Mathew, while travelling to pro- 
 mote the spread of temperance, met with so many
 
 FATHER MATUZW. 59 
 
 appalling facts, that he, with the promptness and 
 humanity which ever marked his conduct, made a 
 timely appeal to the Government for aid, in which 
 he used the following startling words : " Men, 
 women, and children are gradually wasting away. 
 They fill their stomachs with cabbage-leaves, turnip- 
 tops, &c. &c., to appease their hunger. There are at 
 this moment more than five thousand half-starved 
 wretched beings begging in the streets of Cork. 
 When utterly exhausted, they crawl to the workhouse 
 to die." Death was everywhere, in the cabin, on the 
 highway, in the cellar, and even in the streets. Over 
 2,000 died in the Cork Workhouse in four months. As 
 many as sixty-seven were buried in one day. Into 
 the work of helping and securing help Father Mathew 
 threw all his energies, and spent his last shilling. 
 Over ^"3,000,000 was spent in food, and according to 
 the testimony of Sir John Burgoyne, it was "the 
 grandest attempt ever made to grapple with famine 
 over a whole country." It was accomplished through 
 more than 2,000 committees. Yet with all this help, 
 in nine months 10,000 persons had been buried in 
 the cemetery at Cork alone. Father Mathew in this 
 terrible crisis fully earned another title as " The 
 Apostle of Charity." 
 
 The numerous calls upon his benevolence, together 
 with the expenses connected with his temperance 
 work, at length brought him financial difficulties of 
 a very serious character. An effort was therefore
 
 60 THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 commenced, to assist him in such a way as to relieve 
 his mind from anxiety. In consequence of this, the 
 attention of her Majesty's Government was called to 
 the services Father Mathew had rendered to the 
 public peace and to the cause of humanity. The result 
 was, that her Majesty not only bestowed a pension of 
 ^"300 upon him, but also recognised that there are 
 other victories than those won in the field of battle 
 or on the quarter-deck, and that conquerors are to be 
 found among those whose hands are not crimsoned 
 with human blood. The good news was made known 
 to Father Mathew by Lord John Russell, whose letter 
 stated that it was given as a mark of her Majesty's 
 " approbation of your meritorious exertions in com- 
 bating the intemperance which in so many instances 
 obscured and rendered fruitless the virtues of your 
 countrymen." With the pension he was able to 
 insure his life for an amount sufficient to cover all 
 his liabilities. 
 
 It was in the year 1848 that he first began to 
 suffer the penalty of his ten years' marvellous 
 exertions. Time was when he could say, " I am the 
 strongest man in Ireland;" but during Lent, just as 
 he was rising at an early hour, he fell to the ground, 
 and on the physician asking what was the matter, he 
 replied, in a calm voice and with a sweet smile, " I am 
 paralysed on one side." It turned out to be too true. 
 During the following months he seemed to rally, and 
 in 1849 he resolved, in opposition to the remonstrance
 
 FATHER MATHEW. 61 
 
 of his physician and friends, to pay his long- 
 standing engagement to visit America. After a 
 tedious voyage he arrived in safety, and on the 2nd 
 of July he received a hearty welcome from the people 
 in New York. He remained two years at his work, 
 notwithstanding occasional attacks of paralysis. On 
 the 8th November, 1851, he gave his farewell address 
 to the people of the United States, in which he stated 
 he had visited twenty-five States of the Union, and 
 given the pledge to 300 of the principal towns and 
 cities, travelling 37,000 miles for the purpose. 
 " Though," he adds, " the renewed attacks of a 
 painful and insidious malady have rendered it im- 
 possible that I could (without imminent danger to 
 my life) make those public exertions which were 
 never spared by me in the days of my health and 
 vigour, I yet, thank Heaven ! have been instrumental 
 in adding to the ranks of temperance over 600,000 
 disciples in America." He was then advised by his 
 physician to take absolute repose, to which he gave 
 the following noble reply : " Never will I willingly 
 sink into inglorious inactivity. My Ihe cannot be 
 sacrificed in a better cause. If I am to die, I will 
 die in harness." 
 
 One day, towards the close of his life, Father 
 Mathcw was returning unusually animated from 
 where he then lived to the city, when a lady remarked 
 " Something must have pleased you very much ; " to 
 which he replied, " I have been invited to dinner by
 
 62 THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 the little son of a respectable working-man, who has 
 met me in the street. ' Father Mathew/ said the 
 little fellow, ' do come and dine with us ; we have such 
 a nice dinner/ ' What have you, my dear?' I asked. 
 ' We have a fine leg of mutton, and we have turnips, and 
 we have potatoes/ replied the child. ' Have you no 
 cakes ? ' I asked. ' No, sir/ answered the child, feeling 
 somewhat ashamed at having given me an invitation 
 with such a deficiency. 'Then, my dear, you must 
 have them,' said I, as, putting my hand in my pocket, 
 I gave him half-a-crown to go and get them." 
 
 In one of his addresses he tells us that a corn 
 dealer in Cork, named Barry, was one day met when 
 on his way to the savings-bank by a whisky dealer, 
 who said to him with an inquisitive look, " Why is 
 it that you do not come to see me now, my friend, so 
 often as you used to do ? " To this the other replied, 
 " I cannot do any such thing now ; my friend, Father 
 Mathew has desired me to keep from temptation." 
 " I am sorry to see you looking so very badly ; your 
 face is quite yellow ! " " Why," said Barry, " if my 
 face is yellow, so is my pocket too ; " and he pulled 
 out four sovereigns, which he was going to pay into 
 the bank. 
 
 Looking back, amid his sufferings, at the vastness 
 of the work he had done, and the great results which 
 had followed his labours, he saw very clearly that, in 
 addition to his efforts which had been so successful 
 in persuading the people to give up the use of intoxi-
 
 FATHER MATHEW. 63 
 
 eating liquors as a beverage, something ought to be 
 done to remove the temptation to drink out of 
 their way, by stopping the manufacture and sale of 
 such drinks. In a letter to the United Kingdom 
 Alliance, dated Cork, February 2ist, 1853, he thus 
 gives his warmest adhesion to that Society : " My 
 labours, with the Divine aid, were attended with 
 partial success. The efforts of individuals, however 
 zealous, are not equal to the mighty task. The 
 United Kingdom Alliance strikes at the very root 
 of the evil. I trust in God the associated efforts of 
 the many good and benevolent men will effectually 
 crush a monster gorged by human gore? 
 
 Had he lived to see the marvellous results which 
 have been accomplished by the closing of the public- 
 houses on Sunday, not only in Scotland, but also in 
 Ireland, he would have had his heart filled with joy 
 and thankfulness, and felt assured that victory over 
 the monster cannot be very long delayed from being 
 declared, and the blessings of temperance fully and 
 completely enjoyed by the people. 
 
 For four years he continued to suffer under the 
 malady which preyed upon his vital strength, and at 
 the close of the summer of 1856 he went to live at 
 Queenstown, where he might often be seen loitering 
 about. One day a friend called to see him, and found 
 he was praying. Father Mathew rose from his knees, 
 and the gentleman said, " Pardon me for disturbing 
 your devotions/ 7 " My dear friend," he replied, "you
 
 64 THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 must join with me in my prayers to God ; pray for 
 me." " For you, sir ? " " Yes ; I was praying that 
 God would prepare me for leaving this world, and 
 would forgive me for the sins I have committed." 
 Taking the visitor by the hand, he again asked him 
 to kneel with him. " What necessity is there for my 
 praying for you, Father Mathew ? " " Oh ! who can 
 be pure in the sight of God ? " was the reply. " But 
 you have done so much good for mankind/' "No, 
 no," said the humble man, in still more earnest tones, 
 " I have done nothing ; and no one can be pure in 
 the eyes of God. Kneel with me, and pray with 
 me to the Father of mercy." They both knelt 
 and prayed, and arose from their knees radiant 
 with joy. 
 
 On December 2nd, 1856, he had a sixth stroke, 
 but lingered until the 8th, when, in the full enjoyment 
 of the powers of his mind, death stole upon him as 
 sleep upon a weary man, and thus he died in peace. 
 On the 1 2th his remains were deposited in the ceme- 
 tery, and on October loth, 1864, a monument was 
 erected to his memory in Cork, where it stands to the 
 memory of the great Apostle of Temperance, FATHER 
 MATHEW.
 
 ELIHU BURRITT, 
 
 AMERICA'S LEARNED WORTHY. 
 
 T7LIHU BURRITT is a remarkable illustration 
 I-' of the power of taking care of " little things/' 
 " odd moments/' and turning them to some practical 
 account, instead of wasting them in dreams and idle 
 wishes. Indeed, he makes no secret of the fact, that 
 his first success in self-improvement is not to be set 
 down to " genius/' so called, but to the careful em- 
 ployment of those invaluable bits of time which so 
 many waste. While he was working and earning his 
 living as an ordinary blacksmith, he tells us that he 
 managed to learn some eighteen ancient and modern 
 languages, and twenty-two dialects. There is an 
 abundance, also, of other facts which go to show 
 that many persons have missed their way, not so 
 much from want of ability, as from want of diligence 
 in the right use of the proper means. Work is the 
 price of success. Elihu Burritt recognised this to be 
 the case, for he tells us that he found "hard labour 
 necessary to enable him to study with effect ; " and 
 more than once he gave up school-teaching and study, 
 and, taking to his leather apron again, went back to 
 
 E
 
 66 THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 his blacksmith's forge and anvil, for the sake of his 
 health of body, as well as the welfare of his mind. 
 
 Elihu Burritt is also a striking proof in himself 
 of the power of the people to rise a grand illustra- 
 tion, we had almost said, of the compatibility of 
 cheerful, willing, joyous toil with high, vast literary 
 attainments. He was a working-man in the truest 
 sense of the term. He could not have been an idler, 
 or he would have died long before he did. He must 
 work, either with his head or his hand ; and he presents 
 a splendid reproof to those who are afraid to soil 
 their hands or use their brains. He looked upon 
 labour as something given to him by his Creator, and, 
 like Himself, and it was for Him and to Him, when, 
 either as the blacksmith or the philanthropist, he 
 was toiling to lift himself and others into a better 
 and higher life. He was a man of iron in the 
 highest sense of the term, if by that we mean one 
 possessed of solid, fixed principles, and bent upon 
 conquering, and also possessing the stubbornness of 
 iron, which can be so welded and refined, that it 
 can be at last transformed into a bright and shining 
 instrument for either ornament or use. 
 
 Elihu was the youngest of ten children. He was 
 born on December 8th, 1810, in New Britain, Con- 
 necticut. Both his father and mother were noted 
 for their piety and kindness to others, and although 
 humble in circumstances, they brought up their 
 children "in the fear and admonition of the Lord,"
 
 ELIHU BURRITT. 67 
 
 Among the earliest recollections of Elihu's childhood. 
 he tells us, was the arranging of all the chairs and 
 stools in the house in a semicircle around the fire, 
 and the benevolent expression of countenance with 
 which his father used to conduct to the best seat in 
 the family circle an old idiotic pauper, known by the 
 name of " Aunt Sarah." Not that she held in reality 
 such a relationship to the family, but it was the rule 
 of that house, that if any one had met with the mis- 
 fortune to lose a limb, or was halt, blind, or dumb, he be- 
 came to their family an uncle, or, if a female, an aunt. 
 
 With such surroundings, it is easy to understand 
 how it was that, after a hard day's work at the forge, 
 in after days, Elihu was so ready to sit watching by 
 his father's bedside while sick and dying, through 
 half the silent hours of the night. 
 
 When about sixteen years of age, Elihu was ap- 
 prenticed to a blacksmith, and began to live with his 
 elder brother, Elijah, who, in consequence of his oppo- 
 sition to slavery, had been obliged to leave Georgia 
 and return to his native town, where he had opened a 
 school. It appears to have also been about that period 
 that Elihu began first to manifest his diligence in the 
 pursuit of knowledge. By the time he was one-and- 
 twenty, when his term of apprenticeship was up, he 
 laid aside the hammer, and became a student with his 
 brother for six months. It does not appear that he 
 had then any idea of the vastness of the work he was 
 about to accomplish. He complied with his brother's
 
 68 THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 wishes to study mathematics, Latin, and French, 
 simply with the object of qualifying himself for a 
 land surveyor, and being able to read a few works 
 in their original tongue. But those winter's studies 
 were the beginning of one of the most gigantic courses 
 of mental and moral acquirements which the mind of 
 man has ever triumphed over. He was then only 
 able to earn a dollar and a half a day at his trade, and 
 it might be considered that he spent that amount on 
 schooling. This, however, only acted as an additional 
 spur to his energy, and made him doubly industrious. 
 By the expiration of the half-year he managed to 
 acquire a good knowledge of mathematics, besides 
 having read several French works, and gone through 
 Virgil no small task for so short a time. 
 
 He then resolved to go back to his forge, with the 
 determination to make up for lost time. This he 
 managed to accomplish by undertaking to do the 
 work of two men ; thus he also secured double 
 wages. To do this he had to work fourteen hours a 
 day ; yet amid even these labours he still found time 
 to proceed with his French and Latin studies in the 
 morning and evening. He then also began to study 
 Spanish and Greek, but he had to carry his Greek 
 grammar in the crown of his hat, and make it his 
 constant companion in the workshop. He frequently 
 committed part of a Greek verb to memory while 
 standing beside the furnace waiting for the metal to 
 fuse. He spent about six months in this way, and
 
 ELIHU BURRITT. 69 
 
 then again left the forge, with the determination to 
 employ his earnings in gaining more knowledge. To 
 do this, during the winter he took lodgings at New 
 Haven, where his intellectual labours and progress 
 seem to have been perfectly marvellous. To use his 
 own words : " As soon as the man who attended the 
 fires had made one in the sitting-room, which was 
 about half-past four in the morning, I arose and 
 studied German till breakfast, which was served at 
 half-past seven. When the boarders were gone to 
 their places of business, I sat down to Homer's 
 ' Iliad,' without a comment to assist me, and with a 
 Greek and Latin Lexicon. A few minutes before they 
 came in to their dinners, I put away all my Greek and 
 Latin, and began reading Italian, which was less cal- 
 culated to attract the notice of the noisy men who at 
 that hour thronged the room. After dinner I took a 
 short walk, and then again sat down to Homer's 
 ' Iliad,' with a determination to master it without a 
 master. The proudest moment of my life was when 
 I first possessed myself of the full meaning of the 
 first fifteen lines of that noble work. / took a tri- 
 umphal walk in celebration of that exploit. In the 
 evening I read in the Spanish language until bedtime. 
 I followed this course for two or three months, at the 
 end of which time I read about the whole of the 
 ' Iliad ' in Greek, and made considerable progress in 
 French; Italian, German, and Spanish." 
 
 At the close of the winter he returned to his
 
 7O THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 native town, and once more put on his leathern apron, 
 with a fresh determination to make up for lost time 
 by diligence at the anvil. But by this time the fame 
 of his learning had been noised abroad ; the result 
 was, that he had an invitation to take charge of a 
 grammar-school in a neighbouring town. This he 
 accepted, and for twelve months not only attended 
 most industriously to the pupils entrusted to his 
 charge, but vigorously pursued his own studies. This, 
 however, together with the want of the bodily exercise 
 to which he had been accustomed, told upon his health 
 to such an extent, that he relinquished his appointment 
 at the school, and returned again to the forge. 
 
 Still, he did not give up his idea of searching for 
 knowledge and acquiring information, but kept push- 
 ing away from time to time in fresh directions. By- 
 and-by his mind was directed to the Oriental dialects, 
 and to these he gave his attention ; but here a grave 
 obstacle stared him in the face the difficulty of 
 obtaining the necessary books. Undaunted by this, 
 he conceived the idea of working his passage across 
 the Atlantic, in one of the ships to Europe, in order to 
 get them. He started on his long journey, and ac- 
 tually walked to Boston, a journey of one hundred and 
 twenty miles. Hearing on the road of the existence 
 of an antiquarian library at Worcester, he turned his 
 feet in that direction. While on his way, he was over- 
 taken by a waggon, and succeeded in persuading the 
 young driver to give him a friendly lift. While thus
 
 ELIHU BURR ITT. 71 
 
 resting, he began to ponder how he could recompense 
 his friend for the help received. To part with his 
 little stock of money was impossible, as all he had 
 was only a dollar. The only thing left was to tender 
 his old watch in payment, and to tell the lad that if 
 he could afford to have it repaired, it would be worth 
 more than the cost of the ride, and hence, if the two 
 should ever meet again, the " balance might be handed 
 over to the original owner of the watch." These 
 terms were agreed upon, and each went his way. 
 Elihu obtained a situation as a journeyman black- 
 smith at Worcester, at twelve dollars per month, with 
 board included. Some time after, he was surprised 
 by a visit from the young waggoner, who came to him 
 at the anvil, and smilingly handed him a few dollars, 
 saying, at the same time, that the watch had been 
 mended, and gave every satisfaction as a timekeeper. 
 Time rolled on, and years passed away, when one 
 day, while Burritt was travelling by railway from 
 Worcester to his native town, New Britain, a well- 
 dressed fellow-traveller accosted him, saying, " You 
 have forgotten me, Mr. Burritt, but I have not for- 
 gotten you." Burritt acknowledged he had, and asked 
 for further information. "You remember," said the 
 traveller, " the boy to whom you gave your watch ? 
 I am he : a young man, a student of Havard College." 
 It may be readily conceived, that this led to a pleasant 
 and hearty shaking of the hands, and then Burritt 
 asked, " And about that watch ; what has become of
 
 72 THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 it ? for, to tell you the truth, I was much attached to 
 it, and should like to have it back again." " Then 
 you shall," replied the young man ; "you shall have it 
 back. I sold it ; but I know where it is, and it shall 
 be yours." In due time the watch was again in 
 Burritt's hands, and was retained by him, as one of 
 the greatest treasures he possessed, to the day of 
 his death. 
 
 During the time he resided at Worcester, with the 
 intention of availing himself of the privileges for study 
 which the antiquarian library gave him, he met with 
 another difficulty which developed his energy. It 
 arose in this way. The limitation of the hours during 
 which the library was open to the public proved a 
 barrier to his plans, and also a source of grief to 
 his mind. The library was only open to the public 
 at certain hours in the day, and these were the very 
 hours when he had to be at work, and confined to his 
 anvil. He continued, therefore, his Hebrew studies 
 unassisted, as he was best able. Every odd moment 
 he could steal out of the twenty-four hours was 
 devoted to study. He rose early in the winter 
 mornings, and while the mistress of the house was 
 preparing breakfast by lamp-light, he would stand 
 by the mantel-shelf, with his Hebrew Bible on the 
 shelf, and his Lexicon in his hand, thus studying as he 
 ate his breakfast. He did the same at his other meals. 
 It was in this way that he turned to good account 
 the other odd moments which his strong craving for
 
 ELIHU BURRITT. 73 
 
 knowledge led him to deduct from his meal and other 
 times. An extract or two from his own diary will 
 give a better idea than anything else of the kind 
 of life he was at that time leading : 
 
 Monday, June i8th : Headache; forty pages of Cuvier's 
 " Theory of the Earth," sixty-four pages French, eleven hours' 
 forging. Ttiesday : Sixty-five lines of Hebrew, thirty pages of 
 French, ten pages Cuvier's " Theory," eight lines Syriac, ten ditto 
 Danish, ten ditto Bohemian, nine ditto Polish, fifteen names of 
 stars, ten hours' forging. Wednesday : Twenty-five lines He- 
 brew, fifty pages of astronomy, seven hours' forging. Thursday: 
 Fifty-five lines Hebrew, eight Syriac, eleven hours' forging. 
 Friday ; Unwell ; twelve hours' forging. Saturday : Unwell ; 
 fifty pages of Natural History, ten hours' forging. Stmday : 
 Lessons for Bible Class. 
 
 It is not surprising to find that this constant strain 
 upon the body and mind at last made great inroads 
 upon his health. Yet he trudged along undaunted, 
 merely saying, when suffering from headache, "A 
 little less study and a little more work, say two or 
 three hours' additional forging." In' this way, as the 
 years rolled by, he mastered, one after another, the 
 Turkish, Ethiopic, and Persian languages, besides 
 translating many of the Icelandic sagas for leading 
 reviews, and also, on frequent occasions, delivering 
 lectures on many topics. Generous offers were 
 made by friends to ensure him rest from his manual 
 work, so as to enable him to give more time to the 
 cultivation of his mind ; but these, with the manly 
 and true independence of his nature, he thankfully
 
 74 THE WORLDS WORKERS. 
 
 declined, and declared that "the condition of journey- 
 men or apprentices is the most advantageous for tlie 
 acquisition of knowledge" Surely he was able to 
 speak so from his own abundant experience. 
 
 No doubt every one who has heard of the "Learned 
 Blacksmith " will be anxious to hear his own story, 
 " Why I Left the Anvil ! " He tells us : " One day I 
 was tuning my anvil beneath a hot iron, and busy 
 with the thought that there was as much intellectual 
 philosophy in my hammer as in any of the enginery 
 agoing in modern times, when a most unearthly 
 screaming pierced my ears ; I stepped to the door, 
 and there it was, the great iron horse ! Yes, he had 
 come, looking for all the world like the dragon we 
 read of in Scripture, harnessed to half a living world, 
 and just landed on the earth, where he stood braying 
 in surprise and indignation at the ' base use ' to which 
 he had been turned. I saw the gigantic hexiped move, 
 with a power that made the earth tremble for miles. 
 I saw the army of human beings gliding with the 
 velocity of the wind over the iron track, and droves 
 of cattle travelling at the rate of twenty miles an 
 hour, towards their city slaughter-house. It was 
 wonderful. The little busy-bee-winged machinery 
 of the cotton factory dwindled into insignificance 
 before it. Monstrous beast of passage and burden ! 
 It devoured the intervening distance, and welded the 
 cities together! But for its furnace heart and iron 
 sinews, it was nothing but a beast, an enormous
 
 ELIHU BURRITT. 75 
 
 aggregation of horse-power. And I went back to 
 the forge with unimpaired reverence for the intellec- 
 tual philosophy of my hammer. 
 
 " Passing along the street one afternoon, I heard 
 a noise in an old building, as of some one puffing a 
 pair of bellows. So, with no more ado, I stepped in, 
 and there, in a corner of a room, I saw the chef 
 d'aeuvre of all the machinery that has ever been in- 
 vented since the birth of Tubal Cain. In its con- 
 struction it was simple and unassuming as a cheese- 
 press. It went with a lever with a lever longer, 
 stronger, than that with which Archimedes promised 
 to lift the world. ' It is a printing press,' said a boy 
 standing by the ink-trough, with a queueless turban 
 of brown paper on his head. ' A printing press ? 
 What do you print ? ' I asked. ' Print ? ' said the boy, 
 staring at me doubtfully, 'why, we print thoughts.' 
 ' Print thoughts ? ' I slowly repeated after him ; and 
 we stood looking for a moment at each other in 
 mutual admiration, he in the absence of an idea, and 
 I in pursuit of one. But I looked at him the hardest, 
 and he left an ink mark on his forehead, from a 
 pathetic motion of his left hand to quicken his appre- 
 hension of my meaning. ' Why, yes,' he reiterated, 
 in a tone of forced confidence, as if passing an idea, 
 which, though having been current a hundred years, 
 might still be counterfeit for all he could show on the 
 spot ; ' we print thoughts, to be sure.' ' But, my boy,' 
 I asked, in honest soberness, ' what are thoughts ? and
 
 76 THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 how can you get hold of them to print ? ' ' Thoughts 
 are what come out of people's minds,' he replied. 
 ' Get hold of them, indeed ; why, minds arn't nothing 
 you can get hold of, nor thoughts either. All the 
 minds that ever thought, and all the thoughts that 
 minds ever made, wouldn't make a ball as big as 
 your fist. Minds, they say, are just like air : you 
 can't see them ; they don't make any noise, nor 
 have any colour ; they don't weigh anything. Bill 
 Deepcut, the sexton, says that a man weighs just 
 as much when his mind has gone out of him as he 
 did before. No, sir, all the minds that ever lived 
 wouldn't weigh an ounce troy.' ' Then, how do you 
 print thoughts ? ' I asked. ' If minds are thin as air, 
 and thoughts thinner still, and make no noise, and 
 have no substance, shade, or colour, and are like 
 the winds and more than the winds, are anywhere 
 in a moment, sometimes in heaven, and sometimes 
 on earth, and in the waters under the earth, how 
 can you get hold of them ? how can you see them 
 when caught, or show them to others ? ' 
 
 "Ezekiel's eye grew luminous with a new idea, 
 and pushing his ink-roller proudly across the metallic 
 page of the newspaper, he replied, ' Thoughts work 
 and walk in things what make tracks ; and we take 
 them tracks and stamp them on paper, or iron, 
 wood, stone, or what not. That is the way we print 
 thoughts. Don't you understand ? ' The pressman 
 let go the lever and looked interrogatively at Ezekicl,
 
 ELIHU BURRITT. 77 
 
 beginning at the patch in his stringless brogans, and 
 following up with his eye to the top of the boy's 
 brown paper buff cap. Ezekiel comprehended the 
 felicity of his illustration, and, wiping his hands on 
 his torn apron, gradually assumed an attitude of 
 earnest exposition. I gave him an encouraging 
 wink, and so he went on. ' Thoughts make tracks,' 
 he continued impressively, as if evolving a new phase 
 of the idea by repeating it slowly. Seeing we assented 
 to this proposition inquiringly, he stepped to the type- 
 case, with his eye fixed admonishingly upon us. 
 ' Thoughts make tracks,' he repeated, arranging in his 
 left hand a score or two of metal slips, 'and with 
 these here letters, we can take the exact impression 
 of every thought that ever went out of the heart 
 of a human man ; and we can print it too/ giving 
 the inked forme a blow of triumph with his fist ; ' we 
 can print it too, give us paper and ink enough, till the 
 great round earth is blanketed around with a coverlid 
 of thoughts as much like the pattern as two peas.' 
 Ezekiel seemed to grow an inch at every word, and 
 the brawny pressman looked first at him, and then at 
 the press, with evident astonishment. 
 
 " 'Talk about the mind's living for ever!' exclaimed 
 the boy, pointing patronisingly at the ground, as if 
 mind were lying there, incapable of immortality until 
 the printer reached a helping hand ; ' why, the world 
 is brimful of live, bright, industrious thoughts, which 
 would have been dead, as dead as stone, if it hadn't
 
 78 THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 been for boys like me who have run the ink-rollers. 
 Immortality, indeed ! why, people's minds,' continued 
 he, with his imagination climbing into the profanely 
 sublime, 'people's minds wouldn't be immortal if 
 'twasn't for the printers at any rate, in this here 
 planetary burying-ground. We are the chaps what 
 manufacture immortality for the dead men,' he sub- 
 joined, slapping the pressman graciously on the 
 shoulder. The latter took it as if dubbed a Knight 
 of the Legion of Honour, for the boy had put the mys- 
 teries of his profession in sublime apocalypse. ' Give 
 us one good healthy mind,' resumed Ezekiel, ' to 
 think for us, and we will furnish a dozen worlds as 
 big as this with thoughts to order. Give us such a 
 man, and we will insure his life ; we will keep him 
 alive for ever among the honey. He can't die, no 
 way you can fix it, when once we have touched 
 him with these here bits of inky pewter. He shan't 
 die nor sleep. We will keep his mind at work, or 
 all the minds that live on the earth, and all the minds 
 that shall come to live here as long as the world stands.' 
 
 " ' Ezekiel,' I asked, in a subdued tone of reverence, 
 ' will you print my thoughts too ? ' 
 
 " ' Yes, that I will,' he replied, ' if you will think 
 some of the right kind.' ' Yes, that we will,' echoed 
 the pressman. And I went home and thought, and 
 Ezekiel has printed my 'thought-tracks' ever since." 
 
 The circumstances under which he one morning 
 found himself famous are worth special record. I
 
 ELIHU BURRITT. 79 
 
 had come to the knowledge of Mr. Everett, then 
 Governor of Massachusetts, when Elihu was about 
 twenty-seven years of age, that he could read fifty 
 languages, many of which he had also mastered. At 
 an association of mechanics Mr. Everett mentioned 
 this in an address. When the tidings came to 
 Burritt, he wrote : " I find myself involved in a species 
 of notoriety not at all in consonance with my feelings. 
 Those who have been acquainted with my character 
 from my youth up will give me credit for sincerity 
 when I say that it never entered my heart to blazon 
 forth any acquisition of my own. I had, until the 
 unfortunate denouement which I have mentioned, 
 pursued the even tenour of my way unnoticed, even 
 among my brethren and kindred. None of them 
 ever thought I had any particular genius, as it is 
 called. I never thought so myself." What a con- 
 trast this, to the panting after fame by those who 
 never deserve it ! Again, in referring to the same 
 subject, Burritt let us into the secret, if we may so 
 call it, of his success. These are the words in which 
 he makes it known : " All that I have accomplished, 
 or expect or hope to accomplish, has been and will 
 be by that plodding, patient, persevering process of 
 accretion which builds the ant-heap, particle by 
 particle, thought by thought, fact by fact. And if 
 ever I was actuated by ambition, its highest and 
 warmest aspiration reached no farther than the hope 
 to set before the young men of my country an
 
 So THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 example in employing those invaluable fragments of 
 time called ' odd moments.' And, sir, I should 
 esteem it an honour of costlier water than the tiara 
 encircling a monarch's brow, if my future activity 
 and attainments should encourage American work- 
 ing men to be proud and jealous of the credentials 
 which God has given them to every eminence and 
 immunity in the empire of mind. These are the 
 views and sentiments with which I have sat down 
 night by night for years, with blistered hands and 
 brightening hope, to studies which I hoped might 
 be serviceable to that class of the community to 
 which I am proud to belong. This is my ambition. 
 This is the goal of my aspirations." This will be 
 clearly seen if we also .notice what he said on another 
 occasion, when referring to his early career : " For 
 the first five years of my residence in Worcester I 
 devoted all the leisure hours which occurred in the 
 intervals of manual labour to the study of languages, 
 and to other literary pursuits, rather as a source 
 of enjoyment than as the means of future usefulness. 
 When my tastes for these recreations had strengthened 
 almost to a passion, my mind was biased in a new 
 direction by an incident which impressed it with the 
 conviction that there was something to live for besides 
 the gratification of a mere curiosity to learn : that 
 there were words to be spoken with the living tongue 
 and earnest heart, for great principles of truth and 
 righteousness, as well as to be committed to a silent
 
 ELIHU BURRITT. 81 
 
 memory, from the dead languages of the ancient 
 world. To that conviction I yielded the literary pre- 
 dilections and pursuits which had engrossed my hours 
 of leisure, and nearly all the thoughts I could divert 
 from my daily avocation." 
 
 In 1844 ne commenced the publication of a weekly 
 newspaper, the Christian Citizen. It was specially 
 devoted to anti-slavery, peace, temperance, and self- 
 cultivation. In 1846 he visited England. During a 
 three years' residence he originated enterprises, some 
 of which were for promoting peace. " The League of 
 Universal Brotherhood " at one time consisted of ten 
 thousand members in Great Britain, and as many in 
 the United States. Out of this sprang " The Olive- 
 leaf Mission," its object being the insertion in about 
 forty continental journals of articles on peace. In 
 favour of ocean penny postage, he addressed 150 
 meetings in the United Kingdom, and travelled over 
 nearly the whole of the United States on the same 
 mission. In 1854 he began a six years' labour to 
 get the people of America to adopt " compensated 
 emancipation" as the safest, cheapest, and most 
 equitable way of extinguishing slavery; but the 
 descent of Old John Brown on Virginia led to a 
 war which cost ten times more in money alone than 
 if it had been done in the manner he proposed. 
 
 In 1858 he delivered a lecture to the Agricultural 
 Society of New York, during which he thus referred 
 to his early efforts in farming : " I recollect I am
 
 82 THE WORLDS WORKERS. 
 
 merely serving the third year of my apprenticeship in 
 agricultural life, and that all the farm I own is a small 
 sterile hill in Connecticut, so poverty-stricken and 
 exhausted when I acquired possession of it, that 
 only a few sickly daisies and jaundiced weeds showed 
 their diminished heads above the stones, which in 
 many places covered the ground three feet deep." 
 The idea of facing well-to-do large farmers was 
 therefore rather serious to him. Nevertheless, he 
 tells them how he stood up against their scoffs and 
 jeers, and that he had only one answer, and it was 
 this : " I wish to go into co-partnership with Divine 
 Providence in the work of creation ; and if, by 
 virtue of that co-partnership, I could make two spires 
 of grass grow where one did not before, it was a work 
 as near a work of creation as man could attain to. 
 To the man who could grow corn, rye, and potatoes 
 on rich meadow land there was no merit, for Nature 
 would carry off seventy-five per cent, of the credit." 
 
 It was in the year 1837 he signed the temperance 
 pledge, and from 1840 to 1844 he lectured exten- 
 sively on the subject in America. He was one of 
 the most noted of the visitors who attended " The 
 World's Temperance Convention," held in London, 
 August, 1846. Among other contributions which 
 have proceeded from his pen are "The Drunkard's 
 Wife" and "Lead us Not into Temptation." He 
 was an ardent friend of the Juvenile Temperance 
 movement. His views were very decided and clear,
 
 ELIHU BURRITT. 83 
 
 as may be gathered from his own life motto, which 
 can be safely recommended to all even at this time. 
 It was in these words : 
 
 TOUCH NOT ! 
 TASTE NOT ! 
 HANDLE NOT! 
 SMELL NOT ! 
 ANY THING THAT CAN INTOXICATE! 
 
 He had a favourite argument to show that the 
 influence of the drunkard is all on the side of total 
 abstinence, and that the greatest instrument pleading 
 the cause, " with all the eloquence of his misery," is 
 the drunkard ; and then he asks, " When the biting 
 scoffs of men and dogs have chased him into his frosty 
 retreat, and he stands at bay upon the straw on which 
 a broken-hearted creature which he once called his 
 wife is trying to die what does he preach there ? 
 Is it temperate, moderate drinking or total abstinence 
 that he advocates, when his little shoeless, shivering 
 children lift their cold feet out of the cold ashes, and, 
 with faces stereotyped with haggard misery, fix on 
 him their large, glassy eyes for bread ? " 
 
 Again he remarks : 
 
 "The most brilliant genius and talents are no 
 protection or safeguard against the fascinating and 
 fettering power of strong drink. In every age, and in 
 every country, learned, eloquent, and high-born men 
 have fallen before this insidious tempter, and destroyer 
 of the human race. These high qualities, so much
 
 84 THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 admired and coveted by all classes of the community, 
 do not rescue the victims of this foe, when once en- 
 tangled in the meshes of its fascination. The height 
 from which the gifted fall when they sink into the 
 lowest depths of intemperance measures their misery 
 to the eye of the spectator. We see in their fate 
 the magnitude of the ruin which may be wrought 
 by strong drink. We see how the strongest men 
 are made weak before the intoxicating cup. Before 
 this great enemy of man, as before the King of 
 Terrors, the learned and illiterate, the artisan and 
 statesman, the rich and poor, seem to be on an equal 
 footing. There is no safety for either in a moment's 
 dalliance with the tempter. Keep him at a distance. 
 It is dangerous even to ' look upon the wine when it is 
 red, and when it giveth its colour in the cup.' " 
 
 Once more, in speaking to farmers and others, he 
 says : " Drink, is it ? Juleps, nectarine punches, and 
 other artistic mixtures to delight the taste. Look 
 into that dark, deep well, with the cold water just 
 perceptible. This is a more delicious drink to the 
 farmer than was ever distilled from nectar for Jupiter. 
 He wants no golden or silver goblet to drink it from. 
 The old oaken bucket, swinging on its iron swivel, 
 is better to him than all the chased ware of luxury. 
 See him at the windlass or well-sweep, with his 
 face red and dusty, and his mouth, eyes, and throat 
 chafed with hay-seed. Hear the big-bottomed 
 bucket bump against the moss-covered stones as it
 
 EUHU BURRITT. 85 
 
 descends. There is the splash, and the cold gurgling 
 sound at the filling ; and now it slowly ascends, with 
 a spray of water-drops dashing against the wall, every 
 one giving a new edge to the farmer's thirst. There 
 it is, standing on the curb before him, and it mirrors 
 the moistened and reddened face which bends to the 
 draught. There is a drink for you that Nature has 
 distilled for the farmer's lips, the like of which fabled 
 Olympus never knew." 
 
 He walked all over England, from Land's End to 
 John o' Groats, in the spring and summer months, 
 calling upon those who were noted for rearing horses, 
 pigs, cows, and other animals. He made also calls 
 upon growers of flowers, corn, and other produce, noting 
 the special improvements and changes they had intro- 
 duced in cultivation, or of alteration in their character. 
 
 During one of these journeys he says : " I once 
 heard it stated that a certain bombshell of a new 
 pattern cost 11 when ready for use. Then it would 
 cost the labour of an able-bodied man at the plough, 
 sickle, and hoe for six spring and summer months, to 
 pay for one of these death-dealing shells ! How much 
 honest, patient labour is swallowed up in the wolfish 
 maw of war ! " 
 
 One of his plans was to travel on foot, and meet 
 the labouring classes in small rooms in the villages 
 through which he passed. After spending two or 
 three weeks in Manchester and Birmingham, he 
 buckled on his knapsack and started. He walked
 
 86 THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 one hundred and fifty miles in that way, holding such 
 meetings at night. Often he had to arrange for larger 
 meetings, such was the desire to hear him. A year 
 thus rolled by, and wider doors of usefulness were 
 opened to him ; and he then went on the Continent of 
 Europe to disseminate the principles of peace. Ulti- 
 mately he arranged for one of the most important 
 conferences on the subject ever held. Distinguished 
 men of different countries came to Brussels in 1848. 
 This led to another meeting of the same character at 
 Paris, and then in Germany and other places. Thus, 
 step by step, he found his labours crowned with a suc- 
 cess which at first he never contemplated or imagined. 
 
 Like other notable workers for the good of their 
 fellows, Elihu Burritt availed himself of any oppor- 
 tunity which came within his reach to manifest his 
 practical sympathy, irrespective of creed, party, or 
 nation. One of the most notable of these occurred, 
 when on a visit to Ireland in 1847, during the 
 terrible famine. He was so much moved by the 
 scenes he witnessed, that he penned an appeal to his 
 fellow-countrymen for help, which he had the joy of 
 knowing met with a very hearty response from the 
 American nation. 
 
 Referring to this in one of his interesting books, 
 he said : " The very slaves of the South, at their rude 
 cabin meals at night, thought and spoke of the hungry 
 people somewhere beyond the sea, they knew not in 
 what direction ; and they came with their small gifts
 
 ELIHU BURRITT* 87 
 
 in their hands, and laid them among the general con- 
 tributions, each with a heart full of kindly feeling 
 towards the suffering. Never was there such a rum- 
 maging in cellars, garrets, wardrobes, and granaries 
 in the United States, for things that would be com- 
 fortable to the hungry and needy. Little children, 
 in their small way of thinking, brought their cherry- 
 faced dolls, with the idea that these would speak 
 comfort out of their bead eyes to the starving babies 
 in Ireland. The barrels and bags of flour, wheat, and 
 Indian corn, the butter, cheese, and bacon, sent from 
 the prairie farmers of the Western States, were mar- 
 vellous for number and heartiness of contribution. 
 From a thousand pulpits a thousand congregations 
 of different creeds were invited to lend a hand to 
 the general charity in a few earnest and feeling words 
 about the Fatherhood of God, and the Universal 
 Brotherhood of Men. The National Government 
 were touched by the same impulse, and ordered out 
 of their berths two great war-ships, to convey a portion 
 of the people's offerings to Ireland. It was a pleasant 
 sight to see those grim old frigates lay off their armour, 
 and put on the most peaceful civilian dress that any 
 ships ever wore abroad. One of them was a frigate 
 captured from the British navy in the last war between 
 the two countries. Its port-holes, now showing double 
 rows of limbered flour-barrels, charged full to their 
 heads and hoops with the best brands of wheat powder, 
 once belched forth fire, smoke, and hissing bolts of
 
 88 THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 destruction in the angry parlance of battle with its 
 American opponent. Landseer's white lamb looking 
 into a dove's nest, in the mouth of a half-buried cannon, 
 does not make such a good picture of Peace as he 
 might have made of those two frigates, washed and 
 shaved, and walking with a good-natured sailor's roll 
 across the ocean, with all their huge pockets full of 
 bacon, bread, and cheese for the hungry Irish." 
 
 From his " Sparks from the Anvil " we cull what 
 is considered his finest production. It is entitled, 
 " The Natural Bridge ; or, One Inch the Highest." 
 The scene opens with a view of the great Natural 
 Bridge in Virginia. There are three or four lads 
 standing in the channel below, looking up with awe 
 to that vast arch of unhewn rocks which the Almighty 
 bridged over those everlasting butments, " when the 
 morning stars sang together." The little piece of 
 sky spanning these measureless piers is full of stars, 
 although it is midday. It is almost five hundred feet 
 from where they stand, up those perpendicular bul- 
 warks of limestone, to the key-rock of that vast arch, 
 which appears to them only of the size of a man's 
 hand. The silence of death is rendered more impres- 
 sive by the little stream that falls from rock to rock 
 down the channel. The sun is darkened, and the 
 boys have unconsciously uncovered their heads, as 
 if standing in the presence-chamber of the Majesty 
 of the whole earth. At last this feeling begins 
 to wear away ; they look around them ; they
 
 ELIHU BURR ITT. 89 
 
 find that others have been there before them. They 
 see the names of hundreds cut in the limestone 
 butments. A new feeling comes over their young 
 hearts, and their knives are in their hands in an 
 instant. " What man has done man can do," is 
 their watchword while they draw themselves up, and 
 carve their names a foot above those of a hundred 
 full-grown men who have been there before them. 
 
 They are all satisfied with this feat of physical 
 exertion except one, whose example illustrates per- 
 fectly the forgotten truth that there is no royal road 
 to intellectual eminence. This ambitious youth sees a 
 name just above his reach a name that will be green 
 in the memory of the world when those of Alexander, 
 Caesar, and Bonaparte shall sink into oblivion. It was 
 the name of Washington. Before he marched with 
 Braddock to that fatal field, he had been there, and 
 left his name a foot above all his predecessors. It 
 was a glorious thought of the boy to write his name side 
 by side with that of the great " father of his country." 
 He grasps his knife with a firmer hand, and, clinging 
 to a little jutting crag, he cuts a notch into the lime- 
 stone, about a foot above where he stands ; he then 
 reaches up and cuts another for his hands. 'Tis a 
 dangerous adventure ; but as he puts his feet and hands 
 into those notches, and draws himself up carefully 
 to his full length, he finds himself a foot above every 
 name chronicled in that mighty wall. While his 
 companions are regarding him with concern and
 
 90 THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 admiration, he cuts his name in rude capitals, large 
 and deep, into that flinty album. His knife is still 
 in his hand, and strength in his sinews, and a new- 
 created aspiration in his heart. Again he cuts 
 another niche, and again he carves his name in 
 larger capitals. This is not enough. Heedless of 
 the entreaties of his companions, he cuts and climbs 
 again. The graduations of his ascending scale grow 
 wider apart. He measures his length at every notch 
 he cuts. The voices of his friends wax weaker and 
 weaker, till their words are finally lost on his ear. 
 He now, for the first time, casts a look beneath him. 
 Had that glance lasted a moment, that moment would 
 have been his last. He clings with a marvellous 
 shudder to his little niche in the rock. An awful 
 abyss awaits his almost certain fall. He is faint with 
 severe exertion, and trembling from the sudden view 
 of the dreadful destruction to which he is exposed. 
 His knife is worn half-way to the haft. He can hear 
 the voices, but not the words, of his terror-stricken 
 companions below. What a moment ! What a 
 meagre chance to escape destruction ! There is no 
 retracing his steps. It is impossible to put his hands 
 into the same niche with his feet, and retain his slender 
 hold a moment. His companions instantly perceive 
 this new and fearful dilemma, and await his fall with 
 emotions that " freeze their young blood." He is too 
 high, too faint, to ask for his father and mother, his 
 brothers and sisters, to come and witness or avert his
 
 EUHU BURR ITT. 91 
 
 destruction. But one of his companions anticipates 
 his desire. Swift as the wind he bounds down the 
 channel, and the situation of the fated boy is told 
 upon his father's hearthstone. 
 
 Minutes of almost eternal length roll on, and there 
 are hundreds standing in that rocky channel, and 
 hundreds on the bridge above, all holding their breath 
 and awaiting the fearful catastrophe. The poor boy 
 hears the hum of new and numerous voices both 
 above and below. He can just distinguish the tones 
 of his father, who is shouting with all the energy 
 of despair: " William! William! Don t look down ; 
 your mother^ and Henry, and Harriet are all here, 
 praying for you ! Don't look down ; keep your eye 
 towards the top ! " The boy didn't look down. His 
 eye is fixed like a flint towards heaven, and his young 
 heart on Him who reigns there. He grasps again 
 his knife. He cuts another niche, and another foot 
 is added to the hundreds that remove him from the 
 reach of human help below. How carefully he uses 
 his wasting blade ! How anxiously he selects the 
 softest places in that vast pier ! How he avoids 
 every flinty grain ! How he economises his physical 
 powers, resting a moment at each notch he cuts ! 
 How every motion is watched from below ! There 
 stand his father, mother, brother, sister, on the very 
 spot where, if he falls, he will not fall alone. 
 
 The sun is now half-way down the west. The lad 
 has made fifty additional niches in that mighty wall,
 
 92 . THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 and now finds himself directly under the middle of 
 that vast arch of rocks, earth, and trees. He must 
 cut his way in a new direction to get from under 
 this overhanging mountain. The inspiration of hope 
 is dying in his bosom ; its vital heat is fed by the 
 increasing shouts of hundreds perched upon cliffs 
 and trees, and others who stand with ropes in their 
 hands on the bridge above, or with ladders below. 
 Fifty notches more must be cut before the longest rope 
 can reach him. His wasting blade strikes again into 
 the limestone. The boy .is emerging painfully, foot 
 by foot, from under that lofty arch. Spliced ropes 
 are ready in the hands of those who are leaning over 
 the outer edge of the bridge. Two minutes more, 
 and all will be over. The blade is worn to the last 
 half-inch. The boy's head reels ; his eyes are starting 
 from their sockets. His last hope is dying in his 
 heart ; his life must hang upon the next notch he cuts. 
 That niche is his last. At the last faint gash he 
 makes, his knife his faithful knife falls from his 
 little nerveless hand, and, ringing along the precipice, 
 falls at his mother's feet. An involuntary groan of 
 despair runs like a death -knell through the channel 
 below, and all is still as the grave. At the height of 
 nearly three hundred feet the devoted boy lifts his 
 hopeless heart and closing eyes to commend his soul 
 to God. 'Tis but a moment there ! One foot swings 
 off! He is reeling trembling toppling over into 
 eternity ! Hark ! A shout falls on his ears from
 
 ELIHU BURRITT. 93 
 
 above. The man who is lying with half his length 
 over the bridge has caught a glimpse of the boy's 
 head and shoulders. Quick as thought the noosed 
 rope is within reach of the sinking youth. No one 
 breathes. With a faint, convulsive effort, the swoon- 
 ing boy drops his arms into the noose. Darkness 
 comes over him, and with the words " God ! " and 
 " Mother ! " whispered on his lips just loud enough to 
 be heard in heaven, the tightening rope lifts him 
 out of his last shallow niche. Not a lip moves while 
 he is dangling over that fearful abyss ; but when a 
 sturdy Virginian reaches down and draws up the lad, 
 and holds him up in his arms before the tearful, 
 breathless multitude, such shouting such leaping 
 and weeping for joy never greeted the ear of a 
 human being so recovered from the yawning gulf of 
 eternity. 
 
 A crowded meeting was held in the North Church, 
 Boston, to give the " Learned Blacksmith," as they 
 called him, a reception home in 1850, at which he 
 gave the following summary of his experience : " I 
 went out from your midst a timid young man 
 with the meekest aspirations and humblest hopes. 
 I went away pensively on foot, carrying under my 
 arm all I owned in the world tied up in a small 
 handkerchief. So far as I can recall the thoughts 
 which passed my mind during the long walks of 
 that pedestrian journey, I can truly say that a life 
 of contented and obscure usefulness was the height
 
 94 THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 of my earthly ambition. My anticipations had this 
 extent, and no more. And I can say with equal 
 truth and sincerity, and I desire to say it grate- 
 fully, on this the most distinguished occasion that 
 I have ever seen or ever expect to see in life, that 
 if my course has diverged from that condition in 
 which I had expected to pass my days, not unto 
 me be the merit or honour of the change, but to 
 that kind and over-ruling Providence which has led 
 me, by a series of almost imperceptible stages, into 
 a field of labour and experience of which I had no 
 conception when I left New Britain in 1837." 
 
 After cherishing lofty purposes, performing deeds 
 of kindness, and making untiring efforts such as had 
 never been attempted by any one else before for the 
 promotion of education, peace, temperance, and uni- 
 versal brotherhood among all with whom he had to 
 do, he returned to his native town in 1870 to reside. 
 There, when he had nearly reached the age of three- 
 score years and ten, on the 8th of March, 1879, he 
 passed away to his reward, leaving us to own that, 
 of all who have given to the world a grand example 
 of self-culture and self-sacrifice for the good of others, 
 none have ever excelled the " Learned Blacksmith," 
 who, although some may despise him, because of his 
 lowly birth and plodding industry, has, notwith- 
 standing, proved himself to be one of Nature's real 
 noblemen, though he is only known as plain ELIHU 
 BURRITT.
 
 JOSEPH LIVESEY, 
 
 ENGLAND'S TEMPERANCE PIONEER. 
 
 JUST at the beginning of this century, down in a 
 damp cellar, there might have been seen two men 
 and a boy working at three hand-looms, in which the 
 elder had invested all the money he could spare to 
 help his son's business. It could also have been 
 easily perceived that they were struggling hard 
 against difficulties, and that there seemed very little 
 hope of either of them ever making for himself a 
 name, which would be handed down to posterity 
 with honour as having laid the foundation of the 
 greatest and most successful social revolution of the 
 times in which we live. Yet so it was. The youth 
 who was sitting in that corner of yon damp cellar, 
 with his back close to the wet wall, trying to 
 combine reading and working together, was Joseph 
 Livesey, the venerated founder of the Temperance 
 Movement in England. The eldest of the three 
 was his grandfather. The third, Thomas, was the 
 youth's uncle. 
 
 Seven years or so before, on March 5th, 1794, 
 Joseph had made his first appearance in the world,
 
 96 THE WORLDS WORKERS. 
 
 at a small cottage in Walton-le-dale, about one mile 
 and a half from Preston. His father and mother 
 were poor, hard-working people, but both delicate 
 in health. A brother and sister had died early ; in 
 1 80 1, both parents were carried off, within ten 
 weeks of each other, by consumption. Thus, at the 
 early age of seven, little Joseph was left without 
 father, mother, sister, or brother, an orphan upon 
 the wide world, with the natural questions, "What 
 was to be done with him ? Where was he to 
 go ? How was he to live ? " His grandparent, 
 amid his own poverty, found him a home, and it is 
 there we first meet with him. 
 
 With a feeble constitution to start with, and 
 inheriting a tendency to consumption from both 
 parents, it is the more surprising how he was able, 
 from early morn till late at night, to endure such ex- 
 posure and damp. But the fact that he did so illustrates 
 very forcibly what strong common sense and a resolute 
 will can accomplish, when united with perseverance 
 and energy, and how possible it is to triumph over what 
 at first sight appears to be an almost insurmountable 
 barrier and to rise from a very humble origin, to 
 occupy a place in the front rank among the 
 " World's Workers." 
 
 He not only had the sorrow of losing both his 
 parents, but his grandfather soon after his adoption 
 had the misfortune to fail in the cotton business in 
 which he had embarked his all, Mr. Livesey, speak-
 
 JOSEPH LIVESEY. 97 
 
 ing of this time, says : " I remember well the old 
 man, on a Tuesday night, upon the return of Thomas 
 (his son) with unfavourable reports from the Man- 
 chester market, crying like a child. Young as I was, 
 I busied myself in the warehouse, sometimes at the 
 warping mill, sometimes helping to hook pieces, or 
 weighing out the weft. The ' moutre ' trade was 
 then carried on to a great extent, and the disputes 
 with weavers and threats of ' bating ' were frequent. 
 Both yarn and cloth were enormously dear ; so there 
 was a great temptation to weavers to sell cops, to 
 take off ' half beers,' and by obliterating the ' smits ' 
 to get longer ' fents ' than they were allowed." How- 
 ever, the crash came ; the only consolation left 
 being that the assets realised enough to pay all the 
 creditors twenty shillings in the pound. 
 
 The next step was back to a " weaving " farm 
 where young Joseph had also to go with them. They 
 were so poor that the lad had to act as a servant. 
 " From necessity," he tells us, " I became pretty 
 proficient in all kinds of labour connected with 
 domestic life, and I have never regretted this ; for in 
 speaking to the poor during my visitations, I have 
 found my early experience of great service ; and in 
 the event of any reverse, I have always felt I was pre- 
 pared to live where others would perhaps starve." 
 
 Thus animated with a desire to make his way in 
 the world, he kept pushing along. At the close of 
 the day, when tired with toil on the loom, he thought 
 o
 
 98 THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 " there was something better ahead." This roused his 
 energies, and caused him to sit down bravely to a few 
 hours' more study. Like David Livingstone, another 
 weaver boy, he resolved upon cultivating his mind, as 
 the best step to self advancement, and, like the 
 missionary, he learnt to .work and read at the same 
 time. 
 
 There were no school boards in those days, so he 
 went for a short time to an old woman who kept a 
 dame's school. There he learnt to read the Bible, and 
 then the cellar became his school-room, and the three 
 hand-looms at which his grandfather and uncle 
 worked, his desk. Speaking of these times he says : 
 " This cellar was my college, the ' breast-beam ' was 
 my desk, and I was my own tutor. Many a day and 
 night have I laboured to understand Lindley Murray, 
 and at last, by indomitable perseverance, which long ap- 
 peared a hopeless task, this was accomplished, without 
 aid from any human being. Anxious for information, 
 and having no companions from whom I could learn 
 anything, I longed for books, but had no means with 
 which to procure them. There was no public library, 
 and publications of all kinds were expensive ; and if 
 I could succeed in borrowing one, I would devour it 
 like a hungry man would his first meal." 
 
 Living, as we do, surrounded with schools, libraries, 
 and cheap literature, it is hard to realise the differ- 
 ence, so as to contrast it with the state of things 
 with which he had to contend. Then he adds :
 
 JOSEPH LlVESEY. 99 
 
 "At the period I refer to there were no national 
 schools, no Sunday-schools, no mechanics' institu- 
 tions, no penny publications, no cheap newspapers, no 
 free libraries, no penny postage, no temperance 
 societies, no tea parties, no Young Men's Christian 
 Associations, no people's parks, no railways, no gas, 
 no anything, in fact, that distinguishes the present time 
 in favour of the improvement and enjoyment of the 
 masses. Most of the articles of necessity for a poor 
 man's house, during the war with France, were nearly 
 double their present price, and all felt the pressure of 
 the times. My only pocket money, when a lad, was 
 'the Sunday penny.' I have a distinct recollection 
 how proud I felt when I went among my companions 
 on the Sunday afternoon, with my threepence in my 
 pocket, which was my increased weekly allowance. 
 It was then I got my grammar, exercises, and 
 key, Cann's Bible with references, and a few other 
 books, as my means would allow. I seldom got a 
 meal without a book open before me at the same 
 time, and I managed to do what I have never seen 
 any other weaver attempt, to read and weave at the 
 same time. For hours I have done this, and without 
 making bad work. The book was laid on the breast 
 beam, with a cord slipped on to keep the leaves from 
 rising ; head, hands, and feet all busy at the same 
 time. I had a restless mind, panting for knowledge, 
 and incapable of inaction. That part of the loom and 
 the wall nearest my seat was covered with marks,
 
 ioo TH& WORLDS WORKERS. 
 
 which 1 had made to assist me to remember certain \ 
 facts, and these hieroglyphics were there when I left 
 This cellar is only a short walk from where I am now 
 writing, and I feel a pleasure in making a call at this 
 hallowed spot. The privations connected with 
 poverty, in my case, admitted of no exceptions. The 
 day seemed too short for my love of reading, and, as 
 often as I could, I remained to read after uncle and 
 grandfather had retired to bed ; but I was allowed no 
 candle, and for hours I have read by the glare of the 
 few embers left in the fire-gratCj with my head close 
 to the bars. I had hard exercising ground, but still I 
 think it was well fitted, in a case like mine, to prepare 
 me for the battle of life I had to fight." 
 
 Referring again to this period in after years, he 
 had the honesty and manliness to say, " I once was 
 glad to pick up a stray leaf, or to borrow an old 
 backless book, with which to allay my thirst for 
 knowledge." Still the days were too short to satisfy 
 his thirst for knowledge. He was always anxious to 
 reach the end of a book, and when he once began to 
 read the first page, he did not care to lay it down 
 until he had reached the last. Contrasting the ad- 
 vantages which are within the reach of the young 
 people of the present day against those with which he 
 had to struggle, he says : 
 
 " Whilst thousands of costly volumes lie dormant, 
 unopened, and unread by their owners, the backless 
 volume was read by me with eagerness, and this
 
 JOSEPH LIVES BY. 101 
 
 doubtless has been the case with others. What would 
 I not have given at that day to have had the oppor- 
 tunity afforded by the Preston Institution, a privilege 
 too much undervalued by the working-classes of the 
 present time. And yet it is a question in many cases, 
 whether want or plenty makes the most sterling 
 character. My first book-case consisted of two slips 
 of wood, value about eightpence, hung to the wall by 
 a cord at each end, and the first work placed upon 
 these anti-aristocratic shelves was ' Jones's Theological 
 Repository,' a periodical of a number of volumes 
 which I had got at second-hand. I shall never forget, 
 as I descended the cellar stairs, how I sometimes 
 turned back to look at and admire my newly-acquired 
 treasure." 
 
 It was this spirit of self-denial and self-reliance, 
 embued with a deep sense of his great responsibility 
 to a higher power, which ever marked his career, and 
 gave such mighty impetus to his efforts. As an old 
 writer more than two hundred and fifty years before 
 had said: "Self-reliance and self-denial will teach 
 a man to drink out of his own cistern, and eat his 
 own sweet bread, and to learn and labour truly to get 
 his own living, and carefully to save and expend the 
 good things committed to his trust." These words 
 express in the most graphic manner the ruling ideas 
 which seem to have governed the life of Joseph 
 Livesey. Village life seventy or eighty years ago 
 was a very different thing to what it is now. The
 
 IO2 THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 contrast is most marked. The place where Joseph 
 Livesey lived was noted for its " fighting parties," 
 and because he stoutly refused to join with them in 
 their brutal amusement, he had to stand the ordeal 
 of being taunted as " a softy." This, however, did not 
 hinder him from seeking his recreation in other direc- 
 tions. He says, for instance, that once he "followed 
 the hounds all day long in his clogs, but never desired 
 a repetition of that sport." Sometimes he went fish- 
 ing, and nothing gave him more delight than to stroll 
 by the silvery river Ribble, with some choice book 
 for a companion, and after laying night-lines below 
 Walton Bridge, to return home quite happy. It 
 will thus be seen that the less boisterous games were 
 more to his taste than the rough-and-ready sports 
 of the boys. Indeed, he confesses, " I generally made 
 the girls my companions, in preference to the boys." 
 He had no objection to a game at marbles, hide-and- 
 seek, forfeits, and joined heartily in the evening story- 
 telling parties, when "Jack the Giant-Killer," and 
 other like legends, formed the principal material 
 upon which their minds feasted. They believed in 
 "ghosts" and "bogies," and often amused them- 
 selves with repeating rumours of the exploits of a 
 local bogie called "Bannister Doll/' until they be- 
 came so excited that they had to be sent off to their 
 homes. Like every one else who looks around him, 
 Joseph, even in these days, could not help seeing how 
 the use of intoxicating drinks debases self-respect,
 
 JOSEPH LIVESEY. 103 
 
 diminishes self-knowledge, defiles self-reverence, and 
 destroys self-control ; hence it is not surprising to find 
 that, on reviewing his life-long war against such 
 drinks, on his eighty-first birthday, he asked, "Why 
 should drink reign, and drink-selling tread national 
 prosperity, domestic peace, morality, and religion 
 under feet ? Nothing, I believe, is wanting but a 
 strong combined resolution, unity of action among all 
 lovers of sobriety and goodness, and a willingness 
 to sacrifice present and personal pleasure, for the 
 deliverance and happiness of our fellow-creatures. 
 Diffusive teetotalism and agitating teetotalism are 
 what I long to see, and what I try to promote to the 
 utmost of my present limited power." 
 
 As " example is better than precept," he could in 
 fairness urge upon others to " go and do likewise," 
 seeing that for over half a century he had, with an 
 earnestness which never faltered, and a persistency 
 which never flagged, as a true pioneer uttered his 
 earnest convictions, and maintained his unswerving 
 allegiance to the cause of temperance; and many a time 
 when other subjects seemed for the moment to have 
 absorbed the public mind, he successfully called back 
 attention to the subject which lay nearest to his own 
 heart, and so set an example of dogged, persistent 
 determination not often manifested, and which has 
 certainly never been surpassed. 
 
 It seems a wonder that, working for so many years 
 close to the wet wall, that it did not produce im-
 
 IO4 THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 mediate bad results, but he tells us why he thought it 
 did not. " I can only suppose that this was counter- 
 acted in a great measure by the incessant action of 
 almost every muscle of the body required in weaving. 
 ' All fours ' never cease action on the part of the 
 hand- loom weaver. Yet it is very probable that the 
 four rheumatic fevers that I have had to endure, and 
 the seven years' chronic rheumatism in my lower 
 joints, rendering me unable to walk about without 
 pain, which followed, had their remote cause in that 
 miserable place." Gradually he managed to improve, 
 and get piece-work, and so to earn a little extra, with 
 which he bought a grammar and a few other books. 
 He also made several attempts to get lighter work. 
 The shuttle-making was tried, without success ; next 
 " twisting-in " for weavers, then a jobber; this last 
 employment failed so completely, that at the end of 
 the week, by a trick of the trade, he did not receive a 
 penny of wages. 
 
 One of the earliest recollections which stamped 
 itself upon Joseph's mind was the procession of the 
 famous Preston Guild in 1802. He was at that time 
 eight years old, and the various products of cotton- 
 spinning, which had only recently been introduced, 
 formed a very marked feature in the day's proceed- 
 ings. Preston at that time only contained a popu- 
 lation of six or seven thousand inhabitants, but the 
 manner in which the new industry was displayed 
 made it very striking to his youthful mind. Referring
 
 JOSEPH LIVESEY. 105 
 
 to the display, the local historian tells us : " The 
 gentlemen's procession commenced on Monday morn- 
 ing immediately after breakfast ; it was preceded by 
 the marshal, armed cap-a-pie, on horseback, etc. ; 
 then came twenty-four young, blooming, handsome 
 women, belonging to the different cotton-mills, dressed 
 in a uniform of peculiar beauty and simplicity. The 
 dress consisted wholly of the manufacture of the 
 town. Their petticoats were of fine white calico ; 
 the head-dress was a kind of blue-feathered wreath, 
 formed very ingeniously of cotton, so as to look like 
 a garland. Each girl carried in her hand the branch 
 of an artificial cotton-tree as the symbol of her pro- 
 fession. The gentlemen walked in pairs, preceded 
 by Lord Derby and the Hon. T. Erskine." 
 
 From that time onward Preston became a centre 
 of bustling activity, until its population increased to 
 upwards of one hundred thousand, and "King 
 Cotton," as it has been called, converted the once 
 aristocratic town of " proud Preston " into a beehive 
 of industry, by which the people have been enabled 
 to develop their energy, and secure for themselves a 
 large addition to their comforts, of which in the early 
 part of this century they had never dreamt. 
 
 When about sixteen years of age, he formed the 
 acquaintance of a family residing in the village named 
 Portlock. Such was the influence which their con- 
 sistent Christian lives had upon him, that he resolved 
 to accompany them to the Baptist chapel at Preston,
 
 io6 THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 of which church they were members. Finally, it lead 
 to his being baptized, and joining the same church. 
 Speaking of the blessedness of this decision, and the 
 happiness it gave him, he. says, "The return of 
 Sunday was to me a feast of good things ; all the 
 fervency of youth and zeal of a new convert were 
 added to a deep conviction of the importance of 
 religion. With what delight did I use to go, in my 
 clogs, to Preston to the evening prayer-meetings held 
 in the vestry. I have still in my possession Watts' 
 hymn-book, which I bought at the time. On the 
 inside of the front cover is written ' Joseph Livesey's 
 book, 1811.' On the blank leaf is the following : 'Is 
 any merry ? let him sing psalms ' (James v. 13). And 
 at the end is the verse : 
 
 " Hope is my helmet, faith my shield, 
 Thy Word, my God, the sword I wield ; 
 With sacred truth my loins are girt, 
 And holy zeal inspires my heart." 
 
 About that time he tramped, with fourteen others, 
 to Accrington, a distance of fourteen miles, to an 
 ordination service. He 'tells us : " The Rev. Mr. 
 Stephens preached from the text, 'One is your 
 master, even Christ ; and all ye are brethren.' 
 Equality was what I admired, and I was much 
 pleased with the discourse. At the close of the 
 service it was announced that any one who wished to 
 take dinner could be accommodated at a certain inn 
 at one shilling each. But I learnt that there was a
 
 JOSEPH LIVESEY. 107 
 
 free dinner for the ministers and other rich friends. I 
 felt, as one of the poor who really needed a dinner, 
 and not having a shilling to spare, that the doctrine 
 of equal brotherhood, though brilliant in the pulpit, 
 was not so in ' word and deed.' But what offended 
 me most was, that, being allowed to enter the large 
 room after the dinner, I saw the minister and other 
 friends enjoying themselves with their long pipes 
 amid the fumes of tobacco, drinking spirits and other 
 liquors. Though physically feeble, I was never 
 deficient in moral courage, and when we were intro- 
 duced to the reverend gentlemen, I could not forbear 
 giving vent to my feelings. I protested against this 
 eating and drinking, and said that in primitive times 
 men were ordained to the ministry with ' prayer and 
 fasting.' A poor, simple, ill-dressed, illiterate, un- 
 known lad lecturing divines on the primitive duties 
 of self-denial ! A regular laugh was the response ; 
 and, indeed, what else could be expected ? I believe 
 this exhibition gave a cast to my mind of which 
 I have never got clear, and I should be glad to believe 
 that nothing similar is to be met with in the present 
 day." 
 
 Over-confident of his own views, he tells us again 
 that he "became the zealous advocate of opinions, 
 rather than the promoter of charity among all good 
 people," and this led him into a controversy in which 
 he used this phrase, " I never see anything wrong but 
 I am determined to set it right;" and although he met
 
 io8 THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 with a severe rebuke, it at the same time shows the 
 resolute character of the young reformer when only 
 about eighteen years old. He tells us that he 
 " profited by the reproof, which he well deserved." 
 
 Not only had Joseph to contend with ignorance, 
 but he had also to fight against vice. The moral 
 world in which he lived was of the most poisonous 
 character. Drunkenness was to be seen everywhere. 
 The weavers believed in keeping what they called 
 Saint Monday, and a queer kind of saint it was. The 
 public-houses were crowded, and blasphemy and 
 brutality could be seen and heard on every hand. 
 Speaking of this he says : " We had a sad lot con- 
 nected with the church. The grave-digger and his 
 father were both drunkards. The ringers and singers 
 were all hard drinkers ; and I remember the singers 
 singing in my father's kitchen on a Christmas 
 morning in a most disgraceful condition. The parish 
 clerk was no exception. When the clock was 
 standing on a morning for want of winding, as was 
 often the case, the remark was, ' The clerk was drunk 
 again last night.' I was surrounded by mental dark- 
 ness and vice, and was without the companionship of 
 congenial spirits." 
 
 It is said that " a dead dog can go with a stream, 
 but it takes a living man to go against it." Hence it 
 was needful for Joseph not only to resolve to lead a 
 Christian life, but to do all he could to sustain its 
 vigour and promote its efficiency. The result was,
 
 JOSEPH LivESEYt 109 
 
 that soon after his conversion he resolved to become 
 a Sunday-school teacher, then a prayer leader, and 
 after that a preacher. His one desire was to elevate 
 and save others. 
 
 He made up his mind to have a home of his own 
 as soon as he could get one. At the age of twenty-one, 
 by the death of a relative, he became possessed of the 
 sum of 30. Meantime, he had heard of a Miss 
 Williams, a religious girl, and with his usual earnest- 
 ness, and before seeing her, he determined to make 
 her an offer of marriage. Visiting the family with 
 whom she was staying, he attended a prayer-meeting 
 with them. He was asked to deliver an address, 
 which he did. In after years Mrs. Livesey confessed 
 it was owing to the favourable opinion she formed 
 while he was speaking, more than anything else, that 
 she was led to consent. He says, " We were fixed 
 thirty miles from each other, and with the exception 
 of about three visits, all the love-making, which 
 lasted about a year, was done by long sheets of paper 
 filled to every corner." Regardless of the jokes of 
 friends, he attended auctions in the locality to buy 
 articles of furniture cheap, so as to have the home 
 ready when the wedding-day arrived, and on May 
 3Oth, 1815, at St. Peter's, Liverpool, "I remember," 
 he says, " the parson gabbled over the service as 
 quickly as possible, and I paid him a crown piece, 
 remarking what a cheap wife I had got." She proved 
 a real helpmate to him ; and for fifty years he could
 
 no THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 say that his wife was the greatest blessing of his life 
 to him. They went to their home at Walton, and he 
 says, " Here we both settled down to our work, Joseph 
 to his loom and jane to her wheel ; and though as 
 low in means as most people to start with, we have 
 'lived and loved together' now (1868) more than fifty- 
 two years, never once having reason to regret the 
 step we took. I soon learnt the truth of the old 
 saying, ' In taking a wife you had better have a 
 fortune in her than with her.' " 
 
 Under his wife's excellent management the little 
 home became a palace. In less than a year, however, 
 they had to remove into Preston, where Mrs. Livesey 
 gave birth to twins. With bread, owing to the corn 
 laws, at a high price, wages low, and trade bad, it was 
 a gloomy outlook for Joseph ; added to this, his 
 own health gave way. He consulted the doctor, 
 and was ordered to live better, to take malt liquor, 
 and some bread and cheese in the middle of the 
 forenoon. He bought a bit of common cheese at /d. 
 or 8d. per Ib. That bit of cheese, however, proved to 
 be the pivot upon which his business career took a 
 turn. The Lancashire cheese fair was being held, 
 and he happened to hear some one say that prices had 
 gone down to about fifty shillings the hundredweight. 
 By his self-taught arithmetic he discovered that 
 meant 5d. per Ib. He began to think if he could only 
 buy a whole cheese, and sell it out in small pieces to 
 his neighbours at that price, he could get a piece for
 
 LlVESEY. Ill 
 
 himself on the same terms. No idea of profit ever 
 entered his mind. But where to get the money was 
 the point. He ultimately thought of a draper named 
 Burnett, who was known as a friend to those in need. 
 He went and told his tale how he could supply the 
 poor with cheese at 5d. instead of /d. In a minute 
 the needful amount was lent, with which Joseph 
 bought two cheeses at fourpence three-farthings a 
 pound. He had then to go and borrow scales. 
 After selling the cheese at fivepence halfpenny per 
 pound, to cover the loss from cutting and weighing, 
 he found he had made unintentionally a profit of 
 is. 6d.; this was more than he could have earned in 
 the same time by weaving. The news spread, and 
 people kept coming for the cheap cheese ; so he gave 
 up weaving, and took to cheese selling. 
 
 It was to this event that " weaving," so far as 
 Joseph Livesey was concerned, came to an end. So 
 he gave his loom to a poor man named Woodruff, 
 thinking he had no further use for it ; but by a strange 
 coincidence he re-bought it back some years after for 
 a sovereign, and had it made into a writing-table. 
 Of this changed article of furniture he wrote in his 
 seventy-fifth year : " Turn it over, and you will see 
 the several pieces that constituted the cradle of my 
 future usefulness ; and when I am in my grave, may 
 this remind my children that their father was a poor 
 man, and that of all the duties incumbent upon them 
 they should never forget the poor/'
 
 m THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 It was no easy work to establish a business even 
 in those days. Hence, we find that he had to attend 
 the markets at Chorley, Blackburn, and Wigan, 
 walking to and from Preston, railways then being 
 a thing unknown. He then went to Bolton, and 
 walked the double journey of forty miles and selling 
 his cheese in one day. By degrees, with the help of 
 friends lending him some money, he was able to buy 
 a pony, which he had, however, to go and attend 
 to himself. He then added a gig. By this 
 means he was able to ride out into the country 
 districts, and call upon the farmers and buy their 
 cheese. During these journeys he met with many 
 things to test his earnestness, and which also exposed 
 him to serious risk and danger. On one occasion, 
 when at Ulverston, owing to the heavy dew, he could 
 not tell where he was, and wandered until he came 
 to a farm-house, but even then he was afraid to 
 knock, for fear they should take him for a bad 
 character and set the dogs at him. So he sought 
 an outhouse, and lay down on some hay until the 
 morning, and then walked out without any one 
 seeing him. On another journey, he was nearly 
 overtaken by the tide whilst crossing the well-known 
 Eleven-mile Sands, where so many have been drowned. 
 He saw the waves rolling rapidly in from the west, 
 and in an instant started eastward as fast as he could 
 go, and managed in the narrowest way to escape. 
 Once he was nearly in danger of being drowned,
 
 JOSEPH LIVESEY. 113 
 
 through the boatmen whom he had engaged to 
 ferry him across the Wye being drunk. But nothing 
 daunted his courage, or disheartened him in his purpose 
 to succeed. 
 
 The claims of a family of thirteen children (four of 
 whom died in infancy) acted as a spur to his energies. 
 As the boys grew up they were put out to work, or 
 made to take part in the business, and even before 
 the parents became total abstainers no intoxicating 
 drinks were kept in the house ; water or milk was the 
 usual drink. 
 
 In all these matters, and indeed in everything 
 else, he was assisted by his wife ; and although when 
 she knew he was writing his autobiography she said 
 " See thou sayest nothing about me" it is pleasing to 
 hear him own that " I cannot do justice to my feelings 
 if I do not say a few words as to the excellencies of 
 my dear wife. In our early struggles, when com- 
 mencing business out of nothing, she was not only 
 my counsellor in difficulties, but an active and efficient 
 helper to the extent of, and even beyond, her power. 
 She was no lady-wife ; though respectably connected, 
 and accustomed to plenty before marriage, she 
 willingly shared my poverty and privations, and bore 
 a full part of our burdens. She shared my joys, and 
 more than shared my sorrows, for she wiped them 
 away. Whenever I was cast down, she was the one 
 to revive my spirits. For a long time she did all the 
 housework as well as attending to business, and she 
 
 H
 
 ii4 THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 would sit up past midnight making and mending the 
 children's clothes. No pen could do justice in describ- 
 ing the sympathy she showed towards every sufferer 
 that came within her reach ; nor set forth her willing- 
 ness to undergo any toil to give them relief. If ever 
 a ' good mother ' existed, she deserves that name. 
 
 A lady's life of soft indulgence, rising 
 
 late in the morning, lolling on the sofa most of the 
 forenoon reading novels, with little exercise, fed with 
 rich food, and pampered with delicacies these have 
 killed many a thousand with better constitutions than 
 Mother Livesey's." 
 
 Ten years at least before the Anti-Corn Law 
 League began its work, Livesey, in one of his publica- 
 tions called The Moral Reformer, pleaded earnestly 
 for free trade. He gave stirring facts showing that 
 the average earnings of a man at weaving, working 
 from five in the morning till ten at night, only 
 amounted to $s. nfd. per week, and then he added, 
 " Such is the miserable pittance of the weaver. With 
 provisions at the present exorbitant price, if any man 
 can behold this state of things without raising his 
 determined voice against it, he must be destitute of 
 the common feelings of humanity." 
 
 Having learnt by painful experience, amid so 
 many grave surroundings, the difficulty of obtaining 
 an education himself, he set to work to help others 
 around him, whom he discovered in the same condi- 
 tion. As there was no Sunday-school for adults, he
 
 JOSEPH LIVES EY. 115 
 
 opened his own cottage. His wife took the females, 
 he took the males. When his house became too 
 small for the scholars, he hired a large room and met 
 them there. 
 
 A newspaper in those days cost sevenpence, and 
 was therefore beyond the reach of working people, 
 with such small wages as they then could earn. To 
 meet this, on his own responsibility he opened his 
 room for " a general reading-room," the charge being 
 35. 3d. per quarter. Its success was so great, that he 
 had to open six others in various parts of the town. 
 
 Early in life he felt the importance of the printing 
 press, and began to use it, first with placards, then 
 with pamphlets, and then with magazines. These were 
 all issued amid the toil of his own business, and most 
 of the articles were written by himself. This was 
 no easy matter, when we consider that he had the 
 cares of a large family, and the anxiety of creating 
 and developing a business, on which they were 
 dependent, and which for years mainly rested on him- 
 self. In addition to these, he issued a number of pub- 
 lications and tracts on various subjects, and while 
 in 1844 he published the first number of the Preston 
 Guardian, a newspaper which still exists, and stands 
 among the foremost of the provincial papers of 
 the country. 
 
 The circumstances under which Mr. Livesey took 
 his "last glass" are so interesting that it is best to 
 narrate it in his own words. In his annual Tempe-
 
 ii6 THE WORLD'S WORKERS, 
 
 ranee address on New Year's Day, 1881, he says : " It 
 is now fifty years since I took my last glass. It was 
 early in 1831 at Mr. McKie's, Lime Street, Preston. 
 It was only one glass of whisky and water. I often 
 say it was the best I ever drank, the best because it 
 was the last ; and if I remain in my senses I shall 
 never take another. I did not then understand the 
 properties of alcoholic liquors, though I ought to have 
 done, being thirty-seven years of age." The circum- 
 stances under which the event occurred ought to be 
 named. A local manufacturer persuaded Mr. Livesey 
 to join him in business as a sleeping partner, with the 
 assurance that it was in a profitable and prosperous 
 condition. Believing it to be so, Mr. Livesey invested 
 all his spare cash. Soon after doing so, the trade 
 began to fall off, creditors became pressing, and the 
 manufacturer left the town, as well as the business, 
 for Mr. Livesey to do as he might. To use his own 
 words, " It was a trying time ; after emancipating 
 myself from the weaver's cellar, and labouring and 
 toiling with my wife, almost night and day, with half- 
 a-dozen children about our feet, to find, as we feared, 
 all gone at once, by the treachery of one in whom we 
 had confided as a friend, was a condition which 
 experience alone will enable any one to realise. I 
 was left to wind-up the business of which I was 
 ignorant, and to provide for all its liabilities. At 
 such a moment it is cheering to have a partner to 
 share your burden, and keep up your spirits. ' Never
 
 JOSEPH LIVESEV. 117 
 
 mind,' said my dear wife, when she saw me cast down, 
 ' we shall get through ; we worked hard for what we 
 had ; it is lost, but we can work for more.' Time was 
 given me ; I turned the stock into money, and by 
 instalments paid every creditor the full amount of his 
 claims. By this unhappy business I lost in money, 
 time, etc., 2,000." The creditors, when the last 
 instalment was paid, proposed to present him with a 
 silver cup, as a mark of respect for his honourable 
 conduct, but he declined it, saying " he had 
 done nothing more than an honest man. ought 
 to do." It was while thus engaged that Mr. Livesey 
 had one day to meet some of his creditors in connec- 
 tion with this partnership, and a bottle of whisky 
 was produced by the Scotsman as one of the usual 
 methods of selling business in those days. " Either 
 from its strength," says Mr. Livesey, "or from my 
 never having taken whisky before, or more probably 
 from a depression of mind I was labouring under at 
 the time, it ' took hold of me.' I felt very queer as I 
 went home, and retired to bed unwell. Next morning 
 my mind was made up, and I solemnly vowed that I 
 would never take any intoxicating liquors again, a 
 vow which I have religiously kept to the present time. 
 I had a large family of boys, and this resolution was 
 come to, I believe, more on their account than from 
 any knowledge I had of the injurious properties of the 
 liquors." 
 
 He was not long ere he began to find the benefits
 
 n8 THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 which resulted to himself, and on January ist, 1832, 
 the young men in his adult school by his advice 
 formed a Temperance society, which at that time 
 only meant abstinence from spirits and moderation in 
 malt liquors. This was soon found to be a fatal 
 snare, and led to serious disasters. One Thursday 
 (August 23rd, 1832) John King was passing, and 
 Joseph Livesey invited him in. " I asked him if he 
 would sign a pledge of total abstinence, to which 
 he consented. I then went to the desk and wrote one 
 out. He came up to the desk, and I said, ' Thee sign 
 first.' He did so, and I signed it after him." From 
 these two signatures sprang the Total Abstinence 
 movement in this country. A few days after, on 
 Saturday, September ist, 1832, a meeting was called 
 in the Cock Pit, which had been built for cock-fighting, 
 and would hold seven hundred persons. It was after 
 moderation and total abstinence had been warmly 
 discussed, that these seven men of Preston signed the 
 following pledge : " We agree to abstain from all 
 liquors of an intoxicating quality, whether ale, porter, 
 wine, or ardent spirits, except as medicines." At one 
 of these meetings Richard Turner gave birth to the 
 word Teetotal as denoting abstinence from all kinds 
 of intoxicating drinks, and in the churchyard of St. 
 Peter's Church there is a gravestone whereon the fact 
 is recorded in these words : " Beneath this stone are 
 deposited the remains of Richard Turner, author of 
 the word ' Teetotal,' as applied to abstinence from all
 
 JOSEPH LIVES E Y. 119 
 
 intoxicating liquors, who departed this life on the 2/th 
 day of October, 1846, aged 56 years." 
 
 It was about the year 1826 that a number of 
 earnest philanthropists in America began to make 
 an effort to organise themselves into an army, to 
 check the onward march of the terrible vice of intem- 
 perance, with which they were being cursed. Gra- 
 dually their labours were extended, and in 1829 the 
 news reached England. From that time up to 1831 
 societies pledging their members to abstain from 
 spiritous liquors gradually multiplied in number. 
 But the honour of organising the first band of 
 total abstainers from all intoxicating drinks must 
 t>e claimed for the men of Preston. Here and 
 there in many parts of the world, in all ages, there 
 had existed men and women who had manifested by 
 personal experience that all the duties of life could not 
 only be discharged, but a great deal better discharged 
 without intoxicating drinks ; it was not, however, 
 until by a combination of circumstances, which clearly 
 indicated that God was directing the hearts and minds 
 of some of His children to the matter, that anything 
 in the shape of an organised effort was thought of, 
 and it is nothing but right to own that the honour 
 and credit of doing so ought to be ascribed to Joseph 
 Livesey, who led the way. 
 
 From some years after Mr. Livesey signed the 
 pledge, he devoted a large expenditure of time 
 and money to platform work. He delivered
 
 I2O THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 in many parts of England and Scotland his " Malt 
 Liquor Lecture," in which he demonstrated, by evidence 
 which has never been refuted, that " there is more food 
 in a pennyworth of bread than in a gallon of ale." To 
 these efforts Dr. F. Lees, Thomas Whittaker, Jabez 
 Inwards, and other well-known advocates, ascribe 
 their first impressions, and subsequent labours, in 
 support of the Temperance movement. 
 
 Wherever sorrow, suffering, and sin might be found, 
 there Joseph Livesey was sure soon to direct his steps. 
 His life was one constant effort to bless, elevate, and 
 refine those who needed it. He believed in doing 
 such a work himself, and never employed any deputy 
 to relieve him, either of the work or its reward. In- 
 deed, he watched over the cases as intently as if they 
 were his own children. Forty years back he could 
 therefore honestly say, " There is not a working man 
 in Preston with whom I have not a personal acquain- 
 tance, and with whose habits I am not acquainted." 
 He never, however, made any parade of what he did, 
 and few will ever know, until the " great day " shall 
 reveal it, the extent of his efforts, or the blessed results 
 which he secured. 
 
 He believed in the religion of sunshine, and, as a 
 consequence, he was ever on the alert to do anything 
 which would help to promote the happiness of those 
 who happened to be either poor or helpless. Among 
 other things he originated a plan for letting a little 
 brightness into their lives, by having cheap trips to the
 
 JOSEPH LIVESEY. 121 
 
 seaside. Every summer, the poorest of the town, 
 " the halt, the lame, and the blind," the scavengers, 
 the sweeps, and the workhouse people, were treated to 
 a railway trip to Blackpool, Southport, Fleetwood, or 
 some other seaside place. It began in 1845, and has 
 continued, generally in the month of August, ever 
 since. The names by which it is known are expres- 
 sive : the " Poor People's Trip," the " Old Women's 
 Trip," the "Butter-milk Trip." This last was so 
 named, because for a number of years a truck load of 
 butter-milk was taken for the use of the " trippers." 
 At first 2,000 to 2,500 were taken, but it went on in- 
 creasing until 4,000 were conveyed. 
 
 The two following quotations from his own auto- 
 biography will perhaps best illustrate his mode of 
 looking at things, and the manner in which he felt 
 they ought to be dealt with : 
 
 " We want more practical religion ; more feeling, 
 more sympathy for the suffering of others. We should 
 seek out and save, if possible, those who appear to be 
 lost. ' The want of sympathy,' said a late judge, ' is 
 the sin of this age.' If visiting was made a Christian 
 duty, not merely a duty of a committee, but the duty 
 of all, according to their time and opportunities, we 
 should then have a full acquaintance with each other, 
 learning to bear one another's burdens, and thus fulfil 
 the law of Christ. The influence of caste seems to be 
 getting worse. A change is greatly needed. As 
 much as possible we should all mix together, the rich
 
 122 THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 and the poor, the wise and the unwise, the good and 
 the wicked. Not that we need to renounce either 
 private property or private rights, but the mixing 
 should be one of kindness, humanity, love, charity, and 
 goodwill. What should we say of our street sweepers 
 if they were always sweeping in the clean places, 
 avoiding altogether the filth and dirt of the back 
 streets, accumulating and spreading their pestiferous 
 effects all around ? What should we say of our 
 medical men if infective diseases were allowed to get 
 so rife as to destroy thousands for want of their 
 attendance, their time being taken up with those who 
 least need them. I hold it equally important that 
 quite as great efforts should be made to remove moral 
 as physical evil. 
 
 " In all our Temperance labours we should get as 
 low down as possible. It is not the righteous, but 
 sinners, that need all our help. Christ condensed all 
 the commandments into two, one being this : ' Thou 
 shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.' But how can we 
 be said to love our neighbour whom we never see, never 
 call upon, and never inquire after ? Many teetotalers 
 are fond of ' demonstrations,' but those who take a 
 wider and more Christian view delight more in visit- 
 ing and teaching the residents of the slums, helping 
 the downcast, remembering that we are all of one 
 flesh, children of the same parent. Here, indeed, 
 shines the bright example of the Lord Jesus. The 
 interests of the poor, the wicked, the lost, the friend-
 
 JOSEPH LIVESEY. 123 
 
 less, were ever near His heart He delighted in the 
 companionship of the lowly. ... If one in a hundred 
 g;o astray, He teaches us that we should seek him out 
 and bring him back, rejoicing more over his restoration 
 than over the ninety-and-nine who remained in the 
 fold. It is a question for temperance people to con- 
 sider seriously how greatly behind they are in love, 
 compassion, pity, kindness, and self-denial, their 
 great Teacher, who went about doing good." 
 
 Ever on the lookout to do good, nothing calcu- 
 lated to accomplish seemed to escape his notice, or to 
 be beneath his attention. On one occasion, while 
 visiting among the poor, he found that coal was mostly 
 sold to them by the bag, in which the dealer professed 
 to put half, or a hundredweight. On weighing one of 
 these bags, he found it was considerably short of 
 the proper weight. With his usual practical sagacity 
 he resolved to divide the town into districts, and 
 fixing upon points near where the poor mostly lived, 
 he sent cart-loads of coal, with scales for weighing it, 
 which he sold at a little more than cost price, in this 
 way giving the poor the full benefit, and at the same 
 time he had the satisfaction of knowing that he 
 drove the robbers completely out of the field. 
 
 Another illustration of the widespread character 
 of his efforts may be mentioned. As a member of the 
 Corporation and a Guardian of the Poor of Preston, 
 he devoted a good deal of attention to the social 
 welfare of the townspeople. He assisted in the re-
 
 124 T HE WORLDS WORKERS. 
 
 moval of unhealthy dwellings, the straightening of 
 streets, promoting open spaces, playgrounds, and 
 parks, providing seats for the weak and weary, and 
 opening of drinking fountains for men and beasts. 
 All these things clearly illustrate how anxious he was 
 to do all he could to promote the health, comfort, and 
 beauty of the town of which he was a citiaen. 
 
 During the American War, Mr. Livesey availed 
 himself of another opportunity for showing his practi- 
 cal sympathy with the suffering poor. Owing to the 
 stoppage in the supply of cotton in 1862, Preston, 
 which was entirely dependent upon America for its 
 supply of that material, suffered from the terrible 
 Cotton Famine, which continued for nearly four years. 
 Thousands of men, women, and children were out of 
 work, although able and willing to do it. Some urged 
 that relief should be given only through the Board of 
 Guardians, but Mr. Livesey's warm heart hit upon a 
 much more generous method. He used his influence 
 to call a town's meeting. By his speech and subse- 
 quent hearty efforts, they succeeded in raising and 
 distributing 1 31,000, and giving out to the famish- 
 ing ones 5,141,418 tickets of relief. 
 
 Joseph Livesey was a practical reformer. If he 
 saw an evil, he was not content with merely regretting 
 its existence, and weeping over its victims, but he set 
 to work in a business-like way to remedy it. Finding 
 on one occasion, when he was visiting among the poor, 
 that the sleeping arrangements of many of them were
 
 JOSEPH LIVESEY. 125 
 
 of the most wretched character, he at once set to 
 work to improve them in this way. He persuaded the 
 wives to empty the old bed-ticks and wash them, and 
 he provided a supply of chaff to fill them ; where the 
 ticks were too rotten to hold it, he assisted them to 
 get fresh ones, and gave himself no rest till he knew 
 they could sleep in comfort. Once he met with a 
 poor sufferer lying on damp straw, covered with sores 
 and ulcers. He went home, took his own feather bed, 
 and, calling a cab, carried it, with the needful clothes 
 to cover him, to the poor person. This kind of work 
 so increased, that he appealed to others to help him, 
 which led to the formation of what was called " The 
 Bedding Charity," by which thousands of clean beds 
 for the needy and suffering have been provided. 
 
 Another striking incident in which the practical 
 sagacity and shrewd common sense of Mr. Livesey 
 showed itself was in connection with a serious disaster 
 which overtook the people of Preston through the 
 failure of the bank. In July, 1866, it stopped pay- 
 ment. As soon as the event became known, thou- 
 sands of people were plunged into sorrow. The 
 directors were paralysed, and hope fled. As soon as 
 Mr. Livesey heard the sad news, he went at once to 
 the bank, and asked for a full statement of their 
 position. At once he grasped the facts, and saw a 
 way out of the difficulty, which he laid before the 
 directors. His courage and dogged determination 
 inspired them with hope, and they consented to follow
 
 126 THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 his advice. He then went out and addressed the 
 despairing crowd, and told them, as they pressed 
 round the door of the bank, what he was prepared to 
 do. At once confidence was restored. Men who had 
 given up all hope, and feared ruin stared them in the 
 face, quickly lost their fears, and placed the fullest 
 reliance upon the credit of his integrity and upright- 
 ness. The result was, that the bank was re-established, 
 and he was, at the earnest solicitation of the share- 
 holders, made a director. 
 
 Notwithstanding his busy life and active labours, 
 yet he often lamented he had done so little. To 
 one of his best friends and oldest fellow-worker, 
 Mr. Thomas Walmsley, he said, a few months 
 prior to his last moments on earth, "Thomas, 
 what I regret the most is the little I have done 
 in my life. Oh, do work as much as ever you 
 possibly can." It was in this humble and modest 
 manner that this truly noble and unselfish man 
 viewed the vast labour and numerous efforts of 
 his busy life. On another occasion, in reply to 
 the expressions of wonder that he could find time 
 to do so much, he wrote, " Whatever I engaged in I 
 pursued with as much energy as if the success 
 depended upon my exertions alone." Again, on the 
 occasion of his eighty-fifth birthday, he said, in reply 
 to a deputation from the Preston Society, that, " while 
 he lived, and could handle a pen, while he had health, 
 he would still consecrate his energy and influence in
 
 JOSEPH LIVESEY. 127 
 
 promoting the good old cause." How much better 
 to speak thus than to have the sorrow of looking 
 back upon either a useless, wasted, or wicked life. 
 
 Among the provisions found in Mr. Livesey's will, 
 was one to the effect that a copy of his Malt Liquor 
 Lecture should be presented to every householder in 
 Preston. A special edition of 20,000 copies was pre- 
 pared for the purpose, and the borough was divided 
 into sixteen districts, each containing from 600 to 
 1,000 houses. A host of willing workers were supplied 
 with a map, and a list of the streets to be visited. In 
 this way the work was well and speedily done, and the 
 people of Preston was once more reminded, on the ist 
 day of January, 1885, of Mr. Livesey's annual address 
 on Temperance. Each copy was inscribed with the 
 words, " He being dead yet speaketh." 
 
 With increasing years, his latter days were spent 
 in peaceful retirement, now and then cheered by the 
 thought that throughout a long and honourable career 
 he had been engaged in spreading the principles of 
 Temperance, and in this way scattering joy and glad- 
 ness into many hearts and homes all over the world 
 Gradually his sufferings increased, and on September 
 2nd, 1884, only a day after the fifty-second anniver- 
 sary of the signing of that memorable pledge by the 
 seven, he passed away peacefully to his rest, in the 
 presence of his sons and other members of his family. 
 As the Daily News truthfully said, " the usual com- 
 monplaces of regret were inapplicable, for he had
 
 128 THE WORLD'S WORKERS. 
 
 died in the extreme fulness of years, and after his 
 unselfish and humane labours had produced their 
 beneficent fruits." 
 
 On the 5th day of September his remains were 
 laid by the side of her who had been his true and 
 faithful helpmate for fifty-four years. On the way 
 to the resting-place hundreds might be seen, who 
 had come from all parts of the country to testify their 
 respect, while ten thousand people lined the streets 
 with uncovered heads, as the solemn procession passed 
 along, alike ready to own their appreciation of the 
 noble work which had been done by the self-denying, 
 persistent, and courageous pioneer of Temperance, 
 JOSEPH LIVESEY. 
 
 PRINTED BY CASSBLL & COMPANY, LIMITED, LA BELLE SAUVAGE, LONDON, E.G.
 
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