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SERMON

PREACHED ON THE ANNIVERSARY

OF THE

BOSTON FEMALE ASYLUM

FOR

DESTITUTE ORPHANS,

SEPTEMBER 25, 1835.

PUBLISHED BY REQUEST OF THE BOARD OF MANAGERS.

BY JONATHAN M. WAINWRIGHT, D. D. Rector of Trinity Church, Boston.

Boston. DUTTON AND WENTWORTH, PRINTERS, Nos. 10 & 12, Exchange Street, 1835.

TO THE BOARD OF MANAGERS.

LADIES,

Upon your first application to me for a copy of this sermon to be printed, I respectfully declined giving it, because it was not prepared with the slightest reference to such a result, and more especially because it has been my uniform practice to abstain from appearing in this way before the public, when I could with propriety do so. To your renewed request, and the reasons you state for making it, I feel myself constrained to yield, although my own conviction in regard both to the character of the discourse itself, and to the inexpediency of such publications, except in very special cases, remains the same. If, however, its possession, as you imply, can afford gratification to any one interested in your most excellent institution, I ought not perhaps to be longer influenced by a consideration which relates merely to myself in withholding it. I therefore commit it to you, and am,

With the greatest respect,

Your friend and servant,

JONA. M. WAINWRIGHT.

BOSTON, OCTOBER 6, 1835.

SERMON.

"He that hath a bountiful eye shall be blessed; for he giveth of his bread to the poor."

How merciful and gracious is our Heavenly Father in presenting to us his commandments, united with the promise of ample rewards to those who will obey them. As the author of our being, the creator and preserver of our means of existence, and our sources of happiness, he has an unqualified right to our constant obedience and our best services. Yet he treats us as if we were in a measure independent of him, and as if our faculties and possessions were an underived property, for he demands of us no duty or sacrifice for which he does not offer an abundant remuneration. And even to the performance of those duties which are in themselves a source of gratification to the well regulated mind, the inducements are greatly increased by appendant promises. We might not think it remarkable that labor and sacrifices, and self-denial, should be encouraged by the hope of reward; but even the delightful offices of mercy and charity will be remunerated, and heavenly blessings will hereafter be showered upon the heads of those who may now be enjoying the luxury of doing good. Surely I address myself to those who know that there is a pleasure in deeds of beneficence,--a pleasure the noblest and most delightful of which our nature is susceptible. And you my brethren, must have had experience of this sentiment, or vain will be my efforts to unfold to you the subject that is before me. I appear in behalf of the destitute orphan, and if I thought I had need to convince you that there is a sweet and abiding satisfaction in relieving those who are truly objects of charity, I should be utterly discouraged at the outset. But such is not to be my ungrateful task; for I see around me those who I doubt not have often realized the pleasures of beneficence, and have often bestowed their charities upon the simple impulse of generous feeling. I would now, however, present to you a more exalted motive to beneficence than its secret pleasures. I would show you that it is not simply a gratification you can enjoy, but a solemn duty which you must perform; and therefore that your charities are not to be governed by momentary impulses, but by settled principles, and that you are to do good not merely because you take delight in it, but that you may secure the favor of God who has commanded this service. And as I have observed that where our Heavenly Father has put forth a commandment, he has also annexed a reward to induce us to obey it, so in our text the duty of beneficence is presented in the form of a beatitude, like the introductory precepts of our blessed Lord's sermon on the mount. "He that hath a bountiful eye shall be BLESSED."

I propose, first, briefly to explain this duty, then to state its obligation, and lastly to allude to the blessing promised in connexion with it.

Perhaps the most discriminating mode of exercising charity, and one which, if generally adopted, would almost preclude the necessity for giving to unknown objects would be this. Let all persons desirous of performing works of mercy from christian principle, make an estimate of what they ought to contribute from the stores with which God has favored them. Let them duly consider the various claims that are presented to them, and from amongst the many charitable societies with which we are surrounded, let them select the depositaries of their bounty. Let each family also, according to their means, select one or more of the poor whom they can know, and to a certain extent, follow through their good or ill conduct. These let them regard as a charge peculiarly committed to them. Let them become acquainted with the wants, the infirmities, the troubles, the sorrows of these the poorer members of their families, united to them by the bonds of christian relationship. The intercourse will be mutually salutary. It will produce a fuller and healthier developement of the christian character than can be brought out where the ranks in life are kept in a state of separation by the stern despotism of artificial distinctions, where there are no opportunities of passing from one to the other the softening influence of sympathizing feelings, and where on the one side pride, luxury and selfishness are nurtured, and on the other, envy, hatred and discontent. Were the custom I recommend universally adopted amongst a christian people, would not extreme distress from poverty be almost banished from amongst us? Should we ever be called to endure the pain of beholding destitute and miserable persons, except where incurable vice had made them such?

Such is our solemn duty; and it is important that it should be regarded in this light. Beneficence should not be merely the overflowing of a generous heart. This would be an unsafe and uncertain ground on which to place the principle of charitable distribution. Interesting objects indeed might not suffer from it, the orphan, the afflicted widow, decayed and broken age. Cold and insensible must be the heart that could shut up its sympathies from such petitioners. True beneficence however, cannot always be a delight. "It is not," says a powerful writer, "an indulgence to the finer sensibilities of the mind, but according to the sober declarations of scripture, a work and a labor, a business in which you must encounter vexation, opposition, and fatigue, where you are not always to meet with that elegance which allures the fancy, or with that humble and retired adversity which interests the more tender propensities of the heart, but as a business, where reluctance must often be overcome by a sense of duty, and where, though opposed at every step by envy, disgust and disappointment, you are bound to persevere in obedience to the law of God, and the sober instigation of principle." Is it not well then, my brethren, to establish beneficence upon the broad ground of christian obligation, rather than commend it to you by the high gratifications which it sometimes affords? Are not the interests of the poor in this manner more effectually secured? If the grand principle can be established in your breasts, that you are to do good not simply because you delight in this work, but because the dictates of justice and the laws of God require you to be charitable, will you not be preserved from the indiscretions of a heated benevolence on the one hand, and from the cruelty and consequent punishment of selfishness and avarice on the other?

Asylums for the destitute orphan are among those institutions which even the severe, and in some respects, the cold and selfish principles of Political Economy cannot justly disapprove of. To the truly benevolent, and to the pious christian, they have always been, and must ever be, objects of deep interest. Other charities may be perverted in some degree to evil purposes. Their effect may be to encourage idle and dissolute conduct, and to increase the evil they would remedy, by operating as a bounty upon pauperism. To some extent this has been the effect of alms-houses, and of many of those societies which, with the best intentions, have been administered to adult persons. We acknowledge, indeed, that protection, shelter, and subsistence for the aged and decrepit, who are past the ability to labor for their own daily food, medicine and medical advice, and in cases of absolute poverty, the retreat of the hospital, are real charities, such as suffering humanity requires, and pure benevolence will provide for. But in other cases, it is questionable whether relief can be given without ill effects, except it be accompanied with the opportunity and the necessity for bodily labor. I am not, however, upon the present occasion to discuss the general question of charitable societies. It is one of great importance, and one which we think is not yet generally understood. Much light has recently been thrown upon it, especially in this city, by the active and intelligent exertions and experiments of some of our fellow citizens,--and it should continue to occupy the serious attention of our civil authorities, and of every benevolent and public spirited person.

But who can doubt about the expediency, as well as the mercy and christian obligation, of fostering the poor and helpless orphan, whose natural protectors have been removed by the Providence of God? Naked, we must clothe them, for their helplessness cannot provide for their own covering; hungry, we must feed them, for they appeal to us with the moaning cry and innocent tears of childhood; strangers in this world, but just entered upon it, and left without a home to receive, or a parent's fostering care to protect them, we must take them in. We cannot resist or evade such an appeal, we know that it comes from a guileless petitioner, whose distresses no vice of its own has produced, and no exertions of its own can relieve. Should any one of you in your walks through our city during its inclement winter behold a child almost naked, shivering with cold and fainting with hunger, and did you learn that it had wandered unprotected from the home where its only surviving parent had just expired in all the wretchedness of poverty and disease, and finding its mother's voice silent, her hands that had cherished it cold, and her eyes closed, the little one had gone forth weeping and alone, would any of you refuse it a home, and food and protection?--It is this sacred duty which our Institution has performed for many such suffering and innocent beings. Where, if not to such an object, can the heart send forth its sympathies without restraint, and give itself to all the delights of a glowing generosity?

But I need not tell you of these heavenly satisfactions as I see around me those who have long known and shared them, for this Institution has, from its foundation, been a favored and fostered one in our community. Many are the labors that have cheerfully been bestowed upon its interests, many and generous the contributions given to it, and many and ardent the prayers offered up in its behalf to the throne of grace. Of those who first united themselves in this work and labor of love, I find that all have been removed, and have gone to receive their eternal reward.

The last of this respected and excellent band has recently been summoned away from us, and she went gently and peacefully, in a blessed old age, in full preparation, followed by the tears and benedictions of the widow and the fatherless whom she had relieved, and in beautiful accordance with the meek, the honorable, and useful existence, which she had mercifully been permitted to accomplish. One of the earliest founders of this Asylum, and for many years its first Directress, she had uniformly given to it her countenance and assistance; and dying, bequeathed to it a generous evidence of her attachment. Long will her memory be cherished in this community, as a model of the efficient but unassuming and lovely graces that constitute the character of the christian matron; long will it be cherished--and especially by you, Ladies, the present Managers of the Asylum, who have been witnesses of the fidelity, the courtesy, the discretion, the zeal, with which her duties as associated with you were discharged. The Institution has descended to you, the successors as it were of a blessed company who are now we trust, in communion with that Saviour, whose precepts of benevolence they so faithfully fulfilled, and with that blessed company of the spirits of the just made perfect, who now surround the throne of God and the Lamb. You need not our exhortation that you should walk worthy of their example, but you will not reject our devout wishes and prayers, that an equal measure of success may attend your future labors, and that a heavenly and eternal reward may hereafter crown them.

FOOTNOTES:

Proverbs xxiii. 6, 7.

Proverbs xxviii. 22.

Deuteronomy xv. 7-10.

The Board of Visitors of the Poor, as established in this city, is one of the most practically useful institutions which the modern spirit of enlightened charity has devised. Its object is not merely to search out the sick and needy and to relieve them, but also to investigate the claims of any applicants for charity that may be recommended to it, and thus to prevent impositions as far as practicable. Every family that has not time to disburse its charities under the superintendence of its own members, should be in communication with this Board. Measures are now in progress to organize a system, which shall render this Institution more effective even than it has yet been, in accomplishing the important purposes for which it was established. When completed, public notice will be given. Let every benevolent indivi

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