No. LVI.
“Take heed that ye do not your alms before men, to be seen of them; otherwise ye have no reward of your Father which is in Heaven. Therefore when thou doest thine alms, do not sound a trumpet before thee, as the hypocrites do, in the synagogues, and in the streets, that they may have glory of men. Verily I say unto you, they have their reward. But when thou doest alms, let not thy left hand know what thy right hand doeth. That thine alms may be in secret: and thy Father, which seeth in secret, himself shall reward thee openly.”
This ancient word—alms—according to its derivative import, comprehends not only those oboli, which are given to the wandering poor, but all bestowments, great and small, in the blessed cause of charity.
In the present age, how limited the number, whose moral courage and self-denial enable them to do their alms in secret, and without sounding a trumpet, as the hypocrites do! How many, impatient of delay, prefer an immediate reward—to have glory of men—rather than a long draft, upon far futurity, though God himself be the paymaster!
The ability, to plan a magnificent, prospective charity, to provide the means for its consummation, to preserve inviolate the secret of this high and holy purpose, except from some confidential friend perhaps, until the noble and pure-minded benefactor himself is beyond the reach of all human praise—this is indeed a celestial and a rare accomplishment.
My thoughts have been drawn hitherward, by the public announcement of certain testamentary donations of the late Theodore Lyman—ten thousand dollars to the Horticultural Society—ten thousand dollars to the Farm School—and fifty thousand dollars to the Reform School at Westborough. The public have been long in doubt, who was the secret patron of that excellent establishment, upon which he had previously bestowed two and twenty thousand dollars.—While we readily admit, that, in these unostentatious and posthumous benefactions, there is every claim upon the grateful respect of the community—while we delight to cherish a sentiment of reverence, for the memory of a good man, who would not suffer the sound of his munificence to go forth, till he had descended to that grave, where there is no device, nor work, and where his ears must be closed forever to the world’s applause—still there are some, who, doubtless, will marvel at these magnificent, noiseless, and posthumous appropriations. With a very small portion of the amounts, bestowed upon these institutions, what glory might have been had of men, aye, and in his own life time! By distributing the aggregate into comparatively petty sums—by the exercise of rather more than ordinary vigilance and cunning, in the selection of fitting opportunities, what a reputation Mr. Lyman might have obtained! He would not only have been preceded, by the sound of a trumpet, but every penny paper would have readily converted itself into a penny trumpet, to spread the fame of his showy benefactions. His name would have been in every mouth—aye, and on every omnibus and engine. Add to all this a very small amount—a few hundred dollars, devoted to the procurement of plaster casts of himself, to be skilfully distributed, and verily he would have had his reward.
The Hon. Theodore Lyman is dead, and, today, my grateful and respectful dealings are with his memory. The practical benevolence of this gentleman has been well known to me, for years. There are quiet, unobtrusive charities, which are not likely to figure, in the daily journals, or to be known by any person, but the parties. For such as these I have occasionally solicited Mr. Lyman, and never in vain. On the other hand, there are individuals, whose names are forever before the public, in connection with some work, to be seen of men; but whose gold and silver, unless they are likely to glitter, in transitu, before the eye of the community, are parted with, reluctantly, if at all.
This great public benefactor, upon the present occasion, seems to have said, in the gentle, unobtrusive whisperings of his noble spirit—“A portion of that, which God has permitted me to gather, I believe it is my bounden duty to return, into the treasury of the Lord. This will I do. The secret shall remain, while I live, between God, who gives me this willing heart, and myself. And, when the world shall, at last, become unavoidably apprized of the fact, I shall have taken sanctuary in the grave, where the fulsome applause of the multitude can never reach me.”
Between such apostolic charity as this, and certain flashy munificence, whose authors seem to be forever drawing drafts, at sight, and always without grace, upon the public, for fresh laudation—more votes of thanks—additional resolutions of all sorts of societies—and a more copious supply of vapid editorial adulation—between these, I say, there is all that real difference which exists, between the “gem of purest ray serene,” and the wretched Bristol imitation—between the flower that blooms and sends abroad its perfume in secret, and that corruption whose veritable character can never be concealed; and I may be suffered to say, as truly as Jock Jabos of his professional relations, that one of my calling may be supposed to know something of corruption, by this time.
——“My ear is pained,
My soul is sick with every day’s report”
of ad captandum benefactions. Today, that generous benefactor, Mr. Pipkin, endows some village Lyceum, which is destined forever to glory in the euphonious name of Pipkin. Tomorrow our illustrious fellow-citizen, Mr. Snooks, presents a bell to some village church, and, the very next week, we are told, that the bell was cracked, while ringing peals in honor of the munificent Snooks. Even the Tonsons, whose ubiquity is a proverb, and whose inordinate relish for all sorts of notoriety surpasses their powers of munificence, are always in, for a pen’worth of this species of titillating snuff, at small cost.
The Hon. Theodore Lyman was born in Boston, in 1792. His father was Theodore Lyman, a shrewd, enterprising, and eminently successful merchant of this city. His mother’s maiden name was Lydia Williams. She was a sister of Samuel Williams, the celebrated London Banker. The subject of this brief notice received his preparatory education, at Phillips Exeter Academy, under the charge of the venerable Dr. Abbott. He entered Harvard University in 1806, and took his degrees in the usual course.
In 1812, Mr. Lyman went to England, upon a visit to his maternal uncle, Mr. Williams, and, during his absence, travelled on the continent, with Mr. Edward Everett, visiting Greece, Palestine, &c., and remaining abroad, until 1816. He was in Paris, when the allied armies entered that city. Of this event he subsequently published an account, in a work, very pleasantly written, entitled Three Weeks in Paris.
In 1820, or very near that period, Mr. Lyman married Miss Mary Henderson of New York, a lady of rare personal beauty and accomplishments, who died in 1836. The issue of this marriage were three daughters and a son, Julia, Mary, Cora and Theodore. The two last survive. The elder children, Julia and Mary, in language of beautiful significancy, have “gone before.”
Mr. Lyman published an octavo volume, on Italy, and compiled two useful volumes, on the Diplomacy of the United States with Foreign Nations. In 1834 and 1835, Mr. Lyman was Mayor of the City of Boston. He brought to that office the manners of a refined and polished gentleman; the independence of a man of spirit and of honor; a true regard for justice and the rights of all men; a lofty contempt for all time-serving policy; talents of a highly respectable order; a mind well stored and well balanced; and a cordial desire, exemplified in his own personal and domestic relations, and by his encouraging word and open hand, of promoting the best interests of the great temperance reform.
To the duties of this office, in which there is something less of glory than of toil, he devoted himself, during those two years, with great personal sacrifice and privation to those, whom he loved most. The period of his mayoralty was, by no means, a period of calm repose. Those years were scored, by the spirit of misrule, with deep, dark lines of infamy. Those years are memorable for the Vandal outrage upon the Ursuline Convent, and the Garrison riot; in which, a portion of the people of Boston demonstrated the terrible truth, that they were not to be outdone in fury, even by the most furious abolitionist, who ever converted his stylus into a harpoon, and his inkhorn into a vial of wrath.
Mr. Lyman, even in comparatively early life, filled the offices of a Brigadier and Major General of our Militia; and was in our Legislative Councils.
The temperament of Mr. Lyman was peculiar. Frigid, and even formal, before the world, he was one of the most warm-hearted men, among the noiseless paths of charity, and in the closer relations of life. I have sometimes marvelled, where he bestowed his keen sensibility, while going through the rough and wearying detail of official duty. In the spring of 1840 we met accidentally, at the South—in the city of Charleston. He was ill. His mind was ill at ease. He seemed to me, at that time, a practical illustration of the truth, that it is not good for man to be alone. Yet he had been long stricken then, in his domestic relation. His chief anxiety seemed to be about the health of his little boy. He told me, that he lingered there on his account. I never knew a more devoted father.
A gentleman, well-known to the community, by his untiring practical benevolence, to whom I applied for information, has sent me a reply, from which I must be permitted to extract one passage, for the benefit of the world—“I have known much of his benevolent acts, having been the frequent almoner of his bounty, with the injunction, ‘Keep it to yourself.’ He often called, and spent one or two hours, to converse on temperance, and the poor, and would spend a long winter evening in my office, to learn of me what my situation enabled me to communicate, and always left a check for $50 or $100, to give to the Howard, or some other society. In the severe winter weather, I remarked that he would say, ‘This weather makes one feel for the poor.’ He often sent his man with provisions to the houses of the destitute, and had a heart to feel for others’ woe.”
He has gone! But the memory of this good man shall never go! It shall be embalmed in the grateful tears of the reformed, from age to age. Thousands, now unborn, shall be snatched, like brands from the burning, through the agency of this heavenly charity; and, as they turn from the walls of this noble institution, in a moral sense, regenerate, they shall bless the name of their noble benefactor; and thus raise and perpetuate, to the memory of Theodore Lyman, the monumentum ære perennius.