Dwelling on the outskirts of civilization and of the Christian world, he was too deeply impressed with the grand line of distinction between Christianity and hideous ungodliness, whether exhibited in the vices of a penal settlement or the cannibalism of New Zealand, to be likely to attach too much importance to those minor shades of difference which are to be met with in the great family of Jesus Christ. As his heart was large, so too was his spirit catholic. He was sincerely and affectionately attached to the church of England. He revered her liturgy, and in her articles and homilies he found his creed, and he laboured much to promote her extension. Yet his heart was filled with love to all those who name the name of Christ in sincerity. Wherever he met with the evidences of real piety and soundness of doctrine, his house and his purse flew open; and orthodox Christians of every denomination from time to time either shared his hospitalities or were assisted in their benevolent projects with pecuniary aid. With what delicacy this was done may be gathered from such statements as the following, which is copied from the “Colonist” newspaper, September 12th, 1838: “An attempt having been made to build a Scotch church in Sydney, the colonial government for a time opposed the scheme, and in consequence some of its friends fell away. Then it was that the late Samuel Marsden, unsolicited, very generously offered the loan of 750l. to the trustees of the Scotch church, on the security of the building and for its completion. This loan was accordingly made; but as it was found impracticable to give an available security on the building, Mr. Marsden agreed to take the personal guarantee of the minister for the debt.”
In the same spirit he presented the Wesleyan Methodists with a valuable piece of land on which to erect a chapel, at Windsor. This act of Christian charity was acknowledged by their missionaries in a grateful letter. Mr. Marsden’s reply is full of warmth and feeling. “You express your acknowledgment for the ground at Windsor to build your chapel and house upon. I can only say I feel much pleasure in having it in my power to meet your wishes in this respect. To give you the right hand of fellowship is no more than my indispensable duty; and were I to throw the smallest difficulty in your way I should be highly criminal and unworthy the Christian name, more especially considering the present circumstances of these extensive settlements, ‘where the harvest is so great and the labourers are so few.’ ... The importation of convicts from Europe is very great every year; hundreds have just landed on our shores from various parts of the British empire, hundreds are now in the harbour ready to be disembarked, and hundreds more on the bosom of the great deep are hourly expected. These exiles come to us laden with the chains of their sins, and reduced to the lowest state of human wretchedness and depravity. We must not expect that magistrates and politicians can find a remedy for the dreadful moral diseases with which the convicts are infected. The plague of sin, when it has been permitted to operate on the human mind with all its violence and poison, can never be cured, and seldom restrained by the wisest human laws and regulations. Heaven itself has provided the only remedy for sin—the blessed balm in Gilead; to apply any other remedy is lost labour. In recommending this at all times and in all places, we shall prevail upon some to try its effect; and whoever do this we know they will be healed in the selfsame hour. I pray that the Divine blessing may attend all your labours for the good of immortal souls in these settlements.”
His private charities displayed the same catholic spirit. His disinterestedness was great, and his only desire seemed to be to assist the deserving or to retrieve the lost. He was not foolishly indifferent to the value of money, as those who had business transactions with him were well aware; but its chief value in his eyes consisted in the opportunities it gave him to promote the happiness of others. Hundreds of instances of his extraordinary liberality might be mentioned, and it is probable that many more are quite unknown. The following anecdotes, furnished by his personal friends, will show that his bounty was dealt out with no sparing hand.
A gentleman, at whose house he was a visitor, happened to express a wish that he had three hundred pounds to pay off a debt. The next morning Mr. Marsden came down and presented him with the money, taking no acknowledgment. The circumstance would have remained unknown had not the obliged person, after Mr. Marsden’s decease, honourably sent an acknowledgment to his executors. All he assisted were not equally grateful. Travelling with a friend in his carriage, a vehicle passed by. “Paddy,” said he, calling to his servant, “who is that?” On being told, “Oh,” said he, “he borrowed from me two hundred pounds, and he never paid me.” This was his only remark.
Yet he was not tenacious for repayment, nor indeed exact in requiring it at all where he thought the persons needy and deserving. The same friend was with him when a man called to pay up the interest on a considerable sum which Mr. Marsden had lent to him. He took a cheque for the amount, but when the person retired, tore it up and threw it into the fire, remarking, “He is an honest man. I am satisfied if he returns me the principal; that is all I want.”
On another occasion, a friend who had been requested to make an advance of fifty pounds to a needy person, but was unable to do so, mentioned the case to Mr. Marsden, with, “Sir, can you lend me fifty pounds?” “To be sure I can,” was the answer, and the money was instantly produced. When he called, shortly afterwards, to repay the loan, Mr. Marsden had forgotten all about it. “Indeed I never looked to its being repaid.”
The Rev——, being pressed for a hundred pounds, walking with Mr. Marsden, mentioned his difficulties. Mr. Marsden at once gave him a hundred pounds, simply remarking, “I dare say that will do for you.”
A lady had come to the colony at the solicitation of her family, with the view of establishing a school of a superior class for the daughters of the colonists. At first she met with little success. Mr. Marsden saw the importance of her scheme, and at once invited her to Paramatta, offering her a suitable house and all the pecuniary aid she might require, and this under the feeling of a recent disappointment in an undertaking of the same nature.
Of the large sums he expended on the New Zealand mission from his own private resources it is impossible even to conjecture the amount, to say nothing of a life in a great measure devoted to the service. He one day called upon a young man of enterprise and piety, whom he was anxious to induce to settle in New Zealand, and offered him fifty pounds per annum out of his own purse, as well as to raise a further sum for him from other sources. Nor should it be forgotten, in proof of this disinterestedness, that with all his opportunities and influence in New Zealand, he never possessed a single acre of land there, or sought the slightest advantage either for himself or for any member of his family.
Another feature in his character was his unaffected humility. This was not in him the nervous weakness which disqualifies some men for vigorous action, rendering them either unconscious of their power, or incapable of maintaining and asserting their position, and consequently of discharging its obligations. This, though often called humility, is, in fact, disease, and ought to be resisted rather than indulged. Mr. Marsden’s mind was vigorous and healthy; he took a just measure of his powers and opportunities, as the use he put them to proves abundantly. There was nothing in him of the shyness which disqualifies for public life; he was bold without effrontery, courageous without rashness, firm without obstinacy; but withal he was a humble man. His private correspondence will have shown the reader how anxious he was to submit his own judgment, even on questions affecting his personal character, to what he considered the better judgment of his friends at home. To vanity or ostentation he seems to have been a perfect stranger. There is not a passage in his correspondence, nor can we learn that a word ever fell from his lips, which would lead us to suppose that he ever thought himself in any way an extraordinary man. Flattery disgusted him, and even moderate praise was offensive to his feelings. When the life of his friend, Dr. Mason Good, appeared from the pen of Dr. Olinthus Gregory, it contained an appendix, giving an account of his own labours and triumphs at Paramatta and in New Zealand. This he cut out of the volume with his penknife, without any remark, before he permitted it to lie upon his table or to be read by his family. He was so far from thinking he had accomplished much, either in the colony or amongst the heathen, that he was rather disposed, in his later days, to lament that his life had been almost useless; and indeed he was heard more than once to express a doubt whether he had not mistaken his calling, and been no better than an intruder into the sacred ministry. Perhaps failing health and spirits were in part the cause of these misgivings, but his unfeigned humility had a deeper root. It originated in that evangelical piety upon which all his usefulness was built. He saw the holiness of God, he saw his Divine perfection reflected in his law, and though he had a clear, abiding sense of his adoption through the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, this did not interfere with a clear conception too of his own unworthiness. When told one day, by a justly indignant friend, how basely he was misrepresented, “Sir,” he exclaimed, and the solemnity of his manner showed the depth of his meaning, “these men don’t know the worst. Why, sir, if I were to walk down the streets of Paramatta with my heart laid bare, the very boys would pelt me.”