Wayland, Francis, D.D., LL.D., an eminent Baptist divine and educator, was born in the city of New York, March 11. 1796. His parents came to the United States from England in 1793. Soon after his settlement in New Y'ork, his father left his secular business and was licensed to preach the Gospel, and spent the remainder of his days in the ministerial office. The early educational advantages of the son were not of the highest order, apart from those which he enjoyed in his own home, where he felt the influence, in mould- ing his intellectual character, of a mother of rare ()uali- ties of mind and heart. He always gratefully referred, in after-life, to the ability of the instructor who seems first to have taught him to study for the love of it, Mr. Daniel H. Barnes. He was admitted into the sopho- more class of Union College, Schenectady, in iMay, 1811, and was graduated Jul}' 28, 1813. On leaving college he began at once the study of medicine, and |)roceeded so far in his professional career that he had l)egun to practice, when a sudden turn was given to all his life plans by his conversion. He now resolved to stiuiy for the ministry. To make the necessary preparation for entering upon his work, he went to Andover in the au- tuinn of 1816, where he remained one year, deriving great benefit from the instructions of Moses Stuart, one of the most earnest, inspiring teachers any institution in this country has ever had. He left Andover at the close of the session of 1816-17, expecting to resume his studies in the fall. He did not return, however, hav- ing accepted an appointment as tutor in Union College, where he remained the next four years. The First Baptist Church in Boston being destitute of a pastor, at the suggestion of Dr. Wisner. then tlie minister of the Old South Church, the name of INlr. Wayland was men- tioned to the Church, as a most suitable person to fill the vacant place. In due time a call was extended to him, and he was ordained Aug. 21, 1821, being then a few months over twenty-five years of age. In some re- s[)ects it was far from being an inviting field of lalior to which he had been called. The house of worship was old and unattractive. The Church had been greatly weakened in its numbers and in its resources. The personal appearance of the new minister was not partic- ularly graceful or winning. It was a severe discipline through which he was called to pass, but he took up his burdens with meekness, and demeaned himself as a good
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minister of Jesus Christ, and at length his reward came, and it came deservedly as the result of hard, untiring work, and unflinching devotion to his duties as a Chris- tian minister. Not that he became what is called a "popular" preacher, a thing which he never aspired to be, and could not have been under anj' circumstances, but he grew every month in the esteem and respect of those who knew him intimately and could appreciate his worth. A little more than two years after his set- tlement he preached his celebrated sermon on The Mor- al Diynify of the Mhsionary Enterprise. It was on Sunday evening, Oct. 26, 1823, that he delivered it, it being liis turn to preach the lecture to the three church- es of his denomination in Boston, which were wont oc- casionally to hold a union service. "The house was uncomfortable," we are told (the preacher wearing his great-coat throughout the service), " and there was but little enthusiasm on the occasion." What the preach- er's estimate of the performance was, we infer from the statement that "on Monday morning he went to Dr. Wisner's, and threw himself on a sofa, in one of his most depressed moods, saying, ' It was a complete fail- ure. It fell perfectly dead.' " It is needless to say that he was mistaken. Probably no sermon ever preached in America, at least up to that time, has had a wider circulation, or been perused by a larger number of read- ers. Dr. WaN'land was pastor of the Cliurch in Boston which he served so faithfully five years, when he was invited to accept the professorship of moral pliilosophy in Union College, made vacant by the resignation of Rev. Dr. Alonzo I'otter. In this position he remained only a few months, having been called to the presidency of Brown University, upon the duties of which office he entered in February, 1827, being at the time not quite thirty-one years of age.
Dr. Wayland now entered upon what was to be the work of nearly the whole of the remainder of his life. AV'hat"^ie accomplished as president of Brown Univer- sity has passed long since into the records of the liter- ary history of our country. But it was no bed of roses on which he was called to recline. From the outset of his administration he had a well-defined "pol- icy." It was not popular, but he believed it to be right, and he firmlv and persistently pursued it against oppo- sition which at times was very bitter and unrelenting. "I was not responsible," he remarks, in the review of his administration, " for the continuance of a college in Providence, but I considered myself responsible for the conduct of the college on correct principles so long as it continued. What income I derived from my position was a secondary matter. I could live on the poorest fare and wear the cheapest clothing, but I must and would do wliat seemed my duty." He was so pleased with a remark of Dr. Arnold's that he made a special note of it in his copy of the fJfe of that great teacher. "It is not necessary that this (Hugby School) should be a school of three hundred, or one hundred, or of fifty boys; but it is necessary that it should be a school of Christian gentlemen." It is not to be wondered at that shirks, and idle men, and doting parents should look with disfavor upon a man so earnest, and so determined to raise the standard of education to the highest point [lossible. Such persons had but slight appreciation of the moral courage which led him to say, "The vessel might sink; but if so, it should sink with all its colors Hying. We would strive to make it a i)lace of thorough eiiucation, and for the cultivation of elevated and noble character." In a sketch like this we caimot present minute details. It must suffice to say that the policy which the new president marked out for himself com- mended itself to thoughtful men and the lovers of good learning. Those who had long loved the university, and contributed to its prosperity, felt new hope. The men of wealth in the city where it had its home gave liberally to sup|)ly its wants. While he was in office, and chiefly through his personal efforts, Manning Hall was erected, a twenty-tive-thousand-doUar fund raised