MEMOIR OF

THE LATE REV. HENRY MARTYN, B.A. (With a Portrait.)

THE name of Mr. HENRY MARTYN, although he was not far advanced in years, and was of no long standing in the church of Christ, is well known throughout the dominions of Christianity, and deservedly esteemed by every sincere follower of a crucified Saviour. Hence, the events that were connected with his personal history, have rendered his biography peculiarly interesting, while his death awakens our sympathy, and furnishes an occasion for sincere regret.

[1824.

His father was originally in a very humble situation of life, having been a labourer in the mines of Gwenap, the place of his nativity. Having no education but such as a country reading school afforded, he was compelled, for his daily support, to engage in an employment, which, dreary and unhealthy as it was, offered some advantages, of which he most meritoriously availed himself. The miners are in the habit of working, sometimes six, and sometimes eight hours, and of enjoying leisure the remaining portions of the twenty-four. These periods of relaxation from manual labour, to their honour be it spoken, many Nearly two years have elapsed, among them devote to mental improvesince we formed a resolution of giv-ment, and its beneficial influence has ing, in the pages of the Imperial Ma- so far improved their general characgazine, a biographical sketch of this ter, that they need fear no comparison distinguished individual, but our in- with men in the same humble walks ability to procure his portrait deterred of life, throughout his majesty's domius from our purpose. Applications nions. for this end were made to various quarters, but without success; and when one was at length obtained, on submitting it to the inspection of those to whom Mr. Martyn was personally known, it was found to contain an unfaithful representation. Renewing our researches, another was at length procured, which, in some particulars, was found to be deficient; and it is only by combining the features which both contained, that we have been able to give satisfaction to his friends, whom on this occasion we have consulted. Having secured this desirable object, we now proceed to accompany it with that memoir which we have so long had in contemplation.

Mr. Henry Martyn was born at Truro, in the county of Cornwall, on February 18, 1781, and appears, with his family in general, to have inherited a weak constitution; as, of many children, four only, two sons and two daughters, survived their father, Mr. John Martyn, and all of them, within a short period, followed him to the Of these, Henry was the

grave. third.

No. 64.-VOL. VI,

In these intervals of cessation from toil, John Martyn acquired a complete knowledge of arithmetic, and some acquaintance also with mathematics; and no sooner had he gathered these valuable and substantial fruits of persevering diligence, in a soil most unfriendly to their growth, than he was raised from a state of poverty and depression, to one of comparative ease and comfort. Admitted into the office of Mr. Daniel, a merchant of Truro, he lived there as chief clerk, piously and respectably, enjoying considerably more than a competency.

At the grammar school in this town, the master of which was the Rev. Cornelius Cardew, D. D. a gentleman of learning and talents, Henry was placed by his father, at Midsummer 1788, being then between seven and eight years of age. At this seminary of learning, under the same excellent tuition, Henry remained till he was between fourteen and fifteen; at which period he was induced to offer himself as a candidate for a vacant scholarship at Corpus Christi College, Oxford, but was not elected. After this repulse

the best Latin prose composition in the university. But with such exertions he became dissatisfied, and resolved to devote his future life to the service of God, as a CHRISTIAN MISSIONARY, in connexion with the Church Missionary Society.

he returned home, and continued to attend Dr. Cardew's school till June 1797. His residence at St. John's College, where his name had been previously entered in the summer, commenced in the month of October 1797. The tenor of Henry Martyn's life, during this and the succeeding year he passed at college, was, to the eye of the world, in the highest degree amiable and commendable. He was outwardly moral; with little exception, was unwearied in application, and exhibited marks of no ordinary talent. But whatever may have been his external conduct, and whatever his capacity in literary pursuits, he seems to have been totally ignorant of spiritual things, and to have lived "with-causest to approach unto thee, that out God in the world."

"At length, however, it pleased God to convince Henry, by a most affecting visitation of his providence, that there was a knowledge far more important to him than any human science; and that, whilst contemplating the heavens by the light of astronomy, he should devote himself to His service, who having made those heavens, did, in his nature, pass through them as his mediator and advocate. But his conversion did not improperly interfere with his literary pursuits. His decided superiority in mathematics, therefore, soon appeared; and the highest academical honour was adjudged him in January, 1801, a pe- | riod when he had not completed the twentieth year of his age. He soon after visited Cornwall, but returning to Cambridge in the summer of this year, he passed the season of vacation most profitably; and constrained happily to be much alone, he employed his solitary hours in frequent communion with his own heart, and with that gracious God, who once blessed Isaac and Nathaniel in their secret devotions, and who did not withhold a blessing from his.

He now determined to enter on the work of the Christian ministry. From this time, to that of proposing himself for admission to a fellowship in his college, Mr. Martyn's engagements consisted chiefly in instructing some pupils, and preparing himself for the examination, which was to take place previous to the election in the month of March, 1802, when he was chosen fellow of St. John's. Soon after wards, he obtained the first prize for

Having attained to a degree of selfknowledge, and of spirituality equally rare, and being thoroughly instructed how" he ought to behave himself in the church of God-the church of the living God-the pillar and ground of the truth," Mr. Martyn prepared for the solemn rite of his ordination, which was administered at Ely, on Sunday, October 22, 1803: "Blessed is the man whom thou choosest, and

he may dwell in thy courts;" Psalm Ixv. 4. The exercise of his pastoral function, Mr. Martyn commenced, as curate to the Rev. C. Simeon, in the church of the Holy Trinity, in Cambridge; undertaking likewise the charge of the parish of Lolworth, a small village at no great distance from the university; and on Thursday, November 10, he preached for the first time at Trinity Church, to a numerous and earnestly attentive congregation.

In the early part of the year 1804, Mr. Martyn's expectations of becoming a missionary were considerably damped, by the very trying event of his losing all his slender patrimony; a loss rendered more severe to him by the circumstance of his youngest sister being involved in the same calamity. The situation of a chaplain to the East India Company, had long appeared to many of those who took a lively interest in his welfare and his work, to be peculiarly eligible, as offering singular facilities for missionary exertions amongst millions of idolaters. Insuperable obstacles, however, interfered with this arrangement, and " a veil was thus cast over his future proceedings." In the interval which passed between the months of February and June, he was found actively labouring in the service of his divine Master. He preached animating and awakening discourses: he excited societies of private Christians to "watch, quit themselves like men, and be strong;" he visited many of the poor, the afflicted, and the dying: he warned numbers of the careless and profligate-in a

word, he did the work of an evangelist.

ed to detain him any longer at Cambridge.

During the two months Mr. Martyn was resident in London, he considered that he could not better employ his time, than by devoting it to the attainment of the Hindoostanee language; and having the advantage of being assisted by a gentleman eminently competent to direct him, he was incessant in his endeavours to obtain that necessary qualification for an Indian missionary. An intercourse with such men as Mr. Newton and Mr. Cecil, was more than a compensation to Mr. Martyn for his detention in London, and for the uneasi

In the latter part of the spring of this year, he had the singular satisfaction of being introduced to a personal acquaintance with one of a kindred spirit with himself-the late Henry Kirke White. The duties of a public examiner in St. John's, were now, in the month of June, for the second time, consigned to Mr. Martyn; -the subjects for examination, being one of them from the classics, the other, Locke's Treatise on the Understanding. It appeared now to be past a doubt, that Mr. Martyn would succeed in obtaining a chaplainship in the service of the East India Compa-ness of that period of uncertainty and ny, and that in the ensuing spring he would be summoned to leave the shores of his native country for ever. At length, after having visited Cornwall, and withstood there, as well as at Cambridge, the arguments of those who "at all events would have detained him in England," arguments, of which he confesses that "some were not without weight,"-he prepared to leave that part of his native country, which was peculiarly dear to his feeling and affectionate heart. The year 1804 closed with Mr. Martyn's being a third time selected as one of the examiners in St. John's; on fulfilling which office, he speaks of his "soul drawing near to God, whilst in the hall; and of a sacred impression being upon his mind during the examination." The last day of the year found him" rejoicing at the lapse of time, but sorrowing at his unprofitableness."

Towards the end of January, a sudden summons to leave England in ten days, caused some perturbation in Mr. Martyn's spirits. Short, however, as the notice was, he would instantly have complied with it, had be been in priest's orders, which legally he could not be till the 18th of February, when he completed his twentyfourth year. That solemn and most impressive rite of admission to the function and privileges of a presbyter of the church of England, was administered to him, who had well “ performed the office of a deacon," at St. James's Chapel, London, in the month of March: after which, he received the degree of Bachelor of Divinity, conferred upon him by mandate from the university, when nothing remain

delay, which is almost as oppressive to the spirits, as the moment of actual departure. After delivering a sermon to the congregation at St. John's, upon Acts xx. 32; "And now, brethren, I commend you to God, and to the word of his grace, which is able to build you up, and to give you an inheritance among all them that are sanctified," on the 8th of July, Mr. Martyn left London for Portsmouth : and such was the acuteness of his feelings during this journey, that he fainted, and was much convulsed, at the inn where he slept on the road; a painful intimation to those friends who were with him, of the poignancy of that grief which he endeavoured, as much as possible, to repress and conceal. The few days Mr. Martyn remained at Portsmouth, were spent in conversing with his brethren on the things pertaining to the kingdom of God, in social supplication, and thanksgiving.

On the 17th day of July, the Union, East Indiaman, which was to convey Mr. Martyn to Calcutta, sailed from Portsmouth, in company with a large fleet, under the command of Captain Byng, and two days afterwards came to an anchor in the port of Falmouth. On the 10th of September, the signal was made for the ships to sail from Falmouth, at which time, having been deceived in the information communicated to him respecting the continuance of the fleet in port, Mr. Martyn was absent at the distance of twenty miles in the country. The express announcing this mistake was very appalling to him; but by making all possible despatch, he contrived to reach the Union just in time. That

In the commencement of the voyage | from the Cape, which took place in February, Mr. Martyn's patience was exercised, as before, by the tediousness of the passage-by sickness— | and by languor: but whether tossed on that stormy sea which roars round the Cape, or becalmed in the midst of Attached as Mr. Martyn was to the the Indian ocean, or enfeebled by the church of England, he was far from recurrence of illness and extreme re- either the apathy or the jealousy in laxation, he received all with the which too many are apt to indulge, meekest resignation, as the special respecting the interests of other Chrisappointment of his God. Falling in tian communities. At the beginning with the trade-winds, the fleet made of October, he prepared to leave that quick progress towards India; and Christian family, in whose bosom he whilst the breezes wafted Mr. Martyn had received such unremitted kind towards the destined scene of his la-ness. The commencement of the ne