Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1889-07-14
PRINCES OF TIE PULPIT.
SPLENDID INCOMES OF CERTAIN NEW
YORK PREACHERS.
DIR. TaImage Makes $500 n Year
Many Pastors Whose Salaries
Exceed $4,000.

docs Pastor Talmage play the banjo ?
Well, that's an odd thing to ask No; he
has various ways of amusing himself but
he doesn't tease the banjo strings, as far rs
| have heard, nor is he likely to. Ii would
be trihe uudignihed for fashionable
clergyman, with IN income of $4,000 a
year, to be found on his back stoop of
summer evening picking out plantation
tunes on a ten-dollar banjo, wouldn't it?7
The speaker was a gentleman who has,
for several years past, held very close rela-
tionS, clerical and otherwise, with the
famous Brooklyn preacher.
" Has DR.. Talmage, then, private for
tune which gives him 50 large an income p"
was asked.
" Not bit. He earns it every wear.
And | don't believe that any Of the up
town New York churches can show any
thing like it. The Tabernacle folks give
him a salary Of $4,000 nominallv, but he
does not get 50 much. He probably gets
about $4,000 from that source. Then his
lectures net him $3.50 each, and he deIiv-
ers a great many every season. Fifty lee
lures year would make Sl2,5OO. but he
averages more than that. Then his ser
mons are syndicated and there is a profit
OF at least -, 200 from that source. The
sermons and lectures are bound and sold in
book form, and from that quarter owing
TO their extensive circulation here and in
England, he gets from $4,000 TO $1,000 Il
year. He is the editor OF q weekly paper
and has Z handsome salary, too. the duties
being largely nominal. Then he Is not an
intrequent contributor to the weekly or
monthly press and, of course, his name
commands 4 good figure for any article he
writes. Yes, $4,000 Is the closest estimate
we place on his income"
" Does not all this activity interfere
with his pastorate duties? '
at does, DECIDEDLY, and lust there is
where the shoe Pinches. The congrega-
ton don't like it bit. They have no OBJ
lection to the pastor making all the money
he can, but these outside interests engross
so much of his time, that very many duties
have TO be deputizcd which he formerly used
to perform himself No time is left for
funerals or visitations There is a general
feeling in the Tabernacle that the outside
demands upon the pastors time are alto
gether too numerous, and the slumbering
volcano will break out sometime in way
that cannot be mistaken. They love and
admire him; but it should not be forgotten
that when he came to the Tabernacle.
twenty years ago, he was not famous
preacher and all his popularity has dated
from the time he came to Brooklyn. His
lectures on The Marriage Ring and other
sensational topics, have brought and are
still bringing him a great deal of money.
Altogether, he is probably the most liber-
ally rewarded clergyman IN this hemi-
sphere, if not on the globe, at the present
time"
" But his congregation surely do not
object to his good fortune in that respect -"
'Of course not. But they cannot help
remarking that the Friday night lectures
have been practically discontinued, and
that while the Sunday forenoon service is
still mastery effort, that of the evening
is hortatory affair "a mere hOmily or
pulpit talk. Other things, too, contribute
to occupy his time. His duties as Chaplain
of the Thirteenth Regiment, the crack corps
of the City Of Churches, brings him sort
of eclat. On parade days there is no more
observed equestrian than the Tabernacle
pastor, as he ambles along on his we'll
groomed horse, pleased expression on his
face and his side whiskers gently waving
in the soft summer wind. The ladies
are wild over the dominic on horseback.
1t is something they say, to have dear
pastor who can preach well; but when he
can ride like a centaur and carry a distinct
military air into the pulpit, he is jewel,
indeed"
The secret OF the whole matter is that
the Dominic" as his people usually call
him, Is shrewd man of business, with 4
keen eye to prospective profits. The SEN
sational topic of the hour is his theme and
every sermon and lecture is piece Of news.
He carries the newspaper instinct into the
pulpit, and loves to tingIe the nerves of
his audience. He is comedian and TRACE
dian by turns, and hammers away with all
the vim and pregnant vocabulary of first
class reporter, whether his target be the
concert halls, the beer gardens, the wicked
variety shows, the stage itself or the very
latest scandal or disaster. He recognizes
the fact that the old-fashioned Knicker-
booker sermon has become obsolete, and
that people want even their thology in an
entertaining form. Quite lately he was
obliged, through fit of sickness, to break
lecture engagement with a society in a
small town in Pennsylvania, and the man.
ayers intimated that they would sue him
for $4,000 damages. The suit was ami
ca5ly settled but the hint furnished as to
the value of his services was not lost upon
the shrewd Tabernacle preacher.
But while Dominic Talmage stands
easily ahead of his clerical rivals in the
race for emoluments at least, there are
enough splendid prizes to be won in New
\ ork to make it the Eldorado of the pull
plteer, as 1t has long been of the politician
and merchant. Some of the fashionable
pastors have incomes equal to that of the
President of the United States, and there
are many who would hesitate in exchang-
ing their salaries and perquisites for those
OF Cabinet officer. Less than ten years
ago there was general shrug of surprise
when 1t was announced that Mr.. Beecher
had an income of fully $4,000 year from
his pulpit, his book and lectures combined.
To-day when fashion sets the boundaries
OF Ministerial success or failure, as in manv
other things, there ale probably a round
dozen preachers who come very near if
not quite up to the Plymouth pastors
mark.
Probably DR.. Morgan Dix stands as the
best type of the fashionable and successful
preacher in the metropolis to-day. The
rector of Trinity receives a nominal sal
airy OF $4,000, but his actual income from
his passionate is limited only by his neces-
sites. He gets all and everything he |
wants. From the time when old Trinity
was organized, in 1897, till now, it has |
never ceased to be the fashion in New
\ ork. At the outset it almost broke the |
hearts of the dominies of the old Dutch |
Reformed Church by drawing away the |
young Dutchmen, who were fascinated by |
is beautiful service by the fact that it was |
N English you know" thus furnishing
he earliest instance of Anglo-mania on !
'ecord. The little, fan-shaped farm, which |
he church got from the colony, has de-
Teloped into the richest part of New York,
md Trinity's vast possessions between the |
Battery and Fourteenth street are now es- |
mated as being worth $4,000, 900: its
,reat business piles and grimy tenements,
lingy warehouses and Observation-Disclosures
dwellings, now bring it in revenue bio
.nough to run small-sized kingdom. Its
ector is allowed handsome residence
rec, has life position, and is the pet of
he nabo6s of Gotham and the idol of its
fashionable women. What with valuable
lifts and frequent trips to Europe, his lines
re certainly cast In pleasant places. As
he hetter and ,,,ora |