THE LATE ARCHBISHOP VAUGHAN.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XX, Issue 6828, 5 October 1883, Page 6

THE LATE ARCHBISHOP VAUGHAN.

The Month's Mind in commemoration of the decease of Archbishop Vaughan waa held at St. Mary's on September 20, in the presence of an immense congregation, which thronged the building to the doors. The Right Rev. Dr. Redwood, Bishop of Wellington, delivered the panegyric, in the course of which he said:—Archbishop Vaughan dearly cherished monastic poverty j his private apartment was that of a monk— bare table, bare chairs, bare floor. He was a martyr to incessant work, though he knew his advanced stage of heart disease, and often Bpeut whole nights, particularly after his great speeches, in racking torments. Yet he gave no marks of aourness or impatience ; he rejoiced in his painful victory over self. An exact reader of character, his affectionate disposition, perfected by charity, made him a ready admirer of the gifts, accomplishments, and virtues of his fellow-men In conversation with his friends he often expressed his esteem and admiration of the eloquence, ability, scholarly acquirements, and other social qualities of many gentlemen in Sydney in and out of his own nock, and he would sometime* say, " They must think me very stand-off and reserved, and I would fain know more of such men, and of my own children peisonally. But" (he would add, with characteristic modesty), " I really have not that ability which would enable me to become all to all in every sense ; and when I have performed my most important duties there is'no time left for lighter and more enjoyable ones." Finally his whole life may be fitly summed up in the programme which he traced in the conversation with a bosom friend during his noviciate in 1853, and which he faithfully carried out. "I want," he said, "to save my soul, and ; I do not want to do it by halves. Otherwise I would not have entered the cioister. I wish to give all in order to gain all, and'all is little in comparison with God. In religion alone we can shake off all impediments to bur onward course. There will be some hard work, but the object iu view—the possession of God—is the : .nobleat of all, aud worth fighting for. . Aljj else is beneath contempt." Such was the main we have lost before we had learned to appreciate his full worth; such the bright and glowing sun in whose beams we have basked and rejoiced for the last ten years. But now that glorious orb has set, and, oh, sad and overwhelming thought, we shall see his face no more till we meet him in the unveiled presence of the Eternal. Keenly we feel, deeply, we mourn, our loss as disconsolate orphans; but our comfort'is the hope that he how wears a brighter crown than mortal hand can weave.