THE REV. CHARLES CLARK.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume V, Issue 43, 25 October 1890, Page 8

THE REV. CHARLES CLARK.

The Rev. Charles Clark, who has just opened upon his tour in New Zealand with Mr Carlyle Smythe as his cicerone, is a Baptist pastor. He was born at London fifty-two years since, and when lie reached twenty years of age entered upon his preparation for the career of preacher at the Baptist College, Nottingham. After graduating he successively occupied the pulpits of North Parade Baptist Church, Halifax, of Maze Pond, London, and lastly of Broad Mead, Bristol. Here he attained such a popularity that his reputation penetrated to Australia. From theie he received a call to the Albert-street Church, Melbourne, for which he left after preaching his farewell sermon in the great Tabernacle of Mr Spurgeon. After being awhile in Melbourne Mr Clark discovered in giving his lectures on ‘Charles Dickens’ and ‘Christmas Carols,’ that he possessed in an eminent degree the faculty of rivettin" the attention of large audiences, whereupon he launched out upon his career of a public lecturer. The first occasion on which Mr Clark visited New Zealand with Mr R. S. Smythe was in 1875, when he made his debut in the Choral Hall, Auckland. His course through New Zealand has always been one of the most unqualified success. After a tour of the most gratifying character, Mr Clark returned to England via the United States and Canada, retracing his course to New Zealand in the following year. When in Wellington and Napier, on the occasion of this second tour, he preached for the Indian Famine Relief Fund. While in Dunedin Dr. Stewart invited him to occupy his pulpit in the beautiful Knox Church, when the building was beset with eager auditors, and £9O collected for the benefit of the Otago Benevolent Institution. Of this body Mr Clark is now a life-governor.

When Mr Clark made his tour of the United States and Canada, the popular verdict, regarding his powers of attraction was the same as that which has invariably been pronounced upon them by the people of Australia and New Zealand. On the completion of his second visit to our shores Mr Clark returned to Australia, where he was greeted with even more enthusiasm than before. His lectures in the Town Hall of Melbourne, at Sydney during Easter week, and also in the towns of the interior, were the means of attracting extraordinary audiences. In 1879, still under the masterly conductorship of Mr Smythe, he visited South Africa, penetrating as far as King Williamstown, and undergoing all the inconveniences of the then primitive modes of progression over the African veld. On again arriving in England Mr Clark received a special call to Ealing, near London, where a new and handsome church was expressly erected for the purpose of bis ministrations, and where he continued to officiate for seven years. Recently, until his entry upon the present tour, he has been living in retirement at Clifton, near Bristol.