Portrait of John Foster 263 



PORTRAIT OF JOHN FOSTER. 



Our second portrait, that given at p. 226, is that of John 

 Foster, sometimes known as the Essayist. He was a man 

 whose works were highly esteemed and largely read, half a cen- 

 tury ago, but which have been almost forgotten. He was nomi- 

 nally a Baptist minister, but although he never dissociated 

 himself from that body his opinions differed much from some 

 of those of his friends, and his pulpit success was but very 

 small. He usually preached his congregations to vanishing 

 point. Yet was he one of the most earnest and most thought- 

 ful of men. 



His mind although always under the influence of orthodox 

 Christian theology had yet a strong tendency to original 

 modes of realisation. He would examine all minor facts for 

 himself and form his own conclusions respecting everything 

 that he did not regard as sacred truth. He rejected the 

 doctrine of eternal punishment as inconsistent with Divine 

 goodness. Although a Baptist through his whole life he 

 never baptised anyone, and regarded public worship and the 

 Lord's Supper as the only observances of importance. 



He was six years younger than his friend Robert Hall. 

 He was constitutionally unfit to excel as a preacher, and 

 Robert Hall said of him that " though his words might be 

 fire within, the moment they left his lips they froze and fell 

 down at his feet." 



The success of his Essays was immediate on their publica- 

 tion, and was such as to induce him to give up his charge 

 and devote himself to literature. 



Mr. T. F. Henderson in the " Encyclopaedia Britannica " 

 writes : " Foster's moral feelings in youth were not only 

 sensitive, but deeply rooted, and constant and steadfast in 

 their influence, being manifested in entire dutifulness to his 

 parents, strong, but not malicious, antipathies, habitual 

 abhorence of cruelty, intense love of the heroic, and a tone of 

 mind whose seriousness was excessive." 

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