Rensselaer Standard, Volume 1, Number 22, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 15 November 1879 — Rich Clergymen. [ARTICLE]

Rich Clergymen.

Boston Journal. A large number of New York pastors are very wealthy men. This is almost always true of the Catholics, and has been true of nearly all of the older pastors. Dr. Spring was a very rich man, and in old age married a very wealthy woman for a wife. The elder Tyng is a millionaire; Dr. William Adams nas alwkys been rich since he has been in New York. Dr. Beveair, of Trinity Church, has an estate in litigation today. A large portion of the clergy are poor. Two or three of the denomination are rich. Nearly every successful doctor has a fortune. It is the same with eminent legal practitioners. When the minister gets poor, as he does at the last of his life, the lawyer and the doctor become rich. When he outlives his usefulness, ashe does when he becomes old, the lawyer becomes a Judge and the doctor a professor. I asked an eminent physican the other day. Wnyis this? He replied: ‘*lfc results from the way we begin. Nearly every practicing physician and lawyer at the start is poor. He has his fame to get and his fortune to winl He spends three years in laying the foundation of his fame. He studies economy aud rigidly looks out for his coppers. He isn’t required to entertain anybody, and no one expects he will maintain the style of a successful merchant or rich lawyer. He travels little, and earns his money before he spends it. A minister takes his position at a bound. The younger he is the more popular he is. He takes rank with a lawyer and merchant and doctor at the start. He is flush with funds and imagines his brightday will always last. The money that he should lay up for his waning hours he spends in trips to Europe, and visits the places of fashion and culture. When the pastor has got to the summit and looks down the western slope, he has spent his money, just as the doctors and lawyers have the foundations of their wealth laid and fame and usefulness weil secured. There is not a profession in New York in which it is so easy to lay up a competence for the future as the ministerial one. The average pay is larger than in any othtr profession. x