But the side ladder was not the only strange feature of the place, borrowed from the chaplains former seafarings. Between the marble cenotaphs on either hand of the pulpit, the wall which formed its back was adorned with a large painting representing a gallant ship beating against a terrible storm off a lee coast of black rocks and snowy breakers. But high above the flying scud and dark-rolling clouds, there floated a little isle of sunlight, from which beamed forth an angels face; and this bright face shed a distinct spot of radiance upon the ships tossed deck, something like that silver plate now inserted into the Victorys plank where Nelson fell. Ah, noble ship, the angel seemed to say, beat on, beat on, thou noble ship, and bear a hardy helm; for lo! the sun is breaking through; the clouds are rolling off- serenest azure is at hand.
Nor was the pulpit itself without a trace of the same sea-taste that had achieved the ladder and the picture. Its panelled front was in the likeness of a ships bluff bows, and the Holy Bible rested on a projecting piece of scroll work, fashioned after a ships fiddle-headed beak.
What could be more full of meaning? for the pulpit is ever this earths foremost part; all the rest comes in its rear; the pulpit leads the world. From thence it is the storm of Gods quick wrath is first descried, and the bow must bear the earliest brunt. From thence it is the God of breezes fair or foul is first invoked for favourable winds. Yes, the worlds a ship on its passage out, and not a voyage complete; and the pulpit is its prow.
Chapter 9. The Sermon
Father Mapple rose, and in a mild voice of unassuming authority ordered the scattered people to condense. Starboard gangway, there! side away to larboard- larboard gangway to starboard! Midships! midships!
There was a low rumbling of heavy seaboots among the benches, and a still slighter shuffling of womens shoes, and all was quiet again, and every eye on the preacher.
He paused a little; then kneeling in the pulpits bows, folded his large brown hands across his chest, uplifted his closed eyes, and offered a prayer so deeply devout that he seemed kneeling and praying at the bottom of the sea.
This ended, in prolonged solemn tones, like the continual tolling of a bell in a ship that is foundering at sea in a fog- in such tones he commenced reading the following hymn; but changing his manner towards the concluding stanzas, burst forth with a pealing exultation and joy-
Nearly all joined in singing this hymn, which swelled high above the howling of the storm. A brief pause ensued; the preacher slowly turned over the leaves of the Bible, and at last, folding his hand down upon the proper page, said: Beloved shipmates, clinch the last verse of the first Chapter of Jonah- And God had prepared a great fish to swallow up Jonah.
Shipmates, this book, containing only four Chapters- four yarns- is one of the smallest strands in the mighty cable of the Scriptures. Yet what depths of the soul does Jonahs deep sealine sound! what a pregnant lesson to us is this prophet! What a noble thing is that canticle in the fishs belly! How billow-like and boisterously grand! We feel the floods surging over us; we sound with him to the kelpy bottom of the waters; seaweed and all the slime of the sea is about us! But what is this lesson that the book of Jonah teaches? Shipmates, it is a two-stranded lesson; a lesson to us all as sinful men, and a lesson to me as a pilot of the living God. As sinful men, it is a lesson to us all, because it is a story of the sin, hard-heartedness, suddenly awakened fears, the swift punishment, repentance, prayers, and finally the deliverance and joy of Jonah. As with all sinners among men, the sin of this son of Amittai was in his wilful disobedience of the command of God- never mind now what that command was, or how conveyed- which he found a hard command. But all the things that God would have us do are hard for us to do- remember that- and hence, he oftener commands us than endeavors to persuade. And if we obey God, we must disobey ourselves; and it is in this disobeying ourselves, wherein the hardness of obeying God consists.
With this sin of disobedience in him, Jonah still further flouts at God, by seeking to flee from Him. He thinks that a ship made by men will carry him into countries where God does not reign, but only the Captains of this earth. He skulks about the wharves of Joppa, and seeks a ship thats bound for Tarshish. There lurks, perhaps, a hitherto unheeded meaning here. By all accounts Tarshish could have been no other city than the modern Cadiz. Thats the opinion of learned men. And where is Cadiz, shipmates? Cadiz is in Spain; as far by water, from Joppa, as Jonah could possibly have sailed in those ancient days, when the Atlantic was an almost unknown sea. Because Joppa, the modern Jaffa, shipmates, is on the most easterly coast of the Mediterranean, the Syrian; and Tarshish or Cadiz more than two thousand miles to the westward from that, just outside the Straits of Gibraltar. See ye not then, shipmates, that Jonah sought to flee worldwide from God? Miserable man! Oh! most contemptible and worthy of all scorn; with slouched hat and guilty eye, skulking from his God; prowling among the shipping like a vile burglar hastening to cross the seas. So disordered, self-condemning is his look, that had there been policemen in those days, Jonah, on the mere suspicion of something wrong, had been arrested ere he touched a deck. How plainly hes a fugitive! no baggage, not a hatbox, valise, or carpetbag, no friends accompany him to the wharf with their adieux. At last, after much dodging search, he finds the Tarshish ship receiving the last items of her cargo; and as he steps on board to see its Captain in the cabin, all the sailors for the moment desist from hoisting in the goods, to mark the strangers evil eye. Jonah sees this; but in vain he tries to look all ease and confidence; in vain essays his wretched smile. Strong intuitions of the man assure the mariners he can be no innocent. In their gamesome but still serious way, one whispers to the other- Jack, hes robbed a widow; or, Joe, do you mark him; hes a bigamist; or, Harry lad, I guess hes the adulterer that broke jail in old Gomorrah, or belike, one of the missing murderers from Sodom. Another runs to read the bill thats stuck against the spile upon the wharf to which the ship is moored, offering five hundred gold coins for the apprehension of a parricide, and containing a description of his person. He reads, and looks from Jonah to the bill; while all his sympathetic shipmates now crowd round Jonah, prepared to lay their hands upon him. Frighted Jonah trembles, and summoning all his boldness to his face, only looks so much the more a coward. He will not confess himself suspected; but that itself is strong suspicion. So he makes the best of it; and when the sailors find him not to be the man that is advertised, they let him pass, and he descends into the cabin.
Whos there? cries the Captain at his busy desk, hurriedly making out his papers for the Customs- Whos there? Oh! how that harmless question mangles Jonah! For the instant he almost turns to flee again. But he rallies. I seek a passage in this ship to Tarshish; how soon sail ye, sir? Thus far the busy Captain had not looked up to Jonah, though the man now stands before him; but no sooner does he hear that hollow voice, than he darts a scrutinizing glance. We sail with the next coming tide, at last he slowly answered, still intently eyeing him. No sooner, sir? Soon enough for any honest man that goes a passenger. Ha! Jonah, thats another stab. But he swiftly calls away the Captain from that scent. Ill sail with ye, he says, the passage money how much is that? Ill pay now. For it is particularly written, shipmates, as if it were a thing not to be overlooked in this history, that he paid the fare thereof ere the craft did sail. And taken with the context, this is full of meaning.