Matthew Fontaine Maury, the world famous scientific navigator was born January 14, 1806, in Spotsylvania County, Virginia, of French Huguenot parents. As a boy he showed aptitude for mathematics and an interest in the sea. In spite of poverty and a weakened body, due to a severe accident, young Maury by courage, perseverance and exceptional ability, in a very short time worked himself up from the rank of a midshipman in the U.S. Navy to sailing master of a war sloop named the Falmouth.

During his early days at sea he conceived the theory that winds, waves and currents of the sea constituted causes and effects of remarkable regularity. He believed that patient observance and recording of these physical phenomena would yield great results to navigators. Accordingly, he examined thousands of old log books making note of his findings, while at the same time obtaining reports from over a thousand sea captains all over the world. His work took concrete form in a large wind and current chart of the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans published in 1842. It revolutionized shipping, inasmuch as quicker routes were noted, storm areas avoided, doldrums passed by, and a much clearer idea of ship lanes gained.

For this great scientific feat he won national fame and was rightly entitled "The Pathfinder of the Seas." Even royalty in Europe honored him with medals and scientific societies hailed him as a great genius. At a convention of scientists held in Bruxelles, France, his chart of the Atlantic was adopted as the standard. Ten years later, in 1852, Lt. Commander Maury drew a diagram of the ocean bed between Newfoundland and Ireland. He had already sounded it and found it to be a wonderful plateau, a table land, and in his opinion, perfectly suited for a cable. Twelve years after announcing his findings, engineer Cyrus W. Field laid the first permanent Atlantic cable. Maury, however, was the genius who first saw the possibilities of the cable.

He also earned recognition for many other discoveries of a great variety, most of which were of lasting benefit to the human race. As a writer and public speaker he had very few equals, and his fine manliness, zeal for his work, and devotion to his family made him many friends.

The crown of Maury's life, however, was his simple faith as a Christian. A beautiful granite shaft was erected to his memory by the State of Virginia on Goshen Pass, near Lexington, Virginia, which remains there to this day. The inscription is as follows:

How strange it seems, in a day like this, when so many profess to be wiser than the Bible, to learn accurate calculations and deductions on Holy Writ! Clearly enough, Maury was not too "enlightened" to shelve the Grand Old book, but drew from its holy pages "the wisdom that cometh down from above," and thus was guided in his search for facts that had hitherto been locked away from man.

During his last illness when doctors told him they could do nothing more for him he said, "Leave me to the Great Physician." The day he died, February 1, 1873, he gathered his family around him and requested them to sing his favorite hymns. One was "How Firm a Foundation"; another, "Christ is Risen." He prayed and then asked his wife and daughter to leave the death bed. To his sons who remained with him, he asked, "Do I seem to drag my anchors?" "They are sure and stedfast," was the answer. His last words were, "All is well!"

What a glorious way to die. Would that all scientists and seafarers and sons of men could die like that! They can if they will trust in the Lord Jesus Christ as personal Saviour as Maury did. Do not wait until death comes. "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved" (Acts 16:31). Then you will have the sure hope of salvation "as an anchor of the soul, both sure and stedfast" (Heb. 6:18,19).

—The Harbor Light