Part 3
I have said St. Marylebone is a _peculiar_ Crown living; with a Baronet for a Crown Churchwarden. May I ask the reason why the Rector never takes the chair at Vestry Meetings? And if not in me too curious, does the Bishop of London approve of a Clerk in Orders being Preacher, Parish Clerk, and Sexton? And whether the Rev. official pockets the Surplice fees as parson, clerk, and sexton? This triple conjunction of offices is peculiar, and no doubt economic, but it wants reforming altogether. Such an industrious clerk as Mr. Braithwaite, might be supposed to have some influence. But he roughly tells me that he has not any, has never heard, nor wishes to know, anything of Mr. Ewart’s Act. I am surprised the District Rector of St. Mary, Mr. Gurney, and also the Incumbent of All Saints, Margaret Street, should have received a volunteer with so little courtesy. Had I been engaged in devising some evil, instead of an enduring benefit to their Parish, I could not have been more cavalierly treated.
I do not say arrogance is confined to PRIESTS. I have met with POPES out of Rome, who in the garb of FRIENDS, or FREE TRADERS, have much Pride, but little Humility, and whose utter want of common courtesy is in strong contrast to our Old Nobility. Perhaps the most offensive display of intolerance was that of a Rt. Rev. Ratepayer, residing in Queen Ann St., whose Episcopal ire was roused on being asked to aid in setting forward the Libraries Act. {26a} Not a very unreasonable request. A Bishop who daily, I suppose, reads in his Prayer Book the Collect for PEACE, “Trusting in THY Defence, we may not fear the Power of ANY adversaries,” is so alarmed, or attaches so little meaning to the words of the Prayer, that he subscribes handsomely to the Chichester Rifle Corps, and yet betrays no fear of the invasion of an enemy, more dangerous and to be dreaded than the French, is certainly not an agreeable study:
“tantæne animis cælestibus iræ?” Dwells such rancour in heavenly minds?
Long years ago when:
“My thoughts were happier oft than I,”
Lord Grey warned the Bishops “to set their House in order.” If the Church is not reformed from WITHIN, she will be reformed from WITHOUT, with a vengeance. It cannot be denied the sentiments of FESTUS are held by attached members of the Church of England.
“Let not a hundred humble pastors starve, In this or any land of Christendom, While one or two impalaced, mitred, throned, And banqueted, burlesque if not blaspheme The holy penury of the SON OF GOD.” {26b}
The Rector of Christchurch, Lisson Grove, lately advocated the claims of the Diocesan Church Building Society. No doubt it is time that something should be done for the Poor of this District, but I am clearly of opinion that it would be wise to postpone any efforts in this direction, until the cheap experiment of Free Libraries had been tried in St. Marylebone.
Such an Institution in Lisson Grove would to the Ojibbeways especially be a _Home of Refuge_, or what I should term a SCHOOL CHURCH.—Good Books are the best of Missionaries. Parcels of hundred volumes each at five pounds per parcel, can be purchased of _C. Mudie_, 511, New Oxford Street; but CURATES are not so easily obtained. No Institutions, no contrivance, no expenditure, can multiply this sacred crop. As one of the Laity of the Bishop of London’s Diocese I own I demur to additional “Buildings” unless I have some voice in reference to the Incumbents, &c. It is time the Laity “assisted” “Parochial Extension” in other ways besides money contributions. Why do the Bishops and dignified Clergy persist in IGNORING Laymen in their Ecclesiastical arrangements? Why regard them as mere machines for extracting gold or silver? Before I can reply to the Bishop of London’s Letter to the Laity of the Diocese, I respectfully request a satisfactory answer to this question. Will your Lordship aid the Laity in their just claim to a seat in Convocation? The Laity are not excluded from Convocation in the Protestant Episcopal Church of the United States, and if the laity of the Church of England are to be rigidly excluded, Church Building appeals will command little, or no attention.
The Laymen of 1860 are not the unlettered men of twenty years since, and to deny them any deliberation as to the qualification of Curates or Incumbents, reading or preaching capabilities, appears to me very bad policy on the part of our Ecclesiastical superiors.
It would ill become me to set up as an _Episcopus Episcoporum_, believing, however, as I do that this assembling of the Laity and Clergy would tend to Christian UNITY I cannot resist urgently insisting on this Church Reform. Speaking for my own order the Laity are hardly dealt with! How many real grievances they must now silently endure, without the slightest power to remove or abate them! How much which relates to discipline, and the conducting the services is diametrically opposed to the wishes of the Laity! How often has the length of the Morning Service been objected to. Only the other day Lord EBURY did what he could to shorten the services, but in vain; there seems a superstitious reverence for repetition, for retaining certain phrases which must strike high, low, and broad Churchmen as objectionable. The Prayer for both Houses of Parliament under our “most religious and gracious Queen” is truly admirable, and how any Lords Spiritual and Temporal can join in such a comprehensive petition and yet vote against a great Educational boon like the repeal of the last tax on Knowledge I for one cannot understand. But in this Prayer I demur to applying the same term “most gracious” to the Queen, and to the KING OF KINGS AND LORD OF LORDS. Who can deny that damp, ill-ventilated, or icy cold Churches, are not fruitful causes of disease? I attended the Sons of the Clergy Festival, under the Dome of St. Paul’s Cathedral on the 23rd May. It was a warm summer’s day, but owing to the intense cold rushing currents of air, I with others was obliged to leave. People were shivering with cold—and this in the 19th century! A boasted scientific age! A few years ago I was at St. Paul’s Sons of the Clergy Festival, and was then compelled to leave on account of the bitter cold. I wrote on that occasion a polite note to Dean Milman, in which I urged that some means of warming the Cathedral should be adopted. I received no reply; and this is not surprising, for a more _Judaic_ High Priest—a very _Caiphas_ cannot be found than _Henry Hart_ Milman. Why there might have been some excuse for thus trifling with the Public health at the time my Grand-father was Prebendary of this Cathedral, because the appliances of science were not in his day known. Let me tell this supercilious Priest that a curious public are enquiring of what use are DEANS and CANONS with their thousands a year, if they do not even take the trouble to make their Churches comfortable? It is very discreditable to the Dean and Canons that such beggarly parsimony should year after year prevail. Why not FREE ACCESS to this noble Edifice? Why this miserable Clerical impost of 4_s_ 2_d_? Why it is an Education of itself to survey
“until thy mind hath got by heart Its eloquent proportions.”
“The Dome—the vast and wondrous Dome,”
Sir Christopher Wren’s rare masterpiece, of whom it was said,
“Si monumentum requiris, Circurnspice,”
“if you want his monument, look around.” This glorious Temple, which stands alone for grandeur, worthiest of GOD, the Holy and the True, deserves a better fate than to be starved by its Priests on the pretext of a false and wretched economy. Every thing that ministers to comfort is seen in a nobleman’s mansion, shall GOD’S HOUSE alone be dishonoured by such paltry and mean frugality? Who can deny the attendance of invalids at Matins, with litany and communion, is not itself an ordeal, but to combine this length of Service with a Sermon of an hour’s duration is an infliction of no ordinary character. I do not say that when PAUL has served for a text, that PLATO or EPICTETUS have preached, but who shall say the Preacher does not too often exhibit himself and _his crude_ ideas, and NOT the Bible’s. “_It is this text of mine_,” that too often proceeds from the lips of ostentatious Preachers.
It is unreasonable to expect that 20,000 clergymen of the Church of England, are qualified as preachers, shall be able, one and all, at least twice a week, to talk or read something that will command attention for fifty or sixty minutes? Why not some UNIFORMITY in the Prayer, or no Prayer, before sermon? Why not some authorized version of psalms and hymns to be sung in all the churches? Why this diversity? The layman has a right to say to the Bishop, if you forbid me to take any part in the government and discipline of the Church, I cannot contribute towards the “extension” of such injustice. You nominate or appoint a clerk, who _ought to know how to read_; yet how few are capable of MERELY READING the Service, I will not say with propriety alone, but with common decency. Who has not “suffered some,” to use an American phrase, by the deplorable deficiencies in pronunciation, and accentuation? Who with any ear for fit cadence, is not pained to be obliged to listen to the monotonous whining of the simple and beautiful Ritual of the Church of England? It is from the reading desk and the pulpit that boys and girls are told they will hear their mother tongue in all its purity. But is this true? It is not only not true, but the very reverse of truth. The forms of Prayer and Thanksgivings, as literary compositions, are perfect specimens of style. What English prose will venture to challenge a comparison with the dignity and melody of the Collects? And yet, remember, the musical and rhetorical excellence of the Liturgy, consists chiefly of translations from the Latin! Surely such persuasive, such affecting petitions to Heaven deserve a better fate, than to be murdered by ruthless and ignorant men who have missed their vocation. Some mouth and mutter, some rant and roar, others simper and squeak, and not a few read the Service with the same apathy as an animal chewing the cud.
Yet the Laity of the Diocese of London cannot interfere, cannot even hint to such readers they had better retire. This overgrown diocese contains two millions and a half of inhabitants. It is divided into four hundred and thirty-three parishes, with eight hundred and fifty-five clergy. Common sense dictates dividing the Diocese of London. Why not a Bishop of WESTMINSTER? Yet not one word can laymen utter on such topics, in any deliberative church assembly, and I submit the time has come when all this must be REFORMED, and when the Diocese of London must be at UNITY in itself. {30}
It was my intention to have said a few words about Lord John Russell’s scheme of Reform, but I can only just glance with some pity on his poor little forlorn, tender Bill. I can only view it as an instalment of better things to come. The ignoring the claims of £10 or £12 Lodgers in great London parishes especially, would be an act of extreme injustice, and I hope in Committee, the Foreign Secretary will adopt this clause to be proposed by Mr. James.
My extreme anxiety to carry the Libraries Act in St. Marylebone, must atone for any repetitions of last warning words to the Ratepayers. Believe me the enemies of Literature, of innocent, intellectual recreation, are too astute to tolerate fair, or indeed any, arguments in favour of this most hopeful Legislative enactment. They are well aware that reason is too strong for nonsense in the long run, and that if this wise proposal is argued on its own merits, and not hashed or mixed up with Parochial extravagance, or misgovernment, and other extraneous matter, that the ground on which they stand will sink from beneath them. They tell you “this is not the time to agitate the question,” and that it is “inexpedient at present,” and will weary you with some unintelligible jargon about voting against the Act, but at the same time agreeing to the “general principle!” Such miserable, specious excuses are invariably set up in all cases which will not bear the force of argument. The _right time_ with such mean obstructives, let me assure you, will NEVER _arrive_. Once again I beg to remind you that a majority of TWO-THIRDS of the Ratepayers present at the Meeting settles the question of rejecting or adopting the Act, and as by a strange blunder no Poll can be demanded, I entreat you to be early in your attendance, and give a plumper for this truly benevolent measure.
Let me glance for a moment at the Requisition to the Overseers, signed by His Serene Highness Prince Edward of Saxe Weimar, by the Minister of St. Mark’s, by Lord Radstock, four Ladies, the Editors of the _Athenæum_, and _Lancet_, a Rabbi, or Professor, Doctors of Medicine, and Surgeons; also by Mr. Churchwarden Carr, Vestrymen, and other respectable Ratepayers, including Ernest de Bunsen, Abbey Lodge, Joseph Grote Esq., Gloucester Place, S. H. Harlowe Esq., North Bank, and R. H. Collyer, M.D., Alpha Road. Strange meeting of names exemplifying as it does, that UNITY of design, on which the Chaplain of Lincoln’s Inn so delights to dwell; it is a paper of no ordinary interest. Let me gladly acknowledge subscriptions towards defraying the expenses of promoting this great social measure. Mr. Nicholay, 10_s._ Edwin, James Esq., M.P. £1 1_s._, Ernest Hart Esq., F.R.C.S. 10_s._ Sir Francis H. Goldsmid Bart, M.P. £1 1_s._, Mr. Michell, 5_s._, Dakin & Co., 10_s._, W. J. Fox Esq., M.P. 5_s._, J. Grote Esq., 10_s._, and S. H. Harlowe Esq. 5_s._
Gentlemen, As friends of Progress, of more Intellectual Light, and knowing the bitter fruits of Ignorance, I trust you will endeavour to be EARLY at the Meeting. BIS DAT QUI CITO DAT. I entreat you to bear in mind that a small rate for LIBRARIES or MUSEUMS, or NEWS ROOMS, if tax it can fairly be termed, is like the quality of mercy,
“it is twice bless’d; It blesseth him that gives, and him that takes.”
“Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might.” Let those memorable words, “_She hath done what she could_,” be applied to you, and what ought to be done for St. Marylebone, do at once. “The night cometh, when no man can work,” and there is no knowledge, or wisdom, or project in the grave.
Allow me to offer a few suggestions as to the conduct of the Meeting. No person can take the chair as a right. A Churchwarden, _ex-officio_ claiming the chair to the prejudice of the Rector, is indeed an anomaly. You must elect a Chairman, uninfluenced by Party spirit, for on your choice of the right man very much will depend. I have known Churchwardens, chairmen of Library Meetings who had never read the Act, and knew or cared nothing of its scope and tendency, and yet in the shallow guise of “friends of the Poor,” and to gain a little fleeting applause, have not scrupled, to get out of the difficulty to misrepresent or abuse it, or condemn it with faint praise.
Gentlemen, I have much pleasure in stating that the Resolution will probably be moved by that earnest friend of the working classes W. J. FOX Esq., and that it will be seconded or supported by the REV. J. M. BELLEW. To hear two such advocates of Libraries for the People is of itself a treat of no ordinary kind. The great anti-corn law speeches of Mr. Fox are not forgotten, and I am sure the honourable member for Oldham on so congenial a topic as the Instruction of All, will not fail to please. The crowded Church of St. Mark attests MR. BELLEW’S well deserved popularity, and that neglected art among clergymen—the art of READING, the reverend gentleman has attained to perfection. I could not but think as Mr. Bellew read the twelfth chapter of St. Paul’s Epistle to the Romans, that it would be well for the Church if there were more such splendid Readers, and eloquent Preachers, and if in the Ordering of Deacons, the Bishop put the question to every Candidate for Orders, “Can you read?” or “Have you passed your examination in the Art of Reading?”
To opponents I would say are you content to be taxed £70,000 a year for Expenditure at the Workhouse? At the utmost a £2000 Library Rate would be required from the large body of ratepayers, which is not worth consideration, and which would be saved over and over again in the improved habits of the people. Exercise then a little _commercial foresight_, and you will perceive that it is a _good investment_ and will prove an economical Institution.
I should like to see the Proposal to open to the people the portals to enter into communion with the good, the witty, and the wise, carried by a unanimous vote. At the recent Birmingham Meeting, Mr. Gameson opposed, but could scarcely obtain a hearing, for the 1500 Burgesses were in no humour to listen to his worn out, used up fallacies; and to Mr. Dawson was left the not difficult task of reply, who in the course of an amusing speech said that
“whenever he could hear of a rate that was to be spent for a good purpose, he took as much pleasure in advocating it as in tickling up a lazy ox with a goad.”
The Mayor, Thomas Lloyd Esq., said that nothing could possibly be more gratifying to him during his term of office than to have presided over a Meeting at which the Public Libraries’ Act had been adopted. {34}
Gentlemen, I am desirous you should notice this amended Act, under which Parishes can take a vote, provides not only for LIBRARIES and MUSEUMS, but also for NEWS ROOMS, and that the general management is vested in Ratepayers, “not less than Three nor more than Nine,” appointed by the Vestry, and that one third of such Commissioners go out of office yearly—I hope the Vestry will not select the nine from their own body, but will appoint at least four Ratepayers who are NOT Vestrymen.
A local paper, prone to balderdash and babblement, noted for its rigmarole, loose, hyperbolical language, indulges in a jeremiad about the want of a Museum. It seems, according to this mendacious journal, that the great hardship of walking from Lisson Grove, or the district of St. Mary to the British Museum in Great Russell Street, or to Kensington is “desolating hearts that might be bright,” and that setting up a Museum in the wastes of Marylebone by “Government friendship,” or expense, is
“unhappily a universal want; a want that private enterprise cannot meet,”
and then with some insolent rant about Prince Albert, and
“the evil tendencies of our Parish Senators,”
this low class Marylebone Mercury advises a run on the British Museum Natural History collection, and so
“preventing our neighbours from ABSORBING all that is to be had.”
Well for the consolation of this miserable, mean print, and the languishing and desolate in heart, pining for a “splendid museum at somebody else’s expense,” I would prescribe the procuring the Libraries’ Act for “promoting the establishment of Free Public Libraries and MUSEUMS in Parishes.” If a Museum is a “want” in this Parish, which, with the proximity of the National Collection and Kensington Museum, I deny; you have only to adopt the Act. But I earnestly recommend the not attempting too much at once. LENDING Libraries and NEWS Rooms are the great want, and NOT Museums. Why will MR. ROUPELL, M.P., in advocating a South London Museum persist in IGNORING Mr. Ewart’s _Museum’s_ Act? Why this anxiety to rob the National Museum? Why this whining for government aid? Adopt the Libraries Act, if you really require a Museum for South London; but you want _News Rooms_ open to all comers, _not_ Museums.
And here I am constrained to remark that Penny Journals are not always vehicles of instruction in any sense of the term. I regret there are not a few Editors in this great Metropolis who have a special aptitude for lowering and degrading Journalism. Take up the DAILY TELEGRAPH—to talk of the “MORAL tone” of this paper is nothing less than ineffable bosh. Its exaggerated, ethical articles, are nauseous in the extreme. Let me only refer to the case of the “ingenuous” EUGENIE PLUMMER, recently convicted of perjury. With Judaic malevolence the _Telegraph_ from the first displayed great anxiety to criminate Mr. Hatch, who is now acquitted by an impartial Jury. The desire to pander to an impure taste, was only equalled by the base attempt to crush an innocent clergyman, _coûte qui coûte_; and even after the conviction of the precocious, marble hearted girl, (who deserved a sound flogging as the only punishment she could feel,) this cheap and nasty Print is at its dirty work again in assuming guilt, and asserting that the unfortunate gentleman “did not behave like an innocent man.” {35} Serjeant SHEE’S is very dirty money, but this TELEGRAPH’S is worse. It lowers a noble vocation, and sinks it to PRESSGANGISM.
The critic of the _Daily Telegraph_ has a difficult task, for its nauseous, maudlin effusions, when wishing to be mighty fine, have a bewildering effect. Its
“No meaning puzzles more than wit.”
The Editor is evidently a nice man, with very nasty ideas. Not the Holywell Street Press, not the most prurient pages of Romance, can equal the skimble skamble stuff of its virtuous indignation articles. The death of Lady Noel Byron, the widow of the great Poet, is a case in point:—
“The creature’s at his dirty work again,”
The discretion of an Editor is never better employed than in steering clear of the idle gossip and calumnies of the day, and if there ever was a name that should be tenderly uttered, it is that of George Gordon Noel Byron. It is a gross violation of Editorial duty to bespatter, to assail with infamy, the memory of a Poet, only thirty-seven years of age, who accomplished so much, and whose early death eclipsed the gaiety of nations!
“Ruins of years—though few, yet full of fate:”
Why the CHILDE will live as long as the language endures:
“Not in the air shall these my words disperse,”
Now who are you, Mr. Editor of the _Telegraph_, and of what faith, to impiously dare to scan the thoughts, and discern the intents of the human heart? That power to scan belongs to GOD only.
You are told, on Divine authority, which no Christian disputes, to “JUDGE NOT,” and yet you do not scruple to assert that Byron “was driven from his country, and deserved the doom.” Would the editor of the _Telegraph_, the writer of this censorship, escape, if all had their deserts?
Why this wretched, Papistical jumble about the “adoration of Lady Byron by the serious world,” and “reconciliation in the grave,” and “her prayers having been heard for her erring husband.” But I hasten to dismiss this Pharisee of the _Telegraph_, who daily reminds us that
“Dulness is ever apt to magnify.”
Having so often discussed the advantages of Newspaper Reading, it becomes a duty again to refer to such glaring misleaders as the veering _Times_, which affects to _guide_, not to follow opinion. The flood and ebb of public opinion is carefully marked by this unprincipled Paper, and to every passing breeze it trims its sails. The most signal instance of the transparent dissimulation of the _Times_, is its truly hypocritical expression of its “great regret,” because the Lords threw out the Repeal Bill! St. James’ Square, and Printing House Square, have coalesced, and the “Heads of Houses,” Derby, Walter, and Co., must now be prepared to take the consequences of their revolutionary tactics. No doubt my esteemed friend, the Author of Festus, had the Shuttlecock _Times_ in view when he favoured me with the Portraiture of Newspapers. It is far too sweeping an indictment, for the tone of the Press generally is sound and healthy, always excepting the misleading _Times_, the _Daily Telegraph_, and _Morning Advertiser_.
I will quote Mr. Bailey’s clever sketch of the “great mercantile concern.”