Fifteen Chapters of Autobiography
single-handed striving, the good cause now has its workers everywhere.
And to none does it make a more direct or a more imperious appeal than
to us Liberal politicians. If we are worthy of the name, we must be in
earnest about a cause which promises happiness, and health, and length
of days to those who by their daily labour of hand and head principally
maintain the supremacy of the Anglo-Saxon race. We must be impatient of
a state of society in which healthy dwellings and unadulterated food and
pure water and fresh air are made the monopolies of the rich. We must be
eager to do our part towards abolishing filth and eradicating disease,
and giving free scope to those beneficent laws of Nature which, if only
we will obey them, are so manifestly designed to promote the welfare and
the longevity of man. If we believe that every human being has equally
and indefeasibly the right to be happy, we must find our chief interest
and most satisfying occupation in Social Service. Our aim is, first, to
lighten the load of existence for those thronging thousands of the human
family whose experience of life is one long suffering, and then to 'add
sunshine to daylight by making the happy happier.' The poor, the
ignorant, the weak, the hungry, the over-worked, all call for aid; and,
in ministering to their wants, the adherent of the New Liberalism knows
that he is fulfilling the best function of the character which he
professes, and moreover is helping to enlarge the boundaries of the
Kingdom of God."
When those words were written, the London County Council had just begun
its work. I served on it till March, 1895; and during those six years it
had proved in practice what a right-minded Municipality can do towards
brightening and sweetening human life. It cut broad roads through
squalid slums, letting in light and air where all had been darkness and
pollution. It cleared wide areas of insanitary dwellings, where only
vice could thrive, and re-housed the dispossessed. It broke up the
monotony of mean streets with beautiful parks and health-giving
pleasure-grounds. It transfigured the Music-Halls, and showed that, by
the exercise of a little firmness and common sense, the tone and
character of the "Poor Man's Theatre" could be raised to the level of
what would be applauded in a drawing-room. By forbidding the sale of
refreshments in the auditorium, it crushed the old-fashioned
superstition that public entertainment and alcoholic drink are
inseparably connected. In some of these good works it was my privilege
to bear a part; and, in that matter of the purification of the
Music-Halls, I was proud to follow the lead of Sir John McDougall, who
has since been Chairman of the Council, and who, at the time of which I
am writing, fearlessly exposed himself to unbounded calumny, and even
physical violence, in his crusade for the moral purity of popular
amusement. Those were six years of fruitful service; and, though a long
time has elapsed since I left the Council, I have constantly watched its
labours, and can heartily assent to the eulogy pronounced by my friend
Henry Scott Holland, when he was quitting his Canonry at St. Paul's for
his Professorship at Oxford:
"As for London, my whole heart is still given to the lines of the
Progressive policy on the County Council. I still think that this has
given London a soul; and that it has been by far the most effective work
that one has watched happening.... The hope of London lies with the
County Council."
Before I say goodbye to this portion of my "Autobiography," let me
record the fact that the London County Council produced a poet of its
own. The first Council came to an end in March, 1892, and the second,
elected on the 5th of that month, gave the Progressives a greatly
increased majority. One of the newly-elected Councillors uttered his
triumphant joy in song.
"Here then you have your answer, you that thought
To find our London unawakened still,
A sleeping plunder for you, thought to fill
The gorge of private greed, and count for naught
The common good. Time unto her has brought
Her glorious hour, her strength of public will
Grown conscious, and a civic soul to thrill
The once dull mass that for your spoil you sought.
Lo, where the alert majestic city stands,
Dreaming her dream of golden days to be,
With shaded eyes beneath her arching hands
Scanning the forward pathway, like a seer
To whom the riven future has made clear
The marvel of some mighty destiny."[61]
Moved by the desire to gratify a young ambition, I introduced the poet
to Mr. Gladstone, and that great man, who never damned with faint
praise, pronounced that this was the finest thing written about London
since Wordsworth's Sonnet "Composed upon Westminster Bridge."
In August, 1892, Gladstone became Prime Minister for the fourth time. He
gave me a place in his Government; and for the next three years my
activities were limited to North Bedfordshire, which I then represented,
the House of Commons, and Whitehall. I was restored to liberty by the
dissolution of July, 1895. In my chapter about Oxford, I spoke of the
Rev. E. S. Talbot, then Warden of Keble, and now Bishop of Winchester,
as one of those whose friendship I had acquired in undergraduate days.
After serving for a while as Vicar of Leeds, he was appointed in 1895 to
the See of Rochester, which then included South London. Soon after he
had entered on his new work, he said to me, "Men of leisure are very
scarce in South London. Will you come across the Thames, and lend us a
hand?"
FOOTNOTES:
[55] Dr. Butler's Harrow Sermons. Series II.
[56] "Christianity without the Cross a Corruption of the Gospel of
Christ."
[57] Rev. H. Scott Holland, D.D.
[58] Honourable mention ought here to be made of "The Guild of St.
Matthew," founded by the Rev. Stewart Headlam in 1877. Its object was
"To justify God to the People," and it prepared the way for later
organizations.
[59] The Rev. H. S. Holland, D.D.
[60] F. W. H. Myers.
[61] F. Henderson, _By the Sea, and other poems_.
XV
ECCLESIASTICA
The English Church, as established by the law of England, offers
the Supernatural to all who choose to come. It is like the Divine
Being Himself, Whose sun shines alike on the evil and on the good.
J. H. SHORTHOUSE, _John Inglesant_.
Mr. Shorthouse, like most people who have come over to the Church from
Dissent, set an inordinate value on the principle of Establishment. He
seemed (and in that particular he resembled Archbishop Tait) incapable
of conceiving the idea of a Church as separate from, and independent of,
the State. The words "as established by the law of England" in the
passage which stands at the head of this chapter appear to suggest a
doubt whether the English Church, if she ceased to be "established,"
could still discharge her function as the divinely-appointed dispenser
of sacramental grace to the English people. Those who, like Mr.
Gladstone, believe that no change in her worldly circumstances could
"compromise or impair her character as the Catholic and Apostolic Church
of this country," would omit Mr. Shorthouse's qualifying words, and
would say, simply, that the English Church, whether established or not,
offers the Supernatural to all who choose to come, and that she is, has
been, and always will be, "historically the same institution through
which the Gospel was originally preached to the English Nation." But
this is not the place for theorization; so, for the moment, I am content
to take Mr. Shorthouse's statement as it stands, and to say that a
loving pride in the English Church has been the permanent passion of my
life. I hold with Dean Church, a man not given to hyperbole, that "in
spite of inconsistencies and menacing troubles, she is still the most
glorious Church in Christendom."
I was baptized in the Parish Church of St. Mary the Virgin, Woburn,
formerly a chapel dependent on the Cistercian Abbey hard by, which the
first Earl of Bedford received as a gift from Henry VIII.[62] This truly
interesting church was destroyed, to please an innovating incumbent, in
1864; but my earliest impressions of public worship are connected with
it, and in my mind's eye I can see it as clearly as if it were still
standing. It had never been "restored "; but had been decorated by my
grandfather, who inherited the ecclesiastical rights of the Abbots of
Woburn, and whose "Curate" the incumbent was.[63] My grandfather was a
liberal giver, and did his best, according to his lights, to make the
Church beautiful. He filled the East Window with stained glass, the
central subject being his own coat of arms, with patriarchs and saints
grouped round it in due subordination. Beneath the window was a fine
picture, by Carlo Maratti, of the Holy Family. The Holy Table was a
table indeed, with legs and drawers after the manner of a writing-table,
and a cover of red velvet. The chancel was long; and the south side of
it was engrossed by "the Duke's Pew," which was enclosed within high
walls and thick curtains, and contained a fireplace. The north side of
the chancel was equally engrossed by a pew for the Duke's servants. The
choir, male and female after their kind, surrounded the organ in a
gallery at the West End. The whole Church was pewed throughout, and
white-washed, the chancel being enriched with plaster mouldings. On the
capital of each pillar was a scutcheon, bearing the arms of some family
allied to our own. The largest and most vivid presentment of the Royal
Arms which I have ever seen crowned the chancel-arch.
Our clerical staff consisted of the incumbent (who became a "Vicar" by
Act of Parliament in 1868) and a curate. Our list of services was as
follows: Sunday--11 a.m., Morning Prayer, Litany, Table-prayers, and
Sermon; 6 p.m., Evening Prayer and Sermon. There was Evening Prayer with
a sermon on Thursdays, and a prayer-meeting in the schoolroom on Tuesday
evenings. There were no extra services in Lent or Advent, nor on any
Holy Days except Good Friday and Ascension Day. The Holy Communion was
administered after Morning Service on the first Sunday of the month, and
on Christmas and Easter Days; and after Evening Service on the third
Sunday. The black gown was, of course, worn in the pulpit, and I
remember a mild sensation caused by the disuse of bands. The prayers
were preached; the Psalms were read; and the hymn-book in use was "The
Church and Home Metrical Psalter and Hymnal"--a quaint compilation which
I have never seen elsewhere. It would not be easy to describe the
dreariness of the services; and the preaching corresponded to them.
This is curious, for Evangelical preaching generally was rousing and
effective. I remember that we heard preaching of that type from
strangers who occasionally "took duty" or "pleaded for Societies"; but
our own pastors always expatiated on Justification by Faith only. I
cannot recall any other subject; and, even in enforcing this,
"Pulpit-eloquence," topical allusions, and illustrations whether from
nature or from books, were rigidly eschewed. "As dull as a sermon" is a
proverbial saying which for me in early boyhood had an awful truth.
It has been stated in an earlier chapter that I discovered the
Sacramental System of the Church by the simple method of studying the
Prayer Book. Certainly I got no help in that direction from my spiritual
pastors. The incumbent was, I should think, the Lowest Churchman who
ever lived. He was a Cambridge man; a thorough gentleman; well-read;
wholly devoted to his sacred calling; and fearless in his assertion of
what he believed to be right. (He once refused to let Jowett preach in