From the Lakes of Killarney to the Golden Horn Part 3

_So far as they are concerned_, the Church of England, and indeed we may say the Christianity of England, is a wretched failure. Some other and more powerful ill.u.s.tration is needed to turn the heart of England; something which shall not only cause the sign of the cross to be held up in St. Paul's and Westminster Abbey, but which shall carry the Gospel of human brotherhood to all the villages and hamlets of England; to the poorest cottage in the Highlands; that shall descend with the miner into the pit underground; that shall abide with every laborer in the land, and go forth with the sailor on the sea.

How inadequately the Church of England answers to this need of a popular educator and reformer, may be ill.u.s.trated by one or two of her most notable churches and preachers.

On Sunday last we attended two of the most famous places of worship in London--the Temple Church and Westminster Abbey. The former belongs to an ancient guild of lawyers, attached to what are known as the Middle and the Inner Temple, a corporation dating back hundreds of years, which has large grounds running down to the Thames, and great piles of buildings divided off into courts, and full of lawyers'

offices. Standing among these is a church celebrated for its beauty, which once belonged to the Knights Templars, some of whose bronze figures in armor, lying on their tombs, show by their crossed limbs how they went to Palestine to fight for the Holy Sepulchre. As it is a church which belongs to a private corporation, no one can obtain admission to the pews without an order from "a bencher," which was sent to us as a personal courtesy. The church has the air of being very aristocratic and exclusive; and those whose enjoyment of a religious service depends on "worshipping G.o.d in good company," may feel at ease while sitting in these high-backed pews, from which the public are excluded.

The church is noted for its music, which amateurs p.r.o.nounce exquisite.

As I am not educated in these things, I do not know the precise beauty and force of all the quips and quavers of this most artistic performance. The service was given at full length, in which the Lord's Prayer was repeated _five times_. With all the singing and "intoning,"

and down-sitting and uprising, and the bowing of necks and bending of knees, the service occupied an hour and a half before the rector, Rev.

Dr. Vaughan, ascended the pulpit. He is a brother-in-law of Dean Stanley, and a man much respected in the Church. His text was, "He took our infirmities, and bare our sicknesses," from which he preached a sermon appropriate to the day, which was "Hospital Sunday," a day observed throughout London by collections in aid of the hospitals. It was simple and practical, and gave one the impression of a truly good man, such as there are thousands in the Church of England.

But what effect had such a service--or a hundred such--on the poor population of London? About as much as the exquisite music itself has on the rise and fall of the tide in the Thames, which flows by; or as the moonlight has on vegetation. I know not what mission agencies these old churches may employ elsewhere to labor among the poor, but so far as any immediate influence is concerned, outside of a very small circle, it is infinitesimal.

In the evening we went to Westminster Abbey to hear the choral service, which is rendered by a very large choir of men and boys, with wonderful effect. Simply for the music one could not have a more exquisite sensation of enjoyment. How the voices rang amid the arches of the old cathedral. At this evening service it had been announced that "The Lord Archbishop of York" was to preach, and we were curious to see what wisdom and eloquence could come out of the mouth of a man who held the second place in the Established Church of England. "His grace" is a large, portly man, of good presence and sonorous voice.

His text was "Behold, I stand at the door and knock." He began with an allusion to Holman Hunt's famous picture of Christ standing at the door, which he described in some detail; the door itself overgrown with vines, and its hinges rusted, so long had it been unopened; and then the patient Man of Sorrows, with bended head and heavy heart, knocking and waiting to come in. From this he went into a discussion of modern civilization, considering whether men are really better (though they may be better _off_) now than in the days of our fathers; the conclusion from all which was, that external improvements, however much they add to the physical comfort and well-being of man, do not change his character, and that for his inward peace, the only way is to open the door to let the blessed Master in. It seemed to me rather a roundabout way to come at his point; but still as the aim was practical, and the spirit earnest and devout, one could not but feel that the impression was good. As to ability, I failed to see in it anything so marked as should ent.i.tle the preacher to the exalted dignity he holds; but I do not wish to criticize, but only to consider whether a Church thus organized and appointed can have the influence over the people of England we might expect from a great National Establishment. Perhaps it has, but I fail to see it. It seems to skim, and that very lightly, over the top, the thin surface of society, and not to _touch_ the ma.s.ses beneath.

The influence of the Establishment is supplemented by the Dissenting Churches, which are numerous and active, and in their spheres doing great good. Then, too, there are innumerable separate agencies, working in ways manifold and diverse. I have been much interested in the details, as given me by Mrs. Ranyard, of her Bible women, who have grown, in the course of twenty years, from half a dozen to over two hundred, and who, working noiselessly, in quiet, womanly ways, do much to penetrate the darkest lanes of London, and to lead their poor sisters into ways of industry, contentment, and peace.

But after all is said and done, the great ma.s.s of poverty and wretchedness remains. We lift the cover, and look down into unfathomable abysses beneath, into a world where all seems evil--a h.e.l.l of furious pa.s.sions and vices and crimes. Such is the picture which is presented to me as I walk the streets of London, and which will not down, even when I go to the Bank of England, and see the treasures piled up there, or to Hyde Park, and see the dashing equipages, the splendid horses and their riders, and all the display of the rank and beauty of England.

What will the end be? Will things go on from bad to worse, to end at last in some grand social or political convulsion--some cataclysm like the French Revolution?

This is the question which now occupies thousands of minds in Great Britain. Of course similar questions engage attention in other countries. In all great cities there is a poor population, which is the standing trouble and perplexity of social and political reformers.

We have a great deal of poverty in New York, although it is chiefly imported from abroad. But in London the evil is immensely greater, because the city is four times larger; and the crowding together of four millions of people, brings wealth and poverty into such close contact that the contrasts are more marked. Other evils and dangers England has which are peculiar to an old country; they are the growth of centuries, and cannot be shaken off, or cast out, without great tearing and rending of the body politic. All this awakens anxious thought, and sometimes dark foreboding. Many, no doubt, of the upper cla.s.ses are quite content to have their full share of the good things of this life, and enjoy while they may, saying, "After us the deluge!"

But they are not all given over to selfishness. Tens of thousands of the best men on this earth, having the clearest heads and n.o.blest hearts, are in England, and they are just as thoughtful and anxious to do what is best for the ma.s.ses around them, as any men can be. The only question is, What _can_ be done? And here we confess our philosophy is wholly at fault. It is easy to judge harshly of others, but not so easy to stand in their places and do better.

For my part, I am most anxious that the experiment of Christian civilization in England should not fail; for on it, I believe, the welfare of the whole world greatly depends. But is it strange that good men should be appalled and stand aghast at what they see here in London, and that they should sometimes be in despair of modern civilization and modern Christianity? What can I think, as a foreigner, when a man like George Macdonald, a true-hearted Scotchman, who has lived many years in London, tells me that things may come right (so he hopes) _in a thousand years_--that is, in some future too remote for the vision of man to explore. Hearing such sad confessions, I no longer wonder that so many in England, who are sensitive to all this misery, and yet believers in a Higher Power, have turned to the doctrine of the Personal Reign of Christ on earth as the only refuge against despair, believing that the world will be restored to its allegiance to G.o.d, and men to universal brotherhood, only with the coming of the Prince of Peace.

FOOTNOTE:

[2] "The bleak wind of March Made her tremble and shiver, But not the dark arch, Nor the black flowing river.

Mad from life's history, Glad to death's mystery Swift to be hurled Anywhere, anywhere, Out of the world"

CHAPTER VI.

THE RESURRECTION OF FRANCE.

PARIS, June 30th.

Coming from London to Paris, one is struck with the contrast--London is so vast and interminable, _and dark_,--a "boundless contiguity of shade,"--while Paris is all brightness and sunshine. The difference in the appearance of the two capitals is due partly to the climate, and partly to the materials of which they are built--London showing miles on miles of dingy brick, with an atmosphere so charged with smoke and vapors that it blackens even the whitest marble; while Paris is built of a light, cream-colored stone, that is found here in abundance, which is soft and easily worked, but hardens by exposure to the air, and that preserves its whiteness under this clearer sky and warmer sun. Then the taste of the French makes every shop window bright with color; and there is something in the natural gayety of the people which is infectious, and which quickly communicates itself to a stranger. Many a foreigner, on first landing in England, has walked the streets of London with gloomy thoughts of suicide, who once in Paris feels as if transported to Paradise. Perhaps if he had stayed a little longer in England he would have thought better of the country and people. But it is impossible for a stranger at first to feel _at home_ in London, any more than if he were sent adrift all alone in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. The English are reserved and cautious in their social relations, which may be very proper in regard to those of whom they know nothing. But once well introduced, the stranger is taken into their intimacy, and finds no spot on earth more warm than the interior of an English home. But in Paris everybody seems to greet him at once without an introduction; he speaks to a Frenchman on the street (if it be only to inquire his way), and instead of a gruff answer, meets with a polite reply. "It amounts to nothing," some may say. It costs indeed but a moment of time, but even that, many in England, and I am sorry to say in America also, are too impatient and too self-absorbed to give. In the shops everybody is so polite that one spends his money with pleasure, since he gets not only the matter of his purchase, but what he values still more, a smile and a pleasant word. It may be said that these are little things, but in their influence upon one's temper and spirits they are _not_ trifles, any more than sunshine is a trifle, or pure air; and in these minor moralities of life the French are an example to us and to all the world.

But it is not only for their easy manners and social virtues that I am attracted to the French. They have many n.o.ble qualities, such as courage and self-devotion, instances of which are conspicuous in their national history; and are not less capable of Christian devotion, innumerable examples of which may be found in both the Catholic and the Protestant Churches. Many of our American clergymen, who have travelled abroad, will agree with me, that more beautiful examples of piety they have never seen than among the Protestants of France. I should be ungrateful indeed if I did not love the French, since to one of that nation I owe the chief happiness of my earthly existence.

Of course the great marvel of Paris, and of France, is its _resurrection_--the manner in which it has recovered from the war. In riding about these streets, so full of life and gayety, and seeing on every side the signs of prosperity, I cannot realize that it is a city which, since I was here in 1867--nay, within less time, has endured all the horrors of war; which has been _twice_ besieged, has been encompa.s.sed with a mighty army, and heard the sound of cannon day and night, its people hiding in cellars from the bombs bursting in the streets. Yet it is not five years since Louis Napoleon was still Emperor, reigning undisturbed in the palace of the Tuileries, across the street from the Hotel du Louvre, where I now write. It was on the 15th of July, 1870, that war was declared against Prussia in the midst of the greatest enthusiasm. The army was wild with excitement, expecting to march almost unopposed to Berlin. Sad dream of victory, soon to be rudely dispelled! A few weeks saw the most astounding series of defeats, and on the 4th of September the Emperor himself surrendered at Sedan, at the head of a hundred thousand men, and the Empire, which he had been constructing with such infinite labor and care for twenty years, fell to the ground.

But even then the trials of France were not ended. She was to have sorrow upon sorrow. Next came the surrender of Metz, with another great army, and then the crowning disaster of the long siege of Paris, lasting over four months, and ending also in the same inglorious way.

Jena was avenged, when the Prussian cavalry rode through the Arch of Triumph down the Champs Elysees. It was a bitter humiliation for France, but she had to drink the cup to the very dregs, when forced to sign a treaty of peace, ceding two of her most beautiful provinces, Alsace and Lorraine, and paying an indemnity of one thousand millions of dollars for the expenses of the war! Nor was this all. As if the seven vials of wrath were to be poured out on her devoted head, scarcely was the foreign war ended, before civil war began, and for months the Commune held Paris under its feet. Then the city had to undergo a second siege, and to be bombarded once more, not by Germans, but by Frenchmen, until its proud historical monuments were destroyed by its own people. The Column of the Place Vendome, erected to commemorate the victories of Napoleon, out of cannon taken in his great battles, was levelled to the ground; and the Palace of the Tuileries and the Hotel de Ville were burnt by these desperate revolutionists, who at last, to complete the catalogue of their crimes, butchered the hostages in cold blood! This was the end of the war, and such the state of Paris in May, 1871, scarcely four years ago.

In the eyes of other nations, this was not only disaster, but absolute ruin. It seemed as if the country could not recover in one generation, and that for the next thirty years, so far as any political power or influence was concerned, France might be considered as blotted from the map of Europe.

But four years have pa.s.sed, and what do we see? The last foreign soldier has disappeared from the soil of France, the enormous indemnity is PAID, and the country is apparently as rich and prosperous, and Paris as bright and gay, as ever.

This seems a miracle, but the age of miracles is past, and such great results do not come without cause. The French are a very rich people--not by the acc.u.mulation of a few colossal fortunes, but by the almost infinite number of small ones. They are at once the most industrious and the most economical people in the world. They will live on almost nothing. Even the Chinese hardly keep soul and body together on less than these French _ouvriers_ whom we see going about in their blouses, and who form the laboring population of Paris. So all the petty farmers in the provinces save something, and have a little against a rainy day; and when the time comes that the Government wants a loan, out from old stockings, and from chimney corners, come the h.o.a.rded napoleons, which, flowing together like thousands of little rivulets, make the mighty stream of national wealth.

But for a nation to pay its debts, especially when they have grown to be so great, it is necessary not only to have money, but to know how to use it. And here the interests of France have been managed with consummate ability. In spite of the constant drain caused by the heavy payment of the war indemnity to Germany, the finances of the country have not been much disturbed, and to-day the bills of the Bank of France are at par. I feel ashamed for my country when the cable reports to us from America, that our national currency is so depreciated that to purchase gold in New York one must pay a premium of seventeen per cent.! I wish some of our political financiers would come to Paris for a few months, to take lessons from the far more successful financiers of France.

What delights me especially in this great achievement is that it has all been done under the Republic! It has not required a monarchy to maintain public order, and to give that security which is necessary to restore the full confidence of the commercial world. It is only by a succession of events so singular as to seem indeed providential, that France has been saved from being given over once more into the hands of the old dynasty. From this it has been preserved by the rivalship of different parties; so that the Republic has been saved by the blunders of its enemies. The Lord has confounded them, and the very devices intended for its destruction--such as putting Marshal MacMahon in power for seven years--have had the effect to prevent a restoration. Thus the Republic has had a longer life, and has established its t.i.tle to the confidence of the nation. No doubt if the Legitimists and the Orleanists and Imperialists could all _unite_, they might have a sovereign to-morrow; but each party prefers a Republic to any sovereign _except its own_, and is willing that it should stand for a few years, in the hope that some turn of events will then give the succession to them. So, amid all this division of parties, the Republic "still lives," and gains strength from year to year. The country is prosperous under it; order is perfectly maintained; and order _with liberty_: why should it not remain the permanent government of France?

If only the country could be _contented_, and willing to let well enough alone, it might enjoy many long years of prosperity. But unfortunately there is a cloud in the sky. The last war has left the seeds of another war. Its disastrous issue was so unexpected and so galling to the most proud and sensitive people in Europe, that they will never rest satisfied till its terrible humiliation is redressed.

The resentment might not be so bitter but for the taking of its two provinces. The defeats in the field of battle might be borne as the fate of war (for the French have an ingenious way, whenever they lose a battle, of making out that they were not _defeated_, but _betrayed_); even the payment of the enormous indemnity they might turn into an occasion of boasting, as they now do, as a proof of the vast resources of the country; but the loss of Alsace and Lorraine is a standing monument of their disgrace. They cannot wipe it off from the map of Europe. There it is, with the hated German flag flying from the fortress of Metz and the Cathedral of Strasburg. This is a humiliation to which they will never submit contentedly, and herein lies the probability--nay almost the certainty--of coming war. I have not met a Frenchman of any position, or any political views, Republican or Monarchical, Bonapartist or Legitimist, Catholic or Protestant, whose blood did not boil at the mention of Alsace and Lorraine, and who did not look forward to a fresh conflict with Germany as inevitable. When I hear a Protestant pastor say, "I will give all my sons to fight for Alsace and Lorraine," I cannot but think the prospects of the Peace Society not very encouraging in Europe.

In the exhibition of the Dore gallery, in London, there is a very striking picture by that great artist (who is himself an Alsatian, and yet an intense Frenchman), intended to represent Alsace. It is a figure of a young woman, tall and beautiful, with eyes downcast, yet with pride and dignity in her sadness, as the French flag, which she holds, droops to her feet. Beside her is a mother sitting in a chair nursing a child. The two figures tell the story in an instant. That mother is nursing her child to avenge the wrongs of his country. It is sad indeed to see a child thus born to a destiny of war and blood; to see the shadow of carnage and destruction hovering over his very cradle. Yet such is the prospect now, which fills every Christian heart with sadness. Thus will the next generation pay in blood and tears, for the follies and the crimes of this.

CHAPTER VII.

THE FRENCH NATIONAL a.s.sEMBLY.

We have been to Versailles. Of course our first visit was to the great palace built by Louis XIV., which is over a quarter of a mile long, and which stands, like some of the remains of antiquity, as a monument of royal pride and ambition. It was built, as the kings of Egypt built the Pyramids, to tell to after ages of the greatness of his kingdom and the splendor of his reign. A gallant sight it must have been when this vast pile, with its endless suites of apartments, was filled with the most brilliant court in Europe; when statesmen and courtiers and warriors, "fair women and brave men," crowded the immense saloons, and these terraces and gardens. It was a display of royal magnificence such as the world has seldom seen. The cost is estimated at not less than two hundred millions of dollars--a sum which considering the greater value of money two centuries ago, was equal to five times that amount at the present day, or a thousand millions, as much as the whole indemnity paid to Germany. It was a costly legacy to his successors--costly in treasure and costly in blood. The building of Versailles, with the ruinous and inglorious wars of Louis XIV., drained the resources of France for a generation, and by the burdens they imposed on the people, prepared the way for the Revolution. I could not but recall this with a bitter feeling as I stood in the gilded chamber where the great king slept, and saw the very bed on which he died. That was the end of all his glory, but not the end of the evil that he wrought:

"The evil that men do lives after them; The good is oft interred with their bones."

The extravagance of this monarch was paid for by the blood of his descendants. If he had not lifted his head so high, the head of Louis XVI. might not have fallen on the scaffold. It is good for France that she has no longer any use for such gigantic follies; and that the day is past when a whole nation can be sacrificed to the vanity and selfishness of one man. In this case the very magnitude of the structure defeated its object, for it was so great that no government since the Revolution has known what to do with it. It required such an enormous expenditure to keep it up, that the prudent old King Louis Philippe _could not afford to live in it_, and at last turned it into a kind of museum or historical gallery, filled with pictures of French battles, and dedicated in pompous phrase, TO ALL THE GLORIES OF FRANCE.

But it was not to see the palace of Louis XIV. that I had most interest in revisiting Versailles, but to see the National a.s.sembly sitting in it, which is at present the ruling power in France. If Louis XIV. ever revisits the scene of his former magnificence, he must shake his kingly head at the strange events which it has witnessed.

How he must have shuddered to see his royal house invaded by a mob, as it was in the time of the first Revolution; to see the faithful Swiss guards butchered in his very palace, and the Queen, Marie Antoinette, escaping with her life; to see the grounds sacred to Majesty trampled by the "fierce democracie" of France; and then by the iron heel of the Corsican usurper; and by the feet of the allied armies under Wellington. His soul may have had peace for a time when, under Louis Philippe and Louis Napoleon, Versailles was comparatively silent and deserted. But what would he have said at seeing, only four winters ago, the Emperor of Germany and his army encamped here and beleaguering the capital? Yet perhaps even that would not so have offended his royal dignity as to see a National a.s.sembly sitting in a part of this very palace in the name of a French Republic!

Strange overturning indeed; but if strange, still true. They have a proverb in France that "it is always the improbable which happens,"

and so indeed it seems to be in French history; it is full of surprises, but few greater than that which now appears. France has drifted into a Republic, when both statesmen and people meant not so.

It was not the first choice of the nation. Whatever may have been true of the populace of Paris, the immense majority of the French people were sincerely attached to monarchy in some form, whether under a king or an emperor; and yet the country has neither, so that, as has been wittily said, France has been "a Republic without Republicans." But for all that the Republic is _here_, and here it is likely to remain.

When the present a.s.sembly first met, a little more than four years since, it was at Bordeaux--for to that corner of France was the government driven; and when the treaty was signed, and it came north, it met at Versailles rather than at Paris, as a matter of necessity.

Paris was in a state of insurrection. It was in the hands of the Commune, and could only be taken after a second siege, and many b.l.o.o.d.y combats around the walls and in the streets. This, and the experience so frequent in French history of a government being overthrown by the mob of Paris invading the legislative halls, decided the National a.s.sembly to remain at Versailles, even after the rebellion was subdued; and so there it is to this day, even though the greater part of the deputies go out from Paris twelve miles every morning, and return every night; and in the programme which has been drawn up for the definite establishment of the Republic, it is made an article of the Const.i.tution that the National a.s.sembly shall always meet at Versailles.

The place of meeting is the former theatre of the palace, which answers the purpose very well--the s.p.a.ce below, in what was _the pit_, sufficing for the deputies, while the galleries are reserved for spectators. We found the approaches crowded with persons seeking admission, which can only be by ticket. But we had no difficulty.

Among the deputies is the well-known Protestant pastor of Paris, Edouard de Pressense, who was chosen to the a.s.sembly in the stormy scenes of 1871, and who has shown himself as eloquent in the tribune as in the pulpit. I sent him my card, and he came out immediately with two tickets in his hand, and directed one of the attendants to show us into the best seats in the house, who, thus instructed, conducted us to the diplomatic box (which, from its position in the centre of the first balcony, must have been once the royal box), from which we looked down upon the heads of the National a.s.sembly of France.

And what a spectacle it was! The a.s.sembly consists of over seven hundred men, who may be considered as fair representatives of what is most eminent in France. Of course, as in all such bodies, there are many elected from the provinces on account of some local influence, as landed proprietors, or as sons of n.o.ble families, who count only by their votes. But with these are many who have "come to the front" in this great national crisis, by the natural ascendancy which great ability always gives, and who by their talents have justly acquired a commanding influence in the country.

The President of the a.s.sembly is the Duke d'Audiffret Pasquier, whose elevated seat is at the other end of the hall. In front of him is "the tribune," from which the speakers address the a.s.sembly: it not being the custom here, as in our Congress or in the English Parliament, for a member to speak from his place in the house. This French custom has been criticized in England, as betraying this talkative people into more words, for a Frenchman does not wish to "mount the tribune" for nothing, and once there the temptation is very strong to make "a speech." But we did not find that the speeches were much longer than in the House of Commons, though they were certainly more violent.