The Religious Life of London Part 12

It was rarely indeed that South Place was very full. Of course, the hearers were the very _elite_ of the human race. Wherever you go-especially among sects not particularly orthodox or popular-the men and women with whom you come in contact are no ordinary men and women.

By a happy dispensation of Providence they fail to see themselves as others see them, and are as firmly convinced of their own intellectual superiority over a benighted British public as they are of the truth of their principles and of their ultimate success.

"There is a religion of humanity," said Mr. Fox, "though not enshrined in articles and creeds, though it is not to be read merely in sacred books, and yet it may be read in all wherever they have anything in them of truth and moral beauty,-a religion of humanity which goes deeper than all because it belongs to the essentials of our moral and intellectual const.i.tution, and not to mere external accidents, the proof of which is not in historical agreement or metaphysical deduction, but in our own conscience and consciousness,-a religion of humanity which unites and blends all other religions, and makes one the men whose hearts are sincere, and whose characters are true, and good, and harmonious, whatever may be the deductions of their minds or their external profession,-a religion of humanity which cannot perish in the overthrow of altars or the fall of temples, which survives them all, and which, were every derived form of religion obliterated from the face of the earth, would recreate religion as the spring recreates the fruits and flowers of the soul, bidding it bloom again in beauty, bear again its rich fruits of utility, and fashion for itself such forms and modes of expression as may best agree with the progressive condition of mankind."

It was in accordance with these ideas that the Sunday morning services in South Place were carried on.

After Mr. Fox came Mr. Ierson, and a nearer approximation to regular Unitarianism. But the place did not prosper; there were far too many empty benches. He was succeeded by a gentleman formerly a Baptist minister, but who had outgrown his sect, and for a little while there was harmony and progress. Again there was an interregnum. "Seekers are,"

said old Oliver Cromwell, "next best to finders." In London, especially in these unsettled days of free inquiry, are many such, and to such the pulpit of South Place was freely offered. I do not fancy as a rule seekers are good preachers. To say anything effectually you must have something to say. To make others weep you must weep yourself. With mere negations you can never sway the minds or influence the lives of men. In orthodox places of worship there is often much of dreariness. The clergyman whose heart is not in his work is a miserable spectacle for G.o.ds and men, but the dreariness of heterodoxy is infinitely greater; and of all things under the sun the most miserable in the clerical way is the sight of a would-be philosopher feebly diluting or expanding, as the case may be, windy plat.i.tudes or transcendental moonshine. Under such an infliction, as it may well be imagined, South Place did not flourish greatly. At length, in due course, a man appeared to continue the work which Mr. Fox had originated. His name is Mr. M. D. Conway. I believe he is of American origin, and evidently under him the cause is in a prosperous state. When I say prosperous, the term is not to be understood as it would be in orthodox circles. The latter cla.s.s of religionists, when they say that a place is prosperous imply by the use of such language that a place of worship is well filled; that men are turned from sin to holiness, from serving the devil to serving G.o.d, that the place is a centre of religious life and activity, and that all, young and old, rich and poor, are to the best of their power and means co-operating in Christian work. Prosperity in this sense cannot be predicated of South Place. Its doors are only opened once a week. There is no religious, or educational, or philanthropical agency connected with the chapel; but there are more attendants than there were, and that encourages Mr. Conway and his friends. Indeed, there is a talk amongst them of establishing a Sunday-school. At the same time it seems to me that the cla.s.s of people who go to South Place are not socially or intellectually what they were in Mr. Fox's time-when the Cortaulds would come up all the way from Braintree to hear Mr. Fox, when City lawyers like the late Mr. Ashurst, and City magnates like the late Mr. Dillon, were amongst the audience; when on a Sunday morning might be seen there such men as Sir J. Bowring, or Macready, or Charles d.i.c.kens, and others equally well known to fame. They left when Mr. Fox left. I believe Mr.

P. Taylor, M.P., still keeps up a connexion, more or less fitful and uncertain, with the place. Sir Sydney Waterlow also still retains a couple of sittings, but he is rarely there. Nevertheless, the congregation has greatly increased; the chapel is quite three parts full.

Still they use the little book of hymns and anthems selected by Mr. Fox; and the musical part of the service, always a great matter at South Place, is as well conducted and as attractive as ever.

Mr. Conway is a very advanced thinker. The character of his preaching and praying is purely theistic. He wars with dogmas in every form. It may be a wing to-day, a fetter to-morrow. For him there are no sacred books, or rather he places them all on an equality. For his motto he goes to India, and quotes the Brahma Somaj. In this respect he is a true follower of the late Mr. Fox, whose fascinating oratory owed very little of its charm to that which orthodox Unitarians or orthodox Christians hold highest and holiest; whose aim was more to pull down than to build up, and who had a greater faculty for the exposition of Christian fallacies than for the enunciating of truths and principles needful to humanity in its hour of temptation, distress, danger, or death. Few have his exquisite humour, his power of sarcasm, his acquaintance with modern literature, his copious command of polished language, his expressive yet calm delivery, his gentleness almost as touching as that of woman; but that which was lacking in him often made men his inferiors in intellect, his superiors in the art of arousing the spiritually dead, or in giving to the moral wastes in our midst the vigour, the beauty, the fertility of life.

THE SECULARISTS.

It is a sign of the times when Infidelity visits the workshop or the factory, and challenges the admiration of the men in fustian-the men whose hard labours and h.o.r.n.y hands have helped to make England what it is, and who in an increasing ratio are making their influence felt on the Exchange where capital seeks investment, in the ancient halls where the teachers of the next generation are training, in the study of the political philosopher, in Parliaments where practical people a.s.semble to legislate after their necessarily imperfect fashion for the general weal.

It is said of Sir G.o.dfrey Kneller that he was deeply shocked at hearing a common labourer invoking imprecations on his own head. Some such feeling must be entertained by the old-fashioned, scholarly sceptics at all times met with in highly intellectual communities. Religion was a good thing for the poor; it taught them to know their place, to be humble, industrious, and not to murmur when deprived by human agency of the rights to which all are born, or when by the same agency they were made to bear innumerable wrongs. For such religion was intended; and for such considerations it was right and proper that it should be accepted by society-sanctioned by the law-its ministers rewarded and salaried by the State. It was under the influence of some such feeling that Napoleon the Great is reported to have said, if there were no G.o.d, it would be necessary to invent one; and in a proportionate manner do the philosophers feel alarm and indignation when the working man, for whom such trouble has been taken,-for whom religion has, as it were, been discovered,-for whom an Establishment, the most richly endowed with this world's goods in Christendom, rejoices to call itself the poor man's Church,-turns round, and, in his coa.r.s.e, rough way, says, "Ladies and gentlemen, I am much obliged to you. I see your little game. Pray don't take any trouble on my account. Please to leave me to go to the bad in my own way. Give me the right to the free inquiry you claim for yourselves, and don't quarrel with me on account of its results." Really it seems to me the Secularist has the best of it. I may regret his conclusions. I cannot blame his independent spirit.

Of the men who talk in this way it may be said, at any rate as regards the metropolis, Robert Dale Owen was the teacher and apostle. Owen was the first to proclaim to the ma.s.ses that there was no such thing as moral responsibility; that a man's character was formed for him partly by nature at his birth, and partly by the external influences to which he was exposed. As man, there was for him no choice of right or wrong. Any religion, and emphatically that of Christ, which proceeds upon the supposition that man can lay hold of eternal life, can accept the offer of G.o.d's mercy, can believe and live, is false and to be rejected with disdain. Owen was a man of blameless life-a man who made great sacrifices of wealth, and time, and labour, on account of his ideas. As his last apologist has well stated, "his condemnation of religion was not the result of libertine excesses, nor of a philosophical conceit, but followed honestly from the shallow theory he had adopted." Amongst the poor, ignorant, superficial denizens of our crowded cities he was hailed as the regenerator of manhood, and made many converts. Nor are they to be blamed. Owen met with an attentive hearing from such as Brougham and Bentham, Earls Liverpool and Aberdeen, Jefferson and Van Buren, the Duke of Kent and the King of Prussia; actually, we believe, he was presented at Court. It is true in his old age he became a believer in spirits, after all, and was buried in the little churchyard of Newton, Montgomeryshire, in the sure and certain hope of a glorious resurrection to eternal life; but by that time the truth or falsehood he had proclaimed had sunk into many minds, had been re-uttered by many tongues, had been commended to the working cla.s.ses by no less a master of language and argument than George Jacob Holyoake. Certainly, in the hands of the latter, Owenism, under its new name of Secularism, lost none of its power. The master was apt to be egotistic-dogmatic-much given to repet.i.tion-very diffuse. Mr. Holyoake's enemies cannot conscientiously say he is that. His friends, many of them the cleverest of London men, claim for him talents of no common order. A shop in Fleet Street was opened-the _Reasoner_ was established-and Mr. Holyoake went all over the land to emanc.i.p.ate the human mind, spell-bound by priestcraft, and to roll back the double night of ages and of ignorance. In a little while he retired from business, the shop in Fleet Street was shut up, the _Reasoner_ reasoned no more-Mr. Holyoake ceased perambulating. Still we have a genuine Apostolical succession: Mr. Bradlaugh takes up the wondrous tale, and the _National Reformer_ records the triumphs of his cause. According to him, all is prosperous. Hope paints a glorious future-when man's

"Regenerate soul from crime Shall yet be drawn, And Reason on this mortal clime Immortal dawn."

Yet what is the fact? The _National Reformer_ costs 10_l._ a week, and it does not pay. Its readers tell us their name is legion; yet it does not pay. At any rate, it is constantly appealing to its public for support. In every workshop or factory, in all our great hives of intelligence and life, the Secularists boast their thousands. All the intelligent operative manhood of England is, according to their own account, theirs; yet their organ-the child of a giant-is very weak on its legs, and very short of wind.

The headquarters of the Secularists is Cleveland Street, a street lying in that ma.s.s of pauperism at the rear of Tottenham Court Road Chapel. In that street there is a hall, originally erected, I believe, by Owen himself. At any rate, it is the resort of the illuminated to whom his philosophy has opened up a new moral world,-which, as regards appearances, is little better than the benighted Egypt out of which they have departed. Here you will find no free Gospel. The Secularists are determined to make the best of this world. If you wish to enter, you must pay; if you wish to show your gentility and sit near the lecturer, you must pay twopence more. Previous to the lecturer commencing, a boy goes up and down the room selling copies of the _National Reformer_, and a table at one end is devoted to the sale of publications of a similar character.

Cleveland Hall, every Sunday evening, then, is devoted to what are called Popular Free-thought Lectures. The doors open at seven, the lectures commence at half-past. The programme for the month of August, which I have now before me, will give the reader an idea of what is meant by free thought:-

"On Sunday evening, August 2, Mr. Charles Watts-An Impartial Estimate of the Life and Teachings of the Founder of Christianity; on Sunday evening, August 9, Iconoclast (Mr. Bradlaugh)-Capital and Labour, and Trades' Unions; on Sunday evening, August 16, Mrs. Harriet Law-The Teachings and Philosophy of J. S. Mill, Esq.; on Sunday evening, August 23, Mrs. Harriet Law-The Late Robert Owen: a Tribute to His Memory, Drawn from a Comparison of Present Inst.i.tutions and their Effects, with those Advocated by that Eminent Philanthropist; on Sunday evening, August 30, Mrs. Harriet Law, an Appeal to Women to Consider their Interests in Connexion with the Social, Political, and Theological Aspects of the Times."

Let me add, discussions are invited at the close of each lecture, and that, as may be antic.i.p.ated, after a discussion the combatants remain of the same opinion. Nevertheless, the Secularists enjoy these discussions immensely-and no wonder, as on all such occasions they form not a majority merely, but almost the entire a.s.sembly. It is not often they find their match. Men who can meet them on a common platform are rare.

A sincere Christian is shocked and pained, and loses his temper. Every c.o.c.k can crow on his own dunghill; and at Cleveland Hall the Secularists have it all their own way, and are merry at the expense of their opponents. Nor is this all; they often indulge in a style of abuse which sounds even to tolerant ears uncommonly like blasphemy. In fact, they are often needlessly antagonistic, and vulgar, and coa.r.s.e.

I have said Cleveland Hall is the headquarters of the society, for there is a society of which Mr. Charles Watts is secretary. There is another hall in the City Road; lectures are also, I believe, delivered elsewhere in London on a Sunday evening, and there are at least four or five secular societies. In the summer time they have open-air lectures on a Sunday morning in different parts of London. When the writer has been at Cleveland Hall, the room has generally been half full of respectable and sharp working men, all very positive and enthusiastic. There are not many women present, but, of course, there is the irrepressible baby. The lecturers are generally the persons whose names I have already given, who occasionally vary the scene of their labours by provincial engagements.

Their work, whatever it may be, has now been going on for some years.

This argues, on their part, some special fitness, and an adaptation of what they say and think to the cla.s.s to whom they appeal. In this respect they set many of the clergy a good example. The people at Cleveland Hall do not call out for quarter of an hour lectures. Nor do they require anything in the way of music, or choral performances, or floral decorations, or altar lights, to make the service interesting.

For children, whether they go to church or chapel, you must provide shows. For men nothing more is needed than logic and the human voice.

CHAPTER XIX.

THE IRREGULARS.

"What do you think of the Ranters, Mr. Hall?" I quote from the life of the celebrated Baptist orator; "don't you think they ought to be put down?"

"I don't know enough of their conduct to say that. What do they do? Do they inculcate Antinomianism, or do they exhibit immorality in their lives?"

"Not that I know of, but they fall into very irregular practices."

"Indeed, what practices?"

"Why, sir, when they enter a village they begin to sing hymns, and they go on singing until they collect a number of people on the village green, or in some neighbouring field, and then they preach."

"Well, whether that may be prudent or expedient or not depends upon circ.u.mstances, but as yet I see no criminality."

"But you must admit, Mr. Hall, it is very irregular."

"And suppose I do admit that, what follows? Was not our Lord rebuking the Scribes and Pharisees and driving the buyers and sellers out of the temple very irregular? Was not almost all that he did in his public ministry very irregular? Was not the course of the Apostles, and of Stephen, and of many of the Evangelists, very irregular? Were not the proceedings of Calvin, Luther, and their fellow workers in the Reformation very irregular?-a complete and shocking innovation upon all the queer out-doings of the Papists? And were not the whole lives of Whitefield and Wesley very irregular lives, as you view such things? Yet how infinitely is the world indebted to all of these? No, sir, there must be something widely different from mere irregularity before I condemn."

IRREGULAR AGENCIES.

Between Churchmen and Dissenters there are bodies claiming and often receiving the support of both. The number of buildings used in London every Sunday evening for theatre services now amounts to eleven, eight of the eleven being engaged by a united committee, of which the Earl of Shaftesbury is the chairman,-viz., Astley's, Standard, Pavilion, Royal Amphitheatre, Sadler's Wells, Britannia, and the Metropolitan and Oxford Music Halls. The other buildings are St. James's Hall and the Effingham and Victoria theatres. One result of this state of things is rather doubtful. Of the perniciousness of some of these places there can be no doubt. It may be that some of them would have been closed ere this had not the money received from the Sunday preaching made up for the losses of the week. In one year in these places 122 services were held, attended by 190,000 persons.

The London City Mission employs 361 agents. During the last year the number of visits made by them to the houses of the poor amounted to 1,987,259. The number of visits which they made to sick and dying amounted to 255,102. They gave away 6000 copies of the Bible; they circulated 2,677,901 tracts; they held more than 36,000 Bible cla.s.ses and religious services indoors; they conducted 3764 out-of-door services; they induced 1296 persons to partake of the Lord's Supper, 242 backsliders to return, 608 families to begin family prayer, 863 drunkards to abstain, 141 shopkeepers to close their shops on the Sabbath, and 8297 children to attend ragged and Sunday schools.

In London there are 300 Bible women always at work; then there is the Christian community founded in the days of John Wesley; the members of it visit workhouses and lodging-houses in the East of London and preach in the open air. Last year the number of open-air services held by them amounted to 542; the number of addresses delivered, 1626; and the number of hearers, including indoors and out, 379,370. The Society also visits lodging-houses and the Juvenile Refuge, and gives free tea meetings, which, as we may imagine, are very well attended. During the past year 255,477 tracts had been distributed, and altogether it had held 8573 services.

The Open-air Mission needs also to be recorded. It is calculated that in the summer our open-air preachers address every Sunday nearly half a million of persons in the metropolis alone. It must also be remembered that of late, by the closing of public-houses, the number of idle, covetous, mischievous persons thrown on our streets is considerably increased. On Sundays it is evident that the blockage of the streets is greater than ever. In such places as Trafalgar Square, and the steam-boat piers, and in all our back streets, there are thousands of boys and men gambling and demoralizing one another. The Open-air Mission catches some of them, and in the lowest neighbourhoods-where the most depraved live-its agents generally receive a favourable hearing; one exception is recorded, which occurred at the Royal Exchange. Preaching last year commenced there in April, and went on with many striking instances of success till May 9, when a band of secularists, humanitarians, and infidels came to oppose,-one man reading the Koran, while the agent of the City Mission was as usual about to commence his service. On the next Sunday the opposition was still greater, being reinforced by Roman Catholics and their priests. Under these circ.u.mstances preaching was suspended, only to be reopened when the excitement and the danger of a breach of the peace shall have pa.s.sed away. The Society aims at open-air preaching, special visitation, domestic visitation, and conferences for mutual intercourse. The visit to Epsom belongs to the second cla.s.s of these subjects. Twenty-one agents had been there during the race week, 60,000 tracts had been given away, many addresses had been given, and a Bible-stand erected. At this latter place, on the last wet Friday when the Oaks was being run, they sheltered a couple of hundred of poor starving wretches, and for five hours kept up preaching and praying on their account. Their service on the Sunday before the races was very interesting. On the Monday they held a service for the benefit of the gipsies, one of the speakers at which was the Dean of Ripon, better known perhaps as the Rev. Hugh M'Neile.

Of the 60,000 Arabs of London there are 20,000 in the Ragged Schools.

The Female and Domestic Bible Missions now number 230 paid agents, each with her district and lady superintendent, and expend some 11,000_l._ a year, exclusive of between 6000_l._ and 7000_l._ which is paid to it in instalments by the poor themselves for Bibles, clothes, and bedding.

The Young Men's Scripture a.s.sociation has been very successful. Nearly 200 of a Sunday afternoon attend the Bible cla.s.s in Aldersgate Street.

It has twelve branches in different parts of the town.

Connected with no denomination are six or seven chapels or rooms, where as they meet they break bread in the morning and preach the Gospel in the evening. In addition, the Plymouth Brethren have some thirty places of worship, and their dulness and isolation from the world, which cause them even to avoid discharging their duties as citizens as inconsistent with the spiritual life, indicate the little they need be taken into account as a religious body aiming in any way to influence the religious life of London. According to the late Mr. Buckle, good people really do very little good. I fancy this is the case as far as the Plymouth Brethren are concerned.

THE END.

BY THE SAME AUTHOR.

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