Crying for the Light: or, Fifty Years Ago. Volume 1 of 3

‘Besides,’ added the Rector, ‘it is your duty to support the institutions of your country, and to set the people a good example. I am not much of a Churchman myself. I had rather have been a country squire, but my father said I must either take the family living or starve, so, as starving is not in my way, here I am.’

‘And a better parson we don’t want,’ said the old farmer enthusiastically.

‘Well, I try to do my duty in the situation in which Providence has placed me,’ said the Rector, with a truly edifying air.

‘We knows that,’ said the farmer, ‘You’ve allus a bottle for a friend, and you give us short sermons, and when we want to get up a race or a bit of sport, you are always ready to lend us a helping hand, and that is more than the meetingers ever do. I hates ’em like p’ison. All their talk is of eddication and religion – good things in their way, but not to be overdone. My best ploughman can’t read a bit, and what good will larnin’ do him, I should like to know.’

And here the farmer, red in the face, paused for a reply. In the meanwhile the Rector called for the Sunday paper, which had reached there that evening. The surgeon set off to attend a patient in labour – his principal employment in that healthy district, where the people kept good hours and breathed good air – and the bar-parlour of the Spread Eagle resumed its Sabbatic quiet. Only one should-be sleeper lay awake that night, and that was the village pastor’s son. He was to go on probation to Sloville. There was no minister there, and the people wanted one. Was he to succeed? Did he sufficiently realize the import of his message? Had he so mastered the truth that he could commend it in all its fulness and beauty to others? These were questions which gave him – as they do all in such a position – great searchings of heart. At college Wentworth had difficulties which were only to be put away, said his teachers, by Christian work. They, good people, had had doubts themselves, but they had lived them down, and so they went to their daily task quite satisfied, and they reaped the benefit of acquiescence as they became more and more celebrated for wisdom and piety, and as more and more they lost the meaning of Scriptural language in conventional and orthodox formula. Subscription to the Thirty-nine Articles was not imposed on the young divine; but he was expected, nevertheless, to adopt a certain creed, and repeat it. Students at his college were not expected to study truth, but only as it appeared in a human, rather than a Divine, form. Any attempt at independent inquiry was rejected as heresy of the most odious kind. Happy were they who never had their minds darkened by doubt, who, according to their own ideas, were taught of the Spirit; who found every difficulty solved by prayer: to whom Deity revealed Himself, as He did to the Jews of old, as a pillar of cloud by day and of fire by night; who felt that their God was a jealous God, consuming with eternal fire the reprobate; who believed that God was angry with them if they took a walk in the fields on a Sunday, or kept studying secular affairs one moment after twelve (Greenwich time) on a Saturday night. To this class Wentworth did not belong. He was wont to regard the Creator of the world as a Father in heaven – as a God of love – who had filled all this wide earth with beauty for man to grasp and enjoy. Pious people said he lacked unction. But he was anxious for action, as all young men are, for real life and real work, and desirous ‘to settle,’ as the phrase is. His father was poor, and could not afford to keep him at home. He had finished his college career – with acceptance. No one had a word to say against him, and none doubted his ability. At Sloville the people were supposed to be profoundly orthodox. It was hard indeed to send such a young man there, yet it was agreed that Wentworth should go there on probation.

CHAPTER VI.
AT SLOVILLE AGAIN

It was with rather a heavy heart young Wentworth found himself in the ancient town of Sloville, amongst some hard and elderly deacons, who had little sympathy with him or his ways. Everything in the Dissenting creed was dull and dreary. At that time there were no athletic sports – no outlet for that vigorous animal life which is common alike to saints and sinners, to the young preacher as well as to the young layman. Now, when even curates devote themselves to lawn tennis, a freer life is tolerated, and we do not find fault with even an ordained parson who can run, or play cricket, or display animal as well as intellectual or moral vigour. At the time this history refers to, this was not the case, and much did the Church suffer and the world gain in consequence. Young people must have amusements. It is unnatural to ask them to give them up. Amusements are not only lawful but necessary. But at Sloville this was denied, and our young minister was always in hot water. It is true that he did not dance – that was an outrage on the feelings of the Church too awful to contemplate – but it was known that he enjoyed a game of chess. It was whispered that he had confessed to a knowledge of whist, and had been heard to own to a little time wasted on billiards. If he had said bagatelle, people would not have so much minded. The senior deacon had a bagatelle-board himself in his own house; not that he played, he was far too serious for that, but his young people required amusement, and he was forced to give way. But billiards! – that was quite another matter. That was a game played by wicked men in public-houses and at London clubs. Men had been ruined at it, families had been beggared by it; even suicides had been the result. No, that was not a game on which you could pray for a blessing. Yet Mr. Wentworth had been heard to say that he knew something even of that atrocious game. They were very bilious, and therefore very pious, these good deacons. We have improved a little since then, but types of them are still to be found scattered all over the land.

Under this strict regime, as was to be expected, there was not a little restlessness at Bethesda, as the chapel was called. The young preacher was popular, but not, alas! with the soberer and elder portion of the congregation. The deacons were sorely puzzled how to act; some questioned whether the young student had the root of the matter in him, and many were their meetings. Let us go amongst them, as they are at tea, and in the house of one of them, the leading tradesman of the town, a dear old deacon, who from the time he had known the Lord, as he termed it, had never known a doubt, and to whom no sermon was tolerable that did not begin with ruin and end with regeneration and redemption. The house in which he resided was one of the most respectable in the High Street. It was entered by the side door, and not through the shop – that was of itself a sign of gentility. On the present occasion, all the company have come in by the private door, and, dressed in black, you might have taken them for a gathering of the brethren, so thoroughly clerical was their look and demeanour. Of course, they were all professors, as they were called, not of music or mathematics, but of religion. The head of the party, in whose parlour they were seated, and of whose hospitality they were partaking, was the senior deacon of the Independent Chapel. His parents were very poor, but they had sent him to school, and were specially careful that he should be a Sunday scholar. In a little while he became a Sunday-school teacher, and that was a feather in his cap, and helped him to pray and make speeches in public. One of the friends thus gained was a small shopkeeper, who in consequence took Ned Robins, as he was called, into his employ. The lad was steady, of a cold temperament, very selfish, and ambitious to rise in the world. He had no wish nor temptation to be otherwise. He was always at his post, never went to the public-house, never wanted to go to a race, or a fair, or a rowing match, never wished for a holiday, and, consequently, never took one. He had married his master’s daughter; he had courted her on a Sunday when they went to chapel together – that is, they sat in the same pew and sang out of the same hymn-book – and as everyone said they ought to make a match of it, they did so accordingly. By that match he became proprietor of the business, which grew as the town grew, so as to become really worth having. His boys were in the business; his daughters, with the exception of one of them, rather prettier than the rest, were all members of the church, and had married other tradesmen in the town. A good tea did he give his friends, in the best parlour, with the very best tea-things. Truly, he had much to be thankful for. He had never dishonoured a bill, and his good name was unquestioned. If he occasionally sold adulterated articles, that was the fault of the manufacturer, not his. His favourite verse was,

 
‘Not more than others I deserve,
Yet God has given me more.’
 

– apparently quite unaware that, in saying so, he cast a slur upon his Maker.

In the parlour itself there was every sign of comfort, in the way of easy-chairs, and sofas, and good mahogany. Over the fireplace was a good-sized looking-glass. Opposite to it was a bookcase, inside the glass shutters of which was a set of Evangelical Magazines, well bound, a Matthew Henry’s Commentary, an illustrated ‘Pilgrim’s Progress,’ and a large folio copy of Fleetwood’s ‘Life of Christ.’ For the young people there were Cowper’s Poems, those of Jane Taylor, and Milton’s ‘Paradise Lost.’ Perhaps the best-thumbed volume in the collection was the ‘Cookery Book,’ for neither the master nor his wife approved of starving the tabernacle or mortifying the flesh when their pleasure lay in an opposite direction. In the way of ornament the room boasted of portraits of a murdered missionary and a leading London divine, who had been popular in his denomination in his day, and oil-paintings of the master of the house and his missus, by no means flattering to either. The windows were lined with heavy curtains that kept out the cold. The fire burnt brightly on the hearth. The seductive tea-urn sent its rich aroma all round. Plum-cake and hot buttered toast, to say nothing of muffins, were plentiful, while a real Yorkshire ham tempted one to cut and come again.

The deacon and his wife loved to be happy in their way, and it was with pardonable pride they sat down to the feast, and gathered around them their chapel friends. They fell bravely to work, as soon as the compliment had been passed of asking the eldest of the visitors to say grace. The one selected was a chemist, the other who returned thanks was a farmer, who, if goodness was tested by a tendency to sleep all sermon-time, was a saint indeed. His drowsiness, he admitted, was an infirmity, but it was one against which he seemed to make no effort. He was wide-awake enough when he had a horse to buy or a bullock to sell. After the guests had satisfied the wants of their inner man, and discussed the state of the weather, and the corn-market and the crops, they began discoursing. Let us listen to them.

‘Well,’ said Jones, the farmer, ‘I don’t think that young man who preached on Sunday was the sort of man we want for Bethesda. It was all very fine, and, if I had not been a Christian, I should have enjoyed it myself.’

‘Mere morality,’ said Stephens, the chemist and druggist, ‘not a word for the poor sinner.’

‘Yet the chapel was crammed full at night, and I hear we shall have a larger congregation next Sunday.’

‘And a deal of good that will do us. Larnin’ and eloquence will never save a soul. If the root of the matter an’t there, what’s the use of them? We don’t want a lot of giddy creatures coming along and crowdin’ up the place. I’ll be bound to say that young man is a Neologist.’

‘A what?’ all asked with horror.

‘A Neologist; and if you want to know what that is, read the British Beacon. Lor’ bless you! the editor makes fine work of the Neologists.’

‘Well, of course we don’t want a Neologist down here.’

‘I never heard such a sermon. Nothing about being born in sin and shapen in iniquity. Not a word about hell; not a word of the saints being preordained for glory. He had the impudence to tell me, to my own face, that “a God of love would never consign sinners to an everlasting torment.” I’d quite an argument with him. I called him all the names I could think of. I really don’t think I can bring myself to go and hear him again. If you have him, I’m off to the Baptists.’

‘Well, look ’ee, you must not leave us, at any rate. How the people would talk if you were to give up Bethesda and join the Baptists!’

‘We want the elect to be preached to,’ said the chemist, ‘not the world. Now, this young man has no idea of that. It’s all labour in vain preaching to the world. The Lord knows them that are His. They are the flock, and we want a shepherd for them. What are the men of the world but a generation of vipers?’

‘Well,’ said the other deacon, ‘it seems to me that he has no idea of saying a word in season. For instance, as you know, last week old Brown, the milkman, died very suddenly. I said to him, “Mr. Wentworth, you might improve the occasion. You might preach about the shortness of life.” “How old was old Brown?” says he. “Eighty-five,” says I, and then he laughed.’

‘Laughed?’ repeated all the party.

‘Yes; and said he had “better wait for some better opportunity to talk of the shortness of life.” He said old Brown had had “rather a long innings.”’

A shudder ran round the room.

‘Just what I expected myself. Last week old Mrs. Grey broke her leg. She would not go to our new surgeon, because he ain’t a professor. “Quite right,” said I to her. “How can you expect the blessing?” Our new minister replied that “the woman was silly”; that “she should have gone to a clever, rather than to a godly, doctor”; that “it was merely a question of professional skill,” and that “religion had nothing to do with it.” Says I, “We think too much of mere human talent.” Said he, “he did not think we did. It was so rare that when we found it we ought to encourage it,” said he. I said to him, “Our old minister never preached in that way;” and he said he was “sorry to hear it.”’

Again all groaned.

‘Just what I expected,’ observed the chemist and druggist. ‘The other morning, as I called, he was reading Shakespeare. “Not much there for the immortal soul,” says I. “Upon my word,” says he, “I don’t agree with you there at all. I hold Shakespeare to be next to the Bible.” I said as how I had never read a line of Shakespeare, or any other play-acting, fellow. Said he, he was “sorry to hear it.” I had “missed a great treat. There was no one like Shakespeare to display the workings of the human heart.”’

‘And what did you say to that?’

‘Why, that my Bible told me that the heart was “deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked,” and that was enough for me.’

‘Ah, you had him there,’ said the others.

‘Yes, I think I had,’ replied the chemist, with a grim smile of satisfaction.

It is told of the Aristotelians, when Galileo offered to show them that the world moved round the sun, that they refused even to use his telescope, as they would not see what they could not find in Aristotle. These poor men would have done the same. Science offered them a telescope, but they preferred darkness, like the old bigoted Roman Catholics who persecuted Galileo.

‘You know my boy Tom,’ continued Mr. Robins. ‘He thinks he knows a lot more than his father, because I sent him to the grammar-school. He always is telling me he don’t see this, and he don’t see that. Now, according to my way of thinking, he has no right to talk so. It’s really sinful. He has got to believe. The Bible says, “Whoso believeth shall be saved.” I says to the lad, “If I had talked in that wicked way to my father, he would soon have beaten it all out of me, and I had a great mind to do the same with him.” I said as much to the minister. He begged I would “do nothing of the kind. The lad could not help his doubts.” He believed he was “sincere. Thomas was one of the Apostles, and had not he his doubts? Doubts,” said he, “often lead to faith.” Did you ever hear such a doctrine? I saw the Lord in a minute when I was converted, and I’ve never had a doubt since, blessed be His Holy Name!’

‘You’re right, brother,’ said the senior deacon. ‘It is the devil who makes us doubt, and it is only by prayer you can defy him. You know —

 
‘“Satan trembles when he sees
The weakest saint upon his knees.”
 

All that we have got to do is to believe what is in the Bible, and I do every blessed word of it, from the first chapter of Genesis to the last Book of Revelation. Don’t talk to me of carnal reason sitting in judgment on the Word of God. It makes me sick to hear such talk. It is downright wickedness. Human larnin’ will never save the soul. Scripture is plain, so that the wayfaring man, though a fool, may not err therein. The sooner we get an old experienced divine to come and preach to us the better. We shall have all the gay and giddy people at meetin’ if this young fellow preaches here much longer’ – a sentiment which met with the hearty approval of all present. He continued: ‘It was only last night I asked him to come to supper, and he declined, “because,” he said, he had “promised to sup with” that new lawyer, who has come to our town, and who, I believe, never goes anywhere of a Sunday. “That ain’t right,” says I. “Why not?” says he. “Because,” says I, “the Church has nothing to do with the world. We are to be separate from sinners.” He said he did “not take that view of the case.” I said he “ought to,” and left him.’

The deacons were rather hard on the young parson, assuredly, and yet they were very good Christians in their way – ready to pay for an improvement in the chapel, for books for the Sunday-school, or to subscribe money to circulate the Bible or to send forth the missionary. What they lacked was the rarest of Christian virtues – charity; that charity which ‘suffereth long, and is kind; which envieth not; which vaunteth not itself; which is not puffed up; which beareth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things.’ As our young friend set people thinking, refused to repeat old sentences and phrases like a parrot, and avoided religious clap-trap, he was regarded by the deacons with alarm and suspicion.

Just then the shop-bell rang, and the senior deacon left the company of his brother deacons to look after business. In a few minutes he returned, looking a little annoyed.

‘What’s the matter, brother?’ said they all.

‘Who do you think,’ said he, ‘was in the shop just now?’

‘We can’t guess. Pray tell us. The new parson?’

‘Oh no! Rose Wilcox – that poor silly girl the young men here make a fuss about.’

‘What, the girl that used to teach in the Sunday-school, and would have upset us all, had she not taken herself off? A girl who’ll come to no good end,’ said the chemist and druggist, shaking his head.

Perhaps the deacon is right. It is a terrible world, this of ours, for a girl in lowly life who has more than her fair share of feminine beauty. A thousand dangers lurk on every side of her – from the enmity of woman, from the selfish cruelty of man. It is rarely that she does come to a good end.

‘What do you think she said?’ continued the senior deacon. ‘Why, that she came to hear Mr. Wentworth, and that she hopes we are going to have him for the new parson.’

Poor Rose had unwittingly filled up the measure of the new preacher’s guilt. She was the prettiest girl in the town, and, consequently, was supposed to be far, very far from the kingdom. If Mr. Wentworth had preached so as to gain the attention and excite the admiration of a young giddy girl like that, he was not the man for Bethesda; and it must be owned, I frankly admit, that he was not. He lacked what the deacons called unction in the pulpit.

To be popular, to be attractive, to retain a hold on the light and careless and the worldly, was the surest way to alarm the deacons, who guarded jealously the sanctity of the pulpit – a sanctity which had repelled from the chapel the very people whom, now-a-days, the religious world wish to get there. They were not of the world. That was their boast and privilege. They were a chosen people – a peculiar generation.

Outside were the wicked, for whom there was no mercy – nothing but a fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation of the wrath of God. They looked for empty benches in chapel, for it was only the few that could be saved. If a young person wanted to join the church, the deacons were alarmed and surprised. It was almost a breach of conventional etiquette. Hence the unattractive character of their church life, the bitterness of their profession, the unloveliness of their spirit, the feebleness and failure of their efforts. It was a sin in their eyes to make religion palatable to the worldly. Rarely did the sons of these good men follow in their fathers’ steps, too many of them fell into evil courses, and those of them who did become church members were by no means the salt of the earth. Wentworth, as was to be expected, with his open, manly nature, disliked not a little the spirit of the people – their petty quarrels, their miserable ignorance, their attachment to the letter, their forgetfulness of the spirit of the Gospel.

At Bethesda, as the meeting-house was called, there had been a venerable and godly man in the pulpit for nearly fifty years. Never had the grace of Christian humility been more strikingly displayed than by him. He had ever been thankful for small mercies – for the leg of pork, the ton of coals, the load of wood, the old clothes for his children, the new hat for himself – the casual gifts of sundry of his flock who were not quite so stingy as the rest. The wear and tear of a long life had taken all the fight out of him. Even the parson of the parish held him to be a harmless man, and was sorry to note how the race of such godly men was gradually becoming extinct, as Dissent claimed not kindly patronage, not condescending toleration, but civil and religious equality. A wonderful art had that old man for making things pleasant all round. He was truly all things to all men. The young people rather looked down on him, but he did not mind that. To his deacons he was always respectful, and never did he offend in any way their wives. Indeed, they had been known to take his part when some stray guest, some pert young miss from London town, had endeavoured to make fun of his old battered hat, his rusty black clothes, his patched-up shoes, his grotesque figure, his ancient air, his monotonous delivery, his high doctrine. But the fact was, few young persons did go to meeting, and, as the old people died off, the display of empty benches and empty pews was a sorry spectacle.