Transcribed from the 1883 Hodder and Stoughton edition by David Price,
email ccx074@pglaf.org. Many thanks to the Royal Borough of Kensington
and Chelsea Libraries for allowing their copy to be consulted for this
transcription.
CONGREGATIONALISM
IN THE
COURT SUBURB.
* * * * *
BY
JOHN STOUGHTON, D.D.
_Formerly Minister of Kensington Chapel_.
* * * * *
London:
HODDER AND STOUGHTON,
27, PATERNOSTER ROW.
MDCCCLXXXIII.
* * * * *
Butler & Tanner,
The Selwood Printing Works,
Frome, and London.
* * * * *
DEDICATION.
THE FOLLOWING
HISTORICAL SKETCH,
PREPARED AT THEIR REQUEST,
Is Gratefully Inscribed
TO THE
PRESENT MINISTER AND DEACONS
OF
KENSINGTON CHAPEL.
INTRODUCTION.
AT the commencement of my History, I wish to convey some idea of what
Kensington was at the close of the last century, when the original
Nonconformist Church in that place was formed and established.
Kensington as a parish must be distinguished from Kensington as a village
or suburb. The boundaries of the parish are still unaltered, yet what it
contained ninety years ago was different, indeed, from what it contains
now. It is startling to read in Lyson’s “Environs,” published in 1795,
the following sentence:—“The parish of Kensington contains about 1,910
acres of land, about half of which is pasture meadow, about 360 acres are
arable land for corn only, about 230 in market gardens, about 260
cultivated sometimes for corn and sometimes for garden crops, and 100
acres of nursery ground.”
I often think, as I am reading history, what a contrast exists between
its background of natural scenery, and the prospect now before our eyes
on the spot to which the history refers. We should not know Kensington
if we could see it as it was when Hornton Street Chapel was being built.
Then all around was rural. Notting Hill and the whole way to
Paddington—where was the parish boundary to the north—exhibited fields
bordered by hedgerows. Holland Park, to the west, was a lordly demesne
such as you see now “down in the shires,” and the boundary of the parish
in that direction, at what used to be called Compton Bridge, was marked
by a turnpike gate not long ago removed; beyond it lay a bit of country
landscape before you reached the junction of roads at Hammersmith
Broadway. No great change had then taken place since Addison—who lived
in Kensington—wrote to the Earl of Warwick, saying, “The business of this
is to invite you to a concert of music, which I have found out in a
neighbouring wood. It begins precisely at six in the evening, and
consists of a blackbird, a thrush, a robin redbreast, and a bullfinch.
There is a lark that, by way of overture, sings famously till she is
almost out of hearing.” “The whole is concluded by a nightingale.” Such
were the warblers that broke the silence of Kensington woods when no
screech of the railway whistled in the wind, and no lumbering omnibuses
thundered along the highway. Indeed, I well remember the nightingales in
Holland Park, after the commencement of my ministry at Hornton Street.
Earl’s Court, even then, was separated from Holland Park gates by a
country lane which began at Pembroke Square. But fifty years before, now
ninety years ago, it was thereabouts all pleasant open country, dotted
with homesteads, paddocks, gardens; whilst at eventide broad green
meadows saw “the lowing herd wind slowly o’er the lea.” Brompton,
included within the parish, extended to the borders of Chelsea, famous
for cosy retreats occupied by merchants and literary men. Turning from
south to east, there opened, under the shadow of the palace, those
gardens which had become famous and much admired in Queen Anne’s time;
and after Hornton Street chapel was built, a minute of the Board of Green
Cloth recorded that an annual pension of £18 was to be paid to a widow,
named Gray, “in consideration of the loss of her husband, who was
accidentally shot while the keepers were hunting foxes in Kensington
Gardens.” {9a}
Lyson tells us that in 1795 there had been new buildings erected,
principally in and near the hamlet of Brompton. “The present number of
houses,” he says, “is about 1,240, of which about 1,150 are inhabited,
the remainder are for the most part unfinished.” {9b}
So much for the parish. Now look at the Court suburb; so small in
comparison with the parish, that it may be compared to a shrivelled
kernel in a nutshell. There, in the centre, stood the old Parish Church,
pronounced by Bishop Blomfield the ugliest in the country; and in Church
Street, higher up, the Vicarage was encompassed by a goodly garden and
small park, now covered by rows of houses. Quaint-looking tenements
bordered Church Street a little way. Campden House and grounds retained
a palatial appearance. A row of brick dwellings, taking us back to the
days of the first Georges, still line Holland Street, and were then in
their prime. Hornton Street looked out, in spring, upon blooming
orchards. The road between Kensington Palace Gate and Holland House was,
as it still is, the main thoroughfare; and I conclude that Phillimore
Place, called by the Prince Regent “Dish-clout Row,” from its tasteless
slabs in front, was then in pristine pride. Kensington Square, though
shorn of the glories it possessed under the first two Georges—when it
boasted of forty coaches, and of lords and ladies occupying the buildings
round it—still presented much quiet respectability; and old inhabitants,
as they passed by the palace gates, could tell of having heard from their
fathers and mothers how one morning there issued thence “Horse Guards
with their trumpets, and a company of heralds with their tabards, to
proclaim, after Queen Anne’s death, George, by the grace of God, of Great
Britain, France, and Ireland, King, Defender of the Faith.”
All round, the Court suburb was separated from neighbouring hamlets by a
belt of orchards, gardens, and nursery grounds; and the road between
Kensington Gardens and Knightsbridge remained notorious for its
loneliness and perils. Opposite Hyde Park were a few aristocratic
mansions, with spacious lawns, shrubberies, and gardens bounded by lofty
walls; but the road was often in very bad repair. In the middle of the
century, Lord Hervey told his mother it was impassable, and that in
Kensington he lived “in the same solitude as he should do if cast on a
rock in the middle of the ocean.” {11} Matters might have mended
somewhat at the time the chapel was built, but a good old pew-opener, Mr.
Mundy, told me how he remembered that people at Knightsbridge, bound for
Kensington after dark, would wait till they made a number large enough to
defend themselves against the footpads who infested the thoroughfare.
The old half-way house and the turnpike gate, symbolical of ancient days,
lingered so late as the middle of my own ministry.
Along that road, and through Kensington suburbs, George III. used to
drive down to Windsor in a lumbering coach with outriders and an escort.
There sat on the box, in grand livery, “a body coachman,” as he was
called. His name was Saunders. To speak of that good man may seem to be
travelling out of my record, but it will be seen that he played an
important part in Kensington Church history. He was a favourite with His
Majesty, and used to put tracts in the pocket of the coach for his master
to read on the way to the Royal Borough. The latter liked them so well,
that he encouraged the servant to keep the pocket furnished with such
publications; and we can fancy the Queen’s grandfather, in his cocked hat
and neat wig, poring over the pages provided for his entertainment and
benefit. The coachman was a Nonconformist, and when he was staying at
Windsor gathered a few people together in a house which bore the
unattractive name of “Hole in the Wall,” where they held a religious
service, and formed the nucleus of the Independent Church of which I was
pastor for eleven years, part of it as colleague with the venerable
Alexander Redford. It is a curious coincidence that this worthy coachman
may be accounted founder of the two Churches in which I have laboured the
whole of my pastoral life.
He lived part of his time at Kensington, and wished to see a
Nonconformist congregation there. He met with a few people in “a very
humble dwelling,” {12} for religious worship, and out of that grew the
Dissenting Church in Hornton Street.
Kensington Parish Church, between 1762 and 1770, was favoured with the
ministry of the celebrated Dr. Jortin, an author and preacher of
extraordinary reputation; and he was succeeded by Dr. Waller, of whom I
know nothing except that he was killed by the fall of a chimney during a
great hurricane in November, 1795. Then came the Rev. Richard Omerod.
“There was no man, perhaps, who more eminently possessed the faculty of
conciliating all ranks and orders in a large and populous parish than Mr.
Omerod. Nor was this effected by courtly demeanour or by flattering
profession, but by that honest and amiable simplicity of life and heart,
which both dignify and recommend the Christian minister. To a native
purity of mind and unaffected sanctity of life, he added a calm, gentle,
and unobtrusive manner, which never failed at once to disarm hostility
and to command respect. In his discharge of the complicated duties of a
parish priest he was eminent and exemplary. By the higher orders he was
respected and admired, and by the lower orders he was venerated and
loved; and possessing alike the confidence of both, he was the channel of
communicating the bounty of the one to relieve the necessities of the
other.” {13a} He was vicar from 1795 to 1816.
Dr. Waller was incumbent when the body coachman held his meetings at
Kensington, and Mr. Omerod succeeded Dr. Waller soon after Hornton Street
Chapel was built.
I wish we knew more of that coachman, who deserves to be held in honour
by the congregation of the present day; since it appears that he not only
brought together a nucleus for the Church, but contributed out of his
limited means ten pounds for the erection of a chapel. {13b}
The earliest document preserved relative to the building I may here
insert, as it indicates the different elements of Nonconformity blended
in the enterprise. Some of the originators, most it would seem, were
Presbyterians, but united with them were Independents and others.
_To the friends of Religious Liberty_, _Sincere Christianity_, _and
of Benevolent dispositions_, _etc._:
We, the undersigned,—of whom some have been educated in the
principles of the Established Church of Scotland, and others in that
class of Dissenters in England whose principles, opinions, and faith
is the most generally consonant to, and founded on, the Word of God
as revealed in the Scriptures of the Old and New Testament, and on
the essential doctrines of Christianity as professed by both the
National Churches of England and Scotland;—being, therefore,
Dissenters from the established mode of worship in this country, and
being situated at a great distance from any place of worship
agreeable to the dictates of our consciences, we, from pure motives
of religion and piety alone, for conveniency to ourselves and
families, and to others who may be like-minded with us in matters of
religion, do propose, under the favour and blessing of a Divine
Providence, to erect and build a (temple) for the worship of Almighty
God in the parish of Kensington and county of Middlesex.
We profess our religious opinions to be, according to the rites, form
of worship, as well as of the doctrines and discipline agreed upon in
the Confession of Faith, by the Assembly of Divines at Westminster
(so far as the circumstances of our situation will admit of); we wish
to follow their soundness of faith, purity, and simplicity of
worship, as far as we judge them founded on the Word of God,
agreeable to the standard of faith contained in the Holy Scriptures,
the alone unerring guide of faith and manners.
We therefore invite the serious Christian, the friends and lovers of
Gospel truth, to join with us in this good undertaking to promote the
glory of God, the interests of true religion, and the eternal
happiness of ourselves and fellow-Christians; having nothing in view
but to forward the attainment of these great objects, we leave the
briers, and thorny fields of disputation, and false philosophy, of
factions, politics, and jarring interests of ambitious men, “that we
may lead quiet and peaceable lives in all godliness and honesty,” as
commanded. 1 Timothy ii. 1, 2.
Connected with this document is another, shorter and more general,
stating “that a suitable piece of ground, on a long lease,” had been
secured, on which was to be erected a building, “estimated at upwards of
£900,” which had been already begun, and was then “carrying on.” The
object of this paper was to secure contributions. The builders’ estimate
amounted to £927 15_s._ 6_d._ The structure was at once duly registered,
“pursuant to the Act of Toleration in that case made and provided.” A
recommendation of the case is preserved, signed by several ministers,
chiefly Presbyterians, stating that friends at Kensington, for themselves
and neighbours—as there “was no proper regular place of worship for those
who could not conform with the Established Church—had determined to unite
their efforts towards supplying this defect.”
The dimensions of the edifice were sixty feet by forty inside; but the
ground in length extended to one hundred and nine feet.
I. THE FIRST PASTORATE.
_THE REV. JOHN LAKE_.
NO account is given of the chapel opening; but in October, 1794, an
invitation appears, in the name of “the trustees and subscribers,”
addressed to the Rev. John Lake, M.A., {17} requesting him to take “the
pastoral charge of the congregation,” to which, in the following month,
an answer was returned accepting the charge, and expressing a hope that
the people would receive the Word preached with meekness and affection,
with freedom from prejudice, and with the simplicity of little children.
“Carefully guard,” he says, “against whatever may engender strife and
division. Endeavour to keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of
peace. Live in peace, and may the God of love and peace be with you.”
Mr. Lake, it is believed, was a Presbyterian clergyman, and on the 1st of
March he preached two discourses suitable to the occasion, which was to
unite “several constant and serious hearers at the new chapel” in “church
communion,” that they might enjoy “religious ordinances.” The tone of
the whole letter is devout and beautiful, and gives a favourable
impression of the writer’s character.
“On Sunday, March 8th, a special meeting was held at the chapel in the
afternoon, of as many as were desirous of joining as members and
communicants at the Lord’s Table, when Mr. Lake attended and entered into
religious conversation with those present, to whom he also delivered a
suitable exhortation. The service was begun and concluded with prayer,
singing, etc.”
“March 30th. The Rev. Mr. Lake, who had accepted the pastoral office
some months ago, removed with his family to Kensington.”
“On Thursday, April 9th (notice having been given from the pulpit the
preceding Lord’s Day), Mr. Lake was set apart and admitted to the
pastoral office in this Church, in the following manner: The Rev. Mr.
Moore began with prayer and reading some suitable portions of Scripture;
then singing; Dr. Hunter prayed; singing; the Rev. Mr. Smith preached a
suitable and excellent sermon from Ezekiel iii. 17–21; then singing,
after which Mr. Rutledge concluded with prayer and benediction. Several
other ministers, besides those who engaged, were present. The reverend
ministers and some of the principal heads of families afterwards dined
together. The service at chapel was conducted to the general
satisfaction of all present.”
“On Friday, April 10th, in the evening, a sermon, preparatory to the
administration of the Lord’s Supper, was preached by the Rev. Mr. Love,
from Exodus iii. 5. A meeting was afterwards held to consult about the
choice of elders, when, after some deliberation, it was thought proper to
postpone the choice to a future opportunity.”
“On Sunday, April 12th, the members enjoyed the long wished for
opportunity of joining as a Christian Church at the table of the Lord.
The Lord’s Supper was dispensed in the chapel for the first time by the
Rev. Mr. Lake, in the following manner: After preaching a suitable
discourse from 1 Corinthians xi. 26, and giving out a Psalm, he came from
the pulpit to the communion table, where a linen cloth and the elements
had been previously laid, the great pew, as well as three or four of the
adjoining pews, were filled with communicants. After rehearsing the
words of institution, with some useful remarks, Mr. Lake prayed what has
been called the consecration prayer; then, with further address to the
communicants, he distributed the elements of bread and wine. After
which, during the singing of a hymn, he returned to the pulpit, gave an
exhortation to those who had received, and concluded the whole with
prayer, benediction, and a collection, as is usual on such occasions.”
The record of that first communion is very interesting. I have seen the
solemnization of the Holy Supper after different methods: at Rome, before
the high altar of St. Peter’s, amidst lights, flowers, and incense, with
attendant cardinals, and all the pomp and splendour of a Roman court, and
have there witnessed theatrical effects; in England, within the choir of
a Protestant cathedral, I have beheld a bishop and his clergy
administering the eucharist to kneeling worshippers, and have recognised
in the scene much picturesque beauty. But I must say, that while reading
the entry in the Kensington Church book, illuminated by my own memories
of its communion Sundays during more than thirty years, I have before me
a mode of administration, not only different from those just indicated,
but in simplicity approaching, in my estimation, as near as possible to
the Passover feast in the upper room at Jerusalem. It adds greatly to
the interest of this unpretending record, to recall to mind contemporary
events. The Church was formed, the minister was ordained, and the Lord’s
Supper was administered just at the period of “the Reign of Terror” in
Paris and throughout France; and, I may add, a different reign of terror
in London and Great Britain. The revolution storm had been breaking in
wild fury over our continental neighbours. Blood had been poured out
like water by a ferocious tribunal of madmen calling themselves patriots.
In two months, out of seven thousand political prisoners, five hundred
and twenty-seven had perished under the guillotine. Neither sex nor age,
neither rank nor obscurity, neither wealth nor indigence had shielded the
most innocent from vengeance. Exiles had swarmed over to England, and
were hiding their poverty and shame in the country village, the English
capital, and the Court suburb. Tales of change after change had reached
our shores, and filled thousands of hearts with terror. English rulers
of that day, terrified by what they heard, may be really said to have
lost their heads, for they adopted such tyrannical measures for
repressing sedition and treason, that Charles James Fox said in reference
to the trials of Muir and Palmer in Scotland, that if the law enforced
there should be brought into England, it would be high time for “him and
his friends to settle their affairs and retire to some happier clime.”
It was just afterwards, and whilst order on the one side and freedom on
the other were in jeopardy, that the humble fathers and founders of the
Church at Kensington met to choose a pastor and to celebrate the Lord’s
Supper in their new fellowship. “God,” says the forty-sixth Psalm, “is
our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. Therefore will
not we fear, though the earth be removed, and though the mountains be
carried into the midst of the sea; though the waters thereof roar and be
troubled, though the mountains shake with the swelling thereof. _There
is a river_, _the streams whereof shall make glad the city of God_.” As
political storms roared around, the Kensington company enjoyed that
Divine consolation.
The names of the first communicants are preserved, and in the course of
the year 1795 eight others were added. In 1796 nine more, in 1797 five,
and in 1798 three. One of the earliest members was a Mrs. Schmae whose
husband was living when I went to reside in Kensington. He was a pious
old man, full of faith, hope, and love; and when I visited him on his
death bed, he told me he had been many years member of Dr. Steinkopf’s
Lutheran Church in the Savoy, and showed me a German Bible he valued,
which was given to me by the family after his death.
The principal persons in the management of affairs at the earliest period
were Messrs. Forsyth, Broadwood, and Grey, all Scotch Presbyterians. Mr.
Broadwood was the famous pianoforte maker. Mr. Grey was a proprietor of
the “Brompton Park Nursery,” spoken of as famous for plants of all sorts,
“which supply most of the nobility and gentry and gentlemen in England.”
John Evelyn visited the nursery in 1694, with Mr. Waller, who “was in
admiration at the store of plants, and how well the nursery was
cultivated.”
Amongst early secular incidents connected with the chapel, was an attempt
made on the part of the parish to include the building in the poor-rate
assessment. This was in 1795. But the trustees resisted the imposition;
and on the case being considered by the magistrates at Hicks Hall, they
decided that the place being supported by voluntary contributions, could
not be justly liable to the parish rate. Similar attempts were made
afterwards, with a similar result.
In 1798 the general monthly prayer meeting of the London Missionary
Society was held at Hornton Street, and the Rev. Dr. Haweis, it is stated
in the Church book, preached from the text, “Awake, awake, put on
strength, O arm of the Lord.” {23a} The entry deserves special remark.
Dr. Haweis was rector of Aldwinkle, in Northamptonshire, and an intimate
friend of the Countess of Huntingdon. At that period a few Evangelical
clergymen were accustomed to preach in Nonconformist pulpits. The famous
John Berridge, rector of Everton, was of the number; and Fletcher of
Madeley frequently ministered the word of life to Methodist
congregations. Dr. Haweis delivered the first annual sermon on behalf of
the London Missionary Society in Spafields chapel; and on previous
occasions preached in places of worship belonging to the Countess’s
connection. Whether it was owing to that circumstance, I do not know,
but as early as 1767 an unpleasantness arose, which raised a question as
to whether he ought to retain his rectory; and the Rev. Martin Madan, of
the Lock Hospital—who, by the way, is buried at Kensington—advised him to
retain it, a piece of advice which, we are told, subjected Mr. Madan “to
much obloquy.” {23b} Preaching by clergymen in dissenting chapels was
deemed an irregularity, but some bishops winked at it. Whether or not
the practice be legal became a topic of inquiry a few years ago, and
counsel’s opinion was taken on the subject. My friend Dr. Stanley at
that period expressed a wish to occupy Kensington pulpit before I
resigned the pastorate, and an arrangement for the purpose was deferred
in consequence of a controversy on the general subject, which arose at
the time. Counsel’s opinion proved unfavourable, and the matter dropped.
But I may mention that the Rev. Samuel Minton, whilst still a Church of
England incumbent, preached for me one Sunday evening not long before
counsel gave the opinion to which reference has been made.
It is interesting to remember that Dr. Haweis was a warm friend to the
London Missionary Society, and that after having offered four hundred
pounds for sending the Gospel to Tahiti, he said: “For many years I have
planned, prayed, and sought for an opening for a mission among the
heathen. My dear Lady Huntingdon has concurred with me in attempting
it.” {24a} And again: “My former experience has convinced me that only
by a general union of all denominations could a broad basis be laid for a
mission.” {24b}
That at so early a period of this history such a service should be held
was an augury for good. It showed that the insignificant band of
Christians worshipping in Hornton Street cherished sympathies so large
that they swept over the world, and offered prayers that the proclamation
of the Gospel might reach the ends of the earth. From the beginning the
Kensington Church associated itself with the history of missionary trials
and missionary success. Disaster at the antipodes sent a thrill of pain,
and success there created a pulsation of joy amongst the obscure
worshippers. Hearts mourned over the capture of the _Duff_, and in after
years over the massacre of Tongataboo, the imprisonment and death of
Smith in Demerara, the murder of John Williams on the beach of Eromanga,
and the persecutions of early converts by the Queen of Madagascar. From
time to time the countenances of worshippers have brightened on the
arrival of good tidings from the South Seas, from India, from China, from
Caffreland, from the West Indies. And I mention this because I believe
that much of the prosperity enjoyed by Kensington Congregationalists is
owing to their early and ever since continued co-operation in missionary
work. The keynote of their zeal and joy was struck at that meeting which
it is so gratifying to remember.
Mr. Lake’s ministry at Kensington ceased in 1800 or 1801; and the only
notice I have found of his subsequent history, is that he at length
quitted “the Dissenting interest for a curacy in the Established Church,
where he sustained a respectable and useful character to the day of his
death.” {25}
II. THE SECOND PASTORATE.
_THE REV. JOHN CLAYTON_.
1801–1804.
“THE congregation of Hornton Street Chapel, Kensington, being deprived of
the ministerial labours of the Rev. John Lake, by his resignation, and
remaining destitute of a stated overseer in the Lord till the month of
May, 1801, united in a call soliciting Mr. John Clayton, assistant to the
Rev. John Winter, of Newbury, Berks, to undertake the office of their
pastor.” {28} The invitation was in the name of “the trustees, church,
and subscribers,” and received about one hundred signatures. Mr.
Clayton’s reply is not given, but the records state that he paid a visit
and preached two Sabbaths in the month of June; and on the second Sabbath
of August, 1801, he entered upon his stated labours.
Mr. Clayton was educated partly at Homerton College, partly at Edinburgh
University; and after the completion of his preparatory studies he spent
a short time at Newbury, as assistant to the Rev. John Winter. He had
only just come of age when he was invited to the Kensington pastorate.
Having won for himself a good report from the people of the Berkshire
town, as one who had done his work “with the ability of a theologist and
the faithfulness of a minister of Christ,” he was praised by the senior
pastor, who wrote to the young man’s father, saying, “I see that he has
now a call to depart with a prospect of usefulness by preaching the
Gospel in another place. I therefore readily commend him to the Lord,
and the word of His grace, and shall rejoice to hear that all our hopes
are realized among the people of Kensington.”
Mr. Clayton was ordained in Hornton Street Chapel the twenty-first of
October, 1801. The Rev. W. Humphreys, of Hammersmith, delivered the
introductory discourse, and the charge to the minister was given by his
father, the Rev. John Clayton, pastor of the Church assembling in the
ancient Weigh House, not far from the London Monument. This gentleman,
dignified and courtly, had come under the influence of Lady Huntingdon,
and to the time of his death remained attached to the doctrines dear to
the countess. His dissent was of a moderate type, and he did not share
in political views prevalent amongst his brethren; in that respect his
son resembled him. He cultivated friendships with evangelical clergymen,
especially Newton and Cecil. When I was about to enter college I
received from him counsel and encouragement; and I remember well a
discourse which he preached at Norwich fifty years ago, from the words,
“Let us go again and visit our brethren in every city where we have
preached the word of the Lord, and see how they do.” He had visited the
place forty years before, and now came, he said, to see “_how they did_,”
and to make inquiries relative to their temporal as well as their
spiritual welfare. “Have you made your wills?” asked the venerable
patriarch, with his thickly powdered head.
“The charge he delivered at Kensington to his son was a most faithful and
solemn exposition of ministerial duties, enforced with amazing vigour and
pungency of expression; indeed at times there was a trenchant
fearlessness of utterance almost amounting to invective against
timeserving, hesitating, cowardly preachers who kept back the truth or
proclaimed smooth things to gratify graceless spirits.” {29}
“I have not language [he said] of indignant severity sufficiently
strong to express the contemptible cowardice, hypocrisy, and
soul-murdering cruelty of those who adopt an indefinite phraseology
in order (such is the plenitude of their prudence and moderation)
that none may suspend their devotion, but that a heterogeneous mass
of nominal Calvinists and real Arians and Socinians may be assembled
(for united they cannot be) in one society. Frost unites sticks and
stones, moss, leaves, and weeds; the sun separates them. Into the
secret of that frosty liberality may you, my son, never enter, and to
the assembly of its advocates never be thou united.
“Your testimony is to contain nothing but the truth. Sermons should
not consist in declamation, but be calculated to convey solid
instruction. You must teach, and not trifle away time in exhibiting
fine thoughts or playing upon words. Let not your testimony be
encumbered with what is foreign. Be like Paul, who could say,
‘Therefore seeing we have this ministry, as we have obtained mercy,
we faint not; but have renounced the hidden things of dishonesty, not
walking in craftiness, nor handling the word of God deceitfully; by
manifestation of the truth commending ourselves to every man’s
conscience in the sight of God.’
“Your testimony should be borne with zeal, in the heat of which do
not lay aside Christian meekness towards opposers. At the same time,
take care that you do not grow lukewarm and indifferent under the
specious pretext of meekness. An unfaithful, accommodating pastor,
perhaps, applauds himself for carrying it fair with all sorts of
people, whereas this peaceable kind of preaching, in neither
condemning heretics and worldly-minded persons, nor being condemned
by them, is no other than a sign of his being himself in a state of
condemnation and death. That person betrays the truth who ceases
zealously to defend it, or to oppose its professed adversaries,
either from fear of giving occasion of offence, or through a false
love of peace. The shepherd should not only feed the flocks, but
also _drive away_ the grievous wolves.”
When Mr. Clayton had spent a year and a half in the seclusion of what was
then a rural hamlet, he met with an accident whilst riding on horseback,
an exercise to which he was addicted throughout life. The accident
suspended his work for a while, and during that period his brother George
helped to supply his lack of service. There was considerable resemblance
between the two brothers. Each had a commanding appearance and a
sonorous voice. Both were accustomed to express themselves in measured,
ornate sentences, the style of which was caught in a measure from their
good father, who loved his sons, and discriminated between them by saying
“John had the best stock of goods, but George had the best shop window.”
The attainments and mental abilities of the elder certainly were superior
to those of the younger; yet perhaps the younger presented what he had to
say in a manner more ingenious and with even more attractive diction than
his brother John. They became, as they grew older, types of a class at
the time large and influential, chiefly known by their intense and
popular evangelical ministrations, their exemplary discharge of pastoral
duties, their zealous support of catholic institutions for the spread of
the Gospel, their gentlemanly demeanour in society, and their large
intercourse with ministers and people of all denominations.
Let me avail myself of the following reminiscences of Mr. Clayton’s
preaching by my beloved friend, the Rev. J. C. Harrison, who attended at
the Poultry when Mr. Clayton was minister there. They will, with some
slight modification, apply to his preaching at Kensington.
“He was an admirable preacher. In the course of the year you were
sure to hear all the main doctrines of the Christian faith clearly
explained, or if not formally expounded, thrown into a fuller light
by some practical appeal of which he made them the foundation. When
he took up a book of the New Testament, like the Acts of the
Apostles, and founded on it a series of discussions, he would draw
out the spirit of the narrative with great fidelity and effect, and
would rise not unfrequently into real eloquence. He was amongst his
flock hearing the tale of their sorrows or their joys, their mental
conflicts or their bodily sufferings, and becoming thereby acquainted
with all varieties of life and experience, all kinds of spiritual
disease, all phases of Christian character: seeking meanwhile how to
meet difficulties and soothe sorrow, and correct morbid feelings, and
turn tears of sadness into smiles of joy, and thus he got together
the materials for portraitures of spiritual character drawn to the
life, and these he wrought into the texture of his Sunday sermon. It
is difficult to imagine the help which such discourses afforded to
all classes of true Christian hearers. He mixed with all sorts and
conditions of men, lawyers, doctors, merchants, tradesmen, mechanics;
and as he was a felicitous and ready converser, he not only threw out
shrewd hints and sparkling sayings for their advantage, but gained
from them a vast amount of information respecting their mode of life,
their opinions and practices, their weak points and strong points,
their gains and losses, their desperate anxieties and temptations, or
their exhilarating successes; and with these facts from life, in his
memory, he spoke in his sermons, ‘not as one that beateth the air,’
but as one who had been behind the scenes, and knew whereof he
affirmed. His strokes were not delivered at random, but went
straight to the mark. He could reprove, exhort, advise, comfort, as
if he were himself involved every day in the whirl and wear of life.
True his usual style of speech was rather Johnsonian, intermingled
with forms of expression so entirely his own that you could only call
them Claytonian; but those who knew him well, found that he talked
very much as he preached, in rhetorically shaped sentences, with a
singularly felicitous peculiarity of phrase coined in his own mind,
and occasionally with a good-humoured subsidence into some pointed
colloquialism which told all the more forcibly from its contrast with
his ordinary mode. They felt, therefore, that what he said was
thoroughly genuine, the utterance of a true man and not at all of a
quack, or as he would have said, of an empiric. But whether
experimental or practical, his sermons were richly and heartily
evangelical, full of the very spirit of the Gospel. As some of his
old-fashioned hearers used to say, ‘You could always reckon on
sixteen ounces to the pound.’”
Mr. Clayton was an exemplary pastor. After he removed to Camomile Street
and the Poultry, he visited his people in a most methodical way, dividing
London into districts, and going from house to house, week after week, to
comfort sorrowing hearts, to share in domestic joys, to guide the
perplexed, and to stimulate the lukewarm; this I know, and therefore it
may be inferred that he looked well after the few sheep in the Kensington
fields, feeding them by day, and watching over them by night. He used to
talk of the large “ring fence” round his church in the city; the ring
fence round his church in the suburb was small, and hence we may be sure
that his pastoral duties were, during his pastorate at Hornton Street,
thoroughly performed. A gentleman by birth and education, with large
sympathies easily evoked, tears and smiles coming at a moment’s bidding,
apt at telling anecdotes, full of humour if not wit, he was a companion
loved in a circle wider than his own congregation; his genial
friendliness and neighbourly visits helped no doubt to promote the cause
of Evangelical Nonconformity.
A number of minutes occur in the record of affairs, relative to matters
of a temporal kind, during Mr. Clayton’s ministry; but there are no
entries relative to the admission of members or other strictly religious
proceedings. One subject in particular excited the pastor’s solicitude,
namely, that the chapel property should be put in trust, which
accordingly was done; and in connection with this many discussions arose
touching what was needful for discharging pecuniary liabilities. It is
plain from what follows that Mr. Clayton was not satisfied with “the
mixture of temporals with spirituals,” as he called it; and on Christmas
Day, 1804, he publicly assigned reasons for relinquishing the pastoral
office. Various rumours were afloat, which he briefly contradicted as
“untrue,” and then told his friends that if they were asked “Why has Mr.
Clayton left Kensington?” they were to reply, “That it was his earnest
wish to be nearer the immediate circle of his ministerial connections and
religious friends; that his desire was to be united to a Church whose
members more fully coincided with him in sentiment on several subjects,
more especially on the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper; and particularly
that he might find a place where he might not be habitually perplexed
with secular arrangements, and where he might in some degree enjoy that
tranquillity which he deemed so necessary in the present state of his
health.” “I have the pleasure,” he added, “to inform you all, that last
year this chapel was vested in the hands of nine trustees, who are
engaged to see that no minister shall ever be settled here who does not
preach the gospel agreeably to the tenets of the Assembly’s Catechism.”
Mr. Biggs, the collector and secretary, also resigned his office, and Mr.
Walker was appointed in his room.
On the 31st of October, 1805, it was resolved, “at a meeting held in the
vestry,” that Mr. Hamilton, of Brighton, should be invited to become
pastor, and an invitation accordingly was drawn up, and signed by two
deacons and between eighty and ninety other persons.
To the invitation Mr. Hamilton sent a negative reply, addressed to “the
Church of Christ assembling for religious worship in Hornton Street,
Kensington, and the subscribers to that interest.”
Meetings afterwards occurred at intervals for the settlement of pecuniary
affairs, until the month of January, 1807, when by the direction of “the
managers, with the members and subscribers approving,” the secretary, Mr.
Walker, wrote to Mr. Leifchild, a student at Hoxton Academy, who had
occupied Kensington pulpit with great acceptance, to become minister of
the chapel. Mr. Leifchild replied that he could not leave the Academy
before the next Christmas, nor accept any call before the next midsummer.
In August of the same year a meeting was held at Mr. Broadwood’s house,
and it was resolved to secure Mr. Leifchild not less than £160 per annum,
with an addition of whatever the chapel might bring in above that sum.
On the 3rd of January, 1808, the members of the chapel resolved to invite
Mr. Leifchild to the pastorate, and in March he accepted the invitation.
III. THE THIRD PASTORATE.
_THE REV. DR. LEIFCHILD_.
1808–1824.
“BEFORE accepting the call to Kensington,” he said, as we learn from the
Memoir by his son, “while returning from a visit to that place, I heard
at the house of a friend that Rowland Hill had announced me to preach at
Surrey Chapel on the following Tuesday evening.” He went and preached,
and was surprised at the risibility of the audience, which was explained
when he heard that Mr. Hill had crept up into the gallery behind the
pulpit, and in his own comical way expressed assent to one part and
dissent from another part of the discourse. The veteran came into the
vestry and asked the young man to become his curate at Wotton-under-Edge.
The latter declined the overture, when the former replied, “That reminds
me of young men setting up in business before they have served their
apprenticeship.” {37} Just before that evening service, the minister of
Surrey Chapel had written to Mr. Wilson, Treasurer of Hoxton Academy,
saying, “I hear much of a young man of the name of Leifchild. It was
supposed that he was going to _settle_ (a bad word for a young recruiting
spiritual officer) at Kensington; but that there is a set of formal
stupid Presbyterians there, who by no means suit his taste, and that he
is consequently still waiting for the further directing hand of
Providence, to know where he is to go.” {38a} Mr. Hill was mistaken.
John Leifchild did _settle_ at Kensington, and was ordained there in
June, 1808, when Dr. Simpson, his tutor, delivered the charge. Dr.
Simpson, it may be remarked, was a man of singular spiritual power. Many
can argue, illustrate, persuade, and impress, but he could _inspire_; and
the accounts given of him in this respect by his students were
enthusiastic. “I received a charge from his lips at my ordination over
the Church at Kensington,” says his admiring pupil, “which I can never
forget. Much of the attention I afterwards met with in that official
connection I ascribe to the affectionate manner in which he addressed
me.” {38b}
The new pastor does not give a flattering account of the congregation
which formed his maiden charge. “There was a great prejudice,” he says,
“in the town against Dissenters. Many of my hearers resided at a
distance or held situations in London, and some of the managers of the
chapel, who were Scotchmen, were not very spiritual. Of the deacons,
some resided in London, and one was very old. He also was a Scotchman,
but a very good man. He had been a gardener on a nobleman’s estate, and
now lived on a small income, respected for his piety and integrity. He
was my best help, but died after a long and lingering illness.” “During
that period I never found him otherwise than pious, resigned, and
cheerful. He always had a guinea to spare for any religious object of
importance, although his income did not exceed £50 per annum. One of the
managers was worth at least £20,000, and was as niggardly as Duncan was
generous. ‘Here, Duncan,’ exclaimed this wealthy man, on the occasion of
an important collection at the chapel, ‘Here, Duncan, will you put this
in the plate for me?’ handing two half-crowns. ‘I will, sir,’ replied
Duncan, ‘_with my own guinea_.’ This was said with a good intent, but it
hardly agreed with the Master’s precept, ‘Let not thy left hand know what
thy right hand doeth.’”
Within little more than a year after the new pastor’s settlement, George
the Third’s jubilee was held,—an event which of course produced
excitement in Kensington, for whilst the royal old gentleman was popular
all over the country, beyond what the present generation is apt to
believe, he stood particularly high in the affections of the
Kensingtonians, who were familiar with his face and figure, as he dashed
along in his coach and four, attended by his body guard, through the
Court suburb. The cry of his approach, and the distant sight of the
soldiers and outriders brought people to the front, lifting their hats as
he passed by. With Dissenters he was especially popular, and the Hornton
Street congregation loved him all the more because he liked Saunders, the
coachman, and read his tracts. So in the loyal demonstrations of
October, 1809, they came prominently forward, and established on the 25th
of the month a school for “children of both sexes and of all religious
denominations.”
Soon after the jubilee had been celebrated, the Nonconformist part of
English Christendom was thrown into excitement by Lord Sidmouth’s Bill
for abridging the liberty of preaching, under pretence of rectifying an
abuse. He complained that licences to preach were sought in order to
evade parish duties and militia service, and urged that there should be
put upon grants of licence certain restrictions which Dissenters did not
approve. The deputies of the three denominations rose in determined
opposition to this intermeddling with religious liberty, and petitions
against it poured into the Houses of Parliament. The Kensington people
joined other Nonconformists in resisting the mischievous scheme, and
promised the London committee “the utmost assistance and cordial
co-operation”; they also subscribed towards defraying expenses incurred
by this “well meant and well timed” assertion of religious freedom. {40}
Amongst the families connected with the Church during Dr. Leifchild’s
pastorate, two in particular may be mentioned, noteworthy on their own
account, and whom I can describe from personal knowledge.
The Talfourds attended for some years. The mother was one of those
saintly women who when once seen can never be forgotten. She belonged to
the class of matrons immortalized by Solomon. “The heart of her husband
doth safely trust in her.” “She openeth her mouth with wisdom; and in
her tongue is the law of kindness. She looketh well to the ways of her
household, and eateth not the bread of idleness. Her children arise up,
and call her blessed; her husband also, and he praiseth her.” All this
is eminently true of Mrs. Talfourd; and there she used to sit and listen
to her pastor in one of the square green pews at Hornton Street, with her
“children about her”; one of whom, when a matron and mother, was, during
my own ministry, a comfort and a joy. The most distinguished of her
sons—others became distinguished in other ways—was Mr. Justice Talfourd,
who for some time not only adorned the judicial bench, but before doing
so made a mark on literature and politics, by authorship and eloquence.
The good old lady told me of his boyish days, of his school-life at Mill
Hill; read to me one of his letters, in which he spoke of his
school-fellows, especially “one Hamilton,” who joined a party that met
for worship privately, and was “very flowery in his prayers.” This
Hamilton was no other than the subsequently famous Nonconformist minister
of Leeds. The young barrister wrote an article on pulpit oratory, in
which he fully described the preacher to whom he listened on Sundays:—
“Mr. Leifchild is one of those who feels ‘the future in the instant.’
He has almost as intense a consciousness of the world to come as he
has of the visible objects around him. He speaks not only as
believing, but as _seeing_ that which is invisible.
“His manner of level speaking is slovenly, sometimes bordering on the
familiar; but when he is aroused he pours forth a torrent of voice
and energy, and sustains it without intermission to the end. His
whole soul seems thrown into every word. He does not stop to explain
his expressions, or give all his qualifications to his doctrines
which he might think requisite in a confession of faith, but gives
full vent to the predominant feeling, and allows no other to check
its course, which in every kind of oratory is wise. He thus
occasionally, it is true, rushes headlong against some tremendous
stumbling-block, or approaches that fine division where the pious
borders on the profane. But, on the whole, the greatest effect is
produced by this abandonment to the honest impulse of the season.”