The entire absence of criticism on the decennial tables contained in the
report of Mr. Horace Mann on the Census of Religious Worship has filled
the writer with equal surprise and concern. For a period of nearly three
years, hardly a week has passed without some injurious step on the part
of the Government, some disastrous admission on the part of a friend,
some daring rhodomontade on the part of a foe—all of which have owed
their origin more or less directly to the false and mistaken view of the
Church’s position engendered by the still more erroneous and misleading
statistics so widely disseminated by the Census report. Nor is there any
prospect that the evil will diminish—at least, until the next Census. On
the contrary, the idea that the Church has proved a failure seems to gain
strength, and the policy of friends and foes alike appears to shape
itself with special reference to that assumed fact.
The writer does not wish to obtrude upon the public his own calculations
as if they were absolutely correct; but he is satisfied that the account
he has given of the _relative_ growth of Church and Dissent during the
past half century is, if anything, an understatement so far as the former
is concerned. Had Mr. Bright’s very remarkable return fallen sooner in
his way he would probably have much modified his estimate relating to
Dissent; but, as the case was already sufficiently strong for the main
object he had in view, namely, to demonstrate the monstrous fallacy of
the official report, he did not think it worth while to alter his
calculations. His own conviction, however, is that the gross number of
additional sittings supplied by Dissent is much more accurately
represented by the table given in page 24 than by that in page 20.
The Census report on Education offers a tempting subject for remark; but
the writer has not thought it necessary to go further into the matter
than he has done in the note on page 27. For the reasons there stated,
it will appear that there are no grounds whatever for asserting that the
parents of this country neglect to provide their children with the means
of instruction any more than they neglect to provide them with food or
clothing. In every class which by any stretch of the term can be called
“respectable,” parents do supply their children with what they consider a
sufficient education; and their idea of what is sufficient is, after all,
not much lower, everything considered, than prevails amongst the middle
classes, who, in a country like this, must always fix the standard. The
result of the Census goes to show that the Legislature has adopted the
right course—that the way to obtain as large a number of attendants at
school as possible is to subsidise, not to supersede, private exertion;
and that it is even possible to fix the rate of subsidy too high; for all
experience proves that parents will not enforce regular attendance,
unless they feel that if their children stay away from school they will
not receive something for which they have paid. Whether the Government
ought to hold its hand until children of a certain class are brought to
the prison schoolmaster is quite another and a different question; for it
is clear that under any circumstances those unfortunates must be treated
in an exceptional manner. Even if we had a national system, children
belonging to “the dangerous classes” would not be admitted to the common
schools; for no respectable person, however humble, would allow his sons
or his daughters to associate with the offspring of habitual thieves or
beggars.
It is proper to add, in order to account for certain local illustrations,
which it has been thought advisable to retain, that the substance of the
following pages first appeared in a somewhat different form in the
_Nottingham Journal_.
_December_, 1856.
THE TRUTH, &c.
AMONG the many changes which the present age has witnessed, none are more
remarkable than those we have seen take place in the public mind with
regard to the Church of this country.
Thirty or forty years ago, the popular estimate of what was called the
Established Religion was as low as can well be conceived. The laity, for
the most part, regarded Churchmanship as a mere empty tradition, or at
best as a political symbol, and an excuse for lusty choruses in praise of
“a jolly full bottle.” The Clergy, unless they were grievously maligned,
had but two objects in life—the acquirement of “fat livings,” and the
enjoyment of amusements not now considered clerical. Of course, there
never was a time when there were not hundreds of exemplary persons in
holy orders; but that the prevailing impression was wholly without
foundation it would take a bold man to affirm. The worldliness of the
Clergy of the eighteenth century has even left its mark on the language.
The word “curate” literally means a “curé”—a person charged with the cure
of souls, one that has the spiritual care of a parish. Such is its
meaning in the Prayer Book, and such was its signification down to the
last “Review”; but now it has come to mean only a hireling, or an
assistant. In like manner, “Parson” was the most honourable title a
parochial clergyman could possess; and that, no doubt, continued to be
the case so late as the time of George Herbert. The beneficed Clergy
under the Hanoverian dynasty, however, so conducted themselves, that the
term is now never used, except by those who wish to speak disrespectfully
of the profession, or of some individual belonging to it.
It would be wrong, perhaps, to hold the Clergy entirely responsible for
the sad phase through which we have lately passed. That they were what
they were was “more their misfortune than their fault.” At the worst,
they were probably better than the rest of the community, and, save when
by a persecution to the death the Church is forced into a position of
direct antagonism to the world, it would be idle to expect it to be much
in advance of the age. The short reign of the Puritans so confounded
religion with cant that at the Restoration it had come to be thought a
sort of virtue to be ungodly. The Church set itself manfully to resist
the evil, and no doubt it would soon have been successful; but,
unfortunately, the Nonjuring difficulty supervened. Now, it is the
misery of a crisis of that description, that the community in which it
occurs suffers every way. The men whose labours it actually loses are
necessarily amongst the most conscientious, and, therefore, the most
valuable, of its ministers; and those who stay behind have their
usefulness impaired by the stigma which is cast upon their motives. For,
if there are two men under precisely the same obligations, and one of
them feels compelled for conscience’ sake to surrender all his worldly
prospects, people will never be persuaded that the other, who does not
follow the same example, has not sacrificed his convictions to his
material interests. We have seen many instances in our own time in which
this has occurred. Even at this moment many good Churchmen are
reproached with a love of filthy lucre because they do not follow a few
who once thought with them, but who have apostatized from the faith of
their fathers; whereas, if there be a man in the world to whom secession
under any pretext is impossible it is the consistent Anglican—the
distinguishing tenet of whose school is the spiritual equality of
bishops, and the consequent indefeasible authority of that episcopal line
which has from time immemorial been in possession of a given country. In
England, the existing Romanist succession was avowedly created by a Papal
bull in the year 1850; and it is, therefore, on the face of it, an
intrusion, and a usurpation of the rights which are inherent in the
representatives of St. Austin and St. Anselm. Yet, because a few
Anglicans have become Ultramontanists—a step which involved to them as
distinct a giving up of all their former principles as it would have been
for a Catholic to become a Socinian—the “High Church” clergy are reviled
for retaining their benefices, and declining to follow the footsteps of a
Faber and a Newman! In like manner, we may be sure that those Clergymen
who conscientiously felt that they might withdraw their allegiance from
King James, reaped a loss of influence for good, even among the partisans
of King William. Close upon the Nonjuring troubles followed the
scandalous attempt of the Hanoverian Government to undermine the faith of
the Church by means of improper episcopal appointments, its resistance by
the inferior clergy, and the consequent suppression of Convocation. The
mischief to which this most unconstitutional step has given rise can
hardly be overrated. We can scarcely conceive the confusion and
corruption which would creep into the body politic if Parliament were
forcibly silenced for a whole century; and there is no reason why the
English Church should prosper without representative institutions and
free speech any more than the English nation. Under any circumstances,
the Church, deprived of her parliament, must have greatly suffered; much
more so in the face of those vast changes which have come about in the
extent and distribution of the population. The machinery of the existing
Church Establishment was designed for a population of five or six million
souls. By 1821 the inhabitants of this country had increased to twelve
millions. A new population exceeding the old one had thus been
introduced, for which the Church as a body had no means of providing a
single additional bishop or a single new sitting. Had the increase been
evenly spread over the country the mischief would not have been so great;
but, unfortunately, the new population chose all kinds of out-of-the-way
places in which to settle. A rural parish suddenly found itself a
metropolis; and a district, once traversed only by the shepherd or the
ploughboy, became the teeming hive of manufacturing industry. In such a
state of things the parochial system—perfect as it is where the Church
has wholly subdued a country—miserably broke down. A signal failure was
in fact inevitable; for what were the solitary parish priests of
Manchester, Liverpool, Leeds, Bradford, St. Pancras, St. Marylebone,
Islington, or Lambeth, amongst so many! For all practical purposes it
may be asserted that at least half of the new population were as much
beyond the reach of the Church of England as if they had settled in the
woods of Canada or on the plains of Hindostan. Year after year the evil
went on increasing, until at last the number of Englishmen who did not
belong to the Established Church became so great that a Parliament of
Churchmen were obliged to surrender their exclusive right of legislation
and government. The prospects of the Church were at this time truly
deplorable. Its very existence as an establishment was doubtful. The
Whig Premier actually bade the bishops “set their house in order;” and
the experiment of confiscation was begun. Humanly speaking it was only
the difficulty of disposing of the plunder that saved the Church of these
realms.
The hour of danger, however, was not of long duration. A new school of
theologians arose, who boldly asserted that the Church was not a creature
of the State, to be dealt with at the pleasure or convenience of
politicians, but a Divine institution, with laws, privileges, and a
polity of its own; and that the duty of extending its usefulness belonged
to individual exertions not less than to the Legislature. The effect of
this new teaching, as it then appeared, was electric. Churchmen no
longer sat with hands folded in blank despair, or amused themselves with
irrefutable demonstrations that Parliament ought to do something. They
set to work themselves. Sometimes it was the clergy who stimulated the
laity; sometimes it was the laity who applied a gentle compulsion to the
clergy. Churches, parsonages, and schools began to spring up in every
direction, with a rapidity that would have borne comparison with the
palmiest days of the mediæval builders. The ancient indigenous
architecture of the country, and its cognate arts, were in a manner
rediscovered, and were brought to a perfection scarcely less than that
attained by the greatest masters of antiquity. Indeed, the spread of
this new science of ecclesiology has been not the least marvel of the
present century. It has pervaded every part of the community; it has
slain outright the bastard classicalism of the Age of Pigtail; and it has
reproduced itself in the Puginism of the Romanists, and the Ruskinism of
Dissent. It has even crossed the Channel, and appeared in the very
centre of European taste—in Paris itself—the fount and origin of the
whole vast movement being the work of church-building and restoration in
this country, which has proved a school of art more effective, because on
an infinitely larger scale, than any which modern times have witnessed.
All this has been, moreover, but the symbol of a greater and yet more
gratifying change—the gradual rehabilitation of the Church’s character.
Never since the Reformation did it occupy so high a position as that to
which it had attained two or three years ago. Old scandals, and old
epithets of abuse founded upon them, had alike disappeared. We read of
Parson Trulliber with much the same feeling of incredulous amazement as
we perused the accounts of Professor Owen’s extinct monsters; and we
should have looked upon the person who indulged in the sort of
Billingsgate which was common half a century ago as if another Rip Van
Winkle had stood before us. The ingenious calculations in which
demagogues of the last generation used to indulge, with regard to what
might be done with the ecclesiastical revenues, seemed like prospectuses
of the South Sea Company. The very Horsmans, like their Puritan
prototypes who made war on the King in the King’s name, had begun to
profess a desire only to increase the Church’s efficiency. The
Anti-State-Church Society itself, borne away by the spirit of the times,
adopted a clumsy euphemism for its old out-spoken title. It no longer
sought to destroy “the State Church”—its object was the “Liberation of
Religion from State Patronage and Control.”
Once more, alas! the sky has changed. What the public now think of the
Church, it would be difficult exactly to say; but that a strong re-action
has set in, it would be vain to deny. There seems to be an impression
abroad that the Church has been taking credit for far more than she was
entitled to; that she has had a last trial allowed her, whether she would
regain her place as the Church of the people; that her day of grace has
passed, and that she has been found wanting. Political Dissent, which
had fallen into a state of such ludicrous obscurity, has suddenly
revived, and in a Parliament elected under Lord Derby has achieved what
it could never do even in the worst times which followed the passing of
the Reform Bill—it has effected a lodgment in the Universities. It has
several times carried resolutions adverse to Churchrates. The demands of
Mr. Pellatt are now granted almost as a matter of course; and not only
so, but the very Government goes out of its way to flatter the prejudices
of the Nonconformist. Thus, the Solicitor-General brings in a
Testamentary Jurisdiction Bill, which would saddle the country with an
enormous annual charge in the shape of compensations; the sole object
being to afford Dissenters the gratification of reading at the
commencement of their probates the words “Victoria, by the Grace of God,
Queen,” instead of “John Bird, by Divine Providence, Archbishop.” Some
of the concessions which have been made to “the rights of conscience” are
absolutely ludicrous. For example, young ladies and gentlemen of the
different denominations complain that ill-natured people call their
weddings “workhouse marriages.” A remedy is instantly found, at the risk
of establishing a Gretna Green in every Dissenting place of worship. In
a word, the Legislature seems to say to Dissent “Ask and have.” Very
different is the tone both of Parliament and of the Executive, towards
the Church. The prayer of the Convocation for permission to reform its
constitution is, notwithstanding the plighted faith of the Crown,
peremptorily refused. The Royal Letters on behalf of the Church
Societies are stopped; the bill drawn up by the bishops to enfranchise
the Colonial Church is rejected. It is perhaps hardly worth while to
speak of various shabby acts with regard to money votes, such as the
withdrawal of the grants to the Bishop of New Zealand and to the Scottish
Church; but the animus which dictated them is only too obvious. After
all, however, the saddest evidence that the public feeling has undergone
a great change is to be found in the Education Bill of Sir John
Pakington. Every one knows how fast the Church was becoming, in fact,
what she is in theory, the instructress of the people; and till lately no
Churchman could have been found to suggest any material alteration in a
system which was bringing forth such gratifying fruits. Suddenly,
however, Sir John is seized with a panic. The task appears in his eyes
to be utterly hopeless, and he brings in a bill which would have
destroyed the distinctive character of Church schools, and would have
deprived Churchmen of all share (save that of paying school taxes) in the
education of every district in which they could not command an absolute
majority!
That the Church is inefficient, every one now seems to take for
granted—the only matter in dispute is, what has been the cause? Of
course the fault is always laid at the door of the Clergy; but it is
amusing to observe the perplexity which appears to be felt as to the
manner in which the indictment against them should be framed. Sometimes
the charge is that they cannot preach—just as if orators were a whit more
plentiful at the bar or in the senate, on the stage or in the Dissenting
pulpit. Sometimes we are told that the Clergy are not abler men because
they are not better paid. We have actually lived to see it stated by the
_Times_, that the Clergy of the Church of England—the men who a few short
years ago were reported to be rolling in wealth—are worse rewarded in
this life than persons belonging to any other profession whatever!
The object of the present essay is to strike at the very first step in
the _sorites_—to show that the Church, since the great revival, so far
from having proved a failure, has proved herself more than equal to the
situation; and finally to point out how grievously both the public and
the Legislature have been deceived by the data which have been published
for their guidance.
It need hardly be observed that the unfavourable impression to which
allusion has been made has been entirely created by Mr. Horace Mann’s
Report on the Census of Religious Worship. That report has been assailed
by the Bishop of Oxford, and other right reverend prelates; but their
strictures, it is respectfully submitted, do not go quite to the point.
It is not the account given of the present relative positions of Church
and Dissent which has done the mischief. Every one knew that the Church
was strongest in the country and Dissent in the towns; and seeing that
the rural and the urban population were about equal, the public could
scarcely be surprised to learn that the two bodies were also of nearly
equal strength. According to the census, the Church had in 1851,
5,317,915 sittings, and the Dissenters 4,894,648; but the Bishop of
Oxford has shown that there are good reasons for believing that the
Church sittings have been unfairly diminished, while those belonging to
Dissenters have been much exaggerated. On that point the writer will
only add that the number of sittings assigned to the Churches in the
tables relating to one large town, the only one he has had occasion to
verify, is not above three-fourths of the real amount.
The total number of attendants at Church on the census morning was
2,541,244, against 2,106,238 in the meeting-houses. Now, without
pressing any objection that might be made to these figures on the score
of dishonesty in the returns, it must be obvious that they do not fairly
represent the average attendance. In the first place, such institutions
as the colleges at the Universities are not taken into account. In the
next place, no reference is made to such places as the workhouses, in
most of which service is performed by a chaplain, and from which the
dissenting inmates are allowed to attend the meeting-houses of their
respective communities. Thirdly, the weather on the census Sunday was
very inclement, and while the attendance generally would, no doubt, be
less than an average, the effect would, beyond all controversy, be much
more felt in Churches than in meeting-houses. The strength of the
Church, it has already been said, is in the country, and it is quite a
different thing in bad weather to walk a few hundred yards along a
well-paved street, and to trudge a mile down a muddy lane. Fourthly, the
attendants at all the morning masses in Roman Catholic chapels are
returned, whereas it is well known that devout persons of that persuasion
often “assist” at more than one mass on the same morning. Those persons
have thus been counted twice over. Lastly, the day on which the census
was taken was Mid-Lent Sunday, on which rustics in the northern counties
are accustomed to pay visits to their friends instead of attending Divine
service. That, in its degree, would also act unfavourably on the
church-going of the census Sunday. If, therefore, we said that on
ordinary occasions there were three quarters of a million more people at
church on Sunday mornings in 1851 than in all the dissenting places of
worship put together, we should probably not be overstating the case; and
there would certainly be nothing in a state of things like that to
account for any alteration in the public sentiment.
When, however, we come to look at the statements made as to the relative
_progress_ of the two bodies during the last half century our wonder at
the change which has taken place in public opinion ceases. The following
results, compiled from Tables 5 and 13 of Mr. Mann’s Report, will exhibit
at a glance the amount of population and the number of sittings in 1801,
as well as the subsequent increase at each decennial period since then:—
Population. Church Dissenting Total
Sittings. Sittings. Sittings.
1801 8,892,536 4,289,883 881,240 5,171,123
The subsequent increase was as follows:—
1811 1,271,720 24,305 328,720 353,225
1821 1,835,980 42,978 527,160 570,138
1831 1,896,561 124,525 788,080 912,605
1841 2,017,351 293,945 1,253,600 1,547,545
1851 2,013,461 542,079 1,115,848 1,657,927
Total 9,035,073 1,028,032 4,013,408 5,041,440
Increase
Total 17,927,609 5,317,915 4,894,648 10,212,562
So that during the last ten years, while the Church was supposed to be
making unheard-of exertions, the amount of new accommodation she really
provided was not one-half of that supplied by the dissenting bodies! The
Wesleyan sects alone provided no less than 630,498 sittings, against the
542,079 found by the Church! The case may be made yet more clear from
the following table, which exhibits the number of sittings provided at
each period for every thousand of the population:—
Church. Dissent. Total.
1801 482 99 581
1811 424 120 544
1821 363 145 508
1831 323 181 504
1841 300 238 538
1851 297 273 570
So that while the Church has lost 185 sittings, Dissent has gained 174.
In other words, the Church has experienced a total relative loss of 359
sittings per thousand of the population during the last 50 years. Even
since 1831 her loss, as compared with Dissent, has not been less than 118
per thousand!
Comment on this would be superfluous. If such be really the state of the
case it would be idle to waste time in wrangling over inaccuracies in the
returns. If Dissent is gaining on the Church at the rate of 50,000,
sittings per year, whatever may be wrong in the present totals must soon
be corrected; and the Church must make up its mind, ere long, to sink
down into a minority.
The only question is, does the Census Report state the truth? _It does
not_. On the contrary, it states the very reverse of the truth. It is
not merely inaccurate, but altogether false. Mr. Mann’s figures—although
they have hitherto been accepted on all sides as if they were “proofs of
Holy Writ”—rest upon no positive data whatever. So far, indeed, are they
from possessing any claim upon the confidence of the public, the smallest
effort of common sense, the most transient recollection of principles
laid down by the immortal Cocker, would have warned Mr. Mann that the
process he has adopted could not possibly lead to a correct result.
It appears that as soon as the 30,610 districts into which the country
was divided for the purposes of the census had been marked out, the
enumerator in each was directed to return to the head office a list of
all the places of worship within his jurisdiction. The result was to
obtain information respecting 14,077 churches or chapels, and 20,390
dissenting meetings. Circulars were then sent out to the clergy, the
ministers, or other official persons, requesting to know, amongst other
things, the number of attendants on Sunday, the 30th of March, 1851, the
number of sittings, and the date at which the building was erected, or
first appropriated to religious worship (if since 1801). The report adds
that—“When delivering the schedules to the proper parties, the
enumerators told them it was not compulsory upon them to reply to the
inquiries; but that their compliance with the invitation was entirely
left to their own sense of the importance and the value to the public of
the information sought.” As might have been expected there were very
many instances in which no returns were made. These instances were
“principally places of worship in connexion with the Church of
England,—several of the clergy having entertained some scruples about
complying with an invitation not proceeding from episcopal authority. In
all such cases, a second application was made direct from the
Census-office, and this generally was favoured by a courteous return of
the particulars desired. The few remaining cases were remitted to the
registrar, who either got the necessary information from the secular
officers of the church, or else supplied, from his own knowledge, or from
the most attainable and accurate sources, an estimate of the number of
sittings and of the usual congregation.” After all, the number of
sittings could not be obtained in 2,134 cases, the number of attendants
in 1,004, and the number either of sittings or attendants in 390.
With regard to the tables more immediately under notice, namely those
which profess to show the comparative progress of Church and Dissent
during the last half-century, the mode of proceeding was as follows:—The
buildings were first of all arranged under six heads—those erected or
appropriated to religious purposes prior to 1801, and those erected or so
appropriated during five subsequent periods. Thus:—
Built before Churches. Meeting Houses. Total.
1801 9,667 3,427 13,094
1811 55 1,169 1,224
1821 97 1,905 2,002
1831 276 2,865 3,141
1841 667 4,199 4,866
1851 1,197 4,397 5,594
Dates not assigned 2,118 2,428 4,546
Mr. Mann’s next step was to distribute the last line amongst the six
previous ones, “according to the proportion which the number actually
assigned to each of the intervals bears towards the total having dates
assigned at all.” Multiplying the results so arrived at by the present
average number of sittings in churches (377), and by that in Dissenting
meeting houses (240), Mr. Mann obtained two tables (5 and 13) of which
the following is a summary:—
Churches. Sittings. Meeting Houses. Sittings. Total Total
Buildings. Sittings.
1801 11,379 4,289,883 3,701 881,240 15,080 5,171,123
1811 11,444 4,314,388 5,046 1,209,960 16,490 5,524,348
1821 11,558 4,357,366 7,238 1,737,120 18,796 6,094,486
1831 11,883 4,481,891 10,530 2,525,200 22,413 7,207,091
1841 12,668 4,775,836 15,319 3,778,800 28,017 8,554,636
1851 14,077 5,317,915 20,390 4,894,648 34,467 10,212,563
{11}
It would be uncandid not to state that Mr. Mann admits this estimate to
be open to some objection. His words are:—“It is probable that an
inference as to the position of affairs in former times can be drawn from
the dates of existing buildings with more correctness in the ease of the
Church of England, as the edifices are more permanent and less likely to
change hands than are the buildings used by the dissenters. Still there
is a possibility that too great an amount of accommodation has been
ascribed to the earlier periods.” The tables are, therefore, to be taken
with a “certain degree of qualification from this cause.” With respect
to the Nonconformists, he observes in a note:—“In 1801, according to the
estimate from dates, * * * the Dissenters had only 3,701 buildings.
This, however, is scarcely probable, and seems to prove that many
Dissenters’ buildings, existing in former years, have since become
disused, or have been replaced by others. As so much depends upon the
extent to which this disuse and substitution have prevailed, these
calculations, in the absence of any facts upon those points, must
necessarily be open to some doubts.” Now, it may be taken for granted
that no one reading these very mild qualifications would suppose that
they were intended to cover any serious error. Everybody would conclude
that the mere fact of Mr. Mann’s tables appearing in a grave public
document was a guarantee that they were in the main correct. Indeed, the
suspicion that they were not perfectly trustworthy never seemed to have
entered into anyone’s head. The Society for the Liberation of Religion
lost no time in issuing a manifesto grounded upon them, and the
dissenting prints have dwelt on them with great emphasis. Thus the
_Patriot_, some time ago, declared, with a sort of oath, that “as surely
as the morrow’s sun would rise,” so surely would Dissent be in a majority
at the next census. On the faith of these tables, too, Mr. Hadfield
announced, at the close of last session, that a spirit was growing up
which would not much longer tolerate such an abomination as a religious
establishment; and Mr. Gurney, in his sermon at the consecration of the
Bishops of Gloucester and Christchurch, admitted that Dissent was gaining
ground.
Proceeding, without further comment, to examine the Tables in detail, it
must be remarked that Mr. Mann’s formula for distributing the dateless
buildings is open to very strong objections. It is not, however,
necessary to enter upon those objections at this point, because the
operation of the rule with regard to the churches (which shall be dealt
with first) happens by accident to be very nearly right—the number
assigned to the year 1831 corresponding pretty closely with the number
arrived at by the census inquiries in that year. Mr. Mann’s next step,
however, is begging the question with a vengeance. The circumstance that
churches now-a-days contain on the average 377 sittings, affords not the
least ground for supposing that the average capacity of churches was 377,
fifty years ago. On the contrary, it is absolutely impossible, from the
nature of church extension in modern times, that the average should have
remained stationary. First of all, everybody knows that churches in
large towns are, generally speaking, much more spacious than those in the
rest of the country; and unless, therefore, the proportion of large town
and country churches has remained exactly the same, the general average
capacity of churches must have been disturbed. Mr. Mann’s Table 14
deprives him of any excuse he might have had for overlooking this obvious
fact. From that table we learn that there were in 1851:—
Churches. Sittings.
In large town districts 3,457 1,995,729
In residue of the country 10,620 3,322,186
14,077 5,317,915
—exactly the same as in the general table given above. In 1801, however,
matters were different. There were then—
Churches. Sittings.
In large town districts 2,163 1,248,702
In residue of the country 9,216 2,882,983
11,379 4,131,685
The number of churches is the same as in the general table, but the
number of sittings is less by 158,198. The discrepancy, however, is soon
explained. The average capacity of the larger town churches is 577
sittings, or 200 above the general average, while that of the country
churches is 312, or only 65 less; and, while as many as 1,294 new
buildings of the former class have been erected, the number of the latter
class has only been 1,404. On Mr. Mann’s own showing, therefore, his
principle is erroneous, and his Table 13 has cheated the Church of nearly
160,000 sittings. But this is by no means the whole of the injustice of
which he has been guilty. Not merely have there been more churches built
in large towns than is consistent with maintaining the old average on the
country at large, but the new structures both in town and country are of
far greater dimensions than those anciently erected. An Englishman is
not naturally fond of large communities of any kind. He has a passion
for privacy; and his pet phrases are “snug,” “nice little,” “not
numerous, but select.” This feeling breaks out in everything. Take the
matter of lodging. Abroad, many families club together, and occupy a
mansion. The plan has been tried in this country; but it meets with
little success. Most men would regard themselves as “flats” indeed, if
they put up with a floor when they could get a house; and working men
regard model lodging-houses as little better than barracks, or, as they
still term them, “bastiles.” So in ecclesiastical arrangements, John
Bull, looking upon the parish as but an extension of the family, cannot
have it too little for his taste. Abroad, the parish is regarded more in
the light of a city within a city; and hence parochial churches on the
continent were always less numerous and far larger than was anciently the
case in this country. Even when we had large churches they were not
fitted up for many worshippers—size being regarded more a matter of
dignity than of practical utility. London, before the Great Fire, with
its vast cathedral, and its hundred and ten parish churches; or Norwich,
with its spacious minster, and its forty churches, fairly represent the
true English idea. In modern times, however, we are forced to act
differently. The sudden increase of population, and the utter
unpreparedness of the Church to grapple with the difficulty, have
produced an emergency of which our forefathers had no experience. We
adopt the continental custom from sheer necessity, just as in London a
third of the population are obliged, though much against their will, to
live in lodgings. We build our churches large because that is the
cheapest mode of supplying our immediate wants. The two systems may be
well illustrated by contrasting Norwich, with its 41 churches and 17,000
sittings, with Manchester, which has 32 churches and 44,000 sittings; or
by comparing the City with its 73 churches and 42,000 sittings with the
Tower Hamlets which have 65 churches and 68,000 sittings. The census
tables contain many materials for an inferential argument with regard to
the size of our new churches, but it is hardly necessary to pursue the
matter further, because we have ample direct evidence bearing upon the
point. The Metropolis Church Building Society has assisted in the
erection of 85 churches, which contain 106,000 sittings, or an average of
1,247 each. The Church Building Commissioners have aided 520 churches,
and have thus assisted in providing 565,780 sittings, which would give an
average of 1,088 each. Even Mr. Mann himself admits, with amusing
_naïveté_, that “for many reasons the churches in large towns are
constructed of considerable size, and rarely with accommodation for less
than 1,000 persons!” [Report page clxii.] Precisely the same reasoning
will apply to the Church extension of the rural districts; and the reader
who has duly weighed the facts just stated will be little disposed to
doubt that in both cases the average size of modern churches is at least
double that of the churches which were in existence prior to 1801. On
that hypothesis it would be found by an easy arithmetical problem that
the capacity of town churches, in 1801, was 420 sittings, and of country
ones, 276. The increase in the former class would thus have been
1,086,960 sittings, and in the latter 775,008—making together 1,861,968.
Probably it was much more; but at all events the calculation omits a very
important element, namely, the new sittings which have been obtained by
the enlargement or the re-arrangement of old fabrics. From the
statistics of above a score of Church Building Societies, it would appear
that for every additional structure at least two old ones are rebuilt or
enlarged. There must thus have been at least 5,000 of these cases; and
though there are no accessible data on which to calculate the amount of
new accommodation in this manner afforded, it must have been very
considerable.
On the whole, therefore, we may safely adopt the statistics of the
Incorporated Society for Building and Enlarging Churches as our guide.
This society has laboured impartially for the advantage of town and
country; and up to the year 1851 it had assisted in erecting 884 new
churches, and in rebuilding or enlarging 2,174 old ones. The total
amount of new sittings it had thus been instrumental in providing was
835,000; so that each new church would _represent_ an increase of
accommodation to the extent of 944 sittings. As, however, the society
probably assisted the more urgent cases, it would perhaps be safer to
assume that each new church has only represented an increase of 850 new
sittings—in other words, that the new churches not assisted by the
society represent about 800 each. The result will then be as follows:—
No. of Churches. Sittings.
1801 11,379 3,024,615
Decennial increase:
1811 65 55,250
1821 114 96,900
1831 325 276,250
1841 785 667,250
1851 1,409 1,197,650
Total Increase 2,698 2,293,300
Total 14,077 5,317,915
Turning now to the Dissenting tables, we shall find that Mr. Mann’s
formula leads to still more absurd results than when it is applied to the
churches. It has, however, the curious felicity of operating in the two
cases in a manner diametrically opposite; for while it robs the Church of
more than half the new accommodation which she has provided, it
obligingly credits Dissent with about the same number of sittings, to
which it has not the ghost of a claim.
It is the proper place to offer here a few remarks upon the mode which
has been adopted for distributing the dateless buildings amongst the six
periods. Every one is, of course, aware that in many cases “there is
much virtue” in an average. In such problems as determining the number
of letters which will be posted in a given year without being addressed,
it operates with almost infallible certainty. But it must be clear that
2,428 out of 20,390 places could not have been returned without dates by
mere accident. In a large proportion of cases the omission must have
been intentional; and it is obvious that those cases would include very
few new buildings. The enumerators, being all persons possessed of local
knowledge, could have had no difficulty in determining whether a building
had or had not been erected within the last ten, twenty, or thirty years.
It would only be in cases where the structure was of what is called in
ladies’ sometimes “a certain,” sometimes “an uncertain” age, that they
would be unable to ascertain when it was erected or appropriated to
public worship. The number of such instances would bear no relation
whatever to the number having dates assigned. The case is wholly beyond
the province of the Rule of Three; and to attempt to adjust the table by
means of proportion is, on the face of it, unfair. Out of the 2,118
dateless churches, no fewer than 1,712 are relegated to the number of
those erected before 1801, whereas of the 2,428 dateless meeting-houses,
only 465 would be placed in the same category. In point of fact,
however, there are not so many; for Mr. Mann has hit on a plan, which is
a miracle of perverse ingenuity, in order to make the growth of Dissent
during the half century look larger than ever. Ninety-nine persons out
of a hundred would have applied the rule first to the churches, then to
the meeting-houses, and then they would have added the results together.
Mr. Mann has adopted precisely the opposite course. He has, first of
all, dealt with the total column, then with the Church, and he has lastly
subtracted the one set of results from the other. The consequence is he
has assigned no more than 274 of the dateless meeting-houses to the
period before 1801. The total number he has distributed amongst the
first three periods is only 737, whereas he has divided no fewer than
1,691 amongst the last three. It need scarcely be said that all the
probabilities would be all in favour of reversing the process.
At the outset, therefore, Mr. Mann’s estimate comes before us under
circumstances of extreme suspicion; but, granting, for the sake of
argument, that his distribution of the existing meeting-houses were
correct, it must be obvious that any inference from dates would be
preposterous unless we could be certain that there were no buildings in
existence at the earlier periods, other than those included in the table.
It has been seen that Mr. Mann has not overlooked this circumstance. He
admits that the small number assigned to 1801 “seems to prove that many
dissenters’ buildings existing in former years have since become disused
or have been replaced by others;” but no one would suspect from this
statement the vast number of these disused buildings. Take, for example,
the case of Nottingham. From Mr. Wylie’s local history it would appear
that of the 29 meeting-houses returned to the Census Office, only six
dated back to the commencement of the present century. In other words,
dissent in Nottingham, on Mr. Mann’s hypothesis, all but quintupled
itself during the 50 years. In point of fact, however, there were, not
six, but thirteen or fourteen, dissenting congregations in 1801, and
probably several more whose “memorial has perished with them.”
The absurdity of the Census estimate may be still further illustrated by
a reference once more to Tables 6 and 14. Those tables are to Mr. Mann’s
calculation not very different from the proof of an addition sum. If his
estimate were right they would agree with Tables 5 and 13; but instead of
doing so, they lead to the following astounding results:—In 1851, there
were in the
Meeting Houses. Sittings. Average
Sittings.
Large town 6,129 2,131,515 347 each.
districts
Residue of country 14,261 2,763,133 193 „
This is, of course, quite correct. But now see what the tables say of
1801—
Meeting Houses. Sittings. Average
Sittings.
Large town 1,337 258,220 193 each.
districts
Residue of country 2,634 781,218 330 „
The late Mr. Hume’s emphatic appreciation of a certain “modest assurance”
as a means towards getting through life will be remembered. How the
lamented sage would have envied the courage of Mr. Mann in putting his
name to a document embodying these statements! It is really much the
same as if the Astronomer Royal had presented to Parliament an elaborate
calculation, signed with his proper name, in which he proved the diameter
of the earth to be 25,000 miles, and its circumference 8,000! Seriously,
the very least one might have expected from a public servant performing
an important official duty would have been to abandon calculations which
he must have observed led to nonsensical consequences; and not to put
forth statements which, while they involved a gross libel upon the most
venerable institution in the country, were calculated to prove, as they
have proved, so fatally misleading. These very Tables 6 and 14 are of
great importance. We are constantly hearing that the great towns
monopolise the intelligence of the age, and that it is they which are to
govern the country. What then, has been the verdict of the great towns
on the question—Church _versus_ Dissent? According to these tables, the
Church, in the large towns, has provided only 747,027 sittings to meet an
increase in the population of 5,621,096 souls. Dissent, in the meantime,
has furnished 1,873,305, or more than twice as many. The Church’s
increase is not two-thirds the number of sittings she originally
possessed; the increase of Dissent is more than sevenfold! If these
figures were only correct, it would hardly be possible to conceive a more
complete condemnation of the Church’s system; if they are not—and there
is no reason to think that Dissent has materially altered its position in
the large towns since 1801—it is impossible to imagine a more scandalous
or a more gratuitous calumny.
Mr. Mann’s formula proving utterly untrustworthy, the question arises,
are there any data on which a substantially correct notion of the number
of Dissenting sittings in 1801 may be arrived at? To the writer, it
appears that there are. Thus, from the statistics of the different
Wesleyan bodies appended to Mr. Mann’s report, it would appear that the
old and new Connections in 1801 had at least 100,000 members. It would
further appear, that for every member the Wesleyans have about four
sittings, so that in 1801 the Wesleyans must have had at least 400,000
sittings. The next question is, what proportion did the Wesleyans bear
to the aggregate Nonconformity of 1801? At present, the Wesleyan sects
have about 11/24ths of the entire number of Dissenting sittings; but
their ratio of progress has confessedly been double that of their fellow
Nonconformists. Mr. Mann’s process of calculating from dates,
unsatisfactory as it is in other respects, may, perhaps, be allowed to
decide how much of the entire Dissenting accommodation of 1801 was
possessed by the Wesleyan bodies. According to table 17, the old and new
Connections had between them only 165,000 sittings, out of the 881,240.
It has been shown, however, that they had, in reality, not less than
400,000; and, raising the sittings belonging to the other sects in the
same proportion, we get a total of 2,136,339. This result receives
complete corroboration from Mr. Mann’s own returns. First of all, it is
clear that meeting-houses which have remained in existence half a century
must be buildings of some importance. Dissenting places of worship are
of two classes—those which have regular congregations and a regular
ministry attached to them, and those which are merely temporary preaching
stations. The number of these latter will surprise the reader. Mr.
Edward Baines, in his evidence before the Churchrates Committee,
estimated that no fewer than 7,360 of the 19,000 which he supposed
belonged to “the three denominations” were of this description. The
total number of mere preaching stations, however, may be easily
ascertained. It may be safely assumed that all places which have a
regular ministry are opened both on Sunday mornings and on Sunday
afternoons or evenings. The total number of this class in 1851 was only
10,583; so that each would _represent_ an average of 462 sittings. Now,
as the number of Dissenting places of worship which date back to 1801
cannot be less, even if calculated on Mr. Mann’s principle, than 3900,
the number of sittings in that year must have been upwards of 1,800,000.
But it would be a great fallacy to suppose that even first-class
Dissenting congregations are exempt from the tendency to decay and
disappear. If Nottingham may be taken as a fair example, it would seem
that not two-thirds of the regularly organised congregations existing in
1801 survive to this day. The total number of sittings at the
commencement of the present century would thus be at least 2,700,000.
The matter does not, however, rest even here. These estimates are purely
conjectural; but since the writer first turned his attention to the
subject, a valuable piece of positive evidence has fallen in his way. It
is a Parliamentary return obtained by Mr. Bright last year, which
professes to show the number of places of worship licensed under the
Toleration Act. It is very imperfect in its earlier tables, but those
since 1800 seem to be tolerably complete. Comparing the number of places
licensed during each of the last five decennial periods with the number
of existing buildings returned to Mr. Mann as opened in each, we get the
following remarkable results:—{19}
Ten years Places Still in Still in
ending licensed. existence. existence (per
cent.)
1810 5,460 1,169 21
1820 10,161 1,905 18
1830 10,585 2,865 27
1840 7,422 4,199 56
1850 5,810 4,397 75
39,438 14,535
This is a comparison which cannot fail to startle the editor of the
_Patriot_, and to shake the nerves of the Society for the Liberation of
Religion. It proves beyond the possibility of cavil that the enormous
and constantly increasing growth which Mr. Mann’s tables assign to modern
Dissent is “a mockery, a delusion, and a snare.” It shows, moreover
(which is the matter more immediately in hand), that barely two in seven
(21/75ths) of the Dissenting places of worship which were in existence in
1801, are still remaining. The number of such places was not 3,701, as
Mr. Mann states, but between 13,000 and 14,000; and the estimate of
sittings first made, after every conceivable allowance for increase of
average capacity, and other sources of error, is thus greatly under
rather than over the mark. The Dissenting increase may, therefore, be
safely taken at 2,758,309 sittings instead of 4,013,408; and if it be
distributed according to the proportion of places licensed, matters will
stand thus:—
Ten years ending 1811 381,875
,, „ 1821 710,664
,, „ 1831 740,319
,, „ 1841 519,097
,, „ 1851 406,354
If it be objected that the average capacity of Dissenting buildings has
increased of late years, there are two answers—first, there is no
evidence of such increase to any material extent; and, secondly, that
there is an antagonistic influence at work, which would counterbalance
such increase if it existed. It must be clear that the number of
“causes” which annually collapse becomes greater in the same ratio as the
congregations themselves increase. Thus, almost the same number of
places were licensed in the ten years ending 1810 as in the same period
ending 1850; but the number of places discontinued out of 13,000 would
obviously be less than the number discontinued out of, say 18,500; so
that unless the new Dissenting meeting-houses are larger nowadays than
was formerly the case, the amount of sittings attributed to the latter
periods is too large, rather than too small.