THE Church of St. Matthias, Warwick-road, Earl’s-court, Kensington, is
within sight of St. Jude’s, and, like it, stands almost alone in the open
fields. It has no boundary walls or fences, unless a broken-down hedge
on the east side can be called a fence. Externally, as a structure,
there are no very pleasing features; the permanent and temporary portions
do not harmonise, and, indeed, the chancel and aisles, the only parts
finished, have not in point of detail and design much to recommend their
brick walls with bath stone dressings and window tracery of simple
character. Of course the temporary portions as such cannot fairly be
criticised; yet if we must have temporary churches and of corrugated
iron, we see no reason why they should not be picturesque, or at any rate
sightly.
Internally the temporary nave has no attempt at appearance or effect, a
remarkable fact seeing that the Anglican school generally pride
themselves upon effects. A matched-boarded lining to walls and roof is
simply varnished, the glazing of the windows is rendered shocking to
taste by masses of blue and red colour, and a box pulpit is too much like
a box. The excessively plain chancel, arch, and arcades, and general
detail of the windows, have evidently been designed with a view to
economy; and if, when the nave is built, the same quiet spirit is
adopted, we shall be anxious to learn the cost of the structure, which
will certainly be a minimum sum, and valuable to note in these
church-building days. The style is early English. The dwarf stone
parapet and ornamental iron screen across the chancel arch form rather a
nice feature, and the stall-seats are of good design.
The east window is partly filled with effective stained glass, and as the
predominant colour is blue, it is vexatious that the side-lights, not yet
completed, are screened with green blinds.
Two figures of saints over the altar-table are not clearly seen—one might
be St. Matthias; and the reredos might as well have English written on
it—the unlearned could then understand and appreciate.
St. Matthias stands in the midst of a poor district, which was originally
cut off from St. Philip’s, Kensington. A temporary iron church was first
opened on April 17, 1869, and the permanent chancel was consecrated and
opened on the following 10th of July. Nave and chancel together
accommodate from 700 to 750 persons. The cost of the whole structure has
been 4,800_l._; and it is intended if possible to build the nave this
year 1871, which will cost about 4,000_l._ or 5,000_l._ more. The
architect is Mr. J. H. Hatrevile, 5, Southmolton-street. There are no
appropriated sittings; all are free, and the church is always open for
public or private prayer. It is supported by the offertory alone, which
in 1869–70 amounted to the sum of 1,100_l._, and in 1870–71 it will
amount, we are informed, to 1,600_l._ Out of this all the expenses of
the church and the charities and the clergy are met. There are three
_priests_ attached—the Rev. S. C. Haines, M.A., the Vicar; the Revs. H.
Westall, A.K.C., and S. Martin. There is a superb organ built by Jones,
of the Fulham-road, with three manuals, forty stops, and 2,255 pipes, at
a cost of 700_l._ The choir is large—about fifty in number—under the
precentorship of Mr. J. Elwin, of 21, Coleherne-road, Brompton, professor
of musical elocution. During Lent there is daily Communion at eight
A.M., four services every day, and five on Friday, when there is an extra
Communion at eleven A.M.
The service is Gregorian plain song, and on the morning of March 5, the
second Sunday in Lent, the ceremonial is described as being extremely
ornate and symbolical. Our representative says: The chancel is unusually
deep, the space between the altar and the railing being apparently
designed with a view to Ritualistic development. In fact, it is a large
stage on which a numerous company can play their parts. The choristers
wear surplices, and the clergy, over the surplice, a stole, which is at
the present season of the true Lenten violet—according to the practice of
Ritualists—who use the symbolic colours of violet for Lent, black for
Good Friday, red for Martyrs, yellow for Confessors, and so on. The
altar-cloth and pulpit-cover, and even the offering-bags, are also of the
same tinge, the latter being embossed with a white cross. The prayers
were intoned by Mr. Westall, a young gentleman whose voice is in some
danger of collapsing from sheer tension of monotone. The Ritualists have
attained perfection in denying to nature its own freedom and flexibility
of voice. The lessons were read by the second curate, Mr. Martin, who,
we learn, is new to the church, and whose voice, trained in the true
Anglican style—rises always where it ought to fall, and _vice versâ_.
The bowings, curtseys, and genuflexions of this service are so numerous
and complicate, we almost despair of tracing them. Not only in the
Creed, but in every other part where the name of the Saviour occurred and
on every repetition of the _Gloria Patri_, there was a low curtsey as
long as the body could be conveniently bent, which had a most singular
effect in the general aspect of the congregation. In the Nicene Creed,
in the part “Light of light” and up to “rose again,” there was a sudden
drop of voice to a mere whisper—which, being quite unprepared for at the
moment, might startle one into the idea that the congregation and choir
had simultaneously lost their vocal power. But all this was merely
dramatic. On entering the Communion Service the _processional_ hymn is
sung, during which the clergy three abreast commence their pilgrimage to
the altar. They approach it by three stages, pausing at every one, and
on arrival bow and cross themselves, and then dispose themselves on the
left, in line with their backs to the congregation—one a step above the
other—the highest reading the Commandments, turning meanwhile to the
people. They then break line again, and one reads the Epistle for the
day; they form inline again, and the centre figure, the Vicar, reads the
Gospel, during which the curate at his feet turns towards him obliquely,
bending in a worshipping attitude. After the Creed—and so as to chime in
with the close—the Vicar passes with a sharp step to the pulpit, which is
as close to the chancel as it can be; and on entering it, whilst the
people are still standing, crosses himself, fronting them, and repeats
quickly, “To God, the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, Amen,” and at once
announces his text. The short prayer before sermon is dispensed with.
The motion with the finger to the two shoulders and the forehead is the
great feature at this point.
The sermon was founded on 1 Cor. i. 20—“Where is the wise? Where is the
scribe? Where is the disputer of this world? Hath not God made foolish
the wisdom of this world?” Having on the previous Sunday treated of
bodily mortification and fasting, the preacher would now speak of the
subjugation of human imagination, intellect and reason to the dominion of
truth—of the folly of the “wise,” the “scribe,” the “disputer of this
world,” in view of the “wisdom of God.” In what was mainly an
_extempore_ address, aided only by copious notes, and accompanied by much
declamation and earnest action, Mr. Haines denounced the intellect and
literature of the day as extremely sordid, timeserving, and egotistic.
It was “a day of advertisements,” when intellect was “bought and sold
over the counter,” when one might “buy all the intellect of England for
gold, and for so many guineas have so many pages;” and if in any case
pride prevented this degradation, literature was then “but the expression
of an extreme egotism.” Periodicals and books were “pretentious and
misleading;” the novels of the age embodied its “sensualistic intellect;”
our art in its exhibitions handed down pictures and ideas of depravity.
“It would be well if the scientific world would send forth no more
theories.” In short the preacher held in the profoundest contempt all
the ordinary exercises of the human mind and reason. Perverted intellect
had produced anarchy in America, revolution and bloodshed in Europe; and
in the history of Christianity there had been nothing but contention and
division since the intellect of the church first departed from the “holy
Catholic religion,” and so rendered government impossible. The preacher
eulogised, indeed, intellect _sitting at the feet of Christ_; but this
was so explained as to mean, in fact, sitting at the feet of “Holy
Catholic Church.” This part of the sermon was, to our minds, a virtual
denouncement of the Protestant Reformation. In speaking of the mysteries
of religion against which the world’s intellect revolted, the preacher
adverted to that one, “the sacrifice of the altar,” which they were then
daily celebrating. “Christ was in Heaven, but he was also there, yea,”
glancing round to the spot, “on that altar was the real body and the real
blood of our Lord.” Would they deny these mysteries because they could
not understand them? Were there not mysteries in all nature? and did not
the saint see all around him the great sacrifice of nature—the outward
and visible sign of the inward, present, and omnipotent God? After
sermon the preacher returns to the altar, when a fourth functionary
appears, whom we suppose must be termed an acolyte. He carries in his
hand a taper, with which he proceeds to light the candles in the
candelabra at either end of the altar, each having seven lights. A hymn
is being sung and the collection made at the same time, and when ended
the offertory bags are borne to the altar, and, being solemnly placed
upon it, one of the priests, prostrating himself before it, raises the
offering high towards the cross, and there holds it for some moments in
the act of consecration, after which the Benediction is pronounced. The
church in the morning is filled with a congregation chiefly composed of
the higher middle classes of the people, and in the evening principally
of the poor of the immediate locality.