PERSONALIA
It would be as well, before this short book is closed, to examine
some of the ways in which the mind of the Bishop has always worked.
We have seen in the foregoing pages how intensely practical was his
outlook upon life. It could scarcely be otherwise after spending his
first years in actual contact with the ugly facts of life, which
emerged during his Headship of Oxford House and his incumbency of St.
Matthew’s, Bethnal Green; or, again, as he faced the indifference and
materialism of the West End. To him the fact that work of any kind told
in the Kingdom of God was sufficient to prove its source to have been
the Spirit of God. He was fond of telling how a lad on one of our foggy
days held in his hand the end of a long piece of string, the other end
of which was hidden by the murky atmosphere. “What have you there?”
the lad was asked. And he answered, “I am holding my kite!” “Your
kite!--You cannot see your kite!” “No,” he replied. “But I can feel it
pull!”
And the Bishop said: “We cannot be wrong, we priests of God,
Churchworkers, lay-readers, duchesses, servant-girls, men in the
factories, clerks in the City--we cannot all be wrong when we say we
have felt it pull.”
Another thing which kept alive the personal faith of the Bishop was the
impression made upon him by the witness of those around him. According
to him, Bishop Wilkinson, Bishop King and Canon Body were his great
spiritual masters. He says of them:
“If you had known those three as I knew them, you would be as certain,
as you are certain of the sun, that those men were living in a real
world which gave them an extraordinary power. Take Bishop Wilkinson,
a man who all his life had to struggle against a tendency against
melancholia; yet he had his head above the mists all the time, and
because he had his head above the mists he was able to convert
thousands in London, and throughout the world. Take Bishop King,
quite a different man in temperament, with a bright cheerfulness of
disposition. He, too, moved above the mists, and the same was true of
Canon Body. I learnt from them an intense belief in the Holy Spirit.
That is to say, I believe that the Holy Spirit may use what is said and
done. It is perfectly astounding how God can use the weakest word.”
A deep impression was made upon him by the workers whom he met. He told
the story of the Vicar of All Saints’, Margaret Street, after he was
lying dead:
“I think it was about two or three years ago he wrote me a letter,
and he said: ‘I have more money in this living than I had in the last
place where I was. I find there are so many hundreds a year which I do
not want for my board and lodging. If Jesus Christ were visibly alive
to-day, I should give that money to Him; it all belongs to Him; it is
His money. As I cannot actually place it in Jesus Christ’s own hands,
and you are His chief representative in this diocese, I hand it to
you.’ And every penny that that faithful parish priest did not want for
support himself--of course, it is the first duty of a man to pay for
his lodgings and his clothes--he handed over to me every year to spend
for Jesus Christ. He said: ‘Spend it as you like, but I would like the
preference given to educating young men who cannot afford it for Holy
Orders.’ I suppose, perhaps, £400 or £500 a year used to come regularly
during these years into my hands.”
He refers to the impression made upon him by another living man, the
Rev. H. R. L. Shepherd, as a further instance of a man with his head
above the mists: “Let me say I persuaded Mr. Shepherd to be ordained
when he was at Cambridge. I sent him to be Head of Oxford House. I sent
him to this church. I believe the secret of his marvellous influence is
this--that he is a friend of Jesus. It is not his eloquent sermons, it
is not anything particular that he says, but you do feel that you are
in correspondence and in touch with a real friend of Jesus Christ. That
is why this church (St. Martin’s-in-the-Fields) has gone on so well in
his absence. (Mr. Shepherd was away ill at the time.) He did not lead
you to himself: he led you to Christ.”
“Who can forget the names of Benson and Gott? Archbishop Benson will
always stand out to me as I saw him at the consecration of two Bishops
in Bethnal Green Parish Church, characteristically arranged by him so
that East London people might see what the consecration of a Bishop was
like. Always thinking for others.”
It is in references like these that we catch glimpses of the way in
which the Bishop’s mind works and the things which impressed him and
gave him a radiant faith that the men with their heads above the mists
of self, who were living for their Lord and His people, were the men
who could say, like that boy, “I can feel the pull!” and were the men
who could exercise it.
Having now seen the way in which the mind of the Bishop of London
is itself influenced, it will be as well in bringing this book to a
conclusion to indicate how he himself influences others.
He is a great believer in speaking to his audiences without the
restrictive fetter of notes. We heard him quite recently on Good Friday
speak at the Regent Theatre at the People’s Service. He stood there
before the great audience perfectly at home, beating time with his
hymn-book to their singing, and afterwards addressing them on David’s
saying, “Give me the sword of Goliath, there is none like it!” In the
plainest words, and with a perfect flow of language, he enlarged his
theme, driving home his points with telling illustrations in the use of
which he is a past-master. As a matter of fact, his addresses always
abound with them. For instance, he will enforce personal responsibility
thus:
“The situation is just like the case of two boys who are sent to school
by their parents; to one is given the journey-money and the supplies,
but the father hardly thinks that it is necessary to tell him that he
has to share it with the other boy, and would be horrified if the other
boy was to be left by himself on the platform at Willesden without any
money and without any food. If he was, in all probability the elder
boy would have been severely punished the next time he went home to
his parents. At any rate, he ought to have taken it for granted that
he was to share the money and the food, even if little had been said
by the parent about it. The analogy holds good in life. I am sent with
other lives linked with mine, and I am the elder brother, and I have
the journey-money and the supplies are given to me. But not alone for
myself.”
The necessity of self-control is hit off thus:
“There were two men driving into Cambridge in the last generation after
a shooting-party. One of them was my own old father, who was a great
shot in his day, and his friend--my father was driving--took off the
top of the ramrod, and screwed it in the dark into the horse’s back.
The horse started off at a wild gallop; the dogcart was overturned;
the drunken man, as is often the case, got off scot-free, and my poor
father was nearly killed. You have got an animal to control, and it
is possible to control it, and you are the man to control it; but do
not screw a ramrod into the horse’s back. What do I mean by that? Do
not put into those bodies of yours in any great measure--of course, I
believe that you had better not do it in any measure at all, but at any
rate in anything but the smallest measure--that alcohol which is the
irritant to the wild forces in you.”
He is alert to catch and capture an illustration anywhere as in the
following:
“An illustration was forcibly brought home to me in a church in which
I was preaching, where the organ of the church had lain in fragments
for years, and at its restoration that morning was breathing forth
beautiful music, restored to its original shape and form. The question
we have a right to answer to those who tell us that when the grey
matter of the brain ceases to act the person dies is this: ‘When that
organ was lying in fragments, was the organist dead?’ He was not.
He could not use the instrument at the time, but when the organ was
beautifully restored, it was the same man who drew out the music from
the organ. If the organ, the instrument, is in ruins, the organist
lives on!”
Nothing is too commonplace for him to use and claim as grist for his
mill. He is evidently not concerned to secure acknowledgment for
anything but his message. He is great enough to be simple and wise
enough to be clear.
In these foregoing pages we have tried to trace the growth of that
individuality which has given the Bishop of London his commanding
force. “The plastic circumstances”--to use a favourite term of his
own--“the plastic circumstances” in which that growth has occurred have
been many and varied. Country rectory, public school and university
life, country curacy and life of the cathedral-close, were certainly
no unusual avenue for a man to tread whose career was to be that of
an ecclesiastic. But the element of the unusual appears at Oxford
House and in Bethnal Green, if we watch the years there in the light
of what we know now of his future. But it was there that the direct
ways and simple methods of Winnington Ingram were acquired. All the
power of popular appeal that exhibited itself afterwards at St. Paul’s
Cathedral, when he was Canon, and later as Bishop of Stepney, as he
swayed crowds in the City and East and West to sympathy with his aims,
was gained in dealing with men and women, who, if they were to be
moved at all, needed one amongst them who would “stir them up,” as St.
Peter puts it. It is this mission of “stirring men up” that the Bishop
appears to regard as peculiarly his own--a fact which has emerged in
many parochial missions he has conducted, and particularly in his
great London mission a few years since. He has all his life through
apparently been obsessed with the idea that the one thing evil wants is
“to be let alone.” He determined that his whole life should embody his
refusal to do this. He was called for “interference,” and “interfere”
he has. Only the other day, in our hearing, a well-known, highly placed
clergyman said of him in tones half amused, half deprecatory: “If only
he would let things alone!”
It was the finest compliment ever paid him!
Could there be a finer judgment of any man than to describe him as “one
who refused to let things alone, who kicked over stones beneath which
noisome things wriggled and crawled, and ruthlessly let in the light on
dark corners”? Could there be a finer judgment of any man?
Books by the Bishop of London
3_s._ 6_d._ _net each_.
THE SWORD OF GOLIATH
A Mission book by the Bishop of London, with its central theme running
through each chapter, is always the most popular of his writings. In
“The Sword of Goliath,” as in previous Mission volumes, the enquiries
addressed to the Bishop were about difficulties common to many people,
and once more the value of a Mission volume by the Bishop of London
is greatly increased by the inclusion of these personal but often
universal problems, and the Bishop’s Answers to Questions.
_Other Mission volumes are_:
THE SPIRIT OF JESUS
A MISSION OF THE SPIRIT
THE CALL OF THE FATHER
THE LOVE OF THE TRINITY
JOY IN GOD
THE MYSTERIES OF GOD
SECRETS OF STRENGTH
THE GOSPEL OF THE MIRACULOUS
Popular editions in paper covers are issued of these 8 volumes--“The
Spirit of Jesus,” 2_s._ _net_; the other seven are 1_s._ 6_d._ _net
each_.
REBUILDING THE WALLS.
THE SPIRIT OF PEACE.
VICTORY AND AFTER.
THE POTTER AND THE CLAY.
RAYS OF DAWN.
INTO THE FIGHTING LINE.
UNDER THE DOME.
BANNERS OF THE CHRISTIAN FAITH.
WORK IN GREAT CITIES.
THE GOSPEL IN ACTION.
THE CHURCH IN THE TIME OF WAR.
EYES OF FLAME.
THE ATTRACTIVENESS OF GOODNESS.
THE FAITH OF CHURCH AND NATION.
[Illustration]
Other Books by the Bishop of London
2_s._ 6_d._ _net each_.
GOOD SHEPHERDS.
MESSENGERS, WATCHMEN, AND STEWARDS.
THE MEN WHO CRUCIFY CHRIST.
FRIENDS OF THE MASTER.
THE AFTERGLOW OF A GREAT REIGN.
WORK IN GREAT CITIES is also obtainable, paper covers, 1_s._ 3_d._
_net_.
A NEW EARTH. 6_d._ _net_.
PUNISHING THE WRONGDOER. 4_d._ _net_.
DEATH IN THE LIGHT OF THE EPIPHANY. 9_d._ _net_.
THE NECESSITY AND HOPE FOR CHRISTIAN UNION. An address delivered
in the Kingsway Hall. This address is followed by the summary of
another--“Problems of Re-union.” _Price_ 1_s._ _net_.
A CHARGE delivered to the Clergy and Churchwardens of London, in St.
Paul’s Cathedral, October 19th, 1905. 1_s._ _net_.
A CHARGE delivered to the Clergy and Churchwardens in the Diocese of
London, 1911. 1_s._ _net_.
MESSAGE FOR THE SUPREME MOMENT. Delivered to the assembled clergy of
the London Diocese at St. Martin’s-in-the-Fields, November, 1915.
_Sewed_, 6_d._ _net_.
MESSAGES OF TO-DAY. Selected passages from the writings of the BISHOP
OF LONDON. An appropriate Easter Gift. Printed in red and black. 1_s._
3_d._ _net_.
WELLS GARDNER, DARTON & CO. LTD.,
3 & 4, PATERNOSTER BUILDINGS, LONDON, E.C. 4.
And all booksellers.
[Illustration]
TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES
New original cover art included with this eBook is granted to the
public domain.
Missing punctuation restored on pages 4, 66, 71, 79.
Spelling of “Lillishall” on page 27 retained.