The volcanic force which caused all the alarm was a young clergyman
who, by reason of his personal merits and his relationship to the Dean,
became the most minor of all the canons, and probably the most pleasing.
But before he had been a year in attendance it was rumoured that he had
views, and no clergyman with views had ever been associated with the
services at the Minster. There have been clergymen who took a lively
interest in landscape photography--even colour photography--and others
who had rubbed with their own hands some of the finest monumental
brasses in the country. A prebendary went so far in horticulture as to
stand godfather to a new rose (h.p.), and a precentor who devised
an automatic reel--a fishing-rod reel, not the terpsichorean--but
no dignitary had previously been known to develop views on the lines
adopted by this Canon Mowbray, for his views had an intimate connection
with the Church Service.
He had been heard to express the opinion that it was little short of
scandalous that people should enter the Cathedral and find themselves
surrounded by beauties of architecture and facing combinations of colour
in glass that were extremely lovely--that they should be able to hear
music of the most elevating type efficiently rendered by an organist
of ability and a well-trained choir, but the moment a member of the
Chapter--one of the dignitaries of the Church--began to discharge his
duties, either in his stall, at the electern, or in the pulpit, the
congregation were subjected to an infliction of mediocrity sometimes
verging on imbecility. It was little short of scandalous, he said, that
the most highly paid functionaries--men whose education had cost a great
deal of money--should show themselves so imperfectly equipped to
discharge their simplest duties in an intelligent manner. Few of them
could even intone correctly, and he had a suspicion that intoning was
invented to conceal their deficiency in reading the prayers. When they
stood at the lectern and read in that artificial voice that they assumed
for the Lessons for the day, treating the most splendidly dramatic
episodes with a tameness that suggested rather more than indifference,
they proved their inefficiency as plainly as when they stood at the
altar-rails and repeated the Commandments in that apologetic tone they
put on, as if they hoped the people present would understand quite
clearly that they, the readers, were not responsible for the bad taste
of the compiler of the Decalogue in referring to offences of which no
well-bred lady or gentleman would be guilty.
And then he went on to refer to the preaching....
Now Canon Mowbray did not give expression to his views all at once. He
was forced to do so by the action of the Dean and Chapter after he had
startled them all, and the congregation as well, by his dramatic reading
of the First Lesson, which was of the discomfiture of the Priests
of Baal by the prophet Elijah--a subject treated very finely by
Mendelssohn.
The truth was that Canon Mowbray had paid a visit to London every week
in order to get a lesson in elocution from a well-known ex-actor, and at
the end of six months had mastered, at any rate, the fundamentals of the
art. His performance, regarded by itself, would have been thought quite
creditable; but, judged by comparison with the usual reading of the
Lessons in the Minster, it was startling--thrilling. Long before he had
got to the ironic outburst of the prophet, “Cry aloud, for he is a god,”
he had got such a hold upon his hearers that when he made a little pause
the silence was striking. At the close also, when he had shut the
Book and stood for a few moments before saying, “Here endeth the First
Lesson,” the silence was the ecclesiastical equivalent to the plaudits
of the playhouse at the effective close of an act: he might have said,
“Here endeth the First Act.”
It seemed as if there was not a sirloin in Broad-minster over which
the performance was not discussed. Sides were taken in almost every
household of faith, some people condemning the innovation, others being
enthusiastic in its favour. The one said it was too theatrical--it was
not for clergymen to put themselves into a part, as if they were actors;
the other affirmed that the Bible should be read by a clergyman as if he
believed what he was reading, not in that _voix blanche,_ as the French
call the insincere monotone which for some reason, hard to discover, has
been almost universally adopted as the voice of the Church.
As a natural consequence of the discussion the attendance at the
afternoon service was immense, for it was understood that Canon Mowbray
was to read one of the Lessons. Men who had become quite lax in their
churchgoing looked up their silk hats, and even chapelgoers, having
heard of the morning performance, hastened to the Minster just to see
how theatrical it was. The organist wished he had chosen a more showy
anthem than “In Judah is God known.” This was quite too commonplace for
such an occasion, he thought: it would allow of the clergy's competing
with the choir for popularity, the idea of which was, of course, absurd.
The offertory was nearly double that of any afternoon of the year.
There could be no doubt that the “draw” was Canon Mowbray. He filled the
stage, so to speak; when he went to the lectern the effect was the same
as is produced on a full house by the entrance of the “star,” and once
again the silence was felt to be a subtle form of applause.
Canon Mowbray had no chance of electrifying his hearers, for they were
expectant; he managed, however, to get far more out of an unemotional
chapter than had ever been got out of it before, so that it was made
perfectly clear to every one that he meant to pursue the line he had
struck out for himself, and for the next few days there was no real
topic in Broad-minster but the innovation of Canon Mowbray.
It was not surprising that the Close should be greatly perturbed by the
innovation. The Chapter was against it to a man. They had got into a
groove so far as the church services were concerned, and they had been
running very easily in it for many years. Where was the need to make any
change? they asked. But even if some change was needed, why should it be
such a one as that of which Canon Mowbray had made himself the exponent?
There were the weaker brethren to consider: in every clerical discussion
the question of considering the weaker brethren plays a prominent
part. The weaker brethren objected very strongly to the introduction
of elocution in any florid form at the lectern or in front of the
altar-rails, and beyond a doubt the playhouse--a theatre is invariably
alluded to as a playhouse by people who are arguing against it--the
playhouse and the House of God are separate and distinct, and any
attempt to introduce the atmosphere of the former into the latter
savoured of irreverence, and should not be tolerated by any one having
at heart the welfare of the Church.
Of course, Canon Mowbray was quickly made aware of the opinion of the
Chapter regarding his innovation, and then it was that he made use of
the somewhat intemperate phrases already quoted in defining the artistic
incompetence of the clergy; and the clergy speedily learned all that he
had said and was still saying about them, and they were naturally very
much displeased.
But what could they do in the matter?
Well, it was obvious that they could be cold to him--they could delete
his name from the list of invitations to their whist parties and dinner
parties and luncheon parties. They could make it difficult for him to
get up a set at lawn-tennis or badminton; and, sure enough, they put
in motion all the apparatus of excommunication which is still at
the command of the Church. But the result was not all that had been
anticipated; for the people who felt that they owed Canon Mowbray a good
turn for the entertainment with which he had provided them for several
Sundays, got up special parties in his honour: dinner parties, and
whist parties, and even “tweeny” parties--the Sunday lunch between the
services at the Cathedral which occupies so prominent a position in the
convivial régime of Broadminster. But Canon Mowbray was wise enough not
to accept any of the invitations that he received. He knew that there
was far more to be got out of a pose as persecuted reformer than from
appearing at the most elaborate tweeny lunch that the most interesting
house in the town could provide.
He was quite right; for within a month he was summoned before the Dean
himself, and remonstrated with on the error of his excessive elocution.
It was understood the great Dignitary had used his own weapons against
him during this interview: his elocution was excessive as he referred to
the Canon's attempt to introduce an element into the services which
had previously been monopolised by the playhouse--the Dean, of course,
called the theatre the playhouse.
It need scarcely be said that this interview of remonstrance represented
a martyr's crown of 22 carats, hall-marked, to Canon Mowbray, and he
took care to display it: he never appeared in public without it. He
brushed his hair to accommodate its rim upon his head--every one who
has come in contact with a martyr knows how far the brushing of his
hair goes to the establishment of his claim to the crown--and it was
understood that even if Canon Mowbray's “size” had been in excess of
that marked on the ticket in his hat, it was nearly certain that within
a short time his head would be found quite equal to the wearing of his
crown without any one suggesting that it was a misfit.
But he had got the better of the Dean in the interview--he took care
that this fact became known. He had not forgotten himself or his
position for a moment. He had expressed his great regret that the Dean
was unable to look at the question of the innovation with his, the
Canon's, eyes; he had a great respect for the Dean's opinion on most
matters, and he knew no one whose advice he would follow more gladly; but
in this particular point he found it impossible to do so. Surely if
the art of the musician was admitted into the services, the art of the
elocutionist should not be excluded--and so forth. Good taste? He was
said, that he could not allow any considerations of what some people
called good taste to interfere with what he believed to be his duty.
After all, good taste and bad taste were merely relative terms. It was
not possible that on any aesthetic grounds Mr. Dean would be prepared to
say that the slovenly reading of the Sacred Word to which they had been
for long accustomed at the Minster was more tasteful than--than one in
which the ordinary principles of elocution were observed.
It was when the Dean was confronted with arguments which he made no
attempt to answer that he became grossly personal, Canon Mowbray said,
attributing to him, the Canon, motives unworthy of a clergyman with any
sense of his high calling, and thereby proving pretty conclusively, the
Canon thought, that as an arbiter of good taste the Dean could scarcely
be admitted to a position of any prominence.
The result of the Dean's remonstrance was to strengthen the Canon's
cause in the eyes of his adherents; and when one of these friends wrote
a letter to the newspapers, expressing the opinion that if Canon
Mowbray had been guilty of any breach of discipline the ecclesiastical
authorities should take action with a view to justifying themselves in
the attitude they had assumed in regard to him, the general opinion was
that the Canon had triumphed, for the Dean and Chapter knew perfectly
well that they had no power to accept the challenge implied in the
letter: the question was not one of turning to the east or turning
to the west, or of lighting candles in a place where no artificial
illuminant was required, or of wearing an overelaborate robe--it was
solely a question of taste, and the discipline of the Church has nothing
to do with matters of taste.
It was at this point that Lady Birnam, who claimed to be a local
ecclesiastical seismometer, so to speak, prophesied a cataclysm that
would shake the Church to its foundations. She went far beyond the
advisory committee of St. Paul's in considering the consequences of
making new subways by the London County Council.