One of the wonders to us, looking back upon the middle ages, rich in all
the experience they lacked, is their faith in heathenism as a fact, long
after heathenism as a theology had given way to the victorious Cross. It
seems not only as if many Christian churches were erected on what were
once pagan temples, but as if, under new names, the old pagan
superstitions still lingered, as if their hold on the heart of man were
too firm to be driven out by any doctrine, however new or true. In the
middle ages, before a Bacon had led forth the sciences from their house
of bondage--before men had ceased to theorize, and to believe alone in
facts, and the truths facts utter, what confidence, for instance, was
given to that pagan science, or jargon, for it ought not to be called a
science, named astrology. The old heathen gods still remained. Jupiter
and Mars, Saturn, and Venus, and Mercury, were still the arbiters of
human destinies. Take up the great philosopher of that age--Cardan for
instance--and you shall read in him more of the mysterious influences of
the heathen's Jupiter than of the Christian's God. Every educated man
exclaimed in language as plain, though not, perhaps, so poetical, as that
of Max Piccolomini, that--
'Still
Doth the old instinct bring back the old names,
And to yon starry world they now are gone,
Spirits or gods that used to share this earth
With man as with their friend; and to the lover
Yonder they move, from yonder visible sky
Shoot influence down, and even at this day
'T is Jupiter who brings whate'er is great,
And Venus who brings everything that's fair.'
Something like this in the Christian world prevails. Thus is it the Old
Testament binds with iron grasp men who profess to take their religion
from the New. They tell you the law was the schoolmaster--that it was
the shadow of good things to come, and yet for all that they do and plan,
the Old Testament is their perpetual precedent. Instead of the
recognised version, 'All Scripture is given for instruction,' some of the
good people we have referred to seemed as if they read confusion. The
old Commonwealth men blundered terribly in this way; but every age has
had men guilty of similar blunders. Poor Granville Sharpe had an
interview with Mr. Pitt, to plead the cause of humanity, and wasted the
golden opportunity by attempting to explain to that great Minister--to
whom the explanation was all unintelligible--the meaning of the little
horn in Daniel. In spite of Christianity, men still cling to Jewish
rites and Jewish creeds, as if the Temple of Solomon still wore its
ancient splendour, as if the seed of Abraham still enjoyed their sacred
birthright, as if the sceptre had not departed from Judah, and Shiloh had
never come. Go into the churches of the metropolis any time you like,
and the probability is that in more than half the texts will be taken
from the Old Testament, and the certainty is, that in almost all, all the
arguments and illustrations will have a similar source. Thus we have a
composite order of preaching. It seems as if the preacher knew not on
which side to take his stand, under which king to speak or die. The hand
is Esau's, but the voice is Jacob's. You hear as much of David as of
Christ, as much of the ceremonial of a worship of form and ceremony, as
of the simplicity introduced by Him who was born in a manger, and had not
where to lay his head. To break free from all this--to act in the living
present--to let the dead past bury its dead--to speak to the men of
to-day in the language of to-day, is a great advantage to a preacher,
even if it require, on his part, a little extra care in the composition
of his sermons; and no one knows this better than the popular Assistant
Minister of St. John's, Waterloo Place, Regent Square, London--the Rev.
Mr. Bellew, formerly of St. John's Cathedral, Calcutta.
To give a man the position Mr. Bellew has acquired, however, something
further is needed. Peculiar qualities of thought or utterance,
especially the latter, are essential to a man if he would be talked of on
all sides--run after by fine lords and ladies--in request all over London
for charity sermons--and admitted to plead in the august presence of Lord
Mayors and Princes of the blood. In the first place, then, it must be
remembered that Mr. Bellew preaches with all the studied earnestness of
the actor, and every syllable tells as distinctly as if it were Macready
declaiming on the stage. Then he is an Irishman, and what Irishman is
not fluent and born to drive in the pulpit; and what is wonderful, though
an Irish Protestant, Mr. Bellew avoids the _role_, somewhat overdone, of
a McNeile, or a McGee, or a Maguire, and does not commit the absurdity of
making his every sermon a wearisome protest against Popery and the Pope.
Why should Irish clergymen get wild on this head? It is not, says
Goethe, by attacking the false, but by proclaiming the true, that good is
to be done. And it is the same in religion; the Irish Protestants have
little to complain of--their history is written in the tears and blood of
millions whom they have wronged for ages. By the violation of all
right--by means that will ever stain the Irish Protestant Church with
shame--by laws the most infamous the malice of man could devise, have
they got to be where they are; let them take the goods the gods provide
and be thankful. If anything could make a man sympathize with Roman
Catholics, it would be the history of the Protestant Church since its
first establishment there by the strong arm of law. On all other matters
Mr. Bellew seems equally to avoid the errors of partisanship; he ignores
the foolish ceremonial disputes of his own Church--the petty doctrinal
discussions, which are the more fiercely agitated the more trivial and
worthless they in reality are. His Christianity is something proud, and
majestic, and divine,--a universal remedy for a universal disease,--not a
skeleton of dead doctrine, or a bone of contention, or an obsolete word,
but a living, healthy, beneficent power.
But Mr. Bellew has other attractions. Not only are his sermons broad and
catholic in tone,--not only are they enunciated with oratorical
effect,--not only are they heightened by the charm of a commanding
presence,--but they are in themselves highly polished, full of passages
of rare eloquence, and retain the attention of the hearers. They all
open well, the exordium is always spirited, and its tone is maintained to
the end of the discourse. Thus one commences as follows, "Eternity is
the answer to life's question--immortality is the hallowed reward of
life's holy works." Another has, "Life is the expression of religion."
In another we get a quotation from Tacitus pregnant with meaning, "Truth
is established by investigation and delay." Then the circumstances of
the text are well brought out. If Paul speaks at Corinth, we see that
licentious city with its groves and temples; if on Mars' hill he
proclaims an Unknown God, the orator, with a lustre on his face brighter
than any genius could bestow, is in our midst; around him are the
restless Athenians, and in the background, the marble statues of their
deities--of silver-eyed Minerva, and Apollo, lord of the silver bow. If
some divine word of the Great Teacher himself is the subject of
discourse, then the Hebrew landscape is painted as only those can paint
who have trod the steps--as Mr. Bellew has done--where, more than
eighteen centuries ago, the Christ and his sorrowing disciples trod.
Occasionally a little pompous verbosity may be detected; instead of
simply telling us how the earth's great ones are despised too often by
the world, Mr. Bellew says, 'My experience of life, and the more I read
from all history, sacred and profane, modern and ancient, is this--the
veritable heroes of humanity have generally been decorated with the
epithets of popular insult.' This is a little too much in the mouthing
vein, and reminds us of the singular encomium on Mr. Bellew in the
_Morning Herald_, to the effect that our preacher 'unveils the plan of
salvation in the most _graceful_ and _attractive_ manner'--as if Mr.
Bellew was a Madame Mantilini, and the plan of salvation was the last new
fashion. Perhaps for this singular criticism Mr. Bellew is in some part
accountable. Our readers may have seen a caricature of two popular
preachers, under the title of Brimstone and Treacle. Brimstone is
supposed to represent the youthful hero of the Surrey Music Hall: the
pulpit Adonis, curled and scented and lack-a-daisical, called Treacle, is
supposed, though very wrongly, for Mr. Bellew is no man-milliner, to
typify the subject of this sketch. In spite of grey hair and sallow
cheeks, Mr. Bellew has somewhat too much the appearance of a lady's man,
and his Christianity is evidently that which will do credit to the best
society; nor is this to be wondered at. Has he not an uncle a Bishop,
and has he not the _elite_ of the _beau-monde_ to hear him?