The publication of a memoir of Archbishop Trench has sufficed to recall
prominently to the public mind the virtues, endowments, and achievements
of one of the most notable of latter-day divines. Richard Chenevix
Trench was one of the most versatile of writers. He discoursed with
equal knowledge and effect on Biblical and philological topics, and his
prose work will always be respectfully regarded by the students alike of
divinity and of language. But though, on these subjects, his
pronouncements may in time grow stale or require correction, he will
ever hold an honourable place in English literature as one of the most
thoughtful and vigorous of those parson poets of whom this country has
always had so large and valuable a supply.
There is, indeed, a natural connection between parsons and poetry. It is
precisely in the ranks of the clerical body in all civilized countries
that one would look for successful cultivators of the art of verse. For
what is, above all things, necessary for such cultivation? In the first
place, polite learning; in the second, sufficient leisure. It is in the
atmosphere of culture that good verse, as apart from high poetry, takes
its rise. There are probably few educated men who have not at one time
or another essayed to pen a stanza. The busy city clergyman may nowadays
have no time for such elegant diversions, but at all periods the
lettered country parson has been inclined to occupy some of his spare
moments in wooing the Muse of Song. There are other things than learning
and leisure which impel him to the task. There is the nature of his
profession, with the experience it brings him and the reflections it
induces. The most unliterary pastor cannot but be a meditative man. The
literary pastor cannot but be disposed to turn his meditations into
verse, often finding in that 'mechanic exercise' the means of 'numbing
pain.'
Other things being equal, the modern cleric would take serious subjects
for his verse, and it is characteristic of the whole race of parson
poets that the first poetic effort in English literature should be the
Scriptural paraphrases supplied by Caedmon, monk of Whitby. But it was
not in the sphere of Bible history that the immediate successors of
Caedmon, monks (or friars) like himself, sought to disport themselves
most largely. Our early clerical versifiers set themselves rather to
give rhythmical renderings to the romances and chronicles of their time.
They were the secular as well as sacred teachers of the day; and so we
find the names of Wace, Layamon, Robert of Gloucester, Robert of Brunne,
Archdeacon Barbour, Andrew of Wyntoun, and John Lydgate, all associated
with the recital of the deeds of ancient or modern heroes. Not that the
claims of religion or morality were forgotten: they were remembered by
Richard Rolle in his 'Prick of Conscience,' and indirectly recognised by
Barclay in his 'Ship of Fools.' The interests of the poor were served by
Langland in his 'Piers the Plowman,' and poetry, pure and simple, had
its devotees in the persons of the Bishop of Dunkeld and the Franciscan
friar who produced respectively 'The Palace of Honour' and 'The Golden
Terge.'
When we come down to more recent times, we find even greater variety
than this in the writings of the parson poets. But the serious element
prevails. There have been clerical wits and humorists, but they have
been, of necessity, in the minority. A large proportion of the verse
composed by clergymen has been, as one would naturally expect, of a
distinctly didactic, not to say depressing, tendency. One thinks at once
of the 'Temple' of George Herbert, the 'Epigrammata Sacra' of Richard
Crashaw, the 'Night Thoughts' of Young, the 'Grave' of Blair, the
'Sabbath' of Grahame, the 'Course of Time' of Pollok, the 'Christian
Year' of Keble; the hymns of Wesley, Alford, and Stanley; the 'Dream of
Gerontius' of Newman, and a dozen others, differing very much indeed in
all the qualities of poetry, but alike in the earnestness of their
intention. Even Herrick, 'jocund' though his muse was, left behind him
some 'Noble Numbers.' And though clerical satire, as furnished by men
like John Bramston, Charles Churchill, Samuel Bishop, John Wolcot, and
Francis Mahoney, has frequently been flippant both in form and phrase,
it has at other times--and especially in the works of Bishop Hall, of
Norwich--been very vivid and uncompromising. Hall, indeed, was the
Juvenal of his century, filled with the spirit of righteous indignation.
From Donne, Dean of St. Paul's, downwards, the clerical singers who have
not been markedly professional in their outcome have exhibited an
agreeable freedom from monotony. In Donne himself we see the sad
perfection of the metaphysic method, mitigated, however, by a few lapses
into the lucid and the simple. Pomfret gave us in 'The Choice' the
typical poem of the country parson, sounding the praises of rural scenes
and lettered ease. In Parnell we have a sample of the pleasing
versifier, touching nothing which he does not adorn, but making no very
particular impression. Bishop Percy is less celebrated for the ballads
which he wrote than for those which he collected. Logan is remembered
only by his verses on 'The Cuckoo.' To the reverend brothers Warton we
owe respectively 'The Pleasure of Melancholy' and some lines 'To Fancy';
while of Thomas Blacklock, alas! the most remarkable feature was his
blindness. One would like to have forgotten Robert Montgomery, of
Satanic fame, but Macaulay will not let us do so. Blanco White lives on
the strength of one good sonnet, Lisle Bowles on that of many good ones;
and there is no need nowadays to distinguish the work of Crabbe, of
Moultrie, of John Sterling, and of Charles Kingsley, much as they
differed from each other. One of the latest additions to this choir of
voices is Mr. Stopford Brooke, and there are other living lyrists,
belonging to one or other of the Churches, who might be named if there
were no fear of making invidious selection.
There is a certain department of verse-writing in which a cultivated
class like the clergy would of necessity make its mark--that of
rhythmical translation. In a body whose members are all more or less
scholarly, there will always be some, of special scholarship, who will
endeavour to put works of classic or foreign literature into an English
mould. Thus we have had Francis Fawkes, with his versions from the
Greek; Christopher Pitt, with his translation of the 'AEneid'; H. F.
Carey, with his Dante in blank verse; and more others than need be
specified. These clergymen followed the excellent instincts of their
cloth. But what are we to say of those otherwise estimable parsons who
have from time to time attempted, and occasionally with success, to win
fame as the authors of poetical drama? The connection between the
cassock and the buskin has, to this extent, always been fairly
intimate--from the time when Bishop Bale wrote mystery plays, to the
recent years in which Sheridan Knowles, after having been a dramatist
and an actor, closed his days as a preacher. Shirley, Mason, Home,
Milman, Croly, Maturin, White--these are names well known in the history
of the theatre, and they are all names of clerical association. Such has
been the fascination of the 'boards' even for those whose home has been
the pulpit and the cloister.