SUNDAY IN THE COUNTRY.
~Sonst stuerzte sich der Himmels-Liebe Kuss
Auf mich herab, in ernster Sabbathstille;
Da klang so ahndungsvoll des Glockentones Fuelle,
Und ein Gebet war bruenstiger Genuss:
Ein unbegreiflich holdes Sehnen
Trieb mich durch Wald und Wiesen hinzugehn,
Und unter tausend heissen Thraenen,
Fuehlt’ ich mir eine Welt entstehn.~
_Faust._
In other days, the kiss of heavenly love descended upon me in the
solemn stillness of the Sabbath; then the full-toned bell sounded so
fraught with mystic meaning, and a prayer was vivid enjoyment. A
longing, inconceivably sweet, drove me forth to wander over wood and
plain, and amid a thousand burning tears, I felt a world rise up to
me.
_Hayward’s Translation._
Goethe, in his Faust, has given a very lively description of a
German multitude bursting out of the city to enjoy an Easter
Sunday;--mechanics, students, citizens’ daughters, servant-girls,
townsmen, beggars, old women ready to tell fortunes, soldiers, and
amongst the rest, his hero Faust and his friend Wagner, proceeding to
enjoy a country walk. They reach a rising ground; and Faust says--“Turn
and look back from this rising ground upon the town. From forth the
gloomy portal presses a motley crowd. Every one suns himself delightedly
to-day. They celebrate the rising of the LORD, for they themselves have
arisen: from the dark rooms of mean houses; from the bondage of
mechanical drudgery; from the confinement of gables and roofs; from the
stifling narrowness of streets; from the venerable gloom of
churches--are they raised up to the open light of day. But look! look!
how quickly the mass is scattering itself through the gardens and
fields; how the river, broad and long, tosses many a merry bark upon its
surface; and how this last wherry, overladen almost to sinking, moves
off. Even from the farthest paths of the mountain, gay-coloured dresses
glance upon us. I hear already the bustle of the village. This is the
true heaven of the multitude; big and little are huzzaing joyously. Here
I am a man--here I may be one.”
Making allowance for the difference of national manners, this might
serve for a picture of Sunday in the neighbourhood of a large town in
England. Human nature is the same everywhere. The girls are looking out
for sweethearts; and both mechanics and students are seeking after the
best beer and the prettiest girl:
~Ein starkes bier, ein beitzender Toback,
Und eine Magd im Putz dass ist nun mein Geschmack.~
“Strong beer, stinging tobacco, and a girl all in her best,--that is the
taste for me,” cries one: and so it is here and everywhere. See how the
multitudes of our large manufacturing towns, and of London spend their
Sundays. They pour out into the country in all directions, but it is not
to enjoy the country only. They _do_ enjoy the country; but it is
because it heightens their wild delight in smoking, drinking, and
flirtation. Who does not know what innumerable haunts there are within
five, ten, or even twenty miles round London, to which these classes
repair on Sundays: tea-houses and tea-gardens, country inns,
hedge-alehouses, all the old and noted places where good beer and
tobacco, merry company, and noisy politics are to be found? Norwood,
Greenwich, Richmond, Hampton-Court, Windsor, the Nore, Herne-Bay,
Gravesend, Margate; and those old-fashioned places of resort that Hone
gives you glimpses of; such as Copenhagen-House, the Sluice-House,
Canonbury, etc.--what swarming votaries have they all.[30] And what an
immensity of new regions will the railroads that are now beginning to
stretch their lines from the metropolis in different directions, lay
open--_terræ incognitæ_, as it were, to the millions that in the dense
and ever-growing mass of monstrous London pant after an outburst into
the country. Truly may these say, through the medium of this modern and
most providential means of occasional dispersion:--
To morrow to fresh fields and pastures new!
[30] The following calculation, made on Whit-Monday 1835, may give
some idea of the number of similar pleasure-seekers on a fine summer
Sunday. On Monday, between eight in the morning and nine at night, 191
steam-vessels passed through the Pool to and from Margate, Herne-Bay,
Sheerness, Southend, the Nore, Gravesend, Woolwich, and Greenwich,
including several on their way to and from Scotland, Ireland, and the
Continent. Each vessel averaged, at least, 500 persons. The above
calculation was made by Mr. Brown, a boat-builder in Wapping, who with
his servants, watched them all day. But many passed after nine,
swelling the number to upwards of 200; so that more than 100,000
persons must have been afloat in the steamers on Monday, exclusive of
the passengers in small boats. Several steam-vessels carried 800 and
900 souls each to the Nore and back, One steam-vessel brought back
from Greenwich 1000 persons, another 1300, and a third was actually
crowded with 1500 passengers.
I well remember two ladies of high reputation in the literary world,
who, after reading Faust, were inspired with a desire to see how the
lower classes amused themselves on a Sunday in this country. It was,
they thought, a subject of profitable study. They could not divest
themselves of the idea that the people must wonderfully enjoy
themselves, in their own way; and perhaps they might imagine that they
should be received and complimented, as Faust and his friend Wagner
were. Well; the experiment was tried. Another gentleman and myself
accompanied them; and of all schemes we hit upon that of going by the
steam-packet to Richmond. It was a fine morning in May. Our packet and
another sailed from St. Katherine’s wharf with crowded decks, and a
bright sun over our heads, casting its animating glory upon tower and
town, over the majestic river, and the green country to which, anon, we
emerged. We swept under bridge after bridge, and saw the mighty
metropolis, with its vast wilderness of houses, wharfs, warehouses, and
great public buildings, rapidly glide away behind us; above all the
towers and spires of churches St. Paul’s lifting its solemn dome and
glittering cross; and then the villages, splendid villas, and beautiful
gardens, with the tall robinias in their new leaves, and covered with
their snow-white masses of flowers, in gay succession;--Lambeth,
Vauxhall, Chelsea, Battersea, Fulham, Putney, Barnes, Chiswick, Kew,
Richmond!--it was a fair and promising scene.
The people on board were well-dressed. There were some portly,
middle-aged dames, with gold watches at their sides, and clad in richest
silks; and there were some as lovely young ones as London could shew.
You were sure that there were plenty of the very-well-to-do-in-the-world
about you, if there were none of the very refined; substantial
tradespeople, that would have the best the world could procure in
eating, drinking, and dressing. And there was a knot of Germans too; men
with great mustachios and laced coats; and damsels from whose tongues
the strong, homely, expressive German speech seemed to fall wondrous
softly. It was quite an attractive circumstance: for our fair friends,
being just in the fresh fervour of studying “Die Deutche Sprache,” and
reading Faust, imagined every thing in them interesting, and doubtless
fancied them just such characters as Goethe would have drawn much out
of. All seemed promising, when lo! we were at Richmond, and every thing
had been only orderly, cheerful, and nothing more.
Ah well! this was English decorum on a Sunday; if it were not very
piquant, it was at least, very commendable. We stepped on shore,
lunched, strolled about on the terrace, amid streams of gay people; sat
on one of the seats, and gazed over that vast expanse of rich woodland,
meads, and villas; wandered down the green meadows towards Petersham and
Twickenham, into the woods below the Star-and-Garter, and back to the
packet. And now we were destined to see the character of the common
people on a Sunday jaunt. The moment the packet began to move, it began
to rain, and all the way it rained! rained! rained! The ladies took
refuge in the cabin. What a cabin! There were all the sober, orderly
throng of the morning, metamorphosed by the power of strong drink into a
rackety, roaring, drinking, smoking, insolent, and jammed-together crew.
The cabin was crushing full. The stairs were densely packed with people.
One of the ladies made a precipitate retreat upon deck, and there, with
only the protection of her parasol, stood with the patience of a martyr
and the temper of a saint, all the weary length of the voyage, through
dripping, drenching, never-ceasing rain! The other, with more fear of
her silks and satins, and determined to see what such a crowd _was_,
persisted in staying below. It was an act which only the highest heroism
could have maintained. There was a group taking tea at a side-table, all
well, very well-dressed people, and holding a conversation of such
language! such sentiments! such anecdotes! and accompanied with such
bursts of laughter! at what must have stricken people with any sense of
decency, dumb! And then there were those spruce youths, so modest in the
morning, now drinking pots of porter and smoking cigars. Yes, smoking
cigars, though the laws of the cabin, blazoned aloft, proclaimed--“No
smoking allowed in the cabin!”--Spite of all cabin, or cabinet, or
parliamentary laws, they drank, they smoked, they rolled voluminous
clouds from one to another; and when requested to desist, said--“O,
certainly! It is perfectly insufferable for people to smoke in such
company; they ought to be turned out.” And then all laughed together at
their own wit. The captain was called, and begged to enforce his own
law; and they cried, “O yes, captain! certainly, certainly,” and then
laughed again; and the captain smiled, and withdrew: for what captain
could seriously forbid smoke and drink that were purchased of himself?
These drapers’ apprentices and shopmen, for such they seemed, gloried in
annoying the whole company; and for this purpose, they placed themselves
by the open window, so that the draft carried the smoke across all the
place. There did but prove to be one real gentleman in the whole troop,
who accommodated the lady with a seat--for not a soul besides would
stir--and said, as he saw her annoyance; for with all her endurance,
this was visible--“Madam, what a hell we have got into!”
And such, thought I, is a specimen of the populace of the mighty and
enlightened London! Truly the schoolmaster has work enough yet before
him.
It was a party in a parlour,
Crammed just as they on land are crammed;
Some sipping punch, some sipping tea,
All noisy, and all damned!
Our fair friends wished to see the character of the common people in
their Sunday recreations, and they saw here a specimen that, I feel
persuaded, will satisfy them for life. One, at least, saw this; for the
other stood stoically silent upon deck, and saw nothing but rain! rain!
rain! O the weary time of that voyage! amid oaths and clamour, vulgarity
in all its shapes of swaggering, or maudlin foolishness, riot of action,
and indecorum of speech, drinking, smoking, crushing, laughing,
swearing,--a confusion carried along the fair Thames, and into the heart
of London, worse than that of Babel, and worthy of Pandemonium. How many
thousands of such Sunday revellers, steeped in drink, and roystering
vulgarity, were pouring into that mighty heart of civilization and
Christian knowledge, at the moment we joyfully skipped up
Westminster-stairs, and thanked heaven that the Goethe experiment was
over.
What London exhibits on its own great scale, all our populous
manufacturing towns exhibit, each in its own degree. It is curious to
observe from the earliest hour of a Sunday morning, in fine weather,
what groups are pouring out into the country. There are mechanics who,
in their shops and factories,--while they have been caged up by their
imperious necessities during the week, and have only obtained thence
sights of the clear blue sky above, of the green fields laughing far
away, or have only caught the wafting of a refreshing gale on their
fevered cheek as they hurried homeward to a hasty meal, or back again to
the incarceration of Mammon,--have had their souls inflamed with desires
for breaking away into the free country. These have been planning, day
after day, whither they shall go on Sunday. To what distant village; to
what object of attraction. There have come visions of a neat country
alehouse to them; its clean hearth, sanded floor; its capital ale, and
aromatic pipe after a long walk; its pure unadulterated fare, sweet
bread, savoury rashers of bacon, beef steaks and onions, and all with
most mouth-watering odours. Others have seen clear hurrying
trout-streams, or deep still fish-ponds, lying all along wild moors, or
amid tangled woods; and they have determined to be with them. They will
take angle and net; they will strip off clothes, and take the trout with
their hands, from under the grassy banks of their little swift streams.
They will have a dash at the squire’s carp, when he and all his people
are at church. And, in other seasons, mushroom gathering, and nutting,
and all kinds of what is called Sabbath-breaking, come before them with
an unconquerable impetus. For to their minds--neglected, but full of
strong desires and pent-up energies--nature’s delights, wild pursuits,
bodily refreshments, and the enjoyment of one day’s full freedom from
towns, red walls, dry pavements, shops, masters, and even wives and
children, are mixed up into a strange, but wonderfully bewitching
excitement. These are going off, before the world in general is awake,
at four, five, or six o’clock in a morning, in clusters of twos and
threes, sixes and sevens, with long and eager strides, stout sticks in
their hands, and faces set towards the country with a determined
expression of fresh-air hungriness. And there, again, are going the
bird-catchers; two or three of them, with two or three children with
them, perhaps. They have some far-off green lane, or furzy common, or
airy down in their mind, to which they are hastening with their cages,
carried under a piece of green baize, or blinded with a handkerchief.
All the way will they stalk on at a four-mile rate, and these little
lads--the least not more than five years old--will go on trotting after
them, and never think of weariness till all the sport is over, and they
are making their way homeward in the evening. Then shall you see them
dragged along by one of their father’s hands; for the men will not
slacken pace for them, but pull them along with them; and you will see
those little legs go on, trot, trot, trot, till you think they will
actually be worn to the stumps before they reach home. These men and
eager lads you will find in some solitary spot seven or eight miles off,
if you go out so far, seated silently under a tall hedge or old tree, or
in some moorland thicket, watching their apparatus, which is placed at a
distance; their tame bird, of the species they are seeking to take,
chained by its leg to a crossed stick, or a bough thrust into the
ground. There it is, hopping about and chirping in the sunshine; and
around stand cages containing other decoy birds, and other cages ready
to receive the unsuspicious birds, that, attracted by the hopping and
chirping of their captive kinsmen, will presently come and alight near
them, and speedily get entangled in the limed twigs that are disposed
about, or will find the net that is ready spread for them, come swoop
over them. Every person who has walked the streets of London, has seen
the crowds of these little captives, larks, woodlarks, linnets,
goldfinches, nightingales, etc., in the shops, which have been thus
caught on all the great heaths and downs, for twenty miles round the
metropolis, by fowlers, who are nearly always thus employed there.
Then, again, you see another Sunday class; tradesmen, shopkeepers, and
their assistants and apprentices,--all those who have friends in the
country,--on horseback or in gigs, driving off to spend the day with
those that come occasionally and pay them a visit at markets and fairs.
The faces of these are set for farm and other country-houses within
twenty miles round. There is not a horse or gig to be had for love or
money at any of the livery-stables on a Sunday. These hebdomadal
rusticators,--these good dinner-eaters, fruit-devourers,
curd-and-cream-consumers, pipe-smokers, and loungers in gardens,
garden-arbours, crofts, orchards,--these soi-disant judges of cattle,
crops, dogs, guns, game,--these haunters of country-houses,
complimenters of country beauties, and lovers of good country
fare,--have got them all. Yes, yes, many a pleasant Sunday in the
country do these men spend after their fashion,--none of the worst, if
none of the holiest; and yet they go to the village church too
sometimes, and wonder that so fine a preacher should be hidden in such a
place. Towards nine or ten o’clock in the evening, they will be pouring
back into the town as blithely as they rolled out in the morning, being
now primed with all those good things that lured them away so sharply
after breakfast.
And, when they were gone, how sunnily and cheerily passed the day in the
town; the merry bells all ringing, the gay people all abroad, streaming
along the smooth pavements to church or chapel, or for the forenoon and
evening promenade, in their fresh and handsome attire. Such troops of
lovely women, such counterpoising numbers of goodly and well-dressed
men: all squalor, and poverty, and trouble, and distress, shrunk
backward into the alleys and dens out of sight; all cares and
tradesmanship shut up in the closed shops and warehouses; and nothing
but ease, leisure, bravery of equipment, and shew of wealth, walking in
the face of the sun, as if there was no reason why they should not walk
there for ever. The very beggars are gone, like swallows in autumn--not
one to be seen, except in the secret rendezvous where they pass one
long day of luxurious idleness. The barrack has sent forth its troop of
soldiers in their rich full-dress. They have marched with sounding music
to the great church, with their usual crowd of boys and idle men after
them. And then, morning, noon, or evening, you have seen a group of
people collect in the market-place, or some open street, that has grown
and grown into a large, dense crowd; and then you have seen a man
suddenly appear, with bare head, and book in hand, in the centre. This
is some field-preacher; one of many hundreds that on this day, in towns,
villages, rural lanes, or on heaths and commons, go out to preach to
them who are too indifferent, or too shabby, to come into a respectable
place of worship.
We often think how strange it would have been to have lived in the days
of the Reformation, or of the Puritans, when men full of zeal went to
and fro, through the length and breadth of the land, to denounce the
dominant form of religion, and preach repentance and salvation from the
Bible. We have not the opposition and the persecution now, or we should
have just such men and such scenes. There is such freedom for every man
to choose his own mode of worship, and the religiously inclined have so
many modes to choose from, and to associate them with a circle of people
so much after their own hearts, that they have no impulse to seek
further; no, not to seek after those who have no particular desire to be
found; they think it enough that they have chapel-room and open doors
for those who will come. It is chiefly, therefore, the poor that are
left to seek after the poor; that feel it incumbent to “go out into the
highways and hedges and compel them to come in.” The mechanic, who has
been labouring hard all the week in his worldly vocation, now shaves and
washes, and dresses the best he may, and goes forth, fearing not the
sneers and the scorn of the great and learned, of the worldly-wise and
genteel, but comes into the very face of them, and before their gay
windows in the open square; often before the lofty church and majestic
cathedral, whose organ-tones are deeply pealing in his ears. There he
lifts up his homely features, his rudely clipped head; there he lifts up
his horny hand, that has for many a year dealt sturdy strokes to
inanimate matter, and now deals, with tenfold zeal, strokes as hard to
hearts as hard. There he lifts up his voice in no finely modulated or
practised tones, but with earnest pleadings and awful threatenings and
unfoldings of God’s judgments on the wicked and careless; and then, with
as earnest and affectionate expositions of his mercies, arrests,
terrifies, melts, and fills with new sensations and desires the hearts
of his fellows in the lowest regions of human life, who have lived
beyond the sound of heavenly promises, and of God’s love and fear in a
great measure, “because no one cared for their souls.”
The wise may wonder; the learned may curl the lip of classical pride;
the gay and the happy, who live in splendid houses, and worship in
splendid pews and beneath high and arched roofs, may pass by, and not
even glance on the poor illiterate preacher and his spell-bound
audience; but that man is, after all, a patriot and a scholar; a good
subject of the realm--a good servant of heaven; and will probably effect
more real benefit in one day, than a dozen of us, who think sufficiently
well of our services to the commonwealth, shall effect in all our lives:
and till some comprehensive plan is adopted, by which the Sabbath may
lay all its advantages, all its holy peace, all its knowledge and
heavenly fruition, before every man, woman and child, in this great
empire, he must and shall do what he can to supply the deficiency. With
all his ignorance,--and he has much,--he has learned what is necessary
for the good of his own spirit, and the strength of natural sympathy has
taught him the way to communicate it to the hearts of his fellows. He
knows the language, the style, the tone of sentiment and the species of
argument that the soonest reaches them. He knows their besetments and
their wants, for he has been pursued by the same needs, tainted by the
same corruptions, baptized into the same distresses; he has an
experimental knowledge that no man of another class can have. With all
his extravagance,--and he has much,--he has not half the amount that we
daily see in more dignified places; and for the wildness, the error, the
eccentricity of his doctrines, ah! how much more readily could we match
them in those after whom carriages roll, and the world runs, and on whom
honours and wealth are heaped as an inadequate reward. See there, how he
extends his arms! how he beats the air! how he strains every muscle, and
exerts every fibre of his frame, till the perspiration rolls from his
heated brow; how he thunders, and makes the whole great area ring with
the outbreak of his terrors, his adjurations, and his appeals! And yet,
from the simple table on which he is mounted shall no folly proceed,
that has not its counterpart in the most dignified pulpit, wholly
freed--and that is a world of advantage--from the freezing indifference
that fills thousands with its torpidity.
For the seamen, London and Liverpool, and other ports, offer their
floating or seamen’s chapels, where they may hear the gospel preached in
a language that goes straight to their hearts and understandings, but
which a landsman would attempt in vain. Like the lower orders in
general, they have a language and an experience of their own, and the
man who preaches to them in another language, and with other imagery,
cannot keep alive their attention, however eloquent, or however learned;
and he who attempts their language without a practical knowledge of
their life, only excites their ridicule. It is even necessary,
occasionally, to accommodate the language of Scripture to their ideas
and experience. A very popular preacher once requested permission to
address the sailors in their floating chapel at Liverpool, and,
attempting seamen’s language, told them that he who secured an interest
in Christ, cast anchor on a rock! At once all eyebrows were elevated in
amazement, and broad grins overspread every face. “Hear him! Hear him!”
they cried, one to another, “he talks of casting anchor _on a rock_!”
Yet there was no uncommon hardness, or propensity to scoffing in these
men; on the contrary, it was admirable to see, when Captain Scoresby,
the well-known northern voyager, addressed them, how they kindled with
interest, and melted down in emotion: when he told them how Christ
preached in a ship, how he loved the mariners of his days, the tears
started from their eyes, and rolled over scores of hardy cheeks that had
faced the fiercest gales, and been tanned by the hottest suns. It was,
and is still, I doubt not, delightful to see such an audience. There was
the smart sailor and his smart lass; others with their wives and
families; and old men who had spent the greatest portion of a long life
on the seas. Such a collection of black and curly heads, of bushy
whiskers, of the thin and white hair of age, of eyes gleaming with youth
and life, or dimmed by the extremity of years!--such an intent and
childlike throng of listeners! all so little accustomed to artifice,--to
conceal or feel shame for their emotions,--that the changes of their
expressions were as rapid and striking as those of the sun and wind on
their own element. There sate some happy fathers, with their children on
their knees, as though they saw so little of them, had found them so
lately, or must leave them so soon, that they could not have them near
enough. There sate strong men, touched to the depth of their hearts by
the pathos of the preacher, leaning against the side of the cabin, and
weeping unrestrained tears, or listening, with lips apart, in breathless
attention; and there sate women, who, when winds and tempests were
mentioned, turned a fond, anxious look to some dear one sitting by them;
and others, who when the voyagers at sea were prayed for, clasped their
hands, and looked to heaven unutterable things. Great must be the
comfort and the blessing of thus bringing Christianity to the knowledge
of our seafaring men. Great has been its effect amongst the fishermen of
Cornwall, as any one may see, who will visit the crowded chapels of St.
Ives, and other places.
But there is still another class of preachers that may be encountered on
Sundays: the disciples of Irving. None of your simple mechanics, but
gentlemen--gentlemen in appearance, in manners, in education. You will
see such a one pulling out his pocket Bible, in some public situation,
and beginning to address the two or three that happen to stand near. The
singularity of the thing soon attracts others; there begins to be a
moving from all parts towards that spot, till there is at length a large
and dense crowd. There, in the midst of this wondering and promiscuous
circle, in the most cultivated tones, with the most proper action, and
in the purest language, you hear, perhaps, the Honourable and Reverend
---- himself, “dealing damnation round the land;” depicting his audience
in the most fearful colours, as fallen, utterly corrupt, blackened with
every imaginable sin, and wandering blindfold on the very brink of hell.
In the opinion of some of these preachers, all the world is lying in
ignorance and sin; all other preachers of all other creeds are blind
leaders of the blind; to him and his few coadjutors alone has the
mystery of godliness been revealed; “they are the men, and wisdom shall
die with them.” I must confess that to me, this cold Calvinism, this
abusive and declamatory zeal, though coming from very gentlemanly
mouths, is not a thousandth part so attractive as the warm-hearted,
liberal, and affectionate addresses of the illiterate mechanic. Nay, to
me it is excessively repulsive; and I would much rather find myself in
some far-off village, in some green lane, or on the heath, where such
are holding their summer camp-meeting.
I love the sound of hymns
On some bright Sabbath morning, on the moor
Where all is still save praise; and where hard by
The ripe grain shakes its bright beard in the sun:
The wild bee hums more solemnly: the deep sky;
The fresh green grass, the sun, and sunny brook,--
All look as if they knew the day, the hour,
And felt with man the need and joy of thanks.
PHILIP BAILEY’S _Festus_.
There at least are warmth and enthusiasm; there at least, if there be
extravagance, is also an exhibition of much character, and plenty of the
picturesque. A crowd of rustic people is assembled; a wagon is drawn
thither for a stage, and in it stand men with black skull-caps, or
coloured handkerchiefs tied upon their heads to prevent taking cold
after their violent exertions; men of those grave and massy, or thin,
worn, and sharp features, that tell of strong, rude intellects, or
active and consuming spirits; men in whose bright, quick eyes, or still,
deep gaze, from beneath shaggy brows, you read passions that will
lighten, or a shrewdness that will tell with strong effect. In their
addresses you are continually catching the most picturesque expressions,
the most unlooked-for illustrations,--often the most irresistibly
amusing. I heard one edifying his audience with an account of the apples
of the Dead Sea, gathered most likely, at a tenth transmission, from
Adam Clarke’s Commentaries. “Ay,” said he, “sin is fair to look at, but
foul to taste. It is like those apples that grow by the _Red Sea_. They
are yellow as gold on one side, and rosy-cheeked as a fair maid of a
morning on the other; but bite them,--yes, I say bite them, and they are
full of pepper and mustard!”
Another was talking of God’s goodness, and applying Christ’s
illustration: “‘If you ask your father for bread, will he give you a
stone?’ Now, my brethren I don’t mean a stone of bread,--Christ didn’t
mean a stone of bread: for, may be, it was not sold by the stone in his
time; and he would not be a bad father neither, that gave you a stone of
bread at a time; but I mean a stone from the road,--a real pebble, as
cold as charity, as bare as the back of my hand, and as hard as the
heart of a sinner.”
Now, none but those who had known the immense value of a stone of bread
would be likely to think of such a thing, or to guard against such a
mistake. But with such laughable errors, with much ignorance and
outrageous cant, there is often mixed up a rude intellectual strength,
and a freshness of thought that never knew the process of taming and
trammelling called education, and that fears no criticism; and flashes
of poetical light, that please the more for the rudeness of their
accompaniment. There are women, too, that exhort in soft voices and
pathetic tones on such occasions; and, suddenly the crowd will divide
itself into several companies, and go singing to different parts of the
field. Their hymns have a wild vivacity, a metaphoric boldness, and
strange as it may seem, a greater spirituality about them than those of
any other English sect that I have come in contact with. It is well
known that they are set to some of the finest and liveliest, and most
touching song-tunes; and hence, perhaps partly their startling effect;
having divested themselves of that dry and dolorous monotony that hangs
about sectarian hymns in general. They describe the Christian life under
the figure of battles and campaigns, with “Christ their conquering
captain” at their head; as pilgrimages, and night-watches; and hence
their addresses are full of the most vivid imagery. I well remember, in
the dusk of a fine summer evening, the moon hanging in the far western
sky, the dark leaves of the brookside alders rustling in the twilight
air, hearing, from the dim heath where they were holding their
camp-meetings, the wild sound of one of these hymns. It was the dialogue
of a spirit questioning and answering itself in the passage of death and
the entrance into the happy land, and the chorused words of “All is
well!--All is well!” came over the shadowy waste with an unearthly
effect.
Singing then, such hymns,--but on these occasions chiefly of
supplication or triumph,--they kneel down, each company in a circle; the
leaders pray; and it is curious to see what looks of holy jealousy are
cast from one circle to another, as the voice of one leader predominates
over those of the others by its vehemence, its loudness, or its
eloquence; drawing speedily away all the audience of the less gifted. It
is scarcely now to be expected that we shall ever find a Whitefield, a
Wesley, a Fox, or a Bunyan, on such an occasion, but from the effect of
the enthusiasm, the earnestness, the wild energy and rude eloquence,
that I _have_ seen in a few humble men, I can well imagine, with Lord
Byron, what must be the impression made by one strong mind under the
broad blue sky, and amid the accompanying picturesqueness of scene and
people.
But let us away into the far, far country! Into the still, pure,
unadulterated country. Ah! here indeed is a Sabbath! What a sunny peace,
what a calm yet glad repose lies on its fair hills; over all its solemn
woods! How its flowery dales, and deep, secluded valleys reflect the
holy tranquillity of heaven! It is morning; and the sun comes up the sky
as if he knew it was a day of universal pause in the workings of the
world; he shines over the glittering dews, and green leaves, and ten
thousand blossoms; and the birds fill the blue fresh air with a rapture
of music. The earth looks new and beautiful as on the day of its
creation; but it is as full of rest as if it drew near to its close--all
its revolutions past, all its turbulence hushed, all its mighty griefs
healed, its mysterious destinies accomplished; and the light of eternity
about to break over it with a new and imperishable power. Man rests from
his labours, and every thing rests with him. There lie the weary steeds
that have dragged the chain, and smarted under the lash--that have
pulled the plough and the ponderous wagon, or flown over hill and dale
at man’s bidding; there they lie, on the slope of the sunny field; and
the very sheep and cattle seem imbued with their luxurious enjoyment of
rest. The farmer has been walking into his fields, looking over this
gate and that fence, into enclosures of grass, mottled with flowers like
a carpet, or rich green corn growing almost visibly; at his cattle and
his flock; and now he comes back with leisurely steps, and enters the
shady quiet of his house. And it _is_ a shady quiet. The sun glances
about its porch, and flickers amongst the leaves on the wall, and the
sparrows chirp, and fly to and fro; but the dog lies and slumbers on
the step of the door, or only raises his head to snap at the flies that
molest him. The very cat, coiled up on a sunbright border in the garden,
sleeps voluptuously:--within, all is cleanness and rest. There is none
of the running and racketing of the busy week-day: the pressing of
curds, and shaping and turning of cheese; the rolling of the
barrel-churn; the scouring of pails; the pumping, and slopping, and
working, and chattering, and singing, and scolding of dairymaids. All
that can be dispensed with, is, and what must be done is done quietly,
and is early away. There is a clean, cool parlour; the open window lets
in the odour of the garden--the yet cool and delicious odour, and the
hum of bees. Flowers stand in their pots in the window; gathered flowers
stand on the breakfast table; and the farmer’s comely wife, already
dressed for the day, as she sees him come in, sits down to pour out his
coffee. Over the croft-gate the labourers are leaning, talking of the
last week’s achievements, and those of the week to come; and in many a
cottage garden the cottagers, with their wives and children, are
wandering up and down, admiring the growth of this and that; and every
one settles in his own mind, that his cabbages, and peas, and beans are
the best in the whole country; and that as for currants, gooseberries,
apricots, and strawberries, there never were such crops since trees and
bushes grew.
But the bells ring out from the old church tower. The pastor is already
issuing from his pleasant parsonage; groups of peasantry are already
seen streaming over the uplands towards the village. In the lanes, gay
ribbons and Sunday-gowns glance from between the trees, and every house
sends forth its inhabitants to worship. Blessings on those old grey
fabrics, that stand on many a hill and in many a lowly hollow, all over
this beloved country; for much as we reprobate that system of private or
political patronage by which unqualified, unholy, and unchristian men
have sometimes been thrust into their ancient pulpits, I am of Sir
Walter Scott’s opinion, that no places are so congenial to the holy
simplicity of Christian worship as they are. They have an air of
antiquity about them--a shaded sanctity, and stand so venerably amid the
most English scenes, and the tombs of generations of the dead, that we
cannot enter them without having our imaginations and our hearts
powerfully impressed with every feeling and thought that can make us
love our country, and yet feel that it is not our abiding place. Those
antique arches, those low massy doors, were raised in days that are long
gone by; around these walls, nay, beneath our very feet, sleep those
who, in their generations, helped, each in his little sphere, to build
up England to her present pitch of greatness. We catch glimpses of that
deep veneration, of that unambitious simplicity of mind and manner that
we would fain hold fast amid our growing knowledge, and its inevitable
remodelling of the whole framework of society. We are made to feel
earnestly the desire to pluck the spirit of faith, the integrity of
character, and the whole heart of love to kin and country, out of the
ignorance and blind subjection of the past. Therefore is it that I have
always loved the village church, that I have delighted to stroll far
through the summer fields; and hear still onward its bells ringing
happily; to enter and sit down amongst its rustic congregation,--better
pleased with their murmur of responses, and their artless but earnest
chant, than with all the splendour and parade of more lofty fabrics.
Therefore is it that I long to see the people rescued from the thraldom
of aristocratic patronage, that they may select at their own will, the
pious and pure hearted to fill every pulpit in the land, and station in
every parish a lover of God, a lover of the country, and a lover of the
poor.
But Sunday morning is past: the afternoon is rolling away; but it shall
not roll away without its dower of happiness shed on every down, and
into every beautiful vale of this fair kingdom. Closed are the doors of
the church, but opened are those of thousands and tens of thousands of
dwellings to receive friends and kindred. And around the pleasant
tea-table, happy groups are gathering in each other’s houses, freed from
the clinging, pressing, enslaving cares of the six days; and sweetly,
and full of renewing strength to the heart, does the evening there roll
away. And does it not roll as sweetly where, by many a cottage-door, the
aged grandfather and grandmother sit with two generations about them,
and bask in another glorious Sabbath sunset? And is it not sweet where
friends stroll through the delicious fields, in high or cheerful talk;
along the green lane, or broom-engoldened hill-side; or down into the
woodland valley, where the waters run clear and chimingly, amid the
dipping grass and the brooklime; and the yellow beams of the descending
sun glance serenely amongst the trees? And is it not sweet where, on
some sequestered stile, sit two happy lovers, or where they stray along
some twilight path, and the woodbine and the wild-rose are drooping
their flowery boughs over them, while earth and heaven, supremely lovely
in themselves, take new and divine hues from their own passionate
spirits; and youth and truth are theirs: the present is theirs in love,
the future is theirs in high confidence: all that makes glorious the
life of angels is theirs for the time. Yes! all through the breadth of
this great land,--through its cities, its villages, its fair fields, its
liberated millions are walking in the eye of heaven, drinking in its
sublime calm, refreshed by its gales, soothed by the peaceful beauty of
the earth. There is a pause of profound, holy tranquillity, in which
twilight drops down upon innumerable roofs, and prayers ascend from
countless hearths in city and in field, on heath and mountain,--and
then, ’tis gone; and the Sabbath is ended.
But blessings, and ten thousand blessings be upon that day; and let
myriads of thanks stream up to the Throne of God, for this divine and
regenerating gift to man. As I have sate in some flowery dale, with the
sweetness of May around me, on a week-day, I have thought of all the
millions of immortal creatures toiling for their daily life in factories
and shops, amid the whirl of machinery and the greedy cravings of
mercantile gain, and suddenly this golden interval of time has lain
before me in all its brightness,--a time, and a perpetually recurring
time, in which the iron grasp of earthly tyranny is loosed, and Peace,
Faith, and Freedom, the angels of God, come down and walk once more
amongst men!
Ten thousand blessings on this day, the friend of man and beast. The
bigot would rob it of its healthful freedom, on the one hand, and coop
man up in his work-a-day dungeons, and cause him to walk with downcast
eyes and demure steps; and the libertine would desecrate all its sober
decorum on the other. God, and the sound heart and sterling sense of
Englishmen, preserve it from both these evils! Let us still avoid
Puritan rigidity, and French dissipation. Let our children and our
servants, and those who toil for us in vaults, and shops, and
factories, between the intervals of solemn worship have freedom to walk
in the face of heaven and the beauty of earth, for in the great temple
of nature stand together, Health and Piety. For myself, I speak from
experience, it has always been my delight to go out on a Sunday, and
like Isaac, meditate in the fields, and especially, in the sweet
tranquillity and amid the gathering shadows of evening; and never in
temple or in closet, did more hallowed influences fall upon my heart.
With the twilight and the hush of earth, a tenderness has stolen upon
me; a desire for every thing pure and holy; a love for every creature on
which God has stamped the wonder of his handiwork; but especially for
every child of humanity; and then have I been made to feel that there is
no Oratory like that which has heaven itself for its roof, and no
teaching like the teaching of the SPIRIT which created, and still
overshadows the world with its Infinite wings.
[Illustration]