pronounced upon it by the Venerable Archdeacon Sinclair, of great
St. Paul’s. “A pagan city”--he said, or was reported to say--“with
churches glimmering here and there like fairy lamps twinkling in the
spaces of darkness upon a lawn. Like fairy lamps, they serve to show
the darkness rather than to illuminate it.” It was in a manner striking
and curious that the Archdeacon should have chosen such a simile as
“fairy lamps” for the Churches. It was an unconsciously happy hit--no
doubt absolutely unintentional. But it described the Churches of to-day
with marvellous exactitude. They are “fairy lamps”--no more!--only
fit for show--of no use in a storm--and quenched easily with a
strong puff of wind. Fairy lamps!--not strong or steady beacons--not
lighthouses in the rough sea of life, planted bravely on impregnable
rocks of faith to which the drowning sailor may cling for rescue and
haply find life again. Fairy lamps! Multiply them by scores, good
Archdeacon!--quadruple them in every corner of this “pagan” city of
ours, over which the heart of every earnest thinker must yearn with a
passion of love and pity, and they shall be no use whatever to light
the blackness of one soul’s midnight of despair! “Pagan London!” The
roaring, rushing crowd--the broad deep river of suffering, working,
loving, struggling humanity, sweeping on, despite itself, to the
limitless sea of Death,--every unit in the mass craving for sympathy,
praying for guidance, longing for comfort, trying to discover ways out
of pain and grief, and hoping to find God somehow and somewhere--and
naught but “fairy lamps”--twinkling doubtfully, making the gloom more
visible, the uncertainty of the gathering shadows more confusing and
misleading!--“fairy lamps” of which the “Church of the Laodiceans,” so
strongly reproved by the “Spirit” in the Revelation of St. John the
Divine, must have been the originator and precursor--“I know thy works,
that thou art neither cold nor hot; I would thou wert cold or hot. So,
because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spue thee
out of my mouth!”
It is perhaps to be doubted whether any Churchman, no matter how
distinguished, learned, fashionable or popular, has the right to call
London or any city which is under the Christian dispensation “pagan.”
No one man can honestly say he has probed the heart of another,--and
if this be true, as it undoubtedly is, still less can one man assume
to judge the faith or the emotions of six million hearts--six million
striving, working and struggling souls. That even a handful of the
six million should still wander towards “fairy lamp” Churches, in
the hope to find warmth and luminance for their poor lives in such
flickering and easily quenched sparks of life, speaks volumes for the
touching faith, the craving hope, the desire of ultimate good, which
animates our “pagan” citizens. For, if after two thousand years of
Christianity, some of them are still passionately asking to be taught
and guided, still praying for strength and courage to fight against
many natural besetting sins, and still seeking after such pure ideals
of work and attainment as can alone make life worth living, it is not
they, surely, who merit the term “pagan.” They should not be so much
blamed as compassionated, if, when searching for God’s fair and open
sunshine, they only stumble at the “fairy lamps,” and, angered thereby,
turn altogether away into the outer darkness. Such a term as “pagan”
can be applied with far more justice to their teachers and preachers,
who, having all the means of help and consolation at their disposal,
fail to perform their high duties with either power, conviction or
effect. It is quite easy to say “Pagan London,” but what if one spoke
of “pagan clergy”? What of certain ecclesiastics who do not believe
one word of the creed they profess, and who daily play the part of
Judas Iscariot over again in taking money for a new betrayal of Christ?
What of the ordained ministers of Christianity who are un-Christian
in every word and act of their daily lives? What of the surpliced
hypocrites who preach to others what they never even try to practise?
What of certain vicious and worldly clerical _bon-vivants_, who may
constantly be met with in the houses of wealthy and titled persons,
“clothed in fine linen and faring sumptuously every day,” talking
unsavoury society scandal with as much easy glibness as any dissolute
“lay” decadent that ever cozened another man’s wife away from the path
of honour in the tricky disguise of a “Soul”? What of the spiteful,
small-minded, quarrelsome “local” parsons, who, instead of fostering
kindness, neighbourliness, goodwill and unity among their parishioners,
set them all by the ears, and play the petty tyrant with a domineering
obstinacy which is rather worse than pagan, being purely barbarous?
Many cases could easily be quoted where the childish, not to say
querulous, pettiness of the ruling vicar of a country parish has helped
to narrow, coarsen, and deteriorate the spirit of a whole community,
spreading mean jealousies, fostering cheap rivalries, and making every
soul in the place, from Sunday school children up to poor workhouse
octogenarians, irritable, discontented and unhappy. And if the word
“pagan” be used at all, should it not be particularly and specially
applied to those theatrical dignitaries of the Church whose following
of the simple and beautiful doctrine of Christ consists in sheer
disobedience to His commands--disobedience openly displayed in the
ornate ritual and “vain repetitions” which Christ expressly forbade.
“For all their works they do to be seen of men; they make broad their
phylacteries, and enlarge the borders of their garments.” And while
“enlarging the borders of their garments” they institute “processional”
services and promenades round the “fairy lamp” churches, with various
altar-bobbings and other foolish ceremonies, caring nothing for the
_Spirit_ of the faith, if only all forms and observances, imported
from Rome, or from still older “pagan” rites than the Roman, namely,
the Græco-Egyptian, may be in some way introduced into the simple and
unaffected form of prayer authorized by the Church of England. Disloyal
to both God and the King, the “pagan clergy” are doing more at this
present day to injure the cause of true religion among the masses than
is any lack of zeal or want of faith that may exist in the people
themselves. Who can blame sensible men and women for staying away from
church, when in nine cases out of ten they know that the officiating
minister is less Christian, less enlightened, less charitable and
kind-hearted than themselves? Canon Allen Edwards, in an admirable
letter addressed to the Press, put the case of “pagan London” very
clearly. He says: “We do not want new churches.” True. No more “fairy
lamps” are required for the general misleading of the straying sheep.
He adds: “We want new men.”
This is the real need--men! Men of thought--men of heart,--men of
true conviction, ardent faith, passionate exaltation, and unceasing
devotion,--men who will not play about with “show” services, like
amateur actors in a charity performance,--but who will sincerely care
for and sympathize with their fellow-creatures, and will offer up the
prayer and praise of humanity to an all-wise Omnipotence with that deep
heartfelt fervour which is always expressed in the utmost simplicity
of form and language,--men who have the intelligence to understand
intelligent people, and who are as able to deal sympathetically
with the spiritual troubles and perplexities of an educated person
as with those of the ill-taught and frequently ill-fed rustic,--men
who, if they preach, can find something to say of the marvels of this
God-born creation of which we are a part--who will teach as well as
admonish,--and who will take reverent care not to set the Almighty
Creator within a small circle of their own special form of orthodoxy,
and condemn every creature that wanders outside that exclusive “fairy
lamp” enclosure. Canon Allen Edwards further remarked that “The reason
why the working classes do not go to church is the same reason why I
do not go to the Derby, not because I think it wrong, for I have no
opinion on the subject, but because I have no interest in the things
that go on there. And this is the reason, and no other, why many men
do not go to church. They are not interested in what is done there....
A large number of those who are going into the ministry to-day are,
for one most essential part of their work, entirely without the first
elements of equipment. They cannot preach, and they are not helped to
try and learn, and yet preaching is that very part of their work for
which the people expect, and have a right to expect, equipment of the
highest order.”
The Canon says: “they cannot preach.” That is true enough, but why?
I maintain that if they _felt_ their mission, they could preach it.
If they loved their fellow-creatures a thousand times better than
themselves, as they should do, they would find much of greatness,
beauty and truth to say! If they honoured and worshipped their Divine
Master as they profess to honour and worship Him, there would be little
lack of spirit or of eloquence! People always know when a speaker or a
preacher is _in earnest_. He may have a faulty utterance--his elocution
may be far from perfect, but if the _heart_ attunes the voice, the
voice carries. There are many hundreds of noble clergy--but they are
fewer than the ignoble of the same calling. And many there are, not
only ignoble in themselves, but who attempt to pervert their very
churches to illegitimate uses. I quote the following from a letter
addressed to me on one occasion by a notorious “minister” of the Gospel.
“As the vicar of one of the largest parishes in England, I am often
put to it how best to attract to the church the careless and the
indifferent. Though a very strong High Anglican, I am an intense
believer in the Priesthood of the Laity. It is the one weak spot in
the Church’s system that she does not, as do the non-conformists, make
sufficient use of and properly appreciate the services of her lay
members. It has occurred to me therefore this year that by way of a
start in this direction I should ask the help of certain leading people
in the Literary, Dramatic and Artistic worlds. My friend, Mrs. X.,
has already made a beginning by reciting two poems in my Church, and
thereby moving intensely a congregation of upwards of 3,000 people.”
Now Mrs. X. was, and is, a well-known actress, and she recited the
two poems in question _from the chancel steps at the conclusion of
the Sunday evening service_. I am told, (though for this I will not
vouch,) that money was taken at the church doors, and seats reserved
and paid for, precisely as if the sacred building had been suddenly
metamorphosed into a theatre or music hall. It never seemed to occur to
the reverend gentleman who is the proprietor of this once “consecrated”
building, that if he could not attract to his church “the careless
and indifferent,” the fault probably lay in himself and his general
unfitness. As a “very strong High Anglican” he would naturally have
leanings towards the theatre and its lime-light effects, and _certes_,
the “Priesthood of the Laity,” whatever may be meant by that term, is
more to be believed in than the Priesthood of this particular ordained
“priest” who instituted and encouraged a kind of stage recital from the
steps of a sacred chancel, where the actor or actress concerned was
invited to declaim his or her lines, with back turned to the Altar, the
Communion-table serving as the “scenery.” Such men as these are the
real “pagans,” and they do infinite harm to the dignity and purity of
the Christian doctrine by their unworthy and debasing example. Churches
under their dominance are less than “fairy lamps” in their influence
for good,--they are the mere flare of stage footlights, showing up the
grease-paint and powder of the clerical mime.
A deep religious sentiment lies at the hearts of the British people,
as indeed of all peoples in the world. No nation, small or great,
was ever entirely given over to atheism. If atheism and indifference
affect a few, or even a majority of persons, the fault is assuredly
with those who are elected to teach “the Way, the Truth, and the Life.”
They are chosen and solemnly ordained to be the friends, lovers and
guides of humanity,--not to be selfish pedants, quarrelsome quidnuncs,
and bigoted despots, exposing themselves, as they often do, to the
righteous scorn, as well as to the careless contempt of the more honest
laity. When they show themselves unworthy, the people fall away. When
even one minister of religion appears as co-respondent in a divorce
case, tens of thousands of men and women turn their backs on the
Church. When anything low, mean, despicable or treacherous is said or
done by a professing “servant of Christ,” the evil word or deed from
such a source makes Christianity a byword to many more than the merely
profane. When certain great dignitaries of the Church sit wine-bibbing
at “swagger” dinner-parties, relating questionable or “spicy” anecdotes
unfitting for the ears of decent women, they lose not only caste
themselves, but they lay all the brethren of their order open to
doubt. “Example is better than precept.” We have all written that in
our school copy-books,--and nothing has ever happened, or ever will
happen, that is likely to contradict the statement. If London is indeed
a “pagan” city, as Archdeacon Sinclair has solemnly declared from
under the shadowy luminance of his own big “fairy lamp,” St. Paul’s
Cathedral, then the clergy, and the clergy alone are responsible. On
their “ordained” heads be it! For “pagan” people are merely the natural
outcome of a “pagan” priesthood.
[Illustration: Decoration]
A QUESTION OF FAITH
PROPOUNDED TO ALL WHOM IT MAY CONCERN
Before fully entering on this paper, I should like those who may be
inclined to read it to understand very distinctly, once and for all,
that I am a Christian. I am sorry that the too-hasty misjudgment of
others compels me to assert the fact. The term “Atheist” has been
applied to me by several persons who should know better,--for it is an
absolutely false, and I may add, libellous accusation. That it has been
uttered unthinkingly and at random, by idle chatterers who have never
read a line I have written I can well believe,--nevertheless it is a
mischievous rumour, as senseless as wicked. Poor and inadequate as my
service is, and must ever be, still I am a follower of the Christian
Faith, as expounded in Christ’s own words to His disciples. I believe
that Christian Faith to be the grandest and purest in the world,--the
most hopeful, the most strengthening, the most soul-supporting and
ennobling religion ever taught to humanity. To me, in hours of the
bitterest trial, it has proved not “a reed shaken by the wind,”--but
a rock firmer than the foundations of the world, against which the
waves of tribulation break in vain and disperse to naught,--and when
brought face to face with imminent death as I have been, it has kept me
fearless and calm. I know--because I have experienced,--its priceless
worth, its truth, its grand uplifting power; and it is because this
simple Christian Faith is so dear to me, and so much a part of my
every-day life, that I venture to ask a few straight questions of
those who, calling themselves Christians, seem to have lost sight
altogether of their Master and His commands. I like people who are
consistent. Inconsistency of mind is like uncleanliness of body; it
breeds discomfort and disease. And in this wonderful age of ours, in
which there is so little real “greatness,”--when even the tried heroism
of our leading statesmen and generals is sullied by contemptible
jealousies and petty discussions of a quarrelsome nature,--when the
minds of men are bent chiefly on money-making and mechanical inventions
to save labour (labour being most unfortunately estimated as a curse
instead of the blessing it indubitably is), I find inconsistency the
chief ingredient of all modern thought. Things are jumbled up in a
heterogeneous mass, without order, distinction or merit. And the
principal subject on which men and women are most wildly, glaringly
inconsistent, is that which is supposed to be the guiding rule of
life--Religion. I should like to try and help to settle this vexed
question. I want to find out what the Christian Empire means by its
“faith.” I venture to lift up my voice as the voice of one alone in
the wilderness, and to send it with as clear a pitch and true a tone
as I can across the sea of discussion,--the stormy ocean of angry and
contradictory tongues,--and I ask bluntly and straightly, “What is it
all about? DO YOU BELIEVE YOUR RELIGION, OR DO YOU NOT?”
It is an honest question, and demands an honest answer. Put it to
yourselves plainly. DO YOU BELIEVE WITH ALL YOUR HEART AND SOUL IN THE
FAITH YOU PROFESS TO FOLLOW?
Again--put it with equal plainness--DO YOU NOT BELIEVE ONE IOTA OF IT
ALL? AND ARE YOU ONLY FOLLOWING IT AS A MATTER OF CUSTOM AND FORM?
Let us, my reader or readers, be round and frank with each other. If
you are a Christian, your religion is to believe that Christ was a
human Incarnation or Manifestation of an Eternal God, born miraculously
of the Virgin Mary; that He was crucified in the flesh as a criminal,
died, was buried, rose again from the dead, and ascended to heaven as
God and Man in one, and there perpetually acts as Mediator between
mankind and Divine Justice. Remember, that if you believe this, you
believe in the PURELY SUPERNATURAL. But let any one talk or write of
the purely supernatural as existent in any other form save this one of
the Christian Faith, and you will probably be the first to scout the
idea of the supernatural altogether. Why? Where is your consistency? If
you believe in one thing which is supernatural, why not in others?
Now let us consider the other side of the question. You who do
not believe, but still pretend to do so, for the sake of form and
conventional custom, do you realize what you are? You consider yourself
virtuous and respectable, no doubt; but facts are facts, and you, in
your pretence at faith, are nothing but a Liar. The honest sunshiny
face of day looks on you, and knows you for a hypocrite--a miserable
unit who is trying in a vague, mad fashion to cheat the Eternal Forces.
Be ashamed of lying, man or woman, whichever you be! Stand out of the
press and say openly that you do not believe; so at least shall you be
respected. Do not show any religious leanings either to one side or the
other “for the sake of custom”--and then we shall see you as you are,
and refrain from branding you “liar.” I would say to all, clergy and
laity, who do not in their hearts believe in the Christian Faith, “Go
out of all churches; stand aside and let us see who is who. Let us have
space in which to count up those who are willing to sacrifice all their
earthly well-being for Christ’s sake (for it amounts to nothing less
than this), and those who prefer this world to the next.” I will not
presume to calculate as to which will form the larger majority. I only
say it is absurd to keep up churches, and an enormous staff of clergy,
archbishops, bishops, popes, cardinals, and the like, for a faith in
which we do not TRULY, ABSOLUTELY, AND ENTIRELY BELIEVE. It is a mere
pageant of inflated Falsehood, and as such must be loathsome in the
sight of God,--this always with the modern proviso, “if there indeed be
a God.” Yet, apart from a God altogether, it is degrading to ourselves
to play the hypocrite with the serious facts of life and death.
Therefore, I ask you again--Do you believe, or do you not believe? My
object in proposing the question at all is to endeavour to show the
spiritual and symbolic basis upon which the Christian Faith rests,
and the paramount necessity there is for accepting it in its pristine
purity and beauty, if we would be wise. To grasp it thoroughly, we
must view it, not as it now seems to look to us through the darkening
shadows of sectarianism, BUT AS IT WAS ORIGINALLY FOUNDED. The time
has come upon us that is spoken of in the New Testament, when “one
shall be taken and the other left,” and the sorting of the sheep from
the goats has already commenced. It can be said with truth that most
of our Churches, as they now exist, are diametrically opposed to the
actual teachings of their Divine Founder. It can be proved that in our
daily lives we live exactly in the manner which Christ Himself would
have most sternly condemned. And when all the proofs are put before
you plainly, and without disguise or hyperbole, in the simplest and
straightest language possible, I shall again ask you, “DO YOU BELIEVE,
OR DO YOU NOT BELIEVE?” If you do believe, declare it openly and live
accordingly; if you do not believe, in God’s name leave off lying!
The Symbolism of the Christian Faith has been, and is still, very much
lost sight of, owing to the manner in which the unimaginative and
unthinking majority of people will persist in looking at things from a
directly physical, materialistic and worldly point of view. But if we
take the life and character of Christ as a Symbolic representation of
that Perfect Manhood which alone can be pleasing to God,--which alone
can be worthy to call the Divine Source of Creation “Father!”--some of
our difficulties may possibly be removed. Christ’s Gospel was first
proclaimed in the East,--and the Eastern peoples were accustomed to
learn the great truths of religion by a “symbolic,” or allegorical
method of instruction. Christ Himself knew this,--for “He taught them
many things by parables.”
We shall do well to keep this spirit of Eastern symbolism in mind when
considering the “miraculous” manner of Christ’s birth. Note the extreme
poverty, humility, well-nigh shame attending it! Joseph doubted Mary,
and was “minded to put her away privily.” Mary herself doubted the
Angelic Annunciation, and said, “How shall this be?”
Thus, even with those most closely concerned, a cloud of complete
disbelief and distrust environed the very thought, suggestion, and
announcement of the God-in-Man.
It should be remembered that the Evangelists, Mark and John, have no
account of a “miraculous” birth at all. John, supreme as a Symbolist,
the “disciple whom Jesus loved,” wrote, “The WORD was made flesh and
dwelt among us.”
Securing this symbolic statement for ourselves, we find that two of the
chief things to which we attach importance in this world--namely, birth
and position--are altogether set aside in this humanizing of the WORD,
and are of no account whatever. And, that the helpless Child lying in
a manger on that first Christmas morning of the world, was,--despite
poverty and humility,--fore-destined to possess more power than all the
kings and emperors ever born in the purple.
Thus, the first lessons we get from the birth of Christ are--Faith and
Humility--these are indeed the whole spirit of His Divine doctrine.
Now,--How does this spirit pervade our social community to-day, after
nearly two thousand years of constant preaching and teaching?
Look round on the proud array of the self-important, pugnacious,
quarrelsome, sectarian and intolerant so-called “servants of the Lord.”
The Pope of Rome, and his Cardinals and his Monsignori! The Archbishop
of Canterbury, and _his_ Bishops, Deacons, Deans and Chapters and the
like! The million “sects”--and all the cumbrous paraphernalia of the
wealthy and worldly, “ordained” to preach the Gospel! Ask them for
“proofs” of faith! For signs of “humility”! For evidences of any kind
to show that they are in very soul and life and truth, the followers of
that Master who never knew luxury, and had not where to lay His head!
And you, among the laity, how can you pray, or pretend to pray to a
poor and despised “Man of Sorrows,” in these days, when with every act
and word of your life you show your neighbours that you love Money
better than anything else in earth or in heaven!--when even you who are
millionaires only give and do just as much as will bring you notoriety,
or purchase you a “handle” to your names! Why do you bend your
hypocritical heads on Sundays to the Name of “Jesus,” who (so far as
visible worldly position admitted) was merely the son of a carpenter,
and followed the carpenter’s trade, while on week-days you make no
secret of your scorn of, or indifference to the “working-man,” and more
often than not spurn the beggar from your gates!
Be consistent, friends!--be consistent! IF YOU BELIEVE IN
CHRISTIANITY, you must also believe in these three things:--
1. The virtue of poverty.