Our Churches and Chapels - Atticus
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The music at Trinity Church has for a considerable period been a
troublesome, irregular, unsatisfactory thing. Years ago it was fine;
there was full cathedral service in the church then; and the
orchestral performances were attractive. But dullness and poorness
are now their characteristics. The organ is one of the best in the
town; its tones are fine and musical; it could perhaps be improved
in one or two particulars; but everything in it is good as far as it
goes. The tunes, however, which come from it are of a very ordinary
character. Some of them may be tasteful; but the bulk seem weak and
wearisome--lack fine-flowing harmony, and can neither be joined in
nor appreciated by many parties. The members of the choir are not a
very lustrous class of vocalists; but they do their best, and appear
to fight through the musical fog surrounding them very patiently. We
believe the tunes are selected by the incumbent. If so, let us hope
that he will see the propriety of recognising something a little
brisker and more classical--something rather livelier and more
popularly relishable. Many clergymen simply select the hymns and
leave the music to the choir: the incumbent might try this plan as
an experiment. Squabbling about music, carping, and fighting, and
biting about it, have in the past done much harm to Trinity Church.
There is more peace now than there used to be amongst the singers;
but there will never be very much contentment, and never much
harmony of music, until they are permitted to moderately follow the
custom of other places--to swim with the tide--and have a reasonable
share of their own way. Singers can, as a rule, quarrel enough among
themselves when in the enjoyment of the fullest privileges; and
interference with their services, if they are really worth anything,
only makes them more ill-natured, angular, and combative. They are
awkward people to deal with, and have strange likings for "hot
water."
The minister of Trinity Church is the Rev. J. T. Brown, and his
salary amounts to about 300 pounds a year. He was christened at the
place; was in after years curate of it; and is now its incumbent.
About two years ago, when he came to the church in the last-named
capacity, the congregation was wretchedly thin--awfully scarce, and
just on the borders of invisibility. It has since improved a little;
but working up a forsaken place into real activity is a difficult
task, which at times staggers the ablest of men. Mr. Brown is a
scholar, and a thoroughly upright man. He believes not in fighting
down other people's creeds; never rails against religious
antagonists; has a natural dislike to platform bigotry and pulpit
wrathfulness; is generously inclined; will give but not lend;
objects to everything in the shape of loud clerical display; is
strongly evangelical in his tastes; is exact, and calm, and orderly,
even to the cut of his whiskers; won't be brought out and exhibited;
doesn't care about seeing other people make exhibitions; and thinks
every minister should mind his own business, and leave other people
alone. But he is far too good for a parson. A gentle melancholy
seems to have got hold of him. He always preaches sincerely; a quiet
spirit of simple unadorned, piety pervades his remarks--but he
depresses you too much; and is rather predisposed to a calm mournful
consideration of the great sulphur question. He never gets into a
lurid passion, never horrifies, but calmly saddens you, in his
discourses. He is fond of quoting good old Richard Baxter and John
Banyan, and he might have worse authorities. But he is very serious,
and his words sometimes chill like a condensation of Young's "Night
Thoughts." If he had more dash and blithesomeness in him, if he
could fling a little more of this world's logic into his sermons, if
he would periodically blow his own trumpet very audibly, and make a
smart "spread" now and then, he would gather force. The best of
things will sink if there be not some noise and show made about
them. If Mr. Brown knew the "Holloway's Pills and Ointment" theory
better than he does, he would have a fuller congregation; but he is
too honest and too good for superficial emblazonry, and he believes
in quietness.
Trinity Church has some excellent schools for boys, girls, and
infants. The attendance is only poor; but it is better than it was.
The boys' school is improving; that of the girls is also recruiting
the strength it lost last Whitsuntide but one, when a number of its
attendants left in a body because Mr. Brown objected to a display of
orange and blue ribbons which they were senselessly enamoured of;
and with respect to the infants they are regularly growing in size
if not in numbers. Mrs. Brown, wife of the incumbent, not only
industriously visits the district, like a genuine Christian lady as
she is, but teaches in the girls school, and at intervals when at
church--here is an example for parsons' wives--looks after a number
of the scholars personally, whilst her own servants are quietly
occupying the family pew. We could like to see both the church and
the schools of Mr. Brown full; he has our best wishes in this
respect; and we hope he may find some talisman by which the
difficulty will be satisfactorily solved.
LANCASTER-ROAD CONGREGATIONAL CHAPEL.
Preston Congregationalism is a very good, a very respectable, and a
very quarrelsome creature. It is liberal but gingerly; has a large
regard for freedom, but will quarrel if crossed; can achieve
commendable triumphs in the regions of peace, but likes a
conscientious disturbance at intervals; believes in the power of
union, but acts as if a split were occasionally essential; will
nurse its own children well when they are quiet, but recognises the
virtues of a shake if uneasiness supervenes; respects its ministers
much, but will order them to move on if they fret its epidermis too
acutely; can pray well, work well, fight well; and from its
antagonisms can distil benefits. About nine years since, a sacred
stirring of heads, a sharp moving of tongues, and a lively up-
heaving of bristles took place at Cannon-street Congregational
Chapel, in this town. The result of the dispute involved, amongst
other things, a separation--a clear marching from the place of
several parties who, whether rightly or wrongly, matters not now,
felt themselves aggrieved. They did not leave the chapel in
processional order, neither did they throw stones and then run, when
they took their departure. The process of evaporation was quiet and
orderly. For 12 months the seceders worshipped on their own account,
in accordance with the principles of Congregationalism, at the
Institution, Avenham, and whilst there they gathered strength. In
the meantime they negotiated for land upon which to build a new
chapel and schools; and finally they purchased a site on the higher
side of the Orchard, contiguous to the old Vicarage--a rare piece of
antique, rubbishy ruin in these days--and very near, if not actually
upon, ground which once formed the garden of the famous Isaac
Ambrose, who was Vicar of Preston in 1650, and afterwards ejected;
with many more in the land, on account of his religious opinions.
Thinking it good to harmonise with that ancient wisdom which
recommends people to carry the calf before beginning with the cow,
the new band of Congregationalists under notice, commenced
operations on the site named by erecting a large school room in
which for about a year they worshipped. In due time they got the
chapel built, and for about seven years it has been open.
Its position is prominent; but its associations, like those of the
generality of sacred edifices, has a special bearing upon the world
we live in. Above it there is a portion of the old vicarage
buildings, graced in front with various articles, the most prominent
being a string of delapidated red jackets; right facing it we have
the sable Smithsonian Institute, flanked with that gay and festive
lion which is for ever running and never stirring; below there are
classic establishments for rifle-shooting, likeness taking, and hot
pea revelling; and ahead there is the police station. The chapel
stands well, occupies high and commanding ground, and looks rather
stately. Its exterior design is good; and if the stone of its facade
had been of a better quality--had contained fewer flaws and been
more closely jointed--it would have merited one of our best
architectural bows. The chapel and school, and the land upon which
they are erected, cost 7,000 pounds, and about 1,000 pounds of that
sum remains to be paid. This is not bad. Considering the brevity of
their existence and the severe times they have had to pass through,
the Lancaster-road Congregationalists must have worked hard and put
a very vigorous Christian screw into operation to reduce their debt
so rapidly.
The inside of the chapel is plain, very neat, and quite genteel. We
have seen no Congregational place of worship in this part equal to
it in ease and elegance of design. It is amphi-theatrical, is
galleried three quarters round, and derives the bulk of its beauty--
not from ornament, not from rich artistic hues, nor rare mouldings,
nor exquisite carvings, but from its quiet harmony of arrangement,
its simple gracefulness of form, its close adherence in outline and
detail to the laws of symmetry and proportion. The circular style
prevails most in it, and how to make everything round or half-round
seems to have been the supreme job of the designer. The gallery
above, the seats below, the platform, the pulpit on which it stands,
the chairs behind, the orchestra and its canopy, the window-heads,
the surmountings of the entrance screen, the gas pendants, and
scores of other things, have all a strong fondness for circularity;
and the same predilection is manifested outside; the large lamps
there being quite round and fixed upon circular columns. The pews in
the chapel are very strong, have receding backs, and make sitting in
them rather a pleasing, easy, contented affair. The highest price
for a single seat is 3s. 6d. per quarter; the lowest 1s. There are a
few free sittings in the place, and although they may seem a long
way back--being at the rear of the gallery--their position is not to
be despised. They are not so far distant as to render hearing
difficult; and they obviate that unseemly publicity which is given
to poor people in some places of worship. How to give the poorest
and hungriest folk a very good seat in a very prominent place--how
to herd them together and piously pen them up in some particular
place where everybody can see them--appears to be an object in many
religious edifices. But that is a piece of benevolent shabbiness
which must come to grief some day. In the meantime, and until the
period arrives when honest poverty will be considered no crime, and
when a seat next to a poor man will be thought nothing vulgar, or
contaminating, whilst worshipping before Him who cares for souls not
lucre, hearts not wealth, let the poor be put in some place where
they can hear fairly without being unduly exhibited. The chapel we
are noticing has a spacious appearance within, and has none of that
depressing dulness which makes some people very sad long before they
have been ministerially operated upon. From side windows there comes
a good light; and from the roof, which has a central transparency,
additional clearness is obtained. The light from the ceiling would
be improved if the glass it were kept a little cleaner.
The congregation is neither a very large nor a particularly small
one. It is fairly medium--might be worse, and would in no way be
hurt if it were enlarged. The "members" number about 120, and they
are just about as good as the rest of mortals, who have "made their
calling and election sure." The congregation consists almost
entirely of middle and working class people. There is not so much of
that high, gassy pride, that fine mezzotinto, isolated hauteur and
self-righteousness in the place which may be seen in some chapels.
Of course, particles of vanity, morsels of straight-lacedness,
lively little bits of cantankerousness, and odd manifestations of
first person pronoun worship periodically crop up; but altogether
the congregation has a quiet, unassuming, friendly disposition.
Nobody in it appears to be very much better or worse than yourself;
there is an evenness of tone and a sociality of feeling in the spot;
and a stranger can enter it without being violently stared at, and
can sit down without feeling that his room is nearly if not quite as
good as his company. The music is fairly congregational; individuals
in various parts of the chapel have sufficient courage to sing; and
the choir is moderately harmonious; but the melody one hears in the
place is rather flat and meagre; it lacks instrumental relief; and
it will never be really up to the mark until an organ is obtained.
The first regular minister of this chapel was the Rev. G. W.
Clapham; he was connected with it for some years; then had a
"difficulty" with certain parties--deacons amongst the rest, of
course; and afterwards left the place, uttering, in a quiet
Shaksperian tone, as he departed, "Now mark how I will undo myself:"
He threw to the winds his Congregationalism, and a few months ago
joined, in due clerical order, the Church of England. The present
pastor of Lancaster-road Congregational Chapel is the Rev. E.
Bolton. The "church" tried the merits of about 30 ministers before
making a selection. The height, depth, weight, tone of voice,
matter, manner, theology, brains, and spirit of that band of 30 were
duly weighed, and finally, Mr. Bolton was picked out. A salary of
300 pounds was offered him. He might have got other places, and if
he had followed the clerical wisdom of his generation he would have
tried to secure one of them; for they all, more or less, implied a
better salary than that which the Preston people offered him. But he
fixed upon Preston just because he fancied more good might be done
therein than elsewhere. A trick like this--a generosity so distinct
as this--is a real oasis in the ecclesiastical desert. Few parsons
would imitate it. How to get the biggest salary, and lug in the
"will of the Lord" as an excuse for changing to some locality where
it could be snugly got, is the question which many pious men seem
desirous of solving. Mr. Bolton has different ideas, and finds some
compensation in goodness achieved as well as in money pocketed. He
has been at Lancaster-road Chapel three months, and, unlike many new
parsons, he had more sense than preach his best sermons first--than
make a grand pyrotechnic dash at the onset and settle down into a
round of prating mediocrity afterwards. When tried he gave the
people a fair average specimen of what he could do--did not say his
best nor his commonest things; began with a fire which he could keep
up; and the result is not disappointment, but an increasing relish.
Mr. Bolton is a plain, dark-complexioned, clear-headed man--rather
clerical in look; well-built; married; about 38 years of age; fond
of a billycock; teetotal, but averse to drowning other people with
water; doesn't think it sinful to smoke just one pipe of tobacco
after he has done a day's work; had rather visit poor than rich
people; dislikes namby-pambying and making a greater fuss over high
than low class members of his church; thinks that those in poverty
need most looking after, and that those with good homes and decent
purses should try to look a little after themselves; believes in
working hard; cares precious little for deacons--we rather like
that, for deacons are queer birds to encounter; is original in
thought, fairly up in theology, and straightforward in language. It
is rather a treat to see him preach. He does not, like the bulk of
parsons, solemnly work out all his divinity in the pulpit:
preaching is not a sad, up and down, air-sawing, monotonous thing
with him; he steps out of the sacred box when his feelings begin to
warm up, moves to one side of it, then round the back of it, and
then to the other side of it; talks to you and not at you; is quite
conversational in style, and ignores everything conventional and
stereotyped in manner. He exercises his lungs with considerable
force at times; but he never tears nor disturbs the circumambient
air with religious agony. It is as pleasant to hear as to see him.
Good sound sense, neatly adjusted argument, newness of thought, and
clear illustration characterise his expressions. He is liberal and
independent in tone; speaks easily, and if he now and then wanders a
little he always returns to the question with vigour, and freshness.
He has no written sermons; a few notes are sufficient for him; he
does not believe in long discourses; he has an idea that it is
better to say a little and let it be well understood than float into
immensity, let off fireworks there, and dumfounder everybody. But he
has his faults. He has quite as much confidence in himself as is
requisite for the present. He is rather too impervious and too
oracular; but then who would not be if they had the chance? We like
him well on the whole, and as he is new amongst us, it is but right
that we should deliver him with charity. Adjoining the chapel there
are many class-rooms, and a fine school. Boys, girls, and infants
are accommodated in them. The average Sunday attendance is about
200. We believe Mr. Bolton will add numeric strength to both the
chapel and schools. And if he does, let no one make the least
conceivable noise, for there is room enough for all in Preston. The
town isn't a quarter as virtuous as it should be; the bulk of us are
scarcely half as good as we ought to be; and if anybody can do any
good in any way let it be done without a single whimper.
SAUL-STREET PRIMITIVE METHODIST CHAPEL.
There is nothing very time-worn about Methodism; it is only 140
years old; but during that period its admirers have contrived to
split numerous hairs, and have extended very fairly what is known as
"the dissidence of dissent." The ring of Methodism includes many
sections: it embraces, amongst others, ordinary Wesleyans,
Bryanites, New Connectionists, Primitives, United Free Church men,
and Independent Methodists. They can't all be right; but they think
they are; and that is enough. They have as yet requested nobody to
be responsible for them; and weighing that over well, the fairest
plan is to let the creed of each alone--to condemn none, to give all
legitimate chance, and permit them to "go on." Antique simplicity
seems to be the virtue of those whom we have now to describe. And
yet there is nothing very ancient about them. There is more in the
sound than in the name of primitive Methodists. They are a
comparatively young people with a somewhat venerable name. It was
not until 1810 that they were formed into a society. Originally they
were connected with the Wesleyan Methodists; but they disagreed with
them in the course of time, and left them eventually. The immediate
cause of separation was, we are informed, a dispute as to the
propriety of camp meetings, and the utility of female preaching. The
Wesleyans couldn't see the wisdom of such meetings nor the fun of
such preaching: probably they thought that people could get as much
good as they would reasonably digest in regular chapel gatherings,
and that it was quite enough to hear women talk at home without
extending the business to pulpits. The Primitives believed
otherwise--fancied that camp meetings would be productive of much
Christian blissfulness, and thought that females had as much right
to give pulpit as caudle lectures. With a chivalry nearly knightly
they came to the rescue, and gave woman a free pass into the regions
of language and theology. A third point of difference had reference
to the representative character of Wesleyan conferences; but into
that question we need not enter.
The first regular quarters of Preston Primitive Methodism were in
Friargate, in a yard facing Lune-street--in a small building there,
where a few men with strong lungs and earnest minds had many seasons
of rejoicing. The thermometer afterwards rose; and for some time a
building which they erected in Lawson-street, and which is now used
as the Weavers' Institute, was occupied by them. Often did they get
far up the dreamy ladder of religious joy, and many a time did they
revel with a rich and deafening delightfulness in the regions of
zeal there. They were determined to "keep the thing warm," and to
let outsiders know that if they were not a large, they were a
lively, body. Primitive Methodism does not profess to be a fine, but
an earnest, thing--not a trimmed-up, lackadaisical arrangement, but
a strong, sincere, simple, enthusiastic species of religion. It has
largely to do with the heart and the feelings; is warm-natured, full
of strong, straightforward, devotional vigour; combines homeliness
of soul with intensity of imagination; links a great dash of honest
turbulence with an infinitude of deep earnestness; tells a man that
if he is happy he may shout, that if under a shower of grace he may
fly off at a tangent and sing; makes a sinner wince awfully when
under the pang of repentance, and orders him to jump right out of
his skin for joy the moment he finds peace; gives him a fierce
cathartic during conversion, and a rapturous cataplasm in his
"reconciliation." Primitive Methodism occupies the same place in
religion as the ballad does in poetry. It has an untamed,
blithesome, healthy ring with it; harmonises well with the common
instincts and the broad, common intuitions of common life; can't
hurt a prince, and will improve a peasant; won't teach a king wrong
things; is sure to infuse happiness amongst men of humbler mould.
Its exuberance is necessary on account of the materials it has to
deal with; its spiritual ebullitions and esctacies are required so
that they may accord with, and set all a-blaze, the strong, vehement
spirits who bend the knee under its aegis. Primitive Methodism has
reached deeper depths than many other creeds--has touched harder,
wilder, ruder souls than nearly "all the isms" put together. It may
not have made much numeric progress, may not have grown big in
figures nor loud in facts, but it has done good--has gone down in
the diving bell of hope to the low levels of sin, and brought up to
the clear rippling surface of life and light many a pearl which
would have been lost without it. Primitive Methodism is just the
religion for a certain class of beings just the exact article for
thousands who can't see far ahead, and who wouldn't be able to make
much out if they could. There are people adoring it who would be
stupid, reticent, and recalcitrant under any other banner, who would
"wonder what it all meant" if they were in a calmer, clearer
atmosphere--who would be muddy-mottled and careless in a more
classical and ambrosial arena. After this learned morsel of
theorising, we shall return to the subject.
In 1836 the Primitive Methodists left their Lawson-street seminary
and pitched their tent eastwards--on a piece of land facing Saul-
street and flanking Lamb-street. Its situation is pretty good, and
as it stands right opposite, only about eight yards from, the Baths
and Washhouses, we would suggest to the Saul-street brethren the
propriety of putting up some sign, or getting some inscription made
in front of their chapel, to the effect that "cleanliness is next to
godliness," and that both can be obtained on easy terms. The chapel
is a very ordinary looking building, having a plain brick front,
with sides of similar material, and a roof of Welsh slate, which
would look monotonous if it were not relieved on the western side by
19 bricks and two stones, and on the eastern by four stones, one
brick, and a piece of rod-iron tacked on to keep a contiguous
chimney straight. The chapel has a somewhat spacious interior; and
has a large gallery fixed on six rather slender iron pillars. The
pews have at some time had one or more coats of light delicate green
paint--the worst colour which could be chosen for endurance--put
upon them, and many are now curiously black at the rear, through
people leaning back against them. A glance round shows the various
sombre places, and their relative darkness gives a fair clue as to
the extent of their use.
At one end there is a small gallery for the choir and the organ, and
in front of it the pulpit, a plain moderately-subtantial affair, is
located. The organ is a very poor one. It has a tolerably good
appearance; but it is a serious sinner with reference to its
internal arrangements. We quietly examined it very recently, and
should have gone away with a determination not to be comforted if an
intimation had not been made to the effect that "the organist was
organising a plan for a new organ," and that there was some
probability of a better instrument being fit up before very long.
The members of the choir are of a brisk, warbling turn of mind, and
can push through their work blithely. The singing is thoroughly
congregational--permeates the whole place, is shot out in a quick,
cheerful strain, is always strong and merry, is periodically
excellent, is often jolly and funny, has sometimes a sort of chorus
to it, and altogether is a strong, virtuously-jocund, free and easy
piece of ecstacy which the people enjoy much. It would stagger a man
fond of "linked sweetness long drawn out," it might superinduce a
mortal ague in one too enamoured of Handel and Mozart; but to those
who regularly attend the place, who have got fairly upon the lines
of Primitive action, it is a simple process of pious refreshment and
exhileration.