WESTMINSTER ABBEY.
I attended Divine worship in this celebrated edifice last Sunday morning. Situated near the Houses of Parliament, the Royal Palaces of Buckingham and St. James, and in the most aristocratic quarter of the city, its external appearance is less imposing than I had expected, and what I saw of its interior did not particularly impress me. Lofty ceilings, stained windows, and a barbaric profusion of carving, groining and all manner of costly contrivances for absorbing money and labor, made on me the impression of waste rather than taste, seeming to give form and substance to the orator's simile of "the contortions of the sibyl without her inspiration." A better acquaintance with the edifice, or with the principles of architecture, might serve to correct this hasty judgment; but surely Westminster Abbey ought to afford a place of worship equal in capacity, fitness and convenience to a modern church edifice costing $50,000, and surely it does not. I think there is no one of the ten best churches in New York which is not superior to the Abbey for this purpose.
I supposed myself acquainted with all the approved renderings of the Episcopal morning service, but when the clergyman who officiated at the Abbey began to twang out "Dearly beloved brethren," &c., in a nasal, drawling semi-chant, I was taken completely aback. It sounded as though some graceless Friar Tuck had wormed himself into the desk and was endeavoring, under the pretense of reading the service, to caricature as broadly as possible the alleged peculiarity of Methodistic pulpit enunciation superimposed upon the regular Yankee drawl. As the service proceeded, I became more accustomed and more reconciled to this mode of utterance, but never enough so to like it, nor even the responses, which were given in the same way, but much better. After I came away, I was informed that this semi-chant is termed intoning, and is said to be a revival of an ancient method of rendering the church service. If such be the fact, I can only say that in my poor judgment that revival was an unwise and unfortunate one.
The Service was very long—more than two hours—the Music excellent—the congregation large—the Sermon, so far as I could judge, had nothing bad in it. Yet there was an Eleventh-Century air about the whole which strengthened my conviction that the Anglican Church will very soon be potentially summoned to take her stand distinctly on the side either of Romanism or of Protestantism, and that the summons will shake not the Church only but the Realm to its centre.