The outside of the church is plain and void of ornament, but in the center of the roof is a large dome; which cannot be seen to advantage, on account of its being in a manner hid by the Mansion-house. The principal beauties of this justly admired edifice are on the inside; where this dome, which is spacious and noble, is finely proportioned to the church, and divided into small compartments decorated with great elegance, and crowned with a lanthorn, while the roof, which is also divided into compartments, is supported by very noble Corinthian columns, raised on their pedestals. It has three isles and a cross isle; is seventy-five feet in length, and thirty-six in breadth, the height of the middle roof is thirty-four feet, and of the cupola and lanthorn fifty-eight feet. On the sides under the lower roofs are only circular windows, but those which enlighten the upper roof are small arched ones; and at the east end are three very noble arched windows.
In the opinion of some persons this is Sir Christopher Wren’s masterpiece. It is even thought that Italy itself can produce no modern structure equal to this in taste, proportion, elegance and beauty. It is certain that foreigners, to whom it is well known, might very justly call our judgments in question, were we not to allow it as high a degree both of merit and fame as they have bestowed upon it. It is one of the happy productions of Sir Christopher Wren’s great genius without a strict observance of the rules of art. It has a very striking effect at entering, every part coming at once to your eye, except the bases of the columns, which are injudiciously eclipsed by the carving on the top of the pews (these are not represented in the print) and was not the design of the architect. The outside is now in part hid by the Mansion house. The plate also represents a plan and section.
To this church that of St. Bennet Sherehog is annexed, whereby the profits of the rector are much increased: besides other advantages, he receives 100l. a year in lieu of tithes.
S. Wale delin. E. Rooker sculp.
St Stephen’s Walbrook
Stepney, a very ancient village near London; but as it not joined to it by contiguous buildings, we shall not, after the example of some of our late compilers, represent it as a part of this metropolis.
This parish was of such a vast extent, and so amazingly increased in buildings, as to produce the parishes of St. Mary Stratford at Bow, St. Mary Whitechapel, St. Ann’s Limehouse, St. John’s at Wapping, St. Paul’s Shadwell, St. George’s Ratcliff Highway, Christ Church Spitalfields, and St. Matthew’s Bethnal Green; all which have been separated from it, and yet it still remains one of the largest parishes within the bills of mortality, and contains the hamlets of Mile-end, Old and New Towns, Ratcliff and Poplar.
The village of Stepney, is remarkable for its church, and the great number of tombstones, both in that edifice and its spacious cemetry. It has also an independant meeting-house, and an almshouse. The village, however, is but small, and consists of few houses besides those of public entertainment; vast crowds of people of both sexes resorting thither on Sundays, and at Easter and Whitsun holidays, to eat Stepney buns, and to regale themselves with ale, cyder, &c.
There was a church here so long ago as the time of the Saxons, when it was called the church of all Saints, Ecclesia omnium Sanctorum, and we read of the manor of Stepney under the reign of William the Conqueror, by the name of Stibenhede, or Stiben’s-heath; but it does not appear when the church changed its name by being dedicated to St. Dunstan, the name it at present bears. To this church belong both a rectory and vicarage; the former, which was a sinecure, was in the gift of the bishop of London, and the latter, in the gift of the rector, till Ridley, bishop of London, gave the manor of Stepney, and the advowson of the church to Edward VI. who, in his turn, granted them to Sir Thomas Wentworth, Lord Chamberlain of his houshold. But the advowson being afterwards purchased by the principal and scholars of King’s Hall and Brazen-Nose college in Oxford, they presented two persons to the rectory and vicarage by the name of the Portionists of Ratcliff and Spitalfields, till the year 1744, when the hamlet of Bethnal Green being separated from it, and made a new parish by act of parliament, Stepney became possessed by only one rector.
As this is at present a rectory impropriate, the above principal and scholars receive the great tithes, and the incumbent the small, together with Easter offerings, garden pennies, and surplice fees, which are very considerable. Newc. Repert. Eccles.