When Stone died, and where he wished to die, in the Charterhouse, the busy world learned that the Rector of a City Church, who had done memorable work in an East End parish, and was the author of some famous hymns, had passed away. Those who knew and loved him were aware that a great soul, a hero-heart, a rarely beautiful spirit, had gone to God.
In my little life, the years of which are fast approaching threescore, it has so happened that I have known, sometimes intimately, a number of so-called “eminent” women and men. I have known not a few who in intellectual power, in the brilliance of their gifts, their attainments and achievements, or in what is called “fame,” stood immeasurably higher than Stone. I have known none who, judged by the beauty, purity, and nobility of life and character, was half as great as he. I do not say this, be it noted, under the emotional stress which follows the death of a dearly-loved friend. In such an hour of bitter self-reproach when in retrospect we think of the kindly act which, had it been done (alas, that it was not done!) would have helped our friend through a time of trouble; the generous word which had it been spoken (alas, that it remained unspoken!) might have heartened him when we knew him to be most cast down—these and possibly our poignant sense of remorse, it may be for an actual wrong done, not infrequently cause us to lose our sense of proportion. For the time being at least we over-estimate what was good in him, and under-estimate what was indifferent, or worse.
It is not so that I write of S. J. Stone. Sixteen long years, in which life has never been, nor will be, quite the same, missing that loved presence, have passed away since he was laid to rest in Norwood Cemetery; and to-day with my own life’s end nearing I can say, not only for myself, but for many others who knew him, that so brave of heart was he as to make possible for us the courage of a Cœur de Lion, so knightly of nature as to make possible the honour of an Arthur or a Galahad, so nearly stainless in the standard he set himself, in the standard he attained, as to come, as near as human flesh and blood can come, almost to making possible the purity of the Christ.
I am not unaware what will be in the mind of many who read these words. Some will suspect me if not of insincerity, at least of the foolish use of superlative and hyperbole. Not a few will hold my last comparison as scarcely reverent. And all the while there will not be a single woman or man, with any intimate knowledge of Stone, who, reading what I have written, will not say, at least of what is wholly appreciative (many will resent what I have hereafter to say of his temperamental weaknesses and human defects), “All this is truth, sober and unexaggerated, and yet the man himself was in many respects infinitely greater than he is drawn.”
II
Ever since Stone died my intention has been, before laying down my own pen, some day and so far as I am able, to picture him as I knew him. It seemed to me a duty, no less than a trust, that some of us should put on record what manner of man it was who wrote these noble hymns, and how nobly he lived and died. My reason for delaying thus long about what to me is a labour of love, was the difficulty of picturing Stone as he was, without seeming to exaggerate. Fortunately it has not been left only to me to bear tribute, for the Rev. F. G. Ellerton, Vicar of Ellesmere, to whose father we owe the famous hymn, “Saviour, again to Thy dear Name we raise,” has written a Memoir of his former Vicar (I recollect Mr. Ellerton as Stone’s curate, more than a score of years ago), which was prefixed to a volume of “Selections” from Stone’s Poems and Hymns. Only one who had lived and worked with Stone could have drawn so true and sympathetic a picture of Stone the Christian, Stone the Churchman, Stone the hymn-writer, and Stone the man; and, except for the fact that Mr. Ellerton and I approach our subjects from different standpoints, his beautiful Appreciation will be found amply to confirm what I say in my briefer Silhouette.
It is to a sister of mine that I owe my first meeting with Stone. From her girlhood upward she had contributed poems, sketches and stories to the magazines, earning each year by her pen sums which to the rest of us—how wonderful it all was!—seemed princely, and very proud of her we all were.
Ill-health, and her determination never, after marriage, to let her writing interfere with her duties as wife and mother, have prevented her from following up, except very occasionally, the work in literature which she so loved, though two years ago she was able to publish, and with success, a first long novel.
But at that time she had made some girlish reputation as a writer of religious verse, and was commissioned to contribute “A Golden Song” each week to a well-known periodical. Stone’s attention was attracted by the sweet-briar simplicity and beauty of some of these “Golden Songs,” and when he and my sister chanced to meet, each was singularly drawn to the other, and so it was that first she and he, thereafter he and I, became friends and remained so to the end.
Now let me try to describe Stone as he was at the time of our first meeting, when he was in early middle life. Emerson said once that we take a man’s measure when first we meet him—and every time we meet him. One’s first comment at sight of Stone would inevitably have been: “A Man!” And one’s second: “An Englishman!”