The lordliest, loftiest minster ever built
To Holy Peter in our English Isle!
Let me be buried there, and all our Kings,
And all our just and wise and holy men
That shall be born hereafter. It is finished!”
Tennyson (Harold).
The writer of this little book was once showing Westminster Abbey to a party of foreigners—they were Germans,—and after hearing something about the Abbey and the people who are either buried or commemorated there, one of them turned and said: “I can understand the pride of English people when I see a place like this.”
Now, it must be remembered that this German visitor was not thinking of our wealth, or of our Empire, or of our commercial prosperity. He was thinking of the “great cloud of witnesses,” the people of our race who have gone before us, and who are gathered together, resting and remembered in our chief national church. He was thinking, too, of the wide and catholic spirit which would shut out no one who had done good service to God and man.
If one who was not our own countryman could feel this so strongly, is it any wonder that the name of Westminster Abbey is dear to all British folk, men, women, and children, whether at home or across the wide seas? Westminster Abbey is a name that means “home,” and the story of home, almost from the very earliest times of our nation.
And if any one asks how and why this is, it is easy to show him that Westminster Abbey has been part of English history all along, and that if you can read what is written on the old grey stones of Westminster you will know more about the British race and Empire than many books could teach you.