Dr. Stanley told me that he was in the habit of looking at some historical characters through the medium of living people, who appeared to him, in one way or other, to resemble them. Excellencies and frailties on the part of deceased individuals, thus came out more vividly before him. It struck me as a considerable help to a realisation of what departed persons might be; but it requires to be carefully employed, lest from resemblances which are real, we infer other things which are imaginary.
His taste was comprehensive. He loved everything which related to English history, especially where it touched his own dear Abbey. Conformity and Nonconformity he sometimes sought to harmonise in surprising ways.
I may add here that there was in the Abbey a monument to Dr. Watts in a dilapidated condition, when I suggested a plan for its restoration. The plan was adopted, and in consequence the monument was for a time removed. During its absence I received a note containing a playful allusion to the circumstance:—
“If some strong Nonconformist should wander through the Abbey this week, he may go away with the impression that in a fit of sudden intolerance the Dean had torn down the monument of Isaac Watts. I assure you that the gaping and vacant chasm in the wall might well suggest such an interpretation. I hope, however, in a few days the restored angel and the mended harp of your sweet psalmist will dispel any hopes that may be awakened in High Churchmen or suspicions in Nonconformists.”
I was informed not long after the Dean’s death, that a gentleman in Kent had in his possession what was said to be Oliver Cromwell’s skull. A friend of mine procured from that gentleman an invitation to see the relic. A large, handsome box was placed on a table, and out of it was taken, wrapped up in silk, a man’s skull. The lower part of the face was gone, leaving the upper jawbone entire, or nearly so; and within the mouth we saw the shrivelled remains of a tongue, while some of the skin on the upper part of the face was still preserved. What astonished me was the quantity of hair adhering to the scalp; and also the following circumstances pertaining to the relic. The inside, carefully examined by a medical companion, plainly appeared to have been embalmed; signs of this were attached to the surface. Moreover, part of a spike penetrated the upper bone, showing that once the skull must have been exposed in a way common enough, when men, put to death for political crimes, had their heads set up in conspicuous places. Finally the head had been severed from the body, not by a sharp axe, but by a knife which had hacked and torn the skin. These peculiarities pointed to one who, having received honourable burial, was afterwards beheaded with a blunt instrument, and then treated as a traitor, by having his head exhibited like those fixed on the top of Temple Bar. These peculiarities pertained to Oliver Cromwell; and to no one else. Documents are preserved together with the relic. They state that the relic remained publicly exposed for a long time, till one night a gale of wind blew it down; that a soldier on sentry picked it up and took it home, and then became alarmed at finding there was search made after it by public authorities. He concealed it down to the time of his death; and when danger was over, the secret was divulged. The skull was afterwards exhibited as a source of profit, and an account of the exhibition appears among papers preserved in the box. After being withdrawn from public view, it was privately sold to an ancestor of the gentleman possessing it at the time of my visit. There is a story afloat, that Cromwell was not buried in Westminster, another corpse being substituted for public interment, and, therefore, that the body hanged at Tyburn was not his! This story is not to be trusted.
In the August following Dean Stanley’s death, I made, with my friend Harrison and some of my family, a tour in Germany. We were delighted with the Bavarian Highlands and the Bader See.
We visited Oberammergau, and heard much about the Passion Play, and were conducted to the place of performance, by persons who had taken part in it. They gave us interesting information. The priest of the place is no bigot. He insisted that a Protestant, who had died in the village, should be interred in consecrated ground, for which, we are told, he received a rebuke from Rome. The drive we had from Partenkirchen to Mittenwald called forth exclamations of great delight.
In the following winter I mixed with members of various denominations, some widely separated from others. This led me to think a good deal about consistency. I noted down at the time considerations of this kind. Everybody admits the palpable truism, “Truth is true, and falsehood is false,” and some deduce from that the corollary: “Then stick to the true, and eschew the false altogether. Countenance what you believe, by consorting exclusively with such as believe as you do.”
But, it must be remembered, systems are complex, and cannot be fairly dealt with in the fashion recommended by some. In many cases, what is condemned as a whole, contains seeds of another sort. There are estimable people who are not accustomed to analyse what they condemn, and cannot see what of truth may be found in the midst of error. To look alone at one side of a system, which, after all, has much of truth, may involve us in error. Thinking of Divine sovereignty, if not connected with human responsibility, may land us in Antinomianism; to dwell upon responsibility by itself, may make us Pelagians.
In the summer of 1882, I went down to Rodborough, in Gloucestershire, to visit my friend, Sir S. Marling, just made baronet, and to preach, I think, for the seventh time, on behalf of the Sunday Schools. The Countess of Huntingdon, George Whitefield, and Rowland Hill had all been in some way connected with the chapel.