DAVENANT'S SCHOOL
The theory of parish organization in the last century was very simple, yet it was effective. The parishes were small—some of them tiny in their dimensions—so that, although they were densely populated, the rector or vicar knew every soul that belonged to his church. The affairs of the people—the care of the poor—were provided for by the companies. The children were taught at the free-schools or the grammar-schools. At fourteen a boy was made a prentice, and entered some livery. Once in a company, his whole life was assured. He would get regular work; he would have the wages due; he would marry; his children would be cared for as he had been. He would be looked after not by the Church—that was not the function of the Church—but by his company, in sickness and in age, as well as in time of strength and work. Every Sunday, Wednesday, Friday, and holy day there were services, with sermons; but we need not suppose that the working-man considered it his duty to flock to the week-day services. On Sunday, of course, he went, because the whole parish was expected to be in church. They did attend. Station and order were preserved within the church as without. The rich merchants and the masters sat in the most beautiful pews possible to conceive, richly carved with blazoned shields and figures in white and gold, with high backs, above which the tops of the wigs proudly nodded. These pews were gathered about the pulpit, which was itself a miracle of carved work, though perhaps it was only a box stuck onto the wall. The altar, the walls, the galleries were all adorned with wood-carvings. Under the galleries and in the aisles, on plain benches, sat the folk who worked for wages, the bedesmen and bedeswomen, and the charity children. The retail people, who kept the shops, had less eligible pews behind their betters. They left the church in order, the great people first, then the lesser, and then the least. No order and rank—all to be equal—in the house of the Lord? Nonsense! How could that be allowed when He has ordained that they shall be unequal outside His house? The notion of equality in the Church is quite a modern idea. It is not yet accepted, though here and there it is tolerated. It is, in fact, revolutionary; it is subversive of rank. Are we to understand that it is as easy for a pauper to get into the kingdom of heaven as a prince? We may say so, but, my friends, no prince will ever be got to believe it.
An excellent example of a last-century church is to be seen in Thames Street. It is the Church of All Hallows the Great. The building is a square room, with no beauty except that of proportion; it is rich in wood-carvings; the pulpit, lavishly adorned with precious work, ought to belong to some great cathedral; it has got a screen of carved wood right across the church which is most beautiful. The old arrangement of the last century is still preserved; the pulpit is placed against the middle of the wall; the pews of the merchants are gathered about, while the pews of the common people are those nearest to the communion table. Formerly the latter were appropriated to the watermen's apprentices. These youths, once the hope of the Thames, sat with their backs to the table, and have left the record of their presence in their initials carved with dates on the sloping book-stand. There they are, "J. F. 1710," "B. R. 1734," with a rude carving of a ship, showing how they beguiled the tedium of the sermon. The arrangement of the pews illustrates the importance in which the sermon was held. The people, as at Paul's Cross, gathered about the preacher. The modern impatience with which the sermon is received is mainly owing to the fact that we no longer feel so strongly the importance of sound doctrine; we have come to think, more or less clearly, that the future of a man cannot possibly depend upon the question whether he has at any time expressed assent or consent to certain doctrines which he is wholly incapable of understanding. We see around us so many forms of creed that we have grown careless, or tolerant, or contemptuous, or charitable concerning doctrine.
There were penalties for absence from service. A man who stayed away was liable to the censure of the Church, with a fine of one shilling for every offence. He was called upon to prove where he had been to church, because it was not thought possible that anybody should stay away from service altogether. If a person harbored in his house one who did not attend the parish church, he was liable to a fine of £20 a month; the third part of the fine being given to the informer. I do not suppose that these laws were ever rigidly enforced; otherwise the Nonconformists would have cried out oftener and louder. But their spirit remained. During the week, the parish, save for the services, was left to take care of itself. There were no visits, no concerts, no magic lanterns, no Bible classes, no missionary meeting—nothing—everybody attended to his own business. The men worked all day long; the women looked after the house all day long; in the evenings the taverns were crowded; there were clubs of all kinds; everybody took his tobacco and his glass at a tavern or a club, and no harm was thought of it.
For the old people there were almshouses, and there was the bounty of the companies. And since there must be always poor people among us, there were doles in every parish. Special cases were provided for as they arose by the merchants themselves. Finally, if one was sick or dying, the clergyman went to read the office appointed for the sick; and when one died, he read the office appointed for the dead.
All this is simple and intelligible. The Church provided instruction in doctrine for old and young, forms of prayer, consolation in sickness, baptism, communion, and burial for all; some churches had charitable endowments; the rest was left to the parishioners themselves. This is not quite the modern idea of the parish, but it seems to have worked as well as our own practice. Their clergyman was a divine, and nothing more; ours undertakes the care of the poor first of all; he is the administrator of charity; he is, next, the director of schools, the organizer of amusements, the leader of athletics, the trainer of the choir, the president of musical societies, the founder of working-lad's institutes; he also reads the service at church, and he preaches a short sermon every Sunday; but the latter functions are not much regarded by his people. Their clergyman was a divine; he was therefore a scholar. Therein lies the whole difference. We have no divines now, and very few scholars among the parish clergy, or even among the bishops. Here and there one or two divines are found upon the Episcopal bench, and one or two at Oxford and Cambridge; in the parish churches, none. We do not ask for divines, or even for preachers; we want organizers, administrators, athletes, and singers. And the only reason for calling the time of George the Second a dead time for the Church seems to be that its clergy were not like our own.
