After further investigation, Mr. Forster found that he could not even subscribe to that – that he had ceased to regard Christ as a mediator at all – and, consequently, he resigned the charge of a church, which, owing to his labours, had become flourishing and great. Now his banner bears the motto of ‘Free Inquiry.’ He preaches in a handsome chapel in Camden Town. His church calls itself a Free Church. It promises to be a successful one. It is well attended, though it has much to contend against. The orthodox will not forgive Mr. Forster his desertion of their camp; and the Unitarians, who, in their way, are often as narrow-minded and dogmatic as the most orthodox themselves, cannot exactly hold out the right hand of fellowship to a man who professes to be free – who claims to know no master – whose appeal is to the law and to the testimony, rather than to the doctrines and opinions of men.
Thus Mr. Forster gravitates, like Mahomet’s coffin, between heaven and earth. Yet his condition is by no means a rare one. That a large number sympathise with him, the attendance at his chapel is convincing proof. Coming out from the orthodox, he bears testimony against them. In his farewell sermon to his Kentish Town congregation he says: ‘How little have the contents of the Bible to do with men’s personal belief! How seldom are men taught to rely on their own powers in the investigation of the truth! How few are the Christians who sit at the feet of Jesus, or frequent the apostolic college! If Dissenters have renounced the infallibility of the Pope, have they not bowed their necks to a yoke almost as heavy and galling? If they have given up the Thirty-nine Articles, have they on that account conceded to each other the right of judging all things for themselves? If the Trentine pandects are not retained as the law of their religious faith and life, are they not bound by the Institutes of Calvin, the Westminster Confession of Faith, the Assembly’s Catechism, the Minutes of Conference, and the Sermons of Wesley – the creeds of chapel trust-deeds, the Congregational Union Confession of Faith, or by the writings of Howe, Watts, Doddridge, Gill, Fuller, Hall, Priestly, Watson, Channing, and of other great men, who ought to be dear to their hearts, but not lords of their faith? Are we not all of us more or less guilty of this servility? Have we not yet to learn that there is no via media– no middle way between Reason and Rome? There is, unhappily, floating over us an invisible and unexpressed opinion, to which all, in the main, must agree. It hovers over the pulpit and the pew; over the church and congregation; over the professor’s chair and the students’ form; over the family and the school; over the Bible and the Commentary. All thought, all sentiment, all investigation, all conclusions, all teachings, are controlled by it. It is this which checks free inquiry; shuts the mouths of those who have convictions which fit not the Procrustes’ bed, according to which all opinions are to be shortened or stretched; makes hypocrites of those who cannot afford to keep a conscience, or have not courage to brave the consequences of honesty; turns the pulpit too often into the chair of restraint, concealment, or compromise. Wherever this tyranny is obeyed, there cannot be much depth of conviction, vitality of sentiment, growth of knowledge, and improvement of religious life. If this principle were applied to science, it would paralyse all the energies of investigation, and make the wheels of progress stand still. If churches will not respect individual liberty – will not let their ministers and members investigate the Scriptures, and theology, the fruit of other men’s examination of the Scriptures, as fearlessly, impartially, and rigidly as men inquire into Nature and the human results of searching into Nature – such as astronomy, chemistry, and any other branch of science – then it is the duty of every Christian, in God’s name, and the name of human nature, to resist the imposition. It may cost him friends, income, reputation, station, and much which he highly values. He is bound, at whatever sacrifice, to maintain his inborn and inalienable freedom. In this way the yoke of the creeds would be broken. The churches would be turned into the seats of liberty. A noble, manly piety would grow up among us. The truth, whatever it is, would be discovered. A new state of things would be instituted. Every man would be respected as he rejected human authority over his conscience – refused to allow uninspired men to make his creed as his furniture, his bread, or books – tested all opinions by the light of his own reason – chose to give an account of his convictions, or the use of his powers in obtaining his convictions, to none but his Maker. Self-respect, love of truth, reverence to God, benevolence to men, call upon us all to stand by our native right and duty of searching into all truth contained in all creeds, confessions of faith, catechisms, and all other documents, whether human or divine. The obligation lies in our power of searching into whatever concerns our moral culture, spiritual life, and religious duty.’
Mr. Forster, in accordance with the sentiments here advocated, has left the Congregational body with which he was connected, and has founded a Free Church. Whether that church will answer the wants of our age, time will prove. If the work be good, it will stand. If it be better than old-fashioned sectarianism, it will remain. If it speak to the heart of man, it cannot die. Mr. Forster has great qualifications for his task. He is in the prime of life. His manner in the pulpit is pleasing. His sermons evince careful preparation, and the possession of a considerable amount of intellectual power. At times he rises into eloquence. Some of his published sermons are inferior to none that have been published in our time, and have been received well in quarters where, generally, little favour is shown to the pulpit exercises of divines.
Though unwearied in the discharge of pastoral duties, Mr. Forster has found time for other labours. Of the Temperance Reformation he has been one of the ablest and most eloquent advocates, and often has Exeter Hall reëchoed his impassioned advocacy in its behalf. He carries abstinence to an extent rare in this country, and abstains entirely from the use of animal food. At one time he was an ardent member of the party of Anti-State Churchmen, of which the late member for Rochdale is the glory and defence. Latterly he seems to have mixed but little with that body. We can well imagine that his time has been otherwise occupied – that his situation must have been one of growing difficulty and danger – that the claims, on the one side, of a church orthodox on all great questions, and of truth and duty, or what seemed to him as such, on the other, must have cost him many a weary day and sleepless night. That he burst his bonds and became free – that he tore away the associations of a life – argues the possession of honesty and conscientiousness, and fits him to be the preacher of the free inquiry of which he has afforded so signal an example in himself.
THE REV. HENRY IERSON
‘Can you tell me where Mr. Fox’s Chapel is?’ said I to a young gentleman who had evidently been in the habit of passing it every Sunday. ‘No, indeed, I cannot,’ was the reply. I put the same question to a policeman, and with the same result. Yet South Place, Finsbury Square, is a place of no little pretension. It has been the home of rational religion for some years – of the religion of humanity – of religion purified from formalism, bibliolatry, and cant. There the darkness of the past has been rolled away, and the light of a new and better day appeared; and yet the scene of all this was unknown to the dwellers in the immediate neighbourhood. There is a light so dazzling that it can only be seen from afar, that close to it you can see nothing. It may be this is the light radiating from South Place.
‘There is a religion of humanity,’ writes Mr. Fox, ‘though not enshrined in creeds and articles – though it is not to be read merely in sacred books, and yet it may be read in all, whenever they have anything in them of truth and moral beauty; a religion of humanity which goes deeper than all, because it belongs to the essentials of our moral and intellectual constitution, and not to mere external accidents – the proof of which is not in historical agreement or metaphysical deduction, but in our own conscience and consciousness; a religion of humanity which unites and blends all other religions, and makes one the men whose hearts are sincere, and whose characters are true, and good, and harmonious, whatever may be the deductions of their minds, or their external profession; a religion of humanity which cannot perish in the overthrow of altars or the fall of temples, which survives them all, and which, were every derived form of religion obliterated from the face of the world, would recreate religion, as the spring recreates the fruits and flowers of the soil, bidding it bloom again in beauty, bear again its rich fruits of utility, and fashion for itself such forms and modes of expression as may best agree with the progressive condition of mankind.’
And this religion of humanity is to be met with in Finsbury Square. I am not aware there is anything new about it. Every school-boy is familiar with it in Pope’s Universal Prayer; but latterly, in Germany, in England, and across the Atlantic, it has been preached with an eloquence of peculiar fascination and power. Theodore Parker and Ralph Waldo Emerson have been the high priests in the new temple, which fills all space, and whose worship is all time. In England, as an organisation, whatever it may have done as a theory, it has not succeeded. Here William Johnson Fox, originally a student at the Independent Academy, Homerton, then a Unitarian minister, and now the member for Oldham, and the ‘Publicola’ of the ‘Dispatch,’ has been its most eloquent advocate. If any man could have won over the people to it, he, with his unrivalled rhetoric – rhetoric which, during the agitation of the Anti-Corn-Law League, will be remembered as surpassing all that has been heard in our day – would have done it; and yet Fox never had his chapel more than comfortably full – not even when the admission was gratis, and any one who wished might walk in. But now the place has a sadly deserted appearance. You feel cold and chilly directly you enter. The mantle of Fox has not fallen on his successor; and what Mr. Fox could not accomplish, most certainly the Rev. Mr. Ierson will not perform.
At half-past eleven service every Sunday morning commences at the chapel in South Place. You need not hurry: there will be plenty of room for bigger and better men than yourself. The worship is of the simplest character. Mr. Ierson commences with reading extracts from various philosophical writers, ancient and modern; then there is singing, not congregational, but simply that of a few professionals. The metrical collection used, I believe, is one made by Mr. Fox, and is full of beautiful poetry and sublime sentiments; but the congregation does not utter it – it merely listens while it is uttered by others for it. Singing is followed by prayer. ‘Prayer,’ says Montgomery (James, not Robert) —
‘is the soul’s sincere desire,Uttered or unexpress’d,The motion of a hidden fire,That trembles in the breast.’Mr. Ierson’s prayer is nothing of the kind: no fire trembles in the breast while it is offered up. It is a calm, rational acknowledgment of Divine power and goodness and beauty. Then comes an oration of half an hour, the result of no very hard reading, and the week’s worship is at an end, and the congregation, principally a male one, departs, not much edified, or enlightened, or elevated, but, perhaps, a little puffed up, as it hears how the various sects of religionists all, like sheep, go astray. Such must be the inevitable result. You cannot lecture long on the errors of Christians, without feeling convinced of your own superiority. The youngest green-horn in the chapel has a self-satisfied air. Beardless though he be, he is emancipated. The religion which a Milton could make the subject of his immortal strains – which a Newton could find it consistent with philosophy to accept – which has found martyrs in every race, and won trophies in every clime – he can pass by as an idle tale or an old wife’s dream.
Mr. Ierson himself is better than the imaginary disciple I have just alluded to. He has got to his present position, I believe, by honest conviction and careful study. Originally, I think, he was a student at the Baptist College, Stepney; then he became minister over a Baptist congregation at Northampton, and there finding his position at variance with his views, he honestly relinquished his charge. I fear such honesty is not so common as it might be. I believe, in the pulpit and the pew, did it exist, our religious organisations would assume a very different aspect. The great need of our age, it seems to me, is sincerity in religion – that men and women, that pastor and people, should plainly utter what they think. I believe there is a greater freedom in religious thought than really appears to be the case. ‘How is it,’ said I to a Unitarian, the other day, ‘that you do not make more progress?’ ‘Why,’ was the answer, ‘we make progress by other sects taking our principles, while retaining their own names:’ and there was truth in the reply.
Still, it is better that a man who ceases to be a Churchman, or a Baptist, or an Independent, should say and act as Mr. Ierson has done. He will lose nothing in the long run by honesty – not that I take it Mr. Ierson has achieved any great success, but he gives no sign of any great talent. He is not the man to achieve any great success. People who believe his principles will stop at home unless there is in the pulpit a man who can draw a crowd. Fox could scarcely do this. Such men as Ronge, or Ierson, or Macall, who lectured to some forty people in the Princess’s Concert Booms, cannot do it at all. Mr. Brooke might, if he could be spared from Drury Lane – so could Macready or Dickens, or Thackeray; but in these matters everything depends upon the man.
Of course the first question is, thus emancipated – Why worship at all? why rise betimes on a Sunday, shave at an early hour, put on your best clothes, and, mindless of city fog and dirt, rush hurriedly to South Place, Finsbury Square? If I take the New Testament literally, I take with it the command relative to the assembling of ourselves together, and have a scriptural precedent for a course sometimes very wearisome and very much against the grain; but with free reason, an emancipated man, the case is altered. I am in a different position altogether. Custom is all very well to the holders of customary views. I expect a secret feeling lies at the bottom, that, after all, church and chapel going is good – that worship in public is a service acceptable to Deity.
It may be, and this I believe is the great secret of the success of churches and chapels, that people don’t know how to spend their Sundays, especially in country towns, without going to a place of worship. You cannot dine directly you have had your breakfast; you must allow an interval. Now, you cannot, especially if it looks as if it would rain, and your best hat might be damaged, fill up that time better than in a place of worship. So, even Mr. Ierson gets a congregation, although it is made up of people who see in him a man not a whit more qualified to teach religious truth than themselves, and who maintain the right of individual reason, in matters of religion, to its fullest extent. He has no claim to being heard; yet they go to hear him. They claim the right of private judgment; yet they take his. Worship, in its ordinary sense, they deem unnecessary; yet they approach to it as nearly as they can. Such is the incongruity between the religious instinct on the one side, and the logical faculty on the other – an incongruity, however, proclaiming that, reason as you will, man is a religious animal after all; that he has the faculty of worship, and must worship; that, take from him his sacred books – his Shaster, his Koran, or Bible – still the heart is true to its old instincts, and believes, and adores, and loves. True is it, that man, wherever he may be, whatever his creed or colour, still
‘Bound to the earth, he lifts his eye to heaven.’THE IRVINGITES
Are the days of Pentecost gone never to return? Have miracles ceased from amongst men? Cannot signs and wonders still be wrought by men filled with the Holy Ghost? The larger part of the Christian Church answers this question in the negative. It teaches that the miracles are dumb, that the need of them has past away, that in the fulness of time the Divine will was made known, and that the Church needs not now the signs and wonders by which that revelation was attested and declared.
A large body, however, has lately sprung up amongst us, holding opposite views. Enter their churches, and, according to them, the gift of tongues still exists – signs and wonders are still manifest – miracles are still wrought. Still, as much as in apostolic times, does the Divine afflatus dwell in man, and the man so endued becomes a prophet, and declares the will of God in known or unknown tongues.
For some time past, a magnificent Gothic Cathedral has been in process of being built in Gordon Square. It stands near where once stood Coward College, and where still stands University Hall, a Unitarian College, and not far from the University College, which a certain Ex-Lord-Chancellor took under his especial care. On Christmas Day it was thrown open for the performance of the worship of ‘The Holy Catholic Apostolic Church,’ a body better, perhaps, known to the community at large as Irvingites, or followers of Edward Irving. Originally, I believe, the sect sprang up in Scotland, and Edward Irving merely joined it, and the form of worship which now prevails was not fully established till after his death. After Irving left the Scotch Church, the body took refuge in Newman Street, where they have remained till the present magnificent place was opened. There are to be seven cathedrals in London; each cathedral is to have four places of worship attached to it; and to each service in a cathedral appertain an evangelist, an apostle, a prophet, and an angel. The angel is the presiding spirit, an apostle seems to be what a bishop is in the English Church. There is an apostle for England, another for France, another for America, and another for Germany. To every cathedral there are twenty-four priests. The angel is magnificently clad in purple, the sign of authority. The next order, the prophets, wear blue stoles, indicative of the skies whence they draw their inspiration. The evangelists wear red as a sign of their readiness to shed their blood in the cause.
The Cathedral is well attended: upwards of 1000 communicants are connected with it. Service takes place in it several times a-day, and on the Sunday evening a sermon is preached, which is intended to enlighten and to win over such as are not connected with the church. Many distinguished persons are office-bearers in the church, such as Admiral Gambier, the Hon. Henry Parnell, J. P. Knight, R.A., Mr. Cooke, the barrister, Major Macdonald; while Lady Dawson, Lady Bateman, Lady Anderson, are amongst its members. Henry Drummond, the eccentric M.P. for East Surrey, has the credit of being connected with this place; but, while it is true that he is an Irvingite, it is not true that he is an office-bearer of the church. Those who join the church offer a tenth of their annual income towards its support, and this promise, it is believed, year after year is faithfully kept. The Cathedral itself is an evidence of the liberality of the people. Attached to the church is a small, but very elegant, chapel, which is to be used on rare occasions, and which was raised by the ladies, who contributed the magnificent sum of £4000 in aid of the work. The chief beauty of the church, however, is the altar, which is carved out of all sorts of coloured marble, and is superbly decorated. The service-book put into your hands is called ‘The Liturgy and Divine Offices of the Church,’ but I do not learn from the members of the body that they think themselves exclusively the church, and that there is no salvation out of their pale. They merely profess to be one portion of the church, to take within their comprehensive fold members of all other churches; and this, to a very considerable extent, has been the case. The Irvingites have taken their converts not from the world, but the church. They have made proselytes, not Christians: the members of other churches have come over to them. In their ranks are many Dissenters and Churchmen, and amongst their priests are many who have been clergymen in connection with the Dissenters or the Church of England. They profess to be above the common distinction by which sect is fenced off from sect – Catholic and Protestant come alike to them.
The Liturgy appears to be compiled from the rituals of the Greek, Anglican, and Roman Churches, with a slight preponderance to the latter. The apostle of the church is Mr. John Cardall, formerly a lawyer’s clerk, but called to his present office, as he himself states, about twenty years ago, by the voice of prophecy. This call is acknowledged by the community. He rules the whole body with irresponsible authority. He is the final appeal. On his decision everything rests. He claims spiritual preëminence over not only the churches in his own communion, but over all the churches of all baptized Christians throughout the world, nay, over all bishops, priests, and deacons, Anglican, Greek, or Roman, not excepting even the Pope himself. The Liturgy and Service-book is understood to be his compilation. He has also published a work, entitled ‘Readings upon the Liturgy,’ which is privately circulated, and is said, by those who have seen it, to be an interesting and peculiar book, abounding in the interpretations of the symbols and types of the Old Testament, and an ingenious endeavour to adapt them to the purposes of the Christian Church at the present day. In the Liturgy, besides what is found in that of the English Church, there are prayers for the dead, invocation of saints, transubstantiation. The authority of the church, the power of the priesthood, and the existence of actual living apostles to rule the church universal, are acknowledged and enjoined. The chief minister of the church, or, as he is called, the angel or bishop, is Mr. Christopher Heath, who, for many years, carried on business in the neighbourhood of the Seven Dials. He was also called miraculously to his present post. The other ministers, of whom there are a vast number, are all well paid for their services, on an average much better than many London incumbents. Several of them have been military men: they are not formally educated for their work, but called to it. They are not man-made ministers – they claim a Divine sanction and power. Nor are they taken from the well-educated classes. They assert that the Spirit may qualify any man, no matter how humble his occupation or his birth. Some of them, I am told, have been tailors, tinkers, shoemakers, barbers, but are now filled with divine light, and may do the signs and wonders done by the apostles in an earlier day.
With apostolic pretensions, these men are careless of apostolic simplicity. They must meet, not in an upper room, but in a gorgeous cathedral; they must array themselves in grotesque garments; they must have tapers and incense – Roman Catholic forms and ceremonies. One would have thought that the name of Edward Irving would have been kept free from such things; that his followers would have been above them; that they would as much as most realize the spirituality of Him who dwells not in houses made with hands, and whose temple is the lowly and contrite heart. Genius like Irving’s would have lent grandeur to a barn; and now the master is gone, and having no more an orator to enchant them, the church worships in fretted aisles – treads mosaic pavements – rejoices in fine music and elaborate ceremonial.
Thus always is it: when nature fails, men have recourse to art. We have no actors now, but, instead, we have a stage splendidly decorated, regardless of expense. We put Shakspere on the stage in a way that would astonish Shakspere himself: but we have no Shakspere. Is not this a sign of weakness? When a beauty betakes herself to jewellery, and invests herself with borrowed graces, is it not a sign that Time is dealing in his old-fashioned cruel way with the rose upon her cheek and the lustre in her eye? and is it not so with the Irvingite Church? Is not its pomp and splendour a sign that it is not so rich in apostolic gifts as it claims to be? Paul, I think, would hardly feel himself at home in Gordon Square.
