The Religious Life of London

“On Sunday evening, August 2, Mr. Charles Watts – An Impartial Estimate of the Life and Teachings of the Founder of Christianity; on Sunday evening, August 9, Iconoclast (Mr. Bradlaugh) – Capital and Labour, and Trades’ Unions; on Sunday evening, August 16, Mrs. Harriet Law – The Teachings and Philosophy of J. S. Mill, Esq.; on Sunday evening, August 23, Mrs. Harriet Law – The Late Robert Owen: a Tribute to His Memory, Drawn from a Comparison of Present Institutions and their Effects, with those Advocated by that Eminent Philanthropist; on Sunday evening, August 30, Mrs. Harriet Law, an Appeal to Women to Consider their Interests in Connexion with the Social, Political, and Theological Aspects of the Times.”

Let me add, discussions are invited at the close of each lecture, and that, as may be anticipated, after a discussion the combatants remain of the same opinion. Nevertheless, the Secularists enjoy these discussions immensely – and no wonder, as on all such occasions they form not a majority merely, but almost the entire assembly. It is not often they find their match. Men who can meet them on a common platform are rare. A sincere Christian is shocked and pained, and loses his temper. Every cock can crow on his own dunghill; and at Cleveland Hall the Secularists have it all their own way, and are merry at the expense of their opponents. Nor is this all; they often indulge in a style of abuse which sounds even to tolerant ears uncommonly like blasphemy. In fact, they are often needlessly antagonistic, and vulgar, and coarse.

I have said Cleveland Hall is the headquarters of the society, for there is a society of which Mr. Charles Watts is secretary. There is another hall in the City Road; lectures are also, I believe, delivered elsewhere in London on a Sunday evening, and there are at least four or five secular societies. In the summer time they have open-air lectures on a Sunday morning in different parts of London. When the writer has been at Cleveland Hall, the room has generally been half full of respectable and sharp working men, all very positive and enthusiastic. There are not many women present, but, of course, there is the irrepressible baby. The lecturers are generally the persons whose names I have already given, who occasionally vary the scene of their labours by provincial engagements. Their work, whatever it may be, has now been going on for some years. This argues, on their part, some special fitness, and an adaptation of what they say and think to the class to whom they appeal. In this respect they set many of the clergy a good example. The people at Cleveland Hall do not call out for quarter of an hour lectures. Nor do they require anything in the way of music, or choral performances, or floral decorations, or altar lights, to make the service interesting. For children, whether they go to church or chapel, you must provide shows. For men nothing more is needed than logic and the human voice.

CHAPTER XIX.

the irregulars

“What do you think of the Ranters, Mr. Hall?” I quote from the life of the celebrated Baptist orator; “don’t you think they ought to be put down?”

“I don’t know enough of their conduct to say that. What do they do? Do they inculcate Antinomianism, or do they exhibit immorality in their lives?”

“Not that I know of, but they fall into very irregular practices.”

“Indeed, what practices?”

“Why, sir, when they enter a village they begin to sing hymns, and they go on singing until they collect a number of people on the village green, or in some neighbouring field, and then they preach.”

“Well, whether that may be prudent or expedient or not depends upon circumstances, but as yet I see no criminality.”

“But you must admit, Mr. Hall, it is very irregular.”

“And suppose I do admit that, what follows? Was not our Lord rebuking the Scribes and Pharisees and driving the buyers and sellers out of the temple very irregular? Was not almost all that he did in his public ministry very irregular? Was not the course of the Apostles, and of Stephen, and of many of the Evangelists, very irregular? Were not the proceedings of Calvin, Luther, and their fellow workers in the Reformation very irregular? – a complete and shocking innovation upon all the queer out-doings of the Papists? And were not the whole lives of Whitefield and Wesley very irregular lives, as you view such things? Yet how infinitely is the world indebted to all of these? No, sir, there must be something widely different from mere irregularity before I condemn.”

IRREGULAR AGENCIES

Between Churchmen and Dissenters there are bodies claiming and often receiving the support of both. The number of buildings used in London every Sunday evening for theatre services now amounts to eleven, eight of the eleven being engaged by a united committee, of which the Earl of Shaftesbury is the chairman, – viz., Astley’s, Standard, Pavilion, Royal Amphitheatre, Sadler’s Wells, Britannia, and the Metropolitan and Oxford Music Halls. The other buildings are St. James’s Hall and the Effingham and Victoria theatres. One result of this state of things is rather doubtful. Of the perniciousness of some of these places there can be no doubt. It may be that some of them would have been closed ere this had not the money received from the Sunday preaching made up for the losses of the week. In one year in these places 122 services were held, attended by 190,000 persons.

The London City Mission employs 361 agents. During the last year the number of visits made by them to the houses of the poor amounted to 1,987,259. The number of visits which they made to sick and dying amounted to 255,102. They gave away 6000 copies of the Bible; they circulated 2,677,901 tracts; they held more than 36,000 Bible classes and religious services indoors; they conducted 3764 out-of-door services; they induced 1296 persons to partake of the Lord’s Supper, 242 backsliders to return, 608 families to begin family prayer, 863 drunkards to abstain, 141 shopkeepers to close their shops on the Sabbath, and 8297 children to attend ragged and Sunday schools.

In London there are 300 Bible women always at work; then there is the Christian community founded in the days of John Wesley; the members of it visit workhouses and lodging-houses in the East of London and preach in the open air. Last year the number of open-air services held by them amounted to 542; the number of addresses delivered, 1626; and the number of hearers, including indoors and out, 379,370. The Society also visits lodging-houses and the Juvenile Refuge, and gives free tea meetings, which, as we may imagine, are very well attended. During the past year 255,477 tracts had been distributed, and altogether it had held 8573 services.

The Open-air Mission needs also to be recorded. It is calculated that in the summer our open-air preachers address every Sunday nearly half a million of persons in the metropolis alone. It must also be remembered that of late, by the closing of public-houses, the number of idle, covetous, mischievous persons thrown on our streets is considerably increased. On Sundays it is evident that the blockage of the streets is greater than ever. In such places as Trafalgar Square, and the steam-boat piers, and in all our back streets, there are thousands of boys and men gambling and demoralizing one another. The Open-air Mission catches some of them, and in the lowest neighbourhoods – where the most depraved live – its agents generally receive a favourable hearing; one exception is recorded, which occurred at the Royal Exchange. Preaching last year commenced there in April, and went on with many striking instances of success till May 9, when a band of secularists, humanitarians, and infidels came to oppose, – one man reading the Koran, while the agent of the City Mission was as usual about to commence his service. On the next Sunday the opposition was still greater, being reinforced by Roman Catholics and their priests. Under these circumstances preaching was suspended, only to be reopened when the excitement and the danger of a breach of the peace shall have passed away. The Society aims at open-air preaching, special visitation, domestic visitation, and conferences for mutual intercourse. The visit to Epsom belongs to the second class of these subjects. Twenty-one agents had been there during the race week, 60,000 tracts had been given away, many addresses had been given, and a Bible-stand erected. At this latter place, on the last wet Friday when the Oaks was being run, they sheltered a couple of hundred of poor starving wretches, and for five hours kept up preaching and praying on their account. Their service on the Sunday before the races was very interesting. On the Monday they held a service for the benefit of the gipsies, one of the speakers at which was the Dean of Ripon, better known perhaps as the Rev. Hugh M‘Neile.

Of the 60,000 Arabs of London there are 20,000 in the Ragged Schools.

The Female and Domestic Bible Missions now number 230 paid agents, each with her district and lady superintendent, and expend some 11,000l. a year, exclusive of between 6000l. and 7000l. which is paid to it in instalments by the poor themselves for Bibles, clothes, and bedding.

The Young Men’s Scripture Association has been very successful. Nearly 200 of a Sunday afternoon attend the Bible class in Aldersgate Street. It has twelve branches in different parts of the town.

Connected with no denomination are six or seven chapels or rooms, where as they meet they break bread in the morning and preach the Gospel in the evening. In addition, the Plymouth Brethren have some thirty places of worship, and their dulness and isolation from the world, which cause them even to avoid discharging their duties as citizens as inconsistent with the spiritual life, indicate the little they need be taken into account as a religious body aiming in any way to influence the religious life of London. According to the late Mr. Buckle, good people really do very little good. I fancy this is the case as far as the Plymouth Brethren are concerned.

the end