THE SPIRIT OF PERSECUTION.
NEaaoisrax and Sicilian dungeons inspire us with horror, and as the successive descriptions have only tended to confirm what first we were told by Mr. Gladstone. our feelings have been tho- roughly enlisted in sympathy with Garibaldi. In Naples and Sicily we have seen what the spirit of persecution can achieve when unchecked by law, or when laws are defied. The spirit of persecution is the same everywhere ; its dimensions only appear large in proportion to its opportunities of action without control, but its cunning cruelty is not the less active on fields where it is hemmed in by legal guarantees. It is fond of laying hold of the letter of statutes, and even occasionally acts the part of zealously supporting the law. Sometimes, it is by an exercise of social in- fluence that it seeks its ends. But the spirit is still the same, and the intent is always to gratify some narrow passion which has had its day when times were favourable for its production. This spirit never will recognize any advancement or growth ; its fa- vourite argument is that what was ought still to be, and beyond that it cannot get. Happily, so far as England is concerned, so much light abounds that it is only in some obscure agricultural parish, or amongst the wilds of Wales, such narrow spirits find vent fer their activity. Two such oases have lately occurred.
In the county of Norfolk there is a parish called Horsey, of which the Reverend Edward Pots Neale is Vicar. In the 'dis- charge of his duties, the Vicar hears of the death of an unbap- tized. child. Waiting upon the bereaved mother, with very ques- tionable taste in a time of mourning, the Vicar declares he will not bury the child. The mother, to do her justice, although not agreeing with the Vicar upon the vexed subject of baptismal re- generation, seems convinced of the propriety of a religious service at the grave. She stated at once that she would have "singing and prayer over it." Probably she had never heard of the Act of Consecration, by which the parish burial-ground had been "set apart from profane and unholy uses for ever." But the Vicar knew it, and believing singing and prayer by unauthorized per- sons to be unholy and profane, therefore forbade it. But two unsophisticated persons carrying the child to its last resting- place paused, and by the road-side, offered up a prayer, and then, singing two verses of a devotional hymn, advanced into the churchyard. The Vicar was there, and he called out aloud to them to desist. But as they disobeyed, the Vicar ransacked the armoury, of the law, and found a weapon which unex- pectedly another necessity, elsewhere, placed in his hands. St. George's-in-the-East caused a statute to be passed which was intended to suppress riot in the church, but, unfortunately, the statute is clumsily drawn, and therefore if any one "vex and annoy" a vicar he is liable to a penalty. The law does not ap- pear to reserve the definition of "vexation and trouble," but if a vicar gives evidence of the fact of his being "vexed and troubled" the penalty follows. Mr. Bryan King was vexed and troubled indeed ; but it was by groans, cries, and epithets, not by the singing of a hymn. Nevertheless, Mr. Neale is gratified by &flue and costs against the two humble persons whom he brought before the magistrates. The statute, passed against mob cries, whistling, and song-singing, is actually first applied to the singing of hymns. A rude religious service is defined to be vexation and trouble to a vicar. But the desire on the part of the vicar to construe the singing into a breach of the Act, brings us within sight of the tendency to persecution. On the mere letter of the law the vicar is right, but the spirit of the law is entirely twisted to a personal purpose. We do not defend the act of these people in the churchyard, but their error was one which sprung out of their idea of duty, and might easily have been pardoned by a Christian vicar who could soon have reached the conclusion that no offence was intended to him.
Take another case. A Miss Mary Morice is the owner of a
landed estate in Wales. She issues a circular to her tenants, apparently written under the inspiration of a clergyman, and de- claring that "Divine Providence having placed her in the position of proprietress of farms, it is her duty to see that the farmers are churchmen. The letter is very well intentioned, no doubt, and but for a very ugly suggestion of notice to quit might be per- mitted to passt as many other such attempts have passed, as a silly effort to bring about a personal following to church. But Miss Morice forgets that, inasmuch as the contract between her and her tenants is simply so much money annually for the use of so many acres of land, she is seeking to introduce an element into the con- tract which must depend for its compliance upon the force of her position, and the weakness of the tenants to resist. Tenantsare much more easily got than farms ; and it is the loss and, inconvenience to the present tenants upon which Miss Xforice calculates in order to obtain compliance. The strong against the weak, and the weak beaten by the spirit of persecution which calls to its aid pe- cuniary loss.
Mr. Neale and Miss Morice do not suceed however ; indeed, they do great damage to their church. A little local success will not compensate for the aggregate of damage brought upon the church in thousands of places elsewhere. If the Church of England has a mission, it is by the toleration of her practices to draw off the stream of dissent. But proceedings such as we have noticed contribute more to the ruin of the Church than a thou- sand speeches from members of the Liberation Society. Facts like these are more potential than agitations for the severance of Church and State. It exhibits the Church in its least worthy as- pect, when it descends to the employment of threats and fines. The Church has statutes too many for its preservation ; they are edged tools in the hands of some of the clergy, who so unskilfully handle them, and in so narrow and sectarian a spirit, that they give the people a notion of danger from clerical hands. It is as to think of it ; but the clergy might look beyond the surface of events, and, tracing the causes of the alienation of large sections of the people not necessarily irreligious, might discover that it is only by showing forth the Christian life and practice that the Church and the people are to be made one.
Previous page
