LAY VIEWS BY SIX CLERGY.* WE must begin our notice
of this interesting collection of essays by a mild protest against the solecism in its title. At Canterbury they know what is meant by a " six preacher," and in some part of Christendom there may be ministers of religion who for some reason are called "six clergy " ; but we imagine that the editor of this volume meant no more than that his contributors were six clergymen. In a future edition we hope he will say so. The book would be worth possessing if only for the masterly essay with which it opens, on the causes of the decline in church-going, by the Dean of St. Paul's.
Dr. Inge is easily the most brilliant of our modern theologians; to knowledge he adds wisdom, and to wisdom wit ; and the whole is informed by a spirit of piety as clearly genuine as it is unconventional. He takes for the text of his present dis- course the character of King Jotham given in the Book of Chronicles, who "did that which was right in the sight of the Lord ... howbeit he entered not into the temple of the Lord"; and proceeds to describe various specimens of the modern type of Jotham—the "clean-living but frankly irreligious man, who makes Sunday his day of recreation," "the man who might go to church if he liked the services better,"
"the Liberal who is offended by the medievalism of orthodox Christianity, and would welcome a non-miraculous
religion predominantly ethical and perhaps pietistic," and the student of anthropology, no real Jotham at all, who regards all traditional rules of conduct, whether
dogmas or ceremonies, as survivals of savage taboos. These various types Dr. Inge describes not unsympathetically, allow- ing whatever he can find reasonable in their case, as when he admits to the critic of our church services that no professional work is quite so badly done as the average preaching in the Church of England ; at the same time putting his finger on the weak places of their contention. But his most careful and sympathetic study is that of the "mystic," a Jotham par excellence and in exceleis. So sympathetic, indeed, is it, and so intimate, that the reader is almost surprised when, as in the other cases, the Dean turns round upon this also with rebuke :—
"The lonely mystic must remember that Christianity has from the very first been a social religion. The idea of a progress from tribal religion to pure individualism, which our imaginary dis- putant propounded, was counter to the law of love which all recognize as the very centre and kernel of the gospel of Christ.
4, lay Views by Six clergy. London: Longman and Co. [32. 6d. net.] . It is not possible for a band of brothers to be individualist in their religion while they are closely united in all else. . . . The mystical union between Christ and His Church, and the bond of union among Churchmen and Churchwomen, become felt realities to the devout communicant"
On the general question which he set out to investigate the writer can only give an uncertain answer. " There are thousands of parishes in which the Church is the centre of a vigorous spiritual life; and those who predict a rapid change in the religions habits and practices of mankind show only their own lack of the historical sense." On the other hand, " the practice of church-going is likely to decline still further, especially in Protestant churches, which cannot, consistently with their principles, inculcate the duty as a matter of life and death." Probably, from observation of present phenomena, no more reassuring prophecy could l.)e given. But then, if "the historical sense" is to be appealed to, nothing is more certain than that it is the unexpected that happens, and that it happens, in the sphere of religion, through the influence of a commanding spiritual personality. The dead bones in the valley may be scattered and intensely individualistic, but it is always possible that some Son of man may arise who will call the winds of heaven to breathe upon them ; and then they will come together. No one foresaw the revolutions wrought by Francis of Assisi or George Fox or John Wesley, and each movement brought with it a revival of institutional religion.
Mr. Tollinton's essay, which follows Dr. Inge's, is in a way complementary to it, for it sets itself the inquiry whether
the existing Church, without waiting for any problematical developments, might not minister more effectively than it does to those who at present are inclined to stand aloof from it, and especially to one type, with which Dr. Ingo does not
deal at any length, that which is common among "school- masters, journalists, doctors, and men of business." Mr. Tollinton, writing, we feel sure, as one who has an intimate experience of this class, tells us that the point in which the
common language of religion has ceased to "find" them is its occupation with salvation or "security" when their interest is in ideals of conduct ; and with a doctrine of sin and its consequences which rests upon ideas borrowed from the domain of law, whereas the actuating ideal. of to-day come from the region of biological science. Clearly, therefore, the pulpit, if it understood its business, might do much to make the truths of religion once more real and vivid by restating them. And even as to worship, Mr. Tollinton shows by an analysis of its true meaning, and the true basis of the supremacy of Scripture, that neither prayers nor Bible- reading are obscurantist exercises. He then puts to his serious-minded but nnecclesiastical brethren a plain question :—
" Are they quite consistent in first leaving the Church and then accusing it of narrow views, robbing the society, so far as in them lies, of the very qualities of whose absence they complain ? ... He is not entitled to consider church-going as identical with true religion. He is not asked to silence his desire for alterations which may make the heritage of the past more fully available for present needs. But, seeing things as they are, be may well con- sider whether English life stands to lose or gain by the decline of public worship, and by the complete abandonment of the religious element in our Sundays."
The remaining essays are on a somewhat different plane from the two we have discussed, and deal with special problems, such as education and "the economic gospel," but they have each something to say that merits attention. Perhaps the most fresh and informing is that by Canon Pearce on " The Place and Power of the Layman," in which he traces both the steps by which he has lost his influence in the counsels of the Church
and those by which the attempt has recently been made to restore it to him. Among the former, he lays special stress on the Church Building Act of 1818, which introduced the custom of pew-rents, and thereby thrust the parishioners as such on to a back bench. The latter, whether in the shape of Church Congresses, Diocesan and Ruridecanal Congresses, Houses of Laymen, or the Representative Church Council, he finds quite ineffectual, because they have no firm basis in the parishes, and necessarily give opportunity only to the leisured class. " The real question of the moment is whether in the separate parishes the layman can be thoroughly and systematically encouraged to use the powers that be has." The first step must be the organization everywhere of Parochial Councils,
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