THE CLERGY AND THEIR WORK.
[TO THE EDITOR OF THE " SPECTATOR: ]
SIR, When one thinks of the multitude of hungry souls desiring to be fed with wholesome diet, one cannot but be rather pain- fully amused by Mr. H. Bernard's complaint in your last issue,— 'that the younger clergy feel themselves " comparatively useless." is the preaching even one sermon a week and the giving a few hours daily to the sick, the poor, and the young, so small a matter? The query is symptomatic. Why is so little real work
done, but because it is done in a half-hearted way ? It is easy enough to write a weak, wordy essay ; it is not may to preach home to the hearts of the people, rich or poor. Books will not help a man much to do this, save the Book of Books ; and for the knowledge of human nature, the human book of books, Shake- speare ; and in a lower sphere, Thackeray. What our preachers lack is sympathy, the true dramatic faculty, the capability of placing themselves at the point of view of the hearer. The visiting a few hours a day, or a week even, is a great matter, if the clergy do it kindly, lovingly, sympathetically ; not if they go about to spout tracts, and scold. There is a time for all things. Prove your- self the true friend of your parishioners, and they will listen to your sermons, and you will have something real to say to them. You may not be at all fitted to expound deep doctrines, but you can speak of the love of God and of the love of Christ, and if your hearers believe in your love, they will listen to you, and not else. Then, there are the parish schools. To teach your boys and girls to love truth, honour, and goodness,—is that nothing ? Thank God, the unhappy Board-school system has not yet stripped you, the younger clergy, of the opportunity of influencing the minds of the young, and what is more, their hearts,winning them to rever- ence, earnestness, and goodness. Is that nothing? If you think so, I fear we must say to the doubters, " It is because you are nothing,' for a nobler work is not to be conceived. Board Schools are a mistake, because the clergy are banished from them, because in them, of necessity, task-work is substituted for love, and words are made to do duty for thought, feeling, and principle. No re- proach to Board-School masters and mistresses! They do their best, but what is it when done ? They want the sympathy, the co-operation of a more highly-trained mind, and the backbone of an authority based on love, which only the Church can supply,— not Rome, with her fictions and her sillinesses, but our solid, temperate, large-hearted, and large-souled Mother, the Church of England. The Clergy useless ? The Clergy little to do ? Heaven grant me patience ! No wonder church after church is ill attended, and chapels flourish, while such views prevail. " But men are not all born preachers." No ; but you can almost all do far better than you do. I would say to the younger clergy,—Don't think about shining, or say- ing anything fine or decorous, or about self at all. Go amongst your people ; learn to know and love them. The rest will follow. Love is the secret. " Oh ! but there is so much to disgust,—dirt, drink, squalid poverty, &c." The only way good men mostly see to the end is by proclaiming war to all mirth and for- bidding an enjoyment, sanctioned by Holy Scripture and our Lord's example, for fear of abuse, whereby they are identified with a small, Puritanic, noisy, and somewhat offensive section of the community, and become the avowed enemies of all the honest publicans and of all the young men in their parishes. Honest in- tention, doubtless, but deplorable mistake ! We shall never fight abuse, but by right use in everything. When will the clergy learn as much, young or old ?
Pardon my having said more than I meant to say. You are so immersed in political cares, that you are likely to find no place for my expression of surprise. In any case, believe me, Mr. Editor, though differing largely from you on some points, the sin- cere admirer of your honesty and earnestness.—I am, Sir, &c.,
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