The Quarterly Review

ART. I.-Colloquies on the Progress and Prospects of Society.
By Robert Southey. 2 vols. 8vo.
Svo. With Engravings.
THIS is a beautiful book, full of wisdom and devotion-of

poetry and feeling; conceived altogether in the spirit of other times, such as the wise men of our own day may scoff at, but such as Evelyn, or Izaak Walton, or Herbert, would have delighted to honour. Mr. Southey, or Montesinos, (for so he is here called,) is sitting alone in his library, on a November evening, musing upon the death of the Princess Charlotte, then a recent event, and suffering his mind to stray to the national prospects which this national calamity opened before him. It had just occurred to him that, on two former occasions, when the heir-apparent of England was cut off in the prime of life, the nation was on the eve of a religious revolution in the first instance, and of a political one in the second. Prince Arthur and Prince Henry being thus in his mind, an elderly personage, of grave and dignified aspect, of a countenance indicating high intellectual rank, entered, and announced himself, in a voice of uncommon sweetness, to be a stranger from a distant country. It was the ghost of Sir Thomas More; and a very judicious ghost (as might be expected) he proved himself, coping with his host in a melancholy fit, and finding him, as the Duke used to find Jaques at such moments, full of matter.'

Accordingly, the progress and prospects of society are then developed, in a series of dialogues between Montesinos and his disemhodied visiter-the basis of all being a comparison of the present times with those in which Sir T. More lived and lost his head. It may be imagined, from the mere announcement of this introduction, that there is something of the dismal character of the scroll of Ezekiel impressed upon these volumes; and that, as the two friends, the living and the dead, enter upon the dark paths of futurity, (dark in every sense,) they seem the beings of whom Dante and Virgil were the prototypes when they descended to explore those hidden regions which the superscription over the gate proclaimed to be so full of woe. In many of the apprehensions here entertained, we confess that we ourselves participate; nor can we see how any man who watches the signs of these times can prophesy smooth things only. Hope, however, comes, which comes to all; and

VOL. XLI. NO. LXXXI.

our

our grounds both of hope and apprehension will be gathered from the observations we shall offer on the structure of society as it existed before the Reformation, and as it exists now. We must premise, however, that it is not our intention to follow Mr. Southey through all the details of a subject so vast, nor yet to make him accountable for all the positions we advance; but, freely availing ourselves of his excellent materials, and dismissing the dialogue, (a mechanism which generally impedes the easy flow of thought,) we shall devote ourselves rather to the ecclesiastical, than to the political part of the question; and, by thus restricting ourselves, endeavour to keep within compass.

The ceremonial of the Roman Catholic religion, like that of the Levitical law, had its use. It was ever coram populo: its numerous saints'-days-its gorgeous processions-its crucifixesits stations-its rosaries-its places of pilgrimage-its monasteries, both in the city and the wilderness;-all these brought religion home to men, backed such as were religiously disposed by public opinion, served as visible acknowledgments of an invisible world-the substantial confessions of a nation's faith in things unseen. There was much in this liable to abuse, but there was much, too, that was holy and good; and they who have travelled in foreign lands, and listened to the vesper-bell -the

squilla di lontano

Che paia 'l giorno pianger che si muore,'

will regret that tasteless fanaticism which swept away many sensible, yet innocent incentives to devotion, as abominations, and guarded effectually against religious excess by substituting for it religious indifference.

This, however, was brought about by degrees. There was a time, since the worship of images, (and happy would it have been if the religious habits of the country had thenceforth stood fixed,) when the men of England were not ashamed of their faith-when appropriate texts adorned the walls of their dwellingrooms, and children received at night a father's blessing;-and let us worship God was said with solemn air,' by the head of the household; and churches were resorted to daily; and the parson in journey' gave notice for prayers in the hall of the inn for prayers and provender,' quoth he, hinder no man;' and the cheerful angler, as he sat under the willow-tree, watching his quill, trolled out a Christian catch, Here we may sit and pray, before death stops our breath;' and the merchant (like the excellent Sutton, of the Charter-house) thought how he could make his merchandise subservient to the good of his fellow-citizens and the glory of his God, and accordingly endowed some charitable,

and

and learned, and religious foundation, worthy of the munificence of a crowned head; and the grave historian (Lord Clarendon himself does so) chose a text in his Bible as a motto for his chapter on politics; and religion, in short, reached unto every place, and, like Elisha stretched on the dead child, (to use one of Jeremy Taylor's characteristic illustrations,) gave life and animation to every part of the body politic. But years rolled on; and the original impulse given at the Reformation, and augmented at the Rebellion, to undervalue all outward forms, has silently continued to prevail, till, with the form of godliness, (much of it, no doubt, objectionable, but much of it wholesome,) the power in a considerable degree expired too.

Accordingly, our churches are now closed in the week-days, for we are too busy to repair to them; our politicians crying out, with Pharaoh, Ye are idle, ye are idle; therefore would ye go and do sacrifice to the Lord.' Our cathedrals, it is true, are still open; but where are the worshippers? Instead of entering in, the citizen avails himself of the excellent clock which is usually attached to them, sets his watch, and hastens upon 'Change, where the congregation is numerous and punctual, and where the theological speculations are apt to run in Shylock's vein pretty exclusively. If a church will answer, then, indeed, a joint-stock company springs up; and a church is raised with as much alacrity, and upon the same principles, as a play-house. The day when the people brought their gifts is gone by. The solid temples,' that heretofore were built as if not to be dissolved till doomsday, have been succeeded by thin emaciated structures, bloated out by coats of flatulent plaster, and supported upon cast-metal pegs, which the courtesy of the times calls pillars of the church. The painted windows, that admitted a dim religious light, have given place to the cheap house-pane and dapper green curtain. The font, with its florid reliefs and capacious crater, has dwindled into a miserable basin. Sermons have contracted with the buildings in which they are delivered, consisting, like them, of less massive materials than formerly, and having for their title (if it is meant they should be taking) short discourses.' The clerical dress has accommodated itself to the sermons-Virgil's motto for his heifer, 'omnia magna,' in all things reversed the skull-cap gone-the shovel-hat going-the cassock, which almost in the memory of man lingered amongst a few ancients, shrunk into the unmeaning apron of the Bishop and Dean,the flowing bands, which it was heretofore the pride and pleasure of many a Mrs. Primrose to adorn with needlework, dwindled into two puny labels. All these are indications, (many of them trifles, indeed,) that the age of forms is gone by, and of something better

B 2

than

than forms, for they are the straws which point to the quarter from which the wind has been long setting in. To those who seek for other and graver signs, we would say, Look at the number of churches erected, by the piety of our ancestors, within the city' of London, and compare them with those at the west end; or take any town of modern growth, and contrast it, in this particular, with one of other times. The population of Cheltenham, for instance, says Mr. Yates,* a dozen years ago was about equal to that of Gloucester; and what was the relative proportion of the places of worship? Gloucester had ten churches, besides the cathedral; Cheltenham had a single one. Again, at what period before our own was any serious attempt made to separate education from religion-to let loose upon society the intellectual strength of its members, with nothing whatever to direct that strength to beneficent or even to innocent ends? Let it be asked whether, on the supposition that our law-proceedings were to be re-constructed, the judges would in these days be recommended to go to church before they go to court, or whether to do so would not be voted a waste of time? Whether, on a like supposition with regard to our parliament, the Houses of Lords and Commons would be instructed to begin their deliberations with prayers to God to bless them, or whether the practice would not now be considered obsolete? Whether, in the plan of a modern mansion, there would be found the chapel of the king's old courtier,' or the billiard-room of the king's young courtier'? Whether, on building a poor-house, the parish-officers would now think of inscribing over the door, Deo et pauperibus'? Whether, on a reproduction of our Liturgy, prayers would be found in it for deliverance from plague, pestilence, and famine, or whether such petitions would not be thought reflections upon the state of philosophy amongst us, when political economy, and medical police, and agricultural meetings, are understood by so many thinking persons to render a superintending Providence of comparatively little consequence? All these things, it cannot be denied, are against us.

But, on the other hand, if forms are now nothing, forms were heretofore every thing; and accordingly, when the tide set against them, there was not reasonableness enough in some of them to resist such rough assailants as Luther or Calvin, for they were ridiculed by those who were not prepared to go any such lengths as either of them-by none more than Erasmus. Down, therefore, they went at once, under the strong blows of the reformer, and shamed their worshippers. But now, whatever of vital religion there is in the country, is founded upon evidence; and Vide his Letter to Lord Liverpool, entitled The Church in Danger.

whatever

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The Quarterly Review, Volume 41