Part 3 (2/2)

”Decking the h the world”

The 13th of October was my first Sunday in Oxford, and my friend Charles Gore took me to the Choral Eucharist at Cowley St John, and afterwards to luncheon with the Fathers So began rateful ad experiences were at hand: on the 20th of October it was Liddon's turn, as Select Preacher, to occupy the pulpit at St Mary's The impressions of that, my first University ser, the yellow sunlight strea array of scarlet-robed doctors, the preacher's beautiful face looking down froaze And then the rolling Latin hynant text--_He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life; and he that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on hi to St John the Baptist or St John the Evangelist? The preacher holds that we are listening to the Evangelist, and says that the purpose of St John's Gospel is condensed into his text ”If to believe in Him is life, to have known and yet to reject him is death There is no middle term or state between the two In fact, this stern, yet truthful and merciful, claim makes all the difference between a Faith and a theory”

And now there is a moment's pause Preacher and hearers alike take breath So to the crucial point The preacher resumes: ”A state a painful controversy, which it would be better in this place to pass over in silence if too much was not at stake to warrant a course from which I shall only depart with sincere reluctance Need I say that I allude to the vexed question of the Athanasian Creed?” The great discourse which was thus introduced, with its strong argu been the property of the Church, and there is no need to recapitulate it But the concluding words, extolling ”the high and rare grace of an intrepid loyalty to known truth,” spoke with a force of personal appeal which demands commemoration: ”To be forced back upon the central realities of the faith which we profess; to learn, better than ever before, what are the convictions which we dare not surrender at any cost; to renew the freshness of an early faith, which affir worth thinking of, worth living for, if need were, worth dying for, is the unmutilated faith of Jesus Christ our Lord,--these may be the results of inevitable differences, and, if they are, they are blessings indeed”[13]

The saettable experience--my first visit to St Barnabas' The church was then just three years old Bishop Wilberforce had consecrated it on the 19th of October, 1869, and reeable service Acolyte running about Paste squares for bread, etc, but the church a great gift” Three years later, a boy fresh froood Bishop, not only thought ”the church a great gift,” but enjoyed the ”acolyte running about,” and found the whole service theworshi+p in which he had ever joined My impressions of it are as clear as yesterday's--the unadorned si by contrast the blaze of light and colour round the altar; the floating cloud of incense; the expressive and unfussy cere; and, ation of raduates and artisans, all singing Evangelical hymns with one heart and one voice It was, if ever there was on earth, congregational worshi+p; and I, for one, have never seen its like The people's pride in the church was very characteristic: they habitually spoke of it as ”our Barnabas” The clergy and the worshi+ppers were a family, and the church was a home

At the Dedication Festival of 1872, there was a strong list of preachers, including W J E Bennett, of Fro, then Principal of Cuddesdon But the sermon which made an indelible impression on me was preached by R W Randall, then vicar of All Saints, Clifton, and afterwards Dean of Chichester It was indeed a ht word, for, young as one was, one realized instinctively the wonderful art and mastery and technical perfection of the whole There was the exquisitelytopic was touched; the restrained, yet eer still--and the touch of personal reive the sense that ere listening to an elder brother who, thirty years before, had passed through the saedy, which now lay before us on the threshold of our Oxford life It was, in brief, a serht to be much remembered unto the Lord”

Some thirty years later, I was introduced to Dean Randall at a London dinner-party After dinner, I drew my chair towards him, and said, ”Mr

Dean, I have alished to have an opportunity of thanking you for a sermon which you preached at St Barnabas', Oxford, at the Dedication Festival, 1872” The Dean sraceful pleasure of an old er one, and said, ”Yes? What was the text?” ”The text I have long forgotten, but I remember the subject” ”And as that?” ”It was the insecurity of even the best-founded hopes” ”Rather a orn theme,” said the Dean, with a half-smile ”But not, sir,” I said, ”as you handled it You told us, at the end of the sermon, that you reraduate at Christ Church, and were sitting over your Thucydides close to your , grappling with a long and coe which was to be the subject of nextfor aChrist Churchdown to bathe in the Isis You described the gifts and graces of the pair, who, between them, seemed to combine all that was best and most beautiful in body and mind and soul And then you told us how, as your friends disappeared towards Christ Church Meadows, you returned to your work; and only were roused frorief and terror in the quadrangle below attracted your attention, and you saw the dead bodies of Gaisford and Phillimore borne past yourfrom their 'watery bier' at Sandford Lasher”

On Advent Sunday, December 1, I saw and heard Dr Pusey for the first tiathered all his physical and reat sermon on ”The Responsibility of Intellect in Matters of Faith” The thereat trust confided to us by God; that we are responsible to Him for the use of it; and that we must exercise it in submission to His revealed Will What He has declared, that it is our duty to believe Our Lord Hiainst wilful unbelief; the Athanasian Creed only re-echoed His aords; and the storainst the revealed Truth of God ”This tornado will, I trust, by God's mercy, soon pass; it is a , or the Creed because it contains them, would be emphatically to teach our people that it is _not_ necessary to salvation to believe faithfully the Incarnation of our Lord Jesus Christ, or in One God as He hashiy for the Faith, Pusey went abroad for the benefit of his health, and did not return to Oxford till the Summer Term I well remember the crowd of ancient disciples, who hadhis door in Christ Church, like the impotent folk at the Pool of Bethesda

Another res to my first Term Dean Stanley had been noh Churchmen made common cause with the Low Churchious cla--and in this he was conspicuously right--that ”opposition would only aggravate the evil by enlisting the enthusias” The vote was taken, in an unusually crowded Convocation, on the 11th of Dece scene, and ell described by an eyewitness[14] ”Oxford was fairly startled fro-end of the Michaelnitions took place at every street-corner The hotels were put upon their ed, and Boffin's Refreshry parsons from the country As an evidence of the interest which the question of Dean Stanley's appointment excited beyond the walls of the University, I uards and porters at the railway hallooed to each other to know ”the state of the betting”; but even they did not see so ware” At half-past one o'clock the bell of St Mary's gave notice to the combatants to prepare for the fray, and immediately the floor of the Theatre was sprinkled with representative owns of various degrees of rustiness, some with chimney-pot hats and soroups, hugging instinctively those sides of the building on which ritten respectively _Placet_ or _Non-Placet_, giving thereby an inkling of how theyincreased every an to dot the seats around the Vice-Chancellor's chair Prince Leopold, by right of his royalty, entered the sacred enclosure with Dr Acland, and afterwards took his seat a the Doctors Before two o'clock every inch of the floor was full, the occupants standing in anticipation of the coravitated towards their respective voting-doors, and on the _Placet_ side one descried the scholarly face of Professor Jowett, the sharply-cut features of the Rev Mark Pattison, and the well-known physiognoon washis forces, and Dean Goulburn, fro mass of MA's below him” At two o'clock the Vice-Chancellor arrived, and forthwith cos in Latin, which e nuers' Gallery, backed by a narrow fringe of Undergraduates The object of the Convocation was stated as being the appointment of Select Preachers, and the names were then subitur vobis huic no the form in which the question was proposed

The name first on the list was that of the Rev Harvey Goodwin; and a faint buzz in the assembly was interpreted by the Vice-Chancellor, skilled in such sounds, as an expression of approval Thereupon he passed on to naitation, but with clear, resonant voice, he read out as ”Arthurus Penrhyn Stanley”

Immediately there ensued a scene of the wildest confusion On the _Placet_ side, cheers and waving of trencher-caps; on the _Non-Placet_ side feeble hisses; and froled shouts of _Placet_ and _Non_, with an acco voice of Dean Liddell pronounced the ic words _Fiat scrutinium_ Thereupon the two Proctors proceeded first of all to take the votes of the Doctors on their benches; and, when this was done, they took their station at the doors labelled _Placet_ and _Non-placet_ During the process of polling we had an opportunity of criticizing the constituents of that truly exceptional gathering It was certainly not true to say, as soer Masters voted for Dean Stanley There was quite a fair proportion of white and bald heads on the _Placet_ side ”The country contingent was not so numerous as one had expected, and I do not believe that all of these went out at the _Non-placet_ door Evidently, parties were pretty evenly balanced; and, when the _Non-placets_ had all recorded their votes there were about twenty-five left on Dean Stanley's side, which probably would have nearly represented the actual lers, who had only arrived in Oxford by 225 train hurried in, and so swelled the numbers One late-comer arrived without his academicals, and some zealous supporter of the Dean had to denude hientleman to vote” Soon it was over The Proctors presented their lists to the Vice-Chancellor, who, amid breathless silence, pronounced the fateful words--”_Majori parti placet_” Then there was indeed a cheer, which rang through the building froallery, and was taken up outside in a way that reminded one of the trial of the Seven Bishops The hisses, if there were any, were fairly drowned Oxford had given its approval to Dean Stanley, the nu--_Placet_, 349; _Non-placet_, 287

When the fuss was over, Liddon wrote thus to a friend:--”It was a discreditable noht, in the interests of the Faith, to have been allowed to pass _sub silentio_; for, if opposed, it must either be defeated or affirmed by Convocation--a choice, _me judice_, of nearly balanced evils To have defeated it would have been to invest Stanley with the cheap honours of a petty iven a new iations which he represents”

I went up to Oxford well supplied with introductions Dr Cradock, the well-beloved Principal of Brasenose, scholar, gentleman, man of the world, devout Wordsworthian, enthusiastic lover of cricket and boating, had married a connexion of my oho had been a Maid of Honour in Queen Victoria's first household Theirs was the most hospitable house in Oxford, and a portrait of Mrs Cradock, not quite kind, but very lifelike, enlivens the serious pages of _Robert Elsmere_ Dr, afterwards Sir Henry, Acland, with his majestic presence, blandly paternal address, and aius Professor of Medicine, but also the true and patient friend of enerations Mrs Acland is corandest sere--Liddon's ”Worth of Faith in a Life to Co wife of the young Head of a very young College) were, as they have been for 40 years, the kindest and ht, Canon of Christ Church and Professor of Ecclesiastical History, was a lavish entertainer, ”with an intense drae of all the pages of dickens (and of Scott), with shouts of glee, and outpourings of play and fancy and allusion” But I need not elaborate the portrait, for everyone ought to know Dr Holland's ”Personal Studies” by heart Edwin Palmer, Professor of Latin, was reputed to be the best scholar in Oxford, and Mrs Palenial hostess Henry Smith, Professor of Geometry, was, I suppose, the most accomplished man of his time;[16] yet he lives, not by his performances in the unthinkable sphere of metaphysical mathematics, but by his intervention at Gladstone's last contest for the University

Those were the days of open voting, and S the votes in Gladstone's interest Professor ----, who never could e his h's, wished to vote for the Tory candidates, Sir William Heathcote and Mr

Gathorne Hardy, but lost his head, and said:--”I vote for Glad----”

Then, suddenly correcting himself, exclaimed, ”I mean for 'Eathcote and 'Ardy” Thereupon Smith said, ”I claim that vote for Gladstone” ”But,”

said the Vice-Chancellor, ”the voter did not finish your candidate's nain the other two” Henry Smith kept house with an admirable and accomplished sister--the first woman, I believe, to be elected to a School Board, and certainly the only one to whoon (afterwards Dean of Chichester) devoted a whole serainst fe joke in those distant days The Rev H R Bradalen, used to entertain us su link between Dr Routh (1755-1854) and modern Oxford, and in his rooeneration--a newly-elected Scholar of Balliol called Alfred Milner

It is anticipating, but only by a Ter came to Christ Church in 1873), to speak of Sunday luncheons at the house of the Regius Professor of Pastoral Theology, and of Dr Liddon's characteristic allusion to a re Bishop of Oxford in balloon sleeves and a hose portrait adorned the Professor's house ”How singular, dear friend, to reflect that _that person_ should have been chosen, in the providential order, to connect Mr Keble with the Apostles!”

But though the lines seem to have fallen unto elical advantages Canon Linton, Rector of St

Peter-le-Bailey, was a dear old gentleraduates at breakfasts and luncheons, and after the ested pipes, would lead us to a side-table, where a selection of theological works was displayed, and bid us take our choice ”Kay on the Psalms” was a possession thus acquired, and has been used by e oon, Fellow of Oriel and Vicar of St Mary-the-Virgin Dean Church called hiate,” and certainly hiscontroversy savoured (as Sydney Smith said about Bishop Monk) of the apostolic occupation of trafficking in fish But to those whom he liked, and who looked up to him (for this was an essential condition), he was kind, hospitable, courteous, and even playful His humour, which was of a crabbed kind quite peculiar to himself, found its best vent in his serrotesqueness of his preaching was the spell which drew undergraduates to the Sunday evening service at St Mary's

For my next reminiscence of hospitality to Freshmen I must rely on the assistance of a pseudony her Professors one who had graduated, at a rather advanced age, fro a nao, of European reputation” To the kindness of Professor and Mrs Dingo I was commended by a friend who lived near my home in Bedfordshi+re, and soon after my arrival in Oxford they asked me to Sunday luncheon at their villa in The Parks The conversation turned on a new book of Limericks (or ”Nonsense Rhyes The Professor had not seen it, and wanted to know if it was ainal innocence I replied that one rhyme had amused me ”Let's have it,” quoth the Professor, so off I went at score--

”There once was at Magdalen Hall A Man who knew nothing at all; When he took his degree He was past fifty-three-- Which is youngish for Magdalen Hall”