Christ," granting him to have erred, he has in those instances only been detected, and most harshly condemned. Then comes a list of qualities in which Unitarian piety is deficient, "no repentance towards God," a piety without humility, without contrition, without love. This is mere ignorant rant. Without repentance, Unitarianism allows the guilty no hope. Without extolling humility, no man can believe in Jesus; and the leading sentiment of our religion as the religion of Christ is this, "God is love." Mr. B. repeatedly speaks of mankind and himself in scripture language as "dust" acknowledges his entire obligation to the mercy of God; deplores the weakness and folly and vice that stain our nature, and throughout his poems exalts the Deity and praises man only as the image of his Maker, and as deriving all his power and goodness from him. But this is not enough. He should speak as sincerity will allow none but the vilest of mankind to speak of themselves. He should extol as mysteries the most blasphemous perversions of the doctrines of Jesus; or he will have piety without cant, which in this canting age is more galling to the saints than the most unlicensed profligacy and depravity. Our Reviewer bolder grows as he proceeds to blacken the fair fame of his author, and charges him "with the almost total avoidance of the dialect of scripture." By dialect, this nice discerner means the words or language of the Bible. What a base, impudent and false charge is this! In the first quotation in the review there are eleven passages; in the second, there are three; in the third, there are fifteen; in the fourth, ten passages where the expressions are furnished by the Scriptures. And the whole volume is full of images and expressions taken from the Old and New Testament: not to mention the versions noticed by the Reviewer of four portions of the Bible, and a beautiful version of the beginning of the xivth chapter of John which he has not noticed. The Reviewer must know this to be the case, or he must not know the compositions he was abusing, or he must be astonishingly ignorant of the language of holy writ; and the blame does probably fall equally upon his head and heart. To complete the condemnation, this Reviewer decides, that "in the polite world," (which I take to mean the intelligent part of society,) "Mr. B.'s Matins and Vespers may rank with the Hebrew Melodies of Lord Byron, and the sicklier strains of Anacreon Moore;" and thus "damns him to everlasting fame" in a breath. If the Reviewer allude to the Sacred Melodies of Moore, which are most beautiful and often devotional, I pity his taste who can call, "O thou that driest the mourner's tears," or, "Go, let me weep," or the fine martial song of Israel's triumph, "sickly strains." And Mr. Bowring will willingly take his station by the side of the first poets of the age in the chaster efforts of their muse, if the Reviewer can cust him, in the public opinion, into such company. What principles of taste, then, have guided this modern Edipus so incorrectly and unjustly to judge? It is a taste formed in the conventicle, and degraded by constant converse with the most faulty class of English poetry. And as this Reviewer is confident in his religious, so he boldly avows his poetic, creed. "But give us, we say (and affirm) Sternhold "and Hopkins, or the Scotch Psalms, rather than such melo-dramatic devotion as this." That a man with such taste should err in judging of poetry is to be expected, but that he should make the illiberal and unjust observations he has made upon Mr. Bowring's poetry, merely to abuse a sect, whose principles he does not understand, is a melancholy proof of the power of bigotry to blight all the best affections of our nature, to pervert the understanding, and to deprave the moral sense. Let him go and sing with the heart and understanding such devotional and affecting strains of his chosen poets as these: "A man was famous, and was had According as he lifted up His axe thick trees upon. "But all at once with axes now Let him boast that such strains give glory to God, and exalt the devotional feelings of the pious. They have nothing" sickly" about them-nothing to excite "' delusive emotion"-nothing to charm "the polite world :" but the elect, of which number of course the Eclectic Reviewer is one, can find in them something far above the Hebrew Melodies of Byron, the Sacred Songs of Moore, and the Vespers and Matins of our Unitarian Bard. Some of these elect, or eclect, in all their purity, existed in the days of the good Dr. Watts, and he describes their "They love the driest translation of the Psalms best; they will venture to sing a dull hymn or two at Church" (daring spirits!) "in tunes of equal dulness, but still they persuade themselves and their children that the beauties of poesy are vain and dangerous. All that arises a degree above Sternhold and Hopkins is too airy for worship, and hardly escapes the sentence of unclean and abominable." Our Reviewer has advanced a step farther. Every generation improves upon the past. He has imported foreign literature, and finds great gratification in the Scotch Psalms, from which the two beautiful and pious stanzas above are extracted. In one thing Mr. Bowring is superior to all his predecessors, though he modestly disclaims originality. There is breathing through his sacred songs a strain of devotion of a more cheerful, elevating and confiding character than in any volume of devotional poetry with which I am acquainted. His principles lead to this. They put not vengeance, wrath and fury amongst the attributes which they extol. They explain strong oriental language, so as to make it consistent with sense and justice; and they fill the heart with confiding repose, which the advocates of the gloomy tenets of Trinitarianism and Calvinism can never feel. With very slight exceptions, I hesitate not to pronounce Mr. B.'s little volume a beautiful treasure of devotional poetry, which will be read Scotch Psalms, lxxiv. vers. 5, 6. T HIS building, which was opened last, forms a striking and elegant contrast with the generality of chapels and meeting-houses; and may be regarded as a happy illustration of that maxim which ought never to be lost sight of by architects, namely, that beauty is attainable with the most limited pecuniary means, provided those means be employed according to sound economy and pure taste. When we observe the barbarous and truly hideous style in which almost, without a single exception, all our metropolitan structures of this kind are erected,— their utter insignificance, the despicable attempt at ornament which they sometimes display, and the complete absence of the knowledge of, or the least relish for architectural effect, which they invariably manifest,-when we consider this, it was not without some feeling of surprise that we first beheld this truly unostentatious and simple edifice; and, on viewing it, we cannot help considering it, and hailing it as the indication that a better æra of architecture is commenced, and that a taste for its beauties is becoming more generally diffused and yet we must, indeed, confess, that when we witness the sad doings and pitiful grimaces that our builders-especially those who carry on their exploits in our suburbs-daily perform in brick and mortar, we are fain to retract our opinion, and confess, to our shame, that there is still nothing among us like a popular feeling for architecture, else could not such deformity be permitted, or for a single hour be tolerated "tricks that make artists weep." which is occupied by the pulpit, elevated on a sort of screen, which occupies the lower part of these intercoIn the chapel of which we are now lumns, rising to about one-third of speaking, there is no attempt at no- the height of the columns. This arvelty of arrangement, or originality rangement is one of the most advanof design, but both judgment and taste tageous that can be devised, for the are displayed in the adoption of clas- pulpit is thus rendered an important sical features. An hexastyle portico object. It is not thrust on one side, of the Grecian Doric order occupies as in our churches, but the preacher is the whole front of the edifice, and in front of all the congregation, and imparts to it a commanding and tem- equi-distant from either side. Behind ple-like aspect. The wall within this this screen, too, the clergyman enters portico is unbroken by any other aper- the vestry, or the pulpit, without ture than a single door, forming the passing through the chapel itself. At entrance to the building. Hence arise the back of this recess are two antæ, a boldness of effect, a greatness of corresponding with the columns, and manner, a chasteness and repose, of between them the wall is hung with a which we should desire to see more plain purple drapery, on which the examples, and which we would most light is thrown down in a rather picearnestly recommend to the study of turesque manner, by a window which our metropolitan architects. On view- is concealed, being above the entablaing this elegant façade, we regret but ture, over the columns. This entablatwo circumstances: first, that the ture is continued quite round the inte door is not pannelled in a bolder style, rior, constituting the only architec and that it has not been painted in tural embellishment. There are no imitation of some dark, rich-coloured galleries, and the light is admitted by wood,-secondly, that it has not been three, or rather, perhaps, one window attempted to give more the character on each side, consisting of three arched of stone to the building, by tracing apertures, glazed with ground glass. the jointings of courses; yet these The light thus admitted is quite suffiare trifling blemishes, easily corrected, cient, and the effect is far better than and which we should hardly have no- that produced by so many windows as ticed, were it not that we feel some- it is usual to have in our places of what impatient at perceiving the at- public worship. Nearly the whole of tainment of perfect beauty in some this interior being of a uniform tint, degree frustrated by what we consider approaching a white, there is a coldmere capriciousness and perverseness. ness and rawness arising from this The interior corresponds with the ex- circumstance, which, we think, deterior, in simplicity of taste, and in tracts from the general effect: had a the style of its decoration, if we can slightly warm hue been given to the rightly apply the latter term to an glass, this would not have been the edifice, where all that comes under case. We would recommend a large the name of ornament seems to have transparent blind, strained on a frame, been studiously rejected. In this re- so as to be fixed permanently, before spect, we do not think that it would the window on either side, and painted scandalize even a congregation of in chiaroscuro, in three compartments, Quakers; and yet there is a certain answering to the three-arched aper air of taste, a propriety of architectures of each window. We really tural feeling, and, withal, a decorum that satisfies the beholder, and affords him no small pleasure. The chief feature, in this interior, is a recess opposite the entrance, decorated with two fluted Doric columns, forming three intercolumns, the central one of The columns are stone; but the entablature and other parts of the front are covered with cement. think that this sort of blinds, if executed in a superior manner, might be very judiciously and effectively introduced into many of our churches and chapels, to subdue the too great body of light now generally admitted, and, at the same time, to render these apertures-what they certainly are not at present-subservient to decoration and pictorial display. By way of conclusion to these remarks, we will add, that, as we regard the New Church at St. Pancras as one of the happiest models of the simplicity becoming a Protestant Church, where painting is so rarely permitted to display its powers, so do we consider the Stamford Street Chapel as one of the best and chastest models for that still more rigid and economical style which best accords with the worship of a Dissenting congregation. We hope that even sectarians may, by degrees, be led to discard much of that affectation of severity which seems to regard any introduction of the elegancies of art into their chapels and conventicles, as a leaning towards worldly feelings; for, as if to mortify the eye, and to abstain as much as possible from any thing partaking of the nature of a sensual gratification, they have hitherto most pertinaciously adhered to, and most pervertedly affected, what ever is most barbarous, monstrous and contemptible, in architectural taste. Proposal with regard to Religious A Edifices. CORRESPONDENT suggests that as new chapels are now springing up every where amongst the Unitarian Dissenters, it is desirable that the total expense of about a dozen of the last new ones should be printed in a column of the Monthly Repository. By this means, he thinks, congregations meditating new places of worship, would be able to choose their plan without expense or the risque of being misled. They would have only to determine according to their means, whether to consult economy, as at Padiham, or elegance of appearance, as at Brighton and Stamford Street, or to adopt a design between the two extremes. The communication to the Repository should, he advises, record the number of persons the buildings will seat, and the whole cost on their completion. If a duplicate plan were always formed, it might, he says, be lent for inspection and the assistance of others engaged in similar undertakings. We agree with our correspondent's suggestions, and shall be always glad to give publicity to the particulars which he specifies. We add, that it would probably further our correspondent's wishes and be gratifying to our readers if correct views of the more elegant buildings were contributed to our work. We would engage to procure an engraving of them, if the congregations particularly interested would agree to take a certain number of copies at a moderate price. Hove-House, near Brighton, SIR, Nov. 8, 1823. to dissent from a National Church, HE reasons which persuade men may be presumed to be of sufficient weight in their judgment, to make them wish well to the Dissenting cause. The numbers, learning, morals, manners, the worth and the weight of the body to which they are united in principle and profession, must appear to them to be things of moment. Since it can never be fashionable to dissent, it may be supposed that the greater part of those who choose to be so unfashionable, are determined in their singularity by principle. They are satisfied that this is one of those cases in which it is right to be singular, and in which conformity would be wrong. They do not deplore their conscientious dissent as a misfortune, entailed upon them by education, but they think the inconvenience well repaid by independence of mind, and the goodness of their cause. They are happy that they see reason to dissent from false creeds and intolerant institutions they wish that more saw reason to do the same; and they are especially desirous that their natural successors in society should inherit the principles which direct their conduct. ; To all who feel thus, (and thus every consistent and enlightened Dissenter must feel,) it will appear to be their duty to protect the minds of their youth from the influence of situations which are likely to make them indifferent to principles held sacred by themselves. They lament that their sons cannot receive the instruction of the public colleges, without being exposed to this bad influence; since it is impossible that they should submit to the necessary conditions of being members of the English Universities, without injury to the principles of Nonconformity, or to their moral principles. The fact is, that the suc cession of Dissenters of the most opulent class is continually and increasingly diminished from this cause. The youth, who have been taught by their parents or friends occasional conformity, are prepared to be very easy and pliant conformists for the rest of life. If the effect is proposed, the means are certainly well-chosen. But it cannot be doubted that many, who are not guilty of the dishonest purpose, are, notwithstanding, induced to risk the event, that their sons may not want the advantages or the reputation of a university education. The effect is, that many men of distinguished talents, attainments, and place in society, are lost to the Dissenting body. If the evil is without remedy, it is useless to complain of it. Perhaps in these times of corrupt flexibility, to exterminate it is hopeless; but can nothing be done to reduce it? Can no means be devised by which the Dissenting youth might enjoy the benefit of good public lectures, and courses of instruction in all branches of learning and science, without being tempted to subscribe what they do not believe, and what no man understands; and becoming Conformists not from principle but submission? The design cannot be impracticable, with private wealth and public funds amply sufficient to carry it into effect. Liberality could obtain the necessary services of men of talents, attainments and industry; and if the cause deserves to be supported at all, it ought to be sustained with liberality and judgment. In several parts of England institutions now exist, which, if I am not much mistaken, would afford a great facility for the accomplishment of such a design. In London, Liverpool, and more recently in Bristol, literary institutions have been formed, which offer to students the advantages of public libraries and lectures. Within a certain distance of those buildings, houses might easily be found or fitted for the accommodation of as many students as it should be proposed to collect; for from assembling numbers in one dwelling, little good, and probably much evil, would arise. A fit Moderator should be placed at the head of each hall, capable of enforcing the necessary discipline of making the public lectures subjects of daily private examinations, and of forming the taste and correcting the compositions and declamations of the pupils. It would be easy to obtain the assistance of lecturers and teachers in those arts and sciences which would require to be taught constantly and carefully within the walls of the College. Of this kind, in particular, is all that was included in the schools of ancient Greece and Rome in the study and practice of rhetoric. To think, to write, and to speak always correctly, and often eloquently, should be proposed from the first, and pursued steadily to the last, as the end and reward of the studies and exercises of every student; and when it should be found that this ability in different degrees was generally produced, the place in which it had been reared would not want public honour and patronage. As the prosperity of the schools would depend principally on the fitness of the resident tutors to maintain necessary discipline, they should be appointed with a chief regard to this qualification, probably out of different professions, and with different shades of religious opinions. This is a broad outline of a plan which might easily be filled up, if it were thought to merit the attention of the Dissenting public; but whatever may be thought of it, I shall rejoice greatly if, through the medium of your useful Repository, it could draw attention once more to a subject which has been suffered to sleep too long. While Manchester College, York, exists under the direction of such men as now fill the chairs of the professors, Unitarian Dissenters will have good reason to congratulate themselves on an institution which does so much honour to its founders and supporters, and is eminently fitted to provide a succession of able ministers for our churches. But a great want remains, for which no adequate provision has been made by any description of Dissenters. They want public schools for young men in the interval of leaving private academies, and entering into active life. A better and more practicable plan than that which I have ventured to suggest, could, perhaps, be communicated by some of your correspondents; and by men |
