Read Sybil, Or, The Two Nations Page 18


  "And how do you find the people about you, Marney?" said Lord de Mowbrayseating himself on a sofa by his guest.

  "All very well, my lord," replied the earl, who ever treated Lordde Mowbray with a certain degree of ceremony, especially when thedescendant of the crusaders affected the familiar. There was somethingof a Puck-like malignity in the temperament of Lord Marney, whichexhibited itself in a remarkable talent for mortifying persons in asmall way; by a gesture, an expression, a look, cloaked too very oftenwith all the character of profound deference. The old nobility ofSpain delighted to address each other only by their names, when in thepresence of a spick-and-span grandee; calling each other, "Infantado,""Sidonia," "Ossuna," and then turning round with the most distinguishedconsideration, and appealing to the Most Noble Marquis of Ensenada.

  "They begin to get a little uneasy here," said Lord de Mowbray.

  "We have nothing to complain of," said Lord Marney. "We continuereducing the rates, and as long as we do that the country must improve.The workhouse test tells. We had the other day a case of incendiarism,which frightened some people: but I inquired into it, and am quitesatisfied it originated in purely accidental circumstances; at leastnothing to do with wages. I ought to be a judge, for it was on my ownproperty."

  "And what is the rate of wages, in your part of the world, Lord Marney?"inquired Mr St Lys who was standing by.

  "Oh! good enough: not like your manufacturing districts; but peoplewho work in the open air, instead of a furnace, can't expect, anddon't require such. They get their eight shillings a week; at leastgenerally."

  "Eight shillings a week!" said Mr St Lys. "Can a labouring man with afamily, perhaps of eight children, live on eight shillings a week!"

  "Oh! as for that," said Lord Marney; "they get more than that, becausethere is beer-money allowed, at least to a great extent among us,though I for one do not approve of the practice, and that makes nearlya shilling per week additional; and then some of them have potatoegrounds, though I am entirely opposed to that system.

  "And yet," said Mr St Lys, "how they contrive to live is to memarvellous."

  "Oh! as for that," said Lord Marney, "I have generally found the higherthe wages the worse the workman. They only spend their money in thebeer-shops. They are the curse of this country."

  "But what is a poor man to do," said Mr St Lys; "after his day's work ifhe returns to his own roof and finds no home: his fire extinguished,his food unprepared; the partner of his life, wearied with labour in thefield or the factory, still absent, or perhaps in bed from exhaustion,or because she has returned wet to the skin, and has no change ofraiment for her relief. We have removed woman from her sphere; we mayhave reduced wages by her introduction into the market of labour; butunder these circumstances what we call domestic life is a conditionimpossible to be realized for the people of this country; and we mustnot therefore be surprised that they seek solace or rather refuge in thebeer-shop."

  Lord Marney looked up at Mr St Lys, with a stare of high-bredimpertinence, and then carelessly observed, without directing hiswords to him, "They may say what they like, but it is all an affair ofpopulation."

  "I would rather believe that it is an affair of resources," said Mr StLys; "not what is the amount of our population, but what is the amountof our resources for their maintenance.

  "It comes to the same thing," said Lord Marney. "Nothing can put thiscountry right but emigration on a great scale; and as the government donot choose to undertake it, I have commenced it for my own defence on asmall scale. I will take care that the population of my parishes is notincreased. I build no cottages and I destroy all I can; and I am notashamed or afraid to say so."

  "You have declared war to the cottage, then," said Mr St Lys, smiling."It is not at the first sound so startling a cry as war to the castle."

  "But you think it may lead to it?" said Lord Mowbray.

  "I love not to be a prophet of evil," said Mr St Lys.

  Lord Marney rose from his seat and addressed Lady Firebrace, whosehusband in another part of the room had caught Mr Jermyn, and wasopening his mind on "the question of the day;" Lady Maud, followedby Egremont, approached Mr St Lys, and said, "Mr Egremont has a greatfeeling for Christian architecture, Mr St Lys, and wishes particularlyto visit our church of which we are so proud." And in a few moments theywere seated together and engaged in conversation.

  Lord Mowbray placed himself by the side of Lady Marney, who was seatedby his countess.

  "Oh! how I envy you at Marney," he exclaimed. "No manufactures, nosmoke; living in the midst of a beautiful park and surrounded by acontented peasantry!"

  "It is very delightful," said Lady Marney, "but then we are so verydull; we have really no neighbourhood."

  "I think that such a great advantage," said Lady Mowbray: "I must sayI like my friends from London. I never know what to say to the peoplehere. Excellent people, the very best people in the world; the way theybehaved to poor dear Fitz-Warene, when they wanted him to stand forthe county, I never can forget; but then they do not know the people weknow, or do the things we do; and when you have gone through the routineof county questions, and exhausted the weather and all the winds, I ampositively, my dear Lady Marney, aux abois, and then they think you areproud, when really one is only stupid."

  "I am very fond of work," said Lady Marney, "and I talk to them alwaysabout it."

  "Ah! you are fortunate, I never could work; and Joan and Maud, theyneither of them work. Maud did embroider a banner once for her brother;it is in the hail. I think it beautiful; but somehow or other she nevercultivated her talent."

  "For all that has occurred or may occur," said Mr St Lys to Egremont,"I blame only the Church. The church deserted the people; and from thatmoment the church has been in danger and the people degraded. Formerlyreligion undertook to satisfy the noble wants of human nature, and byits festivals relieved the painful weariness of toil. The day of restwas consecrated, if not always to elevated thought, at least to sweetand noble sentiments. The church convened to its solemnities under itssplendid and almost celestial roofs amid the finest monuments of artthat human hands have raised, the whole Christian population for there,in the presence of God, all were brethren. It shared equally among allits prayer, its incense, and its music; its sacred instructions, and thehighest enjoyments that the arts could afford."

  "You believe then in the efficacy of forms and ceremonies?"

  "What you call forms and ceremonies represent the divinest instincts ofour nature. Push your aversion to forms and ceremonies to a legitimateconclusion, and you would prefer kneeling in a barn rather than in acathedral. Your tenets would strike at the very existence of all art,which is essentially spiritual."

  "I am not speaking abstractedly," said Egremont, "but rather withreference to the indirect connection of these forms and ceremonieswith another church. The people of this country associate them with anenthralling superstition and a foreign dominion."

  "With Rome," said Mr St Lys; "yet forms and ceremonies existed beforeRome."

  "But practically," said Egremont, "has not their revival in our serviceat the present day a tendency to restore the Romish system in thiscountry?"

  "It is difficult to ascertain what may be the practical effect ofcertain circumstances among the uninformed," said Mr St Lys. "The churchof Rome is to be respected as the only Hebraeo-christian church extant;all other churches established by the Hebrew apostles have disappeared,but Rome remains; and we must never permit the exaggerated positionwhich it assumed in the middle centuries to make us forget its early andapostolical character, when it was fresh from Palestine and as it werefragrant from Paradise. The church of Rome is sustained by apostolicalsuccession but apostolical succession is not an institution complete initself; it is a part of a whole; if it be not part of a whole it has nofoundation. The apostles succeeded the prophets. Our Master announcedhimself as the last of the prophets. They in their turn were the heirsof the patriarchs: men who were in direct communication with the MostHigh. To
men not less favoured than the apostles, the revelation of thepriestly character was made, and those forms and ceremonies ordained,which the church of Rome has never relinquished. But Rome did not inventthem: upon their practice, the duty of all congregations, we cannotconsent to her founding a claim to supremacy. For would you maintainthen that the church did not exist in the time of the prophets? WasMoses then not a churchman? And Aaron, was he not a high priest? Ay!greater than any pope or prelate, whether he be at Rome or at Lambeth.

  "In all these church discussions, we are apt to forget that the secondTestament is avowedly only a supplement. Jehovah-Jesus came to completethe 'law and the prophets.' Christianity is completed Judaism, or it isnothing. Christianity is incomprehensible without Judaism, as Judaismis incomplete; without Christianity. What has Rome to do with itscompletion what with its commencement? The law was not thundered forthfrom the Capitolian mount; the divine atonement was not fulfilled uponMons Sacer. No; the order of our priesthood comes directly from Jehovah;and the forms and ceremonies of His church are the regulations of Hissupreme intelligence. Rome indeed boasts that the authenticity of thesecond Testament depends upon the recognition of her infallibility. Theauthenticity of the second Testament depends upon its congruity with thefirst. Did Rome preserve that? I recognize in the church an institutionthoroughly, sincerely, catholic: adapted to all climes and to all ages.I do not bow to the necessity of a visible head in a defined locality;but were I to seek for such, it would not be at Rome. I cannot discoverin its history however memorable any testimony of a mission so sublime.When Omnipotence deigned to be incarnate, the Ineffable Word did notselect a Roman frame. The prophets were not Romans; the apostles werenot Romans; she, who was blessed above all women, I never heard she wasa Roman maiden. No, I should look to a land more distant than Italy, toa city more sacred even than Rome."

  Book 2 Chapter 13