Chapter III (2)

The prelate who consecrated Trinity, is known to have been indulgent towards practices in the church, which had long since ceased to be observed. Reformation of some kind was found to be necessary, and practices distasteful to reformers, were introduced. None of those objectionable practices, however, were ever witnessed _within_ any of the churches in Paddington; and this I look upon as an additional reason for inducing the people to ask the bishop, their appointed governor, to condescend to give them some satisfactory reason for the erection of these “ornaments,” which he has consecrated, and for which they have to pay. There is another course open to the bishop, which scarcely any one, with the exception of the architect, would be grieved by his adopting.

But to erect this structure, fitted, to all external appearance, only for the performance of the gorgeous histrionical ceremonies of the most depraved period of the Roman or Anglican churches, the people of Paddington have been, and still are, obliged to subscribe by “compulsory levy;” and having been thus made instrumental, willing or unwilling, in assisting to resuscitate the dry bones of a monster belonging to a former period, they were then asked, (like other people similarly situated) by their local governors, to assist them in laying the spectre that such follies as these had again presented to the mind of the English public.

And how; and at what cost was Trinity built?

In 1843, on the fourth of July, the Rev. Chairman of the vestry, informed that body, he had received a communication from the Rev. Mr. Miles, expressing his readiness to contribute £4000 towards the erection of an additional church in Paddington, upon a site already granted by the bishop and his lessees.

This, the third site, provided out of the four acres to be granted, according to the bishop’s last building Act, was a _deep hole_, which had been left at the point of junction of the Bishop’s-road with the Westbourn-terrace road; these roads having been raised by the Great Western Railway Company, according to agreement with the owners of the estate, when the railway bridges were built. So deep was this hole, and so unfitted was it for the site of a church, that the parishioners would have been money in pocket, if the vestry had politely thanked the bishop and his lessees for their kindness in granting it, and bought the land somewhere else. But then that would not have done for the bishop and his lessees. They knew, and the builders who took their land knew, the increased value a church would give to the neighbouring ground; and, as it had been planned that the church would be better here than elsewhere, here it must be, or no where; although the foundations did cost the parishioners above £2,000; and although another thousand “would not have been lavishly thrown away, _had the proper authorities been sufficiently liberal in granting it_!”

On the tenth of July, at an adjourned meeting of the vestry, a committee was appointed to take Mr. Miles’s letter into consideration, to confer with the bishop, and to report to the vestry thereon. The only other important business done at this meeting, was, to agree to borrow £2,000, on the security of the church-rates, instead of £1,700, as had been previously proposed. This was to be raised to pay the debts of St. James’s, and the other churches. On the twelfth of June, the Vestry had pledged themselves to raise £2,000 towards increased church-accommodation, if the church commissioners would but pay the £2,000 they had promised. On the eleventh of December, in the same year, after receiving the report of their committee, the vestry agree to increase this sum to £6,000; “which they presume will be sufficient for the erection of a suitable church, with Mr. Miles’s donation, and such other sums as may be raised by subscription, and obtained from the church commissioners.” And on the second of January, 1844, a committee was appointed, with full powers, to build the new church.

On the sixth of February, 1844, a letter was read from the church commissioners, consenting to make a grant of £1,000 towards the proposed new church; upon certain conditions therein mentioned.

On the fourth of March, the new church committee report “that they find from the specification of the architect, that the expenses of constructing the foundation, on the site allotted to the church, will be so great as to prevent the possibility of erecting a suitable edifice thereon for the sum at the disposal of the committee; and they therefore recommend that £2,500 _more_ be borrowed.” On the ninth of March, it was resolved, that this further sum should be raised; and on the fifteenth of January, 1846, it was resolved, unanimously, by the Vestry, “That a sum of £13,000 should be raised under the provisions of the church building Acts, _on the credit of the church-rate_, _for the erection of Trinity Church_!”

To make assurance doubly sure, this sum was again voted towards the cost of building Trinity, on the twenty-sixth of March, 1846; and by the final report and statement of the committee appointed to build this church, dated twenty-ninth of March, 1847, we find the total cost of this building to have been £18,458 11_s._ 3_d._; and says that report—

“The church accommodates 1,582 persons; 982 in pews; 600 in free
sittings.

The Lord Bishop of London presented the font.

The Rev. John Miles, the incumbent, presented the large stained glass
window, and the encaustic tiles in the chancel.

Henry Morris Kemshead, Esq. presented one of the stained glass
windows in the chancel; the other three were by subscriptions from
various persons.

George Gutch, Esq. presented the dial, fixed in the gallery under the
organ.

Thomas Cundy, Esq., the architect, presented the carved stone altar
piece.” {155}

A substantial parsonage-house, built at the north-west corner of the piece of ground surrounding this church, is occupied by the minister, the Rev. Mr. Miles, who is said to have given, in addition to his other donations, £500 towards its erection.

The extreme liberality in the contributions of the present incumbent of this church must be properly appreciated, even by those who do not admire being charged with church-rates to make up a sufficient sum to build a place of worship, into which they are never likely to enter; and the greater part of the income from which has been previously secured on the minister, as a good investment for the capital he may have advanced—a plan of “getting up a church” now very much in fashion.

All Saints.

From 1841 to 1851, the population of Paddington increased on the average, _above two thousand one hundred per annum_; and the bishop’s rents increased in due proportion; but as the newcomers were almost all strangers to the parish, they had never, perhaps, heard one word of the History of the Paddington Estate. On this ignorance the owners of that estate must have relied, when they determined to saddle the rate-payers of Paddington with the expense of building and furnishing their churches, and with every other charge incidental to that Estate. But to enable the owners to carry out their project, the consent of the vestry of the parish must be first had and obtained; and to give this consent the vestry were not unwilling; for on the very day they voted away £13,000 for Trinity, they also bound themselves to raise, by rates and subscription, _or by rates alone_, £6,000 more for another church. {156}

The site for this church—a portion of the old reservoir,—had already been given up by the Grand Junction Waterworks Company, to the bishop and his lessees, as agreed upon, and enacted, by the 7th and 8th Vic. cap. 30.

On the fifteenth of January, 1846, the vestry resolved, “that it is expedient to build a church in Cambridge-place; and that a committee be appointed to consider the subject in all its bearings, and report thereon to the vestry.” This committee recommended that £4,000 should be raised by a loan on the church-rates towards the cost of this new building, the furniture, and fittings; that it hold 1,500 persons; and that the cost of the building should be limited to £6,000; £2,000 of which, they recommend, should be raised by subscription; but they recommend the works to be begun, when the subscriptions amount to £1,500; but not before. Their report was adopted by the vestry; it was at once resolved that the £4000 should be raised; that their old friends, the church commissioners, should be applied to for assistance; and that the vestry-clerk should write to the bishop of London, apprizing him of the day’s proceedings; requesting, at the same time, that directions may be given to have the site of the church conveyed in the usual manner.

All this was to be carried into effect by the Trinity Church Committee.

On the third of March, a letter was read from the Church Commissioners, expressing regret that the state of their funds and urgent claims from various other quarters, would not permit them to make any grant of money, this time, towards the proposed new church; but as no more of these public funds could be obtained, the bishop sends word he will give £500.

On the twenty-sixth of March, a special meeting of the vestry is held, to pass unanimously, three resolutions, to enable the vestrymen to charge the rates with £19,000, for building Trinity and this church; they appeal again to the Church Commissioners for _a nominal grant_ “_to establish the validity of their proceedings_;” and, considering the good and pious object, for which the application is made, the commissioners relent, and grant _one hundred pounds_. After much difficulty £19,000, is at length borrowed. But one Assurance Office, of high respectability, refused to have anything to do with this loan, even after the lawyers had put the parish to the expense of £32 17_s._ 10_d._ on account of it; £103 3_s._ being the amount of two other bills “for negotiating” this loan. {157}

But this sum was not enough to carry on the church account; another £1000 had to be borrowed of the banker, on the fourteenth of December, 1847; and above £100 interest was paid on that sum before the loan was returned. Some time after this, the committee report that the subscriptions for All Saint’s Church amount to £1,635 2_s._ 10_d._; and that the cost of the building has been £7,434 18_s._ 2_d._

This church is built in the early pointed style, and its internal fittings and decorations are exceedingly plain. It is capable of holding 1,500 persons; 600 free seats, and 900 appropriated, or pew sittings.

The amount of church-rate, _collected_ for nine years, ending April, 1852, was £20,574 3_s._ 8_d._ Of this there was “balance in hand of £1,607 15_s._ 2_d._;” but a debt of £14,500 was owing for churches which had been built. This debt is bearing interest at the rate of four-and-a-half per cent; and £900 is paid off annually. So that these four churches will have cost the rate-payers of Paddington upwards of £40,000, over and above all the sums given by the Church Commissioners, Metropolitan Committee, bishop and lessees, all Parliamentary provision of the sites, and all private subscriptions; and this sum of money, with upwards of £10,000 paid for St Mary’s, and the church-yard, will have been raised by “_compulsory levy_,” from rate-payers of all denominations; while the receipts of “the rectorial and other lands” are quietly pocketed by the rector and his lessees!

But I have heard rate-payers told, as a great consolation, “that the churches of Paddington cost nothing in comparison to the churches of Marylebone.” This however, may not be very consoling to those who know the cost of the following:—

Wesleyan Metropolitan Chapels, which have been recently built.

“Poplar chapel is of the decorative style, 105 feet long, by 60 feet
wide; is built of Kentish Rag Stone, with Caen Stone dressings; will
seat 1,500 persons; and cost about £4,000.

The New North-road Chapel, Hoxton, is Anglo-Norman, in style; is 35
feet long, including the vestries, by 52 feet wide; built of Brick
and Bath Stone; will accommodate 1,200 persons; and cost £3,700.

The Chapel of St. John’s-square, Clerkenwell, is built of Brick and
Bath Stone; 70 feet long by 60 feet wide; will accommodate 1,300
persons; has a school-room, &c., and cost £4,000.

Jewin-street Chapel, is built in the Early English style; is 68 feet
by 52 feet; seats 1,100 persons; is built of White Brick and Bath
Stone; and cost £2,700.

The Islington Chapel, in the Liverpool road, measures 90 feet long by
54 feet wide; and will accommodate 1,500 persons. It is built of
Kentish Rag and Bath Stone; is in the decorated style and cost about
£6,000.” {159}

But the actual cost of the churches of Paddington, is not the whole of the evil, though, considering all the circumstances, this is sufficiently oppressive. These churches, after all, are not free: pew-rents are obliged to be taken for the support of the ministers; the poor parishioners have less than one-third of the room allotted to them, and a considerable portion of this space is reserved for the best singers, and most showy scholars of the church schools.

And after all this; after all the money raised “by compulsory levy” to build, furnish, ornament and decorate; and after all the pew-rents are paid; these churches do not pay their own ordinary expenses. No; not after there is added to this income the portion of the burial-fees received by the churchwardens; but this source of income, which has averaged for many years more than £350 per annum, must soon cease. So that dissenters and others, who reside even on a bishop’s estate, have a fair prospect of being called on to pay a church-rate, after all the churches which the rate-payers have built, shall have been paid for.

Towards defraying these ordinary expenses of the churches, the ministers of Trinity, and All Saints, contribute fifteen per cent. of the pew-rents received by them; the minister of St. James’s £200 per annum, the stipend set aside for the whole cure; the minister of St. John’s, _nil_. While for the last three or four years the pew-rents of St. Mary’s have more than met the ordinary expenses of that church; although there have been two Services performed in it daily during that period. And “increased church accommodation is loudly called for in Paddington!” How will the bishop of London, and his lessees, _now_ answer to that call? Will the rate-payers of Paddington be left to answer it? Or, will the vestry of this parish, elected under the provisions of Sturges Bourne’s Act, be allowed, of their own mere motion, (without any reference to the rate-payer, or without any efficient representation of the case “in all its bearings,” to the bishop and his lessees), to take upon themselves to spend more of the rate-payers’ property? We shall see.

What _can_ be done by those who care one pin about preserving a state-church; by those who have ground-rents to preserve, and lands and houses to be benefitted by offering to in-coming tenants church accommodation, we have already seen. But another example of voluntary church-building and self-support exists in this parish.

Mr. B. Macaulay tell us, when speaking of the revenues of the State, “experience has fully proved that the voluntary liberality of individuals, even in times of the greatest excitement, is a poor financial resource when compared with severe and methodical taxation, which, presses on the willing and unwilling alike.” Those who govern the state-church, have had experience on this head; and without stopping “voluntary liberality” they deem it necessary, so long as a state-religion is upheld, to use “severe and methodical taxation;” and they employ all the powers the law allows them, to compel the unwilling, as well as the willing, to pay their appointed share of the particular tax raised for its requirements. But it is questioned by some most sincere and learned churchmen, whether this is good policy; whether the people love the church any better for being obliged to pay church-rates, when they see how the property claimed by the church is apportioned; and where they see, as in this parish, church property, much more than sufficient to supply their religious requirements, used, not for their benefit, as it was originally intended, but for individual advantage.

But to shew how thoroughly the religious forms of the state-church _can_ be upheld by the voluntary system alone, even in a parish from which that church has derived vast sums of money, and to which it has returned so little, it is only necessary to mention that

The Chapel of the Lock Hospital,

is not only self-supporting, but a portion of the income derived from the pew-rents annually goes towards the support of the hospital and asylum.

The pew-rents of the Lock Chapel, for the year ending the thirty-first of December, 1851, amounted to £948 3_s._ 2_d._, {160} and this department of a charitable Institution, “after bearing all the expenses incident to its services, yielded to the Institution, the sum of £348 19_s._ 2_d._” during the same period.

Another such an example as this, a third, might have proved too much; and it was not allowed to exist, although the foundations of the building were laid, and the means were in hand to raise the superstructure. The correspondence between the proprietor of the intended chapel, and the Bishop of London, on the subject of this new church, proposed to be built at Westbourn Green, must be fresh in the memory of most readers of the daily journals; and it is only necessary to refer those, who wish to know the history of an attempt to erect another church in this parish upon the voluntary principle, to that correspondence.

At the present time, the parish of Paddington is divided into five ecclesiastical districts; and the episcopal form of church-government and the present forms of the state-religion, are supported by accomplished clergymen, attached to the various places of public worship.

The people of Paddington see in their own parish an exemplification of that state of church economy, which is more or less prominently exhibited all over the country; they know the extent of the church-lands here; they know how they were acquired; they know for the performance of what duties these lands were granted; they see how the income from these lands has been disposed of; they know that the duties of providing for religion, and for the poor, have been transferred from the holders of this church-land, to those who occupy the houses which have been built on it; and they know that a second Reformation is inevitable. So that, if the church ministers of this parish could report to their bishop, that no dissenter lived in this very profitable part of his diocese, it would convey to him no more accurate notion of the feeling of the people respecting the management of the state-church than the bishops conveyed to Laud “on the very eve of troubles, fatal to himself, and to his order,” when they reported to him “that not a single dissenter was to be found within their jurisdiction.” {161}

That those dignitaries of the church, who have taken upon themselves the disposal of the church-lands in Paddington, should have made such sorry provisions for the promulgation and protection of their own creed in this place, is much more surprising, than that they should have looked with no favourable eye on the diffusion of doctrines which differed, in any respect, from their own. To prevent, so far as in them lay, the erection of any places of worship, save those in which were taught the particular dogmas they reverenced, is but what experience teaches us, might have been expected, as it is well known to be the common practice of every dominant sect to permit no rival near its throne; or, if a rival is to be tolerated without a systematic opposition, it must be one that is not seriously antagonistic to its principles.

The Bishop of London, in his last Charge to his clergy, while guarding them against a too great leaning to Popish practices, told them there was less danger to fear from Rome, than from Germany. And, so far as danger to the peculiar dogmas, and the histrionic ceremonies we have seen spring up within the last few years, is concerned, all who know anything of the “Reformation of the nineteenth century,” as it is being developed in Germany, will readily admit. To get a good insight into the “Humane Reformation” now in progress not only in Germany, but in England and America, I must refer my readers to the little Work which has been published for the English reader by the great apostle of this Reformation, Johannes Ronge, and to which I have before alluded.

The present Bishop of London and his predecessors, I am credibly informed, have considered it to be their duty to prevent, so far as in them lay, the erection of any Dissenting place of worship in Paddington. But some part of the Paddington Estate was leased without any restrictive provisions of this nature, therefore the whole of the land in Paddington is not now in the hands of a dominant church.

In 1816, a chapel, capable of holding six hundred persons, with school-rooms on the basement story, was built in Praed-street, on ground leased by the Grand Junction Canal Company.

This chapel, “The Tabernacle,” is now in the hands of a congregation of Baptists, who, to purchase and repair it, incurred a debt of £2,000. This they have paid off within the last ten years, over and above their contributions for the support of their minister. They also educate upwards of two hundred scholars; and twenty-three teachers give their leisure on the day of rest for this purpose.

There is a freehold chapel in the Harrow Road, at the entrance to Paddington Green; the Wesleyans have a chapel in the Queen’s Road, Bayswater; and the Roman Catholics are now building a large church at the western extremity of this parish, on a portion of that land, which was bequeathed by the Lady Margaret, to the poor. Another chapel, called “the Boatman’s chapel,” also exists in Paddington, on the ground leased to the Grand Junction Canal Company. This place of worship, which is capable of holding two hundred persons, was constructed out of a stable and coach-house, at the expense of a few pious individuals, who saw how much the poor boatmen wanted the advantages which accrue from religious instruction, and how little likely they were to get it in a parish-church which could not hold one-fourth part of the settled inhabitants. This little place of worship is in connection with “Paddington Chapel”—a place of worship belonging to the Independents. To attend the latter, the people of Paddington have to cross the Queen’s highway; as they have, to go to the chapels in John Street, and New Church Street.

These very commodious places of worship in St. Marylebone, are served by learned men, who believe that the religion of the poor carpenter’s son needs neither rich bishops nor rich endowments, to preserve its existence in this world; and they are supported in this belief by a very considerable number of tenants on the Bishop of London’s Estate.