| | | | There is, no doubt, something extremely flattering to our | insular conceit in the mystery which hangs about the | institutions which we prize as specially national. We feel | that a Briton is still equal to three Frenchmen, so long as | the three Frenchmen confess with a shrug that the Briton | is wholly unintelligible. The blunders of Dr. Dollinger, | the baffled wonderment with which every foreigner | retires from the study of it, only endear to us the more the | Church of England. This was perhaps the reason, beside | the inherent marvel of the matter, why we passed so | lightly over M. Esquiroz and his late ecclesiastical | researches. It was humiliating to English pride to have to | confess that a Frenchman had unveiled to the world of | Paris the hitherto sacred mysteries of the perpetual curate | and of the tithe rent-charge. The enemy was clearly at the | gates of the central fortress of British insularism; even an | American bishop was tempted to strive to understand | Westminster Abbey; and a dismal rumour prevailed that | nothing hindered the Ecclesiastical Commissioners from | revealing the nature and purpose of their existence but the | fact that, after prolonged inquiry, they found it impossible | to understand them themselves. It was time, we felt, to | abandon these mere outposts of the unintelligible to the | aggressions of an impertinent curiosity, and to retire to | the citadel. There, happily, we are safe. Even the | unhallowed inquisitiveness of M. Esquiroz recoils baffled | from the parson's wife. Disdainful of all artificial | adjuncts of mystery, to all appearance a woman like other | women, packing her little sick-baskets, balancing the | coal-club accounts, teaching in her Sunday school, the | centre of religion, of charity, and of tittle-tattle, woman in | orders fronts calmly the inquirer, a being fearfully and | wonderfully English, unknowable and unknown. | No-one who saw for the | first time the calm. Colourless serenity of the parson's | wife would discover in her existence the result of a | life-long disappointment. But the parson on whose arm she | leans commonly represents to his spouse simply the | descent from the ideal to the real, the step from the | sublime to the prosaic, if not the ridiculous. There was a | moment in her life when the vestry-door closed upon a | world of hallowed wonder, when the being who appeared | in white robes

"mystic, wonderful,"

was a | being not as other men are, a being whose hours were | spent in study, in meditation, in charity, a being of | beautiful sermons and spotless neckties. | | The Flirtation with him, so impatiently longed for, was | not as other men's flirtations; there was a tinge of | sacredness about his very frivolity, and a soft touch of | piety in his sentiment. To share such a life, to commune | hourly with a spirit so semi-angelic, seemed an almost | religious ambition. The spirit of a Crusader, half-heaven, | half-earth, fired the gentle breast if the besieger till | Jerusalem was won. Then came the hour of | disenchantment. The mysterious object of adoration, seen | on his own hearthrug, melted into the mass of men. The | spiritual idealist was cross over an ill-cooked dinner, and | as commonplace at breakfast as his Times. | The discourses so lately utterances from heaven, | dwindled into copies or compilations from other heavenly | utterers. The life of a Lady Bountiful turned out a dull | routine of mothers' meetings and Sunday schools. The | ideal poor, grateful and resigned, proved cross and greedy | old harridans. The world of peace, of nobleness, of | serenity, died into a parish of bustle and scandal and | worry. Out of this wreck of hope arises the parsons wife. | Disillusionment is her ordination for a clerical position | none the less real that it is without parallel in the | ecclesiastical history of the world. She takes her part with | all the decision of genius. Her first step is to restore the | Temple she has broken down, to set up again the Dagon | who lies across the threshold. If not for herself, at any | rate for the world, and for her children, she re-creates the | priest she once dreamt of in the commonplace parson | whom she has actually wedded. Conscious as she is of the | inner nature of the idling apartment where he lounges | through the morning, she impresses on the household the | necessity of quiet while its master is in his

"study." |

By the daily addition of skilful but minute touches, she | paints him to the world as an ideal of piety and of | learning. She takes bills and letters off his hands that his | mind may not be disturbed from more serious subjects. | She enforces a sacred silence throughout the house during | the solemn hours while the sermon is being compiled. | She sews the sacred sheets together, and listens while the | discourse is recited for her approval. She listens again | with an interest as fresh as ever when it is preached. She | marks the text in her Bible, and sees that the children | mark it too. As the first subject of his theological realm, | she sets an example which other subjects are to follow. | They, like her, mingle their contempt for the parson's | business abilities and voluble talk with a hushed | reverence for his esoteric knowledge of subjects | inaccessible to common men. They, like her, manage to | combine a perfect readiness to snub him and his opinions | on all earthly topics, with an equal readiness to listen to | him, as to a divine oracle, on the topics of grace and free | will. Insensibly the subtle distinction tells on the parson | himself. He is conscious, perhaps pleasantly conscious, | that he is seen through the glass of his wife, and seen | therefore darkly. He retires within the domestic veil. He | learns to avoid common subjects, subjects that is, where | the world holds itself at liberty to criticize him. He retires | to fields where he is above criticism. He believes at last | in the vamped up sermons in which his wife persists in | believing. He accepts the position of an oracle on sacred | topics which his wife has made for him. In a word, the | parson's wife has created the British parson. | It is hard to say how far the creator believes in her own | creation. In persuading others, she probably succeeds to a | great extent in persuading herself. At any rate she accepts | willingly enough the consequences of a position which | leaves her the master of the parish. In the bulk of cases | the parson is simply the Mikado, the nominal ruler, | lapped in soft ease, and exempt from the worry of the | world about him. Woman is the parochial Tycoon, the | constitutional premier who does not rule, but governs. | She is the hidden centre and force of the whole parochial | machinery ~~ the organist, the chief tract-distributor, thd | president of the Dorcas society, the despot of the penny | bank and the coal-club, the head of the sewing-class, the | supervisor of district-visitors, the universal referee as to | the character of mendicant Joneses and Browns. In other | words, the parson's wife has revived an Apostolic Order | which but for her would have died away; she has restored | the primitive Diaconate. Woman is the true parochial | deacon, and not the bashful young gentleman fresh from | Oxford, who wears his stole over one shoulder rather than | over two. It is the parson's wife who

“serves tables” |

nowadays; and the results on parochial activity are | in some ways remarkable enough. In the first place, men | are fairly driven from the field. If a layman wishes to help | in a parish he finds himself lost in a world of woman. It is | only those semi-clerical beings who seem to unite with a | singular grace all the weaknesses of both the sexes who | persist in the attempt. Then, too, all the ideas of the | parochial world become feminine; the parish buzzes with | woman's hatred of the Poor-laws, and contempt for | economic principles and hard-hearted statisticians. | Mendicancy flies from the workhouse and the stoneyard | to entrench itself against Guardians and relieving-officers | among the soup-kitchens and the coal-tickets of feminine | almsgiving. The parson, after a faint protest of common | sense, surrenders at discretion, and flings all experience | to the winds. One wife turns her husband into a fount of | begging letters. Another forces him to set up | manufactories for all the lucifer-match girls of the parish. | Woman's imaginativeness, woman's fancy, woman's | indifference to fact exhausts itself in

"sensational | cases,"

and revels in starvation and death. But we | must turn to a brighter side of her activity. Ritualism is | the great modern result of the parson's wife, though, with | a base ingratitude to the rock from which they were hewn, | Ritualists hoist the standard of clerical celibacy. Woman | has long since made her parson; now (as of old with her | doll) her pleasure is to dress him. A new religious | atmosphere surrounds her life when the very work of her | hands becomes hallowed in its purposes. The old crochet | and insertion ~~ we use words to us more mysterious | than intelligible ~~ become that, stale, and unprofitable | by the side of the book-marker and the coloured stole; | and a flutter of excitement stirs even the stillness of a life | which is sometimes offensively still at the sight of the | new chasuble with

"aunt's real lace, you know, | dear,"

sewn about it. However grey an existence | may be, and the tones of a life like this are naturally | subdued, it still cherishes within a warmth and poetry of | its own; and the poetry of the parson's wife breaks out in | vestments and decorations. Nothing brings out more | vividly the fact that Mrs. Proudie is the | Church of England than that her reaction against the | prose of existence is shaking ~~ so the protestant | Alliance tells us ~~ the Church of England to its | foundations. The real disturber of the Church peace, the | real asserter of Catholic principles, or (for those who | prefer a middle phrase to either of these contending | statements) the real defendant in the Court of Arches, is | not Mr. Mackonchie, but the parson's wife. | Mrs. Proudie, we repeat, is the Church of England; but if | it is difficult to estimate the results of her position upon | the spouse of her bosom and the parish which she rules, it | is still harder to estimate its results upon herself. Her | outer manner seems indeed to attest to what we have | ventured to call the grey tones of her | life and a certain weariness of routine breaks out even | in the mechanical precision of her | existence. Power, in the parochial as in the domestic | circle, is bought by her at the cost of a perpetual | self-abrogation, and it is a little hard to be always hiding | the hand that pulls the strings. We may excuse a little | forgetfulness in a wife when her daily sacrifice is wholly | forgotten in the silver teapot and the emblazoned memorial | which proclaim the borrowed glories of her spouse. | Sometimes there may be a little justification | for the complaint of the British priestess | that the priest alone should be crowned with | laurel. But, if she is ecclesiastically forgotten, it must be | remembered that her position receives a shy and timid recognition | from society. She is credited with a quasi-clerical | character, and regarded as having received a sort of | semi-ordination. The Church, indeed, assigns her no parochial | precedence; but public opinion of it sets her beneath her | husband, places her above all other ecclesiastical | agencies. Tacitly she is allowed to have the right to speak | of

"our curates."

Then, again, society assigns | her a sort of mediatorial position between the clergy and | the world; she is the point of transition between the | clergy and their flocks. It is through her that the incense of | congregational flattery is suffered to mount | up to the idol who may not | personally inhale it, and it is through her that the parson | can intimate his opinion and scatter his hints on a number of | social subjects too trivial for his personal intervention. It | is impossible, indeed, to express in words the delicate | shades of her social position, or, what is more remarkable, | the relation to her sister-world of woman. There can be | no doubt that, taken all in all, women are a little proud of | the parson's wife. She is, as it were, the tithe of their sex, | taken and consecrated for the rest. The dignity of her | position in close proximity to the very priesthood itself | extends, by the subtle gradations of sister of mercy, | district-visitors and tract-distributors, to women in the | mass. Her influence is a quiet protest against the injustice | of the present religions of the world in excluding women | from those ministerial functions with which Paganism | invested her. It is an odd transition from the quiet parson's wife | to the priestess of Delphi; but while the parson's wife | exists there is at any rate a persistence in the claim of a | woman's right to resume her tripod again. It is the quiet | consciousness of this, of her spiritual headship of her sex, | of her mystic and unexpressed but real ecclesiastical | position, quite as much as the weariness of her daily | routine, which displays itself in the bearing of the | parson's wife. She is not quite as other women are, any | more than he is as other men. Her dress is ~~ at any rate, | in theory it ought to be ~~ a shade quieter, her bonnets a | little less modern, her manner a trifle more reserved, her | mirth hardly as unrestrained as those of the rest of her sex. | Her talk, without being clerical, takes a quiet clerical | tinge. She has her little scandal about the archdeacon and | her womanly abhorrence of that horrid Colenso. She | knows Early English from Middle Pointed, and interprets | Ritualistic phrases into intelligible vocables. Like the | curate, she dances only in family circles, and then dances | after a discreet and ecclesiastical sort. She has no | objection to cares, but she plays only for love. She sings | sols from the Messiah and St. Paul. | An existence simple, kindly enough in its way, | penetrating society no doubt with a thousand good | influences, but yet, we must own, hardly very interesting | to the priestess who lives it. Altogether, when we get | beyond the purple and gold of our rulers we congratulate | ourselves on being free from the tedium and weariness | and perpetual self-restraint of their lofty position. And | even the curate who has lately raised his faint protest | against what he calls

"feminine domination"

| may remember in charity that while croquet and flirtation | remain to him, his existence, slavery though he deem it, is | a slavery far freer, blither, and more lively than that of the | curate’s wife.