^C:^.> 
 
 K^Sffi^^ 
 
 mf':.:^x 
 
 pm^ 
 
 ^- '^■^^^m% 
 
 mmm», 
 
 :r -v 
 
 
 -->vh«* 
 
 ■^^'ssjm^
 
 I 
 
 L I B R A R.Y 
 
 OF THE 
 
 U N I V LR5 ITY 
 
 or 1 LLI NOIS 
 
 ^
 
 THE CHURCH OF THE RICH 
 
 A LETTER 
 
 THE EIGHT REVEREND 
 
 THE LORD BISHOP OF LONDON. 
 
 REV. EDWARD STUART, M.A., 
 
 VICAK OF S. MAEY MAGDALENE'S CHURCH, MUNSTER SQUASE, 
 KEGE>'T'S PARK. 
 
 LONDON : 
 JOSEPH MASTERS, 78, NEW BOND STREET. 
 
 MDCCCLXXI. 
 
 Price One Penny.
 
 Also hy the same Autlior. 
 
 THE PEW SYSTEM. Price 3d. 
 SACRAMENTAL WORSHIP. Price 6d. 
 LOW MASSES. Price 6d. 
 MEDIATION OF THE CHURCH. Price 6d. 
 CATHOLIC UNITY. Price 6d. 
 
 THEEE EULES FOR A CHRISTIAN LIFE. Price 3d. 
 Paimee, 32, Little Queen Street, Lincoln'8 Inn Fields. 
 
 SHEER TYRANNY. Price Id. 
 
 Masters, 78, New Bond Street.
 
 A LETTER. 
 
 My Lord, 
 
 I take the liberty of writing to you, to express my 
 great regret, that you should have thought it necessary, 
 in your recent Charge, to attempt a defence of the Pew 
 System. Surely this "abomination of desolation" has 
 done the deviFs work long enough amongst us already ! 
 It has driven out of the house of God, in our towns at 
 least, that very class amongst whom Jesus Christ 
 Himself lived ; and has turned our parish churches 
 into the private chapels of the rich, and our parish 
 priests into a mere staff of chaplains to the gentry. 
 
 I regret greatly that you should have said what you 
 have said on this subject. Not that it is at all likely to 
 check that strong and growing feeling, which happily 
 prevails amongst us, that it is a shame and a gross injus- 
 tice in the sight of God and man to turn one whole 
 class of parishioners out of their parish churches, but I 
 fear that your words will be taken as a proof that it 
 is in vain to look for sympathy from you towards those 
 who are striving their uttermost to make the Church of 
 England, once again, the Church of all classes equally ; 
 — not of the rich apart from the poor, nor yet of th^ 
 poor apart from the rich, — but of " high and low, rich 
 and poor, one with another."
 
 4 ' 
 
 You lament in your Charge the separation between 
 rich and poor^ and yet in the very same Charge you 
 advocate a greater separation between them than has 
 ever yet existed, by recommending the establishment 
 of two sets of churches in all our town parishes^ — one 
 for the rich apart by themselves, the other for the poor 
 apart by themselves ! Dives and Lazarus separating 
 from each other, with a great gulf placed between them 
 before the time ! If two sets of churches, — one for 
 the rich and one for the poor, are not necessary in 
 France and Belgium, how is it that they are necessary 
 in England? do twenty miles of salt water really make 
 all this difference ? 
 
 You say it is idle to try and make a town church the 
 church of the people at large, without distinction of 
 ranks : " All old associations, all their prejudices are 
 against it : it never was their church and it never will 
 be ; you must supply them their own place of worship, 
 be it school-room, or much better, chapel or church." 
 But will not this argument apply to the parish priest 
 and to the Bishop as well as to the parish church ? " he 
 never was their minister and he never will be ; — you 
 must supf)ly them with some other ministry," &c. &c. 
 just what Dissenters and Roman Catholics are fond of 
 saying ! I will only observe that what you thus say is 
 not the fact : for the parish church is their church, at 
 this moment, in very many instances in our towns, — 
 and it might be so in all, did not the selfishness of the 
 rich laity and the indifference of the clergy acquiesce 
 in the present abominable exclusion of the poor. 
 
 You speak of our " alienating most of the great 
 middle class" by free and unappropriated churches : — 
 at the same time you advocate one half of each church
 
 5 
 
 being left free and unappropriated; — (are you not here 
 giving up one half of your principle?) — whom then 
 will this line gall, which you would draw through the 
 middle of each congregation ? — not the rich, who will, 
 of course, have pews ; — not the poor, who, of course, 
 will not have pews ; — but just that very middle class 
 itself, of which you speak ; through some section of 
 which the line must of necessity be drawn ! 
 
 You say that a free and unappropriated church may 
 be crowded by non-parishioners ; — you forget to add 
 that every non-parishioner who attends it, leaves so 
 much available accommodation for others in the parish 
 where he lives. Surely it is a very happy thing in a 
 town that there should be several churches, conducted 
 differently, within the limits of the Church of England, 
 so that those who do not meet with what they want in 
 the church of the district where they live, may be able to 
 get it in some other neighbouring church ; instead of all 
 being tied together by the neck, as in a country parish, 
 to squabble over the petty, paltry, sickening trifles — 
 under cover of which " aggrieved parishioners" avenge 
 their own personal quarrels with the clergyman. 
 
 You speak of " tens of thousands of men and Avomen, 
 respectable in their lives and respected worshippers in 
 our churches, and dwellers in homes replete with com- 
 fort, elegance, luxury, who do absolutely nothing, and 
 give next to nothing in discharge of those offices of 
 charity, which done or not done to His brethren, are 
 acknowledged as done, or reckoned as not done to 
 the Divine Saviour Himself." — " Respectable and re- 
 spected !" On what grounds ? — because they " do no- 
 thing and give next to nothing" to religious and 
 charitable works ? Is this the reason why they are to
 
 6 
 
 be " respected ?" For myself, I have no respect for 
 them whatever ; — they are the great curse of the Church 
 of England ; — they are that dead weight of heartless for- 
 malism which hinders every effort of the clergy, and mis- 
 represents the Church in the sight of the people. And 
 yet this is the very class, the only class, which will thank, 
 you for your Charge ! they will henceforth quote you 
 as the champion of their selfishness, and, secure in the 
 respectability of their hired pew, will laugh at the deli- 
 cate insinuation that such " respectable and respected " 
 worldlings really ought to be a little more in earnest 
 in the service of Christ. 
 
 I do not desire to say more. Twenty years' experi- 
 ence has proved that all that was once said about con- 
 fusion in free and unappropriated churches, is mere 
 moonshine : the churchwarden's office and authority is 
 quite sufficient to make such arrangements as effectually 
 hinder anything of this sort. To say that people " like 
 to know where to go'' in church, is to praise free and 
 unappropriated churches, for in them every one knows at 
 once where he may go, — viz., to any unoccupied seat : to 
 pretend that " families cannot worship together" in free 
 and unappropriated churches, is simply nonsense, for they 
 have only got to sit together and do it. For myself, I 
 prefer the old-fashioned separation of men and women 
 in church, and I believe nine men out of ten do so too ; 
 — a father and his sons on one side, the mother and 
 her daughters on the other j — but, nevertheless, many 
 churches are free and unappropriated without this sepa- 
 ration. One thing however is clear as daylight, viz., 
 that if the Church of England is not to continue for 
 ever the Church of the Eich, a religion for Dowagers 
 and Dignitaries, who find religion a very convenient
 
 thing for keeping their children and servants in order ; 
 — if the Church of England is once again to be the 
 Church of the English people at large, and not of a 
 class only, — its Bishops their Bishops, — its clergy their 
 clergy, — its churches their churches, — then, if this is to 
 be the case once again, as I sincerely hope it may, — 
 then that devilish invention of Mammon, the Pew Sys- 
 tem, which provides for the rich and drives out the poor, 
 must be swept away from among us. 
 
 Jesus Christ "taught daily in the temple :" — He did 
 not give up the house of God to the Scribes and Pha- 
 risees and respectable Mammon worshippers of the day, 
 and "preach the Gospel to the poor" in an outhouse 
 or schoolroom : — He drove the money-changers out of 
 the temple : — let us imitate His example. 
 
 Trusting you will believe me when I say, that in 
 writing the above, I have been actuated by no feeling 
 other than that of respect and good-will towards your- 
 self personally, however greatly I regret that part of 
 your Charge to which I have referred, 
 
 I remain, my Lord, 
 Yours very truly, 
 
 EDWARD STUART, 
 
 Vicar of S. Mary Magdalene's, 
 Advent, 1871. Munster Square, Regent's Park. 
 
 J. Masters and Son, Printers, Albion Buildingrs, Bartholomew Close, E.G.
 
 &^M 
 
 ■ri^^v 
 
 •^^ry^! 
 
 ^'^.^M^^'-m^-M 
 
 ^M>