THE PARSON IN LITERATURE.

BY THE REV. P. H. DITCHFIELD, M.A., F.S.A., F.R.S.L. [Read June 2nd, 1920.]

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THINK not, ladies and gentlemen, that I would disparage my profession by giving to my paper this title. In spite of the taunts of the insidious and the common speech of the vulgar, the term parson" is an honourable distinction. The parson is the persona of the parish, the person who manages everything and everybody in the place where he resides. In older times he had the title of "Dominus" " and was addressed as "Sir," and you will find him so described in our register books.

In the course of his varied experience he has had much to do with literature. The parson is a prolific author, and it would require a library as big as the British Museum to contain all the books that he has written. In this paper I shall not concern myself about parsonic authorship, and shall equally steer clear of the lives of clergymen. So many biographies of bishops and clergy, varying from the ponderous tome to the humble funeral sermon, have been written, that if I were to attempt to recount a tithe of what has been published I should have to prolong my discourse till midnight. All that I can attempt this afternoon is to set before you what distinguished writers have said about him in their novels, poems, songs and romances. He is a somewhat prominent person, whether as bishop, rector or

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curate, and therefore naturally attracts the attention of authors, either as critics or sympathisers.

The parson appears oftentimes in the literature of every age, and this distinction testifies to his importance. Some descriptions are flattering, others much the reverse. But on the whole he is tenderly treated; his good deeds and his attention to his duties are recorded with much respect, while the glaring faults and eccentricities of individuals escape not the lash of satire. Nor is this partiality for parsons confined to English authors. Many of you will have read Balzac's 'Le Curé de Village,' wherein he paints such a beautiful portrait of the country parson, and you will remember that charming character of a bishop drawn by Victor Hugo in Les Miserables.'

In England we go back to the father of English song, Chaucer, who describes so tenderly the "poor parson of a town," i. e. of a scattered village, and not what we understand by a town. I need only quote a few lines, as they are well known :

"A good man there was of religion,
That was a poor parson of a town.

But rich he was of holy thought and work:

He was also a learned man, a clerk,

That Christes Gospel truly would he preach.
His parishen dovoutly would he teach.
Benign he was and wonder diligent
And in adversity full patient."

And there are about forty more lines of tender panegyric. A little-known work, entitled Myrc's * Instructions to Parish Priests,' written in verse in the fifteenth century, says much of the duties

required of the medieval clergy; and William Langland in 'Vision of Piers Plowman' is a strong advocate for confining the ministry to those of gentle birth. He does not approve of bondmen and bastards and beggar-children being made bishops and archdeacons, and inveighs against cobblers' sons and beggars' brats getting booklearning and becoming bishops, sitting with the peers of the land, while knights kneel to them, and the father of such a prelate remaining a poor cobbler "with grees his teeth toyling of leather battered as a saw." This idea that ploughmen's sons should follow the plough and tradesmen's sons should go to their father's calling was prevalent at the time of the Reformation and was strongly opposed by Cranmer, who contended that poor men's sons should have the benefit of education since God gives us His great gifts of grace, of learning and other perfections in all sciences and to all kinds and states of people indifferently.

As Fellows and Members of the Royal Society of Literature, you have doubtless read all Spenser's works from cover to cover. I must confess I have not, but I have found one of the sweetest stanzas in the English language. It refers to a parson, Archbishop Grindal, who fell foul of the imperious Queen Elizabeth and was suspended from his functions. Spenser transposed the syllables of Grindal's name and converted it into Algrind, and wrote:

"One day he sate upon a hill

As now thou wouldest me:
But I am taught by Algrind's ill
To love the low degree."

The question occurs to me to ask, What is literature? I scarcely think that such scurrilous pamphlets as the Mar-Prelate tracts can be included in that august term. The vulgarity and indecency of these publications place them beyond the pale, and I think I am right in passing them by, though they might amuse or disgust you. Certain epigrams, such as those on the persecuting wretch Bonner or on the amusing Bishop Corbett, may be omitted, and also Heylin's "Cyprianus Anglicus," which is practically a biography of Laud.

There is rather a good description of a parson in Ben Jonson's "Magnetic Lady" just before the Civil War. He seems to have been rather a fussy autocrat. "Compass," a character in the play,

says:

"He is the Parson of the Parish here,

And governs all the games, appoints the cheer,
Writes down the bill of fare, pricks all the guests,
Makes all the matches and the marriage feasts—
Without the ward: draws all the parish wills,
Designs the legacies, and strokes the gills
Of the chief mourners: and whoever lacks
Of all the kindred he has first his blacks.
Thus holds he weddings up and burials
As the main thing: with the gossips' stalls
Their pews; he's top still at the public mess :
Comforts the widow and the fatherless
In funeral sad; sits 'bove the alderman :
For of the wardrobe quest he better can
The mystery, than of the Levite Law:
That piece of clerkship doth his vestry awe.
He is, as he conceives himself, a fine
Well furnished and apparelled divine."