CHAPTER C.

SHEWING HOW THE VICAR DEALT WITH THE JUVENILE PART OF HIS FLOCK; AND HOW HE WAS OF OPINION THAT THE MORE PLEASANT THE WAY IN WHICH CHILDREN ARE TRAINED UP TO GO CAN BE MADE FOR THEM, THE LESS LIKELY THEY WILL BE TO DEPART FROM IT.

Sweet were the sauce would please each kind of taste,
    The life, likewise, were pure that never swerved;
For spiteful tongues, in cankered stomachs placed,
    Deem worst of things which best, percase, deserved.
But what for that? This medicine may suffice,
To scorn the rest, and seek to please the wise.
                                                        SIR WALTER RALEIGH.

The first thing which Mr. Bacon had done after taking possession of his vicarage, and obtaining such information about his parishioners as the more considerate of them could impart, was to enquire into the state of the children in every household. He knew that to win the mother's good will was the surest way to win that of the family, and to win the children was a good step toward gaining that of the mother. In those days reading and writing were thought as little necessary for the lower class, as the art of spelling for the class above them, or indeed for any except the learned. Their ignorance in this respect was sometimes found to be inconvenient, but by none, perhaps, except here and there by a conscientious and thoughtful clergyman, was it felt to be an evil,—an impediment in the way of that moral and religious instruction, without which men are in danger of becoming as the beasts that perish. Yet the common wish of advancing their children in the world, made most parents in this station desire to obtain the advantage of what they called book-learning for any son who was supposed to manifest a disposition likely to profit by it. To make him a scholar was to raise him a step above themselves.

Qui ha les lettres, ha l'adresse
Au double d'un qui n'en ha point. 1

Partly for this reason, and still more that industrious mothers might be relieved from the care of looking after their children, there were few villages in which, as in Mr. Bacon's parish, some poor woman in the decline of life and of fortune, did not obtain day-scholars enough to eke out her scanty means of subsistence.

2 BAIF.

The village Schoolmistress, such as Shenstone describes in his admirable poem, and such as Kirke White drew from the life, is no longer a living character. The new system of education has taken from this class of women the staff of their declining age, as the spinning jennies have silenced the domestic music of the spinning wheel. Both changes have come on unavoidably in the progress of human affairs. It is well when any change brings with it nothing worse than some temporary and incidental evil; but if the moral machinery can counteract the great and growing evils of the manufacturing system, it will be the greatest moral miracle that has ever been wrought.

Sunday schools, which make Sunday a day of toil to the teachers, and the most irksome day of the week to the children, had not at that time been devised as a palliative for the profligacy of large towns, and the worsened and worsening condition of the poor. Mr. Bacon endeavoured to make the parents perform their religious duty toward their children, either by teaching them what they could themselves teach, or by sending them where their own want of knowledge might be supplied. Whether the children went to school or not, it was his wish that they should be taught their prayers, the Creed and the Commandments, at home. These he thought were better learnt at the mothers' knees than from any other teacher; and he knew also how wholesome for the mother it was that the child should receive from her its first spiritual food, the milk of sound doctrine. In a purely agricultural parish, there were at that time no parents in a state of such brutal ignorance as to be unable to teach these, though they might never have been taught to read. When the father or mother could read, he expected that they should also teach their children the catechism; in other cases this was left to his humble co-adjutrix the schoolmistress.

During the summer and part of the autumn, he followed the good old usage of catechizing the children, after the second lesson in the evening service. His method was to ask a few questions in succession, and only from those who he knew were able to answer them; and after each answer he entered into a brief exposition suited to their capacity. His manner was so benevolent, and he had made himself so familiar in his visits, which were at once pastoral and friendly, that no child felt alarmed at being singled out; they regarded it as a mark of distinction, and the parents were proud of seeing them thus distinguished. This practice was discontinued in winter; because he knew that to keep a congregation in the cold is not the way either to quicken or cherish devotional feeling. Once a week during Lent he examined all the children, on a week day; the last examination was in Easter week, after which each was sent home happy with a homely cake, the gift of a wealthy parishioner, who by this means contributed not a little to the good effect of the pastor's diligence.

The foundation was thus laid by teaching the rising generation their duty towards God and towards their neighbour, and so far training them in the way that they should go. In the course of a few years every household, from the highest to the lowest,—(the degrees were neither great nor many), had learnt to look upon him as their friend. There was only one in the parish whose members were upon a parity with him in manners, none in literary culture; but in good will, and in human sympathy, he was upon a level with them all. Never interfering in the concerns of any family, unless his interference was solicited, he was consulted upon all occasions of trouble or importance. Incipient disputes, which would otherwise have afforded grist for the lawyer's mill, were adjusted by his mediation; and anxious parents, when they had cause to apprehend that their children were going wrong, knew no better course than to communicate their fears to him, and request that he would administer some timely admonition. Whenever he was thus called on, or had of himself perceived that reproof or warning was required, it was given in private, or only in presence of the parents, and always with a gentleness which none but an obdurate disposition could resist. His influence over the younger part of his flock was the greater because he was no enemy to any innocent sports, but on the contrary was pleased to see them dance round the may-pole, encouraged them to dress their doors with oaken boughs on the day of King Charles's happy restoration, and to wear an oaken garland in the hat, or an oak-apple on its sprig in the button hole; went to see their bonfire on the fifth of November, and entertained the morris-dancers when they called upon him in their Christmas rounds.

Mr. Bacon was in his parish what a moralizing old poet wished himself to be, in these pleasing stanzas:—

I would I were an excellent divine,
    That had the Bible at my fingers' ends,
That men might hear out of this mouth of mine
    How God doth make his enemies his friends;
Rather than with a thundering and long prayer
Be led into presumption, or despair.

This would I be, and would none other be
    But a religious servant of my God:
And know there is none other God but He,
    And willingly to suffer Mercy's rod,
Joy in his grace and live but in his love,
And seek my bliss but in the world above.

And I would frame a kind of faithful prayer
    For all estates within the state of grace;
That careful love might never know despair,
    Nor servile fear might faithful love deface;
And this would I both day and night devise
To make my humble spirits exercise.

And I would read the rules of sacred life,
    Persuade the troubled soul to patience,
The husband care, and comfort to the wife,
    To child and servant due obedience,
Faith to the friend and to the neighbour peace,
That love might live, and quarrels all might cease;

Pray for the health of all that are diseased,
    Confession unto all that are convicted,
And patience unto all that are displeased,
    And comfort unto all that are afflicted,
And mercy unto all that have offended,
And grace to all, that all may be amended.2

2 N. B., supposed to be NICHOLAS BRETON.