To Rome and back

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TO ROME AND BACK.

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Chapter I. A

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after ideal perfection are to be satisfied. When, however, the eager student, just passing from boyhood into youth, enters into his vivid and novel undergraduate life, then, for the first time, he begins to understand the relation of men to men, as members of one common humanity. He ceases to be the narrow-minded believer in the absolute blackness or absolute faultlessness of individual men and women, and learns to recognise the fact that no human being can possibly stand or live alone. His antipathies and his prepossessions may be, for the most part, as vehement as ever. But, at any rate, he begins to think. He takes a side in modern politics, and in the conflicts of ancient races. He sees that Greeks, and Romans, and Jews, and Englishmen, and Churchmen, and Dissenters, and Whigs, and Tories, are respectively held together by some deep and subtle bonds of union, which compel them to act together, and to feel instinctively alike on matters of practical moment. In other words, he begins to understand history as such. He sees that the actual life of to-day has its roots in the life of men who lived thousands of years ago.

And so he begins to look for the realisation of his religious ideal, not so much in perfect individual personages as in some grand and beautiful organisation. He conceives the idea of some nation, or church, or age, or race, in which all the pettinesses and vices of

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to day are or were unknown ; and in the contemplation of that perfection the whole force of his young poetic aspirations delights to expend itself. He becomes an enthusiast ; that is, of course, if he is good for anything himself, for a young man who is incapable of enthusiasm is rarely anything better than a cold-hearted, conceited prig, or a slave to the lower passions of his nature.

To a young mind, thus beginning to estimate the possibilities of human life, when transfigured by the light of an ideal splendour, Oxford is pre-eminently the home where such thoughts are fostered and kindled into enduring vitality. To the ardent, undiscriminating eye of the well-disposed ' freshman/ it is the very embodiment of his ideal of bygone ages of learning, faith, and peace. The very trivialities and abuses of its existing life are capable of an ennobling interpretation, and seem to take him back to older and better times. To my own eyes and ears even the mumbling duet between one of the Fellows and one of the Scholars, which, at St Bede's, fulfilled the function of a grace before dinner, was neither ridiculous nor irreverent. It was long 'before I was able to catch the words which were uttered, and to the last I never could completely make out what they were, from the beginning to the end. They were evidently Latin, and, after one or two terms' residence, I

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understood them so far as to perceive from the phrase, ' Jiistomm anima in manibus Dei sunt] that they included a Protestantised version of the old Catholic prayer for the souls of deceased benefactors. But my sensibilities were not shocked ; and I thought if ever it should be my good fortune to become a Fellow of the College, I should take my part in the duet with seriousness and enjoyment.

But it is in the perpetual sight of the buildings of the University that the young imagination takes most delight, when dreaming of the possibilities of a higher life. I well remember the day when this impression first struck me with a freshness and force that exercised a permanent influence on my after years. It was in my second term of residence. I had just been to a wine party at Lancaster College, which deserves more than a passing mention, because it was one of many similar gatherings in which the mind of the young Oxford of the day was moulded to the shape it afterwards exhibited to the somewhat bewildered outside world. It was the first time, too, when I had met a real undergraduate representative of the new religious school, then beginning to make a noise in the University, and to attract serious attention from the existing theological parties of the day.*

* It need hardly be remarked that in the case of all the scenes

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It had promised to be a pleasant party enough. Indeed, to my still ' fresh ' tastes almost any party was pleasant and welcome. But I was beginning to criticise the ' men ' of my own standing, while suspicions were beginning to dawn upon my mind that a couple of years' seniority in undergraduate residence did not invariably confer that infallible wisdom and superiority which at first I had been disposed to attribute to the men who were thus far my seniors. The wine had been circulating freely but by no means immoderately — and what detestable wine it must have been ! — and I was listening, with truly reverential deference, to a discussion on the wretched demerits of the Lancaster ' torpid,' when I was startled by a sudden rise in the tone of the voices at the other end of the table.

1 I knew there would be a row/ whispered my next neighbour, North, a St Bede's man, somewhat my senior, 'the moment I saw that Hawkstone had asked both Gordon and Barge. Hawkstone is a good fellow enough, but he has a hole in his head, and asks men to meet one another who haven't a single taste in common.'

and persons to be described in the following pages, the reality has been so disguised as to prevent their being recognised as pictures of literal fact. The whole are, however, dramatically true, as representative of the real Oxford life of the time, and as embodying the history of the progress of an actual mind in its struggles to solve the dark problems of the visible and the invisible.

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' Why, what are they quarrelling about ?' I asked.

' Listen/ said North, 'and you'll soon understand.'

The whole room was now silent, watching Gordon and Barge, who sat opposite one another with excited faces.

'You have no right to ask me such questions,' exclaimed Gordon with a grave and somewhat scornful solemnity.

' But I have,' retorted the other, 'and no fear of man shall tempt me to be silent when I see these Popish practices spreading every day in half the colleges of the University.'

e Barge is awfully Low Church,' observed North to me in an undertone. ' He got into a pretty scrape last term with the old President.'

I had heard something of this before, but I was too much struck with the expression of Gordon's countenance to pay much heed to my neighbour's commentaries. He looked pained and disgusted, and at the same time intensely self-conscious, but he said nothing.

' Come, Gordon,' at length broke in another man, ' I think you 're bound to reply. You fellows of this new party do yourselves no end of mischief by the secrecy you seem to make a boast of.'

' It 's nothing of the sort,' cried Gordon, now fairly off his balance ; ' but I do say that the most sacred feelings of one's conscience are not to be made a parade of.'

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1 Nonsense, my dear fellow/ interposed Hawkstone, who "was a sort of professed peacemaker, and who blundered accordingly on almost all occasions. I'm sure we hate parade as much as you can do ; but Barge was only asking you a plain question, which you needn't be ashamed to answer.'

' Touch him up about the rubric,' said North, looking mischievous, and addressing himself to Barge. ' He swears by the rubric, you know, and if you handle the rubric judiciously, you can turn these sort of fellows inside out as often as you please.'

' Don't be profane, North, if you please,' cried Gordon, looking more shocked and pained than ever.

' Profane ! ' echoed North, while he secretly nudged me, to imply that he was only trotting Gordon out for the amusement of the company. * Where 's the profaneness ? Is it you yourself, or the rubric, that is too sacred a subject for jesting ? '

! 1 am not jesting at any rate,' interrupted Barge, 'and I repeat that I have a right to have a direct answer to the question I asked.'

' Well ! what is it ? ' cried North ; c your cross-examination of Gordon, which I have no doubt was very brilliant, was lost upon us at this end of the room.'

' I wish to ask Gordon, then,' said Barge, in the most solemn of tones, 'whether it is true that he fasts on

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Fridays on bread and water, and every morning puts on a surplice to say his prayers in ?'

A general shout of laughter greeted this latter part of the question, followed by a torrent of questions showered upon the unfortunate Gordon.

* Impossible ! ' cried one. 4 Nonsense ! ' exclaimed another. 4 I say, Gordon, this is rather strong/ said a third.

4 Once more, I ask, is it true ? ' demanded Barge, when quiet was a little restored.

* I have never had a surplice in my rooms since I came up/ Gordon at length replied ; 'and it is not true that I fast upon bread and water.'

4 Jesuitical ! by Jove ! ' remarked North to me, with a laugh.

4 Then you do fast upon something else/ exclaimed another, a stranger to me.

4 Why not ? ' asked Gordon, regaining his calm, and looking resolutely at his questioner. 4 1 am not ashamed to own that I take the Prayer Book for my guide, and that I try to obey it.'

4 Do you mean to say, Gordon/ North asked, now looking a little serious himself, 4 that as a matter of fact you go without your breakfast and dinner every Friday ? '

4 1 refuse to be questioned about my private affairs/ replied Gordon.

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" Well, man,' retorted North, ' why should you be ashamed of it? Anyhow, a man must be in earnest about his religion, when he takes to starvation to prove his sincerity.'

' I don't want to prove anything at all,' Gordon answered ; ' I merely wish to do my duty.'

* And an awfully unpleasant sort of duty too ! ' exclaimed North, adding immediately, ' I say, . Barge, pass the sherry. We've had enough of this for one evening.'

Barge passed the sherry, but looked the reverse of mollified.

' By the by, Barge,' North immediately added, again nudging me with his elbow, ' is it true that you were seen coming into College the other night in pink, splashed from head to foot ? ' Then he whispered to me, 4 He knows nothing about hunting. He thinks the hounds go out all the year round.'

1 1 will not stay to be made a jest of,' cried Barge, reddening with irritation. ' You know well that I have something else to do besides following worldly amusements.'

And he rose, with the intention of leaving the room.

' Come, come, my good fellow,' rejoined North, ' you shouldn't cut up rough in that way. A fellow like you that goes up on the sly to London, and comes slinking

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into College just before twelve at night, should be prepared to take a joke in good part.'

' Ho ! ho ! Barge,' exclaimed another, ' is this a true count against you ? '

' It is true that I went to London,' rejoined Barge fiercely, ' but I went for a good and holy purpose ; and I am not ashamed to confess it.'

'For which good and holy purpose old Baggs very nearly sent you about your business,' observed North. ' We know all about it. Your respected President has no taste for prayer-meetings, and in my hearing once made a remark about Exeter Hall which you would think as profane as Gordon thought my innocent suggestions concerning rubrics.'

? Who did you pray for ? ' asked a rather impudentlooking freshman, with a coarse expletive, which I will not repeat.

* Come, come,' North sharply exclaimed, * none of that sort of thing here, my good friend. It 's bad taste, you know, and we don't like it'

The man looked astonished, but said nothing j and the talk took another turn, less lively, but less personal. Barge sat down again, but in a few minutes he got up and left the room. When the party at length broke up, and the men dispersed in different directions, I found myself by Gordon's side. As I had not been introduced to

TO ROME AND BACK. n him, I felt shy of speaking, though his way was the same as mine. But he soon broke the ice with the remark —

' You Ve not been long up, I fancy?'

* My second term,' I replied.

We then walked on in silence, till we turned out of the High Street, and came into the midst of the superb group of buildings, of which the Radcliffe Library forms the striking, and yet somewhat incongruous centre. They were all bathed in a flood of moonlight, and I stopped involuntarily to drink in the lovely sight.

1 What a glorious scene it is ! ' I said to my companion, who stood still, as much absorbed in what he saw as I was myself.

■ Yes,' he said in a few moments, 1 the work of other days. When that tower and spire were designed/ he went on, pointing to St Mary's, as its noble spire and pinnacles stood out dark against the almost starless sky, so bright was the moonlight, 1 men built for God, and not for themselves. Nowadays everything is for show or for these low utilitarian ends.'

i What in the world do you mean ? ' I asked completely puzzled. ' Reverence is unknown,' he went on, without answering what I had said. 'Religion is all familiarity ; and the shams we build and then call them churches, are the natural result of the hollowness of our feelings.'

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He spoke with a strange earnestness, which affected me far more than his words themselves.

1 Will you think me an impertinent fellow,' I could not help saying, i if I ask you one question ? Is it true that you fast on Fridays ? 9

' I only keep the rules of the Church to which we all belong,' he replied, without the slightest dogmatism or conceit.

' But what is the use of it ? ' I said. ? Surely God is not pleased at your going without your breakfast and dinner.' •

' Without personal mortification there can be no true peace of mind for a sinner,' he replied.

' But are you not happy yourself? ' I said.

1 How can any man tell that his sins are forgiven?' he answered. ' How do you know that your sins are forgiven ? ' he continued, in a low, sad tone, and fixing his eyes upon the ground before him. Then he went on, murmuring with a quiet and musical voice —

' The golden keys each eve and morn, I see them with a heart forlorn, Lest they should iron prove to me ; Oh, set my heart at liberty !

May I seize what Thou dost give, — Seize tremblingly and live.'

f What verses are those ? ' I asked him.

' They are part of a few stanzas that were shown to me in manuscript the other day/ he replied. 'I learnt them by heart, as they exactly express my own feelings.'

' To me their sentiment is utterly incomprehensible/ I rejoined. 'I can't understand a man being afraid of God.'

As I said this I lowered my voice, as if the subject was too sacred to be spoken of. It was the first time I had ever spoken about God to any one at Oxford ; and in fact I had never before, in all my life, expressed myself at all openly concerning my religious thoughts. And when I did now speak, I almost felt as if I was treading with rash feet upon holy ground.

1 1 don't think I should be afraid of Him,' said Gordon ; ' but I am afraid of myself ; and you know how the Bible is always teaching us how awful the Almighty is in his holiness. And that is what is so shocking in the popular religion of the day. It never begins with wholesome fear and self-denial ; but rushes at once into raptures which are entirely against the spirit of the Church herself.'

' All this sort of thing is so new to me/ I replied, ' that I don't like to say either that I agree with you, or that I disagree with you. But I must confess I don't see what the Church has to do with the matter.'

' Then you don't feel any comfort in the declarations

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of the Church, through her ministers, that your sins are forgiven,' he said.

'Why should I? ' I asked.

y To me it is everything, 5 he answered. * I think that the first duty of every man is obedience and humility, and a desire to be taught by one's betters. And that is why the sight of these old churches fills me with envy and sadness. Just look at that wonderful tower and spire. Was there ever anything more solid and grand, and yet more aspiring and full of grace, rising up into the silent heaven ? The men who built it had their sins forgiven by the absolution of Christ's own ministers, and so they were like the spire itself that they designed and finished : strong and solid in their foundation of repentance, and absolved from all their sins. And thus their hearts rose continually in quiet peace towards the throne of God.'

As he thus went on in a halt rhapsody I stood watching him in amazement. I could not detect in him the faintest element of unreality and cant 3 but it was altogether a strange thing to me to hear any one, and especially a young man, speak in such a manner on such things out of the pulpit, and as if he really meant every word that he uttered. It was all like a sort of dream, in which the moonlit buildings in their eloquent beauty supplied a background of dim, hazy brightness, while

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my whole mind seemed transported into another world of existence. To this day, when I close my eyes, I can recall the sight, and the thoughts it conjured up within me. There was All Souls', and the Schools, and Brasenose, and the great dome of the Library, and St. Mary's high above them all, with the rays of light glimmering through the spacious windows. They seemed the airy, ghost-like habitations of generations of great and pious men, long gone away, and leaving nothing of their great principles behind them, but only the works of their hands, to reproach us for having fallen away into the debasement of these worldly, faithless, money -getting times. It was but a dream at the very moment when I yielded to its fascinations ; but it was a dream that lingered in my memory ever afterwards, and helped to give a shape to every religious speculation that crossed my thoughts.

For some minutes neither Gordon nor I said anything. Then suddenly the recollections of the wine party we had just left rushed into my mind, with a most disagreeable intrusiveness.

' Barge's views must be very different from yours,' I observed, as we at last moved on.

'Yes,' replied Gordon, standing still again, with a look half of sadness, and half of disgust ; ' there you have the religion of the nineteenth century in all its shallow i6

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ugliness. There 's a fellow who laughs at his college rules, and goes up to town for a prayer-meeting, and calls it a preferring of God to the world. Happily, he 's not of a breed that 's very common in Oxford ; but he might have been satisfied with the prayer-meetings here, without joining the fanatics in Exeter Hall.'

'Do you mean to say that such things go on in Oxford ? ' I inquired in surprise.

'That I do,' said Gordon. 'And if you want to know the blessing of belonging to the Church, and the wisdom with which she saves us from ourselves, you have only to go some evening and hear the expounding and the praying that are indulged in. I went once; and heard the best men in Oxford actually prayed at, by a miserable fellow who had been just plucked for his Little-Go. But come, let us drop the nauseous subject, and take a turn or two under these shadows, and hope for better days once more.'

As he spoke, he took my arm with a manifest access of friendliness, and for some little time we paced up and down without speaking. I was so excited that I was glad to uncover my head to let the cool spring breeze play upon my forehead. And as I took off my cap, I almost felt as if I were making an act of homage to some living unseen presence, whose home was in the heaven above, and whose power must still be visible

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somewhere upon earth. Suddenly, a harsh din broke upon our ears, banishing the sweet stillness, and driving away all tender fancies and devout meditations. It came nearer and nearer, and we moved hastily on to learn whence it came.

As we walked quickly along, we soon found ourselves accompanied by other men, whose ears had caught the same sounds that had -seized upon our own attention. From two or three of the College gates a few undergraduates rushed out, and ran in the direction whence the noise proceeded. To my surprise, though they were in cap and gown, they carried sticks in their hands, a proceeding altogether unknown, except to the very freshest of freshmen. It required no long experience of University life to see at once that they were by no means of the class of reading or quiet men, but exhibited that look of ' slanginess ' which rapidly stamps itself upon the least reputable section of the undergraduate world.

' A town and gown row, I suspect,' said Gordon to me, as we watched them dashing along, with eagerness and anger lighting up their unattractive faces.

' Have you any notion what brought it on ?' I asked, seeing that Gordon was apparently slackening his pace, and seemed rather anxious than otherwise to keep out of the fray.

\ I haven't the least suspicion,' he answered ; * I hate

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the very name of such scenes. They disgust me with Oxford more than I can tell you. They only serve to prove what we have come to from our loss of all high principles of action.'

''Why,' I exclaimed, ' I thought these fights were one of the very oldest institutions of the University. You can't think much of a shindy between a handful of big boys, just up from Eton and Westminster, and the young shopkeeping cads of the town.'

' It 's something more than that, I can tell you,' he said. ' And the worst of it is that there 's just now a regular party-set made against Winston — he 's the senior proctor, you know — because of his Church principles ; and there 's no saying what 's to follow if he gets into the middle of the fight.'

'What in the world can you mean?' I asked, as we had now reached the turning where Gordon would naturally have left me on the way to his College. But he stood still, clearly hesitating whether he ought to suffer me to get mixed up with the rioters without a remonstrance against my rashness.

1 What can Church principles have to do with a fight in the streets at night-time ?' I continued, wondering at this fresh exemplification of the conflict between the old and the new ideas of the hour.

< It is clear that you have kept clear of the fast set in

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your College/ he replied, ' or you would have made Winston's acquaintance long before this. All the fast men hate him like poison, because he 's resolved to make the discipline of the Church something like a reality among the undergraduates.'

< This is quite a new light to me,' said I ; < I don't understand what the discipline of the Church is ; I understand College rules and University rules, and all that sort of thing, and the rules of decent society besides. But as to these views of yours about the Church, I can't, for the life of me, make out what you mean.'

'You surely don't mean to say that the Church has no godly discipline of her own, and that the sins of us baptized men are no worse than other people's sins,' he said.

' I don't in the least understand you,' I replied.

1 And it 's because of the views which Winston is known to hold about post-baptismal sin,' continued Gordon, 1 that there 's a dead set made against him amongst the dons themselves. They say that Blakeney, the other proctor, will hardly speak to him. . Blakeney's an Evangelical of the lowest sort, and goes about spreading all the mischievous tittle-tattle he can get hold of in every common room in Oxford.'

' Listen ! ' I exclaimed, as a fresh outburst of shouting told us that the riot was gathering strength. ' I can't

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stand here listening to your exposition any longer, or I shall miss the sight after all.'

1 Nonsense ! my dear fellow/ cried Gordon, taking me roughly by the arm • ' you don't mean to say that you 're going to mix yourself up with these scamps ? '

' I only want to see what sort of a thing it is, I assure you,' I answered. ' But go I must ; and where 's the harm after all ? '

' I can't let you go alone/ he rejoined ; and then, still holding me by the arm, he allowed me to drag him along.

When we reached the Cornmarket, we could at first get no farther, for the street was thronged with a mob, in which town and gown appeared about equal in point of numbers. Almost everybody seemed violently excited, even down to the women — some of them carrying young children in their arms — who formed a by no means insignificant portion of the crowd. Of those who were near us, none of the townsmen were of the genuine rough sort. It was a mere throng of lookers on ; working men, shopmen, and their masters. Nobody could answer our questionings as to the origin or facts of the riot, but we heard Winston's name so often on the lips both of the gownsmen and the others, that it was plain that he was supposed to be specially concerned in the riot in some way or other.

By degrees we found our way through the crowd,

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Gordon still urging me to go no farther ; but the nearer we reached the actual fight, as we supposed it must be, the more impossible I found it to tear myself away. I had never seen a street riot on any large scale, but the popular tradition of the perpetual feuds existing between City and University had often impressed my boyish fancy ; and I considered that I should not have completely thrown off my freshness until I had witnessed what the reality was actually like.

Gordon's talk, too, had served rather to stimulate than to quiet my curiosity. There seemed something so excessively odd in the idea of connecting the sacrament of Baptism with a common riot, that it conferred a sort of factitious importance on the riot itself, and appeared to make it quite a duty to acquaint myself with the details of a conflict which branched out into such unexpected quarters. The words * post-baptismal sin ' still lingered in my ears, like a strange musical phrase linked to words in an unknown language. They conveyed no distinct ideas to my mind, but had a peculiar, forcible ring about them, which suggested the thought that they might have some very good or very bad meaning after all.

Then, too, here were all my reverential feelings towards the proctorial dignity rudely set aside. When I first came up to reside, the velvet sleeves of the proctors were in my eyes the very embodiment of the principle of

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law, and order, and grave collegiate respectability. I fancied that it must be a very pleasant and honourable thing to be a proctor ; especially when the pair of proctors sedately walked to their places near the vice-chancellor at the sermons at St Mary's, the ' pokers ' marching in front of them, while the organ, very badly played, struck up a sort of solemn, heraldic strain. Even the lesser velvet adornments of the proproctorial gown had their fitting beauty, though of a humbler kind. The 'bulldog' was still unknown to me, except by report; but I imagined him to be the very model of grave policemen, conscientiously pledged to support the proctorial mandates with his strong arm and stronger truncheon.