The central Presbyterian. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1856-1908, 1881-08-31
CORRESPOND ENCE.
Letter from England.
LONDON, ENGLAND. Aug

LONDON, ENGLAND, Aug l.
Messrs. E'dators,-In former letter we
referred to Hero Worship as part of the
religion of England Nowhere does this
factimpress one more emphatically than in
Westminster Abbey.
the sepulchre of the philosophers, heroes,
and kings of England AS a work OF
mans hands, architecturally the Abbey
is indeed one of the most finished and ex
quisite ideas ever transmitted into stone.
What mind could escape being charmed
by this grand temple, marked with the
impress of antiquity, solemn with reli-
gious awe, adorned with all the magnif-
cence of ecclesiastical profusion, dim win
dows, fretted pillars, long collonnades,
splendid arches, and dark ceilingsl But
these sensations are greatly enhanced by
the scene of deaths enormous and awful
labors, to which Westminster Abbey in
PRODUCES the beholder. l stand and re-
verence the power of Death, as from the
midst of this temple l throw my eyes
round on the walls filled with the statues
the inscriptions and the monuments OF
the illustrious dead L walk over kings
who trampled down thousands in their
day. They lived like gods in their time
but they died like men and now their
ashes are but the equal of the less fortu-
nate who repose beside them. Here is
the Coronation chair in which the kings
and queens, from the days of William the
Conqueror, A. D. 1906, have sat to be
crowned; but humble as I am, I possess
more consequence in the present scene
than the greatest prince of them ALL
There in yonder corner of the south tran
sept, are the remains of poets, Chaucer,
Shakespeare, Milton, Southey, Thomson,
who swept with mastery hand all the
chords of the human heart hard by re-
pose the great novelists, Thackeray and
Dickens, who delineated with such rare
powers the life of their contemporaries in
all its varied aspects; next are the in
scriptions of the historians, Macauley,
Thirlwall, and Grote, who told SO elo-
quently the story of the races vicissi-
tudes; scientists too beginning at the
great names of Newton and including
many seer who looked with piercing
and successful eyes into the great arcana
OF natures secrets doctrinaires, South
Butler, Paley, the Wesley brothers, and
many others who moulded the religious
convictions of their time; statesmen such
as Lord Chatham, Peel, Fox, Charming,
Palmerston, who guided the nation
through great crises very skilfully. Mu-
sicians who pleased and charmed their
tellow-men, and actors who amused them.
An how many glorious names there are
IN this awful repository of the dead |
What irresistible thoughts crowd upon
one standing amid 30 many voiceless wit
nesses of the last great change What
romances the imagination will continual
ly be weaving while slowly passing from
one inscription to another What mighty
hopes of the heart have been crushed out
forever as the stones were laid over some
OF these graves How has pride attend
ed these puny children of the dust even
to the tomb Could aught signify more
profoundly the vanity of human life ?
They have toiled for brief span, to gain
a transient immortality, and all at length
retired to the narrow house, with no at
tendant but the worm, no fattery but an
epitaph. In the chapter house with many
curious relics of the ancient burials,
some skeletons of rats and gnawed bones
and fragments of paper are exhibited
taken from grave of the time of William
aud Mary. To me the sight was lesson
OF mortality most profound.
Too frequent dreams Of the great busy world
Come Ger me, and pine and strive for fame
Widely my life boats sails are all unfurld
And | forget where bound and whence came
let here Ipause and pray 1 may remember
Where leads my path and why 1 sojourn here.
But Westminster Abbey is not merely
amoral lesson to the beholder. 1t is
A Strong Incentive to True Ambition.
The effect Of the monumental inscrip-
lions is not simply the production Of