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CONGREGATIONALISM IN THE COURT SUBURB.

JOHN STOUGHTON, D.D.

London: HODDER AND STOUGHTON,

Butler & Tanner,

The Selwood Printing Works,

Frome, and London.

DEDICATION.

THE FOLLOWING

HISTORICAL SKETCH,

PREPARED AT THEIR REQUEST,

Is Gratefully Inscribed

TO THE

PRESENT MINISTER AND DEACONS

OF KENSINGTON CHAPEL.

INTRODUCTION.

AT the commencement of my History, I wish to convey some idea of what Kensington was at the close of the last century, when the original Nonconformist Church in that place was formed and established.

Kensington as a parish must be distinguished from Kensington as a village or suburb. The boundaries of the parish are still unaltered, yet what it contained ninety years ago was different, indeed, from what it contains now. It is startling to read in Lyson's "Environs," published in 1795, the following sentence:--"The parish of Kensington contains about 1,910 acres of land, about half of which is pasture meadow, about 360 acres are arable land for corn only, about 230 in market gardens, about 260 cultivated sometimes for corn and sometimes for garden crops, and 100 acres of nursery ground."

I often think, as I am reading history, what a contrast exists between its background of natural scenery, and the prospect now before our eyes on the spot to which the history refers. We should not know Kensington if we could see it as it was when Hornton Street Chapel was being built. Then all around was rural. Notting Hill and the whole way to Paddington--where was the parish boundary to the north--exhibited fields bordered by hedgerows. Holland Park, to the west, was a lordly demesne such as you see now "down in the shires," and the boundary of the parish in that direction, at what used to be called Compton Bridge, was marked by a turnpike gate not long ago removed; beyond it lay a bit of country landscape before you reached the junction of roads at Hammersmith Broadway. No great change had then taken place since Addison--who lived in Kensington--wrote to the Earl of Warwick, saying, "The business of this is to invite you to a concert of music, which I have found out in a neighbouring wood. It begins precisely at six in the evening, and consists of a blackbird, a thrush, a robin redbreast, and a bullfinch. There is a lark that, by way of overture, sings famously till she is almost out of hearing." "The whole is concluded by a nightingale." Such were the warblers that broke the silence of Kensington woods when no screech of the railway whistled in the wind, and no lumbering omnibuses thundered along the highway. Indeed, I well remember the nightingales in Holland Park, after the commencement of my ministry at Hornton Street. Earl's Court, even then, was separated from Holland Park gates by a country lane which began at Pembroke Square. But fifty years before, now ninety years ago, it was thereabouts all pleasant open country, dotted with homesteads, paddocks, gardens; whilst at eventide broad green meadows saw "the lowing herd wind slowly o'er the lea." Brompton, included within the parish, extended to the borders of Chelsea, famous for cosy retreats occupied by merchants and literary men. Turning from south to east, there opened, under the shadow of the palace, those gardens which had become famous and much admired in Queen Anne's time; and after Hornton Street chapel was built, a minute of the Board of Green Cloth recorded that an annual pension of ?18 was to be paid to a widow, named Gray, "in consideration of the loss of her husband, who was accidentally shot while the keepers were hunting foxes in Kensington Gardens."

Lyson tells us that in 1795 there had been new buildings erected, principally in and near the hamlet of Brompton. "The present number of houses," he says, "is about 1,240, of which about 1,150 are inhabited, the remainder are for the most part unfinished."

So much for the parish. Now look at the Court suburb; so small in comparison with the parish, that it may be compared to a shrivelled kernel in a nutshell. There, in the centre, stood the old Parish Church, pronounced by Bishop Blomfield the ugliest in the country; and in Church Street, higher up, the Vicarage was encompassed by a goodly garden and small park, now covered by rows of houses. Quaint-looking tenements bordered Church Street a little way. Campden House and grounds retained a palatial appearance. A row of brick dwellings, taking us back to the days of the first Georges, still line Holland Street, and were then in their prime. Hornton Street looked out, in spring, upon blooming orchards. The road between Kensington Palace Gate and Holland House was, as it still is, the main thoroughfare; and I conclude that Phillimore Place, called by the Prince Regent "Dish-clout Row," from its tasteless slabs in front, was then in pristine pride. Kensington Square, though shorn of the glories it possessed under the first two Georges--when it boasted of forty coaches, and of lords and ladies occupying the buildings round it--still presented much quiet respectability; and old inhabitants, as they passed by the palace gates, could tell of having heard from their fathers and mothers how one morning there issued thence "Horse Guards with their trumpets, and a company of heralds with their tabards, to proclaim, after Queen Anne's death, George, by the grace of God, of Great Britain, France, and Ireland, King, Defender of the Faith."

All round, the Court suburb was separated from neighbouring hamlets by a belt of orchards, gardens, and nursery grounds; and the road between Kensington Gardens and Knightsbridge remained notorious for its loneliness and perils. Opposite Hyde Park were a few aristocratic mansions, with spacious lawns, shrubberies, and gardens bounded by lofty walls; but the road was often in very bad repair. In the middle of the century, Lord Hervey told his mother it was impassable, and that in Kensington he lived "in the same solitude as he should do if cast on a rock in the middle of the ocean." Matters might have mended somewhat at the time the chapel was built, but a good old pew-opener, Mr. Mundy, told me how he remembered that people at Knightsbridge, bound for Kensington after dark, would wait till they made a number large enough to defend themselves against the footpads who infested the thoroughfare. The old half-way house and the turnpike gate, symbolical of ancient days, lingered so late as the middle of my own ministry.

He lived part of his time at Kensington, and wished to see a Nonconformist congregation there. He met with a few people in "a very humble dwelling," for religious worship, and out of that grew the Dissenting Church in Hornton Street.

Dr. Waller was incumbent when the body coachman held his meetings at Kensington, and Mr. Omerod succeeded Dr. Waller soon after Hornton Street Chapel was built.

I wish we knew more of that coachman, who deserves to be held in honour by the congregation of the present day; since it appears that he not only brought together a nucleus for the Church, but contributed out of his limited means ten pounds for the erection of a chapel.

The earliest document preserved relative to the building I may here insert, as it indicates the different elements of Nonconformity blended in the enterprise. Some of the originators, most it would seem, were Presbyterians, but united with them were Independents and others.

We, the undersigned,--of whom some have been educated in the principles of the Established Church of Scotland, and others in that class of Dissenters in England whose principles, opinions, and faith is the most generally consonant to, and founded on, the Word of God as revealed in the Scriptures of the Old and New Testament, and on the essential doctrines of Christianity as professed by both the National Churches of England and Scotland;--being, therefore, Dissenters from the established mode of worship in this country, and being situated at a great distance from any place of worship agreeable to the dictates of our consciences, we, from pure motives of religion and piety alone, for conveniency to ourselves and families, and to others who may be like-minded with us in matters of religion, do propose, under the favour and blessing of a Divine Providence, to erect and build a for the worship of Almighty God in the parish of Kensington and county of Middlesex.

We profess our religious opinions to be, according to the rites, form of worship, as well as of the doctrines and discipline agreed upon in the Confession of Faith, by the Assembly of Divines at Westminster ; we wish to follow their soundness of faith, purity, and simplicity of worship, as far as we judge them founded on the Word of God, agreeable to the standard of faith contained in the Holy Scriptures, the alone unerring guide of faith and manners.

We therefore invite the serious Christian, the friends and lovers of Gospel truth, to join with us in this good undertaking to promote the glory of God, the interests of true religion, and the eternal happiness of ourselves and fellow-Christians; having nothing in view but to forward the attainment of these great objects, we leave the briers, and thorny fields of disputation, and false philosophy, of factions, politics, and jarring interests of ambitious men, "that we may lead quiet and peaceable lives in all godliness and honesty," as commanded. 1 Timothy ii. 1, 2.

The dimensions of the edifice were sixty feet by forty inside; but the ground in length extended to one hundred and nine feet.

NO account is given of the chapel opening; but in October, 1794, an invitation appears, in the name of "the trustees and subscribers," addressed to the Rev. John Lake, M.A., requesting him to take "the pastoral charge of the congregation," to which, in the following month, an answer was returned accepting the charge, and expressing a hope that the people would receive the Word preached with meekness and affection, with freedom from prejudice, and with the simplicity of little children. "Carefully guard," he says, "against whatever may engender strife and division. Endeavour to keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace. Live in peace, and may the God of love and peace be with you." Mr. Lake, it is believed, was a Presbyterian clergyman, and on the 1st of March he preached two discourses suitable to the occasion, which was to unite "several constant and serious hearers at the new chapel" in "church communion," that they might enjoy "religious ordinances." The tone of the whole letter is devout and beautiful, and gives a favourable impression of the writer's character.

"On Sunday, March 8th, a special meeting was held at the chapel in the afternoon, of as many as were desirous of joining as members and communicants at the Lord's Table, when Mr. Lake attended and entered into religious conversation with those present, to whom he also delivered a suitable exhortation. The service was begun and concluded with prayer, singing, etc."

"March 30th. The Rev. Mr. Lake, who had accepted the pastoral office some months ago, removed with his family to Kensington."

"On Thursday, April 9th , Mr. Lake was set apart and admitted to the pastoral office in this Church, in the following manner: The Rev. Mr. Moore began with prayer and reading some suitable portions of Scripture; then singing; Dr. Hunter prayed; singing; the Rev. Mr. Smith preached a suitable and excellent sermon from Ezekiel iii. 17-21; then singing, after which Mr. Rutledge concluded with prayer and benediction. Several other ministers, besides those who engaged, were present. The reverend ministers and some of the principal heads of families afterwards dined together. The service at chapel was conducted to the general satisfaction of all present."

"On Friday, April 10th, in the evening, a sermon, preparatory to the administration of the Lord's Supper, was preached by the Rev. Mr. Love, from Exodus iii. 5. A meeting was afterwards held to consult about the choice of elders, when, after some deliberation, it was thought proper to postpone the choice to a future opportunity."

"On Sunday, April 12th, the members enjoyed the long wished for opportunity of joining as a Christian Church at the table of the Lord. The Lord's Supper was dispensed in the chapel for the first time by the Rev. Mr. Lake, in the following manner: After preaching a suitable discourse from 1 Corinthians xi. 26, and giving out a Psalm, he came from the pulpit to the communion table, where a linen cloth and the elements had been previously laid, the great pew, as well as three or four of the adjoining pews, were filled with communicants. After rehearsing the words of institution, with some useful remarks, Mr. Lake prayed what has been called the consecration prayer; then, with further address to the communicants, he distributed the elements of bread and wine. After which, during the singing of a hymn, he returned to the pulpit, gave an exhortation to those who had received, and concluded the whole with prayer, benediction, and a collection, as is usual on such occasions."

The names of the first communicants are preserved, and in the course of the year 1795 eight others were added. In 1796 nine more, in 1797 five, and in 1798 three. One of the earliest members was a Mrs. Schmae whose husband was living when I went to reside in Kensington. He was a pious old man, full of faith, hope, and love; and when I visited him on his death bed, he told me he had been many years member of Dr. Steinkopf's Lutheran Church in the Savoy, and showed me a German Bible he valued, which was given to me by the family after his death.

The principal persons in the management of affairs at the earliest period were Messrs. Forsyth, Broadwood, and Grey, all Scotch Presbyterians. Mr. Broadwood was the famous pianoforte maker. Mr. Grey was a proprietor of the "Brompton Park Nursery," spoken of as famous for plants of all sorts, "which supply most of the nobility and gentry and gentlemen in England." John Evelyn visited the nursery in 1694, with Mr. Waller, who "was in admiration at the store of plants, and how well the nursery was cultivated."

Amongst early secular incidents connected with the chapel, was an attempt made on the part of the parish to include the building in the poor-rate assessment. This was in 1795. But the trustees resisted the imposition; and on the case being considered by the magistrates at Hicks Hall, they decided that the place being supported by voluntary contributions, could not be justly liable to the parish rate. Similar attempts were made afterwards, with a similar result.

In 1798 the general monthly prayer meeting of the London Missionary Society was held at Hornton Street, and the Rev. Dr. Haweis, it is stated in the Church book, preached from the text, "Awake, awake, put on strength, O arm of the Lord." The entry deserves special remark. Dr. Haweis was rector of Aldwinkle, in Northamptonshire, and an intimate friend of the Countess of Huntingdon. At that period a few Evangelical clergymen were accustomed to preach in Nonconformist pulpits. The famous John Berridge, rector of Everton, was of the number; and Fletcher of Madeley frequently ministered the word of life to Methodist congregations. Dr. Haweis delivered the first annual sermon on behalf of the London Missionary Society in Spafields chapel; and on previous occasions preached in places of worship belonging to the Countess's connection. Whether it was owing to that circumstance, I do not know, but as early as 1767 an unpleasantness arose, which raised a question as to whether he ought to retain his rectory; and the Rev. Martin Madan, of the Lock Hospital--who, by the way, is buried at Kensington--advised him to retain it, a piece of advice which, we are told, subjected Mr. Madan "to much obloquy." Preaching by clergymen in dissenting chapels was deemed an irregularity, but some bishops winked at it. Whether or not the practice be legal became a topic of inquiry a few years ago, and counsel's opinion was taken on the subject. My friend Dr. Stanley at that period expressed a wish to occupy Kensington pulpit before I resigned the pastorate, and an arrangement for the purpose was deferred in consequence of a controversy on the general subject, which arose at the time. Counsel's opinion proved unfavourable, and the matter dropped. But I may mention that the Rev. Samuel Minton, whilst still a Church of England incumbent, preached for me one Sunday evening not long before counsel gave the opinion to which reference has been made.

It is interesting to remember that Dr. Haweis was a warm friend to the London Missionary Society, and that after having offered four hundred pounds for sending the Gospel to Tahiti, he said: "For many years I have planned, prayed, and sought for an opening for a mission among the heathen. My dear Lady Huntingdon has concurred with me in attempting it." And again: "My former experience has convinced me that only by a general union of all denominations could a broad basis be laid for a mission."

Mr. Lake's ministry at Kensington ceased in 1800 or 1801; and the only notice I have found of his subsequent history, is that he at length quitted "the Dissenting interest for a curacy in the Established Church, where he sustained a respectable and useful character to the day of his death."

"THE congregation of Hornton Street Chapel, Kensington, being deprived of the ministerial labours of the Rev. John Lake, by his resignation, and remaining destitute of a stated overseer in the Lord till the month of May, 1801, united in a call soliciting Mr. John Clayton, assistant to the Rev. John Winter, of Newbury, Berks, to undertake the office of their pastor." The invitation was in the name of "the trustees, church, and subscribers," and received about one hundred signatures. Mr. Clayton's reply is not given, but the records state that he paid a visit and preached two Sabbaths in the month of June; and on the second Sabbath of August, 1801, he entered upon his stated labours.

Mr. Clayton was educated partly at Homerton College, partly at Edinburgh University; and after the completion of his preparatory studies he spent a short time at Newbury, as assistant to the Rev. John Winter. He had only just come of age when he was invited to the Kensington pastorate. Having won for himself a good report from the people of the Berkshire town, as one who had done his work "with the ability of a theologist and the faithfulness of a minister of Christ," he was praised by the senior pastor, who wrote to the young man's father, saying, "I see that he has now a call to depart with a prospect of usefulness by preaching the Gospel in another place. I therefore readily commend him to the Lord, and the word of His grace, and shall rejoice to hear that all our hopes are realized among the people of Kensington."

"The charge he delivered at Kensington to his son was a most faithful and solemn exposition of ministerial duties, enforced with amazing vigour and pungency of expression; indeed at times there was a trenchant fearlessness of utterance almost amounting to invective against timeserving, hesitating, cowardly preachers who kept back the truth or proclaimed smooth things to gratify graceless spirits."

"I have not language of indignant severity sufficiently strong to express the contemptible cowardice, hypocrisy, and soul-murdering cruelty of those who adopt an indefinite phraseology in order that none may suspend their devotion, but that a heterogeneous mass of nominal Calvinists and real Arians and Socinians may be assembled in one society. Frost unites sticks and stones, moss, leaves, and weeds; the sun separates them. Into the secret of that frosty liberality may you, my son, never enter, and to the assembly of its advocates never be thou united.

"Your testimony is to contain nothing but the truth. Sermons should not consist in declamation, but be calculated to convey solid instruction. You must teach, and not trifle away time in exhibiting fine thoughts or playing upon words. Let not your testimony be encumbered with what is foreign. Be like Paul, who could say, 'Therefore seeing we have this ministry, as we have obtained mercy, we faint not; but have renounced the hidden things of dishonesty, not walking in craftiness, nor handling the word of God deceitfully; by manifestation of the truth commending ourselves to every man's conscience in the sight of God.'

When Mr. Clayton had spent a year and a half in the seclusion of what was then a rural hamlet, he met with an accident whilst riding on horseback, an exercise to which he was addicted throughout life. The accident suspended his work for a while, and during that period his brother George helped to supply his lack of service. There was considerable resemblance between the two brothers. Each had a commanding appearance and a sonorous voice. Both were accustomed to express themselves in measured, ornate sentences, the style of which was caught in a measure from their good father, who loved his sons, and discriminated between them by saying "John had the best stock of goods, but George had the best shop window." The attainments and mental abilities of the elder certainly were superior to those of the younger; yet perhaps the younger presented what he had to say in a manner more ingenious and with even more attractive diction than his brother John. They became, as they grew older, types of a class at the time large and influential, chiefly known by their intense and popular evangelical ministrations, their exemplary discharge of pastoral duties, their zealous support of catholic institutions for the spread of the Gospel, their gentlemanly demeanour in society, and their large intercourse with ministers and people of all denominations.

Let me avail myself of the following reminiscences of Mr. Clayton's preaching by my beloved friend, the Rev. J. C. Harrison, who attended at the Poultry when Mr. Clayton was minister there. They will, with some slight modification, apply to his preaching at Kensington.

"He was an admirable preacher. In the course of the year you were sure to hear all the main doctrines of the Christian faith clearly explained, or if not formally expounded, thrown into a fuller light by some practical appeal of which he made them the foundation. When he took up a book of the New Testament, like the Acts of the Apostles, and founded on it a series of discussions, he would draw out the spirit of the narrative with great fidelity and effect, and would rise not unfrequently into real eloquence. He was amongst his flock hearing the tale of their sorrows or their joys, their mental conflicts or their bodily sufferings, and becoming thereby acquainted with all varieties of life and experience, all kinds of spiritual disease, all phases of Christian character: seeking meanwhile how to meet difficulties and soothe sorrow, and correct morbid feelings, and turn tears of sadness into smiles of joy, and thus he got together the materials for portraitures of spiritual character drawn to the life, and these he wrought into the texture of his Sunday sermon. It is difficult to imagine the help which such discourses afforded to all classes of true Christian hearers. He mixed with all sorts and conditions of men, lawyers, doctors, merchants, tradesmen, mechanics; and as he was a felicitous and ready converser, he not only threw out shrewd hints and sparkling sayings for their advantage, but gained from them a vast amount of information respecting their mode of life, their opinions and practices, their weak points and strong points, their gains and losses, their desperate anxieties and temptations, or their exhilarating successes; and with these facts from life, in his memory, he spoke in his sermons, 'not as one that beateth the air,' but as one who had been behind the scenes, and knew whereof he affirmed. His strokes were not delivered at random, but went straight to the mark. He could reprove, exhort, advise, comfort, as if he were himself involved every day in the whirl and wear of life. True his usual style of speech was rather Johnsonian, intermingled with forms of expression so entirely his own that you could only call them Claytonian; but those who knew him well, found that he talked very much as he preached, in rhetorically shaped sentences, with a singularly felicitous peculiarity of phrase coined in his own mind, and occasionally with a good-humoured subsidence into some pointed colloquialism which told all the more forcibly from its contrast with his ordinary mode. They felt, therefore, that what he said was thoroughly genuine, the utterance of a true man and not at all of a quack, or as he would have said, of an empiric. But whether experimental or practical, his sermons were richly and heartily evangelical, full of the very spirit of the Gospel. As some of his old-fashioned hearers used to say, 'You could always reckon on sixteen ounces to the pound.'"

Mr. Clayton was an exemplary pastor. After he removed to Camomile Street and the Poultry, he visited his people in a most methodical way, dividing London into districts, and going from house to house, week after week, to comfort sorrowing hearts, to share in domestic joys, to guide the perplexed, and to stimulate the lukewarm; this I know, and therefore it may be inferred that he looked well after the few sheep in the Kensington fields, feeding them by day, and watching over them by night. He used to talk of the large "ring fence" round his church in the city; the ring fence round his church in the suburb was small, and hence we may be sure that his pastoral duties were, during his pastorate at Hornton Street, thoroughly performed. A gentleman by birth and education, with large sympathies easily evoked, tears and smiles coming at a moment's bidding, apt at telling anecdotes, full of humour if not wit, he was a companion loved in a circle wider than his own congregation; his genial friendliness and neighbourly visits helped no doubt to promote the cause of Evangelical Nonconformity.

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