An English author, and a clergyman of the Established Church. He was born in Lisbon, studied in Oxford, was appointed a Fellow of Oriel, and was Dean of Saint Paul’s from 1871 until his death. He is chiefly known as a scholar and writer. His long list of publications includes: “Essays and Reviews” (1854); “Civilization and Religion” (1860); “University Sermons” (1868); “The Beginning of the Middle Ages” (1877); an able volume on “Bacon” (1879) and “Spenser” (1879), in the “English Men of Letters” series. A uniform edition of many of his works appeared in 1888, and a posthumous work on “The Oxford Movement” was published in 1891.

Personal

  By this time I hope the E. Talbots will have met Dean Church. They are certainly to be envied for the opportunity of seeing so much more of so interesting a man than can be managed in London…. There is something of singular charm about him, and I fancy one sees it also in his writing. At least the essay on Dante has some exquisite passages “halfway between beauty and goodness,” if I may so parody one of his quotations.

  How significant is it that Dean Church should write the history of events in which he was a prominent actor, and never once mention his own name! He does not avoid the first person singular, for it appears in the Preface and also in the body of the book—but for the first time, if I mistake not, on the last page! May I be forgiven for asking if a Scotchman or an Irishman ever performed a feat like this, or an Englishman, for that matter, outside this charmed circle.

  On the 10th of December, early in the morning and quite quietly, the end came. The Dean’s love of Whatley had led him years before to choose a spot in the quiet country churchyard there for his last resting-place. And thither he was carried from St. Paul’s after the early Communion in the northwest chapel of the cathedral, where his coffin lay in the midst, and the later funeral service, with its long procession, and solemn music, and gathering of many friends and colleagues. And there, in the snow-covered churchyard, beside the chancel of the village church, and amid the farewell gathering of old friends and parishioners, he was laid at rest. He had left a strict charge that no memorial should be raised to him. Only one thing he had asked;—that a stone like that which he had chosen to mark his son’s grave at Hyères—and which, though he was spared the sorrow of knowing it, was also, within three years’ time, to mark the grave of his youngest daughter there—should mark his own grave at Whatley, and that it should bear upon it the same lines from the Dies Irae—

  The preaching of Dean Church was over the heads of the less cultivated. It is truly said by Canon Scott Holland: “There were no physical effects to aid the impression. The voice, though pure toned, was far from strong; and in delivery he held fast to the earlier traditions so characteristic of Newman and the Tractarian chiefs. Gesture, action, were all rigidly discarded: and the voice retained its even measured monotone throughout.”

  As parish priest and as Dean of St. Paul’s he displayed the character of an English priest—learned, judicious, tolerant, saintly—in its most beautiful aspect. Firm in his convictions and great in his quietness, no man ever represented more perfectly the characteristic excellences of the Anglican Church.

  Soon after his election at Oriel I became and always continued to be, on very close terms of friendship with Church, whose character is so universally appreciated that it is needless for me to speak of his beautiful and attractive qualities. I believe we were always entirely agreed in opinions, both at Oxford and afterwards during his life at St. Paul’s.

  It was not only in his writing that he possessed so great a charm, but in his conversation at home and in society. He had a very keen and delicate sense of humour, and yet maintained perfect dignity without the loss of simplicity and ease. “Austerity and sympathy” have been described as two great notes in his character, and he was able, as Canon Scott Holland has said, to be in favour with all men, and yet never to swerve from the line of duty, and never to submit to the taint of compromise…. Though not gifted with great vocal powers for preaching, his reading was always a treat to those who heard him, whether it was one of Scott’s novels, or a poem of Tennyson, in his drawing-room at Whatley in the evening, or his clear and impressive readings of the lessons in St. Paul’s, at the great special services, when his perfect pronunciation and intonation made him easily heard. He was an untiring and industrious student, and never dropped any of his early studies. Homer and Virgil, Sophocles and Lucretius, were never put away on his shelves after Oxford days. But he was also an indefatigable correspondent, and wrote from abroad delightfully fresh accounts of the places he visited.

General

  His Essay on Dante alone stamps him as one of the first critics of any age; and his volumes on Anselm, Bacon, and “The Beginnings of the Middle Ages,” his singularly brilliant and comprehensive sketch of “The Early Ottomans,” must make every one who has read them sigh that a mind so powerful, so discriminating, so amply furnished with knowledge, and in command of a style at once so dignified and attractive, did not find time to leave behind him some monumental work on history, in addition to the fragmentary monographs which show how well equipped he was for the task.

  It is what you feel in all his writings—the moral beauty of the man, a measure and charm which are no tricks of a well-trained pen, but the natural outcome of characters. It is not the beauty of flexible weakness, but of polished strength; the beauty not of a fragile carving but of a columnar shaft finely proportioned to bear its burden to the best advantage. Large intelligence, thorough scholarship, rare and delicate taste, simple and earnest devotion, were all combined with a certain judicial poise, a just measure in thought and conduct…. His silences were speeches; his suppressions were verdicts. Wisely bold at need, he had no love of figuring at the front of the stage. He had greatness thrust upon him. He could be generous and expect no recognition. You cannot think of his taking an unfair advantage or attempting to hold untenable ground. He knew how to handle hot coals without fanning them into a blaze. He could write history from one side of a controverted position, and remain impartial—just to opponents, and no more than just to friends.

  Upon the whole, the letters do give the impression that the writer took only a transient interest in transitory things. Arnold’s letters, for instance, come much nearer to a continuous commentary on the life of the time. Another impression is a sort of aloofness, of irony, of reserve. The letter in which he announces his first article on St. Anselm to his mother is really remarkable in its way. Of course he had to allow for her Protestantism; but, viewed from inside, St. Anselm is not without attractions to Protestants. It was Church’s own choice to present his subject from the outside as a picture of the cat-and-dog life an archbishop had to live in the eleventh century. He wrote in the same detached way about his children, almost as a neutral observer might. He found his son odd and his daughters interesting: when the former was dying he appears to have discovered, for the first time, that he had been an affectionate son.

  There seem to be two Churches in the field—one secular, scientific, historical, literary, human; the other traditional, ecclesiastical, apologetic. And there are not wanting intimations that the basis of his mind was sceptical, and that he clung to the traditional opinion the more resolutely because he dared not trust himself to his own strength in the wide stream of modern thought…. His letters have the apparently inevitable felicity of style that marks his various books, and it is interesting to find one of them written at the request of some one who would learn the secret of his charm. He can only say that he has watched against the temptation to use unreal and fine words, and read good English, Newman’s in particular, with Shakespere’s, Wordsworth’s, and the rest. It is eloquent for his catholicity that Lucretius was his favorite classic, and Matthew Arnold’s books an indispensable resource. But the evidences of this quality are many.

  Of no modern writer is the saying so obviously true as of Church, that the style is the man. What interests us far more than any particular page in his writings is the personality behind them, a personality concealed rather than obtruded, but plainly individual and full of charm. His peculiar note is a melancholy compounded of many simples, and including those of the scholar, the divine, the traveller, and the accomplished gentleman. He was a student at once of books and of men…. His style, properly so called, may be defined as in the best sense academic; it is periodic in structure, correct in syntax, and harmonious in flow and cadence. It is not hard to trace in it the influence of Newman; the qualities which Church had in common or by contact with Newman; candour, lucidity, and precision, are reflected in his style; amongst smaller points of resemblance may be noted the occasional startling use of very familiar phrases; but it lacks Newman’s extraordinary flexibility and ease. Its defect is the defect of the academic style, a tendency to become dry; and the defect of excessive moderation, a tendency to become tame. Further, the periods are not always well managed, the principle of suspense is too freely used, or, on the other hand, the paragraphs run to seed. But when at its best, the style is vigorous and vivid, and at no time is it without dignity.

  Well versed in theology, philosophy, and history, both ecclesiastical and secular, the author combined the power of looking at large questions largely with the critic’s nice sense of detail. That he writes, however, from the orthodox and high-church standpoint is always apparent; and this could hardly be otherwise, for the greater number of the essays were contributed to “The Guardian,” a professedly high-church journal. Such being his point of view, anything like entirely unprejudiced criticism, in most of the subjects treated by him, is out of the question; nor are we surprised by the writer’s occasional slight tendency to digress along certain familiar or favorite lines of thought and study.