Of the earliest Christian temple erected in Paddington, I have nothing more to say than what I have already said, excepting this, that in all probability it was built and endowed by the first possessors of “the Paddington Estate,” whoever they were; and, whatever were their sins respecting that estate, _they_ must be exonerated from that amount of refined selfishness which has enabled others to take the property dedicated to God, and God’s poor, and leave the people to their own resources for providing themselves with places of worship, and “the cup of charity” for the aged and infirm. St. Katherine’s, and St. James’s. The “old and ruinous” church, pulled down about 1678, was, in the opinion of that accurate observer, Newcourt, dedicated to St. Katherine; for, says he, “I observed the picture of St. Katherine to be set up in painted glass, at the top of the middle panel of the east window in the chancel, where oftentimes the Saint, to which any church is dedicated, is placed.” Newcourt does not tell us to whom the church, “new-built from the ground,” was dedicated; but he saw none of the causes at work which ensured its destruction in rather more than a century; and it could not have been imagined by him that a policy would be inaugurated, and completed, within a century and a half of the time at which he wrote, which would be sorely puzzled to account for the existence of a church built by those who were in receipt of the rectorial revenues. Such a puzzle was not allowed to exist. Doubtlessly, Newcourt thought _the name_ would have existed more than one hundred and ten years—the time the church was allowed to stand—and indeed it does now exist in the _new_ parish church; but Newcourt omits to give it. We find, however, by Willis’s Thesaurus of 1763, and by Lysons, that the Sheldon church was dedicated to St. James. This country church served Hogarth and Jane Thornhill for a Gretna-Green; for here they were married, much against Sir James’s will, it is said, {134} on the twenty-third of March, 1729. Chaterlain’s series of views, dated 1750, contains _two_ of this church; a near north-west view, not mentioned in the King’s Catalogue, British Museum; and a distant view from the green, a copy of which is to be found in the King’s collection. St. Mary’s.