Recollections of a Long Life: An AutobiographyCuyler, Theodore L. (Theodore Ledyard)
Religion
Recollections of a Long Life: An Autobiography
Cuyler, Theodore L. (Theodore Ledyard)
Clergy -- United States -- Biography; Cuyler, Theodore L. (Theodore Ledyard), 1822-1909
A few days afterwards I went up to get a look at Holly Lodge, the
residence of Lord Macaulay, in a side street just off Campden Hill. I
met the Dean just coming out of the gate. He had been attending a garden
party given by Lord Airlie, who then occupied the lodge. It was a
pleasant coincidence to meet the most brilliant ecclesiastical historian
at the door of the most brilliant civil historian of England. The Dean
stopped and chatted about Macaulay, of whom he was very fond, and then
said: "Just beyond is Holland House." We went a few paces and got a
glimpse of the famous mansion in which Lord Holland had entertained the
celebrities of America and Europe. One of the best hours I ever spent
with Stanley was at his own table in the Deanery. He was the most
delightful of hosts. Lady Augusta Stanley, daughter of the Earl of
Elgin, had been a favorite Maid of Honor to the Queen, and the Dean had
accompanied the Prince of Wales on his tour to the Orient. The Queen
quite frequently slipped away from the palace for a quiet chat at the
Deanery with this pair whom she so loved. A marble bust of Victoria, by
her daughter, the Princess Louise, stood in the parlor, a gift of the
Queen. If the Dean was very broad in his theology, his cultured wife was
as decidedly evangelical in hers and her religious influence was very
tonic in all respects. After lunch that day the Dean very kindly took me
into the famous Jerusalem chamber and showed me where the Westminster
Assembly had sat for six years to give birth to our Presbyterian
Confession of Faith and Catechism. I was surprised at the small size of
the room that had held seventy or eighty commissioners.
As I was very desirous of hearing the Dean preach in the Abbey, he sent
me a very kind invitation to come on the next Sabbath to the Deanery
before the service, and on account of my deafness Lady Augusta would
take me into a seat close to his pulpit. Accordingly she stowed me in a
small box-pew, which was close against the pulpit, and within arms'
length of the Dean. His sermon was a beautiful essay on Solomon and
great men, and in the course of it he said: "Such was the greatness of
our Lord Jesus Christ." I felt so pained by _what he did not say_ that I
ventured to write him a most frank and loving note, in which I expressed
my deep regret that when he referred to the "greatness" of our Saviour
he had so entirely ignored what was infinitely His most sublime
work,--that of our human redemption by His atoning death on Calvary. The
dear Dean, instead of taking offense, accepted the frank letter in the
same spirit in which it was written. A day or two after he sent me a
characteristic note, whose peculiar hieroglyphics, after much labor, I
was able to decipher; for it has been often said that the only reason
why he was never made a bishop was that no clergyman in his diocese
would ever have been able to read his letters.
THE DEANERY OF WESTMINSTER,
July 22, 1872
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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