Church of England -- Clergy -- Biography; Jessopp, Augustus, 1823-1914; Rural churches -- England
It may seem strange to the inexperienced, but it is none the less true,
that we suffer a great deal more from the best of our brethren than
we do from the worst. They are the over-zealous, who are determined
to change the face of the world and revolutionize society and reform
everything, and improve everybody, and who cannot leave things alone
to develop and grow, who make their fellow-creatures’ lives a burden
to them. When we are young we have such unbounded faith in ourselves,
and such unbounded ignorance and inexperience. The world is all before
us, and all to conquer and remodel; our seniors are sad fogeys, so
slow, so stiff, so cautious. There is so much dust everywhere and upon
everything. Our brooms are so new, so swishy, and our arms so strong.
We have our wits about us, and our senses all keen and sharp. We find
it hard to believe that we have not been called into being to do a
great deal of sweeping and getting rid of cobwebs. I love to see the
young fellows all bubbling over with energy, and all aflame with fiery
zeal; I would not have it otherwise. God bless them! say I, but they do
rout us about very uncomfortably, and they are very foolish.
It was only the other day that I was asked to go and visit a church to
which a very hurricane of a man had been recently appointed, and which
he had already set himself to restore. He knew no more about church
architecture than I do about Sanskrit, and less about history than I
do about chemistry. He had a small army of bricklayers picking and
slopping about the sacred edifice, tearing down this and digging up
that and smalming over the other. And this reverend worthy had not even
consulted the parish clerk! “Of course you have had a faculty for all
this?” I suggested.
“Not I! Faculty indeed! I have to save all the expense I can. I have
made up my mind to have nothing whatever to do with any officials or
professionals of any sort or kind; I’m my own architect!”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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