{"id":1732,"date":"2011-11-15T22:17:21","date_gmt":"2011-11-15T22:17:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.robertstephenhawker.co.uk\/?p=1732"},"modified":"2012-04-29T11:59:28","modified_gmt":"2012-04-29T11:59:28","slug":"the-poor-man-and-his-parish-church","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.robertstephenhawker.co.uk\/?p=1732","title":{"rendered":"‘The Poor Man and His Parish Church’"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

THE POOR MAN AND HIS PARISH CHURCH<\/strong><\/p>\n

A True Tale<\/em><\/p>\n

THE poor have hands, and feet, and eyes,
\nFlesh, and a feeling mind :
\nThey breathe the breath of mortal sighs,
\nThey are of human kind.
\nThey weep such tears as others shed,
\nAnd now and then they smile :–
\nFor sweet to them is that poor bread,
\nThey win with honest toil.<\/p>\n

The poor men have their wedding-day :
\nAnd children climb their knee :
\nThey have not many friends, for they
\nAre in such misery.
\nThey sell their youth, their skill, their pains,
\nFor hire in hill and glen :
\nThe very blood within their veins,
\nIt flows for other men.<\/p>\n

They should have roofs to call their own,
\nWhen they grow old and bent :
\nMeek houses built of dark grey stone.
\nWorn labour’s monument.
\nThere should they dwell, beneath the thatch,
\nWith threshold calm and free :
\nNo stranger’s hand should lift the latch,
\nTo mark their poverty.<\/p>\n

Fast by the church those walls should stand,
\nHer aisles in youth they trod :–
\nThey have no home in all the land,
\nLike that old House of God.
\nThere, there, the Sacrament was shed,
\nThat gave them heavenly birth ;
\nAnd lifted up the poor man’s head
\nWith princes of the earth.<\/p>\n

There in the chancel’s voice of praise,
\nTheir simple vows were poured ;
\nAnd angels looked with equal gaze
\nOn Lazarus and his Lord.
\nThere, too, at last, they calmly sleep,
\nWhere hallow’d blossoms bloom ;
\nAnd eyes as fond and faithful weep
\nAs o’er the rich man’s tomb.<\/p>\n

They told me of an ancient home,
\nBeside a churchyard wall,
\nWhere roses round the porch would roam,
\nAnd gentle jasmines fall :
\nThere dwelt an old man, worn and blind,
\nPoor, and of lowliest birth ;
\nHe seemed the last of all his kind–
\nHe had no friend on earth.<\/p>\n

Men saw him till his eyes grew dim,
\nAt morn and evening tide
\nPass, ‘mid the graves, with tottering limb,
\nTo the grey chancel’s side ;
\nThere knelt he down, and meekly prayed
\nThe prayers his youth had known :
\nWords by the old Apostles made,
\nIn tongues of ancient tone.<\/p>\n

At matin-time, at evening hour,
\nHe bent with reverent knee :
\nThe dial carved upon the tower
\nWas not more true than he.
\nThis lasted till the blindness fell
\nIn shadows round his bed ;
\nAnd on those walls he loved so well,
\nHe looked, and they were fled.<\/p>\n

Then would he watch, and fondly turn,
\nIf feet of men were there,
\nTo tell them how his soul would yearn
\nFor the old place of prayer ;
\nAnd some would lead him on to stand,
\nWhile fast their tears would fall,
\nUntil he felt beneath his hand
\nThe long-accustomed wall.<\/p>\n

Then joy in those dim eyes would melt ;
\nFaith found the former tone ;
\nHis heart within his bosom felt
\nThe touch of every stone.
\nHe died — he slept beneath the dew,
\nIn his own grassy mound :
\nThe corpse, within the coffin, knew
\nThat calm, that holy ground.<\/p>\n

I know not why — but when they tell
\nOf houses fair and wide,
\nWhere troops of poor men go to dwell
\nIn chambers side by side :–
\nI dream of that old cottage door,
\nWith garlands overgrown,
\nAnd wish the children of the poor
\nHad flowers to call their own.<\/p>\n

And when they vaunt, that in those walls
\nThey have their worship-day,
\nWhere the stern signal coldly calls
\nThe prisoned poor to pray,–
\nI think upon that ancient home
\nBeside the churchyard wall,
\nWhere roses round the porch would roam.
\nAnd gentle jasmines fall.<\/p>\n

I see the old man of my lay,
\nHis grey head bowed and bare ;
\nHe kneels by one dear wall to pray,
\nThe sunlight in his hair.
\nWell ! they may strive, as wise men will.
\nTo work with wit and gold :
\nI think my own dear Cornwall still
\nWas happier of old.<\/p>\n

O ! for the poor man’s church again.
\nWith one roof over all ;
\nWhere the true hearts of Cornish men
\nMight beat beside the wall :
\nThe altars where, in holier days,
\nOur fathers were forgiven,
\nWho went, with meek and faithful ways,
\nThrough the old aisles to heaven.<\/p>\n

R. S. Hawker, 1840.<\/p>\n

Printed privately in leaflet form in 1843, and published in <\/em>Reeds
\nShaken with the Wind. The Second Cluster. 1844. Reprinted in<\/em>
\nEchoes from Old Cornwall, and in <\/em>The Cornish Ballads.<\/em><\/p>\n

*\u00a0 *\u00a0 *\u00a0 *\u00a0 *<\/p>\n

Anglicans Online<\/em> recently published an interesting short article about Hawker<\/strong><\/a> which has encouraged me to do some research on his well documented opposition to the workhouse system. Although I have mixed feelings about the above poem, which sounds sentimental and dated to modern ears, Hawker’s passion for social justice and basic human dignity shines through the rather plodding lines, and the fact that he chose to have it privately printed as a leaflet suggests that he considered it to be of value.<\/p>\n

In 1840 Hawker was in his late thirties and had been vicar of Morwenstow for only a few years. He was one of the first Victorian parsons to introduce the practice of holding a weekly offertory at the end of services to collect alms for charitable purposes and by October 1844 a national debate on the subject was under way in the press. Hawker, who defended the principle of the collections in a letter to the English Churchman,<\/em> was singled out by name for an attack in The Times,<\/em> and responded with his customary vigour. He rebuked the owner<\/em>, John Walter, for permitting himself to ‘invade the tranquillity’ of his parish, robustly defended his position, and concluded with the following splendid and topical advice:<\/p>\n

‘You are, I am told, an elderly man, fast approaching the end of all things, and, ere many years have passed, about to stand a separated soul among the awful mysteries of the spiritual world. I counsel you to beware lest the remembrance of these attempts to diminish the pence of the poor, and to impede the charitable duties of the rich, should assuage your happiness in that abode where the strifes and triumphs of controversy are unknown, ‘Because thou hast done this thing, and because thou hadst no pity.’ And lastly, I advise you not again to assail our rural parishes with such publications, and to harass and unsettle the minds of our faithful people.’… <\/em>(Life and Letters, p. 176)<\/p>\n

Dr Phillpotts, the Bishop of Exeter, later wrote to thank Hawker for the pleasure reading the letter had given him, adding ‘If [ John Walter ] has any sense of shame, he ought to feel deeply the exposure.’<\/p>\n

The underlying impression of helplessness and frustration, and the inability of all concerned to agree on an effective method for supporting the less fortunate members of society, seem familiar today. Piers Brendon in his excellent biography, Hawker of Morwenstow, <\/em>describes how Hawker vented his anger against a vicious landlord, telling him ‘that he had a God and that as he dealt with John Cann and his crippled boy so he would be requited’. Brendon’s comment that ‘In effect this was the language of impotence’, also suggests that little has changed between Hawker’s time and ours.<\/p>\n

Hawker persisted valiantly in his support for his struggling parishioners, in the face of his own ill health and increasing family responsibilities. His correspondents included Louisa Twining, a member of the wealthy tea-importing family and one of the first women to become elected to a workhouse board of guardians, and he was quick to praise those landlords who discharged their obligations to their tenants in a spirit of generosity and compassion. Hawker’s letters on the subject contradict the impression of isolation and remoteness from worldly concerns that he often conveyed when describing his life to acquaintances, and they make invigorating reading. His first wife, Charlotte, appears to have fully supported his efforts, and since Hawker’s earnings were inadequate to cover his charitable outgoings it seems probable that part of her own inheritance went on providing food, fuel and clothing for the poorest inhabitants of the parish. During the period of Hawker’s second marriage his financial difficulties increased alarmingly and in a letter written to a friend only a few years before his death he describes himself as cut ‘to the very heart’ by his distress at being ‘so shorn of the power for charity’.<\/p>\n

Throughout his forty years as vicar Hawker’s efforts eased the plight of many parishioners to whom even the smallest improvement in circumstances brought temporary relief. He set an example that often put his wealthier contemporaries to shame and his writings make a valuable contribution to the history of the labouring poor.<\/p>\n

LINKS<\/strong><\/p>\n

– The Life and Letters of R. S Hawker, <\/em>edited by C. E. Byles<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

– The Workhouse – the story of an institution<\/strong>\u00a0<\/a><\/p>\n

FURTHER READING<\/strong><\/p>\n

Piers Brendon, Hawker of Morwenstow: Portrait of a Victorian Eccentric<\/em>. Picador, 2002.<\/p>\n

Thomas Hardy, Far From the Madding Crowd. <\/em>(1874) Oxford University Press, 2008
\n<\/em><\/p>\n

<\/strong> Henry Mayhew, London Labour & The London Poor. <\/em>(1851) Wordsworth Editions, 2008.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Text and photo \u00a9 Angela Williams 2010, 2011<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A look at Hawker’s charitable rebellion against the Poor Law<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1754,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[63,162],"tags":[23,166,171,9,24,164,165,163],"class_list":["post-1732","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-poetry","category-poor-law","tag-cornwall","tag-dr-phillpotts","tag-louisa-twining","tag-morwenstow","tag-piers-brendon","tag-poor-law-2","tag-speenhamland-system","tag-workhouse"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.robertstephenhawker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1732","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.robertstephenhawker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.robertstephenhawker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.robertstephenhawker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.robertstephenhawker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1732"}],"version-history":[{"count":81,"href":"https:\/\/www.robertstephenhawker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1732\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1821,"href":"https:\/\/www.robertstephenhawker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1732\/revisions\/1821"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.robertstephenhawker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1754"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.robertstephenhawker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1732"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.robertstephenhawker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1732"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.robertstephenhawker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1732"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}