View allAll Photos Tagged Repent
Tudo começou assim, tão de repente, e de um jeito inexplicável você se tornou essencial para a minha vida, para a minha sobrevivência. Foi tanto tempo gasto tentando fazer isso tudo dar certo, parecia até uma eternidade, e esse tempo todo foi a melhor fase da minha vida. Jamais você vai entender o quanto eu te amei, você é simplesmente incapaz de compreender.
Tanto tempo eu esperei por aquele momento, tantas vezes eu já sonhei com isso e tantas vezes eu chorei por isso. Quando finalmente tudo o que eu mais sonhava, aconteceu, em poucas horas já havia acabado. E eu vi, tudo o que eu mais tinha sonhado e esperado, desmoronando. É difícil entender porque tudo acabou assim... tínhamos tudo para dar certo e infelizmente não deu. Eu simplesmente não consigo entender porque isso aconteceu, era tudo tão perfeito ao seu lado e você fazia todos os problemas do mundo parecerem migalhas só com três palavras, simples e singelas, aquelas que muitas pessoas temem... mas não sabem o quão bem fazem para a alma.
Te esquecer? Jamais. A única coisa que me resta agora é seguir em frente, como se nada tivesse importado para mim, da mesma forma que parecia não importar para você. Mas você me deixou marcas, cicatrizes e muita, mas muita tristeza e pra sempre vou carregá-las comigo... já que são as únicas coisas que você teve coragem de deixar para mim. Mas a saudade que eu sinto é algo bom, já que é uma das únicas coisas que me fazem acreditar que por um momento, só por um momento... que o que tínhamos foi real.
Marie Madeleine repentante
Marie Madeleine est représentée, de manière traditionnelle pour l'époque, allongée dans sa grotte (de la Sainte-Baume), l'air farouche, dénudée et méditant, les bras appuyés sur un crâne. L'influence du Caravage est sensible dans les oeuvres de l'école d'Utrecht auquel appartient l'artiste. Le commissaire a placé cette "vanité" dans la partie de son exposition intitulée "Dévoiler l'émotion", car l'intériorité des personnages représentés commence à apparaître dans les toiles du 17è siècle.
Oeuvre de Johannes Moreelse (Utrecht, vers 1603 - vers 1634)
Vers 1630
Huile sur bois
58 x 71,5 cm
Caen, musée des beaux-arts
Notice complète dans le catalogue du musée
mba.caen.fr/oeuvre/marie-madeleine-penitente
Oeuvre présentée dans l'exposition "Le théâtre des émotions", Musée Marmottan Monet, Paris
L’émotion, avec ses « réactions souvent intenses », est systématiquement présente dans les arts visuels, travaillée, traquée, déclinée. Elle incarne même la plus grande partie de leur sens, suggérant la chair, stimulant la curiosité. Toutes les expressions y sont illustrées : de la souffrance à la joie, de l’enthousiasme à la terreur, du plaisir à la douleur... Extrait du site de l'exposition : "Le théâtre des émotions", au musée Marmottan Monet, Paris
Pluvialis fulva
Chorlito dorado del pacifico
Paseo de Los Turistas, Puntarenas
Tamaño y forma
Ave playera de tamaño mediano, con postura erguida, cabeza bastante grande, cuello delgado, alas largas y patas relativamente largas.
Patrón de color
Los adultos en plumaje reproductivo tienen un plumaje dorado salpicado en la parte superior y negruzco en la inferior, con una “pañuelo” blanco que se extiende desde la frente hasta los flancos. Los pájaros adultos que no están en período reproductivo tienen tonos dorados intensos en la parte superior y grisáceos sucios en la parte inferior. Los juveniles son de un dorado intenso en la parte superior y grisáceos moteados en la parte inferior, con la cara de tono dorado.
Comportamiento
Los chorlitos dorados del Pacífico buscan alimento al estilo típico de los chorlitos, corriendo y deteniéndose de repente para observar o atrapar a sus presas; también cavan pequeños hoyos para desenterrarlas. Forman bandadas durante la migración y en las zonas de invernada. Los machos cantan y realizan elegantes exhibiciones aéreas en las zonas de reproducción.
Hábitat
Anida en la tundra, a veces en zonas altas y secas de las montañas, pero normalmente en laderas más bajas con arbustos enanos o juncos. Las aves migratorias e invernantes utilizan campos agrícolas, césped, parques, pastizales, granjas de césped, estuarios, marismas, marismas, playas y manglares.
Alimentación
Invertebrados acuáticosLos chorlitos dorados del Pacífico se alimentan principalmente de insectos. Buscan alimento como la mayoría de los chorlitos, corriendo, deteniéndose y observando, y luego rápidamente recogen presas del suelo antes de reanudar su método de “correr-parar-picotear”. En Hawái, a veces excavan hoyos poco profundos en el césped, en busca de lombrices y milpiés. Tragan presas pequeñas enteras, pero las más grandes las desmembran al picotearlas y luego las consumen pieza por pieza. A fines del verano, comen con gusto arándanos y arándanos, que los ayudan a engordar para su larga migración. También comen semillas y algunas flores y hojas. Comen una gran variedad de alimentos, incluidos saltamontes, escarabajos, cigarras, larvas de grulla, gusanos cortadores, gusanos de alambre, polillas, mosquitos, cucarachas, ácaros, cochinillas, tijeretas, moscas, abejas, avispas, hormigas, lombrices de tierra, sanguijuelas, ciempiés, milpiés, arañas, gusanos de cerdas, babosas, caracoles, mejillones, artemia, pequeños crustáceos, peces pequeños, gecos, escincos y serpientes ciegas. Ocasionalmente pueden comer huevos de aves e incluso ratones pequeños. A diferencia de los chorlitos dorados americanos, los del Pacífico se han habituado bastante a los humanos, particularmente en áreas pobladas como Oahu. Aquí, buscan comida a pocos pies de las personas e incluso comen pan, arroz, pollo, papas fritas, manzanas, etc. desechados.
Foi de repente que a estação mudou. A seca insistente perdurou até há poucos dias; a desolação, o abatimento...
Uma chuvada e os olhos sedentos de imagens já olham para as cores molhadas, cheios de espanto como se fosse a primeira vez.
E a vida pulula, percebida pela vibração cromática ao redor, pelos voos surpreendidos onde se olha, os pios variados que se mesclam em sinfonias. Quase dá para sentir o crescer das folhas novas e das inflorescências das bromélias nas pedreiras bem acima de nós. Como se a natureza estivesse se exibindo e pedindo para ser vista.
O dia foi de árvores e aves nos arredores de Torreões. Talvez a câmera tenha se cansado, depois de 350 fotos.
Eu quero mais.
Sorri. De repente beijei-o, excitado pelo seu calor, pela sensação de maciez e flexibilidade de sua pele quase humana. Deus, como eu odiava a brancura de meus dedos tocando-o, dedos que agora poderiam esmagá-lo sem esforço! Perguntei-me se ele sequer imaginava isso. Encarei-o idiotamente. Como ele me parecia perfeito, parado ali, esperando com tanta delicadeza e tanta paciência! E então, como um tolo, soltei:
Lestat: Você ainda me ama?
Ele sorriu; ah, era torturante ver seu rosto suavizar-se e ao mesmo tempo iluminar-se quando ele sorria!
Louis: Sim.
"We will have to repent in this generation not merely for the hateful words and actions of the bad people but for the appalling silence of the good people."
"He who passively accepts evil is as much involved in it as he who helps to perpetrate it. He who accepts evil without protesting against it is really cooperating with it."
Martin Luther King, the author of the words quoted above, was as a thirty five year old in 1964, the youngest person in history to receive the Nobel Peace Prize. A year earlier, he had made his famous ‘I Have a Dream’ speech in Washington DC which has now been shown as truly prophetic. Four years later, he was assassinated. A man was convicted for this but it was widely believed that it was part of a conspiracy in which the FBI was also involved. Throughout his involvement with the civil rights movement, King had been receiving death threats, some of it allegedly emanating from the FBI itself. He had been a strident opponent of the Vietnam War and criticized the US Congress for the continuing to spend billions in the conduct of the war. "A nation", he declared, "that continues year after year to spend more money on military defence than on programmes of social uplift is approaching spiritual death". For this King was riled not only by the establishment but even by the mainstream media. The Life magazine called the speech "demagogic slander that sounded like a script for Radio Hanoi" and even the liberal Washington Post wrote that King had "diminished his usefulness to his cause, his country, his people." Later events however proved right the wisdom of King.
Take from:
JUST DO IT TRAILER
“It is quite gratifying to feel guilty if you haven't done anything wrong: how noble! Whereas it is rather hard and certainly depressing to admit guilt and to repent.”
Hannah Arendt
"Come, Come who or whatever you are
Should you be an unbeliever, a Magian or a pagan still come
Our lodge is not a lodge of despair
With hundred repentions unheeded you may be,still, come"
For Muslims and non-Muslims alike, the main reason to come to Konya is to visit the Mevlâna Museum, the former lodge of the whirling dervishes and home to the tomb of Celaleddin Rumi (later known as Mevlâna), who we have to thank for giving the world the whirling dervishes. This is one of the biggest pilgrimage centres in Turkey, and the building's fluted dome of turquoise tiles is one of Turkey's most distinctive sights.
For Muslims, this is a very holy place, and more than 1.5 million people visit it a year, most of them Turkish. You will see many people praying for Rumi's help. When entering, women should cover their head and no one should wear singlets or shorts.
After walking through a pretty garden you pass through the Dervişan Kapısı (Gate of the Dervishes) and enter a courtyard with an ablutions fountain in the centre.
At the entrance to the mausoleum, the Ottoman silver door bears the inscription, 'Those who enter here incomplete will come out perfect'. Put on the supplied plastic over-shoes before entering. Once inside the mausoleum, look out for the big bronze Nisan tası (April bowl) on the left. April rainwater, vital to the farmers of this region, is still considered sacred and was collected in this 13th-century bowl. The tip of Mevlâna's turban was dipped in the water and offered to those in need of healing. Also on the left are six sarcophagi belonging to Bahaeddin Veled's supporters who followed him from Afghanistan.
Continue through to the part of the room directly under the fluted dome. Here you can see Mevlâna's Tomb (the largest), flanked by that of his son Sultan Veled and those of other eminent dervishes. They are all covered in velvet shrouds heavy with gold embroidery, but those of Mevlâna and Veled bear huge turbans, symbols of spiritual authority; the number of wraps denotes the level of spiritual importance. Bahaeddin Veled's wooden tomb stands on one end, leading devotees to say Mevlâna was so holy that even his father stands to show respect. There are 66 sarcophagi on the platform, not all visible.
Mevlâna's tomb dates from Seljuk times. The mosque and semahane, the hall where whirling ceremonies were held, were added later by Ottoman sultans (Mehmet the Conqueror was a Mevlevi adherent and Süleyman the Magnificent made charitable donations to the order). Selim I, conqueror of Egypt, donated the Mamluk crystal lamps.
The semahane to the left of the sepulchral chamber contains exhibits such as the original copy of the Mathnawi, Mevlâna's cape and other clothing, a 9th-century gazelle-skin Christian manuscript and a copy of the Koran so tiny that its author went blind writing it. In the middle of the room is a display case holding a casket which contains strands of Mohammed's beard. The small mosque in front of the semahane is reserved for prayers but as you exit the building, look to the left of the mihrab for a seccade (prayer carpet) bearing a picture of the Kaaba at Mecca. Made in Iran of silk and wool, it's extremely fine, with some three million knots (144 per square centimetre).
The matbah (kitchen) of the lodge is in the southwest corner of the courtyard. It is decorated as it would have been in Mevlâna's day, with mannequins dressed as dervishes. Look out for the wooden practice board, used by novice dervishes to learn to whirl. The dervish cells (where the dervishes lived) run along the northern and western sides of the courtyard. Inside the cells are a host of ethnographic displays relating to dervish life. In particular, one room contains personal items belonging to Şems of Tabriz including his hat and a manuscript of the Mâkâlât, his most famous work.
The complex can get oppressively busy, and seeing any of the contents of the museum display cases can be a pushing and shoving, head-ducking affair. Come early on a weekday if you want to see all the items in peace. On the other hand, the atmosphere on busy days is almost addictive and more than makes up for not being able to properly examine the museum pieces.
Beside the museum is the Selimiye Camii.
Thank you so much for visiting my stream, whether you comments , favorites or just have a look.
I appreciate it very much, wishing the best of luck and good light.
© All rights reserved R.Ertug
Please do not use this image without my explicit written permission. Contact me by Flickr mail if you want to buy or use Your comments and critiques are very well appreciated.
Best viewed in lightbox - please click on the image or press L.
Thanks for stopping and looking :)
As the nation of Israel unashamedly and continuously sinned against God, they fell under God’s wrath and judgment—and so may other countries. Yet, as individual Israelites sincerely repented and prayed for mercy, they received it and were restored—and so may other countries be.
“if my people who are called by my name humble themselves, and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and heal their land.” (2 Chronicles 7:14)
As Believers, we know that the throne of God is always accessible to us through Yeshua. Yet, we sometimes need a structured time to make right what has gone wrong. So let us take full advantage of these 40 days of favor, sincerely repenting of our sins against others and against God, asking for His mercy as we extend mercy to those who have sinned against us.
“Give us our daily bread, and forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors.” (Matthew 6:12)
As we take these steps to nullify our debts against others and contemplate our own character, now is a good time to draw closer to God and prepare for a new beginning through greater dedication to Him and His word, as well as through contemplation of His manifold mercies.
“Let us then approach God's throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.” (Hebrews 4:16)
----------------------------------------------------------------
Elul and the Shemitah
"Every seventh year we will forgo working the land and will cancel all debts." (Nehemiah 10:31)
This year, the month of Elul has a special significance. It is the last month of the Shemitah year of 5775.
A Shemitah is a year of rest—the seventh year—in which the Bible commands us to plant no new crops but to eat from the remains of the previous year’s produce.
As tourists traveled around Israel this year, they saw rather unkempt fields with signs stating, “This field keeps the Shemitah.” In other words, nothing has been planted in this field this year.
Elul ends on Erev Rosh Hashanah (Jewish New Year's Eve), which is on Sunday, the 13th of September. As the year of the Shemitah, the Jewish year of 5776 will begin.
Shemitah means release—release for the land, but also release for each of us. According to the Bible, debts are to be forgiven and property returned to its original owner.
Debts can be spiritual, as well. So during Elul this year, in the spirit of Shemitah—of release—this is the time to consider our grudges and to release unto God those who may have offended us, freeing ourselves of any bitterness toward these individuals.
This is also a time to pause and consider our ways, to set goals for personal improvement for the coming year.
We are to look within ourselves to discover what is in need of development, what needs to be renewed, and what needs to be let go of. We can evaluate our achievements and consider where we may have missed the mark.
This process, which is referred to as teshuvah (repentance) or a spiritual return to God, is not passive.
For teshuvah to be effective, we must set aside personal time away from distractions so that we can review the year, contemplate our accomplishments and consider our relationships with others.
We do this because we want to start the New Year fresh, and because we know that holding grudges only hurts ourselves. As the year of release draws to a close, now is the time to participate in this release and rid ourselves of resentments so we can face the New Year with a clean heart.
- Messianic Bible | news@biblesforisrael.com |
De repente bateu uma vontade enorme de usar um Dote ,e dentre todas as opções resolvi usar um dos primeiros da marca que comprei:o Porto de Galinhas,lilás/rosa SUPER clarinho e meigo,mas é aquela coisa depois de um tempo ele acaba perdendo a graça!
E nada melhor do que uma carimbada para animar um pouquinho,durante o processo fui fazendo vários testes para achar algum esmalte que não fosse branco ou preto que funcionasse para carimbar,e ecabei achando o Speciallità Free Rosa Neon que foi usado na Konad M51!
De repente intentó aprender la Ligereza, maravillosa virtud existencial que consiste en saber vivir el presente con plenitud serena…
Rosa Montero – La ridícula idea de no volver a verte
Se o toque do outro de repente for bom? Bom, a palavra é essa. Se o outro for bom para você. Se te der vontade de viver. Se o cheiro do suor do outro também for bom. Se todos os cheiros do corpo do outro forem bons. O pé, no fim do dia. A boca, de manhã cedo. Bons, normais, comuns. Coisa de gente. Cheiros íntimos, secretos. Ninguém mais saberia deles se não enfiasse o nariz lá dentro, a língua lá dentro, bem dentro, no fundo das carnes, no meio dos cheiros. E se tudo isso que você acha nojento for exatamente o que chamam de amor? Quando você chega no mais íntimo, No tão íntimo, mas tão íntimo que de repente a palavra nojo não tem mais sentido. Você também tem cheiros. As pessoas têm cheiros, é natural. Os animais cheiram uns aos outros. No rabo. O que é que você queria? Rendas brancas imaculadas? Será que amor não começa quando nojo, higiene ou qualquer outra dessas palavrinhas, desculpe, você vai rir, qualquer uma dessas palavrinhas burguesas e cristãs não tiver mais nenhum sentido? Se tudo isso, se tocar no outro, se não só tolerar e aceitar a merda do outro, mas não dar importância a ela ou até gostar, porque de repente você até pode gostar, sem que isso seja necessariamente uma perversão, se tudo isso for o que chamam de amor. Amor no sentido de intimidade, de conhecimento muito, muito fundo. Da pobreza e também da nobreza do corpo do outro. Do teu próprio corpo que é igual, talvez tragicamente igual. O amor só acontece quando uma pessoa aceita que também é bicho. Se amor for a coragem de ser bicho. Se amor for a coragem da própria merda. E depois, um instante mais tarde, isso nem sequer será coragem nenhuma, porque deixou de ter importância. O que vale é ter conhecido o corpo de outra pessoa tão intimamente como você só conhece o seu próprio corpo. Porque então você se ama também.
Please read this. It is important.
Charles Spurgeon:
This chapter speaks to many people who know nothing of peace, for “there is no peace, saith my God, to the wicked” (Isa. 57:21). “The wicked is like the troubled sea, which cannot rest, whose waters cast up mire and dirt.” I do not address this to you with any desire of making a false peace with your souls. Woe to the prophets who say, “Peace, peace, when there is no peace!” (Jer. 6:14). Rather let me, first of all, expose the warring state of your soul that is without peace.
O soul! You are at war with your conscience. You have tried to quiet it, but it will prick you. You have shut up the recorder of the town of Mansoul in a dark place, and you have built a wall before His door. Still, when he has His fits, your conscience will thunder at you and say, “This is not right; this is the path that leads to hell; this is the road to destruction.” Oh! there are some of you to whom conscience is like a ghost, haunting you by day and night. You know the good, though you choose the evil. You prick your fingers with the thorns of conscience when you try to pluck the rose of sin. To you the downward path is not an easy one; it is hedged up and ditched up. There are many bars and gates and chains on this road but you climb over them, determined to ruin your own souls.
Oh, there is war between you and conscience. Conscience says, “Turn,” but you say, “I will not.” Conscience says, “Alter this system of trade, it is cheating.” Conscience says, “Lie not one to another, for the Judge is at the door.” Conscience says, “Away with that drinking cup, it makes the man into something worse than a brute.” Conscience says, “Rip yourself from that unchaste connection, be done with that evil, bolt your door against lust;” but you say, “I will drink the sweet though it damns me. I will go still to my haunts, though I perish in my sins.”
There is war between you and your conscience. Still your conscience is God’s vicegerent in your soul. Let conscience speak a moment or two this morning. Fear him not, he is a good friend to you, and though he speak roughly, the day will come when you will know that there is more music in the very roarings of conscience than in all the sweet and enticing tones that lust adopts to cheat you to your ruin. Let your conscience speak.
But more, there is war between you and God’s law. The Ten Commandments are against you this morning. The first one comes forward and says, “Let him be cursed, for he denies me. He has another God besides me. His God is His belly; he yields homage to His lust.” All the Ten Commandments, like ten great cannons, are pointed at you today, for you have broken all God’s statutes, and lived in the daily neglect of all His commands.
Soul! You will find it a hard thing to go to war with the law. When the law came in peace, Sinai was completely in smoke, and even Moses said, “I do exceedingly fear and quake” (Heb 12:21). What will you do when the law comes in terror, when the trumpet of the archangel shall tear you from your grave, when the eyes of God will burn their way into your guilty soul, when the great books shall be opened, and all your sin and shame shall be published? Can you stand against an angry law in that day? When the officers of the law will come forth to deliver you up to the tormentors, and cast you away forever from peace and happiness, sinner, what will you do? Can you dwell with everlasting fires? Can you abide the eternal burning? Oh,
“agree with your adversary quickly, whiles you are in the way with him: lest at any time the adversary deliver you to the judge, and the judge deliver you to the officer, and you be cast into prison. Verily I say unto you, you shalt by no means come out thence, till you have paid the uttermost farehing.” (Matt. 5:25-26)
But, sinner, do you know that you are this morning at war with God? He that made you and was your best friend you have forgotten and neglected. He has fed you, and you have used your strength against him. He has clothed you, — the clothes you have upon your back today are the garb of His goodness — yet, instead of being the servant of Him whose garments you wear, you are the slave of His greatest enemy. The very breath in your nostrils is the loan of His charity, and yet you use that breath perhaps to curse Him, or at the best, in lewdness or loose conversation, to do dishonor to His laws. He who made you has become your enemy through your sin, and you are still today hating him and despising His Word.
You say, “I do not hate him.” Soul, I charge you then, “believe in the Lord Jesus Christ.” “No,” you say, “I cannot, I will not do that! “Then you hate Him. If you loved him, you would keep His great command. “His commandments are not grievous” (1 John 5:3), they are sweet and easy. You would believe in His Son if you did love the Father, for “everyone that loveth the Father loveth him also that is begotten of him” (1 John 5:1).
Are you at war with God in this way? Surely this is a sorry plight for you to be in. Can you meet Him who comes against you with ten thousand? Can you stand against Him who is Almightly, who makes heaven shake at His reproof, and breaks the crooked serpent with a word? Do you hope to hide from Him? “Can any hide in secret places, that I shall not see him? saith the Lord” (Jer. 23:24). Though you dive into the caverns of the sea, He will there command the crooked serpent, and it will bite you. If you make your bed in hell, He will find you out. If you climb to heaven, He is there. (Ps. 130:8). Creation is your prison house, and He can find you when He will. Or do you think you can endure His fury? Are your ribs of iron? Are your bones brass? If they are so, they will melt like wax before the coming of the Lord God of hosts, for He is mighty, and as a lion will He tear in pieces His prey, and as a fire will He devour His adversary, “for our God is a consuming fire” (Heb. 12:29).
This, then, is the state of every unconverted man and woman. You are at war with conscience, at war with God’s law, and at war with God himself. And, now, then, as God’s ambassadors, we come to talk of peace. I urge you to give heed. “As though God did beseech you by me, I pray you, in Christ’s stead, be you reconciled to God.” (2 Cor. 5:20).
Look and listen. It is Christ speaking to you now. I think I hear Him speak to some of you. This is the way He speaks, “Soul, I love you; I love you from my heart, I would not have you at enmity with my Father.” The tear proves the truth of what He states, while He cries, “How often would I have gathered you, as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wing, but you would not” (Matt. 23:37). “Yet,” He says, “I come to treat with you of peace. Come, now, and let us reason together. (Isa. 1:18). I will make an everlasting covenant with you, even the sure mercies of David. (Isa. 55:3). Sinner,” He says, “you are bidden now to hear God’s note of peace to your soul, for thus it runs — ‘You are guilty and condemned; will you confess this? Are you willing to throw down your weapons now, and say, Almighty God, I yield, I yield, I would no longer be Your foe?’ If so, peace is proclaimed to you. “Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts, and let him turn unto the Lord, for he will have mercy upon him, and to our God, for He will abundantly pardon.” (V. 7) Pardon is freely presented to every soul who sincerely repents of his sin; but that pardon must come to you through faith.
So Jesus stands here, points to the wounds upon His breast, and spreads His bleeding hands. He says, “Sinner, trust in me and live!” God no longer proclaims to you His fiery law, but His sweet, His simple gospel, which is “believe and live.” “He that believeth on the Son is not condemned, but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God” (John 3:18). “As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whosoever believeth on him should not perish, but have eternal life” (vv. 14-15).
O soul! does the spirit of God move in you this morning? Do you say, “Lord, I would be at peace with you?” Are you willing to take Christ on His own terms in the matter, and give yourself up, body, soul, and spirit, to be saved by Him? Now, if my Master were here visibly, I think He would plead with you in such a way that you would say, “Lord, I believe; I would be at peace with you.” But even Christ Himself never converted a soul apart from the Holy Spirit, and even he as a preacher won not many to him, for they were hard of heart. If the Holy Ghost is present as you are reading this, He may as much bless you when I plead in Christ’s stead as though he pleaded Himself.
Soul! Will you have Christ or not? Young men, young women, you may never hear about this Word again. Will you die at enmity against God? You who are sitting there, still unconverted, you may never see tomorrow. Would you go into eternity “enemies to God by wicked works (Col. 1:21)?” Soul! will you have Christ or not? Say “No,” if you mean it. Say “No, Christ, I never will be saved by You.” Say it. Look the matter in the face. But I pray you do not say, “I will give no answer.” Come, give some answer this very moment — yes, this very moment. Thank God you can give an answer. Thank God that you are not in hell. Thank God that your sentence has not been pronounced — that you have not received what you have deserved. God help you to give the right answer!
Will you have Christ or not? “I am not fit.” There is no question of fitness; it is, will you have Him? “My heart is black.” He will come into your black heart and clean it. “Oh, but I am hard-hearted.” He will come into your hard heart and soften it. Will you have Him? You can have Him if you will. When God makes a soul willing, it is a clear proof that He means to give Christ to that soul, and if you are willing He is not unwilling. If He has made you willing, you may have Him. “Oh,” says one, “I cannot think that I might have Christ.” Soul, you may have Him now. Mary, he calls you! John, he calls you! Sinner, whoever you may be reading this, if there is a holy willingness towards Christ in your soul, or if there is even a faint desire towards Him, He calls you, He calls you! Oh, do not tarry, but come and trust in Him.
Oh, if I had such a gospel as this to preach to lost souls in hell, what an effect it would have upon them! Surely, surely, if they could once more have the Gospel preached in their ears, I think the tears would wet their poor cheeks, and they would say, “Almighty God, if we may but escape from Your wrath, we will lay hold on Christ.” But here it is preached among you, preached every day, until I fear you listen to it as an old, old story. Perhaps it is my poor way of telling it; but God knows, if we knew how to tell it better, we would do so. O my Master, send better ambassadors to people, if that will woo them. Send more earnest pleaders, and more tender hearts, if that will bring them to Yourself! But oh! bring them, bring them! Our hearts long to see them brought.
Sinner, will you have Christ or not? This morning is the time of God’s power to some of your souls, I know. The Holy Spirit is striving with some of you. Lord, win them, conquer them, overcome them! Do you say, “Yes, happy day! I want to be led in triumph, captive to my Lord’s great love?” Soul, it is done, if you believe. Trust Christ, and your many sins are all forgiven you. Cast yourself before His dear cross, and say —
“A guilty, weak, and helpless worm, Into your arms I fall;
Be you my strength and righteousness, My Jesus and my all.”
And if He rejects you, tell of it. If He refuses you, let us hear it. There was never such a case yet. He always has received those who come. He always will. He is an openhanded and an openhearted Savior.
O sinner, may God bring you to put your trust in Him once for all! Spirits above! Tune your harps anew. There is a sinner born to God this morning. Lead the song, O Saul of Tarsus! And follow the sinner with sweetest music, O Mary! Let music roll up before the throne today; for it is there that heirs of glory are born, and prodigals have returned! To God be the glory forever and ever! Amen.
Finished Project
Goal: To promote an upcoming baptism service. We are trying to emphasize the importance of baptism – an initiatory act that visualizes repentance.
Audience: Churchwide.
Direction: Wanted to avoid the more common text-in-a-fish-tank sort of images. Fresh and direct.
Project: Web and digital signage.
Other important info: This is finished up, but I would still appreciate any input. Would it make you want to get baptized?
De repente el aire te asfixia y necesitas diferencias artificiales. El agujero se cierra y como si se tratara de un reloj de arena, cada minuto de tu vida sigue perfectamente la ley de la gravedad de Newton. Sientes que lo unico que puedes hacer es sobrevivir con resignación. Intentar ser feliz con las risas de los demás y repartir tus ultimos granos de arena, antes que caigan en el olvido.
Titian: Mary Magdalene Repenting
"A good rendering of Mary Magdalene was to contain three elements: the aesthetic, in the form of female beauty, the penitential, generally with a stark landscape, and the ecstatic. This painting is praised in the Musaeum for “the artist’s skill in maintaining proper modesty in such nudity”, and indeed the viewer’s eye is immediately attracted by the saint’s face enraptured in ecstasy." (From the Pinacoteca Ambrosiana website.)
The Pinacoteca Ambrosiana is home to the Portrait of a Musician -- the only Leonardo da Vinci panel painting still in Milan -- as well as the world-famous Codex Atlanticus of 1,119 folios of his designs, sketches, and notes. This small art museum near the Duomo in Milan also has paintings and sculptures by many further famous artists including Caravaggio, Titian, Botticelli, Veronese, Bramantino, and Brueghel but is small enough to appreciate in not much more than an hour. A further top attraction is Raphael's Cartoon for the School of Athens fresco.
Te recuerdo como eras en el último otoño.
Eras la boina gris y el corazón en calma.
En tus ojos peleaban las llamas del crepúsculo.
Y las hojas caían en el agua de tu alma.
Apegada a mis brazos como una enredadera,
las hojas recogían tu voz lenta y en calma.
Hoguera de estupor en que mi sed ardía.
Dulce jacinto azul torcido sobre mi alma.
Siento viajar tus ojos y es distante el otoño:
boina gris, voz de pájaro y corazón de casa
hacia donde emigraban mis profundos anhelos
y caían mis besos alegres como brasas.
Cielo desde un navío. Campo desde los cerros.
Tu recuerdo es de luz, de humo, de estanque en calma!
Más allá de tus ojos ardían los crepúsculos.
Hojas secas de otoño giraban en tu alma.
(Pablo Neruda)
...y muy feliz finde...fresquito ;0))
De repente, en El Retiro, el suelo y el cielo cambiaron momentáneamente sus tareas. Sólo pude mantenerme pegado a la hierba agarrándome a la cámara de fotos.
"Amelie tiene de repente la extraña sensacion de estar en total armonia consigo misma. En ese instante todo es perfecto, la suavidad de la luz, el ligero perfume del aire, el pausado rumor de la ciudad.... Inspira profundamente y la vida ahora le parece tan sencilla y transparente que un arrebato de amor, parecido a un deseo de ayudar a toda la humanidad la invade de golpe”
Caught this guy holding up a religious sign on the street of Chinatown in San Francisco. I thought it was quite a contrast from the Chinese New Year decors all over the street.
De repente en mi vida
Hay algo que me tiene confundida
No lo puedo evitar, puedo intentar
Conservar el asombro hasta el final
Mil palabras ya he oido
Solo las tuyas no han desvanecido
No puedo escapar de sus sonidos
Estoy hipnotizada en un sueño continuo
Primera Ley Fundamental: Siempre e inevitablemente cada uno de nosotros subestima el número de individuos estúpidos que circulan por el mundo.
Personas que uno ha considerado racionales e inteligentes en el pasado se revelan después, de repente, inequívoca e irremediablemente estúpidas.
Día tras día, con una monotonía incesante, vemos cómo entorpecen y obstaculizan nuestra actividad individuos obstinadamente estúpidos, que aparecen de improviso e inesperadamente en los lugares y en los momentos menos oportunos.
Segunda Ley Fundamental: La probabilidad de que una persona determinada sea estúpida es independiente de cualquier otra característica de la misma persona.
La educación y el ambiente social no tienen nada que ver. Son proporcionalmente tan numerosos entre mujeres y hombres, entre una “élite” galardonada de premios nobel o entre los bedeles de los colegios, entre los países desarrollados y subdesarrollados,...
Persiste el hecho de que se esté donde se esté, deberá enfrentarse siempre al mismo porcentaje de gente estúpida, porcentaje que, de acuerdo con la primera ley superará siempre las previsiones más pesimistas.
Concepto de estupidez humana: Los individuos se caracterizan por diferentes grados de propensión a la socialización. Existen individuos para los que cualquier contacto con otros individuos es una dolorosa necesidad. Estos se ven obligados a soportar a las personas y las personas se ven obligados a soportarlos a ellos. En el otro espectro, se hayan los individuos que no pueden soportar de ningún modo vivir solos, y están dispuestos a pasar el tiempo incluso en compañía de personas que desprecian. Entre estos dos extremos existe una gran variedad de situaciones, si bien la gran mayoría se halla más próxima al tipo que no puede soportar la soledad. Aristóteles: “El hombre es un animal social”.
Tanto si uno pertenece al tipo eremita como si pertenece al tipo mundano, en cualquier caso tiene que tratar con la gente. Lo que podría haber hecho por un individuo o por un grupo, y no lo he hecho, representa un “coste-oportunidad” (es decir, una ganancia frustrada o una pérdida) para aquella persona o grupo concreto. La moraleja es que cada uno de nosotros tiene una especie de cuenta corriente con cada uno de los demás. De cualquier acción u omisión, cada uno de nosotros obtiene una ganancia o una pérdida y al mismo tiempo proporciona una ganancia o una pérdida a algún otro. Las ganancias y las pérdidas pueden ser ilustradas oportunamente por una gráfica. El eje de la X mide la ganancia que, pongamos, Ticio, obtiene como consecuencia de su acción. La ganancia puede ser positiva, nula o negativa; una ganancia negativa equivale a una pérdida. El eje Y, por encima y por debajo del punto 0 respectivamente, mide las ganancias y las pérdidas de la persona (Cayo por ejemplo), o grupos de personas, con quienes Ticio está relacionado. Para determinas la ganancia o la pérdida de Cayo, es absolutamente indispensable tomar como referencia el sistema de valores de Cayo, y no el de Ticio. Y para medir la satisfacción de Ticio habrá que medir su sistema de valores. Un ejemplo: Ticio da un golpe en la cabeza a Cayo y obtiene por ello una satisfacción. Tal vez Ticio sostenga que Cayo es feliz por ello. Pero es muy probable que Cayo no sea de la misma opinión. Es más, puede que Cayo considere que el golpe en su cabeza ha sido un desagradabilísimo incidente. Si el golpe en la cabeza de Cayo ha sido una ganancia o una pérdida para Cayo, es Cayo quien debe decirlo, no Ticio.
La Tercera Ley Fundamental presupone que todos los seres humanos están incluidos en una de estas cuatro categorías fundamentales: los incautos, los inteligentes, los malvados y los estúpidos.
Si Ticio comete una acción y obtiene una pérdida, al mismo tiempo que procura un beneficio a Cayo, el signo de Ticio recaerá en el campo H: Ticio ha actuado como un incauto. Si Ticio realiza una acción de la que obtiene un beneficio, y al mismo tiempo procura un beneficio también para Cayo, el signo de Ticio recaerá en el área I: Ticio ha actuado inteligentemente. Si Ticio realiza una acción de la que obtiene un beneficio causando un perjuicio a Cayo, el punto deberá situarse en el área M: Ticio ha actuado como un malvado. La estupidez corresponde al área E:
Tercera Ley fundamental. Ley de Oro: Una persona estúpida es una persona que causa un daño a otra persona o grupo de personas sin obtener, al mismo tiempo, un provecho para sí, o incluso obteniendo un perjuicio.
Las personas racionales reaccionan instintivamente con escepticismo e incredulidad ante la Tercera Ley, tienen dificultades para entender un comportamiento irracional. Nadie sabe, entiende o puede explicar porqué esta absurda criatura hace lo que hace. En realidad, no existe explicación –o mejor dicho- sólo hay una explicación: la persona en cuestión es estúpida.
Distribución de la frecuencia: La mayor parte de las personas no actúa de un modo coherente. En determinadas circunstancias una persona actúa inteligentemente, y en otras, esta misma persona puede comportarse como una incauta. Si bien una persona puede comportarse de diversas maneras, tendrá un media ponderada que le sitúe en un cuadrante u otro. La persona en cuestión será fundamentalmente inteligente, o fundamentalmente incauta, por ejemplo. La única excepción importante a la regla la representan las personas estúpidas que, normalmente, muestran la máxima tendencia a una total coherencia en cualquier campo y actuación.
El malvado perfecto, es aquel que con sus acciones causa a otro pérdidas equivalente a sus ganancias. Él te roba: él gana 10.000 liras, tú pierdes 10.000 liras. El malvado que se sitúa cerca del área E, por ejemplo, estará muy cerca del límite de la estupidez pura. La distribución de la frecuencia de personas estúpidas, sin embargo, es completamente diferente de las demás áreas. Mientras los demás se hallan esparcidos en el ámbito de su propia área, los estúpidos están concentrados, en su mayor parte, a lo largo del eje de la Y, por debajo del punto 0. La razón de esto es que la gran mayoría de personas estúpidas son fundamentalmente y firmemente estúpidas. Esto es, causan daño a los demás sin obtener ninguna ganancia para sí. Cuando se causan daño a sí mismas, estas pertenecen al género de superestúpidos.
Estupidez y poder: El potencial de una persona estúpida depende antes de nada del factor genético. El segundo factor que determina ese potencial procede de la posición de poder o de autoridad que ocupa en la sociedad. La pregunta que se plantean a menudo las personas razonables es cómo es posible que estas personas estúpidas lleguen a alcanzar posiciones de poder o de autoridad. Las castas y las clases fueron las que permitieron un flujo constante de personas estúpidas a puestos de poder en la mayoría de sociedades preindustriales. Hoy, hay que recordar que, según la Segunda Ley Fundamental, una fracción constante de personas que votan son estúpidas.
El poder de la estupidez: No resulta difícil de comprender de qué manera el poder político, económico o burocrático aumenta el potencial nocivo de una persona estúpida. Pero nos queda aún por explicar qué es lo que básicamente vuelve peligrosa a una persona estúpida.
Esencialmente, son peligrosos y funestos porque a las personas razonables les resulta difícil imaginar y entender un comportamiento estúpido. Una persona inteligente puede entender la lógica de un malvado y por lo tanto se pueden prever y preparar la oportunas defensas. Con una persona estúpida todo esto es absolutamente imposible. Frente a un individuo estúpido uno está completamente desarmado. Generalmente el ataque nos coge por sorpresa e incluso cuando se tiene conocimiento del ataque, no es posible organizar una defensa racional, porque el ataque, en sí mismo, carece de cualquier tipo de estructura racional. No sólo hace problemática la defensa, sino que es extremadamente difícil el contraataque. Dickens: “con la estupidez y la buena digestión el hombre es capaz de hacer frente a muchas cosas”. Schiller: “contra la estupidez hasta los mismos dioses luchan en vano”.
Hay que tener en cuenta otra circunstancia: La persona inteligente sabe que es inteligente. El malvado es consciente de que es un malvado. El incauto está penosamente imbuido del sentido de su propia candidez. Al contrario que todos estos personajes, el estúpido no sabe que es estúpido. Esto contribuye poderosamente a dar fuerza, incidencia y eficacia a su acción devastadora. No está inhibido por ese sentimiento self-consciousness. Con la sonrisa en los labios, como si hiciese la cosa más natural del mundo, el estúpido aparecerá de pronto para echar a perder tus planes, destruir tu paz, complicarte la vida y el trabajo, hacerte perder dinero, tiempo, buen humor, apetito, y todo esto sin malicia, sin remordimientos y sin razón. Estúpidamente.
No es de extrañar que las personas incautas, generalmente no reconozcan la peligrosidad de las personas estúpidas. Pero lo que resulta sorprendente es que tampoco las personas inteligentes ni las malvadas consiguen muchas veces reconocer su poder devastador y destructor. Es imposible explicarlo pero se puede formular la hipótesis de que cuando son abordados por estúpidos cometen el error de abandonarse a sentimientos de autocomplacencia y desprecio, en vez de segregar inmediatamente cantidades mayores de adrenalina y preparar la defensa.
Se tiende a creer que una persona estúpida sólo se hace daño a sí misma, pero esto significa que se está confundiendo con la candidez. A veces hasta se puede caer en la tentación de asociarse con un individuo estúpido con el objetivo de utilizarlo en provecho propio. Tal maniobra está basada en la total incomprensión de la naturaleza esencial de la estupidez. Uno puede hacerse la ilusión de estar manipulando a una persona estúpida y, hasta cierto punto, puede que lo consiga. Pero debido al comportamiento errático del estúpido y la imposibilidad de previsión, muy pronto uno se verá arruinado y destruido por sus imprevisibles acciones.
Cuarta Ley Fundamental: Las personas no estúpidas subestiman siempre el potencial nocivo de las personas estúpidas. Los no estúpidos, en especial, olvidan constantemente que en cualquier momento y lugar, y en cualquier circunstancia, tratar y/o asociarse con individuos estúpidos se manifiesta infaliblemente como un costosísimo error.
A lo largo de los siglos, en la vida pública y privada, innumerables personas no han tenido en cuenta la Cuarta Ley Fundamental, y esto ha ocasionado pérdidas incalculables a la humanidad.
Quinta Ley Fundamental: La persona estúpida es el tipo de persona más peligrosa que existe. Corolario: El estúpido es más peligroso que el malvado.”
(Carlo M. Cipolla)
El texto está pasado a cachos, no es exacto al original.
Siempre agradeceré a Moraza que nos descubriera este texto... da para pensar y divertirse un rato.
¿Seré una de ell@s? XD
With the rain falling harder, it was a bit of a route march to Holborn and my next church, the stunning St Sepulchre, which was also open.
-----------------------------------------------------
St Sepulchre-without-Newgate, also known as the Church of the Holy Sepulchre (Holborn), is an Anglican church in the City of London. It is located on Holborn Viaduct, almost opposite the Old Bailey. In medieval times it stood just outside ("without") the now-demolished old city wall, near the Newgate. It has been a living of St John's College, Oxford, since 1622.
The original Saxon church on the site was dedicated to St Edmund the King and Martyr. During the Crusades in the 12th century the church was renamed St Edmund and the Holy Sepulchre, in reference to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem. The name eventually became contracted to St Sepulchre.
The church is today the largest parish church in the City. It was completely rebuilt in the 15th century but was gutted by the Great Fire of London in 1666,[1] which left only the outer walls, the tower and the porch standing[2] -. Modified in the 18th century, the church underwent extensive restoration in 1878. It narrowly avoided destruction in the Second World War, although the 18th-century watch-house in its churchyard (erected to deter grave-robbers) was completely destroyed and had to be rebuilt.
The interior of the church is a wide, roomy space with a coffered ceiling[3] installed in 1834. The Vicars' old residence has recently been renovated into a modern living quarter.
During the reign of Mary I in 1555, St Sepulchre's vicar, John Rogers, was burned as a heretic.
St Sepulchre is named in the nursery rhyme Oranges and Lemons as the "bells of Old Bailey". Traditionally, the great bell would be rung to mark the execution of a prisoner at the nearby gallows at Newgate. The clerk of St Sepulchre's was also responsible for ringing a handbell outside the condemned man's cell in Newgate Prison to inform him of his impending execution. This handbell, known as the Execution Bell, now resides in a glass case to the south of the nave.
The church has been the official musicians' church for many years and is associated with many famous musicians. Its north aisle (formerly a chapel dedicated to Stephen Harding) is dedicated as the Musicians' Chapel, with four windows commemorating John Ireland, the singer Dame Nellie Melba, Walter Carroll and the conductor Sir Henry Wood respectively.[4] Wood, who "at the age of fourteen, learned to play the organ" at this church [1] and later became its organist, also has his ashes buried in this church.
The south aisle of the church holds the regimental chapel of the Royal Fusiliers (City of London Regiment), and its gardens are a memorial garden to that regiment.[5] The west end of the north aisle has various memorials connected with the City of London Rifles (the 6th Battalion London Regiment). The church was designated a Grade I listed building on 4 January 1950.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St_Sepulchre-without-Newgate
The Early History of St. Sepulchre's—Its Destruction in 1666—The Exterior and Interior—The Early Popularity of the Church—Interments here—Roger Ascham, the Author of the "Schoolmaster"—Captain John Smith, and his Romantic Adventures—Saved by an Indian Girl— St. Sepulchre's Churchyard—Accommodation for a Murderess—The Martyr Rogers—An Odd Circumstance—Good Company for the Dead—A Leap from the Tower—A Warning Bell and a Last Admonition—Nosegays for the Condemned—The Route to the Gallows-tree— The Deeds of the Charitable—The "Saracen's Head"—Description by Dickens—Giltspur Street—Giltspur Street Compter—A Disreputable Condition—Pie Corner—Hosier Lane—A Spurious Relic—The Conduit on Snow Hill—A Ladies' Charity School—Turnagain Lane—Poor Betty!—A Schoolmistress Censured—Skinner Street—Unpropitious Fortune—William Godwin—An Original Married Life.
Many interesting associations—Principally, however, connected with the annals of crime and the execution of the laws of England—belong to the Church of St. Sepulchre, or St. 'Pulchre. This sacred edifice—anciently known as St. Sepulchre's in the Bailey, or by Chamberlain Gate (now Newgate)—stands at the eastern end of the slight acclivity of Snow Hill, and between Smithfield and the Old Bailey. The genuine materials for its early history are scanty enough. It was probably founded about the commencement of the twelfth century, but of the exact date and circumstances of its origin there is no record whatever. Its name is derived from the Holy Sepulchre of our Saviour at Jerusalem, to the memory of which it was first dedicated.
The earliest authentic notice of the church, according to Maitland, is of the year 1178, at which date it was given by Roger, Bishop of Sarum, to the Prior and Canons of St. Bartholomew. These held the right of advowson until the dissolution of monasteries by Henry VIII., and from that time until 1610 it remained in the hands of the Crown. James I., however, then granted "the rectory and its appurtenances, with the advowson of the vicarage," to Francis Phillips and others. The next stage in its history is that the rectory was purchased by the parishioners, to be held in fee-farm of the Crown, and the advowson was obtained by the President and Fellows of St. John the Baptist College, at Oxford.
The church was rebuilt about the middle of the fifteenth century, when one of the Popham family, who had been Chancellor of Normandy and Treasurer of the King's Household, with distinguished liberality erected a handsome chapel on the south side of the choir, and the very beautiful porch still remaining at the south-west corner of the building. "His image," Stow says, "fair graven in stone, was fixed over the said porch."
The dreadful fire of 1666 almost destroyed St. Sepulchre's, but the parishioners set energetically to work, and it was "rebuilt and beautified both within and without." The general reparation was under the direction of Sir Christopher Wren, and nothing but the walls of the old building, and these not entirely, were suffered to remain. The work was done rapidly, and the whole was completed within four years.
"The tower," says Mr. Godwin, "retained its original aspect, and the body of the church, after its restoration, presented a series of windows between buttresses, with pointed heads filled with tracery, crowned by a string-course and battlements. In this form it remained till the year 1790, when it appears the whole fabric was found to be in a state of great decay, and it was resolved to repair it throughout. Accordingly the walls of the church were cased with Portland stone, and all the windows were taken out and replaced by others with plain semi-circular heads, as now seen—certainly agreeing but badly with the tower and porch of the building, but according with the then prevailing spirit of economy. The battlements, too, were taken down, and a plain stone parapet was substituted, so that at this time (with the exception of the roof, which was wagon-headed, and presented on the outside an unsightly swell, visible above the parapet) the church assumed its present appearance." The ungainly roof was removed, and an entirely new one erected, about 1836.
At each corner of the tower—"one of the most ancient," says the author of "Londinium Redivivum," "in the outline of the circuit of London" —there are spires, and on the spires there are weathercocks. These have been made use of by Howell to point a moral: "Unreasonable people," says he, "are as hard to reconcile as the vanes of St. Sepulchre's tower, which never look all four upon one point of the heavens." Nothing can be said with certainty as to the date of the tower, but it is not without the bounds of probability that it formed part of the original building. The belfry is reached by a small winding staircase in the south-west angle, and a similar staircase in an opposite angle leads to the summit. The spires at the corners, and some of the tower windows, have very recently undergone several alterations, which have added much to the picturesqueness and beauty of the church.
The chief entrance to St. Sepulchre's is by a porch of singular beauty, projecting from the south side of the tower, at the western end of the church. The groining of the ceiling of this porch, it has been pointed out, takes an almost unique form; the ribs are carved in bold relief, and the bosses at the intersections represent angels' heads, shields, roses, &c., in great variety.
Coming now to the interior of the church, we find it divided into three aisles, by two ranges of Tuscan columns. The aisles are of unequal widths, that in the centre being the widest, that to the south the narrowest. Semi-circular arches connect the columns on either side, springing directly from their capitals, without the interposition of an entablature, and support a large dental cornice, extending round the church. The ceiling of the middle aisle is divided into seven compartments, by horizontal bands, the middle compartment being formed into a small dome.
The aisles have groined ceilings, ornamented at the angles with doves, &c., and beneath every division of the groining are small windows, to admit light to the galleries. Over each of the aisles there is a gallery, very clumsily introduced, which dates from the time when the church was built by Wren, and extends the whole length, excepting at the chancel. The front of the gallery, which is of oak, is described by Mr. Godwin as carved into scrolls, branches, &c., in the centre panel, on either side, with the initials "C. R.," enriched with carvings of laurel, which have, however, he says, "but little merit."
At the east end of the church there are three semicircular-headed windows. Beneath the centre one is a large Corinthian altar-piece of oak, displaying columns, entablatures, &c., elaborately carved and gilded.
The length of the church, exclusive of the ambulatory, is said to be 126 feet, the breadth 68 feet, and the height of the tower 140 feet.
A singularly ugly sounding-board, extending over the preacher, used to stand at the back of the pulpit, at the east end of the church. It was in the shape of a large parabolic reflector, about twelve feet in diameter, and was composed of ribs of mahogany.
At the west end of the church there is a large organ, said to be the oldest and one of the finest in London. It was built in 1677, and has been greatly enlarged. Its reed-stops (hautboy, clarinet, &c.) are supposed to be unrivalled. In Newcourt's time the church was taken notice of as "remarkable for possessing an exceedingly fine organ, and the playing is thought so beautiful, that large congregations are attracted, though some of the parishioners object to the mode of performing divine service."
On the north side of the church, Mr. Godwin mentions, is a large apartment known as "St. Stephen's Chapel." This building evidently formed a somewhat important part of the old church, and was probably appropriated to the votaries of the saint whose name it bears.
Between the exterior and the interior of the church there is little harmony. "For example," says Mr. Godwin, "the columns which form the south aisle face, in some instances, the centre of the large windows which occur in the external wall of the church, and in others the centre of the piers, indifferently." This discordance may likely enough have arisen from the fact that when the church was rebuilt, or rather restored, after the Great Fire, the works were done without much attention from Sir Christopher Wren.
St. Sepulchre's appears to have enjoyed considerable popularity from the earliest period of its history, if one is to judge from the various sums left by well-disposed persons for the support of certain fraternities founded in the church—namely, those of St. Katherine, St. Michael, St. Anne, and Our Lady—and by others, for the maintenance of chantry priests to celebrate masses at stated intervals for the good of their souls. One of the fraternities just named—that of St. Katherine— originated, according to Stow, in the devotion of some poor persons in the parish, and was in honour of the conception of the Virgin Mary. They met in the church on the day of the Conception, and there had the mass of the day, and offered to the same, and provided a certain chaplain daily to celebrate divine service, and to set up wax lights before the image belonging to the fraternity, on all festival days.
The most famous of all who have been interred in St. Sepulchre's is Roger Ascham, the author of the "Schoolmaster," and the instructor of Queen Elizabeth in Greek and Latin. This learned old worthy was born in 1515, near Northallerton, in Yorkshire. He was educated at Cambridge University, and in time rose to be the university orator, being notably zealous in promoting what was then a novelty in England—the study of the Greek language. To divert himself after the fatigue of severe study, he used to devote himself to archery. This drew down upon him the censure of the all-work-and-no-play school; and in defence of himself, Ascham, in 1545, published "Toxophilus," a treatise on his favourite sport. This book is even yet well worthy of perusal, for its enthusiasm, and for its curious descriptions of the personal appearance and manners of the principal persons whom the author had seen and conversed with. Henry VIII. rewarded him with a pension of £10 per annum, a considerable sum in those days. In 1548, Ascham, on the death of William Grindall, who had been his pupil, was appointed instructor in the learned languages to Lady Elizabeth, afterwards the good Queen Bess. At the end of two years he had some dispute with, or took a disgust at, Lady Elizabeth's attendants, resigned his situation, and returned to his college. Soon after this he was employed as secretary to the English ambassador at the court of Charles V. of Germany, and remained abroad till the death of Edward VI. During his absence he had been appointed Latin secretary to King Edward. Strangely enough, though Queen Mary and her ministers were Papists, and Ascham a Protestant, he was retained in his office of Latin secretary, his pension was increased to £20, and he was allowed to retain his fellowship and his situation as university orator. In 1554 he married a lady of good family, by whom he had a considerable fortune, and of whom, in writing to a friend, he gives, as might perhaps be expected, an excellent character. On the accession of Queen Elizabeth, in 1558, she not only required his services as Latin secretary, but as her instructor in Greek, and he resided at Court during the remainder of his life. He died in consequence of his endeavours to complete a Latin poem which he intended to present to the queen on the New Year's Day of 1569. He breathed his last two days before 1568 ran out, and was interred, according to his own directions, in the most private manner, in St. Sepulchre's Church, his funeral sermon being preached by Dr. Andrew Nowell, Dean of St. Paul's. He was universally lamented; and even the queen herself not only showed great concern, but was pleased to say that she would rather have lost ten thousand pounds than her tutor Ascham, which, from that somewhat closehanded sovereign, was truly an expression of high regard.
Ascham, like most men, had his little weaknesses. He had too great a propensity to dice and cock-fighting. Bishop Nicholson would try to convince us that this is an unfounded calumny, but, as it is mentioned by Camden, and other contemporary writers, it seems impossible to deny it. He died, from all accounts, in indifferent circumstances. "Whether," says Dr. Johnson, referring to this, "Ascham was poor by his own fault, or the fault of others, cannot now be decided; but it is certain that many have been rich with less merit. His philological learning would have gained him honour in any country; and among us it may justly call for that reverence which all nations owe to those who first rouse them from ignorance, and kindle among them the light of literature." His most valuable work, "The Schoolmaster," was published by his widow. The nature of this celebrated performance may be gathered from the title: "The Schoolmaster; or a plain and perfite way of teaching children to understand, write, and speak the Latin tongue. … And commodious also for all such as have forgot the Latin tongue, and would by themselves, without a schoolmaster, in short time, and with small pains, recover a sufficient habilitie to understand, write, and speak Latin: by Roger Ascham, ann. 1570. At London, printed by John Daye, dwelling over Aldersgate," a printer, by the way, already mentioned by us a few chapters back (see page 208), as having printed several noted works of the sixteenth century.
Dr. Johnson remarks that the instruction recommended in "The Schoolmaster" is perhaps the best ever given for the study of languages.
Here also lies buried Captain John Smith, a conspicuous soldier of fortune, whose romantic adventures and daring exploits have rarely been surpassed. He died on the 21st of June, 1631. This valiant captain was born at Willoughby, in the county of Lincoln, and helped by his doings to enliven the reigns of Elizabeth and James I. He had a share in the wars of Hungary in 1602, and in three single combats overcame three Turks, and cut off their heads. For this, and other equally brave deeds, Sigismund, Duke of Transylvania, gave him his picture set in gold, with a pension of three hundred ducats; and allowed him to bear three Turks' heads proper as his shield of arms. He afterwards went to America, where he had the misfortune to fall into the hands of the Indians. He escaped from them, however, at last, and resumed his brilliant career by hazarding his life in naval engagements with pirates and Spanish men-of-war. The most important act of his life was the share he had in civilising the natives of New England, and reducing that province to obedience to Great Britain. In connection with his tomb in St. Sepulchre's, he is mentioned by Stow, in his "Survey," as "some time Governor of Virginia and Admiral of New England."
Certainly the most interesting events of his chequered career were his capture by the Indians, and the saving of his life by the Indian girl Pocahontas, a story of adventure that charms as often as it is told. Bancroft, the historian of the United States, relates how, during the early settlement of Virginia, Smith left the infant colony on an exploring expedition, and not only ascended the river Chickahominy, but struck into the interior. His companions disobeyed his instructions, and being surprised by the Indians, were put to death. Smith preserved his own life by calmness and self-possession. Displaying a pocket-compass, he amused the savages by an explanation of its power, and increased their admiration of his superior genius by imparting to them some vague conceptions of the form of the earth, and the nature of the planetary system. To the Indians, who retained him as their prisoner, his captivity was a more strange event than anything of which the traditions of their tribes preserved the memory. He was allowed to send a letter to the fort at Jamestown, and the savage wonder was increased, for he seemed by some magic to endow the paper with the gift of intelligence. It was evident that their captive was a being of a high order, and then the question arose, Was his nature beneficent, or was he to be dreaded as a dangerous enemy? Their minds were bewildered, and the decision of his fate was referred to the chief Powhatan, and before Powhatan Smith was brought. "The fears of the feeble aborigines," says Bancroft, "were about to prevail, and his immediate death, already repeatedly threatened and repeatedly delayed, would have been inevitable, but for the timely intercession of Pocahontas, a girl twelve years old, the daughter of Powhatan, whose confiding fondness Smith had easily won, and who firmly clung to his neck, as his head was bowed down to receive the stroke of the tomahawks. His fearlessness, and her entreaties, persuaded the council to spare the agreeable stranger, who could make hatchets for her father, and rattles and strings of beads for herself, the favourite child. The barbarians, whose decision had long been held in suspense by the mysterious awe which Smith had inspired, now resolved to receive him as a friend, and to make him a partner of their councils. They tempted him to join their bands, and lend assistance in an attack upon the white men at Jamestown; and when his decision of character succeeded in changing the current of their thoughts, they dismissed him with mutual promises of friendship and benevolence. Thus the captivity of Smith did itself become a benefit to the colony; for he had not only observed with care the country between the James and the Potomac, and had gained some knowledge of the language and manners of the natives, but he now established a peaceful intercourse between the English and the tribes of Powhatan."
On the monument erected to Smith in St. Sepulchre's Church, the following quaint lines were formerly inscribed:—
"Here lies one conquered that hath conquered kings,
Subdued large territories, and done things
Which to the world impossible would seem,
But that the truth is held in more esteem.
Shall I report his former service done,
In honour of his God, and Christendom?
How that he did divide, from pagans three,
Their heads and lives, types of his chivalry?—
For which great service, in that climate done,
Brave Sigismundus, King of Hungarion,
Did give him, as a coat of arms, to wear
These conquered heads, got by his sword and spear.
Or shall I tell of his adventures since
Done in Virginia, that large continent?
How that he subdued kings unto his yoke,
And made those heathens flee, as wind doth smoke;
And made their land, being so large a station,
An habitation for our Christian nation,
Where God is glorified, their wants supplied;
Which else for necessaries, must have died.
But what avails his conquests, now he lies
Interred in earth, a prey to worms and flies?
Oh! may his soul in sweet Elysium sleep,
Until the Keeper, that all souls doth keep,
Return to judgment; and that after thence
With angels he may have his recompense."
Sir Robert Peake, the engraver, also found a last resting-place here. He is known as the master of William Faithorne—the famous English engraver of the seventeenth century—and governor of Basing House for the king during the Civil War under Charles I. He died in 1667. Here also was interred the body of Dr. Bell, grandfather of the originator of a well-known system of education.
"The churchyard of St. Sepulchre's," we learn from Maitland, "at one time extended so far into the street on the south side of the church, as to render the passage-way dangerously narrow. In 1760 the churchyard was, in consequence, levelled, and thrown open to the public. But this led to much inconvenience, and it was re-enclosed in 1802."
Sarah Malcolm, the murderess, was buried in the churchyard of St. Sepulchre's in 1733. This coldhearted and keen-eyed monster in human form has had her story told by us already. The parishioners seem, on this occasion, to have had no such scruples as had been exhibited by their predecessors a hundred and fifty years previous at the burial of Awfield, a traitor. We shall see presently that in those more remote days they were desirous of having at least respectable company for their deceased relatives and friends in the churchyard.
"For a long period," says Mr. Godwin (1838), "the church was surrounded by low mean buildings, by which its general appearance was hidden; but these having been cleared away, and the neighbourhood made considerably more open, St. Sepulchre's now forms a somewhat pleasing object, notwithstanding that the tower and a part of the porch are so entirely dissimilar in style to the remainder of the building." And since Godwin's writing the surroundings of the church have been so improved that perhaps few buildings in the metropolis stand more prominently before the public eye.
In the glorious roll of martyrs who have suffered at the stake for their religious principles, a vicar of St. Sepulchre's, the Reverend John Rogers, occupies a conspicuous place. He was the first who was burned in the reign of the Bloody Mary. This eminent person had at one time been chaplain to the English merchants at Antwerp, and while residing in that city had aided Tindal and Coverdale in their great work of translating the Bible. He married a German lady of good position, by whom he had a large family, and was enabled, by means of her relations, to reside in peace and safety in Germany. It appeared to be his duty, however, to return to England, and there publicly profess and advocate his religious convictions, even at the risk of death. He crossed the sea; he took his place in the pulpit at St. Paul's Cross; he preached a fearless and animated sermon, reminding his astonished audience of the pure and wholesome doctrine which had been promulgated from that pulpit in the days of the good King Edward, and solemnly warning them against the pestilent idolatry and superstition of these new times. It was his last sermon. He was apprehended, tried, condemned, and burned at Smithfield. We described, when speaking of Smithfield, the manner in which he met his fate.
Connected with the martyrdom of Rogers an odd circumstance is quoted in the "Churches of London." It is stated that when the bishops had resolved to put to death Joan Bocher, a friend came to Rogers and earnestly entreated his influence that the poor woman's life might be spared, and other means taken to prevent the spread of her heterodox doctrines. Rogers, however, contended that she should be executed; and his friend then begged him to choose some other kind of death, which should be more agreeable to the gentleness and mercy prescribed in the gospel. "No," replied Rogers, "burning alive is not a cruel death, but easy enough." His friend hearing these words, expressive of so little regard for the sufferings of a fellow-creature, answered him with great vehemence, at the same time striking Rogers' hand, "Well, it may perhaps so happen that you yourself shall have your hands full of this mild burning." There is no record of Rogers among the papers belonging to St. Sepulchre's, but this may easily be accounted for by the fact that at the Great Fire of 1666 nearly all the registers and archives were destroyed.
A noteworthy incident in the history of St. Sepulchre's was connected with the execution, in 1585, of Awfield, for "sparcinge abrood certen lewed, sedicious, and traytorous bookes." "When he was executed," says Fleetwood, the Recorder, in a letter to Lord Burleigh, July 7th of that year, "his body was brought unto St. Pulcher's to be buryed, but the parishioners would not suffer a traytor's corpse to be laid in the earth where their parents, wives, children, kindred, masters, and old neighbours did rest; and so his carcass was returned to the burial-ground near Tyburn, and there I leave it."
Another event in the history of the church is a tale of suicide. On the 10th of April, 1600, a man named William Dorrington threw himself from the roof of the tower, leaving there a prayer for forgiveness.
We come now to speak of the connection of St. Sepulchre's with the neighbouring prison of Newgate. Being the nearest church to the prison, that connection naturally was intimate. Its clock served to give the time to the hangman when there was an execution in the Old Bailey, and many a poor wretch's last moments must it have regulated.
On the right-hand side of the altar a board with a list of charitable donations and gifts used to contain the following item:—"1605. Mr. Robert Dowe gave, for ringing the greatest bell in this church on the day the condemned prisoners are executed, and for other services, for ever, concerning such condemned prisoners, for which services the sexton is paid £16s. 8d.—£50.
It was formerly the practice for the clerk or bellman of St. Sepulchre's to go under Newgate, on the night preceding the execution of a criminal, ring his bell, and repeat the following wholesome advice:—
"All you that in the condemned hold do lie,
Prepare you, for to-morrow you shall die;
Watch all, and pray, the hour is drawing near
That you before the Almighty must appear;
Examine well yourselves, in time repent,
That you may not to eternal flames be sent.
And when St. Sepulchre's bell to-morrow tolls,
The Lord above have mercy on your souls.
Past twelve o'clock!"
This practice is explained by a passage in Munday's edition of Stow, in which it is told that a Mr. John Dowe, citizen and merchant taylor of London, gave £50 to the parish church of St. Sepulchre's, under the following conditions:—After the several sessions of London, on the night before the execution of such as were condemned to death, the clerk of the church was to go in the night-time, and also early in the morning, to the window of the prison in which they were lying. He was there to ring "certain tolls with a hand-bell" appointed for the purpose, and was afterwards, in a most Christian manner, to put them in mind of their present condition and approaching end, and to exhort them to be prepared, as they ought to be, to die. When they were in the cart, and brought before the walls of the church, the clerk was to stand there ready with the same bell, and, after certain tolls, rehearse a prayer, desiring all the people there present to pray for the unfortunate criminals. The beadle, also, of Merchant Taylors' Hall was allowed an "honest stipend" to see that this ceremony was regularly performed.
The affecting admonition—"affectingly good," Pennant calls it—addressed to the prisoners in Newgate, on the night before execution, ran as follows:—
"You prisoners that are within,
Who, for wickedness and sin,
after many mercies shown you, are now appointed to die to-morrow in the forenoon; give ear and understand that, to-morrow morning, the greatest bell of St. Sepulchre's shall toll for you, in form and manner of a passing-bell, as used to be tolled for those that are at the point of death; to the end that all godly people, hearing that bell, and knowing it is for your going to your deaths, may be stirred up heartily to pray to God to bestow his grace and mercy upon you, whilst you live. I beseech you, for Jesus Christ's sake, to keep this night in watching and prayer, to the salvation of your own souls while there is yet time and place for mercy; as knowing to-morrow you must appear before the judgment-seat of your Creator, there to give an account of all things done in this life, and to suffer eternal torments for your sins committed against Him, unless, upon your hearty and unfeigned repentance, you find mercy through the merits, death, and passion of your only Mediator and Advocate, Jesus Christ, who now sits at the right hand of God, to make intercession for as many of you as penitently return to Him."
And the following was the admonition to condemned criminals, as they were passing by St. Sepulchre's Church wall to execution:—" All good people, pray heartily unto God for these poor sinners, who are now going to their death, for whom this great bell doth toll.
"You that are condemned to die, repent with lamentable tears; ask mercy of the Lord, for the salvation of your own souls, through the [merits, death, and passion of Jesus Christ, who now sits at the right hand of God, to make intercession for as many of you as penitently return unto Him.
"Lord have mercy upon you;
Christ have mercy upon you.
Lord have mercy upon you;
Christ have mercy upon you."
The charitable Mr. Dowe, who took such interest in the last moments of the occupants of the condemned cell, was buried in the church of St. Botolph, Aldgate.
Another curious custom observed at St. Sepulchre's was the presentation of a nosegay to every criminal on his way to execution at Tyburn. No doubt the practice had its origin in some kindly feeling for the poor unfortunates who were so soon to bid farewell to all the beauties of earth. One of the last who received a nosegay from the steps of St. Sepulchre's was "Sixteen-string Jack," alias John Rann, who was hanged, in 1774, for robbing the Rev. Dr. Bell of his watch and eighteen pence in money, in Gunnersbury Lane, on the road to Brentford. Sixteen-string Jack wore the flowers in his button-hole as he rode dolefully to the gallows. This was witnessed by John Thomas Smith, who thus describes the scene in his admirable anecdotebook, "Nollekens and his Times:"—" I remember well, when I was in my eighth year, Mr. Nollekens calling at my father's house, in Great Portland Street, and taking us to Oxford Street, to see the notorious Jack Rann, commonly called Sixteenstring Jack, go to Tyburn to be hanged. … The criminal was dressed in a pea-green coat, with an immense nosegay in the button-hole, which had been presented to him at St. Sepulchre's steps; and his nankeen small-clothes, we were told, were tied at each knee with sixteen strings. After he had passed, and Mr. Nollekens was leading me home by the hand, I recollect his stooping down to me and observing, in a low tone of voice, 'Tom, now, my little man, if my father-in-law, Mr. Justice Welch, had been high constable, we could have walked by the side of the cart all the way to Tyburn.'"
When criminals were conveyed from Newgate to Tyburn, the cart passed up Giltspur Street, and through Smithfield, to Cow Lane. Skinner Street had not then been built, and the Crooked Lane which turned down by St. Sepulchre's, as well as Ozier Lane, did not afford sufficient width to admit of the cavalcade passing by either of them, with convenience, to Holborn Hill, or "the Heavy Hill," as it used to be called. The procession seems at no time to have had much of the solemn element about it. "The heroes of the day were often," says a popular writer, "on good terms with the mob, and jokes were exchanged between the men who were going to be hanged and the men who deserved to be."
"On St. Paul's Day," says Mr. Timbs (1868), "service is performed in St. Sepulchre's, in accordance with the will of Mr. Paul Jervis, who, in 1717, devised certain land in trust that a sermon should be preached in the church upon every Paul's Day upon the excellence of the liturgy o the Church of England; the preacher to receive 40s. for such sermon. Various sums are also bequeathed to the curate, the clerk, the treasurer, and masters of the parochial schools. To the poor of the parish he bequeathed 20s. a-piece to ten of the poorest householders within that part of the parish of St. Sepulchre commonly called Smithfield quarter, £4 to the treasurer of St. Bartholomew's Hospital, and 6s. 8d. yearly to the clerk, who shall attend to receive the same. The residue of the yearly rents and profits is to be distributed unto and amongst such poor people of the parish of St. Sepulchre's, London, who shall attend the service and sermon. At the close of the service the vestry-clerk reads aloud an extract from the will, and then proceeds to the distribution of the money. In the evening the vicar, churchwardens, and common councilmen of the precinct dine together."
In 1749, a Mr. Drinkwater made a praiseworthy bequest. He left the parish of St. Sepulchre £500 to be lent in sums of £25 to industrious young tradesmen. No interest was to be charged, and the money was to be lent for four years.
Next to St. Sepulchre's, on Snow Hill, used to stand the famous old inn of the "Saracen's Head." It was only swept away within the last few years by the ruthless army of City improvers: a view of it in course of demolition was given on page 439. It was one of the oldest of the London inns which bore the "Saracen's Head" for a sign. One of Dick Tarlton's jests makes mention of the "Saracen's Head" without Newgate, and Stow, describing this neighbourhood, speaks particularly of "a fair large inn for receipt of travellers" that "hath to sign the 'Saracen's Head.'" The courtyard had, to the last, many of the characteristics of an old English inn; there were galleries all round leading to the bedrooms, and a spacious gateway through which the dusty mail-coaches used to rumble, the tired passengers creeping forth "thanking their stars in having escaped the highwaymen and the holes and sloughs of the road." Into that courtyard how many have come on their first arrival in London with hearts beating high with hope, some of whom have risen to be aldermen and sit in state as lord mayor, whilst others have gone the way of the idle apprentice and come to a sad end at Tyburn! It was at this inn that Nicholas Nickleby and his uncle waited upon the Yorkshire schoolmaster Squeers, of Dotheboys Hall. Mr. Dickens describes the tavern as it existed in the last days of mail-coaching, when it was a most important place for arrivals and departures in London:—
"Next to the jail, and by consequence near to Smithfield also, and the Compter and the bustle and noise of the City, and just on that particular part of Snow Hill where omnibus horses going eastwards seriously think of falling down on purpose, and where horses in hackney cabriolets going westwards not unfrequently fall by accident, is the coach-yard of the 'Saracen's Head' inn, its portals guarded by two Saracen's heads and shoulders, which it was once the pride and glory of the choice spirits of this metropolis to pull down at night, but which have for some time remained in undisturbed tranquillity, possibly because this species of humour is now confined to St. James's parish, where doorknockers are preferred as being more portable, and bell-wires esteemed as convenient tooth-picks. Whether this be the reason or not, there they are, frowning upon you from each side of the gateway; and the inn itself, garnished with another Saracen's head, frowns upon you from the top of the yard; while from the door of the hind-boot of all the red coaches that are standing therein, there glares a small Saracen's head with a twin expression to the large Saracen's head below, so that the general appearance of the pile is of the Saracenic order."
To explain the use of the Saracen's head as an inn sign various reasons have been given. "When our countrymen," says Selden, "came home from fighting with the Saracens and were beaten by them, they pictured them with huge, big, terrible faces (as you still see the 'Saracen's Head' is), when in truth they were like other men. But this they did to save their own credit." Or the sign may have been adopted by those who had visited the Holy Land either as pilgrims or to fight the Saracens. Others, again, hold that it was first set up in compliment to the mother of Thomas à Becket, who was the daughter of a Saracen. However this may be, it is certain that the use of the sign in former days was very general.
Running past the east end of St. Sepulchre's, from Newgate into West Smithfield, is Giltspur Street, anciently called Knightriders Street. This interesting thoroughfare derives its name from the knights with their gilt spurs having been accustomed to ride this way to the jousts and tournaments which in days of old were held in Smithfield.
In this street was Giltspur Street Compter, a debtors' prison and house of correction appertaining to the sheriffs of London and Middlesex. It stood over against St. Sepulchre's Church, and was removed hither from the east side of Wood Street, Cheapside, in 1791. At the time of its removal it was used as a place of imprisonment for debtors, but the yearly increasing demands upon the contracted space caused that department to be given up, and City debtors were sent to Whitecross Street. The architect was Dance, to whom we are also indebted for the grim pile of Newgate. The Compter was a dirty and appropriately convictlooking edifice. It was pulled down in 1855. Mr. Hepworth Dixon gave an interesting account of this City House of Correction, not long before its demolition, in his "London Prisons" (1850). "Entering," he says, "at the door facing St. Sepulchre's, the visitor suddenly finds himself in a low dark passage, leading into the offices of the gaol, and branching off into other passages, darker, closer, more replete with noxious smells, than even those of Newgate. This is the fitting prelude to what follows. The prison, it must be noticed, is divided into two principal divisions, the House of Correction and the Compter. The front in Giltspur Street, and the side nearest to Newgate Street, is called the Compter. In its wards are placed detenues of various kinds—remands, committals from the police-courts, and generally persons waiting for trial, and consequently still unconvicted. The other department, the House of Correction, occupies the back portion of the premises, abutting on Christ's Hospital. Curious it is to consider how thin a wall divides these widely-separate worlds! And sorrowful it is to think what a difference of destiny awaits the children—destiny inexorable, though often unearned in either case—who, on the one side of it or the other, receive an eleemosynary education! The collegian and the criminal! Who shall say how much mere accident— circumstances over which the child has little power —determines to a life of usefulness or mischief? From the yards of Giltspur Street prison almost the only objects visible, outside of the gaol itself, are the towers of Christ's Hospital; the only sounds audible, the shouts of the scholars at their play. The balls of the hospital boys often fall within the yards of the prison. Whether these sights and sounds ever cause the criminal to pause and reflect upon the courses of his life, we will not say, but the stranger visiting the place will be very apt to think for him. …
"In the department of the prison called the House of Correction, minor offenders within the City of London are imprisoned. No transports are sent hither, nor is any person whose sentence is above three years in length." This able writer then goes on to tell of the many crying evils connected with the institution—the want of air, the over-crowded state of the rooms, the absence of proper cellular accommodation, and the vicious intercourse carried on amongst the prisoners. The entire gaol, when he wrote, only contained thirty-six separate sleeping-rooms. Now by the highest prison calculation—and this, be it noted, proceeds on the assumption that three persons can sleep in small, miserable, unventilated cells, which are built for only one, and are too confined for that, being only about one-half the size of the model cell for one at Pentonville—it was only capable of accommodating 203 prisoners, yet by the returns issued at Michaelmas, 1850, it contained 246!
A large section of the prison used to be devoted to female delinquents, but lately it was almost entirely given up to male offenders.
"The House of Correction, and the Compter portion of the establishment," says Mr. Dixon, "are kept quite distinct, but it would be difficult to award the palm of empire in their respective facilities for demoralisation. We think the Compter rather the worse of the two. You are shown into a room, about the size of an apartment in an ordinary dwelling-house, which will be found crowded with from thirty to forty persons, young and old, and in their ordinary costume; the low thief in his filth and rags, and the member of the swell-mob with his bright buttons, flash finery, and false jewels. Here you notice the boy who has just been guilty of his first offence, and committed for trial, learning with a greedy mind a thousand criminal arts, and listening with the precocious instinct of guilty passions to stories and conversations the most depraved and disgusting. You regard him with a mixture of pity and loathing, for he knows that the eyes of his peers are upon him, and he stares at you with a familiar impudence, and exhibits a devil-may-care countenance, such as is only to be met with in the juvenile offender. Here, too, may be seen the young clerk, taken up on suspicion—perhaps innocent—who avoids you with a shy look of pain and uneasiness: what a hell must this prison be to him! How frightful it is to think of a person really untainted with crime, compelled to herd for ten or twenty days with these abandoned wretches!
"On the other, the House of Correction side of the gaol, similar rooms will be found, full of prisoners communicating with each other, laughing and shouting without hindrance. All this is so little in accordance with existing notions of prison discipline, that one is continually fancying these disgraceful scenes cannot be in the capital of England, and in the year of grace 1850. Very few of the prisoners attend school or receive any instruction; neither is any kind of employment afforded them, except oakum-picking, and the still more disgusting labour of the treadmill. When at work, an officer is in attendance to prevent disorderly conduct; but his presence is of no avail as a protection to the less depraved. Conversation still goes on; and every facility is afforded for making acquaintances, and for mutual contamination."
After having long been branded by intelligent inspectors as a disgrace to the metropolis, Giltspur Street Compter was condemned, closed in 1854, and subsequently taken down.
Nearly opposite what used to be the site of the Compter, and adjoining Cock Lane, is the spot called Pie Corner, near which terminated the Great Fire of 1666. The fire commenced at Pudding Lane, it will be remembered, so it was singularly appropriate that it should terminate at Pie Corner. Under the date of 4th September, 1666, Pepys, in his "Diary," records that "W. Hewer this day went to see how his mother did, and comes home late, telling us how he hath been forced to remove her to Islington, her house in Pye Corner being burned; so that the fire is got so far that way." The figure of a fat naked boy stands over a public house at the corner of the lane; it used to have the following warning inscription attached:— "This boy is in memory put up of the late fire of London, occasioned by the sin of gluttony, 1666." According to Stow, Pie Corner derived its name from the sign of a well-frequented hostelry, which anciently stood on the spot. Strype makes honourable mention of Pie Corner, as "noted chiefly for cooks' shops and pigs dressed there during Bartholomew Fair." Our old writers have many references—and not all, by the way, in the best taste—to its cookstalls and dressed pork. Shadwell, for instance, in the Woman Captain (1680) speaks of "meat dressed at Pie Corner by greasy scullions;" and Ben Jonson writes in the Alchemist (1612)—
"I shall put you in mind, sir, at Pie Corner,
Taking your meal of steam in from cooks' stalls."
And in "The Great Boobee" ("Roxburgh Ballads"):
"Next day I through Pie Corner passed;
The roast meat on the stall
Invited me to take a taste;
My money was but small."
But Pie Corner seems to have been noted for more than eatables. A ballad from Tom D'Urfey's "Pills to Purge Melancholy," describing Bartholomew Fair, eleven years before the Fire of London, says:—
"At Pie-Corner end, mark well my good friend,
'Tis a very fine dirty place;
Where there's more arrows and bows. …
Than was handled at Chivy Chase."
We have already given a view of Pie Corner in our chapter on Smithfield, page 361.
Hosier Lane, running from Cow Lane to Smithfield, and almost parallel to Cock Lane, is described by "R. B.," in Strype, as a place not over-well built or inhabited. The houses were all old timber erections. Some of these—those standing at the south corner of the lane—were in the beginning of this century depicted by Mr. J. T. Smith, in his "Ancient Topography of London." He describes them as probably of the reign of James I. The rooms were small, with low, unornamented ceilings; the timber, oak, profusely used; the gables were plain, and the walls lath and plaster. They were taken down in 1809.
In the corner house, in Mr. Smith's time, there was a barber whose name was Catchpole; at least, so it was written over the door. He was rather an odd fellow, and possessed, according to his own account, a famous relic of antiquity. He would gravely show his customers a short-bladed instrument, as the identical dagger with which Walworth killed Wat Tyler.
Hosier Lane, like Pie Corner, used to be a great resort during the time of Bartholomew Fair, "all the houses," it is said in Strype, "generally being made public for tippling."
We return now from our excursion to the north of St. Sepulchre's, and continue our rambles to the west, and before speaking of what is, let us refer to what has been.
Turnagain Lane is not far from this. "Near unto this Seacoal Lane," remarks Stow, "in the turning towards Holborn Conduit, is Turnagain Lane, or rather, as in a record of the 5th of Edward III., Windagain Lane, for that it goeth down west to Fleet Dyke, from whence men must turn again the same way they came, but there it stopped." There used to be a proverb, "He must take him a house in Turnagain Lane."
A conduit formerly stood on Snow Hill, a little below the church. It is described as a building with four equal sides, ornamented with four columns and pediment, surmounted by a pyramid, on which stood a lamb—a rebus on the name of Lamb, from whose conduit in Red Lion Street the water came. There had been a conduit there, however, before Lamb's day, which was towards the close of the sixteenth century.
At No. 37, King Street, Snow Hill, there used to be a ladies' charity school, which was established in 1702, and remained in the parish 145 years. Dr. Johnson and Mrs. Thrale were subscribers to this school, and Johnson drew from it his story of Betty Broom, in "The Idler." The world of domestic service, in Betty's days, seems to have been pretty much as now. Betty was a poor girl, bred in the country at a charity-school, maintained by the contributions of wealthy neighbours. The patronesses visited the school from time to time, to see how the pupils got on, and everything went well, till "at last, the chief of the subscribers having passed a winter in London, came down full of an opinion new and strange to the whole country. She held it little less than criminal to teach poor girls to read and write. They who are born to poverty, she said, are born to ignorance, and will work the harder the less they know. She told her friends that London was in confusion by the insolence of servants; that scarcely a girl could be got for all-work, since education had made such numbers of fine ladies, that nobody would now accept a lower title than that of a waiting-maid, or something that might qualify her to wear laced shoes and long ruffles, and to sit at work in the parlour window. But she was resolved, for her part, to spoil no more girls. Those who were to live by their hands should neither read nor write out of her pocket. The world was bad enough already, and she would have no part in making it worse.
"She was for a long time warmly opposed; but she persevered in her notions, and withdrew her subscription. Few listen, without a desire of conviction, to those who advise them to spare their money. Her example and her arguments gained ground daily; and in less than a year the whole parish was convinced that the nation would be ruined if the children of the poor were taught to read and write." So the school was dissolved, and Betty with the rest was turned adrift into the wide and cold world; and her adventures there any one may read in "The Idler" for himself.
There is an entry in the school minutes of 1763, to the effect that the ladies of the committee censured the schoolmistress for listening to the story of the Cock Lane ghost, and "desired her to keep her belief in the article to herself."
Skinner Street—now one of the names of the past—which ran by the south side of St. Sepulchre's, and formed the connecting link between Newgate Street and Holborn, received its name from Alderman Skinner, through whose exertions, about 1802, it was principally built. The following account of Skinner Street is from the picturesque pen of Mr. William Harvey ("Aleph"), whose long familiarity with the places he describes renders doubly valuable his many contributions to the history of London scenes and people:—"As a building speculation," he says, writing in 1863, "it was a failure. When the buildings were ready for occupation, tall and substantial as they really were, the high rents frightened intending shopkeepers. Tenants were not to be had; and in order to get over the money difficulty, a lottery, sanctioned by Parliament, was commenced. Lotteries were then common tricks of finance, and nobody wondered at the new venture; but even the most desperate fortune-hunters were slow to invest their capital, and the tickets hung sadly on hand. The day for the drawing was postponed several times, and when it came, there was little or no excitement on the subject, and whoever rejoiced in becoming a house-owner on such easy terms, the original projectors and builders were understood to have suffered considerably. The winners found the property in a very unfinished condition. Few of the dwellings were habitable, and as funds were often wanting, a majority of the houses remained empty, and the shops unopened. After two or three years things began to improve; the vast many-storeyed house which then covered the site of Commercial Place was converted into a warehousing depôt; a capital house opposite the 'Saracen's Head' was taken by a hosier of the name of Theobald, who, opening his shop with the determination of selling the best hosiery, and nothing else, was able to convince the citizens that his hose was first-rate, and, desiring only a living profit, succeeded, after thirty years of unwearied industry, in accumulating a large fortune. Theobald was possessed of literary tastes, and at the sale of Sir Walter Scott's manuscripts was a liberal purchaser. He also collected a library of exceedingly choice books, and when aristocratic customers purchased stockings of him, was soon able to interest them in matters of far higher interest…
"The most remarkable shop—but it was on the left-hand side, at a corner house—was that established for the sale of children's books. It boasted an immense extent of window-front, extending from the entrance into Snow Hill, and towards Fleet Market. Many a time have I lingered with loving eyes over those fascinating story-books, so rich in gaily-coloured prints; such careful editions of the marvellous old histories, 'Puss in Boots,' 'Cock Robin,' 'Cinderella,' and the like. Fortunately the front was kept low, so as exactly to suit the capacity of a childish admirer. . . . . But Skinner Street did not prosper much, and never could compete with even the dullest portions of Holborn. I have spoken of some reputable shops; but you know the proverb, 'One swallow will not make a summer,' and it was a declining neighbourhood almost before it could be called new. In 1810 the commercial depôt, which had been erected at a cost of £25,000, and was the chief prize in the lottery, was destroyed by fire, never to be rebuilt—a heavy blow and discouragement to Skinner Street, from which it never rallied. Perhaps the periodical hanging-days exercised an unfavourable influence, collecting, as they frequently did, all the thieves and vagabonds of London. I never sympathised with Pepys or Charles Fox in their passion for public executions, and made it a point to avoid those ghastly sights; but early of a Monday morning, when I had just reached the end of Giltspur Street, a miserable wretch had just been turned off from the platform of the debtors' door, and I was made the unwilling witness of his last struggles. That scene haunted me for months, and I often used to ask myself, 'Who that could help it would live in Skinner Street?' The next unpropitious event in these parts was the unexpected closing of the child's library. What could it mean? Such a well-to-do establishment shut up? Yes, the whole army of shutters looked blankly on the inquirer, and forbade even a single glance at 'Sinbad' or 'Robinson Crusoe.' It would soon be re-opened, we naturally thought; but the shutters never came down again. The whole house was deserted; not even a messenger in bankruptcy, or an ancient Charley, was found to regard the playful double knocks of the neighbouring juveniles. Gradually the glass of all the windows got broken in, a heavy cloud of black dust, solidifying into inches thick, gathered on sills and doors and brickwork, till the whole frontage grew as gloomy as Giant Despair's Castle. Not long after, the adjoining houses shared the same fate, and they remained from year to year without the slightest sign of life—absolute scarecrows, darkening with their uncomfortable shadows the busy streets. Within half a mile, in Stamford Street, Blackfriars, there are (1863) seven houses in a similar predicament— window-glass demolished, doors cracked from top to bottom, spiders' webs hanging from every projecting sill or parapet. What can it mean? The loss in the article of rents alone must be over £1,000 annually. If the real owners are at feud with imaginary owners, surely the property might be rendered valuable, and the proceeds invested. Even the lawyers can derive no profit from such hopeless abandonment. I am told the whole mischief arose out of a Chancery suit. Can it be the famous 'Jarndyce v. Jarndyce' case? And have all the heirs starved each other out? If so, what hinders our lady the Queen from taking possession? Any change would be an improvement, for these dead houses make the streets they cumber as dispiriting and comfortless as graveyards. Busy fancy will sometimes people them, and fill the dreary rooms with strange guests. Do the victims of guilt congregate in these dark dens? Do wretches 'unfriended by the world or the world's law,' seek refuge in these deserted nooks, mourning in the silence of despair over their former lives, and anticipating the future in unappeasable agony? Such things have been—the silence and desolation of these doomed dwellings make them the more suitable for such tenants."
A street is nothing without a mystery, so a mystery let these old tumble-down houses remain, whilst we go on to tell that, in front of No. 58, the sailor Cashman was hung in 1817, as we have already mentioned, for plundering a gunsmith's shop there. William Godwin, the author of "Caleb Williams," kept a bookseller's shop for several years in Skinner Street, at No. 41, and published school-books in the name of Edward Baldwin. On the wall there was a stone carving of Æsop reciting one of his fables to children.
The most noteworthy event of the life of Godwin was his marriage with the celebrated Mary Wollstonecraft, authoress of a "Vindication of the Rights of Women," whose congenial mind, in politics and morals, he ardently admired. Godwin's account of the way in which they got on together is worth reading:—"Ours," he writes, "was not an idle happiness, a paradise of selfish and transitory pleasures. It is, perhaps, scarcely necessary to mention, that influenced by ideas I had long entertained, I engaged an apartment about twenty doors from our house, in the Polygon, Somers Town, which I designed for the purpose of my study and literary occupations. Trifles, however, will be interesting to some readers, when they relate to the last period of the life of such a person as Mary. I will add, therefore, that we were both of us of opinion, that it was possible for two persons to be too uniformly in each other's society. Influenced by that opinion, it was my practice to repair to the apartment I have mentioned as soon as I rose, and frequently not to make my appearance in the Polygon till the hour of dinner. We agreed in condemning the notion, prevalent in many situations in life, that a man and his wife cannot visit in mixed society but in company with each other, and we rather sought occasions of deviating from than of complying with this rule. By this means, though, for the most part, we spent the latter half of each day in one another's society, yet we were in no danger of satiety. We seemed to combine, in a considerable degree, the novelty and lively sensation of a visit with the more delicious and heartfelt pleasure of a domestic life."
This philosophic union, to Godwin's inexpressible affliction, did not last more than eighteen months, at the end of which time Mrs. Godwin died, leaving an only daughter, who in the course of time became the second wife of the poet Shelley, and was the author of the wild and extraordinary tale of "Frankenstein."
De repente despiertas y te das cuentas de que estás encerrado en un habitáculo, pero este no está totalmente a oscuras. Hay una ventana grande, -compuesta a su vez de ventanas más pequeñas- de las que emana una luz blanca. Un porcentaje ridículo de luz en comparación con la oscuridad que gobierna el habitáculo pero suficiente para evitar que los órganos del cuerpo se vuelvan locos. ¿Qué haces encerrado en un lugar como ese? Posiblemente hayas caído preso de algo que no aciertas a clarificar. Quizá estés en mitad de un mal sueño que amenaza con volverse eterno. Quizá la realidad se haya evaporado y toda las construcciones que observabas a tu alrededor han desaparecido, siendo arrojado a la realidad de verdad, en la que solo hay un habitáculo oscuro con una ventana a ninguna parte.