Nevertheless, archdeacons are seldom allowed to starve. The bishops5 have it in their power to look to that, and knowing that in these days starving men seldom can exercise much authority, they take care that their archdeacons shall be beneficed. The archdeacon always holds a living. In former happy days he not unfrequently held more than one, and there are probably archdeacons still living in that halcyon7 condition. He always holds a living, and almost always a good living. He not unfrequently is a man of private means, and has been selected for his position partly on that account. He is the nominee8 of the bishop6, and is, therefore, not unfrequently intimately connected with episcopal things. He is, perhaps, the son or nephew of a bishop, or has married a wife from the palace, or has, after some fashion, sat in his early days at episcopal feet. He is one whom the bishop thinks that he can love and trust; and therefore, before he has obtained his{44} archdeaconry, he has probably been endowed with that first requisite9 for a good servant—good wages. A poor archdeacon, an archdeacon who did not keep a curate or two, an archdeacon who could not give a dinner and put a special bottle of wine upon the table, an archdeacon who did not keep a carriage, or at least a one-horse chaise, an archdeacon without a man servant, or a banker’s account, would be nowhere,—if I may so speak,—in an English diocese. Such a one could not hold up his head among churchwardens, or inquire as to church repairs with any touch of proper authority. Therefore, though the archdeacon is not paid for his services as archdeacon, he is generally a gentleman who is well to do in the world, and who can take a comfortable place in the county society among which it is his happy lot to live.
But, above all things, an archdeacon should be a man of the world. He should know well, not only how many shillings there are in a pound, but how many shillings also there are in a clerical pound,—for in these matters there is a difference. Five hundred a year is much more in the hands of a{45} country parson than it is in the hands of a country gentleman who is not a parson,—all which the efficient archdeacon understands and has at his fingers’ ends to the last shilling of the calculation. He should understand, too, after what fashion his brother rectors and vicars live around him,—should know something of their habits, something also of their means, and should have an eye open to their welfare, their pursuits, and their amusements. Of all these things the really stirring archdeacon does in fact know very much.
The archdeacon is, in fact, a bishop in little, and as such is often much more of a bishop in fact than is the bishop himself. To define,—or rather to make intelligible10 by any definition,—an archdeacon’s power and duties, would be very difficult; as also it is very difficult, or I may say impossible, to do so with reference to a bishop’s functions. The archdeacon holds a court, and makes visitations. These visitations may be made pretty much at his pleasure. He must, I believe, make them once in three years, but may make them every year if he thinks fit. He inquires as to the administration of the services,{46} seeing that the canons are maintained, but has no power to alter aught; and as there seems to be much difficulty in knowing when and by what the canons are maintained, and when and by what they are not maintained, we may imagine that the inquiries11 of a discreet12 archdeacon into the practices of a respectable and efficient parson will not be too close or searching in this matter of the canons. It is, however, easier to see whether the windows of a church are in repair, and whether the roof keeps out the rain, than it is to be intelligibly13 and efficiently14 explicit15 on the subject of canons, and, therefore, the outward structure of the parish church gives very safe employment to an archdeacon. The little difficulty as to church rates which sometimes follows upon an order for repairs is not uncongenial to the archdeacon’s mind. It hinges upon politics, and upon a vexed16 political question in which the archdeacon, as a strong local Conservative, has hitherto had his victories. There remain so very few subjects which are still grateful to him in the same way, that church rates, with all their little impediments and embargoes17, naturally present themselves to him as pleasant matters. And then the{47} archdeacons receive reports from the churchwardens, if churchwardens have anything to report,—any scandal of which to tell, or evil practices on the parson’s side of which complaint has unfortunately become necessary according to the judgment18 of those churchwardens! By the word “scandal” let not the uninitiated reader be led to think that undignified tittle-tattle with his neighbour’s churchwardens is the duty or the employment of an archdeacon. Open moral misconduct in a clergyman’s life is supposed to be matter of justifiable19 public scandal—the scandal arising with the clerical sinner, and not with those who tell of the sin—and, as such, is, by the constitution of our Church, an especial subject for the care of our archdeacons, and indeed, under them, of our churchwardens. But in such matters archdeacons are liberal, and much prefer to wink20 an eye than to see too much. We may imagine that a churchwarden, misunderstanding his mission with regard to scandal, and taking upon himself too promptly21 the duty of watching the moral conduct of his parson, would not receive much comfort from a visiting archdeacon. No one knows better than an archdeacon—{48}no one knows so well as an archdeacon—that it is needless and absurd to look for a St. Paul in every parsonage. He would, indeed, be very little at his own ease with a local St. Paul, much preferring a comfortable rector, who can take his glass of wine after dinner and talk pleasantly of old college days. St. Pauls, however, do not trouble him; nor is he troubled much by the scandals of his clerical neighbours; but he must be troubled sorely, I should think, by the increasing number and increasing influence around him of those “literate” clergymen who—from want of better, as we must in sorrow confess,—are flocking to us from Islington, Birkenhead, and such like fountains of pastoral care. The man who won’t drink his glass of wine, and talk of his college, and put off for a few happy hours the sacred stiffnesses of the profession and become simply an English gentleman,—he is the clergyman whom in his heart the archdeacon does not love.
Thus the archdeacon is a bishop in little as regards his own archdeaconry, which may probably comprise half a diocese; and as an energetic financial secretary at the Treasury22 may, under an uninstructed{49} Chancellor23 of the Exchequer24, have much more to do with the finances of the country than the Chancellor of the Exchequer himself, so may an energetic archdeacon have a much stronger influence on his clerical district than the bishop who is over him. He is the bishop’s eye, or should be so, and may not improbably become the bishop’s hand.
But the archdeacon, in spite of all his power and authority, though he be so great among his brother parsons, is hardly in the way to better promotion25. High promotion in the Church now comes from political influence or from the friendship of Ministers,—from those things, combined of course with high clerical attainments—and an archdeacon is not often in the way to obtain political influence or the friendship of Ministers. As deans live in towns, so do archdeacons live in the country; and like other country gentlemen they are always in opposition26. And then they are men who have been made what they are by the bishops, and, therefore, are known well in their dioceses, but are not much known beyond them. They culminate27 in their own local dignity, and, knowing that they do so, they make{50} the most of it. An archdeacon who is potent28 with his bishop, and who is popular with his clergymen, who works hard and can do so without undue29 meddling30, who has a pleasant parish of his own and is not troubled by ambitious or indifferent curates, who can live on good terms with the squires31 around him, understanding how far it is expedient32 that he should be restricted by his coat, and how for he may go in discarding hyper-clerical constraint33, is master of a position in which he need not envy the success of any professional gentleman in the kingdom. But he is not on the direct road to higher things, and will probably die in his rectory, an archdeacon to the last.
If an archdeacon be ambitious of moving in higher clerical matters than his archdeaconry affords him, he generally looks to gratify that desire by sitting in Convocation. This method of doing something more than routine duty is easier and less likely to fail than the other method of publishing a volume of sermons. Sermons are not read now as they were some thirty or forty years since, and Convocation has lately held its head a little up, obtaining recognition in the{51} newspapers, and appearing to do something. An archdeacon is just the man to believe that Convocation can do much; and this faith on his part is evidence of a moral freshness and a real earnestness which adds a charm to his normal character. Who can bring himself to believe that a bishop believes in Convocation—a bishop, that is, who takes his seat in the House of Lords, talks to other peers, and knows what is going on in the well-instructed blasé London world? Such a one cannot but see, cannot but know, that Convocation is a clerical toy, a mere34 debating society to which belongs none of the vitality35 of power. But the archdeacon, fresh from the country, believes in Convocation, and works there with some real conviction that he is one of a clerical Parliament, and that he is animated36 by true parliamentary life.
But it is in his own rectory that an archdeacon must ever shine with the brightest light. I have said that he is a bishop in little, and I may also say that he is the very chief among parsons; and as the country parson—the country parson with pleasant parsonage, pleasanter wife, and plenty of children—is the true and proper type of an English clergyman,{52} to which bishops, deans, canons, and curates are mere adjuncts and necessary excrescences, so is the archdeacon the highest type of the country parson. He is always married—an exception here or there would but prove the rule—he generally has a large family; of course he has a pleasant rectory. He must be an earnest working parish clergyman, or he would hardly have been selected as an archdeacon. He is necessarily—I may say certainly—a gentleman. Alas37! that the day should have gone by when the same might have been said of every clergyman bearing orders in the Church of England. He is a man of the world, as I have above explained, and as such it is not probable that he will be a fanatic38, though living examples may probably be adduced that fanaticism39 can exist under an archdeacon’s hat. And he walks just a head taller than other clergymen around him, receiving that pleasant attitude from the modest authority which he carries. Of all attitudes it is the most pleasant. He who stands high on a column can hardly talk pleasantly with those who stand round his pedestal; and that haranguing40 with loud voice from column top to column top is but a cold{53} ceremonial conversation. Who can imagine two archbishops slapping each other’s backs and being jolly together? But an archdeacon is not raised by his dignity above a capability41 for jovial42 intimacy43, and yet he walks with his head pleasantly raised above the heads of other parsons around him.
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1
peculiarities
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| n. 特质, 特性, 怪癖, 古怪 | |
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allotted
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| 分配，拨给，摊派( allot的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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dearth
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| n.缺乏，粮食不足，饥谨 | |
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calamity
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| n.灾害，祸患，不幸事件 | |
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bishops
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| （基督教某些教派管辖大教区的）主教( bishop的名词复数 )； （国际象棋的）象 | |
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bishop
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| n.主教，（国际象棋）象 | |
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halcyon
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| n.平静的，愉快的 | |
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nominee
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| n.被提名者；被任命者；被推荐者 | |
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requisite
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| adj.需要的，必不可少的；n.必需品 | |
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10
intelligible
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| adj.可理解的，明白易懂的，清楚的 | |
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inquiries
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| n.调查( inquiry的名词复数 )；疑问；探究；打听 | |
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discreet
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| adj.(言行)谨慎的；慎重的；有判断力的 | |
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intelligibly
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| adv.可理解地，明了地，清晰地 | |
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efficiently
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| adv.高效率地，有能力地 | |
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explicit
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| adj.详述的，明确的；坦率的；显然的 | |
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vexed
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| adj.争论不休的；（指问题等）棘手的；争论不休的问题；烦恼的v.使烦恼( vex的过去式和过去分词 )；使苦恼；使生气；详细讨论 | |
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embargoes
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| 贸易禁运令，禁运( embargo的名词复数 ) | |
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judgment
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| n.审判；判断力，识别力，看法，意见 | |
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justifiable
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| adj.有理由的，无可非议的 | |
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wink
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| n.眨眼，使眼色，瞬间；v.眨眼，使眼色，闪烁 | |
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promptly
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| adv.及时地，敏捷地 | |
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treasury
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| n.宝库；国库，金库；文库 | |
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chancellor
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| n.(英)大臣；法官；(德、奥)总理；大学校长 | |
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exchequer
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| n.财政部；国库 | |
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promotion
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| n.提升，晋级；促销，宣传 | |
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opposition
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| n.反对，敌对 | |
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culminate
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| v.到绝顶，达于极点，达到高潮 | |
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potent
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| adj.强有力的，有权势的；有效力的 | |
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undue
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| adj.过分的；不适当的；未到期的 | |
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meddling
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| v.干涉，干预（他人事务）( meddle的现在分词 ) | |
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squires
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| n.地主，乡绅( squire的名词复数 ) | |
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expedient
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| adj.有用的，有利的；n.紧急的办法，权宜之计 | |
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constraint
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| n.(on)约束，限制；限制(或约束)性的事物 | |
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mere
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| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
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vitality
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| n.活力，生命力，效力 | |
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animated
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| adj.生气勃勃的，活跃的，愉快的 | |
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alas
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| int.唉(表示悲伤、忧愁、恐惧等) | |
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fanatic
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| n.狂热者，入迷者；adj.狂热入迷的 | |
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fanaticism
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| n.狂热，盲信 | |
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haranguing
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| v.高谈阔论( harangue的现在分词 ) | |
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41
capability
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| n.能力；才能；(pl)可发展的能力或特性等 | |
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42
jovial
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| adj.快乐的，好交际的 | |
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intimacy
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| n.熟悉，亲密，密切关系，亲昵的言行 | |
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