them an Andrews reiterated them, a Leighton thanked God for them. But then in the context would be found sentiments of a kind to make either of the three bishops turn in his grave. Of Mr. Parker's characteristic style, which has found so many eager and enraptured admirers, we can only say, that its monotony of glitter, of effort, of contortion and even grimace, is to us unspeakably tedious. An extract may be piquant enough but perusal is almost impracticable, so ceaseless is the tension of the writer's anxiety to be striking. It is as though every word began, all for emphasis, with a capital letter, and every sentence set up in italics, and every colon or semi-colon merged in a leash of !!! Every few syllables a sort of subauditur seems to be sub-audible, implying, Are you quite awake, reader? wide awake? sure of that? did you fully catch the last point? and are you all vigilant to look out for the next? It is like being run up and down to prevent the catastrophe of sleep, when poison has made you very sleepy, and to sleep is death: no standing still is allowable for a second—quick step, and right about face, and an approximate realisation of the perpetuum mobile, are what you must do or die.
The earnestness of Mr. Parker's writings goes far to balance what is plentifully objectionable in them. This earnestness is said to be curiously effective in his "pulpit" performances:
There he stands, looking more like a ploughman than priest,
If not dreadfully awkward, not graceful at least,
His gestures all downright and same, if you will,
As of brown-fisted Hobnail in hoeing a drill,
But his periods fall on you, stroke after stroke,
Like the blows of a lumberer felling an oak.
The same "fabulous" witness describes the preacher's phiz as recalling
Sophroniscus' son's head o'er the features of Rabelais—
a comparison confirmed (quâ Socrates) by Miss Bremer's admiring comment on Mr. Parker's "Socratic head"—plus a pair of "large well-formed hands," and ditto of "kind and beautiful eyes." The Swedish lady found him " willing to listen, gentle, earnest, cordial." She adds, "His whole being, expression, gestures, struck me as purely original—the expression of a determined and powerful nature."[1] Self-sufficingness may be pronounced, according to the critic's point of view, either his foible or his forte, his weakness or his strength. While, compared with the ever sliding scale of rival neologies, and the vari-coloured phases of' faith of contemporary creeds, his own creed may be "lighter or darker,"—in one thing at least he admits a fixed duty, an absolute religion, a basis of belief,—c'est lui-meme—
For, in one thing, 'tis clear, he has faith—namely, Parker.
