The Death of Christian Britain
The Death of Christian Britain
The Death of Christian Britain
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— <strong>The</strong> <strong>Death</strong> <strong>of</strong> <strong>Christian</strong> <strong>Britain</strong> —<br />
the fictionalised story was less-<strong>of</strong>ten used with men as the central character.<br />
Thus, discourses on exemplary men were invariably real-life. Biographical<br />
sketches <strong>of</strong> one or two column lengths were a favourite device for<br />
portraying heroic men: men <strong>of</strong> arms, heroes <strong>of</strong> imperial expansion, missionaries<br />
and scholars. In autobiography, sketches focused heavily on moral<br />
virtues as the crux <strong>of</strong> ‘rags to riches’ stories. <strong>The</strong>y characteristically concentrated<br />
on the period <strong>of</strong> youth and poverty where virtue was both most<br />
dissonant with circumstances and most critical to ‘personal progress’.<br />
Chamber’s Journal in 1832 featured Alexander Murray, ‘the son <strong>of</strong> a poor<br />
Galloway shepherd, who finally died pr<strong>of</strong>essor <strong>of</strong> Oriental languages in the<br />
College <strong>of</strong> Edinburgh’. Born in 1775, his father had only three scree sheep<br />
and four cows: ‘He had no debts, and no money.’ His only possessions<br />
were a catechism and a psalm book his father gave him at six years old,<br />
lighting a thirst for reading which was thwarted when banned from using<br />
the family Bible.<br />
I at length got a New Testament, and read the historical parts with<br />
great curiosity and ardour. But I longed to read the Bible, which<br />
seemed to me a much more pleasant book, and I actually went to<br />
where I knew an old loose-leaved Bible lay, and carried it away piecemeal.<br />
I perfectly remember the strange pleasure I felt in reading the<br />
history <strong>of</strong> Abraham and <strong>of</strong> David. I like mournful narratives, and<br />
greatly admired Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and the Lamentations. I pored on<br />
these pieces <strong>of</strong> the Bible in secret for many months, for I durst not<br />
shew them openly. 120<br />
Living ‘in a wild glen’ five miles from the nearest village, his father could<br />
not afford to send him to school, but instead worked him as a shepherd<br />
where he scraped money together to buy ballads-sheets and ‘penny histories’:<br />
‘I carried bundles <strong>of</strong> these in my pockets, and read them when sent<br />
to look for cattle’. At twelve years <strong>of</strong> age he found work as a private tutor<br />
to young children, at which point the biographical sketch effectively ends<br />
as the ‘hero’ starts on the road to university and academic fame.<br />
<strong>The</strong> useful and rational use <strong>of</strong> time was at the crux <strong>of</strong> the discourse on<br />
the secular hero. Religion and piety were devices <strong>of</strong> rationality which<br />
furthered learning, skill and self-improvement. Improvement was the<br />
emblem <strong>of</strong> the democratic free society; wealth was an inhibition to personal<br />
achievement:<br />
. . . there is no condition in which the chance <strong>of</strong> doing any good is<br />
less than in the condition <strong>of</strong> leisure. <strong>The</strong> man fully employed may be<br />
able to gratify his good dispositions by improving himself or his<br />
neighbours, or serving the public in some useful way; but the man<br />
who has all his time to dispose <strong>of</strong> as he pleases, has but a poor chance,<br />
indeed, <strong>of</strong> doing so. 121<br />
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