remains to occupy its inhabitants but agricultural labour. "Give me," said Agur, "neither poverty nor riches, lest I be full, and deny Thee, and say, Who is the Lord? or lest I be poor, and steal, and take the name of my God in vain." The decay of Alfriston is an instance of the results of this common evil: the blindness, the vice, engendered by poverty. Ignorance dense and dark seems to have settled on the place. " More immoral than any part of the Weald," such was the testimony of a resident. Neither church nor chapel seemed to have much power for good. The chapel was the ugliest, most dismal-looking building in the town. Little or no interest could be aroused in the people, save when some homely preacher in a smock came and talked to them in the language of hyper-Calvinism. Why does this dreadful doctrine so commend itself to these poor souls? Is it not because it represents God as dealing with the universe just in accordance with their own experience of life?—the great mass left to rot on in blindness, misery, and corruption, while a favoured few are lifted up into health and wealth, and the enjoyment of all kinds of happiness.
One day last summer we saw this chapel decked out in a way that proved that even old-fashioned Dissenters were beginning to believe that repulsive ugliness was not a necessary adjunct of pure religion. It was the anniversary of the opening of the chapel, and some joyous hearts and tasteful fingers had adorned its naked walls and heavy galleries with floral wreaths and posies.
The old meeting-house was well filled, for the preacher was one who not only had a message to deliver, but was endowed with that gift of eloquence which, like sweet music, steals away every heart. The little inn-yard was crowded with vehicles, showing that preaching has not yet lost its power to attract men.
This was not by any means the first time this little inn had been made busy by such an unusual class of customers. In fact, it may lay claim to be called a house of call for the religious. It dates from the early part of the sixteenth century, and is believed to have been used by the pilgrims on their way to the shrine of St Richard of Chichester.
For three centuries there was no name so popular in Sussex as that of the good Bishop of Chichester, Richard de la Wyche.
