Some men are in great request as preachers and speakers outside their parishes, but for some reason or other they are not very useful at home.

It was not so with the subject of this memoir. The prophet in this case was honoured in his own country. On Sunday mornings, three-quarters of an hour before service began, many aged and poor parishioners might be seen making their way into the church to secure good seats. In Holy Trinity the free seats are more in number than those that are appropriated, and some of the former are in the best part of the church; all these were filled long before the hour for the commencement of service. As eleven o’clock drew near the congregation were in their places, and the aisles were filled with strangers in every available spot waiting in the hope of some possible seat. It was a common thing in the summer for as many as a hundred to go away unable to get accommodation. The writer well remembers the profound impression which the Sundays used to make upon his mind. The old Vicar and his curates were in the vestry in good time robed and ready; [174] having knelt in prayer, there was a silent interval, and exactly to the moment when the clock in the tower struck, the vestry door was opened and they passed out into the church.

Sometimes this was a slow work, as the people stood close together; some were sitting on the pulpit stairs, and the clergy had to thread their way to the chancel rails.

When service began the cushions at the rails were all occupied by worshippers kneeling upon them. Canon Hoare generally took part in the service, which was conducted in the simple old-fashioned way, read, not “toned down” in the manner now so prevalent.

When the preacher ascended the high pulpit it was an impressive thing to see that great congregation, over sixteen hundred in number, ranged beneath in the body of the building and around him in the deep galleries, waiting for his words. His prayer before the sermon was a very striking one, and it was always in the following words: “Almighty God, our Heavenly Father, who hast purchased to Thyself an universal Church by the precious blood of Thy dear Son, and hast promised that the Holy Spirit should abide with us for ever: may we now enjoy His sacred presence! May He direct the word which shall now be spoken, and apply it with Divine power to all our hearts, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.”

Those sermons were wonderful, delivered so well that few could believe them to be written discourses, which they were; with changes of tone which made the sentences impress themselves upon the memory; the manner so solemn, as befitted the ambassador, and yet so pleading, as became the father. The eloquent language attracted the intellectual mind, and the remarkable simplicity of expression appealed to the simplest understanding. The matter of these sermons was, however, their great charm.

The atonement wrought by Christ was their great theme. Many preachers, when enlarging upon other subjects, bring in this doctrine at the close of their discourse, but with Canon Hoare the great foundation of our faith, viz. the substitution of Christ for the sinner, and His finished work of propitiation applied by the Holy Spirit, was always visible, not as a thing to be brought in at the end, but already there, as the centre and pivot of all that he said; hence no doubt the power of his words, and withal as a thing much to be observed was the extraordinary freshness with which he was able to present, Sunday after Sunday, the old story of the Cross, old but ever new.Very powerful were those discourses, for they were full of teaching. The preacher was a deep student of his Bible,—“After diligently working down into it for fifty years,” he used to say, “I am still only scratching the surface!”—and he possessed moreover an unusual power of imparting knowledge; he was pre-eminently a teacher, and among the many privileges which his curates enjoyed none was so great as the Scriptural teaching which they received in their Vicar’s sermons. After the preacher had concluded there was a short prayer, followed by the blessing, and then, with nothing to take away the impression of the solemn words to which they had listened, the congregation dispersed. There were three or four services in the Parish Church every Sunday, besides the shortened Morning Service in the hospital and Mission Service in the large Parish Room; there were also five Sunday Schools, and many classes on the same day for old and young men, women, and senior girls.

Though in his vigorous days he always preached twice, he was in the habit of opening the principal boys’ school every Sunday morning, and in the afternoon visiting one or other of the various schools and classes, finishing all by slipping into the afternoon service in time to hear the sermon preached by one of his curates. By these means he kept in touch with everything going on in the parish.The weekday work was enormous and varied. The Parish Room, so called—really a large building containing a hall and different rooms—was occupied nearly every hour of every day in some part or other; and in the parish at large every conceivable kind of agency for the temporal and spiritual good of rich and poor was to be found, all animated by real energy and spiritual power. Many a time have the workers heard from their Vicar’s lips, “Let us not be content with machinery; what we want is Life.”

The Sunday Evening Services in the Parish Room were deeply interesting. For half an hour beforehand the volunteer choir sang hymns to attract the people in, and workers went into bar-rooms and common lodging-houses to bring in any who would come.

It was a very moving sight, about three hundred people, some of them degraded in vice, packed close together, joining in the familiar hymns, and listening with attention to the speaker. Canon Hoare often said that, intensely as he delighted in the opportunity, it was at times more than he could bear to realise the depth of sin in which many lived who were gathered together at these services—the responsibility of the preacher seemed on such an occasion to be so enormous.

Except as occasional workers, he never would allow the regular church-goers to attend the Mission Room services. “This service is not for you,” he used to say; “it is a stepping-stone to the church.” And such it was. The process of transformation used to be watched with interest in those cases where some poor degraded creature, either there or at the Temperance meetings, was led to “take the first turn to the right, and then go straight on,” as Bishop Wilberforce once tersely put it. Soon the ragged clothing improved, the whole appearance altered; after a while it might be said of such that, clothed and in their right mind, they sat at the feet of Jesus; and then by degrees moving on to the church, they might be seen at the Lord’s Table, or sitting in the adult Confirmation Class in preparation for that sacred privilege.

There were low slums in that parish, but, as Canon Hoare used often to say, “The Church of England can and does reach the lowest of the low, and can bring the Gospel to bear upon the vilest, without the aid of a fiddle or a flag!” One practical difficulty met him at first in the Parish (or Mission) Room services. Many a poor tramp, weary and footsore, used to say when asked to come in: “I have eaten nothing since the morning. Can you give me food? I want that more than the service.” When these answers were reported to him Mr. Hoare used to say, “And if I were in their place I should make the same reply.” It then became a matter of consideration what could be done to remove this difficulty, and yet not give anything like a bribe to induce people to come to these services for a paltry motive. After a great deal of thought and consultation with the workers, it was determined to give a slice of bread and cheese to any poor hungry ones who were not residents, but passing through the place, and in the cold weather a mug of coffee was added. This plan worked admirably; only a few asked for the food, but those received it, and what had been a very real hindrance at the first was satisfactorily removed.

Most if not all of our Religious Societies were well supported in the parish, but the three in which Mr. Hoare seemed to take the warmest interest were the Church Missionary Society, the Church Pastoral Aid Society, and the Irish Church Missions. For the first and last of these three there were, besides the Great Hall meetings, crowded gatherings for the poorer parishioners in the Parish Room. Canon Hoare was an incorporated member of the S.P.G., and had an annual sermon for that society, but of course the Church Missionary Society had the love of his whole heart. What he was to that society every one knows, and he infused some of his missionary enthusiasm into the town, and especially his own parish.

The Church Missionary Society anniversary was indeed a “field-day.” Long prepared for, it was anticipated with keen interest; the best deputations came down, and nearly every church in the town joined in the celebration. Canon Hoare generally preached in the old Chapel of Ease in the morning, but always occupied his own pulpit in the evening of that day, and what a thronged congregation there was on these occasions! The whole soul of the preacher seemed to go forth in his subject, and his hearers were thrilled by the trumpet call of that missionary sermon. In later years the thought of his dearly loved son and daughter working for God in China brought a special and personal interest into his words—not that he spoke of them, but somehow one could feel that they were in his thoughts. The collections on these occasions were very large; in former years £100 was thought the proper thing as the result of the Anniversary Services in Trinity Church, but gradually the amount crept up until about ten years before his death, when on one anniversary, in his absence through illness, it was suggested by the evening preacher that it would be a cheer to their beloved Vicar if £200 were reached; and right liberally was the appeal answered. After the sermon two gentlemen came into the vestry to inquire the amount collected, “for,” said they, “whatever the deficit may be, we will make it £200”; but their kindly help was not needed, as more than that sum was already counted out upon the vestry table!

From that day £200 was looked upon as the proper sum from Trinity Church for the Church Missionary Society anniversary.The parish schools for boys, girls, and infants were all first-rate, and Canon Hoare prided himself upon having the best boys’ school in the diocese; but he was not content with the welfare of his own schools—it was his wish to strengthen all Church schools in the town. We hear now a good deal about the confederation of Church schools. More than twenty-five years ago the Vicar of Holy Trinity started such a confederation. Every Church school in Tunbridge Wells elected its members, and sent them to the periodic meetings, where matters of interest were discussed, weak points strengthened, and preparation made for dangers that threatened. This was only one of the many things in which his statesmanlike ability showed itself; Edward Hoare was one of those “men that had understanding of the times, to know what (the spiritual) Israel ought to do.” The power of such men is readily felt and acknowledged. “All their brethren are at their commandment.”

It would be impossible to write about the work in Holy Trinity parish without alluding to the Ladies’ Bible Class. This was a remarkable feature of his ministry, and, like most of his works, was going on before it had been suggested or thought of in other places.

This was not a Bible-reading, but a class for teaching by preparation beforehand, and at the time by question and answer. The answering was, of course, not compulsory, but nearly every one present in the large assembly of ladies took part.

The teaching was marvellous; sometimes it was a topic or a life in Scripture, sometimes a portion of the Prayer-Book or the Articles. The mastery of the subject and the power of conveying the same clear knowledge to other minds were very striking. Some have even said that they considered this class to have been his greatest work in Tunbridge Wells. The enthusiastic letters which have been received during the past thirty years from generations of young people who, having been taught by him, went forth into life educated and fortified in religious truth, testify to the fact that these classes formed in many an instance the real turning-point of life.

Twice in the period that he was Vicar of Holy Trinity a Parochial Mission was held, the respective missioners being the Rev. Rowley Hill, afterwards Bishop of Sodor and Man, and the Rev. H. Webb Peploe. Each time it was a grand success, greatly owing, under God, to the prayer and preparation which preceded it. The second mission was remarkable for the number of men whom it reached; at the services for men only there used to be two thousand listeners crammed into the church. Being well followed up, these missions left a glorious mark in the parish. Canon Hoare used often to quote the words of some foreign pastor, “The Church of England is the best in the world at throwing the net, but the worst at drawing it in,” and he always added, “Let us not fall into that error, but draw in the net”; and so he did. How familiar to the ears of his old curates were the words that he often said on Sunday morning from the pulpit at the close of some instructive sermon, “If there are any who would like this matter explained further, I shall be glad to see them this afternoon in the Parish Room at a quarter past four”; and he has often remarked, “I have never given this notice without getting some earnest souls who wanted help.”

“Pray for people and look out for God’s answer,” was the direction that he used to give to his workers, and in this lay surely one of the secrets of his great success as a pastor. The characteristic of Holy Trinity parish was “Life”; the Holy Spirit was manifestly at work in the place, blessing the various agencies among rich and poor, young and old, arousing, renewing, converting, and edifying.

One of his loving fellow-workers thus recalls an experience of this in the earlier years of Canon Hoare’s ministry at Tunbridge Wells:—

“I recollect well a great spiritual movement that took place over the whole parish, then undivided except by St. John’s. People, men and women, came to us, chiefly of course to him, asking for help in their spiritual state—people who had been living entirely secular lives. There seemed to have been no special cause for it—no mission—no exciting preaching; it was caused by his careful parish work and ministry. This went on for, I think, about two months; we kept it very quiet, spoke of it only to a few prayerful people, but they were praying for it; at length, however, it got out, and a few unwise persons—some of whom were Church people and some were not—got down Revivalists and hired the Town Hall to throw excitement into the work. Immediately it ceased! I build no theory or argument upon the fact, I merely say what I noticed.”

The same writer continues thus:—

“About that time we began the Evening Communion, and I recollect well our astonishment at the result. Such a number of new faces whom either we did not know or never saw at Holy Communion! Servants, lodging-house keepers, wives of working men, whom practically we had been excommunicating by having the Holy Communion only at the hours when we had hitherto celebrated it.”

All who had the sacred privilege of working with Canon Hoare in his splendidly ordered parish will agree in this, that two clauses of our Church’s Creeds were ever before his eyes: one was the note of all his preaching; the other, the motive and reward of all his work.

“I believe in the Forgiveness of Sins.”

“I believe in the Holy Ghost, the Lord, and Giver of Life.”

This chapter, which describes some of the parochial work of the parish, would not be complete without a reference to a great organisation which, though not of the parish, yet annually assembled in it, viz. “The Aggregate Clerical Meeting.” Shortly after his appointment to Tunbridge Wells, at a time when no conferences of clergy, now so common, had been thought of, the idea of the great spiritual benefit to be gained by such an annual gathering made Mr. Hoare determine to try the experiment. Having consulted with some friends, he sent invitations to the members of seven “Clerical Societies” in the neighbouring parts of Kent, Sussex, and Surrey, to assemble in Tunbridge Wells in the month of June for a series of meetings, not for the public, but for themselves, lasting over two days, with a sermon in Trinity Church on the evening of the first day and a celebration of the Holy Communion in the morning of the day following. All invited guests were given hospitality in the houses of kind friends. The Conference thus assembled met annually for about forty years, and from the first to the last meeting Canon Hoare was its President, although on two occasions illness obliged him to depute another as the chairman. From its small beginning it soon spread, sending its invitations through the South-East of England, although drawing the greater part of its members (who numbered altogether nearly five hundred) from the three counties named above. Laymen too, “introduced by a clergyman,” were invited to attend, and gladly availed themselves of the opportunity. Most of the great Evangelical men have preached at its annual gatherings, and papers and addresses of the greatest possible interest have been given at these meetings. All however who have attended on these occasions will agree in this, that the one thing to which every one looked forward was the closing address of the President. Precious words were always given him to speak, full of spiritual experience and loving exhortation.

The value of conferences like these is now acknowledged everywhere, but it is only due to the one whose memory we affectionately cherish that the credit of originating them should be here given to him whose foreseeing mind recognised the blessings such meetings would confer.