'A Natural Piety': Leigh Hunt's The Religion of the Heart

‘A NATURAL PIETY’: LEIGH HUNT’S THE RELIGION OF THE HEART

Michael Laplace-Sinatra

In 1832, a small volume bearing the name of Leigh Hunt appeared in London. Though it had been written nearly ten years before and circulated to several of Hunt’s friends in manuscript form, this year was the first in which Christianism was made available to the reading public (although only a small quantity was printed and sold principally to friends) . John Forster, a friend of Hunt who had read the manuscript version of Christianism, thought that this work should be made more widely available, and thus decided to publish it at his own expense. Hunt was certainly unable to do such a thing himself, as his financial condition was in such a state that the 1832 Poetical Works had to be published by subscription to raise money for him. It is important to be aware of Christianism not only because it formed the basis for The Religion of the Heart but also because it shows how long Hunt had been seriously contemplating religious issues before The Religion of the Heart was published in 1853. The project was very dear to him, and actually no other work of his went through such a long revisionary stage.
In the Preface to The Religion of the Heart, Hunt explains that:

The book entitled "Christianism," was intended in a default of a better, to supply the want which so many of this portion of the community have felt. A sense of duty may be kept alive in the bosoms of individuals without ostensible religion; and very certainly it is so; otherwise there would not be such numbers of good and excellent men who have no other tie. But one generation may be differently situated in this respect from another . He wrote and distributed Christianism to his friends in order to help bridge gaps between generations and perpetuate the sense of the wonders and beauties of the sacred creation in which he believed. Though Hunt did not adhere to the creeds of any particular church, Christianism was the first expression of his religious philosophy that stands at the core of The Religion of the Heart. In a letter written to his sister-in-law Elizabeth, in November of 1824, Hunt advises her not to be impatient about their future reunion (Hunt had been in Italy for the last two years) but on the contrary to consider it as:

a steady prospect in the distance (if distance it must be), with which, as well as others, heaven will surely reward long-patient and struggling hearts. I cannot but persuade myself, as I saw it prophetically, that we shall all yet be comfortable and together, because we have been patient and done our duty in the meanwhile….heaven seems to afford us consolatory thought, and show to us almost certain glimpses of happiness, in proportion as we do its work with cheerfulness:—and what work is more properly the work of heaven, than that of helping one another to bear our burdens and strengthen our patience ? By that time Hunt had already written Christianism in which he had developed his ideas of ‘glimpses of happiness’ and ‘cheerfulness’, and in the letter he invites Elizabeth to read the work in manuscript form, as he is induced to believe that this would help her.
     Though at that time Christianism was the best expression of Hunt’s religious ideas, it had no practical methodology for worship included and was thus not as beneficial as it should have been. As Hunt notes, ‘All systems of religion . . . to be available for congregational, or even for individual purposes, are in need of formulas’ and Christianism was ‘defective in those particulars, chiefly of meditations, and putting its conclusions into no practical shape—in other words, into no ritual’ (Religion xi). Thus, the book failed to be as serviceable as the author had wished. Twenty years later, with the experience and practise of these many years, he was able to rewrite Christianism into The Religion of the Heart and to include time specific rituals to be performed daily. Although these additions drastically increased the length of the work, now four times its original, they provided his readers with a complete book of prayers.
     The death of Vincent, the favourite and closest of his children, in October 1852 had a strong impact on Hunt’s religious belief and added another personal layer to The Religion of the Heart. In fact, Hunt’s emotional involvement in the work comes to the foreground several times in the preface. Aware that his book might be branded irreligious and looked upon as going against the grain of accepted doctrines, he is quick to emphasise that ‘the object of this book is to supply the wants of one class of religious persons, and not to give more offence than can be helped to others’ (Religion xv). He ends his preface by defending his work against any prejudiced reading due either to its author or its content. ‘The point for reflection is,’ Hunt asserts,
whether the matter is in earnest and is needed; whether the book finds its response in the heart; whether readers felt it to be good for them, good for their families, for parents who would cease to fear questions respecting God and eternity; for hearts that would fain see the final separation of religion from repulsiveness; for understanding, during an age of transition, perplexed between the two extremes of faiths which despise reason, and a reason exasperated or mechanicalized into no faith at all (Religion xx).
    Attentive to social changes which influence people’s religious belief, Hunt is very keen to offer a way to circumvent some of the cultural constraints of society and major religious affiliation. The Religion of the Heart became the very personal expression of his philosophy of life, as well as, in the words of his most recent biographer, ‘the authorised prayer book of cheer’ . Hunt’s strongest point throughout the book is his belief in a general sense of goodness in people, his philosophy of the cheer that personally helped him through many difficult years, and the recent death of Vincent . He was very clear that this book should not become an example for others to follow blindly, but merely a manifestation of this religious feeling shared by many, though not particular to one specific church. He contends that a large number of people around the world have a strong sense of religion at heart though they do not join in any sort or worship, public or private. These people, he declares,

make enquiries on the subject [of religion] in all directions, vainly seeking spiritual satisfaction; and are thus driven to wish that they were in possession of some form of religion of their own, not inconsistent with those exalted notions which they entertain of the Divine Spirit of the universe, and of the duties of beneficence....By a form of religion not inconsistent with these sentiments, is meant one free from contradiction to the best ideas of moral goodness (Religion viii). ‘The consummation to be desired by mankind,’ Hunt further writes, ‘is, not that all should think alike in particulars, but that all should feel alike in essentials, and that there should be no belief or practice irreconcilable with the heart’ (Religion xii-xiii). Religious duty is important to Hunt. According to him, it should be shared but not restrictive and most importantly not ‘irreconcilable with the heart’. It was his hope that his book would find ‘its response in the heart,’ because, in his mind, the heart is intimately associated with happiness, cheerful thinking and piety:

A natural piety, no less than cheerfulness, has ever pervaded my writings; the cheerfulness indeed was a part of the piety, flowing from the same tendency to love and admire (Religion xviii). The metaphor of the heart thus becomes the essence of Hunt’s philosophy, the emblem of a religious feeling that is present in everybody and best expressed in love and cheerfulness.
It comes as no surprise that Hunt was very much involved in every stage of production of The Religion of the Heart. This work was to be the source and statement of his belief. He corresponded numerous times with his publisher John Chapman about the preface, the list of works to be included, the expansion made on the original manuscript, and even the cover of the book . This last point illustrates both Hunt’s emotional and practical investment in the volume:

should the nature of the ornament make no difference in the expense, I should like a heart on the covers, encircled with a wreath of mingled Thorns and Flowers (the Thorns expressing the pains, and the Flowers the pleasure of Duty). I should also prefer, for the colour of the binding, if equally convenient and lasting, a very dark crimson or purple to black; though at the same time as much of a prayer-book character as possible in the general treatment and appearance . To specify the colour of the binding clearly indicates Hunt’s attempt to market his book as a prayer book, an intention which is also reflected in the organisation of the work. Five major sections present the reader with everything she or he needs: ‘Daily Service,’ ‘Weekly Service,’ ‘Exercises of the Heart in Its Duties and Aspirations,’ ‘Punishments and Rewards according to the Neglect or Performance of Duty,’ and ‘The Only Final Scriptures, Their Text and Teachers.’ Two remarks are to be made about the last two sections. First, Hunt was irrevocably opposed to a sense of Hell, or any form of torture and punishment imposed by God. He strongly rejected the idea that

Without threats to terrify us, and impossibilities to bend reason to faith, God would never be thought of, nor man kept in order. The Divine Teacher must succeed differently from all others, and make his children love him by dint of fear and terror; by setting pits of torment beside lessons incapable of comprehension (Religion xiv). Thus, the section ‘Punishments and Rewards’ does not propound any of these ideas, but on the contrary invites the reader to consider what she or he is missing in not accomplishing her/his religious duty.
     Secondly, the section ‘The Only Final Scriptures’ is the only one to present in detail Hunt’s literary inclination combined with his religious views. As Edmund Blunden puts it, Hunt is in this section ‘the librarian of his little church’ . And the reader finds extracts from Confucius, Socrates, St. Francis de Sales, and Shaftesbury, alongside Carlyle, Emerson, Wordsworth, and Hunt’s best friend Shelley. The latter is actually responsible for the title of the work, to the extent that Hunt gave him the ultimate honorary title he could bestow on someone (and indirectly on his own work) by using the image of the heart for the epitaph he devised for Shelley’s tomb in Rome: COR CORDIUM (heart of hearts) .
     Throughout the reading of The Religion of the Heart, one is not struck by Hunt’s originality as much as by the persuasiveness of his approach. Hunt himself certainly did not claim originality in his book, nor could he have anyway as so many of its precepts are to be found in Christian thought, whether Anglican or Catholic. Rather, he declares that he has given the multifarious teaching of the best and wisest of mankind ‘the form of words in which I could best report it’ and brought it ‘under the one head and sanction of that Divine Authority of the Heart, to which they themselves, with more or less emphasis, refer’ (Religion xix). Once again, the symbol of the heart is found to embody the Divine’s presence and aspiration.
     In conclusion, there can be no doubt that The Religion of the Heart is a very personal book for Leigh Hunt, one that he had contemplated for more than twenty years and the wisdom of which, he declared, ‘has been the meditation of half my life’ (Religion xix). Though usually considered a minor Romantic figure, Hunt wrote extensively during the Victorian period, offering a successful play, The Legend of Florence, a novel, Sir Ralph Esher, and his autobiography to the reading public, a public which had come to know and respect him. The Religion of the Heart displays another less well-known aspect of Hunt’s corpus, one which because of its autobiographical and religious importance deserves further attention. Hunt’s work supplied its readers with a religion that was uncomplicated by doctrine, rich in emotion and replete with optimism, a precious commodity for most in the wake of the atheism, despondency, and pessimism which followed a failed revolution in France and an America that was steeped in the buying and selling of slaves.

1. Though it is difficult to judge the extent of the success of The Religion of the Heart beyond the circle of Hunt’s friends, Luther Brewer includes a letter from George Jacob Holyoake in his volume of Hunt’s letters that presents some potentially interesting facts; the letter is dated 25 November 1854:
An audience of 3,500 persons, of the first Glasgow families crowded the City Hall every night. The eyes of those Puritans glistened with interest and entertainment as I read your Prayer of our Lord, supplemented by the doctrine of eternal punishment and its fearful sequences. Nothing said during the debate on either side produced such an effect. [Luther A. Brewer, My Leigh Hunt Library: The Holograph Letters (Iowa, 1938), 355]
As Brewer notes, George Jacob Holyoake was an English reformer, the author of a number of books on cooperation among the working classes, and this offers an instance of the potential readership Hunt’s work received. The few reviews of The Religion of the Heart published in London periodicals were not too positive, with the unsurprising exception of the one published in The Examiner (29 October 1853), a periodical that Hunt edited himself between 1808 and 1822.
2. Leigh Hunt, The Religion of the Heart. A Manual of Faith and Duty (London, 1853), ix-x; hereafter Religion followed by the appropriate page number.
3. Letter dated 4 November 1824. Luther A. Brewer, My Leigh Hunt Library, 134-35.
4. Ann Blainey, Immortal Boy: A Portrait of Leigh Hunt (London and Sydney, 1985), 184.
5. Hunt acknowledges in his Preface that it is not always easy to put in practise the principles to be found in The Religion of the Heart:
if anybody questions me further, and ask whether in other respects I practice what I preach, I answer, that I profess but to be a disciple in my own school; that some of its injunctions are harder to me than they will be to many; and that I pray daily for strength not to disgrace them. (Religion xviii)
6. See for instance Hunt’s letters to John Chapman, publisher of the book, dated 15 March [1853], 1 April [1853], and 4 November [1853] [Luther A. Brewer, My Leigh Hunt Library, 335-37].
7. Letter dated 15 August [1853]. Luther A. Brewer, My Leigh Hunt Library 388-89. Though the cover was in the end green, it has a heart encircled with a wreath of thorns and flowers.
8. Edmund Blunden, Leigh Hunt: A Biography (London, 1930), 323.
9. For a longer discussion of Hunt’s use of the image of the heart, see Timothy Webb’s "Religion of the Heart: Leigh Hunt’s Unpublished Tribute to Shelley," Keats-Shelley Review 7 (1992), 26-28.

Michael Laplace-Sinatra is a DPhil student at St. Catherine's College, Oxford, working on Leigh Hunt. He is the founding editor of Romanticism On the Net, a peer-reviewed electronic journal devoted to Romantic studies. He has published articles on Mary Shelley, Coleridge and Percy Bysshe Shelley, as well as several reviews. He is currently editing collections of essays on Lyrical Ballads and Mary Shelley.