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One member of the NVA (mentioned above) wrote a life of Molesworth.
Life of the Right. Hon. Sir William Molesworth, Bart., M.P., F.R.S. (London: Macmillan, 1901), link
by Millicent Garrett Fawcett (Dame)
In 1889, Labouchere in Truth twitted the NVA for not going after a religious publisher and then learned that the publisher was the distributor for the NVA's Vigilance Record.
Truth, Volume 26, August 15, 1889, Page 292
Where is the Vigilance Committee? During the last two or three weeks hawkers have been parading London with truckloads of an abominable publication called "The High Church Confessional." From a cursory view of one of the numerous copies with which I have been favoured, I should say that a more obscene work was never publicly offered for sale, and this filthy poison is being sold up and down the streets, under the very noses of the police, at the price of twopence. The publisher is one Kensit, of the “City Protestant Book Depôt,” 18, Paternoster-row, who boasts that he has sold 225,000 copies. It is nothing less than a public scandal that this Kensit and his associates should be at large, while Mr. Vizetelly is in gaol; for if what the latter has done be a crime, the crime is certainly infinitely worse when committed under the cloak of religion and morality.
August 29, 1889, Pages 381-382
RELIGIOUS OBSCENITY
In TRUTH of the 13th [sic] inst. I referred to the public sale by hawkers in the streets of London of a publication called "The High Church Confessional," issued by Mr. John Kensit of Paternoster-row. Correspondents had sent me copies of this work, and invited an expression of my opinion of it in the public interest, which I gave.
I have since received the following letter:--
SIR,—-My attention has been called to a most unwarranted attack, both upon myself as a publisher, and a pamphlet which is having a large sale and most effectually opening the eyes of Englishmen to the truth of the abominations of the Confessional. What the result of your remarks will be I cannot at present estimate; and, pending advice from my legal adviser, I am not in a position to judge. In the meantime, I ask you to give somewhat more than a cursory look at the pamphlet, and I claim in your next issue some further explanation or apology for your error.
Trusting you will see your way to act in this manner, and save any further action—-Yours, JOHN KENSIT.
I enclose some others of my pamphlets.
In fairness to Mr. Kensit, and at some violence to my own taste, I have made a further study of the publication in question. I regret to say that the result is to fully confirm my previous opinion. In addition to that, I have looked into some others of Mr. Kensit's pamphlets, including one which he did not send me, and which, in my judgment, deserves an even stronger censure than that which I passed upon “The High Church Confessional.” I am, therefore, unable to offer Mr. Kensit the apology he suggests.
As an alternative to an apology, however, I am asked for an “explanation.” Now, Mr. Kensit has consulted, or is about to consult, a legal adviser, who will, no doubt, be able to give him all necessary information respecting the laws against obscene literature and their bearing upon his own publications. I scarcely see, therefore, why I should be asked to explain either Mr. Kensit's position as a publisher, or mine as a public journalist criticising him. In view, however, of any possible “further action,” such as Mr. Kensit hints at, I will explain the situation as it presents itself to me.
A well-known publisher and literary man has just been sent to prison for publishing translations of the works of an eminent French novelist. They were not, in my judgment, immoral works. They did not, that is to say, set forth vice in an attractive or fascinating light—-quite the contrary, I should say. But they were most unquestionably indecent or obscene—-that is to say, they treated, without reticence or disguise, of subjects which people with healthy minds or cleanly tastes do not discuss or write about publicly. The publisher in question was prosecuted. I do not approve of the prosecution. I recognise the necessity of suppressing public indecency, whether in behaviour, or in language, or in print. But I look on it as a matter of police, not of morals, and I question the expediency of the police assuming a censorship over productions which have a bona-fide claim to be considered works of literature or art, as opposed to publications which cannot pretend to any other than an obscene motive. I do not so much complain of the law, which cannot easily draw delicate distinctions of this kind, as of the indiscretion and inconsistency of the busybodies who set the law in motion in this particular case. However, that is neither here nor there. The publisher was prosecuted, and his publications being unquestionably indecent in the sense I have above indicated, he was sentenced to a heavy term of imprisonment.
Now, I take Mr. Kensit's publication, “The High Church Confessional." I find in it page after page of the most loathsome indecency and obscenity, that is to say, the detailed discussion of subjects unfit for public discussion—-not merely of subjects which mere conventional delicacy enjoins silence about, but of vice and depravity in their foulest and most disgusting phases. What pleas, then, can Mr. Kensit urge why he and his publication should not be dealt with precisely in the same way as Mr. Vizetelly and his?
I can see only two, and both are obviously insufficient. Mr. Kensit may say, in the first place, that the passages to which I refer are merely quotation. The most offensive of them are, as a matter of fact, a verbatim reproduction of the foulest portions of a notorious ecclesiastical handbook called “The Priest in Absolution,” which, however, it is only fair to say, was never actually published, but merely printed for private circulation. Now, obviously such reproduction cannot be permitted unless the law is to become a dead letter. A second publisher cannot be allowed to republish in a quotation what the original publisher could be imprisoned for issuing, or any Holywell-street garbage monger might with impunity bring out an account of the Vizetelly case to-morrow, and “quote” all the most objectionable passages from Zola in an appendix. The first plea, then, is worthless. I imagine that Mr. Kensit will take refuge with more confidence in the second defence open to him—-that he publishes the book with a religious purpose and a good motive. But what is this worth? Granted that Mr. Kensit's motives are beyond reproach—-that he has not the remotest thought of the 225,000 twopences which have come in from the sale of his pamphlet—-was anything said about Mr. Vizetelly's motive, or those of M. Zola? I have no doubt that the latter gentleman could show without difficulty that his writings are dictated by no other motive than that of exposing social evils, unmasking vice, and strengthening the hands of the moralist and social reformer. But that would not avail him in a court of law. Looking at the matter from any point of view, it does not alter the police offence--the offence against public decency. And the moralists--the Vigilance Committee, let us say--would have an equally cogent answer. They would reply, "The motive is immaterial. The good which you will do is remote and problematical; the evil, on the other hand, is immediate and certain. Your writings are devoured by hundreds of boys and girls, or young men and young women, on whom they produce no other effect than sensual gratification and demoralisation of mind and body. You ought, therefore, to be suppressed in the interests of public virtue.” That is the argument used against Zola and Vizetelly, and it applies every bit as strongly to Kensit. I may say, indeed, that it applies with tenfold more force, for, while Vizetelly's indecency was offered to the public in the form of a French novel, bearing the significant name of Zola on the cover, and was sold at a substantial price; Kensit's production is hawked about the streets at the price of twopence, and offered to boys and girls, young and old, wise and ignorant, in the specious guise of a religious publication.
I have granted, so far, the blamelessness of Mr. Kensit's motive. But were it worth while, I should be disposed to offer one or two strong reflections upon that point. As it is, I cannot forbear pointing out that in a preface to what he very candidly calls “this dreadful book,” the publisher himself avows his object to be that of defeating “the Ritualistic traitors in the Protestant Church.” His entire catalogue of “Protestant Works” shows no higher object. This Protestant publisher, therefore, comes before the public far less as a religious teacher with a great moral lesson to enforce than as one whose first object is to vilify fellow Christians of a different persuasion, or to frighten away the sheep from an opposition flock. And it must be borne in mind that the licence which he claims in the pursuit of this amiable object must be equally conceded to the party whom he assails, and who will doubtless have as little difficulty in finding the right sort of dirt to fling back. The question, then, is not one of religion or of morals, but simply whether we are to allow rival divines to descend into the streets, there to bandy filthy epithets or pelt one another with garbage, to the annoyance and defilement of every decent bystander.
For these reasons I adhere to all that I have previously said about Mr. Kensit, and I once more call upon the Vigilance Committee to exercise against him the same vigilance which they displayed with so little reason or judgment against Mr. Vizetelly. Should they be disposed to do so, I should recommend them not to confine their attention to “The High Church Confessional,” but to make a study of Mr. Kensit's publications generally, and particularly of one, the name of which I shall be happy to furnish for that, but for no other, purpose. I know nothing of Mr. Kensit apart from these books. Neither have I any ill-will to the religious sect which he represents, nor any sympathy with the practices which he is desirous of suppressing. I simply assert that the public sale of certain of his books is unquestionably an outrage on public decency, and that the indiscriminate dissemination of such literature in the guise of religion must necessarily be injurious to public morals. And it is on these grounds that I contend that the law should be put in force against Mr. Kensit in the same way as against any other purveyor of obscene and pernicious publications.
September 5, 1889, Pages 421-422
IS THE VIGILANCE ASSOCIATION VIGLANT?
I have received, with mingled surprise and gratification, the following letter respecting Mr. Kensit, of Paternoster-row, and his publications:—-
National Vigilance Association, 267, Strand, London, W.C. (Near the Law Courts), August 31st, 1889.
To the Editor of TRUTH,
DEAR SIR,—-Our attention has been called to the article in this week's TRUTH entitled "Religious Obscenity." In one part of the article you call upon us to exercise the same vigilance towards Mr. Kensit as we have done towards Mr. Vizetelly. I shall be glad, therefore, if you will kindly forward me the title of the book you refer to as being even more obscene and pernicious in its character than the “High Church Confessional.”—-I am, yours very truly,
WM. ALEX. COOTE.
I have, as I intimated my willingness to do, forwarded to Mr. Coote the title of the work to which he refers in his last sentence. At the same time, I hope that this request is not to be taken as implying that “The High Church Confessional” itself does not afford sufficient materials for the exercise of the Vigialnces Association's vigilance. But now for the cause of my surprise at Mr. Coote's letter. I had previously, among numerous other communications on this subject, received the following:--
SIR,--I am glad that you have called attention to the class of publication issued by Mr. John Kensit. As a member of the National Vigilance Association I should like to inform you that the Secretary's attention was called, some time since, to one of these works and his opinion asked, but no answer has yet been received.
It may interest you to know that Mr. Kensit is , as the enclosed will show, the wholesale agent for the "Vigilance Record," the organ of the N. V. A.! Can this account for the Society's inaction in the matter--Your obedient servant, VIGILANS.
This is the enclosure which my correspondent referes to:--
THE VIGILANCE RECORD
Price One Penny, or 1s. 6d. per annum, post free.
Published by W.A. COOTE, at the Office of the National Vigilance Association, 267, Strand, W.C.
May be had wholesale of JOHN KENSIT, Publisher,18,Paternoster-row, E.C.
An edifying disclosure, certainly! Mr. John Kensit, the purveyor of obscene religious literature, is, it appears from this, himself the wholesale agent for the official organ of the National Vigilance Association. The Protestant publishing depôt in Paternoster-row seems, in short, to be a sort of literary chemist's shop, where the poison is kept on one shelf and the antidote on the next. The attention of Mr. William Alexander Coote, in his official capacity, was “some time ago.” directed to one of Kensit's publications, without, up to the present time, any result whatever. It certainly seems to me an incomprehensible state of things that the officers of a body with the pretentious title of the National Vigilance Association should require a stimulus from without to open their vigilant eyes to the character of the business carried on by their own publisher. It is, too, equally incomprehensible that, when their eyes have been opened, their “vigilance” should fail to translate itself into action. And, finally, it is not a little surprising that, after all this, the Secretary should write to me as if he had been all this time entirely in the dark. However, Vigilance is now, let us hope, wide awake, and fully equipped. Let us see whether she is ready to cast the beam out of her own eye.
September 12, 1889, Pages 454-455
I rejoice to find that the Bishop of Chichester has fallen into line with me in my recent attack on “Religious Obscenity.” One Dr. Fulton—-an American divine, if I mistake not—-has delivered a lecture at Brighton which would appear, from the Bishop of Chichester's rebuke to one of his clergy who was present, to have been not only obscene but blasphemous. Now this Fulton is (unless there are two professors of religious obscenity answering to this name) the author of one of the most filthy and disgusting works in Mr. John Kensit's abominable collection. The Bishop of Chichester appears surprised that the Rev. J. G. Gregory should have allowed Fulton's observations to pass without protest. To my mind it is even more astonishing that a clergyman of the English Church, knowing, as he must have known, something of Fulton's character and writings, should have appeared at the same meeting with him.
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But now another word about the National Vigilance Association. Will it be believed that it was actually this very book of Dr. Fulton's—-the filthy publication to which I have referred above—-to which the attention of this association was ineffectually called some time ago by one of their own subscribers, as mentioned in my article on this subject last week? It is now a fortnight since I called their attention to the subject, and a week since Mr. Coote wrote to me for information which it seems that he had already had for a long time in his possession. In the meantime, I am told that barrow-loads of one of the most obscene of Kensit's publications are still on sale in Fleet-street, and I see the statement in a journal calling itself The Christian that my attack “is giving a strong impetus to the sale of the pamphlet.” Had the Vigilance Association chosen, this trade could have been stopped for good a week ago. Why do they not choose?
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Just as I am going to press I have received the following interesting letter:-—
SIR,--Your personal attack upon me and my business is assuming such a position that I feel convinced you must be led on by some other influence than the one you are so loud in proclaiming, viz., the suppression of vice. You are certainly carrying out the old adage “No case, abuse the client.” By this time most of your readers have secured copies of my exposure of the abominable and dreadful High Church Confessional, and many have written thanking me for my noble effort and sympathising with me in the abuse, or worse, I have sustained at your hands. Your mentioning some other book, in fact all my books, has led to a most delightful inquiry by many, who never before took any interest in the subject of Priestism, which is once again trying to subjugate the minds and consciences of Englishmen. The title of your paper is TRUTH, I would that you carried out that title, and published the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the ruth. Sir, if the statements abominable and filthy, as you say they are, be true, why not apply your pen to an awakening of our fellow countrymen to the danger they are in by allowing their wives and daughters—-yes, and empty-headed sons—-to be bamboozled by this cursed system? As a well-informed Englishman, you must know that this is no question of sectarianism, but a matter of liberty of conscience and freedom unknown whenever Popery or its bastard child get the upper hand. If the Priest in Absolution had the power, your organ of TRUTH would soon be gagged, and the press generally muzzled. May I ask if you are aware that the Priest in Absolution is still in possession of the so-called Holy Cross Society, and that it is the manuel (sic) used for training our dear curates to hear confessions? Trusting you will insert this in your next issue,—Yours, JOHN KENSIT.
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Mr. Kensit's previous letter to me took the form of a request for an explanation or an apology, pending the result of a reference to his solicitor, which he had either made or was about to make. I gave him my explanation, and refused an apology. He now changes his tone, and favours me with the above mixture of abuse and cant. I presume that he has thought better of his application to his solicitor, or that the result of his application has been to satisfy him of what I told him before—-viz., that his filthy publications are an offence against the law and against public decency, and that if he had his deserts he would now be serving a term of imprisonment.
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That the sale of his books has increased owing to my notice of them is a misfortune which cannot be helped. I am aware that to publicly describe a certain book as obscene or immoral must have the immediate result of sending hundreds of degraded individuals in quest of it—-whether the book is to be found in Paternoster-row or Holywell-street. But that a publisher should have the audacity to boast, as Kensit does, of this result having actually followed, is a greater stretch of impudence than I was prepared for, and affords, I think, a striking indication of the true value of the religious pretext which is put forward in justification of the offence. However, the Vigilance Association have now Kensit's own admission that he is doing a roaring trade solely as the result of his having been publicly denounced as a purveyor of obscenity. They can have, after that, no excuse for doubt as to the nature of this trade, nor for hesitation in discharging the duty for which they profess to have associated themselves.
September 26, 1889, Pages 552-553
A FEW WORDS WITH THE VIGILANCE ASSOCIATION.
The time has come when the ladies and gentlemen calling themselves the National Vigilance Association may be peremptorily called upon for some answer to the challenge addressed to them in TRUTH of the 29th ultimo and the two weeks following. I am entitled to say, in view of the communications on the subject which have reached me from all parts of the kingdom and all sorts and conditions of men, that the article on “Religious Obscenity,” which I published on the first of those dates, has awakened a very widespread interest. The Vigilance Association have officially acknowledged that the subject concerns them by writing to me through their secretary for further information. I have given them that information (though it was already in their possession); but, although three weeks have since elapsed, no action of any kind has been taken. In the meantime the scandal has continued unabated. More than that, the offender--himself, be it remembered, officially connected with the Vigilance Association—-has written an impudent letter publicly congratulating himself on the fact that, by denouncing him as a purveyor of obscenity, I have given a. profitable stimulus to his abominable trade. I say, without hesitation, that the attitude of the Vigilance Association under these circumstances is one for which the public has some right to an explanation from a body arrogating to itself the high-sounding title of a “National” Association “for the Repression of Criminal Vice and Public Immorality.”
The question which immediately suggests itself to anyone searching for such an explanation is, Who are or what is the National Vigilance Association? One of the first letters which I received on the subject was something to the following effect:--
You may as well spare yourself the trouble of invoking the National Vigilance Association against this nuisance. That body is a purely sectarian organisation, composed of rabid Evangelicals and demented No Popery fanatics. Their sympathies are sure to be with the man Kensit; in fact, I shall be surprised if you do not find that some of them are actively instigating him in what they doubtless consider a sort of Holy War upon the “Scarlet Lady.”
I am, however, rejoiced to find that, so far as the personnel of the Vigilance Association is concerned, there is not a shadow of foundation for this suggestion. In order to test it, I have procured a prospectus of the Association; and the following selection of a few of the more conspicuous names, out of the 120 or so on the General Council, will, I think, satisfy the most sceptical as to the catholicity of the society's constitution and the bona fides of its motives. Certainly, if these names represent a “sectarian organisation,” I have had the good luck to discover the most comprehensive sect in all history:—-
The Bishop of Durham, Rev. Dr. Adler,
The Bishop of Southwell, Mr. Bramwell Booth,
Cardinal Manning, Mrs. Josephine Butler,
The Earl of Meath, Mr. B. F. C. Costelloe,
Sir Arthur Blackwood, Mrs. Henry Fawcett,
Right Hon. J. Stansfeld, M.P., Mr. Mark Knowles,
Professor Stuart, M.P., Mr. George Russell,
and
Mr. W. T. Stead.
Now let me ask these ladies and gentlemen, jointly and severally, on what ground they are prepared to justify their conduct in not merely conniving at Mr. John Kensit's trade, but in taking the man himself under their corporate patronage? Here we have a select quorum of moralists who have taken upon themselves to say what literature is or is not fit for their fellow-citizens to read. In pursuance of that laudable mission they have stopped the public sale of the works of the most popular French writer of the day, and they have succeeded in sending the publisher of those works to gaol for three months. They boast, further, of having attempted to prohibit the circulation of an acknowledged classic like the “Decameron” of Boccaccio, and they are (it must be presumed) equally prepared to set the law in motion against such native writers as the poet Chaucer or the Restoration dramatists. I ask, then, these ladies and gentlemen what apology they can offer for the fact that from the premises of their own official publisher there are now being issued some of the most filthy and demoralising productions that ever left the press—-and that long after the officials of the Association have had their attention called to the fact by some of their own subscribers?
Do the Vigilance Association doubt the accuracy of my description of the works in question? I am reluctant to give Kensit a further advertisement by discussing his publications in detail, but this is a matter in which plain-speaking is the first consideration. Conspicuous among the material of which Kensit's wares are compounded is the notorious “Maria Monk.” The work of Dr. Fulton's to which I referred a fortnight ago is simply a réchauffé of the most tasty passages in that filthy production, thinly disguised at the most outrageous points by a suggestive use of asterisks and “turned metal-rules,” a concession to decency worth about as much as the occasional use of drapery upon his subjects by the artist in obscene photography. But more than this; Kensit is also selling, at the price of one shilling, an unexpurgated edition of the same delectable work, either under its original name or under an improved title, which can only have been adopted for the purpose of attracting the connoisseur in pornography. To the clerical portion of the Vigilance Association the character of this book must be perfectly familiar. I offer no opinion on the authenticity of its pretended revelations, the truth or falsity of which is absolutely immaterial. I simply appeal to the Council of the Vigilance Association, as experts upon this question, to say whether in their judgment the promiscuous dissemination of a book of this nature in a cheap form must not be necessarily and wholly pernicious. Let me ask Cardinal Manning whether he regards “Maria Monk” as entitled to the character and privileges of a religious publication? Let me put the same question to the Bishop of Durham a man of broad and independent views; to the Bishop of Southwell, a schoolmaster of wide experience; to Canon Scott-Holland, whose name figures conspicuously among the subscribers to the Vigilance Association; or to Dr. Adler, whose opinion on this question all parties must accept as free from even the suspicion of theological animus. Or again, let me ask the opinion of any of these divines upon another work of Kensit's, to which I have already referred. What moral purpose do they consider can be served by extracting from the “Priest in Absolution” passage after passage of descriptive writing full of the foulest suggestion, and hawking them about the streets at the price of twopence? By Kensit's own confession, hundreds of thousands of this abomination have been sold at this price. I ask the professed guardians of public morality to look at the clerks and errand-boys and shop-girls who are devouring this filth in the guise of religion, and to say from whom they are in most danger—-from the Scarlet Lady of Rome or “the Protestant Publisher ” of Paternoster-row.
If it were necessary to discuss the motive, I have already said, in dealing with this subject, that even at the best the religious pretext for such offences is worthless. The motives under which Kensit shelters himself are not religious, but solely sectarian. These books make no pretence to a higher purpose than that of defaming the professors of a rival religious persuasion; and if unrestricted licence in the use of such weapons is allowed to one sect, it must be equally allowed to all. All the records of criminal vice and all the resources of prurient imagination must be left at the service of the author and publisher who merely profess to libel a particular form of religion. A new charter must be granted to Holywell-street. In my judgment, however, it is utterly unnecessary to use this argument. The religious pretext for these publications is a flimsy and untenable pretence—-or, at least, the motive is as much commercial as religious; and I appeal to the candid judgment of the Vigilance Association, or any decent minded person, in support of that view.
Only one word more. I disclaim most emphatically any feeling of hostility towards the National Vigilance Association. I have their annual report before me; and though I consider that in certain of their proceedings they have shown a lamentable excess of zeal and deficiency of discretion, I cordially recognize the invaluable character of much of the work which they are doing. I not only recognise it, but, as regards a very great deal of it, I humbly desire to avow myself a fellow-labourer in the same field. Again and again, in the pages of TRUTH, attention has been drawn to immoral traffic in pretended works of literature and art by the professional corrupters of youth; and, wherever the columns of this journal can be of any service in “the repression of criminal vice and public immorality” they have always been open for that purpose. It is for that reason that I have drawn public attention to Kensit and his works; and it is for this reason that I again call on the Vigilance Association to perform their obvious duty towards him.
---end
A capusle review of one of Kensit's publications.
The Literary World, Volume 37, January 6, 1887, Page 19
Scylla or Charybdis. Which? Gladstone or Salisbury? By Lord R. Montagu. This pamphlet cannot be taken seriously. It is written from the ultra-Protestant point of view, and propounds the astonishing theory that both Mr. Gladstone and Lord Salisbury—-the latter of whom is incidentally described as a topsy-turvy Balaam—-are conspiring with Romanists to separate Ireland, and make it an autonomous Roman Catholic State, and a snug home for an expelled and expatriated Pope. (John Kensit, City Protestant Book Depot. 1s.)
---end
Scylla Or Charybdis; Which? Gladstone Or Salisbury? (London: John Kensit, 1887), link
by Lord Robert Montagu
A Vizetelly edition of Zola.
Piping Hot!: (Pot-bouille.) A Realistic Novel (London: Vizetelly & Co., 1887), link
by Émile Zola, George Moore
Life of the Right. Hon. Sir William Molesworth, Bart., M.P., F.R.S. (London: Macmillan, 1901), link
by Millicent Garrett Fawcett (Dame)
In 1889, Labouchere in Truth twitted the NVA for not going after a religious publisher and then learned that the publisher was the distributor for the NVA's Vigilance Record.
Truth, Volume 26, August 15, 1889, Page 292
Where is the Vigilance Committee? During the last two or three weeks hawkers have been parading London with truckloads of an abominable publication called "The High Church Confessional." From a cursory view of one of the numerous copies with which I have been favoured, I should say that a more obscene work was never publicly offered for sale, and this filthy poison is being sold up and down the streets, under the very noses of the police, at the price of twopence. The publisher is one Kensit, of the “City Protestant Book Depôt,” 18, Paternoster-row, who boasts that he has sold 225,000 copies. It is nothing less than a public scandal that this Kensit and his associates should be at large, while Mr. Vizetelly is in gaol; for if what the latter has done be a crime, the crime is certainly infinitely worse when committed under the cloak of religion and morality.
August 29, 1889, Pages 381-382
RELIGIOUS OBSCENITY
In TRUTH of the 13th [sic] inst. I referred to the public sale by hawkers in the streets of London of a publication called "The High Church Confessional," issued by Mr. John Kensit of Paternoster-row. Correspondents had sent me copies of this work, and invited an expression of my opinion of it in the public interest, which I gave.
I have since received the following letter:--
SIR,—-My attention has been called to a most unwarranted attack, both upon myself as a publisher, and a pamphlet which is having a large sale and most effectually opening the eyes of Englishmen to the truth of the abominations of the Confessional. What the result of your remarks will be I cannot at present estimate; and, pending advice from my legal adviser, I am not in a position to judge. In the meantime, I ask you to give somewhat more than a cursory look at the pamphlet, and I claim in your next issue some further explanation or apology for your error.
Trusting you will see your way to act in this manner, and save any further action—-Yours, JOHN KENSIT.
I enclose some others of my pamphlets.
In fairness to Mr. Kensit, and at some violence to my own taste, I have made a further study of the publication in question. I regret to say that the result is to fully confirm my previous opinion. In addition to that, I have looked into some others of Mr. Kensit's pamphlets, including one which he did not send me, and which, in my judgment, deserves an even stronger censure than that which I passed upon “The High Church Confessional.” I am, therefore, unable to offer Mr. Kensit the apology he suggests.
As an alternative to an apology, however, I am asked for an “explanation.” Now, Mr. Kensit has consulted, or is about to consult, a legal adviser, who will, no doubt, be able to give him all necessary information respecting the laws against obscene literature and their bearing upon his own publications. I scarcely see, therefore, why I should be asked to explain either Mr. Kensit's position as a publisher, or mine as a public journalist criticising him. In view, however, of any possible “further action,” such as Mr. Kensit hints at, I will explain the situation as it presents itself to me.
A well-known publisher and literary man has just been sent to prison for publishing translations of the works of an eminent French novelist. They were not, in my judgment, immoral works. They did not, that is to say, set forth vice in an attractive or fascinating light—-quite the contrary, I should say. But they were most unquestionably indecent or obscene—-that is to say, they treated, without reticence or disguise, of subjects which people with healthy minds or cleanly tastes do not discuss or write about publicly. The publisher in question was prosecuted. I do not approve of the prosecution. I recognise the necessity of suppressing public indecency, whether in behaviour, or in language, or in print. But I look on it as a matter of police, not of morals, and I question the expediency of the police assuming a censorship over productions which have a bona-fide claim to be considered works of literature or art, as opposed to publications which cannot pretend to any other than an obscene motive. I do not so much complain of the law, which cannot easily draw delicate distinctions of this kind, as of the indiscretion and inconsistency of the busybodies who set the law in motion in this particular case. However, that is neither here nor there. The publisher was prosecuted, and his publications being unquestionably indecent in the sense I have above indicated, he was sentenced to a heavy term of imprisonment.
Now, I take Mr. Kensit's publication, “The High Church Confessional." I find in it page after page of the most loathsome indecency and obscenity, that is to say, the detailed discussion of subjects unfit for public discussion—-not merely of subjects which mere conventional delicacy enjoins silence about, but of vice and depravity in their foulest and most disgusting phases. What pleas, then, can Mr. Kensit urge why he and his publication should not be dealt with precisely in the same way as Mr. Vizetelly and his?
I can see only two, and both are obviously insufficient. Mr. Kensit may say, in the first place, that the passages to which I refer are merely quotation. The most offensive of them are, as a matter of fact, a verbatim reproduction of the foulest portions of a notorious ecclesiastical handbook called “The Priest in Absolution,” which, however, it is only fair to say, was never actually published, but merely printed for private circulation. Now, obviously such reproduction cannot be permitted unless the law is to become a dead letter. A second publisher cannot be allowed to republish in a quotation what the original publisher could be imprisoned for issuing, or any Holywell-street garbage monger might with impunity bring out an account of the Vizetelly case to-morrow, and “quote” all the most objectionable passages from Zola in an appendix. The first plea, then, is worthless. I imagine that Mr. Kensit will take refuge with more confidence in the second defence open to him—-that he publishes the book with a religious purpose and a good motive. But what is this worth? Granted that Mr. Kensit's motives are beyond reproach—-that he has not the remotest thought of the 225,000 twopences which have come in from the sale of his pamphlet—-was anything said about Mr. Vizetelly's motive, or those of M. Zola? I have no doubt that the latter gentleman could show without difficulty that his writings are dictated by no other motive than that of exposing social evils, unmasking vice, and strengthening the hands of the moralist and social reformer. But that would not avail him in a court of law. Looking at the matter from any point of view, it does not alter the police offence--the offence against public decency. And the moralists--the Vigilance Committee, let us say--would have an equally cogent answer. They would reply, "The motive is immaterial. The good which you will do is remote and problematical; the evil, on the other hand, is immediate and certain. Your writings are devoured by hundreds of boys and girls, or young men and young women, on whom they produce no other effect than sensual gratification and demoralisation of mind and body. You ought, therefore, to be suppressed in the interests of public virtue.” That is the argument used against Zola and Vizetelly, and it applies every bit as strongly to Kensit. I may say, indeed, that it applies with tenfold more force, for, while Vizetelly's indecency was offered to the public in the form of a French novel, bearing the significant name of Zola on the cover, and was sold at a substantial price; Kensit's production is hawked about the streets at the price of twopence, and offered to boys and girls, young and old, wise and ignorant, in the specious guise of a religious publication.
I have granted, so far, the blamelessness of Mr. Kensit's motive. But were it worth while, I should be disposed to offer one or two strong reflections upon that point. As it is, I cannot forbear pointing out that in a preface to what he very candidly calls “this dreadful book,” the publisher himself avows his object to be that of defeating “the Ritualistic traitors in the Protestant Church.” His entire catalogue of “Protestant Works” shows no higher object. This Protestant publisher, therefore, comes before the public far less as a religious teacher with a great moral lesson to enforce than as one whose first object is to vilify fellow Christians of a different persuasion, or to frighten away the sheep from an opposition flock. And it must be borne in mind that the licence which he claims in the pursuit of this amiable object must be equally conceded to the party whom he assails, and who will doubtless have as little difficulty in finding the right sort of dirt to fling back. The question, then, is not one of religion or of morals, but simply whether we are to allow rival divines to descend into the streets, there to bandy filthy epithets or pelt one another with garbage, to the annoyance and defilement of every decent bystander.
For these reasons I adhere to all that I have previously said about Mr. Kensit, and I once more call upon the Vigilance Committee to exercise against him the same vigilance which they displayed with so little reason or judgment against Mr. Vizetelly. Should they be disposed to do so, I should recommend them not to confine their attention to “The High Church Confessional,” but to make a study of Mr. Kensit's publications generally, and particularly of one, the name of which I shall be happy to furnish for that, but for no other, purpose. I know nothing of Mr. Kensit apart from these books. Neither have I any ill-will to the religious sect which he represents, nor any sympathy with the practices which he is desirous of suppressing. I simply assert that the public sale of certain of his books is unquestionably an outrage on public decency, and that the indiscriminate dissemination of such literature in the guise of religion must necessarily be injurious to public morals. And it is on these grounds that I contend that the law should be put in force against Mr. Kensit in the same way as against any other purveyor of obscene and pernicious publications.
September 5, 1889, Pages 421-422
IS THE VIGILANCE ASSOCIATION VIGLANT?
I have received, with mingled surprise and gratification, the following letter respecting Mr. Kensit, of Paternoster-row, and his publications:—-
National Vigilance Association, 267, Strand, London, W.C. (Near the Law Courts), August 31st, 1889.
To the Editor of TRUTH,
DEAR SIR,—-Our attention has been called to the article in this week's TRUTH entitled "Religious Obscenity." In one part of the article you call upon us to exercise the same vigilance towards Mr. Kensit as we have done towards Mr. Vizetelly. I shall be glad, therefore, if you will kindly forward me the title of the book you refer to as being even more obscene and pernicious in its character than the “High Church Confessional.”—-I am, yours very truly,
WM. ALEX. COOTE.
I have, as I intimated my willingness to do, forwarded to Mr. Coote the title of the work to which he refers in his last sentence. At the same time, I hope that this request is not to be taken as implying that “The High Church Confessional” itself does not afford sufficient materials for the exercise of the Vigialnces Association's vigilance. But now for the cause of my surprise at Mr. Coote's letter. I had previously, among numerous other communications on this subject, received the following:--
SIR,--I am glad that you have called attention to the class of publication issued by Mr. John Kensit. As a member of the National Vigilance Association I should like to inform you that the Secretary's attention was called, some time since, to one of these works and his opinion asked, but no answer has yet been received.
It may interest you to know that Mr. Kensit is , as the enclosed will show, the wholesale agent for the "Vigilance Record," the organ of the N. V. A.! Can this account for the Society's inaction in the matter--Your obedient servant, VIGILANS.
This is the enclosure which my correspondent referes to:--
THE VIGILANCE RECORD
Price One Penny, or 1s. 6d. per annum, post free.
Published by W.A. COOTE, at the Office of the National Vigilance Association, 267, Strand, W.C.
May be had wholesale of JOHN KENSIT, Publisher,18,Paternoster-row, E.C.
An edifying disclosure, certainly! Mr. John Kensit, the purveyor of obscene religious literature, is, it appears from this, himself the wholesale agent for the official organ of the National Vigilance Association. The Protestant publishing depôt in Paternoster-row seems, in short, to be a sort of literary chemist's shop, where the poison is kept on one shelf and the antidote on the next. The attention of Mr. William Alexander Coote, in his official capacity, was “some time ago.” directed to one of Kensit's publications, without, up to the present time, any result whatever. It certainly seems to me an incomprehensible state of things that the officers of a body with the pretentious title of the National Vigilance Association should require a stimulus from without to open their vigilant eyes to the character of the business carried on by their own publisher. It is, too, equally incomprehensible that, when their eyes have been opened, their “vigilance” should fail to translate itself into action. And, finally, it is not a little surprising that, after all this, the Secretary should write to me as if he had been all this time entirely in the dark. However, Vigilance is now, let us hope, wide awake, and fully equipped. Let us see whether she is ready to cast the beam out of her own eye.
September 12, 1889, Pages 454-455
I rejoice to find that the Bishop of Chichester has fallen into line with me in my recent attack on “Religious Obscenity.” One Dr. Fulton—-an American divine, if I mistake not—-has delivered a lecture at Brighton which would appear, from the Bishop of Chichester's rebuke to one of his clergy who was present, to have been not only obscene but blasphemous. Now this Fulton is (unless there are two professors of religious obscenity answering to this name) the author of one of the most filthy and disgusting works in Mr. John Kensit's abominable collection. The Bishop of Chichester appears surprised that the Rev. J. G. Gregory should have allowed Fulton's observations to pass without protest. To my mind it is even more astonishing that a clergyman of the English Church, knowing, as he must have known, something of Fulton's character and writings, should have appeared at the same meeting with him.
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But now another word about the National Vigilance Association. Will it be believed that it was actually this very book of Dr. Fulton's—-the filthy publication to which I have referred above—-to which the attention of this association was ineffectually called some time ago by one of their own subscribers, as mentioned in my article on this subject last week? It is now a fortnight since I called their attention to the subject, and a week since Mr. Coote wrote to me for information which it seems that he had already had for a long time in his possession. In the meantime, I am told that barrow-loads of one of the most obscene of Kensit's publications are still on sale in Fleet-street, and I see the statement in a journal calling itself The Christian that my attack “is giving a strong impetus to the sale of the pamphlet.” Had the Vigilance Association chosen, this trade could have been stopped for good a week ago. Why do they not choose?
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Just as I am going to press I have received the following interesting letter:-—
SIR,--Your personal attack upon me and my business is assuming such a position that I feel convinced you must be led on by some other influence than the one you are so loud in proclaiming, viz., the suppression of vice. You are certainly carrying out the old adage “No case, abuse the client.” By this time most of your readers have secured copies of my exposure of the abominable and dreadful High Church Confessional, and many have written thanking me for my noble effort and sympathising with me in the abuse, or worse, I have sustained at your hands. Your mentioning some other book, in fact all my books, has led to a most delightful inquiry by many, who never before took any interest in the subject of Priestism, which is once again trying to subjugate the minds and consciences of Englishmen. The title of your paper is TRUTH, I would that you carried out that title, and published the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the ruth. Sir, if the statements abominable and filthy, as you say they are, be true, why not apply your pen to an awakening of our fellow countrymen to the danger they are in by allowing their wives and daughters—-yes, and empty-headed sons—-to be bamboozled by this cursed system? As a well-informed Englishman, you must know that this is no question of sectarianism, but a matter of liberty of conscience and freedom unknown whenever Popery or its bastard child get the upper hand. If the Priest in Absolution had the power, your organ of TRUTH would soon be gagged, and the press generally muzzled. May I ask if you are aware that the Priest in Absolution is still in possession of the so-called Holy Cross Society, and that it is the manuel (sic) used for training our dear curates to hear confessions? Trusting you will insert this in your next issue,—Yours, JOHN KENSIT.
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Mr. Kensit's previous letter to me took the form of a request for an explanation or an apology, pending the result of a reference to his solicitor, which he had either made or was about to make. I gave him my explanation, and refused an apology. He now changes his tone, and favours me with the above mixture of abuse and cant. I presume that he has thought better of his application to his solicitor, or that the result of his application has been to satisfy him of what I told him before—-viz., that his filthy publications are an offence against the law and against public decency, and that if he had his deserts he would now be serving a term of imprisonment.
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That the sale of his books has increased owing to my notice of them is a misfortune which cannot be helped. I am aware that to publicly describe a certain book as obscene or immoral must have the immediate result of sending hundreds of degraded individuals in quest of it—-whether the book is to be found in Paternoster-row or Holywell-street. But that a publisher should have the audacity to boast, as Kensit does, of this result having actually followed, is a greater stretch of impudence than I was prepared for, and affords, I think, a striking indication of the true value of the religious pretext which is put forward in justification of the offence. However, the Vigilance Association have now Kensit's own admission that he is doing a roaring trade solely as the result of his having been publicly denounced as a purveyor of obscenity. They can have, after that, no excuse for doubt as to the nature of this trade, nor for hesitation in discharging the duty for which they profess to have associated themselves.
September 26, 1889, Pages 552-553
A FEW WORDS WITH THE VIGILANCE ASSOCIATION.
The time has come when the ladies and gentlemen calling themselves the National Vigilance Association may be peremptorily called upon for some answer to the challenge addressed to them in TRUTH of the 29th ultimo and the two weeks following. I am entitled to say, in view of the communications on the subject which have reached me from all parts of the kingdom and all sorts and conditions of men, that the article on “Religious Obscenity,” which I published on the first of those dates, has awakened a very widespread interest. The Vigilance Association have officially acknowledged that the subject concerns them by writing to me through their secretary for further information. I have given them that information (though it was already in their possession); but, although three weeks have since elapsed, no action of any kind has been taken. In the meantime the scandal has continued unabated. More than that, the offender--himself, be it remembered, officially connected with the Vigilance Association—-has written an impudent letter publicly congratulating himself on the fact that, by denouncing him as a purveyor of obscenity, I have given a. profitable stimulus to his abominable trade. I say, without hesitation, that the attitude of the Vigilance Association under these circumstances is one for which the public has some right to an explanation from a body arrogating to itself the high-sounding title of a “National” Association “for the Repression of Criminal Vice and Public Immorality.”
The question which immediately suggests itself to anyone searching for such an explanation is, Who are or what is the National Vigilance Association? One of the first letters which I received on the subject was something to the following effect:--
You may as well spare yourself the trouble of invoking the National Vigilance Association against this nuisance. That body is a purely sectarian organisation, composed of rabid Evangelicals and demented No Popery fanatics. Their sympathies are sure to be with the man Kensit; in fact, I shall be surprised if you do not find that some of them are actively instigating him in what they doubtless consider a sort of Holy War upon the “Scarlet Lady.”
I am, however, rejoiced to find that, so far as the personnel of the Vigilance Association is concerned, there is not a shadow of foundation for this suggestion. In order to test it, I have procured a prospectus of the Association; and the following selection of a few of the more conspicuous names, out of the 120 or so on the General Council, will, I think, satisfy the most sceptical as to the catholicity of the society's constitution and the bona fides of its motives. Certainly, if these names represent a “sectarian organisation,” I have had the good luck to discover the most comprehensive sect in all history:—-
The Bishop of Durham, Rev. Dr. Adler,
The Bishop of Southwell, Mr. Bramwell Booth,
Cardinal Manning, Mrs. Josephine Butler,
The Earl of Meath, Mr. B. F. C. Costelloe,
Sir Arthur Blackwood, Mrs. Henry Fawcett,
Right Hon. J. Stansfeld, M.P., Mr. Mark Knowles,
Professor Stuart, M.P., Mr. George Russell,
and
Mr. W. T. Stead.
Now let me ask these ladies and gentlemen, jointly and severally, on what ground they are prepared to justify their conduct in not merely conniving at Mr. John Kensit's trade, but in taking the man himself under their corporate patronage? Here we have a select quorum of moralists who have taken upon themselves to say what literature is or is not fit for their fellow-citizens to read. In pursuance of that laudable mission they have stopped the public sale of the works of the most popular French writer of the day, and they have succeeded in sending the publisher of those works to gaol for three months. They boast, further, of having attempted to prohibit the circulation of an acknowledged classic like the “Decameron” of Boccaccio, and they are (it must be presumed) equally prepared to set the law in motion against such native writers as the poet Chaucer or the Restoration dramatists. I ask, then, these ladies and gentlemen what apology they can offer for the fact that from the premises of their own official publisher there are now being issued some of the most filthy and demoralising productions that ever left the press—-and that long after the officials of the Association have had their attention called to the fact by some of their own subscribers?
Do the Vigilance Association doubt the accuracy of my description of the works in question? I am reluctant to give Kensit a further advertisement by discussing his publications in detail, but this is a matter in which plain-speaking is the first consideration. Conspicuous among the material of which Kensit's wares are compounded is the notorious “Maria Monk.” The work of Dr. Fulton's to which I referred a fortnight ago is simply a réchauffé of the most tasty passages in that filthy production, thinly disguised at the most outrageous points by a suggestive use of asterisks and “turned metal-rules,” a concession to decency worth about as much as the occasional use of drapery upon his subjects by the artist in obscene photography. But more than this; Kensit is also selling, at the price of one shilling, an unexpurgated edition of the same delectable work, either under its original name or under an improved title, which can only have been adopted for the purpose of attracting the connoisseur in pornography. To the clerical portion of the Vigilance Association the character of this book must be perfectly familiar. I offer no opinion on the authenticity of its pretended revelations, the truth or falsity of which is absolutely immaterial. I simply appeal to the Council of the Vigilance Association, as experts upon this question, to say whether in their judgment the promiscuous dissemination of a book of this nature in a cheap form must not be necessarily and wholly pernicious. Let me ask Cardinal Manning whether he regards “Maria Monk” as entitled to the character and privileges of a religious publication? Let me put the same question to the Bishop of Durham a man of broad and independent views; to the Bishop of Southwell, a schoolmaster of wide experience; to Canon Scott-Holland, whose name figures conspicuously among the subscribers to the Vigilance Association; or to Dr. Adler, whose opinion on this question all parties must accept as free from even the suspicion of theological animus. Or again, let me ask the opinion of any of these divines upon another work of Kensit's, to which I have already referred. What moral purpose do they consider can be served by extracting from the “Priest in Absolution” passage after passage of descriptive writing full of the foulest suggestion, and hawking them about the streets at the price of twopence? By Kensit's own confession, hundreds of thousands of this abomination have been sold at this price. I ask the professed guardians of public morality to look at the clerks and errand-boys and shop-girls who are devouring this filth in the guise of religion, and to say from whom they are in most danger—-from the Scarlet Lady of Rome or “the Protestant Publisher ” of Paternoster-row.
If it were necessary to discuss the motive, I have already said, in dealing with this subject, that even at the best the religious pretext for such offences is worthless. The motives under which Kensit shelters himself are not religious, but solely sectarian. These books make no pretence to a higher purpose than that of defaming the professors of a rival religious persuasion; and if unrestricted licence in the use of such weapons is allowed to one sect, it must be equally allowed to all. All the records of criminal vice and all the resources of prurient imagination must be left at the service of the author and publisher who merely profess to libel a particular form of religion. A new charter must be granted to Holywell-street. In my judgment, however, it is utterly unnecessary to use this argument. The religious pretext for these publications is a flimsy and untenable pretence—-or, at least, the motive is as much commercial as religious; and I appeal to the candid judgment of the Vigilance Association, or any decent minded person, in support of that view.
Only one word more. I disclaim most emphatically any feeling of hostility towards the National Vigilance Association. I have their annual report before me; and though I consider that in certain of their proceedings they have shown a lamentable excess of zeal and deficiency of discretion, I cordially recognize the invaluable character of much of the work which they are doing. I not only recognise it, but, as regards a very great deal of it, I humbly desire to avow myself a fellow-labourer in the same field. Again and again, in the pages of TRUTH, attention has been drawn to immoral traffic in pretended works of literature and art by the professional corrupters of youth; and, wherever the columns of this journal can be of any service in “the repression of criminal vice and public immorality” they have always been open for that purpose. It is for that reason that I have drawn public attention to Kensit and his works; and it is for this reason that I again call on the Vigilance Association to perform their obvious duty towards him.
---end
A capusle review of one of Kensit's publications.
The Literary World, Volume 37, January 6, 1887, Page 19
Scylla or Charybdis. Which? Gladstone or Salisbury? By Lord R. Montagu. This pamphlet cannot be taken seriously. It is written from the ultra-Protestant point of view, and propounds the astonishing theory that both Mr. Gladstone and Lord Salisbury—-the latter of whom is incidentally described as a topsy-turvy Balaam—-are conspiring with Romanists to separate Ireland, and make it an autonomous Roman Catholic State, and a snug home for an expelled and expatriated Pope. (John Kensit, City Protestant Book Depot. 1s.)
---end
Scylla Or Charybdis; Which? Gladstone Or Salisbury? (London: John Kensit, 1887), link
by Lord Robert Montagu
A Vizetelly edition of Zola.
Piping Hot!: (Pot-bouille.) A Realistic Novel (London: Vizetelly & Co., 1887), link
by Émile Zola, George Moore
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