Timothy Larson uses this book to demonstrate that despite the huge variety of Christian religious belief in the nineteenth century, the Victorians were so imbibed in the Bible that they really can be described as ‘a people of one book’. Larson chooses English representatives for groups from agnostics and atheists to Baptists, examining the way in which they each engaged with the Bible, both personally and privately. Even religious sceptics are shown to make regular use of Scriptural text, showing that to the Victorians at least, scepticism and a lack of Scriptural knowledge was by no means the same thing. Larson seeks to avoid what he describes as ‘the well-trampled path of chronicling the Victorian encounter with modern biblical criticism’, instead laying his emphasis on understanding the varieties of spiritual communities used by religious historians.
Larson's research is impressively detailed, and this, combined with a genuine skill in writing his subjects, makes Larson's study a fascinating personal account of Victorian public and religious figures. Larson has a stated aim to include as many women as possible in his survey, and this adds a vital dimension to the study. Many of the women included are seen through the lens of their personal and familial relationship with the Bible, such as the Unitarian Mary Carpenter, whose daily family gatherings revolved around reading Scripture. If there is a slight problem with this approach, it is that such personal accounts may limit the extent to which these women can be considered representative of their denomination. Florence Nightingale, for instance, is chosen to represent the liberal Anglicans, and is shown to have been dedicated to Scriptural learning throughout her life. While Larson argues that a study of Florence Nightingale escapes the restrictions that other, ordained, liberal Anglicans would have met, it perhaps would have been helpful to look at some Church figures as well, given the charge which Larson acknowledges that this group was non-biblical. It is clear that Nightingale's commitment to Scripture affected not only her own life, but informed her engagement with liberal Anglicanism. However, so personal is this account, that it is difficult to judge how far she can be seen to ‘represent’ the group. Josephine Butler is likewise problematic as a representative of evangelical Anglicans, Larson having to spend several pages establishing just what kind of evangelical Anglican Butler was. In other chapters, however, the use of figures who were not ‘typical’ of their denominations works extremely well for Larson's purpose. For instance, the chapter on Methodists looks at Catherine Booth and William Cooke, both with very different approaches to Methodism. However, Larson is able to show that the Bible was a unifying force for the Methodists, and that group differences were those of church government rather than the use of Scripture.
A chapter on Anglo-Catholics begins with the sentence, ‘It is important to keep in mind how much E. B. Pusey was hated’. What follows is a lively discussion on ‘Puseyism’ which dispels the idea that only Low Church Protestantism had the Bible at its centre. Despite Pusey's Biblical scholarship being dismissed by many, Larson reveals a more nuanced engagement with Scripture, in which it was not Scripture itself which was pitted against tradition, but rather individual interpretation of Scripture against that of Church fathers. This look at the Victorian debate surrounding Pusey leads nicely on to the Roman Catholic chapter, in which Archbishop Wiseman faced the same charges of ignoring Scripture by Protestant Victorians facing a Catholic revival. Larson points to anti-Catholic tracts such as Popery: an Enemy of Scripture, and Are Roman Catholics forbidden to read the Scripture? Larson argues that not only was Wiseman's engagement with Scripture ignored by his Protestant contemporaries, but that it has been largely ignored by historians, an oversight which he seeks to rectify in this book.
Larson also dedicates chapters to agnostics and atheists, although the atheists Charles Bradlaugh and Annie Besant are considered mostly (and not uncritically) in terms of the contradictions in the Gospels which fuelled their atheism. The chapter on Agnostics is perhaps more revealing, examining T.H. Huxley's regular use of biblical imagery to express his ideas. Anxious to provide a genuinely complete survey, the conclusion includes those groups for whom Larson was unable to dedicate a whole chapter, and the Plymouth Brethren, Judaism and even spiritualism are considered. The result is an impeccable examination of the Victorians’ relationship with Bible, and after a fascinating tour through the myriad of Victorian denominations, Larson really does make the case for ‘a people of one book’.
