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 A LETTER 
 
 TO 
 
 THE REV. E. B. PUSEY, D.D. 
 
 Olf 
 
 HIS EECENT 
 
 EIEENIOON. 
 
 BY 
 
 JOHN HENRY NEWMAN, D.D. 
 
 OF THE OEATOEY. 
 
 Veui, Domine, et noli tardare, relaxa facinora plebi tuse ; et revoca disperses 
 in ter ram suam. 
 
 SECOND EDITION. 
 
 LONDON: 
 
 LONGMANS, GEEEN, LEADER, AND DYER, 
 
 PATEENOSTEK ROW. 
 
 1866. 
 
LONDON : 
 
 GILBERT AND RIVINGTON, PRINTERS, 
 ST. JOHN’S SQDARE. 
 

 VUI 
 
 A LETTER, 
 
 <^c. 
 
 No one who desii’es the union of Christendom after 
 its many and long-standing divisions, can have any 
 other feeling than joy, my dear Pusey, at finding 
 from your recent Volume, that you see your way to 
 make definite proposals to us for effecting that 
 great object, and are able to lay down the basis 
 and conditions on which you could co-operate in 
 advancing it. It is not necessary that we should 
 concur in the details of your scheme, or in the 
 principles which it involves, in order to welcome 
 the important fact, that, with your personal know- 
 ledge of the Anglican body, and your experience of 
 its composition and tendencies, you consider the 
 time to be come when you and your friends may, 
 ^^ithout imprudence, turn your minds to the con- 
 ^ templation of such an enterprise. Even were you 
 c^an individual member of that Church, a watchman 
 i|upon a high tower in a metropolis of religious 
 
 A 2 
 
4 
 
 INTRODUCTION 
 
 opinion, we should naturally listen with interest to 
 what you had to report of the state of the sky and 
 the progress of the night, what stars were mount- 
 ing up or what clouds gathering, — what were the 
 prospects of the three great parties which Angli- 
 canism contains within it, and what was just now 
 the action upon them respectively of the politics 
 and science of the time. You do not go into these 
 matters ; but the step you have taken is evidently 
 the measure and the issue of the view which you 
 have formed of them all. 
 
 However, you are not a mere individual; from 
 early youth you have devoted yourself to the Esta- 
 blished Church, and, after between forty and fifty 
 years of unremitting labour in its service, your 
 roots and your branches stretch out through every 
 portion of its large territory. You, more than any 
 one else alive, have been the present and untiring 
 agent by whom a great work has been effected in 
 it ; and, far more than is usual, you have received 
 in your life-time, as well as merited, the confidence 
 of your brethren. You cannot speak merely for 
 yourself ; your antecedents, your existing influence, 
 are a pledge to us, that what you may determine 
 will be the determination of a multitude. Num- 
 bers, too, for whom you cannot properly be said to 
 speak, will be moved by your authority or your 
 arguments ; and numbers, again, who are of a 
 school more recent than your own, and who are 
 only not your followers because they have out- 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 5 
 
 stripped you in their free speeches and demon- 
 strative acts in our behalf, will, for the occasion, 
 accept you as their spokesman. There is no one 
 any where, — among ourselves, in your own body, 
 or, I suppose, in the Greek Church, — who can 
 affect so large a circle of men, so virtuous, so able, 
 so learned, so zealous, as come, more or less, under 
 your influence; and I cannot pay them a greater 
 compliment, than to tell them they ought all to be 
 Catholics, nor do them a more affectionate service 
 than to pray that they may one day become such. 
 Nor can I address myself to an act more pleasing, 
 as I trust, to the Divine Lord of the Church, or 
 more loyal and dutiful to His Vicar on earth, than 
 to attempt, however feebly, to promote so great a 
 consummation. 
 
 1 know the joy it would give those conscientious 
 men, of whom I am speaking, to be one with our- 
 selves. I know how their hearts spring up with a 
 spontaneous transport at the very thought of union ; 
 and what yearning is theirs after that great privi- 
 lege, which they have not, communion with the see 
 of Peter, and its present, past, and future. I con- 
 jecture it by what I used to feel myself, while yet 
 in the Anglican Church. I recollect well what an 
 outcast I seemed to myself, when I took down from 
 the shelves of my library the volumes of St. Atha- 
 nasius or St. Basil, and set mvself to studv them ; 
 and how, on the contrary, when at length I was 
 brought into Catholic Communion, I kissed them 
 
6 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 with delight, with a feeling that in them I had more 
 than all that I had lost, and, as though I were directly 
 addressing the glorious saints, who bequeathed them 
 to the Church, I said to the inanimate pages, 
 “You are now mine, and I am now yours, beyond 
 any mistake.” Such, I conceive, would be the joy of 
 the persons I speak of, if they could wake up one 
 morning, and find themselves rightfully possessed 
 of Catholic traditions and hopes, without violence to 
 their own sense of duty ; — and, certainly, I am the 
 ' last man to say that such violence is in any case 
 lawful, that the claims of conscience are not para- 
 mount, or that any one may overleap what he 
 deliberately holds to be God’s command, in order 
 to make his path easier for him or his heart 
 lighter. 
 
 I am the last man to quarrel with this jealous de- 
 ference to the voice of our conscience, whatever judg- 
 ment others may form of us in consequence, for this 
 reason, — because their case, as it at present stands, 
 has, as you know, been my own. You recollect well 
 what hard things were said against us twenty-five 
 years ago, which we knew in our hearts we did 
 not deserve. Hence, I am now in the position of 
 the fugitive Queen in the well-known passage ; 
 who, “ baud ignara mali ” herself, had learned to 
 sympathize with those who were the inheritors of 
 her past wanderings. There were Priests, good men, 
 whose zeal outstripped their knowledge, and who 
 in consequence spoke confidently, when they would 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 7 
 
 have been wiser, had they suspended their adverse 
 judgment of those whom they had soon to welcome 
 as brethren in communion. We at that time were 
 in worse plight than your friends are now, for our 
 opponents put their very hardest thoughts of us 
 into print. One of them wrote thus in a Letter 
 addressed to one of the Catholic Bishops : — 
 
 That this Oxford crisis is a real progress to Catholicism, 
 I have all along considered a perfect delusion. ... I look 
 upon Mr. Newman, Dr. Pusey, and their associates, as wily 
 and crafty, though unskilful guides. . . . The embrace of 
 Mr. Newman is the kiss that would betray us. . . . But, — 
 what is the most striking feature in the rancorous malignity 
 of these men, — their calumnies are often lavished upon us, 
 when we should be led to think that the subject-matter of 
 their treatises closed every avenue against their vituperation. 
 The three last volumes [of the Tracts] have opened my eyes 
 to the craftiness and the cunning, as well as the malice, of the 
 members of the Oxford Convention. ... If the Puseyites are 
 to be the new Apostles of Great Britain, my hopes for my 
 country are lowering and gloom}^ ... I would never have con- 
 sented to enter the lists against this strange confraternity. . . . 
 if I did not feel that my own Prelate was opposed to the guile 
 and treachery of these men. ... I impeach Dr. Pusey and his 
 friends of a deadly hatred of our religion. . . . What, my 
 Lord, would the Holy See think of the works of these 
 Puseyites? ...” 
 
 Another priest, himself a convert, wrote : — 
 
 “ As we approach towards Catholicity, our love and respect 
 increases, and our violence dies away ; but the bulk of these 
 men become more rabid as they become like Borne, a plain 
 proof of their designs. ... I do not believe that they are any 
 nearer the portals of the Catholic Church than the most pre- 
 judiced Methodist and Evangelical preacher. . . . Such, Bev. 
 Sir, is an outline of my views on the Oxford movement.” 
 
8 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 I do not say that such a view of us was un- 
 natural; and, for myself, I readily confess, that 
 I had used about the Church such language, that 
 I had no claim on Catholics for any mercy. But, 
 after all, and in fact, they were wrong in their 
 anticipations, — nor did their brethren agree with 
 them at the time. Especially Dr. Wiseman (as 
 he was then) took a larger and more generous 
 view of us ; nor did the Holy See interfere, though 
 the writer of one of these passages invoked its judg- 
 ment. The event showed that the more cautious 
 line of conduct was the more prudent; and one of 
 the Bishops, who had taken part against us, with 
 a supererogation of charity, sent me on his death- 
 bed an expression of his sorrow for having in past 
 years mistrusted me. A faulty conscience, faith- 
 fully obeyed, through God’s mercy, had in the long 
 run brought me right. 
 
 Fully, then, do I recognize the rights of con- 
 science in this matter. I find no fault with your 
 stating, as clearly and completely as you can, the 
 difficulties which stand in the way of your joining 
 us. I cannot wonder that you begin with stipu- 
 lating conditions of union, though I do not concur 
 in them myself, and think that in the event you 
 yourself would be content to let them drop. Such 
 representations as yours are necessary to open the 
 subject in debate; they ascertain how the land 
 lies, and serve to clear the ground. Thus I begin: 
 — but after allowing as much as this, I am obliged 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 9 
 
 in honesty to say what I fear, my dear Pusey, will 
 pain you. Yet I am confident, my very dear Friend, 
 that at least you will not be angry with me if I 
 say, what I must say, or say nothing at all, that 
 there is much both in the matter and in the manner 
 of your Volume, calculated to wound those who 
 love you well, but love truth more. So it is; 
 with the best motives and kindest intentions, — 
 “ Csedimur, et totidem plagis consumimus hostem.” 
 We give you a sharp cut, and you return it. You 
 complain of our being “ dry, hard, and unsym- 
 pathizing;” and we answer that you are unfair 
 and irritating. But we at least have not pro- 
 fessed to he composing an Irenicon, when we 
 treated you as foes. There was one of old time 
 who wreathed his sword in myrtle; excuse me — 
 you discharge your olive-branch as if from a 
 catapult. 
 
 Do not think I am not serious; if I spoke seri- 
 ously, I should seem to speak harshly. Who will 
 venture to assert, that the hundred pages which 
 you have devoted to the Blessed Virgin give other 
 than a one-sided view of our teaching about her, 
 little suited to win us ? It may be a salutary cas- 
 tigation, if any of us have fairly provoked it, but 
 it is not making the best of matters; it is not 
 smoothing the way for an understanding or a 
 compromise. It leads a writer in the most mode- 
 rate and liberal Anglican newspaper of the day, 
 the “Guardian,” to turn away from your repre- 
 
10 
 
 INTRODUCTION, 
 
 sentation of us with horror. “ It is language,” says 
 your Eeviewer, “ which, after having often heard it, 
 we still can only hear with hori’or. We had rather 
 not quote any of it, or of the comments upon it,” 
 What could an Exeter Hall orator, what could a 
 Scotch commentator on the Apocalypse, do more 
 for his own side of the controversy in the picture 
 he drew of us ? You may he sure that what 
 creates horror on one side, will be answered by 
 indignation on the other, and these are not the 
 most favourable dispositions for a peace conference. 
 I had been accustomed to think, that you, who in 
 times past were ever less declamatory in contro- 
 versy than myself, now that years had gone on, and 
 circumstances changed, had come to look on our 
 old warfare against Rome as cruel and inexpedient. 
 Indeed, I know that it was a chief objection urged 
 against me only last year by persons who agreed 
 with you in deprecating an Oratory at Oxford, 
 which at that time was in prospect, that such an 
 undertaking would he the signal for the rekindling 
 of that fierce style of polemics which is now out 
 of date. I had fancied you shared in that opinion ; 
 but now, as if to show how imperative you deem 
 its renewal, you actually bring to life one of my 
 own strong sayings in 1841, which had long been 
 in the grave, — that “ the Roman Church comes as 
 near to idolatry as can be supposed in a Church, 
 of which it is said, ‘ The idols He shall utterly 
 abolish.’ ” — p. 111. 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 11 
 
 I know, indeed, and feel deeply, that your fre- 
 quent references, in your Volume, to what I have 
 lately or formerly written, are caused by your 
 strong desire to he still one with me as far as you 
 can, and by that true affection, which takes plea- 
 sure in dwelling on such sayings of mine as you 
 can still accept with the full approbation of your 
 judgment. I trust I am not ungrateful or irre- 
 sponsive to you in this respect; hut other con- 
 siderations have an imperative claim to be taken 
 into account. Pleasant as it is to agree with you, 
 I am bound to explain myself in cases in which I 
 have changed my mind, or have given a wrong 
 impression of my meaning, or have been wrongly 
 reported; and, while I trust that I have higher 
 than such personal motives for addressing you in 
 print, yet it will serve to introduce my main sub- 
 ject, and give me an opportunity for remarks 
 which bear upon it indirectly, if I dwell for a page 
 or two on such matters contained in your Volume 
 as concern myself. 
 
 1. The mistake which I have principally in view 
 is the belief which is widely spread, that I have 
 publicly spoken of the Anglican Church as “the 
 great bulwark against infidelity in this land.” In 
 a pamphlet of yours a year old, you spoke of “ a 
 very earnest body of Eoman Catholics,” who “ re- 
 joice in all the workings of God the Holy Ghost in 
 the Church of England (whatever they think of 
 her), and are saddened by what weakens her who 
 
12 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 is, in God’s hands, the great bulwark against infi- 
 delity in this land.” The concluding words you 
 were thought to quote from my Apologia. In con- 
 sequence, Dr. Manning, now our Archbishop, re- 
 plied to you, asserting, as you say, “ the contradic- 
 tory of that statement.” In that counter-assertion, 
 he was at the time generally considered (rightly 
 or wrongly as it may be), though writing to you, 
 to he really correcting statements in my Apologia., 
 without introducing my name. Further, in the 
 Volume, which you have now published, you recur 
 to the saying; and you speak of its author in terms, 
 which, did I not know your partial kindness for me, 
 would hinder me from identifying him with myself. 
 You say, “ The saying was not mine, but that of 
 one of the deepest thinkers and observers in the 
 Roman Communion,” p. 7. A friend has suggested 
 to me that perhaps you mean De Maistre ; and, from 
 an anonymous letter which I have received from 
 Dublin, I find it is certain that the very words in 
 question were once used by Archbishop Murray ; but 
 you speak of the author of them as if now alive. At 
 length, a reviewer of your Volume in the “ Weekly 
 Register,” distinctly attributes them to me by name, 
 and gives me the first opportunity I have had of dis- 
 owning them ; and this I now do. What, ai some time 
 or other, I may have said in conversation or private 
 letter, of course, I cannot tell; but I have never, I 
 am sure, used the word “ bulwark ” of the Anglican 
 Church deliberately. What I said in my Apologia 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 13 
 
 was this : — That that Church was “ a serviceahlo 
 breakwater against errors more fundamental than 
 its own.” A bulwark is an integral part of the 
 thing it defends ; whereas the words “ serviceable ” 
 and “breakwater” imply a kind of protection, 
 which is accidental and de facto. Again, in saying 
 that the Anglican Church is a defence against 
 “ errors more fundamental than its own,” I imply 
 that it has errors, and those fundamental. 
 
 2. There is another passage in your Volume, at 
 p. 337, which it may be right to observe upon. 
 You have made a collection of passages from the 
 Fathers, as witnesses in behalf of your doctrine that 
 the whole Christian faith is contained in Scripture, 
 as if, in your sense of the words. Catholics contra- 
 dicted you here. And you refer to my Notes on St. 
 Athanasius as contributing passages to your list; 
 but, after all, neither do you, nor do I in my Notes, 
 affirm any doctrine which Rome denies. Those 
 Notes also make frequent reference to a traditional 
 teaching, which (be the faith ever so certainly con- 
 tained in Scripture), still is necessary as a Eegula 
 Fidei, for showing us that it is contained there; vid. 
 pp. 283, 344; and this tradition, I know, you uphold 
 as fully as I do in the Notes in question. In con- 
 sequence, you allow that there is a twofold rule. 
 Scripture and Tradition; and this is all that 
 Catholics say. How, then, do Anglicans differ from 
 Rome here ? I believe the difference is merely one 
 of words; and I shall he doing, so far, the work 
 
14 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 of an Irenicon, if I make clear what this verbal 
 difference is. Catholics and Anglicans (I do not 
 say Protestants), attach different meanings to the 
 word “ proof,” in the controversy whether the whole 
 faith is, or is not, contained in Scripture. We 
 mean that not every article of faith is so contained 
 there, that it may thence be logically proved, inde- 
 pendently of the teaching and authority of the Tra- 
 dition ; hut Anglicans mean that every article of 
 faith is so contained there, that it may thence he 
 proved, provided there be added the illustrations 
 and compensations supplied by the Tradition. And 
 it is in this latter sense that the Fathers also speak 
 in the passages which you quote from them. I am 
 sure at least that St, Athanasius frequently adduces 
 passages in proof of points in controversy, which no 
 one would see to be proofs, unless Apostolical Tra- 
 dition were taken into account, first as suggesting, 
 then as authoritatively ruling their meaning. Thus, 
 you do not deny, that the whole is not in Scripture 
 in such sense that pure unaided logic can draw it 
 from the sacred text ; nor do we deny, that the 
 faith is in Scripture, in an improper sense, in the 
 sense that Tradition is able to recognize and deter- 
 mine it there. You do not profess to dispense 
 with Tradition ; nor do we forbid the idea of pro- 
 bable, secondary, symbolical, connotative, senses of 
 Scriptui'e, over and above those which properly 
 belong to the wording and context. I hope you 
 will agree with me in this. 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 15 
 
 3. Nor is it only in isolated passages that you 
 give me a place in your Volume. A considerable 
 portion of it is written with a reference to two 
 publications of mine, one of which you name and de- 
 fend, the other you implicitly protest against; Tract 
 90, and the Essay on Doctrinal Development. As 
 to Tract 90, you have from the first, as all the 
 world knows, boldly stood up for it, in spite of the 
 obloquy which it brought upon you, and have done 
 me a great service. You are now republishing it 
 with my cordial concurrence ; hut I take this oppor- 
 tunity of noticing, lest there should be any mistake 
 on the part of the public, that you do so with a 
 different object from that which I had when I wrote 
 it. Its original purpose was simply that of justi- 
 fying myself and others in subscribing to the 39 
 Articles, while professing many tenets which had 
 popularly been considered distinctive of the Roman 
 faith. I considered that my interpretation of the 
 Articles, as I gave it in that Tract, would stand, 
 provided the parties imposing them allowed it; 
 otherwise, I thought it could not stand : and, when 
 in the event the Bishops and public opinion did not 
 allow it, I gave up my Living, as having no right 
 to retain it. My feeling about the interpretation 
 is expressed in a passage in Loss and Gain, which 
 runs thus : — 
 
 “‘Is it,’ asked Eeding, ‘a received view?’ ‘No view is 
 received,’ said the other ; ‘ the Articles themselves are re- 
 
 ceived, but there is no authoritative interpretation of them 
 at all.’ ‘Well,’ said Eeding, ‘is it a tolerated view?’ ‘It 
 
IG 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 certainly has been strongly opposed/ answered Bateman ; ^ but 
 it has never been condemned.’ ‘ That is no answer,’ said 
 Charles. ‘ Does any one Bishop hold it ? Did any one Bishop 
 ever hold it ? Has it ever been formally admitted as tenable 
 by any one Bishop ? Is it a view got up to meet existing 
 difficulties, or has it an historical existence?’ Bateman could 
 give only one answer to these questions, as they were suc- 
 cessively put to him. ‘I thought so,’ said Charles; Hhe 
 view is specious certainly. I don’t see why it might not have 
 done, had it been tolerably sanctioned; but you have no 
 sanction to show me. As it stands, it is a mere theory struck 
 out by individuals. Our Church might have adopted this 
 mode of interpreting the Articles ; but, from what you tell 
 me, it certainly has not done so.’ ” — Ch. 15. 
 
 However, the Tract did not carry its object and 
 conditions on its face, and necessarily lay open to 
 interpretations very far from the true one. Dr. 
 Wiseman (as he then was), in particular, with the 
 keen apprehension which was his characteristic, at 
 once saw in it a basis of accommodation between 
 Anglicanism and Rome. He suggested broadly 
 that the decrees of the Council of Trent should he 
 made the rule of interpretation for the 39 Articles, 
 a proceeding, of which Sancta Clara, I think, had 
 set the example ; and, as you have observed, pub- 
 lished a letter to Lord Shrewsbury on the subject, 
 of which the following are extracts : — 
 
 “ We Catholics must necessarily deplore [England’s] separa- 
 tion as a deep moral evil, — as a state of schism, of which 
 nothing can justify the continuance. Many members of the 
 Anglican Church view it in the same light as to the first point 
 — its sad evil; though they excuse their individual position in 
 it as an unavoidable misfortune. ... We may depend upon 
 a willing, an able, and a most zealous co-operation with any 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 17 
 
 effort which we may make, towards bringing her into her 
 rightful position, in Catholic unity with the Holy See and the 
 Churches of its obedience, — in other words, with the Church 
 Catholic. Is this a visionary idea ? Is it merely the expression 
 of a strong desire? I know that many will so judge it; and, 
 perhaps, were I to consult my own quiet, I would not venture to 
 express it. But I will, in simplicity of heart, cling to hopefulness, 
 cheered, as I feel it, by so many promising appearances. . . . 
 
 “ A natural question here presents itself ; — what facilities 
 appear in the present state of things for bringing about so 
 happy a consummation, as the reunion of England to the 
 Catholic Church, beyond what have before existed, and par- 
 ticularly under Archbishops Laud or Wake. It strikes me, 
 many. Eirst, &c. ... A still more promising circumstance 
 I think your Lordship will with me consider the jplan w^hich 
 the eventful Tract No. 90 has pursued, and in which Mr. Ward, 
 Mr. Oakeley, and even Dr. Pusey have agreed. I allude to the 
 method of bringing their doctrines into accordance with ours by 
 explanation, A foreign priest has pointed out to us a valuable 
 document for our consideration, — ^ Bossuet’s Eeply to the 
 Pope,’ — when consulted on the best method of reconciling the 
 followers of the Augsburg Confession with the Holy See. The 
 learned Bishop observes, that Providence had allowed so much 
 Catholic truth to be preserved in that Confession, that full 
 advantage should be taken of the circumstance; that no 
 retractations should be demanded, but an explanation of the 
 Confession in accordance with Catholic doctrines. Now, for 
 such a method as this, the way is in part prepared by the 
 demonstration that such interpretation may be given of the 
 most difficult Articles, as will strip them of all contradiction to 
 the decrees of the Tridentine Synod. The same method may be 
 pursued on other points ; and much pain may thus be spared to 
 individuals, and much difficulty to the Church.” — Pp. 11. 35. 38. 
 
 This use of my Tract, so different from my own, 
 but sanctioned by the great name of our Cardinal, 
 you are now reviving ; and I gather from your doing 
 so, that your Bishops and the opinion of the public 
 
 B 
 
18 
 
 INTKODUCTION. 
 
 are likely now, or in prospect, to admit wliat 
 twenty- five years ago they refused. On this point, 
 much as it rejoices me to know your anticipation, 
 of course, I cannot have an opinion, 
 
 4. So much for Tract 90. On the other hand, 
 as to my hypothesis of Doctrinal Development, I am 
 sorry to find you do not look upon it with friendly 
 eyes; though how, without its aid, you can main- 
 tain the doctrines of the Holy Trinity and Incarna- 
 tion, and others which you hold, I cannot under- 
 stand. You consider my principle may be the 
 means, in time to come, of introducing into our 
 Creed, as portions of the necessary Catholic faith, 
 the Infallibility of the Pope, and various opinions, 
 pious or profane, as it may be, about our Blessed 
 Lady. I hope to remove your anxiety as to these 
 consequences, before I bring my observations to an 
 end ; at present I notice it as my apology for inter- 
 fering in a controversy which at first sight is no 
 business of mine. 
 
 5. I have another reason for writing; and that 
 is, unless it is rude in me to say so, because you 
 seem to think writing does not become me, as being 
 a convert. I do not like silently io acquiesce in 
 such a judgment. You say at p, 98: — 
 
 ‘‘ Nothing can be more unpractical than for an individual to 
 throw himself into the Eoman Church, because he could accept 
 the letter of the Council of Trent. Those who were born 
 Eoman Catholics, have a liberty, which, in the nature of 
 things, a person could not have, who left another system, to 
 embrace that of Eome, I cannot imagine how any faith could 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 19 
 
 stand the shock of leaving one system, criticizing and cast 
 himself into another system, criticizing it. Eor myself, I have 
 always felt that had (which God of His mercy avert hereafter 
 also) the English Church, by accepting heresy, driven me out 
 of it, I could have gone in no other way than that of closing 
 my eyes, and accepting whatever was put before me. But a 
 liberty which individuals could not use, and explanations, 
 wdiich, so long as they remain individual, must be unauthori- 
 tative, might be formally made by the Church of Borne to the 
 Church of England as the basis of re-union.” 
 
 And again, p. 210: — 
 
 It seems to me to be a psychological impossibility for one 
 who has already exchanged one system for another to make 
 those distinctions. One who, by his own act, places himself 
 under authority, cannot make conditions about his submission. 
 But definite explanations of our Articles have, before now, 
 been at least tentatively offered to us, on the Boman and 
 Greek side, as sufficient to restore communion; and the 
 Boman explanations too w^ere, in most cases, mere supplements 
 to our Articles, on points upon which our Church had not 
 spoken.” 
 
 Now passages such as these seem almost a chal- 
 lenge to me to speak; and to keep silence would 
 be to assent to the justice of them. At the cost, 
 then, of speaking about myself, of which I feel 
 there has been too much of late, I observe upon 
 them as follows : — Of course, as you say, a convert 
 comes to learn, and not to pick and choose. He 
 comes in simplicity and confidence, and it does not 
 occur to him to weigh and measure every proceed- 
 ing, every practice which he meets with among 
 those whom he has joined. He comes to Catho- 
 licism as to a living system, with a living teaching, 
 
 B 2 
 
20 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 and not to a mere collection of decrees and canons, 
 which by themselves are of course but the frame- 
 w'ork, not the body and substance of the Church. 
 And this is a truth which concerns, which binds, 
 those also who never knew any other religion, not 
 only the convert. By the Catholic system, I mean 
 that rule of life, and those practices of devotion, 
 for which we shall look in vain in the Creed of 
 Pope Pius. The convert comes, not only to believe 
 the Church, but also to trust and obey her priests, 
 and to conform himself in charity to her people. 
 It would never do for him to resolve that he 
 never would say a Hail Mary, never avail himself 
 of an indulgence, never kiss a crucifix, never ac- 
 cept the Lent dispensations, never mention a 
 venial sin in confession. All this would not only 
 he unreal, hut dangerous too, as ai'guing a wrong 
 state of mind, which could not look to receive the 
 divine blessing. Moreover, he comes to the cere- 
 monial, and the moral theology, and the ecclesias- 
 tical regulations, which he finds on the spot where 
 his lot is cast. And again, as regards matters of 
 politics, of education, of general expedience, of 
 taste, he does not criticize or controvert. And thus 
 surrendering himself to the influences of his new 
 religion, and not risking the loss of revealed truth al- 
 together by attempting by a private rule to discrimi- 
 nate every moment its substance from its accidents, 
 he is gradually so indoctrinated in Catholicism, as 
 at length to have a right to speak as well as to 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 21 
 
 hear. Also in course of time a new generation 
 rises round him; and there is no reason why he 
 should not know as much, and decide questions with 
 as true an instinct, as those who perhaps number 
 fewer years than he does Easter communions. He 
 has mastered the fact and the nature of the differ- 
 ences of theologian from theologian, school from 
 school, nation from nation, era from era. He 
 knows that there is much of what may he called 
 fashion in opinions and practices, according to the 
 circumstances of time and place, according to cur- 
 rent politics, the character of the Pope of the day, 
 or the chief Prelates of a particular country ; — and 
 that fashions change. Plis experience tells him, 
 that sometimes what is denounced in one place as 
 a great offence, or preached up as a first principle, 
 has in another nation been immemorially regarded 
 in just a contrary sense, or has made no sensation 
 at all, one way or the other, when brought before 
 public opinion ; and that loud talkers, in the Church 
 as elsewhere, are apt to carry all before them, while 
 quiet and conscientious persons commonly have to 
 give way. He perceives that, in matters which 
 happen to be in debate, ecclesiastical authority 
 watches the state of opinion and the direction and 
 course of controversy, and decides accordingly; so 
 that in certain cases to keep back his own judg- 
 ment on a point, is to be disloyal to his superiors. 
 
 So far generally ; now in particular as to myself. 
 After twenty years of Catholic life, I feel no deli- 
 
22 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 cacy in giving my opinion on any point when there 
 is a call for me, — and the only reason why I have 
 not done so sooner or more often than I have, is 
 that there has been no call. I have now reluctantly 
 come to the conclusion that your Volume is a call. 
 Certainly, in many instances in which theologian 
 differs from theologian, and country from country, 
 I have a definite judgment of my own; I can say so 
 without offence to any one, for the very reason that 
 from the nature of the case it is impossible to agree 
 with all of them. I prefer English habits of belief 
 and devotion to foreign, from the same causes, and 
 by the same right, which justifies foreigners in pre- 
 ferring their own. In following those of my people, 
 I show less singularity, and create less disturbance 
 than if I made a flourish with what is novel and 
 exotic. And in this line of conduct I am but 
 availing myself of the teaching which I fell in with 
 on becoming a Catholic ; and. it is a pleasure to me 
 to think that what I hold now, and would transmit 
 after me if I could, is only what I received then. 
 The utmost delicacy was observed on all hands in 
 giving me advice: only one warning remains on 
 my mind, and it came from Dr. Griffiths, the late 
 Vicar- Apostolic of the London district. He warned 
 me against books of devotion of the Italian school, 
 which were just at that time coming into England; 
 and when I asked him what hooks he recommended 
 as safe guides, he hade me get the works of Bishop 
 Hay. By this I did not understand that he was 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 23 
 
 jealous of all Italian books, or made himself re- 
 sponsible for all that Dr. Hay happens to have 
 said; hut I took him to caution me against a cha- 
 racter and tone* of religion, excellent in its place, 
 not suited for England. When I went to Rome, 
 though it may seem strange to you to say it, even 
 there I learned nothing inconsistent with this judg- 
 ment. Local influences do not form the atmo- 
 sphere of its institutions and colleges, which are 
 Catholic in teaching as well as in name. I recollect 
 one saying among others of my confessor, a Jesuit 
 father, one of the holiest, most prudent men I ever 
 knew. He said that we could not love the Blessed 
 Virgin too much, if we loved our Lord a great deal 
 more. When I returned to England, the first ex- 
 pression of theological opinion which came in my 
 way, was apropos of the series of translated Saints’ 
 Lives which the late Dr. Faber originated. That 
 expression proceeded from a wise prelate, who was 
 properly anxious as to the line which might he 
 taken by the Oxford converts, then for the first 
 time coming into work. According as I recollect 
 his opinion, he was apprehensive of the effect of 
 Italian compositions, as unsuited to this country, 
 and suggested that the Lives should he original 
 works, drawn up by ourselves and our friends from 
 Italian sources. If at that time I was betrayed into 
 any acts which w^ere of a more extreme character 
 than I should approve now, the responsibility of 
 course is mine; but the impulse came, not from 
 
24 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 old Catholics or superiors, but from men whom 
 I loved and trusted, who were younger than myself. 
 But to whatever extent I might be carried away, 
 and I cannot recollect any tangible instances, my 
 mind in no long time fell back to what seems to 
 me a safer and more practical course. 
 
 Though I am a convert, then, I think I have a 
 right to speak out ; and that the more because other 
 converts have spoken for a long time, while I have 
 not spoken ; and with still more reason may I speak 
 without otfence in the case of your present cri- 
 ticisms of us, considering that, in the charges you 
 bring, the only two English writers you quote in 
 evidence, are both of them converts, younger in 
 age than myself. I put aside the Archbishop of 
 course, because of his office. These two authors 
 are worthy of all consideration, at once from their 
 character and from their ability. In their re- 
 spective lines they are perhaps without equals at 
 this particular time; and they deserve the influ- 
 ence they possess. One is still in the vigour of 
 his powers; the other has departed amid the tears 
 of hundreds. It is pleasant to praise them for their 
 real excellencies ; but why do you rest on them as 
 authorities ? You say of the one that he was “ a 
 popular writer;” but is there not sufficient reason 
 for this in the fact of his remarkable gifts, of his 
 poetical fancy, his engaging frankness, his playful 
 wit, his affectionateness, his sensitive piety, without 
 supposing that the wide diffusion of his works 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 25 
 
 arises out of his particular sentiments about the 
 Blessed Virgin ? And as to our other friend, do 
 not his energy, acuteness, and theological reading, 
 displayed on the vantage ground of the historic 
 “ Dublin Review,” fully account for the sensation 
 he has produced, without supposing that any great 
 number of our body go his lengths in their view of 
 the Pope’s infallibility ? Our silence as regards their 
 writings is very intelligible : it is not agreeable to 
 protest, in the sight of the world, against the 
 writings of men in our own communion whom we 
 love and respect. But the plain fact is this, — they 
 came to the Church, and have thereby saved their 
 souls ; hut they are in no sense spokesmen for 
 English Catholics, and they must not stand in the 
 place of those who have a real title to such an office. 
 The chief authors of the passing generation, some 
 of them still alive, others gone to their reward, are 
 Cardinal Wiseman, Dr. Ullathorne, Dr. Lingard, 
 Mr. Tierney, Dr. Oliver, Dr. Rock, Dr. Water- 
 worth, Dr. Husenbeth, and Mr. Flanagan ; which 
 of these ecclesiastics has said any thing extreme 
 about the prerogatives of the Blessed Virgin or the 
 infallibility of the Pope ? 
 
 I cannot, then, without remonstrance, allow you 
 to identify the doctrine of our Oxford friends in 
 question, on the two subjects I have mentioned, 
 with the present spirit or the prospective creed 
 of Catholics ; or to assume, as you do, that, because 
 they are thorough-going and relentless in their 
 
26 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 statements, therefore they ai'e the harbingers of a 
 new age, when to show a deference for Antiquity- 
 will be thought little else than a mistake. For 
 myself, hopeless as you consider it, I am not 
 ashamed still to take my stand upon the Fathers, 
 and do not mean to budge. The history of their 
 times is not yet an old almanac to me. Of course I 
 maintain the value and authority of the “ Schola,” 
 as one of the loci theologici ; still I sympathize with 
 Petavius in preferring to its “ contentious and 
 subtle theology,” that “ more elegant and fruitful 
 teaching which is moulded after the image of 
 erudite antiquity.” The Fathers made me a Ca- 
 tholic, and I am not going to kick down the ladder 
 by which I ascended into the Church. It is a 
 ladder quite as serviceable for that purpose now 
 as it was twenty years ago. Though I hold, as 
 you know, a process of development in Apostolic 
 truth as time goes on, such development does not 
 supersede the Fathers, hut explains and completes 
 them. And, in particular, as regards our teaching 
 concerning the Blessed Virgin, with the Fathers I 
 am content; — and to the subject of that teaching I 
 mean to address myself at once. I do so, because 
 you say, as I myself have said in former years, that 
 “ That vast system as to the Blessed Virgin .... 
 to all of us has been the special crux of the Roman 
 system.” — P. 101. Here, I say, as on other points, 
 the Fathers are enough for me. I do not wish to 
 say more than they, and will not say less. You, I 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 27 
 
 know, will profess the same; and thus we can join 
 issue on a clear and broad principle, and may hope 
 to come to some intelligible result. We are to 
 have a Treatise on the subject of our Lady soon 
 from the pen of the Most Keverend Prelate; but 
 that cannot interfere with such a mere argument 
 from the Fathers as that to which I shall confine 
 myself here. Nor indeed, as regards that argu- 
 ment itself, do I profess to be offering you any new 
 matter, any facts which have not been used by 
 others, — by great divines, as Petavius, by living 
 writers, nay, by myself on other occasions ; I write 
 afresh nevertheless, and that for three reasons ; first, 
 because I wish to contribute to the accurate state- 
 ment and the full exposition of the argument in 
 question ; next, because I may gain a more patient 
 hearing than has sometimes been granted to better 
 men than myself; lastly, because there just now 
 seems a call on me, under my circumstances, to 
 avow plainly what I do and what I do not hold 
 about the Blessed Virgin, that others may know, 
 did they come to stand where I stand, what they 
 would and what they would not be bound to hold 
 concerning her. 
 
28 
 
 CATHOLIC DOCTRINE AND DEVOTION 
 
 I BEGIN by making a distinction which will go 
 far to remove good part of the difficulty of my 
 undertaking, as it presents itself to ordinary in- 
 quirers, — the distinction between faith and devo- 
 tion. I fully grant that devotion towards the 
 Blessed Virgin has increased among Catholics with 
 the progress of centuries ; I do not allow that the 
 doctrine concerning her has undergone a growth, 
 for I believe that it has been in substance one 
 and the same from the beginning. 
 
 By “faith” I mean the Creed and the acceptance 
 of the Creed ; by “ devotion ” I mean such reli- 
 gious honours as belong to the objects of our faith, 
 and the payment of those honours. Faith and de- 
 votion are as distinct in fact as they are in idea. 
 We cannot, indeed, be devout without faith, but 
 we may believe without feeling devotion. Of this 
 phenomenon every one has experience both in him- 
 self and in others ; and we express it as often as we 
 speak of realizing a truth or not realizing it. It 
 may be illustrated, with more or less exactness, hy 
 matters which come before us in the world. For 
 instance, a great author, or public man, may be 
 acknowledged as such for a course of years ; yet 
 
WITH RESPECT TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 29 
 
 there may be an increase, an ebb and flow, and a 
 fashion, in his popularity. And if he takes a last- 
 ing place in the minds of his countrymen, he may 
 gradually grow into it, or suddenly be raised to it. 
 The idea of Shakespeare as a great poet, has ex- 
 isted from a very early date in public opinion ; and 
 there were at least individuals then who under- 
 stood him as well, and honoured him as much, as 
 the English people can honour him now; yet, I 
 think, there is a national devotion to him in this 
 day such as never has been before. This has hap- 
 pened, because, as education spreads in the country, 
 there are more men able to enter into his poetical 
 genius, and, among these, more capacity again for 
 deeply and critically understanding him; and yet, 
 from the first, he has exerted a great insensible in- 
 fluence over the nation, as is seen in the circum- 
 stance that his phrases and sentences, more than can 
 he numbered, have become almost proverbs among 
 us. And so again in philosophy, and in the 
 arts and sciences, great truths and principles have 
 sometimes been known and acknowledged for a 
 course of years; hut, whether from feebleness of 
 intellectual power in the recipients, or external cir- 
 cumstances of an accidental kind, they have not 
 been turned to account. Thus the Chinese are said 
 to have known of the properties of the magnet from 
 time immemorial, and to have used it for land ex- 
 peditions, yet not on the sea. Again, the ancients 
 knew of the principle that water finds its own 
 
30 
 
 CATHOLIC DOCTEINE AND DEVOTION 
 
 level, but seem to have made little application of 
 their knowledge. And Aristotle was familiar with 
 the principle of induction ; yet it was left for Bacon 
 to develope it into an experimental philosophy. 
 Illustrations such as these, though not altogether 
 apposite, serve to convey that distinction between 
 faith and devotion on which I am insisting. It is 
 like the distinction between objective and subjective 
 truth. The sun in the spring-time will have to shine 
 many days before he is able to melt the frost, open 
 the soil, and bring out the leaves; yet he shines out 
 from the first, notwithstanding, though he makes 
 his power felt but gradually. It is one and the 
 same sun, though his influence day by day becomes 
 greater ; and so in the Catholic Church it is the one 
 Virgin Mother, one and the same from first to last, 
 and Catholics may acknowledge her; and yet, in 
 spite of that acknowledgment, their devotion to 
 her may be scanty in one time and place, and over- 
 flowing in another. 
 
 This distinction is forcibly brought home to a 
 convert, as a peculiarity of the Catholic religion, on 
 his first introduction to its worship. The faith is 
 every where one and the same ; but a large liberty 
 is accorded to private judgment and inclination in 
 matters of devotion. Any large church, with its 
 collections and groups of people, will illustrate this. 
 The fabric itself is dedicated to Almighty God, and 
 that, under the invocation of the Blessed Virgin, or 
 some particular Saint ; or again, of some mystery be- 
 
WITH KESPECT TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 31 
 
 longing to the Divine Name or to the Incarnation, or 
 of some mystery associated with the Blessed Virgin. 
 Perhaps there are seven altars or more in it, and 
 these again have their several Saints. Then there is 
 the Feast proper to the particular day ; and, during 
 the celebration of Mass, of all the worshippers who 
 crowd around the Priest, each has his own parti- 
 cular devotions, with which he follows the rite. No 
 one interferes with his neighbour ; agreeing, as it 
 were, to differ, they pursue independently a common 
 end, and by paths, distinct but converging, present 
 themselves before God. Then there are Confrater- 
 nities attached to the church, — of the Sacred Heart, 
 or the Precious Blood; associations of prayer for a 
 good death, or the repose of departed souls, or the 
 conversion of the heathen ; devotions connected with 
 the brown, blue, or red scapular; — not to speak of 
 the great ordinary Kitual through the four seasons, 
 the constant Presence of the Blessed Sacrament, its 
 ever-recurring rite of Benediction, and its extraor- 
 dinary forty hours’ Exposition. Or, again, look 
 through some such manual of prayers as the Rac- 
 colta,' and you at once will see both the number 
 and the variety of devotions, which are open to 
 individual Catholics to choose from, according to 
 their religious taste and prospect of personal edifi- 
 cation. 
 
 Now these diversified modes of honouring God 
 did not come to us in a day, or only from the 
 Apostles; they are the accumulations of centuries; 
 
32 CATHOLIC DOCTRINE AND DEVOTION, &C. 
 
 and, as in the course of years some of them spring up, 
 so others decline and die. Some are local, in memory 
 of some particular saint, who happens to be the Evan- 
 gelist, or Patron, or pride of the nation, or who is 
 entombed in the church, or in the city where it 
 stands ; and these, necessarily, cannot have an earlier 
 date than the Saint’s day of death or interment there. 
 The first of such sacred observances, long before 
 these national memories, were the devotions paid 
 to the Apostles , then those which were paid to the 
 Martyrs ; yet there were Saints nearer to our Lord 
 than either Martyrs or Apostles; but, as if these 
 had been lost in the effulgence of His glory, and 
 because they were not manifested in external works 
 separate from Him, it happened that for a long 
 while they were less dwelt upon. However, in pro- 
 cess of time, the Apostles, and then the Martyrs, 
 exerted less influence than before over the popular 
 mind, and the local Saints, new creations of God’s 
 power, took their place, or again, the Saints of some 
 religious order here or there established. Then, 
 as comparatively quiet times succeeded, the reli- 
 gious meditations of holy men and their secret 
 intercourse with heaven gradually exerted an in- 
 fluence out of doors, and permeated the Christian 
 populace, by the instrumentality of preaching and 
 by the ceremonial of the Church. Then those 
 luminous stars rose in the ecclesiastical heavens, 
 which were of more august dignity than any which 
 had preceded them, and were late in rising, for the 
 
THE BLESSED VIRGIN THE SECOND EVE. 33 
 
 very reason that they were so specially glorious. 
 Those names, I say, which at first sight might have 
 been expected to enter soon into the devotions of the 
 faithful, with better reason might have been looked 
 for at a later date, and actually were late in their 
 coming. St. Joseph fuimishes the most striking 
 instance of this remark ; here is the clearest of 
 instances of the distinction between doctrine and 
 devotion. Who, from his prerogatives and the 
 testimony on which they come to us, had a greater 
 claim to receive an early recognition among the 
 faithful ? A saint of Scripture, the foster-father 
 of our Lord, he was an object of the universal and 
 absolute faith of the Christian world from the first, 
 yet the devotion to him is comparatively of late 
 date. When once it began, men seemed surprised 
 that it had not been thought of before; and now, 
 they hold him next to the Blessed Virgin in their 
 religious affection and veneration. 
 
 As regards the Blessed Virgin, I shall postpone 
 the question of devotion for a while, and inquire 
 first into the doctrine of the undivided Church (to 
 use your controversial phrase), on the subject of 
 her prerogatives. 
 
 What is the great rudimental teaching of An- 
 tiquity from its earliest date concerning her ? By 
 “ rudimental teaching ” I mean the primd facie 
 view of her person and office, the broad outline 
 laid down of her, the aspect under which she comes 
 
 c 
 
34 
 
 THE BLESSED VIRGIN 
 
 to US, in the writings of the Fathers. She is the 
 Second Eveh Now let us consider what this im- 
 plies. Eve had a definite, essential position in the 
 First Covenant. The fate of the human race lav 
 with Adam; he it was who represented us. It 
 was in Adam that we fell ; though Eve had fallen, 
 still, if Adam had stood, we should not have lost 
 those supernatural privileges which were bestowed 
 upon him as our first father. Yet though Eve was 
 not the head of the race, still, even as regards the 
 race, she had a place of her own ; for Adam, to whom 
 was divinely committed the naming of all things, 
 entitled her “ the Mother of all the living,” a name 
 surely expressive, not of a fact only, but of a dignity ; 
 hut further, as she thus had her own general rela- 
 tion to the human race, so again had she her own 
 special place, as regards its trial and its fall in 
 Adam. In those primeval events. Eve had an in- 
 tegral share. “ The woman, being seduced, was in 
 the transgression.” She listened to the Evil Angel; 
 she offered the fruit to her husband, and he ate 
 of it. She co-operated, not as an irresponsible in- 
 strument, but intimately and personally in the sin : 
 she brought it about. As the history stands, she 
 was a sine-qua-non^ a positive, active, cause of it. 
 And she had her share in its punishment; in the 
 sentence pronounced on her, she was recognized 
 as a real agent in the temptation and its issue. 
 
 Vid. Essay ou Development of Doctrine, 184-5, p. 384, &c. 
 
THE SECOND EVE. 
 
 85 
 
 and she suffered accordingly. In that awful trans- 
 action there were three parties concerned, — the 
 serpent, the woman, and the man ; and at the time 
 of their sentence, an event was announced for the 
 future, in which the three same parties were to 
 meet again, the serpent, the woman, and the man; 
 hut it was to be a second Adam and a second Eve, 
 and the new Eve was to be the mother of the new 
 Adam. “ I will put enmity between thee and the 
 woman, and between thy seed and her seed.” The 
 Seed of the woman is the Word Incarnate, and the 
 Woman, whose seed or son He is, is His mother 
 Mary. This interpretation, and the parallelism it 
 involves, seem to me undeniable; hut at all events 
 (and this is my point) the parallelism is the doc- 
 trine of the Fathers, from the earliest times; and, 
 this being established, we are able, by the position 
 and office of Eve in our fall, to determine the posi- 
 tion and office of Mary in our restoration. 
 
 I shall adduce passages from their writings, with 
 their respective countries and dates; and the dates 
 shall extend from their births or conversions to 
 their 'deaths, since what they propound is at once 
 the doctrine which they had received from the 
 generation before them, and the doctrine which 
 was accepted and recognized as true by the gene- 
 ration to whom they transmitted it. 
 
 First then St. Justin Martyr (a.d. 120 — 165), 
 St. Irenseus (120 — 200) and Tertullian (160 — 240). 
 Of these Tertullian represents Africa and Rome; 
 
 c 2 
 
36 
 
 THE BLESSED VIRGIN 
 
 St. Justin represents Palestine ; and St. Irenieus Asia 
 Minor and Gaul; — or rather he represents St. John 
 the Evangelist, for he had been taught by the Mar- 
 tyr St. Polycarp, who was the intimate associate, as 
 of St. John, so of the other Apostles. 
 
 1 . St. Justin ^ : — 
 
 “ We know that He, before all creatures, proceeded from the 
 Father by His power and will, . . . and by means of the Virgin 
 became man, that by what way the disobedience arising from 
 the serpent had its beginning, by that way also it might have 
 an undoing. For Eve, being a virgin and undefiled, conceiving 
 the word that was from the serpent, brought forth disobe- 
 dience and death ; but the Virgin Mary, taking faith and joy, 
 when the Angel told her the good tidings, that the Spirit of 
 the Lord should come upon her and the power of the Highest, 
 overshadow her, and therefore the Holy One that was born 
 of her was Son of God, answered, Ee it to me according 
 to thy word.” — Tryph, 100. 
 
 2. Tertullian: — 
 
 God recovered His image and likeness, which the devil 
 had seized, by a rival operation. For into Eve, as yet a virgin, 
 had crept the word which was the framer of death. Equally 
 into a virgin was to be introduced the Word of God which was 
 the builder-up of life ; that, what by that sex had gone into 
 perdition, by the same sex might be brought back to salvation. 
 Eve had believed the serpent ; Mary believed Gabriel ; the 
 fault which the one committed by believing, the other by be- 
 lieving has blotted out.” — De Cam. Christ. 17. 
 
 3. St. Irenseus:— 
 
 “ With a fitness, Mary the Virgin is found obedient, saying. 
 
 ^ I have attempted to translate literally without caring to 
 write English. The original passages are at the end of the 
 Letter. 
 
THE SECOND EVE. 
 
 37 
 
 ‘ Behold Thy handmaid, O Lord ; be it to me according to 
 thy word.’ But Eve was disobedient ; for she obeyed not, 
 while she was yet a virgin. As she, having indeed Adam for a 
 husband, but as yet being a virgin .... becoming disobedient, 
 became the cause of death both to herself and to the whole 
 human race, so also Mary, having the predestined man, and 
 being yet a virgin, being obedient, became both to herself and 
 to the whole human race the cause of salvation .... And on 
 account of this the Lord said, that the first would be last and 
 the last first. And the Prophet signifies the same, saying, 
 ‘ Instead of fathers you have children.’ Por, whereas the Lord, 
 when born, was the first begotten of the dead, and received into 
 His bosom the primitive fathers. He regenerated them into the 
 life of God, He Himself becoming the beginning of the living, 
 since Adam became the beginning of the dying. Therefore 
 also Luke, commencing the lines of generations from the Lord 
 referred it back to Adam, signifying that He regenerated the 
 old fathers, not they Him, into the Gospel of life. And so the 
 knot of Eve’s disobedience received its unloosing through the 
 obedience of Mary ; for what Eve, a virgin, bound by incre- 
 dulity, that Mary, a virgin, unloosed by faith.” — Adv, Seer, iii. 
 22. 31. 
 
 And again, — 
 
 ‘‘ As Eve by the speech of an Angel was seduced, so as to 
 flee God, transgressing His word, so also Mary received the 
 good tidings by means of the Angel’s speech, so as to bear 
 God within her, being obedient to His word. And, though 
 the on6 had disobeyed God, yet the other was drawn to obey 
 God ; that of the virgin Eve the virgin Mary might become 
 the advocate. And, as by a virgin the human race had been 
 bound to death, by a virgin it is saved, the balance being 
 preserved, a virgin’s disobedience by a virgin’s obedience.” — 
 Ibid., V. 19. 
 
 Now, what is especially noticeable in these three 
 writers, is, that they do not speak of the Blessed 
 Virgin merely as the physical instrument of our 
 
38 
 
 THE BLESSED VIRGIN 
 
 Lord’s taking flesh, but as an intelligent, responsible 
 cause of it ; her faith and obedience being accessories 
 to the Incarnation, and gaining it as her reward. As 
 Eve failed in these virtues, and thereby brought on 
 the fall of the race in Adam, so Mary by means of 
 them had a part in its restoration. You surely 
 imply, pp. 255, 256, that the Blessed Virgin was only 
 a physical instrument in our redemption ; “ what 
 has been said of her by the Fathers as the chosen 
 vessel of the Incarnation, was applied personally to 
 her,” (that is, by Catholics,) p. 151, and again “the 
 Fathers speak of the Blessed Virgin as the instru- 
 ment of our salvation, in that she gave birth to the 
 Redeemer,” pp. 155, 156; whereas St. Augustine, in 
 well-known passages, speaks of her as more exalted 
 by her sanctity than by her relationship to our 
 Lordk However, not to go beyond the doctrine of 
 the Three Fathers, they unanimously declare that she 
 was not a mere instrument in the Incarnation, such 
 as David, or Judah, may be considered ; they declare 
 she co-operated in our salvation, not merely by the 
 descent of the Holy Ghost upon her body, but by 
 specific holy acts, the efiect of the Holy Ghost 
 within her soul; that, as Eve forfeited privileges 
 by sin, so Mary earned privileges by the fruits of 
 grace; that, as Eve was disobedient and unbe- 
 lieving, so Mary was obedient and believing ; 
 that, as Eve was a cause of ruin to all, Mary was a 
 
 ’ 0pp. t. 3, p. 2, col. 8G9, t. 6, col. 342. 
 
THE SECOND EVE, 
 
 39 
 
 cause of salvation to all; that as Eve made room 
 for Adam’s fall, so Mary made room for our Lord’s 
 reparation of it; and thus, whereas the free gift 
 was not as the offence, hut much greater, it follows 
 that, as Eve co-operated in effecting a great evil, 
 Mary co-operated in effecting a much greater good. 
 
 And, besides the run of the argument, which re- 
 minds the reader of St. Paul’s antithetical sentences 
 in tracing the analogy between Adam’s work and 
 our Lord’s work, it is well to observe the particular 
 words under which the Blessed Virgin’s office is 
 described, Tertullian says that Mary “ blotted out” 
 Eve’s fault, and “ brought back the female sex,” or 
 “ the human race, to salvation ;” and St. Irenseus 
 says that “ by obedience she was the cause or 
 occasion ” (whatever was the original Greek word) 
 “ of salvation to herself and the whole human race;” 
 that by her the human race is saved ; that by her 
 Eve’s complication is disentangled; and that she is 
 Eve’s Advocate, or friend in need. It is supposed 
 by critics, Protestant as well as Catholic, that the 
 Greek word for Advocate in the original was Pa- 
 raclete; it should he borne in mind, then, when 
 we are accused of giving our Lady the titles and 
 offices of her Son, that St. Irenseus bestows on her 
 the special Name and office proper to the Holy 
 Ghost. 
 
 So much as to the nature of this triple testi- 
 mony; now as to the worth of it. For a moment 
 put aside St, Irenseus, and put together St. Justin 
 
40 
 
 THE BLESSED VIRGIN 
 
 in the East with Tertullian in the West. I think 
 I may assume that the doctrine of these two 
 Fathers about the Blessed Virgin, was the received 
 doctrine of their own respective times and places ; 
 for writers after all are but witnesses of facts and 
 beliefs, and as such they are treated by all parties 
 in controversial discussion. Moreover, the coinci- 
 dence of doctrine which they exhibit, and again, 
 the antithetical completeness of it, show that they 
 themselves did not originate it. The next question 
 is. Who did ? for from one definite organ or 
 source, place or person, it must have come. Then 
 we must inquire, what length of time would it take 
 for such a doctrine to have extended, and to be 
 received, in the second century over so wide an 
 area; that is, to be received before the year 200 in 
 Palestine, Africa, and Rome. Can we refer the 
 common source of these local traditions to a date 
 later than that of the Apostles, St. John dying 
 within thirty or forty years of St. Justin’s conver- 
 sion and Tertullian’s birth ? Make what allowance 
 you will for whatever possible exceptions can be 
 taken to this representation ; and then, after doing 
 so, add to the concordant testimony of these two 
 Fathers the evidence of St. Irenseus, which is so 
 close upon the School of St. John himself in Asia 
 Minor. “A three-fold cord,” as the wise man 
 says, “ is not quickly broken.” Only suppose there 
 were so early and so broad a testimony, to the effect 
 that our Lord was a mere man, the son of Joseph; 
 
THE SECOND EVE. 
 
 41 
 
 should \vc be able to insist upon the faith of the 
 Holy Trinity as necessary to salvation ? Or sup- 
 posing three such witnesses could be brought to 
 the fact that a consistory of elders governed the 
 local churches, or that each local congregation was 
 an independent Church, or that the Christian 
 community was without priests, could Anglicans 
 maintain their doctrine that the rule of Episcopal 
 succession is necessary to constitute a Church ? 
 And then recollect that the Anglican Church 
 especially appeals to the ante-Nicene centuries, 
 and taunts us with having superseded their 
 testimony. 
 
 Having then adduced these Three Fathers of 
 the second century, I have at least got so far as 
 this : viz. — no one, who acknowledges the force of 
 early testimony in determining Christian truth, can 
 wonder, no one can complain, can object, that we 
 Catholics should hold a very high doctrine con- 
 cerning the Blessed Virgin, unless indeed stronger 
 statements can be brought for a contrary concep- 
 tion of her, either of as early, or at least of a later 
 date'. But, as far as I know, no statements can be 
 brought from the ante-Nicene literature, to inva- 
 lidate the testimony of the three Fathers concern- 
 ing her ; and little can be brought against it from 
 the fourth century, while in that fourth century 
 the current of testimony in her behalf is as strong 
 as in the second; and, as to the fifth, it is far 
 stronger than in any former time, both in its fulness 
 
42 
 
 THE BLESSED VIRGIN 
 
 and its authority. This will to some extent be seen 
 as I proceed. 
 
 4. St. Cyril of Jerusalem (315 — 386) speaks for 
 Palestine : — 
 
 Since through Eve, a Virgin, came death, it behoved, that 
 through a Virgin, or rather from a Virgin, should life appear ; 
 that, as the Serpent had deceived the one, so to the other 
 Gabriel might bring good tidings.” — Cat. xii. 15. 
 
 5. St. Ephrem Syras (he died 378) is a witness 
 for the Syrians proper and the neighbouring Orien- 
 tals, in contrast to the Grseco-Syrians. A native 
 of Nisibis on the further side of the Euphrates, 
 he knew no language but Syriac. 
 
 “ Through Eve, the beautiful and desirable glory of men was 
 extinguished : but it has revived through Mary.” — Cp]). Syr. 
 ii. p. 318. 
 
 Again : — - 
 
 In the beginning, by the sin of our first parents, death 
 passed upon all men ; to-day, through Mary w^e are translated 
 from death unto life. In the beginning, the serpent filled the 
 ears of Eve, and the poison spread thence over the whole body ; 
 to-day, Mary from her ears received the champion of eternal 
 happiness : what, therefore, was an instrument of death, was 
 an instrument of life also.” — iii. p. G07. 
 
 I have already referred to St. Paul’s contrast 
 between Adam and our Lord in his Epistle to the 
 Homans, as also in his first Epistle to the Corin- 
 thians. Some writers venture to say that there is 
 no doctrinal truth, but a mere rhetorical display, in 
 those passages. It is quite as easy to say so, as to 
 attempt so to dispose of this received comparison, 
 
THE SECOND EVE. 
 
 43 
 
 in the writings of the Fathers, between Eve and 
 Marv. 
 
 6. St. Epiphanius (320 — 400) speaks for Egypt, 
 Palestine, and Cyprus : — 
 
 “ She it is, who is signified by Eve, enigmatically receiving 
 
 the appellation of the Mother of the living It was a 
 
 wonder that after the fall she had this great epithet. And, 
 according to what is material, from that Eve all the race of 
 men on earth is generated. But thus in truth from Mary the 
 Life itself was born in the world, that Mary might bear living 
 things, and become the Mother of living things. Therefore, 
 enigmatically, Mary is called the Mother of living things . . . 
 Also, there is another thing to consider as to these women, and 
 wonderful, — as to Eve and Mary. Eve became a cause of 
 death to man .... and Mary a cause of life ; . . . that life 
 might be instead of death, life excluding death which came from 
 the woman, viz. He who through the woman has become our 
 life.”— 78. 18. 
 
 7. By tbe time of St. Jerome (331 — 420), the 
 contrast between Eve and Mary had almost passed 
 into a proverb. He says {Ep. xxii. 21, ad 
 Eustoch.')^ “Death by Eve, life by Mary.” Nor let 
 it be supposed that he, any more than the preced- 
 ing .Fathers, considered the Blessed Virgin a mere 
 physical instrument of giving birth to our Lord, 
 who is the Life. So far from it, in the Epistle 
 from which I have quoted, he is only adding an- 
 other virtue to that crown which gained for Mary 
 her divine Maternity. They have spoken of faith, 
 joy, and obedience ; St. Jerome adds, what they had 
 only suggested, virginity. After the manner of the 
 Fathers in his own day, he is setting forth the 
 
44 
 
 THE BLESSED VIRGIN 
 
 Blessed Mary to the high-born Eoman Lad}’, whom 
 he is addressing, as the model of the virginal life; 
 and his argument in its behalf is, that it is higher 
 than the marriage-state, not in itself, viewed in any 
 mere natural respect, but as being the free act of 
 self-consecration to God, and from the personal 
 religious purpose, which it involves. 
 
 “ Higher wage,” he says, “is due to that which is not a 
 compulsion, hut an oiFering ; for, were virginity commanded, 
 marriage would seem to be put out of the question ; and it 
 would be most cruel to force men against nature, and to extort 
 from them an angel’s life.” — 20. 
 
 I do not know whose testimony is more important 
 than St. Jerome’s, the friend of Pope Damasus at 
 Eome, the pupil of St. Gregory Nazianzen at 
 Constantinople, and of Didymus in Alexandria, a 
 native of Dalmatia, yet an inhabitant, at different 
 times of his life, of Gaul, Syria, and Palestine. 
 
 8. St. Jerome speaks for the whole world, except 
 Africa; and for Africa in the fourth century, if w^e 
 must limit so world-wide an authority to place, 
 witnesses St. Augustine (354 — 430). He repeats 
 the words as if a proverb, “ By a woman death, by 
 a woman life ” ( 0pp. t. v. Serm. 232) ; elsewhere 
 he enlarges on the idea conveyed in it. In one 
 place he quotes St. Irenseus’s words, as cited above 
 {adv. Julian i. 4). In another he speaks as 
 follows : — 
 
 “ It is a great sacrament that, whereas through woman death 
 became our portion, so life was born to us by woman ; that, in 
 the case of both sexes, male and female, the baffled devil should 
 
THE SECOND EVE. 
 
 45 
 
 be tormentecl, when on the overthrow of both sexes he was re- 
 joicing; whose punishment had been small, if both sexes had 
 been liberated in us, without our being liberated through 
 both.” — Oj)p. t, vi. T)g Agon. Christ, c. 24. 
 
 9. St. Peter Chrysologus (400 — 450), Bishop 
 of Eavenna, and one of the chief authorities in the 
 4th General Council : — 
 
 Blessed art thou among women ; for among women, on 
 whose womb Eve, who was cursed, brought punishment, Marj, 
 being blest, rejoices, is honoured, and is looked up to. And 
 woman now is truly made through grace the Mother of the 
 
 living, who had been by nature the mother of the dying 
 
 Heaven feels awe of Grod, Angels tremble at Him, the creature 
 sustains Him not, nature sufficeth not ; and yet one maiden so 
 takes, receives, entertains Him, as a guest within her breast, 
 that, for the very hire of her home, and as the price of her womb, 
 she asks, she obtains peace for the earth, glory for the heavens, 
 salvation for the lost, life for the dead, a heavenly parentage for 
 the earthly, the union of God Himself with human flesh.” — 
 Serm. 140. 
 
 It is difficult to express more explicitly, though 
 in oratorical language, that the Blessed Virgin had 
 a real meritorious co-operation, a share which had 
 a “ hire ” and a “ price,” in the reversal of the fall. 
 
 10. St. Fulgentius, Bishop of Euspe in Africa 
 (468 — 533). The Homily which contains the 
 following passage, is placed by Ceillier (t. xvi. p. 
 127), among his genuine works: — 
 
 In the wife of the first man, the wickedness of the devil 
 depraved her seduced mind ; in the mother of the Second Man, 
 the grace of God preserved both her mind inviolate and her 
 flesh. On her mind it conferred the most firm faith ; from her 
 flesh it took away lust altogether. Since then man was in a 
 
46 THE BLESSED VIRGIN THE SECOND EVE. 
 
 miserable way condemned for sin, tberefore without sin was in a 
 marvellous way born the God man.’^ — Serm. 2, p. 124. De 
 Dupl. Nativ, 
 
 Accordingly, in the Sermon which follows (if it 
 is his), he continues, illustrating her office of 
 universal Mother, as ascribed to her by St. Epi- 
 phanius : — 
 
 Come ye virgins to a Virgin, come ye who conceive to her 
 who conceived, ye who bear to one who bore, mothers to a 
 mother, ye that suckle to one who suckled, young girls to the 
 young girl. It is for this reason that the Virgin Mary has 
 taken on her in our Lord Jesus Christ all these divisions of 
 nature, that to all women who have recourse to her, she may 
 be a succour, and so restore the whole race of women who come 
 to her, being the new Eve, by keeping virginity, as the new 
 Adam, the Lord Jesus Christ, recovers the whole race of 
 men.” 
 
 Such is the rudimental view, as I have called it, 
 which the Fathers have given us of Mary, as the 
 Second Eve, the Mother of the living : I have cited 
 ten authors. I could cite more, were it necessary : 
 except the two last, they write gravely and without 
 anv rhetoric. I allow that the two last write in a 
 different style, since the extracts I have made 
 are from their sermons ; hut I do not see that the 
 colouring conceals the outline. And after all, men 
 use oratory on great subjects, not on small; — nor 
 would they, and other Fathers whom I might quote, 
 have lavished their high language upon the Blessed 
 Virgin, such as they gave to no one else, unless 
 they knew well that no one else had such claims, as 
 she had, on their love and veneration. 
 
HER IMMACULATE CONCEPTION. 
 
 47 
 
 And now, I proceed to dwell for a while upon 
 two inferences, which it is obvious to draw from 
 the rudimental doctrine itself; the first relates to 
 the sanctity of the Blessed Virgin, the second to 
 her greatness. 
 
 1. Her sanctity. She holds, as the Fathers 
 teach us, that office in our restoration which Eve 
 held in our fall : — now in the first place what were 
 Eve’s endowments to enable her to enter upon her 
 trial? She could not have stood against the wiles 
 of the devil, though she was innocent and sinless, 
 • without the grant of a large grace. And this she 
 had ; — a heavenly gift, which was over and above 
 and additional to that nature of hers, which she 
 received from Adam, as Adam before her had also 
 received the same gift, at the very time (as it is 
 commonly held) of his original creation. This is 
 Anglican doctrine as well as Catholic; it is the 
 doctrine of Bishop Bull. He has written a disser- 
 tation on the point. He speaks of the doctrine 
 which “ many of the Schoolmen affirm, that Adam 
 was created in grace, that is, received a principle 
 of grace and divine life from his very creation, or 
 in the moment of the infusion of his soul; of 
 which,” he says, “ for my own part I have little 
 doubt.” Again, he says, “ It is abundantly mani- 
 fest from the many testimonies alleged, that the 
 ancient doctors of the Church did, with a general 
 consent, acknowledge, that our first parents in the 
 state of integrity, had in them something more 
 
48 
 
 HER IMMACULATE CONCEPTION. 
 
 than nature, that is, were endowed with the divine 
 principle of the Spirit, in order to a supernatural 
 felicity.” 
 
 Now, taking this for granted, because I know 
 that you and those who agree with you maintain it 
 as well as we do, 1 ask, was not Mary as fully en- 
 dowed as Eve ? is it any violent inference, that she, 
 who was to co-operate in the redemption of the 
 world, at least was not less endowed with power 
 from on high, than she who, given as a helpmate 
 to her husband, did in the event but co-operate 
 with him for its ruin. If Eve was raised above 
 human nature by that indwelling moral gift which 
 we call grace, is it rash to say that Mary had a 
 greater grace ? And this consideration gives sig- 
 nificance to the Angel’s salutation of her as “ full 
 of grace,” — an interpretation of the original word 
 which is undoubtedly the right one, as soon as we 
 resist the common Protestant assumption that grace 
 is a mere external approbation or acceptance, an- 
 swering to the word “ favour,” whereas it is, as the 
 Fathers teach, a real inward condition or super- 
 added quality of soul. And if Eve had this super- 
 natural inward gift given her from the first moment 
 of her personal existence, is it possible to deny that 
 Mary too had this gift from the very first moment 
 of her personal existence ? I do not know how to 
 resist this inference : — well, this is simply and lite- 
 rally the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception. 
 I say the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception is 
 
HER IMMACULATE CONCEPTION. 
 
 49 
 
 in its substance this, and nothing more or less than 
 this (putting aside the question of degrees of 
 grace) ; and it really does seem to me bound up in 
 that doctrine of the Fathers, that Mary is the 
 second Eve. 
 
 It is to me a most strange phenomenon that 
 so many learned and devout men stumble at this 
 doctrine, and I can only account for it by supposing 
 that in matter of fact they do not know what we 
 mean by the Immaculate Conception; and your 
 Volume (may I say it?) bears out my suspicion. 
 It is a great consolation to have reason for thinking 
 so, — for believing that in some sort the persons in 
 question are in the position of those great Saints in 
 former times, who are said to have hesitated about 
 it, when they would not have hesitated at all, if the 
 word “ Conception” had been clearly explained in 
 that sense in which now it is universally received. 
 
 I do not see how any one who holds with Bull the 
 Catholic doctrine of the supernatural endowments 
 of our first parents, has fair reason for doubting 
 our doctrine about the Blessed Virgin. It has no 
 reference wh atever to her p arent s, but simply to 
 her own person; it does hut affirm that, together 
 with the nature which she inherited from her 
 parents, that is, her own nature, she had a super- | 
 added fulness of grace, and that from the first 
 moment of her existence. Suppose Eve had stood 
 the trial, and not lost her first grace ; and suppose 
 she had eventually had children, those children 
 
 D 
 
50 
 
 HER IMMACULATE CONCEPTION. 
 
 from the first moment of their existence would, 
 through divine bounty, have received the same 
 privilege that she had ever had ; that is, as she was 
 taken from Adam’s side, in a garment, so to say, of 
 grace, so they in turn would have received what 
 may be called an immaculate conception. They 
 would have been conceived in grace, as in fact they 
 are conceived in sin. What is there difiicult in 
 this doctrine ? What is there unnatural ? Mary 
 may be called a daughter of Eve unfallen. You 
 believe with us that St. John Baptist had grace 
 given to him three months before his birth, at the 
 time that the Blessed Virgin visited his mother. 
 He accordingly was not immaculately conceived, 
 because he was alive before grace came to him; but 
 our Lady’s case only differs from his in this respect, 
 that to her grace came, not three months merely 
 before her birth, but from the first moment of her 
 being, as it had been given to Eve. 
 
 But it may be said, How does this enable us to 
 say that she was conceived without original sin ? 
 If Anglicans knew what we mean by original sin, 
 they would not ask the question. Our doctrine of 
 original sin is not the same as the Protestant 
 
 l< 
 
 doctrine. “ Original sin,” with us, cannot be called 
 sin, in the ordinary sense of the word “sin;” it is 
 a term denoting Adam’s sin as transferred to us, 
 or the state to which Adam’s sin reduces his 
 children; but by Protestants it is understood to be 
 sin, in the same sense as actual sin. We, with the 
 
 
 
 r. 
 
 / V ^ / 3 « J 
 
HER IMMACULATE CONCEPTION. 
 
 51 
 
 Fathers, think of it as something negative, Pro- 
 testants as something positive. Protestants hold 
 that it is a disease, a radical change of nature, 
 an active poison internally corrupting the soul, 
 infecting its primary elements, and disorganizing 
 it; and they fancy that we ascribe a different 
 nature from ours to the Blessed Virgin, different 
 from that of her parents, and from that of fallen 
 Adam. We hold nothing of the kind; we consider 
 that in Adam she died, as others; that she was 
 included, together with the whole race, in Adam’s 
 sentence ; that she incurred his debt, as we do ; 
 but that, for the sake of Him who was to redeem 
 her and us upon the Cross, to her the debt was 
 remitted by anticipation, on her the sentence was 
 not carried out, except indeed as regards her na- 
 tural death, for she died when her time came, as 
 others. All this we teach, hut we deny that she 
 had original sin ; for by original sin we mean, as I 
 have already said, something negative, viz., this 
 only, the deprivation of that supernatural un- 
 merited grace which Adam and Eve had on their 
 creation, — deprivation and the consequences of de- 
 privation. Mary could not merit, any more than 
 they, the restoration of that grace ; but it was 
 restored to her by God’s free bounty, from the 
 very first moment of her existence, and thereby, 
 in fact, she never came under the original curse, 
 which consisted in the loss of it. And she had 
 this special privilege, in order to fit her to become 
 
 ° ^ UNIVERSITY OF ILLINO/^ 
 
 tIBRARV; 
 
52 
 
 HER IMMACULATE CONCEPTION. 
 
 the Mother of her and our Eedeemer, to fit her 
 mentally, spiritually for it; so that, by the aid of 
 the first grace, she might so grow in grace, that 
 when the Angel came, and her Lord was at hand, 
 she might be “ full of grace,” prepared, as far as 
 a creature could he prepared, to receive Him into 
 her bosom. 
 
 I have drawn the doctrine of the Immaculate 
 Conception, as an immediate inference, from the 
 primitive doctrine that Mary is the second Eve. 
 The argument seems to me conclusive; and, if it 
 has not been universally taken as such, this has 
 come to pass, because there has not been a clear 
 understanding among Catholics, what exactly was 
 meant by the Immaculate Conception. To many it 
 seemed to imply that the Blessed Virgin did not die 
 in Adam, that she did not come under the penalty 
 of the fall, that she was not redeemed, that she was 
 conceived in some way inconsistent with the verse 
 in the Miserere Psalm. If controversy had in earlier 
 days so cleared the subject as to make it plain to 
 all, that the doctrine meant nothing else than that 
 in fact in her case the general sentence on man- 
 kind was not carried out, and that, by means of the 
 indwelling in her of divine grace from the first 
 moment of her being (and this is all the decree of 
 1854 has declared), I cannot believe that the doc- 
 trine would have ever been opposed ; for an instinc- 
 tive sentiment has led Christians jealously to put the 
 Blessed Mary aside when sin comes into discussion. 
 
HER EXALTATION. 
 
 53 
 
 This is expressed in the well-known words of St. 
 Augustine, All have sinned “ except the Holy 
 Virgin Mary, concerning whom, for the honour of 
 the Lord, I wish no question to be raised at all, 
 when we are treating of sins” {de Nat. et Grat. 42) ; 
 words which, whatever St. Augustine’s actual occa- 
 sion of using them, (to which you refer, p. 176,) 
 certainly in the spirit which they breathe, are well 
 adapted to convey the notion, that, apart from her 
 relation to her parents, she had not personally any 
 part in sin whatever. It is true that several great 
 Fathers of the fourth century do imply or assert 
 that on one or two occasions she did sin venially 
 or showed infirmity. This is the only real ob- 
 jection which I know of; and as I do not wish to 
 pass it over lightly, I propose to consider it at the 
 end of this Letter. ^ ! 
 
 2. How secondly, her greatness. Here let us 
 suppose that our first parents had overcome in their 
 trial ; and had gained for their descendants for ever 
 the full possession, as if by right, of the privileges 
 which were promised to their obedience, — gi'ace 
 here and glory hereafter. Is it possible that those 
 descendants, pious and happy from age to age in 
 their temporal homes, would have forgotten their 
 benefactors ? Would they not have followed them 
 in thought into the heavens, and gratefully com- 
 memorated them on earth ? The history of the 
 temptation, the craft of the serpent, their sted- 
 
64 
 
 HEE EXALTATION. 
 
 fastness in obedience, — the loyal vigilance, the sen- 
 sitive purity of Eve,— the great issue, salvation 
 wrought out for all generations, — would have been 
 never from their minds, ever welcome to their ears. 
 This would have taken place from the necessity of 
 our nature. Every nation has its mythical hymns 
 and epics about its first fathers and its heroes. 
 The great deeds of Charlemagne, Alfred, Cceur de 
 Lion, Wallace, Louis the ninth, do not die; and 
 though their persons are gone from us, we make 
 much of their names. Milton’s Adam, after his 
 fall, understands the force of this law, and shrinks 
 from the prospect of its operation. 
 
 “ Who of all ages to succeed, hut, feeling 
 The evil on him brought hy me, will curse 
 My head ? Ill fare our ancestor impure, 
 
 Por this we may thank Adam.” 
 
 If this anticipation has not been fulfilled in the 
 event, it is owing to the needs of our penal life, 
 our state of perpetual change, and the ignorance 
 and unbelief incurred by the fall; also because, 
 fallen as we are, from the hopefulness of our nature, 
 we feel more pride in our national great men, than 
 dejection at our national misfortunes. Much more 
 then in the great kingdom and people of God; — 
 the Saints are ever in our sight, and not as mere 
 ineffectual ghosts, but as if present bodily in their 
 past selves. It is said of them, “ Their works do 
 follow them ;” what they were here, such are they 
 in heaven and in the Church. As we call them 
 
HER EXALTATION. 
 
 55 
 
 by their earthly names, so we contemplate them in 
 their earthly characters and histories. Their acts, 
 callings, and relations below, are types and antici- 
 pations of their mission above. Even in the case 
 of our Lord Himself, whose native home is the 
 eternal heavens, it is said of Him in His state of 
 glory, that He is “ a Priest for ever and when He 
 comes again. He will be recognized by those who 
 pierced Him, as being the very same that Pie was on 
 earth. The only questiop is, whether the Blessed 
 Virgin had a part, a real part, in the economy of 
 grace, whether, when she was on earth, she secured 
 by her deeds any claim on our memories; for, if 
 she did, it is impossible we should put her away 
 from us, merely because she is gone hence, and not 
 look at her still, according to the measure of her 
 earthly history, with gratitude and expectation. 
 If, as St. Irenseus says, she did the part of an 
 Advocate, a friend in need, even in her mortal 
 life, if, as St. Jerome and St. Ambrose say, she 
 was on earth the great pattern of Virgins, if she 
 had a meritorious share in bringing about our 
 redemption, if her maternity was earned by her 
 faith and obedience, if her Divine Son was subject 
 to her, and if she stood by the Cross with a mo- 
 ther’s heart and drank in to the full those sutferings 
 which it was her portion to gaze upon, it is im- 
 possible that we should not associate these cha- 
 racteristics of her life on earth with her present 
 state of blessedness ; and this surely she antici- 
 
56 
 
 HER EXALTATION. 
 
 pated, when she said in her hymn that “ all gene- 
 rations should call her blessed.” 
 
 I am aware that, in thus speaking, I am following 
 a line of thought which is rather a meditation than 
 an argument in controversy, and I shall not carry 
 it further ; hut still, in turning to other topics, it is 
 to the point to inquire, whether the popular astonish- 
 ment, excited by our belief in the Blessed Virgin’s 
 present dignity, does not arise from the circum- 
 stance that the bulk of men, engaged in matters of 
 the world, have never calmly considered her his- 
 torical position in the gospels, so as rightly to rea- 
 lize (if I may use the word a second time) what 
 that position imports. I do not claim for the 
 generality of Catholics any greater powers of re- 
 flection upon the objects of their faith, than Pro- 
 testants commonly have, but there is a sufficient 
 number of religious men among Catholics who, 
 instead of expending their devotional energies (as 
 so many serious Protestants do) on abstract doc- 
 trines, such as justification by faith only, or the 
 sufficiency of Holy Scripture, employ themselves in 
 the contemplation of Scripture facts, and bring out 
 in a tangible form the doctrines involved in them, 
 and give such a substance and colour to the sacred 
 history, as to influence their brethren ; who, though 
 superficial themselves, are drawn by their Catholic 
 instinct to accept conclusions which they could not 
 indeed themselves have elicited, hut which, when 
 elicited, they feel to be true. However, it would 
 
HER EXALTATION IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 57 
 
 be out of place to pursue this course of reasoning 
 here; and instead of doing so, I shall take what 
 perhaps you may think a very bold step, — I shall 
 find the doctrine of our Lady’s present exaltation 
 in Scripture. 
 
 I mean to find it in the vision of the Woman and 
 Child in the twelfth chapter of the Apocalypse ^ : — 
 now here two objections will be made to me at 
 once ; first that such an interpretation is but poorly 
 supported by the Fathers, and secondly that in 
 ascribing such a picture of the Madonna (as it 
 may be called) to the Apostolic age, I am com- 
 mitting an anachronism. 
 
 As to the former of these objections, I answer as 
 follows : — Christians have never gone to Scripture 
 for proofs of their doctrines, till there was actual 
 need, from the pressure of controversy; — if in 
 those times the Blessed Virgin’s dignity were un- 
 challenged on all hands, as a matter of doctrine. 
 Scripture, as far as its argumentative matter was 
 concerned, was likely to remain a sealed book to 
 them, ^hus, to take an instance in point; the 
 Catholic party in the English Church, (say, the Non- 
 jurors,) unable by their theory of religion simply 
 to take their stand on Tradition, and distressed for 
 proof of their doctrines, had their eyes sharpened 
 to scrutinize and to understand the letter of Holy 
 
 * Vid. Essay on Doctr. Development, p. 384, and Bishop 
 Ullathorne’a work on the Immaculate Conception, p. 77. 
 
58 
 
 PIR EXALTATION IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 Scripture, which to others brought no instruction. 
 And the peculiarity of their interpretations is this, 
 — that they have in themselves great logical co- 
 gency, yet are but faintly supported by patristical 
 commentators. Such is the use of the word TToielv 
 or facere in our Lord’s institution of the Holy 
 Eucharist, which, by a reference to the old Testa- 
 ment, is found to be a word of sacrifice. Such 
 again is \eiTovpyovvT(av in the passage in the Acts, 
 “ As they ministered to the Lord and fasted,” which 
 again is a sacerdotal term. And such the passage 
 in Rom. xv. 16, in which several terms are used 
 which have an allusion to the sacrificial Eucharistic 
 rite. Such too is St. Paul’s repeated message to 
 the household of Onesiphorus, with no mention of 
 Onesiphorus himself, hut in one place with the 
 addition of a prayer that “ he might find mercy of 
 the Lord” in the day of judgment, which, taking 
 into account its wording and the known usage of 
 the first centuries, we can hardly deny is a prayer 
 for his soul. Other texts there are, which ought to 
 find a place in ancient controversies, and the omis- 
 sion of which by the Fathers affords matter for 
 more surprise; those, for instance, which, according 
 to Middleton’s rule, are real proofs of our Lord’s 
 divinity, and yet are passed over by Catholic dispu- 
 tants; for these hear upon a then existing contro- 
 versy of the first moment, and of the most urgent 
 exigency. 
 
 As to the second objection which I have sup- 
 
HER EXALTATION IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 59 
 
 posed, so far from allowing it, I consider that it is 
 built upon a mere imaginary fact, and that the 
 truth of the matter lies in the very contrary direc- 
 tion. The Virgin and Child is not a mere modern 
 idea ; on the contrary, it is represented again and 
 again, as every visitor to Rome is aware, in the 
 paintings of the Catacombs. Mary is there drawn 
 with the Divine Infant in her lap, she with hands 
 extended in prayer. He with His hand in the attitude 
 of blessing. No representation can more forcibly 
 convey the doctrine of the high dignity of the Mo- 
 ther, and, I will add, of her power over her Son. 
 Why should the memory of His time of subjection 
 he so dear to Christians, and so carefully preserved ? 
 The only question to he determined, is the precise 
 date of these remarkable monuments of the first 
 age of Christianity. That they belong to the 
 centuries of what Anglicans call the “ undivided 
 Church ” is certain ; hut lately investigations have 
 been pursued, which place some of them at an 
 earlier date than any one anticipated as possible. 
 I am not in a position to quote largely from the 
 works of the Cavaliere de Rossi, who has thrown so 
 much light upon the subject ; but I have his 
 “Imagini Scelte,” published in 1863, and they 
 are sufficient for my purpose. In this work he has 
 given us from the Catacombs various representa- 
 tions of the Virgin and Child; the latest of these 
 belong to the early part of the fourth century, but 
 the earliest he believes to be referable to the very 
 
60 
 
 HER EXALTATION IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 age of the Apostles. He comes to this conclusion 
 from the style and the skill of the composition, 
 and from the history, locality, and existing inscrip- 
 tions of the subterranean in which it is found. 
 However he does not go so far as to insist upon so 
 early a date ; yet the utmost liberty he grants is to 
 refer the painting to the era of the first Antonines, 
 that is, to a date within half a century of the death 
 of St. John. I consider then, that, as you fairly 
 use, in controversy with Protestants, the traditional 
 doctrine of the Church in early times, as an expla- 
 nation of the Scripture text, or at least as a. sug- 
 gestion, or as a defence, of the sense which you may 
 wish to put on it, quite apart from the question 
 whether your interpretation itself is traditional, so it 
 is lawful for me, though I have not the positive words 
 of the Fathers on my side, to shelter my own inter- 
 pretation of the Apostle’s vision under the fact of the 
 extant pictures of Mother and Child in the Roman 
 Catacombs. There is another principle of Scripture 
 interpretation which we should hold with you, — when 
 we speak of a doctrine being contained in Scripture, 
 we do not necessarily mean, that it is contained 
 there in direct categorical terms, but that there is 
 no other satisfactory way of accounting for the lan- 
 guage and expressions of the sacred writers, con- 
 cerning the subject-matter in question, than to 
 suppose that they held upon it the opinions which 
 we hold, — that they would not have spoken as they 
 have spoken, unless they held it. For myself I 
 
HER EXALTATION IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 61 
 
 have ever felt the truth of this principle, as regards 
 the Scripture proof of the Holy Trinity ; I should 
 not have found out that doctrine in the sacred text 
 without previous traditional teaching ; hut when 
 once it is suggested from without, it commends 
 itself as the one true interpretation, from its appo- 
 siteness, — because no other view of doctrine, which 
 can be ascribed to the inspired writers, so happily 
 solves the obscurities and seeming inconsistencies 
 of their teaching. And now to apply what I have 
 said to the passage in the Apocalypse. 
 
 If there is an Apostle on whom, d priori^ our 
 eyes would be fixed, as likely to teach us about the 
 Blessed Virgin, it is St. John, to whom she was 
 committed by our Lord on the Cross,- — with whom, 
 as tradition goes, she lived at Ephesus till she was 
 taken away. This anticipation is confirmed d 
 posteriori; for, as I have said above, one of the 
 earliest and fullest of our informants concerning 
 her dignity, as being the second Eve, is Irenseus, 
 who came to Lyons from Asia Minor, and had 
 been taught by the immediate disciples of St. 
 John. The Apostle’s vision is as follows : — 
 
 “ A great sign appeared in heaven : A woman 
 clothed with the Sun, and the Moon under her 
 feet ; and on her head a crown of twelve stars. 
 And being with child, she cried travailing in birth, 
 and was in pain to be delivered. And there was 
 seen another sign in heaven ; and behold a great 
 red dragon . . . And the dragon stood before the 
 
62 
 
 HER EXALTATION IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 woman who was ready to be delivered, that, when 
 she should be delivered, he might devour her son. 
 And she brought forth a man child, who was to 
 rule all nations with an iron rod ; and her son was 
 taken up to God and to His throne. And the 
 woman fled into the wilderness.” Now I do not 
 deny of course, that, under the image of the Woman, 
 the Church is signified; but what I would maintain 
 is this, that the Holy Apostle would not have 
 spoken of the Church under this particular image, 
 unless there had existed a Blessed Virgin Mary, 
 who was exalted on high, and the object of vene- 
 ration to all the faithful. 
 
 No one doubts that the “ man-child ” spoken 
 of is an allusion to our Lord : why then is not 
 “ the Woman ” an allusion to His Mother ? This 
 surely is the obvious sense of the words ; of course it 
 has a further sense also, which is the scope of the 
 image; doubtless the Child represents the children 
 of the Church, and doubtless the Woman repre- 
 sents the Church ; this, I grant, is the real or direct 
 sense, but what is the sense of the symbol ? who 
 are the Woman and the Child ? I answer. They 
 are not personifications but Persons. This is true 
 of the Child, therefore it is true of the Woman. 
 
 But again : not only Mother and Child, but a 
 serpent is introduced into the vision. Such a 
 meeting of man, woman, and serpent has not been 
 found in Scripture, since the beginning of Scrip- 
 ture, and now it is found in its end. Moreover, in 
 
HER EXALTATION IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 63 
 
 the passage in the Apocalypse, as if to supply, 
 before Scripture came to an end, what was wanting 
 in its beginnin'g, we are told, and for the first time, 
 that the serpent in Paradise was the evil spirit. If 
 the dragon of St. John is the same as the serpent 
 of Moses, and the man-child is “ the seed of the 
 woman,” why is not the woman herself she, whose 
 seed the man-child is ? And, if the first woman is 
 not an allegory, why is the second ? if the first 
 woman is Eve, why is not the second Mary ? 
 
 But this is not all. The image of the woman, 
 according to Scripture usage, is too bold and pro- 
 minent for a mere personification. Scripture is not 
 fond of allegories. We have indeed frequent figures 
 there, as when the sacred writers speak of the arm 
 or sword of the Lord : and so too when they speak 
 of Jerusalem or Samaria in the feminine ; or of the 
 mountains leaping for joy, or of the Church as a 
 bride or as a vine ; but they are not much given to 
 dressing up abstract ideas or generalizations in 
 personal attributes. This is the classical rather 
 than the Scripture style. Xenophon places Her- 
 cules between Virtue and Vice, represented as 
 women ; .iPlschylus introduces into his drama Force 
 and Violence ; Virgil gives personality to public 
 rumour or Fame, and Plautus to Poverty. So on 
 monuments done in the classical style, we see vir- 
 tues, vices, rivers, renown, death and the like, 
 turned into human figures of men and women. I 
 do not say there are no instances at all of this 
 
64 
 
 HER EXALTATION IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 method in Scripture, but I say that such poetical 
 compositions are strikingly unlike its usual method. 
 Thus we at once feel the difference from Scripture, 
 when we betake ourselves to the Pastor of Hermes, 
 and find the Church a woman, to St. Methodius, 
 and find Virtue a woman, and to St. Gregory’s 
 poem, and find Virginity again a woman. Scrip- 
 ture deals with types rather than personifications. 
 Israel stands for the chosen people, David for 
 Christ, Jerusalem for heaven. Consider the re- 
 markable representations, dramatic I may call 
 them, in Jeremiah, Ezechiel, and Hosea: predic- 
 tions, threatenings, and promises, are acted out by 
 those Prophets. Ezechiel is commanded to shave 
 his head, and to divide and scatter his hair; and 
 Ahias tears his garment, and gives ten out of 
 twelve parts of it to Jeroboam. So too the struc- 
 ture of the imagery in the Apocalypse is not a mere 
 allegorical creation, but is founded on the Jewish 
 ritual. In like manner our Lord’s bodily cures are 
 visible types of the power of His grace upon the 
 soul ; and His prophecy of the last day is conveyed 
 under that of the fall of Jerusalem. Even His 
 parables are not simply ideal, but relations of oc- 
 currences, which did or might take place, under 
 which was conveyed a spiritual meaning. The 
 description of Wisdom in the Proverbs, and other 
 sacred books, has brought out the instinct of com- 
 mentators in this respect. They felt that Wisdom 
 could not he a mere personification, and they 
 
HER EXALTATION IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 (35 
 
 determined that it was our Lord; and the later 
 of these books, by their own more definite lan- 
 guage, warranted that interpretation. Then, when 
 it was found that the Arians used it in derogation 
 of our Lord’s divinity, still, unable to tolerate the 
 notion of a mere allegory, commentators applied 
 the description to the Blessed Virgin. Coming 
 hack then to the Apocalyptic vision, I ask. If the 
 Woman must be some real person, who can it be 
 whom the Apostle saw, and intends, and delineates, 
 but that same Great Mother to whom the chapters 
 in the Proverbs are accommodated ? And let it be 
 observed, moreover, that in this passage, from the 
 allusion in it to the history of the fall, she may be 
 said still to be represented under the character of 
 the Second Eve. I make a further remark : it is 
 sometimes asked. Why do not the saered writers 
 mention our Lady’s greatness ? I answer, she was, 
 or may have been alive, when the Apostles and 
 Evangelists wrote; — there was just one book of 
 Scripture certainly written after her death, and that 
 book does (so to say) canonize and crown her. 
 
 But if all this be so, if it is really the Blessed 
 Virgin whom Scripture represents as clothed with 
 the sun, crowned with the stars of heaven, and 
 with the moon as her footstool, what height of 
 glory may we not attribute to her ? and what are 
 we to say of those who, through ignorance, run 
 counter to the voice of Scripture, to the testimony 
 of the Fathers, to the traditions of East and West, 
 
 E 
 
66 THE BLESSED VIRGIN THE THEOTOCOS. 
 
 and speak and act contemptuously towards her 
 whom her Lord delighteth to honour ? 
 
 Now I have said all I mean to say on what I 
 have called the rudimental teaching of Antiquity 
 about the Blessed Virgin; but after all I have not 
 insisted on the highest view of her prerogatives, 
 which the Fathers have taught us. You, my dear 
 Friend, who know so well the ancient controversies 
 and Councils, may have been surprised why I should 
 not have yet spoken of her as the Theotocos ; — but 
 I wished to show on how broad a basis her great- 
 ness rests, independent of that wonderful title ; and 
 again I have been loth to enlarge upon the force 
 of a word, which is rather matter for devotional 
 thought than for polemical dispute. However, I 
 might as well not write on my subject at all, as 
 altogether be silent upon it. 
 
 It is then an integral portion of the Faith fixed 
 by Ecumenical Council, a portion of it which you 
 hold as well as I, that the Blessed Virgin is Theo- 
 tocos, Deipara, or Mother of God; and this w'ord, 
 when thus used, carries with it no admixture of 
 rhetoric, no taint of extravagant affection, — it has 
 nothing else but a well-weighed, grave, dogmatic 
 sense, which corresponds and is adequate to its 
 sound. It intends to express that God is her Son, 
 as truly as any one of us is the son of his own 
 mother. If this be so, what can be said of any 
 creature whatever, which may not be said of her ? 
 
THE BLESSED VIRGIN THE TIIEOTOCOS. 67 
 
 what can be said too much, so that it does not 
 compromise the attributes of the Creator ? He 
 indeed might have created a being more perfect, 
 more admirable, than she is; He might have en- 
 dued that being, so created, with a richer grant of 
 grace, of power, of blessedness : but in one respect 
 she surpasses all even possible creations, viz. that 
 she is Mother of her Creator. It is this awful title, 
 which both illustrates and connects together the 
 two prerogatives of Mary, on which I have been 
 lately enlarging, her sanctity and her greatness. It 
 is the issue of her sanctity; it is the source of her 
 greatness. What dignity can be too great to attri- 
 bute to her who is as closely bound up, as inti- 
 mately one, with the Eternal Word, as a mother is 
 with a son ? What outfit of sanctity, what fulness 
 and redundance of grace, what exuberance of merits 
 must have been hers, on the supposition, which the 
 Fathers justify, that her Maker regarded them at all, 
 and took them into account, when he condescended 
 “ not to abhor the Virgin’s womb ? ” Is it sur- 
 prising then that on the one hand she should be 
 immaculate in her conception ? or on the other 
 that she should he exalted as a queen with a crown 
 of twelve stars ? Men sometimes wonder that we 
 call her Mother of life, of mercy, of salvation ; what 
 are all these titles compared to that one name. 
 Mother of God ? 
 
 I shall say no more about this title here. It is 
 scarcely possible to write of it without diverging 
 
 E 2 
 
68 THE BLESSED VIRGIN THE THEOTOCOS. 
 
 into a style of composition unsuited to a Letter ; so 
 I proceed to the history of its use. 
 
 The title of Theotocos “ begins with ecclesiastical 
 writers of a date hardly later than that at which 
 we read of her as the second Eve. It first occurs in 
 the works of Origen (185 — 254) ; but he, witnessing 
 for Egypt and Palestine, witnesses also that it was 
 in use before his time ; for, as Socrates informs us, 
 he “interpreted how it was to be used, and dis- 
 cussed the question at length” (Hist. vii. 32). 
 Within two centuries (431) in the General Council 
 held against Nestorius, it was made part of the for- 
 mal dogmatic teaching of the Church. At that 
 time, Theodoret, who from his party connexions 
 might have been supposed disinclined to its solemn 
 recognition, owned that “the ancient and more 
 than ancient heralds of the orthodox faith taught 
 the use of the term according to the Apostolic tra- 
 dition.” At the same date John of Antioch, who 
 for a while sheltered Nestorius, whose heresy lay 
 in the rejection of the term, said, “ This title no 
 ecclesiastical teacher has put aside. Those who 
 have used it are many and eminent; and those who 
 have not used it, have not attacked those who did.” 
 Alexander again, one of the fiercest partisans of 
 Nestorius, witnesses to the use of the word, though 
 ho considers it dangerous ; “ That in festive solemni- 
 ties,” he says, “ or in preaching or teaching, theo- 
 
 ® Vid. Translation of St. Athanasius, pp. 420, 440, 447 
 
THE BLESSED VIRGIN THE THEOTOCOS. 69 
 
 tocos should be unguardedly said by the orthodox 
 without explanation is no blame, because such state- 
 ments were not dogmatic, nor said with evil mean- 
 ing.” If we look for those, in the interval, between 
 Origen and the Council, to whom Alexander refers, 
 we find it used again and again by the Fathers in 
 such of their works as are extant; by Archelaus of 
 Mesopotamia, Eusebius of Palestine, Alexander of 
 Egypt, in the third century; in the fourth by 
 Athanasius many times with emphasis, by Cyril of 
 Palestine, Gregory Nyssen of Cappadocia, Gregory 
 Nazianzen of Cappadocia, Antiochus of Syria, and 
 Ammonius of Thrace: — not to speak of the Em- 
 peror Julian, who, having no local or ecclesiastical 
 domicile, speaks for the whole of Christendom. 
 Another and earlier Emperor, Constantine, in his 
 speech before the assembled Bishops at Nicsea, uses 
 the still more explicit title of “ the Virgin Mother 
 of God ;” which is also used by Ambrose of Milan, 
 and by Vincent and Cassian in the south of France, 
 and then by St. Leo. 
 
 So much for the term ; it would be tedious to pro- 
 duce the passages of authors who, using or not using 
 the term, convey the idea. “ Our God was carried 
 in the womb of Mary,” says Ignatius, who w'as mar- 
 tyred A.D. 106. “The word of God,” says Hippo- 
 lytus, “ was carried in that Virgin frame.” “ The 
 Maker of all,” says Amphilochius, “ is born of a 
 Virgin.” “ She did compass without circumscribing 
 the Sun of justice, — the Everlasting is born,” says 
 
70 
 
 ZEAL OP THE FATHERS 
 
 Chrysostom. “ God dwelt in the womb,” says Pro- 
 clus. “ When thou hearest that God speaks from 
 the bush,” asks Theodotus, “ in the bush seest 
 thou not the Virgin ?” Cassian says, “ Mary bore 
 her Author.” “ The one God only-begotten,” says 
 Hilary, “ is introduced into the womb of a Virgin.’’ 
 “ The Everlasting,” says Ambrose, “ came into the 
 Virgin.” “ The closed gate,” says Jerome, “ by 
 which alone the Lord God of Israel enters, is the 
 Virgin Mary.” “ That man from heaven,” says 
 Capriolus, “ is God conceived in the womb.” “ He 
 is made in thee,” says Augustine, “who made 
 thee.” 
 
 This being the faith of the Fathers about the 
 Blessed Virgin, we need not wonder that it should 
 in no long time be transmuted into devotion. No 
 wonder if their language should become unmeasured, 
 when so great a term as “ Mother of God ” had 
 been formally set down as the safe limit of it. No 
 wonder if it should be stronger and stronger as time 
 went on, since only in a long period could the ful- 
 ness of its import be exhausted. And in matter of 
 fact, and as might be anticipated, (with the few ex- 
 ceptions which I have noted above, and which I am 
 to treat of below,) the current of thought in those 
 early ages did uniformly tend to make much of the 
 Blessed Virgin and to increase her honours, not to 
 circumscribe them. Little jealousy was shown of 
 her in those times ; but, when any such niggardness 
 
FOR THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 71 
 
 of devotion occurred, then one Father or other fell 
 upon the offender, with zeal, not to say with fierce- 
 ness. Thus St. Jerome inveighs against Helvidius; 
 thus St. Epiphanius denounces Apollinaris, St. 
 Cyril Nestorius, and St. Ambrose Bonosus; on the 
 other hand, each successive insult offered to her by 
 individual adversaries did but bring out more fully 
 the intimate sacred affection with which Christen- 
 dom regarded her. “ She was alone, and wrought 
 the world’s salvation and conceived the redemption 
 of all,” says Ambrose®; “she had so great grace, 
 as not only to preserve virginity herself, hut to 
 confer it upon those whom she visited.” The 
 rod out of the stem of Jesse,” says Jerome, “ and 
 the Eastern gate through which the High Priest 
 alone goes in and out, yet is ever shut.” “ The 
 wise woman,” says Nilus, who “ hath clad believers, 
 from the ffeece of the Lamb horn of her, with the 
 clothing of incorruption, and delivered them from 
 their spiritual nakedness.” “The mother of life, 
 of beauty, of majesty, the morning star,” according 
 to Antiochus. “ The mystical new heavens,” “ the 
 heavens carrying the Divinity,” “ the fruitful vine,” 
 “by whom we are translated from death to life,” 
 according to St. Ephrem. “ The manna, which is 
 delicate, bright, sweet, and virgin, which, as though 
 coming from heaven, has poured down on all the 
 people of the Churches a food pleasanter than 
 honey,” according to St. Maximus. 
 
 ® Essay on Doctr. Dev. p. 408. 
 
72 
 
 HER INTERCESSORY POWER. 
 
 Basil of Seleucia says, that “ she shines out above 
 all the martyrs as the sun above the stars, and 
 that she mediates between God and men.” “ Run 
 through all creation in your thought,” says Proclus, 
 “ and see if there be one equal or superior to the 
 Holy Virgin, Mother of God.” “ Hail, Mother, clad 
 in light, of the light which sets not ;” says Theodotus, 
 or some one else at Ephesus, “ hail, all-undefiled 
 mother of holiness ; hail, most pellucid fountain of 
 the life-giving stream.” And St. Cyril too at 
 Ephesus, “ Hail, Mary Mother of God, majestic 
 common-treasure of the whole world, the lamp un- 
 quenchable, the ci'own of virginity, the sceptre of 
 orthodoxy, the indissoluble temple, the dwelling of 
 the Illimitable, Mother and Virgin, through whom 
 He in the holy gospels is called blessed who cometh 
 in the name of the Lord, .... through whom the 
 
 Holy Trinity is sanctified, through whom 
 
 Angels and Archangels rejoice, devils are put to 
 flight, .... and the fallen creature is received up 
 into the heavens, &c., &c.^” Such is hut a portion 
 of the panegyrical language which St. Cyril used 
 in the third Ecumenical Council. 
 
 I must not close my review of the Catholic doc- 
 trine concerning the Blessed Virgin, without di- 
 rectly speaking of her intercessory power, though I 
 have incidentally made mention of it already. It 
 
 ’ 0pp. t. 6, p. 355. 
 
HER INTERCESSORY POWER. 
 
 73 
 
 is the immediate result of two truths, neither of 
 which you dispute ; — first, that “ it is good and 
 useful,” as the Council of Trent says, “ suppliantly 
 to invoke the saints and to have recourse to their 
 prayers;” and secondly, that the Blessed Mary is 
 singularly dear to her Son and singularly exalted 
 in sanctity and glory. However, at the risk of 
 becoming didactic, I will state somewhat more fully 
 the grounds on which it rests. 
 
 To a candid pagan, it must have been one of the 
 most remarkable points of Christianity, on its first 
 appearance, that the observance of prayer formed 
 so vital a part of its organization ; and that, though 
 its members were scattered all over the world, and 
 its rulers and subjects had so little opportunity of 
 correlative action, yet they, one and all, found the 
 solace of a spiritual intercourse and a real bond of 
 union, in the practice of mutual intercession. Prayer 
 indeed is the very essence of religion ; but in the 
 heathen religions it was either public or personal; 
 it was a state ordinance, or a selfish expedient, for 
 the attainment of certain tangible, temporal goods. 
 Very different from this was its exercise among 
 Christians, who were thereby knit together in one 
 body, different, as they were, in races, ranks, and 
 habits, distant from each other in country, and 
 helpless amid hostile populations. Yet it proved 
 sufficient for its purpose. Christians could not 
 correspond; they could not combine; but they 
 could pray one for another. Even their public 
 
74 
 
 HER INTERCESSORY POWER. 
 
 prayers partook of this character of intercession ; 
 for to pray for the welfare of the whole Church was 
 in fact a prayer for all the classes of men, and all 
 the individuals of which it was composed. It was in 
 prayer that the Church was founded. For ten 
 days all the Apostles “ persevered with one mind 
 in prayer and supplication, with the women, and 
 Mary the Mother of Jesus, and with His brethren.” 
 Then again at Pentecost “ they were all with one 
 mind in one place;” and the converts then made 
 are said to have “ persevered in prayer.” And 
 when, after a while, St. Peter was seized and put 
 in prison wdth a view to his being put to death, 
 “prayer was made without ceasing” by the Church 
 of God for him ; and, when the angel released him, 
 he took refuge in a house “ where many were 
 gathered together in prayer.” 
 
 We are so accustomed to these passages, as 
 hardly to be able to do justice to their singular 
 significance; and they are followed up by various 
 passages of the Apostolic Epistles. St. Paul en- 
 joins his brethren to “ pray with all prayer and sup- 
 plication at all times in the Spirit, with all instance 
 and supplication for all saints,” to “ pray in every 
 place,” “ to make supplication, prayers, intercessions, 
 giving of thanks, for all men.” And in his own person 
 he “ ceases not to give thanks for them, commemo- 
 rating them in his prayers,” and “ always in all his 
 prayers making supplication for them all with joy.” 
 
 Now, was this spiritual bond to cease with life ? 
 
HER INTERCESSORY POWER, 
 
 75 
 
 or had Christians similar duties to their bre- 
 thren departed ? From the witness of the early 
 ages of the Church, it appears that they had; 
 and you, and those who agree with you, would 
 be the last . to deny that they were then in the 
 practice of praying, as for the living, so for those 
 also who had passed into the intermediate state 
 between earth and heaven. Did the sacred com- 
 munion extend further still, on to the inhabit- 
 ants of heaven itself? Here too you agree with 
 us, for you have adopted in your Volume the words 
 of the Council of Trent, which I have quoted above. 
 But now we are brought to a higher order of 
 thought. 
 
 It would be preposterous to pray for those who 
 are already in glory ; but at least they can pray for 
 us, and w^e can ask their prayers, and in the Apo- 
 calypse at least Angels are introduced both sending 
 us their blessing and presenting our prayers before 
 the Divine Presence, We read there of an Angel 
 who ‘“came and stood before the altar, having a 
 golden censer and “ there was given to him 
 much incense, that he should offer of the prayers 
 of all saints upon the golden altar which is before 
 the Throne of God.” On this occasion, surely the 
 Angel (Michael, as the prayer in Mass considers 
 him), performed the part of a great Intercessor or 
 Mediator above for the children of the Church 
 Militant below. Again, in the beginning of the 
 same book, the sacred writer goes so far as to 
 
76 
 
 HER INTERCESSORY POWER. 
 
 speak of “ grace and peace ” coming to us, not only 
 from the Almighty, but “from the seven Spirits 
 that are before His throne,” thus associating the 
 Eternal with the ministers of His mercies ; and this 
 carries us on to the remarkable passage of St. Justin, 
 one of the earliest Fathers, who, in his Apology, 
 says, “To Him (God), and His Son who came 
 from Him and taught us these things, and the host 
 of the other good Angels who follow and resemble 
 Him, and the Prophetic Spirit, we pay veneration 
 and homage.” Further, in the Epistle to the 
 Hebrews, St. Paul introduces, not only Angels, but 
 “ the spirits of the just ” into the sacred communion : 
 “Ye have come to Mount Sion, to the heavenly 
 Jerusalem, to myriads of angels, to God the Judge 
 of all, to the spirits of the just made perfect, and 
 to Jesus the Mediator of the New Testament.” 
 What can he meant by having “ come to the spirits 
 of the just,” unless in some way or other they do us 
 good, whether by blessing or by aiding us ? that is, 
 in a word, to speak correctly, by praying for us, for 
 it is by prayer alone that the creature above can 
 bless or aid the creatui’e below. 
 
 Intercession thus being a first principle of the 
 Church’s life, next it is certain again j that the 
 vital principle of that intercession, as an availing 
 power, is, according to the will of God, sanctity. 
 This seems to be suggested by a passage of St. 
 Paul, in which the Supreme Intercessor is said to 
 he “ the Spirit — “ the Spirit Himself maketh 
 
HER INTERCESSORY POWER. 
 
 77 
 
 intercession for us; He maketli intercession for 
 the saints according to God.” However, the truth 
 thus implied, is expressly brought out in other 
 parts of Scripture, in the form both of doctrine 
 and of example. The words of the man horn blind 
 speak the common-sense of nature : — “ if any man 
 be a worshipper of God, him He heareth.” And 
 Apostles confirm them: — “the prayer of a just 
 man availeth much,” and “ whatever we ask, we 
 receive, because we keep his commandments.” 
 Then, as for examples, we read of Abraham and 
 Moses, as having the divine purpose of judgment 
 revealed to them beforehand, in order that they 
 might deprecate its execution. To the friends of 
 Job it was said, “My servant Job shall pray for 
 you; his face I will accept.” Elias by his prayer 
 shut and opened the heavens. Elsewhere we read 
 of “ Jeremias, Moses, and Samuel ;” and of “ Noe, 
 Daniel, and Job,” as being great mediators between 
 God and His people. One instance is given us, 
 which testifies the continuance of so high an office 
 beyond this life. Lazarus, in the parable, is seen 
 in Abraham’s bosom. It is usual to pass over this 
 striking passage with the remark that it is a 
 Jewish expression ; whereas, Jewish belief or not, 
 it is recognized and sanctioned by our Lord Him- 
 self. What do we teach about the Blessed Virgin 
 more wonderful than this ? Let us suppose, that, 
 at the hour of death, the faithful are committed 
 to her arms ; but if Abraham, not yet ascended on 
 
78 
 
 HER INTERCESSORY POWER. 
 
 high, had charge of Lazarus, what offence is it to 
 affirm the like of her, who was not merely “the 
 friend,” but the very “ Mother of God ? ” 
 
 It may be added, that, though it availed nothing 
 for influence with our Lord, to be one of His com- 
 pany, if sanctity was wanting, still, as the Gospel 
 shows. He on various occasions allowed those who 
 were near Him, to be the means by which suppli- 
 cants were brought to Him or miracles gained 
 from Him, as in the instance of the miracle of the 
 loaves ; and if on one occasion. He seems to repel 
 His Mother, when she told Him that wine was 
 wanting for the guests at the marriage feast, it is 
 obvious to remai'k on it, that, by saying that, she 
 was then separated from Him, because His hour 
 was not yet come. He implied, that when that hour 
 was come, such separation would be at an end. 
 Moreover, in fact He did, at her intercession, work 
 the miracle which she desired. 
 
 I consider it impossible then, for those who 
 believe the Church to be one vast body in heaven 
 and on earth, in which every holy creature of God 
 has his place, and of which prayer is the life, when 
 once they recognize the sanctity and greatness of 
 the Blessed Virgin, not to perceive immediately, 
 that her office above is one of perpetual inter- 
 cession for the faithful militant, and that our very 
 relation to her must be that of clients to a patron, 
 and that, in the eternal enmity which exists be- 
 tween the woman and the serpent, while the 
 
HER INTERCESSORY TOWER. 
 
 79 
 
 serpent’s strength is that of being the Tempter, 
 the weapon of the Second Eve and Mother of God 
 is prayer. 
 
 As then these ideas of her sanctity and greatness 
 gradually penetrated the mind of Chi'istendom, so did 
 that of her intercessory power follow close upon them 
 and with them. From the earliest times that media- 
 tion is symbolized in those representations of her 
 with up-lifted hands, which, whether in plaster or 
 in glass, are still extant in Eome, — that Church, 
 as St. Irenmus says, with which “ every Church, 
 that is, the faithful from every side, must agree, 
 because of its more powerful principality “ into 
 which,” as Tertullian adds, “the Apostles poured 
 out, together with their blood, their whole doc- 
 trines.” As far indeed as existing documents are 
 concerned, I know of no instance to my purpose 
 earlier than a.d. 234, but it is a very remarkable 
 one ; and, though it has been often quoted in the 
 controversy, an argument is not the weaker for 
 frequent use. 
 
 St. Gregory Nyssen®, then, a native of Cappadocia 
 in the fourth century, relates that his name-sake. 
 Bishop of Neo-Csesarea, surnamed Thaumaturgus, 
 in the century preceding, shortly before he was 
 called to the priesthood, received in a vision a Creed, 
 which is still extant, from the Blessed Mary at the 
 hands of St. John. The account runs thus : — He 
 was deeply pondering theological doctrine, which 
 * Vid. Essay on Doctr. Dev. p. 386. 
 
80 
 
 HER INTERCESSORY POWER. 
 
 the heretics of the day depraved. “In such 
 thoughts,” says his name-sake of Nyssa, “ he was 
 passing the night, when one appeared, as if in 
 human form, aged in appearance, saintly in the 
 fashion of his garments, and very venerable both in 
 grace of countenance and general mien. Amazed at 
 the sight, he started from his bed, and asked who 
 it was, and why he came ; but, on the other calm- 
 ing the perturbation of his mind with his gentle 
 voice, and saying he had appeared to him by 
 divine command on account of his doubts, in order 
 that the truth of the orthodox faith might be 
 revealed to him, he took courage at the word, and 
 regarded him with a mixture of joy and fright. 
 Then, on his stretching his hand straight forward 
 and pointing with his fingers at something on one 
 side, he followed with his eyes the extended hand, 
 and saw another appearance opposite to the former, 
 in shape of a woman, hut more than human. . . . 
 When his eyes could not bear the apparition, he 
 heard them conversing together on the subject of 
 his doubts; and thereby not only gained a true 
 knowledge of the faith, hut leaimed their names, 
 as they addressed each other by their respective 
 appellations. And thus he is said to have heard 
 the person in woman’s shape bid ‘ John the Evan- 
 gelist’ disclose to the young man the mystery of 
 godliness; and he answered that he was ready to 
 comply in this matter with the wish of ‘ the Mother 
 of the Lord,’ and enunciated a formulary, well- 
 
HER INTERCESSORY POWER. 
 
 81 
 
 turned and complete, and so vanished. He, on the 
 other hand, immediately committed to writing that 
 divine teaching of his mystagogue, and henceforth 
 preached in the Church according to that form, 
 and bequeathed to posterity, as an inheritance, 
 that heavenly teaching, by means of which his 
 people are instructed down to this day, being pre- 
 served from all heretical evil.” He proceeds to 
 rehearse the Creed thus given, “ There is One 
 God, Father of a Living Word,” &c. Bull, after 
 quoting it in his work upon the Nicene Faith, 
 alludes to this history of its origin, and adds, “ No 
 one should think it incredible that such a provi- 
 dence should befall a man whose whole life was 
 conspicuous for revelations and miracles, as all 
 ecclesiastical writers who have mentioned him (and 
 who has not?) witness with one voice.” 
 
 Here she is represented as rescuing a holy soul 
 from intellectual error. This leads me to a further 
 reflection. You seem, in one place in your Volume, 
 to object to the Antiphon, in which it is said of 
 her, “ All heresies thou hast destroyed alone.” 
 Surely the truth of it is verified in this age, as in 
 former times, and especially by the doctrine con- 
 cerning her, on which I have been dwelling. She 
 is the great exemplar of prayer in a generation, 
 which emphatically denies the power of prayer in 
 toto^ which determines that fatal laws govern the 
 universe, that there cannot be anv direct com- 
 munication between earth and heaven, that God 
 
82 
 
 TRUE AND FALSE DEVOTION 
 
 cannot visit His earth, and that man cannot in- 
 fluence His providence. 
 
 I cannot help hoping that your own reading of 
 the Fathers will on the whole bear me out in the 
 above account of their teaching concerning the 
 Blessed Virgin. Anglicans seem to me to overlook 
 the strength of the argument adducible from their 
 works in our favour, and they open the attack upon 
 our mediaeval and modern writers, careless of leaving 
 a host of primitive opponents in their rear. I do 
 not include you among such Anglicans, as you know 
 what the Fathers assert; but, if so, have you not, 
 my dear Friend, been unjust to yourself in your 
 recent Volume, and made far too much of the dif- 
 ferences which exist between Anglicans and us on 
 this particular point ? It is the office of an Irenicon 
 to smoothe difficulties; I shall be pleased if I suc- 
 ceed .in removing some of yours. Let the public 
 judge between us here. Had you happened in your 
 Volume to introduce your notice of our teaching 
 about the Blessed Virgin, with a notice of the 
 teaching of the Fathers concerning her, ordinary 
 men would have considered that there was not much 
 to choose between you and us. Though you ap- 
 pealed ever so much, in your defence, to the authority 
 of the “ undivided Church,” they would have said 
 that you, who had such high notions of the Blessed 
 Mary, were one of the last men who had a right 
 to accuse us of quasi-idolatry. When they found 
 
TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 83 
 
 you calling her by the titles of Mother of God, 
 Second Eve, and Mother of all Living, the Mother 
 of Life, the Morning Star, the mystical new heaven, 
 the sceptre of Orthodoxy, the All-un defiled Mother 
 of Holiness, and the like, they would have deemed it 
 a poor compensation for such language, that you pro- 
 tested against her being called a Co-redemptress or 
 a Priestess. And, if they were violent Protestants, 
 they would not have read you with that relish and 
 gratitude with which, as it is, they have perhaps 
 accepted your testimony against us. Not that they 
 would have been altogether right in their view of 
 you ; — on the contrary I think there is a real dif- 
 ference between what you protest against, and what 
 with the Fathers you hold; but unread men and 
 men of the world form a broad practical judgment 
 of the things which come before them, and they 
 would have felt in this case that they had the same 
 right to be shocked at you, as you have to be 
 shocked at us; — and further, which is the point to 
 which I am coming, they would have said, that, 
 granting some of our modern writers go beyond 
 the Fathers in this matter, still the line cannot be 
 logically drawn between the teaching of the Fathers 
 concerning the Blessed Virgin and our own. This 
 view of the matter seems to me true and important; 
 I do not think the line can be satisfactorily drawn, 
 and to this point I shall now direct my attention. 
 
 It is impossible, I say, in a doctrine like this, to 
 draw the line cleanly between truth and error, right 
 
 E 2 
 
84 
 
 TRUE AND FALSE DEVOTION 
 
 and wrong. This is ever the case in concrete 
 matters, which have life. Life in this world is 
 motion, and involves a continual process of change. 
 Living things grow into their perfection, into their 
 decline, into their death. No rule of art will 
 suffice to stop the operation of this natural law, 
 whether in the material world or in the human 
 mind. We can indeed encounter disorders, when 
 they occur, hy external antagonisms and remedies ; 
 hut we cannot eradicate the process itself, out of 
 which they arise. Life has the same right to 
 decay, as it has to wax strong. This is specially 
 the case with great ideas. You may stifle them; 
 or you may refuse them elbow-room; or you may 
 torment them with your continual meddling ; or 
 you may let them have free course and range, and 
 he content, instead of anticipating their excesses, to 
 expose and restrain those excesses after they have 
 occurred. But you have only this alternative; and 
 for myself, I prefer much, wherever it is possible, 
 to he first generous ^and then just ; to grant full 
 liberty of thought, and to call it to account when 
 abused. 
 
 If what I have been saying be true of energetic 
 ideas generally, much more is it the case in matters 
 of religion. Religion acts on the affections; who 
 is to hinder these, when once roused, from gather- 
 ing in their strength and running wild ? They are 
 not gifted with any connatural principle within 
 them, which renders them self-governing and self- 
 
TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 85 
 
 adjusting. They hurry right on to their object, and 
 often in their case it is, The more haste, the worse 
 speed. Their object engrosses them, and they see 
 nothing else. And of all passions love is the most 
 unmanageable ; nay more, I would not give much 
 for that love which is never extravagant, which 
 always observes the proprieties, and can move 
 about in perfect good taste, under all emergencies. 
 What mother, what husband or wife, what youth 
 or maiden in love, but says a thousand foolish 
 things, in the way of endearment, which the 
 speaker would be sorry for strangers to hear; yet 
 they are not on that account unwelcome to the 
 parties to whom they are addressed. Sometimes by 
 bad luck they are written down, sometimes they 
 get into the newspapers; and what might be even 
 graceful, when it was fresh from the heart, and 
 interpreted by the voice and the countenance, 
 presents but a melancholy exhibition when served 
 up cold for the public eye. So it is with devo- 
 tional feelings. Burning thoughts and words are 
 as open to criticism as they are beyond it. What 
 is abstractedly extravagant, may in religious per- 
 sons be becoming and beautiful, and only fall under 
 blame when it is found in others who imitate them. 
 When it is formalized into meditations or exercises, 
 it is as repulsive as love-letters in a police report. 
 Moreover, even holy minds readily adopt and 
 become familiar with language which they would 
 never have originated themselves, when it proceeds 
 
86 
 
 TRtTE AND FALSE DEVOTION 
 
 from a writer who has the same objects of devotion 
 as they have; and, if they find a stranger ridicule 
 or reprobate supplication or praise which has come 
 to them so recommended, they feel it as keenly as if 
 a direct insult were offered to those to whom that 
 homage is addressed. In the next place, what has 
 power to stir holy and refined souls is potent also 
 with the multitude; and the religion of the multi- 
 tude is ever vulgar and abnormal ; it ever will be 
 tinctured with fanaticism and superstition, while 
 men are what they are. A people’s religion is ever 
 a corrupt religion, in spite of the provisions of 
 Holy Church. If she is to be Catholic, you must 
 put up with fish of every kind, guests good and bad, 
 vessels of gold, vessels of earth. You may beat 
 religion out of men, if you will, and then their 
 excesses will take a different direction ; but if you 
 make use of religion to improve them, they will 
 make use of religion to corrupt it. And then you 
 will have effected that compromise of which our 
 countrymen report so unfavourably from abroad : — 
 a high grand faith and worship which compels 
 their admiration, and puerile absurdities among 
 the people which excite their contempt. 
 
 Nor is it any safeguard against these excesses in 
 a religious system, that the religion is based upon 
 reason, and developes into a theology. Theology 
 both uses logic and baffles it; and thus logic acts 
 both as a protection and as the perversion of reli- 
 gion. Theology is occupied with supernatural 
 
TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 87 
 
 matters, and is ever running into mysteries, which 
 reason can neither explain nor adjust. Its lines of 
 thought come to an abrupt termination, and to 
 pursue them or to complete them is to plunge 
 down the abyss. But logic blunders on, forcing 
 its way, as it can, through thick darkness and 
 ethereal mediums. The Arians went ahead with 
 logic for their directing principle, and so lost the 
 truth; on the other hand, St. Augustine, in his 
 Treatise on the Holy Trinity, seems to show that, if 
 we attempt to find and tie together the ends of 
 lines which run into infinity, we shall only succeed 
 in contradicting ourselves; that for instance it is 
 difficult to find the logical reason for not speaking 
 of three Gods as well as of One, and of One Per- 
 son in the Godhead as well as of Three. I do not 
 mean to say that logic cannot be used to set right 
 its own error, or that in the hands of an able dis- 
 putant the balance of truth may not be restored. 
 This was done at the Councils of Antioch and 
 Nicsea, in the instances of Paulus and Arius. But 
 such a process is circuitous and elaborate ; and is 
 conducted by means of minute subtleties which 
 will give it the appearance of a game of skill in 
 the case of matters too grave and practical to de- 
 serve a mere scholastic treatment. Accordingly 
 St. Augustine simply lays it down that the state- 
 ments in question are heretical, for the former is 
 Tritheism and the latter Sabellianism. That is, 
 good sense and a large view of truth, are the cor- 
 
88 
 
 TRUE AND FALSE DEVOTION 
 
 rectives of his logic. And thus we have arrived 
 at the final resolution of the whole matter; for 
 good sense and a large view of truth are rare gifts ; 
 whereas all men are bound to be devout, and most 
 men think they can argue and conclude. 
 
 Now let me apply what I have been saying to 
 the teaching of the Church on the subject of the 
 Blessed Virgin. I have to recur to a subject of so 
 sacred a natui’e, that, writing as I am for publi- 
 cation, I need the apology of my object for ven- 
 turing to pursue it. I say then, when once we 
 have mastered the idea, that Mary bore, suckled, 
 and handled the Eternal in the form of a child, 
 what limit is conceivable to the rush and flood of 
 thoughts which such a doctrine involves ? What 
 awe and surprise must attend upon the knowledge, 
 that a creature has been brought so close to the 
 Divine Essence ? It was the creation of a new idea 
 and of a new sympathy, of a new faith and worship, 
 when the holy Apostles announced that God had 
 become incarnate ; and a supreme love and devo- 
 tion to Him became possible, which seemed hope- 
 less before that revelation. But besides this, a 
 second range of thoughts was opened on mankind, 
 unknown before, and unlike any other, as soon as 
 it was understood ,that that Incarnate God had a 
 mother. The second idea is perfectly distinct from 
 the former, the one does not interfere with the 
 other. He is God made low, she is a woman made 
 high. I scarcely like to use a familiar illustration 
 
TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 89 
 
 on such a subject, but it will serve to explain wbat 
 I mean, when I ask you to consider the difference of 
 feeling, with which we read the respective histories 
 of Maria Theresa and the Maid of Orleans ; or with 
 which the middle and lower classes of a nation 
 regard a first minister of the day who has come of 
 an aristocratic house, and one who has risen from 
 the ranks. May God’s mercy keep me from the 
 shadow of a thought dimming the purity or blunting 
 the keenness of that love of Him, which is our sole 
 happiness and our sole salvation ! But surely 
 when He became man. He brought home to us His 
 incommunicable attributes with a distinctiveness, 
 which precludes the possibility of our lowering Him 
 merely by exalting a creature. He alone has an 
 entrance into our soul, reads our secret thoughts, 
 speaks to our heart, applies to us spiritual pardon 
 and strength. On Him we solely depend. He 
 alone is our inward life; He not only regenerates 
 us, but (to allude to a higher mystery) semper 
 gignit ; He is ever renewing our new birth and 
 our heavenly sonship. In this sense He may be 
 called, as in nature, so in grace, our real Father. 
 Mary is only our mother by adoption, given us from 
 the Cross ; her presence is above, not on earth ; 
 her office is external, not within us. Her name is 
 not heard in the administration of the Sacraments. 
 Her work is not one of ministration towards us; 
 her power is indirect. It is her prayers that avail, 
 and they are effectual by the Jiat of Him who is 
 
90 
 
 TRUE AND FALSE DEVOTION 
 
 our all in all. Nor need she hear us by any innate 
 power, or any personal gift ; but by His manifes- 
 tation to her of the prayers which we make her. 
 When Moses was on the Mount, the Almighty told 
 him of the idolatry of his people at the foot of it, in 
 order that he might intercede for them ; and thus it 
 is the Divine Presence which is the intermediating 
 Power by which we reach her and she reaches us. 
 
 Woe is me, if even by a bi'eath I sully these in- 
 effable truths ! but still, without prejudice to them, 
 there is, I say, another range of thought quite dis- 
 tinct from them, incommensurate with them, of 
 which the Blessed Virgin is the centre. If we 
 placed our Lord in that centre, we should only 
 be degrading Him from His throne, and making 
 Him an Arian kind of a God; that is, no God 
 at all. He who charges us with making Mary 
 a divinity, is thereby denying the divinity of Jesus.^ 
 Such a man does not know what divinity is. Our 
 Lord cannot pray for us, as a creature, as Mary 
 prays; He cannot inspire those feelings which a 
 ci'eature inspires. To her belongs, as being a 
 creature, a natural claim on our sympathy and 
 familiarity, in that she is nothing else than our 
 fellow. She is our pride, — in the poet’s words, 
 “ Our tainted nature’s solitary boast.” We look to 
 her without any fear, any remorse, any conscious- 
 ness that she is able to read us, judge us, punish 
 us. Our heart yearns towards that pure Virgin, 
 that gentle Mother, and our congratulations follow 
 
TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 91 
 
 her, as she rises from Nazareth and Ephesus, 
 through the choirs of angels, to her throne on high. 
 So weak yet so strong; so delicate, yet so glory- 
 laden ; so modest, yet so mighty. She has sketched 
 for us her own portrait in the Magnificat. “ He 
 hath regarded the low estate of His hand-maid ; for 
 behold, from henceforth all generations shall call 
 me blessed. He hath put down the mighty from 
 their seat ; and hath exalted the humble. He hath 
 filled the hungry with good things, and the rich He 
 hath sent empty away.” I recollect the strange 
 emotion which took by surprise men and women, 
 young and old, when, at the Coronation of our 
 present Queen, they gazed on the figure of one so 
 like a child, so small, so tender, so shrinking, who 
 had been exalted to so great an inheritance and so 
 vast a rule, who was such a contrast in her own 
 person to the solemn pageant which centred in her. 
 Could it he otherwise with the spectators, if they 
 had human affection ? And did not the All-wise 
 know the human heart when He took to Himself a 
 Mother ? did He not anticipate our emotion at the 
 sight of such an exaltation ? If He had not meant 
 her to exert that wonderful influence in His Church, 
 which she has in the event exerted, I will use a bold 
 word. He it is who has perverted us. If she is not 
 to attract our homage, why did He make her soli- 
 tary in her greatness amid His vast creation ? If 
 it be idolatry in us to let our affections respond to 
 our faith, He would not have made her what she 
 
92 
 
 TRUE AND FALSE DEVOTION 
 
 is, or He would not have told us that He had so 
 made her; but, far from this. He has sent His 
 Prophet to announce to us, “ A Virgin shall con- 
 ceive and bear a Son, and they shall call His name 
 Emmanuel,” and we have the same warrant for 
 hailing her as God’s Mother, as we have for adoring 
 Him as God. 
 
 Christianity is eminently an objective religion. 
 For the most part it tells us of persons and facts in 
 simple words, and leaves the announcement to pro- 
 duce its effect on such hearts as are prepared to re- 
 ceive it. This at least is its general character; 
 and Butler recognizes it as such in his Analogy, 
 when speaking of the Second and Third Persons of 
 the Holy Trinity : — “The internal worship,” he says, 
 “ to the Son and Holy Ghost is no farther matter of 
 pure revealed command than as the relations they 
 stand in to us are matters of pure revelation ; for the 
 relations being known, the obligations to such inter- 
 nal worship are obligations of reason arising out of 
 those relations themselves ’.” It is in this way that 
 the revealed doctrine of the Incarnation exerted a 
 stronger and a broader influence on Christians, as 
 they more and more apprehended and mastered its 
 meaning and its bearings. It is contained in the 
 brief and simple declaration of St. John, “ The 
 Word was made flesh ;” but it required century after 
 century to spread it out in its fulness, and to im- 
 
 * Vid. Essay on Doctr. Dev., p. 50. 
 
TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 93 
 
 print it energetically on the worship and practice of 
 the Catholic people as well as on their faith. Atha- 
 nasius was the first and the great teacher of it. He 
 collected together the inspired notices scattered 
 through David, Isaias, St, Paul, and St, John, and 
 he engraved indelibly upon the imaginations of 
 the faithful, as had never been before, that man is 
 God, and God is man, that in Mary they meet, and 
 that in this sense Mary is the centre of all things. 
 He added nothing to what was known before, no- 
 thing to the popular and zealous faith that her Son 
 was God ; he has left behind him in his works no 
 such definite passages about her as those of St. 
 Irenseus or St. Epiphanius; but he brought the 
 circumstances of the Incarnation home to men’s 
 minds, by the manifold evolutions of his analysis, 
 and secured it for ever from perversion. Still, 
 however, there was much to he done; we have no 
 proof that Athanasius himself had any special 
 devotion to the Blessed Virgin; but he laid the 
 foundations on which that devotion was to rest, 
 and thus noiselessly and without strife, as the 
 first Temple in the Holy City, she grew up into 
 her inheritance, and was “ established in Sion and 
 her power was in Jerusalem.” Such was the origin 
 of that august cuUus which has been paid to the 
 Blessed Mary for so many centuries in the East and 
 in the West. That in times and places it has fallen 
 into abuse, that it has even become a superstition, 
 I do not care to deny ; for, as I have said above, the 
 
94 
 
 EXPLANATIONS. 
 
 same process which brings to maturity carries on to 
 decay, and things that do not admit of abuse have 
 very little life in them. This of course does not 
 excuse such excesses, or justify us in making light 
 of them, when they occur. I have no intention of 
 doing so as regards the particular instances which 
 you bring against us, though hut a few words will 
 suffice for what I need say about them : — before 
 doing so, however, I am obliged to make three or 
 four introductory remarks. 
 
 1. I have almost anticipated my first remark 
 already. It is this : that the height of our offend- 
 ing in our devotion to the Blessed Virgin would 
 not look so great in your Volume as it does, had 
 you not placed yourself on lower ground than your 
 own feelings towards her would have spontaneously 
 prompted you to take. I have no doubt you had 
 some good reason for adopting this course, but I 
 do not know it; what I do know is, that, for the 
 Fathers’ sake who so exalt her, you really do love 
 and venerate her, though you do not evidence it in 
 your book. I am glad then in this place to insist 
 on a fact which will lead those among us, iVho 
 know you not, to love you from their love of her, 
 in spite of what you refuse to give her; and Angli- 
 cans, on the other hand, who do know you, to think 
 better of us, who refuse her nothing, when they 
 reflect that you do not actually go against us, but 
 merely come short of us, in your devotion to her. 
 
EXPLANATIONS. 
 
 95 
 
 2. As you revere the Fathers, so you revere the 
 Greek Church; and here again we have a witness 
 on our behalf, of which you must be aware as fully 
 as we are, and of which you must really mean to 
 give us the benefit. In proportion as this remark- 
 able fact is understood, it will take ofip the edge 
 of the surprise of Anglicans at the sight of our 
 devotions to our Lady. It must weigh with them, 
 when they discover that we can enlist on our side 
 in this controversy those “seventy millions” (I 
 think they so consider them) of Orientals, who are 
 separated from our communion. Is it not a very 
 pregnant fact, that the Eastern Churches, so inde- 
 pendent of us, so long separated from the West, so 
 jealous of Antiquity, should even surpass us in their 
 exaltation of the Blessed Virgin ? That they go 
 further than, we do is sometimes denied, on the 
 ground that the Western devotion towards her is 
 brought out into system, and the Eastern is not; 
 yet this only means really, that the Latins have 
 more mental activity, more strength of intellect, 
 less of routine, less of mechanical worship among 
 them, than the Greeks. We are able, better than 
 they, to give an account of what we do; and we 
 seem to be more extreme, merely because we are 
 more definite. But, after all, what have the Latins 
 done so bold, as that substitution of the name of 
 Mary for the Name of Jesus at the end of the 
 collects and petitions in the Breviary, nay in the 
 Ritual and Liturgy ? Not merely in local or popu- 
 
96 
 
 EXPLANATIONS. 
 
 lar, and in semi-authorized devotions, which are 
 the kind of sources that^ supplies you with your 
 matter of accusation against us, hut in the formal 
 prayers of the Greek Eucharistic Service, petitions 
 are offered, not “in the name of Jesus Christ,” 
 hut “ of the Theotocos.” Such a phenomenon, in 
 such a quarter, I think ought to make Anglicans 
 merciful towards those writers among ourselves, 
 who have been excessive in singing the praises of 
 the Deipara. To make a rule of substituting Mary 
 with all Saints for Jesus in the public service, has 
 more “ Mariolatry ” in it, than to alter the Te 
 Deum to her honour in private devotion, 
 
 3. And thus I am brought to a third remark, 
 supplemental to your accusation of us. Two large 
 views, as I have said above, are opened upon our 
 devotional thoughts in Christianity; the one cen- 
 tering in the Son of Mary, the other in the Mother 
 of Jesus. Neither need obscure the other ; and in 
 the Catholic Church, as a matter of fact, neither 
 does. I wish you had either frankly allowed this 
 in your Volume, or proved the contrary. I wish, 
 when you report that “ a certain proportion, it has 
 been ascertained by those who have inquired, do 
 stop short in her,” p. 107, that you had added your 
 belief, that the case was far otherwise with the 
 great hulk of Catholics. Might I not have expected 
 it ? May I not, without sensitiveness, be some- 
 what pained at the omission ? From mere Protes- 
 tants indeed I expect nothing better. They con- 
 
EXPLANATIONS. 
 
 97 
 
 tent themselves with saying that our devotions to 
 our Lady must necessarily throw our Lord into 
 the shade ; and thereby they relieve themselves of 
 a great deal of trouble. Then they catch at any 
 stray fact which countenances or seems to coun- 
 tenance their prejudice. Now I say plainly I 
 never will defend or screen any one from your 
 just rebuke, who, through false devotion to Mary, 
 forgets Jesus. But I should like the fact to be 
 proved first; I cannot hastily admit it. There 
 is this broad fact the other way; — that, if we look 
 through Europe, we shall find, on the whole, that 
 just those nations and countries have lost their 
 faith in the divinity of Christ, who have given up 
 devotion to His Mother, and that those on the 
 other hand, who have been foremost in her honour, 
 have retained their orthodoxy. Contrast, for in- 
 stance, the Calvinists with the Greeks, or France 
 with the North of Germany, or the Protestant 
 and Catholic communions in Ireland. As to Eng- 
 land, it is scarcely doubtful what would be the 
 state of its Established Church, if the Li.turgy and 
 Articles were not an integral part of its Esta- 
 blishment ; and, when men bring so grave a charge 
 against us as is implied in your Volume, they cannot 
 he surprised if we in turn say hard things of An- 
 glicanism In the Catholic Church Mary has 
 
 ^ I have spoken more on this subject in my Essay on Deve- 
 lopment, p. 438, Nor does it avail to object, that, in this con- 
 trast of devotional exercises, the human is sure to supplant the 
 
 G 
 
98 
 
 EXPLANATIONS. 
 
 shown herself, not the rival, hut the minister of her 
 Son ; she has protected Him, as in His infancy, so 
 in the whole history of the Eeligion. There is then 
 a plain historical truth in Dr. Faber’s words which 
 you quote to condemn, “ Jesus is obscured, because 
 Mary is kept in the back-ground.” 
 
 This truth, exemplified in history, might also he 
 abundantly illustrated, did my space admit, from 
 the lives and writings of holy men in modern times. 
 Two of them, St. Alfonso Liguori and the Blessed 
 Paul of the Cross, for all their notorious devotion 
 to the Mother, have shown their supreme love of 
 her Divine Son, in the names which they have 
 given to their respective congregations, viz. “ of the 
 Eedeemer,” and “ of the Cross and Passion.” How- 
 ever, I will do no more than refer to an apposite 
 passage in the Italian translation of the work of a 
 French Jesuit, Fr. Nepveu, “ Christian Thoughts 
 
 Divine, from the infirmity of our nature; for, I repeat, the 
 question is one of fact, whether it has done so. And next, it 
 must be asked, whether the character of Frotestant devotion 
 towards our Lord, has been that of worship at all ; and not 
 rather such as we pay to an excellent human being. . . . Carnal 
 minds will ever create a carnal worship for themselves ; and to 
 forbid them the service of the saints will have no tendency to 
 teach them the worship of Glod. Moreover, . . . great and 
 constant as is the devotion which the Catholic pays to St. 
 Mary, it has a special province, and has far more connexion 
 with the public services and the festive aspect of Christianity, and 
 with certain extraordinary offices which she holds, than with 
 what is strictly personal and primary in religion.” Our late 
 Cardinal, on my reception, singled out to me this last sentence, 
 for the expression of his especial approbation. 
 
EXPLANATIONS. 
 
 99 
 
 for every Day in the Year,” which was recom- 
 mended to the friend who went with me to Rome, 
 by the same Jesuit Father there, with whom, as I 
 have already said, I stood myself in such inti- 
 mate relations; I believe it is a fair specimen of 
 the teaching of our spiritual books. 
 
 “ The love of Jesus Christ is the most sure pledge of our 
 future happiness, and the most infallible token of our pre- 
 destination. Mercy towards the poor, devotion to the Holy 
 Virgin, are very sensible tokens of predestination ; nevertheless 
 they are not absolutely infallible; but one cannot have a 
 sincere and constant love of Jesus Christ, without being pre- 
 destinated. . . . The destroying angel, which bereaved the 
 houses of the Egyptians of their first-born, had respect to all 
 the houses which were marked with the blood of the Lamb.” 
 
 And it is also exemplified, as I verily believe, 
 not only in formal and distinctive Confessions, not 
 only in hooks intended for the educated class, but 
 also in the personal religion of the Catholic popu- 
 lations. When strangers are so unfavourably im- 
 pressed with us, because they see Images of our 
 Lady in our Churches, and crowds flocking about 
 her, they forget that there is a Presence within the 
 sacred walls, infinitely more awful, which claims 
 and obtains from us a worship transcendently dif- 
 ferent from any devotion we pay to her. That 
 devotion might indeed tend to idolatry, if it were 
 encouraged in Protestant Churches, where there is 
 nothing higher than it to attract the worshipper; 
 but all the images that a Catholic Church ever 
 contained, all the Crucifixes at its Altars brought 
 
 G 2 
 
100 
 
 EXPLANATIONS. 
 
 together, do not so affect its frequenters, as the lamp 
 which betokens the presence or absence there of 
 the Blessed Sacrament. Is not this so certain, so 
 notorious, that on some occasions it has been even 
 brought as a charge against us, that we are irreve- 
 rent in Church, when what seemed to the objector 
 to he irreverence was hut the necessary change 
 of feeling, which came over those who were there, 
 on their knowing that their Lord was away ? 
 
 The Mass again conveys to us the same lesson of 
 the sovereignty of the Incarnate Son ; it is a return 
 to Calvary, and Mary is scarcely named in it. Hos- 
 tile visitors enter our Churches on Sunday at mid- 
 day, the time of the Anglican Service. They are 
 surprised to see the High Mass perhaps poorly 
 attended, and a body of worshippers leaving the 
 music and the mixed multitude who may be lazily 
 fulfilling their obligation, for the silent or the in- 
 formal devotions which are offered at an Image of 
 the Blessed Virgin. They may be tempted, with 
 one of your informants, to call such a temple, not a 
 “ Jesus Church,” but a “ Mary Church.” But, if 
 they understood our ways, they would know that 
 we begin the day with our Lord and then go on to 
 His Mother. It is early in the morning that reli- 
 gious persons go to Mass and Communion. The 
 High Mass, on the other hand, is the festive cele- 
 bration of the day, not the special devotional ser- 
 vice; nor is there any reason why those who have 
 been at a Low Mass already, should not at that 
 
EXPLANATIONS. 
 
 101 
 
 hour proceed to ask the intercession of the Blessed 
 Virgin for themselves and all that is dear to them. 
 
 Communion, again, which is given in the morn- 
 ing, is a solemn unequivocal act of faith in the In- 
 carnate God, if any can be such ; and the most 
 gracious of admonitions, did we need one, of His 
 sovereign and sole right to possess us. I knew a 
 lady, who on her death-bed was visited by an 
 excellent Protestant friend. She, with great 
 tenderness for her soul’s welfare, asked her whe- 
 ther her prayers to the Blessed Virgin did not, 
 at that awful hour, lead to forgetfulness of her 
 Saviour. “ Forget .Him ? ” she replied with sur- 
 prise, “Why, He has just been here.” She had 
 been receiving Him in communion. When then, 
 my dear Pusey, you read any thing extravagant in 
 praise of our Lady, is it not charitable to ask, even 
 while you condemn it in itself, did the author write 
 nothing else ? Did he write on the Blessed Sacra- 
 ment ? had he given up “ all for Jesus ? ” I recol- 
 lect some lines, the happiest, I think, which that 
 author wrote, which bring out strikingly the reci- 
 procity, which I am dwelling on, of the respective 
 devotions to Mother and Son; 
 
 “ But scornful men have coldly said 
 Thy love was leading me from God ; 
 
 And yet in this I did but tread 
 The very path my Saviour trod. 
 
 “ They know but little of thy worth 
 
 Who speak these heartless words to me ; 
 
 For what did Jesus love on earth 
 One half so tenderly as time ? 
 
102 
 
 EXPLANATIONS. 
 
 “ Get me the grace to love thee more ; 
 
 Jesus will give, if thou wilt plead; 
 
 And, Mother, when life’s cares are o’er. 
 
 Oh, I shall love thee then indeed. 
 
 “ Jesus, when His three hours were run, 
 
 Bequeathed thee from the Cross to me ; 
 
 And oh ! how can I love thy Son, 
 
 Sweet Mother, if I love not thee.” 
 
 4. Thus we are brought from the consideration 
 of the sentiments themselves, of which you com- 
 plain, to the persons who wrote, and the places 
 where they wrote them. I wish you had been led, 
 in this part of your work, to that sort of careful 
 labour which you have employed in so masterly a 
 way in your investigation of the circumstances of 
 the definition of the Immaculate Conception. In 
 the latter case you have catalogued the Bishops 
 who wrote to the Holy See, and analyzed their 
 answers. Had you in like manner discriminated 
 and located the Marian writers, as you call them, 
 and observed the times, places, and circumstances 
 of their works, I think, they would not, when 
 brought together, have had their present startling 
 effect on the reader. As it is, they inflict a vague 
 alarm upon the mind, as when one hears a noise, 
 and does not know whence it comes and what it 
 means. Some of your authors, I know are Saints ; 
 all, I suppose, are spmtual writers and holy men ; 
 but the majority are of no great celebrity, even if 
 they have any kind of weight. Suarez has no busi- 
 ness among them at all, for, when he says that no 
 one is saved without the Blessed Virgin, he is speak- 
 
EXPLANATIONS, 
 
 103 
 
 ing not of devotion to her, but of her intercession. 
 The greatest name is St. Alfonso Liguori ; but it 
 never surprises me to read any thing unusual in 
 the devotions of a saint. Such men are on a level 
 very different from our own, and we cannot under- 
 stand them. I hold this to be an important canon 
 in the Lives of the Saints, according to the words 
 of the Apostle, “ The spiritual man judges all 
 things, and he himself is judged of no one.” But 
 we may refrain from judging, without proceeding 
 to imitate. I hope it is not disrespectful to so 
 great a servant of God to say, that I never have i*ead 
 his Glories of Mary ; hut here I am speaking gene- 
 rally of all Saints, whether I know them or not; 
 — and I say that they are beyond us, and that we 
 must use them as patterns, not as copies. As to 
 his practical directions, St. Alfonso wrote them for 
 Neapolitans, whom he knew, and we do not know. 
 Other writers whom you quote, as de Salazar, are 
 too ruthlessly logical to be safe or pleasant guides 
 in the delicate matters of devotion. As to de 
 Montford and Oswald, I never even met with their 
 names, till I saw them in your hook; the hulk of 
 our laity, not to say of our clergy, perhaps know 
 them little better than I do. Nor did I know till 
 I learnt it from your Volume, that there were two 
 Bernardines. St. Bernardino of Sienna, I knew of 
 course, and knew too that he had a burning love 
 for our Lord. But about the other, “ Bernardino de 
 Bustis,” I was quite at fault. I find from the Fro- 
 
104 
 
 EXPLANATIONS, 
 
 testant Cave, that he, as well as his namesake, made 
 himself conspicuous also 'for his zeal for the Holy 
 Name, which is much to the point here. “ With 
 such devotion was he carried away,” says Cave, “ for 
 the bare name of Jesus, (which, by a new device of 
 Bernardine of Sienna, had lately begun to receive 
 divine honours,) that he was urgent with Innocent 
 VIII. to assign it a day and rite in the Calendar.” 
 
 One thing, however, is clear about all these 
 writers; that not one of them is an Englishman. 
 I have gone through your book, and do not find 
 one English name among the various authors to 
 whom you refer, except of course the name of that 
 author whqse lines I have been quoting, and who, 
 great as are his merits, cannot, for the reasons I 
 have given in the opening of my Letter, be con- 
 sidered a representative of English Catholic devo- 
 tion. Whatever these writers may have said or 
 not said, whatever they may have said harshly, 
 and whatever capable of fair explanation, still they 
 are foreigners; we are not answerable for their 
 particular devotions; and as to themselves, I am 
 glad to be able to quote the beautiful words which 
 you use about them in your letter to the Weekly 
 Register of November 25th last. “ I do not 
 presume,” you say, “ to prescribe to Italians 
 or Spaniards, what they shall hold, or how they 
 shall express their pious opinions ; and least of all 
 did I think of imputing to any of the writers whom 
 I quoted that they took from our Lord any of the 
 
EXPLANATIONS. 
 
 105 
 
 love wbicli they gave to His Mother.” In these 
 last words too you have supplied one of the omis- 
 sions in your Volume which I noticed above. 
 
 5. Now then we dome to England itself, which 
 after all, in the matter of devotion, alone concerns 
 you and me; for though doctrine is one and the 
 same every where, devotions, as I have already 
 said, are matters of the particular time and the 
 particular country. I suppose we owe it to the 
 national good sense, that English Catholics have 
 been protected from the extravagances which are 
 elsewhere to he found. And we owe it also to the 
 wisdom and moderation of the Holy See, which, in 
 giving us the pattern for our devotion, as well as 
 the rule of our faith, has never indulged in those 
 curiosities of thought which are both so attractive 
 to undisciplined imaginations and so dangerous to 
 grovelling hearts. In the case of our own common 
 people I think such a forced style of devotion would 
 be simply unintelligible; as to the educated, I 
 doubt whether it can have more than an occasional 
 or temporary influence. If the Catholic faith 
 spreads in England, these peculiarities will not 
 spread with it. There is a healthy devotion to 
 the Blessed Mary, and there is an artificial; it is 
 possible to love her as a Mother, to honour her as 
 a Virgin, to seek her as a Patron, and to exalt her 
 as a Queen, without any injury to solid piety and 
 Christian good sense: — I cannot help calling this 
 the English style. I wonder whether you find any 
 
106 
 
 EXPLANATIONS. 
 
 thing to displease you in the Garden of the Soul, 
 the Key of Heaven, the Yade Mecum, the Golden 
 Manual, or the Crown of Jesus. These are the 
 books to which Anglicans ought to appeal, who 
 would he fair to us in this matter. I do not ob- 
 serve any thing in them which goes beyond the 
 teaching of the Fathers, except so far as devo- 
 tion goes beyond doctrine. 
 
 There is one collection of Devotions besides, of 
 the highest authority, which has been introduced 
 from abroad of late years. It consists of prayers 
 of very various kinds which have been indulgenced 
 by the Popes ; and it commonly goes by the name 
 of the Raccolta. As that word suggests, the lan- 
 guage of many of the prayers is Italian, while 
 others are in Latin. This circumstance is unfa- 
 vourable to a translation, which, however skilful, 
 must ever savour of the words and idioms of the 
 original; but, passing over this necessary disad- 
 vantage, I consider there is hardly a clause in the 
 good-sized volume in question which even the sensi- 
 tiveness of English Catholicism would wish changed. 
 Its anxious observance of doctrinal exactness is 
 almost a fault. It seems afraid of using the words 
 “give me,” “make me,” in its addresses to the 
 Blessed Virgin, which are as natural to adopt, as in 
 addressing a pai’ent or friend. Surely we do not dis- 
 parage Divine Providence when we say that we are 
 indebted to our parents for our life, or when we ask 
 their blessing; we do not show any atheistical lean- 
 
EXPLANATIONS. 
 
 107 
 
 ing, because we say that a man’s recovery must be 
 left to nature, or that nature supplies brute animals 
 with instincts. In like manner it seems to me a 
 simple purism, to insist upon minute accuracy of 
 expression in devotional and popular writings. 
 However, the Raccolta^ as coming from responsible 
 authority, for the most part observes it. It com- 
 monly uses the phrases, “ gain for us by thy 
 prayers,” “ obtain for us,” “ pray to Jesus for me,” 
 “ Speak for me, Mary,” “ carry thou our prayers,” 
 “ask for us grace,” “intercede for the people of 
 God,” and the like, marking thereby with great 
 emphasis that she is nothing more than an Advo- 
 cate, and not a source of mercy. Nor do I recollect 
 in this book more than one or two ideas to which 
 you would he likely to raise an objection. The 
 strongest of these is found in the Novena before 
 her Nativity, in which, apropos of her Birth, we pray 
 that she “ would come down again, and be re-horn 
 spiritually in our souls;” — but it will occur to you 
 that St. Paul speaks of his wish to impart to 
 his converts, “ not only the gospel, but his own 
 soul;” and writing to the Corinthians, he says 
 he has “begotten them by the gospel,” and to 
 Philemon, that he had “ begotten Onesimus, in 
 his bonds;” whereas St. James, with greater accu- 
 racy of expi'ession, says “of His own will hath 
 God begotten us with the word of truth.” Again 
 we find the petitioner saying to the Blessed 
 Mary, “ In thee I place all my hope ;” but this is 
 
108 
 
 EXPLANATIONS. 
 
 explained in another passage, “ Thou art my best 
 hope, after Jesus.” Again, we read elsewhere, “ I 
 would I had a greater love for thee, since to love 
 thee is a great mark of predestination;” but the 
 pra 3 'er goes on, “ Thy Son deserves of us an im- 
 measurable love ; pray that I may have this grace, a 
 great love for Jesus,” and further on, “ I covet no 
 good of the earth, hut to love my God alone.” 
 
 Then again, as to the lessons which our Catholics 
 receive, whether by catechising or instruction, you 
 would find nothing in our received manuals to which 
 you would not assent, I am quite sure. Again, as to 
 preaching, a standard book was drawn up three 
 centuries ago, to supply matter for the purpose to 
 the parochial clergy. You incidentally mention, 
 p. 153, that the comment of Cornelius a Lapide on 
 Scripture is “ a repertorium for sermons ;” but I 
 never heard of this work being used, nor indeed can 
 it, because of its size. The work provided for the 
 purpose by the Church is the “ Catechism of the 
 Council of Trent,” and nothing extreme about our 
 Blessed Lady is propounded there. On the whole 
 I am sanguine that you will come to the conclusion, 
 that Anglicans may safely trust themselves to us 
 English Catholics, as regards any devotions to the 
 Blessed Virgin which might be required of them, 
 over and above the rule of the Council of Trent. 
 
 6. And, now at length coming to the statements, 
 not English, but foreign, which offend you in works 
 written in her honour, I will frankly say that I read 
 
EXPLANATIONS. 
 
 109 
 
 some of those which you quote with grief and 
 almost anger ; for they seemed to me to ascribe to 
 the Blessed Virgin a power of “ searching the reins 
 and hearts,” which is the attribute of God alone ; 
 and I said to myself, how can we any more prove 
 our Lord’s divinity from Scripture, if those cardinal 
 passages which invest Him with divine preroga- 
 tives, after all invest Him with nothing beyond what 
 His Mother shares with Him ? And how, again, 
 is there any thing of incommunicable greatness in 
 His death and passion, if He who was alone in 
 the garden, alone upon the cross, alone in the 
 resurrection, after all is not alone, but shared His 
 solitary work with His Blessed Mother, — with her 
 to whom, when He entered on His ministry. He said 
 for our instruction, not as grudging her her proper 
 glory, “Woman, what have I to do with thee?” 
 And then again, if I hate those perverse sayings so 
 much, how much more must she, in proportion to 
 her love of Him ? and how do we show our love for 
 her, by wounding her in the very apple of her eye ? 
 This I said and say ; but then on the other hand I 
 have to observe that these strange words after all 
 are but few in number, out of the many passages 
 you cite ; that most of them exemplify what I said 
 above about the difficulty of determining the exact 
 point where truth passes into error, and that they 
 are allowable in one sense or connexion, and false 
 in another. Thus to say that prayer (and the 
 Blessed Virgin’s prayer) is omnipotent, is a harsh 
 
110 
 
 EXPLANATIONS. 
 
 expression in every-day prose ; but, if it is explained 
 to mean that there is nothing which prayer may 
 not obtain from God, it is nothing else than the 
 very promise made us in Scripture. Again, to 
 say that Mary is the centre of all being, sounds 
 inflated and profane; yet after all it is only one 
 way, and a natural way, of saying that the Creator 
 and the creature met together, and became one in 
 her womb ; and as such, I have used the expression 
 above. Again, it is at first sight a paradox to say 
 that “ Jesus is obscured, because Mary is kept in 
 the back-ground;” yet there is a sense, as I have 
 shown above, in which it is a simple truth. 
 
 And so again certain statements may he true, 
 under circumstances and in a particular time and 
 place, which are abstractedly false; and hence it 
 may he very unfair in a controversialist to inter- 
 pret by an English or a modern rule, whatever may 
 have been asserted by a foreign or mediaeval author. 
 To say, for instance, dogmatically, that no one 
 can be saved without personal devotion to the 
 Blessed Virgin, would be an untenable proposition ; 
 yet it might be true of this man or that, or of this 
 or that countrv at this or that date; and if the 
 very statement has ever been made by any writer of 
 consideration (and this has to be ascertained), then 
 perhaps it was made precisely under these excep- 
 tional circumstances. If an Italian preacher made 
 it, I should feel no disposition to doubt him, at 
 least as regards Italian youths and Italian maidens. 
 
EXPLANATIONS. 
 
 Ill 
 
 Then I think you have not always made your 
 quotations with that consideration and kindness 
 which is your rule. At p. 106, you say, “ It is 
 commonly said, that, if any Roman Catholic ac- 
 knowledges that ‘ it is good and useful to pray to 
 the saints,’ he is not bound himself to do so. 
 Were the above teaching true, it would be cruelty 
 to say so ; because, according to it, he would be 
 forfeiting what is morally necessary to his salva- 
 tion.” But now, as to the fact, where is it said 
 that to pray to our Lady and the Saints is neces- 
 sary to salvation ? The proposition of St. Alfonso 
 is, that “ God gives no grace except through 
 Mary;” that is through her intercession. But 
 intercession is one thing, devotion is another. 
 And Suarez says, “ It is the universal sentiment 
 that the intercession of Mary is not only useful, 
 but also in a certain manner necessary;” but still 
 it is the question of her intercession, not of our 
 invocation of her, not of devotion to her. If it were 
 so, no Protestant could be saved; if it were so, there 
 would be grave reasons for doubting of the sal- 
 vation of St. Chrysostom or St. Athanasius, or of 
 the primitive Mart3TS ; nay, I should like to know 
 whether St. Augustine, in all his voluminous writ- 
 ings, invokes her once. Our Lord died for those 
 heathens who did not know Him ; and His Mother 
 intercedes for those Christians who do not know 
 her ; and she intercedes according to His will, 
 and, when He wills to save a particular soul, she at 
 
112 
 
 EXPLANATIONS. 
 
 once prays for it. I say, He wills indeed according 
 to her prayer, but then she prays according to His 
 will. Though then it is natural and prudent for 
 those to have recourse to her, who from the Church’s 
 teaching know her power, yet it cannot be said 
 that devotion to her is a sine-qud-non of salvation. 
 Some indeed of the authors, whom you quote, go 
 further ; they do speak of devotion ; hut even then, 
 they do not enunciate the general proposition 
 which I have been disallowing. For instance, they 
 say, “ It is morally impossible for those to be saved 
 who neglect the devotion to the Blessed Virgin;” 
 hut a simple omission is one thing, and neglect 
 another. “ It is impossible for any to be saved 
 who turns away from her,” yes ; but to “ turn 
 aw'ay ” is to offer some positive disrespect or in- 
 sult towards her, and that with sufficient know- 
 ledge; and I certainly think it would be a very 
 grave act, if in a Catholic country (and of such 
 the writers were speaking, for they knew of no 
 other), with Ave-Marias sounding in the air, and 
 images of the Madonna in every street and road, 
 a Catholic broke off or gave up a practice that was 
 universal, and in which he was brought up, and 
 deliberately put her name out of his thoughts. 
 
 7. Though, then, common sense may determine 
 for us, that the line of prudence and propriety has 
 been certainly passed in the instance of certain 
 statements about the Blessed Virgin, it is often not 
 easy to prove the point logically ; and in such cases 
 
EXPLANATIONS. 
 
 113 
 
 authority, if it attempt to act, would be in the 
 position which so often happens in our courts of 
 law, when the commission of an offence is morally 
 certain, but the government prosecutor cannot find 
 legal evidence sufficient to ensure conviction. I am 
 not denying the right of Sacred Congregations, at 
 their will, to act peremptorily, and without assigning 
 reasons for the judgment they pass upon writers; 
 but, when they have found it inexpedient to take 
 this severe course, perhaps it may happen from the 
 circumstances of the case, that there is no other 
 that they can take, even if they would. It is wiser 
 then for the most part to leave these excesses 
 to the gradual operation of public opinion, that is, 
 to the opinion of educated and sober Catholics; 
 and this seems to me the healthiest way of putting 
 them down. Yet in matter of fact I believe the 
 Holy See has interfered from time to time, when 
 devotion seemed running into superstition ; and not 
 so long ago. I recollect hearing in Gregory the 
 XVI. ’s time, of books about the Blessed Virgin, 
 which had been suppressed by authority; and in 
 particular of a representation of the Immaculate 
 Conception which he had forbidden, and of mea- 
 sures taken against the shocking notion that the 
 Blessed Mary is present in the Holy Eucharist, in 
 the sense in which our Lord is present ; but I have 
 no means of verifying the information I received. 
 
 Nor have I time, any more than you have had, to 
 ascertain how far great theologians have made pro- 
 
 H 
 
114 
 
 EXPLANATIONS. 
 
 tests against those various extravagances of which 
 you so rightly complain. Passages, however, from 
 three well-known Jesuit Fathers have opportunely 
 come in my way, and in one of them is introduced in 
 confirmation, the name of the great Gerson. They 
 are Canisius, Petavius, and Raynaudus ; and as they 
 speak very appositely, and you do not seem to know 
 them, I will here make some extracts from them : — 
 
 (1.) Canisius: — 
 
 “ We confess that in the cultus of Mary it has been, and is 
 possible for corruptions to creep in ; and we have a more than 
 ordinary desire that the Pastors of the Church should be care- 
 fully vigilant here, and give no place to Satan, whose charac- 
 teristic oflSce it has ever been, while rneji sleep, to sow the 
 cockle amid the Lord’s wheat. . . . Por this purpose it is his w^ont 
 gladly to avail himself of the aid of heretics, fanatics, and false 
 Catholics, as may be seen in the instance of this Mariamis 
 cultus. This cultus^ heretics, suborned by Satan, attack with 
 hostility. . . . Thus too, certain mad heads are so demented by 
 Satan, as to embrace superstitions and idolatries instead of the 
 true cultus,, and neglect altogether the due measures whether 
 in respect to God or to Mary. Such indeed were the Colly- 
 ridians of old. . . . Such that German herdsman a hundred 
 years ago, who gave out publicly that he was a new prophet, 
 and had had a vision of the Deipara, and told the people in her 
 name to pay no more tributes and taxes to princes. . . . More- 
 over, how many Catholics does one see who, by great and 
 shocking negligence, have neither care nor regard for her cultus^ 
 but, given to profane and secular objects, scarce once a year 
 raise their earthly minds to sing her praises or to venerate 
 her ?” — Be Maria Beipard, p. 518. 
 
 (2.) Father Petau says, when discussing the 
 teaching of the Fathers about the Blessed Virgin 
 Incarn. xiv. 8.) — 
 
EXPLANATIONS. 
 
 115 
 
 I will venture to give this advice to all who would be 
 devout and panegyrical towards the Holy Virgin, viz. not to 
 exceed in their piety and devotion to her, but to be content 
 with true and solid praises, and to cast aside what is otherwise. 
 The latter kind of idolatry, lurking, as St. Augustine says, nay 
 implanted in human hearts, is greatly abhorrent from Theo- 
 logy, that is, from the gravity of heavenly wisdom, which 
 never thinks or asserts any thing, but what is measured by* 
 certain and accurate rules. What that rule should be, and 
 what caution is to be used in our present subject, I will not 
 determine of myself ; but according to the mind of a most 
 weighty and most learned theologian, John Gerson, who in one 
 of his Epistles proposes certain canons, which he calls truths, 
 by means of which are to be measured the assertions of theolo- 
 gians concerning the Incarnation By these truly 
 
 golden precepts Gerson brings within bounds the immoderate 
 licence of praising the Blessed Virgin, and restrains it within 
 the measure of sober and healthy piety. And from these it is 
 evident that that sort of reasoning is frivolous and nugatory, 
 in which so many indulge, in order to assign any sort of grace 
 they please, however unusual, to the Blessed Virgin. Eor they 
 argue thus ; ^ Whatever the Son of God could bestow for the 
 glory of His Mother, that it became Him in fact to furnish 
 or again, ^ Whatever honours or ornaments He has poured out 
 on other saints, those all together hath He heaped upon His 
 Mother whence they draw their chain of reasoning to their 
 desired conclusion; a mode of argumentation which Gerson 
 treats with contempt as captious and sophistical.” 
 
 He adds, what of course we all should, say, that, 
 in thus speaking, he has no intention to curtail the 
 liberty of pious persons in such meditations and 
 conjectures, on the mysteries of faith, sacred, his- 
 tories and the Scripture test, as are of the nature 
 of comments, supplements, and the like. 
 
 (3.) Raynaud is an author, full of devotion, if 
 any one is so, to the Blessed Virgin ; yet in the 
 
 H 2 
 
116 
 
 EXPLANxVTIONS. 
 
 work which he has composed in her honour {Dip- 
 tycha Mariana)^ he says more than I can quote 
 here, to the same purpose as Petau. I abridge 
 some portions of his text : — 
 
 Let this be taken for granted, that no praises of ours can 
 come up to the praises due to the Virgin Mother. But we 
 must not make up for our inability to reach her true praise, by 
 a supply of lyiug embellishment and false honours. Bor there 
 are some whose affection for religious objects is so imprudent 
 and lawless, that they transgress the due limits even towards the 
 saints. This Origen has excellently observed upon in the case 
 of the Baptist, for very many, instead of observing the measure 
 of charity, considered whether he might not be the Christ.’’ 
 p.9. “ . . . St. Anselm, the first, or one of the first champions of 
 the public celebration of the Blessed Virgin’s Immaculate Con- 
 ception, says, de JExcell. Virgin that the Church considers it inde- 
 cent, that any thing that admits of doubt should be said in her 
 praise, when the things which are certainly true of her supply 
 such large materials for laudation. It is right so to interpret 
 St. Epiphanius also, when he says that human tongues should 
 not pronounce any thing lightly of the Deipara ; and who is 
 more justly to be charged with speaking lightly of the most 
 holy Mother of God, than he, who, as if what is certain and 
 evident did not suffice for her full investiture, is wiser than the 
 aged, and obtrudes on us the toadstools of his own mind, and 
 devotions unheard of by those Holy Bathers who loved her 
 best ? Plainly, as St. Anselm says, that she is the Mother of 
 God, this by itself exceeds every elevation wffiich can be named 
 or imagined, short of God. About so sublime a majesty we 
 should not speak hastily from prurience of wit, or flimsy pre- 
 text of promoting piety ; but with great maturity of thought ; 
 and, whenever the maxims of the Church and the oracles of 
 faith do not suffice, then not without the suffrages of the Doc- 
 tors Those who are subject to this prurience of inno- 
 
 vation, do not perceive how broad is the difference between 
 subjects of human science, and heavenly things. All noveltj'’ 
 concerning the objects of our faith is to be put far away ; 
 
EXPLANATIONS. 
 
 117 
 
 except so far as by diligent investigation of God’s Word, 
 written and unwritten, and a well founded inference from what 
 is thence to be elicited, something is brought to light which 
 though already indeed there, had not hitherto been recognized. 
 The innovations which we condemn are those which rest nei- 
 ther on the written nor unwritten Word, nor on conclusions 
 from it, nor on the judgment of ancient sages, nor sufficient 
 basis of reason, but on the sole colour and pretext of doing 
 more honour to the Deipara.” — p. 10. 
 
 In anotlier portion of the same work, he speaks 
 in particular of one of those imaginations to which 
 you especially refer, and for which, without strict 
 necessity (as it seems to me) you allege the autho- 
 rity of a Lapide. 
 
 Nor is that honour of the Deipara to be offered, viz. that 
 the elements of the body of Christ, which the Blessed Virgin 
 supplied to it, remain perpetually unaltered in Christ, and 
 
 thereby are found also in the Eucharist This solicitude 
 
 for the Virgin’s glory, must, I consider, be discarded ; since, 
 if rightly considered, it involves an injury towards Christ, and 
 such honours the Virgin loveth not. And first, dismissing 
 philosophical bagatelles about the animation of blood, milk, &c., 
 who can endure the proposition that a good portion of the 
 substance of Christ in the Eucharist should be worshipped 
 with a cultus less than latria ? viz. by the inferior cultus of 
 hyperdulia ? The preferable class of theologians contend that 
 not even the humanity of Christ, is to be materially abstracted 
 from the Word of God, and worshipped by itself; how then 
 shall we introduce a cultus of the Deipara in Christ, which is 
 inferior to the cultus proper to Him ? How is this other than 
 a casting down of the substance of Christ from His Boyal 
 Throne, and a degradation of it to some inferior sitting place ? 
 It is nothing to the purpose to refer to such Eathers, as say 
 that the flesh of Christ is the flesh of Mary, for they speak of 
 its origin. What will hinder, if this doctrine be admitted, our 
 also admitting that there is something in Christ which is de- 
 
118 
 
 EXPLANATIONS. 
 
 testable ? for, as tbe first elements of a body which were com- 
 municated by the Virgin to Christ, have (as these authors say) 
 remained perpetually in Christ, so the same materia^ at least in 
 part, which belonged originally to the ancestors of Christ, 
 came down to the Virgin from her father, unchanged, and 
 taken from her grandfather, and so on. And thus, since it is 
 not unlikely that some of these ancestors were reprobate, there 
 would now be something actually in Christ, which had belonged 
 to a reprobate, and worthy of detestation.” — p. 237. 
 
 % 
 
 8. After sucli explanations, and with such au- 
 thorities, to clear my path, I put away from me, as 
 you would wish, without any hesitation, as matters 
 in which my heart and reason have no part, (when 
 taken in their literal and absolute sense, as any 
 Protestant would naturally take them, and as the 
 writers doubtless did not use them,) such sen- 
 tences, and phrases, as these : — that the mercy of 
 Mary is infinite; that God has resigned into her 
 hands His omnipotence ; that (unconditionally) it is 
 safer to seek her than her Son; that the Blessed 
 Virgin is superior to God; that He is (simply) 
 subject to her command; that our Lord is now of 
 the same disposition as His Father towards sin- 
 ners, viz. a disposition to reject them, while Mary 
 takes His place as an Advocate with Father and 
 Son; that the Saints are more ready to intercede 
 with Jesus than Jesus with the Father; that 
 Mary is the only refuge of those with whom God 
 is angry; that Mary alone can obtain a Pro- 
 testant’s conversion; that it would have sufficed 
 for the salvation of men if our Lord had died, not 
 
expla!nations. 
 
 119 
 
 to obey His Father, but to defer to the decree of 
 His mother; that she rivals our Lord in being 
 God’s daughter, not by adoption, but by a kind of 
 nature; that Christ fulfilled the office of Saviour 
 by imitating her virtues; that, as the Incarnate 
 God bore the image of His Father, so He bore the 
 image of His Mother; that redemption derived 
 from Christ indeed its sufficiency, but from Mary 
 its beauty and loveliness; that as we are clothed 
 with the merits of Christ so we are clothed with the 
 merits of Mary ; that, as He is Priest in a like sense 
 is she Priestess ; that His Body and Blood in the 
 Eucharist are truly hers and appertain to her ; that 
 as He is pi'esent and received therein, so is she 
 present and received therein ; that Priests are 
 ministers as of Christ, so of Mary; that elect 
 souls are born of God and Mai’y; that the Holy 
 Ghost brings into fruitfulness his action by her, 
 producing in her and by her Jesus Christ in His 
 members ; that the kingdom of God in our souls, 
 as our Lord speaks, is really the kingdom of Mary 
 in the soul — and she and the Holy Ghost produce 
 in the soul extraordinary things — and when the 
 Holy Ghost finds Mary in a soul He flies there. 
 
 Sentiments such as these I never knew of till I 
 read your book, nor, as I think, do the vast majority 
 of English Catholics know them. They seem to 
 me like a bad dream. I could not have conceived 
 them to be said. I know not to what authority to 
 go for them, to Scripture, or to the Fathers, or to the 
 
120 
 
 EXPLANATIONS. 
 
 decrees of Councils, or to the consent of schools, or 
 to the tradition of the faithful, or to the Holy See, 
 or to Eeason. They defy all the loci theologici. 
 There is nothing of them in the Missal, in the 
 Roman Catechism, in the Roman Raccolta^ in the 
 Imitation of Christ, in Gother, Challoner, Milner, 
 or Wiseman, as far as I am aware. They do 
 hut scare and confuse me. I should not be holier, 
 more spiritual, more sure of perseverance, if I 
 twisted my moral being into the reception of them ; 
 I should hut be guilty of fulsome frigid flattery 
 towards the most upright and noble of God’s crea- 
 tures, if I professed them, — and of stupid flattery 
 too ; for it would be like the compliment of paint- 
 ing up a young and beautiful princess with the 
 brow of a Plato and the muscle of an Achilles. 
 And I should expect her to tell one of her people 
 in waiting to turn me off her service without warn- 
 ing. Whether thus to feel be the scandalum par- 
 vulorum in my case, or the scandalum Pharisce- 
 orum, I leave others to decide; but I will say 
 plainly that I had rather believe (which is impos- 
 sible) that there is no God at all, than that Mary 
 is greater than God. I will have nothing to do 
 with statements, which can only be explained, 
 by being explained away. I do not, however, 
 speak of these statements, as they are found in 
 their authors, for I know nothing of the originals, 
 and cannot believe that they have meant what 
 you say ; hut I take them as they lie in your 
 
EXPLANATIONS. 
 
 121 
 
 pages. Were any of them the sayings of Saints in 
 ecstasy, I should know they had a good meaning; 
 still I should not repeat them myself; hut I am 
 looking at them, not as spoken by the tongues of 
 Angels, hut according to that literal sense which 
 they hear in the mouths of English men and English 
 women. And, as spoken hy man to man, in Eng- 
 land, in the nineteenth century, I consider them 
 calculated to prejudice inquirers, to frighten the 
 unlearned, to unsettle consciences, to provoke blas- 
 phemy, and to work the loss of souls. 
 
 9. And now, after having said so much as this, 
 bear with me, my dear Eriend, if I end with an ex- 
 postulation. Have you not been touching us on a 
 very tender point in a very rude way ? is not the 
 effect of what you have said to expose her to scorn 
 and obloquy, who is dearer to us than any other 
 creature ? Have you even hinted that our love for 
 her is any thing else than an abuse ? Have you 
 thrown her one kind word yourself all through 
 your hook ? I trust so, but I have not lighted upon 
 one. And yet I know you love her well. Can you 
 wonder, then, — can I complain, much, much as I 
 grieve, — that men should utterly misconceive of 
 you, and are blind to the fact that you have put the 
 whole argument between you and us on a new foot- 
 ing ; and that, whei'eas it was said twenty-five years 
 ago in the British Critic, “ Till Rome ceases to he 
 what practically she is, union is impossible between 
 her and England,” you declare on the contrary. 
 
122 
 
 EXPLANATIONS. 
 
 “ Union is possible, as soon as Italy and England, 
 having the same faith and the same centre of unity, 
 are allowed to hold severally their own theological 
 opinions?” They have not done you justice here; 
 because in truth, the honour of our Lady is dearer 
 to them than the conversion of England. 
 
 Take a parallel case, and consider how you would 
 decide it yourself. Supposing an opponent of a 
 doctrine^ for which you so earnestly contend, the 
 eternity of punishment, instead of meeting you 
 with direct arguments against it, heaped together a 
 number of extravagant descriptions of the place, 
 mode and circumstances of its infliction, quoted 
 Tertullian as a witness for the primitive Fathers, 
 and the Covenanters and Ranters for these last 
 centui'ies ; brought passages from the Inferno of 
 Dante, and from the Sermons of Whitfield; nay, 
 supposing he confined himself to the chapters on 
 the subject in Jeremy Taylor’s work on “ The 
 State of Man,” would you think this a fair and 
 becoming method of reasoning ? and, if he avowed 
 that he should ever consider the Anglican Church 
 committed to all these accessories of the doctrine, 
 till its authorities formally denounced Taylor, and 
 Whitfield, and a hundred others, would you think 
 this an equitable determination, or the procedure 
 of a theologian ? 
 
CONCLUSION. 
 
 123 
 
 So far concerning the Blessed Virgin ; the chief 
 but not the only subject of your Volume. And 
 now, when I could wish to proceed, she seems to 
 stop me, for the Feast of her Immaculate Concep- 
 tion is upon us ; and close upon its Octave, which 
 is kept with special solemnities in the Churches of 
 this town, come the great Antiphons, the heralds of 
 Christmas. That joyful season, joyful for all of us, 
 while it centres in Him who then came on earth, 
 also brings before us in peculiar prominence that 
 Virgin Mother, who bore and nursed Him. Here 
 she is not in the background, as at Easter-tide, but 
 she brings Him to us in her arms. Two great 
 Festivals, dedicated to her honour, to-morrow’s and 
 the Purification, mark out and keep the ground, 
 and, like the towers of David, open the way to and 
 fro, for the high holiday season of the Prince of 
 Peace. And all along it her image is upon it, such 
 as we see it in the typical representation of the 
 Catacombs. May the sacred influences of this time 
 bring us all together in unity ! May it destroy all 
 bitterness on your side and ours ! May it quench 
 all jealous, sour, proud, fierce antagonism on our 
 side ; and dissipate all captious, carping, fastidious 
 refinements of reasoning on yours ! May that 
 bright and gentle Lady, the Blessed Virgin Mary, 
 
124 
 
 CONCLUSION. 
 
 overcome you with her sweetness, and revenge her- 
 self on her foes by interceding effectually for their 
 conversion ! 
 
 I am, 
 
 Yours, most affectionately, 
 JOHN H. NEWMAN. 
 
 The Okatoet, Biemingham, 
 Infest. S. Amlrosii, 1865. 
 
NOTES. 
 
 NOTE A. PAGE 36. 
 
 1. St. Justin : — Ylbv &€0V yeypafifxevov avTov iv rots aTrojJivrjfjLo- 
 
 V€vpia(TL TO)V (XTroorToXcov avTov koI vlbv avrbv Xeyovre?, 
 
 vevo'^KafjLev, Kal 7rpb TrdvTCOV TrotTy/xarcov dvro rod Trarpbs SwapiCL avrov 
 Kol jSovXrj Trpo€X66vTa .... Kal Sta TrapOevov di/6p(jL>7ros\_ov~\ 
 yeyovivat, Iva Kal Si 68oi5 y cxTro tov TrapaKo^ rrjv dp^^v 
 
 eXa/Se, Kal Sid ravTr]^ ttJs oSou Kal KaToXvaiv Xd^rj^ irapOivo^ yap 
 ovcra lEjva Kal a^^opos tov Xoyov tov diro tov o^cws crvXXafSovo-a, 
 TrapaKo^v Kal OdvaTov erefcc* tticttiv Sk Kal ^apdv Xa/iovaa Wapia ^ 
 TrapOivo^s, cvayyeXi^opiivov avTrj Ta(3pi^X dyyeXov, otl Uvevfia 'Kvpiov 
 iir avT^v CTTcXcvo’crat, &C direKpivaTO, VivoiTo /xot Kara to 
 
 p^pid (TOV. — Tryph. 100. 
 
 2. Ijertullian : — “ Ne mihi vacet incursus nominis Adse, unde 
 Christus Adam ab Apostolo dictus est, si terreni non fuit 
 census homo ejus? Sed et hie ratio defendit, quod Deus 
 imaginem et similitudinem suam a diabolo captam aemula opera- 
 tione recuperavit. In virginem enim adhuc Evam irrepserat 
 verbum sedificatorium mortis. In virginem seque introducendum 
 erat Dei verbum extructorium vitae; ut quod per ejusmodi 
 sexum abierat in perditionem, per eundem sexum redigeretur 
 in salutem. Crediderat Eva serpenti; credidit Maria Gabrieli; 
 quod ilia credendo deliquit, haec credendo delevit .” — De Cam. 
 Chr. 17. 
 
 3. St. Irenaeus : — Consequenter autem et Maria virgo 
 obediens invenitur, dicens, ecce ancilla tua, Domine, fiat mihi 
 secundum verbum tuum. Eva vero inobediens: non obedivit 
 
126 
 
 NOTES. 
 
 enim, adhuc quum esset virgo. Quemadmodum ilia, virutn 
 quidem habens Adam, virgo tamen adhuc existens (erant enim 
 utrique nudi in Paradiso, et non confundebantur, quoniam, 
 paullo ante facti, non intellectum habebant filiorum genera- 
 tionis ; oportebat enim illos primo adolescere, dehinc sic multi- 
 plicari), inobediens facta, et sibi et universe generi humane 
 causa facta est mortis : sic et Maria, habens prsedestinatum 
 virum, et tamen virgo, obediens, et sibi et universe generi 
 humane causa facta est salutis. Et propter hoc Lex earn, quae 
 desponsata erat viro, licet virgo sit adhuc, uxorem ejus, qui 
 desponsaverat, vocat ; earn quae est a Maria in Evam recircu- 
 lationem significans : quia non aliter quod colligatum est sol- 
 veretur, nisiipsae compagines alligationis reflectantur retrorsus ; 
 ut primae conjunctiones solvantur per secundas, secundae rursus 
 liberent primas. Et evenit primam quidem compaginem a 
 secunda colligatione solvere, secundam vero colligationem primae 
 solutionis habere locum. Et propter hoc Dominus dicebat, 
 primes quidem novissimos futures, et novissimos primes. Et 
 propheta autem hoc idem significat, dicens, ‘ Pro patribus nati 
 sunt tibi filii.’ ‘ Primogenitus ’ enim ^ mortuorum ’ natus Domi- 
 nus, et in sinum suum recipiens pristinos patres, regeneravit 
 eos in vitam Dei, ipse initium viventium factus, quoniam Adam 
 initium morientium factus est. Propter hoc et Lucas initium 
 generationis a Domino inchoans, in Adam retulit, significans, 
 quoniam non illi hunc, sed hie illos in Evangelium vitae regene- 
 ravit. Sic autem et Evae inobedientiae nodus solutionem dccepit 
 per obedientiam Mariae. Quod enim alligavit virgo Eva per 
 incredulitatem, hoc virgo Maria solvit per fidem.” — S, Iren, 
 contr. Seer. iii. 22. 
 
 “ Quemadmodum enim ilia per Angeli sermonem seducta est, 
 ut effugeret Deum, praevaricata verbum ejus ; ita et haec per 
 Angelicum sermonem evangelizata est, ut portaret Deum, 
 obediens ejus verbo. Et si ea inobedierat Deo ; sed haec suasa 
 est obedire Deo, uti Virginis Evae Virgo Maria fieret advocata. 
 Et quemadmodum adstrictum est morti genus humanum per 
 Virginem, salvatur per Virginem, aequa lance disposita, virginalis 
 inobedientia, per virginalem obedientiam.” — lUd. v. 19. 
 
 4. St. Cyril : — Ata irapOivov Ems ^\6ev 6 Odvaros, eSet 8 A 
 TrapOivoVy pidXXov Se eK TrapOivov, cfiavyjvac rrjv ^(x)7jv tva werTrep 
 
NOTES. 
 
 127 
 
 eKuvrjv o(^ts ’^7rdTrj(T€V, ovto) Kai ravTTjv Ta(3pL^X ^vayyeXiarjTat , — 
 
 Cat. xii. 15. 
 
 5. St. Eplirem.: — ^^Per Evam neinpe decora et amabilis 
 hominis gloria extiucta est, quse tamen rursus per Mariam 
 refloruit.” — 0pp. Byr. ii. p. 318. 
 
 ‘‘Initio protoparentum delicto in omnes homines mors per- 
 transiit ; hodie vero per Mariam translati sumus de morte ad 
 vitam. Initio serpens, Evse auribus occupatis, inde virus in 
 totum corpus dilatavit ; hodie Maria ex auribus perpetusD feli- 
 citatis assertorem excepit. Quod ergo mortis fuit, simul et 
 vitae extitit instrumentum.” — iii. p. 607. 
 
 6. St. EpiphaNITJS : — kvr^ ecTTiv ^ irapa pikv rrj Eva arjpiaivopiivy] 
 
 Sl atny/xaros Xa/^ovaa to KaXetor^at p'^rrjp . . . Kal 
 
 Oavpia OTL /x€Ta t^v Trapa/Jacrtv ravTiqv t^v fieydXrjv l(T')(cv kiro^wpiav. 
 Kal Kara p\v to aladrjTOV, dir iKeivrj^ riys Eva<s Trdora tcov dvOpdiro^v 
 ^ yevvrja-Ls iirl yijs yeyivvTjraC w8e Se dXrjOihs arro Maptas avr^ y 
 
 Tw Koapio yeyivvYjTai' tva ^wvra yevvi^crrj, Kal yivvrjrai 17 Mapta prjTrjp 
 ^d)VT(x)V' Si alvtypaTOS ovv ^ Mapta prjryjp ^dvrcDV iciKXrjTaL . . . 
 dXXd Kal erepov Trcpl rovT 0 )V SLavoetadat Icttl Oavpaarov, Trepl 8 e 
 Ems Kal T 775 Maptas- 17 plv yap Eva 7 rpo<jf>aa-ts yeyevvrjTai Oavdrov 
 rots dvOpdirois* . . . *37 Se Mapta 7 rpo(jf)acrts . . . iva dvrl 
 
 Oavdrov yivvyyrai^ iKKXetaacra rov Odvarov rov Ik yvvaiKOs, TrdXiv 6 
 Sta ywat/cos '^pZv yeyevvrjpivo^. — Seer. 78. 18. 
 
 7. St. Jerome: — “ Postquam vero Virgo concepit in ntero, 
 et peperit nobis puerum . . . soluta maledictio est. Mors per 
 Evam, vita per Mariam.” — I^p. 22, ad Eustochium, 21. 
 
 8. St. Augustine : — “ Hue accedit magnum sacramentum, ut, 
 quoniam per feminam nobis mors acciderat, vita nobis per 
 feminam nasceretur : ut de utraque natura, id est, feminina et 
 masculina, victus diabolus cruciaretur, quoniam de ambarum 
 subversione laetabalur, cui parum fuerat ad poenam si ambse 
 naturae in nobis liberarentur, nisietiam per ambas liberaremur.” 
 — De Agone Christ. 24. 
 
 9. St. Peter Ohrysologus : — “Benedicta tu in mulieribus. 
 Quia in quibus Eva maledicta puniebat viscera ; tunc in illis 
 gaudet, honoratur, suspicitur Maria benedicta. Et facta est 
 vere nunc mater viventium per gratiam quae mater extitit mori- 
 entium per naturara. . . . Quantus sit Deus satis ignorat ille, 
 qui hujiis Virginis mentem non stupet, aniinum non miratur : 
 
128 
 
 NOTES. 
 
 pavet coelum, tremunt Angeli, creatura non sustinet,* natura 
 non sufficit, et una puella sic Deum in sui pectoris capit, 
 recipit, oblectat hospitio, ut pacem terris, coelis gloriam, salutem 
 perditis, vitam mortuis, terrenis cum coelestibus parentelam, 
 ipsius Dei cum came commercium, pro ipsa domus exigat 
 pensione, pro ipsius uteri mercede conquirat, et impleat illud 
 PropbetaB ; Ecce hsereditas Domini, filii merces fructus ventris. 
 Sed jam se concludat sermo ut de partu Yirginis, donante Deo, 
 et indulgente tempore, gratius proloquamur.” — Serm, 140. 
 
 10. St. Eulgentius : — ‘‘In primi hominis conjuge, nequitia 
 diaboli seductam depravavit mentem : in secundi autem hominis 
 matre, gratia Dei, et mentem integram servavit, et carnem : 
 menti contulit firmissimam fidem, carni abstulit omnino libi- 
 dinem. Quoniam igitur miserabiliter pro peccato damnatus 
 est homo, ideo sine peccato mirabiliter natus est Deus homo.”'— 
 Serm . ii. 
 
 “ Venite, virgines, ad virginem ; venite, concipientes, ad con- 
 cipientem ; venite, parturientes, ad parturientem ; venite, 
 matres, ad matrem ; venite, lactantes, ad lactantem ; venite, 
 juvenculse, ad juvenculam. Ideo omnes istos cursus naturae 
 virgo Maria in Domino nostro Jesu Christo suscepit, ut 
 omnibus ad se confugientibus foeminis subveniret, et sic 
 restauraret omne genus foeminarum ad se advenientium nova 
 Eva servando virginitatem, sicut omne genus virorum Adam 
 novus recuperat dominus Jesus Christus.” — Ihid. hi. 
 
NOTES, 
 
 129 
 
 NOTE B. PAGE 49. 
 
 Abridged from Suarez. 0pp. t. 17, p. 7 — Ed, Venet. 
 1746 
 
 ‘^1. Statuendum est B. Virginem fuisse a Christo redemp- 
 tam, quia Christus fuit universalis redemptor totius generis 
 humani, et pro omnibus hominibus mortuus est.” — p. 15. 
 
 ‘‘ 2. Praeterea constat indiguisse Virginem redemptione, quia 
 nimirum descendebat ex Adamo per seminalem generationem.” 
 — p. 7. 
 
 ‘^3. Tanquam certum statuendum est, B. Virginem procrea- 
 tam esse ex viri et foeminse commixtione carnali, ad modum 
 aliorum hominum. Habetur certa traditione et communi con- 
 sensu totius Ecclesiae.” — p. 7. 
 
 4. Absolute et simpliciter fatendum B. Virginem in Adam 
 peccasse.” — p. 16. 
 
 “ 5. B. Virgo peccavit in Adamo, ex quo tanquam ex radice 
 infecta per seminalem rationem est orta ; hsec est tota ratio 
 contrahendi originale peccatura, quod est ex vi conceptionis, 
 nisi gratia Dei prseveniat.” — p. 16. 
 
 6. Certum est B. Virginem fuisse mortuam saltern in 
 Adamo. Sicut in Christo vitam habuit, ita et in Adam fuit 
 mortua. Alias B. Virgo non contraxisset mortem aliasve 
 corporis poenalitates ex Adamo ; consequens [autem] est omnino 
 falsum. Habuit B. Virgo meritum mortis saltern in Adamo. 
 Ilia vere habuit mortem carnis ex peccato Adami contractam.” 
 
 — p. 16 . 
 
 “7. B. Virgo, ex vi suae conceptionis fuit obnoxia originali 
 peccato, seu debitum habuit contrahendi illud, nisi divina 
 gratia fuisset impeditum.” — p. 16. 
 
 ‘‘ 8. Si B. Virgo non fuisset (ut ita dicam) vendita in Adamo, 
 et de se servituti peccati obnoxia, non fuisset vere redempta.” 
 
 — p, 16 . 
 
 “ 9. Dicendum est, potuisse B. Virginem praeservari ab ori- 
 
 I 
 
130 
 
 NOTES, 
 
 ginali peccato, et in primo susd conceptionis insfcanti sancti- 
 ficari.”— p. 17. 
 
 “10. Potuit B. Virgo ex vi su 80 originis esse obnoxia culpse, 
 et ideo indigere redemptione, et nihilominus in eodem rao- 
 mentOyin quo erat obnoxia, praeveniri, ne illam contraheret.” — 
 p. 14. 
 
 “ 11. Dicenduin B. Virginem in ipso primo instanti concep- 
 tionis SU8B fuisse sanctificatam, et ab originali peccato prae- 
 servatam.” — p. 19. 
 
 “ 12. Carnem Virginis fuisse carnem peccati . . . verum est, 
 non quia ilia caro aliquando fuit subdita peccato, aut informata 
 anima carente gratia, sed quia fuit mortalis et passibilis ex 
 debito peccati, cui de se erat obnoxia, si per Christi gratiam 
 non fuisset prseservata.” — p. 22. 
 
 “13. Quod B. Virgo de se fuerit obnoxia peccato, (si illud 
 revera nunquam habuit,) non derogat perfectsD ejus sanctitati 
 et puritati.” — pp. 16, 17. 
 
 Cornelius a Lapide, Comment, in Ep. ad Eom. v. 12 : — 
 
 “The Blessed Virgin sinned in Adam, and incurred this 
 necessity of contracting original sin ; but original sin itself she 
 did not contract in herself in fact, nor had it ; for she was anti- 
 cipated by the grace of God, which excluded all sin from her, in 
 the first moment of her conception.” 
 
 In 2 Ep. ad Corinth, v. 15 : — 
 
 “All died, namely in Adam, for in him all contracted the 
 necessity of sin and death, even the Deipara ; so that both her- 
 self and man altogether needed Christ as a Kedeemer and His 
 death. Therefore the Blessed Virgin sinned and died in Adam, 
 but in her own person she contracted not sin and the death of 
 the soul, for she was anticipated by God and God’s grace.” 
 
NOTES. 
 
 131 
 
 NOTE C. PAGE 53. 
 
 I have allowed that several great Fathers of the Church, of 
 the fourth and fifth centuries, speak of the Blessed Virgin in 
 terms, which we never should think of using now, and which at 
 first sight are inconsistent with the belief and sentiment con- 
 cerning her, which I have ascribed to their times. These 
 Fathers are St. Basil, St. Chrysostom, and St. Cyril of Alex- 
 andria ; and the occasion of their so speaking is furnished by 
 certain passages of Scripture, on which they are commenting. 
 It may in consequence be asked of me, why I do not take these 
 three, instead of St. Justin, St. Irenseus, and Tertullian, as my 
 authoritative basis for determining the doctrine of the primitive 
 times concerning the Blessed Mary ; why, instead of making 
 St. Irenaeus, &c. the rule, and St. Basil, &c. the exception, I do 
 not make the earlier Fathers the exception, and the later the 
 rule. Since I do not, it may be urged against me that I am 
 but making a case for my own opinion, and playing the part of 
 an advocate. 
 
 Now I do not see that it would be illogical or nugatory, 
 though I did nothing more than make a case ; indeed I have 
 worded myself in my Letter as if I wished to do little more. 
 For as much as this is surely to the purpose, considering the 
 majority of Anglicans have a supreme confidence that no case 
 whatever can be made in behalf of our doctrine concerning 
 the Blessed Virgin from the ancient Fathers. I should have 
 gained a real point, if I did any thing to destroy this imagina- 
 tion ; but I intend to attempt something more than this. I 
 shall attempt to invalidate the only grounds on which any 
 teaching contrary to the Catholic can be founded on Antiquit 3 ^ 
 
 I 2 
 
182 
 
 NOTES. 
 
 I. First I set down the’passages whicli create the difiSiculty, as 
 they are found in the great work of Petavius, a theologian too 
 candid and fearless, to put out of sight or explain away adverse 
 facts, from fear of scandal, or from the expedience of con- 
 troversy. 
 
 1. St. Basil then writes thus, in his 260th Epistle, addressed 
 to Optimus; — 
 
 “ [Symeon] uses the word ‘ sword,’ meaning the word which 
 is tentative and critical of the thoughts, and reaches unto the 
 separation of soul and spirit, of the joints and marrow. Since 
 then every soul, at the time of the Passion, was subjected in a 
 way to some uiisettlement (8ta/<pto-€t), according to the Lord’s 
 word, who said, ‘ All ye shall be scandalized in Me,’ Symeon 
 prophesies even of Mary herself, that, standing by the Cross, 
 and seeing what was doing, and hearing the words, after the 
 testimony of Gabriel, after the secret knowledge of the divine 
 conception, after the great manifestation of miracles, Thou wilt 
 experience, he says, a certain tossing (o-aXos) of thy soul. For 
 it beseemed the Lord to taste death for every one, and to 
 become a propitiation of the world, in order to justify all in His 
 blood. And thee thyself who hast been taught from above the 
 things ccmcerning the Lord, some unsettlement (StaKpto-t?) will 
 reach. This is the sword ; ‘ that out of many hearts thoughts 
 may be revealed.’ He obscurely signifies, that, after the scan- 
 dalizing which took place upon the Cross of Christ, both to the 
 disciples and to Mary herself, some quick healing should follow 
 upon it from the Lord, confirming their heart unto faith in 
 Him.” 
 
 2. St. Chrysostom, in Matth. Horn. iv. : — 
 
 “ ‘ Wherefore,’ a man may say, ^ did not the angel do in the 
 case of the Virgin, [what he did to Joseph ?’ ” viz. appear to 
 her after, not before, the Incarnation,] “ ‘ why did he not bring 
 her the good tidings after her conception ? ’ lest she should 
 be in great disturbance and trouble. For the probability 
 was, that, had she not known the clear fact, she would have 
 resolved something strange (aroTrov) about herself, and had 
 recourse to rope or sword, not bearing the disgrace. For the 
 Virgin was admirable, and Luke shows her virtue, when he 
 says that, when she heard the salutation, she did not at once 
 
NOTES. 
 
 133 
 
 become extravagant, nor appropriated the words, but was 
 troubled, searching what was the nature of the salutation. 
 One then of so accurately formed a mind (SLrjKpL/Soijxivri) would 
 be made beside herself with despondency, considering the dis- 
 grace, and not expecting, whatever she may say, to persuade 
 any one who hears her, that adultery had not been the fact. 
 Lest then these things occur, the Angel came before the con- 
 ception; for it beseemed that that womb should be without 
 disorder, which the Creator of all entered, and that that soul 
 should be rid of all perturbation, which was counted worthy to 
 become the minister of such mysteries.” 
 
 In Matth. Horn. xliv. (vid. also in Joann. Horn, xxi.) : — 
 
 “ To-day we learn something else even further, viz., that not 
 even to bear Christ in the womb, and to have that wonderful 
 childbirth, has any gain, without virtue. And this is especially 
 true from this passage, ‘ As He was yet speaking to the multi- 
 tude, behold His Mother and His brethren stood without, 
 seeking to speak to Him,’ &c. This he said, not as ashamed of 
 His Mother, nor as denying her who bore Him ; for, had He 
 been ashamed. He had not passed through that womb ; but as 
 showing that there was no profit to her thence, unless she did 
 all that was necessary. Tor what she attempted, came of over- 
 much love of honour; for she wished to show to the people 
 that she had power and authority over her Son, in nothing ever 
 as yet having been greatly ostentatious {^avTa^opiivri) about 
 Him. Therefore she came thus unseasonably. Observe then 
 her and their recklessness {airovoiav) , . . . Had He wished to 
 deny His Mother, then He would have denied, when the Jews 
 taunted Him with her. But no ; He shows such care of her 
 as to commit her as a legacy on the Cross itself to the disciple 
 whom He loved best of all, and to take anxious oversight of 
 her. But does He not do the same now, by caring for her and 
 His brethren ? . . . And consider, not only the words which 
 convey the considerate rebuke, but also . . . who He is who 
 utters it, . . . and what He aims at in uttering it, not, that is, 
 as wishing to cast her into perplexity, but to release her from 
 a most tyrannical affection, and to bring her gradually to the 
 fitting thought concerning Him, and to persuade her that He 
 is not only her Son, but also her Master.” 
 
134 
 
 NOTES, 
 
 3. St. Cyril, in Joann, lib. xii. : — 
 
 “ How shall we explain this passage ? He introduces both 
 His Mother and the other women with her standing at the 
 Cross, and, as is plain, weeping. Eor somehow the race of 
 women is ever fond of tears ; and especially given to laments, 
 when it has rich occasions for weeping. How then did they 
 persuade the blessed Evangelist to be so minute in his account, 
 so as to make mention of this abidance of the women ? For 
 it was his purpose to teach even this, viz., that probably even 
 the Mother of the Lord herself was scandalized at the unex- 
 pected Passion, and that the death upon the Cross, being so 
 very bitter, was near unsettling her from her fitting mind; 
 and in addition to this, the mockeries of the Jews, and the 
 soldiers too, perhaps, who were sitting near the Cross and 
 making a jest of Him who was hanging on it, and daring, in 
 the sight of His very mother, the division of His garments. 
 Doubt not that she received (eta-eSefaro) some such thoughts as 
 these : — I bore Him who is laughed at on the wood ; but, in 
 saying He was the true Son of the Omnipotent God, perhaps 
 somehow He was mistaken. He said He was the Life, how 
 then has He been crucified ? how has He been strangled by the 
 cords of His murderers ? how prevailed He not over the plot 
 of His persecutors ? why descends He not from the Cross, 
 though He bade Lazarus to return to life, and amazed all 
 Judaea with His miracles? And it is very natural that a 
 woman (to yvvaiov, woman’s nature), not knowing the mystery, 
 should slide into some such trains of thought. For we should 
 understand, if we do well, that the gravity of the circumstances 
 was enough to overturn even a self-possessed mind ; it is no 
 wonder then if a woman (to yvvaLov) slipped into this reasoning. 
 For if he himself, the chosen one of the holy disciples, Peter, 
 once was scandalized, ... so as to cry out hastily. Be it far 
 from Thee, Lord. . . . w^hat paradox is it, if the soft mind of 
 womankind was carried oiF to weak ideas ? And this we say, 
 not idly conjecturing, as it may strike one, but entertaining 
 the suspicion from what is written concerning the Mother 
 of the Lord. For we remember that Simeon the Just, when 
 he received the Lord as a little child into his arms, . . . said 
 to her, ‘ A sword shall go through thine own soul, that out of 
 
NOTES. 
 
 135 
 
 many hearts thoughts may be revealed.’ By sword he meant 
 the sharp access of suffering cutting down a woman’s mind 
 into extravagant thoughts. Bor temptations test the hearts 
 of those who suffer them, and make bare the thoughts which 
 are in them.” 
 
 Now what do these three Bathers say in these passages ? 
 
 1. St. Basil imputes to the Blessed Virgin, not only doubt, 
 but the sin of doubt. On the other hand, 1. he imputes it only 
 on one occasion ; 2. he does not consider it to be a grave sin ; 
 3. he implies that, in point of spiritual perfection, she is above 
 the Apostles. 
 
 2. St. Chrysostom, in his first passage, does not impute sin to 
 her at all. He says God so disposed things for her as to shield 
 her from the chance of sinning ; that she was too admirable to 
 be allowed to be betrayed by her best and purest feelings into 
 sin. All that is implied in a spirit repugnant to a Catholic’s 
 reverence for her, is, that her woman’s nature, viewed in itself 
 and apart from the watchful providence of God’s grace over her, 
 would not have had strength to resist a hypothetical temptation, 
 — a position which a Catholic will not care to affirm or deny, 
 though he will feel great displeasure at having to discuss it at all. 
 This too at least is distinctly brought out in the passage, viz., 
 that in St. Chrysostom’s mind, our Lady was not a mere 
 physical instrument of the Incarnation, but that her soul, as 
 well as her body, “ m-inistered to the mystery,” and needed to 
 be duly prepared for it. 
 
 As to his second most extraordinary passage, I should not be 
 candid, unless I simply admitted that it is as much at variance 
 with what we hold, as it is solitary and singular in the writings 
 of Antiquity. The Saint distinctly and {jpace illius) needlessly, 
 imputes to the Blessed Virgin, on the occasion in question, the 
 sin or infirmity of vain-glory. He has a parallel passage in 
 commenting on the miracle at the Marriage-feast. All that 
 can be said to alleviate the startling character of these passages 
 is, that it does not appear that St. Chrysostom would account 
 such vain- glory in a woman any great sin. 
 
 3. Lastly, as to St. Cyril, I do not see that he declares that 
 Mary actually doubted at the Crucifixion, but that, considering 
 
136 
 
 ^OTES. 
 
 she was a woman, it is likely she was tempted to doubt, and 
 nearly doubted. Moreover, St. Cyril does not seem to consider 
 such doubt, had it occurred, as any great sin. 
 
 Thus on the whole, all three Fathers, St. Basil and St. Cyril 
 explicitly, and St. Chrysostom by implication, consider that on 
 occasions she was, or might be, exposed to violent temptation 
 to doubt ; but two Fathers consider that she actually did sin, 
 though she sinned lightly ; — the sin being doubt, and on one 
 occasion, according to St. Basil ; and on two occasions, the sin 
 being vain-glory, according to St. Chrysostom. 
 
 However, the strong language of these Fathers is not directed 
 against our Lady’s person, so much as against her nature. They 
 seem to have participated with Ambrose, Jerome, and other 
 Fathers in that low estimation of woman’s nature which was gene- 
 ral in their times. In the broad imperial world, the conception en- 
 tertained of womankind was not high ; it seemed only to perpe- 
 tuate the poetical tradition of the “ Varium et mutabile semper.” 
 Little was then known of that true nobility, which is exempli- 
 fied in the females of the Gothic and German races, and in those 
 of the old Jewish stock, Miriam, Deborah, Judith, Susanna, the 
 forerunners of Mary. When then St. Chrysostom imputes vain- 
 glory to her, he is not imputing to her any thing worse than 
 an infirmity, the infirmity of a nature, inferior to man’s, and 
 intrinsically feeble ; as though the Almighty could have created 
 a more excellent being than Mary, but could not have made a 
 greater woman. Accordingly Chrysostom does not say that she 
 sinned. He does not deny that she had all the perfections 
 which woman could have ; but he seems to have thought the 
 capabilities of her nature were bounded, so that the utmost 
 grace bestowed upon it could not raise it above that standard 
 of perfection in which its elements resulted, and that to at- 
 tempt more, would have been to injure, not benefit it. Of course 
 I am not stating this as brought out in any part of his writings, 
 but it seems to me to be the real sentiment of many of the 
 ancients. 
 
 I will add that such a belief on the part of these Fathers, 
 that the Blessed Virgin had committed a sin or a weakness, was 
 not in itself inconsistent with the exercise of love and devo- 
 tion to her (though I am no t pretending that there is proof of 
 
NOTES. 
 
 137 
 
 its actual existence) ; and for this simple reason, that if sinless- 
 ness were a condition of inspiring devotion, we should not feel 
 devotion to any hut our Lady, not to St. Joseph, or to the 
 Apostles, or to our Patron Saints. 
 
 Such then is the teaching of these three Lathers; now how 
 far is it in antagonism to ours. On the one hand, we will not 
 allow that our Blessed Lady ever sinned ; we cannot bear the 
 notion, entering, as we do, into the full spirit of St. Augus- 
 tine’s words, Concerning the Holy Virgin Mary, I wish no 
 question to be raised at all, when we are treating of sins.” On 
 the other hand, we admit, rather we maintain, that, except for 
 the grace of God, she might have sinned ; and that she may 
 have been exposed to temptation in the sense in which our 
 Lord was exposed to it, though as His Divine Nature made it 
 impossible for Him to yield to it, so His grace preserved her 
 from its assaults also. While then we do not hold that St. 
 Simeon prophesied of temptation, when he said a sword would 
 pierce her, still, if any one likes to say he did, we do not con- 
 sider him heretical, provided he does not impute to her any 
 sinful or inordinate emotion as the consequence to it. In this 
 way St. Cyril may be let off altogether ; and we have only to 
 treat of 'paradoxa or anomala of those great Saints, St. Basil 
 and St. Chrysostom. I proceed to their controversial value. 
 
 II. I mean, that having determined what the Three Lathers 
 say, and how far they are at issue with what Catholics hold now, 
 I now come to the main question, viz. What is the authoritative 
 force in controversy of what they thus say in opposition to 
 Catholic teaching ? I think I shall be able to show that it has 
 no controversial force at all. 
 
 I begin by observing, that the main force of passages which 
 can be brought from any Lather or Lathers in controversy, lies 
 in the fact that such passages represent the judgment or senti- 
 ment of their own respective countries ; and again, I say that 
 the force of that local judgment or sentiment lies in its being 
 the existing expression of an Apostolical tradition. I am far, of 
 course, from denying the claim of the teaching of a Lather on 
 our deference, arising out of his personal position and character ; 
 
138 
 
 NOTES. 
 
 or the claims of the mere sentiments of a Christian popula- 
 tion on our careful attention, as a fact carrying with it, under 
 circumstances, especial weight ; but, in a question of doctrine, 
 we must have recourse to the great source of doctrine, Aposto- 
 lical Tradition, and a Pather must represent his own people, and 
 that people must be the witnesses of an uninterrupted Tradi- 
 tion from the Apostles, if any thing decisive is to come of any 
 theological statement which is found in his writings ; and if, in 
 a particular case, there is no reason to suppose that he does 
 echo the popular voice, or that that popular voice is transmitted 
 from Apostolic times, — or (to take another channel of Tradition) 
 unless the Father in question receives and reports his doctrine 
 from the Bishops and Priests who instructed him on the very 
 understanding and profession that it is Apostolical, — then, 
 though it was not one Father but ten who said a thing, it would 
 weigh nothing against the assertion of only one Father to the 
 contrary, provided it was clear that that Father witnessed to an 
 Apostolical Tradition. Now I do not say that I can decide the 
 question by this issue with all the exactness which is conceiv- 
 able, but still this is the issue by which it must be tried, and 
 which I think will enable me to come to a satisfactory conclu- 
 sion upon it. 
 
 Such, I say, being the issue, viz., that a doctrine reported by 
 the Fathers, in order to have dogmatic force, must be a Tra- 
 dition in its source ov form, next, what is a Tradition, considered 
 in its matter ? It is a belief, which, be it affirmative or negative, 
 is positive. The mere absence of a tradition in a country, is 
 not a tradition the other way. If, for instance, there was no 
 tradition in Syria and Asia Minor that the words consub- 
 stantial with the Father,” came from the Apostles, that would 
 not be a tradition that they did not come from the Apostles, 
 though of course it would be necessary for those who said that 
 they did, to account for the ignorance of those countries as to 
 the real fact. 
 
 The proposition Christ is God,” serves as an example of what 
 I mean by an affirmative tradition ; and no one born of woman 
 is born in God’s favour,” is an example of a negative tradi- 
 tion. Here it is observable that a tradition does not carry 
 its own full explanation with it ; it does but land (so to say) 
 
NOTES. 
 
 139 
 
 a proposition at the feet of the Apostles, and its interpretation 
 has still to be determined, — as the Apostles’ words in Scripture, 
 however much theirs, need an interpretation. Thus I may 
 accept the above negative Tradition, that no one woman-born 
 is born in God’s favour,” yet question its strict universality, as 
 a point of criticism, saying that a general proposition admits 
 of exceptions, that our Lord was born of woman, yet was 
 the sinless and acceptable Priest and sacrifice for all men. So 
 again the Arians allowed that Christ was God,” but they 
 disputed about the meaning of the word God.” 
 
 Further, there are explicit traditions and implicit. By an 
 explicit tradition I mean a doctrine which is conveyed in the 
 letter of the proposition which has been handed down ; and by 
 implicit, one which lies in the force and virtue, not in the letter 
 of the proposition. Thus it might be an Apostolical tradition 
 that our Lord was the very Son of God, of one nature with the 
 Father, and in all things equal to Him ; and again a tradition 
 that there was but one God : these would be explicit, but in 
 them would necessarily be conveyed, moreover, the implicit 
 tradition, that the Father and the Son were numerically one. 
 Implicit traditions are positive traditions, as being strictly 
 conveyed in positive. 
 
 Lastly, there are at least two ways of determining an Apo- 
 stolical tradition : — 1. When credible witnesses declare that it 
 is Apostolical; as when three hundred Fathers at Nic80a 
 stopped their ears at Arius’s blasphemies ; 2. When, in various 
 places, independent witnesses enunciate one and the same 
 doctrine, as St. Irenseus, St. Cyprian, and Eusebius assert, that 
 the Apostles founded a Church, Catholic and One. 
 
 Now to apply these principles to the particular case, on 
 account of which I have laid them down. 
 
 That ‘‘Mary is the new Eve,” is a proposition answering to 
 the idea of a Tradition. I am not prepared to say that it can 
 be shown to have the first of the above two tests of its Apo- 
 stolicity, viz., that the writers who record it, profess to have 
 received it from the Apostles ; but I conceive it has the second 
 test, viz., that the writers are independent witnesses, as I have 
 shown at length in the course of my Letter. 
 
140 
 
 NOTES. 
 
 It is an explicit tradition ; and by the force of it follow two 
 others, which are implicit : — first (considering the condition of 
 Eve in paradise), that Mary had no part in sin, and indefinitely 
 large measures of grace ; secondly (considering the doctrine of 
 merits), that she has been exalted to glory proportionate to 
 that grace. 
 
 This is what I have to observe on the argument in behalf of 
 the Blessed Virgin. St. Justin, St. Irenseus, Tertullian, are 
 witnesses of an Apostolical tradition, because in three distinct 
 parts of the w^orld they enunciate one and the same definite 
 doctrine. And it is remarkable that they witness just for those 
 three seats of Catholic teaching, where the truth in this matter 
 was likely to be especially lodged. St. Justin speaks for Jeru- 
 salem, the see of St. James; St. Irenseus for Ephesus, the 
 dwelling-place, the place of burial, of St. John; and Tertullian, 
 who made a long residence at Eome, for the city of St. Peter 
 and St. Paul. 
 
 ‘Now, let us inquire, wdiat can be produced on the other side, 
 parallel to an argument like this ? A tradition in its matter is 
 a positive statement of belief; in its form it is a statement 
 which comes from the Apostles : now, first, what statement of 
 belief at all is witnessed to by St. Basil, St. Chrysostom, and 
 St. Cyril ? I cannot find any. They do but interpret certain 
 passages in the Gospels to our Lady’s disadvantage ; is an in- 
 terpretation a distinct statement of belief ? but they do not all 
 interpret the same passages. Nor do they agree together in their 
 interpretation of those passages which one or other of them 
 interprets so unsatisfactorily ; for, while St. Chrysostom holds 
 that our Lord spoke in correction of His mother at the wedding 
 feast, St. Cyril on the contrary says that He wrought the 
 miracle then, which He was Himself unwilling to work, in order 
 to show ‘‘reverence to His Mother,” and that she “having 
 great authority for the working of the miracle, got the victory, 
 persuading the Lord, as being her Son, as was fitting.” But, 
 taking only the statements which are in her disparagement, can 
 we generalize them into one proposition ? Shall we make it such 
 as this, viz., “ The Blessed Virgin during her earthly life com- 
 mitted actual sin?’’ If we mean by this, that there was a 
 
NOTES. 
 
 141 
 
 positive recognition of suet a proposition in the country of St. 
 Basil or St. Chrysostom, this surely is not to be gathered merely 
 from their separate and independent comments on Scripture. 
 All that can be gathered thence legitimately is, that, had there 
 been a positive belief in her sinlessness in those countries, 
 the Fathers in question would not have spoken of her in the 
 terms which they have used ; in other words, that there was 
 no belief in her sinlessness then and there ; but the absence 
 of a belief is not a belief to the contrary, it is not that posi- 
 tive statement, which, as I have said, is required for the 
 matter of a tradition. 
 
 Nor do the passages which I have quoted from these Fathers 
 supply us with any tradition, viewed in its form, that is, as a 
 statement which has come down from the Apostles. I have sug- 
 gested two tests of such a statement : — one, when the writers 
 who make it so declare that it was from the Apostles ; and the 
 other when, being independent of one another, they bear wit- 
 ness to one positive statement of doctrine. Neither test is 
 fulfilled in this case. The three Fathers of the 4th and 5th 
 centuries are but commenting on Scripture; and comments, 
 though carrying with them of course, and betokening the tone of 
 thought of the place and time to which they belong, are, primd 
 facie of a private and personal character. If they are more 
 than this, the onus prohandi lies with those who would have it 
 so. Exegetical theology is one department of divine science, and 
 dogmatic is another. On the other hand, the three Fathers of 
 the 2nd century are all writing on dogmatic subjects, when 
 they compare Mary to Eve. 
 
 Now to take the Three later Fathers one by one : — 
 
 1. As to St. Cyril, as T have said, he does not, strictly speak- 
 ing, say more than that our Lady was grievously tempted. 
 This does not imply sin, for our Lord was “ tempted in all things 
 like as we are, yet without sin.” Moreover, it is this St. Cyril 
 who spoke at Ephesus of the Blessed Virgin in terms of such 
 high panegyric, as to make it more consistent in him to sup- 
 pose that she was sinless, than that she was not. 
 
 2. St. Basil derived his notion, that the Blessed Virgin at 
 the time of the Passion admitted a doubt about our Lord’s 
 mission, from Origen ; and he, so far from professing to rest it 
 
142 
 
 NOTES. 
 
 on Tradition, draws it as a theological conclusion from a re- 
 ceived doctrine. Origen’s characteristic fault was to prefer 
 scientific reasonings to authority ; and he exemplifies it in the 
 case before us. In the middle age, the great obstacle to the 
 reception of the doctrine of the Blessed Mary’s immaculate con- 
 ception, was the notion that, unless she had been in some sense 
 a sinner, she could not have been redeemed. By an argument 
 parallel to this, Origen argues, that since she was one of the 
 redeemed, she must at one time or another have committed 
 a sin. He says : “ Are we to think, that the Apostles were 
 scandalized, and not the Lord’s Mother ? If she suffered not 
 scandal at our Lord’s passion, then Jesus died not for her sins. 
 If all have sinned and need the glory of God, being justified by 
 His grace, and redeemed, certainly Mary at that time was 
 scandalized.” This is precisely the argument of Basil, as 
 contained in the passage given above ; his statement then of 
 the Blessed Virgin’s wavering in faith, instead of professing 
 to be a tradition, carries with it an avowal of its being none 
 at all. 
 
 However, l am not unwilling to grant that, whereas Scripture 
 tells us that all were scandalized at our Lord’s passion, there 
 was some sort of traditional interpretation of Simeon’s words, 
 to the effect that she was in some sense included in that trial. 
 How near the Apostolic era the tradition arose, cannot be deter- 
 mined ; but this need not include the idea of sin in the Blessed 
 Virgin, but only the presence of temptation and darkness of 
 spirit. This tradition, whatever its authority, would be easily 
 perverted, so as actually to impute sin to her, by such reason- 
 ings as that of Origen. Origen himself, in the passage I have 
 quoted from him, refers to the sword of Simeon, and is the first 
 to do so. St. Cyril, who, though an Alexandrian as well as 
 Origen, represents a very different school of theology, has, as 
 we have seen, the same interpretation for the piercing sword. 
 It is also found in a Homily attributed to St. Amphilochius ; 
 and in that sixth Oration of Proclus, which, according to 
 Tillemont and Ceillier, is not to be considered genuine. It is 
 also found in a work incorrectly attributed to St. Augustine. 
 
 3. St. Chrysostom is, par excellence, the Commentator of the 
 Church. As Commentator and Preaclier, of all the Fathers, he 
 
NOTES. 
 
 143 
 
 carries about him the most intense personality. In this lies his 
 very charm, peculiar to himself. He is ever overflowing with 
 thought, and he pours it forth with a natural engaging frank- 
 ness, and an unwearied freshness and vigour. If he was in the 
 practice of deeply studying and carefully criticizing what he 
 delivered in public, he had in perfection the rare art of con- 
 cealing his art. He ever speaks from himself, not of course 
 without being impregnated with the fulness of a Catholic train- 
 ing, but still, not speaking by rule, but as if “ trusting the lore 
 of his own loyal heart.” On the other hand, if it is not a 
 paradox to say it, no one carries with him so little of the 
 science, precision, consistency, gravity of a Doctor of the 
 Church, as he who is one of the greatest. The difficulties are 
 well known which he has occasioned to school theologians : his 
 obiter dicta about our Lady are among them. 
 
 On the whole then I conclude that these three Lathers supply . 
 no evidence that, in what they say of her having failed in faith | 
 or humility on certain occasions mentioned in Scripture, they 
 are reporting the decisions of Apostolical Tradition. 
 
 Such difficulties as the above are not uncommon in the 
 writings of the Lathers. I will mention several : — 
 
 1. St. G-regory Nyssen is a great dogmatic divine ; he too, like 
 St. Basil, is of the school of Origen ; and, in several passages 
 of his works, he, like Origen, declares or suggests that future 
 punishment will not be eternal. Those Anglicans who con- 
 sider St. Chrysostom’s passages in his Commentary on the 
 Gospels to be a real argument against the Catholic belief of 
 the Blessed Virgin’s sinlessness, should explain why they do 
 not feel St. Gregory Hyssen’s teaching in his Catechetical 
 Discourse, an argument against their own belief in the eternity 
 of punishment. 
 
 2. Again, they believe in the proper divinity of our Lord, in 
 spite of Bull’s saying of the Ante-Nicene Lathers, “nearly all 
 the ancient Catholics, who preceded Arius, have the appear- 
 ance of being ignorant of the invisible and incomprehensible 
 {immensarn) nature of the Son of God an article of faith 
 expressly contained in the Athanasian Creed, and enforced by 
 its anathema. 
 
 3. The Divinity of the Holy Ghost is an integral part of the 
 
144 
 
 NOTES. 
 
 fandamental doctrine of Christianity; yet St. Basil, in the 
 fourth century, apprehending the storm of controversy which 
 its assertion would raise, refrained from asserting it on an 
 occasion when the Arians were on watch as to what he would 
 say. And St. Athanasius took his part, on his keeping silence. 
 Such inconsistencies take place continually, and no Catholic 
 doctrine but suffers from them at times, until what has been 
 preserved by Tradition is formally pronounced to be apostolical 
 by definition of the Church, 
 
 Before concluding, I shall briefly take notice of two questions 
 which may be asked me. 
 
 1. How are we to account for the absence, at Antioch or 
 Caesarea, of a tradition of our Lady’s sinlessness ? I consider 
 that it was obliterated or confused by the Arian troubles in the 
 countries in which those Sees are included. 
 
 It is not surely wonderful, if, in Syria and Asia Minor, the 
 seat in the fourth century of Arianism and Semi-arianism, the 
 prerogatives of the mother were obscured together with the 
 essential glory of the Son, or if they who denied the tradition 
 of His divinity, forgot the tradition of her sinlessness. Chris- 
 tians in those countries and times, however religious themselves, 
 however orthodox their teachers, were necessarily under pecu- 
 liar disadvantages. 
 
 How let it be observed that Basil grew up in the very midst 
 of Semi-arianism, and had direct relations with that, portion of 
 its professors who had been reconciled to the Church and 
 jjccepted the Hornousion. It is not wonderful then, if he had 
 no firm habitual hold upon a doctrine which (though Apo- 
 stolical) was in his day so much in the background as yet 
 all over Christendom, as our Lady’s sinlessness. 
 
 As to Chrysostom, not only was he in close relations with 
 the once Semi-arian Cathedra of Antioch, to the disavowal of 
 the rival succession there, recognized by Eome and Alexandria, 
 but, as his writings otherwise show, he came under the teach- 
 ing of the celebrated Antiochene School, celebrated, that is, 
 at once for its Scripture criticism, and (orthodox as it was 
 itself) for the successive outbreaks of heresy among its 
 members. These outbreaks began in Paul of Samosata, were 
 
NOTES. 
 
 145 
 
 continued in the Semi-arian pupils of Lucian, and ended in 
 JNTestorius. The famous Theodore, and Diodorus, of the same 
 school, who, though not heretics themselves, have a bad name 
 in the Church, were, Diodorus the master, and Theodore the 
 fellow-pupil, of St. Chrysostom. (Vid. Arlans of the Fourth 
 Cent.^ p. 8, and Boctr. Bevel, p. 252.) Here then is a natural 
 explanation, why St. Chrysostom, even more than St. Basil, 
 should be wanting in a clear perception of the place of the 
 Blessed Virgin in the Evangelical Dispensation. 
 
 2. How are we to account for the passages in the Gospels, 
 which are the occasion of the Fathers’ remarks to her dis- 
 paragement ? They seem to me intended to discriminate be- 
 tween our Lord’s work who is our Teacher and Eedeemer, and 
 the ministrative oflSce of His Mother. 
 
 As to the words of Simeon, as interpreted by St. Basil and 
 St. Cyril, there is nothing in the sacred text which obliges us 
 to consider the sword ” to mean doubt rather than anguish; 
 but Matth. xii. 46 — 50, with its parallels Mark iii. 81—35, 
 and Luke viii. 19—21 ; Luke xi. 27, 28, and John ii. 4, re- 
 quire some explanation. 
 
 I observe then, that, when our Lord commenced His ministry, 
 and during it, as one of His chief self-sacrifices. He separated 
 Himself from all ties of earth, in order to fulfil the typical idea 
 of a teacher and priest ; and to give an example to His priests 
 after Him ; and especially to manifest by this action the car- 
 dinal truth, as expressed by the Prophet, “ I am, I am the 
 Lord, and there is no Saviour besides Me.” As to His Priests, 
 they, after Him, were to be of the order of that Melchizedech, who 
 was without father and without mother for no man, being 
 a soldier to God, entangleth himself with secular business:” 
 and “ no man putting his hand to the plough, and looking back, 
 is fit for the kingdom of God.” As to the Levites, who were 
 His types in the Old Law, there was that honourable history of 
 their zeal for God, when they even slew their own brethren 
 and companions who had committed idolatry ; “ who said to his 
 father and to his mother, I do not know you, and to his bre- 
 thren, I know you not, and their own children they have not 
 known.” To this separation even from His Mother He refers 
 by anticipation at twelve years old in His words, How is it 
 
 K 
 
146 
 
 NOTES. 
 
 that you sought Me ? Did you not know that I must be about 
 My Father’s business ? ” 
 
 This separation from her, with whom He had lived thirty 
 years and more, was not to last beyond the time of His 
 ministry. She seems to have been surprised when she first 
 heard of it, for St. Luke says, on occasion of His staying in 
 the Temple, they understood not the word, that He spoke to 
 them.” Hay, she seems hardly to have understood it at the 
 marriage-feast ; but He, in dwelling on it more distinctly then, 
 implied also that it was not to last long. He said, Woman, 
 what have I to do with thee ? My hour is not yet come,” 
 — the hour of His triumph, when His Mother was to take 
 her predestined place in His kingdom. In saying the hour was 
 not yet come. He implied that the hour would come, when He 
 would have to do with her, and she might ask and obtain from 
 Him miracles. Accordingly, St. Augustine thinks that that 
 hour had come, when on the Cross He said, “ Consummatum 
 and, after this ceremonial estrangement of some years, 
 He recognized His mother and committed her to the beloved 
 disciple. Thus by marking out the beginning and the end of 
 the period of exception, when she could not exert her infiuence 
 upon Him, He signifies more clearly, by the contrast, that her 
 presence with Him, and her power, was to be the rule. In a 
 higher sense than He spoke to the Apostles, He seems to 
 address her in the words, ‘‘ Because I have spoken these things, 
 sorrow hath filled your heart. But I will see you again, and 
 your heart shall rejoice, and your joy no man shall take from 
 you.” {Vid, Sermon iii. in Sermons on Subjects of the Day^ on 
 
 Our Lord^s Last Supper and His Firsts) 
 
NOTES. 
 
 147 
 
 NOTE D. PAGE 96. 
 
 Canisius, in his work de Maria Deipard Virgfine, p, 514, while 
 engaged in showing the carefulness with which the Church dis- 
 tinguishes the worship of God from the culttis of the Blessed 
 Virgin, observes, “ Lest the Church should depart from Latvia 
 (i. e. the worship of God) she has instituted the public suppli- 
 cations in the Liturgy in perpetuity in such wise as to address 
 them directly to God the Eather, and not to the Saints, accord- 
 ing to that common form of praying, ^ Almighty, everlasting 
 God,’ &c, ; and the said prayers which they also call ^ Collects,’ 
 she generally ends in this way, through Jesus Christ, Thy 
 Son, our Lord.’ ” He says more to the same purpose, but the 
 two points here laid down are sufficient ; viz. that as to the 
 Latin Missal, Eitual, and Breviary, 1. Saints are not directly 
 addressed in these books : and 2. prayers end with the name of 
 Jesus. An apposite illustration of both of these, that is, in 
 what is omitted and what is introduced, is supplied by the con- 
 cluding prayer of the Offertory in the Latin Mass. If in any 
 case the name of ‘ our Lady and all Saints ’ may be substituted 
 at the end of a prayer for our Lord’s name, it would be 
 when the object addressed is, not God the Father, but the Son, 
 or the Holy Trinity; but let us observe how the prayer 
 in question runs : — 
 
 ‘‘ Suscipe, Sancta Trinitas ” — Beceive, 0 Holy Trinity, 
 this oblation which we make to Thee, in memory of the Pas- 
 sion, Eesurrection, and Ascension of our Lord Jesus Christ, 
 and in honour of the Blessed Mary, Ever- Virgin, of Blessed 
 John Baptist, and of the Holy Apostles Peter and Paul, and of 
 these and all Saints, that it may avail for their honour and our 
 salvation, and that they may vouchsafe to intercede for us in 
 heaven, whose memory we celebrate on earth. Through the same 
 Christ our Lord, Amen.” 
 
 "When in occasional Collects the intercession of the Blessed 
 Mary is introduced, it does not supersede mention of our Lord 
 
 K 2 
 
148 
 
 NOTES. 
 
 as the Intercessor. Thus in the Post-communion on the Feast 
 of the Circumcision, — 
 
 May this communion, 0 Lord, purify us from guilt ; and 
 at the intercession of Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of God, 
 make us partakers of the heavenly remedy, through the same 
 Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.” 
 
 In like manner, when the Son is addressed, and the inter- 
 cession of Mary and the Saints is supplicated. His own merits 
 are introduced at the close, as on the Feast of the Seven 
 Dolours : — 
 
 God, at whose passion, according to the prophecy of 
 Simeon, the most sweet soul of the glorious Virgin-Mother 
 Mary was pierced through with the sword of sorrow, mercifully 
 grant, that we, who reverently commemorate her piercing and 
 passion, may, by the intercession of the glorious merits and 
 prayers of the Saints who faithfully stood by the Cross, obtain 
 the happy fruit of Thy Tassion, who livest and reignest, &c.” 
 
 “ We offer to Thee, Lord Jesus Christ, our prayers and 
 sacrifices, humbly supplicating, that we, who renew in our 
 prayers the piercing of the most sweet soul of Thy Blessed 
 Mother Mary, by the manifold compassionate intervention of 
 both her and her holy companions under the Cross, by the 
 merits of Thy deaths may merit a place with the Blessed, who 
 livest, &c.” 
 
 Now let us observe how far less observant of dogmatic ex- 
 actness, how free and fearless, is the formal Greek devotion : — 
 
 1. We have risen from sleep, and we fall down before Thee, 
 O good God; and we sing to Thee the ilngelic Hymn, O 
 powerful God. Holy, holy, holy art Thou, God ; have mercy on 
 us through the Theotocos. 
 
 “ Thou hast raised me from my bed and slumber, 0 God. 
 Lighten my mind, and open my heart and lips, to sing of Thee, 
 Holy Trinity. Holy, holy, holy art Thou, God ; have mercy 
 on us through the Theotocos. 
 
 “ Soon will come the Judge, and the deeds of all will be laid 
 bare . . . Holy, holy, holy art Thou, God ; have mercy on us 
 through the Theotocos.” — Horologium, p. 2, Yenet, 1836 : vide 
 also, pp. 31. 48. 52. Also, ^ucholog, Yenet, p. 358. 
 
NOTES. 
 
 149 
 
 2. “ 0 God, who lookest on the earth, and makest it tremble, 
 deliver us from the fearful threatenings of earthquake, Christ 
 our God ; and send down on us Thy rich mercies, and save 
 us, at the intercessions (Trpco-^ctats) of the Theotocos.” — Ibid, 
 p. 224. Vid. also Pentecostar, p. 14. 
 
 3. “ 0 Holy God, . . . visit us in Thy goodness, pardon us 
 every sin, sanctify our souls, and grant us to serve Thee in 
 holiness all the days of our life, at the intercessions (Trpeo*- 
 /ScLais) of the Holy Theotocos and all the Saints, &c.’’ — JEucJio- 
 logium^ p. 64. Venet. 1832. 
 
 4. “ Again, and still again, let us beseech the Lord in peace. 
 Help, save, pity, preserve us, O God [through] her, the all- 
 holy, Immaculate, most Blessed, and glorious, (SLacf>vXaiov 
 
 6 ®€og, riys Travayias,) &c.” — Pucliologium, p. 92. Venet. 1832. 
 Vid. also Pentecostar. p. 232 ; passim. 
 
 5. “ Lord, Almighty Sovereign, . . . restore and raise from 
 her bed this Thy servant, &c. ... at the intercession (Trpecr- 
 ^€tats) of the all-undefiled Theotocos and all the Saints.” — 
 Ibid. p. 142. 
 
 6. Have mercy and pardon, (for Thou alone hast power to 
 remit sins and iniquities,) at the intercession of Thy all-holy 
 Mother and all the Saints.” — Ibid. p. 150. 
 
 7. “ O Lord God Almighty, . . . bless and hallow Thy place 
 ... at the intercession (7rp€o-/3€tats) of our glorious Lady, 
 Mary, Mother of God and Ever- Virgin.” — PucJiolog. p. 389. 
 
 Is the Blessed Virgin ever called ‘^our Lady,” as here, in 
 the Latin Prayers? whereas it is a frequent title of her in 
 the Greek. 
 
 8. ‘‘ Save me, my God, from all injury and harm. Thou who 
 art glorified in Three Persons . . . and guard Thy fiock at the 
 intercessions {evr^v^ecnv) of the Theotocos.” — Pentecostarium^ 
 p. 59. Venet. 1820. Vid. also Goar, PucTiolog. p. 30. 
 
 9. In the porch of Solomon there lay a multitude of sick 
 . . . Lord, send to us Thy great mercies at the intercession 
 (7rp€(r^€iats) of the Theotocos.” — Pentecostar. p. 84. Vid. also 
 Goar, PucTiolog. pp. 488. 543. 
 
 10. “ O great God, the Highest, who alone hast immortality 
 . . . prosper our prayer as the incense before Thee . . . that 
 we may remember even in the night Thy holy Name, . . . and 
 
150 
 
 NOTES. 
 
 rise anew in gladness of soul . . . bringing our prayers and 
 supplications to Thy loving-kindness in behalf of our own sins 
 and of all Thy people, whom visit in mercy at the intercessions 
 (TTpea/SetaLs) of the Holy Theotocos.’’ — Ibid, p. 232. Vid. Ho- 
 rolog, p. 192. Venet. 1836. 
 
 11. Between the Trisagion and Epistle in Mass. “ 0 Holy 
 God, who dwellest in the holy place, whom with the voice of 
 their Trisagion the Seraphim do praise, &c. . . . sanctify our 
 souls and bodies, and grant us to serve Thee in holiness all the 
 days of our life, at the intercession (grp^o- of the Holy 
 Theotocos and all the Saints.” — JEucTiolog. p. 64. Venet. 1832. 
 
 12. In the early part of Mass. Lift up the horn of Chris- 
 tians, and send down on us Thy rich mercies, by the power of 
 the precious and life-giving Cross, by the grace of Thy light- 
 bringing, third-day resurrection from the dead, at the inter- 
 cession (jrpecT^dais) of our All-holy Blessed Lady Mary, Mo- 
 ther of God and Ever- Virgin, and all Thy Saints.” — Assemani, 
 Codex Liturg. t. v. p. 71. Bite of St. James. 
 
 13. At the Offertory at Mass. In honour and memory of 
 our singularly blessed and glorious Queen, Mary Theotocos and 
 E ver- Virgin ; at whose intercession, O Lord, receive, O Lord, 
 this sacrifice unto Thy altar which is beyond the heavens.” — 
 Goar, HucJiol. p. 58. Rite of St. Chrysostom. 
 
 14. In the Commemoration at Mass. Cantors. Hail, Mary, 
 full of grace, &c. &c. . . . for thou hast borne the Saviour of 
 our souls. Rriest. [Remember, Lord] especially the most 
 Holy Immaculate, &c. . . . Mary. Cantors. It is meet truly 
 to bless (gaKapLCcLv) thee, the Theotocos . . . more honourable 
 than the Cherubim, &c. . . . thee we magnify, who art truly 
 the Theotocos. O Eull of Grace, in thee the whole creation re- 
 joices, the congregation of Angels, and the race of men, 0 sanc- 
 tified shrine, and spiritual Paradise, boast of virgins,” &c. — 
 Assemani, t. v. p. 44. Jerusalem Rite. 
 
 15. In the Commemoration at Mass. “ Rriest. Especially 
 and first of all, we make mention of the Holy, glorious, and 
 Ever- Virgin Mary, &c. Deacon. Eemember her. Lord God, 
 and at her holy and pure prayers be propitious, have mercy 
 upon us, and favourably hear us. Rriest. Mother of our Lord 
 Jesus Christ, pray for me to thy Son Only-begotten, who came 
 
NOTES. 
 
 151 
 
 of thee, that, having remitted my sins and debts. He may 
 accept from my humble and sinful hands this sacrifice, which is 
 ofiered by my vileness on this altar, through thy intercession, 
 Mother most holy.” — Ibid, p. 186. Syrian Bite. 
 
 16. Apparently, after the Consecration. “ The Priest in-- 
 censes thrice before the Image {imagine) of the Virgin^ and says : 
 Hejoice, Mary, beautiful dove, who hast borne for us Grod, the 
 Word; thee we salute with the Angel Gabriel, saying. Hail, 
 full of grace, the Lord is with thee. Hail, Virgin, true Queen ; 
 hail, glory of our race, thou hast borne Emmanuel. We 
 ask, remember us, 0 faithful advocate, in the sight of our 
 Lord Jesus Christ, that He put away from us our sins.” — 
 Ibid. t. Vii., pars Ida. in fin. p. 20. Alexandrian Bite. 
 
 17. At the Communion in Mass. “Eorgive, our God, 
 remit, pardon me my trespasses as many as I have committed, 
 whether.in knowledge or in ignorance, whether in word or in 
 deed. All these things pardon me, as Thou art good and kind 
 to men, at the intercession (rTpeo - of Thy all-unde- 
 filed and Ever-Virgin Mother. Preserve me uncondemned, 
 that I may receive Thy precious and undefiled Eody, for the 
 healing of my body and soul.” — Goar, Buchologium^ p. 66. 
 
 18. After Communion at Mass. ‘‘ 0 Lord, be merciful to 
 us, bless us, let Thy countenance be seen upon us, and pity us. 
 Lord, save Thy people, bless Thine heritage, &c., . . . through 
 the prayers and addresses (orationes) which the Lady of us all. 
 Mother of God, the divine (diva) and Holy Mary, and the four 
 bright holy ones, Michael,” &c., &c. — Eenaudot, Liturg. 
 Orient, t. i. p. 29. Coptic Bite of St. Basil. Vid. also ibid. 
 pp. 29. 37. 89. 515, of St. Basil, Coptic, of St, Gregory, Coptic, 
 of Alexandria, Greek, and of Bthiopia. 
 
 19. After Communion at Mass. “We have consummated 
 this holy service (Xurovpylav), as we have been ordered, O 
 Lord . . . we, sinners, and Thine unworthy servants, who have 
 been made worthy to serve at Thy holy altar, in offering to 
 Thee the bloodless sacrifice, the immaculate Body and the 
 precious Blood of the Great God, our Saviour, J esus Christ, to 
 Thy glory, the unoriginate Eather, and the glory of Him, Thy 
 only-begotten Son, and of the Holy Ghost, good, life-giving, 
 and consubstantial with Thee. We ask a place on Thy right 
 
152 
 
 NOTES. 
 
 hand in Thy fearful and just day through the intercession (8ta 
 Twv Trpccr/Jetwi/) and prayers of our most glorious Lady, Mary, 
 Mother of God, and Ever- Virgin, and of all saints.” — Assemani, 
 Cod. Liturg, t. vii. p. 85. Bite of Alexandria. 
 
 20. After Communion at Mass. ‘‘We thank Thee, Lord, 
 Lover of men. Benefactor of our souls, that also on this day 
 Thou hast vouchsafed us Thy heavenly and immortal mysteries. 
 Direct our way aright, confirm us all in Thy fear, &c., ... at 
 the prayers and supplications of the glorious Theotocos and 
 Ever-Virgin Mary, and of all Thy saints.” — Eucholog. p. 86. 
 Venet. 1832. 
 
 21. Concluding words of Mass. “Blessed is He who has 
 given us His holy Body and precious Blood. We have received 
 grace and found life, by virtue of the Cross of Jesus Christ. 
 To Thee, 0 Lord, we give thanks, &c. Praise to Mary, who 
 is the glory of us all, who has brought forth for us the Eu- 
 charist.”— Eenaudot, Liturg. Orient, t. i. p. 522. Bite of 
 Bihiojgia. 
 
 I will add some of the instances, which have caught my eye 
 in these ecclesiastical books, of expressions about the Blessed 
 Virgin, which, among Latins, though occurring in some Anti- 
 phons, belong more to the popular than to the formal and 
 appointed devotions paid to the Blessed Virgin. 
 
 22. “ Thee we have as a tower and a harbour, and an accept- 
 able ambassadress {TrpidPiv) to the God whom thou didst 
 bear. Mother of God who hadst no spouse, the salvation of 
 believers.” — Bentecostar. p. 209. Venet. 1820. 
 
 23. “0 Virgin alone holy and undefiled, who hast mira- 
 culously {adTTopm) conceived God, intercede (Trpio-^eve) for the 
 salvation of the soul of thy servant.” — JEucTiolog. p. 439. 
 Venet. 1832. 
 
 24. “ Show forth thy speedy protection and aid and mercy 
 on thy servant, and still the waves, thou pure one, of vain 
 thoughts, and raise up my fallen soul, O Mother of God. Eor 
 I know, 0 Virgin, I know that thou hast power for whatever 
 thou wiliest.” — Ihid. p. 679. 
 
 25. “ Joachim and Anna were set free from the reproach of 
 childlessness, and Adam and Eve from the corruption of death, 
 O un defiled, in thy holy birth. And thy people keeps festival 
 
NOTES. 
 
 153 
 
 upon it, being ransomed from the guilt of their offences in 
 crying to thee. The barren bears the Theotocos, and the nurse 
 of Life.” — Horolog, p. 198. Venet, 1836. 
 
 26. ‘‘ Let us now run earnestly to the Theotocos, sinners as 
 we are, and low, and let us fall in repentance, crying from the 
 depth of our souls. Lady, aid us, taking compassion on us. 
 Make haste, we perish under the multitude of our offences. 
 Turn us not, thy servants, empty away ; for we have thee as 
 our only hope.” — Ihid. p. 470. Vid. “ My whole hope I repose 
 in thee.” — Triodion, p. 94. Venef, 1820. 
 
 27. ‘‘We have gained thee for a wall of refuge, and the all- 
 perfect salvation of souls, and a release (jrXaTvo-fjLov) in afflic- 
 tions, and in thy light we ever rejoice ; O Queen, even now 
 through suffering and danger preserve us.” — Ihid. p. 474. 
 
 28. “By thy mediation, Virgin, I am saved.” — Triod, p. 6. 
 Venet. 1820. 
 
 29. “ The relief of the afflicted, the release of the sick, 
 O Virgin Theotocos, save this city and people; the peace 
 of those who are oppressed by war, the calm of the tem- 
 pest-tost, the sole protection of the faithful.” — Goar, I^ucTiolog* 
 p. 478. 
 
 30. All through the Office Books are found a great number of 
 Collects and Prayers to the Blessed Virgin, called Theotocia, 
 whereas in the Latin Offices addresses to her scarcely get 
 beyond the Antiphons. There are above 100 of them in the 
 Euchology, above 170 in the Pentecostarium, close upon 350 in 
 the Triodion. These, according to Eenaudot, are sometimes 
 collected together into separate volumes. {Liturg. Orient, t. ii, 
 p. 98.) 
 
 31. At p. 424 of the Horologium there is a collection of 100 
 invocations in her honour, arranged for the year. 
 
 32. At p. 271 of the HucTiologium, is a form of prayer to her 
 “in the confession of a sinner,” consisting of thirty-six collects, 
 concluding with a Gospel, supplication, &c. If there were 
 any doubt of the difference which the Greeks make between 
 her and the Saints, one of these would be evidence of it. 
 “ Take with you (jrapaXa^^) the multitude of Archangels and of 
 the heavenly hosts, and the Porerunner, &c., . . . and make 
 
154 
 
 NOTES. 
 
 intercession {irp^cr^dav), Holy One, in my behalf with God,” 
 p. 275. Vid. also ibid. p. 390, &c. 
 
 33. There is another form of prayer to her at p. 640, of forty- 
 
 three collects or verses, “ in expectation of war,” arranged to form 
 an lambic acrostic, ‘‘ O undefiled, be the ally of my household.” 
 Among other phrases we read here, “ Thou art the head com- 
 mander (6 dpxio-TpaTrjyos) of Christians “ They in their 
 
 chariots and horses, we, thy people, in thy name;” ‘‘ with thy 
 spiritual hand cast down the enemies of thy people;” ‘‘Thy 
 power runs with thy will (avvSpopiov &c.” “Deliver 
 
 not thine heritage, O holy one, into the hands of the heathen, 
 lest they shall say, where is the Mother of God in whom they 
 trusted?” “Hear from thy holy Temple, thy servants, O 
 pure one, and pour out God’s wrath upon the Gentiles that do 
 not know thee, and the kingdoms that have not faithfully 
 called upon thy celebrated name.” 
 
 34. It is remarkable, that, not only the Jacobites, but even the 
 Nestorians agree with the Orthodox in the unlimited honours 
 they pay to the Theotocos. “No one,” says Eenaudot, “has 
 accused the Orientals of deficiency in the legitimate honours, 
 which are the right of the Deipara ; but many have charged 
 them with having sometimes been extravagant in that devotion, 
 and running into superstition, which accusation is not without 
 foundation.” — t. i. p. 257. 
 
 Another remark of his is in point here. The extracts above 
 made are in great measure from Greek service-books of this day ; 
 but even those which are not such are evidence according to 
 their date and place of opinions and practices, then and there 
 existing. “ Their weight does not depend on the authority of 
 the writers, but on the use of the Churches. Those prayers 
 had their authors, who indeed were not known; but, when 
 once it was clear that they had been used in Mass, who their 
 authors were ceased to be a question.” — t. i. p. 173. The 
 existing manuscripts can hardly be supposed to be mere com- 
 positions, but are records of rites. 
 
 I say then, first : — That usage, which, after a split has taken 
 place in a religious communion, is found to obtain equally in 
 each of its separated parts, may fairly be said to have existed 
 
NOTES. 
 
 155 
 
 before the split occurred. The concurrence of Orthodox, Nes- 
 torian, and Jacobite in the honours they pay to the Blessed 
 Virgin, is an evidence that those honours were paid to her in 
 their “ Undivided Church.” 
 
 Next : — Passages such as the above, taken from the formal 
 ritual of the Greeks, are more compromising to those who pro- 
 pose entering into communion with them, than such parallel 
 statements as occur in unauthoritative devotions of the Latins. 
 
156 
 
 NOTES. 
 
 NOTE E. PAGE 113. 
 
 I find the following very apposite passage at note t, p. 390, 
 of Vol. I. of Mr. Morris’s Jesus the Son of Mary,” a work 
 full of learning, which unhappily I forgot to consult, till my 
 Letter was finished and in type. 
 
 An error of this sort [that our Lady is in the Holy Eucha- 
 rist] was held by some persons, and is condemned in the fol- 
 lowing language by Benedict XIV.[?], as has been pointed out 
 to me by my old and valued friend, Father Faber: ‘ This doc- 
 trine was held to be erroneous, dangerous, and scandalous, and 
 the cultus was reprobated, which in consequence of it, they 
 asserted was to be paid to the most Blessed Virgin in the 
 Sacrament of the Altar.’ ” 
 
 Lamlertini de Canonizatione Sanctorum, Lib, iv. p. 2, c. 31, 
 n. 32. 
 
 De cultu erga Deiparam in Sacramento Altaris. 
 
 Non inultis abhinc annis prodiit Liber de cultu erga Leipa- 
 ram in Sacramento altaris, auctore Patre Zephyrino de Someire 
 Eecoliecto Sancti Francisci, in quo asserebatur, in Sacramento 
 altaris aliquam illius partem adesse, eandem videlicet carnem, 
 quam olim ejus sanctissima anima vivificavit, eumdemque ilium 
 sanguinem, qui in ejus venis continebatur, et ipsum lac, quo ejus 
 ubera plena erant. Addebatur, nos habere in Sacramento non 
 tantum sanguinem Deiparse, quatenus in carnem et ossa Christi 
 mutatus est, sed etiam partem sanguinis in propria specie ; 
 neque solum veram carnem ipsius, sed etiam aliquid singulorum 
 membrorum, quia sanguis, et lac, ex quibus formatum et nutri- 
 tum fuit corpus Christi, missa fuerunt ab omnibus et singulis 
 membris Beatissimse Virginis. 
 
 Etiam Christophorus de Vega in volumine satis ample, quod 
 inscribitur, THEOLOGIA MARIANA Lugduni edito ann, 
 1653, fusius ea omnia prosecutus est : sed Theophilus Eaynau- 
 
NOTES. 
 
 157 
 
 dus in suis DiptycMs Marianis t. 7. p. 65, ca reprobat, asserit- 
 que hseresitn sapere juxta Guidonem Carmelitam in Summa de 
 hcBresibus tract, de hceresi Grcecorum c. 13., cujus verba sunt 
 hsec : Tertius decimus error Grcecorum est. Dicunt enim, quod 
 reliquicB Fanis consecrati sunt reliquice corporis Beatce Yirginis. 
 Hie error stultitice et amentice plenus est, Nam corpus GJiristi 
 suh qualilibet parte Tiostice consecrated integrum manet. Itaque 
 qucelibet pars, a tota consecrata hostia divisa et separata, est 
 verum corpus CJiristi. Hcereticum autem est etfatuum dicere, 
 quod corpus CJiristi sit corpus Virginis matris suce, sicut Jicere- 
 ticum esset dicere, quod QJiristus esset Beata Virgo ; quia dis- 
 tinctorum hominum distincta sunt corpora, nec tantus honor 
 deJjetur corpori virginis, quantus dehetur corpori Christi, cui 
 ratione Bivini Suppositi dehetur honor latrice, non corpori Vir- 
 ginis, Igitur dicere, reliquias hostice consecrated esse reliquias 
 corporis Beatce Virginis est hcereticum manifested 
 
 Porro Theologorum Princeps D. Thomas 3 part, queest. 31, 
 art. 5, docet primo, Christi corpus conceptum fuisse ex BeatsD 
 Virginis castissimis et purissimis sanguinibus non quibuscun- 
 que, sed ^^perductis adquamdam ampliorem digestionem per virtu- 
 tern generativam ipsius, ut essent materia apta ad conceptum^^ 
 cum Christi conceptio fuerit secundum conditionem naturae; 
 materiamque aptam, sive purissimum sanguinem in conception© 
 Christi sola Spiritus Sancti operation© in utero Virginis aduna- 
 tam, et in prolem formatum fuisse ; ita ut vere dicatur corpus 
 Christi ex purissimis et castissimis sanguinibus Beatse Virginis 
 fuisse formatum. Docet secundo, non potuiss© corpus Christi 
 formari d© aliqua substantia, videlicet d© earn© et ossibus 
 Beatissimse Virginis, cum sint partes integrantes corpus ipsius ; 
 ideoque subtrahi non potuissent sine corruptione, et ejus dimi- 
 nutione ; illud vero, quod aliquando dicitur, Christum de Beata 
 Virgine carnem sumpsisse, intelligendum esse et explieandum, 
 non quod materia corporis ejus fuerit actu caro, sed sanguis 
 qui est potentia caro. Docet demum tertio, quomodo subtrahi 
 potuerit ex corpore Adam aliqua ejus pars absque ipsius dimi- 
 nutione, cum Adam institutus ut principium quoddam humanse 
 naturae, aliquid habuerit ultra partes sui corporis personales^ 
 quod ab eo subtractum est pro formanda Heva, salva ipsius 
 
158 
 
 NOTES. 
 
 integritate in ratione perfect! corporis human! : quse locum 
 habere non potuerunt in Beatissima Virgine, quae uti singii- 
 lare individuum habuit perfectissimum corpus humanum, et 
 aptissimam materiem ad Christ! corpus formandum, quantum 
 est ex parte feminae, et ad ejus naturalem generationem. Ex 
 quo fit, ut non potuerit, salva integritate Beatae Virginis, 
 aliquid subtrahi, quod dici posset de substantia corporis 
 ipsius. 
 
 Itaque, cum per banc doctrinam, Eidei principiis conjunctis- 
 simam, directe et expressis verbis improbata remanserint asserta 
 in citato libro Patris Zephyrini, ejus doctrina habita est tan- 
 quam erronea, periculosa, et scandalosa,^^ reprobatusque fuit 
 cultus, quern ex ea praestandum Beatissimae Virgini in Sacra- 
 mento altaris asserebat. Loquendi autem formulae a nonnullis 
 Patribus adhibitae, Caro Marice est caro Christi Etc, JVbhis 
 carnem Ifarice manducandum ad salutem dedit^ ita explicandae 
 sunt, non ut dicamus, in Christo aliquid esse, quod sit Mariae ; 
 sed Christum conceptum esse ex Maria Virgine, materiam ipsa 
 ministrante in similitudinem naturae et speciei, et ideo filium 
 ejus esse. Sic, quia caro Christi fuit sumpta de David, ut 
 expresse dicitur ad Bomanos 1. “ Quif actus est ex semine David 
 secundum carnem^'* David dicitur Christus, ut notat S. Augus- 
 tinus enarrat, in Bsalm, 144, num, 2. Intelligitur laus ipsi 
 David, laus ip si Christo, Christus autem secundum carnem 
 David, quia Filius DavidP Et infra : “ Qgiia itaque ex ipso 
 Christus secundum carnem, ideo David Est item solemnis 
 Scripturae usus, loquendo de parentibus, ut caro unius vocitetur 
 caro alterius. Sic Laban Gen, 29 dixit Jacob. : Os meum es, et 
 caro mea;'^'* et Judas, loquendo de fratre suo Joseph, Gen, 27. 
 ait : Frater enim, et caro nostra est et Lev, 18 legitur : 
 “ Soror patris tui caro est patris tui, et soror matris tuce caro 
 est matris tuce absque eo quod hinc inferri possit, ut in 
 Jacob fuerit aliqua actualis pars corporis Laban, aut in Joseph 
 pars Judae, aut in filio pars aliqua patris. Igitur id solum 
 affirmare licet, in Sacramento esse carnem Christi assumptam 
 ex Maria, ut ait Sanctus Ambrosius relatus in canone Omnia, 
 de Consecrat, distinct. 2 his verbis : Hcbc caro mea est pro 
 mundi vita, et, ut mirdbilius loquar, non alia plane, quam qu(B 
 
NOTES. 
 
 159 
 
 nata est de Maria, et passa in cruce, et resurrexit de sepulcro ; 
 Ti(Ec,inqiiam, ipsa estP Et infra loquens de corpore Christi: 
 
 Illud vere, illud sane, quod sumptum est de Virgine, quod 
 passum est, et sepultum.^^ 
 
 Since the first edition of this Letter a correspondent of the 
 AVeekly Eegister has pointed out that Oswald’s work (vid. supr. 
 p. 103) is on the Index. Vide page 5 of Appendix Libroruin 
 Prohibitorum a die 6 Septembris, 1852, ad mensem juniura, 
 1858.” 
 
 THE END. 
 
 GILBERT AND RIVINGTON, PRINTERS, ST. JOHN’s SQUARE, LONDON, 
 

 
 
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THE WOEKINGS OE THE HOLY SPIEIT IN 
 THE CHUECH OF ENGLAND. 
 
 A LETTER 
 
 THE EEV. E. B. PUSEY, D.D. 
 
 BY 
 
 HENRY EDWARD MANNING, D.D. 
 
 SECOND EDITION. 
 
 LONDON: 
 
 LONGMAN. GREEN, LONGMAN, ROBERTS, & GREEN. 
 
 1865 . 
 
LONDON 
 
 PRINTED BY SPOTTISWOODE AND CO 
 NEW-STREET SQUARE 
 
My Dear Friend, 
 
 I do not know why twelve years of 
 silenee should forbid iny calling you still by the name 
 we used both to give and to accept of old. Aristotle 
 says indeed — 
 
 IloWac (j)L\laQ airpocTYjyopia dieXvaet ' — 
 
 but he did not know the basis and the affections of a 
 Christian friendship such as that to which — though I 
 acknowledge in myself no claim to it — you were so 
 kind as to admit me. Silence and suspension of com- 
 munications cannot prevail against the kindliness and 
 confidence which springs from such years and such 
 events as once united us. Contentions and variances 
 might indeed more seriously try and strain such a 
 friendship. But, though we have been both parted 
 and opposed, there has been between us neither vari- 
 ance nor contention. We have both been in the field 
 indeed where a warfare has been waging, but, happily, 
 we have not met in contest. Sometimes we have 
 been very near to each other, and have even felt the 
 opposition of each other’s will and hand ; but I believe 
 
4 
 
 on neither side has there ever been a word or an 
 act which has left a needless wound. That I should 
 have grieved and displeased you is inevitable. The 
 simple fact of my submitting to the Catholic Church 
 must have done so, much more the duties which bind 
 me as a pastor. If, in the discharge of that office, 
 I have given you or any one either pain or wound by 
 personal faults in the manner of its discharge, I should 
 be open to just censure. If the displeasure arise 
 only from the substance of my duties, ‘necessity is 
 laid upon me,’ and you would be the last to blame me. 
 
 You will perhaps be surprised at my beginning thus 
 to write to you. I will at once tell you why I do so. 
 Yesterday I saw, for the first time, your pamphlet on 
 the legal force of the Judgment of the Privy Council, 
 and I found my name often in its pages. I have 
 nothing to complain of in the way you use it. And I 
 trust that in this reply you Avill feel that I have not 
 forgotten your example. But your mention of me, 
 and of old days, kindled in me a strong desire to pour 
 out many things which have been for years rising in 
 my mind. I have long wished for the occasion to do 
 so, but I have always felt that it is more fitting to 
 take than to make such an occasion : and as your kind- 
 ness has made it, I will take it. 
 
 But before I enter upon the subject of this letter 
 I wish to say a few words of yourself, and of some 
 others whom I am wont to class with you. 
 
 Among the many challenges to controversy and 
 public disputation which it has been my fortune to re- 
 
5 
 
 ceive, and I may add, my happiness to refuse, in the last 
 twelve or thirteen years, one was sent me last autumn 
 at Bath. It was the only one to which, for a moment, 
 I was tempted to write a reply. The challenger paid 
 me compliments on my honesty in leaving the Church 
 of England, denouncing those who, holding my prin- 
 ciples, still eat its bread. I was almost induced to 
 write a few words to say that my old friends and I are 
 parted because we hold principles which are irrecon- 
 cilable ; that I once held what they hold now, and was 
 then united with them ; that they have never held 
 what I hold now, and therefore we are separated ; that 
 they are as honest in the Church of England now as I 
 was once, and that our separation was my own act in 
 abandoning as untenable the Anglican Church and its 
 rule of faith, Scripture and antiquity, which you and 
 they hold still, and in submitting to the voice of the 
 Catholic and Koman Church at this hour, which I 
 believe to be the sole authoritative interpreter of 
 Scripture and of antiquity. This pidnciple no friend 
 known to me in the Church of England has ever ac- 
 cepted. In all these years, both in England and in 
 foreign countries, and on occasions both private and 
 public, and with persons of every condition, I have 
 boi’ne this witness for you and for others. 
 
 I felt no little indignation at what seemed to me 
 the insincerity of my correspondent, but on reflection 
 I felt that silence was the best answer, 
 
 I will now turn to your pamphlet, and to the 
 subject of this Letter. 
 
6 
 
 You speak at the outset of ‘the jubilee of tri- 
 umph among half believers ’ on the occasion of the 
 late Judgment of the Crown in Council; and you add, 
 
 ‘ A class of believers joined in the triumph. And 
 while I know that a very earnest body of Roman 
 Catholics rejoice in all the workings of God the Holy 
 Ghost in the Church of England (whatever they 
 think of her), and are saddened in what weakens her 
 who is, in God’s hands, the great bulwark against 
 infidelity in this land, others seemed to be in an ecstasy 
 of triumph at this victory of Satan.’ * Now, I will 
 not ask where you intended to class me. But as an 
 anonymous critic of a pamphlet lately published by 
 me accused me of rejoicing in your troubles, and 
 another more recently — with a want of candour 
 visible in every line of the attack — accused me of 
 being ‘ merry’ over these miseries of the Church of 
 England, I think the time is made for me to declare 
 how I regard the Church of England, and events like 
 these ; and I know no one to whom I would rather 
 address what I have to say than to yourself. 
 
 I will, then, say at once : 
 
 1. That I rejoice with all my heart in all the workings 
 
 of the Holy Ghost in the Church of England. 
 
 2. That I lament whensoever what remains of truth 
 
 in it gives way before unbelief. 
 
 3. That I rejoice whensoever what is imperfect in it 
 
 is unfolded into a more perfect truth. 
 
 Legal Force of the Judgment of the Privy Council, by the 
 Rev. E. B. Pusey, D.D., pp. 3, 4. 
 
7 
 
 4. But that I cannot regard the Church of England 
 as ‘ the great bulwark against infidelity in this land,’ 
 for reasons which I will give in their place. 
 
 1. First, then, I will say what I believe of the Church 
 of England, and why I rejoice in every working of 
 the Holy Spirit in it. And I do this the more gladly 
 because I have been sometimes grieved at hearing, and 
 once at even seeing in a handwriting which I reverence 
 with affection, the statement that Catholics — or at least 
 the worst of Catholics called Converts, deny the 
 validity of Anglican Baptism, regard our own past 
 spiritual life as a mockery, look upon our departed 
 parents as heathen, and deny the operations of the 
 Holy Spirit in those who are out of the Church. I 
 do not believe that those who say such things have 
 ever read the Condemned Propositions, or are aware 
 that a Catholic who so spoke would come under the 
 weight of at least two Pontifical censures, and the 
 decrees of at least two General Councils. 
 
 I need not, however, do more than remind you that, 
 according to the faith and theology of the Catholic 
 Church, the operations of the Holy Spirit of God 
 have been from the beginning of the world co-exten- 
 sive with the whole human race.* 
 
 Believing, then, in the operations of the Holy Spirit, 
 even among the nations of the world who have 
 neither the revelation of the Faith nor the Sacraments, 
 
 * Suarez, De Divina Gratia, Pars Secunda, lib. iv. c. viii. xi. 
 xii. Ripalda, De Ente Supernaturali, lib. i, disp. xx. s. xiL and 
 s. xxii. Viva Cursus Theol., pars iii. disp. i. quaDst. v. iii. 
 
8 
 
 how much more must we believe His presence and grace 
 in those who are regenerate by water and the Holy 
 Ghost? It would be impertinent for me to say to you 
 — whose name first became celebrated for a tract on 
 Baptism, which, notAvithstanding certain imperfections 
 inseparable from a Avork Avritten when and where you 
 Avrote it, is in substance deep, true, and elevating — that 
 Baptism, if rightly administered with the due form 
 and matter, is always valid by whatsoever hand it may 
 be given.* 
 
 Let me, then, say at once 
 
 1. That in denying the Church of England to be 
 the Catholic Church, or any part of it, or in any divine 
 and true sense a church at all, and in denying the 
 validity of its absolutions and its orders, no Catholic 
 ever denies the workings of the Spirit of God or the 
 operations of grace in it. 
 
 2. That in afiirmmg the workings of grace in the 
 Church of England no Catholic ever thereby affirms 
 that it possesses the character of a Church. 
 
 They Avho most inflexibly deny to it the character 
 of a Church affirm most explicitly the presence and 
 
 * Concil. Florent. Decretum Eugenii iv. Mansi Concil. tom. 
 xviii. 547. ^ In causa autem necessitatis non solum sacerdos vel 
 
 diaconus sed etiam laicus vel mulier, immo etiam paganus et haereti- 
 cus baptizare potest, dummodo formam servet Ecclesias, et facere 
 intendat quod facit Ecclesia.’ The Council of Trent repeats 
 this under anathema, Sess. vii. can. iv. : ‘Si quis dixerit Bap- 
 tismum qui etiam datur ab hsereticis in Nomine Patris, et Filii, 
 et Spiritus Sancti, cum intentione faciendi quod facit Ecclesia, 
 non esse verura Baptismum, anathema sit.’ See also Bellarm. 
 Coiitroversice, De Baptismo, lib. i. c. vii. 
 
9 
 
 the operations of grace among its people, and that for 
 the following reasons : 
 
 In the judgment of the Catholic Church, a baptized 
 people is no longer in the state of nature, but is 
 admitted to a state of supernatural grace. And though 
 I believe the number of those who have never been 
 baptized to be very great in England, and to be in- 
 creasing every year, nevertheless I believe the English 
 people, as a mass, to be a baptized people. I say the 
 number of the unbaptized is great, because there are 
 many causes which contribute to produce this result. 
 First, the imperfect, and therefore invalid, administra- 
 tion of baptism through the carelessness of the adminis- 
 trators. You, perhaps, think that this is exaggerated, 
 through an erroneous belief of Catholics as to the 
 extent of such carelessness among the Protestant 
 ministers, both in and out of the Church of England. It 
 is however undeniable, as I know from the evidence of 
 eye-witnesses, that such carelessness has, in times past, 
 been great and frequent. This I consider the least, 
 but a sufficient reason for believing that many have 
 never been baptized. Add to this, negligence caused 
 by the formal disbelief of baptismal regeneration in a 
 large number of Protestant ministers. There are, 
 however, two other reasons far more direct. The one 
 is the studied rejection, as a point of religious profes- 
 sion, of the practice of infant baptism. Many there- 
 fore grow up without baptism who in adult life, for 
 various causes, never seek it. The other, the sinful 
 unbelief and neglect of parents in every class of the 
 
10 
 
 English people, who often leave whole families of 
 children to grow up without baptism. Of the fact 
 that many have never been baptized, I, or any 
 Catholic priest actively employed in England, can 
 bear witness. There are few among us who have 
 not had to baptize grown people of every condition, 
 poor and rich ; and, of children, often whole families 
 together. There has indeed been, in the last thirty 
 years, a revival of care in the administration of 
 baptism on the part of the Anglican ministers, and of 
 attention on the part of parents in bringing their 
 children to be baptized; but this reaction is by no 
 means proportionate to the neglect, which on the 
 other side has been extending. My fear is that, 
 after all, the number of persons unbaptized in England 
 is greater at this moment than at any previous time. 
 
 Still the English people as a body are baptized, 
 and therefore elevated to the order of supernatural 
 grace. Every infant, and also every adult baptized, 
 having the necessary dispositions, is thereby placed 
 in a state of justification ; and, if they die without 
 committing any mortal sin, would certainly be saved. 
 They are also, in the sight of the Church, Catholics. 
 S. Augustine says, ‘ Ecclesia etiam inter eos qui 
 foris sunt per baptismum generat suos.’ A mortal 
 sin of any kind, including prava voluntatis electio^ 
 the perverse election of the will, by which in riper 
 years such persons chose for themselves, notwith- 
 standing sufficient light, heresy instead of the true 
 faith, and schism instead of the unity of the Church, 
 
11 
 
 would indeed deprive them of their state of grace. 
 But before such act of self-privation all such people 
 are regarded by the Catholic Church as in the way 
 of eternal life. With perfect confidence of faith, we 
 extend the shelter of this truth over the millions 
 of infants and young children who every year pass 
 to their Heavenly Father. We extend it also in 
 hope to many more who grow up in their baptis- 
 mal grace. Catholic missionaries in this country have 
 often assured me of a fact, attested also by my own 
 experience, that they have received into the Church 
 persons grown to adult life, in whom their baptismal 
 grace was still preserved. Now how can we then be 
 supposed to regard such persons as no better than 
 heathens ? To ascribe the good lives of such persons 
 to the power of nature would be Pelagianism. To 
 deny their goodness would be Jansenism. And, with 
 such a consciousness, how could any one regard his past 
 spiritual life in the Church of England as a mockery? 
 I have no deeper conviction than that the grace of 
 the Holy Spiiit was with me from my earliest con- 
 sciousness. Though at the time, perhaps, I knew it 
 not as I know it now, yet I can clearly perceive the 
 order and chain of grace by which God mercifully 
 led me onward from childhood to the age of twenty 
 years. From that time the interior workings of His 
 light and grace, which continued through all my life, 
 till the hour in which that light and grace had its 
 peiTect work, to which all its operations had been 
 converging, in submission to the fulness of truth, and 
 
12 
 
 of the Spirit in the Church of God, is a reality as 
 profoundly certain, intimate, and sensible to me now 
 as that I live. Never have I by the lightest word 
 breathed a doubt of this fact in the Divine order of 
 grace. Never have I allowed any one who has come 
 to me for guidance or instruction to harbour a doubt 
 of the past workings of grace in them. It would be 
 not only a sin of ingratitude, but a sin against truth. 
 The working of the Holy Spirit in individual souls 
 is, as I have said, as old as the fall of man, and as wide 
 as the human race. It is not we who ever breathe or 
 harbour a doubt of this. It is rather they who accuse 
 us of it. Because, to believe such an error possible 
 in others, shows how little consciousness there must 
 be of the true doctrine of grace in themselves. And 
 such, I am forced to add, is my belief, because I know 
 by experience how inadequately I understood the 
 doctrine of grace until I learned it of the Catholic 
 Church. And I trace the same inadequate conception 
 of the workings of grace in almost every Anglican 
 writer I know, not excepting even those who are 
 nearest to the truth. 
 
 But, further, our theologians teach, not only that 
 the state of baptismal innocence exists, and may be 
 preserved out of the Church, but that they who in 
 good faith are out of it, if they shall correspond with 
 the grace they have already received, will receive an 
 increase or augmentation of grace.* I do not for a 
 
 * Suarez, De Div. Gratia, lib. iv. c. xi. Kipalda, De Elite 
 Supernaturali, lib. i. (lisp. xx. sect. xii. et seq. S. Alphonsi 
 Theol. Moral, lib. i. tract, i. .5, 6. 
 
13 
 
 moment doubt that there are to be found among the 
 English people individuals who practise in a high 
 degree the four cardinal virtues, and in no small de- 
 gree, though with the limits and blemishes inseparable 
 from their state, the three theological virtues of Faith,* 
 Hope, and Charity, infused into them in their bap- 
 tism. I do not think, my dear friend, in all that I 
 have said or written in the last fourteen years, that 
 you can find a word implying so much as a doubt 
 of these workings of the Holy Spirit among all 
 the baptized who are separated from the Catholic 
 Church. 
 
 I will go further still. The doctrine, ‘ extra ecclesiam 
 nulla salus,^ is to be interpreted both by dogmatic 
 and by moral theology. As a dogma. Theologians 
 teach that many belong to the Church who are out 
 of its visible unity ; f as a moral truth, that to be out 
 of the Church is no personal sin, except to those who 
 sin in being out of it. That is, they will be lost, not 
 because they are geographically out of it, but because 
 they are culpably out of it. And they who are 
 culpably out of it are those who know — or might, and 
 
 * De Lugo, De Virtute divinaB Fidei, disp. xvii. sect. iv. v. 
 Viva, Cursus Theol. p. iv. disp. iv. quaest. iii. 7. 
 
 f See Perrone PraBlect. Theolog. pars i. c. ii. 1, 2 : 
 
 ‘ Omnes et soli justi pertinent ad Ecclesiae animam.’ 
 
 ‘Ad Christi Ecclesia3 corpus spectant fi deles omnes tarn justi 
 quam peccatores.’ 
 
 S. Augustine expresses these two propositions in six 
 words, ‘Multae oves foris, multi lupi intus.’ S. Aug. tom. iii. 
 pars ii. p. 600. 
 
14 
 
 therefore ought to, know — that it is their duty to sub- 
 mit to it. The Chui’ch teaches that men may be incul- 
 'pably out of its pale. Now they are inculpably out of 
 it who are and have always been either physically or 
 morally unable to see their obligation to submit to it. 
 And they only are culpably out of it who are both physi- 
 cally and morally able to know that it is God’s will they 
 should submit to the Church ; and either knowing it will 
 not obey that knowledge, or, not knowing it, are cul- 
 pable for that ignorance. I will say then at once, that 
 we apply this benign law of our Divine Master as 
 far as possible to the English people. First, it is 
 applicable in the letter to the whole multitude of those 
 baptized persons who are under the age of reason. 
 Secondly, to all who are in good faith, of whatsoever 
 age they be : such as a great many of the poor and 
 unlettered, to whom it is often physically, and very 
 often morally, impossible to judge which is the 
 true revelation or Church of God. I say physically, 
 because in these three hundred years the Catholic 
 Church has been so swept off the face of England 
 that nine or ten generations of men have lived and 
 died without the faith being so much as proposed 
 to them, or the Church ever visible to them ; and I 
 say morally, because the great majority of the poor, 
 from lifelong prejudice, are often incapable of judging 
 in questions so removed from the primary truths 
 of conscience and Christianity. Of such simple per- 
 sons it may be said that, infantibus cequiparantur^ 
 they are to be classed morally with infants. Again, 
 
15 
 
 to these may be added the unlearned in all classes, 
 among whom many have no contact with the Catholic 
 Church, or with Catholic books. Under this head Avill 
 come a great number of wives and daughters, whose 
 freedom of religious enquiry and religious thought 
 is unjustly limited or suspended by the authority of 
 parents and husbands. Add, lastly, the large class 
 who have been studiously brought up, with all the 
 dominant authority of the English tradition of three 
 hundred years, to believe sincerely, and without a 
 doubt, that the Catholic Church is corrupt, has changed 
 the doctrines of the faith, and that the author of the 
 Reformation is the Spirit of holiness and truth. It 
 may seem incredible to some that such an illusion 
 exists. But it is credible to me, because for nearly 
 forty years of my life I Avas fully possessed by this 
 erroneous belief. To all such persons it is morally 
 difficult in no small degree to discover the false- 
 hood of this illusion. All the better parts of their 
 nature are engaged in its support: dutifulness, self- 
 mistrust, submission, respect for others older, better, 
 more learned than themselves, all combine to form a 
 false conscience of the duty to refuse to hear anything 
 against ‘ the religion of their fathers,’ ‘ the Church 
 of their baptism,’ or to read anything which could 
 unsettle them. Such people are told that it is their 
 duty to extinguish a doubt against the Church of 
 England, as they would extinguish a temptation 
 against their virtue. A conscience so subdued and 
 held in subjection exorcises true virtues upon a false 
 
16 
 
 object, and I’enders to a human authority the sub- 
 missive trust which is due only to the Divine voice of 
 the Church of God. 
 
 One last point I will add. I believe that the people 
 of England were not all guilty of the first acts of 
 heresy and schism by which they were separated from 
 the Catholic unity and faith. They were robbed of it. 
 In many places they rose in arms for it. The chil- 
 dren, the poor, the unlearned at that time, were 
 certainly innocent : much more the next generation. 
 They were born into a state of privation. They knew 
 no better. No choice was before them. They made 
 no perverse act of the will in remaining where they 
 were born. Every successive generation was stiU less 
 culpable, in proportion as they were born into a greater 
 privation, and under the dominion of a tradition of 
 error already grown strong. For three centuries they 
 have been born further and further out of the truth, 
 and their culpability is perpetually diminishing; and 
 as they were passively borne onward in the course of 
 the English separation, the moral responsibility for 
 the past is proportionately less. 
 
 The Divine law is peremptory — ‘to him who knoweth 
 to do good, and doth it not, to him it is sin.’* Every 
 Divine truth as it shines in upon us lays its obliga- 
 tion on our conscience to believe and to obey it. 
 When the Divine authority of the Church manifests 
 itself to our intellect, it lays its jurisdiction upon our 
 conscience to submit to it. To refuse is an act of 
 
 * S. James iv, 17, 2. 
 
17 
 
 infidelity, and the least act of infidelity in its mea- 
 sure expels faith ; one mortal act of it will expel the 
 habit of faith altogether.* Every such act of infidelity 
 grieves the Holy Ghost by a direct opposition to His 
 Divine voice speaking through the Church ; the habit 
 of such opposition is one of the six sins against the 
 Holy Ghost defined as ‘ impugning the known truth.’ 
 All that I have said above in no way modifies the 
 absolute and vital necessity of submitting to the 
 Catholic Church as the only waj^’ of salvation to those 
 who know it, by the revelation of God, to be such. 
 But I must not attempt now to treat of this point. 
 
 Nevertheless for the reasons above given we make 
 the largest allowance for all who are in invincible 
 ignorance ; always supposing that there is a prepara- 
 tion of heart to embrace the truth when they see it, at 
 any cost, a desire to know it, and a faithful use of the 
 means of knowing it, such as study, docility, prayer, 
 and the like. But I do not now enter into the case 
 of the educated or the learned, or of those who have 
 liberty of mind and means of enquiry. I cannot 
 class them under the above enumeration of those who 
 are in culpably out of the truth. I leave them, there- 
 fore, to the only Judge of all men. 
 
 Lastly, I will not here attempt to estimate how far 
 all I have said is being modified by the liberation and 
 expansion of the Catholic Church in England during 
 the last thirty years. It is certain that the I'estora- 
 tion of the Catholic Hierarchy, with the universal 
 
 * De Lugo. De Virtute Fidei Divinae disp. xvii. sect. iv. 53 et seq. 
 
 B 
 
18 
 
 tumult which published it to the whole world, still 
 more by its steady, widespread, and penetrating action 
 throughout England, is taking away every year the 
 plea of invincible ignorance. 
 
 It is certain, however, that to those who, being in in- 
 vincible ignorance, faithfully co-operate with the grace 
 they have received, an augmentation of grace is given ; 
 and this at once places the English people, so far as 
 they come within the limits of these conditions, in a 
 state of supernatural grace, even though they be out of 
 the visible unity of the Church, I do not now enter 
 into the question of the state of those who fall from 
 baptismal grace by mortal sin, or of the great difficulty 
 and uncertainty of their restoration. This would lead 
 me too far; and it lies beyond the limits of this Letter. 
 
 It must not, however, be forgotten, for a moment, 
 that this applies to the whole English people, of all 
 forms of Christianity, or, as it is called, of all de- 
 nominations, What I have said does not recognise 
 the grace of the Church of England as such. The 
 working of grace in the Church of England is a truth 
 we joyfully hold and always teach. But we as joyfully 
 recognise the working of the Holy Spirit among 
 Dissenters of every kind. Indeed, I must say that 
 I am far more able to assure myself of the invin- 
 cible ignorance of Dissenters as a mass than of 
 Anglicans as a mass. They are far more deprived 
 of what survived of Catholic truth ; far more distant 
 from the idea of a Church ; far more traditionally 
 opposed to it by the prejudice of education; I must 
 
19 
 
 add, for the most part, far more simple in their belief 
 in the person and passion of our Divine Lord. Their 
 piety is more like the personal service of disciples to a 
 personal Master than the Anglican piety, which has 
 ahvays been more dim and distant from this central 
 light of souls. Witness Jeremy Taylor’s works, much 
 as I have loved them, compared with Baxter’s, or even 
 those of Andrews compared with Leighton’s, who was 
 formed by the Kirk of Scotland. 
 
 I do not here forget all you have done to provide 
 ascetical and devotional books for the use of the 
 Church of England, both by your own writings, and, 
 may I not say it, from your neighbour’s vineyard? 
 
 With truth, then, I can say that I rejoice in all the 
 operations of the Holy Spirit out of the Catholic 
 Church, whether in the Anglican or other Protestant 
 bodies ; not that those communions are thereby in- 
 vested with any supernatural character, but because 
 more souls, I trust, are saved. If I have a greater joy 
 over these workings of grace in the Church of England, 
 it is only because more that are dear to me are in it, 
 for whom every day I never fail to pray. These graces 
 to individuals were given before the Church was 
 founded, and are given still out of its unity. They 
 are no more tokens of an ecclesiastical character, or 
 a sacramental power in the Church of England, than 
 in the Kirk of Scotland, or in the Wesleyan connexion ; 
 they prove only the manifold grace of God, which, 
 after all the sins of men, and in the midst of all the 
 ruins they have made, still works in the souls for whom 
 
 B 2 
 
20 
 
 Christ died. Such, then, is our estimate of the Church 
 of England in regard to the grace that works not hy 
 it, nor through it, but in it and among those who, 
 without faults of their own, are detained by it from 
 the true Church of their baptism. 
 
 And here it is necessary to guard against a possible 
 misuse of what I have said. Let no one imagine that 
 he may still continue in the Church of England be- 
 cause God has hitherto mercifully bestowed His grace 
 upon him. As I have shown, this is no evidence that 
 salvation is to be had by the Church of England. It 
 is an axiom that to those who do all they can God 
 never refuses His grace. He bestows it that He may 
 lead them on from grace to grace, and from truth to 
 truth, until they enter the full and perfect light of 
 faith in His only true Fold. The grace they have 
 received, therefore, was given, not to detain them in 
 the Church of England, but to call them out of it. 
 The grace of their past life lays on them the obliga- 
 tion of seeking and submitting to the perfect Truth. 
 God would ‘ have all men to be saved, and to come to 
 the knowledge of the truth.’ * But His Church is an 
 eminent doctrine, and member of that truth ; and all 
 grace given out of the Church is given in order to 
 bring men into the Church, wheresoever the Church is 
 present to them. If they refuse to submit to the Church 
 they resist the Divine intention of the graces they have 
 hitherto received, and are thereby in grave danger of 
 losing them, as we see too often in men who once 
 * I Tim. ii. 4. 
 
21 
 
 were on the threshold of the Church, and now are 
 in rationalism, or in states of which I desire to say- 
 no more. 
 
 2. Let me next speak of the truths which the 
 Church of England still retains. I have no pleasure 
 in its present trials; and the anonymous writer who 
 describes me as being ‘positively merry’ over its 
 disasters little knows me. If T am to speak plainly, 
 he seems to me to be guilty of one of the greatest 
 offences — a rash accusation against one whom he 
 evidently does not know. I will further say that I 
 lament with all my heart whensoever what remains of 
 truth in the Anglican system gives Avay before un- 
 belief. 
 
 I do not, indeed, regard the Church of England as 
 a teacher of truths for that Avould imply that it teaches 
 the truth in all its circumference, and in all its divine 
 certainty. Now this is precisely what the Church of 
 England does not, and, as I will show presently, has 
 destroyed in itself the poAver of doing. I am Avilling 
 to call it a teacher of truths^ because many fragment- 
 aiy truths, shattered, disjointed from the perfect unity 
 of the Christian revelation, still survive the Reforma- 
 tion, and, with much variation and in the midst of 
 much contradiction, are still taught in it. I have been 
 wont ahvays to say, and to say with joy, that the 
 Reformation, which has done its work Avith such a 
 terrible completeness in Germany, Avas arrested in 
 England ; that here much of the Christian belief and 
 Christian order has survived. Until lately I have been 
 
22 
 
 in the habit of saying that there are three things 
 which missionaries may take for granted in England : 
 first, the existence of a supernatural woidd ; secondly, 
 the revelation of Christianity; and thirdly, the in- 
 spiration of Scripture. The Church of England has 
 also preserved other doctrines with more or less of 
 exactness, such as the doctrine of the Holy Trinity, 
 the incarnation, baptism, and the like. I will not now 
 enter into the question as to what other doctrines are 
 retained by it, because a few more or a few less would 
 make little difference in the final estimate a Catholic 
 must make of it. A teacher of Christian truths 1 
 gladly admit it to be. A teacher of Christian truth — 
 no, because it rejects much of that truth, and also the 
 divine principle of its perpetuity in the world. Never- 
 theless, I rejoice in every fragment of doctrine which 
 remains in it ; and I should lament the enfeebling or 
 diminution of any particle of that truth. I have ever 
 regarded with regret the so-called Low-Church and 
 Latitudinarian schools in the Anglican Church, because 
 I believe their action and effect is to diminish what 
 remains of truth in it. I have always regarded with 
 joy, and I have never ceased to regard with sympathy, 
 notwithstanding much which I cannot either like or 
 respect, the labours of the High- Church or Anglo- 
 Catholic party, because I believe that their action and 
 effect are ‘ to strengthen the things which remain, 
 Avhich were ready to die.’ Eor myself, I am conscious 
 how little I have ever done in my life ; but as it is 
 now drawing towards its end, I have at least this 
 
23 
 
 consolation, that I cannot remember at any time, by 
 word, or act, to have undermined a revealed truth ; 
 but that, according to my power, little enough as I 
 know, I have endeavoured to build up what truth I 
 knew, truth upon truth, if only as one grain of sand 
 upon another, and to bind it together by the only bond 
 and principle of cohesion which holds in unity the 
 pei’fect I’evelation of God. A very dear friend, whose 
 friendship has been to me one of the most instructive, 
 and the loss of which was to me one of the hardest sacri- 
 fices I had to make, has often objected to me, with the 
 subtlety which marks his mind, that my act in leaving 
 the Church of England has helped forward the un- 
 belief which is now invading it. No doubt he meant 
 to say that the tendency of such an act helped to shake 
 the confidence of others in the Church of England as 
 a teacher of truth. This objection was like his mind, 
 ingenious and refined. But a moment’s thought un- 
 ravelled it, and I answered it much in these words : 
 
 I do not believe that by submitting to the Catholic 
 Church any one can weaken the witness of the Church 
 of England for the truth which it retains. So far as 
 it holds the truth, it is in conformity to the Catholic 
 Church. In submitting to the Catholic Church, I 
 all the more strongly give testimony to the same 
 truths which the Church of England still retains. If 
 I give testimony against the Church of England, it 
 is in those points in which, being at variance with the 
 truth, the Church of England is itself undermining 
 the faith of Christianity. 
 
24 
 
 It was for this reason I always lamented the legal- 
 ising of the sacramentarian errors of the Low-Church 
 party by the Gorham Judgment; and that I lament 
 now the legalising of the heresies of the Essaj^s and 
 EevieAvs, and the spreading unbelief of Dr. Colenso. 
 I believe that anything which undermines the Chris- 
 tianity of England is drawing it further and further 
 from us. In proportion as men believe more of Chris- 
 tianity, they are nearer to the perfect truth. The mis 
 sion of the Church in the world is to fill up the trulh. 
 Our Divine Lord said, ‘ I am not come to destroy, but 
 to fulfil;’ and St. Paul did not overthrow the altar of 
 the Unknown God, but gave to it an object of Divine 
 worship and a true adoration. For this cause I regard 
 the present downward course of the Church of Eng- 
 land and the Christianity of England Avith great 
 sorroAV and fear. And I am all the more alarmed 
 because of those Avho are invoh^ed in it so many not 
 only refuse to acknowledge the fact, but treat us who 
 give Avarning of the danger as enemies and accusers. 
 
 One of my critics has imagined, that I propose to 
 myself and others the alternative of Catholicism or 
 Atheism. I have never attempted to brmg any one 
 to the perfect truth by destroying or by threatening 
 the imperfect faith they might still possess. I do not 
 belieA^e that the alternative before us is Catholicism 
 or Atheism. There are lights of the natural order, 
 divine Avitnesses of Himself inscribed by the Creator 
 on His Avorks, characters engraven upon the conscience, 
 and testimonies of mankind in all the ages of the 
 
world, which prove the existence and perfections of 
 God, the moral nature and responsibility of man 
 anterior to Catholicism, and independently of revela- 
 tion. If a man, through any intellectual or moral 
 aberration, should reject Christianity, that is Catho- 
 licism, the belief of God and of His perfections stands 
 immutably upon the foundations of nature. Catho- 
 licism, or Deism, is indeed the only ultimately logical 
 and consistent alternative, though, happily, few men 
 in rejecting Catholicism are logically consistent 
 enough to reject Christianity. Atheism is an aberra- 
 tion which implies not only an intellectual blindness, 
 but a moral insensibility. The theism of the world 
 has its foundation on the face of the natui’al world, 
 and on the intellect and the heart of the human race. 
 The old Paganism and modern Pantheism are reverent, 
 filial, and elevating compared with the Atheism of 
 Comte and of our modern Secularists. It would be 
 both intellectually and morally impossible to propose to 
 any one the alternative of Catholicism or Atheism. 
 Not only then do I lament to see any truth in the 
 Church of England give way before unbelief, but I 
 should regard with sorrow and impatience any attempt 
 to promote the belief of the whole revelation of Christi- 
 anity by a mode of logic which undermines even the 
 truths of the natural order. The Holy See has autho- 
 ritatively declared that the existence of God may 
 be proved by reason and the light of nature,* and 
 
 * ‘ Ratiocinatio Dei existentiam, animse spiritualitatern, hominis 
 libertatem, cum certitudiiie probare potest.’ Theses a SS. D. N. 
 
26 
 
 Alexander VIII. declared that men who do not know 
 of the existence of God are without excuse.* Atheism 
 is not the condition of man without revelation. As 
 Viva truly says in his comment on this declaration, 
 Atheists are anomalies and exceptions in the intel- 
 lectual tradition of mankind. 
 
 Nay, I will go further. I can conceive a person to 
 reject Catholicism without logically rejecting Christi- 
 anity. He would indeed reject the. Divine certainty 
 which guarantees and proposes to us the whole revela- 
 tion of the Day of Pentecost. But as Catholic theolo- 
 gians teach, the infallible authority of the Church does 
 not of necessity enter into the essence of an act of 
 faith. f It is, indeed, the Divine provision for the 
 perfection and perpetuity of the faith, and in hac pro- 
 videntia^ the ordinary means whereby men are illu- 
 minated in the revelation of God ; but the known and 
 historical evidence of Christianity is enough to con- 
 vince any prudent man that Christianity is a Divine 
 revelation. It is quite true that by this process he 
 cannot attain an explicit faith in all the doctrines of 
 revelation, and that in rejecting Catholicism he reduces 
 himself to human and historical evidence as the maxi- 
 mum of extrinsic certainty for his religion, and that 
 
 Pio IX. approbate, 11 Junii 1855. Denzinger’s Enchii-idion, p. 
 448. Ed. 1856. 
 
 * Viva, Propos. damnat®, p. 372. Ripalda de ente Supernatu- 
 rali, disp. xx. s. 12, 59. 
 
 f De Lugo, De Virtute divinas Fidei, disp. i. sect. xii. 250- 
 5.3. Viva, Cursus. Tlieol. p. iv. disp. i. quaest. iv. art. iii. Ripalda, 
 De Ente Superii. disp. xx. sect. xxii. 117. 
 
27 
 
 this almost inevitably resolves itself in the long run 
 into rationalism. It is an inclined plane on which, if 
 individuals may stand, generations cannot. Never- 
 theless, though the alternative in the last analysis of 
 speculation be Catholicism or Deism, the practical 
 alternative may be Catholicism and fragmentary 
 Christianity. 
 
 I have said this to show how far I am from sym- 
 pathising with those, if any there be, and I can truly 
 say I know none such, who regard the giving way of 
 any lingering truth in the Church of England under 
 the action of unbelief with any feeling but that of 
 sorrow. The Psalmist lamented over the dying out 
 of truths. ‘ Diminutte sunt veritates a filiis hominum,’ 
 and I believe that every one who loves God, and souls, 
 and truth must lament when a single truth, specula- 
 tive or moral, even of the natural order is obscured ; 
 much more when any revealed truth of the elder or 
 of the Christian revelation is rejected or even doubted. 
 Allow me also to answer, not only for myself, which 
 is of no great moment, but for an eminent personage 
 to whom you have referred in your pamphlet. I can 
 say, with a personal and perfect knowledge, that no 
 other feeling has ever arisen in His Eminence’s mind, 
 in contemplating the troubles of the Anglican Church, 
 than a sincere desire that God may use these things 
 to open the eyes of men to see the untenableness of 
 their position ; coupled with a very sincere sorroAv at 
 the havoc which the advance of iinbelief is making 
 among the truths which yet linger in the Chui’ch of 
 lingland. 
 
28 
 
 3. It is, hoAvever, but reason that I should rejoice 
 when Avhatsoever remains in it of imperfect truth is 
 unfolded into a more perfect faith : and that therefore 
 I desire to see not only the conversion of England, but 
 the conversion of every soul to whom the more perfect 
 truth can be made known. You would not respect 
 me if I did not. Your own zeal for truth and for 
 souls here speaks in my behalf. There are tAvo kinds 
 of proselytism. There are the Jcavs Avhom our Lord 
 condemned. There are also the Apostles Avhom He 
 sent into all the world. If by proselytising be meant 
 the employing of unlaAvful and unAvorthy means, 
 motives, or influences to change a person’s religion, 
 I should consider the man who used such means to 
 commit lese-majeste against Truth, and against our 
 Lord AA"ho is the Truth. But if by proselytising be 
 meant the using all the means of conviction and per- 
 suasion which our Divine Master has committed to 
 us to bring any soul who will listen to us into the 
 only faith and fold, then of this I plead guilty with 
 all my heart. I do heartily desire to see the Church 
 of England dissolve and pass aAvay, as the gloAV of 
 lingering embers in the rise and steady light of a 
 reviving flame. If the Church of England were to 
 perish to-morrow under the action of a higher and 
 more perfect truth, there would be no \^oid left in 
 England. All the truths hitlierto taught in fragments 
 and piecemeal Avould be still more vividly and firmly 
 impressed upon the minds of the English people. All 
 of Christianity Avhich survives in Anglicanism Avould 
 
29 
 
 be perfected by the restoration of the truths which 
 have been lost, and the whole would be fixed and 
 perpetuated by the evidence of Divine certainty and 
 the voice of a Divine Teacher. No Catholic desires 
 to see the Church of England swept away by an 
 infidel revolution, such as that of 1789 in France. 
 But every Catholic must wish to see it give way year 
 by year, and day by day, under the intellectual and 
 spiritual action of the Catholic Church: and must 
 watch with satisfaction every change, social and poli- 
 tical, which weakens its hold on the country, and 
 would faithfully use all his power and influence for 
 its complete removal as speedily as possible. 
 
 4. But lastly, I am afraid we have reached a point of 
 divergence. Hitherto I hope we may have been able 
 to agree together ; but now I fear every step of advance 
 will carry us more wide of each other. I am unable to 
 consider the Church of England to be ‘in God’s hands 
 the great bulwark against infidelity in this land.’ And 
 my reasons are these : — 
 
 1.) First, I must regard the Anglican Reformation, 
 and therefore the Anglican Church, as the true and 
 original source of the present spiritual anarchy of Eng- 
 land. Three centuries ago the English people were 
 in faith unius lahii: they were in perfect unity. Now 
 they are divided and subdivided by a numberless 
 multiplication of errors. What has generated them? 
 From what source do they descend? Is it not self- 
 evident that the Reformation is responsible for the 
 production of every sect and every error which has 
 
30 
 
 sprung up in England in these three hundred years, 
 and of all which cover the face of the land at this 
 day? It is usual to hear Anglicans lament the mul- 
 tiplication of religious error. But what is the pro- 
 ductive cause of all? Is it not Anglicanism itself 
 which, by appealing from the voice of the Church 
 throughout the world, has set the example to its own 
 people of appealing from the voice of a local and 
 provincial authority ? 
 
 I am afraid, then, that the Church of England, so 
 far from a barrier against infidelity, must be recog- 
 nised as the mother of all the intellectual and spiritual 
 aberrations which now cover the face of England. 
 
 2.) It is true, indeed, that the Church of England 
 retains many truths in it. But it has in two ways 
 weakened the evidence of these very truths which it 
 retains. It has detached them from other truths 
 which by contact gave solidity to all by rendering 
 them coherent and intelligible. It has detached them 
 from the Divine voice of the Church, which guaran- 
 tees to us the truth incorruptible and changeless. 
 The Anglican Reformation destroyed the principle of 
 cohesion, by which all truths are bound together into 
 one. The whole idea of theology, as the science of 
 God and of His revelation, has been broken up. 
 Thirty-nine Articles, heterogeneous, disjointed, and 
 mixed with error, are all that remain instead of the 
 unity and harmony of Catholic truth. Surely this has 
 been among the most prolific causes of error, doubt, 
 and unbelief. So far from the bulwark against it. 
 
Anglicanism appears to me to be the cause and spring 
 of its existence. As I have already said, the Keforma- 
 tion placed the English people upon an inclined plane, 
 and they have steadily obeyed the law of their posi- 
 tion, by descending gradually from age to age, some- 
 times with a more rapid, sometimes with a slower 
 motion, but always tending downwards. Surely it 
 would be unreasonable to say of a body always de- 
 scending, that it is the great barrier against reaching 
 the bottom. 
 
 I do not, indeed, forget that the Church of Eng- 
 land has produced writers who have vindicated many 
 Christian truths, I am not unmindful of the service 
 rendered by Anglican writers to Christianity in gene- 
 ral, nor, in particular, of the works of Bull and 
 Waterland in behalf of the holy Trinity; of Hammond 
 and Pearson in behalf of Episcopacy ; of Butler and 
 Warburton in behalf of Revelation, and the like. But 
 whence came the errors and unbeliefs against which 
 they wrote? Were they not generated by the Refor- 
 mation abroad and in England ? This is like the 
 spear which healed the wounds it had made. But 
 it is not the Divine office of the Church to make 
 wounds in the faith that it may use its skill in healing. 
 It was only quelling the mutiny which Protestantism 
 had raised, and arresting the progress of the Refor- 
 mation which, like Saturn, devours its own children. 
 
 Moreover, to be just I must say that if the Church 
 of England be a barrier against infidelity the Dis- 
 senters must also be admitted to a share in this office 
 
and commendation. And in truth I do not know 
 among the Dissenters any works like the Essays and 
 Reviews, or any Biblical criticism like that of Dr. 
 Colenso. They may not be very dogmatic in their 
 teaching, but they bear their witness for Christianity 
 as a Divine revelation, for the Scriptures as an in- 
 spired book, and, I must add further, for the personal 
 Christianity of conversion and repentance, with an 
 explicitness and consistency which is not less effectual 
 against infidelity than the testimony of the Church of 
 England. I do not think the Wesleyan Conference 
 or the authorities of the Three Denominations would 
 accept readily this assumed superiority of the Anglican 
 Church as a witness against unbelief. They would 
 not unjustly point to the doctrinal confusions of the 
 Church of England as causes of scepticism, from which 
 they are comparatively free. And I am bound to say 
 that I think they ivould have an advantage. I well 
 remember that while I was in the Church of England 
 I used to regard Dissenters from it with a certain, I 
 will not say aversion, but distance and recoil. I never 
 remember to have borne animosity against them, or to 
 have attacked or pursued them with unkindness. I 
 always believed many of them to be very earnest and 
 devoted men. I did not like their theology, and I 
 believed them to be in disobedience to the Church of 
 England ; but I respected them, and lived at peace 
 with them. Indeed, I may say that some of the best 
 people I have ever known out of the Church were 
 Dissenters or children of Dissenters. Nevertheless, I 
 
33 
 
 had a dislike of their system, and of their meeting- 
 houses. They seemed to me to be rivals of the 
 Church of England, and my loyalty to it made me 
 look somewhat impatiently upon them. But I re- 
 member, from the hour I submitted to the Catholic 
 Church, all this underwent a sensible change. I saw 
 that the whole revelation was perpetuated in the 
 Church alone, and that all forms of Christianity lying 
 round about it were but fragments more or less muti- 
 lated. But with this a sensible increase of kindly 
 feeling grew upon me. The Church of England and 
 the dissenting communions all alike appeared to me 
 to be upon the same level. I rejoiced in all the truth 
 that remains in them, in all the good I could see or 
 hope in them, and all the workings of the Holy Spirit 
 in them. I had no temptation to animosity towards 
 them ; for neither they nor the Church of England 
 could be rivals of the imperishable and immutable 
 Church of God. The only sense, then, in which I 
 could regard the Church of England as a barrier 
 against infidelity I must extend also to the dissenting 
 bodies; and I cannot put this high, for reasons I will 
 give. 
 
 3.) If the Church of England be a barrier to infidelity 
 by the truths which yet remain in it, I must submit 
 that it is a source of unbelief by all the denials of 
 other truths which it has rejected. If it sustains a 
 belief in two sacraments, it formally propagates un- 
 belief in five; if it recognises an undefined presence 
 of Christ in the sacrament, it formally imposes on its 
 
 c 
 
34 
 
 people a disbelief in transubstantiation and the sacri- 
 fice of the altar; if it teaches that there is a Church 
 upon earth, it formally denies its indissoluble unity, its 
 visible Head, and its perpetual Divine voice. 
 
 It is not easy to see how a system can be a barrier 
 against unbelief when by its Thirty-nine Articles it 
 rejects, and binds its teachers to propagate the rejec- 
 tion, of so many revealed truths. 
 
 4. ) But this is not all. It is not only by the rejection 
 of particular doctrines that the Church of England 
 propagates unbelief. It does so by principle, and in 
 the essence of its whole system. What is the ultimate 
 guarantee of the Divine revelation but the Divine 
 authority of the Church? Deny this, and we descend 
 at once to human teachers. But it is this that the 
 Church of England formally and expressly denies. 
 The perpetual and ever-present assistance of the Holy 
 Spirit, whereby the Church in every age is not only 
 preserved from error, but enabled at all times to 
 declare the truth, that is the infallibility of the living 
 Church at this hour — this it is that the Anglican 
 Church in terms denies. But this is the formal 
 antagonist of infidelity, because it is the evidence on 
 which God wills that we should believe that which 
 His veracity reveals. Do not be displeased with me. 
 It appears to me that the Anglican system, by this one 
 fact alone, perpetually undoes what it strives to do in 
 behalf of particular doctrines. What are they, one 
 by one, when the Divine certainty of all is destroyed ? 
 Now, for three hundred years the Anglican clergy 
 
85 
 
 have been trained, ordained, and bound by subscrip- 
 tions to deny not only many Christian truths, but the 
 Divine authority of the as) sKKXrja-ta, the living 
 Church of every age. The barrier against infidelity 
 is the Divine voice which generates faith. But this 
 the Anglican clergy are bound to deny. And this 
 denial opens a flood-gate in the bulwark, through 
 which the whole stream of unbelief at once finds 
 way. Seventeen or eighteen thousand men, educated 
 Avith all the advantages of the English schools and 
 Universities, endowed with large corporate revenues, 
 and distiibuted all over England, maintam a per- 
 petual protest, not only against the Catholic Church, 
 but against the belief that there is any Divine voice 
 immutably and infallibly gixiding the Church at this 
 hour in its declaration of the Christian reA^elation to 
 mankind. Hoav can this be regarded as ‘the great 
 bulwark in God’s hand against infidelity ? ’ 
 
 It seems to me that the Church of England, so far 
 from being a bulwark against the flood, has floated 
 before it. Every age has exhibited an advance to a more 
 indefinite and heterogeneous state of religious opinion 
 within its pale. I will not go again over ground 1 
 have already traversed. Even in our memory the 
 doAvn ward progress of the Church of England is mani- 
 fest. That I may not seem to draw an unfavourable 
 picture from my own Anew, I will quote a very un- 
 suspected witness. Dr. Irons, in a recent pamphlet, 
 says : ‘ The religion of the Church has sunk far 
 deeper into conscience now than the survmng men of 
 
 c 2 
 
36 
 
 1833-1843 are aware of. And all that Churchmen 
 want of tlieir separated brethren is that they accept 
 nothing, and profess nothing, and submit to nothing 
 which has “ no root ” in their conscience.’ * If this 
 mean anything, it means that objective truth has 
 given place to subjective sincerity as the Anglican Rule 
 of Faith. You will know better than I whether this 
 be the state of men’s minds among you. To me it is 
 as strange as it is incoherent, and a sign how far men 
 have drifted. This certainly was not the faith or 
 religion that we held together in the years when I had 
 the happiness of being united in friendship with you. 
 Latitudinarian sincerity was not our basis, and if the 
 men of 1833 and 1843 have arrived at this, it is very 
 unlike the definite, earnest, consistent belief which 
 animated us at that time. You say in your note 
 (page 21), kindly, but a little upbraidingly, that my 
 comment on your letter to the ‘ Record ’ was not like 
 me in those days : forasmuch as I used then to join with 
 those with whom even then you could not. It was 
 this that made me note your doing so now. It was 
 this Avhich seemed to me to be a drifting backward 
 from old moorings. For myself, it is true, indeed, 
 that I have moved likewise. I have been carried 
 onwai’ds to what you then were, and beyond it. What 
 I might have done then, I could not do now. What 
 you do now seems to me Avhat you would not have 
 done then. I did not note this unkindly, but with 
 
 * Apologia pro vita Ecclesias AnglicanaB, p. 22. 
 
37 
 
 regret, because, as I rejoice in every truth, and in every 
 true principle retained in the Church of England, it 
 would have given me great joy to see you maintaining 
 with all firmness, not only all the particular truths 
 you held, but also the impossibility of uniting with 
 those who deny both those truths and the principles 
 on which you have rested through your laborious life 
 of the last thirty years. 
 
 And noAV I will add only a few more words of a 
 personal sort, and then make an end. It was not my 
 fate in the Church of England to be regarded as a 
 contentious or controversial spirit, nor as a man of 
 extreme opinions, or of a bitter temper. I remember 
 indeed that I was regarded, and even censured, as 
 slow to advance, somewhat tame, cautious to excess, 
 morbidly moderate, as some one said. I remember 
 that the Catholics fcar’ s ^ o^yiv used to hold me some- 
 what cheap, and to think me behindhand, uncatholic, 
 over-English, and the like. But now, is there anything 
 in the extreme opposite of all this which I am not? 
 Ultramontane, violent, unreasoning, bitter, rejoicing 
 in the miseries of my neighbours, destructive, a very 
 Apollyon, and the like. Some who so describe me 
 now are the same who were wont then to describe 
 me as the reverse of all this. They are yet 
 catholicising the Church of England, without doubt 
 more catholic still than I am. Well, what shall 
 I say? If I should say that I am not conscious of 
 these changes, you would only think me self-deceived. 
 I will therefore only tell you where I believe I 
 
38 
 
 am unchanged, and then where I am conscious of a 
 change, which, perhaps, will account for all you have 
 to say of me. 
 
 I am unconscious, then, of any change in my love 
 to England in all that relates to the natural order. 
 I am no politician, and I do not set up for a patriot ; 
 hut I believe, as S. Thomas teaches, that love of 
 country is a part of charity, and assuredly I have 
 ever loved England with a very filial love. My 
 love for England begins with the England of S. 
 Bede. Saxon England, with all its tumults, seems 
 to me saintly and beautiful. Norman England I 
 have always loved less, because, though more ma- 
 jestic, it became continually less Catholic, until the 
 evil spirit of the world broke off the light yoke of 
 faith at the so-called Reformation. Still, I loved the 
 Christian England which survived, and all the 
 lingering outlines of dioceses and parishes, cathedrals 
 and churches, with the names of saints upon them. 
 It is this vision of the past which still hovers over 
 England and makes it beautiful, and full of memories 
 of the kingdom of God. Nay, I loved the parish 
 church of my childhood, and the college chapel of my 
 youth, and the little church under a green hill-side, 
 where the morning and evening prayers, and the 
 music of the English Bible, for seventeen years, 
 became a part of my soul. Nothing is more beautiful 
 in the natural order, and if there were no eternal 
 world I could have made it my home. But these 
 tilings are not England, they are only its features, and 
 
39 
 
 I may say that my love was and is to the England 
 which lives and breathes about me, to my countrymen 
 whether in or out of the Church of England. With all 
 our faults as a race, I recognise in them noble Chris- 
 tian virtues, exalted characters, beautiful examples of 
 domestic life, and of every personal excellence which 
 can be found, where the fulness of grace and truth is 
 not, and much, too, which puts to shame those who 
 are where the fulness of grace and truth abounds. So 
 long as I believed the Church of England to be a part 
 of the Church of God I loved it, how well you know, 
 and honoured it with a filial reverence, and laboured 
 to serve it, with what fidelity I can affirm, with what, 
 or if with any utility, it is not for me to say. And I 
 love still those who are in it, and I would rather 
 suffer anything than wrong them in word or deed, 
 or pain them without a cause. To all this I must 
 add, lastly, and in a way above all, the love I bear to 
 many personal friends, so dear to me, whose letters I 
 kept by me till two years ago, though more than fifty 
 of them are gone into the world unseen, all these 
 things are sweet to me still beyond aU words that 
 I can find to express it. 
 
 You will ask me then perhaps, why I have never 
 manifested this before? It is because when I left 
 you, in the full, calm, deliberate and undoubting 
 belief that the light of the only Truth led me from a 
 fragmentary Christianity into the perfect Revelation of 
 the day of Pentecost, I believed it to be my duty to 
 walk alone in the path in which it led me, leaving 
 
40 
 
 you all unmolested by any advance on my part. If 
 any old friend has ever written to me, or signified to 
 me his wish to renew our friendship, I believe he will 
 bear witness to the happiness with which I have accep- 
 ted the kindness offered to me. But I felt that it was 
 my act which had changed our relations, and that I 
 had no warrant to assume that a friendship, founded 
 upon agreement in our old convictions, would be 
 continued when that foundation had been de- 
 stroyed by myself, or restored upon a foundation 
 altogether new. And I felt, too, a jealousy for truth. 
 It was no human pi’ide which made me feel that I ought 
 not to expose the Catholic Church to be rejected 
 in my person. Therefore I held on my own course, 
 seeking no one, but welcoming every old friend — and 
 they have been many — who came to me. This has 
 caused a suspension of nearly fourteen years in which 
 I have never so much as met or exchanged a line 
 with many who till then were among my nearest 
 friends. This, too, has given room for many misap- 
 prehensions. It would hardly surprise me if I heard 
 that my old friends believed me to have become a 
 cannibal. 
 
 But perhaps you will say. This does not account 
 tor your hard words against us and the Church of 
 England. When I read your late pamphlet I said to 
 myself. Have I ever written such hard words as these? 
 I will not quote them, but truly I do not think that, 
 in anything I have ever Avritten, I have handled at 
 least any person as you, my dear friend, in your zeal, 
 
41 
 
 which I respect and honour, have treated certain very 
 exalted personages who are opposed to you. But let 
 this pass. It would not excuse me even if I were to 
 find you in the same condemnation. 
 
 One of my anonymous censors writes that ‘ as in 
 times past I had written violently against the Church 
 of Kome, so now I must do the same against the 
 Church of England.’ Now I wish he would find, in 
 the books I published when out of the Church, the 
 hard sayings he speaks of. It has been my happiness 
 to know that such do not exist. I feel sure that my 
 accuser had nothing before his mind when he risked 
 this controversial trick. I argued, indeed, against the 
 Catholic and Koman Church, but I do not know of 
 any railing accusations. How I was preserved from 
 it I cannot tell, except by the same Divine goodness 
 which afterwards led me into the perfect light of faith. 
 
 But I have written, some say, hard things of the 
 Church of England. Are they hard truths or hard 
 epithets ? If they are hard epithets, show them to me, 
 and I will erase them with a prompt and public expres- 
 sion of regret ; but if they be hard facts, I cannot change 
 them. It is true, indeed, that I have for the last four- 
 teen years incessantly and unchangingly, by word and 
 by writing, borne my witness to the truths by which 
 God has delivered me from the bondage of a human 
 authority in matters of faith. I have borne my -witness 
 to the presence and voice of a divine, and therefore 
 infallible, teacher, guiding the Church with His per- 
 petual assistance, and speaking through it as His organ. 
 
42 
 
 I have also borne witness that the Church through 
 which He teaches is that which S. Augustine de- 
 scribes by the two incommunicable notes — that it is 
 ‘ spread throughout the world’ and ‘united to the Chair 
 of Peter.’ * I know that the corollaries of these truths 
 are severe, peremptory, and inevitable. If the Catholic 
 faith be the pei’fect revelation of Christianity, the Angli- 
 can Eeformation is a cloud of heresies ; if the Catholic 
 Church be the organ of the Holy Ghost, the Anglican 
 Church is not only no part of the Church, but no 
 church of divine foundation. It is a human institution, 
 sustained as it was founded by a human authority, 
 without priesthood, without sacraments, without abso- 
 lution, without the real presence of Jesus upon its 
 altars. I know these truths are hard. It seems heart- 
 less, cruel, unfilial, unbrotherly, ungrateful so to speak 
 of all the beautiful fragments of Christianity which 
 mark the face of England, from its thousand towns to 
 its green villages, so dear even to us who believe it to 
 be both in heresy and in schism. You must feel it so. 
 You must turn from me and turn against me for 
 saying it ; but if I believe it must I not say it? And 
 if I say it, can I find words more weighed, measured, 
 and deliberate than those I have used? If you can, 
 show them to me, and so that they are adequate, I 
 will use them always hereafter. God knows I have 
 never written a syllable -with the intent to leave a 
 wound. I have erased, I have refrained from writing 
 
 * 8. Aug. 0pp. tom. ii. pp. 119, 120; tom. x. p. 93. 
 
43 
 
 and speaking, many, lest I should give more pain than 
 duty commanded me to give. I cannot hope that 
 you will allow of all I say. But it is the truth. I 
 have refrained from it, not only because it is a duty, 
 but because I wish to disarm those who divert men 
 from the real point at issue by accusations of bitter- 
 ness and the like. It has been my lot, more than 
 of most, to be in these late years on the frontier which 
 divides us. And — why I know not — ^people have come 
 to me with their anxieties and their doubts. What 
 would you have done in my place ? That which you 
 have done in your own ; which, mutato nomine^ has 
 been my duty and my burden. 
 
 And now I have done. I have a hope that the day 
 is coming when all in England who believe in the 
 supernatural order, in the revelation of Christianity, 
 in the inspiration of Holy Scripture, in the divine cer- 
 tainty of dogmatic tradition, in the divine obligation of 
 holding no communion with heresy and with schism, 
 will be driven in upon the lines of the only stronghold 
 which God has constituted as ‘ the pillar and ground 
 of the truth.’ This may not be, perhaps, as yet ; but 
 already it is time for those who love the faith of 
 Christianity, and look with sorrow and fear on the 
 havoc which is laying it waste among us, to draw 
 together in mutual kindness and mutual equity of 
 judgment. That I have so ever treated you I can 
 truly say; that I may claim it at jmur hands I am 
 calmly conscious ; but whether you and others accord 
 it to me or not, I must leave it to the Disposer of 
 
44 
 
 hearts alone to determine. Though we are parted 
 now, it may not be for ever ; and morning by morning, 
 in the Holy Sacrifice, I pray that the same light of 
 faith which so profusely fell upon myself, notwith- 
 standing all I am, may in like manner abundantly 
 descend upon you who are in all things so far above 
 me, save only in that one gift which is not mine, but 
 His alone who is the Sovereign Giver of all Grace. 
 
 Believe me, my dear friend. 
 
 Always atfectionately yours, 
 
 Henry Edward Manning. 
 
 St. Mary’s, Bayswater : 
 
 Sept . 27, 1864. 
 
 P.S. My attention has just been called to the 
 concluding pages of the last number of the Quarterly 
 Review., in which I am again described by a writer 
 who evidently has abilities to know better, to be in 
 ‘ecstasies.’ The writer represents, as the sum or chief 
 argument of my ‘ Second Letter to an Anglican 
 Friend,’ the passing reference I there made to the 
 Lord Chancellor’s speech. I quoted this to prove 
 that the late judgment is a part of the law, both of 
 the land and of the Church of England. But the 
 whole of the Letter, excepting this single point, is an 
 argument to shoiv that the vote of the Convocation 
 carries with it no divine certainty, and resolves itself 
 into the private judgment of the majoifity who passed 
 
45 
 
 it. For all this argument the writer has not a word. 
 I cannot be surprised that he fills out his periods with 
 my ‘ecstasies,’ ‘shouts of joy,’ ‘wild pteans,’ a quota- 
 tion from ‘ Shy lock,’ and other things less fitting. 
 This is not to reason, but to rail. Is it worthy ? Is 
 it love of truth ? Is it good faith ? Is it not simply 
 the fallacy of evasion? I can assure him that this 
 kind of controversy is work that will not stand. We 
 are in days when personalities and flimsy rhetoi’ic 
 will not last long. Neither will it bear to be tried 
 by ‘ the fire,’ nor will it satisfy, I was about to say, 
 nor will it mislead, men who are in earnest for truth 
 or for salvation. I had hoped that this style of con- 
 troversy had been cured or suppressed by a greater 
 sincerity, and reality of religious thought in these 
 days of anxiety and unbelief. There either is, 
 or is not, a Divine Person teaching perpetually 
 through the Church in every age, and therefore now 
 as always, generating faith with Divine certainty in 
 the minds of men. This question must be answered ; 
 and, as men answer it, we know where to class them, 
 and how to deal ■with them. All the evasions and 
 half-arguments of such writers are becoming daily 
 more and more intolerable to those of the English 
 people — and they are a multitude — who would give all 
 that they count dear, and life itself, to know and to 
 die in the full and certain light of the revelation of 
 God in Jesus Christ. 
 
 H. E. M. 
 
 PRINTED BY SPOTTISWOODE AND CO., NEW'iSXREET SQUARE, LONDON 
 

BY THE SAME AUTHOR. 
 
 Lately published by Messes. Longman & Co. 
 
 THEEE LETTEES TO ANGLICAN FEIENDS: 
 
 1. THE CEOWN IN COUNCIL ON THE ESSAYS AND 
 
 EEVIEWS. Is. 
 
 2. THE CONVOCATION AND THE CEOWN IN COUNCIL. Is. 
 
 3. THE WOEKINGS OF THE HOLY SPIEIT IN THE 
 
 CHUECH OE ENGLAND. Is. 
 
 THE BLESSED SACEAMENT THE CENTEE OF IMMU- 
 TABLE TEUTH. Is. 
 
 Also, 
 
 SEEMONS ON ECCLESIASTICAL SUBJECTS. (Duffy.) 6s. 
 THE LOVE OF JESUS TO PENITENTS. (Duffy.) 2s. 6c?. 
 THE TEMPOEAL POWEE OF THE POPE. (Burns.) 5s. 
 TEUTH BEFOEE PEACE. (Duffy.) 6d. 
 
 THE MISSION OF ST. ALPHONSUS. (Duffy.) M . 
 
THE LADY CHAPEL 
 
 AND 
 
 DR. PUSEY’S PEACEMAKER. 
 
 Clje Sitljstmtce of n S^nnaix 
 
 PREACHED IN ST. JOHN’S CHURCH, ISLINGTON, 
 
 On the 24th Sunday after Pentecost, 1865, 
 
 BY 
 
 THE REV. FATHER GALLWEY, S.J. 
 
 Peace, peace : and there was no peace. Jereniias vi. 14. 
 In peace is my bitterness most bitter. Isaias xxxviii. 17. 
 
 foY of IJoor CfjHbrcu. 
 
 LONDON: 
 
 BURNS, LAMBERT, AND OATES, 
 
 17, 18 Portman Street & 63 Paternoster Row. 
 DUBLIN : DUFFY, WELLINGTON QUAY. 
 
 \_Price One Shilling.'] 
 
LONDON : 
 
 BOBSON AND SON, GREAT NORTHERN PRINTING WORKS, 
 PANCSAS EOAD, N.W. 
 
9 HMl Street^ Berkeley Square^ 
 December 1865. 
 
 My dear Canon Oakeley, 
 
 I am not where I would he to-day — at yonr fes- 
 tival — ^because I am working at a task which yon imposed on 
 me ; I am getting ready for the printer the Sermon I preached 
 at the reopening of yonr Lady Chapel. I publish it, first, be- 
 canse yon wish it, and gratitnde makes me respect any wish 
 coming from yon ; secondly, becanse the hearty devotion of yonr 
 Evening Service, and the glorious band of men aronnd yonr 
 sanctnary, have left a very pleasmg impression on my mind, and 
 make me glad to be associated with St. John’s ; thirdly (and 
 last, not least), becanse I look on it as a valnable grace to be 
 allowed to say a word in defence of onr Blessed Lady’s cause. 
 
 Yon will find that I have given yon more than yon asked 
 for. Being obliged to write by snatches, at chance moments, I 
 have been more diffuse than I should have been if I could have 
 finished at one sitting. 
 
 Very sincerely 
 
 Yonr servant in Christ, 
 
 P. GALLWEY. 
 

 \ 
 
 '■A; 
 
 
 
THE LADY CHAPEL, &c. 
 
 Then shall the Son of Man come in the clouds of heaven, witli 
 much power and majesty.” 
 
 Matt. xxiv. 30 ( Gosjjel^ 2^tli Blind, after Pentf. 
 
 To judge the living and the dead, dear brethren, our 
 Blessed Lord will then be coming. We all know well that 
 we are to expect this judgment; we were warned at the 
 font of Baptism to cany the white robe of grace then given 
 to us unstained to the Judgment-seat. May God in His 
 mercy grant us all grace to remember this judgment that is 
 to come — to prepare for it, and to wash away by sorrow all 
 stains that may in past time have disfigured the white robe ! 
 Meanwhile, angels are watching each day and each hour of 
 our lives ; no act, no word, no thought of ours escapes their 
 notice. When we leave this world at death, to appear before 
 our Blessed Saviour, we shall be amazed to see with what 
 scrupulous fidelity all our works have been stored up, that 
 they may then receive their just recompense. Among the 
 rest, the work you are busy about to-day, brethren, is chro- 
 nicled and most carefully registered, and will be proved, 
 and weighed, and subjected to a searching scrutiny. Let 
 us, then, reflect upon it a little before this day closes. You 
 are keeping a festival on the occasion of the reopening of 
 the Lady Chapel ; you are making a special public mani- 
 
6 
 
 THE LADY CHAPEL AND 
 
 festation of your devotion to Mary. Let us dwell a little 
 on this act of yours. And first let me mention a circum- 
 stance connected with it that will help to set forth its cha- 
 racter in a clearer light. I have spoken of the white rohe 
 of Baptism. Well, brethren, at the time when, by the in- 
 finite charity of my Creator, I was admitted to the grace 
 of Baptism, there were in the leading University of this 
 country two young students, then in the early days of their 
 manhood, and apparently destined to run the race of life 
 side by side, as they both intended to become clergymen in 
 the Estabhshed Church of England. Later, their destinies 
 seemed to be more closely linked together, as they both 
 became hearty supporters of the Tractarian movement 
 which gave birth to a new and pecuhar school in the 
 Church of England. In their case, however, as in so many 
 others, for reasons only known to the mercy and the justice 
 of our Blessed Lord, those words of His came true, Two 
 men shall be in the field ; one shall be taken, the other 
 shall be left.”^ One of these two students is now a devoted 
 priest in the Holy Roman Catholic Church; and it is he, 
 your Pastor, who has invited me to come here this evening 
 to take a part in this act of honour and love to the Blessed 
 Mother of God. Now, bretliren, about the time when I 
 received his invitation I was engaged in reading a volume 
 recently sent abroad amongst men by the other of these two 
 students, once companions. He is not a Roman Catholic 
 clergyman. He was not taken — he has been left. He 
 has seen many friends go from his side to enter the one 
 * Luke xvii. 35. 
 
DR. PUSEY’s peacemaker. 
 
 7 
 
 fold; but he remains what he was then — a Protestant, a 
 clergyman of the Established Church of England, a leader 
 of a party in that Church ; and in these last days he has 
 prepared and published a volume, of which the leading 
 feature is a strong and earnest denunciation of the devotion 
 which^Catholics pay to the Mother of God. ^^Tiat will 
 be the effect of this protest we know not yet; but this 
 much is evident, that it has been prepared with great care 
 and industry; that all the points that seemed to make 
 against devotion to our Lady have been gathered together 
 with the skill of a keen advocate ; that every fact and 
 statement has been presented in a plausible form; that 
 there has been so clever a subtlety in discovering apparent 
 weak points in this our devotion, that this volume enjoys a 
 melancholy distinction among the works written to deter 
 men from putting any hope in the intercession of our Lady. 
 Now, brethren, it is clear that both these clergymen will have 
 to answer for their respective works. Your Pastor must 
 give an account of the pains he is taking to foster in your 
 souls that hope in the Blessed Virgin and that love of her 
 which your Lady Chapel represents ; and his former compa- 
 nion will also have to render an account of this strong effort 
 which he is making in his old age to discredit the devotion 
 of Cathohcs to our Lady, and to deter men from adopting 
 it. We too, brethren, shall also have to answer for the part 
 we take in this contest. And if I may be allowed to state 
 what I apprehend to be your mind, and what I know to be 
 my own, in this matter, I say that we declare without any 
 hesitation, — we declare advisedly, after the deliberation of 
 
8 
 
 THE LADY CHAPEL AND 
 
 our whole lives, — we declare, with much peace and glad- 
 ness ; and hope that our words will help us at the tribunal 
 of Christ Jesus, — we declare that most happy and delighted 
 we should be if it could be proved against us that we had 
 been devout to our Lady, and had moved others to be 
 devout to her ; and, on the other hand, I should be filled, 
 as you would also, with fear and remorse, and great sad- 
 ness — we should not find any rest, we could not close our 
 eyes in peace — had w^e on our souls the consciousness that 
 we had written a single line to deter any of Christ’s little 
 ones from praying to the most Blessed Mother of God. 
 This is our creed and our profession on this point. But, 
 brethren, it is only a profession — only a statement of our 
 sentiments ; and as it is the will of our Lord that your faith 
 should rest on something more substantial than mere asser- 
 tion, — as we are expected to render to God a worship that 
 is reasonable and founded on convictions, — as we are sup- 
 posed to be able to give an account of the hope that is 
 within us, let us this evening call to mind what kind of 
 answer a child of the Catholic Church will be able to give 
 at the Judgment-seat of Christ, if there accused of having 
 unduly exalted Holy Mary. Catholic men and Catholic 
 women have before now been summoned from the foot of 
 our Lady’s altar to their judgment. Were it, then, announced 
 to any of us that this night his soul should be demanded 
 of him, what sort of answer has that man ready, in case he 
 be charged with an unwarrantable devotion to Mary? 
 Before we go into this question, let us endeavour to se- 
 cure God’s blessing on our endeavours ; and how can we 
 
DK. PUSEY’s peacemaker. 
 
 9 
 
 better secure that blessing than by turning to our Lady, 
 and saying to her in the familiar words of the Church, 
 
 “ Youchsafe that we may praise thee, Holy Yirgin ; 
 
 Grant us strength against thy enemies” ? 
 
 Well, then, brethren, if so be that an accuser is to appear 
 against you on this point, and to charge you with indulging 
 in a blamable devotion to our Lady, what will you answer? 
 
 1. In the first place, brethren, I think that a Catholic A Catholic’s 
 
 plea for devo- 
 
 can safely give this answer : What I believed concerning the Mo- 
 Thy Mother, O Lord, — what I practised in her honour, ^ received 
 that I received. I did not invent the devotion to our 
 Lady : I received it.” In fact, brethren, no one of us has 
 much desire to originate doctrines and devotions. I can 
 well understand that an Anglican should suspect us and 
 accuse us of a fondness for novelties, because naturally a 
 man must read the souls of others in his own. A generous 
 man thinks those around him generous ; an intriguer 
 fancies every one a plotter. Therefore, as in the present 
 state of transition the very life and soul of Anglicanism is 
 innovation ; as the effort of every good Anglican, his 
 pride and his boast, is to add something every year to the 
 ancient Protestantism of his fathers ; as every zealous An- 
 glican feels that his party cannot stand still and must 
 move on, it is natural that they should easily believe us 
 to be also fond of new things. But we are not so. At all 
 events, our devotion to our Lady is not a new thing. We 
 found it existing; we received it. Therefore I think 
 that if accused concerning this matter, a Catholic might 
 with great reverence say to our Blessed Lord, O Lord, 
 
10 
 
 THE LADY CHAPEL AND 
 
 Tliou knowest all things ; Thou knowest that devotion to 
 Thy Holy Mother came to me through the right channel. 
 For is it not Thy decree that faith and truth must come by 
 hearing?” So far then, brethren, we are safe. This de- 
 votion to Mary began well in us ; and a good beginning 
 is always a strong recommendation. When we see the 
 efforts that many Anglicans are making after holiness, we 
 cannot help pitying them as we call to mind how the bad 
 beginning of the Established Church still paralyses their 
 efforts. What price would not some of them, in these our 
 times, have gladly paid if they could have procured a rec- 
 tification of the bad beginning of the Established Church 
 of England ! But there it stands irremediable, that terrible 
 flaw. I say terrible, because our Lord has spoken very 
 strongly against him who enters into the sheepfold not 
 by the door, but climbeth up another way.”^ Do what 
 he will, the pious Anglican cannot bring himself to a be- 
 lief that Anglicanism did come into this country by the 
 right door, which is Christ our Lord. You are aware, 
 brethren, that to an Anglican, when his mind is ill at ease 
 and yearning after security, it is often said, What seek 
 you in Eome that you have not here? You have the 
 Sacraments, you have the apostolic succession, you have 
 the Liturgy, you have the Holy Ghost.” I could well ima- 
 gine the restless soul that God is drawing on, the anxious 
 heart that cannot rest till it rests in God’s one ark, an- 
 swering this appeal something after this manner : Whether 
 we have all these things I know not ; but this I know, that 
 
 * John X. 1. 
 
DR. PUSEY’s peacemaker. 
 
 11 
 
 an evil tree cannot bear good fruit.”^ There is an incurable 
 want of legitimacy adhering to Anglicanism. Its divines 
 love much to claim connection with the early Church. But 
 around the cradle of the early Church you find the Apos- 
 tles and our Lady^ and resting over it the Holy Spirit. 
 
 Around the cradle of Anglicanism you find only the Tudor 
 princes and their servile ^ministers : Elizabeth and her 
 mother are the Eves of this new creation. The devotion 
 of Catholics to Mary, my brethren, is at least free from 
 this reproach, of coming to us in any questionable way ; 
 since what we believe and practise, that v/e received. 
 
 2. True,” the accuser may reply, — true, you received (h) it is not the 
 
 • 1 1 Cl A 1 . speciality of 
 
 it; but from whom? A grown-up man must use his reason, one influential 
 
 Curate, 
 
 must reflect on the lessons taught him in youth, and 
 correct the errors of his education. You received it ; but 
 from whom? From one man — from your parish-priest.” No, 
 no, accusing spirit ; make not this insinuation against us, 
 for we are Roman Catholics, not Anglicans. Among us 
 one priest is not one isolated witness ; he is a host of wit- 
 nesses. A Roman Catholic priest knows perfectly well 
 that he must teach in his parish only what he has received, 
 and only what is taught in all the parishes around. An 
 Anglican clergyman indeed, owing to the disorganised 
 state of the Church of England, is not so bound. He can 
 in his own church bring his people to talk of the Real 
 Presence, to practise confession, and to relish vestments — 
 although the most assiduous church-goer in the surround- 
 ing parishes may never imagine for a moment that there 
 * Matt, vii, 18 . 
 
12 
 
 THE LADY CHAPEL AND 
 
 (c) Not a na- 
 tional error. 
 
 exists either the Eeal Presence, or absolution, or a chasuble. 
 With us this cannot be. The parish-priest, whatever be 
 his shortcomings, knows well that he must bring into his 
 parish only what he has received; that if he preach a 
 gospel other than that which his parishioners have received, 
 his Bishop will in a few days pronounce the sentence, Let 
 him be anathema and his people, though so true and 
 loyal to their priesthood, the moment they discover that he 
 is a Avolf in sheep’s clothing, and that he brings not with 
 him the old familiar doctrine, will no longer receive him 
 into their houses, nor say to him, God speed you !”t or if, 
 through pity for a consecrated ruin, they harbour him when 
 he is cast out, and show a charitable respect to his indelible 
 character, yet this they never will do — they never will go 
 with their children to sit under him, nor pin their souls to 
 his inventions and adaptations. For while we say, 
 believe in the Catholic Church,” we never mean, I believe 
 in one curate, or in one well-appointed Gothic church. 
 
 3. Well, brethren, but even granting that our de- 
 votion to Mary cannot be a peculiarity of one church or 
 parish, still might it not be the superstition of one people ? 
 Can the accuser perhaps contend that it is the growth of 
 one island ? Certainly, we see clearly that men can grow 
 up and live on till death blindly clinging to prejudices and 
 theories and practices which have no value at all beyond 
 the shores of their own island. Anglicanism, for instance, 
 is precisely a body of religious opinions, which, like the 
 coin of England, are current here, but not elsewhere: but 
 * Gal. i. 9. t 2 John i. 10. 
 
DK. PUSEY’s PEACEMAKEK. 
 
 13 
 
 surely no man will say that our devotion to Holy Mary is 
 merely a national extravagance, for it is too well known 
 that the Eosary is found in every land of Christendom in 
 which the Cross of Christ Jesus is honoured; and that on 
 every sea where the storm has power to wreck, the Ca- 
 tholic seaman in the moment of danger calls on Mary. 
 
 Therefore, if our devotion to the Mother of God be an 
 error, it is an error of the whole Catholic world. 
 
 4. So much the worse,” the accuser may reioin de- id) Not a su- 
 
 perstition of 
 
 ploringly; he may say, ^^We know too well that it is 
 widespread error, a world-wide corruption ; but what won- 
 der, when we see the power of the Koman priesthood! 
 
 The poor and the unlettered are every where the same, 
 and may every where be easily seduced into a plausible 
 superstition.” To this new insinuation we answer, brethren, 
 that it is very true, thank God, that the minds and hearts 
 of the poor are very full of this devotion to our Blessed 
 Lady; that the Catholic poor, even if they cannot read, 
 can say their Kosary, and know well the chief mysteries of 
 our Saviour’s life and death. And in this particular, 
 again, our devotion to Mary contrasts strongly with Angli- 
 canism ; for the poor have never been evangelised by the 
 Church of England. Anglicanism, most assuredl}", can 
 never be called a folly of the poor and the unlearned. At 
 the same time, however, it is equally certain that among 
 us the rich and the poor kneel side by side around the 
 Madonna, and the ablest scholars love their rosaries. It is 
 not the poor wdio have robed the Madonnas of Christen- 
 dom in jewels ; it is not the poor who have raised the great 
 
14 
 
 THE LADY CHAPEL AND 
 
 temples to tlie Mother of God ; it is not the poor alone that 
 travel to Loreto. It was not an ignorant, unlearned mind 
 that bequeathed to us the heavenly poetry of the Salve 
 Regina^ which we so often hear and never tire of it. Nor 
 was he a weak-minded man that penned that little prayer, 
 Eemember, Holy Mary;’’ so dear to after ages. Poor he 
 was, indeed, by choice ; for he left the house of his noble 
 sires to become one of Christ’s poor. But no one will say 
 that Bernard was a weak-minded follower of superstition. 
 
 (e) Not a fruit 5. But now, brethren, the accusers can still say, and 
 
 of Ultramon- 
 
 tanism. tliey do say, that it is to the Ultramontane spirit of these 
 our days that we owe this devotion to Mary which we see so 
 widespread among all classes. But surely it is more than 
 a wonder when a doctor of Anglicanism utters this charge ; 
 for Anglicans are wont to love old books ; and there are 
 some quaint old volumes which neither the Reformation 
 nor the hand of time has been able to destroy. I have 
 said already that Anglicanism does not hold to the land- 
 marks set by its fathers ; but, on the contrary, professes to 
 be an improvement on the Protestantism of former days. 
 Hence the Anglican loves and honours old books ; while 
 the first apostles of the Church of England dreaded and 
 destroyed them, as the title-deeds of the ejected heir. In 
 these our days the friends of Anglicanism claim for it a 
 mission to build and to plant. Whatever be said of this 
 claim, this much, at least, is certain — that in the earlier 
 days of its existence the Church of England fulfilled with 
 great vigour, though not with much warrant from above, 
 the other part of the commission given to the prophet or 
 
DR. PUSEY’s peacemaker. 
 
 15 
 
 old, to root up and to pnll down, and to waste and to 
 destroy.”"^ Still all the old volumes did not perish. Here 
 and there a copy of the black-lettered Sarum Hours sur- 
 vived ; and Anglicans do come across these time-honoured 
 pages. How comes it, then, that they do not observe, 
 printed and illuminated there, set before them in very 
 glowing colours, the self-same sweet hymns to our Lady 
 which we now hold so dear ?t Is it our Ultramontanism 
 that compiled for our forefathers and emblazoned these 
 pious poems ? Nay, to push the question further, if I may 
 for a moment digress, how comes it that men who believe 
 so much in old Catholic books, who use old books against 
 their Low-Church bishops much as the J ewish priests used 
 Moses and the prophets against our Lord (John ix. 28), 
 can rmi risk of suspension or deprivation by introducing, 
 on the authority of some moth-eaten book, the use of 
 incense or some obsolete rubric, and yet find it in their 
 hearts to proscribe the ancient hymns and anthems to our 
 Lady which our forefathers loved so well? Is not this 
 tithing mint and anise, and leaving the graver things of 
 the law ? If an Anglican clergyman would from old Ca- 
 tholic books teach himself and his people to value the 
 ancient unity of the Church, and the old-fashioned obedi- 
 
 * Jerem. i. 10. 
 
 t St, Anselm was not afraid to write such lines as these : 
 
 Ave nostra Advocatrix 
 
 Atque vitaa reparatrix. 
 
 There was no Dr. Pusey to chide him. Dr. Pusey may live to atone for 
 his Eirenicon by publishing a good English version of our old monkish 
 hymns to our Lady. 
 
 England is a 
 witness. 
 
16 
 
 THE LADY CHAPEL AND 
 
 The Greek 
 Church is a 
 witness. 
 
 ence of Christendom to one Head, and the devotion of our 
 forefathers to the Mother of God, would not all else he 
 added to him ? But of what avail will incense and vest- 
 mentSj or even nine points of the law, be, so long as the 
 tenth and vital point of obedience be wanted ? And now 
 to come back. Besides our own black-lettered books, the 
 Anglican has a special partiality for the liturgy of the 
 Greek Church, and for every thing else of the Greek 
 Church. He professes a readiness to learn from the vene- 
 rable Greek Church. We need not stay to ask why; for it 
 is obviously because he can have a lesson from the Greek 
 Church without paying for the lesson the bitter price of 
 obedience. When he learns from Greece he is doing ama- 
 teur work ; when he comes in presence of Borne, he 
 stands before his appointed master, and feels as the doctors 
 of the law felt when they stood before our Blessed Lord. 
 But whatever his motive be, this is certain, that just at 
 present the Anglican venerates the Greek Church. Well^ 
 and have the Greeks no hymns to Mary? And if they 
 indulge profusely in the use of such hjunns, and in the 
 ardent expressions of devotion to our Lady, whence have 
 they these ideas? Surely not from us Ultramontanes'. 
 The Greek turned his back on Borne 1000 years ago and 
 more. Since then, Caesar has done for the Greek what he 
 since did for England, — he has established between the 
 Greek Church and Borne a chaos that no man is permitted 
 to pass. Whatever, then, the Greek now has must have 
 come down from old times, — from what the Anglican loves 
 to call pure times. I have said already that the very soul 
 
DR. PUSEY’s peacemaker. 
 
 17 
 
 of Anglicanism at present is the introduction of new doc- 
 trines and practices into the Church of England. So that 
 if the Church of England be a vineyard, the chief occupa- 
 tion of the Anglican husbandman at this moment must of 
 necessity be, to graft on her vine branches cut from our 
 vine. And it so happens that one of the very latest ideas 
 adopted by Anglicanism is, to own the Infallibility of the 
 Church, at least after a fashion ; to say, that when all the 
 branch churches were united, the Church was infallible. 
 This is not old Protestantism, but it is the Anglicanism of 
 this moment. Well, if the Church was infallible when 
 the branches were united, why is devotion to our Lady 
 rejected by Anglicans ? Was it not found in the English 
 branch in days of old, and in the Greek branch, as well as 
 at Rome ? When Greece and England and Rome were 
 one, there were two doctrines in the Catechism of Chris- 
 tendom — obedience to Christ’s Vicar, and devotion to His 
 Mother. What plea can there be for rejecting precisely 
 these two dogmas? It was only when England became 
 a branch cut off that our Lady’s name was hushed in this 
 island. It was only when Greece and England both be- 
 came branches cut off — that is to say, when they ceased to 
 share the Church’s infallibility — that they both disovmed 
 the authority of St. Peter’s See, and said, as another Church 
 had said before them, ^^We have no king but C^sar.”^ 
 Neither modern Ultramontanism, then, nor St. Alphonsus 
 Liguori, is the creator of Catholic devotion to the Blessed 
 Virgin. There is an ancient antiphon, sometimes ascribed 
 * John xix. 15, 
 
 B 
 
18 
 
 THE LADY CHAPEL AND 
 
 to the great St. Augustine : Holy Mary, succour the mi- 
 serable, help the faint-hearted, cheer the mourner, pray 
 for the people, plead for the clergy, intercede for the 
 devout female sex ; let all feel thy helping hand who make 
 remembrance of thee.” This is not modem Ultramon- 
 tanism ; and if our accusers will permit us to use such a 
 prayer as this, we are content ; we care little to add to it 
 any thing modern. Again, there are words attributed to 
 St. Ephrem: ^^Lady most praiseworthy and excellent, 
 fountain of mercy, abyss of goodness, living water and true 
 vine, life of the whole world ; execrable though I be, yet do 
 not thou, since thou art God’s Mother, gentle and com- 
 passionate, spurn me from thee in my sins.” If we may 
 believe all that these ancient words comprise, we ask not 
 for much more. 
 
 Critical re- 6. ^^Nay, hold!” crics the accuser; ^Gn this precisely is 
 
 search does not 
 
 timony^^ OUT Complaint, that these prayers are spurious, and are not 
 the prayers of either Ephrem or Augustine. This is om" 
 great complaint, that the Eoman Church has built up a 
 corrupt devotion to Mary on a foundation of no solidity, 
 on passages of doubtful authenticity, whose authors are not 
 known.” What are we to answer, brethren ? Surely this 
 much, at least, we may hope, that, even if it were true that 
 Augustine and Ephrem are not the authors of these words, 
 it would not, at the Judgment-seat of our merciful Lord, 
 go hard with us because we were not scholars enough to 
 see that the style of one was not the style of Augustine, 
 or that the ancient Ms. which contains the other must 
 not be assigned to the days of Ephrem ; for, after all, what 
 
DE. pussy’s peacemaker. 
 
 19 
 
 damage does this error do? If Augustine and Eplirem 
 did not write these old prayers^ somebody else did; and 
 no matter who wrote them, these ancient prayers, like 
 the bones of nameless martyrs, are still good witnesses to 
 ancient faith and devotion. Whatever doubt may attach 
 to them, this much is certain, that they are old, — older by 
 many centuries than Tractarianism, — old prayers come 
 down from the time when there were no branch churches 
 cut off, — old prayers of the one infallible Church. They 
 say St. Augustine and St. Ephrem never wrote these 
 prayers. Be it so, for the moment, if the critic will have 
 it so. But still this much is certain, that if St. Augustine 
 and St. Ephrem never wrote these prayers, neither they 
 nor any doctors of the Church in any age, early or late, 
 denounced these prayers to our Lady as the Anglican 
 doctor denounces them. You cannot find even a spurious 
 passage in the works of the Fathers that speaks of our 
 Lady as Anglicanism now speaks. They, the watchmen 
 that never let a novelty escape, nowhere complain that 
 some devotees are introducing a new devotion to Mary 
 foreign to the Gospel. No; but had any doctor of a 
 branch church ventured to impugn devotion to our Lady, 
 assuredly they would not have remained silent. Their 
 Catholic hearts would have been wounded, as ours are; 
 and like one man they would have risen and reechoed 
 again and again the cry of Ephesus, Honour to the 
 Mother of God !”* 
 
 * Dr. Pusey rejects summarily such passages as I have cited. They 
 are spurious, he says ; and he gravely assures us, that St. Bernard and 
 
20 
 
 THE LADY CHAPEL AND 
 
 Liigiicanism 
 as no such 
 are title- 
 eeds. 
 
 And here, brethren, let me pause for a while to re- 
 mark how strangely St. Paul’s word comes true — O man, 
 whosoever thou art that judgest .... thou doest the 
 same things which thou judgest.”* The sensualist sus- 
 pects the morality of all around ; the ambitious complain 
 of their neighbours’ pretensions; the Doctor of Angli- 
 canism objects to devotions built on doubtful founda- 
 tions. Can it be so? Why, if there be on earth a 
 man bound by the necessity of his position to shrink from 
 all mention of doubtful foundations and questionable title- 
 deeds, such a man, it seems to me, brethren, is the Angli- 
 can clergyman. For what is an Anglican clergyman? 
 How describe him so as to distinguish him at once both 
 from the old Protestant minister — whom Anglicans 
 would now gladly bury in oblivion, as a thing obsolete — 
 and from the Roman Catholic ^Driest ? I know that a very 
 solemn and sacred and unerring voice seems to pronounce 
 that he is only a simple layman; but this judgment I 
 
 other later saints were misled into their devotion to Mary by a few 
 spurious passages of this kind. The calm oracular boldness with which 
 Dr. Pusey puts forth assertions of this nature is a phenomenon that 
 requires explanation. Meanwhile, the argument I insist on is this : 
 the eminent Eoman Theologians employed to ascertain the mind of the 
 early Church respecting the Immaculate Conception of our Lady have 
 given us, in two thick quarto volumes, prayers to our Lady as ardent as 
 any we use, taken from Oriental liturgies and the writings of Greek 
 Fathers, to the number, I should think, of many thousands. Are all 
 these spurious ? Spurious or not, were they not known to the Greeks 
 and Orientals before the great schism? If so, how comes it that there 
 was no Dr. Pusey to denounce them as innovations ? Surely the Greeks 
 were not in those days asleep, or averse to controversy. Theological 
 discussion was meat and drink and sleep to them. * Kom. ii. 1. 
 
BR. PUSEY’s peacemaker. 
 
 21 
 
 do not at present urge. I wish rather to shape a definition 
 out of the notions of those more partial to Anglicanism ; 
 and I ask what, according to their view, is an Anglican 
 clergyman? Is he not a clergyman of the Established 
 Church, who, with a doubtful title to the priesthood, claims 
 to the full all priestly privileges and aspires to every func- 
 tion of the priesthood? The ancient minister of bygone 
 days was not wont to ambition the higher duties of the 
 priesthood. He used not, even in his dreams, to imagine 
 that he. could offer sacrifice. He did not pretend that 
 he had power to absolve a sinner. It did not enter his 
 mind that he could really change bread into the Body of 
 our Lord. He could pray, and he could preach ; with this 
 he was content, and so were his people. His title to 
 exercise his functions was the same as the title of his 
 Anglican successor ; but if his title to the priesthood was 
 doubtful, his use of its powers was very modest. Between 
 his aspirings and those of the Anglican there is a marked 
 difference. On the other hand, the Roman Catholic 
 priest in this is like the Anglican, that he too aspires 
 to the very height of the Divine powers of the priesthood. 
 In the name of Christ Jesus he looses and he binds. Li 
 the name of Christ J esus he stands at the altar and conse- 
 crates. But he widely differs from the Anglican in this 
 one point, that he never will raise his hand to absolve, 
 never will dare to ascend the steps of the altar to celebrate 
 the mysteries, until his title to the priesthood and all its 
 prerogatives is quite secure. A conscientious Catholic 
 priest would beg his bread for life, or starve for Avant of 
 
22 
 
 THE LADY CHAPEL AND 
 
 bread, ratliei: than once be guilty of tbe sacrilege of 
 usurping priestly power without having secure and certain 
 title-deeds ; and, docile as the Catholic people are, yet 
 were a Catholic congregation to discover that the pastor 
 appointed to minister to them and to their famihes was 
 a man whose consecration could not be proved, whose 
 ordination papers were open to grave suspicion, that congre- 
 gation would never rest till this scandal were removed from 
 the midst of them. And who would blame the agitation ? 
 
 I say then, brethren, that when an Anglican clergy- 
 man, whose priesthood is a tottering structure erected on 
 foundations eminently, preeminently insecure ; whose whole 
 career is, to say the least, made up of things doubtful, 
 — a doubtful ordination by a questionable bishop, doubt- 
 ful jurisdiction, doubtful absolutions, and consecrations 
 most painfully full of uncertainty, — -with regard to whom 
 there is nothing certain but his separation from unity and 
 his antagonism to the Vicar of Christ Jesus, — when a 
 clergyman thus constituted stands forward to denounce 
 devotion to the Blessed Mother of God because it is based 
 on an uncertain groundwork, to say the very least, he is 
 not kind to himself. 
 
 7. But still, brethren, there are other counts against us. 
 The accuser softens towards us and sighs for union ; but 
 q Devotion to feeling that our devotion to Mary, in its 
 
 [ndbioned^by present form, is a necessary apple of discord, a barrier for 
 urci, ^Mf,” he says, ^^you would limit yourselves to the 
 
 moderate teachings of the Church, peace might come back, 
 the wall of separation might be beaten down, the Thurty- 
 
DR. PUSEY’S peacemaker. 
 
 23 
 
 nine Articles and the definitions of Trent might be blended 
 into a harmonious whole, the calf and the lion and the 
 sheep might abide together, and a child might lead them.”* 
 And this charge too, brethren, we must be prepared to 
 meet. And can we not meet it ? Should we fear to say to 
 cm' Blessed Saviour, Lord, Searcher of hearts, is it 
 true ? Did we ever outstrip the teachings of Thy Church 
 in our devotion to thy Blessed Mother? Oftentimes, as 
 we remember, we were warned by the Shepherd to honour 
 her more ; but never were we chidden for honouring her 
 too much.” No, brethren ; it never can be pretended that 
 our devotion to the Blessed Virgin is in the Church, but 
 not of the Church. No man can say that we are a body 
 of active Tractarians, a band of pious conspnators in league 
 to draw on our Bishops into the use of the Kosary. Our 
 Bishops in this point are eminently our teachers. It is not 
 one exceptional colonial bishop, eccentric in his views, 
 but the whole Episcopate — and foremost, he who stands in 
 St. Peter’s place, the Vicar of Christ — who call on us to 
 put our hope in the Mother of God ; and the rule they lay 
 down to regulate our devotion to our Lady is, with propor- 
 tion, something aldn to the rule they give us to guide our 
 devotion to the most Blessed Sacrament : 
 
 “ Quantum potes, tantum aude, 
 
 Quia major omni laude, 
 
 Nec laudare sufficis.” 
 
 Praise her, love her aU you can ; 
 
 For never shall the heart of man 
 Love her as her Son has loved.” 
 
 * Isaiaa xi. 6. 
 
24 
 
 THE LADY CHAPEL AND 
 
 No, brethren, fear not ; it is not with us that Anglicanism 
 has to adjust its quarrel — it is with the Church. We have 
 received all that we believe and practise to the honour of 
 the Mother of God. 
 
 And here, brethren, take rest a little while, as a 
 traveller does upon some rising ground, that he may feast 
 his eye and cheer himself with the lovely landscape, or 
 the murmur of a stream, or the song of the birds ; for is 
 it not a lovelier sight than any landscape that mild as- 
 pect of our Lord when we say to Him, ^^Thy Church 
 taught me”? Is there not a most sweet and cheering 
 music in those words, ^Mt was Thy Church, O Lord; I 
 heard Thy Church”? Need the accused man falter when 
 he utters that plea ? I know, brethren, that our accusers 
 draw a line between Church and Church. They say that 
 if it were the Church of the first century or third century 
 that were teaching them, they would hear. It is a safe 
 promise, brethren ; for the Church of those days is gone by. 
 But who would canonise a man for obedience to dead 
 
 f the living Bisliops ? What OUT Saviour came to teach was obedience 
 hurch of to- 
 
 to the living man, whoever he be, that for the hour holds 
 the place of God. This we knew, O Lord, for we were 
 taught, and therefore we took good care to hear the voice 
 of the living Church of our own century. And when men 
 r told us this fable, that Thy Church was corrupted and was 
 
 [l no longer a sure guide, we marvelled much, and asked 
 
 ourselves which of Thy words concerning Thy Church 
 justified this daring calumny.” Li fact, brethien, what 
 is there in Holy Writ or the ancient Fathers to warrant 
 
DK. PUSEy’s peacemaker. 
 
 25 
 
 this degradation of the present Church? These lovers of 
 antiquity, do they find any words in antiquity that tell 
 them not to hear the Church of the century in which they 
 live? Do they find even some doubtful passages to war- 
 rant them in believing that in their own times there would 
 be no one infallible Church, but only several fallible branch 
 churches? If they will accept nothing that is not an- 
 cient, why do they not find something in ancient lore to 
 justify schism, and obedience to Caesar instead of obedience 
 to Peter ? They say that Thy Holy Spirit is withdrawn, by the Church 
 
 that possesses 
 
 O Lord. But simely if our sins called for a chastisement, the Body and 
 
 ^ Blood of our 
 
 it would have been more merciful to withdraw from earth 
 Thy Body and Thy Blood, which feed sanctity, than to 
 withdraw the guidance of Thy Holy Spirit, without which 
 there can be no certainty, no truth, no faith, which is the 
 beginning of sanctity. As the everlasting Sacrifice, then, 
 is still on earth, as Thou art still in the tabernacle, who 
 shall persuade me that Thou hast withdrawn Thy Holy 
 Spirit?” And, again, brethren, our accusers do not say 
 that God has taken away from man the power of forgiving and the power 
 
 . 1 p of absolving ; 
 
 sins ; but of what use to man is sacramental absolution, if 
 certainty, if truth, if faith are gone, which must prepare 
 the soul for sacramental grace? And if the guidance of 
 the Holy Ghost has been taken away, where is faith? We 
 utterly, then, reject this fable, that Christ is not now with 
 His Church. He never Himself spoke that word. His 
 enemy uttered this blasphemy. Christ called His Church 
 His bride. Did He espouse His bride only for one cen- 
 tury or two — only till such time as Caesar should divorce 
 
26 
 
 THE liAHY CHAPEL AND 
 
 the Churcli of them ? Christ pledged Himself to remain with the Church 
 the promises. 
 
 till the consummation of the world. W^ere all things con- 
 summated in the world at the end of the first four centuries? 
 Christ said His Church should be built on Peter. Be- 
 cause^ then, an island is torn away from Peter by CsesaPs 
 order, is Peter annihilated, and does the promise perish? 
 Or is it only the severed island that suffers — the branch 
 cut off that withers? Christ said that the gates of hell 
 should never prevail against the Church on the rock — the 
 Church of Peter. Did He say any thing like this of the 
 Established Church of England? Are Rome and Eng- 
 land really only two sisters with equal rights — only two 
 branch churches equally unsound ? or is the Roman 
 Catholic Church the Church on the rock, the Church 
 of Christ, the Church of all the promises? And is the 
 Church of England a house built by Csesar on the sands, 
 against which winds and waves can prevail — a house that 
 can be shaken — a house that can totter — a house that can 
 fall — a house that can lie in ruins — a house that can 
 perish so as to leave no discoverable trace, even as the 
 gigantic fabric of Arianism has perished? The Holy 
 Roman Catholic and Apostolic Church then, brethren, 
 has taught us the devotion to Mary which is in our hearts. 
 This is our plea and our apology. 
 
 “Through And now, brethren, are you weary of justifying your- 
 
 ^?^:Bernanh^* Selves ? Be not weary yet, for the accuser does not easily 
 tire of accusing. To the blessed St. John it was revealed 
 that the accusing spirit accused the brethren by day and 
 by night. He is not silenced, then, yet. When we say that 
 
DE. PUSEY’s peacemaker. 
 
 27 
 
 the Church of Christ taught uSj he answers^ So did man 
 in Paradise, when he sinned, lay the blame on his Creator : 
 ^It was the woman whom Thou gavest to me that caused my 
 sin.’ ” “ The Eomanist,” they say, makes Christ account- 
 able for the Church, and the Church accountable for his 
 oivn corruptions. Christ is held accountable for the wor- 
 ship of the Virgin; whereas it is well known and quite 
 evident the Marian system withdraws men, and must with- 
 draw them, from an undivided homage to Christ.” So they 
 say, brethren. And at once we answer by asking. Is it 
 true that we who honour Mary love Christ J esus less than 
 you who honour her not ? And again : since the Madonna 
 was cast down in the Church of England, is Christ Jesus 
 loved more than the old Saxon saints loved Him? Or 
 again : since the Established Church *of England ceased to 
 teach devotion to Mary, or rather began to forbid it, has 
 Anglicanism given birth to a race of saints who loved 
 Christ Jesus more than Theresa, and Xavier, and Ignatius, 
 of modern Spain — more than St. Philip, St. Charles, St. 
 Aloysius, and St. Magdalen de Pazzi, of modern Italy — 
 more than Francis of Sales, and Vincent of Paul, and 
 Mary Marguerite, of modern France — more than the 
 uncounted martyrs of the Eoman Catholic Church, in 
 these latter days, in China, in Japan, and on the seas? 
 Say, since Csesar made the Eosary high-treason, and the 
 state clergy said Amen to Csesar’s decree, have Anglicans 
 become more conformable to the image of Christ Jesus 
 than the rest of men ? Has love burned in their hearts 
 before their altar? — or was the altar pulled down on the 
 
28 
 
 THE LADY CHAPEL AND 
 
 Has England 
 loved our 
 Blessed Sa- 
 viour more 
 since it loved 
 His Holy Mo- 
 ther less ? 
 
 same day as the Madonna, and has love died out since the 
 altar and the tabernacle were taken away, and the image 
 of Mary banished from England? Again, has heavenly 
 purity and virginity flourished here more than before, or 
 did the cloister crumble to ruins from the day when the 
 Mother of God Avas degraded and the holy tabernacle 
 SAA’ept away? And has the spirit of chastening penance 
 grown in England since devotion to Mary was exter- 
 minated by act of parliament — or is the fast in memory 
 of the Passion forgotten as much as the name of Mary is 
 forgotten ? And once more : since the day on Avhich it 
 was made a crime in England to honour the Mother of 
 God, have men become more tender, more compassionate 
 to the poor, or did the burning brand for the poor man’s 
 cheek come into use when the memory of the Mother of 
 God was banished? And to say one word of these our 
 own days, is it true that the factory-child of England, who 
 certainly is never guilty of the crime of honouring Mary, 
 loves our Saviour more than the convent-child of Ireland, 
 who morning, noon, and night, when the bell reminds 
 men of the Word made man, kneels to say ^Hail, Mary’? 
 Is it true that the peasants of England, in their mines or 
 in their fields, know more of Christ Jesus and love Him 
 better than the peasants of Spain and Italy, who come 
 from their work with their beads in their hands, thinking 
 of His crown of thorns, of His scourging and His cruci- 
 fixion ? And fo mount a little higher, is it true that the 
 clergy of England, the consecrated class of England, can 
 point to a larger number of hearts burning with love of 
 
DR. PUSEY’s peacemaker. 
 
 29 
 
 our Blessed Lord tlian tlie Eoman Catholic Church sees 
 in her cloisters and her sanctuaries? Seriously, if the 
 Ancrlican wished to be a friend to me, w^ould he tell me 
 that by leaving Rome, with its devotion to Mary, and going 
 over to Anglicanism, where there is no devotion to Mary, 
 I should grow in grace and find myself nearer to my 
 Lord and Saviour? O brethren, if this were so, why 
 in these our days, when, after their long enslavement 
 of three hundred years, some at least of the men of 
 this country are beginning to feel their thraldom, — why 
 do they spontaneously turn their eyes to Rome? Like 
 the Jews after their captivity, they want to find again 
 the long-lost hallowed fire. Why do they look to Rome 
 for it ? If devotion to Mary is so hostile to the love of 
 Jesus, why does the zealous Anglican, as soon as ever he 
 desires to see the love of J esus revive in his own heart and 
 in the hearts of his friends, run to the Catholic prayer- 
 book, which has retained the hymn to Mary, to find there 
 the language of love, for which he looks in vain in the 
 lifeless pages of that prayer-book where her name is not 
 found — that cold prayer-book of formalities, which so well 
 befits a State Church, a Church of workhouses and poor- 
 rates, a Church without an altar? Seriously, does the 
 conscientious Anglican advise us to give up Roman devotion 
 to Mary, and take in exchange the good things of Angli- 
 canism? No, brethren, I think not; I think that many 
 a thoughtful Anglican would give to his best friend the 
 answer that a minister of the Chm'ch of England, in the 
 early days of its existence, did give to a troubled con- 
 
30 
 
 THE LADY CHAPEL AND 
 
 “Search the 
 Scriptures.” 
 
 “Not in the 
 letter, but in 
 the spirit” (2 
 Cor. iii. 6). 
 
 science. Since you ask me/’ lie said, to speak the truth, 
 I will tell you that this new religion is the one to get a 
 living in, but the old religion is the one to die in.” 
 
 9. Brethren, you must bear with me yet awhile. I have 
 set before you many good arguments that justify the ho- 
 mage we pay to our Blessed Lady ; but I count them all 
 as almost unavailing, so long as I see in the background 
 undisturbed the strong champion of that vast host of men 
 who dislike submission to living .authority, — I mean that 
 much-abused word of our Saviour, Search the Scrip- 
 tures.”^ Protestants of all centuries, Protestants of every 
 shade and degree, Protestants of every country, call them 
 by what name you will, — Scribes and Pharisees in Judea; 
 Nestorians or Eutychians in the East; Albigenses in 
 France; Anglicans, or the branch church, in England — 
 all have this in common, that they dislike a livhig master. 
 Tlie motto of them all is, I will not serve ;”t and they 
 all use the dead letter as helmet, shield, and sword, in their 
 war against living authority. They do search the Scrip- 
 tures ; but not wisely, as our Master wished. They spend 
 their lives in searching, and disputing about Christ Jesus 
 and His doctrine, and never learn the one great lesson He 
 came on earth to teach mankind, which is contained in 
 those few words, ^^He was subject’’^ — He was obedient 
 unto death.” § 
 
 The Protestants of Judea asked our Lord for a sign. 
 He worked a miracle. They protested that this sign was 
 
 * John T. 39. 
 J Luke ii. 5. 
 
 f Jeremias ii. 20. 
 § Philip, ii. 8. 
 
DK. pusey's peace:maker. 
 
 31 
 
 not convincing, and asked for a sign from heaven. He 
 showed a sign from heaven. Again they protested, that 
 Beelzebub helped to work this wonder. Our Saviour, the 
 Eternal Truth, proved to conviction that between Himself 
 and Beelzebub there could be no compact ; that light and 
 darkness could not work together. Were they silenced? 
 No; they protested still, saying, We are the disciples of 
 Moses.” ^ So runs on this never-ending protest. Accord- 
 ingly, brethren, we m^ust be patient; and why should we 
 not reverently search the Scriptm^es, to see how far in our 
 devotion to Mary they are for or against us : whether Scrip- 
 tm’e warrants our belief and practice, as the Church does, 
 or denounces and condemns it, as the accuser does ? Yes, 
 brethren, let us search the Scriptures, most earnestly, and 
 never-tiring; for God in His mercy has stored up there 
 untold treasures, which are figured in the gold and silver 
 of the mines, in the pearls and diamonds hidden m the 
 depths of the ocean. Let us search the Scriptures; but 
 before we begin to search, let us have the grace to remem- 
 ber that we are forewarned that a man may have eyes and 
 see not, ears and hear not; that many a man looked on 
 while the Son of God worked wonders, and yet in his soul 
 saw nothing, and was a Hstener while our Lord was speak- 
 ing words powerful enough to create a world, and yet in 
 his soul heard nothing at all. Let us search the Scrip- 
 tures ; but let us not forget that even the little-instructed 
 stranger, when the holy page fell in his way, and he was 
 asked the question, Thinkest thou that thou understandest 
 * John ix. 28. 
 
32 
 
 THE LADY CHAPEL AND 
 
 "‘How can I what thou reaclest?” had the good sense to answer, ^^How 
 
 unless some ^ ^ 
 
 one show me?” can I niiless some one show mef’"^ Scholar, Doctor, 
 Scriptnrist! — whoever yon be — if separated by schism from 
 the Church in which the Holy Spirit dwells and teaches, 
 thinkest thou that thou understandest what thou teachest ? 
 Is not the sense of Scripture one of the peculiar proper- 
 ties of the Church, as much as the power of the keys 
 and the power to consecrate ? Can Bible dictionaries or 
 German critics reveal to you the hidden manna contained 
 in Scripture and reserved for those who conquer, — who 
 conquer by obeying ? Search the Scriptures ; yes, surely, 
 for every word that cometh from the mouth of God de- 
 serves man’s eternal meditation ; but if you think to read 
 the inspired pages without the guide that God has given 
 you, your eyes will do for you what they do as you gaze 
 on the consecrated Host — ^they will mislead you. You will 
 read in the Book of Kings, for instance, the words, I will 
 be to him a Father, and he will be to Me a son;”t and your 
 critic’s eye will tell you for certain that these words were 
 said of Solomon, and him alone. The context, you will 
 say, proves it beyond dispute. And if Pius IX. or St. 
 Alphonsus were to contend that these same words were 
 spoken with reference to Christ Jesus, the scrip turist of 
 the branch church would cry out that Rome brings in un- 
 warrantable corruptions — clearly, since the words imme- 
 diately preceding, ^^He shall build a house to My name,” 
 designate unmistakably Solomon and no other; and the 
 words that follow immediately, if he commit iniquity, I 
 ♦ Acts viii. 30. f 2 Kings vii. 14. 
 
DR. PUSEY's peacemaker. 
 
 33 
 
 will correct him/’ make it a blasphemy to apply the text 
 to the Son of God. So the critic might have argued, had 
 not St. Paul, under the guidance of that Holy Spirit that 
 points out to the Church the hidden truths, disclosed to 
 us in his letter to the Hebrews, that the words, ‘‘ I shall be 
 to Him a Father, He shall be to Me a Son,” were wiitten 
 concerning the Messias to come.* 
 
 Standing, then, within the pale of that Church which 
 the Holy Spirit overshadows, carrying within us those in- 
 stincts and those habits of mind which Baptism engenders, 
 and the Church with her other Sacraments fosters, — not 
 walking alone (for woe to him that is alone!), but with 
 Christ’s bride to guide our footsteps, — we do set ourselves 
 to explore the sacred mines of Holy Scripture, to see what 
 thoughts concerning Mary lie treasured there — ^whether the 
 thoughts that Holy Church has given us, or the thoughts 
 of the accuser. ^ 
 
 10. And first of all, brethren, I read concerning her, 
 that she brought fortli her first-born Son,”t Jesus — of 
 whom, in after years, the voice of man, the voice of nature, 
 and the voice of God testified that This Man was truly the 
 Son of God!”J ^^The Word was made flesh” § in her virginal 
 womb, and therefore she is the Mother of God as truly 
 and really as any other woman is the mother of the child 
 she bears. This being so, brethren, what follows ? Why, 
 trained as we have been in the bosom of the Church, be- 
 lieving Mary’s maternity to be a reality, not a mere name 
 
 * Hebrews i. 5. 
 
 J Matthew xxvii. 54. 
 
 f Luke ii. 7. 
 § John i, 14. 
 
 C 
 
34 
 
 THE LADY CHAPEL AND 
 
 —even as we believe the body of oui" Lord in the Eu- 
 charist to be a reality, not a mere word — ^^ve find it simply 
 impossible not also to believe that Christ, when He made 
 her His Mother, decreed for her every grace and privilege 
 and prerogative that He could give her. If, then, the 
 holy and infallible Church were to teach me that it was 
 an impossibility that Christ should give to His Mother the 
 power of helping man by her prayers, I should of course 
 bow my head to the decision, and accept the mystery as I 
 accept the dogma of the Trinity, without understanding it.. 
 But if, on the other hand, the Church of Christ allows me 
 to follow on this point the instincts of my faith — and not 
 only allows me, but in the name of God commands me, to 
 follow the teaching of this inward guide — then I will go on 
 believing as I have believed, that the Son of God has given 
 to His Mother every grace and gift that the best of sons 
 can give to the worthiest of mothers. And in order to lift 
 up my mind to becoming thoughts on this matter, I observe 
 tlie action of filial affection wherever it exists in life, or 
 wherever it is described in fiction or in history ; and still 
 as I contemplate I always say. This is not the reality; ^^eye 
 hath not seen,*^ the heart of man has never on earth con- 
 ceived, the great things which the Son of God has done for 
 His IMother, and how He has put forth the might of His 
 right arm to make her in every way the worthy Mother of 
 God. And therefore, wdien I hear Bethsabee say to Solo- 
 mon, My son, I desire one small petition — do not put me 
 to confusion;”* and Solomon answ^er, Mother, ask; I may 
 * 3 Kings ii. 20. 
 
DR. PUSEY’S peacemaker. 
 
 35 
 
 not turn away tliy face,” — I say at once this is a lovely 
 image — but O, how poor an image — of the reality, when 
 Mary stands, holy and immaculate, and His Mother, before 
 the face of her Son, and utters her petition, and He, her 
 Son and her God, makes answer, My Mother, ask ; I must 
 not turn away thy face” ! and certainly, if Lucifer, who 
 does mount up at times and stand among the children of 
 God, could ever see Christ Jesus reject the pleading of His 
 IMother’s countenance, that moment would be a triumph 
 for Lucifer, and great confusion for Holy Mary. But the 
 thought is simply a horrible impossibility. And so again, 
 when I see the great eastern monarch Assuerus spring 
 from his throne and run to Esther, and say to her, What 
 is thy petition, Esther ? The law is not for thee,”* I say 
 to myself, it is a graceful type; but O, what a mere 
 shadow of the great reality — of the ineffable and infinite 
 contentment with which our Blessed Saviour says to Mary, 
 ^Vliat is thy petition ? The law is not for thee” ! No, 
 the law is not for her, brethren, as Mother of God — so 
 the faith that is in me tells me. She ought to have a 
 privilege that goes beyond laws and the ordinary rules of 
 Divine providence : she ought to be indulged as a mother. 
 And if Christ said even to His Apostles, Amen, amen, I 
 say to you. He that believeth in Me, the works that I do 
 he also shall do ; and greater things than these shall lie 
 do ;”t what will He say to His Mother ? This then, I say, is 
 the conclusion that my reason, under the guidance of the 
 Holy Church, would come to — that, being Mother of God, 
 * Esther v. 3, and xv. 13. f - John xiv. 12. 
 
36 
 
 THE LADY CHAPEL A^^> 
 
 she ought to have every prerogative that can he hers ; and 
 among the rest, the great prerogative of helping man to 
 win his place in heaven near his God. 
 
 Hail, full of 11, Yes, I should expect to find that some revelation 
 
 grace ) 
 
 had been made to her, or to others concerning her, that 
 would prove that God had given her every good gift. I 
 search then, brethren, and do I not find my conclusions 
 borne out? Was not such a word revealed to her? 
 We know it — for happily the word that was whispered 
 in her ear has since been preached to us all from the 
 house-top — we know it, that when the fulness of time was 
 come — in the hour when the eternal Son of God was to 
 become her Son, the ever-blessed Trinity — Father and 
 Son and Holy Ghost — sent to her a messenger to say to 
 her in Their name, Hail^ full of grace T And this word, 
 brethren, too, like every word that cometh from the mouth 
 of God, we believe to be a great reality ; and this word 
 that comes from heaven to Mary we accept most rever- 
 ently; and, under the teaching of the Holy Church and of 
 the Divine Spirit, we study it, and we see that it ratifies and 
 sets a seal on our conclusions, and declares to us that God 
 has given to His Blessed Mother every grace befitting her. 
 Therefore, if man tells me that she cannot help the poor 
 sinner to his salvation, I utterly reject the fable, because, 
 were this true, there would be one great grace withheld 
 from the Mother of God ; for we know that it is, of all 
 divine works, the most divine to work along with God our 
 Saviour for the salvation of lost man. And if the adver- 
 sary contend that there is no warrant in Scripture for say- 
 
DR. PUSEY"s peacemaker. 
 
 37 
 
 ing that Maiy can hear the sinner’s prayer, I answer, Yes, 
 there is warrant and proof, heaped up and pressed down, 
 and flowing over for it is written that the angel of God 
 shall sound his trumpet in heaven, and that the sound shall 
 reach the dead bones even of the coldest atheist, wherever 
 they lie buried, either in the bosom of the earth or the 
 depths of the sea. If God, then, has power to make a 
 voice from heaven heard by the buried dead here below, 
 so has He power to make the cry of the banished child of 
 Eve reach the Mother of God in heaven ; and if He has 
 the power to do it, He does it, for she is His Mother, and 
 full of every grace. 
 
 12. But, brethren, for a moment, if it be possible, cast 
 yourselves into a hideous dream, a terrible nightmare, and 
 fancy, if you can, that the Anglican is uttering a truth — 
 that Mary does not hear us nor help us ; that we have been 
 deluded. In this case, what are we to say for ourselves ? 
 I search and seek, brethren, and I find our Lord saying 
 by the mouth of His prophet to His people, Come and 
 accuse Me and most humbly and reverently I do dare to 
 speak to my Saviour, even as Abraham was bold enough 
 to plead with his Creator; and I say, Lord, ever-blessed. 
 Thou knowest all things. Nothing was ever hidden from 
 Thy eyes. The future, as the present and the past, is 
 always before Thee ; and the night and the secrets of om' 
 hearts are all as the noonday in Thy sight. If then, O 
 Lord, Thy Chmxh and her Saints have gone astray, and 
 have unduly and unwarrantably and wickedly exalted Thy 
 
 ♦ Isaias i. 16, 
 
38 
 
 THE LADY CHAPEL AND 
 
 Mother^ and put tlieir trust in her, then, O Saviour^ mer- 
 ciful and compassionate, why didst Thou — knowing all 
 that was to come, and knowing of what we are made and 
 the leaning of our hearts — ^why didst Thou decree that a 
 woman should be Thy Mother, and full of grace f ’ Sup- 
 pose for an instant, brethren, that this fearful saying of 
 Anglicanism were true, and that we were honouring un- 
 duly the Mother of God, how easily might our Blessed 
 Saviour have prevented all this inordinate homage ! for 
 might He not in His wisdom have planned and contrived 
 an Incarnation more according to the mind and heart of 
 Anglicanism, in which there should have been no Blessed 
 Virgin ? Or might He not easily have taken care to say 
 some word or to do some act that might make it clear to 
 all those His faithful servants that were to come, that the 
 Doctors of Anglicanism teach a truth when they tell us 
 it is wicked to pray to the Mother of God, and put our 
 hope in her ? This, my brethren, is the argument we urge, 
 and urge with great force, in establishing from Scripture 
 the doctrine of the Blessed Eucharist. We contend that it 
 would have been easj for our Lord, when He saw that the 
 Jev/s were scandalised at the words He had uttered, ^^My 
 Flesh is meat indeed, and My Blood is drink indeed,”^ to 
 remove the scandal and keep them all near Him, by utter- 
 ing one word of Calvinism ; and because He did not utter 
 that word, but added weight and strength to His former 
 solemn announcement, we believe and contend that He 
 meant His words to convey to the mind of man their full 
 
 ♦ John vi. 56. 
 
BR. PUSEY’s PEACE3IAKER. 
 
 39 
 
 force. If our most merciful Saviour could save us from 
 impiety by a warning, and does not give that Avarning, how 
 could lie fearlessly challenge us and say, What is there 
 that I ought to do more for My vineyard, and have not 
 done it?’^ Well, brethren, search the Holy Scriptimes, 
 and say do you find any thing Avritten to Avarn you that 
 you must not lay too much stress on Mary’s maternity ; 
 that you must not argue from the conduct of Solomon or 
 Assuerus, or any man on earth ; that you must not expect 
 to see her have privileges above measure ? 
 
 I knoAv of no such Avord ; but I do know of Avords that 
 are Avritten AAdiich, to those avIio haA^e eyes to see and ears 
 to hear, do reveal A^ery clearly that it is the will of the Di- 
 vine Son to honour His Mother and giA^e her a mother’s 
 happy prmleges in season and out of season, and beyond 
 laAv and measure, and make her in every sense the Mother 
 o? God, and full of grace. For is it not AATitten that at His 
 very first coming upon earth, while yet His long term of 
 silent preparation Avas not even properly begun, — while tie 
 Avas still unseen by human eye, an unborn infant in His 
 Mother’s Avomb, — He worked a wonder of mercy, the first 
 of His miracles of mercy, a miracle out of time, a miracle 
 that AA^ent beyond all expectation, a miracle that set aside the 
 decree that reigned supreme since the days of Adam’s fall, 
 
 a miracle that outstripped the laAvs of nature, — mAnns: super- “Behold, as 
 ^ ^ / o o i soonasthe'voic 
 
 natural life to John the Baptist before he was ushered into i 
 
 the natural life of man? AVell, brethren, this stupendous 
 
 T « T . , , womb leaped 
 
 prodigy ot power and mercy AA^as just such a AA'onder as for joy” (Luk< 
 
 h 44), 
 
 an initiated soul or an angel might in a holy dream 
 
40 
 
 THE LAHY CHAPEL AND 
 
 imagine the Son of God to work to please His Mother^ to 
 do honour to His Mother, that thus she might he seen 
 to do greater things than He would do when she was 
 not there. And so it is 'written — for the inspired chronicler 
 'Was commanded by the Holy Spirit to leave it on record, 
 that every man in after ages might read it and knoAv it — 
 that the sanctification of John the Baptist, out of all time 
 and natural order, was wrought at the sound of the voice 
 of the Mother of God. How easily might the Holy Spirit 
 have suppressed that line of Scripture had the all-seeing 
 God been anxious to preserve His much-loved bride the 
 Church from what the accuser calls our Mariolatry, our 
 Marian system, our wicked worship of Mary ! This, then, 
 Jesus did in His infancy ; this was the first-fruits of His 
 mission on earth. Afterwards He grew in grace and wis- 
 dom ; but did He afterwards in any way modify what He 
 had done ? Did He do any thing to correct the impression 
 sure to be made on futurity by that first act of His infancy? 
 No, brethren ; but, on the contrary; as in the case of the 
 Blessed Eucharist, when He saw that His words scanda- 
 lised, He repeated them, and added that solemn word, 
 Amen, I say to you. Except you eat the flesh of the Son 
 of Man, you shall not have life in you,”^ to give them firm- 
 ness and an everlasting stability; so when He came to 
 His maturity He said Amen to what He had done in 
 infancy, to make men know and understand that Mary is 
 in very truth Mother of God, and full of grace. For when 
 once more in manhood He was beginning life — now, again. 
 
 ♦ John vi. 54. 
 
DR. PUSEY’S peacemaker. 
 
 41 
 
 not by chance, but acting on a premeditated and eternal 
 
 plan — He assigned His first miracle, the first-fruits of His 
 
 harvest of mercies, to His Mother; and not only that, 
 
 but to make His design more evident, before He worked “^The Mother 
 
 the wonder of Canaan He uttered a word— prepared also to Him, 
 
 from all eternity,— He said to her— and at the same time 
 decreed that what He whispered to her should be preached 
 from the house-tops — He said to her, My hour is not yet 
 come.”* The man wdio dwells among the tombs, the man 
 who has not the life and light of Holy Church within him, 
 the man who has eyes that see not, reads these words, and 
 yields to the foul imagination that Jesus was reproving 
 Mary. But the child of the Church of Christ J esus, the 
 child whom the Holy Spirit teaches, reads, and under- 
 stands that Christ wished all men to know that the law is 
 not for His Mother ; that whether His time be come or not, 
 when she asks. He never will turn her face away. How 
 easy a thing, brethren, I say again, would it have been for 
 the Holy Spirit to secure that the Evangelist should not 
 pen that line, so sure to influence the expectations of after 
 ages, if, as the accuser tells us, to expect great help from 
 Blessed Mary is a folly and a crime ! 
 
 13. And now, brethren, let us search once more and 
 see what we can find in Holy Scripture to lay up in our 
 hearts concerning the handmaid of the Lord, the ever- 
 blessed Mother of God. 
 
 The messenger of the Most Holy Trinity had said to 
 
 ^ . 1 T 1 “The Lord is 
 
 her, “Hail, full of grace!” and now he said, “ The Lord with theo.” 
 
 ♦ John ii. 4. 
 
42 
 
 THE LADY CHAPEL AND 
 
 is Mdtli tliee.” And, brethren, be sure of it, while you 
 ponder on those Vv ords, angels of heaven would sing around 
 you, if you would hear them, Sursum corda.” High, and 
 higher still — as high as your hearts and thoughts can soar 
 — let them ascend, to conceive and picture the perfect 
 companionship between the Son and the Mother that is 
 implied in these words, The Lord is with thee.” Once 
 and for ever He gives Himself to thee. The Lord is 
 with thee,” and shall be with thee in every way in which 
 He can be with thee. He will live in thy memory ; for 
 thou never shalt forget thy Son, thy God. He will be 
 with thy understanding, giving light; and thy God shall 
 be thy everlasting study. He will be with thy heart, 
 setting it on fire ; and He shall be its portion for ever. 
 He will be with thy will, giving it power and an undying 
 firmness to persevere till all is consummated, for thou art 
 the handmaid of thy God for ever and for ever. The Lord 
 is with thee. Mother of God, and thou art with Him ; and 
 because He is with thee thou seest Him and knowest Him 
 as He is in Himself,” and therefore art thou made most 
 like to Him (1 John hi. 2), the most perfect created copy 
 of the uncreated loveliness of thy Son. His image is 
 stamped on thee every where. The features of thy Child, 
 Blessed Mother, are like to thine, and so are all the fea- 
 tures of thy soul and every movement of thy body copies 
 of His perfection. Thy destiny. Holy Mary, is to be in all 
 things conformed to thy Divine Son. Henceforth you shall 
 be two in one: God has joined the Mother and the Son; 
 why should man vainly endeavour to separate ? As in the 
 
DR. PUSEY’s PEACE3IAKER. 
 
 43 
 
 «early ages of tlie Cliurclij tlie Avatclimen of its slieepfold 
 knew at once when the destroyer was near whenever they 
 heard a false teacher trying to separate or divide Christ 
 Jesus into two persons, so now we may be sure of 
 it, that any word that goes to separate Jesus and Mary 
 comes from the father of lies and nowhere else. For 
 observe the prophecy, brethren ; it is only a little en- 
 largement or development of the archangel’s words. He 
 had said to Mary, ^^The Lord is with thee.” A few 
 months later she stood in the Temple with her Child in 
 her arms, and the just man that had so long waited for 
 her to come Avith that Child, took Jesus from her arms 
 and spoke the prophetic words that the Holy Ghost com- 
 manded him to utter, and said, This Child is set for the 
 resurrection and the fall of many, and for a sign Avhich shall 
 be contradicted.”* This word he spoke of the Child ; and he 
 added to the Mother, and thy own soul the sword shall “Thy own soul 
 pierce, that out of many hearts thoughts may be revealed.” 
 
 Weigh each word well, brethren, and wonder how men can be^reveale^”^ 
 search the Scriptures and after reading these proj)hetic 
 warnings strive still to separate Jesus and Mary. Does 
 not the Anglican, who asks us for peace-sake to give up 
 our devotion to our Lady, hear what the old man Simeon 
 says? It cannot be; for it is decreed — ^it is foretold by 
 God, tliat the Son and the Mother shall, till all is con- 
 summated on earth, be set up side by side, sharing sorrow 
 together as they share all else, and making conjointly a 
 spectacle that all men must gaze upon, and, while they 
 
 ^ Luke ii. 34. 
 
44 
 
 THE LADY CHAPEL AND 
 
 gaze, reveal the thought of their hearts that is to deter- 
 mine their doom. Brethren, some men have said that 
 just when death is coming the whole scene of past life is 
 spread out before the mind of the dying Christian, and 
 that if he can gaze without despairing he is saved ; but if 
 he despairs while he gazes, that is the last and final sin 
 that shall not be remitted. Whether this be true or not, 
 we know not. No traveller comes back to tell us the 
 secrets of the last hour of time and the first of eternity. 
 But this we do know, that, according to God’s plan, the 
 Son of God and His Mother have both their place, side by 
 side, in the Incarnation, and man must gaze on both ; and 
 the thought that he gives forth from his heart must seal 
 his doom. CaBsar has willed it otherwise, I know. This 
 state-religion of England has an incarnation without a 
 Mother of God. But this is not God’s decree, for His 
 angel said the word, The Lord is with thee and to 
 the end the Mother and the Son shall not be parted, but 
 be found side by side, as they were when Simeon spoke the 
 prophecy. 
 
 14. The Lord is with thee, Mary ; and this word, bre- 
 thren, is the answ^er to one of those wily war-cries which 
 the enemy of God and men has taken care to render 
 popular. You have all heard it ; you have heard men say 
 fiip])antly, triumphantly, as if they were speaking a dogma, 
 that there is but one Mediator; and therefore, they ar- 
 gue, if Jesus is the Mediator, Mary cannot be a mediator; 
 and hereupon, brethren, they are wont to turn pale and 
 grow scandalised, and rend their garments, because they 
 
DR. PUSEY’s peacemaker. 
 
 45 
 
 find in our Roman books that she Is called the Mediatrix. 
 Yes, brethren, it is true she is called, and she is, the Media- 
 trix ; and if a man will but listen to Gabriel’s words, ‘‘ The 
 Lord is with thee,” he will understand that, of necessity, 
 if J esus is a Mediator, Mary must be a mediator. There ! 
 the accusers cry, What more do we need of witnesses ? 
 You have heard the blasphemy,” — so clearly against the 
 word of God — which teaches that Christ is the one Media- 
 tor ! Well, brethren, let us at once and for ever understand 
 this mystery. Christ is the one Mediator ; but He is also 
 the one Messias, the one Victim, the one Priest, the one 
 who is alone good, the one only God. But if He be the 
 one Messias, does He lock up in Himself the commission to 
 teach ; or does He say to man, As My Father sent Me, I 
 send you”?* Again, He is the one Victim; but if He be 
 so, does He insist on carrying His cross alone, and dying 
 alone — or does He share Mount Calvary with man ? And, 
 to utter one name in particular, did Mary, or did she not, 
 share the Passion of her Son? Was there a wound on the 
 Body of her Son that could not be found on her heart — 
 was there one of His sorrows that was not reproduced in 
 her? Again, brethren, Jesus is the one holy Priest. Then 
 has He, as He well might have done, jealously reserved 
 for Himself all the priesthood? or did He say to man, 
 Whose sins you forgive, they are forgiven” ?t And on 
 that night of ineffable mercies, when by a word He brought 
 into being a new creation — His own Divine Eucharistic life, 
 with all its prodigies — did He, as He so justly might have 
 
 * John XX. 21, t John xx. 23, 
 
*^46 
 
 THE LADY CHAPEL AND 
 
 clone, resen^e for Himself alone that act of a God, and pro- 
 -claim that man should die the death if he dared to stretch 
 out his hand to usurp the office that was His? No, bre- 
 thren ; for He said to the fishermen, You are My friends.”^' 
 He said, ^^All things whatsoever I have heard from My 
 Father I have made known to you/’ He said, ^^Do ye 
 this in memory of Me/’ 
 
 Again, brethren, Jesus is the one alone who is good 
 and holy and most high, — Tu solus altissimus, Tu solus 
 sanctus.” Well, and does He stand isolated and alone, and 
 never share His sanctity ? or does He say to man, I am 
 the Yine, you the branches ;t we are one, the life within 
 us is one ; the fruit I bear, the same you bear ; My sanctity 
 is yours” ? Lastly, Jesus is the one God. And does He 
 keep to Himself His divinity; or is that true which the 
 children of the Church believe, that He became man that 
 man might become a sharer of God’s divinity? The adver- 
 saries forget themselves : their ideal of the Incarnation ia 
 a monstrous disfigurement, and their idea of God is equally 
 false and calumnious. They picture to us a God standing 
 alone, as if He were selfish ; but our Blessed Lord rejects the' 
 slander, and proclaims that God is charity,”^ and must 
 therefore give whatever He can give. And in fact, did He 
 not say to man, ^^All I have is thine” ?§ If, then, out 
 of necessity, constrained by His charity. He must share- 
 all with men, — how if He be the one Mediator? shall not 
 His Mother, then, be also a mediator? Is this one office a 
 
 * Jolin XV. 14, 15. Luke xxii. la. f John xv. 5. 
 
 J 1 John iv. 8. § Luke xv. 31. 
 
DR. PUSEY’s PEACExMAKER. 
 
 47 
 
 thing He will not share ? If she were not the Mediatrix, it 
 would he a clear proof that He is no mediator, since all 
 that is His is hers. I say then, brethren, that most cer-^ 
 tainly if Christ be living in heaven to intercede for man, 
 it follows that Blessed Mary must be also living in heaven 
 to intercede for man. Every time the heart of the Son of 
 God pleads for mercy, Mary’s heart must beat and throb 
 with the self-same yearnings for mercy. Every time the 
 eye of Christ J esus is raised to appeal for mercy, the eye 
 of His Blessed Mother must reflect that tender petition for 
 mercy. Every time the lips of Jesus say, Father, forgive 
 them,” the lips of Mary must of necessity echo the very 
 same words, Father, forgive them;” for they are ^^two in 
 one.” The angel said it, The Lord is with thee,” Mary. 
 
 Brethren, let me once more say it. Oui’ Blessed Saviour 
 asks us, What could I do more for My vineyard, and have 
 not done it ?” Surely, brethren, we might answer, that if 
 the long line of our Catholic saints have been misled, and 
 have misled us into an unholy devotion to Mary, the evil 
 could easily have been prevented if some warning word 
 had been left on the sacred pages, to teach us not to be- 
 lieve that the Lord is with her so perfectly ; and if Simeon 
 had not been permitted to speak that prophecy, that both 
 shall stand, side by side, that out of many hearts thoughts 
 may be revealed. For these words teach us what is going 
 on in the bosom of the Church and out of it ; thej-^ tell us 
 that the Catholic heart must reverence and love both 
 jMother and Son ; that the withered heart, separated from 
 life and unity, shall cavil either against the Son, or the 
 
48 
 
 THE LADY CHAPEL AND 
 
 ‘ ‘ Blessed art 
 thou amongst 
 women.” 
 
 Mother, or both, according as the father of all heresy in- 
 spires. 
 
 15. And there yet remains, my brethren, for ns to 
 think upon one other word that Gabriel spoke to ^lary. 
 He had said, Hail, full of grace !” he had said, The 
 Lord is with thee he now said, Blessed art thou amongst 
 women.” Blessed amongst women ! Why blessed ? how 
 blessed ? Have we not it prophesied that the sword is to 
 pierce her soul ? Wherein is she blessed, brethren ? Men 
 would not call her blessed. It is not flesh and blood that 
 teaches us to call her blessed ; it is the decree of God that 
 makes all generations call her blessed. It is a revelation to 
 us that this Mother of Sorrows is the blessed among women. 
 See her, brethren, on the day in which she came into pos- 
 session of her birthright ; for it was her great birthright 
 to share the sorrows of her Son. He came to suffer, and 
 all that was His was hers. See her, then, where she stands 
 watching till all is consummated on Calvary. Now, I 
 pray you, ask mankind if she ought to be there, — if by all 
 law the Mother ought not to be taken away perforce while 
 her Son undergoes His torments. And let man search the 
 Scriptures on this point too, and what does he find ? Why, 
 brethren, that the tender providence of our Creator, in the 
 book of Deuteronomy, lays down this law for man : ‘‘ If 
 thou find as thou walkest on the way a bird’s nest on the 
 tree or the ground, and the dam with her young, thou 
 shalt not take her with her young, but shalt let her go, 
 keeping the young Avhich thou hast caught.”^' How then, 
 
 Deuter. xxii. 6. 
 
DE. pussy’s PEACEMAKEE. 
 
 49 
 
 brethren, does our Creator, who cares for the sparrow and 
 the raven, forget to watch over the blessed amongst women, 
 the Mother of God ? Why are not men commanded to let 
 her go, and not to carry cruelty beyond all bounds, by cru- 
 cifying the Son in His Mother’s sight ? Brethren, men 
 cannot give the answer ; but the archangel gives it, when 
 he utters that word, Blessed art thou amongst women.” 
 It is because she is the blessed among women that she is 
 to stand on Calvary. For what is Calvary? 
 
 Calvary, brethren, is the second Garden of Eden. The 
 hour is come. There is to be a new heaven and a new 
 earth — a new creation ; but first the great battle must be 
 fought that is to end the story of the old world. Calvary is 
 the new Garden of Eden ; and because there was a tree of 
 life and knowledge in Eden, there must be a tree of life and 
 knowledge on Calvary. And the second Adam, you see, is 
 here ; and He falls asleep in this Paradise, because the first 
 Adam slept in Eden. And mark as He sleeps in death, the 
 men who have no mercy come with their bludgeons to break 
 the bones of the three malefactors ; and they strike their 
 heavy blows unsparingly, and break the knees of the one on 
 the right and the one on the left ; but they never lift their 
 hands to break the knees of J esus. What is the reason, bre- 
 thren ? Is it that they grow pitiful, or reverence the lifeless 
 corpse ? Alas, on that day there was no pity, no reverence 
 for the Man of Sorrows. No; but there was a decree 
 from the beginning that they should not break His bones, 
 but must open His side, because He was the Adam of the 
 new world, and the side of the first Adam had been opened. 
 
 D 
 
50 
 
 THE LADY CHAPEL AND 
 
 Well, brethren, if Calvary be Eden, and if the tree be 
 there, and if the Adam be there, and if Lucifer and his 
 princes of darkness be there — what of the woman ? If the 
 scene of Paradise is to be reproduced— if the struggle is to 
 be fought again — if the watchful eye of our Creator ob- 
 served narrowly every detail of Lucifer’s triumph in Para- 
 dise, and spoke the word that all should be made good, 
 that not an iota of Lucifer’s work should be left unrepaired 
 —where, I ask, is the woman ? The woman fought in the 
 ‘‘Adam was first battle. It was the woman who did fight with Lucifer. 
 
 not seduced, 
 
 but the woman The Serpent never tempted the man. Satan never over- 
 bemg seduced ^ 
 
 transgression” mail. Lucifer fouglit with the woman and con- 
 
 (iTim. 11. H) liev: the woman then became the ally of Lucifer, 
 
 and it was the woman that prevailed over Adam. Where, 
 then, I ask, on the new battle-ground, is the woman? 
 What is her part ? If a woman do not share in the fight, 
 then there is one great gap unfilled. If a woman do not 
 conquer Lucifer, there is one great deficiency on the second 
 battle-day. If, since a woman prevailed over man by the 
 power of her persuasive tongue, and by prevailing worked 
 the ruin of mankind, a woman be not now seen in the new 
 creation to prevail over the second Adam, and to prevail 
 by her pleading and her prayer, and to prevail unto man’s 
 salvation, then there is no harmony between the scenes. 
 There is wanting the all-wise economy. All is not made 
 good and new. Study and weigh, brethren, with the light 
 of faith upon you, and you will expect to find somewhere, 
 as you search, a revelation that the woman is to take part 
 in the fight against Satan, and in his overthrow, and that 
 
DR. PUSEy’s peacemaker. 
 
 51 
 
 she is to have a singular and most special privilege of pre- 
 vailing over the second Adam by her pleading. And do 
 we not find this revelation? Was it not prophesied from 
 the very heginnhiff, in the instant of the fall of man, “I “I will put en- 
 will put an enmity between the woman and the serpent, 
 her seed and thy seed” Is it not decreed, from the very 
 instant of that melancholy defeat in Paradise, that Mary 
 shall stand on Calvary beside her Son, and be by His side 
 as long as the battle with Lucifer lasts? Is not this 
 the reason why men cannot let the Mother go, but must 
 have her there to suffer every torment of her Son ? And 
 it is precisely because she must be with J esus to bear the 
 brunt of that battle, that she is the blessed among women. 
 
 Yes, search the Scriptures ; and the more you search with 
 God’s light upon you, the more clearly you see Mary stand 
 out as the second Eve. And it is only when you pene- 
 trate this idea of her that you can properly read her story. 
 
 Mark, brethren, an angel had dazzled the first woman, and 
 entirely seduced her heart by telling her she was to be 
 
 * Dr. Pusey, in his work, seeks to destroy the force of this prophecy 
 concerning Mary, by asserting that we build our argument on the words, 
 
 “ she shall bruise thy head,” which he pronounces to be a false reading. 
 
 But supposing these words erased altogether, there still remains a clear 
 foretelling that she is to be the Eve of the second warfare, standing 
 beside her Son, bearing with Him the assaults of Lucifer and his ad- 
 herents, and with Him making war on Lucifer. We can, therefore, do 
 without the disputed words. Still, however, whatever critics may gather 
 from manuscripts, the argument — that as Eve, and not Adam, was the 
 one with whom Satan fought directly, so there ought to be given to the 
 second Eve a special and direct victory over Satan — is a sound one, and 
 gives support to the reading of the Latin Vulgate, “ she shall crush,” &:c., 
 and also to that antiphon of the Church, “ thou hast single-handed 
 destroyed all heresies.” 
 
52 
 
 THE LADY CHAPEL AND 
 
 great — gTeat as God Himself. This was Satan’s assault, 
 and it succeeded. The first Eve fell, and betrayed her 
 God. Now, brethren, this struggle must necessarily come 
 on again; and therefore, when the appointed moment is 
 come, an angel is bidden to say to Mary also that she shall 
 be great — as great and as near to the Most High as creatm’e 
 can be — near as a mother to her son. Gabriel told her all 
 this ; and was she dazzled ? was her heart seduced ? Did 
 she fall away from her God for love of greatness ? Never — 
 not for an instant did the eye of her soul even glance at the 
 proffered prize. It was fixed on her God to know His 
 pleasure. The good pleasure of her Creator was her por- 
 tion. She made her choice ; it was that she might be for 
 ever the handmaid of the Lord. In that hour the victory 
 of Lucifer over Eve was undone ; and from that hour the 
 second Eve has a right to prevail with the prayers of her 
 lij)s, the cry of her heart, the pleading of her eye of mercy 
 over the second Adam. This must be henceforth her 
 Mother’s privilege ; and men must see it and know it, that 
 at her petition and gentle bidding He shall do — for He has 
 so decreed it — gi^eater works of mercy than He otherwise 
 would do alone. 
 
 Yes, she is the blessed amongst women. She is the 
 woman long expected — the woman of the second crea- 
 tion. The soul that is severed from the fountain of life 
 sees not these things and wonders why Christ Jesus calls 
 Mary, in His solemn moments, by the name of woman; 
 and, alas, the poisoned mind taints every holy word, and 
 finds death where life ought to be found. The child of 
 
DR. PUSEY’s peacemaker. 
 
 53 
 
 light answers him, and bids him know that Mary’s proper 
 and befitting name is woman,” for she is the Eve and the 
 Mother of the living, the Mother of God, and the Mother 
 of man. 
 
 16. Yes, brethren, the Mother of man. Search the 
 Holy Scriptures; and as you search, if you have eyes to see, 
 clearer and more clear the truth comes to you that she 
 is in very truth both the Mother of God and the Mother 
 of man, till at last we see what St. Paul saw, that by the 
 mysterious scheme of the Incarnation we are verily and in- 
 deed become members of Christ’s body, of His flesh and of 
 His bones.^‘ Now, brethren, if that word can be said by an 
 inspired Apostle without exaggeration, who will be bold 
 enough to say that the same great mystery which makes 
 us bone of Christ’s bone and flesh of His flesh does not 
 also necessarily make us children of His Mother ? And 
 here, once again, I argue, as I have before argued ; I turn 
 to our merciful Saviour, as He hangs on His cross, and I 
 conjure Him to bear with me and suffer me to speak to 
 Him, and say, ‘‘ O Lord and Saviour of mankind, let Thy 
 poor servants accuse Thee ; for if it be true that we and our 
 fathers have erred in loving Thy Mother as if she vf ere ours, 
 in turning our eyes to her in our necessities, and calling on 
 her by that name of Mother, why, O Lord, why didst Thou 
 in that precious hour, when every word of Thine was sure 
 to be remembered by men, and never forgotten, — why didst 
 Thou say to man, ‘ Behold thy Mother f f Why didst Thou 
 bid Thy Mother look on man, and say to her, ‘ Behold thy 
 
 Ephes, V, 30. t John xix. 26, 27, 
 
54 
 
 THE LADY CHAPEL AND 
 
 son’ ? Or if for Thy own good purposes it was necessary 
 that a home should be found for Blessed Mary, yet why 
 was thy Evangelist permitted to record these words, so 
 sure to lead the minds of men astray?” I know, brethren, 
 that the accuser interposes here, and says that we gene- 
 ralise too much, and make out that the words Christ spoke 
 to one man apply to all men. But no, brethren ; alas, we 
 say not so. Would it were so ! would that we could think 
 that all men are the children of our Lady ! But no ; for it 
 is further written by the commandment of the Holy Spirit 
 that the man to whom Jesus said, Behold thy Mother,” 
 was ‘‘ the disciple whom He loved and these words affix 
 a limit to our belief.. We believe, as we have been taught, 
 
 Mary is “the that it is oiilv the mail whom Jesus loves, and designs to 
 
 Mother of all 
 
 the living.” love, that He gives to His Mother to be her child ; and there- 
 fore, if by a sad chance we hear a man who belongs to 
 those dear to us proclaim that he does not own Mary as his 
 Mother,dt is in our ears almost as if that man was sounding 
 his own etgmal death-knell ; for we know that ever since 
 Christ Jesus uttered that word to the disciple whom He 
 loved, Behold thy Mother,” every holy child of the Church 
 who has aspired to be a disciple whom Jesus loves, has, 
 with many an ardent sigh and prayer, called on Mary, and 
 besought her to be his Mother. And I ask it, brethren, if all 
 this mind of the Saints is a fond delirium, then why, in 
 His infinite mercy, did not our most tender Saviour forbid 
 His inspired servant to pen that record, that He said to the 
 disciple of His love, Behold thy Mother” ? 
 
 17. Surely, brethren, the Church of Christ is justified 
 
PR. pussy’s peacemaker. 
 
 55 
 
 in all her words concerning Mary, and has ample warrant 
 for calling her Mediatrix and jointJabourer with her Son 
 Jesus in the work of man’s redemption, — Mother of God 
 and Mother of man." And they that are scandalised at this 
 teaching of the Church, what are they but witnesses that 
 the old prophecy is still true — that now, as in all time 
 before, there is an enmity between the woman and the ser- 
 pent ? Alas, was it a vision of this island that J ohn saw 
 when it was shown to him that the dragon would, till the “He perse- 
 
 ^ ^ cuted the wo- 
 
 end, persecute the woman who brought forth the man- 
 child, and pour out from his mouth a torrent, in the hope 
 of carrying her away?^ How is it that men have eyes and 
 see not that the very same storm which cast down in this 
 island the images of our Lady also overthrew the altar of 
 His Body and His Blood, and swept away the image of 
 Christ crucified ? Does this not prove that the war must 
 ever rage against both the woman and her seed ? 
 
 18. We have then searched and foupd that the Eter- 
 nal Trinity fixed Their eyes on Mary when she was still a 
 child of this earth, and said to her, ‘‘ Hail, full of grace ; 
 the Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou amongst women.” 
 
 We mark this, and lay it up in our hearts, and with the 
 light of the Church upon us, we argue thus : If the Eter- 
 nal Trinity look down from heaven to earth, and utter 
 this hymn to Mary, does Christ’s Church err in teaching us 
 to look up from earth to heaven, and reecho, in presence 
 of the Mother of God, the anthem which the Father and 
 the Son and the Holy Ghost, in one sweet harmony, ad- 
 
 Apocalypse xii. 13. 
 
56 
 
 THE LADY CHATEL AND DR. TUSEY. 
 
 dressed to her ? If this be all the charge against ns at the 
 Judgment-seat, that we have said to Mary, ^Hail, full of 
 grace!’ O, then, welcome is death, and thrice welcome the 
 Judgment.” 
 
 19. And now, brethren, having seen what our own 
 answer is to be at the Judgment-seat of Christ, nothing 
 remains for us to do but to hope in our hearts that our 
 accusers also may find some plea for the 'work they are 
 doing. And there is, brethren, one plea that may serve them 
 well as yet ; for haply it may be only in ignorance that they 
 write against the Holy Mother of God. If so, their case is 
 the case of Saul ; and as our Blessed Lord stopped short the 
 career of Saul by showing Himself to him, and saying, I 
 am Jesus whom thou persecutest who knows ? the hour 
 may also come when, moved by the prayers of those many 
 former friends who, having found rest, are longing to bring 
 their old companions to the haven, the Blessed Mother of 
 God may also stand revealed in her true character before, 
 the eyes of those who now are her persecutors, and say to 
 them, Why persecute you me ? I am Mary whom you 
 persecute.” If that happy hour do come; O then, at the 
 Judgment-seat of Christ, these men, who now are adver- 
 saries, will shield themselves with that plea which Christ 
 our Saviour bequeathed from His Cross to man, Father, 
 forgive us ; for we knew not what we were doing.” And 
 most heartily we all respond. Amen, amen I 
 * Acts ix. 5. 
 
 London : Robson & Son, Great Northern Printing Works, Pancras Pvoad, N. vY. 
 
DE. PUSEY’S EECENT WOEK 
 
 EEVIEWED IN A LETTEE 
 
 ADDRESSED (bY PERMISSION) TO THE 
 
 MOST REV. H. E. MANNING, D.D. 
 
 BY THE 
 
 VEEY EEV. EEEDEEICK OAKELEY, M.A. 
 
 Solliciti servare nnitatem Spiritus in vinculo pacis. — E ph. iv. 3. 
 
 LONDON : 
 
 LONGMANS, GEEEN, AND CO. 
 
 1866 . 
 
LONDON 
 
 PRINTED DY SPOTTISWOODE AND CO 
 NKW-STEEET SQUARE 
 
LETTER 
 
 TO THE 
 
 MOST REV. E E. MAMINO, E.I). 
 
 My deae Lord Archbishop, 
 
 When I read Dr. Pusby’s recently published work, 
 I felt that it ought to be answered, and that Your 
 Grace was the person to answer it, for this as well as 
 for other reasons, — that it was written with immediate 
 reference to yourself. There is but one plea upon 
 which your friends can acquiesce in your unwillingness 
 to enter upon such a task, and that is, that your in- 
 cessant labours on behalf of your flock leave you 
 scarcely a moment for any occupation which does not 
 come before you in the shape of an imperative duty. 
 It is under these circumstances, and on this ground 
 only, that I have obtained your permission to give 
 utterance to my pressing thoughts upon the work in 
 question, in the form of a Letter to Your Grace. In 
 doing so, however, I wish to premise, that you have no 
 other responsibility in the following pages than such as 
 is implied in the fact of this permission. 
 
4 
 
 THE EIRENICON; ITS TWOFOLD ASPECT 
 
 Dr. Pusey calls liis book an ‘ Eirenicon,’ and I thank 
 him for the word. I thank him yet more for the strong 
 assurances he has since given us of his bond fide desire 
 of peace and reconciliation.* I confess that his book 
 seemed to me to wear a twofold aspect, not covertly, 
 nor disingenuously, but of set purpose. I recognised, 
 indeed, in it quite enough to justify the profession of a 
 pacific object which appears on its titlepage ; but I 
 also fancied that I saw in parts of it symptoms of 
 anotlier purpose, of a controversial, not to say 
 hostile, character ; I mean the desire of frighte nin g 
 inquirers away from the Catholic and Eoman Church, 
 as she is, by a carefully selected series of passages on 
 one great subject of her teaching and practice, put 
 forward rather in the spirit of an advocate pleading a 
 side, than of a mediator balancing difficulties with a 
 view to negotiation. I am rejoiced to find from Dr. 
 Pusey’s explanation of his object, that neither this nor 
 any other portion of his work was conceived in an un- 
 friendly spirit. Under such circumstances, we must all 
 be amply gratified by the fact of one holding so high 
 a position, and possessing so extensive a command over 
 the hearts and consciences of others, feeling himself 
 able, in the face of the world, to declare that he is pre- 
 pared to accept all our de fide doctrines in the true sense 
 of the Church ; and that union with us is the dearest 
 object of his pursuit. This is surely a great step. It 
 seems like a dream, that a claim bearing so great a simi- 
 larity to that for the avowal of which, only twenty years 
 
 * See his Letter in the Weekly Register of November 25. 
 
MODIFIED BY SUBSEQUENT EXPLANATION. 
 
 5 
 
 ago, Mr. Ward was stripped of his M.A. gown by a vote 
 of the Oxford Convocation, and myself suspended from 
 all ministerial functions in the province of Canterbury, 
 by a sentence of the Supreme Ecclesiastical Court, except 
 on condition of a full and free recantation of my ‘ errors,’ 
 should now be advanced by a Canon of Christchurch 
 and a Eegius Professor without reserve, yet without 
 reproach. I think, indeed, that Dr. Pusey’s claim 
 labours under the same defect as Mr. Ward’s, inasmuch 
 as the acceptance of all our de fide doctrines is incon- 
 sistent with the practical rejection of the Pope’s divinely 
 ordained supremacy, which, as I shall presently show, 
 is one of those doctrines. It is not, however, the 
 validity of the claim which is here in question, but the 
 spirit which it indicates, and the boldness of declaring 
 it. Dr. Pusey’s avowal, moreover, not merely involves 
 the acceptance of that interpretation of the Thirty-nine 
 Articles for which Mr. Newman was censured by nearly 
 every Bishop of the Establishment, but goes beyond 
 that interpretation in a Catholic direction, inasmuch as it 
 comprehends the doctrine of Transubstantiation, which 
 Mr. Newman, I believe, never thought to be included 
 within the terms of the Articles. It also goes beyond 
 Mr. Newman’s argument in his Tract, in that it supposes 
 the Catholic sense of the Articles to be their obvious 
 and only true sense, instead of being merely one of the 
 senses which is compatible with honest subscription.* 
 And here I must say in passing, that I think Dr. Pusey 
 somewhat unfair on Mr. Ward in attributing to him the 
 
 * See Appendix. 
 
6 
 
 GENIUS OP THE NATIONAL CHURCH 
 
 unpopularity of Tract XC. ; since, in extending the in- 
 terpretation of the Tract to our doctrine of the Blessed 
 Eucharist, Dr. Pusey is in fact adopting Mr. Ward’s 
 construction of the Articles, and not Mr. Newman’s. 
 For as to saying that the Articles condemn such a view 
 of the doctrine only as overthrows the distinction be- 
 tween the changed Substance and the unchanged Acci- 
 dents, no such view was at any time in question, since 
 it is not the view of the Catholic Church ; and if my 
 memory does not deceive me, there was no single point 
 upon which Mr. Ward insisted, more strongly than this 
 very distinction on which Dr. Pusey also insists. 
 
 I repeat, therefore, that Dr. Pusey’s work seems to 
 me a great and important fact. Yet he must forgive 
 me if I say that, gratifying though this fact be as a 
 proof of his own progress in a Catholic direction, and 
 as an augury of things to come, it does not seem to 
 me to tell in favour of his communion ; but the 
 reverse. What many of us feel with regard to the 
 Anglican Church, in its history during the last twenty 
 years, is, that it has become less and less of a teaching 
 Church. Whenever it has attempted to assume that 
 office through its recognised tribunals, it has taught 
 little else than errors, which have supplied its more 
 orthodox members with repeated occasions for protests 
 and disclaimers. I had always supposed that the great 
 object of the Tractarian Movement was to get the 
 Church of England to come out as a teacher of 
 Catholic Truth ; and it is because this purpose seemed 
 to me to have been practically defeated by the fact 
 of Mr. Newman’s conversion, that I said in a passage 
 
COMPREHENSIVE, NOT DOOMATIC. 
 
 7 
 
 in my ‘Historical Notes’ on that Movement with which 
 Dr. Pusey finds fault, that Mr. Newman’s conversion 
 was its ultimate resolution. I am perfectly aware, as 
 indeed I said, that, subsequently to the epoch in 
 question, there has been a great development of Eitual 
 in the Anglican Communion, and, what is far better, 
 of self-denying charity in forms and ways peculiarly 
 Catholic. The latter is a circumstance full of hope 
 and promise ; of the former I will speak hereafter. 
 I know also — especially from Dr. Pusey’s work, as far 
 as the shortness of the period during which it has 
 been in circulation can enable us to judge on the point — 
 that there is a marvellous advance in the liberty of 
 utterance on doctrinal subjects, and in the public 
 toleration of what are called extreme opinions. But 
 I cannot consent to regard this fact as creditable to 
 the Anglican Church, merely because it happens in 
 this instance to tell on our side. It is impossible to 
 shut one’s eyes to the fact, that the Bishops allow 
 Dr. Pusey and his friends to run out in one line, 
 because they wish to secure an indemnity for Eational- 
 ists. Liberals, and Evangelicals in another. I think 
 their Lordships are far wiser in their generation than 
 their predecessors, and take a far truer view of the 
 genius of the Church in which they hold office. That 
 Church is essentially a national institution, and the 
 nation to which it is accommodated is essentially an 
 undogmatic nation. No one was better aware of this 
 than Queen Elizabeth and her councillors, who con- 
 solidated the work of the so-called Eeformation which 
 Hemy VIII. and Cranmer began. In the time of her 
 
8 
 
 AN UNDOGMATIC CHURCH CAN BE NO 
 
 successors, attempts were more than once made to give 
 to the National Church somewhat of a dogmatic cha- 
 racter ; but their effect was to divide into sections that 
 which was intended, in its first origin, to be a national 
 unity. Nothing is easier than to compass unity, if we 
 choose to abandon dogma. The Anglican Bishops of 
 the present day are seeking to bring their Church 
 more and more into conformity with the Elizabethan 
 model. They are opening it to Eomanisers on the one 
 side, and to Liberals and Nonconformists on the other. 
 Their principle is, ‘Hanc veniam petimusque damusque 
 vicissim.’ This is a state of things which cannot last, 
 and sooner or later there will be a conflict and a break 
 up ; for an external and merely political union cannot 
 assimilate sincere minds of an opposite cast. This, 
 however, is not my present point. What I wish to 
 note is, that a Church — so to call it — in which aU 
 opinions are tolerated except those which conflict with 
 some national prejudice more powerful than the love 
 of toleration, and in which there is absolutely no living 
 voice to determine authoritatively and finally which of 
 such opinions is right and which is wrong, is no 
 Church at all, in any sense which consists, I will not 
 say with the theory of Eome, but with the language 
 of Scripture, and the teaching of the Fathers ; and as 
 such ought, I think, to be repudiated quite as much 
 by Dr. Pusey as by ourselves. When, therefore. Your 
 Grace said that the Established Church could be in no 
 sense a ‘bulwark’ against Infidelity, I understood you 
 to refer to this absence of any authoritative and di- 
 rective power Avithin it. I did not understand you to 
 
BULWAEK AGAINST INFIDELITY. 
 
 9 
 
 deny that, as the great organ of Conservatism in this 
 country, it lias exercised a certain, though constantly 
 diminishing, influence in controlling the excesses or 
 checking the inroads of circumambient unbelief. But 
 I am at a loss to understand, quite as much as yourself, 
 how there can be any trustworthy safeguard against 
 the extremest developments of intellectual self-will, 
 except in a Church which teaches, not merely in her 
 recognised formularies, but in her every practical 
 manifestation, that there is an Objective Truth, the 
 nature and limits of which she leaves her members 
 without even the shadow of an excuse for misunder- 
 standing. What we have principally to deplore in the 
 religious condition of this country is a profound 
 spiritual lethargy — a total insensibility to the realities 
 of any world but the present ; compared with which 
 even the strong reaction from a lively faith into posi- 
 tive infidelity, which has sometimes been witnessed in 
 Catholic countries (as in France, at the time of the 
 Great Eevolution), terrible as it is, is an evil that 
 indicates a far less desperate malady in the moral 
 constitution of a people. I am far from denying that 
 positive infidelity prevails also to a very considerable 
 extent in this country. No one who reads our popular 
 literature with attention can doubt this fact; and I 
 know it to be the opinion of excellent Catholics of the 
 middle class, who hold mercantile and official situ- 
 ations, that, in that class of Protestants, infidelity is 
 greatly on the increase. As mere secular education 
 is extended, and the Established Church comes to be 
 more and more amalgamated with sects which do not 
 
10 
 
 RITUAL APART PROM DOGMA 
 
 even recognise the principle of authority, there can be 
 httle doubt that what is now a smothered fire, will 
 break out into something like an open conflagration. 
 Then will be found, I fear too late, the hopelessness of 
 attempting to cope with the spirit of infidelity, except- 
 ing by means of a dogmatic and infallible Church. 
 
 The start which has been made during the last few 
 years, in the direction of ceremonial religion, apart 
 from any corresponding advances in sensitiveness to 
 the necessity of an ordained provision for dogmatic 
 teaching, appears to me to be, not only not a gain, but 
 a distinct and conspicuous evil. It can have no other 
 effect than to amuse with mere baubles a number of 
 good men who mistake the form for the substance. 
 The rites and ceremonies of religion are not only 
 most beautiful in themselves, but react powerfully 
 upon its truths, when they are the natural expressions 
 of those truths, and are so understood by all who 
 witness them ; but they can no more teach religion of 
 themselves, or be a substitute for it, than the emblazoned 
 pall which covers the corpse of a monarch can sustain 
 the idea of a living royalty. I do not, indeed, deny 
 that these mimicries of Catholic ceremonial may do 
 us a service in familiarising the minds of Englishmen 
 with a type of worship which had been totally ob- 
 literated ; but this is a very different thing from saying 
 that they represent a reality where they are, or can be 
 otherwise than most injurious to those who delight in 
 them, by leading them to confound the outward show 
 with the true spirit of Catholicity. But even this is 
 scarcely their worst residt. They cannot be practised 
 
WORSE TUAN USELESS. 
 
 11 
 
 without entailing a system of equivocation and com- 
 promise highly prejudicial to the moral sense. The 
 only legitimate interpreter of doubtful Eubrics is 
 the Ordinary ; and it certainly cannot be said, either 
 that the Eubrics on which these practices are founded 
 are clearly in their favour, or that an explanation of 
 their ambiguities is usually sought from the living 
 authority. Hence, a considerable body of the Clergy 
 are constantly seeking to hoodwink their Bishops, who 
 are themselves not very impatient of the process ; and 
 thus the Catholic principles of authority and obedience 
 find their counterpart in a mutual relation of connivance 
 and evasion. 
 
 But offensive controversy is always an ungracious 
 task, and I gladly pass from it to that department of 
 my subject which is less concerned with attacking the 
 position of others than with defending our own. Here I 
 am at once introduced into a wide field. Hr. Pusey, 
 like those who have preceded him, draws a broad dis- 
 tinction between the dogmatic statements of the Church 
 and her practical system. He considers, and rightly 
 considers, that anyone who submits to the Catholic 
 Church is at once introduced into an entirely new 
 atmosphere of thought, habit, and association, which is 
 not, and cannot be, fully represented by the precise 
 and measured language of doctrinal formularies. So 
 far he is certainly in the right. Where I humbly con- 
 ceive that he is mistaken is, in supposing that the 
 character and effects of that which he calls our practical 
 system can be duly estimated by those tokens of it 
 which protrude from within its limits, into the sphere 
 
12 PERSONAL EXPERIENCE OP CATHOLIC SYSTEM. 
 
 of external observation. He says, as I should have 
 expected from one so dutiful to authority, that he could 
 never consent to enter the Catholic Church in the 
 spirit of an objector or a critic. I will venture to say, 
 most confidently, that I believe if he ever did enter it, 
 he would find not even the temptation to contravene so 
 excellent an intention. I can fully understand the sort 
 of nervous apprehension which any thoughtful Angli- 
 can must experience in the idea, that, on becoming a 
 Catholic, he will have to enter upon a kind of terra 
 incognita, of whose inhabitants and productions he 
 knows nothing ; and more than suspects that when he 
 has reached it he will find himself in a strait between 
 the difficulty of accommodating himself to its strange 
 properties on the one hand, and, on the other, of 
 retracing an irrevocable step ; and, of course, the 
 anxieties of such a prospect are increased in proportion 
 as we grow older, and become more thoroughly accli- 
 matised to the land of our birth. I can understand 
 this state of mind, for I have experienced it, and re- 
 member to have described it, under the pressure of its 
 embarrassment, about a year before I became a Catholic, 
 in a letter which appeared in the ‘English Churchman.’ 
 The apprehension which I there expressed was that, if 
 I entered the Eoman Communion, I should find my 
 conscience and my duty to the Church continually at 
 cross purposes ; and I remember that the subject 
 especially present to my mind was, that of certain 
 popular devotions which I then felt that I could not 
 adopt as a good Christian, and should not be allowed 
 to decline as a good Catholic. But, as time went on, I 
 
PRACTICAL SYSTEM OF THE CHURCH VINDICATED. 
 
 came to the conclusion that the act from which I so 
 recoiled might be what Mr. Newman had called one of 
 the ‘ ventures of faith,’ and that the very quality of faith 
 which had been honourably commemorated in the case 
 of him who is called, by way of eminence, the ‘ Father 
 of the Faithful,’ was, that he followed God’s leading, 
 
 ‘ not knowing whither he went.’ When I say that 
 never for one single instant, since I entered the Holy 
 Catholic and Koman Church, have I been able even to 
 realise the state of mind under which I expressed the 
 anxiety in question, I know that such a saying may be 
 regarded as a controversial expedient, or imputed to 
 circumstances of some special kind ; yet I will say it, 
 however it be understood, as a public expression of my 
 thankfulness to God for giving me, amid whatever other 
 evidences of His chastening love, no practical expe- 
 rience of so terrible a trial. 
 
 I am aware, however, that personal experience is 
 not argument, and, therefore, I must address myself to 
 two topics of a more general kind. The first, that 
 from the very fact of the Catholic religion being a living 
 reality, and not a mere documentary system, that 
 religion cannot be comprehended within the limits of 
 formularies, but must necessarily expand into a vast 
 body of traditions, and logical deductions from its 
 ascertained dogmas and principles, the fruit of pious 
 minds constantly energising within it ; the second, that 
 what is called the practical system of the Catholic 
 Church is, in fact, at once the consequence and the 
 evidence of our religion being such a reality ; and that 
 this system is entirely consistent with the doctrinal 
 
14 
 
 PKACTICAL SYSTEM OP THE CHUKCH 
 
 foundations, out of which it springs, though going 
 beyond those foundations, as the legitimate conclusions 
 of true premisses may be said to go beyond the pre- 
 misses in which they lie hidden. 
 
 Grod the Holy Ghost is the Creator of the Church, 
 and it is in Him that the Church lives and moves and 
 has its being. When He vouchsafed to form it on the 
 Day of Pentecost, He not only descended on the heads 
 of the Apostles, but filled the whole room in which they 
 were gathered together with Mary their Queen, and 
 others of our Lord’s disciples. He guided them, as the 
 Lord had promised, ‘ into all truth.’ All that man is 
 required to believe unto salvation — all that ever has 
 been, or that ever will be, drawn out into the shape of 
 explicit dogma, was virtually and implicitly contained 
 in that one original revelation ; but together with it 
 there was infused into the Church the principle of life, 
 and a power, analogous to that annexed in the creation 
 of the material world to animal and vegetable nature, — 
 the power of continuous reproduction in forms in- 
 definitely various in their details, but all of them 
 founded essentially upon the original type. Hence the 
 Church, when viewed at any period of her subsequent 
 history, presents the appearance, not of a sterile form or 
 stereotyped literature, but of a world teeming with 
 spiritual animation. Here is the theologian working out 
 the problems of his science from its elementary axioms ; 
 there is the Saint following out a train of thought on 
 the Incarnation, and resting with holy rapture on in- 
 ferences, strictly within the terms of the Faith, yet hidden 
 from minds less purified from earthly stain, or less prac- 
 
THE FRUIT AND EVIDENCE OF HER LIFE. 15 
 
 tised in the exercise of mental prayer ; while, in addition 
 to the fruits which are continually added to the Church’s 
 store of untechnical and traditionary knowledge, she is 
 always gathering in fresh resources of the same kind from 
 the attestation of miracles, the illustrations of saintly 
 example, the growth and influence of popular devotions, 
 the comparison of experiences, the collision with 
 error, and many other such outward manifestations of 
 a pervading and vigorous life. It is thus that the 
 Church weaves around her, as it were, a network of 
 associations out of materials within herself, which is at 
 once the evidence of her activity, and the protection of 
 her weakness. This is what men call her popular 
 system ; the assemblage of secondary and inferential 
 doctrines constantly accruing from her energetic action, 
 and gathering round her steps in multiphed profusion 
 as she hastens down the course of ages. In this retinue 
 of concomitant illustrations the Mediaeval Church was 
 richer than the Primitive, and the Present is richer 
 than the Mediaeval. Had not the Church been gifted 
 with this principle of enduring life and prolific repro- 
 duction of new forms, according to an original standard, 
 every succeeding age would have carried her further 
 and further from the source of her purity ; and this is 
 what her enemies or critics, who do not understand 
 her character, are apt to urge to her disadvantage, 
 because they judge her according to the measure of 
 mere human institutions. As it is, however, she can 
 grow old without ceasing to be young. 
 
 Jam senior, sed cruda Deae viridisque senectus. 
 
16 
 
 PRACTICAL SYSTEM OP THE CHURCH 
 
 Nay, it is predicted of her that her youth shall be 
 renewed as that of the eagle; it is ever becoming 
 more beautiful, more vigorous ; for thus it must needs 
 be, since the Saints sustain and propagate the life of 
 the Spirit within the Church, for the Saints are of no 
 single age, but each successive age is enriched by the 
 experiences of those that have gone before. Dr. 
 Pusey and others who look at us from without, always 
 seem to argue as if what they call the popular system 
 of the Eoman Church were something which is of the 
 ‘earth earthy’ — a mass of corruption — the product of 
 human infirmity or perversity, by which the pure gold 
 of Primitive Christianity is hidden or dimmed. What 
 they desire is to see the Church relieved of this 
 incubus, as they regard it ; to drive her within the 
 entrenchments of her ruled and abstract definitions. 
 Thus Dr. Pusey would appeal from our theologians to 
 the Church, as if the two witnesses were not consentient 
 in their evidence. The whole practical and devotional 
 expression of the Church’s mind he seems to look upon 
 as a kind of traditionary gloss, like that by which the 
 Pharisees obscured the law of Moses. This is a view 
 of the case against which we from within must 
 strenuously protest as tantamount to a denial of a 
 Divine Presence constantly within the Church, by 
 which she is secured from errancy, not only in her 
 formal decisions, but in all which relates to the spiritual 
 government of her members, so far as it comes within 
 the sphere of her responsibility. We can no more 
 conceive of the Church without this great accessory 
 system, the work of her theologians and of her Saints, 
 
NOT EXEMPT FROM EFFECTS OF HUMAN FRAILTY. 17 
 
 than of the material world divested of the atmosphere 
 which surrounds and permeates it. We do not place’ 
 this superstructure in the same category with the dog- 
 matic foundations on which it rests. We do not say 
 that heresy is necessarily implied in rejecting it in this 
 or the other of its details ; but we do say that, to tie 
 the Church down to her formal and abstract enact- 
 ments on Articles of the Faith — to deny not only that 
 she may, but that she must, go beyond them, though 
 never beside them, in her practical teaching — to pre- 
 sume that we can be competent judges as to the true 
 relation between certain doctrines and practices ap- 
 proved by the Church where our judgment is at 
 variance with that of the Church herself, who, under 
 the direction of the Indwelling Spirit, determines such 
 practices to be the legitimate result of such doctrines 
 — all this is quite inconsistent with believing the 
 Church to be abidingly ruled by the Spirit of God, 
 and is only not heresy in the concrete, because it is the 
 very essence of heresy itself. 
 
 Of course we do not forget that we have this 
 treasure in earthen vessels ; that God has been pleased 
 to commit the dispensation of His grace to weak and 
 fallible human instruments ; and that, in the actual 
 manifestations of the Church in this or that place at 
 any given time, there may be defects, and even abuses, 
 blended with that popular system which in itself is 
 but the necessary result of an organic and constantly 
 throbbing life. It is also quite possible that the Church 
 may not always expel these spots ‘ and wrinkles ’ from 
 her visible constitution with the promptitude which 
 
 B 
 
18 
 
 PARTIAL AND OCCASIONAL ABUSES 
 
 our indignant and impatient zeal may require at her 
 hands. In such cases it is surely the instinct of faith 
 and loyalty to give her credit for a prudence exceeding 
 our own. There is such a thing as fearing to pluck 
 up wheat with the tares. The line which divides 
 superstition from faith is as fine as a hair, and the eye 
 of a diviner wisdom may see faith where a calculating 
 human prudence sees only credulity. Again : Inter- 
 positions of authority are in their very nature solemn 
 and final acts, such as all wise governments reserve for 
 extreme cases, and especially a government on whose 
 acts the most momentous issues are suspended. Then, 
 again, the wickedness or the waywardness of man may 
 turn the most wholesome laws to a selfish or an evil 
 purpose, or break loose into excesses which no re- 
 straints of rule can control ; and thus the outward 
 aspect of the Church may be prejudiced in the eyes of 
 those who judge her by superficial tokens. Under the 
 former of these heads may be classed the possibly 
 avaricious abuse of so needful and apostolic a regu- 
 lation as that by which a priest is allowed to receive 
 an alms, or, as it is commonly called, a ‘ retribution,’ 
 apportioned to the exigencies of his maintenance, for 
 masses said at the request of another ; a regulation 
 literally in accordance with St. Paul’s words, that they 
 who minister at the altar should live by the altar. 
 As an instance of the second case, we may refer to 
 occasional popidar excesses, or mistakes, in devotion, 
 often rigidly interpreted by casual observers as indi- 
 cations of the formal teaching of the Church ; as if 
 every act or gesture of a class proverbially undiscrimi- 
 
NOT ALWAYS AMENABLE TO DISCIPLINE. 
 
 19 
 
 Dating could be brought under the hand of a power 
 whose course is ordered by considerations upon which 
 it is quite impossible that individuals, and, least of all, 
 Protestants, should be competent to decide. All that 
 is needed is faith in the Divine authority, and constant 
 supernatural guidance of the Church in the government 
 of her members as a body, in regard to all which 
 relates to their eternal welfare. 
 
 I am next to show that a Catholic is bound to no 
 view of doctrine or practice of devotion, which is not 
 a legitimate result of the teaching of Holy Scripture, 
 as embodied in the doctrinal decrees of the Church. 
 I refer here more particularly to our teaching and 
 practice on the subject of the Blessed Virgin, both 
 because it is this which forms the kernel of our 
 popular system, as distinguished from all non-catholic 
 communities, and because it is this which is the gist 
 of Dr. Pusey’s objection to the Holy Catholic and 
 Eoman Church as she is. 
 
 I distinctly and emphatically deny that there is any 
 view of the prerogatives and office of the Blessed 
 Virgin which assigns to her the place of dignity and 
 extent of power imphed in the scriptural representation 
 of her, as symbolised in the Apostles’ Creed, except 
 that which is expressed in the largest and fullest 
 development of approved Catholic devotion. The 
 germ of that expanded flower is contained in the 
 words ‘ Hatus ex Maria Virgine.’ A meditation on the 
 narrative of the Annunciation in St. Luke’s Gospel is 
 alone sufficient to account for the most extreme of the 
 doctrinal and devotional expressions which Dr. Pusey 
 
20 CATHOLIC ESTIMATE OP THE BLESSED VIRGIIT 
 
 has produced ; yet I cannot but observe, in this place, 
 that there is no mode of controversy less fair than that 
 of stringing together a collection of single passages 
 apart from their context, and of subjecting to the rules 
 of hard and technical criticism the fervid language of 
 bold and untechnical devotion. It is a course, I must 
 plainly say, seemingly at variance with the profes- 
 sion of peace which will be apt to attract to Dr. 
 Pusey’s work readers whom its contents will griev- 
 ously disappoint. Those who are unfamiliar with our 
 doctrines will be simply shocked and perplexed by 
 phrases or reasonings to which nothing in their previous 
 habits of religious thought presents either parallel or 
 clue to their interpretation ; and even Catholics, un- 
 accustomed to pursue elementary truths to their legiti- 
 mate consequences, may be startled for the moment 
 by the exhibition of those truths in a form so unusual 
 and so abrupt. If Dr. Pusey considers such results as 
 a gain to the cause of religious truth, he will undoubt- 
 edly have answered his purpose, at least for the time 
 being, by the form into which he has cast his objections. 
 But I do not think that the impression he may have 
 created will be durable. He will at least have opened 
 a great question to the minds of many who will scarcely 
 be prepared to rest in his solution of it. He will lead 
 many to the conclusion that the love and cultus of the 
 Blessed Virgin must be either an extreme or a nullity ; 
 that, unless we be prepared to degrade her office as the 
 Mother of our Eedeemer, and the great instrument of 
 that dispensation whence flow all blessings to the 
 human race, we cannot stop short of ascribing to her 
 
FOUJfDED ON HOLY SCRIPTURE AND THE CREEDS. 21 
 
 even the most majestic of those titles, and the most 
 transcendant of those privileges, which have been 
 found for her in the pious inventions of saintly love. 
 It is quite as much for the consolation and reassurance 
 of my own brethren as for the conviction of those who 
 are separated from us, that I feel it my duty to justify 
 this controversial position. 
 
 ‘ Qui conceptus est de Spiritu Sancto, natus ex MariS. 
 Virgine.’ These words, I repeat, contain the justifica- 
 tion of all that theologians have concluded, or saints 
 conceived, of the prerogatives of the Blessed Virgin, or 
 of the honour due to her.* They open a view of her 
 relation to the Most Holy Trinity which raises her all 
 but infinitely above every other created being. Not 
 only the highest of saints, but the highest of archangels, 
 takes a rank indefinitely below her. If God the Father 
 thus elected her from all eternity to be the Mother of 
 His Only Begotten Son, through the immediate opera- 
 
 * I mean, of course, to confine this remark to writers of established 
 reputation in the Church, and with due allowance for human infirmity, 
 and varieties of character and temperament. Persons often argue as if 
 the Church made herself responsible for every work, and every phrase 
 in every work, which she has not expressly censured. But there are 
 many intervening conditions between the publication of even a question- 
 able work and the declaration of the censure which it may merit. There 
 are, for instance, works so unimportant that to make them the subject of 
 formal censure would be like ^ crushing a butterfly on a wheel.’ Again : 
 the Holy See may judge, in its wisdom, that an extreme indulgence is 
 due to the casual expressions of one who has done the Church good 
 service, or of a work the general purport and tenour of which is good and 
 edifying. 
 
 This may be a suitable opportunity of observing that Dr. Pusey has 
 quoted largely from a writer named Oswald. I pronounce no opinion 
 upon the merits of this writer as a theologian ; but I may remark, that no 
 Catholic I have met with, even of those versed in our theological litera- 
 ture, has ever heard of his name. 
 
2-2 
 
 ‘ HOMO EST EX SUBSTANTli MATRIS.’ 
 
 tion of the Holy Ghost, then is there no hyperbole but 
 simple scriptural truth in the Catholic enumeration of 
 her relationships to the Three Divine Persons, as 
 Daughter of the Eternal Father, Mother of the Eternal 
 Son, and Spouse of the Holy Ghost. Yet what Pro- 
 testant is there who, if this description of our Blessed 
 Lady were abruptly set before him, would not instinc- 
 tively recoil from it as exaggerated and even blas- 
 phemous ? 
 
 Then let us consider what is involved in the title, 
 ‘ Mother of God,’ by which the Ephesian Council sym- 
 bolised the dogma of the Divine Personality of our 
 Lord against the heresy of Nestorius ; thus drawing 
 out into explicit shape the truth, not less really, though 
 less formally, contained in the second article of the 
 Apostles’ Creed, — ‘ Et in Jesum Christum, Eihum Ejus 
 Unicum, Dominum nostrum, qui conceptus est de 
 Spiritu Sancto, natus ex Maria Virgine.’ The Blessed 
 Virgin stands precisely in the same relation to God, 
 her Creator and Eedeemer, in which every mother 
 stands towards the child of her love. Of two whole 
 and perfect Natures which are united, each with its own 
 properties distinct, in the One Person of our Incarnate 
 God, that of His Manhood is given Him by the Blesse 
 Virgin. In the words of that grandest of dogmatic 
 psalms, the Athanasian symbol, ‘ Deus est ex substantia 
 Patris ante specula genitus, et Homo est ex substantia 
 Matris in sa3culo natus.’ Hence it follows necessarily, 
 that whatever appertained to the humanity of the Son 
 of God, except His human Soul, was of the Blessed 
 Virgin, before He took it into union with the Godhead, 
 
CONSEQUENCES OP THIS BELIEF. 
 
 23 
 
 and did not cease to have been once hers by becoming 
 His. It was through her instrumentality that He was 
 born into the world, and born with a nature in which 
 He could share our infirmities, appear among men in 
 visible shape, touch and be touched, hunger, thirst, be 
 weary, suffer, die, be buried, rise again, and carry up 
 our common humanity to the right hand of His Eternal 
 Father. This, and nothing less than this, is what the 
 Blessed Virgin has done for man ; this, and nothing 
 less than this, is the part she has in the nature of the 
 Incarnate God. And little as such an element enters 
 into an ordinary Catholic’s habitual idea of the Blessed 
 Eucharist, it is a matter not of pious inference merely, 
 but of simple fact, that the Precious Blood we therein 
 receive is the blood derived from Mary, though infinitely 
 exalted by its union with the Divinity in the Person of 
 her Son. And this is certain, even though we admit, 
 as we may safely do, the operation in the case of our 
 Divine Lord of those physical changes which the human 
 frame is considered to undergo in the progress of life. 
 In the same sense, surely, in which we say that the 
 blood of our parents and ancestors flows in our veins 
 (those physical changes notwithstanding), and with the 
 necessary limitation expressed above, we may also say, 
 and truly say, that the blood of the Blessed Virgin was 
 in her Son from first to last, and is, therefore, in that 
 wondrous communication of Himself which He makes 
 to us in the Blessed Eucharist. 
 
 Whatever is wanting to the doctrine of our Blessed 
 Lady’s privileges and claims as involved in the simple 
 statement that God the Son was born of lier, is sup- 
 
24 SCRIPTURE NARRATIVE OP THE ANNUNCIATION. 
 
 plied by the literal and inevitable meaning of other 
 passages in the Holy Scriptures. Let us take, for in- 
 stance, the narrative of the Annunciation in St. Luke’s 
 Gospel. The position there assigned to the Blessed 
 Virgin is surely something quite different from that 
 of any ordinary recipient of a Divine communication. 
 The Archangel, as it has often been said, does not lay 
 the Holy Virgin under the obligation of instant submis- 
 sion, as though she were a mere subject, but treats 
 with her as an ambassador bearing a message of love 
 to a sovereign princess. He listens respectfully to her 
 pleas of demur and hesitation, and disposes of them 
 not as though they were the difficulties of incredulity, 
 but as the suggestions of a brightly illuminated con- 
 science. The same question, ‘ How shall these things 
 be ? ’ which in Zachary is reproved as a note of unbelief, 
 is in her virtually commended as an instinct of humi- 
 lity and purity. The Blessed Virgin must be convinced 
 before the Divine commission can be entrusted to her. 
 She must express her free and unbiassed consent, before 
 the human race can be redeemed in the manner fore- 
 ordained of God ; yet foreordained, in such sense as 
 to consist with the freedom, and depend on the concur- 
 rence of the Blessed Virgin. Now, all this being so, I 
 cannot see that those spiritual writers, who have gone 
 the length of attributing to the Blessed Virgin a certain 
 co-ordinate yet wholly subordinate office in the re- 
 demption of the world, have done more than pursue 
 this revelation of the inspired Word of God into its 
 legitimate logical results ; nor can I see (though I ad- 
 mit this to be rather the pious inference of devotion, 
 
PROPHECY IN GENESIS, C. iii. V. 15 . 25 
 
 than the logical conclusion of dogma) that any more 
 direct share in the unapproachable office of our Ee- 
 deemer is ascribed to His Blessed Mother in regarding 
 the Passion itself as suspended upon her consent, than 
 is implied in the intimacy thus proved by the language 
 of Scripture itself to have existed from the first between 
 the decrees of the Most Holy Trinity and the free-will 
 of the Blessed Virgin. 
 
 I now come to what we regard as the scriptural 
 germ of every doctrine, and the legitimate ground of 
 every authorised devotion on the subject of the Blessed 
 Virgin, — I mean the prediction of her office in the 
 Christian Dispensation uttered by Almighty God at the 
 time of the Fall. It is most unfair to commit the 
 argument founded on this prediction to the uncer- 
 tainties of the controversy as to the words ‘ Ipsa ’ or 
 ‘ Ipsum ; ’ since, if the clause of the prediction with 
 respect to which that question has been raised were 
 wholly obliterated from the sacred text, the remnant of 
 it would be abundantly sufficient for the purposes of 
 our argument : ‘ The Lord God said unto the serpent, I 
 will put enmities between thee and the woman, and 
 between thy seed and her seed.’ That, by the woman 
 in this passage must be intended the true Mother of the 
 Divine Seed is a position about which, I suppose, there 
 is no second opinion among pious believers, or indeed 
 among careful readers of the sacred text, whatever be 
 their religious opinions. It cannot surely be pretended, 
 that a relation of internecine warfare was estabhshed 
 between fallen Eve and the Tempter by whom she 
 had fallen ; whereas, if we understand by the ‘ woman ’ 
 
26 
 
 THE FIRST AND SECOND EVE. 
 
 to be meant the second Eve through whose instru- 
 mentality the curse of the Fall was revoked, the force 
 of the prediction becomes lucidly apparent. There is 
 something very remarkable in the manner in which this 
 title of ‘the Woman’ seems to be throughout the 
 Scriptures the especial property of the Blessed Virgin. 
 This view is followed out as part of the Scripture testi- 
 mony to our Lady, in an article which appeared in the 
 ‘ Dublin Eeview ’ for January 1865. Here I will but 
 observe its possible bearing upon the use of that phrase 
 by our Lord in addressing His most Holy Mother at the 
 marriage of Cana, and at the Crucifixion. It is also a 
 most significant fact, that the Blessed Virgin should be 
 spoken of in the Apocalypse, under the very same title 
 by which she is described, in the third chapter of 
 Genesis, as the principal antagonist of the Tempter. It 
 would be a far more prolific theme of sacred reflection 
 than I can possibly enter upon in this necessarily brief 
 review of a great subject, to describe the various 
 ‘ enmities ’ which have subsisted between the glorious 
 Second Eve and the seducer of the First, as well as 
 between her Divine Seed and the feU progeny of her 
 antagonist. 
 
 The antithetic parallel between the office of the First 
 and Second Eve lies at the root of all our teaching on 
 the subject of the Blessed Virgin, and especially of the 
 doctrine of her Immaculate Conception. As our Lord 
 was the Second Adam, so was His Blessed Mother the 
 Second Eve. As the first Eve was the parent of cor- 
 ruption, so is the second the authoress of the dispensa- 
 tion of grace ; the authoress of course I mean in virtue 
 
THE IMMACULATE CONCEPTION. 
 
 27 
 
 of her appointment to that office by Almighty God, and 
 as qualified for the fulfilment of it through the anti- 
 cipated merits of her Divine Son. What may be called 
 the moral fitness of the doctrine of the Immaculate 
 Conception is beautifully pointed out by Dr. Newman 
 in the following passage : — 
 
 ‘ The course of ages was to be reversed ; the tradition of 
 evil to be broken; a gate of light to be opened amid the 
 darkness for the coming of the Just ; a Virgin conceived and 
 bore Him. It was fitting for His honour and glory, that she 
 who was the instrument of his bodily presence should first he 
 a miracle of His grace; it was fitting that she should triumph 
 where Eve had failed, and should “ bruise the serpent’s head ” 
 by the spotlessness of her sanctity. ... As grace was infused 
 into Adam from the first moment of his creation, so that he 
 never had experience of his natural poverty till sin seduced 
 him to it, so was grace given in still ampler measure to Mary, 
 and she was a stranger to Adam’s deprivation. ... If Adam 
 might have kept himself from sin in his first state, much 
 more shall we expect immaculate perfection in Mary.’ * 
 
 Objectors to the doctrine are fond of appealing to 
 the testimony of St. Bernard and St. Thomas, but they 
 uniformly forget to state that St. Bernard in direct 
 terms, and St. Thomas of course by implication, make 
 a reserve in favour of any subsequent definition of the 
 Holy See. The private opinion, even of Saints, upon 
 an open question of theology, cannot be pleaded in 
 arrest of a later authoritative judgment of the Church, 
 without striking at the root of her whole dogmatic 
 system. With regard to the mode in which her in- 
 fallible judgment was arrived at and expressed in the 
 
 Discourses to Mixed Congregations, Discourse XVII. 
 
28 DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MODIFIED 
 
 case of this great dogma of the Faith, I may have 
 something to say further on : here I will only remark 
 in passing, that every requirement, even of the lowest 
 theory of infallibility, is satisfied by a dogmatic 
 decision which emanates from the Sovereign Pontiff 
 speaking ex cathedra, and has subsequently been ac- 
 cepted by the collective Episcopate of the Eoman 
 obedience. 
 
 I pass now to the question of the Catholic devotion 
 to the Blessed Virgin in its general aspect and charac- 
 teristic features. And here I will say, that I think it 
 quite impossible for any one to judge fairly of this de- 
 votion who is not himself a Catholic in the constant 
 use of it, and of its concomitant practices. Cardinal 
 Wiseman, somewhere, illustrates the difference between 
 our devotional system, as viewed from without and 
 from within, by a very apt and beautiful similitude. 
 He says that it is like a painted window in a church, 
 which, as seen by an external observer, presents no idea 
 but that of an indistinct and unsightly mass ; whereas, 
 those who view it from within the church are able to 
 appreciate the beauty of its design, and the harmony 
 of its colouring. Much, no doubt, of the intense dis- 
 like which Protestants and Anglicans feel to the cultus 
 of the Blessed Virgin, is founded in a just appreciation 
 of the claims of our Blessed Lord, with which this 
 cultus seems to them inconsistent, and ought therefore 
 to be treated by us with great forbearance and sym- 
 pathy. What we know experimentally, and they can 
 hardly understand in the abstract, is the power of a 
 Catholic’s habitual estimate of his Lord’s inalienable 
 
BY OTHER PARTS OF THE CATHOLIC SYSTEM. 
 
 29 
 
 and unapproachable prerogatives in supplying the in- 
 terpretation, and modifying the strength, of even the 
 most extreme forms of devotion to His Most Holy 
 Mother. The great means of working this estimate 
 into the texture of the Catholic mind is the daily ob- 
 lation of the Sacrifice of the New Law. But it is also 
 created by a whole series of penetrating and transform- 
 ing devotions, which tend to bring out the subject of 
 our Lord’s work for sinners in a way most difficult to 
 be understood by those who do not realise their effects 
 by experience. Such, for instance, are the devotions 
 to the Blessed Sacrament as a special Object of loving 
 adoration, apart from the daily oblation of Mass. Such 
 also, in a very especial manner, is the devotion to the 
 Sacred Heart of Jesus, — to His Most Precious Blood, to 
 His Five Wounds, to the very instruments of His Pas- 
 sion ; and again that practice so popular, especially 
 with the poor, of performing the Stations of the Cross. 
 It may be taken as an undoubted fact, that devotion to 
 the Blessed Virgin is never an insulated manifestation 
 of Catholic piety. Where Catholics are not devout to 
 our Lord, they are not devout to His Mother, and 
 vice versa ; but I have never happened to meet with 
 an instance of extraordinary devotion to the Blessed 
 Virgin, without a corresponding expansion of piety 
 in other directions. I know it is commonly said, that 
 the merciful attributes of the Blessed Virgin are made 
 by uninstructed Catholics an excuse for the commission 
 of sin. I will not go so far as to plead my own limited 
 experience against an equally authentic testimony in 
 favour of such an abuse ; nor, indeed, were it clearly 
 
30 SUPPOSED ABUSE OP DEVOTION TO THE B. VIRGIN, 
 
 slio'wn to exist, would it prove anything more than a 
 new illustration of the poet’s words, that ‘ Noblest 
 things find vilest using.’ Yet I will say, upon the 
 word of a priest and confessor of nearly seventeen years’ 
 standing, that I have never met with a case of the 
 kind. I have always found, on the contrary, that one 
 of the first symptoms of spiritual decline is the decay 
 of devotion to the Blessed Virgin ; and that they who 
 realise enough of her office to know that she is our 
 true Mother of Mercy cannot, if they would, divest 
 themselves of the salutary impression, that she is also 
 the purest of God’s creatures, and that, as such, she is 
 abhorrent of sin in all its forms. Of course there is 
 always a danger that sinners will be tempted to lay too 
 great a stress on the merciful aspects of religion ; but 
 this they do, even where devotion to the Blessed 
 Virgin is out of the question. It must be one of the 
 duties of Christian preachers to guard that devotion 
 from any such fearful abuse as that of being made 
 subservient to the purposes of sin. To show that I 
 myself am not insensible to this danger (though I 
 repeat that I have no experimental acquaintance with 
 it), I will quote words which I published before I knew 
 that I should be required to defend devotion to the 
 Blessed Virgin against this specific charge. I say in a 
 little volume of sacred poetry which I put out last 
 spring, speaking of the Blessed Virgin : 
 
 But woe to them, that in thy mercy trace 
 
 Deceitful hues of peace that ne’er shall come ^ 
 
 And in the sorrowing sinner’s pledge of grace, 
 
 Forget the harden’d sinner’s threat of doom. 
 
PROTESTS AGAINST IT. 
 
 31 
 
 And again : — 
 
 Bend, 0 ye angels, o’er the precious sight ; 
 
 Return abash’d, ye sinners, from the view ; 
 
 Humbled, yet thankful, that a Queen so bright, 
 
 Should yearn with all a mother’s heart o’er you. 
 
 Yet, while ye claim her sweet indulgent aid, 
 
 Seek ye the grace her life to imitate. 
 
 We cannot love the spotless Mother- maid. 
 
 And love the sin which was her only hate.* 
 
 I cannot conclude this part of my subject without 
 quoting a passage which is directly to the present point, 
 from one of those very writers who is thought by 
 Dr. Pusey to exceed unwarrantably in the line of 
 Marian devotion. In a treatise on that subject, which 
 it was one of the latest acts of Pather Faber to trans- 
 late literally into English, the Venerable Grignon de 
 Montfort has the following words : — 
 
 ^Presumptuous devotees are sinners abandoned to their 
 passions, or lovers of the world, who, under the fair name 
 of Christians and clients of our Blessed Lady, conceal pride, 
 avarice, impurity, drunkenness, anger, swearing, detraction, 
 injustice, or some other sin. They sleep in peace in the 
 midst of their bad habits, without doing any violence to 
 themselves to correct their faults, under the pretext that they 
 are devout to the Blessed Virgin. They promise themselves 
 that Grod will pardon them ; that they will not be allowed to 
 die without confession ; and that they will not be lost eter- 
 nally, because they say the Rosary, because they fast on 
 Saturdays, because they belong to the Confraternity of the 
 Holy Rosary, or wear the Scapular, or are enrolled in other 
 congregations, or wear the little habit or little chain of our 
 Lady. They will not believe us when we tell them that 
 their devotion is only an illusion of the devil, and a perni- 
 
 Lyra Liturgica^ Feast of the Immaculate December 8. 
 
32 
 
 DEVOTIONS TO THE BLESSED VIEGIN 
 
 cions presumption likely to destroy their souls. They say that 
 Grod is good and merciful ; that He has not made us to con- 
 demn us everlastingly ; that no man is without sin ; that they 
 shall not die without confession ; that one good Peccavi at the 
 hour of death is enough; that they are devout to our Lady; that 
 they wear the Scapular, and that they say daily, without re- 
 proach or vanity, seven Paters and Aves in her honour ; and 
 that they sometimes say the Eosary and the Office of our 
 Lady, besides fasting, and other things. To give authority to 
 all this, and to blind themselves still further, they quote cer- 
 tain stories, which they have heard or read — it does not 
 matter to them whether they be true or false — relating how 
 people have died in mortal sin without confession ; and then, 
 because |in their lifetime they sometimes said some prayers, 
 or went through some practices of devotion to our Lady, how 
 they have been raised to life again, in order to go to confes- 
 sion, or their soul miraculously retained in their bodies till 
 confession ; or how they have obtained from Grod at the 
 moment of death contrition and pardon of their sins, and 
 so have been saved; and that they themselves expect similar 
 favours. Nothing in Christianity is more detestable than 
 this diabolical presumption. For how can we say truly that 
 we love and honour our Blessed Lady when, by our sins, we 
 are pitilessly piercing, wounding, crucifying, and outraging 
 Jesus Christ her Son ? If Mary laid down a law to herself, 
 to save by her mercy this sort of people, she would be 
 authorising crime and assisting to crucify and outrage her 
 Son.’ ^ 
 
 After so explicit a protest against the abuse of devo- 
 tion to the Blessed Virgin on the part of one of its 
 most enthusiastic advocates, let it not be said that the 
 Church is responsible for the errors of individuals 
 among her children. 
 
 It is also worthy of note, that devotions to the 
 
 * The Venerable Grignon de Montfort’s Treatise on the True Devotion 
 to the Blessed Virgin, Translated by F. W. Faber, D.D., Priest of the 
 Oratory. 
 
ARE INCLUSIVELY DEVOTIONS TO OUR LORD. 
 
 33 
 
 Blessed Virgin w^hicli are in most frequent use amongst 
 us either distinctly recognise the worship of the Blessed 
 Trinity and of our Divine Lord, or are, inclusively, de- 
 votions to Him. Thus the Litany of Loreto, like all 
 similar litanies, opens with an address to the Three 
 several Persons of the Blessed Trinity, and then to 
 those Three Persons in their essential Union, while it 
 terminates with a triple address to the Lamb of God. 
 The form of the petitions directed to God and to the 
 Blessed Virgin respectively is likewise varied. When 
 we leave the Creator and pass to the creature, we sub- 
 stitute the Ora pro nobis for the Miserere nobis.* A 
 very common mode of commemorating the graces and 
 glories of the Blessed Virgin is to recite Gloria Patris 
 in thanksgiving to God for the favours bestowed on 
 her. But the most customary and popular of all such 
 devotions are the Angelas and the Eosary. Now in 
 the Angelas, which we recite three times a day, we 
 commemorate the Incarnation ; while all the mysteries 
 which we call to mind in saying the Eosary, with the 
 exception of two, are either incidents in the life of Our 
 Lord, or in that of His Blessed Mother, recorded in 
 Scripture, and bearing directly on Him. It is on this 
 type, rather than on that of the ‘ Glories of Mary,’ that 
 the ideas of our people are formed. The phrases which 
 Dr. Pusey has exhibited in a somewhat startling sever- 
 ance from the doctrines which justify them, and the 
 context which modifies them, represent rather the shape 
 
 * Too much weighty however^ must not be attached to this distinction, 
 since the Church, in the Antiphon of the Blessed Virgin for Advent, 
 addresses to her the words ^Peccatorum miserere.^ 
 
 C 
 
34 PRAYER TO THE B. VIRGIN FOR DIRECT AID. 
 
 into which men of ascetic hves and profoundly spiri- 
 tual minds are accustomed to cast their thoughts on 
 this subject, than the standard of our customary preach- 
 ing or the scale of general devotion ; and, in saying 
 this, I am not depreciating devotions of such a cha- 
 racter, but the contrary. For I think that Dr. Pusey 
 himself can hardly have failed to remark two facts 
 most important to our argument ; the one, that they 
 who have spoken the most rapturously of the preroga- 
 tives and merits of the Blessed Ahrgin have always 
 been either canonised Saints or Catholics who have 
 earned the right to venture upon such utterances by 
 some especial fellowship with the sufferings of our 
 Lord ; the other, that those Saints who are the most 
 remarkable for devotion to the Blessed Virgin are also 
 the most devoted to the Passion of her Divine Son. If 
 I cite, as instances, St. Bernard, St. Bonaventure, and 
 St. Alphonsus Liguori, I shall but suggest to the Ca- 
 tholic reader a host of other names with which the 
 union of these two kindred attractions is associated. 
 
 Dr. Pusey, as I understand him, would desire to 
 limit his own practice to the simple use of the ‘ Ora 
 pro nobis,’ that is, of prayer for prayer. Such a limi- 
 tation, however, would preclude him from the use, 
 not merely of less authorised devotions to the Blessed 
 Virgin, but of those which form part of the Liturgy 
 and Breviary. He will remember frequent instances, 
 both in the Missal and Breviary, of addresses to the 
 Blessed Virgin to grant favours, as though they were at 
 her own command. For example : in the Sequence 
 of the Feast of the Seven Dolours ; ‘ Fac ut tecum, lu- 
 
ITS USE JUSTIFIED. 
 
 35 
 
 geam,’ &c. ; in the hymn ‘ Ave maris stella, Solve vincla 
 reis Prefer lumen cmcis, Mala nostra pelle, Nos, culpa 
 solutes, Mites fac et castes ’ ; again in the antiphons 
 at the end of Complin, ‘Jesum benedictum fructum 
 ventris tui, nobis post hoc exilium ostende,’ ‘ Da mihi 
 virtutem contra hostes tuos ’ ; and the passage already 
 cited, ‘ Sumens illud Ave, peccatorum miserere.’ All 
 such expressions are founded in something that corre- 
 sponds Avith -what in literary language, far below the 
 truth, we call a poetical licence. Every well-instructed 
 Catholic knows that the Blessed Virgin possesses no 
 power to grant petitions, except such as she derives 
 from God ; but he also knows that her influence with 
 her Divine Son, in virtue of her maternal relation, and 
 of her transcendant sanctity, must needs be such that 
 her will to grant is tantamount to the fact of granting, 
 since her will is so entirely in harmony with the will 
 of God that her petitions are of necessity all in the 
 order of His providence. If we knew that an earthly 
 sovereign had an almoner, to whom he had given the 
 office of distributing his bounty, we should address our- 
 selves to that almoner as the source from which the 
 bounty emanates, though conscious all the while that he 
 was merely the instrument of its bestowal. The confi- 
 dence of true doctrine, in which a Catholic habitually 
 reposes, imparts a certain freedom to his modes of ex- 
 pression, which, in the eyes of another, wears the 
 appearance of heresy. He knows, or trusts, that God 
 will not misunderstand him ; and gives vent to the 
 natural feelings of his heart, without caring to protect 
 himself at every turn from the misapprehensions of 
 
36 
 
 WHAT IS DR. PUSEY’S STANDARD OF 
 
 those to whom he is not equally responsible. Love 
 shrinks from recourse to provisoes and qualifications. A 
 mother, when fondling her dearest child, uses towards 
 it a great deal of language which a harsh critic might 
 charge with idolatry ; but, were he to bring such a 
 charge under her cognizance^ she would reply in the 
 beautiful words of the poet, ‘ He speaks to me that 
 never had a child.’ Far be it from me to impute any 
 such coldness to Dr. Pusey, who, I sincerely believe, 
 if he were one of ourselves, would be found among 
 the most devoted and un-critical of the clients of Mary. 
 I only use the illustration to show how unfair it is to 
 try the phraseology of affection by too severe a rule.* 
 Dr. Pusey ’s argument on the subject of devotion to 
 the Blessed Virgin is simply negative. He tells us 
 rather what kind of devotion he objects to, than 
 what kind he would approve. He does not point 
 out how, in his judgment, the Scriptural view of 
 the Blessed Virgin as the Mother of Our Eedeemer 
 could be duly satisfied in the practical and devotional 
 estimate of Christians by modes of thought and ex- 
 pression less copious and less intense than those in use 
 among Catholics. He has not shown how he could 
 materially curb the actual latitude permitted by the 
 Catholic Church without striking at the root of the 
 devotion altogether, and thus endangering the prac- 
 tical reception of those more fundamental truths which 
 that devotion seems to us to sustain and promote. If 
 the sentiments of a writer quoted by Dr. Pusey as 
 
 * See Appendix. 
 
FILIAL DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN? 
 
 37 
 
 neither Eoman, Greek, nor Anglican, may be con- 
 sidered to represent the views of the Greek Church, 
 with which at the time when he wrote he was believed 
 to be in sympathy, the strongest expressions of our 
 Marian writers, as they are called, would be weak in 
 comparison with what a proselyte to that communion 
 would be expected to believe and practise. On the 
 other hand. Dr. Pusey would scarcely appeal to the 
 Anglican Church at any period of its history since the 
 Eeformation, as having preserved a just medium be- 
 tween excess and defect in this instance. With the 
 rejection of the Eoman obedience, there seems, if I 
 am not mistaken, to have come over the national 
 Church an all but complete oblivion of the Mother of 
 God. Till Mr. Keble touched so beautifully, yet so 
 sparingly, upon her claims to reverence and love, in 
 parts of the ‘ Christian Year,’ and Mr. Newman fore- 
 shadowed in some of his sermons the advent of a new 
 era, I do not ever recollect to have heard the name of 
 the Blessed Virgin, except in the Creeds and the Holy 
 Scriptures, unless, indeed, it were in the way of con- 
 troversial objection in the University pulpit. It yet 
 remains to be seen how those who think with Dr. 
 Pusey will succeed in propagating true devotion to 
 her without the safeguards of it which are furnished 
 in the Catholic Church. I believe the attempt 
 to be simply impossible. But does there exist any 
 serious desire to set about making it ? So far 
 as Dr. Pusey himself may be taken as an exponent 
 of those with whom he acts, the prospect of any 
 just appreciation of the claims of our Blessed Lady, 
 
38 THE B. VIEGIN AS THE GUARDIAN OF THE FAITH 
 
 except among ourselves, would seem to be most 
 unpromising. From the beginning to the end of 
 Dr. Pusey’s work, I can find nothing to indicate that 
 he recognises them in any due sense. Yet one would 
 have thought that, in protesting against what he 
 regards as the excesses of the devotion, he would have 
 found a natural place for vindicating its legitimate use. 
 Dr. Pusey, I take for granted, understands the ‘Ecce 
 Mater tua,’ at the Crucifixion, as Catholics understand 
 it, to mean the bestowal of the Blessed Virgin as a 
 Mother upon all Our Lord’s disciples in the person of 
 the beloved one ; or, at any rate, he believes that the 
 Mother of Our Lord is also the Mother of those whom 
 He deigns to call His brethren. Yet, what should we 
 think of that sort of filial love which should exhibit 
 itself only or chiefly in defending a mother from the 
 effects of exaggerated praise ? 
 
 The theory of some indissoluble connexion between 
 the office of the Blessed Virgin and that of the Church, 
 which is involved in her title as Destroyer of heresies, 
 is remarkably borne out, both in its positive and nega- 
 tive aspect, by the history of the Church. It is 
 remarkable that the Blessed Virgin should be men- 
 tioned by name as having been in the company of the 
 Apostles when the Holy Ghost came down upon them ; 
 and the silence of Scripture as to her subsequent share 
 in casting on the Church the light of her wisdom and 
 intimate knowledge of the heart of her Divine Son, 
 will be no bar to the devout Christian’s conviction, 
 that she presided over the infancy of the Church with 
 the same intense affection with which she watched 
 
AND THE DESTROYER OP HERESIES. 
 
 39 
 
 beside the manger of Bethlehem. Nor would she 
 seem to have ceased from this charge after her As- 
 sumption into Heaven, for all the great doctrinal 
 decisions of the Church in after times involved some 
 of her prerogatives, and were blessed by her aid. 
 The unity of the Person of her Divine Son was couched 
 in a formula which redounded to her honour, nor were 
 her privileges less really, though less expressly, in- 
 volved in the dogma of His Two Natures. It was the 
 Body which He took from her that the Church ruled 
 to be truly present in the Blessed Eucharist. It was 
 by preaching devotion to her as the Mother of our 
 Incarnate God, that St. Dominic quelled that formidable 
 heresy which assailed the Incarnation by degrading 
 the nature which Christ vindicated against the do- 
 minion of evil by taking it in its purest form into 
 union with Himself. It was by inculcating special 
 devotion to the Blessed Virgin that St. Ignatius and 
 his followers counteracted the deadly work of Luther ; 
 and, lastly, it is by the definition of the dogma of the 
 Immaculate Conception that Pius IX. has struck the 
 latest blow, not so much against any particular heresy 
 as against the root of that evil product itself. On the 
 other hand, it is remarkable how, in our own country, 
 the decay of devotion to the Blessed Virgin has been 
 the harbinger of a corresponding decline in sensitiveness 
 to orthodoxy on the subjects of the Blessed Trinity 
 and Incarnation. In some quarters, Sabellianism has 
 been openly taught, and the objections taken against 
 it treated as mere captious logomachy. In others, the 
 very principle of dogmatism itself has been assailed. 
 
40 PKEE SCOPE FOR DEVOTIONAL PREFERENCES 
 
 Socinianism is believed to exist to a great extent in 
 certain professions, and only not to be avowed as a 
 distinct form of religious opinion, because there is felt 
 to be nothing in the position of a lay member of the 
 Church of England which requires him to renounce it. 
 Clergymen used to omit the Athanasian Creed, on the 
 ground of its doctrinal statements, or of its condemna- 
 tory clauses. Even High Churchmen used to shrink, 
 as I remember, from attributing, in sermons or other- 
 wise, the acts done by Our Lord in virtue of His 
 Human Nature to the Person of God. Nor do I think 
 it any exaggeration to say that there was hardly one 
 clergyman out of a hundred (I had almost said a 
 thousand) who could have explained the doctrines of 
 the Trinity and Incarnation with the same dogmatic 
 precision as an ordinarily instructed Catholic child. 
 Such was the fruit of putting away the devotion to the 
 Blessed Virgin on the plea of loyalty to Christ, our 
 Lord. It was the great Tractarian movement, in 
 which Dr. Pusey bore so important a part, which first 
 helped to recal us from this state of religious lethargy; 
 and I thankfully acknowledge that there is now a 
 promise of better things. But that movement was 
 instrumental, among its other benefits, though still 
 most defectively, in elevating our view of the office 
 and claims of the Blessed Virgin, and will not, I believe 
 (if Dr. Pusey will forgive me for saying so), have 
 answered its providential purpose till it has landed its 
 freight on the shore of the true Church, under the 
 guidance of her beautiful Star of the Sea. 
 
 I am deeply satisfied that this great crux of 
 
ALLOWED BY THE CHURCH. 
 
 41 
 
 Dr. Pusey’s is a phantom of the devil’s creating, and 
 one among the many evidences which history and 
 experience furnish of his implacable hostility to her 
 whom he knows to be the great antagonist of his 
 power. Dr. Pusey would stipulate, as I understand 
 him, for some exemption in favour of himself and his 
 friends from the obligation of adopting, as the form 
 and measure of their practical devotion to the Blessed 
 Virgin, certain expressions to which he objects, not 
 because, as he tells us,* he considers them necessarily 
 to imply any disloyalty to our Blessed Lord, but be- 
 cause he and they think them dangerous, and, at all 
 events, cannot personally go along with them. Were he 
 one of ourselves, he would come to know that no fresh 
 act of the Church is required in order to release any of 
 her members from such an obligation ; inasmuch as no 
 such obligation rests upon them. The Church regards 
 such devotion to our Blessed Lady as, in point of 
 fervour and intensity, goes beyond the standard of 
 her ordinary prescriptions, not as a duty, but as a 
 privilege. I do not think that those who are external 
 to us have any just idea of the room which is allowed 
 us for the free play of personal preferences which do 
 not clash, either in form or spirit, with the faith of the 
 Church, or with principles plainly deducible from it. 
 Now, one such principle would certainly be contra- 
 vened by any view of the prerogatives and claims of 
 our Blessed Lady, which would make a person in- 
 tolerant of the phraseology in which great Saints, 
 
 See his first letter to the Weekly Register, 
 
42 
 
 DK. PUSEY’S DESIRE OP LIMITING 
 
 eminently devoted to our Lord, have occasionally cast 
 their pious thoughts respecting her. But nothing that 
 I know of would involve in well-grounded suspicion 
 of disloyalty to the Church a Catholic who, while 
 placing no restriction on the liberty of others, should, 
 as a matter of taste, prefer the more measured lan- 
 guage of our liturgy and offices on the subject in 
 question to that in which more ardent temperaments 
 than his own might find a more congenial expression 
 of their devotion. 
 
 But Dr. Pusey, in his most commendable anxiety 
 for union with us, has hazarded one suggestion which 
 requires a far more serious treatment. If I understand 
 portions of his ‘ Eirenicon ’ aright, he would desire to 
 apply what is called, in political jargon, the principle 
 of ‘ finahty ’ to the capacities of dogmatic expression 
 in the Church. Alarmed, it may be not unnaturally, 
 by hints thrown out without authority, or private 
 wishes expressed on the part of enthusiastic writers 
 (in one instance not even Cathohc), he puts in his 
 caveat against prospective and purely imaginary deci- 
 sions of the Church on the subject about which he is 
 so sensitive, and he, in the person of an individual 
 Catholic, would say to her, ‘ Thus far shalt thou go, 
 and no further.’ To mention such a suggestion, as I 
 understand it, is to condemn it in the eyes of all those 
 who beheve the Church, as a visible institution, to 
 be habitually ruled by the Holy Ghost. How different 
 is this from the spirit of St. Bernard, who, while freely 
 giving his own private opinion on the subject of the 
 Immaculate Conception, then an open question, makes 
 
THE DOGMATIC ACTION OP THE CHURCH. 
 
 43 
 
 an express reserve in favour of any future dogmatic 
 decision of the Church on the subject! It is obvious 
 to remark that for the Church to pledge herself as to 
 her course in respect of the particular mode of exer- 
 cising her authority as a divine teacher would be 
 tantamount to the abdication of the office delegated 
 to her by her Lord ; and that for any one of her 
 members, or rather nominal members, to rest in the 
 belief that she could, by possibility, express a formal 
 judgment at variance with the Divine revelation, would 
 be a sin against faith of the first magnitude. 
 
 I close the whole subject of devotion to the Blessed 
 Virgin, as the adjunct of faith, with a passage so 
 beautiful and majestic that I might well rejoice to 
 adorn my pages with it from whatever quarter it might 
 proceed ; but it is doubly gratifying to me to enforce 
 my argument by the language of one who, of all 
 Catholics that could be named, is the most likely to 
 carry conviction to the mind and heart of Dr. Pusey. 
 
 Now, as you know, it has been held from the first, and 
 defined from an early age, that Mary is the Mother of God. 
 She is not merely the Mother of our Lord’s manhood, or of 
 our Lord’s body, but she is to be considered the Mother of 
 the Word Himself; the Word Incarnate ; God, in the Person 
 of the Word, the Second Person of the All-glorious Trinity, 
 humbled Himself to become her Son. ‘Thou did’st not 
 shrink from the Virgin’s womb,’ as the Church sings. He 
 took the substance of His human fiesh from her, and clothed 
 in it He lay within her, and He bore it about with Him as a 
 sort of badge, and witness, that He, though God, was her’s. 
 As time went on He ministered to her, and obeyed her ; He 
 lived with her for thirty years, in one house, with an unin- 
 terrupted intercourse, and with only the saintly Joseph to 
 
44 DR. NEWMAN ON DEVOTION TO THE B. VIRGIN. 
 
 share it with Him. She was the witness of His growth, of 
 His joys, of His sorrows, of His prayers ; she was blessed 
 with His smile, with the touch of His hand, with the whisper 
 of His affection, with the expression of His thoughts and 
 His feelings, for that length of time. Now, my brethren, 
 what ought she to be, what is it becoming that she should 
 be, who was so favoured ? Such a question was once asked 
 by a heathen king when he would place one of his subjects 
 in a dignity becoming the relation in which he stood towards 
 him. That subject had saved the king’s life, and what was 
 to be done to him in return ? The king asked, ^ What shall 
 be done to the man whom the king desireth to honour?’ 
 And he received the following answer, ^ The man whom the 
 king wisheth to honour ought to be clad in the king’s 
 apparel, and to be mounted on the king’s saddle, and to re- 
 ceive the royal diadem on his head ; and let the first among 
 the king’s princes and presidents hold his horse, and let him 
 walk through the streets of the city, and say : Thus shall 
 be honoured whom the king had a mind to honour.” ’ So 
 stands the case with Mary ; she gave birth to the Creator, 
 and what recompense shall be made her? What shall be 
 done to her, who had this relationship to the Most High ? 
 What shall be the fit accompaniment of one whom the Al- 
 mighty has deigned to make, not His servant, not his friend, 
 not His intimate, but His superior ; the source of His sacred 
 being, the nurse of His helpless infancy, the teacher of His 
 opening years ? 1 answer, as the king was answered : nothing 
 is too high for her to whom Gron owes His life ; no exube- 
 rance of grace, no excess of glory but is becoming, but is to 
 be expected there, where Gon has lodged Himself ; whence 
 God has issued. Let her ^ be clad in the King’s apparel ; ’ 
 that is, let the fulness of the Godhead so flow into her that 
 she may be a figure of the incommunicable sanctity, and 
 beauty, and glory of God Himself : that she may be the 
 mirror of justice, the mystical rose, the tower of ivory, the 
 house of gold, the morning star ; let her ^ receive the King’s 
 diadem upon her head,’ as the Queen of heaven, the mother 
 of all living, the health of the weak, the refuge of sinners. 
 
‘CORPORATE RE-UNION,’ 
 
 45 
 
 the comforter of the afflicted ; and ‘ let the first amongst the 
 King’s princes walk before her,’ let angels, and prophets, and 
 apostles, and martyrs, and all Saints kiss the hem of her gar- 
 ment, and rejoice under the shadow of her throne. Thus it 
 is that king Solomon has risen to meet His Mother, and 
 bowed himself unto her, and caused a seat to be set for the 
 King’s Mother, and she sits on his right hand.* 
 
 This brings me to the last portion of the subject I 
 have proposed to myself, which is not that of examin- 
 ing Dr. Pusey’s argument in all its details, but that of 
 seizing upon some of its salient points as matter of free 
 discussion. I am now, then, in conclusion, to advert 
 briefly to the difficulties, I will not say vast merely, 
 but insurmountable, which seem to me to lie in the 
 way of his proposal for a ‘ corporate union between 
 the Eoman and Anglican Churches.’ Before doing so, 
 however, I must make some prefatory observations ; 
 the first of them is that which befits every one of us, 
 whatever view of this question he may take, who as 
 a private Catholic presumes to discuss the matter at all, 
 namely, that he speaks but as a private Catholic, with- 
 out warrant either to represent the judgment of autho- 
 rity, or to predict the actual form which that judgment 
 may take. On the other hand, there are certain prin- 
 ciples of absolutely invariable application on whicli 
 every judgment of the Church is founded, and upon 
 which a private Catholic, supposing him otherwise 
 competent as a witness on the subject, is neither dis- 
 qualified nor precluded by any duty from pronouncing. 
 He may certainly, and to any extent, misapprehend or 
 
 * Newman’s Discourses to Mixed Congregations^ Discourse XVIII. 
 
46 
 
 DESIRE OP UNITY A HOPEFUL TOKEN. 
 
 misrepresent these principles ; all I mean is, that he is 
 not ipso facto incapacitated from entering upon a ques- 
 tion to which they belong. I would say, in the next 
 place, that I desire to speak of this matter with the 
 utmost possible tenderness to the good men, unhappily 
 separated from us, whose hearts are now yearning in 
 the direction of Catholic unity ; and I trust that I 
 shall not be turned from the proper effect of such a 
 desire by anything which, in what I may call the draft 
 of their scheme, may seem to me impracticable and 
 even grotesque. I well remember how vast a step in 
 the right direction Mr. Newman and others felt it to 
 be, when five-and-twenty years ago certain persons of 
 our company began to be alive to the tremendous evils 
 of that spirit of isolation in which, up to that time, 
 many Anglicans had not only rested but rejoiced. 
 I remember, also, how strong a sensation was created, 
 even among High Churchmen, at the time when this 
 note of Catholic unity was first sounded in the 
 ‘ British Critic ’ ; nor am I altogether sure that I 
 ought to except from this number JDr. Pusey himself, 
 though ever too generous to utter a public word which 
 might create dissension among those in whose general 
 aims he sympathised, while differing from some of 
 them, even materially, as to the manner of carrying 
 those aims into effect. But I remember also, what is 
 a still more important fact, that there was not one of 
 us earlier converts (unless, indeed, it were our far- 
 sighted friend John Henry Newman) who was not, to 
 use a familiar phrase, ‘ bitten ’ with the theory of a 
 ‘corporate re-union,’ or, at least, who did not foster 
 
THE PEELUDE TO INDIVIDUAL CONVEESIONS IN 1845. 47 
 
 the hope of something like a combined movement, 
 before he decided upon taking an independent step. 
 I could never say, without an act of self-condemnation, 
 which I do not believe to be warranted, that there is 
 any necessary absence of the spirit of humility and 
 submission in the abstract desire of entering the Eoman 
 communion in a body, rather than as individuals. 
 Such a mode of submitting to it, were it practicable, 
 would undoubtedly be clear of many of the real dis- 
 advantages which attend the course of individual and 
 insulated action ; while, in a simply Catholic point of 
 view, no one can doubt that the accession of a large 
 body to the ranks of the Church, always supposing 
 that it could be effected without compromise on any 
 side, would be the subject of a heartier Te Deum than 
 even that with which we celebrate the accession of 
 an individual. On the other hand, I am sure that 
 Dr. Pusey himself would be the last to deny that even 
 a separation which cannot be bridged over without the 
 sacrifice of conscientious conviction, painful and ano- 
 malous as it is, is an incomparably less evil than union 
 (to put a purely hypothetical and absolutely impossible 
 case) brought about by concessions inconsistent with 
 Catholic doctrine and principle. I think, moreover, 
 that Dr. Pusey must be impressed by observing how 
 purely as a matter of conscience, a question involving 
 the prospect of so immense a gain, in point of numbers 
 and influence, to the side of the Eoman obedience, is 
 dealt with by Catholics, and how little they are actually 
 induced to swerve from what appears to them the line 
 of right by the fear of exposing themselves to the 
 
48 ‘CORPORATE RE-UNION ’ — WHAT DOES IT MEAN? 
 
 charge of stubborn inflexibility. To my own mind, 
 this is among the strongest of secondary evidences to 
 the Divine authority of the Church, and exhibits her 
 in the most marked contrast to the religious commu- 
 nities which are swayed to and fro by the action of 
 the world. 
 
 But, when I pass from the hopes of re-union in the 
 abstract to the mode by which it is proposed to carry 
 those hopes into effect, I confess that I am lost in the 
 mazes of a proposition of which the difficulties seem to 
 me as inextricable as the conception is amiable, and 
 the theory at first sight attractive. The very phrase, 
 
 ‘ corporate re-union,’ will not bear sifting. A ‘ corporate’ 
 re-union means, I suppose, a union of bodies ; for the 
 mere fusion of a number of individuals into a definite 
 body is rather an absorption than a union, which seems 
 to imply substantive existence on the part of both the 
 bodies so uniting. In the Eoman communion the 
 presence of this condition is abundantly evident ; but 
 where shall we seek it on the other side ? Where is 
 the principle of cohesion, or the mark of organisation, 
 in the communion with which the Holy See would be 
 invited to enter into ecclesiastical relations ? Its very 
 name is matter of question among its members. Is its 
 denomination the Established Church, or the Anglo- 
 Catholic Church, or the National Church, or the 
 Protestant Church ? The first is rejected by the High 
 Church section of its members ; the second by the 
 Low Church party; the third does not represent its 
 character, for it takes no account of the numerous 
 bodies of Dissenters who with it make up the aggre- 
 
CASE OP THE GREEK CHURCH INAPPLICABLE. 
 
 49 
 
 gate of the nation, religiously speaking ; while the 
 term ‘ Protestant ’ is as zealously repudiated by one 
 party as it is jealously vindicated by another. The 
 collective body of its Bishops represents nothing but 
 the principle of passive disunion. Some of them lean 
 to the latitudinarian side ; one or two appeal to an- 
 tiquity, but protest against Eome ; several uphold 
 private judgment on the Scriptures as sufficient for all 
 the purposes of faith ; others steer clear of extremes, 
 and desire nothing but a quiet life. Who is to be the 
 spokesman of such a body, the representative of such 
 a pohty, the ambassador of such a court ? It is im- 
 possible even to describe such a state of things without 
 exposing oneself to the charge of satire ; but the satire 
 is not in the spirit, but in the fact. 
 
 It must come then, at last, to this : that the union is 
 not to take place between the Church of England as 
 a body (for it is in no true sense a body capable of 
 treating) and the Holy Catholic and Eoman Church, 
 but between a certain section of its members and that 
 Churcli. This, obviously, changes the whole aspect of 
 the question. The case of a communion, such as the 
 Greek Church, with unbroken traditions, unimpaired 
 liturgies, and a united Episcopate, cannot be paralleled 
 with a Church whose traditions have been so rudely 
 invaded, whose formularies so seriously tampered with, 
 and whose government so fatally dislocated as that 
 which claims to be the lineal descendant of the ancient 
 English Church ; and this would be true even did that 
 Church at this time present as much appearance of 
 organisation and union as, for instance, some of the 
 
50 
 
 WANT OF BASIS FOR UNION. 
 
 Dissenting bodies. But still less can the parallel be 
 sustained between an ancient and compact communion 
 and a mere handful of Catholic-minded Christians in 
 one so disunited. 
 
 Even, however, supposing, merely for argument’s sake, 
 that the Anglican Church, as a body, or any of her 
 members, could prevail upon the Holy See to admit the 
 question of a rehgious treaty, the basis of such a treaty 
 would be, beyond all possibility of doubt, that which 
 I now find does not enter into the present contempla- 
 tion of Dr. Pusey. Two views, and two only, of the 
 conditions necessary to the exercise of the infallible 
 authority of the Church are consistent with the posi- 
 tion of a Catholic in communion with the Holy See. 
 The one is that which vests the prerogative of infalli- 
 bility absolutely in the person of the Holy Father, 
 speaking ex caihedrd ; the other that which requires, 
 as a condition of it, the subsequent acceptance, at least 
 tacit, of his decrees by the collective episcopate in 
 communion with Eome. Now, to take the case of the 
 dogmatic decree on the Immaculate Conception, which 
 Dr. Pusey appears to regard as involving some novel 
 exercise of this prerogative, I must say, on the con- 
 trary, that this decree fully satisfies, and more than 
 satisfies, the requirements even of the lowest theory of 
 infallibility. In the instance in question, the Pope did 
 not pronounce the definitive judgment till he had first 
 ascertained the opinions of all the bishops of Catholic 
 Christendom ; and, through their instrumentality, the 
 sensus jidelium on the subject of it. The dogmatic 
 decree, pronounced by the Holy Father with the 
 
DOCTKINE OF INFALLIBILITY. 
 
 51 
 
 utmost solemnity, and in the presence of an extra- 
 ordinary concourse of Bishops from every part of his 
 spiritual dominions, has since been accepted by the 
 whole Church, not only without reluctance, but with 
 the greatest possible joy and gratitude. It was the 
 nearest approach to a General Council which the 
 Church had witnessed for three hundred years. Dr. 
 Pusey, indeed, lays great stress upon the circumstance 
 of a minority of the bishops having sent in to the 
 Holy Father the statement of their difficulties or ob- 
 jections. But he candidly draws attention to the fact 
 that these difficulties and objections, in every instance, 
 related, not to the doctrine itself, but to the time, 
 mode, or prudence of defining it ; and that all the 
 bishops alike expressed their readiness to submit to 
 the definition, if the Holy Father in his wisdom should 
 see fit to proceed with it. The difference between 
 opinions so collected and opinions expressed by word 
 of mouth at a General Council, whatever it may be? 
 is surely not sufficient to counterbalance the weight of 
 such a testimony. But, even had this previous con- 
 sultation of the Episcopate been waived altogether^ 
 the decree would have failed in no condition de- 
 manded even by the lowest theory of infallibility. For 
 that theory calls for no limitation of the Pope’s personal 
 prerogative, save an ex post facto one ; and dogmatic 
 decrees, such as that by which the errors of Jansenius 
 are condemned, are universally accepted as adequate 
 expressions of the infallible voice, although promul- 
 gated without ceremonial solemnity, and without any 
 previous formal consultation of the collective Catholic 
 
52 PAPAL SUPREMACY OF DIVINE EIGHT, 
 
 Episcopate. Hence it follows, not only that the'range 
 of de fide doctrines is far more extensive than the 
 terms of Dr. Pusey’s claim would seem to embrace, 
 but that he is at issue with us as to the necessary con- 
 ditions of a de fide declaration of the Church. And 
 this brings me to the main difficulty in the way of 
 union on Dr. Pusey’s terms. There is no doubt 
 whatever that the supremacy of the See of Peter, in 
 the sense in which Dr. Pusey at present refuses to 
 accept it, is one of those de fide doctrines, to a belief 
 in which the terms of his claim oblige him, but from 
 the obligation of which he would exempt himself 
 by such a limitation of those doctrines as we cannot 
 possibly recognise. He tries to raise a difficulty in the 
 way of this position, by observing that it must compel 
 us to condemn the Greek Church of heresy, as well as 
 schism.* We are perfectly aware of this consequence, 
 and do not shrink from it. We base the position, that 
 the supremacy of the See of Peter is an article of faith, 
 implicitly received from the beginning, upon the decla- 
 ration of the Council of Florence : — 
 
 Sanctam Apostolicam sedem, et Eomanum Pontificem in 
 universum orbem tenere principatum et ipsum Pontificem 
 Eomanum successorem esse Bead Principis Apostolorum, et 
 verum Christi Vicarium, totiusque Ecclesipe caput, et omnium 
 Christianorum Patrem et Doctorem existere ; et ipsi in Beato 
 Petro pascendi, regendi, et gubernandi Universalem Eccle- 
 siam, a Domino Nostro Jesu Christo plenam potestatem tra- 
 ditam fuisse. 
 
 This most explicit declaration is thus recognised as a 
 
 * See Dr. Pusey’s second letter to tlie Weekly Register. 
 
A PEACTICAL DIFFICULTY. 
 
 53 
 
 Catholic dogma in the Constitutions of Pope Pius VI. 
 in the year 1786 : — 
 
 Super soliditate Petrse fundatam a Christo Ecclesiam, 
 Petrumque singulari Christi munere prse cceteris electum, 
 qui vicaria potestate Apostolici Chori Princeps existeret 
 totiusque adeo gregis pascendi, Fratres confirmandi totoque 
 orbe ligandi ac solvendi summam curam auctoritatemque in 
 Successores omni sevo propagandam susciperet, Dogma 
 Catholicum est, quod ore Christi acceptum, perenni Patrum 
 predicatione traditum ac defensum, Ecclesia Universa omni 
 setate sanctissimi retinuit, ssepiusque adversus Novatorum 
 errores Summorum Pontificum, Conciliorumque decretis 
 confirmavit.* — Constitutio Pii VI,, 28 Nov. 1786. 
 
 Here Dr. Pusey is met by a serious practical difficulty. 
 If the Pope is to exercise in a re-united England the 
 power which he claims all over the world, of controlling 
 the appointments to the Episcopate, it is quite certain 
 that the bishops so nominated, or, at least, accepted 
 by him, wiU, with the priests who are their subjects, 
 be the instruments of flooding England with the 
 devotions to which Dr. Pusey conscientiously objects. 
 Dr. Pusey, if I understand him aright, would suggest, 
 as the remedy of what he considers so great an evil, 
 that the Pope should recognise England as part of his 
 spiritual dominions, yet waive in her case the right 
 which he exercises elsewhere of determining who shall 
 be the bishops to preside over the several dioceses. He 
 would have England bear the relation to the Holy See of 
 an outlying colony, with its own independent govern- 
 ment and institutions. To name such a proposal, if I do 
 
 * These extracts will be found in Dr. Patrick Murray’s Theological 
 Essaysj which the reader is strongly recommended to consult. 
 
54 
 
 THE ‘ CATHOLIC MINIMUM.’ 
 
 not misconceive it, is surely to condemn it in the eyes 
 of every good Catholic. It would not, I am convinced, 
 be a union on terms like these, or, indeed, any union 
 of which I can even imagine a satisfactory basis, that 
 would tend to promote the great and most desirable 
 object which enters so largely and so laudably into the 
 mind and heart of Dr. Pusey, as a motive for aiming at 
 a reconciliation with Eome ; the combination, namely, 
 of those elements of strength against the infidel and 
 rationalistic spirit of the day which are at present 
 disunited by religious difierences. There are not 
 wanting evidences that even this spirit itself would be 
 more than tolerant of such an union as might break 
 down what it considers the intolerance of the Church 
 and her stern resistance to the spirit of the age. 
 Dr. Pusey has spoken with approval of the dictum 
 of some Italian nobleman, who is reported to have 
 said, that a point of contact for union might be 
 found between the Catholic minimum and Anglican 
 maximum.* I hardly think that, if he had a clear 
 idea of a Catholic minimum, he would feel it to be a 
 possible basis of such a union as he could approve. 
 To suppose that a substantial religious compound could 
 be formed out of the weakest elements of Catholic 
 and the strongest of Anglican truth is to overlook 
 the ethical bearings of doctrine, and to reduce the 
 subject to the unreal form of a mere question of 
 intellectual assent to certain barren articlesof faith. 
 We ought rather to look at the matter in the concrete. 
 
 See liis first letter in the Weekly Register, 
 
THE ‘ MINIMUM CATHOLIC.’ 
 
 55 
 
 and to imagine, if it be possible, the character of a 
 minimum Catholic engrafted on that of a maximum 
 Anglican. My own belief is that the theory would va- 
 nish, like the logical riddle of Achilles and the tortoise, 
 under the stern operation of a practical experiment ; 
 and that a mere nondescript being would be the product 
 of an attempt to fuse into union such heterogeneous con- 
 stituents. My idea of the character of a minimum Catho- 
 lic will be best conveyed by a rough sketch of what I 
 conceive to be its leading features, with allowance for 
 circumstantial varieties which do not affect the essence 
 of the picture. What may be the minimum Catholic 
 of Italy or France I have no better means of deter- 
 mining than are also at Dr. Pusey’s command. But 
 I think I know in what shape this sort of Catholic 
 would come out in England. He is one, then, who 
 considers belief to be a burden, not a privilege, and 
 who, therefore, believes no more than he can help. 
 In ecclesiastical politics he scarcely rises to the Gallican 
 level. He has more fellow-feeling with his non-Catholic 
 countrymen than with Catholics, however excellent, of 
 other countries ; that is to say, he prefers his country 
 to the Church. He is, therefore, more sensitive to the 
 rights of the Queen and constitution than of the Pope ; 
 not, of course, that he should disregard the former, 
 but that he should especially prize the latter. He 
 dislikes our popular devotions, not only those which 
 relate to the Blessed Virgin, but others also, consider- 
 ing them superfluous and rather sentimental. He 
 wishes priests to be ‘ men of the world ’ ; not in the 
 sense of being experimentally alive to its delusions. 
 
56 
 
 THE ‘ MINIMUM CATHOLIC.’ 
 
 or of meeting it half way in its own line with a view 
 to subduing it, but of copying its ways, mingling in- 
 discriminately with its societies, and entering with 
 undue zest into its peculiar interests. I half suspect 
 that he is secretly disinclined to clerical celibacy ; but 
 upon this subject the feeling is happily too strong to 
 allow of his giving public expression to a sentiment 
 so unpopular. However, he has no scruple about ad- 
 vocating marriages between Catholics and Protestants, 
 as tending to break down invidious distinctions. He 
 prefers mixed to exclusive education ; he sets more 
 store by the social than by the especially supernatural 
 virtues, and is half inclined to doubt whether the 
 latter have any real existence, except in the pages of 
 saintly biography, or in the exhortations of enthu- 
 siastic preachers. He doubts the advantage of Eeligious 
 Orders, excepting, perhaps, those of the female sex 
 which attend the hospitals. He abhors the Irish as a 
 dreamy unpractical people, taking little or no account 
 of their faith and piety. He is inclined to think that ob- 
 jective Truth is a chimera, and a dogmatic religion the 
 most indefensible of tyrannies ; he considers that reli- 
 gious differences are all capable of being cleared up liy 
 mutual explanation ; and that, at last, if a man be a 
 good citizen and a good neighbour, his creed is of the 
 less importance, since the poet has said — 
 
 He can’t be wrong whose life is in the right. 
 
 The formal recognition of a low standard of Catholic 
 doctrine as a basis of union will have no other effect 
 
CONCLUSION. 
 
 57 
 
 than that of multiplying such sorry specimens of the 
 religious character as I have just described. Is it to 
 effect a result such as this, that Dr. Pusey would employ 
 the latest energies of a life, laboriously and honourably 
 spent in the inculcation and exemplification of principles 
 the very reverse of those on which such a character is 
 founded ; and this, too, at the moment when he is 
 striving to borrow from Eome the light and help which 
 may enable him to realise more perfectly the ideal 
 of Catholic loyalty and Catholic sanctity, to which 
 he finds the resources at his command avowedly un- 
 equal ? 
 
 Lastly, let us pause for one moment to consider the 
 results of such an union with reference to the battle 
 against infidelity and atheism. It would be like 
 attempting to conquer a well-disciplined phalanx with 
 a disloyal and treacherous soldiery. Anglicans, as a 
 body, are no match for the rationalism of the age, be- 
 cause their Church does not support them in the main- 
 tenance of objective religion, even, when personally they 
 prize it ; and the allies they require in their necessity 
 are surely such Catholics as combine a devoted alle- 
 giance to the principles and an intimate perception of 
 the spirit of the Church, with a cordial appreciation, 
 and not a bare acceptance merely, of her essential 
 doctrines. 
 
 I have now performed my task, and am fully con- 
 scious how little I have done justice to the subject. 
 The work which I have reviewed so imperfectly is 
 large in bulk, and still larger in the range of matter 
 over which it extends. It would not be easy to deal 
 
58 
 
 CONCLUSION. 
 
 with its contents even in a volume, far less in a 
 pamphlet. It is therefore a satisfaction to me to know 
 that various portions of its contents are likely to re- 
 ceive notice from those who are fully competent to 
 handle them.* My own work is of a character inter- 
 mediate between a complete treatise and a discussion 
 of single topics entering into Dr. Pusey’s plan, and is 
 intended rather as a popular review of his general 
 argument than a minute examination of the various 
 questions involved in it. I submit it most respectfully 
 to Your Grace’s judgment ; and, through you, to the 
 judgment of the Holy See ; desiring that all its con- 
 tents may be understood in the true sense of the 
 Church, and withdrawing every word of them which 
 may be found to be at variance with her mind. 
 
 One word in conclusion. I bring this little work 
 to a close on the Festival, and place it under the espe- 
 cial patronage of that glorious Apostle and Evangelist 
 who is the representative and preacher, in his life, of 
 the tenderest affection to our dearest Lord, and of the 
 most ardent love of the brethren ; in his writings, of 
 heavenly wisdom, and theological science ; and in his 
 office, delegated to him from the Cross itself, of the 
 most loyal fidelity and filial devotion to the Mother of 
 God. These are precisely the interests which it has 
 been my object in these pages to promote and to har- 
 monise ; and I regard it as a providential coincidence, 
 and hail it as an omen of promise, that my work 
 
 * While these sheets are passing through the press^ a most able and 
 elaborate article on Dr. Pusey’s work has appeared in the Dublin Review 
 for January 1866. 
 
CONCLUSION. 
 
 59 
 
 should go forth to the world in the strength of so 
 mighty a name, and under the shelter of so auspicious 
 an invocation. 
 
 I am, my dear Lord Archbishop, 
 
 Yours affectionately, 
 
 FEEDEEICK OAKELEY. 
 
 St. John’s, Islington : 
 
 Feast of St. John the Evangelist, 1865. 
 
APPENDIX. 
 
 « 
 
 Note at page 5. 
 
 The controversy upon the interpretation of the Thirty- nine Articles 
 does not enter into my proposed subject. But I take advantage of 
 a brief allusion to it in the text to give in extenso^ as an appendix 
 to my pamphlet, an admirable letter on the subject from the pen of 
 Canon Estcourt, which appeared in the ‘ Weekly Eegister ’ of 
 December 9, and of which he has kindly allowed me to avail my- 
 self. The publication of Dr. Pusey’s new edition of Tract XC., 
 with a preface, likewise gives me an occasion of explaining very 
 briefly a passage in my pamphlet which conflicts with a statement 
 of his both in the Eirenicon and in his later publication. He there 
 repeats, what he said in his book, that Mr. Ward’s method of ex- 
 plaining Mr. Newman’s Tract, with his own additional comments, 
 was the principal cause of the outcry with which that Tract was 
 received. He founds this opinion partly upon the circumstance of 
 Mr. Ward having adopted into his view of Eoman doctrine those 
 traditionary glosses, as he considers them, against which Mr. New- 
 man understood the Articles to protest ; and partly upon the use of 
 the term ^non-natural,’ by which Mr. Ward described the Catholic 
 sense of the Articles, and which Dr. Pusey seems to think that 
 people had good grounds for regarding as a synonyme with ^ dis- 
 honest.’ 
 
 Now, it is certainly true that in 1844-5 Mr. Ward had arrived at 
 the conclusion that the grave errors against which he supposed the 
 
62 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 Articles to be directed, had no real existence in the authorised 
 teaching, any more than in the formal doctrines of the Roman 
 Church, but were mere creations of the imagination which the 
 framers of the Articles took up at second hand. But it is equally 
 true that, in 1841, Mr. Ward neither expressed, nor even held, any 
 other opinion on this matter than such as was entirely coincident with 
 the view taken by Mr. Newman in the Tract. The outcry against 
 the Tract and its author intervened between these two periods, and 
 had reached its height before the arrival of the second ; so that I do 
 not see how Mr. Newman’s case was prejudiced in the eyes of the 
 world, in this instance at least, by Mr. Ward’s alleged perversion 
 or exaggeration of his meaning. The outcry against Mr. Ward 
 did not take its rise, or at all events assume a very definite charac- 
 ter, till the appearance of the ‘Ideal,’ in the summer of the year 
 1844. The protest of the Four Tutors of the Hebdomidal Boards 
 the Charges of sundry Bishops, and a volley of smaller shot, had 
 been directed against Mr. Newman, and driven him into retirement 
 long before that time. 
 
 I am aware that Mr. Ward brought down on himself, and all who 
 were any way connected with him in the movement, an immense 
 deal of obloquy by the use of the word ‘ non- natural ’ to express the 
 peculiar interpretation of the Articles for which he and others con- 
 tended. But this obloquy was so perfectly groundless, and even 
 absurd, that I wonder how any sensible person can seriously defend 
 it. The word ‘ non-natural ’ does not mean the same with ‘ un- 
 natural,’ but, on the contrary, is carefully framed with the view of 
 excluding such a sense. It simply denies that the sense in question 
 is the ‘ natural ’ sense, without going the length of saying that it is 
 positively contrary to that sense. The sense of ‘ non ’ in such com- 
 pounds is privative rather than positive. Surely Dr. Pusey does 
 not deny that the Articles and Prayer Book are construed in a 
 ‘ non-natural sense ’ by the Evangelicals, — for otherwise he must 
 consider that their natural sense is opposed to certain doctrines to 
 which he attaches a just importance. Yet, on the other hand, he 
 will not say that they who subscribe them in that ‘ non-natural 
 sense’ are dishonest. Now, then, let us take an instance. Does Dr. 
 Pusey mean that the interpretation which extracts the Catholic 
 
APPENDIX. 
 
 63 
 
 doctrine of Transubstantiation from the following language of the 
 XXVIII. Article is natural or non-natural ? 
 
 ‘ Transubstantiation, or the change of the substance of the bread 
 and wine in the Supper of the Lord, cannot be proved by Holy 
 Writ; but is repugnant to the plain words of Scripture, overthrow- 
 eth the nature of a sacrament, and hath given occasion to many 
 superstitions.’ 
 
 Mr. Newman said that such an interpretation of this Article as 
 brought it into harmony with our received doctrine was impossible. 
 Mr. Ward said that it was possible, but not natural. Dr. Pusey 
 says that it is not only possible, but quite natural. Let the reader 
 choose between these different views. If he do not adopt the 
 second, I see no alternative in common sense except in the first. 
 
 It is certain, at any rat^, that Mr. Ward’s epithet of ‘ non- 
 natural’ could have nothing to do with the unpopularity of Tract XC., 
 since it] was first used in the ^ Ideal,’ which did not appear for 
 nearly four years after the publication of that Tract. Dr. Pusey’s 
 statements are strangely deficient in historical accuracy. I now 
 proceed to give Mr. Estcourt’s letter to the Weekly Register, 
 
 To the Editor of the Weekly Kegisteh. 
 
 Sir, — Reading in Dr. Pusey’s letter the following passage — ^ I 
 have long been convinced that there is nothing in the Council of 
 Trent which could not be explained satisfactorily to us, if it were 
 explained authoritatively^ i.e. by the Roman Church itself, not by 
 individual theologians only. This involves the conviction on my 
 side, that there is nothing in our Articles which cannot be explained 
 rightly, as not contradicting any things held to be de fide in the Roman 
 Church ’ — I cannot but fear that he is deceiving himself in assuming 
 such a position. It is no doubt a great grace to be prepared so far 
 to accept the Catholic Faith as declared in the Council of Trent, — 
 and all Catholics will recognise with joy such an admission. But if 
 it is supposed that the Decrees and Canons of the Holy Council 
 may be submitted to the same mental process as that which the 
 Thirty-nine Articles have to undergo, I fear that in the dispositions, 
 apparently so hopeful, there is only a distant approach to the 
 Catholic spirit. 
 
64 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 The Articles are not intended, nor supposed, to bind the consciences 
 of those who subscribe them, and they are therefore susceptible of 
 the utmost latitude of interpretation. It is possible that a person 
 subscribing them may not, by that act, be precluded from accepting 
 the whole Council of Trent. But the converse of this proposition is 
 an impossibility. No one who accepts that Council as the voice of 
 the Church, and the guide of his faith, could, with a safe conscience, 
 subscribe to the Thirty-nine Articles. 
 
 The decisions of the Church, as they embody the Faith, demand 
 not only an exterior assent, but an interior conviction. The divine 
 gift of faith infused into the soul of every Catholic finds in them its 
 food and guidance, and its very life. We have to believe everything 
 the Church believes and teaches, and to condemn everything she 
 condemns. This involves the duty, not only of detesting every open 
 substantial heresy, but also of refusing our assent, whether by word, 
 or act, or sign that might imply assent, to any proposition that 
 even in the form of expression contains error, or that sounds wrong, 
 or that seems offensive, or may cause scandal to Catholics in general, 
 even though the proposition assented to might, in a certain sense, 
 receive an innocent explanation. 
 
 An illustration of this readily occurs. The Oath of Supremacy 
 has been often explained, and is generally understood to mean that 
 the Pope has no power in this country that can be enforced by law. 
 This is no more than the plain fact, and if he has no power by law, it 
 is equally the fact that according to English law he ought not to 
 have it. Thus the Oath of Su]3remacy is capable of an interpretation 
 in which Catholics and Protestants would all agree. But what 
 Catholic would think of taking such an oath ; being in its original 
 intention, and in express form, a renunciation of the authority of 
 the Holy See, and when his so doing would generally appear as an 
 act of apo Stacy ? 
 
 It may then be worth while to examine the possibility of recon- 
 ciling the Anglican formularies with the Council. Whether the 
 Articles were directed against the Council, or the Decrees of the 
 Council against the Articles, may be matter of historical enquiry. 
 Perhaps in some parts the censure is intentional on each side ; for 
 the Articles were first published in 1552, and confirmed in their 
 present form in 1562 ; thus coming in between the first part of the 
 Council, which lasted from 1545 to 1552, and the concluding sessions 
 from 1562 to ’63. There is evidence that the state of religion in 
 England was frequently referred to in the later sessions. 
 
 But this is of no consequence as regards the question of doctrine. 
 
APPENDIX. 
 
 65 
 
 That question depends simply on the language used in either case — 
 viz., whether one contradicts the other. I will therefore place in 
 parallel columns propositions extracted from each — the Thirty-nine 
 Articles and Common Prayer Book on one side, and the Canons 
 and Decrees of the Council on the other, as follows — using Water- 
 worth’s Translation of the Council, and beginning with those in 
 which the heresy is directly stated and apparent. 
 
 Articles. 
 
 IX. This infection of nature 
 doth remain, yea in them that 
 are regenerated ; whereby the 
 lust of the flesh ... is not sub- 
 ject to the law of God. And 
 although there is no condemna- 
 tion for them that believe and are 
 baptized, yet the Apostle doth 
 confess that concupiscence and 
 lust hath of itself the nature of 
 sin. 
 
 XIII. Of Works before Jiistifica^ 
 tion. 
 
 Works done before the grace 
 of Christ and the inspiration of 
 Ilis spirit are not pleasant to 
 God, forasmuch as they spring 
 not of faith in J esus Christ ; . . 
 
 . . yea, rather for that they are 
 not done as God hath willed and 
 commanded them to be done, we 
 doubt not but that they have the 
 nature of sin. 
 
 Council of Trent. 
 
 Session V. The holy Synod 
 confesses and is sensible that in 
 the baptized there remains con- 
 cupiscence or an incentive to 
 sin ; which whereas it is left for 
 our exercise, cannot injure those 
 who consent not, but resist man- 
 fully by the grace of Jesus Christ ; 
 yea, he who shall have striven 
 lavjfully shall he crowned. This 
 concupiscence, which the Apostle 
 sometimes calls sin, the holy 
 Synod declares that the Catholic 
 Church has never understood to 
 be called sin, as being truly and 
 properly sin in those horn agaiiij 
 but because it is of sin, and in- 
 clines to sin. And if any one is 
 of a contrary sentiment, let him 
 be anathema. 
 
 Session VI. 
 
 Canon 7. — If any one saith, 
 that all works done before justi- 
 fication, in whatsoever way they 
 be done, are truly sins, or merit 
 the hatred of God ; ... let 
 him be anathema. 
 
 E 
 
66 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 XXII. The Romish doctrine 
 concerning Purgatory, Pardons, 
 Worshipping and Adoration, as 
 well of Images as of Reliques, 
 and also Invocation of Saints, is a 
 fond thing vainly invented, and 
 grounded upon no warranty of 
 Scripture, but rather repugnant 
 to the word of God. 
 
 Session XXV. 
 
 There is a Purgatory, and the 
 souls there detained are helped 
 by the suffrages of the faithful. 
 
 They think impiously, who 
 deny that the Saints, who enjoy 
 eternal happiness in Heaven, are 
 to be invocated ; or who assert 
 either that they do not pray for 
 men ; or that the invocation of 
 them to pray for each of us even 
 in particular is idolatry ; or tliat 
 it is repugnant to the word of 
 God, and opposed to the honour 
 of the one mediator of God and 
 men, Christ Jesus ; or that it is 
 foolish to supplicate, vocally or' 
 mentally, those who reign in 
 Heaven. 
 
 They who affirm that venera- 
 tion and honour are not due to 
 the relics of Saints, and that 
 these and other sacred monu- 
 ments are uselessly honoured by 
 the faithful . . . are wholly 
 
 to be condemned, as the Church 
 has already long since condemned, 
 and now also condemns them. 
 
 The images of Christ, of the 
 Virgin Mother of God, and of the 
 other Saints, are to be had and 
 retained particularly in temples, 
 and due honour and veneration 
 are to be given them. 
 
 If any one shall teach or enter- 
 tain sentiments contrary to these 
 decrees ; let him be anathema. 
 
 Session XXV. 
 
 The Holy Synod teaches and 
 enjoins that the use of Indul- 
 gences, for the Christian people 
 
APPENDIX. 
 
 67 
 
 XXV. — There are two Sacra- 
 ments ordained of Christ Our 
 Lord in the Gospel, that is to 
 say, Baptism, and the Supper of 
 the Lord. 
 
 Those five, commonly called 
 Sacraments, that is to say. Con- 
 firmation, &c., are not to be 
 counted for Sacraments of the 
 Gospel .... (they) 
 have not like nature of Sacra- 
 ments with Baptism and the 
 Lord’s Supper. 
 
 XXVIII. — Transubstantiation, 
 or the change of the substance of 
 bread and wine in the Supper of 
 the Lord, cannot be proved by 
 Holy Writ ; but is repugnant to 
 the plain words of Scripture, 
 overthroweth the nature of a 
 Sacrament, and hath given oc- 
 casion to many superstitions. 
 
 The Body of Christ is given, 
 taken, and eaten, in the Supper, 
 
 most salutary, and approved of 
 by the authority of sacred Coun- 
 cils, is to be retained in the 
 Church; and it condemns with 
 anathema those who either assert 
 that they are useless, or who 
 deny that there is in the Church 
 the power of granting them. 
 
 Session VII. 
 
 Canon 1. — If any one saith, 
 that the Sacraments the New 
 Law were not all instituted by 
 Jesus Christ Our Lord; or that 
 they are more or less than seven, 
 to wit. Baptism, &c. ; or even 
 that any one of these seven is 
 not truly and properly a Sacra- 
 ment, let him be anathema. 
 
 Session XIII. 
 
 Canon 2. — If any one saith, 
 that in the sacred and Holy 
 Sacrament of the Eucharist, the 
 substance of the bread and wine 
 remains conjointly with the Body 
 and Blood of Our Lord Jesus 
 Christ, and denieth that wonder- 
 ful and singular conversion of 
 the whole substance of the bread 
 into the Body, and of the whole 
 substance of the wine into the 
 Blood — the species only of the 
 bread and wine remaining — 
 which conversion indeed the 
 Catholic Church most aptly calls 
 Transubstantiation ; let him be 
 anathema. 
 
 Canon 8. — If any one saith, 
 that Christ, given {exhihitum) in 
 
68 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 only after an heavenly and spi- 
 ritual manner. 
 
 The Sacrament of the Lord’s 
 Supper was not by Christ’s ordi- 
 nance reserved, carried about, 
 lifted up, or worshipped. 
 
 Rubric. It is declared that (by 
 kneeling) no adoration is in- 
 tended or ought to be done, either 
 unto the Sacramental Bread or 
 Wine there bodily received, or 
 unto any corporal presence of 
 Christ’s natural Flesh and Blood. 
 For the Sacramental Bread and 
 Wine remain still in their very 
 natural substances, and therefore 
 may not be adored (for that 
 were Idolatry, to be abhorred of 
 all faithful Christians) ; and the 
 natural Body and Blood of Our 
 Saviour Christ are in Heaven, 
 and not here ; it being against 
 the truth of Christ’s natural 
 Body to be at one time in more 
 places than one. 
 
 XXX. — The cup of the Lord is 
 not to be denied to the lay 
 people ; for both the parts of the 
 Lord’s Sacrament, by Christ’s 
 Ordinance and commandment, 
 ought to be ministered to all 
 Christian men alike. 
 
 the Eucharist, is eaten spiritually 
 only, and not also sacramentally 
 and really ; let him be ana- 
 thema. 
 
 Canon 6. — If any one saith, 
 that in the Holy Sacrament of 
 the Eucharist, Christ the only 
 begotten Son of God is not to 
 be adored with the worship even 
 external of latria ; and is con- 
 sequently neither to be venerated 
 with a special festive solemnity 
 nor to be solemnly borne about 
 in processions, according to the 
 laudable and universal rite and 
 custom of Holy Church ; or is 
 not to be proposed publicly to 
 the people to be adored, and that 
 the adorers thereof are idolaters ; 
 let him be anathema. 
 
 Session XXI. 
 
 Canon I. — If any one saith, 
 that, by the precept of God or 
 by necessity of salvation, all and 
 each of the faithful of Christ 
 ought to receive both species of 
 the most Holy Sacrament of the 
 Eucharist ; let him be anathe- 
 ma. 
 
 Canon 2. — If any one saith, 
 that the Holy Catholic Church 
 was not induced, by just causes 
 and reasons, to communicate, 
 under the species of bread only, 
 laymen, and also clerics when 
 
APPENDIX. 
 
 69 
 
 not consecrating ; let him be 
 anathema. 
 
 Article VI., ‘ Of the Holy Scriptures,’ and Article XXIV., ‘ Of 
 speaking in the congregation in a tongue understood,’ are also sub- 
 ject to the anathemas of the Council. 
 
 We now come to other expressions in which the heresy is less 
 open and direct. In some of these the language is in a certain sense 
 true, but is used in an heretical sense, having been adopted with the 
 intention of denying some other truth taught by the Church. Such 
 are the following : — 
 
 Art. XL — ^We are accounted 
 righteous before God, only for 
 the merit of our Lord and 
 Saviour Jesus Christ by Faith, 
 and not for our own works or 
 deservings; wherefore, that we 
 are justified by Faith only is a 
 most wholesome doctrine and 
 
 very full of comfort.’ 
 
 [Erroneous, in the phrases 
 ^ accounted righteous,’ ‘ by Faith 
 and not for our own works and 
 deservings,’ and ‘ by Faith only ;’ 
 being intended to deny the 
 Catholic doctrine of the gift of 
 inherent justice, and of justifica- 
 tion by good works.] 
 
 XII. — ‘Albeit that good works, 
 which are the fruits of Faith and 
 follow after justification, cannot 
 put away our sins and endure 
 the severity of God’s judgment, 
 yet are they pleasing and ac- 
 ceptable to God in Christ, and 
 do spring out necessarily of a 
 true and lively Faith ; insomuch 
 that by them a lively Faith may 
 be as evidently known as a tree 
 discerned by the fruit.’ 
 
 [Ambiguous, whether or not 
 intended to mean that good 
 
 Session VI. 
 
 Canon 11. — If any one saith, 
 that men are justified, either by 
 the sole imputation of the justice 
 of Christ, or by the sole remission 
 of sins, to the exclusion of the 
 grace and the charity which is 
 poured forth in their hearts by 
 the Holy Ghost, and is inherent 
 in them ; or even that the grace 
 whereby we are justified is only 
 the favour of God ; let him be 
 anathema. 
 
 Canon 24. — If any one saith, 
 that the justice received is not 
 preserved and also increased 
 before God through good works, 
 but that the said works are 
 merely the fruits and signs of 
 justification obtained, but not a 
 cause of the increase thereof ; let 
 him be anathema. 
 
 28. — If any one saith, that, 
 grace being lost through sin, 
 Faith also is always lost with it ; 
 or that the Faith which remains, 
 though it be^not a lively Faith, is 
 
70 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 works are only the fruits and 
 consequence of justification, and 
 not also a cause of its increase ; 
 and erroneous, because Faith may 
 be true, though not living, with- 
 out good works.] 
 
 Peayer in the Communion. 
 
 . . ‘ We most heartily thank 
 Thee, for that Thou dost vouch- 
 safe to feed us, &c. . . and dost 
 assure us thereby of Thy favour 
 and goodness towards us.’ 
 
 Prayer in Confirmation.’ 
 
 . . ‘ Thy servants, on whom 
 ... we have now laid our hands, 
 to certify them by this sign of 
 Thy favour and gracious good- 
 ness towards them.’ . . • 
 
 [Erroneous ; being intended 
 to deny that grace is more than 
 the external favour of God, and 
 not an interior gift and power.] 
 Art. XXy. — ‘ Sacraments . . . 
 be certain sure witnesses, and 
 effectual signs of grace, and God’s 
 good will towards us, by the 
 which He doth work invisibly in 
 us, and doth not only quicken, 
 but also strengthen and confirm 
 our Faith in Him.’ 
 
 [Ambiguous ; being intended 
 in the same meaning, and the 
 error not being removed by the 
 words ‘ effectual’ and ‘work in- 
 visibly in us.’] 
 
 Art. XIX. — ‘ The visible 
 Church of Christ is a congregation 
 of faithful men, in the which the 
 pure Word of God is preached, 
 and the Sacraments be duly mi- 
 nistered according to Christ’s or- 
 dinance in all those things that 
 
 not a true Faith ; or that he who 
 has Faith without charity is not a 
 Christian ; let him be anathema. 
 
 Session VI. 
 
 Canon 11. — ^If any one saith, 
 . . . that the grace, whereby we 
 are justified, is only the favour 
 of God, let him be anathema. 
 
APPENDIX. 
 
 71 
 
 of necessity are requisite to the 
 same.’ 
 
 ‘ As the Church of Jerusalem, 
 Alexandria, and Antioch have 
 erred, so also the Church of 
 Rome hath erred, not only in 
 their living and manner of cere- 
 monies, but also in matters of 
 faith.’ 
 
 [False and scandalous ; being 
 intended to mean that in the 
 Catholic Church the pure Word 
 of God is not preached, and the 
 Sacraments not rightly adminis- 
 tered ; and that the Church is 
 in error in matters of Faith.] 
 
 ‘ The Absolution to be pro- 
 nounced BY THE Priest.’ 
 
 ‘ Almighty God . . . who hath 
 given power and commandment 
 to His Ministers to declare and 
 pronounce to His people, being 
 penitent, the Absolution and Re- 
 mission of their sins : He par- 
 doneth and absolveth all them 
 that truly repent, and unfeignedly 
 believe His Holy Gospel.’ 
 
 [Erroneous ; because intended 
 to mean that the power of Ab- 
 solution is nothing more than a 
 declaration of remission.] 
 
 ‘ The Order of Confirmation.’ 
 
 . . . ‘ None shall be confirmed 
 but such as can say the Creed, 
 &c., and answer the short Cate- 
 chism .... to the end that, 
 children, being come to years of 
 discretion, and having learned 
 what their godfathers and god- 
 mothers promised for them in 
 Baptism, they may themselves, 
 
 Session XIV. 
 
 Canon 9. — If any one saith, 
 that the Sacramental Absolution 
 of the Priest is not a judicial act, 
 but a bare ministry of pronounc- 
 ing and declaring sins to be 
 forgiven to him who confesses; 
 provided only he believe himself 
 to be absolved, or even though 
 the Priest absolve not in earnest, 
 but in joke ; or saith, that the 
 confession of the penitent is not 
 required in order that the Priest 
 may be able to absolve him ; let 
 him be anathema. 
 
 Session VH. 
 
 Canon 1. — If any one saith, 
 that the confirmation of those who 
 have been baptized is an idle 
 ceremony, and not rather a true 
 and proper Sacrament ; or that 
 of old it was nothing more than 
 a kind of Catechism, whereby 
 they who were near adolescence 
 gave an account of their Faith 
 
72 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 witli their own mouth and con- 
 sent, openly before the Church, 
 ratify and confirm the sanief 
 
 [Erroneous ; because it is in- 
 tended to mean that Confirmation 
 is nothing more than this ratifi- 
 cation of baptismal promises ; 
 with which view the rite has 
 been altered from the ancient 
 Catholic rite, and every expres- 
 sion implying a sacramental gift 
 of grace has been eliminated. 
 Thus the Anglican form of Con- 
 firmation is rendered altogether 
 invalid,] 
 
 Prayers in ^the Communion.’ 
 
 , . ‘ Who made (upon the 
 
 cross) by His one oblation of 
 Himself once offered, a full, per- 
 fect, and sufficient sacrifice, ob- 
 lation, and satisfaction for the 
 sins of the whole world ; and did 
 institute, and in His holy Gospel 
 command us to continue a per- 
 petual memory of that His pre- 
 cious death until His coming 
 again.’ 
 
 . . We desire Thy fatherly 
 
 goodness .... to accept 
 this our sacrifice of praise and 
 thanksgiving.’ 
 
 [Erroneous ; because intended 
 to mean that the Eucharist is no 
 more than a commemoration, and 
 only a sacrifice of praise and 
 thanksgiving. This appears, be- 
 cause the prayers are taken partly 
 from the Canon of the Mass, and 
 these expressions have been sub- 
 stituted for those that imply the 
 real and proper sacrifice.] 
 
 Art. XXXI- — ‘ The Offering 
 
 in the face of the Church ; let 
 him be anathema. 
 
 Session XXII. 
 
 Canon 3. — If any one saith, 
 that the Sacrifice of the Mass is 
 only a sacrifice of praise and 
 thanksgiving ; or that it is a bare 
 commemoration of the sacrifice 
 consummated on the Cross, but 
 not a propitiatory sacrifice ; or 
 that it profits him only who re- 
 ceives ; and that it ought not to 
 be offered for the living and the 
 dead for sins, pains, satisfactions, 
 and other necessities ; let him be 
 anathema. 
 
 Canon 4. — If any one saith, 
 that by the Sacrifice of the Mass, 
 a blasphemy is cast upon the 
 most holy sacrifice of Christ 
 consummated on the Cross ; or 
 that it is thereby derogated from ; 
 let him be anathema. 
 
APPENDIX. 
 
 73 
 
 of Christ once made is that per- 
 fect redemption, propitiation, and 
 satisfaction for the sins of the 
 wliole world, both original and 
 actual ; and there is none other 
 satisfaction for sin, but that 
 alone. Wherefore the sacrifices 
 of Masses, in the which it was 
 commonly said that the Priest 
 did offer Christ for the quick 
 and dead, to have remission of 
 pain or guilt, were blasphemous 
 fables, and dangerous deceits.’ 
 
 [False and impious ; nor can 
 it be defended on the ground of 
 the phrase ^ Sacrifices of Masses ’ 
 being in the plural number, be- 
 cause the term ‘ Sacrificia Mis- 
 sarum’ is equally correct, and 
 has the same meaning with ^ Sa- 
 crificium Missse.’ Thus in the 
 Missa pro Defunctis^ ‘ anima 
 famuli tui his sacrificiis purgata, 
 et a peccatis expedita.’ This 
 Article is therefore nothing else 
 than a charge of blasphemy and 
 imposture on the Most Holy Sa- 
 crifice of the Eucharist.] 
 
 There are various other pointain which the Book of Common 
 Prayer and the Thirty-nine Articles are at variance with the 
 Council ; but these are sufiScient to show that in each of those 
 formularies the errors and heresies condemned by the Church are 
 formally stated and maintained. It is difiScult, therefore, to see any 
 other basis for the reconciliation of Anglicans to the Catholic 
 Church than their renouncing the Prayer Book and Articles, and 
 receiving the Council of Trent. 
 
 I remain, yours faithfully, 
 
 Birmingham, Dec. 2. E. E. Estcoukt. 
 
 F 
 
74 
 
 APPEXDIX. 
 
 Note at page 36. 
 
 A great part of the objection to the language of Catholic devotion 
 arises from the practice of confining certain words to their conven- 
 tional sense, instead of interpreting them according to the intention 
 of the writer or speaker ; or, on the other hand, of restricting to a 
 secondary and technical use those which are employed in a more 
 general sense. Thus there is really no difference in fact between the 
 terms ‘worship’ and ‘veneration’; yet, while mere human qualities 
 are popularly considered to warrant veneration. Catholics are charged 
 with idolatry who speak of the Blessed Virgin as an object of wor- 
 ship ; a charge the more impertinent when we remember that in 
 the words of the marriage rite, common to Catholics with Protest- 
 ants, this term is actually employed in the sense of ‘ service ’ or 
 ‘ devotion.’ The word ‘ adoration,’ again, has come to be restricted, 
 like that of ‘ prayer,’ to the homage claimed by God only ; though 
 the first, according to its etymology, need mean no more than ‘ invo- 
 cation,’ and the second, though refused to the saints, is used without 
 scruple in petitions to Parliament. All such words mean only what 
 they are meant to imply. They are to be interpreted by our inten- 
 tion, and not our intention by them. ‘ Mediation,’ again, has been 
 gifted in Protestant controversy with a special sense which is not 
 borne out by its received use. The word is employed freely and un- 
 suspiciously to denote the friendly intervention of an ambassador or 
 peacemaker ; but in religious language we are expected to apply it 
 exclusively to the office of our Blessed Lord. All this is very intel- 
 ligible on the part of those who do not believe that the saints in 
 heaven render us any assistance in the work of salvation, but it 
 should clearly be understood that the objection to such expressions 
 originates in an objection to that doctrine. Those indeed who attri- 
 bute to the intercession or mediation of the Blessed Virgin any kind 
 of interference with the office of our Lord would seem to imagine 
 
APPENDIX. 
 
 75 
 
 tliat we suppose our Lord to mediate or intercede with the Eternal 
 Father in the same sense in which we believe the Blessed Virgin to 
 mediate or intercede with Him. One hardly likes to hint such a 
 charge ; but the objection is certainly one which might be expected 
 to proceed from an Arian. The Church regards the intercession of 
 our Lord with the Eternal Father as something not only in degree 
 higher, but in kind other, than that of the Blessed Virgin with her 
 Son. The advocacy of the Blessed Virgin with her Divine Son is 
 incomparably the highest and most effectual that a mere created 
 being can exercise ; but it is characteristically different from that 
 according to which God the Son pleads continually, in the bosom of 
 the most Holy Trinity, the priceless satisfaction of His Cross and 
 Passion, which is, in truth, the sole meritorious cause of all the 
 graces and prerogatives of His most blessed Mother. 
 
 The light in which our Lady’s privilege first presented itself to her 
 own mind was as a motive to magnify God. ^ Magnificat anima mea 
 Dominum ; et exultavit spiritus mens in Deo salutari meo^ and her 
 children speak freely of her greatness, and of her gifts, because they 
 feel that all exaltation of her is implicitly, and, by consequence, an 
 exaltation of Him who willed that she should be the created model 
 of divine excellence in willing that she should be His Mother. 
 
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 CATHOLIC EIRENICON, 
 
 IN FRIENDLY RESPONSE TO DR. PUSEY, 
 
 ROMAN CATHOLIC PRINCIPLES IN REFERENCE 
 TO GOD AND THE KING:’’ 
 
 BY THE LOYAL PROFESSION OF WHICH 
 OUR ROMAN CATHOLIC ANCESTORS ACHIEVED EMANCIPATION 
 FOR THEMSELVES AND US. 
 
 Keprinted from the Edition of 1815. 
 
 “ Ne transgrediaris terminos antiques, quos posuerunt Patres tui .'"’ — 
 
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LONDON : 
 
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THE ROMAN CATHOLIC HIERARCHY OF 
 GREAT BRITAIN AND IRELAND, 
 
 THIS REPRINT OF THE PRINCIPLES 
 
 SO OFTEN PUBLICKLY SANCTIONED AND APPEALED TO, 
 DURING THE LAST 150 YEARS, 
 
 BY THEIR PREDECESSORS, 
 
 IS RESPECTFULLY DEDICATED 
 
 BY THE EDITOR. 
 
I 
 
 i 
 
 I 
 
PEEEACE. 
 
 This extraordinary little tract has been upon a small scale to 
 the Catholics of Great Britain and Ireland, for the last 150 
 years or more, what the renowned ‘‘Book of the Sentences” 
 by Peter Lombard, or the ‘‘ Theological Sum ” of S. Thomas 
 Aquinas was to the Schoolmen. It has been at once their 
 ‘‘sum” of principles, and their text-book for commentaries. 
 The last edition of it in a separate form appears to have been 
 that of the Kev. John Kirk, in 1815 : and it is to his researches, 
 and to Mr. Charles Butler, who has condensed and added to 
 them, that we are indebted for its history down to that date. 
 
 Its author, in all probability, was the Eev. James Croker, 
 Abbot of the Benedictine Abbey of Lambspring, in Germany. 
 It came out in 1680, Six editions of it were printed before 
 1684. Lord Stafford referred to it on his memorable trial in 
 1680. In the following year appeared “ Stafford’s Memoirs : 
 or a Brief and Impartial Account of the Trial, Principles, and 
 Final End of William, late Lord Viscount Stafford ; ” and in 
 the folio edition of that work it is given at length. Up to the 
 time of the last edition in 1815, no less than twenty-four 
 different editions of it had been discovered. A partial edition 
 of it was published in 1749 by the Eev. John Hornyhold, 
 afterwards Vicar Apostolic of the Midland District, in his 
 “ Catechism for the Adult.” It was printed at Dublin by Mr. 
 O’Connor, of Belanagare. Dr. Leland, the Historian, on 
 perusing that edition of it, is said to have declared that “if 
 such were the principles of Catholics, no Government had any 
 right to quarrel with them.” Dr. Coppinger, Eoman Catholic 
 Bishop of Cloyne, appended it to his popular manual entitled 
 “ True Piety : or the Day Well- spent,” which, in 1815, was in- 
 its ninth edition. The Eev. Joseph Berington appended it to 
 his “Eeflections Addressed to the Eev. John Hawkins ” in 
 1785, when it elicited the warm approbation of Dr. Walmesley, 
 Vicar Apostolic of the Midland District. It was now put 
 forward, not merely for private instruction, as it had been 
 previously, but upon public grounds. In 1788 — the very year 
 in which Prince Charles Edward died at Eome — it was sent by 
 the Committee of English Catholics to Mr. Pitt, as first 
 Minister of the Crown, accompanied by a letter dated May 9th, 
 
6 
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 in which they called it a printed summary of their tenets, 
 which they were persuaded every Catholic would readily sign.” 
 And that letter was signed by Lords Stourton and Petre ; Sirs 
 H. Englefield, W. Jerningham, J. Throckmorton; Messrs. 
 W. Fermor, J. Townley, T. Hornyhold. The tract itself bore 
 the signature, in his own handwriting, of the Hon. James 
 Talbot, Vicar Apostolic of the London District, on its title- 
 page, The object of its presentation was to securp for Koman 
 Catholics in this country the removal of their civil disabilities : 
 and as their plea for that purpose it was accepted, and answered 
 by the great Catholic Eelief Bill of 1791. 
 
 We now come to its history as a text book for commentaries, 
 like the work of Peter Lombard for the schools. In 1813, 
 the Eev, J. Berington and the Eev. J. Kirk published a work, 
 entitled, The Faith of Catholics, confirmed by Scripture, 
 and attested by the Fathers of the first five centuries of the 
 Church.” They dedicated their work ‘‘ to the Catholics of the 
 United Kingdom, as a monument of the Antiquity and Per- 
 petuity of their Faith;” and from the letter of Mr. Berington 
 to ‘^Dr. Poynter, Vicar Apostolic of the London district,” it 
 would appear that with the trifling exceptions there specified 
 and explained, their work had received the entire approval of 
 that eminent prelate. Its nature shall be given from the 
 Introduction, p. 3, and in the words of its principal author. 
 
 First, I state, in distinct propositions, the articles of belief, 
 as briefly, but as comprehensively as may be : and these 
 propositions I generally take from a small tract, entitled 
 ‘ Koman Catholic Principles,’ published anonymously towards 
 the close of the reign of Charles II. This I did because those 
 Principles — a few clauses excepted — are drawn up with great 
 precision, and because in stating points of religious behef, I 
 feel a predilection for whatever bears the stamp of age — 
 Antiquity is the badge of our faith.” . . . ‘‘ Secondly, 
 the Proposition is followed by such passages from the 
 Scriptures as seem to support it with the clearest evi- 
 dence.” . . . “ Thirdly, to the authorities from 
 
 Scripture, succeed those from the Fathers of the first 
 five centuries of the Church.” ... On examina- 
 tion, it wiU be found that in the work called The Faith of 
 Catholics,” some few of the propositions contained in our Tract 
 have been oijaitted ; some modified, or differently expressed or 
 arranged ; while here and there new propositions have been 
 added to give completeness and fulness to the whole. But in 
 no case is there the least hint dropped that any of the propo- 
 sitions omitted or amended had been thought unsound. In 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 7 
 
 conclusion they say jointly : ‘‘We submit without reserve the 
 work in all its parts to the judgment and correction of our 
 Ecclesiastical Superiors, and the other Pastors of the Church, 
 who are the appointed guardians of her faith and discipline.’* 
 (p. 4.) This edition was before the public for seventeen years 
 before another appeared. In 1830 a second edition was pub- 
 lished by the second of its former authors, the Kev. John Kirk. 
 In his Preface to the Eeader, he states that the Tract in 
 question was written by the Rev. J. Croker ; and his remarks 
 upon it, and on the work which had been founded on it, are as 
 follows : — 
 
 “As this tract was written long before certain doctrines of the 
 present day were broached, or had much currency in this 
 country, it cannot be a matter of surprise, that it was not in 
 every instance so correctly worded as to be sufficiently guarded 
 against those doctrines. It is, however, to be regretted that 
 the explanations given by my late friend Rev. J. Berington, 
 in his letter to the Rev. Dr. Poynter, were not introduced into 
 those propositions, which have been thought to require some 
 explanation. But the fact is, that, not being aware that any 
 great inaccuracies had been committed, or that any material 
 objections could be made to the work, Mr. Berington did not 
 submit the work to Dr. Poynter before it came from the press. 
 It was then too late to make any alterations in the body of the 
 work. Such alterations have now been made as seemed to be 
 called for, either to obviate objections, or to render the mean- 
 ing clearer.” (p. vi.) 
 
 He proceeds then to say that he has improved upon the 
 former translations : and made the references in it, as far as 
 possible, more exact. He has also added a distinct proposition 
 “ to prove the exercise of the Primacy by the successors of 
 S. Peter from the earliest ages of Christianity has “treated 
 largely of the Discipline of the Secret has extracted copiously 
 “ from the Liturgies, on the subject of the Eucharist, of prayers 
 to the Saints, and of prayers for the Dead.” He acknow- 
 ledges his obligations on all these heads “ to the works of Drs. 
 Poynter and Trevern in the full conviction, that as these 
 Venerable Prelates have rnade use of ‘ The Faith of Catholics' 
 . . . they would not object to his taking advantage of their 
 labours” . . . (p. vii.), a remark which shows how favorably 
 its first edition had been received. The new proposition added 
 by him on the Primacy, runs thus : — 
 
 “ The Bishops of Rome have ever been acknowledged, from 
 the earliest ages of Christianity, as the supreme Rulers on 
 earth of the whole Church of Christ : and have exercised an 
 
8 
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 acknowledged primacy of spiritual jurisdiction, . as of Divine 
 right, over all other particular Churches.” (p. 157.) 
 
 The definition of the Council of Florence is given at length 
 on that score, by way of preface to it : and of the fact con- 
 tained in it, there cannot be the slightest doubt in the minds 
 of any, who have studied ecclesiastical history without preju- 
 dice. This is the only real addition to the second edition 
 worth notice. 
 
 The third edition came out in a very enlarged form in 1846, 
 8 vols. 8vo., by the Eev. J. Waterworth. The new matter is 
 mainly due to the wish of the editor to present a digest of 
 the evidence of the first five centuries, rather than a mere 
 selection of passages from the writings of that period.” . . . 
 (Preface, p. i.) Further on, he says, he wishes it to be under- 
 stood that he is not responsible for the ‘ Propositions ’ which 
 head each section. Those propositions are taken from a well- 
 known tract of considerable merit, and have appeared in each 
 of the previous editions. Whatsoever they contain in addition 
 to the doctrinal decisions founds in the extracts from the 
 Council of Trent, usually appended to each question, is not an 
 article of Catholic faith, and where they come short of the 
 decrees of that council, the deficiency must he supplied by 
 carefully attending to the words and declarations of that 
 Synod.” (p. iv.) On examination it will appear that there is no 
 one point oD importance on which the editor has recorded his 
 dissent from those propositions, or the commentaries upon 
 them of his predecessors. This edition was dedicated to 
 Bishop Walsh. 
 
 But we must not lose sight of our little tract, in the thick 
 and gradually increasing volumes that have been written upon 
 most of what it contains. It stands out as a landmark in the 
 history of British Catholicism since the Reformation, and 
 marks its upward progress from the lowest depths of humi- 
 liation and prostration. It, more than any other known work, 
 has reconciled our countrymen, so far, to the faith of their 
 ancestors, that they have been content to re- admit us to full 
 citizenship, on the faith of those sober and truly Christian 
 principles which it sets forth. By their loyal profession of 
 those principles our forefathers effected a reconciliation be- 
 tween themselves and their and our country in State ; let us 
 endeavour, by our equally loyal adherence to them, in God’s 
 name, to reconcile this our country to us in Church. Our pri- 
 vileges in State were restored to us on those terms : and our 
 privileges in State may be forfeited again once more, if we 
 seek to recede from those terms, or to invent new. 
 
ROMAN CATHOLIC PRINCIPLES 
 
 IN 
 
 EEFEEENCE TO GOD AND THE KING. 
 
 Section I. 
 
 Of the Catholic Faith, and Church in general. 
 
 1. The fruition of God, and the remission of sin are not at- 
 tainable by man, otherwise than m and by the merits of Jesus 
 Christ, Who gratuitously purchased them for us. 
 
 2. These merits of Christ, though infinite in themselves, are 
 not applied to us, otherwise than by a right faith in Him. 
 
 3. This faith is but one entire, and conformable to its object, 
 which is divine revelation : and to which faith gives an un- 
 doubting assent. 
 
 4. This revelation contains many mysteries, transcending the 
 natural reach of human understanding. Wherefore, 
 
 5. It became the divine wisdom and goodness to provide some 
 way or means, whereby man might arrive to the knowledge of 
 
 mysteries ; visible dJid apparent to means _pro- 
 
 portioned to the capacities of all ; means sure and certain to 
 all. 
 
 6. This way or means, is not the reading of scripture, inter- 
 preted according to the private judgment of each disjunctive 
 person, or nation in particular ; But, 
 
 7. It is an attention and submission to the voice of the 
 Catholic or Universal Church, established by Christ for the 
 instruction of all ; spread for that end through all nations, and 
 visibly continued in the succession of pastors, and people 
 through all ages. — From this .Church, guided in truth, and 
 
( 10 ) 
 
 secured from error in matters oi faiths by the promised assist- 
 ance of the Holy Ghost, every one may learn the right sense 
 of the scriptures, and such Christian mysteries and duties as 
 are necessary to salvation. 
 
 8. This Church, thus established, thus spread, thus con- 
 tinued, thus guided, in one uniform faith, and subordination of 
 government, is that which is termed the Roman Catholic - 
 Church : the qualities just mentioned, unity, indeficiency, 
 visibility, succession, and universality, being evidently appli- 
 cable to her. 
 
 9. From the testimony and authority of this Church, it is, 
 that we receive the scriptures, and believe them to be the word 
 of God : and as she can assuredly tell us what particular book 
 is the word of God, so can she with the like assurance tell us 
 also, the true sense and meaning of it, in controverted points of 
 faith ; the same Spirit that wrote the scriptures, directing her 
 to understand both them, and all matters necessary to salva- 
 tion. — From these grounds it follows : — 
 
 10. Only truths revealed by Almighty God, and proposed by 
 the Church, to be believed as such, are, and ought to be 
 esteemed, articles of Catholic faith. 
 
 11. As an obstinate separation from the unity of the Church, 
 in known matters of faith, is heresy ; so a wilful separation 
 from the visible unity of the same Church, in matters of subor- 
 dination and government, is schism. 
 
 12. The Church proposes unto us matters of faith, first and 
 chiefiy by the Holy Scripture, in points plain and intelligible in 
 it ; secondly, by definitions of general councils, in points not 
 sufficiently plain in Scripture ; thirdly, by apostolical traditions 
 derived from Christ and his Apostles to all succeeding ages ; 
 fourthly, by her practice, worship, and ceremonies confirming 
 her doctrine. 
 
( 11 ) 
 
 Section II. 
 
 Of spiritual and temporal Authority, 
 
 1. The Pastors of the Church — who are the body represen- 
 tative — either dispersed or convened in council, have received no 
 commission from Christ to frame new articles of faith — these 
 being solely divine revelations — hut only to explain and to de- 
 fine to the faithful what anciently was, and is received and 
 retained, as of faith in the Church, when debates and contro- 
 versies arise about them. These definitions in matters of faith 
 only, and proposed as such, oblige all the faithful to a submis- 
 sion of judgment. But, 
 
 2. It is no article of faith, that the Church cannot err, 
 either in matters oi fact or discipline, alterable by circumstances 
 of time and place, or in matters of specidation or civil policy, 
 depending on mere human judgment or testimony. These 
 things are no revelations deposited in the Catholic Church in 
 regard of which alone, she has the promised assistance of the 
 Holy Spirit. — Hence, it is deduced, 
 
 3. If a general council, much less a papal consistory, should 
 presume to depose a king and to absolve his subjects from their 
 allegiance, no Catholic could he bound to submit to such a 
 decree, — Hence also it follows, that, 
 
 4. The subjects of the king of England lawfully may, with- 
 out the least breach of any Catholic principle, renounce, upon 
 oath, the teaching or practising the doctrine of deposing kings 
 excommunicated for heresy, by any authority whatsoever, as 
 repugnant to ihQ fundamental laws of the nation, as injurious 
 to sovereign power, as destructive to peace and government, 
 and consequently in his majesty’s subjects, as impious and 
 damnable. 
 
 5. Catholics believe that the Bishop of Rome, successor of 
 St. Peter, is the head of the whole Catholic Church; in 
 which sense, this Church may therefore fitly be styled Roman 
 Catholic, being an universal body, united under one visible 
 head. Nevertheless, 
 
 fi. It is no matter of faith to believe that ihePope is in him- 
 self infallible, separated from the Church, even in expounding 
 the faith : by consequence, papal definitions or decrees, in 
 
( 12 ) 
 
 whatever form pronounced, taken exclusively from a general 
 council , or U7iiversal acceptance of the Church, oblige none, 
 under pain of heresy, to an interior assent. 
 
 7. Nor do Catholics, as Catholics, believe that the Pope has 
 any direct or indirect authority over the temporal power and 
 jurisdiction of princes. Hence, if the Pope should pretend to 
 absolve or dispense with his majesty’s subjects from their alle- 
 giance, on account of heresy or schism, such dispensation 
 would be vain and null : and all Catholic subjects, notwith- 
 standing such dispensation or absolution, would be still bound 
 in conscience to defend their king and country, at the hazard of 
 their lives and fortunes (as far as Protestants would be bound), 
 even against the Pope himself, in case he should invade the 
 nation. 
 
 8. As for the pi^ohlematical disputes, or errors of particular 
 divines, in this or any other matter whatsoever, we are no wise 
 responsible for them ; nor are Catholics, as Catholics, justly 
 punishable on their account. But, 
 
 9. As for the king-killing doctrine, or murder of princes ex- 
 communicated for heresy, it is universally admitted in the 
 Catholic Church, and expressly so declared by the council of 
 Constance, that such doctrine is impious and execrable, being 
 contrary to the known laws of God and nature. 
 
 10. Personal misdemeanors, of what nature soever, ought 
 not to be imputed to the Catholic Church, when not justifiable 
 by the tenets of her faith and doctrine. For which reason, 
 though the stories of the Irish cruelties or powder plot, had 
 been exactly true (which yet, for the most part, are notoriously 
 misrelated) nevertheless Catholics, as such, ought not to suffer 
 for such offences, any more than the eleven Apostles ought to 
 have suffered for the treachery of Judas. 
 
 11. It is Si, fundamental truth in our religion, that no power 
 on earth can license men to lie, to forsivear, or perjure them- 
 selves, to massacre their neighbours, or destroy their native 
 country, on pretence of promoting the Catholic cause or reli- 
 gion : furthermore, all pardons or dispensations granted, or 
 pretended to be granted, in order to any such ends or designs, 
 could have no other validity or effect than to add sacrilege and 
 blasphemy to the above-mentioned crimes. 
 
 12. The doctrine of equivocation or mental reservation, how- 
 ever wrongfully imputed to the Church, was never taught or ap- 
 proved by her, as any part of her belief : On the contrary, sim- 
 plicity and godly sincerity are constantly inculcated by her as 
 truly Clwistian virtues necessary to the conservation of justice, 
 truth and common secuidty. 
 
i 1:3 ) 
 
 Section III. 
 
 Of other Points of Catholic Faith, 
 
 1. We believe, that there are seven Sacraments, or sacred 
 ceremonies, instituted by our Saviour Christ, whereby the 
 merits of his Passion are applied to the soul of the worthy 
 receiver. 
 
 2. We believe, that when a sinner repents of his sins from 
 the bottom of his heart, and acknowledges his transgressions to 
 God and his Ministers, the dispensers of the mysteries of 
 Christ, resolving to turn from his evil ways, and bring forth 
 fruits worthy of penance ; there is, then, and no othenvise, an 
 authority left by Christ to absolve such a penitent sinner from 
 his sins : which authority, we believe, Christ gave to his 
 Apostles and their successors, the Bishops and Priests of his 
 church, in those words, when He said, Receive ye the Holy 
 Ghost; whose sins yon shall forgive, they are forgiven unto 
 them, <fc. 
 
 3. Though no creature whatsoever can make condign satis- 
 faction, either for the guilt of sin, or the pain eternal due to it, 
 this satisfaction being proper to Christ our Saviour only ; yet 
 penitent sinners, redeemed by Christ, may, as members of 
 Christ, in some measure satisfy by prayer, fasting, alms-deeds, 
 and other works of piety, for the temporal pain, which in the 
 order of divine justice sometimes remains due, after the guilt 
 of sin and pains eternal have been remitted. Such penitential 
 works are, notwithstanding, no otherwise satisfactory than as 
 joined and applied to that satisfaction, which Jesus made upon 
 the cross, in virtue of which alone all our good works find a 
 grateful acceptance in the sight of God. 
 
 4. The guilt of sin, or pain eternal due to it, is never remit- 
 ted by what Catholics call indulgences ; but only such temporal 
 punishments as remain due after the guilt is remitted : — these 
 indulgences being nothing else than a mitigation or relaxation, 
 
( 14 ) 
 
 upon just causes, of canonical penances, enjoined by the pastors 
 of the church on penitent sinners, according to their several de- 
 grees of demerit. — And if abuses or mistakes have been some- 
 times committed, in point either of granting or gaining indul- 
 gences, through the remissness or ignorance of particular 
 persons, contrary to the ancient custom and discipline of the 
 church ; such abuses or mistakes cannot rationally be charged 
 on the church, or rendered matters of derision, in prejudice to 
 her faith and discipline. 
 
 5. Catholics hold there is a purgatory ; that is to say, a 
 place, or state, where souls departing this life, with remission 
 of their sins, as to the eternal guilt or pain, but yet obnoxious 
 to some temporal punishment, of which we have spoken, still 
 remaining due, or not perfectly freed from the blemish of some 
 defects or deordinations, are purged before their admittance 
 into heaven, where nothing that is defiled can enter. Further- 
 more, 
 
 6. Catholics also hold, that such souls so detained m purga- 
 tory, being the living members of Christ Jesus, are relieved by 
 the prayers and suffrages of their fellow-members here on earth : 
 But where this place is ; of what nature or quality the pains 
 are ; how long souls may be there detained ; in what manner 
 the suffrages made in their behalf are applied ; whether by way 
 of satisfaction or intercession, &c. are questions superfluous 
 and impertinent as to faith. 
 
 7. No man, though just, can merit either an increase of 
 sanctity in this life, or eternal glory in the next, independently 
 on the merits and passion of Christ Jesus : But the good 
 works of a just man proceeding from grace and charity, are so 
 far acceptable to God through His goodness and sacred 
 promises, as to be truly meritorious of eternal life. 
 
 8. It is an article of Catholic belief, that in the most holy 
 sacrament of the Eucharist, there is truly and really contained 
 the Body of Christ, which was delivered for us ; and his Blood, 
 which was shed for the remission of sins : the substance of 
 bread and wine being, by the powerful words of Christ, changed 
 into the substance of his blessed Body and Blood ; the species 
 or appearances of bread and wine, by the will of God, re- 
 maining as they were. But, 
 
 9. Christ is not present in this Sacrament, according to his 
 natural way of existence, or rather as bodies naturally exist, 
 but in a manner proper to the character of his exalted and 
 glorified Body : His Presence then is real and substantial, but 
 sacramental ; not exposed to the external senses, or obnoxious 
 to corporal contingencies. 
 
( 15 ) 
 
 10. Neither is the Body of Christ, in this holy Sacrament, 
 separated from his Blood, or his Blood from his Body, or 
 either of them disjoined from his Soul and Divinity ; but all 
 and whole living Jesus is entirely contained under either spe- 
 cies : so that whosoever receives under one kind is truly 
 partaker of the whole Sacrament ; he is not deprived either of 
 the Body or the Blood of Christ. True it is, 
 
 11. Our Saviour left unto us his Body and Blood, under 
 two distinct species, or kinds ; in doing of which He instituted 
 not only a Sacrament, but also a Sacrifice ; a commemorative 
 Sacrifice, distinctly shewing his Death and bloody Passion, 
 until He come. For as the Sacrifice of the Cross was per- 
 formed by a distinct ejfusion of blood ; so is that sacrifice 
 commemorated in that of the Altar, by a distinction of the 
 symbols. Jesus therefore is here given, not only to us, but /or 
 us ; and the Church thereby is enriched with a true, proper, 
 and propitiatory sacrifice usually termed the Mass. 
 
 12. Catholics renounce all divine worship and adoration of 
 images and pictures ; God alone we worship and adore ; ne- 
 vertheless we place pictures in our churches, to reduce our 
 wandering thoughts and to enliven our memories towards hea- 
 venly things. Further, we shew a respect to the images of 
 Christ and his Saints, beyond what is due to every profane 
 figure ; nor that we can believe any divinity or virtue to reside 
 in them, for which they ought to be honoured, but because the 
 honour given to pictures is referred to the prototype, or thing 
 represented. In like manner, 
 
 13. There is a kind of honour and respect due to the Bible, 
 to the Cross, to the Name of Jesus, to Churches, to the 
 Sacraments, &c., as things peculiarly appertaining to God ; 
 and to Kings, Magistrates, and Superiors on earth ; to whom 
 honour is due, honour may be given, without any derogation 
 to the majesty of God, or that divine worship which is appro- 
 priate to Him. Moreover, 
 
 14. Catholics believe, that the blessed Saints in heaven, re- 
 plenished with charity, pray for us their fellow-members here 
 on earth ; that they rejoice at our conversion : that seeing 
 God, they see and know in Him all things suitable to their 
 happy state : But God may he inclinable to hear their requests 
 made in our behalf, and for their sakes may grant us many 
 favours ; therefore we believe that it is good and profitable to 
 desire their intercession. Can this manner of invocation be 
 more injurious to Christ our mediator, than it is for one 
 Christian to beg the prayers of another here on earth ? How- 
 ever, Catholics are not taught so to rely on the prayers of 
 
( 16 ) 
 
 others, as to neglect their own duty to God ; in imploring his 
 divine mercy md .gpodness ; in mortifying the deeds of the 
 flesh ; in despisinfl-ihe world ; in loving and serving God tod 
 their neighbour ; in following the footsteps of Christ our Lord, 
 Who is the Way, the Truth, and the Life : to Whom he 
 honour, and glory for ever and ever; Anien. 
 
 THE END, 
 
 London : Printed at the Regent Press, 65, King Street, Regent Street, W. 
 
A REVIEW 
 
 f- 
 
 DR. PUSEY’S EIRENICON, 
 
 EEPKINTED FROM 
 
 THE ^‘WEEKLY REGISTER,'^ 
 
 WITH 
 
 TWO LETTERS TO THE EDITOR FROM DR. PUSEY 
 
 ON HIS HOPES OF THE 
 
 REUNION OF 
 
 iihe 0{huin|lt 4 ittglawd imth tlic (KRtltolir djhuith : 
 
 ALSO, LETTERS FROM 
 
 DR. NEWMAN AND CANON OAKELEY. 
 
 LONDON: 
 
 PRINTED BY GEORGE CHEEK AT lA, SAVOY STREET, STRAND ; 
 And Published by him at 32, Brydges Street, Covent Garden. 
 And sold hj all Booksellers, 
 
PRINTED BY GEORGE CHEEK, lA SAVOY STREET, STRAND. 
 
TO 
 
 JOHN HENRY NEWMAN, D.D 
 
 AND 
 
 E. B. PUSEY, D.D. 
 
 TWO VENERABLE AND BELOVED NAMES, 
 
 THAT ONE LOVES IN THOUGHT TO ASSOCIATE TOGETHER. 
 
DR. PUSEY’S EIRENICON. 
 
 The Church of England a Portion of Christ's Holy Catholic Churchy 
 and a means of Restoring Visible Unity : an Eirenicon. In a 
 letter to the Author of “The Christian Year.” By E. B. 
 PusEY, D.D., Begins Professor of Hebrew, and Canon of Christ 
 Church, Oxford. Oxford: Parker, 1865. 
 
 We can quite imagine two Catholic readers rising from a perusal 
 of this book with totally opposite views as to its character and aim. 
 To one it might seem what its name implies : an olive-branch of 
 peace ; to the other a firebrand. To the one a hopeful move in the 
 direction of faith and unity ; to the other a work calculated to 
 strengthen and perpetuate the wall of separation between Angli- 
 cans and the Catholic Church. For the work has a two-fold object 
 indicated by its double title. It is, on the one hand, a controversial 
 defence of the Church of England as a portion of the visible Church ; 
 and yet it is, on the other hand, a most distinct admission throughout 
 of the shortcomings of Anglicanism, of its abnormal condition as 
 separated from the centre of unity, and is, perhaps, the most unequi- 
 vocal advance that has ever been made towards negotiation for heahng 
 the schism of the sixteenth century. For our own part, whilst we 
 deplore a good deal of the controversial portion, and think that more 
 intercourse with Catholics would have saved Dr. Pusey from much 
 misunderstanding of Catholic doctrine, yet on the whole we incline ta 
 think that the book ought to be accepted by Catholics as an Eirenicon, 
 according to its author’s expressed intention. We make every allow- 
 ance for an envoy who comes to us from the hostile camp, bearing an 
 olive-branch in one hand, even though he carries a sword in the other ; 
 and we do not roughly repel him, even though he claims to speak 
 only in the name of one division of the enemy, and though his pro- 
 posals are not of unconditional surrender, but of conference and 
 negotiation. 
 
 Ho doubt we might take another line, and urge the inconsistency of the 
 Anglican position, and the special inconsistency of Dr. Pusey in remain- 
 ing in the Church of England, after his delarations in 1850 and the events 
 which have since occurred. We are indeed, quite unable to understand 
 how Dr. Pusey can speak of the Anglican Church, as having any 
 authoritative voice, or being in any way a Divine teacher, or having any 
 mind or moral personality at all. We think that the best that can be 
 
said of it even by its best defenders is (we quote the words of a 
 contemporary), “ tliat if it tolerates heresy, it also tolerates orthodoxy, 
 and that its prayer-book and formularies admit an orthodox sense.’ 
 Catholics, in fact, can see in it nothing but a mere compromise 
 between two contending parties, bound over before the civil magistrate 
 under heavy penalties to keep the peace and live together. This and 
 a great deal more we fully admit ; nevertheless, when all has been 
 said, there remains the fact that numbers of learned and apparently 
 earnest men do not see their inconsistency now in 1865 any more 
 than their predecessors, the leaders of the movement twenty years 
 ago, who are now Catholics, saw their inconsistency in 1840. 
 
 Old Catholics who have watched both movements cannot see less 
 reason for confidence now than formerly. They cannot see that the 
 celebrated Gorham judgment, or any of the later decisions in the law 
 courts have changed the status of the Church of England. Those 
 who could believe in the Church of England, in spite of the original 
 estabhshment of the royal supremacy, are not necessarily insincere or 
 more unreasonable, if they believe in it, in spite of the acts of 
 that supremacy. In 1840 it was maintained by the leaders of the 
 movement that the Church of England, though well nigh disabled by 
 the incubus of the supremacy, was still alive, iu 1865 their successors 
 only maintain the same. Nor is it as the case would be, if from 
 the time when Newman, Manning, and other leaders of the Anglican 
 School left the EngUsh Church, the Catholic movement had come to an 
 end, or become insignificant. On the contrary, the appearance of such a 
 work as Dr. Pusey’s, and from one in his eminent position, is only one 
 amongst a hundred evidences, that the movement, far from having come 
 to an end, has become broader and deeper. It cannot be denied 
 that almost every Catholic doctrine is now preached in hundreds of 
 Anglican pulpits ; not after the tentative manner of the original 
 Tractarian movement, but boldly and distinctly, indicating unmis- 
 takeably that the leaders are conscious that they are speaking to a 
 laity sufficiently imbued with Catholic ideas, to understand and 
 sympathise with their teachers. In nothing is this change, from the 
 reserve then necessary to the explicitness now possible, more marked 
 than in the restoration in so many churches of the Catholic vestments, 
 as a natural embodiment of the unequivocal teaching of the Eucharistic 
 Sacrifice. 
 
 We have heard it objected to Dr. Pusey’s book that its aim is not 
 so much the restoration of unity, as the prevention of individual 
 conversion. It certainly may have this effect in certain cases, and we 
 quite admit that this must have been in part Dr. Pusey’s object, but 
 we can hardly blame him for doing, what he would not be sincere if 
 
6 
 
 lie did not. The same was done by Dr. Manning and Dr. Newman, 
 so long as they believed in the Anghcan position, and would be done 
 by any one honestly in error. Once let us admit that Dr. Pusey 
 believes, strange and unaccountable as it may seem to us, that the 
 Anglican position is tenable, and we shall see that he could not act 
 difierently. But what hope, it may be said, can there be of this re- 
 union, while Anghcans sincerely hold what they do, since the Church 
 cannot change her essential doctrine ? What result can be hoped for, 
 what course is there but that of individual conversion from error to 
 truth, and how can corporate reunion be possible except by the con- 
 version of each individual of the separated body ? Our reply is to 
 admit at once that we are not prepared in a short review, to answer 
 all. the difficulties that may be raised on this matter of corporate re- 
 union ; yet that corporate reunion cannot be impossible, since it has 
 been reahzed by the Church, at the Council of Florence, as well as in 
 various other transactions with separated bodies. We make no doubt 
 that in such negotiations for reunion, on the part of separatists there 
 must always have been much that was unsatisfactory and anomalous, 
 much previous inconsistency of statement on the part of the separatists, 
 much of indecision, and uncertainty of action. The history of the 
 Council of Florence affords an instance of this. What must have been 
 the inconsistency of many of the Oriental Bishops, who had acted for 
 years out of communion with Rome, and defended their position even 
 in the Council itself, and yet afterwards submitted to all that Rome 
 required as terms of communion ? Of course we are not comparing 
 the present informal movement in the Anglican Church with any of 
 these, but only observing that inconsistency on the part of separatists, 
 is perhaps almost involved in the idea of negotiation for corporate 
 reunion, and yet this has not prevented the Church from admitting 
 such inchoate measures in the direction of unity. The failure of the 
 Council of Florence to effect a permanent reunion is of course no 
 argument against the principle, or it would prove too much, namely, 
 that the Church erred in attempting it. But if the Church attempted 
 it, it is certain that the principle is sound, that it failed of success is to 
 be attributed to the evil will of man, which has so often marred the 
 fair purpose of God. Besides, other corporate reunions have been 
 attempted, before and since, and have succeeded ; such as that of the 
 Armenians under Eugenius IV., and of other Oriental sects, some of 
 which have taken place even in our own day. 
 
 We now turn to the work itself. Dr. Pusey begins his book with 
 what he calls a personal explanation ; he had wished to abstain from 
 controversy for the remainder of his life, but his friends considered 
 that he was in some measure bound to reply to Archbishop Manning’s 
 
7 
 
 published letter ; and this required something controversal in his 
 answer. He goes on to defend himself from a charge made by the 
 Archbishop, that in fraternising with the Lower Church party in 
 certain protests against the RationaUstic school in the Church of 
 England, he had been “ drifting back from the old moorings.” He 
 says : “ Ever since I knew them, which was not in my earliest years, 
 
 I have loved those who are called Evangelicals, I loved them because 
 they loved our Lord, I loved them for their zeal for souls. I often 
 thought them narrow, yet I was drawn to individuals amongst them, 
 more than to others who held truths in common with myself which 
 the Evangelicals did not hold, at least explicitly. When occasion 
 came, as in some of our troubles at Oxford, we acted together. 
 
 “ I have united with the Evangelicals now as I did before, when- 
 ever they would join with me in defence of our common faith. I 
 have not united with them in any of those things which were not 
 
 in accordance with my own principles And this perhaps 
 
 may be an occasion to mention what relates to a very sacred season 
 of my life when death seemed day by day nearer. Had it so pleased 
 God that I should then die, I should have worded the confession of 
 my faith in words like these : ‘ I believe explicitly all which I know 
 God to have revealed to His Church, and implicitly anything if He has 
 revealed it, which I know not ; in simple words I believe all which the 
 Church believes : this is my habit of mind now, this I confess when I 
 say to God, ‘ I believe one Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church.’ ” 
 
 Dr. Pusey goes on to comment on Dr. Manning’s letter, of which 
 he says the real point is to assert the contradictory of the statement 
 that “ the Church of England is in God’s hands the great bulwark 
 against infidelity in this land.” To defend this proposition is a prin- 
 cipal object of Dr. Pusey throughout his book. He explains, how- 
 ever, the sense in which he understood the proposition to have been 
 originally enunciated by Dr. Hewman. He says, “ This saying: was 
 not mine, but that of one of the deepest thinkers and observers m the 
 Roman Communion. It relates plainly only to a present fact ; it does 
 not aver that the Church of England is the best possible bulwark, but; 
 only as a matter of fact that it is at this moment, in God’s Providence;, 
 a real and chief bulwark against infidelity. Of course any Roman 
 Catholic must think that the Roman Communion, if it were of the 
 same extent in this land as the English Church is now, would be a 
 much stronger bulwark, but this is not the question.” He goes on 
 to show what has been the estimate of the Church of England in its. 
 relation to Catholic doctrine and the hopes of reunion, by illustrious 
 Catholics in other days. “We are not in most things,” says' Dupin to» 
 Archbishop Wake, “ so far removed from one another that we majr 
 
8 
 
 not be mutually reconciled.” This union,” says Dr. Doyle (Bishop 
 of Kildare and Leighlin, the celebrated “ J. K. L.”), “is not so 
 difficult as appears to many. It is not difficult, for in the discussions 
 which were held on this subject, in which Archbishop Wake was 
 engaged, as in others which were carried on between Bossuet and 
 Leibnitz, it appeared that the points of agreement between the 
 Churches were numerous, those on which the parties hesitated few, and 
 apparently not the most important. The effort which was then made 
 was not attended Avith success, but its failure was owing to Princes 
 than to Priests, more to State policy than to a difference of belief.” 
 
 The next thirty or forty pages contain an elaborate proof, 
 draAvn chiefly from the celebrated Tract 90 of Dr. Newman, that the 
 Articles of the Church of England and the Decrees of Trent may be 
 reconciled, and that there is nothing in the Decrees of Trent which 
 may not be so interpreted as to form the basis of negotiation for the 
 reunion of Anglicans to the Catholic Church. “ We have been wont,” 
 he says, “ to dwell with pleasure on the amount of faith which we 
 confess in common with the Boman Church. In the three creeds we 
 confess together, the whole doctrine as to the Holy Trinity and the 
 Incarnation of our Blessed Lord, we teach alike, the one end of man, 
 the resurrection of the body, the judgment according to works, the 
 life everlasting, and the everlasting fire.” 
 
 He goes on to maintain that the Anglican Church teaches with the 
 Catholic Church, regeneration in baptism, confession and absolution, 
 the Beal Presence and the Eucharistic Sacrifice, and has the same 
 doctrine on grace and justification. The substance of a great deal 
 which follows is, that according to the view of the learned writer, there 
 is nothing in the formal statements of the Church of England, in her 
 Prayer-book, articles, and homilies, which cannot be reconciled Avith 
 the formal statements of the Catholic Church. 
 
 On the question of the Church’s unity Dr. Pusey would hold an 
 opinion differing, on important points, from the doctrine universally 
 held by Catholics ; and here we fear would he the chief difficulty in 
 discovering a common basis for negotiation. He would look upon the 
 Church as indissolubly one, by reason of a Sacramental bond of union , 
 established between our Lord and all those who hold a right faith 
 concerning Him, through the instrumentality of a rightly- ordained 
 Priesthood, We think we understand him to hold, that visible unity 
 under one Head, and that Head the Bishop of Borne, is not only 
 desirable, but according to the will and intention of our Lord ; that 
 any breach of this unity could not take place without sin, but that 
 there may be such a thing as justifiable or material schism ; and he 
 would consider the separation of England from the Chair of Peter to 
 
0 
 
 be something of this nature. He writes : This unity, derived from 
 
 Our Blessed Lord as Head of the Church, is imparted primarily 
 through the Sacraments.” “ All that were baptised into Christ have 
 put on Christ, and having put Him on are one in Christ ; and in the 
 Holy Eucharist are one bread and one body who ai’e partakers of 
 that one Bread.” “ Unknown in face, in place separate, different in 
 language, opposed, alas ! in some things to one another, still before the 
 throne of God they are One Holy Apostolic Church.” “ This,” he 
 continues, “ is sometimes called objective unity ; ” and this Divine 
 gift requires, as a corresponding duty, what has been called subjective 
 unity, or a unison of wills ; and of this, intercommunion, is the 
 natural expression. But is all unity forfeited where the unity of 
 intercommunion is suspended? No one in the face of Church history 
 can or does maintain, that all interruptions of intercommunion destroy 
 unity. In the second century, “ the East,” says Epiphanius, 
 “differing from the West, they received not from each other tokens 
 of peace.” In the next century was a temporary severance between 
 Borne and both Asiatic and African Churches, through the Bishop of 
 Borne, concerning whom St. Firmilian says : “ While thinking that 
 
 all may be excommunicated by him, he excommunicated himself alone 
 from all.” St. Meletius, of Antioch, though out of communion with 
 Borne, presided at the second General Council, and after his death 
 was owned to be a Saint by those who, in his lifetime, owned him not 
 to be a Bishop. The fifth General Council was the occasion of a 
 schism which rent the West, Africa, Upper Italy, from East to West, 
 and even Ireland ; nor was the schism wholly healed for a hundred 
 and fifty years.” 
 
 Such appears to be a very fair statement of the Anglican theory of 
 the Church’s unity. We have given it, without comment, as a clear 
 expression of what learned Anglicans think they have to say for their 
 position. And for the same reason, we would recommend a careful 
 perusal of the whole work, to those whose duty it may be to be ready 
 to answer difficulties. We do not recommend it to any but learned 
 Cathohes. As the work of one who has made Church history and the 
 writings of the Holy Fathers the study of a lifetime, the controver- 
 sial portion, based chiefly on the writer's view of the Patristic teaching, 
 may easily present difficulties which the unlearned reader may not be 
 able to answer. The Catholic theologian, who studies the Holy 
 Fathers and historians of the early centuries, has a clue to guide him, 
 in the perpetual unbroken tradition of the living Church, which is 
 altogether wanting to the Anghcan student, however learned. The 
 Anghcan studies the Fathers much as the ordinary Protestant studies 
 the Holy Scriptures ; without the clue he wanders hither and thither 
 
10 
 
 tliroTigli a labyrinth, disappointed and baffled at every turn ; or, if he 
 thinks to have found the road out, he may chance to fflscover, that the 
 shortest course is to retrace his steps and begin again. 
 
 The historical difficulties started by Dr. Pusey, are well known to 
 all who have at all studied the relation of the See of Kome to the 
 other Churches. Such anomalies, even if more than apparent, make 
 no way, against the whole current of Patristic teaching running in the 
 other direction ; but in all probability, if we could get at all the facts 
 of the case, the difficulty in each instance would disappear. The case 
 of Meletius, for example, presents a very different view from that 
 given by Dr. Pusey, as we find it stated by Socrates, who wrote in 
 the next centuiy, and whose account must be familiar to Dr. Pusey. 
 It seems that the case of St. Meletius was one of a disputed succession 
 such as occurred at different times in the fine of the Roman Pontifis, 
 depending chiefly on some disputed question of fact, when Cathofisc 
 and even Saints took ojiposite sides. Meletius had been chosen Bishop 
 by the Arian majority in Antioch. After his election he gradually 
 declared himself Catholic, a large body of Arians conformed to the 
 Catholic faith adhering to Meletius, while the Arian party rejected 
 him. Paulinus was soon after chosen and consecrated Bishop by the 
 old Catholic party, who would have nothing to do with Meletius 
 because he had been elected by the votes of the Arians. Borne and 
 the West, on such evidence as reached them, adhered to the side of 
 Paulinus, and did not acknowledge Meletius. Socrates, however, 
 informs us, that a mutual understanding was come to between the 
 two parties that both Bishops should rule, each over his own con- 
 gregation, and that on the death of either the survivor should be 
 recognised as sole Bishop. He tells us that this put an end to the 
 dispute, and there was no longer any division amongst the people. 
 (Soc. Book Y., Ch. V.) This happened a year or more before the 
 Council of Constantinople, at which Meletius presided, and during 
 the sitting of which he died. We do not then see on what grounds 
 Dr. Pusey makes the assertion that Meletius, being out of communion 
 with Borne, presided at the Council and died out of communion ; 
 whereas Socrates tells us that the dispute or schism was at an end at 
 least a year before the Council. We do not know that there is any 
 evidence which makes it clear that he was out of communion with 
 Borne at all. On the other hand, it is certain that Meletius com- 
 municated with Bishops with whom Borne was in full communion, 
 such as St. Basil, St. Cyril, St. Gregory Hazianzen, St. Chrysostom, 
 as well as the whole Council of Constantinople ; and this could not 
 have been, had he been considered by them, orlby Borne as out of 
 communion, since it is notorious that to communicate with those 
 
11 
 
 wlio were out of communion, was always held as ipso facto involving 
 excommunication. (Note A.) 
 
 The next proposition sounds strangely paradoxical. “ The English 
 Church has not rejected a visible head, and is not more independent 
 of Rome than Africa was in the time of St. Augustine.” 
 
 We should be very glad to hear this, if we could see any sense in 
 which it could be true, but we look in vain for proof of it. We should 
 think it will astonish most of Dr. Pusey’s Anglican readers even more 
 than it surprises us. He shows indeed clearly enough that St. 
 Augustine denounced in very strong language, the carrying appeals 
 to Rome, in cases which by the Canons were to be decided before 
 local synods. “ If presbyters, deacons, and other inferior Clergy (he 
 quotes from St. Augustine) shall in any cause which they have, 
 complain of the judgment of their own Bishops, let the neighbouring 
 Bishops hear and determine the matter between them, being called in 
 by them, with consent of their own Bishops. But if they think that 
 they should appeal from these too, let them not appeal to courts 
 beyond the seas, but either to the Primates of their Province, or to a 
 General Council of Africa, as has often been enacted about Bishop s 
 also. But if any one choose to appeal to the parts beyond the seas, 
 let him be received to communion by no one in Africa.” 
 
 Dr. Pusey adds, “ the English Church in the 1 5th century 
 acquiesced in, or consented to the suppression of appeals to Rome. 
 The African Church in the 5th century not only forbade them but 
 excommunicated any one who should so appeal.” Yet Dr. Pusey 
 would not deny, that St. Augustine in his writings, furnishes a link ot 
 that long chain of tradition which runs through all Patristic teaching, 
 in regard to the prerogatives of the Apostolic See, and the Chair ot 
 Peter. St. Augustine himself, in the case of Pelagius sends to the 
 Pope the decrees of two African Synods, by which he had been con- 
 demned. Pope Innocent, in reply, affirms the rights of his See in the 
 strongest language. St. Augustine in his letter on the subject writes 
 of the Pope, “ He hath answered to all as was right, and as it became 
 the Prelate of the Apostolic See. Already the decrees of two Councils 
 on this matter have been sent to the Apostolic See, from whence the 
 rescripts have been received. The cause is terminated.” Again, in 
 his 43rd Epistle, he speaks of the “ Roman Church in which hath 
 always flourished the Primacy of the Apostolic Chair, ‘ ApostolicaB 
 Cathedras Principatus.’ ” Dr. Pusey speaks as if the question of 
 appeals covered the whole case of the Papal claims. It is clear that 
 St. Augustine was of a different opinion, and did not intend while 
 protesting against certain abuses in matters of appeal, to detract from 
 that authority to which he himself appealed as to the highest and 
 
last tribunal in matters of doctrine ; for certainly this seems to he 
 the natural sense of the memorable words “ Apostolicae Cathedrae 
 Principatus,” and “indc recepta sunt rescripta causa finita est.” And 
 certainly this restraining of uncanonical appeals to Kome is a very 
 different thing, from tlie formal declaration required from all the 
 Anglican Clergy, that “the Pope hath no jurisdiction in this realm of 
 England.” 
 
 Dr. Pusey quotes a devout and loyal Catholic like Gerson, speaking 
 strong words against abuses of Papal authority ; but we may be sure 
 Crerson, who had been the great light at the Councils of Basle and 
 Constance, would have died rather than have impugned, that Primacy 
 of jurisdiction in the See of Peter, which a few years later the Council 
 of Florence declared to be of Divine institution. Gerson’s words are, 
 as quoted by Dr. Pusey : “ A General Council, representing the 
 
 Universal Church, if it aim to see complete union, to repress and put 
 an end to schisms, and to exalt the Church, must before all things, 
 after the manner of the Holy Fathers before us, limit and bound the 
 co-active and usurped power of the Pope, which at successive times 
 many supreme Pontiffs obtained to themselves, contrary to God and 
 justice, depriving inferior Bishops of the power and authority given 
 them by God and the Church.” N^othing that Dr. Pusey brings 
 forward is much stronger against abuse of authority by the See of 
 Borne, than the words he quotes of Pope Nicholas Y., who certainly 
 did not intend to repudiate that jurisdiction of the Holy See which is 
 of Divine right, but only to admit that Popes being human may abuse 
 and have abused the authority committed to them by God for 
 edification. The words of Pope Nicholas, as related by Dr. Pusey, 
 are : “ The Boman Pontiffs, it seems to me, extended their skirts too 
 
 far, in that they left no jurisdiction to the other Bishops, those of 
 Basle abridged too much the power of the Apostolic See ; but so it 
 liappens, whoso doth things unworthy must endure things unjust, 
 those who would set erect a tree inclined on one side, draw it on the 
 other. Our mind is, not to despoil of their rights the Bishops who 
 are called to a part of our charge, for so we hope to preserve our own 
 jurisdiction, if we do not usurp what belongs to others.” If Anglicans 
 will accept that Primacy of jurisdiction given by Our Lord to Peter, 
 whicli St. Augustine recognised in his successor, such as was after- 
 wards defined and accepted by East and West at the Council of 
 Florence, the limits of that jurisdiction can easily be settled, and the 
 line drawn betoveen what is Divine and what of ecclesiastical institu- 
 tion, in the actual jurisdiction of the Boman Pontiffs. The separation 
 between England and the Church took place and is perpetuated, not 
 merely because appeals to Borne were abolished, but because all that 
 
13 
 
 was of Divine and all tliat was of human origin, in the jurisdiction of 
 the Pope was rejected together, and is rejected still in the oath of 
 supremacy ; and also because essential changes, of a character no less 
 heretical than schismatic, were introduced or accepted by the Church 
 of England. Such, for instance, was the repudiation of the Sacrament 
 of Extreme Unction from the Service Book, and that tampering with 
 the Liturgy which has obscured, to say the least, if it has not 
 absolutely excluded, the doctrine of the Eucharistic Sacrifice. To 
 these and other such acts the Church of England stands committed, 
 so long as she retains her present Service Book, and until such acts 
 are repented and retracted, it seems almost idle to speak of hopes for 
 reunion. But where so much advance has been made in the right 
 direction, we must hope that the remainder of the way will ere long 
 be traversed. 
 
 The greater part of the remainder of the volume is taken up with 
 proving what most Catholics would be quite ready to admit, that many 
 exaggerated things have been said by Catholic writers of name, 
 concerning the Pope’s personal infallibility, on the prerogatives of the 
 Blessed Virgin, and on many other subjects. Uo doubt, viewed from 
 without, there is much matter for perplexity in this whole subject. We 
 know that many persons now Catholics, have been for years kept back 
 from seeing the Church’s claims on their absolute allegiance, because 
 of the hold these exaggerated statements had obtained on their 
 imagination, and the repugnance they felt in themselves, to the aspect 
 of doctrine thus presented. This we think, has arisen partly from 
 their having attributed to such statements an authority which they 
 did not really possess, and from their not distinguishing between 
 matters of faith and matters of pious opinion ; partly also because they 
 did not make allowance for the exaggeration of rhetorical statements 
 and the use of words in the second intention. Catholics, on the other 
 hand, especially those who have been always Catholics, are not much 
 troubled at these things. They know that the Church while requiring 
 unitas in necessariis is most free in conceding lihertas in duhiis. That 
 there are Schools of opinion in the Church, that great latitude is 
 permitted in the unauthoritative expression of devotional sentiment, 
 and that almost any amount of bad taste is tolerated. In a word, 
 that the Church does not aim at creating a dead and soulless level of 
 uniformity, but tolerates great liberty of opinion in matters of opinion, 
 provided her children accept her, as their Mother and Mistress in 
 Divine Truth, and are ready at any time to submit to her decision, 
 should she, through her legitimate mouthpiece, think fit to pronounce 
 a judgment. Thus she secures to her children the habit of faith and 
 obedience, and the right exercise of their reason and free will. And 
 
14 
 
 so Catholics learn from the Church a large spirit of forbearance and 
 toleration, and put up with the views of others which do not involve a 
 difference of faith, and expect a like forbearance in return. 
 
 As for exaggeration of statement, it is the tendency of the human 
 mind to exaggerate ; because our judgments are influenced, at least as 
 much by the sensitive as by the intellectual part of our being. We 
 speak from what we feel, quite as much as from what we know. And 
 so, when we have to oppose error or defend truth, the more we feel 
 the greatness of the truth, the more difficult do we find it not to over- 
 state what we mean. Moreover, feeling the inadequacy of human 
 language, to express all we feel and all we know, we almost inevitably 
 fall into exaggerations, trusting to other statements, made elsewhere 
 or on other occasions, to qualify our expressions and prevent a mis- 
 conception of our meaning. Thus, for example, no one has made 
 more of the intercession of Mary than St. Bernard, yet no one has 
 shown more clearly, than the sainted author of the ‘‘Jesu dulcis 
 memoriae,” that Jesus was his all in all, or could have said more 
 absolutely 
 
 Simply to His Grace, and wholly, 
 
 Life and light and strength belong, 
 
 And I love supremely, solely 
 Him the Holy, Him the strong. 
 
 Newman’s “ Gerontius.” 
 
 Much the same may be said in behalf of St. Liguori. 
 
 If Dr. Pusey were a Cathohc, or were well acquainted with the 
 practical working of the Catholic religion, in the lives of pious 
 Catholics, he might not, indeed, approve of all that was done or said 
 amongst them, but he would acquit them of taking from Our Lord, 
 any of the love they gave to His Mother, and provided he accepted 
 the statement of the Council of Trent that “ the Saints reigning with 
 Christ intercede for us, and that it is good for us to invoke them,*' 
 he would find himself left pretty free, as to the devotional expression 
 of this belief. 
 
 But it is a wonderful advance on the usual forms of Protestant 
 controversy, when we find these subjects treated, not with the exag- 
 geration of the vulgar controversialist, but with the calmness and pre- 
 cision of the theologian, however much his position outside the Church 
 may necessarily distort his view ; as a painting can never be seen properly 
 except from the right point of sight. It is a great consolation, and 
 opens a new phase of the controversy, to find a writer in the position 
 of Dr. Pusey, after expressing himself most strongly against what he 
 calls exaggerations in “ the practical Boman system,” concluding that 
 ‘‘ the breach with Borne has been widened unduly,” and again Borne 
 
15 
 
 need not make such things terms of communion, nor need she insist 
 that the Church of England, if united with her, should receive them, but 
 provision might be made formally, on both sides, that she need not. 
 
 Again, “I doubt not that the Roman Church and ourselves are 
 kept apart much more by that vast practical system which lies beyond 
 the letter of the Council of Trent, things which are taught with a 
 quasi authority in the Roman Church, than by what is actually 
 defined.” He then goes on, strangely enough, to draw a distinction 
 between those who are born Roman Catholics, “ who have a liberty,” 
 and converts, who, he says, “ in the nature of things,” cannot have the 
 liberty, of choosing what opinions and practices to adopt on open 
 questions, and says : “ For myself I have always felt that had the 
 
 English Church, by accepting heresy, driven me out, I could have 
 gone in no other way, than that of closing my eyes and accepting 
 whatever was put before me ; but a liberty which individuals could 
 not use, and explanations which, so long as they remained individual, 
 must be unauthoritative, might be formally made by the Church of 
 Rome to the Church of England, as the basis of reunion.” Further 
 on he says : “ If Englishmen speak against Papal authority it is not in 
 itself (which would be a matter of indifference), but as an authority, 
 which, if they submitted to it, would enforce upon them that practical 
 system. Probably, too, there is an hereditary dread of the renewal 
 of the fires of Smithfield, the sinfulness of which has never been 
 disowned.” Speaking of his hopes for the unity of Christendom, he 
 says: “Years ago we seemed to be in the position of the Heaven 
 controlled seer : ‘ I see him, but not nigh ; I behold him, but not now.’ 
 And meanwhile our office was within ourselves ; we could not propose 
 union, while we ourselves were so disunited. I hoped that the passing 
 storm of unbelief, which I have seen in the distance these forty years, 
 would drive together those who loved Jesus. I hoped that as we 
 became united in the truth, and in the characteristic principles of our 
 Church, those other great portions of the Church, East and West, 
 would see that God is in us of a truth. Why should not the Church 
 again be united in that faith, which she held before a miserable 
 
 quarrel first caused disunion? Apart from other 
 
 evils, the strength is wasted against each other, which should be 
 concentrated against the common foe of Jesus, and of all who are 
 His. The organic reunion of Christendom, and of the Protestant 
 bodies too, has been held to be possible even by the Ultramontanes 
 in the Roman Church. Cardinal Wiseman quoted, nearly a quarter 
 of a century ago, the expressions of the profound and pious Mohler. 
 After observing,’ he says, ‘ that no Catholic can refuse to 
 acknowledge with humiliation the corruptions of past ages, that the 
 
IG 
 
 proof of this lies in the very existence of Protestantism, ivhich could 
 not have existed without them,’ he thus concludes, ‘Behold the 
 fi^round on which the two Churches will one day meet and clasp 
 hands. In the consciousness of our common fault let us cry out to one 
 another, one and all, ‘ We have all erred ; the Church alone could 
 not fail. We have all sinned ; the Church aloue is pure from stain.’ ” 
 Again be qnotes the words of the Count de Maistre. The extraet is 
 from Gladstone’s remarks on the Royal Supremacy, and this Catholic 
 writer is quoted by him as belonging to “ the strictest sect of the 
 Ultramontane school.” “ If ever Christians are to be brought 
 together, as everything invites them, it seems that the movement 
 should take its beginning from the Church of England . . .the 
 
 Church of England, which touches us with one hand, touches wiih the 
 other those whom we cannot touch. And though, in a certain point 
 of view ... it presents the ridiculous spectacle of a revolt 
 pleaching obedience, yet in another aspect, it is most precious^ and 
 may be considered, like some chemical medium, capable of uniting 
 together elements which, of their owu nature, cannot amalgamate.” 
 “It is now sixty years,” Mr. Gladstone continues, in the extract 
 given by Dr. Pusey, “since thus, a stranger and an alien, a stickler 
 to the extremest point for the prerogative of his Church, and nursed 
 in every prepossession against us, turning his eye across the channel, 
 although he could then only see the English Church iu the lethargy 
 of her organization and the dull twilight of her learning, could 
 nevertheless discern, that there was a very special work written of 
 God for her in Heaven, and that she was very precious to the 
 Christian world. O, how serious a rebuke to those who, not strangers 
 but suckled at her breast, seeing her at the present day can write as 
 men that were hired to make a case against her, aud by an adverse 
 instinct in the selection of evidence, and a severity of construction 
 such as no history of the deeds of man can bear, have too often in 
 these last years put her to an open shame.” 
 
 Dr. Pusey refers to the Association for the Unity of Christendom 
 in great hopefulness. “ And now,” he says. “ God seems again to 
 be awakening the yearning to be visibly one, and He who alone the 
 Author of Peace and Lover of Concord, must have put it into men’s 
 minds to pray for the unity 'of Christendom, will in His time, we 
 trust, fulfil the prayer which He Himself has taught.” 
 
 Dr, Pusey’s conclusion is a strong protest against what he terms 
 “the present theory of Papal infallibility. The Ultramontanes in the 
 Roman Communion seem to be drifting off further from the 
 principles of the early and undivided Church.” 
 
 “The shores of Italy seem ever to be receding.” ... In the 
 
17 
 
 Galilean Church a century and a half as^o there seemed to he a dawn 
 of reunion Now thino^s seem to he taking an opposite direction. 
 
 . . . “To those who would hold the opinions of Bossuet,’^ he 
 
 says, he and those who act with him, “ stretch forth their hands. The 
 strife with unbelief stretches and strains the powers of the Church 
 everywhere; Satan’s armies are united, at least, in their warfare 
 against the truth as it is in Jesus, Are those who would maintain 
 the faith in Him alone to be at variance ? On the terms which 
 Bossuet, we hope, would have sanctioned, we lon<r to see the Church 
 united; to all who in East or Wmst desire to see intercommunion 
 restored amonof those who hold the faith of the undivided Church, 
 we say, this is not our longing only, this is impressed on our Liturgy 
 by those who were before us : for this, whenever we celebrate the 
 Holy Eucharist we are bound to pray, that ‘God would inspire 
 continually the Universal Church with the spirit of truth, unity, and 
 concord.’ For this I pray daily. For this I would gladly die. ‘ O, 
 Lord, tarry not.’” 
 
 Such is the conclusion of this remarkable book. Our object in 
 reviewing it, has been to let the author as far as possible speak for 
 himself: to present his mind to our readers, not to refute, still less to 
 accept his arguments. The book certainly requires an answer; but 
 we cannot help our strong impression, that the best answer to it will 
 come one day from Dr. Pusey himself. We mean, of course, in as 
 far as it impugns any Catholic dogma — for on all the rest Dr. Pusey 
 might retain his opinions, if he and those who think with him were 
 members of the Roman obedience. We think a great aid towards this 
 consummation, would l)e a disposition on our side to explain, and to 
 receive explanations, in a conciliatory spirit. The book unquestion 
 ably is a most clearly pronounced endeavour to find a basis for 
 reunion, on the principles debated between Archbishop Wake and 
 the Gallican divines two centuries ago. And here two ques'dons 
 arise. First, how far is Dr. Pusey authorised to speak in the name 
 of the Church of England; or is backed by any large body of the 
 clergy and laity, headed by any minority however small of the 
 Bishops? The second question is. — How far the authorities of the 
 Catholic Church would be ready at this day to accept such advances 
 if they were really made ? To the first of these questions we do not 
 propose to offer any answer. The only satisfactory reply must soon 
 appear, in the mode in which the book is received in the Church Ox 
 England. To the second we desire to reply with great diffidence. 
 We think, however, that we are not going beyond what we have been 
 accustomed to read in approved theologians, and to receive from the 
 lips and pen of our own Bishops, if we answer, that such advances 
 if made by any large bodies of separatists, would be met by our 
 
18 
 
 authorities in a conciliatory spirit ; and that for the healinof of a 
 schism, any lawful concessions would be ^^ladly made. Even thoua:h 
 we might ourselves hold, that what are commonly called the Ultra- 
 montane opinions, are the more logical, the legitimate deduction 
 from Scripture, the true development of Patristic teaching; and 
 however much we might wish for a union of all Christians on this 
 basis, we should nevertheless, hold most strongly until otherwise 
 taught, that a reunion on the principles of Bossuet would he better 
 than perpetuated schism. Whether such negotiations may ever 
 actually lake place, or how it may please God to direct the issue, no 
 man can pretend to foresee. It may not be God’s way of mercy for 
 England, but we may not dare to say that it cannot be. For our- 
 selves, we feel constrained to look hopefully on any movement 
 tending in that direction. To all Anglicans who hold with Dr. 
 Pusev, and would that we had reason to think that he represents the 
 great body of his Church, we would say from our hearts — God speed. 
 And because the mighty changes in minds and wills, that must take 
 before such a consummation can be possible, must be simply the 
 effect of grace, and the fruit of prayer ; therefore placing our whole 
 confidence in sincere and united prayer, do we hail it as the most 
 hopeful sign of all, that Anglicans are themselves praying for unity. 
 To the members of their Association we desire specially to address 
 ourselves; promising our prayers and inviting them to join in the 
 same petition, that all the Baptized may be brought within the Fold of 
 Visible Unity under the Successor of Peter whom Christ the (lood 
 Shepherd hath set over His whole Flock. It is this which we mean 
 when we pray for the Unity of Christendom. This is the object of the 
 constant prayer of every devout Catholic ; he may ask for it 
 specifically, as a member of some special organisation for this 
 purpose ; and no doubt it would be a great encouragement to 
 sustained and united prayer if we should see established amongst 
 Catholics, with the sanction of authority, an Association of prayer for 
 the reunion of all the Baptised within the Visible Fold of Christ. 
 Such Associations have indeed from time to time been set up by zealous 
 and fervent servants of God, like the late Father Ignatius Spenser 
 and others, but we fear they have too generally languished after a 
 time, and need now to be resuscitated, by an apostolic zeal directed 
 Uy authority. But without any such organisation the prayer 
 for unity, goes up continualty to the throne of God ; it is im- 
 plied each time that we say “ Thy Kingdom come’’ in the “Our 
 Father,” and is prayed for expressly by each Priest when standing 
 daily before the Altar, he recites the prayer before Communion fur 
 the Peace and Unity of the One and Indivisible Church of God. 
 
19 
 
 LETTER OF DR. I^EWMA]N' TO THE EDITOR OF THE 
 ‘‘WEEKLY REGISTER.” 
 
 Sir, I beg leave to call your attention to a passage in your admirable 
 Review last week of Dr. Pusey’s recent work. It is there asserted by 
 implication that “ the statement that the Church of England is, in God’s 
 hands, the great bulwark against infidelity in this land,” was “ originally 
 enunciated by Dr. Newman.” 
 
 I have written in my life-time a great deal more than I can remember, 
 but I neither know Avhere I have made this particular statement, nor can I 
 conceive I ever made it, whether in print, in private letter, or in conver- 
 sation. And I am sure I should not have made it deliberately. Certainly, 
 it does not express my real judgment concerning the Church of England. 
 Nor have I any reason to think that Dr. Pusey ascribes it to me. 
 
 What I said in my Apologia was this; “Doubtless the National 
 Church has hitherto been a servieable breakwater against doctrinal errors 
 more fundamental than its own.” 
 
 The words “ serviceable ” and “ breakwater,” both convey the idea of 
 something accidental and de facto; whereas a bulwark is an essential 
 part of the thing defended. Moreover, in saying “ against doctrinal 
 errors more fundamental than its own,” I simply meant, that, while it 
 happens to serve Catholic truth in one respect, nevertheless in another 
 it has doctrinal errors, and those fundamental. 
 
 I am. Sir, your obedient servant, 
 
 JOHN H. NEWMAN. 
 
 The Oratory, Birmingham, Nov. 19, 1865. 
 
 [We must always feel an honest pride in meeting with Dr. Newman’s 
 approbation, and we are much obliged by the kind letter which 
 we have received from him. We are hardly sorry for the in- 
 accuracy to which Dr. Newman gives correction since it has called 
 forth one of those clear and pithy expressions of his mind, which, when- 
 ever they appear, are no less important than they are welcome to the 
 Catholic public.— Ed. IF. i2.] 
 
 LETTER OF DR. PUSEY TO THE EDITOR OF THE 
 “WEEKLY REGISTER.” 
 
 Sir, — I thank you with all my heart for your kind-hearted and appre- 
 ciative view of my Eirenicon. I am thankful that you have brought out 
 the main drift and object of it, what, in my mind, underlies the whole, 
 to show that, in my conviction, there is no insurmountable obstacle to the 
 union of (you will forgive the terms, though you must reject them) the 
 Roman, Greek, and Anglican communions. I have long been convinced 
 that there is nothing in the Council of Trent which could not be explained 
 satisfactorily to us, if it were Q-Kif[woLQ^aiit1ior itatively,i.e., by the Roman 
 
20 
 
 Church itself, not by individual theologians only. This involves the 
 conviction on my side, that there is nothing in our Articles which cannot 
 be explained rightly, as not contradicting any thing held to he de fide in 
 the Koman Church. The great body of the faith is held alike by both ; 
 on those subjects refered to in our Art XXII., I believe (to use the 
 language of a very eminent Italian nobleman), your [our] maximum, 
 and our [your] minimum might he found to harmonise.” 
 
 In regard to details of explanation, it was not my office, as being a 
 Priest only, invested with no authority, to draw them out. But I wished to 
 indicate their possibility. You are relatively under the same circum- 
 stances. But I believe that the hope which you have held out, that the 
 authorities in the Homan communion might hold that a reunion on the 
 principles of Bossuet would he better than a perpetuated schism,” will 
 unlock many a pent-up longing, pent-up on the ground of apparent 
 hopelessness, that Rome would accord to the English Church any terms 
 which it could accept. 
 
 May I add, that nothing was further from my wish, than to write any- 
 thing Avhich should be painful to those in your Communion ? A defence, 
 indeed, of necessity involves some blame ; since, in a quarrel, the blame 
 must be wholly on the one side or on the other, or divided ; and a defence 
 implies that it is not wholly on the side defended. But having smoothed 
 down, as I believe, honestly, every difficulty I could, to my own people, I 
 thought that it would not be right towards them, not to state, where I 
 conceive the real difficulty to lie. Nor could your authorities meet our 
 difficulties, unless they knew them. You will think it superfluous, that 
 I desired that none of this system, which is now matter of “ pious 
 opinion,” should, like the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception, be made 
 de fide. But in the view of a hoped for reunion, every thing which you 
 do, affects us. Let me say, too, that I did not write as a reformer, but on 
 the defensive. It is not for us to prescribe to Italians or Spaniards, what 
 they shall hold, or how they shall express their pious opinions. All 
 which we wish is to have it made certain by authority, that we should 
 not, in case of reunion, be obliged to hold them ourselves. Least of all 
 did I think of imputing to any of the writers, whom I quoted, that they 
 “ took from Our Lord any of the love which they gave to His Mother.” 
 I was intent only on describing the system which I believe is the great 
 obstacle to reunion. I had not the least thought of criticising holy men 
 who held it. 
 
 As it is of moment, that I should not be misunderstood by my own 
 people, let me add, that I have not intended to express any opinion about 
 a visible head of the Church. We readily recognise the Primacy of the 
 Bishop of Rome ; the bearings of that Primacy upon other local 
 Churches, we believe to be matter of ecclesiastical, not of Divine law ; but 
 neither is there anything in the Supremacy in itself to which we should 
 object. Our only fear is, that it should, through the appointment of our 
 Bishops, involve the reception of that practical ^?^(5!si-authoritative system, 
 
21 
 
 which is, I believe, alike the cause, and (forgive me) the justification in 
 our eyes of our remaining apart. 
 
 But although I intended to be on the defensive, I thank you most 
 warmly for that tenderness, which enabled you to see my aim and objects 
 throughout a long and necessarily miscellaneous work. And I believe 
 that the way in which you have treated this our hona fide ‘‘ endeavour to 
 find a basis for reunion on the principles debated between Archbishop 
 Wake and the Gallicau Divines two centuries ago ” will, by rekindling 
 hope, give a strong impulse towards that reunion. Despair is still. If 
 hope is revived in the English mind, that Christendom may again be 
 united, rekindled hope will ascend in more fervent prayer to Him who 
 maketh men to be of one mind in a house,” and our prayers will not 
 return unheard for want of love. 
 
 Your obedient servant, 
 
 E. B. PUSEY. 
 
 LETTER OP CAKON OAKELEY TO THE EDITOR OF 
 THE “WEEKLY REGISTER.” 
 
 Sir, — Little as I felt myself able to follow the line taken in your 
 interesting and kindly notice of Dr. Pusey’s recent work, I can hardly 
 bring myself to regret, what has been the occasion of drawing forth so 
 very remarkable and important a letter, as that which he has addressed to 
 you on the subject of it. One of two results must follow upon the pub- 
 lication of such a letter, from such a man. Either it must produce a 
 powerful sensation in the country, and direct men’s minds into a new 
 channel of thought, or it will be ignored as a fact too serious to confront. 
 If the former, it may be the inauguration of a new era in our religious 
 history ; if the latter, it will at any rate prove a change in public opinion, 
 upon the questions which have hitherto divided us from the great mass of 
 the people of this country, which must ultimately issue, though by a more 
 gradual process, in the same result. 
 
 For only observe, what Dr. Pusey declares in the face of the world. 
 He expresses his belief that all de fide doctrines, as explained in the sense 
 of the Church, are capable of being reconciled with the language of the 
 Thirty-nine Articles ; nay, that such a construction of the Articles as 
 brings them into harmony with those doctrines, is not merely not a 
 strained and unnatural construction of them, but that which is the more 
 literal and obvious. This is, in substance, precisely the claim for which, 
 twenty years ago, Mr. Ward was degraded at Oxford, and I suspended 
 from all Ministerial functions in the province of Canterbury ; except 
 only that it goes beyond that claim, in asserting that to be the sense of the 
 Articles, which Mr. Ward only contended, to be one of the senses of 
 which they were capable. 
 
22 
 
 This remarkable admission, Dr. Pusey had already made in his book. 
 But his letter published by you last week is a most valuable commentary 
 upon his work, in relieving it from its controversial intention, and repre- 
 senting peace, as the object underlying all that it contains. Now the book 
 is prejudiced in the eyes of all good Catholics, by its exhibition of a 
 number of passages, strung together with the seeming intention of 
 proving, that we give to the Blessed Virgin an honour inconsistent with 
 the honom* of our Divine Lord. Some of these passages are of a most 
 extreme character ; so extreme, indeed, that I know many excellent 
 Catholics, who, while regarding them as doctrinally defensible, would 
 hesitate to adopt them, asthe rule of their language and habits of thought, 
 on the subject of Our Blessed Lady. It is, therefore, no small gratifica- 
 to find Dr. Pusey saying in his letter to you that he had no intention of 
 imputing to holy men using such expressions any want of loyalty to our 
 Lord ; and that he did not quote them as necessarily implying an inscrip- 
 tion of honom* to the Blessed Virgin derogatory to the claims of her 
 Divine Son. It is also a great fact, that Dr. Pusey should say he does 
 not approach the Church in the spirit of a Keformer, though, in truth, no 
 one who knows his humility, his spirit of self-renunciation, and his dis- 
 position to accept with an unquestioning faith all that is put before him 
 by what he regards as competent authority, could ever have been inclined 
 to impute to him an animus so inconsistent with the meek and child- 
 like character of a Christian. 
 
 These ungrudging and generous admissions seem to me so important as 
 to throw into the shade the very difficult and, I must think, dangerous 
 question of a union, based on any other principle than that of unreserved 
 submission. Upon this subject I shall content myself with one or two 
 remarks. The first is, that I am persuaded that those qualities of the 
 Catholic character which Dr. Pusey most appreciates, high spirituality 
 and superiority to the influences of the world, arc intimately connected, 
 not with a minimised^ but a maximised Catholicism ; and that, between 
 those views of Church authority which he espouses, and the rationalistic 
 spirit of the age, there is a more subtle affinity than he is aware. My 
 second remark is this, that the principles, even of Bossuet, which Dr. 
 Pusey proposes as the basis of Union, would require him to accept the 
 Supremacy of the See of Peter as of Divine authority, and would con- 
 sequently inculpate his actual position of schism, at least material. This 
 is a very serious question for him, since there is surely a fear lest his 
 apparent admission of the truth, or at all events, the great probability, of 
 those principles, should impair the bona iides, by which I, for one, am 
 most willing to hope that his position, as a separaist from Catholic Unity, 
 is protected from the character and consequences of a formal act. 
 
 Your obedient servant, 
 
 PBEDERICK OAKELEY. 
 
 Nov. 23. 
 
23 
 
 DR. PUSEY’S EIRENICON ANDiTHE DIFFICULTIES 
 OF REUNION. 
 
 An Eirenicon, in a Letter to the Author of the Christian Year, by E. B. 
 PuSEY, D.D., Regius Prof, of Hebrew, and Canon of Christ "Church 
 Oxford. Parker : Oxford. 1865. 
 
 Letter from Dr Pitsey to the Weekly Register, Nov. 25, 1865. 
 Difficulties of Reunion, By L. (Sennon ix. in the New Series of) 
 Sermons on the Reunion of Christendom. Hayes : London. 1865. 
 
 [second notice.] 
 
 In our former notice of Dr. Pusey’s already celebrated ‘‘ Eirenicon,’^ 
 after admitting that it was quite fairly open to Catholic readers, to 
 fonn a different estimate of the work, we indicated that our own view 
 was favourable to it, as a whole, and that we understood its main drift to 
 be a seeking after unity, and not after pretexts for division ; that it seemed 
 to us the most unequivocal advance that has ever been made towards 
 negociations for healing the schism of the sixteenth century and again, 
 that it is a most clearly pronounced endeavour to find a basis for 
 reunion on the principles debated between Archbishop Wake and the 
 Gallican divines two centuries ago.” In our last week’s impression, Ave 
 were enabled to give to our readers, a letter from Dr. Newman to the 
 Editor of this paper ; this letter we need hardly say we were most grateful 
 to receive, and it was all the more welcome because it came unlooked for, 
 since while writing our review we Avere not without fear, that Ave might 
 be thought by many, and perhaps by Dr. NeAvman, to have been guilty 
 of rashness and presumption, and might be blamed in the words of the 
 old line, “ Fools rush in where angels fear to tread.” We cannot help 
 feeling that our position stands higher in this respect, than Avhen we Avrote 
 last, since one who so well understands the meaning of words as Dr.NeAvman 
 has felt himself able to designate what Ave had written as ari admirable 
 review of Dr. Pusey's recent worU.^'* Of course Ave do not take this 
 single word of praise, as meaning more on the part of Dr. NeAvman, than 
 a general approA^al of the line we have taken, as not an unfair one, though 
 not as necessarily identifying him Avith our interpretation of the 
 author’s meaning. A great confirmation of our estimate of the AA'ork is 
 contained in the Letter from Dr. Pusey himself, Avritten expressly for 
 publication in our columns, and which appeared side by side Avith the 
 letter of Dr. NeAvman. If it be true that an honest man is the best 
 interpreter of his OAvn meaning, and we do not think that many of our 
 readers will deny that Dr. Pusey is an honest man, then it is clear from 
 this letter that we have in our review seized on the true meaning of the 
 author. He Avrites, “ I thank you with all my heart for your kind-hearted 
 and appreciative review of my Eirenicon, I am thankful that you have 
 brought out the main drift and object of it, that Avhich in my mind under- 
 lies the whole, to show that in my conviction there is no insurmountable 
 
24 
 
 obstacle to the union of the Koman, Greek, and Anglican communions. 
 I have long been convinced that there is nothing in the Council of Trent 
 which could not he explained satisfactorily to us if it were explained 
 authoritatirely ^ i.e.^ by the Roman Church herself, not by individual 
 theologians only and again, I thank you for that tenderness which 
 enabled you to see my aim and objects throughout a long and necessarily 
 miscellaneous work.” He then goes on to say that whatever there was 
 controversial in his book he had said only on ‘‘ the defensive, not as a 
 refonner and again, I do not presume to prescribe to Italians or 
 Spaniards what they shall hold, or how they shall express their piotis 
 opinions^ and least of all did I think of imputing to any of the writers 
 whom I quoted” (such as St. Bernard, St. Liguori, Faber, and others) 
 ‘ ‘ that they took from Our Lord any of the love which they gave to His 
 Mother. I was intent only on describing the system which I believe is the 
 great obstacle to reunion. I had not the least thought of criticising holy 
 men who held it.” 
 
 On the subject of the prerogatives of the Sovereign Pontiff, Dr. Pusey 
 expresses, not indeed the Catholic doctrine, but puts forth as his own, an 
 opinion so much beyond what we have been accustomed to hear even from 
 advanced Anglicans, that we feel sure it will be read by most Catholics with 
 unmixed surprise and satisfaction. “ I have not intended,” he says, “ to 
 express any opinion about a visible head of the Church. We readily re- 
 cognise the Primacy of the Bishop of Rome ; the bearings of that Primacy 
 upon other local Churches, we believe to be matter of ecclesiastical, not of 
 Divine law. But neither is there anything in the Supremacy in itself, 
 to which we should object.” 
 
 In another part of his letter he writes, I believe that the hopes which 
 you have held out that the authorities of the Roman Communion nnight 
 hold, ‘ that re-union on the principles of Bossuet would be better than 
 perpetuated schism,’ will unlock many a pent-up longing, pent-up on the 
 ground of its apparent hopelessness.” The concluding words of this 
 beautiful and consoling letter are : ‘‘If hope is revived in the English 
 mind that Christendom may again be united, re-kindled hope will ascend 
 in more fervent prayer to Him ‘who maketh men to be of one mind in 
 a house,’ and our prayers will not return unheard for want of love.” 
 
 We think then, that it will be admitted that we were right, in saying 
 that Dr. Pusey ’s principal object was to seek, if a reunion of Anglicans 
 with the Catholic Church was possible, on what are commonly called 
 Galilean principles, and that he accepts the issue proposed by us, when 
 we said, simidy on our own authority and under correction, “ that a re- 
 union on the principles of Bossuet would be better than perpetuated schism.” 
 The gist of the whole work then may be fairly reduced to this single 
 issue, and so we intend to treat it. We feel moreover bound, to enter 
 somewhat more deeply into the matter in its practical bearings, and there- 
 fore to look in the face some of the principal difficulties which meet us 
 at the outset, and state candidly what we think of them. We set about 
 
25 
 
 this with great diffidence, feeling moreover that it is an ungracious thing 
 to suggest difficulties, and yet that we should not he acting loyally by our 
 Anglican readers, if we did not tell them the thoughts of our mind. To 
 S])eak only of the hopes, and say nothing of the difficulties of reunion, 
 would he like inviting people to an aerial tour through the tranquil 
 heavens, with charming prospects of earth and sea and sky above and 
 around, without warning them that the course of the wind must inevitably 
 bring them up short, against the Peak of Teneriffe. We do not say, since 
 “ all things arc possible to God’’ that such difficulties are insuperable, 
 only that they must be steadily looked in the face. 
 
 1. In the first place, then, what are actually the principles of Bossuet, 
 taking him as a fair sample, theologically, of the Gallican school ? Por 
 these we have not far to go, for we find them stated very concisely, in 
 Bossuet’s well known work entitled Exposition de la Doctrine de 
 I’Eglise Catholique,” and we may as well premise, that probably few books 
 have ever received a greater number of approbations, from Bishops, 
 Cardinals, Roman Congregations, and from the Pope himself. 
 
 Thirty pages of the volume from which we quote are taken up with 
 these approbations only, including two Briefs of Pope Innocent the 
 Eleventh addressed to the author. In these the Pope says : ‘‘We judge 
 the work not only worthy to be praised and approved by us, but also to 
 be read and esteemed by all the world. We hope that this work, by the 
 grace of God, will produce much fiTiit. We trust that it will be found 
 useful and may aid in propagating the orthodox faith.” In the second 
 Brief it is called “ a wise and pious exposition of the Catholic Faith, and 
 an admirable work.” We need not say more,''to commend Bossuet’s Ex- 
 position of the Faith to the attention of our Anglican readers, as an au- 
 thorised exposition of Catholic doctrine ; most educated Catholics are of 
 com'se acquainted with the work. We pass over the chapters on the 
 worship of God, the invocation of Saints, the religious uses of images and 
 relics, on justification and the merits of good works, purgatory and in- 
 dulgences, the Real Presence and the Sacrifice of the Mass. We come 
 then to the chapters treating of the Church and its Head. After having 
 spoken of the Holy Ghost, the Spirit of Truth, he goes on in the next 
 paragraph to speak in order, of the Church the visible and perpetual 
 organ and mouth-piece or oracle of the same Holy Spirit. “It is thus,” 
 he says, “ that the children of God acquiesce in the judgment of the 
 Church, believing that they receive from its mouth the oracle of the Holy 
 Spirit, therefore it is that after we have said in the Creed, ‘ I believe in 
 the Holy Ghost,’ we add immediately, ‘ the Holy Catholic Church,’ 
 whereby we bind ourselves to recognise one truth infallible and per- 
 petual in the Universal Church, since that Church, which we believe has 
 existed in all ages, would have ceased to be the Church if it had ceased 
 to teach the revealed truth of God.” The last chapter of the work is on 
 “ The Authority of the Holy See and of the Episcopate.” “ As the Son of 
 God willed that His Church should be one, and solidly founded on unity 
 
26 
 
 He established and instituted the Primacy of St. Peter in order to main- 
 tain and cement this unity. Wherefore we recognise this very Primacy 
 in the successors of the Prince of the Apostles, to whom, for this reason , 
 we owe that submission and obedience, which the Holy Councils and the 
 Holy Fathers have always enjoined on the faithful. 
 
 “ As to those points which are known to be disputed by the Schools, 
 although often quoted by the reformed ministers, in order to cast odium 
 on the authority of the Holy See, it is unnecessary to allude to them here, 
 as they are not of Catholic faith. It is sufficient to recognise a Head 
 established by God to conduct the whole Flock in His ways; to this all 
 those who love fraternal concord and ecclepiastical unanimity will 
 readily agree. 
 
 ‘‘ Certainly if the authors of the pretended Reformation had loved 
 unity, they would not have abolished the episcopal government, which was 
 established by Jesus Christ Himself, and was in full force in the apostolic 
 age, nor would they have despised the authority of St. Peter’s Chair, 
 which has such a sure foundation in the Gospel, and so manifest a sequel 
 in tradition, but rather, they would have carefully preserved the authority 
 of the Episcopate, which maintains unity in particular Churches, and the 
 Primacy of St. Peter’s Chair, which is the common centre of Catholic 
 unity.” 
 
 Such is a short exposition of the principles of B ossuet, concerning the 
 Visible Church, Avhich is further developed in the larger works of theo- 
 logians like De la Hogue, or in the more recent works of Bouvier and 
 others of the same school. The Galileans held the perpetual visibility 
 and infallibility of the Church, that it was One, Holy, Catholic, Apostolic, 
 and also Roman, because it was a visible, living body, through an essen- 
 tial union with a visible Head, and they taught that the Bishop of Rome 
 was, as successor of Peter, the divinely-appointed Head of the Church, 
 its centre and mouth-piece, apart from whom the Church was not. All 
 this they taught, basing their doctrine ou the decrees of the Council of 
 Florence and of Trent, concerning the Supreme Pontiff, and his prero- 
 gatives in the Church of Christ. Now, are Anglicans prepared to accept 
 this doctrine concerning the Visible Church and its Head ? Dr. Pusey, 
 in the name of his School, has already answered in the affirmative, though 
 the statement of these doctrines in his book, and even in his letter 
 falls short of an acceptance of Bossuet’s doctrine. If however this is 
 his meaning, already we say, the ground has been laid down authorita- 
 tively, and the judgment of the Holy See expressed in a Pontifical Brief, 
 in favour of the soundness of the Gallican principles of Bossuet, on the 
 Visible Church and its Head, to serve as the basis for re-union, for any 
 number of individuals, or of Churches. 
 
 II. But here we confess comes in our chief difficulty, since we think 
 there are very few even of advanced Anglicans, who would define the 
 Visible Church and its Head, with Dr. Pusey, supposing him to accept, 
 unreservedly the principles of Bossuet, of which we do n ot yet feel certain. 
 
27 
 
 This we had already indicated in our previous article, framing our opinion 
 solely from the statements of his book. We there said, “ On the 
 question of the Church’s unity. Dr. Pusey would hold an opinion differ- 
 ing on important points, from the doctrine universally held by Catholics, 
 and, lierCy we fear, would he the chief difficulty in discovering a eommon 
 basis for negotiation.^^ For the Church cannot recede a single step, from 
 the teaching already laid down in the Council of Trent, concerning the 
 Visible Church and its Head ; and the Council of Trent did not, on this 
 point, go beyond what had been already decreed by East and West at the 
 Council of Florence. The words of that Council are as follows: — 
 ‘ Moreover we define that the Holy Apostolic See and the Bishop of 
 Rome is successor to the Blessed Peter, Chief of the Apostles, true Vicar 
 of Christ, Head of the whole Church, and Father and Teacher of all 
 Christians ; that to him was given in the person of Blessed Peter the 
 full power to conduct, to rule, and to govern the whole Catholic Church, 
 according to that mode which is contained in the Acts of CEcumeninical 
 Councils, and the Holy Canons.” (Note c). It is clear, therefore, that there is 
 on way of conciliating, what is commonly called the branch theory of the 
 Visible Church, with the definitions of Florence and of Trent, and with 
 the opinions of Bossuet, and the Gallican school, which were based on 
 these definitions ; and hence, on Gallican principles, the Anglicans have 
 been all along outside the Visible Church. But is there then no possible 
 basis of negotiation for reunion, without a full previous admission on the 
 part of separated bodies, that they are out of the Visible Church ? Our 
 reply is, that the history of the Council of Florence seems to us to furnish 
 an analogy applicable, at least, in great part, to the case of the Anglicans. 
 We quote from the learned work on the Oriental Church, by Pitzipios, 
 printed in Rome ten years ago at the Propaganda Press. Whatever may 
 be the doctrine of the Greeks at the present day concerning the Visible 
 Church, it seems clear that at the time of the Council of Florence, they 
 must have held some such theory as Anglicans now hold ; yet we nowhere 
 find that they were required, either before or after the act of union, to 
 admit that they had been vn formal schism. The only way, as it seems 
 to us, of accounting for the mode in which the Oriental Bishops were 
 treated at Ferrara and Florence, is by supposing that the authorities of 
 the Catholic Church laid down and acted on, a broad distinction between 
 material and formal schism. The Patriarch of Constantinople and his 
 train of Bishops, though they were considered by the Pope as 
 actual schismatics, were not treated as rebels. In the great 
 Church of St. George at Ferrara, seats of honour were 
 placed for the Pope and the Western Bishops, on the left 
 side of the High Altar, while a similar position to the right 
 of the High Altar, was assigned to the Patriarch of Constantinople 
 and the Oriental Bishops, a Royal throne being placed on either side for 
 the Emperor of Germany, who was absent, and the Emperor of Constan- 
 tinople, while in the midst, on a magnificent throne in front of the 
 
28 
 
 Altar, was exposed the Book of the Holy Gospels. The Pope opened the 
 Sacred Synod by intoning the Benedictns^ “ Blessed be the Lord God 
 of Israel, for He hath visited and redeemed His people,” and all joined 
 together in psalms and canticles. Then was read from the Ambon the 
 invitation to the Council and excommunication of all who should not 
 assent to its decrees ; first on the part of the Patriarch of Constanti- 
 nople, and afterwards on that of the Pope, declaring the convocation 
 and opening of thCouncil. This distinction between material and foiTual 
 schism may also account for the fact, that the Greeks were not required 
 to repudiate the Saints of their Communion, who had been canonized 
 during the Schim. (See Palmer’s Orthodox Communion. Note D.) In the 
 same way in the great Western Schism of the Anti-Popes, there were 
 Saints of both obediences, and yet it is certain that there was only one 
 true Pope, and therefore the adherents of one side or the other were at 
 least in material Schism. Of course, the case of the Anti-Popes is only 
 an analogy, as far as it goes ; and so also is the case of the Council of 
 Florence. Neither in any way covers the case of the Anglicans ; if for 
 no other reason, because the orders of the Oriental Church were univer- 
 sally recognised ; while those of Anglicans, up to this moment, have never 
 been admitted either by East or West. Nevertheless, we cannot but 
 think that the mode in which the Oriental Bishops were treated, was not 
 simply owing to the respect due to their orders, which would not make 
 them a whit less schismatical, but was based on the broad and solid distinc- 
 tion between material and formal Schism. And this principle would hold 
 good with certain differences, if any body of baptised Christians, such as the 
 Lutherans of Germany, or the Presbyterians of Scotland, should make 
 advances for negotiations with the Catholic Church, for admission into 
 visible unity. For argument’s sake, and to prevent, misconception of our 
 meaning, which might confuse the real question, with that of Anglican 
 orders, on which we do not intend to enter ; we prefer considering the case 
 of Anglicans in respect of material or formal schism on no higher grounds, 
 and to judge of their relation to the Church, and the relation of the 
 Church to them, from this point only; as if, for instance, it were the case 
 of the Lutherans, debated between Bossuet and Liebnitz. We come then 
 to the conclusion that admission of fundamental error, is not necessarily 
 to be required of separated bodies, as a previous condition of negotiations , 
 for reunion or submission. 
 
 III. But we will suppose that not only Dr. Pusey, but a large body who 
 are willing to be represented by him, are prepared for Ijoiia fide negocia- 
 tions for reunion, on the principles which we have shown to be those of 
 Bossuet ; and we will suppose the authorities of the Catholic Church, to 
 have formally accepted negociations on this basis ; but here occurs a 
 difficulty, so great as to be almost overwhelming. Dr. Pusey represents, 
 as yet, only a School of opinion. Not one English Bishop has publicly 
 identified himself with this School, and few of the Anglican Bishops 
 ever lose an opportunity of publishing their energetic dissent from many 
 
29 
 
 of the doctrines, which Dr. Pnscy and those who think with him, hold us 
 integral portions of the Faith. The Sermon which we have placed third 
 on our list, at the head of this article, states this same difficulty, far better 
 than we can, whilst it offers some solution of it. ' The author quotes from 
 the Christian HcmeTtihranccr : Within the English Church there 
 
 exists a large School, who look upon the desire to unite with Rome in any 
 form as sinful, and who must j)ari passn be conciliated, unless the unity 
 of Christendom, is to determine the break-up of the Church of 
 England.” The writer of the Sermon comments thus on the words 
 quoted, We have no desire to make light of this very serious consider- 
 ation, and no honest discussion of our present subj ect can escape its force 
 and urgency. There are, it may be, some among us who Avould make 
 short work with it. They would regard the expulsion of the so-termed 
 Evangelicals from the Church, as a blessing only inferior, to the reunion 
 of Catholic-minded Churchmen with the Latin] and Greek communions. 
 
 We cannot agree with them in this judgment But no one 
 
 who is really acquainted with the actual tone and working of the Church 
 of England, can deny that the ‘ Evangelical ’ clergy, on the whole, are 
 steadily advancing towards a higher measure of truth, than they had 
 attained in past years. ‘ Evangelicalism,’ indeed, is as the womb of 
 Rebecca : it contains a Jacob and an Esau. To some souls its 
 attraction lies in the fact that it rationalistically ignores or denies Sacra- 
 mental Truth. To others, a fundamentally different class of minds, its 
 charm consists in that love of, and devotion to, the Person of Our 
 Blessed Redeemer which has undeniably characterised its general history. 
 And as those who are attracted by its negative aspects are continually 
 sinking, and become, as opportunity arises, the easy prey of Rationalism ; 
 so those who are drawn by its positive Faith and Love are, under the 
 guidance of the Blessed Spirit, as perpetually rising, and they furnish its 
 best recruits to the cause of Catholicism. Indeed, the advance of Ra- 
 tionalism, fraught as it is with the utmost danger to the salvation of 
 many precious souls, does incidentally help to reduce, as in the long run 
 it may probably destroy altogether, the difficulty before us. It acts as a 
 solvent upon the popular Evangelicalism. It precipitates the anti-sacra- 
 mental negative element towards the pure Rationalism with which, under 
 the common name of Free Thought, it has the strongest and most radical 
 affinities. It drives the adoring and believing element upward to take 
 shelter from its devasting and unspiritual action, in a sincere allegiance 
 to the principle of Church authority. This disintegration of Evangeli- 
 calism is going on rapidly beneath our eyes, and every attack upon the 
 books of Holy Scripture ; nay, more, every serious inquiry into the 
 historical origin and authority of the Sacred Canon, is, a certain, although 
 unnoticed, step in its gradual progress. And we rejoice to believe that 
 while, alas, only too many in that great party are day by day forfeiting, 
 at the bidding of Rationalistic principles, the light and warmth which 
 has heretofore streamed upon their souls from the Sun of Righteousness, 
 
30 
 
 the great majority are truer to the loftier instincts of their spiritual 
 nature, than to the logical exigencies of their theory, and are moving, 
 amid whatever defections and relapses, towards the full acceptance of the 
 Faith. 
 
 If this be so we may trust that in the kindly Providence of our 
 Gracious Lord, the restored unity of Christendom if it be granted to us, 
 will not determine in the break up of the Church of England.’ It may 
 coincide, in point of time with the final retirement from our communion, 
 of those who bend in reality before no Truth whatever, as revealed and 
 certain ; and to whom the language of the Prayer Book, from the daily 
 Morning Absolution down to the Visitation of the Sick, is, when they 
 steadily refiect upon its import, a standing cause of offence. But among 
 these, too, there are generous souls : and God may have for them and f or 
 us, a future in store of which we cannot yet discern the bearings. Enough, 
 at any rate, has been said to show that short of active conciliation of the 
 ‘ Evangelical ’ party, a most sacred duty be it remarked, so far as loyalty 
 to truth permits, there are causes at work, which may re-assure us, when 
 we consider the very formidable objection, to any practical scheme for 
 reunion among Catholic Christians of the Greek, and Roman, and Anglican 
 Churches, the objection which is based on the position and numbers of 
 the ‘ Evangelical ’ party in the latter communion.” Having spoken of the 
 causes which he sees in operation amongst the various sections of his own 
 Church, in which he thinks he discerns afar off the principles of unity 
 and truth working themselves to order out of chaos, he speaks also of the 
 relations in which his Church stands “ to the great Churches of 
 Christendom.” ‘‘ It would be at once disingenuous and unpractical to 
 ignore the fact that the ‘ secondary matters’ which divide the great 
 Churches of Christendom are of graver import than any questions of 
 Liturgical form 
 
 More points of difference might be named, — some of them serious 
 ones. But our present purpose is not to enumerate, still less to exag- 
 gerate them. It is our duty to recognise them. There they are, patent 
 and painful facts ; nor will any scheme of reunion have a chance of 
 success which postulates simple submission from one side, and claims 
 CEcumenicity for the other. The questions which divide the Churches 
 must be regarded, pro tanto, as open questions ; ‘ open,’ that is, not 
 absolutely, but to the revision of an (Ecumenical Council, when such 
 may be had. And if any should say or think that to anticipate the 
 assembling of such a representation of Christendom in our own day is a 
 visionary imagination ; or that, if assembled, it could ever introduce the 
 reign of harmory into the realms of ecclesiastical discord, let us reflect 
 that God has taught His people their deepest lessons, by the pressure of 
 suffering inflicted from without. None can mark the upgrowth and 
 power of the infidel spirit in Europe, without seeing that we are drifting 
 rapidly towards a time more like that of the first three centuries of the 
 Church’ s life than any subsequent period has been. The religion of 
 
31 
 
 Jesus Christ has experienced in turn all the relations towards the worldly 
 power which are abstractedly possible. It has survived persecution ; it 
 has survived, more marvellously still, ages of wealth and power ; it has 
 lived on under a cold neutrality ; and it might seem as if the cycle thus 
 completed might, ere long, begin over again. In the infidel literature of 
 Europe there are ominous threats and undisguised passions, which remind 
 us that the spirit which cried of old, ‘ Christianos ad leones,’ is not 
 extinct. That spirit will re-appear in England with those fuller develop- 
 ments of Eationalism, which are apparently inevitable, and we may hope 
 that suffering in a common cause, if such be the will of Our Divine Lord, 
 will teach those who should be brothers to understand each other. Mean- 
 while, existing differences may be lawfully minimized ; and, even if we 
 do not see our way in the tangled maze, towards a practical solution of 
 the difficulties which they undeniably present, we may cultivate a habit 
 of hopeful, peaceful, trustful expectancy, relying firmly on the revealed 
 will of Our Divine Lord, and looking forward to the time ‘ when 
 Ephraim shall not envy Judah, and Judah shall not vex Ephraim.’ ‘ To 
 recognise difficulties is one thing, to despair of overcoming them is 
 another.’ 
 
 We need hardly observe on the grasp of his subject, and the masterly 
 treatment of the difficulty, by this writer, and we do not need the initial 
 letters of his name to indicate to us, perhaps the most leading mind 
 and greatest preacher that Oxford has produced since the days of Dr. 
 Newman, and one who if we mistake not is likely to do more than any 
 other man, towards forming the mind of the University in its younger 
 members. 
 
 IV. And here may be the j)lace to speak of another great difficulty, 
 which we have felt all along under-lying the whole subject ; we mean 
 the question of individual responsibility, and of individual submission. It 
 is obvious that the disintegration of the Low Church section of Angli- 
 cans,” spoken of by the author of the Sermon just quoted, can only be 
 the work of time ; difficulties and delays may obstruct the project of a 
 General Council, to whose decision the various sections of Anglicans 
 might agree to submit their differences with one another, and their 
 differences with the Catholic Church. Meantime, the national Church, 
 as a body, can make no advances which could be accepted by the 
 Catholic authorities, or even by the Oriental or Kussian Communions, 
 because it can have no authoritative voice, or common principle, or moral 
 personalty, there would be no one to treat or to be treated with. It must 
 continue a heterogeneous body so long as it does not put from it one of 
 the two great Schools which have always held divided sway. How then, 
 meantime, will that school in the Anglican Church, supposing it to be 
 able legally to hold its ground, be able to do so conscientiously, should 
 its members have advanced so far individually, as to be ready to seek 
 for corporate reunion, on the principles of Bossuet and the Gallican 
 divines ? 
 
32 
 
 We have seen that these admit with the Council of Florence, a dogma 
 on the nature of the visible Church which cannot be reconciled with the 
 Anglican branch theory. This theory therefore, and that dogma cannot 
 stand together ; and although we have admitted the obvious distinction 
 between material and formal schism, yet it is no less obvious that mate- 
 rial schism becomes formal, when consciousness of the fact of schism 
 begins. Human events may defer indefinitely projects of corporate re- 
 union, but truth, when we know it, rests on us with an eternal obligation, 
 independent of all conceivable circumstances and events. Fiat jusUtia 
 mat ccclum. If then the truth be once made clear to us, we know of no 
 voice upon earth which can dare to say, Stay and work for unity,” 
 w’hen the voice of illuminated conscience says, “ Go and follow out the 
 exigence of truth.” It was on this principle that NeAMnan and Manning 
 quitted years ago a vantage ground, which no one has since occupied. 
 Far be it from us to judge any man. Each several soul before his own 
 Master standeth or falleth. For our own part, as regards the case of 
 individuals, we know not where to set limits to the possibility of invin- 
 cible ignorance and material schism ; still w'e could not have answered 
 it to our conscience, to have treated this subject at all in the manner we 
 have done, without guarding ourselves against the possibility of leaving a 
 single soul to suppose that anything could justify the sacrifice of the 
 justum to the 'iitile, of truth to expediency ^ even though that expediency 
 might seem to be to the greater glory of God.” We know not whether 
 this present Catholic movement in the Anglican Church may have any 
 immediate issue other than that of the former movement twenty years ago. 
 We pray heartily that its ultimate result may be a great corporate reunion 
 of the National Church with the ancient Mother and Mistress of all the 
 Churches. Or if this be not in the designs of God, and perhaps we are all 
 too weak in faith, in charity, and in prayer to obtain so great a grace ; we 
 cannot doubt that it will issue in important results ; perhaps at first like the 
 foraier movement, only in the submission as individuals of many precious 
 souls ; perhaps in something of which we seem to discover not a few 
 indications, a movement of all that is truest and noblest in Anglicanism 
 in the direction of a Free Church, independent of State control. Should 
 this turn out to be the more immediate issue, such an event we should 
 hail, as the sure precursor of a very speedy act on the part of such 
 seceding body, of corporate submission to the Divine authority of the 
 Visible Church and of Christ’s Vicar upon earth. If Anglicanism were 
 liberated from State control, the Catholic element being set free, would 
 fly as it were of its own nature, to the Centre of Unity. 
 
 Then, if ever, would be the time when a large seceding body, such as 
 might not unfitly be termed a free Church of England, might be in a 
 position to make such propositions on submission to the Catholic Church, 
 as its members might agree upon and deem expedient. We can conceive 
 that it might ask, and the Koman authorities might grant, various explana- 
 tions on points of doctrine, or concessions on points of discipline, if it 
 
fcould be shown that by so doing, some of those difficulties niight be re- 
 moved or lessened, which are presented by the aspect of the Catholic 
 religion, viewed from without, to a nation which, like the English, has 
 been separated by a chasm of three centuries, from the traditions of 
 Catholic Christendom. And so perhaps the way might be made more 
 plain for the return of England, as a nation, to the Ancient Faith. 
 
 But if, as is quite possible, neither of these great movements should 
 take place in our day 5 though we refuse at present to contemplate such an 
 alternative; may Our Lord continue the good work which He has begun, 
 in His own time, and in His own way; and may we cultivate amongst 
 ourselves, and towards those without, a great spirit of charity an forbear- 
 ance — that charity which hopeth all things — that so all our prayers and 
 good works may ascend “ like incense before God,” in never-ceasing 
 intrucession for the peace and unity of our Jerusalem, for the conversion 
 of pagans, infidels, and sinners ; and for the Reunion of all the Baptised 
 who have once been made Members of the Mystical Body of Christ; to 
 the Visible Communion of the world-wide Catholic Church 1 
 
 SECOND LETTER OF DR. PUSEY TO THE EDITOR 
 OP THE “WEEKLY REGISTER.” 
 
 SlE, — Will you allow me a few words in explanation, in consequence of 
 Canon Oakeleys’s remarks on my letter to you, which breathe the kindness 
 of never-forgotten years, but in which, perhaps on that very account, he 
 has read my meaning rather in the light of his own wishes for me? 
 
 1 . In regard to the Council of Trent, my statement was, “ I have long 
 been convinced that there is nothing in the Council of Trent which could 
 not be explained satisfactorily to us, if it were explained authoritatively.” 
 
 I meant by this, that in regard to some of the declarations of the 
 Council of Trent, which, unexplained, present difficulties to us, some of 
 your own theologians, who have spoken with authority, especially in 
 later times, have stated that certain beliefs are sufficient to satisfy the 
 meaning of the Council on these subjects. If the Chmxh of Rome 
 could formally declare that those beliefs were alone de Jide, I believe that 
 the great difficulty to reunion on our side would be removed. I could not 
 call this ‘‘ holding all Roman doctrine ; ” for this would, in my mind 
 involve ( 1 ) holding the doctrine in the way in which it is commonly and 
 popularly held among you, whether de fide or no ; ( 2 ) holding the 
 doctrine on the authority of Rome, wffiich, not being a member of the 
 Roman Communion, I, of course, do not. Rather, it is holding a faith, 
 w'hich I received (at a time when we never read a Roman book), through 
 Writers of our Church, from early tradition, as expounding authorita^ 
 lively Holy Scripture. On comparing my belief with that expressed by 
 the Council of Trent, I thought that its terms^ ftS explained by some 
 individual doctors, yet of authority ahiong you, did not condemn wffiat 
 I believed, and did not require me to believe what I did not believe. I 
 thought that the Council of Trent so explained for the Church of 
 England, might be a basis of union. If I may sum up briefly, I think that 
 
84 
 
 not only on the whole range of doctrine, on the Holy Trinity, and the 
 Incarnation, but also on Original Sin and Justification, and all the 
 doctrines of Grace, there is nothing to be explained ; that on the Canon 
 of Scripture, the Holy Eucharist, and the anointing of the sick, there is 
 what has to be mutually explained; that on what I suppose you will 
 account points of lesser magnitude, as those alluded to in our XXII 
 Article, there will be need not only of explanation, but of limitation, 
 what is to be de fide, 
 
 2. In regard to the Supremacy of the Pope, I do not know what it 
 involves, nor am I aware that its limits have been laid down among you. 
 The Council of Florence, at least according the Greek copies, in Arch- 
 bishop De Marca’s words (De Cone. Sacred et Imp. iii., 8 fin.), declared 
 that “ the privileges of the Pope are to be explained and exercised accord- 
 ing to the Canons and according to the Acts of (Ecumenical Councils, 
 i.e., of the eight Councils, which consisted of the Western and Eastern 
 Church.” But this would leave much to be defined. I conclude however 
 that the Koman Church cannot hold the Supremacy to be de iide, since 
 it has ever called the Greeks, who reject it, schismatics, not heretics. In 
 what I wrote I was thinking of a practical question (as we English do), 
 what, in the case of a reunion, would be its effects upon us. You must, 
 any how, think the application of the Supremacy to vary in different 
 times, since you must believe, that whatever it be or in whatever it 
 consist, it does not necessarily involve either (1) the appointment of the 
 Bishops of a Church in communion with the See of Rome, by the Pope, 
 nor (2) that the sanction of the Roman Court must be had, in order to 
 the vaUdUy of its Canons, within itself, nor (3) suppose that all appeals 
 should be carried to Rome. For the two first were unknown to the 
 Church in St. Augustine’s time ; and the third, the African Bishops in 
 Council refused. And I meant that what we English, as a practical 
 nation, should feel, would be not an abstract relation in itself (which 
 might be modified by Concordats, and would probably, in Henry VIII. ’s 
 time, had that been a time of Concordats), but such authority as would, 
 bv the appointment of our teachers, soon bring in that whole practical 
 svstem, which is the ground of our remaining as we are. 
 
 I have ventured to address this line to you, because I believe, full 
 explicitness and openness is essential to all attempts at a better mutual 
 understanding. Diificulties there are, like mountains; but the prayer of 
 faith can remove mountains ; and He, whose coming in the Flesh we now 
 rejoice in, with the same devotion, can bid ‘‘ every valley be exalted and 
 every mountain and hill to be made low, and the crooked places to 
 become straight and the rough places plain, that the glory of God may be 
 revealed, and all flesh see it together.” Your obedient servant, 
 
 Christ Church, Oxford, Dec. 6, 1865. E. B. PUSEY. 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 1 have to thank a learned friend for the substance of some of the 
 following notes ; 
 
35 
 
 Note A. — When St. Athanasius returned from exile, A.D. 3G2, he was 
 joined by Eusebius, of Vercelli, who had likewise been exiled together with 
 Lucifer of Cagliari, on account of theOrthodox Faith. Lucifer, on his return 
 fi’om exile, went to Antioch, and there ordained Paulinus Bishop of that 
 See, Meletius having been previously elected Bishop, as we have seen, 
 by the votes of the Arians, though he himself had declared for the 
 Catholic Faith. Lucifer despatches two of his Deacons, and two more 
 from Paulinus, to the Synod, then being held at Alexandria by St. 
 Athanasius, at which Eusebius was likewise present. Thus Paulinus 
 became immediately identified with the orthodox party. From that Synod 
 Eusebius went direct to Antioch, when he found the Church divided into 
 two parties; for the followers of Meletius still adhered to him, and 
 communicated in the Mother-Church in the old part of the city. Mele- 
 tius himself had actually been banished by the Arians for having abjured 
 their creed, and he returned just as Eusebius arrived. Eusebius, finding 
 things in this state, could not be brought to approve the manner in whicli 
 Paulinus had been consecrated by Lucifer, though at the same time he 
 had, with the Alexandrian Synod, approved of that act, ignorant of the 
 merits of the case. After fruitless efforts to reconcile the parties he left 
 for Italy, refusing to communicate with either side. Eusebius, therefore, 
 going back into the West, would naturally report how things really 
 stood. Lucifer, on the other hand, irritated with his conduct, was even 
 disposed to quarrel with the Synod ""of Alexandria, and went home to 
 Sardinia, where he died the following year, being the founder of a sect 
 called after him, which made a schism in the Church. We have, there- 
 fore, these two facts. Paulinus had been consecrated by Lucifer, but his 
 consecration had been blamed by Eusebius, the acknowledged leader of the 
 orthodox party, who took the news into the West. His consecrator, on 
 his return to the West, immediately afterwards becomes the founder of a 
 sect and dies in schism. All this must have prejudiced Paulinus in the 
 eyes of the West. On the other hand, Meletius, though elected by the 
 Arian party had afterwards been banished by them for his profession 
 of orthodoxy, and this fact likewise Eusebius, who had met him at Antioch 
 on his return from exile, would naturally report to the West. Thus, 
 Meletius would be going up in opinion ; and, just in proportion 
 Paulinus would be going down. The balance would be still more in favour 
 of Meletius, when he was called upon by an Emperor of the known 
 orthodoxy of Theodosius to preside at the Second General Council. Thus 
 there had been a virtual suspension of Communion on the part of the 
 West, not only in respect of Meletius, but also of Paulinus; yet the cause 
 of Meletius was gaining ground. It is clearly an anomalous case, which 
 must not be judged by modern precedents, and cannot be relied on in 
 proof of any system, since important links are probably wanting, and so 
 much has to be made up by inference. 
 
 Note B. — The prayers for the Conversion of England were, we 
 believe, established at Oscott at the time when the late Cardinal, 
 then Bishop Wiseman, was President of the College, and we believe 
 
86 
 
 they are still in use, there and in many other places,' and by many 
 individuals. In the celebrated letter of Cardinal Wiseman to Lord 
 Shrewsbury, the idea of corporate reunion is entertained throughout. 
 After speaking in terms of great hopefulness of the prayers for unity 
 which had lately been established amongst Anglicans, he continues “ That 
 tiie feelings which have been expressed in favour of unity in the Anglican 
 Church, are every day widely spreading and deeply sinking; no one wbd 
 has the means of judging, I think, can doubt.” Again, he considers 
 this movement “as an approximation not merely towards individual 
 Catholic practices or doctrines, but towards Catholic Union.” But the 
 letter is so important in its bearing on the present movement that it should 
 l)e read by all. 
 
 Note C.— Since my review of Dr. Pusey’s book was in type my attention 
 has been called to the fact that on a clause in the Council of Florence of 
 which I have given there a version, a controversy is at this moment on 
 foot betwee i two writers who translate the passage differently, and that 
 my translation agrees with neither. As I make no pretence to accm'ate' 
 (xreek scholarship, I feel that I am probably wrong ; but as these two 
 writers disagree, I can only give both their translations, leaving those of 
 my readers who are Greek scholars to select which of the three versions 
 they think the truest. 
 
 A writer in the Buhlin Review translates this clause “as is the accepted 
 doctrine in the acts of Councils and in the Holy Canons.^’ ’ 
 
 Another writer, in a letter to the Union, has translated it “ in the way 
 determined both in the acts of the Oecumenical Councils and in the Holy 
 Canons.” In the Greek original, the controverted clause is ov rpo^ov 
 . . . . diaXa/jj(3dvsr(xi, The Latin version, said to have been 
 
 made 150 years after the Council, is “ Quemadmodum etiam in gestis 
 (Ecumenicorum conciliorum et in sacris canonibus continetur.” 
 
 The writer in the Buhlin blames the translation of the word 
 ; he says: “Who ever heard of this word as signify- 
 ing “ determined, appointed, prescribed. It signifies of course, 
 ‘ received,’ ‘appointed.’ ” 
 
 The other writer replies, “ among the ordinary senses of the word, I 
 find in Stephen's ‘ comprehendo, constituo, statuo, censeo, dijudico, 
 expono, tracto ;’ which Hederic and Scapula repeat almost in the same 
 w'ords, and which Liddell and Scott translate, ‘ to grasp with both hands, 
 to weigh, debate and so determine, to resolve, to set out or state clearly 
 and distinctly,’ neither Suicer nor Du Fresne notice any senses of that 
 verb peculiar to the middle ages. No lexicon that I am aware of has 
 rendered it by the Latin ‘ contineo,’ or ‘ contineo ’ by the English, accept.” 
 
 Note D. — Mr. Palmer^s words are : “According to the terms of the 
 Council of Florence, the Greeks wonld have continued to honour all 
 their Saints who had lived since these paration.” Mr. Palmer does not give 
 references, but we presume that so learned and careful a writer may be 
 depended on as an authority; however, we learn from the Bullarium of 
 Benedict XIV. that the rituals of the Greeks and their inenica or 
 martyrology containing the offices of their Saints, were allowed to be 
 retained by them, at the reunion effected at the Council of Florence. 
 
DOCTOK PUSEY'S 
 
 EIRENICON: 
 
 [kEPTJBLISHED FEOM the IRISH ECCLESIASTICAL RECORD.] 
 
 BY 
 
 GERALD MOLLOY, D.D., 
 
 PROFESSOR OF THEOLOGY IN THE ROYAL COLLEGE OF SAINT PATRICK, 
 MAYNOOTH. 
 
 “ Et alias oves habeo, quas non sunt ex hoe ovili : et illas oportet me 
 adducere, et vocem meam audient, et fiet unum ovile et unus pastor.” 
 
 Joan. x. 16. 
 
 LONDON: 
 
 LONGMANS, GREEN, READER, AND DYER. 
 
 DUBLIN : M-^GLASHAN AND GILL. 
 
 1866. 
 
DUBLIN : 
 
 ^riwtcti at ttje ^nibcrsU^ ^^ress, 
 
 BY M. H. GILL. 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 The following Review appeared in the May number 
 of “ The Irish Ecclesiastical Record.” It was intended, 
 not for the few who are deeply versed in polemical 
 literature, but rather for the many who have little 
 leisure to read long treatises, and who yet would 
 gladly learn something about the “ Eirenicon,” and 
 the controversy to which it has given rise. To such 
 a class of readers, minute details and learned dis- 
 cussions are distasteful, and sometimes even repul- 
 sive. Hence, the writer - judged it expedient to 
 abstain from elaborate argument, and to content 
 himself with setting forth sound Catholic views, in 
 clear and simple language. It was his chief aim to 
 be at the same time brief and comprehensive ; and, 
 with this end in view, he endeavoured first to sketch 
 in outline the more striking features of Doctor 
 Pusey’s Volume, and afterwards to consider them 
 by the light of Catholic doctrine. 
 
 The reader, therefore, must not expect to find in 
 A 2 
 
4 
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 these pages an answer in detail to the arguments 
 which Doctor Pusey has advanced so earnestly, or 
 an exolanation of the facts which he has set forth 
 
 i. 
 
 so plausibly ; but rather a general survey of the con- 
 troversy from a Catholic point of view. It may be 
 observed, however, that what is here left undone 
 has been already accomplished by abler hands. The 
 Archbishop of Westminster, and the Bishop of Bir- 
 mingham, have discussed the proposal of Union, 
 with all the authority which belongs to their high 
 position, and with all the gravity and learning which 
 a matter of so great importance demands. Mr. 
 Allies has taken up the question of Papal Supremacy, 
 and, bringing us face to face with the Primitive 
 Church, has clearly shown, that we cannot find there 
 the counterpart of Doctoy Pusey and his party, ex- 
 cept it be among those early heretics whom all An- 
 glicans admit to have been withered branches, cut off 
 from the True Vine, which is Christ. Others, too, 
 of Doctor Pusey’s old associates, have spoken out 
 in friendly words of argument and expostulation. 
 Even the ancient captain of his band, the great mas- 
 ter of dialectic fence, the ever bold, the ever grace- 
 ful, the ever powerful, John Henry Newman, has 
 stood forth to measure swords with his former com- 
 
PEEFACK. 
 
 5 
 
 panion and ally. With true Christian chivalry he 
 was the first to enter the lists in the cause of our 
 Heavenly Queen ; and with more than knightly skill 
 and valour, but yet with more than knightly courtesy, 
 has he done battle for her honour, and won the plau- 
 dits even of her enemies. 
 
 Some, perhaps, will deem it a useless, if not a pre- 
 sumptuous thing, to issue another pamphlet on a 
 subject that has been so ably handled by so many 
 eminent writers. But in the accomplishment of a 
 great work, even the lowliest instrument is often 
 found to have its use. There are noble and majes- 
 tic rivers to carry the treasures of distant lands into 
 the heart of mighty cities ; and yet there is many a 
 stream unknown to fame, that safely bears its more 
 humble, but not less welcome freight to the simple 
 inhabitants of some secluded village. If further ex- 
 cuse were needed, it might be found in the well 
 known words of Saint Augustine : “ Utile est plures 
 a pluribus fieri libros, diverse stylo, non diversa fide, 
 etiam de qumstionibus eisdem, ut ad plurimos res 
 ipsa perveniat, ad alios sic, ad alios autem sic.” 
 
 St. Patrick’s College, Maynooth. 
 
 In Festo Sanctce Bympnce, 1866 . 
 
j'Kijsrr'- • 
 
 : ';r,A i' j'i*. 
 
 
 
DOCTOR PUSEY’S EIRENICON.* 
 
 Doctor Pusey’s book has been a puzzle alike to his 
 friends and to his foes. Indeed, it is a part of the 
 puzzle to tell who are his friends, and who are his 
 foes. He stands almost alone on a lofty eminence 
 between the Church of England, which he has prac- 
 tically quitted, and the Roman Catholic Church, 
 which he hesitates to enter. To the one he is drawn 
 by the force of early associations and long- cherished 
 sympathies : to the other he is attracted by the un- 
 seen influence of grace, and the voices of many friends 
 who have gone before him. The one is the Church 
 of his birth, which won the warm affections of his 
 youthful heart, and to whose service he has devoted 
 the energies of his riper years. The other, as he 
 seems already to admit, is the Church of the Apostles, 
 the Church of the Fathers, the Church which alone 
 can offer a tranquil home to a mind long “ tossed 
 
 ^ “ The Church of England a Portion of Christ’s One Holy Ca- 
 tholic Church, and a Means of restoring Visible Unity. An 
 Eirenicon, in a Letter to the Author of The Christian Year. By 
 E. B. Pusey, D. D., Regius Professor of Hebrew, and Canon of 
 Christ Church, Oxford.” 
 
8 
 
 DOCTOR PUSEY’s EIRENICON. 
 
 to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doc- 
 trine.”* The voice of conscience and the call of 
 God are ringing in his ears. But he still clings 
 with a certain tenderness to the few remaining ties 
 that bind him to his Oxford home, and to the Church 
 which he has laboured in vain to defend. 
 
 In this state of suspense and perplexity, his mind 
 fondly grasps at the idea of Union. He would fain 
 bring himself into communion with the Church of 
 Eome, and yet not altogether abandon the Church 
 of England. Is it not possible, he asks, to restore a 
 Visible Unity ? If there are some points of doctrine 
 on which the two Churches are at issue, there are 
 yet many on which they agree. Nay, these last are 
 the more numerous, as well as the more important. 
 At first sight, no doubt, there is a manifest and a 
 striking conflict, as well in doctrine as in discipline. 
 But, on a closer examination, it will be found that 
 this conflict is often more apparent than real, and 
 that it does not arise so much from the “ formal 
 teaching” of each Church, as from the “ popular sys- 
 tem” of religion, which is superadded to this teach- 
 ing. If we take the Thirty-nine Articles according 
 to the strict meaning of the words, and compare them 
 with the decrees of the Council of Trent, we shall 
 find that the antagonism between the two is by no 
 means so great as is commonly supposed. May not 
 we hope, then, that with mutual concessions and ex- 
 
 * Epli. iv. 1 4. 
 
DOCTOR PUSEY S EIRENICON. 
 
 9 
 
 planations, it would be possible to effect a firm and 
 lasting Union ? 
 
 Such were the ideas that seem to have been float- 
 ing in the mind of Doctor Pusey, when he set about 
 writing a letter to the author of “ The Christian Year.” 
 And, with these ideas in his mind, he chose the title 
 of hisbook,and called it “an Eirenicon,” that is, a mes- 
 sage of peace. But we must candidly say, there is 
 much in his Volume which is at variance with this 
 title. The author often loses sight of his original 
 purpose, and enters upon the common topics of con- 
 troversy, not with the impartiality and delicate con- 
 sideration for the feelings of others, which should 
 distinguish a peacemaker, but with much of the 
 prejudice, and somewhat too of the bitterness, that 
 mark the character of a partisan. Having come to 
 treat of peace and Union, he has scarcely opened the 
 negotiation, when, in the ardour of his zeal, he sud- 
 denly draws his sword, as if to alarm us by the 
 exhibition of his power, and to irritate us by the 
 display of hostile feeling. 
 
 It seems to us, then, that in the tone and spirit of 
 the Eirenicon there is something wavering and in- 
 consistent. At one moment it is a profession of 
 peace, at another a declaration of war. Now we are 
 told that the prospects of Union are hopeful; again, 
 we are assured that Union is impossible. Never- 
 theless a careful reader will not fail to trace the ge- 
 neral current of thought, which we would represent 
 as follows : — The restoration of Visible Unity be- 
 
10 
 
 DOCTOR PUSEy’s EIRENICON. 
 
 tween the various Churches into which Christendom 
 is divided, is an object that must be dear to us all. 
 Not only would it promote directly the cause of 
 charity, and the sanctification of souls, but it would 
 enable us to contend with increased power against 
 the rapid progress of Infidelity. Now, as regards 
 the Church of England and the Church of Rome, 
 there is a vast body of doctrine which both in com- 
 mon teach ; and though, in some points, the Council 
 of Trent is at variance with the Thirty-nine Articles, 
 these points are of minor importance, and the dif- 
 ference is often much less than it seems. From this 
 point of view, therefore, the prospects of Union are 
 hopeful. But when we pass from the “formal teach- 
 ing” of the Roman Catholic Church to that great 
 “ practical system” of belief and devotion which lies 
 beyond, we come upon many things that seem to 
 olfer, in the way of Union, obstacles well nigh in- 
 surmountable. Amongst these, the most striking 
 are the existing devotion towards the Blessed Vir- 
 gin Mary, and the doctrine of Papal Infallibility. 
 The author then proceeds to explain to his readers 
 the “practical system” that prevails amongst Ca- 
 tholics, on these two important questions ; and he 
 strives to persuade them, that what we hold about 
 the Pope is contradicted by history, and what we 
 teach about the Mother of God is repugnant to the 
 first principles of Christianity. 
 
 Thus Doctor Pusey appears before us in a twofold 
 character. He descends into the arena of contro- 
 
DOCTOR PUSEY S EIRENICON. 
 
 11 
 
 versy bearing in his hand the olive branch of peace ; 
 but before he departs from the scene, he rends it in 
 pieces before our eyes, and scatters the fragments 
 to the winds. His Volume opens with a project for 
 the Union of the Churches; it closes with an at- 
 tack — for we can scarcely call it by any milder 
 name — upon Catholic doctrine. As regards the 
 first point, we propose, briefly to explain the terms 
 on which alone an Union is possible ; and in refe- 
 rence to the second, we shall offer a few remarks 
 on the manner in which our author has conducted 
 his argument. 
 
 With a view to establish a basis of Union, Doctor 
 Pusey compares the “ formal teaching” of the Church 
 of England with the ‘‘formal teaching” of the Church 
 of Eome ; and he labours to prove, with great learn- 
 ing and ingenuity, that there is much in which they 
 agree, and little in which they differ. Yet we be- 
 lieve that, notwithstanding his argument, the mass 
 of Anglican Protestants would be very unwilling to 
 accept the Council of Trent as a fair exponent of 
 their doctrine ; and we are quite sure, that all Ca- 
 tholics will still continue to regard the Thirty-nine 
 Articles as deeply tainted with heresy. This, how- 
 ever, is a subject we do not mean to discuss. It is 
 beside the real question at issue. Even if the har- 
 mony for which Doctor Pusey contends, did exist in 
 point of fact, between the dogmatic decrees of Eome 
 and the formularies of the Anglican Church, that 
 
12 
 
 DOCTOR PUSEy’s EIRENICON. 
 
 harmony could never become the basis of Union. 
 Here are the two simple questions on which the suc- 
 cess of Doctor Pusey’s project must ever depend : 
 Does the Church of England hold that the Eoman 
 Catholic Church, as the true Church of Christ, is In- 
 fallible ? Again, Does it hold that Pope Pius the 
 Ninth, as the successor of Saint Peter, is, by Divine 
 right, the supreme head and ruler of Christ’s king- 
 dom upon earth ? If it do not accept these two 
 doctrines, then Union is not only hopeless, but ab- 
 solutely impossible. For the Catholic Church can 
 never sacrifice one jot or one tittle of the sacred 
 deposit of Faith, which it received from our Divine 
 Lord; and these doctrines belong to that sacred 
 trust. But if our questions be answered in the 
 affirmative, then all further negotiation is unneces- 
 sar3^ If the Church of England believe the Eoman 
 Catholic Church to be Infallible, it must, of neces- 
 sity, adopt the whole body of Catholic Faith without 
 exception or limitation. And if it believe the 
 Eoman Pontiff to be, by Divine right, the supreme 
 ruler of the true Church, it must, of necessity, sub- 
 mit to his authority. 
 
 In dealing, therefore, with the Eoman Catholic 
 Church, it is vain to talk of compromise and mutual 
 concessions. To agree to any compromise in mat- 
 ters of doctrine, to grant any concession, would be 
 to abandon the truth; and we believe that this 
 would be not only unlawful, but, through God’s 
 special providence, impossible. Hence, the only 
 
DOCTOR PUSEy’s EIRENICON. 
 
 13 
 
 Union between Catholics and Protestants, which 
 can be the legitimate object of our hopes and our 
 prayers, must consist simply in this, that Protestants 
 cease to be Protestants, and become Catholics. It 
 seems to us, however, that this Union is to be 
 brought about, not so much by formal negotiation, 
 but rather by the general action of the Church, dif- 
 fused throughout the country, and gradually finding 
 its way to the hearts of individuals. Formal nego- 
 tiations lead to controversy; and few are converted 
 by controversy. 
 
 Besides, it is to be observed that no individual in 
 the Anglican Church is competent to accept any 
 terms of Union, except for himself alone. Neither 
 is there any corporate body whose decision, upon 
 such a question, would have any binding force, ex- 
 cept for the individuals who compose that body. W e 
 would ask Doctor Pusey, who is to conclude the 
 treaty of Union on the part of the Anglican Church ? 
 Is it the Queen, who is the head of the Church, or 
 a majority of the bishops, or all the bishops together ? 
 Every supposition of this kind is repugnant alike to 
 the principles of the Established Church, and the 
 principles of the English constitution. It follows, 
 therefore, that these theories of “ Corporate Re- 
 union,” as it is called, are but illusive dreams. If 
 England is to be made Catholic once again, it can- 
 not be done by letters patent of the Sovereign, nor 
 by an order of the Privy Council, nor yet by a decree 
 of Convocation. We must labour to bring back 
 
14 
 
 DOCTOR PUSEY’S EIRENICON. 
 
 our erring brethren, one by one, into the fold of 
 Christ, patiently awaiting the hour when the' grace 
 of God may illumine their minds, and the peerless 
 majesty and beauty of the Sponsa Christi may win 
 their hearts. 
 
 In connexion with this subject, a certain form of 
 speech has been introduced, which sounds well to 
 the ear, but which, nevertheless, as it is commonly 
 understood, is at variance with Catholic doctrine. 
 Doctor Pusey represents the Church of England as 
 “ a means of restoring Visible Unity and the “ res- 
 toration of Unity” is at present the object of the hopes 
 and prayers of many Anglican Protestants : even 
 some Catholics have borrowed the phrase, and seem 
 to consider it harmless. If an inquirer were to say : 
 You talk of the restoration of Unity ; — where ? the 
 answer would probably be : In the Church of Christ. 
 Now, this is precisely what we mean to criticize. 
 When we speak of restoring Unity, we certainly im- 
 ply that Unity formerly existed, and was dissolved. 
 But it is contrary to Catholic faith to suppose that 
 Unity can be dissolved in the Church of Christ. 
 And therefore to speak of restoring Unity in the 
 Church of Christ, is to convey by implication what 
 we must not and cannot admit. No doubt we might 
 speak of restoring Unity between the people of Eng- 
 land, or the people of Prussia, and the true Church.* 
 
 Yet it would be more in accordance with Catholic phrase- 
 ology, and also more strictly correct, to speak of these nations as 
 being restored to the Church. The restoration is not mutual ; 
 
DOCTOR PUSEY S EIRENICON. 
 
 15 
 
 But Doctor Pusey and his followers certainly under- 
 stand the phrase in its most objectionable sense. 
 Their theory is, that the Church of England is “ a 
 means of restoring Visible Unity” between the va- 
 rious sections into which the Church of Christ is divided. 
 If Catholics, therefore, were to borrow this phrase 
 from writers of the Anglican school, they would 
 seem to give their sanction to an error which they 
 are bound to reject.* 
 
 So much for the project of Union. W e now come 
 to the second, or what may be called the hostile, 
 . phase of Doctor Pusey’s book. He says that, over 
 and above the defined doctrines which are to be 
 found in the dogmatic decrees of General Councils, 
 there is a “ vast practical system” to which the Ca- 
 tholic Church is fully committed ; that this practi- 
 cal system is becoming every day larger and larger, 
 and that any portion of it may be made, at some fu- 
 ture period, the matter of a new definition. He then 
 proceeds, at great length, to explain this practical 
 system, and to comment upon it in a manner which 
 has proved very gratifying to the great bulk of his 
 Protestant readers, but to Catholics painful and irri- 
 tating. In particular he selects for especial con- 
 demnation the language we hold concerning the 
 
 when the sheep who have wandered away, are brought hack by 
 the Good Shepherd, it is they who are restored to the Fold, and 
 not the Fold to them. 
 
 ^ See Note A, in the Appendix. 
 
16 
 
 DOCTOR PUSEy’s EIRENICON. 
 
 Blessed Virgin Mary, and the views we entertain on 
 the subject of Papal Infallibility. 
 
 In this part of Doctor Pusey's Volume we find 
 some elements of truth, but we find also much 
 false colouring, and many delusive arguments. 
 It is quite true that a Catholic is bound to believe 
 many things which are not defined by the Coun- 
 cil of Trent, or by any other General Council. 
 The pastors of the Church seldom meet together, in 
 General Council : but they are at all times Infallible 
 in their teaching ; for the Spirit of God ever abides 
 in the midst of them, and teaches them all truth. 
 Jesus Christ has said : “ I will ask the Father, and 
 He shall give you another Paraclete, that He may 
 abide with you for ever; the Spirit of Truth. . . 
 
 He vail teach you all truth.” — Joan. xiv. 16 ; xvi. 
 13. And again: ‘‘Going, therefore, teach ye all 
 nations, . . . teaching them to observe all things 
 whatsoever I have commanded you; and behold I 
 am with you all clays, even to the consummation of 
 the world.” — Matth. xxviii. 19, 20. Moreover, 
 Catholics maintain that not only are the pastors of 
 the Church at all times preserved from error in what 
 they teach, but the universal Church itself, which is 
 “ the pillar and the ground of truth,” is likewise 
 preserved from error in what it believes. It follows, 
 therefore, that whatever is universally taught or be- 
 lieved throughout the Catholic Church bears upon 
 it the stamp of Infallibility, even though it may not 
 have been defined by any General Council. Again, 
 
DOCTOR PUSEY’s EIRENICON. 
 
 17 
 
 there is no doubt that the doctrine which is taught 
 - and believed in the Catholic Church on any parti- 
 cular subject, may be partly gathered from the 
 writings of her theologians, from the language of 
 her liturgy, and from the devotions in common use 
 among the faithful. 
 
 These ideas are shadowed forth, as it seems to 
 us, by Doctor Pusey, though, we must confess, with 
 some vagueness and obscurity. So far, however, we 
 have no cause of quarrel with him. But we have 
 much reason to complain of the manner in which he 
 applies these principles to the subject in hand. 
 First, as regards devotion to the Blessed Mother of 
 God. The picture which he presents to his readers 
 of this devotion, as it exists in our “ practical sys- 
 tem,” is calculated to make a very false impression. 
 He has chosen among Catholic writers those who 
 are most enthusiastic about the Blessed Virgin, — 
 some of them obscure, and all but unknown amongst 
 us, — and from these writers he picks out the strongest 
 passages he can find. Having thus collected his 
 materials, he then so combines them together that 
 his readers will be led to think they have before 
 them a complete representation, as if in a panorama, 
 of what Catholics think and say about the Mother 
 of God. Now we contend that this panoramic view 
 is not a faithful picture : it is a caricature. ,No one 
 can lionestly believe that a number of expressions, 
 selected after this fashion, separated from their con- 
 text, and skilfully dovetailed together, will fairly re- 
 
 B 
 
18 
 
 DOCTOR pussy’s EIRENICON. 
 
 present the general tone and character of Catholic 
 sentiment and of Catholic devotion. Nay more, 
 this is not a fair representation of the sentiments and 
 devotion even of those writers from whom the pas- 
 sages are taken. That they did use the words 
 which Doctor Pusey has placed between inverted 
 commas, we do not call in question. But the sense 
 of a writer upon any subject, and more particularly 
 on a subject in which his affections are deeply en- 
 gaged, is not to be judged by a few phrases, often 
 highly rhetorical, often highly figurative, picked out 
 from the context, and set before the reader cold and 
 dry. 
 
 It is urged, however, by Doctor Pusey, that there 
 is a growth of doctrine in the Catholic Church on 
 the subject of the Blessed Virgin ; that the expres- 
 sions to which he objects, though not yet in general 
 use, may continue to spread more and more every 
 day, until at last they may prevail throughout the 
 whole Church ; and, then, according to our theory 
 of Infallibility, they will become the object of neces- 
 sary belief. As it is, they seem to be approved by 
 the Church : certainly they are not condemned, but 
 rather encouraged. 
 
 Now, there is a general answer to this difficulty, 
 which comes home to the mind of every Catholic, 
 although, perhaps. Doctor Pusey is not yet prepared 
 to accept it. Since the Catholic Church is Infallible, 
 it never can accept a doctrine which is false : neither 
 can it ever come to express its belief by any form of 
 
DOCTOR PUSEY’s EIRENICON. 
 
 19 
 
 words which is out of harmony with revealed truth. 
 Therefore, if the language which has so startled 
 Doctor Pusey be really inconsistent with the honour 
 due to God, it never can be accepted by the univer- 
 sal Church. Whatever may be said about the 
 development of doctrine or of devotion, there is 
 no development possible, by which the precious 
 deposit of revealed truth can be obscured in the 
 Church of Christ. 
 
 With this broad principle before our eyes, we may 
 come now, without fear or hesitation, to examine 
 moi'e closely the grounds of Doctor Pusey’s difficulty, 
 fully prepared to admit what is true, and hoping to 
 demonstrate the fallacy of what is not. It may be 
 fairly said to us ; Granted that these isolated phrases, 
 selected as they have been from a comparatively 
 small number of authors, do not exhibit a faithful 
 picture of what Catholics commonly hold concern- 
 ing the Blessed Virgin Mary ; granted, moreover, 
 that they do not even fully represent the sense of the 
 writers who have used them ; yet, their very exis- 
 tence, and the fact that they seem so startling and 
 repulsive to Protestants, call for some explanation. 
 Are they true, or false ? And is it a fair allegation 
 of Doctor Pusey, that they have the sanction and en- 
 couragement of the Catholic Church ? To this we 
 answer : First, that a large proportion of the lan- 
 guage in question is quite true in the sense of its 
 authors ; but it has been misunderstood and (no 
 doubt, unintentionally) misrepresented by Doctor 
 
 B 2 
 
20 
 
 DOCTOR PUSEY’s EIRENICON. 
 
 Pusey : Secondly, that some of the statements quoted 
 are inconsistent with Catholic doctrine, and abso- 
 lutely indefensible ; but these have received no kind 
 of sanction from the Church, nay, in some instances, 
 they have incurred her formal censure. A few 
 words will be necessary to explain and illustrate 
 each part of our answer. 
 
 And first, we do not mean to make any imputa- 
 tion against the ability or honesty of Doctor Pusey. 
 If he has misunderstood his authors, and therefore 
 in his comments perverted their meaning, we believe 
 that the chief reason is because he has examined 
 them as a Protestant, and not as a Catholic. The 
 books to which he refers were Avritten for Catholics, 
 and not for Protestants ; and therefore, to be under- 
 stood aright, they must be looked at from a Catholic, 
 and not from a Protestant, point of view. This is a 
 very important consideration, which Doctor Pusey 
 seems to have overlooked. 
 
 The English Protestant has learned from his child- 
 hood to believe that the devotion which Catholics 
 pay to the Blessed Virgin, if not absolutely idola- 
 trous, has at least an idolatrous tendency. Hence 
 the term Mariolatry, which is so common among 
 Protestants. This early training is more and more 
 confirmed in proportion as he becomes familiar with 
 the literature of this country, in which, unhappily, 
 the doctrine of the Catholic Church is almost uni- 
 formly misrepresented. Thus he naturally comes 
 to look with suspicion and distrust on the language 
 
DOCTOR PUSEY’S EIRENICON. 
 
 21 
 
 in which the great dignity, and the high prerogatives, 
 of the Blessed Mother of God, are set forth by Ca- 
 tholic writers. By a lamentable perversion of his 
 natural instincts, he insensibly acquires such a habit 
 of mind, that, while he loves Jesus Christ, he can 
 feel nothing but coldness and indifference towards 
 her whom Jesus Christ loved and honoured as the 
 first of creatures. In theory he will not, and can- 
 not deny that Mary was adorned by God with the 
 plenitude of every virtue ; and then, when she stood 
 before Him “ full of grace,” that He came down from 
 heaven, and, having dwelt for nine months in her 
 womb, lived with her for thirty years in her house 
 at Nazareth, and “ was subject” to her. And yet, 
 in practice, he seems to think that every word of 
 praise which is given to Mary, is so much taken 
 from God. An English Protestant, therefore, is little 
 disposed to make any allowance for the ardour of 
 devotional feeling towards the Blessed Virgin. He 
 is jealous for the honour of Jesus when he sees a 
 Catholic rush eagerly to Mary, as a child to the em- 
 braces of its mother ; and when he overhears the fond 
 endearments that pass between them, he measures 
 every word, and balances every phrase by the in- 
 exorable rules of grammar and logic. 
 
 Far different is the tone of mind in which a Catho- 
 lic takes up his book of devotions. From the time 
 that his infant lips have been able to lisp the name 
 of Mary, he has been taught that, though she is the 
 peerless Queen of Angels and Saints, she is yet but 
 
22 
 
 DOCTOR PUSY S EIRENICON. 
 
 a creature, and therefore, in nature and in dignity, 
 infinitely inferior to the Creator. It is consequently 
 to him a first principle, that the honour which is 
 due to the Blessed Virgin is not only very different 
 in degree, but also very different in kind, from the 
 honour which is due to God. All this has been en- 
 graved on his mind from earliest infancy, as the 
 fixed, unalterable teaching of the Catholic Church. 
 If then, amid the ardent effusions of devotional 
 writers, he meet with a phrase, which to others 
 might seem ambiguous or exaggerated, he is not 
 disturbed. He knows that the warm feelings of the 
 lover will sometimes outrun his powers of speech ; 
 that he will not always stop to pick and choose his 
 language with the cautious precision of a gramma- 
 rian ; and that very often his only thought is to give 
 the fullest expression to the depth and tenderness 
 of his devotion. 
 
 We do not mean to say that the language of ardent 
 devotion must, of necessity, be exaggerated. Much 
 less do we maintain that, in popular books upon re- 
 ligious subjects, it can ever be desirable to intro- 
 duce expressions which are out of harmony, even in 
 the smallest degree, with the doctrine of the Catholic 
 Church. Far from it. We adopt much rather the 
 sentiments thus beautifully and forcibly expressed 
 by Eaynaud : “ Let it be taken as a fixed principle, 
 that no praise of ours can come up to the praise 
 which is due to the Virgin Mother. Nevertheless 
 it is not lawful to supply the deficiency of truthful 
 
DOCTOR PUSEY’s EIRENICON. 
 
 23 
 
 panegyric with lying decorations and false ho- 
 nours.”* But the question now at issue is a simple 
 question of fact ; What is the meaning of certain 
 phrases which Doctor Pusey has collected out of 
 Catholic writers ? Our thesis is, that he has failed 
 in many instances to discover the true sense of the 
 language to which he objects ; and for this reason, 
 that he has scrutinized it through the medium of 
 Protestant prejudice, whereas it should be examined 
 in the full light of Catholic teaching. When con- 
 sidered in itself and measured according to the un- 
 compromising rules of grammar, it is sometimes am- 
 biguous ; but it is not ambiguous to those for whom 
 it is written. It is sometimes exaggerated ; but the 
 language of sentiment and feeling is often exagge- 
 rated, and yet is not, on that account, false : it must 
 be always understood according to the known opi- 
 nions of the writer, and of those for whom he writes. 
 
 But, it will be urged, the sentiments quoted by 
 Doctor Pusey cannot be always defended on the 
 ground of devotional ardour, or loving enthusiasm. 
 For they are taken, in some instances, from theolo- 
 gical writers, and they are set forth with a certain 
 “ dogmatic precision of language.” Besides, they 
 are often, not simply ambiguous forms or mere ex- 
 aggerations, but downright errors of doctrine. Take, 
 for example, the opinion that the Blessed Virgin, or 
 at least some portion of her substance, is really pre- 
 
 * See note B in the Appendix. 
 
24 
 
 DOCTOR PUSEY’s EIRENICON. 
 
 sent in the sacrament of the Eucharist. This opi- 
 nion receives a favourable notice from Salazar,* and 
 it is formally defended by Oswald : “ ‘We maintain a 
 (co-) presence of Mary in the Eucharist. This is a 
 necessary inference from our Marian theory, and we 
 shrink back from no consequence.’ ‘ We are much 
 inclined,’ he says afterwards, ‘ to believe an essen- 
 tial co-presence of Mary in her whole person, with 
 body and soul, under the sacred species.’ ”f Now 
 surely this doctrine, thus set before us in “deliberate 
 dogmatic language,” cannot be defended by any arti- 
 fice. And yet it is a part of that “ vast practical 
 system,” ofthat “ §'Ma5z-authoritative teaching,” which 
 Catholics are not free to reject, and which, “ like 
 the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception, may be 
 affirmed as a matter of faith at any future time.” 
 
 This objection, which represents in a condensed 
 form a difficulty that Doctor Pusey has spread over 
 many pages, brings us to the second part of our 
 answer. W e admit that the doctrine is indefensible ; 
 but we deny that it has received the sanction or ap- 
 probation of the Catholic Church. Moreover, we 
 can assure Doctor Pusey that if he were to join us 
 to-morrow, he need have no fear of incurring any 
 obligation to embrace this doctrine, or to adopt any 
 opinion, or any form of language, which varies, even 
 
 * Salazar, “in Proverb” ix. 4, 5, nn. 144, 145. See Doctor 
 Pusey’s Eirenicon, pp. 171, 172. 
 
 t Pusey’s Eirenicon, p. 169; for the extract he refers to Os- 
 wald, “Dogmatische Mariologie,” p. 177. 
 
DOCTOR PUSEY’S EIRENICON. 
 
 25 
 
 by a hair’s breadth, from the clear and simple doc- 
 trine we have already explained. 
 
 First of all, then, we cannot accept the argument, 
 that because a proposition is found in a Catholic 
 writer, and has not been condemned, it is therefore 
 approved by the Catholic Church. We think that 
 it is neither expedient nor possible for the Church 
 to condemn by a formal act, every sentiment, every 
 phrase, which is not in harmony with her teaching. 
 She condemns those errors which she considers to 
 be attended with especial danger to the faith or 
 morals of her children. Thus she has often con- 
 demned an error, because it was disguised under a 
 form which served to hide its real character ; or be- 
 cause it happened to fall in with the prevailing tone 
 of society in a particular country ; or because it was 
 defended by a party or a school, in which there were 
 many men of great ability, and of commanding in- 
 fluence. Now, whilst we frankly admit that the 
 doctrine to which we refer is false, and that some of 
 the other phrases produced by Doctor Pusey, in his 
 Volume, are not in keeping with the “ form of sound 
 words,” which the Church herself has always jea- 
 lously guarded, it seems to us, nevertheless, that 
 neither in the one, nor in the other, is there any very 
 great or general danger to the faith of Catholics. 
 The distinction between the creature and the Crea- 
 tor is so deeply impressed on the Catholic mind, that 
 there is practically but little fear of our confounding 
 the high prerogatives that have been conferred on 
 
26 
 
 DOCTOR PUSEY’s EIRENICON. 
 
 the Blessed Virgin, with the incommunicable attri- 
 butes of God. Again, the relations of God to man 
 as his Maker, his Redeemer, his one Supreme Lord, 
 and last of all, his “ reward exceeding great,” are so 
 fully and so clearly understood by Catholics, that it 
 is almost impossible for any creature so to step in 
 between the mind and God, as to receive any part 
 of that honour which is due to Him alone. 
 
 It follows, therefore, that the silence of the Church 
 concerning those passages, which we admit are open 
 to objection, would not in itself be a proof of her 
 sanction or approbation. But we have another 
 answer which is more direct, and which goes very 
 far to unveil the weakness, not to say the unfair- 
 ness, of Doctor Pusey’s argument. The Church, in 
 point of fact, has not been silent. She has spoken 
 out clearly enough by the general teaching of her 
 theologians, and by the voice of her Sovereign Pon- 
 tiffs. To make this matter clear we will follow up, 
 by way of illustration, the example already intro- 
 duced. 
 
 The opinion that the Blessed Virgin is really pre- 
 sent in the sacrament of the Eucharist, is represented 
 by Doctor Pusey as commonly prevailing among 
 Catholics, and as forming part of that “ vast practi- 
 cal system” which offers an insuperable barrier to all 
 hope of Union between the Churches. Yet strange 
 to say, he refers to no Catholic writer who maintains 
 this doctrine, but Oswald, whose name we had never 
 heard before. He tells us indeed, p. 169, that he 
 
DOCTOR PUSEy’s EIRENICON. 
 
 27 
 
 himself noticed it in a letter Avritten to Doctor Jelf 
 about five-and-twenty years ago, as “ a belief, said 
 to exist among the poorer people in Rome but 
 then he frankly confesses, in a note, that for this 
 statement he had only the authority of a friend who 
 had been staying in that city. Surely this is very 
 miserable evidence on a very important point in 
 his argument. May it not be fairly asked, if that 
 opinion can be said to prevail generally among Ca- 
 tholics, for which Doctor Pusey has been able to 
 produce but one solitary authority? Is it not plain, 
 from this fact alone, that the common voice of our 
 theologians is against the doctrine ? 
 
 It is needless to enforce a conclusion so obvious 
 by a long list of authorities. We shall be content 
 with one who, uniting in his own person the office of 
 Supreme Pontiff with the learning and ability of an il- 
 lustrious theologian, may well stand for all; we mean 
 Benedict the Fourteenth. In his well known treatise 
 “De Canonizatione Sanctorum,” he refers to the work 
 of a certain writer named Zephyrinus, entitled “Liber 
 de cultu erga Deiparam in Sacramento Altaris.” 
 Zephyrinus, he tells us, asserted that some part of 
 the substance of the Blessed Virgin is really present 
 in the sacrament of the altar. Now, this is exactly 
 the opinion of Oswald, except that he goes further, 
 and defends “ an essential co-presence of Mary in her 
 whole person, with body and soul, under the sacred 
 species.” Benedict the Fourteenth, having first given 
 a minute description of the doctrine propounded by 
 
28 
 
 DOCTOR PUSEY’s EIRENICON. 
 
 Zepliyrinus, next proceeds to show that it is rejected 
 by our theologians, and that it is inconsistent with 
 the principles of our faith. Finally, he concludes 
 that it “ has been held to be erroneous, dangerous, 
 and scandalous, and that the worship has been con- 
 demned, which, in consequence of it, Zephyrinus 
 asserted should be paid to the most Blessed Virgin 
 in the sacrament of the altar.”* In the presence of 
 this clear and emphatic declaration, the authority of 
 Doctor Pusey’s friend “who had been staying at 
 Eome,” and the statement in the letter of Doctor 
 Pusey himself, who naturally believed what his friend 
 had told him, and even the teaching of Oswald, 
 must melt away before our eyes, as the patches of 
 winter’s snow that linger upon the hills melt away 
 before the face of the summer sun. 
 
 One point more yet remains to be noticed. Who, 
 it may be asked, is this Oswald, to whose work 
 Doctor Pusey so largely refers, as to a treasury of 
 those opinions which prevail generally among Catho- 
 lics at the present day ? We had never heard his 
 name till we met with it in Doctor Pusey’s volume : 
 and we were not a little startled to be told that the 
 
 Itaque cum per hanc doctrinam, fidei principiis conjunctis- 
 simam, directe et expressis verbis improbata remanserint asserta 
 in citato libri Patris Zephyrini, ejus doctrina habita est tan- 
 quam erronea, periculosa, et scandalosa, reprobatusque fuit cultus, 
 quern ex ea prsestandum Beatissimse Yirgini in Sacramento altaris 
 asserebat.” Benedicti XIY. Opera, Eom. 1749. Tom. iv. pars. 2, 
 cap. 31, D. 32. 
 
DOCTOR PUSEY’s EIRENICON. 
 
 29 
 
 sentiments and the phrases which are extracted from 
 his book, are the sentiments and phrases of a Catholic 
 theologian. But our anxiety was soon relieved, 
 when, turning to the “ Index Expurgatorius,” under 
 the letter 0, we came upon the following: “Oswald 
 (H.) Dogmatisclie Mariologie, das ist : systema- 
 tische Darstellung saemtlicher die allerseligste Jung- 
 frau betreffenden Lehrstiicke ein Yersuch. Latine 
 vero : Mariologia Dogmatica, hoc est : systematica 
 expositio totius doctrinse de B. Yirgine. (Deer. 
 6 Dec. 1855.) Auctor laudabiliter se subjecit et opus 
 reprobavat”* Here is the very book Doctor Pusey 
 has been quoting. So little careful has he been, it 
 would seem, in the choice of his authors, that he has 
 actually gone to seek for what he calls the “ quasi- 
 authoritative teaching” of the Catholic Church, in a 
 book which the Catholic Church has reprobated and 
 condemned. 
 
 We now come to the second great obstacle which, 
 to Doctor Pusey, seems to stand in the way of those 
 Protestants who wish to bring themselves into com- 
 munion with the Church of Rome. He is well 
 aware that the Infallibility of the Roman Pontiff has 
 not yet been defined, and at present forms no part 
 of the creed which a Catholic, as such, is bound to 
 profess. But he considers that the belief in this 
 doctrine is now very general in the Church, and that 
 it may possibly become, at some future period, the 
 
 ^ Index Librorum Prohibitorum Mechliniae, 1860 . 
 
30 
 
 DOCTOR PUSEY’S EIRENICON. 
 
 subject of a formal definition. So far we agree with 
 Doctor Pusey. When he proceeds, however, to ex- 
 plain in what this doctrine consists, we must candidly 
 say that he presents it to his readers in a very dif- 
 ferent form from that in which it is generally held 
 among Catholics. According to him, the Pope is 
 held to be Infallible “ in all his formal utterances, 
 . . . howsoever or to whomsoever those utter- 
 
 ances may be made * not only when he addresses 
 the whole Church, but even in his “ letters to this 
 or that individual pastor.” f Again, his Infallibility 
 is not confined to the main question on which he 
 pronounces judgment, but extends equally to every 
 incidental proposition, every sentence, every argu- 
 ment. “ I will only instance one more, as showing 
 that every sentence in every pronouncement of the Pope 
 
 is to be held as infallible Incidental 
 
 statements then are, equally with the most formal pro- 
 positions, matters of faith Not only the 
 
 main proposition, but every argument used in all these 
 allocutions, is held to be equally infallible truth.” J 
 Lastly, he informs his readers that the Infallibility 
 which we claim for the Pope, is “ an Infallibility 
 equal in extent to that of the Divine Scriptures ; so 
 that each sentence, however incidental, becomes, 
 like the Word of God, a sacred text.” § 
 
 Now we can assure Doctor Pusey, in all sincerity. 
 
 J Pusey’s Eirenicon, pages 288, 289. 
 * Pages 302, 303. 
 
 f Page 292. 
 § Id., 303. 
 
DOCTOR PUSEY S EIRENICON. 
 
 31 
 
 that this is not the common doctrine of Catholics ; 
 nay more, that it is at variance with the express 
 teaching of all our most distinguished and most 
 approved theologians, both ancient and modern. He 
 has persuaded himself, indeed, and he has sought to 
 persuade his readers, that such an Infallibility as he 
 has described, is claimed implicitly by Pope Pius 
 the Ninth in the Encyclical and Syllabus of 1864. 
 We shall not weary our readers by following the 
 course of his argument, which appears to us, from 
 beginning to end, loose, confused, and inaccurate. 
 But there is one plain and practical consideration, 
 which, in our judgment, is quite sufficient to set his 
 mind at rest. The doctrine which prevails com- 
 monly amongst Catholics cannot surely be other 
 than it is represented in the writings of our approved 
 theologians. It is not the way ofthe Catholic Church 
 to hold one doctrine, and to commend those works 
 in which the opposite is maintained. Let Doctor 
 Pusey, then, travel through the various schools of 
 theology that are scattered at the present moment 
 over the broad face of the earth, and we challenge 
 him to produce satisfactory evidence, that in any one 
 of them, such a doctrine of Papal Infallibility is ac- 
 cepted, as that which we have collected above from 
 his Volume. 
 
 By way of example, let us look into Father Perrone. 
 He is a Eoman and a Jesuit. He has grown old 
 in teaching theology beneath the very shadow of 
 Saint Peter’s lofty dome. His works have been ap- 
 
32 
 
 DOCTOR pussy’s EIRENICON. 
 
 proved at Rome, and have been received everywhere 
 throughout the Church, as a treasury of sound Ca- 
 tholic doctrine. In his treatise De Locis Theologi- 
 cis,* he undertakes to explain and defend the “com- 
 mon opinion of Catholics, that the Roman Pontiff is 
 endowed by Christ our Lord with the prerogative of 
 Infallibility.” He says distinctly that the Pope is 
 not regarded as Infallible, except when he publishes 
 a “ dogmatic definition,” as it is said, ex cathedra ; 
 and a decree cannot be considered as published ex 
 cathedra^ unless, 1° it treat of some question which 
 appertains to faith, and unless, 2° it be addressed to 
 the universal Church.f 
 
 If the authority of Father Perrone is not enough, 
 we may still ascend still higher, and come to the 
 very fountain of orthodox teaching ; even to him for 
 whom Jesus Christ prayed that his “ faith should not 
 fail,” and to whom He therefore intrusted the solemn 
 commission to “confirm his brethren.” No one 
 surely will say that Gregory the Sixteenth was dis- 
 posed to form a low estimate of Papal Infallibility. 
 And, fortunately for our purpose, he has recorded 
 his views on the subject in a very elaborate treatise. 
 The work is entitled “ II Trionfo Della Santa Sede e 
 Della Chiesa.” It was written many years before 
 its illustrious author was raised to the Papal chair ; 
 but, after that event, it was several times reprinted, 
 and having been translated into the languages of 
 
 Part i. sect. ii. cap. iv. 
 
 f See Note C in the Appendix. 
 
DOCTOR PUSEY’s EIRENICON. 33 
 
 France, of Germany, of Spain, of Holland, it was re- 
 ceived with immense applause in all these countries. 
 We could not, therefore go to a better source if we 
 wished to learn the “ ^Masi-authoritative teaching” 
 of the Catholic Church. 
 
 Now, in this work we are told,* that in defending 
 the doctrine of Papal Infallibility, it is of the highest 
 importance to make a distinction between the Ro- 
 man Pontiff acting as a private individual, and act- 
 ing as Supreme Pastor. In the latter capacity he is 
 Infallible ; in the former, he is, like other men, sub- 
 ject to error. The author then proceeds to lay 
 down the conditions which are absolutely necessary, 
 in order that the Pope may be said to act as the Su- 
 preme Pastor of the Church ; and amongst them we 
 again find these two : 1°, that “ the point which the 
 Pope defines should appertain to faith and 2°, that 
 the definition should be “ addressed to the whole 
 Church.” Furthermore he maintains, that “even 
 in the definition itself, we must sometimes make this 
 distinction between the Pope as supreme judge and 
 as a private theologian ; as, for instance, when he un- 
 dertakes to confirm the doctrine defined, by argu- 
 ments and theological deductions. In this part he 
 is a simple theologian, although one whose authority 
 is of the greatest weight. . . . and he is judge 
 
 only in the point defined, this being not so much the 
 
 ^ Cap. 24. 
 C 
 
34 
 
 DOCTOR PUSEY S EIRENICON. 
 
 result of theological discussions, as the object of the 
 Divine assistance.”* 
 
 It is plain, therefore, if Father Perrone and 
 Gregory the Sixteenth raay be taken as fair expo- 
 nents of Catholic opinion, that we do not hold the 
 Pope to be Infallible : 1°, upon every subject, but only 
 upon those which “ appertain to faith nor 2°, “ in 
 all his formal utterances, to whomsoever addressed,” 
 but only when, as Supreme Pastor, he addresses the 
 whole Church ; nor 3°, in the incidental statements, 
 or the arguments, even of a dogmatic bull, but only 
 in the “ point defined.” 
 
 And now, that we are about to close Doctor 
 Pusey’s book, it may be asked, what is the end to 
 which it points. The work of an earnest and candid 
 writer is a mirror in which his mind is reflected. 
 And it is impossible to read the Eirenicon without 
 seeking to find therein the image of that mind, whose 
 long and eventful career has been watched with so 
 much interest. On a subject so delicate, and, we 
 might almost say, so sacred, it would be presumptuous 
 to speak with confidence. But if we might venture to 
 express our thoughts, we would say, that the image 
 Avhich we find in this book, is the image of a mind 
 that is ill at ease ; of a mind that is harassed by 
 doubts and perplexities, and borne about by con- 
 
 * See Note D in the Appendix. 
 
DOCTOR PUSEy’s EIRENICON. 
 
 35 
 
 flicting arguments, first in one direction, then in 
 another. 
 
 We have been reminded more than once, in fol- 
 lowing the history of the Tractarian movement, and 
 in marking the various parts which its chief leaders 
 have acted, of a scene that many a time has arrested 
 our notice, when musing, in moments of idleness, by 
 the banks of a winding river. A number of minute 
 objects are seen upon the surface of the water, float- 
 ing down with the current ; and the mind is aroused, 
 almost unconsciously, to watch their progress and to 
 take an interest in their fate. For a time they keep 
 pretty well together, until, coming to a scarcely per- 
 ceptible turn in the river, they are suddenly scat- 
 tered about in every direction. Some are carried 
 back by a contrary current ; some are whirled vio- 
 lently round and round ; some struggle slowly on ; 
 some, coming within the attraction of the land, cling 
 to the banks, and advance no more : but many, in 
 fine, after a variety of eccentric windings, sooner or 
 later, are caught up in the great central stream, and 
 leaving their companions far behind, are borne on 
 with easy and rapid motion to the sea. Something 
 of this kind has been the history of Doctor Pusey 
 and his friends. It is now some thirty years since 
 they launched forth upon the stream of controversy, 
 a little band of able and earnest men. At first they 
 held on their course in company, hoping to make 
 their journey together, and to reach at length a com- 
 mon goal. But they were quickly scattered by con- 
 
36 
 
 . DOCTOR PUSEY’s EIRENICON. 
 
 - trary arguments and conflicting opinions. Some 
 were attracted back to the shore which they had 
 quitted, and ceased to move ; others, after struggling 
 for a time with might and main, reached the mid- 
 channel, and are now moving on to the great object 
 of their hopes, in tranquil security ; and others again 
 are still carried to and fro, and whirled round and 
 round by the currents. 
 
 Foremost amongst these last is Doctor Pusey him- 
 self. Far be it from us to say one word of him that 
 might be thought unkind or severe. From his opi- 
 nions on many points of doctrine we must as Catho- 
 lics dissent ; and we have not hesitated, in the spirit 
 of fair and candid criticism, to give our opinion of 
 his book. But we should be cold and insensible 
 indeed, if we did not sympathize with him in his 
 perplexities and his struggles ; if we did not admire 
 the zeal and the learning he has displayed ; and if 
 we did not stretch out our hand to assist him, and 
 to cheer him on, in the hope that he too, like many 
 of his former companions, may, through God’s grace, 
 come at length into the great stream of Catholic 
 Unity, in which alone his soul can find safety and 
 peace. 
 
APPENDIX. 
 
 NOTE A., p. 15. 
 
 On this subject we may submit to our readers some extracts 
 from a letter addressed (Sept. 16, 1864) by the Roman Inquisi- 
 tion to all the bishops of England : — 
 
 ‘‘ Apostolicse Sedi nunciatum est, catholicos nonnullos et ecclesiasti- 
 cos viros Societati ad procurandaniy uti aiunt, Christianitatis unita- 
 
 tem Londini anno 1857 erectae, nomen dedisse A Protestantibus 
 
 quippe efformata et directa, eo excitata est spiritu, quern expresse 
 profitetur, tres videlicet Christianas communiones Romano- Catholicam, 
 Graeco- Schism aticam et Anglicanam, quamvis invicem separatas ac di- 
 visas, aequo tamen jure Catholicum nomen sibi vindicare Fun- 
 
 damentum cui ipsa innititur hujusmodi est quod divinam Ecclesiae 
 cons tit utionem susque deque vertit. Tota enim in eo est, ut supponat 
 veram Jesu Christi Ecclesiam constare partim ex Romana Ecclesia per 
 universum orbem diffusa et propagata, partim vero ex schismate Pho- 
 tiano et ex Anglicana hseresi, quibus aeque ac Ecclesiae Romanae unus 
 sit Dominus, una fides et unum baptisma.” 
 
 Again, in a subsequent letter addressed by Cardinal Patrizi 
 (Nov. 8, 1865) to the advocates of this same “Association for 
 the Promotion of the Unity of Christendom,” we read: 
 
 “ At Christi Ecclesia suam unitatem nunquam amisit, nunquam ne 
 brevissimo quidem temporis intervallo amittet ; quippe quae perenniter 
 juxta divina oracula duratura sit. . . . Atque haec magis magisque ab- 
 surditatem produnt illius commenti de Catholica ecclesia ex tribus 
 communionibus coalescente, cujus commenti fautores infallibilitatem 
 Ecclesiae necessario inficiari coguntur.” 
 
38 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 These documents have been published by the Most Keverend 
 Doctor Manning, in the Appendix to his Pastoral Letter on the 
 Eeunion of Christendom, addressed to the clergy of the Arch- 
 diocese of Westminster. London: Longman and Co. 1866. 
 
 NOTE B., p. 23. 
 
 The following extracts from the original text of Eaynaud 
 may not be out of place. He was himself not only famous as a 
 theologian, but eminently distinguished as the advocate of devo- 
 tion to Mary : yet he protests strongly against the language of 
 those who, in the ardour of their zeal, had stepped beyond the 
 ‘‘form of sound words,” to which the Church has given her 
 sanction : 
 
 “Fixum igitur esto, nullas laudes nostras, laudabilitati Yirginis Ma- 
 tris pares esse posse. Neque tamen committendum est, ut quod vera 
 laudatione assequi non possumus, per ementita decora^ etfalsos honores 
 suppleamus. Habet hoc nonnullorum imprudens, ac exlex dilectio, ut 
 fines debitos ssepe transcendat, etiam erga sanctos. . . . 
 
 “ Hanc erga sanctos intemperantiam amoris et honoris, vigere 
 maxime erga Deiparam, in Us qui illam non secundum scientiam dilU 
 gunt et colunt^ mirari desinet, quisquis ad sanctitatem ejus supra omnem 
 sanctorum sanctitudinem longissime provectam, animum admoverit. 
 Nam quandoquidem ratio et causa diligibilitatis, amoris ad ineptias 
 exundantis, sanctimonia est et favor divinus, nemo non videt quanto - 
 pere sanctissima Dei mater, qnsd abyssus est gratiarum, obnoxia esse 
 possit his ingeniorum exarrationibus, et falsi nominis cultibus. Idque 
 et experimur ipsi in dies, et experti sunt anterioribus seculis majores 
 nostri. Quo spectat illud Petri Cellensis 1. 9, epist. 10, ‘ EeginaB do- 
 minaB nostrse, beatissima3 Yirginis MariaB, obsequia venerationem pos- 
 tulant non adulationem.” . . . 
 
 “ Notissima et ilia a S. Bernardo epist. 174 pronunciata, contra no- 
 vitates in cultu Deiparae. Cum enim objecisset sibi ex studio aemula- 
 toris cujuspiam, ‘At valde honoranda est, inquis. Mater Domini?* 
 respondet, ‘ Bene admones, sed honor Eeginae judicium diligit. Virgo 
 regia /also non eget honore^ veris cumulata honorum titulis^ infulis dig- 
 nitatum. Honora sane integritatem carnis, vitae sanctitatem. Mirare 
 foecunditatem in Yirgine, prolem venerare divinam. Extolle nescien- 
 tem, vel in concipiendo, concupiscentiam, vel in pariendo dolorem. 
 
APPENDIX. 
 
 39 
 
 Prsedica reverendam Angelis, desideratam gentibus, Patriarchis Pro- 
 phetisque prsecognitam, electam ex omnibus, praelatam omnibus. Mag- 
 nifica gratim inventricem, mediatricem, salutis restauratricem ssaculo- 
 rum. Exalta denique exaltatam super chores Angelorum ad coelestia 
 regna. Haec mihi de ilia cantat Ecclesia, et me eadem docuit decantare. 
 Ego vero quod ab ilia accepisecurus et teneo et trade.’ ... 
 
 ‘‘ Verum ne rationes S. Bernardi ac Petri Cellensis, quantumvis uni- 
 saliter validse, minus quempiam moveant, quia adductae ab eis sunt oc- 
 casione festi Conceptionis, quod hi Patres, donee Ecclesia sensum de eo 
 suum enunciaret, volebant dimissum ; age producamus e conceptionis 
 immaculatas publicis honoribus celebrandae vindicibus, vel primum, 
 vel ex primis unum S. Anselmum. Is libro de Excell. Virg. cap. 2, 
 prolate libro de Ortu Virg. multa ad honorem Yirg. (ut videbatur), 
 sed non solida continente, quern D. Hieron. junior admisisset, subdit ; 
 nequaquam S. Ecclesiam, librum ilium auctoritate sua munitum, legen- 
 dum fidelibus proposuisse, quod Christi sponsa hujusmodi incentiva 
 pietatis.^ solidce veritati non innixa^ semper rejecerit., et nominatim circa 
 Deiparam. Videlicet indecens esse reputans.^ de Beata Matre Dei., quid 
 duhitahile in laudem ejus recitari., cum ea quae incunctanter de ilia vera 
 existunt, tanta laudis materia sint referta, ut quicumque in laudando 
 earn morari desiderat, necesse sit ut facultas ejus magnitudini rei et ve- 
 ritati succumbat. Sicut enim sola prce cunctis., meriti singularis eni- 
 tuit., ita quidquid earn attinet., speciali quadam veritatis firmitate., dig- 
 nuni est enitere^ . . . 
 
 “ Nec aberrant qui eodem modo acceperit, S. Epiphanium in Vir- 
 ginis laudatione, cum negat, humanam linguam debere leviter de 
 Deipara aliquid effari. Nam quis leviter de sanctissima Dei matre 
 loqui dicendus justius est, quam is qui fungos mentis suse et inaudita 
 Sanctis Patribus Deiparm amantissimis decora, (quasi quae certa et 
 explorata sunt non sufficerent ad plenam exornationem), super senes 
 intelligens, audet obtrudere ? Plane ut est apud S. Anselmum lib. de 
 Excell. Virg. cap. 2, hoc solum de Sancta Virgine praedicari quod Dei 
 mater est excedit omnem altitudinem quae post Deum dici, vel cogitari 
 potest. Ut quid ergo adciscamus ei vana decora a quocumque exco- 
 gitata., pro arhitrio Theophili Raynaudi Diptycha Mariana, Cautio 
 Secunda.” 
 
 It is fit that we should here acknowledge our obligation to 
 Doctor Newman who has already called attention to this passage, 
 in his graceful, vigorous, and eloquent letter to Doctor Pusey. 
 
40 
 
 APPENDIX, 
 
 I^OTE 0., Page 32. 
 
 This doctrine is clearly set forth in the following passages: 
 
 “ Communis autem Catholicorum sententia est, Rom. Pontificem 
 ejusmodi infallibilitatis praerogativa a Christo Domino prsBditum esse, 
 ita ut errare nequeat, cum tanquam supremus Ecclesice Primas aliquid 
 de fide credendum aut tenendum universis Christi fidelibus proponit, . . 
 
 “Ac 1° dogmaticae definitionis nomine, seu, ut trito jam loquendi 
 iisu obtinuit, definitionis editae ex cathedra significatur Rom. Pontificis 
 decretum, quo proponit aliquid universce Ecclesice defide tenendum aut 
 respuendum veluti fidei contrarium^ sub censurae aut anathematis 
 poena. 
 
 “ Quapropter neque facta personalia, neque praecepta, neque re- 
 scripta, neque opiniones quas identidem promunt Rom. Pontifices, 
 neque decreta disciplinae, neque omissiones definitionis, aliaque id genus 
 plurima in censu veniunt decretorum, de quibus agimus. Quamquam 
 enim haec omnia pro summa auctoritate, ex qua dimanant^ magno sem- 
 per in pretio habenda sint^ ac humili mentis ohsequio ac veneratione sint 
 excipienda^ nihilo tamen minus non constituunt definitionom ex Cathe- 
 dra de qua loquimur et in qua sola adstruimus Pontificiam infallibi- 
 iitatem.” — De Locis Theologicis^ nn. 724, 726. 
 
 Again when he undertakes to prove that, in fact, no Roman 
 Pontiff has ever yet propounded a false doctrine in any dogmatic 
 bull, he says: 
 
 “ Quandoquidem vero non de quibuslibet erroribus quasstio est, sed 
 de iis tantum, qui in decretis dogmaticis ex Cathedra emissis, dum 
 scilicet Pontifices universam docerent Ecclesiam, iis exciderint, duo 
 efficiant adversarii necesse esset ad Pontifices ex cathedra loquentes 
 erroris insimulandos. Deherent primo ostendere^ errorem ohjectum ita 
 certo fidei errorem esse^ nulla ut possit apta interpretatione purgari ; 
 secundo, esse praeterea errorem definitionis dogmaticce seu definitionis 
 ex cathedra latce. Alterutrum enim si desit ^ multum vero magis si 
 neutrum comprobetur, nulla poteriint ratione adversarii infallihilitatem^ 
 quam Pontificihus summis adstruehamus impugnareP — /&., n. 777. 
 
APPENDIX. 
 
 41 
 
 NOTE D., p. 33. 
 
 We subjoin some extracts from the original text : 
 
 ‘‘ Si e dimostrato, che il Papa puo parlar come capo della Chiesa, e 
 come privato dottore. Ora, non venendo questa distinzione esclusa 
 dalla primazia, perche non s’introducano confusion! e disordini nella 
 Chiesa, e necessario che si diano certe note indubitate e manifesto, 
 merce le quali cognoscere si possa quando il pontefice definisce solen- 
 nemente, ossia ex cathedra e quando altrimenti . . . Di tali note 
 
 poi altre sono intrinseche alle stesse definizioni, ed altre estrinseche e 
 dipendenti da una ecclesiastica consuetudine. E quanto alle prime, 
 eccone le principal!, le quali si deducono come necessarie consequenze 
 della natura e del fine del primato. 1° Pietro venne da Christo cos- 
 tituito capo della sua Chiesa per conservare I’unita della fede : dunque 
 
 il punto, che il Papa definisce, deve appartenere alia fede 
 
 3° Il Papa e preside e capo di tutta la Chiesa, ed ^ della Chiesa tutta 
 interesse universale la fede : quando dunque come capo ei decide, deve 
 far nota alia Chiesa la sua decisione. I"* Dunque deve in essa parlare 
 alia Chiesa y e quindi alia Chiesa stessa esser deve la decisione di- 
 retta 
 
 ‘ ‘ A vviene ancora, che debbasi alle volte far questa distinzione di 
 giudice supremo e di privato teologo anche in una stessa definizione ; 
 come quando il Papa s’adopera in avvalorarla con argomenti e dedu- 
 zioni teologiche. In questa parte egli e semplice benche autorevolissimo 
 teologo ; . . . . e giudice poi nel punto definite, non essendo questo 
 tanto il resultamento delle teologiche discussion!, quanto I’oggetto della 
 
 divina assistenza Dalle quali cose tutte ne seque, che un de- 
 
 creto, il quale : 1° non tratti di materie di fede ; 2° sia espresso con- 
 qualche esitanza; 3° sia fatto senza I’espressa volonta di obligar le 
 coscienze ; 4° non sia direito a tutta la Chiesa ; 5° sia privo delle cha- 
 ratteristiche formalita ; 6“ non sia considerate che neisoli fondamenti 
 teologici, o nei sensi incident!, e non nell’ immediate suo oggetto, non 
 potra giammai dir si veramente dogmatica decisione del Pontefice difini- 
 ente ex cathedra ossia colla pianezza della sua primaziale autorita. 
 
 “Fissate cosi le note delle quali esser debbono forniti i pontificii de- 
 creti onde si possano risguardare quali definizioni del Papa, come capo 
 e pastore universale della Chiesa, e la mancanza delle quali o in tutto 
 od in parte li fa essere semplici decisioni di privata persona, sebbene 
 in vero rispettabilissima, tuttavia sempre ad err ore soggetta^ etc^ 
 Cap. 24, nn. 5, 6, 7. 
 
 THE END. 
 

 ■«r« 
 
 
IVHAT WILL DR. NEWMAN DO? 
 
 A LETTER 
 
 TO THE 
 
 VERY REV. J. H. NEWMAN, D.D. 
 
 BY 
 
 EDWARD HUSBAND, 
 
 PRIEST OF THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND. 
 
 “ I mark his footprints in the sand.’’ 
 
 LONDON : 
 
 G. J. PALMER, 32, LITTLE QUEEN STREET, 
 Lincoln’s inn fields. 
 
 1870. 
 
 Price Foiirpeiice. 
 
A LETTER, &c. 
 
 ♦ 
 
 Dear and Very Reverend Father, 
 
 I feel it is an act of simple courtesy to send 
 you a copy of my little book, published yesterday, 
 containing, as it does, something from your 
 honoured pen, which you yourself kindly gave 
 me permission to print. At the same time I 
 cannot allow the book to be posted without a 
 letter accompanying it. ist. Because of the 
 event in connection with myself, which took place 
 at your Oratory last summer. 2ndly. Because, 
 after what has happened since, my motive in 
 sending you a copy of my book might, without 
 explanation, be wrongly interpreted. 
 
 In the unfortunate tract which I was persuaded 
 to write, concerning my unhappy secession to 
 Rome, after stating what “ an immense love and 
 veneration ” I had for you, I added, “ This fact 
 will, I trust, serve as an apology for introducing 
 Dr. Newman’s great name so frequently into the 
 following narrative of my humble self” This I 
 would repeat in the present instance. I feel and 
 
 B 2 
 
4 
 
 know that when compared with yourself I am 
 but an unlettered boy, and not worthy to write 
 to one so great, so pure, so noble. But for no 
 one living have I so great a love, reverence, 
 and devotion, as for yourself If I were summoned 
 into a chamber where all the Bishops of England 
 were assembled, I should not feel the same sense 
 of awe and reverence as I should when ushered 
 into your presence. The first time I saw St. 
 Mary’s Church at Oxford, where you, when you 
 were an Anglican, were Vicar, I knelt and kissed 
 the pulpit steps, because your feet had trodden 
 them. And now if I was asked where I could 
 point to one who was all that is great, holy, and 
 good, I should point to the red brick house at 
 Edgbaston, and say, “ There lives as perfect a 
 man as man can be in this mortal life, against 
 whom no one can lay any charge, save that he 
 forsook the Church in which the Providence of 
 God ordained that he should be baptized.” 
 
 Yet I should not, perhaps, have thought of 
 writing the following letter, had it not been that 
 partly from what I have seen, and partly from 
 what I have heard (especially of late) from 
 authentic sources, I have a great hope, so full of 
 intense joy that I cannot describe it, that your 
 half-orphaned children in that part of the Catholic 
 Church in which we were baptized, may yet live 
 to welcome you back “ Home” again as, in very 
 
5 
 
 deed, their Father in Christ. In other words, that 
 if the Infallibility of the Pope is declared as an 
 Article of Faith, you will retrace your steps, and 
 return to that portion of the Catholic family which 
 has mourned your loss so bitterly, for many long 
 weary years. For you are in one sense, and that 
 a high one, our great, our honoured, our beloved 
 Father. You, under God, were really the ori- 
 ginator of the “ Oxford Movement,” as it is called. 
 The Church of England was sleeping, and you 
 were the instrument in your Heavenly Father’s 
 Hand, of arousing Her from Her slumbers. Pro- 
 testantism, as the enemy of all righteousness, had 
 lulled Her into a kind of spiritual stupor, and you, 
 with your great Catholic soul, revived Her to a 
 new and more real life. You taught us how to 
 love Jesus, His Blessed Mother, His Sacraments 
 and His Saints, by setting before us the mind and 
 authoritative teaching of the early Church, before 
 the sad separation of East and West. You re- 
 member how wonderfully God owned your work ? 
 You have not forgotten the conversions at St. 
 Mary’s, and of the multitude which hung upon 
 your lips ; as in a less real sense they continue to 
 do still by the re-publication, not of your uncha- 
 racteristic volume of “ Occasional Sermons,” but 
 of your “ Parochial and Plain Sermons,” preached 
 at Oxford between the years 1825 and 1843. 
 And the work that you commenced at Oxford has 
 
6 
 
 been continued by God to this time, increasing in 
 strength, beauty, and reality every day : so that 
 now we have daily Masses, daily Confessions, and 
 a Ritual not far short of that which is practised in 
 your own Oratory. Thinking of these things, we 
 point to you as our Father in Christ, and (of 
 course under God) say — 
 
 “For this, for all. 
 
 We weep our thanks to thee !” 
 
 But that close outward bond of union, which 
 once enabled you and your beloved friend Dr. 
 Pusey to celebrate at the same Altar, has been 
 severed ; and although you are still our priceless 
 property in heart, a great cloud has arisen, and 
 still floats between us. I believe God’s mysterious 
 loving kindness is, at this evening time, driving 
 that cloud away. It is often said by those who 
 are in the Church of England, that had She been 
 in the year 1835 what She is (thank God) now, 
 you would never have left Her. I partly believe 
 it. I can understand how shocked and grieved 
 your holy, righteous soul must have been when 
 you saw the sleepy state of the Church of Eng- 
 land ; the irreverence shown towards Her Sacra- 
 ments ; and the unkindness, and tmsympathizing 
 state of mind evinced by Her Bishops, and those 
 in high authority. But much of what you had 
 then to complain has passed away, and through 
 your own instrumentality. My own dear earthly 
 
7 
 
 father was shocked as you were, and gave up 
 his position as a clergyman of the Church of 
 England and a Fellow of his College, because 
 he was scandalized at the then existing state of 
 things within Her pale, and left all to follow what 
 he believed to be the Will of his God. You 
 have done this. You have sacrificed everything 
 for Christ’s sake ; and broken ties, which caused 
 you agony, of which the thoughtless, heartless 
 world has no idea. You left the Church of Eng- 
 land — your own dear Fatherland — because the 
 Church of Rome promised you a peace and satis- 
 faction which you thought could not be obtained 
 in the Church of your Baptism. May I, as one 
 so unworthy to speak with you that I should not 
 count myself worthy to be your doorkeeper, still 
 ask you — “ Have you found what you hoped and 
 longed for ?” I remember sitting in the Guest 
 Room at the Oratory, and watching your face 
 without speaking. It seemed to me a beautiful 
 picture of a disappointed life. I sat and fancied 
 myself as a looker on at Hursley, when Dr. 
 Pusey went to read the service in the church, (as 
 told by you so touchingly in Sir J. Coleridge’s 
 “ Life of Keble,”) and you and Keble walked 
 about outside in the still quiet of that summer’s 
 evening, “ looking in silence at the church and 
 churchyard so beautiful and calm!' 
 
 I remember when I sought your advice as to 
 
8 
 
 becoming a Roman Catholic, how dispassionate 
 you were in your remarks, and how you bade me 
 proceed with the greatest caution ; and told me of 
 some who had taken the step too hurriedly, not 
 only regretting bitterly the step they had taken but 
 having ultimately to return to that part of the 
 Church from whence they came. During my visit 
 to the Oratory I heard and saw other things which 
 now give me fresh hope, but of which I will not 
 speak lest I should be encroaching on your privacy 
 or betraying trust. 
 
 I remember hearing of one who, I was told, 
 sought your advice as I did about leaving the 
 Church of England, and to whom you made the 
 very significant answer — “ Stay where you are.” 
 Again I know the burning love you still have for 
 Oxford ; for your old peaceful home at Little- 
 more ; for faces that you were familiar with when 
 S. Mary’s knew you as its Vicar. It was not 
 long ago, when I was at Littlemore, that I met an 
 old hoary-headed man, strolling down one of the 
 green lanes near the village with the aid of two 
 sticks. I asked him if he remembered you ? His 
 eye glistened when I mentioned your name. It 
 seemed to him as speaking of one long dead. He 
 tremblingly exclaimed — “Remember him! ah sir, I 
 should think I do 1” and then he gave a long, deep, 
 bitter sigh. This, dear Very Reverend Father, 
 is what all the children of your earlier days do. 
 
9 
 
 They joy when they hear the magic sound of your 
 name, but they sigh when they think of you as a 
 Roman Catholic. Their only hope is that you 
 will yet return to them and call them once again 
 your own. And every little sign or echo of the 
 fulfilment of their oft-repeated prayer and hope is 
 welcomed by them, and treasured up by them as 
 Mary did of old the sayings and doings of the 
 One she loved. 
 
 But although “ an insolent and aggressive fac- 
 tion ” makes your noble heart sad, yet you live in 
 comparative contentment and peace. And why ? 
 Is it not because of the solitary life you lead ? 
 When are you to be seen at the public meetings 
 of the members of your own Communion ? When 
 do we see your name announced as the preacher 
 at High Mass in the churches of your adoption ? 
 Aye, how seldom are you to be heard even in your 
 own pulpit ? and when you are no one knows of 
 it beforehand : I believe I am right in saying not 
 even the fathers of your own religious house. 
 When are you seen at all, except at your own 
 private Mass, at the little Altar dedicated to S. 
 Joseph, in the early morning ? No ; you live the 
 true life of an Oratorian. The world would have 
 forgotten you long ago had you not been Dr. 
 Newman. Your great life, so ennobling, so 
 lofty in its sanctity, is buried alive within those 
 walls at Edgbaston. You, I presume, do not (in 
 
lO 
 
 consequence of the private nature of your life) see 
 the grievous scandals which are being perpetrated 
 daily, as great as Oxford Protestantism in olden 
 days could produce, which those who mix more in 
 the world witness amongst members of your Com- 
 munion. Those holy men who form your own 
 community at Birmingham do not shock your ears 
 by those extravagant assertions about the Mother 
 of our Lord, which are common elsewhere, to the 
 detriment of the honour and worship due to her 
 adorable Son. You do not hear these things, 
 except by report, which is never to be trusted, 
 otherwise you would be sad indeed. Your won- 
 derful knowledge of the love of Jesus, your 
 supreme desire for His honour, would for ever for- 
 bid you from taking part in anything which would 
 interfere with the honour of your Lord. “ May 
 God’s mercy keep me from the shadow of a 
 thought dimming the purity or blunting the keen- 
 ness of that love of Him which is our sole happi- 
 ness and our sole salvation.” These, you will 
 remember, are your own words, in your Letter to 
 Dr. Pusey upon the subject of the “ Eirenicon.” 
 I was talking not very long ago with a member 
 of your own Communion about the days when you 
 were Vicar at Oxford, and he observed to me that 
 he never knew you to grow excited now, except 
 when the honour due to your Lord was called in 
 question, and then, he continued, all your old 
 energy and enthusiasm returned to you again. 
 
Oh ! those old Oxford days ! when you turned 
 the current of a generation ! when, instead of a 
 scanty congregation as at the Oratory, great 
 crowds came together to hear you. When 
 loveless hearts were daily through your own 
 instrumentality taught how to love their Lord, 
 would they could return to us once more ! And 
 I believe like days, without their scandals, will 
 come again. From what I have seen and heard, 
 I cannot — I will not believe that you will die a 
 Roman Catholic. The Holy Roman Catholic 
 Church is not that part of our Lord’s Vine- 
 yard where Englishmen are to find their restful 
 Home. Neither can your Christ-loving heart 
 adapt itself to the Ultramontanism of the present 
 day. You are far too good a Catholic to be an 
 Ultramontane. Your heart is not as their heart. 
 And the Church of your adoption has treated 
 you ill — very ill. As a Roman Catholic told 
 me — “ If the world knew how you had been 
 treated by those of your own Communion, it 
 would have risen as one man in righteous in- 
 dignation.” Some of this ill-treatment has at 
 different times crept from its secret hiding 
 place. I need only refer to your proposal to 
 revise the translation of the Bible ; to establish 
 a College at Oxford ; and the un-Catholic spirit 
 which has led to the appointment of men (I was 
 going to write, “ your inferiors,” but this would 
 
be a mere truism) to high places in your Branch 
 of the Catholic Church, passing you, their noblest 
 gain, over, simply because you were a Catholic, 
 and not an Ultramontane. 
 
 I have myself witnessed a community of young 
 men, all members of your own Communion, 
 divided into two distinct and antagonistic parties. 
 One party believed you to be the model of every- 
 thing that was of good report ; the other regarded 
 you almost as a heretic, and would scarcely touch 
 one of your books. In other words the one party 
 was Gallican, the other Ultramontane. 
 
 I cannot believe that your holy soul will ever be 
 able to accept such a doctrine, so modern, so un- 
 Catholic in all its bearings, as the Personal Infalli- 
 bility of the Pope, should it be proclaimed as an 
 article of Faith. I think it was in November last 
 that an old Roman Catholic, who was one by birth, 
 said to me, that if the Pope was proclaimed 
 Infallible, “ he for one ” (I am quoting his words) 
 “ would not believe it as long as he had any 
 breath in his body.” Yet he had not the 
 remotest idea, I am glad to say, of ever leaving 
 the Roman Catholic Church, in which he was 
 born and baptized. Such a position, for one who 
 has left the Anglican Church, would not, I am 
 sure, be permissible to your logical mind. You 
 know that to disbelieve the Infallibility of the 
 Pope, if it should be declared, would be virtually 
 
13 
 
 to sign yonr death warrant as regards the Roman 
 Communion. If you are driven back to us, it 
 will be the Ultramontanes whom we shall have 
 to thank. Hundreds are being driven at this 
 moment to take the step. Several have written 
 to me on the subject ; and I am glad to say, that 
 some who formerly were priests in the Church of 
 England, are amongst the number. 
 
 Oh ! listen to the tearful cry of those who still 
 look upon you as their spiritual Father! The 
 children of your early days want you ! You have 
 left them almost orphans, to fight the battle of 
 the Faith. You, the gentle leader, the loving 
 counsellor, the eloquent teacher of former years ! 
 We claim you as our own, great, revered Father 
 in Him Whom we love, who taught us how to 
 love our Lord and His Holy Catholic Church. 
 
 Forgive me for writing what I have. Your 
 great kindness to me in days for ever passed, so 
 unmerited on my part, must be my excuse. Never 
 can I forget how, in a season of bitter trial, you 
 with condescending kindness encouraged me with 
 these words — “ May God carry you safely through 
 your great trial I recollect it will have an end, and 
 joy Cometh in the morning.” Or how you hurried 
 down from your study, although engaged in 
 abstruse literary composition, into the quiet little 
 chapel of S. Philip to see unworthy me perform an 
 act which had been undertaken to a great extent 
 
14 
 
 through the feeling that a step which you had 
 taken could not be a wrong one. Your example, 
 I believe, has been the secret cause for hundreds 
 taking the step to which I refer. Again, when I 
 wished you good-bye at the Oratory, after my 
 reception into the Church of Rome, you expressed 
 a hope that you would hear that I was going on 
 well. In a few months you heard that I had undone 
 what I had that day done with your kind sanction 
 at the Oratory. You have not heard from me 
 since. Forgive me, the unworthiest of your loving 
 children in Christ, if I call to you, perhaps for the 
 last time on earth, across the waves of this trouble- 
 some world, to welcome the echo which I have 
 heard of your return “ Home.” 
 
 May I not apply to you the words of one who 
 is a poet like yourself, and say — 
 
 “ O joy to the people, and joy to the throne ! 
 
 Come to us, love us, and make us your own, 
 
 For Saxon, or Dane, or Norman we. 
 
 Teuton, or Celt, or whatever we be. 
 
 We are each all one in our welcome of thee.” 
 
 I remain. 
 
 Dear and Very Reverend Father, 
 
 Your most humble, devoted, and loving 
 servant in Christ, 
 
 E. H. 
 
 1 6, Montpelier Street, Brighton, 
 
 July 'i2,th, 1870.- 
 
THE FUTUEE UNITY 
 
 OF 
 
 CHEISTENDOM. 
 
 BY 
 
 AMBEOSE LISLE PHILLIPPS, ESQ. 
 
 LONDON: 
 
 CHAELES DOLMAN, 61 , NEW BOND STEEET; 
 
 AND W. K. PAINTER & SONS, “THE UNION” OFFICE, 342, STRAND. 
 
PREFATORY NOTE. 
 
 The author wishes to state that the following pages have been 
 submitted to a theological revision from some learned Catholic 
 divines, who judge their contents to be conformable to Catholic 
 orthodoxy. But as he is well aware of his own extreme liability to 
 err, he submits this and all his other writings to the supreme judg- 
 ment of Holy Church, and especially to that of our Most Holy 
 Bather the Pope, to whom especially the guardianship of the faith 
 has been intrusted by Jesus Christ. 
 
ON THE 
 
 FUTURE UNITY OF CHRISTENDOM. 
 
 If it be true that God has made man, and that in 
 making him, He made him not an isolated and inde- 
 pendent being, but bound up by a thousand links with 
 the society of his fellow-men ; if it be true that man’s 
 Maker takes an interest in the welfare and conduct of 
 man both as an individual man, and in his relations to that 
 society of men in which His providence has placed him ; 
 if, in fine, it be true that God has made known to man a 
 rule for his conduct, not only in the various relations of 
 his temporal life here, but with a promise of a happy life 
 hereafter on condition of compliance with its warnings ; 
 I say, if all this be true, as every sincere Christian, no 
 matter what communion he may belong to, concurs in 
 holding and affirming, then it is obviously of the highest 
 importance, both to each individual man and to the 
 society of men in general, to have a right apprehension 
 of the essential nature and conditions of this rule of 
 conduct, to which all Christians profess to appeal, and by 
 which they all equally confess that their condition here- 
 after is to be decided. 
 
 I presume there is no one, who agrees in accepting 
 the Christian Revelation, as contained in the Bible, who 
 will dispute this conclusion ; but it is equally obvious, 
 that for men to have a right apprehension of a truth, 
 they must accept it in a sense that is substantially one. 
 
 B 
 
2 
 
 ON THE FUTURE UNITY 
 
 Doubtless truth, however objectively one, is in its sub- 
 jective reception by limited beings liable to be s'^gn 
 under various aspects, from different points, and in 
 various degrees ; but still, in the midst of this variety, 
 there can never be any substantial contradiction, involv- 
 ing what strictly appertains to its own essence ; and the 
 moment that any substantial contradiction arises, it is 
 clear that one or other, or both, of those who contradict 
 each other, must have swerved from the right apprehen- 
 sion of what each professes to hold. 
 
 Now as the difference between what constitutes a 
 substantial contradiction, and what is simply an aspect 
 of the same truth as seen from different points of view, 
 is very obvious to a sincere mind, we need not here 
 enter into any lengthened disquisition on that subject ; 
 but as it is a fact which no one can deny, and which 
 most believers in Revelation regret, that the differences 
 which divide Christians affect not the accidents merely, 
 but the very substance of Divine Revelation, it is clear 
 that in proportion as men feel and realize the fact, that 
 any such Revelation has been communicated by God to 
 His creature, man, in the same degree is it desirable 
 that such a Revelation should be received in the sense 
 intended by God, who gave it t and in a similar degree 
 is it probable, that some clue or means must have been 
 appointed by God to enable sincere men to arrive at 
 this sense. 
 
 Now this is precisely what that great communion of 
 professing Christians which calls itself the Catholic 
 Church affirms that it possesses. Amongst all the 
 various denominations of Christians, this one great com- 
 munion, spread as it is over all the earth, has never 
 separated from any other ; others have separated them- 
 selves from her ; but she has remained, where she was 
 before, shorn, indeed, like some mighty oak of the forest, 
 of some of her fairest and most fruitful branches, but 
 still the great original tree planted by God in the wild 
 desert of this earth : she claims, and she can prove her 
 
OF CnUISTENDOM. . 
 
 3 
 
 claim, that she descends lineally from generation to 
 generation from those twelve first Disciples of Jesus 
 Christ, whom he chose from his own countrymen, and 
 whom he sent with that wonderful commission, which 
 we find recorded in the New Testament,* just before He 
 finally left them. To those first Disciples Jesus Christ, 
 in words the authenticity of which is not disputed by 
 any Christians, gave an authority which none who 
 accepted His mission could gainsay. “And Jesus 
 coming, spake to them, saying : All power is given to 
 Me in Heaven and on Earth ; Go ye, therefore, and 
 TEACH all nations ; baptizing them in the name of the 
 Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost ; teach- 
 ing them to observe all things, whatsoever I have com- 
 manded you : and behold ! I am with you all days, even 
 unto the consummation of the world.” 
 
 Now in these remarkable words, which, let me again 
 repeat, all Christians agree in accepting as the very 
 words of the Founder of their religion, and to deny the 
 authenticity of which would certainly not be more 
 reasonable (to put them on the very lowest ground) 
 than it would be for some modern schoolmaster to deny 
 the authenticity of Caesar’s Commentaries, or the history 
 of Napoleon the Great ;t I say in these words of Christ 
 we find a clue to solve all our difficulties, we find that 
 Christ did institute a body of teachers, whom He sent 
 with full authority from Himself to teach all nations ; 
 whose delegation He specially grounds on the assumed 
 fact, which He affirms of Himself, that all power had 
 been given Him in Heaven and on Earth ; and the 
 duration of whose teaching, armed, as He made it, with 
 His own authority, was to be commensurate not merely 
 with the lives of the men to whom our Lord addressed 
 the words, but with nothing less than the duration of the 
 
 * Matthew xxviii. 18, 19, 20. 
 
 t See an admirable tract by Archbishop Whately, entitled 
 “ Historic Doubts concerning Napoleon Buonaparte P 
 
 B 2 
 
4 
 
 ON THE FUTURE UNITY 
 
 world : “ all days, even unto the consummation of the 
 world.” 
 
 Now let us observe that side by side with these words, 
 and the fact of the institution of a body of teachers 
 sent to teach all nations with no less authority than that 
 of Christ Himself, — “ Behold ! I am with you all days, 
 even to the consummation of the world,” — there stands 
 prominently before our eyes another great fact, which, 
 no one can deny, fits into the former one in a most 
 remarkable and perfect manner. 
 
 There is a great communion of Christians, the acknow'- 
 ledged teachers of which at the present moment affirm 
 that they descend by the successive “ laying on of 
 hands” from these original teachers of the Christian 
 Church, to whom our Lord spoke these very words ; 
 and history bears them out in recording that a similar 
 claim was advanced in every preceding age by their 
 predecessors. 
 
 Now, putting these two great facts side by side, the 
 prophetic promise and institution of Christ on the one 
 hand, and the realization of it in the history of the 
 Catholic Church in all ages from Christ downwards on 
 the other, it is obvious not merely that there is a perfect 
 harmony between the tw'o, but that we have evidence, 
 perfectly irresistible from this very harmony, that the 
 authority of the teachers of the Catholic Church is the 
 very same authority which was wielded by Christ Him- 
 self w'hen on earth, and with which He has promised to 
 abide even to the end of the probationary condition of 
 mankind. 
 
 Now, before 1 proceed further, it is right to say a few' 
 words by way of explanation in reference to what may 
 come after. This theory of Christian teaching, which is 
 sometimes called the Rule of Faith, and which I have just 
 been stating is admitted professedly, or really, not only 
 by that vast body of Christians which owms the Pope as 
 the successor of St. Peter and the visible head of Christ’s 
 Church upon eartli, but also by another vast body of 
 
OF CHRISTENDOM. 
 
 5 
 
 Christians, which consists of the Russian and Asiatic 
 Churches, including also the Churches of the Greek 
 nation, and of several other smaller nationalities in 
 Europe ; it is also held, at least professedly, if not really, 
 by another very great body of Christians, which, under 
 the denomination of the Anglican Church, extends 
 itself not only through the vast dominions of Britain, 
 but constitutes also the predominant religious communion 
 of an empire only second to that of Britain herself — the 
 United States of America. 
 
 In other words, Roman Catholics, Greeks, and Angli- 
 cans, all profess to hold one and the same rule of faith ; 
 and yet the deplorable fact subsists notwithstanding, 
 that these three great communities of Christendom are 
 more or less severed one from the other, and while 
 they each believe in the same Founder, and each claim 
 authority from Him in virtue of either real or assumed 
 Apostolical descent, so far from acting together in their 
 respective endeavours to carry out our Lord’s commission, 
 they are, alas ! in a state of downright antagonism one 
 to the other ; instead of concurring together to preach 
 the Gospel to those heathen nations that still reject it, 
 their time for the most part is consumed in violent con- 
 troversies amongst themselves ; and the result is, that 
 Christians, in the multiplied perplexities of polemical 
 discussions, are driven from the study of their own 
 individual sanctification, while the infidel and the sceptic 
 draw forth a plausible argument for their respective 
 blasphemies and doubts. And what is the issue ? 
 Christian nations are far from that actual superiority 
 over nations that are not Christian, in morality and 
 general conduct, which the sublime tlieory of their 
 religion would have enabled them to attain, had it been 
 faithfully carried out. 
 
 Now the object of this treatise being an humble eftbrt 
 for the restoration of that unity which has been so sadly 
 broken, it is obvious that it would be altogether foreign 
 to the writer’s scope to enter into any disquisitions as to 
 
6 
 
 ON THE FUTURE UNITY 
 
 where and with whom the guilt of the severance lies ; as 
 to which of the three great denominations (at the present 
 moment) has the best, or the only claim, to representing 
 the Catholic theory. His object is not a polemical one ; 
 he is well aware that all that is involved in such a dis- 
 cussion has already been treated in the ablest way by 
 others, and that he can neither add to, nor detract from, 
 the arguments by w'hich they have substantiated their 
 position ; neither is it his object or his province to notice 
 or to discuss the inconsistencies either of individuals or 
 of corporate bodies, still less to entertain the question of 
 individual responsibilities ; his object is altogether foreign 
 to such a course as this ; it is to entertain the question, 
 how far, on common principles, accepted equally by all 
 these three great denominations of Christians, it may 
 be possible for them to abandon their present position 
 of mutual antagonism, and to return to that state of 
 unity which once existed, and to which the theory of 
 Christianity unquestionably tends. 
 
 In my endeavour, then, to treat this question, I will at 
 once state, that although, as a Roman Catholic, I must 
 necessarily take a very different view of the actual position 
 both of the Greeks and Anglicans from what they them- 
 selves would take, yet in considering the question of the 
 restoration of unity between us, it is obvious that I must 
 do so rather from their point of view than from my own. 
 And that we may at once come to the point, my imme- 
 diate object being the consideration of the possibility of 
 a reunion between the Anglican Church and the Roman 
 Catholic Church, of which I myself am a member, I 
 shall urge its attainment rather on the ground of pi’in- 
 ciples actually held by the Anglican body itself, than on 
 principles which at present they do not hold, and which, 
 if they did hold, they would not be what they are, 
 Anglicans, and in a state of separation from ourselves. 
 
 The first point, then, which it is incumbent upon us to 
 establish, is the exact nature of the Anglican theory, in 
 order that we may ascertain what grounds that theory 
 
OF CHRISTENDOM. 
 
 7 
 
 Iiolds out for indulging the hope of an ultimate restora- 
 tion of unity between those who hold it and ourselves. 
 
 In the reign of Charles I., Pope Urban VIII. sent 
 a Benedictine monk into England, who bore the name 
 in religion of Father Leauder ^ Sancto Martino, with 
 directions to procure for the Holy See accurate informa- 
 tion respecting the state of the Established Church. 
 This commission was given to Father Leander in the 
 year 1634, and in the report which he subsequently 
 forwarded to the Holy Father, he thus expresses himself 
 in reference to the Anglican Church.* “ It retains,” 
 says he, “an external appearance of the ecclesiastical 
 hierarchy which was in force during the time of the 
 Catholic religion ; it has its archbishops, bishops, deans, 
 archdeacons, chapters of canons in the cathedrals of the 
 ancient sees, and most ample revenues. It preserves its 
 ancient edifices, the names of its ancient parishes, priests, 
 and deacons ; a form of conferring orders, which agrees 
 in most respects, with the forms prescribed by the Roman 
 pontifical.f It preserves also the clerical habits and 
 gowns, the pastoral crook and copes, the ancient temples, 
 parishes, churches and colleges of magnificent structure.” 
 Referring to the faith of the Anglican Church, he thus 
 expresses himself: “ In the greater number of the 
 Articles of Faith, the English Protestants of the Estab- 
 lished Church are truly orthodox ; as on the sublime 
 mysteries of the Trinity and the Incarnation ; on the 
 economy of the Redemption of Man and Satisfaction ; 
 
 * Clarendon’s “ State Papers,’’ vol. i. p. 197. 
 
 t The reader should observe that at the time when Pather Leander 
 made this remarkable statement concerning the English Ordinal, it 
 still retained the form such as had been in use in the time of 
 Elizabeth, a form which many Catholic theologians pronounce to be 
 insufficient for the purpose of conferring holy orders. This form was 
 subsequently altered in the time of Charles II., and rendered more 
 conformable to Catholic tradition. But it would appear from the 
 language of Father Leander, which we must remember was drawn 
 up for the Pope himself, that he did not regard Elizabeth’s Ordinal 
 as radically insufficient, but quite the contrary. Whether Father 
 Leander was right in his view is another question. . 
 
8 
 
 ON THE FUTURE UNITY 
 
 ■through the w'hole almost of the controversies respecting 
 Predestination, Grace, and Free Will ; the necessity and 
 merit of good works, and the other articles expressed in 
 the creed of the Apostles, in the Nicene and the Atha- 
 nasian creeds, and in the four first General Councils.” 
 
 Such was the remarkable testimony borne by an envoy 
 of Pope Urban VIII. to the Church of England, both in 
 her hierarchical and in her doctrinal aspect, in the year 
 1634. And if we compare with this statement, that 
 which we find advanced by her own authors, and that 
 which is laid down by her highest authorities, we shall 
 find that Father Leander is fully borne out by facts, and 
 that the Anglican theory presents so many substantial 
 points of resemblance to the Catholic theory in general, 
 that instead of regarding a reunion of churches as impos- 
 sible, one is rather inclined to wonder that it has not 
 been already accomplished. 
 
 In fact, I believe that a reunion would have taken 
 place long ago, but for the obstacles which have been 
 opposed to it by the bitter spirit of polemical contro- 
 versy on the one hand, and by political prejudice on the 
 other. Oh ! that it might please God to fill sincere men, 
 on both sides of the question, with the spirit of charity 
 and forbearance, with that love, of which the Apostle 
 writes, that it is “ the fulfilling of the law.” Could we 
 but really be actuated with such a spirit, it is certain 
 that we should be brought together. But let us examine 
 further into the Anglican theory. 
 
 In the twentieth of the Thirty-nine Articles of religion 
 promulgated by the Church of England, we find this re- 
 markable declaration: “The Church hath power to decree 
 rites or ceremonies, and authority in controversies of 
 faith,” and when in the same article it is urged, that not- 
 withstanding this power and authority, it is not lawful for 
 the Church to ordain anything contrary to Scripture ; 
 nothing is affirmed that is contrary to the authority of the 
 Church, nothing but what every Catholic must necessarily 
 admit ; for it simply amounts to this, that the Church in 
 
OF CHRISTENDOM. 
 
 9 
 
 her teaching c.annot contradict herself, but that, having 
 proposed the sacred Scriptures to her children as God’s 
 word, she can decree nothing that is contrary thereto. 
 In fact the very claim of a divine authority delegated by 
 God to His Church, is equivalent to a declaration that 
 her teaching and His word must ever agree together, and 
 never contradict each other. 
 
 Hence we find one of the most eminent and powerful 
 writers that the Church of England ever produced, John 
 Henry Newman, in one of his earlier and not the least 
 able of his works,* in the 9th Lecture “ On the Essen- 
 tials of the Gospel,” thus expressing himself in reference 
 to these very Thirty-nine Articles, as embodying the 
 teaching of the National Anglican Church : — “ The 
 Thirty-nine Articles,” says he, “ are articles of Religion, 
 not of Faith. We do not consider the belief in them 
 necessary to salvation, except so far as they embody in 
 them the articles of the creed. They are of no divine 
 authority, except so far as they embody these and similar 
 portions of apostolical tradition.” In other words, the 
 Twentieth Article having declared that there can be no 
 contradiction between the teaching of the Catholic 
 Church and the written word of God, it follows also and 
 must be still more obvious, that the teaching of the 
 separate national Church of England (claiming to be a 
 portion and a branch of the Church Catholic), as pro- 
 pounded by her in her Thirty-nine Articles, must be 
 interpreted not only in conformity with the written word 
 of God, but with the great body of the teaching of the 
 universal Church in all ages, as representing the authority 
 given by our Lord to his Apostles and their successors in 
 the ministry to teach all nations, even to the consumma- 
 tion of the world.'f 
 
 And so the reformed Church of England in her 
 General Convocation of 1571, while on the one hand 
 
 * “ On Romanism and Popular Protestantism,” section ix. 
 pp. 285, 286. 
 
 t Matthew xxviii. 18 — 20. 
 
10 
 
 ON THE FUTURE UNITY 
 
 she reviewed and confirmed the Thirty-nine Articles, 
 on the other enacted that justly celebrated canon, which 
 to my mind not only constitutes the very basis of the 
 Anglican theory, distinguishing it clearly from that of 
 any continental body of Protestants, or from the Scotch 
 Presbyterians, and the Protestant Dissenters of this 
 country, but also lays down a principle, which with God’s 
 blessing may one day be found sufficient even for the 
 great work of re-establishing the unity of Christendom, 
 and putting an end to the deplorable divisions that have 
 rent the Church of Christ asunder. 
 
 Now what is this canon? and what does it enjoin? 
 This canon explains itself by what it enjoins, and its 
 injunction will be best understood by its own words : — 
 
 It commands all preachers in the Church of England 
 that they “ should be careful, that they never teach aught 
 in a sermon, to be religiously held and believed by the 
 ])eopIe, except that which is agreeable to the doctrine of 
 the Old and New Testaments, and which the Catholic 
 Fathers and ancient Bishops have collected from 
 that very doctrine.” 
 
 These words, contained in this canon of the celebrated 
 Convocation of the National Church of England, held in 
 the year 1571, appear to me not only to state the theory 
 of Anglican teaching, but (what is still more to my present 
 ])oint) to lay down a principle, that can only be worked 
 out by a restoration of unity between the Anglican 
 Church herself and the rest of Christendom. Indeed, this 
 is so true, that if we consult the annals of the Church 
 of England ever since the period of the so-called 
 Reformation, we find, that no sooner had the excitement 
 of the first severance and its attendant circumstances 
 died away, than a Catholic reaction at once set in, the 
 existence and powerful influence of which Ave find 
 strongly attested in the writings of all the best Anglican 
 divines. It is impossible to refer to any of them without 
 perceiving the fact aflSrmed. Let any one turn to the 
 writings of such an eminently pious and learned prelate 
 
OF CHRISTENDOM. 
 
 11 
 
 as Bishop Andrews, and he will see how that great man’s 
 mind yearned for the restoration of unity. In a prayer- 
 book, which he published in the Latin and Greek 
 languages, and which will ever remain as a bright 
 monument of his piety, he thus prays, “ Pro Ecclesia 
 Catholic^, ut stabiliatur, adaugeatur : Pro Ecclesia 
 Orientali ut liberetur, adunetur. Pro Ecclesia Occidentali 
 ut restituatur, pacific^ agat. Pro Ecclesia Britannicd 
 ut suppleantur defectus, confirmentur reliqua in e^.”* In 
 his pious affections. Bishop Andrews did not limit his 
 ])rayers to the separated Anglican Church, but he em- 
 braced also the rest of the Church, from which he was 
 divided ; and what Avas this, but to act in conformity 
 with the spirit evinced in the canon quoted above ? If 
 the preachers of the Church of England were to conform 
 their teaching to that of the ancient Catholic Fathers 
 and teachers ; if, as again and again it was declared by 
 her soundest authorities, she accepted the first four 
 general councils, it was surely not unnatural that in 
 the fervour of devotion, her prelates and her most zealous 
 children should still pray for the whole Church of Christ, 
 and not limit their intercessions within the narrow 
 bounds of a cold and contracted Protestantism ; and 
 could men pray for brethren, and not wish to be at one 
 with them ? Thus we find another Anglican divine, a 
 man’ justly famous in this country for his learning and 
 his piety, a man whom the illustrious Newman styles 
 “ the Great Bramhall,” expressing himself in such words 
 as these : “ If I have had any bias, it hath been desire of 
 peace, which our common Saviour left as a legacy to 
 His Church, that I might live to see the reunion of 
 CHRISTENDOM, for wliich I shall always bow the knees 
 of my heart to the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ 
 and it is well known how, in the reign of Charles I., 
 
 * Lanceloti Andrews, Epis. Winton., Preces Privatae Quotidianse. 
 Londini, Pickering, 1828, p. 79. 
 
 t Brainhalf’s Works, p. 141. 
 
12 
 
 ON THE FUTURE UNITY 
 
 Archbishop Laud was influenced by the same desire, so 
 much so that some authors have not hesitated to affirm 
 that overtures were made between the Archbishop and 
 the reigning Pope, and that the latter even went so far 
 as to offer a Cardinal’s hat to the Archbishop. But, 
 alas ! the temper of the times, and the political conflicts 
 which raged between the court and the popular party, 
 indefinitely postponed the happy settlement which these 
 good men desired, and which the visible Head of the 
 Church unquestionably encouraged. A tempest burst 
 upon England, that levelled the throne in the dust, and 
 drove the Anglican Church from her temples and her 
 domains. Then, as now, the opinion of Catholics in this 
 country appears to have been divided; and while some 
 lamented that their hopes for the reconciliation of 
 England and England’s Church were dashed to the 
 ground, others rejoiced in the calamities of the national 
 Church, and looked for a speedy triumph of Catholicism 
 upon its ruins. But they soon found their mistake ; if 
 Anglicanism had ceased to be dominant, another and a 
 far bitterer foe had taken her place, and the tyranny of 
 Cromwell and the fury of rampant Puritanism taught a 
 salutary lesson to Catholics who would venture to 
 tamper with the fierce spirit of democracy or to play into 
 the hands of sectaries and fanatics. The reaction that 
 followed, and the restoration of Church and King, 'once 
 more revived in good men’s hearts the hopes of a pacific 
 solution of the perplexing controversies that sundered 
 England and Christendom ; and after the death of 
 Charles II., and the accession of his brother James, an 
 opportunity was granted, which, had it been turned to 
 account, would doubtless have secured the success of 
 this great measure — the reunion of the Anglican with the 
 Catholic Church. But, unfortunately, James took quite 
 another course ; instead of cultivating friendly relations 
 with the Church of England, the rights and immunities 
 of which, in his coronation oath, he had sworn to uphold, 
 he appeared only to dream of giving an undue ascendancy 
 
OF CHRISTENDOM. 
 
 13 
 
 to one section of his subjects over the rest, th<at re- 
 mainder constituting an overwhelming majority of the 
 nation. In his ill-fated schemes to render his crown 
 despotic, he seems to have forgotten the true interests of 
 religion; or, if he cared for them at all, he upheld them 
 by weapons unworthy of the Church of God, and contrary 
 to the spirit of Christianity. In his infatuated policy, 
 he made common cause with the lowest Dissenters, and 
 instead of boldly urging a reunion between the English 
 and Irish Roman Catholics, who still held a high position 
 in the peerage of both kingdoms, and in the ancient 
 landed aristocracy of the realm, and the national An- 
 glican Church, which still held so much in common with 
 the rest of Christendom, James sought to pull down the 
 Established Church, hoping, perhaps, to substitute his 
 own upon the ruins of the latter. The event proved 
 how grievously he had mistaken his course ; and he and 
 his family paid the penalty of his folly in the loss of the 
 British crown. The reaction that follow'ed infused more 
 than ever a Protestant element into the legislature and 
 the national Church ; and although every now and then 
 the old High Church element reappeared and asserted 
 its legitimate claim, as the sole true representative of the 
 Anglican theory, political circumstances were stronger 
 than theological deductions, and from that day to this 
 the predominant party — at least in religion, if not always 
 in politics — has been that which is closely allied with 
 ultra-Protestantism, and the tacit repudiation of what 
 we have clearly established to be the Anglican theory. 
 Nor can we see what conclusion could practically follow, 
 but a gradual overthrow of the Anglican Church herself, 
 in order to make way for a triumph of anarchy and 
 general infidelity, had it not been for one providential 
 circumstance. 
 
 That circumstance was the wonderful religious move- 
 ment which arose in the year 1833, in the University of 
 Oxford. A few learned men, seeing more than was seen 
 by the mass, and perceiving the abyss — both religious 
 
14 
 
 ON THE FUTURE UNITY 
 
 and political — to which England was rapidly drifting, 
 took counsel together, how they could best preserve what 
 still remained of the venerable institutions of their 
 country. Leaving political affairs and temporal questions 
 in the hands of statesmen, they turned to what immediately 
 appertained to their own province — the Church and 
 religion. A series of most remarkable tracts, enforcing 
 a recognition of the distinctive principles of the Anglican 
 theory, as laid down by the canon of 1571, were issued 
 from the press of that learned body, and the result has 
 been, to sum it all up in one word, a revolution in the 
 religious mind of England. The national Church still 
 numbers amongst her prelates and her clergy a majority 
 that represents the ultra-Protestant element ; with this 
 majority, as was not unnatural, the State for the most 
 part has continued to sympathize and co-operate. Hence, 
 until very recently, all the influence of the secular power 
 has been thrown into that channel, whether in the shape 
 of doctrinal decisions emanating from the temporal power, 
 or by the appointment of men who do not hold the An- 
 glican theory, to prelacies and other dignities and emolu- 
 ments in that Church, successive Prime Ministers raising 
 men to the episcopate rather to secure a few votes in the 
 House of Lords, and the short-lived triumph of a political 
 section, than for the purpose of enforcing any particular 
 religious principle ; while the course of parliamentary 
 legislation has run rather in the direction of what is 
 termed the voluntary principle, and which, if it were to 
 continue, must infallibly end in a disruption of Church 
 and State. But, notwithstanding all these obstacles, 
 which might seem to have presented insuperable difficul- 
 ties in the way of the great Anglican revival at which 
 we have been glancing, the movement that commenced 
 in 1833 in such diminutive proportions, has grown 
 to such a height, that I cannot conceive any candid man 
 denying that it now constitutes the ruling religious 
 principle at work in England amongst the most intelli- 
 gent and devout portion of the Established Church. 
 
OF CHRISTENDOM. 
 
 15 
 
 And what is to he the issue of this movement? One 
 effect it has already had ; unable as yet to effect a restor- 
 ation of unity between its own religious body, in which 
 it originated, and in which it is continually growing 
 stronger and stronger, and Catholic Christendom, it has 
 led to the individual union of some of the most earnest 
 and able of the Anglican clergy and laity to the Catholic 
 Church ; so that there is hardly a family in the realm 
 which does not possess one of these converts. And yet 
 the remarkable fact is, that the original movement still 
 goes on, and gathers strength every day. Some persons 
 thought that, when Newman, and Manning, and Wilber- 
 force had joined the Roman Catholic Church, those who 
 remained behind would have turned aside from a course 
 the tendency of which was now so manifest. But has it 
 been so ? If the interests of Protestantism, that is of 
 the continued state of abnormal separation of Christian 
 England from the rest of Christendom, seemed to require 
 such a conclusion, has it been adopted ? Surely not. 
 The force of principle and the cogency of argument has 
 been found stronger than any sectional or party interests, 
 and the current of feeling has continued to run in the 
 direction of Catholicism. Everything that can be ap- 
 pealed to as an indication of public feeling, or of the 
 tendency of human thought, assures us that the goal to 
 which England is tending is at least not ultra-Protest- 
 antism.* That she is more than ever identified with 
 
 * Witness such institutions as The Ucclesioloffical Society, as the 
 societies for the publication of ancient ecclesiastical literature, as the 
 various local societies for the promotion of ecclesiastical architecture, 
 societies for the promotion of sound ecclesiastical music, of plain 
 chant, &c. ; to say nothing of magnificent works of individual labour, 
 carried out at an immense cost, and showing not only the taste of the 
 author but of the age in which he publishes — such works as the 
 reprint of the “ Aberdeen Breviary,” so magnificently executed by 
 that zealous bookseller, Mr. Toovey ; or Gibson’s gloriously illus- 
 trated “ History of Tynemouth Abbey,” or Mr. Chambers’s trans- 
 lation of the “ Sarum Diurnal,” to mention a few, and only a very few, 
 amongst unnumbered evidences of the Catholic tendency of the 
 English mind at the present day. 
 
16 
 
 ON THE FUTURE UNITY 
 
 her national Church I firmly believe ; that that national 
 Church is becoming more vigorous and more influential 
 every day I equally believe ; and that there never was a 
 more unpractical or improbable notion than that which, 
 in spite of such facts, w’ould still count upon its destruc- 
 tion, or build airy castles upon its anticipated ruins ; but 
 holding this conviction as I do, I hesitate not to say 
 that I think those are equally blind to the most evident 
 facts, and equally deluded in their anticipations, who 
 look forwards to the triumph of any other principle 
 than that of Catholicism in the future progress of this 
 mighty movement. The more it is arrested by the op- 
 position of the State, the more numerous and the more 
 striking will be the individual secessions, and the more 
 brilliant the partial triumph of Catholicism ; but at the 
 same time political parties will be more and more ham- 
 pered and perplexed, while the peace and harmony of 
 families will be more and more disturbed and broken. 
 If, on the other hand, the State should throw its influ- 
 ence into the scale of the movement, as one day it 
 infallibly will, then may the friends of peace and good- 
 will, of unity and concord, of harmonious and wise legis- 
 lation, of consequent prosperity and happiness, lift up 
 their heads, for their redemption draweth nigh. The 
 dark night of strife and discord, of hatred and bloodshed, 
 of wickedness and ignorance, will begin to disappear, and 
 the bright rays of truth and justice will beam upon 
 mankind, and England may yet learn, that if God has 
 given her an empire over countless nations and tribes, 
 if He has poured into her lap all the riches of the earth, 
 and raised her to a pitch of glory and power, and mag- 
 nificence, such as no other people has ever attained to, 
 she may yet learn that she has something great to do 
 for God in return for all this, and that this work cannot 
 be achieved by following a 'principle of division, but by 
 carrying out the blessed theory, which in her darkest 
 hour she never entirely abandoned ; that theory of Ca- 
 tholic unity and of adherence to the great oecumenical 
 
OF CHRISTENDOM. 
 
 17 
 
 teaching, which has been the result of the commission 
 to “ teach all nations," intrusted eighteen hundred years 
 ago by Christ our Lord to twelve poor unlearned J ews. 
 Yes, I believe it will be so ; and I believe it, not because 
 I hope it, but because I see it coming. Let only Catho- 
 lics co-operate with their Anglican brethren, and Angli- 
 cans co-operate with Catholics, for the restoration of 
 mutual and corporate unity, for the triumph of Catholic 
 truth, not for the destruction of anything that men hold 
 and cling to as the outward and living form of their 
 visible existence; and the glorious result which every 
 good man must wish for, and which none but evil men 
 would deprecate, will soon crown our mutual and com- 
 bined efforts. Then may our gracious and beloved Queen 
 live to reign over a united people, and to be indeed what 
 so many of her predecessors have been in mere empty 
 title, the Defender of the Faith ; yes, the Defender of 
 the Faith of Him, who of old gave that title to the 
 Sovereign of England : the Defender of the Catholic 
 and Apostolic Faith, not by the triumph of one section 
 of hBr people over another, but by the spontaneous rally- 
 ing of all to the old paths, and by the loving union of all 
 her subjects under her temporal sceptre within the one 
 fold of the one Shepherd. Oh ! if such a glorious victory 
 of truth, and reason, and love, were destined to crown 
 the reign of Victoria, making her strong and invincible 
 in the spiritual and temporal unity of her people, and 
 holding forth her kingdom and her dominion as the 
 very type of moral and physical grandeur to all the other 
 nations of the earth, what a glory would it not be for 
 England and for our Queen ! 
 
 Great as such a result would be, arduous as it seems 
 to aim at it, or to work for it, I believe that it is neither 
 so difficult, nor so distant, if only the members of both 
 churches could be brought to consider the question, and 
 to labour for its solution. 
 
 It is with a view to arriving at this solution, that the 
 writer of this essay now purposes to lay before the reader 
 
 c 
 
18 
 
 ON THE FUTURE UNITY 
 
 the following treatise ; and in doing so he will endeavour 
 to pursue the method which he is now about to class 
 under several heads. 
 
 1. The principal obstacles to union presented by the 
 actual condition of the Anglican Church herself, and the 
 actual state of religious parties within her communion. 
 
 2. Difficulties on the side of Catholics. 
 
 3. Political difficulties on the side of the state. 
 
 4. Political advantages that would result from the 
 restoration of unity. 
 
 5. Religious advantages that would result from the 
 restoration of unity. 
 
 (1.) The principal Obstacles to Union presented by the 
 actual Condition of the Anglican Church herself 
 and the actual State of Religious Parties within her 
 Communion. 
 
 I have already shown in my preliminary observations 
 what is the theory of the Anglican Church ; that she 
 still accounts herself to be a portion of the visible 
 Catholic Church of Christ, estranged rather than divided 
 from the rest of Christendom ; that her Articles of Reli- 
 gion expressly assert the authority of the Universal 
 Church in controversies* of faith, and in the institution 
 of rites and ceremonies ; while in her canonsf she has 
 given to her clergy the proper key for interpreting her 
 Articles of Religion, in ordering them to be understood 
 and explained to the people only in a sense conformable 
 to the teaching of the Catholic fathers and doctors of 
 the undivided Catholic Church. I have shown that this 
 being the theory of the Anglican Church, her most 
 eminent divines, ever since the first bitterness of the 
 original separation began to die away, have continually 
 
 * The twentieth of the Thirtj’^-nine Articles of Religion, 
 t Canon enacted by the Convocation of the Clergy, a.d. 1571. 
 
OP CHRISTENDOM. 
 
 19 
 
 yearned for a restoration of the unity of Christendom, 
 and that many efforts have been made from time to time 
 to bring about this blessed result. 
 
 But notwithstanding what I have said, and although 
 the Anglican theory, considered in itself, unquestionably 
 holds out solid hopes that one day unity may be restored, 
 it must, on the other hand, be confessed that there is 
 much to damp the hopes of a Catholic, when he views 
 the actual condition of the Anglican Church, and the 
 conflicting parties which subsist within her communion, 
 each striving for the mastery over the other, each con- 
 demning and accusing the other of inconsistency and 
 treachery to the fundamental principles of their own 
 Church, and each in turn sharing the patronage and 
 encouragement of the secular power, so that men of the 
 most contradictory belief are exalted to the highest offices 
 in the national Church. I say to a Catholic mind, con- 
 sidering this state of things, the hopes, encouraged by a 
 review of the Anglican theory, and the general aspect 
 of the High Church portion of her clergy, almost fade 
 away, and give place to a conviction, that sooner or 
 later a house thus divided against itself must fall ; and 
 assuredly such a result might at any moment be precipi- 
 tated in the present current of legislative policy, which 
 is every day more and more withdrawing the support 
 of the state from the Established Church, while the 
 executive government is giving every post of dignity 
 and influence to men of the lowest Church principles, 
 or even to men of no Church principles whatever, and 
 the tribunals appointed to determine upon questions of 
 doctrine and ritual (with the single exception of the last 
 decree of the Privy Council, which has undoubtedly 
 sided with the High Church party), have given their 
 decisions, not only in favour of the ultra-Protestants, 
 but in flagrant opposition to the principles of the 
 Liturgy and Catechism of the Church of England, no 
 less than of the twentieth of the Thirty-nine Articles, 
 and the canon of 1571 ; and this, notwithstanding that 
 
 c 2 
 
20 
 
 ON THE FUTURE UNITY 
 
 these very tribunals are assumed to be the guardians 
 and the vindicators of those very principles. Now to 
 any one, who, like myself, undertakes to advocate the 
 reunion of the Anglican with the Catholic Church, it is 
 obvious that it is in this state of things that the greatest 
 difficulty consists ; a difficulty which, I confess, appears 
 almost insurmountable ; nor could there be a greater 
 delusion than any attempt to overlook or underrate its 
 serious character, or to regard the Church of England, 
 as I have done in my preliminary observations, in her 
 theoretical aspect alone, when, in fact, to judge of her, as 
 she practically exists and operates at the present day, 
 she consists of a heterogeneous mass of conflicting and 
 constantly-changing opinion, split up into parties, that 
 hold nothing in common but the name of Christianity, 
 and no principle of agreement save to disagree with 
 Rome, to condemn the Pope, and to abhor the religious 
 system of which he is the spiritual centre and the head. 
 No one is more fully aware than I am how pow-erfully 
 such a state of things as this militates against the pro- 
 bability of any successful issue to the great object which 
 I advocate : while I am compelled to admit, that it 
 places at the disposal of Catholic writers, who deride 
 the notion of a corporate reunion between Anglicans 
 and ourselves, a fund of cogent arguments, the force of 
 which it is impossible to deny; so that, as the case now 
 practically stands, there seems scarcely any escape from 
 utter despair. 
 
 But is there then no hope? With a theory that so 
 closely approximates to that of Catholic orthodoxy; w’ith 
 a liturgy drawn exclusively from Catholic sources ; with a 
 Catechism capable of imbuing the minds of her children 
 with the most Catholic and devout apprehension of the 
 tw^o principal Sacraments, such as Baptism and the Holy 
 Eucharist ; with a ritual containing, if not under the 
 name of Sacraments, yet as rites conveying grace, and 
 the same graces attributed to them by the Catholic 
 theory, the other five Sacraments of the new' law. Con- 
 
OF CHRISTENDOM. 
 
 21 
 
 firmation, Priestly Absolution, Matrimony, Holy Order, 
 and Elxtreme Unction — for it would appear that even 
 the last-mentioned rite was retained in King Edward’s 
 first Prayer Book, while there is evidence that it has 
 never been wholly abandoned by the orthodox party in 
 the Church of England, at least in theory ; with a form 
 of consecrating churches and cemeteries derived from the 
 Roman Pontifical ; and with the blessing of the chrism 
 in the solemn coronation of our kings and queens ; and 
 sundry minor rites, such as that used by prelates of the 
 Anglican Church in the solemn installation of Knights 
 of the Garter, or as that which we still find in some 
 editions of the Book of Common Prayer for the sovereign 
 to use in touching for the king’s evil, a privilege which 
 our sovereigns inherit from St. Edward the Confessor ; 
 I say, with all these badges of Catholicism still preserved 
 by the national Established Church, is there no hope for 
 her ultimate reunion with the rest of Christendom ? 
 
 To this question, if the great bulk of her members 
 are to remain what they are at present, there can be but 
 one answer, and that a most decided negative. With 
 the Church of England, as she now practically is, I am 
 ready to go every length with an able writer in a very 
 forcible and moderate article in the last number of the 
 “ Dublin Review,”* and to admit that a reunion, under 
 present circumstances, would be impossible, for this 
 very solid reason, that the Church of England is not a 
 definite body of Christians, who agree in holding certain 
 principles, but a body of men holding an almost endless 
 variety of theories, and gradations of theories. 
 
 But when, on the other hand, it is considered, that 
 notwithstanding the deplorable divisions that prevail 
 amongst the clergy and members of the Church of 
 England, it would not be fair to impute to the Church 
 itself the blame of opinions which are diametrically op- 
 posed to her own principles ; and that having laid down 
 
 * “ Ou the latest Phenomena of Anglicanism.” 
 
22 
 
 ON THE FUTURE UNITY 
 
 a theory, which in the abstract at least is admitted, or 
 ought to be admitted, by all her members, it is clear 
 that a Catholic, in urging a reunion between the Church 
 of England and the rest of Christendom, must take his 
 stand upon the acknowledged and unrepealed articles and 
 formularies of the former ; and he has a right to expect 
 that sooner or later the bulk of her clergy will either 
 agree to abide in good earnest by those principles, or, as 
 the only intelligible alternative, to abolish them, and to 
 cast out of her communion that portion of their fellow- 
 members who still uphold them. 
 
 Now it is perfectly obvious to any observer of what is 
 going on in England, and what has been now steadily 
 working for twenty-five years, that whatever be the 
 numbers of those who still adhere to ultra-Protestant 
 principles, it is not they who are on the increase in the 
 ranks of the Anglican clergy. On the contrary, it is a 
 fact that very many of the most advanced High Church 
 men once belonged to the Evangelical school, or were 
 born of those who did ; while I am not aware of a single 
 instance of a High Church man abandoning his own 
 views to adopt those of the ultra-Protestant school. 
 There was a time, undoubtedly, when the Evangelical 
 ])arty exercised great influence in the National Church, 
 but it was when that party really represented and con- 
 tained within itself all the earnest religion and all the 
 piety of the Established Church. When it could boast 
 of such men as the illustrious Wilberforce, a man who 
 would have been an honour and a glory to any Church 
 in Christendom ; a man who could write with one hand a 
 noble essay on spiritual religion and earnest faith, while 
 with the other he could strike off the fetters that bound 
 many millions of the human race in abject slavery, 
 binding as they did in still more grievous thraldom the 
 souls of their oppressors. At that time, the Evangelical 
 party was able to point to such a bishop as the noble 
 and the truly pious Henry Ryder, a man who might, 
 without exaggeration, be termed the Fenelon of the 
 
OF CHRISTENDOM. 
 
 23 
 
 Anglican Church. But it is a remarkable fact, that the 
 revival of Catholic and High Church principles in this 
 same Church is in no small degree connected with 
 these two illustrious names, and that these two families, 
 so truly noble in English History, will ever bear a con- 
 spicuous part in the great work which we are now con- 
 templating. But assuredly the Evangelical party can no 
 longer claim such men as these ; their representatives 
 and their children have either abandoned Protestantism 
 altogether, or they uphold in the National Church 
 principles of genuine rectitude, and of honest adherence 
 to the formularies they are sworn to maintain, such as 
 give solid ground to anticipate a rapid improvement in 
 the actual condition of the Church of England. In 
 fact, the last twenty-five years have witnessed a constant 
 decay of ultra-Protestant principles, with a parallel 
 progress of High Church Catholic ideas. And this is so 
 true, that the Times newspaper, in one of those very 
 able articles which stamp it as the highest representative 
 of the masculine mind of England, while commenting 
 on Lord Palmerston’s recent infusion of Evangelical 
 Low Church men into the Episcopate of the English 
 Church, thus expresses itself : — 
 
 “ The result is, that the High Church party never was 
 so numerous, wealthy, fashionable, or enthusiastic, as it is 
 at the present day ; and for every ‘ Evangelical’ bishop 
 Lord Shaftesbury can make, there enter the Church twenty 
 curates, strong in the Fathers, church-building, vestments, 
 seasons, and services.” And this mighty influx of High 
 Church principle amongst the inferior clergy is not only 
 an index of what we may expect a little while hence, 
 but an irresistible evidence of what has been achieved 
 already. The decline of Evangelicalism, and the growth 
 of Catholic tendencies, are the answer which I would 
 give to writers like the one referred to in the “ Dublin 
 Review,” whose argument against the feasibility of a 
 corporate reunion is grounded on the hypothesis, that the 
 present numerical majority of Low Church men is likely 
 
24 
 
 ON THE FUTURE UNITY 
 
 to remain. Those who know most of what is going on 
 in the Anglican mind have come to a different conclusion, 
 and they anticipate that this majority, already so signally 
 diminished, will at no distant day dwindle into a small 
 minority, while the honest and fearless assertors of 
 Anglican principles and Anglican practices will be so 
 universal amongst the clergy and the intelligent and 
 religious laity of the National Church, that we shall very 
 soon see the statesmen and rulers of the land sensible of 
 the change, and acting in compliance with it. I have 
 already said, that the reunion of Christians in the British 
 empire, if ever attained, can only be brought about by the 
 spontaneous rallying of all to the old paths and to the 
 normal principles of Christianity, and not by the political 
 triumph of any section over another. Let me then say 
 that the issue I contemplate does not look to any struggle 
 between High Church men and Evangelicals, still less to 
 any forcible ejectment of the latter from their position. 
 God forbid ! Such an issue might involve the triumph of 
 an idea, but it does not imply the union of men, or the 
 victory of truth. What I look forward to is very 
 different from this ; it is to the gradual working of sound 
 principles and sound argument ; it is the awakening of 
 men in general, who still agree in upholding Christianity, 
 to the necessity of that moral and dogmatic unity which 
 is essential to the progress and triumph of the system 
 they profess to believe, and the only basis for a sound 
 national system of instruction. If one thing more than 
 another has been virtually solved by the mighty convul- 
 sions of the present and the latter period of the last 
 century, it is surely this, that society cannot exist 
 without religion. Now religion cannot exist without 
 belief : and what does belief mean, if it refers not to one 
 definite standard of conviction ? Believing then, as I do, 
 that so long as men still adhere to Christianity and the 
 Bible, by the grace of God and their own sincerity, they 
 may be brought to a substantial agreement (and to deny 
 this would be to deny the office of reason and of the 
 
OF CHRISTENDOM. 
 
 25 
 
 reasoning faculty), I hesitate not to avow that I look 
 forwards to the day, when the force of normal truths will 
 be found so overwhelming that all men will voluntarily 
 embrace them, and the reunion of Christendom will be 
 the result of universal conviction, and the meeting of all 
 men of good will in one mighty botherhood of Christian 
 belief and Christian love. And I am equally persuaded 
 that this glorious result can never be achieved so long as 
 Christians, whether Catholic or Protestant, persevere in 
 the bitterness of polemical controversy, attacking what 
 appear to them the weak points of each other, instead 
 of calmly showing the strong points of truth. Let earnest- 
 minded men, on both sides, suspend their internecine 
 warfare, let a truce be proclaimed, and falling down before 
 God in common prayer, through the merits of our Com- 
 mon Mediator, let us beseech of Him to enlighten us, 
 that so we may come to an agreement, and that faith 
 may take the place of doubt. Let us examine the 
 foundations of all that we hold in common, and let us 
 inquire on the points in which we differ, how far our 
 differences are real and substantial ; and if so, how far it 
 may be possible to come to an agreement concerning 
 them. One thing is evident, the day for hollow com- 
 promise is passed ; and men must make up their minds 
 between some system of positive belief on the one hand, 
 or of downright unbelief on the other : once that the 
 civilized world is divided between these two, which are 
 now the only possible sections of thinking men, it will be 
 seen, which is to triumph, — belief or unbelief? 
 
 Belief will be surrounded by a mighty host; by all those 
 who still think that in the long run the civilization of the 
 Gospel is good for man here below, and that there is 
 solid ground for looking forward to the promises it holds 
 out beyond the grave, to which we are all tending, and 
 into which there is no man who will not go dow'n : all 
 those who cling with affection to the traditions of the 
 past, who value and cherish national recollections and 
 the meniorv of their ancestors; all those who take a 
 
26 
 
 ON THE FUTURE UNITY 
 
 practical view of men and things, and who shrink from 
 the wild theories, and mistrust the delusions of men who 
 have no other motto save Doubt and Destruction ; whose 
 only principle is to doubt what their fellow-men have 
 ever held, and to destroy all that man has ever yet 
 built up. 
 
 On the other hand, will unbelief be the rallying-point 
 for anarchy and revolution, for thieves and murderers, for 
 all those who trample under foot the everlasting principles 
 of right and wrong, who would overthrow all ties of 
 family, and all those sweet bonds of tenderness that unite 
 the brother and the sister with loving parents, and that 
 knit society together as the association of many happy and 
 united families. If pillage is to be universal, if murder 
 and the promiscuous indulgence of every evil passion is 
 to be the normal state of humanity, if civilization is to 
 give way before the most brutal barbarism tliat ever 
 entered into the mind of man, then may unbelief become 
 general, and it may proclaim its triumph over religion 
 and faith. But this is impossible ; it may persecute, it 
 may destroy much that we now cherish, and perhaps 
 make many individual martyrs in some brief and transient 
 convulsion ; but sooner or later the true current of 
 Christian civilization and of Catholic belief will mount to 
 the surface, and we, or our children, will see such a bright 
 day shine upon it, with such a calm and such a heavenly 
 harmony, as will compensate for all the trials of good 
 men in past times, and realize the glowing predictions of 
 Holy Writ, to which men of faith undoubtingly look 
 forwards. 
 
 (2.) Difflculties on the Side of Catholics. 
 
 If it had not been for certain recent articles and letters 
 in some of the organs of English Catholic opinion, I should 
 have supposed that amongst Catholics there could have 
 been but one feeling in regard to such a question as that 
 of the reunion of Christendom. When it is remembered 
 
OF CHRISTENDOM. 
 
 27 
 
 that unity is the grand leading principle of Catholicism, 
 and that the tendency of that religion has ever been to 
 gather men and nations into one great religious con- 
 federation, it might have been expected that any plan 
 that contemplated and aimed at that result, would have 
 been sure to find favour with those who professed a 
 special zeal for the interests of Catholicism, and who had 
 assumed, in one shape or another, the task of vindicating 
 and upholding those interests. And yet, if we may 
 judge from the tone of such articles and letters as I 
 have referred to, it would seem that, in some quarters at 
 least, the proposal for reunion, at least for any corporate 
 reunion, of Protestant bodies with the rest of Christendom, 
 has by no means been favourably received. It is difficult 
 to account for this fact, at least on any inherent principles 
 of Catholicity, excepting indeed on the ground of the 
 practical objection which we have just been discussing, 
 and which we have shown has already been in great 
 measure removed, and is likely to be still further removed. 
 Nevertheless, as the fact exists, it behoves us to consider 
 it, and to grapple with it. 
 
 And first, as far as I can understand its nature and 
 causes, it would seem to me to arise mainly from an 
 inadequate apprehension of the Catholic theory in itself, 
 and from a very imperfect study of Ecclesiastical history. 
 
 The Catholic theory, if I understand it rightly, is 
 simply the result and the expression of the commission 
 given by our Blessed Lord to His Apostles, in the com- 
 mand He gave them “to go and teach all nations,” 
 promising His own infallible guidance in the work ; 
 “ and lo ! I am with you all dags, even to the consum- 
 mation of the world.” 
 
 This theory then contemplates Christianity, or Christ- 
 endom as we generally term it, under this aspect, as all 
 nations brought under the influence of one teaching, and 
 Christ Himself as pledged by His own promise to assist 
 and direct that teaching. 
 
 But let it be observed, the recipients of this teaching 
 
28 
 
 ON THE FUTURE UNITY 
 
 are to be, in theory at least, not a mass of individuals 
 here, and another mass of individuals there, but all 
 nations — that is, the French nation, the English nation, 
 and so on — not a Catholic party in France and a Catholic 
 party in England, at war with every other section of 
 French and English citizens, but England and France 
 severally and mutually confessing the same great truth, 
 and reposing beneath its influence. Such is the Catholic 
 theory. Of course, in saying this, I do not mean to 
 assert that it is inconsistent with such a theory, to suppose 
 that the result predicated was not to be attained at once ; 
 in the lifetime of the Apostles, for instance. We all know 
 that many ages elapsed from the time when our Lord 
 first uttered those wor^s, before religious unity was 
 attained either in France or England, or in any other 
 nation. But I do assert that this result, and nothing 
 less, was what the first disciples of Christianity looked to, 
 and that it was nothing less than this that was at length 
 attained not only in France and England, but in every 
 other country in which the Apostolic teaching was 
 received. Alas ! this blessed unity has now disappeared. 
 I know scarcely any part of the world, if indeed any, in 
 which it exists at the present day. And this is so true, 
 that many learned and pious Catholic writers have as- 
 serted, and not without too much reason, that Christ- 
 endom has arrived at that terrible state foretold by the 
 blessed Apostle St. Paul, in his Epistle to the Homans,* 
 where he seems to intimate that one day before the 
 national conversion of the J ewish people shall take place, 
 the Gentile nations should in their national capacity 
 apostatize from the good olive-tree into which God had 
 engrafted them. Christendom, I confess, has either 
 already arrived at this deplorable apostasy, or it is fast 
 tending to it. I think, to any one who seriously contem- 
 plates all that is now going on in the world, there can be 
 no great difficulty in forming such a conclusion as this. 
 
 * Romans xi. 21. 
 
OF CHRISTENDOM. 
 
 29 
 
 But even admitting this to be the case, it cannot alter 
 the Catholic theory ; and deplorable as such a fact is 
 wherever it exists, and it assuredly does exist, and has 
 existed for the last three hundred years in England, it is 
 the duty of all those who hold the Catholic theory to 
 strive to remedy it as soon as may be. 
 
 Whatever may be the extent of this apostasy, and what- 
 ever the amount of guilt incurred by it, whether on the 
 part of nations or of individuals, it is quite clear that 
 the Catholic theory, which aims at the sanctification of 
 nations no less than of each individual composing them, 
 admits the possibility of national as much as of individual 
 repentance. In fact, that very chapter of St. Paul’s 
 Epistle to the Romans, to which I have just referred, 
 assures us that the Jewish nation itself will one day give 
 the crowning example of national repentance for national 
 apostasy ; but the Apostle also tells us, that this restora- 
 tion of Israel is to succeed, and therefore, probably, to be 
 the consequence of, the total conversion of the whole 
 Gentile world. His words are : “ I would not have you 
 ignorant, brethren, of this mystery, that blindness in part 
 hath happened in Israel, until the fulness of the Gentiles 
 should come in.”^ Now this expression, “the fulness of 
 the Gentilesf is surely best explained by those words of 
 our Lord, which I have so often quoted, “Go ye and 
 teach ALL NATIONS.” The “fulness of the Gentiles^' then 
 “ coming in,” can only signify the totality of the nations 
 coming into the true Apostolic Church of Christ. It is 
 evident, then, that as the time draws near for the con- 
 version and restoration of Israel, all the nations of the 
 earth will, about that period or just before it, be nation- 
 ally incorporated into the Catholic Church : but as it is 
 a fact, which we still witness, that for the last thi’ee 
 hundred years a very large portion of the nations has 
 apostatized from the unity of the Catholic Church, it is 
 quite clear, from the reasoning of St. Paul, that if the 
 
 * Romans xi. 25. 
 
30 
 
 ON THE FUTURE UNITY 
 
 time be approaching for the restoration of the Jews, and 
 in proportion as it draws near, this national severance of 
 so many great and powerful nations must cease. We 
 have then a right to look forwards to the restoration of 
 Catholicity, not only by the conversion of individuals, 
 but also by that of entire nations. 
 
 Now then, if this be true, and I do not see how any 
 one Avho believes in the Bible can deny it, the question 
 arises, how is the Catholic Church to deal with such 
 nations as those which once were in full communion 
 with her, but which at various periods have severed 
 themselves from that communion, still, however, pre- 
 serving the belief of Christianity and the maintenance of 
 many of its ordinances ? I maintain that the answer to 
 this question, given in the way in w^hich I shall give it, 
 is no mere matter of private judgment, but the very 
 answer of the Church herself, laid down and promulgated 
 in a general and oecumenical council, presided over, con- 
 firmed, and approved by the Sovereign Pontiff himself, 
 and undoubtedly representing the whole Church of Christ, 
 both the Eastern and the Western Church, duly repre- 
 senting both the clergy and the laity, in the persons of the 
 bishops of all Christendom, and the emperors and princes 
 of the different Christian nations. This oecumenical 
 council was the Council of Florence, which concluded 
 its sessions in the year 1439, when the great Act of 
 Reunion between the Greek and Latin Churches was 
 finally agreed to and signed by the Pope and Latin bishops 
 on the one hand, and by the emperor of Constantinople 
 and the patriarch of that Church, with the other bishops of 
 the East, on the other. Now, if the reader will take the 
 trouble to procure the remarkable work of the learned 
 Greek Pitzipios, entitled L'Eglise Orieydale,* which has 
 very recently been published on this very subject of the 
 general reunion of Christendom, with the express sanc- 
 
 * “ L’Eglise Orientale, par Jacques G-. Pitzipios, Pondateur de la 
 Societe Orientale.” Borne, Imprimerie de la Bropagande, 1855 ; 
 London, C. Dolman. 
 
OF CHRISTENDOM. 
 
 31 
 
 tion of Pope Pius IX., he will be able at once to under- 
 stand on what principle the Catholic Church proceeds in 
 her dealing with Christian nations in a state of severance, 
 when she endeavours to recall them to unity. She does 
 not deal with them as with heathen nations, for she 
 affirms that they are still her children, still by their 
 baptism a portion of the Church, although estranged 
 and separated from the communion of the Holy See. 
 Whether the separation be one of heresy, that is, of a 
 renunciation of any portion of what has been defined by 
 the oecumenical Church under the sanction of the Sove- 
 reign Pontiff as a portion of Catholic dogma, or whether 
 it be one of schism, that is, of simple rejection of legiti- 
 mate ecclesiastical obedience to the divinely-constituted 
 authority ; whatever be the degree and amount of devia- 
 tion from the normal principles of the Gospel, whatever 
 the loss of spiritual and ecclesiastical privileges, the 
 Church’s conduct, as evidenced throughout the whole 
 of her proceedings in this most famous and venerable 
 council, is ever the same (and this council is only one 
 amongst countless other evidences that might be ad- 
 duced) ; and that conduct, I hesitate not to affirm, con- 
 sists in a conciliatory dealing with separated bodies of 
 Christians in their corporate capacity,^ No one who 
 maintains this is, of course, blind to another important 
 fact, viz., that the Church does not limit her dealings 
 with her separated children to this course : it is quite 
 certain that she calls upon them, singly and individually, 
 to return to unity ; and when any of them hear her voice, 
 she rejoices over the return of the wandering child ; but 
 this, for the most part, is her course of action, when the 
 
 * It is stated in a late number of the “ Rambler,” referring to my 
 letters in tbe “Union,” that tbe Churcb bas never treated with 
 heretics in a corporate capacity. She did so as recently as within 
 the last ten years in receiving into her communion the patriarch and 
 bishops of the Eutychian church of Syria, that is, a church which 
 was not only severed from the Catholic Church by schism, but by 
 downright lieresy. 
 
. 32 ON THE FUTUBE UNITY 
 
 rebellion against her authority is at its height, when a 
 corporate reunion appears hopeless, and when the heads 
 of the separated communions obstinately refuse to listen 
 to any overtures for peace. The moment, however, that 
 a favourable opportunity occurs ; the moment the sepa- 
 rated portions of the Church manifest a desire for peace, 
 for the restoration of unity, then at once the Church 
 comes forth, with all the tenderness of a loving mother, 
 to effect a reconciliation with her separated children : 
 like the good father in our Lord’s magnificent parable of 
 the Prodigal Son, she goes forth, when yet the wanderer 
 is afar off, to meet him with all that divine condescen- 
 sion which is the special characteristic of infinite mercy, 
 and that dwells in its fulness only in the adorable Heart of 
 Jesus Christ. She encourages every, even the least, aspi- 
 ration for union, and mindful of those words of her divine 
 Spouse, that “ the Sabbath was made for man, not man 
 for the Sabbath,” she ever manifests a readinesss to con- 
 cede whatever it is in her power to concede, and what- 
 ever she, under the guidance of the Holy Ghost, judges 
 it may be for edification and for peace to concede. Now 
 to deny this, would simply be to deny the whole history 
 of the Church ; and to condemn it, would simply be to 
 condemn the Church’s conduct from the time of Christ 
 to the present day. 
 
 It is obvious, then, that if some Catholics are averse 
 to the idea of a corporate reunion of the separated com- 
 munions of Christendom, there is no such difficulty on 
 the side of the Church as such ; it is a mere caprice or 
 prejudice of individual Catholics, and repugnant to the 
 established policy and traditional practice of the Catholic 
 Church herself. Hence, in 1853, with the express sanc- 
 tion of Pope Pius IX., a society was established at Rome, 
 Paris being the head-quarters of its operations, the very 
 object of which is to reunite Christendom ; first, by the 
 restoration of unity between the two principal divisions 
 of the Christian w'orld, the eastern and western Churches ; 
 and secondly, by bringing the Protestant communities 
 
OF CHRISTENDOM. 
 
 33 
 
 into fellowship with the main body of the Church, as the* 
 natural consequence of the reunion of the Church herself. 
 This society is called “ The Eastern Christian Society,” 
 and it invites the co-operation of alt who approve of the 
 idea upheld by it, (whether at present in communion 
 with the Catholic Church or in a state of separation 
 from it,) to work for the projected reunion. Pitzipios, 
 in speaking of this excellent institution, mentions that, 
 quite independently of its establishment, and when that 
 fact was not generally known, a very remarkable con- 
 ference was held at Berlin in the year 1854, consisting, 
 he says, “of members of the two separated Churches, 
 that is, the Greek and the Latin, and of the Protestant 
 bodies ; ” and after a lengthened examination and dis- 
 cussion of the question, '■‘'they came to the unanimous 
 conviction that the reunion of Christendom was feasible” 
 “ Such dispositions,” continues Pitzipios, “ spontaneously 
 expressed by all the different Christian bodies of so many 
 countries, is surely an overwhelming evidence that the 
 hour has come for the restoration of unity in the Church 
 of Christ, and that its accomplishment is to be the special 
 work of our own times.” I dwell with the more satis- 
 faction on these statements of the learned Greek, because, 
 independent of their intrinsic force, the work that con- 
 tains them carries with it the greatest moral weight, from 
 the circumstance that it issued from the Pope’s own 
 press, being published at the expense of the college 
 de Propaganda Fide, and being duly approved by the 
 highest ecclesiastical authorities in Rome itself. If, 
 therefore, any single book at the present moment can be 
 appealed to, as expressing the Church’s feeling on this 
 great question of the corporate reunion of the separate 
 Christian communities, it is surely this work, and this 
 work is devoted to the advocacy of this express policy. 
 
 But it must be acknowledged this is not the only 
 difficulty, on the Catholic side. In reference to the re- 
 union of the Church of England, it is contended, that 
 even admitting the theory of Anglicanism to constitute 
 
 n 
 
34 
 
 ON THE FUTURE UNTTY 
 
 n wide distinction between that Chnrcli and any of the 
 foreign Protestant bodies, still she cannot be placed in 
 the same rank with the Great Eastern Church, which in 
 theory at least has never departed from orthodoxy, while 
 no Catholic has ever denied or for a moment doubted 
 the validity of her orders. It is contended that, on the 
 contrary, the orders of the Anglican Church have always 
 been regarded by the rest of the Church as exceedingly 
 doubtful, so that when any of her clergy have returned 
 to the unity of the Universal Church, if they wished to 
 exercise the sacred ministry after their change, they 
 have in every case been reordained, and this, too, with- 
 out any verbal condition. Now it would be altogether 
 at variance with the determination I have already ex- 
 pressed, not to enter within the arena of any polemical 
 controversy in the present essay, for me to discuss in 
 these pages the question of the validity of Anglican 
 orders. It is a question which, in my opinion, does not 
 affect the substantial issue contemplated by me. If ever 
 the desire for unity should become so general in the 
 Anglican body, as to lead to serious negotiations between 
 them and the Holy See, they would be fully competent 
 to argue the point for themselves ; and it being a ques- 
 tion not of abstract doctrine, but of fact, they would be 
 fully at liberty to lay before the Holy See, or before a 
 general council, whatever evidence existed in favour of 
 their own view of it. Nor would the previous practice 
 of the Church in reordaining their clergy for motives of 
 safety, and for the indisputable security of the case, in 
 any way preclude their theologians from laying it more 
 clearly and more elaborately before the authorities of the 
 Catholic Church, if they believed that they had reasonable 
 grounds for thinking that this had been done insufficiently 
 hitherto, and that they had new facts to allege in favour 
 of the validity of their orders. And here I have no 
 hesitation in saying that, although I do not regard this 
 question, however decided, as vitally affecting the feasi- 
 bility of a corporate reunion, for, as I shall presently 
 
OF CHRISTENDOM. 
 
 35 
 
 show, the Popes have sanctioned the pttenipt to reunite 
 even the Calvinistic Churches of France and Switzerland, 
 which never pretended to possess Catholic orders ; yet 
 it cannot be denied that, if the validity of Anglican 
 orders were established, it would constitute an additional 
 link between their communion and the rest of Christ- 
 endom. I can very well understand that in the com- 
 mencement of the separation, and when the spirit of 
 hostility between them and the Catholics was at its 
 greatest height, it might very naturally appear consonant 
 to sound policy on our side to make out the case of the 
 English Church in a Catholic point of view to be as bad 
 as possible ; but now assuredly the circumstances are 
 very different : in the presence of so many indisputable 
 proofs of an altered feeling towards us in their minds, 
 when their ablest and most pious clergy come forward to 
 advocate every dogma of the Catholic faith, and defend 
 all those points common to us both with a learning, a 
 power of argument, and an earnestness, that no Catholic 
 could surpass ; when, in addition to this, they hesitate 
 not to express a noble desire to heal the divisions of 
 Christendom, and to return to the normal state of union, 
 it is obviously our interest, quite as much as theirs, that 
 they should be able to establish as iriuch as possible, not 
 only the doctrinal affinity between their own communion 
 and the Catholic Church, but their organic relationship 
 also.* 
 
 * Since the foregoing remarks were written, the writer of this 
 Essay has perused with much interest a document emanating from 
 Pope Clement XI. in the year 1704, in which his Holiness signs a 
 judgment of the Congregation of the Holy Office, pronouncing the 
 consecration of John Clement Gordon, a bishop of the Scottish 
 Episcopal Church, to be in their opinion null : “ Chm autfem hujus- 
 modi consecrationem opinetur nullam ob rationes quas exprimit,” &c. ; 
 null for the reasons alleged by John Clement Gordon himself, who 
 asked for a confirmation of his own opinion, that he might receive 
 episcopal consecration according to the Catholic rite. This document 
 has been given at length by the “Weekly Register” of May 2nd. 
 The writer of this Essay does not venture to express any opinion of 
 his own on the question of Anglican orders ; on the contrary, he 
 
 D 2 
 
36 
 
 ON THE FUTURE UNITY 
 
 More than a hundred and fifty years ago, when the 
 chances of reunion were so much smaller than in our 
 day, the force of what I have been just referring to w'as 
 so obvious, that the great Bossuet, in his efforts to pro- 
 mote the endeavour to effect such a corporate reconcilia- 
 tion between the Church and the Lutheran body, in his 
 famous correspondence with the Abbot Molanus,* lays 
 down, even in regard to those who belong to the Confes- 
 sion of Augsburg, “ that if there be any bishops belonging 
 to that Confession, concerning whose succession and 
 legitimate ordination suflScient evidence can be adduced, 
 having made profession of the right faith, they shall 
 remain in their office ; and the same rule shall hold good 
 for priests also.” Now it is a fact of indisputable noto- 
 riety, that no one calling himself either bishop or priest 
 in the Lutheran Communion, or in any branch of it, was 
 ever allowed to exercise the sacred ministry in the 
 Roman Communion without previous reordination ; and 
 yet it is clear from these words, laid down by the great 
 Bossuet, that neither he, nor those who laboured with 
 him, thought for a moment that such an antecedent 
 fact as that in any way precluded the Lutheran clergy 
 from establishing, if they could, the validity of their 
 succession and of their ordination. But the reader 
 should bear in mind that the larger portion of the 
 Lutheran body reject episcopacy altogether ; nor am I 
 aware of any Lutheran Church, except the Swedish, 
 
 embraces whatever the holy Church hy her visible head the Pope 
 may have heretofore decided, or may hereafter decide, upon this much- 
 disputed point ; hut he humbly ventures to express his opinion, that 
 the decision of the Holy Office in reference to Bishop Gordon, only 
 expresses an opinion, grounded on certain alleged statements, 
 addressed simply to an individual case, and therefore scarcely 
 amounting to a solemn definition of the Holy See as to the nuUity 
 of Anglican orders. 
 
 * Episcopi confessionis Augustanse, si qui sunt, de quorum suc- 
 sessione et legitima ordinatione eonstiterit, rectam fidem professi, suo 
 loco maneant; idem de presbyteris esto judicium. — CEnvres de 
 Bossuet, vol. vii. p. 462. 
 
OF CHRISTENDOM. 
 
 ‘37 
 
 wliich has retained it, or thought it worth while to make 
 a claim to apostolic succession. And yet, Bossuet felt 
 that, even in that case, the claim was not to be wholly 
 overlooked. How much more would he have laid down 
 a similar principle in the Anglican Church, especially 
 if he could have lived to witness the wonderful revival 
 of Catholic belief in that communion which has taken 
 place in our day ? But as it is quite clear that the object 
 of reunion is far from being materially involved in this 
 question, it is needless for me to refer to it further on 
 the present occasion ; I leave it to the learned theolo- 
 gians of that communion to show more fully than has 
 been yet done what solid ground may exist, which, upon 
 Catholic principles, would tend to establish the validity 
 of their orders ; and I, for one, believe that such an 
 attempt, if successful, would be a great step towards the 
 consummation of the union. 
 
 But there is another difficulty in Catholic minds, 
 which is, perhaps, even greater than the doubt about 
 their orders, and that is the doctrine of the Church of 
 England. In regard to this we must always remember, 
 that when a reunion is contemplated, it does not so much 
 affect the question to consider what has been the teach- 
 ing of separated communities in times past, as whether 
 an agreement can be come to upon doctrine for the 
 future. If, after a careful investigation, it should be 
 found possible by God’s grace to agree in signing a com- 
 mon formulary approved by both parties, it would seem 
 immaterial to enter much into the question as to how 
 great or how small had been the amount of previous 
 deviation from this common standard now agreed upon. 
 And I find in the Rules* for the Ecclesiastical Reunion of all 
 drawn up by the most learned theologians of the 
 German empire in 1691, and published by the authority of 
 the Emperor Leopold, the following very remarkable pro- 
 
 * Regulse circa Christianorum omnium Ecclesiasticam Eeunionem, 
 -i.D. 1691 . — CEuvres de Bossuet, vol. vii. p. 335. 
 
38 
 
 ON THE FUTURE UNITY 
 
 positions laid down as the basis of proceedings, bearing, 
 assuredly, very powerfully on this view to which I have just 
 referred. In theRegula Tertia, it is there laid down : — 
 “ Ad hanc tainen non requiritur, imb subinde non ex- 
 pedit, neque licituin est, alteri dissentient! parti veritates 
 omnes manifestare* et ab e^ petere ut errores omnes, 
 explicite saltern et expresse, deponat. Imb, si hoc ab 
 ullius partis ecclesiasticis rainistris, saltern pro hoc rerum 
 statu exigas, et his apud plebera suam creditum in 
 ininimo diminuas, radicem totam reunionis evellis.” And 
 after advancing other weighty considerations in favour of 
 this course of action, the divines continue as follows : — 
 “ Quia imprimis, dum Ecclesia Latina et Grseca sese in 
 conciliis Lugdunensi et Florentine reunierunt, id nun- 
 quam ita factum est, ut episcopi ullius partis errorem 
 pristinum circa fidei doctrinam expresse et publice con- 
 fiterentur ; sed sese in aliquo utrinque acceptabili sensu 
 explicarunt ; talisque explicatio, apud prudentes, idem 
 fait ac honesta quredam revocation \ 
 
 Now from such rules as these, laid down by the 
 gravest authors, and published on such high authority, 
 with the consent, as it would appear, of the Holy See 
 itself, it is evident that in the return to a common faith, 
 the Catholic Church gladly avails herself of whatever is 
 orthodox in the teaching of the separated communions, 
 while she regards the eventual profession of Catholic 
 Faith as the best renunciation of anything that may 
 have been eri’oneous or defective during the period of 
 their past and separated condition. But however true 
 this be, it is, nevertheless, a most consoling fact, that in 
 
 * These words evidently refer to the indiscreet and unreasonable 
 conduct of some Catholics, who, when there was a prospect of 
 corporate reunion, would unseasonably press upon individual 
 Protestants certain abstract truths, such as the duty of personal 
 return to unity, which, although most important in themselves, 
 would obviously overturn the very work the Church was engaged in, 
 if pressed in that unseasonable and injudicious manner, 
 t (Euvres de Bossuet, vol. vii. p. 336. 
 
OF CHRISTENDOM. 
 
 39 
 
 the Anglican Church, at least, the tradition of Catholic 
 teaching was in a great measure always upheld by a 
 chain of learned divines, who even in the worst times, 
 and when the ultra-Protestant element exercised the 
 greatest influence, never ceased to witness the truth of 
 many of the most important articles of Catholic belief. 
 This fact we have already seen affirmed by’ a great 
 Catholic authority. Father Leander a Sancto Martino, 
 in his statement to Pope Urban VIII. ; but if any one 
 will refer to that very learned and most remarkable 
 letter, published by Dr. Pusey'^ in 1851,* and addressed 
 by him to the then Bishop of London, he will find it 
 triumphantly established by innumerable citations from 
 the standard divines of the Anglican Church, from the 
 period of the Reformation downwards. Nor do I think 
 it possible for any Catholic to read that work, so con- 
 spicuous for its learning and research, without being 
 convinced that the Church of England is something 
 very different from all other Protestant bodies, and that 
 in fact she holds either implicitly or explicitly the main 
 great verities of Catholic doctrine. And here let me 
 express what I have long felt, that if ever, in the good 
 Providence of God, the divisions that now rend asunder 
 the Christian Church should be healed, that glorious 
 result will be more due to the exertions and services of 
 this truly learned and pious writer. Dr. Pusey, than to 
 any other living man, while I cordially pray that God 
 may preserve his valuable life to witness the full accom- 
 plishment of that to which his admirable writings have 
 so much contributed, and that ere he close his honoured 
 career, he may see Christendom what it was of old — 
 one in Faith and one in Charity. 
 
 It would greatly serve my purpose to give an analysis 
 
 * A letter to the Eight Hon. and Eight Eev. the Lord Bishop of 
 London, in explanation of some statements contained in a letter by 
 the Eev. W. Dodsworth. By the Very Eev. E. B. Pusey, D.D., 
 Eegius Professor of Hebrew in the University of Oxford, and Canon 
 of Christchurch Cathedral, Oxford, 1851. 
 
40 
 
 ON THE FUTURE UNITY 
 
 of this treatise of Dr. Pusey, but the limits that prudence 
 suggests for such an essay as the present, would appear 
 to prevent it. At the same time it is impossible not to 
 avail myself of the help of so weighty an author, how- 
 ever briefly and inadequately I may refer to his book, as 
 of the most signal importance in reference to that part 
 of my subject which I am at present discussing, — 
 viz., difficulties on the side of Catholics in the way of 
 reunion. 
 
 It appears to me, I am bound to say, that so far as 
 the doctrinal aspect of the Church of England during 
 the past three hundred years may be supposed to present 
 any grave obstacle in the way of a restoration of Catholic 
 unity, admitting Dr. Pusey’s letter to contain an accurate 
 statement of Anglican doctrine, the force of that ob- 
 stacle has been very materially diminished. Now that 
 Dr. Pusey’s statement is an accurate statement of the 
 doctrine of his Church, is indisputably established by 
 the book itself, for he advances nothing but what he 
 grounds upon undeniable authorities in the Anglican 
 formularies themselves, confirmed by an unbroken catena 
 of traditional witness on the part of all those theolo- 
 gians who are not merely held by a party to represent 
 the teaching of the English Church, but whom history 
 itself holds out to us in that character. Dr. Pusey lays 
 it down that the Church of England, even in the most 
 Protestant periods of our English history, has been 
 orthodox in the main on all the cardinal points of 
 Catholic teaching ; and though, unquestionably, I am 
 far from endorsing every form of expression in his 
 letter, and there are several which I should myself 
 abstain from using, as savouring of heterodoxy, yet I 
 cannot but think, that a little mutual explanation would 
 convince us both, I will not say that there have been 
 no differences betwen his communion and my own, but 
 at least that there is no substantial reason why we 
 should not very soon be brought to unity. 
 
 I am confident, from what Dr. Pusey has written on 
 
OF CHRISTENDOM. 
 
 41 
 
 the Anglican view concerning Confession and the Sacra- 
 ment of Penance, on the Eucharistic Sacrifice, on the 
 Real Presence of our Blessed Lord in the Sacrament of 
 the Altar, no less than in his valuable disquisition on 
 Catholic Devotions and Practices, from which it is most 
 consoling to see how all through the last three hundred 
 years Anglicans have never ceased to sympathize with 
 our spiritual writers ; I say I am confident that the 
 difference between Catholics and Church-of-England- 
 men is far more verbal than real, and if matters were 
 fully explained according to the suggestions of the great 
 Bossuet and the Emperor Leopold, it would disappear 
 altogether. 
 
 In fact let me now say, and I say it with all the 
 emphasis that is possible, when an Anglican, or a Pro- 
 testant, individually embraces the Catholic faith, does 
 any man suppose that such a convert embraces those 
 things against which the protest of the'sixteenth century 
 was mainly directed ? Far from it. In my opinion that 
 protest was far more guilty of charging the Catholic 
 Church with holding what she never held, than it was 
 of impugning what was really Catholic doctrine. Not 
 that I mean to assert that that protest did not also in 
 a great degree impugn positive^Catholic doctrine, while 
 it affirmed many propositions that were absolutely 
 heterodox. But still, if I may judge from my own 
 experience as a Catholic, I should say that, in embracing 
 Catholicism, those of us who are converts will bear me 
 out in affirming, that for the most part we have been 
 far from embracing what Protestantism condemns. Let 
 me explain myself more clearly. 
 
 After what Dr. Pusey has so ably and so learnedly 
 written, it is quite clear that the Anglican Church herself, 
 although separated from the rest of the Church, has never 
 adopted either the Protestant theory, or what is commonly 
 understood as Protestant doctrine, but that she has main- 
 tained for the most part the ancient Catholic teaching — 
 still there has been, as a matter of fact, a very large 
 
42 
 
 ON THE FUTURE UNITY 
 
 admixture of ultra-Protestant teaching within her com- 
 munion, Well then, in addressing myself to this Pro- 
 testant teaching, I am not accusing the Anglican Church 
 of holding it as a Church, but I simply treat it as a fact 
 connected more or less with the religious history of this 
 country during the last three centuries ; and I ask, does 
 any man suppose, that when I for one became a Catholic 
 many years ago, I ceased to believe that divine adoration 
 was due to God alone? or that I was brought to believe 
 that I ought to pay divine worship to the Blessed Virgin 
 Mary ? or that I might lawfully give to any saint, or to 
 any angel, or to the Mother of God herself, the smallest 
 fraction of that honour, which by the Decalogue God 
 restricts to Himself? or that in calling and saluting Mary 
 as the Mother of God, I believed for a moment that she 
 was the mother of the Divinity?* or that in admitting 
 the doctrine of transiibstantiation, as laid down in the 
 creed of Pope Pius IV., I believed in a gross or carnal 
 Presence of Christ in the Eucharist, and not a heavenly 
 and supernatural, although a real and substantial one? 
 or that when I was brought to value and to seek for 
 Holy Indulgences, I looked upon them as a license to 
 commit sin, or in any other light than as a means of still 
 greater sanctification, such as the Psalmist prayed for, 
 when he cried out,t “ Wash me, O Lord, more and more 
 from my iniquity f'" or that in owning the Sovereign 
 Pontilf to be the chief vicar of Jesus Christ in the spiritual 
 government of the Catholic Church, I abandoned one 
 single iota of the most devoted loyalty to my temporal 
 sovereign the king or queen of Great Britain ? or that I 
 
 * By the general council of Ephesus, the Blessed Virgin Mary was 
 solemnly proclaimed, in contradiction to the errors of Nestorius, 
 OeoroKoc, or Mother of Q-od. But no Catholic ever supposed that 
 that decree implied, that Mary was the mother or authoress of the 
 Godhead. It meant simply that she was the Mother of God Incar- 
 nate, Mother of “ the Word made Flesh," or in other words, the very 
 Mother of Him, who is very God and very Man, in one person. 
 
 t Psalm 1. 
 
OP CHRISTENDOM. 
 
 43 
 
 recognized in the Papacy the slightest shadow of a right to 
 temporal power within the realm of England ? or any other 
 than a purely spiritual power, to be exercised for spiritual 
 and moral purposes? or that, in cordially accepting the 
 decrees of oecumenical councils in regard to the veneration 
 of the Cross, or of the images of Christ, of the Mother of 
 God, and of the blessed Saints of God, I was accepting 
 anything that contradicted God’s commandment in the 
 Decalogue, which is as binding now as it was in the days 
 of Moses on Mount Sinai itself in the midst of the awful 
 th underings and lightnings, wherein God gave it to 
 mankind, and which strictly forbids the making of any 
 graven thing, or of any likeness whatever, to be honoured 
 or adored as God ? or that in devoutly kneeling and 
 praying to our Lord in the presence of His sacred image 
 on the Cross, or as a child in the arms of His most 
 blessed Mother, I put the slightest trust in the material 
 image or memorial before me, or for a moment entertained 
 the absurd and impious idea, that there was any virtue or 
 power in it to see, or hear, or help me?* or that in 
 recommending myself to the intercession of the Blessed 
 Virgin Mary, of the angels or the saints of God, I thought 
 for a moment that they had any power of themselves, 
 independent of God, or that they could help me in any 
 other way than by their prayers to God, or by such 
 actual power as God might delegate to them for the 
 purpose of helping me?t or that in assisting at the 
 venerable sacrifice of the New Law, I was taught to 
 
 * Non quod credatur inesse aliqua in eis divinitas vel virtus, 
 propter quam sint colendse, vel quod ab eis sit aliquid petendum, 
 vel quod fidueia in imaginibus sit Agenda, veluti olim fiebat a 
 Grentibus, quae in idolis spetn suam collocabant . — Concilii Tridentini 
 Sessio XXV., p. 272. 
 
 t Sanetos una cum Christo regnantes orationes suas pro hominibus 
 Deo oiferre : bonum atque utile esse supplieitfer eos invocare ; et ob 
 benefieia impetranda a Deo per Filium ejus Jesum Christum, Dominum 
 nostrum, qui Solus noster Eedemptor et Salvator est, ad eorum 
 orationes opem auxiliumque confugere . — Concilii Tridentini Sessio 
 XXV., p. 271. 
 
44 
 
 ON THE FUTURE UNITY 
 
 believe that the oblation of the Mass in any way contra* 
 dieted or denied the oneness and the all-sufficiency of 
 the sacrifice of Christ upon the Cross, or that it did 
 anything more than offer and represent to God the Father 
 that One Victim, offered once for all in a bloody manner 
 upon the Cross, and now exhibited in an unbloody 
 manner upon the Holy Table?* or that in accepting 
 what the (Ecumenical Council of Florence, representing 
 both the Eastern and Western Churches, had decided in 
 reference to the doctrine of Purgatory and Prayer for the 
 Dead, I was in any way obliged to hold any theological 
 opinion on this matter, beyond what was laid down by 
 that council, in the absence of any decree from any 
 competent authority in the Church to ordain anything 
 beyond that decision?! or that in admitting the infalli- 
 bility of the Church in her doctrinal decisions, I recognized 
 any arbitrary power to add to the substance of what was 
 revealed by God, or anything beyond the power of 
 guarding unimpaired the original deposit of revealed 
 truth on the one hand, and of elucidating and more 
 explicitly unfolding its meaning and true relation to any 
 given question on the other ? | 
 
 * In Ccena Novissima, qua nocte tradebatur, ut dilectse Sponsse susb 
 Ecclesise visibili, sicut hominum natura exigit, relinqueret Sacrificium 
 quo cruentum iLLtru semel iu cruce peragendum repreesentaretur . — 
 Concilii Tridentini Sessio xxii., p. 182. 
 
 t Praecipit sancta synodus episcopis, ut sanam de purgatorio 
 doctrinam d sanctis patribus et sacris conciliis traditam, a Christi 
 fidelibus credi, teneri, doceri, et ubique prsedieari diligenter studeaut. 
 Apud rudem verb plebem difficiliores ac subtiliores quaestiones, 
 quaeque ad edificationem non faeiunt, et ex quibus plerumque nulla 
 fit pietatis accessio, k popularibus concionibus secludantur. Incerta 
 item, vel quao specie falsi laborant, evulgari ae tractari non permit- 
 tant. Ea verb, quae ad curiositatem quandam ant superstitionem 
 spectant, vel turpe lucrum sapiunt, tanquam seandala et fidelinm 
 offendicula prohibeant. — Concilii Tridentini Sessio xxv., p. 270. 
 
 J It may be objected to this statement, that at least the recent 
 definition of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary 
 constitutes a practical refutation of what has been just asserted, and 
 that it exhibits a case of arbitrary addition to the universal faith of 
 Christendom. But it may be easily shown that this is far from being 
 
OF CHRISTENDOM. 
 
 45 
 
 Assuredly there is but one answer to all these questions, 
 and the answer which Catholic orthodoxy at once provides, 
 is precisely the answer that the most timorous scrupulosity 
 of Protestantism would desire ; in other words, — it is my 
 firmest conviction, that if even the most ultra-Protestant 
 member of the Anglican Church would but examine the 
 questions at issue between himself and the Definitions of 
 Faith laid down by the Catholic Church, he would find 
 that Catholicism is something very different from what 
 
 the case. True, the belief in the sinless conception of Mary was not 
 defined absolutely in the Latin Church until our own times, but no 
 one can deny that it was the general belief of the Latin Church from 
 a period of very remote antiquity, while the title Uavayia, given to 
 our Lady in the Grreek liturgy, constituted a witness to the truth of 
 the doctrine even from the days of the Apostles themselves : and it 
 is a wonderful fact that the ancient Apostolic Church of Abyssinia, 
 although for so many ages tainted with the errors of Eutyches, 
 nevertheless always maintained the sinless conception of Mary as a 
 part of the divine faith ; so that several years ago a friend of mine, 
 the learned Erench traveller Mens. d’Abbadie, after a lengthened 
 stay in Ethiopia, was assured of this fact by the patriarch of that 
 ancient Church. And I myself was assured of the same fact by the 
 Syrian Archbishop of Keriatim, who visited me at Grrace-Dieu, the 
 year after the Syrian patriarch and twelve bishops with three arch- 
 bishops of the ancient church of Syria, following the Syro-Chaldaic 
 rite of the Apostle St. James, had returned to the communion of the 
 Pope. He stated that in the Syrian Church the sinless conception 
 of Mary had always been believed as of divine faith. So that when 
 Pius IX. defined it to be an article of divine faith, he added nothing 
 to the original deposit of revealed truth, he simply elucidated the 
 ancient tradition of the Catholic Church, vindicating it ivom future 
 contradiction. Some heterodox persons have pretended that this 
 defisnition of the Holy See would make a goddess of Mary : but this 
 is a childish assertion. Do we not all believe that Adam and Eve 
 were originally created free from all sin ? and do we therefore make 
 gods of them ? those who think so, know not what godhead means. 
 The Church believes, that Mary is only a creature, and whatever 
 grace, whatever glory, whatever privilege she possesses, all comes to 
 her from the free gift of Grod, her Creator, in consequence of the 
 foreseen merits of her divine Son, Jesus Christ our only Eedeemer. 
 As Jesus Christ is the Saviour of mankind in general by atoning for 
 their sins, so is He the Saviour even of His own mother also by 
 having graciously preserved her from all sin, both original and actual : 
 blessed be His most holy name ! 
 
46 
 
 ON THE FUTURE UNITY 
 
 he has been led to suppose ; and that wliile on the most 
 cardinal points of faith, such as the mystery of the 
 Blessed Trinity, the Incarnation and Atonement of Jesus 
 Christ, and the moral teaching of the Gospel, he already 
 is perfectly agreed with the Catholic Church ; on the 
 other points on which he has hitherto protested against 
 her, he would find there was nothing in her teaching 
 that contradicted that which he already held, nothing 
 which even on his own principles would justify a con- 
 tinuance of the abnormal division of Christendom. 
 
 He would find, after all, that there was no substantial 
 difference between his own notions and those of the 
 Church as to the intrinsic nature of idolatry and super- 
 stition, only that hitherto he had been misinformed as to 
 the nature of the Church’s teaching. He would admit 
 that it w'as not fair to charge upon the Church the 
 absurdities or the blunders of individuals, or anything 
 that was evidently repugnant to her principles. He 
 would find, that what hitherto he had imagined to tend 
 towards a relaxation of Gospel morality, was nothing but 
 an aid to uphold and enforce it, and to make it practicable 
 for man as he is. In a word he would find, what all who 
 have ever seriously investigated the question have found, 
 that in his previous protest against Catholicism he was 
 fighting with a phantom, so that he would be constrained 
 to cry out with the great St. Augustine, when he aban- 
 doned the errors of the Manicheans and embraced the 
 Catholic faith : “ Gaudens erubui, non me tot annos 
 adversus Catholicam Fidem, sed contra carnalium cogita- 
 tionum figraenta latrasse. Eo quippe temerarius et 
 impius fueram, quod ea qu.e debebam qujerendo 
 
 DISCERE, ACCUSANDO DIXERAM.” * 
 
 If therefore it appear to a Catholic mind that there is 
 a difficulty in the way of reunion, from the very aspect 
 which Catholicity presents to the eye of an ultra-Pro- 
 testant, it is obvious that the very fact of past conversions 
 
 * S. Augustini Confessiones, lib. vi. cap. 3. 
 
OF CHRISTENDOM. 
 
 47 
 
 is an overwhelming argument against the permanence of 
 that difficulty ; whilst the growth of late years within 
 the Church of England of Catholic convictions and 
 Catholic practices is another overwhelming proof of the 
 force of Catholic truth, and of the readiness to embrace 
 it on the part of sincere men, when once it is properly 
 propounded to them. 
 
 (3.) Political Difficulties on the side of the State. 
 
 The Church of England, being so closely bound up as 
 she is with the State, and acknowledging, as she does, 
 that the temporal sovereign of England is her temporal 
 Head, it is obvious, that whilst the national Church 
 continues in that close relation to the secular power 
 she can do nothing effectually to re-establish her union 
 with the rest of Christendom, without the consent and 
 co-operation of the State, with w'hich she is so closely 
 allied. 
 
 In treating this part of my subject, I am bound to say 
 that I am not one of those who wish to see a separation 
 of Church and State, and no one more heartily concurs 
 than I do in the spirit of the famous encyclical of Pope 
 Gregory XVI.,* in which his Holiness condemned the 
 views of the Abb^ de la Mennais, who had asserted that 
 a total severance of the Church from the State was the 
 proper normal condition of the Christian Church. 
 
 We have already seen that the Divine Founder of 
 Christianity commanded his Apostles to gather all na- 
 tions into his fold ; and that, therefore, the true Christian 
 Church was to be identified with nations in their cor- 
 porate and national capacity, while innumerable prophe- 
 cies of Holy Writ foretell the great part which kings 
 and queens are to play in upholding and propagating 
 the religion of Jesus. “ Kings shall be thy nursing 
 fathers, and queens thy nursing mothers,” was the pro- 
 
 * Eneyclical of Gregory XVI., a.d. 1832 . 
 
48 
 
 ON THE FUTURE UNITY 
 
 mise made of old to the Catholic Church, and ecclesi- 
 astical history from the very infancy of the Church 
 records its fulfilment. Any theory, therefore, that con- 
 templates the divorce of the Church from the State, 
 contemplates, to my mind, either a contradiction to our 
 Lord’s own words, or at least a temporary deviation 
 from their spirit, and a partial revolt of nations against 
 the normal principle laid down by our Saviour ; whilst 
 that spirit of jealousy and mistrust that would as a 
 matter of principle exclude the royal protectorship of 
 the Church, expressly foretold as it is in the Word of 
 God, appears to me nothing less than a direct insult to 
 God Himself. 
 
 In laying this down, I am asserting nothing that would 
 favour any undue encroachment on the part of the State 
 overtheindependence of theChurch withinher own sphere 
 of action, or any violation of her essential liberties ; the 
 boundary between the two domains, although often 
 trespassed upon, has always been apparent for every one 
 who acted in good faith, and who aimed at right and 
 justice. 
 
 When Henry VIII. stepped beyond the limits which 
 the Church had cheerfully recognized in his predecessors, 
 he not only violated the common feeling of public right, 
 which was universally held and acted upon throughout 
 Christendom ; but I think I shall not be saying more 
 than every sober-minded statesman, whether Catholic or 
 Protestant, would approve at the present day, when I 
 assert that, in the full extent of his claim of spiritual 
 supremacy over the Church, Henry asserted a principle 
 which is now everywhere repudiated ; and if our actual 
 sovereign, Queen Victoria, still styles herself the Head 
 of the Church in her dominions, she does so in a very 
 different sense from that of her royal predecessor. 
 
 The truth is, however men may view the royal supre- 
 macy as a matter of theory, in its practical working at 
 the present day in this kingdom, I do not see that it 
 invests the Crown with any power beyond what is exer- 
 
OF CHRISTENDOM. 
 
 49 
 
 cised in allCatbolic countries by their respective sovereigns 
 ■with the full consent and approval of the Holy See. 
 Queen Victoria selects and nominates the persons whom 
 she believes to be the most qualified to occupy the episco- 
 pal sees of the Established Church. All the Catholic 
 sovereigns do the same. It is true that in their case 
 the Pope possesses a veto over the appointment, but 
 only in the case of a canonical impediment ; and so even 
 is the English sovereign, in theory at least, fettered in his 
 power of appointment. He cannot appoint a bishop 
 who should be convicted of heresy by a competent court 
 within the realm. Practically this limit may go for very 
 little, but it exists in theory, and it might under certain 
 circumstances operate as a real control. 
 
 Now it is quite clear that no reunion of Christendom 
 could be effected, which would not involve some modi- 
 fication of the royal supremacy, so as to bring it here in 
 England into harmony "wfith what is now universally 
 admitted in all other Catholic countries. And before 
 this could be done, the sovereign of this country would 
 have to weigh the advantages that would result from 
 such a modification, with the assumed advantages con- 
 nected with the supremacy as at present exercised. 
 
 Practically, I do not see what the Queen would give 
 up ; by a wise concordat with the Holy See, she would 
 give to the National Church that right of self-government 
 which she already acknowledges in every other corpora- 
 tion of the State, but she would in no degree abandon her 
 own sovereign rights, or that royal protectorate which 
 the Church has gladly recognized in temporal princes 
 ever since the days of Constantine. Her Majesty w'ould 
 acknowledge in theory, as she now does in fact, that 
 while she, and she alone, was the fountain of all temporal 
 honour in the State, the bishops of the Church derived 
 their mission and their spiritual jurisdiction from God, 
 through the canonical institution of the successor of 
 St. Peter, the supreme vicar of Our Lord on earth ; whilst, 
 on the other hand, a concordat with his Holiness might 
 
 E 
 
50 
 
 ON THE FUTURE UNITY 
 
 acknowledge in her Majesty a full right to present to 
 the episcopal sees according to the sacred canons. 
 
 In saying this, I am not presuming to dictate any 
 course of action either to my august sovereign on the 
 one hand, or to the sovereign pontiff of the Catholic 
 Church on the other : God forbid ! I am merely showing, 
 with the most profound reverence for each of the parties 
 concerned, that there is no insuperable obstacle in the 
 way of an amicable adjustment between the existing 
 prerogatives of the British crown and the spiritual rights 
 of the Church, and that if the State made some conces- 
 sion on one side, it would gain infinitely more than it 
 would lose, in the increased vitality and unity of the 
 Church ; and no wise statesman will deny that the unity 
 and vitality of the Church would greatly conduce to the 
 spread of religion and morality in the land, and that 
 religion and morality are the natural foundations of every 
 commonwealth. 
 
 This is a truth so obvious, and so universally adiuitted, 
 that it would be a mere waste of time to insist upon it. 
 But no one can deny that, if a reunion were brought 
 about, we should at once see a fusion into one body of 
 the members of the great national Established Church 
 and of the members of the Roman Catholic Church, 
 which, in their aggregate in the three kingdoms, are said 
 to constitute nearly one-third of the entire population. 
 Any statesman will see how great a numerical majority 
 the National Church would then constitute, and although 
 the dissenters would still remain in theory as they are, 
 yet the moral force of dissent would be gone. 
 
 Every one who looks below the surface, will at once 
 perceive that the true force of dissent lies in the abnor- 
 mal separation of the National Church from the rest of 
 Christendom. What the Church of England could do 
 against authority which she had previously admitted, 
 her children could equally do against heiself. Hence 
 no sooner had Elizabeth consummated the severance 
 from the Holy See and the rest of the Catholic Church, 
 
OF CHRISTENDOM. 
 
 51 
 
 than her own subjects acted on the precedent, and the 
 union of the National Church was broken by the secession 
 of the Puritans, I need not dwell on the religious and 
 political catastrophe that quickly followed ; but if at the 
 present day w'e do not feel all the evils that spring from 
 religious disunion with all the same force that our 
 ancestors felt when Charles I. lay bleeding on the scaf- 
 fold, or when the peace of England was menaced by a 
 disputed succession to the crown and a partial rebellion, 
 yet we may still confess in our own measure and propor- 
 tion, that England would be a far happier and far greater 
 country, if to all its other advantages religious union 
 could be added as a crowning benefit to give increased 
 vitality to all the rest. 
 
 Our statesmen and our legislators know, what all 
 men feel, that a sound and religious education is the one 
 great want of the day ; and they know how great an 
 obstacle religious disunion presents in its way, so that 
 the legislature, in order to meet it, in providing for this 
 universally recognized want, has been compelled to make 
 separate grants of public money on certain conditions to 
 all the different denominations of Christians that chose 
 to submit to those conditions. But in so doing, while 
 offering a remedy for the prevalent ignorance and con- 
 sequent immorality, the State is in fact prolonging the 
 abnormal state of religious disunion, and so weakening 
 the force of the religious principle itself, by augmenting 
 the individual strength of each of the antagonists, that 
 are labouring far more for the destruction of rival creeds, 
 than for propagating sound morality or positive belief 
 amongst all ranks of the community. 
 
 Meanwhile our statesmen will not deny that there is 
 such a principle as infidelity abroad, working amongst 
 our people and sapping the foundations of our social 
 system. After the political convulsions of 1848, and the 
 great European catastrophe that ensued, even though a 
 temporary reaction may have succeeded, and though at 
 this moment we may breathe with comparative security, 
 
 E 2 
 
52 
 
 ON THE FUTURE UNITY 
 
 it would be madness in those who have the direction of 
 our political affairs to neglect any means of social im- 
 provement ; and what means could act more powerfully 
 on its behalf than a restoration of religious union ? 
 
 We may be again about to witness some fresh erup- 
 tion of the fermenting elements that everywhere in 
 Europe are giving tokens of renewed restlessness. The 
 financial embarrassments of continental governments 
 might easily precipitate a fresh outburst of the fiery vol- 
 cano that is murmuring beneath the surface, and should 
 the torrent once more break forth, who can tell to what 
 limit it would extend its ravages? We have only to 
 open the pages of such a periodical as the French Cor- 
 respondant* of this very month, to ascertain what one of 
 the greatest statesmen and writers of France hesitates 
 not to express in his too just apprehension of the pro- 
 spects of the continent. With no less eloquence than 
 sagacity, that eminent man prepares us for some terrible 
 catastrophe. Nor does he stand alone in his apprehen- 
 sions. Our own best writers on finance and political 
 economy concur in the same gloomy forebodings, not in- 
 deed, I am thankful to say, for our owm beloved country, 
 but for others on the continent. And who can deny 
 that an outburst there, now that we are so mixed up 
 with continental policy and continental interests, would 
 affect England also ? and are there no smouldering em- 
 bers even here, no jarring elements, to be rekindled or 
 convulsed by the conflagration of our neighbours? 
 
 It is not for us to give a gloomy answer to such 
 questions: but if it be wise to strengthen our national 
 defences in the midst of peace, to provide for possible 
 aggression at a future day, we may at least urge that 
 whatever may tend to consolidate the moral and spiritual 
 union of her Majesty’s people is not beneath the atten- 
 tion of her statesmen. And what would more tend to 
 
 * Correspondant, 3Iai, 1857. Des Appels comme d' Abus, par le 
 Comte de Montalembert. Paris: Libraire de Charles Ponniol. 1857. 
 
OF CHRISTENDOM. 
 
 53 
 
 effect that object than a healing of our religious differ- 
 ences? 
 
 I will not dwell more at length upon this portion of 
 my subject, but I will content myself with expressing 
 my hope, that should the great question of religious 
 unity be ever seriously entertained, neither the political 
 nor the religious difficulties that stand in the way of its 
 solution would prove insuperable. 
 
 With a good will on our side, and the grace of God 
 from above, I for one believe that they will be sur- 
 mounted. 
 
 (4.) Political Advantages that would result from the 
 Restoration of Unity. 
 
 In treating of the political difficulties on the side of 
 the State, standing in the way of the restoration of unity, 
 I have already anticipated in great measure this part of 
 my subject, which would enforce the political advantages 
 that would result from its restoration. At the same 
 time something may remain to be said upon this point. 
 
 It is notorious that, in all ages of the world, legislators 
 have aimed at religious unity as a necessary element in 
 every political constitution that pretended to approach 
 a civilized standard, or to aim at endurance and stability. 
 This is so true, that we find it to be the admitted prin- 
 ciple of every political system that history has handed 
 down to us ; whether we turn to the Bible for the record 
 of that civil polity which God of old communicated to 
 His chosen people the descendants of Abraham, or 
 whether we consult the more general ti’aditions of the 
 human race in the classical authors with which in our 
 early youth we were familiarized. Whether amongst 
 the true worshippers of the one true God, or amid the 
 corruptions of primitive truth in the multiplied systems 
 of heathen mythology, we equally find witness borne to 
 this great fundamental principle, that the national pro- 
 
54 
 
 ON THE FUTURE UNITY 
 
 fession of one religion is the surest and strongest founda- 
 tion of the common weal. 
 
 Was this a prejudice, or was it founded upon a great 
 truth originally given to man by his Creator ? That it 
 sprang from the latter source, that is from God Himself, 
 who stamped it upon the common instinct of humanity, 
 I believe may be deduced, not merely from the great 
 fact of its universal recognition, but from what is perhaps 
 more in harmony with the notions of the nineteenth 
 century — from a philosophical and experimental demon- 
 stration of its fitness for securing human prosperity, and 
 of the tremendous alternative that everywhere has been 
 the issue of its rejection. 
 
 If it had pleased God to permit the working of the 
 infidel principle always to continue in men’s minds as it 
 did in those of Bolingbroke or Voltaire, deadening the 
 sense of right and wrong in the midst of gaiety and dis- 
 sipation, searing the conscience indeed as with an iron, 
 but only augmenting the sum of sensual pleasure, and 
 turning the ridicule of corrupt men in triumphant sneers 
 against the restraints and mortifications of the Gospel, 
 there would perhaps be ground for misgiving to the 
 advocate of Christian unity, not indeed from any con- 
 sciousness of weakness on his side, but from an appre- 
 hension of the difficulty that lay in his way to persuade 
 others to admit the force of what he urged. But when 
 the nineteenth century was ushered in amid the horrors 
 of anarchy, triumphant from its alliance with infidelity ; 
 when the abandonment of religion everywhere led to the 
 destruction of all that men had ever valued ; when pro- 
 perty and privilege fell side by side, and altars and 
 thrones in one dreadful ruin symbolized tlie overthrow 
 of the whole social system, a solemn lesson was given to 
 nations and to rulers, and if not accepted, they cannot 
 at least plead ignorance of the penalty which its rejection 
 entails. He who never permits evil in His creature, 
 but to draw from it a greater good for that same creature, 
 has at least now shown what the rulers of states should 
 
OF CHRISTENDOM. 
 
 55 
 
 aim at, if they wish for the continuance of their own 
 safety, and for the welfare of those whom they govern. 
 
 We all know by what means in days of old the secular 
 state upheld the religious system, to which it appealed as 
 the supernatural sanction and foundation of the political 
 edifice. Physical force in every case was invoked to the 
 aid of the national belief. Whether we turn to the 
 annals of true religion amongst the Jews, or of corrujited 
 religion amongst the heathen, force was the last argu- 
 ment in support of the prevalent belief: and in a period 
 of rude civilization, this appeal to force was a defence, 
 rather than a violation, of the rights of conscience. 
 Nevertheless it was not always so to be. In the fulness 
 of time, when the law of Moses had accomplished its 
 mission, that it should serve (as an inspired apostle 
 expresses it) “as a schoolmaster to bring men to Christ,” 
 when the philosophical schools of Gentile civilization had 
 fulfilled their purpose to witness to the great primitive 
 truths handed down by the universal tradition of the 
 human race and deeply fitted into the reason of mankind, 
 while, by their blunders and their discordant theories, 
 they confessed their own impotence to guide man to 
 the great end of his creation, He whom the law fore- 
 shadowed, and the prophets had foretold, whom pagan 
 oracles and Sibylline visions had dimly foreshadowed, and 
 whom all nations desired, because all nations felt that 
 they needed a Divine Teacher, at length appeared ; and 
 though from His cradle to His cross He chose for Him- 
 self a life of mortification, of poverty, and of suffering. 
 He, Avith the infinite charity and loving benevolence of 
 God, came to bestow upon His creatures, whose own 
 nature He assumed, the largest amount of temporal 
 happiness here below, and the promise of everlasting 
 happiness when this life should be closed. How eagerly 
 the human race listened to His voice, and to that of 
 those whom He sent, history records ; and ecclesiastical 
 history, in recounting the successive annexation to His 
 great society, the Church, of all the nations of the earth, 
 
5G 
 
 ON THE FUTURE UNITY 
 
 records the foundation and gradual formation of that 
 civilized Christendom, in the midst of which we now 
 find ourselves, and the broken unity of which we believe 
 that it is the interest of all men, and especially of states- 
 men, to restore. 
 
 The history of every Christian nation bears witness 
 to the zeal with which our Christian ancestors strove to 
 uphold religious unity. The legislation of all Christen- 
 dom in this respect was the same, and even when the 
 protest of the sixteenth century had severed half 
 Christendom from the unity of the Church, this prin- 
 ciple was not abandoned in the legislation of Protestant 
 countries. Religion, as they accepted it, was fenced in 
 by them with the same legal penalties and safeguards as 
 their Catholic ancestors had employed of old to uphold 
 and defend that faith which they had inherited from the 
 first preachers of the Gospel. 
 
 It would open a wide field for discussion, if I were 
 to enter into the various arguments that have been 
 advanced both for and against the employment of force 
 in defence of religious truth. After all that I have ever 
 been able to apprehend in reference to this important 
 question, I confess that if on the one hand powerful 
 arguments exist in favour of force, as the natural 
 auxiliary of whatever is established by the universal 
 consent, I am convinced on the other, that its employ- 
 ment, if at least it ewtend to sanguinary punishment, is 
 very alien to the spirit of Christ and of the Christian 
 Church ; while I am persuaded that history proves its 
 utter failure in upholding the vitality of Christian 
 belief in the various Christian nations that have ap- 
 pealed to it for the preservation of unity. 
 
 And the reason for this conclusion is obvious ; if 
 Christianity has a political bearing, it is only as a 
 secondary, although very important consequence of 
 its fundamental principles. It leads men to think first 
 of the things of God ; it promises the temporal bless- 
 ings, “ after which the heathen seek ” in common with 
 
OF CHRISTENDOM. 
 
 57 
 
 ourselves, as a conditional result and consequence of 
 individual and national fidelity to its leading maxim. 
 
 Are, then, temporal rulers to be indifferent to truth, 
 or to leave it entirely to its own resources ? It has 
 been the object of this whole essay to demonstrate the 
 very opposite proposition. But is there no just medium 
 between what so justly revolts all sound Christian minds 
 at the present day in the atrocities of the Spanish In- 
 quisition, or in our own fiery statute de Hceretico Com- 
 burendo, to say nothing of Protestant penal laws levelled 
 against the professors of the ancient faith at a later 
 period ; — I ask, is there no just medium between such 
 attempts as these on the part of the State to maintain 
 religious union, and a total indifference to it ? 
 
 I think there is. The State, in my opinion, should 
 promote the cause of truth, by giving full liberty to all 
 those who uphold its principles to carry them out to 
 their legitimate consequences. In doing this at the 
 present day, the question may well be asked, as it was 
 by Pilate under the heathen Roman empire, “ What is 
 truth?” for now as then men’s minds are so divided, and 
 so distracted with doubts, that it is difficult to point to 
 any country in which the government, that adequately 
 represented the nation, could be found able distinctly 
 to answer the question. 
 
 But notwithstanding this difficulty, and though, in 
 the presence of such a mass of religious discord, it is 
 clear that any government that would interfere between 
 the various denominations would violate the first prin- 
 ciples of sound policy, and, instead of promoting social 
 harmony, would be laying the foundation of civil war, 
 yet, admitting religious disunion to be an evil, it surely 
 would not be contrary to sound policy to promote a 
 mature and sober investigation into the possibility of a 
 general reunion of all those who hold a positive belief. 
 At least, it is clear, that any government that did not 
 profess open infidelity, and that regarded religion as the 
 only foundation of morality, must admit that some such 
 
58 
 
 ON. THE FUTURE UNITY 
 
 course would eventually tend to promote even the tem- 
 poral welfare of the state. 
 
 How many evils would be removed if religious union 
 could be restored ! and in saying this, I am not referring 
 to mere imaginary evils, or only to spiritual evils, and 
 such as would be so termed by theologians. A man 
 must be very blind indeed, very ignorant of history, if 
 he overlook or underrate the social mischief that in all 
 ages has resulted from religious differences. How many 
 evils, even in our own times, have we ourselves seen 
 resulting from this very source ! Was it no evil that for 
 many years before the final settlement of the question of 
 Catholic emancipation, one half of the empire was kept 
 in a constant state of irritation and agitation ; — that 
 many millions of the subjects of the British crown 
 should feel that they had no bitterer enemy than the 
 very government to which they would naturally have 
 looked up as their protector, but which practically had 
 no relation with them but that of a pitiless oppressor? 
 Was it no evil that the enemies of the British crown 
 could feel that a system of policy was pursued under its 
 sanction, that alienated the affections, if not the loyalty, 
 of one-third of its subjects? And what but religious 
 difference was the source and foundation of such an 
 infatuated policy? Catholic emancipation, it is true, 
 was at length conceded, but not till it was wrung from 
 the fears of the British Government, while religious dis- 
 union still remained unhealed, and eating like a cancer 
 into the social system. But did Catholic emancipation 
 satisfy the Catholic subjects of the British crown? or 
 did it quell the animosity and the jealousy of the ultra- 
 Protestant party ? Assuredly neither the one nor the 
 other ! Catholic emancipation has done something to 
 redress the wrongs of Catholics, but not everything. It 
 has still left the endowments of the Church in Ireland, 
 originally granted for the maintenance of the Catholic 
 faith, and the support of Catholic charities, in the hands 
 of a small ultra-Protestant minority, whose religion still 
 
OF CHRISTENDOM. 
 
 59 
 
 wields an invidious and odious ascendancy over that of 
 the overwhelming majority of the Irish nation. While 
 that anomalous and unjust state of things continues, 
 Ireland will ever constitute the chief difficulty of the 
 Imperial Government, whatever party may direct the 
 counsels of the sovereign. Is this no evil ? and would it 
 be no advantage if this could be removed by a legitimate 
 union between the Anglican and the Catholic Churches ? 
 Again, look to the periodical displays of insane bigotry, 
 that, session after session of the British Parliament, dis- 
 grace not only our houses of legislature, but the public 
 meetings of our metropolis. Year after year, men are 
 to be found with that lack of political wisdom, that 
 deficiency of a sense of justice or of sound logic, as to be 
 capable of threatening to violate the existing settlement 
 of vested interests and pledged endowments by con- 
 tinued onslaughts on that paltry concession to Catholic 
 Ireland — the Maynooth Grant; or by some wretched 
 endeavour to violate the liberties and the domestic 
 privacy of Catholic sisterhoods, regardless that they 
 are the abodes of some of the noblest-born ladies of 
 this empire. Do ultra-Protestants imagine that her 
 Majesty’s Catholic subjects neither feel nor resent such 
 continued acts of insult and injustice ? or do our statesmen 
 think it wise that a few fools and bigots should be able 
 thus annually to tamper with the loyalty of one-third of 
 her Majesty’s subjects?* And yet, while our existing 
 
 * It appears from the most accurate statistics, that in Great 
 Britain and Ireland alone the Catholic subjects of the British crown 
 amount to no less than one-third of the entire population, while in 
 the colonies the proportion of Catholics is larger still : in Canada we 
 all know that the Established Church of the country is Catholic, and 
 the overwhelming majority of the people belong to that faith. In 
 the West Indies, at the Cape of Good Hope, in the Mauritius, in 
 the vast peninsula of India, the majority of the Christian population 
 is said to be Catholic. In Australia the Catholics have an archbishop 
 and seven bishops, all of whom are maintained at the cost of the 
 British Government. In Malta and the Ionian Islands the whole 
 native population is Catholic, of either the Greek or Latin rites. In 
 
60 
 
 ON THE FUTURE UNITY 
 
 religious differences remain unhealed, this folly on the 
 one side, and this danger for the State on the other, 
 must continue also. Or will it be said, that the wide 
 spirit of charity inculcated by what is sometimes called 
 tlie Broad-Church section of ultra-Protestantism, may, by 
 the proclamation of universal compromise, effect a truce 
 between theological antagonists, and so practically effect 
 as close a system of political union as could result even 
 from a reunion of Christians in a profession of definite 
 belief? 
 
 This has been said, and I have heard it urged with all 
 the vehemence of undoubting conviction ; but unluckily 
 for this theory, while I am now writing, its hollowness, 
 its shallowness, its pretentious falsehood, is at once de- 
 monstrated. You have a Broad-Church bishop acting in 
 the metropolis itself, and close under the eye of the 
 Government — a man known as the disciple of Arnold, 
 and supposed to personify the policy of compromise — and 
 w'hat does he do to heal the bitterness of religious strife, 
 and to inaugurate the triumph of his boasted principle ? 
 He visits (so I see it reported in the London journals), 
 in company with some turbulent dissenter, the beautiful 
 churches which were raised by Anglo-Catholic zeal, and 
 thankfully consecrated by his predecessor ; and scorning 
 the feelings of consistent and conscientious members of 
 his own Church, setting at naught even the permissions 
 of the law, he orders the cross to be removed from 
 Christian temples, and applies insulting epithets to the 
 solemn worship performed within their precincts ; he 
 rakes up the old odious epithets of “ Popish ” and 
 “ superstitious ” (if, at least, I may believe the state- 
 ments of the public journals), and he proves the breadth 
 of his Broad-Church charity and the width of his wisdom 
 
 fine the reader will perhaps be surprised when he hears that, subject 
 to the imperial sceptre of Queen Victoria, the Catholic Church num- 
 bers no fewer than eighty episcopal sees, very nearly as many as in 
 the French empire. 
 
OF CHRISTENDOM. 
 
 Cl 
 
 by an arbitrary display of intolerant authority.* How 
 his conduct will be received in his own communion, it is 
 not my province to inquire; but one thing I will tell 
 him as a Catholic, that his use of the epithet Popish will 
 not be easily either forgotten or forgiven by nine millions 
 of her Majesty’s subjects. Let Lord Palmerston place 
 the Church of England under the direction of Lord 
 Shaftesbury, if he pleases, and let him try to bolster up 
 the waning fortunes of his precarious administration by 
 sacrificing the peace of the National Church to the con- 
 flicting and contradictory theories of Broad-Church un- 
 believers, and of Low'-Church impugners of the principles 
 of Anglicanism, he will at least have rendered one 
 service to the cause of ultimate reunion ; he will have 
 shown how powerless is any other measure to allay the 
 bitterness of polemical strife, or to produce even the 
 semblance of peace. 
 
 But there is another evil that more perhaps than any 
 other affects society at the present moment, the direct 
 consequence of our religious differences, and which 
 nothing but a reconciliation of Christians can heal ; I 
 mean the impossibility, on any other principle, of estab- 
 lishing a sound svstem of national education. The 
 legislature indeed strives to meet the evil, by aiding all 
 to educate in their respective systems of religious belief. 
 The State is wise in doing so, it is the only way of 
 meeting the circumstances of the case at the present 
 moment ;J)ut at the same time it must be acknowledged 
 that such a policy amounts to a profession of practical 
 indifference (on the part of the State) to the distinction 
 
 * At the same time that the public press records this enlightened 
 and Christian crusade of the Broad-Church Bishop of London against 
 the symbol of human redemption, we witness an address of fraternal 
 sympathy from other members of the Broad- Church party to “ their 
 Lutheran brethren ” at Berlin. Have they forgotten that Lutherans 
 retain not only the cross, but the crucifix in their churches ? and 
 that if the Bishop of London were to enter any one of their temples, 
 he would find something still more popish (to use his own word) 
 than anything in St. Barnabas’s or St. Paul’s ? ^ 
 
62 
 
 ON THE FUTURE UNITY 
 
 between truth and error, and sooner or later the effects 
 of such a policy will be felt in the growth of scepticism 
 in the minds of public men, and in the general weaken- 
 ing of the religious principle. But even this evil, 
 gigantic as it is, would be annihilated by the restoration 
 of religious unity. 
 
 It would carry me beyond the limits of an essay like 
 this, if I were to dwell at greater length on this part of 
 my subject ; but I have said enough to point out some 
 of the evils that actually exist, and how the reunion 
 which I advocate would tend to heal theiu, and the 
 great political advantage that would thereby ensue to 
 the commonwealth. Let us therefore turn to the last 
 point of my subject. 
 
 (5.) Religious Advantages that would result from the 
 Restoration of Unity. 
 
 In looking forwards to the religious advantages that 
 might reasonably be expected to flow from the reunion 
 of the National Church of England with the rest of 
 Christendom, it would seem almost superfluous for me 
 to assure my readers that the union I contemplate, and 
 which alone I advocate, involves no sacrifice of truth, no 
 compromise of principle ; but that it is a union resulting 
 from the most mature discussion of all our differences, 
 and a deliberate adoption of one definite standard of 
 orthodox belief. Any union that was based, on com- 
 promise would assuredly fail of its purpose. It would 
 come to nothing if attempted, and even the attempt to 
 effect it would break down under the weight of its own 
 intrinsic absurdity. Mosheim, who, in his “ Ecclesiastical 
 History,” records the efforts of Archbishop Wake to 
 promote a union between the English and Gallican 
 Churches, tells us of other schemes also that failed ; such 
 as that of one John Dury, known sometimes by his Latin 
 name Dura3us, a Scotchman, who thought of reuniting 
 the Protestant communities, and who induced Arch- 
 
OF CHRISTENDOM. 
 
 63 
 
 bishop Laud to write for him a kind of circular to 
 Protestant pastors ;* and w'e read of another, George 
 Calixtus, who followed a similar course, but never 
 effected anything. But such failures were natural, for 
 all these schemes were based on a wrong principle ; they 
 were like something which we have witnessed in our 
 own day, — the attempt of the late King of Prussia to 
 make a fusion between the Lutherans and Calvinists in 
 that kingdom, a scheme which appears to have done more 
 for scepticism than for religious union ; or like another 
 scheme, in which our own Government was induced 
 to take a part, — the establishment of an Anglo- Prussian 
 Protestant bishopric at Jerusalem, in which Anglicanism 
 and Lutheranism were to take it in turns ; or like some 
 German churches, which I have visited in my travels on 
 the continent, in which the bewildered stranger may 
 witness at one hour the celebration of Catholic High 
 Mass, at another the Lutheran rite of the Lord’s Supper, 
 and then the Calvinistic denial of the two former ! 
 
 Such schemes as these are not what 1 contemplate. 
 
 What I believe to be possible, and M'hat I look for- 
 ward to as fraught wdth unspeakable blessings for man- 
 kind, would be a union such as that which was under- 
 taken and effected by the Council of Florence between 
 the Greek and Latin Churches, — a union which, as the 
 learned Pitzipios has triumphantly established in a work 
 I have frequently appealed to, has never since been 
 broken, at least by any formal act of either of those 
 great divisions of the Christian world, which, therefore, 
 still subsists de jure., and may at any moment be restored 
 de facto. And here let me urge upon my friends of the 
 Anglican Church who are desirous of union, that, in my 
 humble judgment, if they would establish a solid work, 
 they would do well to examine the rules of the Oriental 
 Society for the Restoration of Unity, which the learned 
 Greek author Pitzipios has founded under the express 
 
 * Moslieini, vol. v. p. 277. 
 
64 
 
 ON THE FUTURE "tTNITY 
 
 sanction of the reigning Pope. I have written to Paris 
 for a copy of its rules ; but, unfortunately, I have not 
 yet received them. As soon as they arrive, I will endea- 
 vour to make them known to my readers through the 
 columns of the Union newspaper. In my opinion, it 
 would greatly conduce to the success of our great cause, 
 if some of the most learned divines of the Anglican 
 Church could meet at Paris some of the most learned 
 of the Greek and Latin theologians, and in concert with 
 them lay down certain preliminaries that might serve as 
 a T'asis for further operations. I have said at Paris^ 
 simply because that city is the head-quarters of the 
 Oriental Society already established by the Pope to 
 effect the general reunion of Christendom, and because 
 Paris is nearer to ourselves than Rome would be, and 
 because it is the great centre of European politics and 
 European civilization. Now, in proposing this suggestion, 
 I am quite aware that nothing ought, to be done in a 
 hurry, and that, if ever there was a question in reference 
 to which every step ought to be taken with the utmost 
 caution, it is the one we are discussing. For union to 
 be lasting, every least point must be maturely weighed, 
 and a perfect consent arrived at, not only by the ecclesi- 
 astical superiors on all sides, but also, let me emphatically 
 add, by the secular powers of Christendom also. Nothing 
 good can be brought about without the approval and 
 consent of the three greatest sovereigns of the world, 
 — the Emperor of Russia, the Emperor of France, and 
 the Queen of Great Britain ; * and, on the other hand, 
 nothing must be done without the knowledge and ap- 
 
 * In reference to this assertion, I would refer my readers to a most 
 interesting and able work, that has lately been published at Paris, by 
 a Kussian Prince, who some years ago became a member of the illus- 
 trious Society of Jesus ; the maiu object of the work being to promote 
 a corporate reunion between the Eussian Church and the great centre 
 of Catholicism. The work itself is entitled, “ La Lussie sera-t-elle 
 Gatholique? Far le Fere J. Gagarin, de la Compagnie de Jesus. 
 Far is ; Charles Donniol. 1856.” 
 
OF CHRISTENDOM. 
 
 65 
 
 proval of him whom all Christendom practically acknow- 
 ledges as tlie great head of the Christian Church, our 
 Holy Father Pope Pius the Ninth. 
 
 My own conviction is that a preliminary meeting at 
 Paris, of divines of the three great communions, would 
 probably lead to what might end in the calling of an 
 oecumenical council. In my opinion, nothing but an 
 oecumenical council can possibly heal our differences and 
 restore that unity for which we are all sighing, and 
 which alone can heal the disorders of the body politic 
 throughout the civilized earth ; and when I say^the 
 civilized earth, let it be borne in mind that the whole 
 universe is being rapidly absorbed within the control of 
 the civilized states. 
 
 Should the Christian princes, who are now by God’s 
 mercy united in a general peace, agree with our Holy 
 Father the Pope, that a general council might be sum- 
 moned for the restoration of religious unity, how glorious 
 would.be the result! Never was there a period in the 
 history of Christendom more favourable for the successful 
 issue of such an enterprise. The narrow prejudices of 
 national feeling were never so powerless as at the present 
 moment. The unprecedented intercourse of all nations 
 with one another has tended to create a just appreciation 
 of all that is good in each, while the continued interchange 
 of kindness and hospitality has weakened old animosities 
 and jealousies, making men remember, what Christianity 
 had never ceased to inculcate, and what Christians ought 
 never to have forgotten, that all mankind are brethren, 
 children of a common Father, servants of the same God, 
 and redeemed by the blood of the same Saviour; unity 
 and fraternity are the very cry of the day, and although 
 in the mouth of the socialist and the red republican they 
 assuredly mean something very different from what they 
 symbolize in the mind of a Christian, yet even when 
 uttered by the most frantic disciple of anarchy, they attest 
 a deep and growing fee-'iig, and express the utterance of 
 that vox populi, which all philosophy regards as prophetic, 
 
 F 
 
G6 
 
 ON THE FUTURE UNITY 
 
 and the infallible harbinger of a divine visitation. On 
 the other hand, our railways and our steamboats have 
 annihilated distance ; so that in a few days Paris or Rome 
 might behold the meeting of the most august and vener- 
 able assembly that ever was held upon earth. What 
 weighty subjects would be discussed ! not only the 
 religious, but the political problems of the day might be 
 solved, and with religious unity, the blessing of universal 
 peace might be secured. The predictions of prophets, 
 the visions of poets, and the unceasing cry of suffering 
 humanity, would at last be realized and redressed, in the 
 possession of that pearl of great price, the revealed truth 
 of God, proclaimed by Jesus Christ, taught by the 
 Apostles, and handed down in all ages by their successors 
 in the Christian ministry, the bishops of the Universal 
 Church. Doubt and discord would disappear, faith would 
 triumph over error; with the universal diffusion of true 
 religion, the political condition of mankind would be 
 everywhere established on a solid and equitable principle ; 
 the arts and sciences would attain a perfection that even 
 we can scarcely imagine ; and the human race would 
 know and xinderstand what was the meaning of that great 
 promise made so many thousand years ago to Abraham : 
 “ In thee and in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth 
 he blessed I 
 
 To this sublime state of things do I firmly believe that 
 God’s good providence is conducting the whole human 
 race. If it is not to be ushered in and established in 
 our own day, at least we may prepare the way for it ; 
 and if God should call us hence before its arrival, it will 
 more than repay all our labours to think and believe that 
 we have done our part to effect it, and that we can hope 
 to bequeath its attainment to the children we love, and 
 who, when we are gone, will not fail to bless and cherish 
 our memory. 
 
 Let no man say that it is visionary to anticipate such 
 a result. Even the infidel looks forward to a political 
 millennium ; but we Christians have “ a more sure word of 
 
OF CHRISTENDOM. 
 
 67 
 
 prophecy,'^ to which an inspired apostle reminds us that 
 do well to give heed''* We know that our Divine 
 Founder prayed to His Father, that in the end all His 
 followers might be brought to perfect unity, for what 
 unity could be more perfect than that to which He 
 referred as its type, “even as He and the Father were 
 one?"\ And that this unity was to be attained on 
 earth, and not merely in the next life. He showed by 
 what He added, “ that all men might believe that the 
 Father had sent Him;"\ that is, that all ground for doubt 
 and infidelity might be removed from mankind. Knowing, 
 then, that our Lord prayed for this great and inestimable 
 blessing, and remembering that other saying of His — 
 “ Heaven and earth shall pass away, but My word shall 
 not fail,” — M"e may look with confidence to the fulfilment 
 of what still remains to be accomplished, arguing from 
 what has been already fulfilled that the remainder also 
 will surely come to pass. :{: 
 
 * 2nd Epistle of the Apostle Peter, chap, i., v. 19. 
 
 t St. John's Gospel, chap, xvii., v. 21. 
 
 J The writer would here commend to the notice of his readers a 
 short treatise of the great St. Augustine, entitled “ Ee Eide Eerum 
 qucB non videntur." It is one of the most masterly things that great 
 man ever wrote ; and the writer of this essay firmly believes that no 
 sincere man could read that short treatise and remain an unbeliever. 
 It is published in the beginning of the twenty-sixth volume of St. 
 Augustine’s Works, edited by Caillau at Paris in 1839. 
 
APPENDIX. 
 
 In this brief treatise I have chiefly dwelt on the restoration of 
 unity as viewed from the Anglican side of the question, and therefore 
 I have dwelt rather on Anglican theories and principles, as furnishing 
 a solid basis for its re-establishment, than on the many most consoling 
 facts connected with that communion, and which practically afford so 
 strong an argument for the probability of its realization. But I 
 cannot conclude without appending a very remarkable circumstance. 
 I was travelling twenty years ago into Wales, and passing the night 
 in a town on the road, I inquired in the morning whether there was 
 a chapel where I could hear mass ; on ascertaining that there was, I 
 went, heard mass, and after mass, the priest having shown me his 
 chapel, and all that he had that was curious and interesting, our con- 
 versation turned on the chances whether England would ever again 
 be Catholic. The good priest said with much earnestness that he 
 believed it would. And he added a most remarkable history that 
 tended to confirm his opinion. About a hundred and fifty years before 
 that time there was a saintly Catholic gardener in that very town, 
 who was a man of extraordinary virtue and prayer ; indeed his life was 
 one continued prayer, and next to his own sanctification no object 
 occupied so prominent a place in his multiplied petitions to the throne 
 of grace, as the return of his own dear country England to the unity 
 of the Catholic Church. One morning, three years before his happy 
 death, he had received the holy communion, and all at once he was 
 rapt in spirit, and Jesus, whom in the sacrament of His love he had 
 just received, manifested Himself to His humble servant, and with a 
 sweet and gracious aspect said to him, “ My son, I have heard your 
 prayer so often poured out before me; I will have mercy upon England.” 
 At these words, the poor gardener, overwhelmed with gratitude, 
 exclaimed: “When, Lord, oh! when?” “Not now,” replied our 
 Saviour ; “ but when England shall build as many churches as she 
 destroyed at the change of religion, and when she shall restore and 
 beautify the remainder.” 
 
APPENDIX. 
 
 69 
 
 This history was related to me by this pious priest in 1837, and he 
 added, ‘‘ Do we not see the first part of this prophecy in a fair way 
 towards accomplishment?” 
 
 I must confess that the history of the Anglican Church during this 
 century afibrds a most wonderful and unexpected fulfilment of the 
 mysterious words heard a hundred and fifty years before in the vision 
 of this poor gardener. Compare with it what an Anglican friend, 
 who is devoting himself to the restoration of Catholic unity, writes 
 me word : 
 
 “ About three thousand churches have, more or less perfectly, been 
 restored, while nearly two thousand new churches have been built 
 in Great Britain since the commencement of this century. A new 
 and sumptuous Cathedral has been erected in honour of the glorious 
 S. Ninian at Perth in Scotland. The ancient cathedral churches of 
 Ely, Wells, Llandafi*, and Oxford, have been well and thoroughly 
 restored ; while, as at Canterbury, York, and others of our ancient 
 sees, magnificent restorations are still in progress. Nor has the 
 return to Catholic ideas been manifested merely in material resto- 
 rations. On principles quite similar to those laid down by the Council 
 of Trent, which urged all bishops to establish diocesan seminaries, 
 for the training of young Levites to serve the altar, four of our 
 bishops have established seminaries for their young clergy : at Cud- 
 desdon, for the diocese of Oxford; at Wells; at Lichfield; and at 
 Chichester. A restoration of conventual institutions has also com- 
 menced, and at this moment there are no less than twenty sisterhoods 
 in the Church of England.” 
 
 This is what my Anglican friend communicated to me only three 
 days ago : if there is not a mysterious relation between the facts he 
 relates and the prediction I heard twenty years ago, let the obiector 
 tell me, why not ? 
 
 I can only say, what I believe, that the finger of Ood is hereP 
 

 
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PROPOSALS 
 
 FOB 
 
 CHRISTIAN UNION. 
 
 BY 
 
 A MEMBER OF THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND. 
 
 LONDON: 
 
 AYLOTT AND JONES, 8 PATERNOSTER ROW. 
 Price Sixpence. 
 
LONDON: 
 
 PRINTED BY GEORGE BARCLAY, CASTLE STREET, 
 LEICESTER SQUARE. 
 
ADVERTISEMENT. 
 
 This little Pamphlet is only designed 
 to open the subject on which it treats. It 
 is written with a sincere desire to do good, 
 and promote the cause of peace and charity ; 
 and as such is respectfully commended to 
 the indulgent consideration of the reader. 
 
PROPOSALS, 
 
 8fc. 
 
 They who are labouring in the Lord’s vineyard, 
 in whatsoever portion thereof their lot may be cast, 
 have, and to a great extent it is right that they 
 should have, their attention so closely fixed on their 
 own duties and occupations as not to allow of their 
 thinking much of any thing else. At times the ab- 
 sence of union among the disciples of the same Lord 
 is felt and spoken of, but the thought is soon dis- 
 missed, and the evils of disunion, however much 
 deplored as repugnant to the first principles of the 
 Gospel, are regarded as irremediable : but they 
 who are not thus actively engaged, in directing 
 their minds to the subject of Christian Union, as 
 the great end of the Saviour’s only recorded inter- 
 cessory prayer, cannot but be painfully afiected, 
 both by the divisions which prevail and by the 
 many evils which are their natural and necessary 
 fruits. 
 
6 
 
 Familiarised now these thirty years and more 
 with the blessings of international peace, we depre- 
 cate war ; we think with shame and horror of the 
 waste of blood and treasure which it involves ; hut, 
 unhappily, during these three centuries past, no 
 intermission of party animosities has taught us the 
 blessings of religious peace : we have no ready 
 statistics to calculate the heavy and grievous losses 
 sustained by this most baneful warfare ; we turn 
 with thoughts of sadness from the mangled bodies 
 of the slain on the battle-field, and yet go uncon- 
 cernedly on, while through our wretched dissensions 
 immortal souls are perishing around us. 
 
 Look at the question morally ; see how disunion 
 has obscured and suppressed truth. It has been 
 proved by convincing evidence, that there is not one 
 among our standard Protestant historians who can 
 be depended upon for his statement of any circum- 
 stance that happened before the Reformation. 
 They, one and all, disregarded and disdained the 
 original sources of knowledge — the monastic writers; 
 and they were safe in their wilful ignorance, for 
 they wrote for generations as indifferent as them- 
 selves. It has been made out to the satisfaction of 
 men of science and philanthropy, that we ourselves 
 are much more in the dark on many subjects of 
 true Christian interest than were the ages com- 
 monly so called ; that, not in ecclesiastical archi- 
 tecture alone, in which we are confessedly inferior. 
 
 
7 
 
 but also in many useful arts, in domestic virtues, 
 in care and protection of the poor, in the con- 
 ception, realization, and comprehensive carrying 
 out of the principles of the Gospel, we must be 
 content to sit at the feet, and learn as humble dis- 
 ciples from our rude forefathers, who accomplished 
 more while contending against the difficulties of an 
 imperfect, than we have been able to effect with all 
 the aids of an almost perfect civilisation. 
 
 Look at the question socially ; consider the 
 ingenious cruelty of those penal laws which afflicted 
 the consciences, benumbed the minds, and for so 
 many generations made the lives of thousands of 
 virtuous citizens aimless, lost to their country and 
 themselves. It is true that the good sense of the 
 people has at length consigned these laws 'to ob- 
 livion, rendered them inoperative and obsolete ; 
 hut, obsolete as they are, rather than see them 
 repealed, some good men and true, enlightened 
 statesmen and amiable prelates, have been found 
 to defend them and demand their preservation, 
 expecting that at some, be it far-distant day, even 
 from their ashes may revive their wonted fires. 
 Consider also this, that even when unjust laws 
 are expunged from the statute-book, how hard is 
 it, in such a state of things as now exists, to replace 
 them by the law of kindness ! how much is there 
 of religious, say rather, irreligious rancour, che- 
 rished and brooded over by each in the deep of his 
 
8 
 
 heart, and ready to be called into action when occa- 
 sion may offer, which no legislation can reach or 
 provide against ! how many scenes of suffering, of 
 alienation and enmities, of hardships and oppres- 
 sion, are enacted under the domestic roof, all to 
 be traced to the one fatal fountain — Christian 
 disunion ! 
 
 Look at the question spiritually ; why, it comes 
 to this, that we are really better off, really in a 
 more satisfactory and hopeful way in times of re- 
 ligious apathy, than we are in times of religious 
 activity : the few kind-hearted, energetic Christians, 
 who are always to be found at all times, can go 
 about quietly and do something in the former state, 
 whilst nothing can be done in the latter. Instead 
 of one uniform system, skilfully adjusted and work- 
 ing steadily towards its great end — to make men 
 good and holy here, that they may be happy here- 
 after, we have a number of opposing systems, each 
 perhaps excellent in itself, each the fruit of patient, 
 conscientious care and studv, each directed to the 
 best objects and guided by the most benevolent 
 will, but every one differing from the rest, and 
 consequently all neutralising one another ; so that 
 the amazed and perplexed spectator, in the conflict 
 of principles which rages around him, has a striking 
 passage, applicable to a widely different condition, 
 fixed upon his thoughts, which, speaking sorrow- 
 fully, says, “ Woe unto them that call evil good, 
 
9 
 
 and good evil ; that put darkness for light, and 
 light for darkness ; that put bitter for sweet, and 
 sweet for bitter ! ” 
 
 At this present time, the noblest work to which 
 the government of a great country can address 
 itself, the Education of the People, is in danger of 
 coming to nothing from this only cause, Christian 
 disunion and the jealousies thereby engendered. 
 What is the remedy ? That is more easily named 
 than the means of attainment pointed out, and 
 these last are as nothing when compared with the 
 difficulty of bringing men to the cheerful use of 
 those means. The remedy is Christian Unity ; the 
 means, the fixing on some existing system of re- 
 ligion, and merging our lesser differences in the 
 adoption of that system. But which shall it he ? 
 Shall the Kirk of Scotland become our standard, 
 the system elaborated by the sturdy, hard-headed, 
 devout disciples of John Knox ? Shall they, who 
 reverence so deeply the Word of God — honour he to 
 them for it ! — that they must always understand that 
 word in its literal, which is not invariably its true, 
 sense ? Shall the Independents, the Baptists, the 
 Friends, the Wesleyans, the United Brethren, in 
 their old associations or new off-shoots, — shall one 
 or other of these become our model ? In each, 
 more perfectly perhaps than any where else, may 
 he found some one feature of the Divine image, hut 
 not more than one. Shall the National Church of 
 
10 
 
 England be our rallying point, great and majestic 
 as she is, with the prestige of a mighty empire 
 around her ? Her very title is fatal to her pre- 
 tensions. The spiritual kingdom of Jesus Christ 
 is not of this world, knows nothing of national 
 churches. The characteristic of that kingdom is 
 to he in every country, and yet, properly speaking, 
 to belong to none ; to be (paradoxical as this may 
 sound) everywhere united to, yet separate from, 
 the temporal power ; to have its own laws, its own 
 officers, its own representative assemblies, its own 
 supreme head ; possessing, it may be, some portion 
 of this world’s goods, ruling over an earthly terri- 
 tory, hut honoured, reverenced, obeyed, throughout 
 all Christian lands : not on this account, but as the 
 successor of the Apostles, the viceroy of Christ. 
 The system which has most of these marks is that 
 which approaches nearest to the Gospel model, is 
 the only system which, with any real chance of 
 Christian Union in an enlarged sense, can be pro- 
 posed for our adoption. 
 
 And now I seem to myself to be very nearly, 
 if not quite, in the position of one of whom we read 
 in sacred story, who, having spoken long on dis- 
 tasteful themes to a dissatisfied and restless audi- 
 tory — who, nevertheless, were by a strong effort able 
 to keep their feelings down — when he uttered one 
 fatal word was instantly silenced by the incensed 
 crowd, who “ lifted up their voices, and said. Away 
 
11 
 
 with such a fellow from the earth : for it is not fit 
 that he should live ! ” A like reception do I predict 
 for myself, when I utter the word Rome, when I 
 declare it to be the conviction of my conscience that 
 the only remedy for our unholy dissensions, the 
 only hope of healing the wounds of distempered 
 Christendom, is reconciliation with the Roman 
 Church. I say advisedly, reconciliation with, not 
 submission to ; between these there is a great 
 difference. 
 
 By men of extreme views, such a proposition 
 will be rejected with scorn. The rigid Catholic, 
 who sees in the conversion of a few learned men 
 and their immediate followers the first-fruits of all 
 England soon to return to the unity of the faith — 
 who already looks forward to, and speaks of as no 
 remote probability, the celebration of high mass in 
 Westminster Abbey — whose pious fancy pictures 
 clouds of incense ascending to its vaulted roof, and, 
 as of old, processions of white-robed priests with 
 cross and banner threading its long-drawn aisles — 
 he will spurn the thought of any thing short of 
 absolute, unconditional surrender. The earnest- 
 minded Evangelical, to whom Rome is* still the 
 only key to the Babylon of the Revelation, the 
 infallible interpretation of the Second Epistle to the 
 Thessalonians, who treasures up as words of truth 
 and soberness the coarse invectives and oft-refuted 
 
12 
 
 calumnies that resounded from the pulpits in the 
 reigns of Edward and Elizabeth, he will stand 
 aghast at the bare idea. The zealous Anglican, 
 to whom belongs the exclusive merit of having 
 struck out the theory of a Church, National while 
 it disowns obedience to the crown, and Catho- 
 lic while it denies the primacy of St. Peter, 
 and who now, buoyant with hope, is poising him- 
 self on the needlepoint of his subtle conception, — 
 he, most assuredly, will condemn and denounce the 
 project. 
 
 But, happily, the great body of Christians are 
 not composed of men holding extreme views. 
 There are, who listening to the Christmas Hymn 
 chanted first by angel voices, “ Glory to God in the 
 highest, and on earth peace, good-will towards men,” 
 and, pondering on these heavenly strains, sorrow 
 that the woidd should shew no peace nor good-will 
 like this. There are, who hearing those divine 
 words, “ There is one body, and one Spirit, even as 
 ye are called in one hope of your calling ; one Lord, 
 one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, 
 who is above all, and through all, and in you all,” 
 think it hard that these words should sound in their 
 ears so hollow and unreal as they do. There are, 
 on whose minds in the silence of cloistered re- 
 treats, or in calm Nature’s sequestered scenes, have 
 flashed bright thoughts of a holy and happy re- 
 
13 
 
 union, as one, a poet of our own, has sung in im- 
 mortal verse : — 
 
 Speak gently of our sister’s fall : 
 
 Who knows, but gentle love 
 
 May win her, at our patient call. 
 
 The surer way to prove I ” 
 
 There are, who in their pensive walks have come 
 suddenly on some retired village, scarcely number- 
 ing a hundred in its clustered cottages, yet so small, 
 so hidden, bearing witness to a divided faith in 
 altar erected against altar j and as they have stood 
 within the churchyard fence, near the mound on 
 which, in old time, the cross was raised, and looked 
 thence on the defaced tombs and neglected pre- 
 cincts of the sanctuary, and on to the tottering, 
 shattered habitations, that told so much of squalid 
 wretchedness within, have wished the old days back 
 again, when deep conviction of present communion 
 with the departed dead made the spot where their 
 bodies rested a reverent care, when the shaft stood 
 upright on its ruined pedestal, and none passed by 
 but bared the head or dropped a courtesy, not to the 
 lifeless stone, but to Him who made that badge of 
 shame the ensign of glory ; when that cross, 
 seen from every surrounding spot meeting the 
 villager’s eye, spoke peace to the aged, meekness to 
 the sufferer, comfort to the mourner, patience to 
 the sick, strength to the young, obedience to the 
 poor, charity to the rich — which, as it reflected the 
 
14 
 
 rays of the rising or setting sun, seemed — meet 
 emblem of the Sun of righteousness ! — to diffuse his 
 genial and hallowed influences around. There are, 
 even among the deeply learned, masters in debate 
 and controversy, to whom almost, as it were, in 
 despite of themselves, at times refreshing thoughts 
 of peace and union will come; and these, as if 
 obeying some mysterious moral law, turn ever to 
 the selfsame point, as though the alienation which 
 had been growing and deepening, year after year, 
 should never be permitted to root out utterly the 
 old affection, that cherished stilh a faint, yet sweet 
 remembrance, of our once united worship and 
 common altars. 
 
 Permit me now to take note of some popular 
 objections, which are usually alleged so often as 
 the subject of reconciliation is mooted, and which 
 are by many considered insurmountably decisive 
 against the proposition. 
 
 The first objection on which I shall touch is 
 that expressed by the phrase, “ private judgment.” 
 When the idea crosses our minds, and we reflect 
 upon it, we can scarcely fail in being struck with 
 the analogy that exists between man as a social 
 being in social communion, and as a spiritual 
 being in spiritual communion. View him in the 
 former condition. In a state of nature, man pos- 
 sesses freedom ; he can think, speak, and act, as 
 he pleases : but as one is, so are all ; and unless they 
 
15 
 
 think, speak, and act alike (an accordance not 
 to be expected), each will find his theoretical 
 freedom in practice a very precarious and incon- 
 venient possession. He will, therefore, be very 
 ready to pass into the artificial state of society, in 
 which it is not true that he loses his freedom, but 
 he trades with it, — he barters it away for its full 
 marketable value, he exchanges an uncertain liberty 
 for a certain security for his person and posses- 
 sions ; and the more civilised society becomes, the 
 more the superior value of the commodity received 
 in exchange is ascertained, the more readily will 
 persons be found to part with their freedom : so 
 that it comes to pass, not from the violent effects of 
 a crushing despotism, hut with the cheerful assent 
 of rational conviction, that the notion of law super- 
 sedes the notion of right. Under the best system 
 of government, a person does not accustom himself 
 to speak of that which he has a right to, but of 
 that which the law gives him. There is nothing 
 in our free constitution which strikes foreigners 
 with more astonishment, inspires them with greater 
 respect, than the universal deference paid to the 
 law in this country — its majesty is recognised in 
 the person of the humblest of its functionaries. 
 Yet, in a fretful or captious humour, it is very easy 
 to persuade ourselves that harsh and vexatious 
 restraints are imposed upon us. 
 
 Take an example or two. I have money ; I 
 
16 
 
 buy with it a piece of land, and I propose to build 
 a house thereon. Surely, I say to myself, I may 
 build as I like with my own money on my own 
 land! No, the law says, you shall not build as 
 you like — you shall build as I require. No sooner 
 have I commenced operations, than the law sends a 
 surveyor to see what I am about. My walls must 
 be of a certain prescribed thickness, more particu- 
 larly if party-walls. My chimneys must be of a 
 certain make and diameter ; and so on. Again, I 
 commence business — I deal in excisable articles. 
 I say to myself, I may do as I like in my own 
 house, with my own capital! The law spoils my 
 dream of independence — it subjects me to a domi- 
 ciliary visit from its own officer, appointed for the 
 especial purpose, whenever he may think good to 
 come. Again, I have a friend in a distant part of 
 the country, with whom I have occasion to corre- 
 spond on some question of great importance : I 
 may at least send my letter in my own way ! Here 
 the law interposes afresh, prescribes to me its own 
 channel of communication, and forbids me, under a 
 penalty, from employing any other. An individual, 
 when the case is his own, may think this hard, but 
 when it is the case of another he sees it to be per- 
 fectly right, — that it is best in the end, — that it is for 
 the advantage of the community ; and where all gain, 
 each are gainers in their proportion. 
 
 Now turn to the latter condition. What free- 
 
17 
 
 dom of action is in the social, the same is free- 
 dom of thought or private judgment in the spiritual 
 communion ; only that which Society has acquired 
 by successive agreements, the Church holds by a 
 certain divine grant. She has her deposit, tradi- 
 tion ; be it written or oral, it is something trans- 
 mitted — handed down through successive gene- 
 rations. Turn it which way you will, look at 
 it in whatever point of view you like, after all, the 
 Church’s deposit is tradition. In that are contained 
 her principles ; she has her own law’s, judges, re- 
 presentative assemblies, supreme head. She, in 
 her discretion, imposes restraints on freedom of 
 thought, just as Society does on freedom of action. 
 In the one case, being that in which we have 
 thought on the matter a great deal, we acknow- 
 ledge the restraint to be very right ; in the other, 
 in which we have never allowed ourselves to reflect 
 on the matter at all, we call the restraint very 
 wrong: yet the latter may be quite as justifiable, 
 quite as beneficial, as the former. 
 
 Here, also, an illustration offers itself. The 
 sacred volume of the New Testament comprises tw’o 
 distinct portions, the one containing the life, words, 
 and actions of the Divine Founder of our religion, 
 written in a plain and simple manner, so that he 
 who runs may read, whence the unlettered man 
 may, from the lips of the Saviour himself, learn, 
 without confusion or perplexity, the whole duty of 
 
 B 
 
18 
 
 man — what he must do to be saved j the other 
 portion, embracing chiefly the epistles addressed to 
 various churches of an eminent servant and chosen 
 apostle of the Lord, in whose writings, however, on 
 the testimony of another equally distinguished, and 
 himself inspired, apostle, “ there are many things 
 hard to be understood, which they that are unlearned 
 and unstable wrest, as they do also the other 
 Scriptures, to their own destruction.” Now, sup- 
 posing the Church were to do as she has done, say 
 in her discretion to her members, — “ I will not 
 give you the whole volume to read just as it stands, 
 but I will select that which I think suited for ge- 
 neral use, and I will reserve the remainder for 
 those whom I consider, by their ability, or learning, 
 or position in which they may he placed, or duties 
 which they may be called upon to perform, quali- 
 fled to study them with advantage ; ” the restraint 
 here alluded to has furnished these centuries the 
 theme for angry declamation, the echoes of which 
 seem as if they would never die away. But now go 
 on and see what has followed. Before the Reform- 
 ation, Christians in this country were familiar with 
 the practical ; since, they have almost exclusively 
 studied the controversial portions of Holy Scripture. 
 Compare the results. Under which system will 
 most of the fruits of true religion be found — of that 
 religion whose blessed part it is “ to visit the father- 
 less and widows in their affliction, and to keep our- 
 
19 
 
 selves unspotted from the world ? ” You must not 
 fly from the question, and talk of the disorders of 
 society in those times, of tyrannical princes, oppres- 
 sive nohles, had laws, commercial monopolies, wars 
 of succession, hrave harons manufactured into in- 
 efficient prelates ; nor will you, if you are wise : 
 because the worse you make out the times to have 
 heen, the more honour you put upon those who 
 overcame the times. But I ask you. Under which 
 system have the great ends of the Gospel heen most 
 consulted ? — under which shall we find the interests 
 of the mass of which society is composed, the 
 poor, the artificer, the agricultural labourer, to 
 have heen deepest considered ? — under which system 
 have men strove hardest to mitigate the sufferings 
 of their fellow-creatures, “to preach good tidings 
 to the meek, to hind up the broken-hearted, to 
 proclaim liberty to the captives, the opening of the 
 prison to them that are hound ; to proclaim the ac- 
 ceptable year of the Lord, to comfort all that 
 mourn?” — under which system has there been less 
 false shame, less of that haughty, supercilious in- 
 difference from the upper towards the lower classes, 
 as if they were not made of the same flesh and 
 blood with themselves ? — under which system were 
 really kings the nursing fathers, and queens the 
 nursing mothers, of the Church, in that they were 
 well pleased to lay aside their crowns and state, 
 and go to the humble cottage, and watch beside the 
 
20 
 
 aged, the sick, the infected, and the dying, and 
 without a thought of pride in their hearts, hut 
 persuaded that they were ministering to Christ in 
 the least of his brethren, perform the most servile 
 and trying offices? — under which system shall we 
 find theories of political economy chasing each 
 other in rapid and profitless succession, making 
 confusion worse confounded ? — and under which 
 shall we find one pure, lofty, comprehensive body of 
 Christian ethics, adapted to every emergency, felt 
 and acted upon every where, without hesitation and 
 without anxiety ? Is it too much to venture to 
 question, whether the restriction which we have 
 been wont to characterise as the most odious of 
 oppressions may have been so had after all ? 
 whether it may not have been dictated by a sound, 
 wise, just, salutary discretion ? 
 
 I have endeavoured to shew that the theory of 
 private judgment is really untenable, but we Pro- 
 testants assert it in its broadest extent, — at least, we 
 think that we do. Let us see whether this he 
 really so. Whenever a religious society imposes 
 terms of communion, then the principle of private 
 judgment is given up ; it does not signify what the 
 terms of communion are, or how many, the cession 
 of a principle does not admit of less or more — one 
 condition enforced is as fatal to it as a thousand. 
 The Church of England has her terms of com- 
 munion, consequently, by the Church of England 
 
21 
 
 the principle of private judgment is given up. 
 The Presbyterians, Independents, Baptists, Friends, 
 Wesleyans, United Brethren, &c., have all, more or 
 less, terms of communion. Therefore, in all these 
 the principle of private judgment is given up. 
 Now conceive, if you can, a society of Christians 
 without any terms of communion at all. Such a 
 society could not go on for a day. It would have 
 no property of coherence — it would, besides, stand 
 out in glaring contradiction to the great Christian 
 notion of believers being members of one body, 
 which tends to shew, that as in practice the prin- 
 ciple of private judgment cannot be maintained, so 
 in theory was it never intended to be maintained in 
 the spiritual society. Hence, when a person 
 reasons after this manner, — “I cannot consent to 
 reconciliation with Rome, because by so doing I am 
 surrendering the inalienable right of private judg- 
 ment,” his reasoning is fallacious. He has, if he 
 belong to any Christian society whatever, given up 
 the principle of private judgment already long be- 
 fore ; the right, which he calls inalienable, has 
 been alienated years since — there is no question of 
 principle at stake at all — it is simply a question of 
 degree. Are the terms of communion which the 
 Church of Rome offers such as I can, with a safe 
 conscience, accept ? Does it, or no, ask too much ? 
 Into the consideration of degree I will not enter ; 
 it is enough to have shewn, that that for which men 
 
will always contend so fiercely has no existence 
 here : the difference between Protestants and Ca- 
 tholics, so far as private judgment is concerned, is 
 not a question of principle. 
 
 I will go on to speak of another popular objec- 
 tion, — the Invocation of Saints. One cannot help 
 thinking that upon this subject great misconcep- 
 tions prevail, yet to remove them to any appreci- 
 able extent seems almost a hopeless task, the 
 reasoning of Protestants on this point is so very 
 strong, were it only as accurately applied. Pro- 
 testants say, that the invocation of saints is idolatry 
 — that it is destructive also of the one mediation 
 between God and man, through the Man Christ 
 Jesus. Now, were these assertions certainly true, 
 there would be an end of the matter — not one 
 word more could be said ; but is it not a little 
 strange, were this practice a sin so heinous, that 
 its criminality should not have been discovered long 
 before — that Christians should have unwittingly 
 gone on for fifteen centuries in the daily commission 
 of it — and that, after the lapse of so many ages, it 
 should have been reserved for a small section of the 
 Church, in Germany and in England, to have been 
 the first to have drawn attention to the fact? 
 Think of the great names, prior and subsequent to 
 the Reformation, whom the charge involves, — of 
 the profound learning of Aquinas, the penetrating 
 genius of St. Bernard, the exquisite tenderness of 
 
23 
 
 St. Francis of Sales, the exhaustless munificence of 
 Carlo Boromeo. Shall we lightly credit that these 
 men lived and died in mortal sin ? that they who so 
 perfectly, out of an honest and good heart, did the 
 will of God, were, in failure of the divine promise, 
 not permitted to know of the doctrine ? Is 
 it not barely possible that, under a mass of popular 
 superstitions that overlaid and obscured it, there 
 may have been a Christian truth beneath ?— that 
 we, in our zeal for godliness, swept away the use 
 with the abuse, the truth with the falsehood ? Let 
 us search the Scriptures “ whether these things be 
 so.” The apostle writing to the Hebrews, in taking 
 the veil from the believer’s eyes, in shewing to him 
 the glorious company into which he is admitted, and 
 with whom it is his privilege to have fellowship, uses 
 these words, — “Ye are come unto Mount Zion, 
 and unto the city of the living God, the heavenly 
 Jerusalem, and to an innumerable company of 
 angels, to the general assembly and church of the 
 first-born, which are written in heaven, and to God 
 the Judge of all, and to the spirits of just men made 
 perfect, and to Jesus the Mediator of the New 
 Covenant ; ” and in another place it is written of 
 Christ, “ Of whom the whole family in heaven and 
 earth is named.” What ideas of strength and com- 
 fort does the word “ family” carry with it ! — of mu- 
 tual assistance and co-operation, of common offices 
 of affection and sympathy ! 
 
24 
 
 Then, again, the Communion of Saints is set 
 before us as a relation much to be valued, as a very 
 article of our creed. Now, if we were left to gather 
 our notions on this point from the collation of 
 passages of Scripture only, if the practice of 
 Christians afforded us no light, we could scarcely 
 miss conceiving to ourselves the Church militant 
 and triumphant, the quick and the dead, who all 
 live to God, as forming one vast society, in real 
 though invisible union, communicating with, acting 
 upon, and influencing each other really and truly, 
 hut in ways mysterious and unknown ; so that, 
 when we read, as we do read, in very early times, 
 of Christians praying for the dead and asking in 
 their own behalf the prayers of the holy departed, 
 and call to mind how it is written that “ the 
 effectual, fervent prayer of the righteous availeth 
 much,” we ought not to feel very much surprised, 
 or “ call it strange, as though some new thing had 
 happened to us.” St. Augustine is a high authority 
 with us Protestants, yet, if we would be consistent 
 with our principles, we ought to regard him as 
 a great criminal, instead of an enlightened father, 
 for he too prayed for the dead, and implored the 
 intereession of the saints. It does not certainly 
 prove a doctrine to be true, but it affords strong 
 confirmation, when we find Churches that have 
 separated holding the same opinions on particular 
 subjects still ; so it is no proof that the invocation of 
 
25 
 
 saints is right, but it militates against the pre- 
 sumption that it is wrong, when we observe, as we 
 do, the doctrine held both by the Greek and Latin 
 Churches. Now, were we to put together all that 
 has been said and written by Protestant divines on 
 the intermediate state between death and judg- 
 ment, and our interest therein, we should see that 
 it amounted to as much as antiquity received, only 
 we should find it put forward in a timid, hesitating, 
 unreal, unpractical way, as something to be thought 
 upon occasionally, when we were depressed by over- 
 much sorrow, but not thought upon long together, 
 and never — against that we should he solemnly 
 warned — to he acted upon at all ; whereas, in Ca- 
 tholic writings, the asking the prayers of the saints 
 is set forth as an approved doctrine, clear, de- 
 finite, tangible, applicable to, and recommended for, 
 general use. 
 
 Here let me remind you of what the Roman 
 Catholic Church has said authoritatively on this 
 subject. The decree of the Council of Trent runs 
 thus : — “ The saints reigning with Christ offer up 
 their prayers to God for men ; it is good and use- 
 ful suppliantly to invoke them, and to have recourse 
 to their prayers, helps, and assistances, to obtain 
 favour from God, through His Son Jesus Christ 
 our Lord, who is alone our Redeemer and Saviour.” 
 The Catechism of the Council of Trent teaches, — 
 “ That God and the saints are not to be prayed to 
 
26 
 
 in the same manner ; for we pray to God that He 
 Himself would give us good things, and deliver us 
 from evil things, but we beg of the saints because 
 they are pleasing to God, that they would be our 
 advocates, and obtain from God what we stand in 
 need of.” “ Cursed,” it is elsewhere pronounced, 
 “ is he that believes the saints in heaven to be his 
 redeemers, that prays to them as such, or that gives 
 God’s honour to them, or to any creature what- 
 soever.” Amen. 
 
 We have been trained to look always on the 
 dark side of the picture, yet it has its brighter 
 side. To him who receives from his heart the 
 doctrine, who believes that there are others, besides 
 the angels, “ ministering spirits sent forth to minister 
 to the heirs of salvation” — to him, in apparent lone- 
 liness and desolation, how does the desert rejoice 
 and blossom as the rose ! — what sweet memories 
 does he cherish! — on what inspiring recollections 
 can he rest 1 — how is he sustained and upborne in 
 his onward course in his pilgrimage Zion-ward I — 
 how is the earth’s dreariness relieved, its wastes 
 peopled with the thronging forms of the great and 
 good, who, with angels their fellow labourers, are 
 intent on their holy and happy work, of prayer 
 unceasing in behalf of their brethren, whose time is 
 not yet fulfilled — who are yet in the flesh ! If any 
 distrust lest to ask the prayers of a saint departed 
 be to dishonour God, let him know that equal dis- 
 
27 
 
 honour is shewn in asking the prayers of a living 
 saint ; the principle in the two cases is the same — 
 both are right, or both are wrong. If the latter be 
 true, then there is an end of all common worship ; 
 we are left without a liturgy, without a priest, with- 
 out a sacrifice. 
 
 A part of the same idea, though one on which 
 the Church of England is silent, neither affirming 
 nor denying, is the use of prayers for the dead. 
 The highest judicial authority has decided that she 
 does not forbid — it is equally certain that she does 
 not enjoin them ; and, coupled with their general 
 disuse since the bond of unity was broken, the 
 silence of the Reformers, so far as their judgment 
 goes, is significant. Yet our conceptions of the 
 reality of spiritual communion have lost much in 
 vividness, our sentiments of reverence have been 
 materially impaired by this disuse. A great deal of 
 unsound doctrine and false morality have forced 
 themselves into our sepulchral memorials since we 
 relinquished this ancient practice, which while it 
 lasted in vigour were kept out. Compare the 
 average of modern and ancient inscriptions ; the 
 former generally contain a pompous enumeration 
 of the virtues and excellences of the deceased, and 
 fond regrets that to this lower world so much good- 
 ness has been lost ; the latter rarely contain more 
 than a recital of the name, age, relation, and 
 quality, with the addition of these brief, touching 
 
28 
 
 words, “ Ora 'pro nobis ” — Pray for us. Contrast 
 the posture of their effigies ; the modern are gene- 
 rally taken from the favourite occupations of those 
 whom they delineate. The orator is sculptured 
 pouring forth the strains of his fervid eloquence ; 
 the sage, in contemplation ; the warrior, in the ex- 
 citement of victory ; the saint, standing upright, 
 with his hand upon the cross. The ancient effi- 
 gies wear always the character of a sacred and 
 affecting monotony ; represent they whom they may, 
 they are ever found with clasped hands and tran- 
 quil features, stretched on the bed of death. Me- 
 thinks that we lost something when a stern rule 
 hid us erase from our tombs, and not inscribe there 
 again, the plaintive appeal — “ Pray for us.” It is 
 as it were the dead calling to us from their graves 
 — the complement of what they would have said 
 living, but could not, so fast their last agony came 
 upon them ; or it may be a reiteration of a last 
 command — a saying it over again, and so beseech- 
 ingly, as though it seemed to cry to us, — “ The 
 parting hour has come and gone — we are divided 
 from each other now — we can no longer, as of old, 
 walk together in sweet communion — we cannot 
 read each other’s thoughts in the bright or shaded 
 eye, in the changing play of features, which we 
 understood so well — the thousand little nameless 
 acts, proofs of considerate tenderness and constant 
 love you cannot shew me now ; but one work of 
 
29 
 
 charity remains — one thing you can do : when you 
 kneel before your Father who is in heaven, and in 
 the name of our common Lord and Saviour present 
 your petitions to the throne of grace, then remem- 
 ber me.” The memory of those whom we love 
 would not so soon be lost, their virtuous lives pass 
 away and leave no trace behind, had the indis- 
 criminating zeal of our Protestant forefathers not 
 spoiled us of this reverent use. 
 
 I will now revert to a part of the subject of the 
 invocation of saints which I did not take in its 
 proper order, because I thought it better to reserve 
 it for separate remark. I approach it, I confess, 
 with extreme reluctance, and great sorrow of heart ; 
 but I have not come forward to plead for Rome as 
 Rome — it is the ministry of reconciliation, which, 
 albeit most unworthy, I have, in my humble sphere, 
 ventured to assume it is my part to remember 
 therein, first truth, and then charity. The point 
 reserved to this moment is the reverence paid in 
 the Roman Catholic Church to St. Mary, the 
 blessed Virgin, the holy mother of God. And 
 here it is just that I should shew how far the 
 Church of England confessedly goes in the re- 
 verence which she pays to St. Mary, by the testi- 
 mony of one of her great standard authorities. 
 Bishop Pearson, in his Exposition of the Creed. 
 This learned prelate thus writes : — “ The necessity 
 of believing our Saviour thus to be born of the 
 
30 
 
 Virgin will appear, both in respect of her who 
 was the mother, and of Him who was the son. In 
 respect of her, it was therefore necessary that we 
 might perpetually preserve an esteem of her person 
 proportionable to so high a dignity. It was her 
 own prediction, ‘ From henceforth all generations 
 shall call me blessed.’ But the obligation is ours 
 to call her, to esteem her so. If Elizabeth cried 
 out, with so loud a voice, ‘ Blessed art thou among 
 women,’ when Christ was but newly conceived in 
 her womb, what expressions of honour and admira- 
 tion can we think sufficient now that Christ is in 
 heaven, and that mother with him ! Far be it from 
 any Christian to derogate from that special privilege 
 granted to her, which is incommunicable to any 
 other. We cannot bear too reverent a regard unto 
 the mother of our Lord, so long as we give her not 
 that worship which is due unto the Lord Himself. 
 Let us keep the language of the primitive Church 
 — let her be honoured and esteemed, let Him be 
 worshipped and adored.” 
 
 The question which hence arises, and a most 
 momentous one, is. Does the reverence which the 
 Roman Catholic Church shews towards the blessed 
 Virgin pass the bounds prescribed by the rule of 
 the primitive Church ? It may, as it will, be said, 
 that a person external to the system cannot form a 
 correct judgment on the matter. Let this objec- 
 tion have all its weight, still, with a real and hearty 
 
31 
 
 affection for much — very much, in the Roman 
 Catholic Church — with a deep regret for the pre- 
 judices and prepossessions which, more or less, 
 prevent all of us on the Protestant side from doing 
 justice to its merits, one cannot enter a Roman 
 Catholic place of worship and witness the devotion 
 offered to the blessed Virgin, one cannot read the 
 “ Garden of the Soul,” and other approved manuals 
 for private use, or those designed for the public ser- 
 vice, the “ Missal” or the “Breviary,” without having 
 the painful conviction forced upon our mind that the 
 rule of the primitive Church is transgressed — that 
 an excessive and unwarrantable reverence is paid 
 to the Blessed Lady, which, if it be not exactly 
 worship, can scarcely he distinguished from it ; 
 and that, in this instance, a serious, but (one has 
 that assurance in the over-ruling providence of God, 
 that persuasion of the wisdom of the present 
 supreme head of the Roman Catholic Church, that 
 induces one to hope) not fatal obstacle, lies in the 
 way of any true and lasting reconciliation. I 
 forbear to quote, because the ocular proofs and 
 written evidence are familiar to most on our side, 
 through the many able books and pamphlets which 
 have had this point for their subject, and because, 
 should any on the opposite side glance over these 
 humble pages, I should be sorry that they should 
 find words and actions, which they may employ 
 
82 
 
 with most innocent intentions, represented in what 
 must to them appear an unfair and distorted light. 
 
 I will, in the last place, say a few words on the 
 use of material objects as helps to devotion. On 
 this point a difference of opinion prevails among 
 Protestants themselves ; the Lutherans retain, while 
 we reject them. Were man all reason, he could, 
 dispense with a great deal which in his present less 
 perfect, if so far less perfect condition it be, is 
 necessary to him. If science would invent for us 
 some vast machine which, without any preparatory 
 labour, would teach our whole population at once 
 the rudiments of knowledge, to read and write, we 
 might perhaps get on better ; at present, notwith- 
 standing that the education of the people is, and 
 for some years past has always been, uppermost on 
 our lips, if not in our thoughts, we are still very 
 far from having attained to this satisfactory con- 
 dition. By recent gaol returns from a large and 
 populous county, it appeared that out of a number 
 of criminals not more than one half of the men, and 
 not nearly so large a proportion of the women, 
 could read at all : of what use is it to give such 
 persons Bibles ? But it may be said that, if they 
 cannot read them themselves, their children or 
 neighbours can read to them : but, with respect 
 to their neighbours, it will generally happen that 
 they are in no happier condition than themselves. 
 
33 
 
 and if they be, this kind of assistance is a very 
 precarious dependence ; and as for the children, 
 it is most often as with the parent so with the 
 child, — the same pressure of poverty that compelled 
 the parent in his tender years to give to labour 
 that time which had been better spent in learning, 
 compels his children to do the same. We who are 
 under no anxiety about our daily bread, can urge 
 upon the peasant excellent counsel upon this sub- 
 ject ; but in hunger, cold, and nakedness, can he 
 follow it ? If religion is to be taught to the un- 
 learned — to those who cannot read — it is experi- 
 mentally certain that through the eye, and not the 
 ear, is the shortest and best avenue to the heart. 
 It has been said, that as we owe the invocation of 
 saints to the pagan mythology, so is the intro- 
 duction of pictures and images to be traced to the 
 same source. If there be any truth in the state- 
 ment at all, it is much overcharged. In regard to 
 the invocation of saints, there cleaidy existed a 
 Christian prior to the importation of the pagan idea ; 
 and with respect to pictures and images, their use 
 admits of rational vindication. Because they may 
 not appear in the primitive Church, it does not 
 necessarily follow that they were a corruption. In 
 the earliest struggles of Christianity, paganism, its 
 essence being idolatry, was all-powerful ; material • 
 objects could not then be used without hazard of 
 misconception, even by the converts themselves : 
 
34 
 
 but when paganism declined and sank into insig- 
 nificance, and the principles of the Christian faith 
 were generally diffused and adopted, material ob- 
 jects were as books to the unlearned, and helps to 
 devotion might he safely resorted to. 
 
 We Protestants attach great importance to the 
 Iconoclastic controversy ; as, in general, we are 
 (and it is no healthy sign) retentive chroniclers of 
 all the divisions which the Church, through trying 
 ages, has had the misfortune to have known. But 
 this appears to have been more an affair of the 
 State than of the Church, and the ultimate general 
 resumption of the use seems to argue general ap- 
 proval. I have already alluded to the criminal 
 returns, so far as they exhibit the state of educa- 
 tion ; but to the large proportion who cannot read 
 at all, we must add — who are not a few — those who 
 can hammer through the words and no more ; and 
 besides these you must include those who may be 
 able to read fluently enough, with an exceedingly 
 limited comprehension of that which they read. 
 Our domestic servants are generally better educated 
 than the day-labourer, yet what is the answer which 
 we usually get when they return to us books which 
 we have been at pains to procure for their especial 
 use ? It is commonly this, — “ It is a very nice book ; 
 very pretty reading ; ” and when we question them 
 further, setting aside the no uncommon result that 
 they can give no detailed account of it at all, when 
 
35 
 
 they do enter into detail, it is almost incredible the 
 mistakes which they make, the unaccountable per- 
 versions into which they fall, of what appears to us 
 the plainest meaning of the author. One must not 
 lay the blame of this so much upon the reader, as 
 the writer will often be found to have been most in 
 fault ; it is so very difficult for a mind trained in 
 one way to sympathise with and make itself intel- 
 ligible to one trained in another way ; and it is 
 very discouraging, but so it is, that when the edu- 
 cated try their utmost to write down to the unedu- 
 cated, the issue, in nine cases out of ten, is decisive 
 failure. Such being the fact, why so jealously 
 maintain our prohibitions ? why so exclusively stick 
 to the distribution of Testaments and tracts ? The 
 Creed and the Lord’s Prayer may be said to com- 
 prise the poor man’s religion ; and when we have 
 gone the weary round of more elaborate devotions, 
 to the Creed and the Lord’s Prayer we are thankful 
 to return at last. Now, give the poor man pictures 
 as helps to devotion, whether descriptive of the life 
 of the Saviour, or of his earlier or later disciples ; 
 let him place the picture before him at his hour of 
 prayer, his heart touched and softened then, will be 
 able to enter into and to feel the lesson which that 
 picture teaches him ; habitual use will engrave the 
 virtue thei'e taught upon his mind, and make it 
 practical to an extent, and with a vividness of real- 
 isation, which for him, circumstanced as he is, no 
 
36 
 
 reading of tracts will ever effect. As of pictures, 
 so of images ; but, on this latter point, our Pro- 
 testant repugnance is so strong that they were best 
 away, except in one instance, in which our ob- 
 stinate prejudices have entailed upon us a most 
 heavy loss. The great centre of the Gospel system 
 — the point whence radiate whatsoever things are 
 true, honest, just, pure, lovely, of good report — is 
 Christ crucified ; and yet how hard is it, by oral 
 instruction and the teaching of books, to make the 
 Christian who is no scholar clearly understand, 
 savingly feel, and in all its bearings practically 
 realise this vital truth ! There is a medium which 
 has perfectly instructed thousands upon thousands, 
 in rapt contemplation before which the greatest 
 saints, the glory of all lands, have confessed that 
 they have learnt more than all their books could 
 teach them. And to what a state has inveterate pre- 
 judice reduced us, that, addressing as I do my fellow 
 Protestants, I hardly dare so much as name that 
 medium ? It costs me an effort to pronounce the 
 word — the crucifix. Yet, who shall call to mind to 
 what blest purposes this heavenly symbol has been 
 turned ! bow it has rekindled the fires of Christian 
 daring in drooping hearts, sustained the servants of 
 God in hopeless and thankless toils, cheered the 
 sorrows of the desolate, and revived the spirit of the 
 contrite ones! how, uplifted, it has hushed the strife 
 of words and sheathed the sword of contention, 
 
m 
 
 soothed sinking nature in her bitterest hour, and, 
 when every other sense has fled, caught the ex- 
 piring eye and illumined the departing soul with 
 a hope full of immortality! — who shall call these 
 things to mind, and not be well-nigh cut to the 
 heart to think that to us that symbol is a for- 
 bidden, and by some accounted almost an accursed, 
 thing ? 
 
 I will now bring these observations to a close. 
 I am conscious that I have avowed opinions which, 
 in the judgment of many, leave me neither place 
 nor name in the Church of which I continue, and 
 I hope I shall always continue, a member. But it 
 has been my earnest endeavour to write in the 
 spirit of charity, using fair liberty of speech, but 
 avoiding as much as I could giving just occasion of 
 offence to any. If, through inadvertence, I may have 
 committed the fault it has been my effort to pre- 
 vent, I desire here to express to whomsoever may 
 feel himself aggrieved my sorrow for that fault ; 
 at the same time I think it right to express my 
 conviction, that they who employ strong distinctive 
 terms, do so from no unkindness towards their 
 brethren, but because those terms are considered 
 as the exponents of principles, and there is a fear 
 lest the disuse of the term should imply a con- 
 cession of the principle. I repeat that it has been 
 ray desire to write in a spirit of charity, and should 
 any condescend to notice or comment on any thing 
 
38 
 
 which 1 have written, I entreat that tliey will do 
 so in the same spirit ; 1 beg of them to bear in 
 mind, that not only may there be strength without 
 bitterness, but that it is certainly true, that when- 
 ever bitterness enters in, there invariably follows a 
 proportionate loss of strength. If, in the endea- 
 vour to clear away the errors and mistakes of 
 others, I have fallen into greater errors myself, let 
 these be exposed, but according to the apostolic 
 precept — “ in meekness.” Do you blame me be- 
 cause that to the already vexed world I have 
 opened up another theme of discussion ? If the 
 Son of God left the bosom of his Father to recon- 
 cile to himself a world dead in trespasses and sins, 
 may not pardon be extended to the most unworthy 
 of his servants, when he goes on, peradventure, the 
 vain errand of reconciling Christians one to an- 
 other ? Time was, when to have written thus 
 might have exposed the rash penman to something 
 harsher than ominous silence, or the lash of cri- 
 ticism ; but these days have passed away ; our lot 
 is cast in times of change and wonder ; science has 
 descended from the regions of lofty abstraction 
 to come and minister to the every-day wants of the 
 humblest and the meainest ; legislation has undone 
 its finished works ; and who shall say what may be 
 in the womb of time ? who shall venture to pro- 
 nounce the notion, the dream of a visionary, that 
 the Lord may yet “ bind up the breach of his 
 
39 
 
 people, and heal the stroke of their wound ? ” 
 There are powers at work which give me con- 
 fidence that such will be the result. 
 
 Protestants, start not at these words ! let there 
 not rise up in your minds visions of dark and 
 deadly conspiracies, the fiendish work of those 
 whose untiring task you deem that it is to weave 
 the web of sophistry. These phantoms of a dis- 
 eased imagination are not in my thoughts. The 
 powers on which I rely are those which religion 
 alone can invoke and inspire. Lately, on occasions 
 of public distress, and at other times, we have used 
 that beautiful prayer of our almost divine Liturgy, 
 the prayer for Unity ; thousands within our own 
 Church daily, in their private and public devotions, 
 and at the eucharistic sacrifice, now pray for Unity. 
 And not only this, but — blest augury of concord 
 more complete! — through the length and breadth 
 of Christendom reverberate the echoes of prayer, at 
 the solemn midnight hour, at matin and vesper 
 time, in the sisters’ sweet thrilling tones, with the 
 brethren’s deep, hoarser voices, from lands in 
 which the memory of ancient feuds has lingered 
 long, from the Vatican’s proud walls, from France’s 
 jealous shore, from the faithful everywhere as- 
 sembled in their churches, from gathered families 
 in chapels of ancestral halls, from the lips of noble 
 and humble, rich and poor, simple and sage, ascend 
 heart-felt litanies, beseeching. 
 
40 
 
 “ O God the Father, Creator of the world, have 
 mercy upon England : 
 
 “ O God the Son, Redeemer of mankind, have 
 mercy upon England : 
 
 “ O God the Holy Ghost, Perfecter of the elect, 
 have mercy upon England : 
 
 “ O Sacred Trinity, three persons in one God, 
 have mercy upon England.” 
 
 Was ever Heaven thus besieged by prayer, and 
 the Lord repented not, returned not, nor left a 
 blessing behind ? We may not live to see the 
 day ; our eyes long ere that may be closed in 
 death ; but God will have mercy upon England. 
 Yes, the day will dawn, when, bidding a last fare- 
 well to the places of separation which kept us too 
 long apart, we shall, a united people, assemble 
 once again where in old time our fathers knelt, 
 and worshipped, and adored. If it be too much to 
 anticipate a golden age, when we shall turn our 
 swords into ploughshares and our spears into pru- 
 ning-hooks, and learn war no more, at least we 
 may look forward to the time when the weapons of 
 controversial keenness, now pointed at each other’s 
 breasts, may be turned to their only legitimate use — 
 warfare against sin and infidelity. Then there will 
 be a chance that our poor suffering country, whose 
 wounds, amidst our hot disputes, have not been 
 closed, nor bound up, nor mollified with ointment, 
 may receive a just measure of our care. Then 
 
41 
 
 there will be a chance that the overtasked mechanic 
 and artificer, the care-worn sempstress, the pining 
 labourer, the neglected child of wicked, because 
 neglected, parents, the dwellers in filthy, sutFo- 
 cating hovels, to whom pestilence and famine are 
 familiar guests, now too often the sport of capricious 
 legislation and the fieeting objects of a hollow sym- 
 pathy, may have their wants, and sufferings, and 
 sorrows studied and mitigated by a thoughtful, 
 discriminating, comprehensive Christian wisdom. 
 
 May God, in His infinite mercy, hasten the 
 consummation of this glorious day ! 
 
 London : — Printed by George Barclay, Castle Street Leicester Square. 
 
m 
 
(1 
 
 SOME CONSEQUENCES 
 
 OF 
 
 THE BONN CONFERENCES, 
 
 FROM A CHURCH OF ENGLAND POINT OF VIEW. 
 
 (Reprinted from the “ Church Review,” Sept. 4th, 1875.) 
 
 Any attempt to estimate the full importance of the Bonn Conferences 
 would be premature, and probably also misleading. For this we must be 
 content to wait. But there are certain consequences naturally flowing 
 from the principles laid down by Dr. Dollinger, and unanimously ac- 
 cepted by those who took part in those conferences, which are of the very 
 greatest importance to the Church Universal, and which must have a 
 direct and immediate influence upon the ecclesiastical affairs of our 
 own country. To direct attention to them will, therefore, be neither 
 inopportune nor useless. 
 
 In the first place, these conferences have made gigantic strides 
 towards Church autonomy. They were initiated, organized, and con- 
 ducted to a triumphant conclusion without any authority from the 
 civil power. The consent of her Majesty’s Ministers was not sought. 
 The law officers of the Crown were not consulted. Yet an authority 
 was acknowledged — an authority superior to that of any earthly 
 empire — the authority of the undivided Church. All previous 
 attempts at reunion were made by the recognized rulers in Church 
 and State. Those who met at Bari, at Lyons, at Ferrara, at Florence, 
 came armed with official powers delegated by popes, by emperors, by 
 kings. While theologians wrangled, statesmen plotted and knights 
 fought ; and the deliberations came to nothing, or rather served only 
 to embitter the quarrels they were designed to end, to perpetuate the 
 old schisms and produce new ones. How different has been the result 
 of these conferences at Bonn ! And it is surely significant that the 
 only approach to a discordant note came from those who had come 
 armed with a ^was^-official authority. The Kussians and Orientals, 
 
2 
 
 says the report now before us, although personally agreeing to the 
 Sixth Article, yet “ preferred to lay the matter before their Church 
 authorities before giving their official consent.” We all know how 
 closely ecclesiastical affairs are bound up with politics in the East ; how 
 the authorities of the Church in Greece, in Roumania, and, above all, 
 in Russia are hampered by the jealousies or the supposed necessities of 
 statesmen. There is reason to fear, then, lest the labours of this 
 latest and as now appears most successful of reunion conferences 
 should be rendered abortive by the timidity or the treachery of 
 
 Church authorities at home.” The cloud of suspicion is as yet no 
 larger than a man’s hand, its shadow faint and almost imperceptible. 
 But we cannot conceal from ourselves the possibility that the bright 
 heaven of our hopes may yet once again be entirely overcast and 
 become black with clouds through the time-serving policy of State 
 nominees. Whatever, then, may be the ultimate result of these con- 
 ferences, one inevitable consequence will be to weaken the hold which 
 the Church and State idol has long maintained over the minds of 
 many well-meaning and pious Englishmen, and to destroy that fatal 
 glamour it has cast over their imaginations. 
 
 A second matter, to which it would be impossible for English 
 Churchmen to attach too much importance, is the opinion expressed 
 by Dr. Dollinger and accepted by the conference nem. con, on the 
 validity of Anglican orders. Of course everyone who cared to trouble 
 himself about this question knew that the Apostolic Episcopate has 
 come down to us by an unbroken line of succession. The inconsist- 
 ency of Rome in admitting the validity of the Oriental and denying 
 that of the Anglican ordinations was patent. The admission of 
 English clergy as priests to the conference was a tacit decision in our 
 favour. Yet, fortunately, the question was not suffered to rest here. 
 It must be thoroughly investigated. And so for the first time since 
 the day on which Pope Pius V. issued his bull of excommunication 
 against Queen Elizabeth, and released her subjects from their 
 allegiance, has the claim of the Anglican Communion to be an in- 
 tegral portion of the one Catholic Church been impartially examined. 
 “ It had been objected,” said the learned theologian of Munich, that 
 while the Latins considered orders a sacramentum, and the Greeks 
 looked upon it as a or mystery, the English rejected the 
 
 idea of its having any sacramental character. That arose, however, 
 from one part of the English meaning that was attached to the word 
 ‘sacrament’ at the Reformation, as being an ordinance in which all 
 might have a part. But the English looked upon ordination as a 
 Divine appointment ; it was accompanied by the laying on of hands, 
 there were words expressive of the communication of power and 
 right, and a grace was supposed to accompany it.” That is to say, 
 we have the matter, the form, and the authorized administrator of 
 the ordinance, whether it be commonly called a sacrament or not. 
 What more can the most obstinate formalist require ? Surely nothing, 
 unless he be prepared to maintain that all ecclesiastical authority 
 
3 
 
 emanates from the Pope and may be withdrawn by him proprio rnotu^ 
 which neither Orientals nor Old Catholics admit. The consequence 
 is a complete justification of our attitude towards Rome, and an im- 
 mense accession of strength in our conflict with the Papal Propaganda. 
 Hitherto the Manning faction has flourished through its success in 
 insinuating doubts as to the validity of Anglican ministrations. 
 Henceforth it stands convicted, in the judgment of every impartial 
 man, of schismatical intrusion into other dioceses, and of violent 
 usurpation of jurisdiction in foreign provinces, contrary to the supreme 
 law of the Church and in direct violation of the canons of oecumenical 
 councils. 
 
 A third point not to be overlooked is the reception accorded to 
 certain Nonconformist ministers. Dr. Hermann Adelberg, who called 
 himself “ a Bavarian Protestant clergyman,” and Dr. Schaff, a well- 
 known Dissenting minister and professor of New York, were per- 
 mitted to address the conference at different times. But only as a 
 matter of courtesy, since, as the President was careful to point out, 
 they had there no locus standi. Nor could they possibly have any, 
 for the conference had already virtually decided against them when it 
 determined that its ‘‘ basis of union must be Catholic and not Protes- 
 tant.” The consequence will be to open the 'eyes of discerning men 
 to the baselessness of Nonconformist claims. Dissenters are never 
 tired of asserting that Anglicans have widely departed from the primi- 
 tive practices and corrupted the primitive faith. Dissent is never in 
 want of texts to prove that it alone is Scriptural. Now an independent 
 tribunal, chiefly composed of Old Catholic and Greek theologians, 
 has decided that they are mistaken, that their views are novel, that 
 their interpretations are erroneous, that they have neither part nor lot 
 in the great society founded by the Apostles, that they have no locus 
 standi except on the basis of a new revelation. None but the veriest 
 dotards can now be led astray by ignorant declamations against Sacer- 
 dotalism, or cozened into the belief that ability to talk about Christ is 
 sufficient witness of a commission from Christ, or that the assumption 
 of Reverend” is a proof of power to administer divinely-ordained 
 sacraments. 
 
 A fourth point worth notice is the attitude of Protestants towards 
 the conference. When permitted to speak, their champions opened a 
 fire of adverse criticisms, and poured in volleys of Scriptural quota- 
 tions condemnatory of the whole proceedings of the conference. They 
 openly admitted that they did not want union, and laughed at the 
 folly of attempting it : their aim is a “ confederation of Churches,” 
 an “ Evangelical alliance.” Now, a very little consideration of this 
 matter, combined with even a superficial knowledge of the New 
 Testament, is sufficient to prove that the evils for which the confer- 
 ence has striven to find a remedy are the very sins against which 
 Christ Himself uttered solemn warnings, and which His Apostles 
 sternly condemned ; the object at which it has aimed is that for which 
 the Lord earnestly prayed, and which His Apostles were most anxious 
 
4 
 
 to maintain. That Anglicans, Old Catholics, and Orientals are 
 aiming at this and nothing else is plain from the terms they have used 
 as well as from the tenour of their whole proceedings. That the 
 Protestant leaders are aiming at something else is equally clear from 
 the fact that the old terms — the words sanctioned and consecrated 
 by Evangelists and Apostles — do not and cannot accurately express 
 their ideas. They have been obliged to coin new words, to invent 
 new phrases. Everyone who can speak English feels, as soon as the 
 sounds fall on his ear, that “ confederation ” is not ‘‘ reunion,” and 
 that “ Evangelical alliance” is not “ Apostolical unity.” The differ- 
 ence is not merely formal and immaterial, but essential and funda- 
 mental. There is a difference in kind. But one set of terms and 
 phrases is the language of the New Testament ; the other that of 
 modern sectarianism. The consequence is that the Protestants stand 
 condemned ‘‘ out of their own mouth ” of repudiating that which the 
 Scriptures inculcate, and of seeking after something else which they 
 implicitly condemn. 
 
 Thus the pr^ eiples,, the proceedings, and the conclusions of these 
 conferences at Bonn tend in every way to confirm the opinions and 
 strengthen the position of the Catholic party in the Anglican Church. 
 The wisd m, as well as the necessity, of repudiating the monstrous 
 assump .ons of the so-called Evangelicals is plainly proved. The 
 justice of our antagonism to the unwarrantable claims of Romanism is 
 fully substantiated. The righteousness of our opposition to the 
 encroachments of the civil power i^ clearly demonstrated. High 
 Churchmen are the Old Catholics of England. On all important 
 points their views are the same as those of their brethren in the 
 European continent and in the far off East. Their aims too are 
 identical. In conjunction with these they will not only maintain their 
 ground in the Anglican Establishment, but also ultimately achieve a 
 glorious triumph for the cause they advocate, and inaugurate a new 
 era for the Church. 
 
 Price Id.^ or 3s. per 100, postage ^d. 
 
 Printed by the Church Printing Company, 11, Burleigh-street, Strand, W.C. 
 
SERIOUS REMONSTRANCE 
 
 ADDRESSED TO 
 
 THE REV. R. W. SIBTHORP, B. D. 
 
 FORMERLY CURATE OF ST. MARY'S CHURCH, HULL. 
 
 OCCASIONED BY HIS RECENT PUBLICATION 
 
 « 
 
 ENTITLED^ 
 
 SOME ANSWER TO THE INQUIRY WHY ARE YOU BECOME 
 
 A CATHOLIC 
 
 w . 
 
 BY THOSE OF THE HULL CLERGY 
 WHO WERE PERSONALLY KNOWN TO HIM. 
 
 “ NOVr THE SPIRIT SPEAKETH EXPRESSLY, THAT IN THE LATTER TIMES SOME 
 SHALL DEPART FROM THE FAITH." — 1 TIM. IV. 1 . 
 
 “ LET HIM THAT THINKBTH HE STANDETH TAKE HEED LEST HE FALL." — 
 
 I COR. X. 12 . 
 
 " HOLD THOU ME UP, AND I SHALL BE SAFE. "—PS. CXIX. 117. 
 
 LONDON : 
 
 L. AND. Ct. SEELEY, 169, FLEET STREET, 
 
 1842. 
 
L. AND G. SEELEY, PRINTERS, THAMES DITTON, SURREY 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Motives which influenced the writers . . . 1,2 
 
 Mr. Sibthorp’s “ Narrative of what passed in his mind 3 
 
 False notion of the typical character of Jewish rites, &c> 5 
 
 Confounds types with patterns .... 5 
 
 The true question respecting Christ’s institutions, one 
 
 of fact ........ 6 
 
 Fallacy of Mr. Sibthorp’s reasoning from types . 7 — 10 
 
 Correspondences between Jewish and Romish systems . 
 
 Unity— Primacy — Orders of spiritual governors — 
 
 Sacrifice — Real Presence — Ceremonies — Authority 
 — Uniformity — Catholicity .... 10 — 18 
 
 Differences between these systems . . . . 19, 20 
 
 Mr. Sibthorp’s argument concerning the unity of the 
 
 church, examined ...... 21 — 25 
 
 And also his argument for the necessity of a centre of 
 
 union ........ 26, 27 
 
 The supremacy of Peter argued from Scripture . 27—36 
 
 Hypothesis respecting the developement of the Primacy 36 
 
 At variance with the analogy before pursued . . 41 
 
 And still more with historical facts .... 42 — 46 
 
 Harmony of the Romish Church, and discords of Pro- 
 testants ........ 46 
 
 Extracts from Mr. Sibthorp’s Discourse in 1827 . 48 — 53 
 
 Want of a centre of unity not felt by Protestants . 53 
 
 The recognition of the Primacy not a first step to unity 54 
 
 The Reformation from Popery no ** disaster” . 56, 57 
 
 Mr. Sibthorp’s subsidiary arguments . . , 57 
 
IV 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 1. From the Church, as being a positive institution 
 
 of Christ ....... 58 
 
 2. From the supposed insufficiency of the union 
 
 contended for by Protestants . . . . 59 
 
 Why do Protestants maintain their views ? . . 63, 64 
 
 Mr. Sibthorp’s charitable, but Anti-Romish admission . 64 
 
 His distinction between the body and soul of the 
 
 Church, unsound . . . . . . 65 — 68 
 
 Protestant differences do not make it necessary to re- 
 turn to Rome ....... 68 
 
 Controversy with the Oxford Tract writers passed over 69 
 
 Mr. Sibthorp’s self-delusion betrayed in the study of 
 
 Protestant Writers . . . . . .69 — 71 
 
 Revindicates the entire system of the Papacy . . 71 
 
 His case very instructive, and monitory . . . 72 
 
 His declension gradual . . . . . . 72, 73 
 
 Romish private devotions, not to be mixed with the 
 
 worship of the Anglican Church . , . . 74, 75 
 
 The English Church gives every needful aid to devotion 75, 76 
 Which Rome does not — either 
 
 By her daily devotions, — her hourly offices, — her con- 
 fessions and penances, — her prayers to saints, — her 
 prayers for the dead, — or her purgatorial fires 7 7 — 8 1 
 
 Mr. Sibthorp veils the grosser errors of Romanism . 81 
 
 Yet yields himself to their worst influence . . 85 
 
 Represents Rome as inviting the Anglican Church to 
 her communion 
 
 Curious motive for accepting the Invitation . . 87 
 
 The question Why have you become a Catholic ? ” 
 improper . 
 
 The true question ....... 
 
 Concluding Remarks ...... 
 
A 
 
 SERIOUS REMONSTRANCE, 
 
 &c. &c. 
 
 Dear Sir, 
 
 If, in your recent proceedings, you have thought 
 of us at all, you will, we doubt not, have supposed, 
 that your letter explanatory of your secession from 
 the Church of England, has been read by us, with 
 deep and painful interest. And we think we 
 should not be doing justice either to you or to 
 ourselves, if we did not, with all openness and 
 sincerity, inform you of the effect it has produced 
 upon our minds. 
 
 We have known you in your earlier days, when 
 “ the candle of the Lord shined upon you,” when, 
 under the happiest auspices, you began your 
 ministerial course in this town,* and won the 
 affections of all, not more by the eloquence of 
 your preaching, than by the simplicity of your 
 
 * Mr. Sibthorp was ordained priest, on a title given by the late 
 Rev. John Scotty to the Curacy of St. Mary’s in Hull. 
 
 B 
 
2 
 
 faith, the fervour of your devotion, and the depth 
 of your humility. It is impossible for us to regard 
 your conduct with indifference, or to be affected 
 by it no more deeply than we should have been 
 by that of a perfect stranger, who, like you, had 
 fallen into grievous error. We have strong feel- 
 ings mingling with our firm convictions — feelings 
 not of bitterness ; or if so — not of the bitterness of 
 anger but of grief, towards one whom we loved as 
 a brother, with whom we “ took sweet counsel 
 together, and walked in the house of God as 
 friends.” Is it then possible that we could wit- 
 ness your gradual declension without regret, and 
 your grievous fall without alarm ? We have 
 hitherto mourned over you in silence, but the time 
 is come when we are constrained to speak ; and 
 even if our words should be uttered in vain ; we 
 shall not regret the measure we are now taking. 
 If our advice and warning cannot reach you, yet 
 our prayers may ; and “ God forbid that we 
 should sin against the Lord, in ceasing to pray 
 for you ! ” 
 
 You profess in your letter, to give only “ some 
 of the reasons ” (p. 2.) which have decided your 
 course, “ though confessedly such as chiefly have 
 weight” with you. We shall not, then, be 
 deemed presumptuous, if we conclude, that, at all 
 events, we have before us, in a condensed form, 
 the substance of your argument against the church 
 you have left, and in favour of that to which you 
 
3 
 
 have now attached yourself. May we then hope, 
 that if we can prove the fallacy of the reasonings, 
 which, by your own acknowledgment, have in- 
 duced you to take this course ; you will submit with 
 Christian humility to “ the shame of one more 
 recantation,” and will retrace the steps by which 
 you have gone astray ? 
 
 We will follow you in the “ narrative of what 
 has been passing in your own mind, and has issued 
 in” your present connexion with the Church of 
 Rome. We do so, with the greater interest, be- 
 cause we are of the number of those who know 
 from your own lips, that “ in early life you sought 
 admission into that church, and that but for the 
 interference of the law, being then under age, you 
 would have joined her.” (p. 3.) And perhaps you 
 will allow us to remind you, that in alluding to this 
 event, you expressed yourself to us in the strongest 
 terms of gratitude to God for having preserved 
 you from the snare into which your youth and ig- 
 norance would then have betrayed you. Little 
 did we who heard you thus speak, imagine, 
 that after a lapse of fifteen or twenty years, you 
 could so far forget the feelings to which, in our 
 hearing, you gave most cordial and unsolicited 
 utterance, as to declare that “ the remembrance 
 of the devotional feelings you then had, never 
 entirely quitted you during subsequent years.” 
 Undoubtedly, you remembered your earlier feel- 
 ings at the time to which we allude, as distinctly 
 
 B 2 
 
4 
 
 as you can do now ; but we are certain that you 
 remembered them with a degree of horror, hu- 
 miliation, and regret, strikingly in contrast with 
 your present favourable recollections of them. 
 When therefore you say ; “ An impression, and in 
 the main a correct one, remained on my mind, 
 that there was among members of the Catholic 
 church, a dedication to the claims and duties of 
 Christianity, an admission of the influence of their 
 belief upon their ordinary life and devotions, — 
 a sort of absorbing interest in their religion, which 
 sustained in me a lingering affection towards them, 
 while I openly condemned what I honestly be- 
 lieved to be the errors of their creed” — -we can 
 only infer that your present “ absorbing interest” 
 in Romanism, has obliterated or obscured your 
 recollection of the actual feelings which you then 
 so freely expressed. We should be glad if this sug- 
 gestion might lead you to reconsider, with more 
 care and attention than you have yet done, the 
 thoughts which at the period referred to, were 
 really passing in your mind. 
 
 We come now to the more important part of 
 your narrative, in which you explain what appears 
 to have been the turning point in your career. 
 Your words are : (p. 5.) “ About five years since, 
 in the course of my ministry at Ryde, I was led to 
 review the Jewish economy, or the church under 
 the Old Testament dispensation. The subject 
 came minutely under my notice, while engaged 
 
5 
 
 ill a series of lectures on the Levitical law and in- 
 stitutions. Fou cannot require proof that these 
 had a typical character. It is universally admitted 
 that they were typical of something better — ‘ of 
 good things to come/ from Israel viewed as a na- 
 tion, down to the smallest ornaments of the taber- 
 nacle, respecting which Jehovah had said, ‘ See 
 that thou make all things according to the pattern 
 that was showed thee in the mount.’ ” 
 
 We here stop to show a double fallacy in your 
 reasoning on the acknowledged typical character 
 of the Levitical dispensation. 
 
 1 . First, you have not the slightest ground from 
 Scripture to conclude, that “ every thing down to 
 the smallest ornaments of the tabernacle,” was 
 typical of something future. That many things 
 were, we allow ; that all things were, we deny; 
 and if they were, some of them would tell strongly 
 against you, as we may have occasion to show 
 hereafter ; but it is enough for our present purpose 
 to say, that your assertion is entirely without the 
 capability of proof ; and that it therefore will form 
 no foundation whatever for an argument. 
 
 2. Secondly, your reasoning proceeds on an 
 assumption altogether at variance with the true 
 nature and significancy of a type. For a type, 
 though it has some necessary resemblance to its an- 
 titype, is not of the same nature, but is manifestly 
 and in every way inferior. A white garment, for 
 instance, may in one dispensation, typify purity 
 
6 
 
 in another, but it does not typify some other white 
 garment like itself. Ornaments — the smallest or- 
 naments — may typify something moral and spiri- 
 tual ; as the bells and pomegranates on the priest’s 
 vesture, may typify the union of profession and 
 fruitfulness in the Christian church, but they do 
 not and cannot typify any corresponding decora- 
 tion of vestments. Now your reasoning all turns 
 on the false supposition that a type is the same 
 thing as a pattern ; and by confounding things 
 which differ, in the progress of your argument, 
 you lose sight altogether of the true meaning of a 
 type. Let this misconeeption be corrected, and 
 your conclusion may be thus stated. “ The 
 Levitical system in every part, was designed to 
 be an exact pattern or counterpart of the Chris- 
 tian system in every part ; and as Moses was re- 
 quired to make all things according to the pattern 
 showed him in the mount, so the founders of the 
 Christian Church were required to construct the 
 whole of the Christian system in exact correspon- 
 dence with the Levitical.” The command to Moses 
 is clearly revealed in the word of God ; show us 
 the other, and we will acknowledge the validity 
 of your argument. 
 
 It may be answered : There is no need for such 
 a command ; for Jesus Christ, being the Founder 
 of his own church, was able so to construct it, 
 without any revelation at all, and certainly with- 
 out any of which we have the power to take cog- 
 
7 
 
 nizance. We admit it ; but then the question is 
 narrowed to one of fact, and we have but to in- 
 quire how Christ did frame his Church. Did he 
 adopt the Levitical model ? Did he either, him- 
 self establish, or enjoin his disciples to establish 
 such a scheme of worship ? In the law every- 
 thing is minutely prescribed. Where is the Le- 
 viticus of the New Testament ? or where, in the 
 New Testament, are we referred to the Leviticus 
 of the Old as the model on which the Ecclesiasti- 
 cal system of the church is to be formed ? 
 
 The foundation then of your reasoning from the 
 types of the Old Testament, sinks like a quick- 
 sand under the structure you are erecting upon it ; 
 and consequently, we might leave all your reason- 
 ings on this subject to fall by themselves, without 
 a single effort to give them further confutation. 
 But as you seem to value the argument highly, 
 we will proceed to take it to pieces, and to show 
 you how completely worthless and insignificant 
 it is in all its parts. 
 
 You first ask the question : (p. 6) “ Where is 
 the antitype of this typical dispensation ? ” And 
 then reply ; “ I naturally sought it in a careful com- 
 parison of the Christian dispensation with these 
 types, and I found one immediate answer to my 
 inquiry, and full of holy and consolatory instruc- 
 tion. They had an accomplishment in Christ, 
 as is largely shown by the Apostle to the Hebrews. 
 He is the typical temple, high priest, and victim ; 
 
8 
 
 his blood and righteousness, mediation, and inter- 
 cession, ministry, character and offices were pre- 
 figured by what went before.” Here we cordially 
 agree with you ; nor have we much to question in 
 what follows : “ The types of the Mosaic economy 
 have not their only accomplishment in the blessed 
 Saviour, or in Christ personally. He, it is clear, was 
 not the typified Israel, nor the mount Zion, nor 
 the Holy City, nor solely the Temple; neither 
 did the shew'-bread, or incense, or seven-branched 
 candlestick, or Levitical ministry prefigure Him, 
 or his work and office only.” It will, we suppose, 
 be generally admitted, that most if not the whole 
 of these particulars have typical reference to the 
 Church of Christ ; or to some blessings connected 
 with that Church. Be this, however, as it may, 
 we are not inclined to controvert the point with 
 you ; but we do most seriously object to the 
 mode in which you reach the following inference. 
 “ If all the typical institutions,” you say, “ of 
 the old dispensation found their sole and entire 
 accomplishment in Christ ; why are any continued 
 in the Christian Church correspondent with them ? 
 Why are there any sacraments, any separate ordain- 
 ed ministry, any sacrifice, any visible form of the 
 Church, &c. ? Would you not find it impossible to 
 establish any of these Christian blessings or privi- 
 leges without thus confounding type W\i\ipattern, of 
 which you here furnish us with so plain an instance? 
 Is not the positive command and appointment of 
 
9 
 
 the Son of God, a better basis for sacraments, for 
 an ordained ministry, and for a visible form of the 
 Church, than is to be found in any mere resem- 
 blances, even though they should be really types, 
 which yours are not ? We say nothing about 
 “ sacrifice,” because in the sense in which a 
 Romanist uses the word, we acknowledge but one 
 sacrifice, once offered to bear the sin of many. 
 
 Our reason for believing that Israel, Mount 
 Zion, the Holy City, typified the Church, is sim- 
 ply that they are represented as doing so in Holy 
 Scripture, and where we have not this divine light 
 to guide us, we are in perpetual danger of mis- 
 taking our own fancies or those of other men for 
 types. 
 
 As we feel that we have much stronger warrant 
 for our views respecting the foundation on which 
 the Christian Ministry, and sacramental institu- 
 tions rest, than those to which you appeal, we 
 are under no apprehension that, when your argu- 
 ment fails, we should be compelled to follow cer- 
 tain “ sectarians,” who hold that the Church 
 should be “ purely spiritual, without distinct 
 ministry.” We have the sure Word of God ; you, 
 nothing but shadows, which you dignify with the 
 name of types. We are compelled then directly 
 to negative your conclusion, that “ the Church 
 under the Old Testament was a close type of the 
 Church under the New.” (p. 8.) 
 
 From this false inference, which you style a 
 
10 
 
 “ guiding truth,” you attempt to trace “ some of 
 the principal points in which this correspondence 
 must ( — this is your word, not may, but musC) — ex- 
 ist between the typifying and the typified church.” 
 You never seem to suspect that there can be the 
 slightest difficulty in accommodating the type to 
 the antitype, or any ambiguity which leaves room 
 for doubt, or any unbending difference between 
 the two institutes of Moses and of Christ, which 
 no ingenuity can reconcile, because they were 
 never designed to harmonize? The similitude is 
 to be plain and obvious throughout ; and to an in- 
 attentive reader of your letter, it might seem to be 
 so ; but you must permit us to say, that this simi- 
 litude could only have been produced by a most 
 cautious selection of materials, and not by a fair 
 and full examination of the whole question on both 
 sides. 
 
 In order that proof of our assertion may not be 
 wanting, we will pay particular attention to the 
 various correspondences between the Jewish and 
 Christian churches, which you have submitted to 
 our notice, and then advert to other features, 
 which, on your principle — that one is a close type 
 of the other — ought to correspond, but which 
 either have no agreement whatever, or stand in 
 direct contrast and opposition. 
 
 1. Your first point of correspondence is that of 
 UNITY ; concerning which you thus state your 
 sentiments (p. 8) : “I found the former ” — 
 
1] 
 
 namely the type — “ to be a compact, united body, 
 really and visibly united in all its parts, combin- 
 ing a number of provincial, and locally separate 
 portions in one religious nation or people ; com- 
 bining them in a most strict, perfect, and evident 
 unity of faith, of worship, of laws, of discipline, of 
 religious ordinances, and even of minute cere- 
 monies ; no variety permitted, — no departure 
 from the oneness demanded being sanctioned 
 in any individual. Such was the ancient Israel, 
 and if typical of the Church, such should be the 
 Israel of God under the New Testament.” 
 
 You will allow, we suppose, that the will and 
 appointment of God is the true foundation on 
 which each of these churches, with their several 
 institutions, ultimately rest ; and that God was not 
 under any obligation, when he had formed one 
 church after a peculiar model, to construct the 
 other on precisely the same model. But if this 
 reasonable concession be made — and we see not 
 how it is to be withheld — then your reasoning is 
 utterly inconclusive, for it goes wholly on the 
 supposition, that J:he Christian must be like the 
 Jewish, because the Jewish is the type of the 
 Christian ! How loose is all such argument ! how 
 contradictory to the plainest matter of fact ! Let 
 us turn from the shadowy region of hypothesis 
 founded in imagined typical resemblances, “ to 
 the law and to the testimony.” He who “ runs 
 may read ” that for every minute particular re- 
 
12 
 
 specting Jewish worship, there was express com- 
 mand from God ; that command, not written on 
 the sandy shore of tradition, to be obliterated by 
 the successive waves of passing generations, but 
 on the imperishable page of Inspiration. Give us 
 the same authority for every religious observance 
 under the Christian dispensation, and the contro- 
 versy is at an end. But without such authority, 
 it is the height of arrogance in any man, or in any 
 section of the Church, to insist upon a kind of 
 unity, extending to most minute ceremonies, which 
 you say, ought to be found in the Church of 
 Christ. 
 
 Permit us further to suggest, that in this para- 
 graph, you unwittingly sanction that monstrous 
 principle of persecution for which the Church of 
 Rome ever has contended, and it is to be feared, 
 ever will. “ No variety,” you maintain, was per- 
 mitted, in the typical Church ; and the inference 
 is not to be evaded, that none ought to be per- 
 mitted in that Church which is the antitype. 
 
 Should you here allege, that Christ and his 
 Apostles gave us certain directions respecting 
 Christian worship, as Moses, by divine command, 
 had given respecting Jewish worship ; we have 
 nothing to do but to ask for chapter and verse, to 
 settle the dispute ; then, however, all your reason- 
 ing from the type to the antitype will be entirely 
 needless. Such would doubtless have been your 
 course, had you not known that there is nothing in 
 
13 
 
 the New Testament, savouring of the precise and 
 systematic arrangement of the externals of divine 
 worship, but everything the very reverse. 
 
 2. Your second point of resemblance is that of 
 Primacy, or Headship, which you maintain in the 
 following language (pp. 8, 9) : “At the head of 
 this body, nation, or church, was one supreme 
 dignitary of priestly order, invested by God with 
 singular prerogatives, ruling in perpetual succes- 
 sion over Israel, until the Lord should come ; in 
 his person, offices and residence, a centre of unity 
 to the whole nation, a representative on earth of 
 the Divine High Priest in heaven.” 
 
 Your own mental perceptions cannot have been 
 very clear, when you penned this last sentence. 
 Whatdivine High Priest was there then in Heaven, 
 for Aaron and his sons to represent ? The Priest- 
 hood of the Son of God was not assumed, in any 
 part of it, till he became a sacrifice for sin, nor did 
 its office commence in Heaven, till he “ascended 
 up on high, led captivity captive, and received 
 gifts for men.” Consequently, here your analogy 
 or correspondence fails in its most essential parti- 
 cular. 
 
 On this point, a most complete refutation of 
 your whole scheme of interpretation, might easily 
 be collected out of the Epistle to the Hebrews 
 alone. You grant that the types had an accom- 
 plishment in Christ, and rightly refer to this 
 epistle for proof. We refer to it, for the further 
 
14 
 
 proof, that with reference to the High -priest hood, 
 they had in Christ their exclusive and perfect ac- 
 complishment. The Apostle teaches us, that as 
 High Priest, Christ never would have any suc- 
 cessor. He argues that succession implies the 
 failure of Him who had preceded. For, while the 
 priests of the law “ were not suffered to continue 
 by reason of death, this man, because he continueth 
 ever, hath an unchangeable’’’ — that is, as the rea- 
 soning implies, an untransferable — “priesthood.”* 
 He can need no successor, because “ he ever liveth 
 to make intercession” for his people. t He requires 
 no vicar or substitute to fill his place on earth, be- 
 cause he himself never leaves it. How can he 
 who has said, “ Where two or three are gathered 
 together in my name, there am I in the midst of 
 them,”;]: want a vicegerent upon earth ? What 
 greater absurdity was ever palmed upon the cre- 
 dulity of mankind ? 
 
 3. Your third feature of resemblance (p, 9), is 
 that which you suppose to exist between the 
 Priests and Levites of the old dispensation, and 
 the Christian ministry in its several branches, 
 under the New. But, with the exception of such a 
 remote kind of correspondence, as may be fairly 
 presumed to exist between different institutions 
 ordained by God, for ends in many respects simi- 
 lar, we shall find little or nothing of the kind of 
 
 * Heb. vii. 23, 24. 
 
 t Ibid. vii. 25. 
 
 t Matt, xviii. 20. 
 
15 
 
 parallelism, for which you plead. The Priesthood, 
 in its strict and proper sense, continued only till 
 the coming of Christ. Christian Ministers are no- 
 where called Priests in the New Testament; 
 Christian people are called so, in a lax, yet im- 
 portant sense; “Ye are a royal priesthood.”* 
 As to Levites, there is no service in the Christian 
 Church, in which persons bearing an official cha- 
 racter similar to their’s, can be employed. You 
 represent them as being continually engaged “ in 
 the instruction of the people ;” but this seems to 
 be a mistake. The prophets, who were not neces- 
 sarily, either of the Levitical or Priestly order, 
 held this office. A fact of itself, at direct variance 
 with the practice of that Church which avowedly 
 adopts the Mosaic ritual as its model. 
 
 4. You pass hastily over the topic of sacrifice, 
 (p. 9,) yet say sufficient to prove, that, in your judg- 
 ment, the Christian Church, ought like its prede- 
 cessor, to offer sacrifices — we mean sacrifices not of 
 prayer and praise only— -but of atonement. The 
 Epistle to the Hebrews, on this subject also, is 
 entirely against you. For it is there expressly main- 
 tained, that “ we are sanctified through the offering 
 of Christ, once for all” — that, “ by one offering 
 Christ hath perfected for ever them that are sanc- 
 tified,” that where remission of sins is, “ there is 
 no more offering for sin.” Yet the Church of 
 
 * 1 Peter ii. 9. 
 
16 
 
 Rome, in defiance of such authority, declares, 
 that “ in the sacrifice of the mass is offered to 
 God, a true, proper and propitiatory sacrifice for 
 the living and the dead.”* The Apostle argues 
 that Christ does not need, as the Jewish High 
 Priests did, “daily to offer sacrifice for sin, for this 
 he did once, when he offered up himself ; ” t and 
 again ; “ Christ is not entered into the holy places 
 which are the figures of the true, but into heaven 
 itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us. 
 Nor yet that he should offer himself often, ... for 
 then he must often have suffered, since the foun- 
 dation of the world ; but now once in the end of 
 the world, hath he appeared to put away sin, by 
 the sacrifice of himself.” “ Christ was once of- 
 fered to bear the sins of many.”J After these tes- 
 timonies, which no sophistry can set aside, will 
 you. Dear Sir, allow yourself to be carried away 
 by the dubious style of argument into which an 
 excessive fondness for subtle analogies, may, in 
 an incautious moment, have betrayed you ? We 
 would still hope better things of you, and things 
 which accompany salvation, though, from real 
 love to you, and from deep interest in your per- 
 sonal welfare, we are compelled to speak as we do. 
 
 5. Your fifth supposed correspondence (p. 9.) 
 between the type and the antitype, though not 
 stated with much clearness and precision, refers 
 
 * Creed of Pope Pius IV. 
 
 + Heb. ix. 24, 28. 
 
 t Heb. vii. 27. 
 
17 
 
 to what you call a “ real and not merely spiritual, 
 figurative or imaginary presence of God himself in 
 his earthly temple.” We have yet to learn that a 
 spiritual presence is not quite as real, though it 
 may be less perceptible than a visible presence. 
 The type of the Shechinah had, as we conceive, 
 its best and most perfect antitype in that spiritual 
 presence with which God has promised to bless 
 those in every age “who worship Him in spirit 
 and in truth.” If by coupling the word brnginary 
 with the word spiritual, you would insinuate, as 
 you seem to do, that purely spiritual blessings are 
 imaginary, we can only regret that your new creed 
 has already made such havoc of your older and 
 better principles, as to render you insensible to 
 one of the most important distinctions, in “ the 
 things that belong to your peace.” 
 
 You speak of “ sculptured cherubim,” of which 
 you make the angels, who are represented as being 
 present in Christian assemblies, the counterpart 
 or antitype. In this there is something more 
 really typical than in any other of your adduced 
 resemblances. Yet you return immediately to 
 patterns which are no types. 
 
 6. In the Levitical dispensation, you inform 
 us (p. 9.) “ there was an impressive and mag- 
 nificent RITUAL, every ceremony of which was 
 symbolical and instructive.” But instead of ex- 
 plaining the symbols, and shewing how they were 
 superseded by that which they signified, you only 
 
 c 
 
18 
 
 adduce them in evidence, that we should now have 
 some other symbols of the same kind, 
 
 7. The questions of authority, uniformity, 
 and CATHOLICITY, come next under review. On 
 the first, you show (p. 10.) that all, “from Dan to 
 Beersheba, were in fealty and submission to the 
 supremacy of the one High Priest ; ” on the next, 
 that none might lawfully “ recognize or use any 
 other sacred ministry, than that of the tribe of 
 Levi and the house of Aaron ; ” on the third, that 
 “ wherever an Israelite journeyed in that land, he 
 found one creed, one faith, one religious rite, one 
 harmonious agreement even in the minutest points 
 of ceremonial worship.” 
 
 These topics all bring us back to that which has 
 been sufficiently discussed, under the head of 
 unity. We are not to rest weighty questions like 
 these, upon fancied typical correspondences, as 
 you seem to do, without warrant of Holy Scrip- 
 ture to sanction our interpretations. Still less are 
 we to condemn those who cannot see a type where 
 we fancy one, or who are unable to agree with us, 
 in “ the minutest points of ceremonial worship.” 
 And we argue thus, without reference to those 
 parts of the New Testament which enjoin us to 
 regard the gospel of Christ as set in opposition 
 to the law ; which teach us that instead of being 
 like the abrogated ceremonial of Judaism a grievous 
 yoke, it is perfect freedom ; that it is a “ perfect 
 law of liberty ; ” and which charge us to “ stand 
 
19 
 
 fast in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made 
 us free and not to be again entangled with the 
 yoke of bondage.” 
 
 It now becomes necessary for us to remark, that 
 while you carefully enumerate correspondences 
 between Judaism and Christianity, you as cau- 
 tiously avoid all allusion to their essential differ- 
 enees. Still less are you disposed to meddle with 
 those differences which are to be traced between 
 the hierarchy of Israel and that of Rome. We 
 have hereto remind you of your own position, that 
 the Church of the Old Testament was a close 
 type ” of the Church under the New. 
 
 We inquire then 
 
 1st, Since the priesthood of the law was a 
 married priesthood, why does the Romish Church 
 forbid marriage to her religious orders ? 
 
 2ndly, Since in the type, the High Priest’s 
 office was hereditary, how comes it to pass that 
 in the antitype it should become elective ? 
 
 3rdly, What precedent does the Jewish Church 
 afford for the College of Cardinals, in which is 
 vested the mighty function of choosing Christ’s 
 vicar for him ? 
 
 4thly, Whereas the High Priest among the 
 Jews had, by the Mosaic Institute no legislative 
 authority whatever ; how comes it to pass that 
 Popes claim the power not only to exercise tem- 
 poral dominion in their own territories, but to give 
 law to nations, to depose monarchs, to bear the 
 
 c 2 
 
•20 
 
 title of “ king of kings and monarch of the world,” 
 to hold the two-edged sword of divine power, to 
 excel the mightiest sovereigns of the earth as far 
 as the sun excels the moon, to apply to themselves 
 the language of God to the prophet ; “ See I have 
 set thee over the nations and over the kingdoms to 
 root out and to pull down, and to destroy and to 
 throw down and to build up ; ” * to compel em- 
 perors to hold their stirrup, to lead their horse, 
 to kiss their toe, and to receive from them the au- 
 thority to reign over their own subjects ? Is any 
 parallel to be found to this, in the descendants of 
 Aaron — at least till the Maccabean race, without 
 any divine authority, became priestly warriors 
 under extraordinary circumstances ? 
 
 Surely, points of difference might more easily 
 be multiplied than points of agreement ; and we 
 are certain you would have found it so, had you 
 gone five years ago, to the consideration of the 
 question, with an unbiassed mind. But even then, 
 dear Sir, you had begun to tamper with the sim- 
 ple truth of the gospel, and hence were the more 
 easily persuaded to see nothing adverse to, but every- 
 thing in favour of Rome, in your investigations of 
 the Levitical constitution. Without some preju- 
 dice of this kind, you would scarcely have dis- 
 covered in the “ seven -branched candlestick,” a 
 type of the seven sacraments of Rome ; nor would 
 
 * Jer. i. 10. 
 
21 
 
 have rushed to the conclusion, that the Saviour’s 
 prayer for the unity of his church, was to be an- 
 swered by that kind of unity, which has at any 
 time subsisted under the Papal hierarchy. 
 
 Here, a new field of inquiry opens before us. 
 Because Christ had prayed for the unity of the 
 Church, and St. Paul had declared, “ There is one 
 body and one spirit .... one Lord, one faith, one 
 baptism ; ” you first infer (p. 12.) that there must 
 be such a church on earth, and then show that 
 “ no protestant sect” presents “ the slightest cor- 
 respondence with it. Having looked to the An- 
 glican church, and found she was not the church, 
 for she never professed to be more than a part of 
 it ; you glance at the multitude of sects among 
 protestants and ask, “ Could such disorder be the 
 designed fulfilment of a type of such holy order ? 
 such disunion be the rightful substance of a 
 shadow marked by an entire harmony of its parts, 
 and perfect oneness of outline ? Ingenuity could 
 not trace a resemblance.” 
 
 In these remarks you first overlook a distinction 
 which you were not wont to esteem unimportant, 
 — between the visible and invisible church ; and 
 then assume what is not borne out by facts. 
 
 We hold, that among all true believers in Christ, 
 a vital and essential union with each other exists, 
 as the natural effect of the connexion of each with 
 that mystical body of which Christ is the Living 
 Head. In this common bond, are many united in 
 
22 
 
 spirit, who are yet severed in denomination, and 
 discordant in their views of the nature and consti- 
 tution of the visible church. And we look for- 
 ward, with cheering expectation, to that period, 
 when in our Father’s house above, we shall asso- 
 ciate with many who could not join our religious 
 assemblies and services on earth. Yet we never 
 cease to deplore the differences which prevail 
 among us, and to desire those clearer manifesta- 
 tions of divine truth, which shall render the church 
 of Christ visibly one, as we sincerely believe it will 
 still become, notwithstanding all present appear- 
 ances to the contrary. We must however, declare, 
 with all seriousness of mind, that we much prefer 
 the present condition of the Church, with all its 
 lamentable divisions and separations, to that kind 
 of unity of which Rome makes so bold and so un- 
 justifiable a boast. 
 
 The perfect unity of the Church of Rome, is 
 by you confidently assumed instead of being 
 in the following words ; “ When I looked to the 
 primitive church of the first six centuries, I found 
 an exact correspondence with the type.” What ! 
 were there no divisions, no separations in the 
 church during these six ages ? Was the Christian 
 worship throughout this period, conducted with 
 the exact uniformity of the Jewish worship ? Did 
 no unauthorized teachers protrude themselves 
 into the ministerial office, without episcopal sanc- 
 tion ? What means the early note of remon- 
 
23 
 
 strance and complaint in the epistles to the Co- 
 rinthians and Galatians? “I hear that there are 
 divisions among you,” — “ Every one of you saith 
 I am of Paul ; and I of Apollos ; and I of Cephas ; 
 and I of Christ.” Were all teachers subject to 
 one acknowledged Head ? Why does the Apostle 
 exclaim : “ I would they were cut off that trouble 
 you ? ” As the stream of time rolled on, vexa- 
 tions of this kind were perpetually multiplied. 
 The reiterated injunctions to unity contained in 
 the writings of the early fathers, especially in 
 those of Ignatius, are no insignificant tokens that 
 divisions were continually becoming more com- 
 mon and more injurious; and all the authority of 
 the most zealous and devoted bishops and martyrs 
 of the church was insufficient to restrain the grow- 
 ing evil. Separation soon took a decided form ; 
 and the existence of Montanists in the age of 
 Tertullian, and of Novatians in that of Cyprian, at 
 the close of the second and the beginning of the 
 third century, proves how impossible it was for 
 the Christian Church to keep its members as 
 closely within one visible communion, as the 
 Jewish Church had done in preceding ages. So 
 much for that “ exact correspondence with the 
 type,” (p. 13.) which furnishes you with an occa- 
 sion of depreciating Protestantism and of extolling 
 Romanism. 
 
 You proceed; (p. 13.) “When I also looked 
 back to the ancient Church of England, as first 
 
24 
 
 formed by St. Augustine, I found the most entire 
 agreement, and an actual, visible, professed one- 
 ness with that Apostolic Church, as it had existed 
 for six centuries/’ We may here ask; Was the 
 ancient Church of England first formed by the monk 
 Augustine whom Gregory the first sent on his mis- 
 sion to this country ? Have we no records of a Chris- 
 tian church in Britain of an earlier date ? Can vou 
 be ignorant of the fact, that Augustine found, on his 
 arrival, Christians and Christian Bishops, who were 
 disposed to dispute with him against the papal 
 claims ? But for you to admit all this ; for you to 
 admit still further that the disputes between the 
 parties about the keeping of Easter, proved the 
 British church to be a scion of the Greek and not 
 of the Roman church, would have marred the 
 lovely picture of unity which you endeavour to 
 present to the readers of your letter. 
 
 You grant that, at a subsequent period, (p. 13.) 
 “ the catholic body had been lopped of some of 
 its limbs by the severing strokes of heresy and 
 schism.” Now this very admission proves, what 
 makes against your analogical argument, that there 
 was not an “ exact correspondency between the 
 type and the antitype.” For no such “ lopping” 
 took place under the Mosaic institute. The rea- 
 son of all which is very plain. God did not in- 
 tend the Christian Church to be tied down by 
 those stringent bonds of uniformity which, in his 
 infinite wisdom, he had seen to be necessary for 
 
25 
 
 the Jewish Church. The Romish Church did not 
 understand this essential difference between the 
 two dispensations, and therefore it took to the 
 system of “ lopping ” by anathemas ; by excom- 
 munications; by persecutions with fire and sword; 
 by inquisitions with their accompaniments — racks 
 and tortures and Autos de Fi. 
 
 Yet to such a church you join yourself under 
 the notion (alas how vain !) that you thereby join 
 yourself “ to the church of the whole earth.” 
 Marvellous infatuation ! Can you have persuaded 
 yourself that the Church of Rome really possesses 
 this comprehensive property, which she has so 
 long arrogated to herself? Were there no churches 
 in existence before the Church of Rome ? Or 
 was she the rod of Aaron which swallowed up all 
 other rods ? Did the Church of Carthage under 
 Cyprian bow to her authority ? Did the Greek 
 Church yield to her lofty claims of Primacy ? 
 Have all the Eastern Churches taken refuge under 
 her wing.'' How is she the church of the whole 
 earth ? You know, dear Sir, that she can only be 
 called so, because she has dared to unchurch all 
 Christian communities which have raised a voice 
 against her tyrannical usurpations, and claimed 
 for themselves the right to regulate their own 
 affairs. Seriously ask yourself, we beseech you, 
 as in the sight of Him who searcheth all hearts, 
 whether you have not, by your late rash act, 
 joined yourself to the most corrupt .and withered 
 
26 
 
 branch in Christendom, rather than to “ the 
 church of the whole earth ! ” 
 
 We have followed you at greater length than we 
 intended, through your analogical argument in 
 favour of the Church of Rome, inasmuch as, for 
 two reasons, you lay considerable stress on it 
 (p. 14), first, because you have seldom found it 
 “ more than hinted at in modern theological 
 works and secondly, because it was “ that 
 which first influenced your own mind, presenting 
 to it what seemed cogent reasons for regarding the 
 Catholic Church in communion with the see of 
 Rome, as claiming your avowed allegiance.” 
 
 You now advance to another line of argument ; 
 in which you attempt to show the necessity of a 
 “centre of unity” (p. 15). “ Every well-established 
 kingdom” — you observe, “ has its central govern- 
 ment, acting both as its effective executive, and 
 as that which combines together, regulates and 
 invigorates all the subordinate authorities and 
 otherwise scattered parts. It cannot subsist with- 
 out it, no more than the body without a head.” 
 You then infer, “ It would be incredible that 
 Christ should leave his kingdom in the world, 
 without any fixed government, or that government 
 without an essential to all governments, a supreme 
 executive and centre of unity.” Such is your 
 argument from analogy. Now, it is clear, that all 
 analogical reasoning must fail, at those very points 
 where the analogy itself fails. Every kingdom 
 
27 
 
 must have a head , the Church has a head, A 
 kingdom must have a temporal, the Church a 
 spiritual head. The head of a kingdom is the 
 executive government ; the head of the Church is 
 Christ ; and He is its only Supreme Governor. 
 All power belongs to Him in heaven and on earth ; 
 and woe be to that man who dares to snatch the 
 sceptre from his hand ! So far the analogy holds, 
 but press it to the point required by your argu- 
 ment, and it breaks down beneath you. Christ 
 has not left his kingdom on earth without a 
 government, because he has not left it at all. He 
 has appointed no earthly centre of unity, because 
 he ever holds in his own hands the reins of 
 government over his church. All your reasoning 
 takes for granted that Christ cannot perform his 
 own work without a substitute. As Protestants, we 
 deny that there is any such want of power or will 
 to guide and keep his church ; and this is our reason 
 for rejecting those proud assumptions of Rome, 
 which, in an evil hour, you have been induced to 
 advocate. You charge Protestants with “ setting 
 at defiance the testimony of nature, reason, fact, 
 antiquity, and scripture.” We maintain that we 
 yield due deference to each, and supreme deference 
 to the last. 
 
 To scripture, however, you immediately turn, 
 endeavouring to prove from it, that Peter was insti- 
 tuted the Primate of the Christian Church, (p. 16) 
 In this argument little room is left for anything 
 
28 
 
 new. Your first quotation is from Matt. xvi. 
 16 — 19; in which Simon Peter makes this noble 
 confession, “ Thou art Christ the son of the living 
 God!” to which the Saviour replies, “ Thou art 
 Peter, and upon this rock will I build my Church, 
 and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it ; 
 and I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom 
 of heaven,” &c. 
 
 On this passage some important questions have 
 to be answered before your explanation of it can 
 be received. It is well known that from the ear- 
 liest times, a different interpretation of it from ypurs, 
 has been given. Can that text then, be so very 
 clear as Romanists now contend, which, in the 
 times nearest to the Apostolic age, was explained 
 in diverse senses? Some, as Augustine, under- 
 stood by the Rock, Christ himself, supposing the 
 Saviour to point to his own person when he said, 
 “ Upon this rock will I build my Church.” Others, 
 among whom we may name Cyprian and Jerome, 
 suppose Peter to be referred to, only as the repre- 
 sentative of all the other apostles. But, perhaps, 
 the most eminent of the Fathers, and we are 
 happy to agree with them, regard Peter’s confes- 
 sion as the rock — a rock of doctrine, — on which the 
 whole superstructure of Christian truth was to be 
 built. The names of Chrysostom, Hilary, Theo- 
 dore!, and Origen, sanction this explanation * But 
 
 See Barrow on the Pope’s Supremacy, p. 87. 
 
•29 
 
 without entering more fully into this controversy, 
 we may ask, is it not strange that so vast a power 
 as that involved in the Primacy of Rome, should 
 rest on the authority of a text, which was thus 
 variously interpreted by the early Fathers ? 
 
 Were we, however, to grant, that Peter is here 
 meant by the rock, we should still be far short of 
 the point necessary to connect the divine promise 
 with the Roman see. For first, we have not a word 
 in the passage referring to his successors ; and, 
 therefore, we have no ground for supposing that 
 they are included in the Saviour’s commission. 
 Then the question occurs ; Was Peter ever Bishop 
 of Rome? The preponderance of evidence is 
 against the supposition. The Apostles made others 
 Bishops, but, unless James bore that title as pre- 
 siding Apostle of Jerusalem, we have no reason to 
 conclude, that any of them, adopted it, or were in 
 a condition to discharge its duties. 
 
 But if, as the Papal authorities contend, Peter 
 received the Primacy from Christ, when the words 
 now under consideration were spoken ; then the 
 Council of Trent has to extricate itself from a great 
 difficulty ; for that council compels men to believe 
 under pain of anathema, that Christ ordained his 
 Apostles Priests when he said, the night before 
 his death, “ Do this in remembrance of me.” It 
 follows hence, that Peter was Primate when he 
 was no Priest. Supposing the dignity of which 
 we speak to have been conferred at this early pe- 
 
30 
 
 riod of Peter’s course, how, was it possible that 
 the disciples should be found afterwards disputing 
 among themselves, “ Who should be the greatest?” 
 and how are we to account for the fact, that Christ 
 solved the vexatious question, by setting a little 
 child, and not St. Peter, in the midst ? Or if St. 
 Paul had known to whom he was speaking, how 
 could he, in the presence of the Church at An- 
 tioch, have withstood the Prince of the Apostles 
 to the face, and dared to censure his conduct ? 
 
 It is impossible to answer these questions with- 
 out coming to the conclusion that Peter had no 
 such prerogatives as you contend for. But if he 
 had, what has Rome to do with them ? 
 
 The giving of the keys to Peter, is by some sup- 
 posed to refer to his being the Jirst to preach the 
 gospel to Jews and Gentiles. But it is manifest 
 that such an office is not and cannot be in perpe- 
 tuity. It expires with the act by which it is 
 accomplished ; he could not therefore delegate it 
 to another. 
 
 Yet on the supposition that Peter had received 
 a grant, which could be conveyed to others ; who 
 was naturally his heir to this inheritance when he 
 received the crown of martyrdom? Was Linus, 
 and then Cletus, and then Clemens Romanus ? 
 What ! while John the Beloved Disciple was still 
 alive? Was /?e then subject to the authority of 
 one who was no Apostle ? Only think of St. 
 John holding his see in fealty to the vicar of 
 
31 
 
 Christ and the successor of St. Peter ; amenable 
 to the tribunal of Rome, and liable to be censured, 
 or even deprived, if he failed in duty to the So- 
 vereign Pontiff! 
 
 Again, if any such office as this was intended 
 to be perpetuated in the church ; how are we to 
 account for the silence on the subject which per- 
 vades the Apostolic writings ? Occasions are not 
 wanting, on which various officers of the church 
 are enumerated ; and yet the chief officer of all, 
 God’s Vicegerent, Christ’s Lieutenant, who (to 
 speak in words appropriated to themselves by later 
 Popes) “ have all power in heaven and on earth,” 
 is entirely omitted. “ Christ gave some Apostles, 
 some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and 
 teachers; ”* how naturally might he have added, 
 “ and over all a Pope I ” But not a word of this 
 great Dignitary. Was St. Paul Jealous 1 or was 
 the catalogue complete and the sovereignty of 
 Peter’s successor a figment then unknown ? 
 
 Your next scriptural authority, John xxi. 15 — 
 17, need not detain us long; for what dignity or 
 what commission, superior to that which Christ 
 gave to the rest of the Apostles, could he intend 
 to convey to Peter, by the charge “ Feed my 
 sheep. Feed my lambs ? ” As to the words them- 
 selves, they are so exactly like those of St. Paul 
 to the elders of Ephesus, that we can scarcely 
 
 Ephesians iv. 11. 
 
32 
 
 suppose more to be intended by them in one in- 
 stance than the other ; “ Feed the church of God 
 which he hath purchased with his own blood.” 
 And, as to the circumstances in which the words 
 were spoken, they are, on the whole, rather dero- 
 gatory to Peter’s dignity than in favour of it. He 
 had denied his Lord with horrid imprecations ; he 
 had falsified his own previous boast of fidelity in 
 the most shameful manner; and yet behold the 
 mercy of the Saviour, who restores him after a fall 
 so grievous, and renews to him his justly forfeited 
 commission to preach the gospel, in common with 
 the rest of the disciples. What can you make for 
 Peter’s Primacy out of such a fact ? 
 
 Your references to Acts ii. iii. iv., contain no 
 proof of Peter’s official superiority, but merely show 
 the prominent part he took in the transactions of 
 the day of Pentecost, and the immediately subse- 
 quent events. Some one must take the lead ; 
 and if he was (as is generally supposed) the eldest, 
 his age would give him a natural precedence ; or 
 if, from a deep sense of his past defection, he was 
 more forward than the rest to show his zeal for 
 God’s glory, and to attempt some reparation of 
 the wrong he had done by his former faithlessness, 
 or if his temper, constitutionally more ardent than 
 that of his brethren, urged him into this more pro- 
 minent position ; there is nothing, in any view of 
 the case, to excite surprise at the part he took, 
 and nothing to justify the inference, that either he 
 
33 
 
 or any of his brethren, imagined him to possess 
 any jurisdiction or any Primacy over them. Nay ; 
 we have positive evidence to weigh against these 
 bootless presumptions, and decide the question of 
 fact, that he had no such jurisdiction. “ When 
 the Apostles which were at Jerusalem heard 
 that Samaria had received the word of God, 
 they sent unto them Peter and John that 
 is, on your hypothesis, the subjects send their 
 prince, the subordinate powers exercise authority 
 over the higher, the holders of inferior offices 
 command the services of him who holds the keys 
 of heaven, who is Christ’s vicar on earth, and 
 whose prerogative it is to exact obedience from all, 
 and to yield it to none. If St. Peter was in 
 Christ’s place, vested with His dignity, and exer- 
 cising His delegated authority over all ecclesias- 
 tical causes and persons ; the Apostles would no 
 more have thought of sending him to Samaria, 
 than they would have thought of sending Christ 
 himself; “ for the servant is not greater than his 
 Lord, neither is he that is sent greater than he that 
 sent him.”'!' 
 
 Another of your references to the Acts applies 
 to St. Peter’s mission to Cornelius. He was sent, 
 it is true, not by the Church, as in the preceding 
 case, but by its Great Head. Yet such a fact 
 affords no proof of Primacy, because, by the same 
 
 Acts viii. 14. f John xiii. 16. 
 
 D 
 
34 
 
 authority, Philip was sent to teach the Ethiopian 
 eunuch, and St. Paul to preach to the Gentiles, 
 As you direct attention both to the tenth and 
 twelfth chapter of the Acts ; we naturally inquire, 
 why you omit all reference to the intervening 
 eleventh chapter ? Does it contain nothing about 
 Peter ? The heading of the chapter in our ver- 
 sion, and with which you must, from habit, be 
 familiar, begins thus “ Peter accused, defendeth 
 himself’'' What ! the Prince of the Apostles ac- 
 cused, and accused by and in the presence of his 
 own subjects? Surely, they were marvellously 
 ignorant of his dignity, or they must have ex- 
 pected an interdict, if not an anathema for their 
 presumption. But, no ! he pleads for no irrespon- 
 sible jurisdiction — he defendeth himself! How 
 little did he understand his own position, if you 
 and the church to which you have fled understand 
 it aright ! 
 
 What there is in the twelfth chapter, bearing 
 upon the question, we are at a loss to perceive. 
 Peter was cast into prison, the church prayed for 
 him, an angel of the Lord set him at liberty ; 
 but these facts are strange evidence to prove 
 that he possessed authority over the rest of the 
 Apostles. 
 
 We will now request your attention to the 
 fifteenth chapter, which you also appear to have 
 overlooked. Rome claims to be “ the mother 
 and mistress of all churches.” The mother she 
 
cannot be, for then, as you will perceive from 
 this chapter, she had a daughter older than her- 
 self. The mistress she has ever attempted to 
 make herself, and has given ample evidence of 
 the great difference which exists between the 
 mother and the mistress. Jerusalem, the true 
 mother church of all the earth, had too much 
 humility to affect the mistress, and on the other 
 hand, the tyranical mistress has too much pride 
 and cruelty to allow her to indulge the tenderness 
 of the mother. The name of step-mother is too 
 good for her. 
 
 In this mother Church of Jerusalem, the first 
 and best Council that ever sat, was assembled. 
 But James, not Peter, presided in that counsel. 
 Nor can it be pretended that James presided as 
 Peter’s delegate ; for Peter himself was present, 
 and took the subordinate part of an advocate, 
 rather than that of the Primate; whereas, James 
 summed up the evidence, and gave his judgment 
 in a tone — which, though meekness itself com- 
 pared with the subsequent thunders of the Vati- 
 can, was characterized by more authority than 
 appears to have been anywhere assumed by Peter, 
 or any other of the Apostles ; “ My sentence 
 is,” &c. 
 
 We should have thought the acts of this council 
 decisive of the cause against Rome, and sufficient 
 to overturn the very foundation of Papal dominion; 
 and so it would have proved, had no other support 
 
36 
 
 been sought for those foundations than that which 
 the sure word of God supplies. 
 
 Such are some of the difficulties (by no means 
 all) with which you have had to contend in yielding 
 to the very slender argument from analogy, the fal- 
 lacy of which we have endeavoured to expose. 
 Truly, you have strained at the gnat, but the camel 
 has gone down whole. 
 
 Having shown that the testimony of Scripture 
 on which you rely, has entirely failed, we might 
 hold ourselves excused from the task of following 
 you any further, in the shadowy region you are in 
 vain attempting to explore. But if we can still 
 furnish you with fresh evidence, that whatever 
 course of reasoning you take, you invariably land 
 in some erroneous conclusion, we shall hope that 
 our labour will not be in vain. 
 
 It is manifestly regarded as an object of some 
 importance by you, to establish the position, that 
 whatever authority Christ virtually gave to Peter, 
 its true nature was not immediately understood, 
 but was so gradually unfolded, that it did not at- 
 tain its full development till the ninth and tenth 
 centuries of the Christian era. “The Saviour,” 
 you assert (p. 18), “ left his church in constant 
 expectation of his return. What he left her, he 
 expected to find her, so constituted and so united, 
 whether he delayed his coming for twenty or two 
 thousand years. Had this event occurred during 
 St. Peter’s lifetime, no farther development of a 
 
37 
 
 primacy and centre of unity in the church had 
 taken place, no successor of the Apostle been 
 needed. But as it was otherwise, when he died 
 to whom the special promise and charge had been 
 given, another took his position to occupj'^ it, and 
 continue the church in her divinely arranged and 
 existing constitution, if haply the Lord should 
 come in his days.” 
 
 The course of this argument will be obvious ; 
 but we interrupt it for a moment, to direct atten- 
 tion to the phrase, which we have put in italics ; 
 “Another took his position.” How? Was it 
 by Peter’s appointment, as his own is alleged to 
 have been by that of Christ himself? Surely the 
 question of the appointment of Christ’s vicar, was 
 one of the most important which could have been 
 proposed ; yet the Scriptures contain no solution 
 of it ; the practice of the Apostles afford no prece- 
 dent for it. We know not how Peter’s first suc- 
 cessor slipped into his place ; but this we know, 
 that it was not by any such mode as that which 
 now prevails at Rome. You must own, that it 
 was by an extraordinary kind of development, that 
 Christ’s appointment of Peter (supposing it real) 
 should have at length resolved itself into a system 
 of election by a whole college of cardinals, whose 
 plots and cabals, and private piques, and family 
 interests, and pride and covetousness, were to de- 
 termine, under an assumed sanction of the Holy 
 Ghost, who should fill the most important station 
 
38 
 
 in the Church which Christ himself had founded. 
 We now return to our quotation ; — 
 
 You proceed ; (p. 18.) “ Thus another and 
 another have successively filled’ the chair of St. 
 Peter for 1800 years, on the same warrant, with 
 the same design, and the same darkness, as to the 
 Lord’s time of return : that warrant, Christ’s words 
 to St. Peter ; that design, the good rule and unity 
 of his church and kingdom ; that darkness, the 
 purpose of God ; (Acts i. 7,) herein accomplishing 
 the type of the continuous high priesthood of the 
 Jews, and no more than that type did, discrediting 
 or displacing the high priesthood and rule of 
 Christ ; neither the one nor the other entrenching 
 on his prerogatives or usurping his power.” 
 
 We need not repeat what we have already said 
 concerning the “ warrant ” of the claim set up 
 for Peter’s authority, and the still more palpably 
 defective warrant pretended for that of his boasted 
 successors. Respecting the “ design ” of this 
 Primacy, some information will be obtained as we 
 advance, and we shall, at least show, that it has 
 failed to accomplish “ the good rule and unity of 
 the church,” of which you speak. The “dark- 
 ness ” respecting the time of Christ’s coming is 
 neither greater nor less,, for the Pontifical succes- 
 sion. How all this, accomplishes “ the type of the 
 continuous high priesthood of the Jews,” which, 
 as we have seen, received its perfect accomplish- 
 ment in Christ, it will not be easy to prove. But 
 
39 
 
 when you add that the Romish Primacy no more 
 discredits or displaces the heavenly high priesthood 
 of Christ, than did that of Aaron, you revert to 
 your original error — the error which pervades your 
 whole book — of confounding subjects essentially 
 different ; and then you graft upon this confused 
 statement, a palpable fallacy. A type precedes, 
 and in a sense, predicts its antitype, and thus 
 honours and brings it into notice. Nor does it 
 displace the antitype, but rather is by it displaced. 
 It is like the morning star which announces the 
 approach of day, and then disappears in the blaze 
 of that light of which it had been the harbinger. 
 So the Jewish high priesthood having served its 
 typical purpose, was for ever superseded by that 
 of Christ. The Primacy of Rome, however, bears 
 a very different character in itself, and a very 
 different relation to the Saviour’s priestly office, 
 from that of Aaron. It discredits the high priest- 
 hood of Christ, by assuming to itself what belongs 
 exclusively to Him. Under pretence of using 
 His authority, it asserts, maintains and extends its 
 own. It arrogates to itself the most presumptuous 
 titles ; claims the most universal homage ; binds 
 the heaviest burdens on the consciences of men ; 
 disposes of kingdoms, crowns and sceptres ; tram- 
 ples on the authority of princes and the laws of 
 nations and the civil and religious rites of man- 
 kind ; gives or sells dispensations to violate God’s 
 law, indulgences for sins past, present, and to 
 
40 
 
 come, pardons and absolutions, without penitence 
 or prayer, to all who can pay the price of such 
 benefits ; and in short makes a traffic of things 
 sacred, in the name and by the assumed authority 
 of Him who is “ King of Kings and Lord of 
 Lords.” Was ever such authority pretended to by 
 the sons of Aaron ? But we have before shown 
 that Christ never gave this office to Peter, still less 
 to any who call themselves his successors. You 
 rightly say “Another took his position,” butsaith 
 St. Paul, alluding to the type on which you dwell 
 so largely, “ No man taketh this honour unto him- 
 self, but he that is called of God as was Aaron.” 
 (Heb. V. 4.) Hence the whole claim is a direct 
 usurpation of the Saviour’s high and inalienable 
 prerogative. 
 
 You proceed; (p. 19.) “The development of 
 this most wise and essential institution for the 
 church’s well-being, was, in the nature of the case, 
 gradual. The strength, properties, and usefulness 
 of a plant, can only be developed as time permits 
 its growth, and natural influences elicit its generic 
 or specific characters. Every added inch, and ex- 
 panding leaf, and swelling bud leads the be- 
 holder to infer these. Thus it was not to be 
 expected, that in the second and third centuries, 
 there would be found, even had there been fuller 
 documents, that clear perception of the designed 
 succession to St. Peter, which the ninth and 
 tenth centuries present ; because, in a degree, its 
 
41 
 
 continuance was the development of the perpe- 
 tuity of the design, and its use, power and pre- 
 rogatives were tested by the circumstances of the 
 church.” 
 
 The whole argument of this passage may be 
 briefly stated thus : Neither Peter himself, nor 
 the rest of the Apostles, nor any of the first dis- 
 ciples of Christ understood the Primacy of Peter 
 so well as the fathers of the second and third 
 centuries ; nor did these understand it so well 
 as their successors in the ninth and tenth cen- 
 turies. The tree which budded in the first age, 
 blossomed in the third, and brought forth its 
 ripened fruit in the tenth ! A very suspicious line 
 of argument truly ! It stands in direct opposition 
 to your carefully wrought comparison between type 
 and antitype. For the Jewish institute required 
 not this lapse of ages for its development, having 
 been indisputably clear from the moment of its 
 promulgation. It proceeds on the absurd suppo- 
 sition that the waters of life, instead of being 
 purest at the fountain head, became clearer and 
 clearer as they passed through muddy and polluted 
 channels; and is directly at variance with Ter- 
 tullian’s celebrated maxim that, “ whatever is 
 most ancient is most true.” Did not your heart 
 misgive you, when your pen struck against the 
 tenth century, and recorded that as the culmi- 
 nating point of Romanism. For this is the very 
 century which Baronins, one of Rome’s most dis- 
 
42 
 
 tinguished advocates, designates as the dark age, 
 and yet, in your apprehension, it casts a flood of 
 light on the succession to St. Peter. How ominous 
 is such an argument ! How painfully indicative 
 of the intellectual obscuration to which even a 
 short attachment to the Papacy can reduce the 
 human mind ! Doubtless the tenth century re- 
 vealed in unblushing effrontery the power and 
 grandeur of Peter’s supposed successor. Was it 
 not a singular coincidence, that the sun of papal 
 supremacy should be in its meridian at the period 
 when the darkness of ignorance, of superstition 
 and of crime covered the face of the professedly 
 ehristian world ? But it was much more than a 
 coincidenee ; the intimate connexion of cause and 
 effect was plainly manifested in these concurrent 
 events. Roman ambition promoted and cherished 
 the moral, mental, and spiritual degradation, which 
 enabled it to ascend its loftiest seat, and to tri- 
 umph over the prostrate energies of mankind. 
 And what could be expected from the nations of 
 the earth reduced to such a state of intellectual 
 and moral imbecility, but that they should pro- 
 claim the glories of that very power which had 
 forged and riveted their chains, with a voice as 
 loud and as unmeaning as that of the multitudes 
 who in former times exclaimed, “ Great is Diana 
 of the Ephesians!” 
 
 We are unwilling, even in a tract, which we 
 would gladly keep within reasonable limits, to 
 
43 
 
 make a statement like the above, without adducing 
 some evidence of its truth, or directing you to 
 sources whence it may be obtained. If you now 
 ever consult Mosheim whom you once deemed “ a 
 respectable historian ; ” * and who certainly was 
 under no temptation to represent one age in darker 
 colours than another, you will find that he reserves 
 some of the deepest shades of his pencil for the 
 tenth century. We quote his introductory sen- 
 tence on this period .• “ It is generally acknow- 
 ledged, that in this century the state of Christi- 
 anity was everywhere most deplorable, as well 
 from the prevalence of incredible ignorance which 
 is the parent of superstition and moral turpitude, 
 as from other causes.”! And then, having re- 
 lated some successes which had attended the 
 eflforts to extend the profession of Christianity, sig- 
 nificantly intimates, that the change was more 
 nominal than real, terminating in certain outward 
 observances, adding that, “ this barbarous age 
 did not even think of that inward and genuine 
 change of mind, which Christ demands of his fol- 
 lowers.” J 
 
 He imputes the extreme ignorance and contempt 
 for learning which prevailed in this age, partly to 
 the wars which had desolated the world, and 
 partly to the “ vile character of the accredited 
 
 See The character and tokens of the true Catholic Church.” 
 By Rev. R. W. Sibthorp. p. 29. London, 1827. 
 
 t Moshemii Hist. Eccles. p. 354. j Ibid. 350. 
 
44 
 
 guardians of truth and virtue.” * “ The Latins 
 
 especially were all enchained by the grossest barbar- 
 ism. Most writers agree that this century merited 
 the title of the iron age of literature ; and the 
 Western world never presented a more melancholy 
 spectacle.”! And when, towards the close of the 
 century, the chair of Rome was held by one 
 learned Pope, Sylvester II, the ignorant monks 
 ranked this eminent scholar among “ the ma- 
 gicians and the disciples of Satan.” J 
 
 Speaking more particularly of the state of reli- 
 gion, he says : “ Nothing is more indisputable 
 than that the sacred order, in this century, was 
 both in the east and west, composed chiefly of 
 men destitute of learning, of fools, of persons ig- 
 norant of everything pertaining to religion, licen- 
 tious, superstitious, and addicted to the basest 
 vices. Nor can it be questioned that the main 
 causes of these evils, lay with those who wished 
 to appear as the parents and guides of the Church. 
 For certainly nothing was deemed too vile, wicked, 
 and dishonourable, for the supreme Ecclesiastical 
 Rulers to perpetrate. Nor did ever any other 
 government addict itself to so many vices of every 
 kind, as that which bore the title of most sacred.” 
 “ The history of the Roman Pontiffs of this century, 
 is the history not of men, but of monsters, . . . as the 
 friends of the Papacy themselves acknowledge.” § 
 
 * Moshemii Hist. Eccles. p. 361. 
 
 i Ibid. p. 364. 
 
 t Ibid. p. 362. 
 § Ibid. p. 365. 
 
45 
 
 Rome itself seemed, at the commencement of 
 the century, placed at the mercy of a profligate 
 woman, who by her influence seated John X. in 
 the Papal chair. He was soon cut off by the still 
 more profligate daughter of his patroness, who at 
 length succeeded in securing this venal dignity 
 for another Pope of the same name, the fruit of 
 her own illicit intercourse with a preceding vicar of 
 Christ. We ask, dear Sir, with all seriousness, 
 as in the sight of Him to whom you and we “ must 
 give account,” Was this the age, and were these 
 the men to furnish the world with a clearer percep- 
 tion of the designed succession to St. Peter, than 
 could be traced in the Apostolic, or in any inter- 
 vening age ? 
 
 Your concession that this centre of Unity has 
 not produced “ unmingled good,” was perhaps 
 intended to anticipate the kind of observations we 
 have just made : but it is quite insufficient for that 
 purpose. We have taken the precise age to which 
 you refer as the example of your system in its per- 
 fection : and we have shown that no previous cen- 
 tury ever equalled, and we may add that no sub- 
 sequent century ever exceeded it in religious, 
 moral and intellectual degradation. If then, your 
 previous assumption that this was the pattern age 
 of Roman Primacy be admitted, the conclusion is 
 incontrovertible, that, out of your own mouth, 
 the Papacy stands charged with an enormity of 
 guilt, as a system productive not of the greatest 
 
46 
 
 good, but of the greatest evil. No enemy of Rome 
 ever uttered a more severe sarcasm against it, 
 than you have involuntarily done, by holding up 
 the tenth century to the admiration of the world. 
 Speak no more of the Primate as a “ pilot sent 
 from heaven ” to bring men thither, till you can 
 prove that the Pontiffs of your boasted tenth cen- 
 tury, the Johns and the Sergiuses, were them- 
 selves walking in the way that “ leadeth unto 
 life.” Proclaim no more “the holy order and 
 discipline ” of that church which has created 
 more wars, desolated more provinces, destroyed 
 more lives, and diffused more vice, error and ruin, 
 than any of those mighty empires which have in 
 turn vanquished the world. 
 
 Your exaggerated representation of the har- 
 mony existing in the Romish Church, gives you 
 the opportunity of adverting, by way of contrast, 
 to the discords of Protestants, and to the unhappy 
 effects which follow them. A few of these mis- 
 guided men, you represent as getting safely on board 
 the Romish vessel ; (p. 20.) “ but the most part — 
 some on boards, and some on broken fragments, 
 and some in solitary effort, struggling for life — 
 present a sad spectacle of the distress, danger and 
 ruin, which men bring on themselves by contempt 
 of that order and rule, which God himself has 
 sanctioned.” The condition in which you describe 
 us, appears indeed pitiable enough ; but after all 
 it is not so desperate as it seems. We thank you 
 
47 
 
 for the allusion to St. Paul’s shipwreck, and are 
 glad to find, that in the storm you do not deprive 
 us of a plank. We only desire that the comparison 
 may hold to its close, and that at last, though it be 
 “ some on boards, and some on broken pieces of 
 the ship, yet we may all come safe to land.” This 
 is, we are sure, more than you can say of the en- 
 tire crew of your gallant vessel. 
 
 Yet do not imagine that we are in love with 
 divisions, or glory in them as advantages, or cease 
 to pray for their removal. And we believe that 
 our prayer shall be heard ; but not as you sup- 
 pose, by our return to Rome. To a salutary union, 
 truth is indispensable. God forbid that we should 
 unite ourselves with a church whose creed is 
 error, whose power is usurpation, whose govern- 
 ment is tyranny, and whose end is destruction. 
 There is, you know, at least one solemn command 
 for separation, in the oracles of God : “ Come out 
 of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her 
 sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues.” * 
 Union with such a head and such a body we 
 utterly disclaim. 
 
 We would not however, shrink from a conside- 
 ration of the comparison at which you have hint- 
 ed ; and we are prepared to prove by a mass of 
 evidence which cannot be overborne, that there is 
 more true union among Christian Protestants than 
 
 Rev. xviii. 4. 
 
48 
 
 there now is, or ever has been among Romanists. 
 You once thought as we do: and though you have 
 changed your opinions, you have not destroyed 
 your arguments. We will therefore, quote from 
 a Sermon published by you, fifteen years ago, 
 some reasoning more convincing, in our judg- 
 ment, than any contained in your recent publica- 
 tion ; and if in your words, we repeat any senti- 
 ments previously delivered in these pages, we 
 shall only be the more glad to find our own posi- 
 tions confirmed by your former reasonings. Having 
 referred to several . passages in the New Testa- 
 ment, (Eph. iv. 4, 5; Col. i. 18;ii. 18, 19.) you pro- 
 ceed : “ In these and many other passages one Head 
 of the church and one only is spoken of, i.e. Christ, 
 and there is not the slightest reference to any 
 other. Surely it is, to say the least, singular if 
 such a visible head existed as the Pope, designed 
 by Christ to fulfil such an office in the church as 
 to preside over it, that no reference should be 
 made to him in those epistles, which as the church 
 of Rome herself admits, were written to instruct 
 men in the things which regard their salvation. 
 It is most remarkable, that not one Apostle, in 
 his letters, should ever refer to, or remotely hint at 
 the existence of such an authority even in pas- 
 sages which naturally and almost necessarily led 
 him to mention it. St. Paul, speaking of the 
 church of Christ says, ‘ Now ye are the body of 
 Christ, and members in particular. And God 
 
49 
 
 hath set some in the church ; first, apostles ; se- 
 condly, prophets ; thirdly, teachers ; after that, 
 miracles : ’* compare with which a parallel pas- 
 sage, ‘ He gave some apostles, and some pro- 
 phets, ’f &c. It is extraordinary indeed, that in 
 enumerating the overseers and instructors of the 
 church, the Apostle should totally omit all men- 
 tion of that authority which, if the Romanists are 
 right, had been given by Christ and set in the 
 church to be his own representative on earth, the 
 chief overseer and ruler of bishops and pastors, the 
 head of his body the church, and the recognition 
 of whom is now held to be, and must ever have been, 
 on their showing, essential to salvation. I call 
 upon any Roman Catholic to produce one single 
 passage from the Epistles of the New Testament 
 which will admit of fair reference to any such su- 
 preme authority or visible head of the church as 
 the Pope or Bishop of Rome, or of any other city. 
 And this silence of these inspired writings speaks 
 volumes against the divine right of supremacy 
 claimed by the Popes. 
 
 Thus speaks the Mr. Sibthorp of 1827 ; little 
 did he then imagine that Mr. Sibthorp of 1842, 
 would meet him with such a reply to this reason- 
 ing as the following. St. Paul knew nothing about 
 the primacy ; how should he ? It was not fully 
 developed till the ninth and tenth centuries. And 
 
 * 1 Cor. xii. 27. t Ephes. iv. 11 — 13, 
 
 % Sibthorp’ s Character and Tokens, p. 13, 
 
 E 
 
50 
 
 can he, even now deem such a reply conclusive ? 
 But let us return to your sermon of 1827, 
 
 You briefly review the creeds of the Primitive 
 church, and conclude thus ; “ In all we find one 
 Head spoken of, the Lord Jesus Christ, and union 
 to him the character of his body the church. It 
 has not two heads. And Him every true Protes- 
 tant, in every part of the world, and all true 
 Christians, to whatever particular part of the 
 church, or outward denomination they may belong, 
 recognise as the one only HeadJ 
 
 You show that “ agreement in one faith is also 
 an essential part of the unity of the church.” It 
 is, however, not the faith of Pope Pius IV., but 
 that of Holy Scripture alone, of which the Apos- 
 tles’ creed is an acknowledged summary. “ This 
 unity, Protestants have. And” — you ask — “is this 
 no unity? Are Protestants so immensely and in- 
 separably divided ? Is there no agreement among 
 them, when all that the church of Christ, for the 
 first four centuries publicly declared she held es- 
 sential to salvation, they publicly and constantly 
 hold ? Is there no unity of faith among them, 
 when one true and upright Protestant travelling 
 through the earth, wherever he meets with another 
 true and upright Protestant, shall find him believ- 
 ing in the same God, the same Saviour, the same 
 Holy Ghost, the same way of salvation by faith in 
 that Saviour’s merits, the same necessity of holy liv- 
 ing and of dependence on divine grace, and a re- 
 
51 
 
 newal of heart and life, all the records of the same 
 blessed volume of inspired truth, yea, everything 
 in the Apostle’s and other ancient creeds ?”* You 
 then give the triumphant challenge : “ And where, 
 with the external appearance of concord so greatly 
 boasted of in the Roman church, is her entire 
 unity of faith ? I speak not now of the unity of 
 spirit, but I ask, where was the perfect unity of 
 faith in the members of that church, when two of 
 her most celebrated and zealous monastic orders, 
 disputed respecting the immaculate conception of 
 the Virgin, the Franciscans as vehemently main- 
 taining as the Dominicans opposed it ? When the 
 Jesuits and Jansenists broke in upon the slumbers 
 of their church, by long and loud contentions re- 
 specting the doctrines of grace? When it is a 
 notorious fact, that not only Popes have decided 
 against Popes, but councils against councils, and 
 the church of one age against the church of ano- 
 ther ; and what canonized saints taught in one 
 age as divine truth, and was received as such in 
 the church for centuries, the Pope and his cardinals 
 in later times condemned as pernicious error ? On 
 a point of fundamental importance as it respects 
 the authority of the Roman church, and the obe- 
 dience of her people, there is an entire disagree- 
 ment among them ; viz. where that infallibility 
 resides, on which she supports her pretensions j 
 
 * Sibthorp’s Character and Tokens, p. 25. 
 E 2 
 
52 
 
 some placing it in the Pope alone, some in general 
 councils, some in both united, and others some- 
 times in one and sometimes in the other.”* 
 
 Again you declare : “ Among all real Christians 
 there is an entire community in the object of wor- 
 ship. They have all one and the same Father, 
 one and the same Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ, 
 of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is 
 named ; and one and the same Holy Spirit. In 
 them is strictly fulfilled that prayer of Christ, 
 ‘ That they all may be one, as thou. Father, art in 
 me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in 
 us, that the world may know that thou hast sent 
 me.’ The union of the Father and the Son is not 
 a visible, tangible, nor external union. It is mys- 
 terious and spiritual. And such is the communion 
 existing between all true Christians. It does not 
 exclude, but it does not necessarily consist in out- 
 ward communion. They have all one object, to 
 glorify God, serve their Saviour Jesus Christ, and 
 save their own souls and those of others ; they 
 have all the same enemies, Satan, the world, and 
 sin ; the same hope ; mainly, the same trials, 
 cares, and temptations ; they have a communioa 
 of interests, joys, and sorrows. One and the same 
 blessed spirit dwelling in them all, knits and unites 
 them to each other, in the communion of the 
 church militant ; and by his hallowing influences 
 
 * Sibthorp's Characters and Tokens, p. 26 . 
 
53 
 
 and holy affections, and blessed hope which he 
 produces in them, knits them to the holy angels 
 and spirits of the just made perfect in the com- 
 munion of the church triumphant ; and thus is 
 fully effected the communion of saints.” * 
 
 Now whatever qualification any of the state- 
 ments in this animated passage may require ; yet 
 it is impossible for us not to admire the spirit which 
 pervades the whole, as well as the general force 
 and cogency of the reasoning. We would gladly, 
 if space permitted, extend our extracts. Perhaps 
 you will think them already too long, but you 
 must excuse us, for we love to linger with you in 
 “ the green pastures,” and “ by the still waters ” 
 of plain and simple Christian truth, rather than to 
 track your steps through the tangled wilderness of 
 error. The work, however, though painful must 
 be done ; and we return, yet reluctantly, to your 
 unhappy recantation of the sound doctrine and the 
 hallowed sentiments which we have j ust recorded 
 from your former writings ; and we do it in the 
 hope that we may gain, or rather regain our bro- 
 ther, and if not, that we may deliver our own 
 souls. 
 
 You allege that “ many Protestants have owned 
 the want of a centre of unity for the church.” 
 Perhaps they may, unwisely enough, in our opi- 
 nion. We have one great centre of unity in 
 
 Sibthorp’s Character and Tokens, p. 28* 
 
54 
 
 Christ, and neither want nor would endure any 
 other. We are well satisfied with that Episcopal 
 jurisdiction under which it is our happiness to live; 
 and we would not have our own diocesan amena- 
 ble to Rome or to any other spiritual tyranny 
 whatever. The earliest episcopal churches knew 
 nothing of such a centre ; and we may surely date 
 the mighty evils which ultimately deluged the 
 church, from the period when other bishops began 
 to bow to the aspiring and ambitious claims of 
 Roman supremacy. 
 
 We may grant you that the permanency of the 
 succession of Roman pontiffs is not invalidated 
 by the misconduct of individual popes, when you 
 have made good your ground that this succession 
 rests on as firm a basis as that of the Levitical 
 High Priesthood. Till you have done this, it is 
 fruitless to discuss a merely minor proposition, 
 which perhaps might not stand with the greater, 
 but certainly cannot stand without it. 
 
 From these observations you will perceive that 
 we are at issue with you on your conclusion, 
 which you thus state, (p 22.) “ It is the recog- 
 
 nition of this claim,” namely, that of Rome to be 
 the one true church — “ arising from due conside- 
 ration of the principle which it involves,” namely, 
 the principle of the Pope’s supremacy — “which 
 must be a first step towards the restoration of unity, 
 and to any effectual measures for remedying the 
 disasters of the sLvteenth century.” 
 
55 
 
 The restoration of unity is, we believe, to be 
 effected by totally different means from that which 
 you suggest. We look for it, not by the re-establish- 
 ment of papal authority, — not by committing the 
 keeping of our consciences, our liberties, our souls 
 and bodies to him, who “as God, sitteth in the 
 temple of God, shewing himself that he is God,”* 
 — not by putting it into the power of any man, and 
 least of all, into the power of a man who usurps 
 the high prerogatives of Deity, to give or to with- 
 hold at pleasure, the scriptures of truth, to bind 
 us again in those fetters, and subject us again to 
 that yoke which our fathers were utterly unable 
 to bear. No ; the worst divisions which can dis- 
 turb the peace of the church, are a less evil than 
 such a tyranny. The unity which might be at- 
 tained by committing into the hands of one man, 
 a supremacy which enables him to anathematize 
 and excommunicate, to burn and to destroy, is 
 the unity of imprisonment and not of liberty, it 
 binds men together by chains and not by the cords 
 of love ! What we desire and pray for is, a more 
 abundant effusion of the Spirit of grace upon “ all 
 orders of men in God’s Holy Church,” for in- 
 creasing zeal, earnestness and fidelity in the 
 “ ministers and stewards of God’s mysteries,” for 
 the removal of existing impediments to the free 
 
 * 2 Thess. ii. 4. See an excellent discourse on this text, by the 
 Rev. R. W. Sibthorp, preached at St. John's, Bedford Row, Feb. 11, 
 1829. 
 
56 
 
 course of God’s word, — for the enlargement and 
 multiplication of the channels by which religious 
 instruction is to be brought home to every neigh- 
 bourhood and every door ; and for the diffusion 
 of that degree of sound information, which shall 
 render men more averse on principle than they 
 now are to needless separation. Then may we 
 hope for a kind of unity worthy of the name ; 
 for a common bond of brotherhood among Chris- 
 tians which shall unite them much more closely 
 together, than that of Romanism ; for that holy, 
 spiritual, and divine union which St. Paul im- 
 plored on behalf of the church, when he prayed 
 that its members might be “ perfectly joined to- 
 gether in the same mind, and in the same judg- 
 ment.” 
 
 What j/ow deplore as “ the disasters of the six- 
 teenth century,” xce shall never cease, we trust, 
 to regard as the greatest blessing, civil and re- 
 ligious, which it has pleased God, in his great 
 mercy, to bestow upon our church and nation. 
 We too, could speak of “ the disasters of the 
 sixteenth century,” but we should point to a dif- 
 ferent series of events from that which you intend. 
 We should direct attention to the cruelties of Her, 
 whom, you are said to have styled, “ the much 
 calumniated Mary ! ” Had you, dear sir, during 
 the reign of this arbitrary queen, dared to preach 
 the Sermons which you preached in Tavistock 
 Chapel, in the year 1827, or in St. John’s, Bed- 
 
57 
 
 ford Row, in the year 1828 , she would surely 
 have sent you to the stake. Would you then have 
 talked about the “much calumniated Mary?” 
 Spirits of Ridley, and Latimer, and Cranmer ! 
 with “the noble army of martyrs” who mingled 
 their ashes with yours, in the conflagration lighted 
 up by that unhappy woman, what testimony have 
 you to give to the character of her, whom a faith- 
 less son of your own church, standing in the 
 pulpit of the Oxford University, could call “ the 
 much calumniated Mary?” But this is a note 
 which strikes no responsive chord in British 
 bosoms, and brings dishonour only on those who 
 could harbour or give utterance to such a senti- 
 ment. 
 
 The Reformation from Popery, though accom- 
 panied, as great revolutions generally are, by many 
 evils, we can regard in any other light, rather 
 than that of a disaster ; we cannot therefore think 
 of it as needing a remedy. We only want to see 
 its principles more widely spread, and more fully 
 developed. We advert to it with admiration of 
 the men by whom it was conducted, and of the 
 divine mercy by which it was brought to a suc- 
 cessful issue. We rejoice to call it the “Blessed 
 Reformation,” and pray God that our latest pos- 
 terity may enjoy its happy fruits ! 
 
 Your main argument being closed, you pass to 
 some minor considerations, which, in your opinion 
 still bear strongly upon the question of unity. 
 
58 
 
 and corroborate your views of its nature. The 
 church, you argue, (p 23.) is a positive institution 
 of Christ, for the diffusion and maintenance of his 
 religion throughout the whole earth : “ That reli- 
 gion is harmonious and immutable truth. There 
 is not one system or set of truths for one age or 
 part of the world, and a different one for another;” 
 and therefore you conclude, that there is but one 
 form of government, and mode of worship and dis- 
 pline ; and that “every deviation from that 
 government or form of his church which he gave 
 it, and from that discipline and worship which he 
 personally, or by his apostles approved, is a most 
 presumptuous innovation, and a daring disregard 
 of the divine will, and fraught with danger to the 
 souls of men.” 
 
 Are you aware, that you are here “ laying the 
 axe” directly “ to the root” of your own argu- 
 ment? For if no “deviation” was to be per- 
 mitted, what becomes of your great scheme of 
 “development?” It will scarcely be pleaded, 
 that the primacy of the tenth century was no de- 
 viation from that of the first, even supposing the 
 validity of your own interpretation of Christ’s 
 commission to Peter. But what, if this inter- 
 pretation be proved utterly invalid ? Then the 
 primacy, and Rome itself become “ a most pre- 
 sumptuous innovation and a daring disregard of the 
 divine will, and fraught with danger to the souls 
 of men.” You could not well have framed a 
 
more accurate description of the character of the 
 Papacy ; and that not only in reference to the 
 nature of its power and pretensions, but also in 
 reference to the endless innovations which it has in- 
 troduced into the “ harmonious and immutable” re- 
 ligion which Christ and his apostles first promul- 
 gated. It is not necessary here to enter minutely 
 into particulars; but we ask, where does Christ, by 
 himself or by his apostles command us to pay 
 homage to the Virgin Mary and the saints ; where 
 does he enjoin the worship of images; where does 
 he insist upon the celibacy of the clergy, seeing 
 that Peter thePrince of the Apostles, was a married 
 man, and we do not even read that Christ re- 
 proved him for it, though he would in a succeed- 
 ing age of the church have been accused of keep- 
 ing his concubine ; where does he enjoin the 
 establishment of monkish institutions ; where 
 does he give Rome the authority to lay nations 
 under ban and interdict, and to burn men’s 
 bodies for the good of their souls ? Are not these 
 innovations, monstrous innovations on the immu- 
 table religion of Christ, tending directly to violate 
 its first principles, to destroy its beauty, and to 
 subvert its firm foundations ? 
 
 Your remaining subsidiary argument rests on 
 the supposition that, in the opinion of Protestants 
 generally, (p. 24.) “ the only unity designed by 
 Christ for his church is spiritual.” .... “ It is 
 affirmed, that the family and household of Christ 
 
60 
 
 may properly consist of a number of different 
 families, varying extremely in government, disci- 
 pline, laws, institutions, and worship.” This you 
 call “ a strange idea of an united people, and not 
 very accordant with St. Paul’s description of the 
 mystical body of Christ.” 
 
 If you had said the principal unity, rather than 
 the only unity designed by Christ for his church, 
 is spiritual, you would more accurately have re- 
 presented, as we believe, the sentiments of re- 
 flecting Protestants. The view we take is, that 
 spirituality in religion is the great essential. “ They 
 who worship God, must worship him in spirit and 
 in truth.” Outward forms are to be valued, just 
 so far as they promote a spiritual service ; and out- 
 ward unity to be appreciated for its tendency to 
 produce spiritual unity and no further. The former 
 may exist without the latter, and then it is com- 
 paratively worthless ; the latter may exist without 
 the former, and then though the unity wants that 
 completeness which is most desirable, still it is a 
 blessing of unspeakable worth. 
 
 But after all, has not the church ever been 
 composed of “different families?” Was there 
 not the family of Jerusalem, the family of Corinth, 
 the family of Ephesus, as well as that of Rome ? 
 And did not these churches, with others after them, 
 maintain their entire independence of the Roman 
 see ? Hence in the earliest periods of the church, 
 “the idea” which seems to you “ so strange,” 
 
()1 
 
 was actually carried out in practice. No common 
 Head but Christ was then acknowledged or obeyed. 
 The difference between Polycarp the martyr, 
 Bishop of Smyrna, and Anicetus Bishop of Rome, 
 on the controversy respecting Easter, shows the 
 independence of the different churches ; yet Ani- 
 cetus did not presume, as some of his successors 
 would have done, either to command, or to punish 
 the aged disciple of St. John. 
 
 Nothing can be more false than the representa- 
 tions given by Romanists of the uninterrupted unity 
 of the Christian church, till the sixteenth century. 
 The contests and animosities of different parties 
 were quite as great, and attended with far more 
 fearful consequences, than the separations of later 
 times. The belligerent parties were generally, 
 perhaps, kept within one inclosure, called the 
 church : but this increased rather than dimin- 
 ished the mischief. The contest was attended 
 with all the horrors of a civil war. It was a do- 
 mestic strife, a “ house divided against itself,” 
 and working by a gradual yet certain process, the 
 ruin of the whole ecclesiastical system. The 
 method pursued by those who had authority in the 
 church, could not fail to issue in such a result. 
 The whole papal system was one of restraint ; 
 if men could not be kept in order by threats, re- 
 course was had to excommunications, to persecu- 
 tions, to imprisonment and death. Freedom of 
 thought was prohibited, conscience over-awed, men 
 
02 
 
 were orthodox by profession while infidels at heart, 
 the greater part sunk into the quiesence of abject 
 slavery, and neither thought nor cared for anything 
 in religion, but the observance of a routine of 
 forms — and the absolution of their priest; others, 
 with more active minds, caught eagerly at any 
 point of contention which might be canvassed 
 without peril of papal vengeance; and such topics 
 as the immaculate conception of the Virgin set 
 all Christendom in a flame, and divided the pro- 
 fessedly religious into two great hostile powers 
 beneath the banners of Dominic and St. Fran- 
 cis. Yet though they fought and cursed and 
 anathematized each other, there was no breach of 
 Papal Unity ! 
 
 The great schism of the fourteenth century 
 which produced three rival popes to launch their 
 thunders against each other, and against the several 
 adherents of each, might be deemed sufficient to 
 silence for ever the claims of Rome to Unity ; and 
 to expose to eternal contempt the vain pretensions 
 of that see. 
 
 But once more, the very existence of the men- 
 dicant orders is a proof that the unity boasted of, 
 was but in name. For what was their province, 
 but that of direct interference with the duties of 
 the parochial clergy ? Acting every where in 
 complete independence of the Bishop of the 
 Diocese, and that under the authority of the Pope, 
 they strove to alienate the people from their resi- 
 
63 
 
 dent pastors, and to diffuse among all classes the 
 very worst principles of disunion. You may call 
 this unity if you please, but it is destructive of all 
 spiritual unity, it is virtual division under the pre- 
 text of union. 
 
 We can now answer the questions with which 
 you wind up this part of your argument (p. 26.) : 
 “ Is this position” — respecting the spiritual nature 
 of the unity of the church — “ so stoutly main- 
 tained simply for the sake of consistency ; and 
 that Protestants may not seem to allow their 
 own foundations to be overthrown ? ” We reply, 
 no ; we maintain nothing on the subject for the 
 mere sake of consistency, but for the sake of truth. 
 We have got hold of something real, though not 
 visible ; you have grasped at something visible, but 
 not real. We have an essential, though not formal 
 unity; you are wandering after an ignis fatuus, a 
 mere show of light which allures but to destroy. 
 So much for your first question. You then ask ; 
 (p. 26.) “ Or is it because that in most of these ex- 
 isting bodies of professed Christians, some are 
 found giving much proof of the reality of their 
 personal piety, and of their individual participa- 
 tion of the grace of God?” Surely, this would 
 be some ground for the conclusion that such per- 
 sons, at least, were members of the one church of 
 the living God. You, however, add; “ I admit 
 the fact, but I deny what it is supposed to prove,” 
 
 We heartily rejoice in, and are thankful for 
 
64 
 
 your admission ; it is a lingering ray of Protestant 
 feeling which still gives warmth and colour to your 
 religion, however debased it may have become by 
 the system to which you have attached yourself. 
 We delight to hear you still dwell on the inspiring 
 truth that “ God is love,” — that He “ so loved the 
 world,’’ as to give “ his only begotten Son” to re- 
 deem it. We rejoice to find you saying, (p. 26 .) 
 “ It is consistent with this fact, and not at all in- 
 consistent with the maintenance of the supreme 
 rights of the church, and of her sole claim to the 
 incorporation with her of all the members of 
 Christ and heirs of eternal life, that there may be 
 out of her, those who yet are not necessarily to be 
 deemed excluded from the final and most ines- 
 timable blessing of salvation.” 
 
 We are glad, extremely glad iov your own sake, 
 that you do not deem the salvation of Protestants 
 inconsistent with the validity of the claims of 
 Rome ; though we own, that to our apprehension, 
 you are wrong in your charitable supposition. The 
 proof lies in narrow compass. In the creed of 
 Pope Pius IV. rendered imperative upon you by 
 the last Roman council, the council of Trent, you 
 are required to profess under the solemn sanction 
 of an oath, all the doctrines which the Protestants 
 have felt themselves bound in conscience to op- 
 pose ; and then to add : “ This true Catholic faith 
 out of which none can be saved," &c. Here then 
 the doctrine of exclusive salvation is, in direct 
 
65 
 
 terms, maintained. None wlio hold doctrines con- 
 trary to those of the council of Trent can be 
 saved. It is true you declare otherwise ; how you 
 will reconcile yourself to your new master, whe- 
 ther it must not be with the souls of these here- 
 tics, we leave you to determine. In the mean 
 time, it is a source of gratification to us, that your 
 charity has got the better of your creed ; and we 
 care not how many Romanists follow in your train ; 
 for we may then hope, that you and they will join 
 with us, in demanding that this hateful doctrine 
 fie expunged from the statute book of the Vatican. 
 
 It is right, however, that we should notice the 
 ground on which you reach a conclusion so anti- 
 roman, so genuinely protestant in its spirit. You 
 allow, “ there may be a unity of the spirit, where 
 there is not the bond of visible communion.” 
 Very excellent, just what we could have wished 
 you to maintain. But now for an illustration of 
 your meaning : (p. 26, 27.) “ The church has, 
 
 so to speak, both a body and a soul ; an outward 
 and visible form, and an inward pervading spirit ; 
 the former God’s institution — the latter his gift. 
 The power and operation of the latter may extend 
 beyond the sphere and limits of the former. Some, 
 or many may belong to the soul of the church, 
 who are not of its body. When we see persons 
 loving truth, and desirous of embracing it as far 
 as it is know'n to them, eschewing evil and doing- 
 good ; persons pursuing after holiness, and aiming 
 
GG 
 
 to live in the love of God and their neighbours ; 
 devout, benevolent, given to all good works, — these 
 we may consider as bound to the church by unity 
 of spirit, though not attached to her by the bond 
 of visible union. They are pervaded by her soul, 
 though not incorporated with her body. She 
 claims them as her children, prays for their com- 
 plete and outward union, and leaves them in the 
 hands of that divine love, which has, she trusts 
 included them in its wide and infinite apprehen- 
 sion, to associate them fully with her in time, or 
 if not, in eternity.” 
 
 Wherein, we would ask, does this distinction 
 between the body and the soul of the church dif- 
 fer from that, to which protestant ears are much 
 more accustomed, between the visible and invisi- 
 ble church, except in being obscurely expressed 
 through a most incongruous metaphor ? 
 
 We can understand that a person may belong 
 to Christ’s body mystical and spiritual, who is 
 not in connexion with his visible body, the church 
 on earth. But when you begin to explain this, or 
 rather to mystify it, by an analogy drawn from 
 the human body and its soul ; we profess ourselves 
 quite unable to follow you. Is there anything in 
 nature corresponding with your supposition, that 
 the soul can diffuse its own life and properties 
 beyond the precincts of the body ? Do you know 
 of anything which belongs to the soul, before it 
 becomes part of the body or after it is separated 
 
G7 
 
 from the body? If not, why attempt to illustrate 
 a question like the present, by a metaphorical 
 argument founded on an absolutely natural impos- 
 sibility ? Is it anything but the fear of protestant 
 principles which has impelled you to hunt for an 
 interpretation at once so fanciful and so absurd ? 
 
 Yet, to meet you on your own ground, we re- 
 mark, that to belong to the body of the church 
 cannot avail, unless we also are pervaded by its 
 soul, and to be pervaded by its soul is all that is 
 essential to salvation, according to your own show- 
 ing, whether we are in its body or not. 
 
 Did a distinction of this sort, think you, ever 
 present itself to the mind of a Gardiner or a 
 Bonner, or any of the fierce agents of the “ ca- 
 lumniated Mary,” when they dragged poor and 
 rich, simple and learned, young and old to the 
 fires of Smithfield ? Did it once occur to them 
 that some of these victims of their insatiable rage 
 might be pervaded by the soul of the church, 
 though now most cruelly cut off from its body ; 
 and might be on the point of ascending from a 
 world which was not worthy of them, to join the 
 “general assembly and church of the first born 
 which are written in heaven ? ” — that, in truth, 
 they were persecuting Christ in the person of his 
 •disciples? Verily, they were strangers to your 
 distinction, and only thought that they were ex- 
 ecuting merited judgment upon men, who if they 
 
 F 2 
 
68 
 
 did not belong to the body of the church, must be 
 doomed to everlasting perdition. 
 
 As we sincerely believe the church to consist 
 of all who agree in “ fundamental truths ; ” we 
 are under no necessity of troubling ourselves re- 
 specting the alternative which you suggest, that 
 we must otherwise return to Rome, Yet you 
 think, that there is no way of escape for us, from 
 the difficulty in which you place us by the follow- 
 ing statement : (p *28.) “ Is it not singular, that 
 
 no two of these denominations agree in funda- 
 mental truths ? for they would not give you the 
 same list of them. I doubt whether two ministers 
 of any one of these bodies are prepared to say they 
 entirely agree as to what these fundamental truths 
 are, or how many the term comprehends. That 
 is a strange test of agreement concerning which 
 all are disagreed. Now in the Catholic Church, 
 there is no disagreement whatever.” 
 
 We beg now, without intending to say to you,: 
 what we could not with equal truth say to many 
 others, plainly to state our acquiescence in the 
 general outline of fundamental truths given by 
 you in the sermon preached at Tavistock Chapel, 
 to which we have before referred. We have only 
 space to set down your concluding summary, 
 “ On every essential and fundamental point, on 
 every doctrine which the Sacred Scriptures teach, 
 as necessary to salvation, and which early creeds 
 and early fathers confirm as such, there is among 
 
69 
 
 true Protestants and 'real Christians of every 
 church and age, a unity of faith, and such as is 
 essential to the true unity of the church.”* We 
 like the old wine better than the new. 
 
 It is not our intention to fill our pages with an 
 examination of your strictures on the writers of the 
 Oxford Tracts; and especially of Tract 90. We 
 leave them entirely to your mercy. But though 
 we meddle not with the controversy between you 
 and the friends by whom you were first induced 
 to take the downward road to Rome ; there is 
 a passage in which you refer so directly to the 
 creed and principles of Romanism, that we must 
 offer upon it a passing observation or two. We 
 first quote your words ; (p. 36,) “ Examining the 
 ablest works of Protestant controversialists, and 
 comparing them with the church’s own authorized 
 declarations of her doctrines, and the solid reasons 
 in support of them which might be adduced, I 
 was left with a sad impression of the misunder- 
 standings and misrepresentation of the former. I 
 know not a Protestant controversial writer (the 
 authors of the Oxford Tracts alone excepted) 
 whose works did not leave me more a Catholic 
 than before ; while I admit that there were some 
 writings of Catholics, which, when I read them, 
 threw me back upon Protestantism.” 
 
 Such language betrays the lurking propensity of 
 
 * Character and Tokens of the true Church, p. 26. 
 
70 
 
 the human mind to deceive itself on those very 
 points, on which it seems to be acting with the 
 greatest sincerity. The clause in the parenthesis 
 enables us, in the present instance, to detect this 
 mental infirmity. When was it, that you found 
 protestant controversialists so blundering or so 
 weak, or so completely in the wrong, as to drive 
 your mind towards Romanism ? Not surely, when 
 you were availing yourself of their arguments in 
 your oiun controversial discourses ; not when we 
 knew you, and heard you, and rejoiced in your 
 success. Not till you had begun to read the Ox- 
 ford Tracts, and to sit at the feet of the Oxford 
 Divines, and to imbibe by degrees the sentiments 
 they warily insinuate or boldly maintain. Yet so 
 silently did the leaven of their doctrine work, that 
 you were not conscious of that estrangement from 
 Protestantism which was taking place in your 
 mind, till under the influence of the false princi- 
 ples which they inculcate, you again took up the 
 protestant writings, and read them with a jaun- 
 diced eye and an averted mind. 
 
 It would be a question of considerable interest, 
 on which you alone are able to give information ; 
 who were those distinguished writers by whose 
 inconclusive arguments you .were driven towards 
 Romanism ; and what were the arguments them- 
 selves which produced an effect so contrary to 
 their design ? We might then be able to judge 
 whether you had really consulted the best authors. 
 
71 
 
 and had grappled with the strongest arguments. 
 But you say “ they made you more a Catholic than 
 before;^' this proves, that you had already swerved 
 to Popery before you begun the examination of 
 them ; and therefore since even infidels will plead 
 that the Bible itself cherished, if it did not cause 
 their scepticism ; so persons, who like you, acquire 
 from any cause, a bias towards Popery, may easily 
 delude themselves with the thought that protestant 
 writers and protestant arguments have helped to 
 make them what they are. 
 
 With regard to the “ disputed tenets,” between 
 the church of Rome and Protestants, you say 
 (p. 36, 37.) : “I carefully examined them, I slowly 
 received them, but I am convinced of the sound- 
 ness of the Catholic doctrine concerning them all. 
 I am satisfied that not one of them, nor all of them 
 collectively, viewed even in connexion with the 
 then existing abuses of them, were justifiable 
 grounds of that separation from the church in com- 
 munion with the see of Rome, which took place 
 in the sixteenth century. And I concluded that 
 if not warrantable grounds of separation then, 
 they afforded not warrantable grounds for con- 
 tinuing that separation now.” 
 
 When you have made good the premises that 
 the reformers were not justified in separating from 
 the church of Rome in the sixteenth century, we 
 will at once concede the inference that we are not 
 justified in continuing that separation now. Let 
 
72 
 
 all, the doctrines of that church be proved true, 
 let her authority be established on the firm basis 
 of Holy Writ, let her practices be shown to be in 
 accordance with the law of God and the gospel of 
 Christ, and we will no longer hesitate to follow 
 your steps. But is this possible ? Were the Re- 
 formers so blind, so ignorant, so infatuated as to 
 venture their lives in a cause for which Scripture 
 afforded them no sanction, and reason no support? 
 Compare their writings with those of their anta- 
 gonists, weigh their reasonings with those of the 
 pontifical advocates, and their conduct with that 
 of their persecutors ; and without contending for 
 the perfection of any one of them, we may boldly 
 assert, that the aggregate of evidence from Scrip- 
 ture, from reason and from the charaeter of the 
 parties, will lie, with immense preponderance, in 
 the scale of Protestantism. 
 
 Having said thus much, we cannot here refrain 
 from the expression of our earnest hope, that the 
 course you have taken may suggest a monitory 
 lesson, which shall not be lost upon others, even 
 if it be disregarded by yourself. 
 
 It is a fearful thing to begin by little and little 
 to tamper with the plain and simple truths of Holy 
 Scripture. Had you been told when first you 
 began to speculate on types at Ryde, what would 
 be the issue of your enterprise ; you would have 
 indignantly exclaimed, “Is thy servant a dog, that 
 he should do such a thing ? ” But the wedge was 
 
73 
 
 silently introduced, which in due time was to 
 cleave the oak. A little more attention to exter- 
 nal forms, a little stricter observance of times and 
 seasons, a little advance towards cathedral forms 
 of service, all harmless, perhaps, in themselves, 
 was soon to be followed by the introduction of 
 doctrines at variance with the simplicity of the 
 faith of Christ, by the setting up of tradition as 
 of co-ordinate authority with the Sacred Writings, 
 by exalting the church at the expense of her great 
 Head and everlasting Saviour ; till, at length, you 
 sunk into the arms of the enchantress, with 
 scarcely an effort at resistance, when none of your 
 most intimate friends suspected it, and when, if 
 report speaks truly, you had undertaken to enter 
 on a contest against her claims. 
 
 Be this as it may, we regret the step you have 
 taken, dear sir, far more on your own account than 
 on that of the church to which you lately be- 
 longed. Your continued services within her pale, 
 ceased to be desirable, when you began to impugn 
 the principles of the Reformation on which she 
 is founded, and to approximate, as closely as pos- 
 sible, to the proscribed ceremonies and practices 
 of the Papacy. If you could not be persuaded 
 (as we once hoped you might) to return from this, 
 as from former wanderings of heart, to the better 
 views and sentiments of your early days, we verily 
 believe it to be for the good of the Church, that 
 you should leave her ; though we fear, not by any 
 
74 
 
 means for your own good. Perhaps, dear sir, and 
 it pains us to think so, an example like yours was 
 needed to convince multitudes among us, that the 
 human heart is in great and continual danger 
 from the enslaving principles of popish supersti- 
 tion, Many persons have thoughtlessly approached 
 much too near the precipice down which you have 
 fallen. They have been attracted by a religion 
 which addresses itself to the senses and to the ima- 
 gination, rather than to the judgment ; and by 
 gazing on beautiful pictures, listening to fine 
 music, and admiring a pompous ceremonial, have 
 been led to suppose that Popery was the true re- 
 ligion, and have been ready to commit themselves 
 to its deceitful guidance. Happy may it be for 
 such persons to behold the spectacle which your 
 fall presents before them; happier still, if they take 
 warning by your fate, and flee for their lives from 
 the threatening danger ! 
 
 The following passage from your pamphlet, 
 bears strongly on this point ; (p. 44, 45.) “ It 
 
 seems indeed the hope of some, that parts of the 
 Catholic system may be so engrafted on the An- 
 glican discipline, and connected with its worship, 
 that this great desideratum ” — of fervency and 
 punctuality in devotion — “may be supplied with- 
 out joining the communion of the Catholic Church, 
 It remains to be seen, whether the attempt will 
 succeed.” “I confess while I utterly re- 
 
 pudiate all idea of claiming any degree of pursuit 
 
75 
 
 of piety, above others of my late brethren, that I 
 sought in vain to satisfy the longings of my soul, 
 by any combination of Catholic forms with Pro- 
 testant doctrines, of Catholic devotion in private 
 with the Anglican public worship. It was like the 
 sewing of new cloth upon an old garment, whereby 
 the rent is made worse.” We accept this reproach 
 as the true honour of our church, and glory in the 
 concession which these words contain — on the part 
 of one who has painfully tried the experiment-— 
 that the Anglican Church and that of Rome 
 are the antipodes of each other. Never can they 
 be amalgamated j never again, we trust, after so 
 signal a failure, will the vain attempt to combine 
 them, be made. Yet we deny that the Anglican 
 Church leaves her children destitute of any kind 
 of provision which is essential to the greatest fer- 
 vency and steadiness of devotion. She has re- 
 jected from her services much which'men easily 
 mistake for devotion, but which is often nothing 
 more than sentimentalism under a devotional form ; 
 she has taken away the intervening objects which 
 eclipse the glory of the Sun of Righteousness, 
 the saint- worship, the image-worship, the idolatry, 
 the superstition, which all work powerfully on the 
 human mind, and produce a false fire of devotion 
 in the breast. But this is her true excellence. She 
 enforces a simple, pure, rational, vigorous piety, 
 which fits men for all the arduous duties of the 
 present life, and for all the glorious hopes of that 
 
76 
 
 which is to come. To adopt your own language : 
 (p. 45.) “ There are those ” — even among Protes- 
 tants — “ whom the infinite and rich grace of God 
 has led to desire the knowledge of, and commu- 
 nion with him, as their chief and only satisfying 
 joy. They wish, but scarcely dare say, they aim 
 to live to and for him alone, he has presented him- 
 self as the admirable and most excellent object of 
 their affections ; they seek to be holocausts to his 
 glory in his daily service ; to keep their souls like 
 altars whereon the fire of devotion goes not out ; 
 their bodies like temples, from which the presence 
 of the Spirit departs not : to be able to say with 
 truth, to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain.” 
 
 Was it necessary to go to Rome for all this? 
 Were not these the very things which your recently 
 adopted church, seated in her pride upon the seven 
 hills, and “drunken with the blood of the saints,” 
 had well nigh banished from the face of the earth, 
 by her impostures, her superstitions and her cruel- 
 ties? Were not the men who earnestly sought 
 such blessings persecuted by the hierarchy, even 
 unto death ? Go to some poor cottager, with his 
 Bible in his hand, and the love of the Saviour in 
 his heart, and you will find much more of what 
 you here profess to seek, than in the narrow cell 
 of the recluse, the gorgeous temple of the Impe- 
 rial City, or the chair of St. Peter. 
 
 We return to our quotation; (p. 45, 46.) “Have 
 such,” you ask, “ tried and found that the Catholic 
 
77 
 
 Church alone, in her glowing daily devotions, her 
 hourly offices, her symbolic rites, her inestimable 
 practice of confession, with its attendant sacra- 
 mental privileges, her soul-engrossing intercourse 
 with the spirits of the just made perfect, her pious 
 recognition of the less perfect departed faithful, 
 whose purification for bliss is still proceeding, — in 
 her inseparable connection with the glorious com- 
 pany of the Apostles, the noble army of martyrs, 
 the admirable band of confessors, her wholesome, 
 rich and well-connected truths, that this church I 
 say, alone presents what can satisfy their high, 
 holy and heavenly desires and aims ? It cannot 
 but be, that, in this circumstance they find also, 
 besides other considerations, that which commends 
 her to their regard, their adhesion, their dutiful 
 and devoted allegiance. They find and admire in 
 her, the beauty of the spouse of Christ, they love 
 and serve her for her own sake, and for His, 
 whose beloved Bride she is. They find her equally 
 the school of heavenly wisdom and godly simpli- 
 city ; of Christian dignity and childlike humility. 
 She presents combined, the characters of the ser- 
 pent and the dove.” 
 
 We have here given extracts at greater length, 
 than perhaps, may be deemed necessary ; but we 
 wished, first, to allow the case the full force of the 
 eloquent language in which you so well know 
 how to adorn it ; and secondly, to show how very 
 easy it is, by a careful suppression of darker fea- 
 
78 
 
 tures, and a judicious disposition of those which 
 are more attractive, to make even a hateful object 
 appear sufficiently lovely and captivating. 
 
 Let those various parts of the Romish system 
 which you have suppressed, but which are abso- 
 lutely essential to its full development, only be 
 supplied, and let the portions of it which you have 
 put forward, be exhibited in their true colours, 
 without varnish or tinsel to set them off ; and it will 
 excite the aversion and disgust of all true and 
 well-instructed disciples of Christ, of all calmly 
 reflecting minds, who make the word of God their 
 rule of judgment and their ultimate standard of 
 appeal. We are certain that you yourself could 
 never have taken the view of Romanism which 
 you now present with so much ardour of feeling, 
 and so much decoration of style, had you not 
 first declined from that deep reverence for, and 
 entire reliance upon the testimony of Holy Scrip- 
 ture, which has ever been the basis of genuine 
 Protestantism. 
 
 We do not question the fact that many devout 
 worshippers are and have been found in the Romish 
 church. But we contend the numbers are com- 
 paratively small, and that the devotion itself is of 
 a strangely mixed and dubious character. Some 
 there are, we acknowledge, who enter with warmth 
 of devotional feeling into the several parts of 
 Romish worship ; and we fully believe you to be 
 of the number ; but the religion of the many, you 
 
79 
 
 will soon find to be of a very different character. 
 With them the “ glowing daily devotions” of 
 which you speak, are nothing more than the rapid 
 and wearisome repetition of Pater Nosters and Ave 
 Marias, of prayers recited not for the purpose of 
 awakening devotional feeling, but for that of ac- 
 complishing a prescribed task, of making compen- 
 sation for sins committed, or of earning, by a 
 merely perfunctory discharge of outward duties, 
 a future recompense of reward. 
 
 Her “ hourly offices,” what do they mean in the 
 lips of the major part of those who use them ? 
 Do they not too much resemble the vain repetitions 
 of the heathen, who “ think they shall be heard for 
 their much speaking ? ” But there is one vicious 
 ingredient in all these services, which defiles and 
 deteriorates the worship of the most devout, and 
 that is, the adoration paid to other beings than 
 the One living and true God, who has said, “ My 
 glory will I not give to another,” 
 
 Is it to be endured, that a creature shall be 
 worshipped in such language as the following : 
 “ We fly to thy patronage, O holy mother of God, 
 despise not our petitions in our necessities, but 
 obtain our deliverance from all dangers, O ever 
 glorious and blessed virgin ! Pray for us, O holy 
 mother of God, that we may be made worthy of 
 the promises of Christ.’’* 
 
 * Garden of the Soul, revised and approved by the Right Reve- 
 rend the Vicar Apostolic in the London District. 
 
80 
 
 Her “ symbolic rites ” too often intercept the 
 clear light of divine truth, teaching the worship- 
 pers of the Romish communion to rest in the 
 shadows and symbols with which the services 
 abound, rather than to look forward to any sub- 
 stantial blessings which they may be thought to 
 represent. 
 
 Her “inestimable practice of confession” to a 
 priest, on which Scripture is entirely silent, has 
 always been the means by which the Roman 
 Priesthood has held the laity in bondage, by ex- 
 torting family secrets, rendering them the arbitra- 
 tors of family differences, the dispensers of pardon, 
 of grace, and of punishments, and the arbiters of 
 the eternal destinies of men ; while it has given 
 occasion to the most shameful vices in the clerical 
 order itself. “ Its attendant sacramental privi- 
 leges ” are a mere nullity — the inventions of men, 
 and not the institutions of Christ, — the product of 
 the latter and more degenerate ages of the church, 
 and not of its earlier and purer times. 
 
 Her “ soul engrossing intercourse with the 
 spirits of the just made perfect,” means nothing 
 more, when stripped of its poetic dress, than 
 prayers to saints and angels ; as if it were not 
 enough for Christians to have “ one Mediator be- 
 tween God and man, the man Christ Jesus but 
 we must be aided by a host of intermediate media- 
 tors, to make our One Great Mediator the more 
 propitious ! 
 
81 
 
 Her “ pious recognition of the less perfect de- 
 parted faithful,” is a well-turned periphrasis to 
 describe prayers for the dead ; a practice resting 
 solely on Apocryphal testimony. Their “ purifi- 
 cation for bliss which is still proceeding,” is a very 
 mild and gentle phrase to explain, or rather to veil 
 the flames of purgatory. 
 
 Are these, dear Sir, attractions to a pious mind? 
 Yet these are, by no means the whole of that 
 mass of error, which, as we are persuaded, you 
 have on very slight and untenable grounds, been 
 prevailed upon to embrace. 
 
 Do you not expose yourself to the curse de- 
 nounced against those who add to, or take from 
 the word of God, by adopting the sentence of the 
 Tridentine Council which declares the Apocrypha 
 to be of equal authority with the canonical Scrip- 
 tures ; and by “ firmly admitting and embracing 
 apostolical and ecclesiastical traditions, and all 
 other constitutions of the (Roman) Church,” since 
 many of those constitutions are wholly repugnant 
 to the revealed will of God ? Do you not attri- 
 bute to the two sacraments instituted by Christ, 
 a meaning, and a virtue which their Great Author 
 never assigned them, by supposing them to convey 
 grace, ea.' opere operato, through the mere outward 
 performance of the rite ; while yet you cause the 
 validity of these sacraments in their administra- 
 tion, to depend upon the will of the priest, so that 
 if be be evil disposed, he has it in his power, 
 
 G 
 
82 
 
 without seeming to do so, to nullify every sacra- 
 mental act which he performs, and to place the 
 salvation of souls in the greatest uncertainty and 
 peril ? Do you not deny the sacramental cup to 
 the laity, though it never was withheld in apos- 
 tolic times, or for ages afterwards ? Do you not 
 transform their blessed ordinance by which Chris- 
 tians are permitted to enjoy the most cheering 
 communion with the Lord and Saviour, into an 
 awful and terrific mystery, requiring the conse- 
 crated elements to be honoured with the same 
 adoration which is given to Christ himself? And 
 is not this,^if nothing besides in your worship 
 can be called so,— a direct act of idolatry ? Do 
 you not add to these sacraments, five others, none 
 of which has the nature, or serves to answer the 
 purpose of a sacrament ? For, these are the words 
 which the Council of Trent puts into your mouth : 
 “ I profess also, that there are truly and properly 
 seven sacraments of the new law, instituted by 
 Jesus Christ our Lord, and for the salvation of 
 mankind, though all are not necessary for every 
 one ; viz. baptism, confirmation, eucharist, pen- 
 ance, extreme unction, orders, and matrimony ; 
 and that they confer grace.” Do you not also 
 engage to “ receive and embrace all, and every 
 one of the things which have been defined and 
 declared in the holy Council of Trent, concerning 
 original sin and justification, whereas, on these 
 articles especially, the church of Rome, in that 
 
8:i 
 
 council, augmented its guilt, — already awfully 
 great, — by consolidating and sanctioning the scat- 
 tered fragments of heterodoxy on that subject, 
 which had floated down the stream, from the 
 times of the schoolmen ; denouncing an anathema 
 against all who should dare to dissent from their 
 perverted interpretation of these fundamental 
 doctrines of the Gospel ? Contrast the following- 
 language of the council with the statements of 
 Scripture on the same subject : “ If any one shall 
 say that the good works of a justified man are so 
 the gifts of God, that they are not also the merits 
 of the same justified person ; or that he being 
 justified by the good works which are performed 
 by him through the grace of God and merits of 
 Jesus Christ, whose living member he is, does not 
 truly merit increase of grace and eternal life, and 
 the attainment of that eternal life, if he shall de- 
 part in grace, and even the increase of glory, let 
 him he aceursed.” 
 
 Do you not here, dear Sir, commit yourself to 
 a doctrine absolutely subversive of that so strenu- 
 ously maintained by St. Paul, that we are “justi- 
 fied freely by God’s grace, through the redemption 
 that is in Christ Jesus ? ” 
 
 On this unsound foundation, what wonder is it, 
 that you should build the “ wood, hay, and stub- 
 ble” of a state of purgatory after death, to supply 
 the deficiencies of the one atonement offered by 
 Christ for the sins of the whole world ? or that vou 
 
 (t 2 
 
84 
 
 should look aside from the great “ Apostle and 
 High Priest of our profession, Christ Jesus,” to 
 such powerful intercessors as the Virgin Mary, St. 
 Jacobus, and St. Thomas a Becket ? or that you 
 should believe that the priest in elevating the host 
 offers to God an unbloody sacrifice for the remission 
 of sins ? or that you should contend that “ the 
 sacrifice of the mass,” does not interfere “ with 
 the one sacrifice of Calvary,” while it pretends to 
 accomplish the very same thing with that sacrifice, 
 and daringly violates the great apostolical axiom 
 that “ without shedding of blood, there is no re- 
 mission ? ” or that you should believe, under the 
 authority of this council, in an inexhaustible store 
 of indulgences held by the Roman Pontiffs, the 
 use of which is “ most wholesome to all Christian 
 people ? ” or that you should acknowledge with 
 this council, “ the Roman church to be the mo- 
 ther and mistress of all churches,” and should 
 “ promise and swear true obedience to the Roman 
 Bishop, the successor of St. Peter, the Prince of 
 the Apostles, and vicar of Jesus Christ? ” finally, 
 that you should “ undoubtedly receive all other 
 things delivered, defined, and declared by the 
 sacred canons and general councils, and particu- 
 larly by the holy council of Trent,” and should 
 “ condemn, reject, and anathematize all things 
 contrary thereto, and all heresies whatsoever, con- 
 demned, rejected, and anathematized by the 
 church ? ” The only true cause of surprise is, that 
 
85 
 
 having gone thus far, you should just hesitate at 
 the last step, and in most obvious contradiction to 
 the decrees of a council, which now commands 
 you with oracular authority, and to which you 
 profess such devoted and even abject submission, 
 you should still hold, that it is possible to be saved 
 out of “ this true Catholic faith.” 
 
 May you retain this happy inconsistency, so 
 long as you retain your connexion with Rome. 
 Yet we must observe that you are acting in oppo- 
 sition not only to the Fathers of Trent, but to the 
 whole current of Romish authority from Thomas 
 Aquinas to this last of the councils of the Papal 
 church. The words of Aquinas are, “ It is of 
 necessity to salvation, to be subject to the Roman 
 Pontiff.” And a decree of Pope Boniface VIII. 
 in the year 1294, extant in the canon law, runs 
 nearly in the same words ; “We declare, say, de- 
 fine, and pronounce that it is absolutely necessary 
 to salvation for every human creature to be sub- 
 ject to the Roman Pontiff.” But enough has been 
 said on this topic. 
 
 We believe you, when you acknowledge that 
 it cost you much to cross a Rubicon like this ; 
 that “ the step was full fraught with trial ; ” and 
 we regret to think, that it is still more fully fraught 
 with danger to your own soul. Oh! that you 
 should have done so much, and endured so much, 
 to shake the very foundations of your hope, and 
 to bring a cloud, — a dark and portentous cloud, — 
 over the evening of your life ! 
 
■ 8G 
 
 You tell us of approaching critical times, of a 
 “ war against Christ and his Church ; ” and we 
 accept the solemn admonition. But you also tell 
 us that the Romish Church is “ repairing her time 
 honoured walls ; strengthening her ancient battle- 
 ments and defences ; presenting her compact and 
 insulated position as the city of God, in the midst 
 of the earth, and that she is calling, especially on 
 the Anglican Church, to join her, and to find pro- 
 tection under her shadow.” Dear Sir, it is the 
 Syren’s song ; and in the name of our God, we 
 refuse to listen to it for a moment ! Shall the 
 olive leave her fruitfulness to seek protection under 
 the shade of the bramble made only to be burned? 
 It has pleased God to raise up our highly-favoured 
 church as a barrier against the corruptions of past 
 times, and the laxity of the present. On all sides 
 she has been assailed ; but having survived many 
 a storm, we know, and are confident, that she will 
 survive that which has swept you before it into 
 the unfathomable abyss of Romanism. And al- 
 though there may be others, who like yourself, 
 shall prove unable to resist its force, the English 
 church shall only be the more confirmed in her 
 pure faith, in her holy purposes, in all the duties 
 of her sacred calling ; like the tree, whose top- 
 most branches may be broken, while its roots are 
 strengthened by the fury of the tempest ! 
 
 You have one pas.sage on this subject, so very 
 
87 
 
 remarkable, that we must quote it before we con- 
 clude. You represent Rome as closing her invi- 
 tation to our Church, with these words : (p. 50.) 
 “ Your return to me will be like health to the fee- 
 ble, and strength to the faint ; like an infusion of 
 young blood into an aged frame. You will be 
 welcomed with gladness, and rejoiced over with 
 singing, and the joy of the earth shall be re-echoed 
 and sustained by that of heaven ; the devout 
 thanksgiving of the sixteenth Gregory, for the re- 
 covery of the strayed sheep of his flock, will be 
 taken up by the first of his name, the saint in hea- 
 ven, for the renewal of that conversion of Eng- 
 land, for which both he on earth so fervently prays, 
 and he in heaven so continually intercedes.” 
 
 Now, as we did not happen to know, that St. 
 Gregory I., “ever liveth to make intercession for 
 us ” in heaven, having supposed that office to be- 
 long exclusively to One greater than he ; we should 
 never have thought of such an argument, to per- 
 suade British Christians to return to their allegiance 
 to the sixteenth of his name. The latter no doubt, 
 would be very glad to receive us, whether he 
 “ prays fervently” for us, as you say ; or curses us 
 once a year at Rome with all other heretics, as is 
 more generally asserted. Having, however, no 
 wish to infuse youthful blood in the aged frame of 
 “ the Man of Sin,” and no desire to gratify any 
 Gregory from the first to the last of those who as- 
 
88 
 
 sume the name ; we can only regret, as we do 
 most sincerely, that it should ever have entered 
 into your mind to pen such absurdity, or to expect 
 that it could produce any desirable impression on 
 the mind of your readers. The present Pope has 
 enough to do, to keep Spain, and Austria, and 
 Italy in order, without seeking again to filch Peter- 
 pence out of Englishmen’s pockets, for the glory 
 of his tiara, and the good of their souls. 
 
 We have written to you with all the plainness 
 which Christian regard demands at our hands. 
 When we began this letter, our design did not 
 extend beyond that of making a private appeal 
 to you ; but our pages grew beyond the limits of 
 a manageable correspondence, we reflected that 
 the publication of your letter might do harm, es- 
 pecially in this neighbourhood, where your former 
 services were so highly appreciated, and we in- 
 dulged the hope that we might by publishing our 
 observations, serve the great cause of true religion 
 and Protestantism ; and therefore, we have adopted 
 the present mode of addressing you. 
 
 We know not by whom you have been asked ; 
 “ Why have you become a Catholic ?” Our ques- 
 tion would rather have been : “Why have you 
 ceased to be a Catholic ?” Why have you for- 
 saken the catholic church of England, for the 
 Anti-catholic, the exclusive, the monopolising 
 church of Rome? Why have you deserted “ the 
 
89 
 
 pure and reformed part” of the universal church 
 established in these realms, for the corrupt and 
 decaying part, which proudly arrogates to itself 
 the title of the whole ? Why have you forsaken 
 the fountain of living water, to drink of the 
 muddy stream of the Tiber, or to drain a few drops 
 from the broken cisterns of Romanism which can 
 hold no living water ? 
 
 We have done ! May God follow with his bless- 
 ing, this our earnest remonstrance with our friend 
 and brother. Painful indeed has been our task; but 
 if it should please God to awaken you from your 
 present slumber, to show where you have begun to 
 go wrong, to bring you back, step by step, to the 
 point from which you set out on your devious 
 course, if it should please Him to sound in yourears 
 the solemn warning once given to the angel and 
 church of the Ephesians : “Remember from whence 
 thou art fallen, and repent, and do the first works ; 
 or else I will come unto thee quickly, and will 
 remove thy candlestick out of its place, except 
 thou repent ; ” and to attend you, by the still 
 small voice of mingled mercy and reproof, till 
 you shall say, “What have I to do any more with 
 idols ?” then shall we again rejoice over you as 
 a sheep restored by infinite and everlasting mercy 
 to the Saviour’s fold; as a child, brought back 
 to your heavenly Father’s house, after all your 
 wanderings. 
 
90 
 
 With the deepest feelings of sorrow for your 
 fall, and with fervent prayers for your recovery, 
 we subscribe ourselves : 
 
 Yours most sincerely, 
 
 THOMAS DIKES. 
 JOHN KING. 
 WILLIAM KNIGHT. 
 Hull, Feb. 10, 1842. JOHN SCOTT. 
 
 To THE Rev. R. W. Sibthorp, B.D. 
 &c. &c. 
 
 
 L. AND G. SEELEY, PRINTERS, THAMES DITTON. 
 
WORDS FOR TRUTH 
 
 REPLIES TO ROMAN CAVILS AGAINST THE 
 CHURCH OF ENGLAND. 
 
 BY 
 
 RICHARD FREDERICK LITTLEDALE, LL.D., D.C.L. 
 
 Quid te, Tucca, juvat vetulo miscere Falerno 
 In Vaticanis condita musta cadis ? 
 
 Quid tantum fecere boni tibi pessima vina ? 
 
 Aut quid fecerunt optima vina mali ? 
 
 MARTIALIS Epigrammatum L, ig. 
 
 Why wilt thou blend the noblest of old wine 
 With trash new-bottled at the Vatican? 
 
 What good is that vile stuff to thee or thine ? 
 
 Hath the best wine e’er done thee evil, man? 
 
 REVISED AND ENLARGED. 
 
 LONDON : 
 
 KENT & Co., 23, Paternoster Row, E.C. 
 
 THE CHURCH DEFENCE INSTITUTION, 
 
 9, Bridge Street, Westminster, S.W. 
 
 NEW YORK : 
 
 JAMES POTT & Co. 
 
 1888. 
 
 PRICE SIXPENCE. 
 
Yacher & Sons, Printers, Westminster. 
 
PREFATORY NOTE. 
 
 following papers (reprinted from the National 
 Church) are not a consecutive treatise. They 
 are separate and independent replies to several pamphlets 
 against the Church of England recently published, and 
 chiefly issued by a body humorously calling itself 
 the ‘‘ Catholic Truth Society.” A certain sequence of 
 argument, however, has been observed in their arrange- 
 ment, and the repetitions which occur in their course are 
 intended to meet similar iterations in the papers which 
 they controvert. 
 
 R. F. L. 
 
 Epiphany, 1888. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 No. PAGE 
 
 I. — The Old Religion 5 
 
 II. — Catholic — Not Roman Catholic 16 
 
 III. — The Four Doctors ... ... ... ... 25 
 
 IV. — Was the British or Anglo-Saxon Church 
 
 Roman Catholic ? 33 
 
 V. — What the Reformation did in and for 
 
 England ... 40 
 
 VI. — Was St. Peter ever Bishop of Rome? ... 47 
 
 VII. — Papal Authority in Fact and in Fiction ... 54 
 
 VIII. — The Anglican Ministry 66 
 
 IX.— Jurisdiction 
 
 75 
 
No. I. 
 
 THE OLD RELIGION.” 
 
 T is the habitual boast of Roman Catholics that theirs 
 is the ^‘Old Religion,” and that the Church of England 
 is modern in belief and usages m comparison with 
 the Church of Rome. And this way of putting the 
 case is widely accepted in popular literature, whether history 
 or fiction, which happens to touch on the events of Tudor and 
 Stewart days, for Roman Catholics are often referred to therein 
 as adherents of the old religion,'' in contradistinction to other 
 English Christians. This has proved of much advantage to the 
 Roman cause, for religion is one of those matters wherein the 
 old is better," and wherein novelty and error are interchangeable 
 terms. But what are the facts ? 
 
 They depend entirely on the meaning put on the word old." 
 A dog is old at ten years of age ; a man is hardly counted old till 
 sixty ; a piece of money does not rank as an old coin under 
 a couple of hundred years ; an old abbey is likely to be five 
 or six hundred years built ; and an old seal from Egypt or 
 Assyria may be three or four thousand years in existence. There 
 is no difficulty at all in finding what can rightly be called ‘‘ old " 
 when we are speaking of the Christian religion. Whatever 
 belongs to the time, eighteen hundred and more years ago, when 
 the Gospel was first preached, and to the time immediately 
 following for the next century or two, this is the real genuine old 
 Christianity. As we come further and further away from this 
 early time, opinions and practices becoming more or less preva- 
 
6 
 
 Words for Truth, 
 
 lent amongst Christians, but not discoverable in the very ancient 
 records of our religion, have less and less title to be called 
 old, and therefore less and less claim to be accepted as 
 true. And there is one point more to be kept in mind : that 
 it often happened that some opinion or practice not regularly 
 authorised or enjoined by any Church council or creed was left 
 unchecked, if not actually encouraged, and thus spread widely in 
 popular acceptance, often winning formal approval at last. Such 
 changes are often set down to the principle of growth, or, as it is 
 called, development,^^ which means that the Christian religion 
 does alter, and cannot help altering, as the Church grows older 
 and has more accumulated wisdom and experience. But the 
 Roman Church does not admit this principle. It alleges by 
 decrees in the Council of Trent and in the Vatican Council, 
 that the faith of the Roman Church has been unchanged from the 
 very beginning, and that it cannot be lawfully altered as if it 
 were an invention of human wisdom, instead of being a Divine 
 revelation.* And this statement is made binding on all Roman 
 Catholics, under pain of anathema. 
 
 What test, then, can be conveniently applied to discover 
 which of the two, the Church of England or the Church of Rome, 
 holds to the old religion, which of the two has brought in 
 changes in doctrine and practice ? There is a very simple and 
 convenient one provided, which, though far from covering the 
 
 * Thus, the Council of Trent decrees: ‘‘This truth and discipline are con- 
 tained in the written order and the unwritten traditions which, received by the 
 Apostles from the mouth of Christ Himself, or from the Apostles themselves, 
 by the dictation of the Holy Ghost, have come down even to us, transmitted 
 as it were from hand to hand.” (Sess. iv.) And the Vatican Council decrees : 
 “ The doctrine of faith which God hath revealed has not been propounded, 
 like a philosophical invention, to be perfected by human ingenuity, but has 
 been delivered as a divine deposit to the spouse of Christ, to be faithfully kept 
 and infallibly declared. Hence also that meaning of the sacred dogmas is 
 perpetually to be retained, which our Holy Mother the Church has once for 
 all declared ; nor is that meaning ever to be departed from, under the pretence 
 or pretext of a deeper understanding of them.” And again: ‘‘The Holy 
 Spirit was not promised to Peter’s successors that they might make new 
 doctrines, but that by His assistance they might inviolably keep and faithfully 
 expound the revelation or deposit of faith delivered through the Apostles.” 
 
The Old Religion! 
 
 7 
 
 whole of the ground, is yet quite sufficient to decide the main 
 question. It is this. There are three ancient Christian creeds, 
 received by both the Roman and the English Church, namely, 
 the Apostles’ Creed, the Nicene Creed, and the Athanasian 
 Creed. As to the reception of these three, and all the doctrines 
 contained therein, no dispute or difference exists between the 
 two Churches. But to these three creeds the Church of Rome 
 has added a fourth, named the Creed of Pope Pius IV., which is 
 more than a thousand years later in date than the youngest of 
 the three older creeds, for it was not published till 1564, and at 
 first was intended only for office-bearers in the Church, though 
 it has long been imposed on all converts from other Christian 
 bodies. And further, whereas the three older creeds contain only 
 the same matter, differently worded, and do not add anything to 
 the list of doctrines to be held ; contrariwise, the Creed of 
 Pius IV. contains twelve articles of belief which are in none 
 of the former creeds, and were not proposed as matter of faith 
 till comparatively recent times. 
 
 None of these twelve articles make part of the belief of the 
 English Church, which is content to keep to the old creeds as 
 sufficient for her children. Let us now see what are these twelve 
 additional articles, and when they first came into notice and 
 reception. The single question before us just now is not, Are 
 these twelve articles true or false, right or wrong ? That is a very 
 serious question, deserving careful examination at a proper time, 
 but the one question to be considered now is. Are these articles 
 new or old ? 
 
 Article I. — I most steadfastly admit and embrace apostolic 
 and ecclesiastical traditions, and the remaining observances and 
 constitutions of the same [Roman] Church.’’ 
 
 On the face of it, this article bears witness against itself on the 
 score of antiquity, by adding “ecclesiastical” to “apostolic” 
 amongst the traditions binding as matters of faith, for all such 
 further traditions, of which there are hundreds, must needs be 
 later than apostolic times. And, in fact, most of them are very 
 much later, and are not denied to be so by their maintainers, so that 
 to make them binding as items of belief is to innovate, to depart 
 from the ancient standards, exactly in proportion as these various 
 
8 
 
 Words for Truth. 
 
 ‘^traditions, observances, and constitutions’" severally belong to 
 a later and still later time than the date of the old creeds. 
 
 Article II.— “ I also admit the Holy Scriptures, according to 
 that sense which Holy Mother Church has held and does hold,* 
 
 . . . neither will I take them and interpret them at any time 
 
 save according to the unanimous consent of the Fathers.’’ 
 
 On this head it will suffice, to say that the last clause is no 
 older than 1564, for the decree of the Council of Trent, whereon 
 it is based, is worded in this very different fashion : “ No one 
 shall presume to interpret Holy Scripture . . . contrary to 
 
 the unanimous consent of the Fathers.” That is to say, the 
 Council barred Catholics from one special way of interpreting 
 Scripture ; the Creed of Pius IV. practically bars them from any 
 way whatever, there being no such unanimity of consent in 
 patristic commentaries on Scripture, though there is a large 
 measure of practical unanimity as to the doctrines deduced 
 thence. 
 
 Article HI. — “ I also profess that there are truly and properly 
 seven Sacraments of the New Law, instituted by Jesus Christ our 
 Lord.” 
 
 There is no trace discoverable of this enumeration of the 
 Sacraments as just seven, and neither more nor fewer, till the 
 writings of Peter I.ombard, Bishop of Paris, who died in 1164. 
 The Eastern Church now agrees with the Roman in counting 
 seven Sacraments, but no old Greek Father does so, and this is 
 merely one of several points wherein the East has copied the West 
 in comparatively recent times. 
 
 Article IV. — “All and everything which the Holy Council of 
 Trent hath defined and declared in the matter of original sin and 
 justification, I embrace and receive.” 
 
 What the Council of Trent has said on these subjects occupies 
 sixteen chapters and thirty-three canons. And a large part of 
 what is so contained was opposed as novel in the Council of Trent 
 itself by a strong minority, including Cardinals Contarini, Serip- 
 
 ^ These words “does hold ” refer every interpretation of doctrine not to 
 the standard of the ancient Church, but to that of the modern Roman Church, 
 and take for granted that the two standards are identical. 
 
s 
 
 The Old Religion. 
 
 9 
 
 andi, and Reginald Pole, the lasf of whom quitted the Council 
 because of its decision on these matters. Clearly, then, whether 
 the Council was right or wrong in its decision, it imposed a new 
 standard of belief upon Roman Catholics, limiting their former 
 liberty, so that this article goes back no earlier than 1547, the 
 date of the decree. 
 
 Article V. — I profess that in the Mass there is offered to God 
 a true, proper, and propitiatory sacrifice for the living and the 
 dead . . . and that there is a conversion of the whole sub- 
 
 stance of the Bread into the Body, and of the whole substance of 
 the Wine into the Blood, which conversion the Catholic Church 
 calls Transubstantiation.” 
 
 It is necessary to touch on the last clause only of this article, 
 that on Transubstantiation. The nature of this opinion is con- 
 stantly mistaken, even by professional theologians. It is not a 
 theological doctrine at all. The theological doctrine is simply 
 that of the Presence of Christ — we are not here concerned 
 with the mode of that Presence — in the Holy Eucharist. Tran- 
 substantiation is merely a philosophical theory, intended to meet 
 certain subtle intellectual difficulties as to the manner of that 
 Presence (which it has signally failed to do), and depends 
 entirely upon the notions entertained by the Realist school of 
 philosophers as to the nature of Substance and Accidents, that 
 is to say, the properties or qualities of substance or body 
 of any kind. This school did not spring up in Western Europe 
 until the eleventh century ; the word Transubstantiation was not 
 adopted until the Council of Lateran in 1215, when also the 
 theory it denotes was first formulated as a dogma ; and the 
 virtual oblivion into which Realism has passed (overthrown 
 centuries ago by great Roman Catholic thinkers of the 
 opposite school of Nominalists) has resulted in the practical 
 abandonment of Transubstantiation (though the name is still 
 retained) by Roman theologians. For whereas they formerly 
 taught that only mere phantasms of bread and wine survive 
 after consecration, now the received teaching is that no physical 
 change whatever, of which the senses can take cognisance, is 
 effected by consecration, but that all the accidents of the bread 
 and wine in the Eucharist remain as they were before. This 
 
lO 
 
 Words for Truth, 
 
 is the Anglican doctrine that the bread and wine remain in 
 their very natural substances/^ expressed in other but equivalent 
 language. For the Realist view is that ‘‘ substance ” is a some- 
 thing with an independent existence of its own, apart and 
 distinct from the ‘^accidents,” qualities, or properties, whereby 
 anything possessing substance is known by and to us ; so that, 
 conceivably, the size, shape, weight, colour, taste, chemical 
 constituents, and so forth, might all be taken away from a 
 piece of bread, for instance, and yet the substance of the bread 
 would still remain.* But now the contrary (Nominalist) view 
 prevails everywhere, that ‘^substance” is nothing else than a 
 collective name for the sum of all the accidents or qualities 
 of a body, so that if all these were taken away, the body 
 would wholly cease to exist, and its substance would be 
 annihilated. Consequently, in acknowledging that all the 
 accidents or qualities of bread and wine do truly remain after 
 consecration, and are not mere deceptive appearances, Roman 
 Catholic theologians thereby practically admit that the bread 
 and wine themselves remain too — which is the denial of Tran- 
 substantiation, for they did not admit the actual truth of these 
 appearances in former times, but burnt men for asserting it 
 (and notably the nutritive power of the Sacrament as bodily 
 food), though believing in the Real Presence. And thus this 
 article of the Creed of Pius IV. is at best late medieval, and has 
 long diverged from the sense at first put upon it. The Anglican 
 doctrine is in minute verbal agreement with that of Pope St. 
 Gelasius (492 — 496), in his treatise against Eutyches, ‘‘ On 
 the Two Natures,” whose authenticity (disputed by Ultra- 
 montanes by reason of the words about to be cited) is certified 
 by the fact of its being quoted as his by his contemporary St. 
 Fulgentius, and by his successor Pope John II. He says: 
 ‘‘The Sacraments of the Body and Blood of Christ which we 
 receive are a divine thing, inasmuch as through them we are 
 made partakers of the divine nature ; and yet the substance and 
 nature (substantia et iiaturd) of bread and wine ceases not to be.” 
 
 * Thus, when a red-hot bar of iron cools, the substance of the iron remains 
 after the heat and redness, accidents of that substance, have disappeared. 
 
The Old Religion '. 
 
 II 
 
 Article VI.- — “ I confess that under either kind alone, a whole 
 and entire Christ and a true Sacrament is received.” 
 
 This article is intended to uphold the usage of lay commu- 
 nion in one kind only. But communion in one kind is de- 
 nounced as a Manichaean heresy and as sacrilegious by 
 Pope Leo the Great (440 — 461) and as “ a great sacrilege ” by 
 Pope Gelasius 1 . (492 — 496), the latter stating that the reason why 
 it is so is that it is a ‘‘ division of one and the same mystery” ; 
 it was forbidden, save in cases of necessity, by Pope Urban II. in 
 the Council of Clermont in 1095 ; and again by Pope Paschal 
 II. in 1 1 18, save in the case of infants and very infirm old people, 
 who cannot swallow bread, and may therefore be communicated 
 with the chalice only. And the first ruling the other way (wherein 
 it was acknowledged that Christ’s institution required recep- 
 tion in both kinds) was at the Council of Constance, on June 15, 
 1415, when the Council had deposed the reigning Pope or Popes, 
 and had not yet elected another. This, consequently, is a very 
 late innovation upon ancient doctrine and practice. 
 
 Article VII. — ‘‘ I constantly hold that there is a Purgatory, 
 and that the souls therein detained are assisted by the prayers of 
 the faithful.” 
 
 Pius IV., who drew up this creed, mentions in his Bull against 
 the Greeks that they reject Purgatory,” and they did so, in fact, 
 at the Council of Florence in 1439, unknown to Oriental 
 theology. And Cardinal Fisher, in his book against Luther 
 (a.d. 153s), says: “Since it was so late before Purgatory was 
 admitted into the Universal Church, who can be surprised that 
 at the earlier period of the Church no mention was made of 
 indulgences ? ” Accordingly, this article also is new. 
 
 Article VIII. — “In like manner I hold that the Saints reigning 
 with God are to be venerated and invoked, and that they offer 
 prayers for us, and that their relics are to be venerated.” 
 
 There is not quite such overwhelming evidence against this 
 clause as against those cited previously, for there is some seeming 
 warrant for invocation of the Saints found in Fathers of the fourth 
 and fifth centuries — even this, however, being far too late to rank 
 as part of the primitive Christian belief and practice. But when 
 these earliest examples are tested, they prove to be sermons on 
 
12 
 
 Words for Truth. 
 
 the anniversaries of Saints’ Days, and the like, in which merely 
 a sort of poetical call is made upon the Saint commemorated to 
 unite in the worship being offered by the Church, exactly 
 analogous to the mention of Ananias, Azarias, and Misael in 
 the Benedicite^ which no sane person supposes to be addressed 
 as a prayer to them. This develops somewhat later into the 
 ‘‘ Pray for us,” when the Saints are asked to intercede, as 
 living friends might do, but with better knowledge and more 
 power. But invocations of the modern kind, asking the Saints 
 to confer favours and graces, as from themselves directly, are 
 not to be found till the ninth century. In the standard com- 
 mentary on the Roman Breviary, that of Gavanti and Merati, 
 it is stated that the earliest discoverable use of the Hail 
 Mary ” as a prayer, and not as a mere anthem, is in the 
 diocesan statutes of Odo de Sully, Bishop of Paris from 1196 
 to 1208, and that the latter clause, as now said, Holy Mary,” 
 &c., is not found till 1508 ; while the earliest mention of the 
 “ Hail Mary,” as used devotionally in England, is in 1237, 
 according to Dr. Rock (“Church of our Fathers,” iii. 318). 
 This article, consequently, is no part of the ancient faith of the 
 Catholic Church. 
 
 Article IX. — most firmly assert that the images of Christ, 
 of the ever-Virgin Mother of God, and of the other Saints, are to 
 be had and retained, and that due honour and veneration are to 
 be rendered to them.” 
 
 The cultus of images was first licensed by the pseudo- General 
 Second Council of Nice (a packed and fettered assembly) in 787, 
 and was promptly repudiated and condemned by the Western 
 Church in the Council of Frankfort in 794; while the so-called 
 “ Caroline Books,” a theological.indictment against image-worship, 
 drawn up at the instance of the Emperor Charlemagne, are still 
 extant to testify to the opposition this novelty met at the outset. 
 
 Article X. — “I most firmly assert that the power of Indul- 
 gences has been left in the Church by Christ, and that their use 
 by the Christian people is of the most salutary character.” 
 
 There is no trace whatever of Indulgences, save as mitigations 
 of canonical penalties imposed by human ecclesiastical law, 
 discoverable till the year 1084, when Pope Gregory VII. olfered 
 
The Old Religioiil 
 
 13 
 
 remission of sins to all who would take up arms against the 
 Emperor Henry IV., with whom he was then at feud. Even then 
 and for long afterwards indulgences made no part of the canon 
 law of the Koman Church, nor was it till 1391 that “ plenary 
 indulgences ” were first granted. Accordingly, Cardinal 
 Fisher, in his book against Luther, says : “ There was no use 
 of Indulgences for the first twelve centuries ; they began after 
 people were affrighted with the torments of Purgatory.” (And 
 see above, under Article VII.) This is, therefore, a new 
 doctrine. 
 
 Article XL— I acknowledge the Holy Catholic and Apostolic 
 Roman Church to be the mother and mistress of all Churches.’’ 
 
 This article is one which has to be tested by facts as well as by 
 dates. As it is certain that the Gospel was first preached from 
 Jerusalem, it is to Jerusalem only that the title of Mother of 
 all Churches ” can historically or theologically apply. Rome 
 itself was evangelised from Jerusalem, first by the ‘‘strangers of 
 Rome,” who reported St. Peter’s Pentecostal sermon there, and 
 after by St. Paul, who first organised the Roman Church. And 
 Rome was not a missionary centre for a very long time. It is 
 just possible that North Africa was evangelised thence, but, after 
 that, Anglo-Saxon England, in the sixth century, is the first-fruits 
 of Roman missionary enterprise. None of the many hundred 
 Churches founded in East or West up to that date were the result 
 of Roman missions, or could have supposed for an instant that 
 they were so ; and it is thus impossible that a belief of the Roman 
 Church being their “ mother ” could have made any part of their 
 creed or tradition. As to its being the “ Mistress of all 
 Churches,” the word mistress ” may stand either for 
 “sovereign” or for “ teacher.” In the former sense, though 
 many strenuous efforts were made to establish such supremacy, 
 yet the Eastern Churches never accepted it at all, and several 
 of the Western Churches — and notably the Church of England 
 — resisted it in principle and in detail. In the sense of teacher, 
 the facts are plainly all the other w^ay. It was the East which 
 taught Rome, which gave Rome the Gospel, the Nicene Creed, 
 its oldest Liturgy, and created nearly all the theology which 
 was not supplied from Africa. It is not till Leo I., in the fourth 
 
14 
 
 Words for Truth. 
 
 century, that Rome begins to have a local school of theology, 
 or to be more than a learner at the feet of more erudite 
 Churches. Consequently this claim lacks the mark of ancient 
 consent, and is to be classed amongst innovations. 
 
 Article XII. — I vow and swear a true obedience to the 
 Roman Pontiff, the successor of St. Peter, Prince of the Apostles, 
 and Vicar of Jesus Christ.^' 
 
 Here it will be enough to say that the Church of North Africa, 
 in 419, and again in 424, enacted canons repudiating the Papal 
 claim to interfere in the concerns of the African Church, and 
 excommunicating all African ecclesiastics who should appeal 
 beyond sea — that is, to the Pope, as that was the point at issue — 
 from the decision of an African Synod, and the famous St. 
 Augustine took part in both these rejections of Papal authority. 
 And the Western Church deposed Popes several times, on the 
 ground of the superior authority of the collective Church over 
 any single Bishop, however exalted in station. The last case 
 was as late as 1415. If the proposition in the Creed of Pius IV. 
 were historically or theologically ancient or true, such an act 
 would have been the cutting off its own head on the part of the 
 body, and thus its own self-murder and annihilation. 
 
 It will be seen from this chronological survey that while 
 several of the twelve articles of the specially Roman Creed may 
 be called old in comparison with the tenets of various modern 
 sects, they are not old in relation to the only standard of age 
 which holds good for the Catholic Faith. And although Rome 
 differs from the sects in this important particular : that she has 
 not cast away any of the ancient articles of Christian belief, 
 however she may have overlaid and obscured them, yet the 
 passion for religious novelties is just as acute amongst Roman 
 Catholics as amongst the most innovating of the sects. The 
 only difference is one of procedure. In Protestantism the in- 
 ventor of a novel opinion or practice starts a new sect for its 
 propagation and maintenance ; in the Roman Church it is not 
 necessary to secede for such a purpose, since it can be effected 
 by starting a new cult, supported by a guild or confraternity of 
 some kind, and certain to obtain formal recognition in course of 
 time, if it can first succeed unofficially in winning a sufficient 
 
The Old Religio7iT 
 
 15 
 
 measure of popularity. That is h^w the cult of the Sacred 
 Heart, for example, came in. And it was freely alleged, during 
 the inception and course of the Vatican Council, by some of its 
 ablest Roman Catholic critics, that one of the most powerful 
 motives which influenced the advocates of Papal Infallibility was 
 that it would provide machinery whereby, without the long 
 delays of previous inquiry and conciliar procedure, a perennial 
 flow of fresh theological definitions and new articles of belief 
 could be supplied for the jaded appetites of devotees, craving for 
 some evermew fashion in religion. 
 
 It is thus clear that not one of the twelve additional articles of 
 the specially Roman Creed can be traced back to primitive or 
 even to very early times. What that means is this : that the 
 only old religion ’’to be found in the Roman Church is that 
 part of its belief and practice which agrees with the standards of 
 the Church of England. What is peculiar to itself, and what 
 makes by far the largest portion of its practical working system, 
 is at most mediaeval, and sometimes not only modern, but ex- 
 tremely modern, as the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception 
 of the Blessed Virgin, which dates as a dogma only from 1854, 
 and that of Papal Infallibility, which was first enacted in 1870, 
 having been repudiated up to the very last by eminent Roman 
 Catholic theologians. Wherever, then, the ‘‘ old religion ’’ may 
 be found, pure and unmixed with modern additions, it is not in 
 the modern Church of Rome. 
 
 
No. II. 
 
 CATHOLIC-NOT ROMAN CATHOLIC. 
 
 0 
 
 VERY time an English Churchman attends Morning 
 or Evening Prayer in church he joins in the Apostles^ 
 Creed as part of those services. Every time he goes 
 to Holy Communion he joins in the Nicene Creed as 
 part of that service ; and in both those Creeds he professes his 
 belief in the Holy Catholic Church. 
 
 Hereupon Roman Catholic proselytisers say : — That means 
 the Roman Church, which is the only Catholic Church. We are 
 everywhere, all over the world, recognised amongst all nations ; 
 your communion is only for England first, and then for English- 
 speaking people elsewhere. At best, even if it is a Church at all, 
 it is a mere local one, and so not the Catholic Church. And 
 because it is not merely local, but separated from those Churches 
 all over the world which are in communion with the Roman 
 Church, the mother and mistress of all Churches, it is no true 
 Church, but only a sect and a schism. There can be no such 
 things as independent National Churches, for that would make 
 a ^ainst the unity of the one Church ; but even if there were such 
 lurches possible, they would still have to be in union with the 
 lurch of Rome, in subjection to the Supreme Pontiff, the 
 buccessor of St. Peter, in order to have any just title to their 
 name and rank.” 
 
 This is a very large claim, and needs to be tested carefully 
 before it can be allowed. And the first thing which has to 
 be ascertained is the meaning and use of the word “Catholic.” 
 
Catholic — Not Roman Catholic. 
 
 17 
 
 It is not a Bible word. It never occurs either in the Greek 
 Old Testament (the LXX.) or in the New Testament. Conse- 
 quently, it is not, as a title of the Church, divinely revealed, but 
 is only of man's invention and application ; and thus its exclusive 
 use, if the Roman Church could prove it to be hers alone in fact 
 and by right, would not also prove her superiority to all other 
 Christian bodies. 
 
 The first appearance of the word in a Christian writer is very 
 early It is in the Epistle of St. Ignatius to the Church of 
 Smyrna, and there it means the Universal Church as distinguished 
 from any local portion of it; in which same sense it is used just 
 after by the Church of Smyrna itself three times in its Letter 
 on the Martyrdom of St. Polycarp. These examples belong to 
 the second century. In that same century, later on, St. Justin 
 Martyr speaks of the ^‘Catholic — i.e. general — Resurrection;” and 
 just in the third century we find the sense of orthodoxy, of the 
 faith of the whole Catholic Ghurch, as being opposed to the 
 doctrines of local and heretical sects, beginning to be attached to 
 the word by St. Clement of Alexandria and others. Two schisms 
 — the Novatian and the Donatist — which arose severally in the 
 third and fourth centuries, and were occasioned by disputes about 
 the rightfulness of lenient Church discipline towards sinful 
 and fallen members, brought the word into yet more prominent 
 use and a more carefully defined meaning, so that it came at last 
 to signify (i) the Church of the whole world, as distinguished 
 from any portion or portions thereof ; (2) this same Church, 
 as distinguished from the sects ; (3) the teaching of this Church, 
 as containing the whole of the Divine revelation and precepts, 
 instead of choosing only portions thereof ; and (4) as applicable 
 to all sorts and conditions of men. This is the fourfold sense in^ 
 which the word is used by St. Cyril of Jerusalem and by 
 Augustine, who replies to the Donatists — claiming as they dv 
 to be the true Church, because the only persons of whom thv 
 third definition just given (which they urged as complete in itself) 
 held good — that geographical universality is an essential element 
 of Catholicity. None of the more ancient Fathers who define the 
 word include communion with the Roman Church as a factor of 
 the meaning. This is true, for instance, not only of the writers 
 already mentioned, but of St. Cyprian, St. Theophilus, St. Pacian, 
 B 
 
Words for T^'uth. 
 
 St. Chrysostom, and several others, though if they had known 
 of it they could scarcely have avoided saying so. A well-known 
 passage of St. Irenaeus (written about a.d. 183) is often cited 
 as though asserting that it is necessary for all Churches to agree 
 with the Roman Church, as the sole depository of Apostolic 
 tradition. But this meaning can be forced out of the words only 
 by a serious mistranslation — that of agree with instead of 
 “ assemble at.” the only sense of which the phrase used {convenire 
 ad) is capable in Latin (the original Greek of all this part is 
 lost, and only an old Latin version remains) — and by the 
 omission of a decisive piece of the context, quoted below. 
 The real force of the passage is this : that Rome was the 
 best place wherein to ascertain the tradition of the whole 
 Church, because, since it was the capital city (^propter potior ern 
 prmcipaliiatem), visitors belonging to all other Churches had 
 occasion to resort thither, and could be questioned ; so that, 
 St. Irenseus goes on to say, the Apostolic tradition was thus kept 
 up in Rome — not by the Pope as its appointed guardian and 
 expounder, but — “ by the multitude of the faithful from all 
 quarters” resorting thither. That is, the tradition, being collected 
 and attested from all quarters, was Catholic, not merely Roman 
 Catholic, and thus was trustworthy. Another of the Fathers 
 just named, St. Cyprian, is often quoted as if he did say that 
 communion with the Pope is a necessary part of the true Catholic 
 belief ; but this can be made out only by misrepresenting the 
 occasion of his language, and by concealing his own conduct in a 
 famous controversy. The fact is that in his time there was a 
 schism in the local Roman Church itself, with a true Pope and an 
 Anti- Pope, and he writes to say that the Romans themselves, and 
 also Christian visitors to Rome, should communicate with the 
 true Pope only, and not with his rival. And as regards his own 
 conduct, he presided, as Primate of North Africa, over two large 
 councils which took an opposite line to the Pope and the Roman 
 Church of that day on the question of re-baptizing heretics, and 
 he would not give in, so that he was actually excommunicated by 
 the Pope in consequence, and, to the best of what is known, died 
 so, though he is accounted among the very greatest of the Saints, 
 and is specially named as such in the Canon of the Mass by the 
 Roman Church herself. 
 
Catholic — Not Roman Catholic. 
 
 19 
 
 We do reach, later on, a time when communion with the Pope 
 was looked on as a test of orthodoxy. It was in the time of the 
 Arian heresy. This heresy was confined at first, and long so, to 
 the East, and made but little way in the West, so that the Roman 
 Church was unaffected by it, and therefore the Catholics in the 
 East were not only glad to have the support of the most powerful 
 Bishop of the Church on their side, but found it a convenient 
 way of settling the question of true Church membership to ask 
 which of two contending parties in any place was acknowledged 
 by the Roman Pope. That is to say, it was not because of 
 his being Pope, but because he held to the Nicene Creed when 
 Arianism was rampant, that he was looked up to in this fashion. 
 But what happened when the Pope himself was not sound in this 
 faith may be simply put in the words of the great St. Hilary of 
 Poitiers to a Pope who signed an Arian creed: — Again, and a 
 third time, I say. Anathema to thee, apostate Liberius.”'*' 
 
 Further, it is to be noticed that the phrase the Catholic 
 Churches is very common in early times, both in Latin and 
 Greek Fathers, meaning thereby the orthodox local Churches in 
 each place, recognised as independent of each other in all matters 
 of jurisdiction, but holding the same faith and united to one 
 another by full inter-communion. That these local Churches in 
 ancient times were independent of each other, though agreeing in 
 all essentials, and thus that there was no authority which could 
 constrain them till the General Councils began to legislate for all 
 Christendom, is unquestionable. To begin with, the Seven 
 Churches of Asia, to which St. John was commanded to write the 
 letters in the Book of Revelation, have plainly no necessary rela- 
 tion to each other, nor is there any trace of a joint government. 
 Least of all is there any hint of a tribunal on earth to which they 
 
 * So damaging is this testimony, that the genuineness of the letters wherein 
 it occurs was roundly denied for the first time by the Jesuit F. Stilting (1703 — 
 1762), who has been followed by Bishop Hefele, never impartial on points 
 affecting the Papacy. But the far weightier names of Tillemont, Dupin, 
 Natalis Alexander, Fleury, Montfaucon, Ceillier, Mohler, and Constant, 
 amongst Roman Catholic critics, are in favour of their authenticity, as is also 
 Cardinal Newman in his History of the Arians.” The fact of Tiberius 
 having apostatized is attested for us by St. Athanasius, St. Hilary, St. Jerome, 
 and the historian Sozomen. But F. Stilting denied that too. 
 
 B 2 
 
20 
 
 Words for Truth. 
 
 are all alike subject ; there is no word of their being bound 
 to refer to St. Peter’s successor for the solution of difficulties and 
 the avoidance of error. Not very much later come the extremely 
 ancient Church laws known as the Canons of the Apostles,” the 
 earliest rules of the kind known to exist. The thirty-fourth of 
 these canons runs thus : — It is necessary that the Bishops of 
 every nation should know who is first among them, recognise 
 him as such, and do nothing important without his assent.” 
 Here, though we have the first beginning of Metropolitans or 
 Primates, there is no hint of any yet higher ecclesiastical autho- 
 rity, or of an appeal outside the limits of each such national 
 Church. St. Cyprian, already referred to, when the Pope inter- 
 fered in the affairs of the African Church, and demanded its 
 submission, gave his opinion on one important issue in the fol- 
 lowing terms of his opening speech at a council of eighty-seven 
 African Bishops in 256 : — None of us sets himself up as a 
 Bishop of Bishops, or by despotic threats compels any of his 
 colleagues to obey him as a duty, seeing that every Bishop has his 
 private right of exercising his liberty and power freely, and can no 
 more be judged by another than he can judge that other himself ” 
 This was a direct and intentional repudiation of the Pope’s 
 authority over the African Church. And considerably later a 
 still more emphatic rejection of it was made, in which St. Augus- 
 tine was concerned. A deposed African priest appealed to 
 Rome, and obtained an order for his reinstatement from Pope 
 Zosimus, who admitted him to communion. The African Church 
 met this by enacting in 419 a canon (cxxv.) forbidding for the 
 future all appeals beyond sea, or to any authority save that of 
 African councils and primates, under pain of excommunication, 
 and by sending a synodical letter to the Pope repudiating his 
 jurisdiction in the matter. And in 424 they did the like to 
 another Pope, further declaring that they, as on the spot, 
 were much more competent to manage their own affairs 
 than he could be, and called on him to withdraw his 
 legate. These facts settle the question of the existence of 
 National Churches independent of Rome, but none the less 
 Catholic on that account. Clearly, then, Rome was not 
 the whole Catholic Church in those days, nor is she now. It 
 is cpiite true that she is the largest of all Christian bodies, and the 
 
Catholic — Not Roman Catholic, 
 
 • 21 
 
 most widely diffused, but that is not the question now and here. 
 Her having small garrisons in countries where she is in a tiny 
 minority, as in Russia, for instance, does not make her the 
 Church of those countries, with their hundred millions of Church 
 members; just as the Queen of England is not Queen of Spain 
 because the English hold Gibraltar, nor Empress of China 
 because they hold Hong-Kong. And unless Rome is the whole 
 Church, she cannot speak with the authority which belongs to 
 nothing less than the whole Church. What is more, the autho- 
 rised and official style and title of the Latin Church is not 
 broadly ‘‘ The Catholic Church,” but only the Holy Roman 
 Church,” or the ‘‘ Holy Catholic Apostolic Roman Church,'’ 
 both which styles occur in the Creed of Pius IV. But the 
 
 Roman ” Church is plainly and necessarily only a localised 
 part of the Universal Church, something smaller and narrower 
 than the whole body. The Eastern Church calls itself the 
 Apostolic Catholic and Orthodox Church, thus bringing in no 
 geographical limitation, and so having a wider style and claim 
 than the Roman. 
 
 But there is a yet more weighty matter still to be considered. 
 As there is a Catholic Church, so there is a Catholic Faith. When 
 we recite the Athanasian Creed we declare what that faith is, and 
 it does not say a word about the Pope or the Church of Rome. 
 There is a famous book called ‘^A Commonitory against Heresy,” 
 by St. Vincent of Lerins, who wrote it about the year 434, as a 
 guide whereby the true Catholic Faith might be distinguished from 
 all erroneous doctrines. And the rule he lays down is this : We 
 are to hold that which has been believed everywhere^ always, and 
 by all fuen, , . . And that we shall do, if we follow uni- 
 
 versality, antiquity, consent. Universality shall we follow thus, 
 if we profess that one faith to be true which the whole Church 
 throughout the world confesses ; we shall follow antiquity, if 
 we depart in no respect from the interpretations prevalent with 
 our predecessors and fathers ; and consent, if in this ancient time 
 we hold to the opinions and definitions of all, or at any rate 
 almost all, the priests and doctors.” He does not seem to have 
 so much as heard of agreement with and obedience to the 
 Pope as a part, not to say the whole, of the safeguard against 
 doctrinal or practical error, and never hints at a Papal decision 
 
22* Words for Truth. 
 
 as being the final appeal, or any appeal at all, in matters of 
 the kind. 
 
 Now, what we learn from this ruling is, that Catholic ’’ is not 
 only a word denoting geographical place ^ but also unbroken dura- 
 tion of thne. And that, because the Church and a General 
 Council of the Church are in one most serious particular unlike 
 any secular kingdom or Parliament. With us any Parliament can 
 repeal every law of former Parliaments, and enact others directly 
 contradicting them ; and the new Acts would thereby become 
 the binding laws of the country. But the Church cannot proceed 
 in this way. She cannot make new doctrine, nor alter the ancient 
 faith ; though explanations of statements which have been mis- 
 understood or wrested from their true meaning can be put forth 
 as required. Therefore, when even a General Council comes 
 together, its business is not to find out what are the private 
 views of its members, nor to endeavour the discovery of the 
 truth, but simply to ascertain from each Bishop present what 
 has been the doctrine hitherto handed down in his diocese ; 
 and, if any considerable fraction declares that the particular 
 tenet under consideration has been unknown amongst their 
 flocks, it cannot be declared part of the Catholic faith, even 
 if a strong majority is in favour of it. There must be virtual 
 unanimity in its favour, because otherwise the doctrine would 
 lack the two necessary warrants of universal diffusion and 
 unbroken reception. 
 
 These, then, are the tests to be applied when we desire to know 
 whether any given practice is Catholic or only Roman Catholic. 
 No tenet or practice which is not known all over Christendom is 
 Catholic ; none which does not trace back to the most ancient 
 times can claim to be received and followed as of right; any 
 tenet or practice which is not merely unknown to the ancient 
 Church, but contradicts Scripture or the ruling of the ancient 
 Fathers, must be rejected as erroneous and even heretical. This 
 is true, for example, of the worship of the Blessed Virgin, for, 
 when that first appears, it is at once condemned as heresy ; it is 
 true of image-worship, also condemned as heresy (although both 
 these late errors prevail now in the Greek Church as well as 
 in the Roman) ; it is true still more of doctrines and usages 
 unknown to the Eastern Churcli, and peculiar to Rome alone, 
 
Catholic — Not Roman Catholic. 
 
 23 
 
 such as communion in one kind only, denounced by Pope St. 
 Gelasius as sacrilegious ; the doctrine of the immaculate concep- 
 tion of the Blessed Virgin, for that was not heard of for more 
 than eight hundred years, and was freely denied as heresy by 
 Roman Catholic divines down to 1854'^ ; several other tenets 
 in the Creed of Pope Pius IV., and Papal infallibility, for even in 
 the Vatican Council itself there was so large a minority against 
 that, including the most learned and able Bishops, and also 
 the Bishops of so many great and populous dioceses, that 
 the promulgation of the decree was null and void as a pure 
 matter of canon law, to say nothing of the notorious falsehood 
 of the ^tenet itself, repudiated till quite the other day by all 
 the most eminent Roman Catholic theologians as a mere novelty 
 and error. 
 
 The essential thing to bear in mind, then, is that as the Saints 
 departed are not dead, but living, they form an integral part of the 
 Catholic Church still, and their teaching is still part of ‘^the living 
 voice of the Church.’’ Accordingly, when Roman Catholics say 
 that they, as constituting the vast majority of Christians, as well 
 as being in communion with the Pope, are the whole Church 
 now, and have a right to speak and decide as such, the reply is 
 that the Church of all the past ages has to be taken into the 
 
 ^ So high did disputes on the subject lise, especially between the Francis- 
 cans, as champions of the tenet, and the Dominicans, as its opponents, that 
 Paul V. issued a Bull in 1617 forbidding any public preaching or discussion 
 upon the question until such time as it should be formally defined by autho- 
 rity, both views being equally silenced. And in 1622 Gregory XV. extended 
 this prohibition even to private conversations, and ordered that in speaking of 
 the festival it should be simply called the “Conception,” with no qualifying 
 adjective, under pain of punishment for breach of this injunction, to be inflicted 
 either by bishops or inquisitors. Hereupon, Caesar Carena, a canon lawyer of 
 the seventeenth century. Auditor, Consultor, and Advocate Fiscal of the 
 Inquisition, states, in his treatise on the mode of procedure in causes of the 
 Holy Office (Cremona, 1636), that any one believing the Immaculate Concep- 
 tion to be an article of faith would thereby become a heretic ; and he cites the 
 work of Alfonso de Castro on the punishment of heretics as an authority ; 
 further adding that the proposition that while the Immaculate Conception was 
 not de fide, yet it belonged to the class of things pertaining to the Faith, and 
 that any one dying for it would be a true martyr, was condemned by the 
 supreme Incpiisitors in Portugal, with the approval of Paul V., in 1619. 
 
24 
 
 Words for Truth. 
 
 reckoning, and that unless they can show that the great Saints, 
 doctors, and martyrs of the purest times are in agreement 
 with them, their case so far fails; for the ‘‘living voice” 
 of those times was against them, and remains so, for we 
 cannot suppose that the Saints in Paradise have altered 
 their faith. Men are Catholics only so long and so far as 
 they are in accord with the rule, Everywhere, always, and 
 by all,” cited above. And while this one good thing can 
 be said for the Roman Church, which cannot be said for 
 the sects, that she has never denied or thrown away any of 
 the revealed truths of Christianity, yet she cannot be acquitted 
 of having overlaid and mixed them with much which is novel and 
 false, and seriously abates their clearness and influence. On the 
 other hand, too many of the sects have thrown aside whatever 
 displeased them in Christianity, without stopping to consider 
 whether it might not be part of Divine truth. Their conduct 
 may thus be severally compared to that of two persons with each 
 of whom a cask of pure wine has been left in charge, sufficient 
 for use during a long time, but to be dealt out just as delivered 
 to them. The Roman Church does not take away the wine, but 
 thinks it not bright enough in colour, sweet enough in flavour, or 
 strong enough in body, and therefore adds all sorts of drugs, 
 more or less useless or noxious, to suit its own palate — coarse raw 
 spirit, cloying molasses, foreign dyeing matter — and thus turns 
 the pure, wholesome wine into a sophisticated and too often 
 deleterious compound. The sectary, thinking all wine evil, adds 
 little or nothing, but draws away the wine itself, and fills up the 
 cask with water, till in some cases there is hardly more than the 
 name of wine remaining, certainly neither its flavour nor its body; 
 and in others there is only water left at last, and not a trace of 
 wine remains. 
 
 The Church of England has kept the safe line between these 
 two parallel errors, and has neither added to the faith of ancient 
 Christendom, nor taken away from it, and, accordingly, while she 
 is Catholic, which the sects are not, she is not Roman Catholic, 
 with mere local and modern variations for the worse from the old 
 teaching of the Church Universal. 
 
No. III. 
 
 THE FOUR DOCTORS. 
 
 E title of ‘’Doctor of the Church” is one which 
 means that the person so described is a theological 
 writer of such eminence that his works have helped 
 to mould the teaching of the Church itself, and have 
 generally been accepted as standard authorities; thus differing 
 from other writers of equal orthodoxy and piety, who have 
 simply repeated the current teaching in their works, and have 
 not enriched it with fresh matter. There are not many of these 
 Doctors, and four of the most distinguished amongst them are 
 known as the Four Latin Doctors, being St. Ambrose, St. 
 Augustine, St. Jerome, and St. Gregory the Great. 
 
 All four are in the Kalendar of the English Book of Common 
 Prayer, as Saints whom the English Church singles out for 
 especial honour; and they are also in the Kalendars of the 
 Roman Missal and Breviary. But although the Roman Catholic 
 Church classes them among the great teaching Saints, yet that 
 Church does not follow their teaching, but has practically aban- 
 doned it ; while, contrariwise, the Church of England holds with 
 the Four Doctors on every point where Rome and England are 
 at variance in matters of religion. 
 
 As the two most salient and obvious points whereon the 
 the Roman Church insists, while the Church of England rejects 
 them, are infallible Papal Supremacy and the worship of the 
 Blessed Virgin as the immaculately conceived Queen of Heaven, 
 it will suffice to narrow the inquiry to these only, not because 
 there is any lack of evidence upon the remaining points in the 
 
26 
 
 Words for Tnith. 
 
 Roman controversy, but because it is beyond all question that no 
 one who does not accept infallible Papal Supremacy and pay acts 
 of direct worship to the Blessed Virgin is a Roman Catholic, as 
 that term is now understood by the authorities of the Roman 
 Church. And of course if the Four Doctors did not believe 
 these tenets, they also were not Roman Catholics, and if alive 
 now would side with the English Church against Rome upon the 
 matters in debate. 
 
 I. St. Ambrose. — This Saint wrote to the Emperor Theodosius 
 the Great about a dispute as to the regularity of the consecration 
 of one Maximus the Cynic, who had been intruded into the 
 Patriarchate of Constantinople, but had been declared by a 
 Canon of the Second General Council in 381 to be no bishop, 
 but a mere pretender, whose ordinations were null and void. 
 Maximus was a very artful and plausible person, and completely 
 gained the ear of St. Ambrose, to whom he appealed after this 
 sentence of deposition against him, wherein Pope Damasus had 
 entirely concurred. St. Ambrose held a Synod at Milan in that 
 same year 381, and, on the ex parte statements of Maximus, 
 declared him innocent of all the charges against him, and to 
 be the lawful Patriarch of Constantinople, to which dignity the 
 Synod declared that he ought to be restored. In the letter 
 to the Emperor, asking him to take action for this purpose, 
 St. Ambrose and his fellow-bishops suggest that a Synod, con- 
 sisting of both Western and Eastern bishops, should be con- 
 voked at Rome to examine the whole matter, and give as their 
 reason that, in an earlier stage of the dispute, the case had 
 been virtually put into the hands of one man, Ascholius, Bishop 
 of Thessalonica, to decide, so that it was not unreasonable 
 now to propose that the matter should be referred to the 
 much larger tribunal of the Roman Bishop sitting with all the 
 other Italian Bishops. The noteworthy points in this matter 
 are, first, that St. Ambrose took upon himself to decide against 
 the known opinion of the Pope, who had sided against 
 Maximus, and that he proposed a new inquiry before a Synod 
 wherein the Pope should be simply one of the members. 
 No idea that the Pope had any right or power to decide the 
 matter singly so much as crossed his mind ; nor is there the 
 
The Four Doctors. 
 
 27 
 
 slightest suggestion in the letter that the Pope could in any 
 way summon the parties belore him, and sit as their judge, 
 even in conjunction with other prelates. It is the Emperor 
 who is asked to constitute the court, and then merely that a 
 fairer hearing than was likely at Constantinople might be 
 secured by appealing to those who were removed from the 
 scene of conflict, and thus freer from partisan bias. 
 
 But not only did St. Ambrose testify thus indirectly against 
 Papalism ; he has denied the whole basis on which the alleged 
 
 Privilege of Peter rests, in the following statements : — 
 
 1. Faith, then, is the foundation of the Church, for it was 
 not said of Peter’s person (literally flesJi)^ but of his faith, that 
 the gates of hell should not prevail against it. (De Incarnat. 
 33. 34-)* 
 
 2. “ Peter exercised a primacy, that is to say, a primacy of 
 confession, not of dignity ; a primacy of faith, not of rank.” 
 (De Incarn, 32,)! 
 
 3. “They do not possess Peter’s inheritance who have not 
 Peter’s faith.” (De Poenitent. i., 7.) This, which is the reading 
 of all old editions of St. Ambrose, is so dangerous a weapon 
 against Papalism that the word fidem, “faith,” has been altered 
 in modern editions into sedefn., “ see,” so as to make the passage 
 read : “ They have not Peter’s inheritance who have not Peter’s 
 see.” The context shows that the older text is the right one, 
 for St. Ambrose is arguing that the Novatians cannot be the 
 legitimate representatives of St. Peter, because they differ from 
 him in doctrine, by denying that power of remitting sins which 
 he believed in as a Divine gift. 
 
 * This excludes the gloss that St. Peter’s faith is only a mode of denoting 
 St. Peter himself, exercising that faith, just as we speak of a general’s valour 
 (that is, the general himself) achieving a victory. St. Ambrose clearly sets 
 that view aside, even if it so much as came before him at all. 
 
 t An attempt has been made to explain this away as referring to the single 
 point of time when St. Peter made his confession of Christ, and before the 
 grant of supremacy was made in his favour. But there are no qualifying 
 words in the context to limit it thus, or to imply that St. Peter afterwards did 
 exercise a primacy of rank and authority. And a similar passage in St. Cyprian, 
 Ep. Ixxi,) goes yet further, stating that St. Peter never claimed any primacy 
 at all, nor exacted personal obedience to himself from others. 
 
28 
 
 Words for Trtith, 
 
 Again, if the treatise on the Sacraments ascribed to St. Ambrose 
 be his, there is a strong passage in it against the whole Roman 
 theory. Speaking of a usage whereon Rome and Milan differed, 
 the writer says: ‘‘I desire to follow the Roman Church in 
 all things ; but, nevertheless, we too are people with under^ 
 standing, and therefore whatever is more correctly observed 
 
 elsewhere, we are more correct in observing In 
 
 this particular, we follow the Apostle Peter himself, we adhere 
 to his devout practice. What answer can the Church of Rome 
 make to that ? ” (De Sacram. III., i., 5, 6.) 
 
 On the point of Mariolatry there is in St. Ambrose this one 
 pregnant sentence : And lest any one should divert this — the 
 act of worship, of which the previous paragraphs speak — to the 
 Virgin Mary, Mary was the temple of God, not the God of the 
 temple. And therefore He only is to be worshipped Who 
 wrought within that temple.” (De Spirit. Sanct. iii., 80.) 
 
 II. St. Augustine. — i. “ I most frequently have thus explained 
 what the Lord said, ‘ Thou art Peter, and upon this rock I 
 will build My Church,’ that it should be understood as upon 
 Him whom Peter confessed, saying, ^ Thou art the Christ, 
 the Son of the living God.’ .... For it was not said 
 unto him, ‘Thou art the rock,’ but ‘Thou art Peter.’ For Christ 
 was the Rock, whom Sim.on confessing, as the whole Church 
 confesses Him, was called Peter.” (Retract, i., 21.) 
 
 2. “ For the rock is not from Peter, but Peter from the rock, 
 just as Christ is not called from Christianity, but Christianity 
 from Christ. .... For Christ was the rock on which 
 foundation Peter himself was built.” (In Evang. Johann, 
 cxxiv., 5.) 
 
 St. Augustine did not confine himself to abstract opinions 
 upon this matter. Pope Boniface I. had received an appeal 
 from a priest in Africa who had been deposed for misconduct, 
 acquitted him, and ordered his restoration, at the same time 
 sending a legate to assert the Papal right of so acting, in 
 virtue of certain canons of the General Council of Nice. A 
 synod of African bishops, in which St. Augustine took a leading 
 part, told the Pope civilly, but firmly, that he had decided 
 wrongly, and requested him not to interfere in such a manner 
 
The Foicr Doctors. 
 
 29 
 
 again, as it was no concern of his, Africa not being under his 
 jurisdiction, but under that of its own bishops and metropolitans ; 
 and as to the alleged Nicene canons, they would inquire into 
 their genuineness, and let him know the result when they 
 received attested copies of the Nicene canons from the archives 
 to which they had applied. Pope Celestine, successor of Boni- 
 face, took up the deposed priest anew, and imitated his pre- 
 decessor’s conduct exactly, whereupon St. Augustine joined in 
 another strongly worded protest, telling the Pope plainly that 
 his pretended canons were not discoverable anywhere, that his 
 plan for hearing appeals could not possibly work well, that he 
 was to be good enough to send no more legates to Africa, 
 where they were not wanted, and wound up by enacting a canon 
 deposing any African ecclesiastic who should venture to appeal 
 beyond sea against any regular decision of an African authority. 
 
 So much for discipline ; now for doctrine. Pelagius and 
 Coelestius, the authors of the Pelagian heresy, having been 
 charged therewith and condemned, appealed to Pope Zosimus, 
 who took up their cause warmly, acquitted them in full as good 
 Catholics, and severely censured their accusers and judges. 
 Hereupon St. Augustine got a Synod convened, repeated the 
 condemnation of the Pelagians, and compelled the Pope to 
 retract his heretical decision. This is so crushing a fact that 
 the conduct of this Pope has been studiously falsified in Roman 
 books, alleging that nothing more than forbearance to proceed 
 to extremities against the heretics, and treating them gently in 
 hopes of reclaiming them, can be ascribed to Zosimus ; but this 
 is knowingly false, because his own letter is extant, wherein he 
 says, in the plainest way, that Pelagius and Coelestius were 
 innocent of the charges against them, and were sound Catholics, 
 unjustly accused. 
 
 St. Augustine has often been quoted as if he upheld the 
 doctrine of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin, 
 by reason of the following passage : — 
 
 ‘‘ Except the holy Virgin Mary, concerning whom, for God’s 
 honour, I wish to have no discussion when sins are the topic, 
 for how can we know what additional grace was bestowed on 
 her to overcome sin on every side, who attained to conceive 
 
30 
 
 Words for Truth. 
 
 and bear Him who certainly had no sin?” De Natura et 
 Gratia,” 42.) But the evident meaning of this must needs be, 
 that reverence keeps him from touching on the sinfulness of 
 her own conception, since, if he could have asserted its immacu- 
 late character, there would have been no reason for him to avoid 
 discussion on the ground of reverence, rather he would have 
 brought it prominently forward. And that such was in truth his 
 attitude appears from his language elsewhere. 
 
 ‘‘The Lord took flesh from that mass which had merited 
 death by sin. That I may put it more tersely, Mary, sprung 
 from Adam, died because of sin ; Adam died because of sin, and 
 the ‘ Flesh of the Lord,’ sprung from Mary, died to blot out sin.” 
 (Serm. II., in Psalm xxxiv., 3.) 
 
 III. St. Jerome. — There is one passage of this writer which, 
 taken by itself, makes very strongly at first sight for Papal 
 Supremacy. He says, writing in a.d. 376 to Pope Damasus : — 
 
 “ I speak with the successor of the Fisherman and a disciple 
 of the Cross, I, following no chief save Christ, am counted in 
 communion with your Blessedness, that is, with the chair of 
 Peter. On that rock I know the Church is built. Whoso eats 
 the lamb outside this house is profane.” 
 
 But he learnt better as he grew older, and so we have language 
 of his in 393, to the following effect : — 
 
 “ But thou sayest the Church is founded on Peter, albeit the 
 very same thing is done also upon all the Apostles, and they all 
 receive the keys of the Kingdom of Heaven, and the strength 
 of the Church is established on them all equally.” (Against 
 Jovinian, ii.) And even the earlier passage, when examined with 
 its context, proves to be concerned with Trinitarian doctrine, and 
 against the widespread Arianism of Eastern Christendom, from 
 which the Roman Church had on the whole been remarkably 
 free, and will very fairly bear, if it does not actually force on 
 us, the meaning that St. Jerome made a point of his communion 
 with Damasus, not because he was Pope, and thus sovereign of 
 the Church, but because he was orthodox on the doctrine in 
 dispute. Sundry other of St. Jerome’s later writings contain 
 passages alleging Christ only to be the Rock of the Church. 
 That St. Jerome recognised no supremacy of jurisdiction as 
 
The Four Doctors, 
 
 31 
 
 vesting in the Roman Pontiff or Church is plain from these 
 words of his : — ‘‘ If you look for authority, the whole world is 
 greater than the City [of Rome]. Wherever a bishop is, whether 
 at Rome or at Gubbio, at Constantinople or at Reggio, at 
 Alexandria or at Tanis, he is of the same dignity and the 
 same priesthood .... all are successors of the Apostles, 
 
 . . . . But you say that at Rome a priest is ordained on the 
 
 testimony of a deacon. Why do you quote to me the custom of 
 a single city ? Why do you urge the small number — of the 
 Roman deacons — “ as though it were one of the laws of the 
 Church (To Evangelus.) As to the Blessed Virgin, not a 
 word that he says can by any ingenuity be tortured into a 
 recognition of any cultus of her, and his mode of speaking 
 concerning her is always what an English Churchman could 
 contentedly use, but which would seem cold, restricted, and 
 almost doubtful doctrinally, to one reared in Ultramontane 
 religion. 
 
 IV. St. Gregory the Great. — This Saint, though he held very 
 high views of the authority vesting in his see, and in himself 
 as its Bishop, contradicts in explicit terms the Vatican decrees 
 assigning a universal Episcopate of immediate jurisdiction over 
 the whole Church to the Pope, for he says, rebuking some 
 who had offered this very dignity to himself : — This title 
 — Universal — is profane, superstitious, haughty, and invented 
 by the first Apostate .... and if one Bishop be called 
 y Universal, the whole Church falls if he should fall.’^ (Epist. vii. 
 27, to the Patriarch of Antioch.) And again, to the same pur- 
 port : — St. Peter is not called Universal Apostle .... 
 The whole Church falls from its place when he who is called 
 
 Universal falls But far from Christian hearts be 
 
 that blasphemous name I confidently affirm that 
 
 who so calls himself, or wishes to be called. Universal Priest, is 
 in his pride a forerunner of Antichrist.” (Epist. v. 20; vii. 33, 
 both to the Emperor Maurice.) 
 
 There is noticeably little said in St. Gregory’s works concerning 
 the Blessed Virgin, but there is one passage which, though not 
 making special reference to her, tells clearly how he would have 
 judged the modern cult if it had existed in his days. Writing 
 
32 
 
 Words for Truth. 
 
 to Serenus, Bishop of Marseilles, whom he thought to have been 
 too hasty in destroying some images which had been super- 
 stitiously misused, he says that there should be no prohibition 
 against making images, But in every possible way avoid wor- 
 shipping images .... and let the people humbly prostrate 
 themselves in honour of the Almighty and Holy Trinity alone.” 
 There can be no doubt what he would have thought, and said, 
 and done, if he had seen a crowded congregation on its knees 
 praying to a huge doll, representing the Blessed Virgin, if such 
 a proceeding had been possible anywhere in the Church Catholic 
 during his lifetime. Accordingly, St. Ambrose, St. Augustine, 
 St. Jerome and St. Gregory the Great, the Four Latin Doctors 
 and most eminent Western teachers of and witnesses to the 
 Catholic B'aith, were not agreed in doctrine with modern Roman 
 Catholics, but do agree with the Church of England. 
 
No. IV. 
 
 WAS THE BRITISH OR ANGLO-SAXON CHURCH 
 ROMAN CATHOLIC? 
 
 HIS is a question which Roman Catholic controver- 
 sialists are asking just now, and answering thus : 
 ‘‘ Of course they were, that is loo evident to be 
 disputed by any honest and fairly read person ; and 
 as all the ancient endowments were given to, and all the ancient 
 churches built for, Roman Catholic purposes, the Anglicans who 
 possess them now are mere usurpers and robbers, so that if 
 right were done, these donations would be reconveyed to the 
 Anglo-Roman body in communion with the Pope/’^ 
 
 There are two leading flaws in this statement, apart from 
 several minor ones, which seriously weaken its force. In a 
 former paper we showed that there is a clearly marked difference 
 between what is Catholic, and so common to all Christendom 
 from the first, and what is only Roman Catholic, and peculiar 
 
 * The Roman Catholic Bishops of England issued in 1826 an “Exposition 
 of Faith and Declaration,” wherein these words occur : “ British Catholics are 
 charged with entertaining a pretended right to the property of the Established 
 Church in England. We consider such a charge to be totally without founda- 
 tion ; we declare that we entertain no pretension to such a claim. We regard 
 all the revenues and temporalities of the Church Establishment as the pro- 
 perty of those on whom they are settled by the laws of the land. We dis- 
 claim any right, title, or pretension with regard to the same.” This language 
 cannot be explained away as meaning only a disclaimer of any right which a 
 secular law court would recognise. It covers the whole ground. 
 
 C 
 
34 
 
 Words for TriUh. 
 
 to the Church of Rome alone. We also pointed out that what 
 is Catholic must belong to all time as well as to all places, so 
 that even a doctrine or custom which at any given date is seen 
 to prevail over all Christendom is not therefore Catholic, unless 
 it can be traced back to the first Christian ages. If we can put 
 our finger on the date when it begins, and show that it was un- 
 known previously, then it is not Catholic. 
 
 So, then, before we are called on to say whether the ancient 
 Church of this country was Roman Catholic, our opponents 
 have to answer the far more serious and difficult question — Was 
 the Church of Rome itself Roman Catholic when St. Gregory 
 the Great sent his missionaries to England ? 
 
 Now, without going into minute details, it may be briefly said 
 that the most obvious and broad marks of distinction between 
 Roman Catholics and Anglicans in the present day are these : — 
 Roman Catholics hold (i) that the Pope is, by Divine charter, 
 sovereign ruler of the whole Church, supreme judge of the faith- 
 ful, bishop of every see, and infallible in deciding matters of 
 faith and morals ; (2) that the Blessed Virgin Mary and other 
 Saints are to be invoked in prayer, and solicited for the bestowal 
 of grace and favours ; (3) that the Blessed Virgin \vas im- 
 maculately conceived; (4) that images and pictures may receive 
 secondary worship and homage, in honour of the personages 
 they represent; (5) that the laity must never partake of the Cup 
 in Holy Communion ; (6) that the souls of departed Christians 
 are tortured in Purgatory; (7) that the way to release them is by 
 means of Indulgences, which can be obtained by the recitation 
 of certain prayers or the performance of certain outward acts, 
 to which a fixed scale of merit is attached, and which can be 
 applied to the profit of any given person, living or deceased. 
 There are many other points of difference, but it will be agreed 
 on all hands that a communion which did not accept or practise 
 any of these seven would certainly not be Roman Catholic, 
 whatever else it might be. 
 
 But that is precisely the case of St. Gregory the Great and the 
 Roman Church in his days. We have his own direct and ex- 
 press testimony on i, 2, 3, 4, and 5 against modern Roman 
 Catholic doctrine; and the indirect evidence of his total silence 
 
IVas the British or A nglo-Saxon Church Roman Catholic? 3 5 
 
 as to 6 and 7, where he must have spoken about them, had he 
 believed them, or even so much as heard of them. Here are the 
 proofs in his own words : — 
 
 I. This title ^ Universal^ was offered during the Council of 
 Chalcedon to the Pontiff of the Apostolic See. . . . But no 
 
 one of my predecessors ever consented to use so profane a title 
 (Ep. V. 43). “ This title (Universal Bishop) is profane, super- 
 
 stitious, haughty, and invented by the first apostate^’ (Ep. VII. 
 27). ‘‘I confidently affirm that whoso calls himself, or desires 
 
 to be called, Universal Priest, in his pride goes before Anti- 
 christ’' (Ep. VIL 33). 
 
 2 and 4. “ In every possible way avoid worshipping images 
 
 . . and let the people humbly prostrate themselves in 
 
 honour of the Almighty and Holy Trinity alone” (Ep. IX. iv. 9). 
 
 3. “ What human being, then, is without sin, save He who 
 was not conceived in sin? Therefore the Ark was finished in 
 one cubit, because the Author and Redeemer of Holy Church 
 is alone without sin ” (Horn, in Ezech. II. iv.). 
 
 5. “ What the Blood of the Lamb means ye have now learnt, 
 not by hearing, but by drinking. And that Blood is put upon 
 both doorposts, when it is not merely swallowed by the bodily 
 mouth, but also with the mouth of the heart” (Homily to the 
 people, in Evang. II. xxii.). 
 
 Plainly, then, St. Gregory the Great was not what is now 
 understood by the term Roman Catholic; and, therefore, we 
 may be sure that the Church of England, founded by his care- 
 fully chosen messengers, was not Roman Catholic either. And, 
 as regards the British Church, which St. Augustine found in pos- 
 session here in the non-Saxon parts of the island, he held two 
 conferences with its Bishops, the end of which was, that after 
 he had called on them to acknowledge his authority, they 
 answered decisively, We will do none of those things which 
 you demand, neither will we have you for our Archbishop ” 
 (Bede, Hist. Eccl. Angl.,” ii. 2). So the old British Church 
 here was not only not modern Roman in its doctrine, but was not 
 Roman even in the sense that St. Augustine and his companions 
 were, that of acknowledging the jurisdiction of the Pope over 
 them. 
 
 C 2 
 
36 
 
 Words for Triith, 
 
 It may be added here that it is sometimes urged that in 
 behaving thus towards the Pope’s legate, the British Bishops 
 were falling away from what more ancient British Bishops had 
 done, because some of them who were at the Council of Sardica 
 in 347, more than two hundred years before St. Augustine’s 
 mission, joined in enacting canons giving a right to the Pope of 
 hearing appeals from all the Churches, and in addressing a letter 
 to the Pope of that day, saying that It is most fit that the 
 priests of the Lord from each province should refer to the Head 
 — that is, to the See of the Apostle Peter.” But the canons in 
 question are almost certainly a Roman forgery, for no trace of 
 them is to be found till an attempt was made by a Pope in 419 
 to palm them off as Nicene, when they were at once rejected as 
 spurious, and could not be found in any of the archives where 
 search was made for them (see above. No. III., pp. 28, 29). 
 And the letter is most probably a forgery too, for it is quite 
 unknown to all the ancient Church historians (Theodoret, 
 Socrates, and Sozomen) who have written about this Council, 
 and record only its Synodical Letter to the Church at large. 
 And, besides, even were this not so, the above clause in the 
 letter has been challenged as a late forgery, detected by its 
 bad Latin; and the learned Roman Catholic Bishop Hefele, 
 who mentions this objection, does not attempt to disprove it, 
 as he would have done were it possible. 
 
 The next flaw in the Roman argument is that it takes for 
 granted that people have no right to put things straight which 
 have once gone wrong. No doubt the mediaeval Church of 
 England was in full communion with the Pope of Rome, and 
 acknowledged him as the principal Bishop in the world ; and it 
 is true that little by little Roman abuses and corruptions made 
 their way into this country; but it is also true that many bad 
 civil laws and customs once prevailed in this country, which have 
 been wisely repealed and done away with. Why should it be 
 impossible or sinful to correct things in open conflict with the 
 revealed will of God? It is very much more certain that it is 
 sinful to worship images or to deprive the lay folk of the cup in 
 Holy Communion, than it is that St. Peter was master over the 
 other Apostles, or that the Pope is heir of St. Peter. And if 
 
PVas the British or Anglo-Saxon Church Roman Catholic f 37 
 
 admitting the infallible and autocratic power of the Popes as a 
 result of such heirship compels us also to admit the lawfulness 
 of image-worship and of half-communion (as is said to be the 
 case), it simply leads us into heresy and rebellion against God. 
 
 The present Church of England holds the same doctrine as 
 St. Gregory the Great and the Roman Church in his days did, 
 and therefore more truly represents the Church of St. Augustine 
 than the Anglo-Roman body, which has got a new creed that St. 
 Gregory never heard of, and would have condemned if he had 
 heard of it, besides being unlike the old English Church in 
 several other ways. 
 
 And there is a further consideration of no slight importance : 
 that even in respect of several particulars wherein the mediaeval 
 Church of England for the most part agreed with the modern 
 Church of Rome, and so far differed from the Church of Eng- 
 land to-day, there was no hard-and-fast rule laid down, since 
 they were rather floating ‘‘ pious opinions,” not positively bind- 
 ing, than formal dogmas imposed by authority. But the Council 
 of Trent changed all that, and hardened into positive law much 
 which was previously open and indeterminate, thereby laying a 
 heavy burden on the modern Roman Catholic’s conscience from 
 which his forefathers were free. 
 
 Even in the days when England was in communion with 
 Rome, the Pope could not do as he pleased here, but was often 
 resisted, not by the kings only, but by the Bishops also. Thus, 
 at the Synod of Easterfield, in 702, Brihtwald, Archbishop of 
 Canterbury, with other prelates, deposed Wilfrid of York from 
 the episcopal dignity, mainly on the ground that he had chosen 
 to appeal to the Pope, instead of being content to abide by the 
 decision of the English episcopate. And Wilfrid himself, in his 
 speech on this occasion, charged them with having opposed the 
 Pope for two-and-twenty years. Pope Paschal II. wrote in 
 1 1 14 complaining that the English Church showed small 
 reverence for the Roman See, sent no appeals to it, and did 
 not ask its advice. And a legate he tried to send to England 
 in 1 1 15 was stopped by means of the Archbishop of Canter- 
 bury, and not allowed to come. Archbishop Larifranc was 
 commanded by Pope Gregory VIE to present himself at Rome, 
 
38 
 
 Words for Truth. 
 
 under penalty of suspension from his office if he did not arrive 
 within four months. He paid no attention to the order, and 
 was not suspended. Archbishop Langton, who led the move- 
 ment against King John which extorted Magna Charta, refused 
 in 1216 to comply with the order of Pope Innocent III. to 
 excommunicate the barons, and all the other English Bishops 
 supported him save two, one of whom was a foreigner and the 
 other a dunce. And the same Archbishop ten years later refused 
 to obey the Pope’s orders, sent by a legate, to make over to 
 him in perpetuity two stalls in every Cathedral, and two monks’ 
 portions in every monastery. Archbishop St. Edmund of Canter- 
 bury, a man of gentle and peaceful temper, went into exile in 
 1240 rather than obey the commands of another Pope, also to 
 plunder the Church for the Pope’s advantage. Bishop Grosse- 
 teste of Lincoln in I1247 refused to allow a collection to be 
 made in his diocese for the Pope, though the Papal mandate 
 for the purpose had been sanctioned by the King. Somewhat 
 later he refused to comply with another Papal mandate, 
 appointing the Pope’s nephew, a young man not in Holy 
 Orders, to a canonry in Lincoln Cathedral, and he wrote to 
 the Papal Commissioners saying that the very respect and 
 obedience he owed to the Apostolic See made it his duty to 
 oppose so wicked a job, which was akin to the deeds of 
 Lucifer and Antichrist. Archbishop Chichele, when censured 
 by Pope Martin V. (about 1420) for not disregarding the 
 English laws which prevented the Pope from appointing to 
 English benefices, told the Pope that he himself was the 
 only Bishop in England who did pay any attention to orders 
 from Rome; and when Martin V., by way of reply, took 
 away from him his rank of ex-officio legate (that is, legate 
 in right of his archbishopric, and without need of any 
 other special appointment to the post), and bestowed that 
 title on another Bishop, proceeding further to excommunicate 
 all the other prelates and to threaten an interdict, his Bulls 
 were stopped in 1427 by the Government, and the Arch- 
 bishop appealed at once to a General Council, while the 
 new legate was never suffered to act in that character. These 
 are merely a few examples to show how very unlike the pre-Re- 
 
PVas the British or Anglo-Saxon Church Roman Catholic^ 39 
 
 formation Church of England was to the present Anglo-Roman 
 communion in its attitude towards the Pope. It did not ac- 
 count him either absolute or infallible, and opposed him stoutly 
 whenever it thought him in the wrong. On the other hand, the 
 Church of England now has no quarrel with him further than 
 this same limit. If he would only come back to the doctrine 
 and practice of Pope St. Gregory the Great, she would freely 
 give him the honour and precedence that were given to St. 
 Gregory by the x\nglo-Saxon Church. For the Church of England 
 has stated her view on this subject plainly in Canon XXX. thus : — 
 
 ‘^So far was it from the purpose of the Church of England 
 to forsake and reject the Churches of Italy, France, Spain, 
 Germany, or any such like Churches, in all things which they 
 held and practised, that, as the Apology of the Church of Eng- 
 land confesseth, it doth with reverence retain those ceremonies 
 which do neither endamage the Church of God, nor olfend the 
 minds of sober men; and only departed from them in those 
 particular points wherein they were fallen both from themselves 
 in their ancient integrity, and from the Apostolical Churches 
 which were their first founders.” 
 
 Not one ancient endowment now held by the Church of 
 England, not one building for her worship, was conveyed to her 
 upon any condition or understanding, express or implied, that she 
 should be subject to the authority of the Pope, and should forfeit 
 it otherwise.^ They were all given for ecclesiastical uses in each 
 place for the benefit of the Church of England, not of the 
 Church of Rome in England ; and the right of the Church of 
 England to them is in no way, legally or morally, weakened by 
 her having remedied various abuses which had crept into her 
 system, and having returned to the faith of her first evangelisers. 
 Rather, as she is thus more truly a Church, more truly Catholic, by 
 complying more nearly with the Divine will, she is better entitled 
 to retain such possessions now than when she was less Catholic 
 and more Roman. 
 
 ^ There are some Anglo-Saxon charters which do make submission to the 
 Church of Rome a condition of the gifts conveyed. But these are grants to 
 monasteries, all of which were alienated from the Church under Henry VIII., 
 and a Papal Bull in Queen Mary’s reign confirmed the new holders in pos- 
 session of them. None of them are held by the Church now. 
 
No. V. 
 
 WHAT THE REFORMATION DID INJAND FOR 
 ENGLAND. 
 
 T is the policy of Roman controversialists, when 
 arguing against the Church of England, to lay great 
 stress on the violence which marked various pro- 
 ceedings during the Reformation era, the departure 
 from former tenets and usages, the destruction of buildings 
 devoted to religious purposes, the disappearance of sundry 
 picturesque observances and customs, the persecutions inflicted 
 by the State on those who refused to conform to the changed 
 condition of things. And the conclusion they draw from all 
 these particulars is that the old Church was violently destroyed, 
 a mere new sect intruded by the brute force of the civil power 
 into its place, and a virtual apostasy from the Catholic faith 
 committed by the nation through its consent thereto. And, of 
 course, there is no difficulty whatever in showing that the exist- 
 ing Church of England does not maintain certain peculiarities of 
 teaching and worship which prevailed here before the Reforma- 
 tion, and still prevail amongst Roman Catholics ; while the goal 
 at which the objectors desire to arrive by this kind of argument 
 is that the Anglo-Roman body here is the true Church of the 
 country, and consequently has alone the moral right to the 
 churches, endowments, titles, and status which the Established 
 Church enjoys by mere human law.* 
 
 No sensible person at this time of day would seriously under- 
 take to defend everything that was said and done during such a 
 
 '' On this see the Declaration of 1826, cited above, No. IV., p. 33. 
 
W/iat the Reformatio 7 i did in mid for England. 41 
 
 time of upheaval and excitement as the Reformation, when even 
 good men on both sides found it almost impossible so much as 
 to understand the attitude of their opponents. But there is one 
 broad issue which the controversialists we are speaking about 
 fail to take into their reckoning — that, after all, God is the Ruler 
 of the world, and the Disposer of events. If the pre-Reformation 
 Church was what we are constantly told it actually was, much 
 purer and sounder in doctrine and practice than the modern 
 Church of England, why did He suffer such a change to come 
 about ? It does not matter for this immediate question whether 
 the change was good or bad in itself, a blessing or a punishment; 
 the point to consider is, Why was it permitted at all? We cannot 
 suppose God to have acted without reasons whose force we 
 should have to admit did we know them ; and of this much we 
 may be sure, that He must have intended either to bless or to 
 chastise, or else to mingle blessing and chastisement together, in 
 allowing the Reformation to come about. He either changed 
 the then existing state of things religious for a better one, to the 
 spiritual gain of the nation, or He punished us for our sins by 
 taking from us blessings which we had despised or misused. 
 Either way, the Reformation came by His permission, and must 
 have been needed for some wise purpose. If it was, on the 
 whole, a blessing, then the entire Roman case fails ; if, contrari- 
 wise, it was a chastisement only, then the pre-Reformation 
 Church must have been guilty of sins which drew that chastise- 
 ment down, just as was the case with the Jewish Church when it 
 was destroyed the first time by the Babylonians, and a second 
 time by the Romans. We can hardly imagine that if it was doing 
 God’s work in God^s way He would have so interfered. We are 
 bound therefore to look carefully into its condition, and to find 
 what grounds of blame could have existed ; and we are also 
 bound to see what the practical result of the change has been, by 
 comparing the moral, social, and religious condition of England 
 now with that of those countries which have continued Roman 
 Catholic. If we find that the teaching and practice of the 
 mediaeval English Church were more in conformity with God’s 
 will, as revealed in His Scriptures and observed by the 
 Saints of His early Church, than those of the present Church of 
 England are ; or if we find that the spiritual condition of the 
 
42 
 
 Words for Truth. 
 
 Roman Catholic nations, or of the Roman Catholic part of our 
 own people, is plainly better and happier than our own, then we 
 must sorrowfully confess that we have been in the wrong, and 
 must make such amends as we can by repentance and change of 
 conduct. 
 
 But when we look into these questions, we find nothing to 
 warrant any such conclusion as that which Roman controver- 
 sialists would have us draw. On such broad issues as clerical 
 immorality and neglect ; popular ignorance of Holy Writ ; the 
 obscuring of the meaning of public worship by conducting it in an 
 unknown tongue ; the setting up a whole host of lesser objects 
 of worship in addition to, and, for the most part, to the deprecia- 
 tion of, God's due homage ; the mutilation of Christ’s institution 
 of the Holy Eucharist by the withdrawal of, the Cup from the 
 laity f the preference given to the rich in the matter of prayers 
 offered for the repose of their souls ; the burden laid upon the 
 people by numerous rites and observances for each of which a 
 tax was imposed, and other such like matters contrary to Scrip- 
 ture and unknown to the Saints of early days — the main matters 
 which attracted the attention of the Reformers — it is enough to 
 say that no sound defence has ever yet been set up for them, and 
 that it was not merely lawful, but our bounden duty, to amend 
 them. No doubt, in the course of the amendment, carried out by 
 human agents with their full share of human weakness and error, 
 many mistakes were made, and some good and beautiful things 
 were unwisely cast away for a time, which in these happier days 
 we see restored, and that without the misuse, which is the probable 
 reason why we were forced to lose them for a while ; but that the 
 change was in the main and in its results healthy and profitable, 
 that it was a return to the faith and practice of the ancient and 
 undivided Catholic Church in most of its details, is a simple 
 historical fact. There are things which might have been more 
 wisely ordered, in particular there was too little provision for the 
 
 * This was effected, not by direct enactment excluding the laity as such 
 from communion in the chalice, but by limiting its reception to the celebrant 
 only, even other priests, if then communicating, being given communion in 
 but one kind. But all priests can receive the chalice by becoming celebrants 
 in their turn, whereas no means exist in the Roman Church whereby a laic 
 can obtain it. 
 
What the Reformation did in and for Eiigland. 43 
 
 emotional side of religion made, and there was no very satisfactory- 
 discipline provided ; uut we can say truly now what no Roman 
 Catholic who holds the new Creed of Pope Pius IV. can truly say, 
 that we are one in doctrine with St. Athanasius and St. Chrysos- 
 tom, with St. Augustine and St. Jerome, with St. Ambrose and 
 St Gregory the Great, and other great lights of ancient Christen- 
 dom. We may compare what was done at the Reformation to 
 the act of the owner of a large and beautiful old castle or mansion, 
 noticeable for its stately aspect and artistic ornament, but with 
 the defects of old age visible in two ways — faults of original con- 
 struction, or faults of wear and tear — making it less healthy and 
 less habitable. For example, when it was built, nothing was 
 known about sanitary science, and it had no drains whatever ; 
 glass was dear, and the value of light and air as conducive to 
 health not thought of, and so the windows were made small and 
 the rooms dark and gloomy; besides which, the roof has since 
 fallen into disrepair and the walls bulge dangerously in parts. 
 The owner sets himself to put all this to rights ; but, while he 
 takes all proper precautions for the sanitary improvement of his 
 dvvelling, he has not got at all so keen a sense of art and beauty 
 as he has of health and comfort, and at the same time that the 
 drainage is thoroughly rectified, the blessed sunlight let into the 
 dark rooms, to the increase of bodily and mental well-being for 
 their inmates, and the roof made weather-tight, he has made 
 other changes which are less happy, as diminishing the beauty and 
 picturesqueness of his house ; perhaps putting in an ugly square 
 window in place of a graceful arched one, or papering over a fine 
 carved oak wainscot with a cheap and common wall-hanging. 
 But it is his own house, and he has a right to deal with it as he 
 pleases, so long as he does no man wrong thereby. It does not 
 cease to be the same dwelling, nor he to be its lawful owner, 
 because he has made these alterations; and it would be a very 
 poor argument if a cousin of his, who did not see any use in 
 drains, light, or ventilation, and who had kept up his own neigh- 
 bouring mansion in the old unhealthy fashion, -were to say: '‘You 
 have fallen away from all the traditions of our family ; our fore- 
 fathers, who first built, and afterwards added on to, this old 
 house, knew better than you do, and they never intended to have 
 such things done as you have been doing. You have no moral 
 
44 
 
 Words for Truth. 
 
 right to possess it any longer, and you should give it up to me, 
 who have not taken up with any new-fangled ways ; and, when I 
 get possession, I shall pull up your drain-pipes, replace the 
 pretty old lozenge-paned casements, and get rid of your staring 
 sheets of plate-glass. The owner might very fairly retort: ‘‘You 
 fail to distinguish between what is essential and what is super- 
 fluous, or even hurtful. A house is meant to be lived in, not 
 looked at from the outside, and I want to live a healthy life in 
 my house — not to die there of typhoid fever before my time. I 
 grant that your house may be prettier to look at than mine, but 
 you are never without sickness within it, whereas I can show 
 a much cleaner bill of health.'' 
 
 And this reply exactly meets the second part of the inquiry we 
 are making. For the case of the Church of England as against 
 the Church of Rome is that England is at this moment, after 
 three hundred and fifty years of Reformation, in a far healthier 
 moral and religious condition than any Roman Catholic country 
 in the world. We have plenty of faults and sins to be ashamed 
 of and to amend, we have no title to play the Pharisee, but it is 
 the plain fact that infidelity in England is altogether unlike in 
 extent and in virulence to what it is in France, in Spain, and in 
 Italy, where Roman Catholicism has had a practical monopoly 
 for centuries past. It was after the whole educational system of 
 France had been for more than a hundred years in the hands 
 of the Jesuits, who were able and accomplished teachers, that 
 the French nation made a public profession of atheism in 1793, 
 and the Christian religion was put under ban for several years, 
 a disaster never yet repaired. And at the last census in t88i 
 seven millions and a half of Frenchmen (or more than a fifth 
 of the whole nation) returned themselves as of no religion.* 
 Of Spain, once the leading power in Europe, a Spaniard has 
 said that the clergy and the Inquisition have made that country 
 “the Turkey of the West;" and in Italy the gulf between the 
 
 * The exact figures, as given in the Statesman's Year-Book for 1885, page 
 65, are as follow : “ The population of France, at the census of December, 
 1881, consisted of 29,201,703 Roman Catholics, being 78*50 per cent, of the 
 total population; of 692,800 Protestants, or i*8 of the population, as com- 
 pared with 584,757 in 1872 ; of 53,436 Jews, and 7,684,906 persons who 
 ‘declined to make any profession of religious belief.’ This was the first 
 
IV/mt the Reformation did in and for Eriglaftd. 45 
 
 Church and the nation gapes widely with none to bridge it. 
 Moreover, in all these countries a foully immoral literature 
 is current and popular; and political disturbances, aiming 
 at social anarchy, are of incessant occurrence, either in open 
 manifestation or secret plots. It is not we who say so, to make 
 a case for our own side ; the witness who has testified most 
 plainly for us is no other than Cardinal Manning himself, who 
 confessed, in an article on ‘‘The Church and Modern Society,’’ 
 in the Noi'th American Review of February, 1880, that the most 
 Christian civil society now extant is that of non-Papal England, 
 contrasting with that of France, Italy, and other Roman Catholic 
 countries. Here are some words from a sermon of his, quoted 
 in the Times of July 17, 1884, p. 10, col. 5. “ What made 
 
 England ? He did not ask what made it a Christian land, 
 but what made England great ? It was not warfare, nor 
 conquest, nor politics, nor legislation. It was that one faith 
 and that 07 ie love of God and our iieighbour which made a united 
 England. The same might also be said of English freedom 
 and liberty.” And the same kind of statement is made with equal 
 clearness by Mr. St. George Mivart, an eminent Roman Catholic 
 scientist, in a paper on the “Conversion of England,” in the 
 Dicblin Review of July, 1884. On the other hand, there is one 
 exception to the reign of morals and order in the United King- 
 dom, and that is Roman Catholic Ireland, where a conspiracy to 
 promote assassination, public plunder, the mutilation of living 
 animals, and the cruel persecution of innocent persons, is either 
 actively encouraged by the Roman Catholic clergy or silently 
 acquiesced in, with rare exceptions. And on this the late P. J. 
 Smyth, a prominent Roman Catholic and Nationalist M.P., said 
 in a paper on the “Priest in Politics” (Dublin: M’Gee, 1885), 
 which he wrote on his death-bed, and desired his wife to publish — 
 “ The system is one, though multiform in character ; and so 
 regarded it is a repudiation of the Decalogue, an outrage on the 
 
 census at which ‘ non-professants ’ were registered as such. On former 
 occasions it had been customary to class all who had refused to state what 
 their religion was, or who denied having any religion, as Roman Catholics. 
 The number of persons set down as belonging to ‘various creeds’ was 33,042.” 
 As the total population of France in 1881 was 37,672,048, the infidels were a 
 good deal more than a fifth. 
 
46 
 
 Words for TriUJi. 
 
 fundamental principles of morality, and a negation of the dogmas 
 of Christianity. . . . One of the most eminent Catholic 
 
 divines in Europe, contemplating the spectacle which Ireland 
 presented lately, is reported — and I believe correctly — to have 
 said that the Catholic Church had failed as a moral teacher in 
 Ireland/’ 
 
 We may add that the Roman Catholic Church has failed 
 scandalously as a religious and moral teacher everywhere in this 
 century, for, besides the wide spread of rabid atheism in all 
 Roman Catholic lands, the criminal statistics of every country 
 where there is a mixed population of Roman Catholics and 
 non-Romans (as in the United Kingdom, Australia, Canada, 
 the United States, Prussia, and Holland) shew a disproportionately 
 large ratio of Roman Catholic offenders, although all the mere 
 heathen outcasts with no religious belief of any kind are reckoned 
 on the other side. And as Christ has said : “ If any man will 
 do His [the Father’s] will, he shall know of the doctrine whether 
 it be of God” (St. John vii. 17), telling us thereby that sound 
 doctrine and holy living are parts of the same whole, we may 
 fairly infer that this universal failure in wholesome results from 
 Roman teaching is because the doctrine it propounds is not pure 
 Christianity, “ By their fruits ye shall know them ” (St. Matthew 
 vii. 20). What we have gained as a nation by the breach with 
 Rome, and by refusal to ally ourselves with the sects, is that 
 here only has the old belief of historical Christendom been 
 maintained, the old Church system kept up, with no division 
 of the country between two religious factions, no gulf between 
 the clergy and laity, no divorce and hostility between art 
 and literature on one side and religion on the other, no com- 
 pulsion upon the ordinary layman to choose between blindly 
 childish credulity and equally blindly childish scepticism, but 
 with the unequalled musical diction of the English Bible familiar 
 to high and low, and the stately periods of the Book of Common 
 Prayer providing a reasonable and intelligible worship, capable of 
 suiting the needs of educated thinkers and of devout emotional 
 believers alike. That has been the result, on a survey of the 
 whole question, and we do not seem to have the worst of the 
 bargain. 
 
No. VI. 
 
 WAS ST. PETER EVER BISHOP OF ROME? 
 
 T is well known that the Roman Catholic Church rests 
 its claim to supremacy over all Christians upon the 
 alleged inheritance of St. Peter’s privilege and 
 primacy by the Popes of Rome, on the ground that 
 St. Peter, by finally settling in Rome and dying there as its 
 Bishop, constituted his successors in the See his heirs, not only 
 to his local authority in Rome itself, but to his universal jurisdic- 
 tion over the whole Church, bestowed upon him by Christ 
 Plimself, over and above the apostolic commission which was 
 common to the rest of the Twelve. It is needless to do more 
 than briefly point out that no trace of any such exceptional com- 
 mission to St. Peter as that of ruling the entire Church is 
 mentioned in Scripture directly, or is indirectly to be discovered 
 there by the fact of actual exercise ; and that even if this were 
 otherwise, the very fact of such an exceptional authority being 
 conferred on any one person would make the privilege a 
 “ personal ” as distinguished from an “ official ” one, and for 
 that reason not transmissible by its holder, but dying with him, 
 and incapable of being exercised by any other person without 
 a fresh grant from the original grantor. This is the rule strictly 
 laid down by Roman Catholic ecclesiastical law in all cases of 
 claim by privilege : that a personal privilege does not admit of 
 the introduction of any name or names except such as explicitly 
 occur in the deed of grant ; that such a privilege dies with 
 the decease of the person or persons thus expressly named ; 
 and that no power of delegation or transmission can exist in 
 the case of privilege, unless such additional power is expressly 
 
48 
 
 Words for Truth. 
 
 given in and by the deed of grant. And yet again, if this were 
 not so, it would at least be necessary that any other person 
 claiming to exercise the privilege in right of any sub-grant or 
 delegation from the original holder should be able to produce 
 evidence that such sub-grant had really been made, and that in 
 such a public and binding manner as to disable objection. 
 
 Not so much as one of these conditions is satisfied in the case 
 of the Roman claim of supremacy. For besides the absence of 
 any proof in Scripture that St. Peter actually did exercise autho- 
 ritative jurisdiction over the other Apostles and the whole 
 Church, there is further to be noted that not one syllable occurs 
 in the three texts alleged to embody the Petrine Privilege (St. 
 Matt. xvi. i8, 19 ; St. Luke xxii. 31, 32 ; St. John xxi. 15, 16, 17) 
 which empowers St. Peter to convey the privilege, whatever be 
 its nature, to any other person. And if this plain fact be set 
 aside, there remains the additional difficulty that not one scrap 
 of evidence is producible that he ever did confer and transmit 
 his peculiar privilege and authority. No hint of the sort is 
 discoverable for centuries after his death, and then it begins in 
 the most suspicious quarter, the assertion of Popes in their own 
 interest, instead of coming from any external and independent 
 source. 
 
 Added to all these flaws in the Roman claim, there comes up 
 the crucial question. Is it true, as a matter of historical fact, that 
 St. Peter ever was Bishop of Rome at all ? If it be true, there 
 must be something to shew for it — something that would be 
 accepted nowadays in a court of justice as proof in any claim of 
 heirship. But here comes in a difficulty. Very few people who 
 have not been specially trained seem to understand what is 
 evidence in proof of anything, and what must be rejected by a 
 judge as having nothing to do with the matter. But it may 
 briefly be said that mere hearsay, second and third hand, is no 
 evidence at all, and that evidence dating long after the time 
 concerned is, if not to be entirely rejected, yet weaker and 
 weaker as the time is longer, and is less to be relied on. If 
 people who lived at the time when some event is said to have 
 taken place never say anything about it, and we hear of it first a 
 hundred years or so later, we do not pay much heed to it ; and 
 
Was Sit. Peter ever Bishop of Rome? 49 
 
 the only thing that would make us pay heed to it is the discovery 
 of some unknown or forgotten papers written by people who did 
 live at the time, and had opportunities for getting information, 
 and who thus confirm the later statements for us. 
 
 Now let us see how the facts stand as to the evidence for St. 
 Peter having ever been Bishop of Rome. If it is really such 
 an enormously important fact in the history of Christianity, if 
 the salvation of hundreds of millions is bound up with it, if the 
 vast temporal and spiritual powers claimed and exercised by the 
 Popes depend upon it, we are fairly entitled to expect that the 
 proof of it will be early, clear and abundant. Is this so? Not 
 in the least. 
 
 First, if we search the New Testament, we find Rome men- 
 tioned by name just nine times,* of which seven have to do with 
 St. Paul and one with his friends Aquila and Priscilla ; while the 
 only one that has any connexion with St. Peter is the mention 
 of strangers of Rome ” amongst his hearers on the day of 
 Pentecost. 
 
 “ No,’" a Roman Catholic disputant replies, there is that 
 other text of St. Peter’s own penning : ‘ The Church that is in 
 Babylon, elected together with you, saluteth you’ (i Peter v. 13), 
 and Babylon means Rome, as has been held from the time of 
 St. Papias, a contemporary of the Apostles.” But at any rate 
 St. Peter does not say Rome, but Babylon, and the rest of the 
 Epistle wherein the word occurs is written in a plain, straight- 
 forward style, without any similar figures of speech, so that it 
 is much more natural to suppose that he meant just what he 
 said, for Babylon was in his time still inhabited, and that largely 
 by Jews, who were strong enough to defeat a powerful band of 
 robbers that infested the neighbourhood, about twenty years 
 before St. Peter wrote the Epistle somewhere about a.d. 63 
 (Josephus, Antiquities,” xviii. 9). Next, it is a mistake to 
 suppose that the very early testimony of Papias to the guess 
 that Babylon means Rome does really exist, for this notion has 
 arisen from a mistake as to the meaning of a passage in the 
 ancient Church historian Eusebius. Here one writer after an- 
 
 ^ Acts ii. 10; xviii. 2 ; xix. 2i ; xxiii. ii ; xxviii. 14, 16 ; Romans i. 7, 15 ; 
 2 Tm. i. 17. 
 
 D 
 
so 
 
 Words for Truth. 
 
 other has copied the blunder, without verifying the original 
 passage, which proves to consist of two separate clauses., the 
 first of which gives Clement of Alexandria and Papias as au- 
 thorities for the tradition that St. Peter gave his sanction and 
 approval to St. Markus Gospel, and for that point only ; while the 
 second clause, which is the identification of Rome and Babylon on 
 the ground of the text already cited, is placed after the reference to 
 these two authors, as an independent statement, and not as war- 
 ranted by them, but merely as a current opinion in Eusebius’s own 
 day. Put the case, however, that the guess is right, and there 
 remains the difficulty that there is nothing said about St. Peter’s 
 personal relation to this Babylon or Rome, certainly not that he 
 was Bishop there, any more than we take for granted that St. 
 Paul must have been Bishop of the Churches of Asia,” whose 
 salutation he sends to the Corinthians (i Cor. xvi. 19), which 
 no one has hitherto asserted. And St. Paubs Epistle to the 
 Romans (written in a.d. 58) obviously takes for granted that no 
 Apostle had yet reached them (Rom. xv. 20), while his silence 
 about St. Peter in his other Epistles, written from Rome itself 
 as late as a.d. 63 or 65, shews that St. Peter had not arrived 
 there even then. When we come to the age next to that of the 
 Apostles, we are met by the silence on the point at issue in the 
 letter of St. Clement, Pope of Rome, to the Corinthians, written 
 in the last quarter of the first century. Though he twice refers 
 to St. Peter, on neither occasion does he say a word to connect 
 him with Rome, while this is exactly what would be the most 
 natural thing for him to do in the circumstances if the fact were 
 so, since it is hardly credible that he should fail to appeal to 
 the teaching of the Apostle as still vesting in some degree in 
 the Church he had ruled. And the like silence is found in the 
 Epistle of St. Ignatius to the Romans, written in the first quarter 
 of the second century, when he was actually on his road to 
 martyrdom at Rome itself. He says, indeed, to the Romans, I 
 do not issue commands to you, as did Peter and Paul,” but (apart 
 from the obvious remark that commands ” may be sent by letter, 
 and do not imply utterance by word of mouth only) he does not 
 say a word implying that he was hoping to fulfil his own course in 
 the same place where St. Peter had done so, and in a like fashion ; 
 and yet it is most difficult to suppose him to have omitted such a 
 
Was St. Peter ever Bishop of Rome? 
 
 SI 
 
 reference, if the fact of St. Peter’s episcopate and martyrdom at 
 Rome had been known to him. The earliest mention of St. Peter 
 in connexion with Rome is in a fragment of an Epistle to the 
 Romans from St. Dionysius of Corinth (about 171), wherein he 
 says that St. Peter and St. Paul both went to Corinth as well as to 
 Rome, and taught us in the same way as they taught you when 
 they went to Italy But this makes against St. Peter’s episco- 
 pate at Rome, since it is not pretended that he or St. Paul was 
 ever Bishop of Corinth, and there is a clear line of difference 
 between the teaching attitude of a passing missionary and that 
 of the resident Bishop of a Church. They may teach the same 
 things, but they do not teach in the same way, any more than an 
 occasional lecturer teaches in the same way as the head-master 
 of a school. Next after this comes the evidence of St. Irenseus, 
 Bishop of Lyons, about a.d. 190, and that is decisive against 
 St. Peter’s episcopate at Rome. For he says that St. Peter and 
 St. Paul preached at Rome, and laid the foundations of the 
 Church there, and after doing so committed into the hands of 
 Linus the office of the episcopate.” The particular Greek word 
 here used cannot be made to mean handed on” or ‘ffiianded 
 down,” as if the phrase meant that Linus succeeded either or both 
 of them after they died, but must mean that they, in their life- 
 time, appointed him to the office ; which, consequently, cannot 
 have been held by St. Peter when he died. There are altogether 
 fifteen authors in the Christian literature of the three earliest 
 centuries, down to the Council of Nice in 325, who say some- 
 thing in twenty-two passages bearing on St. Peter’s connexion 
 with Rome, five of which have been already cited. Out of 
 the remaining sixteen, seven speak only to the fact of St. Peter 
 having been martyred at Rome, and do not say anything of 
 his relation to the local Church ; three relate the legend of 
 his encounter with Simon Magus there, and have to be struck 
 out, because it has been known for the last fifty years by the 
 discovery of a MS. in the Vatican Library in 1837, that all the 
 earlier accounts of St. Peter^s conflict with Simon Magus 
 placed the scene of it in some Eastern city, and thus that the 
 substitution of Rome was a later adaptation of the story ; 
 three speak of St. Peter ordaining Clement, not Linus, as first 
 Bishop of Rome (thus contradicting the lineal order of their 
 D 2 
 
52 
 
 Words for Truth. 
 
 names now accepted by the Roman Chui*ch) ; one (in St. 
 Cyprian) mentions the Roman See as ^^the place of Fabian, that 
 is, the place of Peter two more (also in St. Cyprian) call it 
 ‘‘ the Chair of Peter'’ ; and the last (in St. Firmilian) speaks of 
 Pope Stephen I. as claiming the succession of Peter. Further, 
 only one of the three passages which speak of St. Peter's con- 
 secrating Clement as Bishop of Rome, is expressed in terms which 
 seem to denote that St. Peter had himself been Bishop of Rome 
 up till then, but, knowing his martyrdom to be near at hand, 
 resigned in favour of Clement, appointing him as his successor 
 in the See ; whereas the other two passages make Clement the 
 first Roman Bishop. The five last-named passages are thus the 
 only discoverable quotations down to the fourth century which 
 in any way suggest that St. Peter was Bishop of Rome. But 
 three out of the four are in St. Cyprian, a writer who lived 
 nearly 200 years after the time we are concerned with, and who 
 was never at Rome, so as to have examined the Church archives 
 there, and a fourth is in his contemporary, St. Firmilian; while it 
 is not disputed that the story of St. Peter’s episcopate at Rome 
 had sprung up somewhat earlier, and was then gaining ground. 
 And the first of the three passages in St. Cyprian is rejected by 
 Rigalt and Fell, two editors of his works, as the marginal gloss of 
 a scribe which has crept somehow into the text ; while the state- 
 ment by St. Firmilian that Pope Stephen claimed to be St. Peter's 
 successor in his chair is evidence only that the claim was made, 
 not that it was a just claim, and capable of proof. The 
 remaining passage comes from the Clementine Homilies, a 
 work which was condemned as a heretical forgery by Pope 
 Gelasius I. in a council at Rome in a.d. 494 (chiefly because 
 of its bitterness against St. Paul), so that this, too, disappears, 
 and there is nothing left in the whole of the Christian literature 
 of the first 300 years, except two words of St. Cyprian (^‘' Petri 
 Cathedram," i.e.^ the Chair of Peter '’)^" twice applied to the 
 
 * Even those two words lie under the gravest suspicion as to their genuine- 
 ness where they occur in a treatise of St. Cyprian’s on the Unity of the Church, 
 into which several spurious clauses, now detected and expunged, were foisted 
 to make a case for the Papal claims. And this clause is most probably one of 
 the series, for they are all of a similar kind. The best which can be said for it 
 
Was S^. Peter ever Bishop of Rome ? 53 
 
 See of Rome, and the claim of his contemporary Pope Stephen I., 
 two hundred years after St. PetePs time, to bolster up the 
 legend of St. Peter’s episcopate at Rome. The story that 
 he was martyred at Rome may probably be true, less 
 because there is any strong and convincing evidence for 
 it, than because no rival claim is known to have been set up 
 for any other place ; but we are entitled to say that he can 
 never have been Bishop of Rome, or the ancient Church 
 would have known it, and told us of it. It is to be noted, 
 further, that not one of all the twenty-two references to St. Peter 
 is a first-hand statement by any one who personally attests his 
 presence at Rome. We get plenty of later assertions on the 
 subject, no doubt, growing fuller and more precise as the distance 
 from St. Peter’s own day increases ; but not one of these new 
 witnesses professes to have found any older documents to con- 
 firm his story, and therefore we are bound by the simplest laws 
 of evidence to reject it as a mere invention of later tim*es, most 
 probably due to this circumstance, that the original planters of 
 Christianity in Rome must necessarily have been those Roman 
 hearers of St. Peter on the day of Pentecost who preached his 
 new doctrine there on their return, and who would thus naturally 
 look up to him as the true founder of the Church there, though 
 we can see plainly from St. Paul’s language that it was not yet 
 fully organised when he wrote the Epistle to the Romans, but 
 needed the visit of the Apostle of the Gentiles to set all things in 
 order. 
 
 If we can imagine any analogous claim made by any one in 
 the present day, to be the lawful holder of some great office, on 
 the ground of hereditary descent from its original tenant, but 
 unable to produce evidence within two centuries of that person’s 
 lifetime that he had in fact held the office in question, it is 
 impossible to doubt the legal result. The claimant would be 
 non-suited, and the claim dismissed as incapable of being 
 sustained. 
 
 is that it is not quite certainly spurious. And it does not help the argument 
 in the passage where it occurs, being dragged in quite irrelevantly to the 
 point at issue, which is not the rank of the Roman See, but the claims of 
 rival Popes, each alleging it as his See. The other occurrence of the words, in 
 an Epistle (Iv.) to Pope Cornelius, has not been hitherto challenged. 
 
No. VIL 
 
 PAPAL AUTHORITY IN FACT AND IN FICTION. 
 
 N a sermon preached by Cardinal Manning on Sunday, 
 July 3, 1887, being within the octave of the festival 
 of SS. Peter and Paul, from the text St. John xxi. 17, 
 Feed My sheep,” the preacher took occasion to set 
 forward the Ultramontane explanation of that text, as well as of 
 the other two commonly adduced in support of the Papal claims, 
 St. Matthew xvi. 18, Thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will 
 build My Church,” and St. Luke xxii. 32, ‘‘I have prayed for 
 thee, that thy faith fail not, and when thou art converted, 
 strengthen thy brethren.” 
 
 The preacher points out that, the Fathers of the Church 
 have noted that when our Lord spoke these words, many other 
 of the Apostles were present, but He did not address these words 
 to them. In the presence of all He addressed them to St. Peter 
 alone. That was a commission not given indiscriminately to all, 
 but specially and personally to Peter.” And then, after citing 
 those powers and functions entrusted to all the Apostles alike, it 
 is urged that to St. Peter singly were given prerogatives making 
 him Prince of the Apostles, not in order only, but in authority, 
 and Vicar of his Divine Master, “ that is to say, that all the 
 power and office that was communicable from his Lord to him 
 who should stand in His place as the Head and Centre of the 
 Apostles, was communicated to Peter, and to him was given the 
 undivided pastoral care of the whole flock upon earth.” 
 
 Note, then that this whole section of the sermon directly 
 
Papal A titliority in Fact and in Fiction. 5 5 
 
 implies, though it falls short of explicitly stating, that the inter- 
 pretation just given is that of the Fathers as a collective body, 
 meaning by ‘‘ Fathers all the more eminent Christian theologians 
 from the contemporaries of the Apostles down to the twelfth 
 century, and that this holds true, in particular, of the actual text 
 of the sermon, ‘^Feed My sheep/’ 
 
 What, then, are the facts respecting the meaning put upon this 
 text by the Fathers? The literal truth is that no ancient Father 
 whatever explains it in Cardinal Manning’s fashion. There are three 
 methods of interpreting it found in their writings. First stands 
 the opinion that no new commission was hereby conferred upon 
 St. Peter, but that he, who had fallen from the Apostolate by his 
 sin of denial, and forfeited all powers and privileges of that office, 
 was simply restored to his original position, and brought back to 
 equality with the other Apostles, below which he had sunk for a 
 time. That is how St. Ambrose, St. Augustine, St. Gregory 
 Nazianzen, and St. Cyril of Alexandria, all take it. Thus St. 
 Ambrose says : By feeding Christ’s flock well with the food of 
 faith, he did away the guilt of his former fall. And for that 
 reason he is thrice enjoined to feed, is thrice asked if he loves 
 the Lord, that he may thrice confess Him whom he had thrice 
 denied before the Cross.” (De Fide, v. 2.) St. Augustine says : 
 
 Therefore He saith to Peter, whom He would make a good 
 shepherd, not in Feted s own pei'son., but in that of His body, 
 
 ‘ Peter, lovest thou Me ? Feed My sheep.’ He said this once, 
 twice, thrice, to Peter’s sorrow.” And later on in the same work 
 the Saint adds : But the Lord asks what He knew already, and 
 that not once, but twice and thrice, whether Peter loves Him ; 
 nor is there anything else which He hears so often from Peter as 
 that he does love Him; or enjoin anything else so often upon 
 Peter as to feed His sheep. A threefold confession repays the 
 threefold denial, . . . and it is to be the duty of love to feed 
 
 the Lord’s flock, as it had been the proof of cowardice to deny the 
 Shepherd. ... If thou lovest Me, do not think about feed- 
 ing thyself, but My sheep ; feed them as Mine, not as thine own ; 
 seek My glory in them, not thine ; My authority, not thine ; 
 My gain, not thine.” (Tract, in Evang. Joann, xlvii. 2 ; 
 cxxiii. 5,) 
 
56 
 
 Words for Truth, 
 
 A secohd, but not so usual, interpretation of the text is that 
 some undefined precedence is thereby conferred on St. Peter, and 
 tliis is the view of St. Chrysostom (Horn. Ixxxviii. in Evang. 
 Joann.), but he merely speaks of a p?vstasia, that is, a precedency of 
 honour, like that of the permanent chairman of a Standing 
 Committee, and never implying sovereign authority. This is 
 also, naturally enough, the opinion of Popes Leo I. and Gregory I., 
 but even they, who were both ardent champions of Papal prero- 
 gatives, say nothing that can be stretched fairly to the extent of 
 the assertions made above. 
 
 And then comes the third view, that not primacy of honour 
 only, but a supremacy, was conferred on St. Peter in the words. 
 Feed My sheep.” But no warrant for this can be found in any 
 Father whatever till St. Bernard, who is called the ‘‘Last of the 
 Fathers ” (a.d. 1091-1153), who was not even born till after the 
 new despotic Papal monarchy had been firmly established by 
 Hildebrand, Pope Gregory VIL, and who thus was familiar with 
 a state of things which did not exist in the ancient Church. He 
 does quote St. John xxi. 17, in his treatise “ De Consideratione 
 (hi. 8), addressed to Pope Eugenius HI., as proving the supre- 
 macy of the Pope over all other Bishops and pastors. And yet 
 in this very treatise. Ultramontane as is some of its language, he 
 bears clear witness against yet later developments, for he does not 
 hesitate to speak plainly to the Pope about the moral and practical 
 mischiefs wrought by the system of appeals to Rome, the injustice 
 with which such appeals were too com.monly decided, and the 
 Pope’s own guilt in encroaching upon the rights of other prelates. 
 He compares him to the man in Nathan’s parable who took his 
 poor neighbour’s one ewe lamb, and to Ahab seizing Naboth’s vine- 
 yard ; he speaks of the corruption and simony prevalent in the 
 Roman Curia, and of the manner in which the vilest criminals 
 resorted to Rome, either to obtain or to secure the possession of 
 ecclesiastical benefices at the hands of the Pope. Thus, he 
 plainly regards the very Pontiff, whose privileges and authority he 
 exalts so high, as a mere fallible man, who not merely might err, 
 but who habitually did err, and whose great powers not only 
 might be abused, but constantly were abused in a scandalous and 
 criminal manner. He is thus witness alike against the later tenet 
 
Papal Authority in Fact and in Fiction. 57 
 
 of Papal infallibility, and against the practical benefit of that very 
 supremacy which he believed to have Scriptural warrant. 
 
 Immediately after the words already quoted from Cardinal 
 Manning's sermon, the following occur: — Peter, then, had full, 
 ample, and unlimited power to act in his Divine Master’s name. 
 His brethren had a share and participation in those powers given 
 them, but always in union with and in dependence on Peter, who 
 was their head.” And then the preacher proceeds to ask whether 
 there is any Bishop now who stands to all the Bishops of the 
 Catholic world in the relation that St. Peter did to the Apostles, 
 of course answering his own query with the reply that Pope 
 Leo XIII. does so, and asking if we do not read that during the 
 first three hundred years of the Church the Popes, one after 
 another, suffered martyrdom, and were acknowledged during all 
 those years as the heads of the Church, chief among Bishops, 
 and Vicars of Christ ; answering these queries, too, in the affirma- 
 tive. With one very small deduction, the whole of this is sheer 
 fiction.* 
 
 There is none of the theories started to prop up Papal autho- 
 rity which is more frequently or clearly contradicted by Scripture 
 than that St. Peter was constituted the intermediary betv/een 
 Christ and the other Apostles— that he was, so to speak, made 
 the neck, joining the Head to the body. First of all, if this 
 theory were true, there would be some plain evidence of it in a 
 change of Christ’s attitude and language to the Twelve generally, 
 after His thus specially commissioning St. Peter. We should find 
 either that His communications would have been made to St. 
 Peter singly, with directions to impart them to his colleagues, or 
 else that some words in His general addresses would indicate to 
 
 Even on the minor point of the number of martyred Popes, Cardinal 
 Manning does not give the facts ; for the earliest Pope whose martyrdom is 
 credibly attested is St. Fabian in 249, very near the end of “ the first three 
 hundred years of the Church.” And St. Gregory the Great tells us plainly 
 that in his time (544 — 609) there were no Acts of the Martyrs (apart from 
 those in the writings of Eusebius) preserved in the archives of the Church of 
 Rome, or in any Roman library (Epist. viii., 29) ; so that the later Roman 
 lists are all forgeries. But this is only a detail, useful merely as showing what 
 such utterances as the Cardinal’s are worth. 
 
58 
 
 Words for Truth. 
 
 the other Apostles the new relation thus established. But nothing 
 of the sort is to be found : on the contrary, there is absolute 
 equality in all the commissions He gives, ^‘Go_y^and teach all 
 nations” (St. Matthew xxviii. i8) ; I send the promise of My 
 Father upon (St. Luke xxiv. 49); As My Father hath sent 
 Me, even so send I you. . . . Receive ye the Holy Ghost ; 
 
 whose soever sins ye remit, they are remitted unto them, and 
 whose soever sins ye retain, they are retained” (St. John xx. 
 21-23). Not only so, but He expressly, as well as indirectly, 
 asserts the equality of the Apostles by His repeated refusal to 
 nominate one of them as head and chief over the others, when 
 they were disputing as to that very matter — the last of these 
 occasions being on the night before His death, and immediately 
 before His utterance of the words to St. Peter, I have prayed 
 for thee that thy faith fail not ; and when thou art converted, 
 strengthen thy brethren” (St. Luke xxii. 24-32)— a juxtaposition 
 which teaches us that the Ultramontane gloss put on these words 
 cannot possibly be their true meaning. Next, when we observe 
 what St. Peter and the other Apostles said and did in consequence 
 of the charge given to him, no trace of any sense of peculiar 
 authority on his part is discoverable, for although he certainly 
 assumes the most prominent place in the earlier chapters of the 
 Acts, and takes the lead upon several occasions, yet not one of 
 his recorded words or actions points to any jurisdiction over the 
 Apostles or the Church at large, while several point quite the 
 other way — as in the election of St. Matthias, where St. Peter 
 does not fill up the vacancy ; the mission to Samaria, where he is 
 sent and is not the sender ; the Council at Jerusalem, where he 
 is not the president who gives the final decision; and, above all, 
 the dispute at Antioch, where St. Paul resists him, and compels 
 him to retract his erroneous attitude on the great question then 
 agitating faith and morals in the Church, the relation of Gentile 
 converts towards the Jewish Law (Galatians ii. 11-14). Further, 
 if the Ultramontane theory be sound, St. Peter constituted in 
 his single person, and the Pope constitutes now, a separate 
 order in the Church ; the one having been above all Apostles, 
 not in honour only, but in degree and kind, as the latter is con- 
 sidered by Ultramontanes to be above all Bishops. But St, 
 
Papal AtUhority in Fact and in Fiction. 59 
 
 Paul, when enumerating the offices in the Church, knows nothing 
 of such an arrangement. He says : “ God hath set some in the 
 Church, Jirst Apostles, secondarily prophets,^’ &c. (i Cor. xii. 28); 
 
 Built upon the foundation of the Apostles and prophets ” (Eph. 
 ii. 20) ; with which latter saying may be compared that like one 
 in the Apocalypse : And the wall of the City had twelve foun- 
 dations, and in them the names of the twelve Apostles of the 
 Lamb (Rev. xxi. 14). Clearly, all these passages must have 
 been worded otherwise, on the supposition that the Papal view is 
 right. We should have something of this sort: God hath set 
 in the Church first Peter, as His Vicar, secondarily Apostles,^’ 
 &c. ; ‘‘Ye are built upon Peter the rock ; “The wall of 
 the City had one foundation, and in it the name of Peter, 
 Prince of the Apostles of the Lamb.’^ There is yet one more 
 disproof, almost stronger than all these put together — namely, 
 that we have direct assertion in Scripture that, whatever may at 
 first have been St. Peter’s relation to the Universal Church, he 
 was after a time formally limited to dealing with the Church of 
 the Circumcision only, consisting cf Jewish converts ; while the 
 whole Gentile mission was made over to St. Paul (Galatians ii. 
 7-9), and St. Paul himself is careful to tell us that he did not 
 receive his Apostleship, as St. Matthias had done, from the other 
 Apostles, but directly from our Lord Himself, and so too with 
 his doctrine (Galatians i. i, 12), so that St. Peter had no 
 share whatever in commissioning or teaching him, and it 
 was thus not merely “ in union with and in dependence on St. 
 Peter” that he achieved his great missionary work, but quite 
 independently of him — a fact which seems to have been divinely 
 intended to bar from the very first the Papal claim as false and 
 untenable. The one small grain of fact in the part of the sermon 
 now under discussion is that in the early centuries the Pope of 
 Rome was regarded as “ chief among Bishops ” — that is, that 
 since Rome was the capital of the Empire within which the 
 enormous majority of all Christians dwelt, and contained the 
 largest and wealthiest Christian community, a priority of honour 
 was granted to its Bishop, but he was not invested thereby with 
 any jurisdiction or authority over any part of Christendom lying 
 outside the narrow limits of his own Patriarchate, which extended 
 
6o 
 
 Words for Truth, 
 
 no farther than over Central and South Italy, with the adjacent 
 islands. We have upon this point the most indisputable and 
 authoritative evidence that the case admits, the formal decree of 
 the General Council of Chalcedon in 451, which enacted in its 
 twenty-eighth Canon that as “ The Fathers fitly bestowed preced- 
 ence upon the throne of Old Rome, because that was the Imperial 
 city; the 150 bishops most beloved of God the Fathers of 
 
 the Second General Council in 381 — moved by the same con- 
 sideration, rightly bestowed equal precedency upon the most holy 
 throne of New Rome— Constantinople — wisely judging that 
 the city honoured by the seat of empire and by the Senate, and 
 enjoying the same [civil] precedence as old Imperial Rome, 
 should be aggrandised like it in ecclesiastical matters also, rank- 
 ing next after it.^^ The evidential importance of this canon 
 is accentuated by three weighty facts : (i) It was formally and 
 unanimously reasserted by the Council after a warm protest on 
 the part of the Pope’s legates, and thus has the fullest proof of 
 deliberate decision ; (2) it has never ceased to be acted on by 
 the whole Eastern Church, despite the refusal of Pope Leo I. to 
 recognise its validity; (3) it was a decree of one of those very 
 few Councils which were chiefly doctrinal in their scope, and 
 which settled the faith of Catholic Christendom. The very Pope 
 who refused to accept this canon just quoted is fervid in his 
 praise of the perfect orthodoxy of the Council, and explicit in his 
 agreement with all its theological decisions. Now, if the Petrine 
 supremacy, and the jurisdiction of the Roman See over all 
 Christendom in virtue of a Divine charter, be integral parts of 
 the Christian religion, a Council which implicitly denied the 
 existence of any Divine right in the matter, and alleged the 
 priority of Rome to be a matter of mere human arrangement, 
 and that upon none but political grounds, must have been 
 heretical, and would have been repudiated by the voice of 
 Christendom, as those Synods have been which were held in the 
 Arian interest. As the exact contrary is the fact, as the Council 
 of Chalcedon is one of the great pillars of the Faith, it follows 
 necessarily that the Council was right and orthodox in denying 
 the Roman claim, and so that claim is no part of the Christian 
 religion. It may be just added here that there is a double sup- 
 
Papal AtUhority in Fact and in Fiction. 6i 
 
 pression in Cardinal Manning’s statement that the Pope in early 
 times was recognised as the Vicar of Christ.’^ In the first 
 place, this title ‘‘Vicar of Christ^’ was common to all Bishops 
 in early times, and is so used even as late as the ninth century 
 by the Council of Thionville, in a letter extant in the Capitularies 
 of Charles the Bald, tit. 2, while its restriction to the Pope alone 
 was warmly opposed in the Council of Trent itself ; and, in the 
 next place, the Latin language has no definite article, as Greek 
 and English have ; no way of marking the distinction between 
 a and “ the,” as Greek and English can do. Accordingly, 
 when a noun, or a noun united to an adjective, stands in a 
 Latin sentence, we have to gather from the context (which 
 is not always helpful in the matter) whether we are to put “ a ” 
 or “the” before it. Thus, “ Vicarius Christi,” so far as the 
 Latin goes, may be either “ A Vicar of Christ,” or “ The Vicar 
 of Christ,” just as the title given to Rome, “ Sedes Apostolica,” 
 may, as mere Latin, mean either An Apostolic See” — a title 
 belonging to all the many Sees founded by Apostles, — or The 
 Apostolic See.”* It is the invariable Roman practice to take the 
 latter way, and to use titles, which are properly common to many, 
 as if peculiar to the Pope of Rome alone and indivisibly, and 
 thus as denoting some high exceptional powers. So with the 
 title “ Pope ” itself, which is still used for every parish priest in 
 the Greek Church, but which Pope Gregory VII., by a decree of 
 a Roman synod in 1073, bniited thenceforth in Western Christen- 
 dom to the Bishop of Rome alone. 
 
 The sermon goes on thus : — 
 
 “As the Sovereigns of England have been the heads of the 
 Parliaments of England, so the successor of Peter has been the 
 chief legislator in nineteen (Ecumenical Councils, which are 
 the legislatures of the Church, gathered together from century 
 to century, with long intervals between ; and during those in- 
 tervals who executed the law, and had in charge the canons 
 and decrees which were then made ? As in England the 
 Sovereign, so in the Church the head.” 
 
 This is all fiction. First, there is no See in the whole world 
 
 However, it is true that Rome is the only Western See of Apostolical 
 foundation, though there are many such in the Eastern Church. 
 
62 
 
 Words for Truth. 
 
 wherein the succession has been so often and so fatally inter- 
 rupted and broken as the See of Rome. It is a matter of absolute 
 historical certainty, as will be shewn, that there have been not only 
 a considerable number of minor and temporary breaks in the chain 
 through invalid elections or intrusions, but three huge breaches 
 of long duration, wholly voiding and disqualifying the Papal 
 line. (See No. IX., pp. 82, 83.) Next, there have been only six true 
 (Ecumenical Councils; and even if the Second Council of Nice in 
 787 (the synod which authorised the cult of images) be allowed to 
 be reckoned in, as the Greeks reckon it, there are only seven. 
 For the meaning of the word ^‘oecumenical” is “representative of 
 all Christendom.” But the twelve later Councils which make up 
 the number to nineteen were exclusively Western and Latin, with 
 the single exception of one held at Constantinople in 869, but 
 repudiated a few years later by the Eastern Church, which has 
 never received any of the other eleven, so that they have no 
 claim to be styled oecumenical. Next, there is no more clear 
 disproof of the Papal claims than the very small and, so to 
 speak, subordinate part played by the Popes in all the true 
 (Ecumenical Councils. Let us take them in order. 
 
 I. Nice L, A.D. 325. This Council was not summoned by 
 the Pope, but by the Emperor Constantine the Great, and there 
 is no evidence whatever for the figment that he did so after 
 consultation with, and sanction from, the Pope. It was not 
 presided over by the Pope or his legates, but by Hosius Bishop 
 of Cordova, who signs for himself only, while the Pope’s legates 
 state that they are signing on the Pope’s behalf. This disposes 
 of a theory that Hosius was in fact Papal legate. And the 
 decrees of the Council were at once promulgated as binding, 
 without waiting for any Papal confirmation ; while so clearly has 
 this been seen to affect the Papal claims, that a letter purporting 
 to be addressed by Hosius, as president of the Council, to Pope 
 Sylvester, asking him to confirm its acts, has been forged to 
 supply the missing link. 
 
 H. Council of Constantinople L, 381. This Council was 
 convoked, not by the Pope, but by the Emperor Theodosius the 
 Great ; and it was at first presided over by a Bishop who was 
 actually disowned and excommunicated by the Pope — Meletius 
 
Papal A iLthority in Fact and in Fiction, 63 
 
 of Antioch, who continued its president till his death. It 
 enacted a canon, which practically goes as far as the 
 canon of Chalcedon already cited, giving Constantinople 
 the next place to Rome in ecclesiastical dignity, ‘^because of 
 its being the imperial city ” ; thereby implying that Rome’s 
 former rank as the seat of civil government, and not any epis- 
 copate of St. Peter there, was the reason for its primacy. Not 
 one Western Bishop was present, personally or by proxy, so that 
 the Pope had not even the tiniest share in the proceedings; and 
 yet this is reckoned as a true CEcumenical Council, binding the 
 whole Church by its decrees, though it was never confirmed by 
 the Pope, as we know from the action of the Papal legates at 
 Chalcedon, who alleged in their protest against the twenty- 
 eighth canon, which refers to the above-cited canon of Con- 
 stantinople, that no Constantinopolitan canons whatever were 
 recognised at Rome. And this refusal to acknowledge the Council 
 was persevered in at Rome for two centuries, though it is now 
 admitted as CEcumenical. 
 
 III. Ephesus, 431. This Council was convoked by the Em- 
 peror Theodosius II. to examine the heresy of Nestorius, 
 Patriarch of Constantinople. But Nestorius had been already 
 tried and condemned by the Pope in a Roman synod the previous 
 year, and declared to be deposed from his See. Nevertheless, 
 the Council of Ephesus took no account of this action, but recog- 
 nised and treated Nestorius as Patriarch still, and although the 
 Pope’s judgment was read at the Council, it was not regarded 
 as in any way deciding the point at issue, but the case was 
 inquired into anew, and the heresiarch was condemned, not in 
 virtue of the Pope’s judgment, but of proofs laid before the 
 Council, establishing the falsity of his doctrine. 
 
 IV. Chalcedon, 451. Besides the canon of this Council, 
 already cited, which disproves the alleged Divine primacy of 
 Rome, it is to be noted that here too a doctrinal question was 
 discussed which had been already decided by the Pope in a 
 Roman Council. The famous Tome of St. Leo,” setting forth 
 the Catholic doctrine of the Incarnation, Avas read in the 
 Council ; but so far was it from being, treated as deciding the 
 issues, that objections were taken to it by several Bishops, and 
 
64 
 
 Words for Truth, 
 
 a period of five days (extended to seven) was devoted into 
 inquiring into its orthodoxy, which resulted in its favour, not 
 on the ground of its Papal origin, but of its agreement with the 
 teaching of St. Cyril of Alexandria and other orthodox Fathers, 
 as the Bishops in the Council were solicitously careful to state 
 plainly. Moreover, this Council was not only summoned by the 
 Emperror Marcian without any sanction had of the Pope, but 
 against his express remonstrance and disapproval, which have 
 nevertheless never for a moment affected its reception by the 
 Church Universal. He was himself forced to make the best of it, 
 and to send legates thither, but, as shewn above, they were not 
 permitted to shape its decisions, though given a priority of rank 
 there. 
 
 V. Constantinople II., 5 53. This Council, convened by the 
 Emperor Justinian, directly traversed and contradicted, with 
 anathemas, a doctrinal statement sent to it by Pope Vigilius 
 — his ‘‘Constitution” on the controversy known as the 
 “Three Chapters,” which he had issued formally as his ex^ 
 cathedra judgment — and compelled him to withdraw and 
 retracPit, as well as to confirm its own contrary decision. 
 
 VI. Constantinople III., 680. This was the Council which, 
 convoked by the Emperor Constantine Pogonatus, and attended 
 by the legates of Pope Agatho, formally anathematized Pope 
 Honorius I. as a heretic — a condemnation which was submitted 
 to by the Roman Church, and renewed by every Pope for nearly 
 a thousand years afterwards at his coronation. A record of it 
 stood in the Roman Breviary (June 28) until past the middle of 
 the sixteenth century, when it was struck out as too dangerous 
 to the Papal claims, against which its evidence is conclusive. 
 
 VIL Nice IL, 787. This Synod, convened and carefully 
 packed by] the Empress Irene, renewed the anathema on 
 Pope Honorius.* It was exclusively Eastern, save for the 
 presence of Papal legates ; and in the great Western Council 
 of Frankfort, 794, this was urged as one of the reasons for 
 denying its CEcumenical character, on the ground that the 
 
 * A third great Synod, reckoned as a General Council by the Roman 
 Church, that of Constantinople in 869, repeated this sentence upon Honorius. 
 
Papal Atithority in Fact and in Fiction, 65 
 
 Pope had no power to commit the Church in general ; while 
 that Council compelled Hadrian I., the same Pope who had 
 sent legates to Nice, and who was also represented at Frank- 
 fort, to retract his assent to the Nicene decrees on image- 
 worship, and to pronounce them heterodox. And lastly, at no 
 time during the Conciliar era was it held that the Pope was 
 the sole executive of the Church and guardian of its decrees in 
 the intervals between the sessions of General Councils. He 
 was bound by the decrees of those Councils himself, and it 
 was of course his duty to enforce them within the area of his 
 special jurisdiction, whether as Bishop, Metropolitan, or Patriarch. 
 But outside the bounds of that jurisdiction (confined, as already 
 stated, to part of Italy and the Italian islands), this duty de- 
 volved on the other Patriarchs, Metropolitans, and Bishops, not 
 in the least as the Pope’s deputies for the purpose, but in their 
 own inherent right. There is the historical truth as to the General 
 Councils and the Popes, and it could scarcely be made more 
 unlike Cardinal Manning’s assertion by any ingenuity whatever. 
 
 E 
 
No. VIII. 
 
 THE ANGLICAN MINISTRY. 
 
 T is a very noticeable fact that there are only two re- 
 ligious communions in all Christendom which Roman 
 Catholic controversialists take the trouble to argue 
 against ; namely, the Eastern Church and the 
 Church of England. They appear to consider that no case 
 whatever can be made out in defence of any of the Protestant 
 sects, and, in point of fact, they take little or no literary notice 
 of them. But they are never weary of trying to pick holes in 
 the two bodies just named, which is in itself ample proof that 
 they recognise in both of them the presence of a very strong case 
 indeed, perhaps stronger than their own, which accordingly must 
 be discredited as far as possible, since it cannot be really broken 
 down. The favourite argument with which English Churchmen 
 not very well acquainted with history are plied, is to declare that 
 the Ministerial Orders of the Church of England are invalid and 
 merely nominal, there having been no true Bishops or Priests 
 in the Anglican body since the time of Queen Elizabeth, after 
 those of the old clergy who had conformed died out. And of 
 course it is also alleged that the Orders of the Anglo-Roman 
 clergy are of indisputable validity. 
 
 They do not confine themselves to one line of argument when 
 striving to throw doubt upon Anglican Orders. There are four 
 stock assertions which they bring forward, separately or together, 
 as they think will best suit their purpose, as follows : — 
 
The Anglican Ministry, 
 
 67 
 
 1. Archbishop Parker, the first Primate appointed under Queen 
 Elizabeth, was never consecrated at all, the whole account of his 
 alleged consecration being a forgery. 
 
 2. Although some ceremony of consecration took place, yet 
 it was null and void, because William Barlow, who had borne 
 the style and rank of a Bishop ever since the year 1536, and 
 who was the principal officiant at Barker’s so-called conse- 
 cration, was himself never consecrated at all, but was a mere 
 titular prelate, incapable of conferring Holy Orders. 
 
 3. The form of service employed was insufficient for the pur- 
 pose of consecrating a Bishop; and a change in its wording, 
 made at the last revision of the Book of Common Prayer in 1662, 
 proves that the authors of that revision were conscious of its 
 defectiveness, but mended it more than a hundred years too late 
 to save the succession, since the imperfect and invalid form of 
 Edward VI. had been in use from 1552 till 1661. 
 
 4. Even if Bishops have been validly made in the Church of 
 England, yet, even so, there are no Anglican Priests, because 
 it is essential to the validity of priestly ordination that the Ordinal 
 should expressly confer the power to offer the Eucharistic sacri- 
 fice of the Body and Blood of Christ, which is not done by 
 the Anglican form. 
 
 Before discussing the first and second of these objections 
 (which destroy one another, since they cannot both be true), 
 it may be pointed out that one simple fact establishes the 
 insincerity with which they are urged. It is that, while no 
 such hitch or break as that alleged to invalidate Parker’s epis- 
 copal character and that of all the Bishops deriving from him 
 since, is alleged against the succession in the Anglo-Irish Church, 
 which is manifestly unbroken; nevertheless .Roman Catholics 
 deny Irish Orders just as steadily. If they were in earnest 
 on this matter, they would say : ‘‘We acknowledge that the Irish 
 Orders are valid, though the English ones are not.” But as they 
 do nothing of the sort, they make it plain that these objections 
 are mere pretexts, and do not express their real opinion, being 
 simply used as convenient weapons against unskilful Anglicans 
 ill-acquainted with the facts. 
 
 The first objection — that Parker was never consecrated at 
 E 2 
 
68 
 
 Words for TriitlL 
 
 all — is one of the oldest in date, and has usually taken the 
 form of what is known as the Nag’s Head Fable.’" This is 
 a statement, first put forward in 1603, to the effect that a mere 
 mock ceremony, performed by Scory, took place at a tavern 
 in Cheapside, when Parker and several others were designated 
 as Bishops. It has been rejected by Lingard, Charles Butler, 
 Estcourt, and other eminent Roman Catholic writers, as a clumsy 
 forgery ; but it is brought forward every now and then still by 
 Roman controversialists, when they think that they have to 
 deal with persons ignorant of the truth. The mere fact of using 
 it is full proof of bad faith, and it need not be discussed further. 
 
 As to the second objection — that Barlow was never conse- 
 crated — the only serious argument adduced for it is that the 
 particular document attesting his consecration is missing, though 
 a large number of others, showing that he acted as a Bishop, 
 and was always recognised as such, are producible. No doubt, 
 if he were the only Bishop of that time whose record of conse- 
 cration could not be found, that would be enough to warrant 
 some suspicion. But the fact is that the same holds good of 
 more than twenty Bishops in the reigns of Henry VII. and VIII., 
 including two Archbishops of York (one of whom was also a 
 Cardinal), against whom no such exception is taken. By way of 
 accounting for the non-consecration of Barlow, it is alleged that 
 Henry VIII. thought that he, as Head of the Church of England, 
 could make Bishops by his simple mandate, without any con- 
 secration, and that Cranmer and Barlow, both being Erastians, 
 were content to dispense with the ceremony. If this were true, 
 there would be ample proof that no consecration did take place, 
 instead of there being a bare guess about it — for Henry VIII. 
 was not the sort of man to act secretly. If he had meant to 
 shew that he could make Bishops by his mere patent, he would 
 have taken care that it should be known as publicly as possible. 
 What is more, we have certain knowledge of his views and will 
 on the subject. He caused a statute to be passed in 1533 
 (25 Henry VIII. c. 20), wherein it is laid down, not that the 
 royal mandate is as good as consecration, but that it shall be 
 as good in law as any Papal bull or licence giving permission 
 to consecrate ; and it enacts that any Archbishop failing to con- 
 
The Anglican Ministry. 
 
 69 
 
 secrate the Bishop-designate, together with any abettors he might 
 have, should incur the penalties of prcemimire., then very severe. 
 And King Henry did issue his mandate for Barlow’s consecra- 
 tion, which is still extant (see Rymer, Foedera, xiv., 559). 
 Therefore, the more Erastian Cranmer and Barlow were, the more 
 sure would they be to obey this brand-new law, though they might 
 disregard a Church canon. If they had disobeyed, proceedings 
 would certainly have been taken against Barlow, for illegally 
 sitting and voting in the House of Lords before being qualified 
 by consecration to do so. What is more, if Barlow had been 
 left unconsecrated for the reason just given, that must have been 
 meant as a new departure, and no more episcopal consecra- 
 tions would be recorded in Henry VIII. ’s reign. But, on the 
 contrary, more than twenty-five consecrations later than Barlow’s 
 taking his seat in the House of Lords are found in Henry VIII.’s 
 reign, at two of which Barlow was one of the consecrating Bishops. 
 The figment that he was never consecrated was not trumped up till 
 1616 -forty-seven years after his death, and eighty after he became 
 Bishop of St. David’s. Of course the inventor waited, like the 
 Nag’s Head fabulist, till he thought all rebutting witnesses were 
 probably dead, and the lie might pass uncontradicted. 
 
 But as three other Bishops took part in Parker’s consecration, 
 it would be of little use to disallow Barlow’s episcopal character, 
 unless some way of doing away with them also could be invented. 
 And of course invented it was, in this fashion. It is now asserted 
 that in the rite of consecration, only the consecrator senior in 
 rank really does anything, the juniors being no more than 
 witnesses of the ceremony, so that if for any reason the senior 
 is incompetent to consecrate, or withholds his intention, the 
 juniors effect nothing by their imposition of hands, and the 
 candidate remains unconsecrated. This directly contradicts the 
 received doctrine of the great liturgical writers, such as Martene 
 for the Latin Church and Symeon of Thessalonica for the Eastern 
 Church, who both lay down that the assisting Bishops are actively 
 co-consecrators. Further, it is the accepted and current Roman 
 teaching that a Bishop who has been consecrated by only one 
 Bishop is doiihtfiilly consecrated (Liguori, “Theol. Mcr.” vi. 2, 
 755), which could not be> if, in point of fact there is only one 
 
70 
 
 Words for Truth. 
 
 consecrator on each occasion, however many may seemingly take 
 part in the rite. What is more, the notion is sheer nonsense, for 
 it really comes to this : that the mere presence of a senior in rank 
 actually deprives his juniors of those powers which they would 
 be perfectly able to exercise in his absence, and it destroys the 
 security against possible incompetence on the part of any one 
 consecrator which is provided by the very ancient rule requiring 
 three Bishops to take part in every consecration. Thus, the 
 argument will not stand examination, and may be dismissed to 
 the limbo of detected frauds ; and as Parker was not only con- 
 secrated by four Bishops, but was assisted by three of them 
 in the first consecrations he himself took part in as Primate, 
 there was no interruption or breach whatever in the succession. 
 
 The assertion that Parker's register has been forged is merely 
 a device of men so accustomed to employ fraud in controversy 
 themselves that they suspect it in others ; and the simple answer 
 to it is that this register is only one out of a great number of 
 documents to the same effect, scattered in different archives of 
 different countries, all of which must be forgeries also, if it be 
 one, and must have been surreptitiously deposited there by the 
 same forger or forgers without detection, though they could not 
 have had access to some of these archives, and most probably 
 did not know the very existence of others~a theory too weak 
 for serious consideration. 
 
 The objection raised against the wording of the Ordinal with 
 which Parker and all other English Bishops were consecrated 
 for more than a century is even more wilfully insincere than 
 those named already. It is that the absence from that Ordinal 
 of any words expressly naming the episcopal ofiice at the actual 
 moment of the laying-on of hands — such as those added in 
 1662, ‘‘ For the office and work of a Bishop in the Church of 
 God" — invalidates the whole rite, which may thus intend no 
 more than Confirmation. Now, the reason why this argument 
 is an insincere one is that not only is it a commonplace of 
 theology, familiar to every Boman priest, that Baptism and 
 the Holy Eucharist are the only Christian rites which are tied 
 down to a special form of words as essential to validity, and 
 that any words may be adopted for all the others which fairly 
 
The Anglican Ministry. 
 
 71 
 
 express their intention ; but the fault alleged to nullify the 
 Anglican form is positively more distinct and prominent in the 
 Romaii form for consecrating Bishops, which has, at the actual 
 laying-on of hands, only these three words, Accipe Spiritum 
 Sanctum Receive the Holy Ghost. The words added to 
 our Ordinal in 1662 are peculiar to the English rite, and are not 
 borrowed from any Roman source, besides which, they were inserted 
 with reference to the controversy against Presbyterians only. As 
 to the mention of the episcopal office in the Edwardine Ordinal, 
 it is frequent and precise enough for any reasonable person, 
 occurring four times before the laying-on of hands ; while the 
 Preface to the whole Ordinal declares that its use and intent 
 is for the continuance in the Church of England of the same 
 three orders of Bishops, Priests, and Deacons which had existed 
 from the time of the Apostles — but which were rejected, both 
 as regards name and function, by the leading sects of the day. 
 And as the Ordinal states that the intention of the English rite 
 in consecrating a Bishop is to do for him what Christ did in 
 consecrating the Apostles, and they, in turn, did when laying 
 hands on SS. Paul and Barnabas, there is no room for a charge 
 against it of defective or heterodox intention. It is hard to 
 guess what more than this the Roman rite can profess to 
 effect. 
 
 The other assertion, that Priests must needs be ordained with 
 a form empowering them to offer Christ’s Body and Blood in 
 sacrifice, not only contradicts, like the immediately preceding 
 one, the rule that only Baptism and the Holy Eucharist are 
 tied down to certain words, but there is actually only one of the 
 many forms of ordination used anywhere in Christendom which 
 satisfies this condition, and it is not the Roman one (which 
 speaks vaguely of offering sacrifice to God,” but does not say 
 what sacrifice), but one used only by the heretical Nestorian 
 sect; so that this objection also breaks down when brought to 
 the test. It is, besides, a very two-edged argument to advance, 
 because there is not only no express oblation in the Roman 
 Missal of anything except the as yet unconsecrated bread and 
 wine, but there are words used immediately after the conse- 
 cration which directly imply that nothing else has been offered 
 
72 
 
 Words for Tmth, 
 
 or can be offered even then. They are in the prayer said by 
 the celebrant over the Host and chalice : Receive them, as 
 Thou didst vouchsafe to receive the gifts of Thy righteous 
 servant Abel, and the sacrifice of our Patriarch Abraham, and 
 the holy sacrifice, spotless oblation, which Thy high priest 
 Melchizedek offered unto Thee.” Clearly, if the oblation 
 which has just been made ranks no higher than those of the 
 pre-Mosaic dispensation, it cannot be the offering, even in 
 type only, of Christ’s Body and Blood.'* *' And the result may 
 be conveniently summed up in the words of Dr. von Bollinger 
 (perhaps the most learned theologian of these modern times) 
 at Bonn, in 1875 • ^‘The fact that Parker was consecrated by four 
 rightly consecrated Bishops, rite et legitime, with imposition of 
 hands and the necessary words, is so well attested that, if one 
 chooses to doubt this fact, one could, with the same right, doubt 
 one hundred thousand facts. . . . The fact is as well esta- 
 
 blished as a fact can be required to be. Bossuet has acknow- 
 ledged the validity of Parker’s consecration, and no critical 
 historian can dispute it. The Orders of the Roman Church 
 could be disputed with more appearance of reason.” {Report of 
 Reunion Conference at Bonn, 1875, p. 96. London : 1876.) 
 
 That all these objections were merely trumped up as after- 
 thoughts, and are not genuine, appears from a very noteworthy 
 fact. On November 30th, 1562, a discussion arose in the Council 
 of Trent as to the necessity of papal confirmation to validate the 
 status of Bishops. There was strong opposition to the view of 
 its necessity, notably from the Spanish Bishops. An Irish Bishop 
 
 (F^- t r ^mnnri rn nf. i A.ghf^r1j).e ) said that to rule against this necessity 
 
 AcLo'h.^^ 
 
 * This result is due to simple liturgical ignorance at Rome when the Missal 
 was recast, several centuries ago, and the consecration was held to be in virtue 
 of the words of Institution, instead of the Invocation of the Holy Spirit, as in 
 the Eastern Liturgies, which treat the words of Institution as prefatory only. 
 When the change was made, and the Invocation dropped out, the prayer just 
 cited should have been thrown back earlier, that it might still precede, the 
 consecration, as it must originally have done ; but from inattention to this, 
 the Roman Missal, as it now stands, bears seeming testimony not only against 
 the doctrine of the Eucharistic sacrifice, but against that of the Real Presen e 
 also. 
 
The Anglican Ministry. 
 
 73 
 
 would be very dangerous, because in England the Sovereign 
 appointed Bishops, who were consecrated by three Bishops, and 
 gave themselves out as true Bishops. But we deny it, because 
 they are not approved by the Roman Pontiff, and we say so 
 rightly, and it is with this one reason and no other that we argue 
 against them, for they prove that they have been called, elected, 
 consecrated, and given mission.” The Council took this speaker’s 
 view, and thereby proved that no other ground of objection to 
 Anglican Orders was then advanced orknowm. And yet the four 
 current objections are of sucri a kind, that if true at all, they 
 must have been notorious from the very first. 
 
 But what is the position of Roman Orders in this country? 
 Are they so infallibly valid as their advocates would have us 
 believe? In answering this question there will be no need to 
 follow the Roman example by trumping up objections invented 
 for the occasion, and neither admitted as valid by those at whom 
 they are levelled, nor adduced in good faith, by their opponents. 
 It wall be enough to appeal to authoritative Roman statements. 
 First, then, it is the received Roman tenet that the inward inten- 
 tion and goodwill of the minister is essential to the real efficacy 
 and validity of any rite he outwardly performs. And in the case 
 of Holy Orders the difficulty is doubled, because the intention of 
 the ordinee must be active as well as that of the Bishop who 
 ordains. If he merely passively submits to the ceremony, it is 
 null and void (Togni, ‘‘ Instruct, pro Sacr. Eccl. Minist.”). 
 
 Now, this at once makes every Roman ordination doubtful, 
 for (as Cardinal Bellarmine has said on this very subject) no 
 man can see another’s intention,” and even if the Bishop and 
 the candidate can trust one another’s good faith, that does no- 
 thing towards settling doubts which go further back in date. 
 For it is notorious that there was such widespread infidelity 
 amongst the higher clergy in France and Italy in the sixteenth 
 and seventeenth centuries, and so much secret Judaism in Spain, 
 besides such incessant cases of young men of rank, from whom 
 the Bishops were mostly chosen, being forced into Holy Orders 
 against their will (as Talleyrand, for instance, was), that there is 
 the most serious doubt, on Roman principles, of the validity of 
 all orders which have come through French, Italian, or Spanish 
 
74 
 
 Words for Truth, 
 
 sources, as by far the greater part of those exercised by Anglo- 
 Romans do. Besides this initial difficulty, there are two others, 
 more specially applying to those Roman priests who are seceders 
 from the Church of England. First, they have all been re- 
 baptized, and rebaptism, by Roman canon law, makes the re- 
 baptized person and his rebaptizer both incapable for life of 
 receiving or exercising Holy Orders. And what is very singular, 
 is that there is no saving clause to meet the case of conditional 
 rebaptism (Andre, “Dictionnaire de Droit Canon.^’). But, as just 
 said, every Anglican seceder now in the Roman ministry has been 
 rebaptized. Nor is this all. There is yet another law of the 
 Roman Church, that heretics and the children of heretics, even 
 after conversion and abjuration, are incapable of Holy Orders 
 (Ferraris, Bibliotheca Canonica,” s. v. “ Haereticus ) : and 
 there is further a Bull of Pope Paul IV. {^Ctm ex Apostolatus 
 officio\ declaring all persons who have ever fallen into heresy 
 or schism incapable of becoming bishops, cardinals, or Popes, 
 and annuls all such appointments by a perpetual decree.* So 
 then, unless the Anglo-Roman clergy are ready to confess either 
 that the Church of England is free from doctrinal error, or that the 
 Pope erred in thus ruling, and so \vas not infallible, they must 
 disallow the orders of all the Anglican converts, and in particular, 
 the archiepiscopal rank of Dr. Manning, as well as the claim of 
 himself and Dr. Newman to be lawful and valid cardinals. 
 
 That is the position, on Roman principles, and it is noticeably 
 lacking in certainty. 
 
 * This Bull, being specially aimed at the suppression of Protestantism, is too 
 wide and general in its terms to allow of its scope being limited to born 
 Roman Catholics alone, who may have taken up for a time with anti-Roman 
 doctrines. 
 
No. IX. 
 
 JURISDICTION. 
 
 HEN Roman controversialists find that they are un- 
 successful in exciting doubts as to the validity of 
 Holy Orders in the Church of England, they are 
 accustomed to fall back on another line of argument, 
 and to say, Even if, by any possibility, a true and valid 
 ministry has been preserved amongst you, so far as mere succes- 
 sion is concerned ’’ — it suits them to make little of succession 
 when they are taking this line, as they make much of it when 
 trying to show that we have not got it — yet that is of no 
 practical use without rightful jurisdiction, which Anglicans do not 
 possess ; the only jurisdiction really existing amongst them being 
 the civil jurisdiction of the Crown and Parliament, having no 
 spiritual character whatever. But without true spiritual juris- 
 diction no Christian bishop or priest can lawfully exercise his 
 ministry.'’^ 
 
 This argument is often found to be very telling and effective for 
 its purposes, thoroughly alarming many persons who had been 
 proof against other pleas. But this is not in the least because it 
 is a strong, or even a plausible, argument ; rather because those 
 to whom it is addressed seldom have a notion, however vague, of 
 what Jurisdiction really means, and what is its source, so that 
 they are frightened by this unknown terror, especially if they 
 are persons who would not understand the matter if one set 
 about explaining it to them. The truth is that jurisdiction, 
 instead of being something superadded by Divine grace to 
 
76 
 
 Words for Truth. 
 
 confirm and ratify Holy Orders, is something invented by 
 human law to limit and narrow the exercise of those orders. 
 It is something taken away from them, not annexed to 
 them. For its true nature is that of a prohibition to exer- 
 cise ministerial acts outside a certain fixed area. By ordina- 
 tion, the ordinee becomes a bishop or priest, as the case may 
 be, of the entire Church Universal, his orders are unlimited 
 and unfettered by any restraining clause, and are valid all 
 the world over, as those of the Apostles were, in virtue of 
 their commission to teach all nations (St. Matt, xxviii. 19). 
 But then steps in the principle of jurisdiction, and confines the 
 action of each such minister to a strictly defined territory, be 
 it province, diocese, or parish ; granting him a monopoly, indeed, 
 within that particular sphere, but forbidding him to exercise his 
 ministry beyond it, save by express invitation or permission of 
 those who are similarly empowered to act in other districts. The 
 reason for this kind of arrangement (which is technically known 
 as actual’’ jurisdiction, distinguished from the habitual ” 
 jurisdiction derived from ordination) is simply for method and 
 convenience, and for the avoidance of disputes, such as would be 
 apt to arise amongst persons working at their own pleasure over 
 the same ground, and possibly coming into collision. But it 
 is obvious that a principle of this sort, however sensible and 
 useful it may be in practice, does not go down to the bottom 
 of the matter, nor touch the question of the actual validity of 
 any ministerial acts done in disregard of it. And accordingly, 
 even in the Roman Church itself, where every priest must 
 have a special licence (or faculties,” as the technical word is) 
 to allow of his saying Mass or hearing confessions, yet it is 
 admitted that if he chooses to perform these acts without such 
 faculties, however blameworthy he may be, and whatever penal- 
 ties he may incur for his breach of discipline, nevertheless, the 
 acts themselves are sacramentally valid, though wrongfully done, 
 and even if a cause of guilt in the doer and in those who know- 
 ingly avail themselves of his unlicensed ministrations. 
 
 Thus it is plain, on the showing of Romans themselves, that 
 lack of jurisdiction, even if the Church of England were proved 
 to suffer from it, is not a fatal defect ; it does at most constitute 
 
JtLrisdiction» 
 
 77 
 
 a disciplinary irregularity, whose gravity must be determined on 
 the merits in each instance. Further, not only is jurisdiction the 
 mere creation of human law, as said already, but that law to 
 which it is due is much more largely civil and secular than 
 ecclesiastical. The mapping out of dioceses and parishes, and 
 the assignment of specific rights and privileges therein to par- 
 ticular individuals, has from a very early time required the 
 assent, and not seldom the initiative, of the State to enable it 
 to be done at all, or to be maintained when once set up. Nay, 
 more, all that part of ecclesiastical jurisdiction which is external 
 and coercive, which has to do with inflicting penalties for 
 offences, if those penalties be other than strictly spiritual, can- 
 not, and does not, exist anywhere, even in non-Christian coun- 
 tries, without the express sanction of the civil power, which is 
 bound to protect its subjects from injury to their persons, pro- 
 perty, or character. And so it is clear that the objection brought 
 by Roman Catholics against the Church of England because of 
 the interference of the State in its concerns holds equally in kind 
 (whatever the degree of interference may be) of the Roman 
 Church itself in every country in the world. ^ Not only is there 
 no exception to this rule, but it is not possible that there could 
 be any exception to it in a civilised community. This cavil 
 accordingly fails, even if it were granted that the charge against 
 the Church of England of lacking spiritual jurisdiction is true in 
 canon law and in theology. 
 
 But the charge in question is not true. For the highest kind 
 of spiritual jurisdiction is that which is technically called “ habit- 
 ual,” or, as it might be otherwise called, potential jurisdiction, 
 which is conveyed by the fact of consecration or ordination, 
 whereby the newly ordained or consecrated person becomes 
 capable of validly performing all episcopal or sacerdotal acts, 
 though as a matter of convenience he is authorised to do so 
 within a given area only. In the case of a bishop consecrated 
 for and to a particular see, the two kinds of jurisdiction united 
 
 * Especially when it is remembered that for several centuries the Emperors 
 nominated the Popes, and before that the election vested in the clergy and 
 people of Rome. 
 
78 
 
 Words for Truth, 
 
 are conveyed simultaneously by the ceremony ; for besides the 
 
 habitual ” jurisdiction involved in the fact of his being a bishop 
 at all there is also the actual jurisdiction of authority within 
 a particular diocese imparted to him, so that he is fully and truly 
 its Ordinary from that moment ; and apart from any further cere- 
 mony of enthronement or the like. And this is part of the canon 
 law of the Universal Church, found in the Apostolic Canons and 
 in the Canons of Antioch, which were received by the whole 
 Church, while it is also implied in the oldest Roman office for 
 the consecration of bishops (that in the Gelasian Sacrament ary), 
 as it is likewise in the Anglican Ordinal. The later Roman 
 Pontifical, altered in several respects in the interests of Papal 
 authority, is much less clear, though traces of this ancient doc- 
 trine are still discernible. The Metropolitan is the person who, 
 according to the code of the Universal Church, conveys juris- 
 diction to the provincial bishops, while a new Metropolitan 
 derives his own jurisdiction from his comprovincials jointly, and 
 not from any authority external to the province. The practice of 
 the Popes consecrating Metropolitans came in by degrees, as part 
 of a settled policy for the purpose of increasing Papal power ; but 
 it was unknown to, and never recognised by, the ancient Church 
 Universal. 
 
 What, then, is the truth as to the position of the post- 
 Reformation Church of England in this matter of lawful 
 jurisdiction ? The facts are very simple. The death of Cardinal 
 Pole, Archbishop of Canterbury, on November 19, 1558, left 
 that see canonically vacant ; Matthew Parker was duly elected 
 by the chapter to the vacant see, and hiselection was confirmed 
 in the regular manner, while he was consecrated on December 17, 
 1559, by Barlow, Coverdale, Hodgskin and Scory, the survivors of 
 the Edwardian hierarchy, which had been forcibly deprived by 
 Queen Mary without any canonical process. Of the twenty-two 
 sees in the Province of Canterbury, ten were at that date vacant 
 through the deaths of their occupants, three were held by 
 intruders irregularly thrust in by Queen Mary, and the bishops 
 of two more had abandoned the kingdom and never returned. 
 That left still seven of Queen Mary’s bishops who might have 
 created a difficulty by protesting against the consecration of 
 
Jurisdiction. 
 
 79 
 
 Parker, and yet more by putting forward another claimant to 
 the Primacy. But they did nothing of the kind, then or after- 
 wards, allowing the case since set up against him to fail by 
 default, and, according to all canonical usage, this absence of 
 public dissent and protest on their part is equivalent to assent, 
 so far as the validity of the transaction is concerned/'^ Thus 
 Parker received full jurisdiction, both habitual and actual, at his 
 consecration, and was competent to communicate the like to 
 the bishops he subsequently consecrated, from whom those of 
 the present day derive their succession. 
 
 Of course, when Roman Catholics deny Anglican jurisdiction, 
 it is like the case of a litigant challenging the title to an estate. 
 No one does that who is not trying to get the estate for himself, 
 for otherwise he would have no interest in disturbing the occu- 
 pant. But that he may succeed in doing this, it is not enough 
 for him to prove that the occupant has a bad title, or no title at 
 all ; he must further show that his own title is a better one. 
 What, then, are the facts on this head as regards the Anglo- 
 Roman bishops and clergy ? 
 
 First of all, they base their claim on one principle only, to 
 the exclusion of every other ; and that principle is that the Pope 
 is the one and only source of all spiritual jurisdiction, that he 
 has direct and immediate jurisdiction in every diocese of the 
 world, and that the sitting bishop in each diocese is merely his 
 removable deputy and curate, holding office solely by and at his 
 pleasure. Therefore, they say, as the Anglican hierarchy is not 
 recognised by the Pope, it is necessarily null and void \ while the 
 bishops and clergy sent hither by Papal authority have alone 
 rightful jurisdiction in England. 
 
 This is asserted in virtue of the Pope's inheritance from St. 
 Peter, in whom is alleged to have been vested supreme jurisdic- 
 
 * Those who urge the private dissent of the Marian Bishops in the Province 
 of Canterbury as an objection against the validity of Parker’s position, should 
 remember that Cardinal Manning was thrust uncanonically by Pius IX. into 
 the titular See of Westminster, against the public votes and the wishes of 
 all concerned, and in disregard of the vested claims of Archbishop Errington, 
 coadjutor with right of succession — so far as the word “right” can be used 
 in this connexion — to Cardinal Wiseman. 
 
8o 
 
 Words for Truth, 
 
 tion over the whole Apostolic Church, by reason of the three 
 sayings of our Lord in St. Matthew xvi. i8, 19; St. Luke, xxii. 32; 
 and St. John xxi. 15-17* But there is no express mention of 
 jurisdiction or its equivalent in any of these texts; there is no act 
 or word of St. Peter’s recorded in Holy Scripture, or in any 
 ancient document, showing that he ever exercised or claimed such 
 jurisdiction, whereas acts and words of his are recorded which are 
 quite incompatible with his having possessed it — such as his merely 
 suggesting the election of someone to the vacant Apostleship, 
 instead of filling up the post on his own responsibility, as the 
 Pope does with a vacancy amongst the cardinals (Acts ii. 15-26); 
 his being sent to Samaria by the superior authority of the col- 
 lective Apostles (Acts viii. 14); his admitting the right of other 
 members of the Church to challenge the lawfulness of his action, 
 and his giving them an explanation, instead of simply alleging 
 his supreme authority as sufficient warrant (Acts xi. 2-17); and 
 his secondary position in the Council of Jerusalem, where St. 
 James presided and pronounced the decision (Acts xv. 6, 17, 19). 
 Further, if it were even capable of proof that St. Peter did 
 receive in the first instance jurisdiction over the whole Church, 
 yet there is precise and conclusive evidence that he was after a 
 time limited to the “ Churches of the circumcision,” that is to 
 say, those consisting of Jews only, and was withdrawn from any 
 jurisdiction over the Gentiles, who were formally made over 
 to St. Paul’s care (Galatians ii. 8, 9), who accordingly claims 
 to be not merely an Apostle to the Gentiles, but the Apostle to 
 the Gentiles (Romans xi. 13). Contrariwise St. Peter, like St. 
 James, another Apostle of the circumcision, addresses his First 
 Epistle most probably not to Christians generally, but to Jewish 
 Christians alone. This is shewn not only by the phrase in its 
 first verse, “to the strangers scattered abroad,” which is the 
 specific description of the non-Palestinian Jews, then known as 
 the “ Dispersion,” but also by the counsel he gives in another 
 verse, “ Having your conversation honest among the Gentiles ” 
 (1 St. Peter ii. 12). This shows that they to whom he wrote 
 were not themselves Gentiles, whereas St. Paul, when writing to 
 the Roman Christians, speaks of them as Gentiles, thus proving 
 that this word is not used in the New Testament as equivalent to 
 
J urisdiction. 
 
 8i 
 
 heathens, and so that St. Peter was writing to Jews — fallen away, 
 indeed, into heathen errors in more than one particular before 
 their conversion to Christianity (i. 14, 18), but still genuine 
 Hebrews. This fact of St. PetePs limitation to the Jewish 
 Church has an important bearing on the question of Papal juris- 
 diction. For, even if the unprovable and improbable guesses 
 that St. Peter had power to bequeath any special privilege he 
 may have possessed, that he became first Pope of Rome, and did 
 in fact bequeath his privilege to his successors in that see, be all 
 allowed to pass current, there is a formidable difficulty still 
 remaining. So conflicting and contradictory in the order of 
 names are the ancient lists of the earlier Popes of Rome (of 
 which there are twelve irreconcilable variants, dating from the 
 second century to the middle of the fourth century, thus 
 proving that no trustworthy record or even tradition existed) 
 that the solution which is accepted by the best scholars, whether 
 Roman Catholics or others, as presenting fewest perplexities, is 
 that some of the Popes there named were not successors of each 
 other, but joint occupants of the see, a statement implied directly 
 as to Linus and Cletus by three very ancient authorities. Now 
 there could be only one reason for such a departure from the 
 more usual custom of one chief ruler in one place, and that 
 was what we have reason to believe was done in Antioch 
 and Ephesus — namely, the organisation of the Jews and Gentiles 
 into separate Churches, maintained until the Jewish one died 
 out. But in that case, if SS. Peter and Paul, as anciently alleged, 
 were jointly organising the Roman Church, the Petrine succes- 
 sion would have been in the Jewish Church of Rome alone, and 
 must have died out in the course of a century, leaving only the 
 Pauline succession of the Gentile Church remaining, for which 
 the special Petrine privilege cannot be claimed. Further, though 
 SS. Peter and Paul are said to have been martyred on the same 
 day of the same month (June 29), yet the oldest authorities 
 which are more precise add that they did not suffer in the 
 same year, St. Peter having been put to death a twelvemonth 
 before St. Paul.**' But in that case, as they are stated (by St. 
 Epiphanius) to have been joint Apostles and Bishops at Rome, 
 ^Prudentius, Peristeph. xii. 5 ; St. Augustine, Serm, xxviii.; Arator, ii. 12. 
 
 P 
 
Words for Truth, 
 
 the surviving Apostle, according to the invariable rule of such 
 joint tenure of an office, must have acquired his colleague’s 
 share of it, and have thenceforward exercised the powers of the 
 office alone and singly. That is to say, in effect, the 
 Petrine line died out with St. Peter himself, and only a Pauline 
 succession has ever existed at Rome. Not only so, but there 
 are huge gaps in the Roman line of succession, which so effec- 
 tually break continuity with the ancient Popes that the later 
 Pontiffs belong, so to speak, to a wholly distinct class and 
 dynasty, no more inheriting any special privileges which may 
 have inhered in their predecessors than the President of the 
 French Republic inherits the position of the Emperor Charle- 
 magne. It will suffice to cite three of these gaps, which in- 
 contestably prove that the succession in the Papacy has not been 
 divinely safeguarded, as it must needs have been if the theory of 
 the Petrine privilege of the Popes be true. 
 
 First comes the period between a.d. 903 and 963, during 
 which no fewer than thirteen false Popes were forcibly intruded 
 one after another into the Papal chair, of whom Cardinal 
 Baronius, the most Ultramontane of Church historians, declares 
 that they were not Popes at all, and were never elected by the 
 clergy, but are merely set down in the list of Popes for chrono- 
 logical purposes. It is certain that at the end of these sixty 
 years of anarchy there could have been no clerical voters of 
 canonical standing, and therefore able to elect a Pope validly, 
 remaining in Rome ; and as no man can give what he has not 
 got,” such voters could bestow no title to the Papacy by 
 going through the form of election ; so that even the Popes who 
 came in when peace and order were to some extent restored 
 had no better title in canon law, tlmugh they had a more 
 respectable shew of one, than their intruded predecessors. That 
 constitutes one complete break with the older line of succession, 
 without inquiring too minutely into the very many flaws and 
 irregularities even earlier. The second huge gap to be mentioned 
 is that made by the Great Schism, with rival lines of Popes at 
 Rome and Avignon, lasting from 1378 to 1415? whom come 
 under the broad general rule laid down by Cardinal Bellarmine 
 in respect of this very matter, that ‘‘a doubtful Pope is accounted 
 
Jicrisdiction, 
 
 83 
 
 no Pope.” because it is not even now settled which claimants 
 of the Papacy during this period were the rightful ones. 
 Here, again, it was a new Papacy which was set up in 1417 
 on the ruins of the old one, having no powers or privileges 
 save what the Council of Constance could give it,* the New 
 Testament charter, supposing it to have ever applied, having 
 failed by reason of extinction of line. But the third and last gap 
 is the longest and most fatal of all, having lasted uninterruptedly 
 from 1484 to the present day, and being totally incurable by any 
 existing means. It came in this wise. By along series of eccle- 
 siastical laws, dating from very early times, and frequently 
 renewed, simony the buying and selling of ecclesiastical 
 
 rank and office) totally voids any ordination, consecration, 
 election, or promotion procured by its means, and strips both 
 the buyer and seller of their rank and powers. And though it 
 is held that the Pope has power to dispense from these 
 penalties, yet it is admitted that he cannot dispense him- 
 self. But there is completely decisive proof that Innocent 
 VIII. (1484-1492), Alexander VI. (1492-1503), and Julius II. 
 (1503-15 13) were all simoniacally elected, and therefore were 
 no Popes, and were incapable of performing validly any 
 Papal function, including that of creating the cardinals, 
 who have been for several centuries the only electors to 
 the Papacy ; besides that Alexander VI. sold his cardinal- 
 ates for money, and so his creations were doubly void, 
 while two-thirds of the College which elected Julius 11 . 
 was made up of these simoniacal Cardinals. f But when Julius 
 II. died, the whole College of Cardinals which met to elect his 
 successor were the no-cardinals made by the no-Popes Alexander 
 VI. and Julius II., so that, having no right to vote, they could 
 
 * So many uncanonical irregularities marked the summons, constitution, 
 proceedings, and acts of the Council of Constance, that the gravest doubt 
 exists of the legitimacy of one and all of them. And in any case, by deposing 
 all three claimants of the Papacy, instead of deciding in favour of one of them, 
 the Council broke anew the line of succession, and founded a fresh dynasty in 
 the person of Pope Martin V. 
 
 t Creighton, “History of the Papacy during the Reformation,” hi. 119 
 160 ; iv. 60. 
 
84 
 
 Words for Truth, 
 
 not validly elect anyone, and thus the election of Leo X. was 
 void too. The whole electoral body was then poisoned at the 
 very root, and totally invalidated, with no title whatever left to 
 tender a single vote, and with no machinery existing capable of 
 rehabilitating it. This process has been going on ever since, 
 invalidly created cardinals electing a no-Pope, who in his turn 
 creates no-cardinals, who elect his irregular successor. Thus 
 there has been only a de facto Pope, and not a single de jure one, 
 these four hundred years, and in matters spiritual, unlike secular 
 politics, a mere de facto title is not enough for validity, and con- 
 veys no authority whatever. Of course the new Pope, if already 
 a duly consecrated bishop, can still validly perform ordinary 
 episcopal acts, such as confirmation and ordination, but he 
 is not, and cannot be. Bishop of Rome, with valid Papal 
 powers. 
 
 To all this, the one reply made by Ultramontanes is that the 
 acceptance and recognition of even an invalidly elected Pope by 
 the Roman Church at large validates his election, and makes 
 good any defects therein. 
 
 This is not true. For (i) no such enactment or provision 
 occurs anywhere in the canon law, and this being above all a 
 strictly legal matter of the highest practical importance, there 
 would be some such rule citable if it existed. It would not be 
 left to chance, or to the private opinion of canon lawyers. (2) 
 No such opportunity of expressing either assent or disallowance 
 is afforded to the Roman Church at large on a Papal election, as 
 is provided, at least in theory, by The Constitution of the United 
 States at the election of a President. The choice of the cardinals 
 in conclave is final, and the new Pope is at once proclaimed as 
 actually reigning. (3) The thirteen false Popes between 903 
 and 963 were then fully acknowledged as real Pontiffs, and yet 
 Cardinal Baronius declares that they never were Popes at all. 
 (4) There are two Bulls, the Cum tam divino of Julius II., and 
 Cum ex Apostolaths officio of Paul IV., which in the most express 
 terms contradict this assertion that mere recognition of an 
 invalidly elected Pope makes his defective election good and 
 valid, for they lay down positively that in the case of a simoniac, 
 dealt with in the earlier Bull, and former heresy of any kind. 
 
Jurisdiction. 
 
 85 
 
 dealt with by the latter, no homage, enthronement, or obedience, 
 however general, paid to the irregular Pontiff shall avail to make 
 his election valid, but that he is to be treated as a criminal 
 of the worst kind, and resisted to the uttermost.* These two 
 Bulls are so well known that the contrary assertion must have 
 been made in bad faith, to trade on the ignorance of those 
 unfamiliar with the facts. So there is no Pope now who can 
 confer true jurisdiction, even if it were the fact that the de jure 
 Popes of a now long-distant time were the only sources of 
 jurisdiction ; upon which the words of the great Bossuet may 
 be aptly quoted, ‘‘ Therefore that very late invention, that 
 bishops receive their jurisdiction from the Pope, and are, as 
 it were, his vicars, should be banished from Christian schools, 
 as unheard of for twelve centuries.” 
 
 Thus, even without quoting those ancient Canons of 
 Ancyra, Antioch, and Ephesus, which prohibit any such action 
 as that whereby the Anglo-Roman hierarchy has been set up 
 in England, and make it illegitimate, because done without 
 the consent of the metropolitans, bishops, and clergy of Eng- 
 land, it is plain that by resting their case on a charter which 
 there is no evidence to shew, and no reason to think, ever 
 applied to the Popes, but which, if it ever did so apply, has 
 been forfeited and voided several times over, the Roman 
 Catholic bishops and clergy have put themselves entirely out 
 of court, and have established that they do not possess, and have 
 no means of acquiring, valid jurisdiction in spiritual matters. 
 
 To sum up the results of the foregoing papers, it has been 
 shewn : (i) That the Church of England maintains the “ Old 
 Religion,” while the religion of the Roman Church is largely 
 mediaeval and even modern. (2) That the Church of England 
 is Catholic, agreeing with the undivided Church Universal ; 
 whereas the Roman Church has, in many respects, set up 
 
 * And the Bull of Julius II. is so worded as to have retrospective as well 
 as prospective effect, according to the statement of a great Roman canon 
 lawyer, Gammarus, Auditor of the Rota and Papal Vicar of Rome. He 
 published a commentary upon it in 1527, alleging that it made all simoniacal 
 elections to the Papacy before its own issue not merely voidable, but actually 
 null and void. 
 
86 
 
 Words for Tr7it]i, 
 
 tenets and usages peculiar to itself only, a mere local portion 
 of the Universal Church. (3) That the Church of England 
 adheres to the teaching of the Four Doctors, from which the 
 Roman Church has widely departed. (4) That the Church of 
 England inherits from the British and Anglo-Saxon Church its 
 independent attitude towards the Church of Rome. (5) That 
 the Church of England mended its ways by abolishing, to the 
 great gain of the nation in faith and morals, many corruptions 
 and abuses which the Roman Church continues to maintain, 
 and has even multiplied, to the great injury of Roman Catholic 
 countries. (6) That no clear case can be made out for 
 St. Peter’s alleged Roman bishopric ; and therefore none for 
 Papal supremacy in succession to him. (7) That the autho- 
 rity exercised by the Popes in ancient times was very much 
 smaller in degree and inferior in kind than that claimed for 
 them now. (8) That Anglican orders are not merely valid, 
 but are free from several very serious difficulties which beset 
 Roman orders. (9) That the repeated and total failure of the 
 Papal line of succession has destroyed the one source alleged 
 by Roman Catholics as that of the spiritual jurisdiction of the 
 Roman Church ; whereas Anglican jurisdiction, based on the 
 ancient laws of the Church Universal, is valid and unshaken. 
 
 And consequently it is wiser and safer to remain in the 
 Church of England than to join the Church of Rome. 
 
 Vacher & Sons, Printers, Westminster, S.W. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 Accidents, what, 9, 10. 
 
 African Church, resists Popes, 18, 20, 28, 29. 
 
 Alexander VI., Pope, simoniacally elected, 83 ; sold the Cardinalate, 83. 
 
 Ambrose, St., 25-28, 32, 43, 55. 
 
 Anglicans, how distinguished from Roman Catholics, 34. 
 
 Ante-Nicene testimony as to St. Peter summarised, 51, 52. 
 
 Apostolical See, title common to all Sees founded by Apostles, 6r. 
 
 Augustine, St., 13, 17, 25, 28-30, 43, 55, 81, foot-note. 
 
 Augustine, St., of Canterbury, repelled by British Church, 35. 
 
 Babylon, probably not meant for Rome, 49 
 
 Barlow, Bishop, his consecration denied, 68 ; weakness of arguments to this 
 effect, 68, 6 q ; not trumped up till forty-seven years after his death, 69. 
 
 Baronius, Cardinal, on failure of Papal succession, 82, 84. 
 
 Bellarmine, Cardinal, on Intention, 73. 
 
 Bernard, St., first to explain the words ‘‘Feed My sheep” in Ultramontane 
 fashion, 56 ; his practical contradiction of it, 56. 
 
 Bishops, Anglo-Roman, Declaration of, in 1826, 33. 
 
 Bishops, Assistant, at consecrations are co-consecrators, 69, 70. 
 
 Boniface, I., Pope, attempts to interfere in African Church, 28. 
 
 Bossuet admits validity of Parker’s consecration, 72 ; denies that the Pope 
 is the source of episcopal jurisdiction, 85. 
 
 Brihtwald, Archbishop, deposes Archbishop Wilfrid for appealing to Rome, 
 
 37. 
 
 British Church repelled St. Augustine of Canterbury, 35 ; not bound by 
 Canons of Sardica, 36. 
 
 Bull, of Pius IV., II; to validate alienation of abbey-lands, 39, foot-note; 
 of Julius II., 84 ; of Paul IV., 73, 84. 
 
 Cathohc, Date and meaning of the word, 17, 19, 22 ; not a special attribute 
 of the Roman Church, 2 1 . 
 
 Chichele, Archbishop, resists Pope Martin V., 38. 
 
 Chrysostom, St., on St. Peter’s primacy, 56. 
 
 Clement of Rome, St., silent as to St Peter’s connexion with Rome, 50 ; his 
 ordination as Pope, 51, 52. 
 
 Clementine Homilies condemned at Rome, 52. 
 
 Communion in one kind only, novel, condemned as heretical by Popes, 10, 1 1 ; 
 not known to St Gregory the GreaC 35 ; how effected, 42^ foot-note. 
 
 Consecrations of Bishops under Henry VHI, 68, 69. 
 
 Constance, Council of, first authority for communion in one kind onlv, ii ; 
 irregular in constitution and proceedings, 83, foot-note ; source of a new 
 Papal dynasty, 83, foot-note. 
 
 Councils, African, 18, 20, 28, 29; Chalcedon, 60, 63; Clermont, 10; Con- 
 stantinople, 60, 62, 64; Easterficld, 37; Ephesus, 63; Florence, ii ; 
 Frankfort, 12, 64 ; General, functions of, 22 ; how many, 62 ; convoked by 
 the Emperors, not by Popes, 62-64 » >^alem, 58, 80 ; Lateran, 9 ; 
 
11 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Milan, 26 ; Nice I., 62 ; Nice II., 12, 62, 64 ; Rome, 52, 63 ; Thionville, 
 61 ; Trent, 6, foot-note, 8, 37, 72 ; Vatican, 6, foot-note, 14. 
 
 Creed of Pope Pius IV., twelve articles wherein it differs from the other 
 creeds, 7-13. 
 
 Creeds, Three, common to Roman and English Churches, 3. 
 
 Criminals, Proportion of Roman Catholic, 46. 
 
 Cyprian, St., resists Papal authority, 18, 20 ; denies St. Peter’s primacy, 27, 
 foot-note. 
 
 Damasus, Pope, Attitude of St. Ambrose towards, 26 ; letter of St, Jerome 
 to, 30. 
 
 Development, what, 2 ; not admitted by the Roman Church, 2, foot-note. 
 
 Dionysius of Corinth, first mentions St. Peter in connexion with Rome, 51. 
 
 Doctors of the Church, what and who, 24. 
 
 Edmund, St., Archbishop, disobeys a Papal mandate, 38. 
 
 England, Church of, resisted Popes, 37, 38 ; holds all that is ancient in 
 Roman belief, 14, 39 ; not endowed as a Roman dependency, 39; case as 
 against Church of Rome, 44 ; orders of, impugned, 66 ; interference of 
 State with, 77 ; canonical position of Bishops in, 78 ; summary of position 
 as compared with that of Roman Church, 85, 86. 
 
 Fabian, St., first known martyr Pope, 57, foot-note. 
 
 Firmilian, St., mentions claim made by Pope Stephen I. to the Petrine succes- 
 sion, 52. 
 
 Fisher, Cardinal, acknowledges modern date of Indulgences and Purgatory, 
 II, 12. 
 
 Fitzmaurice, Bishop, acknowledges in Council of Trent that no case could be 
 made out against Anglican Orders, 72. 
 
 France, became Atheist in 1793, 44 ; present number of avowed Atheists in, 
 44. 
 
 Gelasius, Pope, condemned communion in one kind, 10, 23. 
 
 Gregory the Great, St., 25, 31, 32, 34, 35, 56, 57, foot-note. 
 
 Gregory VII., originator of the modem system of Indulgences, 12 ; resisted 
 by Aichbishop Lanfranc, 37 ; established the Papal despotism, 56. 
 
 Grosseteste, Bishop, resists Papal mandates, 38. 
 
 Hadrian I., Pope, forced to retract his approval of image-worship, 64. 
 
 “ Hail Mary,” when introduced as a prayer, 12. 
 
 Heart, Sacred, Cult of, 14. 
 
 Hefele, Bishop, 19, 36. 
 
 Henry VIII., King, his views of the royal powers, 68 ; issued mandate for 
 Barlow’s consecration, 69. 
 
 Heretics, and children of, incapable of Roman Orders, 73. 
 
 Honorius, Pope, condemned as a heretic, 64. 
 
 Hosius of Cordova, President of Council of Nice, but not Papal legate, 62. 
 
 Ignatius, St., on meaning of Catholic, 17; silent as to St. Peter’s Roman 
 Episcopate, 50. 
 
 Images, Cultus of, 12, 23 
 
 Immaculate Conception ofB.V.M., 15, 23, 29, 30. 
 
 Indulgences, 12. 
 
 Tnfallibilit''. Papal, 14, 15, 23. 
 
 Innocent III.. Pope, vainly attempts to set aside Magna Charta, 38. 
 
 Innocent VIII., Pope, simoniacally elected, 83. 
 
 Intention, Doctrine of, in Roman Church, 72, 73. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 Ill 
 
 Invocation of Saints, ii. 
 
 Ireland, Condition of Roman Catholic, 45. 
 
 Irenaeus, St., unjustifiably alleged as a witness for the authority of the Roman 
 Church, 18 ; decisive evidence of, against St. Peter’s Episcopate at Rome, 
 51 - 
 
 Jerome, St., 25, 30, 31, 32. 
 
 Jesuits, result of a century’s teaching in France, 44. 
 
 Jewish-Christian Church, separate in Antioch and Ephesus, perhaps at Rome, 
 80. 
 
 Julius II., Pope, simoniacally elected, 83 ; issues a Bull against simony, 84. 
 
 Jurisdiction, what, 76; “actual” and “ habitual,” 76 ; creation of human 
 law, 77 ; that of Bishops and Metropolitans, 78 ; valid in Church of 
 England, 78 ; voided in Church of Rome, 81-84. 
 
 Lanfranc, Archbishop, disregards orders of Gregory VII., 37, 38. 
 
 Langton, Archbishop, resists Innocent III., 38. 
 
 Leo I., Pope, condemns communion in one kind only, 10; earliest Roman 
 theologian, 13 ; his view of St. Peter’s primacy, 56 ; accepted the doctrine 
 of the Council of Chalcedon, though refusing to allow its twenty-eighth 
 canon, 60 ; his “ Tome ” criticized in Council of Chalcedon, 63. 
 
 Leo X., Pope, in validly elected, 83. 
 
 Liberius, Pope, an apostate, 19. 
 
 Linus, St,, first Bishop of Rome, 51. 
 
 Manning, Cardinal, testimony in favour of Church of England, 45 ; sermon 
 by, criticized, 54-65 ; uncanonical position of, 74, 79. 
 
 Mariolatry, St. Ambrose on, 28 ; no traces of it in the Latin Doctors, 29-32. 
 
 Martin V., Pope, resisted by the English Primate, 38 ; first of a new Papal 
 dynasty, 85. 
 
 Martyrs, No ancient Acts of the, in Roman archives, 57. 
 
 Metropolitans, originally independent of Rome, 78. 
 
 Missal, Roman, faulty teaching on Eucharistic sacrifice, 71, 72, foot-note. 
 
 Mivart, Professor, Testimony of, in favour of Church of England, 45. 
 
 “ Nag’s Head Fable,” 68. 
 
 Nestorian Ordinal, only one which satisfies the new Roman conditions of 
 validity, 71. 
 
 Nestorius, tried over again by Council of Ephesus after a trial by the Pope, 63. 
 
 Old Religion, Definition of, i, 2, 3. 
 
 Orders, Anglican, Arguments against, 67 ; such arguments shewn not to be 
 genuine, 72. 
 
 Orders, Roman, Doubtfulness of, 72-74. 
 
 Ordinal, Anglican, valid, 70, 71 ; Nestorian, 71 ; Roman, 71, 78. 
 
 Papacy, refounded by Council of Constance, 83, foot-note. 
 
 Papias, St., does not witness to identity of Rome and Babylon, 49. 
 
 Parker, Archbishop, his consecration denied, 67 ; but only in bad* faith 68 * 
 circumstances of his election and consecration, 78. 
 
 Paschal II., Pope, complains of English Church, 37 ; resisted by 37. 
 
 Patriarchate, Limits of Roman, 59, 65. ’ 
 
 Paul, St., silent as to St. Peter’s presence at Rome, 50 ; real founder of 
 Roman Church, 50, 53 ; sole Apostle of the Gentiles, 59 ; not commissioned 
 or taught by St. Peter, 59; survived St. Peter by a year, 81 • source of 
 original Papal succession, 81, 82. ’ 
 
 Pelagian heresy acquitted by Pope Zosimus, 29. 
 
IV 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Peter, St., not the Rock or foundation of the Church, 27, 28, 30, 59 ; on 
 proof of his having been Bishop of Rome, 49, 53 ; meaning put by the 
 Fathers on text “ Feed My sheep,” addressed to, 55, 56 ; not sovereign 
 over the other Apostles, 27, 31, 47, 58, 59, 80 ; limited after a time to the 
 Jewish part of the Church, 59 ; had no share in commissioning St Paul, 59 ; 
 writes his First Epistle to Jewish Christians only, 81 ; martyred a year 
 before St. Paul, 82 ; himself last of any Petrine succession at Rome, 82. 
 
 Peter Lombard, first mentions seven Sacraments, 8. 
 
 Pius IV., Bull of Pope, ii ; creed of, 7, 21, 23. 
 
 Pole, Cardinal, quits Council of Trent because of its ruling on Justification, 
 9 ; his death left English primacy canonically vacant, 78. 
 
 Pope, still title for every parish priest in Greek Church ; limited to Bishop of 
 Rome by Gregory VII., 61. 
 
 Popes frequently deposed, 13 ; no trustworthy list of early, 81 ; probably 
 joint Popes in very ancient times, 81 ; none de jure since 1484, 83, 84. 
 
 Privilege, Rules of Roman Church law as to, 47, 48. 
 
 Purgatory, ii. 
 
 Re-baptism, makes incapable of ordination by Roman Church law, 73. 
 
 Reformation, Result of, upon England, 42-44. 
 
 Roman Catholics, how distinguished from Anglicans, 34. 
 
 Rome, how often named in New Testament, and how, 49 ; identification of, 
 with Babylon doubtful, 49, 50 ; not scene of St. Peter’s conflict with Simon 
 Magus, 51 ; possibly the place of St. Peter’s martyrdom, 51 ; capital of 
 Empire, 59. 
 
 Rome, Church of, adds a fourth Creed to the three old ones, 7 ; not Mother 
 nor Mistress of other Churches, 13 ; claims to be the whole Catholic 
 Church, 16; such claim not recognised by the more ancient Fathers, 17; 
 rallying point for traditions from all quarters, 18 ; uot the whole Catholic 
 Church, nor empowered to speak in its name, 21, 31 ; not Roman Catholic 
 in the time of St. Gregory the Great, 34, 35 ; case of Church of England 
 against, 44 ; moral failure as teacher, 45 ; ground of alleged supremacy of, 
 47 ; styled Place and Chair of Peter, 52 ; not organised at the date of the 
 Epistle to the Romans, 53 ; true grounds for primacy of, 59; succession of 
 Bishops broken in, 61, 82, 83 ; primacy conferred for political reasons, 60; 
 submitted to condemnation of Honorius, 64 ; orders disputable, 72 ; no 
 Petrine succession in, 81, 82. 
 
 Sacraments, Seven, first specified by Peter Lombard, 8. 
 
 Saints, Departed, still part of “living voice ” of the Church, 23. 
 
 Sardica, Council of, Canons and Letter of, probably forged, 36. 
 
 Scripture, Interpretation of, 8. 
 
 Simon Magus, Alleged conflict of St. Peter with, not at Rome, 51. 
 
 .Simony voids all ecclesiastical office, 84; effect of, on Papal succession, 84,85. 
 
 Smyth, P. J., M.P., testimony as to moral failure of Roman Church m 
 Ireland, 45. 
 
 Socrates and Sozomen, do not know the alleged Letter of Sardican Council, 
 
 36. 
 
 Stephen, I., Pope, claims to be heir of St. Peter, 52, 53. 
 
 Substance, what, 9, 10. 
 
 Theodoret does not know the alleged Letter of Sardican Council, 36. 
 
 Transubstantiation mediaeval in date, 9 ; virtually abandoned now by Roman 
 Catholics, 9, 10. 
 
 Universal, Title of, condemned by Gregory the Great, 31, 35. 
 
 Urban II., Pope, condemns communion in one kind, 10. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 V 
 
 Vicar of Christ, title anciently coairnon to all Bishops, 6i. 
 
 Vincent of Lerins, St., indirect witness against Roman claims, 21, 22. 
 
 Wilfrid, Archbishop, attests opposition of English Church to Rome, 37. 
 
 Zosimus, Pope, acquits the Pelagian heresy, and is compelled to retract his 
 decision, 29. 
 
AN ASSOCIATION OF CLERGY AND 
 LAITY FOR DEFENSIVE AND GENERAL PURPOSES. 
 
 Offices: PALACE CHAMBEES, 9, BEIDOE ST.. WESTMINSTER. S.W. 
 
 President— ms GRACE THE ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY. 
 Vice-Presidents— ms GRACE THE ARCHBISHOP OF YORK, AND NEARLY ALL 
 
 THE BISHOPS. 
 
 Chairman of the Executive Committee — THE LORD EGERTON OF TATTON. 
 
 General Secretary— H. GRANVILLE DICKSON, M.A. 
 
 Financial Secretary — G, H. F. NYE, EsQ. 
 
 General Organising Secretary — Rev. C. A. WELLS, B.A. 
 
 Special Lecturer to the Institution — H. BYRON REED, EsQ., M.P. 
 
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 District Organising Secretary for the Midlands — W. H. MASON, EsQ. 
 
 Bankers — MESSRS. HOARE & Co. 
 
 T he Work of the Church Defence Institution has become once 
 more of the first importance. Mr. Gladstone, who has hitherto 
 been regarded as opposed to the Disestablishment of the Church of 
 England and Wales, and who, in 1870, declared that he would look 
 upon it as ‘a national mischief,’ has now expressed his deliberate 
 opinion, in a speech delivered at Nottingham on October ig, 1S87, 
 that it is ^ unquestionably ripe for consideration.’ Another promi- 
 nent leader of the Liberal party. Sir William Harcourt, has stated 
 that ‘ the Church Establishment in Wales is an institution which it 
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 Under these circumstances, the Church Defence Institution urges 
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 the Principality. No well-informed person but is aware that it is 
 impossible to separate the Church in Wales from the rest of the 
 Church in England. There is ‘ a cpmplete ecclesiastical, constitu- 
 tional, legal, and, for every practical purpose, historical identity 
 between them.’ An attack on the Church in Wales is, therefore, an 
 attack on the Church of England, and to be repelled with vigour 
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 lications, pamphlets, placards, leaflets, &c., may be had from the 
 Church Defence Office, 9, Bridge Street, S.W. 
 
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 Published Monthly, price Id.; or Is. 6d. per annum, post free. 
 
 This Paper contains special and exclusive information on the Church 
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