Ward

MhgSl 1245 SHI

AN ADDRESS

TO

MEMBERS OF CONVOCATION

IN PROTEST AGAINST THE PROPOSED STATUTE.

THE REV. W. G. WARD, M.A.
FELLOW OF BALLIOL COLLEGE, OXPOBD.

LONDON:
JAMES TOOVEY, 192, PICCADILLY.

M.DCCC.XLV.

London :
Printed by S. & J. Bentley, Wilson, and Fley,
Bangor House, Shoe Lane.

PREFACE.

The publication of this pamphlet has been un
fortunately much delayed by circumstances which it
is unnecessary to specify : for there was indeed no
reason why it should have occupied me long, as the
whole matter of it was in my mind before, and all
I had to do was to give it expression. However,
there is still full time for those Members of Convo
cation who think of voting, to give it that careful
perusal which I claim at their hands as my right.
And I am anxious that they should fully under
stand what they are to expect. I am not professing
in this pamphlet at all to defend my work, either in
substance or in tone : whether I was justified in
using language of such keen and unmeasured invec
tive against the system introduced among us by the
Reformation ; — whether my theory on conscience is
true or questionable; — on what grounds I consider it
safe (or rather my bounden duty) to remain at present
a member of our Church ; — these, and such as these,
are of the utmost importance in themselves, but are
A 2

IV
wholly irrelevant to the issue which Convocation is
called on to determine. What I have wished to do
here, is to impress on the minds of members of Con
vocation what that issue is, and to address a formal
argument in my own behalf on that issue.
Nor, again, does this argument profess to be com
plete ; for this, if for no other reason, that a most im
portant branch of it, the historical, has been taken
in hand by a writer far more competent to do it
justice. That three years should have been allowed
to elapse since Mr. Oakeley published his defence
of Tract XC.,* and advocated, on historical grounds,
the position, that the Articles were intended to in
clude Roman Catholics ; that during this time no
sort of answer, or attempt at an answer, to his ar
gument has been published ; and then, that Mem
bers of Convocation should think of ruling the matter
by the mere force of numbers, by voting without so
much as having professed to give this argument their
most careful consideration ; — this seems to me among
those instances (not altogether rare at present) of
monstrous and glaring injustice, which future ages
will be slow to credit. How any Member of Con
vocation can reconcile it to his conscience to vote
in favour of the present motion without most care
fully weighing Mr. Oakeley's work, and being pre-
* " The subject of Tract XC. historically examined," &c. London,
Toovey, (Second Edition,) 1845.

pared (in his own mind at least) with an answer to
it, is to me inconceivable.
Again : even if Mr. Oakeley's argument, or, again,
my own which here follows, be considered by any
/^satisfactory, it does not therefore follow that such
persons should vote for the motion brought forward
by the Hebdomadal Board, or that they are justified
in even remaining neutral. Many may think that
the proposition, which they are called on to affirm, is
in itself true ; but may yet think it very undesirable
that Convocation should censure my work, when it
has allowed works of a distinctly heretical character
to pass wwcensured. On the other side, of course, is
to be weighed the circumstance, that I have thrown
out so very open and distinct a challenge to my op
ponents. Should any, however, still be of opinion
that it is undesirable for Convocation to affirm the
proposition submitted to them, they are most plainly
justified in voting against it, even though they agree
with its abstract wording.
Since I wrote the body of the pamphlet, a ' Letter
to the Vice-Chancellor,' by Dr. Tait,* has appeared.
I am really most gratified and most thankful to him
for his very kind and flattering mention of myself:
and, in a different sense, I am also very thankful
for the whole ' Letter.' It is written with an open
ness and honesty, which must shew how very sin-
* Published by Blackwood, Edinburgh and London, 1845.

VI
cerely it expresses his sentiments ; the note in page
16 must shew what his theological opinions are; and
the observations from page 12 to page 15 must shew
by how lax an interpretation he himself is able
to subscribe our formularies. Dr. Tait is a Select
Preacher: shall he, I ask Members of Convocation,
shall he, with his opinions, be authorized to teach
the youth of Oxford with an especial authority, and
shall I, with mine, be deprived of my degrees ? I
leave to them the answer. He will not, I am sure,
so far misunderstand these remarks, as to doubt that
I most cordially reciprocate his expressions of good
will to myself; and very highly admire the many
excellent and most estimable qualities of his cha
racter. I will not dissemble my apprehension, that the tone
of the following pamphlet may possibly give offence
and pain to many whom I deeply revere. I have
found that the same was the case in regard to the
tone of my original work, and, indeed, I expected
before-hand that it would be so. As to the work,
an opportunity will probably present itself of en
tering fully into its defence in this particular: of
the present pamphlet I have only to say that,
when I consider the extreme laxity of interpretation
which all parties amongst us must admit into our
formularies when they subscribe them, it appears to
me perfectly outrageous that they should object to my

Vll
subscription ; and I could not conscientiously adopt
a tone which could be taken to imply less than
this. But I do earnestly hope and believe, that no
unbecoming arrogance is really implied in the bold
ness and decision of my language, either here or
elsewhere. If I know anything at all of myself, I
should say that, whether or not I be considered to
rate too highly my intellectual powers (an imputation
on which I am not in the least sensitive), at all
events, as to my moral qualities, I am in some consi
derable measure impressed with a knowledge of my de
plorable deficiency; and with a deep conviction, that
if I am able to render any service to theology, it
must be by accenting religious truths and moral prin-
cipjes-with out. question at the„ hands of holy men, and
confining myself altogether to the humble and merely
intellectual task of analysing those truths and apply
ing those principles.
For want of a better opportunity, I may here
mention, that the article which has appeared on my
work in the Quarterly Review, seems to me so de
finite and argumentative in its character, as to re
quire at my hands a reply ; which I hope to give it
as soon as my present excitement and subsequent
weariness shall have come to an end. I am at once
so confident of the truth of the general views con
tained in my work, and so sensible of the inadequate
manner in which I have been able to exhibit and

Vlll
illustrate them, that I hail with peculiar pleasure
an attack, which will give me the opportunity (1) of
understanding more distinctly the prevalent miscon
ceptions (to me very strange) as to my meaning, (2)
of explaining it more distinctly, and (3) of proving my
positions more irresistibly. Certainly, as far as I see
yet, I am quite unable, in consequence of that article,
either to modify or regret a single sentence I have
written. It is not, I am well aware, by arguments such as
those which follow, or by disputations of any sort, that
we can hope really to heal the unhappy disorders of our
Church. It is in proportion only as we are able all of
us to make the regulation of our hearts and lives the
one pervading object of our earthly existence, that we
shall be brought towards agreement with each other,
and towards the full ' truth as it is in Jesus.' It has
been indeed my very principal aim in the ' Ideal of
a Christian Church' to vindicate and illustrate this
great principle. True it is, that argumentative attacks
must be opposed by argumentative answers; that a
formal indictment must be met by a methodical de
fence: but, still, if I may conclude with a passage
which I have seen quoted from St. Ambrose, ' non
in dialecticd complacuit Domino salvare populum
suum.' London.
Jan. 14, 1845.

IX

For the convenience of readers, I here subjoin
the passages in my work, in which I treat of those
apparently anti-Roman Articles, which I had omitted
to consider in my two pamphlets. I believe if they
are read in connexion with those pamphlets, it will
be found that no part of our formularies, which has
been quoted against me, has been left unnoticed.
ARTICLE XIX.

It has been considered by some, that subscription to our XlXth
Article requires the formation and expression of an opinion, that the
formal doctrine of the Roman Church is erroneous in some particu
lar : but a very little consideration will shew, that no one is at all
committed by this Article to so painfully presumptuous a sentiment.
The Article gives a definition of the Visible Church, and then at
once proceeds to call the Church of Rome a Church ; so much then
at once follows, that the Article implies the (local) Church of Rome
to be part of that " congregation of faithful men, in the which the
pure Word of God is preached, and the Sacraments be duly adminis
tered according to Christ's ordinance in all those things that of necessity
are requisite to the same." It then asserts that, like other Churches,
the Church of Rome hath erred "not only in their living and man
ner of ceremonies, but also in matters of faith." Even without
commenting on the significant use of the word ' their,' which really
seems to me at once to point to members of the Church of Rome, the
general scope of the Article is quite sufficient for my purpose. For,
as is plain, the Church of Rome is here asserted to have erred ' in
matters of faith,' exactly in the same sense in which she is asserted
to have erred in ' living.' Now there is literally no meaning in the
assertion, that the abstract Church of Rome has erred in ' their
living ;' it must by absolute necessity be certain of her concrete mem
bers who have so erred : certain of her concrete members then it is,

who are here asserted to have erred in matters of faith, i. e. of reli
gious belief. This sentiment I most fully hold; for instance, many
of the opinions held by some in Rome, at various times, on the sub
ject of purgatory, are held, I suppose, by very few educated Roman
Catholics at the present day.
I subscribe then the Article in the following sense. I take it to
afiirm, that whereas the Visible Church of Christ is a certain congre
gation of faithful men, &c, every local Church, included in that
body, will contain members not only who act wickedly, not only who
are superstitiously addicted to outward observances, but also who err
on one point or other of religious belief. If this appears the solemn
enunciation of a mere truism, I quite admit that it is so : but so far
am I from allowing that a probability thence follows of its not hav
ing been a sense intended by the Convocation of the time to be ad
missible, that on the contrary nothing seems so natural, as that
when a large number of persons meet together, of most opposite
opinions, each protesting against what clashes with his own, the re
sult of the various eliminations shall be a formula, which gives no
offence to any, because it contains no specific meaning whatever.
The reader should be reminded, that in my pamphlets, three years
since, I distinctly charged the Reformers with fully tolerating the
absence from the Articles of any real anti-Roman determination, so
only they were allowed to preserve an apparent one : a charge which
I here beg, as distinctly, to repeat. I should not close this note with
out observing, that at first sight of the Latin Version, (which accord
ing to Bp. Burnet's account is neither of greater nor of less autho
rity than the English,) the interpretation I have given appears less
obvious than it does in the English; mainly from the words ' agenda'
and ' credenda,' which seem at first sight to speak of formal appoint
ment. This mistake however is removed on closer inspection ; for the
words are, 'qua? credenda sunt,' not fuerunt ; things which are mat
ters of belief, or things which (as being true) ought to be believed.
I am of course quite aware, that the whole of the present argu
ment will be considered as dishonest special pleading by those, who
will not give themselves the trouble to look candidly at the wording
of our Articles, and fairly to examine the allegation of disingenuous-
ness brought against their framers. Nor do I deny, rather I have
plainly said, that the first blush of the Article appears to imply some
reflection on the formal doctrine of the Church of Rome : this indeed
will make it a more unexceptionable evidence, for the truth of the
view which I maintain. For I challenge any objector to give any

XI

meaning to the Article, word by word, which can, by possibility, bring
the formal doctrine of Rome within its scope. For example, if the
phrase had been 'their precepts,' although the pronoun 'their' would
still have been a difficulty, it might have been plausibly enough
maintained, that the formal teaching of Rome on moral points is
condemned in the first clause, and by parity of reasoning her formal
teaching on doctrinal points in the last. But the phrase being, as it
is, ' their living,' any such attempt is impossible.

ARTICLE XXVIII.
'High-churchmen' will, I suppose, with one consent agree, that
the doctrine denied by our Church, under the name ' Transubstan-
tiation,' is the doctrine of our Lord's Body being present after Con
secration, in such sort, that if our senses were not miraculously
withholden, they would perceive it. But that doctrine is virtually
denied by the Roman formularies, as well as by our own ; for, accord
ing to the scholastic use of the words, ' substance' and ' accidents,'
the latter alone can by possibility fall under the cognizance of the
senses ; and it is a ruled point that they are not changed. The
' substance,' in the case of any body whatever, is wholly unknown to
us, and its real nature is just as mysterious without supposing any
change, as it will be with that supposition. The Catechism of the
Council of Trent says, ' that Christ the Lord is not in this Sacra
ment as in a place . . ¦ nor as He is great or small, which belongs to
quantity ; but as He is a substance.' And again, the accidents of
the Bread and Wine, after Consecration, ' beyond all the ordinary
course of nature support themselves and rest on no other thing.'
(De Eucharistia, xliv. xlv.) The substance of a body then, in
scholastic language, is that wholly unknown and inconceivable
thing, (not inclosed in, or referable to, space) which is the ' substra
tum' of 'accidents,' or of what we now-a-days call 'phenomena.'
Nor have I ever been able, by the utmost stretch of my abilities, to
understand how English Churchmen, in saying that the ' bread '
remains, can possibly mean any thing different, from what Roman
Catholics mean in saying that the ' accidents of the bread ' remain.
It must be fully acknowledged that one hears of a popular notion
in the middle ages, contradictory to this doctrine ; a ' notion that
Christ's body in the Eucharist is " carnally pressed" with the teeth ;

XII

that it is a body or substance of a certain extension and bulk in
space, and a certain figure and due disposition of parts.' How far
such a notion may have received more or less countenance from
theologians, (e. g., Bellarmine,) I am not prepared with an opinion.
Such popular notion, however, is plainly that which is condemned in
our twenty-eighth Article: it is one which all members of our
Church do readily condemn, and which, as I have said, the formu
laries of the Roman Church are very far indeed from countenancing
or supporting.

TO THOSE

MEMBEES OF CONVOCATION
WHO PURPOSE RECORDING THEIR VOTES ON
THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 13.
There is one circumstance which I am anxious, far
beyond all others, to impress on your memory ; if you
neglect to consider it, you will commit the most mon
strous injustice. That circumstance is, that you are
called upon to exercise, not a dogmatical, but an inter
pretative act. I beg your careful attention, while I
explain more clearly what I mean.
If the question proposed were, whether you ap
prove the passages selected from my work, or my
work itself considered as a whole, my hope of a
favourable answer would be but small. Believing in
deed, as I firmly do, that the views contained generally
in the work, and specifically in the selected proposi
tions, are most true and certain, — I also believe, that
the more you bring yourselves to act consistently
and unflinchingly on. your existing principles, whatever
they are ; — the more accurately you analyse your moral
impressions ; — and the more steadily you look facts in
the face ; — so much the more speedily you will be led
to approve and embrace those views. But I should
indeed be extravagantly sanguine, if I supposed it
possible that, in the short space which has elapsed
since the publication of the work, its arguments could

14
have had any such miraculous effect, as to revolutionize
your whole course of thought; or that, educated as
we all have been, as in a sort of first principle, to
revere the Reformation, it can be otherwise than
very slowly and gradually that what I conceive to be
juster opinions will make their way ; and that we shall
learn to deplore that event, as among the heaviest of
God's judgments. An adverse vote, whether upon the
merits of my work generally, or of the selected pro
positions in particular, could tell me no more than I
already know; viz., that the positions there contained
are, as yet, in the highest degree unpopular among
members of the English Church.
And yet, even as to the substance itself of my work,
you will do me the greatest injustice if you suppose its
general staple to be intensely violent statements, and
an (at first sight) paradoxical energy of expression.
If you read it as a whole, I am sure you will find it
far otherwise. You will find that such principles as
the following are not merely incidentally admitted,
but most warmly advocated ; and that they are in
deed far more conspicuous features in the work, than
are those contained in the selected propositions:
That inward sanctity is the real sum and substance of
the Christian religion, and that all outward forms,
ordinances, rules, and discipline, are more worthless
than chaff or dust, except so far as they minister to
such holiness; — that to renounce all confidence in
their own merits and look for salvation wholly to
the atoning death of our Saviour, is the habit of mind
towards which real holiness leads Christians ever
more and more near ;— that ardent and absorbing per
sonal love for our blessed Lord is the one vital princi
ple which animates the true believer, so far as he is

15
such ; — these, and others such as these, form the
very foundation on which the general course of argu
ment in my work proceeds. And to go to matters
which, though very important, are of less vital mo
ment, and on which the extracts officially taken
from my work might of themselves tend still more to
produce a wrong impression as to its general spirit,
a kind friend of mine has put together selections of
an opposite import, which I have circulated among
members of Convocation, 'illustrative of its tendency
to promote dutifulness to the English Church, unity
among her members, and charity towards dissentients.'
However, I .am well enough aware, that I should
have very little hope of a favourable verdict at your
hands, if the merits of the work were the point at
issue: and therefore it is that I am so anxious to
impress on your minds the plain fact, that they are
wholly beside the issue. The Hebdomadal Board has
declined to place before Convocation any proposition
as to its theological character, under a belief, as it is
generally said, that the University has no concern
with theological truth as such. The question turns
wholly and solely on my ' good faith' in signing our
formularies. The resolution proposed to you is, that
"the passages read are" — not "false, pernicious,
anti-evangelical, " or the like ; I have no doubt that
the great majority of you think them all this, —
but ' are inconsistent with the Articles of Religion
of the Church of England, and with the declaration in
respect of the Articles made and subscribed by Wil
liam George Ward, and with the good faith of me, the
said William George Ward, in respect of such Declar
ation and Subscription.' This and this only is the ques
tion which you have to try ; and the more intense is

16
your feeling of dislike to mytheology, the more anxious
a duty does it become for you to watch narrowly your
own minds, lest any prejudice should disturb your clear
judgment ; and to study the formularies of the Church
of England in a judicial and dispassionate temper,
that you may discover what really is, and what is not,
contrary to their determination. If you pursue any
other course, if you make your vote on this question
in any degree a party vote, if you consciously allow
your mind to be biassed for one moment in its deci
sion by your aversion to the doctrines I hold, you
pursue a course, which would in private life lead a man
to be shunned as a dishonest and unprincipled person.
What would be said of a juryman who should find a
prisoner guilty on a specific charge of stealing, without
attempting to weigh the question how far his act is
really theft in the eye of the law, and should allege as
his reason, that he considered the moral turpitude of
the act itself to form a justification for any course of
conduct he could adopt in order to obtain its punish
ment? You will say perhaps, that the evil character of the
doctrines advocated makes it in the highest degree
probable a priori, that they are condemned by our
formularies. I deny this presumption wholly ; and
call on you, if you can, to prove it. Do you claim
infallibility for our Church ? On the contrary, the
ordinary language held respecting her, we all know, is
as follows ; — viz., that our belief in the pure and apos
tolical character of that system, which has prevailed
in her since the Reformation, is grounded on a free
examination of the formularies then put forth, and
on their comparison whether with Scripture or Anti
quity. I call on you then to exercise, bond fide, that

17
free examination into our formularies ; I call on you,
not to take for granted that they exclude what you con
sider the most noxious errors, but to look honestly
and candidly into the question, whether they exclude
them. I firmly believe that they do not ; and on that
point issue is joined.
At starting, however, I have to make a concession,
which will have been anticipated by every one, as it
has been selected from my work for reprobation by
the Hebdomadal Board. I concede that there are
some of our formularies which I subscribe in a ' non-
natural ' sense. It appears that some have supposed
me to concede, in- saying this, that I differ from other
members of our Church in the peculiarly 'non-natural'
sense which I ascribe to certain of our formularies when
I assent to them ; whereas a reference to the context
will shew my distinct argument to be, that all, who
subscribe our formularies, subscribe several of them
in a 'non-natural' sense. And this is the main argu
ment that I propose to illustrate in the present
pamphlet : for every other part of the ground I have
already trodden in detail. I maintain (1), that every
one who now subscribes our formularies is compelled
to attach a most violent and strained meaning to
several among their number ; (2) that, whereas the
parties which now divide our Church are in the main
representatives of parties which have existed within
her ever since the Reformation, the same violence
has been done to the spirit of parts of our formularies
by all subscribers to them from the very time when
they were first put together ; and (3) by consequence
from this, that it has always been intended that they
should be subscribed according to an extremely lax and
vao-ue construction. And since the proposed measure
B

18
is so very peculiarly and personally directed against
myself, I trust it will not appear unbecomingly ego
tistical if I add, that those with whom I feel seem to
me in two particulars to exceed all other parties in
the honesty of their dealing with our formularies; first,
that there is no one part of them which has ever been
quoted against us, in regard to which we have not
publicly stated the sense in which we sign that part;
and secondly, that we have plainly put forth a positive
theory to account for the peculiar construction, and
the contradictory spirit, of our Church's authoritative
documents. In neither of these respects has any
other party in the English Church been equally
straightforward. It remains, before closing these preliminary remarks,
to notice another not uncommon misapprehension. It
is continually forgotten, that our subscription to the
Prayer-book is as stringent as that to the Articles ; and
that there is neither any authoritative declaration of
our Church, nor any principle plainly professed by her
which would lead to the conclusion, that there is the
slightest difference as to the degree of strictness in
which our assent is required to either of the two. The
declaration which you all have taken on the former
subject is, that there is nothing in the Prayer-book
contrary to the word of God ; on the latter, that the
Articles are accordant with the word of God ; and no
one can say that the difference between these expressions
is such, as to justify a less close and literal adherence
to the former than to the latter. Much might be said
for an even stronger determination ; by how much it
seems more shocking to use words in a non-natural
sense when we address God in prayer, than when we
merely subscribe a human formulary.

TO ' EVANGELICAL ' MEMBERS OF
CONVOCATION.
First of all I challenge you to compare the open
ness and honesty of your subscription with that of
mine. You will not of course deny, that the funda
mental principles of your theology are the two follow
ing: first, that justified persons may, in all ordinary
cases, know themselves to be justified ; and secondly,
that the characteristic mark of the justified is an un
divided trust for salvation in the merits of Christ's
Atonement. There is no more common allegation
which you make in opposing Roman doctrine, than
that the latter leaves Christians subject to that op
pressive dismay, which must result from a conscious
ness of the possibility of eternal punishment being
their eternal lot. This allegation is of course simply
unmeaning, unless those who hold your doctrine have
the means of being relieved from this dismay ; or, in
other words, of knowing their own justification. And
such accordingly is your universal opinion : you think
that Christians may ordinarily know themselves to re
nounce all trust in their own merits and to look for
salvation only to Christ ; and that, knowing this, they
are saved from the wrath to come.
Now, first I wish to observe that this principle
should, in all consistency, lead farther ; it should
B 2

20
lead you to suppose that justified Christians are free
from the possibility of falling from a state of grace:
for otherwise, surely, they are not saved from those
terrors, which you would fain represent as the ex
clusive portion of those who reject your doctrine. And
certain it is that many of you do carry on your prin
ciple to this its legitimate conclusion. Thus the
' Declaration of ministers and members of the Church
of England respecting several controverted truths,' a
document which has given rise to much public obser
vation, says distinctly, ' ungodly persons have neither
been born again of the Spirit nor justified;' or, by lo
gical conversion, those who have been once born again
of the Spirit and justified, are never afterwards un
godly. And Bishop O'Brien, in his work on faith,
makes the same statement ; e. g., in his paraphrase of
St. James's expressions as to justification by works.
I beg to call the attention of all such persons to
part of our 16th article. " After we have received
the Holy Ghost, we may depart from grace given and
fall into sin." I say to them — .put fairly down on
paper the sense in which you subscribe these words;
compare the naturalness and obviousness of that sense
with the naturalness and obviousness of the sense
in which I subscribe any article you like to name ;
and do not imagine that, unless you shall have fairly
in the sight of God applied yourselves to this task,
you can give otherwise than a grossly dishonest vote
for my condemnation.
However, I will not lay undue stress on an opinion
which, I know, is not universally held among you ;
though I consider that in consistency it ought to
be so held. I will build mainly on the two propo
sitions with which I started, and which you do

21
universally hold. To me it appears almost incon
ceivable, did not experience shew it to be true,
that it should be necessary for me to say one word
in illustration of the position I am now going to
assume ; viz., that those propositions are to the full as
inconsistent both with the spirit of the whole Prayer-
book, and with the letter of individual passages, as
my warmest opponent can represent my views to be
to those of the Articles. But in the present state
of things it is necessary to shew this in some little
detail. According to your view, nominal Christians are
divided into two classes ; those who know themselves
to be in a state of justification, and those who, as
yet at least, are not in that state. This is the very
fundamental principle of your theology, and you feel
it to be such. Now do consider, I beseech you, if
this were really the doctrine of the Prayer-book,
how plainly, how unmistakably, it must be written
on every page ! How indeed, on such an hypothesis,
the justified and unjustified could unite in prayer
at all, it is difficult to fancy : there is but one matter
of real importance for which the justified have to
ask, and that is the continuance of justifying faith ;*
for all else is supposed to flow from that by necessary
consequence : there is but one matter of real im
portance for which the ^justified have to ask, and
that is the possession of justifying faith ; for, till that
be obtained, obedience and self-denial are worthless,
or even worse. In every page, then, of the Prayer-
book should we find this broad distinction, if yours
were the Prayer-book doctrine; can you shew me
* Those, I mean, who think that its continuance need be prayed
for; and that, once had, it can by possibility be lost.

22
even one single page which contains the slightest al
lusion to it? You are called upon to condemn me
for ' divorcing the dry wording of the Articles from
their natural spirit;' supposing, for argument's sake,
you can accept the ' dry wording' of the Prayer-
book, what is the defence of your subscription at
best but the very same, — that you separate that word
ing from the obvious and undeniable spirit ? that
you think it lawful to reject the latter, so only you
can in any way interpret the former consistently with
your views ?
I say, ' granting for argument's sake, you can accept
the dry wording of the Prayer-book ;' I am unable
to grant it otherwise than for argument's sake, for
you have given me no opportunity of judging. Cer
tainly if my conscience be hardened, yours would
appear to be more so ; for whereas there is no one
of our Church's authoritative statements which I have
ever seen quoted against me, in regard to which I
have not published to the world the sense in which
I subscribe it, I can find no such attempt of yours
whatever. As far as appearances go, you accept
formularies which appear to contradict in terms your
most cherished doctrines, without even so much of
scrupulous conscientiousness as is implied in seeing
that there is a difficulty. The sense, which I affix to
several of the Articles in my subscription, is far
fetched enough, I willingly admit ; but what is the
sense which you affix to great parts of the Prayer-
book ? Let me now then proceed, in answer to your
attacks on my 'non-natural' sense, to question you
on the naturalness of your own sense.
To go in detail through every part of the Prayer-
book which, as it appears to me, ought to give you

far more difficulty than any article need give me,
would be an important task, were there sufficient
time : but as there is not, some selection must be
made. And in making this selection, no part can be
taken, with such undeniable fitness, for a specimen
of Prayer-book doctrine as, first, the doctrines taught
therein to the young; and, secondly, the comfort or
warning given therein to those who are soon to meet
their Judge. Accompany me then, I beg you, through
the Catechism and ' Visitation of the Sick.'
1. In the Catechism, I will omit the first answer
on the subject of Baptism, broadly opposed though it
be to your views ; because, for reasons I shall pre
sently give, I prefer reserving the Baptismal ques
tion to a future section of my argument.
In the next answer occurs the promise made in the
child's name by his sponsors ; or, in other words, the
description given by the Prayer-book of our Christian
course. What is that course, so described? It consists
of three parts ; repentance, faith, obedience. What
allusion is there to renouncing confidence in our own
merits ? or looking for salvation to Christ only ? The
answer is plain : that which you consider the very
foundation of all Christian obedience, the very cha
racteristic mark of genuine holiness, finds not so much
as a passing mention in that outline of the Christian
life, which our Church has ordered to be impressed on
her children's mind. Will you say, in reply, that faith
is distinctly specified ? Nay, but observe what is the
account given of faith : — ' that I should believe all
the articles of the Christian faith:' not trust then,
but belief is the Prayer-book version of ' faith.'
This last remark is indeed so important, that a little
more must be said upon it, in reference to other parts of

24
the Prayer-book. When faith is spoken of as a Chris
tian virtue, whether of the two is signified— an undi
vided trust in Christ's merits, or a supernaturally infused
belief in Christian doctrine? You will at once agree
with me, that it is the answer to this question which
discriminates respectively the Roman and ' Evangeli
cal' theologies; and you have only to look through
the Prayer-book to see how general is its usage on
the Roman side. As an instance of what I mean,
take the collect of St. Thomas the Apostle : " Al
mighty and everliving God, who for the more con
firmation of the Faith, didst suffer Thy holy Apostle
Thomas to be doubtful in Thy Son's resurrection,
grant us so perfectly, and without all doubt to believe
in Thy Son Jesus Christ, that our faith in Thy sight
may never be reproved." But I give this only as an
instance : nothing less than looking carefully through
the Prayer-book will sufficiently impress this on your
imaginations. Proceed now with the Catechism. In the next
answer we find every baptized child taught by our
Church to " thank God for having called him to this
state of salvation," and " to pray unto God to give
him His grace that he may continue in the same unto
his life's end." If any special pleading could have
place as to the first of these clauses (though I do
not see how it well can) distinguishing " a state of
salvation " from " a state of justification," the second
must put the matter beyond doubt : the child is
taught, — not to look forward and pray for some new
privilege to be obtained by self-forgetting trust in the
Atonement, — but to pray for the continuance of the
very same state in which Baptism has already placed him.
I am absolutely bewildered by the attempt to consider

25
in what imaginable sense, even the most ' non-natural '
in the world, any ' Evangelical ' can teach his child
such a statement as this. Will you, as honest men,
consider this question and answer it, before you so
much as dream of condemning another ?
We now come to the Creed ; and it is impossible to
omit the observation, how absolutely inconceivable it is,
if the Prayer-book considered the Atonement to be that
one absorbing truth of the Gospel which you consider it,
that there should not be so much as an explicit mention
of it in the Creed. Try to imagine yourselves teaching
your children the ' articles of your belief,' and omitting
all special reference to the Atonement. This is still
more striking in the Athanasian Creed. ' Whoso
ever will be saved, before all things it is necessary'
— what?' — that he renounce all trust in his own
merits? that he close with the gospel offer? that he
believe himself freely pardoned by the Atonement?
Such would he your answer, you must acknowledge:
but widely different is the Prayer-book's answer —
' that he hold the Catholic Faith :' and in all the detailed
exposition of Christian mysteries which follows, the
Atonement receives only a passing allusion. Ask your
selves fairly the question,— can any religious service
be less edifying to you than the Athanasian Creed.
In the following answer observe that every baptized
child is taught to speak of himself as one of the
' elect people of God,' and as being ' sanctified by
the Holy Ghost.' You, on the contray, believe that
the ' elect people of God,' who have been ' sanc
tified by the Holy Ghost,' are few only from among
the number of baptized Christians ; your belief then
is distinctly in contradiction with this plain statement
of our'Catechism.

26
We next come to the Commandments and their
explanation ; to our ' duty towards God ' and ' to
wards our neighbour.' What do you consider our
principal duty towards God ? of course this one, viz.,
to put our whole trust in our crucified Saviour : how
do you account for the fact, that, in this part of the
Catechism, there is no direct mention whatever of our
Lord's death, or indeed of our Lord at all ?
Observe, too, the spirit in which these duties are
inculcated. You are in the habit of saying, that
obedience to God's commandments is hardly, or not
at all, a part of Christian sanctity, except so far as it
flows from gratitude for the Atonement. And the
language of our twelfth Article (which, in its natural
sense, most strongly savours of your theology,) is in
the same direction ; appearing to speak as though
good works derived their whole value- from being the
proof of a lively faith. On this, however, more
presently: here I am observing that the Catechism
makes no allusion to this (as I should say, fanciful,
unscriptural, and immoral) notion ; but inculcates
duties (whether inward only, or going forth also into
external action) in a straightforward manner and for
their own sake ; just in the manner which you call
heathen and unevangelical.
Mr. Newman, in his work on Justification, describes
the contrast between your views and those which he
considers Catholic, as consisting, to a considerable ex
tent, in this, viz., that you regard the keeping of God's
commandments to be impossible, even to the Christian,
while Catholics regard it as possible by the help of
God's grace; and this representation you will admit,
I suppose, to be just. Now the catechist proceeds to
say, " My good child, thou art not able to do these

27
things of thyself nor walk in the commandments of God
and to serve Him, without His special grace." It is
very plain on which side of the controversy these
words decide.
And lastly, (for I defer the section on the Sacra
ments,) the explanation of the Lord's Prayer is, equally
with all the rest of the Catechism, silent upon that
very subject, which, with your opinions, you must con
sider the one central point towards which all prayer
converges, and from which it issues ; I mean the pos
session of that quality of mind which you denomi
nate faith.
II. Turn now to the Visitation of the Sick, where
we may expect our task to be comparatively easy.
For if there be any one occasion, which will bring to
a critical and most unmistakable issue the contrast
between the two theologies, the addressing a dying
sinner, yourselves being judges, must be such an
occasion : indeed it is at such moments especially that
you consider the preacher of the Gospel to shew in
the clearest light his characteristic views, and prove
their efficacy by his miraculous success. To impress
on the sick person the utter nothingness of his best
works, and call on him by the most solemn appeals
to place his whole confidence in the Atoning Death
of our Lord, — this is that course which alone you re
gard as having Scripture-sanction ; this is that course
which, as you think, the Holy Spirit has repeatedly
accredited, by infusing at once, through the instru
mentality of such addresses, the high and noble graces
to which I have alluded. Those graces (total self-abne
gation, I mean, and unreserved confidence in Christ's
work for us) Catholics consider to be the last fruit
matured by a life-long discipline ; and never to exist

28
in their full perfection here on earth. But widely
different is your view of the case ; insomuch that — were
a clergyman to abstain from such appeals, and in their
room interrogate the dying whether their belief in
general Christian doctrine be orthodox, and whether
they repent them truly of their past sins; were he to
exhort them strongly to almsgiving, and recommend a
special confession of their past evil deeds ; — no farther
proof would be necessary: you would at once, you
cannot deny it, regard such a clergyman as carnal
and unregenerate, as wholly ignorant of the real
Gospel. Now do look this one fact plainly in the
face, that the latter and not the former is the course
pursued in the Prayer-book.
Look at the exhortation contained in the service
I am citing, and the rubrics which follow. The Mi
nister exhorts the sick person to ' remember the
profession he made in Baptism ;' he reminds him of
' the account to be given to the Righteous Judge;'
he asks him whether he ' believes all a Christian
man should, ' going through, for that purpose, the
Apostles1 Creed, which does not contain so much
as one explicit mention of the Atonement ; he exa
mines him ' whether he repent him truly of his
sins, and be in charity with all the world ;' he urges
him to ' make amends ' if he 'hath done injury or
wrong to any man;' he 'earnestly moves him to be
liberal to the poor,' and moves him ' to make especial
confession of his sins if he feels his conscience troubled
with any weighty matter.' All this the Clergyman is
required to say; but, of renouncing trust in his own
merits, apprehending Christ's Atonement, and the
rest— not one word. The service is copious and par
ticular in enforcing the very duties and considerations,

29
which you regard as savouring of carnal-mindedness ;
the one matter which you regard as essential, is the one
which it omits. Is there one amongst you who could
bring himself to read the exhortation to which I refer,
and obey the rubrics which follow, bearing as the
whole does directly on fundamental doctrine ? And
if not, by what process of thought can you bring
yourselves to vote for my condemnation, on the ground
of my opinions being at variance with formularies
which I have subscribed ?
The sum then of the argument which I wish to press
on your notice, is this : you hold one doctrine, as no sub
ordinate or incidental opinion, but as the very corner
stone of your faith ; the article, as you call it, of a
standing or falling Church. The Prayer-book, uni
versally in its general spirit, and repeatedly in its
individual statements, appears to contradict this doc
trine. I call on you, as you would preserve the cha
racter of honest men, to state as plainly the sense in
which you subscribe these portions of our Prayer-book,
as I have stated the sense in which I subscribe the ap
parently adverse portions of the Articles. Let this be
openly done, and the world at large may safely be left
to form a judgment between the two ; to compare
together the wrench and distortion of language, —
the adoption of words and phrases in a ' non-natural
sense,' — the neglect of the plain and obvious spirit
of the whole, — which are necessary respectively for
your purpose and for mine. I believe that the ar
tifices of construction, to which I must have recourse,
will appear absolutely simple and natural, when com
pared with the violent and extravagant distortion
which must be your resource.

30

TO 'LOW CHURCH' MEMBERS OF
CONVOCATION.
I have found great difficulty in choosing the name by
which to designate those whom I now wish to address ;
and I beg to assure them, that if I could have found
one simply neutral I would willingly have done so.
Another difficulty arises from the circumstance, that
this class of theologians are by no means so closely
united in opinion as the last whom I noticed, and
that many, who on the whole are fairly referrible to it,
might yet feel justly aggrieved, if opinions were by
implication imputed to them, which are held by other
members of the same class. Addressing you, how
ever, as a whole, I cannot be wrong in saying that you
consider the Fathers and Early Church to have erred
very seriously — (1) in the great value they attached to
ordinances, sacraments, priestly absolutions, and the
like; (2) in the extreme jealousy with which they
guarded strict orthodoxy both of doctrine and of ex
pression ; (3) and most of all, in the arduousness which
they ascribed to the task of obtaining the remission of
past sin, and generally of ' working out our salvation.'
Now before I begin the task of proving apparent
contradiction, between the views maintained by any
of you and the formularies you have subscribed, it
may be well to take a few cases where ' habemus
confitentes reos.' The first I will only allude to, for
I may safely leave my readers to supply for them-

31
selves comments on the facts in question. There
is a writer in high place in the University of Oxford,
who has published, and never retracted, his opinion
that Articles are fatally adverse to all theological
improvement,' and that ' adherence to them is no
less incongruous and injurious to religon than in a
society of physicians to make the maxims of Hippo
crates and Galen the unalterable basis of their pro
fession.' That a person holding these sentiments
should vote in favour of a new test, which requires
us to subscribe the Articles in the sense in which they
were first put forth, is a supposition which we ought
not, I suppose, to consider conceivable, unless the
event were to shew it.
But I will pass to a less extreme case. Mr. Hull
has subscribed the eighth Article, which says that the
Athanasian Creed ' ought thoroughly to be received
and believed.' He has published a work on this
Creed from which I will here quote only one sentence.
' The Christian faith cannot be set forth at all in the
Athanasian Creed, or any other form of words ; and
the Church cannot be justified in saying, as she now says,
that so to think of the Trinity is necessary to salvation.'
What course Mr. Hull intends to take on the present
occasion I have no means of knowing, and I am quite
sure, whatever it is, that it will be adopted according
to his conscientious convictions of right.* But looking
at the matter externally, it is obvious to remark,
that he and those who agree with him, if they sup
port a vote reflecting on my ' good faith,' impeach far
more seriously their own.
* Since writing the above, I observe that Mr. Hull has advertised
a pamphlet on the subject. I have thought it best, however, to leave
the remarks in the text exactly as I wrote them before seeing this
advertisement.

32
Indeed, I beg to call on all whom I am now
addressing, to consider very carefully in what sense
they can subscribe the eighth article. A recent fact
will place this subject in a very striking light. A
professed Unitarian comes to the University of Ox
ford. A project is entertained of introducing him
into the Academical Assembly with a highly eulogistic
speech, and placing him ' honoris causa,' before the
eyes of the students in the highest rank ; this project
fails of success, indeed, but only by an unforeseen
accident ; nay, the opposition to it was rather ex
tensively designated as insubordinate and factious.
It appeared from the proceedings on the occasion,
that no ' non placets ' were heard from the doc
tors' seats ; whence we may safely infer that none of
the board which has proposed the pending statute
opposed the degree : nor did any one present, I
believe, doubt that in the body of the theatre the
' placets ' had an immense majority.
Now here, observe, is no question about the for
bearance from judging of individual cases, (a quali
fication which has, of course, at all times been un
derstood in anathemas, but which assumes especial
prominence under the fearful eclipse which the truth
now suffers;) it is a case of public distinction conferred
on a public man.
In what conceivable sense those who voted for
Mr. Everett subscribe the Article, which sanctions the
Creed that says of all disbelievers in the Trinity ' with
out doubt they shall perish everlastingly,' it is diffi
cult to form the most distant conjecture ; nor have
they told us : but, whatever the sense, surely it must
be a most perversely " non-natural " one. I must
really summon most earnestly all who joined in that

66
vote, to ponder deeply the ground on which they
can dream of voting for my condemnation.
Another most important matter for your considera
tion, is the doctrine expressed on the surface of the
Prayer-book in regard to the Sacraments. I will
not dwell in detail on the Baptismal Service, because
(most plainly and undeniably though the doctrine of
Baptismal Regeneration be there expressed) there
have been members in our Church, who have been
able to accept that doctrine in name, by reason of the
most inadequate sense they have given to this word
' regeneration.' But observe the statements in the
Catechism on the other Sacrament. A sermon,
preached by Dr. Pusey, has been condemned ; and the
condemnation has been hailed with applause by great
part of the religious world. In the absence of grounds
assigned, it can hardly be wrong to regard, as the
doctrine condemned, the preacher's belief in the Real
Presence at the Eucharist of our Lord's Body and
Blood. The declaration, indeed, which I have already
quoted, speaks in this as in other respects, with the
most commendable openness. ' His Body and Blood
are verily and indeed taken and received by them at
that ordinance by faith, just as they are verily and
indeed taken and received by them whenever they
exercise faith in His atoning sacrifice' Many of you,
I know, stop altogether short of this extreme
view, and regard the Lord's Supper as a very especial
and mysterious means of grace : but you shrink from
saying that our Lord's Body and Blood are in real
truth there received ; and you would construe such ex
pressions as those contained in John vi. in a figurative
sense. Now let me beg your attention to the plain
words of the Catechism : ' The Body and Blood of
c

34
Christ are verily and indeed taken and received by the
faithful in the Lord's Supper.' What words could be
more precisely chosen to express the idea opposed to
'figuratively,' than the words 'verily and indeed'?
Again, you complain of me because I subscribe the
Articles in a sense not intended by their framers.
For myself I deny the allegation ; but as against you,
I see not how you can deny one precisely similar:
for, let any one read the quotations from Bishop
Overall, (the framer of that part of our Catechism,)
contained in the appendix to Dr. Pusey's sermon, and
see the sense in which he must have written these
words. If you are compelled to acknowledge that
you cannot accept them in that sense, then I beg you
to consider wherein your case differs from mine ; and
I exhort you not to vote for a censure on me, which
must recoil with equal or greater severity on your
selves. Another subject, on which many of you hold very
strong opinions, is that of fasting and other austerities.
You consider that the laying stress on these observ
ances savours of Judaism, and tends to substitute a
gloomy fanaticism for the cheerful gentleness of' the
true Gospel. In what sense then can you subscribe a
declaration that the Prayer-book contains ' nothing
contrary to the word of God ' ?— the Prayer-book,
which orders ' the Curate to declare unto the people
what Holy days or fasting-days are in the week fol
lowing to be observed,' and includes under the latter head
in the calendar so very large a portion of the year.
I am not speaking of those who may consider that the
application of the general principle requires in every
age indefinite modification, but of those who condemn
the principle itself. Let them answer the plain ques-

35
tion I have put to them as to themselves, before they
think of condemning others.
I will conclude my appeal to you by putting before
you a few passages from our formularies, and asking
you seriously to consider how far the ' sense' in which
you are able to subscribe them is otherwise than ' non-
natural ' : —
" Brethren, in the primitive Church there was a godly discipline,
that, at the beginning of Lent, such persons as stood convicted of
notorious sin were put to open penance, and punished in this world,
that their souls might be saved in the day of the Lord; and that
others, admonished by their example, might be the more afraid to
offend. " Instead whereof (until the said discipline may be restored again,
which is much to be wished),"
" Our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath left power to his Church to
absolve all sinners who truly repent and believe in him, of his great
mercy forgive thee thine offences : And by His authority committed
to me I absolve thee from all thy sins, In the Name of the Father, and
of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.''
" O Everlasting God, who hast ordained and constituted the
services of angels and men in a wonderful order ; Mercifully grant,
that as thy holy Angels alway do thee service in heaven ; so by thy
appointment they may succour and defend us on earth, through Jesus
Christ our Lord. Amen.''
" Receive the Holy Ghost for the office and work of a Priest in
the Church of God now committed unto thee by the Imposition of
our hands. Whose sins thou dost forgive, they are forgiven ; and
whose sins thou dost retain, they are retained."
" Receive the Holy Ghost for the office and work of a Bishop in
the Church of God .... and remember that thou stir up the
grace of God which is given thee by this imposition of our hands."

36

TO 'HIGH CHURCH' ANTI-ROMAN MEMBERS
OF CONVOCATION.
My argument with you is in some respects of a
different character from that which I have hitherto
maintained. In the two former heads I have treated
of those who ought to find the greatest difficulty in
subscribing formularies, which / am able to accept
in their most plain and obvious sense. I have now
a different course to pursue; for, to speak generally,
you whom I now address have no other difficulties
in subscription, than those which I experience also.
But I wish to shew, that the same principles which
justify you in subscribing, also justify me; that the
perplexities which are in the way of all high-church
men are decidedly greater than the additional per
plexities which beset those who, like myself, adopt
' the whole cycle of Roman doctrine.'
You will, I believe, all agree that the critical point
which distinguishes you from ' low-churchmen,' is the
answer you give to the following question: — Has Christ,
or has He not, left behind Him a Body to represent Him
while He is away, to be the medium of His presence,
and the dispenser of His grace ? I need only refer
for this to so well-known and so confessedly mode
rate a work as Mr. Gladstone's ' Church Principles
considered in their Results ;' but that, in truth, no au
thority can be necessary for the establishment of so
undoubted a fact. If the question be answered in

37
the affirmative, it must be the one essential attri
bute of the Visible Church, that it is the Body so
singularly endowed; and to give a definition of the
Visible Church, which should omit all mention of
this attribute, would be, in fact, to deny it.
But, in truth, when we look at the wording of our
19th Article much more may be said. For it is the
principle of your theology, that we can only discover
whether the ' Sacraments be duly ministered accord
ing to Christ's ordinance in all those things that of
necessity are requisite to the same,' by first discover
ing whether the Society which administers them be
part of the Visible Church : whereas the Article, in
its natural sense, rules the precise opposite. Instead of
considering the fact of a Society being part of the
Church as our warrant for believing the Sacraments
duly ministered, it considers the fact of the Sacra
ments being duly administered as part of our warrant
for believing a Society to be part of the Visible Church.
You will say, perhaps, as I have heard it said, that the
words ' duly ministered,' &c, include the idea of being
administered by a society commissioned to dispense
them ; but a moment's consideration will shew how
preposterous is such a construction : for the Article
would then define the 'Visible Church' by a form
of words which includes, as part of its signification,
the very idea that it is proposed to define.
Let us now see what is to be said in defence of the
' high-church' construction of this Article, and that by
a writer who, we may be sure, will put forth all that
ability and ingenuity can urge in its defence. He says,
' This is a description of the actually existing One Holy
Catholic Church diffused throughout the world. This
is evident from the mode of describing the Catholic

38
Church, familiar to all writers from the first ages
down to the age of this Article.' Mr. Newman then
quotes a number of instances, and proceeds : ' These
illustrations of the phraseology of the Article may be
multiplied in any number. And they plainly shew
that it is not laying down any logical definition what
a Church is, but is describing, and, as it were, point
ing to the Catholic Church diffused throughout the
world ; which, being but one, cannot possibly be mis
taken, and requires no other account of it beyond
this single and majestic one.' The quotations which
Mr. Newman introduced in his second edition from
the foreign Reformers, in no way, surely, strengthen
his case, but the very reverse. You will not deny
that they did oppose that doctrine, which is the
foundation of your whole ecclesiastical views : so that
the greater the similarity which can be shewn be
tween our Article and their Confessions of Faith, the
more is proved in behalf of the position I am here
advocating ; viz., that the Article, in its natural sense,
contradicts the doctrine in question. On his other
references it is obvious to remark, (1) that not one of
them contains that which I have made the principal
subject of comment, viz., including the due admin
istration of the Sacraments as part of the notes of
the Church ; (2) that they do not occur in dogmatic
formularies, where a more precise account of the
essence of a Church might be expected ; and (3) that
in times when, by means of the active intercommu
nion and brotherly love of her members and their close
agreement in all matters of faith, the Church bore
such prominent and unmistakable credentials of her
Divine mission, the 'congregation of the faithful'
would be a term frequently and naturally used to

39
describe her. But what can by possibility be more
forced and violent, than to designate a Body, which
you consider to be composed of the Roman, Greek,
and English Communions, by the title, ' a congrega
tion of faithful men'? And does it not seem almost
like irony to say, that the marks which separate off
the English Church from Protestant communities, and
place her in the same category with the Greek and
Roman Church, are so very apparent and decisive, that
' the Catholic Church' (composed of the three distinct
Societies aforesaid) ' being but one cannot possibly be
mistaken, and requires no other account of it than this
simple and majestic one ;' viz., ' the congregation of
faithful men' ?
The present, indeed, is an instance, of which others
will be found, where, in proportion as we approach
to simple Roman doctrine, we are able more easily
to subscribe our formularies : for Roman Catholics now,
just as Catholics of any former age, would most natu
rally call the Church the ' congregation of the faithful ;'
considering the visible union of her members as her
sufficient and characteristic note.
There is another part of this Article which persons
of Roman opinions can subscribe with far more ease
than any others, and which I have specified in my
work. I allude to the mention of the Church of
Rome in the second paragraph. ' The Visible Church
is a congregation of faithful men, in the which the
pure word of God is preached and the Sacraments
be duly ministered according to Christ's ordinance,
in all those things that of necessity are requisite to
the same,' and then immediately we hear of the Church
of Rome. The latter then is part of the Visible
Church ; or, in other words, is a Society in the which

40
the pure word of God is preached, &c. A very
serious difficulty this surely to those who, like the
'evangelicals,' think that anything rather than the
pure word of God is there preached; or to those
who, like most of those I am now addressing, con
sider the allowance of the cup to the laity ' of ne
cessity requisite' to the ' due ministration' of the Lord's
Supper. A difficulty, I may add, which I beg you
to consider how you are able to get over.
' Of course I think the natural meaning of this
Article may be explained away ; for I subscribe it my
self in a non-natural sense.' ' The Visible Church,'
I say, ' is a certain congregation of faithful men,'
&c. ; in other words, I do not take the Article as a
definition of the ' Visible Church,' but as a pointless
and unmeaning assertion of a matter of fact. But if
you denounce my way of subscribing the apparently
anti-Roman Articles as a quibble, I really wish you
would tell me how the way in which both you and
myself subscribe this is anything better.
Let us now take the Articles which bear on the
Rule of Faith ; the 6th, the 20th, and the 21st.
" Holy Scripture containeth all things necessary to Salvation : so
that whatsoever is not read therein, nor may be proved thereby, is
not to be required of any man, that it should be believed as an
Article of the Faith, or be thought requisite or necessary to Salvation.
In the name of the Holy Scripture we do understand those Canoni
cal Books of the Old and New Testament, of whose Authority was
never any doubt in the Church."
" The Church hath power to decree Rites or Ceremonies, and
Authority in Controversies of Faith : And yet it is not lawful for the
Church to ordain anything that is contrary to God's Word written,
neither may it so expound one place of Scripture, that it be repug
nant to another. Wherefore, although the Church be a Witness and
a Keeper of Holy Writ, yet, as it ought not to decree anything

41
against the same, so besides the same ought it not to enforce anything
to be believed for necessity of salvation."
" General Councils may not be gathered together without the
Commandment and Will of Princes. And when they be gathered
together, (forasmuch as they be an assembly of men, whereof all be
not governed by the Spirit and Word of God,) they may err, and
sometimes have erred, even in things pertaining unto God. Where
fore things ordained by them as necessary to salvation have neither
strength nor authority, unless it be declared * that they be taken out
of the Holy Scripture."
There is little that need be said on these Articles.
I can hardly fancy any one fairly looking at them, and
not seeing that in their natural spirit they contemplate
two sources, from which, taken together, private Chris
tians are to learn the faith : Holy Scripture as the
ultimate authority, and the local Church as its inter
preter. The local Church is to teach her members
with authority, and derive the doctrines she teaches
from her unfettered examination of the Sacred Vo
lume ; even things decreed by General Councils have
neither strength nor authority, unless it may be proved *
that they are taken out of the Holy Scripture. This,
I say, is the impression which their wording would at
once, I think, convey to any unprejudiced mind ;
though we all of us, of course, approach the Articles
with so much of prepossession already formed as to
what we are to expect from them, that it is most
difficult to view them in their simple and natural
colours. And the justice of the same impression must
be placed still more beyond suspicion, by observing
the ground on which the Articles rest belief in the
three Creeds themselves. They are ' most thoroughly
* Ostendi : the English word ' declared,' I have been told, had
the meaning of ' proved ' at the time the Articles were written.

42
to be received and believed,' not because they are
supported, by the voice of Antiquity or of Councils,
but ' because they may be proved by most certain
warrants of Holy Scripture.' Those who think that
the local Church is bound to consult Antiquity in her
decisions, must be to the full as much perplexed by
these Articles as the greatest Romanizer extant.
The 21st Article in particular is surely a most
startling one at first sight. Every one must remem
ber the tempest of indignation with which Mr. New
man's exposition of it was at first received ; and cer
tainly anything which on the surface wore more tho
roughly the appearance of dishonest subterfuge, I
never read. Further consideration convinced me of
the perfect honesty and good faith of his interpreta
tion ; and I have done my utmost, in my pamphlets
of three and a-half years ago, to vindicate and enforce
it. But I must say plainly, that I found it far more
difficult to exhibit and substantiate the grounds on
which that interpretation rests, than to reconcile
(which has been another of my tasks) subscription to
the second paragraph of the 19 th Article, with a
refusal to attribute error to the formal decisions of the
Papal See.
And yet I suppose there are few or none of those
whom I am now addressing, who do not believe some
General Councils to be infallible ; and who are not
accordingly pressed by the difficulty to which I allude.
Certainly not Mr. Palmer, who distinctly advocates the
infallibility of (Ecumenical Synods, and who, I suppose,
represents the opinions of a very large number among
you. Indeed, if you consider the Athanasian Creed
— on the one hand, how widely different it is in tone
from by far the greater part of the New Testament,

43
and how much there is in it with no distinct or explicit
Scripture warrant ; and, on the other hand, how fear
less, sweeping, and direct its anathemas, — I see not
how any one could recite it without a shudder, much
less subscribe it without dishonesty, who should not
consider that there is some Divine authority in mat
ters of doctrine, over and above the text of Scripture.
But if you do consider this, you at once do extreme
violence to the manifest spirit of these Articles.
I must not be understood in any way to disparage
the success with which Mr. Newman has on the whole
made out his case in Tract XC. He has pointed out
(p. 7), that the Articles are really silent on the very
questions which are mainly important; viz. 'What is the
Church's method' in interpreting Scripture, ' if any; and
who is her judge, if any ?' And so, in my argument on
the 21st Article, I have laboured to shew the plain
marks of the presence of an adverse party, whom it was
desired to include ; so that various sentiments, which
are most certainly implied in the general spirit, have
been of purpose aforethought omitted in the dry let
ter. But a most important observation, made by Mr.
Oakeley in his pamphlet, is directly in point, and de
serves your most attentive consideration. If there
were a party to be consulted, more Catholic, e. g., than
Ridley, and if the Articles weredrawn up with a view
to their inclusion, that party held the whole doctrine of
Rome ; for the school of Laud, by the confession of
all, was of subsequent growth. It follows, therefore,
that any protection you can obtain for yourselves from
this consideration, you are absolutely bound to extend
also over such as me ; whereas I seem to myself to ob
serve in you a continual tendency to defend yourselves
at my expense.

44
From the rule of faith let us turn to particular doc
trines. You all believe, that in the Lord's Supper the
Body and Blood of our Lord are verily and indeed pre
sent, and are verily and indeed received by a most
unspeakably and mysteriously intimate communication;
and a phrase, added to the Articles at a later period,
must bear, except by extreme distortion, the same
sense ; ' the Body of Christ is given, taken, and eaten
in the Supper:' for how can that be there given, which
is not there present ? But while holding this, you
usually go on to protest against the Roman doctrine of
Transubstantiation (sometimes indeed in very unmea
sured railing ; but always) as an unfounded and ration
alistic dogma. Others, as you know, of whom I am
one, simply accept this doctrine, as I do all other doc
trines of the Roman Church. There is an Article (the
28th) which seems opposed to my view ; and there is
also a passage in the Prayer-book which, I should say,
seems still more violently to oppose yours. This pas
sage I here subjoin : —
" Whereas it is ordained in this office for the ad
ministration of the Lord's Supper, that the Commu
nicants should receive the same kneeling ; (which order
is well meant, for a signification of our humble and
grateful acknowledgment of the benefits of Christ
therein given to all worthy Receivers, and for the
avoiding of such profanation, and disorder in the holy
Communion, as might otherwise ensue ;) yet, lest the
same kneeling should by any persons, either out of ig
norance and infirmity, or out of malice and obstinacy,
be misconstrued and depraved ; it is here declared,
That thereby no adoration is intended, or ought to be
done, either unto the Sacramental bread or wine
there bodily received, or unto any corporal presence of

45
Christ's natural flesh and blood; for the Sacramental
bread and wine remain still in their very natural sub
stances, 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."
The obvious meaning of this passage is ingeniously
explained away in Tract XC ; though the author can
didly confesses that it requires explanation itself, more
perhaps than any part of our formularies. I ask you
carefully to read and weigh his explanation of this
passage, and my explanation of the apparent protest
against Transubstantiation (transcribed in an earlier
page) ; and I confidently anticipate that you will
consider the latter far more obvious and direct
than the former. I say then, that if, on so unspeak
ably sacred and momentous a doctrine, you are con
tent to subscribe a formulary which has so extremely
strong a prima, facie bias on the heretical side, it is
the very extreme of unfairness to blame me, for fol
lowing in the 28th Article the example which you
have yourselves set.
There are, indeed, several cases, where you try to
represent difficulties which are common to me with
you, as though they were exclusively mine. I will
here mention another of this kind ; viz., the oath of su
premacy. This is most certainly at first sight a great
difficulty to me, and you often, I believe, urge it against
me ; but it is to the full as great a difficulty to you, or
indeed to any one except those who adopt the senti
ments commonly called Erastian, advocated by Cranmer
in the 16th century, and Dr. Arnold in the 19th. For

46
observe, the oath is, as its very name shews, on the
King's supremacy; nothing is denied of any foreign
power, potentate, &c, unless that the same may be
attributed to the King. To suppose that in an oath on
the King's supremacy, an accidental determination is
introduced on the wholly irrelevant question of the
respective place held by Pope and Bishop, would be
extravagant almost to the extent of insanity. If it be
true, that in that oath I have denied any spiritual
authority to the Pope, then I have attributed spiri
tual authority to the King ; and vice versa, those who
deny spiritual authority to the King, if they can take
the oath at all, can take it without denying spiritual
authority to the Pope. In truth, the prima, facie bear
ing of the oath is simply Erastian : and it must be
evaded by adopting Dr. Pusey's interpretation, and
considering the word ' spiritual ' to be synonymous
with ' ecclesiastical ' ; as it is the custom in such do
cuments to multiply synonyms, and as we have an
example in the words ' power, prince, potentate,'
&c. recited in the same oath. According to this
construction, the oath refers to power in the eccle
siastical courts, &c, temporal power in things spiritual.
And great as is the violence done to the natural word
ing of the oath in order to elicit from it that sense in
which both you and I must take it, an almost equal
violence must be done to the Article on the subject,
if we would give it any other. For the 37th Article
says, ' We give not to our Princes the ministering
either of God's word or the Sacraments' ; and whereas
the ministration of the Sacraments is that especial
prerogative wherein spiritual power consists, the Ar
ticle in the most express terms denies spiritual power
to the King.

47
Time will not allow me to go through all the appa
rent contrarieties between our formularies and ' high-
church' opinions. You will observe, however, that my
comments have included those which you would your
selves consider the foundation of all your principles,
namely, on the Visible Church, and on the Rule of
Faith, and also that doctrine, the Eucharistic Pre
sence, which you will agree with me in considering the
most sacred next to the cardinal verities of the Trinity
and Incarnation, or rather, indeed, an essential part of
the latter. I will conclude my address to you, by
drawing your attention to the Articles on Justification ;
a subject which, in my opinion, (as I have endeavoured
to shew in my work,) is far more at the bottom of the
present differences in our Church than are any of those
just named.
You will agree with me that the great error of the
' evangelicals ' consists in their disparaging estimate
' of good works ; including, of course, under that title,
acts of obedience, whether inward or outward, whether
of thought, word, or deed. You may not, perhaps, go
along with me in the very extreme view I feel myself
compelled to take, as to the necessary result of their
doctrine, if it could have free scope ; though I ear
nestly solicit a careful perusal of the chapter on
that subject in my work. But you will agree, that their
main mistake is their disregard of the following simple
truth : Good works, (in the wide sense which I have
ascribed to them,) wrought within us by the Holy
Ghost, with the cooperation of our will, have a value in
two different ways ; 1st, they strengthen and enliven
the inward principle ; and 2nd, they will be rewarded
hereafter in proportion to their excellence. ' Evan
gelicals ' virtually deny both these positions ; though

48
here I will confine myself to the former. They seem
then to think ' that acts have nothing to do with forming
habits ; but that certain feelings will sustain themselves
or be sustained, and issue in action whenever any
difficult occasion comes.' They seem to think, in
deed they often plainly say, that justified Christians
possess an inward principle (viz., undivided trust in
the Atonement), which will lead them spontaneously
into all holy living, without special pains bestowed
on their thoughts, words, and actions, one by one.
Whereas you will agree with me so far as this, that
without such pains bestowed on individual actions,
the inward principle must be continually losing in
strength and deteriorating in quality. There can
surely, then, be no one controversy which more closely
concerns the very innermost springs of the Christian
life, than that which you and I have to sustain against
' evangelicals.' And now let us see on which side
the Articles incline in their natural and unconstrained
sense. That faith means ' trust in the Atonement,' this I
readily acknowledge the Articles nowhere imply : but
let us look to their determination on the subject I
have been just discussing, — the place held by good
works under the Gospel. I really can hardly fancy
how the view, which you agree with me in denouncing,
could be affirmed in much clearer language than it is
in the obvious bearing of our 12th Article.
"Good works, which are the fruit of faith, and follow
after justification, . . . are pleasing and acceptable to
God in Christ ; and do spring out necessarily of a true
and livelv faith : insomuch that by them a lively faith
may be as evidently known as a tree is discerned by
the fruit."

49
This Article surely professes on the surface to con
tain the formal account of the value of good works
under the Gospel ; and yet, if you have followed with
any care the few observations I just now made, you
will see at once that it contains absolutely no allusion
to what you, as well as myself, consider their principal
value. It contains no allusion, I say, to their strength
ening the inward principle and leading to future re
ward ; while, by the introduction of the word ' neces
sarily,' it seems to sanction the error, against which
we should all follow Dr. Pusey in so vehemently pro
testing, that the inward principle can be trusted to for
producing good works, without careful pains bestowed
on them one by one.
The sense in which I am able to subscribe this
Article is such as follows : ' Albeit that good works,
which are the fruits of faith, and follow after justifi
cation, cannot put away our sins, and endure the
severity of God's judgment ; yet are they pleasing and
acceptable to God in Christ' — so far there is of course
no difficulty, 'and [true though it be that in order
for Christian works gradually to grow towards per
fection, they must be matured by repeated self-denial ;
and true though it be that if the inward principle be
left to itself, the good works which flow from it will
become ever scantier and more feeble, till they cease
altogether; — still, certain good works, really such, and
the same in kind with other Christian good works,] do
springout necessarily of a true and lively faith, insomuch
that by them a lively faith may be as evidently known
as a tree is discerned by the fruit.' This interpretation
I have designated, in one of the passages submitted
by the board to your judgment, a ' non-natural' sense;
and you will not dispute that I have rightly so called
D

50
it. But can any of you devise a more natural sense,
in which you can yourselves subscribe it ? If not, for
honesty's and consistency's sake do not vote for my
condemnation. I now come to the most painful by far of all the
Thirty-nine Articles ; the 13th. " Works done before
the grace of Christ, and the inspiration of His Spirit,
are not pleasant to God, forasmuch as they spring not
of faith in Jesus Christ, neither do they make men
meet to receive grace, or (as the school-authors say)
deserve grace of congruity : yea, rather for that they
are not done as God hath willed and commanded
them to be done, we doubt not but they have the
nature of sin." " To deserve de congruo," says Mr.
Newman (Tract xc.) " or of congruity, is to move the
Divine regard, not from any claim upon it, but from
a certain fitness or suitableness ; as, for instance, it
might be said that dry wood had a certain disposition
or fitness towards heat which green wood had not."
The Article then seems to deny, that a course of
obedience and self-denial practised by a heathen, makes
him more " meet to receive grace" than is the most
abandoned profligate : to deny, in fact, that, cseteris
paribus, a virtuous and religious heathen is more
likely to receive the Gospel than a vicious one, or to
co-operate better with Gospel Grace when received.
This is the plain and undeniable force of the Article
in its natural sense ; though one might have supposed,
that blasphemy so fearful, against the very elementary
principles of morality, owed its origin to the fanatical
excesses of the sixteenth century, and was now aban
doned by all, were it not that the ' declaration ' to
which I have so often alluded, especially singles out
for reprobation Mr. Newman's sentiment that " works

51
done with Divine aid, and in faith, before justification,
do dispose men to receive the grace of justification." *
Still I am sure that there is not one whom I am
now addressing, who will not regard the view in ques
tion with unmixed detestation and abhorrence ; and
this being so, do carefully observe the difficulties to
which Mr. Newman is reduced in his attempt to
rescue the Article from this interpretation. The title
mentions " works before justification," and the Article
begins, " Works done before the grace of Christ and
the inspiration of His Spirit ;" and if there could have
been any doubt on the natural bearing of these words,
Mr. Newman has removed that doubt ; for he says in
his work on Justification, that this shews " Justifica
tion " to be synonymous in our Church's teaching with
" the grace of Christ and the inspiration of His
Spirit." Yet his whole construction of the present
Article turns on the distinction he draws between
these expressions ; and on his considering good works,
done before Justification, to deserve grace indeed of
congruity, but to be works done after the grace of
Christ and the inspiration of His Spirit. If any of
you can explain away the natural meaning of this
Article by a less extreme and violent distortion of
its wording, or if you can accept its natural mean
ing, the case is different ; but if you can do neither of
these, allow me to subscribe those Articles which are
prima, facie anti-Roman, by help of artifices much less
far-fetched and extraordinary than this which enables
both you and me to subscribe the one now in question.
* Regardless, as ' evangelicals' often appear to be, of the sacred-
ness of natural morality, in the present case how they contrive to
get over the Scripture case of Cornelius (Acts x. 4, 34, 35), has
always puzzled me.

52

TO ALL MEMBERS OF CONVOCATION.
If you have been at all convinced by the preceding
arguments, such a reflection as the following will not
unnaturally arise in your minds : If our formularies
be really capable of so wide a latitude, and if, never
theless, in order for any one to sign them, parts of
them must inevitably be so distorted from their na
tural sense, is not the existence of such formularies an
extreme evil ? I believe I speak honestly when I say,
that if this question be, by my instrumentality, really
and practically brought home to the mind of a sufficient
number of my brethren, this fact would alone amply
repay all the anxiety and labour in which my work
may have involved me. Of course, considering that
the Prayer-book is the strength of one side and the
Articles of the other, it would wholly destroy the
existing balance within our Church, if subscription
to the one were retained, and to the other abolished. I
may be allowed, however, in passing, to throw out
merely a, hint on the untenableness of any theory which
I ever heard of, by which a Church can be defended
for imposing such tests as our Articles. And if it be
considered inconsistent with my engagements as an
English clergyman to hold such an opinion, I would
merely ask of those who object, to point out to me
any document which I have subscribed, which expresses
decision on the subject. It is quite sufficient surely,

53
that I assent to our Church's authoritative formula
ries ; it would be indeed a heavy burden to claim from
her ministers approbation of her wisdom in enforcing
them. Not to speak here of distinct Scripture sanction,
such as the prayer of our Lord (John xvii.), and the
example of his Apostles, it is surely a direct result of
the very rudiments of Christian ethics, that anything
inconsistent with the most cordial, brotherly, and active
union between those who are called by the name of
Christ, is a plain sin where it is not a plain duty.
For Societies calling themselves Christian to erect
barriers against brethren on their own responsibility,
— to say ' such and such doctrines are no necessary
part of the Christian Revelation, and yet unless you
hold them you shall not be included in the same pale
with your fellow-Christians ' — this course, if what I
have above urged be admitted, must be one not less
repugnant to Scripture precept, than at variance with
the first principles of Christian morality.
However, the more common representation is, that
our Articles are not terms of communion, but that the
Creeds only are such ; and that the doctrine of the
Creeds is an essential part of Christian doctrine.
And this is certainly a true representation : it is very
plain that our Articles have never been imposed as terms
of communion. Still, at best, it is surely a startling
violation of the sacred rights of conscience, if, as
' high-churchmen ' ordinarily say, communion with a
Church which imposes those tests on her clergy is
generally necessary to salvation, for those who live in
England :, or, in other words, if no Englishman can
hope for salvation (except on the plea of invincible
ignorance) unless he submit himself to the guidance

54
of ministers, who are required to teach him, over and
above the general Catholic Faith, certain characteristic
doctrines; doctrines for whose truth there is abso
lutely no warrant, except that certain bishops and
others, three centuries since, for whom no one claims
any covenanted Divine illumination, and who were
called upon very suddenly to make most extensive
changes, considered at the moment that these doctrines
were derivable from Scripture and Antiquity. What
would be said if some one of our Colonial bishops
were to draw up a set of Articles according to his own
notions of Scripture and Antiquity, ordain no one
except on condition of subscribing them, and proclaim
that all are out of the pale of Covenanted Salvation,
who refuse to submit themselves to the teaching of
such clergymen ? And wherein does this differ from
what took place at the Reformation ? The Church of
Rome, which I look upon as in so many respects our
fitting model, imposes no tests whatever on her clergy,
as is well known, except belief in those doctrines
which she does consider to be an essential part of the
Christian Faith.
Excuse this short digression, in consideration of the
extreme importance of the subject ; and accept the
following as the sum of all that I have been saying.
If, after the most laborious endeavour to separate off
the opinions of my work from the wholly distinct
question you have to consider, and after an anxious,
calm, judicial study of our formularies in their whole
extent, you come to the opinion that my mode of sub
scription to them is so different from your mode in its
degree of laxity, that it amounts to a difference in
kind, then (so far as my present argument is concerned)
come up and vote against me; if you arrive at the

55
opposite conclusion, come up and vote for me ; but if
you are unwilling, or if you doubt your ability, to enter
on this complex and difficult investigation, then I
pray you, for your sake not mine, (for it will in
jure you and not me if you commit an unprincipled
action,) let not zeal for your particular views of reli
gion blind you to those maxims of common justice
and morality, which must be at the bottom of all true
religion; but pursue the honest and straightforward
course, of refusing to vote on a question which, by
your own acknowledgment, you have not the power, or
else have not taken the pains, rightly to understand.

London :
Printed by S. & J. Bektlet, Wilson, and Fley,
Bangor House, Shoe Lane.

YALE UNIVERSITY LIBRARY

3 9002 08837 0649