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Memoir and Letters 
 
 of the 
 
 Rev. Dr. Bright 
 
Selected Letters 
 
 of 
 
 William Bright, D.D 
 
 Regius Professor of Ecclesiastical History in the 
 University of Oxford; Canon of Christ Church 
 
 Edited by the 
 
 Rev. B J. Kidd, B.D. 
 
 Keble College, Oxford ; Tutor of Non-Collegiate Students, and Lecturer 
 in Theology at Pembroke College 
 
 With an Introductory Memoir 
 
 by the 
 
 Rev. P. G. Medd, M.A. 
 
 Formerly Fellow and Tutor of University College, Oxford 
 
 London 
 Wells Gardner, Darton & Co. 
 
 3, Paternoster Buildings 
 
INTRODUCTORY NOTE 
 
 IN sending forth this Memoir, and selection from 
 the correspondence, of the late Dr. Bright, we 
 desire to thank his many friends who have placed 
 at our disposal diaries, letters, and other re- 
 miniscences. Without their co-operation our task 
 would have been impossible. In arranging his 
 letters it was thought best to follow, in the main, 
 an order of subjects rather than of dates ; while 
 in selecting, those only have been taken which 
 either vividly recall some personal trait, or seem 
 likely to prove of permanent value to the Church 
 as containing his judgment on the points with 
 which they deal. To put his correspondent in 
 possession of the grounds on which his judgment 
 was based, Dr. Bright frequently indicated his 
 authorities. These references have been preserved 
 in the text of the letters, while in the notes others 
 have been added, both to the originals he had in 
 mind and to his own further handling of them in 
 his published works. Unfortunately, The Age of 
 the Fathers appeared too late for much use to be 
 made of it in this connexion. 
 
 P. G. M., 
 B. J. K. 
 
 [v] 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 MEMOIR OF WILLIAM BRIGHT, D.D. . . ix 
 
 DR. BRIGHT'S FIRST VISIT TO ROME . lix 
 
 DR. BRIGHT'S PUBLISHED WORKS . . . Ixxv 
 
 I. INTERPRETATION OF HOLY SCRIPTURE . . 1 
 
 II. DOCTRINE .... -43 
 
 III. LITURGICAL SUBJECTS . . . .138 
 
 IV. HISTORICAL SUBJECTS . . . 207 
 V. THE ROMAN QUESTION .... 237 
 
 VI. CHURCH QUESTIONS OF THE DAY . . . 264 
 
 VII. PERSONAL .... . 333 
 
 APPENDIX ...... 364 
 
 INDEX ...... 366 
 
MEMOIR 
 
 OF 
 
 WILLIAM BRIGHT, D.D., 
 
 CANON OF CHRIST CHURCH AND PROFESSOR OF ECCLESIASTICAL 
 
 HISTORY 
 
 To receive towards the close of life an invitation, 
 quite unexpected and unsought, to review the 
 course of a friendship of nearly fifty years, un- 
 dimmed by any difference whatever, except on 
 lesser matters of opinion, with a mind and spirit 
 like that of William Bright is indeed a joy. 
 
 The execution of the task has involved an 
 almost complete review of my own manhood life, 
 an operation in itself most profitable, if solemn, 
 especially considering the responsibility of such a 
 friendship with one of whom our common friend, 
 Henry Parry Liddon, was wont to speak as o 
 AajtTr pot;, ' the bright ' or ' shining one,' in playful 
 allusion to his name and corresponding qualities. 
 
 William Bright came of a family which, in the 
 middle of the sixteenth century, was settled in 
 the neighbourhood of Sheffield, at Wirlow Hall, 
 and held considerable other estates. 1 His father, 
 
 1 See Hunter's History of Hallamshire and the Life of Sir 
 Charles Bright, vol. i. 
 
 [ix] 
 
x Memoir of Dr. Bright 
 
 William Bright, solicitor and Town Clerk of 
 Doncaster, was the fifth and youngest son of Paul 
 Bright, of Inkersall, Staveley, by his wife Henrietta 
 Bowker, of Spital in Wakefield. His mother 
 was Mary Ann Branson, of Doncaster. He was 
 their only child, born after his father's death, at 
 Doncaster in 1824, on the I2th of December, 
 and baptized on the 29th, which latter date he 
 always preferred to be remembered as his birth- 
 day. 
 
 Of his father's brothers, Thomas was a Captain 
 in the Royal Navy ; Henry was a Major in the 
 Army, and fell in the Battle of Toulouse in 1814 ; 
 Brailsford was the father of the great electrician, 
 Sir Charles Bright; and John was an M.D. and 
 Court Physician to King George III. 
 
 I did not know him in earlier life. When I 
 began residence at Oxford he had already taken 
 his degree, a First Class in Litteris Humanioribus, 
 together with two other Scholars of University 
 College Thomas Valpy French, afterwards 
 Bishop of Lahore, and John Conington, after- 
 wards Corpus Professor of Latin both, like him, 
 subsequently elected to Fellowships in their own 
 college. But after a school at Southwell, and 
 some residence with a private tutor, the Rev. 
 Mr. Butterfield, near Bath, he had been sent to 
 Rugby, then under Arnold. Perhaps Rugby was 
 hardly an ideal school for a boy so peculiar as 
 Bright. Yet a subsequent pupil of his and mine 
 at University College writes : ' I remember, as a 
 Rugbeian, being struck with the " piety " and 
 reverence with which he often mentioned Dr. 
 
Love of Study . xi 
 
 Arnold, greatly as he must, as a Churchman, have 
 differed from him.' He early showed a remark- 
 able love of study and great intellectual power, 
 but I have no distinct recollection of him until 
 about the year 1851, on some one of his visits to 
 Oxford, from either Trinity College, Glenalmond, 
 where he was for eight years Theological Lecturer, 
 or from his home near Manchester, under the 
 roof of Mr. Daniel Maude, Stipendiary Magis- 
 trate of Manchester (afterwards of Greenwich), a 
 most estimable Christian gentleman who had 
 married his widowed mother. He must have 
 been a solitary boy, and I have no doubt these 
 circumstances considerably influenced his life. 
 They doubtless contributed to that shy and 
 recluse character which was so marked in him. 
 They may also have contributed to his great 
 devotion to study and his power of concentrated 
 thought. For his qualities of mind, he, like many 
 distinguished sons, owed much to his mother, to 
 whom he bore a marked resemblance, especially 
 in head and face. 
 
 The Ven. Archdeacon Barber of Chester, who 
 was one of his most intimate friends, writes : 
 
 ' He must very early have become a careful reader and 
 student of the Bible. I have a Bible, interleaved, in two 
 volumes, with his name on the title-page, " William Bright, 
 Univ. Coll., Nov. 12, 1844," showing that he must thus early 
 have intended to read and carefully annotate it On November 
 12, 1864, he gave these volumes to me. They contain, thus, 
 the fruit of twenty years' study. They are the greatest treasures, 
 full of quotations, beautifully written in a neat and legible hand, 
 and are an evidence of the extent of his reading, and of his 
 power of bringing it to bear on his studies.' 
 
xii Memoir of Dr. Bright 
 
 Vividly imprinted on my mind is my one visit 
 to him at Glenalmond. So, especially, is my 
 welcoming him, a day or two afterwards, on his 
 descending from an outside seat on the coach 
 at Perth, on St. Matthew's Day, 1853, for the 
 occasion of the enthronization of the newly- 
 elected Bishop, Dr. Charles Wordsworth, in the 
 new Cathedral of St. Ninian's. I shall never 
 forget his appearance in the white tie and 
 swallow-tailed evening black coat, such as may 
 still be seen in contemporaneous pictures of 
 Mr. Keble and Drs. Newman and Pusey. 
 
 In 1859 Bright left Glenalmond and returned 
 to Oxford. It is not pleasant, nor, at this date, 
 is it worth while, to recall at length the circum- 
 stances of his removal from a post for which he 
 was so pre-eminently fitted. A published Charge 
 of Bishop Forbes Brechin, dealing largely with 
 Eucharistic doctrine, had somewhat alarmed some 
 of the Scottish Bishops. Bishop Trower of 
 Glasgow charged Professor Bright with agreement 
 with it, and with the teaching of Keble's Essay 
 on Eucharistic Adoration, and, indirectly, with 
 unfaithfulness to the teaching of the Anglican 
 Church. He replied that to him Mr. Keble 
 appeared ' to contend for the doctrines of Fathers 
 to whom the English Church in the sixteenth 
 century appealed, and to have thereby trodden in 
 Andrewes' steps.' Bishop Trower's intended reso- 
 lution that the Rev. W. Bright's appointment ' is 
 rescinded by the Bishops ' was not actually 
 brought forward at the Episcopal Synod of 
 May 27, 1858, or was withdrawn. But Bright 
 
Glenalmond xiii 
 
 was made to leave Glenalmond, to the unspeak- 
 able loss of the Scottish Church, as, probably, 
 any survivors of that epoch would now admit. 
 
 Of this event Archdeacon Barber, writes to 
 me : 
 
 ' He must have exercised considerable self-repression, for he 
 was very reticent about his life at Glenalmond. I do not think 
 I ever heard him allude to the treatment he received, and it 
 was years afterwards when circumstances compelled him to 
 speak of it, as he did with great delicacy, in the pages of the 
 Guardian? 
 
 Glenalmond's loss was Oxford's gain. In 1859 
 Bright came back to University College. I was 
 then Fellow and Tutor, and soon had the joy of 
 welcoming him as a fellow-worker. Of course he 
 took the Divinity Lectures, to the great profit of 
 his pupils, especially of those who were looking 
 forward to Holy Orders. I well know that they 
 all will thankfully acknowledge the greatness of 
 their debt to him. He would never accept a full 
 tutorship, with its general and varied responsi- 
 bility. He preferred the position of a lecturer, 
 and of course the Greek Testament was his great 
 subject. I have a lively recollection of the suc- 
 cessive copies of the large square quarto edition, 
 with a very large margin, which were successively 
 filled, volume after volume, with his copious 
 annotations. Here the depth and width of not 
 only his theological, but of his very varied 
 general reading, showed itself. He was a rapid 
 and omnivorous reader, and always had a pen 
 within reach for notes and references. Next to 
 theology, his favourite subjects were history and 
 
xiv Memoir of Dr. Bright 
 
 biography, and even fiction. All were laid under 
 contribution, and made to illustrate the highest of 
 all themes. His manuscript notes in the volumes 
 of which I have spoken now, happily, preserved 
 in Keble College, together with sixty volumes of 
 what he called his ' Sylva' (a set of commonplace- 
 books full of his own written thoughts as well as 
 of valuable extracts and references) are really an 
 inexhaustible mine, which I trust may not be lost 
 sight of by later workers. 
 
 Out of such fulness of knowledge, stored in a 
 strong memory, and not merely in note-books, he 
 spoke, he wrote, both with a clear, lucid incisive- 
 ness and accuracy of language, never hampered 
 or overloaded with verbiage, sustaining an un- 
 flagging interest in his hearers, who felt that 
 he was indeed a teacher who kept their minds 
 awake, whom they could trust, and from whom 
 they could learn. 
 
 One of his former pupils at University College, 
 of that happy time about 1865, afterwards a 
 clergyman and schoolmaster, writes to me now of 
 it as follows : 
 
 ' It is not difficult even now to recall Mr. Bright as the 
 College Tutor and Lecturer in the sixties. To the ordinary 
 undergraduate who came under him, perhaps the most striking 
 point was his extraordinary store of knowledge on almost all 
 literary subjects. I well remember consulting him one morn- 
 ing in the quad when I was sorely perplexed by an essay which 
 someone had set me on " Mysticism." He gave me on the 
 spot what most Dons would have considered sufficient help. 
 But before many hours had passed and I know that he had 
 lectures in the interval I received from him what would have 
 been an excellent article on the subject, exhaustive, and backed 
 
Recollections of his Pupils xv 
 
 up by very many references. His lectures were admirable. I 
 well remember what life he threw into the Ethics ; how " up 
 to date" he made them seem, although I fancy that he did 
 not give us exactly what " paid " in the Schools. It was a 
 delight to read Virgil with him. To those who had been 
 accustomed merely to verbal criticism it was a revelation to 
 find the sEneid full of character. /Eneas, for instance, he 
 could never forgive, not only for his conduct to Dido, but for 
 his constant timidity. "Stupid fellow ! of course up goes his 
 hair on end again !" and so forth. It is needless to say what 
 his Divinity Lectures were. His notes are still among my 
 treasured possessions, and I am sure that a class which was 
 kept on with him, contrary to custom, for a fourth term, 
 though they grumbled openly, were in their hearts very glad . 
 to be still with him. He would put forth illustrations and 
 comments of the most interesting kind, and at the end of some 
 subject, as if himself to enjoy the pleasure of listening, would 
 half reach, half project, some favourite author across the table 
 
 with a "Read it, M ," which few who were present will 
 
 forget. His reading, of course, lay far outside the ordinary 
 academical subjects. Walter Scott he constantly quoted, and 
 thoroughly enjoyed his dry humour. . . . He was full of fun. 
 Many are living who could quote lines from the " Oxoniad "- 
 a fragment with which he had beguiled the monotony of 
 " Collections." ... I remember a former fellow speaking of 
 him once as a "happy monk." I do not know how far this 
 was a true description, but if many monks were like him, a 
 monastery must have been a pleasant place to live in.' 
 
 In speaking he had, for a long time, a hesita- 
 tion in utterance which had disqualified him from 
 reading the lessons in college chapel in his turn 
 as Scholar, and which was even somewhat pain- 
 fully felt when he read family prayers at his 
 mother's house. But this was due only to a kind 
 of shyness or nervousness, not to any organic 
 defect. The practice of the college lecture-room 
 enabled him to overcome it, until, in Oxford 
 
xvi Memoir of Dr. Bright 
 
 churches and elsewhere, and in Convocation, he 
 could preach and speak as many will remember. 
 
 For him, and for me, those were happy days. 
 As Dean and Senior Tutor I had to move to a 
 kind of official residence in college, which happened 
 to be immediately underneath the rooms he occu- 
 pied. I felt this to be a very happy arrangement, 
 as I did again at a later period also, when, in 
 compensation, as it were, for the loss of Bright, 
 his old rooms were inhabited by another dear old 
 friend and brother- Fellow, Allan Becher Webb 
 afterwards Bishop of Bloemfontein, and later of 
 Grahamstown, now Dean of Salisbury. It was 
 on that staircase that I remember hearing the 
 step of Dr. Plumptre's butler ascending to Bright's 
 rooms, followed instantly by the rapid descent of 
 the latter to hand on to me the note which 
 announced the vacancy, and conveyed the offer, 
 of a college living. 
 
 There were greater things in store for Bright 
 than the functions of a vox clamantis in deserto. 
 His gifts were professorial and academic, not 
 pastoral. I felt we soon must lose him, or we 
 ought to do, from University College. 
 
 His first published work on the great subject he 
 afterwards so fully represented was a too small one- 
 volume History of the Church of the century and 
 a half following the Council of Nicaea. It was a 
 work much wanted. There had been grand choix 
 of Histories of the Church of the First Three 
 Centuries, but the post-Nicene period and the 
 later Councils had been very imperfectly dealt 
 with. This work had all Bright's accuracy, all 
 
Resident Friends xvii 
 
 his conciseness and condensation, and his pictur- 
 esqueness, too ; but I remember saying to him that 
 if he had done it in three volumes instead of one 
 he would have been a Professor of Ecclesiastical 
 History long before he was. 
 
 Of course, many things stand out in the re- 
 tracing of those years, more than I have space 
 to dwell on now, tempted as one is to become 
 reminiscent ; but I should wrong the memory of 
 those who are gone if 1 failed to express my 
 thankfulness for the common friendship of my 
 friend and myself with Pusey, Liddon, Kay, 
 Bulley, Leighton of All Souls', the late Lord 
 Beauchamp (then ' Lygon of All Souls' ') ; with 
 Bishop Stubbs, Sargent of Merton, Walton and 
 Noel Freeling, both also of Merton. as well as with 
 others like-minded who, happily, still are with us. 
 Yet Bright never surrendered his judgment to 
 even the best and dearest or ablest of his friends. 
 I well remember how we fretted together over the 
 rigorous pressure which ' the Doctor,' or, as Bishop 
 Forbes of Brechin used to call him, ' il Santo ' 
 (Dr. Pusey), exercised on our beloved and very 
 precious friend, Canon Liddon, when the canonry 
 at St. Paul's made it really desirable for him to 
 leave Oxford for London, and devote himself ex- 
 clusively to what was surely enough for the whole 
 energies of any man. But Pusey's judgment was, in 
 those days, that everyone who had the Faith in him, 
 being an Oxford resident, was bound by his loyalty 
 to Christ to stay there to uphold it. Liddon was at 
 that time Professor of the Exegesis of Holy Scrip- 
 ture, and no doubt was doing inestimable work. 
 
 b 
 
xviii Memoir of Dr. Bright 
 
 That work, again, was enough for one man. We 
 blamed him for putting himself entirely into 
 Pusey's hands. But he did. So, as soon as his 
 neck was out of the collar at Oxford, he had to 
 go to Amen Court, and there put it into another, 
 his three months of London residence being 
 distributed by arrangement so as to permit of his 
 keeping the terms at Oxford. He had thus barely 
 a free month in the whole year for rest. It was 
 bad policy. The result was premature exhaustion, 
 and in the long-run the Church was the loser. It 
 was what Bright dreaded. 
 
 Perhaps Bright was too exclusively a student. 
 It is given to no man to be equally developed on 
 every side. There was a certain physical nervous- 
 ness about him. One form in which this manifested 
 itself was the early hesitation in speaking to which 
 I have alluded. There was not quite enough 
 love of the open air in him. He was always, first 
 and foremost, a student. I never knew him take 
 part in a game. I never saw him on horseback 
 except once in Switzerland, or with the driving- 
 reins, or a gun, or an oar, or a cricket-bat, or a 
 fishing-rod, in his hands. He was no athlete. 
 He lived before athletics were invented. Yet he 
 was a good walker, and, being not insensible to 
 the beauties of Nature, would take some trouble 
 to go and see them, as he would, even more, 
 scenes, places, buildings, and objects which were 
 historically famous. He enjoyed Switzerland, but 
 he was not an enthusiastic mountaineer. The 
 physical triumph over obstacles and difficulties, and 
 sometimes danger, the joy of the vitalizing air, of 
 
Interest in others xix 
 
 the glorious sunshine, of a cloudless sky over glacier 
 and snowfield, he would not fail to acknowledge ; 
 but they were not to him what they were to 
 others, an almost intoxicating delight. The 
 human, the historic interest of Nature was to him 
 the greater of the two. The subjects of physical 
 science, the marvel of the material universe, and 
 the problems of pure philosophical reasoning, 
 especially in the mathematical direction, did not 
 interest him. The problems and paradoxes of 
 human life and feeling did ; the drama of history, 
 the closer reproduction of personal life in biography, 
 even the fictitious inventions and imaginations of 
 a good human or historical novel, had for him an 
 unfailing charm and fascination. 
 
 The vital reality, which he so clearly saw and 
 felt, of the application to human life and destiny 
 of the highest and deepest moral, spiritual, and 
 dogmatic truths, lay at the bottom of his intense 
 devotion to the study of theology and of eccle- 
 siastical questions. For him faith and life were 
 inseparably intertwined. For him the truth 
 and completeness or otherwise of faith were of 
 inestimable importance. For him the life and the 
 future of souls, their permanent worth and 
 character and dignity, and so the life of the 
 Church of God, and of human society, which are 
 built up of souls, all grew out of, and depended 
 upon, faith. As their Faith was, so, in the long- 
 run, must they be, for good or evil. 
 
 The sense of this gave him that deep and 
 affectionate interest in the highest welfare of 
 others which all who were privileged to know 
 
 b 2 
 
xx Memoir of Dr. Bright 
 
 him personally felt to be so deeply characteristic 
 of him, and which gave such intensely practical 
 value and helpfulness to his theological and other 
 writings, lectures, sermons, and conversations. To 
 this the carefully treasured recollections of his 
 numerous friends and pupils bear abundant testi- 
 mony. And this would have made him an 
 admirable parish priest had God's providence 
 called him to the pastoral sphere, as it stood him 
 in good stead afterwards in his office as a Bishop's 
 examining chaplain. We feel very strongly that 
 the Letters we are privileged to publish, and which, 
 we are persuaded, are but a sample of many more, 
 equally valuable, which have not yet reached us, 
 will commend themselves, as not merely interest- 
 ing, but practically useful, to a large circle of 
 readers beyond the clergyman and the student. 
 Warm-hearted Church people of both sexes will 
 find in them just what they want in the way of 
 practical guidance in many matters of the Christian 
 life. Their simple letter form, their being in 
 so many cases written in reply to questions 
 asked, will greatly help towards that useful pur- 
 pose. 
 
 Speaking of literary activity at this period, his 
 first published work was Ancient Collects, 1857. 
 By this he laid the Anglican Communion under a 
 great debt, as he did later on by his Hymns 
 published, in 1866, with other Poems. The com- 
 pressed terseness and clear-cut sharpness of the 
 old Latin Collects, from St. Leo onwards, suited 
 his taste exactly. His renderings preserve these 
 characteristics perhaps a little too closely for 
 
Published Helps to Devotion xxi 
 
 general English use. One feels in some of them 
 a lack of ease and smoothness. This is an almost 
 unavoidable defect in the work of one who was 
 not a musician, nor had himself any practice in 
 musical recitation. This defect is less observable 
 in his metrical writings. Of the nine hymns of 
 his enshrined in the current ' Complete Edition ' 
 of Hymns Ancient and Modern, there are some 
 which, amid whatever changes, will be cherished 
 as long as Christian worship goes up to heaven in 
 English speech. 
 
 Akin to these helps to devotion were his later 
 publications, Faith and Life, a volume of readings 
 from ancient writers for the first half of the 
 Church's year, from Advent to Trinity, published 
 in 1864 ; his Private Prayers for a Week, 1882 ; 
 and his Family Prayers for a Week, 1885. 
 
 It will easily be imagined what a strength the 
 countenance and support and the advice of a 
 man like Bright were to other Oxford residents 
 deeply interested and, more or less, actively 
 engaged in Christian work within and beyond 
 Oxford. Two instances of which I can speak 
 from personal knowledge stand out strongly in 
 the retrospect the interest he took in what for 
 some years was known as the ' Merton Service/ 
 and the help he lent to the origination, in 1862, 
 of the Church Congress on the public and open 
 footing on which it has been continued ever since. 
 
 The opening service of the great Church Con- 
 gress, held during three days in the Sheldonian 
 Theatre under the presidency of the greatest of 
 modern English Bishops, Samuel Wilberforce, took 
 
xxii Memoir of Dr. Bright 
 
 place in Merton Chapel on Tuesday, July 8, 1862, 
 at eight o'clock. The Bishop celebrated, assisted 
 by the Rev. H. W. Sargent and myself. It was 
 an occasion which is, for many reasons, deeply im- 
 printed on my memory. 
 
 Of Canon Bright's warm and sympathetic 
 interest in the great work of the Rev. H. W. 
 Sargent, Fellow of Merton, and Vicar of what was 
 then the separate parish of St. John Baptist, I shall 
 ever cherish the most grateful recollection. From 
 the founder's days the college chapel had served 
 as the parish church of this small ancient parish. 
 It was about the year 1854 that some advances 
 were made on the old customary form of service, 
 which was of the plainest type. From the 
 small beginning of six little surpliced chorister 
 boys and a harmonium Mr. Sargent, who had 
 a beautiful voice and the finest possible musical 
 taste, raised the service and all its accessories to 
 a very high pitch of choral perfection, yet 
 throughout of the strictly parochial type. We 
 grew to a full choir of men and boys, supported by 
 a fine organ, which occupied, perhaps, too large 
 a space in the north transept, and had successively 
 for its players the Rev. Dr. Hayne and Sir John 
 Stainer. Having no Sunday duty out of college, 
 I gave what assistance I could in this work, in 
 conjunction with another personal friend of Canon 
 Bright's, the Rev. Sackett Hope. It was a work 
 which, as subsequent testimony has abundantly 
 showed, was very effective as an instance of a 
 bright and attractive musical service in a parish 
 church at a time when such services hardly 
 
The Latin Prayer-Book xxiii 
 
 existed. It is hardly necessary to say that such 
 a step onward, nearly fifty years ago, met with 
 much prejudiced and irrational opposition from 
 some quarters. Under such circumstances the 
 sympathy and help of men like Bright and Liddon 
 as frequent attendants and occasional preachers 
 were of real value. Dr. Bright dedicated the first 
 edition of his Hymns and other Poems to ' the 
 Clergy of St. John Baptist's, Oxford, in grateful 
 remembrance of the privileges of years.' 
 
 Among other works which I gratefully recall 
 was our Latin Edition of the Book of Common 
 Prayer. Agreeing in the general principle of 
 giving the Vulgate for the Scriptural portions, and 
 of reverting as far as possible to the Latin originals 
 of the collects and prayers, we planned and carried 
 out this work together. The first edition was 
 published by Rivingtons in 1865. It was a joint 
 labour of love, in the process of which we were 
 privileged to consult friends like Canons Liddon 
 and Bramley, both then resident in Oxford, and 
 others who, like ourselves, had given much time 
 to the study of the ancient liturgical treasures of 
 the Church. 
 
 In later life Canon Bright, as we shall see, 
 devoted a very large part of his vacations to 
 foreign travel, often very distant. It was my 
 privilege (and now a cherished recollection) to 
 accompany him, with some other Oxford friends, 
 on his first visit to the Continent. It was in the 
 September of 1863. Accompanied by another 
 University College man, Claude Delaval Cobham, 
 we travelled by Amiens to Paris. Speaking of 
 
xxiv Memoir of Dr. Bright 
 
 our visit to the Cathedral of Amiens, when, I 
 think, he saw Mass for the first time, Dr. Bright 
 writes : ' I was not so much impressed by the 
 Mass as a ceremony as I expected to be. It is 
 so rapidly done and so overloaded with minute 
 observances.' In Paris he was much interested, 
 especially with the historic sites. He writes : ' It 
 is a wonderful sensation to be on the very ground 
 of the French Revolution.' Some days later he 
 writes from Visp, ' Oh, the excessive annoyance 
 which the mind endures from seeing a low Mass 
 performed so rapidly, so mechanically, so inaudibly !' 
 In Paris we were joined by the Rev. E. W. 
 Urquhart of Balliol and his brother and sister. 
 We went by Reims, Strasburg, and Basle to 
 Zurich. Of our journey thence to Lucerne one 
 interesting incident remains permanently fixed in 
 my memory. We had to cover the distance 
 between the lakes of Zurich and Zug in a small 
 diligence. To a very pleasant French layman 
 Bright and Cobham and I added ourselves, 
 and were presently joined by two Capuchin 
 monks in the habit of their order. This made 
 up our full inside complement of six. Foreseeing 
 an imprisonment of nearly three hours, we began 
 a conversation (I think) in French. In this our 
 Capuchin fellow-travellers proved not more ready 
 than we in German. Consequently, though I do 
 not remember who began it, we got into Latin. 
 Then we got on very well, though one of the 
 monks, who seemed little more than a foil to the 
 other, contributed nothing beyond occasional 
 ejaculations. It was very interesting, and not a 
 
Zermatt xxv 
 
 little amusing. Bright writes of this discussion : 
 ' One of the monks kept saying " Consule 
 Historiam," and I kept answering, with a smile, 
 " Ipse consului.'" The future Professor of 
 Ecclesiastical History, of course, held his own 
 admirably. We dwelt in the course of our con- 
 versation rather on points of agreement than of 
 difference, each side explaining their own position, 
 when the French layman, who throughout had 
 been merely listening, suddenly broke in with, 
 ' Sumus fratres, sumus fratres !' 
 
 The mountainous parts of our very pleasant tour 
 did not, I think, interest Bright so much as one 
 had hoped. He preferred to view them from 
 below. Yet he writes to his friend, the Rev. 
 Edward Barber : ' The grandeur of the mountains 
 is simply indescribable. The voyage on the lake 
 was like a dream of beauty.' We did not even 
 get him up the Righi, to whose summit there was 
 no railway in those days, nor over the St. Gothard, 
 which we reached, after diligence from Altdorf to 
 Amsteg, and on foot from thence to Hospenthal. 
 It was a glorious day, but the walk was too much 
 for Bright, as was also the ride, a few days later, 
 from Visp up the St. Niklaus Valley to Zermatt. 
 Of this he writes : ' Medd and the others were very 
 eager to see Zermatt and the Matterhorn. I was 
 not of their mind.' His motto might have been 
 /, demens, curre per Alpes. So after lunch he 
 turned and rode down again, ' leaving them in all 
 the mania of glacier-walking, etc. Non equidem 
 invideo, miror magis." 1 So the rest of us 'did ' the 
 Riffel, the Corner Grat, and the Cima de Jazzi. 
 
xxvi Memoir of Dr. Bright 
 
 We met again some days later, and returned to 
 England by Paris, Chartres, and Rouen. 
 
 Speaking of Berne, he writes, September 25, 
 1863: 
 
 ' The cathedral is in the hands of the Calvinists. I attended 
 their afternoon service on Sunday, not being able to find the 
 "English Church." It is just Presbyterian ; the preacher wore 
 the skull-cap and the huge white collar which one sees in the 
 old pictures of the Puritan ministers. He gave out a hymn, 
 which was sung sitting ; then a prayer was read from a formulary, 
 which the people listened to standing up not, as far as I saw, 
 with much devotion of manner ; then he preached in German, 
 and seemed very earnest ; then prayed extempore, then read 
 another prayer by-the-by, he said the Lord's Prayer twice 
 then a final hymn. In the hotel I met a very interesting 
 Dissenting lawyer (English), who talked of the Rationalist 
 School, the intimate connection of doctrine and morals, the 
 hopelessness of attempting to keep clear of unbelief from merely 
 intellectual grounds apart from Divine grace.' 
 
 Of experiences in Parisian churches he writes: 
 
 ' I saw a Marriage Mass and a Funeral Mass go on in the 
 same church at the same time. At a certain point in the 
 former a white silk veil was held over the happy pair while the 
 priest gave them a blessing. I have also seen a child baptized. 
 The priest did his part so mechanically and hurriedly that I 
 was quite disgusted at him. All the beautiful symbolism of 
 the service was marred. I felt that we do that better in 
 England. Communion is not at all a rare sight, even on week- 
 day mornings. Once I saw two choir boys who attended on 
 the Mass come forward with a white cloth, which they held in 
 front of the communicant ; then the celebrant turned round 
 with the Sacrament I mean the Host, unhappily not the Cup 
 and said, Ecce Agnus Dei, and placed it in the communicant's 
 mouth, saying : Corpus Domini custodiat animam tuam. The 
 communicants always receive kneeling, but upright not 
 prostrating themselves, for that would so much tend to impede 
 the administration, as it does when practised in England.' 
 
Chartres St. Gervais xxvii 
 
 Of the Cathedral of Chartres he writes as 
 ' certainly most magnificent/ but adds : 
 
 'What disappoints one in these grand French churches is 
 their comparative shortness when compared with York or 
 Winchester [he might have added St. Albans]. What makes 
 up for this is their loftiness and the splendour of their porches. ' 
 
 I remember being present with him at Vespers 
 in the Cathedral of Chartres, where we were much 
 shocked by the interruption of the Magnificat by 
 a very superfluous visit of two old Canons from 
 their stalls in the choir to burn incense in front of 
 a black image of the Blessed Virgin in the north 
 transept. We often talked of this afterwards. 
 There was one grain of comfort in it. It seemed 
 so manifest an excrescence that one could not help 
 hoping and believing that it, and other things like 
 it, must drop off some day. The chief incident 
 of our stay at Rouen was a visit to the deeply 
 interesting Church of St. Gervais, on the top of 
 a hill within a mile of Rouen, on the spot where 
 William the Conqueror died. Here we descended 
 by a stone staircase near the western end of 
 the chancel to the primitive subterranean church, 
 by some archaeologists dated before A.D. 250, and 
 noticed right and left, at the foot of the steps, the 
 recessed arcosolia which once contained the tombs 
 of St. Avitien and St. Mello, the earliest preachers 
 of Christianity in that part of Gaul. It has an 
 apse, now lighted by a small narrow window, 
 apparently not original. Round the semicircle 
 of the apse portions of the stone bench were still 
 visible, as were also the strong iron hooks, high 
 
xxviii Memoir of Dr. Bright 
 
 up in the sides of the arch, from which a curtain 
 might be suspended. I suppose there is hardly 
 any other so ancient place of Christian worship 
 north of the Alps. 
 
 In the autumn of 1 865 Bright visited Cambridge 
 for the first time. Writing of his * impressions 
 while they were fresh in his mind,' he says : 
 
 ' I certainly bring away a greater admiration for the place, 
 or, rather, for some features of it, than I had expected to do. 
 Of King's Chapel, of course, one had always heard as the great 
 ornament of Cambridge, but I had never realised its vastness 
 and dignity, or, rather, majesty. I don't say that I should not 
 get weary of the monotonous repetition of crowns and Tudor 
 roses in the ornamentation ; nor that the stall-work is worthy 
 of the place, for, in fact, it is heavy and gloomy. But on the 
 whole it is glorious. Then, the great Court of Trinity is 
 certainly very much more impressive than Tom Quad ; and, 
 thirdly, we have nothing of the same kind of beauty as one 
 sees in what they call " The Backs " that is, the backs of St. 
 John's, Trinity, Clare, King's, Queens', looking out on what 
 they are pleased to call their river, and in the t>eautiful walks 
 on the other side. What is diffused, with us, in different 
 college gardens seems to be more combined there. Also I 
 found more to admire in the venerableness of some of the 
 colleges, particularly Queens', than I had looked for. ... At 
 Ely I was greatly delighted with the magnificent cathedral.' 
 
 From a few lines to Archdeacon Barber, written 
 on Shrove Tuesday, February 13, 1866, we see 
 that Bright's efforts to help the young theological 
 students of Oxford were not confined to his 
 regular work in his own college : 
 
 ' I am going to give some lectures on Tuesday evenings 
 during Lent to some undergraduates and B.A. 's on the 
 doctrine of our Lord's Person, as witnessed to by the Four 
 Councils. Some nine or ten men came to settle about it 
 
Christmas at Oxford xxix 
 
 to-day, and more will come. I shall gain some pleasant 
 acquaintances, and I would fain hope I may be of some use.' 
 
 Another very characteristic letter to the same 
 intimate friend, dated ' Feast of the Circumcision, 
 1867,' gives some pleasant glimpses of our happy 
 life at Oxford in the sixties. He says : 
 
 ' I came here [East Retford] yesterday evening, after 
 a very happy Christmas at Oxford. I did not go to the 
 Magdalen Christmas Eve party, because I had to be up early 
 for the first Celebration at SS. Philip and James. Also I 
 confess to a growing feeling that the scene at Magdalen is, as 
 Lord Beauchamp always said, somewhat too festive for the 
 vigil. The service at Merton in the morning was very grand. 
 . . . Our carol party in the hall at University on St. Stephen's 
 night was a great success, and just as it was beginning I heard 
 from Mansel himself of his appointment to the E. H. Chair. 
 I do not think one can help recognising the fact that special 
 studies in that direction are not regarded as necessary for a 
 Professor by our honoured Lord and Chancellor in his quality 
 as patron of Regius Professorships. Nor can I think that the 
 character of Mansel's mind is historical, nor that he will be able 
 to take to Ecclesiastical History as a congenial subject. At the 
 same time, when one considers what names were talked of as 
 really not out of the question, I think we may be thankful for 
 Mansel's appointment. He is a very able man, a good Church- 
 man, and a Conservative. If he is not quite in his right 
 place as a Professor of Ecclesiastical History, to have him in one 
 of the great chairs, and in a Christ Church Canonry, is no small 
 gain to the cause of truth. Liddon and others think that I 
 should have been appointed, but that I was too well known as 
 a pronounced High Churchman. If that is so, I consider it a 
 great honour, and, personally speaking, I do not think the 
 canonry would have contributed to my happiness. Let it 
 suffice to say this on the matter. 
 
 ' But I have passed away from what I was talking of the 
 joyous scene in our hall on Wednesday evening. The carols 
 were chiefly those in Neale's collection, together with " A 
 Virgin most pure " (which has a most sweet chorus), " The 
 
xxx Memoir of Dr. Bright 
 
 First Nowell," and one or two others. The whole was 
 concluded with " For unto us a Child is born." On St. John's 
 Day most visibly a day of " bright beams '' I celebrated at 
 Merton. On Innocents' night we had a delightful choir party 
 (Merton) in the practice-room so much associated in our 
 memories with the B.H.T. [the Brotherhood of the Holy 
 Trinity] blind-man's buff, snap-dragon, a Christmas-tree, then 
 three carols (how they did sing " Good King Wenceslas "!). 
 And then Sargent, who was well enough to be there, said a 
 few quiet, sweet words as to his pleasure at " seeing their 
 merry faces," and his hope that they remembered why we 
 rejoice at Christmas, etc. They cheered me very cordially. 
 I hardly knew what I had done to deserve it ; but to be with 
 them and really play with them goes a long way with kindly 
 and honest lads.' 
 
 Passing now to the second and longer half of 
 Dr. Bright's life at Oxford, the change from 
 University College to Christ Church took place 
 in 1868. The recent occupants of the Chair of 
 Ecclesiastical History had been Dr. Hussey, Dr. 
 Stanley like Bright, once a Fellow and Tutor of 
 University College and Dr. Shirley, who died in 
 November, 1866. For allusions to his possible 
 successor, and to efforts made in favour of Dr. 
 Liddon, of Mr. Bright himself, and of Mr. Bradley 
 also a former Fellow of University, and at that 
 time Headmaster of Maryborough, afterwards 
 Master of University, and later on Dean of 
 Westminster see the following Letters, pp. 265, 
 267. Lord Derby was then Prime Minister, and, 
 as Bright (p. 268) had anticipated, he appointed 
 Mansel, of St. John's. His tenure of the professor- 
 ship was short. He was soon promoted to the 
 Deanery of St. Paul's, and in 1868 Mr. Bright 
 was appointed by the then Prime Minister, Lord 
 
Archbishop Lycurgus xxxi 
 
 Beaconsfield. He alludes in a letter (p. 338) to 
 the congratulations he received, expressing at the 
 same time his sense of the difficulties of the work 
 which now lay before him. He was installed in 
 his canonry at Christ Church on December 23, 
 1868. He held it for thirty-three years. 
 
 They were years of steady, hard, and fruitful 
 work, both in the stated duties of the professor- 
 ship, which included preaching in the cathedral, 
 and in the outside functions of representative of 
 the Cathedral Chapter in Convocation, and of 
 Examining Chaplain to the Bishop (King) of 
 Lincoln. His lectures were attended by large 
 classes of deeply interested pupils. A list of 
 visible results in published writings is given at 
 the close of this memoir. They will never cease 
 to be valued in the English Church, with whose 
 true spirit they are thoroughly imbued. 
 
 Of one most deeply interesting incident in the 
 early part of my last years of residence in Oxford 
 I have a very vivid recollection. This was the 
 visit of Lycurgus, Archbishop of Syros and Tenos, 
 who, on February 19, 1870, had the degree of 
 D.D. conferred upon him by the University of 
 Oxford. Advantage was taken of his presence in 
 the University to hold, in Dr. Pusey's study, a 
 conference on some of the points at issue between 
 ourselves and the Eastern Church. The discussion 
 was carried on in Greek. At first the Archbishop's 
 pronunciation was difficult to follow, but the ear 
 soon became accustomed to it. My friend, now 
 become Professor Bright, D.D. and Canon of 
 Christ Church, writes as follows of the results : 
 
xxxii Memoir of Dr. Bright 
 
 1 It appeared that he [the Archbishop] could not admit 
 SLO. TOV 'Ytov [" through the Son "] as referring to any eternal 
 relations, and that in his opinion reunion was impossible 
 without the erasure of the Filioque from the Western Creed. 
 He was quite clear, consistent, and decisive. He said that 
 Pope Leo's silver shields could still be seen. He put aside 
 the Council of Florence, which Dr. Pusey cited. The 
 Eucharist, he said, was a 6avp.a (wonder) as great as the 
 fvo-dpKwa-is (Incarnation). As manhood is joined to Godhead, 
 so bread and wine are joined to the Body and Blood. " Did 
 his Church hold that bread and wine lost their natural 
 existence?" He answered, " It is an open question. Person- 
 ally, I think they do not, otherwise there would be something 
 analogous to monophysitism." Invocation of saints was not held 
 to be dvayKalov (necessary or compulsory), but merely a belief 
 (here he spread out his hands) that there was no gap between 
 the Church below and the Church above, etc.' (MS. Reminis- 
 cences, p. 82). 
 
 Writing, two days later, of an entertainment 
 given by the President, Dr. Bulley, in the State 
 Rooms at Magdalen, to the Archbishop and his 
 attendant clergy, he records that the Archbishop 
 said he should 
 
 ' tell the Patriarch of Constantinople that the English Church 
 was not a Protestant sect, but a continuation of the original 
 Apostolic Church. He hoped that a better understanding 
 between it and the Eastern Church would further the reunion 
 of Christendom. Archimandrite Stratoulis, of St. Nicolas' 
 Church, Liverpool, spoke in English, saying that his Church's 
 rlag bore freedom, but freedom must go hand-in-hand with 
 obedience to revelation. Civilisation, truly so called, had its 
 source in Christ, God and man. The Archbishop spoke 
 warmly of George Williams, who was present, as an old friend 
 of the Eastern Church. He told stories, as of an infidel 
 Professor at Athens whom he had tried to impress on his 
 death-bed. The man answered : " No, I have lived without 
 Christ, and I will die without Christ." He sent a message to 
 Dr. Pusey to suggest that English divines might consider 
 
Work as Professor xxxiii 
 
 some propositions which might be sent to them from the East. 
 He wants to get a critical edition of the Liturgies' (ibid., 
 pp. 84, 85). 
 
 I was not privileged to see, on the spot, more 
 than the first two years of B right's work as 
 professor. At the close of 1870 I left Oxford, 
 after twenty-two years' continuous residence, for 
 the Rectory of Barnes. Thenceforward I did 
 not see so much of my friend, who spent a large 
 part of his vacations in often distant and foreign 
 travel with his friend Mr. W. H. Seary of 
 Oxford, to whom he has left a very interesting 
 diary of these ' expeditions.' The occasions on 
 which I met him were the sessions of Convocation 
 and the terminal meetings of the Council of Keble 
 College, of which we both were original members, 
 and for which I often stayed with him at his 
 canonical residence. 
 
 But by the kindness of personal friends of his 
 who were resident in the University during the 
 fruitful years of his professorial activity, and so 
 were able to record their strong and fresh im- 
 pressions of the work of the later years of his life, 
 I am happily allowed to make use of what they 
 wrote on the occasion of his death. For this 
 permission I tender my warmest thanks as my 
 readers also will to Canons Driver, Sanday, 
 Scott Holland, and Randolph. 
 
 The last-named writes, in Goodwill of May, 
 1901 : 
 
 ' As one looks back at the Oxford of those days, the privi- 
 leges one recalls with most vividness and with profound 
 
 C 
 
xxxiv Memoir of Dr. Bright 
 
 gratitude are walks with Liddon, talks and Friday evening 
 " Bethels " with King, and lectures from Bright. 
 
 ' Bright's lectures ! What a delight and refreshment they 
 were ! Who that has once heard them can ever forget the im- 
 pression they left upon the mind and heart ? How he made 
 every character in the history live and move before you ! how 
 every detail was brought out with a vividness and a colouring 
 that were altogether inimitable ! 
 
 ' The great attraction which the early period of Church 
 history had for Bright was, no doubt, due very largely to its 
 intimate connection with the doctrine of the Incarnation, and 
 it was, perhaps, in his treatment of the great heresies that he 
 excelled. He took infinite pains to go to the root of the 
 matter and to make his hearers understand the question at 
 issue. For example, in regard to the Nestorian controversy : 
 "If you are tempted," he would say, "to think that this is an 
 unimportant matter (and here he would speak with the utmost 
 gravity), ask yourself . . . ask yourself . . . what would have 
 happened if the heresy had prevailed I If the child on Mary's 
 breast was not God, if Mary is indeed not Theotokos (Mother 
 of God), reflect what it means. How could a man such as 
 Nestorius believed Christ to be, a man closely associated with 
 the Logos, the highest of the saints, yet not differing in kind 
 from the saints, and therefore, after all, only a man how could 
 such an one be our REDEEMER ?" 
 
 4 Or, if it was a question of Roman controversy, Bright would 
 " scent the battle from afar." You would, as you watched him, 
 see that something specially piquant was "in the air." He 
 would smile, and first of all state the view of some Roman con- 
 troversialist. " Egregius locus," says Baronius, as he comments 
 on the text. " A first-class passage ! But ... let us examine 
 the context. What are the facts ?" 
 
 ' His intense sense of humour never forsook him. In de- 
 scribing the scenes in the life of Athanasius, already referred 
 to, he would give it full play. St. Basil was, "it must be 
 confessed, a bit of a don." Eutyches was "a foolish old man 
 with a narrow mind, stiffened by seclusion and bewildered by 
 harassing excitement." Pelagius was, according to St. Jerome, 
 " that big dog of Albion, overloaded with Scotch oatmeal." 
 Who that heard him narrate it can ever forget the account of 
 the rescue of Dionysius of Alexandria, when that prelate was 
 
Bright's Charm of Conversation xxxv 
 
 dragged across the floor of the room in which he had been 
 sleeping clad only in a nightshirt . . . "a most undignified 
 position for a patriarch." Humour, as everybody knows, is 
 closely akin to pathos, and wonderful was the impression left 
 upon the mind after hearing the infinitely tender and touching 
 way in which Bright would tell the story of the martyrdom of 
 Perpetua and Felicitas in the Severian persecution ; and how 
 he would dwell on the beautiful collocation of the two names, 
 and then with what an exquisite sense of humour he would 
 describe how Saturus (one of the other martyrs of that time) 
 prayed that, however he might meet his death, he might not be 
 hugged by a bear ! 
 
 ' So year after year his lectures went on. As lately as 
 October 23, 1899, he wrote to me as follows: "I am in very 
 fair form. I commenced the term's lectures which will com- 
 plete the thirty-first year of my work with as much zest as 
 ever." And he adds the following postscript, so entirely 
 characteristic of himself : " A Greek deacon of Constantinople, 
 staying in Oxford, comes to the class. I shall have to talk in 
 his hearing of the episcopate of St. Chrysostom." 
 
 ' Passing from his lectures, one may try to recall something 
 of the charm of his conversation. He had an extraordinary 
 power of rejuvenescence, and hence he would often be the 
 central attraction to a group of young men in his own house 
 or elsewhere. Only a few years ago one of the Censors of 
 Christ Church said that, if he wanted to make sure of a party of 
 undergraduates going off well, he always did his best to get 
 Bright, for there was nobody like him to insure the success of 
 the gathering. He had, in fact, an unfailing and ever-ready 
 sympathy with young men, occasionally lapsing purposely, and 
 even in his lectures, into the current slang of the day, with a 
 delightful naivete and freshness. 
 
 ' Anybody who knew Bright knew his great mastiff Cecilia, 
 " my pearl," with whom the Professor would play and frolic like 
 a boy. A touching sight might from time to time be seen in 
 Oxford, which illustrates Bright's love for animals, and his 
 special consideration for Cecilia in particular, when he would 
 linger in his walks, leaning against a railing or watching by the 
 roadside while the mastiff was disposing of a dainty morsel 
 which she had discovered to her own satisfaction, and not with- 
 out Bright's sympathetic interest. 
 
 C 2 
 
xxxvi Memoir of Dr. Bright 
 
 ' This may bring us to the consideration of Bright's preach- 
 ing. How can one describe it ? One can recollect him years 
 ago in a well-known church in Oxford, how he would begin by 
 leaning over the pulpit and hanging out both his hands straight 
 down before him, like a dog's fore-paws hang out of a kennel. 
 Then he would (in this attitude) look slowly round and round 
 at the congregation, and, after a pause, give out his text very 
 rapidly, all the words being rolled together so as to form an 
 almost unintelligible sound, like a bark, and the hearer found 
 himself wondering what he had said ! Then Bright would 
 slowly draw himself up, and repeat the text more deliberately 
 and carefully, and, once having begun, the attention of his 
 audience was secured and retained throughout. You could not 
 help looking at him. His gestures ! Who could describe 
 them, as he drew back into the recesses of the pulpit and 
 crossed his stole over his breast, or as he passed the sleeve of 
 his surplice across his face, or as he twisted that singularly ex- 
 pressive and mobile countenance into that which was only just 
 not a grimace ! Grotesque, was it ? Yes, if you will. Ir- 
 reverent in anyone else ? Yes, if you will ; but never in Bright, 
 for how penetrated he was through and through with reality and 
 intense feeling ! Every word he uttered came from his very 
 soul. It was the man and his message rolled into one intensely 
 real whole. Philips Brooks, the great American preacher, says 
 somewhere that preaching is " truth conveyed through a person- 
 ality," and here was Bright's great personality coming out, 
 permeating every sentence, till you felt thrilled and awed by 
 the utter self-forgetting earnestness of the soul that uttered the 
 words. 
 
 ' When in church among the congregation, in the prayers he 
 was absorbed in devotion ; in the Psalms and hymns it was the 
 same sometimes clasping his hands, sometimes putting his 
 finger through his hair with a rapid and characteristic move- 
 ment, sometimes grasping his sides, sometimes throwing back 
 his head in a strange and almost grotesque attitude. But with 
 all this, it was impossible for him to be irreverent. He was 
 himself penetrated through and through with the significance 
 of what was passing, lost to every trace of self-consciousness ! 
 It was Bright in church, and that meant a soul of no ordinary 
 greatness in intense and fervently realised communion with 
 God. 
 
Appreciation by Dr. Sanday xxxvii 
 
 1 There is one further aspect of Dr. Bright's work of which I 
 may be permitted to say a few words. As Examining Chaplain 
 to the Bishop of Lincoln, that which often struck us very 
 forcibly was the readiness with which he would sometimes give 
 a candidate credit for much greater knowledge than he probably 
 possessed, if only he could find something to go upon in his 
 papers. An accurate phrase here and there meant so much to 
 Bright that he at once seemed to take it for granted that the 
 candidate knew all that it implied to him. Consequently, he 
 was always a " merciful " examiner whenever he could find any 
 appreciation of the subject in hand. But, on the other hand, 
 if a man made a really bad mistake on a point of doctrine ! . . . 
 
 ' How inadequate these lines are as a description of the 
 great personality who has passed away none knows better than 
 the writer. Bright's death left a gap which, so far as he and 
 very many others are concerned, can never be filled up. His 
 beauty of character, his passionate loyalty to our Lord, his 
 simplicity and childlike sincerity, his almost eccentric yet most 
 gracious presence, his ever-ready and instinctive sympathy all 
 this, linked with a consummate power of accurate thought and 
 of precise expression, were, as it seemed to me, altogether 
 unique, and one mourns over him as over a gracious master 
 and leader, to whom one owes more than it is possible to 
 convey to others.' 
 
 Dr. Sanday, in the Journal of Theological 
 Studies (April, 1901, vol. ii., p. 393), writes as 
 follows : 
 
 ' Dr. William Bright . . . was probably less well known, 
 even in the world of scholars, than his conspicuous gifts and 
 merits deserved. They deserved a reputation that should not 
 be less than European, or, rather, Ecumenical. In the circles 
 in which he was known he was deeply beloved and revered ; 
 but it may be doubted whether these circles extended far 
 beyond the clergy of the Anglican communion. The laity, it 
 is probable, knew him chiefly through his influence on the 
 clergy. 
 
 ' With these he was brought in several ways into close and 
 impressive contact. His lectures were attended by candidates 
 for Holy Orders. . . . The best of them richly felt and 
 
xxxviii Memoir of Dr. Bright 
 
 appreciated his power. With some he remained an intimate 
 and delightful friend for life. Others of the clergy he met at 
 the courses of lectures for the working clergy given from time 
 to time in the summer. And here, too, he found enthusiastic 
 listeners. In Convocation he held a unique position, as at 
 once a brilliant speaker, an exact thinker, and probably the 
 most learned man in the whole assembly at least, in the lower 
 House. In this capacity I have reason to know how highly 
 he was valued, because here, as elsewhere, admiration for his 
 gifts went along as it could not but go along with personal 
 affection for the man. 
 
 ' When we look outside in the wider world, Dr. Bright was 
 known in the Episcopal Churches of America, and still more 
 nearly and dearly in the Episcopal Church of Scotland. . . . 
 Besides this, his fame had doubtless spread to the cultured 
 Roman Catholic scholars of France, who have a certain 
 leaning towards the best of our Anglican workers in the same 
 field. I do not think that he read much German, and, partly 
 as a consequence of this, I do not think that he was much 
 known in Germany, expect, perhaps, through a few striking 
 articles in the Dictionary of Christian Biography (Athanasius, 
 Cyril of Alexandria, Dioscorus, and Theophilus of Alexandria) 
 and through his Early English Church History. 
 
 ' Dr. Bright was a born historian, but a historian rather, 
 perhaps, in the older sense of narrative and descriptive history 
 than in the full modern style. He had very nearly all the 
 gifts of a great historian, with just that limitation. 
 
 ' To begin with, he had complete command of his materials. 
 The patristic texts were at his fingers' ends. He had a reten- 
 tive and comprehensive memory, which summoned up the 
 illustrations that he needed at his bidding. He did not need 
 to trust to the references of others, but poured them out in 
 profusion from his own reading, as his copious annotations 
 show. 
 
 ' He was a thoroughly good scholar, trained at Rugby under 
 Arnold and Tait, and he handled all the mass of materials of 
 which we have been speaking with a scholar's sureness. Of 
 course, I do not mean that differences of interpretation are not 
 possible ; but at least these differences will not, as they some- 
 times do with eminent historians, turn upon imperfect know 
 ledge of Greek. 
 
Appreciation by Dr. Sanday xxxix 
 
 'Then he had, in very conspicuous degree, the historical 
 imagination. And it was imagination that never flagged. He 
 saw the scene vividly before his own mind, and presented it as 
 vividly to his hearers or readers. He did not deal much in 
 abstractions, but the men of whom he speaks are essentially 
 creatures of flesh and blood. 
 
 ' For this is a further point, that he had an intense human 
 interest, not without the salt of humour. He entered to the 
 full into all the human aspects of his narrative. It was no 
 dead chronicle, but a living drama. And the interest was not 
 only intensely human, but intensely religious. He saw not 
 only the humour and the pathos, but still more the grandeur 
 and sublimity, more especially in the whole-hearted champions 
 of the faith. He entered alike into their deepest struggles and 
 into their loftiest aspirations. He knew by heart numbers of 
 their prayers, and has left behind more than one collection of 
 prayers for private use based upon the ancient collects. 
 
 ' He was not only a historian, but primarily a Church historian, 
 and not only a Church historian, but a great theologian. I 
 have said that he knew the Fathers through and through, and 
 he knew them not only from the point of view of history, but 
 from that of doctrine. He was entirely at home in all the 
 dogmatic controversies of the early centuries. He could 
 handle these also with absolute precision. There was no 
 greater authority in this country I doubt if there were many 
 greater authorities in any country as to the authentic content 
 of Catholic teaching. On such points Dr. Bright was always 
 ready to take up his pen. He was a controversialist of a kind 
 that is good for a Church, because he did not spend his strength 
 in vague beating of the air, but he had definite standards before 
 his mind, and it was a mind that could appreciate fine dis- 
 tinctions. 
 
 ' It will be seen how the presence of some of these qualities 
 served as a corrective against the dangers that might possibly 
 have been incidental to others. For instance, the strength of 
 the human interest, and still more the strength of the religious 
 interest, saved the theologian from falling a victim to the 
 hardness of dogma. To my thinking, the little volume of 
 Lessons from the Lires of Three Great Fathers (1890) is a 
 perfect model of its kind. The Fathers in question are St. 
 Athanasius, St. Chrysostom, and St. Augustine, and occasion is 
 
xl Memoir of Dr. Bright 
 
 taken to state clearly the principles for which these Fathers 
 contended, and to bring out the erroneous tendencies which 
 they opposed. The main part of the book consists of three 
 Advent addresses delivered in Christ Church Cathedral, so that 
 it was necessarily pitched in a key that brought home its 
 subject to the minds and hearts of plain Christian people. And 
 at the same time it was enriched by a series of appendices that 
 could only have been written by an accomplished theologian. 
 I am not sure that this is not really an ideal combination. The 
 professed dogmatician can hardly escape being hard, formal, and 
 technical, and these qualities are just what repel so many minds. 
 But Dr. Bright's modest volume combines the precision of 
 profound knowledge with the equally profound note of simple 
 piety. Only a great man could have written such a book. 
 
 ' In another sense, the other little volume, Some Aspects of 
 Primitive Church Life, is an example of the same thing. This 
 also is made up only of summer lectures, but they are such 
 lectures as no one but Dr. Bright could give. The " aspects " 
 all stand out as vividly as if they were painted on canvas. I 
 should like to quote freely from, but I will content myself by 
 referring the reader to, more especially, the fourth address, on 
 the relations of the early Christians to the heathen, and on the 
 persecutions. I might quote this address as a good example 
 of the characteristics of Dr. Bright's style. 
 
 ' He was an excellent writer of English. His style had a 
 wide range, and was capable of very varied tones. It was 
 remarkable for its flexibility. Like Newman, though, perhaps, 
 not quite with that supreme delicacy of finish, he could use 
 simple idiomatic, and even colloquial, expressions with great 
 effect. But his style rose naturally with his subject. He was 
 a true poet, and, when the occasion required it, the right word, 
 the imaginative word, with just the fitting dash of colour or of 
 passion, seemed to be always forthcoming. And there was 
 never anything really strained ; the colour or the passion was 
 never overdone. It was true eloquence, and not rhetoric. 
 What it left behind was not the sense of effort, but of 
 mastery. 
 
 ' One of the reasons for this excellence was that his memory 
 was stored with recollections of the English classics. His 
 favourite reading was Scott, Miss Austen, and Dickens. Much 
 of their writings he knew almost by heart. And for the forming 
 
Bright's Intellect xli 
 
 of a style there is no school like that of conversation and 
 the study of writers who are good in conversation. It is just 
 this that gives the kind of ease and flexibility of which I have 
 been speaking. 
 
 ' Perhaps it might be a criticism of Dr. Bright's published 
 works that reminiscences of phrase came almost too easily. 
 The page is sometimes sprinkled almost too freely with inverted 
 commas. But when he spoke this was not noticeable. 
 
 ' I used to think Dr. Bright at his very best in preaching, 
 especially in the later years, in which I heard him most fre- 
 quently. His preaching had all the chastened spontaneity of 
 his writing. Mere accomplishments of style would have 
 counted for nothing if the moving ideas and interests had not 
 been great and noble. And that in his case they emphatically 
 were. He had some drawbacks, as I have already said, in the 
 matter of delivery. He had had to get over a slight impedi- 
 ment, one consequence of which was that the words sometimes 
 seemed to be pent up and come with a rush, so that the end of 
 a sentence, including its most telling part, was too often lost to 
 the hearer. His action, also, though free and unconstrained, 
 was apt to be somewhat ungainly. But there was a fervour and 
 earnestness in his utterance that was very impressive. He 
 spoke as a true " ambassador of Christ " with a burning desire 
 to win souls, and yet one thought only of the message, and not 
 of the man. He seemed as he spoke to have before him a 
 vision of the world unseen, which awed and subdued his 
 language, though it did not quench the fire within.' 
 
 Of Bright's intellect, my abiding impression is 
 of its massive power and force and grasp, its 
 breadth, and its fairness and freedom from preju- 
 dice. There was nothing small or narrow about 
 it, nothing one-sided. He used both eyes, and 
 saw things stereoscopically. Consequently, he 
 could never be a mere partisan. His mind 
 worked in a higher plane. He was absolutely 
 untainted by either ecclesiastical ambition and 
 professionalism or ritualistic pettiness. He had 
 
xlii Memoir of Dr. Bright 
 
 no desire for notoriety, popularity, or promotion. 
 With him secondary considerations of any kind 
 weighed absolutely nothing. Truth, in those 
 highest regions of human thought in which his 
 mind and spirit lived and worked Truth earnestly 
 longed for, and patiently and laboriously sought, 
 then long pondered and balanced, then lucidly 
 and exactly stated in carefully-chosen language, as 
 before God, without fear or favour that was at 
 once his aim, his method, and his goal. His 
 straightness and singleness of eye ; his humble 
 guilelessness and wholly unconscious simplicity ; 
 his freedom from the distortions of bias and 
 prejudice ; his candid, loyal, and careful estimate 
 of the opinions of others who did not see things 
 exactly as he did ; his joyful recognition of essen- 
 tial moral and religious truth from whatever 
 quarter proclaimed; his clear view of the often 
 mistakes (as time has shown them to be) of even 
 the greatest Christian writers, when the standing 
 matured opinion of the general and later Church 
 has not confirmed them ; his refraining from 
 calling any man ' Father ' or ' Master ' upon earth 
 to be blindly followed; his deep and ripe know- 
 ledge of Holy Scripture as a whole, and careful 
 observation of its interconnection and bearings- 
 all these very rare mental powers and habits, 
 combined consistently throughout a long life of 
 patient, prayerful study, have given a value to his 
 writings and his teaching which will be more and 
 more felt and acknowledged as time goes on. 
 
 These marked features of his character and 
 work give especial weight to the very strong anti- 
 
Strong Anti-Papal Feeling xliii 
 
 Roman feeling which is so evident in many of 
 the Letters which follow, which are, after all, but 
 a sample of more that might be added to the 
 same effect. It could not, indeed, be otherwise 
 with a man of his fulness of theological and 
 ecclesiastical learning. With my intimate know- 
 ledge of him, I was well aware of his position in 
 this great and standing controversy, and I entirely 
 sympathised with him. He was not nearly so 
 one-sidedly ' Latin ' or ' Western ' as either Pusey 
 or Liddon. I do not say that he knew more ; 
 though I think he did, especially of the history of 
 the questions at issue, from original sources. But 
 he had a braver, stronger, more masculine, and 
 more balanced mind. He saw, and said, and 
 wrote, long years ago, that no reunion with Rome 
 would ever, humanly speaking, be probable ; for 
 that we could never reunite with Rome as she 
 is, and that Rome, especially since the Vatican 
 Council, is, and will remain, incorrigible (p. 257). 
 Nay, more, he came, as others have come, to see 
 that the future of Christianity is not with Rome, 
 narrowed as she is, ' cribbed, cabined, and con- 
 fined,' in her own petrified Latinism, which daily 
 more and more becomes a mere hopeless and 
 obsolete anachronism. 1 
 
 1 On February 15, 1895, Canon Bright wrote to me : ' I am 
 delighted to hear that you approved of what I said in 
 Convocation. . . . After all the evidence which recent years 
 have accumulated as to the absolute impossibility of "Reunion 
 with Rome," except on terms of absolute submission, to talk 
 now as if hopes which for a while consoled Pusey, and which 
 Pusey was constrained by imperious facts to resign, might 
 again be indulged because Leo XIII. has expressed a strong 
 
xliv Memoir of Dr. Bright 
 
 I do not know that he was much more hopeful, 
 on the whole, about the orthodox Church of the 
 East ; though it and the other Eastern Christian 
 Communions are not, apparently, so self-barred 
 from all likelihood of upward improvement as 
 Rome, to the heart-grief of us all, too plainly is. 
 
 His discernment, therefore, of the splendid 
 possibilities in the future which lay before the 
 English Church, as at once both Catholic and 
 Protestant, and able, from her very position, to 
 stretch out a hand on either side, made him but 
 grieve more deeply over the unspeakable mischief 
 which he clearly saw has been done to English 
 Christianity by the ignorant and reckless extrava- 
 gances, the ' folly and pedantry,' of a few among 
 the younger clergy, of whom he speaks (p. 144), 
 as long ago as 1866, as 'the puerile Ritualists.' 
 These pseudo-' Catholics' in their juvenile wilful- 
 ness and impatience, acting on the principles of 
 the merest Congregationalism, introduced services 
 and a ceremonial wholly alien to the English 
 Church. The result has been to put a serious 
 hindrance in the way of what was surely most to 
 be desired, as the crowning blessing of the High 
 
 desire to promote Christian unity before he dies ! He cannot 
 promote it, except in his own sense. Trent itself, not to say 
 the Vatican Decrees not to dwell on the Jesuit entourage, 
 with its solid mass of traditionary methods stands right in the 
 path of any such reform. To what avail were it if our Orders 
 were to be recognised ? It might abate some bitterness, and 
 silence a good deal of captious talk about " intention." It 
 would not for it could not diminish one jot of the essential 
 Papalist claims, and to those claims we must oppose a resist- 
 ance admitting of no compromise whatsoever.' 
 
General Character xlv 
 
 Church Revival, following, as in God's good 
 Providence it did, upon the Evangelical Revival 
 within the Church, namely, a general advance, 
 steady and permanent, in the direction of a really 
 dignified and reverent worship within the lines of 
 the Reformed Catholic Church of England, and 
 of a worthier conception, on the part of earnest 
 English Church-people in general, of the kingdom 
 of heaven, and of its claims upon them. Of this 
 Canon Bright was very painfully conscious (see his 
 words on pp. 143-145, 183, 287, 288, 294, 327, 329). 
 In general character he was before all things 
 deeply, intensely, fervently Christian in all that 
 goes to make a Christian, and especially a really 
 Catholic New Testament Christian, in whatever 
 communion, in whatever calling, in whatever 
 rank and position in life. All men and women 
 who knew him personally felt this by an unerring 
 instinct, and loved and trusted him accordingly. 
 It was part of this, as well as of his original 
 natural endowment, that he was of a warmly 
 affectionate nature. Yet he was never married. 
 Whether, had he been, he would have been more 
 or less than we his friends knew him or thought 
 him to be, God only knows. The peculiar 
 services he was able to render to the Church 
 through his full term of life had, perhaps, been 
 less. For he would not have had the same 
 disposable time for study and for writing, and 
 we should have been all of us to that extent 
 the poorer. Yet it must be confessed his recluse 
 .and studious habits entailed some drawbacks. 
 The shyness such habits engender has a tendency 
 
xlvi Memoir of Dr. Bright 
 
 to grow upon a man, especially as he gets older, 
 and so to make him appear unsocial. The 
 valuable time thus saved for study is often gained 
 by the sacrifice of precious opportunities of the 
 social influence so valuable in the life of a 
 University, a little world in itself so largely 
 made up of young and eager and enthusiastic 
 spirits at the most impressible age. There was, 
 perhaps, not quite enough of this influence in 
 Canon Bright's life. Perhaps he did not see 
 enough of his pupils outside his lecture-room. 
 The same may be said of general social influence. 
 All who knew him would have been glad to see 
 more of him. But he has been known to pass a 
 year or more without a visit to his nearest neigh- 
 bours in the Canonical Houses at Christ Church. 
 His intensity as a student explains really his 
 reserve and shyness and apparent brusqueness. 
 He had a very keen sense that friends, whether 
 visitors or visited, are ever the ' thieves of time ' 
 time which, in this case, was due not to him- 
 self, but to others for whom he had to provide. 
 Yet he was not a ' don ' or a misanthrope far 
 otherwise. There was about him no assumption 
 of titular or artificial dignity, of the academic or 
 of any other sort. A ' public man,' of course, he 
 never was. He was not often to be seen at 
 crowded meetings or on platforms. But his 
 solitary, almost anchoret, life did not restrict or 
 starve his sympathies nor narrow his interests. 
 For myself, I have the most vivid, and at the 
 same time the most grateful, recollection of two 
 occasions, while we sat together in the Southern 
 
Shyness and Kindly Disposition xlvii 
 
 Convocation, which abundantly illustrate this. 
 The first was an attack apropos, if I remember 
 rightly, of the financial position of clergymen on 
 the married life of the clergy. This, from one 
 who had married young, and had probably never 
 in all his life known the want of money, made me, 
 I remember, somewhat indignant. But I said 
 nothing ; it was not worth while. One knew, 
 and one knows, that in that matter one can trust 
 the common-sense of Convocation, and, more, of 
 the Church and of the nation behind it. But, to 
 my delight, a mighty champion of liberty in that 
 matter arose in the person of my dear friend, the 
 celibate Professor Canon of Christ Church. I 
 did not suggest it, for I never sat near him in 
 Convocation, but I thanked him afterwards. The 
 second occasion (I forget how long afterwards) 
 was similar, and was partly my own fault. Meet- 
 ing my old friend, Dean Butler of Lincoln, the 
 former offender, in the antechamber, I referred to 
 the attack he had made on us poor married clergy. 
 He was 'not a bit sorry, and would do it again.' 
 And he did that day with the same result. 
 But I never observed any tendency towards 
 marriage in my friend himself. I well remember 
 his admirable mother, from whom the general 
 resemblance in contour of head and face suggested 
 a transmitted inheritance, such as may be often 
 observed, of natural ability from mother to son, 
 saying to me on one occasion, ' Oh, Mr. Medd, 
 I wish you could find a nice wife for William !' 
 But that was not to be. If we seek for natural 
 causes of his solitary life, we may perhaps find 
 
xlviii Memoir of Dr. Bright 
 
 them in that shyness and nervous hesitation of 
 which I have spoken, and which may very prob- 
 ably have been the result of the peculiar conditions 
 of his early life, which forced him in upon himself. 
 It was certainly not the result of any absence of 
 affectionate capacities in his nature and disposition. 
 He never entered as much as was to be desired 
 into general society, where yet he was always 
 welcomed. He had warm friends. But perhaps 
 his study table was his chief and most absorbing 
 attraction, for he knew that his duty to the first 
 Friend of all lay there. 
 
 It was, of course, as representative of the 
 Cathedral Chapter of Oxford that he sat in 
 Convocation, succeeding Dr. Mozley in 1878. 
 He there speedily became a power, and made a 
 deep and permanent impression. For there were 
 few, perhaps none, who on many subjects that 
 came before that venerable assembly could speak 
 with equal authority and weight. 
 
 All who were privileged to listen to him felt 
 this. But perhaps, as its chairman, I may be 
 allowed to speak more especially of the help he 
 gave to the Lower House Committee on Addi- 
 tional Services, and which none of its members 
 was so well qualified to give as he. For even 
 apart from his full liturgical knowledge, his 
 sympathetic sense of what was practically needed 
 in pastoral work was remarkable in one who had 
 had no direct experience of it. Much labour, 
 extending over some years and involving long 
 journeys on the part of the members of both the 
 Canterbury and the York Committees for the 
 
Influence in Convocation xlix 
 
 purpose of conference, was spent upon this work. 
 For it was felt by the Lower House, though, 
 unhappily, not by the Bishops, to be an urgently 
 needed work. The need was shown by the fact 
 that the Church was flooded with unauthorised 
 and tentative services, for all sorts of occasions, 
 while many parish priests declined on principle to 
 use such services, even when perfectly loyal and 
 unobjectionable ; and so the acknowledged needs 
 of the Church, the deficiencies in her Prayer- 
 Book, were unprovided for and are so still. It 
 is a melancholy history. Nowhere else in the 
 religious world is so much learning, energy, and 
 power, not to speak of precious time, wasted, for 
 the most part without result, as in the English 
 Convocations. A carefully prepared and full 
 report was presented by the Services Committee 
 of the Lower House in February, 1888, and four 
 services were, after adoption by the Lower House, 
 sent on to the Upper House in the following July. 
 Nothing more was heard of them for nearly four 
 years, when, in May, 1892, they were noticed by 
 the Upper House, but never revised or com- 
 pleted. How many years were expended on the 
 revision of the Accession Service from first to 
 last I should be afraid to say ; but one may be 
 thankful that Convocation had the advantage of 
 Canon Bright's presence to almost, if not quite, 
 the completion of that work. 
 
 The story of Canon Bright's last illness may 
 perhaps be best given in his own words, in the 
 last letter he ever wrote to me : 
 
 d 
 
1 Memoir of Dr. Bright 
 
 'CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 
 ' November 25, 1900. 
 ' MY DEAR MEDD, 
 
 'No letter that I have received since my "attack" has 
 been so practically helpful and suggestive as yours. I will at 
 once tell you what happened on October 29. I had been 
 rather unwell for two days previously. A dull headache 
 oppressed me, perhaps brought on, immediately, by excessive 
 work at certain " proofs." Early on that Monday morning I 
 sent a request to Sankey to come to me after he was free of 
 his home patients that is, about n. But at 10.15 I began 
 to feel a curious sensation, as if the room were whirling round. 
 It was the sensation one has in a gale of wind at sea, 
 exaggerated. I managed to get on to my sofa, and then, after 
 a few moments, to rise up from it, when 1 was flung forward 
 on the hearthrug with a violence which put out the middle 
 finger of the right hand. Stanley, Sankey's partner, was 
 presently at hand, and replaced the joint, with very much less 
 of sensible pain than I should have expected, because sensa- 
 tion was, in fact, benumbed. Stanley felt and expressed to 
 my friend Seary his fear that creeping paralysis was rapidly 
 developing, and Sankey afterwards told me that I was in real 
 danger of life for three hours or so, but that from i or 1.30 I 
 began to improve, and that the steadiness and continuousness 
 of the improvement were " wonderful." He kept me in bed 
 for several days. By degrees I forget how soon I was 
 allowed to get up for part of the day ; and now I come down 
 to breakfast, and have given my lectures for the last week. 
 For three weeks I had received the Vice-Chancellor's dispen- 
 sation. The chief features of my present condition are: (i) 
 The necessity, urged on me by Sankey, of great care to avoid 
 cold ; (2) a persistent weakness in the right hand ; (3) a dull 
 headache, recurring at short intervals ; (4) a very annoying 
 irritation of the skin of both legs and the left arm ; (5) a 
 curious disposition to shut my eyes, and keep them shut, if 
 not to go to sleep for a large part of the day ; (6) a disposition, 
 perhaps allied to it, to avoid receiving callers ; (7) in lecturing, 
 a tendency to put one word for another. I will take note of 
 what you recommend, as to the Bovril and milk, and 
 Horlick's Malted Milk, and the periodical drives, etc. For a 
 time I was obliged to take something during the night, a glass 
 
Funeral Sermon by Dr. Driver li 
 
 of wine and a biscuit at 1 1, and I shall take these to-morrow 
 before lecturing, and, I think, shall keep some Bovril by my 
 bedside, as Louis XIV. used to keep a roast fowl, which he 
 was pleased to call his en cas. I have a fire to dress by in the 
 morning. I think I take all the precautions that you advise. . . . 
 I am under no illusions as to the certainty, humanly speaking, 
 of a recurrence of the attack. I know that a first means a 
 second, and I accept the warning as mercifully given. I 
 forgot to say that I read the most part of your letter to 
 Sankey. He smiled, acquiesced at every point, then asked, 
 " How does he know all that ?" I answered, " His father was a 
 doctor." Farewell, with a thousand thanks. 
 
 4 Ever yours affectionately, 
 
 'W. BRIGHT. 
 
 ' We here are terribly distressed and upset by the death of 
 Mrs. Paget. In her I have lost my only female friend.' 
 
 Some time after I wrote again to my friend. 
 The only answer I received was from a nurse, to 
 say that he was now unable to answer, or even to 
 read, letters. He passed away on March 6, 1901. 
 
 Canon Driver, preaching in Christ Church 
 Cathedral on the text Jer. xxxi. 33, said : 
 
 ' Rare intellectual gifts were his by nature, and he consecrated 
 all to the service and worship of God. History, especially 
 ecclesiastical history, was his favourite subject, though it was 
 by no means the only subject in which he excelled. Those 
 who have attended his lectures know what animation he 
 would throw into them, and how, by some felicitously-told 
 anecdote or flash of quaint humour, he could sustain the 
 interest of his hearers, while his published writings declare to 
 the world at large the prodigious width and minuteness of his 
 reading, and the skill with which he could weave isolated 
 notices into a complete and geographically-drawn picture. 
 He excelled especially in biography. His keen personal 
 interest in his subject, and the vivacity of his historical 
 imagination, enabled him to describe characteristic incidents 
 and scenes with telling and dramatic effect. The chequered 
 
 d 2 
 
lii Memoir of Dr. Bright 
 
 and often tragic story of the introduction and gradual 
 establishment of Christianity in England has been recounted 
 by him with such fulness of incident and illustration that there 
 will never, we may feel sure, be occasion for it to be told again 
 on the same scale. His numerous writings on the history of 
 the Early Church show the same qualities rich and picturesque 
 narratives, with graphic touches, often at the same time tinged 
 with a gentle humour, tending to bring the scene or occasion 
 depicted vividly before the reader's mind in this case, also, 
 coupled generally with a penetrating insight into the theo- 
 logical issues often involved, and a luminous presentation of 
 the principles at stake, or the doctrines around which a 
 controversy had gathered. He had an almost unique power 
 of combining, with ease and lightness of touch, historical and 
 doctrinal movements into a single narrative, of showing how 
 they interacted upon one another, and of bringing out the 
 crucial moments in the progress of a great controversy. 
 Animation of thought and of expression, not less than of 
 action, was, perhaps, the most striking of his personal 
 characteristics ; and, as he had at the same time a singularly 
 powerful and tenacious grasp both of the facts and history and 
 also of the different aspects and bearings of Christian truth, 
 what with another man would often have been laboured and 
 heavy was with him fresh and sparkling, and full of life. It 
 was a consequence of the same gifts of manner and style that 
 he was able to present the characteristic principles of Christian 
 doctrine and practice in a form at once simple, dignified, and 
 attractive. He was perfectly at home in the great Christian 
 classics of antiquity ; he knew the exact doctrinal scope and 
 significance of each, and his retentive memory enabled him 
 always to produce the quotation or other illustration which he 
 needed. Devotedly loyal to Catholic truth, he was at the 
 same time large-minded and sympathetic ; and those who have 
 listened to his studies in Scripture characters, or his expositions 
 of Christian faith and practice from this place, will bear witness 
 not only to the deep spirituality of thought which always 
 characterised them, but also to their breadth and justness of 
 view, to their penetrating analysis of motive and action, and to 
 the sympathetic insight into the life and character and habits 
 of thought of other men, which he always displayed when he 
 began to give practical applications of doctrinal and moral 
 
His Sermons, Prayers, Hymns liii 
 
 truth. Deeply religious, deeply practical, and written with the 
 same characteristic charms of manner and style as his other 
 writings, his sermons were always singularly helpful and 
 suggestive. Nor is this all. He was master, in addition, of 
 the rare art of being able to compose both prayers and hymns 
 in a chaste and classical style suited to the dignity of the 
 subject. Of his hymns, there are some so well known, and so 
 justly admired, that they will, we cannot doubt, continue for 
 long to perpetuate his name. All may not have known who 
 the author was, but all will surely remember the hymn with 
 which our Sunday evening service sometimes closes, beginning 
 with the verse : 
 
 ' " And now the wants are told, that brought 
 
 Thy children to Thy knee ; 
 Here, lingering still, we ask for naught, 
 But simply worship Thee ;" 
 
 and the two Communion hymns : 
 
 ' " And now, O Father, mindful of the love 
 
 That bought us, once for all, on Calvary's Tree, 
 And having with us Him that pleads above, 
 
 We here present, we here spread forth to Thee 
 That only Offering, perfect in Thine eyes, 
 The one true, pure, immortal Sacrifice ;" 
 and : 
 
 ' " Once, only once, and once for all, 
 
 His precious life He gave ; 
 
 Before the Cross our spirits fall, 
 
 And own it strong to save." 
 
 ' Beauty and spirituality of thought, and choice yet simple 
 diction, could hardly be more felicitously blended. He loved, 
 moreover, the cathedral and the college with which for more 
 than thirty years his life had been so closely linked. He 
 loved the services, and was keenly interested in any proposal 
 tending to increase their beauty or efficiency. He discharged 
 with scrupulous conscientiousness all the duties that devolved 
 upon him in virtue of his position, and gave especial pains to 
 anything relating to the important and responsible task of 
 appointing to vacant benefices. He was a friend, moreover, 
 
liv Memoir of Dr. Bright 
 
 of the young, and there are many who in after-life have 
 retained grateful memories of his kindness. In Convocation, 
 which he attended for many years as the representative of the 
 Chapter, he commanded universal respect. He spoke with 
 ability. The stores of historical and theological knowledge 
 which he had at his disposal always provided him with apt 
 illustrations of the subject in hand, and enabled him to 
 approach it from the right side. He knew, further, how to 
 combine firmness and tolerance, and the spirit which breathed 
 in him was always one of sympathetic and conciliatory large- 
 mindedness, such as disarms opposition and converts hostility 
 into admiration. His friends and colleagues, who had learnt 
 by long experience both to love him as a man and also to 
 value his opinion and judgment, will mourn him deeply. 
 They will feel that his death has deprived not only his own 
 college and University, but the Church of this nation at large, 
 of a rare and richly-gifted personality, but they will at the 
 same time cherish delightful memories of his genial presence, 
 his animated look, his kindly sympathy. They will be able to 
 look back with thoughts of thankfulness upon the example 
 which he has set upon his long life of consistent goodness, 
 of generosity and charity, of amiability and gentleness, of high 
 endeavour and Christian usefulness ; upon his talents, too, 
 which were no ordinary ones, fitly bestowed and fruitfully 
 developed. They will remember him as one who lived ever 
 as in the presence of his Lord and Saviour, whose honour was 
 dear to him, and whose service he loved. They will think of 
 him as one whose life was a constant exemplification of the 
 spirit of Christ, who strove, as far as in him lay, to be 
 conformable to His image, and who had His laws, as the 
 prophet says, so " written " in his heart that he responded 
 instinctively to their call. May those of us who remain lay 
 to heart the lesson of his life ! May we, during the time of 
 our sojourning here, so, by God's grace, order our lives in 
 conformity with His will that, like His servants departed this 
 life in His faith and fear, we may in His good time be made 
 partakers of His heavenly kingdom, and enter with them into 
 the joy of our Lord !' 
 
 In connection with the above, the following 
 appreciation by Canon Scott Holland of Canon 
 
Appreciation by Scott Holland Iv 
 
 Bright, his character and work, will be read with 
 equal interest by all who knew him : 
 
 ' All over England there will be those whose hearts will give 
 a sudden leap at the news that Dr. Bright has passed away 
 from the place that knew him so well and where he had so 
 long been familiar. He was part and parcel of Oxford life. 
 His memory was one with the memories of the gray walls and 
 towers of that sweet city to which our hearts cling so tenderly. 
 Always in and out of its courts, he could be caught sight of, 
 vanishing round corners with strange motions all his own ; or 
 his delighted laugh could be heard startling the dumb stones 
 as he greeted some young undergraduate with ringing welcome. 
 His soul was always young, and loved the young, and he had 
 singular gifts for engaging and amusing them. His intense 
 dramatic skill in telling a story (and his stories were infinite), 
 his almost biblical knowledge of all the pages of Dickens, his 
 shouts of glee, his outpour of play, and fancy, and allusion 
 all this made his dinner-parties for undergraduates historical 
 events. His love for youth spread down to children ; he 
 knew their wants and joys with a brotherly instinct. " Shall 
 we have a fag ?" was his famous invitation to some boys whom 
 he was taking out for a trip by train, in whom he detected an 
 inarticulate craving for something to enliven proceedings. At 
 the scene that followed that invitation imagination boggles. 
 He was impulsive and spontaneous, and amazingly fertile, in 
 all that belonged to conversation. The stores on which he 
 drew were immense, and his imaginative and humorous powers 
 were very high indeed. 
 
 ' It was this which made his lecturing so impressive. I well 
 remember the effect of coming to his lectures, after having 
 listened to the best Tutors and Professors who then were 
 lecturing for the School of Lit. Hum. He stood out as a 
 brilliant artist in his own historical field. He captivated by 
 his intense realisation of the inner significance of a scene or a 
 person. His whole being was thrown into the work of making 
 this realisation felt. His minute knowledge of detail was 
 most skilfully handled to heighten or deepen the momentous 
 effects, and his vivid personal interest in the subject gave it 
 extraordinary animation. All his best gifts were in richest use 
 as he lectured. The names and allusions which sometimes 
 
Ivi Memoir of Dr. Bright 
 
 overlay, by their multitude, the broad effect of his books were 
 swept along into the main current by the energy of his 
 dramatic force as he spoke. He was really a first-rate speaker 
 and preacher. The quaintness of the gestures interspersed, 
 the odd noises interjected, disturbed and bewildered the 
 young, so that they often missed the power of speech or of 
 appeal that lay behind. Undergraduates were easily upset. 
 But for those who could survive mere surface difficulties there 
 was a gift felt at work which was rarely equalled. There was 
 a free and noble use of the best theology, in its most living 
 form, which made his sermons profoundly attractive and 
 impressive ; or, in open speaking, there was often, combined 
 with a real eloquence, a dignity with which he would wrap his 
 gown about him as if it were a Roman toga, and a high 
 passion in his voice, which at happy moments would give 
 telling effect to an oratory that was always fed out of Catholic 
 convictions in their largeness and their splendour. 
 
 ' Of his productive erudition in the field of ecclesiastical 
 history it is needless to speak. His work is on all our shelves. 
 It is always full of matter and excellent reading. More 
 especially did he excel in illustrating theological positions by 
 embodying them in personal lives of the champions. By this 
 he has carried along generation after generation of those who, 
 being clergy, feel that they ought to know so much more than 
 they do. 
 
 ' But, besides this continuous work of rescuing us from 
 abysmal ignorance, he has shown himself a finished master in 
 two departments where the fewest possible ever succeed. He 
 could write a prayer, and he could write a hymn. Only two 
 or three in a generation ever attain to this. But he at his 
 best was nearly perfect, and he was not unfrequently at his 
 best. His book of private devotions has prayers as compact, 
 dignified, and personal as Collects. What more can be said ? 
 As long as our Church lives we shall sing, at most sacred 
 hours, " Once, only once," and " And now, O Father," and so 
 his breath will be ever with us, and his memory never willingly 
 let die. It is worth living for, to have left behind one such 
 hymn which will be sung by unnumbered generations. 
 
 ' Death is not the hour in which to speak of his unflagging 
 controversies on behalf of the Anglican position in which he 
 believed with such heart-whole fervour, and to the justification 
 
Burial in Osney Cemetery Ivii 
 
 of which he brought all his intellectual resources with un- 
 stinted keenness and devotion. We owe him debts that 
 cannot be repaid. 
 
 1 But now we want chiefly to recall the man whom we loved. 
 He has 'uad many a weary physical trouble to bear all through 
 life. Dyspepsia gave him bad hours. But his innate cheer- 
 fulness rose again buoyant and triumphant, and it lasted him 
 to the end. Long after he had been broken by the stroke 
 that led to his death he retained his vivid interest and warm 
 affection, and talked with his old delightful freedom and 
 brightness. He lived alone, but he was, however, in the 
 hearts of many, both young and old. He had that outflow of 
 sympathy for people far younger than himself which kept him 
 in touch with movements of thought not wholly his own. He 
 was open, expansive, alert. He never shut himself up into the 
 prison-walls of age. Therefore he belonged to us all, and 
 therefore it is that we miss him sorely now that he is taken to 
 the rest which his long years of unwearied industry for the 
 cause of the Catholic Church and for the honour of the dear 
 Lord whom he loved and adored have so bravely earned.' 
 
 I have now only to add that Dr. Bright availed 
 himself at times of the help of the following friends 
 as Assistant Lecturers: (i) On the Reformation 
 Period, the late Rev. Aubrey Moore, the late 
 H. O. Wakeman, and (1892 to 1901) the Rev. 
 B. J. Kidd (the Editor of the following Letters) ; 
 and (2) On the Ante-Nicene Period, C. H. 
 Turner, Esq., Fellow of Magdalen. 
 
 Bright was buried in Osney Cemetery at 
 Oxford. His memory is enshrined in the hearts 
 of those who knew him and loved him. His 
 monument is the written works which will remain 
 the permanent treasure of the English-speaking 
 Church. 
 
 P. GOLDSMITH MEDD. 
 
 NORTH CERNEY RECTORY, 
 GLOUCESTERSHIRE. 
 
DR. BRIGHT'S FIRST VISIT TO 
 ROME. 
 
 [In the very interesting narrative of Canon Bright's 
 Vacation 'expeditions,' beginning March 30, 1876, and ex- 
 tending to August, 1900, referred to above (p. xxxiii), there 
 is a specially valuable record of his first impressions of Rome, 
 which he did not visit until late in life. The descriptions of 
 one who, from the fulness of his knowledge, had so quick an 
 eye for everything of historical and ecclesiastical importance, 
 will be valued by all persons of culture and education. But 
 I have thought it better to append the narrative here than to 
 interrupt the Memoir by so many pages. P. G. M.] 
 
 'April 6, 1896, the most memorable of all our 
 expeditions began. We left Oxford on Easter 
 Monday afternoon, and next morning went on 
 with the " Lunn " party to Dover, "and so to 
 Calais, Paris, Modane, and through the Mont 
 Cenis Tunnel on to Turin." The first sight of 
 Italy as we emerged from the tunnel was wonder- 
 fully beautiful. The Cathedral of Turin dark and 
 not beautiful. The Chapel of the Sudarium behind 
 the high altar, and accessible through the palace. 
 The Sudarium itself has not been exhibited since 
 1842. . . . On April 9 we left Turin, had half an 
 hour at Genoa, and afterwards shot through some 
 
Ix Dr. Bright's 
 
 fifty tunnels which pierce the maritime range of 
 the Apennines. The intense blue of the sky and 
 of the Mediterranean, the rich vegetation in 
 terraces one over another, the gardens full of lemon 
 and orange trees, the ever-recurring campaniles of 
 churches, the huge shadowy mass of Elba, made 
 the journey wonderfully interesting. . . . Soon 
 after midnight we found ourselves actually in the 
 Eternal City, driving along the silent streets of the 
 Quirinal to our Hotel, de Russie at the foot of the 
 Pincian. . . . Next day, April 10, we began our 
 sight-seeing. Dr. Russell Forbes gave the party 
 a good lecture on the Palatine, beginning at the 
 Via Nova in the west and underneath the 
 Tiberian Palace ruins, and going along the south 
 side, with its grand view of the Aventine, and 
 passing through the guard -chamber, where the 
 "graffito" of " Alexamenos worshipping his god" 
 had been found, up to the summit of the Palatine. 
 There we saw the Temple of Cybele, and the 
 house of Germanicus, excavated by Napoleon III., 
 and the dark passage where Caligula was murdered, 
 Domitian's Palace, and a great basilica, or hall of 
 justice, on the site of which Dr. Forbes thought 
 it not improbable that St. Paul had stood to plead 
 before Nero. The palace was built above that 
 of Augustus. At the foot of the Collis Victoriae, 
 underneath the ancient Roma Quadrata, part of 
 the wall of which is visible at the west end of the 
 Palatine, we looked down on the Pomcerium at 
 the base of the Capitoline, and understood the 
 relation between the old Roman and old Sabine 
 town. Here was the Porta Romana of the 
 
First Visit to Rome Ixi 
 
 Palatine, below the house of Tiberius. Otho 
 passed through it to the Forum at his accession. 
 The steps to the Tiberian Palace remain. Along 
 the southern side, where the tree-covered Aventine 
 spread itself out to view, with recollections of the 
 old Roman plebeians, and of Jerome's devout and 
 learned lady friends, we had our first sight of the 
 dome of St. Peter's. 
 
 ' On the south of the Palatine is the house of 
 Clodius, restored by Hadrian. In the guard-room 
 we saw " <I>HAIKI Feli " scratched on the wall. 
 The modern gasworks are on the site of the 
 Circus Maximus on the south. Within the 
 Palatine is a stadium built by Domitian, turned 
 into a hippodrome by Diocletian. On the east 
 side, the Palace of Commodus, where Mammaea 
 set up schools for Christians ; on the south, to 
 the left, the Temple of Jupiter Stator ; then on 
 the north side, on a lower slope, the house which 
 Cicero had inhabited ; then the wildly arranged, 
 or disarranged, series of chambers built by 
 Caligula (almost symbolic of his madness) extend- 
 ing to the place where Claudius was found hiding 
 for his life, and whence he was brought out an 
 Emperor. 
 
 ' In the afternoon Dr. Forbes lectured on the 
 Forum, explaining all the great features of the 
 unique scene, especially the Julian Rostra, where 
 Caesar's corpse was shown to the crowd, the site 
 of the Comitium on the right i.e., looking west- 
 ward and that of the Temple of Concord on the 
 left, the three columns representing the Temple 
 of Vespasian, the eight Ionic columns represent- 
 
Ixii Dr. Bright's 
 
 ing that of Saturn, with the Via Sacra running 
 between ; the Arch of Severus, where Caracalla 
 had effaced the name of his brother Geta ; the 
 Basilica Julia, or grand Law Court and Exchange ; 
 the three columns of the Temple of Castor and 
 Pollux ; close under the Palatine the Temple of 
 Vesta and the Palace of the Vestals ; the Column 
 of Phocas in centre of Forum. Then the Arch of 
 Titus further east, with its sculpture representing 
 the treasures of the Temple of Jerusalem. In 
 the Forum, also, in the Via Sacra, is the site of 
 the butchers' shops, with the spot where Virginia 
 was slain. Fragments of pillars represent a temple 
 whence Csesar carried off the public money for his 
 wars. The Senate House, on the north side, is 
 partly turned into a very plain-looking church 
 (S. Adriano). In the Palace of the Vestals (atrium 
 Vestse) is an erasure on one inscription, of the name 
 of a chief Vestal, who is supposed, from the com- 
 bination of a cross with the brooch on her statue, 
 to have been secretly a Christian. 
 
 ' I went with two young clerics named Phillip 
 to San Gregorio, on the Ccelian, with its un- 
 speakably interesting memories of the mission 
 of St. Augustine and his companions. In a side- 
 chapel of the church Gregory's stone chair is 
 preserved. Near this is the huge Colosseum 
 which superseded part of Nero's enormous " Golden 
 House." We saw the various tiers of seats for all 
 the classes of Roman society, the Emperor's place 
 nearest the arena. Substructions, recently laid 
 bare, showed the outlets through which the 
 gladiators and the wild beasts seemed to rise out 
 
First Visit to Rome Ixiii 
 
 of the earth. On April 1 1 I looked into three 
 churches of St. Mary near our hotel. In S. Maria 
 del Popolo, representing a church where Luther 
 said Mass, were black trappings for an aristocratic 
 funeral. The gate del Popolo has a new inscrip- 
 tion, referring to the restoration of liberty in 1870. 
 This inscription is in contrast with that within 
 the gateway, which celebrates Pius VII. as having 
 done much (in the last year of his reign) to dignify 
 and enlarge this great entrance to the city. 
 
 'Mr. Douglas Hamilton, the Incumbent of a 
 church at Halifax, our invaluable and most kind 
 fellow-traveller and friend, took us to St. Peter's 
 and the Vatican Palace. We visited the latter 
 first, after admiring the great obelisk fronting the 
 piazza, and the flight of steps behind it to the 
 great doors of the cathedral. The Sistine Chapel 
 disappointed us. The figure of Christ in the Last 
 Judgment over the altar resembles a heathen god 
 in a fury. In the galleries Raphael's better work, 
 the Transfiguration, prominent. One very hideous 
 picture of a massacre of priests by Netherland 
 Protestants, but no representation of Alva's bar- 
 barities to Protestants, or of the autos-da-fe in 
 Spain ! The stately staircases very impressive. 
 
 ' Entering St. Peter's, we soon came to ap- 
 preciate its vastness. St. Peter's is 613^ feet 
 long, St. Paul's in London 520^ feet ; but in 
 area St. Peter's is twice as large as St. Paul's. 
 When, on returning to London, we entered St. 
 Paul's, we said instinctively, "How small!" At 
 what does not seem a great distance from the end 
 the east end, in fact is " Londinensis S. Pauli 
 
Ixiv Dr. Bright's 
 
 fanum," the word chosen, of course, by way of 
 insult to a heretical cathedral. The statue of St. 
 Peter smaller than I expected According to 
 Lanciani, it was not originally a statue of Jupiter, 
 but was cast to represent Peter ; if in Constantine's 
 time, the keys (of a much later shape) must have 
 been added. The toes of one foot are worn away 
 with continual kissing. The high altar looks 
 grand under its baldachino. The crucifix is on 
 the farther side, looking towards the choir, which 
 here is the western limb of the church. We 
 noticed the fine statue of Pius VI., kneeling 
 towards the " Confession " of St. Peter, beneath. 
 There is a new inscription in progress, extending 
 into the transept, containing, "Unde unitas 
 sacerdotii exoritur," and around the wall at the 
 west extremity is : " O Pastor Ecclesise, tu omnes 
 Christi pascis agnos et oves. EY BO2KEI2 TA 
 APNIA KAI TA HPOBATA XPI2TOY." We 
 looked through the doors of the Cappella del Coro, 
 on the south (seemingly north) side of the nave. 
 A lectern in centre ; stalls for the Canons. Various 
 noble monuments and statues of Popes : Inno- 
 cent XI., worn and resolute ; Pius VII., gentle; 
 Gregory XVI., aged and austere. Seven altars 
 peculiarly "privileged." Against a wall near the 
 entrance of the nave is the Stuart monument, 
 recognising the old Chevalier as "James III.," 
 but Charles and Henry simply as his sons. 
 
 ' In the afternoon we visited San Clemente. To 
 see it with its red colouring, and with the vivid 
 look of real antiquity, was a unique experience. 
 A serving brother (the church belongs to Irish 
 
First Visit to Rome Ixv 
 
 Dominicans) took us down to the " second church," 
 with its curious ninth-century frescoes, one repre- 
 senting Clement celebrating at a low table. The 
 graves of Clement and Ignatius are in the upper 
 church. The lowest of the three stories, said to 
 be the original house of Clement, is under water. 
 The Church of St. Mary of the Angels is ample, 
 though made out of one part of the vast Baths 
 of Diocletian, which could accommodate 3,20x3 
 persons. It was founded by Pius IV. It contains 
 an exquisite statue of St. Bruno. Thence by the 
 street of Tre Fontane to the piazza of the 
 Quirinal ; looked at, but did not enter the palace. 
 We went to early Communion on Low Sunday at 
 the English Church of All Saints, in Via Babuino. 
 It has a beautiful sanctuary with a well -decked 
 altar ; correct ritual, but no vestments. After- 
 wards to St. John Lateran. The baldachino over 
 the high altar is Gothic, the sanctuary containing 
 at its extremity the episcopal throne, splendidly 
 restored by Leo XIII. This throne of the 
 Diocese of Rome has a beautiful enamelled border 
 and other curious inlaid work. Round the apse 
 runs a gold inscription, on blue, that Leo XIII. 
 ordered, the " cella maxima " to be enlarged " in 
 novam apsidem," and the mosaics to be renewed. 
 The new frescoes represent the Mount of Paradise 
 and four streams from under a decorated cross, 
 two harts drinking of the water. The impression 
 here is more religious than at St. Peter's. Out- 
 side the west front runs the proud inscription : 
 " Omnium urbis et orbis ecclesiarum mater et 
 caput." 
 
 e 
 
Ixvi Dr. Bright's 
 
 ' Roman street scenes are rich in colouring, 
 especially the headgear of the women of the lower 
 class. They also like red neckerchiefs and white 
 caps just set on the top of the head. Men also 
 like varieties of colour in their clothes blue and 
 red with striped stockings, etc. Clerical students 
 appear in dresses of various hues, some all in 
 scarlet ; goatherds with quaint goatskin leggings, 
 driving their goats into or out of the city, probably 
 just as in Virgil's time. ... In the late afternoon 
 we went to St. Peter's for a Te Deum, on the 
 anniversary of the Pope's coronation. It was 
 sung in the choir, or tribune, the altar at that west 
 end ablaze with lights. A dense crowd ; the 
 music grave and solemn ; many knelt at the " Te 
 ergo quae sumus" ("We therefore pray Thee"). 
 The Host was afterwards exposed and Bene- 
 diction given. As we descended the steps (which 
 remain from the old church) I looked up to the 
 windows of the Papal apartments and saw two 
 faces, one of them obviously that of Leo XIII. 
 The other was that of an attendant ecclesiastic. 
 We heard afterwards that the old man had looked 
 out on the multitude issuing from the church and 
 been pleased. 
 
 'Next day I went to the Capitoline Hill with 
 Dr. Hamilton, and afterwards to the Tarpeian 
 Rock and the Pantheon. Next day we heard 
 a topographical lecture from Canon Evans at 
 S. Pietro in Montorio a grand panorama. 
 Obviously, the notion that the martyrdom of 
 St. Peter took place on Montorio is absurd, 
 although it gave occasion to the foundation of the 
 
First Visit to Rome Ixvii 
 
 church. He suffered, one cannot doubt (if he did 
 surfer at Rome), in the Neronian Circus, "midway 
 between its two goals," on the left-hand side of 
 St. Peter's and at the foot of the great obelisk, 
 which then stood there, but which Sixtus V. 
 removed to its present place in front of the 
 church. Thence to S. Paolo fuori, a most 
 magnificent new basilica, replacing the old one 
 burnt in 1823. It gives a very good idea of the 
 interior form and aspect of old St. Peter's. We 
 were deeply impressed with its splendour and its 
 lonesomeness. We drove on to Tre Fontane, and 
 entered the three little chapels, of which one is 
 said to occupy the site of St. Paul's martyrdom. 
 Trappist monks hold the place. We heard them 
 singing an Office. A lay-brother very cordial ; 
 he had come from Germany but had not yet felt 
 the unhealthiness of the spot. In the afternoon, 
 with Father Puller, Pere Duchesne, to visit the 
 Catacomb of St. Priscilla, outside the Porta Salaria. 
 In this cemetery, Lanciani says, was buried Pudens, 
 Praxedes, and Prisca, the wife of Aquila. " St. 
 Pudentiana," he adds, is a mistake for the adjective 
 belonging to the " Ecclesia" of Pudens. Passed 
 between layers of " loculi," with occasional " arco- 
 solia " and abundance of paintings ; deep dark 
 passage difficult walking. On April 16, by 
 special permission obtained from the Papal Court 
 by Mr. Hamilton (on the ground of his family's 
 relationship to the House of Stuart), we went down 
 into the crypt of St. Peter's, with Mr. W. A. 
 Carroll (of Christ Church Mission, Poplar) and 
 his mother. A most deeply interesting sight : 
 
 e 2 
 
Ixviii Dr. Bright's 
 
 Tombs of medieval Popes, including the English 
 Hadrian IV. ; also the bulging-out stone tombs of 
 "King James III.," and of " Carolus III." and 
 " Henricus IX." Afterwards we were privileged 
 to enter into the " Confession," and our young 
 acolyte guide unlocked the gilded doors of the 
 shrine. We saw a chest marked with a cross. The 
 tomb of Alexander VI. is empty ; Julius II., who 
 abhorred him, turned his body out of St. Peter's. 
 Part of the tomb of Boniface VIII. remains ; part 
 also of Paul II.'s and Nicholas V.'s. One of the 
 finest things in the crypt is the noble sarco- 
 phagus of Junius Bassus, a Christian Prefect of 
 Rome, A.D. 359. The "Confession," or shrine of 
 St. Peter, is supposed to contain half of the body 
 of St. Peter, the other half being at the Lateran, 
 and half of that of St. Paul. Hence the phrase 
 " the threshold of the Apostles." 
 
 ' Afterwards we ascended the dome. W. went 
 up into the ball itself. In the afternoon we drove 
 along the Via Appia for rather more than two 
 miles, just far enough to see the double line of 
 tombs, passing the little chapel of " Dornine, quo 
 vadis ?" and the entrance to the Catacomb of St. 
 Callistus. We also visited the stupendous Baths 
 of Caracalla, looked at the outside of Newman's 
 cardinalitial Church of St. George in Velabro, 
 and walked along the Via Ports Latins to a turn 
 admitting into a by-lane, and so to the octagonal 
 Chapel of St. John at the Latin Gate, in front of 
 a closed gate in the ancient city wall. This little 
 chapel is only of the sixteenth century. There is 
 a church of the twelfth century near it. 
 
Visit to Naples and Pompeii Ixix 
 
 'On April 16 we visited S. Maria Maggiore, 
 and went into both its splendidly adorned chapels, 
 the Paoline or Borghese on the north, and the 
 Sistine on the south. The latter has a statue of 
 Sixtus V. with a vigorous, stern face. Thence to 
 S. Prassede. professedly containing the bodies of 
 SS. Praxedes and " Pudentiana," and the Pillar of 
 the Scourging. Then, after some difficulty, we 
 found " St. Pudentiana's " Church very near 
 S. M. Maggiore, but in a by-street, Via Urbana. 
 
 ' It is quite modernized but a subterranean 
 passage leads down to a well, associated in legend 
 with St. Lawrence. We looked again at the 
 window over the gate of the Quirinal Palace, 
 whence the election of Popes used to be pro- 
 claimed. A noble group of horses in front of it, 
 and a superb view of St. Peter's. The Popes 
 occupied the palace from Paul V.'s time to the 
 Revolution of 1870. 
 
 ' On the same day, April 16, we went to Naples. 
 The Campagna, through which the line passes, 
 has fine mountain scenery, with villages perched 
 on hillsides, distant castles, burial-grounds with 
 cypresses, and, towards the end of the journey, 
 miles of vines trained along low, spreading poplars, 
 with gray olive-trees. We saw Monte Cassino, 
 halfway to Naples. A group of lofty buildings 
 towers up on the summit of a rocky hill. We 
 went to a fine hotel called " de Vesuve," on the 
 Chiaja at Naples, with a magnificent view of 
 Vesuvius. Here we found our friend Mr. Hamil- 
 ton, Dr. Townsend, Mr. Morton, and some of the 
 Perowne family. Next day, in brilliant sunshine. 
 
Ixx Dr. Bright's 
 
 we set off for Pompeii, after visiting the Pompeian 
 remains in the Museo Nazionale. They include 
 carpenter's tools, door-knockers, petrified bread 
 and fruit, tall lamps for the "atrium" or "triclin- 
 ium " of dwelling-houses, cornices inlaid, chair- 
 handles, perfume-boxes, water-spouts, stocks for 
 criminals, milk - jugs (highly ornamented), oil- 
 vessels, wine-flasks, furnaces for heating water, 
 treasure-chests, house-bells, frying-pans, eggcups, 
 plates for boiling eggs, and what not besides. 
 Dr. Townsend told us that some of the probes, 
 pincers, forceps, two-edged knives, specula, etc., 
 were identical in principle with those now in use. 
 The whole daily and domestic environment of a 
 Roman gentleman at his " Brighton" was before 
 us. At Pompeii, which was overwhelmed by a 
 storm of ashes flowing from Vesuvius, while 
 Herculaneum was crushed under thickening 
 streams of lava, we found workmen excavating 
 the uppermost chambers of houses ; one brilliant 
 bit of red painting had been discovered four days 
 before. At the base of the Temple of Jupiter, 
 looking down on the Forum, Mr. Hamilton 
 lectured on the destruction of Pompeii and on its 
 history in general, and read the letter of Pliny the 
 younger about his uncle's death. We entered a 
 number of houses which exhibited the construction 
 of any well-to-do Roman villa. In one of them 
 we saw an actual triclinium. In a modern house 
 near the entrance human bodies preserved under 
 coatings of ashes, some in horrible writhing 
 postures, were exposed to view. We walked 
 down the " Street of Tombs " to the gate looking 
 
First Visit to Rome Ixxi 
 
 towards Herculaneum. After a wildly rapid drive 
 to the station, we caught the evening train, and 
 reached Naples about seven. The sides of 
 Vesuvius were illuminated by lines of red lava. . . . 
 Next morning we had exquisite views of the bay 
 and of Capri. We visited the public gardens and 
 the cathedral, which is professedly Gothic, but not 
 at all beautiful. We were shown the tomb of 
 St. Januarius, and had we been " Catholics " 
 might have had the privilege of kissing the 
 "finger" of the saint in a glass case. . . . We 
 entered a round church opposite the palace, built 
 by the restored Bourbon King, in discharge of a 
 vow, in 1816. It has a magnificent statue of 
 St. Athanasius. Returned to the Hotel de Russie 
 at Rome. 
 
 ' Next day, the second Sunday after Easter, 
 W. went to High Mass at St. Peter's. We after- 
 wards met at All Saints'. One soon gets tired 
 of the Roman churches. W. heard vespers ex- 
 quisitely sung by nuns at S. Trinita de' Monti. 
 In Via Babuino we met a ghastly procession of 
 hired attendants at funerals, wrapt from head to 
 foot in blue gowns, with cowls the face covered 
 up, save for two eyeholes ; in front a banner with 
 grim emblems of death ; closing the train a priest 
 in short surplice and black stole. Next day we 
 visited the Vatican Library, passing by the 
 sacristy of St. Peter's, which occupies the prob- 
 able spot of his martyrdom. We saw the great 
 Vatican manuscript, open at Ps. 9 ff. ; a copy of 
 Henry VIII.'s book on the Seven Sacraments, 
 with his autograph signature, etc. But it hardly 
 
Ixxii Dr. Bright's 
 
 looks like a library ; by far the larger number of 
 the books are in closed cases. But there are 
 many objects some from catacombs represent- 
 ing early Christian art, such as Greek crosses of 
 thin gold, and vessels said to have held martyrs' 
 blood. We looked down from a terrace on the 
 Vatican gardens, which disappointed us by their 
 apparent small extent. Among the sculptures of 
 the galleries we saw the Apollo Belvedere and 
 the Laocoon. The inner court has a tall column 
 made by Pius IX.'s order to commemorate the 
 Vatican Council. Leo XIII. found that its only 
 secure site would be within the precincts of his 
 vast palace. In the afternoon we drove with 
 Mr. Rumsey, Vicar of Burnham, to San Lorenzo 
 " fuori." This church has a double line of 
 columns, two "ambons" like those of St. Clement 
 (one single, one double), a high altar looking 
 towards the episcopal throne in the sanctuary 
 beyond, and beneath it a "Confession," said to 
 contain the bodies of SS. Stephen, Lawrence, and 
 Justin Martyr. Lawrence doubtless was buried 
 there possibly Justin, too. Beyond the sanc- 
 tuary is a decorated chapel containing the remains 
 of Pius IX. Next to S. Croce in Gerusalemme ; 
 looked at its specially venerated chapel called 
 " Holy Jerusalem," which, according to an in- 
 scription, women are forbidden to enter, save on 
 March 20, the anniversary of the dedication. A 
 slab asserts that Helena brought some earth from 
 Calvary, and deposited it in a vault beneath. 
 Next to the Scala Santa at St. John Lateran. 
 This seemed to us the most solemnly pathetic 
 
First Visit to Rome Ixxiii 
 
 place we had seen in Rome, for we saw pious 
 people going up the stairs laboriously on their 
 knees, and praying at the gate of the chapel above, 
 called "The Holy of Holies." "Heretics" may 
 only walk up the two side-staircases, and so reach 
 the entrance to this chapel. It is a truly awe- 
 striking place. In front of the chapel is the 
 inscription " Vulneratus est propter iniquitates 
 nostras." Below, in the vestibule, there are 
 majestic statues of our Lord. We entered the 
 baptistery of the Lateran, and heard a Burial 
 Office performed there (it is used as a parish 
 church). On one side is a chapel of St. John Evan- 
 gelist, with " Love one another " over the door. 
 
 ' We visited several other churches, as of 
 S. Maria sopra Minerva, the nave of which is 
 Gothic, and has a statue of Christ bearing the 
 Cross, by Michael Angelo for the scene of 
 Molinos' forced abjuration in this church, see 
 "John Inglesant,"chap. xxxviii. and of St. Louis 
 of France, which has on its front the old royal 
 arms of France with the lilies, and, inside, epitaphs 
 in French. We also saw a noble "Temple of 
 Nymphs," wrongly called the Temple of Minerva 
 Medica, and a fine fragment called an altar of 
 Minerva in the Via Alessandrina. One very 
 curious open space in this part of the city seemed 
 entirely abandoned to cats. 
 
 'Next day, April 21, we left Rome for Genoa, 
 where we found there was an Anglican " Church 
 of the Holy Spirit," with very frequent Celebra- 
 tions. We had no time to explore the marble 
 glories of the City of Palaces. But while driving 
 
Ixxiv Genoa Turin 
 
 next morning to the station we looked down several 
 curious narrow lanes communicating with the wider 
 streets, like those at Yarmouth. Ascending to- 
 wards the Alps, we enjoyed splendid mountain 
 views. An amphitheatre of Alps seemed to 
 expand behind Turin, where we stayed an hour, 
 and were delighted with the Corso Vittore Em- 
 manuele and its rows of plane and chestnut trees. 
 Above Turin snow lay pretty thick at several 
 points on the sides of the railway, contiguous to 
 images of soft, delicate spring verdure. Every 
 available patch of ground, high up on hillsides, 
 was utilised for vine culture. 
 
 ' At 7 a.m. on April 23 we found ourselves 
 again in Paris, and reached London at 6. Next 
 morning we went to St. Paul's. The first 
 thought was, " How small in comparison of 
 St. Peter's !" ' 
 
DR. BRIGHT'S PUBLISHED WORKS 
 
 1857. Ancient Collects. 
 
 1860. History of the Church from the Edict of Milan. 
 
 1864. Faith and Life. 
 
 1865. Liber Precum Publicarum : a Latin Version of the 
 
 Book of Common Prayer. (With Canon Medd.) 
 
 1866. Hymns and other Poems. 
 1874. A sermon on 'The Priesthood.' 
 
 1877. The Roman Claims tested by Antiquity. 
 
 1878. Chapters of Early English Church History. 
 
 1882. Notes on the Canons of the First Four General Councils. 
 Private Prayers for a Week. 
 
 1885. Family Prayers for a Week. 
 
 1886. lona, and other Verses. 
 
 1887. Addresses on the Seven Sayings from the Cross. 
 
 1889. The Incarnation as a Motive Power. 
 
 1 890. Lessons from the Lives of Three Great Fathers. 
 1892. Morality in Doctrine. 
 
 1894. Waymarks in Church History. 
 
 1896. The Roman See in the Early Church. 
 
 1897. The Proper Sense of the Word ' Catholic ' as applied to 
 
 Christian Communities or Individuals. 
 
 1898. Some Aspects of Early Church Life. 
 The Law of Faith. 
 
 1903. A posthumous work, in two volumes, entitled: 'The 
 Age of the Fathers ; being Chapters in the History of 
 the Church during the Fourth and Fifth Centuries.' 
 This has been edited by Dr. Lock, the Warden of 
 Keble College, with the help of Mr. Turner, of 
 Magdalen, who was for some years Assistant Lecturer 
 to Dr. Bright. It includes an excellent index, the 
 work of the Rev. R. G. Fookes. 
 [ Ixxv ] 
 
Ixxvi Dr. Bright's Published Works 
 
 Dr. Bright edited the following works : 
 
 1872. Eusebius' Ecclesiastical History. 
 
 1873. The Orations of St. Athanasius against the Arians. 
 1878. Socrates' Ecclesiastical History. 
 
 1880. Select Anti- Pelagian Treatises of St. Augustine. 
 
 1 88 1. Historical Writings of St. Athanasius. Later Treatises 
 
 of St. Athanasius, translated in the 'Library of the 
 Fathers.' 
 
 He also left behind him : 
 
 Three copies of the Quarto Greek Testament (editions of 
 1859, 1863, and 1887), with very large margins filled with 
 his MS. notes ; 
 
 Sixty-two volumes, which he called his ' Sylva,' full of his 
 notes on various subjects, theological and historical, all duly 
 numbered and indexed. These, with the above-mentioned 
 copies of the Greek Testament, are now preserved in Keble 
 College. 
 
 A small quarto volume, 293 pages, of ' Oxford Remini- 
 scences,' from April 12, 1862, to June i, 1887. This volume 
 contains notes, evidently made at the time, of sermons he had 
 heard, conversations with Oxford residents, incidents of special 
 interest, impressions of the religious condition of Oxford, etc. 
 
I 
 
 Interpretation of Holy Scripture 
 
 To the Rev. , on Old Testament criticism. 
 
 January 29, 1894. 
 
 ON this urgent question [of Old Testament 
 criticism] I feel most keenly that the point of 
 cleavage the crucial question lies just where 
 you have stated it. It is not whether you think 
 that this or that book was written by its alleged 
 author, or how much was added to the properly 
 Mosaic legislation, or what statements on matters 
 not affecting the great purpose of the Old 
 Testament were allowed to be made, in con- 
 formity to current tradition, but whether you do, 
 or do not, proceed on, or accept, premisses which 
 deny the supernatural. 1 
 
 To the Rev. - , in reply to an inquiry about 
 the different types of apostolic doctrine. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 August 2, 1870. 
 
 I think you might consult the sixth of Canon 
 Liddon's Bampton Lectures; and also Schaffs 
 
 1 Cf. Bright, The Law of Faith, p. 338. 
 
 I 
 
 
2 Interpretation 
 
 History of the Christian Church^ and Pres- 
 sense's Trots Premiers Sihles, vol. ii., p. 103, 
 ' Unite fondamentale dans la diversite,' where 
 he discusses the question, ' Were the different 
 types of Apostolic doctrine contradictory?' which, 
 he says, is 'the great theological debate of our 
 time.' 2 I may add that in Newman's {Paro- 
 chial'} Sermons, vol. ii., p. 190, the question is 
 referred to. 
 
 To the Rer. , on St. Jerome ; and on St. James 
 
 and St. Paul. 
 
 OXFORD, 
 
 May 1 6, 1865. 
 
 You would, 01 course, be shocked at the rough- 
 ness and bitterness of Jerome. I confess I set it 
 down, a good deal, to his monastic zeal, which 
 was well-nigh fanatical ; partly, also, to a natural 
 acerbity of temper. He is an unloveable character. 
 One admires him for his self-denial and his 
 industry, but I consider him a saint only in a very 
 modified sense. 
 
 ***** 
 
 Liddon began his lectures on St. James on 
 Sunday night. There were ninety-five listeners 
 in Queen's Hall, and some of our friends, 
 generally attendants on his lectures, were not 
 present. He told us how essentially different the 
 TT'UJTIQ spoken of by St. James was from that to 
 which St. Paul ascribes justification i.e., it was 
 
 1 Vol. i., pp. 209 sqq. (ed. 1882). 
 
 2 P. 103 (2nd ed., 1870). 
 
Purgatory 3 
 
 'an act of the intellect accepting the Christian 
 revelation.' That is, as I have always thought, it 
 was the -yvuaiq of truth which is spoken of as good 
 and necessary, but not sufficient per se, in 
 i Cor. viii. 
 
 To the Rev. Canon Mcdd, on i Cor. Hi. 10-15. 
 
 ARMTHORPE RECTORY, DONCASTER, 
 August 2, [?i88o]. 
 
 I have not read every word of Dr. Pusey's 
 book, 1 and only about half of Dean Goulburn's. 2 
 But on one point I cannot follow the Doctor 
 I mean as to the sense of i Cor. iii. 12. I 
 cannot think that ' the day ' can be the day of 
 death, 3 or anything than the great Day of 
 Judgment, with which elsewhere St. Paul 
 pointedly associates the idea of ' fire,' but certainly 
 for the purpose of punishment. In i Cor. iii. the 
 ' fire ' seems to have for its object, not the 
 purification of flaws or stains, but the testing of 
 the true value of the thing to which it is applied. 
 It is essential to Dr. Pusey's theory that St. Paul 
 should be, in effect, speaking of a purgative 
 process of suffering carried on in the intermediate 
 state. In other words, he is essentially in 
 accord with the Roman interpretation ; he, like 
 the Roman Catholics, puts a purgatorial sense on 
 the context. I think that this is (i) inconsistent 
 with the natural meaning of ' the day ;' (2) out of 
 
 1 What is of Faith as to Everlasting Punishment ? 
 
 2 Everlasting Punishment. 
 
 3 What is of Faith, etc., p. in. 
 
 I 2 
 
4 Interpretation 
 
 harmony with the scope and purpose of the 
 context, which refers to a Divine examination, at 
 the Judgment, of the building-work whatever 
 that may mean, whether it be or be not restricted 
 to the case of teachers which has been carried 
 out in this world. Dr Pusey argued, in a letter 
 to me, that if ' the day ' were to be understood as 
 the day of doom itself, then the redeemed souls in 
 the intermediate state would have the terrible 
 anticipation of ' intense suffering ' at the day of 
 doom. This implies that it is the souls, not the 
 superstructure which each has raised, to which 
 ' the fire ' is to be applied, whereas St. Paul 
 distinctly connects 'the fire' with the 'work.' 
 True, the builder of ' hay ' and ' stubble ' is to be 
 ' saved, yet so as through fire.' But this, to me, 
 suggests the notion, not of an intensely torturing 
 and definitely penal and purgative infliction, but 
 of a narrow escape, as of one who flies from a 
 burning house and comes out safe. It is remark- 
 able that in Isa. xliii. 2 the possibility of passing- 
 through the fire without being one's self burned 
 is clearly set forth. I cannot, therefore, on this 
 general survey of the passage, accept Dr. Pusey's 
 interpretation, which he seems to consider as the 
 only ' honest >l one possible. To me it is an intro- 
 duction of foreign matter into St. Paul's teaching. 
 Nor do I feel at all sure that it is exegetically 
 necessary or natural to extend the scope of his 
 words beyond the case of teachers. 2 
 
 On another point, the sense of ' so in Christ 
 
 1 What is of Faith, etc., p. 108. 
 
 2 Ibid., pp. 1 08, 109. 
 
' A social Gospel ' 5 
 
 shall all be made alive/ I think Goulburn's inter- 
 pretation 1 less natural than Pusey's. 2 
 
 I go home on Wednesday. Here I write with- 
 out either book at hand. 
 
 To the Rev. J. G. Adder ley, on his article Is there 
 a social Gospel ? 3 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 fanuary n, 1899. 
 
 I have read your article, and I agree with the 
 larger part of it ; in fact, my non-agreement refers 
 to certain details. Very much that you say as to 
 the duties of Christians, and especially of Church- 
 men, is matter-of-course truth, although unhappily 
 not matter-of-course practice. And although at 
 some points of the paper, where the faults of the 
 ' well-to-do ' are referred to and their obligations 
 emphasized, I wished to see the balance held 
 straighter that is, to see a reference to the faults 
 or obligations of the ' masses ' that defect is at 
 least partially made up in the last column, where 
 you speak of the shortcomings of the ' labour 
 party ' from a Christian point of view. Yet even 
 there you do not speak of the masses, but only of 
 their chosen ' leaders.' But let that pass. I do 
 agree there with much that you say. Where, 
 then, do I differ from you ? 
 
 Well, I do not quite like the extension of the 
 New Testament word Gospel, in the scope which 
 
 1 Everlasting Punishment, p. 114, n. 
 
 2 What is of Faith, etc., p. 37. 
 
 3 Looking Upward, pp. 71 sqq. 
 
6 Interpretation 
 
 your article gives to it. Social justice is excellent, 
 is to be aimed at, to be striven for ; but it is an 
 application, not properly a part, of the idea of the 
 Gospel as held by St. Paul. Philanthropy in all 
 its branches equitable conduct between employer 
 and employed, due provision for health, for educa- 
 tion, for social advancement on all these things 
 a blessing may rest. But there is such a dis- 
 position among the English people to a modernized 
 Pelagianism, to a substitution of ' natural ' for 
 'supernatural good,' that I, for my part, shrink 
 from language which if addressed to a people 
 impressed with the supernatural idea, so to speak 
 might be safe from all misconstruction, but is 
 not thus safe when addressed to English ears. 
 
 At any rate, I am disposed to say, Let us distin- 
 guish between the essential thing itself, which 
 operates in the spiritual area, and those legitimate 
 inferences from it which may show that ' godliness 
 has,' in a sense, 'the promise of the life that now 
 is as well as of that which is to come.' Let us 
 rigorously observe proportion and sequence in 
 our insistence on such matters. 
 
 Again (or, rather, as a consequence), I should, 
 for myself, distinguish very needfully and habitu- 
 ally between the kingdom of God and an improved 
 or moralized society, and this the more because a 
 substitution of ' the nation in a religious aspect ' 
 for 'the Church,' is precisely that form of 
 Erastianism which suits the political temper of the 
 day. Your analogy between the Jewish Church- 
 State and Christian society in England fails, 
 because the social life of a modern nation is not 
 
Christ acts on the individual 7 
 
 theocratic in that sense : the Jewish system was a 
 unique fact, not to recur in history. The Chris- 
 tianization of society, I hold, is to be effected by 
 the diffusion of Christian motives and beliefs 
 among individual members of the body politic. 
 The Apocalyptic vision is not the vision of a 
 perfect State, but of the aggregate of redeemed 
 souls ; the State is wholly out of its purview. I 
 do not say this as disparaging national life or 
 society, but they are of the earth, and will have 
 no place in heaven. 
 
 So, again, when you say that 'love, justice, 
 liberty, brotherhood,' are simply 'the foundation 
 truths which Jesus taught,' I am obliged very 
 deliberately to deny it. To say that they are is, 
 I fear, to give great occasion to those who would 
 patronize our Lord if He could be taken as a 
 great social reformer, apart from supernatural 
 claims or a revelation of Spiritual truth. The 
 confusion between what He came expressly to do 
 and to teach, and what applications may be made 
 of His teaching and action in the direction of 
 social reform, is, in my opinion, serious ; and I 
 fear that some of your language will (unintention- 
 ally, I trust) encourage it, especially when you go 
 so far as to explain ' the light which lighteth 
 every man,' 1 etc., by such an inadequate gloss as 
 ' the way out of social distress.' Surely tkis is not 
 to do justice to the thought which filled the soul 
 of St. John! 
 
 Perhaps, also, you hardly make sufficient allow- 
 ance, in your stringent censure of the Church of 
 1 John i. 9. 
 
8 Interpretation 
 
 England on the score of her inactivity in certain 
 departments of social work, for the vastness and 
 arduousness of the properly spiritual work which 
 is, and must be, her primary vocation. Again, 
 you say that the principle of ' the equality of men' 
 as taught by Socialists (I don't know why you 
 object to that title) is a distinctively ' Christian 
 principle.' Surely this is not so, except as Chris- 
 tians assert it with its Christian basis, its explicitly 
 religious or theological idea. In itself it is not 
 only not Christian, but not true, and you yourself 
 practically admit this, when you say that ' no plan 
 for social reform will succeed without such moral 
 force as Christianity proposes to supply.' 
 
 But yet again, are you not a good bit too 
 absolute, and too little mindful of necessary quali- 
 fications (a common tendency, let me suggest, of 
 young men on fire with a single-hearted moral 
 enthusiasm), when you suggest that the Church of 
 England is found generally opposing the principle 
 of the duties of property? Is this a just judg- 
 ment? Is it a true testimony? Is there not just 
 now a strong temptation to echo the complaints 
 of outsiders against our own order, to heap blame 
 on those clergy or laymen who do not agree with 
 a certain political programme, and to identify 
 Radicalism with the service of Christ ? And is 
 there no permanent significance in the old principle 
 of Exodus, 'Thou shalt not countenance a poor 
 man in his cause,' 1 or, still more, in our Lord's own 
 question, ' Who made Me a judge or a divider?" 2 
 These are my impressions, roughly stated. 
 
 1 Exod. xxiii. 3. 2 Luke xii. 34. 
 
*Whosoever shall put away, etc.' 9 
 
 To the Rev. Canon Gore, on Divorce. 
 
 BRIGHTON, 
 
 April 19, 1895. 
 
 I am afraid I cannot resist the logic of the 
 Bishop's letter. 
 
 What did our Lord mean by 'putting away'? 
 The word in the Greek 1 is hardly well rendered 
 by such a phrase ; it strictly indicates a ' release ' 
 from matrimonial obligations. 
 
 1. Did He mean only a separation, a mensa et 
 toro ? or did He mean a divorce proper? Surely 
 the question is needless. There can be no serious 
 doubt that He means the latter. 
 
 2. Therefore (assuming that wopvda in the two 
 passages before us means adultery, not prenuptial 
 unchastity on the woman's part, a theory, I need 
 not say, unknown to the Fathers) in the one case 
 
 in the one only case of the wife's unfaithful- 
 ness (not in the case of the husband's), divorce 
 proper is allowed by our Lord. 
 
 3. But divorce proper means the dissolution 
 of the vinculum. 
 
 4. And if the vincidum is dissolved on one 
 side, it is dissolved on both sides. The husband 
 ceases to be husband, and the wife ceases, not 
 less, to be wife. 
 
 5. Therefore (does it not follow ?) the wife, 
 being by such divorce reduced to the condition of 
 a single woman, commits no new or fuller act of 
 adultery by marrying someone else. 
 
 1 oj ac a70>.-jcT]j TT^V yjva.ua. adroD (Matt. X x. 9). 
 
io Interpretation 
 
 It may well be deemed a wrong act on her 
 part, perhaps an imprudent act ; but it need not 
 be so in all cases. Personally, I think the Church 
 law might very reasonably forbid such marriages, 
 on the ground that the sin which has incurred 
 divorce ought to be followed by perpetual celibacy, 
 as a sort of due penance. But I know not how, 
 on the ground above stated, such a marriage 
 could be called adulterous. If it is, then there 
 has been no real divorce; she is still the wife of the 
 husband who has separated himself from her ; 
 whereas the just interpretation of our Lord's words 
 implies, as I believe, that he has ' put her away ' 
 in such sense as to be absolutely released from the 
 obligation of a husband, which involves her release 
 from the obligations of a wife. 
 
 Our primary duty is, I think, to secure this 
 just interpretation. Consequences may, and must, 
 be left in His hands Whose words we are inter- 
 preting. 
 
 P.S. I return home to-morrow. What thanks 
 we owe to the Bishop of Hereford for his words 
 re the Armenians ! A disposition to question 
 even the substantial truth of the reports of 
 massacres among the Armenians is, I suppose, 
 one of the mischievous survivals of Disraeli's 
 ' Peace with Honour ' policy. I am, as you know, 
 Conservative, but I detest the pro-Turkish animus 
 which he confirmed among the members of the 
 party. I suppose it existed before, it was part of 
 a Governmental tradition ;'the Turk must be borne 
 with, kept on his feet, propped up if he were 
 
The Armenians 11 
 
 tottering, and all his vileness as a sovereign 
 power over Christians minimized or ignored (with 
 a persistent closing of eyes and ears when 
 necessary), lest Russia should profit by his fall 
 and our Indian dominions be endangered. Such 
 
 o 
 
 a policy seems to me obviously immoral, ever 
 apart from our sympathy with suffering fellow- 
 Christians. I trust that Mr. Gladstone's voice 
 will again be heard, so as to put wholesome 
 pressure on the Government. Of all wilful fictions 
 and transparent shams, is any one grosser than the 
 pretence of trusting the Turk's word ? 
 
 To the same, on the same subject. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 April 22, 1895. 
 
 Thank you : I shall be most glad to see you 
 when you are again at Radley in the beginning of 
 next month. 
 
 Yes, I feared that I might ' surprise ' you, 
 although in your Abbey addresses you grant the 
 position that (i) the interpretation put on iropvtia 
 by Dollinger, and Liddon after him, is unsatis- 
 factory, 1 as it is most certainly unpatristic ; and 
 (2) that in one case, that of the wife's unfaithful- 
 ness, real divorce is (not enjoined, but) permitted 
 by our Lord. 
 
 Other friends of mine, such as the Bishop of 
 Reading, do not grant so much, and I am afraid 
 that to them I am proportionately more of a 
 
 1 Gore, Sermon on the Mount, p. 71, and app. iii., p. 215. 
 
12 Interpretation 
 
 ' scandal.' But I cannot help it. I am deeply 
 convinced that the view current among the 
 clergy, derived from the Canon Law which we 
 took over, so to speak, from the pre- Reformation 
 authorities, will not stand as a fair interpretation 
 of our Lord's words, and that to tamper with, or 
 explain away, the natural import of those words, 
 in the supposed interest of social morality, is to 
 incur a responsibility of such gravity as cleaves to 
 all ' will-worship.' 1 
 
 I am convinced that the Canon Law doctrine 
 does not rest on Catholic consent, and, in confront- 
 ing it with the unstrained interpretation of the two 
 texts in St. Matthew, 2 I am, 1 believe, pursuing a 
 parallel course to that which you so reasonably 
 indicated, with reference to De Lugo's (or other 
 ' scholastic and later dogmatic theologians ') 3 
 a priori speculations as to what an Incarnation 
 must have involved. 
 
 But I repeat that the dissolution of marriage is 
 only allowed by our Lord in case of the wife's 
 unfaithfulness, and if a wife now obtains in our 
 courts a ' divorce ' from an unfaithful husband, and 
 thereupon marries somebody else, it seems to me 
 undeniable that such a union is adulterous. It is 
 not hard to see why such a distinction should be 
 made, and it does not conflict with the fact that 
 in God's sight the sin is alike in either party, 
 although the husband's sin does not affect family 
 life as the wife's does. 
 
 1 Col. ii. 23. 2 Matt. v. 32, xix. 9. 
 
 3 Gore, Bampton Lectures, p. 151 (ed. 1891). 
 
Marriage after divorce 13 
 
 [The following letter was sent by the Archdeacon of 
 Quebec to the Montreal Gazette, to introduce to its columns 
 the two appended letters which Dr. Bright had addressed to 
 him]. 
 
 September 14, 1901. 
 
 I send you herewith two letters received some 
 time since from the late Rev. Canon Bright, of 
 Christ Church, Oxford, on a question which then 
 was, and still is, a burning question in the Church 
 of England the question of marriage and divorce. 
 As this question is to be brought under the con- 
 sideration of the Provincial Synod again, I think 
 it of great importance that the Synod should have 
 the opportunity of reading and considering the 
 last utterance upon this difficult question of the 
 greatest theologian of his time in our Church. 
 You will oblige me, and confer a great benefit 
 upon the Church in Canada, if you will print them 
 in your issue. Though private and personal, 
 they are of a character that makes their publica- 
 tion at this time not only proper, but most 
 important. 
 
 HENRY ROE, D.D. 
 
 Dr. Brighfs First Letter. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 May 8, 1895. 
 
 DEAR MR. ARCHDEACON, 
 
 I learned from the Bishop of Quebec that 
 you were so good as to wish for my opinion on 
 the matter of marriage after divorce, and intended 
 to write to me accordingly. I have received 
 
14 Interpretation 
 
 your pamphlet 1 with the Report of the joint 
 committee of your Provincial Synod of 1892, and 
 perhaps I shall best meet your desire if I proceed 
 at once to comment first on that Report. 
 
 And, first, I cannot but observe what, with all 
 respect to the authors, I must regard as a precon- 
 ception impelling them to look out for some way 
 of nullifying the two excepting clauses in St. 
 Matthew's report of our Lord's words. The 
 ordinary rule, surely, would be that when our 
 Lord is reported four times 2 as laying down a law, 
 twice with an exception and twice without it, the 
 exception in the first two cases is to be read into 
 the last two. We apply this method in the con- 
 struction of legal provisions and of Prayer- Book 
 rubrics. It is the method of common-sense inter- 
 pretation. The particular governs or limits the 
 oreneral ; the fuller statement fills out the briefer. 
 
 o 
 
 But such a method is inconvenient with a view 
 to the preconception that, somehow or other, 
 Christ's words must mean what does not conflict 
 with existing Western Canon Law ; therefore the 
 method has in this case to be put aside, and, as 
 the Report frankly says, to be 'avoided.' How ? 
 By disintegrating the New Testament on a 
 chronological principle with the effect of assuming 
 
 1 The right of the innocent party, after a divorce for 
 adultery, to marry again while the other partner is living 
 (Quebec, 1892). This was a supplement to the Minority 
 Report of the committee of the Provincial Synod, of which 
 minority the author was chairman. The Majority and Minority 
 Reports on the question of Divorce and Remarriage may be 
 seen in the Journal of the Provincial Synod of Canada, 1892. 
 
 2 Matt. v. 32, xix. 3-9; Mark x. 2-12 ; Luke xvi. 18. 
 
Passages of St. Paul 15 
 
 that the excepting clauses were to become void 
 after the destruction of Jerusalem. Why ? Be- 
 cause it is assumed that not till then was ' the full 
 message of forgiveness of sins ' l realized (if I 
 rightly understand a very brief and obscure clause). 
 
 How far will this carry us ? What crime may 
 not be condoned on such a principle ? Did the 
 death on the cross mean that adultery was to go 
 unpunished under Christ's law after A.D. 70 ? 
 Surely this is a line of interpretation at once 
 arbitrary in itself, and capable of being used in 
 the interest of rationalism ? 
 
 But further, in this same page, Matt. xix. 3 is 
 said to be Christ's explanation of Deut. xxiv. i to 
 the Pharisees, as distinct from His injunction in 
 private to the disciples in Mark x. n. On this 
 showing our Lord uttered the words containing 
 the excepting clause publicly to the Pharisees, 
 and then the same words minus that clause in 
 private to the disciples. Let anyone believe that 
 who can. I cannot. 
 
 Of the four Pauline passages quoted, not one is 
 relevant not one contravenes the exception. I 
 am, indeed, astonished that I Thess. iv. 3 should 
 have been adduced at all. It never even hints at 
 the question of divorce. 
 
 i Cor. vii. 10 forbids, not divorce for adultery, 
 but separations through quarrels, as is clear from 
 verse 1 1. 
 
 Rom. vii. 2, 3 states the general principle, and 
 
 1 Bishop Kingdon, Divorce and Remarriage, p. 21. This 
 pamphlet represents the views of the Majority Report of the 
 above committee, of which majority the Bishop was chairman. 
 
16 Interpretation 
 
 does not help the object of the Report, unless an 
 exception is held to destroy a rule, or a rule 
 stated generally to exclude all exceptions. 
 
 Eph. v, 23 would prove too much, for it would 
 mean that the conjugal union cannot be severed, 
 even by death, and, therefore, that second 
 marriage is as Montanists held on that principle 
 forbidden to Christians. 
 
 But, lastly, as to the canon proposed on p. 1 1 
 of the Report, I observe : 
 
 1. That it implicitly excludes Dollinger's 1 and 
 Dr. Liddon's 2 interpretation which Dean Luck- 
 ock 3 would apparently like to adopt if he could feel 
 sure of it that iropviia, in the excepting clauses, 
 means prenuptial unchastity on the woman's part 
 discovered after marriage, and treated as nullifying 
 the marriage ab initio. For if the Report favoured 
 or admitted that view, it would recognise such as 
 ' antecedent impediment.' 
 
 2. With astounding inconsistency, not to say 
 with astounding boldness, in the treatment of 
 Christ's own words, as interpreted in a previous 
 page, the Report proposes that, by canon, an 
 individual Bishop should be allowed to treat that 
 as not adultery which Christ, by hypothesis, 
 pronounced to be so. For the Report distinctly 
 affirms that, the exception having come to an end 
 with the fall of the Temple, all divorce, properly so 
 called, is unlawful, and all marriage after divorce 
 
 1 The First Age of the Church, app. iii., p. 424 (tr. Oxen- 
 ham, and ed., 1867). 
 
 2 University Setmons, vol. ii., p. 310, n. 3, and pp. 327 sqq. 
 (4th ed., 1887). 
 
 3 The History of Marriage, pp. 60 sqq. 
 
Passages of Fathers and Councils 17 
 
 is adultery. And in the face of this any Bishop 
 is to be free to admit such adulterous person to 
 Holy Communion and to all 'the other ministra- 
 tions of the Church ' ! I confess that I should 
 have thought this, beforehand, quite incredible. 
 
 The advocates of entire indissolubility of 
 marriage are constrained to explain away, or to 
 ' wrest ' those passages of Fathers or Councils 
 which show, to say the least, that there is no 
 Catholic consensus in their favour. Especially 
 unfair, I think, is their treatment of Origen and 
 of Basil (I have said something about Basil in a 
 long letter to the Guardian, 1 and you doubtless 
 have seen Dr. Reynolds' pamphlet 2 on Origen, 
 which even the Church Quarterly reviewer of 
 April 3 commends, though he differs from it). 
 Basil 4 is signally misinterpreted ; Lactantius 5 is 
 simply abused ; the Council of Aries 6 is put under 
 a screw ; Tertullian's language in Adv. M arcionem 1 
 is ignored or twisted ; Chrysostom 8 is not fairly 
 
 1 Feb. 6, 1895, c f- Feb. 20, 1895. 
 
 2 H. W. R. Reynolds, Origen and the York Report on 
 Divorce (1895). 
 
 3 Church Quarterly Review, vol. xl., No. 79, April, 1895. 
 
 4 Basil, Moralia, Reg. 73 (Opera, torn, ii., p. 308, ed. Ben.), 
 and Ep. ccxvii., Canon 77, where note the comment of the 
 Benedictine editors regretting that Basil came to think that 
 a man might remarry, after divorcing a faithless wife (Opera, 
 torn, iii., p. 329, note a.). 
 
 5 Div. Inst., vi., 23 (ap. Migne, P.L., torn, vi., col. 7206.), 
 and Epitome, 66 (ibid., col. io8oB.). 
 
 6 Canon 10; Hefele, Councils, i., p. 189. 
 
 7 Adv. Marcionem, iv., c. 34 (ed. Oehler, ii., p. 247). 
 
 8 In i ad Cor. Horn., xix., 3 (Opera, torn, x., p. 1626., ed. 
 Ben.), and In Matt. Horn., xvii., 4 (torn, vii., p. 228A.). 
 
i8 Interpretation 
 
 faced. I need not (least of all in writing to you) 
 mention other cases. You have brought out the 
 fact, which needs to be insisted on, that the 
 present Canon Law doctrine virtually runs up into 
 the authority of Jerome 1 and Augustine, 2 not to 
 say of Pope Innocent 3 of Jerome, who had the 
 strongest bias in favour of any restrictions of 
 marriage ; of Augustine, whose comment on the 
 passage in the Sermon on the Mount 4 exhibits an 
 extraordinary incoherence and laxity, and whose 
 ' Retractations ' very seriously modify the force of 
 his earlier assertions on a difficillima qucestio.^ 
 Multiplying canonical prohibitions in the later and 
 mediaeval Western Church does not really in- 
 crease the moral weight of the restrictive view, 
 when one recollects how dominant in the West 
 for long ages both deservedly and undeservedly 
 dominant was the venerabile nomen Augustini. 
 And I do not think that those who appeal to 
 patristic or conciliar authorities on the re- 
 strictive side have always remembered that the 
 appeal debars them from treating the excepting 
 clauses as merely temporary in their bearing, for 
 the reason involved in Dollinger's view. The 
 ancient Church never took or seemed aware of 
 that view. It was taken for granted that Chris- 
 tians, as such, were concerned with the clauses. 
 
 No doubt it is not merely from a Canon Law 
 point of view that the absolute indissolubility is 
 
 1 Roe, The right, etc., p. 21. 
 
 2 Ibid., p. 23. 3 Ibid., p. 23. 
 
 4 De Serm. Dom. in Monte, i., cc. 14-16 (Opera, torn, 
 iii., pars ii., coll. 181 sqq. ; ed. Ben.). 
 
 5 Retract., ii., c. 57 (torn, i., col. 6iC). 
 
Meaning of o'iroAuw 19 
 
 maintained ; that is, the motive underlying the 
 zeal for Canon Law on this point is a fear of 
 danger to morality, especially in view of the 
 pernicious facilities of divorce in the United 
 States and in some Protestant countries of 
 Europe. Keble was likely enough to be most 
 strongly swayed by this motive. Yet I feel, for 
 my part, that our primary duty in this case is not 
 to consider consequences, but to secure a legiti- 
 mate and unstrained interpretation of our Lord's 
 own words. That is a matter of supreme obliga- 
 tion. If we fulfil this duty loyally, we may 
 remember that Christian morality will not be 
 injured by such faithfulness. He may be trusted 
 to provide for it. But our business is to be true 
 to His own teaching, and not to explain it away. 
 
 Now, there are two questions about the pas- 
 sage in question, (i) What does aTroXuw mean? 
 (2) What does Tropvtia mean ? 
 
 To take the second first, the universal inter- 
 pretation in the Church has construed iropveia here 
 as conjugal unfaithfulness ; and those who insist 
 that it shall mean prenuptial unchastity, and who 
 would illustrate, not the word, indeed, but their con- 
 struction by Matt. i. 19, will by parity of reason 
 have to exclude fornication from the purview of 
 the seventh commandment as rendered in Matt, 
 v. 27, 28 (shortly before the first excepting clause). 
 
 Putting aside, then, this expedient of Dollinger's 
 to prop up the Roman maxim as to total in- 
 dissolubility, let us ask the first question. I 
 observe that the Church Quarterly reviewer, in 
 his exceedingly slippery and evasive comment on 
 
 2 2 
 
2o Interpretation 
 
 Christ's words, slides in the word ' separation.' 1 
 Did our Lord mean only separation i.e., what 
 we call separation a mensa et toro ? Impossible, 
 for the Jews did not care about that. Their point 
 was, May a man divorce his wife so as to dissolve 
 his marriage with her ? And, again, if we read 
 TroAuw as equivalent to ' separate,' in the sense 
 of ' no longer allowing the wife to live with the 
 husband ' suspending conjugal life, and dwelling 
 apart what follows ? That such separation is 
 only allowed by Christ, because of iropiwa, which 
 implies that both ecclesiastical and civil law are 
 wrong in allowing it for other causes. Again, 
 aTroAuw of itself suggests the idea of unloosing- 
 
 oo o 
 
 a bond that is, of divorce proper. If such 
 divorce, then, takes place, the vinculum is 
 dissolved, and remarriage becomes lawful ipso 
 facto. For the bond cannot be at the same time 
 binding and not binding. 
 
 I know that here comes in the difficulty. On 
 this showing, the divorced wife, if divorced for 
 her adultery, has ceased to be a wife. She is, 
 therefore, free to marry again. And I do not see, 
 I confess, how it can be maintained, that such 
 marriage on her part, in those special circum- 
 stances, would be adulterous. But the Church 
 might reasonably refuse her blessing to such a 
 contract by way of inflicting a just penalty on sin 
 and avoiding a grave scandal. However, I grant 
 that, even so, there would be the question of the 
 right of such parties to the Sacrament. Either 
 the adulteress has been divorced or merely 
 1 Ch. Qu. Review^ April, 1895, p. 34. 
 
Meaning of aTroXuw 21 
 
 ' separated.' If she has been merely 'separated,' 
 then the Jews asked our Lord about ' putting 
 away ' in one sense (real divorce), and He 
 answered them in another (simple separation), 
 which is not to be thought of. Even to put such 
 a point contingently is offensive. If she has 
 been really divorced if the vinculum has been 
 solemnly broken then she is no man's wife, and 
 may, so far, become the wife of some other man 
 her partner in sin, it may be, or some other. 
 And if such marriage is contracted before a 
 registrar, the Church refusing to bless it, still, 
 on the above interpretation, the new union is a 
 marriage, and the Church, in her administration 
 of Sacraments, would not, so far as I can see, be 
 justified in denying to it that character. You will 
 pardon, Mr. Archdeacon, the length of this letter. 
 I have thought I should best show my sense of 
 the honour which you and the Bishop have done 
 me by risking tediousness rather than the appear- 
 ance of negligence. 
 
 P.S. To avoid one possible misapprehension, 
 I do not at all suppose that to divorce an un- 
 faithful wife is made by Christ's words an absolute 
 duty. 
 
 Dr. B right's Second Letter. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 June 3, 1895. 
 
 MY DEAR MR. ARCHDEACON, 
 
 I thank you for the kind letter received 
 two days ago. May I trouble you now with a 
 
22 Interpretation 
 
 few more remarks ? Sirce I wrote first, as you 
 know, the scandal at a London church has 
 brought the subject of divorce and remarriage 
 before Convocation, and a good deal of correspon- 
 dence in the Guardian has tended to confirm 
 my previous impression that, in regard to the 
 remarriage of an innocent husband after the 
 divorce of a faithless wife (which is the point in 
 debate), opinions are often wholly shaped by a 
 preconception as determined as that which leads 
 Roman controversialists to read Vaticanism into 
 the language of the Fathers. Doubtless the 
 preconception in the present case has a certain 
 claim upon one's sympathy, inasmuch as its 
 motive, so to speak, is anxiety for the purity of 
 domestic life. Men who appeal confidently to 
 the law of Christ and the Church as affirming 
 the absolute indissolubility of marriage show by 
 their words that what weighs most with them is 
 a moral interest. 
 
 But, after all allowance made on that score, it 
 remains true that to promote a moral interest by 
 wresting the sacred words of our Lord Himself 
 approaches nearer to ' will-worship ' than to Chris- 
 tian fidelity. 
 
 As you yourself have shown, there is really no 
 Catholic consensus in favour of this ' law of 
 indissolubility.' To claim for it the authority of 
 Fathers, who, following St. Mark and St. Luke 
 (not to say St. Paul), state the rule without the 
 exception, and to assume that they ' must have 
 had some way ' of getting rid of the natural sense 
 of the excepting clauses in St. Matthew, is 
 
Remarriage permitted up to 400 23 
 
 altogether uncritical. Other ancient language, 
 which recognises that exception, is sometimes 
 very unfairly treated. 
 
 On the whole, I know of no writers before the 
 end of the fourth century who deny the right 
 of the injured husband, after divorcing a faith- 
 less wife, to marry again in her lifetime. And 
 Jerome, of course, had a natural bias towards any 
 restriction of marriage ; while Augustine, at the 
 end of his life, was dissatisfied with his own 
 treatment of the question. And yet the law of 
 the Latin Church, which we are required by some 
 to regard as sacrosanct, runs up very much into 
 the authority of Augustine. 
 
 But then we are referred to the Prayer-Book 
 and the Canons. The Marriage Service, it is said, 
 teaches that man must not ' put asunder ' those 
 ' whom God hath joined together.' Therefore, it 
 asserts the absolute indissolubility. 
 
 It is prudent to avoid arguments that prove too 
 much. For that same language might just as 
 well be quoted as prohibiting any ' separation a 
 mensa et toro' for, e.g., cruelty on a husband's 
 part, which the ' indissolubilists ' make no difficulty 
 of calling lawful. 
 
 As for the passage in the beginning of the 
 service about the symbolism derived from Eph. v. 
 25-32, it is dangerous to press an illustration 
 beyond its defined aim, and St. Paul is clearly 
 thinking of the husband's obligation to love and 
 cherish a wife, who, like his own flesh, is his own 
 as the Churc ; .s Christ's own, the faithful spouse. 
 (Indeed, I could imagine a Montanistic rigorist 
 
24 Interpretation 
 
 using this symbolism in order to prohibit all 
 second marriages.) 
 
 Next as to the English Canons. Archdeacon 
 Kaye, in the Lower House of Canterbury, pointed 
 out with characteristic exactness that they do not 
 pronounce divorce of a faithless wife and subse- 
 quent remarriage on the part of the husband to 
 be a sinful act. They do not treat of the case at 
 all ; they simply presuppose the practice of eccle- 
 siastical courts, and treat only (i) of dissolution of 
 marriages on the ground of original nullity, and 
 (2) of separation improperly called divorce, which 
 separation, as they, of course, insist, leaves the 
 parties still bound by their vow of conjugal fidelity. 1 
 
 The real question, then, is, What do our Lord's 
 words mean ? And surely it is a matter of 
 supreme obligation to interpret them fairly, not to 
 pervert or explain them away. One might infer, 
 from language often met with, that the speaker or 
 writer would be intensely relieved if he could per- 
 suade himself that the two ' excepting clauses ' are 
 an interpolation into St. Matthew's text ; but as 
 no such discovery is to be hoped for, ' tolerable ' 
 or ' possible ' interpretations are suggested as 
 means of escape from their natural sense, which, 
 it seems, must be somehow nullified. We are 
 asked to interpret the two passages in St. Matthew 
 which mention the exception by the two in 
 St. Mark and St. Luke which omit it ; which is 
 as if one were asked to merge the special in the 
 general, to attenuate the fuller into the briefer 
 statement, to set at naught the common-sense 
 1 Canons 105-107. 
 
Rule and exception 25 
 
 maxim that where in one composite law-book a 
 rule is sometimes given with, and sometimes 
 without, an exception, the former passage must 
 interpret the latter, the exception must be read in 
 as part of the rule, and the notion that they contra- 
 dict each other must be simply dismissed. This 
 maxim is clearly inapplicable to the case of the 
 Gospels, except on a disintegrating assumption 
 which critics of a very different school will treat 
 as an instruction which they can easily better. 
 
 But we seem most likely to clear the ground by 
 asking first, What does aTroAvw mean in the four 
 evangelical contexts taken throughout ? It must 
 mean one of two things either (i) 'to divorce so 
 as to dissolve the bond of the marriage,' or (2) 
 ' to separate a mensa et toro? But it cannot mean 
 the latter, for the Jews had no interest in that 
 question ; and when on one occasion the Pharisees 
 asked our Lord whether it was lawful to put away 
 a wife for every cause, they clearly meant real 
 divorcing, and our Lord, therefore, must have 
 meant the same in His reply ; and He showed as 
 much by referring to the original institution of 
 marriage as incompatible with their laxity about 
 ' putting away ' for all sorts of causes. Indeed, 
 indissolubilists would be in a difficulty if they inter- 
 preted aTroAwu here in the sense of mere separa- 
 tion, for on that showing He would be prohibiting 
 separation except in the case of -n-opveia, whereas 
 they require it as lawful on other grounds. It 
 follows, then, that He meant real divorce, and 
 real divorce by hypothesis dissolves the vincuhtm. 
 
 His general rule, then the exception may be 
 
26 Interpretation 
 
 considered afterwards comes to this : ' Divorce 
 is not permissible ; if (always reserving the excep- 
 tion) a man divorces his wife, he gives her occa- 
 sion to become an adulteress by taking a new 
 consort while she is really still his wife, the con- 
 jugal bond not being dissolved ; and if he goes 
 farther and marries another during her lifetime, 
 he is actually an adulterer for a similar reason, she 
 being still his wife and he being still bound to her.' 
 
 But now for the exception. Whatever - 
 means, it is clear that in that excepted case 
 aTroAuw is implied, and, as so implied, bears the 
 same sense : ' In one case I do not forbid you to 
 divorce that is, to annul the bond ; in one case 
 it is permissible to do what in all other cases is 
 forbidden, and therefore sinful.' 
 
 And if it is permissible to divorce, it is per- 
 missible to marry another. We need not rest 
 on the received text of Matt. xix. 9 to prove 
 what is absolutely involved in the very idea of a 
 true divorce. Now, what is that case ? Dol- 
 linger's gloss of ' prenuptial unchastity ' is clearly 
 an expedient suggested by his difficulty as an 
 interpreter of St. Matthew, accustomed to the 
 Roman dogma of indissolubility. It is wholly 
 unpatristic, for one thing ; for another, it rests 
 on a basis which can hardly be thought solid. 
 The reference in Matt. i. 19 to a peculiar Jewish 
 usage cannot be parallel with our Lord's language 
 when He is correcting Jewish laxities and per- 
 petuating the law of marriage for His Church ; 
 and the ' strict sense ' of iropvtia is a questionable 
 ground to occupy, for then the strict sense of 
 
Divorce and Remarriage 27 
 
 might be used to exclude all non-adulterous 
 unchastity from the ban of the seventh command- 
 ment, as it is quoted and expanded in the very 
 paragraph which contains the first excepting 
 clause (Matt. v. 27, 28). 
 
 No doubt it will be objected : ' On this showing 
 the guilty wife, by divorce, ceases to be a wife, as 
 the injured divorcer ceases to be her husband. 
 She is therefore free to marry again, and thus 
 any departure from the principle of absolute in- 
 dissolubility is bound to open the door to persistent 
 scandals.' I admit that if an innocent husband 
 divorces a guilty wife, then, whether he marries 
 another or not, she ceases to be his wife, for a 
 bond broken on one side must be broken on both ; 
 it ceases to exist for either party. But it would 
 be a profanation of the blessing of the Church to 
 sanctify a union which she may wish to contract 
 with the partner of her sin. Although such union 
 is not per se adulterous, yet it is scandalous that 
 the parties should thus profit by their sin, as the 
 Bishop of London phrased it. Surely, if penitent, 
 their penance should be to live apart. 
 
 To the Editor of The Guardian on Divorce and 
 Remarriage. 
 
 June 26, 1895. 
 
 It seems high time that someone should say a 
 word in deprecation of the positiveness with which 
 some clergymen . . . describe ' the absolute indis- 
 solubility of marriage ' during the lifetime of both 
 parties, not only as ' the law of the Church of 
 
28 Interpretation 
 
 England/ not only as 'the law of the Church' 
 simpliciter, but as 'the Jaw of Christ ' and 'of God.' 
 Have they, one asks, in all cases, personally 
 verified an assertion which, at any rate, involves a 
 great responsibility ? Or does it, in some cases, 
 pass as it were from hand to hand, as ' the right 
 thing for a good Churchman to say,' as demanded 
 alike by Christian ' strictness ' and by ecclesiastical 
 obligation ? 
 
 On the ecclesiastical side of the question, I 
 think I have already shown that there is no 
 Catholic consensus for the proposition, and I will 
 add that it seems to have become rooted in the 
 Western Church's mind (in regard to strictly 
 Christian marriages) mainly through the vast 
 authority of the greatest of Western Fathers. It 
 was not apparently remembered, that in one of his 
 works he admitted a certain ' obscurity ' in ' the 
 Divine sayings,' and that in reconsidering another 1 
 he did not feel satisfied with his own treatment of 
 'a very difficult question.' 2 . . . However, there 
 is no question that the dogma thus established in 
 the Latin Church did govern the action of English 
 ecclesiastical courts, and the Canons of 1604 
 recognise that action by providing for (i) the 
 'annulling of pretended matrimony,' 3 (2) divorce 
 in the lax sense of judicial 'separation a toro et 
 mensa^ in which case they, of course, require that 
 the parties to be separated shall continue to 
 respect their conjugal bond. 5 But it is at least ob- 
 
 1 De conjugiis adullerinis (Opera, torn, vi., coll. 387 sq 
 
 2 Detract., ii. 57 (torn, i., col. 6iC). 
 
 3 Canon 106. 4 Ibid- 6 Canon 107. 
 
The Marriage Service 29 
 
 servable that the Canons do not expressly prohibit 
 divorce a vinculo for the unfaithfulness of the wife. 
 
 Then we have confident appeals to the Mar- 
 riage Service. But, first, its language forbidding 
 the ' putting asunder by man ' of ' those whom 
 God hath joined together' (and the like) cannot 
 be quoted against divorce a vinculo for that 
 offence, until it is proved that the Divine pro- 
 hibition for divorce does not provide for any 
 exception ; and, secondly, the words might also 
 be strained to bar all possibility of 'judicial' 
 separation e.g., for a husband's habitual cruelty, 
 which is allowed on all hands to warrant it. 
 Eager writers will do well to avoid proving too 
 much. . . . 
 
 But the heart of the matter lies in our Lord's 
 own words. This point has to be pressed when 
 the view of so many is, to all appearance, deter- 
 mined by the dread of consequences to public 
 morality, and by abhorrence of such laxity as 
 prevails in some foreign countries. Everyone 
 must sympathize with such a feeling ; and yet, 
 after all, the supreme question for Christians is, 
 What did Christ say, and what do His sayings 
 mean ? And if under the motive just referred to 
 we do less than justice to the natural import of 
 those sayings, if we twist, or slur over, or explain 
 away any one of them, if we assume at the outset 
 that a certain Canon Law principle is sacrosanct, 
 and that Christ cannot have meant anything that 
 contravenes it, our zeal for this or that ethical in- 
 terest is, so far, ' not according to ' religious loyalty. 
 
 It will be convenient to see, first, what we 
 
jo Interpretation 
 
 should gather from the four Evangelical contexts, 1 
 //the two excepting clauses were absent from the 
 text of St. Matthew if they could critically be 
 proved to be interpolations. Leaving them out 
 of siofht for a moment, we find that our Lord 
 
 o 
 
 forbids His disciples to 'put away' their wives 
 and to marry others after ' putting them away,' 
 and in the second Gospel a woman is forbidden to 
 ' put away ' her husband and marry another. The 
 verb which we render ' put away ' is aTroAuw. 
 What is its force? Not, assuredly, 'to obtain a 
 separation ' (as our law calls it), a toro et mensa. 
 The Jews were not asking about that, nor could 
 the hearers of the Sermon on the Mount imagine 
 that our Lord was referring to anything of the 
 kind. What was in question, and what our Lord 
 must have been understood to be speaking about, 
 was divorce a vinculo, as, indeed, the Greek verb 
 significantly indicates that sort of 'putting away' 
 which dissolved the conjugal relation. . . . But 
 what follows ? A dissolution of the vinculum, if 
 in any case lawful in Christ's judgment, would 
 annul all mutual obligations of those who had 
 thereby ceased to be husband and wife. The 
 divorcing husband would ipso facto be free to con- 
 tract a new marriage, for he could not be at once 
 released and bound. This, then, is the 'putting 
 away' which, in our Lord's exposition of the true 
 idea of marriage, is prohibited with one exception ; 
 and therefore it is this, and nothing else, which in 
 that one excepted case (whatever it means) is not 
 prohibited. ... ' Except for one cause,' our 
 1 Matt. v. 31, 32, xix. 3-9; Mark x. 2-12; Luke xvi. 18. 
 
Rule and- exception 31 
 
 Lord says in effect, ' I forbid it ; when that one 
 cause exists, I do not forbid it.' 
 
 An attempt is sometimes made by sliding in the 
 word 'separation' when the exception is spoken of, 
 to make aTroAwo mean one thing in the rule and 
 another in the exception ; but this is a quibble 
 which needs no exposure. And now let us try to 
 look into the excepting clauses. . . . There must, it 
 is assumed, be some ' possible' or ' tolerable ' way of 
 making them cohere with the maxim, which at all 
 costs is to be inviolate. We are to 'interpret 
 them by the simpler sayings of St. Mark and 
 St. Luke.' How is this to be done ? If the same 
 law-book contains two directions which state a 
 rule with an exception, and two others which state 
 the same rule without an exception, would not 
 any lawyer tell us would not common-sense and 
 ordinary rules of construction tell us to interrupt 
 the general statement by the special, to read the 
 fuller into the briefer ? To deny that the Gospels 
 have such a unity would be a very broad step in 
 the line of disintegration ! Or if, on the other 
 hand, by way of emphasizing that unity, we are 
 warned to beware of making St. Matthew ' con- 
 tradict ' St. Mark and St. Luke, that is like saying 
 that to admit an exception is to ' contradict ' a 
 general rule. But an expedient has been devised 
 or adopted by writers deserving of the highest 
 respect (including one whose name is specially 
 dear to memory), but whose support of it is, I 
 venture to think, best accounted for by a very 
 strong bias derived from Western Canon Law and 
 from a horror of all ' relaxation.' This is the gloss 
 
32 Interpretation 
 
 which sets the clauses aside as mere side-refer- 
 ences to a usage purely Jewish, and therefore 
 purely temporary, according to which a wife's pre- 
 nuptial unchastity, discovered after marriage, was 
 a ground, not for dissolving the vinculum^ but for 
 treating it as non-existent, as null ab initio. If, 
 then, this sense can be put upon the clauses, they 
 can be explained as not coming into collision with 
 the dogma of absolute indissolubility. Q.E.F. 
 And reasons are adduced : The clauses occur in 
 St. Matthew, the Gospel for Hebrew Christians, 
 and it is in Matt. i. 19 that this Jewish usage 
 is noticed. But there is no true parallelism 
 between such a notice and the passages in this 
 Gospel in which our Lord is giving laws for 
 members of His kingdom, or recalling His 
 hearers from Jewish interpretations to the original, 
 authentic marriage-principle. It is in these pas- 
 sages that St. Matthew's text exhibits the except- 
 ing clauses, and the onus clearly lies with those 
 who would deprive them of permanent significance. 
 Or we are told that to interpret Troprtia as adultery 
 on the wife's part is to pervert the word from its 
 'proper force' a contention peculiarly incautious, 
 for the ' proper force ' of juoi^etiw might just as well 
 be used to take all unchastity on the part of un- 
 married persons clean out of the purview of the 
 seventh commandment, as expounded by our 
 Lord in the opening of that same paragraph which 
 contains the first of the clauses in question (v. 31, 
 32). Finally, it might have been expected that 
 High Churchmen would have hesitated to take up 
 with an interpretation that was wholly unpatristic ; 
 
Results not our concern 
 
 33 
 
 and this, no doubt, would have been the case but 
 for one dominant preconception. 
 
 If this gloss, then, be disallowed, it remains that 
 in one case, and in one case only, that of the wife's 
 adultery, divorce a vinculo is not forbidden is, at 
 least, negatively permitted by Christ as the Law- 
 giver of Christians. I say 'in one case only,' for 
 the excepting clauses are in both passages attached 
 to the mention of what is generally forbidden to 
 the husband ; and we have no right to say that the 
 same exceptional freedom is conceded to both 
 sexes that an injured wife may divorce a faithless 
 husband. But may the divorcing husband con- 
 tract a new marriage? If divorce a vinculo is 
 meant, there is nothing to hinder him. What our 
 Lord forbids in these passages He forbids on the 
 ground of adultery. But if the vinculum is gone, 
 the covenant which could be violated by adultery 
 has ceased to exist. It is true that the words 
 ' and shall marry another ' came after, not before, 
 the words ' except for iropvtia ' j 1 but the Jews would 
 understand that any permission to divorce carried 
 with it a corresponding permission to remarry. 
 
 Of course it will instantly be objected : ' On this 
 showing, when a faithless wife is divorced she 
 ceases to be a wife, and therefore is as free to re- 
 marry as the divorcer, who has ceased to be a 
 husband.' If an interpretation is sound, we cannot 
 help its results. It does follow that such a re- 
 marriage is not, of itself, adulterous. But the 
 Church will act with perfect consistency, and 
 impose an appropriate spiritual penalty, by re- 
 1 Matt. xix. 9. 
 
34 Interpretation 
 
 fusing to hallow it with her benediction, and 
 leaving those who are bent on contracting it to 
 resort to the civil registrar. 
 
 To Rev. , on Lux Mundi and the Kei><o<rte. 
 
 [With a laudatory reference to an article in the current 
 number of the Church Quarterly Review (October, 1891, on 
 ' Our Lord's Knowledge as Man.'] 
 
 November n, 1891. 
 
 . . . One must be careful about the use of the 
 phrase communicatio idiomatum (see Pearson 1 ). 
 Lutherans use it, or have used it, in the sense of an 
 interchange of qualities between the two natures, 
 which results in virtual Monophysitism. Personally 
 I do not suppose that the Divine nature of Christ 
 revealed to His human mind during His ministry 
 all facts which by possibility could have been 
 apprehended by it, but only those which were 
 relevant to His mission. The writer of that 
 article goes very fully and with great judgment, as 
 I think, into the probable reason why the know- 
 ledge referred to in Mark xiii. 32 was not, so to 
 speak, ' translated ' from the purely Divine con- 
 sciousness (if such a term may be used) into the 
 human. . . . 
 
 This kenotic theory is taken up by many 
 almost as Pax vobiscum was by a personage in 
 
 1 An Exposition of the Creed: 'Nor is this union,' etc., 
 p. 163 ; ' For it was no other person,' etc., p. 186 (p. 291 and 
 P- 334> ed. Oxford, 1877). Cf. Bright, Sermons of St. Leo, 
 p. 130. 
 
3 r 
 
 Ivankoe. 1 They do not know its Lutheran 
 genesis ; they do not strictly question themselves 
 as to what it was that, on their interpretation, our 
 Lord 'emptied Himself' 2 of; they do not face the 
 consequences of denying our Lord's infallibility in 
 all the matter of His teaching. 
 
 To the Rev. /. J. Lias, on the KC'IWCHC. 
 
 [With regard to a quotation of words of his own in Mr. Lias' 
 book On the Nicene Creed.} 
 
 What I meant was that by the mere fact of 
 adopting human nature, of taking it into union 
 with Himself, our Lord accepted the condition of 
 acting in it under certain reserves or limitations. 
 
 A body such as man's could not be invested 
 with omnipresence ; a mind such as man's could 
 not be other than intrinsically finite. You say 
 that the Divine prerogatives could not be exer- 
 cised in their fulness in and through the manhood. 
 That is exactly what I mean by saying that such 
 unreserved exercise was incompatible with the 
 acceptance of the limitations attaching to humanity. 
 Our Lord, I hold, did not surrender or part with 
 a single Divine prerogative. He could not, for 
 His attributes are inseparable from His Divine 
 Person. ' God's attributes,' as Newman says, 
 'are He.' But He did consent to forbear exer- 
 cising them ' unreservedly ' through the medium 
 of the humanity which He assumed, because that 
 medium would not admit of it. 
 
 1 C. xxvi. - Phil. ii. 7. 
 
36 Interpretation 
 
 To the Rev. Canon Medd, on the same. 
 
 November 17, 1892. 
 
 Thank you much for your letter. I was very 
 anxious as to those passages in my book which 
 refer to the KtVoxrie. If you approve of them, that 
 is reassuring. If you look at p. 333, l you will see 
 that I adopt words 'better than my own.' They 
 are the words of the Bishop (Stubbs) of Oxford. . . . 
 I might have added that the argument from the 
 creative act for the theory that there could be an 
 actual laying-aside by the Divine Son, as such, of 
 Divine attributes is sophistical. (I believe the 
 theory is that only the Divine will would be strictly 
 inalienable.) God, in creation and in His dealings 
 with moral agents, does not part with His infinity 
 or His omniscience ; He does but place a purely 
 voluntary restraint on his exercise of omnipotence 
 for certain purposes, and while immanent in the 
 universe which He has called into being, He is 
 also independent of it in the sense intended by the 
 word ' transcendent.' 
 
 To the Venerable Archdeacon , on our Lords 
 
 impeccability, and His knowledge as Man. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 July 23, 1893. 
 
 I could not have answered your letter last week, 
 for I had deferred too long the writing out of my 
 1 Morality in Doctrine. 
 
A peccable Christ 37 
 
 five lectures, 1 and was therefore hard at it preparing 
 each in its turn, for the hour of its delivery. 
 
 It was very interesting to speak to a body of 
 clergy on the great theological controversies of 
 the Early Church. Yesterday I closed the short 
 course with a lecture on Pelagianism. I had in 
 one of the lectures spoken of our Lord's human 
 nature as not only actually sinless, but impeccable. 
 A clergyman of some standing came to me this 
 morning to put the old difficulty, ' How, then, 
 could our Lord be an example, and what is the 
 significance of the temptation ?' I tried to put 
 into words the answer substantially given by 
 Liddon, and by W. H. Hutchings in The 
 Mystery of the Temptation. I pointed out that 
 the three temptations appealed not to any interior 
 concupiscence or propensity to actual sin, but to 
 instinctive feelings per se innocent, and that, there- 
 fore, the question was for Him whether they could 
 be gratified consistently with His mission; when 
 His mind grasped the fact that they could not, it 
 was impossible for Him, being the Incarnate, to 
 desire their gratification in spite of His duty. It 
 also occurred to me to say that, if an impeccable 
 soul could not be an exemplar for us, a soul 
 peccable, but which never had sinned, might also 
 seem too far from our position to render us moral 
 support ; and that if a peccable Christ was to be a 
 universal exemplar, He ought to have been sus- 
 ceptible not only of this sinful impulse, but of all 
 sinful impulses congenial to all varieties of tem- 
 
 1 Bright, Way marks in Church History, cc. i, 2, 3, 4, 6, 8, 
 which were given as lectures to the clergy at Oxford, July, 1893. 
 
38 Interpretation 
 
 perament a reductio ad horrendum. This must 
 have often occurred to you, but I write it down 
 because just now it is in my head, and I should 
 naturally talk about it if I met you. 
 
 Like you, I do not go along with everything in 
 Bishop Stubbs' Charge 1 e.g., I cannot (if I under- 
 stand him aright) agree with him in interpreting 
 Mark xiii. 32, as referring to our Lord's higher 
 nature. But, indeed, I am not clear about the 
 exact nature of his own view ; and, so far as I see, 
 I find an insuperable difficulty in supposing that our 
 Lord's Divinity restrained the full influx of light 
 into His human mind on some occasions, just as it 
 left His human heart, so to speak, unsupported 
 by the Divine beatitude in the Passion. There is 
 in the Charge a vast deal of matter, an unfailing 
 suggestiveness, and, of course, a spring of char- 
 acteristic humour which carries one along. 
 
 To the Rev. , on the KsWffie. 
 
 It may perhaps occur to you that there is a dis- 
 tinction recognised by Trench in his Synonyms 
 of the New Testament between GEO'TIJC, the Divine 
 Essence or Godhead, and Geiorrjc, the sum of 
 Divine attributes. 2 The former occurs in Col. ii. 9, 
 the latter in Rom. i. 20, where the Revised Version 
 renders it 'divinity.' But this distinction does 
 not in the least imply that Otiose could be parted 
 with by One who retained George, which is 
 
 Dr. 's contention. The more one thinks of 
 
 it the more paradoxical does it seem. A line is 
 
 1 The Bishop of Oxford's Second Charge (1893), PP- l % S 1- 
 - Pp. 6 sqq. (;th ed.). 
 
Difficulties of Kenoticism 39 
 
 drawn between God's attributes and Himself. A 
 Divine Person is supposed to have been for, say, 
 thirty-three years, not Almighty, not Omnipresent, 
 not Omniscient, qua Son of God in fact, Divine 
 after surrendering Divinity. For by hypothesis 
 this surrender was absolute and total, extending to 
 the whole of the Divine existence. One of the 
 Trinity during this period was altogether without 
 ' his eternal power ' (Rom. i. 20) and His analogous 
 perfections. What, then, would become of the 
 indivisible ' co-inherence ' or unity ? Nor is this 
 all. The human life of Christ is to be the measure 
 of His power and His knowledge during His 
 ministry on earth. He, therefore, while con- 
 fessedly God, while possessing His ' Deity ' as 
 inalienable, would be in every sense, to all intents 
 and purposes, inferior to the angels in those 
 attributes. Was He then an object of adoration 
 to the angels? If not, then how could He be 
 God? If He was, then the angels adored One 
 whom they themselves in those respects trans- 
 cended. There is no end to the incongruities 
 and contradictions which this exaggeration of 
 KeVbxnc is found to involve. It will act as a dis- 
 integrating force on faith in Christ. 
 
 To a candidate for Holy Orders, on the Atone- 
 ment. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, 
 
 November 28, 1895. 
 
 In regard to /caraXXayr) in 2 Cor. v. 18-21, I 
 don't think the antithesis, ' God is not to be recon- 
 
4-O Interpretation 
 
 ciled to us, but we only were to be reconciled to 
 Him,' will suit the context. The very words 
 jjiri Ao-yt&^utvot,' /c.r.A. are, I think, decisive against it, 
 and so are the following words, ' He made Him 
 to be sin for us,' etc. The context, I mean, 
 implies a twofold reconciliation, one ex parte Dei 
 and another ex parte hominis. ' The ministry of 
 reconciliation ' was committed to St. Paul in order 
 that he might announce God's pardoning love 
 v X/OHTTW, as well as that he might exhort and 
 persuade men to lay aside their antagonism to 
 God. In fact, if it is otherwise if there was no 
 barrier on God's part needing to be removed, and 
 removed by Christ's death then there is no 
 mediation, for mediation implies a twofold recon- 
 ciliation. Archbishop Trench contends for this 
 in his Synonyms of the New Testament, ii. p. 275, 
 observing that ' the Christian /caraAAa-y?? has two 
 sides' : (i) whereby God 'laid aside His holy anger 
 against our sins and received us into favour' 
 through Christ's death (observe /caraAXa-yeWtc, 
 Rom. v. 10) ; and (2) ' subordinately the daily 
 deposition of the enmity of the old man toward 
 God.' So Dale on The Atonement, p. 262, and 
 more fully in p. 492. Nor does this view, which 
 exegetical considerations require, conflict at all 
 with such passages as John iii. 16. The Divine 
 attributes are not really a series of distinct things ; 
 they are aspects of one indivisible Divine char- 
 acter. God's holiness is one with His goodness, 
 His hostility to evil is intrinsic and eternal; and 
 when man sinned, that sin produced not a change 
 in God's character, but a change in His relation to 
 
God reconciled to us 41 
 
 man. In order to undo this change of relation, 
 He provided, He initiated, the atonement which 
 was effected by the death of His Son. That 
 death, being the death of a Divine Person in our 
 humanity, had an objective effect on our condition: 
 it removed the barrier ex parte Dei, and restored 
 sinners, as penitent and believing, to His grace. 
 Thus it constituted for them a new relation with 
 God. As long as they that is, we are penitent 
 and believing, we have our part in this Divine 
 atonement; when we sin we^5>r0 tanto impair our 
 interest in it, and therefore need to ask pardon as 
 well as to lay aside our own self-will. 
 
 P.S. The passage which I quoted was not 
 Pusey's own perhaps I carelessly said it was 
 but is one of Faber's which Pusey approves in 
 Wkat is of Faith as to Everlasting Punishment ? 
 
 'As to those who may be lost, I confidently 
 believe that our Heavenly Father threw His arms 
 round each created spirit, and looked it full in the 
 face with bright eyes of love, in the darkness of its 
 mortal life, and that of its own deliberate will it 
 would not have Him.' 1 
 
 To the Rev. , on a statement to the effect tJiat 
 
 Christ rose from the dead by His own power 
 as God. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 
 November 26, 1889 
 
 The statement you quote cannot be heretical, 
 because our Lord in the second lesson for this 
 
 P. 17- 
 
42 Interpretation 
 
 evening speaks of ' taking again ' (John x. 17) His 
 life by His own personal act. Elsewhere, also, 
 we have such a phrase as ' He rose again' (Rom. 
 xiv. 9). Indeed, we find our Lord predicting that 
 He would 'raise up' (John ii. 19) the temple of 
 His body. Only this sort of language must be 
 balanced by other language more ordinarily used 
 in the New Testament, especially by St. Paul, 
 attributing the resurrection to the power or 'glory 
 of the Father ' (Rom. vi. 4), or simply saying 
 that 'Christ was raised up' (Rom. iv. 25), as 
 St. Peter also said in his early sermons (Acts 
 iii. 15, etc.). There is no contradiction; the first 
 kind of language represents our Lord's personal 
 Divine power as the Eternal Son and Life-giving 
 Word ; the second may refer both to the eternal 
 derivation of His Godhead as Son from the 
 Father, and, more directly and obviously, to His 
 position as the Son of Man. The harmony be- 
 tween these two classes of texts is pointed out by 
 Bishop Pearson in his explanation of the article, 
 ' The third day/ etc., and by Dr. Liddon in his 
 Easter Sermons, vol. i., serm. 8. The passage 
 in Pearson begins 'The efficient cause,' and goes 
 on to ' that God the Son raised Himself.' 1 
 
 1 An Exposition of the Creed, Art. V., pp. 256 sqq. (p. 457, 
 ed. Oxford, 1877). 
 
II 
 
 Doctrine 
 
 To the Rev. , a candidate for Priest's Orders, 
 
 on Apollinarianism, the Athanasian Creed, 
 and the Proper Preface for Christmas, 
 
 UNIVERSITY COLLEGE, 
 April 7, 1865. 
 
 I HAVE been over at Cuddesdon twice this week, 
 and am going again to-morrow. I took Apollin- 
 arianism for my subject yesterday ; to-morrow I 
 shall take the great heresy which, I suppose, 
 arose by reaction from it Nestorianism. I can't 
 doubt that the Athanasian Creed was written by 
 some Gallican Christian who had had experience 
 of Apollinarianism as a practically serious mis- 
 chief. Its language so precisely strikes at the 
 two great points of the heresy the denial of 
 Christ's reasonable soul, and the revived Gnostic 
 fancy that His body was part of the Godhead 
 converted into flesh. It was the revival again of 
 some such dream by the Anabaptists and Joan 
 Bocher that made the Reformers frame the 
 Proper Preface for Christmas. By-the-by, I think 
 I forgot to mark (in that scheme of heresies which 
 
 [ 43 1 
 
44 Doctrine 
 
 I gave you) the Apollinarians as having been 
 dealt with by the second General Council, inas- 
 much as it added to the Nicene Creed, as you 
 may see from my history, the mention of the 
 Virgin Mary as Christ's real and true mother. 1 
 Among the parts of my history which I think you 
 would find useful, I may name the description of 
 the various branches of Arianism. 2 
 
 I can't at all wonder at your complaining of 
 Pearson's arrangements. He is very ponderous, 
 often clumsy ; but sometimes his syllogistic clear- 
 ness is admirable. The best passages are those 
 on the One Person 3 and Two Natures of Christ. 4 
 
 To the Rev. , on the Quicunque vult. 
 
 Shrove Tuesday [1872]. 
 
 My own notion is that, if an explanatory clause 
 be not accepted by Convocation, it would be not 
 impossible for us to acquiesce in a modification of 
 the monitory clauses i.e., in the omission of the 
 second and last verses of the Quicunque, all the 
 rest being retained. 
 
 To omit those which affirm the general prin- 
 ciple of the necessity of right belief would, I think, 
 be most fatal. To omit the two verses which 
 speak, or seem to speak, so positively of the con- 
 sequence in every case of a wrong belief would 
 be, in my opinion, no disloyalty to the truth and 
 
 1 Bright, History of the Church, p. 175 (4th ed.). 
 
 - Ibid., p. 68. 3 Art. II., 'His only Son.' 
 
 4 Art. III., 'Which was conceived.' 
 
The Athanasian Creed 45 
 
 to our Lord, and might possibly meet the objec- 
 tions of some sensitive minds. I think at the 
 same time that all the clauses can be explained. 
 
 To the Editor 0/The Guardian on the Atha- 
 nasian Creed. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, 
 
 February 25, 1872. 
 
 In the coming debates on the Athanasian Creed, 
 we may hope that one or two statements will be 
 heard no more. 
 
 For instance, the assertion that our use of this 
 formulary contravenes a decree of the Council of 
 Ephesus. The statement was made, apparently, 
 as an argumentum ad hominem in 1689, and Lord 
 Macaulay in his History^ gives it the advantage 
 of one of his sonorous periods ; it has been 
 recently reproduced. But if we ' verify our refer- 
 ences' by looking at the acts of the Council (Sixth 
 Session, July 22, 431), we find that whereas some 
 Lydian sectarians wishing to join the Church had 
 been misled by a Nestorianizing Creed presented 
 to them as that of the Church, the Council enacted 
 that no one should be allowed ' to present or com- 
 pose a different Creed ' (irkpav nlam-} from the 
 Nicene, 'and that to bring such Creed forward, 
 or present it to persons desiring to come over to 
 the knowledge of the truth,' should entail the 
 heaviest censures 2 (Mansi, iv. 1361). A like 
 
 1 C. xiv. (vol. ii., pp. 113 sq., ed. 1877). 
 - Cf. Brighr, History, pp. 337 sq., and Notes on the Canons, 
 pp. 115 sqq. 
 
46 Doctrine 
 
 enactment against composing, teaching, or deliver- 
 ing a different symbol to such persons was made 
 by the Council of Chalcedon, October 22, 451 
 (ibid., vii. 116). These prohibitions, then, refer 
 to Creeds other than the Nicene, presented to 
 candidates for admission to the Church. But we 
 do not so use the Quicunque. . . . 
 
 If we are told that the patristic passages usually 
 cited as authorities for doctrinal statements in the 
 Quicunque do not mean in the original what they 
 mean in the formulary, this assertion ought to be 
 proved point by point. : . . 
 
 The precise age of the Quicunque in its present 
 complete form is not a matter of primary moment. 
 Other great formularies, as the Apostles' Creed 
 and the Te Deum, have grown. At the same 
 time, the Bishop of Gloucester's advocacy of 
 revised translation and further inquiry into manu- 
 scripts is a real service to the Church. And as 
 to practical considerations : May not objectors to 
 the ' clauses ' be asked to say how far their objec- 
 tions extend ? Do they, e.g., object, not only to 
 the second verse but to the first, to the twenty- 
 eighth and twenty-ninth as well as to the forty- 
 second ? Do they, in short, object to saying that 
 ' it is necessary to everlasting salvation to believe 
 rightly' as to the Trinity and the Incarnation of 
 our Lord ? Is it meant that right belief, where 
 possible, is not among the Gospel terms of salva- 
 tion ? However, even as to verses 2 and 42, the 
 sternest of the five ' clauses,' it is not so very hard 
 to grasp the explanation that as no one can 
 ' hold ' or ' keep ' what has not been given to 
 
Right belief and salvation 47 
 
 him, these clauses in the Athanasian Creed cannot 
 apply to persons who have not had the right faith 
 brought home to them. 
 
 And as to the proposal for banishing the Qui- 
 cungue from our service, but retaining it with its 
 doctrinal authority intact, side by side with the 
 Articles, would it not be necessary in that case to 
 recast the Eighth Article, seeing that ' Creeds ' 
 are meant to be used ? When a doctrinal formu- 
 lary has been publicly recited in church for more 
 than three centuries, to silence it \s prima facie to 
 discredit it, and would be so understood by the 
 people. Professions of respect for it, however 
 sincerely made, would be less significant than the 
 act which they would accompany. Something 
 would have to be done by way of saving the 
 authority of the silenced formula. And what 
 would be done ? Would not the next step be 
 rather this : to admit that the Quicunque, even so 
 retained, was objectionable, and to cast out alto- 
 gether a document already virtually set aside ? 
 The gain would thus be with those who desire 
 simply to abolish it. 
 
 The ' difficulties ' said to inhere in its language, 
 irrespectively of the ' clauses,' have been surely 
 exaggerated. This Creed, so to call it, is meant 
 for those who have received and really hold the 
 faith of the Church, and who have the first claim 
 to her consideration. Let any such persons say 
 which of the doctrinal statements of the Quicunque 
 appear to them superfluous or misleading. A few 
 points will be fully appreciated by those only who 
 know something of the history of controversies ; 
 
48 Doctrine 
 
 but, on the whole, this document, often hastily 
 called a mere congeries of technical subtleties, 
 will be found to speak very intelligibly to all who 
 believe in One God in Three Persons, and in 
 Jesus Christ both God and Man. . . . 
 
 On the same. 
 
 [In reply to a parish priest, who had consulted him on the 
 difficulties of a faithful member of the Church.] 
 
 June 6, 1895. 
 
 Looking back to some memoranda of a few 
 months back, I find myself remarking that in the 
 second verse of the Quicunque the difficulty lies 
 in the extreme stringency of ' without doubt.' It 
 may be said that the case of one who falls away 
 from the faith which he had received, and could 
 therefore have ' kept,' may, in God's sight, admit 
 of extenuating considerations which would put the 
 case outside the scope of the denunciation. The 
 affirmation that he will without doubt be lost will 
 therefore not be verified. To affirm generally 
 that it will is ' too much for a Church to say.' The 
 answer is : ' Oh, but as in Scripture, so also in the 
 formulary : you must presuppose a salvo to cover 
 all such qualifying considerations, of which God 
 will take equitable account.' Yet it may be 
 rejoined that Scripture is Scripture, and we pre- 
 suppose in reading it a good deal which its rule of 
 general language does not express. But a formu- 
 lary which professes to interpret Scripture ought 
 not to require this presupposition ; it ought to 
 
Salvoes should be expressed 49 
 
 express its salvoes and not to leave us to supply 
 them. 
 
 Now, the ancients, including the compiler (or 
 compilers) of the Quicunque, could not be expected 
 to have the same sensitiveness as to the necessity, 
 on a subject so awful, of providing intelligibly for 
 a reserved case, of qualifying and balancing in 
 order to shut out misapprehensions, which ages 
 of controversy have instilled into modern Chris- 
 tianity. But this does not practically help us, 
 when the formula in which these qualifications 
 are omitted is proposed for public use among our- 
 selves at the present time. 
 
 I can see nothing for it but to apply the verse 
 rigorously as a warning to ourselves, who have had 
 such full opportunities of appreciating the truth as 
 would make us specially guilty in abandoning it. 
 Still, I wish that verse could be omitted ; it does 
 not seem to me analogous to ' Resist not evil ' 
 and 'Give to him that asketh thee,' with which 
 Mozley compares it in his posthumous lectures. 1 
 
 To the same, on the same subject. 
 
 June 8, 1895. 
 
 I do not feel the difficulty in quite so urgent a 
 form as [some do], because I always suppose 
 verse 2 to be a warning to those who, like myself, 
 could hardly be capable of denying the Trinity or 
 the Incarnation under any 'ignorance' or 'mis- 
 apprehension ' who, in fact, would be sinning 
 against amply sufficient light if they did so. In 
 1 Lectures and other Theological Papers, p. 195. 
 
 4 
 
50 Doctrine 
 
 principle, the difficulty would apply to a stringent 
 affirmation in similar terms about theism ; and 
 for us, I conceive, it would be true that ' without 
 doubt ' we should forfeit salvation if we threw 
 away faith in God. I still wish that the verse 
 were otherwise worded. But I know that all our 
 divines have interpreted it and the other clauses 
 as addressed to those who have opportunity of 
 knowing the truth, and not to those who have not. 
 
 It may also, perhaps, be suggested that, when 
 Scripture makes an affirmation (such as that in 
 St. John iii. 36 or viii. 24), we may say it is 
 true, 'without doubt,' considering that Christ 
 Himself is the speaker, and, so far, absque dubio 
 is involved in all that we should say on Scripture 
 warrant as to the necessity of true belief. (See 
 Waterland's paraphrase.) 1 The matter, no doubt, 
 wants a considerate judgment, such as many 
 cannot, and some will not, give it. ' 
 
 What you tell me of is interesting. . . . 
 
 I think you could easily make him understand 
 that, as a Christian of the English Church, he is 
 in no sense bound to the pestilent terrorism of the 
 Calvinistic theory. No one was ever more em- 
 phatic than Dr. Pusey in proclaiming that no soul 
 ever was or could be condemned by our Lord and 
 by the Father until it had finally refused the Divine 
 light and love ; and that, if one looks to the portrait 
 of Christ in the Gospels, one sees that statement 
 verified in His lamentations over the perversity 
 of the world which refused to let Him save it. 
 
 1 A Critical History of the Athanasian Creed, c. x. ( Works, 
 iii., p. 231, 3rd ed., 1856). 
 
The power of rhythm 51 
 
 Although I might wish that, in some congrega- 
 tions, we could use a shortened form of the 
 Quicunque, I would rather a great deal have it 
 said in extenso than omitted. For I am quite 
 sure that its rhythmical utterances do stamp on 
 the mind and memory a right conception of 
 supremely momentous truths, both as to the three 
 Divine Persons, and as to the relations of 
 Godhead to Manhood in the Person of Christ, 
 which no other formula could impress so power- 
 fully, and which, once received and assimilated, 
 are of literally incalculable value in preserving a 
 true idea of the faith. 
 
 CORRESPONDENCE RELATING TO THE ARCHBISHOP'S 
 MISSION TO THE EAST SYRIAN CHRISTIANA. 
 
 [Canon Maclean, head of the Mission, had said in his diary 
 that he thought that, while the present East Syrians often used 
 unorthodox language, they held in reality the faith taught at 
 Ephesus and Chalcedon. ' Their forefathers erred,' he wrote, 
 ' not so much in doctrine as in schism in thinking themselves 
 better than the whole of Christendom. On the other hand, 
 immense allowance must be made for their isolated position in 
 the extreme east of the Christian world, and, above all, for 
 their want of an accurate language to express theological terms. 
 Thus, for instance, they use abstract and concrete terms almost 
 indiscriminately such as "Godhead" and "God." This, I 
 believe, lies at the root of their whole difficulty in accepting 
 such phrases as "God died"; "God the Word was born"; 
 " Mother of God "; and, in rejecting them, they are in danger 
 of making two Christs one, man who died, and one, God who 
 did not die. Of course, we explain that by such phrases the 
 Church intends to guard the truth that there is only one 
 Christ that thus the phrase " God the Word was born " means 
 that " Christ was God when He was born." ... All this the 
 
 42 
 
52 Doctrine 
 
 present East Syrians thoroughly believe, and, indeed, insist on 
 most strongly. But with them the phrases above quoted 
 convey the idea that the Godhead was born, the Godhead died, 
 or that St. Mary was Mother of the Godhead. Another 
 difficulty arises from the word Person. They have no exact 
 word for this. . . . They say that Christ has two natures 
 (Kiani) and two Qntimi in one Parsdpa (KPOOUKOV), and what 
 they mean by this they seem incapable of explaining. . . . Their 
 more learned men say that they understand what is meant by 
 the phrases quoted above, and that they guard against the 
 error of two Christs ; but they fear that, if they accepted those 
 phrases, their people would fall into the error of Eutychianisnv 
 Canon Maclean had then proceeded to discuss the historical 
 question of their rejecting the Ephesine decrees.] 
 
 I. 
 
 To the Rev. Dr. Paget, Regius Professor of 
 Pastoral Theology, Oxford. 
 
 [In reference to the above extract.] 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 
 September 4 , 1887. 
 
 I am very grateful to you for letting me see 
 this most interesting extract from Canon Maclean's 
 record of his conference with the Assyrian 
 Matran, 1 who, presumably, may be taken to speak 
 for all the authorities of his Church. It is, 
 certainly, encouraging to those who desire to take 
 as hopeful a view as possible of the doctrinal 
 belief of this poor, long-oppressed community, 
 which has for so many years held fast to ' the 
 Name' 2 in the face of Moslem tyranny. 
 
 1 Or, Metropolitan. - Cf. Acts v. 41 ; i Pet. iv. 14. 
 
Nestorius' language ambiguous 53 
 
 What, on the whole, is one to think ? The 
 mere negation of two Christs, the mere assertion 
 of one Christ, would not be satisfactory in the 
 circumstances, for the extant language of Nestorius 
 informs us that he freely employed that negation 
 and that assertion in his own sense. Although 
 his words often came very nearly, if not quite, up 
 to the point required by Christian orthodoxy, yet, 
 on the whole, it seems certain that he never got 
 beyond the idea of a moral, or honorary, ' union ' 
 that is, a specially intimate alliance between 
 the Son of God and the Son of Mary. So 
 Dorner 1 expressly says of him, and thereby 
 justifies Cyril's repeated charge against him, that 
 he only acknowledged a 'relative' union. In 
 fact, one would be prepared for this conclusion by 
 remembering that he was, in one way or another, 
 the disciple of Theodore, who, among other 
 phrases, compared the union of the Son of God 
 with the Son of Man to the conjugal relation, 2 
 thereby denying point-blank that it was what we 
 call a personal union. 
 
 If, then, the present Assyrians gave no further 
 guarantee than might be found in some passages 
 of Nestorius' sermons, 3 it would not go for much. 
 But, according to Canon Maclean, they do give 
 us further assurance. If they really believe that 
 He, who was from eternity with God, and was 
 God, did Himself become Man, the conclusion is 
 irresistible they hold that of which OSOTOKOC is, 
 
 1 Person of Christ, II., i. p. 55. 
 
 2 Migne, Patrologia Grceca, vol. Ixvi., col. 981 A. 
 
 3 Bright, Church History, pp. 311 sqq. 
 
54 Doctrine 
 
 for Catholic Christians, the symbol and safeguard. 
 I think that, to persons in their position, one 
 would be disposed to say : ' Let us waive, for the 
 present, the terms " Mother of God " and " Per- 
 sonal Union" let us come closer to the point. Do 
 you believe that it is the selfsame He who was 
 from the first in the bosom of the Father, and who, 
 in the fulness of time, appeared on earth as Jesus 
 Christ ?' hoping to hear the answer : ' Yes, 
 we do.' 
 
 Again and again one recurs, with ever-in- 
 creasing admiration and gratitude, to St. Athan- 
 asius. No doubt, he uses OeoroKoc, 1 but he puts 
 his finger on the very core and heart of the 
 subject when, in his second and third orations 
 against the Arians, he uses AVTOC? so emphatically 
 to mean just what later writers would mean by 
 ' His Person.' If they are of one mind with him 
 here, they may (to borrow his tenderly hopeful 
 language about the semi-Arians) ' come in due 
 time to accept ' 3 GSOTO/COC as meaning this, and 
 neither less nor more. And one would rejoice to 
 think that, if they could have understood English, 
 and been present, let us say, at St. Barnabas' this 
 morning, when the church rang with the words, 
 
 1 He was true God in Bethlehem's crib, 
 On Calvary's cross true God,' 
 
 they would have been able to say : ' Yes, we, too, 
 
 1 E.g., Orat. c. Arianos, III., 14, 29, 33 (ed. Bright). 
 
 2 E.g., ibid., 32. 
 
 3 De Synodis, 41, ap. Bright, St. Athanasius' Historical 
 Writings, p. 291. 
 
St. Cyril's disclaimers 55 
 
 believe this !' And then one would have wanted 
 a Te Deum. 
 
 Surely, in the event of their ever adopting the 
 Catholic terms, they might append an explana- 
 tion which would sufficiently guard against even 
 the appearance of Eutychianism. And Canon 
 Maclean might, I venture to think, find it useful 
 to show them some of the many passages in 
 which Cyril, for instance, repudiated as utterly 
 monstrous the notion that Mary gave birth to 
 Godhead, 1 or that there was any kind of change or 
 fusion affecting the Divine Nature of the eternal 
 Son in the assumption of our humanity. 2 He was 
 never weary of disclaiming any such fantasies. 
 Perhaps Canon Maclean has Dr. Heurtley's little 
 reprint of Cyril's three letters in the De Fide et 
 Symbolo. 
 
 [Canon Maclean remarks, with regard to this letter, that he 
 had written to Dr. Bright from Urmi on November 2, 1887, 
 explaining that his diary had only been meant for the general 
 reader, and not for theologians like himself. ' I pointed out,' 
 he says, ' the difficulty, that an Eastern will usually answer 
 according to the wishes of his interrogator, and that therefore 
 we took great care not to disclose our own views when trying 
 to find out those of the East Syrian learned men ; and the 
 further difficulty that all but a few Syrians were too ignorant 
 to hold any Christian doctrine intelligently. I said that the 
 well-instructed among the old Syrians would readily accept 
 Dr. Bright's proposition : " It is the selfsame He," etc., but 
 that they would probably add, " in His Godhead," or "in His 
 
 1 E.g., S. Cyrilli 2 Ep. ad Nest., ap. Heurtley, De Fide et 
 Symbolo, p. 185. 
 
 2 E.g., 3 Ep. ad Nest., 3 (Heurtley, p. 189), and Ep. ad 
 Joann. (ibid., p. 203). 
 
56 Doctrine 
 
 Manhood," respectively. So they would agree that " God the 
 Son died in His Manhood." They cordially accept such 
 expressions as " Jesus was God in the womb of the Blessed 
 Virgin, or on the cross," and repudiate such a notion as is 
 conveyed in the phrases, " The Son of God descended on the 
 Son of Mary, and was united with him," or "God the Word 
 descended on a man, and became flesh." On the other hand, 
 there is no doubt that their phraseology in the past, if not in 
 the present, is unorthodox. I then referred more fully to the 
 word " Person," and to the phrase " two natures, two Qnfinu, 
 oneParsdpa ": as to which I said that a learned Chaldean Bishop 
 at Mosul (now an Uniat, but then holding an independent 
 position), who was much averse to Nestorianism, told me, 
 without being asked, that he thought this phrase was really 
 intended only to convey the idea of the uni-personality of 
 Christ. ... I also added that I expressed no opinion about 
 the theology of the forefathers of the Syrians, but only about 
 that of the present generation.'] 
 
 II. 
 To the Rev. Canon Maclean. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, 
 
 November 26, 1887. 
 
 I heartily thank you for the kindness which has 
 led you, amid all your work, to send me so full a 
 statement in further elucidation of the journal 
 which I was permitted to read, and which has now 
 been laid before all readers of the Guardian^ I 
 will but briefly note some one or two points which 
 occur to me in reading your letter. 
 
 No doubt if all that were desired on the part of 
 the Old Chaldeans, in order to their appreciation 
 and acceptance of Catholic doctrine, were that we 
 1 November 23, 1887. 
 
'Two Qnumi, One Parsopa' 57 
 
 should carefully append to such statements as 
 'God the Son was born,' or 'died,' the explana- 
 tory words ' in,' or ' as touching the Manhood,' no 
 difficulty would remain. We should do this natur- 
 ally ; we do it when we speak to our own brethren 
 about the Incarnation. We do it, as St. Cyril did 
 it before us. And the acceptance by Chaldeans 
 of such a proposition as 'Jesus was God in the 
 womb of the Virgin' or 'on the cross' if they 
 accept it literally and simply carries with it a 
 substantial acceptance of the very truth for which 
 Cyril struggled. The repudiation of the proposi- 
 tion that the Son of God descended on the Son of 
 Mary as on 'a man,' a human individual like 
 Peter or John, confirms the hopes excited by the 
 acceptance above mentioned. But I own that I 
 have some misgivings as to the use of ' two QntimV 
 and 'one Parsdpa! For if 'two QnumV mean 
 only 'two natures,' why are three Qmimi spoken 
 of in regard to the three hypostases in the Holy 
 Trinity ? And that word Parxopa is notoriously 
 ambiguous. I look into Assemani De Syris 
 Nestorianis, and find that Nestorian divines have 
 used it for ' appearance, character, representation'; 1 
 in which sense to confess one Parxopa in the 
 Incarnation might simply mean that the human 
 person represented the Divine, as Nestorius held. 
 One writer even explains unio personalis as like 
 the relation between King and Viceroy. Assemani 
 says they will affirm one Parxdpa, one image, one 
 will, one power, but two substantia and two 
 persona (so he translates the original terms). He 
 1 Bibliotheca Orientalis, Vol. III., part ii., p. 218. 
 
58 Doctrine 
 
 says that by Qnunia they mean hypostasis, by 
 Parsopa a nature as patent to senses, as Christ's 
 Parsdpa would be His visible form, the Spirits 
 the dove, the Father's the fire in the bush. 1 He 
 himself says : * Dum unum irpo<TW7ro' admittunt, 
 nihil agunt nisi unam simul Qnumam sive Hypo- 
 stasim affirment. - He quotes Pope Paul V. in 
 1617 writing to their Patriarch, ' Magna cautione 
 opus est in voce Persona. . .' because ' facile cum 
 commento vocis Parsdpt? . . . confunditur.' The 
 Pope noted as unsound a Nestorian admission of 
 one Persona of the Word in Christ, which was 
 followed by the illustration, 'even as one tree is 
 grafted into another,' 3 and, as fatally significant, the 
 Nestorians' profession that their fathers had always, 
 in fact, believed as they did now. 3 Assemani con- 
 cludes : ' Expositionibus quas afferunt ut sensum 
 Catholicum adstruant' for the proposition, 'Unum 
 Christi TrpwrwTToi',' 'suspecta fide nunquam se purga- 
 bunt, nisi simul dicant " Unam Christi personam et 
 hypostasim." :4 The mere fact, then, that Parsopa 
 is often used where nothing palpable can be 
 meant is no guarantee, no reassurance ; for it 
 might then be used to signify 'character,' as when 
 a lieutenant 'represents ' his chief officer, etc. If 
 one Parsdpa is now used by the Chaldeans in 
 the sense of one hypostasis (and less than this is 
 less than sufficient), this must be by virtue of an 
 advance in later years, from the position of the 
 divines quoted by Assemani. Of course this is 
 
 1 Bibliotheca Oritnialis, Vol. III., part ii., p. 219. 
 
 8 Ibid., p. 221. 3 Ibid., p. 222. 4 Ibid.) p. jr ;. 
 
Decadence of Protestantism 59 
 
 quite possible, and one would most earnestly hope 
 that it has actually taken place. 
 
 What you say of the Presbyterians' disciples is 
 only one more proof of the terrible decadence of 
 the Protestant sects from the Catholic faith as to 
 the Incarnation, of which we have lately heard so 
 much. . . . 
 
 III. 
 
 To Archbishop Benson. 
 
 [In answer to a request that he would report whether the 
 East Syrian liturgies were suitable for publication by the 
 Archbishop's Mission Press at Urmi.] 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, 
 
 February 6, 1888. 
 
 In fulfilment of the commission with which your 
 Grace has honoured me, I would say that there is 
 nothing, so far as I see, in the ' Liturgy of the 
 Apostles,' as exhibited by Dr. Badger 1 or in 
 Hammond's Liturgies Eastern and Western? 
 from Renaudot's text, 3 which expresses, or neces- 
 sarily implies, Nestorian heresy. The use of the 
 term ' Mother of Christ ' would, of course, be 
 objectionable as part of a context which rejected 
 the Catholic term, but here it does not so occur. 
 On the other hand, the liturgy repeatedly speaks 
 in terms which no one could seriously adopt or 
 approve, who regarded our Lord as a human 
 
 Nestorians and their Rituals, ii., pp. 215-221, 223-241. 
 
 2 Pp. 267 sqq. 
 
 3 Liturgiarum Orientalium Collectio, ii., pp. 578 sqq. (2nd ed.). 
 
60 Doctrine 
 
 person associated (however closely) with the 
 Divine Son, or who did not, in fact, recognise in 
 Him the selfsame Divine Son as incarnate. Our 
 Lord is represented, e.g., as ' receiving the Euchar- 
 istic Sacrifice ' l language which goes beyond the 
 usual tenor of liturgies, whether Eastern or 
 Western, although some other rites adopt it. ... 
 
 On the whole, I should take this liturgy as going 
 some way, at least, to a proof that the Assyrians are 
 not consciously and advisedly heretical i.e., that 
 they do not mean to represent our Lord as other 
 than Divine in His Ego, or personal Self. 
 
 The other question which your Grace puts is 
 not quite so easy to answer. The differences 
 between the order, and in some respects between 
 the wording of the liturgy as given by Badger 
 and by Hammond, are considerable, and perhaps 
 Canon Maclean may have before him some manu- 
 scripts which would tend to establish a better text 
 than even Hammond i.e., Re.naudot (Miss Payne- 
 Smith prefers Hammond to Badger). There 
 cannot, then, be a question of simply reprinting 
 Badger ; according to Miss Payne-Smith's notes, 
 his version must be corrected. 
 
 I feel sure that there is a misprint in it in one 
 passage. ' Let us ever and at all times offer 
 praise to Thy glorious Trinity, O Christ!' 2 It 
 is clear that there should be a full-stop after 
 ' Trinity,' and that then our Lord is addressed in 
 a new sentence. 3 
 
 There is in the liturgy according to Badger, 
 
 1 Hammond, p. 279. - Badger, ii. p. 2 [8. 
 
 3 So in Hammond, p. 270; Brightman, Liturgies, i., p. 268. 
 
Anticipative language in Liturgies 61 
 
 and in a less degree according to Hammond, a 
 strangely bold use of ' anticipative ' language at 
 the offertory, the unconsecrated elements being 
 called the Body and Blood. 1 But a subsequent 
 prayer for the sanctification of the oblation 2 
 proves that this language is not to be strained. 
 Similar language in substance occurs in other 
 Eastern rites. If Badger's text be duly corrected, 
 I see no reason against its being printed as a 
 representation of the actual rite of the Assyrians. 
 
 [Canon Maclean remarks on this that the text published 
 was an independent one formed by collation of a large number 
 of manuscripts.] 
 
 IV. 
 To the Rev. Canon Maclean. 
 
 [In answer to an inquiry as to the propriety of the phrase, 
 ' Christ took and put on (as a garment) flesh.'] 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 March 4, 1888. 
 
 This sentence is, on any hypothesis, a some- 
 what strange one. Perhaps if one knew the 
 context, the strangeness might be, at least par- 
 tially, relieved. 
 
 It is not strictly accurate on the Catholic hypo- 
 thesis, but it is actually unintelligible on the Nes- 
 torian ! For who would say of any human person 
 that ' he took and clothed himself with flesh ? 
 
 The inaccuracy, from a Catholic point of view, 
 
 1 Badger, ii., p. 218 ; Brightman, i., p. 267. 
 
 2 Badger, ii., p. 232 ; Brightman, i.,p. 287 (The Invocation). 
 
62 Doctrine 
 
 consists in the substitution of ' Christ ' for ' the 
 Word ' or ' the Son.' Strictly speaking, the Word, 
 or the Son, took flesh, and so, by becoming incar- 
 nate, became ' Christ.' However, as St. Thomas 
 Aquinas says (Summa, III. xvi. 3) that, 'cum 
 dicitur homo Jesus Christus, designatur suppo- 
 situm seternum quod est persona Filii Dei, propter 
 hoc quod est unum suppositum utriusque naturae,' 
 an orthodox writer might in such a connection 
 use ' Christ ' for ' the Person of the Word or Son '; 
 e.g., he might say, ' Christ was from eternity ' 
 or ' Christ made the world ' (especially in a sermon 
 or meditation). 
 
 Substituting, therefore, mentally the terms ' the 
 Son ' or ' the Word ' for ' Christ ' in the pro- 
 position in question, we see that it is utterly 
 contrary to Nestorianism. In what both Gamier 1 
 and Baluze 2 reckon as the first sermon of Nes- 
 torius, he seems to have said, ' For the sake of 
 Him who uses it, I worship the garment which 
 He uses ' 3 language per se quite capable of an 
 orthodox meaning, but in his sense conveying a 
 heterodox meaning, viz., ' I worship the human 
 person whom the Divine Person has associated 
 with Himself, on the principle of relative worship 
 or honour.' And, in the sermon reckoned by one 
 editor as seventh, 4 by another as second, 5 Nes- 
 
 1 Nestorii Sermo I., 9 ; Gamier, Marii Mercatoris Opera 
 (ap. Migne, Patrologia Latina, torn, xlviii., col. 762A). 
 - Baluzius, Mar. Merc. Opera, p. 55 (Parisiis, 1684). 
 
 3 ' Propter utentem illud indumentum quo utitur colo.' Cf. 
 Bright, Church History, p. 311, note^ 
 
 4 Nest. Serm. VII., 32 ; Gamier, Mar. Merc. Opera (ap. 
 Migne, P. L., torn, xlviii., col. 797!)). 
 
 5 Baluzius, Mar. Merc. Opera, p. 65. 
 
The Imagery of a garment 63 
 
 torius says, ' Adoro [Christum] tanquam animatam 
 Regis purpuram,' the King being the Divine 
 Word. 
 
 Now, the anti-Nestorian theologians do not 
 object at all to the imagery of a 'garment,' if used 
 without involving the idea of an association be- 
 tween a human person, Jesus, and the Word or 
 Son. Let the ' garment ' be taken to mean simply 
 the human nature, or manhood, or flesh, assumed 
 by the Word into union with His single Per- 
 sonality, and they will speak thus of it. Proclus, 
 preaching against Nestor ius, says, ' ^) yap 
 eveSvaaro /*> OVK av eawatv Ipi ' J 1 clearly meaning, 
 
 ' If He had not assumed the nature which I 
 bear.' And just as St. Athanasius had spoken 
 of the Lord's Body as the garment which the 
 Lord wore (Ep. lx., Ad Adelphium, 6), 2 so 
 Cyril not only speaks over and over again of 
 the Divine Son as having ' taken ' or assumed 
 our flesh, and thus ' appropriated ' the condi- 
 tions of human life, or ' made that flesh iSmi/,' 3 
 but disclaims or guards against the notion that 
 the Son's Godhead descended into Hades, yvpvri 
 i.e., without its assumed clothing of humanity 
 (De Incarn. Unigen., c. xx.). 4 He says that the 
 ' Son appropriated manhood, 7repi/3A?/wa aniKpoirptTrsf; ' 
 (ibid., c. xxv.) ; 5 and, again, that ' He, being by 
 
 1 8, ap. Migne. P. G., torn, xlv., col. 6870. 
 
 2 Cf. Bright, Later Treatises of St. Athanasius, p. 68, and 
 Orat. c. Ar., iii., 32, p. 186. 
 
 3 Cf. 2 Ep. ad Nest., ap. Heurtley, p. 184. 
 
 4 S. Cyrilli Opera, vol. vii., p. 68 (ed. P. E. Pusey). 
 
 5 Ibid., p. 109. 
 
64 Doctrine 
 
 nature God, T^V TOW TraStiv 
 
 (Quod MUUS est Christus, in Pusey's edition of 
 Cyril, vii., p. 407). 
 
 The imagery in question clearly originated in 
 Heb. x. 20 (cf. ' Veiled in flesh the Godhead see'). 
 I think, therefore, that understanding ' Christ ' to 
 mean the Son of God as a Divine Person, the 
 sentence is quite orthodox, and that to take it in 
 any other way is to introduce, not mere verbal 
 inexactness, but actual unintelligibleness. 
 
 V. 
 
 [The following letter seems to have been written to the 
 Archbishop's chaplain. There had been a question whether 
 the three liturgies of the East Syrians, ascribed respectively to 
 Addai 1 and Mari, 2 to Theodore, and to Nestorius, 3 should be 
 so described in the published edition.] 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, 
 
 June 14, 1889. 
 
 It appears to me that, as the Assyrian Chris- 
 tians do not now hold consciously or intelligently 
 the peculiar heresy which Theodore taught, and 
 which Nestorius imbibed from his writings, there 
 could be no real impropriety in following the 
 example of the Roman Catholic editor of the two 
 liturgies, which bear those two names but contain 
 no taint of the error in question, and are therefore 
 somewhat injured in our eyes by being thus 
 designated. 
 
 1 Renaudot, ii., pp. 578 sqq. 2 Ibid., pp. 610 sqq. 
 
 3 Ibid., pp. 620 sqq. 
 
The rites of the East Syrians 65 
 
 One might think that it would be well, were it 
 possible, to entitle the liturgy of SS. Adckeus and 
 Maris the ' First Liturgy,' as being, I suppose, of 
 primary authority among the Assyrians, and 
 superior, therefore, to the two which would thus 
 rank as 'Second' and 'Third.' But reasons, 
 which those only who are on the spot could appre- 
 ciate, may perhaps be urged as decisive against 
 such a course. 
 
 I do not understand what ' doctrinal considera- 
 tions ' could stand in the way of a combination of 
 the baptismal offices with the liturgies. But such 
 a combination, so far as one can form an opinion, 
 would seem likely to have a good effect. 
 
 Respectfully submitting this to His Grace's 
 judgment, and thanking him for his goodness in 
 consulting me . . . 
 
 [This letter is endorsed by Archbishop Benson : ' I agree ; 
 and if he considers the Baptismal Office sound, add it.'] 
 
 VI. 
 
 To the same. 
 
 [A report on the orthodoxy of the East Syrian Baptismal 
 Office.] 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, 
 
 June 27, 1889. 
 
 It has been a pleasure to go to the Bodleian 
 with the Archbishop's errand. 
 
 The Baptismal Office of the Assyrians as trans- 
 lated by Dr. Badger 1 has not, as far as 1 can 
 
 1 Op. tit., ii., pp. 195 sq. 
 
 5 
 
66 Doctrine 
 
 judge, a single trace of Nestorianism. On the 
 contrary, it contains language which no intelligent 
 holder of that heresy could adopt. Thus, ' The 
 Very Son of the Essence of the Father of His own 
 will humbled Himself, and in His mercy took upon 
 Him our body.' 1 ' Glory be to the Most Highest, 
 who descended and took the body of our humilia- 
 tion !' 2 ' O Thou Highest, who descendedst and 
 tookest . . . !' 3 Throughout the office 'the Saviour,' 
 ' Christ,' is continually identified in the simplest 
 and most absolute manner with the Divine Son, 
 the Second Person of the Holy Trinity ; and in 
 order to express the theory of an association 
 between the Son of God and the Son of Mary (as 
 supposed by Nestorianism), it is not too much to 
 say that the office would have to be reconstructed 
 i.e., supposing always that it was to be used in 
 its simple grammatical meaning, without dis- 
 ingenuous mental glosses in a sense contrary to 
 that which the words convey. 
 
 But on quite another subject one passage does, 
 I think, give occasion for some questioning. 
 
 Thus : ' Who from the beginning made men 
 mortal and corruptible, for the trial of their free 
 will.' 4 (Another clause in a prayer, ' In Thy 
 inscrutable wisdom Thou didst bring ^ls into this 
 world with a corruptible origin,' 5 might refer to the 
 case of each human being since the Fall.) It 
 might, of course, be said that the human body 
 had in itself, from the first, elements of dissolution ; 
 but that, if there had been no Fall, their operation 
 
 1 Badger, ii., p. 198. - Ibid., p. 208. 3 Ibid., p. 211. 
 
 4 Ibid., p. 197. 5 Ibid., p. 206. 
 
Ceremonies at Confirmation 67 
 
 would have been supernaturally arrested, so that 
 practically it was ' through sin ' that ' death came 
 into the world' of our present humanity. A 
 person who meant this would, however, I think, 
 prefer to use language which conveyed that dis- 
 tinction rather than the unqualified terms of the 
 passage above quoted. . . . 
 
 It is curious that in this office unction 1 takes 
 place only before Baptism, and Confirmation is 
 given by simple imposition of hands with the sign 
 of the cross, 2 as in our Prayer-Book of 1549 and 
 in the traditional Scottish use. 
 
 VII. 
 To the Rev. Canon Maclean. 
 
 [In reply to a letter of his from Urmi, October 9, 1889, 
 about the two passages in the East Syrian Baptismal Office 
 above referred to ' Who from the beginning made men mortal 
 and corruptible for the trial of their free will,' and ' Thou 
 didst bring us into this world with a corruptible origin' 
 Canon Maclean had written as follows . ' I find the word used 
 is mithkhablana, which I think cannot mean more than 
 " capable of corruption." It does not seem to imply any 
 notion of the seed of corruption being in Adam before the 
 Fall, but only that he was capable of falling. These passive 
 verbal adjectives are always interpreted as expressing capability 
 . . . and this appears to be carried out by the Pshitta of 
 i Cor. xv. 42, 50-55. . . . These verses, literally translated, 
 seem to bring out a difference (which is not in the Greek) 
 between " being in a state of non-corruption " and " being in a 
 state incapable of corruption." Thus : (var. 42) " They are sown 
 in the state of corrupting : they rise in the state of not-corrupt- 
 
 1 Badger, ii., p. 196. 2 Ibid., p. 210. 
 
 52 
 
68 Doctrine 
 
 ing "; (ver. 50) " That which is in the state of corrupting does 
 not inherit the state of being incapable of corrupting " 
 la mithkhablana ; (ver. 52) " The dead shall rise in the state of 
 not-corrupting"; (ver. 53) "For this, which is in the state of 
 corrupting (pres. tense), is about to put on the state of being 
 incapable of corruption (as before) ; and this, which is in the 
 act of dying (pres. tense), to put on the state of not-dying " (la 
 maytithiWia), or " of not being able to die." . . . Thus, the 
 word we are discussing seems to be used in i Corinthians to 
 denote possibility of corruption, and when that which is actually 
 corrupting is intended, this word is not used, but the present 
 tense of the verb (d'mithkhabal). 
 
 'Where the Authorized Version gives "corruptible" or 
 "incorruptible" (Rom. i. 23 ; i Cor. ix. 25 ; i Peter i. 18, 23, 
 iii. 4, etc.), this word is not used, but the present tense or its 
 equivalent. 
 
 ' These passages seem to confirm the rule that words of the 
 form in question describe only capability. . . . What is meant 
 (in the Baptismal Office) is that Adam was capable of corruption 
 before the Fall, though he had not any corruption in him at 
 that time, and a contrast is drawn between him and God, who 
 is not only not in a state of corruption, but also not capable of 
 corruption. 
 
 'I also suggested that in i Cor. xv. 53, where the grammatical 
 form (" state of not-dying ") is different, this may be due to 
 death being a single action, and corruption a continuous state.' 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 November 9, 1889. 
 
 I thank you very heartily for the letter which 
 you have so kindly written to me on those pas- 
 sages in the Assyrian Baptismal Offices. I am 
 totally incapable of forming any personal opinion, 
 through my ignorance of Oriental tongues. But 
 I have shown your letter to Mr. Margoliouth, our 
 new Professor of Arabic, who is a most learned 
 Orientalist, and I enclose his reply, which, I think, 
 may please you. 
 
Canon Maclean's accuracy 69 
 
 We had an interesting meeting on the subject 
 of the mission at Magdalen College last Sunday 
 evening, when Mr. Riley gave an account of its 
 work. 
 
 VIII. 
 
 From the Laudian Professor of Arabic to 
 Dr. Bright. 
 
 NEW COLLEGE, OXFORD, 
 
 November 8 [1889]. 
 
 DEAR CANON BRIGHT, 
 
 I have read your friend's letter, which I 
 return. His argument seems to me quite sound 
 and accurate, and to take proper account of 
 Syriac usage. 
 
 Yours very truly, 
 
 D. S. MARGOLIOUTH. 
 
 IX. 
 
 To the Rev. Canon Maclean. 
 
 [In answer to a question of his, dated November 23, 1889, 
 as to the orthodoxy of a phrase in the Liturgy of Nestorius : 
 ' He emptied Himself, and took the form of a servant, perfect 
 man, of a reasonable, intelligent, and immortal soul, and of a 
 mortal human body ; and joined and united with Himself, in 
 glory and power and honour, a passible nature which was 
 formed by the power of the Holy Ghost, and was born 
 (literally, was} of a woman, and was under the Law.' Also of 
 the passage in the Liturgy of Addai and Mari : ' When Thou 
 shalt be manifested at the end of times in the man, whom 
 Thou didst assume from us.' Also in the Liturgy of Theodore : 
 ' The Son of God, God the Word, our Lord Jesus Christ, put 
 on Himself perfect man.'] 
 
70 Doctrine 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, 
 
 December 14, 1889. 
 
 i. Looking at all the passages in Renaudot's 
 Latin version, I should say that the passage in 
 the Liturgy of Nestorius to the effect that our 
 Lord ' took the likeness of a servant, perfect man, 
 of a reasonable soul,' etc.. and 'joined him [i.e., 
 man] to Himself in glory . . .' l would not neces- 
 sarily betray any Nestorian taint if taken, as in 
 fairness it should be, with the context. For, in the 
 words preceding, ' our Lord Jesus Christ ' is 
 strictly identified with 'Thy Holy, Only-begotten 
 Son . . . God the Word.' And although (as 
 Renaudot says 2 ) it would be heresy to say that the 
 Son of God took ' a man ' into union with Himself, 
 such union consisting merely in the participation 
 of 'glory and power,' there is no proof here (but 
 the contrary) that by ' perfect man ' in this passage 
 there is intended a human individual, and not, 
 rather, all that really constitutes manhood. 
 
 The use of avOpuTrog and of homo in this sense of 
 ' manhood ' is, we all know, by no means un- 
 common in the Fathers. Cardinal Newman speaks 
 of St. Athanasius' ' ordinary use of ni>0pu)irog for 
 the manhood' (e.g., Orat. cont. Arian., iv., 36; 
 cf. Newman, Treatises of St. Athan., ii. , 345 3 ). 
 And St. Augustine similarly uses homo in Civ. 
 Dei, xi. 2 : ' homine assumpto, non Deo con- 
 sumpto'; 4 and De Agone Christiana, 12 : 'homo, 
 
 1 Renaudot, op. at., ii., p. 622. 2 Ibid., note 7, p. 637 . 
 
 3 Library of the Fathers. 
 
 4 Opera, torn, vii., col. 2730 (ed. Ben.). 
 
'Homo' for 'Manhood' 71 
 
 quern suscepit Filius Dei.' 1 Of course, after Nes- 
 torianism arose such language was to be avoided 
 as capable of easy perversion ; and so St. Cyril 
 says that they go wrong who dare to speak of 
 TOV ava\r]((>9tvTa avOpuirov, ' and affirm that he ought 
 as a separate person to be worshipped jointly 
 with the Son of God' (Adv. Tkeod., c. 8 2 ). And 
 St. Thomas Aquinas says that such expressions as 
 in Augustine's De Agone are to be understood in 
 the sense of the assumption of man's nature, with 
 the result that the Son of God is man (Summa, 
 III. iv. 3). However, such a phrase in such a 
 liturgy, though in a way suspicious, is to be judged 
 by the general drift of the whole document. 
 
 2. The passage in the Liturgy of St. Addaeus and 
 St. Maris, ' in homine quern a nobis assumpsisti,' 3 
 is to be similarly interpreted, for in this liturgy 
 ' the Son ' (of God) is identified with Jesus Christ, 
 as in the * Prayer of Inclination.' 4 Christ is also 
 spoken of as * the Life-giver.' 5 
 
 3. So, in the Liturgy of Theodore (Renaudot, 
 ii. 614), 'induit hominem perfectum ' must surely 
 be interpreted by the preceding phrase (ibid., 612). 
 ' Induitque humanitatem nostram, corpus mortale 
 et animam rationalem,' which is strictly a parallel 
 passage to ' Accepit hominem perfectum ex anima 
 rationali . . .' 6 as quoted before from the Liturgy 
 of Nestorius. 
 
 1 Opera, torn, vi., col. 25 iF. 
 
 2 Migne, P. G., torn. Ixxvi., col. 429; cf. Bright, Later 
 Treatises of St. Athan., p. 164. 
 
 3 Renaudot, ii., p. 582. 4 Ibid., p. 5 86 - . 
 
 5 ' Induisti humanam naturam nostram, ut vitam nobis 
 praestares per divinitatem tuam ' (ibid., p. 584). 
 Ibiii., p. 622. 
 
72 Doctrine 
 
 X. 
 
 To the Rev. Canon Maclean. 
 
 [In answer to a question about printing a reference to ' the 
 company of Diodorus ' in the East Syrian Offices.] 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, 
 
 February 21, 1891. 
 
 I do not remember how you have treated those 
 passages in the East Syrian Office-books, in which 
 Nestorius and Theodore are named with venera- 
 tion. They stand, so to speak, on a different 
 level from Diodore. He was not, so far as appears, 
 condemned (I mean for this heresy, of course) by 
 any CEcumenical Council. The Fifth 1 omits his 
 name when branding the other two. And Cyril's 
 attempt to get his name condemned in the archi- 
 episcopate of Proclus had to be given up from 
 motives of policy, if not from a more Christianlike 
 objection to anathematizing the dead. 
 
 But, on the other hand, I cannot think that 
 Cyril was wrong when he traced the Nestorian 
 mischief through Theodore to Diodore. 2 Doubt- 
 less Theodore developed and systematized his 
 master's line of heterodox speculation ; but, as far 
 as I can see, he found his own favourite idea as to 
 the two personalities of Christ in Diodore, though 
 in a less coherent form. For Diodore appears to 
 have made the difference between Jesus and the 
 
 1 Constantinople, 553 ; cf. Canon 5, ap, Hefele, iv., p. 331. 
 
 2 See Dr. Bright's article 'Cyrillus' in the Dictionary of 
 Christian Biography ; i., p. 771. 
 
Diodore of Tarsus 73 
 
 prophets to be a difference of degree rather than 
 of kind. He held, I mean, that, .whereas the 
 prophets enjoyed only a partial amount of inspiring 
 grace, Jesus permanently abode in the Presence 
 into which they were at times admitted. If he 
 thought out what he said, he could hardly have 
 failed to substitute for a real Incarnation a very 
 exceptional fulness of intercourse between the 
 Divine Son or Word and one highly-favoured 
 human individual. But all this is familiar to you. 
 I cannot judge as to the impression which this or 
 that phrase may now produce on the East Syrians. 
 But, speaking tentatively as from a distance, I 
 cannot but think that if you exclude (as I presume 
 you do exclude) the names of Nestorius and 
 Theodore from the translated Offices, you can 
 hardly with intelligible consistency, or even fair- 
 ness, include the name of the man who, whatever 
 were his merits, for many years, as a steadfast 
 opponent of Arianism at Antioch, did, as a matter 
 of historical fact, gather together the less sound 
 elements of the Syrian school into something like 
 a Christological doctrine, which in effect prepared 
 the way for Nestorianism. 
 
 One feels all the more bound to be careful in 
 this matter, because, most unhappily, the recent 
 discussion about one essay in Lux Mundi has 
 given an impulse to an unsuspected amount of 
 Nestorianizing thought in England, which falls in 
 with the tendencies of the time. Not Eutychian 
 but Nestorian error is the type of misbelief 
 against which we have specially to guard. 
 
74 Doctrine 
 
 P.S. Does not your question mainly depend 
 on another ? Why was ' the company of Diodore ' 
 named in these offices ? Was it not because of 
 his theological connection with Theodore and with 
 Nestorius ? What other reason can be assigned ? 
 
 XI. 
 
 To the Rev. Canon Maclean. 
 
 [In answer to a request that he might quote Dr. Bright's 
 letters in the Catholicos of the East and his People, published 
 a little later by him and Rev. W. H. Browne.] 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, 
 
 September 14, 1891. 
 
 . . . Perhaps in order to meet a possible objec- 
 tion, that Nestorius did at times virtually admit 
 the singleness of the Christ, though he habitually 
 annulled any such admission by making that unity 
 (in Cyril's phrase) o^ert/ci} 1 or unreal, you might 
 use some such word as ' substantially ' before the 
 word ' teaching ' on p. i ; or you might add some- 
 thing to the effect that what he held was, in fact, 
 only a very close association between the Son of 
 God and the Son of Man, differing rather in 
 degree than in kind from the association between 
 the Divine Word and any saintly man. 
 
 At the end of p. 2 I think it would make the 
 communicatio idiomatuni 1 clearer if you said, 
 'Attributing to the Christ Himself in His One 
 
 1 3 Ep. ad Nest., 5, ap. Heurtley, De Fide et Symbolo, 
 p. 190. 
 
 - Cf. Bright, Sermons of St. Leo, p. 130. 
 
St. Cyril's Twelve Anathematisms 75 
 
 Person, under the title belonging to one of His 
 natures, the properties of the other,' and then 
 gave an illustration : e.g., when St. Paul speaks of 
 ' the Lord of glory ' as having been ' crucified ' l 
 i.e., of Christ, under the title of God, as having 
 suffered what He suffered only as man. (This 
 might be stated more clearly, as you will know 
 how.) 
 
 I do not mind being quoted if you like, and if it 
 may also be made clear that I, being ignorant of 
 Syriac, could only read the Office through your 
 translation. 
 
 It might perhaps help, as a further illustration, 
 to quote the Formula of Reunion 2 between Cyril 
 and John, as showing how mutual explanation did 
 in that instance remove differences, Cyril agree- 
 ing to adopt language which he had not before 
 used e.g., as to 'the consubstantiality of the 
 Incarnate with us, as touching the manhood.' 
 Thus far the objections of the Syrians did great 
 service to the faith by leading Cyril to balance 
 his language better. I always feel that his original 
 Twelve Articles 3 were not throughout judiciously 
 worded, that they did, in one or two places at 
 least, invite misgivings on the part of the Syrian 
 school of theologians, and that they needed 
 complementary statements such as the Formula 
 of Reunion supplied. 
 
 1 i Cor. ii. 8. 
 
 2 Ep. ad Joann., Hipl 6t rJjs soro/toy . . . 'ra.pa.didovras, dp. 
 Heurtley, pp. 200 sq. 
 
 3 Ep. ad Nest., ap. Heurtley, pp. 106 sq.; cf. Bright, Later 
 Treatises of St. A than., pp. 157 sqq. 
 
j6 Doctrine 
 
 To the Rev. , on Monothelitism. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 December 8, 1891. 
 
 I fear I cannot enter at all fully into the ques- 
 tion which you mention. One has much to do 
 just before winding up the occupations of term, as 
 to which I am somewhat behindhand. 
 
 But I might refer you to Hefele's History of 
 the Councils, as to the question of Monothelitism. 1 
 For my own part, I should have thought that will, 
 in the sense of the power of volition, was a pro- 
 perty of nature, but exercised by the person hold- 
 ing or living in that nature, or, as one might 
 express it, was of the person in respect to the 
 nature. In the case of the three Divine Hypo- 
 stases, who are not separate persons in the human 
 sense, I should say there was but one will (as 
 there is but one counsel) belonging to the one 
 indivisible Nature, but exercised by the three 
 Hypostases, who are, theologically speaking, co- 
 inherent. (But doubtless the mystery is beyond 
 human language.) In the case of our Lord as 
 incarnate, it seems to me that 'will' and 'activity' 
 are correlative ; that if His Divine and His human 
 nature had respectively an ' activity ' belonging to 
 each, the like would be the case with the ' will.' 
 But both activity and volition would belong to, 
 would be exerted by, the one Ego or Person of 
 the Son, as existing in two spheres of being (cf. 
 St. Leo's Tome 2 ). In the Agony there must 
 
 1 Vol. v. 
 
 2 C. 3, ap. Heurtley, pp. 208 sq. ; and Bright, Sermons of 
 St. Leo, pp. 113 sg. 
 
Two Wills in Christ 77 
 
 have been an act of human volition, expressing 
 itself, as you say, in ' Not My will, but Thine be 
 done ' l i.e., ' Not My will ' considered in the 
 abstract, as if it could be opposed to the Divine 
 will, which was One in the Father and in Himself. 
 If there was no human volition, then the reality of 
 the self-sacrifice is impaired. Archbishop Trench 
 points this out in a note to his Hulsean Lectures. 2 
 Of course what spoke, as it were, in TO aw ytveaOio 
 was our Lord's humanity that is, our Lord in 
 His humanity not the Divinity or Divine will of 
 the Son as such, coinciding with the Divine will 
 of the Father. As Hefele says, there is but one 
 will in the One Trinity, and Pope Honorius 
 (as he represents him) was wrong in ignoring 
 that fact, and also in arguing that because there 
 could be no effective resistance of the lower to the 
 higher nature in Christ, therefore it was necessary 
 to affirm only one will in Christ. He confounded 
 says Hefele, what was distinct with what was 
 opposed, a moral unity with a physical. 3 
 
 It seems to me that the Sixth Council 4 was 
 theologically quite consistent with itself, and quite 
 faithful to the principles laid down by the Fourth. 
 It was the one Person of Christ who, by assuming 
 the ' form ' or character of humanity, while retain- 
 ing, as I should say, the ' form ' or character of 
 Divinity, made Himself capable of living, as it 
 were, two lives, and exerting two sets of qualities 
 
 1 Luke xxiu 42. 
 
 2 P. 200 (2nd ed., 1847); rf- Bright, Sermons of St. Leo, 
 pp. 173 j?. 
 
 3 Councils, v., p. 33. 
 
 4 Constantinople, 680 ; Hefele, v., pp. 149 sqq. 
 
78 Doctrine 
 
 or powers. It was He, the selfsame, who in one 
 of those spheres revealed His essential unity with 
 the Father ; it was He who, in the other sphere, 
 felt a wish for water to allay the human sensation 
 of thirst. Here was the sinless human will, 
 which, as the Council says, never gainsaid or 
 resisted the Divine will. All seems to run up 
 into one point : ' That original mystery' (to borrow 
 a phrase of Cardinal Newman's as to the Trinity) 
 of the Incarnation, that a single Ego became 
 capable of living, willing, acting, both as God in 
 His higher nature and as man in His lower. 
 Grant this, and (as it seems to me) the two wills 
 and two activities (as understood and explained 
 by the Council) will follow. Or one might state 
 the mystery as implying the existence of what (for 
 want of a better term) we call His human nature 
 what constitutes manhood, as belonging not to 
 any individual human person, but to a Divine 
 Person, who is the agent in all its activities. 
 
 P.S. I need hardly refer you to Hooker, 
 Ecclesiastical Polity -, V. xlviii. 9. He adopts 
 Aquinas' dictum, ' Ipsa potentia voluntatis est 
 naturalis.' 1 It goes, then, with the nature. If Nes- 
 torianism were true it would be exercised by a 
 human person, Jesus, as distinct from the Divine 
 Person of the Son of God ; because Nestorianism 
 is false, the human nature's will-power in Christ was 
 exercised by the same Divine Person, who in His 
 Divine nature exercised a Divine will. The 
 passage in Aquinas is Summa, III. xviii. i ad 3, 
 
 1 Summa, III., xviii. i ad 3. 
 
One Person in Two Natures 
 
 79 
 
 where he infers a human will from the complete- 
 ness of human nature as ' taken into God,' but 
 without prejudice to the continuous existence of 
 the Divine will in the Person of the Son. He 
 goes into refinements about a possible assertion of 
 two human wills in Christ, one relating to bodily 
 needs, the other to reason, or about a subdivision 
 of His reasonable will into %k\r\<si^ (pure wishing for, 
 e.g., health) and /3ovAr/(nc. But with these we 
 need not trouble ourselves. Pope Martin I.'s 
 Lateran Council in 649 1 inferred two dtX^iara in 
 union (i.e., close concord), because each <f>vmg in 
 Christ implied His being OtXjjTucoe, and in the 
 synodal letter ' the essential activity and 0*A>?(nc 
 (here = 0sAr?/ua) of our essence is a natural property 
 belonging to that essence." 2 Messengers from a 
 subsequent Pope were led on to admit the notion 
 of one ' personal ' and two ' natural ' wills in Christ, 
 by way of compromise an absurd notion, of course, 
 which would imply that with the two ' natural ' wills 
 the Divine Person was not concerned. 
 
 In Sophronius of Jerusalem's letter to Sergius 
 the Son is said to have become Incarnate ixawrlip 
 OfXrinari by the jSouArjoec of the Father and the 
 ffWEuSojcta of the Holy Spirit; and then it is added 
 that as He is of the same /3ouA/j<rcc with the Father 
 and the Spirit, so is He of the same owr/a, 3 etc. 
 
 The passage to which you refer, I suppose, 
 is in Pope Agatho's letter to the Emperors, read 
 in the fourth session 4 of the Council, inferring (I 
 
 1 Hefele, v. pp. 97 sqq. ' 2 Mansi, x. 11710. 
 
 3 634, Mansi, xi. 473A. 
 
 4 November 15, 680; Hefele, v., p. 155. 
 
.8o Doctrine 
 
 think correctly) ' one natural will, power, dominion, 
 glory,' from 'the one nature or essence in the 
 Trinity,' 1 etc. 
 
 To an Undergraduate who had written to thank 
 him for a sermon on Grace and the Will.' 2 ' 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 November 23, 1891. 
 
 I am very grateful for your kind note. If I 
 said anything that you thought helpful, I am truly 
 glad of it. 
 
 The subject is one which does come home to all 
 of us, sometimes with a force that seems over- 
 aweing. May I suggest to you to look at two 
 sermons by great preachers Newman's, on ' The 
 Power of the Will,' in the fifth volume of his 
 Parochial Sermons? and Mozley's on ' The 
 Strength of Wishes,' in his University Sermons.^ 
 
 Of course, one has to pass somewhat lightly 
 over various parts of so great a subject. That 
 our antecedents do in a sense control us, that habit 
 has a tight hold, and that dispositions do differ in 
 their innate force of self-government these are 
 points which no one could ignore. They are 
 referred to, I recollect, in a very instructive pas- 
 sage in Guizot's Civilization in France, where he 
 points out that Pelagius overlooked real limitations 
 
 1 Mansi, xi. 2370. 
 
 2 Morality in Doctrine , pp. 63 sqq. 
 
 3 Pp. 341 sqq. 4 Pp. 213 sqq. 
 
Grace and the Will 81 
 
 as to the natural power of willing aright. 1 Mozley 
 takes the same ground, I think, in his book on 
 The Augustinian Doctrine of Predestination? 
 And I had only time to allude to the necessity of 
 a movement of the Holy Spirit on the will, which 
 may be neglected or resisted, but which does give 
 that impulse without which a good act or will is 
 impossible. In a practical sense, I think it is best, 
 if one feels a lack of strength, to take one matter 
 of duty at a time, and thus regain strength in 
 detail, always laying stress on what Dr. Pusey 
 used to call the duty nearest to one's hand. 
 
 And as ' nature is not contradictory to grace,' 
 but may be its auxiliary, it helps one a good deal 
 to avoid vacillation and change of mind, even in 
 small matters of secular interest. This sort of 
 steadiness in one's everyday arrangements of time 
 or occupation acts like a tonic on the capacity of 
 the will for higher and more momentous effects. 
 I need not say that one thing is above all others 
 essential, a belief in the Divine readiness to impart 
 the strength of which one stands in need. I do 
 not mean an abstract or general recognition of 
 one's dependence on God, but a personal faith in 
 His desire to help one's self personally. I always 
 think that there is deep comfort in such an instance 
 as the life of Jeremiah furnishes. He seems to 
 have been naturally somewhat irresolute, but he 
 was braced up into a strength which is compared 
 to a 'fenced wall.' 3 In the New Testament, John 
 
 1 Histoire de la Civilisation en France, Legon V. (vol. i.> 
 p. 138, ed. 1872). 
 
 2 P. 64 (ed. 1885). 3 Jer. xv. 20. 
 
 6 
 
82 Doctrine 
 
 Mark is another example of what grace can do in 
 this way. But there is nothing like endeavouring 
 to realize the sympathy and promised help of our 
 Lord. 
 
 If you care ever to look in on me, I shall be 
 glad to see you. 
 
 To Rev. J. J. Lias, on the theological meaning of 
 Grace. 
 
 February 5, 1897. 
 
 I am sure you would not advise us to drop the 
 use of such an established theological term as 
 ' grace.' We should have to rewrite many of the 
 Church Collects if we consented to such a re- 
 striction I will say such an impoverishment of 
 language, which, as it is, is all too weak and scanty 
 for things Divine. It is too late in the day to 
 think of abandoning the Augustinian phraseology 
 as such, warranted as it is (apart from Augustine's 
 exaggerations) by passages in which St. Paul 
 appears to use ' grace ' for a Divine gift of power 
 or help, or a force (not compulsory) energizing our 
 intellect, affections, and will (see Liddon, Univer- 
 sity Sermons, i. 44, ii. 34). Then, if we are to 
 retain the word, we may, you will admit, speak of 
 this force or gift of power as 'bestowed,' 'set in 
 motion,' 'infused.' Of course, we must take all 
 care to associate it, in our own and in other minds, 
 with the personal action of the life-giving Spirit 
 of grace. 1 For instance, one would not undertake 
 
 1 Cf. Bright, Lessons from the Lives of Three Great Fathers, 
 p. 162, n. 3. 
 
' Grace ' ambiguous 83 
 
 to write or speak about ' grace ' without making 
 that clear ab initio; and when it is once made clear, 
 one may fairly trust ingenuous and intelligent 
 readers to bear it in mind throughout the dis- 
 cussion. 
 
 To the Rev. J. J. Lias, on the same. 
 
 Thank you much. I quite see and appreciate 
 your point as to the possible misapprehension of 
 the nature of 'grace' in the Christian sense. In 
 fact, it was to your book on St. John 1 that I owed 
 long ago the first clear and strong impression that 
 I ever received as to this danger. And, as I said, 
 I think one ought always to provide against it by 
 emphasizing at the outset the personal operation 
 of the Holy Spirit, as, you remember, Augustine 
 himself does in his De Spiritu et Littera? But 
 there is, I think, a truth a fact of ordinary Chris- 
 tian experience in the idea of assistance from 
 time to time in view of this or that temptation. 
 When our Lord said to St. Paul, ' My grace is 
 sufficient for thee,' 3 He certainly implied the special 
 activity of that grace to help at the particular time 
 of need which had called forth the Apostle's 
 entreaty. I think, in short, that we cannot dis- 
 pense with the Prayer- Book language ; it is em- 
 bedded in one of the addresses of the Catechism 4 
 as well as in most of the Collects. We must guard 
 
 1 The Doctrinal System of St. John, esp. pp. 257 sqq. 
 - Opera, torn x., coll. 85 sqq.: Bright, Anti - Pelagian 
 Treatises of St. Augustine, pp. i sqq. ; cf. esp. >; 32-36. 
 3 2 Cor. xii. 9. 4 ' My good child, know this,' etc. 
 
 62 
 
84 Doctrine 
 
 it. as we have to guard so much else, by diligent 
 explanations ; but the fact of a constant 'presence' 
 or ' indwelling ' does not, to my mind, abate the 
 necessity of definite supplies of ' grace ' to meet 
 spiritual or moral emergencies, any more than the 
 continuity of physical life annuls the occurrence of 
 critical periods, at which health requires peculiar 
 care or treatment. 
 
 To the Right Rev. the Lord Bishop of , on the 
 
 relation of Confirmation to Baptism. 
 
 Ascension Day, 1894. 
 
 . . . There is a canon of Aries 1 in 1260-1 
 ordering Bishops to be fasting when they confirm, 
 except in case of nimia -multitude (which would 
 lengthen out the service) ; and confirmands when 
 they receive, except parvuti at the breast : so that 
 as late as the thirteenth century infant Confirma- 
 tion lingered in the West. There is the much 
 earlier canon of the First Council of Orange, 2 441, 
 directing that if chrism has in any case been 
 omitted in Baptism, in confirmatione sacerdos (i.e., 
 the Bishop) commonebitur ; which shows that an 
 interval between Baptism and Confirmation was 
 already becoming usual. Canon Mason's view 3 
 appears to me quite irreconcilable with our Prayer- 
 Book and our practice. It would require us, 1 
 think, either to adopt infant Confirmation or to 
 
 1 Canon 3 ; Mansi, xxiii. 1004. 
 
 2 Canon 2 ; Hefele, iii., p. 160. 
 
 3 Mason, The Relation of Confirmation to Baptism, 
 
The principle of Succession 85 
 
 disuse infant Baptism. For no Christian soul 
 under the care of the Church ought to be allowed 
 to go on for years without the specifically Christian 
 gift of the Holy Spirit. 1 
 
 To the Rev. , in reply to enquiries as to 
 
 books for a course of instruction on certain 
 controverted doctrines. 
 
 LANGHAM HOTEL, 
 
 PORTLAND PLACE, W., 
 
 January 31. 1894. 
 
 Generally speaking, I should say that Sadler's 
 Church Doctrine, Bible Truth, would supply what 
 you want, hints or suggestions as to clear and 
 popular exposition of all those five subjects. 
 
 You might supplement that inestimable book 
 by looking at Law's Letters to Hoadly, recently 
 edited anew by Gore, a book which I wish all our 
 friends possessed and knew. 2 It is particularly 
 clear and good on the distinction (to put it techni- 
 cally) between the efficient cause of sacramental 
 grace that is, of course, our Lord's own personal 
 operation and the instrumental cause that is, 
 either (as you look at it) the outward ' sign ' or 
 the human administrator either, or, rather, both. 
 When you speak on the Succession, you might 
 point out that the question there is really between 
 
 1 For further criticism of this view, cf. Bright, Morality in 
 Doctrine, p. 91. 
 
 2 William Law s Defence of Church Principles, edd. Nash 
 and Gore (1893). 
 
86 Doctrine 
 
 it and no ministry at all of Divine appointment ; if 
 there is no derivation of ministerial power by 
 succession from those to whom our Lord first 
 committed it, then every congregation of Chris- 
 tians can appoint its own minister, and all ministers 
 whatsoever will be on the same level of legitimacy. 
 On this see Gore, The Church and the Ministry}- 
 People very often seem to forget that the question 
 is not whether the ministries of Presbyterianism or 
 Congregationalism may not claim equality with 
 that of Episcopacy, but whether all ministries, in 
 the most ephemeral and insignificant of sects, 
 have not as good a right as that of the Scottish 
 Establishment to call themselves ' sent ' 2 and 
 ordained. I should suggest to such persons as 
 you want to reach that we simply want to get a 
 clear 'hold-on' to the ministry, which alone was 
 chartered and empowered by Christ in the person 
 of the Apostles on the first Easter Sunday ; and 
 that no ministry but that of the three Holy Orders 
 can assure us of this connection. 
 
 As to Baptismal Regeneration : of course, you 
 would begin by distinguishing what popular 
 Protestantism confounds, the infusion of the new 
 life and its development. You would express 
 sympathy with the religious earnestness which 
 has made many good persons shrink from the doc- 
 trine understood as they utterly misunderstood it. 
 And you would dwell on the witness which it 
 
 1 Esp. c. iv., pp. 198 sqq. (ed. 1900). Cf. Bright, Some 
 Aspects of Primitive Church Life, pp. 12 sqq. ; and The Law of 
 Faith, pp. 338 sqq. 
 
 2 John xx. 21. 
 
Baptismal regeneration 87 
 
 bears to our Lord's and the Holy Spirit's present 
 agency in regard even to the feeblest and most 
 dependent of human creatures, and the relation 
 between this belief and the gracious action of 
 Christ towards the infants brought to Him. 
 Further, you could easily show how it enhances 
 the responsibility of Christian parents, and fur- 
 nishes a pivot, so to speak, for the work of 
 Christian education. 
 
 ' Can a man give grace ?' Well, of course (as I 
 said just now), he cannot give it in the ordinary 
 sense; but he can act as the human medium through 
 which Christ gives it, just as the system of human 
 media for the bestowal of benefits from God is 
 one which characterizes God's order of natural 
 providence as well as His sacramental operation : 
 so that the former should make it easier to appre- 
 hend the latter. 
 
 Absolution, you could show, is the sentence of 
 God, the priest being merely the medium whereby 
 it is announced. No Christian who accepts the 
 words of Christ to the Apostles, 'Whose soever 
 sins ye remit,' 1 etc., can reject the principle; he 
 may say this power has not survived Apostolic 
 times, but the principle itself is embodied in that 
 text. 
 
 There is more difficulty, perhaps, in bringing 
 Eucharistic doctrines home. Prejudice here is 
 intense yet, after all, on reflection, one might say 
 not more intense than on the last-named topic. 
 I think one might say that the latter part of 
 St. John vi. did prepare one to expect something 
 1 John xx. 23. 
 
88 Doctrine 
 
 very great, mysterious, and spiritually important 
 in connection with the words of Institution, and 
 with St. Paul's reference to the Holy Communion. 1 
 The Incarnation and its relation to our renewal 
 through the communication of Spiritual life from 
 the Incarnate might be dwelt upon before you 
 come to the Eucharist itself, as forming, so to 
 speak, a necessary introduction. And as for the 
 Sacrifice, I should begin by sweeping off the 
 ground all notions of a repetition 2 of the Atone- 
 ment, of a new redemption, 'satisfaction,' etc., so 
 as to show that nothing like that is intended. 
 Then, and only then, would it be opportune to 
 show that our Lord, as the Lamb that was slain, 
 must always be still pleading His Atonement, and 
 thus acting as our propitiation ; 3 and that the 
 Eucharistic memorial is a form of such pleading, 
 inasmuch as He is in an especial manner present 
 in the Eucharist, and if present must be present 
 as the Lamb. 4 I once found great help, as to the 
 Presence, from thinking of the unique character 
 among Christian ordinances ever assigned to the 
 Eucharist. If there is no special presence, then 
 Holy Communion is only one of several means of 
 communicating, and ' Body and Blood ' means only 
 a large amount of grace. 
 
 1 i Cor. x. t6 sqq. ; xi. 23 sqq. 
 
 ~ Cf. Bright, Ancient- Collects, p. 144, note /, and his hymn, 
 ' Once, only once, and once for all' (A. and M., 315). 
 
 3 Cf. The Comfortable Words, ' He is the propitiation for 
 our sins' (i John ii. 2). 
 
 4 Cf. The Gloria in Excelsis, ' O Lamb of God, that takest 
 away,' etc. 
 
The Second Adam 89 
 
 To the Rev. , in reply to questions on points 
 
 of doctrine, for an intended catechism. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 April 26, 1897. 
 
 I suppose your questions and answers are meant 
 for educated people. The doctrine of the second 
 Adam, as one may call it, is best stated, perhaps, 
 in Prebendary Sadler's book 1 bearing that name 
 (probably you have consulted it), or in his excellent 
 Church Teacher s Manual. Or Wilberforce on 
 The Doctrine of Incarnation, c. xiii., will put 
 things in a good light. 
 
 The Apostles' Creed was, I suppose, so called 
 from the notion which appears in some sermons 
 wrongly ascribed to St. Augustine,' 2 that the 
 Apostles severally composed its clauses. It is 
 curious that the earliest complete Western Creed 
 is in Greek. Epiphanius 3 gives one which 
 Marcellus of Ancyra recited as a proof of his 
 orthodoxy, and which was the Creed of the 
 Roman Church of that time. It is the Apostles' 
 Creed in a somewhat shorter form. 
 
 I suppose the distinction to be taken between 
 our partaking of Christ in Baptism and our par- 
 taking of Him through His Body and Blood in 
 the Eucharist is that the recipient of Baptism is 
 incorporated into Christ's Body mystical, which is 
 
 1 The Second Adam and the New Birth. 
 
 - Sermones supposititii, CCXL., CCXLL, ap. Aug., Opera, 
 torn, v., App., coll. 394 sqq. 
 
 3 Haereses, Ixxii. 3 ; and see it in Swete, The Apostles? Creed, 
 p. 105 (ed. 1894). 
 
90 Doctrine 
 
 itself formed and sustained by His Body and 
 Blood, but that he does not directly come into 
 spiritual contact with the Body and Blood till he 
 communicates. Why does he need such contact ? 
 What is the rationale of this further privilege? 
 Must we not find it in the Incarnation ? The 
 Word became flesh, as for other reasons so for 
 this, that His flesh, being the 'flesh of God the 
 Word who is the Life-giver,' 1 may become a 
 medium of imparting a fresh energy of Spiritual 
 life to believers. As it has an efficacy which no 
 other ' flesh ' could have, so it has power of contact 
 or of presence which belong to no other. These 
 powers are exercised, this efficacy is imparted, in 
 the Eucharist. I think, then, that although the 
 phrase 'Sacred Humanity.' is quite sound, yet one 
 might add a little by way of bringing out the idea 
 of a mysterious participation of the sacred Body 
 and Blood of Christ, present or imparted under 
 conditions belonging to their Spiritualized or glori- 
 fied state, and this for the purpose of sustaining 
 Spiritual life in the whole being of the faithful or 
 devout receivers. I am sure that the best way of 
 removing or lessening difficulties as to the Euchar- 
 istic Presence is by linking it as closely as possible 
 to the Incarnation, regarded as in order to the sus- 
 tentation of Spiritual life in Christians. This will 
 help people to see how those great verses in John vi. 
 are the legitimate carrying out of John i. 14-16, 
 and to see, that is, that not Christ's Spirit only, or 
 His grace, has a function in regard to their Spiritual 
 life, but His Body and Flesh also, as being His. . 
 
 1 Cf. S. Cyrilli 3 Ep. ad Nest., 7 ap. Heurtley, p. 192. 
 
Infant Baptism 91 
 
 To the Rev. , on the objections of Dissenters 
 
 to Infant Baptism. 
 
 BLACKHEATH PARK, 
 
 August 15, 1865. 
 
 The difficulty made about / will 1 is, I suppose, 
 an old one among the prejudiced. Curiously 
 enough, the promise of keeping the Command- 
 ments was not in the old Baptismal Office, but one 
 may understand the I will by observing that it 
 must have been intended to have the same sense 
 as in the Ordinal, where it appears to be more or 
 less uniformly a translation of volo. It therefore 
 has the sense of volo in Baptism. ' My intention, 
 desire,' etc., 'is to do so'; and, of course, 'the 
 Lord helping me ' must be understood. 
 
 I sent you yesterday a little tract which I found 
 at Masters', by the schoolmaster of Middleham, 
 who had been once at St. Bee's. It may have 
 something which would meet in a homely way the 
 difficulties of Bucks villagers. I should always 
 be disposed to rest infant Baptism principally on 
 the act of our Lord towards the infants. 2 Thus, 
 (i) that act shows infants, as such, to be fit sus- 
 cipients of Christ's blessing; (2) but Baptism is the 
 appointed medium of Christ's blessing ; (3) there- 
 fore infants, as such, are fit to be baptized. Of 
 course, the difficulty with many people is, that 
 they do not realize No. 2, the minor premiss, as it 
 
 1 In answer to ' Wilt thou then obediently,' etc., in the 
 Public Baptism of Infants. 
 - Mark x. 13 sqq. 
 
92 Doctrine 
 
 were. However, I am sure that this is the most 
 attractive argument, and one which puts Baptism 
 into the most Spiritual light, and brings it closer 
 to our Lord's Person. Another argument which 
 would tell less with modern English people is that 
 which, as one knows, was so present to the mind 
 of St. Augustine 1 the fact that infants, being in 
 original sin, need Baptism as a remedy. Un- 
 happily, 'people's sense of the Fall and of the 
 inherited corruption is so vague. Herein, and 
 on the whole subject, I think Sadler 2 would be 
 very helpful. I rejoice that your christenings 
 increase. Is it not a beautiful service to perform? 
 
 ***** 
 I suspect a great many people think the whole 
 idea of sacerdotalism is equivalent to a belief in 
 charms, not seeing that we regard the sacramental 
 acts as acts of Christ. 
 
 1 St. Augustine, as Ur. Bright used to say in lecture, ' often 
 quoted the classical passage ' from St. Cyprian : ' Porro autem 
 si etiam gravissimis delictoribus . . . remissa peccatorum datur 
 et a baptismo atque gratia nemo prohibetur : quanto magis 
 prohiberi non debet infans, qui recens natus nihil peccavit, nisi 
 quod secundum Adam carnaliter natus, contagium mortis 
 antiquae prima nativitate contraxit ?' Cypr., Ep. Ixiv., 5 
 (Opera, ii., p. 720, ed. Hartel). Cf. Aug., Contra duas Epp. 
 Pel., 23 (ap. Bright, Anti-Pelagian Treatises, p. 368) ; and 
 Sermo CCXCIV., 19 (Opera, torn, v., col. 11930). 
 
 2 The Sacrament of Responsibility ; or, Church Doctrine, 
 Bible Truth, pp. 87 sqq. (ed. 1886). 
 
Lay Baptism 93 
 
 To the Rev. , on Lay Baptism. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 September 18, 1889. 
 
 I have often felt a theoretical difficulty in the 
 recognition of Baptism by those who have not 
 received a commission from the Apostles by the 
 channel historically existing in the Church. I 
 have usually fallen back on the authority of Church 
 tradition, as warranting this great distinction be- 
 tween the administration of Baptism and the 
 administration of the Eucharist. I would not rest 
 it on the fact that the Eucharist is sacrificial, 
 therefore sacerdotal ; for there are other rites, not 
 sacrificial, which we should yet hold to be purely 
 invalid and null, if taken in hand by a person not 
 duly qualified by ordination or consecration. It 
 is important to recollect that in our own Church 
 at least, from the time of Archbishop Theodore to 
 the Reformation Baptism by any Christian in case 
 of necessity was allowed. And as no direct with- 
 drawal of the permission has been made by 
 Church authority since the Reformation, we can, 
 at any rate, plead that in regarding Baptism by an 
 unordained person as valid, when a regular minis- 
 tration was (for reasons which in equity might be 
 allowed) not attainable, we are walking in the 
 ancient traditional path. To be sure, it may be 
 said, ' The case of a Dissenter is not the case of a 
 person who really has no access to a duly ordained 
 minister.' But considerations of equity come in, 
 which are complicated by the various moral, though 
 
94 Doctrine 
 
 not physical, barriers which tradition and educa- 
 tion and lifelong habits have formed between the 
 Dissenter and his parson's ministrations. Of 
 course in recognising the validity of Baptism with 
 right Matter and Form administered in a sect, we 
 are not recognising the validity of the ministry of 
 that sect. It is nothing to the purpose whether 
 the member of the sect called in his own 'minister' 
 or baptized the child with his own hand. 
 
 I do not care for Tertullian's argument in favour 
 of lay Baptism in case of necessity, that anyone 
 can 'give what he has received.' 1 In fact, I think 
 it worthless, as proving too much, and assuming 
 that the person received the gift with a power to 
 hand it on. 
 
 I should rest on tradition especially tradition 
 as embodied for so many ages in the law and 
 usage of the English Church, without any subse- 
 quent express contradiction. Of course, one 
 knows that in James I.'s time care was taken to 
 accentuate the importance of a duly ordained 
 minister's presence, even at a private Baptism.- 
 But our Church has never ruled that Baptism by 
 an unordained person is ipso facto void. And, of 
 course, there is no middle path. Baptism is either 
 valid or void. It may be as irregular as you like, 
 but still valid, in the sense of not being capable of 
 iteration. 
 
 Roman Catholics rebaptize 'converts,' not be- 
 cause they do not admit the validity of Baptism 
 
 1 Tert. de Baptismo, c. 17 (Opera, i., p. 635, ed. Oehler). 
 
 2 Cf. Procter and Frere, A New History of the Book of 
 Common Prayer, p. 142 (ed. 1901). 
 
Re-baptism sacrilegious 95 
 
 by ministrations which they do not recognise, but 
 because they affect to think that there is no real 
 guarantee of the due employment of Matter and 
 Form among us ' careless Anglicans.' Their 
 practice is meant as a blow of polemical hostility 
 directed against our Church. They must hold 
 that, if they were assured that an Anglican had 
 baptized a child with due Form and Matter, they 
 could not baptize such child de novo without sacri- 
 lege. For this is, in effect, the standing law of 
 their Church. St. Thomas (Sitmma, III. Ixvii. 3) 
 grounds his decision in favour of Baptism by any- 
 one in case of necessity on the absolute necessity 
 of Baptism, and the Divine mercy which provides 
 ' ut in his quae sunt de necessitate salutis, homo de 
 facili remedium inveniat.' I suppose we should 
 not hold the absolute necessity quite so strongly 
 as he did ; we should admit the qualification where 
 it may be had}- This, perhaps, deducts somewhat 
 from our own use of his argument. The legend 
 about Athanasius and the children is to me ex- 
 tremely doubtful. 2 And even if it were not, one 
 recognition of that kind by one Bishop would not 
 make a Church rule. The sensible view of sacra- 
 mental intention implies that there shall be a real 
 purpose on the officiant's part to do what the 
 Church does (see Hooker, V. Iviii. 3, ' seriously '), 
 and that the purpose of playing or joking excludes 
 printam rectitudineni (intentionis]^ as St. Thomas 
 
 1 Cf. The Ministration of Baptism to such as are of Riper 
 Years. 
 
 - Rufinus, Hist. Eal., i. 14 ; cf. Dr. Bright's article 'Atha- 
 nasius' in D.C.J3., i., pp. 179 sq. 
 
96 Doctrine 
 
 Aquinas says. 1 He does not confine this exclu- 
 sion to cases where such making fun is openly 
 avowed. 
 
 To the Rev. Canon Medd, on the position of 
 Dissenters with regard to the Church and 
 conditional Baptism. 
 
 January 22, 1896. 
 
 I have seen somewhere (and somehow I connect 
 it with you] a good statement of the principle that, 
 while all baptized members of the sects or other 
 communities of Protestants are, qua baptized, 
 members of the historical Catholic Church, it does 
 not follow that the organized religious bodies to 
 which they belong are properly parts of that 
 Church. . . . The Archbishop [Benson] has 
 asked me to write a paper on the term ' Catholic,' 2 
 a most delicate bit of work, fraught with not a 
 little anxiety. If you can help me, pray do so. 
 
 ***** 
 
 [November 23, 1892.] 
 
 It seems to me that those who, like , are 
 
 advocating conditional Baptism in the case of a 
 doubt, not as to a matter of fact, but as to a theo- 
 logical opinion, are taking a great liberty with the 
 rubric. The Church provides a form of con- 
 
 1 Summa, III. Ixiv. i ad 2. 
 
 - Bright, What is the Proper Use. of the Word < Catholic ' as 
 applied to Christian Communities or Individuals! (S.P.C.K., 
 January, 1897). 
 
Eucharistic Adoration 97 
 
 ditional Baptism expressly in one case, where 
 doubts may exist, independently of all varieties of 
 theological theory, as to whether certain things 
 were done and certain words said. Have they 
 any warrant from the Church to use it when they 
 have not satisfied themselves that such doubts 
 may exist, but simply to satisfy a theory of lay 
 Baptism ? 
 
 To the Rev. - , on Eucharistic Adoration. 
 
 MANCHESTER, 
 
 January 10, 1857. 
 
 The point is, Can we assent to the principle of 
 interpretation contained in the Bath Judgment 1 
 [in the case of Archdeacon Denison] ? I deeply 
 regret that the point of ' adoration ' was so promi- 
 nently urged ; but, since it has been put forward, I 
 cannot think Denison's view wrong. That prin- 
 ciple I take to be this, so far as adoration is 
 concerned, that Article XXVI 1 1. 's proscription of 
 Transubstantiation may be construed as equivalent 
 to a condemnation of the Real Presence. With- 
 out some such canon as this, I cannot imagine 
 how the Court deduced the condemnation of such 
 worship as Denison pleaded for from the premisses 
 to which it alone referred, Article XXVIII. 
 
 1 Cf. Proceedings against the Archdeacon of Taunton in 
 1854-6, p. 209 and p. 225 (Masters, 1857). 
 
98 Doctrine 
 
 To the Rev. , on a visible Presence. 
 
 UNIVERSITY COLLEGE, OXFORD. 
 [No date.'} 
 
 Mr. Bennett's expression as to a visible Euchar- 
 istic Presence 1 (on which you comment in the last 
 Guardian] is surely one to which he would not 
 deliberately adhere, 2 and to which no English 
 Churchman could be expected to assent. You say 
 most truly, ' English Divines have not been accus- 
 tomed to write of a visible Presence.' So far from 
 it, that the maintainers of what is commonly called 
 the doctrine of an ' objective ' Presence, or, as it 
 used to be called, a Presence extra usum, have 
 made a point of asserting that Presence to be 
 utterly impervious to the senses, invisible, intan- 
 gible, immaterial. Dr. Pusey made this perfectly 
 clear in his University Sermon on The Presence 
 of Christ in the Holy Eucharist? published in 
 1853. He spoke repeatedly of ' the unseen 
 Presence,' pp. 13, 25, and of the Fathers as hold- 
 ing ' that there was a real and visible substance, 
 which was the image and symbol of the present 
 spiritual, invisible substance,' p. 39. Archdeacon 
 Denison, in his sermon of the same year, spoke of 
 
 1 ' The visible presence of our Lord upon the altars of our 
 churches ' was Mr. Bennett's expression, condemned by Sir R. 
 Phillimore's Judgment in the Court of Arches, as reported in 
 The Guardian of July 27, 1870. 
 
 2 He withdrew it, and substituted : ' The real and actual 
 presence of our Lord under the form of bread and wine upon 
 the altars of our churches' (Bennett, A Plea for Toleration, 
 preface, p. iii., 3rd edn., Hayes, 1868). 
 
 3 Pusey, University Sermons, vol. i. 
 
No visible Presence in Eucharist 99 
 
 the Presence as ' real, though invisible.' To quote 
 other writings is surely needless. But one may 
 refer to a very recently published work, the Bishop 
 of Brechin's Explanation of the Thirty - nine 
 Articles, which speaks of Article XXVIII. as 
 denying such a change as would imply ' that the 
 visible sign of That which is invisible should have 
 no real existence,' 1 and quotes St. Thomas Aquinas 
 as saying that ' substance is discerned by the intel- 
 lect alone, and not by sense.' 2 A little further on 
 the Bishop characterizes the Eucharistic Presence 
 as ' absolutely supernatural : what is heavenly and 
 spiritual cannot be liable to the laws of physics.' 3 
 He adds that ' only in an improper sense may we 
 say that the Body of Christ is broken,' 3 which is 
 equivalent to saying that only in such a sense may 
 it be spoken of as seen. 
 
 There can surely be no sort of doubt, that it 
 was in this 'improper' sense that Mr. Bennett 
 spoke of the Presence as ' visible.' We may well 
 regret that, in a sentence which spoke of it as 
 4 real ' and ' actual ' (words which must have been 
 used in their ' proper ' sense), he applied to it a 
 term which cannot be used of it with propriety 
 according to any Eucharistic conception estab- 
 lished in any part of the Church. For instance, a 
 theological proposition affirming a ' visible ' pre- 
 sence would certainly be at variance with the 
 formularies of the Roman Communion. It would 
 contradict the rhythmus of St. Thomas, which is 
 appended in the Missal to the prescribed devotions 
 
 1 Forbes, Explanation, etc., p. 551 (ed. 1881). 
 - Jbid., p. 556. 3 Ibid., p. 562. 
 
 72 
 
ioo Doctrine 
 
 of a celebrant : ' Visus, tactus, gustus, in te fallitur. 
 . . . Quem velatum nunc aspicio.' It would 
 contradict the Lauda Sion : ' Quod non capis, quod 
 non vides ' (' Miss. Rom. in Fest. Corp. Christi '). 
 It would contradict the Roman Catechism : 'Nulla 
 extrinsecus panis et vini mutatio apparet ' (II. iv. 
 [8). 'Hoc in primis doceant pastores, animum 
 atque rationem a sensibus omni studio avocandam 
 esse. . . . Nihil aliud prseter panis et vini 
 speciem oculis . . . sentientes ' (ibid., 25). 'Corpus 
 Domini, quod in Eucharistia occulte latet ' (ibid., 
 27). 'Christum . . . pra^sentem et tamen ab 
 oculorum sensu remotum ' (30; cf. 42, 'doceant 
 Christum ... in hoc sacramento ut in loco non 
 esse 1 ). It would also contradict the Council of 
 Trent itself : ' Commune hoc quidem est SS. 
 Eucharistise cum ceteris sacramentis, symbolum 
 esse rei sacrse et invisibilis gratiae formam visi- 
 bilem ' (Sess. 13, ' De Euch.,' c. iii.). 
 
 May we not, then, hope that a phrase which, in 
 its proper sense, would be condemned by Rome 
 herself will, in that sense, be frankly disavowed by 
 one who for years has held so conspicuous a place 
 among the working parish priests of England ? 
 
 To the Editor of The Guardian, on the Euchar- 
 istic Sacrifice. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, 
 
 December 29, 1871. 
 
 ... In short, the doctrine of the Eucharistic 
 presentation depending on the Eucharistic pre- 
 
The Eucharistic Sacrifice 101 
 
 sence of the Body and Blood of Christ no more 
 interferes with that essential truth [of the one 
 sacrifice once offered] than does the doctrine of 
 His presentation of Himself in heaven, inferred 
 from some well-known passages 1 in the New Testa- 
 ment. In each case the ' presentation ' is believed 
 to follow from the presence, because the presence 
 is that of Him who 'is the propitiation': 2 in each 
 case the absolute completeness of the atoning 
 work done on the Cross is believed to be the very 
 basis of the ' presentation,' which is held to be an 
 appeal to, and a pleading of, the merits of that 
 one atoning sacrifice. This is what Mr. Keble 
 believed about the oblation or presentation in the 
 Eucharist, as is plain from his well-known essay. 3 
 More than this, anything else than this, is not 
 held, so far as any evidence goes, by any persons 
 at all affected by the present suit. There is no 
 one, we may trust, in the Church of England, who 
 would admit, even in thought, the notion of a 
 repetition of the one atoning sacrifice ; who would 
 not repudiate it absolutely, ex animo, in all senses 
 and without reserve. In fact, those who hold 
 what Mr. Keble held must needs regard such a 
 notion as abhorrent, not less to their own con- 
 ception of the Eucharistic oblation than to the 
 position of the Cross as the foundation of Christian 
 hope. 
 
 1 Rom. viii. 34 ; Heb ix. 24. ' 2 i John ii. 2. 
 
 3 On Eucharistical Adoration. 
 
102 Doctrine 
 
 To the Rev. , in answer to two questions, as 
 
 to (a) Article XXIX., (6) the best way to deal 
 with a free thinking Theist. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 September (>, 1888. 
 
 I am very glad to hear from you, but I confess 
 that your questions are not of the easiest to 
 answer. 
 
 However, as to (a) the first point : I do not 
 think Article XXIX. is to be taken as one might 
 
 o 
 
 take a proposition on that subject in a professedly 
 Calvinistic formulary. It has to be read along 
 with passages in the Prayer- Book which describe 
 the unworthy communicant as ' receiving ' the 
 'holy Mysteries' and the 'holy Communion.' And, 
 in itself, it seems to use ' partakers of Christ ' in a 
 sense equivalent to what may be predicated of 
 worthy communicants only i.e., a true spiritual 
 union with our Lord, so as to dwell in Him and 
 derive life from Him. This is the Scriptural 
 import of 'partaking of Christ,' as Dr. Pusey 
 urged in one of his books on the Real Presence. 1 
 
 C* 
 
 And this is further illustrated by the antithesis 
 between ' partaking of Christ ' and something else 
 which involves condemnation, for we thus see that 
 ' partaking of Christ' must be an act which involves 
 benediction. What the exact relation of the un- 
 worthy communicant to our Lord's Body and 
 Blood may be, we do not seem to know. Some 
 
 1 The Real Presence the Doctrine of the English Church, 
 pp. 251 sqq. 
 
The objections of a Theist 103 
 
 have thought that the sacred Presence was with- 
 drawn in their case, as it would be if the conse- 
 crated elements were subjected to any physical 
 degradation. Dr. Pusey says that he did not (in 
 a particular passage of an earlier book) venture to 
 decide that point, but that afterwards he rejected 
 this notion of withdrawal. 1 It is, anyhow, certain 
 that in some way or other, such profaners of the 
 Eucharist are 'guilty in regard to the Body and 
 Blood." 2 
 
 (b] In the case of such a person as you describe, 
 a freethinking Theist with vague socialistic ten- 
 dencies, I should doubt whether there was enough 
 knowledge of the New Testament or, rather, 
 specifically of the Gospels for a due estimate of 
 the argument from our Lord's character to His 
 Divinity. That argument presupposes serious 
 study of the discourses, and generally of the whole 
 life, of Christ. I think that you might well post- 
 pone that inference for the present; he is not likely 
 to be in a position to appreciate it. Try some 
 simpler points first. Say you hope he will care- 
 fully read what our Lord says of Himself in the 
 Gospels, and go on praying (as he says he does) 
 for light. You might just hint that for us Church- 
 men, as for all Christians, the great matter of 
 interest is to ' learn Christ,' to be in sympathy 
 with His mind and will, to receive His word in 
 fulness ; only, it must be remembered, we must do 
 so in fulness ; we must not take a bit here, and leave 
 a bit there, of the account given of Him in the 
 Gospels. If we are honestly desirous of getting at 
 
 1 The Real Presence, etc., pp. 306 sq. ~ i Cor. xi. 27. 
 
104 Doctrine 
 
 the truth, we must be serious and thorough in our 
 inquiry. Too many who admit that He was a 
 good man or a holy man, or the like, do not take 
 the trouble to fulfil this requirement. Meantime 
 just change the subject a little, and ask him to look 
 at the Sermon on the Mount. Does it not warn 
 against hasty and uncharitable judgments ? Does 
 he know enough to condemn a whole class of his 
 neighbours (who happen to be clergymen) as 
 'corrupt? Is that condemnation Christ-like? Is 
 it even consistent with an English love of justice? 
 Would it be possible to one who had considered 
 the facts ? And as to the large incomes of Bishops, 
 has he ever thought of what people exact from 
 them, of the proportion which their contributions, 
 or those of clergymen as a class, to religious 
 objects, bear to the contributions of laymen ? In 
 a word, try to put before him gently and Socratic- 
 ally the thought that he has a good deal to learn 
 about the facts before he accepts such statements, 
 and that this sort of easy-going censoriousness is 
 not consistent with a high morality. When you 
 have suggested some such thoughts, you might let 
 them simmer, and avoid theological discussions 
 during the process. It seems to me that such a 
 mind ought to be kept off theological and ecclesi- 
 astical ground until it is more familiar with moral. 
 
The uniqueness of the Eucharist 105 
 
 To a student at a Theological College, in answer 
 to difficulties as to whether the English Re- 
 formers believed in a Real Presence in the 
 Holy Eucharist. 
 
 AMBLESIDE, 
 St. Peters Day, 1898. 
 
 I am glad to receive your letter here. I return 
 home on Friday, having come for a little change. 
 
 I should not myself have said that all the 
 reformers in England agreed on the question of 
 the sacramental presence. I feel sure that not a 
 few were mere Zwinglians, and others held Calvin- 
 istic ideas, such as we now call Virtualistic. But as 
 to these last, we must make some allowance ; the 
 term real seems to have been largely used in 
 those days in the sense of what we should call 
 natural, or corporeal, or material. I believe this 
 was the sense put upon it in the Forty-two Articles. 
 Persons did not see that they might hold a pre- 
 sence in the sense of an inscrutable association of 
 the vital principles of our Lord's humanity with 
 the elements as consecrated. They were, as it 
 were, impelled in the Calvinistic direction by 
 thinking that Transubstantiation the popular 
 notion of a natural presence, as we should say, a 
 material one and that Lutheran theory or way 
 of speaking which seems to be bound up with 
 ubiquitarianism, covered the whole ground on 
 which any presence irrespective of the receiver's 
 faith could be conceived of or held. And they 
 shrank in their piety and reverence their wish to 
 
106 Doctrine 
 
 attach a great virtue to the Eucharist from the 
 merely figurative or simply commemorative theory 
 of the Zwinglians. 
 
 So they took up with language which seemed 
 reverential, but which when examined deprived 
 the Eucharist of all uniqueness, by making ' the 
 Body and Blood ' stand for the virtue of the 
 Passion, imparted to the soul in the act of devout 
 communion in fuller measure than by other reli- 
 gious acts. 
 
 I did correct one oversight of ' theology ' for 
 'religion,' but I must have left the one at p. 39 
 uncorrected. I know I thought the book might 
 have been more fitly described as ' Lectures on 
 Theology.' 1 
 
 Pusey's ' Eirenicon ' was prompted originally by 
 love for Newman ; he could hardly bear to be out 
 of Church fellowship with his beloved friend. 
 
 I greatly like the ' History of Early Chris- 
 tianity.' 2 
 
 To the Rev. , on Hooker s Eucharistic 
 
 Doctrine. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 June 25, 1899. 
 
 ... It is clear that Hooker was writing while 
 Calvin's influence was still upon him, and that his 
 language, so far, represents a transitional state of 
 mind. I suspect that he did not see that the 
 Calvinistic view really tended to destroy belief in 
 
 1 L. Pullan, Lectures on Religion. 2 By the same. 
 
Hooker's Eucharistic Doctrine 107 
 
 the uniqueness of the Eucharistic gift, in that it 
 used language of a high type as to that uniqueness 
 without giving it full reality of meaning, and that 
 it encouraged a lax use of theological terms. In 
 one passage Hooker calls attention away from 
 everything but ' the benefit we have of the Sacra- 
 ment.' 1 This is hardly compatible with the sub- 
 sequent distinction drawn in the Catechism between 
 ' the inward part ' and 'the benefits'; or, rather, it 
 merges ' the inward part ' in ' the benefits.' And 
 one is struck with the calm assumption of a 
 parallelism between ' curious and intricate specula- 
 tions ' or needless queries, such as ' Rabbi, when 
 earnest thou hither ?' and the inevitable question, 
 ' Is the Sacrament constituted by consecration, or 
 by faith on the part of the recipient ?' Of course, 
 that question can be entangled and cumbered with 
 wranglings and subtleties, and so was the question 
 of the Incarnation itself; but it cannot be ignored: 
 it will present itself. 
 
 {July 23, 1899.] 
 
 There is in the Eucharistic sections some lan- 
 guage which is quite satisfactory, if it stood alone, 
 as recognising the efficacy of consecration. But, 
 with all one's reverence for Hooker himself ... I 
 must say deliberately that I think the sentence 
 italicized' 2 in ordinary editions of Hooker, and 
 containing what he proposes as an adequate 
 comment on our Lord's words, would not, to any 
 ordinary reader, suggest that he believed in any 
 real presence of our Lord's humanity as distinct 
 
 1 Cf. Eccl. Pol., V. Ixvii. 3. - Ibid., 12. 
 
io8 Doctrine 
 
 from the benefits or effects of His Incarnation and 
 death. Did Hooker mean by ' the Body and 
 Blood ' the essence or life-principle of our Lord's 
 humanity? He does not, I fear, encourage one 
 in the passage or sentence in question to be sure 
 that he did. Could anyone who held what we 
 hold have been content to write that sentence, as 
 it stands, and leave it ? Did he, one may ask, 
 believe that what we hold to become ineffably, and 
 apart from material or physical conditions, asso- 
 ciated with the elements by virtue of consecration, 
 was imparted to the devout recipient when the 
 elements entered his lips? If he did believe this, 
 I cannot but think that he expressed himself un- 
 fortunately. Nine readers out of ten . . . would 
 construe the sentence (on which we have a fair right 
 to insist as central and crucial) as meaning that 
 'the inward part' of the Eucharist ' the benefits 
 whereof we are partakers thereby.' One must 
 not forget that he was dead when that part of the 
 Catechism was published. . . . Can we make his 
 words equivalent to its teaching ? I, at any rate, 
 cannot honestly think so. 
 
 {July 24, 1899.] 
 
 After I had written my letter [of July 23], it 
 occurred to me in further illustration of the point 
 that Hooker was really unfair (though, no doubt, 
 unconsciously so) in assuming that all discussion 
 as to whether the Sacrament was ' first ' (i.e., ante- 
 cedently to reception) ' possessed with Christ or 
 no' 1 must needs be 'hungry and unpleasant," 2 
 
 1 Ecd. Pol., V. Ixvii. 6. * Ibid., 12. 
 
Sacerdotalism 109 
 
 with several other depreciatory adjectives to follow. 
 It was, and it is, inevitable that the question 
 should be raised, ' Does the consecration make 
 the Sacrament ? What is the force of St. Paul's 
 words, " the cup which we bless, the bread which 
 we break'"?' 1 In effect, to ask his readers to put 
 that question aside is to decline any attempt to 
 interpret some very momentous New Testament 
 words. This will never do. It is hardly loyal to 
 Scripture, and it certainly would not close a dis- 
 cussion. The practical result is that Hooker has 
 been, and is, freely quoted, as if he had positively 
 affirmed that the Sacrament was constituted simply 
 by devout reception. It is his own fault if this 
 does his real meaning a wrong. Contrast his 
 language with that of 
 
 ' Christ was the Word that spake it : 
 He took the bread and brake it ; 
 And what the Word did make it, 
 That I believe, and take it,' 
 
 which Bishop Creighton has recently described as 
 an epigram of high theological value. 
 
 To the Rev. , on Sacerdotalism. 
 
 UNIVERSITY COLLEGE, 
 July 29, 1865. 
 
 Colenso, you see, has prepared to start for 
 Natal. He tells a meeting of sympathizers that 
 some clergy and laity there will support him, 
 as representing Protestantism and the Queen's 
 
 1 i Cor. x. 16. 
 
iio Doctrine 
 
 supremacy against 'sacerdotalism.' How there 
 can be supremacy without Establishment, one 
 doesn't see. But one does see, that it is rather in 
 our favour that he identifies himself with what he 
 calls the carrying out of Protestant principles, and 
 that he considers 'sacerdotalism,' or Catholicism, 
 as the great barrier in his way. All unbelievers 
 have ever found it so, for it makes religion a thing 
 solid and substantive. Again, his flagrant Eras- 
 tianism, ' preferring the Queen to any Bishop or 
 Metropolitan,' etc., is significant. He must put 
 the world above the Church ; for, in fact, he has no 
 Church before his mind, no belief in any kingdom 
 of God. Spiritual realities are to him obsolete. 
 
 To the Rev. , on Absolution and Sacer- 
 dotalism. 
 
 UNIVERSITY COLLEGE, 
 
 January 31, 1867. 
 
 I assume at the outset that the Ordination 
 Service, and specially the actual words of ordina- 
 tion, cannot be reduced to a conventional formula 
 without involving the Church which uses them in 
 the guilt of a most profane abuse of language. . . . 
 We have no business, morally, so to tamper with 
 words, and to do so in this case would be a grave 
 offence against religious seriousness. 
 
 The words, then, must have a real and solemn 
 significance ; but that significance does not imply, 
 (i) generally, any such notion of the ministry, or 
 of the Christian life, as abates personal responsi- 
 
Absolution 1 1 1 
 
 bility, or ignores the sacred rights and privileges 
 of all baptized Christians ; nor (2), specially, the 
 notion that private confession and absolution are 
 ordinary necessities of the Christian soul. 
 
 1. As to the first point : Some of the most earnest 
 upholders of the principle of a priesthood have 
 been as earnest in asserting what is called ' the 
 universal priesthood of Christians,' in a true sense. 1 
 That sacred character of all the baptized co-exists 
 with the special functions of a consecrated order ; 
 the sacerdotal ministry does not exclude or eclipse 
 either the supreme priesthood of Christ, on the 
 one hand, or the fact that He has made His 
 people priests on the other. The ministry repre- 
 sents each of these, brings each of these face to 
 face with the other, is an organ and instrument 
 for each. Similarly, it would be a perversion of 
 the sacerdotal idea if it were made the basis of 
 a spiritual despotism. The priesthood is not 
 ordained to tyrannize over the faithful, any more 
 than it is designed to do their religion for them. 
 Wonderful, surely, is the context of St. Luke xii. 
 42-46 ! Our Lord has been affirming the principle 
 of a priesthood, or body of ' stewards,' through 
 whom the Head of the family dispenses the 
 ' portions ' of food. Then He warns the stewards 
 of what will happen if any of them begin to ' beat 
 the servants' i.e., to establish a spiritual tyranny. 
 
 2. As to the second point : I believe that the 
 public absolutions of the Church are just as valid 
 as the private ones, although they do not so 
 
 1 Cf. Bright, Ancient Collects, p. 99, note h ; and Sermons 
 of St. Leo, p. 203, for examples. 
 
ii2 Doctrine 
 
 pointedly bring home the Divine forgiveness to 
 the consciousness of A or B, and although, in 
 some cases, the private absolution may be highly 
 desirable, as is implied in the Visitation Office. I 
 frankly admit that, not only Roman Catholics, but 
 some in our own Church, hold private confession 
 to be necessary as an ordinary duty. This notion 
 would, no doubt, be a very great obstacle to the 
 acquiescence of English people in the Ordination 
 Service, if it were implied in that service ; but I 
 feel certain that it is not. Compare what is said 
 in the Exhortation before Holy Communion, and 
 in the Visitation Office, and also the authoritative 
 tone of reality and validity which belongs to the 
 public Absolution. 
 
 Clearing away, then, these probable grounds, of 
 objection premising, that is, that the Ordination 
 Service does not involve two opinions or ideas 
 which are likely to give great offence I came to 
 consider the difficulty which you suggest as to the 
 unlikelihood of general acquiescence on the part of 
 the English people in the ordination formula, and 
 in the Catholic conception of the ministry. . . . 
 
 Well, first of all, can one help remembering how- 
 Scripture repeatedly warns the messenger of God 
 that he must not look for general acquiescence ? 
 Surely, the language held in the second and third 
 chapters of Ezekiel is very striking. I think it, 
 and language like it, a strong internal corrobora- 
 tion of the truth of Scripture. It does not flatter 
 its ministers with hopes of complete success ; it 
 does not view men through a roseate medium ; it 
 tells us that He, who was the Incarnate Truth, 
 
Opposition no disproof 113 
 
 was set for ' the falling,' as well as for ' the rising/ 
 of others, and that ' the servant is not greater than 
 his Lord.' Opposition, then, to a doctrine or 
 principle, on the part of the many who have not 
 seriously and religiously considered it, is certainly 
 no proof of its not being a thing to contend for ; 
 nor is it, I think, a reason for not undertaking to 
 stand by it in one's clerical life. 
 
 But to come closer. Is it to the mere idea of a 
 priesthood (that is, of a body of human agents, 
 through whose ministry our Lord bestows certain 
 Spiritual gifts, just as He also bestows them, in 
 another sense, through the ordinances which they 
 administer) that popular objections exist ? Or is it 
 not, rather, true that the objections take a much 
 wider range ? The sort of tone taken in news- 
 papers, and in other expressions of ordinary public 
 opinion, is, I fear, indicative of something much 
 deeper. The opposition is to the whole con- 
 ception of a supernatural order, of a Spiritual 
 kingdom of Christ in some quarters (I am afraid 
 one cannot help saying it), to the present working 
 of a living God. 
 
 People object to ' Sacerdotalism ' too often on 
 grounds which, if they were consistent which, 
 happily, they often are not would carry them 
 very much further. Dependence on the mediation 
 and on the government of Christ; faith in the 
 efficacy of prayer ; belief that He is really at work 
 in, and for, and with His people, in ways distinctly 
 supernatural and Spiritually miraculous ; recogni- 
 tion of the tremendous facts of the New Testa- 
 ment, as being, every day and all day long, fruitful 
 
 8 
 
ii4 Doctrine 
 
 in issues for the human race and every individual 
 of it are not all these things lacking very 
 seriously in the popular mind ? And is not a 
 great deal of its hostility to a particular expression 
 of the supernaturalist principle traceable, virtually, 
 to a more or less conscious uneasiness as to the 
 principle itself? For my part, I always long to 
 ask people who deal in popular talk about ' Sacer- 
 dotalism,' whether they have lately read, in a 
 thoughtful and realizing spirit, the Gospel of 
 St. John and the Epistle to the Ephesians, and 
 whether they agree with them. 
 
 Nobody is more conscious than I am, that some 
 opposition to ' Sacerdotalism ' is of a very different 
 nature ; that it proceeds from a really Christian 
 jealousy for Christ's honour and His people's 
 rights ; that it has been provoked by ' sacerdotalist ' 
 exaggerations, or by the presentation of what I 
 hold to be truth under a garb which (to .say the 
 least) does not connect it with spiritual needs and 
 with Christ's Person and work. So presented it 
 must repel, and it must, even if accepted by the 
 poor, be, as you say, associated with superstition 
 or something like it. Doubtless ; but what then ? 
 Surely it follows that we ought to amend the 
 mistakes made in so presenting it. Look at 
 Sadler's Church Doctrine, Bible Truth, and you 
 will see how well those mistakes can be avoided. 
 
 I would not seem to be unjust or inconsiderate 
 towards the class of minds to which you refer as 
 those of ' hard-headed men of business.' Only, 
 can we help fearing that, on many points beside 
 that of the priesthood or the sacraments, they are 
 
N. T. Christianity supernatural 115 
 
 out of rapport with the atmosphere (so to speak) 
 of such a Christianity as we find glowing and 
 energizing in the pages of the New Testament ? 
 Have they not, on all sorts of points connected 
 with the perpetual Presence and scrutiny of God, 
 the Fall, the Incarnation, the Redemption, the 
 ineffable, infinite Future, the immeasurable supe- 
 riority of unseen interests over temporal ones- 
 have they not, think you, much to learn ? May 
 He who, being the Eternal, condescended to 
 work in a carpenter's shop, and chose a man of 
 hard, prosaic business for the first of His evan- 
 gelists, lead the honest souls among them onward, 
 upward, Christward ! 
 
 Secularism, in one form or another, is the great 
 foe of Christianity just now in England. If we 
 find it opposing the ' Catholic view ' of the Church, 
 we find it also opposing, directly or indirectly, 
 other doctrines on which all hearty Christians 
 agree. 
 
 The lesson of this is (I think) not to give up 
 hope, but to be careful, in humble imitation of 
 St. Paul's spirit, to present truth in such forms as 
 shall, while faithfully preserving it, avoid, as much 
 as possible, the putting a stumbling-block in a 
 brother's way. I am sure that this can be done 
 as well in regard to the priesthood or sacraments, 
 rightly viewed, as in regard to special providence, 
 or probation in this world, or the need of grace, 
 or the offices of our Lord. 
 
 5 2 
 
n6 Doctrine 
 
 To the Editor of The Guardian, on the term 
 Sacerdos. 
 
 October 18, 1877. 
 
 . . . The main point . . . consists in the de- 
 liberate retention by the revisers of our formularies 
 of the English word ' priest,' which was then, as 
 from the first, the received equivalent 1 for a 
 presbyter, who, as such, was a sacerdos i.e., whose 
 office was sacerdotal. This retention is the more 
 significant because the word had been even asso- 
 ciated with popular corruptions of the sacerdotal 
 idea. The argument sometimes drawn from the 
 etymology of a term, for the purpose of nullifying 
 the actual sense which its history has affixed to 
 it, is notoriously untrustworthy. At that rate, 
 ' seigneur ' might be reduced to a mere synonym 
 for 'elder brother.' The term ' priest,' moreover, 
 was from its very outset used with a sacerdotal 
 meaning ; and the term sacerdos itself, if we look 
 merely to its derivation, might be adopted, from 
 his own point of view, by any Presbyterian or 
 Congregationalist minister, as being ' one given to 
 sacred things.' . . . 
 
 Much might be done towards removing mis- 
 conceptions or suspicions, if all who contend 
 for ' the sacerdotal theory of the ministry ' (as it 
 has been styled) would take care to say with all 
 
 1 On the retention and the meaning of ' priest ' in the Eng- 
 lish Bible and Formularies, see Responsio Archiepiscoporum 
 Anglice, p. 25 ; and Bishop John Wordsworth, ftesponsio ad 
 JSatavos, p. 13 (Brown and Co., Salisbury, 1894). 
 
The term * Sacerdos ' 117 
 
 distinctness that they regard the Christian minister 
 in his ' priestly ' capacity, as, on the one hand, in 
 Dr. Pusey's golden words, ' not instead of, but the 
 instrument of Christ; and, on the other hand, 
 the Divinely-appointed organ of the ' collective 
 priestliness ' of the baptized and communicant 
 ' people.' 
 
 [October 25, 1877.] 
 
 . . . If it is contended that the use of ' minister " 
 or ' presbyter ' along with sacerdos deprives the 
 latter term of its received meaning, this must be 
 grounded on some antithesis between that term 
 and the other two. But, as far as Biblical language 
 
 o o 
 
 goes, there is no such antithesis ; the force of the 
 phrase ' a minister of Christ >l is illustrated in a 
 sermon on 'The Christian Ministry' in Newman's 
 Parochial Sermons, ii., pp. 300 sqq. And while 
 there is nothing to indicate that the title of ' pres- 
 byter' is inconsistent with functions which, in a 
 true and sound sense, may be called 'sacerdotal,' 
 it is striking to see how the two terms and their 
 cognates are united, as if thoroughly consistent, 
 in the great sacramentaries of the Western Church 
 Leonine, Gelasian, Gregorian. E.g., ' Quos ad 
 presbyterii munus elegit . . . super hos . . , 
 gratiae sacerdotalis effunde virtutem ' (Muratori, 
 Lit. Rom. Vet., i., col. 424). Some persons, prob- 
 ably, would be surprised to find ' presbyteral ' 
 terms employed fourteen times, interchangeably 
 with 'sacerdotal,' in the present Roman 'Ordi- 
 natio Presbyteri.' 
 
 (Rom. xv. 1 6). 
 
ii8 Doctrine 
 
 {November 15, 1877.] 
 
 . . . For such an antithesis I see no foundation 
 in Scripture, or in the ancient documents of the 
 Church of Christ. 
 
 1. None as to 'presbyter'; for while that term 
 by itself would not involve any proper ministerial 
 character, it is quite compatible with the notion 
 of a ' priestly ' character attaching to that minister 
 of Christ whom it was used to describe ; the rather 
 that, if one goes back to patriarchal ages, there 
 seem reasons to associate priestly functions with 
 the elder brother or first-born son. And I have 
 already called attention to the free and natural 
 manner in which the ancient Western sacra- 
 mentaries combine 'sacerdotal ' terms with ' presby- 
 teral.' 
 
 2. None as to ' minister '; for in the New Testa- 
 ment our Divine High Priest, Himself the one 
 true Agens Principalis in all Church ministrations, 1 
 is called by both the names which may be treated 
 as the originals of 'minister.' He 'became a 
 
 TO/jiris' (Rom. XV. 8), and He is 'ran/ iyiw 
 
 oe, called so just after and just before He is 
 called dp^itptvQ (Heb. viii. 1-3). As to \tirovpyos, 
 indeed, its close connection with 'sacerdotal ideas' 
 in the Septuagint is well known, and we have 
 warrant from Acts xiii. 2 for applying it. in a 
 sacred official sense, to the minister of the New 
 Dispensation. No doubt there is a special ecclesi- 
 astical use of ' minister ' for the deacon who 
 
 1 Cf. S. Thomas Aq., Summa III. Ixiv. i, and Bright, 
 Lessons from the Lives, etc., app. xviii., p. 287. 
 
False antitheses 119 
 
 ' attends on ' the Bishop or presbyter ; but that 
 cannot be the sense in which it is used for the 
 Christian minister in general, and ministerium is 
 repeatedly used in the ancient ritual books, so as 
 to include the function of the Bishop himself 
 e.g., Leonine Sacramentary, ' Consecratio Episco- 
 porum': ' His famulis tuis, quos ad summi-sacerdotii 
 ministerium delegisti ' l ; and further on, 'ad sacer- 
 dotale ministerium' 
 
 The non-use of ttpue in the New Testament for 
 the Christian minister has been naturally accounted 
 for by the necessity of avoiding confusion between 
 the Jewish and Christian ministries, while the 
 former was still de facto extant. Compare Mr. 
 Carter's treatise on The Doctrine of the Priesthood, 
 p. 1 20 (ed. 1857); to which, moreover, I should like 
 to refer for admirable expositions of the relation 
 between 'the only High Priest by nature' and 
 those by whom He acts, pp. 99-103, 129. 
 
 . . . One might observe that ' minister ' is re 
 peatedly used in the Canons of 1 604 for a ' clergy- 
 man in full orders,' to adopt a somewhat old- 
 fashioned phrase e.g., Canon 32, (None to be 
 made Deacon and Minister both in one day). 
 ' The office of deacon being a step or degree to 
 the ministry? etc. But literally sacerdotitm, in the 
 Latin title of Article XXXI I. , includes all the 
 three orders. On this I have already cited Sir 
 W. Palmer [Treatise on the Church, ii., p. 347, 
 ed. 3]. The true account of the case is that such 
 a use of sacerdotes does not deprive the presbyter 
 
 1 Muratori, Lit. Rom. Vet. i., col. 422; cf. Duchesne, 
 Origines du culte chretien, p. 3^7 (ed. 1889). 
 
I2O Doctrine 
 
 of ' sacerdotal ' functions, but invests the deacon 
 with some share in them. See Bingham, Anti- 
 quities, II. xix. 15 ; not to mention Hickes, Chris- 
 tian Priesthood, c. ii., 4 (vol. ii., p. 32, 'Angl. 
 Cath. Lib.'). See also Carter on the Priesthood, 
 p. 33. But the main point consists in the de- 
 liberate retention in the English service of the 
 English word ' priest,' linked closely as it was to 
 the ' sacerdotal ' idea. 
 
 To a candidate for Holy Orders, on the Christian 
 Ministry. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, 
 Tuesday before Easter, 1896. 
 
 Just a word or two on the great subject to 
 which you refer. Lightfoot's essay seemed to 
 me, when I read it long ago, to be written under 
 an ' anti-sacerdotalist ' bias i 1 I remember making 
 some rather full notes on the subject. But you 
 may be aware that he has repeatedly protested 
 against what he held to be perversions of its 
 import. These passages, which are of great 
 interest, are quoted all together 2 in the posthumous 
 volume of his Dissertations on the Apostolic Age, 
 pp. 241 sqq. In one of them he says that he was 
 ' scrupulously anxious not to overstate the evidence 
 in any case.' Repeatedly does he aver that he 
 
 1 Cf. Moberly, Ministerial Priesthood, Preface, p. vii. (ed. 
 1897). 
 
 2 The Essay and additional notes are now published together 
 in a small volume, Lightfoot, The Christian Ministry, 1901. 
 
The Christian Ministry 121 
 
 believes the Episcopate to have come down (as 
 the Preface to the Ordinal states) ' in unbroken 
 continuity from the Apostolic times,' etc. I cannot 
 but think, however, that to treat the question as 
 one simply of ' polity ' or ' administration ' is to- 
 deprive it of its main interest for members of the 
 household and kingdom of Christ. It is to give an 
 advantage to those who, like the late Edwin Hatch, 
 disparage ' organization ' as external, mechanical, 
 and, in a Spiritual sense, quite secondary. As long 
 as we look at 'organization ' (in the case of Christ's 
 kingdom on earth) in this dry and formal manner, 
 we shall not, I conceive, appreciate either the 
 principle of ordination or the ' claims ' of Epis- 
 copacy versus Congregationalism, or versus Presby- 
 terianism. 
 
 But as in Christianity there are no signs or 
 ceremonies of Divine appointment which are not, 
 in their several spheres, means of grace (for, were 
 it otherwise, we should still be on a Judaical 
 level), so a Christian ministry possessing Divine 
 sanction must needs be a great deal more than a 
 contrivance for ' administration ' in the sense of 
 'government.' It must be a stewardship of grace 
 and truth. And we know from Luke xii. 42, and 
 other texts, that such a stewardship is a permanent 
 necessary institution in the sacred ' household,' 
 intimately bound up with its Spiritual interests, 
 and that our Lord constituted such an office in the 
 persons of His Apostles. Now, if we join on to- 
 this fact the other fact which Lightfoot not only 
 admits, but affirms, the Apostolical origin of the 
 Episcopate, we see at once where we stand. He 
 
122 Doctrine 
 
 seems to have been somehow turned aside from 
 the true ' sacerdotalism ' by dread of the false. It 
 is for us to distinguish between the false and the 
 true, and to place the ministry in line with the 
 other 'joints and bands' which sustain the life of 
 'the body.' 1 Of course (I need not say it), you 
 would check Lightfoot's essay by Gore's book on 
 The Church, and the Ministry. 
 
 P.S. From what I have said, you will see that 
 the question of esse or of bene esse, in regard to the 
 three Orders, runs up (as I view it) into the 
 question of a permanent 'stewardship.' If that 
 means 'priesthood,' we can't help it. 
 
 To the Venerable Archdeacon , on the Minis- 
 terial Commision. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 December 14, 1897. 
 
 I sometimes wonder whether I shall live to see 
 a break-up of the old High Church body. It 
 seems to be yielding, at point after point, to the 
 undermining influence of principles and methods 
 most difficult to harmonize with its fundamental 
 idea and its native traditions. I have quite lately 
 come across a fresh instance of this disintegrating 
 process. A friend of mine, who I thought was 
 with us in essentials, has given unhesitating 
 expression (in a volume of the Church Historical 
 Society's series 2 ) to the theory that our Lord's 
 
 1 Col. ii. 19; cf. Eph. iv. 16. 
 
 - Series III., p. 140 (S.P.C.K., 1897). 
 
The * Committee Theory' 123 
 
 commission was addressed, not to the Apostles as 
 an order, but to them as simply representing the 
 4 Christian congregation.' This view cuts right 
 to the heart of Church principles, for on this 
 showing the Apostolic succession resides, not in 
 any ministry, but in the body of the baptized as 
 such ; and there is, properly speaking, no ministry 
 of Christ, but a committee of delegates of the 
 Christian people, of which idea, as far as I can 
 see, St. Paul never gives the faintest trace. He, 
 in fact, would be on this theory the only man in 
 the Apostolic age who had a real commission 
 from the Lord. The other Apostles would have 
 had to take out new commissions from the 
 people. 1 However, as Kidd said to me yesterday, 
 Luke xii. 42 is sufficient to explode the theory, 
 for it would require an absolute inversion of the 
 terms of that text. Our Lord would have to 
 accept stewards from the 'household,' not to 'set' 
 his own stewards ' over ' it. 
 
 To the Rev. B. J. Kidd, on the ' Committee 
 Theory ' of the Ministry. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 May 1 6, 1898. 
 
 I doubt not that you remember Keble's quota- 
 tion, in the preface to Hooker, of Bishop Bilson's 
 words (A.D. 1 593), that the Apostles were recipients 
 of the Power of the Keys ; that ' the Church 
 
 1 Cf. Bright, The Law of Faith, pp. 338 sqq., and Some 
 Aspects, etc., Address I. 
 
124 Doctrine 
 
 received it from the Apostles, not the Apostles 
 from the Church.' 1 
 
 One hears the Church described as ' a living 
 organism,' by way, I suppose, of intimating that 
 no office within the Church had any origination 
 independent of her will ; that she was left to 
 evolve institutions as she might see fit. Well, 
 but are not we also living organisms ? And 
 should we be more so than we are, if we had been 
 left to evolve hands and feet and eyes and ears 
 this way or that, as might seem best to us 
 individually, and diversely, according to our 
 varying circumstances ? And if the Church were 
 left by Christ in this predicament, why did He 
 Himself 'ordain' sacraments, instead of leaving 
 her to do so ? All these questions run up into 
 the master-question : ' What is Christ's Person, 
 and what was His work, and what did He intend 
 with regard to the diffusion of grace as the result 
 of both ?' A worthy estimate of sacraments will 
 carry with it a just view of ministry, whereas the 
 ' committee theory ' of ministry cannot fail to 
 have its effect on our estimate of sacraments. 
 
 The explicit mention of ' stewards ' in Luke xii. 
 42, and the implicit mention in Matt. xxiv. 45, 
 informs us that there will be until the end an 
 order of 'stewards' whom Christ Himself will 
 'set over his household' as a whole, His 'ser- 
 vants ' as a body. The ' committee theory ' would 
 have us understand this to mean no more than 
 that He will accept stewards appointed and 
 empowered for Him by the whole body of His 
 1 Hooker, EccL Pol., vol. i.. p. Ixx (ed. Keble, 1841). 
 
The 'Committee Theory' again 125 
 
 servants. Is this a natural interpretation ? On 
 that theory, also, one has to explain why, after 
 the commission in John xx. 21, our Lord used 
 language which must have conveyed to all His 
 hearers the idea of a pastoral commission given to 
 an Apostle as such by Himself (John xxi. 15). 
 And it is also, on this view, perplexing to find the 
 Twelve, after their number had been filled up by 
 a direct act of Christ Himself, directing the whole 
 Church (on this theory, the collective apostolate) 
 to select the seven, but reserving to themselves 
 (i.e., to a mere committee) the right of commis- 
 sioning them for their office. 1 
 
 To an undergraduate, on Cambridge and Evan- 
 gelicalism. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 September 25, 1895. 
 
 The last place I stayed at during my five weeks' 
 holiday was Cambridge. Have you ever paid 
 your respects to ' our Aunt,' as Dean Stanley 
 used to call that University ? If not, pray take 
 the first opportunity of doing so. The social life 
 of Cambridge is a study of likenesses and unlike- 
 nesses when compared with our own, and the 
 place itself, apart from its three supremely 
 magnificent colleges, exhibits within a small 
 compass a wonderful abundance of foliage, which 
 made Newman once prefer it, in matter of beauty, 
 to Oxford. I cannot go to that point. The 
 
 1 Acts vi. 3. 
 
126 Doctrine 
 
 charm of our gardens and groves is diffusive, as 
 it were, while that of the Cambridge ' backs ' is 
 concentrated. When you have seen them, you 
 have pretty well exhausted the natural amenity of 
 the place. 
 
 I think I understand, practically, the uncer- 
 tainties which you describe or indicate. They 
 are slight by comparison of the terribly chaotic 
 condition in which many of your contemporaries 
 drift hither and thither, without any true convic- 
 tion as to the primary ideas of religion worthy of 
 the name. And let me suggest a point for your 
 consideration. It is, I think, true that the differ- 
 ence between what is called the Evangelical view 
 and what is called the Catholic, Sacramental or 
 Ecclesiastical is not so mainly, by any means, as 
 to the positive views of Evangelicalism, but as to 
 the negative. Persons who hold what I, for 
 instance, hold are altogether of one mind with the 
 Evangelicals on such points as the reality of 
 grace, the need of conversion for many who have 
 been baptized as infants, the absolute dependence 
 of all spiritual life and activity on the Person of 
 our Lord, the purely instrumental character of 
 ordinances, the hollowness of forms when bereft 
 of Spirit. The zeal of Evangelicals for these 
 truths is a zeal which we should wish to assimilate. 
 We therefore (whatever some of them may think) 
 have all this ground in common with them. 
 Where we differ is as to the efficacy which, as 
 we believe, our Lord has attached to ordinances 
 rightly received. We think that they do not 
 estimate it as fully as they might do ; but, then, it 
 
Evangelicalism only defective 127 
 
 is, in our belief, not a power acting mechanically, 
 but the application, so to speak, of His own 
 Personal energy through media of His appoint- 
 ment. We endeavour to see Him operating 
 through the sacraments or other ordinances, 
 and through the ministry. We think that this 
 view brings out the majesty and potency of the 
 Incarnation and the Mediation ; a theory, or way 
 of looking at the subject, which falls short of this 
 seems to us to be, so far, stunted and maimed. 
 You would see the view I am trying to indicate 
 put forth with special force and clearness in the 
 second of Law's Letters to Hoadly, which 
 have been recently edited, with a preface by 
 Gore. 1 But I will venture to lend you Sadler's 
 volume called Church Doctrine, Bible Truth, 
 which I think most helpful, for its lucid and 
 Scriptural exposition of the connection between 
 the sacramental principle and the idea of the 
 Church on one hand, and spiritual aspirations and 
 needs on the other. No writer in late years has 
 done so much to clear the High Church view of 
 these questions from the appearance of formalism, 
 of dry antiquarianism, or of aloofness from the 
 supreme question for each Christian soul : ' How- 
 can I best come into contact with Christ ? How- 
 best appropriate the spiritual power f Chris- 
 tianity ?' You may remember that Dr. Pusey 
 always loved to dwell on the positive side of 
 Evangelical teaching, and to think their theology 
 defective rather than erroneous. 
 
 1 See above, p. 85, n. 2. 
 
128 Doctrine 
 
 To the same, on Evangelicalism and Fasting 
 Communion. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 October 6, 1895. 
 
 I cannot help answering your letter at once. 
 I most fully agree with you as to the danger both 
 of complacent formalism which may end in 
 deadening all spiritual vitality, and of a quasi- 
 Judaical multiplication of ecclesiastical require- 
 ments. It is a subject on which anyone might 
 well dilate in addressing, say, a company of 
 young Catholics. I have more than once, when 
 preaching in the hearing, as I supposed, of some 
 such persons, told them that the warning ad- 
 dressed to us by earnest Evangelicals as to the 
 supremacy of Spirit over forms is not a thing to 
 be superciliously put aside, but to be seriously 
 considered and utilized. No doubt sacramentalism, 
 to use one convenient term, can be abused, just 
 as other true principles can be, in a world where 
 ' noblest things find vilest using.' You may have 
 heard I used to hear that a once-celebrated 
 Congregationalist minister called baptismal re- 
 generation a soul-destroying doctrine. At first, 
 or for a long time, I did not understand what he 
 meant. The denunciation seemed simply a wild 
 outbreak of sectarian rancour. But one sees 
 what he supposed the doctrine to imply that, 
 once baptized, all is safe ; the sonship cannot be 
 forfeited, etc. To us this seems an extravagance 
 of misconstruction, but the peculiar sense which 
 
The danger of formalism 129 
 
 the speaker, and others like him, put on ' re- 
 generation ' will go far to account for it. Catholic 
 ideas or principles do, indeed, exclude so mon- 
 strous a notion of security as he was attacking, by 
 their insistence on the need of regular and minute 
 vigilance against sin. But we are all too prone 
 to enjoy privileges, and only look sideways at 
 responsibilities. And it was against this self- 
 indulgent misuse of Church doctrine that the 
 early Tractarians made so stern a protest, Pusey 
 especially insisting much it has been thought 
 too much on the dreadfulness of wilful sin in 
 the baptized, but never too much on the need 
 of a real turning to God whenever such sin had 
 outraged grace. In his later years he certainly 
 dwelt more than in earlier on the fulness of 
 forgiveness for such sins on condition of repent- 
 ance or conversion. 
 
 Then as to the other point you mention. I 
 hate to hear fasting Communion urged as a matter 
 of obligatory law, and that, perhaps, on the 
 ground of mediaeval canons, which our formularies 
 do not allude to. Liddon used to urge it rather 
 in the form of early Communion, and that, not 
 mainly on the ground of ancient Church ob- 
 servances (though he did lay stress on this), but 
 for the sake of the moral advantage of thus 
 giving to our Lord the freshest thoughts of His 
 own day, etc. Of late, as to this venerable and, 
 as I believe, profitable usage (and also in regard, 
 perhaps, to some others), a habit has grown up 
 (which I deplore) of turning moral appeals or 
 advice into a hard imperative requirement ; and 
 
 9 
 
130 Doctrine 
 
 this has actually been carried so far as to brand 
 with actual sinfulness every act of non-fasting 
 Communion, whatever may be the peculiarities of 
 the case. I often wonder whether such persons 
 seriously and quietly ask themselves whether our 
 Lord would really wish all persons who must take 
 some food before mid-day to go without Holy 
 Communion for months because they cannot get 
 to an early celebration. It is lamentable to see 
 the substitution of the ' letter,' or mere command, 
 for the ' Spirit,' 1 and the result will be, in too many 
 cases, sheer revolt from a Church system which is 
 thus misrepresented as a law in the Judaic sense. 
 I wish all Ritualists, specially the younger, would 
 take to studying St. Paul. 
 
 Prayers for the Departed. 
 
 [From letters to an Oxford guild, and from a private corre- 
 spondence resulting from a discussion at a meeting of the 
 Oxford Clerical Association, 1 880-81.] 
 
 If it had not been for that unhappy Roman ' de- 
 velopment ' about purgatorial fire, we should not, 
 I think, have had much difference of opinion or 
 feeling on this question. . . . There can be no 
 doubt that the custom of including the departed 
 in the prayers of the faithful is of the most 
 primitive antiquity, and that our particular way of 
 making such prayers in connection with the 
 Eucharistic Sacrifice, on anniversaries of death, 
 is mentioned as among Church usages by Tertul- 
 
 1 2 Cor. iii. 6 ; Rom. ii. 29, vii. 6. 
 
Prayers for the departed 131 
 
 Han 1 about 200 A.D. . . . There is good reason 
 to believe that this was among the practices of 
 synagogue worship and of Jewish life when our 
 Lord was upon earth. From the synagogue it 
 passed over, naturally and as of course, into the 
 Church, and, I cannot doubt, into the Church of 
 Apostolic times. . . . 
 
 But to what end would the early Christian thus 
 pray ? I think he would have said : ' We cannot 
 help doing so ! But, as to what we specially 
 intend, we pray that God would keep them, as 
 we are sure He does, in His gracious care, and 
 would give them all the blessings that their state 
 admits of. It is a state of rest and light, but of 
 imperfect happiness. We can pray that this rest 
 and light may be increased ; that ' white ' robes 
 may be given to the souls of the faithful, as they 
 were in St. John's vision ; 2 that the time of their 
 final bliss may be hastened ; and that they may 
 be publicly accepted by Christ at the last day. 
 Reasons enough here, if you believe as we believe, 
 and love as we love.' 
 
 We must, of course, keep firmly in view these 
 points : 
 
 i. That no prayers for the departed can in 
 the least degree change the position of a soul in 
 regard to that secret judgment which is passed 
 upon it at the moment of death, or transfer it 
 from a state of condemnation to a state of 
 
 1 Tert. de Corona Militis, c. 3 (Opera, torn, i., p. 422, ed. 
 Oehler) ; cf. Gwatkin, Selections from Early Christian Writers, 
 p. 118 (ed. 1902). 
 
 2 Rev. vi. ii. 
 
 92 
 
132 Doctrine 
 
 grace. Rome herself never admits any such 
 notion. 
 
 2. That, in remembering the souls which are 
 departed in faith and in grace, we have nothing 
 to do with any idea of obtaining their relief from 
 suffering. 
 
 3. That we must be content with ' a light that 
 is neither clear nor dark,' 1 with a certain dim 
 indistinctness as to the good which we can effect 
 by such prayers. Enough to believe that, in 
 some way or other, we may contribute to increase 
 the happiness of those prayed for. 
 
 ***** 
 It is only so far as prayer for the departed is 
 made a sort of dogma, or, rather, a matter of 
 obligation, that I demur. ... I do not think 
 that we can place the consideration of prayers for 
 the dead in Christ on a firm dogmatic basis, 
 because of our ignorance of the conditions under 
 which such prayer might be operative. . . . The 
 argument from silence [in Holy Scripture] is 
 often precarious, but sometimes it has force. 
 When a writer would, in all reason, have men- 
 tioned a point as germane to his subject, if he 
 had had it in his mind ; when a teacher might well 
 be expected to recommend or urge a practice as 
 intimately connected with his line of teaching on 
 a particular occasion, had he regarded it as 
 important in a practical sense, still more as a 
 duty then this argument begins to tell. And I 
 cannot but think it significant that we are 
 reduced to a rather uncertain inference from 
 2 Tim. i. 1 8 (a parenthetic wish or aspiration), 
 1 Zech. xiv. 6. 
 
The argument from silence 133 
 
 and find no hint on the matter ot praying for the 
 departed in i Cor. xv. or in i Thess. iv. 1 3 sqq. 
 ... I find, too, in i Cor. xii. 12 sqq. ... a long 
 context on the relations of members of the Body 
 [of Christ], but no word that bears the most 
 distant reference to the dead. . . . Indeed, in our 
 debate the other evening, I could not but feel that 
 enough prominence was not given to that awful 
 characteristic of death awful, yet in some respects 
 blessed that it transfers the soul which departs 
 in grace definitely and finally out of that sphere 
 of spiritual probation which gives motive and 
 energy to so much intercessory prayer. 
 
 Christianity must accept the disadvantage of 
 not possessing a clear answer to some ques- 
 tions, which other systems despatch ex cathedra. 
 This trial is as old as Manichaeism or Gnosticism. 
 People who are disappointed with the gaps and 
 reserves of the Christian account of God's oucwopia 1 
 will say that Christianity falters. She must bear 
 the imputation. She can but, as yet, see ' in a 
 glass darkly." 2 
 
 To the Venerable Archdeacon , on the Blessed 
 
 Virgin Marys acceptance of her Vocation. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 January 2, 1895. 
 
 I do not know Vernon Staley's book. That 
 expression 3 which you refer to is surely very un- 
 
 1 For a comment on the theological meaning of this term, 
 see Bright, Later Treatises of St. Athanasius, p. 10, note b. 
 - i Cor. xiii. 12. 
 3 The Catholic Religion, p. 172 (6th ed., 1895). 
 
134 Doctrine 
 
 advised. The Blessed Virgin Mary's acceptance 
 of the high vocation announced to her was but 
 ejusdem generis with any other like act of loyal 
 faith, with Isaiah's ' Here am I, send me,' 1 or with 
 Saul's 'What wilt Thou have me to do?' 2 If 
 Isaiah had taken his passage to Tarshish, if Saul 
 had shaken himself and gone on to Damascus as 
 an inquisitor, other agents would have been found 
 for the Divine purpose ; and so in regard to St. 
 Mary. To isolate her submission as if it had 
 been more decisive than other submissions to 
 imply that, if she had proved herself unworthy of 
 the Annunciation, the Incarnation would not have 
 taken place is unsound as a matter of exegesis ; 
 and mischievous, as tending to the corruptions 
 which we call Marianism, although we are sorry to 
 have to use her name in describing what she 
 would certainly deprecate, or, rather, would con- 
 demn. 
 
 To a student at a Theological College, in view of 
 the difficulties of a friend about the practice 
 of Invocation of Saints. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 Whit Monday, 1899. 
 
 Hearty thanks for your most kind letter. I am 
 
 indeed sorry to be forbidden to go to . I 
 
 cannot, however, let you think that I am actually 
 ill ; but my doctor has advised me to undergo 
 a course of treatment for this rheumatism, and 
 
 1 Is. vi. 8. 2 Acts xxii. 10. 
 
Invocation of Saints 135 
 
 thinks that if I went to I might bring on a 
 
 recurrence of the trouble or hinder the effect of 
 the treatment. I should have greatly enjoyed 
 seeing you at the festival. 
 
 Your friend had better look at Dr. Swete's book 
 on The Apostles Creed, pp. 82 sqq. (2nd ed.). 
 'The Communion of Saints' was most probably put 
 into the Western Creed by way of illustration and 
 enforcement of the article on ' the Holy Catholic 
 Church,' which the Donatists interpreted in their 
 own fashion, but which really did not involve 
 their definition of the conditions of Church life. 
 Although in it the tares were mingled with the 
 wheat, it was still holy nay, it was still a true 
 society of the holy. 
 
 The two words Communio Sanctorum would 
 by no means suggest invocation of departed saints, 
 as necessarily involved in it. In other words, if so 
 interpreted, it stands out from the other articles as 
 not explanatory of itself. 
 
 On the other point, it would be well if he could 
 assimilate the teaching of Bishop Butler as to the 
 exceeding unwisdom of judging a priori as to 
 what God must be expected to reveal, or to bestow 
 by way of gift to His Church. Where in the New 
 Testament is there a promise that the larger part 
 of the Church shall never adopt or retain practices 
 which are fraught with danger, or which involve a 
 twist and perversion of important religious ideas ? 
 If there were such a promise, we might expect to 
 find with it a guarantee against a corresponding 
 or co-extensive prevalence of unfaithfulness in 
 conduct, of inconsistency between profession and 
 
136 Doctrine 
 
 practice. Confessedly there is no such guarantee. 
 Do not let us invent Divine assurances merely to 
 suit our own predilections. That would be a 
 form of taking the Name in vain. 
 
 P.S. There are some very useful remarks, at 
 the end of an article in the last number of the 
 Church Quarterly Review?- on [Dr. Mortimer's] 
 Catholic Faith and Practice. 
 
 To the Editor of The Guardian, on Extreme 
 Unction. 
 
 April, 1890. 
 
 I had expected that someone would have called 
 attention to the manner in which the decree of the 
 Council of Trent on Extreme Unction 'repre- 
 sents ' the language of the text to which it appeals. 
 
 Anyone reading St. James v. 14, 15 without 
 prejudice would see that the primary object of 
 the unction there prescribed was recovery of 
 health. The Spiritual benefit, however superior 
 in intrinsic importance, is mentioned contingently. 
 'And if he be in the condition of one who has 
 committed sins, it shall be forgiven him.' The 
 main point is, ' The prayer of faith shall save the 
 sick person, and the Lord shall raise him up.' 
 But here the Vulgate mistranslates kytpti by alle- 
 viabit, and the Council, naturally swayed by the 
 Vulgate, uses this rendering in support of its own 
 dogma : 
 
 ' This [res of the Sacrament] is the grace of the 
 
 1 Church Quarterly Review, April, 1899, vol. xlviii., No. 95. 
 
Extreme Unction 137 
 
 Holy Spirit, whose unction cleanses away offences 
 if there be still any to be expiated, and the remains 
 of sin, and relieves \alleviat\ and confirms the soul 
 of the sick man by stirring up in him a strong 
 confidence in Divine mercy, whereby he is en- 
 couraged \sublevatu$\ so as to bear more easily 
 [/emus] the distresses and pains of illness, and 
 also to resist with greater facility the temptations 
 of the devil, . . . and in the meantime, where it 
 is expedient for the salvation of his soul, obtains 
 health of body.' 1 
 
 It is obvious here that the order of ideas, or the 
 sequence of objects aimed at in St. James, is 
 simply inverted in the decree of the Council, so 
 that what is primary and absolute with the former 
 is secondary and contingent with the latter, and 
 vice versa ; and also that a word which St. James 
 uses with exclusive reference to bodily recovery 
 is made by a mistranslation to speak of spiritual 
 comfort. This is not to interpret St. James. 
 
 1 Sess. XIV., c. ii., Canones et Decreta, p. 81 (Tauchnitz, 
 1876). 
 
Ill 
 
 Liturgical Subjects 
 
 To a candidate for Holy Orders, on Hooker. 
 
 UNIVERSITY COLLEGE, 
 
 Thursday, April 27, 1865. 
 
 To begin by answering your question as to Hooker 
 [Book V.] : I think some chapters do not require 
 much, or even any, attention, as, especially, those 
 from seventy-eight to the end, which I would not 
 trouble myself to read. And as to several others, 
 one may glance at their general drift, without 
 going into details such, e.g., as those about the 
 reading of Holy Scripture in church. 1 A great deal 
 that he says on that point belongs more to his time 
 than to ours, 2 the particular forms of Puritanic 
 objection having altered, and few Puritans now- 
 adays being at all likely to object to the public 
 reading of Scripture. I think I may also say that, 
 in the chapters on Baptism, 3 something, or much, 
 
 1 Cc. xviii.-xxii. 
 
 ~ Cf. Bishop Paget, Introduction to the Fifth Book of 'Hooker ; 
 pp. 132 sqq.^ 
 3 Cc. Iviii.-lxv. 
 
 [ 138] 
 
Lay Baptism 139 
 
 is less interesting than it must then have been, 
 because the Puritans then maintained very strongly 
 the invalidity of Baptism by other than 'ministers,' 1 
 their object being to deny that strong Catholic 
 view of the necessity of Baptism which has made 
 men admit lay Baptism to be valid. 
 
 But if you look at the table of contents, you will 
 see that many of the points taken are practically 
 important in regard to objections now raised, and 
 you must not neglect them. The great dogmatic 
 passages beginning at chapter li. are of supreme 
 importance ; but I know that the peculiar and 
 unsatisfactory, because unreal, view which Hooker 
 takes of the Eucharistic Presence 2 is not required 
 at . Don't forget to look at William Law. 3 
 
 To the Rev. , on the Office of Reader. 
 
 UNIVERSITY COLLEGE, 
 
 November 2, 1866. 
 
 Touching the new office of readers, I have 
 looked in vain through some back numbers of the 
 Guardian and Church Revieiv for the information 
 which you desire. It must surely have been in 
 August that Bishop Ellicott appointed a reader, 
 but I cannot find any account of it. I suppose the 
 word is meant to express both a permission to 
 read lessons in church, and prayers in chapel, 
 schools, etc., and also to read to the sick. 
 
 1 Cf. Bishop Paget, pp. 163 sqq., and supra, p. 94, n. 2. 
 
 - Cf. supra, pp. 1 06 sqq. 
 
 3 Letters to the Bishop of Bangor ; cf. supra, p. 85, n. 2 
 
140 Liturgical Subjects 
 
 I should have thought it exceedingly important 
 to steer clear between the two mistakes, of placing 
 the new officers on a quasi- ministerial level, and 
 of not giving them a fair and intelligible position 
 as agents of the Church. If our people had a 
 more Christian idea of the ministry, and were less 
 given to regard the clergyman as a gentleman 
 who reads prayers and preaches, we could see 
 minor Orders instituted with little anxiety. The 
 position of the three Orders would maintain itself ; 
 there would be no risk of confusion. I should 
 guard against any such license to read service 
 as would degrade the Morning and Evening 
 Prayers, as some men of the * ultra' stamp would 
 degrade them, into mere prayers which any lay- 
 man might just as fittingly offer. A reader who, 
 without absolute necessity, read the Church Service 
 would (I think) commit a serious offence. Such 
 officiating ought to be in the strictest sense ex- 
 ceptional, and no part of his ordinary function. I 
 should also have thought that the reader might 
 take a good deal of quasi-secular, or, at least, not 
 properly spiritual, work off the Curate's hands. 
 
 To the Rev. - , on the Absolution at Mat tins 
 and Evensong. 
 
 OXFORD, 
 
 May, 1865. 
 
 King 1 was in Oxford the other day. He told 
 me that the preachers at the Cuddesdon Festival 
 
 1 The Right Rev. E. King, D.D., now Lord Bishop of 
 Lincoln, and then Principal of Cuddesdon. 
 
Public Absolution real 141 
 
 were to be the Archbishop of York and Dr. Kay. 
 (He had wanted me to preach in the afternoon !) 
 He asked what I thought on a point which he 
 finds to have occupied the minds of some of the 
 Cuddesdon students. ' Did I think the Public 
 Absolutions real and effective communications 
 of Divine forgiveness to persons capable of it, 
 equally with the Private Absolution?' I said, 
 certainly, adding that Medd and Bramley and I 
 had always been strongly persuaded of the impor- 
 tance of maintaining this. He was well pleased, 
 and then told me that some of his men seemed to 
 have the idea (from whatever source derived) that 
 the Public Absolution was merely what people call 
 a declaration of the terms of Gospel mercy (such 
 as, indeed, the Sentences and Exhortation had 
 virtually been). This view, which has, of course, 
 been always held by Low Churchmen, is now held 
 by several Catholics for the sake of exalting 
 Private Confession and Absolution. Foolish, I 
 think, and short-sighted ; and, as to the construc- 
 tion of the words, the Public Absolution seems to 
 assert its own sacerdotal character. Of course, 
 as we all know, the ' I absolve thee ' is not a 
 necessary formula ; it is not older than the ninth 
 century, 1 and is hardly, if at all, known to the 
 Eastern Church. My belief is that the great value 
 of the daily service would be far more felt if 
 people were taught that it gave them twice a day 
 access to a real priestly absolution, which is valid 
 for those who are in a state to profit by it. Who 
 those are the priest needs not to know. It is 
 1 Cf. Bright, Ancient Collects, p. 101, note r. 
 
142 Liturgical Subjects 
 
 remarkable that even among Roman Catholics 
 Absolutions have been pronounced to large multi- 
 tudes. Alison mentions three such cases occurring 
 in the one war of la Vendee. 1 
 
 To the Rev. , on Ceremonial. 
 
 UNIVERSITY COLLEGE, 
 January 29, 1866. 
 
 I have complied with your request, and am 
 
 sending Mr. a letter by this post. I send you 
 
 at the same time Skinner of Newland's pamphiet,- 
 and a card which Bramley has had printed. 
 
 I have briefly touched upon the points, so far 
 as I understand them, but the documentary 
 evidence is best found, as to the Injunctions of 
 Edward VI., etc., in Cardwell. 3 
 
 The question is, of course, far wider than a 
 merely legal or historical one. Only, I suppose, 
 it is the latter that has to be thought of when an 
 attack on the existing status of things is talked of. 
 For my part, I need not tell you that I should 
 utterly deprecate any hasty or inconsiderate de- 
 velopment of Ritualism ; it should, if possible, be 
 a natural expression of the feelings of the faithful, 
 not an attempt to force their feelings, nor to substi- 
 tute the unfamiliar for the familiar on antiquarian 
 and aesthetic grounds. It is a case for the great 
 
 1 Cf. Alison, History of Europe, c. xii. (vol. ii., p. 664, 
 ed. 1849). 
 
 2 Probably, A Plea for the threatened Ritual of the Church 
 of England, by James Skinner (Masters, 1865). 
 
 3 Documentary Annals, i., pp. 4 sqq. (Oxford, 1844). 
 
Ceremonial 
 
 143 
 
 lesson about new wine in new bottles for much 
 patience, forbearance, common-sense, and genuine 
 spirituality. 
 
 Of course (as I was saying the other day), there 
 are cases in which Ritualism has implanted faith 
 and devotion ; instead of being demanded by them, 
 it has called them out. But are not these, among 
 us English people, at least rather the exception 
 than the rule ? And is not the other way, which 
 the Bishop hinted at in his recent letter to the 
 Deanery of Cuddesdon, the more logical of the two? 
 
 1 like a grand ceremonial, and I own that lights 
 and vestments give me real pleasure. But, then, I 
 should be absurd if I expected that everybody who 
 had the same faith as myself should, necessarily, 
 have precisely the same feeling as to the form 
 of its expression. 
 
 We want several things, several moral qualities, 
 more universal on the Ritualistic side. But in- 
 justice and repression will not contribute to them 
 quite otherwise. 
 
 Touching the * Reproaches,' I think it would be 
 more judicious not to borrow them, regarded even 
 as a kind of hymn, and not as a distinct service, 
 straight from the Roman Office for Good Friday 
 i.e., without any sort of alteration. First, because 
 they are dramatic and sensational ; next, because 
 they are popularly associated with the ceremony 
 of kissing the crucifix. Canon Humble once said 
 
 O 
 
 to me that he thought a good deal of foreign cere- 
 monial was far too sensational, 1 to say nothing else. 
 
 1 Cf. Edmund Bishop, Tke Gtmius of tke R*m*m Riie 
 (Weekly Register Office, 37, Essex Street, W.C). 
 
144 Liturgical Subjects 
 
 Dr. Pusey preached yesterday in Christ Church 
 on prayer for relief from temporal visitations. 1 The 
 sermon was rather hard to follow as an argument, 
 but the conclusion, on the grandeur and might 
 of prayer, and on the superior magnificence of 
 spiritual over physical miracles, was sublime. 
 
 To the Rev. , on the same. 
 
 UNIVERSITY COLLEGE, 
 February 5, 1866. 
 
 I think the editor of the new edition of the 
 Directorium Anglicanum one of the most danger- 
 ous persons extant to the cause of edifying and ma- 
 jestic ceremonial. That bewildering and irritating 
 multitude of small formalities is simply destructive, 
 I think, to real grandeur and solemnity. It not 
 only provokes John Bull, but it distinctly mars, as 
 I think, the effect of the whole ceremonial. I feel 
 quite indignant at the folly and pedantry of some 
 of those whom I take leave to call the puerile 
 Ritualists. 
 
 To the Rev. Canon Medd> on Ceremonial. 
 
 October 16, 1899. 
 
 I wish your paper 2 could be worked up into a 
 fuller statement for the benefit of those who are 
 carried away by paradoxes in the hope of an 
 
 1 University Sermons, 1864-79, No. 2. 
 
 - The Principles of Liturgical Uniformity, communicated to 
 the Guardian of August 30 and October 18, 1899. 
 
* Catholic usages' 145 
 
 ulterior object the introduction of the general 
 mass of Roman ceremonial, in preparation for the 
 corporate reunion of which they dream. . . . 
 
 Some words of X seem to intimate, rather 
 
 to avow, his conviction that Prayer-Book rules 
 or teachings are to be, not only supplemented, but 
 corrected, by what he vaguely describes as Catholic 
 usages or customs. He utterly fails to see that 
 the English Church at the end of the nineteenth 
 century has gone through an experience which 
 makes it finally impossible for her to acquiesce in 
 an elaborate symbolical ceremonial, such as might 
 have been suitable, in the way of object lesson, to 
 a laity without education and without any intel- 
 lectual activity. To offer it to modern English- 
 men would, indeed, be like feeding men on milk ! 
 
 To the Rev. , on the Ritual Commission. 
 
 THE VICARAGE, CREDITON, 
 August 31, 1867. 
 
 The Report of the Commission 1 on Vestments 
 is clearly a compromise, and more verbally than 
 really antagonistic to their use. ' Essential ' is 
 a perfectly vague term by itself ; essential in what 
 sense, for what end ? The Times may gloss it 
 in a sense hostile and insulting ; but if a National 
 
 1 ' We find that whilst these vestments are regarded by some 
 witnesses as symbolical of doctrine, and by others as a dis- 
 tinctive vesture whereby they desire to do honour to the Holy 
 Communion as the highest act of Christian worship, they are 
 by none regarded as essential, and they give grave offence to- 
 many.' Report of the Ritual Commission, p. vii (1867). 
 
 10 
 
146 Liturgical Subjects 
 
 Church is not to allow any observance which is 
 non-essential, and which gives offence to many 
 persons, our Church was terribly wrong when, in 
 Elizabeth's days, she did not simply allow, but 
 enforced, the surplice, the cross in Baptism, and 
 the kneeling at Communion not one of which was 
 more essential, properly speaking, than chasuble 
 or alb, and every one of which gave serious 
 offence to a large body of professing Churchmen. 
 
 To tfie Editor of The Guardian, on the Mixed 
 Chalice. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, 
 
 March 6, 1871. 
 
 Not the least distressing feature in the recent 
 judgment in the Purchas case is the prohibition 
 of any, even the most unobtrusive, observance of 
 that most venerable usage, the mixture of water 
 with the wine prepared for the Holy Eucharist. 
 There is no need to cite the testimony of St. 
 Justin Martyr, 1 or other ancient testimonies, on 
 this point. It is, as many will feel, a griev- 
 ance that the clergy of a Church which pro- 
 fesses to follow primitive antiquity should be 
 forbidden, as far as the present Court of Appeal 
 can forbid them, to observe, in any way what- 
 ever, a Eucharistic custom probably Apostolic, 
 and at any rate as old as the first half of the 
 second century. Granting that the public mixing 
 of water with the wine, at the time of the offertory. 
 
 1 Apol., i. 67 (i., p. 1 86, ed. Otto); cf. Gwatkin, Selections, 
 etc., p. 54. 
 
Chalice mixed before Mass 147 
 
 was to be treated as illegal, why should the 
 private mixing, done in the vestry before service, 
 be so vigorously disallowed ? Their lordships, 
 we all know, had not the advantage of hearing 
 counsel for the side against which they have 
 pronounced. Had it been otherwise, they could 
 hardly have been left to think that the private 
 mixture was ' not likely, in default of the public, 
 to find favour with any,' or that, in fact, ' it had 
 not prevailed at all.' It had only prevailed in 
 the whole Eastern Church, 1 as is plain from 
 the Preparation Office, said in the side-chapel 
 of the Prothesis before the liturgy begins : 2 as it 
 did prevail at low celebrations in the mediaeval 
 English Church, according to the use of Sarum. 
 ' When low Masses first began,' says the learned 
 editor of The Sarum Missal in English (p. lix), 
 ' the priest was in the habit of putting in the wine 
 and water here [in the sacristy] before Mass.' 3 
 
 To the Venerable Archdeacon , on the struc- 
 ture of a Collect. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 May 1 6, 1900. 
 
 I am afraid I cannot think that the new matter 
 contained in the paper quite satisfies the con- 
 
 1 Except in Armenia [Ed.]. 
 
 2 Cf. Brightman, Liturgies Eastern and Western, i. p. 357, 
 line 23, and Glossary, s.v. ' Mixture,' p. 582. 
 
 3 Pearson, The Sarum Missal, p. lix, note * (ed. 1884) ; and 
 cf. the Judgment of Archbishop Benson in Read v. the Bishop 
 of Lincoln, pp. 7 sqq. 
 
 IO 2 
 
148 Liturgical Subjects 
 
 ditions by no means easy conditions which go 
 to the making up of a Collect. Before saying 
 anything else, I will ask you to try an experiment. 
 Read aloud to yourself, first, any three typical 
 Collects of the Prayer-Book e.g., that for this 
 week, 1 as one of the best and then three of 
 the newly-composed Collects in the paper. You 
 will see at once what I mean : how the Collect, 
 properly so called, exhibits such characteristics as 
 regularity of plan, intelligible progress or order of 
 ideas, harmonious balance of clauses, condensation 
 of expression (so as often to suggest more than is 
 said), an equable flow of rhythm which excludes 
 all abruptness and satisfies the ear, while the 
 mind is filled with the substance of the prayer as 
 a whole, and, as it were, rests in it as complete 
 and as saying just what was wanted. 
 
 One cannot make a Collect by stringing 
 together a few tags of Scriptural language, with 
 the Divine title at the beginning and a reference 
 to the mediation at the end. There is no art in 
 that, and a Collect is an artistic thing, a true 
 composition. 2 
 
 To the Rev. , on the word Oblations. 
 
 Septuagesima, 1882. 
 
 Patrick 3 is, I believe, the first writer who refers 
 the oblations of the Book of 1662 exclusively to 
 
 1 Collect for the Fourth Sunday after Easter. 
 
 2 Cf. Bright, Ancient Collects, Appendix on the Collects in 
 the Prayer-Book, pp. 197 sqq. 
 
 3 Mensa Mystica (Works, i., p. ii5,ed. 1858), and Christian 
 Sacrifice (ibid., p. 377). Cf. Procter and Frere, A new history 
 
'Oblations' 149 
 
 the elements. Through Wheatly 1 this interpre- 
 tation became a tradition ; and, certainly, if one 
 were to look merely at the text of the Book, it 
 would be very forcible. I long took it for granted. 
 Yet not only did the word oblations as his- 
 torically used before 1662, and as used (see Scud- 
 amore 2 ) in Forms of Prayer of Charles II 's. reign, 
 bear a sense wider than that of 'bread and wine,' 
 and find place where there was no celebration, but 
 Cosin, in his suggestions in the corrected Book, 
 had proposed 3 
 
 1. To say offer up as to the bread and wine. 
 
 2. To add and oblations after ' alms.' 
 
 3. To read if there be no alms or oblations given 
 to the poor, in a marginal rubric. 
 
 Possibly, when the Revisers declined to put in 
 offer up, and also struck out given to the poor 
 in the marginal rubric, they may have wished to 
 compensate for the former by the latter, so as to 
 suggest indirectly an oblatory sense for the bread 
 and wine. 
 
 Yet there remains the phrase devotions of the 
 people, which cannot mean the elements (for they 
 are collected with the alms in a bason), and which 
 might be called parallel to oblations. 
 
 of the Book of Common Prayer, p. 482, n. i (ed. 1901), and 
 Journal of Theological Studies, i., pp. 321 (April, 1900). 
 
 1 A Rational Jllustration of the Book of Common Prayer, 
 p. 238 (ed. 1846). 
 
 - Notitia Eiicharistica, p. 409 (2nd ed., 1876). 
 
 3 For these proposals, and the treatment they received, see 
 Parker, Introduction to the revisions of the Book of Common 
 Prayer, p. cc. 
 
150 Liturgical Subjects 
 
 There are, I think, these plain points : 
 
 1. Oblations has, historically, a very general 
 meaning. It would apply to anything, in money 
 or kind, contributed to the service of the Church 
 or of the poor. 
 
 2. But elsewhere in the Prayer- Book offerings, 
 an equivalent phrase, is used of the dues paid 
 by a person (as at a Churching) ; and here obla- 
 tions would properly be exclusive of alms ; as 
 Stephens says, they are ' expressly distinguished (1 
 from alms. Thus, they would mean anything 
 offered by the parishioners or congregation except 
 alms i.e., money for the poor. 
 
 3. They would include money collected for 
 church repairs, for curates' stipends, for societies, 
 etc. 
 
 4. But, since the bread and wine are contributed, 
 or found, by the parish, oblations will, at any rate, 
 always include them. 
 
 5. And when, as is often the case, nothing is 
 collected at the offertory save alms for the poor, 
 then oblations, by exhaustive process, will neces- 
 sarily mean the bread and wine. 
 
 But it will hardly do to say that the word always 
 means the bread and wine only. In many cases it 
 means these plus some other sort of contribution 
 in money. In many others, for lack of such con- 
 tribution, it can only mean the bread and wine. 
 
 1 The Book of Common Prayer with Notes, ii., p. 1175 
 (ed. 1850). 
 
Alms and Oblations* 151 
 
 To the Rev. , on Alms and Oblations. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 July 2T, 1884. 
 
 I have been looking up some notes of mine on 
 the sense of oblations. The matter is not quite so 
 clear as one would wish. Against the application 
 of oblations to the elements is the fact (a) that in 
 the Scottish Prayer-Book of 1636-37 oblations in 
 the same context = devotions of the People , a and, 
 again, (b] one finds Bancroft, as Archbishop, 
 speaking of alms and oblations as to be devoted 
 ' to pious and charitable uses,' 2 and he had been 
 secretary to the Revisers of the Prayer-Book in 
 1 66 1. Moreover, in that Revision (c] Cosin had 
 proposed, indeed, to insert offer up, in relation to 
 the placing of the elements on the Table, but had 
 also gone on to read, if there be no alms or oblations 
 given to the poor, as if he did not mean by oblations 
 the elements. 
 
 1. To begin with, one thing is clear.: oblations 
 must be distinct from alms ; it must mean some 
 things offered by, or, at least, in the name of, the 
 people, which are not alms. 
 
 2. Now, setting aside, for the moment, all 
 
 1 ' While the Presbyter distinctly pronounceth some or all 
 of these sentences for the Offertory, the Deacon . . . shall 
 receive the devotions of the People ... in a bason. . . . And 
 ... he shall . . . bring the said bason with the oblations 
 therein. . . .' Scottish Book of 1637 in Hall, Reliquice Litur- 
 gicce, vol. ii., p. 132 (ed. 1847). 
 
 2 Visitation Articles of 1686, quoted in Journal of Theo- 
 logical Studies, i., p. 342. 
 
152 Liturgical Subjects 
 
 historic considerations as to the terminology of 
 the Office, it is certain that the bread and wine 
 provided by the parish for the Sacrament may be 
 regarded as thus offered by, or in behalf of, the 
 people (as they always were regarded in the 
 early Church). They may then, thus far, be 
 oblations. 
 
 3. And there is this to be said in favour of so 
 regarding them, as dealt with in our service as 
 placed, at this point in the service, on the holy 
 Table -that we know that the Revisers, under 
 Cosin's guidance, and with the recollection of 
 Laudian traditions and aims full in their view, did 
 mean, somehow or other, to restore the oblation 
 of the elements. 
 
 4. We have to put these two facts together, 
 that (a) they introduced a rubric as to placing the 
 elements on the Table ; (6) they introduced the 
 words and oblations into the prayer, and or oblations 
 into the rubric (alms had been in the prayer since 
 the Revision of 1552). 
 
 It is impossible to overlook the significant 
 co-ordinateness of these two acts of theirs ; (a) and 
 (6) must be interpreted together, and illustrate 
 each other. I conjecture that when the Revisers, 
 on consideration, thought it better or safer not to 
 adopt Cosin's proposal about the words offer up, 
 they wished to compass the same end that Cosin 
 had had in view, in a manner which would give less 
 offence ; and for this purpose they struck out given 
 to the poor after oblations, in the hope that thus 
 oblations might be associated simply with the 
 preceding rubric about the bread and wine, and 
 
Alms and Oblations' 
 
 J 53 
 
 receive a sacramental instead of an eleemosynary 
 interpretation. This would be exactly in harmony 
 with their frequent policy of raising the tone of 
 the service by suggestion rather than expression. 
 They were diplomatists by the necessity of their 
 position, and they dealt in words 
 
 P.S. See this parallel : 
 
 The Prayer-Book as it stood 
 before 1661. 
 
 [Rubric] Then shall the 
 Churchwardens . . . gather 
 the devotion of the people, 
 and put the same into the 
 poor men's box. 
 
 [Prayer] . , . most merci- 
 fully to accept our *alms, and 
 to receive . . . 
 
 [Rubric] *If there be none 
 alms given unto the poor, 
 then shall the words [of ac- 
 cepting our alms] be left out 
 unsaid. 
 
 In 1 66 1 Cosiris Proposals. 
 [Rubric] The Deacon or 
 . . . one of the Church- 
 wardens shall receive the alms 
 for the poor and other devo- 
 
 The Prayer- Book as revised in 
 1661. 
 
 [Rubric] . . . the Deacons, 
 Church-wardens . . . shall 
 receive the Alms for the Poor, 
 and other devotions of the 
 people, in a decent bason 
 . . . ; and reverently bring 
 it to the Priest, who shall 
 humbly present and place it 
 upon the holy Table. 
 
 And when there is a Com- 
 munion, the Priest shall then 
 place upon the Table so much 
 Bread and Wine. . . . 
 
 [Prayer] . . . most merci- 
 fully [*to accept our alms and 
 oblations, and] to receive. . . . 
 
 [Rubric] *If there be no 
 alms or oblations, then shall 
 the words [of accepting our 
 alms and oblations] be left out 
 unsaid. 
 
 In 1 6 6 1 Actual Revision. 
 
 [Rubric] ... the Deacons, 
 
 Church-wardens . . . shall 
 
 receive the Alms for the Poor, 
 
 and other devotions of the 
 
'54 
 
 Liturgical Subjects 
 
 tions of the people in a 
 decent basin . . . and rever- 
 ently bring it to the Priest, 
 who shall humbly present and 
 place it upon the holy Table. 
 And if there be a Com- 
 munion, the Priest shall then 
 offer up and place upon the 
 Table as much Bread and 
 Wine as he shall think suffi- 
 cient. 
 
 [Prayer] ... to accept 
 these our alms and oblations, 
 and . . . 
 
 [Rubric] If there be no 
 alms or oblations given to the 
 poor, then shall the words [of 
 accepting our alms and obla- 
 tions] be left out unsaid. 
 
 people, in a decent bason 
 . . . ; and reverently bring it 
 to the Priest, who shall 
 humbly present and place it 
 upon the holy Table. 
 
 And when there is a Com- 
 munion, the Priest shall then 
 place upon the Table . . . 
 
 [Prayer] ... to accept our 
 alms and oblations . 
 
 [Rubric] If there be no 
 alms or oblations, then shall 
 the words, etc. 
 
 To the Editor of The Guardian, on the north 
 side of the Table. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 March 22, 1871. 
 
 In regard to the position of the Priest in Conse- 
 cration, it would appear that the Judicial Com- 
 mittee attach some value to the words of Bishop- 
 then only Archdeacon Cosin, in his Visitation 
 Articles of 1627. He there presumes 1 that the 
 celebrant will remain at the north side of the Table, 
 except when reading the Gospel, preaching, 'de- 
 livering the Sacrament, or on other occasions of a 
 like nature.' Does this illustrate the interpretation 
 
 1 Articles of Inquiry, etc., No. 7 (Works, ii., p. 8, ed. 1845). 
 
'Before the Table' 155 
 
 of ' before the Table ' in our Consecration rubric ? 
 Hardly so : for when Cosin thus wrote the Con- 
 secration rubric ran simply, 'Then the Priest, 
 standing up, shall say as followeth.' Not one 
 word about 'standing before the Table,' 'ordering 
 the Bread and Wine,' 'taking' the elements 'into 
 his hands,' ' before the people.' The rubric as it 
 now stands was drawn up thirty-four years after 
 this Archidiaconal Visitation, and was apparently 
 written by Cosin himself. What would he mean 
 by it ? That is, would he mean to direct the 
 Priest to consecrate in front of the Table? In 
 support of this affirmative view, we may observe 
 
 (1) that Cosin, when Canon of Durham, had been 
 accused by a violently Puritanical brother Canon, 
 Peter Smart, in 1630, of ' administering the Com- 
 munion ' a phrase which must here mean con- 
 secrating ' with his back to the people and his 
 face to the east'; 1 and this although the Prayer- 
 Book then in use said nothing about ' standing 
 before the Table ' (any more than about the 
 ' manual acts ' in Consecration, which yet, as is 
 well known, were generally observed as a matter 
 of usage by well-instructed priests). And, then, 
 
 (2) the editor of Cosiris Correspondence tells us 
 that Cosin appears to have been in the habit of 
 standing at the north side except at the Consecra- 
 tion Prayer, which he repeated ' standing in front 
 of the altar ' (vol. I., p. xxvii.). Further, (3) Cosin 
 must have had in mind throughout the Revision 
 of 1 66 1 that Scottish Prayer- Book of 1637, 
 
 1 Cosin's Correspondence, i., p. 190 (ed. Surtees Society, 
 1858). 
 
156 Liturgical Subjects 
 
 which, as the President of Magdalen well re- 
 marks, ' was destined to exercise a material 
 influence on the Service Book of England.' 1 
 Now, that Prayer- Book had a Consecration 
 rubric of considerable significance: 'The Presbyter 
 . . . during the time of consecration shall stand at 
 such a part of the holy Table where he may with 
 the more ease and decency use both his hands.' 2 
 A direction well understood by the Puritan assail- 
 ants of that liturgy to mean that the celebrant 
 was to consecrate, not at one end of, but in front of, 
 a table placed as a previous rubric prescribed 
 ' at the uppermost part of the Chancel or Church ' 3 
 that is, altar- wise, north and south, along the 
 east wall. 
 
 But another point deserves consideration. It has 
 been said that, as the rubric about the position of 
 the Table ' in the body of the Church or in the 
 Chancel ' suggests a different position for it in fact, 
 apparently supposes (though certainly it does not 
 expressly order) the Table to be set lengthways, 
 with its long sides north and south (see Mr. Walton's 
 able pamphlet on The Celebrants Position*) we 
 cannot interpret 'before the Table,' in our Conse- 
 cration rubric, as necessarily meaning ' in front of 
 it.' But the Revisers of 1661, who framed this 
 latter rubric, were thinking of a table set, as was 
 
 1 Bulley, A Tabular View of the Variations in the Com- 
 munion and Baptismal Offices, p. xxiii (ed. 1842). 
 - Hall, Reliquiae Liturgicce, ii., p. 148. 
 
 3 Ibid., p. 123. 
 
 4 H. B. Walton, The Rubrical Determination of the Cele- 
 branfs Position (1866). 
 
'Before the people' 157 
 
 then the case, altar-wise, along or in front of the 
 east wall. This arrangement, the great 4 ritualistic 
 innovation ' of Charles I.'s time, had made good 
 its ground ; it was established in practice, though 
 not enjoined by law. And to ' stand before ' a 
 table thus placed is to stand either, if there be 
 room, behind it, in the old basilican manner, or 
 else in front of its western side. 1 (Canon Liddon 
 has quoted the illustrative passage in the Office of 
 Matrimony). 2 
 
 But the words ' before the people ' have often 
 been supposed to forbid the Priest to consecrate 
 in this position. He may, it is said, 'order' the 
 elements in front of the altar ; he must return to 
 the north end in order to consecrate. An illustra- 
 tion, however, of the true meaning of this phrase 
 may be derived from a somewhat similar phrase 
 in the Coronation Office. After certain promises 
 have been made by the Sovereign, she goes to the 
 altar-steps, and there, kneeling, touches the Bible 
 held out to her by the Archbishop. Here she is 
 evidently looking away from the people, and look- 
 ing towards the altar. Yet she is said by the 
 rubric to be then making ' Her Solemn Oath in the 
 sight of all the people ' (Maskell, Mon. Kit., ii. 
 p. ii4). 3 
 
 The ' Remonstrance ' now in circulation selects 
 for special reference that one point in the present 
 case which strongly interests all High Church- 
 men. But many who have signed it feel aggrieved 
 at the restrictions of existing liberty in the matter 
 
 1 Cf. Archbishop Benson's Lincoln Judgment, pp. 18 sqq. 
 
 2 Cf. infra, p. 161. 3 2nd edition, 1882. 
 
158 Liturgical Subjects 
 
 of vestments and ' the mixture.' I have already 
 ventured to show that the Court's assumption, to 
 the effect that the private mixing of the chalice 
 has no history, and is of no interest to anyone, 
 was made in ignorance of facts. 1 And as to the 
 vestments, one might have expected that the 
 Court, proceeding on its dictum in the Westerton 
 case ' The same dresses, and the same utensils 
 or articles, which were used under the first Prayer- 
 Book of Edward VI., may still be used' would 
 have drawn a distinction between those vestments 
 which were mentioned in that book, and those as 
 the amice and maniple which were not so men- 
 tioned. But no such discrimination has been 
 exhibited. The Court's dictum of 1857 is really 
 cancelled by its Judgment of 1871, which pro- 
 scribes the chasuble, alb, and tunicle ordered by 
 that Book, and only allows the cope in cathedrals 
 and collegiate churches, and that on authority 
 subsequent to the reign of King Edward. Hereby 
 the reference in our present rubric to ' the second 
 year of Edward VI.' is deprived of all reasonable 
 meaning is made, one may fairly say, of no effect ; 
 and, so far, a great statute of the realm, the Act of 
 Uniformity, which covers the whole of our present 
 Prayer- Book, is constructively stultified. The 
 significance of this is increased when we remember 
 that the Ornaments Rubric, as it once stood, had 
 a clause 2 which referred implicitly to some further 
 
 1 See above, p. 147. 
 
 2 ' According to the Act of Parliament set in the beginning 
 of this [sc. 1559] book.' Liturgical Senrices of Queen Eliza- 
 beth, p. 53 (ed. Parker Society). The reference is to i Eliz., 
 
The Ornaments Rubric 159 
 
 'order' which Elizabeth might be supposed to 
 have ' taken ' after the passing of her Act of 
 Uniformity, and whereby vestments might be held 
 to have been excluded ; that even with this clause 
 the Puritan party in 1641 and 1661 supposed the 
 rubric to sanction vestments, and objected to it 
 accordingly ; that with full knowledge of this the 
 Revisers of 1661 (including Cosin, who had agreed 
 with the Puritans as to the legal effect of the 
 rubric) struck out that clause, and so made the 
 rubric look straight back to ' the second year of 
 Edward'; that the words 'be retained and be in 
 use ' were simply copied by the Revisers from the 
 Act of Elizabeth ; that if Bishops after 1661 did 
 not order their parish Priests to wear chasubles, 
 neither did they, so far as we know, order their 
 Deans and Canons to wear copes, but confined 
 themselves in this, as in other matters, to what 
 seemed practicable in the way of official require- 
 ment. 
 
 Enough on these points. Dr. Monsell calls 
 this l a judgment without mercy.' It is more to 
 the purpose to call it a judgment without equity. 
 The upright intentions of its framers are above 
 all question, but the result of their work does 
 injustice, we may well believe, to their own per- 
 sonal dispositions ; for one can hardly ascribe fair- 
 ness or equitableness to a decision which virtually 
 contravenes a statute, overthrows one dictum of 
 the same Court, explains away the prima-facie 
 
 c. 2, ibid., p. 32 ; or Gee and Hardy, Documents illustrative of 
 English Church History, p. 466. 
 
160 Liturgical Subjects 
 
 sense of another, puts a non-natural sense on 
 momentous words, and strains the facts and docu- 
 ments of the case in an intensely restrictive 
 direction, and against the undefended side. One 
 might have looked for tokens of moderation, 
 liberality, tolerance, disposition to ' interpret be- 
 nignantly ' in a matter admitted to involve some 
 difficulties, and leading to penal results. One sees 
 the sharpest edge of absolute prohibition pressed 
 down by a de facto Supreme Court of Appeal, 
 not on mere extravagances or excesses, but on 
 a whole type of ceremonial which could largely 
 refer, in its own vindication, to previous language 
 of this same Court, which, however unacceptable 
 to many earnest and pious persons, is yet prized 
 by many others, not on merely aesthetic and anti- 
 quarian grounds, but as representing what they 
 hold to be great facts of the Divine kingdom, and 
 which has been found by experience in many 
 cases, specially among the younger lay people, to 
 lift up hearts into a higher atmosphere of rever- 
 ential devotion, to increase their capacity for 
 enjoying ' the pleasures of God's house,' and to 
 deepen their sense of the beauty, majesty, rich- 
 ness, power in one comprehensive word, the 
 glory of the faith and worship of His Incarnate 
 Son. 
 
 To have taught or learned high truths as to 
 Christ's sacramental work, without the aid of this 
 or that expressive ceremony, is one thing. To be 
 deprived of such externals after they have become 
 associated with such truths, and to suffer this dis- 
 tressing, this manifoldly unsettling privation, not 
 
Ceremonial an outwork of Faith 161 
 
 by a deliberate expression of the Church's mind, 
 but by a decree of the Judicial Committee of 
 Privy Council and a decree widely felt to be 
 harsh and unjust is quite another. The grave 
 religious evils which would follow the general 
 enforcement of such a decree are matter for the 
 religious consideration of prelates who care for all 
 classes of their flocks, who would be loath to see a 
 large body of loyal Churchmen wounded and dis- 
 heartened, who desire to promote the Church's 
 internal unity at a time of increasing peril to- 
 Establishments, and, more than all, who know 
 what may come, in an age like this, of forcibly 
 uprooting anything that can serve as a help to 
 faith, and therefore as a link between the soul 
 and its Redeemer. 
 
 To the Rev. , on Before the Table. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 June 6, 1900. 
 
 I do not remember that we followed any Latin 
 version in regard to that passage. 1 We took ante 
 with respect to the Table because ante naturally 
 means in front of a thing, whether with face or 
 back towards it. But in this case the Priest must 
 have his face to the Table, because he has to 
 order what is upon it. 
 
 But we took coram in reference to the people, 
 
 1 ' Cum Sacerdos, stans ante Mensam . . . coram populo. r 
 Bright and Medd, Liber Precum Publicarum, p. 155 (ed. 
 1877). 
 
 1 I 
 
162 Liturgical Subjects 
 
 because coram expresses the idea of doing a thing 
 in the presence of a person or persons. This 
 does not necessarily mean with the face towards 
 the person ; for in the Marriage Service the 
 parties witness before this company, although they 
 do not face it. In the Coronation Service the 
 Queen goes to the Altar and makes Her Solemn 
 Oath in the sight of all the People, but, of course, 
 with her face towards the altar as she kneels upon 
 the steps. This is, I think, parallel in sense to the 
 words before the people in our rubric. In the old 
 Coronation Service the oath was to be taken 
 super altare coram cunctis, and then the King is 
 to prostrate himself ante altare during Veni 
 Creator ? 
 
 I have not yet met with the book which you 
 mention. Personally I hold that a practice 2 of 
 which the Prayer- Book says nothing may have, 
 and in the case in question has, much to recom- 
 mend it when it can be adopted without risk to 
 health or mental attention, but that it cannot be 
 imposed on Anglican Church people as an obli- 
 gatory law. 
 
 If Mr. should really wish to make my 
 
 acquaintance, I should be glad to see him if he 
 would call. But please do not urge him to do 
 so. Acquaintances of this sort, which the junior 
 merely consents to make because a friend suggests 
 it, come to nothing. I have had some experience 
 of this kind, and at the age one has reached I 
 fear one can make but little use of the opportunities 
 
 1 Maskell, Mon. Rit., ii., pp. 1 1 sq. 
 - Fasting Communion. 
 
Posture of celebrant 163 
 
 of intercourse with undergraduates, as one could at 
 an earlier time. 
 
 To the Rev. on the posture of the celebrant 
 
 while communicating. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 July 26, 1887. 
 
 The ' ritual ' custom, as you know, is for the 
 celebrant to stand when he communicates. I 
 suspect it to be a survival of the old Mass custom. 
 In the Sarum Rite the Priest never knelt at all, 
 though he repeatedly 'inclined.' What is said is 
 that the reception by the Priest is the consumma- 
 tion of the sacrifice. I do not myself entirely 
 appreciate this view. I think it at least maintain- 
 able that the Priest necessarily sustains two char- 
 acters that he is, as celebrant, the representative 
 of our Lord in the great act of memorial ; but he 
 is also, as communicant, one of those who are 
 joint partakers of ' that one bread.' 1 I do not 
 quite like the notion of his being differentiated, 
 so to speak, from the people in the act of Com- 
 munion. Does any celebrant at that moment 
 think of himself as engaged in an act of sacrifice ? 
 Does he not rather feel that he is on a level with 
 communicants behind him in their common need 
 of, and their common reception of, the Heavenly 
 Food ? I have a feeling, which I cannot shake off, 
 that this is the simpler and more natural view, and 
 that the other is the more technical and artificial. 
 
 1 i Cor. x. 17. 
 
 1 1 2 
 
164 Liturgical Subjects 
 
 Speaking of the matter from the point of view of 
 edification, I should have thought that it might 
 perplex, and even offend, good Church people 
 not familiar with ritual ' order ' to see the Priest 
 stand at such a moment. They might ask, Is he 
 not, then, bound to be as visibly reverent and 
 humbly thankful as we of the laity are ? Cer- 
 tainly I have had this thought when I have seen 
 a celebrant stand during the Confession. How 
 
 o 
 
 he could bear to do so I knew not. All this is 
 against ritual authorities, even against the view 
 taken in the Annotated Book of Common Prayer. 1 
 I cannot help it ; I merely give x y u mv private 
 opinion. Bishop Cosin in 1661 (see Parker's In- 
 troduction to the Revisions of the Book of Common 
 Prayer, pp. ccxvii. sgq.} proposed to insert an 
 express direction that the celebrant should receive 
 the Holy Communion ' in both kinds upon his 
 
 knees.' When I celebrate at St. or at 
 
 similar churches, I conform to the standing 
 practice, but my own inclination, and, I confess, 
 my own personal opinion as to propriety, goes the 
 other way. The Scottish Liturgy gives no direc- 
 tion in any of its recensions. 1 have not got a 
 copy of the Nonjurors' Office at hand. If one goes 
 to the First Book of Edward, one finds another 
 instance of the paucity of its rubrical directions. 
 It presupposed a knowledge of, and a retention of, 
 old customs. It did not even direct the communi- 
 cants to receive kneeling. That was done in the 
 Second Book. The doctrine that the sacrifice is 
 not complete until it has been partaken of does 
 1 Blunt, Annotated, etc., p. 391 (ed. 1888). 
 
Sacrifice complete on Consecration 165 
 
 not seem to have occurred to the framers of the 
 ancient liturgies, the Roman 1 included, for they 
 place the Great Oblation within the act of Conse- 
 cration itself, or, at any rate, immediately after- 
 wards. And, unless I am mistaken, our modern 
 devotional manuals usually advise the communi- 
 cant to regard the memorial sacrifice as really 
 made as soon as the Consecration Prayer is 
 finished. Persons are directed or encouraged 
 there to plead, by virtue of that memorial, and in 
 the presence of that which is its centre and con- 
 stituent, for whatever objects they have at heart. 
 Of course, the Priest communicates in a few 
 moments. after he has finished the Consecration ; 
 but the point to which, I think, attention is 
 directed is not his Communion, but the completion 
 of the Consecration itself. 
 
 To the Rev. , on the Prayer of Oblation and 
 
 the Eucharistic Sacrifice. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 January 13, 1897. 
 
 It never occurred to me that ' this our bounden 
 duty and service ' could be restricted to the offer- 
 ing of ' ourselves.' I should certainly take it as 
 applying to the whole Eucharistic service. 
 
 I do not find in the Sarum Mass rubrics any 
 provision for communicating the people as there 
 
 1 'Unde et memores,' etc., the consecration, as is implied 
 by the prayers of the Roman Canon, not being completed till 
 after ' Supra quae ' and ' Supplices te.' Cf. Hammond, 
 Liturgies, pp. 336 sq. (ed. 1878). 
 
166 Liturgical Subjects 
 
 is in the Roman. But I have no doubt that they 
 were communicated that is, when they desired 
 to be after the celebrant had received in both 
 kinds. Maskell (Ancient Liturgy, p. iS/j. 1 ) quotes 
 the Ritus celebrandi Missam : ' Si qui sint com- 
 municandi in missa, sacerdos post sumptionem 
 sanguinis, antequam se purificet, facta genu- 
 flexione, ponat particulas,' etc., on a paten for 
 administration. Of course, Mass was often in 
 fact, most frequently said without communicants. 
 Communion once a year had, in many parts of 
 England, become the practice. 
 
 On the general subject, I think the best clue is 
 to associate the Eucharistic sacrifice, not directly 
 with the sacrifice on the Cross, but with the 
 heavenly self-presentation, of which the Eucharist 
 service is the earthly counterpart. Both look 
 back to the sacrifice on the Cross ; both plead 
 its efficacy as an all-sufficient atonement ; neither 
 is co-ordinate with it or a repetition of it. If 
 Romanists had kept this in view, they would not 
 have gone so far wrong as they have done. 2 
 
 To the Editor of The Guardian, on St. Chrysos- 
 tom and Evening Communions. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 April 13, 1871. 
 
 . . . The Church rule, as it stood in St. Chry- 
 
 sostom's days, was not the less binding on the 
 
 conscience of a faithful Churchman because it was 
 
 not laid down in Scripture, or because Scripture 
 
 1 3rd edn., 1882. - See above, pp. 88, 101. 
 
Fasting Communion 167 
 
 gave indications of a different observance. What 
 St. Chrysostom means to say is that nothing- 
 should induce him to neglect the Church rule 1 ; 
 that he would regard such neglect with horror 
 'the utmost horror' is Dean Milman's phrase 
 (History of Christianity, iii., p. 139, ed. 1863) 
 as an offence deserving heavy penalties (this is, 
 in fact, to understate the force of his words), but, 
 still, that the rule was not what we should call a 
 moral law, and that tradition, and not Scripture, 
 was its basis. I cannot see that to admit this is 
 to admit that ' on the broad issues of the case 
 St. Chrysostom was of one mind with those who, 
 of their own authority, set this rule at naught.' 
 
 With regard to the other passage quoted from 
 St. Chrysostom's third homily on the Ephesians 
 (torn, xi., p. 22, ed. Montfaucon, Paris, 1734), I 
 venture to think that it does not touch the 
 question. . . . The mention in this passage of 
 the practice of communicating at a fasting time 
 refers, not to the universal custom of receiving the 
 Eucharist before the first meal of the day, but to 
 the selection of Lent as a specially appropriate 
 reason for communicating. 
 
 There is another passage in St. Chrysostom 
 which may as well be quoted in regard to the 
 general observance of fasting Communion in his 
 day. It is in his twenty-seventh homily on 
 i Corinthians, $? He is rebuking those who 
 
 1 Sc. of Fasting Communion. Cf. Ep. 125 (Opera, torn, iii., 
 p. 668 D, ed. Ben.) and Bright, Lessons from the Lives of three 
 Great Fathers, App. x., p. 252. 
 
 2 Opera, torn, x., p. 248 c. 
 
168 Liturgical Subjects 
 
 .are careless after communicating. ' You before 
 you have partaken, fast, that you may appear 
 in some measure worthy of the Communion,' etc. 
 Those who now, among ourselves, urge the 
 practice of fasting Communion in all cases in 
 which it can be followed without injury to health- 
 are, in fact, resisting, as best they may, a move- 
 ment which, by multiplying Evening Commu- 
 nions, will undoubtedly tend to the weakening, or 
 even to the destroying, of that faith and reverence 
 towards our Lord's greatest gift in the Holy 
 Eucharist which was so conspicuous an element 
 in St. Chrysostom's spiritual life. So far as they 
 pursue their object with equitableness and charity, 
 .and with a view not merely to ecclesiastical pre- 
 cedents, but to deep religious interests, they may 
 surely claim his authority on their side. 
 
 To the Editor of The Guardian on St. Chrysostom 
 and non-communicating attendance. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, 
 
 June 15, 1872. 
 
 What manner of persons were those Antiochene 
 Churchmen whom St. Chrysostom rebuked for 
 their ' non - communicating attendance ? Not 
 only . . . were they in the habit of communica- 
 ting only thrice a year, and then pro forma, with- 
 out earnestness and devotion, but they carried 
 their indevotion into their attendance at the 
 ordinary celebrations. They stood idly gazing at 
 the service, or, as St. Chrysostom puts it, ' when 
 
Non-communicating attendance 169 
 
 the King's table was present and the angels were 
 ministering at it, and the King Himself was 
 present, they stood gaping' 1 ; they were quite in- 
 different to the fact of their own condition as 
 habitual non-communicants ' cared nothing about 
 it, thought it nothing ' 2 and thus might be de- 
 scribed as virtually ' despising the mysteries ' with 
 an 'impudent effrontery,' which was the result of 
 irreligious 'sloth.' Such was their moral and 
 spiritual condition. Is there not an essential 
 difference between it and the condition of those 
 regular and devout communicants, whose right to 
 attend celebration at other times without actual 
 participation would be implicitly assailed by that 
 rubric which, on Archdeacon Randall's motion, was 
 adopted in a thin House by a small majority? And 
 ought this difference to be forgotten and ignored 
 when St. Chrysostom is cited on this subject ? 
 
 There is at least, there ought to be no differ- 
 ence of opinion as to the extreme undesirableness 
 of inviting the presence of indevout and alien 
 spectators at the most solemn mysteries of the 
 Church, and as little in regard to the ruinous 
 mistake, or, rather, the undutifulness to our Lord 
 and the starving of the soul's life, which would be 
 involved in the practical substitution of ' attend- 
 ance' for sacramental 'reception.' 'Attendance,' 
 however devout, is not in any sense an equivalent 
 to reception, and ' attendants,' as such, are on a 
 lower footing than receivers, for they are not 
 
 1 yd Horn, in Ephes., 5 (Opera, torn, xi., p. 23 B, c). 
 - Ibid., 4 (Opera, torn, xi., p. 23 B). Cf. Bingham, Anti- 
 quities, XV. iv., 2. 
 
170 Liturgical Subjects 
 
 fully participating in the Eucharistic action. But 
 the persons whose present freedom so many are 
 anxious to see secured are either (i) in the habit 
 of regular, devout, and not infrequent communion, 
 or (2) training to become communicants. It is well 
 known, I believe, to not a few pastors that by 
 ' attendance ' under judicious guidance persons 
 are often led on to form habits of communicating 
 who otherwise might have gone on as non-com- 
 municants. What Mr. Carter and others desire 
 to preserve is, not the ' attendance ' of non-com- 
 municants, but the right of ' attendance ' for devo- 
 tional purposes, on the part of communicants, at 
 other celebrations beside those at which they 
 communicate, and also of others who are learning 
 to appreciate the sacramental privileges of the 
 Church, and preparing to use them regularly. 
 As to a ' frightfully rare reception of the Holy 
 Mysteries/ have not we in England, during the 
 last three centuries, been familiar with that evil 
 as prevalent among large masses of professing 
 Church people, who have never been in the habit 
 of ' attending,' but have simply walked out of 
 church as a matter of course on ' Sacrament 
 days ' ? . . . 
 
 Those devout communicants who, beside their 
 regular communions, ' attend ' at some other cele- 
 brations, would hardly allow that Archdeacon 
 Freeman 1 had entered into their state of mind 
 when he described them as ' saying or doing one 
 thing while the Church was doing another.' They 
 
 1 Cf. Principles of Divine Service, vol. i., p. 388, and vol. ii., 
 Introduction, pp. 29, 53. 60 (ed. 1880). 
 
Opinion of Dr. W. H. Mill 171 
 
 would probably think that he had estimated such 
 attendance, so to speak, ab extra, without that 
 kind of sympathetic discernment which is so re- 
 markable a feature in the famous letter 1 of Dr. 
 Mill. ' I would not,' said that greatest of modern 
 Cambridge divines, ' conceive those persons to 
 be excluded from' the 'benefit' of the Euchar- 
 istic offering, ' whose presence is intended to 
 express their sympathy with the act ; who feel 
 strongly that it is better to be with the Communi- 
 cants than with those who turn their backs upon 
 them, while prevented from any cause satisfactory 
 to their own conscience, and not offensive to- 
 others, from participating with the reverence they 
 feel due to the Body and Blood of the Lord. I 
 cannot but think they are included, if they are 
 duly sensible of the great blessing and privilege 
 of actual Communion, and are not in any way 
 seeking excuses for standing aloof from it; and (I 
 would add) if they are not seeking new and un- 
 authorized modes of approaching the Divine 
 Majesty, seeking through a sight of the Elements 
 what is only promised to the manducation of them. 
 . . . While the comparison with the Primitive 
 Church makes me very well pleased that our 
 Church has never commanded the absence of 
 those who do not participate, when many of the 
 Puritan school were for enforcing such an order, 
 I should be strongly opposed, under our present 
 circumstances, to inviting their presence as non- 
 communicants' (Quoted in the Ecclesiologist for 
 
 1 Dr. W. H. Mill in Tracts on Catholic Unity, No. 7 
 (London, Darling). 
 
172 Liturgical Subjects 
 
 1858, vol. xix., p. 1 80.) The whole letter is 
 eminently worth reading. It may be confidently 
 hoped that Convocation will not in these days 
 impose a prohibition which would have been 
 earnestly deprecated by Dr. Mill. 
 
 To the Editor of The Guardian, on non-communi- 
 cating attendance. 
 
 August 9, 1872. 
 
 It may be permissible to observe : 
 
 1. That nothing as yet advanced has shaken 
 the statement made in your columns to the effect 
 that St. Chrysostom's censures in the Homilies 
 on the Ephesians apply, as the context proves, to 
 a case of non-communicating attendance, which is 
 morally quite different from that of regular and 
 devout communicants who at certain times attend 
 the celebration devotionally, without sacramental 
 reception. St. Chrysostom, therefore, cannot be 
 cited as an authority for regarding all who do not 
 mean to communicate on a particular occasion as 
 ranking 'pro hac vice among the penitents.' 
 
 2. That if the Ninth Apostolic Canon 1 (accept- 
 ing the Dionysian version of it) be taken strictly, 
 and appealed to as practically authoritative, it will 
 
 ras TOJ)S /crtovTas TKTTIM/S xat TMV ypa^Zv aKo-jov^a.^, (jt,fi 
 TTJ K2<><rtv~/Ji(i *t TY) a//a fj,iru,\fj-^/-i, w? ara^/'av 
 TTJ X>cXjjori<2, apopL^HrOou ~/J?TI. Hefele, Councils, 
 i., p. 461. For an account of the date, authorship, and authority 
 of these Canons, see Bishop John Wordsworth, The Ministry 
 .of Grace, p. 42, and Brightman, Liturgies, I., p. xxv. 
 
Proving too much 173 
 
 prove a good deal too much. For it will prevent 
 all Church people who do not, on a given Sunday 
 or holiday, purpose to communicate, from attend- 
 ing any part of the Communion Service, or, indeed, 
 any part of the morning service, and will compel 
 them to stay away from church for that morning 
 altogether. 
 
 3. That whereas, ' in the primitive Church the 
 several classes of non-communicants were solemnly 
 dismissed, each with appropriate prayer and cere- 
 mony,' communicants who for some reason did 
 not, on that particular occasion, intend to com- 
 municate were not dismissed at all. Those of 
 them who, in St. Chrysostom's time, went out 
 after the sermon, did so without liturgical 
 warrant j 1 and his expression of grief at seeing so 
 many of his hearers depart, ' when Christ was 
 about to appear in the sacred mysteries,' 2 does not 
 lead us to think that, had he known of the case 
 now before us, he would have insisted on the de- 
 parture of devout Church people who might have 
 communicated a short time previously perhaps 
 even at an earlier hour of the same day and who 
 wished to remain in prayer throughout the celebra- 
 tion. Nor would he surely have applied to their 
 conduct such words as those cited from pseudo- 
 Dionysius about certain persons ' not perfect in 
 simplicity, not altogether unblamable,' although 
 he would probably have exhorted them to guard 
 
 1 "Oaoi e'v ixeravota avss.Strt -rams (Brightman, Liturgies, 
 p. 472. 
 
 2 De Incomprehens. Dei Nat., iii., 6 (Opera, torn, i., 
 p. 469 A). 
 
174 Liturgical Subjects 
 
 against any substitution of such attendance for 
 communion, or against any other misuse of the 
 time spent in church under such very solemn 
 circumstances advice which, we may trust, will 
 be acted upon now. 
 
 To the Rev. , on non-communicating atten- 
 dance at the Holy Eucharist. 
 
 [In reply to a paper submitted to him containing certain 
 propositions on the subject.] 
 
 October 24, 1896. 
 
 The practice of the Primitive Church does not 
 seem to throw any decisive light on the matter as 
 it comes before us, for the simple reason that a 
 stringent discipline prevailed in all the depart- 
 ments of its life, and that we have none whatever 
 so far as the modern laity are concerned. It was 
 then, I suppose, a matter of acknowledged obliga- 
 tion for the faithful to communicate, as a rule, 
 every Sunday. They could not, without risk of 
 censure, go out when those who could not com- 
 municate were dismissed at the end of the first 
 part of the Liturgy. There was also, as we all 
 know, an express regulation that the penitents of 
 the highest class, who were all but restored to 
 full Church privileges, should ' stand with ' the 
 faithful throughout the celebration, but should not 
 actually communicate. 1 This implied that, when 
 they were again admitted into the ranks of the 
 faithful, they should do so. 
 
 1 Nicene Canon II. Cf. Bright, Notes on the Canons, 
 PP- 3 8 > 75 ed. 1882. 
 
Eclecticism no guide 175 
 
 If, then, we now, on the score of ancient prac- 
 tice, forbid those who are not intending to com- 
 municate at a particular celebration to remain, or 
 ' attend,' without communicating, we ought, in 
 consistency, to press all whom we consider as 
 ' faithful ' to communicate every Sunday. And 
 who would dare to incur such a responsibility in 
 our circumstances ? 
 
 My point here is, that it will not do for us to 
 make a half-and-half, bit by bit, eclectic use of 
 ancient methods or rules in this matter. All that 
 we can do is to follow, as far as may be, the mind 
 of the Early Church under gravely different condi- 
 tions. I may add that passages often quoted 
 from St. Chrysostom as against all non-communi- 
 cating attendance need to be carefully looked at in 
 their context (see the 3rd Homily on the Ephe- 
 sians). The persons whom Chrysostom is cen- 
 suring are idle, indevout gazers, such as, it seems, 
 the earlier form of our own Exhortation 1 had in 
 view, if one is to construe the words literally. 
 They would be better away ; they are insulting 
 the awful rite. It was the world which had 
 invaded the Church ; Christianity having become 
 respectable, fashionable, popular in a sense, men 
 crowded to its highest functions with unprepared 
 souls ; and this, doubtless, went on in all great 
 cities as well as at Antioch. It was a new problem, 
 which the primitive ages had not known. Prob- 
 ably it vexes Roman Catholic authorities abroad, 
 
 1 Sc. of 1552 and 1559. Cf. Cardwell, Two Liturgies of 
 Edward VI., p. 283 ; and Clay, Liturgical Services of Queen 
 Elizabeth (ed. Parker Society), p. 186. 
 
176 Liturgical Subjects 
 
 where to hear Mass on Sundays is a matter of 
 course for those who would keep well with the 
 Church ; and very often, one fears rather, one 
 cannot doubt it is a sort of attendance which 
 might call forth a rebuke like that of St. Chry- 
 sostom. After his time, in the West it was 
 thought best to require all fideles to stay until 
 after the priest's communion 1 at any rate. 
 
 One other remark may be suggested by any 
 retrospect of the usages of antiquity. An ancient 
 Christian would certainly have been very much 
 astonished if he could have been taken on Sunday 
 morning to a choral Mattins and Ante-Communion 
 (so called). He would have said, ' Is that all that 
 you Christian people do at the Lord's Day morn- 
 ing worship ?' On his Lord's Day he had been 
 wont to attend a service which did incomparably 
 more in the way of bringing home the great 
 realities of the supernatural order than Morning 
 Prayer, as such, can do. And it is just at this 
 point that frequent ' attendance,' in a reverent 
 spirit, by those who do periodically and devoutly 
 communicate, meets a want and secures an object. 
 It makes people feel what is expressed in Heb. x. 
 19-25, and xii. 22-24. And it is just in this realiza- 
 tion of the presence of the Kingdom of God that 
 our English temperament usually falls so far below 
 
 1 According to the Ordo Romanns> I., j 20 (c. 800 A.D.), the 
 Archdeacon at Rome announced the day and place of the next 
 ' station ' at this point of the Mass (cf. Muratori, Lit. Rom. 
 Vet., ii., col. 985). 'Par precaution'; says Mgr. Duchesne, 
 1 les personnes qui ne prenaient point part a la communion [du 
 peuple] avaient sans doute 1'habitude de sortir avant qu'elle ne 
 commen^at ' (Origines, etc., p. 179). 
 
Unbalanced language 177 
 
 the primitive Christian standard. As Dean Butler 
 once said to me, ' What we want the people to 
 get hold of is, that something very great takes 
 place at Church, which cannot take place else- 
 where.' The daily Office does not impress this 
 fact, and the Eucharist does ; that is the difference. 
 
 The mind of the Bishops of 1661 may not be 
 easily ascertainable. They struck out of the Ex- 
 hortation the words I have referred to ; but that 
 may have been because the custom of ' attendance ' 
 had practically died out. But I aver I should not 
 lay much stress on their mere opinion ; they had 
 not before them the question as it comes before us. 
 ***** 
 
 Further, I would say that, even for intending 
 communicants, or for actual periodical communi- 
 cants, a caution seems necessary. No one who 
 ' attends ' without reception is, pro hac vice, on a 
 level with those who do receive. The rubric of 
 the First Book expressed this, when it directed non- 
 participants to ' depart out of the quire ?1 into the 
 nave. I do not approve of any language which 
 implies that mere attendance is a fulfilment of our 
 Lord's ' Divine appointment of this act of worship,' 
 or that it involves a complete share in the oblatory 
 part of the service. A good deal of language in 
 some of our devotional books or in Church news- 
 papers seems to me faulty in this important par- 
 ticular. It is assumed that we do fully ' shew 
 forth,' or proclaim, ' the Lord's death,' if we are 
 present with devout minds at the celebration, yet 
 do not, on that occasion, ' eat of that bread and 
 
 1 Cardwell, Two Liturgies, p. 281. 
 
 12 
 
178 Liturgical Subjects 
 
 drink of that cup.' But that is not a true represen- 
 tation of St. Paul's words. I am also not without 
 apprehension that the pressing of Sunday ' attend- 
 ance' as a canonical obligation on all Churchmen 
 may, or, rather, that it will, tend to produce a per- 
 functoriness, which may develope into irreverent 
 coldness, or, as Chrysostom calls it, ' indifference.' 1 
 The multiplication of obligations of this sort among 
 ' advanced ' Churchmen, as they are called, is, 1 
 think, a snare of our time, and needs to be cor- 
 rected. It takes men back to a state of things 
 in which ' letter ' exists without ' Spirit.' 
 
 To the Rev. , on the same subject. 
 
 [ ? Aug., 1872.] 
 
 The Canon to which I referred is the tenth 
 (otherwise the ninth) Apostolical Canon. ' All 
 those of the faithful who come into Church and 
 listen to the Scriptures, but who do not remain 
 for the Prayer and the Holy Reception, ought to 
 be separated' (from Church privileges) 'as causing 
 disorder in the Church.' 
 
 If this Canon be pressed against the presence 
 at the Eucharist of any persons who do not there 
 and then communicate, it may as well be pressed 
 against their presence at any part of the Sunday 
 morning service. They ought not, on that show- 
 ing, to come to Church unless they are prepared 
 to receive. This is what I meant by ' proving 
 too much. . . .' Actual Communion is the only 
 
 1 Cf. p. 169, note 2, above. 
 
Keble's death 
 
 179 
 
 full mode of sharing in the Eucharistic Service ; 
 and faithful Christians ought to aim at weekly 
 Communion. When they attend without com- 
 municating, for good reasons, they are, pro hac 
 vice, occupying a lower position than those who 
 do communicate. 
 
 To the Rev. , on Kebles death and on Good 
 
 Friday celebration of Holy Communion. 
 
 OXFORD, 
 Holy Saturday, 1866. 
 
 I must add a line to my letter of yesterday 
 that is, I must add a short letter to follow it in 
 order to tell you of the heavy loss which the 
 Church has endured. Mr. Keble died at Bourne- 
 mouth on Maundy Thursday afternoon. His ill- 
 ness had only caused immediate alarm for four 
 days. His brother said the Commendatory 
 Prayer ; his wife who will soon follow him at 
 once referred to the closing stanzas of his hymn 
 for Good Friday. Liddon writes, ' a fitting close 
 of his wonderful life, that he should lie down to 
 rest under the Cross of his Lord.' To me, too, 
 Maundy Thursday seems a fitting day for the 
 departure, if depart he must, of one who has done 
 more, perhaps, than anyone else in our day to 
 bring out, in all its depth and sweetness and 
 power, the Mystery of which that day commemo- 
 rates the institution. 
 
 I talked to Lord Beauchamp last night, as we 
 returned from SS. Philip and James' Evensong 
 
 12 2 
 
180 Liturgical Subjects 
 
 (Gray gave us an exquisite sermon) on the point 
 of Good Friday Communion, or, rather, celebra- 
 tion. His singular nobleness and purity of inward 
 character which would not be marred if he were 
 all the Earls of England in his own person- 
 coupled with a very vivid and intense faith, make 
 his opinion on such matters worth hearing. He 
 said, ' It isn't a thing you can argue about ; but if 
 a person once feels the true nature of the Eucha- 
 ristic Service, if the Sacrifice, in all its joyfulness, 
 shines out before him, he will feel it next to im- 
 possible to have a celebration on that day. It 
 isn't a day of festival, and a celebration must be 
 festal.' What one feels is that, while a celebra- 
 tion comes naturally on any other day unless 
 this day be also exceptional, naturally even after 
 a funeral Good Friday is a day sui generis : not 
 a day like any other. He is not a martyr, but a 
 sin-bearer, and that fact, as Dr. Pusey somewhere 
 says, is what wraps the day in such depths of 
 mourning. At three yesterday we had Litany 
 and Miserere, and afterwards I found St. 
 Thomas's thronged while the Reproaches were 
 being sung. I doubt the safety of introducing 
 such services on any other day, for fear the 
 Puritans could take advantage of it in their own 
 style ; but Good Friday is exceptional, and 
 perhaps the ordinary offices of the Prayer-Book 
 are not quite sufficiently expressive. 
 
 Gray said that according to medical authorities 
 the blood and water were the result of a real 
 rupture of the heart. 1 
 1 Cf. Dale, The Atonement, p. 462, note D (gth ed., 1884). 
 
Good Friday Communion 181 
 
 To the Rev. , on celebration of Holy Com- 
 munion on Good Friday. 
 
 February 14, 1880. 
 
 My own feeling, I confess, would be not to 
 have Holy Communion on Good Friday. I 
 know that there is something to be said on the 
 other side, and that (e.g.) Bishop Andrewes refers 
 to Holy Communion on that day in his sermons. 1 
 Moreover, it may be said, in the Latin Church 
 there is a Mass of the Pre-sanctified, which 
 includes a good deal more than we could have in 
 what is called the Ante-Communion. It includes 
 an actual participation of the Reserved Sacra- 
 ment. We cannot reserve the Sacrament, and 
 therefore, it is argued, we had better have the 
 regular Eucharistic Service. 
 
 At the same time, on the other hand, there was 
 a strong tradition in the ancient Church against 
 associating the highest and most joyful act of 
 Christian worship with the most mournful of 
 all anniversaries. It was felt, I suppose, that the 
 Ter-Sanctus and other such parts of the service 
 had better be silent, so to speak, on that day. 
 
 I grant that the authority of the Laodicene 
 Council 2 would go so far as to exclude the cele- 
 bration from nearly all the week-days of Lent ; 
 but I think the principle natural and reverential. 
 The difference between different sections of our 
 Church on this point seems probably to coincide 
 
 1 Works, ii., p. 134 (ed. 1841). 
 
 2 Canon 49. Cf. Hefele, ii., p. 320. 
 
182 Liturgical Subjects 
 
 with the different views which they take of the 
 Eucharistic service. If it is viewed simply as a 
 Communion, there will be a natural disposition to 
 have it on that day, the day of the Passion, just 
 as on Easter Day, as was the custom when I was 
 a boy in Yorkshire. But if it is viewed as also 
 a high act of triumphant thanksgiving, the cul- 
 mination in this world of all possible worship, 
 then there is a natural disposition to forego it for 
 this one day, the ' darkest ' l day of the year, as 
 Keble calls it. The mind is not in tune for 
 exaltation ; it prefers to wait till the death-day is 
 over. And as this view of the Eucharist is that 
 of High Churchmen, it is consistent in them, as a 
 rule, not to celebrate on Good Friday. 
 
 To the Rev. , on the Three Hours Service. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 Easter Day, 1 900. 
 
 Are you not sometimes a little less than com- 
 fortable as to the popularity of the Three Hours' 
 Service ? It seems to me a thing worth consider- 
 ing whether it has not drawn many persons away 
 from the ordinary offices of Good Friday, and 
 therein deprived them of a great amount of 
 precious instruction, such as the carefully selected 
 Psalms and Lessons convey to those who attend 
 
 Mattins or Evensong. At the daily office of 
 
 Good Friday is, or very lately was, thrust aside 
 into two corners, and the hours most available for 
 
 1 The Christian Year, Good Friday. 
 
'Attractive' Services 183 
 
 church-going preoccupied by 'fancy services '- 
 the Way of the Cross and the Reproaches, which 
 stir emotion, but can hardly be said to ' build up.' 
 Sensationalism is a real danger, and the maxim 
 that one ' must somehow make an impression ' is 
 a very dangerous instrument to employ. 
 
 I am very glad that you like Dale's great book 1 
 as I do. I looked through it again on Friday 
 with unabated sense of its very real and far- 
 reaching value. 
 
 The Pilot, in a recent number, deprecated any 
 stress being laid on the differences between 
 sections of High Churchmen. I know what this 
 means. I do not admit that clergy such as you 
 allude to, still less their lay followers (who really 
 have a good deal of Dathan and Abiram about 
 them) are High Churchmen at all. Churches 
 which represent definitively Roman ideals are a 
 grave menace not only to the Church's peace, but 
 to her very safety. That foolish woman who 
 told you that the Articles were a legal document 
 meant, I suppose, that their only claim was not to 
 be explicitly contradicted. That is what her 
 clergy, a clergy such as she would 'go after,' are 
 saying as to the principle laid down in Article 
 XXXIV. as to the rights of national churches in 
 matters merely ceremonial. You might have asked 
 her to define Transubstantiation, and to state pre- 
 cisely her ideas as to the mediaeval, philosophic 
 sense of substance. 
 
 1 The Atonement. 
 
184 Liturgical Subjects 
 
 To the Rev. , on I mean an outward and 
 
 visible sign of an inward and spiritual grace 
 given unto us, ordained by Christ Himself, 
 
 etc. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 All Saints Eve, 1878. 
 
 There is, no doubt, a comma after ' grace ' in 
 the original document and in the Black Letter 
 Prayer- Book used for the revision of 1661-62. I 
 suppose that Dean Aldrich founded his version 1 
 on that comma. But his version in itself is of no 
 sort of authority ; it is, in various instances, lax. 
 In the present case his translation is unquestion- 
 ably wrong. 
 
 1. It introduces a feeble superfluity. What 
 would be the use of saying that the sacramental 
 sign was given unto us, when we are just going to 
 hear that it was ordained by Christ ? Of course, 
 it is meant for our use ; but it would be a very 
 unecclesiastical tautology, considering that we are 
 construing Bishop Overall, to say that the sign 
 was, (a) given unto us, (6) instituted by our Lord. 
 It seems to me also that grammatically such a 
 construction would seem to require an and 
 between given and, ordained. There is even 
 some awkwardness in. Dean Aldrich's phraseology, 
 Quod nobis datur, ab ipso Christo institution, and 
 the English makes it still awkwarder. But this 
 is a minor point. 
 
 2. The other interpretation is consistent with 
 
 1 See note 5, p. 186. 
 
The Catechism and Articles 185 
 
 the history of theological language, and with the 
 requirements of the case. For it is extremely 
 important to emphasize the fact that, as the 
 Articles say, the sacraments were efficacia signa ; l 
 that is, that they were signs of a grace that was 
 not simply attested, but really given, the word 
 given being equivalent to conferred, the verb so 
 often used in regard to the bestowal of grace by 
 means of sacraments. So that on this interpreta- 
 tion given unto us is not a jejune surplusage but 
 an important security of the idea to be conveyed. 
 Even the ' Confessio Beloqca ' calls the sacraments 
 
 o 
 
 donorum Dei pignora [Niemeyer, Collectio Con- 
 fessionum, p. 383]. 
 
 The close relation between grace and Gods 
 gift, the readiness with which given attaches itself 
 
 to the word ;'#<:, may be called even proverbial. 
 
 To the same, on the same subject. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 November 3, 1878. 
 
 Many thanks for your note. When I wrote to 
 you, I had forgotten, I believe, another passage 
 in the Articles, connecting the verb to give with 
 grace: it is in Article XVI., depart from grace 
 given. 
 
 I find that Bagster's Latin and Greek Versions 
 support my construction : Signum gratia collate 
 
 1 Art. xxv. Cf. Hardwick, History of the Articles, pp. 93, 
 323, 324, (413 ed. 1884). [Dr. Bright used to speak of this 
 book as 'quite invaluable.' ED.] 
 
i86 Liturgical Subjects 
 
 nobis, ab ipso Christo institutum and TTJC ww /cat 
 
 Tryev/tari/CTjc ^apirog r\\juv SoStiariQ <rrj/iaoi>, TO u/r avrov 
 
 rou X/OICTTOU Siara)(0a'. I think that this Greek 
 version is that which was made a few years after 
 the last revision by a Chaplain of the Archbishop 
 of Canterbury. 1 once had a copy of this, but 
 have lost it, 1 fear. 
 
 1 am not very well off for comments on the 
 Catechism. But in a very good little book by a Mr. 
 Arden, Manual of Catechetical Instruction, that 
 construction is adopted which we followed in the 
 Latin Prayer- Book 1 ; adopted as a matter of 
 course. 2 So in a still better book, Mr. Sadler's 
 admirable Church Teacher s Manual, thus : ' Why 
 do you say, Given unto us? Because this . . . grace 
 is given to us when we duly receive the outward 
 sign ' ' the sign of a grace which God intends us 
 to receive when we receive the Sacrament.' 3 In 
 other words, he teaches that the true sense of 
 given unto us is fixed by the ampler phrase in the 
 clause, ordained . . . as a means whereby we 
 receive the same. See also Blunt's Annotated 
 Book of Common Prayer.^ 
 
 I do not know what reasons, apart from the 
 authority of Dean Aldrich 5 and the punctuation of 
 
 1 ' Intelligo signum externum et visibile gratiae internae et 
 spiritualis nobis collatae,^. Christo ipso institutum ' (Bright and 
 Medd, Liber Precum Publicarum, p. 181, ed. 1877). 
 
 2 Arden, Manual, etc., p. 144 (ed. 1847). 
 
 3 P. 282 (ed. 1888). 4 P. 435 (ed. 1888). 
 
 5 ' Externum et visibile signum intelligo internae et spiritualis 
 gratis?-, quod nobis datur, ab ipso Christo institutum ' (Liber 
 Precum Ecclesice Cathedralis Christi, Oxon. E Theatro Shel- 
 doniano, MDCCXXVI). 
 
'Generally necessary to salvation' 187 
 
 the early text, appear to decisive for the other 
 
 construction. I own that I cannot even imagine 
 any derived from the history of theological forms, 
 or from the idea which Bishop Overall (a very 
 accurate theologian) must have had before his 
 mind and must have intended to express. To be 
 sure, it may be said, 4 We hear in Scripture of 
 {jtod giving a sign? 1 But that thought is fully and 
 more theologically expressed, for the purpose of 
 this answer, in the next words, ordained by Christ ; 
 and if Dean Aldrich's construction were the right 
 one, we should have naturally expected given to 
 us by Christ, or given to us and ordained by Christ. 
 Once more receive grace is just a natural correla- 
 tive to grace given, as man's part to God's. 
 
 I may add that Dean Aldrich has another 
 error in his version of the Catechism. He 
 actually translates (query, misled by logical re- 
 collections ?) generally by in genere. Had he 
 looked at the Authorized Version of 2 Sam. 
 xvii. n, or Jeremiah xlviii. 38, he would have 
 seen that Bishop Overall meant necessary for all. 
 
 To the Rev. , on Godparents. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 
 Feast of Circumcision, 1886. 
 
 I think that you cannot absolutely dispense 
 with a Godfather in the administration of Public 
 Baptism, but I should, in a case of extreme diffi- 
 
 1 Isa. vii. 14; cf. Rom. iv. n. 
 
i88 Liturgical Subjects 
 
 culty, accept one Godparent, although strictly there 
 ought to be three. The Convocation of Canter- 
 bury proposed two as the required number, but 
 that proposal is not Church law. We may be 
 permitted to regret the increased stringency of 
 requirement in the reformed Office as compared 
 with the Sarum rubric, which even forbade, in 
 ordinary cases, more than unus vir et una mulier^ 
 to act as sponsors for the same child. If no 
 actual and qualified Godfather could be found, I 
 should ask a brother-clergyman to present the 
 child and answer for it. 
 
 Of course, in case of illness, when a child is 
 baptized at home, no sponsors are required until 
 it is brought to Church to be ' received.' 
 
 You will get over your shyness about home 
 visiting. It is a threshold difficulty once make 
 the plunge, and you don't feel the shock again. 
 
 Always ask me any question you think I can 
 answer. 
 
 To the Rev. , on Confirmation. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 January 16, 1896. 
 
 I am glad to see your letter in the Guardian* 
 on Confirmation. 
 
 'Presbyter" seems to be very imperfectly in- 
 formed as to the import of 'ratify and confirm 
 the same,' when he takes it to represent the 
 
 1 Maskell, Mom. Kit., i, p. 35 (and ed., 1882). 
 
 2 January 15, 1896. 
 
Confirmation 189 
 
 essence of Confirmation. 1 The confused use of 
 ' confirm ' is, indeed, as old as the second Prayer- 
 Book of Edward VI., where, unfortunately, 
 ' ratify and confess ' was altered into ' ratify and 
 confirm.' 2 But, in both these Prayer- Books, the 
 reference was not to the essence of the rite, but 
 to a condition of duly receiving it. Candidates 
 were to be able to say ' the Articles of the Faith, 
 etc., and also to answer to such questions of this 
 short Catechism as the Bishop (or such as he 
 shall appoint) shall by his discretion appose 
 them in.' 2 
 
 This Catechism-saying, then, was what was 
 described as a ratifying of baptismal obligation, 
 and clearly such a ratifying was identical with 
 what was to take place in Church Sunday after 
 Sunday during the previous period of instruction 
 in preparation for Confirmation. 
 
 The child, when coming ' to be Confirmed,' was 
 to be competent to satisfy the Bishop that he 
 could * say his Catechism,' including (as you put 
 it) the ' Yes, verily.' But, to ' say the Catechism ' 
 could not constitute the essence of a rite which, 
 in the service, was virtually traced back to 
 Apostolic institution, and was reserved for a 
 Bishop's ministration. It was a preliminary, or 
 antecedent, requirement, and such is the present 
 answer to the question, ' Do ye here, in the 
 presence of God ?' etc., which question, be it 
 always remembered, with the answer annexed to 
 it, was no part of the Confirmation Service before 
 
 1 January i, 1896. 
 
 - Cardwell, Two Liturgies, p. 344. 
 
190 Liturgical Subjects 
 
 1661-62, and it was unfortunate that, at that last 
 revision, the very valuable passage in the original 
 preface about ' Confirmation ' being ' ministered ' 
 for the reception of ' strength and defence against 
 all temptations to sin,' 1 etc., was left out. The 
 question, historically considered, is very simple : 
 Did the Church, before 1661-62, regard a correct 
 repetition of the Catechism, or a part of it, in the 
 Bishop's hearing, as Confirmation ? Assuredly 
 such a notion was never dreamt of. Assuredly, 
 also, the Church did not, in 1661-62, change her 
 view as to what constituted Confirmation. She 
 merely accentuated the solemnity of that pro- 
 fession which the repetition of ' Yes, verily,' etc., 
 had involved, by making the Bishop put the 
 essence of ' Dost thou not think ?' etc., into the 
 form, ' Do ye here ?' etc. 4 Presbyter,' I suppose, 
 never looked at Canon 6o, 2 where (in 1604) the 
 Church defined Confirmation without one word 
 about ratification of vows. 
 
 To the same, on the same subject. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 January 18, 1896. 
 
 Every now and then one does get startling 
 proof of the theological ignorance of a large 
 number of the clergy, and of their absolute 
 
 1 Cardwell, Two Liturgies, p. 344. 
 
 - Cardwell, Synodalia, p. 281 (ed. 1842). 
 
Hooker on Confirmation 191 
 
 imperviousness to the influences of the Church 
 revival. 
 
 As to Confirmation, one would have thought 
 that the very definition of it in the Prayer- Book, 
 ' or laying on of hands,' etc., would have sufficed 
 to show that it consisted in an act of the Bishop, 
 not in an act of the persons ' to be then con- 
 firmed.' But Puritan prejudices are inaccessible 
 to history or to grammar. 
 
 There is a small volume by W. Jackson on 
 The History of Confirmation, which I once pro- 
 cured, but which I seem to have disposed of. 
 
 I fear that Canon Mason's exaggerated estimate 
 of Confirmation, 1 as (in a way) superior to 
 Baptism, will have given a fresh lease to the 
 ' ratification ' view, by way of recoil. 
 
 Do you think ' Presbyter ' has ever heard of a 
 certain divine, not without reputation, whose 
 name was Richard Hooker? If so, has he 
 found in Hooker's account of Confirmation 2 
 anything about ratification of vows as con- 
 stituting it, or as a part of it ? What Hooker 
 says is that Confirmation is administered 'by 
 prayer and imposition of hands,' and that it is 
 reasonably postponed until the candidates have 
 been ' seasoned with the principles of true 
 religion,' and the Bishop, 'by trial and examina- 
 tion,' 3 has ascertained them to be thus competent. 
 This refers, of course, to the ' apposing ' in the 
 Catechism. My point is, that the question now 
 
 1 Mason, The Relation of Confirmation to Baptism. 
 * Ecd. Pol., V. Ixvi. 
 3 Ibid., 7- 
 
192 Liturgical Subjects 
 
 put by the Bishop is precisely ejusdem generis 
 with the previous * apposing ' in the Catechism, 
 which was avowedly a preliminary to Confirma- 
 tion, not part of it. Can ' Presbyter ' name a 
 single divine of authority in favour of his view ? 
 
 To the Rev. , oti the Burial Office. 
 
 PRN-Y-LAN, TAN-Y-BWLCH, CARNARVON, 
 August 8, 1863. 
 
 As to the Burial-Service question, what I 
 wrote to the Archbishop was in substance this : 
 that my impression was (though I, of course, 
 added that I would go into the matter when I 
 got back to Oxford) that wherever we, with our 
 present Office, expressed the feelings of survivors 
 in the form of thanksgiving and strongly-worded 
 hope, the old rituals expressed those feelings in 
 the form of commendations of the soul to Divine 
 mercy or keeping ; not ipso facto implying a 
 belief in purgatory, nor, perhaps, written with 
 any very distinct or logical view of the subject. 
 Such commendations were retained in Edward 
 VI. 's First Prayer-Book (the framers of which 
 could not mean to teach purgatory), and, in short, 
 that was an Office ready to hand, more consonant 
 to ancient models than our own. But one could 
 hardly expect that the old, simple, affectionate 
 use of such prayers for the departed, as media for 
 uttering the Christian's affection for those who 
 were gone before, could again become general in 
 England. Apart, therefore, from other con- 
 
The Burial Service 193 
 
 siderations, it would probably be impossible to 
 restore Edward VI.'s first Burial Office 1 with 
 general acceptance. But were this not so, or, 
 again, were we to retain the structure of the 
 present Office, only leaving out the strongest 
 expressions ' as our hope is,' etc. still we could 
 not expect our people, nor could we wish them, 
 to accept any Office which did not presume a 
 Christian character in the deceased, as one who 
 had, to all appearance, died in a state of grace. 
 This presumption must be retained. But if so, 
 then the old difficulty still meets us ; we have to 
 use the Office over some of whom we cannot, 
 without a great shock to sincerity, suppose that 
 they died as good Christians. 
 
 How to meet this difficulty I do not see, for 
 any general system of discipline seems impractic- 
 able in our present circumstances. (I doubt 
 whether the plan of refusing the Office when the 
 person had not communicated three times in the 
 past year would really work. 1 think it would 
 only produce new complications.) However, if 
 the difficulty cannot be overcome, it can be 
 modified ; for ' in sure and certain hope,' etc. 
 (although I know that ' hope of resurrection ' 2 was 
 turned into 'hope of the resurrection' in 1661, in 
 order to avoid, if possible, any special reference), 
 one might read, borrowing from the Office for the 
 Burial of the Dead at Sea, ' looking for the resur- 
 rection of the body and the life of the world to 
 come, through our Lord,' etc. Perhaps (I don't 
 
 1 Card well. Two Liturgies, etc., pp. 372 sqq. 
 
 - Ibid., p. 373 [1552] . 
 
 13 
 
194 Liturgical Subjects 
 
 think I suggested this to his Grace) one might 
 also, in another place, read, ' We give Thee hearty 
 thanks for that Thou dost deliver Thy faithful 
 servants out of the miseries,' etc. And perhaps 
 ' as our hope is ' might be omitted, although it 
 would go hard with many mourners to sacrifice it. 
 I wonder how the Easterns manage ; for, although 
 parts of their funeral rite are very sombre, even 
 mournful, other parts are extremely jubilant, 
 consisting, I believe, of triumphant hymns on the 
 Resurrection. However, it is certain that our 
 present service is more free from sombre elements 
 than any other now in use ; more like what might 
 be thought suitable for a very primitive com- 
 munity, even for the Apostolic age. 
 
 Our parson last Sunday preached a very good 
 sermon, telling us that if people who disbelieved 
 in the Sacraments held the Incarnation, it was by 
 a ' happy inconsistency ' ; and he consecrated 
 standing before the altar. 
 
 To the Rev. , on Christmas, Positivism, the 
 Burial Office. 
 
 OXFORD, 
 Christmas Eve, 1863. 
 
 Christmas has begun for me, for 1 have just 
 come back from the ' first vespers ' at Merton. 
 The Church was, for the first time in my know- 
 ledge of it, decorated with evergreens and beautiful 
 devices at the east end, and flowers on the altar. 
 In fact, the choir looked really glorious, and the 
 
Christmas 195 
 
 singing was what it always is. What a wonderful 
 thing Christmas is, with its power of concentrating 
 the whole Christian religion into a small compass, 
 and blending so perfectly the awful and the 
 joyous elements, and making everything seem 
 fresh and young again ! I am writing this while 
 the first peals are beginning from different 
 churches, and before I go down to Magdalen. 
 
 ***** 
 W- - read me an extract from a letter of 
 Symonds's ; l he is at Florence, and has met C 
 there, who has expounded to him his Positivist 
 system. No God, no future life, but contented 
 devotion to the interests of humanity, without 
 ' selfish ' hopes or fears. This system, the 
 wretched apostate hopes, will one day, ere long, 
 be universally recognised as furnishing all the 
 supports and motives needed by man. Symonds 
 will not, I trust, be gulled by such infatuated 
 nonsense ; but a sentence in his letter about his 
 indefiniteness of views, owing to a 'frost of 
 scepticism,' made one very anxious. He has no 
 
 groundwork of doctrinal religion. W wishes 
 
 he would carefully read the historical account of 
 our Lord's life, and work that well into his mind. 
 
 ***** 
 
 I have written again to his Grace of York, 
 after looking over the old Latin rituals i.e., the 
 really ancient ones in respect to prayers at 
 funerals, etc. I find even more emphatically 
 hopeful language about the person dead than in 
 
 1 The late Mr. J. A. Symonds. 
 
 132 
 
196 Liturgical Subjects 
 
 our own Office e.g., 'Quern Dominus de laqueo 
 hujus sseculi liberare dignatus est' 1 ; ' Assumpsisti 
 consummatione felici' 2 ; ' Quern in requiem Tuam 
 vocare dignatus es.' 3 I found no parallel exactly 
 to ' we give Thee thanks,' etc., and none at all to 
 'hasten Thy kingdom/ But it is clear that these 
 old Offices, like ours, presumed that the person had 
 died as a Christian, and I again said to the Arch- 
 bishop that I thought no burial service which 
 would be tolerable to Christian feelings, or in 
 any respect consistent with ancient models, could 
 avoid treating the person buried as one who had 
 not, by the circumstances of his death, forfeited 
 his Christian character. And then, so long as 
 our service does make this necessary assumption, 
 the scandals now complained of will exist ; in 
 other words, we never can have or tolerate a rite 
 which would suit a non-Christian as well as a 
 Christian. The scandals will not be cured by any 
 alterations which we could endure to think of. 
 
 To the Rev. , on hymns. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 February 6, 1887. 
 
 Many thanks for your kind letter. I have not 
 seen the Literary Churchman, and have not the 
 least intention of troubling myself about Mr. V 
 or his opinion of any hymns of mine. I think I 
 once saw the Altar Hymnal, and I am pretty 
 
 1 Wilson, The Gelasian Sacramentary , p. 298. 
 
 2 Ibid., p. 302. 3 Ibid., p. 303. 
 
Hymnody 197 
 
 sure I should not like it, as I do not like the 
 fiymnal Noted. As for unreality, that is a vague 
 charge : what is very real to A will often be mere 
 fantasy to B ; minds are cast in such various types, 
 that on such a point they often simply cannot 
 approach each other. I can honestly say that / 
 never published in either of my two volumes a 
 hymn, or any such composition, which was not 
 real to me. They have usually been written, so 
 to say, because I could not help it ; they expressed 
 (I do not say, in all cases, wholly) what was really 
 working in my own mind. There are a few 
 hymns of mine, I grant, which were written in 
 compliance with requests, but I have taken care 
 to make them intrinsically 'genuine,' exactly as 
 one would try to make one's sermons genuine 
 instead of putting one's hearers off with what one 
 ' thought it the right thing to say.' The question 
 of ' objective' and ' subjective ' hymns is one which 
 suffers for want of a discriminate use of terms. 
 What people mean, I suppose, when they denounce 
 4 subjective hymns,' considered as for use in 
 Church, is that many such compositions go to 
 excess in the unreserved expression of feelings 
 which are not likely to come within the average 
 Christian experience; and particularly that in some 
 instances, there is an effusion of devout sentiment 
 which does not really strengthen the principle of 
 devotion, but may rather dilute its force. I myself 
 said as much in an article in the Church Quarterly 
 Review^ for April, 1884, and I seriously think that 
 
 1 English Hymnology, Church Quarterly Review, vol. xviii., 
 No. xxxv., p. 89 sqq. 
 
198 Liturgical Subjects 
 
 Hymns Ancient and Modern wants pruning" in 
 this respect, that several hymns admitted by the 
 Editors are repellent to the ordinary masculine 
 mind. 
 
 All this I grant, or more than grant ; but at the 
 same time I would guard against the falsehood of 
 extremes in that form which, I presume, is repre- 
 sented by Mr. V . Hymnody is meant, in the 
 
 first instance, to be an element in the offering of 
 adoration and praise ; but it has a kindred and yet 
 a distinct purpose to provide a means of utter- 
 ance for the religious affections in the Divine 
 Presence of utterance more free and fervid than 
 the forms of a liturgy can supply. If we confine 
 the language of hymns, as I suppose Mr. V- 
 would wish, to the simple recitation of, or medita- 
 tion on, revealed facts, we stop up this vent, and 
 ignore a want which the religious spirit cannot 
 but feel as natural. The result would be chilling. 
 On this rigid theory I doubt whether twenty 
 celebrated hymns by English writers would be 
 allowed a place in a hymn-book. I know it is 
 said, ' Look at the oldest Latin hymns and see 
 how sternly self-repressed, how concise, how un- 
 exuberant they are.' Yes ; and what English 
 congregation could assimilate them without ampli- 
 fication of some kind ? And when were they 
 written ? While the Latin races were learning, 
 but had not fully learnt, how Christianity was to 
 expand their sympathies. 1 We are not as the old 
 Latin Christians : we must speak in tones natural 
 
 1 Cf. Dean Church, Influences of Christianity on National 
 Character, pp. 54 sqq. (ed. 1873). 
 
The choice of hymns 199 
 
 to our own hearts ; it is pedantry to enforce on us 
 their canons of taste, it is cant to talk of ' objec- 
 tivity in hymns ' as requiring a surrender of all 
 that goes beyond their standard. Here is more 
 than I had meant to inflict upon you, but it is well 
 to say what one thinks on a matter which requires 
 a distinguendum. I shall assuredly not reply to 
 Mr. V . 
 
 To the organist of the Cathedral Church of 
 Christ in Oxford. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 January 2, 1893. 
 
 Dr. I nee, I find, desiderated a New Year's 
 hymn yesterday, as well as the one which referred 
 to the Circumcision. I have looked into Hymns 
 Ancient and Modern, and the three set down for 
 New Year's Day, 72, 73, 74, seem to me poor 
 beyond ordinary poverty, and No. 485 is not 
 really better. But 288 and 289 have both, I 
 think, been used at the time in Cathedral ; cer- 
 tainly 165 has, and that is the best and most 
 expressive of all to my mind. Personally I like 
 it far better than 288 or 289. Perhaps you would 
 make a note about this. It is true that the New 
 Year is only referred to in the Prayer- Book in a 
 single rubric, yet it is also true, as Dr. I nee says, 
 that we all do, as a matter of course, associate New 
 Year thoughts with the festival of the Circum- 
 cision ; and perhaps, if I may suggest as much, it 
 might meet the case if on January i there were 
 
2co Liturgical Subjects 
 
 two hymns, referring severally to the two aspects 
 of the day. In regard to one of these aspects, let 
 me add my best wishes, and remain. . . . 
 
 P.S. The service, sung by men this morning, 
 seemed to me noble, with a peculiar simplicity 
 and force. 
 
 To the same. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 July 15, 1893. 
 
 Do you think we might suspend, at least, the 
 use of Hymn 221 ('Let saints on earth') for 
 ' black-letter ' Saints' days ? The original by 
 Charles Wesley (which has been greatly altered) 
 stands in Wesley's Hymn-book among those on 
 ' Time, Death, and the Future State.' The hymn, 
 whether in its original or its present form, seems 
 much more appropriate for a funeral than for a 
 minor festival, and Mr. Julian says it first appeared 
 among Charles Wesley's funeral hymns. 1 The 
 word 'saints' is clearly used in its general New 
 Testament sense, not in its later specific meaning, 
 and the hymn itself is not among those which are 
 recommended for use on Saints' days after hymn 
 429. It has, no doubt, been long used here, but I 
 doubt whether it might not be superseded on such 
 occasions by some others more directly appro- 
 priate. 
 
 1 Dictionary of Hymnology, p. 248. 
 
Latin Hymnody 201 
 
 To the same. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 December 30, 1893. 
 
 As for translations of the Sarum Office hymns, 
 it would be, I fancy, a very difficult piece of work. 
 I have never at all satisfied myself in attempts to 
 translate ancient hymns, except in, perhaps, two 
 instances. And I should think that the Sarum 
 hymns in question would be hardly available 
 owing to the frequency of invocations of saints 
 contained in them. Moreover but this is a 
 question of taste I seem to feel an atmosphere 
 of chilliness and hardness in this class of hymns. 
 They do not impress one like the Veni Creator, or 
 the Veni Sancte, or the Dies Ir&, etc. Somehow, 
 Latin of the ecclesiastical or Christian type seems 
 to me more frequently successful when relieved 
 from the constraint of metre : there are far more 
 Latin collects than hymns which attain to a high 
 degree of excellence. "Even the old Ambrosian 1 
 or Gregorian hymns have, to my thinking, over- 
 much of stiffness and reserve ; and although 
 'gushing' hymns are objectionable, and some 
 samples of that class are even offensive, they repre- 
 sent a craving for which the Prayer- Book does not 
 sufficiently provide, and which many, at least, of 
 the Breviary hymns refuse in the most absolute 
 sense to satisfy. I wish Hymns Ancient and 
 
 1 Twelve hymns are printed in Ambrosii Opera, torn. II., 
 pars i. ap. Migne, P.L., torn, xvi., col. 1,409 sqq., and are 
 acknowledged by the Benedictine editors to be genuine. Cf. 
 Batiffol, Histoire du Breviaire roniain, p. 1 64 sqq. 
 
2O2 Liturgical Subjects 
 
 Modern were more satisfactory than it is in the 
 matter of Saints' day hymns. Should you not 
 like to do a little weeding out in that collection ? I 
 should. The compilers have been too tolerant of 
 prosaic, or feeble, or pointless language, and the 
 hymns for red-letter days are in several cases 
 sadly vapid. 
 
 To the same. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 March 31, 1894. 
 
 Might we have Hymn 201 on some day during 
 the Ascension Octave ? It is a fine hymn, one of 
 the Scotch paraphrases, by a young poet who 
 died early, and whose compositions were dis- 
 honestly claimed by another after his death. Per- 
 haps it might be worth considering against next 
 Easter, whether Hymn 127 or 132 might not, by 
 way of experiment, be tried at Evensong on Easter 
 Day instead of Hymn 125, which assumes a view 
 as to the descent into Hades, which, as Dr. Ince 
 reminds us, is questionable, although it was, I 
 suppose, undoubtingly received in the mediaeval 
 Church. Moreover, the ' crying aloud ' in con- 
 nection with ' Judah's Lion ' disagreeably recalls 
 the notion on which Neale 1 tells us it is based, that 
 the lion's whelps are born dead, but vivified by 
 his roaring over them ! 
 
 The boys, I think, occasionally perhaps the 
 choir in general -would benefit by being reminded 
 that it is better not to be turning over the leaves 
 of music-books during the lessons. 
 
 1 Mediceval Hymns, p. 49 (3rd ed., 1867). Cf. Julian, 
 Dictionary of Hymnology, p. 224. 
 
An authorized hymnal 203 
 
 To the Venerable Archdeacon , on an 
 
 aiUhorized hymnal. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 May 7, 1894. 
 
 I am very glad that you feel with me on the 
 Hymnal question. I did not say, what, of course, 
 I felt, that a Con vocational Hymnal would mean 
 a Hymnal of compromise. There would be a 
 process of levelling up and down. ' We must 
 alter this phrase, it will offend A. B., and we 
 must have that hymn, for C. D. are accustomed 
 to it.' (But I don't think you have in your Con- 
 vocation as we have in ours a grave Archdeacon 
 who would intimate somewhat indirectly, it is 
 true an objection to ' Son of Mary, hear,' pro- 
 fessedly on the ground that our Lord should be 
 always addressed with reference to His Divine 
 Nature as if He could be addressed in prayer 
 apart from that Nature as a basis, and as if the 
 Litany did not call Him 'Son of David'! No, 
 
 you have not got an Archdeacon !) Nor did 
 
 I care, at the close of a debate in which the 
 advocates of an authorized Hymnal were mani- 
 festly the feeblest of minorities, to dwell on the 
 futility, in our circumstances, of an analogy 
 between the Book of Common Prayer and a 
 brand-new Book of Common Praise : or between 
 such services as those for harvest festivals or 
 intercession days which are outside the ordinary 
 course of Church going, and which filled up a 
 blank when they were supplied, and so disturbed 
 no old associations, and such a Hymnal as would 
 
204 Liturgical Subjects 
 
 bring Convocational authority to bear on the 
 conscience of clergy and people on at least every 
 Sunday of their lives, to the ousting of books 
 which they had learned to use and love. 
 
 To the Venerable Archdeacon , on harvest 
 
 festivals. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 October 2, 1899. 
 
 Wheeler tells me that you are to have a 
 harvest festival in the Cathedral. I am glad, I 
 confess, that we here do not observe those 
 ' festivals of natural providence,' seeing that they 
 have become so inordinately popular in England 
 at the expense of the festivals of Grace a bad 
 sign, I think, for English religion. At Salisbury 
 one could hardly get a Church without the usual 
 display of loaves and vegetables on the Sunday 
 that I spent there. And the hymns provided are 
 so washy ! 
 
 To the Venerable Archdeacon , on the Spanish 
 
 reformers. 
 
 ROYAL STATION HOTEL, YORK, 
 July 26, 1894. 
 
 The letter of the Bishop of Iowa 1 seemed to 
 me entirely unsatisfactory. He drew a parallel 
 
 1 To The Times; reprinted in The Guardian of July 25, 
 1894. 
 
The Spanish reformers 205 
 
 between the Spanish reformers' Office-book and 
 that earlier edition of the American Prayer- Book 1 
 as to which the English Bishops suggested (he 
 says) only a few slight changes before confirming 
 the succession. The parallel is worthless. The 
 period was one in which doctrinal perceptions 
 were comparatively torpid ; the true bearing of 
 liturgical changes had not been appreciated, as 
 now it is. And we know, too, that the Spanish 
 book, with its deliberate exclusion of the idea 
 of grace conveyed, not merely pledged, through 
 sacraments, is distinctly intended, or, at least, 
 welcomed, by Archbishop Plunket as representing 
 what he would like to see in the way of Prayer- 
 Book revision for Ireland. 
 
 To the Editor of The Guardian, on the mosaic 
 in Keble College Chapel. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 December 4, 1897. 
 
 May I supplement the letter of the Principal of 
 Cuddesdon and Canon Newbolt on this subject 
 by quoting a few words from Archbishop Trench's 
 volume on the Epistles to the Seven Churches f 
 
 He speaks of the 'descriptions of the glorified 
 Lord' in Rev. i. 13 sqq., as 'sublime as a 
 purely mental conception, but unendurable if we 
 were to give it an outward form and expression.' 
 He points out that Hebrew religious symbolism, 
 except in the one case of the cherubim, was never 
 
 1 'The Proposed Book' of 1785. 
 
206 Liturgical Subjects 
 
 intended to be embodied in ' outward form and 
 shape,' and he proceeds : 
 
 ' Thus in the present description of Christ, sub- 
 lime and majestic as it is, ... it is only such so 
 long as we keep it wholly apart from any external 
 embodiment. Reproduce it outwardly the sword 
 going forth from the mouth, the eyes as a flame 
 of fire, the hair white as wool, the feet as molten 
 brass and each and all of these images in one 
 way or another violate and offend our sense of 
 beauty.' 1 
 
 To adopt some of the features of the description 
 for pictorial representation, and to drop others, is 
 clearly an inconsistent course, as when the sword 
 is depicted as hovering in the air near the Lord's 
 mouth but not actually issuing from it. 
 
 I can speak for one member of the council of 
 Keble College as unable to look at this particular 
 mosaic without regretting that Dr. Pusey's ' two- 
 fold objection ' was not allowed to prevail. 
 
 1 Trench, Epistles to the Seven Churches, p. 47 (4th ed., 
 1886). 
 
IV 
 
 Historical Subjects 
 
 To the Editor of The Guardian, on the ancient 
 British Church. 
 
 March 14, 1888. 
 I DESIRE to echo the words of my friend Mr. 
 
 as to the mischief done by those reconstructions 
 of our old Church history which Church Defence 
 meetings and the like have unfortunately made 
 popular. They do, indeed, * put a handle into 
 the hands of Roman controversialists,' and they 
 illustrate the conditions under which, in the 
 Roman domain itself, a strong bias and a dis- 
 regard of evidence have too often changed history 
 into something little better than legend. 
 
 The bias, in the present case, is an eager de- 
 termination to treat the English Church as simply 
 the British Church enlarged, in order to minimize 
 the obligations of English Christianity to Latin 
 Christendom. The disregard of evidence may, I 
 fear, be summarized in a single proposition that 
 
 [ 207 ] 
 
208 Historical Subjects 
 
 persons speak and write about the subject without 
 having read their Bede^ 
 
 To take a few particular points. Would anyone 
 who had read Bede and knew what he meant by 
 the term ' Scot ' confound the ' Scots ' with the 
 Picts, Northern or Southern ? Would such a 
 person speak of Paulinus as a ' comrade monk of 
 Augustine's train ' ? Would he disparage ' the 
 Roman's' planting as 'only surface deep,' as a 
 thing which ' withered ' under the first heat of 
 persecution ? Would he apply the term 'apostasy,' 
 which Bede uses of Osric and Eanfrid, to the 
 whole body of Northumbrian converts, many of 
 whom were massacred by a so-called Christian 
 British King, who outdid his heathen ally, Penda, 
 in cruelty towards the Christian English ? Would 
 he forget that during that sad year James the 
 Deacon remained in Yorkshire, bravely fulfilling 
 the work of an evangelist ? Would he assume 
 that, when that year was at an end, Aidan ' found 
 nothing to water ' after six years of ' prodigious 
 labour,' as Canon Raine calls it, on the part of 
 ' the great missionary ' whom the Church of York 
 honours as St. Paulinus ? Would he forget that 
 East Anglia owed its Christianity, in the first 
 instance, to the influence of Paulinus, and in the 
 second to a foreign Bishop ' sent ' from Canter- 
 bury, whose work was especially successful in 
 linking education to religion ? Would he 
 ignore the apostolate of Birinus, who came into 
 
 1 Cf. Bright, Chapters in Early English History, and Way- 
 marks in Church History, p. 279 sqq.^ on the subject of this 
 and the next two letters. 
 
The British Church 209 
 
 Wessex direct from Italy? Would he treat the 
 Englishmen Cedd and Chad as simply children of 
 'the ancient British Church,' whereas the former 
 had nothing to do with that Church, and the 
 latter was only connected with her through his 
 consecration ? St. Chad, as a boy, had been a 
 pupil of St. Aidan, and Cedd was ordained and 
 consecrated by Finan ; but Aidan and Finan were 
 not Britons, but Irishmen. How often must it 
 be pointed out that ' British ' and ' Irish' are not 
 interchangeable terms ? 
 
 Then as to the alleged connection of ' the 
 ancient British Church ' with the conversion of 
 the English. People begin with a preconception 
 that the English Church grew out of the British, 
 and, when they are told that this will not stand, 
 they fall back on a circuitous argument which is 
 to give them as much as possible of the advan- 
 tages of that preconception. Thus David and 
 other Welsh ecclesiastics instructed Finnian of 
 Clonard ; Finnian instructed Columba ; Columba 
 founded Icolmkill ; from Icolmkill came Aidan 
 into Northumbria ; and Aidan's successor sent a 
 mission into the Midlands, which also restored 
 the faith in Essex. Therefore a very large part 
 of England owes its Christianity, in the last 
 resort, to the old Welsh Church Q.E.D. 
 
 Now, first, as to the dates. Finnian of Clonard 
 appears to have returned from Wales to Ireland 
 before 520. Columba was born in 521. He 
 was ordained deacon under Finnian of Movtlle. 
 He is said to have been one of the twelve chief 
 disciples of Finnian of Clonard ; yet there are 
 
zio Historical Subjects 
 
 some chronological difficulties about the statement, 
 and Lanigan (Eccl. Hist. Ireland, ii., p. 117), 
 does not treat it as quite certain. Anyhow, he 
 must have left Clonard before he was twenty-five, 
 for he founded the monastery of Derry in 546. 
 It was seventeen years later (and before Gildas 
 visited Ireland) that he founded Icolmkill ; and 
 although two of his monks there were ' Saxons,' 
 it was not until seventy-two years after its founda- 
 tion that the convent sent forth Aidan, in reply 
 to the request of the English King, St. Oswald. 
 Then, if Finnian's Welsh teachers inspired him 
 with any zeal for missions to the heathen, it is 
 remarkable that they did not act on their own 
 teaching with regard to the heathen on their own 
 border. For we know of no attempt made by 
 the Welsh Church in that century to convert the 
 Saxons or Angles ; and in the next century she 
 not only refused to work with Augustine in that 
 field, but refrained from entering it for herself, and 
 was supposed to treat English Christianity as 
 1 worth nothing.' It is no pleasure to dwell upon 
 this fact ; but it has to be emphasized, because it 
 has been slurred over, and it considerably affects 
 the claim made for that Church to a ' large 
 indirect share in the English conversion.' Her 
 4 direct ' relation to that work was one of absten- 
 tion. I repeat, with grateful acknowledgment of 
 its truth and clearness, the words of your Article : 
 ' The British Church stood aloof, and had no 
 share in the work, but was afterwards con- 
 strained to merge itself in the English Church.' 
 Then it was that the English Church acquired 
 
British Christianity not Eastern 211 
 
 continuity with the body which had sent delegates 
 to Aries and to Ariminum, and that continuity is 
 something for us to prize. 
 
 To the Editor of The Guardian, on agencies in 
 the conversion of England. 
 
 August 28, 1889. 
 
 Canon Body is reported, in your last number, 
 to have said that 
 
 ' There was no portion of England which owed 
 its Christianity to the Roman Mission, except the 
 county of Kent, and some portions of the county 
 of Middlesex ; that Paulinus did, indeed, " build a 
 Church " i.e., gather together a flock in York- 
 shire, but after he fled, at the moment of danger, 
 the people recently won to the faith were not 
 established in it, and the whole of the people of 
 Yorkshire and Bernicia that is, Durham and 
 Northumberland relapsed into heathendom, and 
 continued in that state until, at length, mission- 
 aries came from lona, a missionary station estab- 
 lished by the Church in Ireland,' whose great 
 missionary, St. Patrick, had come ' from Scotland 
 to preach in Ireland, and therefore had gained his 
 Christianity through British Christianity, which, 
 traced to its source, was distinctly Oriental, and 
 not in any sense Western.' 
 
 If I venture to question the completeness and 
 entire accuracy of this representation, it is purely 
 in the interest of historical truth. When Canon 
 Body says that British Christianity in its origin 
 
 142 
 
212 Historical Subjects 
 
 was exclusively Oriental, he can hardly mean that 
 it came directly from the East, but only, I pre- 
 sume, that the Gallic Church, which in all likeli- 
 hood sent the first mission into Britain, was itself 
 founded from Asia Minor. It is fully admitted 
 that various links of connection between British 
 Christianity and the East can be pointed out, 
 and will be found, for instance, fully exhibited 
 in Mr. Warren's learned volume on the Celtic 
 Church, 1 although the advocates of the Celtic 
 Easter-rule were easily confuted when they 
 identified it with the old Ephesian tradition. 
 St. Patrick was a North- British Christian, but as 
 a missionary to Ireland he came not from his 
 native Church, but apparently from the Church 
 of Gaul, which was in close fellowship with the 
 West in general. But as to the results of the 
 ' Roman Mission ' to our country, may not one 
 be excused for attributing to a controversial bias 
 not a little of the disposition recently shown by 
 popular speakers to disparage the work of the 
 emissaries of Pope Gregory ? Do we not, after 
 all, owe a deep debt of gratitude to him and to 
 those whom he sent? Is there not a sense in 
 which Augustine of Canterbury may be called 
 our ' apostle,' in that, when our fathers were 
 sitting in darkness, it was he who inaugurated 
 the period of their illumination ? Before he 
 landed at Ebbsfleet no one had taken such a task 
 in hand ; no Irish or British Christians had ever 
 endeavoured to Christianize the hated and 
 
 1 Warren, The Liturgy and Ritual of the Celtic Church, 
 pp. 46 sqq. 
 
St. Paulinus and St. Aidan 213 
 
 dreaded ' Saxon ' people. It was Augustine who 
 opened the path in which others after his day 
 followed. We may grant that, as Dean Stanley 
 has said, he was ' not a man of any great eleva- 
 tion of character.' He showed some narrowness, 
 some self-importance, some want of tact, and 
 some asperity ; he had not a long episcopate ; his 
 personal ministry did not cover a large field. 
 Kent was thoroughly won, and it was no small 
 achievement to found the See of Canterbury. 
 London became, for a time, the seat of a missionary 
 Bishop ; and after Augustine's death the East 
 Anglian King was baptized in Kent, and although 
 he afterwards made a compromise with paganism, 
 his son, cum sua provincia, received the faith from 
 Northumbria during the Episcopate of the 
 Roman-born Paulinus. (I do not pause to notice 
 the doubt that has been raised as to Paulinus's 
 nationality.) The East Anglians did, indeed, 
 relapse for three years, and were reclaimed by 
 Felix the Burgundian. But who 'sent' Felix? 
 An Archbishop of Canterbury. 
 
 Again, as to the immediate work of Paulinus 
 as Bishop (not Archbishop) of York, it consisted, 
 certainly, in the laying of foundations, rather than 
 in the erection of a structure ; he had not time 
 nor instruments for more ; but his energy was 
 felt in remote parts of the North country, and 
 when his royal convert was slain, and he, rightly 
 or not, deemed himself bound to reconduct the 
 widow to her native Kent, he left behind him 
 'James the deacon,' whose labours 'in teaching 
 and baptizing ' were full of fruit. And did ' the 
 
214 Historical Subjects 
 
 whole ' of the North-country people fall back into 
 heathenism ? We find no such statement in 
 Bede ; it is not to the converts of Paulinus as a 
 body, but to the two wretched princes who at- 
 tempted to reign after Edwin that he ascribes the 
 guilt of ' apostasy.' Nor was the mission of 
 St. Aidan, as Canon Body seems to imply, long 
 subsequent to the ' flight ' of Paulinus ; little more 
 than a year intervened. And although Aidan 
 found much to do, and so did it as to attract a 
 peculiar enthusiasm of loving reverence, our only 
 real authority does not warrant us in assuming 
 that he found his predecessor's ' influence ' extinct, 
 and had to begin the whole work de novo. Rather, 
 he took up, he consolidated, he widely extended, 
 during his sixteen years, what Paulinus had begun 
 in six. One would not compare Paulinus with 
 him in point of pure saintliness ; the singular 
 beauty of his character was appreciated, we are 
 told, at Canterbury and in East Anglia ; but one 
 can hardly help surmising that Paulinus would 
 have been more generously judged if he had not 
 represented 'the Roman Mission.' Nor is it well 
 to forget that while Mercians owed their conver- 
 sion, and East Saxons their reconversion, to 
 missionaries, mostly Anglian, ordained by Aidan's 
 successor, Wessex was evangelized by an Italian 
 who came to Britain by the ' counsel ' of one Pope, 
 and Sussex by an Anglian who had been banished 
 for appealing to another. 
 
 Honour to whom honour is due, and thanks, 
 under the Supreme Giver, to whom thanks, be 
 they Celts, Teutons, or Latins. It ought not, 
 
British and English Churches 215 
 
 surely, to be difficult to put aside the disturbing 
 considerations of even the most necessary pole- 
 mics, when we are trying to estimate the manifold 
 forces which were so mercifully combined to bring 
 us, as the Whitsuntide Proper Preface touchingly 
 words it, ' into the clear light and true knowledge 
 of the Father and of the Son.' 
 
 To a Priest of the American Church, on the 
 ancient British Church. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 June ii, 1893. 
 
 (1) As to the Article on the ancient British 
 Church in the Gitardian of February 8, 1888. It is 
 not mine, but comes from the pen of a much higher 
 authority, the late Professor Freeman. He him- 
 self admitted to me that it was his, but no one 
 who knew his style could have any doubt of the 
 authorship. There can be no harm in stating the 
 fact publicly ; the article is of practical value, and 
 I hope you may secure its publication. It will 
 clear away a great many errors. 
 
 (2) As to Mr. L (author of a Catechism 
 
 of Church History, published in America), what 
 you quote proves one thing beyond all doubt or 
 question, and it is a thing of some moment with 
 regard to his qualifications for instructing American 
 Churchmen in Early English Church History. It 
 is that he has never read Bede. Had he done so, 
 he never would have put together such a farrago 
 as the passage contains. He would have learned 
 
216 Historical Subjects 
 
 that the ' British ' and the Welsh persistently 
 refused to aid in evangelizing the Saxons, and 
 that they regarded the Christianity of the con- 
 verted Saxons as not worthy of the name. Bede 
 is explicit on that point, and Aldhelm had already 
 gone into fuller details. 1 The English Church, as 
 a matter of fact, was not developed out of the 
 Welsh by any process of development ; on the 
 contrary, it grew up without Welsh help, and it 
 was only by a long gradual process that the Welsh, 
 old British, Church first approximated to the 
 English by conforming to the Catholic Easter, 
 and then through several centuries, became more 
 and more absorbed into or incorporated in the 
 English ; a consummation which Haddan and 
 Stubbs place at the end of the thirteenth century. 2 
 That the English episcopate is derived from the 
 Welsh is simply an imagination. 
 
 3. Dr. W 's letter is an example of this 
 
 futility of talking about ' England ' and the Eng- 
 lish Church, when he means ' Britain ' and the 
 British. There could be no English Church or 
 English national settlement in this island before 
 the Angles and Saxons subdued it. Your reply 
 is quite correct. I might, perhaps, express myself 
 a little otherwise on points of detail. Paulinus 
 actually secured a formal acceptance of Christianity 
 by the Northumbrian kingdom as such. He laid 
 a foundation on which Aidan built. He finally 
 evangelized at least North Lincolnshire, and his 
 
 1 Cf. Haddan and Stubbs, Councils and Ecclesiastical Docu- 
 ments, vol. iii., p. 271. 
 
 2 Ibid., L, pp. 552 sqq. 
 
British and English Churches 217 
 
 influence through Edwin produced the first con- 
 version of East Anglia, although Felix afterwards 
 had to do the work over again, at least to a great 
 extent. It would be clearer (would it not?) to 
 read ' Northumbria ' instead of ' North Britain/ 
 with regard to Cedd's work in the Midlands ; and 
 I think I should make it clear that he and two 
 other of the original four missionaries to the Mid- 
 Angles were Angles, though trained under the 
 Irish episcopate of Lindisfarne. It is quite true 
 in one sense that Theodore was the founder of the 
 Church of England, but an average reader might 
 not know in what sense i.e., as the consolidator 
 and organizer of the English Churches into 
 one. 
 
 Augustine, of course, was the founder of the 
 original English Church life ; he was an Apostle 
 in the sense of a first evangelizer (Bishop Light- 
 foot's substitution of Aidan 1 is misleading). Myths 
 die hard when they serve polemical interest ; and 
 the historical sense of some English Churchmen 
 has been distorted by a wish to minimize our 
 obligation to the Continental Churches, especially 
 the Roman. That we are deeply indebted to the 
 Irish Church goes without saying ; but not to the 
 British Church, as such, although the British 
 Bishops took part in Chad's consecration, and 
 doubtless British Christians may have done 
 much as individuals of which history takes no 
 account. 
 
 Lightfoot, Leaders in the Northern Church, p. 9. 
 
218 Historical Subjects 
 
 To the Rev. , on early British Church 
 
 history. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 September 19, 1898. 
 
 The first thing to be done, I suppose, in regard 
 to your subject would be to introduce your students 
 to the original texts as given in the first volume 
 of Haddan and Stubbs I mean the first part of 
 that first volume. 
 
 Gildas takes up not a few pages, and consider- 
 able allowance must be made for his ' sseva 
 indignatio ' in the estimate of his diatribes ; but 
 he must have had some substratum of fact as 
 to the deterioration of British Church life among 
 clergy as well as among princes, etc. 
 
 The best manual that I know of on early 
 British Church History in general is Archdeacon 
 Pryce's book. 1 It is sensible, lucid, and very 
 readable ; the notes also give excellent references 
 and short extracts. I referred to it in the last 
 edition of my Chapters of Early English Church 
 History? in which I have said pretty much what 
 I could consider historically worth saying on the 
 period. The truth is, there is not very much to be 
 known, as distinct from legend and surmise ; and 
 there has been a good deal of conjectural history 
 built up by patriotic enthusiasm. Legends always 
 have a certain value, and the stories of Cornish 
 Saints are given with detail and a good deal 
 
 1 The Ancient British Church (ed. 1878). 
 
 2 3rd ed., 1897, p. 6, note 3. 
 
The British Church 219 
 
 of interesting comment in Borlase's Age of 
 Saints. The life of David is best studied in 
 Freeman and Jones's History of St. David's, a 
 monumental work. I need not mention so im- 
 portant a little book as your Oxford Principal's 
 Celtic Britain^ and there is a small book by 
 Romilly Allen on the Monumental History of the 
 Early British Church, which is worth consult- 
 ing. But the period simply does not afford us 
 any continuous and trustworthy record ; we have 
 to do the best we can with landmarks and glimpses 
 ' broken lights ' as I called them. 
 
 To the Rev. , on St. Aidan. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 St. Chad's Day, 1898. 
 
 I do not admit that, in regard to apostleship, 
 Augustine and Aidan are on a par. Aidan's work 
 was more extensive and lasted longer than Augus- 
 tine's, and his character is more beautiful and 
 attractive. But he was not, properly speaking, 
 apostle even of the Northumbrians, and he did 
 nothing at all for any outside their borders. He 
 was not their apostle because he was not their 
 first evangelist. 
 
 The mischief done to historical proportion in 
 this matter by Lightfoot's uncritical antithesis 2 
 (prompted, no doubt, by the natural pietas of a 
 Bishop of Durham) has been incalculable. 
 
 1 Rhys, Celtic Britain (1892). 
 
 2 See above, p. 217. 
 
22O Historical Subjects 
 
 I wonder that no one has placed Birinus in the 
 position which Aidan is made to hold. He really 
 was the apostle, or first evangelist, of the great 
 district of Wessex, extending from Devonshire to 
 Bedfordshire. I think that for you in Mercia for 
 a church in Birmingham St. Chad, whom we all 
 honour on this day, would have been a more 
 appropriate figure for religious commemoration 
 than Aidan, to whom directly the Midlands owe 
 nothing, for the mission to Mercia was sent forth 
 after his death. 
 
 Of course, I do not forget that Chad had per- 
 sonally sat at the feet of Aidan, but that was in 
 his boyhood. 
 
 To the same, on the same subject. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 March 4, 1898. 
 
 Thanks. I see your point about Palladius, but 
 his presence in Ireland seems to have effected 
 nothing whatever. He failed that is, if we can 
 trust the somewhat vague stories about him. 1 Now, 
 Paulinus did not fail, considering the short time 
 that he had for missionary work. He obtained 
 the national adhesion of Northumbria to Christi- 
 anity ; he laboured mainly, of course, in Deira or 
 Yorkshire, but we find him catechizing and 
 baptizing for weeks together in remote villages of 
 Northumbria I mean of the county which has 
 this name. ' His labours,' says Canon Raine in 
 
 1 Haddan and Stubbs, Councils and Ecclesiastical Documents, 
 vol. II. , part ii., pp. 290 sq. 
 
St. Paulinus 221 
 
 his history of the Archbishoprick of York, ' must 
 have been prodigious ' l and it is obvious that all 
 this work could not possibly, as the ' Aidanolaters ' 
 are pleased to assume, have been undone in the 
 space of a single year, which intervened between 
 the death of Edwin and the accession of Oswald. 
 There are clear indications in Bede's language 
 that there were permanent effects of Paulinus's 
 work existing, which Aidan found when he arrived; 
 that he often, in short, had not to lay the founda- 
 tion, but to build upon it. 
 
 To the Rev. Canon , in reply to an inquiry 
 
 on the study of Scottish Church history. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 December 10, 1885. 
 
 I used to read Scottish Church History in a 
 two-volume work by Bishop Russell, 2 called 
 
 1 Fast. Ebor., i., p. 42. Cf. Bright, Chapters, etc., p. 138 
 (ed. 1897). 
 
 - The Rev. R. G. Fookes, an intimate friend of Dr. Bright's, 
 who now has many of his books, writes : ' In recent years 
 Dr. Bright was accustomed to recommend W. Stephen's 
 History of the Scottish Church, and Bishop Dowden's little 
 work on The Celtic Church in Scotland. . . . His copies 
 of Lawson's Episcopal Church of Scotland from the Reforma- 
 tion to the Rmolution, and History of the Scottish Episcopal 
 Church from the Revolution to the Present Time have been 
 a good deal used; but his copy of Russell is very fully 
 annotated. ... I have two of Dr. Bright's note-books on 
 Scottish Church History, one containing a continuous and 
 clearly-written history from the earliest times down to the year 
 1690, and the other a series of notes on miscellaneous points 
 of importance.' 
 
222 Historical Subjects 
 
 History of the Church in Scotland. There are 
 other and longer works ; the best of these is in 
 four volumes, by Mr. Grub (infelicitous name !) 
 of Aberdeen. It is called Ecclesiastical History 
 of Scotland. A moderate-sized manual does not, 
 to my knowledge, exist. There is a pretty little 
 introduction to Scottish History in general by a 
 Miss Kinloch 1 ; it tells one, pleasantly enough, a 
 good deal about the ancient Scottish Church. 
 The second volume of Skene's Celtic Scotland 
 gives a good deal of sound information about 
 St. Columba, and about those Culdees whom 
 Presbyterian fancy has so fondly idealized into 
 Presbyterian or quasi- Presbyterian ministers, t 
 wish I did know of any one commodious book 
 like Perry's Student's English Church History. 
 Of course, the main points to attend to are : 
 
 1. The early Missions : Ninian, Kentigern, 
 Columba, etc. 
 
 2. The unorganized state of the Church up to 
 the foundation of the See of St. Andrews. 
 
 3. The introduction of Roman and English 
 ecclesiastical culture by Queen Margaret. 
 
 4. The relations of the Church of Scotland to 
 that of England as complicated by the Wars of 
 Independence. 
 
 5. The erection of the two archbishoprics late 
 in the fifteenth century. 
 
 6. The deep corruption or secularization of tone 
 in the Church just before the Reformation. 
 
 7. The overthrow of the old Church by Knox's 
 movement. 
 
 1 A History of Scotland, chiefly in its Ecclesiastical Aspect. 
 
Scottish Church History 223 
 
 8. Nominal and gradual restoration of Episco- 
 pacy under James VI. 
 
 9. Real restoration of Episcopacy, 1611. 
 
 10. Overthrow of the Church in the days of 
 the Covenant. 
 
 IT. Restoration under Charles II. 
 
 12. Third overthrow, or ' disestablishment ' 
 under William and Mary. 
 
 To the Rev. , on the Western Canon Law. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 February 22, 1900. 
 
 I own that I am not at all an expert on the sub- 
 ject of Western Canon Law ; nor, to say the truth, 
 do I think that the study of it is practically 
 fruitful, considering the dependence of mediaeval 
 Canonists on the traditionary belief in Papal 
 supremacy, or, in other words, of the mass of 
 mediaeval legislation on the False Decretals. The 
 mediaeval period is not one to which we should 
 naturally look for intelligent and equitable defini- 
 tion of clerical or Christian duty. It was a time 
 in which the multiplication of restrictive law for 
 its own sake was a passion with ecclesiastical 
 legislators ; more and more laws Pelion on Ossa 
 were piled up, on the assumption that this was 
 to promote the cause of the Church, whereas it 
 was rather to furnish a colossal illustration of the 
 littera occidens. You might look for information 
 to an article in the Church Quarterly Review^ 
 
 1 The Legal and Historical Value of the Study of the Canon 
 Law (Church Quarterly Revieiv, vol. XVI., No. xxxii., pp. 270 
 
 w-)- 
 
224 Historical Subjects 
 
 July, 1883, or to Robertson's History of the 
 Church, vol. v., p. 431 ; vol. vi., p. 409. Doubtless 
 all legislative work has an interest of its own, but 
 we of the present English Church shall gain, I fear, 
 but little available guidance from the Decretum or 
 the successive books of Decretals. 
 
 To the Editor of The Guardian, on Wycliffes 
 views. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 May 30, 1884. 
 
 . . . Now, assuming the above to be a correct 
 representation of Wycliffe's theory, what does it 
 come to ? Surely to this : All mortal sin cancels 
 the effect of ordination. When one who has been 
 ordained a priest falls into this unhappy state, he 
 ceases to be a priest ; although he may go through 
 all his exterior functions, they are destitute of 
 interior validity. If he celebrates, the consecra- 
 tion is null so far as he is concerned ; all that can 
 be 'hoped' is that Christ Himself will consecrate, 
 instead of or without him, and that thus the com- 
 municants will not be losers. But this is only a 
 matter of ' hope '; the communicants, if they know 
 the celebrant to be a bad man, cannot be sure that 
 they will receive the Holy Eucharist ; they must 
 do the best they can amid inevitable uncertainty. 
 He may, to the knowledge at least of some among 
 them, be in mortal sin on one Sunday ; so far, then, 
 as that day's service goes, they have to lean on 
 the probability of an extraordinary operation of 
 
1 Unworthiness of the Minister' 225 
 
 Divine mercy. By the next Sunday he may have 
 repented and been restored to grace. The 
 moment this takes place he is invisibly, but effect- 
 ually, reordained ; he is as much a priest as ever, 
 but those who know of his sin may not know of 
 his recovery, and will then be still in anxiety 
 when they should be full of confidence. And so 
 it may go on. Is this theory I do not say com- 
 fortable for the private Christian, but consistent 
 with the teaching of the present English Church? 
 Article XXVI. expressly says that when evil men 
 administer the sacraments, they do so 'by Christ's 
 commission and authority.' In other words, they 
 are true priests, their wickedness notwithstanding, 
 and so far as their sacramental ministrations are 
 concerned, their people need be under no anxiety 
 whatever. The whole context of the Article 
 surely implies that however seriously mortal sin 
 may affect the priest as a man, it affects him not 
 at all in regard to his Orders or the validity of what 
 he does in his priestly character, so that as far as 
 any such acts are concerned, his people may have 
 exactly the same assurance not mere ' hope ' or 
 ' supposition,' but assurance as they would have 
 in regard to the ministrations of a St. Polycarp or 
 a Bishop Wilson. Such is unquestionably the 
 orthodox Anglican doctrine, and if Wycliffe did 
 not hold it, he must have fallen into a confusion 
 between the personal and official character of the 
 ordained ministers of Him Who is, as St. Thomas 
 Aquinas says, the Agens principalis 1 in the sacra- 
 ments (Summa, III. Ixii. i), the ever-present Be- 
 1 See above, p. 118. 
 
 15 
 
226 Historical Subjects 
 
 stower of that grace which He conveys through 
 media entrusted to instrumental hands. On this 
 point St. Augustine is a safer teacher than 
 Wycliffe. He habitually insists that, just because 
 Christ is the Lord of, and the supreme Agent in, 
 sacraments, therefore they are altogether of the 
 same validity when administered by bad or good 
 priests. The sunlight, he says in one place, is in 
 no wise contaminated by passing through a foul 
 atmosphere (De Baptismo, iii., c. lo 1 ). Again, 
 in the same treatise, ' Neither outwardly nor 
 inwardly can anyone who is on the side of the 
 devil stain in himself or in anyone sacramentum 
 quod Christi est ' (iv. c. I2 2 ). And, again, he asks 
 the Donatists whether in their view, if one of their 
 priests were secretly an adulterer, ' Per manus 
 eius vel Christus vel Spiritus Sanctus, vel forte 
 angelus, baptizavit?' 
 
 ' If, then/ he proceeds, ' it is a man that baptizes 
 when the baptizer is known to be good, but when 
 the baptizer is secretly bad, then it is God or an 
 angel that baptizes . . . those who desire to be 
 baptized should wish that their baptizer might not 
 be known to be good, but be secretly bad, so that 
 they might attain to be born again in greater 
 holiness, Deo vel angelo baptizante. Hanc 
 absurditatem si cogitant evitare, per quemlibet 
 hominem, cum quis Christi baptismo baptizatur, 
 Christum baptizare fateantur.' 
 
 He adds that the passage, 'As My Father, . . . 
 retained' (John xx. 21-23) 'contra nos esset, ut 
 
 1 Opera, torn, ix., col. 1136 (ed. Ben.). 
 
 2 Ibid., col. I32F. 
 
St. Augustine and the Donatists 227 
 
 cogeremur fateri ab hominibus hoc, non per homines 
 fieri, si posteaquam dixit, Et ego mitto vos, subie- 
 cisset continue, Si cui dimiseritis, etc. Cum vero 
 interpositum est, Hoc cum dixisset, insufflavit, et ait 
 illis, Accipite Spiritum Sanctum, et deinde illatum, 
 per eos vel remissionem vel retentionem fieri pec- 
 catorum ; satis ostenditur non ipsos id agere, sed/^r 
 eos utique Spiritum Sanctum. . . . Spiritus autem 
 Sanctus in ecclesise prseposito vel ministro sic 
 inest, ut si fictus (a hypocrite or insincere) non 
 est, operetur per eum Spiritus et eius mercedem 
 in salutem sempiternam, et eorum regenera- 
 tionem . . . qui per eum . . . consecrantur. . . . 
 Si autem fictus est (here a reference to Wisdom 
 i. 5), deest quidem saluti eius . . . ministerium 
 tamen eius non deserit, quo per- eum salutem 
 operatur aliorum ' (Contra Epist. Parmen., ii. 
 c. ii 1 ). 
 
 This was evidently, to St. Augustine, a ' matter 
 of faith.' If Wycliffe or his followers held other- 
 wise, may we not say, so much the worse for 
 them ? 
 
 To the Rev. , on the authority of the Homilies. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 March 12, 1889. 
 
 The Bishop of Winchester, in his book on the 
 Articles calls the Homilies 'semi-authoritative.' 
 ' All writers on the subject have agreed that the 
 kind of assent which we are here called to give to 
 
 1 Opera, torn, ix., col. 41. 
 
228 Historical Subjects 
 
 them is general, not specific. We are not expected 
 to express full concurrence with every statement 
 or every exposition of Holy Scripture contained 
 in them, but merely, in the general, to approve of 
 them as a body of sound and orthodox discourses, 
 and well adapted for the times for which they 
 were composed.' The Homily of Salvation ' is 
 of greater authority than the rest, being referred 
 to in Article XI.' 1 
 
 In Hook's Church Dictionary (/th edition, 
 1854) we find, quoted from Bishop Overall : 
 
 ' They have many scapes in them in special, 
 although they contain in general many wholesome 
 lessons for the people.' 
 
 It is rather dangerous for Low Churchmen to 
 appeal to the Homilies as if they were wholly 
 authoritative. For they treat the Apocrypha as 
 Scripture (Against Peril of Idolatry, part i.), and 
 Toby and Baruch as prophets (Of Almsdeeds, i. ; 
 Against Wilful Rebellion, i.) ; describe the font 
 as ' the fountain of regeneration ' (For Repairing 
 of Churches] ; use ' baptized ' in closest connection 
 with ' justified ' (Of Salvation, iii.), and allow 
 Absolution and Orders to be sacraments in a lax 
 sense, only not such sacraments as Baptism and the 
 Communion are (Of Common Prayer and Sacra- 
 ments]. In An Homily of the Worthy Receiving 
 . . . of the Sacrament, part i., although the ' sacri- 
 fice ' is denied, it seems to be denied in the sense 
 of a proper propitiatory sacrifice such as Christ 
 once made on the Cross, and in that homily we 
 
 1 Browne, An Exposition of the Thirty-nine Articles, p. 777 
 {ed. 1882). 
 
Language of the Homilies 229 
 
 read that in the Supper ' there is no untrue figure 
 of a thing absent ' (although it does not appear from 
 the context that the homilist meant an 'objective' 
 presence, as it is called, yet he speaks of the 'ancient 
 catholic fathers ' as ' calling this Supper the salve 
 or food of immortality,' etc.). Moreover, the 
 doctrine of the Homilies on the subject of 
 obedience to rulers goes the whole length of 
 non-resistance even when rulers 'abuse their 
 power' (Concerning Obedience, part ii.). And the 
 second series of Homilies, if taken as strictly 
 authoritative, would commit the Church for all 
 time to the Tudor maxims of government. I pass 
 by some historical errors and the queer blunder 
 (Of the Reading of Holy Scripture] about 
 ' Eunuchus, a nobleman of Ethiope.' 
 
 In fact, if anyone quietly considers it, there 
 could not be a more intolerable burden than to 
 inflict on us as perfectly authoritative those sets of 
 long sermons, differing broadly in tone and style 
 from the Prayer- Book. No party in the Church 
 could endure it for a day. Traces, and more than 
 traces, of red-hot controversial feeling are found 
 repeatedly in the Homilies, although there is a 
 good deal in them which is historically interesting 
 and morally and doctrinally edifying. To claim 
 more for them is to prove far too much. 
 
230 Historical Subjects 
 
 To the Venerable Archdeacon of - , on 
 the word religion. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 December 4, 1892. 
 
 Trench makes the same remark 1 as to the sense 
 of ' religion ' in the Reformation age (see Eng- 
 lish Past and Present, p. 135 [ed. 1855]) ; but he 
 overstates a little. ' Religion ' is used absolutely 
 and in a good sense in connection with ' God's 
 word ' in the Homily against Contention, part iii. ; 
 see also part i. of the same, at the beginning. 
 Elsewhere it is used with qualifying terms, and 
 once {Homily on Good Works, part ii.) as the 
 equivalent of ' sect.' 
 
 Probably this use of the word, as not intrinsi- 
 cally good in its idea at least, as not of itself mean- 
 ing ' godliness ' was in part due to the fact that it 
 had been technically applied to the monastic pro- 
 fession with its vows. (I wish we were not 
 embarrassed, as we now are, by this restricted use 
 of a great word, which suggests to the unin- 
 structed that life is somehow not religious unless 
 it is spent in a Sisterhood or Brotherhood.) 
 
 In Titus Andronicus, V. i. 74, ' religious ' is 
 connected with having a ' conscience ' (this would 
 quite agree with the old Latin use of the word) ; 
 and see another good use of ' religion ' in 
 2 Henry IV., I. i. 201. 
 
 1 ' Like the Latin religio, it means the outward forms and 
 embodiments in which the inward principle of piety arrayed 
 itself, the external service of God.' 
 
The 'religious life' 231 
 
 In Paradise Lost, Book I. 372, 'gay religions 
 full of pomp and gold/ the word has the sense of 
 external observances. 
 
 Of course, one knows that the phrase ' religious 
 life ' is explained as a life exceptionally and 
 exclusively devoted to religious acts, etc. But 
 still it has a sound which might mislead. 
 
 To the Editor of The Guardian, on C/mrck and 
 
 State. 
 
 February 4, 1881. 
 
 An ' English Churchman ' argues in your last 
 number that if the House of Commons is now 
 ecclesiastically heterogeneous, so it was from 
 1549 to 1673, inasmuch as Protestant Dissenters 
 sat in it then as now, and took full part in ecclesi- 
 astical legislation. 
 
 i. If it were as your correspondent supposes, 
 Hooker's theory, to which he refers, would be 
 unaccountable. For if Hooker, writing under 
 Elizabeth, calls ' the Parliament of England, 
 together with the convocation annexed there- 
 unto, the body of the whole realm' (VIII. vi. u), 
 this is because ' there is not any man of the 
 Church of England but the same man is also a 
 member of the commonwealth, nor any man a 
 member of the commonwealth which is not also 
 of the Church of England' (VIII. i. 2). Church 
 and State are, in fact, coextensive. It is one 
 body under different names, representing its 
 different aspects. ' In a word, our estate is ac- 
 cording to the pattern of God's own ancient elect 
 
232 Historical Subjects 
 
 people, which people were not part of them the 
 commonwealth, and part of them the Church of 
 God ; but the self- same people, whole and entire, 
 were both under one Chief Governor,' etc. 
 (VIII. i. 7). Could Hooker have written thus if 
 he had had before him such an England, and 
 such a House of Commons, as we have in 1881 ? 
 Were he alive now, would he not admit that the 
 growth of religious dissensions among the com- 
 munity of citizens had made his theory obsolete ?' 
 (See Dr. Barry's paper on Hooker in Masters of 
 English Theology, p. 57.) 
 
 2. But your correspondent appears to have 
 confused two senses of the word ' Puritan.' The 
 Puritans of Elizabeth's House of Commons were 
 professing Churchmen, who desired to see the 
 Church, in their own sense, further reformed. 
 This is the very point of Wentworth's celebrated 
 speech to Archbishop Parker, and of his words 
 when reporting it to the House in 1576 : ' I fear 
 lest our Bishops do attribute to themselves ' 
 infallibility. 1 Real Nonconformity, 2 or organized 
 Dissent, began about 1566, but took its most 
 extreme form about 1580, in the Brownists, 
 whom Neal describes as ' the separatists, who 
 renounced all communion with the Church in the 
 word and sacraments, as well as in the common 
 prayer and ceremonies ' (^History of the Puritans, 
 
 1 Cf. Hallam, Constitutional History, c. iv., vol. i., p. 192 
 (7th ed., 1854). 
 
 2 [Dr. Bright was here using ' Nonconformity' in its modern 
 sense as synonymous with ' Dissent.' For its historical mean- 
 ing, as the opposite of ' Separatist,' see Dixon, History of the 
 Church of England, iii., pp. 184 sqq. ED.] 
 
Puritans not all Separatists 233 
 
 i. p. 347). Compare Hallam's Constitutional His- 
 tory, c. iv. : ' The real separatists were de- 
 nominated Brownists. . . . These went far beyond 
 the Puritans.' 1 Both writers are referring to the 
 severe statute 2 passed in 1593 against Noncon- 
 formity, after the Mar-prelate libels had given 
 special offence, as Canon Perry shows in his 
 Student s English Church History, ii. p. 336. 
 It might well be deemed needless to exclude 
 such men by a Church test from the House of 
 Commons, when they were viewed as ' rebellious 
 subjects ' (ibid., p. 366) and threatened by statute 
 with imprisonment and exile. It was by law, as 
 Canon Curteis says, 3 that these persons were 
 penally dealt with. Some three weeks after 
 the Long Parliament met (in November, 1640), 
 all its members communicated from the hands of 
 Bishop Williams, a table being, by special order 
 of the House, set ' in the middle of the church on 
 that occasion' (Neal, ii. p. 5). It was gradually 
 drawn from the position of Puritan Churchman- 
 ship to that of virtual Presbyterianism but by 
 the necessity of securing Scottish help. Hence 
 its acceptance of the Covenant 4 in 1643. It will 
 hardly be maintained that this acceptance the 
 act of the whole body can find a place among 
 ' constitutional ' precedents. 
 
 An 'English Churchman's' list of cases in 
 
 1 Vol. i., p. 213 sq. 
 
 2 35 Eliz., c. i, a/>. Gee and Hardy, Documents illustrative 
 of English Church History, pp. 492 sqq. 
 
 3 Dissent in its Relation to the Church of England, p. 74 
 (6th ed., 1885). 
 
 4 Gee and Hardy, p. 569 sq. 
 
234 Historical Subjects 
 
 which the authority of Parliament, as acknow- 
 ledged by Hooker, acted for the Church, signifi- 
 cantly omits the one great statute 1 which, together 
 with the action of Convocation so carefully 
 recited in its preamble, represents the present 
 ecclesiastical settlement as accepted by ' this 
 Church and Realm in 1661-2. It is little to say 
 that he ignores the royal pledge contained in the 
 Declaration prefixed to the Articles ; but he 
 should not forget that the House of Commons in 
 1689 reminded William III. of the ancient usage 
 of bringing ecclesiastical matters before Convoca- 
 tion. 2 On his principles, one fails to see why 
 Convocation exists at all as a constitutional 
 body. 
 
 I need not dwell on that momentous change 
 from a really royal to a really parliamentary 
 government, which should never be lost sight of 
 in any survey of the Post- Reformation relations 
 of Church and State, and to which you refer in 
 your leading article, as it was pointed out twelve 
 years ago by Professor Burrows (Constitutional 
 Progress, p. 160), and thirty years ago by 
 Mr. Gladstone (Letter on the Royal Supremacy, 
 reprinted in Gleanings, v. p. 262). And when your 
 correspondent asks whether what is involved 
 in the ' list of cases ' is to be altered at the 
 request of the Toleration memorialists, he seems 
 to forget that they speak of ' State encroachment 
 on rights assured to the Church of England by 
 solemn Acts of Parliament '; so that, thus far, 
 
 1 14 Charles II., c. 4, Gee and Hardy, pp. 600 sqq. 
 
 2 Cardwell, Conferences, p. 410 (3rd ed., 1849). 
 
Rights of Civil Power limited 235 
 
 they request that Parliament will adhere to its 
 ancient engagements with the Church. 
 
 It is of no use to appeal to Hooker's theory of 
 Church and State without remembering not only 
 that time has made it untenable, but also what 
 consequences it directly involved. For him, the 
 Christian King, clothed with authority over the 
 people in their character of Christians, as in their 
 character of citizens, is like a Jewish King, a 
 Jehoshaphat, and is bound to use the ' civil 
 sword ' for the Church's benefit, ' to keep her 
 children in obedience withal' (VIII. iii. 4). On 
 the other hand, although Hooker's monarchical 
 views are obsolete in modern England for he 
 would clearly have disapproved of the Revolution 
 of 1688 (VIII. ii. 10) yet he set the King 
 ' below the law,' denied him the power of 'juris- 
 diction ' as of ' order,' and significantly observed 
 that the ' Rule for proceedings in ecclesiastical 
 affairs and causes by regal power had not hitherto 
 been agreed upon with so uniform consent and 
 certainty as might be wished' (VIII. ii. 16); add- 
 ing, more boldly, 'Whether it be the nature of courts, 
 or the form of pleas, or the kind of governors, or 
 the order of proceedings, in whatsoever spiritual 
 businesses, for the received laws and liberties of 
 the Church the king hath supreme authority and 
 power, but against them none. It would,' he 
 proceeds, ' be very scandalous and offensive if, in 
 principal matters of religion, either kings or laws 
 should dispose of the affairs of God without any 
 respect had to ' ancient Church order ; and he 
 
236 Historical Subjects 
 
 cites with approval the clause in i Eliz., c. i, 
 36, l as to the prescribed criterion of heresy, 
 including the decisions of the first four General 
 Councils (VIII. ii. 17). Is not this pertinent to 
 our present ' crisis ' ? 
 
 1 The Act of Supremacy, ap. Gee and Hardy, pp. 442 sqq. 
 
V 
 The Roman Question 
 
 To the Rev. , on the Roman claims. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 September 22, 1889. 
 
 THERE is no doubt that Roman proselytism is, 
 consciously or not, influenced by the unhappy 
 tradition of lax casuistry which the last three cen- 
 turies have rooted in the Latin Church system. 
 Look, if you have the chance, at the Church 
 Quarterly Review for April an article on 
 ' Certain Graver Aspects of the Roman Position.' 1 
 It dwells on the moral unsoundness of the system ; 
 it is by one who has had internal knowledge of 
 what we only know from without. Sometimes a 
 Roman controversialist like Rivington shows a 
 readiness to say anything in presence of any 
 evidence, as if really the sense of obligation to 
 facts had been scooped out of them. Take one 
 example : in his Aiithority he absolutely writes 
 down, corrects in proof, and sends to press the 
 assertion, that at the Council of Jerusalem St. 
 
 1 Vol. XXVIIL, No. lv., pp. 31 sqq. 
 
 [237] 
 
238 The Roman Question 
 
 Peter formulated the decree and all the rest signed 
 it, beginning with St. James, and that the question 
 between SS. Peter and Paul at Antioch was only 
 of 'personal conduct' and 'practical expediency.' I 
 have been dissecting his statements on ancient 
 Church history (in his new book 1 ) in an article for 
 next month's Church Quarterly Review? Such 
 writers ought to be shown up. It is charlatanry 
 when they handle patristic evidence ; they assume 
 a Papist's major premiss all through. As for 
 Rivington himself, I suspect that in most cases 
 he has been primed with passages taken out of 
 contexts, and has deemed it a piece of religious 
 loyalty not to 'verify the references.' If you can 
 make the lad in question see that such self-chosen 
 guides are not to be lightly trusted and that 
 really there was, in the mere dallying with such 
 suggestions, a certain element of self-will and self- 
 confidence some moral good may ensue. Of 
 course, he liked to think himself important enough 
 to be addressed with a view to his 'conversion.' 
 But what I never can sufficiently wonder at is, 
 that youths who know that they cannot judge so 
 complex a question in its historical and theological 
 bearings, should think it consistent to play with 
 bits of it just those bits which a Roman pro- 
 selytizer chooses to hold out to them. It is not like 
 the case of a poor ignorant young soldier, who (as 
 sometimes happens) wishing to marry a Roman 
 
 1 Dependence, or the Insecurity of the Anglican Position. Cf. 
 pp. 69, 74 (2nd ed., 1888). 
 
 2 A Roman proselyte on ancient Church History (Vol. xxix., 
 No. Ivii., pp. 122 sqq.\ 
 
Defects of the Catechism 239 
 
 Catholic wife, accepts her religion 'in block,' on 
 the simple assurance that ' there must be a teach- 
 ing Church, and that the Roman Church alone is 
 that Church.' We might, to be sure, take lessons 
 from Rome as to careful catechetical training in 
 some leading principles of Churchmanship. That 
 is what the Lower House wanted to supply by 
 their questions and answers, but the Upper House 
 stopped us on a question of prerogative. 1 I wish 
 the Catechism were more simply worded as to the 
 sacraments. Many do not understand the con- 
 struction of ' ordained by Christ Himself; ' promise 
 them both ' is often puzzling to a child, and ' the 
 faithful ' is ambiguous. Moreover, some answers 
 contain too much ; they need practically to be 
 broken up. I often wonder whether Overall had 
 ever really taught a schoolboy, or rather, really 
 catechized children. The first part is much more 
 intelligibly worded. Still, after all deductions it is 
 a most invaluable document, as far as it goes. Of 
 course, beside the question of the Church, there 
 are other subjects of importance on which it does 
 not profess to give instruction. 
 
 To the same, on the same subject. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 October 24, 1889. 
 
 I need not say that I am always most ready to 
 answer questions which admit of a concise and 
 definite reply within the compass of a letter. In 
 1 See appendix. 
 
240 The Roman Question 
 
 vacation I would that is, I can give awider scope 
 to such questions ; but in term, you know, one's 
 leisure is limited. And the questions which you 
 mention, on the whole, could not be fully answered 
 without, so to speak, writing a regular chapter of 
 Church History ; e.g., as to the relation of the 
 African Episcopate to Rome in the Pelagian con- 
 troversy, to which that doctrine of St. Augustine 
 refers. If it be said that this doctrine has been 
 ' condensed into that famous maxim,' 1 the answer is 
 that the maxim was an impudent substitute for 
 St. Augustine's own words, 2 omitting one capital 
 feature of them. All I can say here is, that it is 
 a subject treated of in histories ; I think I have 
 said something about it in my own. The one 
 thing which can be put into a brief compass is : 
 Let Fr. Bruno or any other Roman Catholic 
 prove, instead of assuming, that the See of Rome 
 in 418 held the position which it claims in 1889 ; 
 that any respectful deference paid, say, to Pope 
 Innocent I. by such prelates as St. Augustine 
 carries with it the principles of the whole Vatican 
 dogma about the Papal jurisdiction and infallibility. 
 That dogma claims to represent aboriginal 
 Christian tradition ; therefore no theory of de- 
 
 1 Bruno, \Roman\ Catholic Belief, p. 44 (4th ed, 1883), 
 gives the maxim as Roma locuta est, causa finita est.' 
 
 2 St. Augustine wrote : ' Jam enim de hac causa duo concilia 
 missa sunt ad sedem apostolicam : inde etiam rescripta vene- 
 runt : causa finita est.' Sermo, cxxxi., 10 (Opera, torn, v., 
 col. 645D). The phrase, as commonly misquoted, represents 
 the matter as settled by Rome and Rome only. St. Augustine 
 represents it as not settled till after ' the reports of the two 
 councils, to which Rome's utterance was a reply.' Cf. Bright, 
 Roman See in the Early Church, pp. 130 sqq. 
 
Theory of development irrelevant 241 
 
 velopment, except in mere expression, can be 
 consistently held by obedient Romanists, 1 which 
 considerably narrows the issue. But how can I, 
 in a letter, disprove in detail the large assertion 
 that all the Fathers imply Papal supremacy ? Of 
 course it is false ; but one cannot prove its falsity 
 without something like a pamphlet, or, better, a 
 short treatise. It is utterly false that, e.g., the 
 Nicene Council was summoned by the Pope. On 
 Vatican principles it need never have met at all. 2 
 
 As for the objection with which this poor lad 
 has been primed, ' Ah, those are Protestant 
 authors,' anybody with common - sense might 
 answer, ' Well, are Roman authors to be implicitly 
 trusted to be judges in their own cause ?' If I 
 were dealing orally with a fairly educated inquirer, 
 I would take him simply to ancient documents. 
 
 But the question is one which opens up deeper 
 considerations. Is this youth morally competent 
 to form an opinion on such matters ? What has 
 he read, what can he have read, save scraps of 
 Fathers given him, or shown him, as quoted by 
 Roman Catholic writers ? How can he possibly 
 estimate the proportion and the real significance 
 of isolated passages, unless he can look at them 
 as in the framework of the whole period ? And 
 if you allow him to think that he can really form 
 a personal judgment on such questions, without 
 having at all prepared himself by requisite study, 
 are you not in danger of simply feeding self- 
 conceit? If he talks of Transubstantiation, could 
 
 1 Bright, Roman See, etc., pp. 2 sq. 
 
 2 Ibid., pp. 66 sqq. 
 
 16 
 
242 The Roman Question 
 
 he answer any elementary questions about the 
 theory of substance and accidents ? If he talks of 
 Tradition, could he tell you how much he means 
 by it, what points it covers, how far an unwritten 
 tradition supplementary, in matters of faith, to 
 Scripture can be historically proved ? And if he 
 does not know whether it can or not, how can he 
 affect to argue from it as if proved ? Again, if he 
 were asked whether the idea of a continuous 
 tradition were quite in harmony with the insist- 
 ence on the simple voice of the actual Roman 
 Church, would he know what to say ? would he 
 even know enough to understand your meaning ? 
 Poor fellow ! Still, you will really, with the best 
 intentions, be doing him harm if you allow him to 
 pose as an argaer on a great theological arid 
 historical question. He is not to blame for not 
 possessing the requisite knowledge ; but is he 
 not to blame if, without such knowledge, he 
 assumes the responsibility of pronouncing his own 
 Church wrong on a series of propositions in theo- 
 logy and in history ? It were better for him to 
 say, as some who know far more have said, ' I 
 don't understand the historical question, and I 
 don't pretend to weigh the several passages in the 
 Fathers which are quoted on both sides ; but the 
 Roman system suits me, seems to meet my needs, 
 corresponds with my own ideal.' Oakeley said 
 this, and Ward, in effect, said this ; but this lad, 
 apparently, thinks himself qualified to discuss 
 what Ward and Oakeley declined, substantially, 
 to handle. I am not, for a moment, justifying 
 their position ; but it was more modest, and it 
 
The need of humility 243 
 
 was more intelligible. You might, perhaps, tell 
 the youth that really he ought to qualify himself 
 more than he has done for forming what must be a 
 private individual judgment, for which he, and he 
 alone, will have to answer before God, against the 
 Church of England. Do try to make him a little 
 more humble ; let the moral question come to the 
 front. A few Socratic questions, quietly and 
 judiciously put, might give him some idea of his 
 own incompetency for such matters. I must not 
 forget to say that Clement of Rome's name never 
 once appears in the Epistle called his. He wrote 
 it in the name of the Roman Church 1 to remon- 
 strate with Corinthians as to a schism in which 
 their ministers had been deposed. Papal claims 
 are wholly ' out of it.' 
 
 To the Rev. - , on the same subject. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 October 27, 1889. 
 
 The passage which Romanists formerly quoted 
 in its garbled condition is not in the Anti- Pelagian 
 Treatises, but in the end of Sermon i^i. 2 The 
 reference is to the report of Anti- Pelagian decisions 
 by African Synods, sent to Innocent I. The 
 
 1 Cf. 'H e'xxATjo-ia roD 0eo q Ta/ao/xoSo-a ( Pu>fJ.i}v ry 
 
 ro3 0oD TTJ Ka.por/.ovar, KopivQw, i Clem, ad Cor., i, ap. Light- 
 foot, Apostolic Fathers, Part I., vol. ii., p. 5. Dionysius of 
 Corinth and Irenaeus both refer to it as the letter of the Roman 
 Church. Cf. Gwatkin, Selections, etc., pp. 62, 102 ; and cf. 
 Bright, Roman See, etc., p. 23. 
 
 2 See above, p. 240, note 2. 
 
 1 6 2 
 
244 The Roman Question 
 
 synodical letters are Aug. Epp. 175, 176. Ep. 175 
 plainly, though respectfully, intimates to the Pope 
 that the Council expects his concurrence. So 
 does the other letter, and in it one finds the 
 significant remark, ' We think that they (the 
 heretical teachers who had not hitherto yielded, 
 but were maintaining their error) will more easily 
 yield auctoritati sanctitatis tuce de sanctarum 
 scripturarum auctoritate deprompta^ i e., Inno- 
 cent will adduce Scriptural evidence against their 
 false notions. 
 
 Then, after Innocent had utilized the occasion 
 to magnify his own see, 2 and had condemned 
 Pelagianism, the next Pope (I use the term for 
 mere convenience), Zosimus, was beguiled by the 
 Pelagians, wrote strongly in their favour to the 
 African Church in their behalf, 3 and was respect- 
 fully resisted, that Church demanding that he 
 should not depart from the lines of his prede- 
 cessor. 4 
 
 Of course, your poor lad doesn't know that 
 whereas Pius IV.'s Creed imposes the duty of not 
 interpreting Scripture ' except according to the 
 
 1 Ep. clxxvi., 5 (Opera, torn, ii., col. 62 2 A). 
 
 2 Aug., Ep. clxxxi., i (Opera, torn, ii., col. 635?). 
 
 3 Zosimus spoke of their ' absoluta fides,' and said ' a catho- 
 lica veritate nunquam fuisse divulsos.' His letter is in Aug., 
 Opera, torn, x., app., coll. 99 sqq. ' It has no direct bearing 
 on Papal Infallibility.' Cf. Bright, Anti-Pelagian Treatises of 
 St. Augustine, p. xl. 
 
 4 ' Constituimus,' said the Africans, ' in Pelagium atque 
 Cselestium per . . . episcopum Innocentium de beatissimi 
 apostoli Petri sede prolatam manere sententiam.' Cf. Aug., 
 Opera, torn, x., app., col. IO2D; and Bright, Roman See, etc., 
 p. 133, note 2. 
 
The consent of the Fathers 245 
 
 unanimous consent of the Fathers >l there is not 
 even a shadow of pretence for claiming such a 
 consent on behalf of the Papal interpretation of 
 ' Thou art Peter.' 
 
 It is certainly a great pity that you formerly 
 thought all those questions unpractical. That 
 horrid question, ' What will pay in the schools ?' 
 has done too much mischief ere now. 
 
 You had better get Littledale's Petrine 
 Claims? which is a reprint of articles in the 
 Chiirck Quarterly Review. He is a keen counsel, 
 whose tone won't suit people with Roman fever 
 on them or threatening them ; and here and there 
 he presses a point too far; still, it is a very useful 
 book. But, as I said, the first thing is, lead this 
 lad to a humbler and healthier estimate of his own 
 capacities for really handling such questions. 
 What would he say if, e.g., a parson dealt thus 
 with a technical question in some secular business ? 
 
 P.S. The ominous point in this youth's case is 
 that instead of presuming that the Church in 
 which he had been bred up and in which he was 
 actually a Sunday-school teacher, was right until 
 she could be proved wrong instead of saying, 
 when scraps and 'tags' from ancient writers about 
 which he could not possibly know anything were 
 offered to him by a professed enemy to that 
 Church, ' I can't enter into these minute ques- 
 tions, but I think my own clergy are just as likely 
 to be trustworthy on such a subject as Roman 
 
 1 Canones et Decreta Concilii Tridentini, p. 227. 
 
 2 S.P.C.K., 1889. The articles were contributed between 
 1878 and 1884. 
 
246 The Roman Question 
 
 priests, and until I have a real knowledge of the 
 matter for myself, I may reasonably rely on them 
 instead of this, he practically throws the burden 
 of proof on his own clergy when it ought to lie on 
 their opponents. What makes him do this ? It is 
 plain as noonday. The proposal made to him, 
 4 Look at these passages for yourself, and you will 
 soon see how they upset the Anglican pretensions,' 
 flatters his self-importance, or self-confidence, as 
 it could not possibly be flattered or pleased or 
 ministered to, by the course which was in the cir- 
 cumstances natural and legitimate for one like him. 
 
 To the Rev. , on the same subject. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 October 29, 1889. 
 
 What you quote from Bruno is very like what 
 I read in Rivington. I think they all sent out 
 the same article, with some little varieties as to 
 colour and trimming. 
 
 Rivington writes as if facts had really no rights ; 
 as if evidence might be treated in the most arbitrary 
 fashion in order to make out a case for the Pope. 
 
 But look at that passage which you quote from 
 Bruno : could anyone who had really read the 
 New Testament call the Roman Church the 
 ' trunk ' of all Churches ? But what would be 
 ' inconceivable,' unless we admit what? ' Incon- 
 ceivable ' that 4 all churches ought to be united to 
 the Church of Rome as branches to the trunk, and 
 to conform their faith ' to the teaching of the 
 
Roman assumptions 247 
 
 Church of Rome, unless we admit that the Pope's 
 teaching was infallible. 1 
 
 Undoubtedly, a very obvious proposition ; but 
 how if we deny the proposition, which is thus 
 assumed, that all Churches ought so to submit ? 
 It is in these quiet assumptions that much of the 
 Roman tactics consists. 
 
 Then again, in what sense does ' every part of 
 Christendom bear witness from the earliest ages 
 that the Church is built on Peter'? 2 What does the 
 phrase mean? Most certainly it did not mean, say 
 to St. Cyprian, what it means to Dr. Bruno. The 
 latter is simply trafficking in ambiguities. I suppose 
 he reckons on his readers not cross-questioning his 
 language. But I can't acquit him of distinct sug- 
 gestio falsi when he talks of the Corinthians apply- 
 ing to Clement I. to know who would be their 
 ' legitimate Pastor.' 2 If he ever read anything that 
 the Epistle of the Roman Church, doubtless written 
 by Clement, says on the subject, he must know 
 better than that. And if not, he is morally wrong 
 in talking about the matter as if he knew. 
 
 I wonder what T. B. (poor lad, how old is he ?) 
 has been primed with as to the Council of 
 Jerusalem. Rivington, in his Authority, had the 
 ' cheek ' to tell his readers that St. Peter's speech 
 was the determination, the final decisive sentence, 
 and that it was, as such, subscribed by St. James 
 and the rest ! I do believe these converts, in 
 the flush of their neophyte enthusiasm, will say 
 anything. . . . 
 
 1 Bruno, \^Romari\ Catholic Belief, pp. 43 sq. 
 
 2 Ibid., p. 117. 
 
248 The Roman Question 
 
 P.S. The absurd argument from the employ- 
 ment of Peter's boat is a very old story. I forget 
 which of the Anglican divines it was who perhaps 
 not very reverently paraphrased the text in the 
 Roman sense substantially thus : ' Peter, I do 
 mean by sitting in thy boat that thou and thy 
 successors in the See of Rome shall be Popes and 
 Oracles of My church for ever.' (Moreover, 
 James and John should thus be made ' partners ' 
 in the papacy.) Of course, we must frankly 
 admit that St. Peter did occupy, in our Lord's 
 own day and in the early period of the Church's 
 life, a conspicuous position as spokesman and as 
 leader. He may even be called o ^ov^nvoq after 
 Luke xxii. 26 but this is just the point, Is 
 fiytpovia the equivalent of tipyji ? The allies of 
 Athens, at the opening of the Peloponnesian War, 
 were disposed to think that she had turned her 
 legitimate riytfjiovia, by gradual aggressions, into an 
 illegitimate a'/o^i). It is a very natural process, and 
 we contend that Rome has performed it. But it is 
 the trick or policy of Roman arguers to heap up 
 passages which recognise a riy^ovia in St. Peter, or 
 in the ancient Roman Bishops, and to glide from 
 this into the inference that they prove an dpyrj ; 
 that primacy or pre-eminence involves supremacy 
 or monarchy. 1 We have to watch this sinuous 
 motion, and stop it. 
 
 1 Thucydides, i. 97. Cf. Bright, Roman, See, etc., p 21. 
 
The African Councils of 416 A.D. 249 
 
 To the Rev. , on the same subject. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 October 31, 1889. 
 
 I understand auctoritati . . . depromptce^- to 
 mean ' the authoritativeness of your own state- 
 ment on the question in controversy based, as it 
 will be, on the fontal, original authority of Holy 
 Scripture' (Ep. 176). 
 
 Compare the previous Epistle of the other 
 Council, 2 Ep. 175. They quote texts and add 
 et innumerabilia talia, qu& de Scripturis omnibus 
 si colligere velimus, tempus non sufficit. Et 
 veremur ne apud te ista ipsa commemorando, quce 
 majore gratia de sede apostolica pr&dicas, incon- 
 venienter facere videamur? In Ep. 176 itself, 4 
 there is also a clause ut alia omittamus qu<z contra 
 sane t as scripturas plurima disserunt? They 
 evidently expect Innocent to give his judgment 
 backed up by a full argument from the New 
 Testament. Bruno must be one of those un- 
 scrupulous people who think that all is fair against 
 'Protestants' and for the Holy See. What a 
 fatal mistake the mediaeval moralists made in not 
 including mendacium among the peccata capi- 
 ta lia. . . . 
 
 As to that ridiculous assumption . . ., where is 
 
 1 See above, p. 244. 
 
 2 Sc. of Carthage, 416. Cf. Hefele, ii. p. 455. 
 
 3 Aug., Ep. 175, 3 (Opera, torn, ii., col. 6i9A). 
 
 4 Sc. of the Co. of Milevum, 416. Cf. Hefele, ii., p. 455. 
 
 5 Aug., Ep. 176, 3 (Opera, torn, ii., col. 6210). 
 
250 The Roman Question 
 
 there in Acts xv. a word about Peter giving to 
 James any position whatever? I do not, for my 
 part, see an actual presidential sentence in St. 
 James' syw Kpivu. It is very emphatic ; but /cptW 
 might mean only a personal judgment, not neces- 
 sarily the pronouncement made from the presi- 
 dential seat and expressing the decision of the 
 assembly. R. V. has ' my judgement is . . .' 
 (xv. 19). 
 
 That St. Peter concealed his own Pontifical 
 authority while he lived ! Can such a shift be 
 treated gravely ? What of St. Paul's magnifying 
 his office P 1 What of St. John's threat against 
 Diotrephes ? 2 What of the instruction to Titus 
 to speak and act with all authority ? 3 Our Lord 
 Himself gives no example of such false and disloyal 
 humility. He ever affirmed His own supreme 
 authority. He did so for the sake of souls and 
 for the sake of the truth. . . . 
 
 To a candidate for Holy Orders, on the Roman 
 
 claims. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 February 21, 1894. 
 
 Let me suggest to you a practice which I have 
 often found useful : when one writes a letter on a 
 grave subject, to write it twice over, especially, 
 perhaps, when one wants to ascertain another 
 person's opinion. It saves time ; but, what is still 
 better, it clears the thoughts, and corrects the 
 tendency to inexact or confused statement. 
 
 1 Rom. xi. 13. 2 3 John 9. 3 Tit. ii. 15 
 
Two kinds of criticism 251 
 
 Your letter may I say it ? would have been 
 the better for such revision. You write as if all 
 the conclusions of all the adherents of the new 
 criticism were identical. A glance at Professor 
 Kirkpatrick's Divine Library of the Old Testa- 
 ment might show the contrary : one has to dis- 
 tinguish between writers and between hypotheses. 
 Indeed, you even speak of ' the conclusion ' in the 
 singular. Then as to Psalm 110, you hardly 
 seem to know what Mr. Gore says about our 
 Lord's reference to it. I do not myself agree 
 with him, but he says clearly that if he believed 
 our Lord to have been distinctly teaching or 
 affirming on the subject, he would hold that 
 teaching or affirmation to be absolutely binding 
 on his acceptance ; his explanation, which, as I 
 said, seems to me strained, is that Christ was 
 there arguing ad kominem. 1 For my part, I should 
 hold that there is criticism and criticism ; to 
 criticism which admits the supernatural in miracle 
 and prophecy, and bows before the infallibility of 
 Christ, I should allow a large scope in its treat- 
 ment of literary questions. 2 Then you rush away 
 (pardon me) to the Encyclical of Leo XIII. on 
 Scripture, as if it pointed to the conclusion that 
 Rome is the normal centre of unity. That con- 
 clusion must be supported by proper historical 
 and theological arguments, and you surely know 
 how vulnerable the Roman side is on that score. 
 
 Next, you hint that we are reaping the fruits of 
 
 \ Cf. Lux Mundi, p. 359 (ed. 1889), and Gore, Bampton 
 Lectures, pp. 196 sqq. (ed. 1891). 
 2 See above, p. i. 
 
252 The Roman Question 
 
 ' the disastrous separation ' (meaning the Reforma- 
 tion in England), in 'Socinianism and infidelity.' 
 Did you ever look into the condition of Europe, 
 religiously speaking, in the century before the 
 Reformation ? If not, please do so. But further, 
 do you not know what ' fruits,' in the way of blank 
 infidelity, may be said to have resulted in France 
 and Spain, not to say Italy, from the identification 
 of the Papal system and all that it involves, with 
 faith in Christ and in God. Is not England as a 
 whole far more Christian, more Theistic ? Surely 
 you would do well to think a little of these facts, 
 as well as of the ancient facts of the primitive and 
 early period, before considering that Rome may 
 turn out to be the centre of unity for Christians 
 and the one sole, genuine, legitimate representative 
 of the mind of our Lord. At the end of your 
 letter you tell me of a prophecy of Professor 
 Mivart. It is very good of him to predict our 
 future ; but is he qualified for the task ? Did he 
 ever breathe our atmosphere ? Does he know our 
 mind, our traditions, our rjfloy (to use an old Tract- 
 arian phrase) ? One who has recently had to recant 
 at Rome's bidding his own attempts to reconcile 
 Roman Catholicism with new ideas had better be 
 more modest when he ' casts the horoscope ' of 
 Anglicanism. But the pith of your letter consists 
 in the question, Can there be a logical middle 
 point between the (extremest) theories of criticism 
 theories which deny the supernatural and 
 submission to Rome as she now is ? Are you 
 sure of your own logic ? Do you not feel (Oxford 
 men ought to feel) that to shut up the choice to 
 
Worthlessness of dilemmas 253 
 
 one or the other extreme is, at the very outset, a 
 questionable proceeding a thing to be suspected 
 rather than welcomed ? Rome cannot be accepted 
 except by the assertion of a number of propositions, 
 theological and historical ; is there no grave re- 
 sponsibility in making the assertion before verify- 
 ing what you w r ould have to assert ? And is it 
 possible that you have not heard of cases in which 
 the submission to Rome, on such grounds, has 
 been only a preliminary to the loss of all faith ? 
 It cannot shut out the knowledge of critical diffi- 
 culties, it cannot provide you with an answer 
 which will not itself suggest more difficulties and 
 invite more criticism. . . . 
 
 My advice, then, is that you should suspect all 
 extreme positions, and be careful to observe dis- 
 tinctions between statements, and between what is, 
 and what is not, relevant to the particular issue 
 raised ; that you should disentangle threads which 
 ought to be kept straight, and be quite sure what 
 the theory is which, for the moment, strikes you 
 as necessitating a certain conclusion, and ask 
 whether the conclusion really follows what is the 
 reasonable alternative for rejecting it and so on. 
 In short, accustom yourself to cross-questioning, 
 so to speak, when a Roman arguer or a Roman 
 book presents to you that very old, very familiar, 
 and all too self-confident form of dilemma either 
 the Pope or unbelief. Remember, that with far 
 too many I could tell you of recent cases it has 
 been, first the Pope and then imbelief. This is 
 the nemesis of impatient, or, at any rate, of im- 
 pulsive and inconsiderate arguing, of an excessive 
 
254 The Roman Question 
 
 reliance on what looks like logical sequence ; in 
 fact, as it could easily be shown, all the great 
 historical heresies have ensnared minds and souls 
 by the profession of being logical. 
 
 To the same, on the same subject. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 February 24, 1894. 
 
 Thanks for your letter. I sympathize very 
 deeply with you. I have known in long past 
 days something of the same trouble, although the 
 developments of ' free thought ' on one hand, and 
 of Papalism on the other, since I was preparing 
 for ordination, may seem to have accentuated 
 difficulties and thereby intensified trials. 
 
 What I would venture to suggest is as follows : 
 i. You say that these discussions are hurtful, 
 in your experience, to spiritual life ; that they 
 interrupt prayer and overcloud Communions. Yes, 
 I know ; they do so. Well, might it not help 
 you to set them resolutely aside for awhile during 
 the rest of Lent, during the sacred Easter time ? 
 ' Come apart and rest awhile ' is not that in 
 many circumstances just the direction that we 
 need most, if we take it as coming to us personally 
 from Him who first gave it? I am sure you 
 could put yourself expressly into His hands. 
 Tell Him your trouble, ask Him to give you 
 light and guidance in His own way and time, and 
 then for a time determine to drop controversy of 
 all sorts. 
 
Danger of logic 255 
 
 2. I hope it may not seem inconsistent with 
 this advice if I say a word as to the fascination 
 or attraction which a definite, exact theory, a 
 clear-cut definition e.g., the Roman definition of 
 the Church has had at times for you. Believe 
 me, I understand something of this ; but if one 
 thinks a bit (still more, if one reads parts of 
 Butler's Analogy as to the discipline involved 
 in a certain want of such complete evidence for 
 religion as one might antecedently have expected), 
 one begins to suspect these promises of clear and 
 logical definition, of complete logical satisfaction 
 for the mind. Does one get it on all moral 
 questions ? Does one get it on some important 
 religious questions not directly involved in the 
 Roman controversy ? Have you not often ob- 
 served how much in various departments of 
 serious thought is necessarily left in ' the rough,' 
 in outline? How many aspects of truth seem 
 parallels never destined to meet in our compre- 
 hension ? Is it not almost a commonplace to say 
 that statements can be definite at the expense of 
 comprehensiveness ; that they may gain this 
 apparent advantage by ignoring a whole side of 
 facts ; that systems may be too systematic, and 
 simplifications may be too simple, to be true ? 
 Nothing is easier than to complain of a statement 
 or ' definition ' which laboriously and scrupulously 
 endeavours to do justice to all aspects of a case. 
 It 'halts,' it 'stumbles,' it 'stammers'; it 'tries 
 to reconcile contradictions'; it 'would fain be 
 black and white at once.' Who has not heard of 
 such criticisms ? Yes ; but perhaps it is the 
 
256 The Roman Question 
 
 critic who is wrong, who yields to onesidedness 
 and impatience. 
 
 Believe it, in God's world, all round and 
 throughout, we have to reckon with anomalies, 
 with apparent contrarieties, with knots and warps, 
 and disorders and irregularities, that offend our 
 craving for something round and smooth and 
 normal. And, to vary St. Paul's phrase, not only 
 outside the area of the Church or of Christian 
 thought, but ' even we also ' l within it, must accept 
 this condition of things, and do the best we can 
 with it, resolving not to ignore any truth for the 
 sake of gaining what seems a lucid formula ; and, 
 especially in regard to the ' theory of the Church,' 
 we shall be wise in recognising, as Dean Church 
 says in his book on The Oxford Movement, 
 the ' presence of anomalies everywhere,' and in 
 connecting their presence with those deplorable 
 divisions of Christendom which are the permitted 
 effects of human self-will. The apparent neat- 
 ness, precision, ready-to-handness of the Roman, 
 or, rather, the Papalist definition of the Church 
 (for all Romanism is now Papalism of a highly- 
 developed kind), is too dearly purchased by its 
 grave deviations from the criteria recognised in 
 antiquity ; but that opens too large a field. 
 What I want to suggest to you at present is but 
 the general reflection, which I am well assured 
 that all experience will verify, that what is clear 
 and positive is not always true and well founded ; 
 that errors and heresies have repeatedly claimed 
 to be more logical and intelligible than Catholic 
 1 Rom. viii. 23. 
 
Corporate Reunion illusory 257 
 
 belief ; that claims have to be scrutinized and 
 definitions to be analysed ; and that the de facto 
 existence of heterodoxy in one Church does not 
 warrant us in the least degree in accepting as 
 de fide the unverified assertions of another. 
 
 To the Rev. , on reunion with Rome. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 February 27, 1895. 
 
 I regard all theories of possible corporate re- 
 union with Rome as the merest illusion. If the 
 history of the last fifty years has taught us nothing 
 else, it has surely taught us that. It is not merely 
 a question of Papal supremacy ; it is the whole 
 mass of Roman obedience and usage, of Roman 
 principle and standpoint, the whole atmosphere, 
 theological and ethical, in which Roman Catholic 
 life energizes, that constitutes for us the impossi- 
 bility of reunion. We dare not accept responsi- 
 bility for Romanism as it is, and as, except for 
 some inconceivable revolution in Latin Church 
 opinion, it is likely to continue. Even if the bare 
 letter of the Tridentine Decrees were all that we 
 had to do with, it would form a barrier insur- 
 mountable. But behind and around that stretches 
 all that is covered by the magisterium of the 
 Latin Church, and that those who submit to her 
 
 must assimilate. I grieve over 's idealism. 
 
 We have no right to indulge in dreams which are 
 dissipated by facts. . . . 
 
 17 
 
258 The Roman Question 
 
 To the Rev. B. J. Kidd, on the Bull Apostolicae 
 
 curse. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 
 September 22, 1896. 
 
 Does not the new Papal Bull recall to you a con- 
 versation which we had on a point as to which you 
 differed from , and I entirely agreed with you? 
 
 The grounds on which Anglican Orders are 
 treated as null is that of a change made under 
 Edward VI. in the actual 'form,' coupled with, 
 and interpreted by, the omission throughout the 
 Ordinal (or, as he says, the exclusion from it) of 
 a particular view of the priesthood and the 
 Eucharistic sacrifice. 1 This view is that of an 
 actual sacrifice of the body and blood of our 
 Lord by the priest in the Mass. As to this, one 
 might observe that the Pope has too many 
 windows in his own house. He has to read the 
 view in question into a Canon of the Mass 
 which does not affirm it, or, rather, he has to 
 suppose that what he refers to (in the Supra qucz) 
 as a parallel to the firstlings of Abel's flock is 
 nothing less than totus Christus, already by hypo- 
 thesis present between his hands. 2 But that is 
 not the main point. The mistake which, as you 
 pointed out in the Church Quarterly Review, the 
 Roman theology made when it placed the sacrifice 
 
 1 Letter Apostolic of His Holiness Leo XIII. on Anglican 
 Orders, 7, 8. 
 
 2 Cf. Church Quarterly Review, April, 1896 (Vol. XLIL, 
 .No. Ixxxiii., pp. 36 sq.). 
 
Eucharistic Sacrifice 259 
 
 of the Mass in a line with that of the Cross, instead 
 of in a line with the heavenly self-presentation, 1 is 
 now repeated with paramount authority. The 
 moral for us is surely twofold : (i) Not to wonder, 
 or still less to be perturbed, because our Orders 
 are set aside as failing to satisfy criteria which we 
 do not accept ; and (2) to give up, if we have 
 begun, or, if not, carefully to avoid, language 
 which attempts to obliterate all distinction between 
 what we hold on the Eucharistic offering, and 
 consequently on the Christian priest's office with 
 regard to it, and what Rome holds e.g., in the 
 Tridentine Professio Fidei. The terms ' true, 
 proper, and propitiatory sacrifice,' 2 naturally under- 
 stood, are (we must now explicitly say) not ap- 
 propriate to the Eucharist, for the simple and 
 decisive reason that they are not appropriate to 
 the heavenly self- presentation, of which the 
 Eucharist is the counterpart. We are, therefore, 
 at variance with Rome not only as to the abuse 
 of private Masses, or as to this or that extravagant 
 form of language about the sacrifice, but on the 
 deeper question of the point of view from which 
 the Eucharistic sacrifice is to be regarded. Is 
 not this so ? 
 
 There is one passage in the Bull which is 
 almost Irish. The Pope says that the addition 
 of 'for the office and work,' etc., in 1661-62 
 betokened a consciousness of the inadequacy of 
 the existing ' form.' 3 As if those who introduced 
 
 1 Church Quarterly Review, April, 1896 (Vol. XLIL, No. 
 Ixxxiii., p. 48). 
 
 2 Canones et decreta Cone. Trid.,p. 227. 
 
 3 Letter Apostolic, etc., 7. 
 
 172 
 
260 The Roman Question 
 
 it could by any possibility have hoped thus to 
 cure a fatal defect in the succession as it had 
 come down to them ! But we know that the real 
 reason was to meet an objection that the ' form ' 
 did not clearly distinguish between the offices of 
 priest and of bishop. 1 
 
 To the Rev. , on the Roman claims. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 Feast of the Circumcision, 1897. 
 
 I am anxious just now about a young Trinity 
 undergraduate who has fixed his lodgings in 
 parish, and whom I met at that Church on Sunday. 
 
 He has got into acquaintance with G and has 
 
 met R there ; but has also found out, by look- 
 ing up references, that that glib advocate of Ultra- 
 montanism is not to be trusted as to facts. How- 
 ever, he knows another Roman priest who is 
 staying in Oxford, and I fear he has got the 
 peculiar turn of mind which predisposes a person 
 to take 'the Roman fever.' Why is there not 
 among the young High Churchmen more of the 
 healthy Teutonism which corrects those tendencies, 
 and repels the influences of which they are sus- 
 ceptible ? As for G , no rational being could 
 
 be impressed by him as an arguer ; he is a gentle- 
 man all over, and a person of kindly nature inde- 
 pendently of his proselytizing hospitalities, but his 
 mind, as all know who knew him as a ' ritualistic ' 
 undergraduate (although the adjective was hardly 
 
 1 Cf. Cardwell, Conferences, p. 386 note q. (3rd ed., 1849). 
 
Begging the question 261 
 
 invented in those days), is of the thinnest and 
 flimsiest calibre. The argument which you quote 
 is exactly fit for its measure ; it reminds me of 
 James II.'s conclusion that the English Church 
 had ' no right to do what she did at the Reforma- 
 tion,' which, of course, assumes the Roman claims 
 to start with. 
 
 Our Church, we know, does not claim infalli- 
 bility ; she knows, as we do, in what difficulties 
 Rome has involved herself by such a claim. If 
 she thinks she was wrong in accepting what we 
 call mediaeval peculiarities of doctrine or practice, 
 she does so not arbitrarily or from a mere stet pro 
 ratione voluntas, but for definite reasons, theo- 
 logical and historical ; and for the self-same reasons 
 she believes herself right in adhering to that posi- 
 tion. Let Romanists disprove those reasons, and 
 then they will make out their case. To submit 
 to Rome before they are so proved and on the 
 ground of an hypothetical possibility is simply 
 childish ; or, rather, it is an enormous exercise of 
 private judgment without tenable cause shown. 
 
 To the Venerable Archdeacon , on secessions 
 
 to Rome, and on Sxpius officio of the two 
 Archbishops. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 March 21, 1897. 
 
 M 's secession is of much less importance 
 
 than would have attached to that of an English- 
 man with a balanced mind and with adequate 
 
262 The Roman Question 
 
 knowledge of the real merits of the question. He 
 was never imagined to be an authority on theology 
 or history, and he is an emotional, or, at least, a 
 highly sensitive and excitable Celt. For eleven 
 years, I hear, he has been unsettled has had fits 
 of 'Roman fever'! and now this last has been 
 decisive. But women who dote on his preaching 
 (which I once heard and never wished to hear 
 again) will be apt to think that so pious and 
 spiritual a mind as his must needs have been 
 guided aright in its ' submission ' to Rome. I 
 dare say he is one of the many who are attracted 
 by the very breadth and in Dean Church's 
 phrase 'audacity' of Roman assumptions. Angli- 
 canism frets them by its 'moderation,' and they 
 catch at the very absoluteness of the claims which, 
 to us, are signs against Rome. In one sense, 
 this was the case with Newman in 1845 : ne 
 craved for a bigger Church, a Church with more 
 sonorous and imperative voice than that of 
 England. The reply of our Archbishops 1 is the 
 greatest lift that the cause of Church principles 
 has had, in our memory. The calm dignity of its 
 tone agrees well with the matter-of-course accept- 
 ance of a sacramental and sacerdotal function for 
 Anglican theology and the Anglican ministry. 
 One could hardly have believed it possible, some 
 years ago, that such a pronouncement should have 
 been solemnly issued from the two thrones of 
 Canterbury and York. I am sure we owe very 
 much to Archbishop Maclagan. He was so good 
 
 1 Answer of the Archbishops of England to the Apostolic 
 Letter of Pope Leo XIII. (1897). 
 
The Armenians 263 
 
 as to write to me both before and after the word- 
 ing was settled. 
 
 P.S. [from a letter of March 22]. As for 
 the Eastern troubles I am, I confess, disgusted 
 with the reiteration of that formula as to the 
 integrity of the Turkish Empire, which is too gross 
 a fiction to be called a ' make-believe.' We are 
 degraded by the use of it, but Lord Salisbury 
 has, no doubt, to keep within the lines of the 
 so-called ' concert ' in order not to ' give occasion ' 
 to those three Emperors who have no sympathy 
 either with liberty, as such, or with the Eastern 
 Christians as under the Turkish tyrant. If we 
 broke with them they would actively support him. 
 
VI 
 Church Questions of the Day 
 
 To the Rev. P. G. Medd, on the Denis on 
 Judgment. 
 
 MANCHESTER, 
 
 August 26, 1856. 
 
 As to the Denison Judgment ... I do not see 
 how I could comfortably retain m/ Fellowship [at 
 University College] if that decision became the 
 law of the Church. For, whatever one might 
 think of evil communicants and, as to them, it is 
 perfectly evident that two distinct lines of language 
 as to two distinct sides of the subject were held 
 together, not by St. Augustine only, but by St. 
 Chrysostom, as the recent work of Dr. Pusey 
 shows 1 yet the decision proceeds to touch the fact 
 of the Real Presence itself by absolutely denying 
 what Bishop Andrewes 2 absolutely affirmed, that 
 Christ's Sacramental Presence is an object of 
 adoration. And this is to declare war against the 
 
 1 Doctrine of the Real Presence, pp. 497 sqq. (ed. 1855). 
 
 2 Quoted in Pusey, The Real Presence the doctrine of the 
 English Church, pp. 315 sq. (ed. 1857). 
 
 [ 264] 
 
The Real Presence 265 
 
 theology and ritual of the Fathers, as well as to 
 proclaim disbelief in the reality of the Presence. 
 But, besides this, it seems to me that the decision 
 touches many who do not hold particularly high 
 views on the Holy Eucharist. For its principle is 
 that the Articles without the Liturgy are the sole 
 dogmatic test of the Church of England. In this 
 point of view it is an attack on all who have 
 been accustomed to consider the Liturgy as a co- 
 ordinate authority with the Articles. . . . 
 
 To the Rev. , on the possible successor to Dr. 
 
 Shirley, Regius Professor of Ecclesiastical 
 History, who died November 20, 1866. 
 
 UNIVERSITY COLLEGE, 
 
 November 27, 1866. 
 
 Shirley was buried to-day in the Latin Chapel 
 with full cathedral solemnity, the Canons bearing 
 the pall, all the members of the Foundation join- 
 ing in the procession, and the Dean reading the 
 service, which he is said to have done with much 
 feeling, 
 
 I do not know who has any real chance of the 
 appointment ; between ourselves, I wrote to Lord 
 Beauchamp and also spoke to the Bishop about 
 Liddon. But I think the Government would 
 hardly appoint so thorough a Churchman. The 
 Bishop, with a humorous smile, said to me : ' Ah, 
 Liddon has been beforehand with you ; he has 
 been speaking to me in favour of somebody else 
 Mr. Bright, of University.' Some of the younger 
 
266 Church Questions of the Day 
 
 fellows here are kind enough to talk of me, but it 
 is all chimerical. I shouldn't like to be Canon of 
 Christ Church, except, perhaps, for such reasons 
 as being able to set apart a big room in the house 
 for your visits ; and it is quite pleasure enough 
 to know that some of one's friends wish to see one 
 there. 
 
 My fear is that either the Government may 
 appoint some Conservative who has no special 
 aptitudes, or may be coerced into appointing some 
 
 Liberal. Imagine old being talked of ! And 
 
 the Liberals are again stirring for Bradley. 
 
 Meantime, how many plans for good, how many 
 expectations of prolonged, quiet usefulness, lie 
 mysteriously buried in that new coffin which the 
 Cathedral holds to-night for the first time ! 
 
 To the Rev. , on Bishop Wilberforces Visita- 
 tion : Dr. Shirley's probable successor : Colenso. 
 
 UNIVERSITY COLLEGE, 
 
 December 7, 1866. 
 
 The Visitation here was spoilt by the dear 
 Bishop's unpunctuality ; he came so late that 
 Mattins had to be omitted : he began the Com- 
 munion Service, delivered his Charge after the 
 Gospel, and it lasted until about ten minutes to 
 four, so that it was obviously too late to have a 
 celebration. All this was sadly mismanaged. 
 The Bishop should have come earlier, had the 
 Celebration first, and then given the Charge. And 
 the clergy, who were wearied with the waiting 
 
Bishop Wilberforce's Charge 267 
 
 and the long sitting, were disappointed by the 
 Bishop's only just appearing at the dinner and 
 then hurrying away. The Charge itself, with 
 some strong things against Ritualism, 1 of which 
 the Times makes much, had some valuable 
 passages in another direction, to the existence of 
 which that honest paper bravely alludes. Mr. 
 Carter was exceedingly well satisfied. I am 
 struck with the increased moderation of tone 
 which appears in the Timess article on the 
 Bishop's Charge. Now I do wish that the older 
 and more thoughtful Ritualists would meet and 
 confer on the course that should be adopted on 
 the subject. Manifestly, there is at present a 
 breathing time, as manifestly there will be a 
 Parliamentary debate and perhaps a movement 
 for legislation ; and to me it is not less manifest 
 that much of Ritualistic detail that is carried out 
 in St. Alban's and elsewhere is really quite exces- 
 sive. It is hard that those who adhere to the 
 principle of Ritualism (because they adhere to 
 Sacramentalism), and would stand for certain 
 leading features of it, should be crushed or over- 
 ridden by a hostile movement which is mainly 
 provoked by some who 'go in ' for all mediaeval 
 details. These men want every detail they can 
 borrow from mediaeval or Roman sources ; we, it 
 seems, are likely to pay for their pertinacity by 
 losing even what we ourselves are content with. 
 This is very unreasonable. 
 
 As to the Ecclesiastical History Chair, you 
 needn't think I have any chance, as people call it, 
 1 Cf. Life of Bishop Wilberforce, iii., pp. 199 sqq. 
 
268 Church Questions of the Day 
 
 of having the offer made to me, although my 
 friends here kindly wish it. I do not think, nor 
 does Liddon, that Lord Derby will appoint any- 
 one known as a thorough High Churchman. 
 What I expect is that Mansel will be appointed ; 
 or perhaps Haddan, which would be better, if he 
 had health ; Claughton would be an unfit man for 
 this special post but there is a great likelihood 
 that special fitness will be practically disregarded. 
 Governments don't care about such specialities. 
 The fact is no doubt vexatious to those who, like 
 me, feel an interest in this special subject. I 
 have some fear that Government may yield to 
 Liberal pressure, and appoint some man who is 
 just not a heretic, or, at least, who is not known 
 to be rationalistically inclined, but who would 
 really serve the Liberals' turn effectually. Lord 
 Derby is not perhaps the likeliest man in the 
 world to be the subject of Liberal dictation ; but 
 his position as Premier is notoriously weak, and 
 Liberalism is insolent and popular. Dr. Moberly 
 is talked of, but I think he is too old for a new 
 sphere of teaching work. . . . Liddon says that 
 the Liberals here are most intolerant in their 
 language, and bitter against the very idea of a 
 High Church appointment ; ' as for the subject, 
 anybody can get it up, of course.' 
 
 I saw a letter dated from Natal the other day, 
 which gave the saddest picture of affairs. There 
 seems hardly such a body as a faithful laity there. 
 The riff-raff support Colenso as explaining away 
 the miraculous, and as denying hell ; Dissenters, 
 as opposing Church claims ; Socinians, lor his 
 
Popular Protestantism 269 
 
 dislike of prayer to Christ ; Deists, for a like 
 reason ; and, shameful to say, actually some Evan- 
 gelicals (not all, I know), because he denounces 
 the doctrine of baptismal grace. ... It seems as 
 if popular Protestantism were hurrying to its ap- 
 pointed development. Obviously, it cannot secure 
 even loyalty to our Lord. 
 
 To the Editor of The Guardian, on the Purchas 
 Judgment. 
 
 Maundy Thursday [1871]. 
 
 1. It matters very little, in reference to the 
 interpretation of our present Consecration Rubric, 
 whether Cosin, as Archdeacon or Canon i.e., 
 before 1661 was wont to consecrate in front of 
 the altar, for at that time, to which the extract 
 from the Acts of High Commission refers, the 
 rubric . . . was simply, ' Then the priest, stand- 
 ing up, shall say as followeth.' 
 
 2. A proof that the celebrant in the ancient 
 Basilicas stood behind the altar, with his face 
 turned across it towards the people, may, I think, 
 be found in St. Gregory Nazianzen's well-known 
 description of the memorable celebration by St. 
 Basil in the cathedral of Caesarea in Cappadocia, 
 at the Epiphany of 372. The Emperor Valens is 
 described as standing among the people, and 
 seeing Basil, as he ' stood, without moving his 
 body, or his countenance . . . fixed, as one might 
 say, on God and on the altar' (Orat., xliii., 
 
270 Church Questions of the Day 
 
 c. 52). 1 The face of Basil must thus have been 
 visible to the congregation. A similar usage ap- 
 pears to have prevailed in the original ' Basilica of 
 our Lord and Saviour Christ' at Canterbury. 2 It 
 is needless to observe that there was an essential 
 difference, as to effect and impression produced, 
 between this position of the ancient celebrant, 
 standing in the sanctuary among his assistants, 
 with the altar between him and the people, and 
 that of the Puritan or Presbyterian minister, 
 standing at the long side of a table set lengthways 
 in the body of the church, with rows of communi- 
 cants on either hand. Moreover, this ' Basilican ' 
 position is not allowed by the terms of the recent 
 judgment. 
 
 3. Among the modern authorities for the mixed 
 chalice one ought not to be forgotten the prac- 
 tice of the apostolic Bishop Wilson. In his 
 Sacra Privata, among his ' Devotions at the 
 Altar,' are some to be used ' upon placing the 
 bread and wine and water upon the altar.' 3 
 
 P.S. from a letter of April 29, 1871 One is 
 rather weary, by this time, of the ' Basilican ' 
 argument. It is, anyhow, irrelevant until our 
 chancels are arranged in the Basilican manner. 
 And in the old Basilicas the idea of the Eucharistic 
 oblation was abundantly expressed by the whole 
 
 1 Migne, P. G., torn, xxxvi., col. S63A. Cf. Bright, Way- 
 marks, p. 93. 
 
 2 Cf. Bright, Chapters in Early English Church History, 
 p. 61 (3rd ed., 1897). 
 
 3 Works, V., p. 74 (ed. Keble : Library of Anglo-Catholic 
 Theology). 
 
The Eastward Position 271 
 
 aspect of the service ; whereas it is the very 
 object of the Church Association to crush out as 
 far as possible every such expression of it among 
 ourselves. It is well to refer to the position of a 
 Basilican celebrant ; but what of the entire 
 Basilican ritual ? 
 
 To the Rev. , on the Church Courts. 
 
 January 12, 1877. 
 
 Of course there would be cases in which it 
 would be right to resist a legal tribunal, and to 
 suffer. But what I cannot accept is the claim 
 made by some to be entirely independent of the 
 Courts of the Establishment. The claim of such 
 independence appears to me untenable, while we 
 cleave to Establishment. It is said, 'A Court to 
 try ecclesiastical offences set up by Parliament 
 has no right to our regard.' Well, I cannot see 
 that this proposition is implied in the settlement 
 of 1662. It may be said, 'We must revise that 
 settlement, because it is now used in a tyrannic 
 spirit alien from that of the Bishops and States- 
 men of 1662.' If so, let it be said plainly ; as yet 
 I do not hear it said plainly ; I hear only vague 
 and large assertions about ' the principles of the 
 Christian Religion ' forbidding us to recognise the 
 present Courts. 
 
 I am afraid that such claims will disorganize 
 and divide the High Church forces. Hoc Ithacus 
 velit / 
 
272 Church Questions of the Day 
 
 To the Editor of The Guardian, on popular 
 election of bishops. 
 
 March 20, 1877. 
 
 . . . There is a 'people ' and a 'people.' Such 
 a ' people ' as is represented by the majority of an 
 English House of Commons is one thing ; such a 
 ' people ' as took part in a primitive episcopal 
 appointment [e.g., of St. Ambrose] is another. 
 The former is a constituency including persons of 
 all religions, or of none ; the latter was professedly 
 the great body of the Christian Church. Among 
 the former there are very many who are most 
 earnestly Christian, not to say Churchmen, in the 
 practical sense of the word ; but, dismissing all 
 theories grounded on a state of things now extinct, 
 we see that their Christianity or their Churchman- 
 ship is independent of their political status and 
 their right to political representation. Among 
 the latter there were very many imperfect Chris- 
 tians, specially after the Empire adopted the faith; 
 but, as a body, they acknowledged what was 
 indeed the raison d'etre of their corporate existence, 
 their obligation to the kingdom that was not from 
 this world. They held its creed, partook of its 
 ordinances, were amenable to its discipline ; and 
 when they expressed their minds in regard to the 
 filling up of one of its cathedra, they did so as 
 performing an ecclesiastical act, and therefore as 
 discharging a religious responsibility. In spite of 
 those cases in which partisanship and southern 
 excitability disgraced an episcopal election by 
 
The Laity 273 
 
 scenes of tumult ... it remains true and it is the 
 point, that those who called out, e.g., for Ambrose 
 as bishop, acted avowedly as ' the people ' in the 
 special ecclesiastical sense of the term, 1 not as the 
 ' people ' in an ordinary and secular sense. But it 
 is the people in this latter sense which returns a 
 Parliamentary majority, and thereby, under the 
 conditions of Establishment, determines, to a 
 great extent, the appointment of bishops, and 
 generally the character of ecclesiastical legislation. 
 Political circumstances, we all know, have gone 
 far to extend, in a legal point of view, the area of 
 Anglican Church membership. It is all the more 
 necessary to be on our guard against a fallacy 
 which is potent for harm in many spheres of 
 English life ; to remind ourselves that a 'layman,' 
 in the true historical meaning of the word, is not 
 an equivalent for ' any unit of the English public 
 who happens not to be ordained.' When people 
 talk, for instance, of the ' lay mind,' the ' lay view 
 of things,' how often do they mentally define their 
 own phrase ? Is it not a patent sophism to recite 
 the high religious titles, the solemn ecclesiastical 
 duties and functions which in primitive days 
 belonged to the ' brethren,' the ' faithful,' the 
 ' holy people,' the ' royal priesthood,' that plebs 
 intus posita to which St. Cyprian, 'hierarchical' as 
 men call him, so energetically attributed a fidelis 
 atque incorrupta majestas 1 (Epist. lix. 18), and 
 then practically serve all the ratepayers heirs of 
 this sacred dignity and rightful claimants of this 
 
 1 Cf. i Pet. ii. 9. 
 
 2 Opera, ii., p. 687 (ed. Hartel). 
 
 18 
 
274 Church Questions of the Day 
 
 large share in Church administration? In every 
 other case it is admitted, and even urged, that 
 rights imply duties, and are annulled by failure to 
 fulfil duties ; it should be admitted therefore, in 
 this case, that it is unreasonable to demand 
 religious prerogatives for those who will not 
 discharge religious obligations. Who are they 
 that are most injured by this wholesale transfer 
 of rights ? Not the clergy, but the true laity 
 the communicants of the Church. 
 
 To the Editor of The Guardian, on a Patri- 
 archate for Canterbury. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 June 20, 1878. 
 
 Many will thank you for your article in this 
 week's Guardian^ directed against a proposal 
 which one is sorry to see associated with the name 
 of the Archdeacon of George, in South Africa. 
 We may well hope that the proposal is, ' for the 
 present at least, out of the range of practical 
 Church questions.' The subjection of the See of 
 Canterbury, under an ecclesiastical Establishment, 
 to a Royal supremacy which cannot have any 
 relation to Churches ' in no better but no worse 
 position ' than other non-established or voluntary 
 communities, such as the Scottish or Irish 
 Churches, must be in limine fatal to the scheme. 
 
 But even if the home Church were not 
 ' established,' I know not what precedent the 
 
 1 June 19, 1878. 
 
Patriarchates 275 
 
 Archdeacon, or those who agree with him, could 
 produce from antiquity for the formal creation of 
 a new patriarchate by one group of Churches 
 without the concurrence or sanction of any exist- 
 ing patriarchates. The ancient patriarchates 
 grew up in a Christendom unlike our own. 
 When the See of Moscow was made patriarchal 
 in 1587, the Eastern patriarchates gave solemn 
 consent, and Jeremiah II. of Constantinople came 
 into Russia to bless and establish the new 
 Patriarch. 
 
 Some of the Archdeacon's statements are 
 apparently coloured by his imagination. The 
 Synod of Cloveshoe in 803 did not proclaim the 
 Archbishop of Canterbury ' Primate or Patriarch 
 in settlement of a temporary schism.' It merely 
 reaffirmed the rights which he had possessed 
 previously to the temporary creation of an arch- 
 bishopric of Lichfield. It restored the status quo 
 by abolishing the latter archbishopric. It decreed 
 that the primatus monarchies archiprincipatus 
 meaning, not a patriarchate, but simply the old 
 archiepiscopal authority traced back to St. 
 Augustine should ' continue ' with Canterbury. 
 See Haddan and Stubbs, Councils^ III., p. 543 ; 
 compare pp. 524, 537. 
 
 The Archdeacon has forgotten the principle 
 laid down by the African Church (which had 
 not a patriarchal see) as to appeals to Rome. 
 It discountenanced recurrence to transmanna 
 judicia (Cod. Afric. 28, I25). 1 In its famous 
 letter to Pope Celestine (426 A.D.) it emphasized 
 
 1 Cf. Hefele, ii., pp. 468 sqq. 
 
 18 2 
 
276 Church Questions of the Day 
 
 this point : ' The Nicene decrees . . . most 
 prudently provided that all causes should be 
 concluded in their own places, where they had 
 originated. . . . How will the transmarine 
 judgment itself be valid, seeing that the neces- 
 sary witnesses will not be able to appear ?' etc. 
 Compare Mansi, Concilia, iv., col. 516 A, B ; and 
 Fleury bk. xxiv., c. 35. 1 
 
 The Archdeacon says truly that the claims of 
 the Papacy are different in kind from the claims 
 of any Patriarch, and it is most important, in 
 view 7 of the former claims, to recollect that it is 
 precisely because the Roman Bishop insists on 
 being owned as Supreme Pontiff that we cannot 
 regard him in his canonical character of first 
 Patriarch. The old right is barred by the later 
 wrong. But then, in point of fact, not only did 
 the Papacy grow up, in large measure, by a 
 systematic extension and exaggeration of the 
 patriarchal powers of Rome, but we know of 
 other cases in which patriarchal powers were 
 strained and magnified to the detriment of 
 bishoprics and churches. The Suffragans of 
 Alexandria became almost helpless in the hands 
 of their ' Pope'; 2 and it was a Bishop of Constan- 
 tinople who first assumed the style of ' (Ecu- 
 menical Patriarch.' 3 
 
 1 Newman's Translation, ii., pp. 390 sq. (ed. 1843). 
 
 - Cf. Bright, Notes on the Canons, pp. 17, 208 (ed. 1882). 
 
 3 Mennas, in a Synodical letter of May 15, 536 : see Hefele, 
 iv., pp. 198, 415. On St. Gregory the Great's attitude to the 
 title, see Bright, Chapters in Early Church History, p. 71 nn. 
 (3rd ed., 1897). 
 
Church reform 277 
 
 To the Rev. , on projects of Church reform. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 February 10, 1886. 
 
 You must have overlooked my letter (rather a 
 long one) on Church franchises, in the Guardian 
 
 of February 4. S and all those people who 
 
 allow themselves to join with revolutionists in 
 the Church area, and advocate organic changes 
 in the working constitution of the Church of 
 England, are inexperienced and over-confident. 
 I should not like to take a severe estimate of 
 their motives, but it is vexatious to see them take 
 up such fancy franchises with a light heart, in the 
 childish confidence that if ' the people are trusted 
 with ecclesiastical power, they will respond to the 
 trust,' etc. Of course, behind this group of well- 
 meaning idealizers is the small but resolute party 
 which intends, if possible, to stamp out dogma 
 and ' ecclesiasticism ' by reconstituting the Church 
 on a secular and democratic basis, so as to 
 convert it into a ' kingdom of this world.' 
 
 To the Rev. , on the Scandinavian com- 
 munion. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 February i, 1888. 
 
 I confess I do not look with any great hopeful- 
 ness towards the Scandinavian communion. It 
 is essentially Lutheran, and I should gravely 
 
278 Church Questions of the Day 
 
 doubt whether a body pervaded and animated by 
 Lutheran tradition could, as such, conform itself 
 to the ' Churchly ' type. The sacramental 
 theory of the Lutherans is, I suppose, impaired 
 and distorted by treating the Gospel ordinances 
 as means of stimulating faith, rather than as 
 means of grace in the Catholic sense of the 
 phrase i.e., as instruments effecting and sustain- 
 ing a union with the life-giving Humanity of the 
 Incarnate Son. I believe that Luther cast off, 
 advisedly and thoroughly, the whole sacerdotal 
 conception of the ministry, 1 and a question which 
 you raised in one. of your letters is really funda- 
 mental : Do the ' bishops ' of this ' Church ' 
 intend by their imposition of hands to transmit 
 the historic ministry of the Catholic Church 
 i.e., to confer Holy Orders ? 2 Unless they do 
 intend, and therefore (supposing the episcopal 
 descent to be proved) effect this, one cannot say 
 that they have the ' succession ' in the proper 
 sense. I suspect that a Norsk or Swedish divine 
 or prelate would not approve of our Ordinal. I 
 wish, of course, that one had trustworthy evidence 
 of a higher view on their part, as regards these 
 and similar matters ; but mere verbal similarities 
 
 1 Cf. His Address to the Christian Nobility, Wace and 
 Buchheim, Luther's Primary Works, pp. 164 sq. (2nd ed., 
 1896); with further references and comments in Beard, Re- 
 formation, pp. 133 sqq. (2nd ed., 1885), or Kidd, The Con- 
 tinental Reformation, pp. 117 sqq. 
 
 2 Cf. Bright, Some Aspects, etc., p. 50 n. ; and on the general 
 question of Swedish 'Orders' see Palmer, Treatise on the Church, 
 i., p. 297 (3rd ed., 1842), and Report of the Lambeth Conference, 
 1897, pp. 119 sqq. 
 
Lutheran theology 279 
 
 of language do not go very far when there is a 
 divergence as to fundamental ideas of Church life. 
 And if there is such a divergence between us and 
 them, any renewal of ecclesiastical relations 
 between our Church and theirs would do no 
 good, would represent no real unity. Vestments 
 and crosses and lights are of small account, 
 unless they represent ideas. I will look at the 
 MS., if you send it to me, as I may find time. 
 
 I need hardly say that what one wants to know 
 is not how near the Norsk formulas can be 
 brought to Catholic standard by a specially 
 favourable interpretation, but what is their actual, 
 historic, and received sense. 
 
 Notes on the MS. referred to above. 
 
 . . . As to justification. I find no satisfaction 
 in the statements on this head. What is, faith ? 
 There is no clear definition given. It is called a 
 ' living faith ' ; but the question is whether it is a 
 mere apprehension of Christ's merits by an act of 
 self-assurance 1 (' I believe that my sins are for- 
 given,' or ' that I am saved '), or whether it 
 involves a moral element, an act of self-committal 
 whereby the whole inner man gives itself up to 
 Christ ? 
 
 Observe, too, the language as to good works. 
 They are ' necessary,' only not in the sense of 
 
 1 Cf. ' Decent quod homines . . . gratis justificentur propter 
 Christum per fidem quam credunt se in gratiam recipi,' Con/, 
 dug., I. iv. ap. Francke, Libri Symbolid Ecclesice Lntherana, 
 i., p. 14; see Kidd, Cont. Ref., p. 115, note 2. 
 
280 Church Questions of the Day 
 
 compulsion (which would exclude filial freedom), 
 but in the sense of obligation. Very well ! Was 
 it necessary to exclude the idea of compulsion ? 
 Did ever any divine maintain it ? And then, at 
 the same time, although they are necessary in the 
 sense of being obligatory, and as the natural 
 fruits of faith, yet they are to be ' excluded 
 entirely when there is a question of eternal 
 salvation ' ! Could an Antinomian desire any- 
 thing more ? . . . Are the ' works ' excluded by 
 St. Paul good works in the Christian sense ? 
 Many, no doubt, say they are ; and we may well 
 hold that justifying faith can exist when there has 
 been no time for such good works. It is some- 
 times said that justification cannot take place 
 without them. I should not go so far. I should 
 say, Not without the potentiality of them, not 
 without that moral self-committal out of which 
 they proceed, but which is quite different from 
 the Lutheran'syfo^/tf. 
 
 But would [this document] justify one in 
 explaining the good works which it ' excludes 
 from the question of salvation ' as being works of 
 Roman ceremonialism ? Would not this explana- 
 tion be set aside as trifling ? Would not, then, 
 any fair interpreter give to the good works 
 excluded their ordinary meaning ? And is it not 
 a grave error to quote Rom. iv. 6 and Eph. ii. 
 8, 9, as putting them utterly out of sight when we 
 are considering the conditions of salvation ? [The 
 question is,] Are good works, when possible, a 
 condition of salvation, or not ? . . . 
 
 The leaven of Lutheranism reappears in the 
 
Unworthy Communions 281 
 
 statement that unworthy reception [of the Holy 
 Sacrament] proceeds only from unbelief a most 
 inadequate view ! Contrast our Prayer-Book : 
 'Therefore if any of you be a blasphemer. . . .' 
 If worthiness 'does not at all consist in our 
 preparation,' how about the application of ' the 
 marriage - garment '? Here again is that un- 
 theological neglect of the distinction between 
 causa efficiens and causa instrumentalis or con- 
 ditionalis. . . . 
 
 On the whole these extracts do not increase 
 my desire for intercommunion with the Norwegian 
 or Swedish communion, even supposing that the 
 historic ministry could be shown to have been 
 transmitted in that body. 
 
 I should exceedingly doubt whether, with all 
 the high language used as to the Eucharistic 
 presence, they really do apprehend the funda- 
 mental conception of sacramental grace in its 
 connection with the life-giving Manhood of the 
 Incarnate. 
 
 Let us not hurry reunion anywhere. To 
 ' reap unripe seed ' is no part of wisdom. Let us 
 not make out ' eirenicons ' by any process which 
 involves a strain. Let us not imagine a readi- 
 ness to join hands with the Church in quarters 
 where, so far as at present appears, the root-ideas 
 of ' Churchly ' Christianity have not been grasped. 
 I know that, for generous and peace-loving souls, 
 there is a temptation to premature hopefulness 
 as to reunions, in this or that direction. But 
 prematureness is never healthy. 
 
282 Church Questions of the Day 
 
 To the Rev. Canon Medd in anticipation of the 
 L incoln Judgment. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, 
 
 March 24, 1890. 
 
 The acute crisis which has now been reached 
 in the internal disorder, so to speak, through 
 which the Church is passing, absorbs one all the 
 more because of one's close connection with the 
 Bishop of Lincoln. . . . People are much excited 
 
 by the injudicious half- revelations made by 
 
 and as to the character of the forthcoming 
 
 Archiepiscopal Judgment. We may presume, 
 after what we have heard, that it will be against 
 certain things . . . e.g., against the public mixing 
 of the chalice. What is to be the course taken 
 by clergy ? 
 
 If the Judgment was in any obvious way deter- 
 mined by Puritanical writings, it would lose all 
 the spiritual validity attaching to a real Archi- 
 episcopal Judgment, assuming, for the moment, 
 that such validity does attach to a sentence pro- 
 nounced by the Archbishop as sole judge, with 
 certain suffragans as assessors or advisers. This 
 tribunal is very poor in the authority of prece- 
 dents, and, as far as the analogy of English 
 judicature has force, it is hardly constitutional, in 
 that it concentrates the whole judicial authority 
 and responsibility in one man. Here is an objec- 
 tion which applies to it on the supposition that it 
 does not act as a subordinate tribunal to the 
 Judicial Committee, bound by that Committee's 
 decisions in the past, and admitting an appeal to 
 
The Archbishop's jurisdiction 283 
 
 it in the present. On that supposition, all the 
 ecclesiastical precedents, such as are referred to 
 by the Archbishop in his previous Judgment as to 
 his own jurisdiction, fall hopelessly to the ground. 
 But, putting that supposition aside, does the other 
 objection amount to a reason for absolutely deny- 
 ing the jurisdiction of the Court ? The Bishop of 
 Lincoln did not think so ; and he, I believe, will 
 submit to its rulings, reserving any rights which, 
 as a Bishop of the Province, he may have in the 
 way of moving for a hearing before the whole 
 Provincial Episcopate, not that such a hearing 
 would practically mend matters on the merits of 
 this particular case. 
 
 Could a priest (e.g.] who used altar-lights deter- 
 mine to ignore a prohibition of such use by the 
 Archbishop without denying the jurisdiction of 
 the Archbishop as thus exercised ? I confess I 
 do not see how he could. He might submit with 
 protest of appeal to the whole Provincial Episco- 
 pate and ad interim, but I do not see on what 
 principle he could refuse all compliance. To 
 stand simply on ' the impossibility of giving up 
 now what one has so long used, and has found to 
 be an impressive symbol of Catholic doctrine and 
 of Catholic continuity ' would be, I think, hardly 
 a tenable position. Our ' party ' has been not a 
 little demoralized by individualism. The eccle- 
 siastical spirit of obedience is almost extinct in 
 many quarters. To stand out against a hierar- 
 chical tribunal (always supposing that it is not 
 governed by the Privy Council) would confirm 
 the English impression as to the lawlessness of 
 
284 Church Questions of the Day 
 
 ' Ritualists,' and deprive them of intelligible 
 ground for their resistance to a ' secular ' tribunal. 
 
 To the Rev. , on the judgment of Arch- 
 bishop Benson in the case of Read, etc., v. the 
 Bishop of Lincoln. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, 
 
 December 14, 1890. 
 
 I agree with you that the Judgment is faulty in 
 logic in regard to the manual acts. Grant that 
 ' before the people ' does not necessarily mean 
 more than ' in their presence ' during the service, 
 and the inevitable consequence is that the charge 
 ought to be dismissed ; for, confessedly, the frac- 
 tion is the only manual act to which these words 
 apply, if grammatical considerations are to have 
 weight. At the outside, they could not be ex- 
 tended beyond the two manual acts specified in 
 the rubric preceding the consecration. To apply 
 them, then, to all the manual acts, and that in a 
 sense which just before had been deemed to be 
 necessary even in regard to one, is logically quite 
 unsound. Moreover, to insist on visibility for all 
 those acts when that rubric speaks only of two is 
 virtually to make a new rubric exactly the thing 
 which, in a former passage, the Court had 
 declared itself incompetent to do. I think that 
 secrecy should, on all grounds, be eschewed with 
 regard to any manual acts ; but when one speaks 
 of legal obligation, one has no right to extend its 
 scope beyond the terms of the law i.e., in this 
 case of the rubric. I hold that to turn half round 
 
' Before the People ' 285 
 
 even for the fraction is (i) quite inconsistent with 
 the 'decency' i.e., the becomingness, of a very 
 solemn prayer ; (2) risky, lest particles should 
 drop ; (3) quite needless even for the purpose of 
 visibility, for a motion of the priest's arms and 
 hands can perfectly well assure any who desire to 
 look at him at this moment that he is doing what 
 he is bidden to do, which is all that it can be 
 necessary to show them. He can (as ' Episcopus' 
 suggests in The Guardian^ make the fraction with 
 face eastwards and hands slightly raised, and can 
 then show the several portions of the bread, one 
 in each hand. He can, of course, still looking 
 eastwards, hold the chalice when ' taking it into 
 his hands,' first to one side, then to the other. 
 
 I do not suppose that the Judgment requires 
 the mixture of the chalice to take place privately, 
 in the vestry. It has to be done, not as a part 
 of, not as in, the service. I think it had best be 
 done at the credence before the service begins, 
 but while people are in church waiting for service. 
 It is certainly well to avoid all appearance of con- 
 cealment ; few things irritate the English mind so 
 much. I grant also that some minds may feel it 
 more reverential to keep their eyes fixed on the 
 priest throughout the consecration, though most 
 of our devout people bow their heads when the 
 memorial is to be made. I have written a paper 
 on the Judgment for the next Church Quarterly 
 Review? 
 
 1 Dec. 10, 1890. 
 
 - ' The Archbishop of Canterbury's Judgment,' Vol. XXXI., 
 l\'o. Ixii., pp. 265 sqq. 
 
286 Church Questions of the Day 
 
 To a priest of the diocese of Southwell, on Church 
 and Dissent. 
 
 BUXTON, 
 December 7, 1897. 
 
 I heard something about your Bishop's success 
 in his address to the Congress, and I hope that 
 the meeting will not have left Nottingham quite 
 as it found it in regard to Church influence. By 
 all accounts, the town was one of the strongholds 
 of Dissent. It is hard to resist the feeling that 
 many dissenters hate the Anglican spirit and 
 dread its influence more than they care for dis- 
 tinctive Christian doctrine ; and although one 
 values any tokens of kindliness or equitable 
 judgment from that quarter such, for instance, 
 as the late Dr. Dale so repeatedly exhibited yet 
 the essential difference between their theology 
 and ours between their conception of the king- 
 dom of Christ or of the requirements of definite 
 Christian belief and ours appears to stand out 
 more distinctly than ever, and to rebuke the 
 futility of such estimates as, not long ago, Arch- 
 deacon Sinclair used to suggest as to the merely 
 external character of the grounds of difference 
 between Church and sects, as if they could be 
 melted away by a sufficient exertion of sympa- 
 thetic feeling on both sides. . . . 
 
The crisis in the Church 287 
 
 To the Venerable Archdeacon , on the crisis 
 
 in the Church. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, 
 May 3, 1898. 
 
 I am anxious about the Latinizing condition of 
 mind which has expressed itself in a revival of 
 mediaeval devotions of a highly sensational type 
 and has given occasion to fanatics and firebrands 
 like Kensit, who represents a modern and adapted 
 form of Elizabethan Puritanism. Educated Evan- 
 gelicals seem afraid or ashamed to acknowledge 
 him as an agent, but one has always to take 
 account of the huge brute mass of uneducated, 
 lower middle-class antipathy to all that is Churchly 
 in our sense of the word. Nothing, I fear, will 
 expel this perennial cause of trouble from the 
 body of our Church, unless, indeed, disestablish- 
 ment were to produce internal disruptions. But 
 then one has all the more reason for anxiety, 
 and indeed for effective practical resistance when 
 among one's own friends so called a really 
 Romanizing movement furnishes this vulgar 
 Puritanism with topics of denunciation and 
 material for a campaign. 
 
 To the Venerable Archdeacon , on the same. 
 
 QUEEN'S HOTEL, EASTBOURNE, 
 August 25, 1898. 
 
 Your Dean does not seem very anxious as to 
 the issue of the Kensit agitation. I am, I confess, 
 
288 Church Questions of the Day 
 
 disposed or, rather, compelled to be apprehen- 
 sive ; one knows how inexhaustible, how irrecon- 
 cilable, is the vulgar Protestantism of the class to 
 which the Paternoster Row bookseller appeals. 
 Our younger brethren in London and elsewhere 
 seem to have lived in a fool's paradise in regard 
 to this grave point. I cannot but hold some of the 
 London clergy very gravely responsible for the 
 storm that is at least menacing us ; and I cannot 
 conceal from myself the fact that, with a certain 
 number I hope not many a really Latinizing 
 ideal has determined their action and holds posses- 
 sion of their minds. But it is perhaps all for the 
 best that Kensit and his supporters, some of them 
 in high places, have declared their policy as taking 
 a much broader sweep than the presence of a few 
 distinctly Roman ceremonies. It is an avowed 
 campaign against the whole High Church or 
 Sacramentalist theory ; the object is to make the 
 Church of England simply and aggressively Pro- 
 testant, and expel from her all who in any sense 
 adhere to the movement of 1833. In this enter- 
 prise I believe they will fail. Our business is to 
 keep before fair minds the fact that they are the 
 revolutionists, and that their campaign, if success- 
 ful, would mean disruption. I hope we may say 
 Passi graviora, and add Deus dabit his quoque 
 finem. 
 
 P.S. There is good in all storms ; and if some 
 of our juniors can be taught by these troubles that 
 there is a real difference between Roman and 
 Anglican conceptions of Christian life and worship 
 
Excessive Ceremonialism 289 
 
 and a real danger, as well as an immediate un- 
 wisdom, in excess of ceremonial development, it 
 will be well for them, and indirectly for the Church. 
 I am glad that we have a strong Primate ; his 
 recent address was very helpful. 
 
 To the Venerable Archdeacon , on the same. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 October 30, 1898. 
 
 The present agitation is proof enough, if proof 
 were wanted, that the Church is in real danger of 
 disruption ; the cords which keep discordant or 
 really irreconcilable elements together are strained 
 wellnigh to bursting. The Church Congress type 
 of language about the benefits of comprehension 
 is in a fair way to be discredited by facts, the 
 antagonisms are, as the Duke of Argyll said, too 
 pronounced to be explained away ; and our 
 weakest point the point which will give Romans 
 a special occasion for jubilant scorn is that they 
 manifest themselves so pointedly and undeniably 
 within our Episcopate. How few of the Bishops 
 have had courage to say that this Puritanical 
 agitation must not be allowed to reduce the 
 Church to the dimensions of a mere Protestant 
 sect ; and that its pretensions of zeal for the posi- 
 tion of the Church of England must be considered 
 onesided, and therefore morally unreal, while it 
 openly disregards the Church's historical principles, 
 and is absolutely silent when her essential faith 
 is virtually denied. I suppose that Sir William 
 
 19 
 
290 Church Questions of the Day 
 
 Harcourt has a real hatred of ' sacerdotalism ' on 
 popular- Protestant grounds ; and we know, from 
 Mr. Gladstone's own words, that (like so many 
 lawyers, e.g., Lord Grimthorpe) he is intelligently 
 and resolutely Erastian ; but I suspect that one 
 motive for his activity in fanning the flame of 
 this new ' popish plot ' mania is a wish to bring 
 disestablishment within measurable distance. 
 
 To a priest of the diocese of Southwell, on the 
 same. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 November 8, 1898. 
 
 As yet I have not heard of any riot or outrage 
 in churches of this neighbourhood ; Kensit's reply 
 to his Bishop (why did his Bishop ever grace the 
 man so far as to correspond with him ?) indicated 
 a resolution to abandon his crusade in its original 
 form. Doubtless he has been warned that it 
 might get him into trouble. Probably also the 
 attacks of Mr. Labouchere have shown him that 
 outside the Churchly area he has powerful adver- 
 saries to reckon with ; and not a few Protestants 
 are evidently ashamed of having countenanced so 
 complete a specimen of all that a Church reformer 
 ought not to be. But we are by no means out of 
 the wood ; nor shall we nor can we be so while 
 a distinctly Latin ideal analogous to that of 
 \V. G. Ward in the year before his secession- 
 holds possession of many minds among the clergy, 
 and, even more strongly, of certain lay theologians 
 
Divisions 291 
 
 who, not having in their own persons the responsi- 
 bilities of the clergy, are all too prominent in 
 dictating a policy and censuring the heads of the 
 Church. . . . The weak point in the present 
 situation is the inevitable exhibition of irrecon- 
 cilable differences among those same heads. If 
 we have been indulging in optimistic dreams as to 
 the abatement of differences among Churchmen, 
 we have had a rude, though a salutary, awakening. 
 How glad one feels now that the Pope did not 
 give recognition, such as was eagerly desired by 
 some among us, to Anglican Orders ! Had he 
 done so, we should have had a stream of secessions 
 like that of 1846 and the next following years. . . . 
 
 To the Rev. Canon , on a proposed book of 
 
 Daily Readings, 
 
 March 22, 1899. 
 
 Whether ' readings ' of any kind are much in 
 daily use. I have no means of judging. I doubt, 
 however, whether they commend themselves to 
 men. And it is for men that just now (in my 
 opinion) we should chiefly provide, whether in devo- 
 tional literature or in hymnology. In both these 
 departments writers for many years past have, I 
 fear, been too much swayed by woman's supposed 
 wants and real predilections. The result is seen 
 in a grave loss of masculine interest about religion 
 and Church-life -- in a serious and increasing 
 diminution of male church-goers. We observe 
 this even here in certain quarters. 
 
 19 2 
 
292 Church Questions of the Day 
 
 To the priest in charge of St. Annes, Buxton, who, 
 having been one of Dr. Brighf s pupils, had 
 taken the opportiinity of consulting him, when 
 on a visit to Buxton, what to do as to the use 
 of incense, upon the Archbishops decision of 
 July 31, 1899. 
 
 THE PALACE HOTEL, BUXTON, 
 August 8, 1899. 
 
 I should like to comply with so kind a proposal ; 
 but I think I shall best follow out my doctor's 
 advice by refraining, while under his treatment, 
 from any unusual exertion, even so much as 
 preaching at St. Anne's would involve. My hip 
 is still at times (as this morning) rather trouble- 
 some. 
 
 I shall long remember that at St. Anne's last 
 Sunday I saw a fundamental Church principle 
 carried out at the cost of some real sacrifice. I 
 wish I could hope that such a course would be 
 generally adopted ; but the line taken at some 
 typical London churches seems to me morally 
 akin to a very stubborn type of Protestantism. It 
 is certainly incompatible with the original tone 
 and spirit of the movement of 1833. 
 
 I will endeavour to see you some time this 
 week, avoiding the days on which you will be 
 absent from home. 
 
 It has been a great pleasure to renew intercourse 
 with a former pupil under such circumstances as 
 the present. 
 
The Lambeth Decision 293 
 
 To the Venerable Archdeacon , on the Arch- 
 bishops decision as to incense. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 August 25, 1899. 
 
 Touching the present trouble, I also wish that 
 the Archbishops had more distinctly sanctioned 
 what is called the still use of incense. But, I pre- 
 sume, that what they allow would include the 
 retention of incense in a pendant censer, or 
 similar vessel, provided that it was not kindled as 
 part and parcel of a ceremonial. The ground 
 which they took has, I think, been misunderstood, 
 not to say misrepresented. They rely much, it is 
 true, on the Elizabethan Act of Uniformity ; 
 therefore, it is urged, they Erastianize. The 
 sequitur is surely imperceptible. This statute is 
 by no means an ordinary Act of Parliament. 
 Not to say that without it we should never have 
 had our present Ornaments Rubric, it seems to 
 me quite obvious that if Archbishops, when asked 
 to decide a point of legality I mean, of ecclesi- 
 astical legality may not refer to a statute which 
 has actually stood at the very beginning of the 
 Prayer- Book from 1559 to the present day, one 
 hardly sees what they may found upon. This 
 I'nmo Elizabeths has acquired a distinctly eccle- 
 siastical character, and retains its place in all com- 
 plete copies of the Prayer- Book of 1662. And 
 on the showing of the extremists, it its prohibi- 
 tions are of no force, then nothing remains which 
 can bar the introduction at an individual priest's 
 
294 Church Questions of the Day 
 
 will of any ceremony whatever, which it suits him 
 loosely to label Catholic. I think their Graces 
 might have dwelt yet more over the section Of 
 ceremonies, why some are abolished, etc. Alas ! 
 the developments of externalism have of late 
 years been excessive and unhealthy ; men have 
 lost their sense of proportion and their perception 
 of the different susceptibilities of a Teutonic and 
 a Latin people, and their sense of the need of 
 keeping ceremonialism within its due subordinate 
 sphere. If they would only read St. Paul and 
 study the history of the fifteenth century! But 
 what strikes one as more disastrous is the temper 
 of contumacy and selfwill which leaps into action 
 at any check. Surely it is akin to the Protestant 
 ?$oc : at any rate, it is alien to the Tractarian. 
 
 To the Editor of The Guardian, on a question 
 raised by the Archbishops decision in regard 
 to incense, as to whether the Elizabethan Act 
 of Uniformity, 1559, received the sanction of 
 Convocation in 1661. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 September, 1899. 
 
 Without entering further into the discussion 
 which now crowds the columns of your corre- 
 spondence, I may be allowed to notice a point of 
 some significance, which seems to have been over- 
 looked by my friend Mr. Denny. 
 
 He has argued in effect as follows : That which 
 Convocation in December, 1661, 'approved' was 
 
i Eliz. c. 2 295 
 
 simply and solely that which it had 'revised/ 
 But it had no commission to revise the Eliza- 
 bethan Act of Uniformity, and did not revise it. 
 Therefore that Act is external to what Convoca- 
 tion ' approved,' and the Archbishops' argument 
 that it then received ' the authority of the Church ' 
 in a more formal manner than mere acquiescence 
 in Elizabeth's reign would involve falls to the 
 ground, and carries a good deal along with it. 
 
 Clearly it would not be for Convocation but for 
 Parliament to alter a statute ; and, in fact, the 
 Elizabethan statute was in the following spring 
 statutably made (by Charles II.'s Act) to apply to 
 the Prayer- Book as recently revised. There was 
 no occasion for Convocation to ask expressly that 
 this should be done. Of course, it would be 
 done, unless a deadlock occurred between Con- 
 vocation and Parliament. 
 
 Clearly, also, there is a sense in which a statute 
 is not part of a Prayer- Book as a collection of 
 services and rubrics, whether that collection has 
 or has not a distinct 'preface' or 'exordium.' 
 But the question is whether the Elizabethan Act 
 had not long been regarded, and was still regarded 
 in 1 66 1, as inseparably attached to the authorized 
 forms of worship. If it was so, then to approve 
 the forms as revised was to approve it in a sense 
 sufficient for the Archbishops' contention. Now, 
 let us look to the highest documentary authority 
 that of the solemn Approbation, by the Upper 
 House of Canterbury, on December 20, 1661, of 
 the book as ' reduced to ' a particular ' form.' 
 Mr. Denny has quoted the words from Librum 
 
296 Church Questions of the Day 
 
 P re cum to revisum inclusive. But what follows 
 immediately after revisum ? This : et quingentos 
 quadraginta et quatuor paginas continentem. So 
 that the Liber, of which Archbishop Juxon and his 
 Suffragans presently go on to say, recepimus, et 
 approbavimus, eidemque subscripsimus^ is a book 
 of exactly 544 pages, neither more nor less. But 
 this MS. ' Annexed ' Book, as reprinted with due 
 official certificate in 1891, exhibits on its second 
 page ' the Contents of this Book,' of which No. i 
 is 'the Act for the Uniformitie of Common 
 Prayer'; and that Act, dated as ' primo Elisa- 
 bethae ' (not ' primo Elisabeth,' as Sancroft had 
 written in the 'Black-Letter Prayer- Book'), comes 
 next after the ' Contents/ and extends from the 
 third to the eleventh page inclusive, being tran- 
 scribed exactly in the same hand which appears 
 in the rest of the book. Thus, if the Act is not, 
 in a real sense, ' contained ' in the book, the 
 numeration in the table of contents (as the Bishop 
 of Edinburgh has observed) is wrong from No. i 
 to No. 27- that is, throughout ; and, what is much 
 more serious, if it is not included in what Con- 
 vocation 'received and approved,' the approbation 
 itself, describing the book, is wrong by nine pages 
 too many. 
 
 1 Parker, Introduction to the Revisions of the Book of Common 
 Prayer, p. ccccxlv. 
 
i Eliz. c. 2, 13 297 
 
 To the Editor 0/~The Guardian, on points arising 
 out of the Archbishops decision as to incense. 
 
 October, 1899. 
 
 Old English punctuation is by no means an 
 unfailing guide to the sense ; it is often no more 
 than a guide to pauses in reading. This must be 
 well known to all who have examined the Sealed 
 Books, and if it had always been remembered, 
 there need have been no controversy as to a well- 
 known answer in the Catechism. However, the 
 ' Statutes of the Realm ' put only a comma before 
 the clauses about ' alterations ' in the Elizabethan 
 Act and no comma between ' by authority of Par- 
 liament ' and 'in the second year' in the thir- 
 teenth clause of the same Act. 1 The truth is that 
 the combined phrase is a technical designation, 
 the authority in question being that of a Parlia- 
 ment holden in, and thus belonging to, the year 
 January 28, 1548, to January 28, 1549. 
 
 The letter of ' Observer ' might well suggest 
 comment on its tone in censuring the heads of 
 the English Church (which would have deeply 
 shocked the great Tractarians) and on its wild 
 treatment of early Church history. It is curious 
 to compare what Dr. Sanday does say on page 13 
 of his pamphlet 2 (the generous tone of which will 
 be appreciated by all High Churchmen) with 
 what ' Observer ' makes him say. Perhaps one 
 
 1 Cf. Gee and Hardy, Documents, etc., pp. 459, 4 66 - 
 ' 2 The CatJiolic Movement and the Archbishops Decision 
 (1899). 
 
208 Church Questions of the Day 
 
 7 f^ J 
 
 may be permitted to doubt whether we can alto- 
 gether rely on the inventories of Constantine's 
 gifts to the great Roman basilicas as having full 
 contemporary authority ; and Duchesne, although 
 he regards them as such, ranks ' a fixed censer ' 
 as among ' vessels less commonly used ' (Liber 
 Pontificalis, I., p. cxliv.). And some will think that 
 the censers which Silvia 1 saw carried (after certain 
 prayers) into 'the Cave of the Resurrection' would 
 most likely, in such a place, have a ' fumigatory ? 
 purpose. 2 But it may be best to dwell on two 
 points : the argument from ' The Order of the 
 Communion as to the import of the thirteenth 
 clause,' and the reference to a passage in the 
 Preface to the Prayer- Book of 1661-62. 
 
 On the first point, the argument, as I under- 
 stand it, is this: Edward VI., in March, 1548, 
 early in his ' second year,' put forth a form for 
 administering Communion during Mass, ' without 
 the varying of any other rite or ceremony in the 
 Mass ' 3 up to the priest's own communion. The 
 Proclamation 4 which introduced it referred to an 
 Act of Parliament. 5 Therefore, when Elizabeth's 
 
 1 Silvia was a lady of Aquitaine who made a pilgrimage to 
 Jerusalem, c. 385, and has left us a description of the rites and 
 ceremonies she saw there. Cf. the Peregrinatio S. Silvia in 
 Duchesne, Origines, etc., App. 4. The passage alluded to is 
 on p. 474- 
 
 2 Cf. Bishop John Wordsworth, The Ministry of Grace, 
 pp. 322 sq. 
 
 3 Cardwell, Two Liturgies, etc., p. 428 (3rd ed., 1852). 
 
 4 Ibid., pp. 425 sq. 
 
 5 i Ed. VI., c. i : for which see Gee and Hardy, Documents, 
 etc., pp. 322 sqq. 
 
The Elizabethan Ornaments 299 
 
 Parliament, by the thirteenth clause of the Act of 
 Uniformity, legalized (provisionally) all the orna- 
 ments which had 'authority of Parliament ' in her 
 brother's ' second year,' 1 it ipso facto legalized all 
 the ceremonies of the Mass as they were main- 
 tained under ' the Order of Communion,' and 
 went on until the First Book was established in 
 the beginning of 1549. But the Act cited in 
 Edward's Proclamation (i Edw. VI., c. i) did not 
 prescribe any such ' Order,' and would have been 
 sufficiently carried out if the priests had simply 
 administered in both kinds to their communicants; 
 the new 'Order' was put forth by the boy-Kings 
 own authority, with the advice, it is implied, of 
 the Protector and the Privy Council. Next, the 
 phrase ' by authority of Parliament,' would hardly 
 have been used by the framers of the Act of 1559 
 in regard to what had only indirect Parliamentary 
 sanction ; it clearly points to a sanction direct and 
 explicit. Again, only seven years before that 
 Act, an Act is cited in 5 and 6 Edward VI., c. i 
 (i.e., in the second Edwardian Act of Uniformity), 
 as ' made in tke second year of the King's Majesty's 
 reign,' 2 and that Act is the First Act of Uniformity 3 
 which authorized the first Prayer-Book ; so that, 
 on this evidence, there is no occasion for going 
 back to 1548 for the interpretation of the Eliza- 
 bethan provision about ' ornaments.' And, lastly, 
 so to go back would involve the gravest improba- 
 bilities. For we should have to suppose that 
 Elizabeth's first Parliament, in the very act of 
 
 1 Ibid., p. 466. - Ibid., p. 371. 
 
 3 Ibid., pp. 358 sqq. 
 
300 Church Questions of the Day 
 
 abolishing the ritual practised under ' our late 
 Sovereign Lady Queen Mary,' 1 advisedly retained 
 for Church use (' until other order should be 
 taken ') 2 the ornaments of the unreformed worship, 
 with the exception of the very few which in 1548 
 were already abolished by injunctions, such as the 
 Paschal candle. It is worth while to look at the 
 list of things required in Bonner's Visitation 
 articles of 1554 to be provided for the churches 
 (Card well, Documentary Annals, i., p. 151) ; and 
 this, while knowing that Edward, in publishing his 
 ' Order,' gave fair warning that further changes in 
 the form of worship would be announced ' with 
 all convenient speed.' 3 Is this conceivable in the 
 circumstances ? What would those counsellors 
 of Elizabeth have said who had felt it necessary 
 to thwart her own desire of restoring the First 
 Book ? And those precursors of the Puritans 
 whose ideal had been formed, let us say, at 
 Zurich, who groaned under the scandal of the 
 Queen's altar cross and tapers, who would fain 
 have got rid of the surplice itself would not they 
 have filled the air with the storm of their protest 
 against such a wholesale ' return to Babylon ' ? 
 Doubtless Sandys, not then a Bishop, did say, 
 two days after the Act passed, that it retained, for 
 the time, the ornaments of the first and second 
 years 4 ; but he was doubly misinformed as to its 
 wording, and may have been vaguely thinking of 
 the First Book in the light of what might be 
 
 1 Gee and Hardy, p. 459. ' 2 Ibid., p. 466. 
 
 3 Two Liturgies, p. 426. 
 
 4 Parker Correspondence, p. 65. 
 
* Catholic Practices ' 301 
 
 called a preparatory process, which, in a sense, 
 had begun in December, 1547. The whole 
 stream of authority and probability is in favour of 
 connecting the clause about ornaments in the Act, 
 and the Ornaments Rubric in both its forms, with 
 the provisions of the First Book. 
 
 The passage in the Preface, too often used as 
 if it gave individual priests a perfectly free hand 
 for introducing into their services any observance 
 which they deem ' Catholic,' although it be not 
 recognised in the Prayer-Book, is simple enough 
 if read as it there stands. ' We have rejected,' it 
 is said, all proposals for alteration of the Prayer- 
 Book (as it came before Convocation for revision) 
 which ' struck at some . . . laudable practice of 
 the Church of England, or indeed q/ the whole 
 Catholic Church of Christ' Here, manifestly, the 
 scope of the passage is limited to what was in the 
 Prayer-Book. The Puritanic objectors had asked 
 that this, that, or the other practice, having 
 Prayer-Book authority, should be deprived of it. 
 The reply comes to this : ' The things which you 
 object to are good Anglican practices; and some 
 of them have a further claim, being observed 
 throughout the whole Church. In their case, 
 then, there are two good reasons against change.' 
 In short, the passage contemplates such ' Catholic 
 practices ' as are recognised by the Prayer-Book, 
 and goes no further. It does not warrant the 
 claim of a 'freedom' signally ' unchastened,' and 
 fatal alike to authority and to good order. 
 
302 Church Questions of the Day 
 
 To the Rev. , in criticism of a ' Report 
 
 of the Committee on Church Reform ' ac- 
 cepted by the Salisbury Diocesan Synod, 
 
 1900. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 January 26, 1900. 
 
 I cannot, I own, attach much practical impor- 
 tance to, or feel much interest in, schemes for 
 Church Reform in the sense of self-govern- 
 ment, so long as Establishment lasts, and places 
 us under what is in fact a Parliamentary su- 
 premacy. 
 
 But the draft scheme is, in my opinion, ob- 
 jectionable in several respects. It places the lay 
 communicant on a footing of absolute equality 
 with the pastors of the Church on all the subjects 
 which are supposed to come before the ' General 
 Synod.' It professes to reserve certain subjects 
 as outside the purview of the ' National Synod.' 
 I cannot believe that this is anything better than 
 a mere paper safeguard. Any layman may start 
 a discussion on the doctrinal sense of the Anglican 
 formularies with regard to some case which at the 
 moment excites interest or is connected with 
 popular agitation, or, as you say, to propose some 
 revision of this or that part of the Prayer- Book ; 
 and is it conceivable that the Synod will be 
 stopped from discussing such a matter by an 
 appeal or reference to ' the next Pananglican ' ? 
 In this and in other points the scheme appears to 
 me hopelessly ' doctrinaire ' and unpractical I 
 might say, academic. 
 
Laity, ancient and modern 303 
 
 That assurance that the laity will always be 
 conservative requires the counter question, ' Con- 
 servative of what ?' Are we as yet in a position 
 to say that lay communicants will be sufficiently 
 trained if you like, educated in Church princi- 
 ples (using that term in no narrow sense) as to be 
 capable of so vast a trust as this scheme confides 
 to them ? Ireland is not far off, and the conduct 
 of its laity in the Synod is not wholly without 
 significance for ourselves. And if electors of lay 
 representatives are not to be communicants, it is 
 quite idle to claim primitive sanction for the idea 
 involved in the scheme. As we all know, a non- 
 communicant layman in primitive times was not a 
 layman, not ?ifidelis, not practically a member of 
 the Church. As for churchwardens, their case, 
 if adduced, is only one more anomaly incident to 
 our ' established ' position. And if you are 
 drawing out a scheme for all time, you should 
 not perpetuate anomalies which in themselves and 
 on religious grounds are incapable of defence. 
 
 The scheme has no chance of being made a 
 reality, otherwise one would seriously deprecate 
 it. But I confess that one point in it touches my 
 sense of humour. This new ' body need not 
 interfere with ' the Convocations. What place 
 logically, or practically, would they have in 
 presence of this brand-new ' Synod ' ? I fancy 
 that if this were read out in our Lower House 
 it would strike most of the hearers as well, as 
 comic. As for a more adequate representation 
 of the parochial clergy in Convocation, we know 
 that the lawyers bar the way to it. 
 
304 Church Questions of the Day 
 
 All this reminds one a little of Carlyle's picture 
 of ' constitution making ' in the French Revolu- 
 tion. Abbe Sieyes was fertile in beautiful paper 
 schemes. But they would not ' march.' 
 
 As for ' the primitive church ' and its precedents, 
 no doubt our conditions are different from those 
 of old in various respects, partly for gain, partly 
 I must needs think for loss. Pedantic archaism 
 is itself mere folly ; but still, after all, however 
 made, the question recurs : Are we going to 
 throw overboard the principle of our traditional 
 theology, and, indeed, of our Reformation ? Has 
 that principle nothing to say to us when we are 
 plunging forward into new, and, one might say, 
 revolutionary, plans of ecclesiastical reconstruc- 
 tion ? Is such a plunge to be taken with a ' light 
 heart,' without grave apprehension of the danger 
 of such false steps as cannot, humanly speaking, 
 be recalled ? Dr. Pusey has not been refuted on 
 the main point as to whether the laity were con- 
 stituent members of ancient Synods. I have said 
 something of this in my Aspects of Primitive Church 
 Life, c. 2. It would be interesting if you could ob- 
 tain from Prebendary an answer to two definite 
 
 questions, (i) Is there any producible evidence 
 that the laity, as such, were present as an Order 
 (not simply present in the persons of laymen who 
 could inform or advise) at any one of the great 
 ancient Synods, or that they ' sat apart, voted en 
 masse? etc? (2) Is there any evidence that this 
 lay Order could and did, as of right, demand a 
 suspension of the conclusions arrived at by the 
 rest of the Synod? If such evidence exists, let 
 
Laity, ancient and modern 305 
 
 us know what it is. As at present advised, I 
 simply deny both propositions ; and, in particular, 
 I am astonished to find the Council of Chalcedon 
 claimed as an instance of the truth of the first. 
 
 May I add that, if laymen are placed on a foot- 
 ing of absolute equality with Bishops and clergy 
 in regard to matters involving doctrine, the 
 principle on which such equalization would be 
 rested would logically extend to the admission of 
 laymen to teach in church on a parity with the 
 ordained pastors ? For to decide a question of 
 doctrine is to teach, is to ' divide the word,' 1 in 
 a sense peculiarly effective. 
 
 It would be quite another matter to recognise 
 in laymen the right of saying : ' This is not in 
 accordance with the teaching which has heretofore 
 been received, and in which we as Churchmen 
 have a very direct interest.' 
 
 Unquestionably, the rights of deacons cannot 
 be ignored if the rights of laics are put forward in 
 so pronounced a form. 
 
 I would not seem to forget the large area of 
 manifold influences which the faithful Laity did 
 certainly possess in regard to the administration 
 of Church affairs, and even in regard to Synods ; 
 nor, again, the peculiarly representative function 
 (I know the word is ambiguous, but one has to 
 use it) which the Bishop, as the elect of his clergy 
 and his people, could in ancient times appropriately 
 discharge. 
 
 Three things seem at this juncture peculiarly 
 important for Church Reformers to bear in 
 1 2 Tim. ii. 15. 
 
 20 
 
306 Church Questions of the Day 
 
 mind. First, not to loosen their hold on old 
 moorings, and drift out into untried waters with- 
 out the restraint of principles which are imbedded 
 in the New Testament account of Church life 
 e.g., the principle that authority is ' from above 
 and not from below.' Secondly, to scrutinize, 
 very strictly, proposed ' safeguards,' which may 
 turn out to be shams. And, thirdly, to remember 
 that ' one can't have just as much of an argument 
 as one likes ' that, if we admit an unchurchly 
 principle to a certain extent, we shall find that it 
 will constrain us to ' go with it ' further, and that, 
 perhaps, to very embarrassing extremes. 
 
 To the same, in reference to the same. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 September 28, 1900. 
 
 The laymen seem to forget that, if they want 
 to be teachers of doctrine co-ordinately with the 
 ordained pastors, they ought, at least, to qualify 
 themselves for such a function. At present, as 
 laymen, they give no guarantee whatever that 
 they have done anything to prepare themselves 
 for it. 
 
 I am not personally opposed to the House of 
 Laymen scheme, as proposed by way of de- 
 velopment of the existing system sanctioned by 
 Convocation and carried into effect. The fideles 
 have a clear right to say, ' We cannot accept 
 this or that new doctrinal formula' to veto it, in 
 short. But if there is a ministry ' given to 51 the 
 1 Eph. iv. 7,j8, ii ; cf. 'set over the household' (Luke xii. 42). 
 
The rights of the Laity 307 
 
 Church, and not invented by the Church, and 
 if that ministry has a stewardship 1 of truth as 
 well as of grace, it is impossible to acquiesce 
 in demands which involve a denial of its Divine 
 institution. 
 
 To Prebendary , on the rights of the Laity. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 March 31, 1900. 
 
 . . . Mr. Macleane has referred to you as 
 having expressed a strong opinion in favour of 
 the right, on ancient evidence, of laymen to con- 
 stituent membership in Synod, and I therefore 
 suggested the two questions which he transmitted 
 to you. Of course, I should not ultro have 
 troubled you in the matter. But I will ask you 
 kindly to let him see what I now write by way of 
 comment. 
 
 I. (i) As to Leo's iO2nd letter 2 I need not say 
 that it is not new to me. But you must allow me 
 to express my surprise at the construction which 
 you place on the context, cum ob hoc ipsum 
 sexcentorum fere fratrum co-episcoporumque nos- 
 trorum synodus congregata, nullam artem ratio- 
 cinandi, nullum eloquium disserendi contra fun- 
 datani divinitus fidem spirare permiserit? Leo 
 distinctly defines the Synod as consisting of 
 ' about 600 Bishops.' Then he speaks of its 
 
 1 Cf. Luke xii. 42 ; i Cor. iv. i. 
 
 2 Leonis Epp., pp. 1136 sqq. (ap. Migne, P. L., torn liv., 
 coll. 983 sqq.}. 
 
 3 Ep. cii., c. 2, p. 1137 (Migne, P. Z., liv. 986A). 
 
 2O 2 
 
308 Church Questions of the Day 
 
 results, emphasizing the pains taken by his own 
 legates, and saying that it has been made clear, 
 non solum sacerdotibus C/iristi, sed etiam principi- 
 bus et potestatibus Christianis, cunctisque cleri et 
 plebis ordinibus, that the doctrine which he 
 maintains (e.g., in his Tome 1 ) is orthodox. 
 What proof is there in these words that ' the 
 princes, and orders,' etc. were constituent members 
 of the Synod ? Assuredly, none at all ! Pius IV. 
 might have used similar language after the 
 Council of Trent, from his own point of view 
 i.e., that now the authentic doctrine of the 
 (Roman) Church had been unequivocally made 
 manifest to all (Roman Catholic) Christendom. 
 And, on your showing, Valentinian must have 
 been a member of the Council of Chalcedon, 
 personally or by representation. So must his 
 Praetorian prefects ; nay, all the Western clergy, 
 all the Western laymen, must have been in 
 exactly the same condition, every single priest, 
 deacon, laic in the world must have thus acted 
 as a constituent member of the Synod, which, 
 some eight lines above, is described by the writer 
 of the passage as consisting of fratrum co-episco- 
 porumque nostrorum. 
 
 You seem to assume that the sacerdotibus 
 Christi are merely the 600 or more at Chalcedon, 
 whereby Leo is thinking of all Bishops every- 
 where as thus informed of the truth. 
 
 (2) In the beginning of the seventh session [of 
 
 1 Cf. Bright, Sermons of St. Leo on the Incarnation, pp. 109 
 sqq. (and ed., 1886). 
 
The Council of Chalcedon 309 
 the Council of Chalcedon], you rely on KOI rf)c 
 
 AOITTTJC . . . avvoSov following on KO.I \oiiruv eiriaKoTrtuv. 
 
 But after \onrwv comes TWV Trpottpi^ufywy, 1 which I 
 take to refer to the names recited in the fuller list 
 given in the sixth session, after which follows 
 ' and the rest of the holy Bishops.' 2 It seems to 
 me clear that 'the above-named' (in session vii.) 
 mean the chief or leading Bishops. In session vii. 
 the names of this class, besides the Roman 
 legates, are Anatolius, Maximus, Juvenal, Quin- 
 tillus, Anastasius (by proxy), and Thalassius. 
 In the corresponding, but longer, list in session vi., 
 six others (seven, including a proxy) are 
 mentioned ; and these make up, in my opinion, 
 the ' above-named.' Then, ' the rest of the holy 
 CEcumenical Synod ' naturally means all the other 
 Bishops, present or represented, just as in 
 session vii. we have teal TWV AourtJv. The words 
 ' the rest of the Synod ' must be interpreted 
 consistently with the language defining the Synod 
 as meaning the 600 or more Bishops, all of whom 
 sat, as the context goes on to say, in front of the 
 sanctuary-screen. 3 What ground have we for 
 saying that presbyters, or deacons, or laity sat 
 there ? What room would there be for so huge 
 a crowd as this construction supposes ? I might 
 add that, if ' the rest of the Synod ' were inter- 
 preted to mean others besides Bishops, that 
 would not prove that the persons in question 
 were laics. Of course, the Imperial Commis- 
 sioners were there, not as laics, but as representa- 
 
 1 Mansi, vii. i8oB. 2 Ibid., 1276. 8 Ibid., i8oB. 
 
310 Church Questions of the Day 
 
 tives of the Emperor. They were, in a sense, 
 the Presidents. 
 
 (3) You refer to a letter of Pulcheria to the 
 Consular of Bithynia. It is in Mansi, vi. 555, 556. 
 You infer from it that there were clerics, monks, 
 and laics, who were, and others who were not, 
 summoned or ' called ' to attend at Chalcedon. 
 But you must observe that, a few lines lower 
 
 down, after Xat/couc, COmes oi)e ou&tg Xoyoc STTI av 
 
 Ka\eli>. The former words, then, Si^a 
 /cAr7<ruc, must be taken with these ; and they 
 mean that the imperial authority is necessary in 
 order to warrant the presence of non-members 
 in Chalcedon ; and they imply, taken with the 
 context, that the Sovereigns do not mean to give 
 such warrant, lest tumults arise to the disturbance 
 of ' the Synod ' itself. The letter is illustrated by 
 the imperial citation (Mansi, vi. 551), bidding the 
 Metropolitans to attend with those of their 
 Bishops whom they think fit. Could anything 
 be more distinct as showing who were to con- 
 stitute the Assembly ? And, in the previous 
 Council of 448, the admission of one layman, 
 Florentius, is distinctly marked as exceptional, as 
 ordered by Theodosius 1 on the ground that he 
 was orthodox and approved in faith. If the 
 Laity, as such, had had at the time an acknow- 
 ledged right to proper membership in Synod, this 
 language would not have been held (compare 
 Mansi, vi. 733). 
 
 As to the latter part of my question, observe 
 
 1 Mansi, vi. 7320.; Hefele, iii. /. 199; Bright, Age of the 
 Fathers, ii. p. 455. 
 
Laymen not members of Synods 311 
 
 that I am not contending one way or another as 
 to practical modern arrangements ; my point of 
 view is purely historical. I do not admit that 
 laymen were ' members ' of these Councils at all. 
 There is no question that they were often 
 present ; but the one point at issue is their 
 membership. Now, I have never seen as yet any 
 proof, or any approach to a proof, that they were 
 such ' members,' and it is precisely this that has 
 to be proved. I cannot, for my part, admit that 
 the onus lies with me to show that they were not. 
 any more (if you will permit me the illustration) 
 than I can admit (or, in controversy with the late 
 Dr. Rivington, could admit) that the onus lies 
 with Anglicans to show that the Pope was not in 
 primitive times the acknowledged ruler of the 
 Church. It seems to me that you start with the 
 presumption that the Laity, as such, must have 
 been members of Synods in antiquity. I start 
 with no preassumption at all ; I simply say, ' We 
 know that Synods were held : we know that, when 
 they first came forward, they are described as 
 consisting of (or, if you like, as containing) Bishops. 
 That is clear from Eusebius, H.E., v. 23.' I ask, 
 ' Have we any evidence that other classes or orders 
 were in a like position?' If it exists, it must be 
 producible. Let it be produced, and we will do 
 it all justice. Until it is produced, we must go 
 by the evidence that we have. ' But,' you say, 
 ' laymen signed sy nodical decrees, and would not 
 have been allowed to do so if they had not been 
 constituent members.' In what sense did they 
 sign ? To sign as consenting, or simply to sign 
 
312 Church Questions of the Day 
 
 implying consent, is one thing ; to sign as defin- 
 ing is another. And no lay signatures appear in 
 the acts of the great Synods. Cyprian's Synods, 
 at which many laymen were present, consisted, 
 as the speeches show, of Bishops. Archbishop 
 Benson complains of this, while he notes the 
 presence of laymen, 1 evidently showing that mere 
 presence does not at all imply membership. I 
 must plead that, until proof of membership on 
 historical grounds is forthcoming, references to 
 mere presence are nil ad rem. 
 
 II. Then for my second question. It meant, 
 ' Assuming, for argument's sake, that laics were 
 present qua laics, as an order ' which, in view 
 of existing evidence, I do not admit ' can you 
 show that they, in that capacity, could command 
 a suspension of the decisions of (what you call) 
 the rest of the Synod ?' You answer, in effect, 
 ' We do not possess enough evidence as to any 
 order having that power ; but we may assume that 
 each must have had it.' Now, I grant, of course, 
 that Bishops, or clerics, or laics, might, out of 
 Synod, join in demanding a new Council. But 
 this would not be a synodical act, and I under- 
 stand you to be thinking of action in Synod. 
 Again, a cleric or a laic, aggrieved by being con- 
 demned in a Synod, might appeal to a higher 
 Synod. But that is a different matter. 
 
 Now for what 'puts your back up.' Well, I, 
 
 too, have a back, and it objects to your expression 
 
 ' dummies.' I never said or thought that laymen, 
 
 present at Synods, and competent to give testi- 
 
 1 Benson, Cyprian, pp. 426 sqq. 
 
Laymen present at Synods 313 
 
 mony or advice, were debarred from doing so. I 
 believe that very often their presence was in- 
 fluential. All I say is, ' Neither they, nor, as a 
 rule, presbyters or deacons, were present as 
 members proper ; but both clerics and competent 
 laics, present as hearers, were also capable of 
 being consulted.' Only, I repeat, before you 
 speak of what laics might do, or might not do, in 
 their capacity of members of Synods, you must 
 first ' catch your hare ' you must show the fact of 
 membership. And, when you quote Haddan, I 
 must remind you of what he goes on to say in the 
 self-same sentence that ' no proof at all exists 
 that the laity . . . ever voted individually in 
 actual divisions.' 1 But this is surely the one differ- 
 entiating point of real membership in an assembly. 
 
 When you speak of Dr. Pusey as having con- 
 tended for the autocracy of Bishops, I can only 
 regret that you have not read his preface to 
 vol. ii. of St. Cyprian, in the Library of the 
 Fathers. I need not discuss what you impute to 
 him as his ' theory.' But I will remind you that 
 a very unsuspected authority in the eighteenth 
 century maintains that neither clergy nor people 
 had ' decisive voices ' in ancient Synods, and gives 
 reasons for the proposition. That authority is 
 Archbishop Potter (Church Government, c. 5) 2 . 
 
 The Laity, you say, had in primitive times a 
 function of bearing witness to Apostolic doctrine 
 generally, and this function had its exercise in 
 
 1 Smith and Cheetham, Dictionary of Christian Antiquities, 
 i. p. 482. 
 
 2 Works, ii. pp. 124 sqq. (ed. Oxford, 1753). 
 
314 Church Questions of the Day 
 
 Synods. They certainly, you will admit, had not 
 the same function as the Pastors of the Church, 
 for they were not commissioned to ' preach the 
 Word.' Therefore, they could not, on your own 
 showing (in fact, you say so), have the same power 
 at Synods as the Pastors had. But the present 
 contention is that they shall have the same power. 
 I should say that their influence, being real when 
 they wer&jfidefes and competent, found its natural 
 exercise in all sorts of ways, as well as by their 
 presence as auditors and advisers at Synods. 
 The problem for modern Churchmen is to define 
 their layman, and to secure that he shall be really 
 competent to do what could be done by his primitive 
 predecessors. 
 
 P.S. I ought not, I think, to pass over your 
 appeal to the formulary for holding a Council, 
 translated by Keble. You quote as if it spoke of 
 common consultation by, or of, ' the Bishops, 
 presbyters, deacons and laymen, who are con- 
 trasted with the rest, who are not members of the 
 Council.' Pardon me: this is not a fair representa- 
 tion of the text, (i) We hear first of laymen (I 
 had better quote the briefer Latin from Mansi, x. 
 617): Ingrediantur laid qui electioni (read elec- 
 tione) Concilii meruerunt interested this at once 
 excludes the idea of an intrinsic right. Then (2), 
 towards the end, Si presbyter aliquis aut diaconus, 
 clericus, sive laicus, de his qiii foris steterint, Con- 
 cilium pro qualibet re crediderit appellandum^ he 
 is to let the Archdeacon know of it, and then be 
 
 1 Col. 6170 ad fin. - Col. 6i8B. 
 
Bishops alone members 315 
 
 allowed to enter and state his case These cases, 
 of course, are distinct from those whom the 
 Council had permitted before to be present. Now 
 for the words which, I submit, are not properly 
 represented in your pamphlet (p. 27) : Concilium 
 quoque nullus soivere audeat, nisi fuerint cuncta 
 determinates : ita ut qutzcunque deliberatione com- 
 muni finiantur, Episcoporum singulorum manibus 
 subscribantur. Words could not more clearly 
 show that the common deliberation is to be the 
 act of the Bishops ; and that the document gives 
 no warrant for including with them, in regard to 
 it, either presbyters, deacons, or laymen. 
 
 To the same, on the same subject. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, 
 
 April 26, 1900. 
 
 I shall best thank you for the kindness of your 
 letter by coming at once to the point. My present 
 interest in the question, I may here remark, is 
 simply historical. I hold no brief for any view as 
 to modern Synods : and I am not, therefore, to be 
 understood, in this letter or in the preceding, as 
 wishing to advocate this or that programme for 
 modern synodal action. 
 
 I. I begin, then, with Leo's iO2nd letter. 
 Your construction of the passage Cum ob hoc . . . 
 supposes Leo to refer to transactions in the 
 Council of Chalcedon in fact, to what took place 
 in its fifth session. But you overlook, I think, 
 the fact that Leo is writing three months after 
 
316 Church Questions of the Day 
 
 that session, and is thinking of what could not be 
 said to have taken place until some time after the 
 Chalcedonian definition had thus been adopted, 
 universe jam mundo consentiente}- That is, he is 
 referring to the general acceptance of it in the 
 Catholic world of that day. But this is not all. 
 You suppose him to say that a very decided 
 minority is called ' the Council ' itself, and then is 
 said to have made a certain thing clear to, what 
 you take to be, the vast majority of members, 
 consisting of Princes, and Powers, and Bishops, 
 and all orders of clergy and laity. Your hypothesis 
 requires them to be regarded as members in the 
 proper sense of the term. What evidence, then, 
 one asks, is there for ' so large an order ' as this 
 view involves ? Not one iota ; the evidence 
 goes the other way. If your theory is maintained, 
 it cannot be maintained in any slighter form than 
 that of the membership of all Valentinian III.'s 
 state officers or provincial rulers, all Bishops of the 
 West as well as of the East, and, by representa- 
 tion, every cleric and every laic in Christendom. 
 Truly a portentous Council ! Now, the Western 
 Empire was but very scantily represented at 
 Chalcedon ; there were hardly any Western 
 Bishops beyond the Roman legates certainly, no 
 laics of the West [were] present, or [are] in any 
 way referred to. Surely your construction rests 
 on a very shaky basis ! I will come presently to 
 the language of Marcian and Pulcheria as to 
 Eastern Bishops, or, as you suppose, of other 
 Easterns as well ; but your argument, as involved 
 1 Leonis Epp.p. 1138 (Ep. cii., c. 2, Migne, P. Z., liv. 9866). 
 
Synods consist of Bishops 317 
 
 in your construction, proves, I submit, a great 
 deal too much. 
 
 My construction is simple and natural. Leo 
 says that the Synod of Bishops, with the aid of the 
 Legates, has made the true doctrine clear to a vast 
 number of persons who were not present in any 
 sense at Chalcedon, but all [of whom] have heard 
 of its definition of the faith. As he is writing to 
 Gallic bishops, one quite sees the point of his 
 reference to Sacerdotes Christi at the head of the 
 persons who have thus been instructed. 
 
 1 1. I will now take the language of the Emperor 
 and Empress. 
 
 1. Marcian most certainly implies (Leo, Ep. 76), l 
 that the Synod will consist of Bishops. You 
 repeatedly assume that this language, whenever 
 used, is popular, current, lax meaning no more 
 than that Bishops are the chief members of the 
 Synods. I think we have no right thus to explain 
 away it is nothing less this formal and official 
 language. Marcian writes as Emperor, and his 
 words ought to have their full weight. 
 
 2. Then for Pulcheria she writes, before the 
 Council, to the Consular of Bithynia: 2 he is to take 
 care that no person shall remain in Chalcedon who 
 has no business there, as clerics or others, lest 
 they disturb the Synod. As for her phrase, 'with- 
 out any summons of ours,' it is, 1 think, quite 
 arbitrary to infer that there were others, not being 
 Bishops, but monks, clerics or laics, whom she did 
 
 1 Leonis Epp. pp. 1025 sqq. (Ep. Ixxvi. ap. Migne, P. L., liv., 
 coll. 903 sqq.]. 
 - Mansi, vi. 555. 
 
318 Church Questions of the Day 
 
 summon, (a) If a farmer catches a boy of the 
 village trespassing, and says, ' I never gave you 
 leave to come here,' that does not imply that he 
 had given leave to other boys, (ft) The words, 
 ' Whom no principle summons to a Synod ' 
 literally, ' Whom there is no reason to call to a 
 Synod ' T may refer to monks and clerics, as 
 well as laics ; but they do certainly refer to 
 laics. Pulcheria clearly supposes in this official 
 letter that ' the holy Synod ' will consist of the 
 Bishops who came to Chalcedon ' by virtue of an 
 imperial order,' 2 and this naturally interprets her 
 phrase on which, to my surprise, you build so* 
 much Kon>y Trapa, TTO.VTWV /cpaTw$7Jj>ai 3 immediately 
 following the reference to the Synod. In an 
 earlier letter of hers to Leo (Ep. 77)* she im- 
 plies the like. You say, however, that Hefele 
 admits that there were other members of that 
 Synod besides the Bishops. If you refer to 
 vol. i., p. 32, I must observe that he is speaking 
 of the Commissioners of the Empress, whose 
 presence proves nothing at all as to the right of 
 laity, qua laity. They were sent to represent the 
 State, to keep order, and generally to regulate 
 the proceedings. (We may compare the Czar's 
 Commissioners in a Russian Synod.) In the 
 very first session, when certain clerics attendant 
 on Anatolius were understood to speak, the 
 Egyptian Bishops appealed to the fact that this 
 
 1 oiif ou5/s Xoyo; STTI <rv\>obov xaXtTv. Mansi, vi. 556C. 
 
 2 Ibid. 5566. 
 
 3 Ibid. 556D. 
 
 4 Leonis Epp., p. 1030 (Migne, P. Z., liv. 905). 
 
Clerics present, without votes 319 
 
 was a Synod of Bishops, not of clerics. 1 And, 
 once for all, any argument from such presence of 
 clerics must be set aside, when we consider that 
 (as in the case of Aries, in that of Nicsea, and in 
 that of the Council of Antioch in 269) clerics did 
 accompany their Bishops to Councils. It was a 
 well-understood custom ; but they were simply 
 there to assist, inform, suggest, sometimes, as in 
 the case of Malchion 2 and Athanasius, with ex- 
 cellent effect : but nobody imagines that (e.g.} 
 Athanasius was one of 'the Nicene Fathers.' I 
 know it is hard for us to realize what, to our 
 notions, is anomalous the presence and influence 
 of persons who had no votum dec.isivum, no share 
 in framing the actual conclusions arrived at. But 
 the difficulty may be lightened when we recollect 
 that Bishops in the early Church were natural 
 representatives alike of their clergy and of their 
 people. 
 
 111. Now as to the words in the Acts of the 
 seventh session of Chalcedon, /cat \onrw TMV 
 
 Trpotipri/uLevujv . . . cuAa/SeoTarwi' 7no7CO7r(ov KO.I TJJC AOITTTJC 
 (TWo'Sov. The adjective, euAaj3e<TTarwi>, I do not 
 
 at all restrict to Metropolitans or Primates ; such 
 a notion would be absurd. And you seem to 
 interpret Trpoti^rjf.itviw as looking back to the list 
 of the sixth session, which is what I suggested. 
 I take it to refer, not to all the Bishops named in 
 that list, but to the chief Bishops. The Acts of 
 the seventh session recite a small number of 
 
 1 Hefele, iii. p. 302 ; Bright, Age of the Fathers, ii. p. 518. 
 
 2 At Antioch, 269. Cf. Hefele, i. /. 121 ; and Routh, Rell. 
 Sacr., iii. pp. 287 sqq. 
 
320 Church Questions of the Day 
 
 chief Bishops, Primates, or Metropolitans. Then 
 they say, ' And the rest of the above-named.' I 
 interpret this to mean the rest of the chief Bishops 
 as more fully enumerated in the sixth session, where, 
 after the Roman legates, came eleven (or, in Latin, 
 twelve) Bishops of high rank, as those of Con- 
 stantinople, Antioch, Jerusalem, Thessalonica (by 
 deputy), etc., and afterwards /cat TW \onrwv. 1 In 
 the seventh session the list of such chief Bishops 
 is shorter, and I refer Trpotipri/iitixvv to those who 
 are there omitted. But as to /cat rijc AotTrrjc , 
 observe that the rest of the Synod is said in the 
 next words to have been assembled by the order 
 of the Emperor, 2 and we know whom he did 
 order to assemble, Bishops. Compare session 5, 
 Kal rrig AOITTJJC <rwoou, where Hefele says : 'Of 
 the Bishops who were present . . . the Greek Acts 
 name only three, the Latin translation forty-seven 
 more. The presence of the rest is expressed by 
 
 the formula /cat TIJC AOITTTJC . . . avvo$ov.' S 
 
 But you rely on Marcian's short speech to the 
 Council in that sixth session, after the Definitio 
 Fidei had been read, as it was passed in the fifth 
 session. He asks the Synod to say whether the 
 Definition had been put forth with the approval, 
 of whom ? Of all members of the Synod 
 episcopal, cleric, or laic as you contend ? No : 
 ' of the holy Bishops' And all assent : ' We all 
 
 1 Mansi, vii. 1276. 
 
 - ?TJ Xo/fl-Jjs' a'yius xai olx.outj,vix.ris avvodov, r$jj Kara t)i<sirifftj.a 
 ro\J dtioraTOu xa/ fvffsfitardrov TJ/AUV dfff-roYoy o TTJ X 
 foXsi awasOpoieOiiert^. Ibid., i8oB. 
 
 3 Councils, iii. p. 342. 
 
Marcian's speech at Chalcedon 321 
 
 so believe.' 1 How can he be imagined to be 
 including others than Bishops in this language ? 
 You say they had already signed the Definition : 
 yes, but in the absence of most of his Com- 
 missioners ! And, in a matter so solemn and 
 critical, he might well wish to get the whole 
 Synod's express reaffirmation, in his own presence, 
 of the conclusions reached in the fifth session. 
 He might thus wish to make assurance doubly 
 sure. As for the words in the fifth session, ' Let 
 the Metropolitans now sign,' 2 they prove nothing 
 
 relevant ; and the words, TO irapa ruv ay'uav 7rarpwv 
 rv7rw0ei/ra /cat iraaiv apeaavra, are Spoken by the 
 
 Commissioners. What is the ground for sup- 
 posing that the TraVrtc means others besides ' the 
 holy fathers ' ? None that I can see, looking at 
 the documents. It was unanimity among the 
 Bishops on the doctrinal question that was all- 
 important, and it was quite natural for Greeks, 
 with their love of amplification and their in- 
 difference to iteration, to add the clause which 
 thus committed all. 
 
 IV. Before I go further, I must needs notice a 
 charge which, I cannot but think needlessly, you 
 bring against me of preassuming the main point. 
 You say that I ' start with the assumption that the 
 Synod must have consisted of Bishops only, and 
 then assume that whatever appears to the contrary 
 must be made to square with that assumption.' 
 Now, I had expressly disclaimed this method in 
 my first letter ; I had said, and I now say, that I 
 assume nothing to start with. I find, in Eusebius 
 1 Mansi, vii. 1696. - Ibid., nyA. 
 
 2 1 
 
322 Church Questions of the Day 
 
 and elsewhere, Synods described as of Bishops ; 
 there is ample evidence that they, at any rate, 
 were constituent members i.e., had votum deci- 
 sivum. As to presbyters, the evidence from the 
 great conciliar documents is that (except as 
 proxies for absent Bishops) they had not this 
 votum. They certainly had not in Cyprian's 
 Synods. We do hear of a Synod of Bishops and 
 presbyters depriving Origen of his catechist's 
 office, but of a Synod of Bishops as deposing 
 him from priesthood. 1 We know that presbyters 
 often assisted Bishops in a Synod, and were called 
 ' assessors ' ; but that, I think, is as far as we can 
 get. But the crucial point at present refers to the 
 Laity. Were they members of ancient Synods ? 
 Were they possessed of votum decisivum ? for 
 that is the criterion of proper membership. I 
 know of no grain of evidence for the affirmative. 
 'A certain status.' you quote from Haddan. Yes, 
 but what status ? That is precisely the point on 
 which you are concerned to give a 'view.' I 
 need not be reminded that one cannot take just 
 what one likes of evidence, interpret it according 
 to one's wishes, and neglect the rest, and 1 really 
 think I have given no occasion at all for any such 
 admonition. I have asked for distinct evidence ; 
 I am not barring it out by any preassumption ; 
 but, on the other hand, I cannot allow the onus to 
 be thrown on me to disprove lay membership, 
 when it is precisely the point on which I am 
 entitled to say, ' Prove it.' There has not, so far 
 as I know, been produced any evidence that lay- 
 
 1 Cf. Hefele, i. p. 88. 
 
Case of Florentius 323 
 
 men, qua laymen, and in virtue of an ecclesiastical 
 right, were summoned to Synods I mean as 
 members, not as mere spectators, auditors, possible 
 witnesses ; that they took part in the shaping of 
 synodical decrees ; that they formally voted ; or 
 even that (as you suppose) they even asked for a 
 ' suspension ' of the decision or ' proposed action.' 
 It is no argument to suppose this ; it has to be 
 historically proved. 
 
 My qualifying words ' qua laymen ' refer to (a) 
 such a case as that of Florentius, whom an 
 imperial order introduced at Flavian's Synod re 
 Eutyches, because he was an orthodox person 
 and theologically instructed ; or (/3) the presence 
 of lay Commissioners of the Emperor, referred to 
 above. 
 
 I see that you cite what Socrates 1 says about 
 laymen skilled in reasoning at Nicsa ; but this 
 was before the formal and solemn commencement 
 of the synodical proceedings, and it proves nothing 
 whatever as to the only point at issue, and would 
 prove nothing even if it had taken place in a 
 regular session. But you also say that, as to prac- 
 tice, it is found ' beyond all possibility of dispute 
 that neither Bishops nor clergy have exclusively 
 kept synodal duties to themselves ; the part taken 
 by laymen in them may be minimized, but denied 
 it cannot be.' This proposition is not to me quite 
 clearly intelligible ; at any rate, it wants precision 
 and distinctness, and I can only deal with it by 
 saying: If it means lay-membership, I know as 
 yet of no evidence to support it ; if it means 
 
 1 Hist. EccL, i. 8. 
 
 21 2 
 
324 Church Questions of the Day 
 
 what comes short of such membership, it is nil 
 ad rent. 
 
 I turn to a few details. I am a little surprised 
 that you refer to a Roman Synod of the early 
 part of the eighth century, when you had already, 
 after adducing it, disparaged the seventh-century 
 method of holding a Synod and admitting the 
 laics (not as of right). But I observe under 
 A.D. 715 that at a Lombard Synod three Bishops 
 use the form, judicatum a nobis actum ; an 
 Archdeacon says, judicatum interfui; and pres- 
 byters sign simply, ego . . . presbiter.^ It is 
 true that in the Synod of 721 not only one, but 
 three, of the priests sign with 'a nobis promulgate* ^ 
 but so does a deacon, 3 which shows, I think, that 
 4 promulgate ' was used in divers senses. You 
 refer to divers forms of signing, and ask whether 
 <TwaiveaaQ means less than op/o-ag. I do not 
 suppose that it does. It simply illustrates that 
 love of varying phrases which comes out so 
 quaintly in Anglo-Saxon documents, and was 
 evidently a motive long before. But, then, you 
 also disparage all signing as comparatively an 
 insignificant act, because of diversities of usage. 
 I do not see the seqiiitiir ; and I cannot read the 
 old conciliar Acts without seeing that (e.g., at 
 Chalcedon) great importance was attached to the 
 act of signature, and questions were raised as to 
 its voluntariness, etc. You say, without giving 
 proof, that laymen signed on numerous occasions. 
 I think this needs qualification. And as to the 
 
 1 Mansi, xii. 256. - Ibid., xii. 265. 
 
 3 Ibid., xii. 266. 
 
Lay signature at Synods 325 
 
 second Council of Orange as to which I vexed 
 Archdeacon Churton years ago by differing from 
 him the case of lay-signature there, I need not 
 say, proves nothing as to membership. I have 
 already adverted to the presence of clerics as 
 attendants on their Bishops : you quote Con- 
 stantine's order that every Bishop going to Aries 
 shall take two priests with him. You are quite 
 inaccurate in saying that letters of summons to 
 this Council were addressed to presbyters as well 
 as Bishops. Look, again, at Constantine's letter 
 to Chrestus ; it is the Bishop who is addressed 
 and told to bring two presbyters. 1 Here there 
 would have been a good opportunity to add laics. 
 We do find laics, in a sense, added: but they were 
 to be famuli. 2 We are not arguing about the 
 rights of priests : otherwise I might show that 
 Barsumas was only admitted as a member of the 
 Latrocinium in subservience to imperial com- 
 mands ; the proceeding was an anomaly. It is 
 quite a by-point ; but whereas you read Kara 
 TTOCTTJC artppoTiiTos in PulchcHa's letter to the 
 Consular, Mansi reads /wra. 3 Of course, the sense 
 is, 'with all strictness.' 
 
 I say nothing about present plans of synodical 
 reconstruction, except that the present ' move- 
 ment ' seems utterly to reject any inferiority of 
 position or limitation of powers in regard to 
 'laymen, members of Synod,' and you abstain 
 from saying what powers you would leave to 
 them. Of course, I value any acknowledgment 
 that the average laic is not by right on the same 
 1 Mansi, ii. 466C. 2 Ibid., 4660. 3 Ibid., vi. 5560. 
 
326 Church Questions of the Day 
 
 footing with the ordained pastors. But I fear 
 that Archbishop Benson (whose remarks in his 
 Cyprian show too much of the parti pris] would 
 have given no support to any such distinction. 
 
 This is all that I have time to say, and, as 
 Term is at hand, and I am constrained just now 
 to husband my strength (having been somewhat 
 of an invalid for some time), I cannot continue 
 the discussion. I am afraid we must accept the 
 fact that our standpoints, or starting-points, some- 
 what differ. 
 
 A private letter to the Editor of The Guardian, 
 thanking him for a leading article on the 
 Archbishops decision as to Reservation. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 May 4, 1900. 
 
 I cannot help thanking you for the leading 
 article on the Reservation decision. 
 
 I could never seriously doubt that the Arch- 
 bishops would find themselves obliged to maintain 
 the present unlawfulness of the practice in any 
 form. 
 
 I should have laid chief stress on the rubric, 
 and used the dictum of Judge Coleridge re the 
 Ornaments Rubric, to the effect that where any 
 sentence in one of the formularies is grammatically 
 plain, and incapable of being diversely interpreted, 
 we have no call to go behind it in order to inquire 
 into the possible intention of its framers. 
 
 It is far better that a practice which has been 
 
The ' new ritualism ' 327 
 
 taken up without sufficient authority should be 
 checked, than that clergymen should be encour- 
 aged to resort to such argumentative twistiness 
 as cannot be reconciled with an ingenuous treat- 
 ment of documents, and is quite sure to aggravate 
 the existing suspicions as to clerical veracity. 
 
 I rejoice that The Guardian has taken so 
 direct a line as to the question of lawfulness, and 
 at the same time one which will indicate sympathy 
 with all reasonable wishes for a reconsideration, 
 in existing circumstances, of certain rather antique 
 rules. 
 
 To the Rev. , on the ' new ritualism' 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, 
 
 April 21, 1900. 
 
 I quite feel with you as to the danger involved 
 in the Roman-mindedness which is so unhappily 
 prevalent among some I trust not many of the 
 most energetic of our clergy at this time. If the 
 most literal obedience in matters ceremonial were 
 rendered to Archiepiscopal rulings or Episcopal 
 monitions, that would not go to the root of the 
 evil, which consists in the adoption of Roman 
 ideas, and Roman standards of judgment, as to 
 Christian and Church life, and in the deliberate 
 effort to carry them out in spite of all Anglican 
 principles or formularies. It is a whole way of 
 looking at things that is in question ; and if men 
 were consistent, those who have accepted it, and 
 assimilated the preconception on which it rests, 
 would forthwith submit to Rome. 
 
328 Church Questions of the Day 
 
 To the Rev. , on ' extremists ' in the English 
 
 Church ; non-communicating attendance, etc. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, 
 
 May 19, 1900. 
 
 The extraordinary twistiness and lack of argu- 
 mentative directness, not to say fairness, which 
 one observes in the extremist writers, are another 
 indication of the extent to which the Roman 
 temper has, in them, mastered the English. I 
 do not see how, in face of the unequivocal 
 grammatical sense of the rubric, the Archbishops 
 could have given any different exposition of the 
 present Church law. 
 
 As to non-communicating attendance, I should 
 say that it required very 'distinct safeguards. A 
 person attending is, I hold, ipso facto in an 
 inferior position to a person who also communi- 
 cates ; this the first Prayer- Book emphasized by 
 ordering such persons to ' depart out of the 
 quire.' 1 I do not admit that anyone can fully 
 join in the Eucharistic oblation who does not also, 
 at the time, communicate ; and it is, I think, cor- 
 rupt teaching which encourages people to think 
 that the two acts can be thus disjoined. The 
 result is that, whereas, according to the proper idea 
 of the service, communion is the primary element 
 and sacrifice the derivative or secondary, this 
 order is practically reversed among Romans, and 
 to a great extent among some of our own brethren. 
 The assistant at a celebration, or the celebrant, 
 ought surely to read the Epistle facing the people. 
 
 1 Third Rubric after the Offertory ; cf. Cardwell, Two 
 Liturgies, etc., p. 281. 
 
The recent action of the E.C.U. 329 
 
 To the Rev. , on the recent action of tJic 
 
 E.C.U. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, 
 
 St. Peter's Day, 1900. 
 
 I, too, am scandalized and alarmed by the line 
 taken at the recent E.C.U. meeting. As for the 
 Declaration, what strikes me is its extraordinary 
 want of charitable considerateness. The framers 
 wished to manifest their adherence to a certain 
 Eucharistic belief, but, one presumes, to do so in 
 the manner most persuasive to great masses of 
 their fellow-Churchmen, who are deeply prejudiced 
 against it. In such circumstances, the natural 
 course would be to choose the least technical and 
 the least disputable terms that were consistent 
 with such belief. They have taken precisely the 
 opposite line ; they do not say what they mean by 
 the terms Body and Blood, which to many Eng- 
 lishmen would suggest, I suppose, the Body and 
 Blood under material conditions. And they use 
 the highly equivocal phrase ' under the forms,' 
 which has really no authority from our formu- 
 laries. If one wanted to lead a person higher up 
 towards full Eucharistic ideas, one would begin 
 much further back, and suggest the uniqueness of 
 the Holy Eucharist as more than an ordinary 
 sacramental channel or means of grace, etc. Why, 
 one asks, in so critical a moment, was this obvious 
 counsel of Christian prudence neglected ? As for 
 the President's speeches, I gladly note one or 
 two saving clauses, which recognise a distinction 
 between different classes of Catholic custom ; but 
 
330 Church Questions of the Day 
 
 I observe the same principle laid down as before, 
 that the Church of England has not the right, in 
 regard to observances of human origin, which she 
 undoubtedly claims in her XXXI Vth Article. And 
 when he talks of Protestantism and private 
 judgment as involved in the notion that she can 
 abolish Catholic usages, one asks whether private 
 judgment could go to a further point than the 
 claim of individual priests to interpret, each for 
 himself, our formularies by the light of Catholic 
 usages, and withal to say which of such usages 
 have, and which have not, a primary obligation. 
 
 To talk as if the rubric of 1661-62 did not 
 grammatically and literally exclude Reservation is 
 to misuse terms very gravely, and to parallel the 
 honour done to statues of the Blessed Virgin Mary 
 with flowers set on Lord Beaconsfield's statue is to 
 insult common-sense. Why does not some real 
 theologian in the E.C. U. Council exercise some 
 control upon that excellent and truly lovable man 
 whom the society has exalted into its lay pope ? 
 
 N 's speech was all very well ; but in regard 
 
 to the Declaration it was apologetic, as if he were 
 conscious of the weak points in the formulary : as 
 how could he not be ? It is all very distressing, 
 and bodes a serious rent in the ' Catholic ' school 
 or party or section, and I associate the danger 
 very closely with the President's own enormous 
 imprudence in the negotiations which he carried 
 on as to Anglican Orders with a view to corporate 
 reunion. That reference of his to a phrase of 
 Keble's in a letter will furnish matter for Kensit. 
 The context shows ( i ) that Keble was in favour 
 
Keble on obedience 331 
 
 of a tablet commemorating the blessings of the 
 Reformation, as opposed to a monument in honour 
 of three Reformers; (2) that in the self-same letter 1 
 (January, 1839) Keble writes, The great thing is 
 obeying ones superiors when one really knows their 
 wishes. Would this have been an unwelcome 
 quotation for that excitable assembly ? What 
 one sees in some of these lay theologians is a dis- 
 position to treat the Reformation as a negligible 
 accident in the history of the Church of England. 
 
 To the Rev. , of Brighton, on the ' new 
 
 ritualism. ' 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, 
 
 October 12, 1900. 
 
 I very much doubt whether you can find four 
 South-Country saints whose names will suggest 
 anything or whose example will teach. St. Aid- 
 helm would be only a name to your folk ; Wilfrid, 
 I dare say, some of them have heard of. I recol- 
 lect that Archdeacon Hannah preached and pub- 
 lished a sermon about him. I think that, if I were 
 providing for a window of four lights to be con- 
 tributed by children, I should select a few young 
 saints, whose stories could be told to them, and 
 would then take hold of their sympathies, such as 
 St. Agnes, or St. Pancras, or St. Sebastian, or 
 St. Ponticus of Vienne (Eus., H.E. v. i). 
 
 Why did Kensit obtain thousands of votes from 
 your Brightonians ? Was the number swollen, as 
 has been suggested to me, by votes given on the 
 1 Quoted in Liddon, Life of Pusey, ii. p. 71. 
 
332 Church Questions of the Day 
 
 part of Liberals ? Or are we to set it down to 
 the Protestant wrath which has been evoked I 
 cannot say, to one's surprise by the Roman 
 doings of such a church as - - ? Anyhow, it is 
 a disagreeable revelation of the hold which can 
 be gained over lower middle-class folk by the 
 vulgarest and most insolent of agitators if he only 
 comes forward in the name of Protestantism. 
 
 One of the mischiefs of the ' new ritualism ' is 
 that it impairs the sense of truthfulness in the 
 construction of documents and of the obligations 
 which they involve. The priest who made that 
 remark to you was surely well advanced on the 
 road which ends in the acceptance and assimila- 
 tion of Roman casuistry in its most disingenuous 
 form. If such modes of interpretation were 
 applied to the ordinary affairs of secular life, they 
 would root out the very principle of honour. 
 But, then, in Roman ethics honour is a natural, 
 not a supernatural, principle, and falsehood, in any 
 of its thousand forms, is but a venial sin, not a 
 mortal one. 
 
VII 
 
 Personal 
 
 To the Rev , on a sermon by Dr. Liddon. 
 
 UNIVERSITY COLLEGE, 
 March 18, 1865. 
 
 LIDDON preached yesterday evening in St. Mary's. 
 The church was crowded, if not quite full, before 
 the bells began, and people came streaming in 
 afterwards. It was a wonderful sight. Your 
 President sat on a low chair, having no other seat 
 open to him, in front of the pulpit ; Gregory 
 cowered under the pulpit stairs ; Russell and 
 Claude and others were in the organ-gallery ; 
 Peter's beard was seen near the door ; Donaldson 
 stood at the choir entrance ; Christopher was con- 
 spicuous with his ear-trumpet. The ' Rock of 
 Ages ' was very striking, rising up from so great 
 a throng. Liddon's subject was the struggle 
 against the undue exaltation of intellect ; l his 
 text 2 Cor. v. 10. A very Liddonian sermon: a 
 dash of polished sarcasm at the mercenary intel- 
 lect, which writes down faith in the papers ' at so 
 
 1 University Sermons, i., pp. 165 sqq. (ed. 9). 
 [ 333 ] 
 
334 Personal 
 
 much per annum done ' ; the vain, self-adver- 
 tising intellect the sensualized the cynical. He 
 fully recognised the sphere and claims of intellect ; 
 Faith does not require for her own safety that 
 Reason should be insulted. But there are three 
 fortresses of rebellious intellect which have to be 
 'cast down': (i) 'The notion of Reason's all- 
 sufficiency, as if there were no higher world above 
 her sphere as to which Revelation must inform 
 us.' (2) 'That, at least, if there is a Revelation, 
 it must not include any mysteries.' He was 
 magnificent here ; defined a mystery as ' a truth 
 indirectly seen, apprehended but not compre- 
 hended,' and employed Butler's argument from 
 the analogy of mysteries in Nature e.g., the 
 beautiful mystery of vegetation. (3) Then, the 
 third stronghold was, ' That even if a Revelation 
 and mysteries be admitted, there must at least be 
 no dogmas.' You can imagine how he met this : 
 showing that, if a man believed a religious idea to 
 be truth, he must in consistency say it was truth ; 
 which is dogma. To say ' There is one God ' 
 was to dogmatize that is, to assert the dogmatic 
 principle as much as if one went through the 
 Athanasian Creed. The ' real crime of dogma ' 
 was that it gave reality to religious belief, etc. 
 
 To the Rev. , on Liddon, Mozley^ Co lens o. 
 
 UNIVERSITY COLLEGE, 
 March 24, 1865. 
 
 Liddon has removed his Sunday Lectures into 
 the Hall of Queen's. The good old Provost, 
 
Liddon, Mozley, Colenso 335 
 
 quite unsolicited, offered it to him. Liddon, in 
 thanking him, said : ' I hope, if you find that 
 any of the Fellows don't quite like it, you will 
 recall your kind offer without scruple.' The 
 Provost consulted the Fellows ; no one made any 
 objection. Is not this grand ? Liddon calls it 
 the Feast of the Translation. His face was quite 
 radiant on Sunday evening. 
 
 ***** 
 
 Liddon has sent his name as a candidate for the 
 Bampton Lectureship, but doesn't expect success. 
 
 Mozley 's lecture 1 last Sunday was to the effect 
 that the expectation of an unbroken ' course of 
 nature ' was not based on any reasoning, but was 
 a presumption, an instinct, therefore could not be 
 a rational bar to evidence for miracles. 
 
 As to the Colenso Judgment, I send you The 
 Churchman, which you can return. The Guardian 
 is very vigorous, so is The Daily News, which 
 says that the Judgment treats the Colonial Church 
 in a ' one-sided ' way, denying it the advantages, 
 and trying to impose on it the disadvantages, of 
 an Establishment. However, says The Daily 
 News, ' Colenso has triumphed, like Samson ; 
 he has pulled down the house on his foes and on 
 himself.' ' He is a Bishop of anywhere or no- 
 where.' 'This is not what he or his counsel 
 wanted.' He wanted to carry State Church law 
 with him into his diocese : he finds that if the 
 law does not support Bishop Gray as Metropolitan, 
 neither will it support him as Diocesan. How- 
 ever, now the South African Church must be 
 1 Mozley's Bampton Lectures, No. 2. 
 
336 Personal 
 
 allowed freedom, like any other voluntary com- 
 munion like Roman Catholics or Wesleyans. 
 Very well done, Daily News ! 
 
 It is clear that, if the Bishops of South Africa 
 have as Diocesans no legal status, the Royal 
 Supremacy has no right of hearing appeals from 
 them, unless it will claim such a right as to the 
 proceedings of Wesleyans. Now, as Dr. Pusey 
 says, the South African Church will act freely, 
 and it will not accept Colenso, nor will the law 
 force him back upon it. 
 
 To the Rev. , on the election of a Bampton 
 
 Lecturer, and on St. Cyril and St. Leo. 
 
 OXFORD, 
 
 May 20, 1865. 
 
 Liddon was voted for by seven Heads, Haddan 
 by seven ; and the Vice-Chancellor gave a casting 
 vote for Haddan on the ground that he had 
 competed before. Haddan's subject is the 
 authority of Creeds. 1 I hope we shall secure 
 two good Bamptons running ; for Liddon's 
 success next year is, humanly speaking, certain. 
 Liddon is going to publish a volume of Oxford 
 sermons, and is so good as to wish to dedicate 
 them to me. 2 
 
 A Tinnevelly missionary, writing to Burrows, 
 mentions my book 3 with much kind language, and 
 says that he had been wont to render St. Leo's 
 
 1 Cf. Haddarfs Remains, pp. xxvi, xxvii. 
 
 - University Sermons, vol. i. 
 
 3 Bright, Sermons of St. Leo, ist ed., 1862 ; 2nd, 1886. 
 
St. Leo and St. Cyril 337 
 
 sermons into Tamil, and deliver them to his 
 Indian flock, their antithetical vigour being con- 
 genial to Tamil. This was before he fell in with 
 my Leo. 
 
 As to St. Cyril, I think I may say to you that 
 I consider my account of him 1 to be much more 
 just than Robertson's, 2 and Robertson doesn't seem 
 to me to have gone to original sources, as I was 
 careful to do. No doubt he began, as a young 
 Archbishop, in a style which showed a rather 
 undisciplined temper and a want of scrupulous- 
 ness as to the machinery to be used in the 
 Church's service. But the real cause why modern 
 Liberals so bitterly hate him is that he stood up 
 so pertinaciously for dogma. And yet, when he 
 thought essential unity in dogma secured, he was 
 willing to make great concessions, as in the case 
 of John of Antioch. 
 
 To the Rev. , on Kebles death and Miss 
 
 Yonge. 
 
 UNIVERSITY COLLEGE, 
 May 3, 1866. 
 
 I dined with the Warden of New College 
 yesterday, and met Miss Yonge. She was most 
 interesting and delightful to talk to. She told 
 me that Keble's last words were, ' More white 
 flowers ' - apparently with some reference to 
 Maundy Thursday and his own church. Her 
 
 1 Bright, History of the Church, 313-451. P- 37- 
 
 2 Robertson, History of the Christian Church, ii. pp. 180 sqq. 
 (ed. 1876). 
 
 22 
 
338 Personal 
 
 mother told me several very interesting things 
 about the composition of her books, and seemed 
 pleased with the admiration which I most sincerely 
 professed for them. 
 
 To the Rev. , on his appointment to the 
 
 Professorsh ip. 
 
 UNIVERSITY COLLEGE, 
 
 November 6, 1868. 
 
 I most cordially thank you for your kind and 
 welcome letter. I seem to swim in assurances of 
 satisfaction and goodwill. But my friends will, on 
 reflection, appreciate the difficulties and anxieties 
 which a sphere of Church work like this, which is 
 now before me, must needs involve. 
 
 I have had a most kind letter from the Bishop 
 of London. 
 
 To the Rev. , in reply to his defence of an 
 
 article by the late Professor Slmttleworth 
 on ' Christian Secularism ' in The Oxford 
 House Chronicle, No. 7. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 October 5, 1887. 
 
 I do not think that I need go over the ground 
 
 which is traversed by my letter to H ; it is 
 
 enough for the present purpose to touch on the 
 points which your letter takes up, and to refer to 
 your own tract, which I had read some time ago, 
 and am glad of an occasion for reading again, and 
 thankful to possess in another copy. 
 
' Christian Secularism ' 339 
 
 You think that I am ' rather hard on ' Shuttle- 
 worth, and that I practically confound his line 
 with Mr. Barnett's. Well, I do not think that I 
 am in the habit of judging any writer otherwise 
 than by his own words ; and as I have known 
 Shuttleworth for (I may now say) many years, 
 personal feeling would prevent me, if nothing else 
 did, from censuring anything that bore his sig- 
 nature without deliberateness, and apart from 
 grave cause, or, at any rate, what seems to myself 
 grave cause. 
 
 Now let us see. I put aside at the outset all 
 considerations foreign to The Oxford House 
 Chronicle, No. 7, or, indeed, to the paper itself 
 signed by Shuttleworth. I mean that we have 
 nothing to do in this case with Shuttleworth's 
 general teaching in his church or elsewhere. We 
 must suppose ourselves to be in the position of 
 East London secularists, or, at any rate, East 
 London non-religious persons, reading this one 
 article. What is its purpose ? To conciliate the 
 secular mind, by showing that Christianity itself 
 takes full account of secular interests. Very well. 
 Now let us look at the terms used. ' The better- 
 ing,' or ' the better ordering, of this world,' are 
 pivot phrases, so to speak, in the article. The 
 similarity to be established turns upon them. 
 
 Now, is it not manifest that they will have one 
 meaning for a non-religious and another for a 
 religious mind ? The former looks to morality 
 minus religious motives as its highest aim, and 
 also subordinately to social and political improve- 
 ments. To a religious mind all these improve- 
 
 22 2 
 
34 Personal 
 
 ments are not unimportant, certainly but 
 subordinate not merely to a non-religious ethical 
 standard, but to the higher standard set forth in 
 Christ's teaching. 
 
 Now, Shuttleworth's article encourages I say 
 it deliberately, though without imputing to him 
 this or that intention it verbally encourages the 
 non - religious conception of this ' bettering.' 
 Bodily health, ' wholesome food,' preservation 
 of life, ' reform ' of society, ' progress of the 
 people ' : where does he mention conformity to a 
 Divine example, loyalty to a Divine Master, re- 
 sponsiveness to a Divine call, employment of a 
 Divine power or force ? Where does he find 
 room for the supernaturalism, so to call it, of 
 Christian morality ? The spiritual importance of 
 Christ's 'signs' is suppressed. (I wonder whether 
 he forgets John vi. 26, 27, or whether he takes 
 account of the fact that when our Lord disparaged 
 relatively the value of signs and wonders as 
 evidences of His mission He was referring to the 
 lack of spiritual appreciation in the minds of His 
 fellow-countrymen.) Worse still, the Sermon on 
 the Mount is described thus : ' Nearly all of it 
 consists of instruction as to duty in this life.' 
 Yes ; but here the special motive power appealed 
 to throughout the Sermon, the very conception of 
 ' duty ' therein set forth, is conspicuous by its 
 .absence. I never saw a graver case of suppressio. 
 Does anyone imagine that an intelligent secularist 
 reading just this article and then the Sermon will 
 not at once see and resent a representation which 
 keeps in the background its theology ? Look on 
 
c Christian Secularism ' 341 
 
 to the next paragraph, and the Church is de- 
 scribed as ' existing to make this world better.' 
 Yes, so I should say also ; but in what sense, by 
 what means ? What would St. Paul have said if 
 anyone had told him that a Christian priest, 
 trained up in the study of his writings, had told 
 unbelievers that this 'bettering' was the improve- 
 ment of men's ' secular ' condition, ' the promotion 
 of the advance and progress of the people ' ? I 
 need not, I think, go further. Surely you cannot, 
 on reflection, maintain that a Christian writer, 
 undertaking to recommend, to represent, Chris- 
 tianity to non-Christians, is not called upon to 
 take account of, is justified in leaving out of 
 sight, that which makes Christianity a living and 
 energizing religion ? If he does leave out of sight, 
 if he does not take account of, these characteristic 
 elements of our faith, he surely does grave in- 
 justice, I do not say merely to the claims of the 
 faith or his own conscience, but to the facts which 
 he professes to handle. 
 
 Doubtless, he ought not to appeal to the 
 disbeliever by means of principles not yet ac- 
 cepted by the mind which he wishes to influence. 
 Doubtless, he ought not to state Christian 
 doctrine in forms which are likely to give need- 
 less offence. Doubtless, he ought to be tender, 
 cautious, equitable, Pauline cela va sans dire. 
 But to undertake to show what Christianity is, 
 and present it as it is, cleared from misappre- 
 hensions which are said to have been caused 
 by a narrow or Puritanical representation of its 
 doctrines, and then to omit, almost or altogether, 
 
34 2 Personal 
 
 what differentiates it from a philosophy or a 
 non-religious school of conduct, what are we, 
 from the standpoint of simple literary fairness, to 
 say of such a proceeding ? 
 
 You will permit me to summarize my objection 
 to Shuttleworth's article by comparing it with 
 your own tract. Had the article resembled the 
 tract, I should have been thankful for it. The 
 tract exactly supplies what the article, most 
 culpably, omits. The tract speaks out, not only 
 of Christian motives, which is much ; but also, 
 repeatedly, emphatically, unmistakably, of Chris- 
 tian 'grace/ of the 'power that is working in us,' 
 of a ' sustaining strength ' yes, of a ' Divine 
 Humanity imparting itself,' which is much more. 
 I wish that your tract were in the hands of every 
 secularist in London ; I could wish that Shuttle- 
 worth's paper had never been printed ; and that, 
 just because its line is so defective where the line 
 of your tract is so satisfactory. 
 
 P.S. I would not even appear to be unmind- 
 ful of the circumstances which have led Shuttle- 
 worth into his present line of public utterance. I 
 seem to myself to understand pretty well what 
 has thus acted on his naturally warm and even 
 passionate sympathies. He is an instance, to my 
 mind, of what Dr. Liddon once said to me : 
 ' Sympathy is an excellent servant, but a bad 
 master.' I know that he has attracted not a few 
 minds, previously alienated from all religion. If 
 he had had more balance of mind, more steadfast- 
 ness in the grasp of principles, he might have 
 
Perils of c concessionism ' 343 
 
 become a great power for good, a true ' pillar ' of 
 4 the house of God,' in London. Years, perhaps, 
 may even yet bring him up to this point of use- 
 fulness. But at present he is possessed by a 
 passion for what I may call Concessionism. The 
 outsiders are to be brought in quocunque modo. 
 But it often ends in the insiders going out to 
 them. I told him long ago to beware lest, when 
 he stretched forth his hand to the secularist or 
 non-religious mind on the other side of the gap, 
 he might find a wrist stronger than his own. 
 Then he is, moreover, possessed by a democratic 
 enthusiasm ; and, lastly, he has become the 
 disciple, the shield-bearer, of Mr. Stewart Head- 
 lam ; with what results let a recent report of the 
 Guild of St. Matthew explain. There one sees 
 Mr. Headlam, and therefore Shuttleworth, ready 
 to revolutionize the Church in order to satisfy 
 Demos. Long ago I had a correspondence with 
 Shuttleworth as to this ominous tendency, but in 
 vain. Liber avi animam meant was all that I 
 could say at the end. Oh that he, and others, 
 would remember practically that they are not 
 called upon to produce results by means of their 
 own choosing, but to be faithful to a high trust, 
 and to remember who is the Master and Guide 
 of all souls ! 
 
 To the Rev. Canon , on Cardinal Newman. 
 
 September 17, 1890; February n, 1891. 
 I think that Newman's spiritual and moral 
 power, as put forth in the first volume of the 
 
344 Personal 
 
 Parochial Sermons, was greater and more valuable 
 than you have quite allowed for. . . . Depend 
 upon it, our predecessors were not so much mis- 
 taken in treating him for several years as the true 
 head of the Movement, whether or not he accepted 
 that position. For once that I turn to Pusey's 
 sermons I turn fifty times to Newman's I mean, 
 of course, the ' Parochial.' Hutton's book on his 
 career is deeply interesting. There can surely be 
 no doubt that his was a much larger, more complex, 
 more vividly and manifoldly energetic character 
 than either Pusey's or Keble's. . . . But a good 
 deal, no doubt, of the popular homage to his 
 memory is worship of genius : and that is not a 
 worship for sober Christians. 
 
 To the Rev. Canon , on Mr. Gladstone s 
 
 Romanes Lecture. 
 
 October 26, 1892. 
 
 Gladstone's lecture showed his irrepressible 
 fidelity to the Tractarian tradition. The Premier 
 of a Radical Government insisted on doing full 
 justice to Archbishop Laud. For this, and for 
 the truly wonderful way in which he brought out 
 St. Paul's very mind and soul when he read the 
 second lesson of last Sunday morning in the 
 Cathedral, I confess, I am grateful to him. 
 
Adaptations of Roman devotions 345 
 
 To the Rev. , in answer to a request for 
 
 advice as to adapting part of Henri Per- 
 reyves ' Stations of the Cross. ' 
 
 SCARBOROUGH, 
 
 August 12, 1893. 
 
 I confess, I do not like adaptations of passages 
 characteristically Roman. First, they seem to be 
 hardly fair to the original. And should we like a 
 Dissenter to adapt some typical Anglican book, 
 by seriously modifying its sacramental language ? 
 When Neale adapted the Pilgrims Progress in a 
 Churchly sense, he made himself justly obnoxious 
 to Macaulay's incisive sarcasm ; but an admirer of 
 Bunyan's theology might have taken up a graver 
 objection. Then, secondly, it is (I fancy) the 
 rarest thing in the world to see an adaptation so 
 executed as not to present the appearance of the 
 ' new cloth agreeing not with the old.' The 
 reader is set wondering what the original was like. 
 If you insert it in a footnote, you betray the 
 general (Roman) character of the material you are 
 utilizing ; if you leave it dark, the mind instantly 
 speculates as to whether you have altered more 
 than was necessary, and so forth. Moreover, 
 specially, the original here is French. Now, is it 
 not next to impossible to bring French devotional 
 sentiment into line with English ? This is so, 
 unless I mistake, even where the French original 
 has no trace of Roman peculiarities. Here, for 
 instance, to class the Blessed Virgin Mary among 
 ' dear gentle ones ' may seem all right to a devote 
 
346 Personal 
 
 French lady ; to Anglicans, male or female, it is 
 likely enough to cause nausea. Again, what 
 warrant have we for saying that our Lord did meet 
 His blessed Mother on the way to the Cross? 
 Absolutely none. The only sources of real know- 
 ledge as to what happened on that awful forenoon 
 are totally silent about it. Ought we, then, to 
 assert it, and, very specially, in an act of devout 
 meditation which professedly brings the soul 
 straight up into the presence of God ? Here, I 
 suppose, the French and the English religious 
 minds differ so widely as to be incapable of juxta- 
 position. A French Christian at least, a French 
 Catholic would probably wonder at the question 
 being raised. 'It is a pious opinion,' or 'it is 
 very sweet, touching, edifying ; it stirs up the 
 tenderest devotional feeling. What can be the 
 hindrance to expressing it?' And if the Anglican 
 answers, ' Simply that one does not know it to be 
 grounded on truth or fact, and that, in such in- 
 tensely sacred matter, to go beyond truth is really 
 to forfeit edification,' I can imagine the French 
 shoulders to be shrugged, and the French lips to 
 murmur something gently contemptuous as to the 
 Teutonic dulness and (perhaps) the Teutonic 
 overvaluing of veracity. Never mind, we can't 
 help it ; we are Teutons, and write for Teutons, 
 and it is one of the favours granted to our race to 
 have learned more as to the essentialness of 
 veracity than has ever come home to the Latin 
 Catholic mind abroad. 
 
 This is more than I meant to inflict upon you ; 
 but, to sum up, I should be disposed, if the affair 
 
Modern Cambridge theology 347 
 
 were mine, simply to omit the whole passage, and 
 in a very brief footnote to give the reason why. 
 
 To an Oxford undergraduate who had migrated to 
 Christ 's College, Cambridge, on modern Cam- 
 bridge theology. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 October 20, 1893. 
 
 I was very glad to hear from you ; I should 
 have replied at once, but, as you may suppose, 
 one has lived in a whirl during this first week of 
 Term this first week of a new Oxford year. 
 
 It is curious to think of you as a member of 
 Milton's College. 
 
 I dare say you will profit by new points of view 
 as presented by Cambridge life. What you have 
 already, it appears, verified by a brief experience 
 has been, to my mind, illustrated by the peculiar 
 strength, and also, if one may say so, the peculiar 
 shortcomings, of modern Cambridge theology. I 
 hope I shall not seem to ignore the former ; but 
 while Westcott was the dominant Cambridge 
 teacher (we are thinking of theology), I never, 
 for my part, could help the feeling that he was an 
 Alexandrian Father revived under modern con- 
 ditions. By some, such a phrase might be used 
 in pure admiration ; it is the fashion (for reasons 
 which seem to me very obvious, but not at all 
 decisive) to exalt Alexandrianism, and depress, to 
 the lowest depths, Augustinianism. Westcott, like 
 Clement of Alexandria, seemed to me to take his 
 reader through a golden Platonic mist ; I was not 
 
348 Personal 
 
 sure where I stood, or what definite objects were 
 within view. Possibly the recollection of Liddon's 
 opinion weighed much with me. The present 
 Regius Professor of Divinity at Cambridge is a 
 theologian of a more definite and, I imagine, a 
 more ecclesiastical type ; his two books on the 
 doctrine of the Holy Spirit 1 are most helpful ; he 
 will revive doctrinal theology where its place has 
 been somewhat too much occupied by historical 
 criticism. 
 
 It is curious that, while one class of Cambridge 
 minds is apt to put the literary interest of sacred 
 studies above that which is more directly religious, 
 and to do scant justice to the supernaturalism of 
 Christianity as the Church has apprehended it, 
 another class, the ultras, as they might be called, 
 on the Catholic side, present Church ideas, too 
 often, in a form altogether too hard to be attrac- 
 tive ; I believe I am said to have called it 'spiky,' 
 in a letter to my friend the Principal of Ely 
 College. Canon Law, it seems, can be idolized ; 
 I own I should fear that this cultus would provoke 
 a vehement recoil. The mistake made seems to 
 be like a putting forward of ' the letter that 
 killeth,' of Church law in itself, mandatory and 
 rigidly obligatory, as the ground of this or that 
 devotional practice, which is better recommended 
 on moral grounds, as by ' the Spirit that giveth 
 life.' 
 
 If I write under what some on the banks of 
 
 1 Swete, On the early history of the doctrine of the Holy 
 Spirit, 1873 ; and On the early history of the doctrine of the 
 Procession of the Holy Spirit, 1876. 
 
Dean Butler 349 
 
 Cam might call the influence of Oxford prejudice, 
 I still regard myself, you see, as writing to an 
 Oxford man. I shall be glad to hear from you 
 again some time, as to your ordination prospects. 
 
 To the Venerable Archdeacon , on Dean 
 
 Butler. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 January 16, 1894. 
 
 Yes, Butler's death is a great loss indeed. I 
 grieve the more because it might, humanly speak- 
 ing, have been postponed : he seems to have 
 caught a chill in returning late at night, or in the 
 evening, from preaching in a church built by the 
 late Mr. E. Stanhope, at the request of the widow. 
 He loved preaching here and there : his restless 
 temperament would not have endured a long stay 
 at Lincoln without breaks of that kind. I do not 
 think he was eminently qualified to be the head of 
 a great Cathedral. His habits had made him 
 centre his keenest interest in work closely related 
 to his own individuality, such as was the work at 
 Wantage : he could not easily merge himself in a 
 majestic institution independent of himself or of 
 any other of its temporary guardians. But as a 
 parish priest at any rate, as a country parish 
 priest he was unrivalled. His long pastorate at 
 Wantage was epoch-making. He had very noble 
 qualities of heart and mind, and although he was 
 often too impulsive, and far too apt to put all his 
 opinions into the extremest form of statement, so 
 as to damage his own cause, as I well recollect 
 
350 Personal 
 
 on several occasions in Convocation, yet one 
 forgot all this in thinking of his thorough self- 
 devotion and his splendid generosity of soul. 
 He is to be buried in the Minster cloister on 
 Thursday. 
 
 To the Rev. Canon , on Purcelfs Life of 
 
 Manning. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 January 22, 1896. 
 
 Thank you again. If I have the opportunity, 
 I will look at those parts of the Life of Manning 
 to which you refer. The whole biography I 
 should have no time to read. And the man him- 
 self is not to me an attractive figure. Perhaps 
 there is in my feeling about him a certain small 
 atom of resentment, for I once believed in him as 
 almost a typical Anglican leader, and rejoiced in 
 reading and re-reading those three volumes of his 
 Anglican sermons, which contain, indeed, as one 
 now feels, so incomparably less than the sermons 
 of Newman or Church, but which had the attrac- 
 tion of an intensely musical rhythm, and, often 
 enough, of an exquisite felicitousness of phrase- 
 ology. We did not dream in those days, when 
 one might hear him at Merton or St. Mary's, that 
 he would come out ere many years as the type 
 of Roman methods of Church administration, far 
 away more morally and intrinsically Roman than 
 the far greater man who was his junior in the 
 Cardinalate because he was so much less in 
 accord with Roman ecclesiastical traditions of life 
 
Cardinal Manning 351 
 
 and work. It is impossible, I fancy, to overrate 
 the extent to which he was indebted for success 
 in his Roman career to that beautiful face, that 
 unearthly stillness and absorbedness of demeanour, 
 and those tones that used at least to thrill one as 
 representing a vision of the unseen. . . . 
 
 Curious it is to recollect that I heard him preach 
 the anti-Papal sermon on November 5 which 
 vexed the soul of Newman ! Manning may have 
 hated the Jesuits (I know not why), but he was 
 universally credited with some skill in that 
 species of priestcraft which is popularly associated 
 with their name. He made administration his 
 object, and seems to have been as masterful in 
 pursuing it as he would have the Pope be in the 
 government of the ' Catholic ' world. But what 
 will be his place in religious history ? 
 
 To the Venerable Archdeacon , on impressions 
 
 of Rome and Pompeii. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 April 26, 1896. 
 
 I have within the last three days returned from 
 a very successful and delightful visit to Rome. 
 
 G could well understand the indescribable 
 
 pleasure and unique interest of such a first visit ; 
 I am still hoping that I may some day (next year) 
 achieve a second. We were happy in having 
 extremely pleasant and helpful companions, and, 
 above all, a most competent guide to many places 
 of interest in Mr. Douglas Hamilton, Vicar of 
 
35 2 Personal 
 
 Holy Trinity, Halifax. Ten nights in Rome 
 made up, to be sure, only a short time for seeing 
 the great sights ; as for museums, we could only 
 visit those in the Vatican. St. Peter's itself is 
 stupendous, but not, in a religious sense, so im- 
 pressive as St. John Lateran or the very magnifi- 
 cent Church of St. Paul outside the walls, or, 
 perhaps, one or two others. We stayed at an 
 excellent hotel, the Russie, near the northern gate, 
 the Porta del Popolo, from which three main- 
 streets radiate, and we had access to a lovely 
 garden, rich in orange-trees, camellias, and flowers 
 of all sorts. I did not see much of the Roman 
 services ; but one was very touching and solemn 
 a Te Deum in St. Peter's for the anniversary 
 of the Pope's coronation. The music was grand 
 and severe, and clerics or seminarists, among 
 whom I found myself, took up the strain with 
 deep Italian voices and evident earnestness. 
 Altogether, I wished that I had seen Rome many 
 years sooner ; it is a distinct step in one's educa- 
 tion. The fears as to unhealthiness are much 
 less now that the Italian Government has vigor- 
 ously undertaken sanitary improvements ; in fact, 
 one cannot doubt that it was high time for the 
 Papal sovereignty to come to an end. We had 
 two nights at Naples, and saw Pompeii to great 
 advantage ; it is awful, and might serve as a 
 visible commentary on our Lord's words as to the 
 days of Lot. We also stayed one night in Turin 
 (a beautiful, radiant, cheery city), and another in 
 Genoa, the magnificence ' of which, however, we 
 had not time to appreciate. I believe that one 
 
Genoa 353 
 
 ought to look at it from the sea. The Alps were 
 snow-clad in many places. But, ah, the exquisite 
 charm of the Italian sky and of the brilliant Medi- 
 terranean ! 
 
 To the Rev. - , a letter of sympathy and en- 
 couragement ; Archbishop Benson s death ; the 
 Armenians. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 October 16, 1896. 
 
 I am sorry about the difficulty you describe. I 
 suppose it arises from some arrangement as to the 
 subordinate chapelries of the big parish, which 
 you have to serve in turn while the early Celebra- 
 tion is going on in the old church. This inability 
 of old men to understand the wants of their juniors 
 is a great trial to the latter, and should be care- 
 fully guarded against, and, so far as possible, 
 counteracted on the part of the former. As one 
 gets old, one understands it better ; the conscious- 
 ness of not wanting this or that, or of not assimi- 
 lating this or that line of thought in one's own 
 person, generates a sort of irrational resentment 
 against those who care for objects which one does 
 not appreciate, or adopt opinions which are not 
 one's own. I don't mean that we seniors always 
 feel thus, but that one sees how one might get to 
 feel so. The man who most splendidly overcame 
 this senile tendency and kept most helpfully in 
 touch with his juniors was Dean Church. But, 
 as you say, the privation of sacramental oppor- 
 tunities may be turned to good account ; it will 
 
 23 
 
354 Personal 
 
 then become an effectual safeguard against a 
 mechanical sacramentalism, the caricature and 
 perversion of that which is Spiritual and true. 
 
 For it may bring home to one the fact that in 
 sacraments one is dealing with a personal Lord 
 who is greater than His own consecrated instru- 
 ments, and can, at His will, exuberantly supply 
 outside them the grace which they ordinarily 
 convey. Ours is a great mission : to represent, 
 both towards other souls and towards our own, 
 the Spirituality of ordinances of the Church as 
 an institution, of the priesthood, of the organized 
 system which we call sacramental, etc. 
 
 I am very glad that you have already seen 
 some success in your work with the young fellows. 
 It is the most important part, from one point of 
 view, of parochial work, because it touches the 
 men of the future, and diminishes that special 
 difficulty of 'getting hold of the men.' Those 
 poor lads ! How much is against them when 
 they try to keep straight ! How much to deter 
 them from using helps, lest they should seem to 
 be ' crawling to the parson ' ! I always wonder 
 how an agnostic moralist would deal with them. 
 He would probably be obliged to leave them to 
 their animalism. 
 
 The Archbishop's death is a blow which makes 
 the whole Church reel. In itself it was enviable, 
 and there was a beautiful dramatic completeness 
 in such a close of such a career. I know of 
 hardly any similar case. Fletcher of Madeley, 
 a very saintly clergyman of the early Methodist 
 period, passed away almost immediately after 
 
Archbishop Benson 355 
 
 administering Communion, and Bishops doubtless 
 have been employed in sacred offices up to the 
 last hour. The late Primate had much nobleness, 
 vast sweetness, a rare power of sympathy, and 
 more administrative ability in the discharge of 
 a tremendous office than he was at first expected 
 to show. In many respects he far outshone 
 Tait. The Times fairly observes that he under- 
 stood High Churchmen as Tait never did, and 
 Tait never attracted such widespread and personal 
 affection. The scene in Canterbury Cathedral 
 to-day will be unique in its pathetic solemnity ; 
 there is a value in that insistence on the Church's 
 continuity which has fixed on that Cathedral as 
 his place of interment. We have had a Celebra- 
 tion this morning in memorial of him whom the 
 newspapers instinctively describe as the Head of 
 the English Church. 
 
 I suppose we may hope that the young Tsar's 
 conference with Lord Salisbury has produced at 
 least some good has prepared the ground for a 
 combination of Russian and French influence,, 
 not against, but for the victims of Turkish bar- 
 barity. Russia has deeply disgraced herself by 
 allowing jealousy and vindictive feeling towards 
 England to keep back the interference which 
 would have saved so many Christian lives. But 
 if she repents and will amend, let her do so. We, 
 too, have much to repent of as a nation : our 
 recent disappointments and humiliations are a just 
 penalty for the antichristian policy in which 
 Beaconsfield and, unhappily, Salisbury, as his 
 lieutenant, involved us after the Crimean War. 
 
 23 2 
 
356 Personal 
 
 To the same, on the difficulties of young lads. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 October 20, 1896. 
 
 I don't believe we can at all realise the diffi- 
 culties which beset the upward path for lads or 
 young fellows working in a mill, or, indeed, in any 
 house of business, as, for instance (to take a case 
 that I know of here), a printing-office. They have 
 to stand the fire of all manner of gibes and sneers, 
 and coarse imputations of hypocrisy, and positive 
 attacks upon their faith as to which a propaganda 
 of infidel objections is being systematically carried 
 out, even in villages, much more in towns. It is 
 mysterious that so formidable a trial should be 
 laid upon such young souls. But what may one 
 not hope for those who are helped to go through 
 it without harm ! That wonderful verse about 
 the three young men (unfortunately called the 
 ' three holy children '), ' on whose bodies the fire 
 had no power,' might be sung with an Alleluia ! 
 after it, whenever such a case rejoices the heart of 
 a pastor. 
 
 To the same, on his ordination to the priesthood. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 Trinity Sunday, 1897. 
 
 I was thinking only yesterday that you would 
 probably be ordained priest on this Trinity 
 Sunday, and I rejoice to have that supposition 
 confirmed with your own hand. 1 need not assure 
 you of my best wishes. I can sympathize with 
 
Ordination to the priesthood 357 
 
 you on such a day as this by help of some very 
 vivid recollections of my first ordination on a 
 Trinity Sunday at Cuddesdon. It was just such 
 a brilliant summer morning as this is, and I recall 
 a walk round the palace garden before the service 
 with a fellow-ordinand, who is now Archdeacon 
 Furse. The sight and the scent of seringas 
 seems always to bring back that hour. I should 
 like to go over to Cuddesdon on Trinity Sunday 
 for the service, but ecclesiastical luncheons are an 
 infliction which I avoid when I can. Ah ! that 
 dear old Church of St. Mary of Southwell, which 
 was so long reckoned as one of the three secondary 
 churches of the Diocese of York ! I have a love 
 for it which goes back sixty years. For my private 
 school was just opposite the north gate of the 
 Minster churchyard, and it was in that Minster 
 now, I rejoice to think, the Cathedral that I first 
 learned what the dignity of worship meant. 
 
 71? the Rev. J. G. Adder ley, on St. Frideswide as 
 a dedication. 
 
 WORCESTER, 
 
 St. John Baptist. 
 [1898]. 
 
 Your letter finds me here. I have been 
 ordered to take brine baths at Droitwich. 
 
 Will ' St. Frideswide ' be an intelligible dedi- 
 cation in your people's eyes, I wonder ? Her 
 celebrity is purely local. She was not a martyr, 
 only a virgin and Abbess, and very little is really 
 known about her. Our first church at Oxford 
 
358 Personal 
 
 was for ages St. Mary's, and to my ear there is 
 no dedication like that ! Wolsey kept that beauti- 
 ful and sacred name in the dedication of his 
 college ; so, I think, did Henry in his first founda- 
 tion, not in the final foundation of 1546. Double 
 dedications are not uncommon. St. Frideswide's 
 name came after that of the Blessed Virgin Mary 
 in Wolsey's dedication ; but practically they are 
 not convenient, and at Oxford ' SS. Mary and 
 John ' has succeeded in establishing itself, but 
 St. James's name is usually absorbed by St. 
 Philip's when the church named after both is 
 mentioned. I do not think that ' St. Frideswide's 
 and All Saints ' would do well. (I used to think 
 St. Andrew's would be appropriate, because of 
 4 There is a lad here,' and of the 'finding of his 
 own brother/) 
 
 In honour of \.\\& saint in question is quite right; 
 I suppose it is more usual than in memory. 
 
 When I say that very little is really known 
 about our foundress, I only mean that 1 distrust 
 much of the legend that grew up around her 
 name. I don't feel sure of anything, save that 
 she was a Mercian lady, who in the first half of 
 the eighth century founded a nunnery on the site 
 of Christ Church. The Dean, when preaching at 
 an anniversary connected with the removal of her 
 remains to a worthier shrine, took pleasure in the 
 significance of her name, ' the bond of peace.' 
 I wish she were more of a historic personage, with 
 a real life and something specific in her character 
 and example. Some sceptics have doubted her 
 existence. That be far from me ! 
 
Our Crucifix 
 
 359 
 
 To the same, on his little book Our Crucifix. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 July 20, 1898. 
 
 I am not capable, I trust, of letting a note of 
 yours go unanswered. I must needs be brief 
 and for you, too, the less your time is invaded by 
 letters to be read, the better. 
 
 I must be brief, I say, because this is the week 
 of 'summer lectures to clergy,' and I have daily 
 occupation of that kind. (This hindered me from 
 writing yesterday.) But, in however few words, 
 I must thank you for your letter, which touched 
 me deeply. Truly I may say that it was just like 
 yourself. ... In that address of mine, I was 
 anxious to be quite equitable ; and I find just the 
 same anxiety indicated in Our Crucifix. You 
 have thoroughly emphasised the supremacy of 
 spiritual work, and your paper contains much that 
 we older clerics, with our more ' conservative ' 
 instincts, may well ponder and profit by. Some 
 difference of standpoint must be allowed for ; and 
 perhaps I may suggest that the phrase ' Christian 
 Socialist,' however closely associated with such 
 noble memories as those of Maurice and Kingsley, 
 is prima facie open to the criticism that it inverts 
 the due order of the two terms ; the substantive 
 and the adjective ought to change places. 
 
 And one other point just consider again the 
 parallelism between our Lord's position (so to 
 speak) in the Passion and that of His servants 
 who may now believe themselves to be trustees, 
 
360 Personal 
 
 in His Name, of a certain status whether political 
 or ecclesiastical. There, surely, we may speak of 
 rights, and the defence of them (though not in the 
 temper that often mars Church defence, which 
 often means Establishment defence rather than 
 that of the Church herself). There simple 
 passivity would be out of place, as, e.g., at the 
 Revolution of '88. Resistance to a King who 
 had misused his charge and violated the Constitu- 
 tion was (pace the Nonjurors) entirely consistent 
 with Christian duty. Herein, you see, I am not 
 a follower of Keble and Pusey. 
 
 Farewell, dear fellow, and take once more my 
 true thanks and my best wishes. 
 
 To a candidate for Holy Orders, on ' the present 
 distress? 
 
 September 8, 1898. 
 
 ' The present distress,' I own, seems to me 
 fraught with perilous or disastrous possibilities. 
 Perhaps, however, one ought to say Passi 
 graviora, and dwell on the next words in our 
 own sense. . . . You young men who take 
 Orders now have fair warning to expect trouble. 
 But trouble, in one form or another, attends the 
 Church throughout ; and her sons know how 
 their predecessors faced it, and drew good out of 
 it, as water from the flinty stone. 
 
Venice 361 
 
 To the Rev. , on a visit to Venice. 
 
 GRAND HOTEL, TURIN, 
 April 13, 1899. 
 
 I was delighted to receive your letter at 
 Venice. We saw, during five full days, about as 
 much as could be duly seen in such a period. Of 
 course, we became perfectly familiar with calle 
 and campi and fundamenta, and all the rest, and 
 the way to St. Mark's by St. Moses' was ere long 
 as trite as the ' High.' Why did the Venetian 
 clergy dedicate so many churches in names from 
 the Old Testament ? Samuel, Simeon the 
 prophet, Job, Jeremiah, Zachariah, etc. I sus- 
 pect it was through Greek influence. We visited 
 Torcello on one quiet afternoon. Its desolation 
 and its majesty combined were very impressive. 
 But, as you will remember, the lofty reredos with 
 its angels obstructs the view of the unique con- 
 sessus. I took my seat on the venerable throne, 
 although I felt it was almost sacrilegious to 
 venture so far. One could easily reproduce in 
 imagination the celebration of the Eucharist on a 
 great day by the Bishop, with all the ranks of his 
 clergy, or a Diocesan Synod under his presidency. 
 We also visited the Armenian monastery, which, 
 by a strange irony of fate, owes its exemption 
 from the wholesale dissolution of Italian religious 
 houses to the fact of its subjection to the Porte. 
 It is, happily, the furthest Western bit of Moslem 
 possession ; and what must its inmates have 
 thought of their sovereign ' protector ' during the 
 
362 Personal 
 
 Armenian massacres, which may too justly be 
 laid to his charge ? I was interested in the 
 library, specially because among the professorial 
 books under my charge there is an edition of the 
 Armenian version of Eusebius' Chronicle actually 
 printed at the press of this Isle of St. Lazzaro. 
 Of course, I didn't neglect to visit the sometime 
 Cathedral of Castello, with its curious Arabian 
 episcopal throne. It was characteristic of the 
 Venetians to lavish all that wealth and skill and 
 interest on St. Mark's as the ducal chapel, and 
 allow the seat of the ' patriarchate ' to remain in 
 a very inferior church, far away from the centre 
 of political, and even of ecclesiastical, life. How- 
 ever, now, and ever since 1807, the patriarchal 
 throne stands in the sanctuary of St. Mark's, and 
 has survived the Doges and all their 'signory.' 
 One thing struck me specially in St. Mark's : the 
 Marian element is not, as in so many foreign 
 churches, predominant ; the supremacy is most 
 unequivocally reserved for the figure of our Lord 
 Himself, repeatedly exhibited as in 'majesty.' 
 
 From Venice we went to Verona on Tuesday. 
 It is a very characteristically Italian town, and 
 St. Zeno's is a magnificent Romanesque basilica. 
 ... I expect to be at home, and to be embraced 
 by Bess's paws, on Saturday evening. 1 
 
 1 Bess was his mastiff. 
 
The last letter 363 
 
 To the Rev. Father Page, Superior of the Society 
 of St. John the Evangelist, Cowley St. John, 
 Oxford. 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD, 
 January 3, 1901. 
 
 DEAR FATHER SUPERIOR, 
 
 I hope you will kindly continue your good 
 prayers for me. I have had very little pain in my 
 life, and I wish to take it well, and according to 
 God's will. I have rather more hopes of getting 
 through this, physically, than I had a week ago. 
 
 [Father Page, in enclosing the above letter, which was 
 written within two months of Dr. Bright's death, adds : ' When 
 I visited Dr. Bright on Monday, February 4, and began to 
 read the evening Psalms (xxii. and xxiii.) to him at his request, 
 he said the alternate verses with me clearly and quite audibly, 
 without any mistake, although at that time he was in a very 
 weak state of health. The effort seemed rather to sustain and 
 refresh than weaken him. A few days before his death he said 
 the Easter hymn, " Jesus Christ is risen to-day." He was in 
 the habit of coming to our church to make his Confessions. 
 His last Confession he made to me about three weeks before 
 his death.'] 
 
APPENDIX 
 
 QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS ON THE CHURCH, 
 SUPPLEMENTARY TO THE CATECHISM. 
 
 ADOPTED BY THE LOWER HOUSE OF THE CONVOCATION OF 
 CANTERBURY IN SESSIONS OF MAY 12 AND JULY 5, 6, 7, 
 1887. 
 
 // was intended to present this to the Upper House for their 
 approval, but it was considered by the Primate and Bishops 
 that matters connected with doctrine must emanate from the 
 Upper House. 
 
 I. Q. What meanest thou by the Church ? A. I mean the 
 Body of which Jesus Christ is the Head, and of which I was 
 made a member in my Baptism. 
 
 II. Q. How is the Church described in the Creeds? A. It 
 is described as One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic. 
 
 III. Q. What meanest thou by each of these words? A. I 
 mean that the Church is One, as being One Body under the 
 One Head ; Holy because the Holy Spirit dwells in it, and 
 sanctifies its members ; Catholic, because it is for all nations 
 and all times ; and Apostolic, because it continues steadfastly 
 in the Apostles' doctrine and fellowship. 
 
 IV. Q. We learn from Holy Scripture that in the Church 
 the evil are mingled with the good. Will it always be so? 
 A. No ; when our Lord comes again, He will cast the evil out 
 of His kingdom ; will make His faithful servants perfect both 
 in body and soul; and will present His whole Church to Him- 
 self without spot, and blameless. 
 
 V. Q. What is the Office and Work of the Church on earth ? 
 A. The Office and Work of the Church on earth is to 
 maintain and teach everywhere the true Faith of Christ, and to 
 be His instrument for conveying Grace to men, by the power of 
 the Holy Ghost. 
 
 [ 364 ] 
 
Appendix 365 
 
 VI. Q. How did our Lord provide for the government and 
 continuance of the Church ? A. He gave authority to His 
 Apostles to rule the Church ; to minister His Word and 
 Sacraments ; and to ordain faithful men for the continuance of 
 this Ministry until His coming again. 
 
 VII. Q. What Orders of Ministers have there been in the 
 Church from the Apostles' time? A. Bishops, Priests, and 
 Deacons. 
 
 VIII. Q. What is the office of a Bishop? The office of a 
 Bishop is to be a chief Pastor and Ruler of the Church ; to 
 confer Holy Orders ; to administer Confirmation ; and to take 
 the chief part in the ministry of the Word and Sacraments. 
 
 IX. Q. What is the office of a Priest? A. The office of a 
 Priest is to preach the Word of God ; to baptize ; to celebrate 
 the Holy Communion ; to pronounce Absolution and Blessing 
 in God's Name ; and to feed the flock committed by the 
 Bishop to his charge. 
 
 X. Q. What is the office of a Deacon? The office of a 
 Deacon is to assist the Priest in Divine Service, and specially 
 at the Holy Communion ; to baptize infants in the absence of 
 the Priest ; to catechize ; to preach, if authorized by the Bishop; 
 and to search for the sick and the poor. 
 
 XI. Q. What is required of members of the Church? 
 A. To endeavour, by God's help, to fulfil their baptismal vows ; 
 to make full use of the means of grace ; to remain steadfast in 
 the communion of the Church ; and to forward the work of 
 the Church at home and abroad. 
 
 XII. Q. Why is it our duty to belong to the Church of 
 England ? A. Because the Church of England has inherited 
 and retains the Doctrine and Ministry of the One Catholic and 
 Apostolic Church, and is that part of the Church which has 
 been settled from early times in our country. 
 
INDEX 
 
 TO THE LETTERS 
 
 ABSOLUTION, 87, no ff. , 140 ff. 
 Adaptations, 345 ff. 
 Aidan, St., 219 f. 
 1 Alms and oblations,' 148 ff. 
 Anglican Orders, 258, 291, 330 
 Apollinarianism, 43 f. 
 Apostles' Creed, 89, 135 
 Apostolic doctrine, Types of, i 
 Appeals to Rome, 275 f. 
 Archbishops, Answer of the, 262 
 Armenians, 10 f. , 263, 355, 361 f. 
 Articles, St. Cyril's, 75 
 Articles, The Thirty-nine, 99, 102, 
 
 119, 183, 224 ff. 
 Athanasian Creed, 43 ff. 
 Athanasius, St., 63, 70, 95 
 Atonement, 39 ff., 88 
 Attractive services, 183 
 Augustine of Canterbury, St., 
 
 212 f. , 217, 275 
 Augustine of Hippo, St., 18, 23, 
 
 28, 70, 82 f., 92, 226 f., 240 
 
 BAPTISM, Infant, 91 f. ; Lay, 93 ff, 
 
 139 
 
 Basil, St., 17, 269 
 1 Before the people,' 157, 284 f. 
 ' Before the Table,' 161 
 Belief, Responsibility for, 47 
 Bennett, Mr., 98 ff. 
 Benson, Archbishop, 59, 65, 96, 
 
 282 ff. , 312, 326, 354 f. 
 Bilson, Bishop, 123 
 Bishops, Election of, 272 f. 
 British Church, 207 ff., 215 ff. 
 
 I Burial Office, 192 ff., 195 f. 
 Butler, Bishop, 135, 255 
 Butler, Dean, 177, 349 i. 
 
 CALVINISM, 50, 105 f. 
 
 Cambridge, 125 f., 347 ff. 
 
 Canon Law, 12, 14, 18 f. , 223 f. 
 i Canons of 1604, 24, 28, 119 
 ' Canterbury, A patriarchate for, 
 
 274 ff. 
 
 j Carter, Canon, 119 f. 
 I Catechism, 107 f., 184 ff. , 239, 
 364 f. 
 
 ' Catholic,' Meaning of, 96 
 
 ' Catholic usages,' 145, 301, 330 
 
 Ceremonial, 142 ff., 161, 289, 294 
 
 Chad, St., 220 
 
 Chalcedon, Council of, 46, 51, 77, 
 
 37 ff, 315 ff- 
 
 ' Christian secularism,' 338 ff. 
 Christian socialism, 359 
 Christmas, 195 
 Chrysostom, St., 166 ff. , 172 f., 
 
 - 
 
 Church and State, 231 ff. 
 Church Courts, 271 
 Church questions, 264 ff. 
 Church Reform, 277, 302 ff. 
 Clement of Rome, St., 243 
 Colenso, 109 f., 335 f. 
 Collect, 147 f. 
 
 Communicatio idiomatum, 34, 74 f. 
 Communion, 166 
 Communion of Saints, 135 
 Confession, 363 
 
 366] 
 
Index 
 
 3 6 7 
 
 Confirmation, 84, 188 ff. 
 Congregationalism, 86 
 Constantine, 325 
 
 Constantinople, Councils of, 44,77 
 Conversion, 129 
 Conversion of England, 211 ff. 
 Coronation Ser% r ice, 162 
 Cosin, Bishop, 154 ff. , 164, 269 
 Creighton, Bishop, 109 
 Crisis in the Church, 360 
 Criticism, i, 251 
 Cyprian, St., 92, 273, 312 f. 
 Cyril, St., 55, 63, 72, 74 f. 337 
 
 DALE, Dr., 183, 286 
 
 Denison, Archdeacon, 97 f. 
 
 Development, Theory of, 241 
 
 Dilemmas, Worthlessness of, 253 
 
 Diodore, 72 
 
 Dissenters, 286 
 
 Divinity, Our Lord's, 103 f. 
 
 Divorce, 9 ff. 
 
 Doctrine, 43 ff. 
 
 Dogma, 334 
 
 Dollinger, Dr., u, 16, 18 f. 
 
 Donatism, 135 f. 
 
 EAST SYRIANS, 51 ff. 
 Ecclesiastical History, Chair of, 
 
 265 ff. 
 
 English Church Union, 329 ff. 
 Ephesus, Council of, 45, 51 
 Erastianism, 6, no, 290 
 Eucharist, The Holy, 87 f, 90, 105 
 
 ff. , 139. 329 
 
 Eucharistic Adoration, 97 
 Eucharistic Sacrifice, 88, 100 f. , 
 
 130, 164 ff., 258 f. 
 Eutychianism, 55 
 Evangelicalism, 125 ff., 228 f., 287 
 Evening Communion, 166 ff. 
 Extreme Unction, 136 f. 
 
 FAITH, 2 
 
 Fasting Communion, 129 f. , 162, 
 
 167 f. 
 
 Fathers, The, 244 f. 
 Florentius, 323 
 Forbes, Bishop, 99 
 Formalism, 128 f. 
 
 Formula of Reunion, 75 
 Frideswide, St., 357 f. 
 
 GLADSTONE, Mr., 234, 290, 344 
 
 Gnosticism, 133 
 
 Godparents, 187 f. 
 
 Good Friday, 180 ff. 
 
 Gore, Dr., 9, n f., 86, 122, 127, 
 
 251 
 
 Gospel, A social, 5 ff. 
 Grace, 80 ff., 85 f. 184 ff. 
 Gregory, St., 269 
 Guizot, 80 
 
 HARVEST FESTIVALS, 204 
 
 Hatch, Dr., 121 
 
 Historical subjects, 207 ff. 
 
 Homilies, The, 227 ff. 
 
 ' Homo ' for ' manhood,' 70 f. 
 
 Hooker, 78, 95, 106 ff., 123, 138 f., 
 
 191, 231 ff. 
 
 Hymnal, An authorised, 203 f. 
 Hymns, 196 ff. 
 
 IMPECCABILITY, Our Lord's, 37 
 
 Incense, The Archbishops' de- 
 cision on, 292 ff. 
 
 Indissolubility of marriage, 27 
 
 Innocent I., Pope, 243 f. 
 
 Intention, 95 
 
 Interpretation of Holy Scripture, 
 i ff . 
 
 Invocation of Saints, 134 ff. 
 
 JEROME, St., 2, 18 
 
 KEBLE, 101, 123, 179, 182, 331. 
 
 337 
 Keble College Chapel, 205 f. 
 
 Kenoticism, 34 ff. 
 
 LACTANTIUS, 17 
 
 Lads, 356 
 
 Laity, in. 272 ff., 303 ff. 
 
 Law, William, 85. 127 
 
 Leo, St., 76, 307 f., 315 ff., 336 f. 
 
 Letter and Spirit, 130, 178 
 
 Liddon, Dr., i f., n. 16, 37, 42, 
 
 82, 129. 179, 333 ff 34 2 
 Lightfoot, Bishop, 120 
 Lincoln Judgment, 282 ft 
 
3 68 
 
 Index 
 
 Liturgical subjects, 138 ff. 
 Liturgies, 59 f. , 64 f., 69 ff., 147, 
 
 164 f. 
 
 Logic, 255 
 
 Lutheranism, 34 f., 105, 278 ff. 
 ' Lux Mundi,' 73 
 
 MANICH^EISM, 133 
 Manning, Cardinal, 350 f. 
 Margoliouth, Professor, 68 f. 
 Marianism, 134 
 Marriage Service, 23, 29 
 Mason, Dr., 84 
 Mill, Dr. W. H., 171 
 Ministry, 86, 116 f., 120 ff., 140 
 Mixed Chalice, 146, 158, 285 
 Monothelitism, 76 ff. 
 Morning Service, 176 
 Mother of God, 51 f. 
 Mozley, Dr., 49, 80 f., 335 
 
 NATIONAL CHURCHES, 183 
 Nestorianism, 53 f. , 62, 66, 71 ff. 
 Newman, Cardinal, 2, 70, 80, 106, 
 
 117, 125, 343 f. 
 Non- communicating attendance, 
 
 1 68 ; ff., 328 
 Non-jurors, 360 
 ' North side of the Table,' 154 ff. 
 
 OBLATIONS. See Alms 
 Old age, 353 
 Ordination, 356 f. 
 Origen, 17, 322 
 
 Ornaments Rubric, 158 ff., 298 ff., 
 326 
 
 PAGET, Dr., 52 
 
 Papacy, 276 
 
 Paulinus, St., 208, 213 f. , 220 f. 
 
 Pearson, Bishop, 44 
 
 Pelagianism, Modern, 6 
 
 Pelagius, 80 f. 
 
 Person and Nature, 57 ff. 
 
 Petrine claims, 245 ff. 
 
 Pompeii, 352 
 
 Positivism, 195 
 
 Posture of the celebrant, 163 f. , 
 
 269 ff. 
 
 Prayers for the Dead, 130 ff. 
 Presbyterianism, 86 
 
 Primitive Church, 174 ff., 304 ff. 
 Protestantism, 59, 86, 109 f. , 269, 
 
 287 f., 332 
 Pullan, Mr., 106 
 Punishment, Everlasting, 3 f., 41 
 Purgatory, 3 f., 130, 192 
 Puritanism, 191, 232 
 Pusey, Dr., 3, 50, 98, 102 f. , 106, 
 
 117, 127, 129, 144, 206, 264, 304, 
 
 3*3. 336 
 
 READER, 139 
 
 Real Presence, 88, 97 f., 102 f., 139, 
 
 264 f. 
 
 Reformation, 252, 261, 331 
 Reformers, 105 
 Regeneration, 86 f., 128 f. 
 Religion, 230 f. 
 Remarriage, 13 ff. , 23 
 Reproaches, 143, 180, 183 
 Reservation, The Archbishops' 
 
 decision on, 326 f. 
 Reunion, 257, 281, 286 
 Ritual Commission, 145 
 Ritualism, 267, 287 ff. , 292, 327 f. , 
 
 33i f- 
 
 Roman question, 237 ff. 
 Rome, 351 ff. 
 
 SACERDOS, 116 ff. 
 Sacerdotalism, 92, 109 ff. 
 Sacramentalism, 128, 354 
 Sacramentaries, 117 
 Sacraments, 85,87, 128, 185 f. , 194 
 Sadler, Mr., 85, 89, 92, 114, 127 
 Sanday, Dr., 297 
 
 Scandinavian Christendom, 277 ff. 
 Scottish Church, 221 
 Second Adam, 89 
 Secularism, 115 
 
 Silence, The argument from, 133 
 Spanish reformers, 204 f. 
 Stubbs, Bishop, 36, 38 
 Succession, 85 f. 
 Supernatural, i, 113 f. , 251 
 Synods, Membership of, 304 ff. 
 Swete, Dr., 135, 348 
 
 TERTULLIAN, 17, 130 f. 
 Theodore of Mopsuestia ,64, 72 f. 
 Theodore of Caaterbury, 217 
 
Index 
 
 369 
 
 Thomas Aquinas, St., 62, 71, 78, 
 
 95. 99. "8, 225 f. 
 Tractarians, 129, 294, 297 
 Transubstantiation, 97, 105 
 Trent, Council of, 100, 136 f. 
 Turk, The, 10 f. 
 
 UBIQUITARIANISM, 105 
 
 Unction, 67 
 
 Uniformity, Elizabethan Act of, 
 
 293 ff. 
 ' Unworthiness of the Minister,' 
 
 224 ff. 
 
 VATICANISM, 22 
 Venice, 361 f. 
 Vestments, 145, 158 
 Vulgate. 136 f. 
 
 WATERLAND, 50 
 Westcott, Bishop, 347 
 Wilberforce, Bishop, 266 f. 
 Wilson, Bishop, 270 
 Wycliffe, 224 ff. 
 
 YONGE, Miss, 337 f. 
 
 CORRIGENDUM. 
 On p. 81, note 2, for ' 1885 ' read ' 1855.' 
 
 THE END 
 
 WELLS GARDNER, DARTON, AND CO., LONDON 
 
C,