Campbell had been much pleased with Reding, and his interest in him was
not lessened by a hint from Bateman that his allegiance to the English
Church was in danger. He called on him in no long time, asked him to
dinner, and, when Charles had returned his invitation, and Campbell had
accepted it, the beginning of an acquaintance was formed between the
rectory at Sutton and the family at Boughton which grew into an intimacy
as time went on. Campbell was a gentleman, a travelled man, of clear
head and ardent mind, candid, well-read in English divinity, a devoted
Anglican, and the incumbent of a living so well endowed as almost to be
a dignity. Mary was pleased at the introduction, as bringing her brother
under the influence of an intellect which he could not make light of;
and, as Campbell had a carriage, it was natural that he should wish to
save Charles the loss of a day's reading and the trouble of a muddy walk
to the rectory and back by coming over himself to Boughton. Accordingly
it so happened that he saw Charles twice at his mother's for once that
he saw him at Sutton. But whatever came of these visits, nothing
occurred which particularly bears upon the line of our narrative; so
let them pass.
One day Charles called upon Bateman, and, on entering the room, was
surprised to see him and Campbell at luncheon, and in conversation with
a third person. There was a moment's surprise and hesitation on seeing
him before they rose and welcomed him as usual. When he looked at the
stranger he felt a slight awkwardness himself, which he could not
control. It was Willis; and apparently submitted to the process of
reconversion. Charles was evidently _de trop_, but there was no help for
it; so he shook hands with Willis, and accepted the pressing call of
Bateman to seat himself at table, and to share their bread and cheese.
Charles sat down opposite Willis, and for a while could not keep his
eyes from him. At first he had some difficulty in believing he had
before him the impetuous youth he had known two years and a half before.
He had always been silent in general company; but in that he was
changed, as in everything else. Not that he talked more than was
natural, but he talked freely and easily. The great change, however, was
in his appearance and manner. He had lost his bloom and youthfulness;
his expression was sweeter indeed than before, and very placid, but
there was a thin line down his face on each side of his mouth; his
cheeks were wanting in fulness, and he had the air of a man of thirty.
When he entered into conversation, and became animated, his former self
returned.
"I suppose we may all admire this cream at this season," said Charles,
as he helped himself, "for we are none of us Devonshire men."
"It's not peculiar to Devonshire," answered Campbell; "that is, they
have it abroad. At Rome there is a sort of cream or cheese very like it,
and very common."
"Will butter and cream keep in so warm a climate?" asked Charles; "I
fancied oil was the substitute."
"Rome is not so warm as you fancy," said Willis, "except during the
summer."
"Oil? so it is," said Campbell; "thus we read in Scripture of the
multiplication of the oil and meal, which seems to answer to bread and
butter. The oil in Rome is excellent, so clear and pale; you can eat it
as milk."
"The taste, I suppose, is peculiar," observed Charles.
"Just at first," answered Campbell; "but one soon gets used to it. All
such substances, milk, butter, cheese, oil, have a particular taste at
first, which use alone gets over. The rich Guernsey butter is too much
for strangers, while Russians relish whale-oil. Most of our tastes are
in a measure artificial."
"It is certainly so with vegetables," said Willis; "when I was a boy I
could not eat beans, spinach, asparagus, parsnips, and I think some
others."
"Therefore your hermit's fare is not only the most natural, but the only
naturally palatable, I suppose,--a crust of bread and a draught from the
stream," replied Campbell.
"Or the Clerk of Copmanhurst's dry peas," said Charles.
"The macaroni and grapes of the Neapolitans are as natural and more
palatable," said Willis.
"Rather they are a luxury," said Bateman.
"No," answered Campbell, "not a luxury; a luxury is in its very idea a
something _recherché_. Thus Horace speaks of the '_peregrina lagois_.'
What nature yields _sponte suâ_ around you, however delicious, is no
luxury. Wild ducks are no luxury in your old neighbourhood, amid your
Oxford fens, Bateman; nor grapes at Naples."
"Then the old women here are luxurious over their sixpenn'rth of tea,"
said Bateman; "for it comes from China."
Campbell was posed for an instant. Somehow neither he nor Bateman were
quite at their ease, whether with themselves or with each other; it
might be Charles's sudden intrusion, or something which had happened
before it. Campbell answered at length that steamers and railroads were
making strange changes; that time and place were vanishing, and price
would soon be the only measure of luxury.
"This seems the measure also of _grasso_ and _magro_ food in Italy,"
said Willis; "for I think there are dispensations for butcher's meat in
Lent, in consequence of the dearness of bread and oil."
"This seems to show that the age for abstinences and fastings is past,"
observed Campbell; "for it's absurd to keep Lent on beef and mutton."
"Oh, Campbell, what are you saying?" cried Bateman; "past! are we bound
by their lax ways in Italy?"
"I do certainly think," answered Campbell, "that fasting is unsuitable
to this age, in England as well as in Rome."
"Take care, my fine fellows," thought Charles; "keep your ranks, or you
won't secure your prisoner."
"What, not fast on Friday!" cried Bateman; "we always did so most
rigidly at Oxford."
"It does you credit," answered Campbell; "but I am of Cambridge."
"But what do you say to Rubrics and the Calendar?" insisted Bateman.
"They are not binding," answered Campbell.
"They _are_, binding," said Bateman.
A pause, as between the rounds of a boxing-match. Reding interposed:
"Bateman, cut me, please, a bit of your capital bread--home-made, I
suppose?"
"A thousand pardons!" said Bateman:--"not binding?--Pass it to him,
Willis, if you please. Yes, it comes from a farmer, next door. I'm glad
you like it.--I repeat, they _are_ binding, Campbell."
"An odd sort of binding, when they have never bound," answered Campbell;
"they have existed two or three hundred years; when were they ever put
in force?"
"But there they are," said Bateman, "in the Prayer Book."
"Yes, and there let them lie and never get out of it," retorted
Campbell; "there they will stay till the end of the story."
"Oh, for shame!" cried Bateman; "you should aid your mother in a
difficulty, and not be like the priest and the Levite."
"My mother does not wish to be aided," continued Campbell.
"Oh, how you talk! What shall I do? What can be done?" cried poor
Bateman.
"Done! nothing," said Campbell; "is there no such thing as the desuetude
of a law? Does not a law cease to be binding when it is not enforced? I
appeal to Mr. Willis."
Willis, thus addressed, answered that he was no moral theologian, but he
had attended some schools, and he believed it was the Catholic rule that
when a law had been promulgated, and was not observed by the majority,
if the legislator knew the state of the case, and yet kept silence, he
was considered _ipso facto_ to revoke it.
"What!" said Bateman to Campbell, "do you appeal to the Romish Church?"
"No," answered Campbell; "I appeal to the whole Catholic Church, of
which the Church of Rome happens in this particular case to be the
exponent. It is plain common sense, that, if a law is not enforced, at
length it ceases to be binding. Else it would be quite a tyranny; we
should not know where we were. The Church of Rome does but give
expression to this common-sense view."
"Well, then," said Bateman, "I will appeal to the Church of Rome too.
Rome is part of the Catholic Church as well as we: since, then, the
Romish Church has ever kept up fastings the ordinance is not abolished;
the 'greater part' of the Catholic Church has always observed it."
"But it has not," said Campbell; "it now dispenses with fasts, as you
have heard."
Willis interposed to ask a question. "Do you mean then," he said to
Bateman, "that the Church of England and the Church of Rome make one
Church?"
"Most certainly," answered Bateman.
"Is it possible?" said Willis; "in what sense of the word _one_?"
"In every sense," answered Bateman, "but that of intercommunion."
"That is, I suppose," said Willis, "they are one, except that they have
no intercourse with each other."
Bateman assented. Willis continued: "No intercourse; that is, no social
dealings, no consulting or arranging, no ordering and obeying, no mutual
support; in short, no visible union."
Bateman still assented. "Well, that is my difficulty," said Willis; "I
can't understand how two parts can make up one visible body if they are
not visibly united; unity implies _union_."
"I don't see that at all," said Bateman; "I don't see that at all. No,
Willis, you must not expect I shall give that up to you; it is one of
our points. There is only one visible Church, and therefore the English
and Romish Churches are both parts of it."
Campbell saw clearly that Bateman had got into a difficulty, and he came
to the rescue in his own way.
"We must distinguish," he said, "the state of the case more exactly. A
kingdom may be divided, it may be distracted by parties, by dissensions,
yet be still a kingdom. That, I conceive, is the real condition of the
Church; in this way the Churches of England, Rome, and Greece are one."
"I suppose you will grant," said Willis, "that in proportion as a
rebellion is strong, so is the unity of the kingdom threatened; and if a
rebellion is successful, or if the parties in a civil war manage to
divide the power and territory between them, then forthwith, instead of
one kingdom, we have two. Ten or fifteen years since, Belgium was part
of the kingdom of the Netherlands: I suppose you would not call it part
of that kingdom now? This seems the case of the Churches of Rome and
England."
"Still, a kingdom may be in a state of decay," replied Campbell;
"consider the case of the Turkish Empire at this moment. The Union
between its separate portions is so languid, that each separate Pasha
may almost be termed a separate sovereign; still it is one kingdom."
"The Church, then, at present," said Willis, "is a kingdom tending to
dissolution?"
"Certainly it is," answered Campbell.
"And will ultimately fail?" asked Willis.
"Certainly," said Campbell; "when the end comes, according to our Lord's
saying, 'When the Son of man cometh, shall He find faith on the earth?'
just as in the case of the chosen people, the sceptre failed from Judah
when the Shiloh came."
"Surely the Church has failed already _before_ the end," said Willis,
"according to the view you take of failing. How _can_ any separation be
more complete than exists at present between Rome, Greece, and
England?"
"They might excommunicate each other," said Campbell.
"Then you are willing," said Willis, "to assign beforehand something
definite, the occurrence of which will constitute a real separation."
"Don't do so," said Reding to Campbell; "it is dangerous; don't commit
yourself in a moral question; for then, if the thing specified did
occur, it would be difficult to see our way."
"No," said Willis; "you certainly _would_ be in a difficulty; but you
would find your way out, I know. In that case you would choose some
other _ultimatum_ as your test of schism. There would be," he added,
speaking with some emotion, "'in the lowest depth a lower still.'"
The concluding words were out of keeping with the tone of the
conversation hitherto, and fairly excited Bateman, who, for some time,
had been an impatient listener.
"That's a dangerous line, Campbell," he said, "it is indeed; I can't go
along with you. It will never do to say that the Church is failing; no,
it never fails. It is always strong, and pure, and perfect, as the
Prophets describe it. Look at its cathedrals, abbey-churches, and other
sanctuaries, these fitly typify it."
"My dear Bateman," answered Campbell, "I am as willing as you to
maintain the fulfilment of the prophecies made to the Church, but we
must allow the _fact_ that the branches of the Church are _divided_,
while we maintain the _doctrine_, that the Church should be one."
"I don't see that at all," answered Bateman; "no, we need not allow it.
There's no such thing as Churches, there's but one Church everywhere,
and it is _not_ divided. It is merely the outward forms, appearances,
manifestations of the Church that are divided. The Church is one as much
as ever it was."
"That will never do," said Campbell; and he stood up before the fire in
a state of discomfort. "Nature never intended you for a
controversialist, my good Bateman," he added to himself.
"It is as I thought," said Willis; "Bateman, you are describing an
invisible Church. You hold the indefectibility of the invisible Church,
not of the visible."
"They are in a fix," thought Charles, "but I will do my best to tow old
Bateman out;" so he began: "No," he said, "Bateman only means that one
Church presents, in some particular point, a different appearance from
another; but it does not follow that, in fact, they have not a visible
agreement too. All difference implies agreement; the English and Roman
Churches agree visibly and differ visibly. Think of the different styles
of architecture, and you will see, Willis, what he means. A church is a
church all the world over, it is visibly one and the same, and yet how
different is church from church! Our churches are Gothic, the southern
churches are Palladian. How different is a basilica from York Cathedral!
yet they visibly agree together. No one would mistake either for a
mosque or a Jewish temple. We may quarrel which is the better style;
one likes the basilica, another calls it pagan."
"That _I_ do," said Bateman.
"A little extreme," said Campbell, "a little extreme, as usual. The
basilica is beautiful in its place. There are two things which Gothic
cannot show--the line or forest of round polished columns, and the
graceful dome, circling above one's head like the blue heaven itself."
All parties were glad of this diversion from the religious dispute; so
they continued the lighter conversation which had succeeded it with
considerable earnestness.
"I fear I must confess," said Willis, "that the churches at Rome do not
affect me like the Gothic; I reverence them, I feel awe in them, but I
love, I feel a sensible pleasure at the sight of the Gothic arch."
"There are other reasons for that in Rome," said Campbell; "the churches
are so unfinished, so untidy. Rome is a city of ruins! the Christian
temples are built on ruins, and they themselves are generally
dilapidated or decayed; thus they are ruins of ruins." Campbell was on
an easier subject than that of Anglo-Catholicism, and, no one
interrupting him, he proceeded flowingly: "In Rome you have huge high
buttresses in the place of columns, and these not cased with marble, but
of cold white plaster or paint. They impart an indescribable forlorn
look to the churches."
Willis said he often wondered what took so many foreigners, that is,
Protestants, to Rome; it was so dreary, so melancholy a place; a number
of old, crumbling, shapeless brick masses, the ground unlevelled, the
straight causeways fenced by high monotonous walls, the points of
attraction straggling over broad solitudes, faded palaces, trees
universally pollarded, streets ankle deep in filth or eyes-and-mouth
deep in a cloud of whirling dust and straws, the climate most
capricious, the evening air most perilous. Naples was an earthly
paradise; but Rome was a city of faith. To seek the shrines that it
contained was a veritable penance, as was fitting. He understood
Catholics going there; he was perplexed at Protestants.
"There is a spell about the _limina Apostolorum_," said Charles; "St.
Peter and St. Paul are not there for nothing."
"There is a more tangible reason," said Campbell; "it is a place where
persons of all nations are to be found; no society is so varied as the
Roman. You go to a ballroom; your host, whom you bow to in the first
apartment, is a Frenchman; as you advance your eye catches Massena's
granddaughter in conversation with Mustapha Pasha; you soon find
yourself seated between a Yankee _chargé d'affaires_ and a Russian
colonel; and an Englishman is playing the fool in front of you."
Here Campbell looked at his watch, and then at Willis, whom he had
driven over to Melford to return Bateman's call. It was time for them to
be going, or they would be overtaken by the evening. Bateman, who had
remained in a state of great dissatisfaction since he last spoke, which
had not been for a quarter of an hour past, did not find himself in
spirits to try much to detain either them or Reding; so he was speedily
left to himself. He drew his chair to the fire, and for a while felt
nothing more than a heavy load of disgust. After a time, however, his
thoughts began to draw themselves out into series, and took the
following form: "It's too bad, too bad," he said; "Campbell is a very
clever man--far cleverer than I am; a well-read man, too; but he has no
tact, no tact. It is deplorable; Reding's coming was one misfortune;
however, we might have got over that, we might have even turned it to an
advantage; but to use such arguments as he did! how could he hope to
convince him? he made us both a mere laughing-stock.... How did he throw
off? Oh, he said that the Rubrics were not binding. Who ever heard such
a thing--at least from an Anglo-Catholic? Why pretend to be a good
Catholic with such views? better call himself a Protestant or Erastian
at once, and one would know where to find him. Such a bad impression it
must make on Willis; I saw it did; he could hardly keep from smiling:
but Campbell has no tact at all. He goes on, on, his own way, bringing
out his own thoughts, which are very clever, original certainly, but
never considering his company. And he's so positive, so knock-me-down;
it is quite unpleasant, I don't know how to sit it sometimes. Oh, it is
a cruel thing this--the effect must be wretched. Poor Willis! I declare
I don't think we have moved him one inch, I really don't. I fancied at
one time he was even laughing at _me_.... What was it he said
afterwards? there was something else, I know. I recollect; that the
Catholic Church was in ruins, had broken to pieces. What a paradox!
who'll believe that but he? I declare I am so vexed I don't know what to
be at." He jumped up and began walking to and fro. "But all this is
because the Bishops won't interfere; one can't say it, that's the worst,
but they are at the bottom of the evil. They have but to put out their
little finger and enforce the Rubrics, and then the whole controversy
would be at an end.... I knew there was something else, yes! He said we
need not fast! But Cambridge men are always peculiar, they always have
some whim or other; he ought to have been at Oxford, and we should have
made a man of him. He has many good points, but he runs theories, and
rides hobbies, and drives consequences, to death."
Here he was interrupted by his clerk, who told him that John Tims had
taken his oath that his wife should not be churched before the
congregation, and was half-minded to take his infant to the Methodists
for baptism; and his thoughts took a different direction.