Part VI

History of My Religious Opinions--1841-1845

From the end of 1841, I was on my death-bed, as regards my membership

with the Anglican Church, though at the time I became aware of it

only by degrees. I introduce what I have to say with this remark, by

way of accounting for the character of this remaining portion of my

narrative. A death-bed has scarcely a history; it is a tedious

decline, with seasons of rallying and seasons of falling back; and

since the end is foreseen, or what is called a matter of time, it has

little interest for the reader, especially if he has a kind heart.

Moreover, it is a season when doors are closed and curtains drawn,

and when the sick man neither cares nor is able to record the stages

of his malady. I was in these circumstances, except so far as I was

not allowed to die in peace,--except so far as friends, who had still

a full right to come in upon me, and the public world which had not,

have given a sort of history to those last four years. But in

consequence, my narrative must be in great measure documentary.

Letters of mine to friends have come to me since their deaths; others

have been kindly lent me for the occasion; and I have some drafts of

letters, and notes of my own, though I have no strictly personal or

continuous memoranda to consult, and have unluckily mislaid some

valuable papers.

And first as to my position in the view of duty; it was this:--1. I

had given up my place in the Movement in my letter to the Bishop of

Oxford in the spring of 1841; but 2. I could not give up my duties

towards the many and various minds who had more or less been brought

into it by me; 3. I expected or intended gradually to fall back into

Lay Communion; 4. I never contemplated leaving the Church of England;

5. I could not hold office in her, if I were not allowed to hold the

Catholic sense of the Articles; 6. I could not go to Rome, while she

suffered honours to be paid to the Blessed Virgin and the Saints

which I thought incompatible with the Supreme, Incommunicable Glory

of the One Infinite and Eternal; 7. I desired a union with Rome under

conditions, Church with Church; 8. I called Littlemore my Torres

Vedras, and thought that some day we might advance again within the

Anglican Church, as we had been forced to retire; 9. I kept back all

persons who were disposed to go to Rome with all my might.

And I kept them back for three or four reasons; 1, because what I

could not in conscience do myself, I could not suffer them to do; 2,

because I thought that in various cases they were acting under

excitement; 3, while I held St. Mary's, because I had duties to my

Bishop and to the Anglican Church; and 4, in some cases, because I

had received from their Anglican parents or superiors direct charge

of them.

This was my view of my duty from the end of 1841, to my resignation

of St. Mary's in the autumn of 1843. And now I shall relate my view,

during that time, of the state of the controversy between the

Churches.

As soon as I saw the hitch in the Anglican argument, during my course

of reading in the summer of 1839, I began to look about, as I have

said, for some ground which might supply a controversial basis for

my need. The difficulty in question had affected my view both of

Antiquity and Catholicity; for, while the history of St. Leo showed

me that the deliberate and eventual consent of the great body of the

Church ratified a doctrinal decision, it also showed that the rule of

Antiquity was not infringed, though a doctrine had not been publicly

recognised as a portion of the dogmatic foundation of the Church,

till centuries after the time of the apostles. Thus, whereas the

Creeds tell us that the Church is One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic,

I could not prove that the Anglican communion was an integral part of

the One Church, on the ground of its being Apostolic or Catholic,

without reasoning in favour of what are commonly called the Roman

corruptions; and I could not defend our separation from Rome without

using arguments prejudicial to those great doctrines concerning our

Lord, which are the very foundation of the Christian religion. The

_Via Media_ was an impossible idea; it was what I had called

"standing on one leg;" and it was necessary, if my old issue of the

controversy was to be retained, to go further either one way or the

other.

Accordingly, I abandoned that old ground and took another. I

deliberately quitted the old Anglican ground as untenable; but I did

not do so all at once, but as I became more and more convinced of

the state of the case. The Jerusalem bishopric was the ultimate

condemnation of the old theory of the _Via Media_; from that time the

Anglican Church was, in my mind, either not a normal portion of that

One Church to which the promises were made, or at least in an

abnormal state, and from that time I said boldly, as I did in my

Protest, and as indeed I had even intimated in my letter to the

Bishop of Oxford, that the Church in which I found myself had no

claim on me, except on condition of its being a portion of the One

Catholic Communion, and that that condition must ever be borne in

mind as a practical matter, and had to be distinctly proved. All

this was not inconsistent with my saying that, at this time, I had

no thought of leaving that Church because I felt some of my old

objections against Rome as strongly as ever. I had no right, I had no

leave, to act against my conscience. That was a higher rule than any

argument about the notes of the Church.

Under these circumstances I turned for protection to the note of

sanctity, with a view of showing that we had at least one of the

necessary notes, as fully as the Church of Rome; or, at least,

without entering into comparisons, that we had it in such a

sufficient sense as to reconcile us to our position, and to supply

full evidence, and a clear direction, on the point of practical duty.

We had the note of life,--not any sort of life, not such only as can

come of nature, but a supernatural Christian life, which could only

come directly from above. In my article in the _British Critic_, to

which I have so often referred, in January, 1840 (before the time of

Tract 90), I said of the Anglican Church that "she has the note of

possession, the note of freedom from party titles, the note of

life,--a tough life and a vigorous; she has ancient descent, unbroken

continuance, agreement in doctrine with the Ancient Church."

Presently I go on to speak of sanctity: "Much as Roman Catholics may

denounce us at present as schismatical, they could not resist us if

the Anglican communion had but that one note of the Church upon

it,--sanctity. The Church of the day [fourth century] could not

resist Meletius; his enemies were fairly overcome by him, by his

meekness and holiness, which melted the most jealous of them." And I

continue, "We are almost content to say to Romanists, account us not

yet as a branch of the Catholic Church, though we be a branch, till

we are like a branch, provided that when we do become like a branch,

then you consent to acknowledge us," etc. And so I was led on in

the Article to that sharp attack on English Catholics for their

short-comings as regards this note, a good portion of which I have

already quoted in another place. It is there that I speak of

the great scandal which I took at their political, social, and

controversial bearing; and this was a second reason why I fell back

upon the note of sanctity, because it took me away from the necessity

of making any attack upon the doctrines of the Roman Church, nay,

from the consideration of her popular beliefs, and brought me upon

a ground on which I felt I could not make a mistake; for what is

a higher guide for us in speculation and in practice, than that

conscience of right and wrong, of truth and falsehood, those

sentiments of what is decorous, consistent, and noble, which our

Creator has made a part of our original nature? Therefore I felt I

could not be wrong in attacking what I fancied was a fact,--the

unscrupulousness, the deceit, and the intriguing spirit of the agents

and representatives of Rome.

This reference to holiness as the true test of a Church was steadily

kept in view in what I wrote in connection with Tract 90. I say in

its Introduction, "The writer can never be party to forcing the

opinions or projects of one school upon another; religious changes

should be the act of the whole body. No good can come of a change

which is not a development of feelings springing up freely and calmly

within the bosom of the whole body itself; every change in religion"

must be "attended by deep repentance; changes" must be "nurtured in

mutual love; we cannot agree without a supernatural influence;"

we must come "together to God to do for us what we cannot do for

ourselves." In my letter to the bishop I said, "I have set myself

against suggestions for considering the differences between ourselves

and the foreign Churches with a view to their adjustment." (I meant

in the way of negotiation, conference, agitation, or the like.) "Our

business is with ourselves,--to make ourselves more holy, more

self-denying, more primitive, more worthy of our high calling. To be

anxious for a composition of differences is to begin at the end.

Political reconciliations are but outward and hollow, and fallacious.

And till Roman Catholics renounce political efforts, and manifest in

their public measures the light of holiness and truth, perpetual war

is our only prospect."

According to this theory, a religious body is part of the One

Catholic and Apostolic Church, if it has the succession and the creed

of the apostles, with the note of holiness of life; and there is much

in such a view to approve itself to the direct common sense and

practical habits of an Englishman. However, with events consequent

upon Tract 90, I sunk my theory to a lower level. What could be said

in apology, when the bishops and the people of my Church, not only

did not suffer, but actually rejected primitive Catholic doctrine,

and tried to eject from their communion all who held it? after the

Bishops' charges? after the Jerusalem "abomination?" Well, this could

be said; still we were not nothing: we could not be as if we never

had been a Church; we were "Samaria." This then was that lower level

on which I placed myself, and all who felt with me, at the end of

1841.

To bring out this view was the purpose of four sermons preached at

St. Mary's in December of that year. Hitherto I had not introduced

the exciting topics of the day into the pulpit; on this occasion

I did. I did so, for the moment was urgent; there was great

unsettlement of mind among us, in consequence of those same events

which had unsettled me. One special anxiety, very obvious, which was

coming on me now, was, that what was "one man's meat was another

man's poison." I had said even of Tract 90, "It was addressed to one

set of persons, and has been used and commented on by another;" still

more was it true now, that whatever I wrote for the service of those

whom I knew to be in trouble of mind, would become on the one hand

matter of suspicion and slander in the mouths of my opponents, and of

distress and surprise to those on the other hand, who had no

difficulties of faith at all. Accordingly, when I published

these four sermons at the end of 1843, I introduced them with a

recommendation that none should read them who did not need them.

But in truth the virtual condemnation of Tract 90, after that the

whole difficulty seemed to have been weathered, was an enormous

disappointment and trial. My Protest also against the Jerusalem

Bishopric was an unavoidable cause of excitement in the case of many;

but it calmed them too, for the very fact of a Protest was a relief

to their impatience. And so, in like manner, as regards the four

sermons, of which I speak, though they acknowledged freely the great

scandal which was involved in the recent episcopal doings, yet at the

same time they might be said to bestow upon the multiplied disorders

and shortcomings of the Anglican Church a sort of place in the

Revealed Dispensation, and an intellectual position in the

controversy, and the dignity of a great principle, for unsettled

minds to take and use, which might teach them to recognise their own

consistency, and to be reconciled to themselves, and which might

absorb into itself and dry up a multitude of their grudgings,

discontents, misgivings, and questionings, and lead the way to

humble, thankful, and tranquil thoughts;--and this was the effect

which certainly it produced on myself.

The point of these sermons is, that, in spite of the rigid character

of the Jewish law, the formal and literal force of its precepts, and

the manifest schism, and worse than schism, of the ten tribes, yet

in fact they were still recognised as a people by the Divine Mercy;

that the great prophets Elias and Eliseus were sent to them, and not

only so, but sent to preach to them and reclaim them, without any

intimation that they must be reconciled to the line of David and the

Aaronic priesthood, or go up to Jerusalem to worship. They were not

in the Church, yet they had the means of grace and the hope of

acceptance with their Maker. The application of all this to the

Anglican Church was immediate;--whether a man could assume or

exercise ministerial functions under the circumstances, or not, might

not clearly appear, though it must be remembered that England had the

apostolic priesthood, whereas Israel had no priesthood at all; but so

far was clear, that there was no call at all for an Anglican to leave

his Church for Rome, though he did not believe his own to be part of

the One Church:--and for this reason, because it was a fact that the

kingdom of Israel was cut off from the Temple; and yet its subjects,

neither in a mass, nor as individuals, neither the multitudes on

Mount Carmel, nor the Shunammite and her household, had any command

given them, though miracles were displayed before them, to break off

from their own people, and to submit themselves to Judah.[3]

It is plain that a theory such as this, whether the marks of a divine

presence and life in the Anglican Church were sufficient to prove

that she was actually within the covenant, or only sufficient to

prove that she was at least enjoying extraordinary and uncovenanted

mercies, not only lowered her level in a religious point of view,

but weakened her controversial basis. Its very novelty made it

suspicious; and there was no guarantee that the process of subsidence

might not continue, and that it might not end in a submersion.

Indeed, to many minds, to say that England was wrong was even to say

that Rome was right; and no ethical reasoning whatever could overcome

in their case the argument from prescription and authority. To this

objection I could only answer that I did not make my circumstances. I

fully acknowledged the force and effectiveness of the genuine

An glican theory, and that it was all but proof against the disputants

of Rome; but still like Achilles, it had a vulnerable point, and that

St. Leo had found it out for me, and that I could not help it;--that,

were it not for matter of fact, the theory would be great indeed, it

would be irresistible, if it were only true. When I became a

Catholic, the editor of a magazine who had in former days accused me,

to my indignation, of tending towards Rome, wrote to me to ask, which

of the two was now right, he or I? I answered him in a letter, part

of which I here insert, as it will serve as a sort of leave-taking of

the great theory, which is so specious to look upon, so difficult to

prove, and so hopeless to work.

"Nov. 8, 1845. I do not think, at all more than I did, that the

Anglican principles which I advocated at the date you mention, lead

men to the Church of Rome. If I must specify what I mean by 'Anglican

principles,' I should say, _e.g._ taking _Antiquity_, not the

_existing Church_, as the oracle of truth; and holding that the

_Apostolical Succession_ is a sufficient guarantee of Sacramental

Grace, without _union with the Christian Church throughout the

world_. I think these still the firmest, strongest ground against

Rome--that is, _if they can be held_. They _have_ been held by many,

and are far more difficult to refute in the Roman controversy, than

those of any other religious body.

"For myself, I found _I could not_ hold them. I left them. From the

time I began to suspect their unsoundness, I ceased to put them

forward. When I was fairly sure of their unsoundness, I gave up my

Living. When I was fully confident that the Church of Rome was the

only true Church, I joined her.

"I have felt all along that Bp. Bull's theology was the only theology

on which the English Church could stand. I have felt, that opposition

to the Church of Rome was _part_ of that theology; and that he who

could not protest against the Church of Rome was no true divine in

the English Church. I have never said, nor attempted to say, that any

one in office in the English Church, whether Bishop or incumbent,

could be otherwise than in hostility to the Church of Rome."

The _Via Media_ then disappeared for ever, and a new Theory, made

expressly for the occasion, took its place. I was pleased with my new

view. I wrote to an intimate friend, Dec. 13, 1841, "I think you will

give me the credit, Carissime, of not undervaluing the strength of

the feelings which draw one [to Rome], and yet I am (I trust) quite

clear about my duty to remain where I am; indeed, much clearer than I

was some time since. If it is not presumptuous to say, I have ... a

much more definite view of the promised inward Presence of Christ

with us in the Sacraments now that the outward notes of it are being

removed. And I am content to be with Moses in the desert, or with

Elijah excommunicated from the Temple. I say this, putting things at

the strongest."

However, my friends of the moderate Apostolical party, who were my

friends for the very reason of my having been so moderate and

Anglican myself in general tone in times past, who had stood up for

Tract 90 partly from faith in me, and certainly from generous and

kind feeling, and had thereby shared an obloquy which was none of

theirs, were naturally surprised and offended at a line of argument,

novel, and, as it appeared to them, wanton, which threw the whole

controversy into confusion, stultified my former principles, and

substituted, as they would consider, a sort of methodistic

self-contemplation, especially abhorrent both to my nature and to my

past professions, for the plain and honest tokens, as they were

commonly received, of a divine mission in the Anglican Church. They

could not tell whither I was going; and were still further annoyed,

when I would view the reception of Tract 90 by the public and the

Bishops as so grave a matter, and threw about what they considered

mysterious hints of "eventualities," and would not simply say, "An

Anglican I was born, and an Anglican I will die." One of my familiar

friends, who was in the country at Christmas, 1841-2, reported to me

the feeling that prevailed about me; and how I felt towards it will

appear in the following letter of mine, written in answer:--

"Oriel, Dec. 24, 1841. Carissime, you cannot tell how sad your

account of Moberly has made me. His view of the sinfulness of the

decrees of Trent is as much against union of Churches as against

individual conversions. To tell the truth, I never have examined

those decrees with this object, and have no view; but that is very

different from having a deliberate view against them. Could not he

say _which_ they are? I suppose Transubstantiation is one. A. B.,

though of course he would not like to have it repeated, does not

scruple at that. I have not my mind clear. Moberly must recollect

that Palmer thinks they all bear a Catholic interpretation. For

myself, this only I see, that there is indefinitely more in the

Fathers against our own state of alienation from Christendom than

against the Tridentine Decrees.

"The only thing I can think of [that I can have said] is this, that

there were persons who, if our Church committed herself to heresy,

_sooner_ than think that there was no Church anywhere, would believe

the Roman to be the Church; and therefore would on faith accept what

they could not otherwise acquiesce in. I suppose, it would be no

relief to him to insist upon the circumstance that there is no

immediate danger. Individuals can never be answered for of course;

but I should think lightly of that man, who, for some act of the

Bishops, should all at once leave the Church. Now, considering how

the Clergy really are improving, considering that this row is even

making them read the Tracts, is it not possible we may all be in a

better state of mind seven years hence to consider these matters? and

may we not leave them meanwhile to the will of Providence? I _cannot_

believe this work has been of man; God has a right to His own work,

to do what He will with it. May we not try to leave it in His hands,

and be content?

"If you learn anything about Barter, which leads you to think that I

can relieve him by a letter, let me know. The truth is this--our good

friends do not read the Fathers; they assent to us from the common

sense of the case: then, when the Fathers, and we, say _more_ than

their common sense, they are dreadfully shocked.

"The Bishop of London has rejected a man, 1. For holding _any_

Sacrifice in the Eucharist. 2. The Real Presence. 3. That there is a

grace in Ordination.[4]

"Are we quite sure that the Bishops will not be drawing up some

stringent declarations of faith? is this what Moberly fears? Would

the Bishop of Oxford accept them? If so, I should be driven into the

Refuge for the Destitute [Littlemore]. But I promise Moberly, I would

do my utmost to catch all dangerous persons and clap them into

confinement there."

Christmas Day, 1841. "I have been dreaming of Moberly all night.

Should not he and the like see, that it is unwise, unfair, and

impatient to ask others, What will you do under circumstances, which

have not, which may never come? Why bring fear, suspicion, and

disunion into the camp about things which are merely _in posse_?

Natural, and exceedingly kind as Barter's and another friend's

letters were, I think they have done great harm. I speak most

sincerely when I say, that there are things which I neither

contemplate, nor wish to contemplate; but, when I am asked about them

ten times, at length I begin to contemplate them.

"He surely does not mean to say, that _nothing_ could separate a man

from the English Church, _e.g._ its avowing Socinianism; its holding

the Holy Eucharist in a Socinian sense. Yet, he would say, it was not

_right_ to contemplate such things.

"Again, our case is [diverging] from that of Ken's. To say nothing of

the last miserable century, which has given us to _start_ from a much

lower level and with much less to _spare_ than a Churchman in the

17th century, questions of _doctrine_ are now coming in; with him, it

was a question of discipline.

"If such dreadful events were realised, I cannot help thinking we

should all be vastly more agreed than we think now. Indeed, is it

possible (humanly speaking) that those, who have so much the same

heart, should widely differ? But let this be considered, as to

alternatives. _What_ communion could we join? Could the Scotch or

American sanction the presence of its Bishops and congregations in

England, without incurring the imputation of schism, unless indeed

(and is that likely?) they denounced the English as heretical?

"Is not this a time of strange providences? is it not our safest

course, without looking to consequences, to do simply _what we think

right_ day by day? shall we not be sure to go wrong, if we attempt to

trace by anticipation the course of divine Providence?

"Has not all our misery, as a Church, arisen from people being afraid

to look difficulties in the face? They have palliated acts, when they

should have denounced them. There is that good fellow, Worcester

Palmer, can whitewash the Ecclesiastical Commission and the Jerusalem

Bishopric. And what is the consequence? that our Church has, through

centuries, ever been sinking lower and lower, till good part of its

pretensions and professions is a mere sham, though it be a duty to

make the best of what we have received. Yet, though bound to make the

best of other men's shams, let us not incur any of our own. The

truest friends of our Church are they, who say boldly when her

rulers are going wrong, and the consequences; and (to speak

catachrestically) _they_ are most likely to die in the Church, who

are, under these black circumstances, most prepared to leave it.

"And I will add, that, considering the traces of God's grace which

surround us, I am very sanguine, or rather confident (if it is right

so to speak), that our prayers and our alms will come up as a

memorial before God, and that all this miserable confusion tends to

good.

"Let us not then be anxious, and anticipate differences in prospect,

when we agree in the present.

"P.S. I think, when friends [_i.e._ the extreme party] get over their

first unsettlement of mind and consequent vague apprehensions, which

the new attitude of the Bishops, and our feelings upon it, have

brought about, they will get contented and satisfied. They will see

that they exaggerated things.... Of course it would have been wrong

to anticipate what one's feelings would be under such a painful

contingency as the Bishops' charging as they have done--so it seems

to me nobody's fault. Nor is it wonderful that others" [moderate men]

"are startled" [_i.e._ at my Protest, etc. etc.]; "yet they should

recollect that the more implicit the reverence one pays to a Bishop,

the more keen will be one's perception of heresy in him. The cord is

binding and compelling, till it snaps.

"Men of reflection would have seen this, if they had looked that way.

Last spring, a very high churchman talked to me of resisting my

Bishop, of asking him for the Canons under which he acted, and so

forth; but those, who have cultivated a loyal feeling towards their

superiors, are the most loving servants, or the most zealous

protestors. If others became so too, if the clergy of Chester

denounced the heresy of their diocesan, they would be doing their

duty, and relieving themselves of the share which they otherwise have

in any possible defection of their brethren."

"St. Stephen's [December 26]. How I fidget! I now fear that the note

I wrote yesterday only makes matters worse by _disclosing_ too much.

This is always my great difficulty.

"In the present state of excitement on both sides, I think of leaving

out altogether my reassertion of No. 90 in my Preface to Volume 6,

and merely saying, 'As many false reports are at this time in

circulation about him, he hopes his well-wishers will take this

Volume as an indication of his real thoughts and feelings: those who

are not, he leaves in God's hand to bring them to a better mind in

His own time.' What do you say to the logic, sentiment, and propriety

of this?"

There was one very old friend, at a distance from Oxford, afterwards

a Catholic, now dead some years, who must have said something to me,

I do not know what, which challenged a frank reply; for I disclosed

to him, I do not know in what words, my frightful suspicion, hitherto

only known to two persons, as regards my Anglicanism, perhaps I might

break down in the event, that perhaps we were both out of the Church.

He answered me thus, under date of Jan. 29, 1842: "I don't think that

I ever was so shocked by any communication, which was ever made to

me, as by your letter of this morning. It has quite unnerved me.... I

cannot but write to you, though I am at a loss where to begin ... I

know of no act by which we have dissevered ourselves from the

communion of the Church Universal.... The more I study Scripture, the

more am I impressed with the resemblance between the Romish principle

in the Church and the Babylon of St. John.... I am ready to grieve

that I ever directed my thoughts to theology, if it is indeed so

uncertain, as your doubts seem to indicate."

While my old and true friends were thus in trouble about me, I

suppose they felt not only anxiety but pain, to see that I was

gradually surrendering myself to the influence of others, who had not

their own claims upon me, younger men, and of a cast of mind

uncongenial to my own. A new school of thought was rising, as is

usual in such movements, and was sweeping the original party of the

movement aside, and was taking its place. The most prominent person

in it, was a man of elegant genius, of classical mind, of rare talent

in literary composition:--Mr. Oakeley. He was not far from my own

age; I had long known him, though of late years he had not been in

residence at Oxford; and quite lately, he has been taking several

signal occasions of renewing that kindness, which he ever showed

towards me when we were both in the Anglican Church. His tone of mind

was not unlike that which gave a character to the early movement; he

was almost a typical Oxford man, and, as far as I recollect, both in

political and ecclesiastical views, would have been of one spirit

with the Oriel party of 1826-1833. But he had entered late into the

Movement; he did not know its first years; and, beginning with a new

start, he was naturally thrown together with that body of eager,

acute, resolute minds who had begun their Catholic life about the

same time as he, who knew nothing about the _Via Media_, but had

heard much about Rome. This new party rapidly formed and increased,

in and out of Oxford, and, as it so happened, contemporaneously with

that very summer, when I received so serious a blow to my

ecclesiastical views from the study of the Monophysite controversy.

These men cut into the original Movement at an angle, fell across its

line of thought, and then set about turning that line in its own

direction. They were most of them keenly religious men, with a true

concern for their souls as the first matter of all, with a great zeal

for me, but giving little certainty at the time as to which way they

would ultimately turn. Some in the event have remained firm to

Anglicanism, some have become Catholics, and some have found a refuge

in Liberalism. Nothing was clearer concerning them, than that they

needed to be kept in order; and on me who had had so much to do with

the making of them, that duty was as clearly incumbent; and it is

equally clear, from what I have already said, that I was just the

person, above all others, who could not undertake it. There are no

friends like old friends; but of those old friends, few could help

me, few could understand me, many were annoyed with me, some were

angry, because I was breaking up a compact party, and some, as a

matter of conscience, could not listen to me. I said, bitterly, "You

are throwing me on others, whether I will or no." Yet still I had

good and true friends around me of the old sort, in and out of Oxford

too. But on the other hand, though I neither was so fond of the

persons, nor of the methods of thought, which belonged to this new

school, excepting two or three men, as of the old set, though I could

not trust in their firmness of purpose, for, like a swarm of flies,

they might come and go, and at length be divided and dissipated, yet

I had an intense sympathy in their object and in the direction of

their path, in spite of my old friends, in spite of my old life-long

prejudices. In spite of my ingrained fears of Rome, and the decision

of my reason and conscience against her usages, in spite of my

affection for Oxford and Oriel, yet I had a secret longing love of

Rome the author of English Christianity, and I had a true devotion to

the Blessed Virgin, in whose College I lived, whose altar I served,

and whose immaculate purity I had in one of my earliest printed

Sermons made much of. And it was the consciousness of this bias in

myself, if it is so to be called, which made me preach so earnestly

against the danger of being swayed by our sympathy rather than our

reason in religious inquiry. And moreover, the members of this new

school looked up to me, as I have said, and did me true kindnesses,

and really loved me, and stood by me in trouble, when others went

away, and for all this I was grateful; nay, many of them were in

trouble themselves, and in the same boat with me, and that was a

further cause of sympathy between us; and hence it was, when the new

school came on in force, and into collision with the old, I had not

the heart, any more than the power, to repel them; I was in great

perplexity, and hardly knew where I stood; I took their part: and,

when I wanted to be in peace and silence, I had to speak out, and I

incurred the charge of weakness from some men, and of mysteriousness,

shuffling, and underhand dealing from the majority.

Now I will say here frankly, that this sort of charge is a matter

which I cannot properly meet, because I cannot duly realise it. I

have never had any suspicion of my own honesty; and, when men say

that I was dishonest, I cannot grasp the accusation as a distinct

conception, such as it is possible to encounter. If a man said to me,

"On such a day and before such persons you said a thing was white,

when it was black," I understand what is meant well enough, and I can

set myself to prove an alibi or to explain the mistake; or if a man

said to me, "You tried to gain me over to your party, intending to

take me with you to Rome, but you did not succeed," I can give him

the lie, and lay down an assertion of my own as firm and as exact as

his, that not from the time that I was first unsettled, did I ever

attempt to gain any one over to myself or to my Romanizing opinions,

and that it is only his own coxcombical fancy which has bred such a

thought in him: but my imagination is at a loss in presence of those

vague charges, which have commonly been brought against me, charges,

which are made up of impressions, and understandings, and inferences,

and hearsay, and surmises. Accordingly, I shall not make the attempt,

for, in doing so, I should be dealing blows in the air; what I shall

attempt is to state what I know of myself and what I recollect, and

leave its application to others.

While I had confidence in the _Via Media_, and thought that nothing

could overset it, I did not mind laying down large principles, which

I saw would go further than was commonly perceived. I considered that

to make the _Via Media_ concrete and substantive, it must be much

more than it was in outline; that the Anglican Church must have a

ceremonial, a ritual, and a fulness of doctrine and devotion, which

it had not at present, if it were to compete with the Roman Church

with any prospect of success. Such additions would not remove it from

its proper basis, but would merely strengthen and beautify it: such,

for instance, would be confraternities, particular devotions,

reverence for the Blessed Virgin, prayers for the dead, beautiful

churches, rich offerings to them and in them, monastic houses, and

many other observances and institutions, which I used to say belonged

to us as much as to Rome, though Rome had appropriated them, and

boasted of them, by reason of our having let them slip from us. The

principle, on which all this turned, is brought out in one of the

letters I published on occasion of Tract 90. "The age is moving,"

I said, "towards something; and most unhappily the one religious

communion among us, which has of late years been practically in

possession of this something, is the Church of Rome. She alone, amid

all the errors and evils of her practical system, has given free

scope to the feelings of awe, mystery, tenderness, reverence,

devotedness, and other feelings which may be especially called

Catholic. The question then is, whether we shall give them up to the

Roman Church or claim them for ourselves.... But if we do give them

up, we must give up the men who cherish them. We must consent either

to give up the men, or to admit their principles." With these

feelings I frankly admit, that, while I was working simply for the

sake of the Anglican Church, I did not at all mind, though I found

myself laying down principles in its defence, which went beyond that

particular defence which high-and-dry men thought perfection, and

though I ended in framing a sort of defence, which they might call a

revolution, while I thought it a restoration. Thus, for illustration,

I might discourse upon the "Communion of Saints" in such a manner,

(though I do not recollect doing so) as might lead the way towards

devotion to the Blessed Virgin and the saints on the one hand, and

towards prayers for the dead on the other. In a memorandum of the

year 1844 or 1845, I thus speak on this subject: "If the Church be

not defended on establishment grounds, it must be upon principles,

which go far beyond their immediate object. Sometimes I saw these

further results, sometimes not. Though I saw them, I sometimes did

not say that I saw them; so long as I thought they were inconsistent,

_not_ with our Church, but only with the existing opinions, I was not

unwilling to insinuate truths into our Church, which I thought had a

right to be there."

To so much I confess; but I do not confess, I simply deny that I ever

said anything which secretly bore against the Church of England,

knowing it myself, in order that others might unwarily accept it. It

was indeed one of my great difficulties and causes of reserve, as

time went on, that I at length recognised in principles which I had

honestly preached as if Anglican, conclusions favourable to the Roman

Church. Of course I did not like to confess this; and, when

interrogated, was in consequence in perplexity. The prime instance of

this was the appeal to Antiquity; St. Leo had overset, in my own

judgment, its force in the special argument for Anglicanism; yet I

was committed to Antiquity, together with the whole Anglican school;

what then was I to say, when acute minds urged this or that

application of it against the _Via Media_? it was impossible that, in

such circumstances, any answer could be given which was not

unsatisfactory, or any behaviour adopted which was not mysterious.

Again, sometimes in what I wrote I went just as far as I saw, and

could as little say more, as I could see what is below the horizon;

and therefore, when asked as to the consequences of what I had said,

had no answer to give. Again, sometimes when I was asked, whether

certain conclusions did not follow from a certain principle, I might

not be able to tell at the moment, especially if the matter were

complicated; and for this reason, if for no other, because there

is great difference between a conclusion in the abstract and a

conclusion in the concrete, and because a conclusion may be modified

in fact by a conclusion from some opposite principle. Or it might

so happen that I got simply confused, by the very clearness of the

logic which was administered to me, and thus gave my sanction to

conclusions which really were not mine; and when the report of those

conclusions came round to me through others, I had to unsay them. And

then again, perhaps I did not like to see men scared or scandalised

by unfeeling logical inferences, which would not have touched them to

the day of their death, had they not been made to eat them. And then

I felt altogether the force of the maxim of St. Ambrose, "Non in

dialectica complacuit Deo salvum facere populum suum;"--I had a great

dislike of paper logic. For myself, it was not logic that carried me

on; as well might one say that the quicksilver in the barometer

changes the weather. It is the concrete being that reasons; pass a

number of years, and I find my mind in a new place; how? the whole

man moves; paper logic is but the record of it. All the logic in the

world would not have made me move faster towards Rome than I did; as

well might you say that I have arrived at the end of my journey,

because I see the village church before me, as venture to assert that

the miles, over which my soul had to pass before it got to Rome,

could be annihilated, even though I had had some far clearer view

than I then had, that Rome was my ultimate destination. Great acts

take time. At least this is what I felt in my own case; and therefore

to come to me with methods of logic, had in it the nature of a

provocation, and, though I do not think I ever showed it, made me

somewhat indifferent how I met them, and perhaps led me, as a means

of relieving my impatience, to be mysterious or irrelevant, or to

give in because I could not reply. And a greater trouble still than

these logical mazes, was the introduction of logic into every subject

whatever, so far, that is, as it was done. Before I was at Oriel, I

recollect an acquaintance saying to me that "the Oriel Common Room

stank of Logic." One is not at all pleased when poetry, or eloquence,

or devotion, is considered as if chiefly intended to feed syllogisms.

Now, in saying all this, I am saying nothing against the deep piety

and earnestness which were characteristics of this second phase of

the Movement, in which I have taken so prominent a part. What I have

been observing is, that this phase had a tendency to bewilder and to

upset me, and, that instead of saying so, as I ought to have done, in

a sort of easiness, for what I know, I gave answers at random, which

have led to my appearing close or inconsistent.

I have turned up two letters of this period, which in a measure

illustrate what I have been saying. The first is what I said to the

Bishop of Oxford on occasion of Tract 90:

"March 20, 1841. No one can enter into my situation but myself. I see

a great many minds working in various directions and a variety of

principles with multiplied bearings; I act for the best. I sincerely

think that matters would not have gone better for the Church, had I

never written. And if I write I have a choice of difficulties. It is

easy for those who do not enter into those difficulties to say, 'He

ought to say this and not say that,' but things are wonderfully

linked together, and I cannot, or rather I would not be dishonest.

When persons too interrogate me, I am obliged in many cases to give

an opinion, or I seem to be underhand. Keeping silence looks like

artifice. And I do not like people to consult or respect me, from

thinking differently of my opinions from what I know them to be. And

again (to use the proverb) what is one man's food is another man's

poison. All these things make my situation very difficult. But that

collision must at some time ensue between members of the Church of

opposite sentiments, I have long been aware. The time and mode has

been in the hand of Providence; I do not mean to exclude my own great

imperfections in bringing it about; yet I still feel obliged to think

the Tract necessary.

"Dr. Pusey has shown me your Lordship's letters to him. I am most

desirous of saying in print anything which I can honestly say to

remove false impressions created by the Tract."

The second is part of the notes of a letter sent to Dr. Pusey in the

next year:

"October 16, 1842. As to my being entirely with A. B., I do not know

the limits of my own opinions. If A. B. says that this or that is a

development from what I have said, I cannot say Yes or No. It is

plausible, it _may_ be true. Of course the fact that the Roman Church

_has_ so developed and maintained, adds great weight to the

antecedent plausibility. I cannot assert that it is not true; but I

cannot, with that keen perception which some people have, appropriate

it. It is a nuisance to me to be _forced_ beyond what I can fairly

accept."

There was another source of the perplexity with which at this time I

was encompassed, and of the reserve and mysteriousness, of which it

gave me the credit. After Tract 90 the Protestant world would not let

me alone; they pursued me in the public journals to Littlemore.

Reports of all kinds were circulated about me. "Imprimis, why did I

go up to Littlemore at all? For no good purpose certainly; I dared

not tell why." Why, to be sure, it was hard that I should be obliged

to say to the Editors of newspapers that I went up there to say my

prayers; it was hard to have to tell the world in confidence, that I

had a certain doubt about the Anglican system, and could not at that

moment resolve it, or say what would come of it; it was hard to have

to confess that I had thought of giving up my living a year or two

before, and that this was a first step to it. It was hard to have

to plead, that, for what I knew, my doubts would vanish, if the

newspapers would be so good as to give me time and let me alone.

Who would ever dream of making the world his confidant? yet I was

considered insidious, sly, dishonest, if I would not open my heart

to the tender mercies of the world. But they persisted: "What was I

doing at Littlemore?" Doing there? have I not retreated from you?

have I not given up my position and my place? am I alone, of

Englishmen, not to have the privilege to go where I will, no

questions asked? am I alone to be followed about by jealous prying

eyes, who note down whether I go in at a back door or at the front,

and who the men are who happen to call on me in the afternoon?

Cowards! if I advanced one step, you would run away; it is not you

that I fear: "Di me terrent, et Jupiter hostis." It is because the

Bishops still go on charging against me, though I have quite given

up: it is that secret misgiving of heart which tells me that they do

well, for I have neither lot nor part with them: this it is which

weighs me down. I cannot walk into or out of my house, but curious

eyes are upon me. Why will you not let me die in peace? Wounded

brutes creep into some hole to die in, and no one grudges it them.

Let me alone, I shall not trouble you long. This was the keen heavy

feeling which pierced me, and, I think, these are the very words that

I used to myself. I asked, in the words of a great motto, "Ubi

lapsus? quid feci?" One day when I entered my house, I found a flight

of undergraduates inside. Heads of houses, as mounted patrols, walked

their horses round those poor cottages. Doctors of divinity dived

into the hidden recesses of that private tenement uninvited, and drew

domestic conclusions from what they saw there. I had thought that an

Englishman's house was his castle; but the newspapers thought

otherwise, and at last the matter came before my good Bishop. I

insert his letter, and a portion of my reply to him:--

"April 12, 1842. So many of the charges against yourself and your

friends which I have seen in the public journals have been, within my

own knowledge, false and calumnious, that I am not apt to pay much

attention to what is asserted with respect to you in the newspapers.

"In a" [newspaper], "however, of April 9, there appears a paragraph

in which it is asserted, as a matter of notoriety, that a 'so-called

Anglo-Catholic Monastery is in process of erection at Littlemore, and

that the cells of dormitories, the chapel, the refectory, the

cloisters all may be seen advancing to perfection, under the eye of a

Parish Priest of the Diocese of Oxford.'

"Now, as I have understood that you really are possessed of some

tenements at Littlemore--as it is generally believed that they are

destined for the purposes of study and devotion--and as much

suspicion and jealousy are felt about the matter, I am anxious to

afford you an opportunity of making me an explanation on the subject.

"I know you too well not to be aware that you are the last man living

to attempt in my Diocese a revival of the Monastic orders (in

anything approaching to the Romanist sense of the term) without

previous communication with me--or indeed that you should take upon

yourself to originate any measure of importance without authority

from the heads of the Church--and therefore I at once exonerate you

from the accusation brought against you by the newspaper I have

quoted, but I feel it nevertheless a duty to my Diocese and myself,

as well as to you, to ask you to put it in my power to contradict

what, if uncontradicted, would appear to imply a glaring invasion of

all ecclesiastical discipline on _your_ part, or of inexcusable

neglect and indifference to my duties on _mine_."

"April 14, 1842. I am very much obliged by your Lordship's kindness

in allowing me to write to you on the subject of my house at

Littlemore; at the same time I feel it hard both on your Lordship and

myself that the restlessness of the public mind should oblige you to

require an explanation of me.

"It is now a whole year that I have been the subject of incessant

misrepresentation. A year since I submitted entirely to your

Lordship's authority; and with the intention of following out the

particular act enjoined upon me, I not only stopped the series of

Tracts, on which I was engaged, but withdrew from all public

discussion of Church matters of the day, or what may be called

ecclesiastical politics. I turned myself at once to the preparation

for the Press of the translations of St. Athanasius to which I had

long wished to devote myself, and I intended and intend to employ

myself in the like theological studies, and in the concerns of my own

parish and in practical works.

"With the same view of personal improvement I was led more seriously

to a design which had been long on my mind. For many years, at least

thirteen, I have wished to give myself to a life of greater religious

regularity than I have hitherto led; but it is very unpleasant to

confess such a wish even to my Bishop, because it seems arrogant, and

because it is committing me to a profession which may come to

nothing. For what have I done that I am to be called to account by

the world for my private actions, in a way in which no one else is

called? Why may I not have that liberty which all others are allowed?

I am often accused of being underhand and uncandid in respect to the

intentions to which I have been alluding: but no one likes his own

good resolutions noised about, both from mere common delicacy and

from fear lest he should not be able to fulfil them. I feel it very

cruel, though the parties in fault do not know what they are doing,

that very sacred matters between me and my conscience are made a

matter of public talk. May I take a case parallel though different?

suppose a person in prospect of marriage; would he like the subject

discussed in newspapers, and parties, circumstances, etc., etc.,

publicly demanded of him, at the penalty of being accused of craft

and duplicity?

"The resolution I speak of has been taken with reference to myself

alone, and has been contemplated quite independent of the

co-operation of any other human being, and without reference to

success or failure other than personal, and without regard to the

blame or approbation of man. And being a resolution of years, and one

to which I feel God has called me, and in which I am violating no

rule of the Church any more than if I married, I should have to

answer for it, if I did not pursue it, as a good Providence made

openings for it. In pursuing it then I am thinking of myself alone,

not aiming at any ecclesiastical or external effects. At the same

time of course it would be a great comfort to me to know that God had

put it into the hearts of others to pursue their personal edification

in the same way, and unnatural not to wish to have the benefit of

their presence and encouragement, or not to think it a great

infringement on the rights of conscience if such personal and private

resolutions were interfered with. Your Lordship will allow me to add

my firm conviction that such religious resolutions are most necessary

for keeping a certain class of minds firm in their allegiance to our

Church; but still I can as truly say that my own reason for anything

I have done has been a personal one, without which I should not have

entered upon it, and which I hope to pursue whether with or without

the sympathies of others pursuing a similar course." ...

"As to my intentions, I purpose to live there myself a good deal, as

I have a resident curate in Oxford. In doing this, I believe I am

consulting for the good of my parish, as my population at Littlemore

is at least equal to that of St. Mary's in Oxford, and the _whole_ of

Littlemore is double of it. It has been very much neglected; and in

providing a parsonage-house at Littlemore, as this will be, and will

be called, I conceive I am doing a very great benefit to my people.

At the same time it has appeared to me that a partial or temporary

retirement from St. Mary's Church might be expedient under the

prevailing excitement.

"As to the quotation from the [newspaper] which I have not seen, your

Lordship will perceive from what I have said, that no 'monastery is

in process of erection;' there is no 'chapel;' no 'refectory,' hardly

a dining-room or parlour. The 'cloisters' are my shed connecting the

cottages. I do not understand what 'cells of dormitories' means. Of

course I can repeat your Lordship's words that 'I am not attempting

a revival of the Monastic Orders, in anything approaching to the

Romanist sense of the term,' or 'taking on myself to originate any

measure of importance without authority from the Heads of the

Church.' I am attempting nothing ecclesiastical, but something

personal and private, and which can only be made public, not private,

by newspapers and letter-writers, in which sense the most sacred and

conscientious resolves and acts may certainly be made the objects of

an unmannerly and unfeeling curiosity."

One calumny there was which the bishop did not believe, and of which

of course he had no idea of speaking. It was that I was actually in

the service of the enemy. I had been already received into the

Catholic Church, and was rearing at Littlemore a nest of Papists,

who, like me, were to take the Anglican oaths which they did not

believe, and for which they got dispensation from Rome, and thus in

due time were to bring over to that unprincipled Church great numbers

of the Anglican clergy and laity. Bishops gave their countenance to

this imputation against me. The case was simply this:--as I made

Littlemore a place of retirement for myself, so did I offer it to

others. There were young men in Oxford, whose testimonials for Orders

had been refused by their Colleges; there were young clergymen, who

had found themselves unable from conscience to go on with their

duties, and had thrown up their parochial engagements. Such men were

already going straight to Rome, and I interposed; I interposed for

the reasons I have given in the beginning of this portion of my

narrative. I interposed from fidelity to my clerical engagements, and

from duty to my Bishop; and from the interest which I was bound to

take in them, and from belief that they were premature or excited.

Their friends besought me to quiet them, if I could. Some of them

came to live with me at Littlemore. They were laymen, or in the place

of laymen. I kept some of them back for several years from being

received into the Catholic Church. Even when I had given up my

living, I was still bound by my duty to their parents or friends, and

I did not forget still to do what I could for them. The immediate

occasion of my resigning St. Mary's, was the unexpected conversion of

one of them. After that, I felt it was impossible to keep my post

there, for I had been unable to keep my word with my Bishop.

The following letters refer, more or less, to these men, whether they

were with me at Littlemore or not:--

1. 1843 or 1844. "I did not explain to you sufficiently the state of

mind of those who were in danger. I only spoke of those who were

convinced that our Church was external to the Church Catholic, though

they felt it unsafe to trust their own private convictions; but

there are two other states of mind; 1, that of those who are

unconsciously near Rome, and whose _despair_ about our Church would

at once develop into a state of conscious approximation, or a

_quasi_-resolution to go over; 2, those who feel they can with a safe

conscience remain with us _while_ they are allowed to _testify_ in

behalf of Catholicism, _i.e._ as if by such acts they were putting

our Church, or at least that portion of it in which they were

included, in the position of catechumens."

2. "July 16, 1843. I assure you that I feel, with only too much

sympathy, what you say. You need not be told that the whole subject

of our position is a subject of anxiety to others beside yourself. It

is no good attempting to offer advice, when perhaps I might raise

difficulties instead of removing them. It seems to me quite a case,

in which you should, as far as may be, make up your mind for

yourself. Come to Littlemore by all means. We shall all rejoice in

your company; and, if quiet and retirement are able, as they very

likely will be, to reconcile you to things as they are, you shall

have your fill of them. How distressed poor Henry Wilberforce must

be! Knowing how he values you, I feel for him; but, alas! he has his

own position, and every one else has his own, and the misery is that

no two of us have exactly the same.

"It is very kind of you to be so frank and open with me, as you are;

but this is a time which throws together persons who feel alike. May

I without taking a liberty sign myself, yours affectionately, etc."

3. "1845. I am concerned to find you speak of me in a tone of

distrust. If you knew me ever so little, instead of hearing of me

from persons who do not know me at all, you would think differently

of me, whatever you thought of my opinions. Two years since, I got

your son to tell you my intention of resigning St. Mary's, before I

made it public, thinking you ought to know it. When you expressed

some painful feeling upon it, I told him I could not consent to his

remaining here, painful as it would be to me to part with him,

without your written sanction. And this you did me the favour to

give.

"I believe you will find that it has been merely a delicacy on your

son's part, which has delayed his speaking to you about me for two

months past; a delicacy, lest he should say either too much or too

little about me. I have urged him several times to speak to you.

"Nothing can be done after your letter, but to recommend him to go to

A. B. (his home) at once. I am very sorry to part with him."

4. The following letter is addressed to a Catholic prelate, who

accused me of coldness in my conduct towards him:--

"April 16, 1845. I was at that time in charge of a ministerial office

in the English Church, with persons entrusted to me, and a Bishop to

obey; how could I possibly write otherwise than I did without

violating sacred obligations and betraying momentous interests which

were upon me? I felt that my immediate, undeniable duty, clear if

anything was clear, was to fulfil that trust. It might be right

indeed to give it up, that was another thing; but it never could be

right to hold it, and to act as if I did not hold it.... If you knew

me, you would acquit me, I think, of having ever felt towards your

Lordship an unfriendly spirit, or ever having had a shadow on my mind

(as far as I dare witness about myself) of what might be called

controversial rivalry or desire of getting the better, or fear lest

the world should think I had got the worst, or irritation of any

kind. You are too kind indeed to imply this, and yet your words lead

me to say it. And now in like manner, pray believe, though I cannot

explain it to you, that I am encompassed with responsibilities, so

great and so various, as utterly to overcome me, unless I have mercy

from Him, who all through my life has sustained and guided me, and to

whom I can now submit myself, though men of all parties are thinking

evil of me."

5. "August 30, 1843. A. B. has suddenly conformed to the Church of

Rome. He was away for three weeks. I suppose I must say in my

defence, that he promised me distinctly to remain in our Church three

years, before I received him here."

Such fidelity, however, was taken _in malam partem_ by the high

Anglican authorities; they thought it insidious. I happen still to

have a correspondence, in which the chief place is filled by one of

the most eminent bishops of the day, a theologian and reader of the

Fathers, a moderate man, who at one time was talked of as likely to

have the reversion of the Primacy. A young clergyman in his diocese

became a Catholic; the papers at once reported on authority from "a

very high quarter," that, after his reception, "the Oxford men had

been recommending him to retain his living." I had reasons for

thinking that the allusion was to me, and I authorised the editor of

a paper, who had inquired of me on the point, to "give it, as far as

I was concerned, an unqualified contradiction;"--when from a motive

of delicacy he hesitated, I added "my direct and indignant

contradiction." "Whoever is the author of it, no correspondence or

intercourse of any kind, direct or indirect, has passed," I continued

to the Editor, "between Mr. S. and myself, since his conforming to

the Church of Rome, except my formally and merely acknowledging the

receipt of his letter, in which he informed me of the fact, without,

as far as I recollect, my expressing any opinion upon it. You may

state this as broadly as I have set it down." My denial was told to

the Bishop; what took place upon it is given in a letter from which I

copy. "My father showed the letter to the Bishop, who, as he laid it

down, said, 'Ah, those Oxford men are not ingenuous.' 'How do you

mean?' I asked my father. 'Why,' said the Bishop, 'they advised Mr.

B. S. to retain his living after he turned Catholic. I know that to

be a fact, because A. B. told me so.'" "The Bishop," continues the

letter, "who is perhaps the most influential man in reality on the

bench, evidently believes it to be the truth." Dr. Pusey too wrote

for me to the Bishop; and the Bishop instantly beat a retreat. "I

have the honour," he says in the autograph which I transcribe, "to

acknowledge the receipt of your note, and to say in reply that it has

not been stated by me (though such a statement has, I believe,

appeared in some of the Public Prints), that Mr. Newman had advised

Mr. B. S. to retain his living, after he had forsaken our Church. But

it has been stated to me, that Mr. Newman was in close correspondence

with Mr. B. S., and, being fully aware of his state of opinions and

feelings, yet advised him to continue in our communion. Allow me to

add," he says to Dr. Pusey, "that neither your name, nor that of Mr.

Keble, was mentioned to me in connection with that of Mr. B. S."

I was not going to let the Bishop off on this evasion, so I wrote to

him myself. After quoting his letter to Dr. Pusey, I continued,

"I beg to trouble your Lordship with my own account of the two

allegations" [_close correspondence_ and _fully aware_, etc.] "which

are contained in your statement, and which have led to your speaking

of me in terms which I hope never to deserve. 1. Since Mr. B. S. has

been in your Lordship's diocese, I have seen him in common rooms or

private parties in Oxford two or three times, when I never (as far as

I can recollect) had any conversation with him. During the same time

I have, to the best of my memory, written to him three letters. One

was lately, in acknowledgment of his informing me of his change of

religion. Another was last summer, when I asked him (to no purpose)

to come and stay with me in this place. The earliest of the three

letters was written just a year since, as far as I recollect, and it

certainly was on the subject of his joining the Church of Rome. I

wrote this letter at the earnest wish of a friend of his. I cannot

be sure that, on his replying, I did not send him a brief note in

explanation of points in my letter which he had misapprehended. I

cannot recollect any other correspondence between us.

"2. As to my knowledge of his opinions and feelings, as far as I

remember, the only point of perplexity which I knew, the only point

which to this hour I know, as pressing upon him, was that of the

Pope's supremacy. He professed to be searching Antiquity whether the

see of Rome had formally that relation to the whole Church which

Roman Catholics now assign to it. My letter was directed to the

point, that it was his duty not to perplex himself with arguments on

[such] a question ... and to put it altogether aside.... It is hard

that I am put upon my memory, without knowing the details of the

statement made against me, considering the various correspondence in

which I am from time to time unavoidably engaged.... Be assured, my

Lord, that there are very definite limits, beyond which persons like

me would never urge another to retain preferment in the English

Church, nor would retain it themselves; and that the censure which

has been directed against them by so many of its Rulers has a very

grave bearing upon those limits." The Bishop replied in a civil

letter, and sent my own letter to his original informant, who wrote

to me the letter of a gentleman. It seems that an anxious lady had

said something or other which had been misinterpreted, against her

real meaning, into the calumny which was circulated, and so the

report vanished into thin air. I closed the correspondence with the

following letter to the Bishop:--

"I hope your Lordship will believe me when I say, that statements

about me, equally incorrect with that which has come to your

Lordship's ears, are from time to time reported to me as credited and

repeated by the highest authorities in our Church, though it is very

seldom that I have the opportunity of denying them. I am obliged

by your Lordship's letter to Dr. Pusey as giving me such an

opportunity." Then I added, with a purpose, "Your Lordship will

observe that in my Letter I had no occasion to proceed to the

question, whether a person holding Roman Catholic opinions can in

honesty remain in our Church. Lest then any misconception should

arise from my silence, I here take the liberty of adding, that I see

nothing wrong in such a person's continuing in communion with us,

provided he holds no preferment or office, abstains from the

management of ecclesiastical matters, and is bound by no subscription

or oath to our doctrines."

This was written on March 7, 1843, and was in anticipation of my own

retirement into lay communion. This again leads me to a remark; for

two years I was in lay communion, not indeed being a Catholic in my

convictions, but in a state of serious doubt, and with the probable

prospect of becoming some day, what as yet I was not. Under these

circumstances I thought the best thing I could do was to give up duty

and to throw myself into lay communion, remaining an Anglican. I

could not go to Rome, while I thought what I did of the devotions she

sanctioned to the Blessed Virgin and the Saints. I did not give up

my fellowship, for I could not be sure that my doubts would not be

reduced or overcome, however unlikely I thought such an event. But I

gave up my living; and, for two years before my conversion, I took no

clerical duty. My last sermon was in September, 1843; then I remained

at Littlemore in quiet for two years. But it was made a subject of

reproach to me at the time, and is at this day, that I did not leave

the Anglican Church sooner. To me this seems a wonderful charge;

why, even had I been quite sure that Rome was the true Church, the

Anglican Bishops would have had no just subject of complaint

against me, provided I took no Anglican oath, no clerical duty, no

ecclesiastical administration. Do they force all men who go to their

Churches to believe in the 39 Articles, or to join in the Athanasian

Creed? However, I was to have other measure dealt to me; great

authorities ruled it so; and a learned controversialist in the North

thought it a shame that I did not leave the Church of England as much

as ten years sooner than I did. His nephew, an Anglican clergyman,

kindly wished to undeceive him on this point. So, in 1850, after some

correspondence, I wrote the following letter, which will be of

service to this narrative, from its chronological character:--

"Dec. 6, 1849. Your uncle says, 'If he (Mr. N.) will declare, sans

phrase, as the French say, that I have laboured under an entire

mistake, and that he was not a concealed Romanist during the ten

years in question' (I suppose, the last ten years of my membership

with the Anglican Church), 'or during any part of the time, my

controversial antipathy will be at an end, and I will readily express

to him that I am truly sorry that I have made such a mistake.'

"So candid an avowal is what I should have expected from a mind like

your uncle's. I am extremely glad he has brought it to this issue.

"By a 'concealed Romanist' I understand him to mean one, who,

professing to belong to the Church of England, in his heart and will

intends to benefit the Church of Rome, at the expense of the Church

of England. He cannot mean by the expression merely a person who in

fact is benefiting the Church of Rome, while he is intending to

benefit the Church of England, for that is no discredit to him

morally, and he (your uncle) evidently means to impute blame.

"In the sense in which I have explained the words, I can simply and

honestly say that I was not a concealed Romanist during the whole, or

any part of, the years in question.

"For the first four years of the ten (up to Michaelmas, 1839) I

honestly wished to benefit the Church of England, at the expense of

the Church of Rome:

"For the second four years I wished to benefit the Church of England

without prejudice to the Church of Rome:

"At the beginning of the ninth year (Michaelmas, 1843) I began to

despair of the Church of England, and gave up all clerical duty; and

then, what I wrote and did was influenced by a mere wish not to

injure it, and not by the wish to benefit it:

"At the beginning of the tenth year I distinctly contemplated leaving

it, but I also distinctly told my friends that it was in my

contemplation.

"Lastly, during the last half of that tenth year I was engaged in

writing a book (Essay on Development) in favour of the Roman Church,

and indirectly against the English; but even then, till it was

finished, I had not absolutely intended to publish it, wishing

to reserve to myself the chance of changing my mind when the

argumentative views which were actuating me had been distinctly

brought out before me in writing.

"I wish this statement, which I make from memory, and without

consulting any document, severely tested by my writings and doings,

as I am confident it will, on the whole, be borne out, whatever real

or apparent exceptions (I suspect none) have to be allowed by me in

detail.

"Your uncle is at liberty to make what use he pleases of this

explanation."

I have now reached an important date in my narrative, the year 1843,

but before proceeding to the matters which it contains, I will insert

portions of my letters from 1841 to 1843, addressed to Catholic

acquaintances.

1. "April 8, 1841 ... The unity of the Church Catholic is very near

my heart, only I do not see any prospect of it in our time; and I

despair of its being effected without great sacrifices on all hands.

As to resisting the Bishop's will, I observe that no point of

doctrine or principle was in dispute, but a course of action, the

publication of certain works. I do not think you sufficiently

understood our position. I suppose you would obey the holy see in

such a case; now, when we were separated from the Pope, his authority

reverted to our Diocesans. Our Bishop is our Pope. It is our theory,

that each diocese is an integral Church, intercommunion being a duty

(and the breach of it a sin), but not essential to Catholicity.

To have resisted my Bishop, would have been to place myself in an

utterly false position, which I never could have recovered. Depend

upon it, the strength of any party lies in its being _true to its

theory_. Consistency is the life of a movement.

"I have no misgivings whatever that the line I have taken can be

other than a prosperous one: that is, in itself, for of course

Providence may refuse to us its legitimate issues for our sins.

"I am afraid, that in one respect you may be disappointed. It is my

trust, though I must not be too sanguine, that we shall not have

individual members of our communion going over to yours. What one's

duty would be under other circumstances, what our duty ten or twenty

years ago, I cannot say; but I do think that there is less of private

judgment in going with one's Church, than in leaving it. I can

earnestly desire a union between my Church and yours. I cannot listen

to the thought of your being joined by individuals among us."

2. "April 26, 1841. My only anxiety is lest your branch of the Church

should not meet us by those reforms which surely are _necessary_. It

never could be, that so large a portion of Christendom should have

split off from the communion of Rome, and kept up a protest for 300

years for nothing. I think I never shall believe that so much piety

and earnestness would be found among Protestants, if there were

not some very grave errors on the side of Rome. To suppose the

contrary is most unreal, and violates all one's notions of moral

probabilities. All aberrations are founded on, and have their life

in, some truth or other--and Protestantism, so widely spread and so

long enduring, must have in it, and must be witness for, a great

truth or much truth. That I am an advocate for Protestantism, you

cannot suppose--but I am forced into a _Via Media_, short of Rome, as

it is at present."

3. "May 5, 1841. While I most sincerely hold that there is in the

Roman Church a traditionary system which is not necessarily connected

with her essential formularies, yet, were I ever so much to change my

mind on this point, this would not tend to bring me from my present

position, providentially appointed in the English Church. That

your communion was unassailable, would not prove that mine was

indefensible. Nor would it at all affect the sense in which I receive

our Articles; they would still speak against certain definite errors,

though you had reformed them.

"I say this lest any lurking suspicion should be left in the mind of

your friends that persons who think with me are likely, by the growth

of their present views, to find it imperative on them to pass over to

your communion. Allow me to state strongly, that if you have any such

thoughts, and proceed to act upon them, your friends will be

committing a fatal mistake. We have (I trust) the principle and

temper of obedience too intimately wrought into us to allow of our

separating ourselves from our ecclesiastical superiors because in

many points we may sympathise with others. We have too great a horror

of the principle of private judgment to trust it in so immense a

matter as that of changing from one communion to another. We may be

cast out of our communion, or it may decree heresy to be truth--you

shall say whether such contingencies are likely; but I do not see

other conceivable causes of our leaving the Church in which we were

baptized.

"For myself, persons must be well acquainted with what I have written

before they venture to say whether I have much changed my main

opinions and cardinal views in the course of the last eight years.

That my _sympathies_ have grown towards the religion of Rome I do not

deny; that my _reasons_ for _shunning_ her communion have lessened or

altered it would be difficult perhaps to prove. And I wish to go by

reason, not by feeling."

4. "June 18, 1841. You urge persons whose views agree with mine to

commence a movement in behalf of a union between the Churches. Now

in the letters I have written, I have uniformly said that I did not

expect that union in our time, and have discouraged the notion of all

sudden proceedings with a view to it. I must ask your leave to repeat

on this occasion most distinctly, that I cannot be party to any

agitation, but mean to remain quiet in my own place, and to do all I

can to make others take the same course. This I conceive to be my

simple duty; but, over and above this, I will not set my teeth on

edge with sour grapes. I know it is quite within the range of

possibilities that one or another of our people should go over to

your communion; however, it would be a greater misfortune to you than

grief to us. If your friends wish to put a gulf between themselves

and us, let them make converts, but not else. Some months ago, I

ventured to say that I felt it a painful duty to keep aloof from all

Roman Catholics who came with the intention of opening negotiations

for the union of the Churches: when you now urge us to petition our

Bishops for a union, this, I conceive, is very like an act of

negotiation."

5. I have the first sketch or draft of a letter, which I wrote to a

zealous Catholic layman: it runs as follows, as I have preserved

it:--September 12, 1841. "It would rejoice all Catholic minds among

us, more than words can say, if you could persuade members of the

Church of Rome to take the line in politics which you so earnestly

advocate. Suspicion and distrust are the main causes at present of

the separation between us, and the nearest approaches in doctrine

will but increase the hostility, which, alas, our people feel towards

yours, while these causes continue. Depend upon it, you must not rely

upon our Catholic tendencies till they are removed. I am not speaking

of myself, or of any friends of mine; but of our Church generally.

Whatever _our_ personal feelings may be, we shall but tend to raise

and spread a _rival_ Church to yours in the four quarters of the

world, unless _you_ do what none but you _can_ do. Sympathies, which

would flow over to the Church of Rome, as a matter of course, did she

admit them, will but be developed in the consolidation of our own

system, if she continues to be the object of our suspicions and

fears. I wish, of course I do, that our own Church may be built up

and extended, but still, not at the cost of the Church of Rome, not

in opposition to it. I am sure, that, while you suffer, we suffer too

from the separation; _but we cannot remove the obstacles_; it is with

you to do so. You do not fear us; we fear you. Till we cease to fear

you, we cannot love you.

"While you are in your present position, the friends of Catholic

unity in our Church are but fulfilling the prediction of those of

your body who are averse to them, viz. that they will be merely

strengthening a rival communion to yours. Many of you say that _we_

are your greatest enemies; we have said so ourselves: so we are, so

we shall be, as things stand at present. We are keeping people from

you, by supplying their wants in our own Church. We _are_ keeping

persons from you: do you wish us to keep them from you for a time or

for ever? It rests with you to determine. I do not fear that you will

succeed among us; you will not supplant our Church in the affections

of the English nation; only through the English Church can you act

upon the English nation. I wish of course our Church should be

consolidated, with and through and in your communion, for its sake,

and your sake, and for the sake of unity.

"Are you aware that the more serious thinkers among us are used, as

far as they dare form an opinion, to regard the spirit of Liberalism

as the characteristic of the destined Antichrist? In vain does any

one clear the Church of Rome from the badges of Antichrist, in which

Protestants would invest her, if she deliberately takes up her

position in the very quarter, whither we have cast them, when we took

them off from her. Antichrist is described as the [greek: anomos],

as exalting himself above the yoke of religion and law. The spirit

of lawlessness came in with the Reformation, and Liberalism is its

offspring.

"And now I fear I am going to pain you by telling you, that you

consider the approaches in doctrine on our part towards you, closer

than they really are. I cannot help repeating what I have many times

said in print, that your services and devotions to St. Mary in matter

of fact do most deeply pain me. I am only stating it as a fact.

"Again, I have nowhere said that I can accept the decrees of Trent

throughout, nor implied it. The doctrine of Transubstantiation is a

great difficulty with me, as being, as I think, not primitive. Nor

have I said that our Articles in all respects admit of a Roman

interpretation; the very word 'Transubstantiation' is disowned in

them.