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 THE VIA MEDIA ^ ~ 
 
 THE ANGLICAN CHUECH. 
 
 ILLUSTRATED IN LECTURES, LETTERS, 
 AND TRACTS 
 
 WRITTEN BETWEEN 1830 AND 1841. 
 
 JOHN HENRY NEWMAN, 
 
 OF THE OEATOET, 
 SOMETIME TELLOW OP OEIEL COLLEGE. 
 
 v 
 
 IN TWO VOLUMES, 
 WITH A PEEFACE AND NOTES. 
 
 VOL. I. 
 
 Hontfon: 
 PICKERING AND CO. 
 
 1882. 
 

 From the 
 
 Library of 
 
 L. IV. McGrath, Jr 
 
 tf^M* 
 
PREFATORY NOTICE. 
 
 It stands to reason that these Volumes must 
 contain various statements, which I am sorry to 
 have made, and which I reproduce at the present 
 time not without pain. Gladly would I obliterate 
 them, but that cannot be ; and I have only the 
 alternative of publishing them afresh with what I 
 consider a refutation, or leaving them unanswered 
 to the chance of publication by others at some 
 future time. I have chosen to republish them 
 myself, and perhaps it would be some want of faith 
 in the Truth, or some over-appreciation of my own 
 controversial powers, if I had any dread lest my 
 present explanations in behalf of the Catholic 
 Religion could be inferior in cogency to the charges 
 which I once brought against it. 
 
 I repeat here what I wrote in the Advertise- 
 ment of the recent edition of my Essays : — 
 
 " The author cannot destroy what he has once 
 put into print : ' Litera scrip ta manet.' He might 
 suppress it for a time ; but, sooner or later, his 
 
VI PREFATORY NOTICE. 
 
 power over it will cease. And then, if, either in 
 its matter or its drift, it is adapted to benefit the 
 cause which it was intended to support at the 
 time when it was given to the world, it will be re- 
 published, in spite of his later disavowal of it. 
 
 te In order to anticipate the chance of its being 
 thus used after his death, the only way open to 
 him is, while living, without altering the original 
 text, to accompany it with additions calculated to 
 explain why it has ceased to approve itself to his 
 own judgment. If he does as much as this, he 
 may reasonably hope, that either no reprint of it 
 will be made hereafter, or that the reprint of his 
 first thoughts will in fairness be allowed to carry 
 with it a reprint of his second. And he is san- 
 guine that he has been able to reduce what is 
 uncatholic in these volumes, whether in argument 
 or statement, to the position of those ' Difficul- 
 tates' which figure in dogmatic treatises of 
 theology, and which are elaborately drawn out, 
 and set forth to best advantage, in order that they 
 may be the more carefully and satisfactorily 
 answered." 
 
 The Oratory, 
 May 26, 1877. 
 
VOLUME I. 
 
 LECTURES 
 
 ON THE 
 
 PROPHETICAL OFFICE OF THE CHURCH 
 
 VIEWED EELATIYELT TO 
 
 ROMANISM AND POPULAR PROTESTANTISM. 
 
TO 
 
 MARTIN JOSEPH ROUTH, D.D. 
 
 PRESIDENT OF MAGDALEN COLLEGE, 
 WHO HAS BEEN RESERVED 
 
 TO REPORT TO A FORGETFUL GENERATION 
 WHAT WAS THE THEOLOGY OF THEIR FATHERS, 
 
 THIS VOLUME 
 
 IS INSCRIBED, 
 
 WITH A RESPECTFUL SENSE 
 
 OF HIS EMINENT SERVICES TO THE CHURCH, 
 
 AND WITH THE PRAYER 
 
 THAT WHAT HE WITNESSES TO OTHERS 
 
 MAY BE HIS OWN SUPPORT AND PROTECTION 
 
 IN THE DAY OF ACCOUNT. 
 
 Feb. 24, 1837. 
 
ADVERTISEMENT 
 TO THE FIRST AND SECOND EDITIONS. 
 
 The following Volume has grown out of Parochial Lectures 
 delivered on weekdays ; and, had its limits admitted, 
 would have embraced the Sacerdotal as well as the 
 Prophetical office of the Church. Great portions of a 
 correspondence which the writer commenced with a learned 
 and zealous member of the Gallican Church are also 
 incorporated in it. 
 
 To prevent misconception as to the meaning of the 
 Title-page, he would observe, that by popular Protes- 
 tantism he only wishes to designate that generalized idea 
 of religion, now in repute, which merges all differences of 
 faith and principle between Protestants as minor matters, 
 as if the larger denominations among us agreed with us in 
 essentials, and differed only in the accidents of form, ritual, 
 government, or usage. Viewed politically, Protestantism 
 is at this day the rallying-point of all that is loyal and 
 high-minded in the nation; but political considerations 
 do not enter into the scope of his work. 
 
Xll ADVERTISEMENT 
 
 He has endeavoured in all important points of doctrine 
 to guide himself by our standard divines, and, had space 
 admitted, would have selected passages from their writings 
 in evidence of it. Such a collection of Testimonies is 
 almost a duty on the part of every author, who professes, 
 not to strike out new theories, but to build up and fortify 
 what has been committed to us. For specimens of what he 
 here has in view he refers to the Catenas Patrum published 
 in the Tracts for the Times. In the absence of such in 
 this place, he hopes it will not look like presumption to 
 desire to make his own the following noble professions of 
 the great Bramhall. 
 
 " No man can justly blame me for honouring my spiri- 
 tual Mother, the Church of England, in whose womb I 
 was conceived, at whose breasts I was nourished, and in 
 whose bosom I hope to die. Bees, by the instinct of 
 nature, do love their hives, and birds their nests. But, 
 God is my witness, that, according to my uttermost talent 
 and poor understanding, I have endeavoured to set down 
 the naked truth impartially, without either favour or 
 prejudice, the two capital enemies of right judgment. 
 The one of which, like a false mirror, doth represent things 
 fairer and straighter than they are; the other like 
 the tongue infected with choler makes the sweetest meats 
 to taste bitter. My desire hath been to have Truth for 
 
TO THE FIRST AND SECOND EDITIONS. Xlll 
 
 my chiefest friend, and no enemy but error. If I have 
 had any bias, it hath been my desire of peace, which our 
 common Saviour left as a legacy to His Church, that I 
 might live to see the re-union of Christendom, for which 
 I shall always bow the knees of my heart to the Father of 
 our Lord Jesus Christ. It is not impossible but that this 
 desire of unity may have produced some unwilling error 
 of love, but certainly I am most free from the wilful love 
 of error. In questions of an inferior nature, Chiist re- 
 gards a charitable intention much more than a right 
 opinion. 
 
 " Howsoever it be, I submit myself and my poor 
 endeavours, first to the judgment of the Catholic Ecu- 
 menical essential Church, which if some of late days have 
 endeavoured to hiss out of the schools as a fancy, I cannot 
 help it. From the beginning it was not so. And if I 
 should mistake the right Catholic Church out of human 
 frailty or ignorance (which, for my part, I have no reason 
 in the world to suspect, yet it is not impossible when the 
 Eomanists themselves are divided into five or six several 
 opinions, what this Catholic Church, or what their infalli- 
 ble Judge is), I do implicitly and in the preparation of my 
 mind submit myself to the true Catholic Church, the 
 Spouse of Christ, the mother of the Saints, the Pillar of 
 Truth. And seeing my adherence is firmer to the Infalli- 
 
XIV ADVERTISEMENT, ETC. 
 
 ble Rule of Faith, that is, the Holy Scriptures interpreted 
 by the Catholic Church, than to mine own private judg- 
 ment or opinions, although I should unwittingly fall into 
 an error, yet this cordial submission is an implicit retracta- 
 tion thereof, and I am confident will be so accepted by 
 the Father of Mercies, both from me and all others who 
 seriously and sincerely do seek after peace and truth. 
 
 "Likewise I submit myself to the Representative Church, 
 that is, a free General Council, or so General as can be 
 procured; and until then to the Church of England, 
 wherein I was baptized, or to a National English Synod. 
 To the determination of all which, and each of these 
 respectively, according to the distinct degree of their 
 authority, I yield a conformity and compliance, or at 
 the least and to the lowest of them, an acquiescence." — 
 Works, p. 141. 
 
 Oriel College, 
 The Feast of St. Matthias, 1837. 
 
PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. 
 
 I propose here in some introductory pages to consider, first, 
 how far and with what argumentative force these Lectures, 
 published just forty years since, bear upon the teaching in 
 faith and morals of the Catholic Church, against which 
 they were more or less directed ; and next what satisfactory 
 answer can be given in explanation of the main charges in 
 which they issue. As to incidental objections and matters 
 of detail, they shall be dealt with in bracketed notes, in 
 loco, at the foot of the page, as they occur. 
 
 ii. 
 
 I have said that these Lectures are "more or less" directed 
 against points in Catholic teaching, and that I should con- 
 sider " how far," because it must be borne in mind that the 
 formal purpose of the Volume was, not an attack upon that 
 teaching, but the establishment of a doctrine of its own, 
 the Anglican Via Media. It only indirectly comes into 
 collision with the theology of Eome. That theology lay 
 in the very threshold of the author's experiment ; he came 
 across it, whether he would or no, and, while he attacked 
 
XVI PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. 
 
 it at considerable length, in its details, he adopted its main 
 principles and many of its conclusions ; and, as obliterating 
 thereby or ignoring the very rudiments of Protestantism, 
 he acted far more as an assailant of the religion of the 
 Reformation than of what he called u Popery." 
 
 " The immediate reason," he says in his Introduction, 
 " for discussing the subject [of the Church] is this : Tn the 
 present day such incidental notice of it, as Christian 
 teachers are led to take in the course of their pastoral 
 instructions, is sure to be charged with what is commonly 
 called e Popery : ' and for this reason — that, Romanists 
 having ever insisted upon it, and Protestants having 
 neglected it, to speak of it at all, though it is mentioned in 
 the Creed, is thought to savour of Romanism. Those then 
 who feel its importance, and yet are not Romanists, are 
 bound on several accounts to show why they are not 
 Romanists, and how they differ from them," infr. p. 5. 
 
 He continues : ' ' This happens for another reason. After 
 all, the main subject in discussion should be, not to refute 
 error merely, but to establish truth. . . [Christians] have 
 a demand on their teachers for the meaning of the article 
 of the Creed, which binds them to faith 'in the Holy 
 Catholic Church.' ... To do this effectually, we must 
 proceed on the plan of attacking Romanism, as the most 
 convenient method of exhibiting our own views about it. 
 
PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. XV11 
 
 It has pre-occupied the ground, and we cannot erect our 
 own structure without partly breaking down, partly using 
 what we find upon it. And thus for a second reason the 
 following Lectures, as far as their very form goes, are 
 chiefly written against Romanism, though their main 
 object is not controversy, but edification," pp. 6, 7. 
 
 Nay, still further, as a matter of duty, he made it a 
 special point in the composition of his Yolume to inflict 
 upon his own people the intellectual force, nay the truth of 
 the Roman teaching, viewed as a whole, in spite of large 
 and serious errors in detail, in order to open Protestant eyes 
 to the weakness of Protestant polemics, and to persuade 
 Protestant divines to fall back and take up a safer position, 
 giving up what they could not hope to retain, and 
 maintaining by sound and clear argument what they 
 could not religiously surrender. Hence, large portions of 
 these Lectures are expositions, nay, recommendations of 
 principles and doctrines, recognized in the Catholic Church, 
 and in these portions, now that I take up the Volume afresh 
 as a Catholic, I have nothing or little to alter. 
 
 Such is good part of the first Lecture, which is on the 
 subject of Tradition, and explains and professes Catholic 
 teaching respecting it with very few statements which 
 
 vol. i. a 
 
XV111 PEEFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. 
 
 require correction or addition. The doctrine treated in 
 the second Lecture is that of the cogency of Ancient 
 Consent or of the testimony of Antiquity ; and here again 
 what Catholics hold is accurately expounded and affirmed, 
 though at the same time various instances are adduced to 
 show that Catholics in practice contradict the principle 
 which they formally profess. 
 
 The third and fourth Lectures are anti-catholic from 
 beginning to end, and constitute the special portion of the 
 Volume which is antagonistic to the Roman Church. These 
 two Lectures are mainly occupied in tracing the supposed 
 evils which come of the doctrine of Infallibility, though in 
 a later Lecture the author seems to consider that privilege as 
 having been intended by Divine Providence for His Church, 
 and as actually enjoyed by her for some centuries. 
 
 The fifth, on Private Judgment, is a delineation and 
 defence of the Via Media, for which on the whole it is little 
 more than an apology, confessing it to be, as a doctrine, 
 wanting in simplicity, hard to master, indetermiuate in its 
 provisions, and without a substantive existence in any age 
 or country. 
 
 The sixth, which is on the abuse of Private Judgment, 
 might have been written by a Catholic, and so might the 
 first part of the seventh, till the argument passes on to 
 an attack upon the doctrines of Purgatory and Papal 
 Supremacy. 
 
PREFACE TO THE TH1ED EDITION. XIX 
 
 In the eighth, ninth, and tenth, amid much which a 
 Catholic would condemn and protest against, it is allowed 
 that the Church, which the Apostles founded, is " ever 
 divinely guided to teach the truth," is " indefectible in 
 her witness of the Christian faith," " has a supernatural 
 gift " for the purpose of transmitting it, and is " unerring, 
 infallible, in matters of saving faith," 
 
 The three which follow, the eleventh, twelfth, and 
 thirteenth, on Scripture as the Rule of Faith, are in such 
 wise guarded and explained as virtually to admit, while 
 denying, the authority of Tradition, and are for the most 
 part in accordance, or reconcilable, with Catholic belief 
 on the subject, in spite of some misconception of our 
 teaching, and of language which needs correction. 
 
 The last Lecture, like the Introduction, is a candid 
 confession of the shortcomings and reverses of the 
 Anglican Establishment, and only so far injurious to the 
 Catholic Church as it is an attempt to shelter such misfor- 
 tunes, past or present, behind those scandals, of which the 
 Church herself has been from time to time the victim. 
 
 Thus at least one half of the Volume, as I consider, is 
 taken up with an advocacy, unexceptionable more or less, of 
 Catholic principles and doctrines ; with this I can have no 
 quarrel, and must turn to the other half, if I am to find 
 matter for it. Such matter no doubt there is, and serious 
 
 a 2 
 
XX PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION". 
 
 too ; but, before proceeding to it, I have to distinguish 
 between those statements or charges which can claim an 
 answer, as being argumentative, and those which cannot. 
 
 3. 
 
 I observe then that controversial writings are for the 
 most part made up of three main elements, only one of which 
 is, strictly speaking, of an argumentative character, 
 meaning by argument truths and facts, together with 
 deductions from them. This last is the logical element ; 
 but there are other two instruments in controversy seldom 
 dispensed with by those who engage in it, and more or less 
 rhetorical, and which, though they may have a considerable 
 place in these Lectures, have no claim to a place in this 
 Preface. 
 
 One of these two is the free use of hypothesis, as a sub- 
 stitute for direct evidence and hard reasoning, in support 
 of propositions which have to be maintained ; I mean, a 
 suggestion of views more or less probable or possible, and 
 either consistent, or not inconsistent, or perhaps in actual 
 concurrence, as ideas, with the facts of the case; and this, in 
 order to reconcile difficulties and answer objections, to sup- 
 plement what is obscure or deficient, to bring together into 
 one separate matters which seem to be without a meaning, 
 and to assign a law for them, where none was suspected. 
 
PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. XXI 
 
 Such hypotheses are altogether legitimate, and often 
 necessary ; for representations may be true, which never- 
 theless are not or cannot be proved ; and probabilities, 
 when accumulated, tell, and new openings for thought and 
 for discovery are sometimes the issue of what is in the first 
 instance little more than a conjecture. Still such hypo- 
 theses appeal to the imagination more than to the reasoning 
 faculty; and, while by their plausibility, ingenuity, or 
 brilliancy, they may gain from the reader more sympathy 
 than is strictly their due, they do not admit, and on that 
 account cannot demand, a logical refutation. Reason can- 
 not be called on to demolish what reason has not even 
 professed to establish. 
 
 For instance, in answer to the argument against the 
 Plurality of Worlds, drawn from the fact that first presents 
 itself to scientific observation on the question, viz. that the 
 Moon is but a cinder unsuitable to animal life, it has been 
 objected, I believe, that, for what we know, a rich soil, 
 a profuse vegetation, and races of animals, sentient and 
 intellectual, may be on the hemisphere, which we never 
 see. This is an hypothesis for the occasion ; and till 
 arguments are adduced in its behalf, it cannot challenge a 
 reply. So also, it is an hypothesis to suggest, with a view 
 to reconcile the Scripture text about the creation of Adam 
 with recent scientific possibilities as to the origin and past 
 
XX11 PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. 
 
 duration of man, that the second chapter of Genesis and 
 the first relate to different creations, and that there was a 
 race of Pre- Adamites. 
 
 4. 
 
 Such is an hypothesis ; and, to come to the subject of 
 these Lectures, such also is the Via Media, a possible road, 
 lying between a mountain and a morass, to be driven 
 through formidable obstacles, if it is to exist, by the 
 boldness and skill of the engineers. It is projected and 
 planned for a definite necessity, the necessity of the 
 Anglican position, except for which it would never have 
 been imagined ; and, as many other projects and plans, it 
 may be made to look very fair on paper. And this dressing 
 up of an hypothesis being the scope of the Author's 
 undertaking here, it is not wonderful, that he should be all 
 through " qualis ab incepto ;" that he should be fertile in 
 hypotheses in subservience to his main theory, as expedients 
 for successive emergencies, that he should aim at consis- 
 tency in his statements rather than at proof founded on 
 evidence, and in consequence that, for the most part, 
 he cannot claim to be formally refuted. 
 
 And, indeed, he starts with a profession whioh, unobjec- 
 tionable as it is in itself, prepares the reader for the 
 unsubstantial character of the discussions whioh are to 
 
PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. XX111 
 
 follow. " What Christians especially need and have a 
 right to expect/' he says in the Introduction, " is a positive 
 doctrine on such subjects as come under notice. . . It is a 
 poor answer merely to set about an attack upon Romanism. 
 .... Erroneous or not, a view it certainly does contain, 
 and that religion, which attempts a view, though imperfect 
 or extreme, does more than those who do not attempt it at 
 all." p. 6. I subscribe to this doctrine as reasonable and 
 true ; but, as to its bearing on the Author's undertaking, 
 two things were necessary for the defence of the Anglican 
 Church, a broad, intellectual, intelligible theory, and a 
 logical and historical foundation for that theory ; and he 
 was content to attempt the former, taking the latter for 
 granted. 
 
 Proof was not the main object of his book ; as far as he 
 aimed at proof in behalf of Anglicanism, he insisted on 
 its reasonableness and consistency : and this, though at the 
 same time he was accusing the theology of Rome of basing 
 itself on consistency to the neglect of truth. He avows that 
 Christianity itself does not in the first place depend on or 
 require argument. He thinks the very preaching of it suf- 
 ficient to secure its victory. ' ' Truth," he says, " has the gift 
 of overcoming the human heart, whether by persuasion or 
 compulsion ; and, if what we preach be truth, it must be 
 natural, it must be popular, it will make itself popular." 
 
XXIV PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. 
 
 p. 15. Here again I go with him: I readily grant in 
 particular that there is much truth in Anglican teaching, 
 and that, so far, it does and will, while it lasts, powerfully 
 affect the multitude of men, to whom it comes; but I 
 cannot allow to the Church of Eugland itself what is 
 true of much of its teaching and mauy of its teachers, for 
 that teaching and those teachers, who are so effective, 
 know nothing of the Via Media. 
 
 However, this innate persuasiveness, as he considered it, 
 of the Via Media, was in truth the writer's chief stay in the 
 controversy. He did not set much by patristical litera- 
 ture or by history. He frankly allows that his theory 
 had never been realized, and that for 1800 years the true 
 Gospel, as regards his special aspect of it, had never been 
 preached to the world. " The doctrines in question," he 
 says, in the mouth of an objector, " are in one sense as 
 entirely new, as Christianity was when first preached. 
 Protestantism and Popery are real religions . . . they 
 have furnished the mould in which nations have been cast ; 
 but the Via Media, viewed as an integral system, has 
 scarcely had existence, except on paper." He adds, " It 
 cannot be denied there is force in these representations, 
 though I would not adopt them to their full extent," 
 pp. 16, 17. 
 
 As to the ante-Nicene period, made so much of by Angli- 
 
PREFACE TO THE THIED EDITION. XXV 
 
 can divines, lie limits himself to the task of ascertaining 
 " what is the nearest approximation to that primitive truth 
 which Ignatius and Polycarp enjoyed, and which the 19th 
 century has virtually lost ? " p. 7. It was almost enough 
 for him that the Fathers did not contradict him, and that 
 he was not obliged absolutely to part company with them ; 
 for, as matters stood, he felt the Anglican hypothesis could 
 shoot up and thrive in the gaps between the trees which 
 were the pride of the Eden of primitive truth, neither 
 choking nor choked by their foliage. And he hoped to 
 be able to retain Origen and Cyprian, though he held by 
 Laud. 
 
 5. 
 So much in the Introduction ; and the Lectures which 
 follow are in keeping with it. Take, for instance, the 
 fifth, on Private Judgment, it is scarcely more than a 
 gratuitous hypothesis from beginning to end, supported 
 neither by Scripture, nor Antiquity, — and an intricate 
 hypothesis, as the Author confesses. " It cannot easily be 
 mastered," he says, "first, because it is of a complex nature, 
 involving a combination of principles, and depending 
 on multiplied conditions ; next, because it partakes of that 
 indeterminateness, which is to a certain extent the 
 characteristic of English theology ; lastly, because it has 
 never been realized," p. 129. Accordingly he " attempts 
 
XXVI PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. 
 
 to describe it, first in theory, and then as if reduced to 
 practice." To prove it from the Fathers, or from the 
 nature of the case, does not enter into the scope of his 
 undertaking. When he has finished his sketch of it, he 
 assures the reader that C( he really does believe" p. 143, 
 that in point of " primitive simplicity, rational freedom, 
 truth and certainty," his rule of determining revealed 
 doctrine is better than the Roman. 
 
 And so, when he comes to the question of the indefectibi- 
 lity of the Church, though he argues, and plausibly, from 
 the parallel of the Jewish dispensation, that gifts may have 
 been intended for an elect people, and even promised 
 them, of which they came short in the event, yet he is far 
 more bent on distinguishing between the Roman and the 
 Anglican teaching on the subject under review, than on 
 proving the Anglican to be true. He says, u I have said 
 enough by way of distinguishing between our own and 
 the Roman theology, and of showing that neither our 
 concessions are reluctantly made, nor our differences subtle 
 and nugatory, as is objected by opponents," p. 211. And 
 further on : " These distinctions are surely portions of a 
 real view, which, while it relieves the mind of those bur- 
 dens and perplexities which are the portion of the mere 
 Protestant, is essentially distinct from Romanism," p. 213. 
 To draw out these distinctions, indeed, was his primary 
 
PEEFACE TO THE TH1ED EDITION. XXV11 
 
 reason for writing" about the Roman Church at all, as he 
 stated in a passage already quoted. 
 
 6. 
 
 2. So much on one of the non-logical aspects, under 
 which these Lectures may in their controversial character be 
 regarded. The other, tliough often presented to us in such 
 works, is not so blameless. It is the coarse rhetoric of hard 
 names and sweeping imputations in advance of proof, proof 
 not only not adduced, but not even promised. Incontroversy 
 one has no right to complain of strong conclusions, but to 
 assume them on starting is the act of a pleader or advocate, 
 not of a theologian. I will not indeed say that this arm in 
 polemical attack is altogether inadmissible, but at least it is 
 not logical, and may without scruple be ignored and passed 
 over by a respondent. It is at times, and in a measure 
 pardonable, when it stands for a token or symbol of earnest- 
 ness in an assailant, and of confidence in the goodness of 
 bis cause. From the freshness and originality of thought 
 which gives life to such rhetoric, — or from the authority of 
 the speaker or writer which gives it weight, — or from the 
 congeniality of strong words in the matter in dispute with 
 the sentiments of the audience or hearer, — or from their 
 terseness and keenness as dicta, appeals, denunciations, 
 defiances, — or again as the vehicle of humorous images, 
 
XXVlll PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. 
 
 satirical nick-names, epigrammatic hits, — or as watch- 
 words in a great conflict — they may be serviceable, nay, 
 indispensable, in exciting attention and interest, in en- 
 couraging the wavering or timid, and in diffusing light 
 over subjects obscure or abstruse ; but after all, or for 
 the most part, their proper place is public meetings or the 
 Courts of Law, and, when disjoined from argument, they are 
 as unworthy of ecclesiastics as they are easy and seductive. 
 
 7. 
 
 I wish these Lectures did not furnish instances of 
 this reprehensible polemic. There was a great deal of 
 calling of names all through them, (I do not mean as 
 regards individuals but as against " Romanism/') of which 
 the Author has cause to be ashamed. That very word 
 " Romanism/' together with " Romanist " and " Romish/' 
 is an instance, though not the worst. It is not the worst, 
 first from the great need there is of some word to take its 
 place in the case of an Anglican controversialist, who 
 could not consistently with his own pretensions use the 
 right words Catholic and Catholicity. And again the 
 offensive word had a specific and definite meaning, conve- 
 nient in polemical writings, even if elsewhere improper. It 
 was not used in this Volume simply for Catholics and their 
 religion ; but for that particular aspect, which both their 
 
PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. XXIX 
 
 faith and they themselves bore, when they identified 
 themselves with the See of Rome and its characteristic 
 claims and tenets. 1 The more a writer revered that 
 wonderful See and followed its teaching — (and, several 
 years before these Lectures appeared, their Author had 
 spoken of " the high gifts and strong claims of the Church 
 of Rome on our admiration, reverence, love, and gratitude,'" 
 and had asked how we could " refrain from melting into 
 tenderness and rushing into communion with it/' but for 
 its errors), — the more he had these feelings towards it, the 
 more he needed a word which would distinguish what he 
 accepted from what scandalized him. One of the character- 
 istics of this Volume, of which I shall have to say much 
 presently, is the recurring contrast insisted on in it between 
 the theological side of Roman teaching and its political 
 and popular side ; and it was the latter which the Author 
 had chiefly in mind, when he spoke of Romanists and 
 Romanism. However, Catholics feel that appellation to 
 be a nick-name, whatever may be said in its defence ; and 
 it does not become those who are so sensitive at being 
 called Protestants (though Laud took the title to himself 
 
 1 " Viewed as an active and political power, as a ruling, grasping, ambi- 
 tious principle, in a word, as what is expressively called Popery," &c, infr. 
 p. 83. " This system I have called, in what 1 have written, Romanism or 
 Popery, and by Romanists or Papists I mean all its members so far as they 
 are under the power of these principles," infr. vol. 2, Letter to Bishop of 
 Oxford. 
 
XXX PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. 
 
 on the scaffold), to inflict on us an ambiguous designation 
 which we refuse to accept. 
 
 8. 
 
 Worse than the use of this word are the vague charges, 
 and random reproaches, and scornful epithets indulged in 
 by the Author, keenly alive as he was to the vulgarity of 
 the Exeter Hall eloquence of the day. Thus we are told 
 of "the bold speculativeness of Bomanisin," "the bold 
 exactness of Bomanism," " the presumptuous dogmatism 
 of Borne," " the reckless conduct of Borne," and of " that 
 venturesome Church." We are told that, " Borne would 
 classify and number all things and settle every question ;" 
 that this is its "pernicious," its "mischievous peculiarity ;" 
 that Boman Divines are " ever intruding into things not 
 seen as yet ;" that they " venture to touch the ark," and 
 " give an opening to pride and self-confidence ;" that " in 
 Bomanism there would seem tobelittleroom for unconscious 
 devotion ;" that it is especially " characteristic of Boman- 
 ism to indulge the carnal tastes of the multitude ;" that 
 it is " shallow as a philosophy, and dangerous to the Chris- 
 tian spirit m " that " if earth is the standard and heaven 
 the instrument, Borne is most happy in her religious 
 system ;" that she is " bent on proselytizing, organizing 
 and ruling, as the end of life ;" that her doctrine of infalli- 
 
PEEFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. XXXI 
 
 bility is "an effort, presumptuous and unwarranted, as 
 well as founded in error, to stem the tide of unbelief;" 
 that " Romanism makes the Church the instrument of a 
 double usurpation," and as to Roman Divines, " as in the 
 building of Babel, God has confounded their language." 
 
 Sometimes the offence is greater still, because the Author 
 goes out of his way to aim a side-blow at Rome, or, again, 
 by some violent words against her to cover some quasi- 
 Catholic statement, which was likely to be unpalatable to 
 his readers : thus, after saying that the treatment by 
 Petavius of the early Fathers is parricide, which he had a 
 right to say, if he so felt, he will not admit that it was 
 an extreme case without the ungracious circumlocution, 
 " Rome even, steeled as she is against the kindlier feelings, 
 when her interests require, has more of tender-mercy left 
 than to bear this often." And elsewhere, after saying 
 that " the Romanists have no difficulty in answering " a 
 particular " question," he gratuitously adds, " unscrupu- 
 lousness commonly makes a clear way." 
 
 The most serious of these passages is that at the 
 commencement of the third Lecture, in which derangement 
 or a worse calamity is attributed to the Roman Church. 
 This passage I included in the list of Retractations which 
 I published several years before I became a Catholic, and, 
 as it will be printed at the end of the second of these 
 
XXX11 PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. 
 
 Volumes which. I am editing, I have omitted a portion of 
 it in its proper place ; and, together with it, other phrases 
 and sentences which occur here and there ; that is, such as 
 were not necessary for the logical continuity, or the ex- 
 plicitness or the force of the context in which they occur. 
 
 9. 
 
 3. Putting aside, then, what I have called the rhetorical 
 elements of the Lectures under review, I come now in the 
 third place to that portion of them which may be considered 
 argumentative. This is mainly to be found in the Second, 
 Third, and Fourth, which severally survey the Church of 
 Rome in her patristical, moral, and political aspects. And 
 I shall have no difficulty in admitting on the whole the 
 definite facts and statements which are there made the 
 ground of charges against Catholic teaching. Those 
 alleged facts and statements were the result of a careful and 
 not unfriendly study of Bellarmine's great work, and are in 
 substance accurate. . Of the charges themselves, however, 
 I cannot speak so favourably ; they are for the most part 
 made at second hand ; but, since the Author took upon himself 
 the responsibility, they ought to have been the issue of his 
 own independent judgment, not the opinions of Laud, Tay- 
 lor, or Leslie. They are portions for the most part of that 
 Via Media teaching, which is characteristic of the divines 
 
PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. XXXUl 
 
 of the Anglican School. He admitted far too easily what 
 those divines said about the early Fathers, and what they 
 said about Rome, the chief work he took upon himself being 
 that of systematizing what they had variously put forth. 
 
 This indeed he professes to be his special aim in the In- 
 troduction to these Lectures. "It is proposed/' he says, 
 " to offer helps towards the formation of a recognized 
 Anglican theology in one of its departments. The most 
 vigorous, the clearest, the most fertile minds have been 
 employed in the service of our Church, minds too as 
 reverential and holy, and as fully imbued with Ancient 
 Truth, and as well versed in the writings of the Fathers, 
 as they were intellectually gifted. One thing is still 
 wanting : we have a vast inheritance, but no inventory 
 of our treasures. All is given us in profusion ; it remains 
 for us to catalogue, sort, distribute, select, harmonize, and 
 complete/' p. 24 and so on. 
 
 In the years which followed the publication of this 
 Volume, in proportion as he read the Fathers more care- 
 fully, and used his own eyes in determining the faith and 
 worship of their times, his confidence in the Anglican 
 divines was more and more shaken, and at last it went 
 altogether. And, according as this change of mind came 
 over him, he felt of course disturbance at that strong lan- 
 guage he had used against the Roman teaching, on which 
 
 vol. i. b 
 
XXXIV PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. 
 
 I have animadverted above, and which, though he had 
 used it with a full belief that it was merited and was 
 necessary for the Anglican argument, had never been 
 quite according to his taste. At length he published a 
 Retractation of the chief passages which were coloured 
 with it. And he felt no thanks at all to the writers in 
 whom he had so rashly confided. In the words of the 
 Apologia jpro Vita Sua — 
 
 " Not only did I think such language necessary for my 
 Church's religious position, but I recollected that all the 
 great Anglican divines had thought so before me. They 
 had thought so, and they had acted accordingly. . . . We 
 all know the story of the convict, who on the scaffold 
 bit off his mother's ear. ... I was in a humour certainly 
 to bite off their ears. ... I thought they had taken me in. 
 I had read the Fathers with their eyes, I had sometimes 
 trusted their quotations or their reasonings. ... I had 
 thought myself safe, while I had their warrant for what 
 I said. I had exercised more faith than criticism in the 
 matter. This did not imply any broad misstatements on 
 my part, arising from reliance on their authority, but it 
 implied carelessness in matters of detail, and this of course 
 was a fault." 
 
 10. 
 
 However, in thus speaking of the polemical statements 
 
PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. XXXV 
 
 which I rashly made my own, I do not mean that nothing 
 at once plausible and important has been brought by the 
 Anglican writers against the doctrine, worship, organiza- 
 tion, government, and historical action of the Catholic 
 Church. They have in fact made several broad charges, 
 which cannot be shuffled away, but demand a formal and 
 careful answer. Some of these charges were reproduced 
 in these Lectures, two of them of special importance. Of 
 these, one I have considered in a former publication, and 
 the other shall be the subject of the pages which follow. 
 
 I address myself to this latter objection in particular, 
 because I have made it on many occasions and in many 
 ways. I am not undertaking here to defend the Catholic 
 Church against all assailants whatever, but against one, 
 that is, myself. I say this lest readers should consider I 
 have done nothing unless I refute such allegations as 
 these — that Rome dwarfs the intellect, narrows the mind, 
 hardens the heart, fosters superstition, and encourages a 
 blood-thirsty, crafty, and bigotted temper, — these are 
 charges which this Volume does not contain. 
 
 b 2 
 
XXXVI PEEFACE TO THE THIED EDITION. 
 
 § 2. 
 
 I am not here addressing those who unhappily find 
 themselves unable to profess Christianity. I shall assume 
 a great number of principles and facts, which they will 
 deny ; as they on their part often cause me to wonder and 
 grieve, by the strange assumptions they themselves make 
 without hesitation or remorse. But there are those, not a 
 few, who would be Catholics, if their conscience would let 
 them; for they see in the Catholic Religion a great sub- 
 stance and earnest of truth ; a depth, strength, coherence, 
 elasticity, and life, a nobleness and grandeur, a power of 
 sympathy and resource in view of the various ailments of 
 the soul, and a suitableness to all classes and circumstances 
 of mankind ; a glorious history, and a promise of perpe- 
 tual youthfulness; and they already accept without scruple 
 or rather joyfully feed upon its solemn mysteries, which are 
 a trial to others ; but they cannot, as a matter of duty, enter 
 its fold on account of certain great difficulties which block 
 their way, and throw them back, when they would embrace 
 that faith which looks so like what it professes to be. 
 
 To these I would address myself, as far as my discussion 
 on a very large subject extends ; and, even if I do not suc- 
 ceed with them, at least I shall be explaining, as I have 
 long wished to do, how I myself get over difficulties which 
 I formerly telt as well as they, and which made me for 
 
PEE PACE TO THE TRTED EDITION. XXX Vll 
 
 many years cry out bitterly, " Union with Rome is impos- 
 sible." Most probably I shall be able to do little more. 
 It is so ordered on high that in our day Holy Church should 
 present just that aspect to my countrymen which is most 
 consonant with their ingrained prejudices against her, 
 most unpromising for their conversion ; and what can one 
 writer do to counteract this misfortune ? But enough of 
 this; whatever conies of it, I must be content to have 
 done what I feel it an obligation to do. 
 
 2. 
 
 Two broad charges are brought against the Catholic 
 Religion in these Lectures, and in some of the Tracts and 
 other Papers that follow. One is the contrast which 
 modern Catholicism is said to present with the religion of 
 the Primitive Church, in teaching, conduct, worship, and 
 polity, and this difficulty I have employed myself in dis- 
 cussing and explaining at great length in my Essay on 
 Development of Doctrine, published in 1845. 
 
 The other, which is equally obvious and equally serious, 
 is the difference which at first sight presents itself between 
 its formal teaching and its popular and political manifesta- 
 tions ; for instance, between the teaching of the Breviary 
 and of the Roman Catechism on the one hand, and the 
 spirit and tone of various manuals of Prayer and Meditation 
 and of the Sermons or Addresses of ecclesiastics in high 
 
XXXV111 PEEFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. 
 
 position on the other. This alleged discordance I have no- 
 where treated from a Catholic point of view; yet it certainly 
 has a claim to be explained ; and, as I have said, at least I 
 can show how I explain it to myself, even though others 
 refuse to take my explanation. 
 
 3. 
 My answer shall be this : — that from the nature of the 
 case, such an apparent contrariety between word and deed, 
 the abstract and the concrete, could not but take place, 
 supposing the Church to be gifted with those various pre- 
 rogatives, and charged with those independent and con- 
 flicting duties, which Anglicans, as well as ourselves, 
 recognize as belonging to her. Her organization cannot be 
 otherwise than complex, considering the many functions 
 which she has to fulfil, the many aims to keep in view, the 
 many interests to secure, — functions, aims, and interests, 
 which in their union and divergence remind us of the 
 prophet's vision of the Cherubim, in whom " the wings of 
 one were joined to the wings of another, " yet "they turned 
 not, when they went, but every one went straight forward." 
 Or, to speak without figure, we know in matters of this 
 world, how difficult it is for one and the same man to 
 satisfy independent duties and incommensurable relations; 
 to act at once as a parent and a judge, as a soldier and a 
 minister of religion, as a philosopher and a statesman, as 
 
PEEFACE TO THE THIED EDITION. XXXIX 
 
 a courtier or a politician and a Catholic ; the rules of con- 
 duct in these various positions being so distinct, and the 
 obligations so contrary. Prudent men keep clear, if they 
 can, of such perplexities; but as to the Church, gifted 
 as she is with grace up to the measure of her responsibi- 
 lities, if she has on her an arduous work, it is sufficient to 
 refer to our Lord's words, " What is impossible with men, 
 is possible with God," in order to be certain (in spite of 
 appearances) of her historical uprightness and consistency. 
 At the same time it may undeniably have happened before 
 now that her rulers and authorities, as men, on certain 
 occasions have come short of what was required of them, 
 and have given occasion to criticism, just or unjust, on 
 account of the special antagonisms or compromises by 
 means of which her many-sided mission under their 
 guidance has been carried out. 
 
 4. 
 With this introduction I remark as follows : — When 
 our Lord went up on high, He left His representative be- 
 hind Him. This was Holy Church, His mystical Body and 
 Bride, a Divine Institution, and the shrine and organ of 
 the Paraclete, who speaks through her till the end comes. 
 She, to use an Anglican poet's words, is u His very self 
 below/' as far as men on earth are equal to the discharge 
 and fulfilment of high offices, which primarily and 
 supremely are His. 
 
xl PKEFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. 
 
 These offices, which specially belong to Him as Medi- 
 ator, are commonly considered to be three ; He is Prophet, 
 Priest, and King ; and after His pattern, and in human 
 measure, Holy Church has a triple office too ; not the Pro- 
 phetical alone and in isolation, as these Lectures virtually 
 teach, but three offices, which are indivisible, though diverse, 
 viz. teaching, rule, and sacred ministry. This then is the 
 point on which I shall now insist, the very title of the Lec- 
 tures I am to criticize suggesting to me how best to 
 criticize them. 
 
 I will but say in passing, that I must not in this argu- 
 ment be supposed to forget that the Pope, as the Yicar of 
 Christ, inherits these offices and acts for the Church in 
 them. This is another matter ; I am speaking here of the 
 Body of Christ, and the sovereign Pontiff would not be the 
 visible head of that Body, did he not first belong to it. 
 He is not himself the Body of Christ, but the chief part 
 of the Body ; I shall have quite opportunities enough in 
 what is to come to show that I duly bear him in mind. 
 
 Christianity, then, is at once a philosophy, a political 
 power, and a religious rite : as a religion, it is Holy ; as a 
 philosophy, it is Apostolic; as a political power, it is im- 
 perial, that is, One and Catholic. As a religion, its special 
 centre of action is pastor and flock; as a philosophy, the 
 Schools ; as a rule, the Papacy and its Curia. 
 
 Though it has exercised these three functions in sub- 
 
PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. xli 
 
 stance from the first, they were developed in their full 
 proportions one after another, in a succession of centuries ; 
 first, in the primitive time it was recognized as a worship, 
 springing up and spreading in the lower ranks of society, 
 and among the ignorant and dependent, and making its 
 power felt by the heroism of its Martyrs and confessors. 
 Then it seized upon the intellectual and cultivated class, 
 and created a theology and schools of learning. Lastly it 
 seated itself, as an ecclesiastical polity, among princes, 
 and chose Rome for its centre. 
 
 Truth is the guiding principle of theology and theo- 
 logical inquiries ; devotion and edification, of worship ; 
 and of government, expedience. The instrument of 
 theology is reasoning ; of worship, our emotional nature ; 
 of rule, command and coercion. Further, in man as he 
 is, reasoning tends to rationalism ; devotion to superstition 
 and enthusiasm ; and power to ambition and tyranny. 
 
 Arduous as are the duties involved in these three offices, 
 to discharge one by one, much more arduous are they 
 to administer, when taken in combination. Each of the 
 three has its separate scope and direction; each has its own 
 interests to promote and further ; each has to find room 
 for the claims of the other two ; and each will find its 
 own line of action influenced and modified by the others, 
 nay, sometimes in a particular case the necessity of the 
 others converted into a rule of duty for itself. 
 
xlii PEEFACE TO THE THIKD EDITION. 
 
 5. 
 
 " Who," in St. Paul's words, " is sufficient for these 
 things?" Who/even with divine aid, shall successfully 
 administer offices so independent of each other, so diver- 
 gent, and so conflicting ? What line of conduct, except 
 on the long, the very long run, is at once edifying, expe- 
 dient, and true ? Is it not plain, that, if one determinate 
 course is to be taken by the Church, acting at once in all 
 three capacities, so opposed to each other in their idea, 
 that course must, as I have said, be deflected from the line 
 which would be traced out by any one of them, if viewed 
 by itself, or else the requirements of one or two sacrificed 
 to the interests of the third ? What, for instance, is to 
 be done in a case when to enforce a theological point, as 
 the Schools determine it, would make a particular popula- 
 tion less religious, not more so, or cause riots or risings ? 
 Or when to defend a champion of ecclesiastical liberty in 
 one country would encourage an Anti-Pope, or hazard a 
 general persecution, in another ? or when either a schism 
 is to be encountered or an opportune truth left undefined ? 
 
 All this was foreseen certainly by the Divine Mind, 
 when He committed to His Church so complex a mission ; 
 and, by promising her infallibility in her formal teaching, 
 He indirectly protected her from serious error in worship 
 
PREFACE TO THE THIED EDITION. xllii 
 
 and political action also. This aid, however, great as it is, 
 does not secure her from all dangers as regards the pro- 
 blem which she has to solve ; nothing but the gift of 
 impeccability granted to her authorities would secure them 
 from all liability to mistake in their conduct, policy, 
 words and decisions, in her legislative and her executive, 
 in ecclesiastical and disciplinarian details; and such a gift 
 they have not received. In consequence, however well 
 she may perform her duties on the whole, it will always be 
 easy for her enemies to make a case against her, well 
 founded or not, from the action or interaction, or the 
 chronic collisions or contrasts, or the temporary suspense 
 or delay, of her administration, in her three several depart- 
 ments of duty, — her government, her devotions, and her 
 schools, — from the conduct of her rulers, her divines, her 
 pastors, or her people. 
 
 It is this difficulty lying in the nature of the case, 
 which supplies the staple of those energetic charges and 
 vivid pictures of the inconsistency, double-dealing, and 
 deceit of the Church of Eome, as found in Protestant 
 writings, and in particular in the Lectures and other pub- 
 lications here immediately under consideration. 
 
 6. 
 For instance, the Author says in Lecture iii. : " There 
 
xllV PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. 
 
 are two elements in operation within the Roman system. 
 As far as it is Catholic and scriptural, it appeals to the 
 Fathers ; as far as it is a corruption, it finds it necessary 
 to supersede them. Viewed in its formal principles and 
 authoritative statements, it professes to be the champion 
 of past times ; viewed as an active and political power, as 
 a ruling, grasping, ambitious principle, in a word, as what 
 is expressively called Popery, it exalts the will and 
 pleasure of the existing Church above all authority, 
 whether of Scripture or Antiquity, interpreting the one 
 and disposing of the other by its absolute and arbitrary 
 decree." 
 
 That is, the Regal function of the Church, as repre- 
 sented by the Pope, seems to be trampling on the 
 theological, as represented by Scripture and Antiquity. 
 
 Again, in Lecture i. : " Members of our Church, in 
 controversy with Rome, contend that it must be judged, 
 not by the formal decrees of the Council of Trent, but by 
 its practical working and existing state in the countries 
 which profess it. Romanists would fain confine us in 
 controversy to a consideration of the bare and acknow- 
 ledged principles of their Church ; we consider it to be an 
 unfair restriction ; why ? because we conceive that Roman- 
 ism is far more faulty in its details than in its formal 
 principles." 
 
PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. xlv 
 
 That is, the Church, as a political and popular power, is 
 answerable in her past and present history for innumerable 
 acts which go far beyond any theological definitions in the 
 Council of Trent. 
 
 Again in Tract 71: — "They claim to be judged by 
 their formal documents, especially by the decrees of the 
 Council of Trent ; but, though the acts of individuals are 
 not the acts of the Church, yet they may be the results, 
 and therefore illustrations of its principles. We cannot 
 consent then to confine ourselves to the text of the 
 Tridentine Decrees apart from the teaching of their doctors 
 and the practice of the Church. It is not unnatural to 
 take their general opinions and conduct in elucidation of 
 their synodal decrees." 
 
 That is, the current history and ordinary ways of 
 Catholicity, as sanctioned by its rulers and instanced 
 individually in its people, scandalous as they are, must 
 be after all the logical result of the innocent-looking 
 Tridentine decrees. 
 
 And to Dr. Jelf: "The doctrine of the schools is at 
 present, on the whole, the established creed of the Eoman 
 Church, and this I call Popery, and against this I think 
 the Thirty Nine Articles speak. I think they speak, not of 
 certain accidental practices, but of a body and substance 
 of divinity, and that traditionary, — of an existing, ruling 
 
xlvi PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. 
 
 spirit and view in the Church, which, whereas it is a 
 corruption and perversion of the truth, is also a very 
 active and energetic principle, and, whatever holier 
 manifestations there may be in the same Church, 
 manifests itself in ambition, insincerity, craft, cruelty, and 
 all such other grave evils as are connected with these. 
 Further, I believe that the Decrees of Trent, though 
 not necessarily in themselves tending to the corruptions 
 which we see, will ever tend to foster and produce them ; 
 that is, while these decrees remain unexplained in any 
 truer and more Catholic way." 
 
 That is, there may indeed be holiness in the religious 
 aspect of the Church, and soundness in her theological, 
 but still there is in her the ambition, craft, and cruelty of 
 a political power. 
 
 7. 
 
 I am to apply then the doctrine of the triple office of 
 the Church in explanation of this phenomenon, which gives 
 so much offence to Protestants ; and I begin by admitting 
 the general truth of the facts alleged against us ; — at the 
 same time in the passages just quoted there is one mis- 
 conception of fact which needs to be corrected before I 
 proceed. The Author of them ascribes the corruptions and 
 other scandals, which he laments in the action of the 
 
PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. xlvii 
 
 Church, to the Schools ; but ambition, craft, cruelty, and 
 superstition are not commonly the characteristic of 
 theologians, and the natural and proper function of the 
 Schools lies and has lain in forming those abstract decrees 
 which the Author considers to be the least blamable portion 
 of Roman teaching. Nor, again, is it even accurate to say, 
 as he does, that those so-called corruptions are at least the 
 result and development of those abstract decrees : on the 
 contrary, they bear on their face the marks of having a 
 popular or a political origin, and in fact theology, so far 
 from encouraging them, has restrained and corrected such 
 extravagances as have been committed, through human 
 infirmity, in the exercise of the regal and sacerdotal 
 powers ; nor is religion ever in greater danger than when, 
 in consequence of national or international troubles, the 
 Schools of theology have been broken up and ceased to be. 
 And this will serve as a proposition with which to begin. 
 I say, then, Theology is the fundamental and regulating 
 principle of the whole Church system. It is com- 
 mensurate with Revelation, and Revelation is the initia 
 and essential idea of Christianity. It is the subject-matter, 
 the formal cause, the expression, of the Prophetical Office, 
 and, as being such, has created both the Regal Office and 
 the Sacerdotal. And it has in a certain sense a power of 
 jurisdiction over those offices, as being its own creations, 
 
xlvlil PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. 
 
 theologians being ever in request and in employment in 
 keeping within bounds both the political and popular 
 elements in the Church's constitution, — elements which are 
 far more congenial than itself to the human mind, are far 
 more liable to excess and corruption, and are ever 
 straggling to liberate themselves from those restraints 
 which are in truth necessary for their well-being. On the 
 one hand Popes, such as Liberius, Vigilius, Boniface YIIL, 
 and Sixtus V., under secular inducements of the moment, 
 seem from time to time to have been wishing, though un- 
 successfully, to venture beyond the liues of theology ; and 
 on the other hand, private men of an intemperate devotion 
 are from time to time forming associations, or predicting 
 events, or imagining miracles, so unadvisedly as to call 
 for the interference of the Index or Holy Office. It is not 
 long since the present Pope in his exercise of the Pro- 
 phetical Office, warned the faithful against putting trust 
 in certain idle prophecies which were in circulation, dis- 
 allowed a profession of miracles, and forbad some new and 
 extravagant titles which had been given to the Blessed 
 Virgin. 
 
 8. 
 Yet theology cannot always have its own way; it is too 
 hard, too intellectual, too exact, to be always equitable, or 
 to be always compassionate; and it sometimes has a conflict 
 
PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. XllX 
 
 or overthrow, or has to consent to a truce or a compromise; 
 in consequence of the rival force of religious sentiment or 
 ecclesiastical interests ; and that, sometimes in great 
 matters, sometimes in unimportant. 
 
 As a familiar illustration of the contrast with each other 
 which the theological and the religious elements present in 
 their bearing towards the same subject, I am led to notice 
 some words of a Protestant writer incidentally quoted 
 infr. p. 66. Theology lays down the undeniable truth (as 
 derived from such passages as " God is not unjust to forget 
 your work," &c. Heb. vi. 10,) that our good works have 
 merit and are a ground of confidence for us in God's judg- 
 ment of us. This dogma shocks good Protestants, who 
 think that, in the case of an individual Catholic, it is the 
 mark of a self-righteous spirit, and incompatible with his 
 renunciation of his own desert and with a recourse to 
 God's mercy. But they confuse an intellectual view with 
 a personal sentiment. Now it is well known that Bellarmine 
 has written on Justification, and of course in his treatise 
 he insists, as a theologian must, on the doctrine of merit ; 
 but it also happens he is led on, as if he was praying or 
 preaching or giving absolution, to drop some few words, 
 beyond the limits of his science, about his own or his 
 brethren's unworthiness and need of pardon and grace. 
 That is, he has happened to let his devout nature betray 
 
 vol. i. c 
 
1 PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. 
 
 itself between the joints of his theological harness. He 
 says, " On account of the uncertainty of our own righteous- 
 ness and the danger of vain-glory, it is safest to place our 
 whole trust in the sole mercy and goodness of God." 
 What Bellarmine says every theologian in propria persona 
 will say; nevertheless the doctrine of merit is a great 
 truth. However, Mr. Bickersteth thinks his confession 
 wonderful, and, as a charitable man, rejoices in it. He 
 looks on him as " a brand from the burning/" " I cannot 
 read," he says, " the pious practical works of Bellarmine, 
 himself the great defender of Popery, and know that he 
 said ' Upon account of the uncertainty of life it is most 
 safe to rely on Christ alone,' without hoping that he was 
 led before his death to renounce all confidence in anything 
 but God's testimony concerning His Son, and so became 
 a child of our heavenly Father, and an heir of our 
 Saviour's kingdom." 
 
 Again, I have already referred to the dilemma which 
 has occurred before now in the history of the Church, 
 when a choice had to be made between leaving a point of 
 faith at a certain moment undefined, and indirectly open- 
 ing the way to some extended and permanent schism. 
 Here her Prophetical function is impeded for a while in its 
 action, perhaps seriously, by the remonstrances of charity 
 and of the spirit of peace. 
 
PEEFACE TO THE THIED EDITION. li 
 
 In another familiar instance which may be given, the 
 popular and scholastic elements in the Church seem to 
 change parts, and theology to be kind and sympathetic 
 and religion severe. I mean, whereas the whole School 
 with one voice speaks of freedom of conscience as a 
 personal prerogative of each individual, on the other hand 
 the vow of obedience may sometimes in particular cases be 
 enforced by Eeligious Superiors in some lesser matter to 
 the conceivable injury of such sacred freedom of thought. 
 
 Another instance of collision in a small matter is before 
 us just at this time, the theological and religious element 
 of the Church being in antagonism with the political. 
 Humanity, a sense of morality, hatred of a special mis- 
 belief, views of Scripture prophecy, a feeling of brother- 
 hood with Russians, Greeks, and Bulgarians, though 
 schismatics, have determined some of us against the 
 Turkish cause; and a dread lest Russia, if successful, should 
 prove a worse enemy to the Church than Turks can be, 
 determines others of us in favour of it. 
 
 9. 
 
 But I will come to illustrations which involve more 
 difficult questions. Truth is the principle on which all 
 intellectual, and therefore all theological inquiries proceed, 
 and is the motive power which gives them effect; but the 
 
 c 2 
 
lil PEEFACE TO THE THIED EDITION. 
 
 principle of popular edification, quickened by a keen sensi- 
 tiveness of the chance of scandals, is as powerful as Truth, 
 when the province is Religion. To the devotional mind 
 what is new and strange is as repulsive, often as dangerous, 
 as falsehood is to the scientific. Novelty is often error to 
 those who are unprepared for it, from the refraction with 
 which it enters into their conceptions. Hence popular 
 ideas on religion are practically a match for the clearest 
 dicta, deductions, and provisos of the Schools, and will 
 have their way in cases when the particular truth, which is 
 the subject of them, is not of vital or primary importance. 
 Thus, in a religion, which embraces large and separate 
 classes of adherents, there always is of necessity to a 
 certain extent an exoteric and an esoteric doctrine. 
 
 The history of the Latin versions of the Scriptures 
 furnishes a familiar illustration of this conflict between 
 popular and educated faith. The Gallican version of the 
 Psalter, St. Jerome's earlier work, got such possession 
 of the West, that to this day we use it instead of his 
 later and more correct version from the Hebrew. De- 
 votional use prevailed over scholastic accuracy in a matter 
 of secondary concern. " Jerome," says Dr. Westcott, 2 
 " was accused of disturbing the repose of the Church, and 
 shaking the foundations of faith ;" and perhaps there was 
 2 Smith's Diet, of the Bible, vol. 3, pp. 1702-3. 
 
PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. llll 
 
 good reason for alarm. In the event " long use made it 
 impossible to substitute his Psalter from the Hebrew/' 
 and the Gallican version, unless I mistake, is the text of 
 our present Psalter. 3 A parallel anxiety for the same 
 reason is felt at this time within the Anglican com- 
 munion, upon the proposal to amend King James's 
 Translation of the Scriptures. 
 
 10. 
 
 Here we see the necessary contrast between religious 
 inquiry or teaching, and investigation in purely secular 
 matters. Much is said in this day by men of science 
 about the duty of honesty in what is called the pursuit of 
 truth, — by "pursuing truth" being meant the pursuit 
 of facts. It is just now reckoned a great moral virtue to 
 be fearless and thorough in inquiry into facts ; and, when 
 science crosses and breaks the received path of Revelation, 
 it is reckoned a serious imputation upon the ethical 
 character of religious men, whenever they show hesitation 
 to shift at a minute's warning their position, and to accept 
 as truths shadowy views at variance with what they 
 
 8 " Advertendum est Psalmorum Librum in Vulgata non esse ex S. Hiero- 
 
 nymi Versione ex Hebraeo Quia enioa Psalmos ex quotidiano usu, 
 
 et quia in Teinplis canebantur, etiain vulgus memoriter tenebat, ita ut 
 mutatio sine gravi ipsius offensa fieri non posset, ideo Psahni in Vulgata 
 secundum antiquara versionem retenti fuere." Nat. Alex. Sac. iv. Diss. 39. 
 
Hv PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. 
 
 Lave ever been taught and have held. But the contrast 
 between the cases is plain. The love and pursuit of truth 
 in the subject-matter of religion, if it be genuine, must 
 always be accompanied by the fear of error, of error which 
 may be sin. An inquirer in the province of religion is 
 under a responsibility for his reasons and for their issue. 
 But, whatever be the real merits, nay, virtues, of inquirers 
 into physical or historical facts, whatever their skill, their 
 acquired caution, their experience, their dispassionateness 
 and fairness of mind, they do not avail themselves of 
 these excellent instruments of inquiry as a matter of 
 conscience, but because it is expedient, or honest, or 
 beseeming, or praiseworthy, to use them ; nor, if in the 
 event they were found to be wrong as to their supposed 
 discoveries, would they, or need they, feel aught of the 
 remorse and self-reproach of a Catholic, on whom it breaks 
 that he has been violently handling the text of Scripture, 
 misinterpreting it, or superseding it, on an hypothesis 
 which he took to be true, but which turns out to be un- 
 tenable. 
 
 Let us suppose in his defence that he was challenged 
 either to admit or to refute what was asserted, and to do so 
 without delay; still it would have been far better could he 
 have waited awhile, as the event has shown, — nay, far better, 
 even though the assertion has proved true. Galileo might 
 
PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. lv 
 
 be right in his conclusion that the earth moves; to consider 
 him a heretic might have been wrong ; but there was 
 nothing wrong in censuring abrupt, startling, unsettling, 
 unverified disclosures, if such they were, disclosures at once 
 uncalled for and inopportune, at a time when the limits of 
 revealed truth had not as yet been ascertained. A man 
 ought to be very sure of what he is saying, before he 
 risks the chance of contradicting the word of God. It 
 was safe, not dishonest, to be slow in accepting wliat never- 
 theless turned out to be true. Here is an instance in which 
 the Church obliges Scripture expositors, at a given time 
 or place, to be tender of the popular religious sense. 
 
 11. 
 
 I have been led on to take a second view of this matter. 
 That jealousy of originality in the matter of religion, 
 which is the instinct of piety, is, in the case of questions 
 which excite the popular mind, the dictate of charity also. 
 Galileo's truth is said to have shocked and scared the 
 Italy of his day. It revolutionized the received system 
 of belief as regards heaven, purgatory, and hell, to say 
 that the earth went round the sun, and it forcibly imposed 
 upon categorical statements of Scripture, a figurative 
 interpretation. Heaven was no longer above, and earth 
 below ; the heavens no longer literally opened and shut ; 
 
Ivi PEEFACE TO THE THIED EDITION. 
 
 purgatory and hell were not for certain under the earth. 
 The catalogue of theological truths was seriously curtailed. 
 Whither did our Lord go on His ascension ? If there is 
 to be a plurality of worlds, what is the special importance 
 of this one ? and is the whole visible universe with its 
 infinite spaces, one day to pass away ? We are used to 
 these questions now, and reconciled to them ; and on that 
 account are no fit judges of the disorder and dismay, 
 which the Galilean hypothesis would cause to good 
 Catholics, as far as they became cognizant of it, or how 
 necessary it was in charity, especially then, to delay the 
 formal reception of a new interpretation of Scripture, 
 till their imaginations should gradually get accustomed 
 to it. 
 
 12. 
 
 As to the particular measures taken at the time with 
 this end, I neither know them accurately, nor have I any 
 anxiety to know them. They do not fall within the scope 
 of my argument ; I am only concerned with the principle 
 on which they were conducted. All I say is, that not all 
 knowledge is suited to all minds ; a proposition may be 
 ever so true, yet at a particular time and place may be 
 "temerarious, offensive to pious ears, and scandalous/' 
 though not " heretical " nor u erroneous." It must bo 
 recollected what very strong warnings we have from our 
 Lord and St. Paul against scandalizing the weak and 
 
PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. 
 
 lvi: 
 
 tmintellectual. The latter goes into detail upon the point. 
 He says, that, true as it may be that certain meats are 
 allowable, this allowance cannot in charity be used in a 
 case in which it would be of spiritual injury to others. 
 " Take care," he says, " that you put not a stumbling- 
 block or a scandal in your brother's way ; " " destroy not 
 the work of God for meat ;" " it is good to abstain from 
 everything whereby thy brother is offended, or scandalized, 
 or made weak ; there is not knowledge in every one," but 
 " take heed lest your liberty become a stumbling-block 
 to the weak/' " All things are lawful to me, but not all 
 edify ; do not eat for his sake who spoke of it, and for 
 conscience sake, conscience, not thine own, but the 
 other's." 4 
 
 Now, while saying this, I know well that " all things 
 have their season," and that there is not only " a time to 
 keep silence," but " a time to speak," and that, in some 
 states of society, such as our own, it is the worst charity, 
 and the most provoking, irritating rule of action, and the 
 most unhappy policy, not to speak out, not to suffer to be 
 spoken out, all that there is to say. Such speaking out is 
 under such circumstances the triumph of religion, whereas 
 concealment, accommodation, and evasion is to co-operate 
 with the spirit of error ; — but it is not always so. There are 
 times and places, on the contrary, when it is the duty of a 
 
 4 Vid. also 1 Cor. iii. 1, 2, and Heb. v. 12—14. 
 
IVlll PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. 
 
 teacher, when asked, to answer frankly as well as truly, 
 though not even then to say more than he need, because 
 learners will but misunderstand him if he attempts more, 
 and therefore it is wiser and kinder to let well alone, than to 
 attempt what is better. I do not say that this is a pleasant 
 rule of conduct, and that it would not be a relief to most 
 men to be rid of its necessity, — and for this reason, if for 
 no other, because it is so difficult to apply it aright, so that 
 St. Paul's precept may be interpreted in a particular case 
 as the warrant for just contrary courses of action, — but 
 still, it can hardly be denied that there is a great principle 
 in what he says, and a great duty in consequence. 
 
 13. 
 
 In truth we recognize the duty of concealment, or what 
 may be called evasion, not in religious matters only, but 
 universally. It is very well for sublime sciences, which 
 work out their problems apart from the crowding and jost- 
 ling, the elbowing and the toe-treading of actual life, to 
 care for nobody and nothing but themselves, and to preach 
 and practise the cheap virtue of devotion to what they 
 call truth, meaning of course facts ; but a liberty to blurt 
 out all things whatever without self-restraint is not only 
 forbidden by the Church, but by Society at large ; of 
 which such liberty, if fully carried out, would certainly be 
 
PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. lix 
 
 the dissolution. Veracity, like other virtues, lies in a 
 mean. Truth indeed, but not necessarily the whole truth, 
 is the rule of Society. Every class and profession has its 
 secrets ; the family lawyer, the medical adviser, the poli- 
 tician, as well as the priest. The physician often dares 
 not tell the whole truth to his patient about his case, 
 knowing that to do so would destroy his chance of reco- 
 very. Statesmen in Parliament, I suppose, fight each other 
 with second-best arguments, the real reasons for the 
 policy which they are respectively advocating being, as 
 each is conscious to each, not these, but reasons of state, 
 secrets whether of her Majesty's Privy Council or of 
 diplomacy. As to the polite world, which, to be sure, is 
 in itself not much of an authority, I think an authoress of 
 the last century illustrates in a tale how it would not hold 
 together, if every one told the whole truth to every one, 
 as to what he thought of him. From the time that the 
 Creator clothed Adam, concealment is in some sense the 
 necessity of our fall. 
 
 14. 
 
 This, then, is one cause of that twofold or threefold aspect 
 of the Catholic Church, which I have set myself to 
 explain. Many popular beliefs and practices have, in spite 
 of theology, been suffered by Catholic prelates, lest, 
 
IX PEEFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. 
 
 " in gathering up the weeds," they should " root up the 
 wheat with them," We see the operation of this necessary 
 economy in the instance of the Old Covenant, in the 
 gradual disclosures made, age after age, to the chosen 
 people. The most striking of these accommodations is the 
 long sufferance of polygamy, concubinage, and divorce. 
 As to divorce, our Lord expressly says to the Pharisees, 
 that " Moses, by reason of the hardness of their hearts, 
 permitted them to put away their wives ;" yet this was a 
 breach of a natural and primeval law, which was in force 
 at the beginning as directly and unequivocally as the law 
 against fratricide. St. Augustine seems to go further 
 still, as if not only a tacit toleration of an imperfect 
 morality was observed towards Israel by his Divine 
 Governor, but positive commands were issued in accord- 
 ance with that state of imperfection in which the people lay. 
 " Only the True and Good God," he says in answer to the 
 Manichee objecting to him certain of the Divine acts 
 recorded in the Old Testament, " only He knows what 
 commands are to be given to individual men. He had given 
 the command, who certainly knows . . according to the 
 heart of each, what and by means of whom each individual 
 ought to suffer. They deserved, then, the one party to be 
 told to inflict suffering, the other to have to bear it." 5 
 
 5 Mozley, Lect. on the 0. T. xi., p. 270. " Deus enim jusserat, qui 
 
PREFACE TO THE THIRD ElrtTTON. ]xi 
 
 This indeed is the great principle of Economy, as advo- 
 cated in the Alexandrian school, 6 which is in various ways 
 sanctioned in Scripture. In some fundamental points 
 indeed, in the Unity and Omnipotence of God, the Mosaic 
 Law, so tolerant of barbaric cruelty, allowed of no con- 
 descension to the ethical state of the times ; indeed the 
 very end of the Dispensation was to denounce idolatry, and 
 the sword was its instrument of denunciation; but where 
 the mission of the chosen people was not directly concerned, 
 and amid the heathen populations, even idolatry itself was 
 suffered with something of a Divine sanction, as if a deeper 
 sentiment might lie hid under it. Thus Joseph in the 
 time of the Patriarchs had a divining cup and married the 
 daughter of the Priest of Heliopolis. Jonah in a later 
 time was sent to preach penance to the people of Niueveh, 
 but without giving them a hint, or being understood by 
 them to say, that they must abandon their idols ; while 
 the sailors, among whom the Prophet had previously been 
 thrown, though idolaters, recognized with great devotion 
 and religious fear the Lord God of heaven and earth. 
 
 utique novit, non solum secundum facta, verum secundum cor hominis, 
 quid unusquisque, vel per quern perpeti debeat. . . . Digni ergo erant et 
 
 isti quibus talia juberentur, et illi qui talia paterentur Sed Deus, 
 
 inquit, verus et bonus nullo modo talia jussisse credendus est. Imino vero 
 
 talia recte non jubet, nisi Deus verus et bonus Solus Deus verus 
 
 et bonus novit quid, quando, quibus, per quos, fieri aliquid vel jubeat vel 
 permittat." Contr. Faust., xxii. 71, 72. 
 
 6 Vid. Arians of the Fourth Century, p. 67- 
 
lxii PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. 
 
 Again, when Balaam had built his seven altars and offered 
 his sacrifices, and prepared his divinations, it is signifi- 
 cantly said, that " the Lord met him, and put a word in his 
 mouth," yet without any rebuke of his idolatry and 
 magic. And when Naaman asked forgiveness of God if 
 he " bowed down in the temple of Remmon," the Prophet 
 said no more than " Go in peace." And St. Paul tells 
 both the rude and the cultivated idolaters of Lystra and 
 Athens, that God, in times past, while He gave all nations 
 proofs of His Providence, " suffered them to walk in their 
 own ways/' and " winked at the times of their ignorance. - " 
 
 15. 
 
 From the time that the Apostles preached, such tolera- 
 tion in primary matters of faith and morals is at an end 
 as regards Christendom. Idolatry is a sin against light ; 
 and, while it would involve heinous guilt, or rather is 
 impossible, in a Catholic, it is equally inconceivable in even 
 the most ignorant sectary who claims the Christian name ; 
 nevertheless, the principle and the use of the Economy has 
 a place, and is a duty still among Catholics, though not as 
 regards the first elements of Revelation. We have still, as 
 Catholics, to be forbearing and to be silent in many cases, 
 amid the mistakes, excesses, and superstitions of indi- 
 viduals and of classes of our brethren, which we come 
 
PEEFACE TO THE THIED EDITION. 1X111 
 
 across. Also in the case of those who are not Catholic, we 
 feel it a duty sometimes to observe the rule of silence, 
 even when so serious a truth as the i( Extra Ecclesiam 
 nulla salus " comes into consideration. This truth, indeed, 
 must ever be upheld, but who will venture to blame us, or 
 reproach us with double-dealing, for holding it to be our 
 duty, though we thus believe, still, in a case when a 
 Protestant, near death and to all appearance in good faith, 
 is sure, humanly speaking, not to accept Catholic truth, if 
 urged upon him, to leave such a one to his imperfect 
 Christianity, and to the mercy of God, and to assist his 
 devotions as far as he will let us carry him, rather than 
 to precipitate him at such a moment into controversy 
 which may ruffle his mind, dissipate his thoughts, unsettle 
 such measure of faith as he has, and rouse his slumbering 
 prejudices and antipathies against the Church ? Yet this 
 might be represented as countenancing a double aspect of 
 Catholic doctrine and as evasive and shuffliug, theory 
 saying one thing, and practice sanctioning another. 
 
 16. 
 
 I shelter what I go on to say of the Church's conduct 
 occasionally towards her own children, under this rule 
 of her dealing with strangers : — The rule is the same in 
 its principle as that of Moses or St. Paul, or the Alexan- 
 
lxiv PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. 
 
 drians, or St. Augustine, though it is applied to other 
 subject-matters. Doubtless, her abstract standard of 
 religion and morals in the Schools is higher than that 
 which we witness in her children in particular countries 
 or at particular times ; but doubtless also, she, like the 
 old prophets before her, from no fault of hers, is not 
 able to enforce it. Human nature is in all ages one 
 and the same : as it showed itself in the Israelites, so 
 it shows itself in the world at large now, though 
 one country may be better than another. At least, in 
 some countries, truth and error in religion may be so 
 intimately connected as not to admit of separation. I 
 have already referred to our Lord's parable of the wheat 
 and the cockle. For instance, take the instance of relics ; 
 modern divines and historians may have proved that cer- 
 tain recognized relics, though the remains of some holy 
 man, still do not certainly belong to the Saint to whom 
 they are popularly appropriated ; and in spite of this, a 
 bishop may have sanctioned a public veneration of them, 
 which has arisen out of this unfounded belief. And so 
 again, without pledging himself to the truth of the legend 
 of a miracle attached to a certain crucifix or picture, he 
 may have viewed with tolerance, nay, with satisfaction, 
 the overflowing popular devotion towards our Lord or the 
 Blessed Virgin, of which that legend is the occasion. He 
 
PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. lxv 
 
 is not sure it is true, and he does not guarantee its truth ; 
 he does but approve and praise the devotional enthusiasm 
 of the people, which the legendary fact has awakened. 
 Did indeed their faith and devotion towards Christ rise 
 simply out of that legend, if they made Him their God 
 because something was said to have taken place which had 
 not taken place, then no honest man, who was simply 
 aware of this, could take any part in the anniversary out- 
 burst of rejoicing ; but he knows that miracles are wrought 
 in the Church in every age, and, if he is far from certain 
 that this was a miracle, he is not certain that it was not ; 
 and his case would be somewhat like French ecclesiastics 
 in the beginning of the century, if Napoleon ordered a 
 Te Deum for his victory at Trafalgar, — they might have 
 shrewd suspicions about the fact, but they would not see 
 their way not to take part in a national festival. Such 
 may be the feeling under which the Church takes part in 
 popular religious manifestations without subjecting them 
 to theological and historical criticism ; she is in a choice 
 of difficulties ; did she act otherwise, she would be rooting 
 up the wheat with the intruding weeds; she would be 
 " quenching the smoking flax," and endangering the 
 faith and loyalty of a city or a district, for the sake of an 
 intellectual precision which was quite out of place and was 
 not asked of her. 
 
 vol. i. d 
 
lxvi PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. 
 
 The difficulty of course is to determine the point at 
 which such religious manifestations become immoderate, 
 and an allowance of them wrong ; it would be well, if all 
 suspicious facts could be got rid of altogether. Their 
 tolerance may sometimes lead to pious frauds, which are 
 simply wicked. An ecclesiastical superior certainly cannot 
 sanction alleged miracles or prophecies which he knows to 
 be false, or by his silence connive at a tradition of them 
 being started among his people. Nor can he be dispensed 
 of the duty, when he comes into an inheritance of error 
 or superstition, which is immemorial, of doing what he 
 can to alleviate and dissipate it, though to do this without 
 injury to what is true and good, can after all be only 
 a gradual work. Errors of fact may do no harm, and 
 their removal may do much. 
 
 17. 
 
 As neither the local rulers nor the pastors of the Church 
 are impeccable in act nor infallible in judgment, I am not 
 obliged to maintain that all ecclesiastical measures and per- 
 missions have ever been praiseworthy and safe precedents. 
 But as to the mere countenancing of superstitions, it must 
 not be forgotten, that our Lord Himself, on one occasion, 
 passed over the superstitious act of a woman who was in 
 great trouble, for the merit of the faith which was the 
 
PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. lxvil 
 
 real element in it. She was under the influence of what 
 would be called, were she alive now, a " corrupt " religion, 
 yet she was rewarded by a miracle. She came behind 
 our Lord and touched Him, hoping " virtue would go out 
 of Hiin," without His knowing it. She paid a sort of 
 fetish reverence to the hem of His garment ; she stole, as 
 she considered, something from Him, and was much discon- 
 certed at being found out. When our Lord asked who had 
 touched Him, " fearing and trembling," says St. Mark, 
 ff knowing what was done in her, she came and fell down 
 before Him, and told Him all the truth," as if there were 
 anything to tell to the All-knowing. What was our 
 Lord's judgment on her ? ' i Daughter, thy faith hath 
 made thee whole ; go in peace." Men talk of our double 
 aspect now ; has not the first age a double aspect ? Do 
 not such incidents in the Grospel as this, and the 
 miracle on the swine, the pool of Bethesda, the restoration 
 of the servant's ear, the changing water into wine, the 
 coin in the fish's mouth, and the like, form an aspect of 
 Apostolic Christianity very different from that presented 
 by St. Paul's Pastoral Epistles and the Epistle General 
 of St. John ? Need men wait for the Medieval Church 
 in order to make their complaint that the theology of 
 Christianity does not accord with its religious manifesta- 
 tions ? 
 
 d 2 
 
lxVlll PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. 
 
 18. 
 
 This woman, who is so prominently brought before us 
 by three evangelists, doubtless understood that, if the 
 garment had virtue, this arose from its being Christ's; 
 and so a poor Neapolitan crone, who chatters to the crucifix, 
 refers that crucifix in her deep mental consciousness to an 
 original who once hung upon a cross in flesh and blood ; 
 but if, nevertheless she is puzzle-headed enough to assign 
 virtue to it in itself, she does no more than the woman in 
 the Gospel, who preferred to rely for a cure on a bit of 
 cloth, which was our Lord's, to directly and honestly ad- 
 dressing Him. Yet He praised her before the multitude, 
 praised her for what might, not without reason, be called 
 an idolatrous act ; for in His new law He was opening 
 the meaning of the word " idolatry/'' and applying it to 
 various sins, to the adoration paid to rich men, to the thirst 
 after gain, to ambition, and the pride of life, idolatries worse 
 in His judgment than the idolatry of ignorance, but not 
 commonly startling or shocking to educated minds. 
 
 And may I not add that this aspect of our Lord's teaching 
 is quite in keeping with the general drift of His discourses ? 
 Again and again He insists on the necessity of faith; but 
 where does He insist on the danger of superstition, an 
 infirmity, which, taking human nature as it is, is the sure 
 companion of faith, when vivid and earnest ? Taking 
 
 
PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. lxix 
 
 human nature as it is, we may surely concede a little 
 superstition, as not the worst of evils, if it be the price of 
 making sure of faith. Of course it need not be the price ; 
 and the Church, in her teaching function, will ever be 
 vigilant against the inroad of what is a degradation both of 
 faith and of reason: but considering, as Ad glicans will allow, 
 how intimately the sacramental system is connected with 
 Christianity, and how feeble and confused is at present the 
 ethical intelligence of the world at large, it is a distant day, 
 at which the Church will find it easy, in her oversight of 
 her populations, to make her Sacerdotal office keep step 
 with her Prophetical. Just now I should be disposed to 
 doubt whether that nation really had the faith, which is free 
 in all its ranks and classes from all kinds and degrees of 
 what is commonly considered superstition. 
 
 19. 
 
 Worship, indeed, being the act of our devotional nature, 
 strives hard to emancipate itself from theological restraints. 
 Theology did not create it, but found it in our hearts, and 
 used it. And it has many shapes and many objects, and, 
 moreover, these are not altogether unlawful, though they 
 be many. Undoubtedly the first and most necessary of all 
 religious truths is the Being, Unity, and Omnipotence of 
 God, and it was the primary purpose and work of Revelation 
 
Ixx PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. 
 
 to enforce this. But did not that first truth involve in itself 
 and suggest to the mind with a sympathetic response a 
 second truth, namely, the existence of other beings besides 
 the Supreme ? and that for the very reason that He was 
 Unity and Perfection, — I mean, a whole world, though to 
 us unknown, — in order to people the vast gulf which sepa- 
 rates Him from man ? And, when our Lord came and united 
 the Infinite and Finite, was it not natural to think, even 
 before Revelation spoke out, that He came to be " the 
 First born of many brethren/* all crowned after His 
 pattern with glory and honour ? As there is an instinctive 
 course of reasoning which leads the mind to acknowledge 
 the Supreme God, so we instinctively believe in the 
 existence of beings short of Him, though at the same time 
 far superior to ourselves, beings unseen by us, and yet 
 about us and with relations to us. And He has by His 
 successive revelations confirmed to us the correctness of 
 our anticipation. He has in fact told us of the myriads of 
 beings, good and evil, spirits as God is, friendly or hostile 
 to us, who are roundabout us ; and, moreover, by teaching 
 us also the immortality of man, He sets before us a throng 
 of innumerable souls, once men, who are dead neither to 
 God nor to us, and, who, as having been akin to us, 
 suggest to us, when we think of them, and seem to 
 sanction, acts of mutual intercourse. 
 
PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. Ixxi 
 
 20. 
 
 Revelation in this matter does but complete what Na- 
 ture has begun. It is difficult to deny that polytheism is 
 a natural sentiment corrupted. Its radical evil is, not the 
 belief in many divine intelligences, but its forgetf ulness of 
 their Creator, the One Living Personal God who is above 
 them all, — that is, its virtual Atheism. First secure in the 
 mind and heart of individuals, in the popular intelligence, 
 a lively faith and trust in Him, and then the cultus of 
 Angels and Saints, though ever to be watched with jealousy 
 by theologians, because of human infirmity and perverse- 
 ness, is a privilege, nay a duty, and has a normal place in 
 revealed Religion. 
 
 Holding then this recognition of orders of beings be- 
 tween the Supreme Creator and man to be a natural and 
 true sentiment, I have a difficulty in receiving the opinion 
 of the day that monotheism and polytheism are the 
 characteristics of distinct races, the former of the Semitic, 
 the latter of the Aryan. I cannot indeed see the justice 
 of this contrast at all. Did not the Israelites, for all their 
 Semitic descent, worship Baal and Astoreth in the times of 
 the Judges, and sacrifice to these and other false gods 
 under their Kings ? And then, when at last a sense of 
 the Divine Unity had been wrought into them, did they not 
 still pay religious honours to Abraham, up to teaching, as 
 
lxxii PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. 
 
 our Lord's language shows, that his bosom was the limbo of 
 holy souls ? and did not our Lord sanction them in doing 
 so ? and this in spite of the danger of superstition in such 
 beliefs, as shown afterwards in St. Paul's warning against 
 Angel worship in his Epistle to the Colossians. 
 
 Again, the Saracenic race is Semitic, yet the Arabian 
 Nights suffice to show how congenial the idea of beings 
 intermediate to God and man was to that and other 
 Mohammedan people. In spite of the profession of their 
 religion to uphold severely the Divine Unity, they are 
 notorious for superstitions founded on the belief of innume- 
 rable spirits in earth and heaven. Such is their doctrine 
 of Angels, and the stories they attach to them ; of whom 
 a large host waits upon every Mussulman, in so much that 
 each of his limbs and functions has its guardian. Such 
 again is that fantastic and fertile mythology, of which 
 Solomon is the central figure ; with its population of peris, 
 gins, devis, afreets, and the like, and its bearing upon 
 human affairs. And such again their magic, their charms, 
 spells, lucky and unlucky numbers; and such their belief 
 in astrology. Their insistence on the Divine Unity is 
 rather directed against the Holy Trinity, than against 
 polytheism. 
 
 Still more readily will that true theology, which teaches 
 that He ever was a Father in His incomprehensible essence, 
 
PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. lxxiii 
 
 accept and proclaim the doctrine of the fertility, bounti- 
 fulness and beneficence of His creative power, and claim 
 for Him the right of a Father over the work of His hands. 
 All things are His and He is in all things. All things are 
 "very good," and, in St. Paul's words, we may "glorify 
 Him in " them. This is especially true as regards intel- 
 lectual and holy beings, and is the very principle of the 
 cultus of Angels and Saints, nor would there be anything 
 to guard against or explain, were it not for the moral 
 sickness and feebleness which is the birth-portion of our 
 race, and which, as the same Apostle affirms, has led 
 them to " change the truth of God into a lie, and worship 
 and serve the creature rather than the Creator, who is 
 blessed for ever." 
 
 ■ 21. 
 
 Here at last I come to the point, which has been the 
 drift of these remarks. The primary object of Revelation 
 was to recall men from idolizing the creature. The 
 Israelites had the mission of effecting this by the stern and 
 pitiless ministry of the sword. The Christian Church, after 
 the pattern of our Lord's gentleness, has been guided to an 
 opposite course. Moses on his death was buried by Divine 
 Agency, lest, as the opinion has prevailed, a people, who 
 afterwards offered incense to the brazen serpent which 
 
1XX1V PREFACE TO THE TBIRD EDITION. 
 
 lie set up, should be guilty of idolatry towards his dead 
 body. But Christians, on the contrary, have from the first 
 cherished and honoured with a special cult us the memo- 
 ries of the Martyrs, who had shed their blood for Christ, 
 and have kept up a perpetual communion with all their 
 brethren departed by their prayers and by masses for their 
 souls. That is, the Christian Church has understood that 
 her mission was not like that of Moses, to oppose herself 
 to impulses which were both natural and legitimate, 
 though they had been heretofore the instruments of sin, 
 but to do her best, by a right use, to moderate and purify 
 them. Hence, in proportion as the extinction of the old 
 corrupt heathenism made it possible, she has invoked 
 saints, sanctioned the use of their images, and, in the 
 spirit of the Gospels and the Acts, has expected miracles 
 from their persons, garments, relics, and tombs. 
 
 This being her mission, not to forbid the memory and 
 veneration of Saints and Angels, but to subordinate it to 
 the worship of the Supreme Creator, it is not wonderful, 
 if she has appeared to lookers-on to be sanctioning and 
 reviving that " old error " which has " passed away;" and 
 that the more so, because she has not been able to do all 
 she could wish against it, and has been obliged at times 
 and in particular cases, as I have said above, as the least 
 of evils, to temporize and compromise, — of course short of 
 
PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. JxxV 
 
 any infringement of the Eevealed Law or any real neglect 
 of her teaching office. And hence, which is our main 
 subject, there will ever be a marked contrariety between 
 the professions of her theology and the ways and doings 
 of a Catholic country. 
 
 22. 
 
 It must be recollected, that, while the Catholic Church 
 is ever most precise in her enunciation of doctrine, and 
 allows no liberty of dissent from her decisions, (for on 
 such objective matters she speaks with the authority of 
 infallibility,) her tone is different, in the sanction she 
 gives to devotions, as they are of a subjective and 
 personal nature. Here she neither prescribes measure, 
 nor forbids choice, nor, except so far as they imply doc- 
 trine, is she infallible in her adoption or use of them. This 
 is an additional reason why the formal decrees of Councils 
 and statements of theologians differ in their first aspect 
 from the religion of the uneducated classes; the latter 
 represents the wayward popular taste, and the former the 
 critical judgments of clear heads and holy hearts. 
 
 This contrast will be the greater, when, as sometimes 
 happens, ecclesiastical authority takes part with the 
 popular sentiment against a theological decision. Such, 
 we know, was the case, when St. Peter himself committed 
 
1XXV1 PREFACE TO THE THIUD EDITION. 
 
 an error in conduct, in the countenance he gave to the 
 Mosaic rites in consequence of the pressure exerted on him 
 by the Judaic Christians. On that occasion St. Paul with- 
 stood him, ' ' because he was to be blamed.-" A fault, which 
 even the first Pope incurred, may in some other matter of 
 rite or devotion find a place now and then in the history of 
 holy and learned ecclesiastics who were not Popes. Such 
 an instance seems presented to us in the error of judgment 
 which was committed by the Fathers of the Society of Jesus 
 in China, in their adoption of certain customs which they 
 found among the heathen there ; and Protestant writers 
 in consequence have noted it as a signal instance of the 
 double-faced conduct of Catholics, as if they were used to 
 present their religion under various aspects according to 
 the expedience of the place or time. But that there is a 
 religious way of thus accommodating ourselves to those 
 among whom we live, and whom it is our duty, if possible, 
 to convert, is plain from St. Paul's own rule of life, con- 
 sidering he " became to the Jews as a Jew, that he might 
 gain the Jews, and to them that were without the law, as 
 if he were without the law, and became all things to all 
 men that he might save all." Or what shall we say to 
 the commencement of St. John's Gospel, in which the 
 Evangelist may be as plausibly represented to have used the 
 language of heathen classics with the purpose of interesting 
 
PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. lxxvii 
 
 and gaining the Platonizing Jews, as the Jesuits be charged 
 with duplicity and deceit in aiming at the conversion of the 
 heathen in the East by an imitation of their customs. St. 
 Paul on various occasions acts in the same spirit of economy, 
 as did the great Missionary Church of Alexandria in the 
 centuries which followed ; its masters did but carry out, 
 professedly, a principle of action, of which they considered 
 they found examples in Scripture. Anglicans who appeal 
 to the Ante-nicene period as especially their own, should 
 be tender of the memories of Theonas, Clement, Origen,and 
 Gregory Thaumaturgus. 
 
 23. 
 
 The mention of missions and of St. Gregory leads me on to 
 another department of my general subject, viz. the embar- 
 rassments and difficult questions arising out of the regal 
 office of the Church and her duties to it. It is said of this 
 primitive Father, who was the Apostle of a large district 
 in Asia Minor, that he found in it only seventeen Chris- 
 tians, and on his death left in it only seventeen pagans. 
 This was an enlargement of the Church's territory worthy 
 of a Catholic Bishop, but how did he achieve it ? Putting 
 aside the real cause, the Divine blessing, and his gift of 
 miracles, we are told of one special act of his, not unlike 
 
lxxviil PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. 
 
 that of the Jesuits in the East, which I will relate in the 
 words of Neander : — " Having observed that many of the 
 common people were attached to the religion of their 
 fathers from a love of the ancient sports connected with 
 paganism, he determined to provide the new converts with 
 a substitute for those. He instituted a general festival in 
 honour of the Martyrs, and permitted the rude multitudes 
 to celebrate it with banquets similar to those which 
 accompanied the pagan funerals (parentalia) and other 
 heathen festivals." 7 
 
 Neander indeed finds fault with Gregory's indulgence, 
 and certainly it had its dangers, as all such economies 
 have, and it required anxious vigilance on the part of a 
 Christian teacher in carrying it out. St. Peter Chry- 
 sologus, in the fifth century, when Christianity needed no 
 such expedients, expressed this feeling when, on occasion of 
 the heathen dances usual in his diocese on the Calends of 
 January, he said, " Whoso will have his joke with the 
 devil, will not have his triumph with Christ." But, I sup- 
 pose, both measures at once, the indulgence and the vigi- 
 lance, were included in St. Gregory's proceeding, as mother 
 times and places in the Church's history. At this very time 
 Carnival is allowed, if not sanctioned, by ecclesiastical 
 authorities in the cities of the Continent, while they not only 
 
 * Hist. vol. ii. p, 496 (Hohn). 
 
PREFACE TO THE THTUD EDITION. lxxix 
 
 keep away from it themselves, but appoint special devotions 
 in the Churches, in order to draw away the faithful from the 
 spiritual dangers attending on it. 
 
 24. 
 St. Gregory was a Bishop as well as a preacher and 
 spiritual guide, so that the economy which is related of him 
 is an act of the regal function of the Church, as well as 
 of her sacerdotal and pastoral. And this indeed attaches 
 to most of the instances which I have been giving above 
 of the Church's moderating or suspending under circum- 
 stances the requisitions of her theology. They illustrate 
 at once both these elements of her divinely ordered con- 
 stitution ; for the fear, as already mentioned, of " quench- 
 ing the smoking flax/' which is the attribute of a guide of 
 souls, operated in the same direction as zeal for the ex- 
 tension of Christ's kingdom, in resisting that rigorous- 
 ness of a logical theology which is more suited for the 
 Schools than for the world. In these cases then the two 
 offices, political and pastoral, have a common interest as 
 against the theological; but this is not always so, and 
 therefore I shall now go on to give instances in which 
 the imperial and political expedience of religion stands 
 out prominent, and both its theological and devotional 
 duties are in the background. 
 
1XXX PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. 
 
 25. 
 
 I observe then that Apostolicity of doctrine and Sanc- 
 tity of worship, as attributes of the Church, are differently 
 circumstanced from her regal autocracy. Tradition in good 
 measure is sufficient for doctrine, and popular custom and 
 conscience for worship, but tradition and custom cannot of 
 themselves secure independence and self-government. The 
 Greek Church shows this, which has lost its political life, 
 while its doctrine, and its ritual and devotional system, have 
 little that can be excepted against. If the Church is to be 
 regal, a witness for Heaven, unchangeable amid secular 
 changes, if in every age she is to hold her own, and 
 proclaim as well as profess the truth, if she is to 
 thrive without or against the civil power, if she is to be 
 resourceful and self-recuperative under all fortunes, she 
 must be more than Holy and Apostolic ; she must be 
 Catholic. Hence it is that, first, she has ever from her 
 beginning onwards had a hierarchy and a head, with a 
 strict unity of polity, the claim of an exclusive divine 
 authority and blessing, the trusteeship of the gospel gifts, 
 and the exercise over her members of an absolute and almost 
 despotic rule. And next, as to her work, it is her special 
 duty, as a sovereign State, to consolidate her several por- 
 tions, to enlarge her territory, to keep up and to increase 
 
PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. Ixxxi 
 
 her various populations in this ever-dying, ever-nascent 
 world, in which to be stationary is to lose ground, and to 
 repose is to fail. It is her duty to strengthen and facilitate 
 the intercourse of city with city, and race with race, so that 
 an injury done to one is felt to be an injury to all, and the 
 act of individuals has the energy and momentum of the 
 whole body. It is her duty to have her eyes upon the 
 movements of all classes in her wide dominion, on ecclesi- 
 astics and laymen, on the regular clergy and secular, on civil 
 society, andpoliticalmovements. She must be on the watch- 
 tower, discerning in the distance and providing against all 
 dangers ; she has to protect the ignorant and weak, to 
 remove scandals, to see to the education of the young, 
 to administer temporalities, to initiate, or at least to direct 
 all Christian work, and all with a view to the life, health, 
 and strength of Christianity, and the salvation of souls. 
 
 It is easy to understand how from time to time such 
 serious interests and duties involve, as regards the parties 
 who have the responsibility of them, the risk, perhaps the 
 certainty, at least the imputation, of ambition or other 
 selfish motive, and still more frequently of error in judg- 
 ment, or violent action, or injustice. However, leaving this 
 portion of the subject with this remark, I shall bring what 
 I have to say to an end by putting the Regal office of the 
 Church side by side with the Prophetical, and giving 
 
 vol. i. e 
 
lxxxii PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. 
 
 instances of the collisions and compromises which have 
 taken place between them in consequence of their respec- 
 tive duties and interests. 
 
 26. 
 
 For example : the early tradition of the Church was 
 dissuasive of using force in the maintenance of religion. 
 " It is not the part of men who have confidence in what 
 they believe/' says Athanasius, (i to force and compel the 
 unwilling. For the truth is not preached with swords, or 
 with darts, nor by means of soldiers, but by persuasion 
 and counsel." Arian. Hist. § 83. Augustine at first 
 took the same view of duty ; but his experience as a 
 Bishop led him to change his mind. Here we see the 
 interests of the Church, as a regal power, acting as an 
 iufluence upon his theology. 
 
 Again : with a view to the Church's greater unity and 
 strength, Popes, from the time of St. Gregory I., down to 
 the present, have been earnest in superseding and putting 
 away the diversified traditional forms of ritual in various 
 parts of the Church. In this policy ecclesiastical expedience 
 has acted in the subject-matter of theology and worship. 
 
 Again : acts simply unjustifiable, such as real betrayals 
 of the truth on the part of Liberius and Honorius, become 
 intelligible, and cease to be shocking, if we consider that 
 those Popes felt themselves tobe head rulers of Christendom 
 
PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. lxxxiil 
 
 and their first duty, as such, to be that of securing its 
 peace, union and consolidation. The personal want of 
 firmness or of clear-sightedness in the matter of doctrine, 
 which each of them in his own day evidenced, may have 
 arisen out of his keen sense of being the Ecumenical Bishop 
 and one Pastor of Christ's flock, of the scandal caused by 
 its internal dissensions, and of his responsibility, should 
 it retrograde in health and strength in his day. 
 
 27. 
 The principle, on which these two Popes maybe supposed 
 to have acted, not unsound in itself, though by them 
 wrongly applied, I conceive to be this, — that no act could 
 be theologically an error, which was absolutely and un- 
 deniably necessary for the unity, sanctity, and peace of the 
 Church ; for falsehood never could be necessary for those 
 blessings, and truth alone can be. Tf one could be sure of 
 this necessity, the principle itself may be granted ; though, 
 from the difficulty of rightly applying it, it can only be 
 allowed on such grave occasions, with so luminous a tradi- 
 tion, in its favour, and by such high authorities, as make it 
 safe. If it was wrongly used by the Popes whom I have 
 named, it has been rightly and successfully used by 
 others, in whose decision, in their respective cases, no 
 Catholic has any difficulty in concurring. 
 
 e 2 
 
1XXX1V PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. 
 
 28. 
 I will give some instances of it, and of these the most ob- 
 vious is our doctrine regarding the Canonization of Saints. 
 The infallibility of the Church must certainly extend to this 
 solemn and public act ; and that, because on so serious a 
 matter, affecting the worship of the faithful, though relating 
 to a fact, the Church, (that is, the Pope,) must be infallible. 
 This is Card. Lambertini's decision, in concurrence with 
 St. Thomas, putting on one side the question of the Pope's 
 ordinary infallibility, which depends on other arguments. 
 iC It cannot be," that great author says, " that the Universal 
 Church should be led into error on a point of morals by 
 the supreme Pontiff ; and that certainly would, or might 
 happen, supposing he could be mistaken in a canonization.'" 
 This, too, is St. Thomas's argument : c ' In the Church there 
 can be no damnable error ; but this would be such, if one 
 who was really a sinner, were venerated as a saint/' &c. — 
 Card. Lambert, de Canon. Diss. xxi. vol. i. ed. Yen. 1751. 
 
 29. 
 Again : in like manner, our certainty that the Apostolical 
 succession of Bishops in the Catholic Church has no flaw 
 in it, and that the validity of the Sacraments is secure, 
 in spite of possible mistakes and informalities in the course 
 of 1800 years, rests upon our faith that He who has 
 
PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. lxxXV 
 
 decreed tlie end has decreed the means, — that He is always 
 sufficient for His Church, — that, if He has given us a 
 promise ever to be with us, He will perform it. 
 
 30. 
 
 A more delicate instance of this argument, ex absurdo, 
 as it may be called, is found in the learned book of 
 Moriiius " de Ordinationibus." He shows us that its 
 application was the turning-point of the decision ultimately 
 made at Rome in the middle age, in regard to simoniacal, 
 heretical, and schismatical ordinations. As regards ordi- 
 nations made with simony, it seems that Pope Leo IX., 
 on occasion of the ecclesiastical disorders of his time, held 
 a solemn Council, in which judgment was given against 
 the validity of such acts. It seems also that, from certain 
 ecclesiastical difficulties which followed, lying in the region 
 of fact, from the " incommoda hinc emergentia," the Pope 
 could not carry out the Synodal act, and was obliged to 
 issue a milder decision instead of it. St. Peter Damiani, 
 giving an account of this incident, says, " When Leo pro- 
 nounced all simoniacal ordinations to be null and void, 
 the consequence was a serious tumult and resistance on the 
 part of the multitude of Roman priests, who urged, with 
 the concurrence of the Bishops, that it would lead to the 
 Basilicas being deprived of the sacerdotal offices; more- 
 
1XXXV1 PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. 
 
 over, that the Masses would absolutely cease, to the 
 overthrow of the Christian Religion and the dismay of all 
 the faithful everywhere." 
 
 Such a mode of resolving a point in theology is intelli- 
 gible only on the ground laid down above, that a certain 
 quasi-doctrinal conclusion may be in such wise fatal to the 
 constitution, and therefore to the being of the Church, as 
 ipso facto to stultify the principles from which it is drawn, 
 it being inconceivable that her Lord and Maker intended 
 that the action of any one of her functions should be the 
 destruction of another. In this case, then, He willed that 
 a point of theology should be determined on its expediency 
 relatively to the Church's Catholicity and the edification of 
 her people, — by the logic of facts, which at times overrides 
 all positive laws and prerogatives, and reaches in its effective 
 force to the very frontiers of immutable truths in religion, 
 eihics, and theology. 
 
 31. 
 
 This instance, in which the motive-cause of the decision 
 ultimately made is so clearly brought out, is confirmed by 
 the parallel case of heretical ordination. For instance, 
 Pope Innocent, in the fourth century, writing to the 
 Bishops of Macedonia, concedes the validity of heretical 
 orders in a certain case specified, declaring the while, that 
 such a concession ran counter to the tradition of the Roman 
 
PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. lxxxvii 
 
 Church. This concession was made in order to put an end 
 to a great scandal ; but " certainly w the Pope says, ( ' it was 
 not so from the first, as there were ancient rules, which, 
 as handed down from the Apostles and Apostolical men, 
 the Roman Church guards and commits to the guardian- 
 ship of her subjects." 
 
 32. 
 
 Again, as regards schismatical ordination, as of the 
 Donatists : — on this occasion, Rome stood firm to her tra- 
 ditional view, and Augustine apparently concurred in 
 it; but the African Bishops on the whole were actuated 
 by their sense of the necessity of taking the opposite line, 
 and were afraid of committing themselves to the principle 
 that heresy or schism nullified ordination. They con- 
 demned (with the countenance of Augustine) Donatus alone, 
 the author of the schism, but accepted the rest, orders and 
 all, lest remaining outside the Church, they should be 
 a perpetual thorn in her side. " It was not possible/' 
 says Morinus, "for Augustine to come to any other decision 
 considering he saw daily the Donatists with their orders 
 received into the Church/' This is another instance of 
 the schools giving way to ecclesiastical expedience, and of 
 the interests of peace and unity being a surer way of 
 arriving at a doctrinal conclusion than methods more 
 directly theological. 
 
lxxXVlii PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. 
 
 33. 
 
 The considerations which might be urged, in behalf of 
 these irregular ordinations, on the score of expedience, 
 had still greater force when urged in recognition of here- 
 tical baptism, which formed the subject of a controversy 
 in the preceding century. Baptism was held to be the 
 entrance to Christianity and its other sacraments, and once 
 a Christian, ever a Christian. It marked and discriminated 
 the soul receiving it from all other souls by a super- 
 natural character, as the owner's name is imprinted on a 
 flock of sheep. Thus heretics far and wide, if baptized, 
 were children of the Church, and they answered to that 
 title so far as they were in fact preachers of the truth of 
 Christ to the heathen ; since there is no religious sect 
 without truth in it, and it would be truth which the 
 heathen had to be taught. That exuberant birth of strange 
 rites and doctrines, which suddenly burst into life all 
 round Christianity on its start, is one of the striking 
 evidences of the wondrous force of the Christian idea, and 
 of its subtle penetrating influence, when it first fell upon 
 the ignorant masses : and though many of these sects had 
 little or no claim to administer a real baptism, and in 
 many or most the abounding evil that was in them 
 choked the scanty and feeble good, yet was the Church 
 definitely to reject a baptism simply on the ground of 
 
PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. lxxxix 
 
 its not being administered by a Catholic ? Expedience 
 pointed out the duty of acknowledging it in cases in which 
 our Lord's description of it, when He made it His initiatory 
 rite, had been exactly fulfilled, unless indeed Scripture 
 and Tradition were directly opposed to such a course. 
 To cut off such cautious baptism from the Church was 
 to circumscribe her range of subjects, and to impair her 
 catholicity. It was to sacrifice those, who, though at 
 present blinded by the mist of error, had enough of truth 
 in their religion, however latent, to leave hope of their 
 conversion at some future day. The imperial See of 
 Peter, ever on the watch for the extension of Christ's king- 
 dom, understood this well ; and, while its tradition was 
 unfavourable to heretical ordination, it was strong and 
 clear in behalf of the validity of heretical baptism. 
 
 Pope Stephen took this side then in a memorable 
 controversy, and maintained it against almost the whole 
 Christian world. It was a signal instance of the triumph, 
 under Divine Providence, of a high, generous expediency 
 over a conception of Christian doctrine, which logically 
 indeed seemed unanswerable. One must grant indeed, as 
 I have said, that he based his decision upon Tradition, 
 not on expediency, but why was such a Tradition in the 
 first instance begun ? The reason of the Tradition has to 
 be explained; and, if Stephen is not to have the credit 
 
XC PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. 
 
 of the large and wise views which occasioned his conduct, 
 that credit belongs to the Popes who went before him. 
 These he had on his side certainly, but whom had he 
 besides them ? The Apostolical Canons say, " Those who 
 are baptized by heretics cannot be believers." The 
 Synods of Iconium and Synnada declare that " those 
 who came from the heretics were to be washed and 
 purified from the filth of their old impure leaven." 
 Clement of Alexandria, that " Wisdom pronounces that 
 strange waters do not belong to her." Firmilian, that 
 " we recognize one only Church of God, and account 
 baptism to belong only to the Holy Church." " It seemed 
 good from the beginning," says St. Basil, "wholly to 
 annul the baptism of heretics." Tertullian says, ft We 
 have not the same baptism with heretics; since they 
 have it not rightly ; without, they have it not at all." 8 
 -' Then may there be one baptism," says St. Cyprian, 
 " when there is one faith. We and heretics cannot have 
 a common baptism, since we have not the Father, or the 
 Son, or the Holy Ghost in common. Heretics in their 
 baptism are polluted by their profane water." St. Cyril 
 says, "None but heretics are re-baptized, since their 
 former baptism was not baptism." St. Athanasius asks, 
 
 8 Vid. infr p. 170, and Pusey's Tertullian, p. 280. 
 
PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. XC1 
 
 " Is not the rite administered by the Arians, altogether 
 empty and unprofitable ? he that is sprinkled by them 
 is rather polluted than redeemed/ 7 Optatus says, " The 
 stained baptism cannot wash a man, the polluted cannot 
 cleanse." " The baptism of traitors/' says St. Ambrose, 
 u does not heal, does not cleanse, but defiles." 
 
 Expedience is an argument which grows in cogency 
 with the course of years ; a hundred and fifty years after 
 St. Stephen, the ecclesiastical conclusion which he had 
 upheld was accepted generally by the School of Theo- 
 logians, in an adhesion to it on the part of St. 
 Augustine. 
 
 34. 
 
 Lastly, serious as this contrast is between the decision 
 of the Pope and the logic of the above great authors, there 
 was, before and in his time, a change yet greater in the 
 ideas and the tone of the theological schools ; a change 
 which may remind us of the language of Cardinal Fisher 
 on a collateral subject, as is to be found below at p. 72. 
 I mean that relaxation of the penitential canons, effected 
 by a succession of Popes, which, much as it altered the 
 Church's discipline and the ordinary course of Christian 
 life, still was strictly conformable to the necessities of her 
 prospective state, as our Lord had described it beforehand. 
 As Christianity spread through the various classes of the 
 
XC11 PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. 
 
 Pagan Empire, and penetrated into private families, social 
 circles, and secular callings, and was received with 
 temporary or local toleration, the standard of duty 
 amongst its adherents fell ; habits and practices of the 
 world found their way into the fold ; and scandals became 
 too common to allow of the offenders being cast off by 
 wholesale. 
 
 This, I say, was but the fulfilment of our Lord's prophetic 
 announcement, that the kingdom of heaven should be a 
 net, gathering fish of every kind ; and how indeed should 
 it be otherwise, if it was to be Catholic, human nature 
 being what it is ? Yet, on the other hand, the Sermon 
 on the Mount, and other discourses of our Lord, assigned 
 a very definite standard of morals, and a very high rule 
 of conduct to His people. Under these circumstances, the 
 Holy See and various Bishops took what would be called 
 the laxer side, as being that which charity, as well as 
 expediency suggested, whereas the graver and more 
 strict, as well as the ignorant portion of the Christian 
 community did not understand such a policy, and in 
 consequence there was, in various parts of the world, both 
 among the educated and the uneducated, an indignant 
 rising against this innovation, as it was conceived, of their 
 rulers. Montanus and his sect in the East, represent the 
 feelings of the multitude ; at Koine, the school of Ter- 
 
PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. XClll 
 
 tullian, Novatian, and the author of the Elenchus, able 
 and learned men, stood out in behalf of what they con- 
 sidered the Old Theology, terminating their course in the 
 Novatian schism ; while the learned Donatist Bishops and 
 the mad Circumcelliones illustrate a like sentiment, and 
 a like temper, in Africa. During a long controversy, the 
 collision of those elements in the Church/ s constitution, 
 which have formed the subject of this Essay, is variously 
 illustrated. It carries us through the Pontificates of 
 Zephyrinus, Callistus, Cornelius, Stephen, and Dionysiu«, 
 and so on down to the Episcopate of St. Augustine; 
 and it ends in the universal acceptance of the decision 
 of the Holy See. The resolution of the difficulties of the 
 problem was found in a clearer recognition of the dis- 
 tinction between precepts and counsels, between mortal 
 sins and venial, and between the two forums of the 
 Church, the external and internal ; — also in the develop- 
 ment of the doctrine of Purgatory, and in the contem- 
 porary rise of the monastic institution, as exhibited in 
 the history of St. Antony and his disciples. 
 
 35. 
 
 So much on the collision and the adjustment of the 
 Regal or political office of the Church with the Propheti- 
 cal : that I may not end without an instance of the politi- 
 
XC1V PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. 
 
 cal in contrast with the Sacerdotal, I will refer to the 
 Labarum of Constantine. The sacred symbol of unresist- 
 ing suffering, of self-sacrificing love, of life-giving grace, 
 of celestial peace, became in the hands of the first Chris- 
 tian Emperor, with the sanction of the Church, his banner 
 in fierce battle and the pledge of victory for his sword. 
 
 36. 
 
 To conclude : — whatever is great refuses to be reduced 
 to human rule, and to be made consistent in its many 
 aspects with itself. Who shall reconcile with each other 
 the various attributes of the Infinite God ? and, as He is, 
 such in their several degrees are His works. This living 
 world to which we belong, how self-contradictory it is, 
 when we attempt to measure and master its meaning and 
 scope ! And how full of incongruities, that is, of mys- 
 teries, in its higher and finer specimens, is the soul of man, 
 viewed in its assemblage of opinions, tastes, habits, powers, 
 aims, and doings ! We need not feel surprise then, if 
 Holy Church too, the supernatural creation of God, is an 
 instance of the same law, presenting to us an admirable 
 consistency and unity in word and deed, as her general 
 characteristic, but crossed and discredited now and then 
 by apparent anomalies which need, and which claim, at 
 our hands an exercise of faith. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 WAS 
 
 Introduction . , 1 
 
 LECT. 
 
 I. — The Nature and Ground of Eoman and Protestant 
 
 Errors 26 
 
 IT.— On Roman Teaching as Neglectful of Antiquity . 47 
 
 III.— Doctrine of Infallibility Morally Considered . 83 
 
 IV. — Doctrine of Infallibility Politically Considered 106 
 
 Y. — On the Use of Private Judgment .... 128 
 
 VI. — On the Abuse of Private Judgment . . . 145 
 
 VII. — Instances of the Abuse of Private Judgment . 168 
 
 VIII. — The Indefectibility of the Church Catholic . . 189 
 
 IX. — On the Essentials of the Gospel .... 214 
 
 X. — On the Essentials of the Gospel .... 239 
 
 XI. — On Scripture as the Eecord of Faith . . . 266 
 
 XII. — On Scripture as the Eecord of our Lord's 
 
 Teaching 290 
 
 XIII. — On Scripture as the Document of Proof in the 
 
 Early Church 309 
 
 XIV. — On the Fortunes of the Church .... 331 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 So much is said and written just at this time on the 
 subject of the Church, by those who use the word in 
 different senses, and those who attach to it little distinct 
 sense at all, that I have thought it might be useful, by 
 way of promoting sound and consistent views upon it, to 
 consider it attentively in several of its bearings, and 
 principally in its relation to the Roman theory con- 
 cerning it, which is more systematic than any other. 
 Unhappy is it that we should be obliged to discuss and 
 defend what a Christian people were intended to enjoy, 
 to appeal to their intellects instead of " stirring up their 
 pure minds by way of remembrance,^ to direct them 
 towards articles of faith which should be their place of 
 starting, and to treat as mere conclusions what in other 
 ages have been assumed as first principles. Surely life is 
 not long enough to prove everything which may be made 
 the subject of proof; and, though inquiry is left partly 
 open in order to try our earnestness, yet it is in great 
 measure, and in the most important points, superseded by 
 Revelation, — which discloses things which reason could 
 not reach, saves us the labour of using it when it might 
 avail, and sanctions thereby the principle of dispensing 
 with it in other cases. Yet, in spite of this joint testimony 
 of nature and grace, so it is, we seem at this day to con- 
 sider discussion and controversy to be in themselves chief 
 goods. We exult in what we think our indefeisible 
 VOL. I. b 
 
2 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 rio-ht and glorious privilege to clioose and settle our 
 religion for ourselves ; and we stigmatize it as a bondage 
 to be obliged to accept what the wise, the good, and the 
 many of former times have made over to us, nay, even to 
 submit to what God Himself has revealed. 
 
 From this strange preference, however originating, of 
 inquiry to belief, we, or our fathers before us, have con- 
 trived to make doubtful what really was certain. We 
 have created difficulties in our path ; we have gone out 
 of our way to find ingenious objections to what was 
 received, where none hitherto existed; as if forgetting 
 that there is no truth so clear, no character so pure, no 
 work of man so perfect, bat admits of criticism, and will 
 become suspected as soon as it is accused. As might be 
 expected, then, we have succeeded in our attempt ; we have 
 succeeded in raising clouds which effectually hide the sun 
 from us, and we have nothing left but to grope our way 
 by our reason, as we best can, — our necessary, because 
 now our only guide. And as a traveller by night, calcu- 
 lating or guessing his way over a morass or amid pitfalls, 
 naturally trusts himself more than his companions, though 
 not doubting their skilfulness and good will, and is too 
 intent upon his own successive steps to hear and to follow 
 them, so we, from anxiety if not from carelessness, have 
 straggled each from his neighbour, and are all of us, or 
 nearly so, in a fair way to lose our confidence, if not our 
 hope. I say, we, or others for us, have asserted our right 
 of debating every truth, however sacred, however pro- 
 tected from scrutiny hitherto ; we have accounted that 
 belief alone to be manly which commenced in doubt, that 
 inquiry alone philosophical which assumed no first prin- 
 ciples, that religion alone rational which we have created 
 for ourselves. Loss of labour, division, and error have 
 
INTRODUCTION. 6 
 
 been the three-fold g*am of our self-will, as evidently visited 
 in this world, — not to follow it into the next. 
 
 3. 
 
 How we became committed to so ill-advised a course, by 
 what unfortunate necessity, or under what overpowering 
 temptation, it avails not here to inquire. But the con- 
 sequences are undeniable ; the innocent suffer by a state 
 of things, which to the self-wise and the carnal is an ex- 
 cuse for their indifference. The true voice of Revelation 
 has been overpowered by the more clamorous traditions of 
 men; and where there are rivals, examination is neces- 
 sary, even where piety would fain have been rid of it. 
 Thus, in relation to the particular subject which has led 
 to these remarks, that some one meaning was anciently 
 attached to the word u Church/ ' is certain from its occur- 
 ring in the Creed ; it is certain, for the same reason, that 
 it bore upon some first principle in religion, else it would 
 not have been there. It is certain moreover, from history, 
 that its meaning was undisputed, whatever that meaning 
 was ; and it is as certain that there are interminable 
 disputes and hopeless differences about its meaning now. 
 Now is this a gain or a loss to the present age ? At first 
 sight one might think it a loss, so far as it goes, whatever 
 be the cause of it ; in the same sense in which the burning 
 of a library is a loss, the destruction of a monument, the 
 disappearance of an ancient record, or the death of an 
 experimentalist or philosopher. Diminution from the 
 stock of knowledge is commonly considered a loss in this 
 day ; yet strange to say, in the instance before us, it 
 is thought far otherwise. The great mass of educated 
 men are at once uneasy, impatient, and irritated, not 
 simply incredulous, as soon as they are promised from any 
 quarter some clear view of the original and apostolic 
 doctrine, to them unknown, on any subject of religion. 
 
 b 2 
 
4 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 They bear to hear of researches into Christian Antiquity, 
 if they are directed to prove its uncertainty and unprofit- 
 ableness; they are intolerant and open-mouthed against 
 them, if their object be to rescue, not to destroy. They 
 sanction a rule of philosophy which they practically refute 
 every time they praise Newton or Cuvier. In truth, they 
 can endure a categorical theory in other provinces of 
 knowledge; but in theology belief becomes practical. 
 They perceive that there, what in itself is but an inquiry 
 into questions of fact, tends to an encroachment upon what 
 they think fit to consider their Christian liberty. They 
 are reluctant to be confronted with evidence which will 
 diminish their right of thinking rightly or wrongly, as 
 they please; they are jealous of being forced to submit to 
 one view of the subject, and to be unable at their pleasure 
 to change ; they consider comfort in religion to lie in all 
 questions being open, and in there being no call upon them 
 to act. Thus they deliberately adopt that liberty which God 
 gave His former people in wrath, " a liberty to the sword, 
 to the pestilence, and to the famine/' l the prerogative of 
 being heretics or unbelievers. 
 
 4. 
 
 It would be well if these men could keep their restless 
 humours to themselves ; but they unsettle all around them. 
 They rob those of their birthright who would have hailed 
 the privilege of being told the truth without their own 
 personal risk in finding it; and they force them against 
 their nature upon relying on their reason, when they are 
 content to be saved by faith. Such troublers of the Chris- 
 tian community would in a healthy state of things be 
 silenced or put out of it, as disturbers of the king's peace 
 are restrained in civil matters; but our times, from what- 
 ever cause, being times of confusion, we are reduced to the 
 
 1 Jer. xxxiv. 17. 
 
 
INTRODUCTION. 5 
 
 use of argument and disputation, just as we think it lawful 
 to carry arms and barricade our houses during national 
 disorders. 
 
 Let this be my excuse for discussing rather than pro- 
 pounding what was meant to be simply an article of faith. 
 We travel by night : the teaching of the Apostles concern- 
 ing it, which once, like the pillar in the wilderness, was 
 with the children of God from age to age continually, is 
 in good measure withdrawn ; and we are, so far, left to 
 make the best of our way to the promised land by our 
 natural resources. 
 
 In the following Lectures, then, it is attempted, in the 
 measure which such a mode of writing allows, to build up 
 what man has pulled down, in some of the questions con- 
 nected with the Church ; and that, by means of the stores 
 of Divine truth bequeathed to us in the works of our 
 standard English authors. 
 
 The immediate reason for discussing the subject is this : 
 En the present day, such incidental notice of it, as Christian 
 teachers are led to take in the course of their pastoral 
 instructions, is sure to be charged with what is commonly 
 called " Popery;" and for this reason, — that Roman 
 Catholics having ever insisted upon it, and Protestants 
 having neglected it, to speak of the Church at all, though 
 it is mentioned in the Creed, is thought to savour of Rome. 
 Those then who feel its importance, and yet are not 
 Romanists, are bound on several accounts to show why they 
 are not Romanists, and how they differ from them. They 
 are bound to do so, in order to remove the prejudice with 
 which an article of the Creed is at present encompassed ; 
 and on the other hand to prevent such persons as have 
 right but vague ideas concerning it, from deviating into 
 Romanism because no other system of doctrine is provided 
 
6 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 for them. Till, in this respect, they do more than they have 
 hitherto done, of course they hazard, though without any 
 fault of theirs, a deviation on the part of their hearers into 
 Romanism on the one hand, a reaction into mere Pro- 
 testantism on the other. 
 
 From the circumstances then of the moment, the follow- 
 ing* Lectures are chiefly engaged in examining and ex- 
 posing certain tenets of the Roman Church. But this 
 happens for another reason. After all, the main object in 
 a discussion should be, not to refute error merely, but to 
 establish truth. What Christians especially need and 
 have a right to require, is a positive doctrine on such sub- 
 jects as come under notice. They have a demand on their 
 teachers for the meaning of the article in the Apostles' 
 Creed, which binds them to faith in " the Holy Catholic 
 Church/' It is a poor answer to this inquiry, merely to 
 commence an attack upon Roman teaching, and to show 
 that it presents an exaggerated and erroneous view of the 
 doctrine. Erroneous or not, a view it certainly does pre- 
 sent ; and that religion which attempts a view, though 
 imperfect or extreme, does more than those forms of 
 religion which do not attempt it at all. If we deny that 
 the Roman view of the Church is true, we are bound in very 
 shame to state what we hold ourselves, though at the risk of 
 a theory, unless indeed we would fight with them at an 
 unfair advantage ; and also in charity to our own people, 
 lest we tempt them to error, while we refuse to give them 
 some definite and intelligible doctrine which is better than 
 the Roman. But in doing this we necessarily come across 
 the existing teaching of Rome, and are led to attack it, 
 as the most convenient, or rather only, way of showing 
 what our own views are. It has pre-occupied the ground, 
 and we cannot erect our own structure without partly 
 breaking down, partly using what we find upon it. And 
 thus for a second reason, the following Lectures, so far as 
 
 
INTRODUCTION. 7 
 
 their form goes, are directed against Rome, though their 
 main object is not controversy but edification. 
 
 Their main object is to furnish an approximation in one 
 or two points towards a correct theory of the duties and 
 office of the Church Catholic. Popular Protestantism does 
 not attempt this at all ; it abandons the subject altogether : 
 Rome supplies a doctrine, but, as we conceive, an untrue 
 one. The question is, what is that sound and just ex- 
 position of this Article of Faith, which holds together, or 
 is consistent in theory, and, secondly, is justified by the 
 history of the Dispensation, which is neither Protestant 
 nor Roman, but proceeds along that Via Media, which, 
 as in other things so here, is the appropriate path for sons 
 of the English Church to walk in ? What is the nearest 
 approximation to that primitive truth which Ignatius and 
 Poly carp enjoyed, and which the nineteenth century has 
 virtually lost ? 
 
 This is the problem w T hich demands serious consideration 
 at this day, and some detached portions of which will be 
 considered in the following Lectures. Leaving to others 
 questions directly political and ecclesiastical, I propose to 
 direct attention here to some of those which are connected 
 with the Prophetical Office of the Church. 
 
 6. 
 . This it what I propose to do ; — but first it will be well 
 to observe upon certain obvious objections which may be 
 made to my attempt altogether, as this will incidentally 
 give me an opportunity of defining more exactly what it is 
 I have in view. 
 
 It is urged, then, by conscientious and sensible men, 
 th.it we have hitherto done sufficiently well without any 
 recognized theory on the subject, and therefore do not need 
 it now or in prospect ; that certain notions, abstractedly 
 correct or not, have become venerable and beneficial by 
 
8 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 long usage, and ought not now to be disturbed ; that the 
 nature and functions of the Church have been long settled 
 in this country by law and by historical precedents, and 
 that it is our duty to take what we find, and use it for the 
 best ; that, to discuss so great a subject, though under the 
 guidance of our great Divines, necessarily involves the un- 
 settling of opinions now received ; that, though the views 
 which may be put forward be in themselves innocent or 
 true, yet under our circumstances they will lead to Rome, 
 if only because the mind when once set in motion in any 
 direction finds it difficult to stop ; and, again, because the 
 article of li the Church " has been accidentally the badge 
 and index of that system ; that the discussions proposed 
 are singularly unseasonable at this day, when our Church 
 requires support against her enemies of a practical charac- 
 ter, not speculations upon her nature and historical pre- 
 tensions, — speculations of a past day, unprofitable in them- 
 selves, and in fact only adding to our existing differences, 
 and raising fresh parties and interests in our already dis- 
 tracted communion — -speculations, it is urged, which have 
 never been anything but speculations, never were realized 
 in any age of the Church ; lastly, that the pretended Via 
 Media is but an eclectic system, dangerous to the religious 
 temper of those who advocate it, as leading to arrogance 
 and self-sufficiency in judging of sacred subjects. This is 
 pretty nearly what may be said. 
 
 Now it is obvious that these objections prove too much. 
 If they prove anything, they go to show that the article 
 of the Holy Church Catholic should not be discussed at all, 
 not even as a point of faith ; but that in its most essential 
 respects, as well as in its bearings and consequences, it may 
 be determined and interpreted by the law of the land. This 
 consideration in itself would be enough to show, that there 
 was some fallacy in them somewhere, even if we could not 
 detect it. However, let us consider some of them in detail. 
 
 
INTRODUCTION". 9 
 
 7. 
 One of the most weighty of these objections at first 
 sight, is the danger of unsettling things established, and 
 raising questions, which, whatever may be their intrinsic 
 worth, are novel and exciting at the present day. When, 
 for instance, the office of Holy Scripture in the divine 
 system, or the judicial power of the Church, or the funda- 
 mentals of faith, or the legitimate prerogatives of the 
 Roman see, or the principles of Protestantism are dis- 
 cussed, it is natural to object, that since the Revolution of 
 1688 they have been practically cut short, and definitely 
 settled by civil acts and precedents. It may be urged, 
 that the absolute subjection of the bishops, as bishops, to 
 the crown is determined by the deprivations of 1689; the 
 Church's forfeiture of her synodical rights by the final 
 measure of 1717; the essential agreement of Presby- 
 terianism with Episcopacy by the union with Scotland in 
 1706-7; and our incorporation with dissenters, on the 
 common ground of Protestantism, by the proceedings of 
 the Revolution itself. It may be argued that these 
 measures were but the appropriate carrying out of the acts 
 of the Reformation ; that King William and his party did 
 but complete what King Henry began ; and that we are 
 born Protestants, and though free to change our religion 
 and to profess a change, yet, till we do so, Protestants, as 
 other Protestants, we certainly are, though we happen to 
 retain the episcopal form ; that our Church has thriven 
 upon this foundation in wealth, station, and usefulness ; 
 that being a part of the Constitution, it cannot be altered 
 without touching the Constitution itself ; and, consequently, 
 that all discussions are either very serious or very idle. 
 
 8. 
 
 To all this I answer, that the Constitution has already 
 been altered, and not by any act of ours ; and the mere 
 
10 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 question is, whether the Constitution being altered, and 
 the Church in consequence, which is part of it, being ex- 
 posed to danger in her various functions, we may allow 
 those who have brought her into danger, to apply what 
 they consider suitable remedies, without claiming a voice 
 in the matter ourselves. Are questions bearing more or 
 less upon the education of our members, the extension of 
 our communion, and its relations to Protestant bodies, to 
 be decided without us ? Are precedents to be created, 
 while we sit by, which afterwards may be assumed to our 
 disadvantage as if our acknowledged principles ? It is 
 our own concern; and it is not strange if we think it will 
 be better looked after by ourselves, than by our enemies 
 or by mere politicians. We are driven by the pressure 
 of circumstances to contemplate our own position, and to 
 fall back upon first principles ; nor can an age, which 
 prides itself on its powers of scrutiny and research, be 
 surprised if we do in self-defence what it does in wanton- 
 ness and pride. We accepted the principles of 1688 as the 
 Church's basis, while they remained, because we had 
 received them : they have been surrendered. If we 
 now put forward a more ancient doctrine instead of them, 
 all that can be said against us is, that we are not so 
 much attached to them on their own account, as to con- 
 sent, that persons, still more ignorant of our divinely- 
 framed system than the statesmen of that era, should 
 attempt now, in some similar or worse form, to revive 
 them. In truth, we have had enough, if we would be 
 wise, of mere political religion j which, like a broken reed, 
 has pierced through the hand that leaned upon it. While, 
 and in proportion as we are bound to it, it is our duty to 
 submit, just as duty determined the Jews to submit to 
 Nebuchadnezzar, as Jeremiah instructed them. We will 
 not side with a reckless and destructive party, even in 
 undoing our own chains, when there is no plain call 
 
INTRODUCTION. 11 
 
 of duty to oblige us ; nay, we will wear them, not only 
 contentedly but loyally; we will be zealous bondsmen, 
 while the state honours us and is gentle towards us, in 
 our captivity. It has been God's merciful pleasure, as of 
 old time, to make even those who led us away captive to 
 pity us. Those who might have been tyrants over us, 
 have before now piously tended on the Church, and 
 liberated her, as far as was expedient, in the spirit of him 
 who " builded the city, and let go the captives not for 
 price nor reward." 2 
 
 And while the powers of this world so dealt with us, 
 who would not have actively co-operated with them, from 
 love as well as from duty ? And thus it was that the 
 most deeply learned, and most generous-minded of our 
 divines thought no higher privilege could befall them 
 than to minister at the throne of a prince like our first 
 Charles, who justified their confidence by dying for the 
 Church a martyr's death. And I suppose, in similar cir- 
 cumstances, any one of those who afterwards became Non- 
 jurors, or any one of those persons who at this day have 
 the most settled belief in the spiritual powers of the 
 Church, would have thought himself unworthy to be her 
 son, had he not taken his part in a system which he had 
 received and found so well administered, whatever faults 
 might exist in its theory. This is the view to be taken 
 of the conduct of our Church in the seventeenth century, 
 which we do not imitate now, only because we are not 
 allowed to do so, because our place of service and our 
 honourable function about the throne are denied us. And, 
 as we should act as our predecessors, were we in their 
 times, so, as we think, they too would act as we do in 
 ours. They, doubtless, at a time like this, when our 
 enemies are allowed to legislate upon our concerns, and 
 to dispose of the highest offices in the Church, would feel 
 
 2 Isa. xlv. 13. 
 
12 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 that there were objects dearer to them than the welfare 
 of the state, duties even holier than obedience to civil 
 governors, and would act accordingly. It is our lot to 
 see the result of an experiment which in their days was 
 but in process, that of surrendering the Church into the 
 hands of the state. It has been tried and failed ; we have 
 trusted the world, and it has taken advantage of us. 
 While the event was doubtful, it was the duty of her 
 rulers to make the best of things as they found them : 
 now that it is declared, though we must undergo the evil, 
 we are surely not bound to conceal it. 
 
 9. 
 These reflections would serve to justify inquiries far 
 beyond the scope of the following Lectures, such inquiries, 
 I mean, as bear upon our political and ecclesiastical con- 
 dition ; but my present business is mainly with what 
 concerns the Church's internal state, her teaching rather 
 than her action, her influence on her members, one by 
 one, rather than her right of moving them as a whole. 
 At the same time, the distinct portions of the general 
 subject so affect each other, that such points as Church 
 authority, Tradition, the Rule of Faith, and the like, 
 cannot be treated without seemiug to trench upon poli- 
 tical principles, consecrated by the associations of the 
 Revolution. It has ever required an apology, since that 
 event, to speak the language of our divines before it ; 
 and such an apology is now found in the circumstances of 
 the day, in which all notions, moral and religious, are so 
 unsettled, that every positive truth must be a gain. 
 
 10. 
 But, in answer to a portion of the foregoing remarks, 
 it is not uncommon to urge what at first sight seems to be 
 a paradox; that our enemies, or strangers, or at least 
 persons unacquainted with the principles of the Church, 
 are better fitted than her proper guardians and ministers to 
 
INTRODUCTION. 1 3 
 
 consult for her welfare ; that they are better friends to us 
 than ourselves, and in a manner often defend us against 
 ourselves ; and the saying of a great- and religious author 
 is quoted against us, that " clergymen understand the 
 least and take the worst measure of human affairs of all 
 mankind that can write and read." 3 And so they cer- 
 tainly do, if their end in view be that which secular poli- 
 ticians imagine. If their end be the temporal aggran- 
 disement of the Church, no greater or more intolerable 
 visitation could befall us than to be subjected to such 
 counsellors as Archbishop Laud. But, perhaps the objects 
 we have in view are as hidden from the man of the 
 world, whether statesman, philosopher, or courtier, as 
 heaven itself from his bodily eyes; and perchance those 
 measures which are most demonstrably headstrong and 
 insane, if directed towards a political end, may be most 
 judicious and successful in a religious point of view. It 
 is an acknowledged principle, that the blood of martyrs is 
 the seed of the Church; and if death itself may be a 
 victory, so in like manner may worldly loss and trouble, 
 however severe and accumulated. 
 
 11. 
 
 I am aware that professions of this nature increase 
 rather than diminish to men of the world their distaste 
 for the conduct they are meant to explain. The ends 
 which are alleged to account for the conduct of religious 
 men, remove the charge of imprudence only to attach to 
 it the more odious imputation of fanaticism and its 
 kindred qualities. Pilate's feeling when he asked " What 
 is truth ? " is a type of the disgust felt by men of the 
 world at the avowal of Christian faith and zeal. To pro- 
 fess to act towards objects which to them are as much a 
 theory and a dream as the scenes of some fairy tale, angers 
 them by what they consider its utter absurdity and folly. 
 3 Clarendon's Life, vol. i. p. 74. 
 
14 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 ce Miserable men ! " said the heathen magistrate on wit- 
 nessing the determination of the martyrs of Christ, u if 
 ye will die, cannot yon find precipices or halters ? " 4 Nor 
 is, this feeling confined to infidels or scorners ; men of 
 seriousness and good intentions, and it is especially to 
 the purpose to observe this, feel the same annoyance and 
 impatience at certain parts of that Ancient Religion, of 
 which the doctrine of the Church is the centre, which 
 profligate men manifest towards moral and religious 
 motives altogether. 
 
 To take an instance which will be understood by most 
 men. Should a man, rightly or wrongly, for that is not 
 the question, profess to regulate his conduct under the 
 notion that he is seen by invisible spectators, that he and 
 all Christians have upon them the eyes of Angels, espe- 
 cially when in church ; should he, when speaking on 
 some serious subject, exhort his friends as in their pre- 
 sence, nay, bid them attend to the propriety of their 
 apparel in divine worship because of them, would he not 
 at first be thought to speak poetically, and so be excused ? 
 next, when he was frequent in expressing such a senti- 
 ment, would he not become tiresome and unwelcome ? and 
 when he was understood to be thus speaking of the 
 Angels literally, as St. Paul did, would not what he said 
 be certainly met with grave, cold, contemptuous, or im- 
 patient looks, as idle, strained, and unnatural ? Now this 
 is just the reception which secular politicians give to 
 religious objects altogether; and my drift in noticing it is 
 this, — to impress on those who regard with disgust the 
 range of doctrines connected with the Church, that it 
 does not at all prove that those doctrines are fanciful and 
 are uninfluential, because they themselves are disgusted, 
 unless indeed the offence which the infidel takes at the 
 doctrine of the Cross be an argument that it also is really 
 4 Tertull. ad Scap. 5. 
 
INTRODUCTION. 1 5 
 
 foolishness. These doctrines may be untrue and un- 
 reasonable certainly ; but if the surprise of those who 
 first hear them and have never acted on them, be a proof 
 that they are so, more will follow than would be admitted 
 by any of us ; for surely, no annoyance which the doctrines 
 in question occasion, equals the impatience with which 
 irreligious men hear of the blessed doctrine that Grod has 
 become man, no surprise of theirs now can equal the 
 amazement and derision with which the old pagans 
 witnessed a saint contending even unto bonds and death, 
 for what they considered a matter of opinion. 
 
 It does not follow, then, that doctrines are uninfluential, 
 when plainly and boldly put forward, because they offend 
 the prejudices of the age at first hearing. Had this been 
 so, Christianity itself ought not to have succeeded ; and 
 it cannot be imagined that the respectable and serious 
 men of this day who express concern at what they con- 
 sider the exaggerated tone of certain writers on the sub- 
 ject of the Church, are more startled and offended than 
 the outcast to whom the Apostles preached in the begin- 
 ning. Truth has the gift of overcoming the human heart, 
 whether by persuasion or by compulsion, whether by 
 inward acceptance or by external constraint; and if what 
 we preach be truth, it must be natural, it must be season- 
 able, it must be popular, it will make itself popular. It 
 will find its own. As time goes on, and its sway extends, 
 those who thought its voice strange and harsh at first, 
 will wonder how they could ever so have deemed of sounds 
 so musical and thrilling. 
 
 12. 
 
 The objection, however, which has led to these remarks, 
 takes another and more reasonable form in the minds of 
 practical men, which shall now be noticed. A religious 
 principle or idea, however true, before it is found in a 
 substantive form, is but a theory ; and since many theories 
 
16 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 are not more than theories, and do not admit of being 
 carried into effect, it is exposed to the suspicion of being 
 one of these, and of having no existence out of books. 
 The proof of reality in a doctrine is its holding together 
 when actually attempted. Practical men are naturally 
 prejudiced against what is new, on this ground if on no 
 other, that it has not had the opportunity of satisfying 
 this test. Christianity would appear at first a mere 
 literature, or philosophy, or mysticism, like the Pytha- 
 gorean rule or Phrygian worship ; nor till it was tried, 
 could the coherence of its parts be ascertained. Now the 
 class of doctrines in question as yet labours under the 
 same difficulty. Indeed, they are in one sense as entirely 
 new as Christianity when first preached; for though 
 they profess merely to be that foundation on which it 
 originally spread, yet as far as they represent a Via Media, 
 that is, are related to extremes which did not then exist, 
 and do exist now, they appear unreal, for a double reason, 
 having no exact counterpart in early times, 5 and being 
 superseded now by actually existing systems. Protes- 
 tantism and Popery are real religions ; no one can doubt 
 about them ; they have furnished the mould in which 
 nations have been cast : but the Via Media, viewed as 
 an integral system, has never had existence except on 
 paper ; it is known, not positively but negatively, in its 
 differences from the rival creeds, not in its own proper- 
 ties ; and can only be described as a third system, neither 
 the one nor the other, but with something of each, cutting 
 between them, and, as if with a critical fastidiousness, 
 trifling with them both, and boasting to be nearer Anti- 
 quity than either. 
 
 8 [This is what the Author thought, before to his confusion and distress 
 he found in early history a veritable Via Media in both the Semi-Arian and 
 the Monophysite parties, and they, as being heretical, broke his attachment 
 to middle paths. Vid. Diilkulties of Angl., Lect. xii.] 
 
INTRODUCTION. 1 7 
 
 What is this but to fancy a road over mountains and 
 rivers, which has never been cut ? When we profess our 
 Via Media, as the very truth of the Apostles, we seem to 
 bystanders to be mere antiquarians or pedants, amusing 
 ourselves with illusions or learned subtleties, and unable 
 to grapple with things as they are. They accuse us of 
 tendering no proof to show that our view is not self- 
 contradictory, and if set in motion, would not fall to pieces, 
 or start off in different directions at once. Learned 
 divines, they say, may have propounded it, as they have ; 
 controversialists may have used it to advantage when 
 supported by the civil sword against Papists or Puritans ; 
 but, whatever its merits, still, when left to itself, to use 
 a familiar term, it may not " work." And the very cir- 
 cumstance that it has been propounded for centuries by 
 great names, and not yet reduced to practice as a system, 
 is alleged as an additional presumption against its feasi- 
 bility. To take for instance the subject of Private Judg- 
 ment; our theory here is neither Protestant nor Roman; 
 and has never been duly realized. Our opponents ask, 
 What is it ? Is it more than a set of words and phrases, of 
 exceptions and limitations made for each successive emer- 
 gency, of principles which contradict each other ? 
 
 13. 
 
 It cannotbe denied there is force in these representations, 
 though I would not adopt them to their full extent ; it still 
 remains to be tried whether what is called Anglo-Catho- 
 licism, the religion of Andre wes, Laud, Hammond, Butler, 
 and Wilson, is capable of being professed, acted on, and 
 maintained on a large sphere of action and through a suffi- 
 cient period, or whether it be a mere modification or transi- 
 tion-state either of Romanism or of popular Protestantism, 
 according as we view it. It may be plausibly argued that 
 
 vol. i. c 
 
18 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 whether" the primitive Church agreed more with Rome or 
 with Protestants, and though it agreed withneither of them 
 exactly, yet that one or the other, whichever it be, is the 
 nearest approximation to the ancient model which our 
 changed circumstances admit ; that either this or that is 
 the modern representative of primitive principles ; that 
 any professed third theory, however plausible, must neces- 
 sarily be composed of discordant elements, and, when 
 attempted, must necessarily run into one or the other, 
 according to the nearness of the attracting bodies, and the 
 varying sympathies of the body attracted, and its indepen- 
 dence of those portions of itself which interfere with the 
 stronger attraction. It may be argued that the Church 
 of England, as established by law, and existing in fact, has 
 never represented a doctrine at all or been the develop- 
 ment of a principle, has never had an intellectual basis ; 
 that it has been but a name, or a department of the state, 
 or a political party, in which religious opinion was an 
 accident, and therefore has been various. In consequence, 
 it has been but the theatre of contending religionists, that 
 is, of Papists and Latitudinarians, softened externally, or 
 modified into inconsistency by their birth and education, 
 or restrained by their interests and their religious engage- 
 ments. Now all this is very plausible, and is here in place, 
 as far as this, that there certainly is a call upon us to 
 exhibit our principles in action ; and until we can produce 
 diocese, or place of education, or populous town, or colonial 
 department, or the like, administered on our distinctive 
 principles, as the diocese of. Sodor and Man in the days 
 of Bishop Wilson, doubtless we have not as much to urge 
 in our behalf as we might have. 
 
 14. 
 
 This, however, may be said in favour of the indepen- 
 dence and reality of our view of religion, even under past 
 
INTRODUCTION. 1 9 
 
 and present circumstances, that, whereas there have ever 
 been three principal parties in the Church of England, 
 the Apostolical, the Latitudinarian, and the Puritan, the 
 two latter have been shown to be but modifications of 
 Socinianism and Calvinism by their respective histories, 
 whenever allowed to act freely, whereas the first, when 
 it had the opportunity of running into Romanism, in 
 fact did not coalesce with it ; which certainly argues 
 some real differences in it from that system with which 
 it is popularly confounded. The Puritan portion of the 
 Church was set at liberty, as is well known, during the 
 national troubles of the seventeenth century; and in no 
 long time prostrated the Episcopate, abolished the ritual, 
 and proved itself by its actions, if proof was necessary, 
 essentially Calvinistic, The principle of Latitude was 
 allowed considerable range between the times of Charles II. 
 and George II., and, even under the pressure of the 
 Thirty-nine Articles, possessed vigour enough to develope 
 such indications of its real tendency, as Hoadly and his 
 school supply. The Apostolical portion of the Church, 
 whether patronized by the Court, or wandering in exile, 
 or cast out from its mother's bosom by political events, 
 evinced one and the same feeling of hostility against 
 Rome. Its history at the era of the Revolution is es- 
 pecially remarkable. Ken, Collier, and the rest, had 
 every adventitious motive which resentment or interest 
 could supply for joining the Roman Church; nor can 
 any reason be given why they did not move on the 
 one side, as Puritans and Latitudinarian s had moved on 
 the other, except that their Creed had in it au indepen- 
 dence and distinctness which was wanting in the religious 
 views of their opponents. If nothing more has accrued 
 to us from the treatment which those excellent men 
 endured, this at least has providentially resulted, that we 
 are thereby furnished with irrefragable testimony to the 
 
 c 2 
 
20 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 essential difference between the Roman and Anglican 
 systems. 
 
 15. 
 But if this be so, if the English Church has the mission, 
 hitherto unfulfilled on any considerable stage or consistent 
 footing, of representing a theology, Catholic but not 
 Roman, here is an especial reason why her members 
 should be on the watch for opportunities of bringing out 
 and carrying into effect her distinctive character. Such 
 opportunities perhaps have before now occurred in our 
 history, and have been neglected, and many never return ; 
 but, at least, the present unsettled state of religious 
 opinion among us furnishes an opening which may be 
 providentially intended, and which it is a duty to use. 
 And there are other circumstances favourable to the 
 preaching of the pure Anglican doctrine. In a former 
 a^e, the tendency of mere Protestantism had not discovered 
 itself with the fearful clearness which has attended its 
 later history. English divines were tender of the other 
 branches of the Reformation, and did not despair of their 
 return to the entire Catholic truth. Before G-ermany had 
 become rationalistic, and Geneva Socinian, Romanism 
 might be considered as the most dangerous corruption 
 of the gospel ; and this might be a call upon members 
 of our Church to waive their differences with foreign 
 Protestantism and Dissent at home, as if in the presence 
 of a common enemy. But at this day, w r hen the connexion 
 of foreign Protestantism with infidelity is so evident, what 
 claim has the former upon our sympathy? and to what 
 theology can the serious Protestant, dissatisfied with his 
 system, betake himself but to the Roman, unless we dis- 
 play our characteristic principles, and show him that he 
 may be Catholic and Apostolic, yet not Roman ? Such, 
 as is well known, was the service actually rendered by our 
 Church to the learned Prussian divine, Grabe, at the end 
 
INTRODUCTION. 21 
 
 of the seventeenth century, who, feeling the defects of 
 Lutheranism, even before it had lapsed, was contemplating 
 a reconciliation with Rome, when, finding that England 
 offered what to a disciple of Ignatius and Cyprian were 
 easier terms, he conformed to her creed, and settled and 
 died in this country. 
 
 16. 
 Again : though it is not likely that Roman Catholics 
 will ever again become formidable in England, yet they 
 may be in a position to make their voice heard, and in 
 proportion as they are able, the Via Media will do impor- 
 tant service of the following kind. In the controversy 
 which will ensue, Rome will not fail to preach far and 
 wide the tenet which it never conceals, that there is no 
 salvation external to its own communion. On the other 
 hand, Protestantism, as it exists among us, will not be 
 behindhand in consigning to eternal ruin all who are ad- 
 herents of Roman doctrine. What a prospect is this ! two 
 widely spread and powerful parties dealing forth solemn 
 anathemas upon each other, in the name of the Lord ! 
 Indifference and scepticism must be, in such a case, the 
 ordinary refuge of men of mild and peaceable minds, who 
 revolt from such presumption, and are deficient in clear 
 views of the truth. I cannot well exaggerate the misery 
 of such a state of things. Here the English theology 
 Would come in with its characteristic calmness and caution, 
 clear and decided in its view, giving no encouragement to 
 lukewarmness and liberalism, but withholding all absolute 
 anathemas on errors of opinion, except where the primitive 
 Church sanctions the use of them. 
 
 17. 
 Here we are reminded of one more objection which may 
 be made to the discussion of such subjects as those con- 
 tained in the following Lectures ; and with a brief notice 
 
22 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 of it I will conclude. It may appear, then, that there is 
 something in the very notion of examining and completing 
 a doctrine at present but partly settled and received, and 
 in the very name of a Via Media, which is adapted to 
 foster a self-sufficient and sceptical spirit. The essence of 
 religion is the submission of the reason and heart to a posi- 
 tive system, the acquiescence in doctrines which cannot be 
 proved or explained. A realized system is pre-supposed 
 as the primary essential, from the nature of the case. 
 When, then, we begin by saying that the English doc- 
 trine is not at present embodied in any substantive form, 
 or publicly recognized in its details, we seem content to 
 reduce religion to a mere literature, to make reason the 
 judge of it, and to confess it to be a matter of opinion. 
 And when, in addition to this, we describe Anglicanism as 
 combining various portions of other systems, what is this, 
 it may be asked, but to sanction an eclectic principle, which 
 of all others is the most arrogant and profane? When men 
 choose or reject from religious systems what they please, 
 they furnish melancholy evidence of their want of earnest- 
 ness; and when they put them selves above existing systems, 
 as if these were suited only to the multitude or to bigoted 
 partisans, they are supercilious and proud ; and when they 
 think they may create what they are to worship, their 
 devotion cannot possess any high degree of reverence and 
 godly fear. Surely, then, it may be said, such theorizing 
 on religious subjects is nothing else than an indulgence 
 in that undue use of reason, which was so pointedly con- 
 demned in the commencement of these remarks. 
 
 I would not willingly under-value the force of this 
 representation. It might be said, however, in reply, that 
 at the worst the evil specified would cease in proportion 
 as we were able to bring into practical shape that system 
 which is wanting. But after all the true answer to the 
 objection is simply this, that though Anglo-Catholicism is 
 
INTRODUCTION. 23 
 
 not practically reduced to system in its fulness, it does 
 exist, in all its parts, in the writings of our divines, and in 
 good measure is in actual operation, though with varying 
 degrees of consistencyand completeness in different places. 
 There is no room for eclecticism in any elementary matter. 
 No member of the English Church allows himself to build 
 on any doctrine different from that found in our book of 
 Common Prayer. That formulary contains the elements 
 of our theology ; and herein lies the practical exercise of 
 our faith, which all true religion exacts. We surrender 
 ourselves in obedience to it : we act upon it : we obey it 
 even in points of detail where there is room for diversity of 
 opinion. The Thirty-nine Articles furnish a second trial 
 of our humility and self-restraint. Again, we never forget 
 that, reserving our fidelity to the Creed, we are bound to de- 
 fer to Episcopal authority. Here then are trials of principle 
 on starting; so much is already settled, and demands our 
 assent, not our criticism. What remains to be done, and 
 comes into discussion, are secondary questions, such as 
 these, How best to carry out the rubrics of the Prayer- 
 book ? how to apply its Services in particular cases ? how 
 to regard our canous of the sixteenth and seventeenth 
 centuries ? how to reconcile the various portions of the 
 ritual? how to defend certain formularies, or how to 
 explain others ? Another series of unsettled difficulties 
 arises out of the question of education and teaching : What 
 are the records, what the rule of faith ? what the authority 
 of the Church ? how much is left to Private Judgment ? 
 what are the objects and best mode of religious training ? 
 and the like. The subject of Church government opens 
 another field of inquiries, which are more or less unan- 
 swered, as regards their practical perception by our clergy. 
 The Thirty-nine Articles supply another. And in all these 
 topics we are not left to ourselves to determine as we 
 please, but have the guidance of our standard writers, and 
 
24 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 are bound to consult them, nay, when they agree, to follow 
 them * but when they differ, to adjust or to choose between 
 their opinions. 
 
 18. 
 Enough has now been said by way of explaining the 
 object of the following Lectures. It is proposed, as has 
 been said above, to offer helps towards the formation of a 
 recognized Anglican theology in one of its departments. 
 The present state of our divinity is as follows : the most 
 vigorous, the clearest, the most fertile minds, have through 
 (rod's mercy been employed in the service of our Church : 
 minds too as reverential and holy, and as fully imbued with 
 Ancient Truth, and as well versed in the writings of the 
 Fathers, as they were intellectually gifted. 6 This is God's 
 great mercy indeed, for which we must ever be thankful. 
 Primitive doctrine has been explored for us in every direc- 
 tion, and theoriginal principles of the gospel and the Church 
 patiently and successfully brought to light. But one thing 
 is still wanting : our champions and teachers have lived 
 in stormy times ; political and other influences have acted 
 upon them variously in their day, and have since obstructed 
 a careful consolidation of their judgments. We have a 
 vast inheritance, but no inventory of our treasures. All is 
 given us in profusion ; it remains for us to catalogue, sort, 
 distribute, select, harmonize, and complete. We have 
 more than we know how to use ; stores of learning, but 
 little that is precise and serviceable ; Catholic truth and 
 individual opinion, first principles and the guesses of genius, 
 all mingled in the same works, and requiring to be dis- 
 criminated. We meet with truths over-stated or mis- 
 directed, matters of detail variously taken, facts incom- 
 pletely proved or applied, and rules inconsistently urged 
 or discordantly interpreted. Such indeed is the state of 
 
 G [Vid. however supr., Preface to this edition, § 1.] 
 
INTRODUCTION. 25 
 
 every deep philosophy in its first stages, and therefore of 
 theological knowledge. What we need at present for our 
 Church's well-being, is not invention, nor originality, nor 
 sagacity, nor even learning in our divines, at least in the 
 first place, though all these gifts of God are in a measure 
 needed, and never can be unseasonable when used reli- 
 giously, but we need peculiarly a sound judgment, patient 
 thought, discrimination, a comprehensive mind, an absti- 
 nence from all private fancies and caprices and personal 
 tastes, — in a word, divine wisdom. For this excellent 
 endowment, let us, in behalf of ourselves and our brethren, 
 earnestly and continually pray. Let as pray, that He who 
 has begun the work for our Holy Mother with a divine 
 exuberance, will finish it as with a refiner's fire and in the 
 perfectness of truth. 
 
 19. 
 
 Merely to have directed attention to the present needs 
 of our Church, would be a sufficient object for writing the 
 following pages. We require a recognized theology, and 
 if the present work, instead of being what it is meant to 
 be, a first approximation to the required solution in one 
 department of a complicated problem, contains after all 
 but a series of illustrations demonstrating our need, and 
 supplying hints for its removal, such a result, it is evident, 
 will be quite a sufficient return for whatever anxiety it has 
 cost the writer to have employed his own judgment on so 
 serious a subject. And, though in all greater matters of 
 theology there is no room for error, so prominent and con- 
 cordant is the witness of our great Masters in their behalf, 
 yet he is conscious that in minor points, whether in 
 questions of fact or of judgment, there is room for diffe- 
 rence or error of opinion ; and while he has given his best 
 endeavours to be accurate, he shall not be ashamed to own 
 a mistake, nor reluctant to bear the just blame of it. 
 
LECTURE I. 
 
 THE NATURE AND GROUND OF ROMAN AND 
 PROTESTANT ERRORS. 
 
 All Protestant sects of the present day may be said to 
 agree with, us and differ from Roman Catholics, in 
 considering the Bible as the only standard of appeal in 
 doctrinal inquiries. They differ indeed from each other as 
 well as from us in the matter of their belief ; but they one 
 and all accept the written word of God as the supreme 
 and sole arbiter of their differences. This makes their 
 contest with each other and us more simple ; I do not say 
 shorter, — on the contrary, they have been engaged in it 
 almost three hundred years, (as many of them, that is, as 
 are so ancient,) and there are no symptoms of its ending, 
 — but it makes it less laborious. It narrows the ground 
 of it ; it levels it to the intelligence of all ranks of men ; it 
 gives the multitude a right to take part in it j it encourages 
 all men, learned and unlearned, religious and irreligious, 
 to have an opinion in it, and to turn controversialists. 
 The Bible is a small book ; any one may possess it ; and 
 every one, unless he be very humble, will think he is able 
 to understand it. And therefore, I say, controversy is 
 easier among Protestants, because any one whatever can 
 controvert; easier, but not shorter; because though all 
 sects agree together as to the standard of faith, viz . the Bible, 
 yet no two agree as to the interpreter of the Bible, but each 
 person makes himself the interpreter, so that what seemed 
 
THE NATURE AND GROUND, ETC. 27 
 
 at first sight a means of peace, turns out to be a chief 
 occasion or cause of discord. 
 
 It is a great point to come to issue with an opponent ; 
 that is, to discover some position which oneself affirms and 
 the other denies, and on which the decision of the contro- 
 versy will turn. It is like two armies meeting, and settling 
 their quarrel in a pitched battle, instead of wandering to 
 and fro, each by itself, and inflicting injury and gaining 
 advantages where no one resists it. Now the Bible is this 
 common ground among Protestants, and seems to have 
 been originally assumed iu no small degree from a notion 
 of its simplicity in argument. But, if such a notion was 
 entertained in any quarter, it has been disappointed by this 
 difficulty, — the Bible is not so written as to force its mean- 
 ing upon the reader ; no two Protestant sects can agree 
 together whose interpretation of the Bible is to be received ; 
 and under such circumstances each naturally prefers his 
 own ; — his own ' c interpretation/ - ' his own " doctrine," his 
 own " tongue," his own " revelation." Accordingly, acute 
 men among them see that the very elementary notion 
 which they have adopted, of the Bible without note or 
 comment being the sole authoritative judge in controver- 
 sies of faith, is a self-destructive principle, and practically 
 involves the conclusion, that dispute is altogether hopeless 
 and useless, and even absurd. After whatever misgivings 
 or reluctance, they seem to allow, or to be in the way to 
 allow, that truth is but matter of opinion; that that is 
 truth to each which each thinks to be truth, provided he 
 sincerely and really thinks it ; that the divinity of the Bible 
 itself is the only thing that need be believed, and that its 
 meaniug varies with the individuals who receive it ; that 
 it has no one meaning to be ascertained as a matter of fact, 
 but that it may mean anything because it may be made to 
 mean so many things ; and hence that our wisdom and our 
 duty lie in discarding all notions of the importance of any 
 
28 THE NATURE AND GROUND OP [LECT. 
 
 particular set of opinions, any doctrines, or any creed, each 
 man having a right to his own, and in living together 
 peaceably with men of all persuasions, whatever our private 
 judgments and leanings may be. 
 
 2. 
 
 I do not say that these conclusions need follow by logical 
 necessity from the principle from which I have deduced 
 them ; but that practically they will follow in the long run, 
 and actually have followed where there were no counteract- 
 ing causes in operation. Nor do I allow that they will 
 follow at all in our own case, though we agree with Protes- 
 tant sects in making Scripture the document of ultimate 
 appeal in matters of faith. For though we consider 
 Scripture a satisfactory, we do not consider it our sole 
 informant in divine truths. We have another source of 
 information in reserve, as I shall presently show. We 
 agree with the sectaries around us so far as this, to be ready 
 to take their ground, which Roman Catholics cannot and 
 will not do, to believe that our creed can be proved entirely, 
 and to be willing to prove it solely from the Bible ; but we 
 take this ground only in controversy, not in teaching our 
 own people or in our private studies. We are willing 
 to argue with Protestants from " texts ;" they may feel 
 the force of these or not, we may convince them or 
 not, but if such conviction is a necessary criterion of 
 good argument, then sound reasoning is to be found 
 on no side, or else there would soon cease to be any 
 controversy at all. It is enough that by means of their 
 weapon we are able to convince and convert others, though 
 not them ; for this proves its cogency in our use of 
 it. We have joined issue with them, and done all that can 
 be done, though with them we have not succeeded. The 
 case is not as if we were searching after some unknown 
 and abstruse ground of proof which we were told they had, 
 
 
I.] ROMAN AND PROTESTANT ERRORS. 29 
 
 but were uncertain about, and could not ascertain or circum- 
 scribe. We know their greatest strength, and we discover 
 it to be weakness. They have no argument behind to 
 fall back upon : we have examined and decided against 
 their cause. 
 
 And they themselves, as I have observed, have decided 
 against it too ; their adoption of the latitudinarian notion 
 that one creed is as good as another, is an evidence of it. 
 We on the contrary should have no reason to be perplexed 
 at hearing their opposite interpretations of Scripture, were 
 they ever so positive and peremptory in maintaining them. 
 Nay, we should not waver even if they succeeded in 
 weakening' some of our proofs, taking the text of Scripture 
 by itself, both as considering that in matters of conduct 
 evidence is not destroyed by being impaired, and because 
 we rely on Antiquity to strengthen such intimations of 
 doctrine as are but faintly, though really, given in Scrip- 
 ture. 
 
 3. 
 
 Protestant denominations, I have said, however they 
 may differ from each other in important points, so far 
 agree, that one and all profess to appeal to Scripture, 
 whether they be called Independents, or Baptists, or Uni- 
 tarians, or Presbyterians, or Wesleyans, or by any other 
 title. But the case is different as regards Roman Catho- 
 lics : they do not appeal to Scripture unconditionally; 
 they are not willing to stand or fall by mere arguments 
 from Scripture ; and therefore, if we take Scripture as our 
 ground of proof in our controversies with them, we have 
 not yet joined issue with them. Not that they reject 
 Scripture, it would be very unjust to say so ; they would 
 shrink from doing so, or being thought to do so; and 
 perhaps they adhere to Scripture as closely as some of 
 those Protestant bodies who profess to be guided by 
 
30 THE NATURE AND GROUND OF [LECT. 
 
 nothing else ; but, though, they admit Scripture to be the 
 word of God, they conceive that it is not the whole word 
 of God, they openly avow that they regulate their faith by 
 something else besides Scripture, by the existing Traditions 
 of the Church. They maintain that the system of doctrine 
 which they hold came to them from the Apostles as truly 
 and certainly as the apostolic writings ; so that, even if 
 those writings had been lost, the world would still have 
 had the blessings of a Eevelation. Now, they must be 
 clearly understood, if they are to be soundly refuted. 
 We hear it said, that they go by Tradition, and we fancy 
 in consequence that there are a certain definite number of 
 statements ready framed and compiled, which they profess 
 to have received from the Apostles. One may hear the 
 question sometimes asked, for instance, where their pro- 
 fessed Traditions are to be found, whether there is any 
 collection of them, and whether they are printed and pub- 
 lished. Now though they would allow that the Traditions 
 of the Church are in fact contained in the writings of her 
 Doctors, still this question proceeds on somewhat of a 
 misconception of their real theory, which seems to be as 
 follows. By Tradition they mean the whole system of 
 faith and ordinances which they have received from the 
 generation before them, and that generation again from 
 the generation before itself. And in this sense un- 
 doubtedly we all go by Tradition in matters of this world. 
 Where is the corporation, society, or fraternity of any 
 kind, but has certain received rules and understood prac- 
 tices which are nowhere put down in writing ? How 
 often do we hear it said, that this or that person has 
 " acted unusually," that so and so " was never done be- 
 fore, " that it is "against rule," and the like; and then 
 perhaps, to avoid the inconvenience of such irregularity in 
 future, what was before a tacit engagement, is turned into 
 a formal and explicit order or principle. The absence 
 
I.] ROHAN AND PROTESTANT ERRORS. 31 
 
 of a regulation must be felt before it is supplied ; and 
 the virtual transgression of it goes before its adoption. 
 At this very time great part of the law of the land is ad- 
 ministered under the sanction of such a Tradition ; it is 
 not contained in any formal or authoritative code, it depends 
 on custom or precedent. There is no explicit written law, 
 for instance, simply declaring murder to be a capital offence ; 
 unless indeed we have recourse to the divine command 
 in the ninth chapter of the book of Genesis. Murderers 
 are hanged by custom. Such as this is the tradition of 
 the Church ; Tradition is uniform custom. When the 
 Komanists say they adhere to Tradition, they mean that 
 they believe and Act as Christians have always believed 
 and acted; they go by the custom, as judges and juries do. 
 And tlien they go on to allege that there is this important 
 difference between their custom and all other customs in 
 the world ; that the tradition of the law, at least in its 
 details, though it has lasted for centuries upon centuries, 
 anyhow had a beginning in human appointments ; whereas 
 theirs, though it has a beginning too, yet, when traced 
 back, has none short of the Apostles of Christ, and is in 
 consequence of divine not of human authority, — is true and 
 intrinsically binding as well as expedient. 
 
 4. 
 
 If we ask, why it is that these professed Traditions were 
 not reduced to writing, it is answered, that the Christian 
 doctrine, as it has proceeded from the mouth of the Apostles, 
 is too varied and too minute in its details to allow of it. 
 No one you fall in with on the highway, can tell you all 
 his mind at once ; much less could the Apostles, possessed 
 as they were of great and supernatural truths, and busied 
 in the propagation of the Church, digest in one Epistle or 
 Treatise a systematic view of the Eevelation made to them. 
 
32 THE NATURE AND GROUND OF [LECT. 
 
 And so much at all events we may grant, that they did 
 not do so ; there being confessedly little of system or 
 completeness in any portion of the New Testament. 
 
 If again it be objected that, upon the notion of an un- 
 written transmission of doctrine, there is nothing to show 
 that the faith of to-day was the faith of yesterday, nothing 
 to connect this age and the Apostolic, the theologians of 
 Rome maintain, on the contrary, that over and above the 
 corroborative though indirect testimony of ecclesiastical 
 writers, no error could have arisen in the Church without 
 its being protested against and put down on its first 
 appearance; that from all parts of the Church a. cry 
 would have been raised against the novelty, and a declara- 
 tion put forth, as we know in fact was the practice of the 
 early Church, denouncing it. And thus they would 
 account for the indeterminateness on the one hand, yet on 
 the other the accuracy and availableness of their existing 
 Tradition or unwritten Creed. It is latent, but it lives. 
 It is silent, like the rapids of a river, before the rocks 
 intercept it. It is the Church's unconscious habit of 
 opinion and sentiment ; which she reflects upon, masters, 
 and expresses, according to the emergency. We see then 
 the mistake of asking for a complete collection of the 
 Roman Traditions ; as well might we ask for a full cata- 
 logue of a man's tastes and thoughts on a given subject. 
 Tradition in its fulness is necessarily unwritten ; it is the 
 mode in which a society has felt or acted during a certain 
 period, and it cannot be circumscribed any more than a 
 man's countenance and manner can be conveyed to 
 strangers in any set of propositions. 
 
 Such are the Traditions to which the Roman Catholics 
 appeal, whether viewed as latent in the Church's teaching, 
 or as passiug into writing and being fixed in the decrees 
 of the Councils or amid the works of the ancient Fathers. 
 
ROMAN AND PROTESTANT ERRORS. 33 
 
 5. 
 
 Now how do we of the English Church meet these state- 
 ments ? or, rather, how do Roman Catholics prove them ? 
 For it will be observed, that what has been said hitherto, 
 does not prove that their Traditions are such as they aver 
 them to be, but merely that their theory is consistent with 
 itself. And as a beautiful theory it must, as a whole, 
 ever remain. To a certain point indeed it is tenable : but 
 this is a very different thing from admitting that it is so 
 as regards those very tenets for which Roman theologians 
 would adduce it. They have to show, not merely that there 
 was such a living and operative Tradition, and that it has 
 lasted to this day, but that their own characteristic doctrines 
 are parts of it. Here then we see how, under such con- 
 ditions of controversy, we ought to meet their pretensions. 
 Shall we refuse to consider the subject of Tradition at all, 
 saying that the Bible contains the whole of Divine Re 
 velation, and that the doctrines professedly conveyed by 
 Tradition are only so far Apostolic as they are contained in 
 Scripture ? This will be saying what is true, but it will be 
 assuming the point in dispute ; it will in no sense be meet- 
 ing our opponents. We shall only involve ourselves in 
 great difficulties by so doing. For, let us consider a 
 moment ; we are sure to be asked, and shall have to answer, 
 a difficult question ; so we had better consider it before- 
 hand. I mean, how do we know that Scripture comes from 
 God ? It cannot be denied that we of this age receive it 
 upon general Tradition; we receive through Tradition 
 both the Bible itself, and the doctrine that it is divinely 
 inspired. That doctrine is one of those pious and com- 
 fortable truths "which we have heard and known, and 
 such as our fathers have told us/' " which God commanded 
 our forefathers to teach their children, that their posterity 
 might know it, and the children which were yet unborn ; to 
 the intent that when they came up, they might show their 
 VOL. I. d 
 
34 THE NATUIiE AND GROUND OP [LECT. 
 
 children the same." 1 The great multitude of Protestants 
 believe in the divinity of Scripture precisely on the ground 
 on which the Roman Catholics take their stand in behalf of 
 their own system of doctrine, viz. because they have been 
 taught it. To deride Tradition therefore as something 
 irrational or untrustworthy in itself, is to weaken the 
 foundation of our own faith in Scripture, and is very cruel 
 towards the great multitude of uneducated persons, who 
 believe in Scripture because they are told to believe in it. 
 If, however, it be said that pious Protestants have " the 
 witness in themselves," as a sure test to their own hearts 
 of the truth of Scripture, the fact is undeniable; and a 
 sufficient and consoling proof is it to them that the teaching 
 of Scripture is true ; but it does not prove that the very 
 book we call the Bible was written, and all of it written, 
 by inspiration ; nor does it allow us to dispense with the 
 external evidence of Tradition assuring us that it is so. 
 
 6. 
 
 But if, again, it be said that the New Testament is 
 received as divine, not upon the present traditionary belief 
 of Christians, but upon the evidence of Antiquity, this too, 
 even were it true, — for surely the multitude of Christians 
 know nothing about Antiquity at all, — yet this is exactly 
 what the Romanists maintain of their unwritten doctrines 
 also. They argue that their present Creed has been the 
 universal belief of all preceding ages, and is recorded in 
 the writings still extant of those ages. Suppose, I say, we 
 take this ground in behalf of the divinity of Holy Scripture, 
 viz. that it is attested by all the writers and other authori- 
 ties of primitive times : doubtless we are right in doing so ; 
 it is the very argument by which we actually do prove the 
 divinity of the sacred Canon; but it is also the very 
 
 1 Psalm lxxviii. 3—7. 
 
!•] ROMAN AND PROTESTANT ERRORS. 35 
 
 argument which Roman Catholics put forward for their 
 peculiar tenets ; viz. that while received on existing Tra- 
 dition, they are also proved by the unanimous consent of 
 the first ages of Christianity. If then we would leave our- 
 selves room for proving that Scripture is inspired, we must 
 not reject the notion and principle of the argument from 
 Tradition and from Antiquity as something in itself absurd 
 and unworthy of Almighty wisdom. In other words, to 
 refuse to listen to these informants because we have 
 a written word, is a self-destructive course, inasmuch as 
 that written word itself is proved to be such mainly by 
 these very informants which, as if to do honour to it, we 
 reject. This is to overthrow our premisses by means of our 
 conclusion. That which ascertains for us the divinity of 
 Scripture, may convey to us other Articles of Faith also, 
 unless Scripture has expressly determined this in the 
 negative. 
 
 7.' 
 
 But the sacred volume itself, as well as the doctrine of 
 its inspiration, comes to us by traditional conveyance. 
 The Protestant of the day asks his Roman antagonist, 
 " How do you know your unwritten word comes from the 
 Apostles, received as it is through so many unknown hands 
 through so many ages ? A book is something definite and 
 trustworthy; what is written remains. We have the 
 Apostles' writings before us; but we have nothing to 
 guarantee to us the fidelity of those successive informants 
 who stand between the Apostles and the unwritten doc- 
 trines you ascribe to them/' But the other surely may 
 answer by the counter inquiry, how the Anglican on his 
 part knows that what he considers to be their writings 
 are really such, and really the same as the Fathers pos- 
 sessed and witness to be theirs : " You have a printed 
 book/' he may argue ; ' ' the Apostles did not write that ; it 
 
 b 2 
 
36 THE NATURE AND GROUND OF [LECT. 
 
 was printed from another book, and that again from another, 
 and so on. After going back a long way, you will trace 
 it to a manuscript in the dark ages, written by you know 
 not whom, copied from some other manuscript you know 
 not what or when, and there the trace is lost. You profess, 
 indeed, that it runs up to the very autograph of the Apos- 
 tles ; but with your rigorous notions of proof, it would be 
 more to your purpose to produce that autograph than to 
 give merely probable reasons for the fidelity of the copy. 
 Till you do this, you are resting on a series of unknown links 
 as well as we ; you are trusting a mere tradition of men. 
 It is quite as possible for human hands to have tampered with 
 the written as with the unwritten word ; or at least if cor- 
 ruption of the latter is somewhat the more probable of the 
 two, the difference of the cases is one of degree, and not any 
 essential distinction/' Now whatever explanations the 
 Protestant in question makes in behalf of the preservation 
 of the written word, will be found applicable to the un- 
 written. For instance, he may argue, and irresistibly, that 
 manuscripts of various, and some of very early times, are 
 still extant, and that these belong to different places and 
 are derived from sources distinct from each other ; and 
 that they all agree together. If the text of the New 
 Testament has been tampered with, this must have 
 happened before all these families of copies were made ; 
 which is to throw back the fraud upon times so early as to 
 be a guarantee for believing it to have been impracticable. 
 Or he may argue that it was the acknowledged duty of the 
 Church to keep and guard the Scriptures, and that in mat- 
 ter of fact her various branches were very careful to do so j 
 that in consequence it is quite incredible that the authentic 
 text should be lost, considering it had so many trustees, as 
 they may be called, and that an altered copy or a forgery 
 should be substituted. Or again, he may allege that the 
 early Fathers are frequent in quoting the New Testament 
 
J.] ROMAN AND PROTESTANT ERRORS. 37 
 
 in their own works ; and that these quotations accord 
 substantially with the copy of it which we at present 
 possess. 
 
 Such as these are the arguments we as well as the 
 ordinary Protestant use against the infidel in behalf of 
 the written word, and most powerfully ; but it must be 
 confessed that they are applicable in their nature to tra- 
 ditionary teaching also; they are such as the Roman doc- 
 trines might possess, as far as the a priori view of the case 
 is concerned. 
 
 8. 
 How then are we to meet the Romanists, seeing we can- 
 not join issue with them, or cut short the controversy, by 
 a mere appeal to Scripture ? We must meet them, and 
 may do so fearlessly, on the ground of Antiquity, to which 
 they betake themselves. We accepted the Protestant's 
 challenge, in arguing from mere Scripture in our defence ; 
 we must not, and need not shrink from the invitation of 
 our Roman opponent, when he would appeal to the witness 
 of Antiquity. Truth alone is consistent with itself; we 
 are willing to take either the test of Antiquity or of Scrip- 
 ture. As we accord to the Protestant sectary, that Scrip- 
 ture is the inspired treasury of the whole faith, but 
 maintain that his doctrines are not in Scripture, so when 
 the controversialist of Rome appeals to Antiquity as our 
 great teacher, we accept his appeal, but we deny that his 
 special doctrines are to be found in Antiquity. So far then 
 is clear ; we do not deny the force of Tradition ; we do not 
 deny the soundness of the argument from Antiquity ; but 
 we challenge our opponent to prove the matter of fact. 
 We deny that his doctrines are in Antiquity any more than 
 they are in the Bible ; and we maintain that his professed 
 Tradition is not really such, that it is a Tradition of men, 
 that it is not continuous, that it stops short of the Apostles 
 
38 THE NATURE AND GROUND OP [LECT. 
 
 that the history of its introduction is known. On both 
 accounts then his doctrines are innovations ; because they 
 run counter to the doctrine of Antiquity, and because they 
 rest upon what is historically an upstart Tradition. 
 
 This view is intelligible and clear, but it leads to this 
 conclusion. The Bible indeed is a small book, but the 
 writings of Antiquity are voluminous ; and to read them is 
 the work of a life. It is plain then that the controversy with 
 Eome is not an easy one, not open to every one to take up. 
 And this is the case for another reason also. A private 
 Christian may put what meaning he pleases on many parts 
 of Scripture, and no one can hinder him. If interfered 
 with, he can promptly answer that it is his opinion, and may 
 appeal to his right of Private Judgment. But he cannot 
 so deal with Antiquity. History is a record of facts ; and 
 " facts," according to the proverb, " are stubborn things." 
 Ingenious men may misrepresent them, or suppress them 
 for a while; but in the end they will be duly ascertained 
 and appreciated. The writings of the Fathers are far too 
 ample to allow of a disputant resting in one or two obscure 
 or ambiguous passages in them, and permanently turning 
 such to his own account, which he may do in the case of 
 Scripture. 2 For two reasons, then, controversy with 
 Romanists is laborious ; because it takes us to ancient 
 Church history, and because it does not allow scope to the 
 offhand or capricious decisions of private judgment. 
 
 However, it must be observed, for the same reasons, 
 though more laborious, ic is a surer controversy. We are 
 
 2 [This is true, but history and the patristical writings do not absolutely 
 decide the truth or falsehood of all important theological propositions, any 
 more than Scripture decides it. As to such propositions, all that one can 
 safely say is, that history and the Fathers look in one determinate direction. 
 They make a doctrine more or less probable, but rarely contain a statement, 
 or suggest a conclusion, which cannot be plausibly evaded. The definition 
 of the Church is commonly needed to supply the defects of logic] 
 
I.] ROMAN AND PROTESTANT ERRORS. 39 
 
 more likely to come to an end; it does not turn upon 
 opinions, but on facts. 
 
 9. 
 
 1. This may be regarded from somewhat a different 
 point of view. You know that three centuries ago took 
 place a great schism in the West, which thenceforth was 
 divided into two large bodies, the Roman communion on 
 one hand, the Protestant on the other. On the latter 
 side it is usual to reckon our own Church, though it is 
 really on neither : from it after a time certain portions 
 split off, and severally set up a religion and communion 
 for themselves. Now supposing we had to dispute with 
 these separated portions, the Presbyterians, Baptists, 
 Independents, or other Protestants, on the subject of their 
 separation, they would at once avow the fact, but they 
 would deny that it was a sin. The elementary controversy 
 between us and them would be one of doctrine and prin- 
 ciple ; viz. whether separation was or was not a sin. It is 
 far otherwise as regards the Eoman Catholics; they as 
 well as ourselves allow, or rather maintain, the criminality 
 of schism, and that a very great sin was committed at 
 the Reformation, whether by the one party, or by the 
 other, or by both. The only question is, which party com- 
 mitted it ; they lay it at our door, we retort it, and justly, 
 upon them. Thus we join issue with them on a question of 
 fact ; a question which cannot be settled without a sufficient 
 stock of learning on the part of the disputants. So again 
 the Calvinistic controversy is in great measure dependent 
 on abstract reasoning and philosophical discussion ; where- 
 as no one can determine by a priori arguments whether 
 or not the Papacy be a persecuting power. 
 
 On the whole, then, it appears from what has been said, 
 that our controversies with the Protestants are easy to 
 handle, but interminable, being disputes about opinions ; 
 
40 THE NATURE AND GROUND OF [LECT. 
 
 but those with Rome are arduous, but instructive, as 
 relating rather to matters of fact. 
 
 10. 
 2. These last remarks throw some light on the difference 
 of internal character between Protestant and Roman 
 teaching, as well as of argumentative basis. Our con- 
 troversy with Rome, I have said, turns more upon facts 
 than upon first principles ; with Protestant sectaries it is 
 more about principles than about facts. This general con- 
 trast between the two religions, which I would not seem 
 to extend, for the sake of an antithesis, beyond what the 
 sober truth warrants, is paralleled in the common remark 
 of our most learned controversialists, that Romanism holds 
 the foundation, or is the truth overlaid with corruptions. 
 This is saying the same thing in other words. They discern 
 in it the great outlines of primitive Christianity, but they 
 find them touched, if nothing worse, touched and tainted 
 by error, and so made dangerous to the multitude, — dan- 
 gerous except to men of spiritual minds, who can undo 
 the evil, arresting the tendencies of the system by their 
 own purity, and restoring it to the sweetness and freshness 
 of its original state. The very force of the word corrup- 
 tion implies that this is the peculiarity of Romanism. 3 All 
 error indeed of whatever kind may be. called a corruption 
 of truth ; still we properly apply the term to such kinds 
 of error as are not denials but perversions, distortions, or 
 excesses of it. Such is the relation of Romanism towards 
 
 3 [Such powerful truths as Catholicity reveals certainty run the risk of 
 engendering whether fanaticism or superstition in the ignorant, weak, or 
 carnal-minded, the correction of which requires and receives the constant 
 vigilance of Holy Church. In this point of view " corruption " doubtless is 
 the " peculiarity of Romanism," as compared with Protestantism, because 
 it is emphatically the preacher of effective doctrines which specially admit 
 of corruption, such as the cultus of the saints and the belief in purga- 
 tory.] 
 
I.] ROMAN AND PROTESTANT ERRORS. 41 
 
 true Catholicity. It is the misdirection and abuse, not 
 the absence of right principle. To take a familiar illus- 
 tration ; rashness and cowardice are both faults, and both 
 unlike true courage ; but cowardice implies the absence of 
 the principle of courage, whereas rashness is but the 
 extravagance of the principle. Again, prodigality and- 
 avarice are both vices, and unlike true and wise liberality ; 
 but avarice differs from it in principle, prodigality in 
 matters of detail, in the time, place, person, manner of 
 giving, and the like. On the other hand, prodigality may 
 accidentally be the more dangerous extreme, as being the 
 more subtle vice, the more popular, the more likely to 
 attract noble minds, the more like a virtue. This is some- 
 what like the position of Romanism, Protestantism, and 
 Catholic Truth, relatively to each other. Romanism may 
 be considered as an unnatural and misshapen develop- 
 ment of the Truth; not the less dangerous because it 
 retains traces of its genuine features, and usurps its name, 
 as vice borrows the name of virtue, as pride is often 
 called self-respect, or cowardice or worldly-wisdom goes 
 by the name of prudence, or rashness by that of courage. 
 On the other hand, no one would ever call a miser liberal ; 
 and so no one would call a mere Protestant a Catholic, 
 except an altogether new sense was put on the word to 
 suit a purpose. Rome retains the principle of true Catho- 
 licism perverted; popular Protestantism is wanting in the 
 principle. Lastly, virtue lies in a mean, is a point, almost 
 invisible to the world, hard to find, acknowledged but by 
 the few ; and so Christian Truth in these latter ages, when 
 the world has broken up the Church, has been but a 
 stranger upon earth, and has been hidden and superseded 
 by counterfeits. 4 
 
 4 [It is quite true that the ethos or temper of " Romanism," when con- 
 trasted with Protestantism, is in excess, and that Protestantism, viewed 
 relatively to " Romanism," is in defect ; but in a state of things in which the 
 mean teaching of a so-called 'Catholic Truth " is non-existent, and the 
 
42 THE NATURE AND GROUND OP [LECT. 
 
 11. 
 
 3. The same view of Romanism is implied when we 
 call our ecclesiastical changes in the sixteenth century a 
 Reformation. A building has not been reformed or re- 
 paired, when it has been pulled down and built up again ; 
 but the word is used when it has been left substantially 
 what it was before, only amended or restored in detail. 
 In like manner, we Anglo- Catholics do not profess a dif- 
 ferent religion from that of Rome, we profess their Faith 
 all but their corruptions. 5 
 
 4. Again, this same character of Romanism as a perver- 
 sion, not a contradiction of Christian Truth, is confessed 
 as often as members of our Church in controversy with it 
 contend, as they may rightly do, that it must be judged, 
 not by the formal decrees of the Council of Trent, as its 
 advocates wish, but by its practical working and its 
 existing state in the countries which profess it. Romanists 
 would fain confine us in controversy to the consideration 
 of the bare and acknowledged principles of their Church ; 
 we consider this to be an unfair restriction ; why ? because 
 we conceive that Romanism is far more faulty in its details 
 than in its formal principles, and that Councils, to which 
 its adherents would send us, have more to do with its 
 abstract system than with its practical working, that the 
 abstract system contains for the most part tendencies to 
 evil, which the actual working brings out, thus supplying 
 illustrations of that evil which is really though latently 
 contained in principles capable in themselves of an honest 
 interpretation. Thus, for instance, the decree concerning 
 
 choice lies between the one and the other extreme, who would not prefer 
 that " Romanism " which has an excess of life to that Protestantism which 
 is deficient in it ? An extreme is not wrong as such, else there would be 
 something wrong in the idea of Divine Infinity.] 
 
 s Vid. the Canons of 1603, No. 30, " The abuse of a thing doth not take 
 away the lawful use of it." 
 
I.] ROMAN AND PROTESTANT ERRORS. 43 
 
 Purgatory might be charitably made almost to conform to 
 the doctrine of St. Austin or St. Chrysostom, were it not 
 for the comment on it afforded by the popular belief as 
 existing in those countries which hold it, and by the 
 opinions of the Koman schools. 6 
 
 12. 
 
 5. It is something to the purpose also to observe, that 
 this peculiar character of Roman teaching, as being sub- 
 stantial Truth corrupted, has tended to strengthen the 
 popular notion, that it, or the Church of Rome, or the Pope 
 or Bishop of Rome, is the Antichrist foretold in Scripture. 
 That there is in Romanism something very unchristian, I 
 fully admit, or rather maintain ; 7 but I will observe here 
 that this strange two-fold aspect of the Roman system 
 seems in matter of fact to nave been in part a cause of 
 that fearful title attaching to it, — and in this way. When 
 Protestants have come to look at it closely, they have 
 found truth and error united in so subtle a combination 
 (as is the case with all corruptions, as with sullied snow, 
 or fruit over-ripe, or metal alloyed) , they have found truth 
 so impregnated with error, and error so sheltered by 
 truth, — so much too adducible in defence of the system, 
 which, from want of learning or other cause, they could 
 not refute without refuting their own faith and practice 
 at the same time, — so much in it of high and noble 
 principle, or salutary usage, which they had lost, and, as 
 losing, were, in that respect, in an inferior state, — that for 
 this very reason, as the readiest, safest, simplest solution 
 
 6 [This subject is treated of at length in the Preface to this edition.] 
 
 7 [The author says in his Apologia, " In 1816 I read Newton on the 
 Prophecies, and in consequence became most firmly convinced that the 
 Pope was the Antichrist predicted by Daniel, St. Paul, and St. John. 
 My imagination was stained by the effects of his doctrine up to the year 
 1843."] 
 
44 THE NATURE AND GROUND OF [LECT. 
 
 of their difficulties, not surely the fairest, but the readiest, 
 as cutting the knot and extricating them at once from 
 their position, they have pronounced Rome or its Pope 
 to be the Antichrist ; I say, for the very reason that so 
 much may be said in its behalf, that it is so difficult to 
 refute, so subtle and crafty, so seductive, — properties 
 which are tokens of the hateful and fearful deceiver who 
 is to come. Of course I do not mean to say that this 
 perplexing aspect of the Roman Church has originally 
 Drought upon it the stigma under consideration ; but 
 that it has served to induce people indolently to acquiesce 
 in it without examination. 
 
 6. In these remarks on the relation which Romanism 
 bears to Catholic Truth, I have appealed to the common 
 Opinion of the world; which is altogether confirmed when 
 we come actually to compare together the doctrinal articles 
 of our own and of the Roman faith. In both systems the 
 same Creeds are acknowledged. Besides other points in 
 common, we both hold, that certain doctrines are necessary 
 to be believed for salvation ; we both believe in the doc- 
 trines of the Trinity, Incarnation, and Atonement; in 
 original sin ; in the necessity of regeneration ; in the 
 supernatural grace of the Sacraments ; in the Apostolical 
 succession ; in the obligation of faith and obedience, and 
 in the eternity of future punishment. 
 
 13. 
 
 In conclusion I would observe, that in what I have been 
 saying of the principles and doctrines of Romanism, I have 
 mainly regarded it, not as an existing political sect among 
 us, but in itself, in its abstract system, and in a state of 
 quiescence. Viewed indeed in action, and as realized in 
 its present partisans, it is but one out of the many de- 
 nominations which are the disgrace of our age and country. 
 
1.] ROMAN AND PROTESTANT ERRORS. 45 
 
 In temper and conduct it does but resemble that unruly 
 Protestantism which lies on our other side, and it submits 
 without reluctance to be allied and to act with that Pro- 
 testantism for the overthrow of a purer religion. But 
 herein is the difference of the one extreme from the other ; 
 the political Romanist of the day becomes such in spite of 
 his fundamental principles, the political Protestant in 
 accordance with his. The best Dissenter is he who is least 
 of a Dissenter ; the best Roman Catholic is he who comes 
 nearest to be a Catholic. The reproach of the present 
 Roman party is that they are inconsistent ; and it is a 
 reproach which is popularly felt to be just. They are 
 confessedly unlike the loyal men who rallied round the 
 throne of our first Charles, or who fought, however ill- 
 advisedly, for his exiled descendants. The particular 
 nature of this inconsistency will be discussed in some 
 following Lectures ; meanwhile I have here considered the 
 religion of Rome in its abstract professions for two reasons. 
 First, I would willingly believe, that in spite of the violence 
 and rancour of its public supporters, there are many 
 individuals in its communion of gentle, affectionate, and 
 deeply religious minds ; and such a belief is justified when 
 we find that the necessary difference between us and them 
 is not one of essential principle, that it is the difference of 
 superstition, and not of unbelief, from religion. Next, I 
 have insisted upon it, by way of showing what must be 
 the nature of their Reformation, if in God's merciful 
 counsels a Reformation awaits them. It will be far more 
 a reform of their popular usages and opinions, and eccle- 
 siastical policy, that is, a destruction of what is commonly 
 called Popery, than of their abstract principles and 
 maxims. 8 
 
 On the other hand, let it not be supposed, because I have 
 spoken without sympathy of popular Protestantism in 
 8 [Vid. supr. the Preface to this edition.] 
 
46 THE NATURE AND GROUND, ETC. 
 
 the abstract, that this is all one with being harsh towards 
 individuals professing it ; far from it. The worse their 
 creed, the more sympathy is due to their persons; chiefly 
 to those, for they most demand and will most patiently 
 suffer it, who least concur in their own doctrine, and are 
 held by it in an unwilling captivity. Would that they 
 would be taught that their peculiar form of religion, 
 whatever it is, never can satisfy their souls, and does not 
 admit of reform, but must come to nought ! Would that 
 they could be persuaded to transfer their misplaced and 
 most unrequited affection from the systems of men to the 
 One Holy Spouse of Christ, the Church Catholic, which 
 in this country manifests herself in the Church, commonly 
 so called, as her representative ! Nor need we despair 
 that, as regards many of them, this wish may yet be 
 fulfilled. 
 
LECTURE II. 
 
 ON THE KOMAN TEACHING AS NEGLECTFUL OF 
 ANTIQUITY. 
 
 We differ from Roman Catholics, as I have said, more in 
 our view of historical facts than in principles ; but in say- 
 ing this, I am speaking, not of their actual system, nor of 
 their actual mode of defending it, but of their professions, 
 professions which in their mouths are mere professions, 
 while they are truths in ours. The principles, professed by 
 both parties, are at once the foundation of our own theology, 
 and what is called an argumentum ad hominem against 
 theirs. They profess to appeal to primitive Christianity; 
 we honestly take their ground, as holding it ourselves ; but 
 when the controversy grows animated, and descends into 
 details, they suddenly leave it and desire to finish the dis- 
 pute on some other field. In like manner in their teaching 
 and acting, they begin as if in the name of all the Fathers 
 at once, but will be found in the sequel to prove, instruct, 
 and enjoin simply in their own name. Our differences 
 from them, considered not in theory but in fact, are in no 
 sense matters of detail and questions of degree. In truth 
 there is a tenet in their theology which assumes quite a 
 new position in relation to the rest, when we pass from the 
 abstract and quiescent theory to the practical workings of 
 the system. The infallibility of the existing Church is 
 then found to be its first principle, whereas, before, it was 
 
48 ON THE KOMAN TEACHING AS [LECT. 
 
 a necessary, but a secondary doctrine. Whatever princi- 
 ples tbey profess in theory, resembling, or coincident with 
 our own, yet when they come to particulars, when they 
 have to prove this or that article of their creed, they super- 
 sede the appeal to Scripture and Antiquity by putting 
 forward the infallibility of the Church, thus solving the 
 whole question, by a summary and final interpretation 
 both of Antiquity and of Scripture. 1 
 
 This is what takes place in the actual course of the con- 
 troversy. At the same time it is obvious that, while they 
 are as yet but engaged in tracing out their elementary 
 principles, and recommending them to our notice, they 
 cannot assign to this influential doctrine the same sove- 
 reign place in their system. It cannot be taken for 
 granted as a first principle in the controversy; if so, 
 nothing remains to be proved, and the controversy is at an 
 end, for every doctrine is contained in it by implication, 
 and no doctrine but might as fairly be assumed as a first 
 principle also. Accordingly, in order to make a show of 
 proving it, its advocates must necessarily fall back upon 
 some more intelligible doctrine ; and that is, the authority 
 of Antiquity, to which they boldly appeal, as I described 
 in my last Lecture. It follows that there is a striking dis- 
 similarity, or even inconsistency between their system as 
 quiescent, and as in action, in its abstract principles, and 
 its reasonings and discussions on particular points. In the 
 Creed of Pope Pius not a word is said expressly about the 
 Church's infallibility; it forms no Article of faith there. 
 
 1 [I do not see why the author connects the doctrine of the Church's 
 Infallibility with the " practical workings of its system," and not with its 
 " abstract theory," i. e. formal theology. The case is rather the reverse. 
 The Pope (or the Church) is not infallible in action, but in doctrinal 
 utterances. But in speaking of "practical workings," the author se- ms 
 here to limit his view to the Roman method of controversy or of argu- 
 mentation ; and so far, I confess, belief in the Church's infallibility rules 
 all inquiries into matters of doctrine. Vid. supr. note, p. 38.J 
 
II.] NEGLECTFUL OF ANTIQUITY. 49 
 
 Her interpretation, indeed, of Scripture is recognized as 
 authoritative ; but so also is the u unanimous consent of 
 Fathers." But when we put aside the creeds and pro- 
 fessions of our opponents for their actual teaching and 
 disputing, they will be found to care very little for the 
 Fathers, whether as primitive or as concordant; they 
 believe the existing Church to be infallible, and if ancient 
 belief is at variance with it, which of course they do not 
 allow, but if it is, then Antiquity must be mistaken; that 
 is all. 2 Thus Romanism, which even in its abstract system, 
 must be considered a perversion or distortion of the truth, 
 is in its actual and public manifestation afar more serious 
 error. It is then a disproportionate or monstrous develop- 
 ment of a theory in itself extravagant. I propose now to 
 give some illustration of it, thus considered, viz. to show 
 that in fact it substitutes the authority of the Church for 
 that of Antiquity. 3 
 
 2. 
 
 First, let us understand what is meant by saying that 
 Antiquity is of authority in religious questions. Both the 
 Eoman school and ourselves maintain as follows : — That 
 
 2 [Take a parallel. St. Paul was infallible ; first he gave proofs of it, viz. 
 by miracles, &c., then he acted upou it. He did not appeal to James, Cephas, 
 and John for his doctrine, though they were " pillars ." Was he then 
 " inconsistent " ? Supposing the Church is infallible, that very thing must 
 happen which does happen, viz. she must assert her infallibility, and then act 
 upon it as decisive in every controversy of faith. I say " supposing ; " 
 and this supposition the author, though repudiating here, actually grants 
 to his own hypothetical " Church Catholic " in Lecture viii., in these words, 
 " Not only is the Church Catholic bound to teach the truth, but she is ever 
 divinely guided to teach it. . . . She is indefectible in it. . . . How can 
 she have authority in controversies of faith, unless she be, so far, certainly 
 true in her declarations ? . . . Our reception of the Athanasian Creed is 
 another proof of our holding the infallibility of the Church, as some of 
 our divines express it, in matters of saving faith."] 
 
 3 [As I have said, the infallible Church supersedes the ancient Fathers, 
 just as much as St. Paul's infallibility put aside the procedure of Peter in 
 Gal. ii., and St. Peter and St. James St. Paul, in James ii., 2 Pet. iii.J 
 
 TOL. I. E 
 
50 ON THE EOMAN TEACHING AS [LECT. 
 
 whatever doctrine the primitive ages unanimously attest, 
 whether by consent of Fathers, or by Councils, or by the 
 events of history, or by controversies, or in whatever way, 
 whatever may fairly and reasonably be considered to be the 
 universal belief of those ages, is to be received as coming 
 from the Apostles. This Canon, as it may be called, rests 
 upon the principle, which we act on daily, that what many 
 independent and competent witnesses guarantee, is true. 
 The concordant testimony of the Church Catholic to certain 
 doctrines, such as the Incarnation, is an argument in its 
 behalf the same in kind as that for the being of a God, 
 derived from the belief of all nations in an intelligent 
 Providence. If it be asked, why we do not argue in this 
 way from the existing as well as from the ancient Church, 
 we answer that Christendom now differs from itself in all 
 points except those in which it is already known to have 
 agreed of old ; so that we cannot make use of it if we would. 
 So far, then, as it can be used, it is but a confirmation of 
 Antiquity, though a valuable one. Besides, the greater is 
 the interval between a given age and that of the Apostles, 
 and the more intimate the connexion and influence of 
 country with country, the less can the separate branches of 
 the Church be considered as independent witnesses. In 
 the Eoman controversy, then, the witness of a later age 
 would seldom come up to the notion of a Catholic Tradition, 
 inasmuch as the various parts of Christendom either would 
 not agree together, or when they did, would not be distinct 
 witnesses. Thus Ancient Consent is, practically, the only, 
 or main kind of Tradition which now remains to us. 4 
 
 4 [Hardly so; one instance of "modern consent" is still possible and 
 exists, which is a stronger proof of doctrine than any other, viz. a consent 
 maintained through ages in spite of division and antagonism in the com- 
 munions maintaining it. Such is the present doctrinal consent of the 
 Churches of Rome and Greece, as regards the cult of the Blessed Virgin and 
 all saints, and the ritual generally, and specially in their judgment of the 
 theological and ethical tenets of all branches of the Reformed Religion.] 
 
II.] NEGLECTFUL OP ANTIQUITY. 51 
 
 3. 
 
 The Rule or Canon which I have been explaining, is 
 best known as expressed in the words of Yincentius of 
 Lerins, in his celebrated treatise upon the tests of Heresy 
 and Error ; viz. that that is to be received as Apostolic 
 which has been taught " always, everywhere, and by all." 
 Catholicity, Antiquity, and consent of Fathers, is the 
 proper evidence of the fidelity or Apostolicity of a pro- 
 fessed Tradition. Infant Baptism, for instance, must have 
 been appointed by the Apostles, or we should not find it 
 received so early, so generally, with such a silence con- 
 cerning its introduction. The Christian faith is dogmatic, 
 because it has been so accounted in every Church up to 
 this day. The washing of the feet, enjoined in the 13th 
 chapter of St. John, is not a necessary rite or a Sacrament, 
 because it has never been so observed : — Did Christ or His 
 Apostles intend otherwise, it would follow, (what is surely 
 impossible,) that a new and erroneous view of our Lord's 
 words arose even in the Apostles' lifetime, and was from 
 the first everywhere substituted for the true. Again; 
 fabrics for public worship are allowable and fitting under 
 the Gospel, though our Lord contrasts worshipping at 
 Jerusalem or Gerizim with worshipping in spirit and 
 truth, because they ever have been so esteemed. The 
 Sabbatical rest is changed from the Sabbath to the Lord V 
 day, because it has never been otherwise since Christianity 
 was a religion. 
 
 4. 
 
 It follows that Councils or individuals are of authority, 
 when we have reason to suppose they are trustworthy 
 informants concerning Apostolical Tradition. If a Council 
 is attended by many Bishops from various parts of Christen- 
 dom, and if they speak one and all the same doctrine, 
 without constraint, and bear witness to their having re- 
 ceived it from their Fathers, having never heard of any 
 
 e 2 
 
52 ON THE ROMAN TEACHING AS [LECT. 
 
 other doctrine, and verily believing it to be Apostolic, — 
 great consideration is due to its decisions. If, on the other 
 hand, they do not profess to bear witness to a fact, but 
 merely to deduce from Scripture for themselves, besides or 
 beyond what they received from their Fathers, whatever 
 deference is due to them, it is not of that peculiar kind 
 which is contemplated by the Rule of Vincentius. In like 
 manner, if some great Christian writer in primitive times, 
 of high character, extensive learning, and ample means of 
 information, attests the universality of a certain doctrine, 
 and the absence of all trace of its introduction short of the 
 Apostles' age, such a one, though an individual, yet as the 
 spokesman of his generation, will be entitled to especial 
 deference. On the other hand, the most highly gifted and 
 religious persons are liable to error, and are not to be im- 
 plicitly trusted where they profess to be recording, not a 
 fact, but their own opinion. Christians know no master 
 on earth ; they defer, indeed, to the judgment, obey the 
 advice, and follow the example of good men in ten thousand 
 ways, but they do not make their opinions part of what is 
 emphatically called the Faith. Christ alone is the Author 
 and Finisher of Faith in all its senses ; His servants do 
 but witness it, and their statements are then only valuable 
 when they are testimonies, not deductions or conjectures. 
 When they speak about points of faith of themselves, and 
 much more when they are at variance with Catholic 
 Antiquity, we can bear to examine and even condemn the 
 uncertain or the erroneous opinion. Thus Pope Gregory 
 might advocate a doctrine resembling Purgatory; St. 
 Gregory Nyssen may have used language available in 
 defence of Transubstantiation ; St. Ephraim may have 
 invoked the Blessed Virgin ; St. Austin might believe in 
 the irrespective Predestination of individuals ; St. Cyril 
 might afford a handle to Eutyches ; Tertullian might be 
 a Montanist ; Origen might deny the eternity of future 
 
II.] NEGLECTFUL OF ANTIQUITY. 53 
 
 punishment; yet all such instances, whatever be their 
 weight from other circumstances, still, as not professing to 
 be more than expressions of private opinion, have no weight 
 at all, one way or other, in the argument from Catholic 
 Tradition. In like manner, Universality, of course, proves 
 nothing, if it is traceable to an origin short of Apostolic, 
 whether to existing influences from without, or to some 
 assignable point of time. Whatever judgment is to be 
 formed of a certain practice or doctrine, be it right or wrong, 
 and on whatever grounds, at any rate, it is not part or 
 adjunct of the Faith, but must be advocated on its intrinsic 
 propriety,, or usefulness, or, if tenable, is binding in duty 
 only on particular persons or parties, ages or countries, if 
 its history resembles that of the secular establishment of 
 the Church, or of Monachism, or of capital punishment for 
 religious opinions, or of sprinkling in Baptism, or of the 
 denial of the cup to the laity, or of Ecclesiastical Liberty, 6 
 or of the abolition of slavery, subjects which I do not, of 
 course, put on a footing with each other, but name together 
 as being one and all external to that circle of religious 
 truth which the Apostles sealed with their own signature 
 as the Gospel Faith, and delivered over to the Church 
 after them. 
 
 5. 
 
 But here it may be asked, whether it is possible accu- 
 rately to know the limits of that Faith, from the peculiar 
 circumstances in which it was first spread, which hindered 
 it from being realized in the first centuries in its complete 
 proportions. It may be conjectured, for instance, that the 
 doctrine of what is familiarly called ' ' Church and King f) 
 is Apostolic, except that it could not be developed, while a 
 heathen and persecuting power was sovereign. This is 
 
 5 [" Ecclesiastical Liberty " is introduced here among other instances 
 upon the ground, I suppose, that, till the secular power came within the 
 pale of the Church, the question of her liberty could not arise.] 
 
54 ON THE ROMAN TEACHING AS [LECT. 
 
 true ; and hence a secondary argument is derivable from 
 Ancient Consent in any doctrine, even when it does not 
 appeal to traditionary reception ; viz. on the principle that 
 what was in an early age held universally, must at least 
 in spirit have been unconsciously transmitted from the 
 Apostles, if there is no reason against it, and must be the 
 due expression of their mind and wishes, under changed 
 circumstances, and therefore is binding on us in piety, 
 though not part of the Faith. The same consideration 
 applies to the interpretation of Scripture ; but this is to 
 enter on a distinct branch of the subject, to which I shall 
 advert hereafter. 
 
 6. 
 
 In the foregoing remarks I have not been attempting 
 any systematic discussion of the argument from Antiquity, 
 which is unnecessary for our present purpose, but have 
 said just so much as may open a way for illustrating the 
 point in hand, viz. the disrespect shown towards it by the 
 Koman divines. In theory, indeed, and in their protessions, 
 as has already been noticed, they defer to the authority of 
 the Eule of Vincent as implicitly as we do ; and commonly 
 without much hazard, for Protestantism in general has so 
 transgressed it, that, little as it tells for Rome, it tells still 
 more strongly against the wild doctrines which they oppose 
 under that name. Besides, they are obliged to main- 
 tain it by their very pretensions to be considered the Ooe 
 True Catholic and Apostolic Church. At the same time 
 there is this remarkable difference, even of theory, between 
 them and Yincentius, that the latter is altogether silent on 
 the subject of the Pope's Infallibility, whether considered 
 as an attribute of his see, or as attaching to him in General 
 Council. If Vincentius had the sentiments and feelings of 
 a modern Eoman Catholic, it is incomprehensible 6 that, in 
 
 6 [Not incomprehensible. The highest authority speaks last, and Vincent's 
 
II.] NEGLECTFUL OF ANTIQUITY. 55 
 
 a treatise written to guide the private Christian in matters 
 of Faith, he should have said not a word about the Pope's 
 supreme authority, nay, not even about the Infallibility of 
 the Church Catholic. He refers the inquirer to a triple 
 rule, difficult, surely, and troublesome to use, compared 
 with that which is ready-furnished by Rome now. Apply- 
 ing his own rule to his work itself, we may unhesitatingly 
 conclude that the Pope's supreme authority in matters of 
 Faith, is no Catholic or Apostolic truth, because he was 
 ignorant of it. 
 
 However, Roman Catholics are obliged by their profes- 
 sions to appeal to Antiquity, and they therefore do so. 
 But enough has been said already to suggest that, where 
 men are indisposed towards such an appeal, where they 
 determine to be captious and take exceptions, and act the 
 disputant and sophist rather than the earnest inquirer, it 
 admits of easy evasion, and may be made to conclude any- 
 thing or nothiDg. The Rule of Vincent is not of a mathe- 
 matical or demonstrative character, but moral, and re- 
 quires practical judgment and good sense to apply it. 
 For instance : what is meant by being " taught always " ? 
 does it mean in every century, or every year, or every 
 month? Does "everywhere" mean in every country, or 
 in every diocese ? And does " the Consent of Fathers " 
 require us to produce the direct testimony of every one of 
 
 Rule is for use in the free controversy which precedes and may supersede 
 the exercise of infallibility. A passage from my Apologia, p. 267, written 
 with another drift, will illustrate this point. " All through Church history 
 from the first, how slow is authority in interfering ! Perhaps a local 
 teacher, or a doctor in some local school, hazards a proposition, and a 
 controversy ensues. It smoulders or burns in one place, no one interposing ; 
 Rome simply lets it alone. Then it comes before a Bishop. . . Then it 
 comes before a University, and it may be condemned by the theological 
 faculty. . . Rome is still silent. . . Meanwhile the question has been 
 ventilated and turned over and over again," &c, &c. . . Via. a parallel 
 passage infr. Lecture xiii. ; and so Perroue de Rom. Pont. p. 517, " Cum 
 aliquis error aut haeresis," &c, &c] 
 
56 ON THE ROMAN TEACHING AS [LECT. 
 
 them ? How many Fathers, how many places, how many 
 instances constitute a fulfilment of the test proposed ? It 
 is, then, from the nature of the case, a condition which 
 never can be satisfied as fully as it might have been ; it 
 admits of various and unequal application in various 
 instances ; and what degree of application is enough must 
 be decided by the same principles which guide us in the 
 conduct of life, which determine us in politics, or trade, or 
 war, which lead us to accept Revelation at all, for which 
 we have but probability to show at most ; nay, to believe in 
 the existence of an Intelligent Creator. This character, 
 indeed, of Vincent's Canon, will but recommend it to the 
 disciples of the School of Butler, from its agreement with 
 the analogy of nature ; but it affords a ready loophole for 
 such as do not wish to be persuaded, of which both Pro- 
 testant and Roman controversialists are not slow to avail 
 themselves. 7 
 
 7. 
 
 As to the latter, with whom we are here concerned, let 
 us suppose some passage from Antiquity to contradict their 
 present doctrine, and then its being objected to them that 
 what even one early writer directly contradicted in his day 
 was not Catholic teaching at the time he contradicted it ; 
 — forthwith they unhesitatingly condemn the passage as 
 unsound and mistaken. 8 And then follows the question, 
 is the ancient writer who is quoted to be credited as report- 
 
 7 [Surely this unmanageableness is a reason against Vincent's Rule being 
 the divinely appointed instrument by which Revelation is to be brought 
 home to individuals. Without offending by the use of a priori un- 
 Butlerian arguments (though Butler does use them too), we may surely say 
 tliat a Revelation is intended to reveal. But, if this Rule is all that is 
 given us for the interpretation of Scripture or of Antiquity, it is a " lucus 
 k non lucendo."] 
 
 8 [What do Catholic theologians more than the author himself did a 
 few pages back, when he discarded the statements of Pope Gregory, Gregory 
 Nysseu.Ephraim, Austin, Cyril, Tertullian, and Origen, when those Fathers 
 contradicted, not Antiquity, but the Anglican view of Antiquity ?] 
 
II.] NEGLECTFUL OF ANTIQUITY. 57 
 
 ing the current views of his age, or had he the hardihood, 
 though he knew them well, to contradict, yet without 
 saying he contradicted them ? and this can only be decided 
 by the circumstances of the case, which an ingenious 
 disputant may easily turn this way or that. They proceed 
 in the same way, though a number of authorities be 
 adduced ; one is misinterpreted, another is put out of sight, 
 a third is admitted but undervalued. This is not said by 
 way of accusation here, though of course it is a heavy charge 
 against the Romanists ; nor with the admission that their 
 attempts are successful, for, after all, words have a distinct 
 meaning in spite of sophistry, and there is a true and a 
 false in every matter. I am but showing how Romanists 
 reconcile their abstract reverence for Antiquity with their 
 Romanism, — with their creed, and their notion of the 
 Church's infallibility in declaring it ; 9 how small their 
 success is, and how great their unfairness, is another 
 question. Whatever judgment we form either of their 
 conduct or its issue, such is the fact, that they extol the 
 Fathers as a whole, and disparage them individually ;* they 
 call them one by one Doctors of the Church, yet they 
 explain away one by one their arguments, judgment, and 
 testimony. They refuse to combine their separate and 
 coincident statements; they take each by himself, and settle 
 with the first before they go on to the next. 2 And thus 
 their boasted reliance on the Fathers comes, at length, to 
 this, — to identify Catholicity with the decrees of Councils, 
 and to admit those Councils only which the Pope has 
 confirmed. 
 
 9 [Is not this precisely the method of other controversialists beside the 
 Roman ? May it not be retorted, " This is how Anglicans get over St. 
 Gregory Nyssen's witness to transubstantiation, and St. Ephraim's to the 
 glories of Mary," &c. &c. ?] 
 
 1 [We disparage them only so far as this, that we do not hold even the 
 greatest of them to be infallible, whereas the Church is infallible.] 
 
 2 [This ought to be proved by instances, as being a categorical and 
 definite charge.] 
 
58 ON THE ROMAN TEACHING AS [LECT. 
 
 Sucli is that peculiarity of Romanism which is now to 
 be illustrated ; and with this purpose I will first quote one 
 or two passages from writers of authority, by way of show- 
 ing the abstract reverence in which Romanism holds the 
 Fathers, and then show from others how little they carry 
 it into practice. 
 
 8. 
 
 Bossuet, in his celebrated Exposition, thus speaks : 
 " The Catholic Church, far from wishing to become abso- 
 lute mistress of her faith, as it is laid to her charge, has, 
 on the contrary, done everything in her power to tie up 
 her hands, and to deprive herself of the means of innova- 
 tion ; for she not only submits to Holy Scripture, but in 
 order to banish for ever these arbitrary interpretations, 
 which would substitute the fancies of men for Scripture, 
 she hath bound herself to interpret it, in what concerns 
 faith and morality, according to the sense of the Holy 
 Fathers, from which she professes never to depart ; declar- 
 ing by all the Councils, and by all the professions of faith 
 which she has published, that she receives no dogma that 
 is not conformable to the Tradition of all preceding 
 ages." 3 
 
 Milner, in his End of Controversy, adopts the same 
 tone. " When any fresh controversy arises in the Church, 
 the fundamental maxim of the Bishops and Popes, to whom 
 it belongs to decide upon it, is, not to consult their own 
 private opinion or interpretation of Scripture, but to in- 
 quire 'what is and has ever been the doctrine of the 
 Church ' concerning it. Hence, their cry is and ever has 
 been, on such occasions, as well in her Councils as out of 
 them, ' So we have received, so the Universal Church 
 believes, let there be no new doctrine, none but what has 
 been delivered down to us by Tradition.' " Again : "The 
 
 3 Chap. xix. 
 
II.] NEGLECTFUL OF ANTIQUITY. 59 
 
 infallibility ... of our Church is not a power of telling 
 all things, past, present, and to come, such as the Pagans 
 ascribed to their oracles ; but merely the aid of God's 
 Holy Spirit, to enable her truly to decide what her faith 
 is, and ever has been, in such articles as have been made 
 known to her by Scripture and Tradition." 4 It seems 
 from these passages, that the writings of Antiquity are to 
 be considered as limitations and safeguards put upon the 
 Church's teaching, records by which she is ever bound 
 to direct her course, out of which she ascertains and proves 
 those doctrinal statements in which, when formally made 
 she is infallible. The same view is contained in the fol- 
 lowing extracts from Bellarmine, except that, writing, not 
 an Apology, but in controversy, he insists less pointedly 
 upon it. For instance: "We do not impugn, nay we 
 maintain against impugners, that the first foundation of 
 our faith is the Word of God/' that is, written and un- 
 written, " ministered by Apostles and Prophets : . . . 
 only we add, that, besides this first foundation, another 
 secondary foundation is needed, that is, the witness of the 
 Church. For we do not know for certain what God has 
 revealed, except by the testimony of the Church." 5 And 
 in another place : " That alone is matter of faith, which is 
 revealed by God, either mediately or immediately ; but 
 divine revelations are partly written, partly unwritten. 
 And so the decrees of Councils and Popes, and the Consent 
 of Doctors, . . . then only make a doctrine an article of 
 faith, when they explain the Word of God, or deduce any- 
 thing from it." 6 
 
 Let us now proceed from the theory of the Eoman 
 Church to its practice. This is seen in the actual conduct 
 
 4 Letters xi. and xii. 5 De Verb. Dei Interpr. iii. 10. 
 
 6 De Purg. i. 15. 
 
60 ON THE ROMAN TEACHING AS [LECT. 
 
 of its theologians, some of whom shall here be cited as a 
 sample of the whole. 
 
 1. First, I refer to the well-known occasion of Bishop 
 Bull's writing his " Defence of the Nicene Faith." He was 
 led to do so by an attack upon the orthodoxy of the Ante- 
 Nicene Fathers from a quarter whence it was at first sight 
 little to be expected. The learned assailant was not an 
 Arian, or Socinian, or Latitudinarian, but Petavius, a 
 member of the Jesuit body. The tendency of the portion 
 of his great work on Theological Dogmas which treats of 
 the Holy Trinity, is too plain to be mistaken. The his- 
 torian Gibbon does not scruple to pronounce that its 
 "object, or at least, effect/' was "to arraign/' and as he 
 considers, successfully, " the faith of the Ante-Nicene 
 Fathers ; " and it was used in no long time by Arian 
 writers in their own justification. Thus, Romanist, heretic, 
 and infidel unite with one another in this instance in 
 denying the orthodoxy of the first centuries, just as at this 
 moment the same three parties are banded together to 
 oppose ourselves. We trust we see in this circumstance an 
 omen of our own resemblance to the Primitive Church, since 
 we hold a common position with it towards these parties, 
 and are in the centre point, as of doctrine, so of attack. 
 But to return to Petavius. This learned author, in his 
 elaborate work on the Trinity, shows that he would rather 
 prove the early Confessors and Martyrs to be heterodox, 
 than that they should exist as a court of appeal from the 
 decisions of his own Church ; and he accordingly sacrifices, 
 without remorse, Justin, Clement, Irenseus, and their 
 brethren, to the maintenance of the infallibility of Rome. 
 Or to put the matter in another point of view, truer, per- 
 haps, though less favourable still to Petavius, — he consents 
 that the Catholic doctrine of the Holy Trinity should so 
 far rest on the mere declaration of the Church/ that be- 
 
 7 [So far from making the Trinitarian doctrine " rest on the mere declara- 
 
II.] NEGLECTFUL OF ANTIQUITY. 61 
 
 fore it was formally defined, there was no heresy in reject- 
 ing it, provided he can thereby gain for Rome the freedom 
 of making decrees unfettered by the recorded judgments 
 of Antiquity. 
 
 10. 
 
 This it was which excited the zeal of our great theo- 
 logian, Bishop Bull, whom I will here quote, both in order 
 to avail myself of his authority, and because of the force 
 and clearness of his remarks. In the introduction then of 
 his celebrated work, after enumerating certain heretical 
 and latitudinarian attempts to disparage the orthodoxy 
 of the Ante-Nicene centuries, he speaks as follows of 
 Petavius : — 
 
 " But I am beyond measure astonished at that great 
 and profoundly learned man, Dionysius Petavius ; who, for 
 all the reverence which he professes for theNicene Council, 
 and his constant acknowledgment that the faith confirmed 
 in it against the Arians, is truly Apostolic and Catholic, 
 yet makes an admission to them, which, if it holds, goes 
 the full length of establishing their heresy, and of dis- 
 paraging, and so overthrowing, the credit and authority 
 of the Nicene Council ; namely, that the Rulers and 
 Fathers of the Church before its date were nearly all of 
 
 the very same sentiments as Arius What was 
 
 Petavius' s view in so writing, it is difficult to say. Some 
 .suspect that he was secretly an Arian, and wished by these 
 means insidiously to recommend the heresy to others. 
 This was the opinion of Sandius," the heretical writer, 
 " whom I just now mentioned. . . . However, Petavius's 
 own writings make it, I think, abundantly clear, that 
 this pretender's supposition is altogether false. If some 
 underhand purpose must be assigned for his writing as he 
 
 tion of the Church," he has a Preface of six chapters in order to show that it 
 is to be received on the warrant of a continuous tradition.] 
 
62 ON THE ROMAN TEACHING AS [LECT. 
 
 did, and it be not sufficient to ascribe it to bis customary 
 audacity and recklessness in criticizing and animadverting 
 on the Holy Fathers, I should give my opinion that this 
 author, as being a Jesuit, had in view the interest of 
 Popery rather than of Arianism. For, granting the Catho- 
 lic Doctors of the first three centuries held nearly all of 
 them that very error of doctrine, which the Nicene Council 
 afterwards condemned in Arius as heresy (which is Pe- 
 tavius's statement), two things will readily follow : first, 
 that little deference is to be paid to the Fathers of the 
 first three centuries, to whom reformed Catholics specially 
 appeal, as if in their time the chief articles of the 
 Christian faith were not yet sufficiently understood and 
 developed; next, that (Ecumenical Councils have the 
 power of framing or (as Petavius speaks) of establishing 
 and publishing new articles of faith, which may fitly 
 serve to prepare the ground for those additions which 
 the Fathers at Trent annexed to the Eule of Faith and 
 obtruded on Christendom ; though even this will not be a 
 sufficient defence of the Roman faith, since the meeting at 
 Trent was anything but a General Council. However, the 
 masters of that school, it seems, feel no compunction at 
 erecting their own pseudo-catholic faith on the ruins of 
 that which is truly Catholic. The Divine oracles themselves 
 are to be convicted of undue obscurity, the most holy Doc- 
 tors, Bishops and Martyrs of the primitive Church are to 
 be charged with heresy ; so that in one way or other the 
 credit and authority of the degenerate Roman Church 
 may be patched up and made good. At the same time 
 these sophists, to be sure, are the very men to execrate us 
 as brethren of cursed Ham, and scoffers and despisers of 
 the venerable Fathers of the Church, and to boast that 
 they themselves religiously follow the faith of the ancient 
 Doctors, and hold their writings in highest reverence. 
 That such a nefarious purpose led to Petavius's statement, 
 
II.] NEGLECTFUL OF ANTIQUITY. 63 
 
 I do not dare say for certain, but leave the matter to the 
 heart-searching God. Meanwhile, what the Jesuit has 
 written, as it is most welcome to modern Arians (all of 
 whom on that account revere and embrace him as their 
 champion), so, as I would affirm confidently, it is manifestly 
 contrary to truth, and most injurious and slanderous as 
 well towards the Nicene Fathers as the Ante-Nicene." 8 
 
 So remarkable an instance as this is not of every day's 
 occurrence. I do not mean to say there have been many 
 such systematic and profound attempts as this on the part 
 of Petavius, at what may be justly called parricide. 
 Eome even, steeled as she is against the kindlier feelings, 
 when it is required by her interests, has more of tender 
 mercy left than to bear them often. In this very instance, 
 the French Church indirectly showed their compunction at 
 the crime, on Bull's subsequent defence of the Nicene 
 Anathema, by transmitting to him, through Bossuet, the 
 congratulations of the whole clergy of France assembled 
 at St. Germain's, for the service he had rendered to the 
 Church Catholic. 9 
 
 11. 
 
 2. However, not even the Gallican Church, moderate 
 as she confessedly has been, can side with Rome without 
 cooling in loyalty towards the primitive ages; as will 
 appear by the following remarks extracted from the Bene- 
 dictine edition of St. Ambrose. The Benedictines of St. 
 Maur are, as is well known, of a school in the Roman 
 
 8 Defens. Fid Nicen. Prooem. § 7, 8. 
 
 9 [That is, one man was disrespectful to the early Fathers, and the whole 
 of the Gallican Church rose up against him : how does this prove that 
 Catholics generally are accustomed to "explain away the arguments, judg- 
 ment, and testimony " of the Fathers ? And, as to Petavius, let it be 
 observed, he was maintaining just the doctrine which Anglicans also main- 
 tain concerning the Blessed Trinity, not innovating; and was "explaining 
 away " nothing in Justin, Origen, &c. It was Bull who, rightly or wrongly, 
 explained away seeming heterodoxies in them.] 
 
64 ON THE ROMAN TEACHING AS [LECT. 
 
 Church distinct from the Jesuits, to whom Petavius 
 belonged. So much so, that the Benedictine edition of 
 Bossuet's works is accused of Jansenism, at least so I under- 
 stand the English editor of his Exposition, who speaks 
 of its being " infected with the spirit of that sect which 
 disfigures everything that it touches." l Their learning 
 and candour are well known ; and one can hardly accuse 
 those who spend their lives in an act of ministration towards 
 the holy Fathers, of any intentional irreverence towards 
 them. The following passage occurs in their introduction 
 to one of the works of St. Ambrose, on occasion of that 
 Father making some statements at variance with the 
 present Roman views of the intermediate state : — 
 
 " It is not indeed wonderful that Ambrose should have 
 written in this way concerning the state of souls; but 
 what seems almost incredible is the uncertainty and incon- 
 sistency of the holy Fathers on the subject, from the very 
 times of the Apostles to the Pontificate of Gregory XI. and 
 the Council of Florence ; that is, for almost the whole of 
 fourteen centuries. For they not only differ from one 
 another, as ordinarily happens %n such questions before the 
 Church has defined, but they are even inconsistent with 
 themselves, sometimes allowing, sometimes denying to 
 the same souls the enjoyment of the clear vision of the 
 Divine Nature." 2 
 
 It may be asked, how it is the fault of the Benedictines 
 if the Fathers are inconsistent with each other and with 
 themselves in any point ; and what harm there is in 
 stating the fact, if it is undeniable ? But my complaint 
 with them would be on a different ground, viz. that they 
 profess to know better than the Fathers ; that they, or 
 rather the religious system which they are bound to 
 follow, consider questions to be determinable on which 
 
 1 Vid. Palmer ©n the Church, i. 11. Append. 1. 
 
 2 Adinouit. in Libr. de Bono Mortis. 
 
II.] NEGLECTFUL OP ANTIQUITY. 65 
 
 the early Fathers were ignorant, and suppose the Church 
 is so absolutely the author of our faith, that what the 
 Fathers did not believe, we must believe under pain of 
 forfeiting heaven. 3 Whether Rome be right or wrong, 
 this instance contains an acknowledgment, as far as it 
 goes, that her religion is not that of the Fathers ; that her 
 Creed is as novel as those Protestant extravagancies 
 from which in other respects it is so far removed. 
 
 12. 
 
 3. I will pass on to another instance of the disrespect 
 shown by Roman theologians towards the ancient Fathers, 
 from Bellarruine's celebrated work on the Controversies 
 of Faith. The name of this eminent writer is familiar to 
 most persons who have ever so little knowledge of our 
 disputes with Rome ; but it brings with it less favourable 
 associations than its owuer deserves. The better the 
 man individually, the worse the system that makes him 
 speak uncandidly or presumptuously ; and that both as a 
 man and as a writer he has no ordinary qualities, will be 
 clear from what is said of him by two English authors of 
 this day, who are far from agreeing either with him or with 
 each other. Bishop Marsh, in his Comparative View of 
 the Churches of England and Rome, calls him " the most 
 acute, the most methodical, the most comprehensive, and 
 
 3 [The answer to this is an exposition of the doctrine of the growth and 
 development in the Catholic mind, as time goes on, of the Apostolic deposition. 
 It is difficult for any one to deny that there are points of doctrine on which the 
 Church is clearer now than in the first age. We are not the only parties who 
 maintain this ; our opponents maintain it also, in their own creed. Will 
 any Anglican deny that (say) Dr. Pusey has a more exact, a truer view 
 of the "Filioque" than Theodoret or St. John Damascene? Will any Pro- 
 testant deny that Luther, in his " Articulus stantis vel cadentis Ecclesia?," 
 saw Gospel truth with a luminousness and assurance which, they consider, 
 was not enjoyed by St. Basil, St. Ambrose, and St. Chrysostom ?] 
 VOL. I. F 
 
6$ ON THE EOMAN TEACHING AS [LECT. 
 
 at the same time one of the most candid among the contro- 
 versialists of the Church of Rome." 4 On the other hand, a 
 recent writer of very different religious sympathies from' 
 the Bishop, speaks of him in a spirit honourable both to 
 himself and the subject of his panegyric. ff I cannot 
 read/'' he says, " the pious practical works of Bellarmine, 
 himself the great defender of Popery, and know that 
 he said, 'upon account of the uncertainty of life it is 
 most safe to rely on Christ alone/ without hoping that 
 he was led before his death to renounce all confidence 
 in anything but God's testimony concerning His Son, 
 and so became a child of our heavenly Father, and an 
 heir of our Saviour's kingdom.'" 5 Others may humbly 
 trust he was all through his life, as he had been first 
 made in Baptism, a child of grace; but, however this 
 be, the testimony afforded to Bellarmine's personal piety 
 in this extract is express and under the circumstances 
 remarkable. 
 
 To these may be added what Mosheim says of him : 
 " His candour and plain dealing exposed him/'' he says, 
 "to the censures of several divines of his own communion; 
 for he collected with diligence the reasons and objections 
 of his adversaries, and proposed them for the most 
 part in their full force with integrity and exactness. Had 
 he been less remarkable on account of his fidelity and 
 industry, had he taken care to select the weakest argu- 
 ments of his antagonists, and to render them still weaker 
 by proposing them in an imperfect and unfaithful light, 
 his fame would have been much greater among the 
 friends of Rome than it actually is." 6 
 
 « Chapter I. 
 
 5 Bickersteth on Popery, p. 8. 
 
 6 Vol. iv. p. 206. Bellarmine's work was excepted against in the Index 
 of Sextus V. The evidence of this fact, which seemed to need clearing up, 
 has lately been brought out by Mr. Gibbings in his Reprint of the Index, 
 and by Mr. Mendham. 
 
II.] NEGLECTFUL OF ANTIQUITY. 67 
 
 13. 
 
 Let us turn then to the work of an author thus candid 
 as a theologian, thus highly endowed as a man. 
 
 In his treatise in defence of Purgatory, he uses severe 
 language against Calvin, who represents the Fathers as 
 speaking doubtfully concerning that doctrine. " This," he 
 says, "is intolerable hardihood or ignorance ; for first, had 
 they nowhere mentioned Purgatory by name, yet their 
 sentiments about it had been sufficiently plain from their 
 distinct statements that the souls of certain believers 
 need relief and are aided by the prayers of the living. 
 Next, there are the clearest passages in the Fathers, in 
 which Purgatory is asserted, of which I will cite some 
 few" Then follow extracts from twenty-two Fathers in 
 evidence; and so he brings his proof to an end, and 
 dismisses that head of his subject. Now will it be 
 believed that in a subsequent chapter, in recounting the 
 various errors concerning Purgatory, he enumerates some 
 of the same Fathers, as holding one or other of them, nay, 
 holding them in some of the very passages which he had 
 already adduced in proof of the tenet of his Church ! He 
 enumerates Origen, St. Ambrose, St. Hilary, Lactantius, 
 and St. Jerome, as apparently, in one or other respect, con- 
 travening or diverging from the Tridentine doctrine. Of 
 these he surrenders Origen altogether; Jerome he ex- 
 culpates, but rather by means of other extracts than as 
 clearing up what was objectionable in the passage he first 
 quoted. As to the rest, he allows that they all " sound 
 erroneous/' but says that " they may be understood " in 
 an unexceptionable sense ; though after all, of one of the 
 two best meanings which may be put upon the words of 
 some of them, he can but pronounce at most that he 
 "neither affirms nor condemns it/ 7 
 
 7 Be Purgat. i. 10; ii. 1 . [This explanation may be given of Bellarmine's 
 proceeding, viz. that a " consensus Patrum " is, according to Vincent's Rule, 
 
 F 2 
 
68 ON THE ROMAN TEACHING AS [LECT. 
 
 To explain the state of the case, it is necessary to 
 observe, that various early writers speculate on the possi- 
 bility of fire constituting at the Judgment a trial of the 
 integrity of all believers, however highly gifted in faith 
 and holiness. This opinion, whatever be its value, differs 
 from the notion of Purgatory, not to mention other 
 respects, in time, place, and subjects ; yet certain passages 
 from the Fathers containing it and other private notions, 
 are enumerated by Bellarmine, first as instances in his 
 inductive proof, then as exceptions to the doctrine thereby 
 established. The only alleviation of this strange inconsis- 
 tency is that he quotes, not the very same sentences both for 
 and against his Church's doctrine, but neighbouring ones. 
 
 14. 
 
 Now, do I mean to accuse so serious and good a 
 man as Bellarmine of wilful unfairness in this procedure ? 
 No. Yet it is difficult to enter into the state of mind 
 under which he was led into it. However we explain it, 
 so much is clear, that the Fathers are only so far of use in 
 the eyes of Romanists as they prove the Roman doctrines ; 
 and in no sense are allowed to interfere with the con- 
 clusions which their Church has adopted ; that they are of 
 authority when they seem to agree with Rome, of none 
 if they differ. Bat, if I may venture to account in 
 Bellarmine's own person for what is in controversy con- 
 fessedly unfair, I would observe as follows, though what 
 I say may seem to border on refinement. 
 
 A Romanist then cannot really argue in defence of the 
 Roman doctrines ; he has too firm a confidence in then- 
 truth, if he is sincere in his profession, to enable him 
 critically to adjust the due weight to be given to this or that 
 
 necessary for the validity of the argument from Antiquity ; and therefore 
 he had quite a right to adduce in his proof of Purgatory that doctrine in 
 which they all agreed together, while he rejected those points in which 
 they differed from each other.] 
 
II.] NEGLECTFUL OF ANTIQUITY. 69 
 
 evidence. He assumes his Church's conclusion as true ; 
 and the facts or witnesses he adduces are rather brought 
 to receive an interpretation than to furnish a proof. His 
 highest aim is to show the mere consistency of his theory, 
 its possible adj ustment with the records of Antiquity. I 
 am not here inquiring how much of high but misdirected 
 moral feeling is implied in this state of mind ; certainly 
 as we advance in perception of the Truth, we all become 
 less fitted to be controversialists. 
 
 15. 
 
 If this be the true explanation of Bellarniine's strange 
 error, the more it tends to exculpate him, the more deeply 
 it criminates his system. He ceases to be chargeable with 
 unfairness only in proportion as the notion of the infalli- 
 bility of Rome is admitted to be the sovereign and engross- 
 ing tenet of his communion, the foundation-stone, or (as it 
 may be called) the fulcrum of its theology. 8 I consider, 
 then, that when he first adduces the above-mentioned 
 Fathers in proof of Purgatory, he was really but interpret- 
 ing them; he was teaching what they ought to mean, — what 
 in charity they must be supposed to mean, — what they 
 might mean, as far as the very words went, — probably 
 meant, considering the Church so meant, — and might be 
 taken to mean, even if their authors did not so mean, from 
 the notion that they spoke vaguely, and, as children, that 
 they really meant something else than what they formally 
 said, and that, after all, they were but the spokesmen of 
 the then existing Church, which, though in silence, cer- 
 tainly held, as being the Church, that same doctrine which 
 Rome has since defined and published. This is to treat 
 
 8 [But if infallibility exists in the Church, it must supersede, as far as 
 the gift is exercised, all argument and all authority of doctors ; now the 
 author himself allows in Lecture viii. that the Church is infallible, at least 
 according to the divine intention.] 
 
70 ON THE ROMAN TEACHING AS [lECT. 
 
 Bellarmine with the same charity with which he has on 
 this supposition treated the Fathers, and it is to be hoped 
 with a nearer approach to the matter of fact. 
 
 So much as to his first use of them ; but afterwards, in 
 noticing what he considers erroneous opinions on the 
 subject, he treats them not as organs of the Church 
 Infallible, but as individuals, and interprets their language 
 by its literal sense, or by the context, and in consequence 
 condemns it. The Fathers in question, he seems to say, 
 really held as modern Rome holds ; for if they did not, 
 they must have dissented from the Church of their own 
 day; for the Church then held as modern Rome holds. 
 And the Church then held as Rome holds now, because 
 Rome is the Church, and the Church ever holds the same. 
 How hopeless then is it to contend with Romanists, as if 
 they practically agreed with us as to the foundation of faith, 
 however much they pretend to it ! Ours is Antiquity, 9 
 theirs the existing Church. Its infallibility is their first 
 principle ; belief in it is a deep prejudice quite beyond the 
 reach of anything external. It is quite clear that the 
 combined testimonies of all the Fathers, supposing such a 
 case, would not have a feather's weight against a decision 
 of the Pope in Council, nor would matter at all, except 
 for the Fathers' sake who had by anticipation opposed it. 
 They consider that the Fathers ought to mean what Rome 
 has since decreed, and that Rome knows their meaning 
 better than they themselves did. That venturesome Church 
 has usurped their place, and thinks it merciful only not to 
 banish outright the rivals she has dethroned. 1 By an act, 
 
 9 [No, not Antiquity, but the conclusions which divines who do not even 
 pretend to be infallible, Ussher, Taylor, and Stillingfleet, draw from the 
 testimonies of Antiquity as regards the articles of the Christian faith. 
 Who, for instance, will be " venturous " enough to say that the twenty-two 
 Fathers, whether they agree or not with Roman doctrine, are in any sort 
 of accordance with Anglican ?] 
 
 1 [Those "rivals" never were Popes, never professed to be infallible.] 
 
II.] NEGLECTFUL OP ANTIQUITY. 71 
 
 as it were, of grace, she has determined that when they 
 contradict her, though not available as witnesses against 
 her, yet as living in times of ignorance, they are only hete- 
 rodox and not heretical ; and she keeps them around her 
 to ask their advice when it happens to agree with her own. 
 Let us then understand the position of the Romanists 
 towards us ; they do not really argue from the Fathers, 
 though they seem to do so. They may affect to do so in 
 our behalf, happy if by an innocent stratagem they are 
 able to convert us ; but all the'while in their own feelings 
 they are taking a far higher position. 2 They are teaching, 
 not disputing or proving. They are interpreting what is 
 obscure in Antiquity, purifying what is alloyed, correcting 
 what is amiss, perfecting what is incomplete, harmonizing 
 what is various. They claim and use all its documents as 
 ministers and organs of that one infallible Church, which 
 once forsooth kept silence, but since has spoken; which 
 by a divine gift must ever be consistent with herself, and 
 which bears with her, her own evidence of divinity. 
 
 16. 
 
 1 have said enough perhaps to illustrate the subject in 
 hand; yet various instances shall be added, which are 
 noticed by our divines in the controversy. 3 They are 
 from such and so various quarters, as make them fair 
 samples of the system. 
 
 4. Cardinal Fisher, Bishop of Rochester, who suffered 
 death during the troubles in King Henry the 8th's reign, 
 is a man, as readers of our history know, of no ordinary 
 name. He is supposed to have assisted Henry in his work 
 
 2 [Certainly no Catholic controversialist will say that his real ground 
 for considering (e. g.) infant baptism obligatory, is the testimony of the 
 first three centuries. Of course he must appeal to the voice of the 
 infallible Church. On what do Anglicans rest its obligation ?] 
 
 2 Vid. Note 1 at the end of this Lecture. 
 
72 ON THE ROMAN TEACHING AS [lECT. 
 
 against Luther, and while in prison received a Cardinal's 
 hat from the Pope. He surely is as fair a specimen of the 
 Roman controversialist as could be taken. Now in one of 
 his works against Luther, he thus speaks on the subject of 
 modern rise of Indulgences and Purgatory : — " There are 
 many things, about which no question was agitated in the 
 Primitive Church, which, by the diligence of posterity, 
 when doubts had arisen, have now become clear. No 
 orthodox believer, certainly, now doubts whether there be 
 a Purgatory, of which, however, those early writers made 
 no mention, or next to none. Nay, the Greeks up to this 
 day do not believe it. . Nor did the Latins, all at once, nor 
 save gradually, apprehend the truth of this matter. For 
 faith, whether in Purgatory or in Indulgences, was not so 
 necessary in the Primitive Church as now. For then love so 
 burned, that every one was ready to meet death for Christ. 
 Crimes were rare : and such as occurred, were avenged by 
 the great severity of the Canons. Now, however, a good 
 part of the people would rather give up Christianity itself, 
 than bear the rigour of the Canons; so that it was not 
 without the especial providence of the Holy Spirit, that, 
 after the lapse of so many years , belief in Purgatory and 
 the use of Indulgences was generally received by the 
 orthodox. As long as there was no care of Purgatory, no 
 one sought for Indulgences. For the consideration of 
 Indulgences depends entirely on it. If you take away 
 Purgatory, what is the use of Indulgences ? for we should 
 not need these, but for it. By considering, then, that 
 Purgatory was for some time unknown, and then believed 
 by certain persons, by degrees, partly from revelations, 
 partly from the Scriptures, and so at length, that faith in 
 it became firmly and generally received by the orthodox 
 Church, we shall most easily form our view of Indul- 
 gences." 4 
 
 4 Assert. Luther. Confut. 18. [Here again we derive an explanation of 
 
II.] NEGLECTFUL OF ANTIQUITY. 73 
 
 17. 
 
 5. Medina, a Spanish Franciscan of the same century, 
 well esteemed for his learning in the Fathers and Councils, 
 when writing upon the subject of Episcopacy, is led to 
 consider the opinion of St. Jerome, who is accused by 
 many of expressing himself incorrectly concerning it. 
 This is not the place to examine that Father's views ; 
 Medina does examine them, and, in consequence, charges 
 him with agreeing with the Aerian heretics. Not content 
 with this, he brings a similar charge against Ambrose, 
 Augustine, Sedulius, Primasius, Chrysostom, Theodoret, 
 Ecumenius, aud Theophylact. This, in addition to its un- 
 tenable nature, is, indeed, a startling accusation in the 
 mouth of one, who, according to the abstract profession of 
 his Church, is bound to direct himself by the judgment of 
 Antiquity. The circumstance of error in a single Father we 
 could bear without any great surprise ; but should there be 
 so many of them upon one side as he supposes iD the case 
 before him, perchance we are the heretics, and they the 
 witnesses of Catholic doctrine. To those, however, who rest 
 upon the Church's Infallibility, there is certainly no danger 
 of such a misfortune. Medina, feeling himself in that 
 
 what at first sight certainly is startling, by referring to the doctrine of the 
 Development of the Catholic Creed. Its principle and defence are found in 
 the Tract of Vincent, spoken of by the author a few pages back, as so great 
 an authority in the present controversy. He says : " Forsitan dicit aliquis, 
 nullusne ergo in Ecclesia Christi profectus habebitur religionis ? Habeatur 
 plane, et maximus. . . . Sed ita tamen, ut vere profectus sit ille fidei, non 
 permutatio. . . . Imitetur animarum religio rationeni corporum, quae licet 
 annorum processu numeros suos evolvant et explicent, eadem tamen quae 
 erant permanent. Multum interest inter pueritise florem et senectutis ma- 
 turitatem . . . parva lactantium membra, magna juvenum, eadem ipsa sunt 
 tamen. . . . Fas est ut prisca ilia coelestis philosophise dogmata processu 
 temporis excurentur, limentur, poliantur ; sed nefas est ut commutentur. 
 Accipiant licet evidentiam, lucem, distinctionem; sed retineant necesse est 
 plenitudinem, integritatern, proprietatein." 28—30.] 
 
74 ON THE ROMAN TEACHING AS [lECT. 
 
 position, and independent of all the Fathers brought to- 
 gether, thus remarks : " Thus spoke men otherwise most 
 holy, and most thoroughly acquainted with the Holy 
 Scriptures ; yet this opinion of theirs was condemned by 
 the Church, first in Aerius, then in the Waldenses, lastly 
 in Wickliffe." And presently, " From respect to Jerome 
 and those Greek Fathers, this opinion was in their case 
 hushed up, or tolerated .... but in the case of those 
 heretics, who in many other points also dissented from the 
 Church, it has always been condemned as heretical." ° It 
 is fair to add that Bellarmine, who quotes this passage to 
 refute it, speaks of it with severity. 6 
 
 6. To the same purport is the following avowal of the 
 University of Douay, as contained in the Belgic Expurga- 
 tory Index. " In the old Catholic writers we suffer very 
 many errors, and we extenuate them, excuse them, fre- 
 quently find out some explanation and so deny them, and 
 assign some fitting sense, when they are objected in dis- 
 putations." 7 
 
 5 De Clericis, i. 15. The passages quoted are as follows : " Atque ita isti 
 viri alioqui sanctissimi et sanctarum scripturarum consultissimi ; quorum 
 tainen seutentiam prius in Aerio, deiude in Waldeusibus, postremo Joanne 
 Wiclefodamnavit Eeclesia. . . . Ergo in Hieronymo et Grsecis illis Patribus, 
 olim propter eorum honorem et reverentiam hsec sententia aut dissimulabatur 
 aut tolerabatur, quanquam Christianis ac Theologicis disputationibus semper 
 repulsam paterentur ; in illis contra hsereticis, Aerio, &c. quod in aliis 
 quoque multis ab Eeclesia declinare:it, tanquam bseretica semper est dam- 
 nata." De Sacr. Horn, continent, i. 5. pp. 5, 6. 
 
 8 [How then can Medina, any more than Petavius, be taken as the 
 representative of Catholic theologians, cousidering that, as the Gallican 
 Church protested against the latter, so the foremost and pattern Catholic 
 controversialist of the Reformation era, Bellarmine, enters his protest against 
 the former ?] 
 
 ' Taylor's Dissuasive, i. i. 1. vol. x. p. 136. Gibbings, Preface, p. xliv. 
 The passage stands thus in the Index : " Ut Liber Bertrami Pres. de Corp. et 
 Sang. Domini tolerari emendatus queat. — Judicium Universitatis Duacensis 
 censoribus probatum. Quanquam librum istum magni non existemus 
 momenti, . . . attameu cum jam scepe recusus sit et lectus a plurimis, &c. 
 
II.] NEGLECTFUL OP ANTIQUITY. 75 
 
 7. It is not surprising, with, these sentiments, that 
 Romanists should have undertaken before now to suppress 
 aud correct portions of the Fathers' writings. An edition 
 of St. Austin published at Venice contains the following 
 most suspicious confession : " Besides the recovery of 
 many passages by collation with ancient copies, we have 
 taken cave to remove whatever might infect the minds of the 
 faithful with heretical prav'ty, or turn them aside from 
 the Catholic and orthodox faith." 8 And a corrector of 
 the press at Lyons, of the middle of the 16th century, 
 complains that he was obliged by certain Franciscans to 
 cancel various passages of St. Ambrose, whose works he 
 was engaged upon. 9 
 
 18. 
 
 8. The Council of Constance furnishes us with a me- 
 morable instance of the same disregard for Antiquity to 
 which the whole Roman Communion is committed, in the 
 decree by which it formally debars the laity from the par- 
 ticipation of the Cup in the Lord's Supper. There is no 
 need here of entering into the defence put forward by its 
 advocates, as if the Church had a certain discretion com- 
 mitted to her in the Administration of the Sacraments, 
 and used it in this prohibition, as in the substitution of 
 affusion for immersion in Baptism. Even allowing this 
 
 . . [cum] in catholicis veteribus aliis plurimos feramus errores, et extenuemus, 
 excusemus, ex cogitate- commento perssepe negemus, et cominodum iis sensum 
 affingamus, durn opponuntur in disputationibus aut in conflictionibus cum 
 adversariis, non vidernus cur non eandem sequitateni et diligentem recogni- 
 tionem mereatur Bertrainus," &c. — p. 11. ed. 1599. 
 
 8 " In quo, prseter locorum multorum restitutionem secundum collationem 
 veterum exemplarium, curavimus removeri ilia omnia, quae fidelium mentes 
 bseretica pravitate possent inficere, aut a catholica ortbodoxa fide deviare." 
 Vid. Taylor, Diss. Part. ii. i. 6. vol. x. p. 497. 
 
 9 " Qui pro auctoritate bas ornnes paginas dispunxerunt, ut vides, et illas 
 substitui in locum priorum curaverunt, prseter omnem librorum nostrorum 
 fidem." Ibid. 
 
76 ON THE ROMAN TEACHING [LECT. 
 
 for argument's sake, the question simply is whether the 
 spirit of the following passage is one of reverence for 
 Antiquity : — ■ 
 
 "Although" says the Council, in the primitive Church the 
 Sacrament was received by the faithful under both kinds, yet 
 for the avoiding some dangers and scandals, this custom 
 has been reasonably introduced, that it be received by the 
 consecrating persons under both kinds, and by the laity 
 only under the bread ; since it is to be most firmly believed, 
 and in no wise to be doubted, that the entire Body and 
 Blood of Christ is truly contained as well under the bread 
 as under the wine." 1 The Primitive Church, we can 
 believe, has authority as the legitimate Expositor of 
 Christ ; s meaning; she acts not from her own discretion, 
 but from Christ and His Apostles. 2 We communicate in 
 the morning, not in the evening, though He did in the 
 evening, because she, His work and pattern to us, was 
 used to do so. For the. same reason we baptize Infants, 
 and consider the washing the feet no Sacrament, though 
 His own words, literally taken, command the latter far 
 more strongly than the former observance. But, what is 
 to be thought of a theology which, on its own authority, 
 on mere grounds of expedience, to avoid dangers and 
 scandals, reverses what itself confesses to be the custom 
 of the Church from the time of the Apostles ? 
 
 19. 
 
 9. Such was the conduct of the Council of Constance. 
 Cardinal Cusa justifies its decree in a passage which shall 
 be next referred to. He may be taken as the representa- 
 tive of two great parties in the Church in the fifteenth 
 century. He was present at the Council of Basil, being 
 
 1 Act. Cone. Constant. Sess. 13. 
 
 2 [Catholics of course hold that, whatever the Primitive Church could 
 lawfully do, that and such as that can be done by her in every age.] 
 
II.] NEGLECTFUL OF ANTIQUITY. 77 
 
 an upholder of the rights of a General Council above the 
 Pope. Afterwards he joined the Pope who was then cen- 
 sured, and assisted at Florence, but without modifying his 
 former opinions. With this double claim upon our notice, 
 he rests his defence of the withholding of the cup from the 
 laity, on an argument which is thus summed up by Bishop 
 Taylor : " If the Church do expound any evangelical sense 
 contrary to what the current sense and practice of the 
 Catholic Primitive Church did, not that, but this present 
 interpretation must be taken for the way of salvation, for 
 God changes His judgment as the Church does." 3 
 
 10. Lastly, I quote the words of Cornelius Mussus, 
 Bishop of Bitonto, who acted a conspicuous part at the 
 Council of Trent: "I for my part, to speak candidly, 
 would rather credit one Pope in matters touching the faith, 
 than a thousand Augiistines, Jeromes, or Gregories/' 4 
 
 20. 
 Before concluding, I would briefly remark, that instances 
 such as the foregoing, altogether expose the pretence of 
 some Roman writers, 5 that the silence of Antiquity on the 
 subject of their peculiarities arises from a disciplina arcani, 
 as it has been called, or Rule of secrecy, practised in the 
 early Church, which forbad the publication of the more 
 sacred articles of faifch to the world at large. For it has 
 now been seen that, according to the avowed or implied 
 conviction of their most eminent divines, there is much 
 actually to censure in the writings of the Fathers, much 
 which is positively hostile to the Roman system. No rule 
 of secrecy could lead honest men to make statements dia- 
 
 3 Vid. Dissuasive, Works, vol. x. p. 485. Stillingfleet (on the Council 
 of Trent, Works, vol. vi. p. 451) quotes a sentence from the same Epistle. 
 The whole passage in the original is too long to quote, but some portions 
 are extracted at the end of this Lecture. [Vid. Note 2.] 
 
 4 [Vid. Note 3 at the end of this Lecture.] 
 * Pagi Ann. 118. n. 9. 
 
78 ON THE ROMAN TEACHING AS [LECT. 
 
 metrically opposite to their real belief, statements which 
 are now the refuge of those who resist what Eomanists 
 consider the real opinion of the men who made them 
 
 I am led to this remark, because apprehensions have 
 been felt, I would say causelessly, lest those who admit the 
 existence of this primitive rule, or rather usage, were there- 
 by making some dangerous concession to the Roman party 
 which it cannot be, if, as the latter avow, the Fathers, not 
 merely fail to mention, but actually contradict the Roman 
 peculiarities. But, were the Fathers only silent respect- 
 ing them, so as just to admit of the hypothesis of a rule of 
 secrecy of such a nature as these apologists wish, at least 
 this would be inconsistent with Bossuet's boast of the 
 " conditions and restrictions " under which the Church 
 has ever exercised her gift of infallibility. " Far from 
 wishing, " he says in a passage already quoted, but which 
 will be now more justly estimated after the specimens 
 since given of his Church's reckless conduct towards the 
 primitive Fathers, "far from wishing to become absolute 
 mistress of her faith, as is laid to her charge, she has on 
 the contrary done everything in her power to tie up her own 
 hands } and deprive herself of the means of innovation ; for 
 she not only submits to Holy Scripture, but in order to 
 banish for ever those arbitrary interpretations, which would 
 substitute the fancies of man for Scripture, she hath hound 
 herself to interpret it, in what concerns faith and morality, 
 according to the sense of the holy Fathers from which she 
 professes never to depart." That is, she implicitly obeys an 
 authority which, even on the more favourable supposition, 
 says nothing for, and as the fact really is, earnestly pro- 
 tests against the course which she ventures to pursue. 
 
 21. 
 I make one remark more. Enough has been said to 
 show the hopefulness of our own prospects in the contro- 
 
 ! 
 
U.] NEGLECTFUL OF ANTIQUITY. 79 
 
 versy with Borne. We have her own avowal that the 
 Fathers ought to be followed, and again that she does not 
 follow them ; what more can we require than her witness 
 against herself which is here supplied us ? If such incon- 
 sistency is not at once fatal to her claims, which it would 
 seem to be, at least it is a most encouraging omen in our 
 contest with her. We have but to remain pertinaciously 
 and immoveably fixed on the ground of Antiquity ; and, 
 as truth is ours, so will the victory be also. We" have 
 joined issue with her, and that in a point which admits of 
 a decision, — of a decision, as she confesses, against herself; 
 Abstract arguments, original views, novel interpretations 
 of Scripture, may be met by similar artifices on the other 
 side ; but historical facts are proof against the force of 
 talent, and remain where they were, when it has expended 
 itself. How mere Protestants, who rest upon no such 
 solid foundation, are to withstand our common adversary, 
 s not so clear, and not our concern. We would fain make 
 them partakers of our vantage-ground; but since they 
 despise it, they must take care of themselves, and must 
 not complain if we refuse to desert a position which pro- 
 mises to be impregnable, — impregnable both as against 
 Rome and against themselves. 
 
 Note 1 on p. 71. 
 
 Stillingfleet supplies us with the following specimens, which must be 
 looked at as a whole, as marking the temper of Romanism, and its dis- 
 respectful bearing towards the Fathers. " If St. Cyprian," he says, " speaks 
 against Tradition, ' it was/ saith Bellarmine, ' in defence of his error, and 
 therefore no wonder if he argued after the manner of erroneous persons.' If 
 be opposeth Stephen, Bishop of Rome, in the business of rebaptization, * he 
 seemeth,' saith he, 'to have erred mortally in it/ ... If St. Chrysostom 
 saith, ' That it is better not to be present at the Eucharist, than to be present 
 and not receive it/ ' I say/ saith Bellarmine, ' that Chrysostom, as at other 
 times, went beyond his bounds in saying so/ If St. Augustine expound a 
 place of Scripture not to his mind, he tells him roundly, < He did not 
 
80 ON THE ROMAN TEACHING AS [LECT. 
 
 thoroughly consider what he said." Do not these things argue that due 
 respect they had for the Fathers ? So loug as they think they can make 
 them serve their turns, then ' who but the Fathers ? ' If they appear refrac- 
 tory, and will not serve as hewers of wood and drawers of water to them, 
 then', ' Who are the Fathers ? ' It is the Church's judgment they rely on, 
 and not the Fathers. . . . Thus the price of the Fathers rises and falls 
 according to their use, like slaves in a market. If yet the Fathers seem to 
 deliver their judgments peremptorily in a matter contrary to the present 
 sense of their Church, then either they speak it 'in the heat of disputation, 
 or, if not, they were 'contradicted by others as good as they ;' if many of 
 them concur, yet, ' it was but their private judgment/ not the sense of the 
 Catholic Church which they delivered. Still we see the rate the Fathers 
 stand at is their agreement with the present Roman Church ; if they differ 
 from this, they were men like others, and might be deceived ; only the Pope 
 is infallible, or at least the present Roman Church. For if Hilary, Gregory 
 Nyssen, Chrysostom, Cyril, Augustine, and others say, that Christ, when He 
 said, < Upon this rock will I build my Church,' understood Peter's confession 
 of Himself, saith Maldonate, 'Nothing could be more incongruous than what 
 they say.' . . . The same liberty he takes in very many other places."— 
 Stillingfleet, Grounds, i. 5. 19. pp. 137, 138. 
 
 Bishop Taylor writes to the same effect in his Dissuasive : " What think 
 we," he asks, " of the saying of Cardinal Cajetan, ' If you chance to meet 
 with any new exposition which is agreeable to the text, &c. although, perhaps, 
 it differs from that which is given by the whole current of the Holy Doctors, 
 I desire the readers that they would not too hastily reject it.' And again ; 
 < Let no man, therefore, reject a new exposition of any passage of Scripture, 
 under pretence that it is contrary to what the Ancient Doctors gave.' What 
 think we of the words of Petavius ? ' There are many things by the most 
 Holy Fathers scattered, especially St. Chrysostom in his Homilies, which if 
 you' would accommodate to the rule of exact truth, they will seem to be void 
 of good sense.' And again ; ' there is no cause why the authority of certain 
 Fathers should be objected, for they can say nothing but what they have 
 learned from St. Luke ; neither is there any reason why we should rather 
 interpret St. Luke by them, than those things which they say by St. Luke.' " 
 Presently Taylor adds, " Of late, ' knowledge is increased,' — at least many 
 writers think so ; and though the ancient interpretations were more honoured 
 than new, yet Salmeron says plainly, ' that the younger doctors are better- 
 sighted and more perspicacious.' And the question being about the concep- 
 tion of the blessed Virgin, without original sin, against which a multitude 
 of Fathers are brought : the Jesuit answers the argument with the words 
 in Exodus xxiii. 'Thou shalt not follow a multitude to sin.' "—Toy lor 's 
 Dissuasive, part 2, Introd. vol. x. p. 320. Vid. also, Ussher's Answer to a 
 Jesuit, ch. i. 
 
 [I do not know that it is necessary to hunt out in the original the above- 
 
II.] NEGLECTFUL OF ANTIQUITY. 81 
 
 passages as professedly quoted here from Catholic writers. Doubtless re- 
 ference was carefully made to them, or to their Anglican quoters, in former 
 editions of this volume. The substance of them is perfectly true, and must 
 be true, if, as the Author grants in Lecture 8, the Church is infallible in 
 faith and morals. Whether it be they or their translators, who had expressed 
 themselves so roughly, intemperately or flippantly, matters little in view of 
 the main question whether they are right or wrong in principle. We may 
 freely grant that individual theologians, nay particular schools or parties, 
 have made extravagant assertions. On the main subject, vid. the Author's 
 Essay on Development of Doctrine.] 
 
 Note 2, on p. 77. 
 
 Cardinal Cusa, Ep. ii. de Usu Communionis ad Bohemos, Works, p. 833-5, 
 speaks as follows : " Dices fortasse, ' Ecclesia hodierna non ita ambulat in 
 ritu communionis, sicut ante ista tempora, quando sanctissimi viri utriusque 
 speciei sacramentum necessarium esse vi prajcepti Christi et verbo et opere 
 astruebant. Potuitne tunc Ecclesia errare ? Certe non. Quod si non, 
 quomodo id hodie verum non est, quod tunc omnium opinione aflSrmabatur, 
 cum non sit alia Ecclesia ista quam ilia ? ' Certe hoc te non moveat, quod 
 diversis temporibus alius et alius ritus sacrificiorum et etiam sacramentorum 
 stante veritate invenitur, scripturasque esse ad tempus adaptatas, et varie 
 intellectas, ita ut uuo tempore secundum currentem universalem ritum 
 exponerentur, mutato ritu iterum sententia mutaretur. Christus enim, cui 
 Pater regnum cceleste terrenumque tradidit, in utroque . . dispensat, et quce 
 singulis temporibus congruunt, vel occulta, inspiratione, vel evidentiore 
 illustratione, suggerit. Hsec est doctoris sententia Ambrosii, &c. . . Quare 
 etiam si hodie alia f uerit interpretatio Ecclesise, ejusdem prsecepti evangelici 
 quam aliquando, tamen hie sensus nunc in usu currens ad regimen Ecclesice 
 inspiratus, uti tempori congruus, ut salutis via debet acceptari, sicut de 
 Baptismi forma Apostolorum tempore, ubi in Christi nomine, et alio sequence 
 
 ubi in Trinitatis nomine, &c Hanc sententiam [Augustini libro 18 
 
 de Civ. Dei] radicem universalium conciliorum, in omnibus pcene conciliis 
 reperimus canonizatam, quia ex unanimitate omnium, etiam paucis resisten- 
 tibus, inspirationem divinam sententiam dictasse legitur. Fatuum es ergo 
 argumentum, velle universalem Ecclesice ritum ex scripturis pradecessorum 
 arguere. . . . Scripturee de bene esse regiminis Ecclesise etiam inceptae et 
 continuatae, nequaquam de essentia existere possunt. . . . Si ut concilium, 
 dixerit Ecclesia scripturam etiam in verbis praeceptivis explicatam, verbo vel 
 praxi acceptandam, cum non habeat aliud auctoritatis quam uti per Ecclesiam 
 dictatur, non ad verba, sed ad experimentalem sensum Ecclesia obliget, 
 quoniam Ecclesia est, qua? non habet maculam neque rugam erroris et falsitatis. 
 Est enim corpus Christi, qui est Veritas, et sic spiritu veritatis continue 
 vegetatur et regitur, quia in Ecclesia loquitur Christus, et in Christo Eccle- 
 
 VOL. I. G 
 
82 ON THE ROMAN TEACHING, ETC. [LECT. II. 
 
 ia Et ita mutatio ista interpretationis a Christi voluntate ita nunc 
 
 volentis inspirante depeudet ; sicut prseceptum ipsum quandum juxta illius 
 temporis convenientem aliter practicatum, et propterea ha?c ligandi et 
 solveudi potestas noil minor est in. Ecclesia quam in Christo." 
 
 Note 3, on p. 77. 
 
 [" Si certum tibi fnerit, ilium contra Deum dicere, regulam habes. 
 Obedire magis oportet Deo, quam hominibus. At si dubium tibi sit, dicatne 
 secundum Deum vel non, ne sollicitus sk . Prselato crede ; illius culpa erit, 
 si peccabis. Animam meam exquiret Deus de manibus suis. Ego, ut 
 ingenue fatear, plus uni summo Pontifici crederem, in his qua? fidei mysteria 
 tangunt, quam mille Augustinis, Hieronymis, Gregoriis, ne dicam Ricardis, 
 Scotis, Guillelmis. Credo enim et scio, quod summus Pontifex in bis, qua? 
 fidei sunt, errare non potest, quoniam Ecclesia? auctoritas determinandi, qua? 
 ad fidem spectant, in Pontifice residet. Et ita Pontificis error, universalis 
 error Ecclesia? esset. Universalis autem Ecclesia errare non potest. Ne 
 mihi dicas de concilio, &c." in Rom. xiv. p. 606. vid. Stillingfleet, Grounds, 
 i. 5. § 19. p. 137.] Yet Mussus was a divine of great moderation on some 
 points. Pallavicino gives him a high character, Hist. p. 261. [Anglicans 
 may deny, if they will, the Pope's Infallibility; but, if he is infallible, his 
 determination on points of faith is and must be worth the judgment of a 
 tbousand St. Augustines or St. Jeromes. 
 
 I sum up what I have to say on this Lecture thus : — 
 
 1. There is the same difference between the modern and primitive teaching 
 and action of the Catholic Church, as between the boy and the grown man. 
 
 2. Such difference as little interferes with the identity of the modern aud 
 primitive teaching, as with the identity of man and boy. 
 
 3. This growth or development in the Church's teaching proceeds on fixed 
 laws under the safeguard of her infallibility, which secures her from what- 
 ever is abnormal or unhealthy. 
 
 4. The early Fathers, who are witnesses to her early teaching, are not in 
 a position to act as judges of her later. 
 
 5. If those Fathers, though Doctors of the Church, must be kept apart 
 from, not confused with her, so surely must modern theologians, such as 
 Bellarmine or Bossuet, however great their reputation. 
 
 6. As to language such as Medina's, or conduct such as that attributed to 
 the editors of the Venice St. Austin, those may defend it who care to do so.J 
 
LECTURE III. 
 
 DOCTRINE OF INFALLIBILITY MORALLY CONSIDERED. 
 
 Enough perhaps was said in the last Lecture to show that, 
 however the Church of Home may profess a reverence for 
 Antiquity, she does not really feel and pay it. There are in 
 fact two elements in operation within her system. As far 
 as it is Catholic and Scriptural, it appeals to the Fathers ; 
 as far as it is a corruption, it finds it necessary to super- 
 sede them. Viewed in its formal principles and autho- 
 ritative statements, it professes to be the champion of past 
 times ; viewed as an active and political power, as a ruling, 
 grasping, ambitious principle, in a word, as what is 
 expressively called Popery, it exalts the will and pleasure 
 of the existing Church above all authority, whether of 
 Scripture or Antiquity, interpreting the one and disposing 
 of the other by its absolute and arbitrary decree. 1 
 
 2. 
 
 We mast take and deal with things as they are, not as 
 they pretend to be. If we are induced to believe the 
 professions of Eome, and make advances towards her as if 
 a sister or a mother Church, which in theory she is, we 
 shall find too late that we are in the arms of a pitiless and 
 unnatural relative, who will but triumph in the arts which 
 have inveigled us within her reach. No ; dismissing the 
 dreams which the romance of early Church history and 
 
 1 [Vid. supr. the Preface, § 2. which professes to meet this charge.] 
 G 2 
 
84 DOCTRINE OF INFALLIBILITY [lECT. 
 
 the high, doctrines of Catholicism will raise in the inex- 
 perienced mind, let us be sure that she is our enemy, and 
 will do us a mischief when she can. In speaking and act- 
 ing on this conviction, we need not depart from Christian 
 charity towards her. We must deal with her as we would 
 towards a friend who is not himself ; in great affliction, with 
 all affectionate tender thoughts, with tearful regret and a 
 broken heart, but still with a steady eye and a firm hand. 8 
 And in saying this, I must not be supposed to deny that 
 there is any real excellence in the religion of Eome even 
 as it is, or that any really excellent men are its adherents. 
 Satan ever acts on a system ; various, manifold, and 
 intricate, with parts and instruments of different qualities, 
 some almost purely evil, others so unexceptionable, that in 
 themselves and detached from the end to which all is sub- 
 servient, they are really " Angels of light," and may be 
 found so to be at the last day. In Romanism there are 
 some things absolutely good, some things only just tainted 
 and sullied, some things corrupted, and some things in 
 themselves sinful ; but the system itself so called must be 
 viewed as a whole, and all parts of it as belonging to the 
 whole, and in connexion with their practical working and 
 the end which they subserve. Viewed thus as a practical 
 system, its main tenet, which gives a colour to all its parts, 
 is the Church's infallibility, as on the other hand, the 
 principle of that genuine theology out of which it has 
 arisen, is the authority of Catholic Antiquity. 3 In this 
 
 2 [This passage, a portion of which is now relegated to the end of Volume 
 II. is illustrated by the following extract from my Apologia : — "As a boy 
 of fifteen I had so fully imbibed [the spirit of Protestantism] that I had 
 actually erased in my Gradus ad Parnassvm such titles, under the word 
 ' Pope,' as ' Christi-Vicarius,' and substituted epithets so vile that I cannot 
 bring myself to write them down here. The effect of this early persuasion 
 remained as a stain upon my imagination." Yid. supr. p. 43, note.] 
 
 3 [Here it is said that the claim to infallibility is the bane of the Church; 
 yet in Lecture viii. infallibility in teaching is claimed for her by the author : 
 
HI.] MORALLY/ CONSIDERED. 85 
 
 and the following Lecture, I shall observe upon some of 
 the characteristics of this main error, as we may consider 
 it; viewing it first morally, and then what may be called 
 politically. And the points to which I wish to direct 
 attention, as involved in the doctrine of Infallibility, are 
 such as the following : that Romanism considers unclouded 
 certainty necessary for a Christian's faith and hope, 4 and 
 doubt incompatible with practical abidance in the truth ; 
 that it aims at forming a complete and consistent theo- 
 logy, and in forming it, neglects authority, and rests upon 
 abstract arguments and antecedent grounds : and that it 
 substitutes a technical and formal obedience for the spirit 
 of love. I notice these peculiarities in order to draw in- 
 telligible lines of demarcation between members of the 
 Roman Church and ourselves; and first will treat of them 
 in a moral point of view. 
 
 3. 
 
 The doctrine of the Church's Infallibility is made to rest 
 upon the notion, that any degree of doubt about religious 
 
 " her witness of the Christian Faith is a matter of promise as well as of duty ; 
 her discernment of it is secured by a heavenly as well as by a human 
 rule. . . . She not only transmits the faith by human means, but has a 
 supernatural gift for that purpose." ... In Scripture she " is declared to 
 be the great and special support of the Truth, her various functionaries to be 
 means towards the settlement of diversities and uncertainty of doctrine and 
 securing unity of faith and . . . the Spirit of Almighty God is expressly 
 pledged to her for the maintenance of the One Faith from generation to 
 generation even to the end." How can a divine gift be a " main" error ? 
 Let it be observed that the various evils which form the matter of the 
 Lecture are made to arise out of infallibility as such, not as professed with- 
 out good grounds and as counterfeit.] 
 
 4 [If by " unclouded " is meant the absence of all involuntary misgivings, 
 or a sense of imperfection or incompleteness in the argumentative grounds of 
 religion, a certitude so circumstanced is not (according to Catholic teaching) 
 " necessary for a Christian's faith and hope." Nor can real "doubt" 
 be anything short of a deliberate withholding of assent to the Church's 
 teaching.] 
 
86 DOCTRINE OF INFALLIBILITY [LECT. 
 
 truth is incompatible with faith, and that an external in- 
 fallible assurance is necessary to exclude doubt. " Proof," 5 
 or certainty of the thiugs believed, is secured upon two 
 conditions ; if there be a God, " who cannot lie," as the 
 source of Kevelation, and if the Church be infallible to 
 convey it. Otherwise, it is urged, what is called faith is 
 merely opinion, as being but partial or probable knowledge. 
 To this statement it is sufficient to reply here, that accord- 
 ing to English principles, religious faith has all it needs 
 in having only the former of these two secured to it, in 
 knowing that God is our Creator and Preserver, and that 
 He may, if it so happen, have spoken. 6 This indeed is its 
 trial and its praise, so to hang upon the thought of Him and 
 desire Him as not to wait till it knows for certain from infal- 
 lible informants 7 whether or no He has spoken, but to act in 
 the way which seems on the whole most likely to please Him. 
 If we are asked, how Faith differs from Opinion, we reply, 
 in its considering His being, governance, and will as a 
 matter of personal interest and importance to us, not in the 
 degree of light or darkness under which it perceives the 
 truth concerning them. When we are not personally 
 concerned, even the highest evidence does not move us ; 
 when we are concerned, the very slightest is enough. 
 Though we knew for certain that the planet Jupiter were 
 in flames, we should go on as usual ; whereas even the 
 confused cry of fire at night rouses us from our beds. 
 
 5 Heb. xi. 1. Bellarm. de Gratia, vi. 3. 
 
 6 [Is it possible that the author here says that faith in Revelation is nothing 
 beyond the thought, " Perhaps after all God may have spoken," " the doctrine 
 of the Holy Trinity perhaps may be, if it so be"? Who would call this an 
 act of faith ? Was such Abraham's faith, our father, as described in Rom. 
 iv., " non infirmatus est in fide," " non hsesitavit diffidentia " ?] 
 
 " [At least we have an " infallible informant" in Scripture. St. Paul first 
 distinctly declares that it is "inspired of God," and then that it is "profitable" 
 How then can the gift, or the teaching, or the belief of infallibility have a 
 bad moral effect? Again, not writings only, the Apostles were infallible.] 
 
HI.] MOEALLY CONSIDEEED. 87 
 
 Action is the criterion of tiue faith/ as determining 
 accurately whether we connect the thought of God with 
 the thought of ourselves, whether we love Him, or regard 
 Him otherwise than we regard the existence of the solar 
 system. And as well might we say, that the man who 
 acts upon a letter from a friend does not believe his friend, 
 because he is not infallibly sure the letter is not forged, 9 
 as deny that such men have real faith as hear the Church 
 and obey, though they have no assurance that in reporting 
 God's words, she cannot err. Nay, doubt in some way or 
 measure may even be said to be implied in a Christian's 
 faith. Not that infallible certainty would take away all 
 trial of our hearts, and force us to obey, nor again as if 
 nothing were clearly told us by Revelation, for much is ; 
 but that the greater the uncertainty, 1 the fuller exercise 
 there is of our earnestness in seeking the truth, and of our 
 moral sagacity in tracing and finding it. As reasonably 
 then might fear, despondency, dulness of mind, or heavi- 
 ness of spirit be judged inconsistent with faith as doubt. 2 
 Imperfection of every kind, moral and natural, is a trial or 
 temptation, and is met by striving and acting against it. 
 Scripture is full of instances in point as regards Faith. 
 It has been remarked, that our Saviour scarcely once or 
 twice declared to inquirers that He was the Christ ; though 
 
 8 [Not of true faith, but of true earnestness, of love and fear of God. No 
 one would say we believed our house was on fire, because we thought it 
 safest, on a cry of fire, to act as if it was.] 
 
 9 [This is an altogether different case. I don't believe the cry of fire ; I 
 do believe my friend's letter. Here there is a confusion between dimness 
 in faith and a sense of dimness in the evidence on which it is grounded. 
 Evidence is always incomplete, but sometimes it is sufficient for real 
 certitude (as regards my friend), sometimes only for what is called practical 
 certitude, i. e. for what is prudent in action, (as; regards the cry of fire.)] 
 
 1 [I. e. uncertainty of evidence ; if the evidence is not sufficient, then it 
 serves to tax our earnestness in seeking for more.] 
 
 2 [Faith may follow after doubt, and so far is not inconsistent with it ; 
 but the two cannot co-exist.] 
 
83 DOCTRINE OP INFALLIBILITY [LECT. 
 
 their impatience on many occasions showed how hard they 
 felt it to flesh and blood to act without an infallible assur- 
 ance. He left them to gather the great truth for them- 
 selves how they could, with whatever degree of certainty, 
 sometimes referring them to His miracles, sometimes to the 
 types or prophecies of the Law, sometimes to His forerun- 
 ner the Baptist, sometimes urging them to make trial of 
 the truth in practice and so to find it. When St. Thomas 
 doubted of His resurrection, far from justifying his demand 
 for an infallible witness/ He declared that He was but 
 diminishing his blessedness by giving him a higher 
 evidence of the miracle than he had already received. On 
 one occasion, indeed, He did publicly declare Himself to 
 be the Christ, but, as we shall find, it was not in love but 
 in wrath. It was in answer to the adjuration of the High 
 Priest, whom He forthwith by implication consigned to 
 the destiny of those miserable beings, who should " see 
 Him whom they had pierced," 4 believe and tremble. 
 And, as is His conduct during His ministry, such is the 
 uniform doctrine of the whole of Scripture, summed up, 
 as it is, in the expressive words of the Prophet, " Who is 
 among you that feareth the Lord, who heareth the voice 
 of His servant, who walketh in darkness and hath no 
 light ? Let him hope in the name of the Lord, and stay 
 upon his God." 5 This is only parallel to what we see in 
 the course of nature ; the proofs of the being of a God are 
 not written on the sun and sky, nor the precepts of 
 morality spoken from a Urim and Thummim. To require 
 such definite and clear notices of truth, 6 is to hanker after 
 
 3 [Infallible witness, that is, infallible evidence. There is always in 
 concrete matters incompleteness in tbe evidence of a fact, even when there 
 is enough for faith. St. Thomas, had he been captious, might have raised 
 the question, as unbelievers do now, whether our Lord was not taken down 
 from the cross alive. He had not seen Him dead.] 
 
 * Cf. Matt, xxvi. 64. with Eev. i. 7. s Isaiah 1. 10. 
 
 6 [Here is still the same confusion between the incomplete notices of truth, 
 
HI.] MORALLY CONSIDERED. 89 
 
 the Jewish Law, a system of less mysterious information 
 than Christianity, as well as less generous faith. 
 
 4. 
 This leads me to notice an important peculiarity of 
 the Roman system, to which such a temper gives rise. 
 According to its theory, the Church professes to know only 
 what the Apostles knew, to have received just what they 
 delivered, neither more nor less. But in fact, she is 
 obliged to profess a complete knowledge of the whole 
 Dispensation, such as the Apostles had not. Unless we 
 know the whole of any subject we must have difficulties 
 somewhere or other ; and where they are left, there we 
 cannot possess infallible knowledge. To know some things 
 in any subject infallibly, implies that we know all things. 7 
 Or, to put the matter more clearly, where there is know- 
 ledge of only portions of a system, one of those portions 
 will be more plain and certain to us than another, and 
 can be spoken of more confidently ; thus the clearness of 
 our view will vary with those portions, but there are no 
 degrees 8 in Infallibility. Now partial and incomplete 
 knowledge must surely be an inseparable attendant on a 
 theology which reveals the wonders of heaven. The 
 human mind cannot measure the things of the Spirit. 
 Christianity is a supernatural gift, originating and living 
 in the unseen world and only extending into this. It is a 
 vast scheme running out into width and breadth, encom- 
 
 i. e. evidence, and that " generous faith," which, though it might captiously 
 demand more evidence, is contented with what it ought to feel to he enough. 
 Vid. Grammar of Assent, ch. 6 and 9.] 
 
 7 [Neither the reasoning nor the facts here laid down can be admitted 
 The Church does not profess to "'know the whole dispensation ;" such a charge 
 ought to be proved, and not merely asserted. Nor is it axiomatic, just the 
 contrary, that to be infallible in what is revealed, implies a profession of 
 knowing what to the Apostles was not revealed.] 
 
 8 [No degrees ; certain portions are known absolutely, and what remains 
 besides them is more or less probable. J 
 
90 DOCTRINE OP INFALLIBILITY [LECT. 
 
 passing us round about, not embraced by us. No one can 
 see the form of a building but those who are external to it. 
 We are within the Divine Dispensation; we cannot take 
 it in with the eye, ascertain its proportions, pursue its 
 lines, foretell their directions and coincidences, or ascertain 
 their limits. We see enough for practice, but not even 
 as much as this with an c qual degree of clearness ; but 
 one part more clearly than another. These detached 
 portions of a complicated system necessarily vary in the 
 precision and definiteness with which they come to the 
 mind. 9 That which is set before it in many of its relations 
 is more fully understood and grasped than that which is 
 only just revealed. When the mind knows a certain part 
 of a system, it cannot ascertain the limits of its knowledge; 
 as the eye when fixed on any object cannot determine how 
 much it indirectly sees all around it. Surely the Apostles 
 themselves, though infallibly sure of the greater truths, 
 could not determine the limits of their infallibility. 1 To 
 know the lesser truths as they knew the main ones, had 
 been to open a fresh field of knowledge beyond, in the way 
 of deduction and implication. It would have been like 
 moving the eye to a new object, which brings it into a 
 new range of vision. Thus, I say, to know all that is 
 revealed with equal clearness, implies that there is nothing 
 not revealed. Agreeably with this anticipation, the Church 
 of Eome is in fact led on to profess to know not only 
 infallibly but completely. 2 She begins by claiming the 
 power of infallibly determining throughout the range of 
 the Apostles' knowledge, of accurate delineation in all such 
 
 9 [All tins is true, but not to the purpose. .Where the Church speaks, there 
 is knowledge ; where. not as yet, there is opinion, and it is opinion that varies.] 
 
 1 [They knew the limits, for they knew the field, viz. faith and morals; 
 but they would not know the answers to particular questions in that field, 
 till they actually turned their minds to the consideration of each, as it arose.] 
 
 2 [This is not the case, as is shown by the various conflicting opinions in 
 the schools.] 
 
HI.] MOEALLY CONSIDERED. 91 
 
 lesser matters as they would not be able to realize to them- 
 selves as certain, of rendering equally vivid all those 
 marvellous traces of things invisible, which in the first 
 inspired teachers would gradually melt from distinctness 
 in their outlines into dim distance or into minute intricacy 
 of detail. And, in consequence, she is led on from the 
 profession of uniform precision to that of universal know- 
 ledge. 
 
 5. 
 This, then, is a second and not the least observable pecu- 
 liarity of Roman theology. It professes to be a complete 
 theology. 3 It arranges, adjusts, explains, exhausts every 
 part of the Divine Economy. It may be said to leave no 
 region unexplored, no heights unattempted, rounding off 
 its doctrines with a neatness and finish which are de- 
 structive of many of the most noble and most salutary 
 exercises of mind in the individual Christian. That feel- 
 ing of awe which the mysteriousness of the Gospel should 
 excite, fades away under this fictitious illumination which 
 is poured over the entire Dispensation. Criticism, we 
 know, is commonly considered fatal to poetical fervour and 
 imagination; and in like manner this technical religion 
 destroys the delicacy and reverence of the Christian mind. 
 So little has actually been revealed to us in a systematic 
 way, that the genuine science of theology carried to its 
 
 3 [Here is a confusion between the Church and her Schools. Her infallible 
 voice is seldom exercised, and comparatively few dogmas have been pro- 
 mulgated to be accepted de fide. But the subtle and curious intellect 
 of her theologians has investigated and determined innumerable questions, 
 not with infallible accuracy, but each in his own way, and often in opposition 
 to each other, still with incalculable advantage to religion. The result has 
 been a wide knowledge of Revelation and a large freedom of thought, a 
 flood of illustration on existing dogmas, and a store of material which, as 
 human means, are at the service of the Infallible Church, when she is called 
 upon to decide a controversy and to formulate some new definition of 
 faith.] 
 
92 DOCTRINE OP INFALLIBILITY [LECT. 
 
 furthest limits, has no tendency to foster a spirit of 
 rationalism. But Rome would classify and number all 
 things, she would settle every sort of question, as if re- 
 solved to detect and compass by human reason what ruus 
 out into the next world or is lost in this. Revelation so 
 melts into Providence that we cannot draw the line be- 
 tween them. Miraculous events shade off into natural 
 coincidences, visions into dreams, types into resemblances ; 
 Inspiration has before now spoken among Idolaters and 
 Pagans ; the Church itself gradually fades away into the 
 world. Whatever subject in religion we examine accurately, 
 we shall find full of difficulties. 4 Whether miracles have 
 ceased, and, if so, at what date? how long Catholic doc- 
 trine was preserved from human additions ? how far Gospel 
 privileges are extended to separatists ? how much must be 
 believed by individuals in order to salvation ? what is the 
 state of unbaptized Infants ? what amount of temporal 
 punishment must be set against the sins of accepted Chris- 
 tians ? what sort of change takes place in the consecration 
 of the Eucharist ? all these are questions which man cannot 
 determine, yet such as these Romanists 5 delight to handle. 
 Not content with what is revealed, they are ever intruding 
 into things not seen as yet, and growing familiar with 
 mysteries ; gazing upon the ark of God over boldly and 
 long, till they venture to put out the hand and touch it. 
 But, not to dwell upon this part of the subject, which is 
 painful, it is sufficiently evident what an opening is given 
 by a theology of so ambitious a character to pride and 
 self-confidence. It has been said that knowledge is power ; 
 and at least it creates in us the imagination of possessing it. 
 This is what makes scientific and physicial researches so 
 
 4 [Good, but irrelevant as against Rome.] 
 
 5 [That is, schoolmen and theologians ; not the Catholic populations, 
 whose moral state is simply untouched for good or bad by the Latin treatises 
 which are here supposed to have so deleterious an effect upon them.] 
 
III.] MORALLY CONSIDERED. 03 
 
 intoxicating: it is the feeling they inspire of perfect 
 acquaintance with the constitution of nature. He wl o 
 considers himself fully to understand a system, seems to 
 have sway over it. Astronomers can predict the motions 
 of the heavenly bodies, with an accuracy which in their 
 own fancy places them above them. Now religion is the 
 great chastiser of human pride; nor would I say, that 
 however perverted, it ever can cease to be so ; yet it is 
 plain that when thus turned into an intellectual science, 
 even polytheism answers such a moral purpose better 
 than it. 6 
 
 I have been speaking in general language ; it will tend 
 to explain my meaning to take an instance of this bold 
 speculativeness in Roman theology to the loss of more 
 reverent, wondering, and expectant thoughts. With this 
 view, let us consider their doctrine of Satisfaction ; which 
 I will describe as briefly as the intricate nature of the 
 subject will allow : — 
 
 6. 
 No questions in religion are more painfully interesting 
 to the awakened mind than those relating to the forgive- 
 ness of its sins. Revelation has cleared away some of the 
 main obscurities of the subject, but has left others. It 
 asserts the doctrine of everlasting punishment to the finally 
 impenitent, and it proclaims pardon and salvation to all 
 who repent, believe, and obey. Further it declares that 
 the death of Christ upon the Cross has put away the wrath 
 of God from us, and reconciled Him to us : that this pre- 
 cious Atonement is applied to every individual on his 
 Baptism, and that it is realized in his soul and body in a 
 
 6 [It is true of course that polytheism has more of religion in it than the 
 mere exercise of intellect resulting in scientific knowledge; and of course it 
 is possible for a theologian to be indevout and self-trusting; but possibilities 
 are not facts, and it is fair to ask for evidence of the fact, before so serious 
 a charge as this is urged against the Catholic Church.] 
 
94 DOCTRINE OF INFALLIBILITY [LECT. 
 
 peculiar way in the Holy Eucharist ; lastly, that its virtue 
 flows in various indirect and indefinite ways by means of the 
 ministrations of the Church, to whom these sacraments are 
 also entrusted. But this is nearly all that is told us. We do 
 not know hoiv the death of Christ operates for our salvation; 
 we do not know why it was required, or what is its full de- 
 sign and effect. We do not know what it does for the Angels, 
 or for the heathen ; we do not know whether or how it 
 influences the state of Infants dying unbaptized. Coming 
 to questions more nearly interesting us, we do not know 
 what will be the future destiny, whether of happiness or 
 misery, of the mass of baptized persons, who certainly seem 
 to live and die in an unchristian way. We do not know 
 the measure of chastisement due for particular sins, or if 
 there be any measure. We do not know how far sins com- 
 mitted after Baptism are forgiven, that is, what permanent 
 disadvantages remain after forgiveness, what diminution of 
 rewards otherwise attainable, or the like. We do not know 
 what the effect of prior services may be, in those who sin 
 deeply and afterwards repent, but without much subse- 
 quent fruit. We do not know how far the Eucharistic Bite 
 avails to their pardon, or to whose pardon itavails, and under 
 what circumstances. We do not know how and when the 
 intercession of others operates towards our repentance and 
 pardon. Nor can we cast the balance between the outward 
 advantages and disadvantages of any one individual and his 
 works or failings, or decide upon his state in Cod's sight. 
 Nor do we know when it is that forgiveness is formally 
 conveyed to individual Christians who have lapsed into 
 sin, whether it is in this life, or upon death, or during 
 the intermediate state, or at the day of judgment. All 
 these are " secret things with the Lord our God," things 
 not lightly to be spoken Of, not dreams of our own, which, 
 as not existing, have no answer, but such as have an 
 answer one way or the other, though we do not know 
 
HI.] MORALLY CONSIDERED. 95 
 
 which way, and it is presumptuous to inquire. Now, 
 while impatience of doubt leads the Protestant of this day 
 to treat all such questions as inherently fanciful, creations 
 of the mind, and not questions of fact, the same impatience 
 leads the Romanist to answer them. 7 
 
 7. 
 
 Their answers are of the following kind. 
 
 They consider with us that Baptism is a plenary and 
 absolute remission of all sin whatever, original and actual, 
 with which the baptized person is laden. Then, as to sin 
 committed after Baptism, they proceed to divide it into 
 two kinds, venial and mortal. Mortal sins are such as 
 throw the soul out of a state of grace, and deserve eternal 
 punishment, such as murder, adultery, or blasphemy. 
 Venial sins deserve a punishment short of eternal, a punish- 
 ment that is, in time, or before the day of judgment. 
 These are such either in hind or degree ; an idle word, 
 excessive laughter differ in hind from perjury or adultery; 
 but a sudden and passing anger is but in degree different 
 from indulged and lasting wrath, which is mortal. For 
 venial sins there is no normal means of absolution, or 
 Sacrament dispensed by the Church; their punishment, 
 whatever it is, but anyhow at most temporal only, remains 
 to be endured, or to be averted by certain expedients, some 
 of which shall presently be noticed. 8 
 
 Mortal sin deserves, not a mere temporal retribution, 
 though this it incurs also, but an eternal punishment; in 
 other words, it incurs a punishment both before and after 
 
 7 [Hardly any one of these points is determined in Catholic doctrine 
 any more than in Protestant.] 
 
 b [Of these various points of doctrine, those which have been made defide 
 m Catholic teaching, as being determined by the Church's infallibility, are 
 also to be met with and are taught as revealed truths in those writings of 
 the Fathers, which Anglicans call " Antiquity." So they do not serve as 
 specimens of the " bold speculativeness of Romanism."] 
 
96 DOCTRINE. OF INFALLIBILITY [LECT. 
 
 the day of j udgment . Upon repentance the eternal punish- 
 in ent is forgiven, and that through the Sacrament of 
 Penance, and then the temporal punishment alone remains, 
 which that Sacrament does not reach. It seems then, 
 that according to the Roman doctrine, a soul in a state of 
 grace, though rescued from all eternal consequences of its. 
 sins, or from any hazard in the day of judgment, remains 
 liable to a certain temporal punishment in two ways, for 
 venial sins, and for mortal sins forgiven as to their eternal 
 consequences. This distinction between the temporal and 
 eternal consequences of sin, its advocates illustrate by the 
 case of David, who though expressly forgiven his adultery 
 aud murder, so far as not to " die," yet had a heavy tem- 
 poral chastisement put upon him in this life. And they 
 consider there is a certain fixed correspondence between 
 sins of whatever kind and the punishment of them : so that 
 every Christian will have a definite quantity of punish- 
 ment to undergo before the coming of Christ to judge 
 the world and to take him to his eternal rest. 
 
 The time of suffering this punishment, or of expiating 
 his sins in their temporal respects, is the interval between 
 their commission and the day of judgment ; and, since each 
 sin has its specific measure of suffering, if he does not ex- 
 haust that measure in this life, he must complete it in the 
 intermediate state, and the more he sustains here the less 
 he will have to sustain there. And, since this life is a 
 state of grace, and suffering here is far less severe than 
 suffering in the intermediate state (i.e. in Purgatory), 
 it is his interest, as far as may be, to expiate his sins here. 
 Hence the utility of penances, either imposed by the Church 
 or voluntary in the offender, with a view of satisfying the 
 punishment due to his sins. Hence too the advantage of 
 abounding in good works, which in the regenerate mj.n, 
 besides availing to eternal life, are considered to have an 
 inherent efficacy in the expiation of sin. A like efficacy, 
 
III.] MORALLY CONSIDERED. 97 
 
 but proceeding immediately from the great Atoning Sac- 
 rifice, is considered to lie in the Eucharistic Offering. 9 
 
 Even this is not the limit to which they carry their 
 systematic account of the pardon of sin. After all appli- 
 ances, whether by penances, good work, or the Sacrifice 
 of the Altar, it is considered that the multitude of Chris- 
 tians leave this life with a considerable debt of temporal 
 punishment standing against them, and are certainly 
 destined to suffer in Purgatory. On the other hand it 
 is considered that certain great Saints leave this world 
 with an overplus of temporal suffering, whatever their sins 
 may have been. Men like Jeremiah or John the Baptists 
 sanctified as they were from their mother's womb, singularly 
 holy and fruitful in works, and uniformly suffering until 
 their martyrdom, have more than satisfied divine justice 
 for such venial offences as have overtaken them, and ren- 
 der up to God together with their obedience a store of suf- 
 ferings which have, as far as they are concerned, answered 
 no purpose. Considering then the virtue and properties 
 of that mysterious Communion which exists between all 
 Christians, that they all are but one body, and have all 
 things common, it is concluded that what is done or suf- 
 fered over and above by the Saints, may be put to the score 
 of the souls in Purgatory; and that the Church repre- 
 
 ' [As I have said, Antiquity, in these respects, is as bold and minute as 
 Catholicity can be said to be. St. Augustine and other Fathers recognize 
 the distinction between mortal and venial sins; determine that mortal sins 
 merit an eternal punishment ,• that souls are kept in prison till their lesser 
 sins are purged away ; that prayers, e. g. the Lord's Prayer, satisfy for 
 light and daily, that is, venial sins j that post-baptismal falls are remitted 
 through Penance, as a raft may save after shipwreck ; that after such re- 
 mission punishment remains due ; that this punishment is averted by good 
 works and bodily mortifications, and by the Eucharistic Sacrifice, which, 
 by Apostolic tradition, is profitably offered for the dead.] 
 
 VOL. I. H 
 
98 DOCTRINE OF INFALLIBILITY. [LECT. 
 
 sented in her ministers and especially in the Pope, is the 
 agent in this sacred interchange. To the Pope, then, is 
 committed the key of this treasure-house of the merits of 
 the Saints, together with those of our Lord Jesus Christ; 
 and he dispenses it according to his discretion. This 
 benefit is called an Indulgence, which is an application of 
 the merits of the Saints in lieu of a certain penance in 
 this life or of an equivalent suffering in Purgatory. 1 
 
 Such is the bold exactness of Roman teaching in deter- 
 mining theological points, and this in consequence of its 
 claim of Infallibility, which obliges it to be positive and 
 complete in its statements on any question, so soon as it 
 is led to entertain it at all. 
 
 9. 
 
 Another and distinct evil, and of a very serious character, 
 which follows from the doctrine of Infallibility, is of the 
 following kind. The practice of systematizing 2 necessarily 
 
 1 [The main feature in modern Catholic teaching, as distinct from that 
 of Antiquity, is the doctrine of the " Treasure of Merits," but the thing is 
 in the Fathers, though not the phrase. 
 
 This doctrine is founded on the article of the creed, the Communion of 
 Saints, according to which the Christian body is like an expedition of 
 pilgrims, helping each other with all their powers and in every way by tem- 
 poral aid and spiritual, with prayers, good works, sufferings, as they go 
 forward towards heaven, and that, up to the hour of death, when each shall 
 stand by himself and "bear his own burden." 
 
 Beginning with this great doctrine, we teach that the Church has the 
 prerogative of effecting the remission, in whole or part in each case, of 
 such punishments as are still due for venial sin or for forgiven mortal sin, 
 not only by the Eucharistic Sacrifice, &c, but also by setting against them, 
 or rather, pleading with God, that infinite treasure of merits which our 
 Lord has wrought out, first in His own Person, next through the grace 
 which He has given to His saints. I say, "next," for this treasure consists 
 essentially of His own merits, not of His Saints' ; and includes theirs, only 
 as it includes also those of good men on earth. Moreover, its benefits can- 
 not be given in any measure, great or small, except in regard of the 
 punishment of past sins, already repented of and forgiven.] 
 
 5 [What has infallibility to do with systematizing ? Scripture is infallible, 
 
In -J MORALLY CONSIDERED. 99 
 
 leads to a decision concerning the relative importance of 
 doctrines. Every system has its principal and its secondary 
 parts, and views one part in connexion with another, as 
 bearing together with more or less influence upon the 
 whole, or upon some main portion which it considers es- 
 sential and supreme. Of course religion has its greater 
 and its lesser truths ; but it is one thing to receive them so 
 far as Scripture declares them to be so, quite another to 
 decide about them for ourselves by the help of our own 
 reasonings. However, it is not wonderful that Rome should 
 claim authority over the work of its own hands; it has 
 framed the system and it proceeds to judge of it. But 
 this is not all. They who are resolved that the Divine 
 counsels and appointments should be cognizable by the 
 human intellect, are naturally tempted to assign some 
 visible and intelligible object as the scope of the whole 
 Dispensation; or, in other words, they make in some shape 
 or other, present expediency the measure of its excellence 
 and wisdom. I do not say they are forced, but they are 
 easily betrayed into doing this. They ask what is the use 
 of tins doctrine, what the actual harm of that error • as if 
 the experience of results were necessary before condemning 
 the one and sanctioning the other. This, as is obvious it 
 strikingly instanced in the religion popular amon* us at 
 the present day, in which only so much of the hio°h doc- 
 trines of the Gospel is admitted, as is seen and felt to tend 
 to our moral improvement. According to it, the most 
 striking and persuasive proof of the divine origin of 
 Christianity, lies in the harmonious adjustment and corre- 
 spondence, and the evident meaning of its parts One of 
 the ablest defenders of this view, at the close of a popula r 
 Hjssay even ventures to speak as follows : "It has been my 
 object, he says, « to draw the attention of the reader to 
 
 but it does not systematize; this volume's professed object (***. s« P r. p. 24) 
 M to systematize, yet it does not call itself infallible.] **-*** 
 
 H 2 
 
100 DOCTRINE OF INFALLIBILITY. [LECT. 
 
 the internal structure of the religion of the Bible, first, 
 because I am convinced that no man in the unfettered 
 exercise of his understanding can fully and cordially ac- 
 quiesce in its pretensions to divine inspiration, until he 
 sees in its substance that which accords both with the 
 character of God and with the wants of man; and secondly, 
 because any admission of its divine original, if unaccom- 
 panied with a knowledge of its principles, is absolutely 
 useless." 3 Here, unless I am unjust to the writer, it is 
 plainly asserted that the understanding has a right to claim 
 an insight into the meaning and drift of the matter of 
 Revelation ; nay, that faith is not available unless accom- 
 panied by this knowledge ; principles surely which would 
 have justified Abraham when called from his native 
 country, to have refused to go, till he was told whither he 
 was journeying. Yet such principles are now in repute ; 
 and much is popularly said about the beauty of the 
 Christian system, the unity of its aim, the simplicity of 
 its contrivance for the conversion of the soul, and the 
 manifestation of the Divine Character contained in it, 
 with little reverence towards things sacred, and great 
 risk of injury to faith. Such is the main subject of the 
 treatise to which I have referred, and the same views are 
 repeated again and again in the sermons 4 of a well- 
 known Divine of the Scotch Establishment, who is ever 
 to be mentioned with respect and sympathy. 
 
 10. 
 Such is the popular Protestantism of the day. Now one 
 might have hoped that the religion of Eome would have 
 been clear of the fault into which the rival system has been 
 betrayed. One might have trusted beforehand to its very 
 propensity to insist on the mysteries of heaven, as at least a 
 
 3 Erskine's Internal Evidence. 
 
 4 Dr. Chalmer's Sermons at the Tron Church. 
 
 
III.] MOEALLY CONSIDERED. 101 
 
 guarantee that no one end, and still less a visible end, 
 would be proposed by its controversialists as a measure of 
 gospel excellence and truth. Yet, strange to say, as if to 
 show the agreement of temper and character between the 
 one and the other creed as actually held and applied, we 
 find one of the latest advocates of Rome claiming the 
 privilege of criticizing and applauding the Gospel as a 
 system. He observes that there is something in Roman 
 teaching " beautifully contrasted to the eye of the philoso- 
 pher, with the manifest imperfections of " what he calls 
 the Protestant " system. There is a natural and obvious 
 beauty in the simplicity of this basis, which at once gives 
 stability and unity to conviction.'" In another place he 
 observes, " the end of every rule and law, and consequently 
 of every rule of Faith," is " to bring men into a unity of 
 principle and action ; " that ' ' the rule proposed by others is 
 proved by experience to lead to exactly opposite results ; 
 in other words, that it removes men farther from that union 
 towards which it must be intended to bring them, for it 
 leads them to the most contradictory opinions, pro- 
 fessing* to be supported and proved by precisely the same 
 principle of Faith ; " whereas " the principle " of the 
 Roman system is " fully equal to those objects for which 
 the rule was given." 6 Now, I am far from denying there 
 is soundness and truth in the argument, as used both by the 
 Roman and the Scotch Divine; the process is sound when 
 used under limitations, the conclusion is true in its degree. 
 But both the one party and the other evidently put forth 
 their respective views as convincing and decisive proofs, 
 as independent and substantive evidences ; and that they 
 are not such, is shown, if in no other way, at least in this, 
 that they are adduced by their respective advocates in 
 order to prove contradictories. Now what leads to oppo- 
 site conclusions is no real test of truth. However, we are 
 5 Dr. Wiseman's Lectures, vol. i. pp. 17. 76. 
 
102 DOCTRINE OF INFALLIBILITY [LECT. 
 
 here concerned merely with the fact of this peculiarity in 
 the religion of Rome, which it has in common with some 
 other modern systems, — its subjecting divine truth to the 
 intellect, and professing to take a complete survey and to 
 make a map of it. 
 
 11. 
 One more remark shall be made, though, as it is often 
 urged in controversy, a few words on the subject will suffice. 
 Roman teaching by its profession of Infallibility, lowers 
 the standard and quality of Gospel obedience as well as 
 impairs its mysterious and sacred character ; and this in 
 various ways. When religion is reduced in all its parts to 
 a system, there is hazard of something earthly being made 
 the chief object of our contemplation instead of our Maker. 
 Now Rome classifies our duties and their rewards, the things 
 to believe, the things to do, the modes of pleasing God, 
 the penalties and the remedies of sin, with such exactness, 
 that an individual knows (so to speak) just where he is 
 upon his journey heavenward, how far he has got, how 
 much he has to pass ; and his duties become a matter of 
 calculation. It provides us with a sort of graduated scale 
 of devotion and obedience, and, so far, tends to engross our 
 thoughts with the details of a mere system, to a comparative 
 forgetfulness of its professed Author. 6 But it is evident 
 that the purest religious services are those which are done, 
 not by constraint, but voluntarily, as a free offering to 
 Almighty God. There are certain duties which are in- 
 dispensable in all Christians, but their limits are left un- 
 defined, as if to try our faith and love. For instance, what 
 portion of our worldly substance we should devote to 
 charitable uses, or in what way we are to fast, or how we 
 
 6 [There is a certain truth in this remark, hut a man must have a large 
 knowledge of Catholics and of the effect of their system upon them, to assert 
 with confidence what is here imagined of them.] 
 
Til.] MORALLY CONSIDERED. 103 
 
 are to dress, or whether we should remain single, or what 
 revenge we should take upon our sins, or what amusements 
 are allowable, or how far we may go into society; these 
 and similar questions are left open by Inspiration. Some 
 of them are determined by the Church, and suitably, with 
 a view to public decency and order, or by way of recom- 
 mendation and sanction to her members. A command 
 from authority to a certain point acts as a protection to our 
 modesty, though beyond this it would but act as a burden. 
 For instance, at this very time, when the practice of fast- 
 ing has become so unpopular, in spite of the Church's rule, 
 it would be a great comfort to individuals who wish to 
 observe it, yet dread singularity in so doing, did the 
 custom exist, as I believe it did once, of pastoral letters at 
 the beginning of Lent, enforcing it from authority. But 
 in most matters of the kind, certainly when questions of 
 degree are concerned, the best rule seems to be to leave 
 individuals free, lest what otherwise would be a spon- 
 taneous service in the more zealous, should become a 
 compulsory imposition upon all. 
 
 This is the true Christian liberty, not the prerogative of 
 obeying God, or not, as we please, but the opportunity of 
 obeying Him more strictly without formal commandment. 
 In this way, too, not only is our love tried, but the delicacy 
 and generous simplicity of our obedience consulted also. 
 Christ loves an open-hearted service, done without our 
 contemplating or measuring what we do, from the fulness 
 of affection and reverence, while the mind is fixed on its 
 Great Object without thought of itself. Now express 
 commands lead us to reflect upon and estimate our ad- 
 vances towards perfection, whereas true faith will mainly 
 contemplate its deficiencies, not its poor attainments, what- 
 ever they be. It does not like to realize to itself what it 
 does ; it throws off the thought of it ; it is carried on and 
 reaches forward towards perfection, not counting the steps 
 
104 DOCTRINE OF INFALLIBILITY [LECT. 
 
 it has ascended, but keeping the end steadily in its eye, 
 knowing only that it is advancing, and glorying in each 
 sacrifice or service which it is allowed to offer, as it occurs, 
 not remembering it afterwards. But in the Roman system 
 there would seem to be little room, for this unconscious 
 devotion. Each deed has it price, every quarter of the 
 land of promise is laid down and described. Roads are 
 carefully marked out, and such as would attain to perfec- 
 tion are constrained to move in certain lines, as if there 
 were a science of gaining heaven. Thus the Saints are cut 
 off from the Christian multitude by certain fixed duties, 
 not rising out of it by the continuous growth and flowing 
 forth of services which in their substance pertain to all 
 men. And Christian holiness, in consequence, loses its 
 freshness, vigour, and comeliness, being frozen (as it were) 
 into certain attitudes, which are not graceful except when 
 they are unstudied. 7 
 
 12. 
 The injury resulting to the multitude from the same 
 circumstance, is of a different but not less serious nature. 
 While, of those who aim at the more perfect obedience, 
 some may be made salf-satisfied and more are made 
 formal, the mass of Christians are either discouraged from 
 attempting or countenanced in neglecting it. It requires 
 very little knowledge of human nature, to perceive how 
 readily a doctrine will be embraced and followed which 
 sanctions a secondary standard of holiness, or which allows 
 the performance of certain duties to make up for the dis- 
 regard of others. If, indeed, there is one characteristic 
 which above others attaches to Roman teaching, it is 
 this, its indulging the carnal tastes of the multitude of 
 men, 8 setting a limit to their necessary obedience, and 
 absolving them from the duty of sacrificing their whole 
 
 7 [This is plausible, theoretical, and untrue.] 
 
III.] MORALLY CONSIDERED. 105 
 
 lives to God. And this serious deceit is in no small degree 
 the necessary consequence of that completeness and minute- 
 ness in its theology to which the doctrine of Infallibility 
 gives rise. 
 
 13. 
 The foregoing remarks are not intended as any sufficient 
 discussion of the subject under consideration, but are made 
 with a view of discriminating between the Roman creed 
 and our own. In the former Lectures it was observed that 
 the abstract and professed principles of both systems were 
 often the same, but that in practice, the question of the 
 Church's Infallibility created a wide and serious difference 
 between them. We now see, in a measure, in what this 
 difference consists, viz. in the Roman Church having 
 adopted a minute, technical, and peremptory 9 theology, 
 which is no part of Revelation, and which produces a 
 number of serious moral evils, which is shallow in philoso- 
 phy, as professing to exclude doubt and imperfection, and 
 dangerous to the Christian spirit, as encouraging ns to ask 
 for more than is given us, as fostering irreverence and 
 presumption, confidence in our reason, and a formal or 
 carnal view of Christian obedience. What further evils 
 arise from the political character of these same peculiari- 
 ties, shall be reserved for a separate Lecture. 
 
 9 [It is quite as true to say that Scripture is not dogmatic, as to say, as is 
 said here, that it is not technical and not peremptory ; and, if a theology of 
 the latter character is "no part of Revelation," neither is a theology of the 
 former. How then is Anglican teaching more defensible than Roman, if 
 we may argue after this fashion ? 
 
 This, on the admission that Scripture does not countenance minute and 
 strict rules and ordinances ; but in the sense in which they attach to Catholic 
 teaching, they attach to St. Paul's. He had a certain number of " ways," 
 which he "taught every where in every church ;" and which he thought 
 important enough to make it advisable to send Timothy to recall them to 
 the minds of the Corinthians. And not for the Corinthians only were they 
 advisable. He bids the Thessalonians to " stand fast and hold the traditions 
 they had learned" from him "by word or letter." Does not this imply an 
 Apostolic system of small observances ?] 
 
LECTUBE IV. 
 
 DOCTRINE OF INFALLIBILITY POLITICALLY 
 CONSIDERED. 
 
 If the object of Home be to teacli moral Truth in its high- 
 est and purest form, like a prophet or philosopher, intent 
 upon it more than upon those whom she addresses, and by 
 the very beauty of holiness, and the unconscious rhetoric 
 of her own earnestness, drawing up souls to her, rather 
 than by any elaborate device, certainly she has failed in 
 that end, as was shown in my last Lecture. But if her 
 one and supreme end is to rule the human mind, if man 
 is the object of her thoughts and efforts, and religion but 
 the means of approaching him, if earth is to be the 
 standard, and heaven the instrument, then we must con- 
 fess that she is most happy in her religious system. 
 What is low in the scale of moral truth, may be the per- 
 fection of wordly wisdom ; or rather, principles of action 
 which stand first in the school of rhetoric, or of politics, are 
 necessarily unworthy the ethical teacher. Now the Church 
 of Rome is a political power ; and, if she stunts, or distorts 
 the growth of the soul in spiritual excellence, it is because, 
 whether unconsciously or not, she has in view political 
 objects, visible fruits, temporal expediency, the power of 
 influencing the heart, as the supreme aim and scope of her 
 system ; because she considers unity, peace, the public 
 confession of the truth, sovereignty, empire, the one 
 practical end for which the Church is formed, the one 
 
LECT. IV.] INFALLIBILITY POLITICALLY CONSIDEEED. 107 
 
 necessary condition of those other and unknown benefits, 
 whatever these be, which lie beyond it in the next world. 1 
 I am now to illustrate this peculiarity ; and in order that 
 there may be no mistake, I will briefly say what I am to 
 do. I do not attempt to prove that Eome is a political 
 power ; so well known a fact may be taken for granted ; 
 but I wish to show that those same principles, involved in 
 the doctrine of Infallibility, which distinguish it from our 
 own creed, morally, conduce to that special political 
 character, which also distinguishes it from our own ; that, 
 what is morally a disadvantage to it, is a political gain : 
 I mean its neglect of the Fathers, its abstract reasonings, 
 and its attention to system. 
 
 2. 
 
 Now, first, their political temper is the cause of their 
 treating the Ancient Fathers with the rudeness and reck- 
 lessness which has been instanced. Rome acts, like men 
 of keen and impetuous minds, in their dealings with the 
 old or infirm ; she supersedes them because they are hard 
 of hearing, are slow to answer, are circuitous in their 
 motions, and go their own way to work. The most vigor- 
 ous and commanding intellects, through the interposing 
 medium of centuries, will pour but a feeble and uncertain 
 ray, compared with their original lustre ; and Eome con- 
 siders it better to supersede them with fresh luminaries, 
 
 1 [The Catholic Church is by its very structure and mission a political 
 power, by which I mean a visible, substantive body of men, united together 
 by common engagements and laws, and thereby necessarily having relations 
 both towards its members and towards outsiders. Such a polity exists 
 simply for the sake of the Catholic Religion, and as a means to an end; but 
 since politics in their nature are a subject of absorbing interest, it is not 
 wonderful that grave scandals from time to time occur among those who 
 constitute its executive, or legislative, from their being led off from spiritual 
 aims by secular. These scandals hide from the world for a while, and 
 from large classes and various ranks of society, for long intervals, the real 
 sanctity, beauty and persuasiveness of the Church and her children.] 
 
108 DOCTEINE OF INFALLIBILITY. [LECT. 
 
 than doubtingly and painfully to use them. Emergencies 
 have occurred, opinions have been circulated, changes 
 have been effected in the Christian Church, which were 
 not contemplated, even in fancy, and can but be indirectly 
 met, by the Fathers ; — which, moreover, as creating ex- 
 ceptions to some general rules, and obliterating exceptions 
 to others, have given their writings an interpretation, 
 which they were never intended to bear. Thus while the 
 highest truths remain in those writings immutable, to 
 develope and apply them duly in particulars, is the work of 
 much delicacy, and gives an opening to ingenious perver- 
 sions of their meaning. Here, then, is a second reason why 
 Roman theologians have been jealous of the Fathers, 
 over and above the weakness of their own cause. They 
 have dreaded the range and complication of materials, 
 when thus made the body of proof, which from the nature 
 of the case might as easily be made a handle for the 
 errors of others, as a touchstone of their own. Bent upon 
 action, not speculation, they are unwilling to allow to 
 heretical sophistry the opportunities of so large a field, 
 and are ready to go great lengths to hinder an evil of 
 which they form a just estimate. 
 
 3. 
 
 
 The difficulty in question is ours as well as theirs, but 
 we do not make it a difficulty. We, for our part, 
 have been taught to consider that in its degree faith, as 
 well as conduct, must be guided by probabilities, and that 
 doubt 2 is ever our portion in this life. We can bear to 
 confess that other systems have their unanswerable argu- 
 ments in matters of detail, and that we are but striking a 
 
 2 [Here as before, by doubt of a doctrine is meant a recognition of the 
 logical incompleteness of its proof, not a refusal to pronounce it true. Both 
 Catholics and Anglicans doubt more or less in the former sense, neither of 
 them doubt in the latter.] 
 
IV.] POLITICALLY CONSIDERED. 109 
 
 balance between difficulties existing on both sides ; that 
 we are following as the voice of God, what on the whole 
 we have reason to think such. We are not bent (to God 
 be the praise!) on proselytizing, organizing, and ruling 
 as the end of life and the summum bonum of a Christian 
 community, but have brought ourselves to give our testi- 
 mony "whether men will hear, or whether they will 
 forbear/' and then to leave the matter to God. And, 
 while we are keen and firm in action, we would rather be 
 so according to the occasion, and because it is right to be 
 so, than as connecting our separate efforts into one whole, 
 and contemplating ulterior measures. We would rather 
 act as a duty towards God, the Great Author and Object 
 of our faith, than with unclouded 3 and infallible appre- 
 hension of the subject-matter which He sets before us ; 
 with a vigorous will, creating for ourselves those realities 
 which the external world but faintly adumbrates, but 
 which we know we ought to discern in it. 
 
 Those who are thus minded, will be patient under the 
 inconveniences of an historical controversy. Perceiving 
 that on the whole facts point to certain definite con- 
 clusions, and not to their contraries, they will adopt those 
 conclusions unhesitatingly; illuminate what, though true, 
 is obscure, by acting upon it ; call upon others to do the 
 same ; and leave them to God if they refuse. But it will 
 be otherwise with the man of ardent political temper, and 
 of prompt and practical habits, the sagacious and aspirino- 
 man of the world, the scrutinizer of the heart, and con- 
 spirator against its privileges and rights. Such a one 
 will understand that the multitude requires a strong 
 doctrine ; that the argument " it is because it is," a hun- 
 dred times repeated, has more weight with them than the 
 most delicate, ably connected, and multiplied processes of 
 proof; and that (as is undeniable), investigations into 
 3 [Vid. ropr. p. 85, note 4.] 
 
110 DOCTRINE OF INFALLIBILITY [LECT. 
 
 the grounds of our belief, do but blunt and enfeeble the 
 energy of those who are called upon to act. He will feel 
 the truth of this principle of our nature, and instead of 
 acting upon it only so far as Revelation has sanctioned, 
 and dispensing with inquiry within the exact limits in 
 which it is mercifully superseded, he will impatiently 
 complete what he considers to have been left imperfect. 
 He will not be content to take the divine word as it 
 comes to him from above ; but he will drug it, as vintners 
 do their wines, to suit the palate of the many. Accord- 
 ingly, I could almost believe that the advocates of Roman- 
 ism would easily be reconciled to the loss of all the Fathers 
 (should such a mischance happen), as thinking with a 
 barbarian conqueror, that as far as they agreed with 
 Rome, they were superfluous, and where they disagreed, 
 dangerous. Certainly it would much simplify the theory 
 of their religion to be rid of them. Of course I speak 
 only of hardened controversialists, not of Roman Catholics 
 in general, among whom, I doubt not, are many whose 
 names are written in heaven, minds as high, as pure, and 
 as reverential as any of those old Fathers, whose writings 
 are in question ; loyally attached to them, jealous of their 
 honour, in that same noble English spirit, as it may be 
 called, which we have already seen exemplified in Bishop 
 Bull. I am but speaking of the Papist as such, as found 
 on the stage of life, and amid the excitement of contro- 
 versy, stripped of those better parts of his system, which 
 are our inheritance as well as his ; and so contemplating 
 him, surely I may assert without breach of charity, that 
 he would, under circumstances, destroy the Fathers* 
 writings, as he actually does disparage their authority, — 
 just as he consents to cut short dispute by substituting 
 the Vulgate for the original inspired Text, and by 
 lodging the gift of Infallibility in the Pope rather than 
 in a General Council. 
 
IV.] POLITICALLY CONSIDERED. HI 
 
 4. 
 
 The same feeling which leads the Eoman disputant to 
 shrink from a fair appeal to the Fathers, however loudly 
 he may profess it in the outset and in general terms, will 
 also cause him to prefer abstract proof to argument from 
 fact. Facts, indeed, are confessedly troublesome, and 
 must be avoided as much as possible, by any one who is 
 bound by his theory to decide as well as dispute, much 
 more if he professes himself infallible. Those who have 
 to command, should either give no reason for their move- 
 ments, or reasons which cannot successfully be gainsayed. 
 To appeal to facts is to put the controversy out of their 
 own hands, and to lodge the decision with the world at 
 large. If they must argue, they should confine themselves 
 to abstract proofs and to matters of opinion. Abstract 
 arguments are but an expression of their will. Besides, 
 they lie in very little compass, and any one can learn and 
 use them, whether to remind and instruct himself, or in 
 disputation. Not without reason, then, are the proofs of 
 the Romanists such as we actually find them in the 
 controversy,— antecedent inferences from premisses but 
 partially true, or parallels and analogies assumed, or large 
 principles grounded on single instances, or fertile expo- 
 sitions of single texts of Scripture. 1 will not say that such 
 reasoning is necessarily inconsequential, or unfair. Of 
 several independent meanings, which may be given to the 
 sacred text, each may be separately possible ; though one 
 only can be the true one. It does not follow, then, that 
 a certain interpretation is not sound, because neither the 
 wording nor the context force us into it. Principles do 
 often lie hid in single instances, resemblances argue con- 
 nexion, and abstract truths admit of development. I 
 merely say that such a line of proof, whatever it merits, is 
 safe,— is necessary for the Eomanist. When Innocent III 
 
112 DOCTRINE OF INFALLIBILITY [LECT. 
 
 for instance, claimed to reign over the kings of the earth, 
 because the sun ruled the day, and the moon the night, 
 his argument might be invalid, but it might also be valid, 
 and could not be confuted. King John, or the Emperor, 
 might refuse to acknowledge it ; but it was enough for the 
 Pope that he felt it himself. But on the other hand, had 
 he, in proof of his pretensions, alleged that St. Peter trod 
 upon Nero's neck, he might have still made and enforced 
 them, but he would have unnecessarily subjected himself 
 to an external tribunal. Whether, then, abstract argu- 
 ments be in the particular case sound or not, at least they 
 are unanswerable, and for that reason are peculiarly neces- 
 sary for an authority that claims infallibility. But, after 
 all, serviceable as they may be in religious controversy, 
 they are plainly presumptuous, when they depend on 
 nothing beyond themselves. Religion is too serious a 
 subject to be made to rest on our own inferences and 
 examinations, when it can be settled in any other possible 
 way ; and especially when it is to be settled authoritatively 
 for others. It is quite allowable indeed, or rather a duty 
 to deduce from Scripture for ourselves, when we have no 
 other guide; but to enforce such deductions upon others 
 is plainly unjustifiable. 
 
 The case is different where we have clear authority for 
 such inferences, beyond ourselves. Thus, sanctioned by 
 our Saviour, we may, or rather are bound to discern the 
 doctrine of the Resurrection in God's words to Moses in 
 the bush ; and under St. Matthew's guidance we preach 
 the Miraculous Conception from the seventh chapter of 
 Isaiah, whatever becomes of the criticism on the Hebrew 
 word conveying the doctrine. Again, the unanimous 
 tradition of the early Church authorizes us to maintain 
 and enforce the doctrine that Christ is the Son of God, in 
 the sense of His being consubstantial with Him. On the 
 other hand, a man may, indeed, fairly and profitably 
 
IV.] POLITICALLY CONSIDERED. 113 
 
 conclude from the eighth chapter of Genesis that the curse 
 on the earth was reversed after the flood, and yet he is not 
 allowed to consider it a matter of faith. I say this for 
 fear of misconception ; and now, for the sake of definite- 
 ness, let me illustrate the point in hand, — which I will do 
 from the same general head of doctrine to which I drew 
 attention in my last Lecture, the doctrine of Indulgences. 
 
 5. 
 
 This doctrine, as drawn out by Bellarmine, will be found 
 to be as gratuitous in its proof, as it is in itself indefen- 
 sible. Bellarmine begins by arguing, that ' ' there is in the 
 Church a treasure of the satisfactions of Christ and the 
 Saints, which is applicable to those who, after the remis- 
 sion of the guilt in the Sacrament of Penance, are still 
 liable to the payment of temporal punishment." To make 
 this good he lays down certain propositions ; first, that 
 " to the good deeds of just men a double value or price is 
 assignable, viz. of merit and of satisfaction." For instance, 
 it would seem that the grace of charity at once recom- 
 mends us favourably to God, and tends to make up for 
 former offences; and it performs each of these functions 
 distinctly and completely. He quotes Scripture in proof; 
 on the one hand, the text in Tobit iv., "Almsgiving 
 delivers from all sin, and from death/ 3 and St. Chrysostom 
 and St. Cyprian to the same effect ; and, on the other, our 
 Lord's words, "Receive the kingdom prepared for you 
 from the beginning of the world, for I was an hungred and 
 ye gave Me meat," &c. And to show that one and the same 
 act may be both expiatory and meritorious, he maintains 
 that good deeds are capable of a twofold quality, — they 
 are painful, and they are fruits of love; considered as 
 fruits of love they are pleasing to God ; considered as 
 paiuful they are a compensation for past sin. Again, he 
 refers to the parallel of fasting and prayer; in a word, of 
 vol. i. i 
 
114 DOCTRINE OF INFALLIBILITY [LECT. 
 
 all penitential exercises, which, in St. Cyprian's language, 
 tend not only to gain "pardon for the regenerate, but a 
 crown" to blot out past sin, and to obtain a heavenly 
 reward. The same doctrine might be argued from the 
 instance of Intercession, which does good to others 
 while it is in itself pleasing to Almighty God. 
 
 Again, in human affairs the same acts sometimes gain 
 both a return of payment, and a reward. As a soldier 
 gains at once pay and honour by his service, so the 
 Christian Evangelist at once is " worthy of his hire," yet 
 receives " a crown of glory that fadeth not away." More- 
 over, that the punishment of sin is paid off by measure, 
 he argues from the words of Moses, 4 — " according to his 
 fault, by a certain number " of stripes ; whereas reward 
 plainly goes on a distinct principle. 
 
 6. 
 
 His next proposition is that " a good work, considered 
 as meritorious, cannot be applied to any other than the 
 doer ; but can, considered as a satisfaction/' The first 
 part of this proposition he almost takes for granted, there 
 being a contradiction in the idea that the excellence and 
 desert of one man should be the excellence of another. 
 The latter part is proved from the nature of a debt, which 
 we all know one person can pay for another. 
 
 After laying down, in the third place, that '-there is 
 in the Church an infinite and inexhaustible treasure of 
 Satisfactions, from the sufferings of Christ ; " he proceeds 
 to maintain "that to this treasure of overflowing satis- 
 factions pertain also the sufferings of the blessed Virgin 
 Mary, and of all other Saints, who have suffered more 
 than their sins " (in a temporal way) " required." He 
 proves it because, the Virgin Mary, having no actual sin, 
 needed no satisfactions for herself, and yet suffered much. 
 4 Deut. xxv. 2. 
 
IV.] POLITICALLY CONSIDERED. 115 
 
 The same may be said, in their respective measures, of 
 St. John the Baptist, the Prophets, the Apostles, the 
 Martyrs, and Ascetics. 
 
 Having in this way proved the existence of a Treasure 
 of Satisfactions for the temporal punishment of sins, he 
 proceeds after the same method to show that the Church 
 is the dispenser of it to individuals ; — but enough, surely, 
 has already been said. He does not attempt to detect the 
 substance of his doctrine in the writings of the Fathers. 5 
 
 Thus the practice of abstract reasoning, as well as the 
 neglect of the Fathers, with Rome are measures of poli- 
 tical expediency ; — the same will be found to be the case 
 as regards the completeness and consistency of its system. 
 Ifc is not only the necessary result, as was observed in 
 the last Lecture, but it is also the main evidence of its 
 Infallibility. 
 
 7. 
 
 To resume my line of discussion : — Rome claims to 
 be infallible ; she dispenses with the Fathers, and relies 
 upon abstract reasoning, because she is infallible; but how 
 does she prove she is so ? To speak simply, she does not 
 prove it at all. At least, she does not prove it argumenta- 
 tively, but she acts upon the assumption, she acts as if she 
 were infallible, and in this way persuades the imaginations 
 
 5 That our Lord has left to His Church the power of relaxing the tem- 
 poral punishments due to sin, is a doctrine plain from Scripture, from the 
 continual practice of the Church, and from the Fathers, and it is enjoined 
 on Catholics as defide, as being the decision of the infallible Church. But 
 the two other propositions which complete the doctrine are not de fide 
 according to Perrone, though " fidei proximae ; " viz. that Indulgences avail, 
 first, not only as a remission of ecclesiastical penance (i.e. in foro externo), 
 but in the court of heaven (i. e. in foro interno), and secondly, through the 
 merits, i. e. the Satisfactions of our Lord and His Saints. Moreover, by 
 " merits " in the latter proposition it is allowable to understand impetra- 
 tions. Lupus says, " Sanctorum passiones nonuisi impetrando, seu non 
 nisi de congruo, possunt prodesse." 
 
 i 2 
 
116 DOCTRINE OF INFALLIBILITY [LECT. 
 
 of men into a belief of her really being so. Perhaps it 
 may be asked, why her theologians claim for her at all 
 an infallibility, which they cannot prove, — why they are 
 not satisfied she should act as if she possessed it ? And it 
 may be urged with some plausibility at first sight, that 
 this actually is the practice of orthodox Protestantism (as 
 it is called), which imposes dogmatic creeds and anathe- 
 matizes dissentients as unhesitatingly as Rome, and so 
 really exercises an infallibility, while it evades the 
 difficulty of maintaining it in words. As far as this 
 remark is aimed against ourselves, it will be answered in 
 its place ; at present let us confine ourselves to the case of 
 Koine. I answer, then, that it is true, nothing is gained 
 to the intellect, rather something is lost by this venturous 
 claim ; but much is gained thereby as regards impression, 
 and Rome is content to sacrifice logical completeness to 
 secure practical influence. Men act, not because they are 
 convinced, but because they feel; the doctrine in question 
 appeals to their imagination, not to their intellect. The 
 mind requires an external guide ; Protestantism, in its so- 
 called orthodox forms, furnishes one indeed, but is afraid 
 to avow it. Romanism avows it, and that in the most 
 significant and imposing manner. It uses the doctrine of 
 Infallibility as a sort of symbol or strong maxim, bringing 
 home to the mind the fact that the Church is the divinely 
 appointed keeper and teacher of the truth. 
 
 This may be illustrated by our Saviour's mode of teach- 
 ing. He said, "Whoso shall smite thee on thy right 
 cheek, turn to him the other also." Now, without daring 
 to limit or impair this sacred precept, or assuming the 
 power of determining what it precisely means, or why it is 
 so worded, so much at first sight is conveyed in the 
 sentence, whatever else is contained in it, a great principle, 
 the duty of meekness expressed typically or emblematically. 
 Our Lord has the prerogative of choosing His own words, 
 
IV.] POLITICALLY CONSIDERED. 117 
 
 and has His own deep scope in them, and an aptness in 
 the very letter; if Rome tries to imitate Him in His 
 mode of speech, it is without His permission or the ability 
 to do so. Yet there seems such attempt in her doctrine 
 of Infallibility; it symbolizes and brings out strongly, as 
 in a figure, the office of the Church as the one appointed 
 teacher, and that, in ages of the Gospel when the preva- 
 lence of licence in religious inquiries has called for some 
 forcible protest in behalf of Revelation. It is an effort 
 to stem the tide of unbelief. It scarcely then affects to 
 produce a formal proof of its own truth, being rather a 
 dogma serviceable in practice, though extravagant in 
 theory; as legal fictions, such as "The king can do no 
 wrong," which vividly express some great and necessary 
 principle, yet do not appeal to argumentative proof. Nor 
 does it require any serious argument to recommend such 
 a doctrine to the multitude. The human mind wishes to 
 be rid of doubt in religion ; and a teacher who claims 
 infallibility is readily believed on his simple word. We 
 see this constantly exemplified in the case of individual 
 pretenders among ourselves ; in the Roman communion 
 it is the Church that professes it. She rids herself of 
 competitors by forestalling them. And probably, in the 
 eyes of her children, this is not the least persuasive argu- 
 ment for her Infallibility, that she alone of all Churches 
 dares claim it ; as if a secret instinct and involuntary mis- 
 givings restrained those rival communions, which go so 
 far towards affecting it. 
 
 Under these circumstances, all that is incumbent on 
 the Church of Rome in proof of her pretensions, is to act 
 out the infallibility which she professes ; with the decision 
 and uniformity which such a claim requires. Her consis- 
 tent carrying out of her assumed principle forms a suffi- 
 
118 DOCTEINE OF INFALLIBILITY [LECT. 
 
 cient argument that she has a right to it. Here, then, that 
 diversified, minute, and finished system of doctrine which 
 I have already spoken of, subserves her political purposes. 
 It is but fulfilling her theory ; it is but showing herself to 
 be what she claims to be. Had she the gift of Infallibility, 
 her various judgments, however unpremeditated, would be 
 consistent with each other ; she dresses up a theology in 
 hopes that the artificial show of consistency will be taken 
 in evidence of truth. But, besides this, there is some- 
 thing in the very appearance of order and system which 
 spontaneously impresses us with the notion that they are 
 not owing to accidental and foreign causes merely. The 
 regularity of nature, for instance, has led certain philoso- 
 phers to ascribe it, not to an external design, but to an 
 innate life and reality as its principle ; and, in like manner, 
 the orderly system of Rome serves to persuade the imagi- 
 nation of its being but the ever-acting energy of her In- 
 fallibility, not a mere theology elaborated out with a 
 studied attempt at completeness and consistency. And 
 hence it happens, that the further her professed revelations 
 are carried, the more minutely she investigates, and the 
 more boldly she decides, the more firmly she takes her 
 stand, and the more peremptory she is in her utterances, 
 so much the more successful are her attempts upon the 
 heart and the imagination of the many. She developes 
 her system till it seems self-supported, each part answer- 
 iDg for another, and her very claim, as I have said, 
 guaranteeing her right to make it. 6 Moreover, she has 
 had the address so to complete the revealed notices of truth, 
 as thereby to increase her own influence. It is admitted 
 
 6 [It must be granted that systematic order and consistency in teaching 
 are not a proof of the truth of what is taught, but still they form in fact 
 one of those presumptions of truth which go a certain way towards a logical 
 proof; and that argument in its favour the Catholic Church has. Its 
 teaching is like truth, verisimile.] 
 
IV.] POLITICALLY CONSIDERED. 119 
 
 that some of the most interesting questions to the human 
 mind, as the state of the soul immediately upon death, are 
 left in obscurity by Almighty God. Here Kome comes in 
 and contrives to throw the mind upon the Church, as the 
 means by which its wants may be supplied, and as the 
 object of its faith and hope, and thus makes her the in- 
 strument of a double usurpation, as both professing to show 
 how certain objects may be attained, and next presenting 
 herself as the agent in obtaining them. 
 
 9. 
 
 It would be too large a work to illustrate these remarks 
 adequately from the Koman theology, and it has often 
 been done already. Two or three instances may suffice 
 as a specimen. For example : there is no plenary absolu- 
 tion of sin under the Gospel, such as Baptism is, after 
 Baptism, until the day of Judgment ; Romanism adds the 
 doctrines of Penance, Purgatory, and Indulgences. Christ 
 is the Saviour from the eternal consequences of sin ; Christ 
 in His Saints is, according to Rome, the Saviour from the 
 temporal. 7 In Baptism His merits are applied j in Indul- 
 gences the merits of the Saints. He saves from hell ; the 
 Virgin Mary from Purgatory. 8 His Sacrifice on the Cross 
 avails for the sins of the world ; His Sacrifice in the Mass 
 for the sins of the Church. Again, there are six precepts 
 of the Church, three counsels, twelve fruits of the Holy 
 Ghost, six sins against the Holy Ghost, seven works of 
 mercy, seven deadly sins, four sins which cry for ven- 
 geance, four receptacles of souls departed. There is one 
 
 7 [This is not conceding to us enough ; for the merits of the Saints are 
 only the medium by which the infinite merits of the Redeemer are applied 
 for the relaxation of the temporal punishment, "uti fit per opera justorum 
 in hac vita degentiuin." Perrone, p. 42, note. ] 
 
 8 [Not in the same sense as our Lord from hell, i. e. by vicarious suffering, 
 but by prayer as we pray for each other. ] 
 
120 DOCTRINE OF INFALLIBILITY [LECT. 
 
 Sacrament for infancy, another for childhood, a third as 
 food for mature age, a fourth for spiritual sickness, a fifth 
 for the increase of mankind, a sixth for their government 
 in society, and a seventh for death. 
 
 So again, in a work for the direction of Christian doctrine 
 and Purgatorian Societies, we read : " The prayers usually 
 said to gain an indulgence, are f the Lord's Prayer/ ' Hail 
 Mary/ and ( Grlory be to the Father/ repeated five times, in 
 honour of the five most adorable wounds of our Lord Jesus 
 Christ, from whence all grace, merit, and indulgence pro- 
 ceed to our souls and one Pater and Ave for the pious in- 
 tentions of the sovereign Pontiff and for the wants of the 
 Church." Again : (< A plenary Indulgence is granted on 
 the first Sunday of each month to all the faithful of these 
 Dioceses, wlio approach the Holy Sacraments, visit any of 
 the Parochial Churches, and devoutly pray for the propa- 
 gation of the Catholic Faith, and for the other pious inten- 
 tions of the sovereign Pontiff.". . "The Indulgence of seven 
 years and seven quarantines (40 days) is granted each time 
 to those who devoutly recite the theological acts of faith, 
 hope, and charity ; and if daily recited, a plenary Indul- 
 gence once a month, applicable to the souls of the faithful 
 departed, provided they approach the Holy Sacraments of 
 Penance and Communion, and pray for the wants of the 
 Church and pious intentions of the Pope." . . " The In- 
 dulgence of a hundred days is granted each time the 
 ' Angelus/ or the Angel of the Lord, is said, morning, noon, 
 and evening, and a plenary Indulgence once a month for 
 those who recite it daily, fulfilling the above conditions. 
 Note, to gain this Indulgence it is prescribed to be said 
 'kneeling on weekdays, but standing on Sundays and during 
 Paschal time." "The Indulgence of seven years and seven 
 quarantines is granted to the faithful, who practise medi- 
 tation or mental prayer for half an hour, or at least for a- 
 quarter" . . " A plenary Indulgence is granted to the 
 
IV.J POLITICALLY CONSIDERED. 121 
 
 faithful in the hour of death, who have frequently during 
 life invoked the most sacred name of Jesus, and do piously 
 call on Him at that awful hour at least in affection of 
 heart." . . . "The Indulgence of 300 days is granted to 
 those who devoutly repeat the three following ejaculations : 
 ' Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, I offer you my heart and soul ; 
 Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, assist me in my last agony ; 
 Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, may I breathe forth my soul 
 unto you in peace.' " 9 
 
 I am not condemning the principle itself of so arranging 
 what is divinely given us ; it is only when it is applied in 
 excess or without foundation, as it is by the Church of 
 Rome, that it is reprehensible. And, without being able 
 to draw the line between its use and abuse, yet we may 
 clearly see that in her case it actually does subserve her 
 ambitious and secular views, lowering the dignity and 
 perfection of morals, and limiting by denning our duties, 
 in order to indulge human weakness, and to gain influence 
 by indulging it. 
 
 Nor do I decide whether such a Theology is calculated 
 to deaden the conscience, and even (as it is sometimes 
 urged) to encourage crime. Much may be said on both 
 sides ; it takes from the Roman Catholic the fear of hell l 
 altogether, and it gives him the certainty of Purgatory. 
 The question then depends upon another, whether men are 
 more deterred from sinning by the definite prospect of 
 Purgatory any how, or by the vague threat (as most men 
 receive it) of eternal punishment. But so far is certain, 
 that such statements, whether or not they encourage the 
 
 9 [This repetition of the Pater noster, &c, that is, of formularies simple and 
 familiar to all, will be found, I think, by experience to be practically the best 
 means of securing prayer, and the union of prayer, from masses of men and 
 from individual supplicants. Litanies answer the same purpose.] 
 
 [This is not so. One of the topics especially urged in retreats, missions, 
 and books of devotion is the danger of losing the soul. Hell is one of the 
 " Four last things."] 
 
122 DOCTRINE OP INFALLIBILITY [LECT. 
 
 sinner, lower the idea and standard of moral truth ; and, 
 whether or not they avail to comfort the penitent and 
 fearful, at least they arrest attention and gain influence 
 by engaging to do so. 
 
 10. 
 
 Enough has nowbeen said to show how the completeness 
 and consistency of the Roman system tend to create a 
 belief in its infallibility. This being the case, it is very 
 remarkable, that after all these very characters are wanting 
 to it in some important respects. Not only is the doctrine 
 of Infallibility defective in respect of 'proof, it is defective 
 even viewed in its theory in two main points ; and with a 
 brief reference to these I will bring this Lecture to an 
 end. 
 
 Roman theologians, though claiming for the Church the 
 gift of Infallibility, cannot even in theory give an answer 
 to the question how individuals are to know for certain that 
 she is infallible; nor in the next place where the gift 
 resides, supposing it to have been vouchsafed. They 
 neither determine who or what is infallible, or why. 
 
 As to the first point, they insist on the necessity of an 
 infallible guide in religious matters as an argument that 
 such a guide has really been accorded. Now it is obvious 
 to inquire how individuals are to know with certainty that 
 Rome is infallible ; by which I do not mean, what is the 
 particular ground on which her infallibility rests, but how 
 any ground can be such as to bring home to the mind 
 infallibly that she is infallible, — what conceivable proof 
 amounts to more than a probability of the fact; — and 
 what advantage is an infallible guide, if those who are to 
 be guided have, after all, no more than an opinion, as the 
 Romanists call it, that she is infallible ? 2 
 
 3 [This is a fallacy. We are certain of the Church's infallibility by means 
 not of a probability, but of an accumulation of probabilities. I am certain 
 
IV.] POLITICALLY CONSIDERED. 123 
 
 They attempt to solve this difficulty by boldly maintain- 
 ing that Christians do receive such an unerring perception 
 of the whole circle of their doctrines, and that, conveyed 
 through the Sacrament of Baptism. And this is worth 
 noticing, were it but for the instance it affords of their 
 custom of making internal consistency stand in the place of 
 external proof; for to assert that Baptism gives infallible 
 assurance of the infallibility of Rome, is only saying that 
 those who discern it do discern it, though those who do 
 not discern it do not. It is not an argument tending to 
 prove the point in dispute. We know there are individuals 
 among Protestants who consider themselves to be infallibly 
 taught by a divine light, but such a claim is never taken 
 as a proof that they are favoured in the way they suppose. 
 To consider that Baptism gives this infallible discernment 
 of the infallible guide, is to shift the difficulty, not to solve 
 it. And by so considering, not even the consistency of the 
 system is really preserved ; for since the professed object of 
 infallibility is to remove doubt and anxiety, how does it 
 practically help a perplexed Romanist, to tell him that his 
 Baptism ought to convey to him an infallible assurance of 
 the external infallibility, when the present sense of his 
 uncertainty evidences to him that in matter of fact it does 
 not ? If such inward infallibility be requisite, it were a 
 more simple theory, like enthusiasts, to dispense with the 
 external. 
 
 11. 
 
 The abstract difficulty, however, is small compared with 
 that attendant on the seat of infallibility claimed by 
 Romanism. Little room as there is in the Roman 
 controversy for novelty or surprise, yet it does raise fresh 
 
 that I am in England by physical sense and common sense, not because I am 
 infallible. Else, we must all be exercising a supernatural gift every hour of 
 our lives.] 
 
124 DOCTRINE OF INFALLIBILITY [LECT. 
 
 and fresh amazement, the more we think of it, that 
 Romanists should not have been able to agree among 
 themselves where that infallibility is lodged which is the 
 key-stone of their system. Archbishop Bramhall 3 reckons 
 no less than six distinct opinions on the subject ; some 
 Romanists lodging the gift in the Pope speaking ex 
 Cathedra, others in the Pope in council of Cardinals, others 
 in the Pope in General or Provincial Council, others in 
 the General Council without the Pope, others in the Church 
 Diffusive, that is, the whole company of believers through- 
 out the world. Bellarmine 4 observes, by way of meeting 
 this difficulty, that all Romanists are agreed on two points ; 
 first, that wherever the infallibility lies, at least the Pope 
 in General Council is infallible; next, that even out of 
 General Council when he speaks ex Cathedra, he is to be 
 obeyed (for safety's sake, I suppose,) whether really 
 infallible or not. And no English theologian can quarrel 
 with so wise and practical a mode of settling the difficulty ; 
 but then let it be observed, that so to settle it is to deviate 
 from the high infallible line which Rome professes to walk 
 upon in religious questions, and to descend to Bishop 
 Butler's level, to be content to proceed not by an unerring 
 rule, but by those probabilities which guide us in the 
 conduct of life. 5 After all, then, the baptismal illumination 
 does not secure the very benefit which occasions Roman 
 theologians to refer to it. They claim for it a power which 
 in truth, according to their own confession, does nothing 
 at all for them. 
 
 12. 
 
 Nor is this all ; granting that infallibility resides in the 
 Pope in Council, yet it is not a matter of faith, that is, it 
 
 3 Works, p. 39. Vide Leslie, iii. p. 396. 4 De Rom. Pont. iv. 2. 
 
 5 [Of course we go by probabilities, viz. note, p. 122. Probabilities in the 
 evidence create certitude in the conclusion, vid. supr. p. 88, notes 3, 6.] 
 
IV.] POLITICALLY CONSIDERED. 125 
 
 has not been formally determined what Popes have been 
 true Popes ; which of the many de facto, or rival Popes, 
 are to be acknowledged j nor again which of the many 
 professed General Councils are really so. A Romanist 
 might at this moment deny the existing Pope to be St. 
 Peter's successor without offending against any article of 
 his Creed. 6 The Gallican Church receives the Councils 
 of Basil and Constance wholly, the Roman Church rejects 
 both in part. The last Council of Lateran condemns the 
 Council of Basil. The Council of Pisa is, according to 
 Bellarrnine, neither clearly approved nor clearly rejected. 
 The Acts of other Councils are adulterated without any 
 attempt being made to amend them. Now I repeat, such 
 uncertainty as to the limits of Divine Revelation, is no 
 antecedent objection to the truth of the Roman system; 
 it might be the appointed trial of our faith and earnest- 
 ness. But it is a great inconsistency in it, being what it 
 is, that is, engaging as it does to furnish us with infallible 
 teaching and to supersede inquiry. 
 
 Unless it seemed like presumption to interpret the his- 
 tory of religion by a private rule, one might call the cir- 
 cumstances under consideration even providential. No- 
 thing could be better adapted than it to defeat the counsels 
 of human wisdom, or to show to thoughtful inquirers the 
 hollowness of even the most specious counterfeit of divine 
 truth. The theologians of Rome have been able dexter- 
 ously to smooth over a thousand inconsistencies, and to 
 array the heterogeneous precedents of a course of centuries 
 in the semblance of design and harmony. But they cannot 
 complete their system in its most important and essential 
 point. They can determine in theory the nature, degree, 
 extent, and object of the infallibility which they claim ; 
 they cannot agree among themselves where it resides. As 
 
 6 [Not so, it is as certain as tLat our Lord suffered under Pontius 
 Pilate.] 
 
126 DOCTRINE OF INFALLIBILITY [LECT. 
 
 in the building of Babel, the Lord hath confounded 
 their language; and the structure stands half finished, 
 a monument at once of human daring and its failure. 7 
 
 13. 
 But, whether we call it providential or not, except so 
 far as all things are so, it at least serves to expose the 
 pretensions of Romanism. The case stands as follows : 
 Roman theology first professes a common ground with 
 ourselves, a readiness to stand or fall by Antiquity. 
 When we appeal to Antiquity accordingly, it shifts its 
 ground, substituting for Ancient Testimony abstract argu- 
 ments. If we question its abstract arguments, it falls 
 back on its infallibility. If we ask for the proof of its 
 infallibility, it can but attempt to overpower the imagi- 
 nation by its attempt at system, by the boldness, decision, 
 consistency, and completeness with which it urges and 
 acts upon its claim. Yet in this very system, thus 
 ambitious of completeness, we are able to detect one or 
 two serious flaws in the theory of the very doctrine which 
 that system seems intended to sustain. 8 
 
 14. 
 Such are some of the outlines of the theology by which 
 Rome supersedes the teaching of the early Church. Her 
 excuse, it seems, lies in this, that the Church now has lost 
 the strength and persuasiveness she once had. Unanimity, 
 uniformity, mutual intercourse, strict discipline, the fresh- 
 
 ' [All these objections are superseded by the late definition of the Vatican 
 Council lodging the gift of infallibility in faith and morals in the Pope.] 
 
 8 ("Not so : 1. Catholic controversialists only partially appeal to Antiquity. 
 2 To interpret it they appeal to the principle of doctrinal development and 
 to immemorial usage and belief and continuous tradition ; 3. they introduce 
 abstract arguments in confirmation; 4. they preach and insist on the Church's 
 infallibility, not as an argument in disputing with Protestants, but as a 
 decisive answer to the questionings of her own children.] 
 
IV.] POLITICALLY CONSIDEEED. 127 
 
 ness of Tradition, and the reminiscences of the Apostles 
 are no more ; and she would fain create by an artificial 
 process what was natural in Antiquity. This is what can 
 be said for her at best ; and there is any how, I do not 
 deny, a difficulty existing in the theory of the Church's 
 present authority; though no difficulty of course can 
 excuse the use of fiction and artifice. 9 How ive meet the 
 difficulty, comes next into consideration. 
 
 9 [A word perhaps is necessary upon the animus and tenor of the third 
 and fourth Lectures. Every one has a right to his own opinion, but a man 
 must have some special excuse for himself, who takes upon himself to make 
 public charges of ambition, cruelty, craft, superstition, and false doctrine 
 against a great Church. The author thought he had such a justification for 
 his so doing in these Lectures. He was saying, not only what he believed 
 to be simply true, but what was in no sense new ; what all Englishmen, 
 not Catholics, felt and took for granted. Such a serious indictment against 
 Rome was the only defence of the Reformation, a movement which was a 
 heinous sin, if it was not an imperative duty. Especially he was only 
 repeating the words of all the great ecclesiastical writers of his communion, 
 who had one and all been stern and fierce with the Church of Rome as an 
 obligation and a necessity. There was no responsibility in his saying what 
 they had said before him. He says in his Apologia, "Not only did I think 
 such language necessary for my Church's religious position, but I recollected 
 that all the great Anglican divines had thought so before me. I had not 
 used strong language simply out of my own head, but in doing so I was 
 following the track, or rather, reproducing the teaching, of those who had 
 preceded me." p. 202.] 
 
LECTURE V. 
 
 OX THE USE OF PRIVATE JUDGMENT. 
 
 By the right of Private Judgment in matters of religious 
 belief and practice, is ordinarily meant the prerogative, 
 considered to belong to each individual Christian, of ascer- 
 taining and deciding for himself from Scripture what is 
 Gospel truth, and what is not. This is the principle 
 maintained in theory, as a sort of sacred possession or 
 palladium, by the Protestantism of this day. Pome, as 
 is equally clear, takes the opposite extreme, and maintains 
 that nothing is absolutely left to individual judgment; that 
 is, that there is no subject in religious faith and conduct 
 on which the Church may not pronounce a decision, such as 
 to supersede the private judgment, and compel the assent, 
 of every one of her members. The English Church takes 
 a middle course between these two. It considers that on 
 certain definite subjects private judgment upon the text of 
 Scripture has been superseded, but not by the mere autho- 
 ritative sentence of the Church, but by its historical testi- 
 mony delivered down from the Apostles. To these definite 
 subjects nothing more can be added, 1 unless, indeed, new 
 records of primitive Christianity, or new uninterrupted 
 traditions of its teaching were discoverable. 
 
 Th e Catholic doctrines, therefore, of the Trinity, Incarna- 
 
 1 [This of course takes for granted that " historical testimony " is minute 
 enough and complete enough to determine beyond question these "definite 
 subjects.' 
 
LECT. V.] ON THE USE OE PEIVATE JUDGMENT. 129 
 
 tion, and others similar to these, as contained in Anti- 
 quity, are, as we maintain, the true interpretations of 
 the notices contained in Scripture concerning those doc- 
 trines. But the mere Protestant considers that on these 
 as well as on other subjects, the sacred text is left to the 
 good pleasure or the diligence of private men ; while the 
 Roman Catholic, on the contrary, views it as in no degree 
 subjected to individual judgment, except from the accident 
 of the Church having not yet pronounced on this or that 
 point an authoritative and final decision. 
 
 2. 
 Now these extreme theories and their practical results 
 are quite intelligible ; whatever be their faults, want of sim- 
 plicity is not one of them. We see what they mean, how 
 they work, what they result in. But the middle path 
 adopted by the English Church cannot be so easily mas- 
 tered by the mind, first because it is a mean, and has in 
 consequence a complex nature, involving a combination of 
 principles, and depending on multiplied conditions ; next, 
 because it partakes of that indeterminateness which, as has 
 been already observed, is to a certain extent a characteris- 
 tic of English theology ; lastly, because it has never been 
 realized in visible fulness in any religious community, and 
 thereby brought home to the mind through the senses. 
 What has never been fairly brought into operation, lies 
 open to various objections. It is open to the suspicion of 
 not admitting of being so brought, that is, of being what 
 is commonly understood by a mere theory or fancy. And 
 besides, a mean system really is often nothing better than 
 an assemblage of words ; and always looks such, before it 
 is proved to be something more. For instance, if we knew 
 only of the colours white and black, and heard a description 
 of brown or grey, and were told that these were neither 
 white nor black, but somethinglike both, yet between them, 
 
 VOL. L K 
 
130 ON THE USE OF [LECT. 
 
 we should be tempted to conceive our informant's words 
 either self-contradictory or altogether unmeaning \ as if it 
 were plain that what was not white must be black, and what 
 was not black must be white. This is daily instanced in 
 the view taken by society at large of those persons, now, 
 alas ! a comparatively small remnant, who follow the an- 
 cient doctrines and customs of our Church, who hold to 
 the Creeds and Sacraments, keep from novelties, are 
 regular in their devotions, and are, what is sometimes 
 called almost in reproach, " orthodox." Worldly men 
 seeing them only at a distance, will class them with the 
 religionists of the day ; the religionists of the day, with a 
 like superficial glance at them, call them worldly and 
 carnal. Why is this ? because neither party can fancy 
 any medium between itself and its opposite, and connects 
 them with the other, because they are not its own. 
 
 Feeling, then, the disadvantages under which the 
 Anglican doctrine of Private Judgment lies, and desirous 
 to give it something more of meaning and reality than it 
 popularly possesses, I shall attempt to describe it, first, in 
 theory, and then as if reduced to practice. 
 
 3. 
 
 1 . Now, if man is in a state of trial, and if his trial lies in 
 the general exercise of the will, and if the choice of religion 
 is an exercise of will, and always implies an act of indi- 
 vidual judgment, it follows that such acts are in the number 
 of those by which he is tried, and for which he is to give 
 an account hereafter. So far, all parties must be agreed, 
 that without private judgment there is no responsibility ; 
 and that in matter of fact, a man's own mind, and nothing 
 else, is the cause of his believing or not believing, and of 
 his acting or not acting upon his belief. Even though an 
 infallible guidance be accorded, a man must have a choice 
 of resisting it or not ; he may resist it if he pleases, as 
 
V.] PEIVATE JUDGMENT. 131 
 
 Judas was traitor to his Master. Roman Catholic, I 
 consider, agrees with Protestant so far ; the question in 
 dispute being, what are the means which are to direct our 
 choice, and what is the due manner of usiog them. This 
 is the point to which I shall direct my attention. 
 
 4. 
 The means which are given us to form our judgment by, 
 exclusively of such as are supernatural, which do not 
 enter into consideration here, are various, partly internal, 
 partly external. The internal means of judging are 
 common sense, natural perception of right and wrong, the 
 sympathy of the affections, exercises of the imagination, 
 reason, and the like. The external are such as Scripture, 
 the existing Church, Tradition, Catholicity, Learning, 
 Antiquity, and the National Faith. Popular Protestantism 
 would deprive us of all these external means, except the 
 text of Holy Scripture ; as if, I suppose, upon the ante- 
 cedent notion that, when Grod speaks by inspiration, all 
 other external means are superseded. But this is an 
 arbitrary decision, contrary to facts ; for unless inspiration 
 made use of an universal language, learning at least must 
 be necessary to ascertain the meaning of the particular 
 language selected ; and if one external aid be adopted, of 
 course all antecedent objection to any other vanishes. 
 This notion, then, though commonly taken for granted, 
 must be pronounced untenable, nay, inconsistent with 
 itself; yet upon it the prevailing neglect of external 
 assistances, and the exaltation of Private Judgment, 
 mainly rest. Discarding this uarrow view of the subject, 
 let us rather accept all the means which are put within 
 our reach, as intended for use, and as talents which. must 
 not be neglected ; and, as so considering them, let us 
 trace the order in which they address themselves to the 
 minds of individuals. 
 
 k 2 
 
132 ON THE USE OP [lECT. 
 
 5. 
 
 Our parents and teachers are our first informants con- 
 cerning the next world ; and they elicit and cherish the 
 innate sense of right and wrong which acts as a guide 
 co-ordinately with them. By degrees they resign their 
 place to the religious communion, or Church, in which we 
 find ourselves, while the inward habits of truth and 
 holiness which the moral sense has begun to form, react 
 upon that inward monitor, enlarge its range, and make 
 its dictates articulate, decisive, and various. Meantime 
 the Scriptures have been added as fresh informants, 
 bearing witness to the Church and to the moral sense, 
 and interpreted by them both. Last of all, where there 
 is time and opportunity for research into times past and 
 present, Christian Antiquity, and Christendom, as it at 
 present exists, become additional informants, giving sub- 
 stance and shape to much that before existed in our minds 
 only in outline and shadow. 
 
 6. 
 
 Such are the means by which God conveys to Christians 
 the knowledge of His will and Providence ; but not all of 
 them to all men. To some He vouchsafes all, to all some ; 
 but, according to the gifts given them, does He make it 
 their duty to use their gifts religiously. He employs these 
 gifts as His instruments in teaching, trying, converting, 
 advancing the mind, as the Sacraments are His impercep- 
 tible means of changing the soul. To the greater part of 
 the world He has given but three of them, Conscience, 
 Reason, and National Religion; to a great part of 
 Christendom He gives no external guidance but through 
 the Church ; to others only the Scriptures ; to others both 
 Church and Scriptures. Few are able to add the know- 
 ledge of Christian Antiquity; the first centuries of 
 Christianity enjoyed the light of Catholicity, an informant 
 which is now partially withdrawn from us. The least 
 
V.] PRIVATE JUDGMENT. 133 
 
 portion of these separate means of knowledge is sufficient 
 for a man's living religiously ; but the more of them he 
 has, the more of course he has to answer for ; nor can he 
 escape his responsibility, as most men attempt in one way 
 or other, by hiding his talent in a napkin. 
 
 Most men, I say, try to dispense with one or other of 
 these divine informants ; and for thi i reason, — because it 
 is difficult to combine them. The lights they furnish, 
 coming from various quarters, cast separate shadows, and 
 partially intercept each other ; and it is pleasanter to walk 
 without doubt and without shade, than to have to choose 
 what is best and safest. The Roman Catholic would 
 simplify matters by removing Reason, Scripture, and 
 Antiquity, and depending mainly upon Church authority ; 
 the Calvinist relies on Reason, Scripture, and Criticism, 
 to the disparagement of the Moral Sense, the Church, 
 Tradition, and Antiquity ; the Latitudinarian relies on 
 Reason, with Scripture in subordination j the Mystic on 
 the imagination and affections, or what is commonly 
 called the heart ; the Politician takes the National Faith 
 as sufficient, and cares for little else ; the man of the 
 world acts by common sense, which is the oracle of the in- 
 different ; the popular Religionist considers the authorized 
 version of Scripture to be all in all. But the true Catholic 
 Christian is he who takes what God has given him, be it 
 greater or less, does not despise the lesser because he has 
 received the greater, yet puts it not before the greater, 
 but uses all duly and to God's glory. 
 
 7. 
 I just now said that it was difficult to combine these 
 several means of gaining Divine Truth, and that their 
 respective informations do not altogether agree. I mean 
 that at first sight they do not agree, or in particular cases : 
 for abstractedly., of course, what comes from God must be 
 
134 ON THE USE OF [lECT. 
 
 one and the same in whatever way it comes : if it seems to 
 differ from itself, this arises from our infirmity. Even 
 our senses seem at first to contradict each other, and an 
 infant may have difficulty in knowing how to avail him- 
 self of them, yet in time he learns to do so, and uncon- 
 sciously makes allowance for their apparent discordance ; 
 and it would be utter folly on account of their differences, 
 whatever they are, to discard the use of them. In like 
 manner, Conscience and Reason sometimes seem at variance, 
 and then we either call what appears to be reason sophistry, 
 or what appears to be conscience weakness or superstition. 
 Or, the moral sense and Scripture seem to speak a distinct 
 language, as in their respective judgments concerning 
 Jacob or David ; or Scripture and Antiquity, as regards 
 Christ's command to us to wash each other's feet ; or 
 Scripture and Reason as regards miracles, or the doctrines 
 of the Trinity and Incarnation ; or Antiquity and the 
 existing Church, as regards immersion in Baptism ; or the 
 National Religion and Antiquity, as regards the Church's 
 power of jurisdiction; or Antiquity, and the Law of 
 Nature, as regards the usage of celibacy; or Antiquity 
 and Scholarship, as at times perhaps in the interpretation 
 of Scripture. 
 
 8. 
 
 This being the state of the case, I make the following 
 remarks ; which, being for the sake of illustration, are to 
 be taken but as general ones, without dwelling on extreme 
 cases or exceptions. 
 
 (1.) That Scripture, Antiquity, and Catholicity cannot 
 really contradict one another : 
 
 (2.) That when the Moral Sense or the Reason of the 
 individual seems to be on one side, and Scripture on the 
 other, we must follow Scripture, except Scripture any- 
 where contained contradictions in terms, or prescribed 
 undeniable crimes, which it never does : 
 
V.] PRIVATE JUDGMENT. 135 
 
 (3.) That when the sense of Script ure, as interpreted by 
 the Reason of the individual, is contrary to the sense 
 given to it by Catholic Antiquity, we ought to side with 
 the latter : 
 
 (4.) That when Antiquity runs counter to the present 
 Church in important matters, we must follow Antiquity ; 
 when in unimportant matters, we must follow the present 
 Church : 
 
 (5.) That when the present Church speaks contrary 
 to our private notions, and Antiquity is silent, or its 
 decisions unknown to us, it is pious to sacrifice our own 
 opinion to that of the Church : 
 
 (6.) That if, in spite of our efforts to agree with the 
 Church, we still differ from it, Antiquity being silent, we 
 must avoid causing any disturbance, recollecting that the 
 Church, and not individuals, " has authority in contro- 
 versies of faith." 
 
 I am not now concerned to prove all this, but am illus- 
 trating the theory of Private Judgment, as I conceive the 
 English Church maintains it. And now let us consider 
 it in practice. 
 
 9. 
 
 2. It is popularly conceived that to maintain the right 
 of Private Judgment, is to hold that no one has an en- 
 lightened faith who has not, as a point of duty, discussed 
 the grounds of it and made up his mind for himself. But 
 to put forward such doctrine as this, rightly pertains to 
 infidels and sceptics only ; and if great names may be 
 quoted in its favour, and it is often assumed to be the true 
 Protestant doctrine, this is surely because its advocates 
 have not always weighed the force of their own words. 
 Every one must begin religion by faith, not by controversy; 
 he must take for granted what he is taught and what he 
 cannot prove ; and it is better for himself that he should 
 do so, even if the teaching he receives contains a mixture of 
 
136 ON THE USE OP [LECT. 
 
 error. If lie would possess a reverent mind, he must begin 
 by obeying ; if he would cherish a generous and devoted 
 temper, he must begin by venturing something on uncer- 
 tain information ; if he would deserve the praise of modesty 
 and humility, he must repress his busy intellect, and for- 
 bear to scrutinize. This is a sufficient explanation, were 
 there no other, of the subscription to the Thirty-nine 
 Articles, which is in this place exacted of the youth who 
 come hither for education. Were there any serious objec- 
 tions lying against those Articles, the case would be dif- 
 ferent; were there immorality or infidelity inculcated in 
 them, or even imputed to them, our younger members 
 would have a warrant for drawing back; but even those who 
 do not agree with the Articles, will not say this of them. 
 Putting aside, then, the consideration that they contain in 
 them chief portions of the ancient Creeds, and are the form 
 in which so many pious men in times past have expressed 
 their own faith, even the circumstance of their constituting 
 the religion under which we all are born is a reason for 
 our implicitly submitting ourselves to them in the first 
 instance. As the mind expands, whether by education or 
 years, a number of additional informants will meet it, 
 and it will naturally, or rather it ought, according to its 
 opportunities, to exercise itself upon all of these, by way of 
 finding out God's perfect truth. The Christian will study 
 Scripture and Antiquity, as well as the doctrine of his own 
 Church ; and may perhaps, in some points of detail, differ 
 from its teaching; but, even if eventually he differs, he 
 will not therefore put himself forward, wrangle, protest, or 
 separate from it. Further, he may go on to examine the 
 basis of the authority of Scripture or of the Church; and 
 if so, he will do it, not, as is sometimes irreverently said, 
 u impartially " and " candidly," which means sceptically 
 and arrogantly, as if he were the centre of the universe, 
 and all things might be summoned before him and put to 
 
V.] PRIVATE JUDGMENT. 137 
 
 task at his pleasure, but with a generous confidence in 
 what he has been taught ; nay, not recognizing, as will 
 often happen, the process of inquiry which is going on 
 within him. 
 
 Too many men suppose that their investigation ought to 
 be attended with a consciousness of their making it ; as if 
 it was scarcely pleasing to God unless they all along reflect 
 upon it, tell the world of it, boast of it as a right, and 
 sanctify it as a principle. They say to themselves and 
 others, " I am examining, I am scrutinizing, I am judging, 
 I am free to choose or reject, I am exercising the right of 
 Private Judgment/'' What a strange satisfaction ! Does 
 it increase the worth of our affections to reflect upon them 
 as we exercise them ? Would our mourning for a friend 
 become more valuable by our saying, "I am weeping ; I am 
 overcome and agonized for the second or third time ; I am 
 resolved to weep " ? What a strange infatuation, to boast 
 of our having to make up our minds ! What ! is it a great 
 thing to be without an opinion ? is it a satisfaction to have 
 the truth to find ? Who would boast that he was without 
 worldly means, and had to get them as he could ? Is 
 heavenly treasure less precious than earthly ? Is it any- 
 thing inspiring or consolatory to consider, as such persons 
 do, that Almighty God has left them entirely to their own 
 efforts, has failed to anticipate their wants, has let them 
 lose in ignorance at least a considerable part of their short 
 life and their tenderest and most malleable years ? is it a 
 hardship or a yoke, on the contrary, to be told that what, 
 in the order of Providence, is put before them to believe, 
 whether absolutely true or not, is in such sense from Him, 
 that it will improve their hearts to obey it, and will convey 
 to them many truths which they otherwise would not know, 
 and prepare them perhaps for the communication of 
 higher and clearer views ? Yet such is a commonly re- 
 ceived doctrine of this day ; against which, I would plainly 
 
138 ON THE USE OF [LECT. 
 
 maintain, — not the Roman doctrine of Infallibility, which 
 even if true, would be of application only to a portion of 
 mankind, for few comparatively hear of Rome, — but gene- 
 rally that, under whatever system a man finds himself, he 
 is bound to accept it as if infallible, and to act upon . it in 
 a confiding spirit, till he finds a better, or in course of 
 time has cause to suspect it. 
 
 10. 
 
 To this it may be replied by the controversialist of Rome, 
 that, granting we succeed in persuading men in the first 
 instance to exercise this unsuspicious faith in what is set 
 before them in the course of Providence, yet, if the right 
 of free judgment upon the text of Scripture is allowed to 
 them at last, it will be sure, whenever it is allowed, to carry 
 them off into various discordant opinions ; that they will 
 fancy they have found out a more Scriptural system even 
 than that of the Church Catholic itself, should they happen 
 to have been born and educated in her pale. But I am not 
 willing to grant this of the Holy Scriptures, though our 
 opponents are accustomed to assume it. There have been 
 writers of their communion, indeed, who have used the 
 most disparaging terms of the inspired volume, as if it were 
 so mere a letter that it might be moulded into any mean- 
 ing which the reader chose to put upon it. Some of these 
 expressions and statements have been noticed by our 
 divines ; such as, that " the Scriptures are worth no more 
 than Esop's fables without the Church's authority ; " or 
 that " they are like a nose of wax which admits of being 
 pulled and moulded one way and another." 2 
 
 In contradiction to these it surely may be maintained, 
 not only that the Scriptures have but one direct and un- 
 changeable sense, but that it is such as in all greater mat- 
 ters to make a forcible appeal to the mind, when fairly put 
 2 Stillingfleet, Grounds, i. 5, § 2, p. 138. 
 
V.] PRIVATE JUDGMENT. 139 
 
 before it, and to impress it with a conviction of its being 
 the true one. Little of systematic knowledge as Scripture 
 may impart to ordinary readers, still what it does convey 
 may surely tend in one direction and not in another. 
 What it imparts may look towards the system of the 
 Church and of Antiquity, not oppose it. Whether it does 
 so or not, is a question of fact which must be determined 
 as facts are determined ; but here let us dwell for a moment 
 on the mere idea which I have suggested. There is no 
 reason why the Romanist should be startled at the notion. 
 Why is it more incongruous to suppose that our minds are 
 so constituted as to be sure to a certain point of the true 
 meaning of words, than that they can appreciate an argu- 
 ment ? yet Romanists do argue. If it is possible to be sure 
 of the soundness of an argument, there is perhaps.no ante- 
 cedent reason to hinder our being as sure that a text has a 
 certain sense. Men, it is granted, continually misinterpret 
 Scripture ; so are they as continually using bad arguments; 
 and, as the latter circumstance does not destroy the mind's 
 innate power of reasoning, so neither does the former show 
 it is destitute of its innate power of interpreting. Nay, 
 our adversaries themselves continually argue with indi- 
 viduals from Scripture, even in proof of this very doctrine 
 of the Church's Infallibility, which would be out of place 
 unless the passages appealed to bore their own meaning 
 with them. What I would urge upon them is this ; they 
 of course confess that the real sense of Scripture is not 
 adverse to any doctrine taught by the Church; let me 
 maintain in addition, that it is also the natural sense, as 
 separable from false interpretations by the sound-judging, 
 as a good argument is from a bad one. And as believing 
 this, we think no harm can come from putting the Scrip- 
 ture into the hands of the laity, allowing them, if they 
 will, to verify by it, as far as it extends, the doctrines they 
 have been taught already. 
 
140 ' ON THE USE OP [LECT. 
 
 11. 
 
 They will answer that all this is negatived by experience, 
 even though it be abstractedly possible ; since, in fact, the 
 general reading of the Bible has brought into our country 
 and Church all kinds of heresies and extravagances- 
 Certainly it has; but it has not been introduced under 
 those limitations and provisions, which I have mentioned 
 as necessary attendants on it, according to the scheme de- 
 signed by Providence. If Scripture reading has been the 
 cause of schism, this has been because individuals have 
 given themselves to it to the disparagement of Cod's other 
 gifts ; because they have refused to throw themselves into 
 the external system which has been provided for them, 
 because they have attempted to reason before they acted, 
 and to prove before they would consent to. be taught. If 
 it has been the cause of schism in our country, it is because 
 the Anglican Church has never had the opportunity of 
 supplying her aid which is the divinely provided comple- 
 ment of Scripture reading ; because her voice has been 
 feeble, her motions impeded, and the means withheld from 
 her of impressing upon the population her own doctrine ; 
 because the Reformation was set up in disunion, and theories 
 more Protestant than hers have, from the first, spoken 
 with her, and blended with, and sometimes drowned her 
 voice. If Scripture reading has, in England, been the 
 cause of schism, it is because we are deprived of the power 
 of excommunicating, which, in the revealed scheme, is the 
 formal antagonist and curb of Private Judgment. But 
 take a Church, nurtured and trained on the model I have 
 been proposing, claiming the obedience of its members in 
 the first instance, though laying itself open afterwards to 
 their judgment, according to their respective capabilities 
 for judging, claiming for itself that they make a generous 
 and unsuspicious trial of it before objecting to it, and able 
 to appeal confidently for its doctrines to the writings of 
 
V.] PRIVATE JUDGMENT. 141 
 
 Antiquity ; a Church which taught the Truth boldly and 
 in system, and which separated from itself or silenced those 
 who opposed it, and I believe individual members would 
 be very little perplexed ; and, if men were still found to 
 resist its doctrine, they would not be, as now, misguided 
 persons, with some good feelings, and right views, but 
 such as one should be glad to be rid of. 
 
 One chief cause of sects among us is, that the Church's 
 voice is not heard clearly and forcibly ; she does not exer- 
 cise her own right of interpreting Scripture ; she does not 
 arbitrate, decide, condemn ; she does not answer the call 
 which human nature makes upon her. That all her mem- 
 bers would in that case perfectly agree with each other, 
 or with herself, I am far from supposing; but they would 
 differ chiefly in such matters as would not forfeit their 
 membership, nor lead them to protest against the received 
 doctrine. If, even as it is, the great body of Dissenters 
 from the Church remained during the last centuries more 
 or less constant to the Creeds, except in the article which 
 was compromised in their Dissent, surely much more fully 
 and firmly would her members then abide in the funda- 
 mentals of faith, though Scripture was ever so freely put 
 into their hands. We see it so at this day. For on which 
 side is the most lack at this moment ? in the laity in 
 believing ? or the Church in teaching ? Are not the laity 
 everywhere willing to treat their pastors with becoming 
 respect ; nay so to follow their guidance as to take up 
 their particular views, according as they may be of a 
 Catholic or private character, in this or that place ? Is 
 there any doubt at all that the laity would think alike, if 
 the Clergy did ? and is there any doubt that the Clergy 
 would think alike, as far as the formal expression of their 
 faith went, if they had their views cleared by a theological 
 education, and moulded on a knowledge of Antiquity ? 
 We have no need to grudge our people the religious use 
 
142 ON THE USE OF [LECT. 
 
 of Private Judgment ; we need not distrust their affection, 
 we have but to blame our own waverings and differences. 
 
 12. 
 
 The free reading of Scripture, I say, when the other 
 parts of the Divine System are duly fulfilled, would lead, 
 at most, to diversities of opinion only in the adjuncts and 
 details of faith, not in fundamentals. Men differ from 
 each other at present, first from the influence of the false 
 theories of Private Judgment which are among us, and 
 which mislead them ; next from the want of external guid- 
 ance. They are enjoined as a matter of duty, nay of 
 necessity, to examine and decide for themselves, and the 
 Church but faintly protests against this proceeding, or 
 supersedes the need of it. Truth has a force which error 
 cannot counterfeit ; and the Church, speaking out that 
 Truth, as committed to her, would cause a corresponding 
 vibration in Holy Scripture, such as no other notes, how- 
 ever loudly sounded, can draw from it. If, after all, per- 
 sons arose, as they would arise, disputing against the 
 fundamentals, or separating on minor points, let them go 
 their way ; " they went out from us, because they were 
 not of us." They would commonly be " men of corrupt 
 minds, reprobate concerning the faith •" 3 I do not say 
 there never could be any other, but for such extraordinary 
 cases no system can provide. If there were among them 
 better men, who, though educated in the Truth, ultimately 
 opposed it openly, they, as well as others, would be put out 
 of the Church for their error's sake, and for their contu- 
 macy ; and God, who alone sees the hearts of men, and 
 how mysteriously good and evil are mingled together in 
 this world, would provide in His own inscrutable way for 
 anomalies which His revealed system did not meet. 
 
 I consider then, on the whole, that however difficult it 
 
 3 2 Tira. Hi. 8. 
 
V.] PRIVATE JUDGMENT. 143 
 
 may be in theory to determine when it is that we must go 
 by our own view of Scripture, and when by the decision of 
 the Church, yet in practice there would be little or no 
 difficulty at all. Without claiming infallibility, the Church 
 may claim the confidence and obedience of her members ; 
 Scripture may be read without tending to schism ; minor 
 differences allowed, without disagreement in fundamentals; 
 and the proud and self-willed disputant discarded without 
 the perplexed inquirer suffering. If there is schism among 
 us, it is not that Scripture speaks variously, but that the 
 Church of the day speaks not at all ; not that Private 
 Judgment is rebellious, but that the Church's judgment 
 is withheld. 4 
 
 13. 
 I do really believe that, with more of primitive simpli- 
 city and of rational freedom, and far more of Gospel truth 
 than in Roman system, there would be found, in the rule 
 of Private Judgment, as I have described it, as much cer- 
 tainty as the doctrine of Infallibility can give. As ample 
 provision would be made both for the comfort of the in- 
 dividual, and for the peace and unity of the body ; which 
 are the two objects for which Pome professes to consult. 
 The claim of Infallibility is but an expedient for im- 
 pressing strongly upon the mind the necessity of hear- 
 ing and obeying the Church. When scrutinized care- 
 fully, it will be found to contribute nothing whatever to- 
 wards satisfying the reason, as was observed before ; since 
 it is as difficult to prove and bring home to the mind that 
 the Church is infallible, as that the doctrines she teaches 
 are true. Nothing, then, is gained in the way of convic- 
 tion ; only of impression, — and, again, of expedition, it 
 being less trouble to accept one doctrine on which all the 
 
 * [This is a plausible theory. The question is whether it would work. 
 The author confesses in various places of his volume it has not been carried 
 
 out intu act anywhere yet.] 
 
144 ON THE USE OF PEIVATE JUDGMENT. [LECT. V. 
 
 others are to depend, than a number. Now this impres- 
 siveness and practical perspicuity in teaching, as far as 
 these objects are lawful and salutary, may, I say, be gained 
 without this claim ; they may be gained in God's way, 
 without unwarranted additions to the means of influence 
 which He has ordained, without a tenet, fictitious in itself, 
 and, as falsehood ever will be, deplorable in many ways 
 in its results. 5 
 
 5 [Is this Lecture written in the tone of" Antiquity " ? "Jesus Christ," 
 says Ignatius, "is the mind of the Father; the Bishops appointed even to 
 the utmost bounds of the earth, are after the mind of Jesus Christ, wherefore, 
 it will become you to concur in the mind of your Bishop." Tertullian : 
 " [Heretics] put forward the Scriptures, accordingly we oppose them in 
 this point above others, viz. not admitting them to any discussion of the 
 Scriptures." " The successors of the Apostles," says Irenseus, " guard our 
 faith, and expound for us the Scriptures without peril." " Does a man 
 think himself with Christ," says Cyprian, « who strives against the Christian 
 Priesthood, and separates himself from the concourse of Christ's clergy and 
 people ? He is bearing arms against the Church, setting at nought the 
 Bishops and despising the Priests of his God." " It is necessary," says 
 Vincent, " in order to avoid the labyrinth of error, to direct the lines of 
 interpretation, both as to Prophets and Apostles, according to the sense of 
 the Church and Catholic world." And so on ad infinitum. To the Fathers 
 the idea of private judgment, and private judgment on Scripture, suggests 
 itself only to be condemned.] 
 
LECTURE VI. 
 
 ON THE ABUSE OF PRIVATE JUDGMENT. 
 
 I must not quit the subject of Private Judgment, without 
 some remarks on the popular view of it ; which is as 
 follows, — that every Christian has the right of making up 
 his mind for himself what he is to believe, from personal 
 and private study of the Scriptures. This, I suppose, is 
 the fairest account to give of it ; though sometimes Private 
 Judgment is considered rather as the necessary duty than 
 the privilege of the Christian, and a slur is cast upon here- 
 ditary religion, as worthless or absurd ; and much is said 
 in praise of independence of mind, free inquiry, the re- 
 solution to judge for ourselves, and the enlightened and 
 spiritual temper which these things are supposed to pro- 
 duce. But this notion is so very preposterous, there is 
 something so very strange and wild in maintaining that 
 every individual Christian, rich and poor, learned and un- 
 learned, young and old, in order to have an intelligent faith, 
 must have formally examined, deliberated, and passed sen- 
 tence upon the meaning of Scripture for himself, and that 
 in the highest and most delicate and mysterious matters of 
 faith, that I am unable either to discuss or even to impute 
 such an opinion to another, in spite of the large and 
 startling declarations which men make on the subject. 
 Rather let us consider what is called the right of Private 
 Judgment; by which is meant, not that all must, but that 
 
 VOL. I. L 
 
Ii6 ON THE ABUSE OF [LECT. 
 
 all may search Scripture, and determine or prove their 
 Creed from it : — that is, provided they are duly qualified, 
 for I suppose this is always implied, though persons may 
 differ what the qualifications are. And with this limita- 
 tion, I should be as willing as the most zealous Protestant 
 to allow the principle of Private Judgment in the abstract; 
 and it is something to agree with opponents even in an 
 abstract principle. 
 
 2. 
 
 At the same time, to speak correctly, there seems a still 
 more advisable mode of speaking of Private Judgment, 
 than either of those which have been mentioned. It is 
 not the duty of all Christians, nor the right of all who are 
 qualified, so much as the duty of all who are qualified ; 
 and as such it was spoken of in the last Lecture. How- 
 ever, whether it be a duty or a right, let us consider what 
 the qualifications are for exercising it. 
 
 To take the extreme case : inability to read will be 
 granted to be an obstacle in the exercise of it ; that is, a 
 necessary obstacle to a certain extent, for more need not 
 be assumed, and perhaps will not be conceded by all. 
 But there are other impediments, less obvious, indeed, but 
 quite as serious. I shall instance two principal ones ; first, 
 prejudice, in the large sense of the word, whether right or 
 wrong prejudice, and whether true or false in its matter, — 
 and secondly, inaccuracy of mind. And first of the latter. 
 
 3. 
 1. The task proposed is such as this, — to determine 
 first, whether Scripture sets forth any dogmatic faith at 
 all ; next, if so, what it is ; then, if it be necessary for sal- 
 vation ; then, what are its doctrines in particular ; then, 
 what is that exact idea of each, which is the essence of 
 each and its saving principle. I say its exact idea, for a 
 
VI.] PEIVATE JUDGMENT. 147 
 
 man may think he holds (for instance) the doctrine of the 
 Atonement; but, when examined, may be convicted of 
 having quite mistaken the meaning of the word. This 
 being considered, I think it will be granted me, by the 
 most zealous opponent, that the mass of Christians are 
 inadequate to such a task ; I mean, that, supposing the 
 Gospel be dogmatic, for that I am here assuming, sup- 
 posing it be of the nature of the Articles of the Creed, 
 or the Thirty- Nine Articles, the greater number even of 
 educated persons have not the accuracy of mind requisite 
 for determining it. The only question is, whether any 
 accurate Creed is necessary for the private Christian "; 
 which orthodox Protestants have always answered in the 
 affirmative. Consider, then, the orthodox Protestant 
 doctrines ; those relating to the Divine Nature, and the 
 Economy of Redemption ; or those, again, arising out of 
 the controversy with Rome, and let me ask the popular 
 religionist, — Do you really mean to say, that men and 
 women, as we find them in life, are able to deduce these 
 doctrines from Scripture, to determine how far Scripture 
 goes in implying them, to decide upon the exact force of 
 its terms, and the danger of this or that deviation from 
 them ? What even is so special, in the mass of men, as the 
 power of stating any simple matter of fact as they 
 witnessed it ? How rarely do their words run with their 
 memory, or their memory with the thing in question ! 
 With what difficulty is a speaker or a writer understood 
 by them, if he puts forward anything new or recondite ! 
 What mistakes are ever circulating through society about 
 the tenets of individuals of whatever cast of opinion ! 
 What interminable confusions and misunderstandings in 
 controversy are there between the most earnest men ! 
 What questions of words instead of things. 
 
 4. 
 View the state of the case in detail. For instance : 
 
 L 
 
 9 
 
148 ON THE ABUSE OF [LECT. 
 
 let it be proposed to one of the common run of men, 
 however pious and well-meaning, to determine what is the 
 true Scripture doctrine about original sin, whether Adam's 
 sin is or is not imputed and how ; or again, about the Holy 
 Eucharist, how to interpret our Lord's words concerning 
 it ; or again, whether we are justified by works, or by 
 faith, or by faith only : what answer can he be expected to 
 give ? If it be said, in answer, that he may gain religious 
 impressions and practical guidance from Scripture, without 
 being able to solve these questions, I grant that this, thank 
 God, is, through His blessing, abundantly possible ; but 
 the question is, whether Gospel doctrine, the special "form 
 of sound words " which is called the Faith, whatever it be, 
 can be so ascertained. I say " whatever it be," for it 
 matters not here whether it be long or short, intricate or 
 simple ; if there be but one proposition, one truth 
 categorically stated, such as, iC Prayers to good men de- 
 parted are unlawful," or " we are justified by faith only," 
 I say this is enough to put the problem of proving it l from 
 Scripture beyond the capacity of so considerable a number 
 of persons, that the right of Private Judgment will be con- 
 fined to what is called in this world's matters, an exclusive 
 body, or will be a monopoly. And I repeat, it does seem 
 as if reflecting men must grant as much as this ; only, 
 rather than admit the conclusion, to which it leads, they 
 will deny that the Gospel need be conveyed in any but 
 popular statements, it being (as they would urge), a matter 
 of the heart, not of creeds, not of niceties of words, not of 
 doctrines necessary to be believed in order to salvation. 
 They would maintain that it was enough to accept Christ 
 
 1 [Or inferring it. Categorical statements of fact can be understood by 
 the least cultivated mind ; I mean such as " Christ is God ;" " The Church 
 is the Teacher of her children;" " The Church is the Ark of Salvation;" 
 '•'Sinners are sentenced to hell," &c, whereas to prove or to deduce such 
 truths from Scripture may require various gifts o' intellect.] 
 
VI.] PRIVATE JUDGMENT. 149 
 
 as a Saviour, and to act upon the belief ; and this, they 
 would say, might be obtained from Scripture by any 
 earnest mind. 
 
 5. 
 Here then it will be asked me in turn, whether there 
 is not a great number of Christians who on either suppo- 
 sition, whether the creed is given them by the Church, or 
 whether they have to find it in Scripture for themselves, 
 yet cannot get beyond that vague notion of the Gospel 
 which has just been mentioned. I do grant it ; but then 
 I maintain, that whereas every Christian is bound to have 
 as accurate notions as he can, many a man is capable of 
 receiving more accurate and complete notions than he can 
 gather for himself from the Bible. It is one thing to 
 apprehend the Catholic doctrines ; quite another to ascer- 
 tain how and where they are implied in Scripture. Most 
 men of fair education can understand the sacred doctrine 
 debated at Nicea, as fully as a professed theologian ; but 
 few have minds tutored into patient inquiry, attention, and 
 accuracy sufficient to deduce it aright from Scripture. 
 Scripture is .not so clear — in God's providential arrange- 
 ment, to which we submit — as to hinder ordinary persons, 
 who read it for themselves, from being Sabellians, or 
 Independents, or Wesleyans. I do not deny, I earnestly 
 maintain, that orthodoxy in its fullest range is the one 
 and only sense of Scripture; nor do I say that Scripture 
 is not distinct enough to keep the multitude from certain 
 gross forms of heterodoxy, as Socinianism; nor do I 
 presume to limit what God will do in extraordinary cases ; 
 much less do I deny that Scripture will place any earnest 
 inquirer in that position of mind which will cause him to 
 embrace the Catholic creed, when offered to him, as the real 
 counterpart and complement of the view which Scripture 
 has given him ; but I deny that the mass of Christians, 
 
150 ON THE ABUSE OP [LECT. 
 
 perusing the Scripture merely by themselves, will have 
 that nice and delicate critical power which will secure 
 them from Sabellianism in Germany or America, from 
 Pelagianism in Geneva, or from undervaluing the 
 Sacraments in Scotland. All that can be objected is that 
 Sabellianism, and Pelagianism, and low notions of the 
 Sacraments, are not injurious, where the heart is warm and 
 the feelings (what is improperly called) spiritual. 
 
 6. 
 
 But it may be said that at least the common run of 
 people can see what is not in Scripture, whatever be their 
 defect of accuracy ; and that thus in a Roman Catholic 
 country they may obtain clear views of the Gospel from 
 Scripture, when the Church has corrupted it. To a certain 
 point they may ; but an accuracy, which they have not, 
 will be necessary to teach them where to stop in their 
 retrenchments of faith. What is to secure their stopping 
 at the very point we wish ? Is all that really is contained 
 in Scripture clearly stated, and may all that is but implied 
 be rejected ? What is to hinder the multitude of men 
 who have been allowed to reject the doctrine of Transub- 
 stantiation because they do not find it in Scripture, from 
 rejecting, also, the divinity of the Holy Ghost, because He 
 is nowhere plainly called God, whereas the consecrated 
 Bread is called Christ's Body ? No ; such Private Judg- 
 ment is a weapon which destroys error by the sacrifice of 
 truth. 
 
 From all this I conclude that persons who maintain 
 that the mass of Christians are bound to draw the 
 orthodox faith for themselves from Scripture, hold an 
 unreal doctrine, and are in a false position ; that, to be 
 consistent, they must go further one way or the other, 
 either cease to think orthodoxy necessary, or allow it to 
 be taught them. 
 
VI.] PRIVATE JUDGMENT. 151 
 
 7. 
 2. In the next place, let us consider what force 
 prepossessions have in disqualifying us from searching 
 Scripture dispassionately for ourselves. The multitude of 
 men are hindered from forming their own views of 
 doctrine, not only from the peculiar structure of the 
 sacred Volume, but from the external bias which they 
 ever receive from education and other causes. Without 
 proving the influence of prejudice, which would be 
 superfluous, let us consider some of the effects of it. For 
 instance; one man sees the doctrine of absolute predes- 
 tination in Scripture so clearly, as he considers, that he 
 makes it almost an article of saving faith ; another thinks 
 it a most dangerous error. One man maintains, that the 
 civil establishment of religion is commanded in Scripture, 
 another that it is condemned by it. One man sees in 
 Scripture the three evangelical Councils, another thinks 
 them a device of the evil one. Such instances do not 
 show that Scripture has no one certain meaning, but that it 
 is not so distinct and prominent, as to force itself upon the 
 minds of the many against their various prejudices. Nor 
 do they prove that all prejudice is wrong; but that some 
 particular prejudices are not true; and that, since it is 
 impossible to be without some or other, it is expedient to 
 impress the mind with that which is true ; that is, with 
 the faith taught by the Church Catholic, and ascertainable 
 as matter of fact beyond the influence of prejudice. 
 
 Again : take the explanations in detail given by Pro- 
 testants of particular texts of Scripture ; they will be found 
 to involve an inconsistency and want of intelligible prin- 
 ciple, which shows how impossible it is for the mass of men 
 to contemplate Scripture without imparting to it the 
 colouring which they themselves have received in the 
 
152 ON THE ABUSE OP [LECT. 
 
 course of their education. Nothing is more striking, in 
 popular interpretations and discussions, than the amplitude 
 of meaning which is sometimes allowed to the sacred text, 
 compared with its assumed narrowness at other times. In 
 some places it is liberally opened, at others it is kept close 
 shut ; sometimes a single word is developed into an argu- 
 ment, at another it is denied to mean anything specific 
 and definite, anything but what is accidental and transient. 
 At times the commentator is sensitively alive to the most 
 distant allusions, at times he is impenetrable to any ; at 
 times he decides that the sacred text is figurative, at 
 other times only literal ; — without any assignable reason 
 except that the particular religious persuasion to which he 
 belongs requires such inconsistency. For instance, when 
 Christ said to the Apostles, " Drink ye all of this," He 
 is considered to imply that all the laity should partake 
 the cup : yet, when He said to them, " I am with 
 you always," He spoke to the original Apostles, exclu- 
 sively of their successors in the ministry. When St. Paul 
 speaks of "the man of sin," he meant a succession of sin- 
 ners ; but when Christ said, " I give unto thee the keys of 
 the kingdom of heaven," He does not mean a line of 
 Peters. When St. Paul says of the Old Testament, " All 
 Scripture is given by inspiration of God," he includes the 
 New ; yet when he says, " We are come to the city of the 
 Living God," he does not include the Church militant. 
 " A fountain shall be opened for sin," does not prove bap- 
 tismal grace; but " Christ is unto us righteousness," proves 
 that He fulfils the law instead of us. "The fire must 
 prove every man's work," is said to be a figure; yet, "Let 
 no man judge you in meats and drinks," is to be taken to 
 the letter as an argument against fasting. " Do this in 
 remembrance of Me," is to be understood as a command; 
 but, " Ye also ought to wash one another's feet," is not a 
 command. " Let no man judge you in respect of a holy- 
 
VI.] PEIVATE JUDGMENT. 153 
 
 day, or of the Sabbath-days/' is an argument, not indeed 
 against the Sabbath, but certainly against holy days. 
 " Search the Scriptures/' is an argument for Scripture 
 being the rule of faith ; but " hold the Traditions/' is no 
 argument in favour of Tradition. " Forbidding to marry" 
 is a proof that Rome is Antichrist ; but, " It is good for a 
 man not to marry/' is no argument in favour of celibacy. 
 The Sermon on the Mount contains no direction for Pro- 
 testants to fast; but the second Commandment is plainly 
 against Image Worship. The Romanist in using prayers 
 in an unknown tongue is guilty of disobeying St. Paul ; 
 but the Protestant, in teaching justification by faith only, 
 is not guilty of at once garbling St. Paul and contradict- 
 ing St. James. 
 
 9. 
 Let me not be supposed to imply that all these interpre- 
 tations are equally true or equally false ; that some are not 
 false and others not true; it will be plain to any one who 
 examines them that this is not my meaning. I am but 
 showing the extreme inconsistency which is found in the 
 popular mode of interpreting Scripture; — men profess to 
 explain Scripture by itself and by reason, yet go by no rule, 
 nor can give any account of their mode of proceeding. They 
 take the most difficult points for granted, and say they 
 go by common sense when they really go by prejudice. 
 Doubtless Scripture is sometimes literal and sometimes 
 figurative ; it need not be literal here, because it is literal 
 there; but, in many cases, the only way of determining 
 when it is one and when the other, is to see how the early 
 Church understood it. This is the Anglo- Catholic prin- 
 ciple ; we do not profess to judge of Scripture in greater 
 matters by itself, but by means of an external guide. But 
 the popular religion of the day does ; and it finds itself 
 unequal to its profession. It rebels against the voice of 
 
154 ON THE ABUSE OF [lECT. 
 
 Antiquity, and becomes the victim of prejudice and a slave 
 to Traditions of men. It interprets Scripture in a spirit 
 of caprice, which might be made, and is made by others, to 
 prove Romanism quite as well. And from all this I infer, 
 not that Scripture has no one meaning in matters of doc- 
 trine, or that we do not know it, or that a man of high 
 qualifications may not elicit it, but that the mass of men, 
 if left to themselves, will not possess the faculty of reading 
 it naturally and truly. 
 
 10. 
 But more may be said in illustration of this subject. It 
 is very observable how a latent prejudice can act in obscur- 
 ing or rather annihilating certain passages of Scripture in 
 the mental vision, which are ever so prominently presented 
 to the bodily eyes. For instance, a man perhaps is in the 
 habit of reading* Scripture for years, and has no impression 
 whatever produced on his mind by such portions of it as 
 speak of God's free grace, and the need of spiritual aid. 
 These are at length suddenly and forcibly brought home to 
 him ; and then perhaps he changes his religious views alto- 
 gether, and declares that Scripture has hitherto been to him 
 nothing better than a sealed book. What security has he 
 that in certain other respects it is not still hidden from him, 
 as it was heretofore as regards the portions which have 
 now unsettled him ? Anglican divines will consider him 
 still dark on certain other points of Scripture doctrine. 
 Or, again, I would ask him what satisfactory sense he puts 
 to our Lord's words, " Verily, thou shalt in nowise come 
 out thence till thou hast paid the very last farthing "? or, 
 1 ' Stand fast and hold the Traditions " ? or, " Let them 
 pray over them, anointing them with oil in the name of 
 the Lord " ? and whether a Roman Catholic might not as 
 fairly accuse him of neglecting these texts still, as he at 
 present considers certain other texts, to which he was 
 before blind, the sum and substance of his religion ? 
 
VI.]' PE1VATE JUDGMENT. 155 
 
 11. 
 
 Or, to take another and more painful illustration. The 
 (so-called) Unitarians explain away the most explicit texts 
 in behalf of our Lord's divinity. These texts do not affect 
 them at all. Let us consider how this is. When we 
 come to inquire, we find that they have a preconceived 
 notion in their minds that the substance of the Gospel lies 
 in the doctrine of the Resurrection. This doctrine is their 
 Christianity, their orthodoxy ; it contains in it, as they 
 think, the essence of the Revelation. When then they 
 come to the texts in question, such as " Christ, who is over 
 all, God, blessed for ever;" or, "The Word was God;" 
 they have beforehand made up their minds, that, whatever 
 these words mean, they can have no important meaning, 
 because they do not refer to the Resurrection ; for that 
 alone they will allow to be important. So, when they 
 are pressed with some such text in argument, they are 
 annoyed indeed at having to explain what it means, when 
 they cannot satisfactorily ; yet without feeling shame or 
 misgiving at its appearing to tell against them. Rather, 
 they think the objection idle, — not serious, but trouble- 
 some. It is in their view almost as if we asked them the 
 meaning of any merely obscure passage, such as "baptizing 
 for the dead ;" and would not let them read the chapter 
 through in which it occurs, till they had explained it. In 
 such a case they would of course urge that we were acting 
 very unfairly ; that, when the drift of the whole was so 
 plain, it was mere trifling to stop them at one half sen- 
 tence, which after all they were ready to confess they did 
 not understand. This is what they actually do feel to- 
 wards the solemn texts lately cited. They consider them 
 obscurities ; they avow they do not understand them ; and 
 they boldly ask, what then ? that they are but a few words, 
 half a sentence perhaps, in a chapter otherwise clear and 
 
156 ON THE ABUSE OP [LECT. 
 
 connected; and they do not feel themselves bound down 
 to explain every phrase or word of Scripture which may 
 meet them. If then, at any time, they undertake to ex- 
 plain them, it is not as if they laid any particular stress on 
 their own explanations. They are not confident, they 
 are not careful, about their correctness ; they do not 
 mind altering them. They put forward whatever will 
 stop or embarrass their opponent, nothing more. They 
 use some anomalous criticism, or alter the stopping, or 
 amend the text, and all because they have made up their 
 minds already what the Gospel is, that some other doc- 
 trine is the whole of it, and that in consequence the ques- 
 tion in dispute is very unimportant. 
 
 12. 
 Is this state of mind incredible ? Yet, from whatever 
 cause, these persons undeniably do contrive to blind 
 themselves to what Scripture says concerning the Trinity 
 and Incarnation, which is all that concerns us here. It 
 shows that Scripture does not teach doctrine as the 
 Athanasian Creed teaches it; the prejudices which misin- 
 terpret the one, cannot succeed in misinterpreting the 
 other. But after all it is not so incredible, ourselves 
 being witnesses ; as will directly appear. As Socinians 
 take the Resurrection to be the whole of the Gospel, so do 
 others take the Atonement to be the whole of it. This 
 sacred truth is most essential, as essential as the Resur- 
 rection, but it is nowhere said to be the whole of Christian 
 doctrine ; nowhere is it so presented to us as to sanction 
 us in neglecting the rest. Yet such is the view taken of it 
 by many in this day, who, abhorring, as they ought, the 
 creed of Socinians, agree with them as far as this, viz. in 
 indulging certain theories and prejudices of their own, 
 making, as they do, the doctrine of the Atonement not 
 only an essential but the whole of the Gospel. This then 
 
VI.] PKIVATE JUDGMENT. 157 
 
 is their orthodoxy. For instance ; St. Paul says, ee God was 
 manifested in the flesh ; " Socinians pass over these words, 
 or explain them anyhow ; but what are the words, imme- 
 diately before them ? They stand thus : " The Church 
 of the living God, the pillar and ground of the Truth/' 
 Now, I do not ask what these words mean ; I do not ask in 
 what sense the Church is a pillar; but merely this, — has 
 not many a man who calls himself orthodox, and is ortho- 
 dox so far as not to be a Sociniau, passed over these words 
 again and again, either not noticing them or not thinking- 
 it mattered whether he understood them or not ? And 
 when his attention is called to them, is he not impatient 
 and irritated, rather than perplexed ; fully confident that 
 they mean nothing of consequence, yet feeling he is bound 
 in fairness to attempt some explanation of them? and 
 does he not in consequence drive to and fro, as if to burst 
 the net in which he finds himself, giving first one solution 
 of the difficulty, then another, altering the stopping, or 
 glossing over the phrase, as will most readily answer his 
 immediate purpose? And so, in like manner, many a 
 man insists on the words, u Thou art the Christ, the Son 
 of the Living God," who will not go on to our Lord's 
 answer, " Thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build 
 My Church." Let us, then, no longer wonder at Socinians : 
 the mass of Christians bring their prejudices and impres- 
 sions to the written word, as well as they, and find it 
 easier to judge of the text by the spontaneous operation of 
 habit and inclination, than by the active and independent 
 exercise of their reason; in other words, they think 
 inaccurately ; they judge and feel by prejudice. 
 
 13. 
 Here then we have two serious disqualifications in the 
 case of the multitude of men, which must discourage those 
 who are in any measure humble and cautious, from 
 
158 ON THE ABUSE OP [LECT. 
 
 attempting to rely on their own unassisted powers in inter- 
 preting Scripture, if they can avoid it. Scripture is not 
 so distinct in its announcements, as readers are morally or 
 intellectually slow in receiving them. And if any one 
 thinks that this avowal is derogatory to Scripture, I 
 answer that Scripture was never intended to teach doctrine 
 to the many ; and if it was not given with this object, it 
 argues no imperfection in it that it does not fulfil it. 
 
 I repeat it ; while Scripture is written by inspired men, 
 with one and one only view of doctrine in their hearts and 
 thoughts, even the Truth which was from the beginning, 
 yet being written not to instruct in doctrine, but for those 
 who were already instructed in it, not with direct announce- 
 ments but with intimations and implications of the faith, 
 the qualifications for rightly apprehending it are so rare 
 and high, that a prudent man, to say nothing of piety, will 
 not risk his salvation on the chance of his having them ; 
 but will read it with the aid of those subsidiary guides 
 which ever have been supplied as if to meet our need. I 
 would not deny as an abstract proposition that a Christian 
 may gain the whole truth from the Scriptures, but would 
 maintain that the chances are very seriously against a 
 given individual. I would not deny, rather I maintain 
 that a religious, wise, and intellectually gifted man will 
 succeed : but who answers to this description but the 
 collective Church? There, indeed such qualifications 
 might be supposed to exist; what is wanting in one 
 member being supplied by another, and the opposite errors 
 of individuals eliminated by their combination. The 
 Church Catholic may be truly said almost infallibly to 
 interpret Scripture aright, though from the possession of 
 past tradition, and amid the divisions of the time present, 
 perhaps at no period in the course of the Dispensation has 
 she had the need and the opportunity of interpreting it for 
 herself. Neither would I deny that individuals, whether 
 
VI.] PRIVATE JUDGMENT. 159 
 
 from height of holiness, clearness of intellectual vision, or 
 the immediate power of the Holy Ghost, have been and 
 are able to penetrate through the sacred text into some 
 portions of the divine system beyond, without external 
 help from tradition, authority of doctors, and theology ; 
 though since that help has ever been given, as to the 
 Church, so to the individual, it is difficult to prove that 
 the individual has performed what the Church has 
 never attempted. None, however, it would seem, but a 
 complete and accurately moulded Christian, such as the 
 world has never or scarcely seen, would be able to bring 
 out harmoniously and perspicuously the divine characters 
 in full, which lie hid from mortal eyes within the inspired 
 letter of the revelation. And this, by the way, may be 
 taken as one remarkable test, or at least characteristic of 
 error, in the various denominations of religion which 
 surround us ; none of them embraces the whole Bible, none 
 of them is able to interpret the whole, none of them has a 
 key which will revolve through the entire compass of the 
 wards which lie within. Each has its favourite text, and 
 neglects the rest. None can solve the great secret and 
 utter the mystery of its pages. One makes trial, then 
 another : but one and all in turn are foiled. They retire, 
 as the sages of Babylon, and make way for Daniel. The 
 Church Catholic, the true Prophet of God, alone is able to 
 tell the dream and its interpretation. 
 
 14. 
 3. But it may be objected that full justice has not yet 
 been done to the arguments in behalf of the popular 
 religion. A widely extended shape of Protestantism in 
 this country, and that which professes to be the most 
 religious of all, maintains that, though Scripture may seem 
 to mean anything in matters of faith to unassisted reason, 
 yet that under the guidance of divine illumination it speaks 
 
160 ON THE ABUSE OF [LECT. 
 
 but one doctrine, and is thus the instrument of the Holy 
 Ghost in converting the soul. Starting from this funda- 
 mental article, its advocates speak as follows : — that 
 Scripture is the only divine instrument given us; that 
 everything else is human ; that the Church is human ; 
 that rites and sacraments are human; that teachers are 
 human ; that the Fathers are but fallible men ; that creeds 
 and confessions, primitive faith, Apostolical Traditions, are 
 human systems, and doctrines of men ; that there is no 
 need of proving this in particular instances, because it is 
 an elementary principle, which holds good of them all ; 
 and that till we acknowledge and accept this principle we 
 are still in the flesh. It follows that to inquire about the 
 early Church, the consent of Fathers, uninterrupted testi- 
 monies, or the decisions of Councils, to inquire when the 
 Church first became corrupt, or to make the early 
 writers a comment upon the inspired text, are but 
 melancholy and pernicious follies. The Church, according 
 to this view of it, is not, and never was, more than a col- 
 lection of individuals. Some of those individuals have, in 
 every age, been through God's mercy spiritually enlightened, 
 and may have shed a radiance round them, and influenced 
 the Christian body even for ages after them ; but, true reli- 
 gion being always rare, and the many being always evil, an 
 appeal lies as little with Antiquity as with modern times. 
 The Apostolic Church was not better than the present, nor 
 is of more weight and authority ; it was a human system, 
 and an aggregate of fallible men, and such is the length and 
 the breadth of the whole matter. In the eyes of such re- 
 ligionists the very subject of these Lectures is irrelevant 
 and nugatory, and the time and attention required to hear 
 or to write them are but squandered upon earthly subjects, 
 which supply no food for the hungry soul, no light for 
 the wandering feet, no stay or consolation in the hour of 
 death or the day of judgment. 
 
VI.] PRIVATE JUDGMENT. 161 
 
 15. 
 
 I suppose this is, on the whole, a fair view of what 
 many thousands alas ! of serious and well-meaning persons 
 hold at this present time among us, and with so firm a con- 
 viction that they are right, as to believe that no one is a 
 real Christian who does not assent to it, and that no one 
 can have once seen and acknowledged it, but must for ever 
 profess it as something more heavenly and comfortable 
 than any doctrine he ever maintained before. And this 
 belief, which their conduct evidences, perhaps accounts for 
 the state in which they leave the theory in question, which 
 is as follows. — It is perfect as a theory ; I mean, it is con- 
 sistent with itself, it being quite conceivable that Provi- 
 dence might have acted in the way it represents, might have 
 called the predestined few, or tried the earnestness of all, 
 by what is at first sight a various and intricate volume. 
 But secondly, I observe that, whether if be true or false, 
 no part of the foregoing account tends towards the proof of 
 it, nor is any serious attempt made that way by its advo- 
 cates. As Baptismal grace is supposed by Roman Catholics 
 to convey to individuals the evidence of their Church's 
 Infallibility, so a similar divine influence, but not in Bap- 
 tism, is supposed, according to this popular form of 
 Protestantism, to assure the soul without proof that the 
 Bible is the only instrument of divine knowledge. 
 
 16. 
 The only semblance of argument of any kind in this 
 doctrinal theory, as above drawn out, lies in this, that, the 
 majority being always evil, its assent to certain points of 
 faith is no presumption of their truth. Something has 
 been said in former Lectures which will serve to explain 
 this objection, and something will be said in one soon to 
 follow. Here, fully acknowledging that the many are 
 bad, I will but observe that they may witness for truth and 
 
 VOL. I. m 
 
162 ON THE ABUSE OF [LECT. 
 
 yet act against it. Surely it is the very characteristic of 
 the world, that it kills the Prophets of God and builds their 
 sepulchres, — the very charge against it that " knowing 
 the judgment of God, that they which commit such things 
 are worthy of death," yet it " not only does the same, but 
 has pleasure in them that practise them ;" and this incon- 
 sistency in its conduct was never considered to interfere 
 with the value of its witness. When men witness against 
 themselves, this surely affords no presumption that they 
 witness falsely. Does "the corruption that is in the 
 world through lust " invalidate or strengthen its unani- 
 mous testimony to the being of a moral Governor and 
 Judge, and again to the sovereignty of the moral law and 
 to the guilt and pollution of sin ? Surely then the con- 
 cordant assent of Christendom to doctrines so severe and 
 high as the Christian Mysteries, is no slight argument in 
 favour of their Apostolic origin. Is there anything in the 
 doctrine of the Trinity to flatter human pride ? or in that 
 of the Incarnation to encourage carnal tastes and appetites? 
 or in that of the Spirit's abidance within us to make us 
 easy and irreverent ? or in the Atonement to make us 
 think lightly of sin ? Fallible men then may convey truth 
 infallible ; human systems may be instruments of heaven. 
 And he who feels his ignorance will seek for light wherever 
 he can obtain it ; he will not prescribe rules to God's 
 providence ; he will not say, " Instruct me by inspired 
 oracles or not at all." If indeed full information had been 
 promised to individuals from private study of the text of 
 the Scriptures, this indeed might be a reason for dispensing 
 with Antiquity, whatever was its value. But even could 
 it be proved without value, as fully as the persons in ques- 
 tion desire, still it must be recollected this would not go one 
 step towards proving that such a promise of guidance from 
 reading Scripture has been given ; and it happens most 
 remarkably, as I have already hinted, that satisfied, I sup- 
 
VI.] PRTVATE JUDGMENT. 163 
 
 pose, with the simplicity of their theory, they have chiefly 
 employed themselves in assailing the Christian Fathers, 
 without proving what far more nearly concerns them, their 
 own doctrine, that Scripture is sufficient for teaching the 
 faith ; which failing, the Fathers are their sole, even 
 though an insufficient resource. To maintain that the 
 Fathers cannot be trusted, does not prove that one's own 
 private judgment can ; positive reasons are necessary for so 
 serious a claim ; let us then, in conclusion, review the chief 
 arguments, if they must so be called, adducible in defence 
 of this main principle of popular Protestantism. 
 
 17. 
 Now, if its advocates are asked on what grounds they 
 conceive that Scripture is, under God's grace, the one 
 ordained informant in saving truth, I suppose they will 
 refer to such texts as our Lord's words to the Jews, " Search 
 the Scriptures •" or to St. Paul's, " All Scripture is given 
 by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for 
 reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, 
 that the man of God may be perfect, throughly furnished 
 unto all good works ;" or to St. Luke's account of Christ's 
 " opening the understanding" of His Apostles, " that they 
 might understand the Scriptures;" or to St. James's telling- 
 us " to ask wisdom of God, who giveth liberally ;" or to our 
 Lord's assurance, " Ask, and it shall be given you ;" or 
 to St. Paul's statement, that " the natural man receiveth 
 not the things of the Spirit of God;" or to our Lord's 
 promise to the twelve, that the Holy Ghost the Com- 
 forter " should guide them into all truth ;" or to the 
 prophet Isaiah's prediction, " All thy children shall be 
 taught of the Lord;" or to St. John's declaration, "Ye 
 have an unction from the Holy One, and ye know all 
 things." Yet after all, can any one text be produced, 
 or any comparison of texts, to establish the very point 
 
 m 2 
 
164 ON THE ABUSE OP [LECT. 
 
 in hand, that Scripture is the sole necessary instrument 
 of the Holy Ghost in guiding the individual Christian 
 into saving truth ? for it may be very true that we 
 ought to search the Scriptures, and true that Scripture 
 contains all saving doctrine, and is able to make us wise 
 unto salvation, and true that we cannot understand it with- 
 out the Holy Spirit, and true that the Holy Spirit is given 
 to all who ask, and true that all perfect Christians do 
 understand it, and yet there may not be such connexion 
 between these separate propositions as to make it true 
 that men are led by the Holy Spirit into saving truth 
 through the Scriptures. We may be bound to search the 
 Scriptures in order to gain wisdom, yet not to find saving 
 doctrines, but chiefly to be "throughly furnished unto 
 all good works ;" it may contain all saving doctrine, yet so 
 deeply lodged in it that tc those who are unlearned and 
 unstable may wrest it unto their own destruction ;" the 
 grace of the Holy Ghost may be promised to all Christians, 
 yet not in order to teach them the faith simply through 
 Scripture, but in order to impress the contents of Scripture 
 on their hearts, and to teach them the faith through what- 
 ever sources. Let us inspect some of the foregoing texts 
 more narrowly. 
 
 18. 
 First, there are texts which bid us ask wisdom of God, 
 and promise that it will be granted. 2 It is true ; but this 
 does not show that the private reading of Scripture is the 
 one essential requisite for gaining it. If such texts are 
 taken by themselves, they would rather prove that no 
 external means at all is necessary, not even Scripture, for 
 Scripture is not mentioned. To be consistent, we ought 
 to call the Scripture an outward form as well as the 
 Church, and to say that " asking," in other words, prayer, 
 is alone necessary. If then one external means of gaining 
 
 2 Matt. vii. 7. J uines i. o. 
 
VI.] " PRIVATE JUDGMENT. 165 
 
 light is admitted as intervening between the Holy Ghost 
 and the soul, though it is not mentioned, why not another? 
 When Christ says, " Seek, and ye shall find/' He does not 
 specify the mode of seeking; He means, as we may sup- 
 pose, by all methods which are vouchsafed to us, and are 
 otherwise specified. He includes the Church, which is called 
 by St. Paul " the pillar and ground of the Truth."" Our 
 Service applies our Lord's promise to seeking God in Bap- 
 tism, and as He may include the use of the Sacraments in 
 seeking, so may He include the use of Catholic teaching. 
 Again, no Christian can doubt that without divine grace 
 we cannot discern the sense of Scripture profitably ; but 
 it does not follow from this that with it we can gain every- 
 thing from Scripture, or that the " wisdom unto salvation," 
 which we thence gain, is theological knowledge. The 
 grace of God seems to be promised us chiefly for practical 
 purposes, for enabling us to receive what we receive, what- 
 ever it is, doctrine or precept, or from whatever quarter, 
 profitably, with a lively faith, with love and zeal. If it 
 supersedes Creeds, why should it not supersede Sacra- 
 ments ? it acts through Sacraments, and in like manner 
 it acts throug-h Creeds. Sacraments, without the presence 
 of the Holy Ghost, would sink into mere Jewish rites ; 
 and Creeds, without a similar presence, are but a dead 
 letter. The appointment of Sacraments is in Scripture, 
 and so is the proof of the Creed ; yet Scripture is no more 
 a Creed, than it is a Sacrament, — no more does the work 
 of a Creed, than it does the work of a Sacrament. By 
 continuous Tradition we have received the Sacraments 
 embodied in a certain definite form ; and by a like Tradi- 
 tion we have received the doctrines also ; Scripture may 
 justify both the one and the other, when given, without 
 being sufficient to enable individuals to put into shape 
 whether doctrines or Sacraments, apart from oral teaching 
 and tradition. Besides, if the Holy Spirit illuminates 
 
16G ON THE ABUSE OF [LECT. 
 
 the word of God for the use of the individual in all things, 
 then of course as regards unfulfilled prophecy also ; which 
 we know is not the case. As then, for all that the 
 Spirit is given us, the event is necessary in order to inter- 
 pret prophecy, so in like manner a similar external fact 
 may be necessary for understanding doctrine. True then 
 though it be that " the natural man discerneth not the 
 things of the Spirit of God;" it does not therefore fol- 
 low that the spiritual man discerneth spiritual things 
 through Scripture only, not through Creeds. 
 
 Lastly : there are texts which recite the various purposes 
 for which Scripture is useful ; but it does not follow thence 
 that no medium is necessary for its becoming useful to indi- 
 viduals. Scripture may be profitable for doctrine, instruc- 
 tion, and correction, that the man of God may be perfect, 
 without thereby determining at all whether or not there 
 are instruments for preparing, dispensing, and ministering 
 the word for this or that purpose which it is to effect. 
 Certainly Christ says, " Search the Scriptures/' but He is 
 speaking to the Jews about their Scriptures, and about 
 definite prophecies ; how does it follow that because it was 
 the duty of the Jews to examine such documents as pro- 
 phecies, which profess to be prophecies, that therefore we 
 are meant to gather our doctrines from documents which 
 do not profess to be doctrinal ? Besides, when Christ told 
 them to search the Scriptures for notices of Himself, He 
 had vouchsafed already to present Himself before them ; 
 He was a living comment on those Scriptures to which He 
 referred. 3 What He was to be, was not understood before 
 He appeared. The case is the same with Christian doctrine 
 now. The Creed confronts Scripture, and seems to say to 
 us, " Search the Scriptures, for they testify of Me." But 
 if we attempt to gain the truth of doctrine without the 
 Creed, perhaps we shall not be more successful in our 
 3 Vide Acts viii. 30—35 ; xvii. 11. 
 
VI.] PRIVATE JUDGMENT. 167 
 
 search than the Jews were in seeking Christ before He 
 came, — yet under circumstances different from theirs, in 
 that in our case knowledge is necessary to salvation, and 
 error is a sin. 
 
 19. 
 
 Enough has now been said on the theory of Private 
 Judgment. I conclude then that there is neither natural 
 probability, nor supernatural promise, that individuals 
 reading Scripture for themselves, to the neglect of other 
 means when they can have them, will, because they pray 
 for a blessing, be necessarily led into a knowledge of the 
 true and complete faith of a Christian. I conclude that 
 the popular theory of rejecting all other helps and reading 
 the Bible only, though in most cases maintained merely 
 through ignorance, is yet in itself presumptuous. 
 
 I make but one remark in conclusion. A main reason 
 of the jealousy with which Christians of this age and 
 country maintain the notion that truth of doctrine can be 
 gained from Scripture by individuals, is this, that they are 
 unwilling, as they say, to be led by others blindfold. They 
 can possess and read the Scriptures ; whereas of Traditions 
 they are no adequate judges, and they dread priestcraft. 
 I am not here to enter into the discussion of this feeling, 
 whether praiseworthy or the contrary. However this be, 
 it does seem a reason for putting before them, if possible, 
 the principal works of the Fathers, translated as Scripture 
 is ; that they may have by them what, whether used or 
 not, will at least act as a check upon the growth of an 
 undue dependence on the word of individual teachers, and 
 will be a something to consult, if they have reason to 
 doubt the Catholic character of any tenet to which they 
 are invited to adhere. 
 
LECTURE VII. 
 
 INSTANCES OF THE ABUSE OF PEIV ATE JUDGMENT. 
 
 I propose now to follow up the remarks last made upon 
 the Abuse of Private Judgment, with some instances in 
 which it has been indulged, and in which, as might be 
 expected antecedently, it has been productive of error, 
 more or less serious, but never insignificant. These in- 
 stances shall, on the whole, be such as no orthodox Pro- 
 testant shall be able to look at with any satisfaction, and 
 some of them shall be taken from the history of Roman 
 theology itself. 
 
 Without further preface I enter upon the subject, viz. 
 what are the chief precedents, which past ages supply to 
 modern Protestants, of the exercise of Private Judgment 
 upon the text of Scripture to the neglect of Catholic 
 Tradition ; and what is their character ? 
 
 1. 
 
 1. First might be instanced many of the errors in mat- 
 ters of fact connected with the Scripture history, which 
 got current in early times, and, being mentioned by this 
 or that Father, now improperly go. by the name of Tra- 
 ditions, whereas they seem really to have originated in a 
 misunderstanding of Scripture. Such, for instance, is the 
 report recorded by Irenasus, and coming, as he conceived, 
 on good authority, that our Saviour lived to be forty or 
 
LECT. VII.] ABUSE OF PEIVATE JUDGMENT. 169 
 
 fifty. Such is Clement's statement that St. Paul was 
 married; such is that of Clement and Justin that our 
 Lord was deformed in person. These make out no claim 
 to be considered Apostolical, whereas they do singularly 
 coincide severally with certain texts in Scripture which 
 admit of being distorted into countenancing them. 1 Such 
 again are probably in no slight degree the early opinions 
 concerning the Millennium ; certainly in Egypt in the 
 third century they seem to have had their origin in a 
 misconstruction of Scripture. 2 
 
 If these various opinions did really thus arise, it is a 
 very curious circumstance that they should now be imputed 
 to Tradition, nay, and adduced, as they are popularly, as if 
 palmary refutations of its claims, being all the while but 
 the result of either going solely by Scripture, or with but 
 scanty and insufficient guidance from Tradition. At the 
 same time it should be borne in mind, that, even if they 
 were not mere deductions from Scripture, still such local 
 rumours about matters of fact cannot be put on a level 
 with Catholic Tradition concerning matters of doctrine. 
 
 2. The controversy about Baptism in which St. Cyprian 
 was engaged, and in which, according to our own received 
 opinion, he was mistaken, is a clearer and more important 
 instance in point. Cyprian maintained that persons bap- 
 tized by heretical clergy, must, on being reconciled to the 
 Church, be re-baptized, or rather that their former Bap- 
 tism was invalid. The Roman Church of t the day held 
 that confirmation was sufficient in such case ; as if that 
 ordinance, on the part of the true Church, recognized and 
 ratified the outward act, already administered by heretics, 
 and applied the inward grace locked up in the Sacrament, 
 
 1 John viii. 57. 1 Cor.ix. 5. Isa. lii. 14; liii. 2. 
 3 Euseb.Hist. vii. 24. 
 
170 INSTANCES OF THE ABUSE [lECT. 
 
 but hitherto not enjoyed by the parties receiving it. And 
 she rested her doctrine simply on Apostolical Tradition, 
 which even by itself was a sufficient witness on such a 
 point. Cyprian did not profess any Apostolical Tradition 
 on his side, but he argued from Scripture against the judg- 
 ment of the Roman See. The argument of himself and 
 his countrymen was of the following kind : — " ' There is 
 but one Lord, one Faith, one Baptism ; ' the heretics 
 have not the one Faith, therefore they have not the one 
 Baptism. " — Again, " c There is one Body, one Spirit, one 
 Baptism ;' the one Baptism of the one Spirit is in the one 
 Church, therefore there is no Baptism out of it." " Christ 
 has said, ' He who is not with Me, is against Me/ and St. 
 John, that they who go out from us are antichrists ; how 
 can antichrists confer the grace of Baptism ? " " There 
 are not two Baptisms ; he who recognizes that of heretics, 
 invalidates his own." " ' No one can receive anything but 
 what is given him from heaven ;' if heresy, then, be from 
 heaven, then, and then only, can it confer Baptism." 
 " ' God heareth not sinners ; ' a heretic is a sinner ; how 
 then can his Baptism be acknowledged by God?" 3 Such 
 are the texts with which the African Church defended itself 
 in Cyprian's days ; and who will not allow, with great spe- 
 ciousness ? Cyprian himself says in like manner, " Usage 
 is of no force where reason is against it ;" 4 nor is it, where 
 reason is clear and usage is modern. Yet, after all, how- 
 ever this be, here is a case, where the mere arguing from 
 Scripture without reference to Tradition (whether volun- 
 tarily neglected or not), led to a conclusion which Pro- 
 testants now will grant to be erroneous. 
 
 3. 
 
 3. Again, at least all members of the English Church 
 
 3 Tertull. de Baptiemo 15. Concil. Cartliag. apud Cyprian, pp. 230—240. 
 
 4 Cypr. ad Quint. Ep. 71. ed Bened. 
 
VII 
 
 OF PRIVATE JUDGMENT. 171 
 
 consider Arianism to be a fatal error ; yet, when its history 
 is examined, this peculiarity will be found respecting it, 
 that its upholders appealed only to Scripture, not to 
 Catholic Tradition. I do not mean to say, that they 
 allowed that no one ever held their doctrine, before its 
 historical rise ; but they did not profess, nay, they did not 
 care, to have the Church Universal on its side. They set 
 themselves against what was received, and owed their 
 successes to the dexterity with which they argued from 
 certain texts of the Old and New Testament. I will not 
 enlarge on what is notorious. Arianism certainly pro- 
 fessed in its day to be a scriptural religion. 
 
 4. 
 
 4. Another opinion, which, though not a heresy, will 
 be granted by the majority of Protestants to be an error, 
 is the tenet with which the great St. Austin's name is 
 commonly connected. He, as is generally known, is, among 
 the ancient Fathers, the Master of Predestinarianism, that 
 is, of the theological opinion that certain persons are 
 irreversibly ordained to persevere unto eternal life. He 
 was engaged in controversy with the Pelagians, and it is 
 supposed, that, in withstanding them, he was hurried into 
 the opposite extreme. Now it is remarkable that in his 
 treatises on the subject, he argues from Scripture, and 
 never appeals to Catholic Tradition. For instance, in his 
 work on the Gift of Perseverance he speaks as follows : — 
 
 " The enemy of grace presses on, and urges in all ways 
 to make it believed that it is given according to our deserts, 
 and so ' grace should no longer be grace ; ' and are we loth 
 to say what with the testimony of Scripture we can say ? I 
 mean, do we fear, lest, if we so speak, some one may be 
 offended, who cannot embrace the truth; and not rather 
 fear lest, if we are silent, some one who is able to embrace 
 it, may be embraced by error instead ? For either Pre- 
 
172 INSTANCES OP THE ABUSE [lECT. 
 
 destination is so to be preached, as Holy Scripture plainly 
 reveals it, that in the predestined the gifts and calling of 
 God are without repentance or we must confess that the 
 grace of God is given according to our deserts, as the 
 Pelagians consider." 
 
 Here it is curious indeed to see, how closely he follows 
 St. Cyprian's pattern, in his mode of conducting his argu- 
 ment, which consists in a reference to certain texts of 
 Scripture, and (if I may say it of such holy men) a ven- 
 turesome a priori, or at least abstract, course of reasoning. 
 But now let us see how he treats the objection which was 
 made to him, that his doctrine " was contrary to the 
 opinion of the Fathers and the Ecclesiastical sense." He 
 speaks as follows : — 
 
 " Why should we not, when we read in commentators of 
 God's word, of His prescience, and of the calling of the 
 elect, understand thereby this same Predestination ? For, 
 perhaps, they preferred the word prescience because it is 
 more easily understood, while it does not oppose, nay, 
 agrees with the truth which is preached concerning the 
 Predestination of grace. Of this I am sure, that no one 
 could have disputed against this Predestination, which we 
 maintain according to the Holy Scriptures, without an error. 
 Yet I think those persons who ask for the opinions of com- 
 mentators on this subject, ought to have been contented with 
 those holy men, celebrated everywhere for Christian faith 
 and doctrine, Cyprian and Ambrose, whose clear testimonies 
 we have given. They ought to have taken them as suffi- 
 cient authorities both for believing thoroughly, and preach- 
 ing thoroughly, as is fitting, that the grace of God is free ; 
 and also for considering such preaching as quite consistent 
 with exhorting the indolent and rebuking the wicked : in- 
 asmuch as of these two Saints, the one says concerning 
 
VII.] OF PRIVATE JUDGMENT. 173 
 
 God's grace, l We must boast of nothing, for nothing is 
 our own/ and the other, ' Oar heart and our thoughts are 
 not in our power/ and yet they do not cease to exhort and 
 rebuke, in behalf of the divine precepts/' After quoting 
 other testimonies, as he thinks them, from these Fathers, 
 he proceeds, " What do we seek clearer from commentators 
 of the word of God, if it be our pleasure to hear from them, 
 what is plain in the Scriptures? However, to these two, who 
 ought to be enough, we will add a third, St. Gregory, who 
 witnesses that both faith in God and the confession of that 
 faith, are God's gift, in these words : — ' Confess, I beseech 
 you, the Trinity of the one Godhead, or (if you prefer to say 
 it), the one nature ; and God shall be implored to vouchsafe 
 you voice to confess what you believe. He will give, doubt- 
 less; He who gave what comes first, will give what comes 
 second; ' He who gave to believe, will give to confess." * 
 What makes the failure of this appeal to the previous 
 belief of the Church still more remarkable, is the clear 
 view St. Austin possesses of the value of Catholic Tradition, 
 and the force with which he can urge it against an adver- 
 sary on a proper occasion. 6 Here, then, we are furnished 
 with a serious lesson of the mischief of deductions from 
 the sacred text against the authority of Tradition. If the 
 doctrine of irrespective Predestination has done harm, 
 and created controversy in the Church, let it not be for- 
 gotten that this has arisen from exercising private judg- 
 ment upon Scripture, to the neglect of the Catholic sense. 
 
 5 De dono Persever. 40, 41. 48, 49. Prosp. ad Aug. Ep. 225. 
 
 6 Ego, ubicunque sis, ubicunque legere ista potueris, te ante istos judices 
 
 intus in corde tuo constituo, sanctos et in sancta Ecclesia illustres 
 
 antistites Dei . . . ut in eis timeas, non ipsos, sed llluin qui sibi eos utilia 
 vasa f orinavit et sancta templaconstruxit . . . Nullas nobiscuin vel vobiscum 
 amicitias attenderunt, vel inimicitias exercuerunt, neque nobis neque vobis 
 irati sunt, neque nos neque vos niiserati sunt. Quod invenerunt in Ecclesia- 
 tenuerunt; quod didicerunt, docuerunt; quod a patribus acceperunt, hoc 
 filiis tradiderunt. In Julian. Pelag. ii. 34, V id. also, de Nat. et Oir.it. 71 , 
 (See. Upus iraperf hi Jul. vi. 
 
1 71 INSTANCES OP THE ABUSE [LECT. 
 
 6. 
 
 5. My next instance shall be tlie Roman doctrine of 
 Purgatory. All Protestants are sufficiently alive to the 
 seriousness of this error. Now I think it may be shown 
 that its existence is owing to a like indulgence of human 
 reason and of private judgment upon Scripture, in default 
 of Catholic Tradition. 7 That it was no received opinion 
 during the first ages of the Gospel, has often been shown, 
 and need not be dwelt on here. Hardly one or two short 
 passages of one or two Fathers for six centuries can be 
 brought in its favour, and those, at the most, rather sug- 
 gesting than teaching it. In truth, the doctrine seems to 
 have occurred to them, as it has been received generally 
 since, first from the supposed need of such a provision in 
 the revealed scheme, — from (what may be called) its 
 naturalness in the judgment of reason ; and next in con- 
 sequence of the misinterpretation of certain texts; as I 
 propose to explain at some length. 8 
 
 How Almighty God will deal with the mass of Christians, 
 who are neither very bad nor very good, is a problem 
 with which we are not concerned, and which it is our 
 wisdom, and may be our duty, to put from our thoughts. 
 But when it has once forced itself upon the mind, we are 
 led, in self-defence, with a view of keeping ourselves from 
 dwelling" unhealthily on particular cases which come 
 under our experience, and perplex us, to imagine modes, 
 not by which God does (for that would be presumption 
 to conjecture), but by which He may solve the difficulty. 
 Most men, to our apprehensions, are too little formed in 
 
 l [Private judgment ; yes, so it may be called, while it is exercised simply 
 by individual writers. But when it is take i up by the Church it is no longer 
 " private,'* but has the sanction of her, who, as our author observed above, 
 p. 158, "may be truly said almost infallibly to interpret Scripture."] 
 
 s [I have no fault to rind with this history of the growth of a revealed 
 doctrine. It is in substance an instance of the process of its development.] 
 
Vil.] OF PRIVATE JUDGMENT. 175 
 
 religious habits either for heaven or hell ; yet there is no 
 middle state, when Christ comes in judgment. In conse- 
 quence it was obvious to have recourse to the interval before 
 His coming, as a time during which this incompleteness 
 might be remedied ; a season, not of changing the spiritual 
 bent and character of the soul departed, whatever that be, 
 for probation ends with mortal life, but of developing it 
 into a more determinate form, whether of good or of evil. 
 Again, when the mind once allows itself to speculate, it 
 would discern in such a provision, a means whereby those, 
 who, not without true faith at bottom, yet have committed 
 great crimes ; or those who have been carried off in youth, 
 while still undecided ; or who die after a barren though 
 not an immoral or scandalous life, may receive such chas- 
 tisement as may prepare them for heaven, and render it 
 consistent with God's justice to admit them thither. 
 Again, the inequality of the sufferings of Christians in this 
 life, compared one with another, would lead the unguarded 
 mind to the same speculations ; the intense suffering, for 
 instance, which some men undergo on their death-bed, 
 seeming as if but an anticipation, in their case, of what 
 comes after death upon others, who without greater claims 
 on God's forbearance, have lived without chastisement and 
 die easily. I say, the mind will inevitably dwell upon 
 such thoughts, unless it has been taught to subdue them 
 by education or by the experience of their dangerousness. 
 
 7. 
 
 Various suppositions have, accordingly, been made, as 
 pure suppositions, as mere specimens of the capabilities 
 (if one may so speak) of the Divine Dispensation, as 
 efforts of the mind, reaching forward and venturing beyond 
 its depth, into the abyss of the Divine Counsels. If one 
 supposition could be produced to satisfy the problem, ten 
 
176 INSTANCES OP THE ABUSE [LECT. 
 
 thousand others were imaginable ; unless, indeed, the re- 
 sources of God's Providence are exactly commensurate 
 with man's discernment of them. Religious men, amid 
 these, searchings of heart, have naturally gone to Scrip- 
 ture for relief ; to see if the inspired word anywhere gave 
 them any clue for their inquiries. And from what was 
 there found, and from the speculations of reason upon it, 
 various notions have been hazarded at different times ; for 
 instance, that there is a certain momentary ordeal to be 
 undergone by all men after this life, more or less severe 
 according to their spiritual state ; — or that certain gross 
 sins in good men will be thus visited, or their lighter fail- 
 ings and habitual imperfections ; — or that the very sight 
 of Divine Perfection in the invisible world will be in itself 
 a pain, while it constitutes the purification of the imperfect 
 but believing soul ; — or that, happiness admitting of vari- 
 ous degrees of intensity, penitents late in life may sink for 
 ever into a state, blissful as far as it goes, but more or less 
 approaching to unconsciousness, and infants dying after 
 Baptism may be as gems paving the courts of heaven, or 
 as the living wheels in the Prophet's vision, while matured 
 Saints may excel in capacity and consciousness of bliss, as 
 well as in dignity, even Archangels. Such speculations are 
 dangerous ; the event proves it ; — from some of them, in 
 fact, seems to have resulted the doctrine of Purgatory. 
 
 Now the texts to which the minds of primitive Christians 
 seem to have been principally drawn, and from which they 
 ventured to argue in behalf of these vague notions, were 
 these two :— " The fire shall try every man's work," &c, 
 and " He shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost and with 
 fire." These texts, with which many more were found to 
 accord, directed their thoughts one way, as making 
 mention of fire, whatever was meant by the word, as the 
 
VII.] OF PRIVATE JUDGMENT. 177 
 
 instrument of trial and purification ; and that, at some 
 season between the present time and the Judgment, or at 
 the Judgment. And accordingly, without, perhaps, any 
 distinct or consistent meaning in what they said, or being- 
 able to say whether they spoke literally or figuratively, 
 and with an indefinite reference to this life as well as to 
 the intermediate state, they sometimes named fire as the 
 instrument of recovering those who had sinned after their 
 Baptism. That this is the origin of the notion of a 
 Purgatorial fire, I gather from these circumstances; — 
 first, that they do frequently insist on the texts mentioned ; 
 next, that they do not agree in the particular sense they 
 put upon them. That they quote them, shows that they 
 rest upon them ; that they vary in explaining them, that 
 they had no Catholic sense to guide them. Nothing can 
 be clearer, if these facts be so, than that the doctrine of 
 the Purgatorial fire in all its senses, as far as it was more 
 than a surmise, and was rested on argument, was the result 
 of private judgment, 9 exerted, in defect of Tradition, upon 
 the text of Scripture. 1 
 
 Thus Hilary says : — " According to the Psalmist it is 
 difficult, and most perilous to human nature, to desire God's 
 judgments. For, since no one living is clean in His sight, 
 how can His judgment be an object of desire ? Consider- 
 ing we shall have to give account for every idle word, shall 
 we long for the day of judgment, in which we must 
 
 9 [In proportion as the Church took up and recognized the doctrine, it 
 ceased to be "the result of private judgment."] 
 
 1 Cardinal Fisher {supra, p. 72) fully grants that the Koman doctrine 
 was an introduction of later times, "partly from Scripture, partly from 
 revelations." In Luther. 18. No allusion has been made above to the 
 supernatural appearances on which it has been rested, for the appeal to 
 these seems to have come after the belief in it, when people felt that some 
 clear sanction was necessary, as a substitute for Tradition. 
 
 VOL. I. N 
 
178 INSTANCES OP THE ABUSE [LECT. 
 
 undergo that everliving fire and those heavy punishments 
 for cleansing the soul from its sins ? Then will a sword 
 pierce the soul of Blessed Mary, that the thoughts of many 
 hearts may be revealed. If that Virgin, which could 
 compass God, is to come into the severity of the judgment, 
 who shall venture to desire to be judged of God? Job, 
 when he had finished his warfare with all calamities of 
 man, and had triumphed, who, when tempted, said, ' The 
 Lord gave/ &c, confessed himself but ashes when he 
 heard God's voice from the cloud, and determined that 
 he ought not to speak another word. And who shall 
 venture to desire God's judgments, whose voice from 
 heaven neither so great a Prophet endured, nor the 
 Apostles, when they were with the Lord in the Mount?'' 2 
 
 Lactantius says, " When He judges the just, He shall try 
 them in the fire. Then they whose sins prevail in weight 
 or number, will be tortured in the fire, and burnt in the 
 extremities ; but they, who are mature in righteousness 
 and ripeness of virtue, shall not feel that flame, for they 
 have somewhat of God within them, to repel and throw off 
 the force of it. Such is the power of innocence, that from 
 it that fire recoils without harm, as having received a 
 mission from God to burn the irreligious, to retire from 
 the righteous." 3 
 
 Augustine, who approaches more nearly to the present 
 Roman doctrine, speaks thus doubtfully : — "Such a suffer- 
 ing, too, it is not incredible, may happen after this life, 
 and it is a fair question, be it capable of a solution or not, 
 whether some Christians, according to their love of the 
 perishing goods of this world, attain salvation more slowly 
 or speedily through a certain Purgatorial fire." 4 
 
 2 Tract in Ps. cxviii. 3. § 12. [The passage which follows from Lactan- 
 tius may be taken to explain what is here said about the Blessed Virgin. 
 " Such is the power/' &c] 
 
 3 Div. lnstit. vii. 21. 4 Enchir. 69. 
 
VII.] OF PRIVATE JUDGMENT. 179 
 
 10. 
 
 As this doctrine, thus suggested by certain striking 
 texts, grew into popularity and definiteness, and verged 
 towards its present Roman form, it seemed a key to many 
 others. Great portions of the books of Psalms, Job, and 
 the Lamentations, which express the feelings of religious 
 men under suffering, would powerfully recommend it by 
 the forcible, aud most affecting and awful meaning which 
 they received from it. When this was once suggested, 
 all other meanings would seem tame and inadequate. 
 
 To these must be added various passages from the 
 Prophets ; as that in the beginning of the third chapter 
 of Malachi, which speaks of fire as the instrument of 
 judgment and purification w T hen Christ comes to visit 
 His Church. 
 
 Moreover, there were other texts of obscure and indeter- 
 minate bearing, which seemed on this hypothesis to receive 
 a profitable meaning ; such as our Lord's words in the 
 Sermon on the Mount, — "Verily I say unto thee, Thou 
 shalt by no means come out thence, till thou hast paid 
 the uttermost farthing;" and St. John's expression in 
 the Apocalypse, that " No man in heaven, nor in earth, 
 neither under the earth, was able to open the book." u 
 
 Further, the very circumstance that no second instru- 
 ment of a plenary and entire cleansing from sin was given 
 after Baptism, such as Baptism, led Christians to expect 
 that that unknown means, whatever it was, would be of a 
 more painful nature than that which they had received so 
 freely and instantaneously in infancy; and confirmed, not 
 only the text already cited, " He shall baptize you with 
 the Holy Ghost and with fire;" but also St. Paul's 
 announcement of the " judgment and fiery indignation" 
 which avvait those who sin after having been once en- 
 5 Malt. v. 26. Rev. v. 3. 
 N 2 
 
180 INSTANCES OF THE ABUSE [LECT. 
 
 lightened, and Christ's warning to the impotent man to 
 sin no more, " lest a worse thing come unto him." 
 
 Lastly : the universal and apparently Apostolical 
 custom of praying for the dead in Christ, called for some 
 explanation, the reasons for it not having come down to 
 posterity with it. Various reasons may be supposed quite 
 clear of this distressing doctrine ; but it supplied an ade- 
 quate and a most constraining motive for its observance, 
 to those who were not content to practise it in ignorance. 
 
 I do not wish to frame a theory, but anyhow so far 
 seems undeniable, whatever becomes of the rest, and it is 
 all that it concerns us here, that there was no definite 
 Catholic Tradition for Purgatory in early times, and that, 
 instead of it, certain texts of Scripture, in the first in- 
 stance interpreted by individuals, were put forward as 
 the proof of the doctrine. 
 
 11. 
 
 6. One more instance shall be adduced from the history 
 of the Church, of an error introduced professedly on 
 grounds of Scripture without the safeguard of Catholic 
 Tradition, — the doctrine of the Pope's universal Bishop- 
 rick ; 6 though in treating it I shall be obliged to touch 
 on a large subject in a cursory way, which is scarcely de- 
 sirable amid the present popular misapprehension about it. 
 
 That St. Peter was the head of the Apostles and the 
 
 centre of unity, and that his successors are the honorary 
 
 Primates of Christendom, in the same general sense in 
 
 which London (for instance) is the first city in the British 
 
 Empire, I neither affirm nor deny, for to make a clear 
 
 6 [It seems to me plain from history that the Popes from the first 
 considered themselves to have a universal jurisdiction, and against tbis 
 positive fact the negative fact that other sees and countries were not clear 
 about it, does not avail. The doctrine doubtless was the subject of a 
 development. There is far less difficulty in a controversial aspect in the 
 proof of tbe Pope's supremacy than in that of the canon of Scripture.] 
 
VII.] OF PRIVATE JUDGMENT. 181 
 
 statement and then to defend it, would carry us away too 
 far from our main subject. But for argument's sake I 
 will here grant that the Fathers assert it. But what there 
 is not the shadow of a reason for saying that they held, 
 what has not the faintest pretensions of being a Catholic 
 truth, is this, that St. Peter or his successors were and are 
 universal Bishops, that they have the whole of Christen- 
 dom for their own diocese in a way in which other Apostles 
 and Bishops had and have not, that they are Bishops of 
 Bishops in such a sense as belongs to no other Bishop ; in 
 a word, that the difference between St. Peter and the 
 Popes after him, and other Bishops, is not one of mere 
 superiority and degree, but of kind, not of rank, but of 
 class. This the Romanists hold : and they do not hold it 
 by Catholic Tradition ; by what then ? by private inter- 
 pretation of Scripture. 7 
 
 They will say that the texts in their favour are so very 
 strong, that it is not wonderful that they should quote 
 them. If so, Protestants who rely on what they think 
 strong texts, must see to that ; I am not just now engaged in 
 refuting the Roman theologians ; I am taking for granted 
 here that they are wrong; and am addressing those who are 
 quite sure that they are wrong, who are quite sure that 
 their " texts " do not prove their point, even supposing 
 they look strong, but who yet do not see how best to meet 
 them. To such persons, I would point out, before going 
 into the consideration of these professed proofs at all, that 
 they have been arrived at by means of that mischievous 
 but very popular principle among us, that in serious matters 
 we may interpret Scripture by Private Judgment, whether 
 the judgment of the individual, or of the day, or of the age, 
 or of the country, or of the civil magistrate, or of the science 
 in fashion, or of mere human criticism (for it matters not 
 
 " [How private? since it is the interpi-etation of the whole Latin 
 Church ?] 
 
182 INSTANCES OP THE ABUSE [LECT. 
 
 which it may be, they are all one) and not by Catholic 
 Tradition. And this I will say, that if Roman Catholics 
 make converts in this country, it will be more by the bold 
 misinterpretation of one or two strong texts, which Pro- 
 testants have superciliously put aside or explained away, 
 than by any broad recommendations or well-connected 
 arguments which they can produce. 
 
 12. 
 
 The texts, I need not say, are such as these : " Blessed 
 art thou, Simon Barjona, for flesh and blood hath not 
 revealed it unto thee, but My Father which is in heaven. 
 And I say also unto thee, that thou art Peter, and upon 
 this rock I will build My Church, and the gates of hell 
 shall not prevail against it. And I will give unto thee 
 the keys of the kingdom of Heaven ; and whatsoever thou 
 shalt bind on earth, shall be bound in heaven ; and what- 
 soever thou shalt loose on earth, shall be loosed in 
 heaven." 
 
 Again : " Simon, Simon, behold Satan hath desired to 
 have you, that he may sift you as wheat ; but I have 
 prayed for thee, that thy faith fail not ; and when thou 
 art converted, strengthen thy brethren." 
 
 And again : " Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou Me more 
 than these ? He saith unto Him, Yea, Lord, Thou 
 knowest that I love Thee. He saith unto him, Feed My 
 lambs." And he repeats twice, " Feed My sheep," with 
 the same question before it. 
 
 From these passages, Roman Catholics argue, that St. 
 Peter, with the Popes after him, is the rock or foundation 
 of the Church, as Christ's representative ; that all Chris- 
 tians, including the Apostles, are committed to him as 
 sheep by our Lord and Saviour; and that he is especially 
 the keeper and preserver of his brethren's faith. 
 
 Now, that no pretence of Catholic Tradition has led to 
 
VII.] OF PRIVATE JUDGMENT. 183 
 
 the establishment of this doctrine, I will show from the 
 testimony of two Popes, of very different ages, the one of 
 the sixth, the other of the fifteenth century ; the former 
 of whom shall witness that it was not a Catholic doctrine, 
 the latter that it was founded on the wrong interpretation 
 of Scripture. 
 
 13. 
 
 The evidence of the former of these, St. Gregory, sur- 
 named the Great, is continually used in the controversy ; 
 yet it is so striking that I will here introduce it, using for 
 that purpose the words of Leslie. " The Pope," says that 
 able writer, " not being content with that primacy which 
 by the constitution of the Western Church had been 
 affixed to his see, for the better and more easy regulation 
 and carrying on the commerce and correspondence, and 
 managing the jurisdiction of the Episcopal College, and 
 which was granted to him only jure ecclesiastico," by 
 ecclesiastical right, (t did set up for an universal and un- 
 limited supremacy, and that jure divino" by divine right, 
 " over all his colleagues, the Bishops of the whole Catholic 
 Church; making all their authority depend upon him 
 alone, and thereby resolving the power of the whole 
 Episcopal College into the single see of Rome. This is one 
 of the new doctrines of Rome. It was not known there 
 in the days of Gregory the Great, Bishop of Rome, who 
 died in the seventh century. Then it first began to be set 
 up by John, Bishop of Constantinople, after the seat of 
 the empire was translated thither. And Gregory the 
 Great wrote severely against it ; he calls it a novel doc- 
 trine, which had never been known at Rome, or pretended 
 to by any of her Bishops ; that it was against the doctrine 
 of the Gospel, against the decrees of the Canons, against 
 the rights of all other Bishops and of all Churches ; 
 a horrible injury and scandal to the whole universal 
 
184 INSTANCES OP THE ABUSE [LECT. 
 
 Church ; that the Bishops were the stars of God, and who- 
 ever sought to advance his throne above them, did in that 
 imitate the pride of Lucifer, and was the forerunner of 
 Antichrist ; whose times, he said, he then saw approach- 
 ing, by this most wicked and tyrannical usurpation of one 
 Bishop above all the rest of his colleagues, and to ' style 
 himself Patriarch of almost the whole Ecumenical 
 Church/ . . . And Gregory does not only thus severely 
 inveigh against this usurpation, but gives excellent 
 reasons against it ; he says, ' If one Bishop be called 
 universal, the universal Church falls, if that universal 
 Bishop falls/ 'But/ says he, ' let that blasphemous 
 name be abhorrent to the hearts of all Christians, by 
 which the honour of all Bishops is taken away, while it 
 is madly arrogated by one to himself/ " s 
 
 14. 
 
 Such is the witness of that great Pope to whom we owe 
 the line of our own primates to this day ; so little did he 
 think of claiming as a matter of divine right, that power 
 over us which his successors exercised. Nearly nine cen- 
 turies after his time,iEneas Sylvius was consecrated Bishop 
 in his see, under the title of Pius II. ; and he, in a work 
 written before he was Pope, had spoken as follows, as 
 Leslie quotes him : " It is the opinion of all that are dead, 
 if that can be called a mere opinion which is fortified with 
 sufficient authorities, that the Pope of Rome is subject to the 
 universal Church ; neither dare those who now live deny 
 it. But it is made a doubt among some whether he be 
 subject to a general council ; for there are some, whether 
 out of singularity, or that they expect the rewards of their 
 flattery, who have begun to preach new and strange doctrines, 
 and are not afraid to exempt the Pope from the jurisdiction 
 of the Holy Council ; for ambition has blinded them, from 
 
 8 Leslie, Case of the Regale and the Pontificate, 16. For specimens of 
 the passages referred to vide the end of this Lecture, Note 1, p. 186. 
 
VII.] OF PRIVATE JUDGMENT. 185 
 
 whence not only this modern, but all schisms to this day 
 have arisen. . . . These poor men do not consider that 
 these things which they preach are but the words either of 
 Popes who would enlarge their fringes, or of their flatterers; 
 and because such sayings are easily answered, they straight 
 run to the Gospel, and interpret the words of Christ, not 
 according to the meaning of the Holy Ghost, but by their 
 private judgment. And they make much of that which was 
 said to Peter, 'Thou shalt be called Cephas/ by which 
 they make him head of the Church ; and, ' I will give unto 
 thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven ; ' and, ' Whatso- 
 ever thou bindest upon earth •' and, ' I have prayed for 
 thee, Peter, that thy faith fail not ; ' and, l Feed My sheep ;' 
 and, ' Launch out into the deep ; ' and, ' Fear not^ thou 
 shalt henceforth catch men ; ' and that Christ commanded 
 Peter alone, as Prince of the Apostles, to pay tribute for 
 himself and for Him ; and because Peter drew the net to 
 shore full of great fishes ; and that Peter alone drew his 
 sword in defence of Christ. All which passages these men 
 after a strange manner do exaggerate, wholly neglecting 
 the expositions of the Holy Doctors." 9 
 
 15. 
 Enough has now been said in illustration of errors 
 arising from the exercise of Private Judgment on the text 
 of Scripture. The practical conclusion is obvious. Let 
 those whom it concerns be cautious how they countenance 
 a procedure which has led, not only to Arianism, but to 
 tenets which Protestants of every denomination will agree 
 in condemning, — Purgatory and the Pope's Supremacy. 1 
 
 9 Leslie, Ibid. The original is appended to this Lecture, note 2, p. 186. 
 
 1 The following passage from Sarpi's account of the proceedings at Trent 
 is in point : " The major part of the divines said . . that the doctrine of 
 the Church of Rome . . is in great part founded hy the Pope and School 
 divines, upon some passage in Scripture, which if every one had liberty to 
 examine whether it was well translated . . these new grammarians would 
 confound all, and would be made judges and arbiters of faith," lib. 2. p. 146. 
 
I 86 INSTANCES OF THE ABUSE [LECT. 
 
 Note 1 on pp. 183, 4. 
 The passages in St. Gregory are such as the following. "Si ergo ille 
 [Paulus] membra dominici corporis certis extra Christum quasi capitibus* 
 et ipsis quidem Apostolis subjici partialirer evitavit, tu quid Christo, univer- 
 salis scilicet ecclesia capiti, in extremi judicii es dicturus examine, qui cuncta 
 ejus membra tibimet conaris universalis appellatione supponere ? Quis, rogo, 
 in hoc tam perverso vocabulo, nisi ille ad imitandum proponitur, qui, despectis 
 angelorum lcgionibus secum socialiter constitutis, ad culmen conatus est 
 siugularitatis erumpere, ut et nulli subesse et solus omnibus prseesse videretur ? 
 Qui etiam dixit, ' In caelum conscendam, super astra coeli, &c.' Quid enira 
 fratres tui omnes universalis Ecclesia? Kpiscopi, nisi astra cceli sunt ?" Greg. 
 Ep. v. 18. '* Triste tamen valde est, ut patienter feratur, quatenus despectis 
 omnibus, piaedictus frater et coepiscopus meus solus conatur appellari 
 Episcopus. Sed in hue ejus superbia quid aliud nisi propiuqua jam Anti- 
 christ' esse tempora designatur ? Quia ilium videlicet imitatur, qui spretis 
 in sociali gaudio angelorum legionibus, &c." Ibid. 21. " Per sanctum 
 Chalcedonensem Synodum Pontifici Sedis Apostolica?, cui Deo disponente 
 deservio, hoc universitatis nomen oblatum est. Sed nullus unquam deeesso- 
 rum meorum hoc tam profano vocabulo uti consensit, quia videlicet, si unus 
 Patriarcha universalis dicitur, Patriarcharum nomen ca?teris derogatur." 
 Ibid. 43. " Si unus Episcopus vocatur universalis, uni versa Ecclesia corruit, 
 si unus universus cadit." vii. 27. " Ego autem fidenter dico, quia quisquis 
 se universalem sacerdotem vocat, vel vocari desiderat, in elatione sua 
 Antichiistum pra?currit, quia superbiendo se ca?teris prseponit .... Quis- 
 quis iste est qui solus sacerdos appellari appetit, super reliquos sacerdotes se 
 extollit." Ibid. 33. What makes these passages more forcible is, that 
 Gregory altogether recognized the application of the texts above quoted (in 
 Matt. xvi. &c.) to the Bishop of Rome, vid. Ep. v. 20, "Cunctisenim 
 Evaugelinm scientibus liquet, quod voce Dominica sancto et omnium Aposto- 
 lorum Petro principi Apostolo, totius Ecclesia? cura commissa est . . . et 
 tamen universalis Apostolus non vocatur," &c, and he admitted that the title 
 Universal had been applied to the Roman Bishop at Chalcedon ; yet he does 
 not treat its use as resting on an Apostolical Tradition. 
 
 Note 2 on p. 184. 
 These are the actual words of iEueas Sylvius: — "Opinio, sicut jam liquet, 
 omnium mortuorum est, si opinio vocari debet qua? idoneis confirmatur 
 authoribus, quia Romanus pontifex universal i ecclesia? subjectus existit ; 
 neque hoc viventes negare audent : illud autem apud aliquos revocatur in 
 dubium, an id quoque de generali concilio credi oporteat. Suntenim aliqui, 
 sive avidi gloria? sive quod adulando prsemia expectant, qui peregrinas quas- 
 dam et omnino novas pra?dicare doctrinas cceperunt, ipsumque summum 
 pontificem ex jurisdictione sacri concilii demere non verentur. Excaecavit 
 namque illos ambitio, a qua non solum hoc modernum sed omnium usque in 
 
VII.] OF PlilYATE JUDGMENT. 187 
 
 banc diem schismata suborta reperiuntur. Namque ut olim pestiferam illam 
 bestiarn, quae per Arrium prirrio quasi de in fern is extulerat caput, cupiditas 
 episcopates induxit, sic bodiernam haeresin illi praecipue nutriunt, quos jam 
 mendicare suppudet, quorum alius clamat, subditorum facta judicari a papa, 
 Eomanum vero poutificem solius Dei reservari arbitrio. Alius dicit, quia 
 primam sedem nemo judicabit, quod neque ab Augusto, neque ab omni clero, 
 neque a regibus, neque a populo valeat judicari. Alius asserit ejectionem 
 summorum Pontificum sibi Dominum reservasse. Alius vero asserere non 
 veretur, Romanun Pontificem, quamvis animas catervatim secum ad inferos 
 trahat, nullius reprebensioni fore subjectum. Nee considerant miseri, quia 
 quae praedicant tantopere verba, aut ipsorum summorum pontificum sunt suas 
 fimbrias extendentium, aut illorum qui eis adulabautur. Et quia hujusmodi 
 dicta solutionem habent, recurrent statim ad evangelium, et verba Cbristi 
 nou proutSpiritus Sancti sensus exposcit, sed suopte ingeuio interpretantur. 
 Plurimumque illud extollunt, quia Petro sit dictum, ' Tu vocaberis Cephas,' 
 per quod ilium caput ecclesiae faciunt : ' Tibi dabo claves regni coelorum,' et 
 * Quodcunqe ligaveris' &c. &c. . . . Quae omnia hi homines iniro modo 
 sublimant, expositionibus sanctorum doctorum omnino posthabitis ; quos si, 
 ut par esset, considerarent, manif'este coguoscerent, quia ex auctoritatibus 
 supradictis Romanus Pontifex non coujunctim, sed separatim omnibus 
 praest." Mn. Sylv. de Gest. Bas. Concil. i. p. 772, Ed. Paris, 1666. After 
 JEneas Sylvius became Pope he retracted his former doctrine in a letter 
 addressed to the university of Cologne. It runs as follows : " In minoribus 
 agentes, non sacris ordinibus initiati, cum Basileae inter eos versaremur, qui 
 se generale concilium et universalem Ecclesiam repraesentare aiebant, dia- 
 logorum quendam libellum ad vos scripsimus, in quo de auctoritate concilii 
 generalis, ac de gestis Basiliensium et Eugenii Papae contradictione, ea 
 probavimus vel damnavimus, quae probanda vel damnanda censuimus ... sed 
 quis non errat mortalis ? . . ' Omnesdeclinaverunt, simul inutiles f acti sunt, 
 
 non est qui faciat bonum non est usque ad unum ' &c Nos homines 
 
 sumus, et ut homines erravimus ; neque imus inficias, multa quae diximus, 
 scripsimus, egimus, damnari posse ; verum non ut Arrius, Eutyches, Mace- 
 donius, aut Nestorius, &c. . . . Cogimur igitur, dilecti filii, beatum Augus- 
 tinum imitari, qui cum aliqua insuis voluminibus erronea inseruisset, 
 retractioues edidit." Then after unsaying the passage above quoted, and 
 quoting the texts in the sense it condemns, he continues, " Si quid adversus 
 hancdoctrinam inveneritis aut in dialogis aut in epistolis nostris (multa enim 
 scripsimus adbuc juvenes) respuite atque contemnite ; sequiinini quae nunc 
 dicimus, et seni rnagis quam juveni credite, nee privatum hominem pluris 
 facite quam Pontificem. iEneam rejicite, Pium recipite; illud gentile nomen 
 parentes indidere nascenti ; hoc Christianum in Apostolatu suscepimus." He 
 then answers the objection that he had cbanged his mind on his promotion. 
 " Haud ita est, longe aliter actum. Audite, filii, couversationem nostram, 
 brevis narratio erit, &c. Eramus adhuc paene laici, quando ad Eugenii 
 obedientiam redivimus. Ex Basilea clericali tantum charactere insigniti 
 
188 INSTANCES OP THE ABUSE, ETC. [LECT. VII. 
 
 recessimus," &c. Ibid. pp. 841, &c. However he was an active partisan of 
 the rights of the Council for a whole ten years, and did not pass over to the 
 Pope till he was 40. He was raised to the Papacy about thirteen years 
 after. 
 
 Note 3 on note 1. 
 
 [I used to consider the passages of St. Gregory here quoted as forming one 
 of the strongest arguments adducible against Papal Supremacy ; but, on 
 carefully considering his circumstances and his drift, I take the view of 
 Neander and Milman, neither of whom discern in them that special polemical 
 force which Anglicans assign to them in controversy. There are two patent 
 and important facts which are preliminary conditions of a just appreciation 
 of them. 
 
 1. The Fourth General Council, A.D. 452, called the Pope by the title, as 
 Gregory himself observes, supr., of Bishop of the Universal Church ; as 
 St. Cyril at the Third, a.d. 431, had called him " Archbishop of the world," 
 i.e. Universal Archbishop. 
 
 2. St. Gregory himself went far towards exercising in fact such universal 
 ecclesiastical jurisdiction over Christendom. 
 
 It follows that in the passages in question, he objects, not to the thing, 
 but 1, to the name, and 2, to John of Constantinople as claiming it. His 
 own prerogatives were undoubted, and did not come into question; he 
 himself was far more than a patriarch, but here was a Bishop exalting himself 
 above his brother patriarchs, making himself sole Bishop in the Church, and 
 using a title which even Gregory, who might have used it, thought unbecoming 
 in one who was the " Servus servorum Dei." 
 
 Milman writes thus : " He heard with astonishment and indignation that 
 John, Patriarch of Constantinople, had publicly, openly, assumed the title of 
 Universal Bishop, a title which implied his absolute supremacy over the 
 Christian world. . . The pretensions of the successors of St. Peter were thus 
 contemptuously set aside. . . Is this a time, chosen by an arbitrary prelate 
 to invade the undoubted rights of St. Peter by a haughty and pompous 
 title ? . . . Let all Christian hearts reject the blasphemous name. It was 
 once applied by the Council of Chalcedou in honour of St. Peter, to the Bishop 
 of Home ; but the more humble Pontiffs of Koine would not assume a title 
 injurious to the rest of the Priesthood." 
 
 Neander : " Eulogius, patriarch of Alexandria, had addressed Gregory as 
 ' Papa universalis,' a title which the great bishops used to apply to each 
 other ; but Gregory found it offensive. . . . On the same principle he 
 found fault with John of Constantinople, when he assumed the title of 
 Universal Bishop. . . True, he was so blinded by his passionate zeal for 
 what he supposed to be the injured honour of the Roman Church as to make 
 an important matter of it."] 
 
LECTURE VIII. 
 
 THE INDEFECTIBILITY OF THE CHURCH CATHOLIC. 
 
 So much on the subject of Private Judgment in matters 
 of Faith which, when legitimately exercised, may hold 
 its own against the claims of Church authority, for the 
 two do not, in principle, interfere with each other. The 
 Church enforces, on her own responsibility, what is an 
 historical fact, and ascertainable as other facts, and obvious 
 to the intelligence of inquirers, as other facts ; viz., the 
 doctrine of the Apostles ; and Private Judgment has as 
 little exercise here as in any matters of sense or experience. 
 It may as well claim a right of denying that the Apostles 
 existed, or that the Bible exists, as that that doctrine 
 existed and exists. 1 We are not free to sit at home and 
 speculate about everything ; there are things which we 
 look at, or ask about, if we are to know them. Some 
 things are matters of opinion, others of inquiry. The 
 simple question is, whether the Church's doctrine is Apos- 
 tolic, and how far Apostolic. Now if we could agree in 
 our answer, from examining Scripture, as we one and all 
 agree about the general events of life, it would be well ; 
 but since we do not, we must have recourse to such sources 
 as will enable us to agree, if there be such; and such, 
 I would contend, is Ecclesiastical Antiquity. There is, 
 
 1 [The difficulty for Anglicans is to draw the line, and to determine how 
 much of the Roman doctrine is in Antiquity and how much not.] 
 
190 THE INDEFECTJBILITY OF [LECT. 
 
 then, no intricacy and discordance in the respective claims 
 of the Church, and Private Judgment in the abstract. 
 The Church enforces a fact, Apostolical Tradition, as the 
 doctrinal key to Scripture ; and Private Judgment ex- 
 patiates beyond the limits of that Tradition ; 2 — each acts 
 in its own province, and is responsible within it. 
 
 1 have said the Church's Authority in enforcing doctrine 
 extends only so far as that doctrine is Apostolic, and 
 therefore true ; and that the evidence of its being Apos- 
 tolic, is in kind the same as that on which we believe the 
 Apostles lived, laboured, and suffered. But this leads to 
 a further and higher view of the subject, to which I shall 
 devote the present Lecture. 
 
 2. 
 
 Not only is the Church Catholic bound to teach the 
 Truth, but she is ever divinely guided to teach it ; her 
 witness of the Christian Faith is a matter of promise as 
 well as of duty j her discernment of it is secured by a 
 heavenly as well as by a human rule. She is indefectible 
 in it, and therefore not only has authority to enforce, but 
 is of authority in declaring it. This, it is obvious, is a 
 much more inspiring contemplation than any I have 
 hitherto mentioned. The Church not only transmits the 
 faith by human means, but has a supernatural gift 3 for 
 that purpose ; that doctrine, which is true, considered as 
 an historical fact, is true also because she teaches it. 
 
 In illustration of this subject I shall first refer to two 
 passages in our received formularies. 
 
 2 [But supposing Private Judgment exercises itself on the documents of 
 Antiquity, and comes to conclusion as to facts different from those which 
 Church authority imposes ?] 
 
 3 [This " supernatural gift " then must put a stop to the lively action of 
 Private Judgment, and contradicts the doctrine, p. 189, that " Private Judg- 
 ment and Church Authority do not in principle interfere with eacn other."] 
 
VIII.] THE CHURCH CATHOLIC. 191 
 
 3. 
 
 First ; in the 20th Article we are told that the Church 
 has "authority in controversies of faith." Now these 
 words certainly do not merely mean that she has authority 
 to enforce such doctrines as can historically be proved to 
 be Apostolical. They do not speak of her power of en- 
 forcing truth, or of her power of enforcing at all, but say 
 that she has " authority in controversies ;" whereas, if this 
 authority depended on the mere knowledge of an historical 
 fact, and much more, if only on her persuasion in a matter 
 of opinion, any individual of competent information has 
 the same in his place and degree. The Church has, 
 according to this Article, a power which individuals have 
 not; a power not merely as the ruling principle of a 
 society, to admit and reject members, not simply a power 
 of imposing tests, but simply "authority in controversies 
 of faith." But how can she have this authority unless 
 she be so far certainly true in her declarations ? She can 
 have no authority in declaring a lie. Matters of doctrine 
 are not like matters of usage or custom, founded on ex- 
 pedience, and determinable by discretion. They appeal to 
 the conscience, and the conscience is subject to Truth alone. 
 It recognizes and follows nothing but what comes to it 
 with the profession of Truth. To say the Church has 
 authority, and yet is not true, as far as she has authority, 
 were to destroy liberty of conscience, which Protestantism 
 in all its forms holds especially sacred; it were to substitute 
 somethingbesides Truth as the sovereign lord of conscience 
 which would be tyranny. If this Protestant principle is 
 not surrendered in the Article, which no one supposes it 
 to be, the Church is to a certain point there set forth as 
 the organ or representative of Truth, and its teaching is 
 identified with it. 
 
192 THE INDEFECTIBILITY OF [lECT. 
 
 Oar reception of the Athanasian Creed is another proof 
 of our holding the infallibility of the Church, as some of 
 our Divines express it, in matters of saving faith. In that 
 Creed it is unhesitatingly said, that certain doctrines are 
 necessary to be believed in order to salvation ; they are 
 minutely and precisely described; no room is left for 
 Private Judgment ; none for any examination into Scrip- 
 ture, with the view of discovering them. Next, if we 
 inquire the ground of this authority in the Church, the 
 Creed answers, that she speaks merely as the organ of the 
 Catholic voice, and that the faith thus witnessed, is, as 
 being thus witnessed, such, that whoso does not believe 
 it faithfully, cannot be saved. "Catholic/' then, and 
 n saving " are taken as synonymous terms; in other words, 
 the Church Catholic is pronounced to have been all along, 
 and by implication as destined ever to be, the guardian of 
 the pure and undefiled faith, or to be indefectible in that 
 faith. 
 
 5. J 
 
 If it be inquired whether such a doctrine does not 
 trench upon the prerogative of Scripture, as containing all 
 things necessary to salvation, I answer, that it cannot; for 
 else, one portion of our formularies would be inconsistent 
 with another. And, in truth, there is obviously no incon- 
 sistency whatever in saying, first, that Scripture contains 
 the Saving Faith; and, next, that the Church Catholic 
 has, by a Divine gift, ever preached it ; though, doubtless, 
 it would be inconsistent to say, first, that the Church 
 Catholic has ever preached the Saving Faith ; next, that 
 each individual is allowed to draw his Faith for himself 
 from Scripture ; but this our formularies do not say. 
 
 We do not, therefore, set up the Church against Scrip- 
 ture, but we make her the keeper and interpreter of 
 
VIII.] THE CHURCH CATHOLIC. 193 
 
 Scripture. And Scripture itself contains what may be 
 called her charter to be such. 
 
 6. 
 
 Out of various texts, bearing more or less on the subject, 
 I select the following : — 
 
 " The Church of the Living God, the pillar and ground 
 of the Truth." — "He gave some Apostles, and some 
 Prophets, and some Evangelists, and some Pastors and 
 Teachers, for the perfecting of the Saints, for the work of 
 the Ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ, tiU 
 we all come in the unity of the Faith, and of the knowledge 
 of the Son of God unto a perfect man, unto the measure 
 of the stature of the fulness of Christ, in order that we 
 henceforth be no more children tossed to and fro, carried 
 about with every wind of doctrine." Again, " As for Me, 
 this is My covenant with them, saith the Lord, My Spirit 
 that is upon thee, and My words which I have put in thy 
 mouth, shall not depart out of thy mouth, nor out of the 
 mouth of thy seed, nor out of the mouth of thy seed's seed, 
 saith the Lord, from henceforth and for ever." 4 
 
 In these passages, let it be observed, the Church is 
 declared to be the great and special support of the Truth, 
 her various functionaries are said to be means towards 
 the settlement of diversities and of uncertainty of doctrine, 
 and securing unity of faith; and a direct promise is vouch- 
 safed to her that the word of Truth committed to her shall 
 never be lost, and that, in consequence of the ever-present 
 care and guidance of the Holy Ghost. How these passages 
 are understood by Protestant sectaries, I know not ; how, 
 for instance, the first cited is understood at all, by those 
 who deny a visible Church. On the other hand, if only a 
 visible Church can be a stay and maintenance of the 
 
 4 1 Tim. iii. 15. Eph. iv. 11—14. Isa. lix. 21 j vide also xxx. 20, 21. 
 VOL. I. O 
 
194 THE INDEFECTIBILITY OF [LECT. 
 
 Truth, and if therefore a visible Church is spoken of in 
 this passage, let us reflect how high an office, how august 
 and magnificent a privilege is there assigned her. Was 
 not St. Paul speaking of a something existing in his day? 
 Does not what he then spoke of still exist in the same 
 sense in which the children of Israel, who were once called 
 out of Egypt, now exist ? and would it not be just as 
 extravagant to say that the threatenings uttered against 
 Israel by Moses, were not fulfilled in the Israel we see, as 
 to deuy that the promises made to the Church Catholic in 
 Scripture, are not also fulfilled in the Church we see ? 
 But, if so, the Spirit of Almighty God is expressly pledged 
 to her for the maintenance of the One Faith, from genera- 
 tion to generation, even to the end ! 
 
 7. 
 Such is the doctrine of our most considerable Divines, 
 and such the grounds of it, whether in Scripture or in our 
 formularies ; but here we encounter a difficulty. Roman- 
 ists and Protestant sectaries combine in resisting our 
 interpretation of the foregoing texts. Both parties agree 
 as far as this, that such passages either mean a great deal 
 more than we make of them, or nothing at all. The 
 Protestant of the day considers them to mean nothing ; 
 the Romanist sees in them the doctrine of the Church's 
 abiding and continuous Infallibility : but both parties 
 unite in charging us with taking up an interpretation on 
 no principle ; with stopping where we stop without mean- 
 ing ; with adopting a middle, timid path ; with receiving 
 the promises only so far as we dare, and are constrained ; 
 confessing them when we are pressed by argument, and 
 retracting our confession when the need is over ; commit- 
 ting ourselves to all the odium of the Roman view, without 
 what even its enemies own to be its redeeming points; 
 being arrogant without pretension, and ambitious without 
 
VIII.] THE CHURCH CATHOLIC. 195 
 
 aim. Accordingly they call upon us to retreat, or, since 
 we have gone so far, to go further. The Protestant 
 sectary alleges that we differ from the Romanist only in 
 minute and unintelligible points ; the Romanist retorts, 
 on the other hand, that in heart we are Protestants, but in 
 controversy are obliged by our theory to profess a devo- 
 tion while we evade an obedience to the teaching of 
 Antiquity. Such is the position of the Via Media. 
 
 8. 
 
 We are accused, it seems, of drawing fine, and over- 
 subtle distinctions ; as if, like the Semi-arians of old, we 
 were neither on the one side nor the other. The following 
 remarks on the general subject of the promises made to 
 the Church Catholic, are made with the hope of showing 
 that our distinctive peculiarities are not matters of words 
 and names, but are realities. 
 
 The texts above quoted are considered by Roman theo- 
 logians to prove the Infallibility of the Church in all mat- 
 ters of faith, and general morals. They certainly will 
 bear so to be interpreted, it cannot be denied : and if this 
 be so, why, it may be asked, are they not so interpreted 
 by us ? I answer by referring to the parallel of the 
 Mosaic Law. God's favour was promised to the Israelites 
 for ever, but has been withdrawn from them. Has God's 
 promise, therefore, failed? or, rather, was it not forfeited 
 by neglect on the part of His people, to perform the con- 
 ditions on which it was granted ? Surely we so account 
 for the rejection and ruin of the nation when Christ came. 
 Even supposing, then, for argument's sake, that the 
 promises to the Christian Church be in themselves as 
 ample as the Romanist pretend, perhaps they have been 
 since forfeited, or suspended in their measure, by our dis- 
 obedience. 5 I will explain what I mean. 
 5 Leslie, Works, vol. iii. p. 25 — 28. 
 
 o 2 
 
196 THE INDEFECTIBILITY OP [LECT. 
 
 9. 
 
 We Anglo-Catholics say, that the Christian Church 
 will ever retain what is called in Scripture " the Faith/' 
 the substance or great outlines of the Gospel as taught by 
 the Apostles, (whatever they are, — which is not the 
 question at present,) and that, in consequence of the Scrip- 
 ture promise that the word of God shall never depart out 
 of her mouth. Roman Catholics say that she is pure and 
 spotless in all matters great and small, that she can never 
 decide wrongly on any point of faith and morals, but in 
 every age possesses and teaches explicitly, or implicitly, the 
 whole truth as it was held by St. Paul or St. John, in 
 spite of all deficiencies in written documents or errors in 
 particular writers and periods. Now, I do not see any 
 antecedent reason why such a fulfilment of the prophecy 
 should not have been intended, though it has not taken 
 place. It is more reasonable indeed, and more modest, in 
 the first instance to put only a general sense upon the 
 words of the promise, and to view it rather in its great 
 outlines than in detail ; yet there is nothing in Scripture 
 or elsewhere to limit it, — there is no rule assignable for 
 determining how much it means and what it cannot meau. 
 So solemn are the promises made to the Church, so ample 
 is the grace pledged to her for their fulfilment, so intelli- 
 gible are the human provisions appointed in co-operation, 
 that there surely is no antecedent reason why Almighty 
 God should not have designed to bestow on the Church 
 that perfect purity which the Roman School claims for 
 her. All through the inspired history, we have traces of 
 divine intentions mysteriously frustrated. It was pur- 
 posed that the Jewish people should receive, preach and 
 dispense the Gospel ; it was not fulfilled. It was an- 
 nounced beforehand to the Christian Church, that " her 
 people should be all righteous," whereas iniquity has 
 
VIII.] THE CHURCH CATHOLIC. 197 
 
 abounded. " The wolf was to dwell with the lamb, and 
 the leopard to lie down with the kid; " and there have 
 been endless wars and fightings. God's promises depend 
 on man's co-operation for their fulfilment in detail ; and 
 though they are ever fulfilled in such measure as to satisfy 
 the formal wording of them, they have a large or a small 
 extent of blessing ; they expand or contract, according 
 to our reception of them, and often admit of a meaning 
 which the event does not sanction. 
 
 The promise that the word of truth should not depart 
 out of the mouth of the Church, is satisfied in what we see 
 fulfilled at this day, viz. in the whole Church in all its 
 branches having ever maintained the faith in its essential 
 outlines ; nay, it might be satisfied even in a scantier ful- 
 filment. Less, I say, might be enough ; but, supposing it, 
 still perhaps the promise may have originally meant more 
 than what the letter absolutely requires, viz. as much as 
 has actually been fulfilled ; and, if so, perhaps even more 
 than that. God's thoughts are deeper than human words ; 
 they cannot be exhausted. The more you ask, the higher 
 you aim, the more faithfully you expect, the more diligently 
 you co-operate, the fuller return you obtain. The man of 
 God was angry with Joash, king of Israel, for smiting on 
 the ground but thrice, and then staying ; and he said, 
 " Thou shouldest have smitten five or six times, then hadst 
 thou smitten Syria till thou hadst consumed it ; whereas 
 now thou shalt smite Syria but thrice. 6 If the Christian 
 Church was intended to come on earth in the power and 
 spirit of Christ Himself, her Lord and Defender, if she was 
 to manifest Him mystically before the eyes and in the souls 
 of men who is on the right hand of God, if her glory was to 
 be like that of heaven, though invisible, her reign eternal, 
 and her kingdom universal, if she was destined to compel 
 
 6 2 Kings xiii. 19. 
 
198 THE INDEFECTIBILITY OF [lECT. 
 
 the nations with an irresistible sway, smiting and wither- 
 ing them if rebellious, though not with earthly weapons, 
 and shedding upon the obedient overflowing peace, and 
 the holiest and purest blessings, it is not extravagant to 
 suppose that she was also destined to an authoritative, 
 manifold ministry of the word such as has never been 
 realized. And thatthese prospects have been disappointed, 
 may be owing, as in the case of the Jews, to the misconduct 
 of her members. They may have forfeited for her in a 
 measure her original privileges. 
 
 10. 
 Nay, the parallel of Judaism is a positive argument in 
 favour of such a supposition ; for surely, with the history 
 of Israel before us, and the actual recorded sins of the 
 Christian Church, we may pronounce it improbable that 
 those sins have forfeited nothing at all, that they have 
 not influenced her subsequent fortunes, or impaired her 
 invisible, as they undeniably have curtailed her visible 
 powers. Any one who maintains that the Church is all 
 that Christ intended her to be, has the analogy of Judaism 
 full against him. As well may we imagine it was God's 
 intention that the temple should be burned and the Jews 
 should go into captivity, as that Christendom should be 
 what we see it is at this day. Nor will it avail to argue, 
 that of knowledge at least there was a gradual increase in 
 the Jewish Church, not a diminution, as time went on, so 
 that the parallel does not hold in the point for which I 
 bring it ; for this increase was by means of fresh revela- 
 tions, which God imparted rather in spite of the existing 
 Church, and against it, than through it; by the mouth of 
 the Prophets, not of the Priests. And moreover, these 
 successive revelations were in their turn forgotten in 
 course of time, or withdrawn in consequence of the people's 
 sins. By the time of Josiah the book of the Law was 
 
 I/O 
 
VIII.] THE CHURCH CATHOLTC 199 
 
 lost ; by the time of Christ's coming the Evangelical pro- 
 phecies had been overlaid with Pharisaical Traditions. 
 
 11. 
 I have said, that arguing from the history of Judaism, it 
 is not improbable antecedently, rather the reverse, that the 
 Christian Church has forfeited a portion of the promises ; 
 but we shall find, I think, in the New Testament that the 
 promises made to her actually did depend more orless upon 
 a condition which now for many centuries she has broken. 
 This condition is Unity/ which is made by Christ and His 
 Apostles, as it were, the sacramental channel through 
 which all the gifts of the Spirit, and among them purity 
 of doctrine, are secured to the Church. It is not neces- 
 sary to do more than touch upon the abundant evidence 
 which the New Testament furnishes on this subject. 
 Unity may be called the especial badge of Christ's disci- 
 ples and the tenure of their privileges. "By this," He 
 says, "shall all men know that ye are My disciples, if ye 
 have love one to another." Again, " Where two or three 
 are gathered together in My name, there am I in the midst 
 of them." He prays for His Apostles, and through them 
 for all believers, " that they may be One," as He is in His 
 Father ; or, as His own words stand, iC that fchey all may 
 be One, as Thou, Father, art in Me, and I in Thee, that 
 they also may be One in Us. . . . The glory which Thou 
 gavest Me, I have given them, that they may be One, even 
 as We are One, I in them, and Thou in Me, that they may 
 be made perfect in One, that the world may know that Thou 
 has sent Me." In these words, a visible unity, a unity 
 such as the world could recognize, whatever depths it has 
 besides, is made the token, or the condition, as we view it, 
 of that glory in which the Church was to be clad. 
 
 7 In Cathedra unitatis doctrinam posuit veritatis. August. Ep. 105. 
 p. 303. 
 
200 THE INDEFECTIBILITY OF [LECT. 
 
 Again : consider the following passages from St. Paul's 
 Epistles. It will be found that the grace of the two Sa- 
 craments, the faith of the Gospel, the renewal of the heart, 
 all the privileges given us, are there represented as in con- 
 nexion with unity ; whether as cause, or as effect, or col- 
 laterally, matters not to our present purpose. " By One 
 Spirit are we all baptized into One Body ; . . . and have 
 been all made to drink into One Spirit." " There is One 
 Body } One Spirit, One Faith." " Stand fast in One Spirit, 
 with one mind striving together for the Faith of the 
 Gospel." " Is Christ divided ? was Paul crucified for 
 you ? or were ye baptized in the name of Paul ? " " As 
 many of you as have been baptized into Christ, have put 
 on Christ ... ye are all One in Christ Jesus." " Ye 
 have put on the new man, which is renewed in knowledge, 
 after the image of Him that created him ; where there is 
 neither Greek nor Jew, circumcision nor uncircumcision, 
 Barbarian, Scythian, bond nor free ; but Christ is all and 
 in all. Put on therefore, as the elect of God, holy and 
 beloved, bowels of mercies, kindness, humbleness of mind, 
 meekness, long-suffering, forbearing one another and for- 
 giving one another, if any man have a quarrel against 
 any ; even as Christ forgave you, so also do ye. And 
 above all these things put on charity, which is the bond of 
 perf ectness ; and let the peace of God rule in your hearts, 
 to the which also ye are called in One Body/ 3 
 
 12. 
 
 Surely these passages of Scripture express most strongly 
 the dependence, nay, considering our Lord's wcrds, the 
 essential dependence of the privileges of the Gospel upon 
 a visible as well as a moral unity. The one image of 
 Christ, the seal of the covenant, which must be impressed 
 on all who would be saved, is then only stamped upon His 
 disciples when they are brought together or viewed in one ; 
 
VIII.] THE CHURCH CATHOLIC. 201 
 
 and by their separation and discord, it is broken asunder. 
 The instances recorded in the Acts of the Apostles, do but 
 corroborate this doctrine. The Holy Ghost originally 
 descended, when the Apostles " were all with one accord in 
 one place ;" and, on another occasion, when " they lifted 
 up their voice to God with one accord/' " the place was 
 shaken where they were assembled together, arid they were all 
 filled with the Holy Ghost, and spake the word of God with 
 boldness." In like manner, in their synodical letter to the 
 Churches, they speak of its " seeming good to the Holy Ghost 
 and to them," after they were " assembled with one accord." 8 
 
 And the very passages in the Prophets which have led to 
 these remarks, tend to the same conclusion. The promises 
 therein contained are made to the Church as One, not to 
 two, or three, or a dozen bodies ; and here we may make 
 use of the very argument commonly argued by Roman 
 controversialists against us. They ask triumphantly, 
 |B which is the One true and Infallible Church ? " implying 
 that if Scripture names but one, it must be theirs ; but we 
 may answer that, since the Church is now not one, 9 it is 
 not infallible ; since the one has become in one sense many, 
 the full prophetical idea is not now fulfilled ; and, with 
 the idea also is lost the full endowment and the attribute 
 of Infallibility in particular, supposing that were ever 
 included in it. 
 
 13. 
 
 This then is the conclusion we arrive at; that the 
 Church Catholic, being no longer one in the fullest sense, 
 does not enjoy her predicted privileges in the fullest sense. 
 And that soundness of doctrine is one of the privileges 
 thus infring*ed, is plain from the simple fact that the sepa- 
 
 8 Acts ii. 1 ; iv. 24—31 ; xv. 25. 28. 
 
 ■ [Then there is no one visible Church. Church is an abstract word, not 
 signifying one body. Anglicans, like Independents, should talk of "the 
 Churches."] 
 
202 THE INDEFECTIBILITY OP [LECT. 
 
 rate branches of the Church do disagree with each other 
 in the details of faith ; discordance in teaching, which once 
 was not, among witnesses of the truth, being the visible 
 proof of that truth being impaired, as well as the breach of 
 the condition guaranteeing it. Further it may be remarked, 
 that since the duty of unity admits of fuller or scantier 
 fulfilment, 1 it does not follow, though it has been broken in 
 its highest sense, that therefore it is altogether lost, and 
 its privileges with it ; or again, that it would be lost in the 
 same sense by every kind of infringement, or is actually 
 lost in the same degree in every place. The meeting of 
 " two or three " private men in Christ's name, is one kind 
 of fulfilment, and in default of higher opportunities, may 
 be attended under any circumstances with a portion of 
 divine blessing. Again, the unity of the Ministerial Suc- 
 cession may be the tenure on which the sacred mysteries 
 of faith are continued to us, as seems probable both from 
 the history of the Church, and from the circumstance that 
 both to that Ministry and to that fundamental Faith con- 
 tinuance is promised to the end of the world. Higher 
 measures of truth may be attached to a unity of jurisdic- 
 tion and external order ; while the highest of all, amount- 
 ing to a continual Infallibility, were it ever intended, might 
 require the presence of a superhuman charity and peace, 
 such as has never been witnessed since the time w hen the 
 disciples " continued steadfastly in the Apostles' doctrine 
 and fellowship, and in breaking of bread, and in prayers/' 
 and " had all things common, selling their possessions and 
 goods, and parting them to all men, as every man had 
 need, and continued daily with one accord in the temple," 
 and ate their food " with gladness and singleness of heart, 
 praising God, and having favour with all the people." 2 
 
 1 [Visible unity surely does not admit of degrees. Christians are either 
 one polity or they are not. We cannot talk of a little unity.] 
 
 2 Acts ii. 42—47. 
 
VIII.] THE CHURCH CATHOLIC. 203 
 
 14. 
 
 If this view of the subject be in the main correct, it 
 would follow that the Ancient Church will be our model in 
 all matters of doctrine, till it broke up into portions, and 
 for Catholic agreement substituted peculiar and local 
 opinions ; but that since that time the Church has possessed 
 no fuller measure of the truth than we see it has at this 
 day, viz. merely the fundamental faith. 3 And such ap- 
 pears to be the principle adopted by our own writers, in 
 their disputes concerning those points in the superstructure 
 of faith in which our Church differs from her sisters else- 
 where. They refer to those times when the Church spoke 
 but one language ; they refer to Antiquity, as the period 
 when all Christians agreed together in faith. And thus 
 we shall be able to answer the question commonly put to 
 us by our Eoman opponents concerning the date of their 
 corruptions. They consider it fair to call upon us to show 
 when it was that their doctrines, supposing them errors, 
 were introduced, as if the impossibility of our doing this 
 accurately, would be a proof that they were not introduc- 
 tions. They challenge us to draw the line between the 
 pure and corrupt ages of the Church ; and, when we reply 
 discordantly, they triumph in what they consider a virtual 
 refutation of our charge. They argue that what betrays no 
 signs in history of being introduced was never introduced, 
 but is part of the original Gospel ; and when we object the 
 silence of Antiquity as to any recognition of the Roman 
 system, they retort upon us what they allege to be a simi- 
 lar silence in history concerning its rise. Now, let us apply 
 to this argument the foregoing considerations on the subject 
 
 3 [This implies that by a happy coincidence, a providential disposition, the 
 great quarrels and divisions of the Christian body did not take place till 
 just upon the date of* the complete enunciation by the Church of all the 
 " fundamentals " of faith.] 
 
204 THE INDEFECTIBILITY OP [LECT. 
 
 of unity. Are not Christians for certain divided now, as 
 Romanists themselves will be the first to acknowledge ? 
 then must there have been a time when they began to be 
 divided ; even though the year and the day cannot be 
 pointed out, and we differ one with another in determining 
 it. Now it is upon this very fact of the schism that I 
 ground the corruption of doctriue ; the one has taken place 
 when and so far as the other has taken place, though the 
 history of both the one and the other be unknown. If 
 asked, then, for the point of time when Christian truth 
 began to be impaired, I leave it for our opponents to 
 answer, when it v as that Christian unity began to be 
 compromised. We are not bound to assign it. It is a 
 question of degree and place, not to mention the imperfec- 
 tion of historical documents. Who can trace the formal 
 acts of schism running through the whole Church, and 
 combining, as the jarrings in some material body, to split 
 it into fragments ? Let us then clearly unders f and what 
 is meant by the question they ask us. We disclaim the 
 notion that there was any one point of time, at which 
 the Church suddenly sank into the gulf of error ; we do 
 not say she ever so sank as not to be in a truer sense not 
 sunken; and we think it mere trifling for them to insist upon 
 our pointing out the very first rise or the popular introduc- 
 tion of the doctrines we condemn. Once grant there are 
 intrinsic grounds for suspecting those doctrines, and this 
 is a pure historical question ; and, if unanswered, is but an 
 historical obscurity, not a theological difficulty. Itis enough 
 if we do here, just so much as we are able to do in respect 
 to the divisions of the Church, when we assign the formal 
 and public acts of schism and their age and place. To 
 quarrel with us because we do no more, nay, or because we 
 differ among ourselves in a question of dates, is as pre- 
 posterous as it would be to object to the received interpre- 
 tation of Jeremiah's prophecy of the seventy years because 
 
VIII 
 
 .] THE CHURCH CATHOLIC. 205 
 
 three separate commencements may be assigned to the 
 period, or deny that Daniel's of the seventy weeks was 
 fulfilled in Christ's coming, on account of the difficulties 
 which attend its nice adjustment in detail. 
 
 15. 
 
 Until, then, Roman Catholics maintain that their Church 
 has not quarrelled with others, as well as kept the faith 
 incorrupt, they gain no triumph in proving differences 
 among our Divines in what is merely a point of history. 
 Till they maintain their Church's Infallibility as regards 
 matters of fact, they may well bear with individuals 
 umong us who differ one from another in a question of 
 dates. For it is little more than this ; since the greater 
 number of our writers, whether they say the Church's faith 
 was first impaired at the end of the fourth century, or iu 
 the eighth, still agree in the principle of appealing to 
 those ages which they respectively consider to lie within 
 the period of peace and union ; and when they seem to 
 differ they are often but speaking of different stages of the 
 long history of error, of its first beginnings, or its estab- 
 lishment, or the public protests against it, — of the earlier 
 time, when truth was universally maintained, or of the 
 later, when errors were universal. 
 
 Thus, Bishop Ken, for instance, takes in the whole tract 
 of centuries, up to the disunion of the East and West, that 
 is nearly 800 years. Bishop Yan Mildert says nearly the 
 same, expressing his belief that "until the great schism 
 between the Eastern and Western Churches, and the full 
 establishment of the Papal usurpation/' the Fathers kept 
 before them the duty of contending for the faith and 
 guarding it against heretical innovations. 4 Archbishop 
 Bramhall names 600 years, that is, up to Pope Gregory's 
 mission to England. Bishop Jewell, again, challenges the 
 
 4 Bampt. Lect. iv. p. 97. 
 
206 THE INDEFECTIBILITY OP [LECT. 
 
 Romanists to adduce authority from the first six centuries, 
 for certain points in their faith and worship which he 
 specifies. Bishops Hall and Cosin adopt the same period. 5 
 The directions given to the Bishops from the Lords of the 
 Council in the year 1582, with a view to their disputations 
 with Jesuits and seminary Priests, observe the same rule, 
 enjoining them, if the latter " shall show any grounds of 
 Scripture and wrest it to their sense," to call for " the in- 
 terpretation of the old Doctors, such as were before Gre- 
 gory I., for that in his time began the first claim of the 
 supremacy by the Patriarch of Constantinople, and shortly 
 after was usurped by the Bishop of Rome." 6 Hammond 
 and Stillingfleet are willing to stand by the first six General 
 Councils, which lie between 325 to t>80. 7 The act of the 
 first year of Elizabeth especially names the first four 
 (a.d. 325 — 451), not however to the exclusion of the fifth 
 and sixth, for which and for others it expressly leaves an 
 opening, but from the great importance of those former 
 Councils, which Pope Gregory, though living after the fifth, 
 compares in their own department to the four Gospels. In 
 like manner four or five centuries are named by other of 
 our writers, not as rejecting therebya more extended space, 
 but from the notion that, in granting so much, a field of 
 controversy was opened as large as Romanists could desire. 
 And I suppose the latter would allow, that if the age of 
 true Catholicism be extended by us as far as the end of the 
 fourth century, they would gain little in controversy by the 
 addition of the fifth or sixth. If the voluminous remains 
 of that period, including the works of Ambrose, Austin, 
 Jerome, Chrysostom, Basil, Gregory Nyssen, Gregory 
 Nazianzen, Athanasius, and Cyril of Jerusalem, will not 
 afford a standard of Catholic doctrine, there seems little 
 profit to be gained from Antiquity at all. Thus Archbishops 
 
 5 Hall, Cone, ad Clerum. 6 Brett, on Tradition, § 1. 
 
 7 Hammond, vol. i. p. 551. Stillingfleet, vol. vi. p. 650. 
 
VIII.] THE CHURCH CATHOLIC. 207 
 
 Laud/ and Usher by implication, 9 specify " four or five 
 hundred, years ; " while Bishop Stillingfleet, 1 still proceed- 
 ing by the test of unity as already explained, dates the 
 rise of the schism, and therefore, as it would seem, of cor- 
 ruption, from the Councils of Constantinople or Chalcedon, 
 that is, he places it between a.d. 381 and 451. And in 
 like manner, Waterland specifies the three or four first 
 centuries ; 2 and Beveridge also. 3 
 
 16. 
 
 Such is the agreement in principle, such the immaterial 
 disagreement of our Divines, in determining the limit of 
 that period to which we give the name of Antiquity. 4 
 The principle is clear, the fact obscure. Different Judg- 
 ments may be formed of the date when the East and West 
 fell into schism, but that " love is the bond of perfectness " 
 will be admitted on all hands. Thus much is plain, that 
 the termination of the period of purity cannot be fixed 
 much earlier than the Council of Sardica, a.d. 347, which 
 an historian of the next century names as the commence- 
 ment of the division, 5 nor so late as the second Nicene or 
 seventh General Council, which was held a.d. 78 7. Indeed 
 this latter Council bears upon it various marks of error, as 
 if to draw our attention to its want of authority. It was 
 the Council which decreed the worship of images ; but 
 this I do not here assume to be a corruption, that being 
 the point in dispute between ourselves and the Romanists. 
 But that, independent of doctrinal considerations, it has no 
 pretensions to authority, is plain, from the fact, that it was 
 
 8 On Tradition, p 53, § 15. 9 Answer to Jesuit, ch. i. 
 
 1 Stillingfl. Grounds, pp. 38, 39. 
 
 2 Waterland, on Eccles. Antiq. 5. 9. 3 Beveridge, Procera. ad Can. 7. 
 
 4 [" Immaterial ? " how can it be immaterial, when the faith of Christen- 
 dom, of each one of us, is determined by the limit given to " Antiquity " ?] 
 
 5 Sozom. Hist. iii. 13. 
 
208 THE INDEFECTIBILITY OF [LECT. 
 
 the meeting, not of the whole Church, but of a mere party 
 in it, which in no sense really represented the Catholic 
 world. Thirty years before, nearly as many Bishops as then 
 assembled, had condemned in Council the usage which it 
 enforced. Seven years after it, three hundred assembled 
 in Council at Frankfort, and protested against its decision, 
 which was not fully acknowledged in the West for five or 
 six hundred years afterwards. 6 Moreover this same Coun- 
 cil has upon it other characteristics, in which it has also 
 been a precedent for the after innovations of Rome. It 
 was the first General Council which professed to ground 
 its decrees, not on Scripture sanction, but mainly on Tra- 
 dition ; and it was the first which framed as an article of 
 faith, what, whether true or false, was besides and beyond 
 the articles of the Apostles' Creed. 7 So closely did griev- 
 ous mistakes, as they will hereafter be shown to be, in 
 ecclesiastical principles, follow on the breach of Catholic 
 unity. Without then urging against it, its decree in 
 favour of image worship, which is the error which espe- 
 cially attaches to it, here are two separate violations of 
 principle incurred in its proceedings. A point of doctrine 
 is made necessary to salvation, — on the one hand without 
 Scripture warrant, — on the other, beyond the Articles of 
 the Creed. Lastly, it maybe remarked, that in the course 
 of the controversy about Images, the Popes disowned the 
 authority of the Emperor, and thus involved themselves in 
 
 6 Mosheim, Cent. 8. ii. 3. § 12. Spanheim, Annal. Ecclesiast. Cent. 8. say 
 that it is not received by the Greeks ; the following, however, seems to be 
 the more correct statement : " It has been latterly admitted as oecumenical 
 in the Eastern Church, but the facts are undeniable, that for a space of 60 
 vears, the decree of Nice was not approved by the East ; but for 90 years at 
 least it was not generally admitted to be oecumenical : and in fine, even in 
 the time of Barlaam, Abbot of St. Saviour, a.d. 1339, nearly 600 years after 
 its celebration, some of the Orientals still reckoned only six General Councils, 
 thus denying the authority of this Synod." Palmer on the Church, vol. ii. 
 p. 202, vid. also Marheineke, Instit. Symb. § 119. 
 
 " Stillingfl. vol. vi. p. 450. 
 
VIII 
 
 .] THE CHURCH CATHOLIC. 209 
 
 a distinct sin, which led the way to many of those pecu- 
 liarities by which their monarchical rule was afterwards 
 distinguished. 
 
 17. 
 But whenever the fatal deed took place, it is long done 
 and past, and its effects live to this day. Century after 
 century the Church Catholic has become more and more 
 disunited, discordant, and corrupt. Under these circum- 
 stances it is a great privilege to know that certain pro- 
 mises are irrevocably made to her, as being made on the 
 simple condition of her existence : that the Apostolical 
 ministry is to continue, and the presence of Christ in that 
 ministry, "even unto the end of the world." And what 
 is promised to Apostolic ordinances, we trust is promised 
 as it has hitherto been granted, to the Apostolic faith also. 
 That original Creed, which St. Paul committed to Timothy, 
 and the first ages considered as the fundamental faith, still 
 remains to us, and to all Christians all over the world ; 
 the gates of hell have not prevailed against it. What- 
 ever might formerly have been possessed besides of a 
 strictly traditionary nature ; whatever of rich, but un- 
 sorted and uncatalogued treasures ; whatever too sacred, 
 or too subtle to record in words, whether comments on 
 Scripture, or principles of interpreting it, or Apostolic 
 usages ; still at least we have the essentials of faith : and 
 that we have as much as this, considering the numberless 
 hazards to which it has been exposed, is at once a most 
 gracious and a most marvellous appointment of Divine 
 Providence. To the enemies of the Church it is a sign 
 which they " are not able to gainsay nor resist ; " and to 
 us an encouragement that, in what we do for her sake, 
 her Maker and Saviour will be with us. 
 
 18. 
 On this subject I am led to quote an impressive passage 
 vol. i. p 
 
210 THE JNDEFECTIBILITY OF [LECT. 
 
 from the Bampton Lectures of Bishop Van Mildert, who 
 enforces the main principle under consideration, though 
 treating it more as a fact than as a doctrine. 
 
 "If a candid investigation/' he says, "be made of the 
 points generally agreed upon by the Church Universal, it 
 will probably be found, that at no period of its history 
 has any fundamental or essential truth of the Gospel been 
 authoritatively disowned. Particular Churches may have 
 added many superstitious observances and many erroneous 
 tenets, to these essential truths; and in every Church, 
 particular individuals, or congregations of individuals, 
 may have tainted large portions of the Christian com- 
 munity with pestilential heresies. But as far as the 
 Church Catholic can be deemed responsible, the substance 
 of sound doctrine still remains undestroyed, at least, if not 
 unimpaired. Let us take, for instance, those articles of 
 faith which have already been shown to be essential to the 
 Christian Covenant — the Doctrines of the Trinity, of our 
 Lord's Divinity and Incarnation, of His Atonement and 
 Intercession, of our Sanctification by the Holy Spirit, of 
 the terms of acceptance, and the Ordinances of the 
 Christian Sacraments and Priesthood. At what period of 
 the Church have these doctrines, or either of them, been 
 by any public act disowned or called in question ? We 
 are speaking now, it will be recollected, of what in the 
 language of Ecclesiastical History, is emphatically called 
 The Church ; that, which has from age to age borne rule, 
 u pon the ground of its pretensions to Apos tolical Succession. 
 
 And to this our inquiry is necessarily restricted 
 
 But view now, on the other hand, the labours of those 
 who endeavoured to subvert any of these fundamental 
 truths. Observe the parties with whom they originated, 
 and the estimation in which they were holden. No age of 
 the Church has ever been entirely free from attempts to 
 spread pernicious errors. Yet at what period have they 
 
VIII.] THE CHURCH CATHOLIC. 211 
 
 ever received its authoritative sanction ? Did the Church 
 in primitive times yield one iota of essential doctrine to 
 the Gnostic Heretics ? Did it afterwards adopt either the 
 Sabellian, the Arian, or the Macedonian tenets ? Did the 
 wild enthusiasm of Manes,, or Montanus, and their 
 followers, in any respect influence its Creed? And in 
 later times, when and where have the Socinian notions been 
 recognized as of any legitimate authority ? Or, what 
 proof can even the disciples of Calvin produce, that his 
 doctrine of arbitrary and irrespective decrees was ever 
 the received persuasion of the Catholic Church ? To say 
 nothing of the multitude of lesser divisions of religious 
 opinion, or of those ephemeral productions, of each of 
 which, as of their authors, it might be said, ' in the 
 morning it flourisheth, and groweth up, in the eveniDg it 
 is cut down and withereth/ Surely here is something to 
 arrest reflection; something which they who sincerely 
 profess Christianity, and are tenacious of the inviolability 
 of its doctrines, must contemplate with sentiments of awe 
 
 and veneration How have they withstood the 
 
 assaults of continued opponents ; opponents, wanting 
 neither talents nor inclination to effect their overthrow ? 
 If these considerations be deemed insufficient, let the 
 adversary point out by what sure tokens we shall discover 
 any Christian community, duly answering the Apostle's 
 description, that it is i built upon the foundation of the 
 Apostles and Prophets, Jesus Christ Himself being the 
 chief Corner-Stone'?" 8 
 
 19. 
 I have said enough, I hope, in the course of this 
 Lecture, by way of distinguishing between our own and 
 the Roman theology, and of showing that neither our con- 
 cessions to its advocates are reluctantly made, nor our 
 
 8 Bampt. Lect. viii. 
 
212 THE INDEFECTIBILITY OF L LECT « 
 
 differences subtle and nugatory, as is objected to us by 
 opponents. Whether we be right or wrong, our theory of 
 religion has a meaning, and that really distinct from the 
 Roman theory. Both we and Roman Catholics hold that 
 the Church Catholic is unerring in its declarations of 
 faith, or saving doctrine ; but we differ from each other as 
 to what is the faith, and what is the Church Catholic. 
 They maintain that faith depends on the Church, we that 
 the Church is built on the faith. By Church Catholic we 
 mean the Church Universal, as descended from the 
 Apostles ; they those branches of it which are in com- 
 munion with Rome. They consider the see of St. Peter, 
 to have a promise of permanence, we the Church Catholic 
 and Apostolic. Again, they understand by the Faith, 
 whatever the Church at any time declares to be faith ; we 
 what it has actually so declared from the beginning. We 
 hold that the Church Catholic will never depart from 
 those outlines of doctrine which the Apostles formally 
 published ; they that she will never depart in any of her 
 acts from that entire system, written and oral, public and 
 private, explicit and implicit, which the Apostles received 
 and taught ; we that she has a gift of fidelity, they of 
 discrimination. 
 
 Again, both they and we anathematize those who deny 
 the Faith ; buc they extend the condemnation to all who 
 question any decree of the Roman Church ; we apply it to 
 those only who deny any article of the original Apostolic 
 Creed. The creed of Rome is ever subject to increase ; 
 ours is fixed once for all. We confine our anathema to 
 the Athanasian Creed; they extend it to Pope Pius's. 
 They cut themselves off from the rest of Christendom; we 
 cut ourselves off from no branch, not even from themselves. 
 We are at peace with Rome as regards the essentials of 
 faith ; but she tolerates us as little as she tolerates any sect 
 or heresy. We admit her Baptism and her Orders; her 
 
VIII.] THE CHURCH CATHOLIC 2J3 
 
 custom is to re-baptize 9 and re -ordain our members who 
 chance to join her. 
 
 20. 
 These distinctions are sufficient for my present purpose, 
 though they are only a few out of various differences 
 which might be pointed out. They are surely portions of 
 a real view/ which, while it relieves the mind of those 
 burdens and perplexities which are the portion of the 
 mere Protestant, is essentially distinct from Roman 
 teaching. Some further differences will be considered in 
 my next Lecture. 
 
 9 [Conditionally.] 
 
 1 [Real, as being consistent ; not real in the sense of being practicable, 
 concrete, realized in fact, anywhere exemplified.] 
 
LECTURE IX. 
 
 ON THE ESSENTIALS OF THE GOSPEL. 
 
 It may have been observed, that in the last several Lec- 
 tures, I have frequently spoken of greater truths and 
 lesser truths, of the essential parts of the Gospel, of the 
 saving faith, and the like. I have said that the Church 
 was indefectible in the Faith, or in the fundamentals of 
 Revealed Religion, and that in consequence she superseded 
 Private Judgment so far, and enforced her authoritative 
 declarations of Christian truth; in other words, that she 
 imposed a certain faith as a condition of communion with 
 her, inflicting anathemas on those who denied it. Yet, I 
 have not as yet said what that Faith is, or how we ascer- 
 tain it. Here, then, a very important subject is opened 
 upon us, which I shall consider in this and the following 
 Lecture ; viz. what are the essential doctrines of the Gos- 
 pel; on determining which will depend the terms of 
 communion, the range of Private Judgment, and the 
 character of the Church's indefectibility. What are those 
 points, if there are such, which all branches of the 
 Church hold, ever have held, and ever shall hold; and 
 which every individual must profess, in order to be con- 
 sidered a member of the Church ? 
 
 2. 
 
 Roman Catholics have no difficulty in answering this 
 question. Considering the Church to be infallible, and 
 
LECT. IX.] ON THE ESSENTIALS OF THE GOSPEL. 215 
 
 the faith to depend on the Church, not the Church to be 
 built on the faith, they maintain, as I have already said, 
 that whatever the Church imposes, is fundamental and 
 essential, be it greater or less, and that what it has once 
 imposed, of course it cannot reverse. But we Anglo- 
 Catholics certainly have a difficulty in the matter, as aim- 
 ing at truth, as dealing with facts, with the history of 
 1800 years, and not framing a theory at our pleasure. 
 
 For instance, they ask us, how we determine what are 
 the essential parts of the Gospel and what not ? If we 
 should answer, that we consider all is essential which 
 Scripture expressly teaches, they ask in reply how we draw 
 the line, and who is to draw it, amid the present variety 
 of creeds, and considering the peculiar structure of the 
 inspired Yolume. 
 
 Again, if we attempt to decide antecedently what is 
 essential and what is not, to judge, criticize, and analyze 
 the Revelation, we fairly expose ourselves to the charge 
 of exalting our own reason inconsistently with the very 
 notion of faith, and with danger to its essential qualities 
 in our minds and tempers. 
 
 Once more; if we appeal to Antiquity, which is the 
 most advisable proceeding, then we have to determine 
 whether all that Ancient Consent has taught is essential, 
 and if so, how to ascertain it all ; or, on the other hand, 
 if we select a portion, we are bound to say why we select 
 it, and pass over the rest. In consequence of these 
 difficulties, many Protestants have taken refuge in the 
 Latitudinarian notion that there are no essentials at all, 
 — no orthodox faith, as it is called, — that all anathemas, 
 all " damnatory clauses " are encroachments upon Chris- 
 tian liberty ; and that the reception of the Bible, nay, 
 even mere sincerity, is enough, so that we live morally 
 and religiously. Now then let us turn to the considera- 
 tion of this difficulty; in the course of which I shall have 
 
216 ON THE ESSENTIALS [LECT. 
 
 the opportunity of pointing out some of the serious excep- 
 tions which lie against the Roman mode of solving it. 
 
 3. 
 
 And, first, let it be clearly understood what is meant by 
 the word " fundamentals " or ' ' essentials/' I do not 
 mean by it what is (C necessary to be believed for salvation 
 by this particular person or that." No one but God can 
 decide what compass of faith is required of given indivi- 
 duals. The necessary Creed varies, for what we know, 
 with each individual to whom the Gospel is addressed ; one 
 is bound to know and believe more, or more accurately, 
 another less. Even the minutest and most precise details 
 of truth may have a claim upon the faith of a theologian ; 
 whereas the peasant or artisan may be accepted on a 
 vague and rudimental faith, — which is like seeing a pros- 
 pect at a distance, — such as a child has, who accepts the 
 revealed doctrine in the letter, contemplating and em- 
 bracing its meaning, not in its full force, but as far as his 
 capacity goes. I do not then enter into the question how 
 much is essential, and how accurately, in the case of a given 
 individual. This is not, strictly speaking, a question of 
 Theology ; for Theology, as being a science, is ever con- 
 cerned with doctrines, principles, abstract truths, not with 
 their application. 
 
 Still, though the clearness or keenness of vision may 
 vary in individuals, there may be some one object, some 
 circle of sacred truths, which they one and all must see, 
 whether faintly or distinctly, whether in its fulness or in 
 outline, doctrines independent and external, which may 
 be emphatically called the Gospel, which have been com- 
 mitted to the Church from the first, which she is bound to 
 teach as saving, and to enforce as the terms of cora- 
 munion ; doctrines accordingly, which are necessary in 
 themselves for what may be called an abstract Christian, 
 
IX.] OF THE GOSPEL. 217 
 
 putting aside the question of more or less, of clearness or 
 confusion, — doctrines which he must receive in their 
 breadth and substance, in order to be accounted a Chris- 
 tian, and to be admitted into the Church. 
 
 It is plain, indeed, from what has led to this discussion, 
 that to examine the state of this or that given individual 
 would be quite beside our purpose, which is to determine 
 merely this, — what doctrines the Church Catholic will 
 teach indefectibly, what doctrines she must enforce as a 
 condition of communion, what doctrines she must rescue 
 from the scrutiny of Private Judgment ; in a word, what 
 doctrines are the foundation of the Church. The con- 
 troversialists of Rome challenge us to produce them, 
 thinking we cannot, and implying thereby that we cannot 
 on our principles maintain a visible Church at all ; for it 
 stands to reason that a Church cannot exist even in 
 theory without some revealed faith as its principle of life, 
 whether that be a supernatural doctrine, or a claim to 
 supernatural power. 
 
 4. 
 
 What, then, is the Church/ s deposit of faith, and 
 how is it ascertained ? Now I might answer, in the first 
 place, that the event has determined it. If the Church 
 Catholic is to be indefectible in faith, we have but to in- 
 quire what that common faith is, which she now holds 
 everywhere as the original deposit, and we shall have 
 ascertained what we seek. If we adopt this course, we 
 shall find what is commonly called the Creed, to be that in 
 which all branches of the Church agree; and, therefore, 
 that the fundamental or essential doctrines are those 
 which are contained in the Creed. This conclusion, thus 
 inferred from the prima facie state of the case, is proved to 
 be correct from the following historical considerations. 
 
218 ON THE ESSENTIALS [LECT. 
 
 5. 
 
 It is known to all who are acquainted with Christian 
 Antiquity, that at Baptism the candidate made a confession 
 of his faith, before he was admissible to it. Here, then, 
 we have one of our inquiries answered at once. Whatever 
 that confession might contain, it was, by the force of the 
 terms, the primitive condition of communion, or funda- 
 mental faith. Now this confession was what we now call 
 the Creed. At first, indeed, that is, during the first years 
 of the Apostles, while the Church itself was forming, the 
 Creed was but partially developed too; nor, indeed, was 
 there any imperative necessity, that any part of the system 
 should be reduced to rule, while infallible guides were 
 present. The baptismal confessions recorded in the Acts 
 are of this nature : — " I believe that Jesus is the Son of 
 God ;" — " I believe in Jesus Christ," and the like. But 
 this elementary confession, thus brief and incomplete as 
 far as the express words went, seems even before the 
 Apostles'* death, to have been expanded and moulded into 
 form, and in that form or type it has remained up to this 
 day in the Baptismal Service. I say this was done in the 
 Apostles' days ; because history bears witness to the fact, 
 calling it "the Creed," "the Apostles' Creed," the trea- 
 sure and legacy of faith which the Apostles had left to 
 their converts, and which was to be preserved in the 
 Church to the end. Indeed, St. Paul himself, in his first 
 epistle to the Corinthians, so speaks of it, when quoting 
 part of it, viz., as that which had been committed to him, 
 and which he had committed in turn to his converts. 1 
 
 It was for this reason that the Creed was commonly 
 called the Symbol or Badge, being a mark, such as a 
 uniform or a watchword is in the case of soldiers, distin- 
 guishing Christians from infidels. 
 1 1 Cor. xv. 3. 
 
IX.] OF THE GOSPEL. 219 
 
 In like manner it was called the Regula Fidei, or Eule 
 of Faith, as the formulary, by which all statements of 
 doctrine made in the Church, were to be measured and 
 estimated. 
 
 Further, the early Church considered it to be unalter- 
 able ; and here, again, in accordance with what is another 
 Apostle's account of it, as "the faith once for all de- 
 livered unto the Saints." These two points, viz., that 
 the essential doctrines of the Gospel, (those which must be 
 professed as the condition of communion), were comprised 
 in the Creed; next, that they were regarded as unalterable, 
 can hardly be disputed ; but it may be useful to adduce 
 one or two authorities by way of illustration. 
 
 The terms in which the early Fathers speak of the 
 Creed bear me out in this account of it. For instance; 
 St. Irenaeus, who is but one step removed from St. John 
 himself, says, " The Church, though propagated through- 
 out the whole world, unto the ends of the earth, has 
 received from the Apostles and their disciples the belief 
 in One God, the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and 
 earth, the seas, and all that is therein ; and in One Jesus 
 Christ, the Son of God, incarnate for our salvation, and in 
 the Holy Ghost, who proclaimed by the Prophets the 
 divine Dispensations, and the advent, birth of a Virgin, 
 passion, resurrection from the dead, and ascension into 
 heaven in our flesh, of His beloved Son, Christ Jesus, our 
 Lord, and His coming again from heaven in the glory of 
 the Father, to gather together all things in one, and raise 
 from the dead all flesh of human kind; that, to Christ 
 Jesus our Lord and God, and Saviour and King, according 
 to the good pleasure of the Invisible Father, every knee 
 should bow, of things in heaven and things in earth, and 
 things under the earth, and that every tongue should con- 
 
220 ON THE ESSENTIALS [LECT. 
 
 fess to Him, and that He may exercise just judgment upon 
 all, and send into everlasting fire wicked spirits, and 
 transgressing and apostate angels, with all ungodly, un- 
 righteous, lawless, and profane men; but upon the just 
 and holy, who have kept His commandments and per- 
 severed in His love, whether serving Him from the first 
 or turning by repentance, may bestow immortality by 
 the free gift of life, and secure for them everlasting glory. 
 This message, and this faith, which the Church has re- 
 ceived, as I have said, though disseminated through the 
 whole world, she diligently g-uards, as dwelling in one 
 house; and believes as uniformly as though she had but one 
 soul and one heart ; and preaches, teaches, hands down 
 to others, in such true unison, as though she had but one 
 mouth. True it is, the world's languages are various, 
 but the power of the Tradition is one and the same. 
 There is no difference of Faith or Tradition, whether in 
 the Churches of Germany, or in Spain, or in Gaul, or 
 in the East, or in Egypt, or in Africa, or in the more 
 central parts of the world ; but as the sun, God's creature, 
 is one and the same in all the world, so also the preaching 
 of the Truth shines everywhere, and lighteth every one 
 who desires to come to the knowledge of the Truth. 
 Among the Rulers of the Church, neither he who is all 
 powerful in word speaks other doctrine, (for no one can 
 be above his Master), nor does the weak in word diminish 
 the Tradition. For, whereas the Faith is one and the 
 same, neither he who has much to say concerning it, hath 
 anything over, nor he who speaketh little, any lack." 
 
 7. 
 Tertullian, in like manner, who was contemporary with 
 Irenasus, gives his testimony in various places, that "the 
 Rule of faith is altogether one, sole, unalterable, unchange- 
 able, viz., that of believing in One God Almighty, Maker 
 
IX.] OF THE GOSPEL. 221 
 
 of the world, and his Son Jesus Christ, born of the Virgin 
 Mary, crucified under Pontius Pilate, raised from the dead 
 the third day, received into heaven, and now sitting at 
 the right hand of the Father, and to come to judge quick 
 and dead, by the resurrection of the flesh. " 
 
 And so, again, in the Apostolical Constitutions, which 
 is a collection of usages of the Eastern Church, compiled 
 about the end of the fourth century, we read that " when 
 the Catechumen has gone through his preparatory course, 
 and is about to be baptized, let him be told how to re- 
 nounce the devil, and how to dedicate himself to Christ. 
 . . . Thus : ' I renounce Satan, and his works, and his 
 pomps/ &c. &c. After this renunciation, let him enrol 
 himself among Christ's disciples, saying, ' I devote myself 
 to Christ, and believe and am baptized into one Ingenerate, 
 the only true Cod Almighty, the Father of Christ, Creator 
 and Maker of all things, of whom are all things ; and into 
 the Lord Jesus, the Christ, His Only-begotten Son, the 
 First-born of every creature, &c. . . who came down from 
 heaven and took flesh on Him, and w r as born of the Holy 
 Virgin Mary, &c. . . and was crucified under Pontius 
 Pilate, &c. &c. . . and I am baptized into the Holy Spirit, 
 which is the Paraclete, which has wrought in all Saints 
 from the beginning, and at length was sent by the 
 Father to the Apostles also, &c. . . and after the Apostles 
 to all who in the Holy Catholic Church believe in the 
 resurrection of the flesh, . . and the life of the world to 
 come/ " 2 
 
 8. 
 
 These are some out of many passages, and those separate 
 and independent, in which we have distinctly placed be- 
 
 2 Iren. Haer. i. 10. Tertull. de Vol. Virg. i. Const. Apost. vii. 40, 41. 
 Cyril. Hier. Cat. v. Ed. Ben. p. 84. "Contineri symbolo totum fidei ob- 
 jectum docet prseter alios [Pseudo-] Augustinus Serra. 115 de Tempore." 
 Bellarm. de Just. i. 9. Vid. ib. references, p. 719. 
 
222 ON THE ESSENTIALS [LECT. 
 
 fore us, as the substance of the Catholic faith, what is now 
 called the Creed; as taught in all places, and as required 
 by every Christian on his admission into the Church. We 
 find it digested in form, limited in its topics, circumscribed 
 in its range, one and the same everywhere. We find, 
 moreover, what I have as yet taken for granted, as being 
 almost self-evident, but which the Romanist disputes, and 
 which therefore it is necessary to prove, that the funda- 
 mentals of faith, or Creed of admission, were also the rule 
 of teaching subsequently to admission. He on the con- 
 trary, would maintain that the Baptismal creed was but a 
 portion of the sacred deposit specially committed to the 
 Church's keeping. 3 But with the passages already cited 
 before us, which expressly call the Creed the rule of teach- 
 ing, is it possible to conceive that that teaching then com- 
 prised anything that did not naturally rise out of it, or was 
 an explanation of it ? Even granting there were articles 
 of faith which as yet lay, amid the general traditionary 
 teaching, undefined and unrecognized in public formu- 
 laries, such as the Divinity of the Holy Ghost, is it not 
 plain that still they must have been implied and virtually 
 contained in the Creed, if the Creed had any title to the 
 name of a Symbol, or Rule, or Summary of Christian doc- 
 trine ? Would the Fathers so have called it, had it not 
 been the substance and centre, the measure and analysis 
 of the whole counsel of G-od, so that nothing could be 
 added really, because there was nothing to add but what 
 bore and depended upon it ? If there had been secret 
 doctrines, essentially distinct from these articles, yet 
 necessary parts of the Faith, such as the propriety of 
 Image-worship, would the Fathers have ventured to say 
 
 3 [Surely no one can say otherwise. Is original sin, is the inspiration of 
 Scripture, no point of Faith because it is not in the Creed ? Were not the 
 doctrines of the Holy Trinity and of the Holy Eucharist taught after 
 baptism ? at least they are uot in the Creed.] 
 
 
IX.] OF THE GOSPEL. 223 
 
 that the Creed contained all they taught ? or can any 
 reason be assigned why Image-worship should have been 
 kept secret, and yet the doctrine of Baptism expressed in 
 an Article ? 4 To take a parallel case : supposing in the 
 writings of several of our own divines, we found what 
 professed to be an abstract of the Thirty-nine Articles, is 
 it conceivable that one and all should omit every allusion 
 to those Articles which treat of the controversy between 
 us and the Eomanisfcs ? is it conceivable they should 
 say, " the English Church binds all her ministers on enter- 
 ing the Church to subscribe their assent to the doctrines 
 of the Trinity, Incarnation, Original Sin, Election, and the 
 Sacraments ; this is all she exacts of them, in every 
 diocese w ? Would any one say such an account would do 
 justice to the prominence which the Articles give to the 
 Roman controversy ? and could any number of distinct 
 writers coincide in giving it? I think not; and this is 
 precisely parallel to what is supposed by Roman theo- 
 logians of the Primitive Fathers, viz. that they were in 
 the habit of excluding from their abstract or table of 
 essential and vital truths, 5 those which, if Romanism be 
 true, were some of the most essential, the most prominent, 
 practical, and influential, or rather, I may say, the en- 
 grossing doctrines ; that they asserted that to be the whole 
 which after all was but a part ; that a silence which would 
 be unnatural in us who deny, is conceivable in those who 
 enforced these doctrines as saving. 
 
 4 [Doctrines remain implicit till they are contravened ; then they are 
 stated in explicit form. The Creed contains the primary, rudimental 
 articles, those which St. Paul calls the " elementa exordii sermonum Dei."] 
 
 * [Not a table of the sole essential and vital, but of the elementary and 
 initial. The 39 Articles are directly controversial, and to make a summary 
 of them without reference to their points of controversy would be to omit 
 what is characteristic and distinctive in them. Image-worship was not, 
 like baptism, necessary ; it was not in controversy then j — it could not then 
 be even contemplated ; and it would have encouraged idol-worship.] 
 
224 ON THE ESSENTIALS [LECT. 
 
 But perhaps it will be granted, that these doctrines were 
 not part of the formal teaching of the early Church ; but 
 will nevertheless be maintained that they were floating 
 opinions, commonly received, and true, though unrecog- 
 nized as true, mixed with error as held by individuals, and 
 undefined ; but that, when the necessity arose, they were 
 sifted, accurately determined, and enfo 1 ced, and so became 
 an addition to the Rule of Faith. Nay, but we are expressly 
 told by the Fathers that this Eule does not admit of 
 increase ; 6 it is, " sole, unalterable, unreformable ; " not a 
 hint been given us of the Church's power over it. To 
 guard and to transmit it, not to remodel it, is her sole 
 duty, as St. Paul has determined in his 2nd Epistle to 
 Timothy. What a contrast to passages such as the fore- 
 going, what a violation of them, is the Creed of Pope Pius, 
 which was the result of the proceedings at Trent ! whether 
 or not its articles be true, which is a distinct question. 
 Irenasus, Tertullian, and the rest cite the Apostles' Creed 
 and say, " This is the faith which makes a Christian, the 
 essentials of revelation, the great truths of which the Gos- 
 pel consists, the saving doctrine, the treasure committed to 
 the Church ; " but in the Creed of Pope Pius, after adding 
 to it the recognition of the seven Sacraments, Transub- 
 stantiation, Purgatory, the Invocation of Saints, Image- 
 worship, and Indulgences, the Romanist declares, " This 
 true Catholic Faith, out of ivhich no one can be saved, which 
 I at present freely profess and truly hold, this same do 
 I promise, vow, and swear by God's assistance, most con- 
 stantly to retain and confess, whole and inviolate, to the 
 last breath of life." Now, I repeat, the question at pre- 
 sent is, not whether these additions are true or false, but 
 
 6 [But Vincent, as quoted supr. p. 73, says that, though unalterable, it 
 admits of growth.] 
 
 
IX.] OF THE GOSPEL. 225 
 
 whether they are so clearly revealed and so powerfully 
 and persuasively recommended to the convictions of 
 individual Christians, as to be portions of the necessary and 
 saving Catholic Faith. 7 Are we to understand that the 
 words "out of which no one can be saved," attaches to 
 every one or any one of those additions ? if so, whence is 
 the Roman Church's or the Church Catholic's power to 
 add to that essential Faith which St. Jude declares, and 
 the Fathers witness, to be once for all delivered to the 
 Saints ? 
 
 10. 
 
 But here we are met with this objection, that the Papal 
 Church has but acted in the spirit of the Nicene Council 
 in its additions to its Creed ; that the Council added the 
 celebrated word Homoiisius, or, " of one substance with 
 the Father," when our Lord's divinity was denied by the 
 Arians, and that Rome has added twelve articles as pro- 
 tests against the heresies of the sixteenth century. To 
 which I answer by asking, is there no difference between 
 adding a word and adding a doctrine, between explaining 
 what is in the Creed and inserting what was not in it ? 
 Surely it was not inconsistent with the reverence due to it, 
 for the Church Catholic, after careful deliberation, to clear 
 up any ambiguity which, as time went on, might be 
 found to exist in its wording. The words of the Creed 
 were not inspired ; they were only valuable as expressing 
 a certain sense, and if they were found deficient in ex- 
 pressing that sense, there was as little interference with 
 things sacred, as little real change, in correcting or sup- 
 plying what was needful, as in completing the lines of a 
 
 7 [New questions, new opinions are ever rising in the Church, and she has 
 the power of answering those questions, and judging those opinions with 
 infallible exactness, when they relate to faith and morals. If she cannot 
 say Yes or No, how can she teach the Truth ?] 
 
 VOL. I. Q 
 
226 ON THE ESSENTIALS [LECT. 
 
 chart or map by the original. That original was the one 
 universally received Faith, which was in the minds and 
 mouths of all Christians without variation or ambiguity. 
 When the early Christians used the words, " Son of God/' 
 they did not use a dead letter ; they knew what they 
 meant by it, and they one and all had the same meaning. 
 In adding, then, the explanation " consubstantial with the 
 Father," they did but fix and perpetuate that meaning, 
 as it had been held from the beginning, when an attempt 
 had been made to put a new sense upon it. 
 
 And this view of the subject will account for such varia- 
 tions in the separate articles of the Creed, as occurred 
 anciently in different Churches. The one Faith, cast into 
 one general type, was from the first developed in this or 
 that place with varieties in the detail, according to acci- 
 dental or other circumstances. As in the first preaching 
 of the Gospel, one convert was admitted to Baptism on 
 confessing Jesus to be the Christ, and another on confess- 
 ing Him to be the Son of God, not as if the one confession 
 excluded the other, but because the one and the other 
 were but different symbols, indications, or specimens of 
 the same and only true doctrine, so as regards the formal 
 Creed which the Apostles afterwards adopted and be- 
 queathed to the Church, in one country a certain article 
 might be added, in another omitted, without interfering 
 with its substantial identity, or its accuracy as a sum- 
 mary or sketch of the Faith once delivered. Thus the 
 Roman Creed speaks of " the forgiveness of sins," the 
 Eastern, of the " One Baptism for the remission of sins," 
 and the African, of "forgiveness of sins through the Holy 
 Church;" 8 yet all of them speak of but one and the 
 same great and blessed doctrine, variously described and 
 developed. Again, the Roman Creed speaks of Almighfcy 
 God as " Maker of heaven and earth ;" the Eastern adds, 
 
 8 Vid. Austin. Serm. 215, {in. t. 5. p. 952. 
 
IX.] OP THE GOSPEL. 227 
 
 "and all things visible and invisible;" while in the 
 African the words run, if Tertullian gives them exactly, 
 " who produced all things out of nothing by His Word." 
 These variations were as far from evidencing any real dif- 
 ference between these formularies, as difference in the 
 headings of chapters in separate editions of the Bible 
 argues difference in those chapters ; and interfere as little 
 with the integrity and oneness of the Catholic Creed, as 
 the variations in the Lord's Prayer, as delivered to us by 
 St. Matthew and St. Luke, prevent our considering it one 
 and the same form. 9 
 
 11. 
 
 Accordingly, we must consider the Nicene and the 
 Apostles' Creed as identical ; the latter the Creed of the 
 West, the former of the East, from the beginning ; and, 
 as it differs from itself as received in those two great divi- 
 sions of Christendom in immaterial points, so in turn in 
 the separate countries of East and West, it varies in 
 similar details. And to this day, as the Creed called 
 Apostles' is used in Baptism throughout the West, (as 
 among ourselves,) so is the Nicene used on the same 
 occasion in the Greek Church. 1 And thus we gain per- 
 haps a truer view of what was done at Nicaea, than at first 
 sight is likely to be taken. The assembled Fathers did 
 not so much add to the Creed, as consolidate, harmonize, 
 and make uniform the various formularies of the East. 2 
 The phrases " God from God, Light from Light," and the 
 like, were not the framing of the Council, but were such 
 as had already been in use here or there, and might be 
 
 9 [The African " forgiveness through the Church " would surely, to a 
 Protestant, be as much an addition to the Creed as "Purgatory."] 
 
 1 Wall on Baptism, part ii. 9. § 13. 
 
 1 The Benedictine Editor says in Cyrill. Hier. p. 80, that the Nicene 
 Creed did not supersede the Anfciochene till up to the middle of the fifth 
 century. 
 
 Q 2 
 
228 ON THE ESSENTIALS [LECT. 
 
 adopted to advantage everywhere. Accordingly, the wore 
 " Homoiisius/' or consubstantial, is perhaps the onl; 
 word which can be considered as really an addition, an( 
 this even was no novel term, but one of long standing in 
 Christendom, having already been publicly and solemnly 
 recognized by the great Churches of the Bast, South, and 
 West, and introduced at this time, as I have said, merely 
 in explanation of a great article of faith, held from the 
 first, but then needing, from circumstances, a more 
 accurate wording. 3 
 
 12. 
 
 It is well, moreover, to observe the honourable jealousy, 
 (as it may be called,) which even this addition, unexcep- 
 tionable and needful as it was, excited in the Western, nay, 
 in the universal Church. 4 Even at this day, as I have 
 already remarked, it does not occur in our Creed of Baptism. 
 After its adoption, at Nicasa, new heresies as to our Lord's 
 nature arose ; but in spite of them, Athanasius, its illus- 
 trious champion, was firm against the attempt, which was 
 made by some parties, to add further explanations to 
 the Creed. He was not even moved by the rise of the 
 Macedonians, who denied the divinity of the Holy Ghost, 
 to develope the article in it relating to that doctrine of 
 faith. Not, of course, that he would concede one jot or 
 tittle to their heresy, but he might consider that, under the 
 circumstances, the maintenance of the true doctrine would 
 be better consulted by the unanimous voice of the Church 
 diffusive, than by risking the disturbances which might 
 follow upon a second explanation of the Creed in Council. 
 This is shown by his conduct in the Council held at 
 
 3 [But it must be recollected that the Fathers at Nicsea added anathemas 
 which really included in them important additions to the Creed, though made 
 for the sake of clearness, such as "our Lord was without beginning," &c.J 
 
 4 Taylor, Disbuasive, part ii. 1. § 4. 
 
IX.] OP THE GOSPEL. 229 
 
 Alexandria upon Julian's death. A rumour had been 
 spread, that at a largely-attended Council held some years 
 after the Nicene (viz. at Sardica), some addition had been 
 made to the Creed on the subject of the Divine Nature. 
 On occasion of this he made at the Alexandrian Council the 
 following statement, which is found in that Council's letter 
 to the Church of Antioch. " As to the paper which some 
 speak of, as having been drawn up in the Council of Sardica 
 respecting the faith .... that Council determined nothing 
 of the kind. It is true that there were persons, who, on 
 the plea that the Nicene Council was deficient, urged 
 additions to the faith, and that in a headstrong way; but 
 the Holy Council was indignant, and determined that no 
 additions should be made, the Nicene Creed being sufficient 
 .... lest a pretext should be afforded to those who desired 
 to make frequent definitions of the faith." Influenced by 
 the same feelings he desired no addition to the Creed in 
 order to meet the heretical tenets of the Apollinarians ; 
 and all through his writings no point is urged more 
 constantly, earnestly, and decidedly than this, that the 
 Nicene Faith is sufficient to confute all heresies on the 
 subject of the Divine Nature. 
 
 The second General Council, indeed, after his death, 
 supplied with great caution, and apparently from existing 
 Creeds, some words declaratory of the Divinity of the Holy 
 Spirit ; but this being done, the Creed was finally closed 
 and sealed once for all. Subsequent Councils might indeed 
 profitably record their unanimous Traditions of its sense, 
 or of doctrines collateral, but the baptismal Confession, the 
 Creed of the Church, remained unalterable. At the third 
 General Council (a.d. 432) it was expressly determined 
 that " it should not be lawful for any to publish or compose 
 another Faith or Creed than that which was defined by 
 the Nicene Council, and that whosoever should dare to 
 compose or offer any such to any persons willing to be 
 
230 ON THE ESSENTIALS [LECT. 
 
 converted from Paganism, Judaism, or heresy, if they were 
 Bishops or clergy, they should be deposed; if laymen, 
 they should be excommunicated." The Fourth General 
 Council, nineteen years after, confirmed this decree, 
 declaring that " the Faith formerly determined should, at 
 no hand, in no manner, be shaken or moved any more." 
 Nor was there from that time any material interference 
 with the Creed till the error of the Council of Trent 
 when the Creed of Pope Pius, embodying the decrees there 
 made, was imposed as a test of ourselves and other 
 Protestants. 5 
 
 13. 
 
 Athanasius's rule, as has been incidentally observed, 
 was to restrain heresy rather by the existing Creed and the 
 witness of the Church Catholic interpreting and enforcing 
 it, than by adding to its articles even in explanation ; to 
 adhere to the Creed and to anathematize its opposers. 6 
 So reluctant was he to perplex scrupulous and hesitating 
 minds, as even to admit to communion the existing Semi- 
 arians of his day, who repudiated the Homoiision with 
 an unaccountable violence ; influenced, that is, by the 
 notion that the men in question really believed in accor- 
 dance with the Church Catholic, and only scrupled at the 
 
 5 [The Apostles' Creed is rudimental ; the so-called Creed of Pope Pius is 
 controversial, and in this point of viewis parallel to the Thirty-nine Articles, 
 which no one would call a creed. We may call it Pope Pius's Creed impro- 
 perly, as we call the Hymn Quicunque the Athanasian " Creed," because it 
 contains what is necessary for salvation, but there can be but one rudimental 
 and catechetical formula, and that is the Creed, Apostolic or Nicene.] 
 
 6 /U^Sev ttX4ov aTrairr\(rr}Tz ■nap' avrcjv, 7) dvade/maT t£e iv /xev t^jv 'Apeiav^r 
 alpeaiv, 6/j.o\oyc7y Se ttji/ irapa tuv ayloov Trarepuv o/moXoyrjOelaav eV "Ntuala 
 trioTiV dvaBefxar (£c iv 8e Kai tovs Xiyovras kti<t/j.o. elvai to Tlisevfia to 
 ayiou. k. t. A. — Ath. torn, ad Antioch. 3. This practice formed a curious 
 negative comment on the Creed as time went on. [True, but that com- 
 ment was an addition to the credenda, though not to the Creed, just as are 
 the Canons of the Council of Trent.] 
 
IX.] OF THE GOSPEL. 231 
 
 term. At the same time he would not consent to their 
 holding any office in the Church, as conceiving that an 
 error which was but verbal in their case and the result of 
 some peculiarity of mind, would be real and perilous in 
 the mass of those who were submitted to their teaching, 
 especially when the point in controversy had once been 
 stirred. 7 
 
 14. 
 
 Athanasius then considered the doctrine of the Trinity 
 sufficiently developed in the Creed, as we now have it, for 
 all practical purposes ; at the same time his enforcement of 
 the Homoiision shows he recognized the principle of such 
 explanation. In like manner, then, had the need arisen 
 and discretion recommended, he would have been prepared 
 to clear up by the voice of the Church Catholic, those 
 other articles which have come down to us in their 
 primitive simplicity. Had, for instance, any heresy spread 
 far and wide in his day, denying the powers of the Church, 
 it would have been in accordance with the precedent of 
 Nicsea, to have taken into the Catholic formulary the 
 African article already quoted of " forgiveness of sins 
 through the Holy Glmrcli" as a witness or preservative 
 against the error. Again, Pelagius's rejection of the doc- 
 trine of Original Sin had indeed been condemned from the 
 first by the same article as it now stands ; but had cir- 
 cumstances permitted, I suppose the occasion would have 
 justified the addition of the words " both original sin and 
 actual/' to the article " forgiveness of sins/" 8 The doctrine 
 of the Atonement is already declared in the Nicene and 
 implied in the Koman, or Apostles' Creed ; but, had a 
 
 7 [The addition of the Filioque must not be forgotten. But vid. Dr. 
 Pusey's recent most interesting work upon it.] 
 
 8 [Surely this is giving up the point in di.-pute. Original sin is as much 
 external to the Creed as the Immaculate Conception. There is an attempt 
 to answer this representation in Lecture X. by an assumed principle.] 
 
232 ON THE ESSENTIALS [LECT. 
 
 Socinus then arisen, it might have been more pointedly 
 expressed, under sanction of a General Council, by way of 
 fixing" and perpetuating the Church's meaning. Nay, 
 such an explanation of the original wording might be 
 made, I conceive, even now, if the whole of Christendom 
 agreed together in the explanation, and in such explanation 
 conveying the uniform sense of the Church Catholic, and 
 in its expediency. At the same time the Church neces- 
 sarily has less power over the Creed now than anciently ; 
 for at first it was but a form of sound words, subservient 
 to a Faith vividly and accurately engraven on the heart 
 of every Christian, and so of secondary value ; but now 
 that the living power of truth has declined, it is a witness 
 of the primitive, instead of being a mere summary of an 
 existing Faith. Since traditionary teaching has been 
 impaired, it has become almost sacred from being the 
 chief remains left us of apostolical truth ; as the likeness 
 of a friend, however incomplete in itself, is cherished as 
 the best memorial of him, when he has been taken from 
 us. 
 
 If, then, as we have seen, a more accurate delineation of 
 the articles of the Creed was not to be attempted but with 
 great caution even by the early Church Catholic, what 
 can be said in defence of the Roman Church, which 
 created at Trent a new Creed, and published anathemas 
 against all objectors ? or in what assignable way does the 
 introduction of the Homoiision into the Creed, in explana- 
 tion of an existing article, justify the addition at Trent of 
 essentially distinct doctrines, 9 of articles about Image- 
 worship, the Invocation of Saints, and the authority of 
 
 9 [There is no addition by Rome of these Articles to the Creed, 
 because the Creed, being rudimental, does not admit of their addition. 
 They are articles in the Depositum (as Anglicans hold " Inspiration of 
 Scripture" to be) that is, revealed truths, but not the subjects of primary 
 instruction.] 
 
IX.] OF THE GOSPEL. 233 
 
 Tradition, and this on the sanction of but a portion of the 
 Church Catholic then in Council represented ? 
 
 15. 
 
 And now enough has been said by way of showing what 
 the Faith is which was once delivered to the Saints, that 
 Faith which is ever to remain in the world, which is the 
 treasure and the life of the Church, the qualification of 
 membership, and the rule of her teaching. The Creed 
 commonly so called, not in its mere letter, but in its living 
 sense, is this Faith, ' ' the engrafted word, which is able to 
 save our souls ; " to deny or resist which, is no lawful use 
 of Private Judgment, but heresy or scepticism. We find 
 it declared to be all this by the Church in the beginning; we 
 find it actually maintained by all its branches even in this 
 day of division. True it is that in the Roman Communion 
 other articles are enforced also; but this very circumstance, 
 being irreconcilable with the spirit of primitive teaching, 
 is our principal ground of complaint against that Church. 
 She has " cursed those whom God has not cursed, and 
 defied those whom the Lord has not defied." 1 
 
 1 [The argument urged against the Catholic Church in this Lecture is, 
 that, unlike the Anglican, she has enforced by an anathema, as if necessary 
 points of faith, doctrines not contained in the Creed. I answer, 1. Why 
 should not she ? the Articles in the Creed are not the only revealed truths, 
 but those intended for catechumens, as being rudimental, initial, elementary. 
 
 2. If she does so, so did the Council of Nicaea ; viz. it added to the Creed 
 under anathema, that our Lord was not made of created matter, that He had 
 no beginning, that He was a Son from eternity, and that He was immutable. 
 
 3. So does the Athanasian Symbol Quicunque ; viz. it teaches under anathema 
 that the Holy Ghost is God, that He proceeds from Father and Son, that the 
 Three Divine Persons are co-equal, that the Son took on Him a human soul 
 as well as body, that the Divine nature did not become incarnate, and that 
 future punishment will be eternal. 4. So do Anglicans and Evangelicals ; 
 viz. they hold as necessary points of faith those in the Nicene addition and 
 in the Quicunque, also original sin, inspiration of Scripture, salvation only 
 through Christ, (" They are to be had accursed," &c), justification by faith, 
 the impiety of works of supererogation, and the blasphemousness of Masses.] 
 
234 ON THE ESSENTIALS [LECT. 
 
 16. 
 
 Before concluding, I will briefly notice a similar objec- 
 tion, which superficial persons have urged by way of 
 retort against ourselves. It is argued that the English 
 Church, having drawn up Articles and imposed them on 
 the Clergy and others, has in fact committed the same 
 fault which her advocates allege against Rome, viz. of 
 adding without authority to the necessary faith of a 
 Christian. 
 
 But this is surely a great misconception of the state of 
 the case. The Thirty-nine Articles are " Articles of 
 religion" not of "faith." We do not consider the belief 
 in them necessary to salvation, except so far as they 
 embody in them the articles of the Creed. They are of 
 no divine authority, except so far as they embody these 
 and similar portions of Apostolical Tradition ; but they 
 come to us on ecclesiastical sanction ; and they have a hold 
 on us over and above this, first because they have been 
 adopted by the Saints of our Church for some centuries ; 
 secondly, because in our private judgment we think them 
 scriptural; thirdly, because we have subscribed them. 
 Further, they are not necessary terms of communion in our 
 Church, being imposed, not on all our members, but prin- 
 cipally on the Clergy. In truth, their imposition in its 
 first origin was much more a political than an ecclesiastical 
 act ; it was a provision of the State rather than of the 
 Church, though the Church co-operated. I mean, that the 
 jealousy of Rome entertained by the Civil Power, was the 
 principle of the Reformation, considered historically ; and 
 that the outward form into which our religion was cast, has 
 depended in no slight measure on the personal opinions 
 and wishes of laymen and foreigners. Thus, our Articles 
 were, in the first instance, a test ; a test, whether the 
 Clergy of the Church Catholic in England were willing to 
 exercise their ministry on certain conditions, with the 
 
IX.] OF THE GOSPEL. 235 
 
 stipulation on the other hand that, if so, they should be 
 protected not persecuted, and a legal recognition ex- 
 tended to those rights and privileges which from the 
 beginning have been chartered to them by God Himself. 
 But the Church Catholic knows nothing of tests, beyond 
 the Baptismal test, if it must be so called ; so that our 
 Articles, far from being an addition on our part to the 
 necessary faith, were in the first instance but indirectly 
 connected with the Church at all. 
 
 17. 
 
 I say the Church is not familiar with tests, not as if she 
 may not adopt them as a matter of expedience, if she 
 thinks fit, but because they are but the resort of authority 
 when it is weak. We bind men with oaths when we can 
 secure their fidelity in no other way; but the Church 
 Catholic is inherently strong, can defend herself, and fears 
 nothing. Ignorance of her own power is her only weak- 
 ness. She admits her members on their profession of 
 Christianity, and if in the event they become heretical, 
 she ejects them as she admitted them. The power of the 
 keys is the antagonist of Private Judgment. But when, 
 from circumstances, she suspends her use of that power, 
 being deprived of her natural defence, she needs others ; 
 she makes " alliances/' so called, or appeals to her civil 
 rights ; and in like manner declarations and pledges on 
 the part of her members may become a suitable, as well 
 as necessary expedient, for securing herself against the 
 encroachments of heresy. 
 
 Accordingly in England she co-operates with the State 
 in exacting subscription to the Thirty-nine Articles, as a 
 test; and that, not only of the Clergy, but also of the govern- 
 ing body in our Universities, — a test against Romanism ; 
 but, while so doing, she has, after her manner, modified and 
 elevated their original scope in a way well worthy of our 
 gratitude. 
 
236 ON THE ESSENTIALS [LECT. 
 
 18. 
 
 The faulty principle, involved in the decrees of Trent, 
 is, not the mere publication of doctrines, not contained in 
 the Creed, but the enforcement of these as necessary 
 points of faith. To collect, systematize, and set forth the 
 Traditions of the Church, is surely a most edifying and 
 important work, and great is our debt to Councils, modern 
 or ancient, in proportion as they have attempted this; 
 even though the direct Apostolical origin of every phrase 
 or view of doctrine they adopt, be not certain. Now the 
 Articles of our Church must be taken as doing this for us 
 in their place and degree. It is no valid objection to them, 
 whether the fact be so or not, that they are but partially 
 drawn from Traditionary sources, or that the individual 
 authors of them are unknown, and the state of feeling and 
 opinion in the writers at the moment of their writing them, 
 or that they were inclined to what is now called either Cal- 
 vinism, or Arminianism, or some of them to the one, some 
 to the other. Such objections, however popular, are very 
 superficial. The Church is not built upon individuals, nor 
 knows individuals. We do not receive the Articles from 
 individuals, however celebrated, but as recommended to 
 us by our Church itself; and whether we judge of the 
 Church's meaning in imposing them by the consent of her 
 Divines since their imposition, or by the intention of that 
 Convocation, 2 which immediately ratified them, we shall 
 come to this conclusion, that whatever have been the 
 designs or feelings of individuals, she herself intends us to 
 receive them as portions of Catholic teaching, as expressing 
 and. representing that Ancient Religion, which of old time 
 found voice and attained consistency in Athanasius, Basil, 
 Augustine, Chrysostom, and other primitive Doctors. 3 
 
 2 Watcrland on Ecclesiastical Antiquity, 8. 
 
 3 [This is the principle on which the Thirty-nine Articles are interpreted 
 in No. 90 of the Tracts for the Times.] 
 
IX.] OP THE GOSPEL. 237 
 
 This is plain, I say, to a demonstration, from the words 
 of the Convocation of 1571 ; which, on the one hand 
 reviewed and confirmed the Thirty-nine Articles, and on 
 the other enjoined by Canon, that preachers " should be 
 careful, that they never teach aught in a sermon, to be 
 religiously held and believed by the people, except that 
 which is agreeable to the doctrine of the Old and New 
 Testament, and which the Catholic Fathers and Ancient 
 Bishops have collected from that very doctrine." It is 
 evident that the Divines who drew up this Canon, did 
 not dream, (to use a common phrase), of the Thirty-nine 
 Articles in any degree superseding or interfering with 
 the Ancient Catholic teaching, or of their burdening us 
 with the novelties of any modern school. Nor is there 
 anything* in their "literal and grammatical sense," of 
 which the King's Declaration speaks, inconsistent with 
 this Ancient Teaching, whatever obscurities may hang 
 over their origin historically, — a subject, which that 
 Declaration renders unimportant. 
 
 19. 
 The Thirty-nine Articles, then, are adopted by our 
 Church in a sense equally remote from the peremptory 
 dogmatism of Rome, and from the cold and narrow 
 spirit which breathes in a test. They are neither 
 enforced as necessary for communion, nor serve the mere 
 negative purpose of excluding error ; but they are 
 instruments of teaching, of Catholic teaching, being, as 
 far as they go, heads, as it were, of important chapters 
 in revealed truth. And it is as thus viewing them, that 
 we put them before the young, not by way of ascertaining 
 their Churchmanship, but as the particular forms under 
 which we teach the details of faith, the basis on and out 
 of which the superstructure of theology may be most 
 conveniently raised. 
 
238 ON THE ESSENTIALS OF THE GOSPEL. [LECT. IX. 
 
 Such, then, seems to be the light in which we are to 
 regard our Articles ; and till they are imposed on all our 
 members as terms of communion, they are quite consistent 
 with the prerogative accorded, as we have seen, by 
 Antiquity to the Apostolic Creed, quite distinct from 
 the forcible imposition of the Trident ine Articles on the 
 part of Rome. 
 
 
LECTURE X. 
 
 ON THE ESSENTIALS OF THE GOSPEL. 
 
 I trust that the foregoing Lectures have disposed us to 
 take a more cheerful view of what the Protestantism of 
 the day considers a hardship. It considers it a hardship 
 to have anything clearly and distinctly told it in elucida- 
 tion of Scripture doctrine, an infringement on its right of 
 doubting, and mistaking, and labouring in vain. And the 
 violent effort to keep itself in this state of ignorance, — this 
 unnatural " stopping of ears," and u throwing dust into 
 the air," after the pattern of those Jews who would not 
 hear the voice of Apostles and Martyrs, — all this it digni- 
 fies by the title of defending the sacred right of Private 
 Judgment, calls it a holy cause, a righteous battle, with 
 other large and senseless epithets. But I trust that we 
 have learned to glory in that which the world calls a 
 bondage. We do boast and exult in bearing Christ's yoke, 
 whether of faith or of obedience ; and we consider His 
 Creed, not as a tyrannical infliction, (God forbid !) or a 
 jealous test, but as a glorious privilege, which we are 
 ready to battle and to suffer for, nay, much more ready, 
 (so be it ! through His grace), than they for their low, 
 carnal, and despicable licence to reject it. 
 
 And as they are eager to secure liberty in religious 
 opinions as the right of every individual, so do we make 
 
240 ON THE ESSENTIALS [lECT. 
 
 it every individual's prerogative to maintain and defend 
 the Creed. They cannot allow more to the individual in 
 the way of variety of opinion, than we do in that of con- 
 fessorship. The humblest and meanest among Christians 
 may defend the Faith against the whole Church, if the 
 need arise. He has as much stake in it and as much right 
 to it, as Bishop or Archbishop, and has nothing to limit 
 him in his protest, but his intellectual capacity for making 
 it. The greater his attainments the more serviceably of 
 course and the more suitably will he enter into the dis- 
 pute ; but all that learning has to do for him is to ascertain 
 the fact, what is the meaning of the Creed in particular 
 points, since matter of opinion it is not, any more than 
 the history of the rise and spread of Christianity itself. 
 No persons (to speak generally) properly qualified, what- 
 ever their own opinion may be, can doubt, for instance, in 
 what cases the articles of the Creed concerning the Son of 
 God, are contradicted ; all that could come into dispute is, 
 whether those articles are necessary or essential to the 
 Gospel, and that point has been settled long ago. 
 
 3. 
 
 Now then, having considered in general what the saving 
 Faith is, let us proceed to examine some of the principal 
 objections which are taken to the above view of it. 
 
 1. First, then, it may be urged that the Creed, which I 
 have stated to be the abstract of saving Faith, does not 
 include all doctrines which are essential; especially it 
 does not include any acknowledgment that Scripture is 
 the word of God. It has been asked of us, is belief in 
 Scripture a fundamental of faith or not ? if it is, it follows 
 that there are fundamental doctrines besides the articles 
 of the Creed ; if it is not, what becomes of the popular 
 notion that the Bible, and the Bible only, is the religion 
 of Protestants. I answer as follows : — 
 
X.] OF THE GOSPEL. 241 
 
 If the Roman Catholic asks, whether belief in Scripture 
 is an essential part of the faith, 1 which he is apt to do, I 
 ask him in turn, whether the Infallibility of the Church is 
 or is not in his system an article of faith. It is nowhere 
 so declared ; 2 how then is it less defective in the Creed of 
 Romanism to omit so cardinal a doctrine, than in our own 
 Creed to omit the inspiration and canonicity of the Scrip- 
 tures ? Whatever answer he gives in his own behalf, will 
 serve for us also. If he says, for instance, that the whole 
 Roman system implies and is built upon the principle of 
 Infallibility, that the doctrines which it holds as funda- 
 mental could not be such were not the Church an infallible 
 oracle, that every truth must have some truth beyond itself 
 until we come to the ultimate principles of knowledge, 
 that a Creed never could recount all the previous steps by 
 which it became a Creed, and that after all the doctrine 
 in question is at least indirectly expressed in Pope Pius's 
 Creed, I answer that much the same pleas may be offered 
 in explanation of Scripture not being recognized in the 
 Apostolic Creed. It may be something more than a funda- 
 mental of faith ; it may be the foundation of the funda- 
 mentals, and may be passed over in the Creed, as being 
 presupposed and implied in it. This is what might be 
 said in explanation. But in truth it is really recognized 
 in it as the standard of appeal ; viz. in those articles 
 which, after St. Paul's pattern, speak of our Lord's resur- 
 rection as being " according to the Scriptures." What 
 
 1 [Catholics will not instance one doctrine merely, but, as has been noted 
 above, there are many doctrines, which, though not in the Apostolic Creed 
 (as the developed doctrine of the Holy Trinity, original sin, the necessity of 
 grace, eternal punishment), still the high Anglican considers to have a place 
 in the Apostolic depositum of faith.] 
 
 2 [If we are ashed why it is not so declared, our answer is, that commonly 
 truths of the Apostolic depositum are not made dogmas or articles of faith* 
 till they have been publicly denied. However, in fact the Church's Infalli- 
 bility has been a&serted by the Vatican Council.] 
 
 VOL. I. E 
 
242 ON THE ESSENTIALS [LECT. 
 
 happen to be expressed in one instance, as regards the 
 Old Testament, is a kind of index of what is tacitly signi- 
 fied throughout. This, indeed, is no proof to a Romanist, 
 who denies that the Bible was considered by the original 
 framers of the Creed, as the fundamental record of the 
 Gospel : but it goes as far as this, to show that the Bible 
 may have been so considered by them, to show that our 
 doctrine is consistent with itself. As far as the facts of 
 the case go, that may be, which we say really is. The 
 indirect manner in which Scripture is referred to in the 
 Creed, while it agrees with the notion that the Creed con- 
 tains all the fundamentals, seems also to imply that Scrip- 
 ture is their foundation. 
 
 4. 
 
 This is no singular case. I refer to the parallel of 
 Romanism, not as a mere argumentum ad hominem, but 
 as a specimen of a general principle. Surely it might be 
 asked, with just as much, and just as little reason, whether 
 belief in a Revelation be a fundamental of faith ; whereas 
 the fact of its being granted is properly a truth prior to 
 the fundamentals, for without a revelation there would be 
 nothing to believe in at all. Now what is the Bible, if it 
 is worth while to pursue the argument, but the permanent 
 voice of God, the embodied and continuous sound, or at 
 least the specimen and symbol of the message once super- 
 natural ly delivered ? By necessary faith, is not meant all 
 that must be believed, but all that must be immediately 
 believed, what must be professed on coming for admittance 
 into the Church, what must be proclaimed as the condition 
 of salvation ; it is quite another question whether there be 
 certain necessary antecedents, and of what nature. It is 
 impossible, for instance, to accept the Creed, or to come 
 for Baptism, without belief in a Moral Governor, yet there 
 is not a word on the subject in the Creed, nor is it to be 
 looked for there. Again, the candidate for Baptism must 
 
*•] OF THE GOSPEL. 243 
 
 feel the needs and misery of his nature, the guilt of 
 disobedience, his own actual demerits and danger, and the 
 power, purity, and justice of God, if Baptism is to be 
 profitable to him ; yet these convictions are preparatives, 
 not parts of Baptismal faith ; not parts of that act of the 
 mind by which the candidate realizes things invisible, 
 surveys the Gospel Economy, embraces it, submits to it, 
 appropriates it, and is led to confess it. Faith is of many 
 kinds, and these have their respective objects. Repent- 
 ance involves faith ; yet is always considered distinct 
 from justifying faith notwithstanding. No one can come 
 to God without believing " that He is, and is the rewarder 
 of them that diligently seek Him," but, we know, Calvi- 
 nists and others consider that the faith that justifies has 
 also a simple reference to Christ's Atonement ; so that 
 they at least will understand the distinction here insisted 
 on. I say, belief in the Scriptures may be requisite for a 
 Christian, but still as little be included in the Baptismal 
 faith, as the faith which " cometh to God/' or the faith 
 implied in repentance. 
 
 5. 
 But I will go further, and venture to deny that belief 
 in the Scriptures, is, abstractedly, necessary to Church 
 communion and salvation. It does not follow from this 
 that any one, to whom they are actually offered, may with- 
 out mortal sin reject them ; but in the same way a man is 
 bound to believe all truth which is brought home to him, 
 not the Creed only. Still it may be true that faith in 
 Scripture is not one of the conditions which the Church 
 necessarily exacts of candidates for Baptism ; and that it 
 is not, is, I suppose, sufficiently clear. Heathen nations 
 have commonly been converted, not by the Bible, but by 
 Missionaries. If we insist that formal belief in the Canon 
 of Scripture, as the inspired Word of God, has been a 
 necessary condition of salvation, we exclude from salvation, 
 
 e 2 
 
244 ON THE ESSENTIALS [LECT. 
 
 as far as our words go (which happily is, not at all), 
 multitudes even in the earliest ages of the Gospel, to say 
 nothing of later times. A well-known passage of St. 
 Irenseus is in point, in which he says, " Had the Apostles 
 left us no Scriptures, doubtless it had been a duty to fol- 
 low the course of Tradition, which they gave to those 
 whom they put in trust with the Churches. This proce- 
 dure is observed in many barbarous nations, such as believe 
 in Christ, without written memorial, having salvation 
 impressed through the Spirit on their hearts, and dili- 
 gently preserving the Old Tradition." 3 
 
 The Creed, indeed, can be proved from Scripture, which 
 in this sense is its foundation, but it does not therefore 
 follow that it must be so proved by every one who receives 
 it. Scripture is the foundation of the Creed ; but belief 
 in Scripture is not the foundation of belief in the Creed. 
 
 It is not so in matter of fact, even at this day, in spite 
 of the extended circulation of the Scriptures. It is not 
 true in fact, and never will be, that the mass of serious 
 Christians derive their faith for themselves from the Scrip- 
 tures. No ; they derive it from Tradition, whether true or 
 corrupt ; and they are intended by Divine Providence to 
 derive it from the true, viz., that which the Church Catholic 
 has ever furnished ; but how they derive it, whether from 
 Scripture or Tradition, is in no case a necessary point of 
 faith to be asked and answered before their admittance 
 into the Church. Suffice it that they believe in the blessed 
 doctrines of the Trinity, Incarnation, and the other parts 
 of the Gospel, however they have learned them ; as to 
 Scripture, they either do already believe it to be God's 
 word, if they have been properly catechized, or they 
 shortly will so believe, but its divinity, though a necessary 
 and all-important, is only a collateral truth. 
 
 From the 
 
 t • i ~, ~-p 3 Haer. in. 4. 
 
 Library ox 
 L. W. McGrath, J*« 
 
X.] OF THE GOSPEL. 245 
 
 But, if this be so, how very extravagant is the opposite 
 notion, now so common, that belief in the Bible is the 
 sole or main condition for a man being considered a Chris- 
 tian ! how very unchristian the title by which many men 
 delight to designate themselves, turning good words into 
 bad, as Bible- Christians ! We are all of us Bible-Chris- 
 tians in one sense; but the term as actually used is un- 
 christian, for the following reason. — As soon as it is 
 assumed that the main condition of communion is the 
 acceptance of the Bible as the word of God, doctrines of 
 whatever sort become of but secondary importance. They 
 will practically become matters of mere opinion, the 
 deductions of Private Judgment from that which alone is 
 divine. This principle then, of popular Protestantism, is 
 simply Latitudinarian ; and tends by no very intricate 
 process to the recognition of Socinians and Pelagians as 
 Christians. Men who hold it and yet attempt to hold 
 definite essentials of faith, are in a false position, which 
 they cannot ultimately retain ; as the history of the last 
 three centuries abundantly shows. They must either give 
 up their maxim about the Bible and the Bible only, 
 or they must give up the Nicene formulary. The Bible 
 does not carry with it its own interpretation. When 
 pressed to say why they maintain fundamentals of faith, 
 they will have no good reason to give, supposing they do 
 not receive the Creed also as a first principle. Why, it is 
 asked of them, should those, who equally with themselves 
 believe in the Bible, be denied the name of Christians, 
 because they do not happen to discern the doctrine of the 
 Trinity therein ? If they answer that Scripture itself 
 singles out certain doctrines as necessary to salvation, and 
 that the Trinity is one of them, this, indeed, is most true, 
 but avails not where men are committed to this theorv. 
 
246 ON THE ESSENTIALS [LECT. 
 
 It is urged against them, that, though the texts referred 
 to may imply the Catholic doctrine, yet they need 
 not ; that they are consistent with any one out of several 
 theories; or, at any rate, that other persons think so; 
 that these others have as much right to their opinion as the 
 party called orthodox to theirs ; that human interpreters 
 have no warrant to force upon them one view in particu- 
 lar; that Private Judgment must be left unmolested; that 
 man must not close, what God has left open ; that Uni- 
 tarians (as they are called) believe in a Trinity, only not 
 in the Catholic sense of it ; and that, where men are will- 
 ing to take and profess what is written, it is not for us to 
 be " wise above what is written ;" especially when by such 
 a course we break the bonds of peace and charity. 
 
 This reasoning, granting the first step, is irresistible; I 
 do not mean that it convinces those against whom it is 
 directed, for their hearts happily are far better than their 
 professed principles, and keep them from acting upon 
 them. They, more or less, believe in the doctrines of the 
 Trinity and Incarnation, not as mere deductions, but as 
 primary truths, objects of their faith, embraced and 
 enjoyed by their spiritual sight, though they use language 
 which implies that they have gained them by a process of 
 reasoning. But though certain individuals are not in- 
 jured by the principle in question; the body of men who 
 profess it are, and ever must be injured. For the mass of 
 men, having no moral convictions, are led by reasoning 
 and by mere consistency of argument; and legitimately 
 evolve heresy from principles which to the better sort of 
 men may be harmless. — And now let us proceed to a 
 second objection which may be advanced against the 
 doctrine of fundamentals, as I have maintained it. 
 
 7. 
 2. It may be urged, then, that at least the Creed doe3 
 
X.] OP THE GOSPEL. 247 
 
 not contain the whole revealed truth, as necessary for salva- 
 tion, even though it contain its main elements ; so that the 
 charge which was brought in the last Lecture against the 
 Romanists, of considering it only an initiatory formulary, 
 and not an abstract of the whole Gospel, lies against us 
 also ; else what is the meaning of our Articles, which un- 
 deniably contain doctrines, not developed out of the Creed, 
 but added to it ? These doctrines, it may be urged, either 
 are Apostolical, or they are not ; if they are, they must be 
 binding ; if they are not, they ought not to be taught. 
 If true, they must be necessary ; we cannot choose but 
 believe them ; they have claims upon our acceptance in 
 the nature of things, and the idea of receiving them or 
 not, as we please, is self-contradictory. Now I would 
 maintain, on the contrary, that there are what may be 
 called minor points, which we may hold to be true with- 
 out imposing them as necessary ; and, as I have already 
 considered those which are of first importance, let me 
 now direct attention to those which are of secondary. 
 
 8. 
 Doctrines may be secondary in two ways; in their 
 nature and in their evidence. Evidence which may be 
 strong enough to make it safer to believe and act than to 
 remain uninfluenced, may yet be insufficient to enable us 
 to preach and impose what it attests. I may believe, for 
 instance, that infant baptism is an Apostolic usage, and 
 think men very mistaken and unhappy who think other- 
 wise, and yet not feel authorized to say, that to disbelieve 
 it is to throw oneself out of the pale of salvation. The 
 highest evidence of Apostolical Tradition is where the 
 testimony is not only everywhere and always, but where 
 it has ever been recognized as tradition, and reflected upon 
 and professedly delivered down as saving, by those who 
 hold it. Such is the Creed, and such, in the way of ordi- 
 
248 ON THE ESSENTIALS [LECT. 
 
 nances, are the Sacraments, and certain other rites and 
 usages. The next are those doctrines which are delivered 
 as tradition, but not as part of the faith. Next may be 
 placed the consent of Fathers, without apparent conscious- 
 ness of agreement, as in the interpretation of Scripture. 
 Other doctrines again, may come on such comparatively 
 slender evidence, as to be but probable, as interpretations 
 of prophecy. For all these reasons it may be right in 
 many cases to state without enforcing ; and again, it may 
 be safe or pious to believe, where it cannot be pro- 
 nounced absolutely necessary, or be made a condition of 
 communion. 
 
 9. 
 
 Again, the matter of the doctrine may be of a nature such 
 as not to demand enforcement ; mere facts are an instance 
 in point. It is certain that David was king of Israel ; and 
 that St. Paul was martyred ; yet it would be unmeaning to 
 say belief in such facts was necessary to salvation. Again, 
 certain doctrines may be true only under circumstances, or 
 accidently, or but expedient, or developments of the truth 
 relatively to a given state of things ; such as the duty of 
 the union of Church and State. Or they may be com- 
 paratively unimportant, as the duty of women covering 
 their heads in Church; or they may be but protests 
 against the errors of a particular day. 
 
 Such are most of those doctrines in our Articles which 
 go beyond the doctrine of the Creed; such are many of 
 the decrees of Roman and other Councils. All of these, 
 whether true or false, are at any rate no part of necessary 
 truth ; as for instance the doctrine of the soul's conscious- 
 ness in the intermediate state, of the indirectly divine 
 character of Paganism, of the person and reign of Anti- 
 christ, of the just limits of the Pope's power, of the time 
 of keeping Easter, of the lawfulness of bearing arms, of the 
 
X.] OF THE GOSPEL. 249 
 
 lawfulness of oaths, of the use of the Cross, of the design 
 of the Jewish Law, of the indefectibility of the Church, 
 and an indefinite multitude of others. But it may be 
 "better to treat the subject historically, though at the risk 
 of some repetition. 
 
 10. 
 I say, then, that the Creed is a collection of definite 
 articles set apart from the first, passing from hand to 
 hand, rehearsed and confessed at Baptism, committed and 
 received from Bishop to Bishop, forced upon the attention 
 of each Christian, and thus demandiug and securing due 
 explanation of its meaning. It is received on what may 
 fitly be called, if it must have a distinctive name, Episco- 
 pal Tradition. Besides, it is delineated and recognized 
 in Scripture itself, where it is called the Hypotyposis, or 
 " outline of sound words ; * and again, in the writings of 
 the Fathers, as in some of the passages cited in the last 
 Lecture. But independently of this written evidence in 
 its favour, we may observe that a Tradition, thus formally 
 and statedly enunciated and delivered from hand to hand, 
 is of the nature of a written document, and has an evidence 
 of its Apostolical origin the same in kind with that addu- 
 cible for the Scriptures. For the same reason, though it 
 is not pertinent here to insist on it, rites and ceremonies 
 too are something more than mere oral Traditions, and, as 
 being so, carry with them a considerable presumption in 
 behalf of the things signified by them. And all this, let it 
 be observed, is independent of the question of the Catho- 
 licity or Universality of the rites or doctrines which are 
 thus formally sealed and handed down; a property which 
 in this case attaches to both of them, and becomes an 
 additional argument for their Apostolical origiu. 
 
 11. 
 Such then is Episcopal Tradition, — to be received 
 
250 ON THE ESSENTIALS [LECT. 
 
 according to the capacity of each individual mind. But 
 besides this, there is what may be called Prophetical 
 Tradition. Almighty God placed in His Church first 
 Apostles, or Bishops, secondarily Prophets. Apostles rule 
 and preach, Prophets expound. Prophets or Doctors are 
 the interpreters of the revelation ; they unfold and define 
 its mysteries, they illumiDate its documents, they har- 
 monize its contents, they apply its promises. Their teach- 
 ing is a vast system, not to be comprised in a few 
 sentences, not to be embodied in one code or treatise, but 
 consisting of a certain body of Truth, pervading the Church 
 like an atmosphere, irregular in its shape from its very pro- 
 fusion and exuberance ; at times separable only in idea from 
 Episcopal Tradition, yet at times melting away into legend 
 and fable ; 4 partly written, partly unwritten, partly the 
 interpretation, partly the supplement of Scripture, partly 
 preserved in intellectual expressions, partly latent in the 
 spirit and temper of Christians ; poured to and fro in 
 closets and upon the housetops, in liturgies, in controversial 
 works, in obscure fragments, in sermons, in popular pre- 
 judices, in local customs. This I call Prophetical Tradition, 
 existing primarily in the bosom of the Church itself, and 
 recorded in such measure as Providence has determined in 
 the writings of eminent men. This is obviously of a very 
 different kind from the Episcopal Tradition, yet in its first 
 origin it is equally Apostolical, and, viewed as a whole, 
 equally claims our zealous maintenance. " Keep that which 
 is committed to thy charge/' is St. Paul's injunction to 
 Timothy, and for this reason, because from its vastness and 
 
 4 JE. g. The Catholic interpretation of certain portions of Scripture, as 
 Rom. vii., comes close upon the highest kind of Tradition ; on the other hand, 
 the Tradition of facts is very uncertain, often apocryphal, as that St. Ignatiui 
 was the child whom our Lord took in His arms and blessed, which, however, 
 even if untrue, indirectly confirms certain truths, viz. that St. Ignatius was 
 closely connected with the Apostles, &c. 
 
X.] OP THE GOSPEL. 251 
 
 indefiniteness it is especially exposed to corruption, if the 
 Church fails in vigilance. This is that body of teaching 
 which is offered to all Christians even at the present day, 
 though in various forms and measures of truth, in different 
 parts of Christendom, partly being a comment, partly an 
 addition upon the articles of the Creed. 
 
 12. 
 
 Now what has been said has sufficed to show, how it 
 may easily happen that this Prophetical Tradition has 
 been corrupted in its details, in spite of its general 
 accuracy and its agreement with Episcopal ; and if so, 
 there will be lesser points of doctrine as well as greater 
 points, whatever be their number and limit, from which a 
 person may possibly dissent, as doubting their Apostolical 
 origin, without incurring any anathema or public censure. 
 And this is supposed on the Anglo-Catholic theory actually 
 to be the case; that, though the Prophetical Tradition 
 comes from God, and ought to have been religiously pre- 
 served, and was so in great measure and for a long time, 
 yet that no such especial means were taken for its preser- 
 vation as those which have secured to us the Creed, — that 
 it was rather what St. Paul calls " the mind of the Spirit," 
 the thought and principle which breathed in the Church, 
 her accustomed and unconscious mode of viewing things, 
 and the body of her received notions, than any definite 
 and systematic collection of dogmas elaborated by the 
 intellect. Partially, indeed, it was fixed and perpetuated 
 in the shape of formal articles or doctrines, as the rise of 
 errors or other causes gave occasion ; and it is preserved 
 to a considerable extent in the writings of the Fathers. 
 For a time the whole Church agreed together in giving 
 one and the same account of this Tradition ; but in course 
 of years, love waxing cold and schisms abounding, her 
 various branches developed portions of it for themselves, 
 
252 ON THE ESSENTIALS [LECT. 
 
 out of the existing mass, and, according to the accidental 
 influences which prevailed at the time, did the work well 
 or ill, rudely or accurately. It follows, that these developed 
 and fixed doctrines are entitled to very different degrees 
 of credit, though always to attention. Those which are 
 recognized by the Church at an early date, are of more 
 authority than such as are determined at a later; those 
 which have the joint assent of many independent 
 Churches, than those which are the result of some pre- 
 ponderating influence ; those that are sanctioned dispas- 
 sionately, than those which are settled in fear, anger, or 
 jealousy. Accordingly, some Councils speak far more 
 authoritatively than others, though all which appeal to 
 Tradition may be presumed to have some element of truth 
 in them. And this view, I would take even of the decrees 
 of Trent. They claim indeed to be Apostolic ; and I 
 would grant so much, that they are the ruins and perver- 
 sions of Primitive Tradition. 
 
 13. 
 
 What has been here maintained, that there are matters 
 of doctrine, true yet not necessary, is sanctioned by the 
 Fathers; as the following authorities suffice to show. 
 
 The first instance I shall take occurred under extraordi- 
 nary circumstances ; yet that does not make it less appo- 
 site. It is Athanasius's conduct towards the Semi-Arians. 
 Even the article of the Homoiision, which, in consequence 
 of its wide acceptance in former centuries, the Nicene 
 Fathers admitted into the Catholic Creed, they did not 
 impose on those who had been admitted into the Church 
 before their decree was made. It was exacted, indeed, at 
 once of the Clergy, as being teachers, but not of the laity. 
 On the other hand, anathemas were levelled against those 
 who openly professed any other doctrine. Here then we 
 have three classes of persons brought before us; the 
 
X.] OP THE GOSPEL. 253 
 
 ministers of the Church bound to teach after her rule, con- 
 tumacious opposers excommunicated, and the mass of 
 Christians left as they were before, neither pledged as if 
 teachers, nor expelled as if heretics. 5 " What has been 
 said," says Athanasius in one place, " is sufficient for the 
 refutation of those who altogether reject the Council. 
 But as for those who receive its whole Creed except the word 
 Homoiisionj but doubt about it, we must not regard them 
 as enemies ; for our opposition to them is not as if we 
 thought them Arians and impugners of the Fathers, but 
 we converse whh them as brothers with brothers, who 
 hold the same sense as we do, only hesitate about the 
 word." 
 
 To the same purpose are the following passages from 
 Yincentius of Lerins. " It is necessary/' he says, "that 
 the heavenly sense of Scripture be explained according to 
 this one rule, the Church's understanding of it, principally 
 in those questions only on which the foundations of the 
 whole Catholic doctrine rest. Again, he says, " The 
 ancient consent of the Holy Fathers is to be diligently 
 ascertained and followed, not in all the lesser questions of 
 the Divine Law, but only or at least principally as regards 
 the Rule of Faith." And again, in the following passage, 
 he tacitly allows the right of Private Judgment in lesser 
 matters ; that is, the necessity and duty of judging on our 
 own responsibility piouslyand cautiously, provided our con- 
 clusions be not pertinaciously urged, for then our Judg- 
 ment is no longer private in any unexceptionable sense of 
 the word. " Whatever opinion has been held beyond or 
 
 5 [This is not quite in point. It was not a difficulty of doctrine at Nicsea, 
 but of a word ; the doctrine was both true and necessary, and the mass of 
 Christians were so zealous for it as not to need to be pledged. The word 
 was refused, not by the mass of Christians, but by two parties of ecclesiastics, 
 the one political, the other (of whom Athanasius is writing) pious but 
 subtle-minded and perversa.] 
 
254 ON THE ESSENTIALS [LECT. 
 
 against the whole Church, however holy and learned be 
 the author of it, let it be separated from common, public, 
 and general opinions which have authority, and included 
 among peculiar, secret, and private surmises. " 6 
 
 14. 
 
 3. That there are greater truths, then, and lesser truths, 
 points which it is necessary, and points which it is pious 
 to believe, Tradition Episcopal and Tradition Prophetical, 
 the Creed and the Decrees of Councils, seems undeniable. 
 But here another object obviously calls for consideration ; 
 viz., how the line is to be drawn between them. It has 
 been above confessed that the doctrine of the Creed runs 
 into the general Prophetical Tradition ; how much, then, 
 or how little doctrine is contained in the Creed ? what 
 extent and exactness of meaning must be admitted in its 
 Articles by those who profess it ? what in fact, after all, 
 is that Faith which is required of the candidates for Bap- 
 tism, since it is not to be an acceptance of the mere letter 
 of the Creed, but of a real and living doctrine ? For 
 instance, is the doctrine of original sin to be accounted 
 part of the Creed? or of justification by faith? or of 
 election ? or of the Sacraments ? If so, is there any 
 limit to that faith which the Creed represents ? 
 
 I answer, there is no precise limit ; nor is it necessary 
 there should be. Let this maxim be laid down concerning 
 all that the Church Catholic holds, to the full extent of her 
 Prophetical Tradition, viz. that her members must either 
 believe or silently acquiesce in the whole of it. Though 
 the meaning of the Creed be extended ever so far, it cannot 
 go beyond our duty of obedience, if not of active faith ; 
 and if the line between the Creed and the general doctrine 
 of the Church cannot be drawn, neither can it be drawn 
 between the lively apprehension and the submission of 
 6 Athan. de Syn. 41. Vincent. Commonit. 39, 41. 
 
X.] OF THE GOSPEL. 255 
 
 her members in respect to both the one and the other. 
 Whether it be apprehension or submission, it is faith in 
 one or other shape, nor in fact can individuals themselves 
 ever distinguish what they spiritually perceive from what 
 they merely accept upon authority. It is the duty of every 
 one either to believe and love what he hears, or to wish to 
 do so, or at least, not to oppose, but to be silent. 
 
 This distinction between openly opposing and passively 
 submitting to the Tradition of the Church Catholic, is 
 recognized by Vincentius in the last of the foregoing 
 extracts ; and rests upon grounds which have come under 
 notice in former Lectures, and which easily recommend 
 themselves to the mind. 
 
 15. 
 
 Take the case of the Ethiopian Eunuch, whom Philip 
 baptized. Philip did not oblige him to contemplate, 
 accept, and profess, the doctrine of eternal punishment, 
 yet surely the Eunuch was not at liberty to oppose it. He 
 did not, could not teach him at once everything that was 
 to be learned; yet was he at liberty, when once a Christian, 
 to sift, criticize, and prove for himself Philip's teaching 
 before he accepted it ? Whether or not this case is pre- 
 cisely parallel to that under consideration, it shows all 
 that I bring it to show, that there is a medium conceivable 
 between confessing all truth from the first, and having a 
 right of opposing it from the first. Such opposition, or 
 again, even a resolute disbelief without open opposition, 
 would be the token of an arrogant mind, as certainly as 
 wilful acts of impurity argue a carnal mind; and as a 
 fornicator or adulterer would be an unfit subject for 
 Church communion, so would a disturber or scorner of the 
 Church's Tradition. He is excluded on a moral offence; 
 not only because he believes amiss, but because he acts 
 
256 ON THE ESSENTIALS [LECT. 
 
 presumptuously. The Church Catholic is more likely to 
 be right thau he. 
 
 Such is the moral state,, and such the punishment, of 
 those who presumptuously resist the Church ; but it does 
 not follow because a man does not oppose a certain article 
 that therefore he firmly holds it. There is surely a middle 
 state of mind between affirming and denying, and that in 
 many forms ; and in one or other of them, it is the por- 
 tion, in a measure, of all of us. Either we are ignorant, 
 or we are undecided, or we are in doubt, or we are on 
 inquiry, or we take secret exceptions in one or other part 
 of that extended system which has existed more or 
 less all over the Church, and which I have called the 
 Prophetical Tradition. Unless the Church were thus in- 
 dulgent to her children, she could not be called Catholic. 
 
 16. 
 
 The Primitive Church recollected that she was instituted 
 for the sake of the poor and ignorant. ' ' To the poor the 
 Gospel is preached." She was simple and precise in her 
 fundamentals to include all classes, to suggest heads of 
 belief, to assist the memory, to save the mind from per- 
 plexity. 7 However, while thus considerate, she has not 
 forgotten her high office, as the appointed teacher of her 
 children. She is il the pillar and ground of the truth ; n 
 of all truth, Christian Truth in all its developments, in 
 the interpretation of Scripture, in the exposition of doc- 
 trine, in the due appointment of ordinances, in the par- 
 ticular application and adjustment of the moral law. She 
 is called a superstructure, as being built upon the great 
 rudiments of the Gospel Doctrine ; a pillar and ground, as 
 beiug the expounder of it. And, in consequence, such 
 being her office towards her children, they are bound, if 
 they would remain her children, as far as their minds 
 7 August, beriu. 'ZLo, init. 
 
X.] OF THE GOSPEL. 257 
 
 attain to her doctrine, to take it on the ground of her 
 Catholicity. 
 
 I say, "as far as their minds attain to it/' for few of 
 us indeed have the opportunity of acquainting ourselves 
 with the whole system of truth which is preserved in the 
 Church. Every word of Eevelation has a deep meaning. 
 It is the outward form of a heavenly truth, and in this 
 sense a mystery or Sacrament. We may read it, confess 
 it; but there is something in it which we cannot fathom, 
 which we only, more or less, as the case may be, not perfectly, 
 enter into. Accordingly, when a candidate for Baptism 
 repeats the Articles of the Creed, he is confessing some- 
 thing incomprehensible in its depth, and indefinite in its 
 extent. 8 He cannot know at the time what he is binding 
 on himself, whither he is letting himself be carried. It is 
 the temper of reverent faith to feel this ; to feel that in 
 coming to the Church, it stands before God's representa- 
 tive, and that, as in her Ordinances, so in her Creed, there 
 is a something supernatural and beyond us. Another 
 property of faith is the wish to conceive rightly of sacred 
 doctrine, as far as it can conceive at all; and, further, to 
 look towards the Church for guidance how to conceive of 
 it. This is faith, viz., submission of the reason and will 
 towards God, wistful and loving meditation upon His mes- 
 sage, childlike reliance on the guide which is ordained 
 by Him to be the interpreter of it. The Church Catholic 
 is our mother ; if we attend to this figure, we shall have 
 little practical difficulty in the matter before us. A child 
 comes to its mother for instruction ; she gives it. She 
 does not assume infallibility, nor is she infallible ; yet it 
 would argue a very unpleasant temper in the child to 
 doubt her word, to require proof of it before acting on it, 
 
 8 " Considera quod voceris fidelis, non rationalis. Denique accepto 
 baptismo hoc dicimus, Fidelis factus sum, credo quod nescio." Augustin . 
 Serm. de Tempore. 189. 1. de Trin. apud Bellarm. 
 
 VOL. I. S 
 
258 ON THE ESSENTIALS [LECT. 
 
 to go needlessly to other sources of information. 9 Some- 
 times, perhaps, she mistakes in lesser matters, and is set 
 right by her child; yet this neither diminishes her pre- 
 rogative of teaching, nor his privilege of receiving duti- 
 fully. Now this is what the Church does towards her 
 children, according to the primitive design. She puts 
 before them, first of all, as the elements of her teaching, 
 nothing but the original Creed ; her teaching will follow 
 in due time, but as a privilege to children necessarily 
 in-oorant, as a privilege which will be welcomed by them, 
 and accepted joyfully, or they would be wanting in that 
 temper of faith which the very coming for Baptism pre- 
 supposes. 
 
 17. 
 
 Thus, then, I would meet the difficulty of drawing the 
 line between essentials and non-essentials. The Church 
 asks for a dutiful and simple-hearted acceptance of her 
 message growing into faith, and that variously, according 
 to the circumstances of individuals. And, if this be the 
 principle on which the Catholic Church anciently acted, 
 we see how well it was adapted to try the humility of her 
 children, without imposing any yoke upon them, after the 
 manner of Eome, or repressing the elastic or creative force 
 of their minds. She makes her way by love, she does not 
 force a way by violence. All she asks is their confidence, 
 which will practically preserve them from all difference 
 from her, except in minor matters. Thus, in the case of 
 particular minds, she allows for a defect in the evidence 
 they have received of her full doctrine, or in the impression 
 of this or that part of her Creed. She is gentle, holds 
 back, watches her time, and is persuasive according to the 
 
 ' [But supposing that after she has given her answer, the child has real 
 reason to come to a conclusion of his own, what is to hinder him, since she 
 is not infallible ? Yet she may be light alter all in the particular case.] 
 
X.] OF THE GOSPEL. 259 
 
 opportunity. She secures to herself the power of accom- 
 modating her communications to the circumstances, ranks, 
 and ages of her children ; of consulting for their ignorance, 
 or even waywardness ; of keeping silence when it would 
 be inexpedient or unkind to urge truth in its fulness, or 
 where men are unworthy of it ; of letting the reason range 
 freely, and then bringing it round. She exacts the great 
 rudiments of the Gospel from all, she requires teachable- 
 ness, she is severe with scepticism, but she is tender 
 and considerate amid her zeal and loyalty towards God. 
 She does not " strive nor cry," nor " quench the smoking 
 flax; " but retires into the sanctuary, dispensing her mes- 
 sage, not lavishly, or by necessity, but on those who care 
 to follow her. She has that confidence in the truth of her 
 doctrine and in the sovereignty of truth, that she can be 
 long-suffering towards error; that faith in her spiritual 
 powers, that she is slow to display them. She can within 
 bounds bear with the fro ward or the obstinate, knowing her 
 gift both in the word and in the sacraments, when the 
 time comes for using it. She has too generous a temper 
 to rule by engagements, but, like an absolute monarch, is 
 familiar with her children without jealousy, because God 
 is with her. But supposing they are hopelessly contuma- 
 cious, resist her word, oppose and preach against her, she 
 has no desire, nay, no warrant to retain them, and suf- 
 fers or compels them to depart, lest the rest should be 
 injured. Yet after all, even when she strips them of her 
 glorious privileges, she does not thereby absolutely pro- 
 nounce on their spiritual state in God's sight, or their 
 future destiny. She is as little concerned with such ques- 
 tions as with the state of heathens. 1 She surrenders them 
 to that Master " to whom they stand or fall ; " doing her 
 part, and leaving the rest to Him. 
 
 1 [Nor is the Catholic Church, though she be infallible in her statements 
 of doctrine. This whole paragraph is in the main true of her.] 
 
 S 
 
 
 
260 ON THE ESSENTIALS [LECT. 
 
 18. 
 
 4. It is time to bring this Lecture to an end, but one 
 objection, and not the least important, remains, which 
 shall be treated with as much brevity as the nature of it 
 admits. It will be said that, even if the above theory of 
 Fundamentals is consistent, yet, after all, it is but a theory ; 
 a mere shadowy, baseless, ingenious theory, since the divi- 
 sion of the East and West, and still more so since the 
 great schism of the North and South. " You speak/' it 
 may be urged against me, " of the Church Catholic, of the 
 Church's teaching, and of obedience to the Church. What 
 is meant by the Church Catholic at this day? where is 
 she? what are her local instruments and organs? how 
 does she speak ? when and where does she teach, forbid, 
 command, censure ? how can she be said to utter one and 
 the same doctrine everywhere, when we are at war with all 
 the rest of Christendom, and not at peace at home ? In 
 the Primitive Church there was no difficulty, and no mis- 
 taking ; then all Christians everywhere spoke one and the 
 same doctrine, and if any novelty arose, it was at once 
 denounced and stifled. The case indeed, is the same now 
 with the Roman Church ; but for Anglo- Catholics so to 
 speak, is to use words without meaning, to dream of a state 
 of things long past away from this Protestant land. The 
 Church is now but a mere abstract word ; it stands for a 
 generalized idea, it is not the name of any one thing really 
 existing ; which if it ever was, yet ceased to be, when Chris- 
 tians divided from each other, centuries upon centuries ago. 
 Rome aud Greece, at enmity with each other, both refuse 
 communion to England, and anathematize her faith. 
 Again, in the English Church by itself may be found dif- 
 ferences as great as those which separate it from Greece 
 or Rome ; — Calvanism and Arminianism, Latitudinarianism 
 and Orthodoxy, all these sometimes simply such, and 
 sometimes compounded together into numberless varieties 
 
X.] OF THE GOSPEL. 261 
 
 of doctrine and school ; and these, not merely each up- 
 holding itself as true, but, with few exceptions, denouncing 
 all the rest as perilous, if not fatal errors. Such is its 
 state even among its appointed ministers and teachers. 
 Where, then, in the English Church is that one eternal 
 voice of Truth, that one witness issuing from the Apostles' 
 times, and conversant with all doctrine, the expounder of 
 the Creed, the interpreter of Scripture, and the instructor 
 of the people of God ? " 
 
 19 
 
 Whatever truth there is in these remarks, still I cannot 
 allow that what I have been above drawing out is there- 
 fore a mere tale of other times, when addressed to those 
 who are really bent on serving God as well as they can, and 
 who consult what is most likely to please Him. The very 
 difficulty of applying it, will be a test whether we earn- 
 estly desire to do His will or not. Those who do not, 
 will gladly seize the excuse that His will is difficult to 
 find. Common experience of life shows us clearly enough 
 how men evade what they do not like. They find reasons 
 for pleasing themselves, good unanswerable reasons, but 
 which after all do not deceive us for an instant as to the 
 real motives which influence them. The two things are 
 quite distinct and quite compatible, neither interfering 
 with the other nor arguing its absence, the motive for an 
 act and the excuse for it. The excuse which is urged to 
 defend it, does not obscure in any degree our view of the 
 motive which it argues. We know quite well that if their 
 heart had been in the business, they would have found at 
 least an approximation and made an attempt towards that 
 which they have passed over ; as is even plain from the 
 proverb, " where there is a will, there is a way." Now, 
 we have no reason to suppose, that God will accept in our 
 conduct towards Him excuses which we see through when 
 
262 ON THE ESSENTIALS [LECT. 
 
 offered to ourselves ; and, if so, the difficulty of obedience 
 may be a trial of our motives, not a subject for argument. 
 The servant who hid his talent and made excuses, did not 
 find his account in making them. 
 
 It being kept in view, then, what kind of obedience 
 God requires of us, viz. such as we can pay, not the alter- 
 native of the highest conceivable obedience, or none at all, 
 of the very letter, or not of the spirit, let us see, whether 
 even amid our present confusions there be any such in- 
 superable obstacle in obeying the Church, as is pretended. 
 Now, in spite of differences within or without, our own 
 branch may surely be considered as to us the voice of her 
 who has been in the world ever one and the same since 
 Christ came. Surely, she comes up to the theory ; she 
 professes to be the Catholic Church, and to transmit that 
 one ancient Catholic Faith, and she does transmit it simply 
 and intelligibly. Not the most unlettered of her members 
 can miss her meaning. She speaks in her formularies 
 and services. The Daily Prayer, the Occasional Offices, 
 the Order of the Sacraments, the Ordination Services, pre- 
 sent one and the same strong, plain, edifying language to 
 rich and poor, learned and unlearned ; and that, not as the 
 invention of this Reformer or that, but as the witness of 
 all Saints from the beginning. The very titles of the 
 Prayers and Creeds show this ; such as, " the Apostles' " 
 and " the Nicene Creed/ - ' " the Creed of St. Athanasius," 
 " the Catholic Faith," " the Catholic Religion," a " Prayer 
 of St. Chrysostom," and the like. It is undeniable, that 
 a stranger taking up the Prayer-Book would feel it to be 
 no modern production ; the very Latin titles to the Psalms 
 and Hymns would prove it. It claims to be Catholic ; 
 nor is there any one of any party to deny, that on the 
 whole it is. There is no mistaking then in this day in Eng- 
 land, where the Church Catholic is, and what her teaching. 
 To follow her is to follow the Prayer-Book, instead of fol- 
 lowing preachers, who are but individuals. ' Its words are 
 
X.] OF THE GOSPEL. 263 
 
 not the accidental out-pouring of this or that age or 
 country, but the joint and accordant testimony of that in- 
 numerable company of Saints, whom we are bound to 
 follow. They are the accents of the Church Catholic and 
 Apostolic as she manifests herself in England. Surely, if we 
 did but proceed on the great principle above described, of 
 acting towards duties which we cannot fulfil exactly, did 
 we take what is given us, and use it not grudgingly, nor 
 of necessity, but with a cheerful obedience, did we receive 
 the Creed as our Gospel, embrace and act upon the doctrine 
 of our Services, and, if anywhere we differed, differ in 
 silence, we should of ourselves without effort revive all 
 those visible tokens of the Church's sovereignty, the want 
 of which is our present excuse for disobedience. Surely, 
 " the kingdom of God is within us ; " we have but to 
 recognize the Church in faith, and it rises before our eyes. 
 
 20. 
 
 Nor is there anything in the profession of the sects 
 around us to disturb us. They contradict each other, or 
 rather themselves. They pretend to no Antiquity, they do 
 not claim a Tradition, they have no stability, no consistency; 
 they as little interfere, or profess to interfere, with our doc- 
 trine and our pretensions at all, as the schools of philosophy 
 and science. They have taken a different line and occupy 
 a different province. They gain their opinions from a 
 distinct source. As well might it be said that diviners 
 interfere with prophecy, as those who out of their own 
 judgment conjecture the doctrine of Christ, with its tra- 
 ditionary delivery through His appointed stewards. 
 
 The only real difficulty in our path in the question now 
 under review, arises from the pretensions of the Koman 
 Catholics who are among us. They profess to be the 
 Church and to teach the Catholic Faith as well as we, yet 
 differ materially from us. Which then are our people to 
 believe ? but even here there is no such difficultv in our 
 
264? ON THE ESSENTIALS [LECT. 
 
 path as opponents would be glad to create. Assuming, as 
 our present argument leads us to do, that Romanists and 
 we are both branches of the one Catholic Church, I say the 
 difference of doctrine between them and us is no prac- 
 tical difficulty in finding what is Apostolical, no drawback 
 upon our people's certainty and comfort in the Anglo- 
 Catholic communion. Indeed, the two rival systems, 
 Roman and English, agreeing amid their differences in 
 those points which they each hold to be the highest truths, 
 and which sectaries more or less undervalue, afford a 
 remarkable attestation to the Apostolical origin of both. 
 Both profess the Apostles' Creed. Both use substantially 
 the same Common Prayer, ours indeed being actually but 
 a selection from theirs. It is nothing to the purpose in this 
 point of view, what and how great the errors of Romanism 
 are in practice. We know they are very serious ; but I am 
 speaking of its professions, with which alone at this instant 
 I am concerned. And the doctrines of Three Persons in 
 One indivisible Divine Nature; of the union of two 
 Natures, Divine and Human, in the One Person of Christ ; 
 of the imputation of Adam's sin to his descendants; of the 
 death of Christ to reconcile God the Father to us sinners ; 
 of the application of His merits through external rites ; of 
 the singular efficacy and mysteriousness of Sacraments ; of 
 the Apostolical ministry ; of unity ; of the necessity of good 
 works; these and other doctrines are maintained, and main- 
 tained as the chief doctrines of the Gospel, both by us and 
 by them. And our very differences in other matters, and 
 our hostility towards each other increase, I say, the force 
 of our unanimity where it exists. 
 
 On the other hand, the very fact of those differences 
 throws a corresponding uncertainty over those points 
 which Rome maintains by herself, 2 such as the existence 
 
 2 [Do, in like manner, the theological differences between Bp. Bull and 
 Socinus, add weight to their evidence for the Divine Unity, in which they 
 
X.] OP THE GOSPEL. 265 
 
 of Purgatory, the supremacy of the Roman see, and the 
 Infallibility of the Church. 
 
 21. 
 
 If, in answer to this statement, it be urged that the 
 peculiar claim set up by Rome to be the true Church to 
 the exclusion of ourselves, is so serious as to perplex the 
 inquirer, and almost to lead him to join himself to her 
 communion as the safest course, whatever be the identity 
 of doctrine between the two systems on greater points, let 
 it be considered whether on the other hand there be not 
 some peculiarities hanging about her, which are sufficient 
 from the same prudential motives to keep us at a distance 
 from her. Our Lord said of false prophets, "By their 
 fruits shall ye know them ;" and, however the mind may 
 be entangled theoretically, yet surely it will be struck with 
 certain marks in Rome which seem intended to convey to 
 the simple and honest inquirer a solemn warning to keep 
 clear of her, while she carries them about her. Such are 
 her denying the cup to the laity, her idolatrous worship of 
 the Blessed Virgin, her Image-worship, her recklessness 
 in anathematizing, and her schismatical and overbearing 
 spirit. Surely we have more reason for thinking that her 
 doctrines concerning Images and the Saints are false, than 
 that her decision that they are Apostolical is true. I con- 
 ceive, then, on the whole, that while Rome confirms by her 
 accordant witness our own teaching in all greater things, 
 she does not tend by her novelties, and violence, and threats, 
 to disturb the practical certainty of Catholic doctrine, or 
 to seduce from us any sober and conscientious inquirer. 
 
 And here I end, at last, my remarks on Fundamentals, in 
 which I have been unavoidably led, partly to repeat, partly 
 to take for granted, some portions of the preceding Lectures. 
 
 agree, but throw doubt upon the doctrine of the Holy Trinity, about which 
 they differ ?] 
 
LECTURE XI. 
 
 ON SCRIPTURE AS THE RECORD OF FAITH. 
 
 It will perhaps be questioned, whether the foregoing view 
 of Catholic Tradition and the Fundamentals of the Church,, 
 is consistent with the supremacy of Holy Scripture in 
 questions of faith. That it is not consistent with present 
 popular notions on the subject I am quite aware ; but it 
 may be that those notions are wrong, and that the fore- 
 going view, which is taken from our great divines, is right. 
 If it could be proved contrary to anything they have 
 elsewhere maintained, this would be to accuse them of 
 inconsistency ; which I leave to our enemies to do. How- 
 ever, I will not content myself with a mere appeal to 
 authority, but will argue the question on grounds of 
 reason. In this, then, and the two following Lectures, I 
 propose to discuss the question of what is sometimes called 
 " the Rule of Faith;" and to show, that nothing that has 
 gone before is inconsistent with the reverence, thankful- 
 ness, and submission with which we should receive 
 Scripture. 
 
 2. 
 
 The sixth Article speaks as follows : " Holy Scripture 
 containeth all things necessary to salvation, so that 
 whatsoever is not read therein, nor may be proved 
 thereby, is not to be required of any man, that it 
 
LECT. XI.] ON SCRIPTURE AS THE RECORD OP FAITH. 267 
 
 should be believed as an article of the faith, or be 
 thought requisite or necessary to salvation." 
 
 Now, this statement is very plain and clear except in 
 one point, viz. who is to be the judge what is and what 
 is not contained in Scripture. Our Church is silent on 
 this point, — very emphatically so. This is worth ob- 
 serving ; in truth, she does not admit, strictly speaking, 
 of any judge at all, in the sense in which Roman 
 Catholics and Protestants contend for one ; and in this 
 point, as in others, holds a middle course between 
 extreme theories. The Roman Church, as we all know, 
 maintains the existence of a Judge of controversies, nay, 
 and an infallible one, that is, the Church Catholic 
 herself. It considers, that the Pope, in General Council, 
 can infallibly decide on the meaning of Scripture, as 
 well as infallibly discriminate between Apostolic and 
 spurious Traditions. Again, the multitude of Protestants 
 also maintain the existence of a judge of Scripture 
 doctrine, but not one and the same to all, but a 
 different one to each individual. They consider every 
 man his own judge; they hold that every man may or 
 must read Scripture for himself and judge about its mean- 
 ing and make up his mind for himself ; nay, is, as regards 
 himself, and practically, an infallible judge of its 
 meaning ; — infallible, certainly, for were the whole new 
 creation against him, Bishops, Doctors, Martyrs, Saints, 
 the Holy Church Universal, the very companions of the 
 Apostles, the unanimous suffrage of the most distinct times 
 and places, and the most gifted and holiest men, yet 
 according to the popular doctrine, though he was aware of 
 this, he ought ultimately to rest in his own interpretations 
 of Scripture, and to follow his private Judgment, however 
 sorry he might be to differ from such authorities. 
 
 Thus both the Protestant and the Roman Catholic hold 
 the existence of an authoritative judge of the sense of 
 
268 ON SCRIPTURE AS [LECT. 
 
 Scripture, each makes itself judge in its own cause, and 
 places the ultimate appeal in its own decision ; whereas 
 our Article preserves a significant silence on the subject ; 
 which agrees with the mode of treating it adopted in other 
 passages of our formularies. For, in truth, we neither 
 hold that the Catholic Church is an infallible judge of 
 Scripture, nor that each individual may judge for himself; 
 but that the Church has authority, and that individuals 
 have liberty to judge for themselves outside the range of that 
 authority. This is no matter of words, but a very clear 
 and piratically important distinction, as will soon appear. 
 
 3. 
 
 The Church is not a judge of the sense of Scripture in 
 the common sense of the word, but a witness. If, indeed 
 the word judge be taken to mean what it means in the 
 Courts of Law, one vested with authority to declare the 
 received appointments and usages of the realms, and with 
 power to enforce them, then the Church is a judge, — but 
 not of Scripture, but of Tradition. 1 On the contrary, both 
 Protestant sectaries and Catholics of Rome consider their 
 supposed judge to be a judge not merely of past facts, of 
 precedents, custom, belief, and the like, but to have a 
 direct power over Scripture, to contemplate questions of 
 what is true and false in opinion, to have a special gift by 
 divine illumination, a gift guaranteed by promise, of 
 discerning the Scripture sense without perceptible human 
 Media, to act under a guidance, and as if inspired, even though 
 not really so. 2 Whether any such gift was once destined 
 
 1 [Is it not as difficult, and just as much and as little of a usurpation, to 
 judge of what Tradition says, as of what Scripture says ?J 
 
 2 Accordingly in both parties there is a tendency to deny that Scripture 
 has one definite unalterable meaning; vid. above, the quotation from Cardinal 
 Cusa, Lecture ii., p. 97, on the one hand, and the Latitudinarian doctrine 
 on the other. 
 
XI.] THE RECORD OF FAITH. 269 
 
 for mankind or not, it avails not to inquire; we consider 
 it is not given in fact, and both Roman Catholics and 
 Protestants hold that it is given. We, on the other hand, 
 consider the Church as a witness, a keeper and witness of 
 Catholic Tradition, and in this sense invested with 
 authority, just as in political matters, an ambassador, 
 possessed of instructions from his government, would speak 
 with authority. But, except in such sense as attaches to 
 an ambassador, the Church, in our view of her office, is not 
 a judge. 
 
 She bears witness to a fact, that such and such a 
 doctrine, or such a sense of Scripture, has ever been 
 received and came from the Apostles ; the proof of which 
 lies in evidence of a plain and public nature, first in her 
 own unanimity throughout her various branches, next in 
 the writings of the Ancient Fathers ; and she acts upon 
 this evidence as the executive does in civil matters, and is 
 responsible for it ; but she does not undertake of herself to 
 determine the sense of Scripture, she has no immediate 
 power over it, she but alleges and submits to that doctrine 
 which is ancient and Catholic. The Protestant, indeed, 
 and the Romanist may also use Antiquity ; but it is as a 
 mere material by which the supreme judge, the spiritual 
 mind, whether collective or individual, forms its de- 
 cisions, — as pleadings in its court, itself being above them, 
 and having an inherent right of disposing of them. We, 
 on the contrary, consider Antiquity and Catholicity to be 
 the real guides, and the Church their organ. 3 For in- 
 stance, in the 20th Article, a distinction is made between 
 
 3 [How can history, that is, words and deeds which are dead and gone, act 
 as an effectual living decider of quarrels between living men ? To apply 
 past principles, doctrines, laws, precedents to present cases requires an 
 applier, that is, a living and present mind ; and if neither the body is to 
 decide nor the individual member of it, who is there to decide when 
 questions arise, as they will to the end of time ?] 
 
270 ON SCEIPTURE AS [LECT. 
 
 rites and doctrines, and it is affirmed the Church has 
 power over the one, but not over the other; u the Church 
 hath 'power to decree rites and ceremonies, and authority in 
 controversies of faith. " Again, in the Canon of 1571, the 
 rule of deciding these controversies is given : ' ' Preachers 
 shall be careful not to preach aught to be religiously- 
 held and believed by the people, except what is agreeable 
 to the doctrine of the Old or New Testament, and 
 collected from that very doctrine by the Catholic Fathers and 
 ancient Bishops." 41 
 
 The Act of Queen Elizabeth, though proceeding from 
 the laity and since repealed, expresses the opinion of the 
 age which imposed the Articles, and it speaks to the same 
 purport as this Canon. It determines that " such matter 
 and cause " only shall be adjudged to be heresy, as 
 heretofore has been adjudged to be so, " by authority of 
 the Canonical Scriptures, or by some of the first four 
 General Councils, or by any other General Council wherein 
 the same was declared heresy by the express and plain 
 words of the said Canonical Scriptures." 
 
 The present Church, then, in our view of her office, is 
 not so much a judge of Scripture as a witness of Catholic 
 Truth delivered to her in the first ages, whether by 
 Councils, or by Fathers, or in whatever other way. 
 
 4. 
 
 And if she does not claim for herself any gift of inter- 
 
 4 [It must not be forgotten that the Council of Trent too forbids any inter- 
 pretation of Scripture which runs counter to the unanimous consent of the 
 Fathers. But in order to determine what the Fathers say, and in what 
 they agree, the Church's witness involves a judgment. Judges in our 
 Courts of law are primarily witnesses to the law, written and unwritten, but 
 still they :»re called judges of the law, and are truly such. And who can 
 deny that a Jury judges of facts ? The facts of Antiquity are not too clear 
 to dispense with the exercise of a judgment upon them. The view in the 
 text is a theory which will not stand.] 
 
 
 
XI.J THE EECORD OF FAITH. 271 
 
 pretation, in the high, points in question, much less does 
 she allow individuals to pretend to it. Explicit as our 
 Articles are in asserting that the doctrines of faith are 
 contained and must be pointed out in Scripture, yet 
 they give no hint that private persons may presume to 
 search Scripture, independently of external help when 
 they can obtain it, and to determine for themselves what 
 is saving. The Church has a prior claim to do so, but 
 even the Church asserts it not, but hands over the office to 
 Catholic Antiquity. 5 What our Articles say of Holy 
 Scripture as the document of proof, has exclusive 
 reference to the mode of teaching. It is not said that 
 individuals are to infer the faith, but that the Church 
 is to prove it from Scripture ; not that individuals are to 
 learn it for themselves, but that they are to be taught it. 
 The Church is bound over to test and verify her doctrine by 
 Scripture throughout her course of instruction. She must 
 take care to show her children that she keeps Scripture in 
 mind, and is ruling, guiding, steadying herself by it. In 
 Sermons and Lectures, in catechizings and controversy, 
 she must ever appeal to Scripture, draw her arguments 
 from Scripture, explore and develope Scripture, imitate 
 Scripture, build up her form of doctrine on Scripture 
 rudiments ; and though individuals have no warrant to set 
 themselves against her particular use of Scripture, yet her 
 obligation to use it is surely a great practical limitation of 
 her power. The sole question, I say, in the Articles is 
 how the Church is to teach. Thus, in the sixth it is said, 
 that nothing but what is contained in Scripture, or may 
 be proved by it, is to be u required of any man that it 
 should be believed as an article of the faith." And the 
 
 5 [This is an assumption. The Anglican Church should thus act ac- 
 cording to its theory, but does not in fact, because Antiquity cannot fulfil 
 the office thus gratuitously put upon it. Is Article 35 in Antiquity without 
 an interpreter ?J 
 
272 ON SCRIPTUEE AS [LECT. 
 
 20th still more clearly : " It is not lawful for the Church 
 to ordain any tiling that is contrary to God's word 
 written, neither may it so expound one place of Scrip- 
 ture that it be repugnant to another. Wherefore, 
 although the Church be a witness and a keeper of Holy 
 Writ, yet as it ought not to decree anything against the 
 same, so besides the same ought it not to enforce any- 
 thing to be believed for necessity of salvation." It 
 does not say what individuals may do, but what the 
 Church may not do. In like manner, the Canon of 1571 
 is concerning the duty of preachers ; the question whether 
 individuals may exercise a right of Private Judgment on 
 the text of Scripture in matters of faith is not even con- 
 templated. 
 
 5. 
 
 Such then are the respective places to be assigned to 
 the Church of this day and to her members in regard to 
 the interpretation of Scripture. Neither individual, nor 
 Bishop, nor Convocation, nor Council, may venture to 
 decline the Catholic interpretation of its sacred mysteries. 
 We have as little warrant for rejecting Ancient Consent 
 as for rejecting Scripture itself; 6 our Private Judgment 
 is as much and as little infringed by the yoke of the 
 Catholic sense as by the yoke of Scripture itself. Scrip- 
 ture is an infringement on our Private Judgment. It 
 demands our assent ; it threatens us if we refuse it ; and 
 towards it, too, we may exercise what we presumptuously 
 call the right of judging for ourselves. We may reject 
 Scripture as we reject Antiquity, and we may take the 
 consequences of what in the next world will be seen to he 
 either unavoidable ignorance or self-will. It will be 
 
 6 [And as little hope of finding it in the greater number of questions which 
 arise. Thus the subject of Justification, Luther's cardinal article, had not 
 come before the Ancient Church, aud both parties could plausihly appeal to 
 the Fathers for dicta in their own iavour in logical controversy.] 
 
XI.] THE EECORD OF FAITH. 273 
 
 observed, that I am speaking all along of necessary doctrine, 
 or the Faith once delivered; for in matters of inferior 
 moment, both the Church and the individual have room 
 to exercise their own powers ; the individual to judge for 
 himself, and the Church to give her judgment, " as one 
 that hath obtained mercy of the Lord to be faithful ;" 
 and that for this simple reason, either that Scripture or 
 Tradition is obscure, indeterminate, or silent. But such a 
 necessity is not a privilege, but the absence of a privilege, 
 and such an exercise of judgment is not a boast but a 
 responsibility on either side. Hoav the Church and the 
 individual adjust their respective judgments, has been con- 
 sidered in the last Lecture ; and is a mere case of relative 
 duties, as that between a master and scholar, or parent 
 and child. 
 
 6. 
 
 We have now cleared the way to another important 
 principle of the Anglo- Catholic system, in which with equal 
 discrimination it takes middle ground between Roman 
 teaching and mere Protestantism. Our Church adheres 
 to a double Rule, 7 Scripture and Catholic Tradition, and 
 considers that in all matters necessary to salvation both 
 safeguards are vouchsafed to us, and both the Church's 
 judgment and private judgment superseded; whereas the 
 Romanist considers that points of faith may rest on 
 Tradition without Scripture, and the mere Protestant that 
 they may be drawn from Scripture without the witness of 
 Tradition. That she requires Scripture sanction is plain 
 
 7 " With them," the Romanists, "both Scripture and Fathers are, as to 
 the sense, under the correction and control of the present Church ; with 
 us the present Church s-ays nothing, but under the direction of Scripture 
 and Antiquity taken together, one as the rule, the other as the pattern or 
 interpreter. Among them, the present Church speaks by Scripture and 
 Fathers; with us, Scripture and Fathers speak by the Church. . . . Two 
 witnesses are better than one, though one be superior." — Waterland, Eccles. 
 Antiq. 8, 9. 
 
 VOL. I. T 
 
274 ON SCRIPTURE AS [LECT. 
 
 from the Articles ; that she requires Catholic sanction is 
 plain from the Athanasian Creed, which, in propounding 
 the necessary faith of a Christian, says not a word about 
 Scripture, resting it upon its being Get tholic; 8 that she 
 requires both is plain from the Canon quoted more than 
 once, which declares nothing to be the subject of religious 
 belief except what is agreeable to the doctrine of the Bible, 
 and collected out of it by the Catholic doctors. 
 
 This being the state of the case, the phrase ' Rule of 
 Faith/ which is now commonly taken to mean the Bible 
 by itself, would seem, in the judgment of the English 
 Church, properly to belong to the Bible and Catholic 
 Tradition taken together. These two together make up a 
 joint rule; 9 Scripture is interpreted by Tradition, Tradi- 
 tion is verified by Scripture ; Tradition gives form to the 
 doctrine, Scripture gives life ; Tradition teaches, Scripture 
 proves. And hence both the one and the other have, 
 according to the occasion, sometimes the Catholic Creed, 
 sometimes Scripture, been called by our writers the Rule 
 of Faith ; not as if that particular source of truth which 
 was not mentioned at this or that time was thereby ex- 
 cluded, but, as is implied throughout, the question lying 
 not between the Creed and Scripture, but between the 
 Church and the individual. Scripture, when illuminated 
 by the " Catholic Religion," or the Catholic Religion 
 when fortified by Scripture, may either of them be called 
 
 s E. g. "It is necessary that he hold the Catholic faith;" ' ; we are 
 forbidden by the Catholic religion;'" "this is the Catholic iwxth, which, 
 except a man believe faithfully, he cannot be saved." It is quite certain that 
 Protestantism, as we experience it in this da}', would have worded it, " This 
 is the Scriptural faith," &c. &c. On the other hand the Articles, as was to 
 be expected, sj euk of the Three Creeds as " proved by most certain warrants 
 of Holy Scripture." 
 
 9 " The Scriptures and the Creed are not two different Rules of Faith, but 
 one and the same Rule, dilated in Scripture, contracted in the Creed." — 
 Bramhall, Works, p. 402. 
 
XI.] THK EECORD OF FAITH. 275 
 
 the Gospel committed to the Church, dispensed to the 
 individual. 1 
 
 HaviDg now stated as perspicuously as may be, what 
 seems to be the English doctrine, I have to proceed next 
 to the proof of that part of it which has not yet come into 
 discussion. The grounds on which Catholic Tradition is 
 authoritative have been explained ; it follows to inquire 
 into the reasons for considering Scripture as the document 
 of proof, as our Sixth Article declares it to be. In what 
 remains of this Lecture I shall but state the different lines 
 of argument which have been adopted with this view, and 
 make some remarks upon them. 
 
 7. 
 
 Now Protestants sometimes argue, that the Word of 
 God must necessarily be written ; because how else could 
 we be sure of its authenticity and integrity ? that the 
 notion of a revelation involves its being written, else the 
 very object of the revelation would be defeated. They 
 have been led to take this ground in rivalry of Roman 
 theologian?, who have adopted the very same antecedent 
 line of argument, in behalf of the Church's infallibility, as 
 if the revelation would not really be such, if it left room 
 for various and interminable questions concerning the 
 contents of it. Chillingworth, for instance, uses the fol- 
 lowing language : " The Scripture is . . a sufficient rule 
 for those to judge by who believe it to be the word of 
 God, (as the Church of England and the Church of Rome 
 both do,) what they are to believe and what they are 
 not to believe . . And my reason hereof is convincing 
 and demonstrative, because nothing is necessary to be be- 
 lieved but what is plainly revealed.'"* Now in spite of the 
 great name of this author, I cannot allow that a revela- 
 
 1 The Articles do not introduce the term, " Rule of Faith," at all. 
 
 2 Chillingworth, Answ. ii. 104. 
 
 T 2 
 
276 ON SCR1PTUEE AS [LECT. 
 
 tion, if made, must necessarily be plain, or that faith 
 requires clear knowledge ; and that in consequence the 
 uncertain character, supposing it, of Catholic Tradition is 
 a decisive objection to its being considered a divine 
 informant in religious matters. And, in making this 
 avowal, I defend myself by the greater name of Bishop 
 Butler. — -" We are not in any sort able to judge' 3 says that 
 profound thinker, " whether it were to have been ex- 
 pected, that the Revelation should have been committed 
 to waiting ; or left to be handed down, and consequently 
 corrupted by verbal tradition, and at length sunk under 
 it, if mankind so pleased, and during such time as they 
 are permitted, in the degree they evidently are, to act as 
 they will." 3 
 
 Indeed it certainly does seem presumptuous for a crea- 
 ture, not to say a sinner, to take upon him to say, u I will 
 believe nothing, unless I am told in the clearest con- 
 ceivable form." The utmost that can be safely advanced 
 antecedently, is, that, part of the revelation being con- 
 fessedly written, it is likely that the whole is, whatever 
 weight may attach to this presumption. Facts, too, are 
 inconsistent with this line of argument ; from Adam 
 to Abraham there seems to have been no written revela- 
 tion at all. Again it is undeniable that the Gospel has 
 been before now preached, and successfully too, where the 
 written word was unknown ; if then the argument in dis- 
 pute be correct, the people addressed ought to have dis- 
 missed the preachers, refused to hear anything, because 
 they could not know all, and remained in heathenism. 
 Further, it is not true that a traditionary doctrine cannot 
 be " plainly revealed ;" for the transference of the sab- 
 batical rest from the seventh day to the Lord's day, comes 
 to us upon Tradition. If the maxim in question were 
 sound, we should have " convincing and demonstrative 
 3 Anal, part ii. c. iii. 
 
XI.] THE RECORD OF FAITH. 277 
 
 reason " for disbelieving that transference. But if Tradi- 
 tion may convey to us one truth, it surely may convey 
 others also. I say there is no antecedent necessity for the 
 written word containing the whole of the Gospel, true 
 though it be, that it does contain it. 
 
 Others have considered that Scripture bears witness to 
 its own sufficiency and perfection in matters of doctrine. 
 And to prove this, they bring forward such texts as 2 Tim. 
 iii. 16, 17, "All Scripture is given by inspiration of 
 God," &c. : which speaks of the Old Testament, before the 
 New was even completed, much less collected into a 
 volume ; and which therefore proves, if anything, that 
 the Old Testament is sufficient without the New, or else 
 that every Scripture, every separate book, is a Canon. 
 Again, it might plausibly be argued, if such strong terms 
 are used of the Old, and yet the New is not excluded from 
 the Canon, but rather is the most important part of it, 
 therefore, even had the New been so spoken of, yet doc- 
 trines might have remained behind for Tradition to supply- 
 And so far I suppose is certain, whatever comes of it, that 
 clearly as Scripture speaks of the divine inspiration of its 
 writers, yet it nowhere says that it, by itself, contains all 
 necessary doctrine. Indeed from the beginning to the end 
 of the New Testament there is no recognition even of its 
 own existence, no reflection on itself, no putting forward 
 of its claims as a written document. We simply meet 
 with our Saviour and His Apostles' teaching, and their 
 respective claim of authority for their own words and their 
 own persons, and this for the most part historically con- 
 veyed in the books of which it is composed. The last 
 words of the Apocalypse are, I suppose, the sole great ex- 
 ception to this remark, the sole declaration in the books of 
 the New Testament, of an exclusive character, and surely 
 
278 ON SCRIPTURE AS [LECT. 
 
 they cannot be considered sufficient in themselves to 
 establish so bold and eventful a negative, as that nothing 
 is necessary doctrine but what is in it. 
 
 9. 
 Others, accordingly, argue from the analogy of the 
 Jewish Law that the Christian Law also must be written. 
 But why should the analogy between the Dispensations 
 hold in this point ? does it hold in all points in which 
 Scripture omits to say that it does not hold ? At least the 
 Protestantism of the day would not gain by the recogni- 
 tion of such a rule. Again, it might be argued that the 
 Jewish Covenant was one of formal enactments, of rites 
 and ceremonies, and therefore required a written word, 
 but that the Gospel is of the spirit, not of the letter ; 
 either then that the New Testament must be obeyed in all 
 points literally, or that perhaps it is not the whole of 
 the revelation ; and no party in the controversy consider 
 themselves bound literally to cut off the right hand, and 
 pluck out the right eye, to wash each other's feet, or to 
 have all things in common. It might be added too, that, 
 though the Gospel has definite doctrines and rites, as well 
 as the Jewish Law, yet that the Catholicity of the Tradi- 
 tion, which was wanting under the Law, may supply the 
 office of a written word. I mean to say, that the analogy 
 of the Jewish Law is an insufficient ground on which to 
 reject Tradition from the Gospel Revelation, considering 
 that it is a means of Truth, ample and adequate in its 
 nature, and already employed by Providence in conveying 
 to us the New Testament itself. 
 
 10. 
 
 Such are some of the most approved methods at the 
 present day for proving that Scripture, and Scripture 
 only, is of supreme authority in matters of faith. Another 
 
XI.] THE EECORD OF FAITH. 279 
 
 and acuter line of argument is to call on those who deny 
 it to prove their point ; — if there be anything besides 
 Scripture equal to Scripture, to produce it, and give 
 reasons in its behalf. In other words, it grants their 
 principle and denies their matter of fact. And certainly 
 it does seem as if the onus probandi, as it is called, lay 
 with the Roman controversialist, not with us. Such, then, 
 has been the course pursued by some of our greatest 
 writers, as Hooker, who observes, " They which add 
 Traditions, as a part of supernatural necessary truth, have 
 not the truth, but are in error. For they only plead, 
 that whatsoever God revealeth as necessary for all Chris- 
 tian men to do or believe, the same we ought to embrace, 
 whether we have received it by writing or otherwise, 
 which no man denieth ; when that which they should con- 
 firm, who claim so great reverence unto Traditions, is, 
 that the same Traditions are necessary to be acknowledged 
 divine and holy. For we do not reject them, only because 
 they are not in the Scripture, but because they are 
 neither in Scripture, nor can otherwise sufficiently by any 
 reason be proved to be of God. That which is of God, and 
 may be evidently proved to be so, we deny not but it hath 
 in his kind, although unwritten, yet the self-same force and 
 authority with the written laws of God."* Such is the 
 judgment of this great author, who sets us right as to the 
 sense in which Tradition is inadmissible, viz., not in the 
 abstract, and before inquiry, but in the particular case ; 
 not as being an uncertain mode of conveying religious 
 truth, as requiring care and thought on our part, and 
 after all leaving us in some degree of doubt, which is the 
 objection noticed above, but because, in matter of fact, 
 certain given Traditions, (so called,) as the Roman, after 
 inquiry, turned out not to be Traditions. 
 
 4 Hookei-, Eccl. Pol. i. 14. 
 
280 ON SCRIPTURE AS [lECT. 
 
 11. 
 
 Yet this mode of understanding the Sixth Article 
 would seem to lie open to two serious objections. First, 
 the matter of fact is not at all made out that there are no 
 Traditions of a trustworthy nature. For instance, it is 
 proved by traditionary information only, (for there is no 
 other way,) that the text of Scripture is not to be taken 
 literally, concerning our washing one another's feet, while 
 the command to celebrate the Lord's Supper is to be 
 obeyed in the letter. Again, it is only by Tradition 
 that we have any safe and clear rule for changing the 
 weekly feast from the seventh to the first day. 
 
 Again, our divines, such as Bramhall, Bull, Pearson, 
 and Patrick, believed that the Blessed Mary was (< Ever- 
 Virgin," as the Church has called her ; but Tradition was 
 their only informant on the subject. Thus there are 
 true Traditions still remaining to us, independent of 
 Scripture. 
 
 12. 
 
 Perhaps it may be said, however, that all that the argu- 
 ment under review really denies is, the existence of any 
 important Traditions, any points of faith, affecting our sal- 
 vation. But then follows a still more difficult question, as 
 to what are necessary points of faith, and how they are to 
 be defined. We say Scripture contains all necessary doc- 
 trines ; and why ? because there happen to be none except 
 in Scripture. Now there are true Traditions extant of 
 some kind, as by the argument is granted, and such as we 
 even act upon ; perhaps then they are necessary. How do 
 we know they are not ? The common answer would be, 
 because they are not in Scripture ; but this is the very 
 point to be proved. It will perhaps be replied, however, 
 that such Catholic Traditions, as the transference of the 
 
XI.] THE EECORD OP FAITH. 281 
 
 Sabbath, though true, do uot bring with them any claim 
 to be considered as parts of the necessary faith; that 
 the only Traditions of this nature are those which are 
 contained in the Creed; and that every Article of the 
 Creed can in matter of fact be proved from Scripture ; 
 accordingly, that the Sixth Article only means to say 
 that for proving the Articles of the Creed we do not 
 want Tradition, but Scripture is enough. This answer 
 seems so far unexceptionable ; yet it does not hold against 
 the second objection which I have to make to the line of 
 argument under consideration. This lies in the wording 
 of the Article itself. The Article is certainly engaged in 
 stating a great principle ; it begins with a formal enuncia- 
 tion, as if uttering what it felt to be a bulwark of the 
 Truth, and an antidote against the errors of the time. 
 " Holy Scripture containeth all things necessary to salva- 
 tion, so that whatsoever is not read therein, nor may be 
 proved thereby, is not to be required of any man." How 
 is this fulfilled, by merely proving that it so happens that 
 no doctrine coming from the Apostles is to be found any- 
 where else, — that it so happens the Creed can be proved 
 from Scripture? Surely the Article speaks, not as if 
 narrating a matter of history, but of doctrine, not a con- 
 clusion to be arrived at, but a principle to start with. 
 
 13. 
 
 These, then, are the difficulties in the proof of our Sixth 
 Article ; to which Romanists add the particular structure 
 of the New Testament. They observe it is but an in- 
 complete document on the very face of it. There is no 
 harmony or consistency in its parts. There is no code of 
 commandments, no list of fundamentals. It comprises 
 four lives of Christ, written for different portions of the 
 Church, and not tending to make up one whole. Then 
 follow epistles written to particular Churches on particular 
 
282 ON SCRIPTURE A3 [LECT. 
 
 occasions, and preserved, (as far as there can be accident 
 in the world,) accidentally. Some books, as the Epistle to 
 the Laodiceans, are altogether lost ; others are preserved 
 only in a translation, as perhaps the Gospel of St. Matthew, 
 and the Epistle to the Hebrews; some delivered down 
 with barely sufficient evidence for their genuineness, as 
 the Second Epistle of St. Peter. Nor were they generally 
 received as one volume till the fourth century. These are 
 disproofs, it may be said, of any intention, either in the 
 course of Providence, or in the writers, that the very books 
 of Scripture, though inspired, should be the Canon of faith, 
 that is, that they should bound and complete it. Also, 
 the office of the Church as the " keeper of Holy Writ/' 
 seems to make it probable that she was intended to inter- 
 pret, perhaps to supply what Scripture left irregular and 
 incomplete. On the other hand, the circumstance that 
 religious truths can be conveyed by ordinances, or by 
 Catholic Tradition, as well as by writing, seems an intima- 
 tion that there is such a second Rule of Faith, equally 
 authoritative and binding with Scripture itself. 
 
 14. 
 
 This being the state of the case, the line of argument 
 I would adopt is one which many of our most eminent 
 Divines have pursued, and among them the writer of the 
 first Homily. Nor let any one be startled at all this 
 discordance of opinion among our Divines, in their mode 
 of proving one of the great principles of Protestantism, as 
 if it reflected upon the wisdom or soundness of the principle 
 itself. Above all, let not Romanists venture to take ad- 
 vantage of it, lest we retort upon them the vacillations, 
 intrigues, jealousies, and violences displayed in the delibe- 
 rations of divines attendant on their General Councils, 
 which issued, as they conceive, in infallible decisions. It 
 is well known that the Church of Rome reckons no part of 
 
XI.] THE RECORD OF FAITH. 283 
 
 the process by which the Fathers in Council arrive at their 
 final decree to be of any authority. She conceives they 
 are overruled, in whatever manner, to ari'ive at it. And 
 accordingly, on inspecting their deliberations, we shall find 
 them so full of both moral and intellectual defects, as to 
 make us agree with her that, if their conclusions be 
 infallible, it clearly is in consequence of some miraculous 
 guardianship, and not from any tendency in the human 
 agency employed to produce that result. But surely a 
 theory which serves plausibly to evade a difficulty in the 
 teaching of Rome, may, with more speciousness, and with- 
 out evasion, be applied to the case under consideration. 
 Which, or whether any of the reasons already mentioned, 
 or presently to be mentioned, was adopted as the ground 
 of the Article by its framers, matters not ; nor whether 
 we can ascertain it, or adopt it ourselves. 
 
 It matters not, I say, whether or not they only happened 
 to come right on what are, in a logical point of view, 
 faulty premises. They had no time for theories of any 
 kind ; and to require theories at their hand, argues an 
 ignorance of human nature, and of the special way in which 
 Truth is struck out in the course of life. Common sense, 
 chance, moral perception, genius, the great instruments in 
 the discovery of principles, do not reason. The discoverers 
 have no arguments, no grounds ; they see the Truth, but 
 they do not know how they see it ; and if at any time they 
 attempt to prove it, it is as much a matter of experiment 
 with them, as if they had to find a road to a distant moun- 
 tain which they see with the eye, and they get entangled, 
 embarrassed, and perhaps overthrown in the superfluous 
 endeavour. It is the second-rate men, though most useful 
 in their place, who prove, reconcile, finish, and explain. 
 Probably the popular feeling of the sixteenth century saw 
 the Bible to be the word of God, so as nothing else is His 
 word, by the power of a strong sense, by a sort of moral 
 
284 ON SCRIPTURE AS [LECT. 
 
 instinct, or by a nappy augury. Even though the first 
 Protestants proceeded to give insufficient reasons for their 
 belief, or at times stated it unguardedly or extravagantly, 
 it would not follow that they did not discern and speak a 
 great Truth. Nor does it follow that we, to whom they 
 have left the task of harmonizing their doctrines, are mis- 
 taken, because we are at times at fault, and dispute among 
 ourselves what is the best way of setting about it. 
 
 15. 
 
 If asked, then, how I know that the Bible contains all 
 truth necessary to be believed in order to salvation, I 
 simply reply with the first Homily, that the early Church 
 so accounted it, that there is a " Consent of Catholic 
 Fathers " in its favour. No matter, whether or not we 
 can see a principle in it; no matter, whether or not we 
 can prove it from reason or Scripture; we receive it 
 simply on historical evidence. The early Fathers so held 
 it, and we throw the burden of our belief, if it be a bur- 
 den, on them. It is quite impossible they should so have 
 accounted it, except from Apostolic intimations, that it 
 was so to be. 5 Stronger evidence for its truth is scarcely 
 conceivable ; for if any but the Scriptures had pretensions 
 to be an oracle of faith, would not the first Successors of 
 the Apostles be that oracle ? must not they, if any, have 
 possessed the authoritative traditions of the Apostles ? 
 They surely must have felt, as much as we do, the unsys- 
 tematic character of the Epistles, the silence of Scripture 
 about its own canonicity, or whatever other objections can 
 be now urged against our doctrine ; and yet they certainly 
 held it. 
 
 5 la the Apostolical Fathers, Clement and Ignatius, as writing close upon 
 Apostolic times, when local were stronger than ecclesiastical traditions, the 
 special recognition of Scripture as the supreme authority does not appear ; 
 but we find it in St. Polycarp, who lived to the next generation. 
 
XI.] THE EECORD OF FAITH. 285 
 
 16. 
 
 If this line of argument can be maintained, there will 
 be this especial force in it as addressed to the controver- 
 sialists of Rome. They are accustomed to taunt us with 
 inconsistency, as if we used the Tradition of the Church 
 only when, and as far as, we could not avoid it ; for instance, 
 for the establishment of the divinity of Scripture, but not 
 of the Creed. " Were it not for the testimony of the 
 Church," they say, " we should not know what books are, 
 what books are not inspired ; they do not speak for them- 
 selves, or at least when they do they scarcely can be 
 admitted as their own vouchers. Yet a Protestant will 
 quote them implicitly as divine, while he scoffs and rails 
 at that informant to whom he is indebted for his know- 
 ledge/'' Protestants have felt the cogency of this repre- 
 sentation ; and have been led to explore other modes of 
 proving the genuineness of the New Testament, which 
 might set them free from the first ages of Christianity. 
 Paley, for instance, has shown from the undesigned 
 coincidences of the Acts and Epistles, that they bear with 
 them an internal evidence of their truth. Others have 
 enlarged upon what they conceive to be the beautiful and 
 wise adaptation of the Christian doctrines to each other, 
 which, in the words of one writer, is such as to show that 
 " the system " of the Apostles " is true in the nature of 
 things, even were they proved to be impostors."" 6 Inge- 
 nious as such arguments are, were they as sound and 
 reverent, as they are generally irreverent and often 
 untenable, still they do not touch the question of the divine 
 origin of the New Testament itself, except very indirectly, 
 nay, sometimes tend to dispense with it. However 
 allowing what force we will to them, I suppose it is un- 
 deniable after all that we do receive the New Testament 
 
 6 Erskine's Internal Evidence, p. 17. 
 
286 ON SCRIPTURE AS [LECT. 
 
 in its existing shape on Tradition, not on such refinements; 
 for instance, we include the Second Epistle of St. Peter, 
 we leave out St Clement's Epistle to the Corinthians 
 simply because the Church Catholic has done so. Now 
 this difficulty, whatever be its weight, is fully met by the 
 mode of proof which I have suggested; or rather a point 
 is gained by means of it. We do not discard the Tradition 
 of the Fathers ; we accept it ; we accept it entirely ; we 
 accept its witness concerning itself and against itself ; it 
 witnesses, to its own inferiority to Scripture; it wit- 
 nesses, not only that Scripture is the record, but that it is 
 the sole record of saving truth. 
 
 17. 
 
 This is the more remarkable from the great stress which 
 the Fathers certainly do lay on the authority of Tradition. 
 They so represent it in its Apostolical and universal 
 character, they so extol and defer to it, that it is difficult 
 to see why they do not make it, what Eoman Catholics 
 make it, an independent informant in matters of faith; 
 yet they do not. Whenever they formally prove a doc- 
 trine, they have recourse to Scripture ; they bring forward 
 Tradition first; they use it as a strong antecedent argu- 
 ment against individual heretics who profess to quote 
 Scripture; but in Councils they ever verify it by the 
 written Word. 7 Now, if we choose to argue and dispute, 
 we may call them inconsistent, and desire an explanation ; 
 but, if we will be learners in the school of Christ, we shall 
 take things as we find them, we shall consider their conduct 
 as a vestige and token of some Apostolic appointment, 
 from its very singularity. It is nothing to the purpose, 
 that Catholic and Apostolic Tradition is strong enough, 
 even supposing it to be so, to sustain theweightof an appeal, 
 if, in matter of fact, it was not so employed by the early 
 
 7 [This is strange ; vid. infr. p. 312 note 2. ] 
 
XI.] THE RECORD OF FAITH. 287 
 
 Church. Christ surely may give to each of His instruments 
 its own place; He has vouchsafed us two informants in 
 saving truth, both necessary, both at hand, Tradition for 
 statement, Scripture for proof; and it is our part rather to 
 thank Him for His bounty, than to choose one and reject 
 the other. Let us be content to accept the canonicifcy of 
 Scripture on faith. 
 
 18. 
 
 Moreover this view of the subject rids us of all questions 
 about the abstract sufficiency and perfection of Scripture, 
 as a document of saving truth. Roman Catholics some- 
 times ask whether some one book, as the Gospel of St. John, 
 would have been sufficient for salvation ; and, if not, 
 whether those of the Apostles' writings which happen to 
 remain are sufficient, considering that others of them are 
 undoubtedly lost. We may answer, that any one book of 
 Scripture would be sufficient, provided none other were 
 given us ; that the whole Volume, as we have received it, 
 is enough, because we have no more. There is no abstract 
 measure of what is sufficient. Faith cannot believe more 
 than it is told. It is saving, if it believes as much as that, 
 be it little or great. 
 
 19. 
 
 Lastly, it may be asked of us, how it is, supposing 
 Scripture be, as has been here represented, only the docu- 
 ment of appeal, and Catholic Tradition the authoritative 
 source of Christian doctrine, that our Articles say nothing 
 of Catholic Tradition, and contemplate Tradition only in 
 its relation to Ceremonies and Rites which are not " in all 
 places one or utterly like,"" "and may be changed according 
 to the diversity of countries, times, and men's manners? " 
 To which I answer by asking, in turn, why the Articles 
 contain no recognition of the inspiration of Holy Scripture. 
 
288 ON SCRIPTUEE AS [LECT. 
 
 In truth, we must take the Articles as we find them ; they 
 are not a system of theology on whatever view, but a pro- 
 test against certain specific errors, existing at the time 
 when they were drawn up. There are, as all parties must 
 confess, great truths not expressly stated in the Articles. 
 
 Note on Lecture xi. 
 
 [That the Anglican theory differs from Catholic teaching in this, that it 
 considers the historical documents and acts of the first centuries to furnish 
 so luminous, forcible, direct, and detailed an evidence of the contents of the 
 Apostolic deposition, as to suffice for answering all questions and settling all 
 disputes, which may arise on vital points to the end of time, whereas Catholics 
 hold such a task to require the interposition of a living authority, who cannot 
 err — S o much is undeniable. But, as to the other subject of controversy 
 between England and Rome, which is discussed in the foregoing Lecture, viz. 
 whether Scripture, or Scripture and Tradition is the record and rule of faith, 
 this, I conceive is, as between Catholics and Anglicans, of a verbal character. 
 I speak of it in my " Letter to Dr. Pusey," thus : — 
 
 " You allow that there is a twofold rule, Scripture and Tradition, and this 
 is all that Catholics say. How then do Anglicans differ from us here ? 
 1 believe the difference is one of words. Catholics and Anglicans, in the 
 controversy as to whether the whole faith is or is not contained in Scripture, 
 attach different meanings to the word ' proof.' We mean that not every 
 article of faith is so contained there, that it may thence be logically proved, 
 independently of the teaching and authority of the Tradition ; but Anglicans 
 mean that every article of faith is so contained there, that it may thence be 
 proved, provided there be added the illustrations and compensations supplied 
 by the Tradition. You do not say that the whole revelation is in Scripture 
 in such sense that pure unaided logic can draw it from the sacred text ; nor 
 do we deny that it is in Scripture in an improper sense, in the sense that the 
 Tradition of the Church is able to recognize and determine it there. You do 
 not profess to dispense with Tradition ; nor do we forbid the idea of probable, 
 secondary, symbolical, connotative senses of Scripture, over and above those 
 which probably belong to the wording and context." 
 
 There is a further reason for considering this question, as between 
 Catholics and Anglicans, to be verbal. In the case of Protestants indeed it 
 is by no means verbal; for they consider, in opposition to Catholics, that 
 Scripture is the one authoritative iuformant about revealed doctrine, in- 
 dependent and exclusive, and that Tradition is no informant at all. 
 But Anglicans, by allowing that Scripture requires an interpreter, do 
 
XI.] THE EECOED OP FAITH. 289 
 
 necessarily agree with Catholics in denying that Scripture is the one 
 authoritative informant. This is what is brought out in the above quota- 
 tion ; but now I add that, by the same allowance, they also agree with 
 Catholics in holding Tradition as well as Scripture to be a substantive and 
 independent informant. 
 
 This is plain: — for they follow Vincent of Lerins, Athanasius and 
 Tlieodoret (vid. infra, pp. 321 — 327) in saying that it is Tradition that 
 guides and decides the interpretation of Scripture. E.g., in the Arian con- 
 troversy, certain passages of Scripture were interpreted by the orthodox in 
 one way, and by the Arians in another : upon this the orthodox appealed to 
 the " ecclesiastical scope," or traditionary sense, in order to determine the 
 question ; that is, tbey turned to Tradition as an arbiter. Is not an arbiter 
 an authority supreme and definitive ? is an arbiter a " subordinate " 
 authority ? How tben do not Anglicans, in spite of the formidable-looking 
 references to the Fathers in a later Lecture, agree with Catholics in holding, 
 contrary to Protestants, that Tradition as well as Scripture is an infor- 
 mant authoritative and independent?] 
 
 VOL. I. 
 
LECTURE XII. 
 
 ON SCRIPTURE AS THE RECORD OF OUR LORD'S 
 TEACHING. 
 
 Of the two lines of proof offered in behalf of the sixth 
 Article, which I discussed in my last Lecture, the one 
 implied that it declared a doctrine, the other a fact ; the 
 one spoke as if Holy Scripture must contain, the other as 
 if it happened to contain, all necessary truth. Of these 
 the former seems to me to come nearer to the real meaning 
 of the Article, and also to the truth of the case, though the 
 particular considerations commonly offered in argument are 
 insufficient. Certainly, we cannot maintain the peculiar 
 authority of the written word, on the ground of any ante- 
 cedent necessity, that Revelation should be written, nor 
 from the witness of Scripture itself, nor from the parallel of 
 the Jewish Law; yet there are probabilities nevertheless, 
 which recommend its special authority to our belief, even 
 before going into the details of that historical testimony 
 which I consider to be the proper evidence of it. 
 
 Let us see, then, what can be said on the prima facie 
 view of the subject, in behalf of the notion that Scripture 
 is on principle, and not only by accident, the sole Canon 
 of our faith. 
 
 2. 
 
 First, the New Testament is called by the name of a 
 testament or will. Indeed the very circumstance that 
 
LECT. XII.] ON SCRIPTURE AS THE RECORD, ETC. 291 
 
 St. Paul calls the Gospel Revelation a Testament, and 
 that Testaments are necessarily written, and that he 
 parallels it to the Mosaic Testament, and that the Mosaic 
 was written, prepares us to expect that the Gospel will be 
 written also. And the name of Testament actually given 
 to the sacred volume confirms this anticipation. It evi- 
 dently is a mark of special honour; and it assigns a most 
 significant purpose to the written Word, such as Tradi- 
 tion, however clearly Apostolical, cannot reach. Even 
 granting Tradition and Scripture both to come from the 
 Apostles, it does not therefore follow that their written 
 Word was not, under God's over-ruling guidance, designed 
 for a particular purpose, for which their Word unwritten 
 was not designed. 
 
 Next, we learn from the testimony of the early Church, 
 that Scripture and Scripture only is inspired. This explains 
 how it may be called in an especial manner the Testament 
 or Will of our Lord and Saviour. Scripture has a gift 
 which Tradition has not ; it is fixed, tangible, accessible, 
 readily applicable, and besides all this perfectly true in all 
 its parts and relations; in a word, it is a sacred text. 
 Tradition does not convey to us any sacramental words, 
 as they may be called, or sustained discourses, but ideas 
 and things only. It gives us little or nothing which can 
 be handled and argued from. We can argue only from a 
 text ; we can argue freely only from an inspired text. 
 Thus Scripture is in itself specially fitted for that office 
 which we assign it in our Article ; to be a repository of 
 manifold and various doctrine, a means of proof, a stan- 
 dard of appeal, an umpire and test between truth and 
 falsehood in all emergencies. It thus becomes the nearest 
 possible approach to the perpetual presence of the Apostles 
 in the Church; whereas Tradition, being rather a collection 
 of separate truths, facts, and usages, is wanting in ap- 
 plicability to the subtle questions and difficulties which. 
 
 u 2 
 
292 ON SCRIPTURE AS THE RECORD [LECT. 
 
 from time to time arise. A new heresy, for instance, 
 would be refuted by Tradition negatively, on the very 
 ground that it was new ; but by Scripture positively, by 
 the use of its text, and by suitable inferences from it. 
 
 3. 
 
 Here, then, are two tokens that Scripture really is what 
 we say it is. But now let us proceed to a third peculiarity, 
 to which more time shall be devoted. 
 
 Scripture alone contains what remains to us of our 
 Lord's teaching. If there be a portion of Revelation, 
 sacred beyond other portions, distinct and remote in its 
 nature from the rest, it must be the words and works of 
 the Eternal Son Incarnate. He is the One Prophet of the 
 Church, as He is the One Priest and King. His history 
 is as far above any other possible revelation, as heaven is 
 above earth; for in it we have literally the sight of 
 Almighty God in His judgments, thoughts, attributes, and 
 deeds, and His mode of dealing with us His creatures- 
 Now this special revelation is in Scripture, and Scripture 
 only ; Tradition has no part in it. 
 
 To enter into the force of this remark, we should care- 
 fully consider the peculiar character of our Lord's recorded 
 words and works when on earth. They will be found to 
 come to us even professedly, as the declarations of a Law- 
 giver. In the Old Covenant, Almighty God first of all 
 spoke the Ten Commandments from Mount Sinai, and 
 afterwards wrote them. So our Lord first spoke His own 
 Gospel, both of promise and of precept, on the Mount, and 
 His Evangelists have recorded it. Further, when He 
 delivered it, He spoke by way of parallel to the Ten 
 Commandments. And His style, moreover, corresponds 
 to the authority which He assumes. It is of that solemn, 
 measured, and severe character, which bears on the face of 
 it tokens of its belonging to One who spake as none other 
 
xil] of our lord's teaching. 293 
 
 man could speak. The Beatitudes, with, which His 
 Sermon opens, are an instance of this incommunicable 
 style, which befitted, as far as human words could befit, 
 God Incarnate. 
 
 Nor is this style peculiar to the Sermon on the 
 Mount. All through the Gospels it is discernible, distinct 
 from any other part of Scripture, showing itself in solemn 
 declarations, canons, sentences, or sayings, such as 
 legislators propound, and scribes and lawyers comment 
 on. Surely everything our Saviour did and said is 
 characterized by mingled simplicity and mystery. His 
 emblematical actions, His typical miracles, His parables, 
 His replies, His censures, all are evidences of a legislature 
 in germ, afterwards to be developed, a code of divine truth 
 which was ever to be before men's eyes, to be the subject 
 of investigation and interpretation, and the guide in con- 
 troversy. " Verily, verily I say unto you/' — " But, I say 
 unto you," — are the tokens of a supreme Teacher and 
 Prophet. 
 
 4. 
 
 And thus the Fathers speak of His teaching. " His 
 sayings," observes St. Justin, " were short and concise; 
 for He was no rhetorician, but His word was the power of 
 God." l And St. Basil, in like manner : u Every deed, and 
 every word of our Saviour Jesus Christ is a canon of piety 
 and virtue. Wnen then thou nearest word or deed of His, 
 do not hear it as by the way, or after a simple and carnal 
 manner, but enter into the depth of His contemplations, 
 and become a communicant in truths mystically delivered 
 to thee." St. Jerome tells us that St. John's disciples 
 once asked him why he so often said, " My little children, 
 love one another;" on which he replied, iC Because it 
 is a precept of the Lord's, and is enough, though it be 
 
 1 Apol. i. 14. Constit. Monast. i. 
 
294 ON SCEIPTURE AS THE RECORD [LECT. 
 
 alone." And Cyprian, "Whereas the Word of God, our 
 Lord Jesus Christ, came to all men,and, gathering together 
 learned and unlearned alike, did to every age and sex pro- 
 claim the precepts of salvation, He formed those precepts 
 into a grand compendium, that the memory of His scholars 
 might not be taxed by the heavenly teaching, but might 
 promptly learn what for a simple faith was needed. " 2 
 
 As instances in point, I would refer, first, to His 
 discourse with Nicodemus. We can hardly conceive but 
 He must have spoken during the Pharisee's visit much 
 more than is told us in St. John's Gospel ; but so much 
 is preserved as bears that peculiar character which became 
 a Divine Lawgiver, and was intended for perpetual use in 
 the Church. It consists of concise and pregnant enuncia- 
 tions on which volumes of instructive comment might be 
 written. Every verse is a canon of Divine Truth. 
 
 His discourse to the Jews in the fifth chapter of St. 
 John's Gospel, is perhaps a still more striking instance. 
 
 5. 
 Again, observe how the Evangelists heap His words 
 together, though unconnected with each other, as if under 
 a divine intimation, and with the consciousness that they 
 were providing a code of doctrine and precept for the 
 Church. Take for instance, at the end of the ninth chapter 
 of St. Luke : " Then there arose a reasoning among them, 
 which of them should be the greatest ; and Jesus, 
 perceiving the thought of their heart, took a child, and set 
 him by Him, and said unto them, Whosoever shall receive 
 this child in My name, receivethMe; and whosoever shall 
 receive Me, receiveth Him that sent Me; for he that is least 
 among you all, the same shall be great. And John answered 
 and said, Master, we saw one casting out devils in Thv 
 name ; and we forbad him, because he followeth not with 
 
 2 ITiorou. in Gal. vi. ]0. Cyprian in Orat. Dom. 18. 
 
XII.] OF our lord's teaching. 295 
 
 us ; and Jesus said unto him, Forbid him not, for he that is 
 not against us is for us. And when His disciples, James 
 and John, saw " that the Samaritans did not receive Him, 
 "they said, Lord, wilt Thou that we command fire to 
 come down from heaven and consume them, even as Elias 
 did ? But He turned and rebuked them, and said, Ye 
 know not what manner of spirit ye are of; for the Son of 
 Man is not come to destroy men's lives but to save them. 
 And a certain man said unto Him, Lord, I will follow 
 Thee whithersoever Thou goest ; and Jesus said unto 
 Him, Foxes have holes, and the birds of the air have nests, 
 but the Son of Man hath not where to lay His head. And 
 He said to another, Follow Me ; and he said, Lord, 
 suffer me first to go and bury my father ; Jesus said unto 
 him, Let the dead bury their dead, but go thou and preach 
 the kingdom of God. And another also said, Lord, I will 
 follow Thee, but let me first go bid them farewell which 
 are at home at my house ; and Jesus said unto him, No 
 man having put his hand to the plough and looking back is fit 
 for the kingdom of God." Here are six solemn declarations 
 made one after another, with little or no connexion. 
 
 The twenty-second chapter of St. Matthew would supply 
 a similar series of sacred maxims ; or again, the 
 eighteenth, — in which the separate verses, though succeed- 
 ing one the other with somewhat more of connexion, are 
 yet complete each in itself, and very momentous. 
 
 No one can doubt, indeed, that as the narratives of His 
 miracles are brought together in one as divine signs, so 
 His sayings are accumulated as lessons. 
 
 6. 
 Or take again the very commencement of His pro- 
 phetical ministrations, and observe how His words run. 
 He opens His mouth in accents of grace, and still they fall 
 into short and expressive sentences. The first : " How is 
 
296 ON SCRIPTURE AS THE RECORD [LECT. 
 
 it that ye sought Me ? wist ye not that I must be 
 about My Father's business ? " The second : " Suffer it to 
 be so now, for thus it becometh Us to fulfil all righteous- 
 ness." The third : " Woman, what am I to thee ? 
 Mine hour is not yet come." The fourth : " Take these 
 things hence : make not My Father's house a house of 
 merchandise." The fifth : " Repent ye, for the kingdom 
 of heaven is at hand." 
 
 The same peculiarity shows itself in His conflict with 
 Satan. He strikes and overthrows him, as David slew the 
 giant, with a sling and with a stone, with three words 
 selected oat of rhe Old Testament : " Man shall not live by 
 bread alone, but by every word which proceedeth out of 
 the mouth of God." " Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy 
 God." " Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and Him 
 only shalt thou serve." 
 
 In like manner, His utterances from time to time at 
 His crucifixion even go by the name of His seven last 
 words. 
 
 Again : His parables, and often His actions, as His 
 washing His disciples' feet and paying the tribute, are 
 instances of a similar peculiarity. 
 
 7. 
 Now, let it be observed, I am not venturing to conjec- 
 ture what our Lord's usual mode of conversation was ; I 
 am only speaking of it so far as it was of a public and 
 formal character, intended for everlasting memory in the 
 Church. But who else among the Prophets, from the 
 beginning of the Bible to the end, thus speaks " in pro- 
 verbs," to use His own account of His teaching ? Whose 
 incidental sayings but His are thus collected and preserved 
 by the inspired writers ? s And thus, according to the text 
 
 8 E.g. David's saying, recorded 2 Sam. xxiii. 17, is a similar instance, and 
 xxiv. 14, 24. 
 
XII.] OF our lord's teaching. 297 
 
 which He Himself quotes, we do really live by every 
 word which proceedeth from His mouth. Certainly this 
 separates Him on the whole from other Prophets, whatever 
 exceptions there may be to the general rule, or whatever 
 resemblance St. James and St. John may bear to Him in 
 their Epistles. 
 
 Such in character is our Lord's teaching, impressed 
 with the signs of that sovereign dignity which we know 
 belonged to Him ; and, being such as it is, it surely indis- 
 poses us to look for it elsewhere than where we originally 
 find it. For, as any one may see, it has not the character 
 of diffuse and lavish communications; it is not so exuberant, 
 various, or vague, as to lead us to expect portions of 
 it scattered through the records of Antiquity. We have 
 actual evidence from the Gospels themselves, that in the 
 midst of His condescension, our Lord was sparing in His 
 words and actions, and that every single deed or word was 
 in one sense complete. To His own indeed, to those who 
 lay upon His breast at supper, or conversed with Him for 
 forty days, He might vouchsafe to tell much, whether in 
 the way of prophecy, or interpretation of Scripture, or 
 Church discipline; and the result, nay, perhaps portions 
 of such instructions, may remain among us to this day. But 
 I speak of the formal declarations of His word and will ; to 
 which the witness of His Apostles, derived from Hisprivate 
 teaching, would be subordinate and as a comment; and 
 these, I say, are not prodigally bestowed. He utters the 
 same precept again and again, and repeats His miracles. 
 The very manner, then, of His teaching, as recorded in 
 Scripture, rather disinclines us than otherwise to expect 
 portions of it out of Scripture ; and in matter of fact it is 
 not to be found elsewhere. Of this teaching, remarkable 
 both from its Author and its style, Tradition contains no 
 remains. The new Law is preserved by the four Evange- 
 lists alone. The force of this remark will be seen by con- 
 
298 ON SCRIPTURE AS THE RECORD [LECT. 
 
 sidering its exceptions. One solitary instance is furnished 
 by a passage of the Book of Acts, where St. Paul preserves 
 a sentence of our Lord's, which is omitted in the Gospels : 
 " It is more blessed to give than to receive." Two other 
 precepts are preserved by Antiquity ; the one by several 
 early writers, " Be ye approved money-changers ; " the 
 other by St. Jerome, " Be ye never very glad, but when ye 
 see your brother live in charity." 4 
 
 Here then is a broad line of distinction between the 
 written and the unwritten word. Whatever be the trea- 
 sures of the latter, it has not this pre-eminent gift, the 
 custody of our Lord's teachiug. I might, then, for 
 argument's sake, even grant to Roman Catholics in the 
 abstract all that they claim for Tradition as a vehicle of 
 truth, and then challenge them to avail themselves of the 
 allowance ; in fact, to add to the sentences of the New 
 Law, if they can. No ; the Gospels remain the sole record 
 of Him who spake as never man spake ; and it is some kind 
 of corroboration that they are so, that they confessedly 
 contain so much as is really to be found in them How 
 is it, unless they are the formal record of the New Cove- 
 nant, that they have in them all the rudiments of Christian 
 
 4 Acts xx. 35. Origen. 1. 19. in Joan. viii. 20., Hieron. quoted in Taylor's 
 Dissuasive. The ylv^crOe &c. is from an apocryphal work according to 
 Ussher, Prol. in Ign. viii. 7. Val. in Ens. et Socr. Huet. Origen. Cotteler 
 thinks it a marginal note on the Gospels ; Const. Apost. ii. 36 : and Suicer. 
 Thesaur. ii. 1283, that it is taken from the parables in Matt. xxv. 25, Lukexix. 
 12. Jones on the Canon collects all the sayings attributed to Christ in the 
 writings of the first four centuries, of which three alone deserve any notice, 
 in addition to the above, viz. those in Justin Martyr, Dial. p. 267 (sis Jones 
 quotes it), in Iren. Hser. i. 20, and in Athenag. Leg. 32 fin., which last, if 
 it were genuine, would remarkably illustrate Rom. xvi. 16 ; 1 Cor. xvi. 20 j 
 2 Cor. xiii. 12 ; 1 Thess. v. 26 ; 1 Pet. v. 14. Vid. also Koerner. (de Serm. 
 Christi aypdcpois, Lips. 1776) ; he refers to instances in Barnab. 4 init. Clem. 
 Ep. i. 23. 
 
xii.] of our lord's teaching. 299 
 
 Truth as it has ever been received by all branches of the 
 Church, by Roman Catholics as well as ourselves ? Their 
 containing so much is, as far as it goes, a. presumption that 
 they contain all; they seem to tend towards completeness. 
 Roman Catholics, I suppose, allow that Baptism and the 
 Kucharist are the especial ordinances of the New Law, and 
 have a certain priority of rank over the other Sacraments. 
 Now, if they ground this on their being expressly ordained 
 in Scripture, they seem to confess that things prescribed 
 therein are of moreimportancethan whatisderivedthrough 
 the medium of Tradition. If they do not, then it rests 
 with them to account for this singular accident, viz., the 
 coincidence of their being prescribed in Scripture, and 
 their also being the chief ordinances of the Gospel. Cer- 
 tainly, coincidences such as this, lead to the surmise that 
 Scripture is intended to be that which it is actually, the 
 record of the greater matters of the Law of Christ. " Is 
 not all that we know of the life and death of Jesus," asks 
 Bishop Taylor, " set down in the writings of the New 
 Testament ? Is there any one miracle that ever Christ did 
 the notice of which is conveyed to us by Tradition ? Do 
 we know anying that Christ did or said, but what is in 
 Scripture ? . . . How is it possible that the Scriptures 
 should not contain all things necessary to salvation, when of 
 all the words of Christum which certainly all necessary things 
 to salvation must needs be contained, or else they were never 
 revealed, there is not any one saying, or miracle, or story 
 of Christ, in anything that is material, preserved in any 
 indubitable record, but in Scripture alone ? " 5 
 
 9. 
 
 In this passage, Bishop Taylor assumes that our Lord's 
 
 teaching contains all things necessary to salvation; an 
 
 opinion, which, in addition to the indirect evidence result- 
 
 5 Dissuasive, part ii. book i. § 2. 
 
300 ON SCRIPTURE AS THE RECORD [LECT. 
 
 ing from the foregoing remarks, seems to be sanctioned by 
 the concluding words of St. John. Let it be remembered, 
 he wrote what may be considered a supplement to the three 
 preceding Gospels. Surely, then, the inspired Apostle 
 speaks in the following passages as if he were sealing up 
 the records of his Saviour's life, and of the Christian Law, 
 after selecting from the materials which the other 
 Evangelists had passed over, such additions as were 
 necessary for the strength and comfort of faith. Surely, 
 the following passages taken together, tend to increase the 
 improbability already pointed out, that our faith, as to 
 greater matters, has been turned over to the information 
 of Tradition, however well authenticated. " And there 
 are also many other things which Jesus did, the which if 
 they should be written every one, I suppose that even the 
 world itself could not contain the books that should be 
 written.'' " And many other signs truly did Jesus in the 
 presence of His disciples, which are not written in this 
 book ; but these are written that ye might believe that Jesus 
 is the Christ the Son of God; and that believing ye might 
 have life through His name." "And he that saw it, bare 
 record ; and his record is true. And he knoweth that he 
 saith true, that ye might believe" 6 Here St. John, closing 
 the record of our Lord's life, declares, that out of the 
 numberless things which might be added to the former 
 Gospels, he has added so much as is necessary for faith ; 
 and implies moreover, as if it were a principle, that in 
 things supernatural proposed for our acceptance, the 
 testimony of the original witnesses may be expected, and 
 not such secondary information as mere Tradition at best 
 must be accounted. 
 
 It will be replied, I suppose, that St. John is 
 speaking of miracles, not of doctrines ; as if we were 
 not allowed to detect a great principle in the inspired 
 e John xxi. 25 ; xx. 30, 31 ; xix. 35. 
 
xil] of our lord's teaching. 301 
 
 text, though conveyed in a form of expression arising out 
 of the immediate events which led to his bequeathing it to 
 us. For he surely uses language which generalizes his 
 statement, and makes the particular case but one instance 
 of what he really meant in fulness. When he says, " there 
 were many other things which Jesus did," 7 what else can he 
 mean but simply, " much more might be told concerning 
 Him when on earth/'' whether of His words or works being 
 an irrelevant distinction ? It is the more strauge that 
 such an exception should be taken, though it is taken, 
 because all parties understand the principle of extending 
 the meaning of texts, and apply it in many important 
 cases. Both Protestants and Roman Catholics agree with 
 us in understanding our Lord's " suffering little children 
 to come unto Him," as a sanction for infant Baptism. 
 There is nothing extravagant then in the notion of such 
 an extended interpretation of the words before us ; and in 
 the particular instance it is sanctioned by the authority of 
 St. Austin. He explains them as follows : ft The Holy 
 Evangelist testifies that the Lord Christ said and did 
 many things which are not written. Those were selected 
 for writing which appeared tobe sufficient for the salvation of 
 believers. 3 ' 8 St. Austin becomes in this passage a witness 
 of our doctrine, as well as of our interpretation of the par- 
 ticular text. 
 
 10. 
 
 I have said all this by way of refuting what is a 
 favourite theme with the Roman controversialist, that the 
 New Testament consists of merely accidental documents, 
 and that our maintenance of its exclusive divinity is 
 gratuitous and arbitrary. And to this I have replied, that 
 
 7 He has just recorded a saying of Christ's. 
 a August. Tract, in Joanu. 49. 
 
302 ON SCRIPTURE AS THE RECORD [LECT. 
 
 at least there is something in it peculiar and singular, viz. 
 our Lord's teaching. However, to this representation, 
 two objections will be made, which deserve attention ; 
 first, that it does not avail except by narrowing the Canon 
 of Scripture within the limits of the Gospels, to the ex- 
 clusion of the Old Testament and the Apostolic Epistles ; 
 next, that after all, the characteristic doctrines of Chris- 
 tianity are found in the Epistles, not in our Lord's teach- 
 ing. These I shall consider together. 
 
 11. 
 
 Now the fact is not as the latter objection represents it. 
 The doctrines of our faith are really promulgated by Christ 
 Himself. There is no truth which St. Paul or St. John 
 declares, which He does- not anticipate. Which of them 
 all can He be said to omit ? He names " the Name of the 
 Father, the Sou, and the Holy Ghost;" He announces 
 Himself as "the Only-begotten Son, given by the Father 
 to the world, that whosoever believes in Him should not 
 perish, but have everlasting life ; " " the Son of Man, 
 which is in heaven ; " " having glory with the Father be- 
 fore the world was ; " " giving His life a ransom instead of 
 many ; " and, after His resurrection, having " all power in 
 heaven and earth." He declares that without a new birth 
 of " water and the Spirit/' there is no entrance into ' ' the 
 kingdom of heaven ; " that except we " eat His flesh and 
 drink His blood, there is no life in us." He prays that we 
 may be all " one in Him, as He and His Father are one ;" 
 and He promises to " build His Church," and that " the 
 gates of hell shall not prevail against it." If we had 
 only the Gospels, we should have in them all the great 
 doctrines of the Epistles, all the articles of the Creed; 
 only, in consequence of our Saviour's peculiar style, as 
 already described, His announcement of them is not as- 
 sisted by the context. Every word of His is complete in 
 
XII.] OP our lord's teaching. 303 
 
 itself; in half a sentence He states a mysterious truth, 
 and passes on. And it has ever been the fallacy of here- 
 tical interpretation to measure the depth of the text by 
 the immediate context; as, for instance, in the discourse 
 in the tenth chapter of St. John, which ends with, " I and 
 My Father are One ;" — words which mean far more than 
 the context requires; and "who proceedeth from the 
 Father," in chapter the fifteenth. 
 
 12. 
 
 And this is one main reason, it would seem, why the 
 Epistles are vouchsafed to us ; not so much to increase the 
 Revelation, as to serve as a comment upon it, as taught by 
 our Lord ; to bring out and fix His sacred sense, lest we 
 should by any means miss it. That this was the office of the 
 Apostles, and not that of preaching a new .and additional 
 revelation, is surely implied by our Lord when He promises 
 them the gift of the Holy Ghost. For instance : " These 
 things have I spoken unto you/' He says, "being yet 
 present with you ; but the Comforter, which is the Holy 
 Ghost, whom the Father will send in My name, He shall 
 teachyouall things, and bring all things to your remembrance, 
 whatsoever I have said unto you." Again, after telling them 
 they could not bear as yet to be told the whole Truth, and 
 that the Holy Spirit would teach it them, (words, which 
 do not imply that He had not Himself uttered it, only 
 that He had not conveyed it home to their minds,) He 
 proceeds : " He shall not speak of Himself, but whatsoever 
 He shall hear, that shall He speak; and He will show you 
 things to come. He shall glorify Me ; for He shall take of 
 Mine, and shall show it unto you" 9 Now whatever else 
 these words mean, they seem to imply what the former 
 
 9 John xiv. 25, 26 ; xvi. 13, 14. Yid. Cyr. Catecli. xvi. 14, also Heb. ii. 
 
304 ON SCRIPTURE AS THE RECORD |_LECT. 
 
 passage expresses literally,, that the Comforter would use 
 and explain Christ's own teaching ; not begin anew, but 
 merely develope it. That some deep and heavenly mystery 
 is implied in the words, il whatsoever He shall hear, that 
 shall He speak," I doubt not; yet it seems to relate also 
 to what took place on earth. It is part of the condescen- 
 sion of the Persons of the Ever-blessed Trinity, that They 
 vouchsafe to allow the adorable mysteries of heaven to be 
 adumbrated in some inscrutable way on earth. The 
 Eternal Son was subjected to a generation in time ; He 
 received the Spirit in time ; and the Spirit proceeded from 
 the Father to Him, and them from Both, in time. The 
 texts which speak of what took place in eternity, are also 
 fulfilled in the economy of redemption. 1 And in like 
 manner, I say, whatever else is meant by the words in 
 question, this is meant also, that the Holy Ghost, as is 
 expressly said in the corresponding passage, would bring 
 Christ's words to their remembrance. The office of the 
 Holy Ghost, then, lay in " glorifying " Christ ; in opening 
 the minds of the Apostles for their better remembering, 
 understanding, and preaching of all that was their Lord's, 
 of His person, His mission, His works, His trials, His 
 sufferings, and among the rest, His words, — in exalting 
 Him as the Prophet of the Church, as well as her Priest 
 and King. In one of the clauses it is added, " He will 
 show you things to come," and this will be found to com- 
 plete the description of the inspiration which the Apostles 
 received ; viz., understanding in our Lord's words, and 
 the gift of prophecy. Their writings are actually made 
 up of these two, prophecy and doctrine. 
 
 13. 
 
 The same general meaning comes within the scope of a 
 later verse of the chapter last quoted. " These things 
 i E. g. Ps. ii. 7. 
 
XII.] OF our lord's teaching. 305 
 
 have I spoken unto you in proverbs ; but the time cometli 
 when I shall no more speak unto you in proverbs, but I 
 shall show you plainly/' that is, in explicit words, " of the 
 Father." 2 
 
 To the same purport is our Lord's parting charge, 
 recorded by another Evangelist. " All power is given 
 unto Me in heaven and in earth. Go ye therefore and 
 disciple all nations, baptizing them in the name of the 
 Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, teaching 
 them to keep all things, whatsoever I have commanded you." 3 
 The revelation had been already made to the Apostles ; it 
 was like seed deposited in their hearts, which, under the 
 influences of heavenly grace, would, in due season, germi- 
 nate, and become " the power of God unto salvation " to 
 all that believed. 
 
 A number of passages in the Gospels will occur to every 
 inquirer, which take the same view of our Lord's teaching, 
 viz., that it was not mere instruction conveyed in acci- 
 dental words, but that it consisted of formal and precise 
 sayings and actions afterwards to be opened and illustrated 
 by the Apostles ; some of these shall now be cited. 
 
 " These things understood not His disciples at the first: 
 but, when Jesus was glorified, then remembered they that 
 these things were written of Him, and that they had done 
 these things unto Him." 
 
 He says to St. Peter, before washing his feet, " What 
 I do, thou knowest not now ; but thou shalt know here- 
 after." 
 
 When He had bidden them to keep the miracle of the 
 Transfiguration secret till after His resurrection, " they 
 kept that saying with themselves, questioning one with 
 another what the rising from the dead should mean." 
 
 At another time Christ says, <( What I tell you in dark- 
 
 2 John xvi. 25. 3 Matt, xxviii. 18, 19. 
 
 VOL. I. X 
 
306 ON SCRIPTURE AS THE RECORD [LECT. 
 
 ness, that speak ye in light ; and what ye hear in the ear, 
 that preach ye upon the housetops." 
 
 14 
 
 We have a remarkable instance of this gradual illumina- 
 tion in the way in which they learned that the Gentiles 
 were to be called. After His resurrection, Christ enlight- 
 ened them, we know, in many things ; it is said expressly, 
 u Then opened He their understanding that they might 
 understand the Scriptures." The sacred narrative con- 
 tinues : " and said unto them, Thus it is written, and thus 
 it behoved Christ to suffer, and to rise from the dead the 
 third day ; and that repentance and remission of sins 
 should be preached in His name among all nations, begin- 
 ning at Jerusalem." Who would not have supposed that 
 His words now at length came to their minds in their full 
 meaning ? but it was far otherwise ; the Holy Ghost had 
 not descended, and they were still ignorant of the calling 
 of the Gentiles. 
 
 In the calling of Cornelius, however, the divine purposes 
 were at length illustrated fully and finally ; but it is very 
 deserving of notice, that though the Holy Ghost was the 
 gracious Agent in the revelation, as our Saviour had given 
 them to expect, yet St. Peter, instead of regarding His 
 guidance as a new and independent source of truth, 
 promptly refers his increased insight into the Gospel to 
 our Lord's teaching. " Then remembered I the word of the 
 Lord, how that He said, John indeed baptized with water, 
 but ye shall be baptized with the Holy Ghost." He 
 perceived that that religion which was spirit and truth, 
 could not be confined to place or nation. 
 
 15. 
 Again ; when the women came to the sepulchre, the 
 Angels said to them, " He is not here, but is risen ; 
 
XII.] OP our lord's teaching. 307 
 
 remember how He spake unto you when He was yet in 
 GJilee." 
 
 Further ; the last chapter of St. John's Gospel seems to 
 supply a striking instance of the religious caution with 
 which the Apostles treated His words, resisting wrong 
 interpretations, but there stopping, contemplating them 
 even in ignorance, rather than superseding them. " Then 
 went this saying abroad among the brethren that that 
 disciple should not die; yet Jesus said not unto him, he 
 shall not die ; but, If I will that he tarry till I come, what 
 is that to thee ? w To have our Lord's words was in their 
 judgment the principal thing, to aim at comprehending 
 them secondary, and not to be impatiently attempted. 
 
 In this connexion, I may notice as remarkable the 
 sameness of expression under which the three Evangelists 
 record our Lord's consecration of the Bread in the Holy 
 Eucharist. All three use precisely the same words, ' ' This 
 is My body." They were, it would seem, more bent on 
 recording our Lord's words than interpreting them. Were 
 the notions now popular among us true, one Evangelist 
 would have worded it, " This is a figure of My Body;" 
 another, " This imparts the benefits of My Body ;" and a 
 third, " This is a pledge of receiving My Spirit." But the 
 sacred writers seem to have understood that our Lord's 
 words were too solemn to paraphrase. As a contrast to 
 this, we find that Pilate's inscription on the cross is re- 
 corded by each Evangelist with some accidental variation. 4 
 
 16. 
 
 Enough has now been said to show, not only the pecu- 
 liar prerogative of the Gospels, but the position also of the 
 Apostolic Epistles in the revelation. They are on the 
 
 * John xii. 16 ; xiii. 7. Mark ix. 10. Matt. x. 27. Luke xxiv. 45—47. 
 Acts xi. 16. Luke xxiv. 6. John xxi. 23 and Matt. xxvi. 26. Mark xiv. 22. 
 Luke xxii. 19, also 1 Cor. xi. 24, with Matt, xxvii. 37. Mark xv. 26. Luke 
 xxiii. 38. John xix. 19. 
 
 x 2 
 
308 ON SCRIPTURE AS THE RECORD, ETC. [LECT. XII. 
 
 whole an inspired comment upon the Gospels, opening our 
 Lord's meaning, and eliciting even from obscure or ordi- 
 nary words and unpretending facts, high and heavenly 
 truths. On the other hand, our Lord's teaching in the 
 Gospels acts as a rule and key to the Epistles ; it gives 
 them their proportions, and adjusts their contents to their 
 respective place and uses. So far from His teaching 
 superseding theirs, as may at first sight be objected to the 
 view under consideration, it rather recognizes and requires 
 it. And, as to the Old Testament, far from being put 
 aside on this view of the revelation, it is delivered to us on 
 the same authority, under the seal of canonicity impressed 
 upon it by Christ Himself. There is something beautiful 
 in this appointment. Christ is the great Prophet of the 
 Church, and His teaching is as truly her law, as His death 
 and intercession are her life. In that teaching the whole 
 canon centres, as for its proof, so for its harmonious adjust- 
 ment. Christ recognizes the Law and the Prophets, and 
 commissions the Apostles. 
 
 17. 
 
 These then are some presumptions in favour of attribut- 
 ing a special sacredness to the New Testament over and 
 above other sources of divine truth, however venerable. 
 It is in very name Christ's Testament; it is an inspired 
 text ; and it contains the Canons of the New Law, dictated 
 by Christ, commented on by His Apostles and by the 
 Prophets beforehand. Though then, as the Romanists 
 object, it be incomplete in form, it is not in matter ; it 
 has a hidden and beautiful design in it. Why we limit it 
 to the particular books of which it is composed, will be 
 seen in the next Lecture, in which, passing from antecedent 
 presumptions, such as have here been discussed, I shall 
 draw out the direct proof of the Article on which we are 
 engaged. 
 
LECTUKE XIII. 
 
 ON SCRIPTURE AS THE DOCUMENT OF PKOOF IN 
 THE EARLY CHURCH. 
 
 Should any one feel uncertain about the argument against 
 the Roman doctrine contained in the last Lecture, he 
 may put it aside without interfering with what goes before 
 and after. It is intended to show, how far there is a 
 presumption that Scripture is what is commonly called, 
 " the Rule of Faith/' independently of the testimony of 
 the Fathers, which is the direct and sufficient proof of it. 
 And perhaps it may suggest profitable thoughts to those 
 who will receive it, over and above the immediate service 
 which it has been brought to supply. 
 
 Before proceeding to the Fathers, which I shall now do, 
 let me, for the sake of distinctness, repeat what is the 
 point to be proved. It is this ; that Holy Scripture con- 
 tains all things necessary to salvation, that is, either as 
 being read therein or deducible therefrom; not that 
 Scripture is the only ground of the faith, or ordinarily the 
 guide into it and teacher of it, or the source of all religious 
 truth whatever, or the systematizer of it, or the instrument 
 of unfolding, illustrating, enforcing, and applying it ; but 
 that it is the document of ultimate appeal in controversy, 
 and the touchstone of all doctrine. 
 
310 ON SCRIPTURE AS THE DOCUMENT [LECT. 
 
 We differ, then, from Roman teaching in this, not in 
 denying that Tradition is valuable, but in maintaining 
 that there is no case in which by itself, and without 
 Scripture warrant, it conveys to us any article necessary 
 to salvation ; in other words, that it is not a rule distinct 
 and co-ordinate, but subordinate and ministrative. And 
 this we hold, neither from any abstract fitness that it 
 should be so, nor from the accident that it is so, — neither 
 as a first principle, nor as a mere fact, — but as a doctrine 
 taught us and acted on by the Fathers, as proved to us 
 historically, as resting neither on argument nor on expe- 
 rience, but on testimony. Thus the same course is to be 
 pursued, as in determining the Fundamentals ; we must 
 take what we have received, whether we know the reason 
 of it or not. 
 
 The most simple and satisfactory mode of settling the 
 question would be to find some judgment of Scripture upon 
 it ; but Scripture, as I have said, does not contemplate 
 itself. The mention which it makes of inspiration, is 
 rather a promise to persons, than a decision upon a docu- 
 ment. It is a promise to the Apostles, and to the Church* 
 built on them ; aud the Roman divines ask why this 
 promise need be confined to that first age any more than 
 other promises, — than the promise of Christ's presence 
 where two or three are gathered together, or of the power 
 of His ministers to remit and retain sins ; or than those 
 precepts which we still observe, as the command to cele- 
 brate the Lord's Supper. But Scriptui^e does not interpret 
 itself, or answer objections rising out of misinterpretations. 
 
 1 [No promise of inspiration is given to the Church, but of infallibility, 
 which is not a habit or permanent faculty, but consists in an external divine 
 protection, when the Church speaks ex cathedra, against her falling into 
 error.] 
 
XIII.] OF PROOF IN THE EARLY CHURCH. 31 L 
 
 We must betake ourselves to the early Church, and see how 
 she understood the promise. We consider the Eucharist is 
 of perpetual obligation, because the ages immediately suc- 
 ceeding the Apostles thought so ; and so again we consider 
 that the inspired Canon was cut short in the Apostles 
 whose works are contained in the New Testament, and 
 that their successors had no gift of expounding the Law 
 of Christ such as they had, because the same ages so 
 ruled it. Those ages witness to their own inferiority, like 
 John the Baptist in speaking of Christ, and we accept what 
 they say. One passage, indeed, there is, that with which 
 the New Testament closes, which is remarkable certainly, 
 as seeming to anticipate the testimony of the primitive 
 Church on this subject; and considering its correspondence 
 with the closing verses of the Prophet Malachi, and those of 
 St. John's own Gospel, which is known to be supplemen- 
 tary, it would favour the notion that he was sealing up 
 the revelation within the limits of the inspired volume, sup- 
 posing any evidence could be brought that before his death 
 such a volume existed. Any how, they demand the 
 attention of the Roman controversialists, especially con- 
 sidering that the testimony of Antiquity agrees with them, 
 when thus interpreted. To that testimony I now proceed. 
 
 4. 
 The mode pursued by the early Church in deciding 
 points of faith seems to have been as follows. When a 
 novel doctrine was published in any quarter, the first 
 question which the neighbouring Bishops asked each other 
 was, " Is this part of the Rule of Faith ? has this come 
 down to us ? " The answer being in the negative, they at 
 once silenced it on the just weight of this presumption. 
 The prevailing opinion of the Church was a sufficient, an 
 overpowering objection against it ; nor could truth suffer 
 from proceedings which only subjected it, if it was on the 
 
312 ON SCRIPTURE AS THE DOCUMENT [LECT. 
 
 innovating side, to a trial of its intrinsic life and energy. 
 When, however, the matter came before a Council, when 
 it was discussed, when the Fathers reasoned, proved, and 
 decided, they never went in matters of saving faith by 
 Tradition only, but they guided themselves by the notices 
 of the written word, as by landmarks in their course. 2 
 Tradition was no longer more than a subordinate guide, as 
 explaining, illustrating, reconciling, applying the Scrip- 
 tures. Then, as under the Old Covenant, the appeal was 
 made " to the Law and to the Testimony," to the testament 
 of the Saviour, to the depository of His teaching, to the 
 inspired document of Apostles and Prophets ; nor is article 
 of faith producible from the remains of the early Church 
 inconsistent with this appeal, and resting on mere tradi- 
 tion and not on Scripture. The following passages from 
 the Fathers are given in proof or explanation of what has 
 been said. 8 
 
 2 [This is incorrect, and I cannot guess whence the author got such a 
 statement. At Ephesus, for example, the General Council did not refer to a 
 single passage of Scripture before condemning Nestorius, but principally to 
 the Creed of Nicaea, and to ten or twelve passages from the Fathers. And in 
 thefourth General Council at Chalcedon the language of its members was from 
 first to last, " to keep to the faith of Nicaea, of Constantinople, of Athanasius, 
 Cyril, Hilary, Basil," &c, Scripture being hardly once mentioned.] 
 
 3 [Quite as ample a collection of passages might be made in favour of the 
 independent authority of Tradition. Vid. infr. note p. 328. Here I will but 
 quote in illustration a portion of what I have myself noted down in translating 
 and editing at a later date (1811-43) some of the works of Athanasius. 
 
 Speaking of that exposition of various texts which is the staple of his Three 
 Discourses, I say, p. 482, " It is remarkable that he ends, as he began, with 
 a reference to the ecclesiastical scope, or Regula Fidei, which bas so often 
 come under our notice, (E. g. orris ahrjOeias Xoyos eAeyx^h Orat. ii. 35 ; also, 
 ii. 1, 3, 5, 13, 31, 18, 65, 60, 63, 70, &c. Orat. i. 44 ; iii. 28, 58. Apol. contr. 
 Ar. 36, 46. Scrap, ii. 2, 7 ; iv. 15. Orat. i. 32, de Syn. 18. Sent. D. 19, de 
 Deer. 13, 17, et passim. Epiphan. Hair. p. 830. Euseb. Eccl. Theol. pp. 62. 
 164, &c. &c.) as if distinctly to tell us that Scripture did not so force its 
 meaning on the individual as to dispense with an interpreter, and as if his 
 own deductions were not to be viewed merely in their own logical power, 
 great as that power often is, but as under the authority of the Catholic 
 
XIII.] OP PROOF IN THE EAELT CHURCH. 318 
 
 5. 
 
 Tertullian, for instance, is well known as recommending 
 Tradition as a means of silencing heresy, in preference to 
 Scripture. He observes that there is no end of disputing 
 if we go to Scripture, whereas the joint testimony of the 
 Catholic world is at once clear and unanswerable. This 
 is true ; the force of the argument from Tradition is of 
 singular use in hindering controversy, but the question is, 
 what is to be done when controversy is persisted in, and 
 heresy spreads so widely, or is countenanced so powerfully, 
 that it cannot be put down by authority ? Excommunica- 
 tion is doubtless the ultimate resolution of the difficulty ; 
 but meanwhile the Church, as being considerate and long- 
 suffering towards her members, allows herself to dispute 
 and argue, and she argues from Scripture. She proceeds 
 from the negative argument from Tradition, that the 
 opinions advanced were not known before, or not allowed, 
 to the positive refutation from Scripture. Accordingly 
 Tertullian says in his treatise against Hermogenes, who 
 maintained the eternity of matter, u ' In the beginning 
 God created the heaven and the earth/ I adore the 
 depth of Scripture, in which are manifested to me a 
 Creator and His work. The Gospel adds the Word as the 
 Minister and Agent of Providence; but I read not a 
 word anywhere of a pre-existing matter, out of which 
 things were made. Let the school of Hermog-enes show us 
 that it is mentioned in Scripture; if it is not in Scripture, 
 let it fear the woe destined for those who add or take 
 away." * 
 
 6. 
 
 Origen in like manner : c ' We know that the Saviour is 
 
 doctrines which those deductions subserve. It is hardly a paradox to say 
 that, in patristical works of controversy, the conclusion in a certain sense 
 proves the premisses."] 
 4 Contr. Herin. c. 22. 
 
314 ON SCE1PTURE AS THE DOCUMENT [LECT. 
 
 Lord, and we seek to refer the words V of the Prophet 
 Jeremiah "to the Saviour, according to the requirements 
 of the text and the truth. It is necessary to take the Holy 
 Scriptures as witnesses ; for our comments and statements 
 without these witnesses are not trustworthy." 5 
 
 In another place 6 he says, " All the Scriptures, accord- 
 ing to the Preacher, are ' words of the wise as goads 
 and as stakes well planted, given as secret cyphers from 
 one Shepherd;' nor is there ought superfluous in them. 
 The Word is the One Shepherd of all things intelligent, 
 which to those who have not ears to hear seem to dis- 
 agree with one another, but in truth are most harmonious. 
 For as the several strings of psaltery or harp, with each 
 its own note, different (as it would seem) from the rest, 
 make discords in the judgment of the unmusical and 
 unscientific, because of their variety, so in like manner 
 ears unpractised in the divine concord of Holy Scripture, 
 set the Old Testament against the New, and the Prophets 
 against the Law, and Gospel against Gospel, and St. Paul 
 against Evangelist, or against himself, or against his 
 brother Apostles. But when another comes well taught 
 in God's harmonies, accomplished in deed and word, as a 
 second David, ' cunning in playing/ he will bring out 
 their perfect tones, being instructed thence to strike the 
 strings in season, now those of the Law, now those which 
 respond in the Gospel, now of the Prophets, now again, 
 when fitting, of the Apostles in accordance, and so 
 again those of the Apostles with the Evangelists. Eor 
 he knows that Scripture, as a whole, is God's One Perfect 
 and Complete Instrument, giving forth, to those who wish 
 to learn, its one saving music from many notes combined, 
 stilling and restraining all stirrings of the evil one, as 
 David's music in Saul's madness." The main drift of this 
 passage doubtless is to show the consistency of Scripture ; 
 5 In Jerem. Horn. i. 7. 6 In Mutt. torn. ii. 
 
XIII.] OF PROOF IN THE EAELY CHUECH. 315 
 
 but it also bears a clear and strong testimony to its 
 intrinsic completeness and its independence of all other 
 sources of truth. Could Origen have so spoken, had he 
 believed that Scripture contained only one portion of 
 the Revelation, and that the rest was unwritten ? 
 
 The light in which St. Cyprian regarded Holy Writ, 
 is shown by his books of Testimonia, or Scripture Proofs, 
 in which he goes through the various points of doctrine 
 relating to the abolition of the Law, the person and 
 office of Christ, and the discipline of the Christian Church, 
 with a selection of texts in behalf of each of them. And 
 the introductions to the first and third Books set before 
 us the feeling under which he did this. The work is 
 addressed to a friend : — 
 
 "I could not but comply, well-beloved Son, with 
 your religious wish, most urgently imploring the divine 
 directions, which God has vouchsafed through the Holy 
 Scriptures for our grounding and building up ; that, 
 being rescued from the darkness of error, and illuminated 
 by His pure and radiant light, we might, by such 
 
 saving intimations, attain the way of life The 
 
 perusal of these books may serve you for the time for 
 tracing out the first lineaments of faith. More strength 
 will be given you, and the understanding of the heart will 
 become more and more vigorous, the more fully you search 
 into the Old and New Scriptures, and study one and all 
 of the portions of those spiritual books. For in the 
 following work I have but drawn somewhat from the 
 divine fountains, to send to you for the season. You will 
 be able to drink to the fall and be satisfied, if you for 
 yourself, as I have done, approach the same fountains of 
 divine fulness to drink therefrom." 
 
316 ON SCRIPTURE AS THE DOCUMENT [LECT. 
 
 It is still more remarkable that lie should bring texts 
 in maintenance of the lesser duties and usages of Chris- 
 tians, which he does with the following preface : — 
 
 " As becomes your known faith and devotion towards 
 the Lord God, dearly-beloved Son, you have asked me to 
 instruct you by extracts from the Holy Scriptures relating 
 to the discipline of our religion ; seeking a succinct course 
 of divine reading, that your mind, devoted to God, 
 instead of being wearied by long or many books, . . . 
 might have its memory refreshed by a wholesome and 
 complete summary. - " 
 
 St. Optatus, who lived in the same part of Chris- 
 tendom, about a century later (a.d. 360), argues against 
 the repetition of Baptism as follows : — 
 
 "You say it may be repeated, we say it may not; 
 the minds of our people fluctuate between the two. Let 
 no one trust you, or us either ; we are all of us party men. 
 Arbiters must be found ; but if they be Christians, such 
 are not fairly producible on either side, for Truth suffers 
 by our private prejudices. If we go out of doors for an 
 arbiter, he must be either a pagan, and so unacquainted 
 with our mysteries ; or a Jew, who is necessarily the 
 enemy of Christian Baptism. It follows that no human 
 tribunal can be found for the question ; we must have 
 recourse to heaven. But why knock at heaven's gate, 
 when we have with us a Testament in the Gospel ? We 
 may here fitly compare earthly things to heavenly. It 
 is like the case of a man with a large family. While the 
 father is alive, he gives his orders to each of them ; a 
 will is not yet necessary. Christ, iu like manner, during 
 His abode on earth, (may He never really be absent !) 
 laid His commands on the Apostles, as this or that was 
 necessary. But when a father feels himself to be 
 
XIII.] OF PEOOF IN THE EARLY CHURCH. 317 
 
 dying, and fears lest after his deatli his sons should 
 quarrel and go to law, he summons witnesses, and transfers 
 his will from his heart, which is soon to fail, to tablets 
 which shall endure; so that, if afterwards a quarrel arise 
 between the brothers, they have recourse, not to his tomb, 
 but to his testament, and thus he who rests in his tomb 
 yet speaks, though without voice, from his writing. 
 Now He whose testament we speak of, is alive in 
 heaven ; therefore His will must be sought for, as in a 
 testament so in the Gospel/' And then he proceeds to 
 prove the Church's view of Baptism, by the conduct and 
 words of our Lord when He washed the disciples' feet. 7 
 
 9. 
 
 Cyril of Jerusalem : " As regards the divine and holy 
 Mysteries of faith, it is necessary that not even a chance 
 word should be delivered in our tradition without the 
 warrant of divine Scripture, to the exclusion of mere 
 probabilities or skilfully contrived arguments. Neither 
 give credence to my mere words, unless they are demon- 
 strated from the Scriptures. For this our saving faith is 
 derived, not from our inventions, but from proofs of Holy 
 Scriptures." 8 What makes this passage the stronger, is, 
 that Cyril speaks thus with reference to the Creed, which, 
 if any statement of doctrine, might surely depend on 
 Tradition. 
 
 St. Basil's judgment, as contained in the following 
 passage, has been often adduced in the controversy. 
 " It is a plain fall from the faith," he says, " and a sign of 
 pride, either to annul anything that is in Scripture, or to 
 add what is not in Scripture, since our Lord Jesus Christ 
 has said, ( My sheep hear My voice/ .... And to add 
 
 1 Optat. De Schism. Don. v. 3. Vid. also Austin on Ps. xxi. ii. 30. 
 s Cat.iv.17. 
 
318 ON SCEIPTURE AS THE DOCUMENT. [LECT. 
 
 to the inspired Scriptures, or to detract from them, is 
 forbidden with especial earnestness by the Apostle, saying, 
 ' Though it be but a man's Testament, do man disannulleth 
 or addeth thereto/ " 9 
 
 10. 
 Let us now proceed to St. Chrysostom, commenting on 
 the words, " He who entereth not by the door into the 
 sheep fold, but climbeth up some other way, the same is a 
 thief and a robber/' He speaks thus : " Behold the 
 evidences of a robber ; first, that he enters not openly ; 
 next, that he enters not by the Scriptures, for this is 
 meant by not entering in at the door. Here Christ 
 alludes to those before Him, and to those who were to 
 come ; Antichrist, and false Christs. Judas and Theudas, 
 and such like. He suitably calls the Scriptures the door ; 
 for they bring us to God, and open upon us the knowledge 
 of Him. They make the sheep, guard them, and fence 
 olf the wolves. As a trusty door, Scripture shuts out 
 heretics, securing us from error, in whatsoever we desire ; 
 and, unless we damage it, we are unassailable by our 
 enemies. By means of it we shall know who are pastors 
 and who are not." 1 
 
 11. 
 
 St. Austin : " If any one, in matters relating to Christ, 
 or His Church, or any other thing which belongs to faith or 
 6ur life, — I will not say, if we, . . . but even (what St. 
 Paul has added) ' if an angel from heaven shall preach 
 unto you, besides what ye have received in the Scriptures 
 of the Law and the Gospel, let him be accursed/ " 2 
 
 Again, speaking to the Donatists, he asks, " Why add 
 
 9 Serm. de Fide 1 fin. and Moral, reg. 72, c. i. 
 
 1 In Joann. 58, ed. Duo. He is speaking primarily of the Old Testament. 
 
 2 Contr. Lit. Petilian. iii. 7. [These passages are " pie legenda." Else, 
 they prove too much for the Anglican view, viz that Tradition has no force, 
 and Private Judgment is incumhent on us.] 
 
XIII.] OF PROOF IN THE EARLY CHURCH. 319 
 
 ye to God's Testament by saying, that Christ is heir of no 
 lands but where He has Donatus for co-heir ? We are 
 not jealous. Eead this to us out of the Law, out of 
 the Prophets, out of the Psalms, out of the Gospel itself, 
 or out of the letters of the Apostles, read it thence, and 
 we believe it." 3 
 
 Anastatius of Antioch, speaking of the trees of life, and 
 of the knowledge of good and evil, says, " It is manifest 
 that those things are not to be inquired into, which Scripture 
 has passed over in silence. For the Holy Spirit has 
 dispensed and administered to us all things which conduce 
 to our profit. " 4 
 
 12. 
 
 In our controversy with. Rome, we need not bring 
 early authorities ; indeed, the later is the date of the 
 evidence, the stronger is our case against its theology. 
 With this view I quote John of Damascus (a.d. 730), 
 whose exact and learned orthodoxy 5 on the great points 
 of faith is sullied by his defence of Image-worship. In the 
 beginning of his work on the Orthodox Faith, he says, 
 " God has not abandoned us in our complicated ignorance 
 of Himself ; nay, He has implanted in all men, by nature, 
 
 the knowledge that there is a God Moreover He 
 
 has revealed to us a knowledge of Himself, as far as our 
 weak nature can bear it, first by the Law and the Prophets, 
 then also by His Only-begotten Son, our Lord and God 
 and Saviour, Jesus Christ. All things, therefore, which 
 are delivered to us by Law and Prophets and Apostles and 
 Evangelists, we receive, and acknowledge, and reverence ; 
 
 a Contr. Donatist. Ep. (l)e Unitate Eccl.) 11. This work is of the date of 
 St. Austin, if not his. 
 
 4 Anagog. Contempl. in Hexem.lib. 8 init. 
 
 5 He denies, however, the Procession of the Third Person of the Holy 
 Trinity from the Second, de P. O. i. 8 tin. 
 
320 ON SCKIPTURE AS THE DOCUMENT [LECT. 
 
 but we seek for nothing beyond them. For in that God is 
 good ; He is the Giver of all good ; He has neither jealousy 
 nor other passion. . . . Whatever is profitable for us, that 
 He has revealed : whatever were too great to bear, that 
 He has buried in silence. These things, then, [which are 
 given] let us, on our part, make much of, in these let us rest; 
 neither overpassing the everlasting boundaries, nor in any 
 respect transgressing the divine message." In the next 
 chapter, he closes a reflection upon the most sacred doctrines 
 of the Faith thus : " It cannot be that we should preach, or 
 at all know, anything about God, besides what the divine 
 oracles of the Old and New Testaments have divinely set 
 forth, said, or manifested to us." 
 
 13. 
 
 These extracts, strong as they are in themselves, give 
 but a faint impression of the distinct and familiar appre- 
 hension of this great principle, in the minds of the Fathers, 
 as evinced by their writings. It is not in one or two 
 formal enunciations, but in the spirit, the drift, the 
 concealed assumption of their arguments, that we discern 
 this fundamental doctrine of the Anglican Church. It is 
 by tracing the course of a controversy, and observing how 
 habitually present it was to the reasonings of all the 
 contending parties, how it guided the deliberations and 
 decisions of Councils, how it is incidentally brought out 
 into words, that we realize to ourselves the strength of our 
 position. This cannot be adequately conveyed to the 
 mind by a mere assertion that it is so, or by mere 
 extracts, yet one or two more may be of service in illus- 
 trating what nothing but a perusal of the originals in 
 course can suitably impress on the mind. 6 
 
 [That the informations of Scripture were of the first importance with the 
 early Church is indisputable, and I do not wish so far to modify what is said 
 in the text. But before concluding that Scripture was therefore recognized 
 
XIII.] OF PROOF IN THE EARLY CHURCH. 321 
 
 14 
 
 Yincentius is commonly and rightly adduced as the 
 champion of Tradition. He is certainly a remarkable 
 witness of the sense of the Church in his day, that Private 
 Judgment was not to be tolerated in the great matters of 
 faith, which were as clearly determined, as much parts of 
 thefoundationof Christianity, as the Scriptures themselves, 
 or their canonicity. He maintains that individuals must 
 yield to the voice of the Church Catholic. But let it be 
 observed after all, what kind of Tradition he is upholding ; 
 an independent witness of Christian Truth ? far from it, 
 merely and solely an interpretative Tradition, a Tradition 
 interpretative of Scripture in the great articles of faith. 
 Thus the very treatise, which is so destructive to mere 
 Protestantism, is as fatal to the claims of Rome. Not only 
 is all mention of the Pope omitted as the Judge of con- 
 troversies, but all mention of Tradition, except as subordi- 
 nate to Holy Scripture. The opening of his work will set 
 this clearly before us : — 
 
 " I have made frequent inquiries/' he says, " and that 
 with much earnestness and anxiety, of a great number of 
 
 as the sole rule of doctrine and document of proof in early times, the follow- 
 ing consideration must be taken into account. The mode of proving a point 
 varies, we know, with its subject matter. As investigations leading to 
 physical conclusions must be physical, so when conclusions are in what 
 may be called theological literature, the necessary investigations must lie 
 in books. As the Author has allowed, sup*-, p. 291, mere tradition has not body 
 enough to furnish materials for argument and research ; what is needed in con- 
 troversy is the expression of ideas and of trains of thought in language. 
 The early Christians, when teaching and proving Christianity, had nothing 
 tangible to appeal to but the Scriptures. As time went on, and a theological 
 literature grew up, the appeal exclusively to Scripture ceased. Intermitted 
 it never could be. Scripture had the prerogative of inspiration, and therel y 
 a sacredness and power, sui generis; but, from the nature of the case, it 
 was inferior as an instrument of proof, in directness and breadth, to 
 Councils, to the Schola, and to the Fathers, doctors, theologians, and devo- 
 tional writers of the Church.] 
 
 VOL. I. T 
 
322 ON SCRIPTURE AS THE DOCUMENT [lECT. 
 
 holy and learned men, for some definite and general rule 
 for discriminating the truth of the Catholic faith, from 
 the falsity of heretical pravity ; and have always got an 
 answer such as this, I may say, from all .... to fortify 
 my faith in two ways .... first, by the authority of the 
 Divine Law, next, by the Tradition of the Catholic Church. 
 Here some one may ask, Since the Canon of the Scriptures 
 is perfect, and sufficient, and more than sufficient in itself 
 for all purposes, what is the need of joining to it the 
 authority of the ecclesiastical sense ? I answer, because 
 the depth of Holy Scripture is such, that all do not take it 
 in one and the same sense, but its statements are inter- 
 preted variously by various persons, so that as many 
 senses seem deducible from it, as there are men to read it. 
 .... On this account it is very necessary, such compli- 
 cated and various error abounding, to regulate the inter- 
 pretation of Prophets and Apostles by the standard of the 
 Ecclesiastical and Catholic Sense/'' 7 
 
 Now, on the former part of this extract I make this 
 remark ; Tradition, we know, is prior to Scripture in order 
 of time, both historically and in its application to in- 
 dividuals. 8 Rome indeed rests the claims of Tradition in 
 no slight degree on this very circumstance. " Jesus 
 Christ," says Bossuet, 9 " having laid the foundation of 
 His Church by preaching, the unwritten word was con- 
 sequently the first rule of Christianity ; and when the 
 writings of the New Testament were added to it, its 
 authority was not forfeited on that account." This being 
 the case, it is very remarkable that Vincentius should put 
 the written Word first, and Tradition second. Had not 
 Scripture been first in dignity and consideration, he would 
 necessarily have made prior mention of the unwritten 
 word. There is no other way of accounting for his saying, 
 "first the authority of the Divine Law, next the Tradition 
 
 ' Commonit. 1 and 2. s Laud. Conf. xvi. 32, p. 101. 9 Expos, ch. xvii. 
 
XIII.] OF PEOOF IN THE BAELY CHUECH. 323 
 
 of the Church Catholic." What follows makes this 
 abundantly clear. The very need of Tradition arises only 
 from the obscurity of Scripture, and is terminated with 
 the interpretation of it. Vincentius assumes as undeniable, 
 the very doctrine rejected by the Romanists, the sovereign 
 and sole authority of Scripture in matters of faith, nor has 
 he a thought of any other question but the further one, 
 how it is to be interpreted. His submission even to Catho- 
 lic Tradition, is simply and merely as it subserves the due 
 explanation of Scripture. 
 
 15. 
 
 Vincentius's treatise was written during the Nestorian 
 controversy. I will now review some of the documents of 
 the Apollinarian, in which the same principle of verifying 
 doctrine by means of Scripture is carefully and uniformly 
 kept in view. 
 
 Athanasius, in the following passage, distinguishes 
 between Tradition as teaching, and Scripture as proving, 
 verifying doctrine. " Our faith is correct, and is derived 
 from Apostolical teaching and the Tradition of the Fathers, 
 being established out of the New and Old Testaments/'' l 
 
 Again ; he recommends the very course, as a mode of 
 acting familiar to him, which has been already described 
 as the Church's usual procedure towards innovators ; viz. 
 
 1 Ad. Adelph. § 6. The same contrast between Scripture and Tradition 
 is observed by Cyril of Jerusalem. He says just before the passage already 
 quoted from him, after reciting and commenting on the Creed, " Keep in 
 thy mind always this seal of faith, which I have now summarily stated in 
 its chief articles. But if the Lord permit, I will speak of them according to 
 my power with proof from Scripture." And shortly after, " Learn and 
 hold fast thy faith in what is taught and promised ; .that faith which alone 
 is now delivered to thee by Tradition of the Church and established from 
 Scripture. But, since not all have ability to read the Scriptures, but are 
 hindered from knowing them, whether by want of education or of leisure, 
 we comprehend in a few articles the whole doctrine of faith, lest souls perish 
 from want of instruction." Catech. iv. 17, v. 12. 
 
 Y 2 
 
324 ON SCRIPTURE AS THE DOCUMENT [LECT. 
 
 first to silence them by her own authority and the 
 received Tradition ; but if matters became worse and a 
 controversy ensued, then to have recourse to Scripture as 
 a sure confirmation of the Catholic doctrine. He has been 
 recounting the Apollinarian tenets, and then chides the 
 Bishop to whom he writes, for not having silenced them 
 at once. " For my part," he says, " I was astonished that 
 your holiness endured such impieties, and did not silence 
 the authors of them with the pious Faith of the Church ; 
 that they might either submit and be quiet, or resist and 
 
 be treated as heretics And though, it might be 
 
 necessary formally to prove and expose their extravagance, 
 yet it were well, if possible, to stop here, and write not a 
 word more. For doctrines so unsound on the very face of 
 them, ought not to be discussed and made much of, lest to 
 disputatious men they should appear really doubtful. 
 They ought to receive this answer and nothiug beyond, 
 c It is enough that these are not the doctrines of the 
 Church nor of the Fathers.'' However, lest these devisers 
 of evil should be emboldened by our continued silence, it 
 may be well to bring to memory a few things from the 
 Holy Scripture, since this may shame them perhaps from 
 pursuing their base notions." 2 
 
 Again : " Either then deny the Holy Scriptures, or, if 
 you acknowledge them, do not indulge speculations beyond 
 what is written, which will do irreparable mischief." 3 
 Now, this is one of those passages, which, taken by itself, 
 would stand for little ; for it might easily be said, that it 
 merely asserts that Scripture is of authority, not that 
 Tradition is not. But when we find this appeal to Scrip- 
 ture repeated again and again in various shapes, and no 
 similar appeal to Tradition, the argument for Scripture 
 being at that time accounted the record of saving faith, 
 becomes a strong one. 
 
 Ad. Epict. 3. 3 Contr. Apoll. i. 6 
 
XIII.] OF PROOF IN THE EARLY CHURCH. 325 
 
 16. 
 
 For this reason, I add the following passages from the 
 same treatise : " If then ye be disciples of the Gospels, 
 speak not iniquity against God, but walk by what is 
 written and done. But if ye desire to speak other things 
 beyond what is written, why do you contend with us, who 
 are determined neither to hear nor to speak beyond what 
 is written, the Lord having said, ' If ye abide in My word, 
 ye shall be truly free.'' " 4 
 
 "What inconceivable abandonment of mind is this, 
 which leads you to speak what is not in Scripture, and to 
 entertain thoughts foreign to godliness ? " 
 
 " While then we confess that Christ is God and man, 
 we do not speak this as if to imply separation in His 
 nature, (God forbid) but, again, according to the Scrip- 
 tures." 
 
 He concludes with the following words, in which the 
 same distinction is made, as has already been pointed out, 
 between the Tradition of the Church, as in antecedent 
 argument, a fair plea, ordinarily superseding inquiry, and, 
 on the other hand, when for one reason or another the 
 inquiry has proceeded, Scripture as the only basis of sound 
 argument and inference. " I have written the above, 
 beloved, though really it was unnecessary, for the Evan- 
 gelical Tradition is sufficient ; but because you asked con- 
 cerning our faith, and because of those who are willing to 
 make sport with their original views, and do not consider 
 that he who speaks out of his private judgment speaks a 
 lie. For neither the comeliness nor the glory of the 
 Lord's human body can we attain to express by wit of 
 man ; but so far only, to confess what has been done, as it 
 is in Scripture, and to worship the true God, for the glory 
 and acknowledgment of His love towards man/' 5 &c. 
 4 Contr. Apollin. i. 8. fin. 5 Ibid. 9. 11. 22, fin. 
 
326 ON SCRIPTURE AS THE DOCUMENT [LECT. 
 
 Again, in his second book against Apollinaris : " Whence 
 you gained your notion," that the soul is of a fleshly 
 nature, " I cannot understand ; it is neither proved from 
 the Holy Scriptures, nor is it according to the received 
 opinion of the world." 6 
 
 17. 
 
 I conclude with referring to Theodoret's mode of con- 
 ducting the same or a similar controversy. In each of 
 the three argumentative Dialogues, of which his Erauistes 
 is composed, we find the following significant arrange- 
 ment, in accordance with Vincentius's direction already 
 commented on ; — the arguments from Scripture come first, 
 and then passages from the Fathers in illustration. More- 
 over in his first Dialogue, he introduces his authorities 
 from the Fathers in the following way. Eranistes, the 
 heterodox disputant, after hearing his proofs from Scrip- 
 ture, says, " You have expounded this text well ; but I 
 would fain learn how the ancient Doctors of the Church 
 understood it." Orthodox replies, " You ought to have 
 been satisfied with these proofs from Apostles and Pro- 
 phets. However, since you desire besides the expositions 
 of the Holy Fathers, I will give you this aid also, with 
 God's blessing." As if he said, it is not now the place 
 for bringing mere authority ; I am proving the doctrine. 
 Authority is well in its place, viz., before the controversy ; 
 but now our business is with Scripture. 
 
 Again, in his second Dialogue : " We will endeavour to 
 persuade Arius to confess the one substance of the Holy 
 Trinity, and we will bring the proofs of this from Holy 
 Scripture." 
 
 And again : " How can a man dispute with those who 
 deny our Lord has taken flesh, or human soul, or mind, 
 except by adducing his proofs from Divine Scripture ? how 
 6 Ibid. ii. 8. Vide also passages in 9. 13, 14. 17, 18, and 19. 
 
XIII.] OF PROOF IN THE EARLY CHURCH. 327 
 
 refute those who with mad zeal disparage the Divinity of 
 the Only-begotten, except by showing that Divine Scrip- 
 ture has spoken some things with reference to His Divine, 
 other things with reference to His human Nature ? " 7 
 
 Out of the third Dialogue I select the following. After 
 Orthodox has stated the Catholic doctrine of the Passion 
 and Resurrection, Eranistes answers, " The doctrines of 
 the Church should be set forth, not in declaration merely, 
 but by proof. Show me, then, that Holy Scripture teaches 
 this." Upon which Orthodox proceeds to cite the Epistle 
 to the Romans. 
 
 Again : " Eranistes, — St. Peter says, l Christ having 
 suffered for us in the flesh.' Orthodox. — Surely this is 
 quite agreeable to our doctrine ; for we have learned our 
 Canon of doctrines from Holy Scripture." 
 
 One more passage shall be cited. " To add anything 
 to the words of Scripture is madness and audacity ; but to 
 open the text, and to develope its hidden sense, is holy 
 and religious." Here is the doctrine of the Gallic Vin- 
 centius in the mouth of a Syrian Bishop. 8 
 
 18. 
 Nothing, I think, is plainer from these extracts, than 
 that the authors of them looked upon Scripture as the 
 public standard of proof, the tribunal of appeal, in con- 
 troversy, however conclusive the argument from Catholic 
 Tradition might be for private conviction. 9 "Now how 
 
 ' Pp. 43. 78. 113. Vide also pp. 79 and 97. 
 « Pp. 199, 213. 224. 
 
 9 [After all is said, it would appear (as observed supr. p. 289) that the 
 differences of Rome and England in the question of Scripture and Tradition 
 are, in the hands of Anglican controversialists, verbal only. Catholic con. 
 troversialists, while insisting that they need not prove their doctrine from 
 Scripture, always do so prove it ; and Anglicans, while insisting that 
 Tradition is unauthoritative, treat it with a deference, which is the cor- 
 relative of authority. 
 
828 ON SCRIPTURE AS THE DOCUMENT [LECT. 
 
 strikingly coincident with this view are the words of our 
 Articles ! " Holy Scripture containeth all things necessary 
 to salvation, so that " (i. e. in such sense that) " whatso- 
 ever is not read therein, nor may be proved thereby, is uot 
 to be required of any man." The Article is altogether of 
 a polemical character. 
 
 Note on Lecture XIII. 
 
 [As to the passages quoted from the Fathers in the foregoing Lecture in 
 favour of the exclusive authority of Holy Scripture iu matters of faith, as 
 opposed to Tradition, I have already said, — 
 
 1. That some of these prove too much for the Anglican theory, as going, 
 if taken in the letter, to the extent of Protestant Private Judgment, p. 318. 
 
 2. That others of them give to Tradition the office of arbitrating between 
 rival possible senses of Scripture, and predetermine and impose a sense, thus 
 making Scripture subordinate, p. 289. 
 
 3. That others do but recognize and avail themselves of the necessary 
 characteristic of a written document, as contrasted with a tradition, viz. as 
 something that can be handled, examined, analyzed, and drawn out into con- 
 clusions, — a process which could not be applied to Tradition, till, as afterwards, 
 it had been converted into the definitions of Councils and the theses and dicta 
 of the Schools, p. 321. 
 
 4. That, if the Fathers speak strongly in favour of the authority of Scrip- 
 ture, as in the foregoing passages, they speak as strongly elsewhere in favour 
 of Tradition, p. 312. In proof I will here set down some passages from 
 their writings : — 
 
 1. Irenaeus, writing against the heretics, who, when confuted out of Scrip- 
 ture, appealed to a secret tradition from the Apostles, says, — " Through 
 none others know we the disposition of our salvation, than through those 
 through whom the gospel came to us, first heralding it, then by the will of 
 God delivering it to us in the Scriptures, which were to be the foundation 
 
 and pillar of our faith But, when the heretics are refuted out of the 
 
 Scriptures, they turn to find fault even with those Scriptures, as if they were 
 wrong, and unauthoritative, and were variable, and the truth could not be 
 extracted from them by those who were ignorant of" [a secret] "tradition. 
 .... And when we challenge them in turn with that " [true] " tradition, 
 which is from the Apostles, which is guarded by the succession of elders in 
 the churches, they oppose themselves to " [this] " Tradition, saying that 
 they are wiser, not only than those elders, but even than the Apostles. The 
 Tradition of the Apostles, manifested " on the contrary " in the whole world, 
 
 is open in every Church to all who wish to see the truth And, since 
 
 it is a long matter in a work like this to enumerate these successions, we will 
 
XIII.] OP PROOF IN THE EARLY CHURCH. 329 
 
 confute them by pointing to the Tradition of that greatest and most ancient 
 and universally known Church, founded and constituted at Rome by the 
 two most glorious Apostles, Peter and Paul, a tradition which she has and 
 a faith which she proclaims to all men from those Apostles/' Hor. hi. 
 1—3. 
 
 2. Tertullian : " Our appeal must not be made to the Scriptures, nor must 
 controversy be admitted on points in which victory will either be impossible 
 or uncertain, or not certain enough. But even if a discussion from the 
 Scriptures should not turn out in such a way as to place both sides on a par, 
 yet the natural order of things would require that this point should be first 
 proposed, which is now the only one which we must discuss, with whom lies 
 that very faith to which the Scriptures belong ? From what original giver, 
 and through whom, and when, and to whom, has been handed down that 
 Rule by which men became Christians ? " Praescrip. 19 (Holmes's Transl.). 
 
 3. Vincent of Lerins : " That holy and wise man " Pope Stephen, " under, 
 stood aright that the rule of orthodoxy (rationem pietatis) admitted nothing 
 but this, that all thiugs should be consigned to the children by that same 
 faith by which they had been received from the fathers, and that we, instead 
 of making religion follow our lead, should on the contrary follow the lead of 
 religion, and that it belonged to Christian sobriety and humility, not to 
 hand down our own ideas to posterity, but to keep those which we have 
 received from our ancestors." Comra. c. 9. 
 
 4. Athanasius, speaking of the Arian interpretations of Scripture, says, 
 <e Who was ever yet a hearer of such a doctrine ? or, whence did they gain 
 it ? or who thus expounded to them, when they were at school ? What is 
 not from our Fathers, but has come to light in this day, how can it be but 
 that which the blessed Paul has foretold, that " in the latter times, some 
 shall depart from the sound faith," &c, Orat. i. 8. " Let them tell us from 
 what teacher, or by what tradition, they derived those notions concerning 
 the Saviour ? " De Deer. 13. 
 
 5. Athanasius : " That of what they now allege from the Gospels they 
 certainly give an unsound interpretation we may easily see, if we now 
 consider the object (vkottos) of that faith which we Christians hold, and, 
 using it as a rule, apply ourselves, as the Apostle teaches, to the reading 
 of inspired Scripture. For Christ's enemies, being ignorant of this object, 
 have wandered from the way of truth." Orat. iii. 28. 
 
 6. " Theodosius," says Socrates, "consulted Nectarius, Bishop of Constan- 
 tinople, in what way best to rid the Christian religion of its differences of 
 opinion, and to give unity to the Church. This being an anxious matter to 
 Nectarius, Sicinnius advised him to avoid all dialectic contests, and to appeal 
 to the statements of the ancients, and to put the question to the heresiarchs 
 from the Emperor whether they made any account of the doctors who 
 belonged to the Church before the division, or came to issue with them 
 as aliens from Christianity. Hist. v. 10. 
 
330 ON SCEIPTURE AS THE DOCUMENT, ETC. [LECT. XIII. 
 
 7. Basil : — " Of the decrees and announcements kept in the Church, some 
 we have from written teaching, some from the tradition of the Apostles . . . . 
 The day would fail me, if I went through the mysteries of the Church which 
 are not in Scripture (to aypatpa). I pass by the others, the very confession 
 of faith, in Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, from what written document have 
 we ? " De Spir. s. 66, 67. 
 
 8. "It is manifest," says Chrysostom, "that not all things have [the 
 Apostles] delivered down by letter, but many things without writing. Both 
 the one and the other have a claim on faith. So we consider the tradition 
 also of the Church to have a claim on faith. It is a tradition ; seek nothing 
 more." In 2 Thess. ii. 15. 
 
 9. Augustine, speaking of religious usages says, " Those which we keep, 
 not as being written, but as from tradition, if observed by the whole of 
 Christendom, are thereby understood to be committed to us either by the 
 Apostles themselves or by plenary Councils, and to be retained as in- 
 stituted." Ep. 118. 
 
 10. Epiphanius: " One ought to use Tradition, for not all things can 
 be learnt from Holy Scripture. Some things in writing, some in Tra- 
 dition, did the Holy Apostles deliver." Haer. 61. 6.] 
 
LECTURE XIV. 
 
 ON THE FORTUNES OF THE CHUKCH. 
 
 And now, that our discussions on what may fitly be called 
 the Prophetical Office of the Church draw to a close, the 
 thought, with which perhaps we entered on the subject is 
 not unlikely to recur, when the excitement of the inquiry 
 has subsided, and weariness has succeeded, that what has 
 been said is but a dream, the wanton exercise, rather than 
 the practical conclusion of the intellect. Such is the 
 feeling of minds unversed in the disappointments of the 
 world, incredulous how much it has of promise, how little 
 of substance ; what intricacy and confusion beset the most 
 certain truths ; how much must be taken on trust, in 
 order to be possessed ; how little can be realized except by 
 an effort of the will; how great a part of enjoyment lies in 
 resignation. Without some portion of that Divine Philo- 
 sophy which bids us consider " the kingdom of God " to be 
 " within us," and which, by prayer and meditation, by act- 
 ing on what is told us, and by anticipating sight, developes 
 outwardly its own views and principles, and thus assimi- 
 lates to itself all that is around us, — not only the Church in 
 this age and country, but the Church Catholic anywhere, 
 or at any time, Primitive, Roman, or Reformed, is but a 
 name, used indeed as the incentive to action, but without 
 local habitation, or visible tokens, i( here or there, " " in 
 the secret chambers," or " in the desert." After all, the 
 
332 ON THE FORTUNES [LECT. 
 
 Church is ever invisible in its day, and faith only appre- 
 hends it. 1 
 
 Under this feeling I proceed, lastly, to consider more 
 attentively this main difficulty in the Anglo- Catholic 
 system ; and in so doing shall have opportunity to justify, 
 by examples, the doctrine which has just been suggested, 
 by way of reconciling the mind to it. 
 
 The most plausible objection, then, urged by the parti- 
 sans of Rome against the English Church, is, that we are 
 what they call a Parliamentary Church, a State Creation 
 or Establishment, depending on the breath of princes or 
 of populace, and directed towards mere political ends, such 
 as the temporal well-being of the community, or the 
 stability of the Constitution ; whereas the True Church is 
 built upon the One Faith, transmitted through successive 
 generations, and simply maintains what it has so received, 
 leaving temporal benefits to come and go, to follow or be 
 suspended, as the case may be. The argument comes 
 with the greater force, because Protestants have not un- 
 frequently granted the fact, and only denied its importance. 
 Yet we need not fear to contest the fact itself in spite 
 both of our Roman and our Protestant opponents ; and 
 in order to show how little it can be maintained, I will 
 take pains to state it as strongly as I can, before I pro- 
 ceed to reply to it. 
 
 3. 
 
 It is objected, then, that the Church is by office, and in 
 her very definition, ' ' the pillar and ground of the Truth," 
 that " God's Spirit which is upon her, and His words 
 
 i Vid. Hab. iii. 17, 18. [After all then the Church of God is, what 
 Protestants have ever considered it, invisible. Hoc Ithacus velit, et niagno 
 mercentur Atrida?.] 
 
XIV.] OF THE CHURCH. 333 
 
 which He has put in her mouth, shall not depart out of 
 her mouth, nor out of the mouth of her seed, nor out of the 
 mouth of her seed's seed, from henceforth and for ever ; '• 
 that " all her children are taught of the Lord, and great 
 is the peace of her children/'' In such texts the Faith 
 committed to the Church is represented, not as a secret 
 and difficult doctrine, but as clearly proclaimed, inde- 
 fectibly maintained, and universally acknowledged. What- 
 ever errors and corruptions there may be in the Church 
 and in her children, so far, it may be argued, is clear, that 
 the true Faith, the one way to heaven, the one message 
 from the Saviour of sinners, the Revelation of the Grospel, 
 will be plain and unequivocal, as the sun in the heavens, from 
 first to last ; so that whoever goes wrong within her pale, 
 will have himself to blame wholly, not his defective light. 
 In the English Church, however, we shall hardly find ten 
 or twenty neighbouring clergymen who agree together ; 
 and that, not in the non-essentials of religion, but as to 
 what are its elementary and necessary doctrines ; or even 
 as to the fact whether there are any necessary doctrines at 
 all, any distinct and definite faith required for salvation. 
 Much less do the laity receive that instruction in one and 
 the same doctrine, which is a necessary characteristic, as 
 may be fairly alleged, of their being "taught of the 
 Lord." They wander about like sheep without a shep- 
 herd, they do not know what to believe, and are thrown 
 on their own private judgment, weak and inadequate as it 
 is, merely because they do not know whither to betake 
 themselves for guidance. If they go to one Church they 
 hear one doctrine, in the next they enter into they hear 
 another : if they try to unite the two, they are obliged to 
 drop important elements in each, and thus dilute and 
 attenuate the Faith to a mere shadow ; if they shrink, as 
 they may naturally do, from both the one doctrine and 
 the other, they are taught to be critical, sceptical, and 
 
334 ON THE FOKTUNES [LECT. 
 
 self -wise : and thus they are sure to be led into heterodoxy 
 in one form or other, over and above the evil whether of 
 arrogance or indifference in themselves. If, again, they 
 are blessed with teachable and gentle minds, such un- 
 certainly makes them desponding and unhappy; they 
 walk in darkness and disquiet, far removed from that 
 " peace " which the Prophet describes as resulting from 
 the " teaching " which the children of the True Church 
 receive. 
 
 4. 
 Further, it "may be urged, that, over and above the 
 variations existing in the doctrine of our Church, we are 
 not even agreed among ourselves whether there be any 
 Church at all, that is, One True Church, commissioned 
 and blessed by Christ ; that many of our Clergy openly 
 avow their disbelief of it, and without censure from our 
 Bishops ; and that our national schools, in which we pro- 
 fess to educate the mass of the population, commonly teach 
 nothing definitely and strictly about it, but are content 
 for the most part with providing that vague kind of re- 
 ligious knowledge which might be learned as well among 
 Dissenters; that, while we instil into the minds of chil- 
 dren some sufficient horror of Popery, we give them no 
 preservative against the Wesleyans, Baptists, or Indepen- 
 dents. It may be further objected, that we are in a state 
 of actual warfare with each other, not only differing, but 
 considering our mutual differences perilous or even damn- 
 able ; that we have no internal bond of union, but are 
 kept together by the state, which by a wholesome tyranny 
 forces us to be friends with each other. And further still, 
 much intemperate declamation may be indulged about our 
 system of patronage in the Church, the mode in which 
 our Bishops are appointed, their being corrupted by their 
 intercourse with laymen in Parliament, and the like 
 
XIV.] OF THE CHUECH. 335 
 
 topics. Specific instances of scandal may be added ; that 
 Hoadly, for instance, in the last century, though a Soci- 
 nian, as is now acknowledged by high authority in Church 
 matters, was allowed to remain for nearly fifty years a 
 Bishop in possession ; and that, when in the early part of 
 his career the Clergy in Convocation, the legitimate mini- 
 sters of the Faith, attempted to censure some of his errors, 
 they were hindered by the civil power, which suspended 
 the Convocation forthwith, and has never allowed it since 
 to resume its functions. Or again, notice may be directed 
 to the existing carelessness in many places about the due 
 administration of Baptism, no sufficient regard being had 
 to the persons administering, the mode of administering 
 it, nay, or the very rite itself. 
 
 5. 
 
 All this has been said, and in an exaggerated tone ; 
 certainly exaggerated, for after all the Prayer Book is 
 a practical guide into the sense of Scripture for all teach- 
 able minds ; and those of our Divines, whom " all the 
 people account as prophets,'"' with whatever differences of 
 opinion in minor points, yet on the whole teach in essen- 
 tials one and all the same doctrine. For instance, the 
 most popular books in our Church, and the most highly 
 sanctioned for the last 100 or 200 years, have been, I sup- 
 pose, such as Bishop Taylor's Holy Living and Dying, the 
 Whole Duty of Man, Hammond's Catechism, or Bishop 
 Wilson's Sermons ; and do not these sufficiently agree to- 
 gether in doctrine to edify all who ask what the Faith of 
 Christ is ? Surely then there is much exaggeration in 
 such statements as the foregoing. But whether exaggera- 
 tion or not, it matters little ; were every word of them 
 literally true, yet they would not tend to invalidate the 
 claim of the English Church to be considered a branch of 
 the One Church Catholic. 
 
336 ON THE FORTUNES [LECT. 
 
 The parallel of the Jewish Church will afford us a 
 sufficient answer to all that has been objected. I need 
 scarcely observe that the Israelites were especially raised 
 up to be witnesses for the One True God against idolatry, 
 and had the doctrine of the Divine Unity set before them, 
 with an injunction upon the fathers ever to teach the 
 children, also that they remained God's peculiar people 
 till Christ came ; and yet, as every one knows, there were 
 even long periods in their history during which the whole 
 nation was sunk in idolatry or lingered on in decay, 
 captivity, or dispersion. Even then were the English 
 Church, as a Church, to go further than she is ever alleged 
 to have gone, in denying her own powers, were she to put 
 herself on a level with the sectaries round about her, and 
 to consider Ordination as a mere human ceremony, it 
 would not follow that she had lost her gift. 2 That they 
 who do not claim the One Church Catholic as theirs, 
 possess it not, however specious an argument, cannot 
 really be maintained. Of course there are cases in which 
 a Church incurs more or less of punishment for neglect of 
 its privileges, but even then its state is not the same as if 
 they had never been given ; generally speaking, they are 
 but suspended or impaired, not forfeited. Even Samson, 
 after losing his hair upon the lap of Delilah, recovered his 
 strength in his captivity, when his hair grew again. If 
 we have been made God's children, we cannot unmake 
 ourselves; we can never be mere natural men again. 
 There is but the alternative of our being His children still, 
 though erring ones, and under rebuke, or apostates and 
 
 2 [The external unity and independence of the Jewish Church remained 
 from first to last. Even when under secular influences and secular rulers, no 
 one could call it a department of the Roman State or an organ or function 
 of the civil government.] 
 
XIV.] OF THE CHURCH. 337 
 
 devils ; and surely there is enough on the very face of our 
 Church, as we humbly trust, and as our most bigoted 
 opponents must grant, to show that we are not repro- 
 bates, but that, amid whatever scandals, we have faith 
 and love abiding with us. This is to take far lower 
 ground than we think we may fairly take in comparison 
 of Rome; yet it is well to see what the objection under 
 review amounts to at the utmost. Whether or not there 
 are cases in which a branch of the Church, as an indi- 
 vidual Christian, may utterly exhaust itself of grace and 
 become reprobate, at least St. Paul expresses the rule of 
 God's dealings with us in his Epistle to the Romans ; 
 " the gifts and calling of God are without repentance." If 
 His people sinned, they were not to be abandoned ; on the 
 contrary, it is declared, "then will I visit their trans- 
 gression with the rod, and their iniquity with stripes; 
 nevertheless, My loving -kindness will I not utterly take from 
 him, nor suffer My faithfulness tofa.il; My covenant will I 
 not break, nor alter the thing that is gone out of My 
 lips." 3 Or again, in the well-known passage of the Pro- 
 phet, God says to the Jews, " That which cometh into 
 your mind shall not be at all, that ye say, We will be as 
 the heathen, as the families of the countries, to serve wood 
 and stone. As I live, saith the Lord God, surely with a 
 mighty hand, and with a stretched- out arm, and with fury 
 
 poured out, will I rule over you And I will cause 
 
 you to pass under the rod, and I will bring you into the 
 bond of the Covenant." 4 The same is the lesson of the 
 New Testament; as in the parable of the talents, in which 
 the servant who hid his Lord's talent did not at once for- 
 feit it, did not release himself from the responsibility of 
 having it ; he had it by to produce, though unused, at the 
 last day. 5 Still more impressive, because more directly 
 in point, are St. Paul's words concerning his own com- 
 * Psalm lxxxix. 32—34. 4 gzek. xx. 32—37. 3 Matt. xxv. 25. 
 
 Z 
 
338 ON THE FORTUNES [LECT. 
 
 mission : " Though I preach the Gospel, I have nothing 
 to glory of : for necessity is laid upon me ; yea, woe is 
 unto me, if I preach not the Gospel. For, if I do this 
 thing willingly, I have a reward ; but if against my will, 
 a dispensation of the Gospel is committed unto me." 6 If we 
 disbelieve or neglect our gifts, they remain with us, 
 though as a burden and as a witness at the last day. 
 The Church does not become a mere creation of man, 
 though she sell herself to be his slave. 
 
 7. 
 And, if not even a denial of her gifts on the part of 
 a Church, necessarily leads to their absolute forfeiture, 
 much less will the disbelief of certain of her ministers 
 incur that penalty. From their own souls, indeed, the 
 grace of her ordinances will be shut ; but though they 
 trample on their invisible powers, yet are they uncon- 
 sciously the instruments of transmitting them onwards, 
 and of imparting their blessed effects to those who be- 
 lieve. They do what they know not ; holy Isaac blessed 
 Jacob for Esau, and could not reverse it. The old Pro- 
 phet of Bethel was the involuntary instrument of God's 
 wrath, though he condemned himself the while. Balaam, 
 with a covetous heart and amid heathen enchantments, 
 announced Christ's coming. Caiaphas, the high priest, 
 while contriving his Lord's death, prophesied, because 
 he was high priest, yet did not know that he prophesied. 
 The words of St. John should be carefully studied : 
 " One of them, named Caiaphas, being the high priest 
 that same year, said unto them, Ye know nothing at 
 all, nor consider that it is expedient for us that one man 
 should die for the people, and that the whole nation 
 
 s 1 Cor. ix. 16, 17. 
 
 7 [Baptism marks individuals with an indelible character ; but what spiri- 
 tual promises have been made from heaven to the Anglican Church, as such?] 
 
XIV.] OP THE CHUECH. 339 
 
 perish not. And this spake he not of himself, but 
 being high priest that year, he prophesied that Jesus 
 should die for that nation, and not for that nation only, 
 but that also He should gather together in one the chil- 
 dren of God that were scattered abroad.-" 8 The language 
 of Caiaphas then had quite a different sense from what 
 he intended, and far higher. He spoke of the Jewish 
 nation under the word " people," but it was the Holy 
 Ghost's word in his mouth to denote the elect children of 
 God wherever found all over the earth; and, while he meant 
 to speak of Christ's death as removing the perplexities 
 which His miracles caused to himself and his party, he 
 really spoke of the Atoning Sacrifice which was to be made 
 for the sins of the whole world. In like manner, even 
 though a Bishop were to use the words, u Receive ye the 
 Holy Ghost/' with little or no meaning, or a Priest the 
 consecrating words in the Eucharist, considering it only a 
 commemoration of Christ's death, or a Deacon the water 
 and the words in Baptism, denying in his heart that it is 
 regeneration ; yet they may, in spite of their unbelief, be 
 instruments of a power they know not of; and "speak 
 not of themselves ; " 9 they may be as Balaam or as Isaac. 
 
 The state of the later Jewish Church, of which Caia- 
 phas affords one instance, illustrates most strikingly 
 how dangerous it is to go by sight in religious matters 
 instead of consulting God's word. How deeply was the 
 divine building " daubed with the untempered mortar " 
 of secular politics ! l how closely did it simulate a 
 mere civil establishment, till the day of vengeance 
 
 8 John xi. 49 — 52. lJ [Certainly, if the power has heen given them.] 
 
 1 [Just so ; the Jewish Church was a divine building daubed with politics, 
 but the Anglican is a civil establishment daubed with divinity.] 
 
 z 2 
 
3-40 ON THE FOKTUNES [LECT, 
 
 came, and God claimed His fugitive Prophet, who had 
 hid himself amid the empires of this world ! What 
 anomalies in the present state of the Church can parallel 
 those which were to be found among the Jews ? What 
 infraction, for instance, of the law of Moses could be 
 greater than that the high priesthood should be taken 
 away from the hereditary line, held but for a time, and 
 associated with the profession of arms or with royalty ? 
 Yet such were its fortunes in the family of the Asmonaeans, 
 who, besides their unpriestly character, were many of 
 them stained with crimes which gave a deeper shade to 
 the irregularity. Aristobulus, son of Hyrcanus, starved 
 to death his mother, caused one brother to be assassinated, 
 and imprisoned the rest, and then died of remorse. 
 Alexander, on occasion of a mutiny, massacred six thou- 
 sand of the Jewish populace ; and, at another, had eight 
 hundred crucified before his eyes at an entertainment he 
 gave in honour of his wives and concubines. Hyrcanus 
 and Aristobulus, his sons, carried on civil war against 
 each other. Herod, a man of Edom, was allowed to fill 
 the throne of David ; and, stained as he was with the mosc 
 heinous crimes, he appointed three or four high priests in 
 succession, and rebuilt the temple of God. Yet in spite of 
 all these enormities, " the seat of Moses," 2 the oil of the 
 priesthood, and the miraculous governance of the nation, 
 remained, not fading away without memorial, but for a 
 while latent and quiescent, then fearfully showing them- 
 selves in the utter destruction of the race which had pro- 
 faned its own gifts. But, till that final destruction the 
 gifts continued, and were profitable to those who cared to 
 use them religiously. 
 
 in which He hus not chosen the Anglo-Saxons. We cannot argue from 
 Jerusalem to Canterbury and York. He was pledged to Judah till Shiloh 
 came.] 
 
XTV.] OF THE CHUECH. 341 
 
 9. 
 
 Earlier periods in Jewish history may next be specified ; 
 for though in these the irregularities themselves might be 
 less, yet the presence of a supernatural Providence, how- 
 ever latent, is further removed from doubt or cavil. 
 
 What a remarkable picture does the Book of Judges pre- 
 sent to us ! Suppose it were lost and we were to read Num- 
 bers and Joshua, and then turn to the reign of David, could 
 we have conceived the actual state of the nation between the 
 former and the latter period ? Had we been bidden to de- 
 scribe it by conjecture, to connect together the two by some 
 probable medium, should we have guessed by a stretch of 
 fancy that the newly- created fabric of Judaism had been 
 destined so soon to fall to pieces, or rather to fade away like 
 a dream, unrealized and unattempted, after the giving of the 
 Law, for a space of three or four hundred years ? Moses 
 and Joshua set in motion a system which suddenly stops 
 with the human originators of it. What must have been 
 the feelings of a thoughtful Israelite during those centuries 
 of confusion, when every one did what was right in his 
 own eyes, and the lawless were kept in order as much by 
 the yoke of the invader and oppressor as by the divinely- 
 ordered sway of the Judges ? what would have been his 
 arguments against the cavils of Philistine or Midianite, who 
 thought it worth while to examine the pretensions of his 
 Polity ? Would they not treat those pretensions with 
 utter scorn and derision, as equally fantastic and extrava- 
 gant, equally idle, foolish, and irrational, as the world now 
 deems our Apostolical Descent? What evidence, indeed, 
 could the Israelites then give of a supernatural presence 
 among them ? There were men who lived and died in the 
 holy land, without sign or token, as far as we are told, of 
 the Lord God of Israel, except such as a lively faith detects 
 and appropriates. The Philistines at one time were mas- 
 
342 ON THE FOETUNES [LECT. 
 
 ters of the chosen people for forty years, the Moabites for 
 eighteen, the Canaanites for twenty, the Ammonites for 
 eighteen. And snch greater disturbances of the Mosaic 
 covenant were but centres and origins of the extended 
 distress and confusion in which religion lay during those 
 early times. Its champions, too, had sometimes almost as 
 litttle in them to refresh the eye of purity and truth as its 
 enemies. The history of Samson and Jephtha presented as 
 great perplexities to faith, as Jabin, king of Canaan, or 
 Chusan-rishathaim, king of Mesopotamia. Or, consider' 
 the fortunes of Gideon's family ; Abimelech, the son of his 
 concubine, massacring all his brethren, to the number of 
 threescore and ten persons except one, and making him- 
 self king; his townsmen, by whose aid he seized the 
 sovereignty, revolting from him, and then defeated and 
 destroyed by him ; then he himself cut off in battle. Or, 
 consider the history of the tribe of Benjamin, its victories 
 over the other tribes, then its overthrow with the loss of 
 twenty-five thousand men in one day ; or again, (what is 
 portentous,) the worship of a graven image set up by certain 
 Danites, on their original settlement in Palestine, with the 
 regular succession of a priesthood, all the time the house of 
 God was in Shiloh, as if Satan were from the first to share 
 the holy land with the Lord God of Hosts. Such are some 
 of the irregularities and disorders which Almighty Wisdom 
 does not find inconsistent with the continuous and pro- 
 gressive fulfilment of its purposes ; such the valleys and 
 pits in the wilderness which intervene between the great 
 providences of God, and are lost to us while we contemplate 
 the majestic summits of Moriah, Pisgah, or Zion, and the 
 beacon lights thereon kindled. And if a supernatural pre- 
 sence was with the Israelites all along their years of crime 
 and captivity, who shall presume to say, that we, whatever 
 be our misfortunes and our sins, have certainly forfeited the 
 Gospel promises, or that a true faith cannot elicit from our 
 
XIV.] OF THE CHURCH. 343 
 
 Ordinances and appropriate in their fulness those benefits 
 which Christ originally lodged in them ? Who shall curse 
 whom God has not cursed, drying up our Baptism, or 
 tainting the manna of our Eucharist, making our Priests 
 speechless, or breaking the staff of our Rulers ? Who shall 
 excommunicate those who have ever held to that Creed, and 
 that Succession, and those Ordinances which Apostles be- 
 queathed to them ? Let Romanists see to it, whether, 
 iu stead of attempting anything against us, it is not rather 
 their wisdom to shelter their own Church under the fore- 
 going arguments from the far more serious charges to 
 which it is exposed. 3 
 
 10. 
 
 Two other periods occur in the history of Israel, which 
 deserve attention. In their captivity in Egypt, they seem 
 almost to have forgotten that any promise had been made 
 to their race ; and when Moses reminded them of it, they 
 "hearkened not unto him for anguish of spirit and for 
 cruel bondage." Again, much might be said concerning 
 their captivity in Babylon, when " their king and 
 their princes were among the Gentiles, the Law was 
 no more, and their prophets found no vision from the 
 Lord." 4 Once more, a fresh field of remark is afforded by 
 the great schism of the ten tribes under Jeroboam, and the 
 ministry of Elijah and Elisha among them. 
 
 Setting*, theu, our present disorders at the very highest, 
 making the largest admissions on that score which Roman 
 Catholics can demand, not denying for argument's sake, 
 that our bishops have before now done despite to their own 
 Apostolical powers, that our Teachers have been at variance 
 with each other, that aliens and enemies have usurped our 
 
 3 [The simple question is, has a local Church any promises made to it, 
 and specially the promise of perpetuity ?] 
 
 4 Lam. ii. 9. 
 
344 ON THE FOETUNES [LECT. 
 
 rights, that the laity has been almost sanctioned by their 
 pastors in loose and irreverent views and practices, and 
 that the very notion of the Church Catholic has died away 
 from the popular mind ; granting, that is, what is a great 
 deal more than the truth, it will not follow that Almighty 
 God may not be as truly and supernaturally with us as He 
 was with His former people, when the Angel appeared to 
 Gideon during the Midianitish captivity, or to Zacharias in 
 the days of Herod. And if truly with us, then, doubtless, 
 in a far higher and more miraculous way, by how much 
 the Christian Church has more of heaven in it than had 
 the Polity of Israel. 
 
 One more remark shall be suggested. Is it not very 
 strange, and very significant, that our Lord and Saviour, 
 the immaculate Lamb of God, should be descended not only 
 from virtuous Ruth the Moabitess, but from incestuous 
 Tamar ? 
 
 11. 
 
 Such is the light which the Jewish history throws upon 
 our present circumstances, taken at the worst ; but Chris- 
 tian times afford us a second parallel to them. The advo- 
 cate of Rome must admit that the state, whether of the 
 Catholic Church or of the Roman Church, at periods before 
 and during the middle ages, was such, as to bear a very 
 strong resemblance to the picture he draws of our own, 
 I do not speak of corruptions in life and morals merely, or 
 of the errors of individuals, however highly exalted, but 
 of the general disorganized and schismatical state of the 
 Church, her practical abandonment of her spiritual preten- 
 sions, the tyranny exercised over her by the civil power, 
 and the intimate adherence of the worst passions and of 
 circumstantial irregularities, to those acts which are vital 
 portions of her system. 
 
 For instance, the especial stain, which is imputed to our 
 
XIV.] OP THE CHURCH. 345 
 
 own Church, is this; that in a.d. 1560, Elizabeth, on 
 succeeding to the throne, deprived, by Act of Parliament, 
 all its existing Bishops but one, for refusing to become 
 Protestants, and introduced a new succession, by means of 
 Parker, who was consecrated under her special licence to 
 the Archbishopric of Canterbury, by certain Bishops, 
 either not in possession of Sees, or only Suffragan. No 
 one denies this was a violent proceeding, though unavoid- 
 able under her peculiar circumstances; but it is one thing 
 to be violent in accidentals and adjuncts, another to be 
 invalid in essentials. The question is simply whether 
 Parker was formally consecrated by those who had the 
 power of consecrating. 6 God may carry on His work amid 
 human sin, granting, for argument's sake, that it was 
 such ; as the incest of Judah was, as I have observed, in 
 the line of our Lord's genealogy. This is to view the 
 matter at the extremest point of disadvantage at which 
 the Eoman controversialist can place it. Now let us see 
 whether former times do not supply instances of similar 
 scandals. 7 
 
 12. 
 
 The third General Council was held a.d. 431, on occasion 
 of the Nestorian heresy, and passed decrees concerning our 
 Lord's Person, as divine and human, which the English 
 Church, as well as the Roman, has ever recognized as true 
 and necessary. Now under what circumstances were these 
 decrees framed ? Nestorius, Bishop of Constantinople, 
 
 5 [It is not a mere question of succession. The Catholic Church is not 
 a mere (spiritual) family or race, the essential idea of which is propagation, 
 hut a polity, of which the essential idea is union and subordination, and of 
 which propagation is but the condition and necessity.] 
 
 6 [No, " the question simply is " whether the Anglican body was not by 
 those proceedings formally separated from the "Sancta per orbem terrarum 
 ecclesia."] 
 
 ? Vid. Bramhall, Works, pp. 40. 153, 154. 
 
346 ON THE FORTUNES [LECT. 
 
 was charged, and rightly charged, by Cyril, Bishop of 
 Alexandria, with heresy. Antioch, and the rest of the 
 East, remained neuter; Rome, and the West, took part 
 with Cyril. Celestine, Bishop of Rome, held a Latin 
 Council, condemned Nestorius, degraded him on the event 
 of his contumacy, and committed the execution of this 
 sentence to Cyril. The Emperor of the day interposed, 
 and summoned at Ephesus the General Council in question. 
 Cyril and Nestorius, with their respective partisans, 
 arrived at Ephesus at the time appointed, before John, 
 Bishop of Antioch, and the Orientals. After waiting for 
 a fortnight, Cyril opened the Council, as President, with- 
 out them ; in spite of the earnest representations of the 
 Imperial Officer, who intreated him to allow a further 
 delay. Its proceedings thus unsatisfactorily commenced, 
 ■were concluded within the space of a single day. Five 
 days afterward the Orientals arrived, and, angry at the 
 slight put upon them, they held a Council by themselves, 
 and degraded Cyril, and Memnon, the Bishop of Ephesus, 
 who had sided with him. Memnon, being powerful in his 
 own city, shut the Churches against them, and stationed a 
 guard in the Cathedral, which, on the advance of the 
 Imperial troops against it, vigorously repulsed and routed 
 them. After a riot of three months' continuance, the 
 hostile parties retired to their respective homes ; and at 
 the end of several years John and Cyril, making mutual 
 admissions and explanations in points of doctrine, were 
 reconciled to each other, and jointly assented to the con- 
 demnation of Nestorius. From that time Nestorius has 
 been accounted a heretic by the Church. Transactions 
 such as these are a proof that, in the Roman system at 
 least, while adherence is paid to the positive observances 
 enjoined us, the sins of individuals taking part in their 
 execution, do not interfere with their validity. That at 
 that time, with whatever incidental dissension and delay, 
 
XIV.] OF THE CHURCH. 347 
 
 the testimony of the Catholic world was at length col- 
 lected on the subject of dispute, and that that testimony 
 really condemned Nestorius ; and further that it was but 
 a repetition of the testimony afforded by the Catholic 
 Fathers from the first, is sufficiently clear to all students 
 in theology. But, anyhow, the scandals of the Council of 
 Ephesus are an effectual hindrance to any over- delicate 
 and fastidious criticisms by Roman writers of our Refor- 
 mation. 
 
 13. 
 
 The history of Vigilius, bishop of Rome, in the following 
 century, presents them with a similar difficulty. It is well 
 known that according to the Roman system, a General 
 Council is not of authority unless confirmed by the Pope ; 
 now the fifth Council was confirmed by this Vigilius, who, 
 unless positive observances, nut moral qualifications, be the 
 conditions, on man's part, of supernatural agency, neither 
 confirmed the Council, nor was Pope at all. His career 
 was as follows. — The last Bishop of Rome had died at 
 Constantinople, after deposing the Bishop of that city for 
 heresy; Yigilius, who was at that time a deacon, had 
 accompanied him thither, and made offers to the Empress 
 Theodora, who had adopted the same heresy, to acknow- 
 ledge and support the deposed Bishop, if she assisted 
 himself to rise to the See of St. Peter. Having gained the 
 Empress, he proceeded into Italy, to Belisarius, whom he 
 also gained through the interest which she exerted in his 
 favour, and by promising two hundred pieces of gold, from 
 himself, should he obtain the appointment. Meanwhile 
 Silverius had been chosen at Rome to fill the vacant See. 
 On a charge of corresponding with the Goths, he was sum- 
 moned before Belisarius, stripped of his sacerdotal habit, 
 and banished to Lycia. Yigilius was appointed in his 
 room, and his first act was to refuse to discharge his own 
 
348 ON THE FORTUNES [LECT. 
 
 engagements in the contract ; neither siding with the 
 heretics, nor paying the promised bribe. The latter con- 
 dition he at length fulfilled on being put into possession of 
 his rival, Silverius, whom he sent to Palmaria where he died 
 by starvation. The fifth General Council being afterwards 
 held at Constantinople, he refused to assent to its decrees, 
 and was, in consequence, banished by Justinian ; nor was 
 he allowed to return to Rome, till he recanted, formally 
 confirmed them, and thereby secured, as a theologian of 
 Rome must consider, their infallibility. Unless formal 
 acts are the secret threads by which the line of Divine 
 Providence is continued, how can Romanists hold either 
 that Vlgilius was Pope, or that he confirmed the decrees 
 of the fifth General Council ? Thus they accord to us a 
 principle which brings us safely through our own misfor- 
 tunes, whatever they be. 8 
 
 14. 
 
 Let us now take an instance some hundred years later. 
 
 In the tenth and eleventh centuries the rank and wealth 
 
 of the higher ecclesiastics was such as to absorb those 
 
 spiritual functions which had led to their possession of 
 
 them. The Bishops were temporal princes, were appointed 
 
 irrespectively of their religious fitness, and felt more 
 
 closely bound to the feudal lord of whom they held their 
 
 temporalities, than to the Church. " They were obtruded 
 
 in their Sees," says a recent writer, " as the Supreme 
 
 Pontiffs were upon that of Rome, by force or corruption. 
 
 A child of five years old was made Archbishop of Rheims. 
 
 The See of Narbonne was purchased for another at the 
 
 age of ten." He adds, "It was almost general in the 
 
 Church to have Bishops under twenty years old." Again, 
 
 " Either through bribery in places where elections still 
 
 8 [Not so, for where is any promise of divine Providence to the Anglican 
 communion, when visibly separated from the visible Catholic Church ?] 
 
XIV.] OF THE CHUKCH. 349 
 
 prevailed, or through corrupt agreemeuts with princes, or 
 at least customary presents to their wives and ministers, a 
 large proportion of the Bishops had no valid tenure in 
 their sees. The case was perhaps worse with inferior 
 clerks ; in the Church of Milan, which was notorious for 
 this corruption, not a single ecclesiastic could stand the 
 test, the Archbishop exacting a price for the collation of 
 every benefice."" 9 
 
 Such being the general state of the Church, Rome itself 
 was the scene of contest between rival claimants of the 
 Holy See, the respective champions of the imperial pre- 
 rogatives and ecclesiastical liberty. In 1038, Benedict 
 IX., a man of abandoned life, being degraded by the 
 Romans, was restored by the Emperor Conrad, and, 
 running into still greater excesses, was again deposed by 
 his people, who chose in his place Sylvester III. A third 
 time he was reinstated, by the arms of his adherents ; and 
 at length, despairing of appeasing the resentment of the 
 Romans, he sold his holy office to the arch-presbyter of 
 Rome, who succeeded under the name of Gregory VI. 
 While the Roman see thus lay between the pretensions of 
 three competitors, the Emperor, Henry III., deposed them 
 all, and introduced a fourth, under the name of Clement 
 II. This is one instance out of many, of ecclesiastical 
 irregularities, greater, surely, than any which have occurred 
 among ourselves, whether in the reigns of the Tudor 
 princes, or of William III. 1 
 
 15. 
 The great Western Schism, in the course of the four- 
 teenth and fifteenth centuries, is another instance of eccle- 
 
 • Hallam's Middle Ages, chap. vii. Vide passages quoted in Tillotson's 
 Rule of Faith, iii. 7. 
 
 1 [Of course a rivalry of Pontiffs would have issued in a formal schism, 
 had it continued. But the Divine Promise was pledged that it should not 
 continue, and it never has.] 
 
350 ON THE FORTUNES [LECT. 
 
 siastical disorder, such, as has not happened in our own 
 branch of the Church. We in England think it, as it really 
 was, a very grievous thing, that there should have been in 
 King William's time rival Bishops in the Archiepiscopal 
 and some other sees, the exigencies of the State calling 
 for measures towards the Church which, in civil matters, 
 would have been tyranny. But what prudent Romanist 
 will object this to us, as if more than a ruffling of the sur- 
 face of the deep fountains of her power, who recollects the 
 state of his own Church during the period referred to ? 
 For fifty years the Latin Church had two or three heads at 
 the same time, each intriguing and directing anathemas 
 against his rivals. Mosheim remarks, that during that 
 period, as was natural, " many plain, well-meaning people, 
 who concluded that no one could be saved unless united 
 to the Vicar of Christ," i. e. the Pope, " were overwhelmed 
 with doubt, and plunged into the deepest distress of 
 mind ; " ~ the very misfortune which is alleged mutatis 
 mutandis to be the result of our own unhappy differences 
 at present. Meanwhile the Gallican Church, seriously 
 affected by the scandal of the contest, in a council held at 
 Paris at the end of the fourteenth century, solemnly re- 
 nounced all subjection to either of the contending parties. 
 At the beginning of the next century the Council of Pisa 
 deposed the rival Popes of the day, appointing a third 
 in their place, who being unable to carry into effect their 
 decision with a strong hand, did but become a third com- 
 petitor, and form a fresh party in the schism. Doubtless 
 to these and similar miserable disorders we owe the licen- 
 tious and profane movements of the sixteenth century, of 
 which our Roman opponents are so ready to complain ; and 
 the present wasted and enfeebled state of the Church, in- 
 cluding our own branch of it. And, as during the con- 
 
 2 Mosheim, vol. iii. p. 328. 
 
XIV.] OF THE CHURCH. 351 
 
 tinuance of these old dissensions, the pure-hearted and 
 believing, as we humbly trust, enjoyed the Ordinances of 
 grace though administered by unchristian hands, much 
 less can their legitimate consequences, our present and 
 past distressing circumstances, taken at the greatest, be 
 any bar in the due administration of the Sacraments to 
 those who believe and seek God truly. 
 
 16. 
 
 Such was the state of things in the middle ages j let us 
 now turn to the early Church, which apparently was not 
 altogether free from those errors and disorders which are 
 the scandal of modern times. 
 
 In the fourth century there were at one time three, and 
 for a long time two, Bishops of Antioch at once, one coun- 
 tenanced by the East, the other by the West; and that 
 succession at last prevailed which had been violently in- 
 troduced by the Arians. In Africa the Donatists, in the 
 time of their power, had as many as four hundred Bishops, 
 that is, as many within sixty or seventy as the Catholic 
 Church. 
 
 In the early Ante-Nicene times, the Church seemed for 
 a while to be but one sect among many, being confused with 
 Jews, and the various Gnostic denominations, as it is at 
 this time in our own country with the multitude of parties 
 and heresies which prevail. Nay, it had peculiar diffi- 
 culties of its own, distinct from those of after centuries. 
 While it was still under persecution, with deficient union 
 in its separate branches, private Christians had to struggle 
 with uncertainties, and with partial knowledge, — I do not 
 say whether more or less than ours, — but certainly such a3 
 we have not. Till the fourth century there was no unani- 
 mous reception of the Canon of the New Testament, no 
 sufficient check upon the fancies and extravagances of 
 individual teachers. All the great points, indeed, of faith 
 
352 ON THE FORTUNES [LECT. 
 
 were thoroughly known by all, in a far higher way than 
 is at present vouchsafed to us ; but though there was, 
 undoubtedly, one uniform doctrine handed down from the 
 Apostles, yet heresy was not so immediately recognized, 
 whether in points of detail, or as regards the intellectual 
 comprehension of its terms, as it was afterwards, when the 
 stimulus it supplied had retouched and deepened the linea- 
 ments of the Creed. It is observable that the two most 
 learned and gifted of the Ante-Nicene Fathers, Origen 
 and Tertullian, while explicit in their report of Catholic 
 Truth in all matters of necessary faith, yet are little trust- 
 worthy in themselves, and are open at least on secondary 
 points to the charge of unwarrantable speculation. There 
 can be no instance among ourselves of sincere Christians 
 being tempted, as Origen was, to question what is meant 
 by the eternal punishment destined for the finally impeni- 
 tent j or of a Bishop, as Dionysius, speaking of the Eternal 
 Son, in terms which to some others conveyed a sense as far 
 from orthodoxy as from his own meaning; or of a whole 
 Church, as the Roman, doubting of the full authority of 
 the Epistle to the Hebrews. All the most important 
 points in the Christian system have been publicly canvassed 
 in detail, and settled once for all ; but in the first age of 
 the Church there was more room than now, not for prac- 
 tical uncertainty where men were teachable, but for in- 
 quiry where they were restless, and for controversy where 
 they were stubborn. 
 
 17. 
 
 To these instances, in earlier and later times, I will but 
 add, in conclusion, the testimony of two Bishops of the 
 Church in ages and countries far removed from each other, 
 and under circumstances widely different, in proof of this 
 one fact, that there have been junctures in the history of 
 the Dispensation before our own, in which contemporaries 
 
XIV.] OF THE CHURCH. 353 
 
 thought they saw the utter confusion and the destruction 
 of all tbat was sacred, venerable, or precious, — the imme- 
 diate extinction of that Truth which has lasted centuries 
 after them. The first of these writers is St. Basil, Exarch 
 of Cassarea, in the fourth century ; the other is the famous 
 Thomas Becket, Archbishop of Canterbury in the twelfth. 
 Of these the former thus writes concerning the state of 
 Asia Minor and the East, where the Arians had for some 
 years been spreading their heresy : — 
 
 i( The doctrines of godliness are overthrown: the laws 
 of the Church are in confusion. The ambition of men 
 who fear not the Lord seizes upon its dignities ; its high 
 places are avowedly made a prize for impiety ; so that he 
 who blasphemes the worst, is preferred as a Bishop for the 
 people. The gravity of the sacerdotal order has perished ; 
 there are none to feed the Lord's flock with knowledge ; 
 ambitious men are ever squandering in self-indulgence and 
 bribery, possessions which they hold in trust for the poor. 
 The accurate observance of the Canons is vanished ; there 
 
 is full liberty to sin The laity remain unchastised ; 
 
 the prelates have lost all freedom of speech, for they who 
 have obtained their power by man, are slaves to those who 
 
 gave it Unbelievers laugh at what they see, and the 
 
 weak in faith are unsettled ; no one can tell what the true 
 faith is, ignorance about it is spread over the soul, because 
 the wicked adulterators of the world imitate the truth. 
 Beligious people keep silence; but the blaspheming tongue 
 is free. Sacred things are profaned ; those of the laity 
 who are sound in faith avoid the places of worship, as 
 schools of impiety, and raise their hands in solitude, with 
 groans and tears, to the Lord in heaven. " 3 
 
 18 
 Eight hundred years afterwards, an Archbishop of Can- 
 
 3 Basil, Ep. 92. 
 VOL. I. a a 
 
354 ON THE FORTUNES [LECT. 
 
 terbury, wlio at least is an authority with Romanists, writes 
 as follows : <c The king of England/' he says, in a letter 
 concerning Henry II., addressed to the Roman Cardinals, 
 " has seized, and is every day seizing the property of the 
 Church, subverts her liberty, stretches out his hands against 
 the anointed ones of the Lord, against the clergy, without 
 limit of place or selection of persons, imprisoning some, 
 beheading others, tearing out the eyes of others, forcing 
 others to single combat, others to the ordeal, that the 
 Bishops may not pay obedience to their Metropolitan, nor 
 the Clergy to their Bishops, nor account themselves ex- 
 communicated when they have been duly excommuni- 
 cated.^ In another place, he thus speaks of the corrupt 
 practices of the Roman see : " Sacrilegious men, murder- 
 ers, plunderers are absolved, — impenitent men, whom I 
 boldly pronounce on Christ's word, though the world be 
 against me, not even St. Peter, were he in the Roman see, 
 could absolve in God's sight Certainly, if restitu- 
 tion might be made and is not, there is no true repent- 
 ance Let who dare thus bind himself and not 
 
 fear the sentence of the Judge to come. Let him absolve 
 men of plunder, sacrilege, murder, perjury, blood, and 
 
 schism, though impenitent I will trouble the court 
 
 of Rome no longer ; let those apply to it who are strong 
 in their iniquities, and after triumphing over justice and 
 leading innocence captive, return in glory for the confusion 
 of the Church." 4 
 
 19. 
 But in truth the whole course of Christianity from the 
 first, when we come to examine it, is but one series of 
 troubles and disorders. Every century is like every other, 
 and to those who live in it seems worse than all times be- 
 fore it. The Church is ever ailing, and lingers on in weak- 
 
 4 Ep. D. Thorn, ii. 46, v. 20. 
 
XIV.] OF THE CHURCH. 355 
 
 ness, " always bearing about in the body the dying of the 
 Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be made 
 manifest in her body." Religion seems ever expiring, 
 schisms dominant, the light of Truth dim, its adherents 
 scattered. The cause of Christ is ever in its last agony, 
 as though it were but a question of time whether it fails 
 finally this day or another. The Saints are ever all but 
 failing from the earth, and Christ all but coming; and 
 thus the Day of Judgment is literally ever at hand ; and 
 it is our duty ever to be looking out for it, not disappointed 
 that we have so often said, f ' now is the moment," and that 
 at the last, contrary to our expectation, Truth has some- 
 what rallied. Such is God's will, gathering in His elect, 
 first one and then another, by little and little, in the inter- 
 vals of sunshine between storm and storm, or snatching 
 them from the surge of evil, even when the waters rage 
 most furiously. Well may prophets cry out, " How long 
 will it be, Lord, to the end of these wonders ? " how 
 long will this mystery proceed ? how long will this perish- 
 ing world be sustained by the feeble lights which struggle 
 for existence in its unhealthy atmosphere ? God alone 
 knows the day and the hour when that will at length be, 
 which He is ever threatening ; meanwhile, thus much of 
 comfort do we gain from what has been hitherto, — not to 
 despond, not to be dismayed, not to be anxious, at the 
 troubles which encompass us. They have ever been ; 
 they ever shall be ; they are our portion. " The floods 
 are risen, the floods have lift up their voice, the floods lift 
 up their waves. The waves of the sea are mighty, and 
 rage horribly ; but yet the Lord, who dwelleth on high, is 
 mightier." 
 
 THE END. 
 
LONDON : 
 
 PEINTED BY GILBERT AND RIVINGTON, LIMITED, 
 
 ST. JOHN'S SQUARE. 
 
CARDINAL NEWMAN'S WORKS. 
 
 1. SERMONS. 
 1 — 8. Parochial and Plain Sermons. (Bivingtons) 
 9. Sermons on Subjects of the Day. (Bivingtons.) 
 
 10. University Sermons. {Bivingtons.) 
 
 11. Sermons to Mixed Congregations. (Burns and Oates.) 
 
 12. Occasional Sermons. (Bums and Oates.) 
 
 2. TREATISES. 
 
 13. On the Doctrine of Justification. (Bivingtons.) 
 
 14. On the Development of Christian Doctrine. (Pickering.) 
 
 15. On the Idea of a University. (Bickering.) 
 
 16. On the Doctrine of Assent. (Burns and Oates.) 
 
 3. ESSAYS. 
 
 17. Two Essays on Miracles. 1. Of Scripture. 2. Of Eccle- 
 
 siastical History. (Bickering.) 
 
 18. Discussions and Arguments. 1. How to accomplish it. 
 
 2. The Antichrist of the Fathers. 3. Scripture and the 
 Creed. 4. Tamworth Reading-Room. 5. Who's to blame ? 
 6. An Argument for Christianity. (Bickering.) 
 19,20. Essays Critical and Historical. Two Volumes with 
 Notes. 1. Poetry. 2. Rationalism. 3. Apostolical Tra- 
 dition. 4. DelaMennais. 5. Palmer on Faith and Unity. 
 6. St. Ignatius. 7. Prospects of the Anglican Church. 
 8. The Anglo-American Church. 9. Countess of Hunt- 
 ingdon. 10. Catholicity of the Anglican Church. 11. 
 The Antichrist of Protestants. 12. Milman's Christianity. 
 13. Reformation of the Eleventh Century. 14. Private 
 Judgment. 15. Davison. 16. Keble. (Bickering.) 
 
4. HISTORICAL. 
 21—23. Three Volumes. 1. The Turks. 2. Cicero. 3. Apol- 
 lonius. 4. Primitive Christianity. 5. Church of the 
 Fathers. 6. St. Chrysostom. 7. Theodoret. 8. St. 
 Benedict. 9. Benedictine Schools. 10. Universities. 
 11. Northmen and Normans. 12. Medieval Oxford. 13. 
 Convocation of Canterbury. {Pickering.) 
 
 5. THEOLOGICAL. 
 24. The Asians oe the Fourth Century. (Pickering.) 
 25, 26. Annotated Translation oe Athanasius. Two Volumes 
 (Pickering.) 
 27. Tracts. 1. Dissertatiimculse. 2. On the Text of the 
 Seven Epistles of St. Ignatius. 3. Doctrinal Causes of 
 Arianism. 4. Apollinarianism. 5. St. Cyril's Formula. 
 6. Ordo de Tempore. 7. Douay Version of Scripture. 
 (Pickering.) 
 
 6. POLEMICAL. 
 
 28, 29. Via Media. Two Volumes with Notes. 1. Vol. Pro- 
 phetical Office of the Church. 2. Vol. Occasional Letters 
 and Tracts. (Pickering.) 
 
 30, 31. Difficulties oe Anglicans. Two Volumes. 1. Vol. 
 Twelve Lectures. 2. Vol. Letters to Dr. Pusey con- 
 cerning the Bl. Virgin, and to the Duke of Norfolk in 
 Defence of the Pope and Council. (Burns and Oates, and 
 Pickering.) 
 
 32. Present Position oe Catholics in England. (Bums 
 
 and Oates.) 
 
 33. Apologia pro Vita Sua. (Longmans.) 
 
 7. LITERARY. 
 
 34. Verses on Various Occasions. (Bums and Oates.') 
 
 35. Loss and Gain. (Burns and Oates, and Pickering.) 
 
 36. Callista. (Bums and Oates.) 
 
 % It is scarcely necessary to say that the Author submits all that 
 he has written to the judgment of the Church, whose gift and 
 prerogative it is to determine what is true and what is false in 
 religious teaching. 
 
* V JL BRARY 
 
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