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THE CREED OR A PHILOSOPHY

BY THE SAME AUTHOR.

LETTERS FROM ROME, ON THE OCCASION OF
THE CECUMENICAL COUNCIL, 1869-1870. 2 vols, crown
8vo. i8j.
THE WORD. Crown 8vo. y$. 6d.
' On all topics Mr. Mozley exhibits a sweet reasonableness, which is
nowhere incompatible with a passionate solicitude that his readers shall
not forfeit their inheritance of spiritual fellowship with Heaven. The
volume deserves to be studied for its theory. Long before the reader has
imbued himself with that -he will have fallen in love with its scattered
gems of wisdom, shrewd insight, eloquence, and even a certain humour,
which has a vein in it of gentle malice without ever being sour or malig
nant.— The Times.
THE SON. Crown 8vo. 7s. 6d.
' This is a new and powerful representation of the essential correspond
ence between the Christian faith and the nature, needs, and aspirations of
man. It is the work of a man who thinks for himself, and borrows little
from the theology of the schools. That it is interesting, instructive, and
eminently suggestive, hardly needs to be said. Nothing that Mr. Mozley
has ever written is lacking in these qualities, and there are few living
writers who are entitled to be reckoned his superiors in the mastery of the
English language. When such a writer, so original in thought, so persuasive
in speech, undertakes to illustrate the great analogy between man's nature
and the faith of Christendom, it cannot but be that his work is entitled to
the serious attention of all serious readers.'— The.Times.

London and New York: LONGMANS, GREEN, & CO.

THE CREED

OR

A PH ILOSOPHY

BY THE
REV. T. MOZLEY, M.A.
FORMERLY FELLOW OF ORIEL! AUTHOR OF 'REMINISCENCES
'LETTERS FROM ROME' ( THE WORD' AND ' THE SON '

/

LONDON
LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO.
AND NEW YORK: 15 EAST i6"> STREET
1893
1 A 11 rights reserved

PRINTED BY
SPOTTISWOODE AND CO., NEW-STREET SQUARE
LONDON

PREFACE

When a writer, after spending a long life in a great
variety of occupations and inquiries returns at last,
again and again, to a theme of the greatest import,
he has no reason to complain, as far as he is himself
concerned, if he finds himself received with sharp
criticism, prompt censure, and, what he may more
care for, polite indifference. The manner of doing
that which is intrinsically disagreeable to a nation, a
class, or a Church, is always excepted to, and can
hardly fail to deserve it. If the man who is lifting
up his voice in the wilderness has not hit the right
time, or the fitting circumstance ; if he presents him
self, as it were, in an unfamiliar garb, and is found to
be stammering between a known and an unknown
tongue, he may reasonably be asked why he has not
given life, health, and strength to that upon which.
he now bestows a scant and, possibly, worthless

vi PREFACE
remainder. He may plead an urgency, a necessity,
and even a call, when the world at large sees nothing
unusual, or only a groundless, perhaps wanton, alarm.
If he says that matters have been growing worse and
worse for his whole life, and some centuries before,
that will hardly account for his holding his tongue
for half a century, and falling in very much with the
prevailing mode of thought and sentiment. In fact,
he cannot expect others to see his case in the same
light that he has come to do, of course, with more
knowledge of the particular circumstances.
I may add that my own long and varied experi
ence leads me to regard with the greatest charity, not
to say the profoundest pity, the ready writers invited
to pronounce summary, final, judgments on long and
laborious works at an hour's notice, or less. They
cannot read a page without finding something that
may be reasonably objected to, on the question of its
absolute truth, or its propriety, or its tone, or its value,
or its motive. In religious controversy it is always
possible to give a man a bad name, which does not
require that the critic should have read even the title
or know what the book is about. In this respect the
theological vocabulary is far more copious, decisive,
and pungent than any other, for while politicians

PREFACE vii
mostly leave loop-holes, theologians do not. Contro
versy is internecine, devastating, and exterminating,
and loves to contemplate an Armageddon fought on
the smallest battle-field.
The Church has been, and still is, the great school
of manners. It has purified and sweetened civilisa
tion, and has produced the gentleman and the lady of
our times ; but an enemy has sown tares in it, and
these tares are apt to overshadow and stifle the
crop. Anything like an attack upon current phrases
and ideas, implies the charge of heresy, and against
that every religious community has always had its
weapons, and always will have.
I will not attempt any lengthened apology for
the position in which I now return to the subject of
this volume. . The world is rather sick of apologies,
and is of the opinion that, so far as a man excuses
himself, so far does he accuse himself also, seeing
that his life ought to speak for itself.
But I will venture to repeat a few facts, mostly
to be found already in my former published volumes.
I was puzzling over the Anglican dogma of the
Trinity — mind, reader, not the Nicene, not the
Athanasian, not the Catholic dogma, but the Angli
can — when Wellington and Bonaparte were standing

viii PREFACE
face to face at Waterloo. In proof of this, I can ad
duce my well-kept, though much-used, manual of the
Catechism, with questions, answers, and texts, by
an intimate friend of Dr. Waterland. For many
years the perfectly insolvable and, as I believe, the
perfectly gratuitous, mystery intruded itself on my
private and common devotions. Perhaps it was better
that I should thus wander in a maze, instead of
doing despite to truth. In my boyhood I inhaled
much poison from the Evolutionary school — that
hydra with fifty heads, each claiming to be the
original, and all doubly reproducing themselves.
At college I was the devoted pupil, admirer, and
friend of the man who shortly became the greatest
writer of his age, and who then had only one wish
or thought, which was to be the restorer of the
Church of England. After committing myself en
tirely to him and his cause, whatever it might be, I
took charge of an out-of-the-way country parish, to
which for some years I gave my whole time, heart,
mind, and resources. Following the order of the
Ecclesiastical Year, I had to explain as well as I
could the doctrine of the Trinity. Failing to satisfy
both myself and what the Church of England seemed
to require, I preached one or two of Newman's ser-

PREFACE ix
mons, and found that here and there I had to diverge
from the text. Then came a year of college life,
plunging me deep — indeed, quite out of my depth — in
what came to be called the Oxford movement.
Strange as it may now seem, neither the Atha
nasian nor the Anglican dogma of the Trinity ever
made an appearance in the ' Tracts for the Times.'
The Tracts entitled * Athanasian Creed ' were wholly
and solely on the expediency of believing something
or other, whatever it might be, and applies with equal
force to the Mohammedan and Hindoo creeds ; while
the voluminous and dull ' Tracts on Reserve ' are
simply on the old thesis, ' Milk for Babes and Meat
for Men,' and, to the best of my recollection, contain
not even a hint of the particular doctrines to be
reserved. I have already related, in my first ' Reminiscences,1
that in this year (1836), having to read an MS. series
of eight lectures on theology in the College Chapel,
and finding them deeply imbued with the Anglican
dogma, I went on correcting and delivering them for
seven mornings without being called to account, till
I found the last lecture utterly incorrigible ; that, after
spending the whole night in attempts to mend it, I
returned the MS. to the Provost about half an hour

x PREFACE
before chapel-time, with a note explaining my
difficulty, and that the result was a very kind letter
from the Proyost, and a very handsome — though, in
the result, very disastrous — present of a costly archi
tectural work from W. J. Copleston, who kindly took
my place on the occasion.
Within a few days of finally giving up Moreton
Pinkney, I was in the heart of Salisbury Plain, soon
taking pupils, enlarging the parsonage, having daily
morning service, and allowing myself to be com
mitted, by the opportune acquisition of an ancient
oak roof, to the building of a church in every respect
unsuitable to the place, and dragging me into every
kind of difficulty. The sober second thoughts of
later years have much disposed me to regard that
work as a prodigious folly, consuming to little pur
pose, and with some sad consequences, the best of
my years, my heart, my position, and my circum
stances, and comparable only to the enormous archi
tectural extravagances of the Middle Ages which led
to such abuses, and eventually to the Protestant re
volt against the Church of Rome. But I take much
comfort in the reflection that from the same royal
demesne, Cardinal Morton brought the magnificent roof
of Bore Regis Church, in Dorset ; and Edward IV.

PREFACE xi
the simpler roof still hanging over the Manger at
Bethlehem. Then I began to write for the ' British Critic,' and
before long to edit it, to write long articles, to read
and briefly notice many books, and to deal with some
of the most self-willed and intractable gentlemen
produced by this prolific century. That could not
last long, and it did not. On returning from my
first visit to a Catholic country I was on the point of
going over to Rome, but had first to consult Newman,
who suggested two years' consideration. A much
less time satisfied me that I was bound to finish my
church if I could.
Only a month or two before the late Cardinal's
death, I was surprised to receive from him a short
but carefully-written letter, to the effect that he had
never repented, even for an instant, of his joining the
Church of Rome, but that he did very much repent
of the advice he gave me on this occasion.
I was now stranded, helpless, lonely, and with no
employment but the care of a few simple folk. To
divert my mind from painful and harassing thoughts,
I actually turned to the piano, and strummed out
hymn tunes — first with my forefinger, and then at
tempting chords. In the midst of this there came a

xii PREFACE
proposal to write for the ' Times ' on subjects I was
known to have at heart. It was afterwards repeated,
in one form or another, and in the spring of 1 844 I
went up to town. I soon took to the night-work,
and from that time I wrote almost daily — that is, for
portions of the year nightly — for many years. It
involved frequent journeys to town, mounted mes
sengers, sometimes daily, from the heart of Hamp
shire to Wilts, a very perfunctory performance of my
pastoral duties, and an assistant curate. I knew that
Edward Denison was aware of my employment, but
had no wish to recognise it He had already, in a
well-known charge, denounced what he deemed the
factious utterances of the ' British Critic.'
Some other circumstances, which I need not recall,
added much to my difficulties, and, on the whole, I felt
that the ground would be much clearer for everybody
if I resigned my living, which I did with a pang, as if
shedding my life's blood, and resolved, my present
difficulties over, to accept any living of 300/. a year
offered to me. My church was finished and con
secrated in 1850. In 1852 I thought Twerton might
be passed by all the actual Fellows of Oriel, and
wrote to Church to say that if it were I should be
glad of the refusal. Buckle took it.

PREFACE xiii
Thus for sixteen years I was a journalist, but often,
for long spells, doing as much clerical duty as many
who pass for residents. My work was very engrossing,
very exhausting, and, considering what else I had to
do, too much for me, not to speak of the anxieties
even a journalist can feel in the political problems
pressing for solution.
In the year 1868 I accepted the living of Plym-
tree, at once felt a passionate interest in the place,
and entered into a series of costly and difficult under
takings, more suited to a high-minded youth just
come into the savings of a long minority, than to a
sexagenarian who had never sufficiently attended to
his health, strength, and affairs. I soon became Rural
Dean, which in Devonshire is a laborious office, at
least was in Temple's time. My humour then was to
be at peace with all the world. This I soon found
impossible if a man was to do anything.
Nor were my collisions confined to my parish,
where for generations there had been those who set
themselves against anything done, or proposed, by the
rector. I had to preach a Visitation sermon, and I
put it rather strongly that the main chance for the
Church of England was a demonstration of its
beneficent character. Archdeacon Freeman did not

xiv PREFACE
agree with me. He thought the only remedy for
the evils of the present day was the exaltation and
accentuation of dogma.
Some time afterwards an attempt was made to
train the yeomen of the county in the habit of free
but well-regulated discussion in religious subjects,
and after the usual charge, the payment of fees, and
the presentments, the churchwardens were invited to
a conference. The churchwardens had nothing to
say, so the Archdeacons had it all to themselves. Free
man congratulated the churchwardens upon Convoca
tion having passed an explanation of the Athanasian
Creed, which would remove all difficulties in the way
of its use. I could not help interposing, and said
that the proposed explanation would remove no
difficulties, and that it had not been passed at
all, as the two Houses of Convocation were still
exchanging suggestions on slips of paper when the
clock struck the hour closing the session. The Arch
deacon mildly replied that on his next visit to town
he would inquire into the matter. On his next
appearance in Convocation he was advised by the
Prolocutor not to disturb sleeping lions. A church
warden told me not long after that on this occa-

PREFACE xv
sion my words flowed out of my mouth like water
out of a bucket, that being far from my usual
manner. Not long after there was a re-arrangement of the
Rural Deaneries, and I was told that Freeman had a
hand in cutting mine in two — a process in which I
had to perform the office of executioner. I emerged
from that cataclysm Rural Dean of Ottery with a
miniature cathedral, a pretty and pleasant watering-
place, and ten miles of sea-coast in my Deanery.
Some years after this, at one of our quarterly
meetings, I read a long paper recommending a
restricted and guarded use of dogmatic expressions
in hymns intended for public use, on the particular
ground that they interfered with the simplicity and
warmth of devotion. I did not expect a single voice
in my favour, and I had not a single voice. The
paper will be found constituting Chapter XXII of
this volume.
In 1880 a serious and increasing ailment led me
to resign my Devonshire rectory and to take refuge
in Cheltenham, where friends had preceded me, and
to which friends now directed me, indifferent myself
where I should go. I soon found myself with much
time on my hands, less absorbed in the present, more
a

xvi PREFACE
mindful, perhaps I might add, of the future. I felt
that my time was short, and that I must redeem it.
I was reminded that the story of the Oxford move
ment had to be told, and that none were so able to
tell it as myself. Hitherto little had come before
the public beyond the workings of one fervid and
generous nature, one fine and subtle intellect, one
prince of dialecticians. The work had to be done
under difficult conditions. I could not do it without
letting out the particular obstacles that had stood in
the way of my complete adhesion and unqualified
loyalty to the cause. This was done bluntly, in
formally, and, as some thought, offensively.
The same necessity urged me in my second set of
' Reminiscences,' with the same results. A volume on
' The Word ' necessarily trespassed on the forbidden
ground, but was more readily accepted as a specula
tion outside theology. I believe the judgment of the
public on my last work, 'The Son,' is that I never
was the man to write on such a subject ; and at my
age, and with my confessed infirmities, I was abso
lutely unfit. I am told that I have lost myself in
metaphysics, that my topics are without order, method,
or apparent design, that the reader has to find out
for himself what I am driving at, and that I am

• PREFACE xvii
occasionally irreverent, and sometimes, it is darkly
hinted, even worse.
I really have little to say in reply to these com
ments, and what I now say will be thought to justify
them, and even to constitute a necessity for laying
down my pen altogether. During the preparation
of all these four works, as well as in re-editing my
' Letters from Rome,' I have had serious, painful,
and disabling illnesses, besides ailments of a more
local or more chronic character. For one whole
month I was under continual apprehension of the
immediate loss of life, reason, or eyesight ; in which
case I should leave behind me a mass of undecipher
able, unrevised, unarranged MSS. I seemed to be
running a race with pursuing death, and as if, every
now and then, the shadow, and even the breath, of
the foe was upon me. I have little doubt these
illnesses have affected my memory, especially for
names, my apprehensive powers, my judgment, my
tact — I hope not my temper. In one illness I kept
saying to myself, ' I shall not die, but live, and
declare the works of the Lord.' Writing to a sister,
I said, ' What do you say to a saint writing a book,
correcting the proofs, and bringing it out, while
burning at the stake ? ' To myself I said, ' She will

xviii PREFACE
smile at the idea, but it is much nearer the truth in my
case than she will think.' This is not very encourag
ing as regards the volume, which, as I write this,
remains to be written, especially as I think the
anxieties attending my four publications were
probably the cause of my ailments. But the work
remains to be done, and I can only hope for the
best. There is hardly such a thing as an honest and
true biography, or autobiography either. Reason
able observers can always trace in a man's life and
works tendencies and principles of action which he
is himself ever declining to recognise. The net result
is the question. I can and will attempt to justify
what I am now proposing in this volume ; but I can
not justify having so long only dimly discovered its
necessity, having failed to follow the kindly light that
offered to lead me, and having, over and over again,
even with my eyes open, and the course compara
tively clear, put myself in a position, and brought
myself into straits, making it impossible to do, for
the present, that which I thought always incumbent
and finally inevitable. I must add that though old
age certainly does bring more leisure, more calmness,
and dispassionateness, and a larger stock of materials

PREFACE xix
at command, the correspondence arising out of my
recent works has painfully taught me that old men
are very liable to forget what they ought to re
member, and to remember what had best be for
gotten. This means that memory follows the weaker
side of the character. However that may be, I am
sure there is a work to be done, and, by God's help,
I will make what can hardly fail to be, in my case, a
final attempt to do it.

CONTENTS

PACE
I. Introduction  i
II. 'Ousia' in the Old Testament. ... g
III. ' Ousia ' in the New Testament ... 29
IV. The Eternal and Unchangeable . . . 39
V. 'Ousia' in" the Creed  44
VI. Has the Church been Evolved? . . . 57
VII. Triunity  64
VIII. The Terms of Controversy Indefinite . 69
IX. Boethius  74
X. Rome Fostering the Corruptions of the
Creed  84
XI. Anselm  92
XII. St. Bernard  103
XIII. 'Ousia' in Medieval Theology . . .113
XIV. Natural Workings of Philosophy and Creed 120
XV. An Unintelligible Creed in Place of a
Superstitious Practice . . . .131
XVI. The Reformation hurried, interrupted,
AND CUT SHORT  I37

CONTENTS

FAGB
XVII. 'Ousia-' in the Church of England . . 141
XVIII. ' Ousia ' in the Prayer Book . . . . 149
XIX. 'Ousia' in the Litany  156
XX. ' Ousia ' in the Services, Collects, and Cate
chism  164
XXI. Church Hymns  173
XXII. Read at a Meeting of the Rural Deanery
of Ottery •  204
XXIII. The Instinctive and Instantaneous . . 213
XXIV. The Sonship a Reality  221
XXV. All Goodness Relative, and under Divine
Order  225
XXVI. Temptations of Presumed Orthodoxy . . 234
XXVII. Infirmities of Goodness  240
XXVIII. The Vicar of Christ  250
XXIX. Is it Allowable to disturb Long-existing
Beliefs ?  256
XXX. Questions and Answers on the Nicene Creed 261
XXXI. What we are Coming to ... . 268
XXXII. Miraculous Encouragement . . . . 281
XXXIII. Final Appeal  292

THE CREED OR A PHILOSOPHY

i
INTRODUCTION
The question I propose to ask and to answer in this
volume is whether that which I have called ' the
Anglican Creed ' be a Creed or a Philosophy. As the
reader of these words may not have read any othei
line of my writing, it is necessary to repeat that the
Anglican Creed is that Father, Son, and Spirit are
One God ; Three Persons and One God ; the Triune
God ; One in Three, Three in One ; One God perform
ing three offices and presenting Himself in three
aspects ; and that He may with equal propriety be
addressed as God the Father, God the Son, and God
the Holy Ghost.
Is this a creed or a philosophy ? If it is a creed
it appeals to our faith ; if a philosophy, to our intel
lect. What is a creed ? The word itself has acquired
its present general use from being the first in the
so-called Apostles' Creed, which in its present form
B

2 INTRODUCTION
dates from the eighth century, and comes to us with
the authority of the Western Church, not the Eastern,
and is, accordingly, in Latin. It is simply a compen
dium of Scriptural statements, and must be accepted
by everyone who puts any faith in the Bible. We
translate the word ' I believe,' and call the whole our
' Belief.' What, then, is meant by 'belief ? Johnson
defines it : I. 'Credit given to something which we
know not of ourselves, on account of the authority
by which it is delivered.' 2. The theological virtue
of faith, or firm confidence in the truths of religion.
3. Religion, the body of tenets held by the professors
of faith. 4. Persuasion, opinion. 5. The thing
believed ; the object of belief. 6. Creed ; a form
containing the articles of faith.
The phrase ' Credo in Deum Patrem Omnipo-
tentem' is theological Latin, and it suggests the
idea of committing oneself and all one has to that
foundation. It is as when a man commits himself
and his belongings to a ship bound for a distant port,
trusting to the builders of the ship, its seaworthiness*
the captain and the crew. It is, however, a literal
rendering of the older Greek equivalent. The New
Testament, of which the Apostles' Creed may be
called a belief abstract, draws quite as much on our
faith as the Old. We believe it because we believe
the authorities, the chief of whom were St. Paul, and
his biographer, St. Luke, neither of whom, as far as

TESTIMONY OF THE TWO LATER CREEDS 3
we know, had ever seen our Lord in the flesh. They
believed, and we believe, because we are sure they
believed on good grounds, and were honest, sensible,
and trustworthy men, with ample means of verifying
what they were told and certainly under no tempta
tion to invent.
As regards the correct use of the word ' belief,'
something has to be added. The matters believed
must be of primary importance, and of intimate
relation to us. They must have a plain moral signi
ficance. Like other grand words expressive of grand
acts, the word ' believe ' is capable of depravation.
When a bad man wishes to propagate a slander and
is too cowardly to assert it as a fact within his
knowledge, he says, ' I believe such a one did or
said this.'
The origin both of the Apostles' Creed and of the
so-called Athanasian Creed is so obscure that it is
impossible to say with any certainty which is the
older in the present form — nor does it at all matter.
They testify to the co-existence of two schools or
factions in the Church, respectively concerning them
selves with the moral and the intellectual aspects of
the Christian faith — its facts and its possible theories,
its finite and its infinite bearings. On the whole, it
must be said that authority, practical importance,
and distinct relation to ourselves, are involved in the
above idea of belief — that is, of a creed.

4 INTRODUCTION
Turn we now to Philosophy : it certainly is not
necessarily always dull, for it is often very pleasant,
very fanciful, very irresponsible, and very little bur
dened with the tasks and charges laid on the
shoulders of the rank and file. It is supposed to be
always searching for the true account of matters
striking the sense as extraordinary, inconsistent, con
flicting, or suggestive of some cause or some law
not yet revealed to human knowledge. The philo
sopher is a man at large in the grandest of inter
national exhibitions — the world, to which is now
added the greater world of the ever-growing universe.
For the very reason that it is always expanding, ever
stretching its cords, it is in vain that he labours to
get behind it.
Till a few centuries ago Philosophy was hide
bound, cramped, and confined in a hollow sphere,
canopied with an illuminated firmament, and sur
rounded by an irreclaimable, impenetrable, unap
proachable chaos. Every human affair was deemed
to come chance-wise, and to offer some choice of
theories. So Philosophy indulged in abstracts, and
as boys rub pebbles together for phosphorus, it
tried to make one hard thing throw light on another.
For ages the human mind was in quest of the great
secrets that would solve all the mysteries of physical
nature or of intellectual conception. The observation
and study of actual phenomena was found to be

PURSUIT AND DISPLAY OF KNOWLEDGE 5
laborious, slow of result, full of by-paths and disap
pointments. What people wanted was something to
save them all this trouble, and reach the goal by a
royal road.
But the pursuit of knowledge itself, while one of
the noblest and most necessary employments of the
human mind, is sore beset by innumerable tempta
tions. Among these is the desire of knowledge for
the pride of knowledge, for its exhibition, for the
sense of acquisition and of power. People are not
content with that which leaves them learners. They
must have that which they can grasp, wield, measure,
and weigh ; that of which they can feel the edges and
the corners and the shape, and so be in full posses
sion. Orators, preachers, and writers are compelled
to supply this demand, often without being conscious
of it. They will disclaim, and even despise, style
and rhetorical art. They only do their best to repre
sent matters plainly, distinctly, and forcibly, leaving
truth itself to work its way on its truthful exhi
bition. But such an exhibition is not possible except
by a wholesale sacrifice of truth. It is impossible to
impart, or even to possess, perfectly distinct, solid,
and measurable ideas, bounded by hard and fast lines,
on moral questions. It is impossible so to describe
characters, policies, situations, crises, events, relations,
parties, classes, or any of the stuff that history is

6 INTRODUCTION
made of. It is impossible so to describe the smallest
possible sphere, even that of a family or a single
household. Even if there arise the necessity of a
succinct narrative, truth is not to be brought into a
nutshell without much loss of edging. Of course we
owe much to the proverbs and the maxims, in which
laborious thinkers' and multifarious actors have com
pressed and coined long experiences. But these are
apt to become the mere formalities of wisdom in the
heads and hearts of ordinary men, and truth itself
fares better in. the brilliant jewel on 'Time's fore
finger.' What now passes for philosophy does not much
help us to understand what passed for philosophy so
recently as in the Middle Ages, the philosophy that
Bacon has the credit of putting an end to by the
processes of observation, experiment, and induction.
The subjects of curiosity and inquiry in these our
days are much more generally physical than moral,
and the discovery to be made is not a virtue, a power,
or an isolated secret, but a demonstrable law reducing
any number of various facts to the greatest possible
simplicity — and if it may be, all that exists to some
one universal law, and a spark of life or an atom of
organism. Such a craving is very different from the
old craving, but it exhibits the human mind still in
quest of the key of all knowledge, that which shall
dispense with the wearisome toils of examination,

THEOLOGY IN HANDY FORMS y
comparison, and judgment ; in other words, the labour
of apprehending, remembering, and weighing a multi
tude of different facts just as they have come to us,
and waiting till time has thrown more light on them.
Religion and theology, or that which so describes
itself, still occupy a prominent place in the inquiries
of a considerable part of mankind and the practice
of a larger. The inquiry, or research as it is now
styled, is beset with the old cravings, temptations, and
difficulties. Theological conceptions cannot be uttered
or even entertained without passing at once from the
finite to the infinite, that is to the incomprehensible.
The multitude will not tolerate that which they can
only aspire to, or which they cannot touch without its
instantly escaping from their grasp. A large part of
the world must have idols ; a large part must have
national sanctities ; a large part must have rites
and ceremonies ; so will a large part insist on dog^
matic expressions which it is sufficient to utter,
and which shall save themselves and those they
wish to save, and ban those for whom they have no
such wish.
But are these philosophies ? it will be asked.
They are certainly founded on the old philosophies,
which equally aimed at reducing the sum of human
knowledge to a breath, in a few strokes of the pen.
Very early had St. Paul to warn the Church against
the knowledge that puffeth up, that is, the philosophy

8 INTRODUCTION
that had intruded into the Church and put itself in
the place of faith and charity. The men who
in those days claimed to be the monopolists of real
knowledge had some advantages over their modern
representatives. They had a more recent antiquity,
a closer firmament, a more bounded horizon, and a
smaller store of facts to be mastered. So they could
more easily people their comparatively • little world.
In these days infinity of space and time has to be
grasped if possible, and that can only be attempted
by inquiries into the Divine nature. This must
needs be in itself a cold, unemotional study, demanding
an isolation from all human entanglements. Indeed,
so it was regarded generally in the early days of the
Church, for it was the employment of monks and
hermits. But it could lend itself to the passions, to
faction, to ambition, to revenge ; and Christian philo
sophy became a more disturbing force in the political
world than its heathen predecessor had ever been, or
could ever have expected or wished to be.

II
'OUSIA' IN THE OLD TESTAMENT
The word ova-La will be new to many of my readers
and can scarcely be said to have any existence except
in the conceptions of grammarians, philosophers, and
theologians. It is a derivative of the Greek word
signifying ' to be,' and as much a form of that word
as a participle or a supine is. In common converse
we never say ' I am,' ' You are,' or ' He is ' without
adding a word which grammarians call the predicate.
But ' being ' has often a distinct and independent
sense, as when we might ask ¦ What does this being
owe his being to ? ' In no form whatever, either
simple or compound, or abbreviated or changed, has
the word ' ousia ' entered the English language. It
was never adopted into Latin ; nor is it here neces
sary to consider how far it is represented by the
words ' essence,' ' substance,' ' existence,' or by such
expressions as the ' Nature of God.'
Starting thus, as ' ousia ' does, by necessary deflec
tions from a verb usually employed as a necessity of
intelligible speech, it may be said that no word has

lo 'OUSIA' IN THE OLD TESTAMENT
performed, or now performs, a more important part
in the history and present state of the Church and
the world. It has largely contributed to create a
gulf that cannot be passed between the East and
the West, between the Primitive Church and all
succeeding ages, between the Gospel and theology,
between the unlearned and the learned, between the
poor and the rich, between those in whom the
Gospel allays a hunger and a thirst and those to
whom it is an amusement, a battle-field, an arena, or
a market. Even now, in these latter days, we have
to ask, with regard to this word, What is this
Ousia ? Nay, Who is it ? For the Church of
England bids us address our prayers, our litanies,
our songs, our confessions, our vows, and other devo
tions to the Ousia as distinctly as to the Father, the
Son, and the Spirit.
I am not ashamed to confess that I do not even
know how to spell this all-important word. By one
of the severest rules of the old grammarians the
Greek ov becomes u in Latin. ' Usia,' therefore, is
the right spelling. But the theologians and the
historians have thought fit to set the grammarians
at naught, and to retain the Greek diphthong in the
words ' Homoousian ' and ' Homoiousian.' They
lead the way, and I must follow.
It must be premised that in the time of the great
Hebrew Lawgiver, which is but thirty-four centuries

ASSYRIA, ARABIA, AND EGYPT n
ago, or forty times the life of the present writer, there
were, and had been for centuries, a considerable num
ber and variety of religious beliefs and customs in
the world. Indeed, the number and variety make it
scarcely possible to accept unreservedly the received
genealogies and the chronology founded upon them.
Of these religious systems those that appear in
the front of both sacred and profane history are the
Assyrian, the Arabian, and the Egyptian.
Of these the Assyrian retained the idea of a
Supreme Being, but with a fatal tendency to raise
the king or the emperor to an almost equal place
among the Divine Powers, and with the debasing cor
ruption of practice always found in a large, -mixed,
and prosperous population. Arabia was intensely
monotheistic, but peopling the heavens and eternity
with sons of God and spiritual agencies much in
terested in this our creation, and taking their respec
tive parts in our affairs. The tradition that the
Pentateuch was written by Moses while in the wilder
ness of Sinai testifies at least to the faith and religion
prevailing in his time. The Egyptians received from
a remote age a belief in absolutely existing deities,
unchangeable in their natures, universal in their-
dominion, in full command of the elements, and pre
siding over an enormous crowd of subordinate divini
ties. As in Assyria, their social condition had an
overwhelming tendency to corruption of morals and

12 'OUSIA' IN THE OLD TESTAMENT
consequently of belief; but several recorded inscrip
tions — especially one over a famous temple of Isis —
testified to a Supreme, Almighty, Infinite, undis-
coverable, Self-existent Deity, compared with whom
all that were called gods were only delegations, sub
ordinates, or simply forms. It is clear there was
one faith, or philosophy, for the educated and the
initiated, and another — indeed, many others — for the
people who wanted only spectacles, amusements,
occasional rest from labour, and breaks in the mono
tonous toil of agriculture or public works.
Of all the changes known to history there is none
so frequent, none so intelligible, as that from the
simple faith, or the simple idea, to the superstitious.
We have need only to look around us to find the
cue to the old labyrinth of multitudinous inventions.
By the institution of caste, by the laws of moral
refraction, and by the madness of competition, every
city in Egypt came to have its Deity and its fes
tival, its observances and priesthood. There was a
continuous round of ceremonies as attractive, as seduc
tive, as they could be made, and appealing irresistibly
to the imagination and the sense. With the melan
choly desert on one side, and the liveliest of people
on the other, the Children of Israel could not but
suffer much moral contamination in spite of their
singular obstinacy upon comparatively indifferent
matters. While they were really much at one with

THE GREAT LAWGIVER 13
the Egyptians in the religious ideas derived from all
time, like their neighbours they were always under
a temptation to make compromises between reason
and sense ; to catch the fleeting joys of the day, alike
heedless of the past and improvident of the future,
and feeling more certainty in the seen than in the
unseen. It is to the Great Lawgiver himself that we have
to look, in the first instance, for the history of the
world and the revelation of the Deity, leading . up to
the establishment of the one chosen race. No other
authority has yet superseded him ; no other record
has yet taken the place of the Pentateuch. If we
are not content with that, we are left with nothing at
all. If we must conclude that the greater part of
the book was collected, compiled, and rewritten only
a few centuries before the Christian era, in the time
and place of the Captivity, that is only to connect the
traditions of Assyria, Egypt, and Arabia into one
library, as it has been called, and, as must be added,
into one singularly consistent, sacred, and religious
form. It is a remarkable fact, and has had but scant
justice done to it by even religious writers, that while
the other records of Assyria and Egypt abound with
ridiculous and frivolous details, as if the object of the
writers was to amuse at any price, there is nothing
whatever of the kind in the Bible.
Then how did Moses describe the Deity, with

14 'OUSIA' IN THE OLD TESTAMENT
whom the Covenant of Works was made ? The reader
will possibly be aware of a widely organised design
to represent that Deity as the head of a family, a
household God, the God of a people, a racial, or
national God, such as the great cities and states of
the heathen world had in one form or another, and at
constant variance the one with the other. The design
of these ingenious writers is to establish by careful
suppression, addition, diminution, and exaggeration,
the ncjw favourite theory of evolution, from the lower
to the higher conception of the Deity, indeed, from
the physical to the intellectual and moral.
The Deity described by Moses was the Creator
and Preserver of the whole universe and of mankind,
to whom He granted, under conditions, the dominion
over all the earth and all brute nature. He taught
mankind duty, inculcated obedience, punished de
fault, gave hope of a return to favour, and provided
the means. This spirit struggled for ages with man's
violence and lawlessness. Again He punished the'
human race, with a reservation and hope of retrieval.
When the world combined, as it has often since com
bined, to raise the works of man and the political or
social state above all proportion, God came down, and
scattered the family across the surface of the world,
thereby founding many nations in place of one. From
time to time He sent good and bad harvests, bless
ings, and visitations, and not only to one race, but to

FITFULNESS OF SCRIPTURE HISTORY 15
the whole world, and all conducive to one great object,
the final elevation of mankind. In a very remarkable
manner, and by a series of incidents to this day not
surpassed by any fabricated story, He made the
chosen people, and one member of it, the saviour of
Egypt, and the founder of its economic system, its
financial resources, and its mercantile position in the
world. One remarkable feature of the sacred record is its
alternate periods of illumination and of darkness. The
children of Israel, declared from the days of Abraham
to be the objects of special love, alike blessing and
blessed, appear and almost disappear in the history,
or only appear now and then in the incidents of a tribe,
a family, or a single career. There is little continuity
but much congruity in the narrative. The identity of
the people is found in domestic details, in rites, cere
monies, and customs, and in the relation established
with neighbouring races. The religious ideas of the
people are to.be found by comparison with those of
the surrounding world, as much as from the poetry or
annals directly composed for the purpose.
For some hundred years there is an awful and
mysterious blank. Israel in Egypt was like a man
passing through a long and painful illness, that so
effectually deprives him of all power of observation,,
reflection, memory, action, prder, and judgment,
that he cannot even remember his existence during

1 6 ' OUSIA' IN THE OLD TESTAMENT
the period. It was literally a furnace of affliction,
a bondage depriving the sufferer of his very self.
For generations the Hebrews were outsiders, mal
contents, and nonconformists. Indeed, they were
all this everywhere, and the most probable meaning
of the name Hebrew is Protestant. They retained
their original customs, their pastoral habits, their
lunar reckoning of time. That calendar had been
rectified by solar observation when Abraham and
his father left Ur of the Chaldees, but they brought
with them the older form. It was again rectified by
the Egyptian astronomers to a closer agreement
with the solar period between the time of Joseph and
of Moses, but the shepherd people still adhered to
their old shepherd's calendar.
This peculiarity, as far as it goes, seems to coun
tenance the opinion that the children of Israel re
garded the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob
simply as the God of their race, even as other races
had their respective patrons and protectors in the
heavens, and occasionally showing themselves. But
it is the way of all the world, especially of England,
to regard the Almighty both as the Maker and
Judge of all mankind, and also as specially and pre
eminently interested in the safety, power, and pro
sperity of one nation in particular. The national
hymn of this country, the one in which all join,
takes for granted that the enemies of England are

MOSES WITH THE PRIEST OF MIDI AN \y
also the enemies of God, and that He may be
reckoned on to take the English side in all quarrels.
It is not that we regard Him as less than almighty,
nor less than universal, equal, merciful, and just in
His relation with His creatures, but rather because
we do not think about it. The simple fact of our
asking His ready and effective interference implies
that we suppose Him almighty, all wise, and all
good. Were it ever put to an Englishman he would
indignantly disclaim all thought of regarding God
as a family God, a tribal God, or a national God.
After many years of oppression, culminating in a
law for the annihilation of the servile but still re
bellious race, and meanwhile the forced appropria
tion of its services, Moses appears on the scene.
Through an extraordinary chain of circumstances, he
acquires all the wisdom of Egypt at its court, which
would be the very central school of its religion and
philosophy. There, too, he would see the incon
sistency and hypocrisy of the political system. At
full age he conceived the project of rescuing his
race from an abominable tyranny which was a stand
ing reproach to his brethren, his forefathers, and his
Maker. He shows his hand too plainly, and has to
fly to the arid and almost desert land of Midian,
where he immediately finds a home and a wife with
a priest of the most high God.
There, so runs the only record, he remained for
C

1 8 'OUSIA' IN THE OLD TESTAMENT
forty years under the heavens, which there alone
show the glory of God, and the firmament that nightly
displays His handiwork, and in that darkness which
is no darkness to Him or His servants. There, free
from ceremonies, festivals, and inventions, he could
feel the Almighty both far and near, in the awful
solitude,, the mysterious horror, and the sublime
aspiration. There he could daily hear the simple
traditions current in converse or engraven on the rock.
that had been read and studied for many generations;
with no other literature. In that changeless region
there is one object almost absolutely constant — the
grandest emblem of divinity, but not itself divine ;
the life-giver, yet never losing vital power ; con
suming, but never consumed ; an inexhaustible
treasury ; the maker of the paradise and of the
desert. This was the sun,, of whom the Roman
poet says, ' Aliusque et idem semper nasceris.'
How could it remain the same from age to age with
out diminution or change. Even in populous cities
and cultivated plains the ancients made frequent
comparisons between the labours, the defaults, and
the incapabilities of the moon, and the unchange-
ableness ofthe sun. The sun never failed to give light
enough for work and safety in his allotted hours ; but
when there was no, moon at night the Desert was
a black and hideous darkness, often with wild beasts
prowling around the tent or the sheep-fold. In a

THE FATHER OF LIGHTS 19
moment of inspiration, as of devotional fervour,
Moses might well be assured that the Almighty, or
His angel, spake to him through the most constant,
most glorious, most beneficent of His created things.
Such an opinion IcannOt think an impiety, though it
is plainly gratuitous and needless, and it does not put
the Almighty out of the question, for we have still to
ask -who made the emblem, and who conveyed its
meaning and its force and its special significance to the
heart of Moses at that particular juncture, and who
gave him the courage to act upon the sudden call. The
earnest and hearty ' brother of our Lord,' after re
ferring sadly and kindly to the burning heat of the
sun, which is no sooner ' risen but it withereth the
grass, and the flower thereof faileth, and the grace
of the fashion of it perisheth,' x is immediately led to
speak of the Father of lights, from Whom comes
every good gift and every perfect gift, and with
whom there is no variableness, neither shadow of
turning. I have to say at once that I cannot give more
than a momentary glance at the vast mass of litera
ture on the name, or names, of God or gods. At
my time of life what I learned to-day I should have
forgotten to-morrow, or only retained in some, dim
confused form. I cannot go, farther back than the
New Testament and the Septuagint. The latter was
1 James i. 11. c 2

ao 'OUSIA' IN THE OLD TESTAMENT
often quoted by our Lord, by the Evangelists, and
the Apostles, and cannot but be an unquestionable
authority upon the beliefs of the more believing and
more religious Jews at the Christian era. There is
no reason to suppose that the ordinary pious Jews
of the time troubled themselves with any critical
questions of authorship, composition, or compilation.
In regular course the books were read in their
synagogues, and the Psalms sung according to the
traditional usage.
It is enough that, while tending his father-in-law's
sheep in the midst of awful scenery, Moses became
suddenly conscious of a Divine presence, and heard a
voice summoning him to a conference as on holy
ground. It was the God of Abraham, Isaac, and
Jacob who now declared Himself, and commanded
Moses without further delay to proceed to the
execution of his long-cherished design for the
deliverance of Israel, with instructions how to set
about it, and with the assurance that he would
succeed. But he had at once to convey a message
to the people, who had only known him as an
agitator, a rebel, and a fugitive. By what name was
. the sender of the message to be known ? Egypt
was full of sacred names, for every town there had
its god, and its temple, and its oracle. According to
our Authorised Version : ' God said unto Moses, I AM
THAT I AM : and He said, Thus shalt thou say unto

/ AM HE THAT IS 21
the children of Israel, I AM hath sent me unto
you.' Probably there are no- words in the English Bible
that have acquired so strong a hold on the English
mind, and that give so deep an impression of mystic
— indeed, insoluble — significance. As a nation, we
are easily satisfied with words we do not understand,
and are apt to quarrel with those who would put a
definite construction upon them. It cannot be said
that the words as they stand in our Bible are so
plain but that two meanings — indeed, several — may
be put on them. A captious critic may say they
mean nothing at all, for everything is what it is. So
that tells you nothing. But no pious mind will allow
the words to be designed to baffle our understandings.
They must be intended to convey something. How
does the passage stand, then, in the Septuagint ? It is,
' I AM HE THAT IS,' and ' He THAT IS hath sent me
unto you.' Surely there can be no doubt as to the
meaning of these words. They must mean, I am
He that really and truly exists ; the only one who
so exists ; not a sharer or receiver of existence ; not
one of the many gods the children of Israel have
been hearing of and have been compromising them
selves with. I am He who called your ancestors
away from the false religions of Chaldaea, Padan
Aram, and Canaan. In like manner I now call you
to escape from the contagion and corruption of

22. 'OUSIA'' IN THE OLD TESTAMENT
Egypt; . Thus the point of the answer given : to
Moses is the absolute and sole mode of existence
of the Supreme. So, again, in the 90th Psalm, where
we read in our version, ' From everlasting to ever
lasting Thou art God,' the passage in the Septua
gint ,ruris, ' From age to age Thou art.'
The Revised Version offers in the margin several
alternative translations, upon which I can offer no
opinion, as that would require some knowledge of
Oriental languages, specially of Hebrew tenses.
These are as follows: 'I AM BECAUSE I AM ; 'I
am Who am' ; 'I will be that I will be' ; 'I
WILL BE.' The second and third of these alternatives
are rendered by Poole, Ero qui ero. Now, is there
any new revelation of the nature of the Supreme
Being in these words ? Do they add to the numerous
Divine manifestations and interventions in the history
of man and of all creation recorded by Moses, and
commonly supposed to have been gathered and com
piled by him in the wilderness before this great
event ? The children of Israel were recalled to their
first faith, and commanded, as on several occasions
afterwards, to purge themselves of all Egyptian
leaven, to stamp out Egyptian idolatry, to roll away
the reproach of Egypt.
The popular religion of Egypt was now a deifica
tion of all created things, from the monarch and from
the Nile itself, down to the smallest flying or creeping

DERIVATION OF 'OUSIA 23
thing. Such a religion could present no barrier against
the continual inroad of foolish fancies and abominable
practices. There was no reality or constancy about
it. It would change from place to place, from year
to year. The God of Israel was, and would -be,
that which He had ever been everywhere. Scholars
tell us that in the Hebrew the future is here used
because it embraces the present and the past. But
it must be added that while we cannot conceive the
eternal past or infinite present, and only make
the attempt to find ourselves on the brink of a dark
and hideous void, we can and do conceive the infinite
future, for the simple reason that it is the work of
our lives to contemplate the future, and advance into
it. But let it be observed, again, we are here told
nothing ofthe nature of God, nothing of a supposed God
head attributable to different persons'. The declaration
is as simple as words could make it, and no more than
the occasion required. In the Septuagint the same
verb occurs in two deflections, the indicative and
the participle, from the latter of which the word
' Usia ' is immediately derived, signifying the being
of a Being. In the 90th Psalm, ascribed by tradition
to Moses, the indicative only is- used, but in the
sense of absolute and unchangeable self-existence,
while in Exodus it rather attaches to the participle.
In these days any questions dealing with the text
of Exodus will receive a summary treatment. If it

24 'OUSIA' IN THE OLD TESTAMENT
is a purely speculative matter when or where or by
whora or from what materials the book was written
or compiled, then any particular passage must ' share
the general uncertainty. I cannot undervalue or
deprecate such inquiries — indeed, they are to me
most interesting ; but, knowing what I do of the
literary manner, tradition, and practice, I have to
content myself with, probabilities. I feel sure that
there did occur in a definite and particular form that
which is recorded in Exodus and also that which is
recorded in the Gospel according to St. John. In
the course of this century the distinctive character pf
the Almighty declared at the Burning Bush has
received great illustration from the researches of-
Egyptologists. The special wisdom of Egypt in
which Moses had been instructed was undoubtedly
not its polytheism of popular practice, but its theism,
its central truth of an absolute Self-existent, Maker
and Preserver of all things, King of kings and Lord
of lords, Judge of all men, exercising a moral
government over the whole world, and holding His
own for ever and ever.
There Can be little doubt that from the remotest
period within our knowledge there was in every
religion and every philosophy- such an inner school
and inner circle holding the tradition of a Supreme
Self-existent. The Egyptians must have known it
to be the central and fundamental faith of the strange

THE LORD OF ALL LIFE 25
people occupying the borderland between them and
monotheistic Arabia, though they might doubt
whether He was the sworn protector of one chosen
race hardly seeming to deserve that distinction.
Pharaoh quailed at the mention of One for whom
there was no name that man could venture to pro
nounce. He demurred, indeed ; and had to be
taught by the most terrible demonstrations that the
Power with whom he was now face to face was
absolute Master of all the elements of nature, earth
and sky, fire and water, even of the heaven-descended
Nile, of the ripening harvests, and every class of
animal life, from the minutest and most multitudinous
to the highest, rarest, and most precious, the first-born
of him that sat on the throne.
That Pharaoh should recognise the one, true,
omnipotent God, yet hesitate to recognise His actual
presence and interposition, so far from being strange,
is the almost universal attitude of the highly-edu
cated, even if they combine strong religious sentiment
with sound philosophy. There are philosophers, not
without a certain piety, who hold the first Cause
answerable for the government of the world, and both
able and ready to vindicate His system, to amend its
aberrations, and to repair its seeming failures without
human aid. On the other hand, there are theolo
gians, so styled, who hold the first clause of the
Apostles' Creed as a sublime philosophy ; the second

26 'OUSIA' IN THE OLD TESTAMENT
clause as an historical summary of some events con
stituting a' new creation about two thousand years
ago, and at once taxing our faith and demanding it;
the third as a grand ecclesiastical theory — all three
leaving us much at liberty to do what we please
under existing circumstances.
To my great loss, I am unacquainted with Hebrew,
and cannot get behind the Septuagint. But if that
is to be confided in, surely the passage of Isaiah
xliii. ,10, in the Authorised Version, 'that ye may
know and believe Me, and understand that I am He,'
ought to be rendered, ' that I AM.' So, again, Psalm
xc. 2 would be rendered ' From everlasting to ever
lasting Thou art.'
Critics who think it worth while may reply that they
have no objection to the rendering, for all three pass
ages referred to were written at the same time and place,
that is at Babylon. But that only introduces us to a
new question, viz., the influence of the Oriental philo
sophy and faith upon the Egyptian, whereby the latter
was saved from that utter deterioration threatened by
its African affinities. The popular religion of Egypt
was the worship of the creature as representing in its
innumerable forms the power, the wisdom, and the
goodness ofthe Creator ; but that could not but tend to
every variety of corruption, and the result was a people
holding an ancient heritage of sublime truths, and a
grand tradition fortified by the grandest edifices, the

WHO OR WHAT IS THAT WHICH IS? 27
most sumptuous establishments and the most gorgeous
ceremonies, combined with an unequalled social and
political degradation. It was the successive" foreign
element, the Greek, the Jew, and the Christian, that
finally saved Egypt and gave it a place among the
nations, making Alexandria for centuries the seat of
literature, philosophy,. and faith.
Now, what or who is this mystery of mysteries,
this innermost core of all religions and all theories,
this ever-recurrent visitor from another world, reap
pearing again and again, exploded by one generation
to return triumphant in another ? ' Who is He ? ' the
believer can ask. ' What is it ? ' asks the philo
sopher. Both questions were answered from the
' Burning Bush ' in the words ' I am He that is.' We
cannot really say what God is, if by that we mean His
nature and inner being. We can only know Him by
His works, as they come within our finite sphere and
finite apprehension. "The Christian must brave the
charge of Agnosticism if he is challenged to describe
the being, the nature, and the attributes of Him
whom the question supposes to have existed before
all creation and apart from it. He knows what God
has done and is doing and will do, and that is enough
for him. Indeed, he cannot say or conceive more.
Virgil was well acquainted with the Septuagint,
and it is possible he may have had in his mind
the verb, with the texts in which it occurs, in several

28 'OUSIA' IN THE OLD TESTAMENT
passages of remarkable force : ' Sum pius .-Eneas,'
' Troja fuit,' ' His ego nee metas rerum, nee tempora
pono ; imperium sine fine dedi.' The verb ' to be ' is
usually supposed to depend for its meaning entirely
on that which is affirmed or denied ; that is, to have
no meaning in itself. It is supposed to require a
distinct predicate, expressed or implied. But Virgil
uses the word with a negative force for ceasing to
exist, as Homer had done the equivalent word.

29

III
'OUSIA' IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
The only appearance of this word in the New Testa
ment is in two successive verses of the Parable of
the Prodigal Son. It there designates first the
'living' which the Prodigal Son compelled his
father to divide with him, and in the next verse
the ' substance ' which he immediately proceeded to
throw away on his bad associates. But, though little
used by itself, it had already entered into the com
position of important words, notably of a word signi
fying, according to the context, liberty of action
privilege, authority, power, an angelic order, or a
veil worn by a woman to signify that she was under
proper protection.
It is also used as the composition of a word which
occurs in both St. Matthew's and St. Luke's version of
the ' Lord's Prayer,' and which remains the subject
of a controversy sufficiently difficult to allow the
Roman theologian to render the clause ' Give us this
day our supersubstantial bread,' that is, our spiritual
bread, food for our souls as well as for our bodies. For

30 'OUSIA' IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
my own part I cannot wholly give up this solution of
what remains a real difficulty, and if it sounds like a
surprise, or a mystery where that was not to be
expected, so, too, did our Lord's use of the verb
itself in his controversy with the Pharisees in the
Temple. I must also add that I feel myself haunted, as it
were, by the reflection that the word ousia in the
parable and epiousion in the Lord's Prayer are
Divine utterances, proceeding from the lips of our
Lord, while the exousia, signifying a system of
authority, or of delegation from a higher to a lower1
rank of obedience', was addressed directly to Him.
Is the parable prophetic as well as retrospective, and
as well as bearing upon the inner life of every soul ?
May it suggest the distribution, the squandering of
Divinity among the countless creations of fancy
appetite, superstition, tradition, and downright im
posture, in all ages ? Does it encourage the expec
tation of a universal return of a wandering world to
the forgiving Father and his sympathetic Son ?
In the Gospel according to St. John we read that
in the third year of our Lord's ministry, the year
before the Passion, our Lord's disciples had become
impatient of what seemed a retreat, indeed, an aban
donment of His cause in Galilee, and urged a visit to
Jerusalem at the approaching Feast of Tabernacles.
They were aware that it would be attended with

BEFORE ABRAHAM WAS, I AM 31
danger, for that His usual opponents, unable other
wise fo confute Him, or to counteract His teaching,
were seeking His life. Our Lord sent them up to the
Feast, but at the Feast made His usual appearance
in the Temple, and, as was customary, delivered ad
dresses to the assembled people revealing His mission
and authority. The Pharisees replied to the effect
that it all rested on His own opinion of Himself, for
He could show neither authority nor mission, and
could not pretend to be a greater man than Abra
ham, who did not promise eternal life, and who had
died himself like other men. Thus challenged to a
comparison, arid while the attention of His hearers
were fixed on their great forefather and his high
place in God's favour and intention, our Lord closed
His case with an averment of surpassing interest and
importance : ' Verily, verily, I say unto you, before
Abraham was, I am.'
There can be no doubt that our Lord was here
quoting the declaration heard from the Burning
Bush. As, too, He did often quote the Septuagint,
it is probable that He did so on this occasion. Ac
cording to the received text the only word quoted is
the first, the indicative present, but it evidently would
necessarily have a much larger range of time than
the present tense, as commonly used, and, to an in
definite extent, it implies the sense attaching to the
participle in the Mosaic narration. Our Lord. claims an

32 'OUSIA' IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
existence further back than human record, genealogies,
fixed conditions, and creations, for there is no limit, and
an indefinite future, an existence infinitely more real
and abiding than that possessed by man, or attribu
table to any of the fictitious imaginings and traditional
divinities of Egypt, Greece, or Rome. The astound
ing extent of the claim was at once apprehended by
the Jews who heard it. They regarded it as blas
phemy : ' Then took they up stones to throw at Him.'
It is not necessary to suppose that they had any
distinct apprehension of our Lord's words, or that
they agreed among themselves as to the interpreta
tion of the words. The idea of pre-existence, involv
ing transmigration of souls, was prevalent among the
Jews, and would itself carry the range of possibili
ties very far back. It could not be this alone that
offended the hearers on this occasion. The offence
was the appropriation of the word ' I am,' itself witta
out meaning, but full of meaning in the use of it in
these two old and new passages.
Nor is it possible for us to put any exact con
struction on these passages and their relation to one
another. We cannot comprehend the Father. We
cannot comprehend the Eternal Son. We cannot
comprehend the relation of the Father and the Son,
created as we are. We cannot get out of creation.
To use an old illustration, we only break our wings
against the bars of our cage. The mere attempt sup-

HUMAN AND DIVINE CONSCIOUSNESS 33
poses a definite estimation and conception of our
Lord's conscious and actual co-operation in all the
works of the Eternal Father.
The human mind is incapable of conceiving that
during this argument with the Jews in the Temple
He was at the same time really conscious of every
thing going on in the whole universe, and the move
ment of every atom, the thoughts of every intelligent
being in it. But if it be a pious folly to go designedly
beyond the limits imposed by the laws of our own
physical nature, it is an impious folly to stop any
where, and an impious tyranny to insist on others
stopping at any point we may choose to name. Our
only escape from such folly and such wickedness is to
hold our tongue and to abstain from language that
in our case cannot possibly have a meaning. While
it is scarcely possible to doubt that His answer to
the Jews was intended to close the controversy by
an appeal to the Burning Bush, and to leave an
awful revelation of Himself to be pondered over, it
is not less apparent that He designedly stopped
far short of the declaration made to Moses. ' I was
before Abraham ' is a very different thing from ' I
am the only really and truly existent — the one source
of all existence, the one unchangeable in a universe
of change.' It is true that the later declaration was quite as
much an appeal to faith and a trial of faith as the
D

34 'OUSIA' IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
earlier, for nothing could well be more improbable,
in itself, than that the Galilean mechanic who had
suddenly appeared from the outer darkness of a
despised province, and gathered round himself an
ignorant and credulous crowd of followers, all of the
humblest rank, should be earlier in time and greater
in precedence than Abraham, and able to confer not
merely a few years' enjoyment of an earthly inherit
ance, but the sure possession of a happy immortality,
The Jews fully realised this immense difference,
and their sense of it would be but inadequately
expressed by the exclamations ' Abraham is dead,
and the Prophets are dead;' 'thou art not yet
fifty years old.' Still the matter we have to deal
with is not so much what the Jews thought or felt,
as what our Lord says, and He certainly does not
here say of Himself that He is the one eternal and
only true and real existent. The more closely we
connect the two declarations, the more do we find it
necessary to discriminate between them.
Our Lord never claimed to be Himself the source
and original of what He said or did. He never
claimed inherent power or authority. He claimed a
mission, a mandate, a divine and singular relation,
the privilege of a certain access to the Father with an
immediate response, and the certainty of a perfect
correspondence and agreement between His inten
tions and the will of the Father. What He claimed,

WHO SPOKE FROM THE BURNING BUSH? 35
and did, and said, He taught. He taught us all to
do and to say nothing as of ourselves, but only as,
with our best endeavours, we may discover what the
Father of all wishes us to do and say.
But some of the Fathers, and a long line of
theologians, have held that, by the use of the word
I am, our Lord declared Himself to be Him who
spoke from the Burning Bush. These Fathers and
theologians proceed on the supposition that every
Divine communication and appearance is to be
ascribed immediately to the Word, the Son of God,
whom, indeed, they would thus make absolutely one
with the Father. Whatever to the sense and appre
hension of man comes from heaven, they say, is a
Word of God, and, as there can be only one Word,
so they all constitute the Word.
It certainly cannot be necessary to come to such
a conclusion, for, under the Divine Providence, by far
the greater number of Christian people have been
under a necessity not to come to it, having not even
heard of it, and being certain not to entertain it.
They take Scripture as it stands, and as it must
stand to simple-minded men. True, there are matters
to be explained to them, and questions best left un
answered when it really does not matter whether
they are answered. Theologians themselves, when
they have a theory to defend, will take an authority
at his word, or not, as they please. D 2

36 'OUSIA' IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
When the Protomartyr speaks of the voice from
the Burning Bush, the Deliverer of the Law to Moses,
the Guide through the wilderness, and the Conqueror
of Canaan, as the Angel of God, these authorities pro
nounce that such a Personage must be the Son of God,
and as such the one Almighty. Accordingly when it is
stated that Stephen saw, in the rapture of his martyr
dom, the glory of God, and the Son of God standing
on the right hand of God, they argue that the Omni
present cannot have a right and a left, and that what
Stephen saw must have been God Himself in His
glory. What, then, is to be said of the utterances which,
to human sense and apprehension, came down from
heaven, directly to, or concerning, the Son ? How
are we to understand, ' This is my beloved Son, in
whom I am well pleased ; ' ' This is my beloved Son,
hear Him ; ' ' I have both glorified it, and will glorify
it again,' of which last words our Lord said, ' This
voice came not because of Me, but for your sakes ' ? '
If we do not take Scripture as it stands, leaving
apparent inconsistencies to those who have theories
to invent or to maintain, we have not much to say to
those still more critical, still more imperious, still more
courageous readers who are prepared fo explain away
the sacred record altogether, on the ground of its
impossibility, improbability, or inconsistency. We
1 John xii. 26.

WERE NOT THESE QUESTIONS OF FAITH? 37
certainly lead the way, and begin the breach through
which the rising flood of unbelief will soon deluge
the land.
Nevertheless, and after all, it must be borne in
mind that there are two distinct questions before us,
in whatever order we may choose to take them. There
is the question of the mode of existence, whether
original and absolute, or derivative and conditional ;
and there is also the question raised by the mode
of declaration. It may be truly said of the One
Almighty that He was before the days of Abraham,
and we might suppose it the will of God to say that
much and no more, leaving faith and love to discover
what was left untold. So they who believe that our
Lord could truly have said that He was the One only
and truly existent may argue that He would certainly
not have been believed by any one of His hearers, all
of them being utterly unprepared for the declaration,
and incapable of comprehending it, insomuch that it
would have precluded all further communication
even with His own most believing and most loving
disciples. Were these questions of philosophy or of faith?
Was either the former revelation at the Burning Bush
or the latter in the Temple an appeal to the intellect
or to the religious sentiment of those to whom it was
delivered ? In both cases the whole surroundings and
circumstances point to the one object of winning the

38 'OUSIA' IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
obedience, the loyalty, the hearty submission of the
soul at a great crisis of deliverance on the one hand,
impending doom on the other. In both cases the
deliverer had to show himself, and, so to speak,
deliver his credentials sufficient for the occasion.
In both cases it was an appeal to faith, to a right-
faith, and a properly educated faith. It does not
peremptorily demand to know everything, to compre
hend the whole matter, to put the informant on trial
and seek occasion to discredit and dishonour him, to
prove him an impostor, or what not. It is content to
take the averment as far as it goes, leaving the de
nouement to time. It does not go out of its way
to invent a new issue to put the question upon. It
does not search for a question that cannot be answered.
Even if it be conceded that it is difficult — indeed, very (
difficult — to apprehend the distinctness and relation of
the two voices in this matter, is that too great a trial
for faith to undergo ? Must it cut the matter short
by roughly concluding that the two who thus severally
announced themselves must be one and the same?
Must it jump at the conclusion that the less must
comprise the greater, the undefined part the infinite
whole ? Is it not rather bound to ponder over these
things, till it is better informed, and has more of that
knowledge which comes from above ?

39

IV
THE ETERNAL AND UNCHANGEABLE
They who would make it a chief part of religion to
keep the eyes fixed on the Ousia, have to be reminded
that, in one form or other, every faith has its Ousia,
that is, its eternal, imperishable, incorruptible element.
Some have believed that there were eternal ingredi
ents in matter, even if mixed with the perishable
and infected with evil, yet reducible to order. The
Epicureans contemplated with a scientific pleasure,
even if with excusable envy, an order of beings who
had no affairs, nothing to call business of their own ;
and, happily for themselves, no right or power to take
any part in the affairs of mortals below. Accord
ingly, a Greek or a Roman philosopher would specu
late on the happy condition of those exalted beings
as he would on that of the possible inhabitants in
the moon and the planets. Oriental caste is a varia
tion of the same religious idea, exhibiting at least
the unchangeable element as prevailing over the
changeable. But when the eternal is dissociated from
the moral, it can only be by robbing the Almighty of
His moral aspect and even of His spiritual.

40 THE ETERNAL AND UNCHANGEABLE
The material philosopher has also his eternal and
unchangeable, even if he credit it with creative and
conservative functions. He regards the great physical
laws and elements as eternal and incorruptible. They
are the Ousise of his faith. Conditional as man is, and
tethered by sense to a fixed place and time, he finds
it simply impossible to regard gravitation, momen
tum, chemical elements, light, heat, electricity, as
coming into existence either suddenly or by de
grees, or in any conceivable manner. Christians who1
found their faith on the Bible are content to leave
such questions alone, but the physical philosopher is
ever casting such difficulties in their face, and de
manding a solution, independent of Scripture and
creed-. Gaining, as he thinks, a victory on this ground,
he pushes his advance further, and pretends to find a
sufficient explanation of all moral questions on the
physical basis.
The reply to this enormous pretension is not by
depreciating science, or disregarding its moral bear
ings. If besides the immutable elements of nature —
that is, immutable as far as we know — there are moral
elements constantly in fervid and even violent, action,
and also that which is widely held to be Divine in
terference and a revelation, these have claims to our
regard not only just but also highly important and
not to be disregarded without certain loss and un
known danger. Ifa man wish not so much to wor-

HUMILIATION AND GLORY 41
ship a marble statue as to be himself turned into
stone, not so much to be a philosopher as to be him
self undefinable, he cannot do it better than by bestow
ing his whole regards and affections on those attri
butes of the Deity which are beyond all human
compreheiision. It is to make a great gulf between
us and that Eternal who by the almost unanimous
consent of all ages and climes is not so remote from
us, or so indifferent to us, but that He is now and
ever acting upon us.
The theologians of this age warn the less initiated
in the tone of rebuke that they are apt to dwell on
the humiliation of Christ rather than on His glory, the
glory that he had ever had with the Father, and the
glory He received on His victory. What a theologian
includes in the ' humiliation ' is best known to himself.
Surely we need not regard the whole work of Christ,
His life, His passion, His intercessions for us while in
the flesh, His doctrine, His example, as humiliation.
Surely we are not bound to deem it safer to dwell
on that which passes understanding than on that
which all can understand. Surely it is not necessary
to regard the plainest teaching and the simplest ex
ample to be dangerous, and the rifts in the darkness
separating us from the Eternal the only objects of a
laudable curiosity, the only safe ground of religious
Conviction, the only matter good for the cure of
souls. At all events, nothing is to be gained by

42 THE ETERNAL AND UNCHANGEABLE
underrating that which must ever remain the most
prominent, the most moving, and the most affecting
of all human records, the story told by the Evangelists*
supplemented, so Gpd willed it, by the life and writings1
of the Apostle to the Gentiles.
In all matters whether of earth or of Heaven there
is one rule always to be observed. It is the rule of
proportion. Nothing must be pressed beyond its place,
nothing must be allowed to exclude or overshadow the
rest, and so to monopolise our limited powers of atten
tion and observance. Neither the finite nor the infinite,
neither the' comprehensible nor the incomprehensible,.
is to be so insisted on as to put the rest into the
background. Either aspect of these great questions
is necessary to a just appreciation of the other. But
all human life is in direct and immediate relation
with that which we know of the Almighty, His Son,
and His Spirit, as revealed to us in the New Testa
ment. To neglect the Gospel history, or to allow it
to dwindle and fade into the form of a mere represen
tation, is to lose the most precious of all the gifts of
God, at least the most appreciable.
It is fit — indeed, necessary — that we should now
and then be reminded of that which passes man's
understanding, of that which reduces the wise to a
level with the simple, the philosopher to a level with
the ploughman, the theologian to a level with a child.
But if we take for our models our Lord's discourses,

NISI DIGNUS VI N DICE NODUS 43
or the Pauline Epistles, we must allow that the
matter bearing upon our every-day life must occupy
our attention every day — indeed, every hour — while
in regard to the Self-Existent, the Eternal, and the
Infinite, we have rather to wait for the Divine call
and opportunity, and then promptly and humbly
attend to it as best we can,
Taste as well as common sense resents the fre
quent introduction of the grander and sublifner
truths of Revelation into the ordinary course of con
versation and action. We do not really think a man
the better Christian because he is always asserting
and claiming to be our teacher. It is a violence
done to our nature, which cannot but desire to work
out the great problems of human and divine existence
on its own lines. We can all enter into the feelings,
not of the tyrant who demanded an immediate answer
to the question, ' What is God ? ' but of the wiser
philosopher who demanded first three days, then
nine, arid then failed to satisfy his questioner.

44

V
'OUSIA' IN THE CREED
IT is out of the scope of this volume to dwell on the
faith and life of the Apostolic, primitive, and ante-
Nicene age — that is, of the first three centuries. The
records — that is, the materials we have to deal with —
are scanty, intermittent, with many blanks, combined
with many errors and now admitted forgeries, or
writings passed off on Christian credulity like many of
the ' good books ' written for children in our days. It
amounts to a special intervention of Providence that
Christianity survived at all, and became a stronger
and distincter tradition from age to age.
As for creeds, they make very little appearance, in
the first two centuries. Even as early as the first
century — that is, in the ' New Testament ' itself— there
are several passages, much in the form of- hymns
or doxologies, that would be daily mementos for
private use or mutual encouragement. The contem
poraries, the eye-witnesses, the survivors who could
witness to the testimony and faith of eye-witnesses,
remained long ; and the writer of these lines can

EARLY CREEDS FEW, SHORT, AND SIMPLE 45
testify to the distinctness with which the early part
of a century can be remembered and its story told to
near the end of it. There was not so free or so
constant a communication between the different parts
of the world — that is, between the different provinces
of the Roman Empire, as there is in these days, and
there was consequently much room for variety, and
even inconsistency, in the professions of faith. They
were very often short, very simple, and they con
tained very little disputable matter.
So long as Christians were poor and despised, so
long as the Christian profession was dangerous and
unrewarded, the religion of the humbler classes and the
road to the bloody arena, to deserts or to catacombs,
there was not much competition for such prizes as it
had to offer. At length it became a power, a force —
a factor, as the expression is— in the great Roman
realm. Emperors courted bishops, and before long
created them — setting up one and putting down
another. The bishops of the great cities were
very great men, lived in palaces, held courts, con
ducted grand functions, and had multitudes in daily
attendance, besides large gatherings upon occasion.
Controversies broke out like sudden conflagrations —
sometimes with as terrible consequences. They were,
of course, not upon the facts of the Gospel history,
not upon the truth of the Jewish or Christian Scrip
tures, not upon the sacred text, but upon the most

46 'OUSIA' IN THE CREED
obscure, most mysterious, most unascertainable,
points. If the argument carried the disputants beyond
the range of human intelligence, just as a rough
game might carry the competitors in one entangled
mass from the Campus Martius into the Tiber, so
much the better. Some would live to tell the tale
and reap the fruits of victory. The fate of the van
quished would be so much gain to the survivor.
The survivors of a battle do not take much amiss
the diminished company that meets after it. But
something like agreement among Christians was of
the first necessity to the Civil State and the Imperial
power. Constantinople could not be made the
capital of the East, and the link between two worlds
— indeed, three worlds, so different as the three con
tinents — without a common code of laws, religion', and
belief. At that crisis in the world's history everything
had to be put into an imperial form, and on an
imperial basis, for imperial enforcement. The iron
rod of empire, which had been recently used in open
persecutions against all Christians whatever, was
henceforth to be used upon those only who would
not accept imperial Christianity.
The common idea of a Church Council is that of
a number of learned divines, fairly and equally repre
sentative of the universal Church, meeting day after
day, comparing text with text, ' authority with

THE NICENE COUNCIL 47
authority, local tradition with local tradition, and in
this way arriving at a conclusion that would be an
impregnable barrier against creeping error or ram
pant unbelief. So long as truth held the ground, it
is said, there was no need of Creeds, and the Church
was better without them. But when the truth was
attacked, then the Church had to put forth its
strength, and, shoulder to shoulder, present a phalanx
to the invading or the treacherous foe. The ill
results, if any, are to be charged on those who com
pelled the use of such human inventions, which seemed,
indeed, the Church's only defence against the mis
behaving and aggressive world.
Alas for the poor simple folk who so imagine
of the great Councils, with high-sounding names
and over fifteen centuries of prescription ! They
were held neither in the stately council-chambers of
great cities, where there would at least be order, nor
in wilderness-like spots, where there would be at
least quiet and seclusion. They were held in
pleasure resorts, practically suburbs of the rising
capital of Constantinople, having about the same
relation to it as the watering-places that line our
South-Eastern coasts have to our metropolis. They
were summoned, held, and conducted with sur
prises, rushes, tumults, veritable mobs, menaces
wisely regarded or fatally disregarded — indeed, with
such disorder as is never found in our country now

'48 'OUSIA' IN THE CREED
even at a contested election. True, the armoury,
the fatal weapons, the battle cries, the terrible en
gines, the crucial questions, the racks, and the Pro
crustean beds had been long prepared and carefully
elaborated, just as it may take a whole generation
of peace and confidence to prepare for one day's
fighting. Whether it tell in favour of the so-called
Nicene Creed, or against, it did not take its present
form till centuries after the Council giving it the
name. Now I am not much of a theologian, nor do I
even know what English man is, or has been, for some
centuries. I am writing chiefly for those who are not
theologians, and know they are not, but bearing in
mind those who believe themselves to be theologians.
I am forced to use what may seem an invidious' ex
pression, but it is universal, and apparently a neces
sity of the case, that everybody who has really given
heart and mind to the study should find himself the
only theologian in the world. Having arrived at the
conclusion through dark and winding ways, with-
many ups and downs, he cannot retrace his steps or
make out his bearings, and is, consequently, unable
to identify his exact position with that of any other
traveller in the same forest. It must be, nearly all
of it, dead reckoning. It is true any new text or
authority ought to have a fresh and corrective force
bringing him back to the way if he has lost it, but:

HOMOOUSIUS AND HOMCEOUSIUS 49
the actual possession has been won so laboriously,
and held so long, that the possessor or possessed, as
it may be, cannot amend his kingdom or his
thraldom at the dictation of an hour.
I also labour under the supposed disadvan
tage of having avoided controversy upon matters
of faith for the greater part of my life— indeed, of
the century. If this seem a strange confession to
make, and hardly consistent with my own little
history, be it remarked that neither the ' Tracts
for the Times ' nor the ' British Critic ' discussed
matters of faith in what may be called theology
proper, nor did the late Cardinal himself ever grapple
at all closely with them — no, not even in his Work
on the 'Arians,' as. some shrewd critics have abun
dantly shown.
However, I must give no more time or space to
preambles. The word ' Ousia ' first appears in the
Nicene Creed. In the oldest known form of that
Creed it occurs twice, the text running, ' The only
begotten Son of the Father — that is to say, of the
substance of the Father ' . . . ' Begotten not made, of
one substance with the Father.' Whether there is this
iteration in the original Creed cannot be ascertained,
nor does it matter. The contention had been between
the words ' of the same substance,' and ' of like sub
stance ' — Homoousius and Homceousius. No ques
tion whatever has so divided this world, so shaken E

50 'OUSIA' IN THE CREED
the earth, and so agitated all the elements of society,
as that between these two words. Was our Lord of
the same nature as His Father, or only of a like
nature ?
No, we must not ask that question, because the
word ' nature ' is not admissible. It cannot be applied
to the Father, who is born of no one, and therefore
has no nature, which is that which we have by birth.
Cicero wrote a treatise, ' De Natura Deorum,' but all
those deities were born of some one, some time, or
other. Nor can the question be put in any other.
way. No words in our language would meet the
case. After a long life spent in the serious considera
tion and sometimes happy solution of difficulties, the
late Archbishop Tait could only pray, in what proved
to be his dying hours, that the Almighty might some
day Himself work our deliverance from this great
linguistic, that is verbal, embarrassment.
It is simply for want of a better word, as the
Roman theologians often deplored, that substantia^
was adopted — nay, in this sense invented — as an
equivalent for Ousia ; and we have accepted what
must be called the damnosa hcsreditas. It still hangs
like a millstone round our necks. Ninety-nine out of
every hundred members of our Church cannot pos
sibly attach any other meaning to it than the material
one, the pagan one — that is the matter, the elements,
the airy and gaseous stuff out of which aerial

DIFFERENCE BETWEEN TWO REVELATIONS 51
cosmic, and celestial beings may be supposed to
have been made. I ask a particularly clever, well
instructed, and religious school-teacher — indeed, one
of the few who fulfil the promise of their earlier
days — -' What do you understand by the words " of
the same substance with the Father " ? ' She is ac
customed to think before she replies, and she does so
now. ' I never think about it, Sir.' I tell her she is
wise, and recommend her to go on never thinking
about it. But would that be a proper answer for her
to make, or a proper rejoinder for me to make with
regard to any other article of the Creed ?
Well, we have to return again and again to the
very words. Words, indeed ! It is only one word —
the simplest and shortest of words, and the one most
necessary to anything that can be called a statement,
a truth, or a fact. It is our Lord Himself who makes
and compels upon us a comparison of the two most
important revelations ever made to man : ' I am He
that is ' ; 'I was before Abraham.' Is the being — ¦
that is, the existence, here the same, or something
short of the same, that is, different in some respect ?
If the latter, then there are two, at least two, degrees
of existence — one absolute, the other not. Literally,
that is taking the words, ' I am ' is common to the
two revelations ; ' that is,' not. Does the force of the
second revelation consist in the word which is com
mon ? Is the difference significant ? e 2

52 'OUSIA' IN THE CREED
But the questions that cannot be answered, some
times, for that very reason, can be most tremendously
and most advantageously urged. The history of
this question is also the history of the Arians, semi-
Arians, or whatever their opponents chose to call them.
As they were stripped of their possessions, driven to
banishment in remote and barbarous regions, mostly
murdered on the road, their writings burned, and every
Christian upon whom a scrap was found put to death
instantly, we have to take their teaching on the word
of their opponents. They were charged with the
weakness of endeavouring to substitute, by the
change of a vowel into a diphthong, a word signify
ing of like substance, or similar substance. This, of
course, was held to be a bit of Pagan mythology.
But to that charge one answer was sufficient. Accord
ing to the Scriptures, and, it must be added, our
reason also, man — the true Man, the perfect Man —
is of a like or similar substance to the Almighty,
being made in the image, or likeness, of God. The
most religious philosophers of antiquity recognised a
God through the nature of man.
Surely it i.s the wisest and most reverential course
to take each of these revelations as it stands, to in
culcate its distinct bearing and force, and so let it
grow naturally in the mind — the Almighty, the only
self-existent, the one source of all existence; the
Son, existing before all creation that we know of,

SUBSTANCE 53
Himself in a sense the Maker by whom or through
whom and after whom it is made ; its Heir, its
King, the one solution of its mysteries, its difficulties,
its seeming shortcomings and mischances. Surely this
is enough to teach and to learn here, without import
ing new terms that utterly defy interpretation, that
baffle the sense, and rather contribute to harden the
rebellious heart than to soften it or to make men love
either God or man. Surely, when learned and well-
intentioned theologians urge us to hold fast to the
word ' substance,' we may ask, Why ? what good has
it done ? If it holds its ground, surely that is enough.
Then you avowedly and distinctly quarrel with
the Nicene Creed, the very foundation of the Church,
the ground all true believers stand upon. You would
meddle with the glorious work of Divine and human
art which has stood as a rock against the assaults of
heretics, barbarians, philosophers, scoffers, and genera
tion after generation of open persecution and muttered
scepticism. Take that away, what do we stand upon ?
I reply that it stood for ages as the monument of a
period that left for us many lessons, but its super
session is not so large a question. It is virtually
superseded, disgraced, and degraded to a lower rank
in authoritative precedence by the Anglican dogma
which says that Father, Son, and Spirit are One God.
At the best, the statement that I or anybody else
takes his stand on the Nicene Creed can only be true

54 'OUSIA' IN THE CREED
in a certain sense, for the Creed admits of a great
variety of interpretation, and has been seriously
modified. It is impossible to bind the Almighty, or
our conception of the Almighty, with words. If the
expression ' God of God ' have any sense whatever,
which may be reasonably doubted, that sense itself
makes a difference between the two uses of the word-.
The Almighty is here called God, simply and abso
lutely. Jesus Christ is called God, but, it is immedi
ately explained, not God simply and absolutely, but
in a qualified and derivative sense of the word. He
that is ' God ' cannot be ' of God.' He that is ' of
God ' cannot be ' God.' Nor is the statement at all
affected by the use of the word ' very,' or true. Jesus
Christ may be called God truly, but the derivative
sense remains. The Son is not the Father, and the
Father is not the Son.
To any serious Christian it cannot be a pleasant
remembrance that by far the most interesting and
most intelligible account of the controversy is
Gibbon's. He plays round and round the Ousia with
inexhaustible and almost genial wit, and if anybody
would prefer the humorous treatment of it to the
serious, he cannot do better than give a few days to
the two celebrated chapters of his great work. It is
scarcely necessary to observe that Gibbon neither
could nor would suppose there to be anything in the
matter beyond opinion, ideas, and beliefs. Even so it is

ALTERNATIVES EQUALLY IMPOSSIBLE 55
unphilosophical to , think there is nothing in these
things, for, if an opinion has contributed much towards
making this world what it is, it is a much more im
portant matter than any event in history, any war, or
any convulsion of nature that we know of. The
conquests of Alexander the Great entered history
quickly, and almost as quickly passed out of it, but
a few words in a Creed have contributed and still
contribute much to separate one quarter of the world
from another.
It may reasonably be said that only two courses
are open to anyone professing to treat of the Nicene
Creed. He may accept it unreservedly, or as un
reservedly reject it. There is no mid course, it may
be added, unless a man can set himself as another
Athanasius contra mundum. But an honest man
may find a great variety of courses presenting them
selves, and not to be discussed easily or easily ac
cepted, and the two alternatives proposed to him
simply impossible. It is not possible for the reason
to accept statements defining the incomprehensible.
It is also impossible to discard, to ban, and to forget
the conceptions that have occupied the heart, mind,
memory, and loyalty for a whole lifetime. It is also
impossible to most men to search out, to examine, to
sum, and to compare, the writings of a whole library
of ancient and modern authors on these subjects, the
initial process in every stage ¦ being to find out what

56 'OUSIA' IN THE CREED
an author himself meant or understood by his own
words. It is impossible to do all this with even
living writers, ready to explain what they mean, that
is, if they can.
It is not so impossible, or even difficult, to arrive
at some vague conception of the current theology of
a Church or a sect or a school, or at least to accept
the expression. But what is quite possible, indeed
easy, not to say a downright necessity, is to accept
creeds, or other theological expressions, in simple
loyalty, and bestow no further thought upon them.
Indeed, what can the greater part of mankind do
in this matter? They are often told to search for
themselves. But their teachers also begin by an
inquiry into opinions or reliable authorities. Yet
it is frequently found, even by honest and gifted
inquirers, that the search for truth in the open
field of opinion is to begin with hope and end in
despair.

57

VI
HAS THE CHURCH BEEN EVOLVED?
Whether we should or should not take our stand
on any particular form of words or manner of Chris
tian life, adopted at any particular place and time,
remains, and must ever remain, a matter of contro
versy. If it much divides, much harasses, much
weakens a people, it also strengthens the Christian
world. Everybody has the idea of a standpoint and
a rule of faith in his hand, in his will, and even in his
heart, but everybody deals negligently with the idea,
and even craftily, sometimes departing far from it, or
stretching his tether to the breaking-point Most
educated men, and still more English ladies, think
they have taken their stand on the Nicene Creed and
are orthodox after the manner of the Nicene Fathers.
Poor things, little do they know how they have de
parted from it, how indeed they have all long ago
thrown it in the waste-paper basket. In that Creed
there is not a hint or a suggestion of a Triune God ;
and I feel as sure as I am that I am alive, and shall
soon die, that the Fathers of that Council would have

58 HAS THE CHURCH BEEN EVOLVED?
regarded the idea of a Triune God as an invention of
the Evil One, designed to discredit the Council and
reduce its Creed to an absurdity.
It cannot fail to be noticed that the reiterated ex
pressions intended to show and to demonstrate that
the Son partakes of the substance of the Father are
not repeated in the third part of the Creed. Of
course, the people who think they stand upon the
Creed, but do not, reply that it was unnecessary to
declare that the Being described as the Lord and
Giver of Life, proceeding from the Father, and whose
very name is the Spirit or the Breath of God, must
be of the same nature, and that all Three are of one
nature, and consequently One. They will also add,
if they are versed in the long controversy, that Coun
cils and Creeds only say what it is necessary to say
and are silent where it is unnecessary to speak.
But behind truth and all the controversies is a
spectre, and that is the meaning of this word ousia,
or substance. Is it an element or a relation ? The
former would probably be the prevalent supposition
with most of the Fathers at that Council, for they were
philosophers rather than theologians, and all philo
sophy then was apt to be materialistic. If we adopt,'
or try to adopt, the latter alternative, then it cannot
surely be said that the relation of the Spirit to the
Father is the same as that of the Son to the Father,
or that the mutual relation of the Three Persons is the

HUMAN AFFAIRS ERRATIC 59
same. The Council of Nicaea did not approach these
questions, and therefore avoided the conclusion of an
absolute Oneness comprising all the Three Persons.
It was not till many centuries after that theologians
could define the Trinity as an Individual, consisting
of Three Indifferent Persons, that is one who could
not be divided, but who consisted of Three Persons,
not differing in nature, that is in properties, qualities,
rank, power, and authority, from one another.
Cardinal Newman appreciated so fully all the facts
of the question, as far as he could take cognisance
of them, that to save them at any cost, including
the great fact of human philosophy, he suggested
evolution, as explaining different conceptions not only
of the Church but even of the Almighty and of His
only begotten Son. The word itself means procedure
in a curve, which in this case is supposed to be affected
by circumstances. No doubt, evolution has had a very
important part in the history of the world, and in the
formation of its institutions, its faiths, its languages,
and its national characters. No doubt, it has worked
powerfully upon the Church. If it has been usually
regarded as the element of error, rather than truth,
that does not determine the question. When Cicero
said he would rather err with Plato than be bound to
a straight line, he indicated the erratic course always
pursued by free agency. Flocks and herds wander,
and it is best they should, even if they have to be

60 HAS THE CHURCH BEEN EVOLVED?
watched and kept within bounds. The facts ofthe case
are on the. Cardinal's side, and he was not the man
to speak without a good basis in facts. The elder
Church was seriously affected by every successive race,
nation, and religion that it came into contact with, and
the evolutionary theorists try to make out that from
the beginning the Jewish conception of the Deity
was entirely racial, and so far no novelty or exception
to the general rule. They may have something to
say for themselves, but, in fact, the one universal
opprobrium against the Jews has been their obstinacy,
their bigotry, and their unchangeable adherence tb
their own beliefs.
Nor can it be denied that our Lord's own life and
ministry has a certain look of development. A new
Creation, a course of instruction covering the whole
ground of ethics, the Atonement with all that it
won for us, the preparation for the gift of the
Spirit, and some insight into the near and far future,
had all to be done within brief limits of time, under
the most difficult conditions. Indeed; how was our
Lord straitened till all -this could be done! The
new creation had to be as broad as the old ; the
teaching had to be the correction, the purifying,
the elevation, and the sanctifying of all that is good
in any philosophy, tradition, or belief. Our Lord
always took His text, so to say, from the incident, the
persons, and the place ; and whatever He said or did

DEVELOPMENT 61
it was a distinct addition to all He had said or done
before, and, to some extent, a variation. There is no
other record of so great a work, so multifarious, so
effectual, so complete and so abiding, done in so
short a time, so many places to be visited, so many
races, classes, schools of thought, ruling powers,
languages, and traditions to be dealt with in detail.
While all this gives a variety to the Gospel history,
by which it never palls, it gives also to some an
occasion for charging our Lord with either a change
of front or an extension of design, or a retreat from
His original plan, or an inflated ambition, or dis
appointed hopes. Plainly it is a development which
the objectors misinterpret, or have not the sense to
understand. The faithful and loving disciple saw a
perfect consistency and absolute identity of character,
the change being not in the Divine object but in the
human conception and estimate.
When we come to the Acts of the Apostles, the
case is easier for the theory of development. Though
on three particular occasions the Apostolic mission
has the look of contracting, it expands by leaps,
as it were, as Samaria, Joppa, Damascus, Antioch,
Tarsus, Athens, and Corinth come into view. The
First Council (that at Jerusalem) can hardly be
thought to have fully realised the great change
already wrought in the spiritual status of the world.
It is on the decidedly impulsive and erratic move-

62 HAS THE CHURCH BEEN EVOLVED?
ments of the Church in after-times that the Cardinal
relies for the strength of his favourite argument, not
so much in favour of his own views as to confound
objectors, ' How do you know that so and so is not
the case ? ' The Church does seem to describe a
curve as it impinges and rebounds from Antioch,
Ephesus, and Alexandria, to Rome, whither also
thence possibly the Cardinal does not say. The curve
would be round an invisible stem or axis. Practi
cally, straightness most gratifies the eye and the
intellect when it is always reverted to after various
aberrations, and is found to be the fundamental law.
One does, however, rebel against the notion of the
Church being a creeper or a bine.
But there now presents itself a greater question
than any calculation of ecclesiastical or dogmatic
curves ; and never more imminently or more im
periously than now, and in this our own country.
How, and where, and in what form, upon the whole,
has Christ most revealed Himself to the rank and
file of the great Christian army, to the flocks them
selves, to the children of toil, the unlearned, un
witting of controversy, really incapable of creeds —
at least, of such documents as the Nicene ? Do they
see anything of a curve, or a succession of impacts
and rebounds ? To them Christ is a constant efful
gence straight from Bethlehem, or Nazareth, or
Jordan, or the Lake, or the Mount, or the Temple, or

STRAIGHT EFFULGENCE 63
the Judgment Seat, or Calvary, or the Tomb, or the
Mount of Ascension, it matters not, all somewhere
afar off, and from the Almighty behind. It is in the
Gospel they find the law of the Church and the
character of the Saviour. They made no attempts to
scan the infinite past or the infinite all round. They
are soon dizzy on the edge of those abysses. They
can no more describe curves in historical matter
than in prehistorical space. Such feats they leave to
the men who offer you stones for bread, and instead
of fish give you serpents.
But the mental condition of the great Christian
flock is little more than that continued childhood to
which the highly educated will often return in old
age. It is a constant recurrence of the same thoughts,
indeed, of the same words, gathering round some
centre of affection and admiration. The religious
mind, in all classes and conditions, will find this
centre in Him of whom the Gospel tells the story.
It is a straight, undying, even if intermitting and
sometimes clouded, effulgence. It ever falls in with
the effulgence of Nature in its most genial moods,
and with the most spontaneous emotions ofthe heart in
its greatest trials, its deepest sensations, and its best
won triumphs over its worst enemies. So far Nature
and Grace are ever coincident, though not the same.

64

VII
TRIUNITY
All the dogmatic expressions implying Threeness
as an attribute of the Almighty are an unwarranted
foreclosure of a grave question which cannot but con
tinue to engage the human mind with ever-increasing
interest and urgency. Science now reveals to us
millions and millions of suns, with probable worlds,
probable occupants, and probable circumstances and
histories like our own. All that we know of our own
world and ourselves constitutes a probability of the
like in other systems and spheres. ¦ We are repeat
edly told by theologians that man can only become
good by probation, that he must have the opportunity
of falling and of restoration ; and that this can only
be by Some One entitled to be called God's Only
Begotten Son, as being in a special sense partaker of
the Divine nature. The probabilities of the case thus
point to an infinite number — if there be such a thing
as an infinite number — of only begotten sons of
God, and in that sense a multiplicity, , not a trinity,
in the Godhead. Of course it is not necessary that

ONE WORLD. OR ANY NUMBER OF WORLDS 65
anyone should attempt to follow up such a ques
tion, and answer it, but we certainly do pretend to
answer it when we talk of a Triune God, or say that
Father, Son, and Spirit are one God. Revelation
throughout is addressed to the existing state of
human knowledge, and, it may even be said, to
existing notions, existing beliefs, and existing
ignorance. This is the usual answer given, and very properly
given, to the busy mockers who tell us that Christ
was mistaken, or misinformed, upon various points on
which science or criticism has thrown more light than
there was in His time. In His time man knew only
of one world, occupying the centre of all things, and
resting upon some solid and eternal foundation, with
a universe, as that word itself indicates, revolving
round it Absolute Oneness is the prevailing idea
of such a conception, the only one possible under the
circumstances. Can we suppose our Redeemer doing
at the same time one and the like work in an infinite
number of worlds ? No, we cannot, and the attempt
is gratuitous as well as presumptuous. True, our
Lord says, ' Other sheep I have that are not of this
fold,' and that bears a large, and still larger, interpre
tation. But the difficulty of conception must ever
remain on our part.
• There is no such difficulty in the interpretation of
Holy Writ, which only tells us what concerns ourselves. F

66 TRIUNITY
It is we who make difficulties by saying more than
the Bible says, and by adding to its simple and pro
fitable teaching much that is inscrutable and unprofit
able. Yet the speculation — the mere speculation — as to
various forms of spiritual existence must be permis
sible, for it cannot be suppressed, and it receives
every day what seems to be positive encouragement.
We cannot but feel much curiosity as to the in
habitants, if such there be, of our planetary neigh
bours. As their condition of material existence would
differ much from ours in gravity, heat, light, atmo
sphere, length of days, nights, and years, and relation
to the other bodies in our system, we cannot but
conclude a difference of spiritual and intellectual con
stitution amounting to a real difference of being. Such
a conclusion, while it expands the range of our ideas,
must tend to check all dogmatising — that is, all
narrowing, fixing, and hardening of our lines— by
the mere force of words.
The Canon of Holy Writ concludes with a book
which, though only a series of dreams, and, like
other dreams contained within the limits of mental
conception, stretches that faculty, and of belief also,
up to breaking-point. It has caused more specula
tion than any other book in the whole Canon, by
admitting us, as it were, into the innermost heaven,
the remotest past, the most problematical future, the

MULTIPLICITY IN UNITY 67
most rapturous vision of glory, and the most awful
sights of moral downfall and just retribution. The
Saviour no longer appears with no more terrible
tokens than a scourge of small cords, picked up from
the floor of a market, a few withered leaves, or the
casualty of a herd of swine, but as the vicegerent and
wielder of Almighty Power and the Judge of all
men. Yet this very book concludes with an emphatic
and ominous warning against those who would add
subversive or needless words of their own to the
sacred text, and so at once weaken Divine authority
and narrow the lawful range of human thought.
The idea of an eventual absolute Oneness in all
spiritual existence may be said to cover the East,
and to find favour in the West. It is always some
thing to fall back upon, whether in argument or in
meditation. ' Would that I were but a leaf in the
Tree of Life,' says George Herbert. 'What do we
know about numbers,' said the late Cardinal to those
who objected to Threeness, or whether there will be
such a thing as number in a future state ? But the
idea of an absolute unity in all spiritual existence
certainly tends rather to multiplicity than to Trinity
of Persons. The explanation would be that the
multiplicity is comprised in the Person of the Son,
thus saving the dogma of the Trinity. Perhaps the
idea is equally important and valuable to some seri
ous minds as saving the countless host of saints in

68 TRIUNITY
Roman Hagiology, all elevated to the rank of
saviours, redeemers, sanctifiers, and even creators,
and wielding together an omnipotent power.
Let it be borne in mind that we are peopling the
universe with an increasing multitude of saints as
sured of eternal happiness, death as regards them
being swallowed up in victory. We may be going
beyond the letter of the record, but we certainly are
not going beyond a reasonable interpretation when
we suppose that this process has been going on much
longer than six thousand years, and that it will go on
for ever. We cannot reasonably or piously suppose
that Heaven will ever be too full, or the Almighty
ever wearied with well-doing, or ever exhausting His
creative and sanctifying power. The probability is
that, as He will always be what He is now, so He
will be always doing what He is doing now. That
consideration alone ought to stop all dogmatising in
the narrow lines of human thought with which the
world had to be content fifteen hundred years ago.
St. John . had visions which theologians tell us
amounted to an enlargement, explanation, and de
finition of all that had heretofore been revealed to us.
So have we. The angel of Science has opened to
us new heavens, a new earth, and new Jerusalems,
demanding recognition in our faith and worship.

69

VIII
THE TERMS OF CONTROVERSY INDEFINITE
THE conclusion that I have myself come to, after a
much longer consideration than one man in ten
thousand has been able to give to it, is that all these
words — Ousia, Homoousia, substance, consubstantial,
existence, co-existence, essence, or being — are inde
finite, and depend on that which circumstances, and
the mind of the hearer, reader, or speaker bring to
them. They express adoration, veneration, admira
tion, religious sentiment, but are not philosophical
in any exact sense. Whether they are religious de
pends on the religious feeling brought to bear on
them, and this may be very slight indeed — nay, none
at all. Our Lord nowhere says that the Son is all
that the Father is, nor does the Creed say it, nor can
any reasonable being say it, except with a reserve —
that is, in a certain sense, still leaving the Father the
Father and the Son the Son. As Father and Son
they must be co-existent, or, as the Creed expresses
it, consubstantial. Indeed, at the date of the Creed the one universal

70 TERMS OF CONTROVERSY INDEFINITE
argument for the use of the word was that drawn
from the earthly and physical parallel. ' Begotten,
and not created,' was heard from ten thousand
mouths. The Son must be of the same substance as
the Father. There they rested. They did not pro
ceed to interpret this into one absolute unity. They
evidently saved the Fatherhood and the Sonship.
They would not confound the Persons. They al
lowed the Father to differ from the Son in being the
Father, and the Son to differ from the Father in
being the Son, even while they saw that, in a certain
real sense, the Son must be in the Father and the
Father must be in the Son. All these necessary re
serves are swamped and drowned by a deluge of
nonsense now filling our churches, reducing the
Father, the Son, and the Spirit to One Supreme
Being, whom we certainly make a composite Person,
that is, an Idol of our own intellectual conception,
when we worship Him, and render Him divine service
as here we do now continually.
When a word has been in use for fifteen hundred
years, though for the greater part of the time in a
dead language, and sung rather than said, there may
be abundant reasons for retaining it in use, even if
the original mistake of its adoption becomes at last
the fruitful seed of dangerous error. We should deem
a man absurdly scrupulous who objected to the word
' universal ' as implying that all created things re-

UNDERSTANDINGS 71
volved round our own little globe every twenty-four
hours, and worse than foolish if he insisted on making
that an article of faith. In our own country in
numerable instances assure us that a man may be a
sound astronomer without losing a particle of his
faith and loyalty to Holy Writ.
The Latin Fathers complained, 'as Cicero had
done long before, of the poverty of their language,
which did not readily produce equivalents for the
terms of Greek controversy, but it was something
deeper than the language that was at fault. Greek
was more the language of theory, Latin of life. The
Greeks retained much of their Oriental origin and
affinities ; the Romans, though they too could boast
an Asiatic ancestry and foundation, had long been
mainly a conglomerate of all the nations under the
sun, rapidly embodied in a municipal code that ac
cepted, digested, and utilised all the elements of
social and political life. The word ousia certainly is
suggestive of Oriental theory, that is, of elemental.
From that point of view the Latin ' substance '
was a great downfall. It was a business expression —
' We understand one another ' — impossible either in
fact or conception, but practically sufficient for the
occasion. Not but that it too had its dangers and
mischances. Cardinal Newman several times ex
pressed his horror at alleged ' understandings,' which
it was impossible to bring to any proof or test,

72 TERMS OF CONTROVERSY INDEFINITE
and of which, at the best, there must have been two
distinct apprehensions. Even in so fundamental
a matter as truth, the Greek and Latin words are
not quite equivalent, the Greek Alethe referring
rather to physical law, including human infirmity ;
the Latin verus being rather an appeal to what we
mean by the honour of a gentleman.
But while the Latin Fathers were in the second
class of tradition, receivers, imitators, and copyists,
and so far admittedly less authoritative, the Eastern
Fathers had even more difficulty in settling among
themselves what was their common meaning and the
net value and form of the theology they had to
impose on the whole world. The most critical ques
tion — indeed, the turning-point — was the difference
between generation and creation. On this point the
arguments are sometimes shocking to the taste as
well as to the reason of theologians who may be said,
in this respect, to live in happier times. It may be
reasonably and hopefully doubted whether these
arguments were more than words, and whether they
obtained any place in the understandings of those
who used them.
Seeing that the Almighty is a Spirit, filling all
space and time, with a conscious and active existence,
and seeing that nothing is entirely external to Him,
and everything is foreseen, it follows that, even on
the premises laid down as fundamental in our own

PHILOSOPHY NOT EQUAL TO THE OCCASION 73
theology, our philosophy is not equal to the task of
explaining that which our Creed commands us to
believe. We cannot force such inquiries upon the
common apprehension, unaccustomed and untrained
as it is. We must be content to put these matters
as they were put to the simple fishermen, craftsmen,
women and children of despised, ill-favoured, be
nighted Galilee.

74

IX
BOETHIUS
I HAD often wished to fall in with Boethius, and
to see in print what manner of man he was, and how
far a real personage of sterling merit and likely to
yield a little good. I was aware that he had written
a work ' De Consolatione Philosophise,' which long had
a great reputation, and many translations, including
one into Anglo-Saxon by King Alfred. This feat
of the royal scholar is commonly described as an
agreeable diversion from the cares of fighting and
governing. More probably Alfred had to do it as
his daily task during one of his two long sojourns at
Rome before he was twelve, for his education had
not been so neglected as historians are pleased to
imagine. How was it I never came across the book, or
even saw it quoted ? How was it that the man him
self had disappeared from history? The ecclesias
tical historians describe him as the one shining light
that redeemed the sixth century from utter darkness ;
yes, the one philosopher, one poet, one Christian, as I

A WELCOME FIND 75
then supposed, doing duty for all the arts and sciences,
all mental culture, for one whole century, five hun
dred years after the prodigious, preternatural galaxy
of the Augustan age.
In March 1891, after toiling for many days
through the flat and barren sands of the ' De Imita-
tione Christi,' in the vain search for some living and
growing thing, I saw ' Boethius ' in a catalogue. I
immediately wrote to ' The Bodley Head,' in Vigo
Street, and, at the very moderate charge of three
shillings, secured a pretty little well-bound volume,
worthy of a place on any shelf. The title-page
informed me that the once-famous work had now
been made English, and illustrated with ' Notes ' by
the Right Honourable Richard Lord Viscount
Preston, that this was the second edition corrected,
and that the names of Tonson and of Round vouched
for the printing. The date was MDCCXII— that is,
two years before the final extinction of the Stuart
dynasty. Several pages of advertisements at the
end of the volume announced that Mr. Tonson had
on sale the works of Mr. Dryden, Mr. William
Shakespeare, Mr. William Congreve, Mr. Abraham
Cowley, Mr. John Milton, Joseph Addison, Esq., and
some other literary gentlemen ; while W. Taylor, at
the Ship in Paternoster RPw, was selling, among
other religious or controversial works, 'The Com
ments of a Presbyter on Mr. Hoadly's Views upon

76 BOETHIUS
the Lawfulness of Resistance to the Supreme Magis
trate in Certain Cases.'
On turning over the leaves I soon perceived that
Boethius was somebody. After a dip here and there,
I further perceived that to do some justice to the
work I must begin at the beginning. There are five
books divided into forty chapters, each chapter con
sisting of a ' Metrum ' and a ' Prosa.' Of the former
the translator gives the original of the first two lines!
All runs easy, and his Lordship has fairly accom
plished the difficult task of importing the rhythm
of both metre and prose into the translation. I see
that a learned work has been published on the
metres, which are sometimes classic, sometimes those
of a later age.
Whatever the reason of it was, I had scarcely
read half a page before I became conscious of a
certain hum that had set in my inner hearing, and
which returned every time I took up the book, and
never ceased till I put it down. What was it ? How
shall I describe it ? Was it the distant roar of old
Rome ? Horace calls that a strepitus, and it con
tributed to drive all who could afford it to the sur
rounding hills. Was it the music of the spheres?
An Irish dean once assured me that he had heard
that distinctly. He did not say on what occasion
and what it was like. Was this the grinding of the
earth on its axis ? Americans tell us you must get

A MYSTERIOUS HUM yy
near the pole to hear that. For many months after
my break-down at Colchester, in 1832, I had the
sound of a water-mill in my head. It was not like
that ; nor was it the sound of a cotton-mill, or of
bees, or of hornets.
The last is a decidedly musical creature. The
Irish, as I conclude from Tennyson's 'To-morrow,'
call it ' the piper that piped before Moses,' and helped
to drive the Canaanites out of the land. I was once
dining in company with Lord Eversley. After
dinner he observed to our host, ' I did not know,
Sir Erskine, that you had an organ.' ' Nor have I,'
was the answer. ' Then, what's that I hear ? ' We
listened, and soon discovered a big hornet poised
about a yard over our heads, evidently considering
upon which of us it should make a swoop. The
napkins were all put in requisition, but the hornet
was hard to drive away. His Lordship was about a
foot taller than I was, and I took comfort in the
lines — Feriuntque summos
Fulgura montes.
Well, if the reader is not tired of solutions for
what he may consider a mere fancy, here is one
more. Macaulay mentions that William's first speech
from the Throne was received by the gentlemen who
crowded the .bar — that is, by the Commons — with
the deep hum by which our ancestors were wont to

78 , BOETHIUS
express admiration, and which was often heard in
places more sacred than the Chamber of the Peers,
He afterwards mentions that Viscount Preston heard
that hum, and did not like it, for his heart was with
James. In fact, the hum haunted him, and impelled
him to conspiracy.
This strange return of an old world never ceased
while I was reading through a third of the volume.
But then came on a painful illness, which disabled
me and threatened to cut short the volume I was
engaged on — that is, ' The Son.' I had to finish my
work, or, rather, to bring it out unfinished. I have
now resumed Lord Preston's book, and, after a glance
at the unread portion, at what Gibbon has to say of
Boethius and his work, at the elaborate article in the
' Encyclopaedia Britannica,' and at the sad — but, I
fear, too just — picture of the unhappy translator given
by Macaulay, I have concluded to write as much on
these matters as the present purpose will allow, while
my hand can still hold and guide this pen.
The singular distinction ofthe man rests on some
what better grounds than as the occurrence of an oasis
in a desert, or of a solitary rock in a level plain. He
was in several senses the last of the Romans ; the
last of its citizens, the last of its patricians, the last
of its politicians, the last of its philosophers, and
only not the last man to defy the barbarian king
then ruling Italy and half the world from Ravenna,

THE CHRISTIAN STOIC 79
because he paved the way for Belisarius, who was
more of a warrior and a man of action. He persis
tently intrigued and made some open demon
strations to obtain the intervention of the orthodox
Emperor of the East and of the Patriarch of Con
stantinople for the expulsion of the Arian Goths
from Italy. Strange as it may seem to us, he was
regarded as the pillar of orthodoxy, for no other
reason than that he was a Stoic philosopher of the then
universal school. At last his efforts, more provoca
tive than efficacious, exceeded the limits of common
prudence, and were more than Theodoric could
safely tolerate. Boethius found himself a prisoner at
Milan, or at Pavia, held for a time as a hostage for
the better behaviour of his fellow citizens at Rome,
but under sentence of death and daily expecting it.
From a merely literary point of view it is to his
credit that he could write the book under such
trying circumstances, but there is not a particle of
Christianity in it, and it has been even doubted
whether Boethius so much as professed to be a
Christian. The philosophy is that which even to
the present day is synonymous with stolid, apathetic
endurance, and which is regarded as a fossilised sur
vival of the old world'. It consists in maxims more
likely to silence complaint than to alleviate pain or
to bring out the proper fruit of adversity. This is a
world of ups and downs. You've had your day ; it

80 BOETHIUS
is somebody else's turn now. You cannot expect the
heyday of life twice over. Chance, destiny, envy,
malice, indeed, all kinds of evil, will pursue their in
exorable course. Necessity is ever driving her iron
chariot over all human institutions, marking her path
with ruin, wreck, and blood. If there results a sum-
mum bonum you must not quarrel with your place in
the world. Very great men have suffered as much as
you, and as undeservedly. The art of Ufe is to be
come indifferent to it, for it will assuredly come to
an end. For many a century this dreary landscape and
this dismal drone were deemed the fittest ornament
and the sweetest music for banqueting halls and
presence chambers. It was the skeleton of the feast and
the ' Remember thou art mortal,' whispered in the
ear of the conqueror. Dress up such consolations as
you will, they are nothing more or less than to sur
render self, body, soul, and everything else in earth or
heaven, to the blind rage of an infuriated chaos, a
tornado without order, purpose, beginning or end. It
is to give the worst an eternal mastery over the
best. But we must not be too hard on Boethius or hold
him singularly at fault. Has Christianity a high
and distinct place even in the writings of Addison,
Dr. Johnson, or any of the novelists from Miss
Austen down to the legion now engaged in the manu-

BOETHIUS SUFFERING AND TRIUMPHANT 81
facture of ' airy nothings ' ? Has it a high and
distinct place in the press, at least in that portion
which is not devoted to the advocacy of some par
ticular sect or school ? Has it a becoming position
in the legislature, or in the general policy of the
empire ? How about the schools in which England of
the future — if it be indeed England still, and if it have
a future — is being industriously taught and trained ?
Well. It must not be omitted that Boethius met his
fate with dignity, and a very few years saw the Goths
driven first out of Rome, and then finally and utterly
cleared out of Italy.
But now for the English Boethius, Viscount
Preston. He was a man of high standing, of figure,
and of letters, and as such was a great favourite of
James II., who gave him his title and made an attempt,
too late as it proved, to advance him higher in the
peerage. He submitted with the rest to the Prince of
Orange, and must have been present when the Prince
announced to the Parliament his intention to be
neither Regent, nor Lieutenant, nor simply the Queen's
husband, but King, and he perceived by the general
' hum ' that the announcement was well received by
the Commons. Was that the ' hum ' I have described
above as mysteriously accompanying the volume ? No,
it could not be. So the mystery remains unsolved.
Preston was nobody at the new court, and his
only chance, so he conceived, was. the return of the old
G

82 BOETHIUS
one ; and, with many others in a like case, he entered
into a correspondence with the deposed monarch at
St Germain's. With half-a-dozen hare-brained con
federates, and some bundles of letters in curious
varieties of cypher, he dropped down the Thames on
a dark night, had been already betrayed, was over
taken and captured, tried and found guilty, and had
then the alternative of betraying his accomplices if he
would escape immediate execution. It proved too
much for his weak nature, and he soon found himself
consigned to present and eternal ignominy, beyond
all chance of reparation, in a remote corner of York
shire. What could he do ? He could not purge himself,
but he might palliate the crime or put his pursuers
on a wrong scent. Something suggested a certain cor
respondence between his case and that of Boethius,
True, the one had not betrayed his accomplices, the
other had. The one had met his .fate nobly, the
other had not. But there was this saving differ
ence. Boethius was a man of strong nerve, Preston
had no nerve. Boethius was born a strong character,
Preston felt himself a weakling. Such facts had to
be taken into account. What is a poor soul to do
when it finds itself a crazy tenement, and shivering
in the blast ? Some . dread Power must be held
answerable for the result. That dread Power is
Necessity, which its unhappy victim makes out to be

BOETHIUS FORGOTTEN 83
a moral anarchy. The outcome or summing up cf
such a career, including the crime and the attempt at
self-restoration, is that Preston is forgotten, that he
has contributed to make Boethius forgotten also, and
that it was in vain that Dr. Johnson recommended a
favourite lady friend to undertake another translation.

G 2

84

X
ROME FOSTERING THE CORRUPTIONS OF
THE CREED
Strange to say, nowhere is it so difficult to discover
the present local ideas and conceptions of Divine
persons and things as at Rome. It presents an enor
mous number of churches with their respective dedi
cations and names — the Divine Mother in a boundless
variety of characters, Saints innumerable, a church or
two of late dedication to the Trinity, the Angels
more distinctly recognised than on English soil — and
a prodigious quantity of relics generally in aisles,
chapels, cloisters, and vaults, numerous commemora
tions, crowds of clergy and students, sacred pictures
and sculptures more or less in modern taste and
rather less than more pleasing to an English eye,
several edifices surpassing all others iii the world,
and a central Hying personage also surpassing all other
sovereigns in antiquity, in political or ecclesiastical
descent, surrounded, it is universally admitted, by
the most assiduous and efficient court in the world.
In all the material garniture of Rome, perhaps

THE ' LAST JUDGMENT' IN SIS TINE CHAPEL 85
there is nothing so grand, so significant, or so
famous as the fresco over the altar of the Sistine
Chapel. It occupied what may be called Michael
Angelo's spare time from about 1533 to 1541, the
most critical period of the Reformation, when Luther
had well nigh finished his work, Calvin was establish
ing the Genevese Republic and Church, Loyola was
forging the Jesuit Order into the weapon of a spiritual
despotism, and Rome was busily laying down the
lines of the approaching Council of Trent. The one
piece of sculpture contributed by Michael Angelo to
the illustration of the Old Testament is Moses about
to dash down the Tables of the Law on seeing that
in his short absence the children of Israel had lapsed
into idolatry.
What does the picture represent ? It wants not
space, for the painter was not cramped and confined
in a niche as the sculptor had been. It fills the whole
end of the chapel. Time has told sadly on its colours
and its effect, and few Englishmen take the trouble
to find out what it is meant for. It is called the
' Last Judgment,' but it is very far from representing
either parable or prophecy associated with the second
advent. In the centre, suspended in the air between heaven,
earth, and the spectator, is a tremendous figure ex
pressing just indignation and unappeasable wrath,
with a wave of the arm separating the damned from

86 ROME AND CORRUPTIONS OF THE CREED
the saved — more distinctly the condemnation than the
invitation. The vision of the Almighty Father in
the heaven of heavens is indistinctly and partially
developed from clouds of glory, but on either side
is seen an army of Apostles and Saints bearing the
instruments and emblems of their martyrdom. Below
angels are assisting the saints to extricate themselves
from their graves, and lashing back the impenitent
sinners into the hell gaping for them.
All is final here, There is no Purgatory. In view
of the great question before us — indeed, of Roman
Catholic theology — it would be interesting to ascer
tain the relation of the central figure to that only
partially revealed, far above, in clouds of glory. The
central figure is projected from the higher figure.
Did it bear any resemblance whatever, it might repre
sent the Almighty as seen through some refracting
medium, His image, or radiance. But it is exceedingly
unlike and represents only one act of Divine ven
geance. Was the artist bound by his instructions ?
Authorities describe the picture as singularly charac
teristic of him.
Was this simply a menace to the increasing mul
titude of reformers ? Has the picture any dogmatic
. character at all ? It certainly has some correspond
ence to what the present writer has described as the
Anglican Creed. Here is the Redeemer represented
as much as possible absolutely one with fhe

WHAT DID THE PROTOMARTYR SEE? 87
Father, and performing that final act of condemna
tion so frequently associated with the inscrutable
mystery. The Sonship disappears in a sort of
optical unity. Christ is not at the right hand of
God, nor in the judgment seat Himself. As to the
former point, scientific theologians often point out
that there can be no right and left of the Almighty,
as He fills all space. But by the same rule there is
no above nor below, no far nor near, no presence nor
absence, no local heaven nor hell. Then what did the
Protomartyr see ? The Divine glory, some will reply.
But that is not what Stephen said, if we are to credit
the narrative. Of course we do not know what he
saw, but that is no reason why we should say just
what we please about it.
Upon the whole we may be thankful that the
picture is not in the best preservation, that it is not
very attractive, or very intelligible, or very likely to
make converts ; that it does not occupy so much
space in the imagination of mankind as it does on
the walls of the Sistine Chapel, and does not share
the extreme interest felt in the Transfiguration, the
Last Communion of St. Jerome, and the Cartoons.
Sixty years ago Oxford men used to watch
with a significant curiosity to note whether the Uiili-
versity preacher in the bidding prayer designated it
the judgment seat of God or of Jesus Christ In his
earlier sermons J. H. N. used the former expression ;

§8 ROME AND CORRUPTIONS OF THE CREED
but very soon the latter. There is Scriptural war
rant for both. If any difficulty be felt, it is one
of our own making, for we cannot possibly fashion
the scene, if indeed scene there be. But there is
nothing to justify the reduction of the Son of God
to a figure of the Deity — indeed, the absorption of
the Son into the One Almighty God.
No wonder that when the actual faith of Rome
was thus pictured, the whole work of the Son was dis
tributed among an enormous, multitudinous, and mul
tiform delegation, infected with all the errors to which
human agency is liable. No wonder that the con
fidence and loyalty of the weaker part of mankind
were transferred from One whom they could no longer
apprehend to objects expressly fashioned and de
scribed to meet their erring expectations. No wonder
that they had a curious variety of saviours and
intercessors when they knew not what had become
of the One, the only prevailing One. No wonder,
indeed, that, inasmuch as they still naturally yearned
for One to possess their hearts wholly and solely,
they elevated the Divine Mother into the place of her
Son, and found in the Virgin Mary one whom they
could both worship and love, and who could command
with maternal claims the obedience of a Son possessed
of Divine power.
But if this be a true account of the celebrated
picture, and of the actual faith of Rome at the era

ROMAN TOLERATION 89
of the Reformation, what becomes of the allegation
repeatedly made in this volume, and in some former
volumes, that it is distinctively the Creed of the
Anglican, mediaeval, and local Church? Well, it
must be supposed that the allegation can only be
made with reserve. Rome has ever been very
hospitable to beliefs that gratified national vanity,
that practically contributed to her own power and im
portance, and that allowed her to have her own way
in more pressing questions. Almost everything that we
have been accustomed to regard as Popish invention,
as Popish exaggeration, has been forced upon Rome,
and is the price she has paid for obedience, for
tribute, and for aid against the world of Caesars she'has
had to contend with. Thus it is commonly said, and has
been said truly, that at Rome you may believe what
you please, if you will only be quiet about it ; and that
in no other place in the world is discussion so free, and
all views or opinions so candidly and fairly discussed.
To the wprld at large the great boast and special
claim of Rome has been her almost absolute un-
changeableness ; indeed, change only in the direc
tion of greater uniformity. Now, it cannot be said
the Church of England can make this boast, when it
has quietly condoned, indeed encouraged, so immense
an outburst and development of the Triune theology
in the course of this not yet completed century.
The superstructure of observance, rite, ceremony,

90 ROME AND CORRUPTIONS OF THE CREED
and belief that Rome has built upon a simple founda- '
tion is indeed enormous, and in , its very bulk a
reproach. But there is no part of it for which Rome
cannot adduce Scriptural as well as primitive warrant.
For every miracle, dogma, and definition it can bring
proof, or possibility, not to say probability. Angli
can theologians may find it convenient to lay down
hard-and-fast lines restricting miracles to the Apos
tolic age, or even to the Scriptural record, but they
are simply putting themselves out of court altogether
in the Roman controversy. They may find a com
prehensive definition of Two Sacraments easier to
maintain than one to meet Seven. They may find
their faith and practice much more economical of time,
tongue, pen, and money, than that of Rome, which
certainly does make unlimited demands on those who
have to work ten hours a day if they would keep
pace with their neighbours. But if we can take
Scripture text by text — indeed, word by word — no
thing doubting, all believing, and all doing also, we
certainly find ourselves at issue with the world as
it is, and human nature as we wish to estimate it.
What, then, is the antidote and corrective of this
great and inevitable danger ? Why need we not run
into extreme upon the Scylla of a thousand acutely
pointed inventions, while' avoiding the Charybdis of a
deeply contrived mystery ? The answer is ready, and
plain. It is that common sense, moderation, modesty,

THE MOTE AND THE BEAM 91
caution, consideration, and other homely virtues are
as much gifts of the Spirit as anything claiming to
be distinctly a theological virtue or a special faculty
of spiritual discernment. Indeed, as has been abun
dantly demonstrated by one of the most sensible
divines England can boast of, the strongest proof of
the truth of the New Testament record consists in
the fact that the writers had full possession of their
faculties, full command of their passions, and had
none of the marks of enthusiasm, fanaticism, credu
lity, or imposture. But if we are, indeed, to be for
ever pulling the motes out of our brother's eye, we
are, at least, bound to take some account of the beam
in our own — the fierce refractory ray that dazzles our
vision and disturbs our calculation.

92

XI
ANSELM
Of the men that I have not seen in the flesh, but
only heard and read of, none have caused me more
perplexity and discomfort than Anselm and Bernard.
I could not but admire them, but I never could quite
suppress the misgiving that they were wrong in their
politics, their economics, and, most of all, in their
theology — the very root, as I thought, of their aber
rations. Times and times countless have I had to
hold my tongue while all about me were full of their
praises. Then it has occurred to me that it some
times is found that a good work has to be done, and
cannot be done on the lines of truth and justice, so a
wrong line has to be taken for want of a better.
Even in our own times it may be asked whether
truth, justice, or common sense are not sometimes
impossible. If so, we must certainly allow that
excuse for the enormous blunders, follies, and
excesses of the dark ages, as we are pleased to call
them. Anselm has been quite recently evoked from the

AOSTA 93
shades by that veritable necromancer, the late Dean
Church, whose graceful and poetic pen has done
more for Anselm than historians and Popes have
been able to do, in making him live and speak again.
But the Dean never allowed his pen to fly away with
him and soar to heights from which it was impossible
to descend safely. Indeed, he wholly and consistently
disclaimed himself all pretence to theology. So uni
formly did he adhere to this wise abstinence that not
even can his silence be interpreted one way or the
other with regard to Anselm. He admires him as
a chivalrous Christian might admire and even love
Mahomet, or Buddha, or any Crusader, pirate, or
adventurer. Whence came these two men who left such a
mark on English and European history ? They both
hail from Aosta — Anselm as a native, Bernard as Arch
deacon. To the untravelled English Aosta is best
known as one of the chief titles of the House of Savoy,
now reigning over Italy. In this way it is now borne
by a descendant of our Charles I. To the travelled
English the city of Aosta is the most extraordinary
combination of greatness and meanness, dignity and
squalor, glory and misery, to be found anywhere on the
much varied surface of this earth. It lies at the foot of
the three greatest mountains in Europe — Mont Blanc,
Mont Cervin, and Monte Rosa,. and is ' fed ' by their
confluent streams. It is on the track of the Little

94 ANSELM
St. Bernard pass, once the easiest. It must have been
the first considerable town to receive Hannibal and
what was left of his enormous host after reaching the
lower earth. But it was not then a Roman, or even
an Italian, town, for it was held by the Salassi,
whose name would seem to indicate a sea-going
people, and various mountain tribes — Gallic, Celtic,
Teutonic, dr what not.
It was not till 28 B.C. that Augustus conquered it,
and built a great city, calling it Augusta, a name
borne by our own London during the Roman occu
pation, and by some score other cities, generally
retaining the Roman name, with many varieties of
corruptions, to the present day. Aosta, on the
usual Roman plan, with cross streets, rectangular
walls, forts, a Praetorian palace, triumphal arches,
bridges, courts of justice, survives wholly or partially
to the present day. But in vain do the guide-books
descant on these interesting remains, so eager is the
traveller to reach the Alps one way or Rome the
other. But for the inhabitants, woe, woe, woe ! What a
contrast ! What a downfall ! Nowhere on the face
of this earth is the human kind physically so debased,
so deformed, so ugly, so corrupted, so stunted, so
twisted, so crooked, so utterly perverted from all
proper form, grace, and comeliness. All are blighted
one way or another. Many are cretins, more have

A BLIGHTED POPULATION

95

huge goitres, some are humpbacked, some paralytic,
some palsied, some are incapable of locomotion and
have to be laid out in the sun, or in tubs, or sprawling
at large, some are baying at the moon all night or
howling all day, some are incapable even of that sign
of vitality. The Church does what it can under difficulty far
surpassing those which are said to baffle all effort in
our own country. You stand before the painted
front of the cathedral. Suddenly the great west
door is thrown open. Out there issues a grand pro
cession, with banners, pictures, crosses, men in showy
vestments, choristers, and chanters — the procession
ists themselves as if the occupants of a lazar-house
or an asylum had broken loose and had a grievance
or a cause to demonstrate upon.
There is every reason to believe that this mass
of uncouth wretchedness has existed from a remote
antiquity ; and so long ago as in Pliny's time it was
attributed, as now, to the snow water from the neigh
bouring glaciers. One might suppose water fresh
from the mountain tops would be absolutely pure.
Perhaps it is, but may want something we know not
of, necessary to sustain complete and perfect vitality.
More probably the injurious quality of the water is
owing to the presence of rock in it; which the look
pf the stream everywhere shows to be the case.
Out of this city of Calibans there issued, shortly

96 ANSELM
after our own Norman conquest, almost simultane
ously, two men to impose new relations of Church
and State, new sacred and civil institutions, and a
new conception of the Almighty and of His deal
ings with men, very confident of success, and by
no means unsuccessful. As to their mutual relation,
Bernard is called the last of the Fathers, and
Anselm the first of the Schoolmen, but it is not easy
to see the difference, for the outcome is the same.
Both were men of good family, position, and high
personal endowments, who had received from some
quarter a call to a higher life than it was easy to find
the opportunity and the means for in those days.
The soil about Aosta was very fertile, the population
mixed, and the disturbing forces great. There was a
universal contest for land, for adherents, for all the
prizes of life, and it was impossible to escape entangle
ment in faction and in war. Everybody had to take
one side or another, and to be compromised in its
iniquities. The clergy might escape partisanship,
but they had to renounce a good deal more, more
than flesh and blood could easily endure. Even the
clergy were bound by local ties, had local masters on
whom they depended for position, pay, and protec
tion, whose pleasure they had to consult, and at
whose frailties they had to connive.
Very early, even in the lifetime of the founders,
these ideas expressed themselves in the demand —

PHILOSOPHERS FIRST 97
indeed, the fact — that half the world was to spiritualise
at the cost and toil of those who were content to
secularise, and that saints were to enjoy the fulness of
the earth which poor, hard-worked, underfed sinners
were to bring to their doors. Well, the saints, some
of them at least, were to contribute something to
their own sustenance and to the relief of their poor
dependants, but they were to be secure from anxiety
and common vicissitudes by a first claim to the fruits
of all vulgar industry.
These recluses and monks, soon an army of
them — indeed, armies — wanted something to do,
something more suited to young and energetic na
tures than fasting and praying. Their minds wanted
exercise as well as their bodies, and a contagious
zeal led them all into the difficult paths of philosophy
and polemical controversy. All had been versed in
philosophy, for the whole world were still philoso
phers first, Christians afterwards, and the one universal
study was to harmonise Christianity, regarded still as
a comparative novelty, with the much older intellec
tual system that had been acquiring form and force
for nearly twice a thousand years.
It may seem that these two men appeared rather
too late in the great drama of human affairs to be
credited with any novel and original part in it, but
such was not the opinion of their contemporaries, or
of their successors. As a fact they stand out, not
H

98 ANSELM
simply as restorers, but rather as founders ; indeed, as
founders of as distinctly new opinions, and new insti
tutions, as those which give an original character to
Luther, or to Calvin, and even to less-known leaders
of thought. As to the new institutions, which in this part of
the world came to regard Anselm and Bernard as their
most effectual, if not absolutely original founders,
the tale is soon told. These good men, finding the
world in a very chaotic condition, and wholly en
gaged in internecine quarrels for land, inheritances,
royalties, dignities, titles, alliances, wives, and all that
the world, the flesh, and the devil have to offer,
joined the scramble with certain reserves favourable,
if not quite necessary, to free action and success.
The reserves may be summed up in one great
reserve. They were to renounce all natural and
universal duties, all domestic, social, and political
relations, and become a legion of angels under the
command of my Lord the Pope of Rome. From
him, and not from any earthly potentate, they were
to take their orders, their possessions, their -privi
leges, and their exemptions, and to him they were to
owe their undivided allegiance, render homage, pay
tribute, customs, and dues. The notion was that by
an obstinate persistence in this plan they would find
all temporal sovereignties melt away like so many
icebergs, and earth would become a New Jerusalem,

CUR DEUS HOMO 99
the City of God. That is not promised in the
Gospels, or imagined by St. Paul, or, indeed, by any
other specially inspired writer. It is an idea and
nothing more, only resuscitated in these our days, now
and then, by some harmless fanatic, or some vile
impostor ; but for four centuries it kept this part of the
world in an incessant conflict, between the temporal
and the spiritual powers, culminating in sanguinary
wars, cruel persecutions, hideous scandals, impious
devices, shameful dishonesties, till at length the
fictitious fabric thus founded on the violation of com
mon sense and common feeling, fell to pieces, it may
be said, in a day, leaving in this country nothing but
ruins to tell its tale.
Anselm's theology, so far as I am acquainted
with it, is as simple as his ecclesiastical and political
system. The work by which he is chiefly known in
this country is ' Cur Deus Homo ' — why God was made
man. That idea runs through the book. ' The Son
of God,' ' Christ,' and even ' Jesus,' make an appear
ance late in the book, after long arguments based on
philosophical principles, and but still only as repre
sentative and relative ; as names for the Divine oper
ations and attributes. There is no actual personality
allowed in the matter, except that of Almighty God.
The necessity of an atonement is proved on lega
grounds. ' No man,' says Anselm, ' can make this
satisfaction except God Himself.' The question is

100 ANSELM
asked, ' Who was it that of His own accord willed to
make Himself man ? ' The answer given is, ' God, the
Son of God.'
Any one might read through the volume, that is
if he had patience to remain so long in the, frame
of abstract discussion, and yet remain absolutely igno
rant of the history, moral teaching, and characters re
corded and described in detail in the New Testament
Predestination and necessity are harsh enough when .
applied to created man, conscious as he is of free
will ; but they are not less harsh when applied to
the Uncreate and Only-begotten. We feel we must
attribute free will and' distinct personal action to the
Son of God if we are ever to believe Him our
Saviour, Redeemer, King, Lord, and Judge. If we
love Him it must be for what He did Himself volun
tarily ; that is, freely.
Anselm's episcopate was but a name. He was
only a few months, at long intervals, in this country.
How his place was supplied and his duty done for
him is a mystery. Was the rite of confirmation
thought necessary in those days ? Was it commonly,
or at all, observed ? Were the parochial clergy kept
in order and at their posts in those days ? The work
actually done by Anselm was not, as regards his
diocese and his province, either spiritual, or theo
logical, or disciplinarian, or philosophic— the side
to which his natural proclivities leant. It was one .

QUESTION OF INVESTITURE 101
long wrangle between him and the Norman sovereign
on the purely secular question of investiture. His
lands, his manors, his fees and his dues, his civil
rights, such even as his right to be protected by the
law of the land, his right of assistance in the enforce
ment of his claims, and his right to have a sufficient
military force at his disposal — all these was he to
receive from the king or from the Pope ? To which of
the two was he to do homage ? The king said ' To me,
of course.' The Pope said, ' No, not to the king, but
to me.' No English king could acquiesce in such a
pretension. He might temporise. In fact, a com
promise was come to and quickly broken.
Anselm's quarrel broke out again in the immedi
ately succeeding reign, and led to the long and finally
disastrous conflict between Henry II. and Thomas a
Becket. The modern historian and the modern
juridicist very justly says, ' Non nostrum inter vos
tantas componere lites,' and that is about as much as
he can have to say on the philosophical and theo
logical controversies of those days.
In the reign of Henry VII. Rome declined to
canonise Henry VI. on the ground that they had
canonised many innocents, but never such a mere
innocent as he. As a solatium for this refusal, they
canonised Anselm. Now, Rome is very clever at
compromises and anything in the nature of a bargain,
and in this case the concession and gift was not from

102 ANSELM
Rome to England, but from England to Rome.
Dean Church,' with characteristic candour and sim
plicity, grieves to have to add that it was Cesar
Borgia who negotiated this affair. Now, the said
Cesar Borgia has always been regarded as an emis
sary of Satan. If so, he knew what he was about
when he inserted Anselm in the most sacred Choir.

Io.3

XII
ST. BERNARD
In any attempt to trace the lines of Providence and
to declare the fairness and wisdom of the Almighty
as shown in His actual dispensations, we often find
ourselves driven to accept and to warrant much that
our reason condemns and our hearts have no liking
for. All the sects, all the schools, all nations are
alike in this difficulty, and the solution of it. In this
country we hold ourselves free to criticise and utterly
to condemn all the institutions and customs, religious,
political, or social, in the world, and to find a good
deal of fault with one another at home. We cannot,
therefore, pretend that in any special sense we are at
one with the Almighty in His management of human
affairs. Upon one point, indeed, all men of thought, of
learning, and of that which is called candour, have a
standing difference with the Almighty. It is upon the
ever-prevailing sense and acceptance of the preter
natural in the hearts and minds of the industrious
and uneducated. The poor workers will still be ready

104 ST. BERNARD
to believe, any tale of marvel or of miracle as much as
they would the most reasonable narrative of current
history and yesterday's addition to it. In spite of
the great pains taken in these days to disinfect them
and disabuse them, our rural congregations are ready
to accept ' as gospel ' the most amazing details, the
most exceptional particulars, the most flagrant incon
sistencies, as they may seem to us. Nothing comes
amiss with them. Now and then a village critic will
ask a curious question, but it will not challenge the
right of the Almighty to do what He pleases, and to
pursue His ends in His own way and fashion.
If, therefore, the great majority of the Christian
world are agreed in a matter of faith, and the rule,
' Quod semper, quod ubique, quod ab omnibus,' is
good for anything, we have to be always ready to
accept much that our reason revolts from. It is not
necessary to say that Paganism was a good thing, or
that Buddhism is good, or Hindooism or Mahometan
ism is as good as Christianity, but it is allowable to
admit that they fill a void which, through the hard
ness of the human heart and the vagrancy of human
affection, cannot be, or at least is not, better filled.
¦ The truth is, the great human flock is a very wander
ing body. Its history, whether in or out ofthe Christian
fold, is one story of aberrations, the stragglers being
only driven out of one error to fall into another.
They are suddenly enlightened every now and then

ABNORMAL DEVELOPMENT 105
and retrace their steps, but it is only to be again
misled and started on another divergency by the
apostles of some new gospel. As it certainly is not
absolute truth that mankind love and follow, or are
even capable of receiving, we must conclude that it is
goodness, whether of a higher or a lower quality — that
is, the moral development of our natures — that wins
the battle in the great conflict. But as the moral
sense is quite as liable to imposition and misleading
influences as the intellectual and rational, we must
also conclude that there is One who sitteth above,
and who gives to moral influence such part as it
may naturally have in the determination of human
affairs. About the last thing to be found in the Gospels
and Acts is that there would come a time in which
Christ's truest disciples, those most in the place of
His mother and brethren, and most representing His
Apostles, would occupy magnificent palaces, sit high
on thrones and under stately canopies in temples far
surpassing the Temple, exceeding David in royal
progress and Solomon in glorious worship, drawing
large revenues from the sons of toil, and rendering
dues and allegiance neither to Caesar nor to God, but
to the Annas or the Caiaphas of the day. But much
the same may be said of that development from
primitive simplicity of which Rome is the centre and
of that of which London is the centre, not to speak of

106 ST. BERNARD
many other national or voluntary communities,
adding the errors of private licence and local
peculiarity to those of political or ecclesiastical
corruption. Bringing these considerations nearer home, we
may find that we have at least to make allowances,
in common charity, for the great doctrinal aberrations
of the Middle Ages. We may find ourselves regard
ing, with the sympathies of equals rather than the
contempt of superior wisdom, the vast schemes of
ecclesiastical reform and renovation which Anselm
and Bernard have the credit of originating, and
which their admirers still regard as the salvation of
the Church in the period of its worst decline and
greatest peril, when, indeed, it was trembling for very
existence. It is very true that they covered England,
France, and other countries with abbeys very unlike
the stable at Bethlehem or the home at Nazareth,
but these became the refuges of faith, of learning,
of civilisation, and of life itself, and their ruins are
still the most interesting ornaments of the land.
But after ten generations of increasingly fastidious
grandeur in this country the morrow came and they
were cast into the oven. In France they only endured
longer to meet with a more terrible and universal
downfall, dragging down with them the greatest of
European monarchies and the oldest of aristocracies.
The doctrinal foundation of this movement is

COUNCIL AT RHEIMS 107
what we are now concerned with, and it shall be given
by no mean authority. The following account of a
discussion at the great Council at Rheims is extracted
from. ' The Life and Times of St. Bernard,' by Dr.
Augustus Neander, ' Professor of Theology in the
Royal University of Berlin, translated from the
German by Matilda Wrench. Rivington, 1843.
The investigation was to take place in the abbey of
St. Denis, near Paris, before a council presided by Eugenius
in person, during the Easter week of 1 147, and Bernard ap
peared there as his accuser, supported by two masters of arts.
But Bernard was no match for so dexterous a logician as
Gilbert, and the decision of the matter was therefore
adjourned by the pope to the great Council at Rheims,
where, assisted by his cardinals and by the most learned
men of France, he announced his intention of hearing both
parties. Bernard had now an opponent far more difficult
to overcome than Abelard had been : Gilbert had followed
the scholastic course in his studies, which had been pursued
under the direction of the most celebrated theologians, and
he had always confined his investigations within the limits
of the Church system. He thus enjoyed universal respect
and consideration, and numbered many of the most dis
tinguished men among his disciples, and many of the
cardinals among his friends. He now solicited the pro
tection of the latter, and these were generally ill-disposed
towards Bernard on account of his great influence with the
pope, who submitted himself in all things to his guidance.
When all the other business of the council had been
disposed of, Gilbert's business was brought forward, in order
that it might be investigated at leisure by the most learned

108 57: BERNARD
of the prelates, who alone remained in attendance. After
a whole day had been well nigh spent in disputation, the
pope, who was unaccustomed to follow such subtleties, said
to Bishop Gilbert, ?Thou canst indeed talk much, my
brother, and hast, it may be, caused many things to be read
which pass our comprehension : but tell us now plainly
whether thou dost call that Supreme Existence, by virtue of
whom the Three Persons are one God — God?' This was
the point of the dispute most interesting and comprehen
sible to the pope. Without taking any time for considera
tion, Gilbert, exhausted by the length of the argument,
answered 'No;' for, according to his opinion, that the
quality or property of the Godhead was one general con
ception, common to the Three Persons x: it was already
decided. Bernard immediately desired that this confession
of the bishop might be taken down in writing, in order to
bind the slippery disputant.
On the following day the dispute was renewed, and
Bernard, in the course of the argument, expressed himself
in a manner displeasing to the cardinals : whereon Gilbert,
in his turn, rose and said, 'Now, let this also be written
down.' ' Yea,' rejoined Bernard, with his wonted firmness,
'it may be written with an iron pen, and graven. in the
rock.' When at length the disputation had been continued
long enough, it was terminated by the intervention of the
cardinals, who were desirous of showing their authority.
' We have heard all that can be said on both sides ; we
will now determine how the matter is to be decided.1
These words, by which the cardinals of Gilbert's party
appropriated to themselves the right of decision, aroused
the fears of Bernard ; and he resolved by means of his
authority in the French Church, and his influence with the
pope, to be beforehand with them. He quickly assembled

POPE EUGENIUS 109
the remaining prelates, abbots, and masters, and represented
to them the necessity of preparing a creed in direct opposi
tion to Gilbert's errors, to be presented to the pope and
consistory, in order to preserve the Gallican Church from
those errors. They united in the following confession of
faith, which was probably drawn up by Bernard, and which
was to be delivered to the pope.
' It is our steadfast belief that the nature of the Godhead
is God, and that it can, in no Catholic sense, be denied, that
the Godhead is God, and God is the Godhead. And when
it is' said that God is wise by virtue of His wisdom ; great,
by virtue of His greatness ; and God, by virtue of His God
head, &c, &c, we must so understand it, that He is wise,
great, and God, only through the wisdom, greatness and
Godhead, which are God Himself, and so forth ; therefore
that He is of Himself , wise, great, and God. In speaking of
the three Persons of the Godhead, we recognise Them as one
God, one Divine Being; and on the other hand, in speaking
of one God, one Divine Being, we acknowledge that this
one God, this one Divine Being, is Three Persons. We
believe that the Trinity alone is Eternal ; and that no
things, relations, qualities, or unities can be asserted to
have been from all eternity, without being God. We
believe that the Godhead Itself, or, if it be preferred, the
Divine Substance or Nature, did, indeed, in the Son of
God, become flesh.'
This symbol of faith was presented by three distin
guished prelates, with these words : ' We, also, do herewith
deliver to you our confession of faith, that you may not
judge of one party only, but of both. Our opponent has
presented his unto you, with this postscript, ' that you may
amend whatever you find to censure therein ; ' but we ex
clude any such condition, and declare, in delivering to you

no 571. BERNARD
this confession of our faith, that we must always abide by
it, without the slightest alteration.'
The pope was satisfied with this confession, and pro
nounced it to be in harmony with the doctrine of the
Church of Rome. This greatly displeased the cardinals,
and they unanimously declared to the pope the disgust
they had so long entertained on the subject of Bernard's
influence with him.
' You are to know,' they said, ' that it was by us you
were exalted to be the ruler of the Church, and from a
private man became the common father, and it concerns us
as well as you, that you should not presume to prefer your
private friendship to the common good, but that you should
provide for the common weal, and assert the dignity of the
Romish court, according to your duty. But what hath
your abbot, and with him the Gallican Church, thought fit
to do ? What audacity is this, that they should rebel
against the Primate of the Apostolical throne, to whom
alone appertaineth the right of binding and of loosing, and
of deciding matters touching the Catholic faith, and who
cannot be prejudiced, even in his absence, in these his
peculiar rights by any man, unless he be himself a party to
the wrong. Yet now observe, these men, holding us alto
gether in contempt, and as though it were for them to decide
upon the question which has just been discussed before us,
have presumed, without consulting us, to draw up their con
fession of faith. Yet even in the East, when any such
question is agitated before all the patriarchs, they can
determine nothing positively without our authority. How
dare these men then to do that in our presence, which is
not permitted to the more remote, to those who are greater
than we? It is therefore our pleasure that you oppose

THE CARDINALS in
yourself to this impertinent innovation, and at once reprove
their refractory spirit.'
Eugenius, who, on the one hand, durst not oppose him
self to the will of the cardinals, and, on the other, was
most anxious to avoid mortifying his former master, was
thrown into a state of the greatest perplexity by this ex
planation ; he did his best to soothe the irritated feelings of
the former, and sent in haste for Bernard, to intreat that
he would devise some means of adjusting the matter. Ber
nard appeased the cardinals by the submissive turn wliich
he gave to his proceedings, declaring that it had never been
his intention, or that of the bishops, to determine the ques
tion ; but that since the bishop of Poitiers had desired him
to set down his confession of faith in writing, he had, in
order to avoid doing this solely on his own responsibility,
expressed his individual opinions under the authority and
with the concurrence of those prelates. The cardinals
were satisfied with this, and only required further that the
creed should be regarded simply as a private memorial, not
as an authorised creed, such as those drawn up by general
councils in opposition to heresies, and they were un
doubtedly right in their decision, although they erred in
the grounds which they alleged for it. Why overwhelm the
Church doctrines with logical definitions unintelligible to the
generality of men, and tending to paralyse the energies of
the mind and the heart, by abstracting the mind of the dis
ciple from the realities of religion ?
The authority of the cardinals prevented any definite
sentence against Gilbert of Poitiers ; the pope confined
himself to the condemnation of his first doctrinal article
(on which indeed his whole theory was based), declaring
that without distinguishing between the Divine Nature and
Persons, the Godhead is in the strictest sense to be called

112 ST. BERNARD
God. Gilbert submitted himself to the judgment of the
pope, reconciled himself with his clergy, and returned with
undiminished honour to his diocese. The spirit of the
times was opposed to the total suppression of the specula
tive theology ; and the attacks which Abelard and Gilbert
, had sustained, had only the effect of clipping its wings and
driving it to shelter itself under the authority of the fathers,
and to confine its activity within the limits of the Church
system. Such was the origin of the work which became a
text-book for succeeding generations, the Libri Sententiarum
of Petrus Lombardus.
There was nothing in the speculative theology which
could lead to any reformation of the Church, or to any
separation between the earthly and the heavenly, in the
doctrinal conceptions of the Church. The speculative theo-
logists received the doctrines of the Church just as they
were presented to them ; and then, in virtue of the uni
versal capacity of the human understanding to construct
and to deduce, they built up an organised system, framed
of artfully mingled truth and falsehood, by which the rhind
and heart were alike led captive.

II'

XIII
'OUSIA' IN MEDIEVAL THEOLOGY
The formation of the Creeds did but give a new
impulse and a distinctive direction to a movement of
the human mind that had then been long in progress.
This was the shattering, the mixing, the fusing, and
the compounding of all ideas, all faiths, all principles,
and all systems into one huge, indistinctive miscellany.
The Roman Empire, had grown in this way to what
it came to be, and as the Empire was now the Church
and the Church the Empire, it was bound to follow
the example. In the earlier, fresher, and keener
stages of the human intellect, it had asked many
questions, like an inquisitive, bright, quick develop
ing child opening its very eyes wider to the largtr
the more distinct, the more glorious objects within
view, and more and more desirous to give a name,
and a place, and a distinct character to everything
that it sees or hears of. In course of time the wish
to know everything, and to be everything, and to let
everybody know that you had thoroughly explored and
mastered the common good of all subjects, proved an
I

114 'OUSIA' IN MEDIEVAL THEOLOGY
ambition that overleapt itself. There was something
like loyalty, there was a fervour of devotion, there was
religious expectation, the sublimity of hope, and
occasionally a certain saintliness in the earlier philo
sophical schools that divided society all over the
inhabited world. Some were even content to converse
and enquire, leaving no record, in the hope that new
comers would start afresh, perhaps on higher ground,
But when every youth in the well-to-do class had
to be taught all the philosophies, and men were every
where found ready to teach any or all, they gradually
lost their distinctive features. It is hard to say what
was the philosophy of any one author, any one poet,
orator, or historian,, even of the Augustan age. As
regards the next and all succeeding ages it is hope
less. It was a return to chaos. Deity, necessity,
fortune — that is mere chance — speculative systems,
like gossamer webs, floating in mid air, divinity in
gradations and layers, untold treasures in unknown
depths, final causes with or without a deity to con
ceive them, virtues in plants with celestial affinities,
material thirsting for quality, and quality for embodi
ment, spirits good, bad, and indifferent, luck — that is
chance— running in streaks or with personal attach
ments, a universal soul or spirit leagued with matter or
free all that man has ever dreamt of, were formed as
much as possible its one bulky whole, the ingredients
of which were used as they were wanted. Personality

PHILOSOPHIC RESIGNATION 115
fared but ill in the mile'e, but philosophy and faith
almost disappeared. For a millennium and more,
philosophy was a resignation to an inevitable neces
sity, to blind chance, to violence, to tyranny, to casual
or providential politics, to everything one could not
guard against or foresee. So sure a footing did
philosophy obtain in this character, as the wisest
result the human mind could attain to under the
actual circumstances, that the word is still used in the
sense of resignation to the casual or inevitable. We
still talk of a man bearing disasters or annoyances
with much philosophy, when he has no more of the
philosopher in him than his horse or his dog.
This doggedness, this apathy, this stupidity, this
utter selfishness as it often proved to be, came to be
regarded as fixedness of purpose when there was
nothing to be called purpose ; firmness of character
when there was no character ; patriotism when a man
had been all his life subordinating all the rights and
duties ofthe citizen to his own convenience or pleasure.
But it was regarded as the right human expression of
that which alone was fixed, eternal, and so far reliable
in the universe, and the only ground to stand upon
The holder of this position might bear without a quiver
the crack of doom and the collapse of the great vault
with all its star-lit furniture. Within him was the
eternal, the unchangeable, superior even to the possi
ble deities weakened by human affection.

1 1 6 < 0 US I A ' IN ME DIE VA L THEOL OGY
During the whole of this very long period, described
as the Decline and Fall of a Great Empire, and seldom
rising much above the level of anarchy, there were
two kinds of religion in this Western Continent, both
of them showing a very partial recognition of the
Christian revelation, or a reaction from it. The un
educated, the proletarian, and the village folk, were
still Pagans at heart and in their superstitions and
their celebrations ; the educated retained their old
eclectic philosophy, with some change of titles and
forms. It is the latter, that is, the educated, that we
are most concerned with when we come to any ques
tion of creed, for they had some chance, some
opportunity, and some capacity for distinguishing
between one creed and another, or between a creed
and no creed. It is not too much to say that for more
than a thousand years the conception of the Son of
God, sent by His Father to save and redeem fallen
humanity, actually assuming it, teaching by precept
and example the homely lessons of humility, love,
purity, self-denial, common sense, reverence, forgive
ness of injury and insult, and the hearty co-operation
of all believers in the Divine mission by the con
tribution of their various services, had all but dis
appeared from the human mind.
True, it still loved the imagination and represen
tation of these things in self-chosen, romantic, and
picturesque forms. In the God of Nature they still

FAITH REDUCED TO A DRAMA TISM 117
recognised a great artist, a painter, a sculptor, a
dramatist, the author of spectacles and ceremonies,
the manager of mysteries. This kind of teaching,
this worship, they could appreciate and enjoy. But the
inevitable result of theatrical ideas and customs in
religion is to regard that which is thus represented as
imaginary, and to look for a more solid basis of faith
that cannot be thus represented. That at least is
what the intellectual and cultivated minds will do.
The Western Church came, in fact, to accept, to
teach, and to transmit the notion of a Supreme Being,
personified, exhibited, illustrated, in the grandest and
most touching of dramas. This was, in truth, to send
the Almighty Himself back to His own dreary, solitary,
unfathorhable eternity, and with no concern, as far as
could be seen or felt, in the everyday movements of
human life ; with a beautiful phantasmagoria to supply
His place and keep up the semblance. He remained
the only real Existent, the Ousia, the Divine Sub
stance. For a thousand years the earth was full of violence,
outrages, and frauds. All the West was engaged in
one continuous struggle, scramble rather, for the frag
ments ofthe Roman Empire. There was unbounded
license of manner. The powerful defied opinion as
well as right. Poetry, such as it was, lent itself to any
vice. Courts were popular as they were abandoned
to every indulgence, and any chief, any league had

118 'OUSIA' IN MEDIEVAL THEOLOGY
only to adopt some religious war-cry — a word only—
and it had a charter of libertinism.
To men of strong personality, men of action,
natural leaders, it was a golden age, and all they had
to do was to press into their service men over whom
they possessed or could create any claim to their
allegiance. The sword and the lance everywhere
prevailed over the spade and the plough, and the
only chance for a proper man was to enlist in
the service of some lord or some adventurer. They
who could not handle the sword or the lance, who
had learnt no industry, who could neither acquire nor
retain a sufficient share of earth and its gifts, had to
betake themselves to the Church, which became, in
time, the very Adullam of the world. Of this they
could not be free till they had learnt the proper,
watchword, and, as often happens, the less meaning
it had the better it suited its purpose as a Masonic
token of brotherhood.
For many centuries the great controversy had to
be fought round a word that ill' expressed the Greek
Ousia, and sadly hampered the disputants. This
word, for want of a better, was ' substance,' which
remains in the Western version of the Nicene Creed,,
I cannot find the Greek word Ousia in any one of
the many thousand hymns particularly noticed in M.
Julian's monumental work, excepting only in one out
of a thousand Sequences. These Sequences came late

ADORATION OF THE USIA 119
into use. They were the prolongation of the last note
of the Alleluyah sung between the Epistle and the
Gospel. In a missal printed at Wiirzburg in 1484 is
a Sequence, of which the first line is 'Adoranda,
veneranda est Trinitatis usia.'
The date is significant. This was a few years
after Constantinople and the Eastern Empire had
passed into the hands of the Turks. In our own
country the Houses of York and Lancaster had not
yet been united, and everything indicated an approach
ing struggle for the crown of England. It was shortly
before the discovery of America, the Conquest of
Granada, the expulsion of the Moors from Spain, and
the expedition of the French King, Charles VIII.,
with the best appointed army yet seen, to Naples, on
the invitation of the Pope, a Borgia, and his better
known nephew. On that occasion our own Cardinal
Archbishop Morton took a part in the delicate
arrangements necessary to save alike the pretensions
of the Pope and the dignity of the King, when the
French army were com mitting great outrages. Morton
did his work so well, that when Charles VIII., with
his army, had to pass through Rome on his return,
and the Pope and his friends preferred to be out of
the way, Morton did the honours of Rome to the
French King, who then and there inaugurated the
Church of the Trinity on the Pincian.

XIV
NATURAL WORKINGS OF PHILOSOPHY
AND CREED
The difference between the natural working of a
creed and the natural working of a philosophy, is
very great and most important. Resting on authority
and the record, a creed is ready to recognise, to em
brace, and to associate with a distinct and special in
terest, every fact, every utterance thus commended to
the believer's notice. Philosophy, on the other hand, is
ever for reducing facts to laws and principles — indeed,
any number of facts to one — and in that way to throw
aside anything that does not immediately tend to serve
the particular conclusion aimed at. It will be replied,
indeed, that if philosophy can subordinate everything
to a theory, and accordingly be too simple and one
sided, faith has an almost irresistible tendency to
multiply its objects and to hold many so-called
beliefs without regard to credential or moral signi
ficance, and so inviting imposture. Yet the fact .
remains. Faith is conservative, philosophy destruc
tive ; and as regards religion, the result is a store-

FAITH CONSERVATIVE 121
house and a library in one case, and a few abstrac
tions in the other.
As to their bearing upon moral and religious
matters, there is all the difference in the world
between faith and philosophy. Faith is a habit
founded upon a moral instinct and on a certain esti
mate of character. It cannot help taking others into
account and forming ideas of duty, moral design, and
personal qualification. Philosophy engages itself in
generalities and flies away from personal and par
ticular obligations. The difference is most seen and
most flagrant in religion, and in what aims to be
theology. Here faith is simple and straightforward ;
avoiding excuses, evasions, complications, and needless
obscurities. It is even charged with bestowing itself
too freely and lavishing its too kindly service. It is
readily duped, and it falls an easy prey to impostors
and charlatans. But without this spontaneous ac
ceptance of these proffered relations and those exag
gerated reliances, this world that we live in, not so
unhappily, would be nothing better than a sand-hill.
Philosophy quickly extricates itself from man as
he is and things as they are. It extracts and
manipulates airy conceptions. It is a perpetual
levitation, a dream in which you are flying across
hedges, ditches, -wood and water, with delightful
facility, and wondering how it was you never did
this before and that nobody else ever did. But when

122 NATURAL WORKING'S OF PHILOSOPHY
this process is applied to the matter of religion,
some of which it has to accept in order to generalise
upon, it can only create difficulties, which it charges
upon the darkness of untutored apprehensions. It is
true, indeed too true, that simple folk are sadly
tormented by philosophised religion, especially when
they find their own way of taking the Bible as it
stands, verse by verse, treated with contempt. They
don't like to be told that besides the Bible — indeed,
over and above the Bible — there is the sense of the
Bible, which only a few scholars can understand,
but which is the only truth of it.
But these obscurities, labyrinths rather, have a far
worse effect on those who flatter themselves they
possess the clue. They are like the corners and dark
places which are ever found to harbour dirt and vermin
and worse evils. Man is unkind to man, unjust to
man, ungenerous to man, because he thinks himself
entitled to regard without sympathy or common
justice those who cannot accept what his own accus
tomed lips can glibly utter. Let anyone consider
where lies the field of moral religion and religious
faith. It is not wholly or chiefly in questions of
justice, or even of that which can be distinctly called
generosity ; it is in the indistinct, soft-hued border or
fringe surrounding what can be called either justice
or generosity. It is that which a man, if he be con
scious of it, which is not always the case, holds to be

PHILOSOPHY IRRESPONSIBLE 123
entirely at his own disposal, insomuch that when he
conceives he is acting fully within his right and only
doing his duty at once to his neighbour and to himself,
he may yet do it in what manner or with what over
flow he pleases. May he not give of his own at
discretion ?
It is here that the social bond grows or decays.
Here is the very point, or the very surface, as it
may be properly described, where there is moral con
tact The proud possessor of an inscrutable mystery
constituting the watchword of social warfare and of
social position, may present to a neighbour a hand of
stone or the warm blood of fellowship as he pleases.
Nobody has a right to challenge the distribution of
that which a man is under no obligation to give at all.
If he gives or withholds by rules of his own, what
is a man made for but to discharge an individual re
sponsibility ? But it may easily fail to be the Com
munion of Saints, the Fellowship of the Holy Spirit,
or Christian Brotherhood. It is not Life unto Life,
and may easily be, in a very wrong sense, Death unto
Death. Indeed, in the whole history of the Church,
the most prominent and the most lamentable feature
has been the very ill use made of the cardinal truths
themselves, let alone the .points on which it seems
permissible for the human intellect to rest content
with different conclusions.
Thus, when philosophy is applied to religion, and

124 NATURAL WORKINGS OF PHILOSOPHY
places itself in direct antagonism to faith, it can
only produce sterility and moral desolation. Philo
sophy has fields of its own — all creation, all history,
all language, all literature, to wander over, and to mar
shal into something like order. It must be allowed —
indeed, it does not wait for leave — to notice such
matters as the Bible history and the Church after its
own fashion, its own sweet will and pleasure. It can
regard these matters as picturesque phenomena, and
as worthy of notice among other apparent violations
of the order of nature, such as earthquakes and
volcanoes, epidemics and pests. It can arrange an
endless procession of personages in proper costume,
action, and bearing, with the grandest of all figuring as
the conquered and doomed foes in a Roman triumph
to swell the glory of their conqueror — that is, of the
writer himself. It can do this and more, but it can
never' satisfy the soul with an assurance that it has
learnt all it had to learn from human affairs.
In all matters of faith there is the person to be be
lieved, his character to be apprehended, certain facts
to be accepted, their distinct relation to ourselves,
the homage to be paid, and the duty to be done —
including the command to be understood and the
obedience to be rendered. There need not be any
difficulty on any of these points when the Person
commanding our allegiance and surrender is the
Father, or the Son, or the Holy Spirit, understood to

JUSTICE AND GENEROSITY 125
be speaking to us through the word and the Church.
But when a philosophy steps in and substitutes for
these the Triune God, the Trinity as One God, then
personality, character, distinct relation, particular
duty, and specific obedience all seem to disappear, or
recede from us, leaving us to speculate as piously as
we can on the being and nature of that for which is
claimed our hearts, hands, and souls. This certainly
must leave the ground more open to the intrusion of
the idle thoughts and vain wishes always ready to
invade the mind of the worshipper, to darken the
Divine radiance, and to make His presence a curious
enquiry. What is more than all, it gives more scope
and sufferance to that self-will that begins of idle
wishes, and that predetermination to have one's own
way in the end, which even the best man can be
guilty of and the less good can hardly escape from.
Justice and generosity divide between them the
whole ground of social, indeed, public affairs ; some
times very markedly, for there are those who are said
to be just but not generous, and those who are said
to be generous at the cost of justice. There is strict
justice, and what some will describe as moral virtue
and as practical justice when it suits them • and there
is also generosity, which is regarded sometimes as a
positive duty, sometimes as a spontaneity, and to be
hailed when it shows itself. There are those who can
play fast and loose with all these ideas, riding first

126 NATURAL WORKINGS OF PHILOSOPHY
one horse then another, now playing first one card
then another, and who can thereby impoverish and
even exhaust those who are not as wise in their
generation. Now, everybody carries about him a treasury of
justice and of mercy, and can deliver law from one
mount and mercy from another. He is, however,
answerable for his exercise of both these endowments.
If he follows his own capricious affections and fancies,
he will preach from one mount to those whom he does
not like, or regards as rivals, from another to those who
are dear to him, including his own dear self. Surely
he wants monitors, counsellors, and comforters, in the
discharge of functions so delicate and so liable to
error. Now, it cannot be denied that any representa
tion of the Deity, however vague, however deformed,
however impersonal, however grotesque, may have
some effect in shaking a man's overweening self-con
fidence, and reminding him of that which is above
him and yet all around him. It cannot be denied that
even an ' unknown God ' may be sufficient for this.
But the Gospel was to tell us who and what this
is, not to send us back still to search for Him in vain,
or recognise Him, if we could, in a new disguise.
Is the fact of an inscrutable mystery in the teach
ing of a church so far its own defence, inasmuch as it
may be said there is no other account to be given of
it except that it is the truth ? Can it be said that we

THE SCHOOL OF CHRIST 127
are promised we should be led to all truth, and there
fore must expect teachings that would not have been
understood by earlier Christians, and are but im
perfectly understood even now ? Can we call it
development ? Can it be added that good men and
educated Christians would not hold the doctrine
except for its unquestionable truth, and that there
can be no other reason for holding that which, it is
admitted, confounds the human intellect? Why, if
anything is to be expected, anything that needs no
inspired prophet to warn us against, it is that the
aspiring intellect and mind of man should find this
very escape from the school of Christ and the teach
ing of His Gospel.
In all the records of humanity, sacred or profane,
European or Oriental, there is no character so
humane, as well as so Divine, as Christ's ; none so
touching, so calculated to abate the pride of man, to
disappoint his earthly hopes, to moderate excessive
desires, to chasten the lust of power, the greed of
gain, the rivalry of equals, the tyranny of the great,
the indignation of the weak, the resentments of the
oppressed, the vengeance of the victim. There is no
warning voice and manner so directly addressed to
those that seek mastery, not without just claim to
it, pre-eminence that has devolved upon them, un
deniable and indefeasible rights, wise unions, just
partitions, and sound prerogatives. Above all, it is

128 NATURAL WORKINGS OF PHILOSOPHY
the pride of intellect, the golden apple contended for
by a hundred schools of philosophy, and the one axis
of all the spheres, the only key of all the enigmas,
that the Gospel bids us to seek no longer anywhere
than in the perfectly simple and absolutely intelligible
life and words of One Man, and His immediate com
panions and followers.
Of the direct and distinct meaning of each act and
utterance in this record, itself the sublimest of his
tories, there surely is hardly the possibility of one
honest doubt or misgiving. But it certainly does lay
genius at the feet of simplicity, and levels the most
towering ambition to the rank of brotherhood, not to
say servitude.
It is a universal error of the natural, that is, the
self-seeking undisciplined intellect, to look out for
something that you may ask the sense of it, and to
throw away the bark while you take the kernel into
your own keeping. But what most tempts the good,
the wise, and great to achieve this escape from the
Gospel call, is that it is a continual summons to a
great fight, to be fought in the arena of home affairs ;
in the mere discharging of domestic, social, and
political duties. Neither in Gospel nor Epistle is there
a hint of monasteries, hermitages, pilgrimages, crusades,
or any of the exceptional expedients by which whole
classes and crowds of men were to discharge by one
step, as it were, all their moral responsibilities. .

PHILOSOPHY NEED NOT BE CONSCIENTIOUS 1 29
The Gospel finds and leaves men in the market,
in the field, on the waters, at the customs, in the
counting-house, in the shop, on military service, and
at public posts fertile of embarrassing questions. For
every variety of position it supplies help and guidance.
Only suppose a man tender enough to feel all this,
but unable, that is unwilling, to accept the Guide
who bids him first and foremost to be humble and
meek, and to think little of himself, and there you
find the too-willing victim of a delusion which would
reduce the Gospel to a philosophy, a riddle, a recipe,
or a charm, and give yourself some virtue in its holding
and some power in the monopoly of distribution.
Many instances in the Gospels justify us in taking
an illustration from commercial affairs. We may
suppose a young man early engaged in business,
with singular natural qualifications. He is quick of
apprehension, subtle, and retentive of names, places,
and facts. He can take in a financial statement
at a glance and calculate differences speedily and
exactly. He knows the resources of States and
the material conditions upon which credit is de
manded ; but he has made up his mind not to be
over-scrupulous either in his own undertakings or in
those he has to deal with — that is, neither in the
transactions he will have to take part in, nor as regards
the known character and antecedents of the persons
he will have to act with. He does not expect others
K

130 NATURAL WORKINGS OF PHILOSOPHY
to be better than himself, and if they are a little
worse he feels himself well able to outwit them and
to profit by their dishonesty without being directly
compromised in it. Such a man — and certainly there
are many such — riiakes the mart a philosophy, but
most undoubtedly not a creed. He trusts nobody
on the ground of his proved and consistent honesty,
and he even thinks the better of him for not being
quite honest ; and his final and decisive trust and
confidence is in himself, as well able to take care of
himself under any circumstances. Of course he often
finds himself sadly mistaken.

13'

XV
AN UNINTELLIGIBLE CREED IN PLACE OF
SUPERSTITIOUS PRACTICE
THIS temptation there certainly was at the time of
our Reformation — a temptation that amounted to a
sort of practical necessity, that is, a case of self-
preservation. It cannot be called simply historical,
a thing of the past, for it survives in a chronic form.
The Reformers • had to give up a world of directly
religious acts, forms, institutions, and ideas. The old
stock-in-trade, as they regarded it, had to be de
stroyed. Seven sacraments had to be abandoned
altogether or left contingent on spiritual conditions.
There could now be no confessions or pardonings ;
no pilgrimages or stations ; no indulgences, penances,
relics, ex-votoes or rosaries ; no forty paternosters,
and as many ave marias ; no ashes, no palms, no
monks or nuns ; no mendicant orders ; no calvaries,
no crosses or shrines of miraculous sanctity.
Nearly all the externals of the Church were gone.
The country was covered with its ruins, and its spoilers
laid down garden and ploughland in grass for the
K 2

132 AN UNINTELLIGIBLE CREED ETC.
profitable sheep that now supplied the place of a
priest-ridden, unprofitable people. The once glorious
edifice, competing with Jerusalem the Golden, had
now vanished like a dream, and its place had to be
supplied. The new ministers were unlearned, indeed
many could hardly read ; they were singularly
destitute of preaching power ; they were ill paid with
the crumbs that fell from the spoiler's table ; they had
not their hearts in their work ; they trembled between
the halter, the axe, and the stake that threatened
them on all sides. They had misgivings as to their
commission, for they had believed themselves to be
originally derived from Rome, and Rome they were
now told was Antichrist. A holy commission from
a Tudor seemed a contradiction in terms.
So what was to be done to fill the terrible gap,
and arm the naked and defenceless pastors alike with
weapons against the wolves and food, for the sheep?
As for the Bible, in such raw hands it was found to
reduce pastor, sheep, and wolf to a mixed multitude,
each his own interpreter, preacher, and devourer. As
far as can be concluded from the actual documents,
all that could be done was to take the most impos
sible, inconceivable, self-contradictory form of the
so-called Trinity ever devised by ignorant and pre
sumptuous theologians, and constitute it, by Act of
Parliament, the special secret and property of the
national church. The holder of this talisman, no

FICTITIOUS ORTHODOXY AND WORLDLINESS 133
longer a priest, but rather a magician, was to offer to
them that hungered and thirsted after righteousness
something better than their own heart-yearnings and
scruples, and to the ruder sort a freedom from high
moral responsibility.
If this was all, and if the very virtues of the in
vention consisted in its bold defiance of Scripture,
Church, and common sense itself, what else was neces
sary ? Why stint of any enjoyment within reach
when an incoherent jumble of words, pronounced now
and then, would save from all ill consequences ? It
may seem unwarrantable, or at all events uncharitable,
to associate a fictitious orthodoxy with worldliness
and moral licence. But it has been always seen and
deplored that men will seek in religion a discharge
from high morality and condonation for habitual dis
regard and positive breaches. That it had been so
in all ages of the. Church it is needless to admit, for it
cannot be denied.
Did the Reformers put an end to this old and
universal custom ? Did they eagerly seek and gladly
embrace a faith that by its commanding simplicity
and plainly moral force should irresistibly draw the
hearts of men from earth to heaven, and make
obedience both easy and delightful ? When the slaves
of superstition found themselves free from their chains
and masters of their own movements, did they walk
into the Temple, like the poor cripple healed by

134 AN UNINTELLIGIBLE CREED, ETC.
Peter and John, walking and leaping and praising
God? Not only history, whether of politics or o
private life, but even still more the existing appro
priation of landed property, testifies to the triumph
of the world, and worldly men and worldly ideas, over
the Church, over common morality and over the
public good. It was a day when everybody was for
himself, and he was the best man who secured the
largest armful of spoil. With rapine came licence,
as is always the case. Ill-gotten gains were soon
spent, spent in building up houses and families
committed by their own family affections to a share
in old crimes.
Thus the Reformation came on the Western
Church as Mahometanism had on the Eastern,
devastating whole regions and climes, and substitut
ing what claimed to be simpler worship and simpler
faiths in place of an excessive and abnormal growth
of usages, beliefs, and institutions. As in the East,
so in the West, the iconoclasts were not content with
clearing the earth of its superstitious burdens, they
must also clear the air of pious phantasms, and heaven
itself, as far as that heaven is conceived in the human
mind. An effusive and inventive faith had peopled
the skies with angelic legions and successive ranks
of mediators, principalities, and powers. Perhaps it
is not too much to say that these local or domestic
saints — these heavenly patrons of churches, families,

HEAVEN AND EARTH TO BE CLEARED 135
nations, classes, and professions — had been so many
lesser Christs, more or less encroaching on the
sovereignty of the Divine Original. Once on the
move the Reformers could not, or would not, stay
their hand till they had swept heaven and earth clean
of them. They allowed saints, prophets, and martyrs
to survive only as pious memories,
But in England, at least, they did not stop here.
There remained One whom Christians were bound to
believe still living, still interceding for them, still
hearing their prayers, still present with them, still
conveying to them the benefits of His work and Pas
sion, His death and rising again. With His last
words still ringing in the ears of an expectant world,
He might be still supposed the Leader of a mighty
cause, the Captain of a great army, the Judge of a
trial to come once for all. He was always. omniscient,
indeed, immanent.
The scoffers of the period had early warned the
Reformers that they must cut at the very root of the
mischief, and extinguish preternaturalism at its source.
There was no security so long as you allowed Jesus
of Nazareth to be King of kings and Lord of lords,
present here and in the heaven of heavens. If there
be such a being as the Son of God, is a matter,
they said, which need not much concern us. Banish
Him to an infinite distance, shut Him up with a strong
definition conclude Him in the Deity — the two really

136 AN UNINTELLIGIBLE CREED, ETC.
one, theoretically or what you please, so as He
trouble us no more. Let Him be a long way back,
or a long way off, and we will do Him cheap and
easy service in return for competence and honours.
But let's have no more of His actual presence amongst
us, except as God is everywhere. Speculate as you
please on His nature and His doings through all
space, and beyond all reaching of time, before and
after this creation. That is a sublime and safe em
ployment, and if it cannot do much good, neither
need it do much harm. You can be as positive as
you like when there is none to call you to account.
In the realm of the immeasurable and incomprehen
sible, you can always make your own rules, lay your
own basis, build what you please upon it, and con
found whom you please.
Such was the language heard in high places all
over Europe in that period, and it had its repre
sentatives in this country — men of action, strong in
deeds if not in words. The Church had to come to
terms with them, and promise what one now hears
of so often — a modus vivendi. This it found in the,
conception of a Deity embracing in Himself all the
attributes of perfect humanity, requiring no son
because Himself Son, and no Holy Spirit because
Himself Spirit — at once the All-sufficient Creator,
Redeemer, and Sanctifier.

137

XVI
THE REFORMATION HURRIED, INTERRUPTED,
AND CUT SHORT
BUT justice, as well as pity, is due to the men who
had to encounter a vast league of opposition from
many quarters, and rebuild the Church in evil times.
There are situations in which the best thing that can
be done is only the least of many possible ills. The
enormous scandals of the Church of Rome had now
disgusted all reasonable — indeed, all religious — men,
and driven them to the conclusion that everything
which could be called human invention must be
cleared off the ground before Divine truth could have
a chance. The good was now indistinguishable from
the evil, and the cry was to root up the crop alto
gether. The very atmosphere had to be purified.
In the early days of the Church the conception of a
Being distinct from the Almighty, yet of the same
nature, or a like nature, had never been a difficulty to
the mass of the Christian people, fresh, as it was,
from the very lap of polytheism.
Both Jew and Greek did find great stumbling-

138 THE REFORMATION
blocks in the personality, the words, and the work of
Christ ; in His humiliation, His humbling doctrines,
His sufferings, and His ignominious death'. , In these
respects the new divinity presented a very great and
distasteful contrast to the principal personages of the
Pagan Pantheon. On the other hand, the 'elect,'
at first few among many, and generally of the
humbler classes, did apprehend and appreciate One
who should be Saviour, King, Mediator, and in all
spiritual respects should enable man to communicate
with his Maker. Such a Being would, of necessity,
be God and man, as regarded His relation to God and
His relation to man.
The only difficulty was to secure this idea from
corruption, multiplication, and degradation. The
two great • Churches of Christendom vied with one
another in the race for popularity, and in a ready
acceptance of new pretensions, which, like other
imitations, bore witness to the truth and potency
of the original. For more than a thousand years
mediation was becoming more human than divine, till
saints, miracles, legends, and usages became neither
human nor divine, but mere romances and fairy tales.
The Breviary itself, forced by the Church of Rome
on its subject clergy, became encumbered with stories
which they could only understand as well-meant, and
edifying fictions. So the Reformers had to make
a clean sweep, even if it should seem a massacre.

DEAN NO WELL'S CATECHISM 139
They seemed, indeed, to make heaven and earth a
solitude, and then call it a pure faith.
Presumably they trusted that all would end well,
that even in this world, and in a spiritual sense, the
true saints that had once been in Christ would rise
again, and the earlier stars of the Christian firmament
would shine the more clearly for the extinction of
false fires and meteoric illusions. It is, too, quite
certain that, after the violent oscillation of three
Tudor reigns, the Reformers hoped and expected
more time and opportunity to perfect the work in the
quiet days of the young Protestant queen.
In some respects we may deem it happy they
were disappointed. They were encountered by a suc
cession of statesmen of the sort that perform a neces
sary function in human affairs without contributing
much to the dignity of their office. The order of the
day was to settle questions as quickly as possible and
have no more controversy. If anyone wishes to see
what becomes of debatable matter under such
peremptory conditions, let him compare the Church
Catechism as we now have it with Dean Nowell's two
Catechisms, of which it is the merest debris. In the
work commonly understood as Nowell's Catechism,
entitled ' A Catechisme for the Instruction and
Learning of Christian Religion, translated out of
Latine into English (by T. Norton), an. 1570,' and
running to 125 closely printed pages, the question

Uo THE REFORMATION
before us has very little prominence and occupies
little space in comparison with that given to it in
our present Catechism. The Dean was in the service,
and at the service, of the greatest ecclesiastical
personages of the day, and at their beck and call.
He adopts the current theology of the West ; but in
several places he is careful to state that the unity is
in the ' Godhead,' that is, in the Ousia ; he nowhere
expressly states that this is an object of worship ; on
several occasions where this seems to be approached
the language is ambiguous, and it is not easy to
say whether he is speaking of the Ousia, or of the
Father, and after a bare half page he cuts the matter
short by the very significant words, ' The infinite depth
of this mystery is so great that it cannot with mind
be conceived, much less with words be expressed ;
wherein, therefore, is required a simplicity of Christian .
faith ready to believe rather than wit to search, or
the office of the tongue to express, so secret and
hidden a mystery.'

141

XVII
'OUSIA' IN THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND
WHATEVER we are in other matters, in theology we
are a rough and ready nation. For two centuries
and a half — that is, from the Reformation to the end
of last century — there was no such thing as theological
education or properly conducted theological enquiry
in this country. We were content to avail ourselves
ofthe labours of remote ancestors and foreign divines.
Even now there is no school of theology in the world
that does not look upon us as barbarians in this
matter. Italians, Germans, Greeks, Orientals, differing
as they do between one another, agree in regarding
the English as simply incapable of theology. As a
rule the Englishman, obliged by his profession to
accept the creeds, to use a common expression,
' bolts ' them, and resolves to trouble no more about
them. When his majestic calmness is ruffled by
some circumstance, or casual encounter, he speedily
settles the question by calling the man a heretic or
a fool as the occasion may require or allow. That
done, he resumes his wonted placidity, and feels he

142 'OUSIA' IN THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND
has witnessed to the truth, and is so far a confessor
and even a martyr.
Age has conferred upon me some right tb speak
out in these matters, and speak out I must. Of a
loyal and emotional nature, circumstances put me
early on the track of free enquiry, and made me a
precocious thinker as well as writer. Now, for three
quarters of this century, a good way on to the whole
of it, I have been trying to ' crack the nuts of
theology,' as Burton expressed it, and to allow ' its
bones to be forced down my throat,' as John Newton
once expressed it at a meeting ofthe Eclectic Society.
True, the study has been only intermittent, and fpr
long periods forcibly repelled, but only to return
with fresh urgency and fresh sense of a ' call ' on
my part.
It is needless now to recur to the tenor or the
episodes in my protracted existence, but here is how
the matter now stands — that Is, since I felt bound to
deliver myself, now ten years since. Writers who, for
anything that appears, have not given a quarter of an
hour to the perusal of the volume they were invited
to review, or five minutes at a time to any question
in theology, have pronounced me, off-hand, as a
rejecter of the creeds and a traitor to my Church.
They speak as if they hold their ground firmly on
the Nicene Creed as the divinely ordered and final

THE ROYAL AND PARLIAMENTARY CREED 143
summary of the faith once delivered to the Church —
the truth to which the Spirit would lead it.
Alas ! Upon how small a pretence will an Eng
lish theologian deem himself a good and true man !
' The Nicene Creed has been simply knocked to
pieces and absolutely superseded by the Church of
England. That royal and Parliamentary institute
declares in the Thirty-nine Articles, in the Litany,
in the Catechism, and in many additions to the old
English services, that the Father, the Son, and the
Spirit are One God. There is no such statement or any
thing to warrant it in the Nicene Creed. A man may
please to say that it follows necessarily from a com
parison of different clauses in the Creed, but that
remains his own private inference, the value of which
is included within his own personal dimensions, which
may be infinitesimal.
The Church of England says in the first of the
Thirty-nine Articles, ' In the unity of this Godhead
there be three Persons of one substance (that is Ousia),
power, and eternity, the Father, the Son, and the
Holy Ghost.' There is no such statement in the
Nicene Creed. It says that the Lord Jesus Christ is
of one substance, or Ousia, with the Father, but
says nothing about the substance of the Holy Ghost,
or about the eternity of the Holy Ghost. A man
may please to say that it was needless, inasmuch
as the Spirit of God, or the Breath of God, must

144 'OUSIA' IN THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND
be of the same substance as God, but this involves a
certain conception of the said substance which one
man may have, and another may not. One man may
understand by substance a certain element in nature,
and undoubtedly till long after the fourth century
philosophy and theology were deeply infected with
materialism. Another man may understand by
community of substance that which must be in
common between anyone and his son ; also that
which must be in common between anyone and his
utterance or that which proceeds from him, and yet
hold that the community is different in the two cases,
inasmuch as it is defined by the relation itself, and
is, therefore, relative and not absolute. Should the
holders of these two different views attempt a common
understanding, they would find the question left open
in the Nicene Creed, not in the Anglican.
The Church of England says that the Son took,
and has, and will for ever have, a community of sub
stance with the Blessed Virgin. There is no such
statement in the Nicene Creed. Could that Council
have foreseen that one day a great Church would
compel all its members to hold that the Son of God
has, and will for ever have, a community of substance,
or Ousia, with the Father and the Spirit, and also
with the Virgin Mary, they might possibly have been
more guarded in their expressions. The Nicene Creed
says nothing about the reconciliation of the Father to

THE THIRTY-NINE ARTICLES 145
us, or ' original guilt,' and is quite silent upon a great
number of other questions decided dogmatically in the
Thirty-nine Articles.
That very miscellaneous, incoherent, and arbitrary
document, roughly framed, and roughly, if ever
formally, agreed to, has the character and force of a
creed, being for the avoidance of diversities of
opinion, and for the establishment of consent touching
true religion. Its history is about as obscure as that
of any other creed ; and were that better known, it
would have all the less weight with conscientious and
scrupulous people. But certainly its claim to have
added nothing to the Nicene Creed is not only
utterly untrue, but is simply ridiculous. The great
moral to be drawn from it is that no one body of men
has a right to impose what it may please to regard as
sound and safe opinions on all the world ; and that
no one generation has a right to foreclose any number
of difficult questions for all time to come. The con
dition of affairs in this country, now, as I write, 330
years after the supposed passing of these Thirty-nine
Articles for the establishment of universal and ever
lasting peace, shows not the impotence of such
designs, but rather their very great power of evil,
culminating, possibly, after an allotted term and some
time for repentance, in the disruption and ruin of a
great kingdom and of a world-wide empire.
May be, it is happy for us that we cannot L

146 'OUSIA' IN THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND
foresee from how small a beginning a purely human
conception, assuming the character of faith, may
acquire an obstinate hold, a long development, and
an enormous prevalence. The very idea is enough
to deter from all religious action beyond the personal,
the dutiful, the official, and the necessary. Here is a
word coined by philosophers, who were, perhaps the
very year before, earning small fees by teaching
rhetoric or Roman law, in order to express more dis
tinctly that a son, so far as he is a son, must partake of
the nature of his father. The authors of this device
presented it with hesitation, and on repeated occasions
without effect. It germinated and struck out roots.
As the Roman poet says of Rumour, this figment of
grammarians planted its foot in the ground and now
hides its head in the clouds. After some fifteen
hundred years we have still to ask what it really
stands for ; that is, if we continue to declare that it
must be brought within human comprehension. What
is this Ousia ? Nay, who is He ? For the Church of
England bids us address our prayers and other acts
of worship to Three Persons and One God, that is to
the Ousia.
Hooker is one of the greatest, if not the very
greatest, of our prose writers, and, for aught I know,
still the greatest of our divines. But he died young-
only forty-five. He was an Achilles, not a Tithonus.
I do not know him, or consult him, as often as I

HOOKER 147
ought, but when I do read but a sentence of him I
feel like Jacob bowing his head to the stripling Joseph.
To the last he was more than mature ; he was still
maturing and still pursuing truth as if not having
attained to it. At near twice his age I may venture
to comment upon him. He accepts the Anglican
dogma! but with a diffidence amounting to a decided
reserve :
The Lord our God is but one God, in which indivisible
unity, notwithstanding, we adore the Father, as being alto
gether of Himself; we glorify the Consubstantial Word,
which is the Son ; we bless and magnify the co-essential
Spirit, eternally proceeding from both, which is the Holy
Ghost. Here we find Hooker doing his best to adhere to
the lines of Scripture and of the Nicene Creed. The
Son, he says, is consubstantial, the Spirit co-essential.
If it be interposed that substance and essence mean
the same thing, then it may be asked, why did not
Hooker use the same word, and why did the Roman
Church shrink from importing the word ' Ousia ' into
its version of the Nicene Creed, and, also, whether in
common use substance and essence mean the same
thing ? Hooker distinguishes further as to the worship
respectively due to Father, Son, and Spirit. We adore
the Father ; we glorify the Son ; we bless and magnify
the Spirit. Are these distinctions only so many
ornaments of style ? When we talk of the judicious

148 'OUSIA' IN THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND
Hooker we mean surely something more than that
he wrote, like his great contemporary Shakespeare,
with an inexhaustible grace and variety of style. In
fact, he was more judicious — that is, judiciosus, than
judicial. He was judging — that is, modifying and
so far suspending his judgments — to the end, and he
thereby becomes the best guide we can have'ftnder
existing circumstances.

149

XVIII
'OUSIA' IN THE PRAYER BOOK
In order to present the fact of a great deviation, or
irregular development from the earlier teaching of
the Church Catholic, it is necessary to contrast some
passages in the English Prayer Book with documents
of greater antiquity and, so far, authority. In the
history of the Prayer Book the most remarkable
points are the hastiness, the roughness, and the ob
scurity with which the important work of selection
and composition was done ; the peremptoriness of
its completion, and the obduracy with which it has
been stereotyped and forced ever since on the con
science, at least the practice, of the nation, with the
entailment of very serious penal consequences to the
most honest and peaceful non-compliant
Such an account of the matter seems to reflect
on our Reformers, at least, if we are to suppose the
novelty of doctrine entirely theirs and the creation
of the period. Did the Reformation itself produce
the very exaggerated — indeed, monstrous — conception
which, in this volume, as in some preceding, is styled

ISO 'OUSIA' IN THE PRAYER BOOK
the Anglican dogma ? Once for all, it must- be
answered that the Reformers did not. They found
the dogma the leading dogma of the English Church,
not to speak of other churches, and they had to
choose between rejection, revision, and acceptance.
What they felt about the matter it may seem bootless
now to enquire, but political and ecclesiastical neces
sities pointed to a general acceptance of what had
then been for many centuries the prevailing Western
dogma, which, as it happened, would bring it more
to the front than it had ever been before, and give it
a distinctly national character.
The origin of error is seldom, if ever, so personal,
so occasional, so limited to place or time, as is sup
posed by either the upholders or the denouncers. It
may be said of heresies, as of truth itself —
Multosque per annos
Stat fortuna domus, et avi numerantur avorum.
The first preachers of the Gospel could not leave
what must be called its native soil without imme
diately encountering a polytheistic Paganism which
had occupied the whole world from prehistoric times.
Philosophy was but a feeble light compared with a
vast, indefinite chaos of confused and intermingled
traditions, ideas, elements, and fictitious personages
severally holding their own by their strength, their
beauty, their art and skill, their convenience, and, more

EUROPE LONG HALF PAGAN i5(
than all, by their ready compliance with human
appetite or convenience, as might be. It is scarcely
realised in these days, even by well-informed people,
how large a part of Europe itself remained absolutely,
indeed, hopelessly, Pagan, for many centuries after
the Christian era, and how readily, indeed univer
sally, the Christians themselves made compromises
with the surrounding and permeating flood of many-
formed superstitions. It was in this direction that
the danger was supposed to lie, and had to be
guarded against by direct, vigorous, and unmistak
able protests. As philosophy had always been the
chief, indeed the one prevailing weapon against
Paganism, so it continued to be, as was supposed,
against all doctrine that tended to diffuse, to divide,
to qualify, and to graduate the Divine Essence, and
to create gods many and lords many, principalities and
powers in heavenly places.
All this long and dreary period, in the midst of
what seemed insurmountable difficulties and struggling
for existence, worm-eaten with scandals and contend'-
ing with foes, the Church had been hiding its light
under a bushel. Its services were in a dead language,
and, for the most part, sung rather than said. The
musical part had always had a tendency to pre
dominate, and in the larger edifices and best-sustained
choirs the organist and the choir obtained at last sole
possession of the. ground. On any pretence they

152 'OUSIA' IN THE PRAYER BOOK
interpolated, added, and extended music with words,
music without words, music with sense, music without
it, with utter indifference to what are now called the
spiritual needs of the congregation. Their maxim
seems to have been that all have ears whether or not
they have hearts, brains, or souls. An immense and
increasing array of monks, friars, and ' religious '
persons of many orders, grades, and characters had
to employ their time as well as they could. A large
proportion of them occupied themselves in the com
position of hymns, which had to be original, on sub
jects in which originality was difficult and dangerous.
They rang continual changes on the most mysterious
themes, and there ensued a universal ambition to be
the discoverer of grand secrets that had escaped the
eye or the understanding of less holy saints, or less
gifted philosophers.
In the discharge of his grande munus Mr. Julian
reveals a world of hymn-writers exceeding one an
other in the race of reckless invention and audacious
irreverence. No part of holy ground — not even the
throne of the Divine Majesty — have they spared in
digging for the treasures that might be found in so
rich a soil. All the cathedrals had their respective
missals, which, within certain limits prescribed by
Canon Law, allowed endless variety. The Sarum
Missal obtained the greatest popularity in this country,
and the highest authority as a standard ; but its hymns

MUSICAL EXCESSES 153
are appreciably in advance of the more cautious
traditions of the original service.
Of course, it is a very ordinary thing for a dis
course, or a commentary, to go beyond the limits of
the text. The orator or the writer ' improves ' upon
it, and feels that he has to bring out of it more than
the common folk thought there was in it. He will
linger for an hour, with much variety of expression
and illustration, upon a few words spoken in a breath ;
and his own expressions and illustrations become the
text in their turn, and take the place of the original.
If this is done every day in the vulgar tongue,
how much more is it likely to be done in a dead
language !
The monasteries were everywhere formidable
rivals of the secular clergy, and a mitred abbot might
have forty or fifty choirs in his peculiar charge,
owing no allegiance except to him and the pope, his
only master. So long as he served the pope's turn
he had his own, and nobody was likely to interfere
with him in so small a matter as the verses set to
music in his churches. No modern frequenter of the
opera would think of studying or criticising the
libretto, and it is evident from the songs that gain the
most street and music-hall popularity that utter non
sense is what the majority like best when music is in
the question.
The Reformers, however, found these extrava-

154 'OUSIA' IN THE PRAYER BOOK
gances of dogmatism in possession of the ground, and
they had also to provide against the possible charge
of rejecting dogma altogether, at least the Trinitarian
dogfna. Might it not be in their minds to transfer
these dogmatic innovations and excesses, in a succinct
and unpretentious form, from the musical parts of
the service to the prose, when they were so consider
ably curtailing the musical ? The Book of Homilies
shows that they regarded the choir, rather than the
altar, the pulpit, the lectern, or the reading-desk, as
the stronghold of the old system and the great ob
stacle in the way of reform.
I must confess, however, that I have to leave to
those who have been able to give more time to theo
logical and liturgical studies, the origin, growth, and
history of that which I understand as the Anglican
dogma — the dogma that the Almighty is Triune, and
that the Father, the Son, and the Spirit are one God,
Three in One and One in Three. History is always
a long and difficult matter, requiring time, opportuni
ties, means, and special qualities apt to interfere with
one another. The historian has to bear continually
in mind important facts, grand principles, leading
characteristics, while descending to details frequently
of no value except in their relation to great issues.
It is enough that I put the above dogma before the
reader as it is professed and enforced in the Church
of England, side by side with the so-called Nicene

THE DOCUMENTS TO BE COMPARED 155
Creed, and even with the so-called Athanasian, that
is the original Latin text of the Quicunque vult, and
ask whether the Church is really standing on these two
last-named creeds, or standing — staggering, rather —
on a creed of its own directly at variance with them.

i56

XIX
'OUSIA' IN THE LITANY
THE Litany is ordered to be sung or said three times
a week, on some other occasions, and whenever com
manded by the ordinary. It is a very old act of wor
ship, formerly of a special, occasional, and sometimes
picturesque character. In the successive stages of
the ' Reformation ' it was adapted to English use by
striking out many invocations and commemorations,
and by the substitution of the English Creed — viz.
that before us. It contains the above-mentioned
antithesis between the Father of heaven and the Son
the Redeemer of the world. To Father, Son, and
Holy Ghost it gives severally the supreme title of
' God.' The Holy Ghost it describes as proceeding
from the Father and the Son, according to the
Western variation upon the Eastern — indeed, Catho
lic — formula. This variation, it must be observed, is
a step towards that unity of conception which really
impairs the conception of distinct personality, for if
the Holy Spirit be supposed to proceed equally from
Father and Son, it seems to suppose them a unity,

THE FOUR INVOCATIONS 157
while the Spirit itself cannot easily, be conceived
as distinct from Him whose power, utterance, and
very breath it is.
The first four invocations of the Litany in use
before the Reformation were :
Pater de ccelis, Deus miserere nobis.
Fili redemptor mundi Deus, miserere nobis.
Spiritus sancte Deus, miserere nobis.
Sancta Trinitas unus Deus, miserere nobis.
These have been in use in the Western Church for
many centuries, though not found in any MS. earlier
than the tenth century. They have never been used
in the Eastern Church, which from a much earlier
date has recited at this place in the service :
Kyrie Eleison.
Christe Eleison.
< Kyrie Eleison.
Having regard to the order of the words, the second
and third Latin invocations are not so expressly dog
matical as the English substitutes. The fourth Latin
invocation certainly contains the dogma, but does not
introduce the word ' Person.'
It has frequently, too frequently, occurred to me to
ask to whom I am addressing the several supplications
in our Litany. I have sometimes suggested, rather
than urged, the question to others. The answer in
that case has been ' to God,' or ' to the Trinity,' or ' to

158 'OUSIA' IN THE LITANY
the Three Persons of the Godhead.' This has never
satisfied me. Even when I thought I must accept it,
in a theological sense, it seemed to do me no good.
The answer, however, seems justified by the express
terms of the Litany.
The fourth and last of the introductory in
vocations is —
O holy, blessed, and glorious Trinity, three Persons and
one God : have mercy upon us miserable sinners.
The well-known and meritorious writer of 'A
Church Student's Manual ' says : ' The Litany
opens with an invocation to each Person of the
Blessed Trinity, but avoids the charge of tri-theism
by a united invocation to the Three Persons in one
God.' In the same page the writer proceeds: 'The
Litany is divided into four great parts. I. Four
invocations to each Person of the Blessed Trinity,'
and under this head observes : ' In the expression
"O God, the Son," instead of "O Son of God," we
recognise the divinity of Christ.' The above writer,
it will be noticed, has thought it necessary to
insert a comma as an additional protest against tri-
theism. The minister immediately proceeds :
Remember not, Lord, our offences, nor the offences of
our forefathers ; neither take thou vengeance of our sins ;

WHOM ARE WE ADDRESSING? 159
spare us, good Lord, spare thy people, whom thou hast re
deemed with thy most precious blood, and be not angry
with us for ever.
To this the congregation responds, ' Spare us,
good Lord.' At first sight, or thought, it might seem
that, after addressing Father, Son, and Holy Spirit,
and declaring their unity, we proceed to address the
Son, but I expect that most educated Church people,
in submission, as they suppose, to the Athanasian
dogma,' conceive that they are still addressing the
Trinity, and that they are justified in the use of these
terms by the text, Acts xx. 28, in which St Paul,
according to the Authorised Version, calls the blood
of Christ God's own blood. That text will ever
remain a controversy, but no reasonable scholar or
divine can venture to give it a meaning exceeding,
or varying upon, the simple statement in the Nicene
Creed, that the Lord Jesus Christ was crucified
for us. May not the text be rendered, With the
blood of His own Son ? However, in that sense,
the blood of Christ tnight still be called God's own
blood. The next five petitions might be addressed with
equal propriety to the Father and to the Son ; and
I expect that some in an ordinary congregation do
the one and some the other ; but the two following
supplications can only be addressed to the Son — at

160 '0USIA1 IN THE LITANY
least, will be addressed to the Son by any simple
Christians not versed in theological subtleties.
This must be their intention when they say :
By the mystery of thy holy Incarnation ; by thy holy
Nativity and Circumcision ; by thy Baptism, Fasting, and
Temptation, by thine Agony and bloody Sweat ; by thy Cross and
Passion ; by thy precious Death and Burial ; by thy glorious
Resurrection and Ascension.
The learned author of the Origines Liturgica
appears, to have been unable to find ancient examples
for the words last quoted as parts of the Litany ; and
even with regard to the previous quotation, 'Remember
not,' &c, can give us no older authority than the Sarum
Breviary. The latter is obviously addressed to Jesus
Christ. This address evidently continues to the end of
the Litany, where for ' good Lord ' are substituted ' Son
of God,' ' Lamb of God,' and ' Christ.' In a manual
of private devotion by Bossuet, edited by Dupanloup,
I find the words included in Litanies du saint nom de
Jt?sus. They begin with the invocation, 'Sainte
Trinite, qui etes un seul Dieu,' but it is immediately
followed by the invocation, 'J/sus, Fils du Dieu vivanl.'
There can be no doubt here that we are invoking
Jesus, the Son of God, by His Passion. Such doubt
there is, almost necessarily, in our Litany, and the
doubt is not unfrequently settled by the conclusion
that the Trinity may be said to have suffered all that

PETER THE FULLER 161
Jesus Christ did, and that this is, iri fact, the orthodox
doctrine. Certainly, if we are to be allowed to
explain revelation by philosophical conceptions over
riding and destroying personality altogether, we may
say that the Almighty, be He one, or triune, or, say,
multiple, is everything, does everything, and suffers
everything, and was on the Cross at Calvary as surely
as He then was everywhere.
But this is perilous language. It is not common
sense. It is not on the face of Scripture. The
doctrine that God the Father suffered on the Cross
and died has been repeatedly, and I can't but believe
justly, condemned by that Catholic Church to which
some supposed Trinitarians are so often appealing.
In the fifth century a great stir was made by a theo
logian well known as Peter the Fuller, who maintained
it to be the teaching of the Church that God had
suffered and God had been crucified. He was,
however, everywhere strenuously opposed, and his
doctrine was condemned by both the Eastern and
Western churches. With several other sects, still
holding ground in the Church, the Theopathitce were
held to be a branch of the Eutychian heresy in
volving a denial or ignorance of the two natures in
Christ In ' The Catholic Doctrine of the Church of
England,' by Thomas Rogers, chaplain to Archbishop
Bancroft, edited for the Parker Society by Mr.
Perowne, 1 find it described as an error and a wicked M

1 62, 'OUSIA' IN THE LITANY
opinion, 'that the- whole and Holy Trinity was
crucified, as saith Petrus Antiochanus.' Yet if the
English Litany be regarded as a grammatical, compo
sition, it favours this opinion.
In the ' Manual for the Sick,,' by Lancelot Andrews,
there is a Litany for the sick person when in danger
of death. It begins, as our Litany does, with an
invocation of the Trinity. The petition that imme
diately follows appears to me to have been retained
in deference to the common reading and interpreta
tion of the text, Acts xx. 28. But, after several,
petitions, Bishop Andrews proceeds : ' By the manifold
and great works of Jesus Christ, Thy Son ; by His
agony and bloody sweat ; by His strong crying and
fears ; by His bitter cross and passion, &c.' It is
plain that the good bishop, having to deal with a
dying man, would not disturb his mind with any
difficulty as to the object of his worship, but instructed
him to approach the Father through the Son.
There are differences in the character and purport
of the twenty-one latter petitions in the Anglican
Litany as compared with the first nine, which need
not here be dwelt upon, but they generally suggest
that we are praying to Him whom we commonly
understand by the One Almighty God. Immediately
after these twenty-one petitions, which are such as
any Theist might use, we proceed to address suffrages,
or brief heart utterances, to the ' Son of God,' ' Lamb

A FOURFOLD DEITY 163
of God,' concluding with alternate and repeated
prayers to Christ and the Lord to have ' mercy upon
us,' and the ' Lord's Prayer.'
There certainly is a great confusion here, in the
transition from one Person to another, from three to
one and one to three ; indeed, from one to two and
two to one ; while the grammar ofthe Litany indicates
four Persons, Father, Son, Holy Ghost, and Trinity,
the last containing all, or over all. Impious and
blasphemous as the jest may seem, it has long been
a standing jest, let us hope no more than a jest, at
Rome, that the Pope may declare four Persons in the
Godhead if he pleases. The insinuation is that the
Pope may or does declare himself a divinity. It has
frequently been said, with only too much truth, that
the Trinity in careless or unskilful hands, that is, in
the hands of rude and semi-barbaric theologians, does
become a fourfold Deity. How far this confusion and
entanglement in the composition of our Litany and
Catechism were accidental or intentional ; or in the
mind of some one so-called theologian ; or arising from
the vain attempt to reconcile discordant views ; or, it
is not impossible, from the wish of the orthodox to
establish a modus vivendi with unbelievers, — it is now
impossible even to conjecture ; but it is enough to
say that there is no such confusion, no such appear
ance of wilful entanglement, in the Scriptures, or in
the Fathers, or in the two really Catholic Creeds. M 2

1 64

XX
'OUSIA' IN THE SERVICES, COLLECTS, AND
CATECHISM
In our Communion Service there is what must some
times suggest a momentary doubt ; indeed, I have
often felt it. What is called the Trisagion need not
have the particular significance which Athanasians
give to it ; but many educated Christians do so use
it ; and they are certainly encouraged to do so by the
Proper Preface on Trinity Sunday. Most people,
however, suppose it addressed simply to the Almighty
Father. They are justified in so doing by the Proper
Prefaces for Christmas, Easter, Ascension Day, and
Whitsunday ; by the prayer before Communion, and
by the prayer of Consecration ; for all the six contain
the words ' Thy Son.' But the Proper Preface for
Trinity Sunday determines the Trisagion in the
Athanasian sense, and for that purpose omits
the words ' Holy Father ' in the opening clause.
The alteration, even if it be allowable and pro
per, is not complete, inasmuch as the Priest imme
diately proceeds to address the Father alone.

CONFUSION OF PERSONS 165
But that is not expressly stated till the middle of the
prayer. There are those who will tell me I may as well
leave people alone to address whom they please as
the Godhead, for that it is much the same whom they
address, and whatever is addressed to one is addressed
to Father, Son, and Spirit But is it not important
we should have clear and definite views on these
matters, and understand what we say ? The Athana
sian Creed begins with condemning confusion of
Persons, a much more intelligible error than division
of substance. Any child may know what it is to pray
to the Father ; what it is to pray to Jesus ; what it is
to pray to the indwelling Spirit, long before it has any
notions at all on the Divine substance.
In the Collect for the First Sunday in Lent, the
closing words, ' to thy honour and glory, who livest
and reignest with the Father and the Holy Ghost,
one God, world without end,' are entirely additional
to the very short collect in the Sarum Missal, and the
somewhat longer form quoted from ancient liturgies
in Palmer's ' Antiquities of the English Ritual.'
In the First Collect for Good Friday, for ' Qui
tecum vivit,' the Prayer Book has ' who now liveth
and reigneth with thee and the Holy Ghost, ever one
God, world without end.' This was adopted into the
Form of Prayer for the day of intercession for mis
sionary work, 1880. To the Third Collect are added

1 66 'OUSIA' IN THE SERVICES
the words, ' who liveth and reigneth with thee and
the Holy Spirit, one God, world without end.' This
also was adopted into the above missionary service.
In the service for Good Friday in the Sarum
Missal there is a long succession of collects, whether
for a choice to be made from them, or for all to be
used, I know not. There soon follows an Adoration
of the Cross, in ten stanzas. If the last of the
stanzas be compared with the following Collect in
the Adoration, it will' be seen that the hymn is more
intensely and distinctly triune in its conception of
Him to whom it is addressed :
Let us pray also for Pagans, that Almighty God may
remove iniquity from their hearts ; that, leaving their idols,
they may be converted to the living and true God, and his
only Son, Jesus Christ our God and Lord, who liveth and
reigneth with the Holy Ghost, God, world without end.
Concluding Verse of Hymn.
To the Trinity be glory
Everlasting as is meet ;
Equal to the Father, equal
To the Son, and Paraclete.
Trinal unity, whose praises
All created things repeat.
In the Collect for Ascension Day the words ' and
with him continually dwell, who liveth and
reigneth with thee and the Holy Ghost, one God,
world without end,' are added to the Collect for the

GELASIUS, PATRIARCH OF ROME 167
Day in the Sarum Missal, for which Palmer gives
ancient authorities.
The Proper Preface in Communion on Trinity
Sunday is —
Who art one God, one Lord ; not one only Person, but
three Persons in one Substance. For that which we
believe of the glory of the Father, the same we believe of
the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, without any difference or
inequality. Therefore, &c.
Palmer gives the original, of which this is a
reduced but faithful rendering, and observes that it is
as old as the time of Gelasius, patriarch of Rome,
A.D. 494. The reference proves the antiquity of the
' Preface ' ; but it also directs our attention to the
character ofthe period to which we owe it. Theo-
doric, king of the Ostrogoths, and as such a reputed
Arian, had just completed the conquest of Italy, and
established himself at Ravenna, with the evident wish
and avowed intention of enjoying the fruits of victory
in peace for the rest of his days. For this purpose
he left Rome to itself as much as possible, and under
fhe forms of its old constitution. Boethius, as stated
in a former chapter, was then the idol of Rome, the
representative of its past, its present, and its future ;
of its history and philosophy. Whether he was a
Christian at all remains a question, so little does
Christianity appear in his writings. So far as he
was a Christian he had to reduce it into accordance

168 'OUSIA' IN THE SERVICES
with his philosophy, and this could only be done by
taking texts out of their context and forcing them,
indeed twisting them, to suit the requirements of a
philosophic system.
Of Gelasius himself I know nothing ; indeed, I
believe nothing is known. Nor does it matter. Rome
was entirely in the hands of the philosophers, and
would then accept no doctrine except so far as it was
compatible with the current philosophy of the whole
civilised world and could be expressed in its language.
This may seem a strong thing to say and to put in
print ; but if any one will consider how large a part
Greek and Latin philosophy, and poetry, have in the
education and the character of our own educated
classes, and how small a part the Bible or Church
history has, it will certainly be a step towards under
standing how Rome, as it stood in its last agonies
face to face with a newly converted barbarian world,
found itself more philosophic than Christian.
In the Marriage Service the benediction imme
diately following the declaration of marriage was :
Benedicat vos Deus Pater, custodiat vos Jesus Christus,
illuminet vos Spiritus Sanctus, ostendat Dominus faciem
suam ad vos, &c.
The English form substituted for this is :
God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Ghost,
bless, preserve, and keep you ; the Lord mercifully with his
favour look upon you, &c.

THE ANGLICAN CATECHIST 169
The Latin original is simple and intelligible ; not
so the English paraphrase.
In the Catechism the three Persons of the sup
posed Godhead, or Ousia, stand without any summing
up or explanatory clause. The catechist is left to ex
plain the manifest inconsistency as best he can, or
according to his own particular creed, if he has one.
He or she has to decide for the catechumen, a child
of six years, or a young woman of fourteen, whether
God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Ghost,
mean Divine Father, Divine Son, and Divine Spirit,
or God, who art Father, Son, and Spirit ; or, possibly,
some tertium quid of his own invention.
The catechist upon whom devolves this serious
function may be a pupil teacher twelve years old, bred
on Church, or dissenting, or nothingorian principles,
or may be a business-like old schoolmaster, who
knows how to impose and extort the proper
answer, and satisfy the clerical manager and the
diocesan inspector. It is left to him or her
to harmonise the three divers utterances. This
creed, without the fourth clause, is adopted in
the service for the Public Baptism of Infants, in
which the godfathers and godmother are directed to
see that the child shall be instructed in the Church
Catechism. A similar creed, virtually the same, appears in
the final Blessing pronounced by the Bishop in the

17b 'OUSIA IN THE SERVICES
Confirmation Service ; ' the Blessing of God Almighty,
the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost.' This cer
tainly does not incline to tri-theism, for it is almost
outspoken theism.
The creed of the Catechism appears in the Bless
ing pronounced by the minister immediately after the
declaration that the persons whose hands have been
joined are man and wife. The last-mentioned decla
ration is made ' In the Name of the Father, and of the
Son, and of the Holy Ghost ' ; and as if this were not
sufficient, it is immediately added, ' God the Father,
God the Son, God the Holy Ghost, bless, preserve and
keep you ; the Lord mercifully with his favour look
upon you.' It is needless to ask whether this is a proper
time for introducing such a theological paradox as is
implied in an attempt to reconcile the three first
clauses with the last. The framers of the office evi
dently thought the Scriptural doctrine of Father, Son,
and Spirit incomplete and therefore requiring to be
supplemented by the Anglican innovation. That,
however, it was felt had its own danger — the danger
of a tri-theistic interpretation, and to obviate this
there was added, ' the Lord mercifully with his favour
look upon you ' — including in the title ' Lord,' Father,
Son, and Spirit.
The Anglican creed is interpreted in the tri-theistic
sense, not only by many simple and half-educated
Christians, but also by some who might be supposed

THE TRI-THEISTIC INTERPRETATION 171
utterly incapable of so serious an error. Our English
theologians consider the danger of the creed to lie in
that direction, and even think that most of our
religious enthusiasts, whether in or out of the com
munion of the Established Church, are practically
tri-theists: — that is, believers in three Gods. As far as
can be judged from the different forms of the creed,
they who incorporated it into the formularies of our
Church, and made it the keystone, as well as the
symbol of English Christianity, were fully sensible of
the danger. What they felt or saw, and what were
their reasons, their system, or their authorities, it is
impossible to say, certainly beyond an ordinary range
of opportunities to inquire into. The formation of our
Catechism, like the introduction of this creed into
our prayer books, is among the darkest deeds done
in all history. It was done only abouffour times a
long life-time since, but for any exact knowledge to be
ever obtained about it, this great innovation might as
well have been done in the days when England was
evenly divided between the Danes and the Saxons.
So the documents have to be taken as they stand.
The danger of a tri-theistic interpretation is boldly
faced in some instances, while in other instances an
attempt is made to guard against it. It can be called
an attempt and nothing more. There are people
who say the wrong thing and then try to set it right,
or pretend to set it right, all the time knowing that

172 'OUSIA' IN THE SERVICES
the wrong thing, having first possession of the ground,
will survive the correction. A man says something
quite plain, striking, and indelible, and then adds, ' I
don't mean to say so and so.'
In the case before us a simple Christian finds
three Persons invoked — Father, Son, and Holy Ghost,
with a prefix common to the three. That is a
puzzle. He does not know what to think about it.
He may, or he may not, exercise his mind about it.
In the course of time he settles into some habitual
mode of viewing the matter, and that will be accord
ing to his disposition and temperament. But cer
tainly, as the words stand, the three invocations
suggest three Gods, three Divine beings equally en
titled to be called God.

173

XXI
CHURCH HYMNS
In order to bring home the very serious charge of
heresy against the dogmatism of the day in this
country, it is necessary to produce what may be
regarded as the corpus delicti. The cry will be,
' What is it you complain of ? Who is it that's to
blame ? Put your finger on the objectionable matter
and then we shall know how to deal with you. Mere
generalities are not sufficient in such a case.' The
requirement is just ; but now, for many years — indeed,
since I became conscious of a distinct call to move in
this matter — I felt the greatest repugnance to comment
critically on the devotions of the good people about
me — friends, ministers, and fellow-worshippers. Even
when noting and collecting materials, I wished it
might be long before I had occasion to use them.
The pace of the day, however, has little regard for
tender consciences, and tramples upon scruples. It
will not admit of delay, and it accepts silence as con
sent. Nothing has struck me so much during the last
sixty years as the utter self-abandonment with which

174 CHURCH HYMNS
men with some pretence to theological acumen allow
themselves to be carried away, as in a torrent, by
men with no pretence whatever. The rush wins the
day. I can assure my readers that the feeling remains
in me. I would rather let my good and kind neigh
bours use what words they please, in the agreeable
certainty that they never think of their meaning, or
that they take for granted there must be some mean
ing in the words, though they cannot themselves see
it. But I can wait no longer. Every day is bringing
me sensibly nearer to the fated hour when memory,
judgment, consciousness, life will cease, and when I
may have to leave unfinished work to those who will
shrink from the task of completion, or prefer peace to
a controversy. The hand that writes this is already
half-paralysed with gout or what not.
Nothing remains under this heading but to lay
before the reader the matter in question, and to say
in a succinct and unmistakable form what I have to
say about it. I object to the expression and the
notion of a ' Triune God ' ; to such expressions as
three in one and one in three ; to the use of the
singular pronoun in referring to the Father, the Son,
and the Spirit ; to the summing-up of the three.
Persons with the words ' one God ' ; to the phrase
' God the Son,' and to all expressions favouring the
opinion that the Son and the Spirit are nothing more
than Divine aspects, procedures, and offices ; to the
title of God given to Jesus Christ in such a way as to

CORPUS DELICTI 175
imply that it was God Almighty who was born of the
Virgin Mary and nursed and taught by her, and that
it was He who walked about the Holy Land with
the disciples, who ate, drank, and slept, who was
struck in the face and spit upon, who was crucified,
dead, and buried ; to all gratuitous intrusion into the
manner and form of the Divine existence, and into
the unfathomable and inscrutable eternity supposed to
have preceded creation. All these expressions I must
regard as unwarranted additions to the teaching
of the Scriptures, of the early fathers, of the early.
councils and creeds, and as offences placed in the way
of those little ones whom Christ came to save. I
must regard them as heresies and sins against the
Holy Ghost. So shall I regard them as long as this
hand can hold a pen or this tongue make an in
telligible utterance — to my last breath, my last
moment of consciousness.
Church 7. Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God Almighty,
Hymns. . Early in the morning our song shall be of
Thee;
Holy, Holy, Holy, Merciful and Mighty,
God in Three Persons, blessed Trinity.
Reginald Heber.
This hymn recalls the second vision in the Reve
lation of St John, as that recalls Isaiah. A student
must have got confidence in himself if he arrives at
any certainty, even at any clearness of conception, as
to the meaning of the Revelation ; but it may be said

176 CHURCH HYMNS
with certainty that there is not a single passage in it
expressing, or countenancing, the doctrine that the
Father, the Son, and the Spirit are one God. The Son
is always described as receiving from the Almighty,
and as delegated by Him. In this vision He is figured
as the Lion of the Tribe of Judah, as the Lamb in
the midst between the Throne, the Elders, and the
mystic ' Beasts,' and as the Recipient and Opener of
the Sealed Book.
i p. Now that the daylight fills the sky,
All praise to God the Father be ;
All praise, Eternal Son, to Thee ;
Whom with the Spirit we adore,
One God, both now and evermore !
Anon., from the Latin (fifth century). Translated by
J. M. Neale, with alterations.
12. O God, who canst not change nor fail,
Grant this, O Father, Only Son,
And Holy Spirit, God of Grace,
To whom all glory, Three in One,
Be given in every time and place.
23. Holy Father, &c.
Holy Saviour, &c.
Holy Spirit, &c.
Holy, Blessed Trinity,
Darkness is not dark to Thee ;
Those Thou keepest always see
Light at evening time.
R. Hayes Robinson. '

CHRISTOPHER WORDSWORTH 177
33. The splendours of Thy glory, Lord,
Hath no man seen nor known.
Grant us Thy peace, blest Trinity,
Fair love and saintly might ;
And for this dim and fleeting day,
Give us immortal light.
40. The dawn of God's new Sabbath
Breaks o'er the earth again.
When angels' hands have gathered
The first ripe fruit for Thee ;
O Father, Son, and Spirit,
Most holy Trinity ! Amen.
Ascribed in the Preface to ' Mrs. Cross.'

45. O Day of rest and gladness.
v. 2. On thee, the high and lowly,
Through ages joined in tune,
Sing Holy, Holy, Holy,
To the great God Triune.

v. 6. To Holy Ghost be praises,
To Father and to Son ;
The Church her voice upraises
To Thee, blest Three in One.
Christopher Wordsworth,
Bishop of Lincoln. N

178 CHURCH HYMNS
65. Advent. Creator of the starry height,
Thy people's everlasting light ;
O Christ, Redeemer, bow Thine ear,
In mercy our petitions hear.

To God the Father, God the Son,
And God the Spirit, Three in One ;
Praise, honour, might, and glory be,
From age to age eternally. Amen.
Translated from the Latin of sixth or seventh century
by J. M. Neale, 1818-1868, with alterations.
70. O glory of Thy chosen race.
All praise to God the Father be,
All praise Eternal Son to Thee ;
Whom with the Spirit we adore,
One God both now and evermore. Amen.
Rev. F. J. A. Hort.
89. For thy mercy and thy grace.
Glory to the God of Heaven,
To the Father, to the Son,
To the Holy Ghost be given,
One in Three and Three in One. Amen.
H. Downton.
97. 0 Lord of health and life, what tongue can tell.

CHARLES WESLEY 179
Then grant us strength to pray, ' Thy Kingdom come ' ;
When we shall know Thee in Thy Father's home,
And at Thy great Epiphany adore
The co-eternal Godhead evermore. Amen.
G. Phillimore.
i oi. Sons of men, behold from far.
Doxology added, viz. :
Glory to the Heavenly King ;
Glory, all ye angels sing ;
Glory to the Father, Son,
And blest Spirit, Three in One. Amen.
C. Wesley.
103. Awhile in Spirit, Lord, to Thee,
Into the desert would we flee.
Blest Three in One and One in Three,
Almighty God, we pray to Thee
That Thou wouldst now vouchsafe to bless
Our past with fruits of righteousness.
In Mr. Julian's ' Dictionary ' mention is made of ' a
Doxology from the Latin,' besides other alterations.
J. F. Thrupp.
107. Giver of the perfect gift !
Doxology added :
God the Holy Trinity,
Grant the mercy we implore ;
God the One, all praise to Thee
Through the ages evermore. Amen.
J, Montgomery. N2

i8o CHURCH HYMNS
1 1 6. O Thou, who through this holy week.

Doxology from Denton's Church Hymnal.
To God, the blessed Three in One,
. All praise and glory be :
Crown, Lord, Thy servants, who have won
Through Thee the victory. Amen. J. M. Neale.
117. Sing, my tongue, the Saviour's glory.
Blessing, honour everlasting,
To the Eternal One in Three ;
To the Father, Son, and Spirit,
Equal praises ever be !
Glory through the earth and heaven
To the Holy Trinity. Amen.
119. Comes once more the awful night.

Father, Son, and Holy Ghost,
One Almighty God of love,
Praised by all the heavenly host
In Thy shining courts above,
We, O Holy Trinity,
Bless Thee for Gethsemane. Amen.

JOHN KEBLE 181
127. Alleluia ! Alleluia ! Hearts to heaven and voices
raise.
Alleluia ! Alleluia ! Glory be to God on high !
To the Father, and the Saviour, who has gained the
victory !
Glory to the Holy Spirit, fount of Love and Sanc
tity !
Alleluia ! Alleluia ! To the Triune Majesty. Amen.
An Easter Hymn, by Chr. Wordsworth,
Bishop of Lincoln.
141. To Father, Son, and Holy Ghost,
The God Whom we adore,
Be glory as it was, is now,
And shall be evermore. Keble.
Otherwise — To God the Father, God the Son,
And Spirit glory be,
The ever blessed Three in One,
Through all eternity.
' Added ' — i.e. substituted, by
Thring.
146. O Christ who hast prepared a place,
Send down Thy Holy Ghost to be
The raiser of our souls to Thee.
0 future Judge, eternal Lord,
Thy name* be hallowed and adored;
To God the Father, King of Heaven,
And Holy Ghost like praise be given.
J. B. de Sauteuil.
(Tr. by J. Chandler.)

1 82 CHURCH HYMNS
148. The Lord ascendeth up on high.

All praise to Christ our King be given,
Who hath to heaven ascended ;
To Father, Son, and Holy Ghost,
The God of Heaven's resplendent host,
In bright array extended ! Amen.
A. T. Russell.
1 54. All glory to the Father be.

4. Three Persons, but one God, whose grace
Has formed and saves our human race ;
With joyful hearts and lips to Thee •
We sing this mighty mystery ;
Thy Holy Name we magnify,
O Trinity in Unity.
187. Where angelic hosts adore Thee.

Praise to Thee, Who hast created
Earth and heaven, with all their host;
Praise to Thee, O God most mighty,
Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. Amen.
193. The eternal gifts of Christ the King.

To God the Father, and the Son,
And Holy Spirit, One and Three,
Was praise before the worlds begun,
And praise for evermore shall be. Amen.

'PEOPLE'S HYMNS' 183
195. From hidden source arising.
For this Thy fourfold Gospel
All thanks, O Lord, to Thee,
In it Thyself revealing,
Eternal Trinity. Amen. /
R. F. Littledale.
Written for, and first published in, the ' People's
Hymns.' 1867.
199. Hark ! the sound of holy voices, chanting at the
crystal sea.
6. God of God, the One begotten, &c.
Pour upon us of thy fulness, that we may for ever
more,
God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy
Ghost adore. Bishop Chr. Wordsworth.
For All Saints^ Day. First published in his 'Holy
Year.' 1862.
The Song of the Saints in the Revelation is 'Salvation
unto our God, which sitteth upon the throne and unto the
Lamb.' 220. Father of heaven, who hast created all,
. Father of heaven,
O Son of God . 0 Son of God,

0 Holy Ghost

. O Holy Ghost,

184 CHURCH HYMNS
O Triune God, lo, at Thy word 'tis done,
We speak, but Thine the might ;
This child hath scarce yet seen our earthly sun,
Yet pour on it the light
Of faith, and hope, and joyful love,
Thou Sun of all below, above.
O Triune God.
A. Knapp. i 7 98- i 864.
(Tr. C. Winkworth.)
272. Public Thanksgiving for Victory.
Great God of Hosts, our ears have heard.
To Father, Son, and Holy Ghost,
One God in Persons Three,
All highest praise, all humblest thanks,
Now and for ever be ! Amen.
284. Holy off 'rings, rich and rare.
To the Father and the Son,
And the Spirit, Three in One.
Though our mortal weakness raise
OfFrings of imperfect praise,
Yet with hearts bowed down most lowly,
Crying Holy ! Holy ! Holy !
On Thine altar laid we leave them ;
Christ present them! God receive them ! Amen.
J. S. B. Monsell, 1814-1875.

/. 5. B. MONSELL 185
289. Arise, O Lord, and shine.
To God the Father, Son,
And Spirit ever blest,
Eternal Three in One,
All worship be addressed !
Join all on earth, rejoice and sing ;
All glory give to God our king !
Missionary Hymn. W. Hurn.
301. Lord of the living harvest.
Be with us, God the Father,
Be with us, God the Son ;
And God the Holy Spirit,
O blessed Three in One !
J. S. B. Monsell. 1817-1873.
307. Here may God the Father, God the Saviour Son,
God the Holy Spirit, be adored as One ;
Till the whole creation at Thy footstool fall,
And in adoration own Thee Lord of all !
310, When the Architect Almighty had created Heaven
and Earth,
Temple of the glorious Godhead, angels shouted
at their birth.
In that holy place Isaiah did Thy throne of glory
see,
And he heard the voice of seraphs singing hymns
of praise to Thee ;

1 86 CHURCH HYMNS
Holy, Holy, Holy is the Lord of hosts eternally,
Sing they in the heavenly temple to the Blessed
Trinity. Bishop Chr. Wordsworth.
311. Lift the strain of high thanksgiving,
Praise to Thee, Almighty Father !
Praise to Thee, Eternal Son !
Praise to Thee, all quickening Spirit !
Ever blessed Three in One ! J. Ellerton.
314. Holy, Holy, Holy, to Thee our vows we pay.

Addressed as
- one Person and
one God.

For Thee, O Lord Almighty
Thyself the Master Builder
Thyself the Corner-Stone
O Comforter most blessed
When Thou art Temple, Sacrifice,
and Priest upon the throne /
316. Church Festival.
Angels' voices ever singing.
5. Honour, glory, might and merit
Thine shall ever be ;
Father, Son, and Holy Spirit,
Blessed Trinity !
Of the best that Thou hast given,
Earth and Heaven
Render Thee. F. Pott.

J. M. NEALE 187
The song of which this is supposed to be a rendering is
that in Rev. iv. 11 :
' Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honour
and power ; for Thou hast created all things, and for Thy
pleasure they are and were created.'
319. Dedication of Organ.
Hark !- Hark ! the organ loudly peals.

To God the Father, Son,
And Spirit, Three in One.
G. Thring.

3 21.' 1. Eternal Father, strong to save, &c.
2. 0 Saviour, whose Almighty word, &c.
3. O Sacred Spirit, who didst brood, &c.
4. O Trinity of love and power.
And ever let there rise to Thee
Glad hymns of praise from land and sea.
336. Behold the Lamb !
Behold the Lamb !
Worthy is He alone
To sit upon the throne
Of God above ;
One with the Ancient of all days,
One with the Paraclete in praise,
All Light, all Love ! Amen.
M. Bridges.

1 88 CHURCH HYMNS
338. Deeply laid, a sure Foundation,
Christ, the anointed Corner-Stone,
Reaching on to every nation,
Binding both the worlds in one,
Sion's joy and strong salvation,
Makes the faithful all His own.
All her halls a royal priesthood
Fills with music gloriously,
Praise of God from saintly voices
Ringing out melodiously ;
Heralding with endless joyance
God the One in Persons Three.
To the Everlasting Father,
And the Son who reigns on high,
With the Holy Ghost for ever,
Unity in Trinity ;
Honour, glory, virtue, blessing,
Praise, and might, and majesty.
Translated by J. M. Neale from the Latin (seventh century).
344. 1. Christ is our corner-stone.
Oh ! then with hymns of praise
These hallowed courts shall ring ;
Our voices we will raise
The Three in One to sing ;
And thus proclaim
In joyful song,,
Both loud and long,
That glorious Name.
From the Latin (seventh century). Tr. J. Chandler.

VENI, CREATOR -, 189
346. Come, Holy Ghost, our souls inspire.
Teach us to know the Father, Son,
And Thee, of both, to be but one.
That through the ages all along,
This may be our endless song :
Praise to Thy eternal merit,
Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
Original.
Per te sciamus, da, Patrem,
Noscamus atque Filium ;
Teque utriusque Spiritum
Credamus omni tempore.
Deo Patri sit gloria,
Et Filio, qui a mortuis
Surrexit, ac Paraclito,
In sseculorum ssecula.
The English version of ' Veni, Creator,' in Church
Hymns is the same as that in the Consecration Service in
the Prayer Book.
In the Latin version in Palmer's ' Antiquities of the
English Ritual,' the last verse is given as follows, with a
reference to the Breviarium Sarisb. :
Sit laus Patri cum Filio,
Sancto simul Paraclito ;
Nobisque mittat Filius
Charisma Sancti Spiritus.
347. Come, Holy Ghost, who ever One,
Reign'st with the Father and with Son.

i go • CHURCH HYMNS
Now to the Father, to the Son,
And to the Spirit, Three in One,
Be praise, and thanks, and glory given
By men on earth and saints in heaven.
St. Ambrose.
(Translated by J. H. Newman?)
In the hymns for Dominica, from the Roman Breviary,
are the following final verses :
Prsesta, Pater piissime,
Patrique compar Unice,
Cum Spiritu Paraclito,
Regnans per omne saeculum.
Prasstet hoc nobis Deitas beata
Patris, ac Nati, pariterque Sancti
Spiritus, cujus resonet per orbem
Gloria mundum.
Deo Patri sit gloria
Ejusque soli Filio
Cum Spiritu Paraclito,
Nunc et per omne sseculum.
Patri simulque Filio
Tibique Sancte Spiritus,
Sicut fuit, sit jugiter
Saeculum per omne gloria.
Virtus, honor, laus, gloria
Deo Patri, cum Filio,
Sancto simul Paraclito,
In sseculorum ssecula.

/. H. NEWMAN 191
Jesu, tibi sit gloria,
Qui natus es de Virgine,
Cum Patre et almo Spiritu,
In sempiterna ssecula.
Praesta, beata Trinitas,
Concede, simplex Unitas,
Ut fructuosa sint tuis
Jejuniorum munera.
Sempiterna sit beatse
Trinitati gloria,
^Equa Patri Filioque,
Par decus Paraclito ;
Unius Trinique nomen
Laudet universitas.
359. Father, Son, and Spirit are supposed severally on
. thrones, before each of which we successively worship and
pray, summing up in v. 4 :
Jehovah, Father, Spirit, Son,
Mysterious Godhead ! Three in One !
Before Thy throne we sinners bend ;
Grace, pardon, life to us extend.
Edward Cooper.
376. Guide us [me], O Thou great Jehovah,
Pilgrims through this barren land :
We are weak, but Thou art mighty ;
Bread of heaven,
Feed us till we want no more.
&c, &c.
Translated from the Welsh of W, Williams, 171, 7-1 791.

192 CHURCH HYMNS
399. Text : ' Whom haveT in heaven but Thee ? And
there is none upon earth that I desire beside Thee.' —
Ps. lxxiii. 35. Jesus, my Lord, my God, my all.

406. Final Verse.
Jesus, Name of wondrous love !
Human Name of God above !
Pleading only this we flee,
Helpless, O our God, to Thee.
Bishop W. W. How.
In my second Reminiscences I relate that im
mediately on reading a very kind and touching
letter addressed by Bishop Ryder to my father on
the occasion of a pew controversy, I made a
resolution never to do, say, or feel any disrespect to
a bishop. To the best of my memory and belief I
have kept this vow, when much better and greater men
have felt themselves bound by no such law. It is
therefore with the greatest repugnance that I venture
even to ask a bishop a question which he may find
it not easy to answer. How can Bishop How re
concile his doctrine that Jesus is the human name
of God above with the double announcement of
the angel Gabriel, ' He shall be called the Son of
the Highest,' and ' He shall be called the Son of
God'?

CATHERINE WINKWORTH 193
430. Love Divine, all love excelling.
Jesu, Thou art all compassion.
Addressed to Jesus as God.
Charles Wesley,. (First line altered.)
431. March, march onward, soldiers true !
Praise, praise Him who reigns on high,
Praise the co-eternal Son,
Praise the Spirit, Lord of life,
Praise the blessed Three in One ;
&c, &c.
439. Now thank we all our God.

All praise and thanks to God
The Father now be given,
The Son, and Him who reigns
With Them in highest heaven.
The One eternal God
Whom heaven and earth adore ;
For thus it was, is now,
And shall be evermore !
M. Rinkart (1586-1649).
{Translated by Catherine Winkworth.)
461. 1. O Thou who hast our sorrows borne,
Help us to look on Thee, and mourn.

O

194 CHURCH HYMNS
2. Vouchsafe us eyes of faith to see
The Man transfixed on Calvary,
To know Thee who Thou art,
The One eternal God and true !
O let Thy dying love constrain
Our souls to love their God again,
Their Lord to glorify.
463. O ye immortal throng
Of angels round the throne,
Join with our feeble song,
To make the Saviour known.
Praise, bright-winged host,
The Three in One ;
The Father, Son,
And Holy Ghost. Amen. P. Doddridge.
On this hymn Mr. Julian observes : ' The S.P.C.K.
Church Hymns is an exception in favour of a text which is
much altered, and a doxology unknown to Doddridge.'
465. Oh, come, loud anthems let us sing. (Ps. xcv.)
To God the Father, God the Son,
And God the Spirit, Three in One,
Be honour, praise, and glory given,
By all, on earth and all in heaven.
472. Oh ! Love, how deep ! how broad ! how high !
It fills the heart with ecstasy !
J7hat God, the Son of God, should take
Our mortal form for mortals' sake.

/. M. NEALE 195
He sent no Angel to our race.
For us He was baptized, and bore.
For us to wicked men betrayed.
Translated by J. M. Neale from the Latin of fifteenth to
seventeenth century.
476. O, what the joy and the glory must be
Those endless Sabbaths the blessed ones see !
Low before Him, with our praises, we fall,
Of whom, in whom, and through whom are all ;
Of whom the Father, and in whom the Son,
Through whom the Spirit, with them ever One.
Translated, with alterations, by J. M. Neale, from the
Latin. Fourteenth century.
I cannot understand, or even construe, these four
lines. 477. Oh, worship the King,
All glorious above.
Our Maker, Defender,
Redeemer, and Friend ! (Ps. civ.)
By Sir R. Grant.
This appears to be addressed simply to God the Father.
478. On our way rejoicing as we homeward move.

o 2

196 CHURCH HYMNS
Unto God the Father, joyful songs we sing ;
Unto God the Saviour, thankful hearts we bring ;
Unto God the Spirit, bow we and adore,
On our way rejoicing, now and evermore ;
On our way rejoicing, as we homeward move,
Hearken to our praises, O Thou God of love.
J. S. B. Monsell.
481. Our blest Redeemer, ere He breathed.
O ! praise the Father, praise the Son,
Blest Spirit, praise to Thee !
All praise to God, the Three in One,
The One in Three. Harriet Auber. Dox. anon.
Mr. Julian observes that there is not a doxology in the
original. 483. Pleasant are Thy courts above. (Ps. Ixxxiv.)
H. F. Lyte.
This appears to be addressed to the 'Heavenly
Father,' with not even an allusion to the Son and His
work. Perhaps it is often used as it were to the Son.
487. Praise to the Holiest in the height,
And in the depths be praise.
And that a higher gift than grace
Should flesh and blood refine ;
God's presence and His very Self,
And Essence all Divine !
J. H. Newman.
Written 1865. First appearance in verses on various
occasions in the ' Dream of Gerontius.'

DEAN E. H. PLUMPTRE 197
489. Rejoice, ye pure in heart.
1 1 • • «
Praise Him who reigns on high,
Whom heaven and earth adore ;
Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost,
One God for evermore. Amen.
Dean E. H. Plumptre.
497. Sing Alleluia forth in duteous praise,
0 citizens of heaven ; in sweet notes raise
An endless Alleluia !
Almighty Christ, to Thee our voices sing
Glory for evermore ; to Thee we bring
An endless Alleluia !
Anon, from the Latin (fifth century) ; tr. J. Ellerton.
To this is prefixed, in 'Church Hymns,' Rev. xix. 3 ;
in 'The Church of England Hymn Book,' Rev. xix. 6.
The passage describes the glory of God, and a solemn act
of praise, between the fall of Babylon and the Marriage of
the Lamb. 498. Sing to the Lord a joyful song. (Ps. cxiv.)
¦ «¦•¦*
Repeated after every verse.
For He's the Lord of heaven and earth,
Whom angels serve and saints adore —
The Father, Son, and Holy Ghost,
To Whom be praise for evermore.
J. S. B. Monsell,
Vicar of Egham.

198 CHURCH HYMNS
507. Take up thy cross, the Saviour said.
• , • •«„¦/.,¦
To Thee, great Lord, the One in Three,
All praise for evermore ascend ;
Oh, grant us in our home to see
The heavenly life that knows no end.
C. W. Everest, alt. Dox. anon.
t
509. The Church's one Foundation.
Yet she on earth hath union
With God, the Three in One. S. J. Stone.
In another hymn-book I find the second line above :
' With Father, Spirit, Son.'
511. The God of Abraham praise.
This is very different in the two hymn-books before me.
The following concluding stanza appears only in ' Church
Hymns ' : The whole triumphant host ,
Give thanks to God on high ;
Hail, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost !
- They' ever cry. #.
Hail, Abraham's God and mine !
I join the heavenly lays ;
All might and majesty are Thine,
And endless praise.
Apparently selected from a hymn ascribed to Thomas
Olivers. I cannot find the third line in any angelic utter
ances, nor can I find any angelic worship that could be so
interpreted.

/. MARRIOTT 199
516. The strain upraise of joy and praise.
Last verse.
Praise be done to the Three in One.
Godescaleus (tenth century).
(Tr. J. M. Neale)
528. Thou, whose Almighty word.
Holy and Blessed Three,
Glorious Trinity,
Wisdom, Love, Might ;
Boundless as ocean's tide,
Rolling in fullest pride
Through the earth, far and wide,
Let there be light. Amen. J. Marriott.
This hymn is adopted in the Form of Prayer for ' The
Day of Intercession on behalf of the Missionary Work of
the Church,' published by the S.P.C.K., 1880.
529. 1. Three in One and One in Three,
Ruler of the earth and sea,
Hear us, while we lift to Thee
Holy chant and psalm.
4. Three in One and One in Three/
Dimly here we worship Thee ;
With the saints hereafter we
Hope to bear our palm.
In a long and interesting notice of this hymn by
Mr. Julian, I find that it first appeared in Dr. Rorison's

zoo CHURCH HYMNS
' Hymns and Anthems,' and that it is an imitation and
combination of two hymns in the Roman Breviary, one of
them Tu Trinitatis Unitas.
535. To Him who for our sins was slain,
To Him, for all His dying pain,
Sing we Alleluia !
To Father, Son, and Holy Ghost,
One God most high, our joy and boast,
Sing we Alleluia ! Amen.
562. 1. Ye servants of the Lord. P. Doddridge.
Doxology added :
To God the Father, Son,
And Spirit ever blessed ;
The One in Three and Three in One
Be endless praise addressed.
Children's Litanies.
582. God the Father, God the Word,
God the Holy Ghost adored,
Blessed Trinity, one Lord,
Spare us, Holy Trinity.
Godfrey Thring.
588. God the Father, seen of none,
God, the sole-begotten Son,
God the Spirit, with them One,
Spare us, Holy Trinity.
By way of apology, partly, for my comments,
partly for the matter commented on, and that ac-

THE 'ROCK OF AGES' 201
cuser and accused may share alike, I have suggested
that congregations care more for the music than for
the words. The music of antiquity was much simpler
than ours, and the instruments weaker, for there was
nothing formerly to compare with one of our big
organs. But there is more than the music in the
question. Beside the words themselves, the tone of
them, the swing of them, and the sweet inflection —
may we not say inspiration ? — carries us off our legs,
and while we are delivering vocal sounds, it may be
something beyond the sense that animates us.
Let us take the ' Rock of Ages.' It has been
freely criticised, but a man might as well criticise
Mont Blanc, or a storm in the Atlantic, or Homer,
as undertake to prove that this hymn is not really
suitable for public worship. He has on his side no less
an authority than Toplady himself, who sang his own
hymns in his own fashion. At midnight he would put
on his surplice — a good warm garment in those days
— sally forth from his parsonage at Broad Hem-
bury, and ascend to Hembury Fort, a^lofty hill com
manding one of the grandest panoramas in Devon
shire. There, far away from the haunts of men, and
with nothing between him and the Eternal, he would
sing his hymns, pouring out his heart's longings,
careless of hearers or readers.
But how are these hymns sung Sunday after
Sunday, say, at the Metropolitan Tabernacle ? The

202 CHURCH HYMNS
words of the ' Rock of Ages ' are so familiar — in
deed, so dear — to us all, that I need not quote them.
I am told that when it is given out, there is nothing
in all London to compare with the grandeur of the
sight, the volume of sound, as if the voice of a
nation, and the perfection of the harmony. But is it
the ' ages ' they are thinking of ? No. The instant
effect. Is it, indeed, ' me only ' ? No. There are five
thousand of them. Are they trying to hide them
selves ? No. There are five thousand showing them
selves to one another, and raising their voices as if
each would be heard above all. Is the labour of their
hands at all in question ? Have they tried to fulfil
the Law, and found it wanting ? Has their zeal found
no respite ? How many tears have ever flowed
from their wounded consciences ? What efforts have
they made, or neglected to make, to atone for sin \
Have they brought nothing in their hands ? They
have all brought either silver or gold. Are they
clinging to any cross ? Are they naked ? No ; in
their Sunday's best. Have they come to our Lord. for
dress ? No ; in the best dress which their means
will afford. Are they helpless ? No ; very self-con
fident and independent. Are they foul ? No ; extra
washed, and in clean linen. Are they waiting the
approach of death ? No ; they are hoping to live a
few years longer. Are they preparing for the Judg
ment day ? Well, we will hope they are.

THE MUSIC EVERYTHING 203
But I do not suppose the- Tabernacle congre
gation to differ in these respects from other con
gregations — not even from the sedatest Church
congregation — unless it be that they all join and sing
more lustily. A young lady of the period assures me
that she never thinks of the words she is singing, and
is under a fixed impression that they have no mean
ing at all. No wonder, I must be allowed to observe.
For words to carry their meaning with them, it is
necessary there should be no very great departure
from the tone, manner, and pose of conversation, or
from words unaccompanied with music ; but in these
days the music certainly does engross the sentient
faculties, leaving a bare utterance to the words.

204

XXII
READ AT A MEETING OF THE RURAL DEANERY
OF OTTERY
There are hymns for common use, and hymns not
for common use. The difference is important, but
not sufficiently recognised. It may not be easy to
draw a line between the hymns proper for common
use, and not proper ; . but undoubtedly a large pro
portion of the hymns included in popular collections
are not so fit as other hymns are. This proportion,
too, includes, perhaps, the great number of hymns
that we should spontaneously read, reflect on, and
remember. Private conditions, personal experiences,
poetical effusions, passing thoughts and feelings, are
often, indeed generally, unfit for common use. By
common use is meant use by all the members of such
a congregation as we see in our village churches, in
cluding all classes, and consequently many persons
very simple and uneducated. It may be assumed, I
think, that there ought to be some hymns or psalms
in which all can join, if not in their voices, yet in
heart and mind. On the other hand, it must be con-

HYMNS FOR COMMON USE 205
ceded that in all churches, and in all times, hymns
have been used which could not be regarded as simply
for common use, except so far as the simplest might
follow them at a humble distance, with a general idea
of the subject, and picking up here and there a word,
a name, or an epithet. This must be so when the
hymns are in a dead language. It must be so when
the words, the structure of the sentences, and the
thoughts themselves are not those of the common sort.
Proceeding on the supposition, which we must all
agree in, that there ought to be, in every service,
one or two hymns for common use, what conditions
can be laid down for their selection and composition ?
They ought to be very plain. They ought to be of
simple construction. They ought to present no
difficulty which shall set the mind at work, or as a
puzzle. For this reason they ought not to be dog
matic, but in the language of Scripture rather than
of controversy. They ought not to describe transient
moods, despondencies, ecstacies, absolute certainties
founded on personal feeling, or particular opinions as
to the present state of the dead in Christ, or the
employments of heaven, or the future state of the
wicked and impenitent. They cannot but be sub
jective as well as objective, for singing itself is a very
subjective process ; so much so, that in most cases it
is mainly subjective, and the contribution brought by
each member of the congregation is not his full share

206 READ AT A RURIDECANAL MEETING
in the sense of the words sung, but in the spontaneous
thoughts and feelings moved by the musical sounds.
It is desirable that there should be as much agree
ment and accord as possible, so as to make the singing
one act ; and for this end, the words ought to be very
simple indeed, and such as ordinarily good Christians
will not hesitate to join in. Having at different
times looked through various collections, I have
myself come to the conviction that the work is still to
be done, and that the Church of England still wants
hymns for common use. Our town congregations
contain, unhappily, very few of the less educated
men. We do not there find the desired spectacle of
all classes uniting in hymns. In the country con
gregation we have more working men and women,
and all seem to like the singing, but they do not
generally join in the words or follow the sense. In
deed, it is to be feared very few do. Where the
failure is so great, it may be reasonably suspected
that a great change has to be made.
Any attempt to simplify our hymns starts under
great difficulties. The modern verse or stanza is
longer than the Hebrew, and length itself is against
simplicity. It is in four divisions against the two of
the ordinary Hebrew psalm ; for even when the
Hebrew verses group themselves in pairs, they still ex
press the meaning with more brevity than the English
translations can manage. Whether rhythm be difficult

HYMNS FOR COMMON USE 207
in English verse or prose, I will not pretend to say ;
but it is a fact that a large proportion of our hymns
are wanting in rhythm. They do not run off the
lips and so favour the flow of thought and the music.
But the great difficulty is the rhyme. I have long
been of opinion that rhyme is not only a difficulty
but a positive antagonism to sense and correct ex
pression, being continually the reason why the sense
is departed from, or confused, or weakly put. Even
where this is not the case, the expectation of the
rhyme and the sort of satisfaction with which it is
retained seem to me to come between the mind and
the sense and the feeling which the sense is intended to
impart. Alternate rhymes are found in practice easier
than rhymes in couplets, and therefore they tend to
the use of the stanza of four lines, which has hence
become the most common form of hymn. This must
be a complex and artificial structure, and it is made
more so when, for the sake of greater effect, the four
lines are continued to six by the addition of a couplet
with a new rhyme.
The copiousness of the English language offers
peculiar facilities for both rhythm and rhyme ; and,
as I have said, together they favour the use of the
quartette of octosyllabic lines. This fritters the sense
into short clauses, each of which must have a certain
distinctness. The whole result is a very great licence
as regards force, exactness, and coherency. In the

208 READ AT A RURIDECANAL MEETING
most beautiful hymns may be found words, phrases,
and whole lines which are only excusable from the
necessities of the versification. It may be said that if
they are beautiful, that is enough ; but nothing excuses
want of propriety in the collocation of the ideas and
words. Why are we to fall below the simplicity,
grandeur, and harmonious expression of the Psalms ?
There are, it is true, many long verses in the Psalms,
but they are generally descriptive or amplifications,
and therefore one simple idea largely stated. To
dwell on a thought is a very different matter from
complicating it. As I am not a Hebrew scholar, I
cannot say how far these remarks apply to the
original, but I find Keble, who was a scholar, and had
the assistance of Pusey, saying much the same.
The faults of diction I have described cannot but
have an effect on the doctrinal statements, in which it
is evident a greater license is taken than is generally
allowed in prose. When I read a sermon by any
ordinary clergyman, or even a minister not of our
Church, I do not expect to be startled by statements
instantly presenting the question, Is this agreeable to
Holy Writ ? But in many hymns in popular collec
tions it might be supposed that the very object of the
writer is to surprise us, or to carry us for the moment
beyond our convictions. In my own early days I had
for many years to think well of every verse I was
called on to join in lest it committed me to some

HYMNS FOR COMMON USE 209
point of the Calvinistic theory. In those days there
were few churches where this could be the case.
The danger is in the opposite direction.
When I came to Plymtree, eleven years since, I
found no village choir, in the old sense, for it had
been silenced many years. The Hymns Ancient and
Modern of the period were feebly sung by a thin choir
of young women and children, without any accom
paniment, the small barrel-organ being out of repair. I
had myself very little knowledge of Hymns Ancient
and Modern, but without giving much thought to the
matter, expressed a wish that they should be con
tinued. I found that if they were, I should have no
male voices and no instrumental music. There was
put into my hands a not very pleasant attack on
the collection, which attack I read with a strong
prejudice against it — partly justified by the contents.
But I found myself agreeing with so much that the
assailant said, that I felt I could not make a stand for
the book, when a mere accident, in which I had no
concern, silenced the new choir. I let the old one
return with the ' Tate and Brady,' and their instrument.
Indeed, on my coming to residence, I found them in
possession, and let them so remain to this day. I
must own myself startled and even shocked at much
I find in Hymns Ancient and Modern. I could not do
battle for that collection, nor for any other that I
know of. p

2io READ AT A RURIDECANAL MEETING
Yet I need hardly say I am far from satisfied
with ' Tate and Brady, ' though I think that, as a
poetical composition, it is really a work of high order.
My choir, I suppose, do not see the Christian bearing
of the Psalms, for they omit all the Psalms of a
Messianic character. Having four to select each
Sunday, they. usually have two condemnatory, one
in favour of charity or justice, and one in praise of
God. If I thought they, or the congregation, paid
the slightest attention to the sense of the words, I
should interfere so far as to ask for a better selection ;
but I am sure the musical notes are all that is taken
in, and perhaps the rhymes. How is it that very few
men join in the singing of psalms and hymns either
in church or anywhere else, insomuch that one is
struck by the sight of anyone joining ? How is it
that, unless one knows the words, it is never possible
to form even a conjecture of what the people and the
women and children are singing, even immediately
round one ? It would not be so if the words were
simpler, more emphatic, and more adapted to the com
mon mood. That common mood is not one of in
difference to sacred subjects, but it is one which rather
resents the pressure of impulsive and ecstatic appeals
to feeling. I turn to a Confirmation hymn, and find it takes
for granted that the persons joining in that hymn feel
a renewed transport every time they think of that

HYMNS FOR COMMON USE 211
day, and are hastening to interchange their warm
feelings about it with their neighbours. We are sup
posed to share with rapid alternation the transports
and black despondencies of such men as Cowper. No
doubt there must be much of this sympathy in our
worship. We are called on to sympathise with
David and the other Psalmists, with the sufferings
and rejoicings of God's people, especially of the good.
But this is no more than happens in the course of
home affairs, for not a day, hardly an hour, passes
without our sympathy being invoked first in one
direction then another. We open a letter, and the
writer is alternately glad and sorry several times in
five minutes. But none of this justifies the pretence of
complete abandonment to delight or to woe, to con
fidence or to despair, made by hymns professing to
be founded on personal experience, or a supposed
realisation of the Divine attributes of love and ven
geance. I am aware that this was more done .fifty years
ago than now ; but I must plead that I found an equal
difficulty in following, as I was expected, the sense
of many hymns in common use, but not, as I think,
proper for common use. I even thought that of
the two I would rather say my prayers at the foot
of one of the crucified, naked, bleeding figures one
sees in a continual Calvary, than industriously, word
by word, raise up the image before my mind's eye. Let

212 READ AT A RURIDECANAL MEETING
others do this. Let them do it in that solitude that
best fits the occasion. I feel a repugnance to it, and
it is quite evident that the mass of mankind feel much
as I do. Let us wish to praise God and pray to Him
in psalms and hymns. I ask if it is not possible to
do this in compositions very similar to the Psalms —
similar in simplicity of style, similar in tracing the
•goodness of God through all His dealings with the
outer world, and with the hearts of His true servants.
The great work of Christ and the Gospel story can
be treated simply, so as a child can understand.
I wish this could be done with rhythm and without
rhyme, but the time, perhaps, has not yet come for
that.

213

XXIII
THE INSTINCTIVE AND INSTANTANEOUS
IF anyone will consider the pace of human affairs, of
conversation and of devotion, he must notice that it
leaves little time for anything to call a mental opera
tion. We cannot be always, or even frequently, put
ting our thoughts in order, comparing ideas, analysing,
constructing, building one conclusion on another,
guarding ourselves against possible error, or simply
taking care that we are not altogether mistaken.
The greater part of mankind can hardly do these
things at all ; indeed, are hardly called upon to do
them, let alone their want of means and opportunity.
But even the more fortunate and educated classes are
much limited in this matter. Neither in childhood,
nor when they have come to man's estate, and are
actually engaged in the business of life, have they
leisure or allowance to stay the course of instruction,
of talk, or of action, for any exercise of the logical
faculty. In some of the most important matters and
occasions we cannot and do not exercise it at all, but
act as it were by instinct. We enter life with instincts —

214 THE INSTINCTIVE AND INSTANTANEOUS
whence derived, or how formed, it matters not for the
present purpose ; and we soon acquire by education,
by force of habit, or by experience, other instincts
upon which we act as instantly and decisively as chil
dren or the brutes. Whether we love or hate, or respect
or despise, or trust or fear, or reverence, it is generally
the result of the first glance.
You see a new face or a new figure, and you have
formed an estimate of it in the tenth of a second. You
like a man or dislike him, you know not why. You
cannot give the reason ; or if you do, it is probably not
quite the true account of the matter, only a patched-up
reason to give colour to a foregone conclusion. The
object of your dislike may think it hard, cruel, and
unjust, but if he could himself search his own con
science, he might easily find what it was that pro
duced this impression on you. You enter a building,
and you are awestruck, or charmed, or disappointed
by it ; you catch a glimpse of a landscape, and you
have added a paradise to your memories. You hear
a tone or notice a look, and are bewitched or re
volted. The merchant goes to an Exchange with
a distinct and simple idea of everybody he meets
there, and is likely to transact business with. The
legislator is soon equally well prepared for all
comers in a Parliament, however numerous and mis
cellaneous. If the commander does not see at a
glance how the land lies, and how he is to dispose his

ACQUIRED INSTINCTS 215
forces for offence or defence, he is not likely to do
better when the engagement has once begun. Many
a homely saying warns us that we must not be
thinking when we are called on to act. The child
and the man are equally full of instincts, received in
one case, formed and acquired in the other,
These instincts are marked in the features, the
bearing, and the tone, and a man is known at once.
It is the business of the portrait painter to catch this
real, though sometimes indefinite character, which,
like a spirit or a good genius, seems to co-exist and
become a distinct though inseparable identity. There
are painters who can catch it, and painters, very clever
in their way, who cannot. There are painters, such as
Vandyke, or Gainsborough, or Sir Joshua, who, with
all their mannerisms, can produce the inner man,
and associate it with a superb and almost divine
grace and dignity- They are not always the men to
reason or to inquire. They do the substantial and
critical part of their work very quickly. It is the
same with the poets. They must be felicitous, or
nothing. A great poet will strike off in ten lines as
many beauties as a laborious cultivator of the Muse
will fabricate in five thousand lines, the result of five
years' honest toil. It is the same with the preacher.
One sometimes hardly knows how it is a man pro
duces such an effect, and is so run after. The first
condition of eloquence is that the speaker shall be

216 THE INSTINCTIVE AND INSTANTANEOUS
immediately understood and felt, and that he must
therefore impose no labour of thought on his hearers.
If they have to think about one sentence they will
lose the next
Now, if anyone were to ask, as indeed anyone
might properly ask, for a book in which these con
ditions are fulfilled, and that can be read and read
again, gratifying, moving, and satisfying the reader,
as much by a singular simplicity as by the subject,
that is the Bible. There is hardly a word in it
that cannot be understood at once, in some sufficient
sense, by any ordinary reader or hearer. He may
wonder and feel that he has not obtained the whole
sense of the passage, and that a wise expositor may
have more to tell him, but there is nothing to puzzle
him, no knot that he has to unravel, no positive;
bar between him and the sense. Of course, a miracle
is an astounding thing. So, too, is a glimpse of
heaven: So, too, the few words in which our Lord
spoke of His own pre-existence and share of the
Divine glory. But each is a simple idea, and not
entirely new to the vulgar apprehension. Each
is comprehensible to a certain sufficient extent ; nay,
not only comprehensible, but even familiar to those
who have been accustomed to ask how man came to
be, and what he was designed to be hereafter.
Surely, if there be any occasion on which logic,
or what passes for logic, is an unwelcpnie intruder,,

THE LANGUAGE OF SCRIPTURE SIMPLE 217
where we have to trust to instinct, and to lean on
authority rather than on science, or what pretends
to' be such, that is the act of worship, whether it be
prayer or praise, or thanksgiving or confession, or
Holy Communion. The natural heart of man is not so
disposed for these things as it ought to be, as indeed we
recognise by the accessories found necessary in these
days to raise the flagging soul to the pitch of devotion.
The wings of love are not so ready or so powerful for
the assumed flight. They will not bear the additional
burden and difficulty of devices, suggestive of nets
and gins. There is not a text in the Bible in which
it will actually occur to an ordinary reader to ask
who is speaking ? Of whom is this said ? Whom
are we addressing ? To whom are we praying ?
Whom are we praising ? It is only the theologian who
sees a difficulty, and his difficulty is that it does not
fit into his own theory, that is, the theory of a parti
cular school of thought, or of a national establishment.
Mental acts of contrition, prayer, and praise must
constitute the greater part of the religion even of the
best and most devout Christian. If they obtain utter
ance, it is usually as simple ejaculations. To whom,
are they addressed ? They are addressed to the
Father, or to the Son, or to the Spirit. There is
many a text of Holy Writ suggesting, allowing, and
encouraging a prayer to each, and distinct spiritual
relations with each. Christians — I am speaking of

218 THE INSTINCTIVE AND INSTANTANEOUS
English Churchmen — are reminded of texts, and rely
on them as upon charters of ready access and free
intercourse. They put themselves for the moment in
the place of the Jews, or of the disciples and apostles,
or of the first converts. Nothing can exceed the
simplicity of the record on each occasion. The
petition is to One believed, as if actually seen, or
inwardly felt. It is the same when God is spoken of;
when the life and words of Jesus Christ are related ;
when the Holy Spirit is the subject. True, in the
historical record these are spoken of in their mutual
relation. Especially is the Son spoken of in relation
to the Father. Indeed, this relation to the Father is
the most prominent teaching of the New Testament.
But, upon the whole, there is absolutely nothing in
the Bible to encourage a continual arrangement of the
Father, the Son, and the Spirit in such a way as to
suggest one supremeobject of worship, consisting ofthe
Three discharging their respective offices within one
individual Being. There is nothing intricate, artificial,
wheel within wheel, as it were. There is nothing to
take the matter" out of the province of faith and piety,
or to make demands on the intellect. There is nothing
to give the scholar an enormous advantage over the
poor rustic whose chief occupation it is to drive a
straight furrow through a stiff or stonyfield. Even if the
scholar may correct or enliven his devotions with the
grand secrets, not to say the curiosities, of high

INVOCATION A NATURAL ACT 219
theology, he need not insult the crude apprehensions
of the rustic, and impress upon him that the Gospel,
the very news of our salvation, was not meant for
such as he. But the melancholy truth remains, that
few of us are better than the poor rustic is on the
most trying occasions. Unless the Gospel be accepted
in the very simplest form, we shall find ourselves
hardly yet worthy to be called true converts in the
hour of need. We shall find ourselves hardly yet
babes in Christ when we should be men, and have
long flattered ourselves that we were something more
than ordinary men.
The invocation of a departed saint, though without
a clear Scriptural warrant, is a simple and natural
act, and litanies composed of successive invocations,
though a more decided departure from the Scriptural
basis, are only repetitions of simple acts. The same
may be said of invocations addressed to supposed
companies, whole classes, armies and hosts, to the
elemental forces and powers. Such devotions are
recommended to the use of the unlearned much for
the same reason that processions and ceremonies of a
sort to attract congregations are resorted to by the
churches that best understand both the weakness and
the strength of human nature.
The experience, indeed the practice, of all ages
and countries testifies to the fact that thefe is no
intellectual difficulty in these conceptions ; indeed.

220 THE INSTINCTIVE AND INSTANTANEOUS
that the commoner sort of people are rather too prone
to them, and have to be withheld from them some
times, as in our ' own country, by positive legislation.
Heaven is a very large place ; the coast is very clear,
and the way, so we are apt to think, very open. We
may people it, in imagination at least, as much as we
please. Of course we are disposed to give our own
friends the preference, but that done, to exercise some
choice. We have only to look to the multitudes
of Welsh and Cornish saints, to see there is no mental
difficulty in the creation of personal sanctities. But
these are all absolutely and wholly distinct persons, so
we suppose, not many in one, or one in many.

221

XXIV
THE SONSHIP A REALITY
THE Bible is throughout a history of distant promises,
imperfect revelations, faith in the unseen, hope for the
unattained, possession deferred, and enjoyment ever
lacking its proper completeness. Man is impatient.
He wants to make quick work of it, even by some
short cut or royal road, if necessary. He would have
all in his hands at once, and so call it his own. Yes,
his prize in the race, his lot in the inheritance. Not
so are the ways of God with man. For aught we
know they never will be ; and even in the world to
come man may be still looking forward and arriving
nearer and nearer the eternal secret for ever and ever.
Certainly it is so here. We do not see God, or
comprehend Him, or understand His ways, except
that they are wise and good. Is it, then, in accord
with all we know of God that we should at once
attempt to bound, at a leap, over the revealed Son-
ship of Christ to the assumption of such a oneness
or union, as is indistinguishable from absolute
. identification ? Because the Bible says He is the

222 THE SONSHIP A REALITY
Son of God, are we, therefore, tp add that He is
Himself God indeed ? and not only God in such sense
as may be necessarily implied in Sonship, but even
God the Son, a title which neither the Father, nor the
Son, nor the Holy Spirit has given Him ?
For nearly the whole of my very long life I have
wondered who they could be that invented and
bestowed a title which certainly overcomes all diffi
culties and supersedes all inquiry, by committing the
supposed acceptor to a dogma alike repugnant to
reason and to revelation. It has, indeed, been shown
above that the Creed of the Church of England as
thus interpreted may be justified as describing the
Father as He is understood by the light of religious
philosophy. It is a truth of natural religion that the
Almighty is Creator, Saviour, and Sanctifier. There
can be no doubt that in all the peoples history tells
of, there was an inner circle of thinkers, inquirers,
and worshippers who received and handed down the
knowledge of such a Deity. But the Old Testament
by anticipation, and the New Testament by revela
tion, attested by present fact and miracle, carried
mankind immeasurably beyond that vague and
general conception of the Deity. In the fulness of
time the Son of God entered this world and accom
plished for us a work beyond all that man had hoped
or imagined — for the creation of a new family and
the foundation pf a new and heavenly kingdom.

NATURE AND REVELATION 223
Prodigious, incredible as the work was, nobody
has yet. so much as suggested that the Person, the
mode, the teaching, and the example were unbecoming
either the majesty of Heaven or the grandeur of
the design. But He who did this work which has
so utterly changed the world, while content to call
Himself the Son of man, received from His disciples
no higher or better title than the Son of God, and
greeted them as His brethren. In the course of several
years of intimate and even domestic association, He
maintained and established firmly in their minds that
He was indeed man, remained man as long as he was
with them, and left no doubt that He would be man
in His heavenly kingdom. Nothing in all this
hindered that He should be also the Son of God, and
so far, in such measure as the Father had given and
should give, partaker of the Divine nature.
The Creed of the Church of England sends us
back to the elder dispensation — earlier, indeed —
making our salvation simply the work of one Lord
Almighty, performing, as the occasion required, the
parts of Father, Son, and Spirit. As we have said,
any pious heathen knew as much, and often felt that
much was still wanting — that is> the Son Himself and
Spirit Himself.
Take that storehouse of theology, the wonderful
discourse handed down and delivered at the Last
Supper. I have to confess to a great difficulty in

224 THE SONSHIP A REALITY
conceiving how this could have been then and there
all delivered as it stands in the Scripture ; and that I
have much the same difficulty in what I may call the
clerical composition of the whole of the fourth gospel.
But I do not think that matters the least. From
this discourse various texts are picked out to prove
an absolute oneness between the Father and the
Son, making, indeed, the Father Son, and the Son
Father. But what becomes of such passages as
John xvii. 3, one out of many like : ' And this is life
eternal, that they might know Thee the only true
God, and Jesus Christ, whom Thou hast sent ' ?

225

XXV
ALL GOODNESS RELATIVE, AND UNDER
DIVINE ORDER
As far as comes within human cognisance there is no
such thing as absolute goodness. It exists only in
its relative forms. These forms may be few and
simple, as in the case of the poor workman doing his
daily task and providing for the wants of a single
household, perhaps for only one besides himself,
perhaps even for himself alone. True, there is always
One above, always the Saviour, always the laws of
the land, always public decency, always a choice of
company, always some opportunity of learning more,
and often some new occasion of trial and new test
of obedience. As people rise in what is called the social scale,
or in the cultivation of the intellect or the taste, and
as their lot is cast in what they call a favoured land,
or in a land of darkness, the relative forms of goodness
become innumerable, theoretic, and fanciful. We
can speculate on them, amuse ourselves with them,
indeed, play with them. We can sit down and write
Q

226 GOODNESS RELA TIVE, UNDER DIVINE ORDER
stories based on particular ideas of goodness, and
conceiving characters so good, in a particular way, as
also to do the right thing in the prettiest and most
appropriate fashion. These ideal characters, ideal
occasions, and ideal acts are emanational, emotional,
or, as the phrase now runs, evolutions from the writer's
own good and right-minded inner self. It is he who
creates the little world, peoples it, and gives it its
orders. He may be said to be in the beginning of
it, and he entirely commands the end. He is thus
the Alpha and Omega of his little dispensation.
Gifted with imagination, possessed of a style, strong
in self-reliance, with some; knowledge of books, and,
perhaps, a little of the living world, he finds the
creations of his prolific fancy live and breathe and
do their work with even unexpected vitality.
So few people possess these creative and governing
faculties, and they contribute so much to the relief
of idle hours, that they are entitled to a respectful
and tender consideration. They are excelled in
audacity by not a few composers of moral and philo
sophical systems who can map out the whole area of
virtue and belief, found them upon any basis, trace
their lineage, and give you their very beginning, if not
in an authentic, at least in a convenient, indeed, quite
portable form. If they cannot always tell you exactly
what goodness is — for, in truth, they, describe it as
a development— they can do what is better, they

DIFFICULTIES OF FICTION MONGERS 227
can tell us what it ought to be, and what it will be,
if the world will only accept the primary assumptions
and the logic of these grand discoverers. Again, as
in the case of the writers of fiction dealing with
moral ideas, we must feel a certain debt accruing to
the man who thinks at all about the matter, if only
because he compels people to clear their brains if they
can. The unfortunate victims are the' crowd who
accept without a moment's hesitation baseless theories,
gratuitous estimates, and ideas which are nothing
more than the coinage, say rather the unredeemable
paper issues, of writers who flatter themselves they
possess the key of all truth and knowledge.
But what is the result invariably in the case of
those whose mental nourishment has been of this
purely ideal, fanciful, and speculative character?
They cannot go to a school, to a college, to an office,
to a country living, to a new neighbourhood, without
immediately finding to their surprise and embarrass
ment that the people and things are wholly different
from what they had imagined, and what they had, as
they thought, a right to expect. They find everything
bad, and everybody is in the wrong. They resent as
an indignity anything that does not square with their
own notions. They find it impossible to act or to
be on common terms with people who, they would be
bound to admit, are doing their duty after their own
fashion. Instead of winningsympathy, they studiously Q2

228 GOODNESS RELA TIVE, UNDER DIVINE ORDER
repel it, as if independent of it, and only interested
in not incurring its obligations.
They are as much lost in what to them is a new
world — new only because it is the world — as if they
found themselves in the society of savages or some
strange animals. They are virtually in the dark ;
Virtually among people speaking an unknown tongue,
to whom their one language is equally unintelligible.
Where are now the men and women they have
written, read, and talked about ? Nowhere. Where
are the happy occasions for the easy and complete
satisfaction of their virtuous instincts and for the
winning of high honours in that field ? No sign of
them. What are those people whom they now find
about them ? The only answer they could frame in
their own minds is, that these people, being what they
are, simply ought not to be, and may accordingly be
treated with any slight or insult.
One resource, indeed, there is in such cases, and
it is very generally adopted. It is by force of wit,
money, friends, some little blunting of the finer in
stincts, and some hardening of the conscience, to
set about creating a state of things quite different
from that found to hand, and more amenable to the
play of imagination and the exercise of a cultivated
taste. The new clergyman raises a cry of distress,
and appeals for succour far and wide. What can he
do under existing circumstances ? His hands are

SUBSTITUTES AND EXCUSES 229
tied, he declares. He cannot present the Gospel as
it ought to be presented. He can make no way.
He is positively . ashamed to meet his friends and
have to confess the shortcomings of his parish and
of his work in what are now thought matters of
the first necessity. But how stand the naked, serious,
and undeniable facts of the case ? There will pro
bably be in the parish some hundreds "of persons, all
only too glad of a word in season, or even a kind
look, from this heaven-sent pastor ; all requiring
advice, or encouragement, or consolation under dif
ficult circumstances — poverty itself an almost uni
versal difficulty ; all, at least, what God has made
them, and where He has placed them. There will
be drunkards, and worse. There will be dissenters,
and worse, as there may easily be. There will be
knaves, and there will be fools. Now here is work
for everybody, The artificial being sent to mend all
these matters declares them all completely out of his
line. So he must have a new church, or a renova
tion and enlargement. He must have organ, choir,
good musical services, for which the mass of the
people have no heart, and in which they cannot
join. Meanwhile, it is the standing excuse for all other
omissions and neglects, that this grand operation re
quires all his time. Not unfrequently he finds the
success so doubtful, and the whole ground so unpro
mising, that he declares he can find nothing to do,

230 GOODNESS RELA TIVE, UNDER DIVINE ORDER
and must seek elsewhere — in the metropolis, or at
least in a fashionable town — a more suitable sphere
for his indefatigable working powers.
Well, any clergyman who is not content with
the many express and distinct duties which God, and
the Church, and his own act, word, and deed have
bound upon him, has at least one more resource
possibly still more to his taste. If he cannot find in
some half-crazy member of his flock some point of
utter disagreement, entailing a long and fruitless
warfare, he need be at no loss, for he can easily
supply that desideratum. By this process many a
man passes from a household supposed to be the
very school of true faith and real goodness into a
career — possibly a long one — of indolence and fri
volity, ruffled now and then by the passing breeze of
a ' movement,' a ' cause,' or an agitation.
Such is the only account to be given of most of
the Church's troubles and most of society's quarrels.
It is the error of men who would rather be any
thing than do their duty in natural or gospel fashion.
To call it Christianity without Christ is to" speak too
well of it, for those people plainly think they have
something better than either. They have a senti
mental morality and an abstract philosophy better
than anything resting on the trite old ' It is written.'
It is a combination that has done greater things
than disturb the thousand parishes and as many

THE CHRISTIAN WORK AND MISSION 231
social circles, for it was just such a concurrence that
led up, by sure and almost measured steps, to the
great French Revolution.
Our Lord is the great Example not of absolute
goodness, simply because there is no such thing, but
of relative goodness, the only form in which we know
it to exist. He descended from heaven to accom
plish a great work of relative goodness, to teach and
preach relative goodness, to exemplify it, to perform
numerous acts of relative goodness, relative duty,
relative affection, relative obedience, and relative
authority. He came down from a higher sphere
to a lower ; from a much higher sphere than
a university, a metropolis, a fashionable centre, a
cathedral town, or a gay watering-place, to an
out-of-the-way, disagreeable, factious, and rebellious
parish, as it might be called, that had always
quarrelled with its appointed pastors, whatever they
were and whatever they did. He came from an
eternal glory to a continual humiliation. He had to
take things as they were, without demanding an
immediate change, or expecting the work to be
done in a day. He did not desire, or believe it pos
sible, that earth could be made heaven at once,
nor did He set up a new heaven in the centre of the
earth, with its celestial choirs, its glorious garniture,
its perfected ministrants, its select, special, and highly
privileged congregation. He did not at once insist

232 GOODNESS RELATIVE, UNDER DIVINE ORDER
on teaching that one language of heaven which the
oldest poets contrasted with the many tongues of
much-divided man. He had to leave nothing un
tried, to seek the wandering sheep everywhere, to
win the very outcast, to confound the most presump
tuous, to detect the most hypocritical, to humble the
proudest, to encourage the weakest, to smite down
the mighty, and to lift the beggar from the dunghill.
There was no common office of charity or good
citizenship He had not to discharge. He had to
declare Himself the heir of the universe, and submit
to an ignominious execution.
All this was no stage performance, no pictorial
illustration, no ceremonial mystery ; it was all a sad
and terrible reality. He was tortured with anguish,
enveloped in gloom, beset with strange mysterious
misgivings, and compelled to open His heart to His
Father. There is not a hint of His desiring another
sphere more suitable to His exalted character, His
mysterious properties, and unique qualities. He
would not seek more work, or that of a less degrading
character. He did not resent being chastened after
His Father's pleasure. He came with a strict com
mission, and He executed it He had received a
message, and He passed it on. He gave and took
security for its due transmission and performance by
His successors. Now all this is relative. There is
nothing absolute about it Eternity and infinity

CHRIST'S WORK AND MISSION 233
essence and substance, and what not, make little
appearance in it ; scarce even does heaven appear.
The unities insisted on by the old critics are strictly
observed. It is all confined to the earth we stand
upon, most of it to three short years, and to a small
country that could be well walked over in that time.

234

XXVI
TEMPTATIONS OF PRESUMED ORTHODOXY
ALL experience shows that it is impossible for a
man to have any great excellence, or any great
power, without making ill uses of it, or at least uses
manifestly below the dignity of the excellence, and
quite outside of the purposes for which alone it can
be supposed to have been given. A man cannot be
very powerful or very rich, or very handsome or very
eloquent, or very learned or very judicious, or even'
very good in such a way as to be recognised as
a decidedly good man, without being thereby ex
posed to special temptations. Every one of these
excellences is a power and an honour. A man may
be easily too sensible of the honour, and be thereby
led to make too much of himself in the exercise
of the power. The possession of the divine gift of
truth in the greatest and most important questions
shares the liability attaching to all other gifts. The
best man will- be disposed to think much of himself
if, in a world of error, a tempest of passion, and a

IMPROPRIATIONS OF TRUTH 235 .
confusion of tongues, he believes he possesses the
palladium which will save his own soul from error.
Nowhere is the value of truth, or the danger of
its supposed possession, more felt than in our country.
There exists here no living power, authority, or in
stitution to which we could all agree to refer any
religious question upon which two opinions are ex
tensively entertained. Neither the Pope, nor the
Church of England, nor the Sovereign, nor the British
Parliament could obtain more than a respectable
minority in favour of any doctrine, any proposition,
any rule, or any trivial bit of ceremony, notwith
standing the great practical benefit of some agree
ment if it were possible. Indeed, the strongest
opinions, and those that the holders would be most
ready to die for, are those held by the smallest
minorities. Well, it will be said, the truth always has been
the faith of the minority. The Bible is the history of
the truth, and it is also the history of successive small
minorities, small households, small families, small
races, small states, few among many, wandering, sore
beset, captive, in bondage, persecuted, scattered,
robbed, and massacred. If such, indeed, is the fact,
and this be, indeed, a faithful epitome of the golden
legend of divine dealing, then such continued ad
versity is no argument against the alleged truth, but
rather in its favour, for admittedly it is the truth

236 TEMPTATIONS OF PRESUMED ORTHODOXY
itself that has ever fared so ill. Yet if we are to take
the divine mercy and wisdom into account and to
suppose that whatever has happened tb the Church,
or to truth, has been for its good, and was indeed
necessary, we have at once a very serious warning
that the truth, and still more a very confident sense
of the possession of infallible truth, has its special
dangers, and that it requires continual correction and
chastisement. Foremost among these dangers is that the proud
possessors of truth never have been really content
with truth in its simplicity, or as a divine gift, or to
be held with definite moral obligations. They have
always been too bent on making truth their very
own, their own proud discovery, their own useful
invention, their own formidable weapon, their own
rod of power, their own solution of all intellectual as
well as social problems. Even if the metal be
divine, there must be some very human images and
superscriptions. The truth must be something not
only to pass current in a small circle of believers, but
also to have a solid and convertible value in the
markets of the world. How it might have been had
the favoured recipients of divine morality always
been content to believe what they were told, and to
do what they were bid, it is quite impo'ssible to say,
for, in fact, there never was any considerable com
munity who were so simple in their faith or sore-

TOTO DIVISOS ORBE BRITANNOS 237
strained in the enjoyment and use of it. There never
even has been a time in which God's people, or those
who would so describe themselves, exhibited the
truth unalloyed with error. The story of the New
Testament, transcendent as it is in beauty, interest,
and import, is a development and a teaching of the
truth by a reprobation of error. Indeed, a favourite
thesis of some theologians is that the whole Christian
revelation was imperfect, and so far erroneous, till
near a century after the birth of Christ, when to the
original series of revelations there was added a ter
rible prediction of heresies, shortcomings, chastise
ments, and world-wide disasters, all of them earned
and entailed by perversions of the one divine truth.
But when we read in every page of Scripture that
the truth itself is so liable to ill-handling, and good
ness itself so weak, surely there is no disloyalty in
suggesting the question whether the ills now en
vironing the Church, dividing it, and seeming to
threaten its very existence as a visible unity, be not
partly owing to some things amiss in the Church
itself. The question was asked very sharply over
three centuries and a half since — two centuries and a
half before the writer's own birth — and answered
decidedly and with a tremendous severity. The
evils alleged to justify the complete separation of
England from the rest of the Catholic world were
great, inveterate, and undeniable. The only apology

238 TEMPTATIONS OF PRESUMED ORTHODOXY
for them was that the course of political history Tiad
not allowed of any regular corrective process, and
that while the State had been going their own way,
the Church, as distinguished from the State, had
gone its way from bad to worse. Is there no warn
ing in this ? Are we to maintain that, though all the
rest of the world is grievously wrong upon one point
or another, most of them upon many points, we of
this island — the smaller half of the English popula
tion — are quite and altogether right? Are we to
maintain that, while we are right in separating from
almost everybody, nobody is right in a like cause
against us ?
The Church of England claims to be right — sin
gularly right — against all Christendom besides It
protests against all other rule and authority, though
it cannot define or discover its own. It cannot
even assign place, or time, or circumstance to the
distinctive Creed it is so proud of, so tenacious of,
and for the sake of which it inflicts on its working
clergy such troubles and losses. It has absolutely
nothing whatever of a canonical character except
one of a purely home manufacture, which confesses
itself an imposture every time it parades itself. It is
not even the Church of England, except in name ;
and while it is very severe, and sometimes very
satirical, on bishops in partibus, it cannot claim for

CHURCH PEOPLE 239
itself anywhere — not even in its own country — a more
real position.
The majority of men, whether clergy or laymen,
whether scholars after a fashion or not, can no more
enter into questions of words than the much traduced
Gallio could ; and in this matter they must be re
garded rather as sheep than as shepherds. The
feeling that holds the mass of' so-called Church
people together is a warm loyalty and a strong sense
of social superiority. The existence of these senti
ments is no test of truth, for they have been, and
still are, common to truth and error, and are, indeed,
more found where people do not use their reason at
all than where they do to some extent The majority
thus loyal, exclusive, and uncritical, thinking much
of the Church Established, and not less of their own
order, rank, and quality, contend that the question
between them and the outer Christian world cannot
be a question of words, as if a word could make the
difference. But if a word can be of no real import
ance, why do we split the Church upon words?
The truth is, they are of very great importance, as
we recognise in every earthly question, and therefore
we have to be careful how we use them in the
gravest of all matters.

240

XXVII
INFIRMITIES OF GOODNESS
WERE this volume to close with the preceding
chapter, it might be misinterpreted into an argument
against theological truth, as either impossible of at
tainment or not worth it. That would, indeed, be a
reductio ad absuYdum, not only of this volume, but
also of a life's long and weary incubation. The writer
has never for an instant asked with Pilate, ' What is
truth ? ' as if it were nothing more than what a man
might fancy, think, or believe. On the contrary, he
has always felt assured that there was solid ground
under him, in the language of metaphor, the everlast
ing rock, the foundations of the earth that never shall
be moved, the firmament over our heads.
Truth, in fact, does but share the fate of goodness,
which a man must indeed be hardy to believe un
attainable, or nothing at all. Truth and goodness
have both their shortcomings, their counterfeits, and
their dangers. Truth may be held in ungodliness, and
goodness may equally be found in alliance with error.

THE HINDOO AND HIS MASTER 241
The best and the wisest may still be warnings for the
benefit of those who are less wise and less good. So
this only brings one to the consideration of the
greatest of all the difficulties in the way of anyone
professing to set the world right on an important
matter incapable of mathematical solution. Some
allusion has been made to it in former volumes, indeed
in this. It. is only too natural to approach it and
recoil. That difficulty is the enormous mass of really
good people, very good people, on the side of error.
They have mostly put their own sense on words
grammatically bearing a totally different sense ; or
they cannot be rid of fixed ideas established like idols
in their minds, while their moral and spiritual being
is meanwhile developing itself in obedience to the
voice of conscience, in a freer, truer, and nobler
fashion. Thus we are assured a Hindoo may be a
very good man, better, may be, than his Christian
master, though the worshipper of some monstrous
idol. Anyhow, the chief obstacles in a reformer's way
are not the bad people, but the good, sometimes, in
deed, they of his own country and his father's house ;
indeed, they who have most known him, and have the
best right to his tenderest regards.
Simple goodness is a poor, weak thing, a plant
springing out of dry ground ; in the language of the
parable, hardly escaping foot of wayfarer, beak
R

242 INFIRMITIES OF GOODNESS
of birds, smother of weeds, harshness of grit and
stone. It generally presents itself in a form to
be pitied or despised, or tolerated or resented, or
challenged and persecuted. The good child is apt to
remain a good child, and to find no place among the
older grown. The result is a self-contained, confident,
and at length unsympathetic form of goodness. Early
goodness, even the warm-hearted, gushing goodness
of youth, forming its own ways, its own order, its own
manners, and its own longings', becomes absolutely
intolerable to thPse whose lot is cast in this world of
continual change, and who have to adapt their lan
guage to actual persons and to existing circumstances.
Tossed about, as all must be, once in the ocean of
life, we crave for something more than a pure elemental
goodness, in what may be called its raw state, not
adapted to the wants of man.
Early goodness is apt to be as the plant in the
forcing-house, nursed with love, flattered by admira
tion, drawn out by sympathy, spared its share of frost
and snow, wind- and rain, still pleasant to look at, and
distilling sweet odours. No sooner is it brought out
into the open air, than check or wreck is the sure
consequence. Leaf and flower fade and fall, and. the
only chance for the poor nursling is to begin; life
again, bare, mutilated, and unsightly. But the conse
quences of precocious goodness are often more lasting
and more prejudicial to the good cause. It reveals

THE DODDER 243
itself in a self-esteem rising to the pitch of arrogance ;
in a jealousy for truth reaching to intolerance ; in a
dictatorial tone, and a continual demand not only for
submission, but for worship.
Perhaps it is not very common for a child to be
taught from its earliest consciousness that truth and
goodness are the most precious of all things within
our reach. Perhaps it is still less commonly found
that the child entirely accepts the teaching. But
undoubtedly there are households in which the
attempt is made, occasionally with a promise of suc
cess. But with the plant there spring up not only
tares, but a worse weed — the dodder, that fastens
round the stem, and starves, dwarfs, and deforms it
till it dies. Even very good people show a repulsive
rigidity, a ridiculous quaintness, a dangerous eccen
tricity, or a violent egotism, telling much against, their
influence, and even their reputation.
There are persons so strikingly suggestive of early
wrong or mishap, and who so persistently pose as
victims, that one must conclude there to be some sad
mystery in their case. Their tone is querulous ; their
very look desponding ; they sometimes rise into re
monstrance, and even ascend to indignation. Even
the Fates they conceive to be prejudiced against
them, and the universe in the conspiracy. They
find some consolation in identifying themselves with
martyrs, confessors, and all who have suffered fpr

244 INFIRMITIES OF GOODNESS
truth's sake, though it does not appear that they
have willingly sacrificed anything — or, for the matter
of that, done anything — in a good cause. As these are
not bad people, or covetous, or malicious, or ambitious,
how comes it they are disappointed ? It may be found
that they have been early trained on extract of good
ness and essence of truth till they had learned the
flavour of these spiritual condiments, and believed
them part of their own spiritual composition. The
flavour would not itself help them on with others
who had not themselves fully acquired it — indeed,
would answer no other purpose than to prevent com
munication. Hence the shy, reserved soul that
broods on its own wrongs, contemplates its own
virtues, and fosters an ever-growing quarrel not with
man only, but with every power above and below
that it can regard in any connection with its own
life's story.
Others there be, fed from their infancy on good
ness and truth, who certainly show more for their
diet, neither inviting compassion nor enduring con
tempt. The satirical writer has not unfrequently
been brought up in the very lap of goodness, and in
the straightest lines of divine truth. Of course, all
depends on what it is that he satirises, for his power is
as the engines of war that destroy as they are turned
on friend or on foe. It cannot be said that truth has
no right to defend itself by its only weapon, or that

HYPOCRISY 245
goodness, wanting better occasion, must always be
passive. Yet goodness that begins with self-com
placency and ends in satire cannot be said to fulfil its
proper functions.
The truth is, it is very hard indeed to be good,
and the better people are, the harder they find it.
As their own scale rises, they regard at a greater
distance those who have settled at a lower level —
that is, the common world. They have decided
many questions which the common sort are content
to leave undecided. They have fixed not only on
the right thing, but also the right way to do it ; and
even if there be much agreement as to the thing, the
manner — that is, the proper presentation — and right
course of action may be as fertile of differences as
ever. But all these infirmities of goodness, all these
follies and vices, are summed up in the warning,
' Beware of hypocrisy.' The good man cannot but
know and feel that he is good, and that therein he
has a proper dignity and just claim. He has at
least to declare his goodness, and not to hide that
light under a bushel. But the process, necessary as
it may be, cannot stop at a moderate amount of
ostentation. The good man feels safe. He has a
passport through this world to a higher. He can
appeal from all tribunals below to one above. How
ever his account may stand here, he is running up a

246 INFIRMITIES OF GOODNESS
long score in his favour on an imperishable tablet.
It cannot matter so very much what he does to the
poor creatures who are blind to his merits, deaf to
his appeals, and quite indifferent to his sympathy.
What are they but as the brutes that perish ? It is
sad, indeed, to misuse the brute creation as we do, but
we do them no wrong ; we are within our right, and
death closes our account with them. Sad to say, even
a good man may very easily come to a like conclu
sion as regards all inferior specimens of humanity, at
least those that he has to deal with. It is the force
of his own goodness that impels him to the conclu
sion, though manifestly there must be some error in
the calculation.
What, then, is that error ? Why should goodness
be so often disappointing, so disagreeable, so unfruit
ful, so inconsistent, so hypocritical ? We have to con
sider what goodness is. It is not a gift of nature in
the common sense of that word. It is not an affair
of circumstances. It cannot be forced, crammed, or
impressed. It is a matter of freewill. Certainly it
becomes a habit in time, but it requires time, and
cannot be put on at once. It is a divine gift, with
promises and on conditions. It involves and imposes
active duties to God, and to all with whom we have
any relation. It is more than a profession, more than
a sensation, more than a knowledge, more than a rule
for the measurement of moral differences, or a code

APPOINTED PLACE AND WORK 247
for righteous judgment and denunciation. It is a
practical relation with the Author of all good, and with
those whom He has appointed to receive its proper
discharge and its genuine fruits.
Nor is there any reason to suppose that even the
angels, be there myriads upon myriads of them, all
engaged in the service of the Almighty, are all alike,
not as it were cast in the same mould. Variety is a
universal law of the creation, and no angel or angelic
being is named in the Scriptures but with a distinct
character and commission. They that minister to
the saints must indeed have distinct experiences and
duties. The frequent substitution in the sacred
record of one person for another, one government for
another, one king for another, one dynasty for another,
one prophet for another, one city for another, and
sometimes even a distinct command for its distinct
contrary, suggests the idea of a great work to be
accomplished, independently of the services of par
ticular individuals, and of a whole for every part of
which a suitable agency is to be found by the continual
elimination of the unfit and unworthy.
Wandering at large in the regions of fancy or self-
indulgence, and losing his moral bearings, man is apt
to take refuge in mechanical ideas of truth, goodness,
virtue, and theology itself, as far'as he cares to look
that way. Truth and goodness he comes to think
straight lines, the dreary long lane through the

248 INFIRMITIES OF GOODNESS
reclaimed morass, or the half-hour's exercise of the
penitentiary. What, not to diverge for an instant !
Not to pick' up a flower by the wayside ! Not even
to look right or left ! A man might as well be
fettered, handcuffed, or marched along with his eye
always fixed on one spot seemingly not worth the
trouble of reaching. They who feel this have
brought the punishment on themselves. Moral truth
and moral goodness are infinitely various; indeed, it is
impossible that any one good action, any one good
choice, any one good intention, should be repeated
even by the doer and intender himself, much less by
any other person. The circumstances and all the con
siderations to be taken- into account vary with every
occasion ; and of every occasion it may be said that
the royal decree has gone forth, ' Now or never.'
There is no such thing as postponement in God's deal
ings with man, or man's response to the Divine call,
for to-morrow will not be as to-day, nor will even the
next hour be as that which is now slipping away from
our careless grasp. It is not the man who promptly
and gladly obeys the call of the hour that finds him
self the slave of a routine and the victim of an un
changeable code. It is the man who resents the call
to duty or to denial, because he thinks it new and un
called for ; and who refuses to be led by the hand,
because he thinks his own way better. His own way,
and the liberty to pursue it, is the only freedom he

THE DUTIFUL THE ONLY FREE 249
can conceive, and he is sure to find eventually that
his own way is the dullest of rounds, the most incur
able of monotonies, the most irredeemable of bondages,
and the one prison from which there is no release or
escape. There is no idea, no conception, no aspiration so
familiar, so dear to the higher and tenderer class of
mind, as the combination of perfection and freedom.
Perfection without freedom seems mere mechanism ;
freedom without perfection, without, at least, the
highest attainable, is so far licence. The whole course
of human affairs, all the workings of the mind, all the
currents of thought, all the rightly affectioned motives
of the heart, tend to the hope of a kingdom in which
dweiieth righteousness, that is purified from evil, living
in the heart, and established in the common life.

250

XXVIII
THE VICAR OF CHRIST
In the course of these pages expressions have been
dropped, and arguments maintained, which the reader
may or may not have thought it worth his while to
compare and carry out to their just conclusions. The
Anglican Creed has been challenged, that is, the,
Creed of the Catechism, the Litany, the Baptismal
and Marriage Services. The position of the Church
of England towards Dissenters has been described as
weak and indefensible, its wall of social partition un
justifiable, and its economical arrangements probably
the worst in the world. Whatever political incon
venience it inflicts on its rivals, it suffered at least as
much, as the price to be paid for its supposed pre
eminence. Civil things have been said of Dissenters,
and there has been some looking over the hedge at
Rome. The ideal Church has been lifted well above
the actual, and the writer has spoken longingly ofthe
one body, the one great organisation, the one work, the
one theme, plot, and drama of terrestrial annals, the

INFALLIBILITY 251
one abiding and universal presence of the Deity, of
His Son, and of His Spirit To see this exclusively
in the Church of England, or to regard her as part
of such a unity, requires at least the eye of faith. Has
the vision become plainer ? Is it no vision at all, but
a grand reality, in the Church of Rome, towards which
some of these expressions might seem to tend ?
It is now twenty-two years since the definition
of Papal Infallibility in what was then assumed to
be its final form. The Roman Church declared the
object attained, and celebrated a victory. By this
time it ought to be possible to note consequences, to
test calculations, to revise opinions, and to distinguish
between the true and the false prediction. True, this
cannot be done completely, judicially, and finally.
None but the infallible can discern and prove the
infallible. Infallibility is the instrument and ex
ponent of that truth which is the sum of all
good gifts, blessings, and promises ; to be ever
sought, never quite won, if we are to believe the
divine oracles. But infallibility is a working power,
and it was for present, indeed, and immediate benefits
that all Christendom was summoned to establish it
on a firmer basis.
What, then, has it done in the course of these
twenty-two years ? There is much to be said on both
sides. On the one hand, infallibility has not saved
the Pope's temporal power. It has not saved the

252 THE VICAR OF CHRIST
' eldest son of the Church ' from a downfall beyond
all example or anticipation. It has not materially
affected the moral and political life of the States in
union or compact with Rome. The Pope holds him
self a prisoner in the Vatican. His friends point out
that his predecessors have lost and regained their
kingdom several times in history — indeed, in the pre
sent century. So far the world goes on as it did
before, and if the Papal thunder has not destroyed a
single enemy, neither has it scorched the hand that
wields it.
In England the Roman Catholic still plays the
part of the suffering saint, constructs a persecution
out of the rates and taxes, and inserts himself in his
own rack for sensational exhibition. He is still able
to put a good gloss on the politics or the line of
action that best suits his own convenience.
Not to have changed at all, and to be the same
from generation to generation, is itself an achieve
ment, and may be said to be even worthy of infalli
bility. It may not be easy always to recognise the
spiritual element in this perfect uniformity, but all
history testifies to a certain special value in that
which changeth not, and which is to-day what it was
thousands of years ago. Unchanged error seems to
proclaim that deviation is erroneous, from whatever
line, and disobedience a sin, whatever the authority.
Much in this world stands upon custom, and if you

A CHANGEFUL PERIOD 253
attempt to change the custom, it altogether dis
appears. In many nations, and many conditions of
life, there is such an absence of the inventive faculty,
or such a certainty of its misuse, that the dullest
idolatry and the most sluggish superstition is posi
tively beneficial in preventing that which would be
worse. But if Rome itself be unchanged, and if it cannot
be shown that the mighty effort made twenty-two
years ago has done her either good or evil, has there
been change in other quarters ? There can be only
one reply, at least, as far as our own country is con
cerned. There have been great and manifold changes.
The physical sciences are now everywhere uppermost.
The philosophy founded upon them, to the rejection
of sacred traditions and revelations, usurps the
ground they occupied in the schools and even in the
pulpit. English dogma has fared but ill since Rome
last claimed the monopoly. Through failure of in
come, by the accident of seasons, and through
resistances industriously fomented by political
agitators, the Church of England has been reduced to
poverty, with but small hopes of better days. The
¦entire representative system of this country has
been reconstructed on the principle that man has a
right to govern himself, and make his own constitu
tion, without any regard to divine commission or
sacred authority. Capital and labour, as well as the

254 THE VICAR OF CHRIST
various classes concerned in the profession, occupation,
and cultivation of land, have been latterly brought into
sharp and dangerous antagonism. At this moment
it is quite beyond conjecture who will be the owners of
the soil of Ireland twenty years hence, nay, who will
be the inhabitants — for that, too, is in question.
Englishmen have so long been habituated to
regard the Pope as only second, if second, to the
father of lies and the author of all evil, that they
cannot open their eyes to the full dimensions of that
which they protest against. Who is not infallible in
his own eyes ? Who is not quite sure that he has
only to exercise his own judgment and he will be
right ? What church, what sect, what community, is
not right in its own eyes ? Yet, it must be admitted
there are various kinds of infallibility, as regards its
form and operation. The infallibility which claims to
evolve, declare, and define, to the extent of making
that a mortal sin to hold to-day which was an allow
able opinion yesterday, certainly is one to excite
alarm and to provoke antagonism. It lives and moves,
and that is itself terrible. But the conception itself
finds countenance in the progress and development
of art, science, political opinions, and social customs.
Fashion has a wide range of subjects, and it freely
condemns to-day what it commended yesterday.
Fickle, too, as it may seem, it always claims a hold
on the immutable.

ANGLICAN INFALLIBILITY 255
But there is one aspect — indeed, one part of this
question, which concerns England much more than
anything passing on the banks of the Tiber. The
Church of England is an infallible Church. Its
temporal head is infallible — at least, as far as the
Church is concerned. The Tudor sovereigns and
their advisers fully understood that they were
wresting their priceless prerogative from the Pope
and conferring it upon the wearer of the English
crown. Norv were they long about it. Many a
little question it has taken centuries to decide, but it
took a short life to see this more than kingly diadem
snatched from one head to be placed on the other.
We now believe ourselves possessed of the absolute
truth in spiritual matters, and not the worse for being
a diamond cut to the most effective form. The
dogmatic teaching peculiar to the Church of England,
and made a necessary condition of membership, can
only claim enforcement on the ground of an infallible
authority, and, so far, the Church of England has to
prove its infallibility better than that of the Church
of Rome. It will have to do that before long in the
open field of controversy and in the great council of
the nation.

2?6

XXIX
IS IT ALLOWABLE TO DISTURB LONG-EXISTING
BELIEFS ?
There is a very prevalent opinion that it is better
to leave long-standing beliefs to themselves, to wear
themselves out, or to let them be stifled and sup
planted, if it must be, by new beliefs. Some people
think it arrogance and even impertinence to interfere
with any existing mode of religion. At least, it is
deemed the wisest course to let others think as they
please, so as you are allowed to do the same.
Seventy years ago there were several schools of
religious thought at Oxford and in England generally.
Not one of them could pretend an antiquity either
of the old English sort or of the Catholic. But when
there appeared a new school claiming antiquity and
Catholicism on its side, the newcomers were publicly
— indeed, officially, denounced as disturbers of the
public peace. The Apostles were charged with
disturbing the peace of an Empire which had
hitherto boasted that it kept peace between all the

OUR INDIAN FELLOW- SUBJECTS 257
old religions in the world on the single condition
that they did not menace the State. Certainly a
man had better think well and long before he tries
to disturb long established or long popular forms of
belief. He may destroy or weaken what is doing
some good, and put nothing in its place.
But if the so-called Reformers were wise and right
in disturbing beliefs and practices at least a thousand
years old, some of them with a foundation in Scrip
tural authority and primitive usage, that is so far a
precedent for challenging a settlement which can claim
no higher authority than a Parliament and a young
queen, and no longer antiquity than just about four
times the life of the hand that writes these lines.
Then, if indeed we are never to disturb a foundation
once laid, and a settlement that has endured a cen»
tUry or two, every serious Christian must feel some
misgiving as to our position and our prospect in our
Indian Empire. Are we, indeed, to. hold it bur best
wisdom and our highest duty not to interfere with
the false faiths and abominable traditions long in
possession of that ground ? There are those who
think so, and boldly maintain it. Not long ago
there passed away a native chief who was held up
to us as an example. He had received a European
education ; he could converse in our language as well
as any English gentleman ; but he remained to the
end, at least outwardly, a Hindoo as to his creed and
s

258 LONG-EXISTING BELIEFS
devotions, and accordingly, it is added to his credit,
did not offend his subjects, who are now in a condition
to quote his authority, his practice, and its cPmplete
success. What he was doing a few years ago the
Roman Empire did for many centuries both before
and after the Christian era. ¦ There never was a time
when it contended for the truth, or held truth to be
more important than peace and prosperity. Worship
whom you please, it said, and as you please. Have
your temples, and your oracles, and your groves. Have
your open processions and your secret mysteries,
your outer and your inner circles, your beliefs and
your unbeliefs, but let us have no disturbances,
no cities in an uproar, no impossible questions forced
upon our courts and our magistrates. Above all,
have no one setting up any rivalry with our Emperor,
who is at once the military, the civil, the political,
and the religious head of this great empire. His
rights are absolute, and not to be challenged. His
will is his only law. His person is sacred. Assail
him not in deed, word, or even thought. With this
reserve, think, say, and do what you please. In fact,
the Emperors were Popes in their way ; and when the
Popes became Emperors, as they now account them
selves, they did the same, and they do the same to-day
as far as circumstances allow.
The result of this liberal, indeed, let-alone policy
was that large portions of Europe remained subject

THE HOME OF OUR FAITH 259
to the most degrading heathen superstitions for many
centuries after the Christian era ; and that some even
lost their first faith, to be converted a second time
more effectually, and organised in more lasting
fashion. The most incumbent of all Christian duties, those
of the Evangelist, Apostle, and Pastor, may be
deferred, or neglected for indefinite periods, till only
remembered to be immediately dismissed from prac
tical consideration ; and yet the account may run up,
and the work may one day be done, indeed, so
thoroughly, that the wonder will be that it should
have been so long deferred.
Let us hope against hope, and not in vain, that
this may one day be the Case with our hundreds of
millions of fellow- subjects in the great Indian
Peninsula. Why should they not be converted in a
day, the weaker ones in the rush with the strong ? the
stronger ones finding themselves few amongst many,
and divided amongst themselves in the presence of a
grand unity ?
The Gospel, like the Jewish faith, came from the
East, and remains indelibly stamped, so our wise
men tell us, with an Oriental character. Why, then,
should it not find a home in the house it came from ?
What, too, is there to hinder a like return to primi
tive truth on what might be deemed a smaller scale
and a less important matter ? The sad truth has to
- s 2

260 LONG-EXISTING BELIEFS
be confessed. There never has been such a settlement
of the Christian Faith as could satisfy the Church at
large, except as a respite from controversy, persecu
tion, and even internecine strife, and a possible step
to some still future and happier and more enduring
consummation. But to return to the individual — the unit who is
left out of count in all large computations and large
views. Surely the course is now open for every one
to do what he thinks best, and what most commends
itself to his own measure of himself and his circum
stances. He may either volunteer to encounter the
giants of error, while still young and ruddy, with his
sling and stone, or he may wait for near a century,
only to find matters getting worse and worse, and
his own strength only the shrunk and dry remainder
of once too self-confident and too enterprising power.

261

XXX
QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS ON THE
NICENE CREED
THERE are not a few who, as English Church
men, and in Anglican orders, seem to take it as a
matter of course that they are standing on the
Nicene Creed, and that they are thereby justified in
charging upon others that they do not stand upon it,
and are therefore heretics, or schismatics, or some
thing of the kind. These self-complacent people,
chary of their wits, but ever ready with their tongue,
and freest to talk when least liable to be answered,
can hardly have given the least thought to a matter
which has been at once the great staple of human
progress and the field of man's saddest downfalls and
disasters. At this very moment some hundred thou
sand English gentlemen and ladies are taking it for
granted that the Nicene Creed is that which most
stands in the way of a re-union between the sadly
severed branches of what once was the Church of
England. At all events, they hold their own position

262 THE NICENE CREED
unassailable ; they call their Church the one historic
Church — that is, the only Church in these isles able to
prove an actual continuity of existence and form with
the Church of the Apostles, and the only represen
tative of Nicene, indeed, ante-Nicene, theology. Where
there has been really no thought at all, hardly con
sciousness, certainly no wish to be better informed
and more distinctly assured, it is necessary to resort
to some degree of violence, or some departure from
the routine of social comity, to rouse sensation, atten
tion, and reflection. This, I hope, will justify me in
asking some questions on the Nicene Creed, and
suggesting to those who say they stand upon it the
only possible answers.
Is any one of the following words and expres
sions, constituting the vocabulary of Mediseval and
Anglican theology, to be found in the Nicene Creed : —
Trinity, Person, Triune, Three in One, One in Three,
Godhead, equal, inferior, afore, after, comprehensible,
measurable ?— Answer : No.
Does the Nicene Creed say that the Holy Spirit
is of the same substance with the Father ? — Answer:
No. Does the Nicene Creed say that the Father,
the Son, and the Spirit are one God ? — Answer :
No. Does the Nicene Creed speak of Three Persons
and One God ? — Answer : No.

QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS 263
Does the Nicene Creed speak of ' God the Son,' or,
'God the Holy Ghost ' ? — Answer : No.
Does the Nicene Creed style Jesus Christ simply
and absolutely God, Light, Maker of all things ? —
Answer : No. It styles Hitn, God of God, Light oj
Light, and says that the Father Almighty is the
Maker of all things, assigning to the Son the place
of an only-begotten Son in that work.
Whom does the Nicene Creed call the Father
of our Lord Jesus Christ ? — Answer : The Father
Almighty. Does it call the Holy Ghost His Father ? —
Answer : No.
Does the Nicene Creed say that it was God who
did, said, and suffered all we are told of in the
second division of the Nicene Creed? — Answer : No.
Jesus Christ.
Where does the Nicene Creed say Jesus Christ is
how ? — Answer : On the right hand of the Father.
Answers have been made not only on the rare
occasions on which questions have been asked, but
even in anticipation. The Creed, we are told, like
anything else, is attacked, and has to be defended.
The assailant uses any weapons that will do the
work, and the attacked must do the like. If he
cannot find words or phrases to hand, he must invent
new ones. The world is always new and old, and
the householder must have things new and old in his

264 THE NICENE CREED
store. Inconsistencies are pointed out ; they have to
be explained ; and this can only be done by re
conciling text with text, and interpreting one by the
other. The comparisons of phrase with phrase com
pels the use of terms that shall be common to both.
We have induction in science, why not in theology ?
Why is the whole world to move on, and theology
stand still ? The Bible has had the same treat
ment, and has received the same defence. The inter
preter must have his ' views,' his opinions, and his apt
expressions, conveying much in a few words. It would
be no reply to a defence of the Bible that it is not to
be found in the Bible.
The fact, however, remains that English Church
men do not stand on the Nicene Creed, but on a
later theology, which I must pronounce a mere philo
sophy, at variance with it, contradicting it, and
effacing it
Upon the whole, the Nicene Creed is a sensible,
prudent, and peace-making summary of the great
truths of Revelation, as far as is necessary for a truce
between many sects, and a modus vivendi between
many factions. There is not a clause in it that does
not suggest the texts which the compilers of the Creed
had in their eye. The Fathers assembled at Niccea
had, ho doubt, their opinions, their traditions, their
interests, and their mental proclivities, but they had
to produce what later days have called chapter and

THE APPEAL TO SCRIPTURE 265
verse, not indeed in the same literal fashion as people
now do, for they were rather loose and uncritical at
quotation ; still, they did appeal to Scripture as a
last resource.
That appeal remains open and in force. At least
half pur fellow-Christians in this country, when they
appeal, as they sometimes do in very noisy fashion,
take good care that they shall be heard, even if not
listened to. But the day cannot be distant when
the Church of England stands with her enemies at
the gate, and, has to count her children. Would that
her most forward advocates were as well versed in
Scripture as many of 'her assailants are. But there
lies her worst difficulty. Few educated men in this
country have as familiar,' ready, and appreciative
a knowledge of the Bible as they have of Homer,
Horace, and Virgil. For a hundred holy texts on
the tips of their tongues, they will have a thousand
more or less profane — good for social intercourse, but
not much good for a vital controversy.
But besides the absorbing theme of the Bible
and its grand unity, it attracts by its vast multi
plicity and its endless variety. It is not simply
the rush of one stream, it is the sound of many
voices. It presents innumerable surface incon
sistencies. This it has in common with any history,
any one life, any cause, and any collection of
documents. But no other book represents so many

266 THE NICENE CREED
persons, circumstances, moods of mind and phases
of thought. Its most remarkable characters are one
and many. Its very material consists of conver
sions, changes, revolutions, developments, departures,
successions, settlements, visitations, migrations,
collisions, dispersions, consummations, all revealing
something new, and having to be interpreted, the
unknown . by the known, the surprising by the
familiar. As you please, and according to your
bent, you may construct out of them a faith, or a
school, or a theory, or a blank negation, leaving you
an outsider in the presence of a glorious moral
creation, a rebel, as you flatter yourself, but in the
end an exile.
Inconsistency, anomalies, and self-contradiction
can never be quite eliminated from the matter.
Where variation is the source, there will be varia
tion in each successive change, and to the end. It
is in the Scripture ; it is in the Creed ; it is in the
Creed that aims to explain the Creed ; it is not less
in any attempt to dispense with Scripture, Creed,
and explanatory Creed altogether. There always
remains an unsettled, account.
The obvious lesson inculcated upon us by such a
state of things is no longer to insist on an absolute
uniformity of intellectual conception and formal
utterances. If the tremendous authority of the Bible
seems to fail of its object, much more will the

BY US OR FOR US 267
philosophic fiction, the philological trap, the gram
matical enigma, the play of words, the shallow
refrain, the senseless war cry. If the sacrifice be not
made by us, it will soon be made for us, and that
by rougher hands than our own, and more likely to
do it effectually.

268

XXXI
WHAT WE ARE COMING TO
Then you would leave your fold open for any
stranger to enter, any wolf to devour or to scatter.
The poor sheep themselves will seek shepherds of
their own. Whatever you say about dogma, there
can be no doubt that it meets an instinct and a
necessity. People love it all the more, because it
makes no demands on the intellect or on the affec
tions, and leaves people to settle its moral requisites
as they please, without too distinct a purpose. They
even like it better when sung than when said. If the
Church of England fails to supply this want, then
the gentlemen and ladies will go to Rome for it, and
find it ; while the mass will go where they will find
any kind of dogma, subjective rather than objective,
possibly as unintelligible, but preached with more
effective enunciation and sung with a larger and
deeper chorus. The hundred gates of Rome are
open night and day to receive the houseless stranger.
You know something of Rome, and surely you

SIBYLLA GUMMA 269
cannot be insensible to this danger. Perhaps you
think it no danger, but rather a deliverance.
It is true that I ought by this time to know
something about Rome, for the whole course of my
life has been at her threshold — once, indeed, at the
very point of entering. Twenty-three years ago I
undertook the singular errand of picking up and
arranging the stray leaves of the mighty Sibyl as the
opening and the shutting of the door might throw
them in my face. Some people thought I was half
hearted, but in one respect I was like the rest of the
Fathers assembled on that occasion. I returned from
Rome not a bit more of an Infallibilist than I had
been before.
To that rare experience I have now to add the
more common one of a protracted stage of reflection
and meditative life. I have been compelled to think
over the past, and latterly I have found something
like a new light thrown on every name, every incident,
every utterance, as often as it recurs to me. What,
then, is the summing-up so far? Tactically, and
from a politician's point of view, it may be safe, and
even wise, to advise those in authority to let people
go their own way, and read the Scriptures by the
light of their own understandings, and choose their
own interpretations and their own shepherds : but
what am I to recommend as the best course to
those who have some option in the matter, and the

270 WHAT WE ARE COMING TO
conscience to use that option well ? Here, then, is
what may prove my last dying speech and confession.
It may be reasonably hoped that a quarter of a
century of comparative retirement adds somewhat
to the value of any counsels a public adviser may be
called on to offer. Speaking for myself, I am not
sensible of any material change as regards the matters
before us, whether in this volume or in its now
numerous predecessors. On some important points
I have for more than half a century been too fixed
and obstinate to give entire satisfaction to all friends
and neighbours. My own more ordinary and super
ficial instincts, those that generally move me, would
prompt me to leave things alone, to go my own quiet
way, and let others do the same. Earlier in life I had
had dreams and prepossessions of my own sufficiently
engrossing and self-rewarding to allow me to tolerate
the like in others, and to prevent me from taking a
serious part in religious controversy. Even when
these dreams disappeared and realities took their place,
half-heartedness and something like double-minded-
ness remained. Circumstances threw me into enter
prises, causes, and crusades, which ran their appointed
course, and left me finally more disposed than ever
to see that all sides have a good deal to say for
themselves — certainly on all the questions between
the Church of England and the Church of Rome.
Both these Churches credit themselves with all the

RESULT OF A LONG EXPERIENCE 271
requisites for a right judgment in all things ; but for
my part I see nothing in the judgment but a deter
mination of the will. Each one inwardly says, Sic
volo, sic j'ubeo, stet pro ratione voluntas.
But as the most equable tempers and the best
regulated minds have often been found to break
out unexpectedly into violence and extravagance of
one sort or another, so is it with the most indolent,
most tolerant, and most indifferent in religious ques
tions. In this respect the latter part of a long life is
often found in contradiction to the first. Few can
ever be quite satisfied with a course which allows
things to go with a run, or to rust, moulder, and rot,
or to flare up, or to fall into hopeless entanglement,
according as so-called accident, or folly, or wicked
ness may prevail. The deeper feelings are those
which ought to prevail, and which will prevail in the
warmer hearts and the stronger minds.
Now I may or may not be credited with opinions
worth offering or entitled to respect, but a long
experience, most of it of a strictly clerical character,
and very large sacrifices, make me sufficiently con
fident in my right to emerge, if by God's help I
can, from the present confusion of tongues. The
net result of this experience is that each community
of Christians had best work conscientiously and
diligently on its own lines, and charitably towards its
neighbours, till Heaven send a deliverance. This is

272 WHAT WE ARE COMING TO
not saying that all communions are one as good as
another, or that the maintenance and the denial of
the same doctrine may be equally true, or that it is
all a matter of good intentions and feelings, not of
objective truth or of obedience. It is only saying
what most Englishmen assert with the utmost con
fidence when it is the Pope who is to be taught
liberality of sentiment. Of course he has no right to
pronounce this man wrong and that man right, or
to anathematise this man and beatify that. But he
cannot be the only man in the world liable to
infirmity of judgment, and therefore better employed
in keeping his own house in order than in throwing
stones all around. If Englishmen generally say, ' Let
there be no Pope,' I reply, ' Let there not be some
thousand Popes. Let us all mend ourselves before
we stigmatise others, who have only done what we
do — that is, as their fathers have done before them.'
The Anglican and the Roman settlements are ot
equal antiquity — if, indeed, antiquity in any serious
.sense can be ascribed' to settlements only four times
as old as I am. The Church of Rome and the
Church of England emerged out of the same furnace
of affliction and the same din of theological and
ecclesiastical warfare in the middle of the sixteenth
century. Both Churches claim to have then scoured
themselves of many old defilements, and both are
liable to.the reproach of having thus imported, or

FAS EST ET AB HOSTE DOCERI 273
authorised, some novelties. Of course, there arises
the question, ' What is a novelty ? ' for on that
depends the question, ' What is an antiquity ? '
There are English divines who think only of the semi-
barbaric travesty of the Christian Faith found in
Western Europe in what we too justly call the Dark
Ages, as genuine as antiquity — nay, more genuine —
than the traditions and conclusions of the Early
Fathers. Anyhow, if Rome is to be recalled to
primitive antiquity, let not England herself decline
that ordeal. Let her not trust to that legendary
purgation she boasts to have undergone at the rough
hands of her self-styled Reformers.
It will be said, perhaps, that any charge of errors
or shortcomings on our own communion, even if it
be proved or admitted, has nothing to do with the
question now before us. That is not a question of
preference or of charity, or even of theology ; it is a
question of self-preservation. But let it be granted
that we are in a dangerous condition, and let it be
also accepted that Rome is the enemy, or rival, we
have most to fear and guard against in these isles,
' Fas est et ab hoste doceri.' Whatever Rome has been,
she is now a purely voluntary society, and England
has laboured now for a long time most industriously
and successfully to bring her to that pass. We have
helped to make her members — that is, the population
comprised in Roman allegiance — both as free and as
T

274 WHAT WE ARE COMING TO
powerless as ourselves — as free to hold what dogma
they please, and as powerless to enforce' it upon others.
Nobody, high or low, in any foreign country, need be
a Roman Catholic unless he chooses. What is more,
under that segis of political liberty which England
has largely contributed to interpose between the
persecutor and the persecuted, any Roman Catholic
may observe the particular obligations of his religion
much as he pleases. It is notorious how very easily
a Roman Catholic gentleman bears what we suppbseto
be an intolerable burden. How this is managed it is
not for outsiders to inquire into. In these days there
is a universal agreement to let people and communi
ties manage their own affairs. If Roman Catholics
are, after all, very like other people, it is not for other
people to complain of the resemblance. Nor is it for
Englishmen to criticise the particular process by which
the Roman Catholics' have been latterly assimilated
to the rest of the human race. No doubt it has been
forced on them. Force has been a powerful element in
the history of our own religious and political ideas. ,
But how can a communion be called voluntary,
it will be said, which does not truly and consistently
stand upon the voluntary principle ? Rome is a reign
of terror. She imposes penalties. She excommuni
cates, with serious social results. In an instant she
reduces the largest heart and the greatest mind of a
nation or a century to the rank and state of an out-

CHURCH AND STATE 275
cast — a pariah. Even if her oppression be only a
dark shade, who can bear to live always out of the
sunshine, or in a gloom through which are dimly
seen mysterious and hostile eyes, hands, and
weapons ? Is this voluntary action ? The volun
tary principle cannot be said to have been thoroughly
accepted if it is only claimed and appealed to in
order to make war against the natural and universal
liberties of the human race.
Be it so. Yet there are in these isles hundreds of
societies, clubs, connections, churches great and smallj
social circles, self-constituted local Parliaments,
besides many conspiracies pure and simple, that may
be said to reign by terror. They impose rules, inflict
penalties, and expel, as they may find necessary-
That is, they excommunicate, and, in some sense,
anathematise. Any Church holding itself to be
identical with the Church whose foundation we find
in the New Testament, must feel itself voluntary
though under severe obligation to the highest
spiritual authority.
But there necessarily ensues a change when this
voluntary body allies itself, enters into partnership,
and even establishes an actual identity with a civil
and political body. No State, covering a whole
territory, can be voluntary as regards the obedience
of its members. They enter the State by the act of
birth, and cannot leave it except by death or by flight,

276 WHAT WE ARE COMING TO
which may or may not be possible. Concordats and
Acts of Toleration fall far short of both the voluntary
and the involuntary conditions, for they are designed
to reconcile the opposites. All depends on the
loyalty of the contracting parties, and the mutual
recognition of the rights conferred and reserved.
The alleged necessity of a temporal sovereignty,
though only on the pretence of exhibiting to the
world a true ' City of God,' proves that the Church of
Rome does not quite trust its claims as a voluntary
institution. It is now more of a voluntary Church
than it ever has been — quite as voluntary, indeed, as
any of our long list of British denominations. Of
tourse, any Church theory, whether on the voluntary
principle or not, meets with insuperable difficulties
from the perpetual intrusion of adverse elements,
whether in the higher or in the lower strata of the
social organisation. Under the most despotic, or
most tyrannical, or most bigoted system, a man may
often live just as he pleases ; and, on the other hand,
he may find himself the victim of grinding oppression
in a professedly free State or Church. These incon
sistencies are of universal occurrence.
Practically, the greatest peril that a church can
either fall into or occasion, is entanglement with a
political cause, or secular interest, or faction, or a
class. The history of the Roman Catholic Church
has been one series of unfortunate alliances dna evil

SOCIAL ENTANGLEMENTS 277
experiences with the worst constitutions, the most de
praved dynasties, the most profligate rulers, the most
corrupt aristocracies, and the most sinful practices
in the world. Always wanting power, always ex
travagant, pompous, and vainglorious, it has had to
seek money or support by any means, fair or foul.
That is the case of the Church of Rome, and may be
again ; it ever leans that way.
What is the case ofthe Church of England ? Only
• the other day it was politically and indissolubly leagued
with all the worst causes in our social state. It really
is needless to recapitulate them, for my readers have
only to recall anything that was bad in our system
and in our customs in the last century and some way
into this, and the Church of England was in political
league with it The consequence has been that it has
been lamentably wanting in the power of self-govern
ment, self-adaptation, and self-purgation, and, though
loud in its pretensions to primitive faith and practice,
is successfully challenged on those very points by
Christian communities outside its pale. It cannot
defend the special creeds with which it aims to improve
on a Christian antiquity, but cannot find courage to
give them up. It is too complicated with those whose
interest lies in things just as they are, or whose vanity
forbids the confession of error.
Even if a universal reform and universal union
be hopeless, or only to be discovered in the dim

278 WHAT WE ARE COMING TO
twilight of a far-off future, still all must be credited
with the hope and the desire. All must be supposed
ready to take a step that way, to sacrifice something
for it, and to find a bond of union in the very idea.
All may justly deem it more to their honour than
to their shame, if they own themselves interested in
such an operation as that desired in these pages.
It is not necessary that people should precipitate
action, suffering, rather, which they now only fear
to be steadily approaching. It is not necessary they
should at once abandon a position which has its
advantages as long as it lasts, and which confers
dignity on those who hold it. To hold your ground,
to stick to your post, to stand firm where Providence
rather than yourself seems to have placed you, is
generally wise, always honourable. It is the regi
mental idea, and it is not everybody who can aspire
to a place in the staff of a Church Militant, or demand
the immediate mobilisation of the great army. But
every soldier is bound to be prepared for marching
orders, and for the sudden call and quick compliance
necessary on the battle-field.
There is a very old and very sacred text warning
us not to be hasty and partial in our interpretation of
great disasters ; not to pronounce them judgments,
or to conclude the sufferers much worse than other
men, but rather to accept the warning for ourselves.
A quarter of a century ago Rome summoned all her

ROME BOUND AND ROME FREE 279
bishops from every nook and corner of Italy and the
earth to show her strength, and to illustrate her pre
tensions. As an exhibition the result was a splendid
success, and the immediate outcome was hardly
below what had been anticipated. The Vatican
Council has been described as the most august
assemblage ever seen on this our poor earthly scale.
When the Council parted, as it supposed, to meet
again, not only was the Roman Catholic Church the
established Church of the city of Rome, but no other
faith was so much as tolerated in the city. In a couple
of months it had ceased to be the established faith in
the old sense, and every other faith was tolerated that
satisfied the requirements of peace, order, and civil
duty. England looked as placidly and cheerfully on
the sudden change as the two Britons interwoven
in the tapestries of the Roman theatre might have
been supposed to do at the transformations of which
they were the senseless agents. But had England
given a thought or a feeling to the matter, it might
have gathered a lesson that its turn might come, and
that it was best to be prepared.
It is often said that there is actually more liberty
of opinion and action in the Church of England,
which professes to be the religion ofthe State, and the
law of the land, than in the voluntary bodies that
reject and protest against such a pretension. Practi
cally nobody is so free as a Churchman, though he

280 WHAT WE ARE COMING TO
cannot be baptized, and cannot even marry, without
being pledged to a Creed, which would have been
thought a detestable heresy in the first four centuries
of the Church. Chains of paper and parchment hang
light on the muscular frame of the ordinary English
Churchman, and, so as he is allowed to live and talk
as he pleases, he is indifferent to the peculiarities of
belief floating in the air about him, and to the
eccentricities of pious practice, so long as they reach
not sight or hearing. While other people are amusing
themselves after tlieir fashion, he will amuse himself
after his own. But our Nonconformists, as a rule,
stand neither on antiquity, nor on any merely inherited
faith or practice, nor in the presumed efficacy of an
official class to do the work of salvation for them.
They must do it all, and they must do it themselves ;
and as they act and think in concert with the rest of
the particular connection, there ensues a more solid,
and, in process of time, a more obligatory religious
practice than is necessary in an established Church.
Thus, while the involuntary degenerates into laxity
and licence, the voluntary often endures and hardens
into a tyranny far beyond any exercised by the
Church of Rome in these degenerate days.

XXXII
MIRACULOUS ENCOURAGEMENT
In one of my volumes of Reminiscences, I relate an
incident which left on me a life-long impression that
the Almighty is near me, and with me, and in me, lead
ing me and encouraging me. In the year 1 820, a week
or two before I went to Charterhouse, we were let out of
Mr. Higginson's school at eleven, that we might make
preparations for a great eclipse of the sun, to begin at
twelve. I was sitting on a chair placed against a book
case in my father's library, the lower shelves of which
were filled with the ' Monthly Review ' of last century.
Without turning in my chair, I put out my hand
behind me, took out a volume, and opened it at
random. The first words that caught my eye were :
'Whoever survives to witness the great eclipse of
1820, will have the opportunity of observing certain
appearances,' or words to that effect, and the writer
proceeds to describe what have since come to be
called ' Bailey's beads ' and ' protuberances,' &c. I
had not the requisite apparatus, so the astronomical

282 MIRACULOUS ENCOURAGEMENT
result in me was slight, the spiritual great. That was
seventy- two years ago.
Now for what occurred on the 4th of this
present month of August, 1892. My sister Fanny
had brought my widowed sister-in-law from Derby,
and was bound to return this day. She had half an
hour to spare for me. It might be, and it may still
be, our last meeting. We seemed at once to feel we
must make a good use of it. I mentioned that this
series, seventy volumes, after being dispersed for
many years, had now all reverted to me ; that I had
arranged the volumes in chronological order, and pro
cured a second-hand book-case, and that though sadly
damp eaten and gas rotted, indeed, a ragged regi
ment, as a friend styled it, yet it had now the
character of uniformity. My sister observed that my
sister Anne had never found it worth consulting. I
replied that I had never looked into it without finding
something new and interesting, and that it had raised
my estimate of the last century. So here was one
little point of issue between me and my sister Anne.
From childhood I had had many and many a little
tiff with her, owing, I suspect, to our being so like one
another, and therefore always running on the same
line. On this occasion I persisted in my testimony
as to the ' Monthly Review,' and was glad to dismiss
the topic and think of some other.
We passed on to our early experiences, of which

AGBARUS, KING OF EDESSA 283
my sister gave some interesting particulars. I said
that in my younger days there were more supersti
tions, charms, and amulets than are to be found now,
and that in many cottages in Northamptonshire there
was hung up an alleged letter from our Lord to
Agbarus, King of Edessa, in a frame, with certain
directions for its proper use as a preventive against
ague, then the worst plague of Northamptonshire.
It was generally, but, as far as I can remember, not
always, accompanied by some rude outlines, sup
posed to be a portrait of our Lord sent to Agbarus.
I added that in my youth I had mixed up Edessa
with Odessa in the Black Sea, and had wondered at
the implied relations between that and the Lake of
Gennesareth. ' Where is Edessa ? ' said my sister. I could only
reply, not far from Palestine, and eastward of it.
However, I was not satisfied with that answer, and
set about looking for it. I consulted my maps,
' Mosheim,' ' Hartwell Home,' the ' Dictionary of
the Bible,' ' Gazetteer,' some works on geography,
a ' Dictionary of 30,000 Miracles,' all in vain. I
thought of ' Gibbon ' ; indeed, he was then before
me, in bulky form. But my arm is weak, my fingers
numbed, and for consulting the index I should have
had to look for the big lens I require for small print
So I had to let my sister go to make a P.P.C. call,
promising to return just for a final good-bye. As

284 MIRACULOUS ENCOURAGEMENT
soon as she had gone I bethought myself. Have I
not rated those ' Monthly Reviews ' too high, and de
livered myself in the spirit of contradiction ? I
went to my dingy acquisition, took out a volume at
random, and opened it at random. The first words
that caught my eye were those at the top of the
page held in my right hand. My thumb was all but
on the very word Edessa. The page was 311,
vol. Ix., year 1779 : — ^
From Mosul Mr. Niebuhr travelled with a caravan
through the desert, by way of Mardin to Aleppo. When
we read the preparations to be made, and the account of
the baggage, which is required for a journey through the
deserts, we thought it threw light upon several passages of
Scripture, and particularly Ezek. xii. 3, 4. The caravan
passed Diarbekr, which is the ancient Amida (as this place
still is called in Turkish records), and Orfa, called by the
Greeks Edessa, famous in ecclesiastical history. Of both
places Mr. Niebuhr gives an account. He saw, not far
from Orfa, several wells, to which the girls from the neigh
bouring villages came to water their flocks and cattle.
Their faces were uncovered, and they were, as Mr.
Niebuhr expresses himself, well- shaped beauties, burnt by
the- sun. As soon as our author and others had saluted
them, and alighted from theirhorses, they came and offered
them water, and likewise watered their horses. Mr. Niebuhr
was particularly struck with this civility, because Rebecca,
who, in his opinion, was certainly born and educated in
this country, showed .herself equally civil towards strangers
(Gen. xxiv. 18). Our author is so much pleased with this
idea, that he thinks he has drank out of the same well

AN UNSOUGHT RESPONSE 285
from which she fetched the water ; for Haran is still a
place, about two days' journey from Orfa, which is fre
quented by the Jews, and probably the very place which
Abraham quitted for Canaan (Gen. xii. 9).
The traveller was a man of much note in his own
time, but destined to be eclipsed by his more cele
brated son, the historian ; and he was now employed
by the Danish Government on a roving commission,
in the interest of geographical science, and for possible
openings in trade.
On my sister's return, I immediately asked what
we had been talking about before she left. ' About
Edessa. You were trying to find it, and could
not' 'Was not there another point, one on which
I and Anne differed ? ' ' Yes. Anne used to say
she never found anything in those " Monthly Re
views" worth the trouble of looking into them.
You said you always found yourself rewarded.'
' Here, then,' said I, 'is an answer to both these
questions,' and I showed her the passage, much to
her surprise.
On my referring to my ' Lists of the Fathers at
the CEcumenical Council of 1 869-70,' I find that Edessa
was represented there by Giuseppe Cardoni, Arch
bishop in partibus, born at Rome in 1802, and, at
the time of the Council, residing at the Accademia
Ecclesiastica. Edessa is described as in Mesopo
tamia.

286 MIRACULOUS ENCOURAGEMENT
The more I think of this very extraordinary inci
dent, the more do I feel myself to realise its signifi
cance, which my survivors may soon realise much more
than even I can do. I will, therefore, add what I can
briefly to the above account of Edessa, accepting the
risk of my better-informed readers thinking it a very
superfluous digression. From Gibbon I learn that
Edessa was a city of great importance, the capital of
Osrhoena, between the Euphrates and the Tigris, at
the north-west end of Mesopotamia, situated twenty
miles from the, former of these rivers. Its inhabitants,
from the time of Alexander, were a mixed race of
Greeks, Arabs, Syrians, and Armenians. After a long
period of unwilling and uncertain dependence on the
Romans, they were finally subdued by Caracalla,
A.D. 230, and the Agbarus, or Ackbar, of the day
carried in chains to Rome. Gibbon observes that the
polished citizens of Antioch called those of Edessa
mixed barbarians, but of the three dialects of the
Syriac, the purest and the most elegant, the Aramaean,
was spoken at Edessa. About A.D. 361, the so-called
apostate Julian, upon hearing that the Arians at
Edessa were behaving very ill to the Valentinians,
disestablished and disendowed the Arian Church, and
divided the proceeds between his soldiers and the
poor, in order to show the Arians that he was truer to
the Galilean faith than they were. The Nestorians
who had found a refuge in Edessa had disappeared

THE PORTRAIT MADE WITHOUT HANDS 287
from the Roman Empire in the days of Justinian, but
attained a sudden but transient splendour at their new
home, where they inculcated their tenets in the purest
Aramaic upon the surrounding Persians, and taught
them to anathematise the Alexandrian Fathers, of
whose persons and language they were wholly un
acquainted. There is some uncertainty as to the
doctrines of these Nestorians, and some variety in the
record, but there is no doubt that the one original
and comprehensive ground upon which the majority,
if, indeed, a majority, of the assembled Fathers at
Ephesus were able to drive Nestor and his adherents
out of the pale of the Roman Empire, was that Nestor,
could not see his way to entitling the Virgin Mary
' the Mother of God.'
It was not till the middle of the sixth century
that there occurred the great event which Gibbon
humorously observes reflects on the industry or
the honesty of the historian Eusebius. Edessa was
besieged and sorely pressed. Its bishop happily dis
covered an image, that is, a portrait of our Lord, in a
niche in a wall, where it had been hidden for five
centuries, and of which it was known with certainty
that it was the handicraft of the Almighty, made
without hands, and that with it was the assurance that
so long as it is in good hands the city could not be
taken. The city was not taken, and the fame of
the image, the copies, and the veneration of them,

288 MIRACULOUS ENCOURAGEMENT
spread over the world, and added much to the
original difference as to the use of pictures and of
statues between the East and the West. No doubt
it was to the picture rather than to the letter that
I had now become indebted for my acquaintance with
King Agbarus.
Under the Emperor Maurice, about A.D. 602, the
Roman garrison at Edessa was sufficiently numerous
and mutinous to be a disturbing force in the Empire.
By the intervention of the Crusaders in A.D. 1087,
Edessa became a Frank or Latin principality, which
subsisted till A.D. 1145, when Zinghi, after a siege of
twenty-five days, stormed the city and recovered it
from the Franks, who recovered it again in a few
years, when it was held, much to its advantage, by
a succession of wise and chivalrous Counts of the
Norman, but now English, family of Courtenay.
Amid these and still greater political changes, the
material wealth and industry of this region, and the
dress, manners, and language of the people, remained
much as it was in the days of Abraham. In ' The
Land and the Book,' the writer expresses his astonish
ment at the annual arrival of sheep in such numbers
as to confound the imagination, on their way to the
populous coast of Syria from the upper waters of the
Euphrates, where the country literally swarms with
sheep. Everything which thus recalls the patri
archal history, I can the more easily realise from'

PATRIARCHAL LIFE 289
having been more than once entangled in a moving
column of sheep all the way from Salisbury to Chol-
derton, eleven miles, no sooner extricating myself from
one flock than finding myself in another. It was
said that with their sharp little feet they did more
harm to the road than all the wheel traffic by picking
off its skin. They threw up dust, gathering much of it
in their fleeces, and they vitiated the air. They were
not allowed to drink of any running stream. The
stronger ones would run a long way ahead, to get a
few mouthfuls of grass by the roadside. When they
were pastured for the night, they would turn a pad
dock, a churchyard, or half a dozen acres, into a sur
face as bare of grass as a worn-out Turkey carpet by
the time they had to be off next morning.
These were from the West of England to Weyhill
Fair, and when the Cholderton children heard the
Dorsetshire sheep had come following their shep
herds, instead of being driven, they used to come to
the doors, clap their hands, and scream for delight.
A very common incident on Salisbury Plain suggests
the trick played by Rebecca on poor Isaac. When a
lamb died it was usual to envelop in its skin the off
spring of a ewe that had borne twins, and put it with
the borrowed mother, which, after some doubt and
hesitation, finally accepted the imposture.
Well, satis superque about Edessa, the reader will
sav ; but I advise him to bestow a few spare hours
U

290 MIRACULOUS ENCOURAGEMENT
to the sacred and still teeming source of God's own
people, and so make it holy ground. On thinking over
the whole matter, I have come to think it possible
that some pious clergyman had persuaded the very
primitive folk of Northamptonshire that their county,
reaching from the centre of England to near the sea,
and traversed by the head-waters of the southern
rivers, was the English Mesopotamia, and had a claim
to share the special privileges attaching to that
character. There is a current story of an old woman
in whom a young clergyman looked to find some dis
tinctively Christian hope or feeling, and could only
extract from her, ' Oh, that blessed Mesopotamia ! ' Is
it possible that the poor old soul represented some
expiring tradition handed down by a succession of
old women from Crusading and still earlier times ; a
certain strain of soft patriarchal sentiment holding its
own for ages, amid much that was better, much that
was worse ?
Now, I don't know, nor do I very much care to
know, what philosophers and theologians may say
about this. I feel it to be nothing short of a mira
culous intimation to me to persevere in my present
efforts to induce the Church of England to restore its
Creed, its teaching, and its worship to better accord
ance with Scripture and to the Nicene Creed. If it
be objected that the Almighty does not speak in this
way, but more directly and more solemnly, then I reply

BY HOOK OR BY CROOK 291
that it is the very way to speak to me. I have
been told, indeed I have sometimes myself told my
readers, that I am more superstitious than religious,
more scrupulous than serious, apt to lose myself in
trivialities, and to wander off the right road. Such
a one is to be caught by hook or by crook, and if
the summons answers the purpose, that becomes its
explanation.

u 2

292

XXXIII
FINAL APPEAL
My days, my hours rather, are numbered, and I
cannot expect, and certainly do not desire, to have
to take a part in a protracted controversy. So far,
there has been no controversy, nor have I gone the
way to procure it. Partly through my own defaults,
partly through various mishaps, partly through the
state of things in this country and the whole theological
world, there has for a long time really been no con
troversy upon the national or popular Creeds. Rites,
ceremonies, and other externals, have held possession
ofthe lists. If I have been lifting my voice in vain,
now for ten years, beginning five years after the
age when the late Cardinal said a man ought to lay
down his pen altogether, I have no just cause to com
plain. If I have put off plain speaking so long, may
not others do the same ?
But a considerable number of comments have been
made in periodicals of more or less repute, by the
unhappy gentlemen requested to analyse, sum up, and
pronounce judgment upon bulky volumes, after two
or three cuts of the paper-knife, and a quarter of

THE SENSE OF SCRIPTURE . 293
an hour's skimming. If these gentlemen were not
always fore-armed or fore-warned they were evidently
prepared, were it only one thing they had to say,
one ' fatal thrust, as they supposed, ' Oh, then you
avow yourself not Athanasian, and consequently, if
not an Arian, certainly no Catholic, and not a real
believer in the divinity of Christ' For their own
part, these critics say, they are prepared to stand by the
Catholic faith. ' What matters it,' these gentlemen
proceed, ' if certain dogmatic words and statements are
not to be found in the Bible ? The sense of Scrip
ture is Scripture. The appeal to Scripture is the
palmary device of Satan. The Son of God must be
God, and there cannot be two Gods, there is only
one. The Creeds are only summaries of Scripture,
and if you object to them you must object to the
Bible also, as the advanced critics are doing more
honestly than you are.'
I have read dark allusions to something worse even
than irreverence or heresy itself in my pages. Some
one sent me an Oxford paper containing a sermon
by a northern bishop. I had only to hold up the
page to the light, and I could read on the other side
of it the whole matter compressed into one sentence :
' In becoming a journalist he has ceased to be a
moral agent, and this is an end of him.'
Then I have been described as losing myself in
metaphysics, not my line, and avoiding the point by

294 FINAL APPEAL
endless digressions. Well, again I admit, I have no
right to complain, as far as I am myself concerned.
But I am sure the time is at hand when the con
troversy will be no longer one of words but of
measures, and when verdicts will be given to be
followed by sentence and speedy execution. It
becomes necessary to be straight and brief.
The Church of England professes to appeal to
Scripture, to the Creeds, to the early Fathers and
the chief Councils, and, by the use of the word
Catholic, to the Catholic Church, as far as we are
understood to accept the term. In all this exten
sive and varied mass of documents and authoritative
matter is there to be found the expression ' God the
Son ' ? Are there to be found the words ' One in
Three, and Three in One ' ? Is there a prayer, or a
hymn, to the Trinity ? Is it stated that the Son is
absolutely all that the Father is ? Is He identified
as the One God of the First Commandment, beside
whom there is no other God? Is the Almighty
worshipped as the Triune God ?
Is it hopeless to make the appeal ? Surely there
must be those who can meet it ! Are there not
among the masters in Israel men with the once solid
and much respected title of D.D. added to their names,
pinned to their sleeves, and painted on their robes ?
Surely there is ample learning and sufficient leisure
somewhere in this busy land. Surely, too, there are

BISHOP KAYE

295

men who do not think it sufficient to denounce as
wicked and detestable any doctrinal position they
cannot otherwise deal with. I have lately read an
old review of a work by Bishop Kaye in his later
days, in which the reviewer gave him great and
almost unqualified praise, only complaining that his
Lordship came to lack fervour in his old age, and
could even regard those who differed from him with
misapplied gentleness and a dangerous tenderness.
The ruler of a north-eastern diocese, the very nursery
of dissent, had no doubt come to see the wisdom
of those old advisers whom the young King of Israel
and Judah disregarded to his cost. Not a few
passages in our own history tend to illustrate the
same moral, and history, we all know, is only too apt
to repeat itself.
But I know well what some of my readers, perhaps
those whom I should most respect, are already
saying : ' You profess yourself ready to fall back on
the Nicene Creed, and on the Catholic Church, and
on Scripture. But the people you wish to win back
to the Church are prepared to fall back from every
one of these battlefields to the absolute self-
sufficiency of private opinion. You have yourself
said that everybody has his own creed, which, on
that supposition, must be saving. But controversy
is futile when positions are only held provisionally
and the object is entirely negative. When this is the

296 FINAL APPEAL
case, no Creed, no Church, no appeal to Scripture, no
Faith, no opinion is worth a day's purchase unless
it be worth something to prove the whole matter a
delusion, a madness, or an organised hypocrisy.
As matters now stand, and as they have stood
for many centuries, the question is forced upon any
one who ventures to ask what it is that he is required
to believe, "and perhaps also to teach and preach.
In these days the utterance of the individual writer
is properly called his monograph ; it is treated with
charity, perhaps even respect, but it remains what the
writer sees, and thinks, and says — no more. The
modest form of the monograph involves a certain
egotism, that is, the occasional use of the first person
singular. This leave I ask by the way.
The question enters holy ground in one of the
most prominent and most awful passages in the
Old Testament, and returns in the not less prominent
and awful passage in the New, which, by almost
universal admission, is associated with the older.
Who was the really and truly Existent whom Moses*
saw in the wilderness ? Who was the really and
truly Existent who declared Himself to the unbe
lieving Jews at Jerusalem ?
It is proudly said of all the Creeds that they are
masterpieces of constructive and even analytical
science. We have right to a science, it is said.
Every other matter has its art and its science, why

SCIENTIFIC THEOLOGY 297
not we ? If there be uneducated masses, or people
too engrossed in the matters of this world, or people
naturally incapable of science, that is their misfor
tune, and we, who are more favoured or less hin
dered, are not bound to share their loss. That would
be to reduce all the world to a lower level, with an
inevitable tendency to descend to a lower still. The
demand is plausible, and more than plausible, for it
has something to say for itself. St. Paul is here and
there argumentative, which may be called an approach
to science. But there are also in his epistles passages
which have come to be regarded as creeds, compen-
diums of Christ's doctrines, in the form of hymns, as
if learnt by new converts, children, and other simple
folk. These possible Creeds are by no means
scientific, not more so than the ' Apostles' Creed.'
But since the claim is made as if founded on the
laws of our nature, the general practice, and the
rights of Christian men, let us see how that stands.
The claim has no more foundation in nature than it
even has in grace. There is very little indeed of this
world that can be reduced to exact science. All but
a few amateurs, or devotees, as they might be called,
are obliged to leave simple arithmetic and pure
mathematics behind them at school or at college, and
thenceforth address themselves to the difficulties —
moral difficulties they often become— of mixed mathe
matics.

298 FINAA APPEAL
But Creeds, certainly in this country, are not
official or professional. They are everybody's concern,
from the savant and the hero, to the labourer and
the child. They are part of our religion. They have
their part in the saving of our souls. They relate to
our highest aspirations, our grandest inheritance, our
spiritual nature, our deepest and purest delights.
Religion is everybody's affair, and everybody has that
in him and about him that is comparable with religion,
that may assist it, or interfere with it, and that is
apt to become a religion, occupying the same ground
in his outward presentment and his inner life. These
matters of earth having a certain resemblance and
relation to the matters of infinitely higher concern,
should have certain analogies, the lower with the
higher. In matters of taste, in poetry, in politics,
whether of faction or of opinion, in the choice
of friends, in the addiction to particular pursuits, in
our amusements, iri our reading, in the selection of
favourite characters, in dress, in manners, and very
much else, we refuse and resent the bondage of exact
rules, and artificial systems. We simply feel that
they are inapplicable. Even if a friend interposes
with the generalities and formalities of wisdom, we
think him a nuisance, perhaps also a hypocrite. We
insist on acting and choosing for ourselves, and would,
indeed, rather make an ill choice than accept one by
constraint or over persuasion.

A WORLD OF. MYSTERIES 299

ter or

No poet, no historian, no orator, no painte
sculptor, no general, no statesman, can explain to
others how he succeeds, or can himself be made to
understand how he fails. No man or woman of the
world — that is, of society— can communicate the
secret of personal power. Perhaps it is too simple
to be accepted by those who look for something
more, and who would rather quarrel with a whole
world than abate the least from their own sweet will
and lofty claims. There is no remedy for a man
who will have his own way, but the inevitable failure,
which may not cure the disease, but will, at least,
curtail the range of its mischief. Providence has
allowed the wisest man in the world to commit the
greatest follies and betray the greatest weakness, in
order to show to us that where the heart, the will,
and the imagination are concerned, we must look
for a better guide than any weak device of man's
construction — some living guide.
But the truth is we live in a world of mysteries ;
of dreams, fancies, and opinions ; of things partly
seen, partly unseen ; of clouds, mists, and vapours ;
of edges and fringes ; of refractions and reflexions ;
of irregular tides and variable currents ; of things
seen distinctly afar off, and indistinctly very near ;
of perishing remainders and doubtful beginnings ; of
rifts, glimpses, and cross lights ; of audacious errors
and cowardly truths ; of dull carnivals and gay

300 FINAL APPEAL
solemnities ; of the solemn call neglected, and the
trifles of the hour made the business of the life. In
all this impending chaos and ever-emerging order,
emerging not by anything that we have done, but
as it were by a nightly burial and a daily resurrec
tion, what place, what functions remain for the hard-
and-fast, the cut-and-dried Creed that nobody ever
understood, and nobody ever will understand —
the Creed framed on the old principle of obscurum
per obscurius ? It remains a monument, a warning,
and a lesson ; and the lesson is that we give up
the vain attempt to bind the reason and curtail the
liberty of Christians as good as ourselves, not only
those now living, but to all time.
I believe I have now said my say about all the
Creeds, and nothing remains for me but to make my
bow to the good men whom we call the Fathers, as
the Jews called their great ancestors, good, bad, and
indifferent, the Patriarchs. These truly but variously
illustrious personages stepped one by one out of the
darkness of heathendom, out of the mazes of a de
crepit and long-surviving philosophy, out of a world
wide strife of arms and of tongues, out of deserts
and cities, out of camps, courts, and schools, to take
their several parts in the greatest work ever suddenly
imposed upon the human mind — a lasting settle
ment of what all future generations were to believe,
and how they were to understand sacred text and

THE FATHERS OF THE CHURCH

301

tradition. If I seem to have spoken with scant re
spect and grudging candour of the men called on to
undertake this Atlantean problem, now is the time,
and in this my eighty-seventh year, to make what
reparation is possible to me. They had, or at least
they believed they had, to define the indefinable, to
reduce the Infinite Truth to the private conception,
to make that plain which is hidden from mortal eye,
and to render that, which primeval piety durst not
pronounce, a current phraseology.
It was, the necessity of the occasion that all this
should be made plain, pronounced, and peremptory.
But therein lay the danger. The plain is the very
region of the mist and the mirage. Writers of all
ages, historians, theologists, philosophers, have gravely
assured their readers that they had purposely avoided
grace of style, fictitious ornament, and pleasant
digression, in their one prevailing wish to be per
fectly plain and absolutely true. If the matter does
not admit of perfect plainness, except by some de
parture from the truth, or of truth, except at the
sacrifice of plainness — that is, if the truth must ever
remain partly conjectural, partly hidden — then the
very attempt to master the difficulty is fatal to all
hopes of success. Every one of the Fathers had his
own views, which he had taken great pains to ex
plicate and elaborate, and which he had now to
exhibit in large letters, and force upon the intellectual

302 FINAL APPEAL
vision of the world. There must be no faltering, no
childish lisp, no lowering of the note to distinguish
between the certain and the uncertain, the indubitable
and the probable, the hypothetical, the actual, and
the inferential. Conceptions were to be stated so
succinctly and exactly as to take the reason by storm,
to astound, to daze, and to hold the ground, thus
won, by right of sole possession, and in course of
time by the rule of long prescription.
The first step in this process demanded the
supreme exercise of singular gifts and of energy at
its full stretch. The front rank and the immediate
recipients of the dogma were not ordinary or passive.
They had their views also, and they had to give or
accept wager of battle one by one in the sight of
several contending hosts. Some of them were giants,
and , they had to be encountered by men sometimes
so fresh to their faiths and to their profession that
they could hardly yet have proved their armour, and
had therefore to do the work that was to be done by
rough and ready weapons. We must not quarrel
with the weapon when the work is done. We read
in Scripture of a millstone having done its work in
one place, a dagger in another, a mallet and tent-
peg in another, a round pebble from the brook in
another, an arrow shot at a venture in another, while
there was even more variety and chance work in the
instruments of directly beneficial power. Some of

GOOD-BYE 303
the theological engines now in question have done
their work for good, and, must we say, for ill, now
for fifteen hundred years. They have become in
delible, and necessary to the understanding of history
and controversy. We no longer fight with spears, or
bows and arrows, or even wooden men-of-war, but
we have to be acquainted with their forms and uses.
The men who invented and who employed them are
at least worth our acquaintance. So good-bye, I
shall say to them soon ; I hope to meet again where
all is forgiven, — whether forgotten also, is more than
I can venture to say.

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