Thou art the source and centre of all minds,Their only point of rest, Eternal Word.From Thee departing, they are lost, and roveAt random, without honour, hope, or peace.From Thee is all that soothes the life of man,His high endeavour and his glad success,His strength to suffer and his will to serve.But oh, Thou Sovereign Giver of all good,Thou art of all Thy gifts Thyself the crown;Give what Thou canst, without Thee we are poor,And with Thee rich, take what Thou wilt away.
Thou art the source and centre of all minds,Their only point of rest, Eternal Word.From Thee departing, they are lost, and roveAt random, without honour, hope, or peace.From Thee is all that soothes the life of man,His high endeavour and his glad success,His strength to suffer and his will to serve.But oh, Thou Sovereign Giver of all good,Thou art of all Thy gifts Thyself the crown;Give what Thou canst, without Thee we are poor,And with Thee rich, take what Thou wilt away.
Thou art the source and centre of all minds,
Their only point of rest, Eternal Word.
From Thee departing, they are lost, and rove
At random, without honour, hope, or peace.
From Thee is all that soothes the life of man,
His high endeavour and his glad success,
His strength to suffer and his will to serve.
But oh, Thou Sovereign Giver of all good,
Thou art of all Thy gifts Thyself the crown;
Give what Thou canst, without Thee we are poor,
And with Thee rich, take what Thou wilt away.
Octobercame at length, and with it Charles's thoughts were turned again to Oxford. One or two weeks passed by; then a few days; and it was time to be packing. His father parted with him with even greater emotion than when he first went to school. He would himself drive him in the phaeton to the neighbouring town, from which the omnibus ran to the railroad, though he had the gout flying about him; and when the moment for parting came he could not get himself to give up his hand, as if he had something to say which he could not recollect or master.
"Well, Christmas will soon come," he said; "we must part, it's no use delaying it. Write to us soon, dear boy; and tell us all about yourself and your matters. Tell us about your friends; they are nice young men apparently: but I have great confidence in your prudence; you have more prudence than some of them. Your tutor seems a valuable man, from what you tell me," he went on repeating what had passed between him and Charles many times before; "a sound, well-judging man, that Mr. Vincent. Sheffield is too clever; he is young; you have an older head.It's no good my going on; I have said all this before; and you may be late for the train. Well, God bless you, my dearest Charlie, and make you a blessing. May you be happier and better than your father! I have ever been blest all my life long—wonderfully blest. Blessings have been poured on me from my youth, far above my deserts; may they be doubled upon you! Good-bye, my beloved Charles, good-bye!"
Charles had to pass a day or two at the house of a relative who lived a little way out of London. While he was there a letter arrived for him, forwarded from home; it was from Willis, dated from London, and announced that he had come to a very important decision, and should not return to Oxford. Charles was fairly in the world again, plunged into the whirl of opinions: how sad a contrast to his tranquil home! There was no mistaking what the letter meant; and he set out at once with the chance of finding the writer at the house from which he dated it. It was a lodging at the west-end of town; and he reached it about noon.
He found Willis in company with a person apparently two or three years older. Willis started on seeing him.
"Who would have thought! what brings you here?" he said; "I thought you were in the country." Then to his companion, "This is the friend I was speaking to you about, Morley. A happy meeting; sit down, dear Reding; I have much to tell you."
Charles sat down all suspense, looking at Willis with such keen anxiety that the latter was forced to cut the matter short. "Reding, I am a Catholic."
Charles threw himself back in his chair, and turned pale.
"My dear Reding, what is the matter with you? why don't you speak to me?"
Charles was still silent; at last, stooping forward, with his elbows on his knees, and his head on his hands, he said, in a low voice, "O Willis, what have you done!"
"Done?" said Willis; "whatyoushould do, and half Oxford besides. O Reding, I'm so happy!"
"Alas, alas!" said Charles; "but what is the good of my staying?—all good attend you, Willis; good-bye!"
"No, my good Reding, you don't leave me so soon, having found me so unexpectedly; and you have had a long walk, I dare say; sit down, there's a good fellow; we shall have luncheon soon, and you must not go without taking your part in it." He took Charles's hat from him, as he spoke; and Charles, in a mixture of feelings, let him have his way.
"O Willis, so you have separated yourself from us for ever!" he said; "you have taken your course, we keep ours: our paths are different."
"Not so," said Willis; "you must follow me, and we shall be one still."
Charles was half offended; "Really I must go," he said, and he rose; "you must not talk in that manner."
"Pray, forgive me," answered Willis; "I won't do so again; but I could not help it; I am not in a common state, I'm so happy!"
A thought struck Reding. "Tell me, Willis," hesaid, "your exact position; in what sense are you a Catholic? What is to prevent your returning with me to Oxford?"
His companion interposed: "I am taking a liberty perhaps," he said; "but Mr. Willis has been regularly received into the Catholic Church."
"I have not introduced you," said Willis. "Reding, let me introduce Mr. Morley; Morley, Mr. Reding. Yes, Reding, I owe it to him that I am a Catholic. I have been on a tour with him abroad. We met with a good priest in France, who consented to receive my abjuration."
"Well, I think he might profitably have examined into your state of mind a little before he did so," said Reding; "youare not the person to become a Catholic, Willis."
"What do you mean?"
"Because," answered Reding, "you are more of a Dissenter than a Catholic. I beg your pardon," he added, seeing Willis look up sharply, "let me be frank with you, pray do. You were attached to the Church of Rome, not as a child to a mother, but in a wayward roving way, as a matter of fancy or liking, or (excuse me) as a greedy boy to something nice; and you pursued your object by disobeying the authorities set over you."
It was as much as Willis could bear; he said, he thought he recollected a text about "obeying Godratherthan men."
"Iseeyou have disobeyed men," retorted Charles; "Itrustyou have been obeying God."
Willis thought him rude, and would not speak.
Mr. Morley began: "If you knew the circumstances better," he said, "you would doubtless judge differently. I consider Mr. Willis to be just the very person on whom it was incumbent to join the Church, and who will make an excellent Catholic. You must blame, not the venerable priest who received him, but me. The good man saw his devotion, his tears, his humility, his earnest desire; but the state of his mind he learned through me, who speak French better than Mr. Willis. However, he had quite enough conversation with him in French and Latin. He could not reject a postulant for salvation; it was impossible. Had you been he, you would have done the same."
"Well, sir, perhaps I have been unjust to him and you," said Charles; "however, I cannot augur well of this."
"You are judging, sir," answered Mr. Morley, "let me say it, of things you do not know. You do not know what the Catholic religion is, you do not know what its grace is, or the gift of faith."
The speaker was a layman; he spoke with earnestness the more intense, because quiet. Charles felt himself reproved by his manner; his good taste suggested to him that he had been too vehement in the presence of a stranger; yet he did not feel the less confidence in his cause. He paused before he answered; then he said briefly, that he was aware that he did not know the Roman Catholic religion, but he knew Mr. Willis. He could not help giving his opinion that good would not come of it.
"Ihave ever been a Catholic," said Mr. Morley; "so far I cannot judge of members of the Church of England; but this I know, that the Catholic Church is the only true Church. I may be wrong in many things; I cannot be wrong in this. This too I know, that the Catholic faith is one, and that no other Church has faith. The Church of England has no faith. You, my dear sir, have not faith."
This was a home-thrust; the controversies of Oxford passed before Reding's mind; but he instantly recovered himself. "You cannot expect," said he, smiling, "that I, almost a boy, should be able to argue with yourself, or to defend my Church or to explain her faith. I am content to hold that faith, to hold what she holds, without professing to be a divine. This is the doctrine which I have been taught at Oxford. I am under teaching there, I am not yet taught. Excuse me, then, if I decline an argument with you. With Mr. Willis, it is natural that I should argue; we are equals, and understand each other; but I am no theologian."
Here Willis cried out, "O my dear Reding, what I say is, 'Come and see.' Don't stand at the door arguing; but enter the great home of the soul, enter and adore."
"But," said Reding, "surely God wills us to be guided by reason; I don't mean that reason is everything, but it is at least something. Surely we ought not to act without it, against it."
"But is not doubt a dreadful state?" said Willis; "a most perilous state? No state is safe but that offaith. Can it be safe to be without faith? Nowhaveyou faith in your Church? I know you well enough to know you have not; where, then, are you?"
"Willis, you have misunderstood me most extraordinarily," said Charles: "ten thousand thoughts pass through the mind, and if it is safe to note down and bring against a man his stray words, I suppose there's nothing he mayn't be accused of holding. You must be alluding to some half-sentence or other of mine, which I have forgotten, and which was no real sample of my sentiments. Do you mean I have no worship? and does not worship presuppose faith? I have much to learn, I am conscious; but I wish to learn it from the Church under whose shadow my lot is cast, and with whom I am content."
"He confesses," said Willis, "that he has no faith; he confesses that he is in doubt. My dear Reding, can you sincerely plead that you are in invincible ignorance after what has passed between us? now, suppose for an instant that Catholicism is true, is it not certain that you now have an opportunity of embracing it? and if you do not, are you in a state to die in?"
Reding was perplexed how to answer; that is, he could not with the necessary quickness analyze and put into words the answer which his reason suggested to Willis's rapid interrogatories. Mr. Morley had kept silence, lest Charles should have two upon him at once; but when Willis paused, and Charles did not reply, he interposed. He said that all the calls in Scripture were obeyed with promptitude by those who were called; and that our Lord would not suffer one man even to goand bury his father. Reding answered, that in those cases the voice of Christ was actually heard; He was on earth, in bodily presence; now, however, the very question was,whichwas the voice of Christ; and whether the Church of Rome did or did not speak with the voice of Christ;—that surely we ought to act prudently; that Christ could not wish us to act otherwise; that, for himself, he had no doubt that he was in the place where Providence wished him to be; but, even if he had any doubts whether Christ was calling him elsewhere (which he had not), but if he had, he should certainly think that Christ called him in the way and method of careful examination,—that prudence was the divinely appointed means of coming at the truth.
"Prudence!" cried Willis, "such prudence as St. Thomas's, I suppose, when he determined to see before believing."
Charles hesitated to answer.
"I see it," continued Willis; and, starting up, he seized his arm; "come, my dear fellow, come with me directly; let us go to the good priest who lives two streets off. You shall be received this very day. On with your hat." And, before Charles could show any resistance, he was half out of the room.
He could not help laughing, in spite of his vexation; he disengaged his arm, and deliberately sat down. "Not so fast," he said; "we are not quite this sort of person."
Willis looked awkward for a moment; then he said, "Well, at least you must go into a retreat; you must go forthwith. Morley, do you know when Mr. de Mowbrayor Father Agostino gives his next retreat? Reding, it is just what you want, just what all Oxford men want; I think you will not refuse me."
Charles looked up in his face, and smiled. "It is not my line," he said at length. "I am on my way to Oxford. I must go. I came here to be of use to you; I can be of none, so I must go. Would Icouldbe of service; but it is hopeless. Oh, it makes my heart ache!" And he went on brushing his hat with his glove, as if on the point of rising, yet loth to rise.
Morley now struck in: he spoke all along like a gentleman, and a man of real piety, but with a great ignorance of Protestants, or how they were to be treated.
"Excuse me, Mr. Reding," he said, "if before you go, I say one word. I feel very much for the struggle which is going on in your mind; and I am sure it is not for such as me to speak harshly or unkindly to you. The struggle between conviction and motives of this world is often long; may it have a happy termination in your case! Do not be offended if I suggest to you that the dearest and closest ties, such as your connexion with the Protestant Church involves, may be on the side of the world in certain cases. It is a sort of martyrdom to have to break such; but they who do so have a martyr's reward. And, then, at a University you have so many inducements to fall in with the prevailing tone of thought; prospects, success in life, good opinion of friends—all these things are against you. They are likely to choke the good seed. Well, I could have wished that you had been able to follow the dictates of conscience at once; but the conflictmust continue its appointed time; we will hope that all will end well."
"I can't persuade these good people," thought Charles, as he closed the street-door after him, "that I am not in a state of conviction, and struggling against it; how absurd! Here I come to reclaim a deserter, and I am seized even bodily, and against my will all but hurried into a profession of faith. Do these things happen to people every day? or is there some particular fate with me thus to be brought across religious controversies which I am not up to? I a Roman Catholic! what a contrast all this with quiet Hartley!" naming his home. As he continued to think on what had passed he was still less satisfied with it or with himself. He had gone to lecture, and he had been lectured; and he had let out his secret state of mind: no, not let out, he had nothing to let out. He had indeed implied that he was inquiring after religious truth, but every Protestant inquires; he would not be a Protestant if he did not. Of course he was seeking the truth; it was his duty to do so; he recollected distinctly his tutor laying down, on one occasion, the duty of private judgment. This was the very difference between Protestants and Catholics; Catholics begin with faith, Protestants with inquiry; and he ought to have said this to Willis. He was provoked he had not said it; it would have simplified the question, and shown how far he was from being unsettled. Unsettled! it was most extravagant. He wished this had but struck him during the conversation, but it was a relief that it struck him now; it reconciled him to his position.
Thefirst day of Michaelmas term is, to an undergraduate's furniture, the brightest day of the year. Much as Charles regretted home, he rejoiced to see old Oxford again. The porter had acknowledged him at the gate, and the scout had smiled and bowed, as he ran up the worn staircase and found a blazing fire to welcome him. The coals crackled and split, and threw up a white flame in strong contrast with the newly-blackened bars and hobs of the grate. A shining copper kettle hissed and groaned under the internal torment of water at boiling point. The chimney-glass had been cleaned, the carpet beaten, the curtains fresh glazed. A tea-tray and tea commons were placed on the table; besides a battel paper, two or three cards from tradesmen who desired his patronage, and a note from a friend whose term had already commenced. The porter came in with his luggage, and had just received his too ample remuneration, when, through the closing door, in rushed Sheffield in his travelling dress.
"Well, old fellow, how are you?" he said, shaking both of Charles's hands, or rather arms, with all his might; "here we are all again; I am just come likeyou. Where have you been all this time? Come, tell us all about yourself. Give me some tea, and let's have a good jolly chat." Charles liked Sheffield, he liked Oxford, he was pleased to get back; yet he had some remains of home-sickness on him, and was not quite in cue for Sheffield's good-natured boisterousness. Willis's matter, too, was still on his mind. "Have you heard the news?" said Sheffield; "I have been long enough in college to pick it up. The kitchen-man was full of it as I passed along. Jack's a particular friend of mine, a good honest fellow, and has all the gossip of the place. I don't know what it means, but Oxford has just now a very bad inside. The report is, that some of the men have turned Romans; and they say that there are strangers going about Oxford whom no one knows anything of. Jack, who is a bit of a divine himself, says he heard the Principal say that, for certain, there were Jesuits at the bottom of it; and I don't know what he means, but he declares he saw with his own eyes the Pope walking down High Street with the priest. I asked him how he knew it; he said he knew the Pope by his slouching hat and his long beard; and the porter told him it was the Pope. The Dons have met several times; and several tutors are to be discommoned, and their names stuck up against the buttery-door. Meanwhile the Marshal, with two bulldogs, is keeping guard before the Catholic chapel; and, to complete it, that old drunken fellow Topham is reported, out of malice, when called in to cut the Warden of St. Mary's hair, to have made a clean white tonsure atop of him."
"My dear Sheffield, how you run on!" said Reding. "Well, do you know, I can tell you a piece of real news bearing on these reports, and not of the pleasantest. Did you know Willis of St. George's?"
"I think I once saw him at wine in your rooms; a modest, nice-looking fellow, who never spoke a word."
"Ah, I assure you, he has a tongue in his head when it suits him," answered Charles: "yet I do think," he added, musingly, "he's very much changed, and not for the better."
"Well, what's the upshot?" asked Sheffield.
"He has turned Catholic," said Charles.
"What a fool!" cried Sheffield.
There was a pause. Charles felt awkward: then he said, "I can't say I was surprised; yet I should have been less surprised at White."
"Oh, White won't turn Catholic," said Sheffield; "he hasn't it in him. He's a coward."
"Fools and cowards!" answered Charles: "thus you divide the world, Sheffield? Poor Willis!" he added; "one must respect a man who acts according to his conscience."
"What can he know of conscience?" said Sheffield; "the idea of his swallowing, of his own free-will, the heap of rubbish which every Catholic has to believe! in cold blood tying a collar round his neck, and politely putting the chain into the hands of a priest!... And then the Confessional! 'Tis marvellous!" and he began to break the coals with the poker. "It's very well," he continued, "if a man is born a Catholic; I don't suppose they really believe what they areobliged to profess; but how an Englishman, a gentleman, a man here at Oxford, with all his advantages, can so eat dirt, scraping and picking up all the dead lies of the dark ages—it's a miracle!"
"Well, if there is anything that recommends Romanism to me," said Charles, "it is what you so much dislike: I'd give twopence, if some one, whom I could trust, would say to me, 'This is true; this is not true.' We should be saved this eternal wrangling. Wouldn't you be glad if St. Paul could come to life? I've often said to myself, 'Oh, that I could ask St. Paul this or that!'"
"But the Catholic Church isn't St. Paul quite, I guess," said Sheffield.
"Certainly not; but supposing youdidthink it had the inspiration of an Apostle, as the Roman Catholics do, what a comfort it would be to know, beyond all doubt, what to believe about God, and how to worship and please Him! I mean,yousaid, 'I can't believe this or that;' now you ought to have said, 'I can't believe the Pope haspowertodecidethis or that.' If he had, you ought to believe it, whatever it is, and not to say, 'I can't believe.'"
Sheffield looked hard at him: "We shall have you a papist some of these fine days," said he.
"Nonsense," answered Charles; "you shouldn't say such things, even in jest."
"I don't jest; I am in earnest: you are plainly on the road."
"Well, if I am, you have put me on it," said Reding, wishing to get away from the subject as quick as hecould; "for you are ever talking against shams, and laughing at King Charles and Laud, Bateman, White, rood-lofts, and piscinas."
"Now you are a Puseyite," said Sheffield in surprise.
"You give me the name of a very good man, whom I hardly know by sight," said Reding; "but I mean, that nobody knows what to believe, no one has a definite faith, but the Catholics and the Puseyites; no one says, 'This is true, that is false; this comes from the Apostles, that does not.'"
"Then would you believe a Turk," asked Sheffield, "who came to you with his 'One Allah, and Mahomet his Prophet'?"
"I did not say a creed was everything," answered Reding, "or that a religion could not be false which had a creed; but a religion can't be true which has none."
"Well, somehow that doesn't strike me," said Sheffield.
"Now there was Vincent at the end of term, after you had gone down," continued Charles; "you know I stayed up for Littlego; and he was very civil, very civil indeed. I had a talk with him about Oxford parties, and he pleased me very much at the time; but afterwards, the more I thought of what he said, the less was I satisfied; that is, I had got nothing definite from him. He did not say, 'This is true, that is false;' but 'Be true, be true, be good, be good, don't go too far, keep in the mean, have your eyes about you, eschew parties, follow our divines, all of them;'—all whichwas but putting salt on the bird's tail. I want some practical direction, not abstract truths."
"Vincent is a humbug," said Sheffield.
"Dr. Pusey, on the other hand," continued Charles, "is said always to be decisive. He says, 'This is Apostolic, that's in the Fathers; St. Cyprian says this, St. Augustine denies that; this is safe, that's wrong; I bid you, I forbid you.' I understand all this; but I don't understand having duties put on me which are too much for me. I don't understand, I dislike, having a will of my own, when I have not the means to use it justly. In such a case, to tell me to act of myself, is like Pharaoh setting the Israelites to make bricks without straw. Setting me to inquire, to judge, to decide, forsooth! it's absurd; who has taught me?"
"But the Puseyites are not always so distinct," said Sheffield; "there's Smith, he never speaks decidedly in difficult questions. I know a man who was going to remain in Italy for some years, at a distance from any English chapel,—he could not help it,—and who came to ask him if he might communicate in the Catholic churches; he could not get an answer from him; he would not say yes or no."
"Then he won't have many followers, that's all," said Charles.
"But he has more than Dr. Pusey," answered Sheffield.
"Well, I can't understand it," said Charles; "he ought not; perhaps they won't stay."
"The truth is," said Sheffield, "I suspect he is more of a sceptic at bottom."
"Well, I honour the man who builds up," said Reding, "and I despise the man who breaks down."
"I am inclined to think you have a wrong notion of building up and pulling down," answered Sheffield; "Coventry, in his 'Dissertations,' makes it quite clear that Christianity is not a religion of doctrines."
"Who is Coventry?"
"Not know Coventry? he is one of the most original writers of the day; he's an American, and, I believe, a congregationalist. Oh, I assure you, you should read Coventry, although he is wrong on the question of Church-government: you are not wellau courantwith the literature of the day unless you do. He is no party man; he is a correspondent of the first men of the day; he stopped with the Dean of Oxford when he was in England, who has published an English edition of his 'Dissertations,' with a Preface; and he and Lord Newlights were said to be the two most witty men at the meeting of the British Association, two years ago."
"I don't like Lord Newlights," said Charles, "he seems to me to have no principle; that is, no fixed, definite religious principle. You don't know where to find him. This is what my father thinks; I have often heard him speak of him."
"It's curious you should use the wordprinciple," said Sheffield; "for it is that which Coventry lays such stress on. He says that Christianity has no creed; that this is the very point in which it is distinguished from other religions; that you will search the New Testament in vain for a creed; but that Scripture is full ofprinciples. The view is very ingenious, andseemed to me true, when I read the book. According to him, then, Christianity is not a religion of doctrines or mysteries; and if you are looking for dogmatism in Scripture, it's a mistake."
Charles was puzzled. "Certainly," he said, "at first sight thereisno creed in Scripture.—No creed in Scripture," he said slowly, as if thinking aloud; "no creed in Scripture,thereforethere is no creed. But the Athanasian Creed," he added quickly, "isthatin Scripture? It eitherisin Scripture, or it isnot. Let me see, it either is there, or it is not.... What was it that Freeborn said last term?... Tell me, Sheffield, would the Dean of Oxford say that the Creed was in Scripture or not? perhaps you do not fairly explain Coventry's view; what is your impression?"
"Why, I will tell you frankly, my impression is, judging from his Preface, that he would not scruple to say that it is not in Scripture, but a scholastic addition."
"My dear fellow," said Charles, "do you mean that he, a dignitary of the Church, would say that the Athanasian Creed was a mistake, because it represented Christianity as a revelation of doctrines or mysteries to be received on faith?"
"Well, I may be wrong," said Sheffield, "but so I understood him."
"After all," said Charles sadly, "it's not so much more than that other Dean, I forget his name, said at St. Mary's before the Vacation; it's part of the same system. Oh, it was after you went down, or just at the end of term: you don't go to sermons; I'm inclined not to go either. I can't enter upon the Dean's argument;it's not worth while. Well," he added, standing up and stretching himself, "I am tired with the day, yet it has not been a fatiguing one either; but London is so bustling a place."
"You wish me to say good-night," said Sheffield. Charles did not deny the charge; and the friends parted.
Therecould not have been a lecture more unfavourable for Charles's peace of mind than that in which he found himself this term placed; yet, so blind are we to the future, he hailed it with great satisfaction, as if it was to bring him an answer to the perplexities into which Sheffield, Bateman, Freeborn, White, Willis, Mr. Morley, Dr. Brownside, Mr. Vincent, and the general state of Oxford, had all, in one way or other, conspired to throw him. He had shown such abilities in the former part of the year, and was reading so diligently, that his tutors put him prematurely into the lecture upon the Articles. It was a capital lecture so far as this, that the tutor who gave it had got up his subject completely. He knew the whole history of the Articles, how they grew into their present shape, with what fortunes, what had been added, and when, and what omitted. With this, of course, was joined an explanation of the text, as deduced, as far as could be, from the historical account thus given. Not only the British, but the foreign Reformers were introduced; and nothing was wanting, at least in the intention of the lecturer, for fortifying the young inquirer in the doctrine and discipline of the Church of England.
It did not produce this effect on Reding. Whether he had expected too much, or whatever was the cause, so it was that he did but feel more vividly the sentiment of the old father in the comedy, after consulting the lawyers, "Incertior sum multo quam ante." He saw that the profession of faith contained in the Articles was but a patchwork of bits of orthodoxy, Lutheranism, Calvinism, and Zuinglism; and this too on no principle; that it was but the work of accident, if there be such a thing as accident; that it had come down in the particular shape in which the English Church now receives it, when it might have come down in any other shape; that it was but a toss-up that Anglicans at this day were not Calvinists, or Presbyterians, or Lutherans, equally well as Episcopalians. This historical fact did but clench the difficulty, or rather impossibility, of saying what the faith of the English Church was. On almost every point of dispute the authoritative standard of doctrine was vague or inconsistent, and there was an imposing weight of external testimony in favour of opposite interpretations. He stopped after lecture once or twice, and asked information of Mr. Upton, the tutor, who was quite ready to give it; but nothing came of these applications as regards the object which led him to make them.
One difficulty which Charles experienced was to know whether, according to the Articles, Divine truth was directlygivenus, or whether we had toseekit for ourselves from Scripture. Several Articles led to this question; and Mr. Upton, who was a High Churchman, answered him that the saving doctrine neither wasgivennor was to besought, but that it wasproposedby the Church, andprovedby the individual. Charles did not see this distinction betweenseekingandproving; for how can weproveexcept byseeking(in Scripture) forreasons? He put the question in another form, and asked if the Christian Religion allowed of private judgment? This was no abstruse question, and a very practical one. Had he asked a Wesleyan or Independent, he would have had an unconditional answer in the affirmative; had he asked a Catholic, he would have been told that we used our private judgment to find the Church, and then in all matters of faith the Church superseded it; but from this Oxford divine he could not get a distinct answer. First he was told that doubtless wemustuse our judgment in the determination of religious doctrine; but next he was told that it was sin (as it undoubtedly is) to doubt the dogma of the Blessed Trinity. Yet, while he was told that to doubt of that doctrine was a sin, he was told in another conversation that our highest state here is one of doubt. What did this mean? Surely certainty was simply necessary onsomepoints, as on the Object of worship; how could we worship what we doubted of? The two acts were contrasted by the Evangelist; when the disciples saw our Lord after the resurrection, "they worshipped Him,butsome doubted;" yet, in spite of this, he was told that there was "impatience" in the very idea of desiring certainty.
At another time he asked whether the anathemas of the Athanasian Creed applied to all its clauses; for instance, whether it is necessary to salvation to hold that there is "unus æternus" as the Latin has it; or "suchas the Father, ... such the Holy Ghost;" or that the Holy Ghost is "by Himself God and Lord;" or that Christ is one "by the taking of the manhood into God?" He could get no answer. Mr. Upton said that he did not like extreme questions; that he could not and did not wish to answer them; that the Creed was written against heresies, which no longer existed, as a sort ofprotest. Reding asked whether this meant that the Creed did not contain a distinctive view of its own, which alone was safe, but was merely a negation of error. The clauses, he observed, were positive, not negative. He could get no answer farther than that the Creed taught that the doctrines of "the Trinity" and "the Incarnation" were "necessary to salvation," it being apparently left uncertainwhatthose doctrines consisted in. One day he asked how grievous sins were to be forgiven which were committed after baptism, whether by faith, or not at all in this life. He was answered that the Articles said nothing on the subject; that the Romish doctrine of pardon and purgatory was false; and that it was well to avoid both curious questions and subtle answers.
Another question turned up at another lecture, viz. whether the Real Presence meant a Presence of Christ in the elements, or in the soul, i.e. in the faith of the recipient; in other words, whether the Presence was really such, or a mere name. Mr. Upton pronounced it an open question. Another day Charles asked whether Christ was present in fact, or only in effect. Mr. Upton answered decidedly "in effect," which seemed to Reding to mean no real presence at all.
He had had some difficulty in receiving the doctrine of eternal punishment; it had seemed to him the hardest doctrine of Revelation. Then he said to himself, "But what is faith in its very notion but an acceptance of the word of God when reason seems to oppose it? How is it faith at all if there is nothing to try it?" This thought fully satisfied him. The only question was,Isit part of the revealed word? "I can believe it," he said, "if I know for certain that Ioughtto believe it; but if I am not bound to believe it, I can't believe it." Accordingly he put the question to Mr. Upton whether it was a doctrine of the Church of England; that is, whether it came under the subscription to the Articles. He could obtain no answer. Yet if he didnotbelieve this doctrine, he felt the whole fabric of his faith shake under him. Close upon it came the doctrine of the Atonement.
It is difficult to give instances of this kind, without producing the impression on the reader's mind that Charles was forward and captious in his inquiries. Certainly Mr. Upton had his own thoughts about him, but he never thought his manner inconsistent with modesty and respect towards himself.
Charles naturally was full of the subject, and would have disclosed his perplexities to Sheffield, had he not had a strong anticipation that this would have been making matters worse. He thought Bateman, however, might be of some service, and he disburdened himself to him in the course of a country walk. What was he to do? for on his entrance he had been told that when he took his degree he should have to sign the Articles,not on faith as then, but on reason; yet they were unintelligible; and how could he prove what he could not construe?
Bateman seemed unwilling to talk on the subject; at last he said, "Oh, my dear Reding, you really are in an excited state of mind; I don't like to talk to you just now, for you will not see things in a straightforward way and take them naturally. What a bug-bear you are conjuring up! You are in an Article lecture in your second year; and hardly have you commenced, but you begin to fancy what you will, or will not think at the end of your time. Don't ask about the Articles now; wait at least till you have seen the lecture through."
"It really is not my way to be fussed or to fidget," said Charles, "though I own I am not so quiet as I ought to be. I hear so many different opinions in conversation; then I go to church, and one preacher deals his blows at another; lastly, I betake myself to the Articles, and really I cannot make out what they would teach me. For instance, I cannot make out their doctrine about faith, about the sacraments, about predestination, about the Church, about the inspiration of Scripture. And their tone is so unlike the Prayer Book. Upton has brought this out in his lectures most clearly."
"Now, my most respectable friend," said Bateman, "do think for a moment what men have signed the Articles. Perhaps King Charles himself; certainly Laud, and all the great Bishops of his day, and of the next generation. Think of the most orthodox Bull,the singularly learned Pearson, the eloquent Taylor, Montague, Barrow, Thorndike, good dear Bishop Horne, and Jones of Nayland. Can't you do what they did?"
"The argument is a very strong one," said Charles; "I have felt it: you mean, then, I must sign on faith."
"Yes, certainly, if necessary," said Bateman.
"And how am I to sign as a Master, and when I am ordained?" asked Charles.
"That's what I mean by fidgeting," answered Bateman. "You are not content with your day; you are reaching forward to live years hence."
Charles laughed. "It isn't quite that," he said, "I was but testing your advice; however, there's some truth in it." And he changed the subject.
They talked awhile on indifferent matters; but on a pause Charles's thoughts fell back again to the Articles. "Tell me, Bateman," he said, "as a mere matter of curiosity, howyousubscribed when you took your degree."
"Oh, I had no difficulty at all," said Bateman; "the examples of Bull and Pearson were enough for me."
"Then you signed on faith."
"Not exactly, but it was that thought which smoothed all difficulties."
"Could you have signed without it?"
"How can you ask me the question? of course."
"Well, do tell me, then, what was yourground?"
"Oh, I had many grounds. I can't recollect in a moment what happened some time ago."
"Oh, then it was a matter of difficulty; indeed, you said so just now."
"Not at all: my only difficulty was, not about myself, but how to state the matter to other people."
"What! some one suspected you?"
"No, no; you are quite mistaken. I mean, for instance, the Article says that we are justified by faith only; now the Protestant sense of this statement is point blank opposite to our standard divines: the question was, what I was to say when askedmysense of it."
"I understand," said Charles; "now tell me how you solved the problem."
"Well, I don't deny that the Protestant sense is heretical," answered Bateman; "and so is the Protestant sense of many other things in the Articles; but then we need not take them in the Protestant sense."
"Then in what sense?"
"Why, first," said Bateman, "we need not take them in any sense at all. Don't smile; listen. Great authorities, such as Laud or Bramhall, seem to have considered that we only sign the Articles as articles of peace; not as really holding them, but as not opposing them. Therefore, when we sign the Articles, we only engage not to preach against them."
Reding thought; then he said: "Tell me, Bateman, would not this view of subscription to the Articles let the Unitarians into the Church?"
Bateman allowed it would, but the Liturgy would still keep them out. Charles then went on to suggest thattheywould take the Liturgy as a Liturgy of peace too. Bateman began again.
"If you want some tangible principle," he said, "for interpreting Articles and Liturgy, I can give you one. You know," he continued, after a short pause, "what it iswehold? Why, we give the Articles a Catholic interpretation."
Charles looked inquisitive.
"It is plain," continued Bateman, "that no document can be a dead letter; it must be the expression of some mind; and the question here is,whoseis what may be called the voice which speaks the Articles. Now, if the Bishops, Heads of houses, and other dignitaries and authorities were unanimous in their religious views, and one and all said that the Articles meant this and not that, they, as the imponents, would have a right to interpret them; and the Articles would mean what those great men said they meant. But they do not agree together; some of them are diametrically opposed to others. One clergyman denies Apostolical Succession, another affirms it; one denies the Lutheran justification, another maintains it; one denies the inspiration of Scripture, a second holds Calvin to be a saint, a third considers the doctrine of sacramental grace a superstition, a fourth takes part with Nestorius against the Church, a fifth is a Sabellian. It is plain, then, that the Articles have no sense at all, if the collective voice of Bishops, Deans, Professors, and the like is to be taken. They cannot supply what schoolmen call theformof the Articles. But perhaps the writers themselves of the Articles will supply it? No; for, first, we don't know for certain who the writers were; and next, the Articles have gone through so manyhands, and so many mendings, that some at least of the original authors would not like to be responsible for them. Well, let us go to the Convocations which ratified them: but they, too, were of different sentiments; the seventeenth century did not hold the doctrine of the sixteenth. Such is the state of the case. On the other hand,wesay that if the Anglican Church be a part of the one Church Catholic, it must, from the necessity of the case, hold Catholic doctrine. Therefore, the whole Catholic Creed, the acknowledged doctrine of the Fathers, of St. Ignatius, St. Cyprian, St. Augustin, St. Ambrose, is theform, is the one true sense and interpretation of the Articles. They may be ambiguous in themselves; they may have been worded with various intentions by the individuals concerned in their composition; but these are accidents; the Church knows nothing of individuals; she interprets herself."
Reding took some time to think over this. "All this," he said, "proceeds on the fundamental principle that the Church of England is an integral part of that visible body of which St. Ignatius, St. Cyprian, and the rest were Bishops; according to the words of Scripture, 'one body, one faith.'"
Bateman assented; Charles proceeded: "Then the Articles must not be considered primarily as teaching; they have no one sense in themselves; they are confessedly ambiguous: they are compiled from heterogeneous sources; but all this does not matter, for all must be interpreted by the teaching of the Catholic Church."
Bateman agreed in the main, except that Reding had stated the case rather too strongly.
"But what if their lettercontradictsa doctrine of the Fathers? am I to force the letter?"
"If such a case actually happened, the theory would not hold," answered Bateman; "it would only be a gross quibble. You can in no case sign an Article in a sense which its words will not bear. But, fortunately, or rather providentially, this is not the case; we have merely to explain ambiguities, and harmonize discrepancies. The Catholic interpretation does no greater violence to the text thanany otherrule of interpretation will be found to do."
"Well, but I know nothing of the Fathers," said Charles; "others too are in the same condition; how am I to learn practically to interpret the Articles?"
"By the Prayer Book; the Prayer Book is the voice of the Fathers."
"How so?"
"Because the Prayer Book is confessedly ancient, while the Articles are modern."
Charles kept silence again. "It is very plausible," he said; he thought on. Presently he asked: "Is this areceivedview?"
"Noview is received," said Bateman; "the Articles themselves are received, but there is no authoritative interpretation of them at all. That's what I was saying just now; Bishops and Professors don't agree together."
"Well," said Charles, "is it atoleratedview?"
"It has certainly been strongly opposed," answered Bateman; "but it has never been condemned."
"That is no answer," said Charles, who saw byBateman's manner how the truth lay. "Does any one Bishop hold it? did any one Bishop ever hold it? has it ever been formally admitted as tenable by any one Bishop? is it a view got up to meet existing difficulties, or has it an historical existence?"
Bateman could give but one answer to these questions, as they were successively put to him.
"I thought so," said Charles, when he had made his answer: "I know, of course, whose view you are putting before me, though I never heard it drawn out before. It is specious, certainly: I don't see but it might have done, had it been tolerably sanctioned; but you have no sanction to show me. It is, as it stands, a mere theory struck out by individuals. Our Churchmighthave adopted this mode of interpreting the Articles; but from what you tell me, it certainlyhas notdone so. I am where I was."
Thethought came across Reding whether perhaps, after all, what is called Evangelical Religion was not the true Christianity: its professors, he knew, were active and influential, and in past times had been much persecuted. Freeborn had surprised and offended him at Bateman's breakfast-party before the Vacation; yet Freeborn had a serious manner about him, and perhaps he had misunderstood him. The thought, however, passed away as suddenly as it came, and perhaps would not have occurred to him again, when an accident gave him some data for determining the question.
One afternoon he was lounging in the Parks, gazing with surprise on one of those extraordinary lights for which the neighbourhood of Oxford is at that season celebrated, and which, as the sun went down, was colouring Marston, Elsfield, and their half-denuded groves with a pale gold-and-brown hue, when he found himself overtaken and addressed by the said Freebornin propriâ personâ. Freeborn liked atête-à-têtetalk much better than a dispute in a party; he felt himself at more advantage in long leisurely speeches, and he was soon put out of breath when he had to bolt-out oredge-in his words amid the ever-varying voices of a breakfast-table. He thought the present might be a good opportunity of doing good to a poor youth who did not know chalk from cheese, and who, by his means, might be, as he would word it, "savingly converted." So they got into conversation, talked of Willis's step, which Freeborn called awful; and, before Charles knew where he was, he found himself asking Freeborn what he meant by "faith."
"Faith," said Freeborn, "is a Divine gift, and is the instrument of our justification in God's sight. We are all by nature displeasing to Him, till He justifies us freely for Christ's sake. Faith is like a hand, appropriating personally the merits of Christ, who is our justification. Now, what can we want more, or have more, than those merits? Faith, then, is everything, and does everything for us. You see, then, how important it is to have a right view about justification by faith only. If we are sound on this capital point, everything else may take its chance; we shall at once see the folly of contending about ceremonies, about forms of Church-government, about, I will even say, sacraments or creeds. External things will, in that case, either be neglected, or will find a subordinate place."
Reding observed that of course Freeborn did not mean to say that good works were not necessary for obtaining God's favour; "but if they were, how was justification by faith only?"
Freeborn smiled, and said that he hoped Reding would have clearer views in a little time. It was a very simple matter. Faith not only justified, itregenerated also. It was the root of sanctification, as well as of Divine acceptance. The same act, which was the means of bringing us into God's favour, secured our being meet for it. Thus good works were secured, because faith would not be true faith unless it were such as to be certain of bringing forth good works in due time.
Reding thought this view simple and clear, though it unpleasantly reminded him of Dr. Brownside. Freeborn added that it was a doctrine suited to the poor, that it put all the gospel into a nutshell, that it dispensed with criticism, primitive ages, teachers—in short, with authority in whatever form. It swept theology clean away. There was no need to mention this last consequence to Charles; but he passed it by, wishing to try the system on its own merits.
"You speak oftruefaith," he said, "as producing good works: you say that no faith justifiesbuttrue faith, and true faith produces good works. In other words, I suppose, faith, which iscertain to be fruitful, orfruitfulfaith, justifies. This is very like saying that faith and works are the joint means of justification."
"Oh, no, no," cried Freeborn, "that is deplorable doctrine: it is quite opposed to the gospel, it is anti-Christian. We are justified by faith only, apart from good works."
"I am in an Article lecture just now," said Charles, "and Upton told us that we must make a distinction ofthiskind; for instance, the Duke of Wellington is Chancellor of the University, but, though he is as much Chancellor as Duke, still he sits in the House of Lordsas Duke, not as Chancellor. Thus, although faith is as truly fruitful as it is faith, yet it does not justify as being fruitful, but as being faith. Is this what you mean?"
"Not at all," said Freeborn; "that was Melancthon's doctrine; he explained away a cardinal truth into a mere matter of words; he made faith a mere symbol, but this is a departure from the pure gospel: faith is theinstrument, not asymbolof justification. It is, in truth, a mereapprehension, and nothing else: the seizing and clinging which a beggar might venture on when a king passed by. Faith is as poor as Job in the ashes: it is like Job stripped of all pride and pomp and good works: it is covered with filthy rags: it is without anything good: it is, I repeat, a mere apprehension. Now you see what I mean."
"I can't believe I understand you," said Charles: "you say that to have faith is to seize Christ's merits; and that we have them, if we will but seize them. But surely not every one who seizes them, gains them; because dissolute men, who never have a dream of thorough repentance or real hatred of sin, would gladly seize and appropriate them, if they might do so. They would like to get to heaven for nothing. Faith, then, must be some particularkindof apprehension;whatkind? good works cannot be mistaken, but an 'apprehension' may. What, then, is a true apprehension? whatisfaith?"
"What need, my dear friend," answered Freeborn, "of knowing metaphysically what true faith is, if we have it and enjoy it? I do not know what bread is, but I eat it; do I wait till a chemist analyzes it? No,I eat it, and I feel the good effects afterwards. And so let us be content to know, not what faithis, but what itdoes, and enjoy our blessedness in possessing it."
"I really don't want to introduce metaphysics," said Charles, "but I will adopt your own image. Suppose I suspected the bread before me to have arsenic in it, or merely to be unwholesome, would it be wonderful if I tried to ascertain how the fact stood?"
"Did you do so this morning at breakfast?" asked Freeborn.
"I did not suspect my bread," answered Charles.
"Then why suspect faith?" asked Freeborn.
"Because it is, so to say, a new substance,"—Freeborn sighed,—"because I am not used to it, nay, because I suspect it. I must saysuspectit; because, though I don't know much about the matter, I know perfectly well, from what has taken place in my father's parish, what excesses this doctrine may lead to, unless it is guarded. You say that it is a doctrine for the poor; now they are very likely to mistake one thing for another; so indeed is every one. If, then, we are told, that we have but to apprehend Christ's merits, and need not trouble ourselves about anything else; that justification has taken place, and works will follow; that all is done, and that salvation is complete, while we do but continue to have faith; I think we ought to be pretty sure that wehavefaith, real faith, a real apprehension, before we shut up our books and make holiday."
Freeborn was secretly annoyed that he had got into an argument, or pained, as he would express it, at thepride of Charles's natural man, or the blindness of his carnal reason; but there was no help for it, he must give him an answer.
"There are, I know, many kinds of faith," he said; "and of course you must be on your guard against mistaking false faith for true faith. Many persons, as you most truly say, make this mistake; and most important is it, all important I should say, to go right. First, it is evident that it is not mere belief in facts, in the being of a God, or in the historical event that Christ has come and gone. Nor is it the submission of the reason to mysteries; nor, again, is it that sort of trust which is required for exercising the gift of miracles. Nor is it knowledge and acceptance of the contents of the Bible. I say, it is not knowledge, it is not assent of the intellect, it is not historical faith, it is not dead faith: true justifying faith is none of these—it is seated in the heart and affections." He paused, then added: "Now, I suppose, for practical purposes, I have described pretty well what justifying faith is."
Charles hesitated: "By describing what it isnot, you mean," said he; "justifying faith, then, is, I suppose, living faith."
"Not so fast," answered Freeborn.
"Why," said Charles, "if it's not dead faith, it's living faith."
"It's neither dead faith nor living," said Freeborn, "but faith, simple faith, which justifies. Luther was displeased with Melancthon for saying that living and operative faith justified. I have studied the question very carefully."
"Then doyoutell me," said Charles, "what faith is, since I do not explain it correctly. For instance, if you said (what you don't say), that faith was submission of the reason to mysteries, or acceptance of Scripture as an historical document, I should know perfectly well what you meant;thatis information: but when you say, that faith which justifies is anapprehensionof Christ, that it isnotliving faith, or fruitful faith, or operative, but a something which in fact and actually is distinct from these, I confess I feel perplexed."
Freeborn wished to be out of the argument. "Oh," he said, "if you really once experienced the power of faith—how it changes the heart, enlightens the eyes, gives a new spiritual taste, a new sense to the soul; if you once knew what it was to be blind, and then to see, you would not ask for definitions. Strangers need verbal descriptions; the heirs of the kingdom enjoy. Oh, if you could but be persuaded to put off high imaginations; to strip yourself of your proud self, and toexperiencein yourself the wonderful change, you would live in praise and thanksgiving, instead of argument and criticism."
Charles was touched by his warmth; "But," he said, "we ought to act by reason; and I don't see that I have more, or so much, reason to listen to you, as to listen to the Roman Catholic, who tells me I cannot possibly have that certainty of faith before believing, which on believing will be divinely given me."
"Surely," said Freeborn, with a grave face, "you would not compare the spiritual Christian, such as Luther, holding his cardinal doctrine about justification,to any such formal, legal, superstitious devotee as Popery can make, with its carnal rites and quack remedies, which never really cleanse the soul or reconcile it to God?"
"I don't like you to talk so," said Reding; "I know very little about the real nature of Popery; but when I was a boy I was once, by chance, in a Roman Catholic chapel; and I really never saw such devotion in my life—the people all on their knees, and most earnestly attentive to what was going on. I did not understand what that was; but I am sure, had you been there, you never would have called their religion, be it right or wrong, an outward form or carnal ordinance."
Freeborn said it deeply pained him to hear such sentiments, and to find that Charles was so tainted with the errors of the day; and he began, not with much tact, to talk of the Papal Antichrist, and would have got off to prophecy, had Charles said a word to afford fuel for discussion. As he kept silence, Freeborn's zeal burnt out, and there was a break in the conversation.
After a time, Reding ventured to begin again.
"If I understand you," he said, "faith carries its own evidence with it. Just as I eat my bread at breakfast without hesitation about its wholesomeness, so, when I have really faith, I know it beyond mistake, and need not look out for tests of it?"
"Precisely so," said Freeborn; "you begin to see what I mean; you grow. The soul is enlightened to see that it has real faith."
"But how," asked Charles, "are we to rescue thosefrom their dangerous mistake, who think they have faith, while they have not? Is there no way in which they can find out that they are under a delusion?"
"It is not wonderful," said Freeborn, "though there be no way. There are many self-deceivers in the world. Some men are self-righteous, trust in their works, and think they are safe when they are in a state of perdition; no formal rulescanbe given by which their reason might for certain detect their mistake. And so of false faith."
"Well, it does seem to me wonderful," said Charles, "that there is no natural and obvious warning provided against this delusion; wonderful that false faith should be so exactly like true faith that there is nothing to determine their differences from each other. Effects imply causes: if one apprehension of Christ leads to good works, and another does not, there must be somethinginthe one which is notinthe other.Whatis a false apprehension of Christ wanting in, which a true apprehension has? The wordapprehensionis so vague; it conveys no definite idea to me, yet justification depends on it. Is a false apprehension, for instance, wanting in repentance and amendment?"
"No, no," said Freeborn; "true faith is complete without conversion; conversion follows; but faith is the root."
"Is it the love of God which distinguishes true faith from false?"
"Love?" answered Freeborn; "you should read what Luther says in his celebrated comment on the Galatians. He calls such a doctrine 'pestilens figmentum,''diaboli portentum;' and cries out against the Papists, 'Pereant sophistæ cum suâ maledictâ glossâ!'"
"Then it differs from false faith in nothing."
"Not so," said Freeborn; "it differs from it in its fruits: 'By their fruits ye shall know them.'"
"This is coming round to the same point again," said Charles; "fruits come after; but a man, it seems, is to take comfort in his justificationbeforefruits come, before he knows that his faith will produce them."
"Good works are thenecessaryfruits of faith," said Freeborn; "so says the Article."
Charles made no answer, but said to himself, "My good friend here certainly has not the clearest of heads;" then aloud, "Well, I despair of getting at the bottom of the subject."
"Of course," answered Freeborn, with an air of superiority, though in a mild tone, "it is a very simple principle, 'Fides justificat ante et sine charitate;' but it requires a Divine light to embrace it."
They walked awhile in silence; then, as the day was now closing in, they turned homewards, and parted company when they came to the Clarendon.