Discussions and arguments on various subjects

Front matter

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A.D.WOODHOUSE

Bl RMINGHAM

Contents

FAGR

I. HOW TO ACCOMPLISH IT . . . . • i

II. THE PATRISTICAL IDEA OF ANTICHRIST:—

I. I

WHEN I was at Rome, I fell in with an English acquaintance, whom I had met occasionally in his own county, and when he was on a visit at my own University. I had always felt him a pleasant, as rather engaging companion, and his talent no one could question ; but his opinions on a variety of political and ecclesiastical subjects were either very unsettled or at least very uncommon. His remarks had often the effect of random talking ; and though he was always ingenious, and often (as far as I was his antagonist) unanswerable, yet he did not advance me, or others, one step towards the conviction that he was ri$jht and we were wrong- in the matter which happened to be in dispute. Such a personage is no unusual phenomenon in this day, in which every one thinks it a duty to exercise the " sacred right of private judgment;" and when, consequently, there are, as the grammar has it, " quot homines, tot

* [The discussion in this Paper is carried on by two speculative Anglicans, who aim at giving vitality to their Church, the one by uniting it to the Roman See, the other by developing a nineteenth-century Anglo-Catholicism. The narrator sides on the whole with the latter of these.] * * I

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sententlae;" nor should I have distinguished my good friend from a score of theorists and debaters, producible at a minute's notice in any part of the United Kingdom, except for two reasons — first, that his theories lay in the different direction from those now in fashion, and were all based upon the principle of " bigotry," (as he, whether seriously or paradoxically, avowed) — next, that he maintained they were not novelties, but as old as the Gospel itself, and possessing as continuous a tradition. Yet, in spite of whatever recommendations he cast about them, tney did not take hold of me. They seemed unreal ; this will best explain what I mean : — unreal^ as if he had raised his structure in the air, an independent, self-sustained pile of buildings, sui simile, without historical basis or recognized position among things existing, without discoverable relations to the wants, wishes, and opinions of those who were the subjects of his speculations.

We were thrown together at Rome, as we had never been before ; and, getting familiar with him, I began to have some insight into his meaning. I soon found him to be quite serious in his opmions ; but I did not think him a wit the less chimerical and meteoros than before. However, as he was always entertaining, and could bear a set-down or a laugh easily, from the sweetness and amiableness of his nature, I always liked to hear him talk. Indeed, if the truth must be spoken, I believe, in some degree, he began to poison my mind with his extravagances.

One day I had called at the Prussian Minister's, and found my friend there. We left together. The landing from which the staircase descended looked out over Rome; affording a most striking view of a city which the Christian can never survey without the bitterest, the

How to accojnplish it. 3

most loving, and the most melancholy thoughts. I will not describe the details of the prospect ; they may be found in every book; nothing is so common now as panoramic or dioramic descriptions. Suffice it to say, that we were looking out from the Capitol all over the modern city ; and that ancient Rome, being for the most part out of sight, was not suggested to us except as the basis of the history which followed its day. The morning was very clear and still : all the many domes, which gave feature to the view before us, rose gracefully and proudly. We lingered at the window without saying a word. News of public affairs had lately come from England, which had saddened us both, as leading us to forebode the overthrow of all that gives dignity and interest to our country, not to touch upon the more serious reflections connected with it.

My friend began by alluding to a former conversation, m which I had expressed my anticipation, that Rome, as a city, was still destined to bear the manifestation of divine judgments. He said, " Have you really the heart to say that all this is to be visited and overthrown ?" His eye glanced at St. Peter's. I was taken by surprise, and for a moment overcome, as well as he ; but the parallel of the Apostles' question in the Gospel soon came to my aid, and I said, by way of answer, ** Master, see what manner of stones and what buildings are here !" He smiled ; and we relapsed into our meditative mood.

At length I said, " Why, surely, as far as one's imagination is concerned, nothing is so hard to conceiv^e as that evil is coming on our own country : fairly as the surface of things still promises, yet you as well as I expect evil. Not long before I came abroad, I was in a retired parish in Berkshire, on a Sunday, and the inestimable blessings of our present condition, the guilt of

4 ■ Hozi) to accomplish it.

those who are destroying them, and moreover, the difficulty of believing they could be lost, came forcibly upon me. When everything looked so calm, regular, and smiling, the church bell going for service, high and low, young and old flocking in, others resting in the porch, and others delaying in the churchyard, as if there were enjoyment in the very cessation of that bodily action which for six days had worried them, (but I need not go on describing what both of us have seen a hundred times,) I said to myself, ' What a heaven on earth is this ! how removed, like an oasis, from the dust and dreariness of the political world ! And is it possible that it depends for its existence on what is without, so as to be dissipated and to vanish at once upon the occurrence of certain changes in public affairs ? ' I could not bring myself to believe that the foundations beneath were crumbling away, and that a sudden fall might be expected."

He replied by one of his occasional flights — " If Rome itself, as you say, is not to last, why should the daughter who has severed herself from Rome 1 The amputated limb dies sooner than the wounded and enfeebled trunk which loses it."

" Say this anywhere in Rome than on this staircase," I answered. " Come, let us find a more appropriate place for such extravagances ; " and I took him by the arm, and we began to descend. We made for the villa on the Palatine, and in our way thither, and while strolling in its walks, the following discussion took place, which of course I have put together into a more compact shape than it assumed in our actual conversation.

" What I mean," said he in continuation, " is this : that we, in England, are severed from the centre of unity, and

How to accoviplish it. 5

therefore no wonder our Church does not flourish. You may say to me, if you please, that the Church of Rome is corrupt. I know it ; but what then t If (to use the common saying) there are remedies even worse than the disease they practise on, much more are remedies conceivable which are only not as bad, or but a little better. To cut off a limb is anyhow a strange mode of saving it from the influence of some constitutional ailment. Indigestion may cause cramp in the extremities, yet we spare our hands or feet, notwithstanding. I do not wish to press analogies ; yet, surely, there is such a religious fact as the existence of a great Catholic body, union with which is a Christian privilege and duty. Now, we English are separate from it."

I answered, " I will grant you thus much, — that the present is an unsatisfactory, miserable state of things ; that there is a defect, an evil in existing circumstances, which we should pray and labour to remove ; yet I can grant no more. The Churcn is founded on a doctrine — the gospel of Truth ; it is a means to an end. Perish the Church Catholic itself, (though, blessed be the promise, this cannot be,) yet let it perish rather than the Truth should fail. Purity of faith is more precious to the Christian than unity itself. If Rome has erred grievously in doctrine (and in so thinking we are both of one mind), then is it a duty to separate even from Rome."

" You allow much more," he replied, " than most of us ; yet even you, as it seems to me, have not a deep sense enough of the seriousness of our position. Recollect, at the Reformation we did that which is a sin, unless we prove it to be a duty. It w^as, and is, a very solemn protest. Would the seraph Abdiel have made his resistance a triumph and a boast, — spoken of the glorious stand he had made, — or made it a pleasant era in his history ? Would he have gone on to praise himself, and say, ' Certainly, lam one among a thousand ; all of them went wrong but I, and they are now in hell, but I am pure and uncorrupt, in consequence of my noble separation from those rebels ' ? Now, certainly, I have heard you glory in an event which at best was but an escape as by fire, — an escape at a great risk and loss, and at the price of a melancholy separation."

I felt he had, as far as the practical question vv^ent, the advantage of me. Indeed it must be confessed that we Protestants are so satisfied with intellectual victories in our controversy with Rome as to think little of that charity which " vaunteth not herself, is not pufTed up, doth not behave herself unseemly."

He continued : — " Do you recollect the notion entertained by the primitive Christians concerning Catholicity .'' The Church was, in their view, one vast body, founded by the Apostles, and spreading its branches out into all lands, — the channel through which the streams of grace flowed, the mystical vine through which that sap of life circulated, which was the possession of those and those only who were grafted on it. In this Church there can be no division. Pass the axe through it, and one part or the other is cut off from the Apostles. There cannot be two distinct bodies, each claiming descent from the original stem. Indeed, the very word catholic witnesses to this. Two Apostolic bodies there may be without actual contradiction of terms ; but there is necessarily but one body Catholic." And then, in illustration of this view, he went on to cite from memory the substance of passages from Cyril and Augustine, which I suspect he had picked up from some Romanist friend at the English College. I have since turned them out in in their respective authors, and here give them in translation.

The first extract occurs in a letter written by Augustine to a Donatist bishop : —

" I will briefly suggest a question for your consideration. Seeing that at this day we have before our eyes the Church of God, called Catholic, diffused throughout the world, we think we ought not to doubt that herein is a most plain accomplishment of holy prophecy, confirmed as it was by our Lord in the Gospel, and by the Apostles, who, agreeably to the prediction, so extended it. Thus St. Paul preached the Gospel, and founded churches, etc. John also writes to seven Churches, etc. With all these churches we, at this day, communicate, as is plain ; and it is equally plain that you Donatists do not communicate with them. Now, then, I ask you to assign some reason why Christ should ... all at once be pent up in Africa, where you are, or even in the whole of it. For your community, which bears the name of Donatus, evidently is not in all places — that is, catholic. If you say ours is not the Catholic, but nickname it the Macarian, the rest of Christendom differs from you ; whereas you yourselves must own, what every one who knows you will also testify, that yours is known as the Donatist denomination. Please to tell me, then, how the Church of Christ has vanished from the world, and is found only among you ; whereas our side of the controversy is upheld, without our saying a word, by the plain fact, that we see in it a fulfilment of Scripture prophecy." *

The next is from one of the same Father's treatises, addressed to a friend : —

"We must hold fast the Christian religion, and the communion of that Church which is, and is called, Catholic, not only by its members, but even by all its enemies. For, whether they will or no, even heretics themselves, and the children of schism, when they speak,not with their own people, but with strangers, call that Church nothing else but Catholic ? Indeed they would not be understood, unless they characterized it by that name which it bears throughout the world." t

* Ep. 49, Ed.. Benedict. f De vera Rcl., c. 7, n. 12.

The last was from Cyril's explanation of the doctrine of the One Holy Catholic Church : —

" Whereas the name {cJmrch) is used variously .... as (for instance) it may be applied to the heresy or persuasion of the Manichees, etc., therefore the creed has carefully committed to thee the confession of the One Holy Catholic Church, in order that thou mayest avoid their odious meetings, and remain always in the Holy Catholic Church, in which thou wast regenerated. And if perchance thou art a traveller in a strange city, do not simply ask, 'Where is the house of God?' for the multitude of persuasions attempt to call their hiding-places by that name ; nor simply, •' Where is the Church ? ' but, ' Where is the Catholic Church ? ' for such is the peculiar name of this the holy Mother of us all, who is the spouse of the Only-Begotten Son."*

After giving some account of these passages, he continued : " Now, I am only contending for the fact that the communion of Rome constitutes the main body of the Church Catholic, and that we are split off from it, and in the condition of the Donatists ; so that every word of Augustine's argument to them, could be applied to us. This, I say, is 2ifact; and if it be a grave fact, to account for it by saying that they are corrupt is only bringing in a second grave fact. Two such serious facts — that we are separate from the great body of the Church, and that it is corrupt — should, one would think, make us serious ; whereas we behave as if they were plus and minus, and destroyed each other. Or rather, we triumph in the Romanists being corrupt, and we deny they are the great body of Christians, unfairly merging their myriad of churches under the poor title of ^ the Church of Rome ; ' as if unanimity destroyed the argument from numbers."

* Cyril Hieros. Catech., xviii. 12,

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"Stay! not so fast !" I made answer; "after all, they are but a part, though a large part, of the Christian world. Is the Greek communion to go for nothing, extending from St. Petersburg to Corinth and Antioch ^ or the Armenian churches ? and the English communion which has branched off to India, Australia, the West Indies, the United States, Canada, and Nova Scotia ? The true state of the case is this : the condition of the early Church, as Augustine and Cyril describe it, exists no more ; it is to be found nowhere. You may apply, indeed, the terms which they used of it to the present time, and call the Romanists Catholics, as they claim to be ; but this is a fiction and a theory, not the expression of a visible fact. Is it not a mere theory by which the Latin Church can affect to spread itself into Russia ? I suspect, in spite of St. Cyril, you might ask in. vain for their churches under the name of Catholic throughout the autocrat's dominions, or in Greece, as well as in England or Scotland. Where is the Catholic Bishop of Winchester or Lincoln ? where the Catholic Church in England as a visible institution .'' No more is it such in Scotland ; not to go on to speak of parts of Germany or the new world. All that can be said by way of reply is, that it is a very considerable communion, and venerable from its consistency and antiquity."

" That is the point," interrupted my companion ; "they maintain that, such as they are, such they ever have been. They have been from the first ' the Catholics.' The schismatical Greeks, the Nestorians, the Monophysites, and the Protestants have grown up at different times, and on a novel doctrine or foundation."

" Have a care," I answered, " of diverging to the question of Apostolicity. We are engaged upon the Catholicity of the Latin Church. If we are to speak of lO How to acco77iplish it.

Antiquity, you yourself will be obliged to abandon Its cause, for you are as decided as myself upon its corruptions from primitive simplicity. Foundation we have as apostolical as theirs, (unless you listen to the Nag's-head calumny,) and doctrine much more apostolical. Please to keep to the plain tangible fact, as you expressed it when you began, of the universal or catholic character of the Roman communion."

He was silent for a while, so I proceeded.

"Let me say a word or two more on the subject I had in hand when you interposed. I was observing that the state of things is certainly altered since Augustine's time — that is, in matter of fact, divisions, cross divisions, and complicated disarrangements have taken place in these latter centuries which were unknown in the fifth. We cannot, at once, apply his words as the representatives of things now existing ; they are, in great measure, but the expression of principles to be adopted. May I say something further without shocking you.? I think dissent and separatism present features unknown to primitive Christianity — so unknown that in its view of the world a place is not provided for them. A state of things has grown up, of which hereditary dissent is an element. All the better feelings of stability, quietness, loyalty, and the like, are in some places enlisted in its favour. In some places, as in Scotland, dissent is the religion of the state and country. I am not supposing that such outlying communities have blessings equal to the Church Catholic; only, while I condemn them as outlying, I would still contend that they retain so much of privilege, so much of the life and warmth of that spiritual body, from the roots of which they spring, as irregular shoots, as to secure their individual members from the calamity of being altogether cut

How to accomplish it, II

off from it. In the latter ages of Judaism, the ten tribes, and afterwards the Samaritans, and then the proselytes of the gate, present a parallel, as having a position beyond the literal scope of the Mosaic law. I shall scruple, therefore, to apply the strong language which Cyprian uses against schismatics to the Scottish presbyterians or to the Lutherans. At least, they have the Scriptures. You understand why I mention this — to show, by an additional illustration, that not every word that the Fathers utter concerning the Church Catholic applies at once to the Church of this day. The early Christians had not the complete canon, nor were books then common, nor could most of them read. Other differences between their Church and our Church might be mentioned ; — for instance, the tradition of the early Church was of an historical character, of the nature of testimony ; and possessed an authority superadded to the Church's proper authority as a divine institution. It was a witness, far more perfect in its way, but the same in kind, as the body of ancient writers may be for the genuineness of Caesar's works. It was virtually infallible. Now, however, this accidental authority has long ceased, or, at least, is indefinitely weakened ; and to resist it is not so obviously a sin against light. Here, then, is another reason for caution in applying the language of the Fathers concerning schism to our own times, since they did not in their writings curiously separate the Church's intrinsic and permanent authority as divine, from her temporary office of bearing witness to the Apostolic doctrine as to an historical fact."

"I must take time to think of this," he replied; "meanwhile, you at least grant me that the Latin communion is the main portion of Christendom — that participation, with it is especially our natural position — and that our

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present separation from it is a grievous calamity as such, and, under the circumstances, nothing short of a solemn protest against corruptions in it, of which we dare not partake."

•' I grant it," said I.

"And, in consequence, you discard, henceforth and for ever, the following phrases, and the like — * our glorious emancipation from Rome,' ' the noble stand we made against a corrupt church,' * our enlightened times,' ' the blind and formal papists,' etc. etc."

" We shall see," I answered — ** we shall see."

We walked some little way in silence ; at length, he said, " I wonder what use you intend to make of the view you just now so eagerly propounded, of the difference of circumstances between the present and the ancient Church. It leads, I suppose, to the justification of some of those ill-starred theories of concession which are at present so numerous 1 "

To tell the truth, I did not see my way clearly how far my own view ought to carry me. I saw that, without care, it would practically tend to the discarding the precedent of Antiquity altogether, and was not unwilling to have some light thrown by my friend upon the subject ; so I affected, for the moment, a latitudinarianism which I did not feel.* " Certainly," I replied, " it would appear to be our duty to take things as we find them ; not to dream about the past, but to imitate, under changed circumstances, what we cannot fulfil literally. Christianity is intended to meet all forms of society ; it is not cast in the rigid mould of Judaism. Forms are transitory — principles are eternal : the Church of the

* \yid. Note on " Essays Ciit. and Histor.," vol. i., p. 2S8 ; also p. 308.]

day IS but an accidental development and type of the invisible and unchangeable. It will always have the properties of truth ; it will be ever (for instance) essentially conservative and aristocratic ; but its policy and measures will ever vary according to the age. Our Church in the seventeenth century was inclined to Romanism ; in the nineteenth, it was against Catholic emancipation. The orange ribbon, the emblem of a whig revolution, is now the badge of high tory confederations. Thus, the spirit of the Church is uniform, ever one and the same ; but its relative position and ordinances change. At least, all this might be said ; and I should like to see how you would answer it."

" That is," he interposed, *' you grant that a Jew would have been wrong in philosophizing after the pattern you are setting, and talking of the nature of things, and transitory forms, and eternal truths, though you are privileged to do so } "

" May we not suppose that the rules of the early Church were expedient then — nay, expedient now — as far as they could conveniently be observed, without considering them absolutely binding ?"

''Will you allow," he asked, in reply, "that St. Cyprian would have been in sin had he dispensed with episcopal Ordination, or St. Austin had he recognized the Donatists, or St. Chrysostom had he allowed the deacons to consecrate the elements ? "

" They would have committed sin," I answered.

" And in what would that sin have consisted ? "

" I suppose in doing that which they thought to be contrary to the continued usage of the Church."

"That is," he said, "in doing what they thought contrary to apostolic usage ? "

I granted it

"And, of course," he said, "what they thought to be of apostoHc usage, in such matters, was really such ? "

I allowed this also.

"So it seems," he continued, "that they might not, and we may, do things contrary to apostolic usage."

" That," I said, " is the very assertion I am making ; outw^ard circumstances being changed, we may alter our rule of conduct."

He made answer : " I will give you my mind in a parable. Not many days since, I had scrambled into the rubbish yonder, which marks the site of the Apollo library, when I found what would be a treasure in the eyes of all the antiquarians in Europe, but which, to me, has a value of another kind — a MS. vindication of himself by a Jewish courtier of Herod the Great, for not observing the rites and customs of Judaism. It is well argued throughout. He sets out with owning the divinity of the Mosaic law, its beauty and expediency ; the associations of reverence and interest cast around it ; the affection it stirs within the mind ; and the abstract desirableness of obeying it. * But, after all, I confess,' he continues, ' I do not think its precepts binding at this day, because we are at such a distance from the age of Moses, and all the nations around us, not to say ourselves are changed, though the Law is not' He proceeds to argue that he is not bound to go up to Jerusalem at the Passover, because there are synagogues about the country, which did not exist in the time of Moses ; and, though it is true that purifications may be performed at the Temple, which the synagogues do not allow of, yet, * after all,' he asks, * how can we possibly know that the line of priests and Levites has been kept pure } Who can tell what irregularities may not have been introduced into their families during the captivity } Then, again,

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what a set of men these said priests are ! Tainted with Pharisaical pride, or rather polluted with pharisaical hypocrisy : especially the high priests : the very office has become altogether secular — very much changed, too, in form and detail from the original institution. What enormities have occurred in the history of the Asmoneans ! Who can suppose that they have any longer extraordinary gifts, prophecy, or the like, as of old time? Besides, there is a temple at Alexandria now, not to say another at Gerizim. Again, Herod, a man of Edom, is king, and has remodelled the state of things ; for centuries we have had secular alliances, and religion is now to be supported by ordinary, not extraordinary, means. From the time that these political changes took place, the rites have been superfluous. Events have proved this. A number of Jews once attempted to keep the Sabbath strictly, w^hen an enemy came who surprised them in consequence, and killed them. They were pious ' but plainly narrow-minded and extravagant men. In short, since the Captivity, the former system has been superseded.' "

" Enough, enough," I interrupted ; " perhaps I have spoken more strongly than I meant as to our liberty of acquiescing in innovations. However, I still must hold that we have no right to judge of others at this day, as we should have judged of them, had all of us lived a thousand years earlier. I do really think, for instance, that in the presbyterianism of Scotland we see a providential phenomenon, the growth of a secondary system unknown to St. Austin — begun, indeed, not without sin, but continued, as regards the many, ignorantly, and compatibly with some portion of true faith : I cannot at once apply to its upholders his language concerning schismatics."

i6 How to accomplish it.

" Well, perhaps I may grant you this, under explanations," he replied, " if you, indeed, will grant that we, on our part, should deviate in practice from primitive rules as little as we can help — only so much as the sheer necessity of our circumstances obliges us. For instance, no plain necessity can ever oblige us to bury an unbaptized person ; though a necessity (viz., of climate), may be urged for baptizing by sprinkling, not by immersion. This will serve as an illustration."