Dogma and the Church of England

Front matter

DOGMA

AND THE

CHURCH OF ENGLAND.

Contents

PAGE

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Preface

tion of the majorities in Church Councils, by whom the hints and indistinct foreshadowings of doctrine in Holy Writ are developed into creeds and formulae.

Both schools of dogmatists believe that on the acceptance of these metaphysical subtleties depends our everlasting welfare. Most of them regard moral conduct as the result of creed, and of secondary importance thereto. The extreme members — Calvinists, Antinomians, Mystics — attach no importance whatever to practice, even considering good works a stumbling-block and an occasion of falling. By far the greater part, however, are more moderate ; and though they will not admit that a man's deeds can be good if his creed be not sound, they yet refuse to credit the sincerity of his faith if it be not shown in right living.

The change from primitive Christianity to a metaphysical system began early. Mankind speedily erected a standard of belief, first by the side of, then above and finally in some cases instead of, that of conduct. Before long the exhortations of the Master to love peace and forbearance were drowned in a hubbub of angry quarrels about His nature, His past and future existence, or, still worse, about the proper time, mode and place for celebrating His death, or for making the simple pledge of membership He required of His followers.

But during these nineteen centuries of doctrinal extension, there have always been certain opponents of dogmatism. Even in the darkest ages of the Church, when paltry quarrels and bitter hatreds threatened her very life, there were at least a few seers of righteousness — hated, despised, and often rejected, doubtless — who by their protests against what they regarded as a lamentable fall from grace in the Church of Christ, showed that they belonged to that goodly fellowship of prophets whose

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xi message to their generation has always been that conduct is more important than creed and ritual, and lovingkindness more honouring to God than persecution and anathema.

These anti-dogmatists or liberals deny that there are any truths necessary to salvation. They maintain that the Founder of their religion proposed no doctrinal tests for admission into His kingdom, insisted on no ceremonial observances, and taught no articles of belief, but simply required of His followers to live as He lived, and if need be to die as He died, in a spirit of brotherly love and self-devotion ; that His entire teaching — so much, that is, as we can know of it from the witness of His immediate followers — was of the beauty of hobness and the obligations to righteousness, without any metaphysical or theoretical propositions whatever ; in short, that Christ preached little theology and much religion. They acknowledge no development of doctrine in Christianity, for they say there are, properly speaking, no doctrines to develop; they simply apply and reapply, under all the changing circumstances of the individual and of the race, the fundamental moral principle of Christ, seeking •ever to widen, deepen, and strengthen the power of the Golden Rule.

Corresponding to the extreme dogmatists who attach an ultra-importance to belief, there are some anti-dogmatists who seem to attach an almost equal importance to disbelief. The latter denounce metaphysics for being useless and harmful, as the former repudiate good works for being superfluous and misleading. This school has a few followers in the Church of England, but more among Agnostics, Positivists, &c. With neither of these extreme parties, however, have we here anything to do.

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Metaphysical speculations are allowed, even encouraged, by the greater part of the anti-dogmatic school, but not as being essential to the Christian religion. " The best creed in the world," says one of the leading members of this party, " will never save a single soul" 1 But it is natural to man to reason and to speculate. It is instinctive with him to question " What God and man is." To seek and to love truth, according to his ability, is, indeed, required of every Christian, inasmuch as it is his duty to aim at perfection in mind as in spirit. Still to arrogate to one's self the complete possession of truth, is not the same thing as to seek it ; nor is to hate and despise those who differ from us about it, the same thing as to love it. Some belief may indeed be helpful to good conduct. Confidence in the wise government of the world ; hope that good will at last triumph over evil, and that there is indeed " a stream of tendency which makes for righteousness ; " faith in a Supreme Being, good, powerful and loving ; trust that all our strivings, our yearnings, our aspirations are but the earnest of a glorious achievement hereafter : all this may be helpful to some of us ; but that it is not indispensable is shown by the lives of those who, with a noble irrationality, love righteousness and pursue holiness, even though, as it seems to them, in a world all out of joint, and for the brief span of a single life. If only the righteousness has been loved and the holiness pursued, such men may be as spiritually developed, as Christ-like, as much " saved," as those who, happily for themselves, can believe that they live under the rule of a God who doeth all things well, and that an eternity of progress awaits both the individual and the race.

It is, then, the aim of the anti-dogmatists, first, to

1 Church and Creed, by Rev. A. W. Momerie, LL.D., D.Sc, p. 79.

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XU1 restore conduct to its rightful place in religion ; and, second, to substitute a sound and reasonable philosophy for mere theological assertion. If the Christianity of the future have any creed at all, it will be one that is very simple, very flexible and very rational.

It is not my purpose to trace this real Apostolic succession through the whole history of Christianity back to Christ. Nor, after the works of Reville, Kenan, Stanley, Edwin Hatch, and others, does it seem necessary for any one else to show the gradual process whereby poetical, metaphorical and legendary speculations have been petrified into dogmas, and simple Eastern habits and customs expanded into elaborate ceremonials and unnatural practices.

My aim is merely to show that dogmatic teaching, however general it may be among individual clergy, is contrary to the real character of the Church of England ; that the Church of England has since she broke with Eome ever recognised righteousness rather than doctrine or ceremony to be the essence of Christianity ; that its members by right of membership should enjoy full freedom of thought and speech on doctrinal subjects ; that the spirit of rationalism, tolerance and charity should be naturally active within it, so that it is entitled to be called a Broad Church, and may — after a few minor reforms and a clearer understanding of its own character — justly claim to be representative of Christ's Christianity.

The breadth of a Church is shown in three ways : first, by the nature of its constitution ; second, by the number of its liberal divines ; third, by its comprehension of all parties.

As to the first mark of a Broad Church, I hope to prove that it is not merely by occasional quibbles or by accidental omissions in its charters, that liberal views xiv

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have effected an entrance into the Church of England. But that, on the contrary, hy almost every act of the legislature on Church matters, freedom of thought has been confirmed and extended. That the evident, and often the avowed, object of the ecclesiastical reformers, from the sixteenth to the nineteenth century, has been to increase its comprehensiveness, to ensure its freedom from theological bondage, and to maintain the superiority of conduct over creed. From the compilation of the Liturgy under Elizabeth to the passing of the Clerical Subscription Amendment Act under Victoria, the ideal of comprehension, of liberty, of non- dogmatism has been pretty steadily pursued. As to the second mark, I hope to trace in the Church of England a steadily increasing school of true Protestants, always maintaining the rights and duties of English Churchmen to free thought and free speech ; to show how dogma has decayed directly, in that the heresy of one age is received as orthodox, or as at least tolerable in the next ; and indirectly, in that doctrines are ever less dwelt upon in the sermons of our divines, and moral lessons more often enforced. I venture to believe that there cannot be found as large a body or as unbroken a continuity of able High Church or Low Church teachers as can be produced of liberal or undogmatic Churchmen. With regard to the third characteristic, I hope to show that the Church of England, as the national Establishment, demands agreement only upon axiomatic moral truths, and not upon subjects of argument and dispute. In accordance with this principle the Church of England, besides starting with scanty doctrinal tests, has grown more and more lax about even these. It has shown its indifference to doctrinal matters by permitting within its borders both the extreme parties— the Eitualistic and the Evangelical — only checking

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XV their inclination to persecute each other, or to arrogate to themselves alone the title of the National Church.

In confirmation of this estimate of the character of the English Church let me quote three entirely independent opinions : —

Dr. Dollinger taunts the English Church with a lack of authoritative utterance on doctrinal matters. " The Established Church," he says, " has not so much as the semblance of the unity of doctrine or character. This," he continues, " has the effect that, even to the religiousminded Englishman, doctrine appears as something relatively unimportant and subordinate, which one need not be too exact about." 1

Bishop Eyle says : — " A strong dislike to all ' dogma ' in religion is a most conspicuous and growing sign of the times." 2

Mr. Wilfrid Ward, in his study of " the Oxford Movement," points out that the High Church party is not in accordance with the tone of the Establishment, but is merely suffered within its pale because of its total indifference to dogma. ' ' Never could one-tenth of the views of the present High Church party have been tolerated on the ground that the English Church teaches them, and that dogma is, in its view, a sacred and important thing. A ruling power, whose spirit is that of indifferentism, declares all dogma to be unimportant, and High Churchmen may hold what they like, not in virtue of any special approval on the part of the Established Church, but because that Church does not either enforce or condemn any doctrinal system." 3

Two factors are supposed to have largely contributed

1 The Church and the Churches, pp. 168-9.

2 Principles for Churchmen, p. 96.

3 W. G. Ward and the Oxford Movement, pp. 379-80.

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to the development of free-thought in England during the present century. These are the French Revolution and the introduction of German criticism. Neither of these has, however, been productive of any radical alteration in the English character. The love of freedom and the appreciation of practical Christianity have been distinctive traits in English religious thought from the first. With these tendencies the influences of the French Revolution and of German erudition have but amalgamated. We shall find in the writings of the sixteenth, seventeenth, and eighteenth century divines unmistakable evidence of that desire to return to primitive Christianity so openly advocated by many in the nineteenth century. With these characteristics of the English nation the influence of the French Revolution has combined far more effectively and immediately than has that of German criticism. The shock of the political events of the later years of 1700 and the early years of 1800 seem to have aroused the rather torpid tendencies of the English into great activity. Since then our religion has been ever increasingly practical. Doctrines have been but little combated or rationalised ; they have rather been neglected for the more pressing claims of mankind. Men are learning to love, instead of to dispute with, one another. German philosophy, since about the middle of the nineteenth century, has had some little effect upon our theology, but it has hardly taken any immediate or popular hold, and is scarcely suited to the general tone of the English people. The wider character of the religion of England at the end of the nineteenth century is due to the original bias of the nation towards freedom, kindliness and common sense, prompted, doubtless, somewhat by the example of France, and to a far less degree by the teaching of Germany.

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In following the movement of reform in the English Church it must not be supposed that the friends of progress venture to claim the day as already theirs. The battle of freedom is not yet won, but the enemy's ranks are in many places broken through. The citadel is not yet taken, but several outposts have surrendered. The recent judgment pronounced by the Archbishop of Canterbury upon the case of the Bishop of Lincoln, the failure of a veteran persecutor to obtain the censure of Convocation on " Lux Mundi," illustrate the growth of liberty in the English Church during the last fifty or even thirty years. The tone of " Lux Mundi," and of the writings of many modern High Churchmen, notably of the late Canon Aubrey Moore, show the influence of liberalism even in the dogmatic party. The doctrines for which the dogmatists of the last generation fought so stubbornly against the Essayists, Maurice, Colenso and Stanley, are now either adopted, abandoned, or so transformed as to be practically repudiated. The Moderate Churchmen of these last years of the nineteenth century would have been called Erastians, Unitarians, Latitudinarians, even Atheists at its beginning. For one liberal Churchman in the early years of 1 800 we now have fifty ; for one Broad Churchman we now have ten. The battle is not yet won, but the enemy's ranks are wavering from end to end. The citadel is not yet taken, but by their desperate valour and fierce denunciation its defenders show that their hearts grow faint within them. One after another crosses over from the dogmatic to the anti-dogmatic party ; one after another of the onlookers joins the side of peace, of love, of toleration. May we not hope that ere long there will be no parties to divide the Church of God in England, but that all will be united in one common work of love, with the one common aim xviii

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of following Christ ? ' Then will be fulfilled in our midst that ancient prophecy of the seer at I'atmos, " And there shall be no more curse ; but the throne of God and of the Lamb shall be in it, and His servants shall serve Him." Then indeed may our Church be defined as " THE NATION LOVING RIGHTEOUSNESS."

I must add some words of more particular explanation of the scope and plan of this work.

In the first place, it may be objected that a book attacking ecclesiasticism ought not to deal exclusively with the writings of the clergy, but that the equality of the clerical and lay parts of the Church should be recognised. It must nevertheless be remembered that, however real this equality may be in theory, it is not popularly admitted ; nor, indeed, can it be until a great change, well-nigh a revolution, has been effected in our way of thinking. Although legally all Englishmen, unless they have joined another communion, are by right of birth members of the Establishment, there are many, especially among the scientific and literary, who take no pains to make good their title. Public opinion and their own wish put them outside the pale of the ecclesia. They speak and write, and are heard and read, as Englishmen, patriots, humanitarians, even as Christians, but not necessarily as Churchmen. Professor Huxley might not mind having done the Church of England a good turn when he criticised Genesis or the Gospels, but he certainly never meant to do so. The author of " Ecce Homo " may be glad to have lightened the burden of doubt for many who belong to its communion, but he gives no indication of caring to defend the English, or any other division of Christendom. Even those lay theologians who have claimed or even boasted their Church membership, have either, like T. H. Green, addressed them-

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xix selves rather to the defence of Christianity in general than of their own Church in particular, or else, like Matthew Arnold, have defended the Establishment against the Dissenters, without seeking to influence the character of the Church itself. When a new theological book startles the reading world, if it is by a layman, we ask, " Is this consistent with Christianity ? " but if it is by a clergyman we say, "Is this consistent with the Church of England ? " In short, we usually regard the clergyman writing on theology as speaking for his communion, and the layman as simply expressing the opinion of an individual.

In the case of laymen, however, who acknowledge themselves members of the English Church, the mutual influence between pulpit and pew is so active that it is quite possible to gauge their religious condition by examining only their theological representatives — the clergy. Until it is generally admitted that opinions have nothing to do with salvation, the clergy must continue to be looked upon as somewhat different from the laity. As long as religion is confused with theology, and men are supposed to be saved by their own learning or the learning of another, the clergy must be the leaders of the people in religious matters. Men will still be obliged to specialise about their salvation, just as they do about their worldly affairs. As they give over the management of their estates to lawyers and of their bodies to doctors, so must they give over the care of their souls to parsons. As they have not always the time, nor the talent, nor the inclination, to study for themselves the rise and fall of stocks, the ins and outs of land tenure, or the mechanism of the human frame ; so they have seldom the time, talent, or inclination to examine for themselves subtle points in theology or delicate problems in meta-

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physics. They must leave these matters to experts, trusting chiefly to the self-respect and self-interest of the lawyer, doctor, and parson to keep them in health and wealth here and hereafter. But, at the same time, Englishmen are jealous of entirely resigning their estates, their bodies, or their souls into another's hands. They generally choose a safe man whether for lawyer, doctor, or parson, and keep a certain amount of watch over him from the midst of their particular business. A tacit agreement is entered into between clergy and people that the former shall save the souls of the latter — for a consideration — on a respectable orthodox system. There must be no priestly arrogance ; no departure from custom. The average preacher, feeling the greatness of the confidence placed in him, is fearful of betraying his trust, and accordingly year after year lays before his congregation that plan of salvation which he is expected to produce. " That which was good enough for our fathers is good enough for us," say the majority of the occupants of the pews. " That which saved your fathers will also save you," obediently reply the majority of the occupants of the pulpits. Fear of being unsettled, fear of unsettling, are natural and right in those who hold that eternal life depends on accepting precise and definite formulae. If the people think that their forefathers — whose salvation it is impious to question — were saved by regular attendance at church, and not by forgiving unto seventy times seven their erring sons and straying daughters : by loudly reciting the Creed, and not by being just and kind to tenants and servants, to kinsmen and neighbours : they may well be fearful of departing from the ancient faith, and their pastors also do well to preserve them from all peril of false doctrine. In pro-

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xxi portion only as dogma dies in the pew will freedom live in the pulpit.

But there are forces in the moral and intellectual worlds which cannot be kept out of the clerical. Changes gradually'steal over the congregations, and in course of time affect the utterances of the clergy. With whatever pains a man may try to change his thoughts, like his coat, on Sunday morning, it is impossible to exclude from church every question and interest of the day. No matter how zealously the pastor may shield his flock from the approach of doubt, the desire for truth will show itself at last, even in the sacred building. Stray facts picked up in the newspapers and magazines about geology and astronomy clash with the lessons from Genesis and Joshua ; widening experience of men and manners conflict with the readings from Chronicles and Kings. " Philosophy and criticism have become a great power in the world," says Matthew Arnold, " and inevitably tend to alter and develop Church doctrine. . . . Yet the seat of the developing force is not in the Church, but elsewhere ; its influences filter strugglingly into the Church, and the Church slowly absorbs and incorporates them." 1 Criticism and philosophy cannot be restricted to any one profession, least of all to that profession which has for the most part openly rejected the one and stopped half-way in the other. If, therefore, we would really estimate the theological progress of the Church, we must do so through her ordained, and not through her lay members. We can best judge of the results of criticism and philosophy on doctrine in the writings of those who have made it their especial province. The clergy, as a general rule, touch in their sermons upon those doctrines which correspond to the subjects uppermost in the minds

1 St. Paul and Protestantism, p. 104.

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of their people. Sometimes the more exceptional and independent among them express opinions in advance of the mass of their congregations. But even in these cases, it is probable that in their most daring utterances they are responding to the half-uttered questionings of a few among their hearers. When it is not so, their influence is gone and their teaching relegated to a limbo of forgotten heresies and ignored truths. Such is the action and reaction between clergy and people, that, as a general rule, any liberal views held by the ordained ministers of one generation are widely, if not universally, adopted by the laity of the next.

The time will come, perhaps it is not very far off, when the modifications in doctrine, demanded by the laity and granted by the clergy, will be seen to be so numerous, startling and general, that the supreme question, trifled with for so many generations, will force itself upon the attention of the Church — What was it saved our fathers ? What must we do to be saved ? Was it these changeable, doubtful doctrines, or was it something far surer and simpler ? Was it recitiug the Creed or keeping the Commandments ? Was it obeying the letter of the Decalogue or entering into the spirit of the Beatitudes ?

There is yet another point that may require a word of explanation. As this book is of a somewhat party nature, it has been thought kindest and wisest to avoid as far as possible all discussion of living Churchmen. Some might not care to be reckoned among the liberals ; some again may, before they die, show themselves less fit than they seem at present to be so counted. Of course, with regard to several of our living Broad Churchmen such caution is absurd ; but as it is difficult to make exceptions, their pardon is craved and the rule adhered to

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The history of religious thought in England from the sixteenth to the end of the eighteenth century has been so fully treated by Dr. Hunt, J. J. Tayler, and many others, that I have not thought it necessary to enter into it with any detail. My purpose is therefore, after a preh'minary sketch of the history of the English Church from the earliest times to 1 800, to trace, in the writings of its broad and liberal divines, from Sydney Smith to Edwin Hatch, the progress of liberal religion during the nineteenth century.

In conclusion, I would here offer my very cordial thanks to those friends who have shown most kind interest in my work, even when they have not altogether approved of it ; also to the librarians and attendants of the British Museum Leading- Eoom, of Lambeth Palace Library, of Sion College, and of the London Library for their unfailing courtesy and patience.

A. I. F.

DOGMA AND THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND.

Chapter I. Introductory

Section L — From the Beginning to the Reformation.

At no time in her history has the English nation willingly submitted to the authority of the Pope. The union of Church and State, with the supremacy, even in matters spiritual, of the sovereign have been claimed over and over again by the government, and generally with the full consent of the people.

From the earliest times the temporal and spiritual powers have been closely united. " The English bishops," says J. R Green, "were at first royal chaplains, and their diocese was naturally nothing but the kingdom." 1 Both Mr. W. Gr. Brooke2 and Canon Fremantle3 have amply shown how primitive was the custom for the King to be equal, if not superior, to the Primate in Church matters. William the Conqueror, though he might have

1 Short History of the English People, p. 29.

2 Introduction to Six Privy Council Judgments, by W. G. Brooke.

3 Introduction to Broderick and Fremantle's Ecclesiastical J udgments of the Privy Council.

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been expected to submit to the power to which he was so greatly indebted for his new kingdom, was, on the contrary, "the one ruler of his time who dared firmly repudiate the claims which were now beginning to be put forward by the Court of Eome." He refused point blank to do fealty to Gregory VII., saying, "I have never promised it, nor do I find that my predecessors did it to yours." He exacted homage from bishop as from baron. He suffered none of his vassals to be excommunicated without his consent, nor permitted Papal letters to be received into the country without his leave. He allowed no synod to sit without his licence, nor admitted their decrees to be valid without his ratification.1

During the five centuries between the Conquest of the Crown by William and the Keformation of the Church by Henry, the pretensions of the Pope were steadily opposed by the National Government. Appeal to Eonie was objected to by both barons and bishops in the reign of William Rufus "as a thing unheard of without the King's leave ; " 2 and though these appeals became afterwards common enough, they were never recognised by the law of the land. The attempt to teach Canon Law at Oxford was stopped by Stephen;3 the supremacy of the Crown over the bishops was confirmed by the Constitutions of Clarendon in 1164; and yet more strongly was the Church's independence of Rome secured by

1 Short History of the English People, by J. R. Green, p. 823.

2 Introduction to Ecclesiastical Judgments of the Privy Council, by Broderick and Freraantle, p. xxviii.

J Introduction to Six Privy Council Judgments, by W. G. Brooke, pp. xviii.-xix.

FROM TUE BEGINNING TO THE REFORMATION. 3

Magna Charta in 1215. Again, in the reign of liichard II. the bishops and abbots "passed a fresh statute reaffirming that of Edward III. against the introduction of excommunication" &c ; and Parliament petitioned the King "against the presentation to benefices by the Pope." 1

England had been making ready, morally and intellectually, for the Reformation long before Luther nailed his thesis on the church-door of Wittemburg. Wyclif in the fourteenth century had denounced the corrupt and luxurious lives of the clergy, and urged that those only were worthy of their hire who were really holy and industrious. He had also claimed "the Bible as the one ground of faith " and " the right of every instructed man to examine " it " for himself." 2 The New Learning of the sixteenth century had brought the forces of philosophy and criticism to bear upon the tenets and practices of the Church ; the Universities, under its influence, " passing," as Green says, " from death unto life."

The New Movement in England may truly be claimed as starting from the English Church, for Colet, one of its principal leaders, was Dean of St. Paul's, and Archbishop Warham was ever its steadfast friend and protector. " Would that for once," cried Colet, addressing the clergy in Convocation "you would remember your name and profession and take thought for the Reformation of the Church! Never was it more necessary and never did the state of the Church need more vigorous en-

1 Introduction to Sis Privy Council Judgments, by W. G. Brooke, pp. xxvi.-xxviii. ' J. R. Green's Short History, p. 234.

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deavours. . . . "We are troubled with heretics, but no heresy of theirs is so fatal to us as the vicious and depraved lives of the clergy. That is the worst heresy of all!"1