kind, and acquitted me. But hardly was my back turned out my enemies (for so I must call them) practically got the upper hand. Our Bishop seems to think no great good comes of seeing the Pope, if it is only once seeing him. What chance have I against persons who are day by day at his elbow. . . . I trust I shall ever give a hearty obedience to Rome, but I never expect in my lifetime any recognition of it."""

"And now, alas, I fear that in one sense the iron has entered into my soul. I mean that confidence in any superiors whatever never can blossom again within me. I never shall feel easy with them. I shall, I feel, always think they will be taking some advantage of me, that at length their way will lie across mine, and that my efforts will be displeasing to them.""

The problem arising out of these strong expressions of opinion is that side by side with them Newman was able to distinguish between the Roman Church as a whole and the men in authority during his time. When reports became current that he was dissatisfied with his Roman position and was likely to return to the Anglican Church, he wrote with severity and even bitterness that "Protestantism is the dreariest of possible religions", and he was always able somehow or other to rest content in the Roman Catholic Church in spite of the lack of sympathy and even opposition which he found at Headquarters. It is a curious state of mind, for it is surprising that Newman did not see that intellectual infallibility should have logically involved moral infallibility as well. As we review the judgments of the Roman Church since the promulgation of the Decree in 1870, we are compelled to ask what is the precise practical value of an infallibility which has not been used for over forty years?

The Oxford episode naturally bulks very largely in the story of Newman's life. When the proposal for an Oratory there was broached, everything for a time seemed to go without a hitch, though there were incidents in the negotiations with the Vatican which naturally depressed Newman. Thus Cardinal Reisach, who was personally known to him, came to England for the express purpose of finding out the general feeling on the Oxford question, 14 Vol. ii, p. 142. 15 Vol. ii, p. 201.

and yet Newman was not approached by him and never even made acquainted with his mission. Indeed, the Cardinal visited Oscott without letting Newman know that he was near Birmingham. The Cardinal's informants were carefully selected by Manning, and W. G. Ward was mentioned as the best representative of laymen. The new ground that Newman had bought at Oxford was actually inspected without any sign being given to its owner. No wonder that Newman deplored this incident, and complained that no opportunity was afforded him of giving Rome his view of the subject. But this was nothing compared with the sequel. When everything was in readiness for departure to Oxford and the portmanteau of Newman's friend and colleague, Father Neville, actually packed, a letter came from Newman's Bishop which plainly showed that he was not to go. "Coupled with the formal permission for an Oratory at Oxford, Propaganda had sent a 'secret instruction' to Dr. Ullathorne, to the effect that, if Newman himself showed signs of intending to reside there, the Bishop was to do his best 'blandly and suavely' (blande suaviterque) to recall him."

Newman never forgot that unfortunate "blande suaviterque".

One of the greatest difficulties felt by Newman was the opposition of a former friend, Mgr. Talbot, who was at the Pope's right hand and was all along the intimate and confidential correspondent of Manning, and the channel through which all English news reached the Pope. We can see more than once what Talbot thought of Newman.

"Dr. Newman is the most dangerous man in England, and you will see that he will make use of the laity against your Grace. You must not be afraid of him. It will require much prudence, but you must be firm, as the Holy Father still places confidence in you."""

There is perhaps nothing so significant in its quiet severity as the reply of Newman to Talbot when he received an invitation to preach in the latter's Church in Rome.

"I have received your letter, inviting me to preach next Lent in your Church at Rome to 'an audience of Protestants more edu1 Vol. ii, p. 139.

16

17 Vol. ii, p. 147.

cated than could ever be the case in England'. However, Birmingham people have souls; and I have neither taste nor talent for the sort of work which you cut out for me. And I beg to decline your offer."

9918

In the light of all these experiences within the Roman Church we find ourselves asking again and again whether Newman really found his true home and did his proper work there?

III. THE CHURCH OF ROME AND UNBELIEF

According to Newman the Catholic movement in the Church of England was "the only effective check on the advancing tide of unbelief",19 and when he discovered, as he believed, that Anglicanism offered no adequate check, he wrote during his last days at Littlemore that he had

"an increasing intellectual conviction that there is no medium between Pantheism and the Church of Rome"."

We know that this opinion was due to the conviction that only by the presentation of a living authority, continuous through the ages, could unbelief be effectively met. But the question arises, as we review the last fifty years, whether Newman's opinion has proved in any sense accurate. Dr. Fairbairn seems to be much nearer the truth when he writes:

"Over against his charge, 'outside Catholicism things are tending to Atheism', I place this as the simple record of fact, verifiable by all who choose to pursue the necessary enquiries-inside Catholicism things have tended, and still, wherever mind is active, do tend, to the completest negation."

9121

The history of Roman Catholicism on the Continent during the last few years tends increasingly to the conclusion that Rome is responsible for more unbelief than any other Institution in the world. To quote again from the Church of Ireland Gazette:

"So far from leaving folk secure in their ancient faith, Newman by the force and depth with which he argued the thesis that you must either be an atheist or a Roman Catholic, or else commit

18 Vol. ii, p. 539.

20

Vol. i, p. 81.

19 Vol. i, p. 58.

Catholicism, Roman and Anglican, p. 134.

intellectual suicide, succeeded in making a large number of his disciples very uncomfortable, and inducing a smaller number definitely to move on."

And the reason for this may be summed up in Dr. Fairbairn's striking words:

"He who places the rational nature of man on the side of Atheism, that he may the better defend a Church, saves the Church at the expense of religion and God."22

As the Times review truly said, Newman

"never understood the antagonist he had challenged. . . . This is not the place to analyze his philosophy as concentrated in the Grammar of Assent. It is sufficient to say that Newman himself confessed that it is not calculated to convince anyone who is not already prepared to be convinced. . . . . In short, those who do not accept the principles on which he bases his philosophy are 'infidels'. He has no understanding of the essentially religious character of the claim of the modern scientific spirit that no artificial barriers shall be erected across the path of human knowledge, and that no mortal shall dare to say to another, 'Thus far shalt thou go in inquiry and no further'."

IV. NEWMAN'S DOCTRINAL POSITION

From his Anglican days Newman's pronouncements on Doctrine, especially when related to history, are at once interesting and puzzling, for in the light of certain unquestioned facts of history it is perplexing to understand how so acute a mind could have adopted the attitude that he did on many fundamental and doctrinal questions. What, for instance, are we to make out of this?

"The general type of Christendom, and the relation of part with part, in early times and in the present is one and the same—that the Catholic Church and sects and heresies then, correspond to the Roman, Protestant, and other Cummunions now-and in particular that the Anglican Church corresponds to the Semi-Arian body, or the Nestorian, or the Monophysite."

1123

Can any true historical student say that there is a real correspondence between the early centuries and the present day? Would it not again seem as though to Newman the wish were father to the thought?

"Catholicism, Roman and Anglican, p. 140.

Vol. i, p. 122.

It is also an unending puzzle to minds brought up on the New Testament to read Newman's statements about the presence of Christ in the Sacrament.

"I am writing next room to the Chapel. It is such an incomprehensible blessing to have Christ's bodily presence in one's house, within one's walls, as swallows up all other privileges and destroys, or should destroy, every pain. To know that He is close by-to be able again and through the day to go in to Him; and be sure, my dearest W., when I am thus in His presence you are not forgotten. It is the place for intercession surely, where the Blessed Sacrament is. Thus Abraham, our father, pleaded before his hidden Lord and God in the valley.""

"It is really most wonderful to see the Divine Presence looking out almost into the open streets from the various Churches so that at St. Lawrence's we saw the people take off their hats from the other side of the street as they passed along; no one to guard it, but perhaps an old woman who sits at work before the Church door, or has some wares to sell."

To say nothing of the Divine Presence being circumscribed in this way, the whole conception seems to suggest a spiritual materialism and a failure to realize the true spirituality of the New Testament conception of the presence of God in Christ.

And of like manner are the references to relics, of which the following is a typical instance:

"And then to go into St. Ambrose's Church-where the body of the Saint lies-and to kneel at those relics, which have been so powerful, and whose possessor I have heard and read of more than any other saints from a boy."

It is hardly credible that a mind like that of Newman could have become so convinced of the power of these things. The many allusions to the Mother of our Lord point in the same direction:

"What took us to Bologna was that we went round by Loretto. We went there to get the Blessed Virgin's blessing on us. I have ever been under her shadow, if I may say it. My College was St. Mary's and my own Church; and when I went to Littlemore, there, by my own previous disposition, our Blessed Lady

"Vol. i, p. 118.

25 Vol. i, p. 139.

26

2 Vol. i, p. 139.