Chapter VII (3)

The Word, who is one Godhead with the first person, a distinct person himself, is also the substantial image of the first person. Because, in force of the act by which he is uttered, which is essentially assimilative, he is produced as the likeness of him whose expression and utterance he is; and as he is one as to substance with the conceiver, he is, consequently, his substantial image and likeness. We conclude, therefore, that the production of the second person in the infinite--resulting in a person, the substantial image of the conceiver, in force of the act of intelligencing by which he is produced, which is essentially assimilative--is governed by the law of generation; and that, consequently, the first person in the infinite is _Father_, and the second, _Son_. "_Thou art my Son, to-day I have begotten thee_." [Footnote 291]

[Footnote 291: Ps. ii. 7.]

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The law by which the third person in the infinite is produced, is different from that which governs the production of the second.

The latter takes place according to the law of generation or assimilation; the former is subject to the law of aspiration, which must be understood as follows.

By his Word, the intelligent activity apprehends and conceives his infinite perfection and goodness. For the Word, as we have seen, is nothing but the infinite and most perfect expression or image of the intelligent activity, and as the intelligent activity is infinite perfection and excellence, so the Word is the utterance, the intellectual reproduction of that excellence and goodness. Hence the intelligent activity, by his Word, conceives and utters himself as infinite perception and excellence. But perfection or goodness _apprehended_ is necessarily loved. For goodness, once apprehended, awakens the will, and necessarily inclines it toward itself; it necessarily attracts and affects it. The intelligent activity, therefore by apprehending himself through his Word as infinite perfection and goodness, necessarily loves himself.

Love implies the insidence or indwelling of the object loved in the subject loving. The intelligent activity, therefore, who necessarily loves himself through his Word, must be as object loved in himself as subject loving.

This love as object must be co-eternal with the infinite, because by the law of immanence which governs the genesis of infinite life, every origination in the infinite must be co-eternal with the infinite.

By the same law also, it must be identical and one with the infinite; because love, being originated by an immanent act, terminates inside of the infinite, and is, therefore, identical with the infinite. The love as object, therefore, is coeternal and identical with the infinite; it _is_ the infinite.

It is distinct from love as subject and from the Word, by the law of opposition of origin, which implies that a term which originates from a principle is necessarily opposed to it, and consequently distinct. Now, love, as object in the infinite, originates from the intelligent activity and from the Word. The intelligent activity, by apprehending himself, as infinite goodness and excellence, through his Word, loves himself. Hence, this love proceeds from both--the intelligent activity, who conceives his infinite goodness--the Word, who represents it, and makes it intelligible. This love-object is a third person. For, from what we have said, it appears that love-object is identical with the infinite, with the divine essence, and consequently partakes of all the infinite attributes of the essence; hence he is a spiritual and intelligent being; as distinct from both the intelligent activity and the Word, he is possessed of a termination exclusively his own, which makes him the owner of himself incommunicable and solidary of his notional action. Hence he is a person.

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This third person, not being originated according to a likeness of nature, cannot, like the second person, be called son. He is the personal and subsisting love of the Father and of the Son; and as the object loved exists in the subject loving, as inclining, and in a certain manner as impelling, the subject toward it, as raising in the subject an attraction or aspiration toward it, hence the third person is called the living and subsisting Spirit of God.

The better to conceive this distinctive termination of the third term in the infinite, let us suppose an attraction between two persons. It is needless to remark that we use this term for want of a better and more spiritual one. Suppose, therefore, an attraction between two persons; do not make it an accident or modification, but substantial; carry it to its utmost perfection, actualize it _ad infinitum_; so that it may be able to return upon itself, to have consciousness of itself, to possess and own itself, and in this sense to feel itself distinct from and independent of all others--and you will have, as product, a subsisting or _personal_ attraction, a third person.

Such is the idea we can form of the Holy Spirit. The Father beholds himself totally in the Son as an offspring of himself, and loves himself in his offspring, his perfect and substantial expression.

The Son beholds himself totally in the Father as his author, and loves the Father as his principle and origin. This common love, this mutual attraction, this aspiration of the Father toward the Son, and of the Son toward, the Father, being infinite, is most actual, perfect, and complete--a living, subsisting attraction, with consciousness and the ownership of himself, a subsistence personifying their mutual love and binding both in one eternal tie of affection.

Hence, by this distinctive constituent of common love, the Spirit is the archetype of harmony and order; since in his personality he brings the opposition existing between the conceiver and the conceived into harmony and unity of love.

He is also the archetype of the _beautiful_, being the very beauty and loveliness of God.

Beauty, in its highest metaphysical expression, is variety reduced to unity, by order and proportion. Now, the Spirit harmonizes the reality and the intelligibility of God into a unity of love. Hence he is the beauty of the Father and the Son--their personal and eternal loveliness; and as such, the archetype of the beautiful in all orders.

He is the very bliss of the infinite, because bliss is the perfect possession of infinite life. Now, it is in the production of the Spirit that the genesis of infinite life terminates and is complete. He is, then, the expression of the perfect possession and enjoyment of the infinite life--the living Blessedness of the infinite. The last law which governs the mystery of God's life, and which is a consequence of all the laws we have explained, is the law of _insidence_.

This implies the indwelling of all the divine persons in each other. It is founded both on the community of essence and the very nature of personalities.

For the essence of the three divine persons, being one and most simple, it follows that they all meet in it, and consequently dwell in each other. On the other hand, what constitutes them persons is essentially a relation. Now, a relation necessarily asks for and includes the relative term. The intelligent activity is such, because in him dwells the Word, his infinite expression. The Word is such, because he is the expression of the intelligent activity, and dwells in him. The Spirit necessarily dwells in both, because he is the subsisting aspiration of the activity toward its conception, and of the conception toward its principle.

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"_Believe that the Father is in me, and I in the Father_." (St. John.)

With these laws, we conclude the first part of the problem of multiplicity raised by pantheism. It is true, as pantheism affirms, that there must be a certain multiplicity in the unity of infinite essence. For, without a certain multiplicity, no being can exist or be intelligible. Pantheism, in giving such prominent importance to the problem, has rendered great service to philosophy and to religion, and has cut off, in the very bud, all those objections raised by the superficial reason of Arians or anti-trinitarians of old, or Unitarians of modern times. But, as we have seen, however able in raising the problem, Pantheism utterly fails in resolving it; and, in its effort to explain the problem, destroys both the terms to be reconciled. Catholicity, fully conscious of the immense value of the problem, unflinchingly asserts that it alone has the secret of its solution. Without at all assuming to explain away its super-intelligibility, it lays down such an answer as fully satisfies the mind which can appreciate the importance and the sublimity of the problem, and follow it into the depths of its explanation. The infinite, says Catholicity, is not infinite as an abstraction or potentiality, a germ as Pantheism affirms, which ceases to be infinite when it passes into multiplicity; the infinite is actuality itself.

This actuality consists in a first personality unborn and unbegotten, with full consciousness of himself and his infinite perfection. This personality is active intelligence, and in intelligencing his infinite perfection, begets a conception, an intelligible expression of that perfection, a second person. The active intelligence loves his infinite personality conceived by him in his intelligence. This love is a third personality.

Three personalities or terminations of one infinite actuality: a multiplicity in unity; unity without being broken by multiplicity; multiplicity without being destroyed by unity.

Hence the infinite is not a dead, immovable, unintelligible unity, but a living, actual, intelligible unity; because it is unity of nature and a trinity of persons; because the unity falls in the essence, the multiplicity, in the terminations of the essence.

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A Legend for Husbands.--1699.

Which Wives, Too, May Read--possibly Not Without Profit.

My story is of people that have long since passed away, so that no one need take it as personal.

American travellers sometimes differ--though for my part, I do not see why they should--as to the relative attractions of Paris and London. But they seldom fail to concur in their estimate of Brussels as one of the most interesting and agreeable cities in Europe.

And really the Flemish metropolis presents a remarkable variety of attractions. Parks, boulevards, botanic gardens, museums, quaint old streets, quainter old houses, libraries, great pictures, treasures of Rubens, wealth of old MSS., and last, not least, grand specimens of middle-age architecture, such as the Hotel de Ville and the Cathedral of St. Gudule.

Indeed, in mediaeval monuments no country in Europe is richer than Belgium.

In presence of her grand old cathedrals you can well understand the enthusiasm of those artists who maintain that our age takes entirely too much credit to itself for its encouragement of the fine arts. Neither the past nor the present century, they maintain, will leave to posterity monuments of such grandeur, boldness, beauty, and originality as have been bequeathed to us by the period that immediately followed the crusades; and strangely enough, these bequests of the "dark ages" can bear any test of critical scrutiny, even in the full blaze of our nineteenth century enlightenment.

Will our architectural legacies appear as well in the eyes of future generations?

"Why, look around you," said to me a Flemish artist; "in those days the erection of a costly edifice was not handed over to mere mechanics. The body of it was intrusted to architects. Sculptors created its woodwork. Carvers executed what is now turned out by machinery; painters gave you pictures where you now get plaster, and the Benvenuto Cellinis of the day worked their miracles of art in metals which today the blacksmith hammers out at his forge. Ah! that was the golden age of artists, when the pulpits, the altars, the stalls, and the organ-lofts were monuments; when furniture, doors, chairs, and tables were poems in wood; when the family goblets, the mere handle of a poignard or a sword were chased and embellished; when exquisite miniatures, illuminated missals, and wood engravings made a picture-gallery of the dryest chronicle; when fresco and encaustic decorated the walls and floors; when ceilings and beams shone with arabesques, windows were bright with stained glass; when, in short, all the arts brought their tribute of beauty to a church or to a palace. It was in the fading twilight of these artistic glories that sculpture in wood still flourished among the artists of ancient Flanders."

Somewhat thus discoursed to me an enthusiastic young Belgian painter, as we stood together admiring that grand work of art, the carved oak pulpit in the cathedral of St. Gudule, at Brussels.

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This pulpit is a work to which the term unique may be applied with scrupulous fidelity.

The admiration drawn from you by sculptures in wood elsewhere culminates in presence of this singular creation of genius. No description can adequately place it before you or render it justice. In its exquisite architecture and sculpture, a poem as grand as that of Milton is spread out before you.

An outline, only, the merest outline, can be attempted to supply description.

Adam and Eve apparently sustain the terrestrial globe. An angel chases them from Paradise, and Death pursues them. The life-size figure of Adam, in particular, is admirable. Carved in marble, it would have been something for Canova to have been proud of. The preacher stands in the concavity of the globe, which is overshadowed by the branches of the tree of good and evil, covered with birds and animals characteristically grouped. By the side of Adam is an eagle; on that of Eve, a peacock and a squirrel.

To the top of the tree is attached a canopy upheld by two angels and a female figure symbolical of truth. Above stands the Blessed Virgin with the infant Saviour, who, with a cross in his hand, crushes the head of the Serpent, whose hideous body, in huge folds, twines around the tree. "This pulpit was made," said, or rather sang, to me, the old gray-haired sexton or _bedeau_, to the tune in which he had shown the lions of the cathedral for more than thirty years--"This pulpit was made by Verbruggen, of Antwerp, in 1699, for the Jesuits of Louvain. Upon the suppression of their order, it was presented to this cathedral by the empress Maria Theresa. This pulpit--"

Here I interrupted him with questions as to Verbruggen--what was known of him? Had he left any other works? and so on, to the end of the chapter. All in vain; I could obtain nothing but a negative shake of the head, and a hint that it was time to close the cathedral doors.

My stay in Brussels was prolonged many weeks; and besides my attendance on Sundays, I frequently, in my rambles between the grand park and what Mrs. Major O'Dowd calls the _Marchy O'flures_, strayed into St. Gudule to admire the finest specimens of stained glass in the world; to read the inscriptions on the tombs of the Dukes of Brabant, and to feast my eyes and imagination on the grand old pulpit.

In the course of these visits I became better acquainted with the _bedeau_ in charge, and after some persuasion and a few well-timed attentions, the old man at last acknowledged to me that there was something more than mere names and dates connected with the history of the pulpit.

Finally, upon my solemn assurance that I was not an Englishman, and would not write a book and put him and the pulpit therein, he promised to tell me all he knew about it.

Accordingly, by arrangement with him, I loitered in the cathedral one evening after vespers until the faithful had finished their devotions and left the church.

Taking a couple of rush-bottom chairs from one of the huge pyramids of them piled up at the lower end of the building, we seated ourselves just outside the grand portal, and the old man began his recital. Years have since gone by, and I cannot repeat it in his quaint manner; but, substantially, he thus told me the

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Story Of The Carved Oak Pulpit.

Henry Verbruggen was heart and soul an artist. Gay, careless, pleasure-loving, he appeared to live but for two things; his art, first, and then his amusements.

Verbruggen married Martha Van Meeren, the pretty, the timid, the good Martha Van Meeren. In the mirage of his artist's enthusiasm her sweetness, her grace, her beauty, made her at first appear to him a sylph, a muse, an angel.

Alas! though gentle and attractive, Martha was, after all, only a woman, of the earth, earthy. In a quiet, well-ordered household Martha would have been a treasure; but in the eccentric home of the artist she was out of her element.

A pattern of neatness and economy, an accomplished Flemish house-wife, a neat domicil and well-spread table possessed for Martha more attraction than the imaginary world of beauty in which her artist husband revelled, even when poverty threatened or want oppressed them. Poor Martha! In vain she remonstrated; in vain she implored. Henry would neglect his work; he would be idle and spend his days at the _cabaret_, in the society of those who were even more idle and more dissipated than himself.

Thus years went on. Martha was not happy. A tinge of moroseness shaded the clear sunshine of her usual mildness. Occasionally, too, she came out of her quiet sadness and found sharp words of reproof for Henry, and anger for the companions who kept him from home. And so it came about that soon, in Verbruggen's eyes, Martha appeared harsh and repulsive. Then swiftly followed dispute and recrimination. His early enchantment had disappeared; Martha was not the wife for him, thought Verbruggen. He should have had one as careless, as enthusiastic as himself. Would such a wife have suited him, think you--you who know the human heart?

Meantime things went from bad to worse. Verbruggen scarcely came home, totally neglected his art, fell into utter idleness and the slough of despond, and his family was soon reduced to want--almost to beggary.

In this crisis--it was in the year 1699--a Jesuit father who had heard of Verbruggen's talent, called upon him, supplied him with means, and ordered a pulpit, the most beautiful his art could produce, for the church at Louvain.

Surprise, gratitude, joy, enthusiasm, all contributed to arouse the dormant energies of the artist. He set himself energetically at the composition of a design for his work.

"I will make," said he, "of this pulpit my greatest production. It shall be," he exclaimed, growing radiant with artistic inspiration, "something that shall display at a glance the history of the Christian religion. I will place," thus he mused, "under the terrestrial globe, Adam and Eve the moment after the fatal act of disobedience. This globe shall be the pulpit. Around it shall watch the four Evangelists. Over it shall hang the canopy of heaven, supported on the right by angels, on the left by Truth herself. The date-tree shall lend its shade. The long scaly wings of the serpent shall encircle it, reaching from man on earth to the Blessed Virgin in heaven. By the side of man I will place the cherubim armed with his flaming sword, and near Eve, young and beautiful, a hideous figure of Death. Higher up shall be the divine infant, with one foot on the head of the serpent; he shall stand by the side of his august mother, resplendent in her crown of stars, surrounded by angels, cherubs, and seraphs. {827} Yes, all this and more will I do. The very wood shall grow into life under my hands, and ages yet unborn shall hear of Henry Verbruggen of Antwerp."

The artist went at his work with all the enthusiasm of genius, and had completed the body of the pulpit without placing the Evangelists according to his original design, when, in a moment of malicious spite, he imagined he would punish Martha by displaying near Eve various satirical emblems of her sex's qualities.

On the branches, then, that entwine the staircase leading up on the side of Eve, he placed a peacock, symbol of pride; a squirrel, symbol of destruction; a cock, symbol of noise; and an ape, image of malice; of all which defects, poor Martha, as the angels well knew, was as innocent as an infant.

Of the statue of Adam, Verbruggen made a _chef d'oeuvre_--a figure full of dignity and manly beauty. The figure of Eve is inferior, and has less grace and animation.

And now to complete his sculptured marital spite, on Adam's side he carved an eagle, symbol of genius.

Thus far had he progressed when poor Martha sickened and died. In his motherless household Verbruggen soon discovered the extent of his misfortune, and learned, as Shakespeare has so well told the world, that

"What we have we prize not to the worth;
But being lacked and lost,
We then do know its value."

And now came the reaction. Verbruggen deeply mourned Martha. He sincerely deplored her. Her admirable qualities came fresh upon his memory, and he bitterly reproached himself for his unkindness and neglect.

Soon he fell into fits of despondency. Discouragement took possession of him, and his pulpit, begun with so much energy, stood unfinished.

Accustomed to find his home in order, his table spread, he soon discovered their loss, as well as the want of a thousand little attentions and kindnesses which none could now give him; and in short, as he was in the high road for discoveries, we may safely conclude that he found out, with Ben Franklin, that a lone man is but the half of a pair of scissors.

Twelve months passed by. Verbruggen's friends counselled him to remarry. "You are but thirty-six," said they. "You have sincerely mourned Martha's loss, and have done full justice to her excellent qualities; but you can yet do as well, if not better. There is Cecily Van Eyck, talented, a painter, an artist, like yourself. Your dispositions accord, and if she consents to have you, she will be a mother to your little girl and make you an admirable wife."

Henry listened to his friends, thought over what they said, and followed their advice. He became Cecily's suitor, and was accepted.

Now Cecily Van Eyck was very smiling, very sweet, very charming; but Cecily had a will of her own.

Scarcely had the honeymoon gone by, when she enlightened Henry with some new ideas, and gave him several very distinct notions as to the proper distribution of domestic power in a household. In a more propitious age Cecily would have made her mark in a _Sorosis_, and been a leader of the most advanced radical wing of a woman's rights party.

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Her mastery over Verbruggen was complete, and the poor artist even kissed his chains.

One day she said to him, "What are you doing? Your apathy is complained of, and I am taunted with it. Remember, if you please, that Van Eyck is a name not unknown. Let me not lose, I pray you, by changing it for that of Verbruggen. Where is the pulpit, that _chef d'oeuvre_ you so long since announced?"

In reply he led her to his studio. Cecily had an artist's eye, and more--a woman's.

"What mean," said she, "these emblems by the side of Eve?"

The sculptor blushed.

"When I made them," he answered, "I did not know Cecily Van Eyck."

"'Tis well. But after these emblems of defects, which perhaps women have not, what do you intend to bestow upon your own sex?"

"I had already commenced," stammered Verbruggen--"you see the eagle. 'Twas perhaps somewhat vain."

"Vain! Oh! no; not at all. The eagle--a bird of prey and rapine, the symbol of brutal tyranny--nothing could be fitter. Well, and what further do you intend?"

Verbruggen could find no reply.

"Well, then, listen," continued his wife, "to render full justice to your sex, near the eagle you will place a fox, emblem of deceit; a parrot, emblem of noisy chatter; a monkey eating grapes, symbol of intoxication; and a jackdaw, emblem of silly pride."

Verbruggen executed her orders with a docility most edifying. The pulpit was soon finished, and, fortunately for us, has been preserved intact through years of war and revolution. Higher teachings have been proclaimed from it, but to those who know its story even its dumb wood speaks a salutary lesson.

"Ah sir!" ejaculated the old sexton, when he had finished the story of the pulpit, "if I had known the history of that pulpit before I married a second time, I--"

Just then I came away.

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The Future Of Ritualism.

We propose to devote a few pages to the consideration of Ritualism and its probable future, because it is an interesting religious movement which is of great importance to many souls, and because it seems to us to have reached its crisis. A writer in the _Churchman_ (an Episcopalian journal of Hartford, Ct.) wonders that Catholics take such an interest in his communion and its members. "Our bishops being no bishops," he says, "our clergy only decently behaved laymen, our laity a perverse generation whose only chance of salvation lies in the charitable hope of their invincible ignorance, surely it is wasting powder and shot upon us to criticise our doings when we are thus only playing at being a church." It is certainly true that in the eyes of the Catholic Church, and also of every ecclesiastical body which has the apostolic succession, the bishops of the Episcopal Church are no bishops, and the clergy are mere laymen. {829} It is also true that the extreme High-Churchmen are "playing at being a church." But cannot the writer understand our zeal for the salvation of souls and our honest desire to help those whose religion is only a logical farce? We assure him that if he does not appreciate our sincerity, he does injustice to the feelings which should animate every Christian heart. We see that which every intelligent and unbiased mind can see, a party in the Episcopal Church holding opinions which are suicidal to every species of Protestantism, and which lead directly to the Catholic faith, and we know that those who belong to this party cannot long continue in their present position. They must come honestly forward to us, or go backward to lose what little faith they have. Is it wonderful that for the love of Christ we beg them to be truthful to their convictions, and manly in their profession? Is it strange that we attempt to show them that the doctrines they profess to hold have no home in Protestantism, and that the church they pretend to venerate is only a fiction of their imagination?

In this spirit we write now a few words which will, we hope, fall into the hands of Ritualists, and help at least some to the knowledge of the truth. Let us say at once, and in all candor, that our sympathy is with the movement which is called Ritualism, and that from its beginning we have earnestly prayed to God to bless it to the conversion of many souls. We hope it will go on and prosper, and be truthfully developed; for we can think of nothing so fearful as "playing church," when the question is one of salvation. There is, however, among some of the leaders of this movement, a want of honesty and a direct untruthfulness which surprise us greatly. If this dishonesty be not wilful, it is owing to an obliquity of mind which it is hard to comprehend. The object of this article is to show that Ritualism can have no standing in the Episcopal Church, and that they who would propagate it had better lay down the weapons of insinuation and falsehood and be brave enough to look the truth full in the face.

There is nothing gained by attempting to skulk away under the _general_ meaning of the name which the world has applied to a particular signification. "There can be no religion without external ceremonies, say the High-Churchmen, "therefore, Ritualism is proper and necessary." This argument is as fallacious as the following "There is no man without a body, therefore the negro is a necessity to the human race." The question, honest friends, is not whether the religion of Christ demands ceremonies, but whether it demands the particular ceremonies advocated at St. Alban's and other ritualistic churches. And Ritualism does not mean the adoption of any rites in the service of God, but the use of the peculiar ones which are recommended by the leaders of the movement in the Episcopal Church. Why, then, not say so at once with manliness? A man will make little progress in our day who is afraid to avow his creed.

Ritualism means a good deal more than mere rites and ceremonies. We do not take our good friends who put on Catholic vestments as automatons who are dressed up by the tailor to show off his art. They are not so senseless as to play for the benefit of the dress-maker alone. There is doctrine beneath all this external ritual which is intended to show forth the sacrifice of the mass, and the real presence of our Lord in the holy Eucharist. {830} It includes the whole sacramental system, and the power of the priesthood. There is little outward distinction between the tenets of the Ritualists and the creed of the Catholic Church. They may pretend to draw a line for the satisfaction of fearful disciples, but really there is little difference. As far as we can see, they are willing to accept our faith, so long as they can enjoy it without submitting to the Catholic Church. They go to confession, and invoke the saints, and pray for the dead, and believe in the seven sacraments, and kneel devoutly before the bread and wine which they elevate for the adoration of the people. "You can have," said a leading Ritualist of this city, "everything in the Episcopal Church which you can find in the Catholic communion, and why therefore should you go away from the fold in which you were born?" We ought, therefore, to define Ritualism as a movement toward the actual faith and worship of the one church of Christ, which were rejected by all Protestants at the Reformation. This is its true definition before every honest mind, and any attempts to hide under generalities, are attempts at deception. It will perhaps bring our remarks to more clear conclusions, if we show, first, that these doctrines which underlie the whole movement can have no status in the Episcopal Church; secondly, that any attempts at disguising the truth, only injure the leaders in their enterprise; and lastly, from the indications of the present, conclude the future of Ritualism.

Little time need be spent to persuade any honest mind that the sacramental system can have no home in the Anglican communion. First of all, the great body of the people reject it, and can never be made to accept it, while they say with sincerity that they see no distinction between it and the teachings of the Catholic Church. If it be deemed worth while to profess substantially all the doctrines of Trent, why not undo the Reformation and go back at once to the fold which their forefathers forsook? And, as Bishop Lee remarked at the opening of the late Episcopal Convention, what right had the church organized by Queen Elizabeth to set forth articles of faith, or in fact to be a church at all, if not on the Protestant principle of private judgment? The majority of Episcopalians have the greatest possible aversion to anything that can be called Romanism, and will, as a body, never allow themselves to be catholicised. In this country there is great liberty of speech, and great pretensions are easily tolerated; but when it is understood that such pretensions mean more than words, the spirit of Protestantism, which is the only living thing in the Episcopal Communion, shows itself in full armor. Individuals daily come to the one fold of Christ, but the body will never move from its hostile attitude. It will stand consistent to its own principle until the hour of dissolution. If any Ritualist doubts this, let him actually practise all he preaches, and openly avow all he believes. His eyes will soon be opened sufficiently to see that the antagonism between himself and his surroundings can never be removed.

Our friends, the High-Churchmen, are zealous upholders of church authority; but where is the authority to which they submit? Their own church ought to be an authority to them, yet we find that its decisions have no weight for their minds. The articles are against them, and every doctrinal judgment that has been made throughout the history of the controversy is distinctly adverse to their views; yet they insist on holding on, and appealing from the stern present to the impossible future. {831} The thirty-nine articles are really the doctrinal standards of the English Church and truly express the belief which formed and animates their communion. When these articles are given up, if such an event should ever take place, the Episcopal brotherhood will commit suicide and vote itself out of existence. These remarkable canons of doctrine condemn the whole sacramental system, deny any real presence of Christ in the blessed Eucharist, and cut away, root and branch, any encouragement which the Ritualists might find in the other portions of the Prayer-Book. Whatever authority therefore the Episcopal Church has, is most decidedly against the unnatural children who profess great fondness for their mother, call her by great names which she disowns, and still never obey her. We have before us a declaration of principles made in the year 1867, in which are contained the very doctrines which the articles condemn, and which the bishops, whenever they have spoken, have rebuked. One sentence particularly pleases us by its great frankness and amiable sincerity. "We heartily and loyally _obey_ the authority of our own particular church, receive _every one_ of her doctrines, and adopt, as our own, her every act of devotion." Article xxviii says, "The sacrament of the Lord's supper was not by Christ's ordinance reserved, carried about, lifted up, or worshipped." The declaration of these _loyal_ children declares that "Christ is _really present_ in the Holy Eucharist, and being present, is of course to be adored."

Now, if the bishops of the Anglican communion have any right to decide in litigated questions, they have spoken with sufficient plainness. The "Catholic school" in England has had a hard road to travel while one after another their favorite positions have been condemned. The last decision of the Privy Council is adverse to the ceremonies of Ritualism, and of course to the doctrines which underlie them. Twenty-eight bishops of the American Episcopal Church have published an open protest against the new movement, and the late Pastoral of the Convention reasserts the principles of the Reformation, denies the presence of our Lord in the Eucharist, and concludes the subject by saying: "We would most earnestly deprecate those extravagances in Ritualism, recently introduced, which tend to assimilate our worship to that of a church hostile to our own. And we must urge you to remember that the reverent obedience to their bishops and other chief ministers, promised by the clergy at their ordination, would, if faithfully rendered, prevent these evils." We are not aware that anything more explicit be required by our friends who "love their own particular church" so well; but if the above be not enough, we imagine they will not wait very long for something more.

The most painful feature, however, in this movement, is an apparent want of truthfulness and a disingenuousness which are inconsistent with the earnest desire to know the faith of Christ. It is very hard to comprehend the course of some of the leaders in this "Catholic revolution," unless their aim be to maintain a cause without any regard for truth or justice. They are sometimes very insincere in their condemnations of Romanism before the people, when in their hearts they must see that they are making dupes of the ignorant.

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A very vapid book has been handed to us, entitled _Conversations on Ritualism_. The Rev. Mr. Wilson (Ritualist) instructs Mr. Brown, and opens his eyes to see that there is a pure Catholicity all unknown to Rome, and even to the (beloved) East, which is now about to revive and do wonders. Mr. Brown is informed that the American Church has not yet been put together. The elements of which it is composed are floating around; but so sure as the sun rises some bright day, the chaos will be one beautiful scene of order and unity, when all shall think alike, and the brilliant altars shall blaze with candles and smoke with incense. Now, Rev. Mr. Wilson "doubts if there are many of his bishops and priests who know more than the mere A, B, C, of the real question of the church worship." They will, however, be enlightened, because the world is to see the "gorgeous Ritual without the doctrinal errors and corruptions of Rome," and to take a "pill which is not to be gilded." Puritanism comes in for a terrible malediction. "If ever an evil spirit has appeared on the earth, of such a character as to put men out of patience with its inconsistencies and absurdities, that spirit is Puritanism." O Puritanism, Puritanism, thou that abhorrest pictures and flowers, stained glass and altar-cloths, thou that lovest whitewash and blank hard-finish, with what amazement shalt thou hereafter discern the glories of the heavenly city, the New Jerusalem! "This Puritanism is a very subtle and persistent poison; I have known it to crop out where least expected; I have even known of mitred heads which seem in some way turned by it." But, bad as it is, it is not worse than Popery, which good Mr. Brown is taught to distinguish well from Ritualism. Then Rev. Mr. Wilson, speaking _ex cathedra_, defines what this Popery is. Its errors are "the cultus of the Blessed Virgin; adoration of the cross, images, and relics; the doctrine of purgatory, Transubstantiation, Papal pardons, indulgences and dispensations, supererogatory merits, and forbidding the clergy to marry." Pope Wilson, who rejects the authority of Pius IX., pronounces these doctrines and practices as grave errors. There can be no doubt, therefore, of the clearness of his vision, and discussion were useless and certainly inappropriate. But, behind the scenes, what is the practical difference between the Catholic doctrine condemned, and the belief symbolized by the Ritualists? Mr. Brown has gone home quite satisfied, and he will not hear our conversation, and we can afford to talk our honest convictions. The cultus of the Blessed Virgin and the saints is nothing more than the devotion which our friend, Mr. Mackonochie approves under another name. Catholics do not _adore_ the cross, nor images, nor relics. They treat them with veneration and religious respect, and so do the Ritualists. Rev. Mr. Wilson prays for his departed friends, though for the world he would not say out loud Purgatory. Transubstantiation he does not accept, though he believes that the bread and wine are the body and blood of Christ, and to be adored with every outward symbol of devotion. Pardons are very good in themselves, if the Pope has nothing to do with them; and as for forbidding the clergy to marry, he would leave that an open question. Many of the Ritualists have evinced a preference for a single life, and a desire even to establish convents and monasteries. Mr. Brown is sleeping quietly on his Protestant pillow while Mr. Wilson prays before his crucifix, and is a Romanist at heart though not in name. {833} We fear there are many Mr. Browns, and Madame Browns, and Misses Brown, who are likewise deceived. In religion we would prefer more manliness and outspoken honesty. These _Conversations on Ritualism_ are only an example of what we have often seen and heard with much pain. We have great hopes of any man who is truthful; but when there is a desire to deceive, and an unwillingness to follow truth to its just conclusions, there is little chance for argument. But some of the Ritualists are as unfair toward their own church as they are toward us. It cannot condemn them; for whatever language it may use, they will interpret it to suit their own case. When Tract No. XC. appeared, the entire English communion scouted its attempt to reconcile the articles with Catholic doctrine. Now, there is no difficulty in explaining away every objectionable point and making those thirty-nine daggers inoffensive. The _Baptist Quarterly_ says: "The twenty-fifth article declares, 'The sacraments were not ordained to be gazed upon,' an unquestionable interdiction of eucharistic adoration. But this, we are told, must mean that they are not to be looked upon without reverence and devotion. So article twenty-eight says, 'The sacrament of the Lord's supper was not by Christ's ordinance lifted up or worshipped.' This, it is said, may mean that elevation may not be practised, on the ground of its being done by Christ's ordinance, but it may be done on some other ground. What may be the casuistry of men who can so defend their principles, it is difficult for minds accustomed to frank and straightforward actions to comprehend." If the Privy Council forbids the practices of the Ritualists, the _Church Record_ tells us that "they must indeed be short-sighted who suppose that the disuse under compulsion of the ritual expression of a doctrine will hinder it from being taught and believed." If the whole house of American bishops distinctly deny any presence of the body and blood of Christ in the Eucharist, and forbid any worship of the elements, on the ground that Christ is not there, then these loyal churchmen are "cheered," and take refuge under the incautious use of a term which in one sense might be objected to even by Catholics. Say the bishops, "Especially do we condemn any doctrine of the holy Eucharist which implies that, after consecration, the proper nature of the elements of bread and wine does not remain; which _localizes_ in them the bodily presence of our Lord." The prelates meant to say that our Lord is not really in the sacrament, and had no idea of the theological objection which Catholic doctors might find to the use of the word localize. The _Catechism_ of the Council of Trent tells us that our Lord is not in the sacrament "_ut in loco_" that is, he is not limited or circumscribed by the ordinary laws of quantity and extension. This is evident, because our Lord is present by miracle and according to the conditions of his glorified humanity. "When the Pastoral is examined," says the _Churchman_, "it turns out to be a denial of a physical or carnal presence, which the writer (in _The Catholic World_) not having the fear of the Council of Trent before his eyes, declares must be _local_." The Pastoral says nothing about a physical or carnal presence, the precise meaning of which in high-church casuistry we do not know; but it denies any "bodily presence." Now, if our Lord's body is there at all, there is a bodily presence, and that presence is localized, that is to say, he is within the species of bread and wine. {834} To use the words of St. Cyril, "That which appears to be bread is not bread, but the body of Christ; and that which appears to be wine is not wine, but the blood of Christ." It is hard for us to believe that the author of the above stricture on the Pastoral knows what he means himself. If by "physical" he means according to the ordinary laws of physics, he need not beat the air any more. If by "carnal" he intends to say that our Lord is not in the Eucharist, as when in the days of his sojourn on earth, he was subject to all the natural conditions of flesh and blood, he will find no adversary in the Catholic Church. The substance of the bread and wine is changed into the substance of the body and blood of Christ, and he is in the Eucharist sacramentally, but as truly and really as he is at the right hand of the Father in heaven. Two substances cannot coexist at one time in one and the same space, and so, according to the plain definition of our creed, the Incarnate Word is miraculously present, whole and entire in either form, and under every consecrated host in the world. That the bishops meant to deny distinctly any true presence of Christ in the sacrament, is evident enough to any mind, and we cannot admire the candor of the writer who would try to escape from it by a quibble upon a word whose common acceptation is quite plain. The _Church Record_ would have us believe that anything can here be tolerated, provided you do not use the word "Transubstantiation."

But what shall we say of the following language taken from the _Churchman_? "The Romish Church does not, comparatively speaking, care one fig for transubstantiation, the celibacy of the clergy, the employment of her particular liturgy and ceremonial. She has sacrificed these for dominion in times past. She will do it again. She will explain away transubstantiation, she will admit the marriage of the clergy, she will make almost any other concession, if she can get her penny's worth in return. But one thing she does care about, and that is the Pope's supremacy." The author of this famous passage is unsafe in any community, and ought to be continually watched by detectives. It is easy to write falsehood, and not very hard to speak it; but it avails very little those who have the hardihood to use it. We have come to the conclusion, from a long experience, that high-churchmen will never be driven from their ground by any decisions of their own church, and that many of them are exceptions to the ordinary laws of humanity. They are inaccessible to reason. On this ground they will excuse us if we pray the more earnestly for them, or endeavor to point out to the world their wonderful inconsistency. They advocate a kind of infallibility which, to be sure, is not within the reach of any one, and yet when the Catholic Church is called infallible, they find the very idea inconsistent with their reason. "So long as Rome keeps to itself, it is grand, imposing, and may pass for powerful. But when it appeals to argument and ventures into the province of reason, it admits the possibility of an adverse conclusion. Infallible men must not reason, they can only pronounce." Perhaps it was a hoary head that indited these words in the _Churchman_, or it may have been a young and inexperienced warrior. Is there any objection to show the grounds of our faith to one who asks for them, and may not even the writer of the above enter upon an argument to prove the existence of God, "without admitting the possibility of an adverse conclusion"? {835} It is something new to us that we can only defend by argument the things that we doubt. We do not reason on the _intrinsic_ credibility of the doctrine proposed to our belief, but upon the extrinsic evidence that God, the only revealer, really proposes the doctrine. And we are quite ready to show to any honest mind the proofs that the Catholic Church is the one and only church of God. Nay, this has been done by our fathers and doctors from the beginning. Every Catholic is infallible so far as his faith goes, because he relies upon the church which is infallible; but this does not prevent him from defending by reason the creed which he holds. The same luminous author asks if "Rome will stand equally well the daylight which will be let into her secret places." So also the accusation has been made, that "the Romish Church has one set of doctrines for the public and another for the initiated; that to converts she always showed her best face, and did not reveal her true features until she had fairly caught them in her iron grasp." In reply to these nursery tales, meant for crying children only, we say briefly that Rome has no "secret places" whatever; that the daylight shines in her, and through her; and that all she holds and teaches is in her catechism, which is taught to young and old. Any one who wishes to know her creed can easily find it out, and it is as much in the possession of the unlettered peasant as it is of the learned philosopher. It is barely possible that they who write and speak such silliness as the above may be honest; but surely, if they are in their right minds, there is no excuse for their ignorance. Dear Ritualists, when you wish to keep your friends or parishioners from going Romeward, pray tell the truth; for when they find out that you have tried to deceive them, they will all the faster run from a system which cannot bear honesty and plain-dealing.

There is another point in which our good friends who like to call themselves Catholics are manifestly either ill-informed or disingenuous. They profess to see a great distinction between the schismatic Greek communion and the Catholic Church, and speak as if there were the slightest hope of any intercourse between themselves and the Eastern sects. The separated Greeks are certainly in a lifeless state, owing to their schism and their slavish subjection to the state; but their standards are as decisive against Protestantism and the English pretensions as even the canons of Trent. To speak otherwise, and to represent to an unlettered person that there is any approximation between Anglicanism and the East, is only an attempt to deceive. The position of the schismatic Christians of the East is quite simple upon our views of Catholic unity; but we venture to again urge our brethren of the Episcopal Church, to prosecute their investigations and do something more than pass resolutions such as are every year triumphantly carried at the sessions of the American and Foreign Christian Union. "Why not quietly wait," says the _Churchman_, "and let us be snubbed?" We are quite willing to wait; but in this day of telegraph and steam improvements, may we not beg the committee to move a little faster? In the mean time, we would place in their hands a little manual, by Dr. Overbeck, a Russian priest, who speaks only the sentiments of his whole communion. {836} We quote from the English edition of his work on Catholic orthodoxy. Speaking in the name of the Greek Church, he says in answer to Dr. Pusey's _Eirenicon_, (page 97,) "We do not want your power nor your riches; these are no baits for us. We are content with our poverty and our pure faith, which nobody shall sully; and are we to commune with a church _so replete with heresy_ as the English Church is! Are we to expose our only treasure, our pure faith! You have installed heresy in your pulpits; you do not cast it out; nay, you cannot cast it out, because your church is historically a Protestant Church, and Protestants framed your articles which you contrive in vain to unprotestantize. God forbid! _No communion with an heretical church! No communion with the English Church--it would be the grave of orthodoxy_." Again, (page 89,) "The Orthodox Church does not recognize the English Church to be _achurch_, in her own meaning of the word, any more than the Lutheran, Reformed, or any other Protestant Church. If we, nevertheless, use the term _church_ in the controversy, it is only a conventional mode of speaking, while disproving the fact, and denying the truth of the underlaid idea." "The English Church is not, and never was recognized by any Catholic Church."

From what we have seen, the prospects of Ritualism are not very bright. Whatever authority the Episcopal Church possesses will undoubtedly be used to prevent its growth and influence. It is quite certain that it can never be grafted upon the service or discipline of a communion whose very existence depends upon its Protestantism. The bishops are in a directly hostile attitude toward the movement; and if some of them let it alone, it is, perhaps, because they think that it will the sooner die out. Ritualists will go forward to a certain point, and High-Churchmen will stand ungenerously behind to take any advantage of their success, and to disavow all responsibility when the hour of trouble comes.