[Letters and Correspondence—1839]REV. J. H. NEWMAN TO J. W. BOWDEN, ESQ. Oriel College: January 3, 1839. What a row poor Todd of Dublin has raised! The Archbishop of Tuam ratified the act of his clergy, the four Articles; so that actually we have a synod against him, and us here. What a great thing it is that our Bishop is for us! By-the-bye, did I ever tell you the conclusion of the affair with him? He was extremely pleased (I am told) with my letters, and has done everything to counteract any effect such as I feared. When his Charge came out with his notes I sent for Keble's advice, wishing to go by it implicitly, and he was strong for taking it as a sufficient warrant for going on with the Tracts; so I did. Also the Bishop has written to Hook (I am told) thanking him for his remarks on his (the Bishop's) Charge and speaking kindly of us. However, I confess I was not fully reconciled till I saw the poor Bishop had got into trouble, and now I begin to feel very grateful to him. You see the 'Christian Observer,' 'Church of England Quarterly,' and 'Morning Herald' are all at him. By-the-bye, have you observed that most grotesque piece of news in the 'Christian Observer' of this month about me? One step alone is wanted—to say that I am the Pope ipsissimus in disguise. REV. J. H. NEWMAN TO MRS. J. MOZLEY January 9, 1839. Gladstone's book, you see, is making a sensation. Thank you for your kind anxiety about me. Somehow I do not care about the attacks of strangers; it is only when friends fall upon me that I am touched. The papers would not make this great noise unless we were making way. What is to be our length of tether I know not—no one can know. It is a fearful and interesting thought, but at present it is lengthening out. You know I wrote to Rose from Derby to ask his leave to dedicate my volume to him. Well, I caught him the very day before he set out—which I feel now to have been so happy a chance. I will transcribe you his letter in answer. 'I little thought when I wrote yesterday what pleasure was in store for me today. Be assured that your letter of today, in giving me such an assurance of your regard, sends me off on my winter's exile much more cheerful. I shall consider (not making fine speeches) placing my name where you propose to do as a very great honour publicly, and privately a very high gratification indeed. This last day my head (feeble now at best) is quite in a whirl. I will only, therefore, say again, May God bless you and forward your labours in His cause. Ever most truly yours.' Do not you think that many newspapers and many reviews and magazines are necessary to outweigh the pleasure of this letter? My hand is so tired I can but scrawl. I meant my fourth volume [of sermons] to be the best, and am curious to know what will be thought. I think you will be much interested in parts of the forthcoming volume of St. Cyprian. The treatises on 'Mortality,' on 'Patience,' on 'Envy,' to 'Demetrianus,' and on the 'Lord's Prayer,' are especially touching. REV. J. H. NEWMAN TO F. ROGERS, ESQ. Oriel College: January 14, 1839. The Bishops en masse are joining the testimonial [Note 2]. I could fancy worse things, though I have no time to prose, it being past 10: I think it may do good. It is not to be a monument, which is a gain. Prichard has come up here, and the Dean has moved into Greswell's rooms, who is much better. I heard from Marriott (Rome) a week since—he evidently was not well. I hope he will remain. He prepared me somewhat for Rose's departure by saying that he was not at Rome, and that they were anxious. What a fine fellow Gladstone is! Mrs. Pusey is about the same. I saw her the other day. The fourth volume of Tracts has already (in half a year) come to a second edition—the first was 1,000 copies. Parker is entering on a plan of selling them and other books on a large scale through the country. REV. J. H. NEWMAN TO F. ROGERS, ESQ. Oriel College: January 22, 1839. Poor Rose, or happy, that he is taken off just as the battle begins! You seem somewhat discouraged, but depend on it, Apostolicity is nothing till it is tried, and less than nothing if it cannot bear a puff. I do not know how I should feel were I in the world; but here I cannot realise things enough either to hope or fear. It sometimes comes on me as an alarming thing, almost a sin, that I doubt whether I should grieve though all that has been done melted away like an ice palace. {250} I do not mean, of course, I should not grieve in the case of individuals I knew, or should not be annoyed about opponents, whom I knew, triumphing—but I speak of the whole as a work. I wish I lived as much in the unseen world as I think I do not live in this. The fear is, lest one lives in a world between the two, a selfish heart. The 'Times' is again at poor Gladstone—really I feel as if I could do anything for him: I have not read his book, but its consequences speak for it. Poor fellow! it is so noble a thing. He and Marriott are on their way home together. Is he prepared for the tempest? The Tracts are selling faster than they can print them. Curious enough the day before yesterday the thought came into my head of printing extracts from our works against Popery—and they will appear stitched into some of the February magazines. This will be something such as you heard wished for. And Pusey (perhaps) is going to write the very thing—a manifesto of principles. I do not know that much good will come for the avowed object, but it will encourage and strengthen friends, who will know what to say. The last news is that the Irish clergy are rising en masse to call on the English Bishops to convene a holy Synod and condemn us. Have they not enough to do at home? The Corn Laws, the Belgian Question, Canada, and Afghanistan will in a while divert people's thoughts. They will tire of wondering—we shall not tire, so be it. The following birthday letter was written to his friend, then most seriously ill. Later on in the year, when Mr. Newman records a passing visit to him at Roehampton, there is this note: 'This was after Bowden's most serious illness, which sent him to the Continent.' REV. J. H. NEWMAN TO J. W. BOWDEN, ESQ. February 21, 1839. God and all good angels be with you! REV. J. H. NEWMAN TO MRS. J. MOZLEY Oriel College: April 23, 1839. I commend to your notice, if it comes in your way, Carlyle on the French Revolution. A queer, tiresome, obscure, profound, and original work. The writer has not very clear principles and views, I fear, but they are very deep. REV. J. H. NEWMAN TO MRS. BOWDEN May 2, 1839. What you say about John [Mr. Bowden] quite bears out what Mr. Woodgate has told me. It will be a great point when you get him to Roehampton. REV. J. H. NEWMAN TO J. W. BOWDEN, ESQ. May (between 7 and 18) 1839. Keble is here for a week, and I write this in Trinity Common-Room, where we have been dining. I wonder what the effect this change of Ministry will have on the spread—of good principles. I suppose Sir Robert Peel will try to allure the Church back into utter captivity, and perhaps will succeed. I hope this letter will not annoy you to read [viz. in the weakness of his convalescence]. Johnson assures me that it will not. REV. J. H. NEWMAN TO MRS. BOWDEN Oriel College: May 27, 1839. It is now twenty-one years since Pusey became attached to his late wife, when he was a boy. For ten years after he was kept in suspense, and eleven years ago he married her. {253} Thus she has been the one object on earth in which his thoughts have centred for the greater part of his life. He has not realised till lately that he was to lose her. My love to the children. I take Emily's wish as a particular compliment, considering how select she is in her friendships. REV. J. H. NEWMAN TO J. W. BOWDEN, ESQ. Oriel College: June 22, 1839. I was thinking what news I had to tell you, but there is not much. Pusey is to take his children to the south coast of Devonshire. His sister is to be married next week to Cotton, the new Provost of Worcester, who in consequence, as in duty bound, gives up his house and the College entirely to Mr. Pusey and the cattle-men [Note 4] at the great meeting in July. It is a compliment to Oxford their coming here at all; but it is, I suppose, an inconvenience. All Souls has declined lending rooms to the Duke of Richmond, under the apprehension of his position necessarily introducing crowds of all sorts into the College. We are going to have London police. … How amusing it is that the Whig-Radicals, by way of merely an argument in debate, should puff us so much in the House as they have upon the Education Question! Of course it will do us good, as making people believe we are formidable. P.S.—We sold above 60,000 tracts altogether last year. My new volume of Sermons has come to a second edition in half a year. Nothing of mine has been so quick before. REV. J. H. NEWMAN TO J. W. BOWDEN, ESQ. Oriel: July 11, 1839. We hope to begin publishing a translation of Fleury after all; not beginning with the first three centuries—for Burton would supply that for the present—nor with the fourth, for my 'Arians' after a way does that; but from the Council of Constantinople, A.D. 381. From it to the Council of Chalcedon, A.D. 452, will make two volumes octavo. We shall put notes; and, if encouraged by the sale, go on to two volumes more, and so on. I have to write to Rivington's about it, to know if it will interfere with any plan of Maitland's. REV. J. H. NEWMAN TO F. ROGERS, ESQ. Oriel: July 12, 1839. I wish to make a volume or two of the mere Acta Conciliorum for the 'Library of the Fathers.' Those of the Council of Chalcedon are most exceedingly graphic and lively, though the exclamations of the Bishops have less dignity in them than R. H. F. would have approved. Two things are very remarkable at Chalcedon—the great power of the Pope (as great as he claims now almost), and the marvellous interference of the civil power, as great almost {255} as in our kings. Hence when Romanists accuse our Church of Erastianising, one can appeal to the Council, and when our own Erastians appeal to it, one can bring down on them a counter-appeal to prove the Pope's power, as a reductio ad absurdum … Keble thinks this number of the 'B. C.' good, though I suspect he is always chivalrous enough to take part with the weak. However, I do think it a good number myself—very good. Someone also took H. W.'s article for mine. Keble's Psalms (1,000 copies) are out in a month; a second edition is preparing. We are undertaking the beginning of a translation of Fleury. [A. J.] Christie, B.C. [Bible Clerk at Oriel], is setting about notes on the portion between Councils of Constantinople and Chalcedon, which will form two octavos. Parker recommended beginning after my 'Arians,' since the following tract of history was most wanted. I suppose I shall do great part of the notes myself. My present reading will just fit into it. The translation is ready to our hands, but Christie or someone else is to revise it. P.S.—Mr. H. has been here today inquiring about his renewal. I said you were away till October, and—unhappy man!—taking him for M., behaved not over-civilly to him, which is on my conscience. He looks forbidding and tortuous, which increased my delusion. Do prove to me he is a very worthless fellow. REV. J. H. NEWMAN TO F. ROGERS, ESQ. Oriel: September 15, 1839. You see, if things were to come to the worst, I should turn Brother of Charity in London—an object which, quite independently of any such perplexities, is growing on me, and, peradventure, will some day be accomplished, if other things do not impede me. That Capuchin in the 'Promessi Sposi' has stuck in my heart like a dart. I have never got over him. Only I think it would be, in sober seriousness, far too great an {256} honour for such as me to have such a post, being little worthy or fit for it. The following letter to Mr. Rogers shows the writer in an unsettled state of mind, clearly requiring some relief. The misgivings hinted at here as something scarcely serious, issued a month later in the 'astounding confidence' made to a friend in the New Forest. This was, however, a passing alarm; his mind returned to its allegiance. REV. J. H. NEWMAN TO F. ROGERS, ESQ. Oriel College: September 22, 1839. I seriously think this a most uncomfortable article on every account, though of course it is ex parte ... I think I shall get Keble to answer it. As to Pusey, I am curious to see how it works with him. And now, carissime, good-bye. It is no laughing matter. I will not blink the question, so be it; but you don't suppose I am a madcap to take up notions suddenly—only there is an uncomfortable vista opened which was closed before. I am writing upon my first feelings. Amongst the papers placed in the hands of the Editor is an extract from an article [Note 5] by H. W. Wilberforce (as inscribed by J. H. N.), which gives the history of what passed in the New Forest: 'It was in the beginning of October 1839 that he made the astounding confidence, mentioning the two subjects which had {257} inspired the doubt—the position of St. Leo in the Monophysite controversy, and the principle securus judicat orbis terrarum in that of the Donatists. He added that he felt confident that when he returned to his rooms, and was able fully and calmly to consider the whole matter, he should see his way completely out of the difficulty. But he said, "I cannot conceal from myself that, for the first time since I began the study of theology, a vista has been opened before me, to the end of which I do not see." He was walking in the New Forest, and he borrowed the form of his expression from the surrounding scenery. His companion, upon whom such a fear came like a thunderstroke, expressed his hope that Mr. Newman might die rather than take such a step. He replied, with deep earnestness, that he had thought, if ever the time should come when he was in serious danger, of asking his friends to pray that, if it was not indeed the will of God, he might be taken away before he did it.' REV. J. H. NEWMAN TO F. ROGERS, ESQ. Cholderton: October 3, 1839. I can't help thinking I shall find St. Austin agreeing that, under circumstances, grace is given even in a schismatical Church, and that in the very controversy with the Donatists which is Dr. W.'s strong ground. I shall take to the subject on my return. He says, 'Ecclesia etiam per ancillarum sinum liberos parit Christo,' in his 'De Bapt. adv. Donat.' Again, the Romanists grant that those who in time of schism bona fide adhere to an anti-pope, yet are virtually in communion with the centre of unity. If so, they are so virtute pręcepti, non {258} medii. There are saints in the Roman calendar who adhered to an anti-pope and, I believe, died in that adherence: of these Pope Gregory says, 'Qui non malitia sed ignorantię errore peccaverat, purgari post mortem a peccato potuit.' If so, as ignorance may be one legitimate excuse, there may be others also. As the Archbishop of C. is Pope to those who are not better informed, so he may be to those who, born and ordained in the English Church, afterwards are otherwise informed. But this you will not allow. You will say, light is given for some end. What do they do in consequence of their light who remain as they were? Well, then, once more: as those who sin after baptism cannot at once return to their full privileges, yet are not without hope, so a Church which has broken away from the centre of unity is not at liberty at once to return, yet is not nothing. May she not put herself into a state of penance? Are not her children best fulfilling their duty to her—not by leaving her, but by promoting her return, and not thinking they have a right to rush into such higher state as communion with the centre of unity might give them. If the Church Catholic, indeed, has actually commanded their return to her at once, that is another matter; but this she cannot have done without pronouncing their present Church good-for-nothing, which I do not suppose Rome has done of us. In all this, which I did not mean to have inflicted on you, I assume, on the one hand, that Rome is right; on the other, that we are not bound by uncatholic subscriptions. On a case of conscience, in which Miss Giberne seems to have been asked to procure Mr. Newman's judgment, he sends the following reply. The correspondence placed before the Editor from different sources contains very few letters of this character. REV. J. H. NEWMAN TO MISS GIBERNE Oriel College: October 16, 1839. As to Pusey's introducing himself in the coach, it is impossible almost nowadays to travel without one's having to do so, to prevent things being said (of whatever kind) painful under the circumstances to all parties. REV. J. H. NEWMAN TO J. W. BOWDEN, ESQ. October 20, 1839. … Pusey is returned and in appearance much better. It is no exaggeration to say he is a 'Father' in the face and aspect. He has been preaching to breathless congregations at Exeter and Brighton. Ladies have been sitting on the pulpit steps, and sentimental paragraphs have appeared in the papers—in the 'Globe'! Fancy! I will tell you a story I heard the other day. A clerical brother-in-law of one of the Fellows of Exeter was dining at a Visitation dinner in (I think) Wiltshire, and was addressed by a Cambridge clergyman present. 'Perhaps you don't know the origin of that Tract system; it is curious enough. Mr. Newman was plucked for his divinity. He could not construe {260} a word of the Greek Testament; and when pressed, said that he took up the Fathers instead. Accordingly, he has since made it a point to prove that the Fathers are everything, and the New Testament of little importance!' REV. J. H. NEWMAN TO MRS. J. MOZLEY Oriel College: October 25, 1839. What have I to say? ... I fear we have an anxious year before us—here, that is. I have not been anxious about the Apostolical movement till now, but now I am. The V.-C. is striking at us. REV. J. H. NEWMAN TO J. W. BOWDEN, ESQ. November 4, 1839. This was too much for any Vice-Chancellor. In consequence, he was had up before him; his sermon officially examined; and he formally admonished; and the Bishop written to. Thus the matter stands at present. The Bishop is to read his sermon, and I have been obliged to give my judgment on it, to him, which is not favourable, nor can be. I don't suppose much more will be done, but it is very unpleasant. The worst part is that the Vice-Chancellor has not said a single word to me, good or bad, and has taken away his family from St. Mary's. I cannot but hope he will have the good sense to see that this is a mistake. I wish all this kept secret, please; for it is not known even here. Our Provost is stirring himself in the writing line. He has been publishing letters in the Oxford paper; sermons, I think, in the 'Church of England Magazine,' and a sermon on Church Extension, which has been inserted at length in the 'Record.' He is to preach the Bamptons, you know, next year. P.S.—In the Christmas 'British Critic' I have thought of writing an indirect answer to Dr. Wiseman's article. REV. J. H. NEWMAN TO MRS. J. MOZLEY November 17, 1839. P.S. ... Pray give my very affectionate remembrance to Louisa [Mrs. Deane] when you write, and tell her that I do not forget her or any other friends, and am not so violently different from what I was when she knew me a little, as she may think from the tin-kettle accounts of me which rattle to and fro in the world. Such notes of warning as are sounded in the above letter were doubtless very trying to the receiver; but Mrs. Mozley was assisted to bear them with serenity, both by her high esteem for her brother's character and by her own unworldliness. The loss of position and the world's estimate would tell little with her. The question would be one of right and wrong. And, trusting her brother as she did, and full of faith in her own Church, she hoped, and held her peace. Top | Contents | Biographies | Home Notes1. Sermon X. 'Faith and Reason contrasted as Habits of Mind'; preached on Sunday morning, the Epiphany, 1839. Heb. xi. 1. 'Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen ... ' Sermon XI. 'The Nature of Faith in relation to
Reason'; preached on Sunday morning, January 13, 1839. 1 Cor. 1.
27. 'God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the
wise, and God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the
things that are mighty ... '—University Sermons. 2.
The Martyrs' Memorial. 3.
At this date the post regulations only allowed single sheets to pass
without extra charge. The same sheet torn in two was charged double. 4.
The Agricultural Show, held this year at Oxford. 5.
Dublin Review, April 1869. See also Apologia, p. 162. 6.
These articles are headed, 'Armed Associations for the Protection of
Life and Property,' and 'New Churches.' Top | Contents | Biographies | Home Newman Reader — Works of John Henry Newman |