Appendices, Volume 2
[Notes in the appendices are placed at the end of the letters to which they refer.—NR] Appendix to Chapter 21{539} THE following is the text of the correspondence referred to at p. 47: MONSIGNOR TALBOT TO DR. NEWMAN '8 York Place, Portman Square, London: July 24, 1864. 'One of the reasons for which I called upon you was to invite you to come to Rome for next Lent to preach at my Church in the Piazza del Popolo, where you would have a more educated audience of Protestants than could ever be the case in England, and where they are more open to Catholic influences. 'When I told the Holy Father that I Intended to invite you, he highly approved of my intention, and I think myself that you will derive great benefit from revisiting Rome, and again showing yourself to the Ecclesiastical Authorities there, who are anxious to see you. 'We shall have an apartment prepared for you at the English College, where Doctor Neve will be very glad to receive you. 'I am afraid that you may plead age &c. as an excuse for not taking so long a journey, as some persons have told me you are likely to do, but I feel convinced that you are prepared to make any sacrifice when the greater glory of God, and the Salvation of Souls are concerned, and that you are prepared to forego your own comfort, when the high interests of the Church are concerned, and you have an opportunity to serve the Holy See. 'To me it would be a great consolation to be able to
tell the Holy Father that you have accepted my invitation, and I am sure
that the Blessing of the Vicar of Christ will amply repay you for going
so far. DR. NEWMAN TO MONSIGNOR TALBOT 'The Oratory, Birmingham: July 25, 1864. '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. DR. NEWMAN TO AMBROSE ST. JOHN 'The Oratory: July 25, 1864. The following is the text of the "questions" concerning higher education for English Catholics referred to at p. 66, and of Mr. Gaisford's reply to them in a letter to Dr. Grant, Bishop of Southwark: 'December 4th, 1864. '2. What would you say is the exact meaning of scholarship as the peculiar characteristic of University education? '3. What are the studies in which a Catholic youth going to a Protestant University would be engaged during his course in it? '4. Would he acquire a greater knowledge than he could
in a [Catholic] College: '5. Have you observed or heard on any good authority that in competitive examination, according to proportion of numbers, the Catholics have fallen below Protestant aspirants, whether in military or administrative competition? '6. Has it similarly come under your notice that, attending to ratio of numbers, at the Bar, from the Bench downwards, or in any other learned profession, persons brought up in a University have shewn a decisive superiority over those educated in Catholic establishments? '7. Putting aside all questions of tone and manner, and considering the average of young men who annually go into the world from the University and of those who finish their studies exclusively among Catholics, does any superiority in solid learning and good education manifest itself in the first above the second? '8. Supposing a young Catholic, whose education had been carried on in one of our Colleges to the extent professed to be taught there, were to go for three years to a Protestant University, in what respect and to what extent do you suppose that his education would be found advanced and his character better formed? '9. And more specifically, do you consider that the chances of improvement in moral and religious condition would be increased during that interval, and that the probability is that he would be found better grounded in faith, in piety, and moral feeling, at the end than he was at the beginning of that term? '10. Considering the present condition of belief in the truths of revelation among leading minds in the Universities, do you think that the intercourse natural {541} between the learned and able men of the University, with younger minds and inexperienced scholars, would not necessarily weaken the faith in these? '11. Would it be possible, not to say expedient, to guard such impressionable minds, especially where there was an ardour for learning, by weakening or destroying all confidence on the part of youth in those whom they are otherwise expected to respect and submit their judgment to? '12. Why is the demand in favour of University education, according to your way of viewing it, to be limited to the laity? '13. If there be a higher, a nobler, and a more useful education to be attained at a University than can possibly be given in a Catholic College (unless such College is established in a Protestant University), why should the Clergy be deprived in England alone of those signal advantages? '14. Ought the principles to be admitted that the laity should be more highly educated than their clergy, considering the reproaches too readily cast on the latter for lagging in the progress of knowledge and solid attainments? '15. May it not be justly considered (1) that if no danger of loss of faith or morals exists for a layman, a fortiori there can be none for an Ecclesiastic? (2) that the mixture of virtuous and fervent Ecclesiastical scholars will sustain and encourage their former College companions? '16. Is it not true that, although we treat the Universities as though great national institutions for lay education, they are no less, or perhaps in the main, the Protestant substitutes for Ecclesiastical Seminaries, and form in reality the places in which all the clergy of the Church of England are educated? Are not all the Archbishops and Bishops of England and in great measure of Ireland, all the dignitaries, certainly of England, and the vast bulk of the parochial clergy of the Established Church educated there; and has not the fruit of such education been on the whole to produce a clergy most hostile in feeling and most heterodox in doctrine in their attitude towards the Catholic Church? '17. Do you think that, such being the case, it would be worthy of the Catholic Church and its pastors, believing themselves to be under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, to surrender the highest education of their children, or of their Ecclesiastical students, to the teaching and guiding of such a body of men? '18. Is not the great teaching body of the University composed of Protestant, consequently heretical, clergymen; and do you think that the Bishops ought to advise the Holy See to commit the final training, and the finishing touch of the formation of mind and heart of the children of God's people, to the hands of those who have publicly declared and professed to hold that belief in the most solemn and consoling doctrines, and observance of the most beautiful practices of devotion in the Church, are damnable and idolatrous? '19. Or do you think it possible for a professor or teacher holding the Holy Catholic Church in contempt, and perhaps execration, from day to day to lecture upon even indifferent topics without almost involuntarily allowing his feelings to escape from any amount of watchful guardedness, and insinuate themselves into the susceptible minds or imaginations of a few unnoticed Catholic pupils? '20. On the whole, after considering all these questions and the answers which you have no doubt conscientiously given them in the presence of God, looking at the whole state of Europe and of England, and weighing in the balance of the Sanctuary the opinions, political, scientific, social, and moral, in conflict through the world, do you believe that should a considerable body of young Catholics receive education in Protestant Universities, the result will be the formation of a future Catholic body more conscientious, more orthodox, more religious, more devout, and more pure than we can obtain by any other process of education? And that should the decision be now in favour of {542} Protestant University education, our successors, and the future heads of Catholic families, will feel thankful to God and believe that His Providence has guided and blessed the decision?' MR. GAISFORD TO THE BISHOP OF SOUTHWARK 'December 11, 1864. 'I will now make a few remarks upon some of the printed questions. 'Question 2. I am no scholar myself, but, being asked to define the word "Scholarship" I shall say that a good Greek Scholar is one who has an accurate and critical knowledge of Greek—I believe that the term is applied at Oxford exclusively to Greek and Latin, and I think that the Catholic Seminaries are inferior in Scholarship to Oxford. Much has been done for Greek literature in this century, by Porson, Bloomfield, Maltby, and others,—my own father among them, but I know of no English Catholic who has contributed. '4. In modern languages, foreign literature, history, &c., I daresay Oscott is not inferior. '5 & 6. I have not watched the competitive examinations, but I know of no leading English Catholic Barrister. '7. I cannot put aside tone and manner. '8. He would gain a knowledge of the world (I use the term in a good sense). His character would be better disciplined by being thrown in a large society, he would have better choice of friends with whom he would live hereafter and with whom I should wish him to live. My own Oxford friends have always stood by me. There is no doubt that Catholic young men make a bad show in London society; at the best clubs they were pretty sure to be blackballed, and why? Not on religious grounds. What does the Travellers' Club care for a man's religious opinions? Nothing,—but it knows that the Catholics are exclusively educated, have little in common with its other members, and would be a bore, and so they are rejected, and rightly. London ladies say the same: "Excellent young man, but a bore; we don't know what to say to him, nor he to us." Catholic gentlemen are now more numerous and I want to see them take their proper position in the world, and I believe that the prejudices against our religion would rapidly diminish if we were better known and mixed more freely with our equals. '9. I see no reason why at Oxford he should be less well grounded in faith—the Oratorian Fathers would see to this. '11. What is to become of my son at 18 if he does not go to Oxford? There must always be danger to him, and I think he runs less risk at Oxford than elsewhere; the bane of the old Catholics has been lying about idle at their parents' houses, or lounging on the Continent to pass the time between boyhood and manhood. '12, 13, 14, 15. I give no opinion on education of the clergy, but if it be thought inexpedient that they should go to Oxford and that therefore their education may be inferior, I don't see why the laity should be under-educated because the clergy can't have equal advantages. {543} '16. Yes, but though the Protestant clergy are hostile, I don't think they despise or execrate our religion—there are exceptions however. '19. I should not consider a youth's faith endangered by attending an Oxford Professor's lectures on indifferent subjects. '20. I expect great advantages from Oxford. This question would have been fairer if put thus: "With these advantages would the future Catholic be likely to be less conscientious, less orthodox, &c.?" I answer "No." 'And now, my dear Lord, I ask your pardon if I have written too openly; I thought over your questions most seriously, but I have written my answer currente calamo, my only object being that you should know just what I think on the subject.' Top | Contents | Biographies | Home Appendix to Chapter 24EXTRACT from the Weekly Register, April 6, 1867, referred to at p. 140. OUR ROMAN LETTER . . . . . . . 'Rome: March 28. 'Much will, no doubt, be said about this in England. The Anglican papers of the mosquito or flea tribe, such as the Church Times and the Church Review and gnats of the Union Review school, will, no doubt, make a great commotion, and be very ready—for Anglicans of the advanced school love slander as Mrs. Gamp loves her bottle—to throw the blame on a very illustrious personage. It is not for me to be so impertinent as to vindicate beforehand that unflinching leader of the Church in England; all I may do is to deny, point blank, that that illustrious personage had directly or indirectly had anything to do with it. Failing this accusation, they will probably have recourse to another. It will be said that the distinguished prelate who, with so much credit to his country, represents Catholic England at the Papal Court, had had the ear of the Holy Father in this matter. The objection is in substance as old as the oldest heresy. Everywhere have heretics profanely said, that they appeal from Rome drunk to Rome sober. Unhappily Dr. Newman himself has said what comes to the same thing in the "Apologia" having in mind, one may believe, a miserable calumny of Dr. Döllinger. But pace these people, great or little, one may say that there are, as there have ever been, thousands of Catholics, as well distinguished as not distinguished, who, when the Shepherd of the Church so speaks and decides, look, and have ever looked, upon such utterances as warnings to save the faithful from pastures which, however fair they may appear, may be in certain circumstances only a kind of poison. At any rate, on a road along which it is very easy to get fast in a bog or to fall over a precipice, it is better for poor, simple men, to follow one St. Austin, or one St. Bernard, or one St. Alphonsus, in childlike faith, than a whole army of Dr. Döllingers.' On the Address to Newman from the laity which the above letter called forth, Newman writes as follows to Mr. F. R. Ward: 'April 26, 1867. When asked in this same year for advice as to young Catholics going to Oxford, Newman wrote as follows: 'Dec. 8, 1867. 'Against your sending him lie the following weighty reasons: '1. The Holy See has spoken as strongly as it could speak on the danger of sending youths to Oxford. As to the trickery which has been employed in gaining that decision I don't see that that invalidates the prima facie force of it. The Pope speaks in a matter, which, as the rescript says, is entirely within his province—for he is speaking of occasions of mortal sin, and danger of eternal salvation. '2. We must recollect St. Paul's strong words, "Obey them that have the rule over you ... and submit yourselves, for they watch for your souls as those who must give account." '3. There is a certain instinct which the Church (and the Holy See as being its executive) has, which is ever to be taken into account as something over and above and independent of the imperfection of the human organs and ministers. The chance is that it will turn out right, even when very bad means have been used in the course of its action. '4. Then, for my own judgment, what made me so willing that the Oratory should go to Oxford, except that I thought the position of young Catholics there perilous unless there were some strong religious community entrusted with the Mission? '5. A new point is introduced by the very fact of the serious ecclesiastical dissuasive. A boy of tender conscience goes there knowing his being there is unrecognised, disliked by the Holy See and his Bishops. This is a bad start in life for him. Is it not likely to harm his faith, temper of obedience, ever afterwards? '6. Whoever sends his son to Oxford, is responsible for the example and precedent which he sets for others. 'Fully as I feel these considerations, I do not deny there may be extraordinary cases which would oblige me in the confessional to allow that it was no sin in a particular father sending a particular youth to Oxford. '1. There may be a choice of difficulties:—e.g. Woolwich or London may be a worse place for a boy's faith and morals than Oxford—yet the alternative may be between one and the other. '2. It may be an alternative between diligence, a cheerful obedience at Oxford, and idleness, or despondency and disappointment, if [a boy is] refused [leave] to go there. {546} 'Other cases are supposable, in which I should boldly take on myself the responsibility of recommending a youth to be sent to Oxford. 'As the Bishops take up a very [important] part in dissuading,
so a priest in the confessional can but allow. You must be the
decider. As to your boy, I do not at present know enough of him, to say
that his case would be thus exceptional—though I fear there would be
great difficulty in making him work if he does not go. Top | Contents | Biographies | Home Appendix to Chapter 25THE following letters should be read with those cited in the text of this chapter: F. AMBROSE ST. JOHN TO DR. NEWMAN 'May 1867. 'When then Father Perrone stopped, I told him I had had all that before, and having now seen the Pops I hoped there was an end of it, for it was altogether a false report. I also laid it on to Propaganda, and said it was not fair to say the Bishop was in fault. Propaganda was in fault for granting a leave which was wholly nugatory. He said he hoped you would found an Oratory at Oxford though you did not go yourself. This, I said, I thought very improbable, but, waiving that subject which had been abundantly discussed elsewhere, I had come to ask his advice about what I had heard in two quarters respecting the Rambler. He said he knew all about it. He had read the passage (he did not say he had been consulted upon it) and thought he recollected it. He said you had seemed to say that there were times when the true doctrine lay only in the people,—this was depriving the Church of her function as a teacher. I said I was sure you meant no such thing as that, but were engaged mainly upon an historical view of the matter, and were saying only what Baronius had said, but I said I would rather not attempt myself to speak on the subject. "What would you, a friend who knows Father Newman to be sound in doctrine at heart, have him do?" He said: "Take occasion to write on some other subject, and bring this in and explain the controverted passages." This, I said, would never do. You would, by so doing, only expose yourself to fresh misunderstanding. It would be like attacking an enemy in the dark. When there had been reports before, I knew you over and over again expressed your readiness to answer any questions plainly; that you ought to have the passages put before you with plain statements like: "this is wrong, and must be retracted." "This may be misunderstood, and must be explained." Then you would know what to do. Would he extract for {547} me such passages? Yes, he would, and if you would send your answers to him, he would settle the matter by saying: "I guarantee Father Newman's faith to be sound in the matter in question." This he said would be quite sufficient. "Well, then," I went on to say, "would he as Consultor of Propaganda undertake to plead Father Newman's cause there." Then he looked cunning, and said that was not the way to do things there. They would say: "You have been put up to this, and come as a petitioner for your friends," and would look with suspicion on what he said. Let me have something to say, and let them come to me, then I shall have so much more weight as being consulted than as a petitioner. So the matter ended, and I am to borrow for him the Rambler. Talbot has one, but I cannot ask him. I must go and try. Perrone said I should find one at the Scotch College. I have not yet had time to ask. Then after breakfast I went to Cardinal de Luca, the ablest (so to say) of all the Cardinals, with the best chance of being (so it is said) the next Pope. He reads English, has a great admiration of your writings, and no one can make him a partisan. This is Neve's account. Well, he is a small man with a most intelligent eye which goes through you and makes you at home at once. Unlike everybody else, when I came in, he didn't preach, listened most attentively to all I had to say, asked a great many questions about Oxford, about examinations for London, Woolwich, &c., expressed his sympathy for parents with sons, and then I told him the state of parties at Oxford, what you might do; how you had been misunderstood and your charitable love of souls turned against you, and I mentioned the newspaper report, &c. "Yes," he said, "I know all about that. Who is that Martin? [Note] Is he an oblate?" "No," I said, "I believe not,—a Deacon studying here by himself in Rome." "Oh." Then he began to ask questions. "What could be done? Could a College be founded in Oxford for Catholic students with Catholic Professors?" I mentioned the difficulty you apprehended, at the same time saying generally that I was most grateful to His Eminence for really entering into the difficulties of education in England, and I would take the liberty of reading to him your opinion. So I pulled out the Italian translation of your opinion about Oxford Education, saying I had the original in your writing. He at once pounced on the original and said: "I prefer this. I read English." So I left it with him. He asked if I knew anything of the German Universities, mentioning Breslau (I remember now). I then spoke of Bonn, said what the Jesuits had done, &c. "Ah," he said, "you ought to inform yourself thoroughly about Bonn. There is a Jesuit Father—Father Bozzio—here from Bonn; you ought to go to him and find out all about it." I said: "If it was any good I would go home by Bonn." He said it would be very important to inform myself about the matter and to write to him and lay proposals before him. "Something," he said, "must be done, and as to a Catholic University, it was an absurdity in the present state of things. But," he said, "I must warn you of one thing; the Holy See will never act against the wishes of the Episcopate of a country." I said I feared the Archbishop would always be contrario to anything whatever connected with Oxford. He thought he would not be unreasonable, and for himself he saw nothing better than a Catholic College. There would be difficulties, but difficulties must be faced. Would Father Newman take any part in it? I said "you had been so [misunderstood] in what you had already done I hardly thought you would." "Oh," he said, "you must have courage. What had happened had done you no harm at all." After many more very kind words we parted, I to see Father Bozzio and talk to him about Bonn,—he to read and {548} meditate on your opinion. Meanwhile I think to myself "Cui bono?" Here is a friend, a high friend, a clever friend. But what can he do? He is one and everybody else is the other way. He says as an initiatory step you must gain Manning!!!' Note: Mr. Martin, who had divulged the 'secret instruction' in the Weekly Register, vide supra, p. 140. FATHER AMBROSE ST. JOHN TO DR. NEWMAN 'May 10, 1867. The following is the Memorandum referred to at p. 180, drafted by Mr. William Palmer on behalf of the Oratorian Fathers, which was sent in Italian to Cardinal Barnabo on May 16, 1867: 'It has been objected to us by your Eminence and by others besides (members too of the S. Congregation of the Propagation of the Faith) that certain passages of an article in the Rambler having been delated by a Bishop to the S. Congregation of the Index, as long ago as 1860, and Father Newman having been called upon by authority to explain statements either heterodox or as some say even "heretical," he has never yet explained. 'If this were simply so, it would be no wonder that he should have been mistrusted as heterodox, or at least as disobedient, and suspected as if capable of manœuvring to encourage mixed education in England in spite of the judgments of the S. Congregation and of the Holy Father against it. 'But in point of fact Father Newman, immediately on hearing of the call made upon him, addressed to the late Cardinal Archbishop of Westminster,—Cardinal Wiseman—then at Rome, the following letter [Note] … 'This letter was certainly received by the Cardinal as it was shown by him to persons still living; but (to whatever cause the failure may have been owing) no answer to it from the Cardinal himself, nor any written or verbally delivered in his name, was ever received by Dr. Newman; only he was told briefly some months later by Monsignor Manning (then Provost of Westminster) that "the affair of the Rambler had been settled." 'Since then, however, influential writers and something like a party in England have not ceased to utter and to circulate suspicions and imputations against Father Newman as if he were heterodox, and even the greatest adversary of orthodoxy; at the same time they have deprecated with warmth his being sent to Oxford not merely for any bye reason of alleged insincerity or disobedience in the question of mixed education, but honestly and avowedly for fear of his being successful as a missionary and converting Protestants to a spurious Catholicism more pernicious than Protestantism itself. And here at Rome not only do we hear Father Newman spoken of by members of the Sacred Congregation and by others as having been under a cloud and as suspected of persistent opposition to the wishes and judgments of the S. Congregation and of the Holy Father in the matter of mixed education; but we find also that the article in the Rambler above alluded to, and its author, have been denounced as heterodox by Roman Professors in full class, and in lectures which are lithographed and sold. 'It becomes therefore our duty, as sent to offer explanations on his behalf, to petition that now, at least, the article of the Rambler with the passages marked, as originally denounced, and with that Italian translation on the presumption of the accuracy of which explanation was called for, may be communicated to Father Newman by the same authority which calls upon him to explain. 'If he should be able to explain satisfactorily a double question will still remain respecting the Oxford Mission. 'First, whether the Bishop has judged well or ill in regarding Oxford as preeminently the place for a Mission, and in selecting Father Newman as the Missionary most fitted by his antecedents to be sent thither; and 'Secondly, whether (apart from any suspicion of heterodoxy or disobedience in the Missionary) the fact that the very existence of a Mission at Oxford, and {550} still more its being placed under Father Newman (nay, even his keeping a superior Grammar School at Birmingham), may tend in particular cases to attract Catholics to Oxford, is a sufficient reason for either suppressing the Oxford Mission altogether, or at least ostracising that particular Missionary whom, on general grounds, the Bishop selects as the fittest person to send there. 'On neither of these questions when once they are disentangled from those personal suspicions and imputations with which they have hitherto been mixed up from the first, is it becoming for Father Newman or for us to enter; they relate to the interests of the Catholic Church in England viewed either as a community within itself, or in its relation to a great heterodox nation or empire in the midst of which Divine Providence has placed it as a little leaven, for the purpose, as we may hope, of leavening the whole. 'But until all personal suspicions, not only of heterodoxy, but also of opposition and disobedience on the matter of mixed education, and the confusion and misconceptions thence arising, both in England and here too, as it seems, at Rome, have been completely dispelled and until sunshine has broken through that "cloud" under which we are seen by some to be, we cannot but regret and think it hard that when the question of encouraging Catholics to study or discouraging and all but prohibiting them from studying in the Protestant Universities was first raised in England (being raised too in connection with rumours and suspicions about Father Newman), and when the opinions of many other Ecclesiastics, converts especially, were sought by the late Cardinal to lay before the Bishops, it was not thought necessary or advisable to ask Father Newman also, as one among the rest, what his views on the subject really were. 'We have certainly been sent to offer explanations not on behalf of the Bishop of Birmingham, but on behalf of Father Newman and the Oratory; still as the Bishop also was desirous and urgent that we should come, we think it proper, before leaving Rome, to offer to Your Eminence and to Propaganda a Memorandum as to the manner in which the Bishop seems to ourselves to have acted towards Father Newman and the Oratory, so that we may not, by our silence, be open hereafter to a suspicion of having behaved as if we were indirectly complainant against him. 'The Bishop clearly did not understand Propaganda (however strongly it might discourage Catholics from studying in Protestant Universities) to discountenance his wish to improve the Oxford Mission (although no doubt any improvement small or great of that Mission might incidentally and in some degree tend to attract Catholics to Oxford); on the contrary, he supposed that he was rather commended for having opportunely treated ("opportune cum illo egeres de Missione," &c.) with Father Newman with a view to his undertaking the Oxford Mission, and directed in case Father Newman declined it, still to send some able priest to Oxford. 'The Bishop, in making his second overture to Father Newman, communicated to him this portion of the letter (then recently received from Propaganda) as favourable to Father Newman's acceptance of the Oxford Mission. And Father Newman at length consented; not, however, unless permission could be obtained for the new Oratory which he should found in connection with the Mission at Oxford to remain during his own life and for three years after his death subordinate to the Oratory at Birmingham, from which he did not contemplate (as the Bishop wrote afterwards to the Propaganda) transferring himself absolutely to Oxford. 'The Bishop's application for this permission having been mistrusted, as if implying some indirect view towards mixed education, he wrote a statement at length of the circumstances of the Oxford Mission, appending also that whole passage of the former letter of the Propaganda which he had communicated to {551} Father Newman as one reason among others for him not to persist in declining the Mission. 'After some time the permission petitioned for was granted, but "conditionally and provisionally," and with an Instruction appended, that, "If the Bishop perceived Father Newman to contemplate transferring his residence to Oxford he was gently and courteously to dissuade him." 'This clause, being based, seemingly, on the Bishop's own words respecting Father Newman's intentions in a former letter, was not taken to imply a denial and retractation of the main point which had been petitioned for, and which had apparently been granted. For certainly neither the Bishop nor Father Newman had contemplated that while undertaking the Mission with cure of souls at Oxford, and founding there an Oratory to be subordinate to that of Birmingham, he should be fettered either as to the frequency, or the length, of those stays in Oxford which he might find to be desirable. The Bishop, therefore, thought that on the sense of this clause he had need to ascertain more distinctly the intention of Propaganda. And in the meantime, expecting to be himself before long at Rome, and seeing the clause to be of the nature of a private Instruction, he did not think it necessary, or proper, to communicate it, when he communicated the rest of the letter to Father Newman. 'Father Newman then issued a Prospectus, embodying a letter from the Bishop, inviting contributions from Catholics towards the foundation of an Oratory, and the building of a Church at Oxford. On which immediately misconceptions and misinterpretations arose as before; and an anonymous article in a newspaper, written from Rome, detailed, as if from some authentic sources of information, the views and acts and motives of the Propaganda, imputing to it and to the Holy Father himself, grave suspicions against Father Newman, not only of persistent disobedience in the matter of mixed education, but also of heterodoxy, and announcing that, if permission had been given to found a Church and Oratory at Oxford, it had been clogged with such conditions and reservations as would render it innocuous; and, in particular, that there was an express stipulation that Father Newman himself should not reside there. 'After this the Bishop felt himself obliged to communicate to Father Newman that reserved clause or Instruction, the substance of which (whether in its true sense or otherwise) had already appeared in the newspaper. And hence there was an additional reason for the Bishop's wishing and urging that some one should be sent from the Oratory at Birmingham to offer at Rome on behalf of Father Newman whatever explanations might be desired.' Note: The text of the letter is given at p. 171. {552} Top | Contents | Biographies | Home Appendix to Chapter 29THE following letters referred to at p. 299 should be read, in addition to those in the text, as illustrating Newman's state of mind during the progress of the Vatican Council and after its prorogation: DR. NEWMAN TO MR. HOPE-SCOTT 'The Oratory: Feast of the Holy Name of Jesus, January
16th, 1870. 'It has another difficulty. Since you cannot make a division in the Pope's divine gift, and say he is infallible only in part of the things in which the Church is infallible, to pass a decree that the Pope is infallible in matters de fide is to say that in all matters not de fide there is nowhere any gift of infallibility—but this is contrary to the Gallican notion, which, lodging the gift in the Church, not the Pope, enlarges the subject matter of the gift, taking in, for instance, infallible condemnation of books. Therefore, though I know Manning's proposition is what I have said, still it can't pass. Time is everything—but the Ultras are hurrying on.' 'April 1st, 1870. 'Ward supports, I suppose, Tablet as well as Dublin—and the London Oratory too—but no one does anything for any London Congregation which takes the other side, or any London periodical of moderate sentiments. 'I think, whatever happens, a sort of Catholic alliance should be formed with the French and German Bishops, and Yankee Bishops for time to come,—each country standing by itself, yet having an understanding with each other. You set up the Guardian, which has done its work well—you should help in setting up a Catholic Guardian. 'I fear by some mistake my bulky letter was not
prepaid. DR. NEWMAN TO MISS HOLMES 'The Oratory: Easter Day, 1870. 'I felt it a sacred duty to tell him all my mind. Whom could I speak to but my Bishop? I spoke to no one else. No one whatever saw my letter here, but one person—and I could not send it without the eye of another over it—and he and I kept a profound secret about it. No—it is one of those wonderful things, which cannot distress one, because simply it was in no sense one's own doing. I only wish, since the letter was to get out, I had introduced into it the awful text, which is so much forgotten, "who shall scandalize one of these little ones, who believe in Me, it were better that a millstone should be tied round his neck, and he cast into the sea." What call have we to shock and frighten away the weak brothers for whom Christ died? 'Thank you for your prayers—Don't suppose I am cast
down—not a bit of it. And, thank God, I am very well. 'P.S.—Let me know when you want me to lend you anything.' TO FATHER JOHN WALFORD, S.J. 'The Oratory: May 19th, 1870. 'Difficulties, such as my nephew's, are, as you know, not uncommon. It is a delicate thing to answer them without knowing something of the objector, for what is apposite for one is unsuitable to another. '1. As to the wonderful revival of religion in the Established Church, I certainly think it comes from God. If so, it must tend, as it visibly does tend, to the Church's benefit. One cannot conceive the generation which is brought up under it, when they come to maturity and to power, resting satisfied with the Anglican system. If their fathers, the present generation, yearn for unity, and for communion with St. Peter, much more will their children. 'There is nothing to prove that the present race of Catholicizing Anglicans is in bad faith; and there is much to show on the other hand that they are in good faith. 'It is possible indeed that the next generation may go off into Liberalism—as Hale and Chillingworth, the disciples of Laud. But I rather hope that Holy Church will arrest and win them over by her beauty and sanctity, her gentleness, serenity, and prudence. 'Anyhow we need not say that Anglicans at this time cast out devils through Beelzebub; rather they are like the man of whom Our Lord said: "Forbid him not," &c. '2. As to my nephew's fears about the definition of the Pope's Infallibility, while they are but fears, they are not arguments; and they never will become arguments, because he says he has no expectations that they will ever be fulfilled.' TO SISTER MARIA PIA 'July 14, 1870. 'I am very well, except when I move about. That tries me. Lately, in execution of long promises, I went from home from Monday to Saturday, visiting Mr. Church, my cousin Louisa Deane (whom I had not seen for 26 years), H. Wilberforce, and George Copeland; and was certainly not the better for it. George Copeland, who, as you must know, is utterly paralysed except in his head, which is as full of vigorous thought as ever, inquired much after you. I had never seen his daughters before. They are suffering from their Father's long illness. He showed me your first oil painting, which he praised very much. 'This leads me to thank you, as I do sincerely, for
the precious presents which you are sending me by Fr. M. I have given
you (with some others) a Mass a week since January—Indeed have done
the like for years. 'Fr. Ambrose will tell me about you. He is knocked up by the heat and work, and thirsty for the High Alps.' TO MR. ORMSBY 'August 21, 1870. TO MISS BOWLES . . . . . . . 'April 30, 1871. TO THE SAME 'June 8, 1872. '(1) That I never have by word or act advocated the scheme of a Catholic College at Oxford, though many have attributed such a scheme to me. What alone I took part in was the establishment of an Oratory there to protect Catholic youths residing in Protestant Colleges. '(2) And what I advocated then I advocate now. In a hard matter and in a choice of difficulties, I would rather have Catholic youths in Protestant Colleges at Oxford with a strong Catholic Mission in the place, than a Catholic College. '(3) And I thought and think that the Bishops took an unadvisable step, and brought the whole Catholic body in England into a great difficulty, when on March 23, 1865, they discountenanced, to the practical effect of a prohibition, the residence of Catholics at Oxford. 'Moreover, since the Archbishop (Manning) or Dr. Ward may maintain that I have now softened what I said in my private letter to a friend, part of a sentence of which was shown to the Archbishop, I here quote the whole sentence unmutilated, as it stood in my letter, that you may have your answer pat. '"If I were upon the rack, and forced to name some scheme or other for Catholic University education, when nothing satisfactory is possible, I should not propose a Catholic University, for I think our present rulers would never give us a real one; nor a Catholic College at Oxford, for such a measure at the present moment would be challenging controversy and committing Catholic theologians most dangerously in the religious difficulties of the day; but I should say that the Bishops ought to have let things alone seven years ago, and that, in our present straits, they will do best to undo their own work, and to let Catholics go to Protestant Colleges, (without their formal sanction) and to provide a strong Mission worked by theologians, i.e. a strong Jesuit Mission, to protect the Catholic youth from the infidelity of the place." 'As to Father St. John, he has advocated in his late remarks a Catholic College at Oxford; but he adds, (I believe, for he may have some trouble in finding his paper) that no youths had gone to Oxford lately who did not lose by the absence of a strong ecclesiastical superintendence.' {556} Top | Contents | Biographies | Home Appendix to Chapter 31THE following letters (see p. 379) were addressed by Newman to persons who were tried by the definition of 1870: TO SIR WILLIAM COPE, BT. 'Decr. 10th, 1871. 'Divine Providence has allowed the act of last year for some good purpose, and we must submit to His will. For myself, I see the doctrine implied in the conduct of the Roman See, nay of the Catholic Church, from the first, but I am not of course blind to the difficulties in detail which it has to encounter. The dogma seems to me as mildly framed as it could be—or nearly so. That the Pope was infallible in General Council, or when speaking with the Church, all admitted, even Gallicans. They admitted, I think I may say, that his word ex cathedra was infallible, if the Bishops did no more than keep silence. All that is passed last year, that in some sense he may speak per se, and his speech may be infallible—I say in some sense, because a Bishop who voted for the dogma tells me that at the time an explanation was given that in one sense the Pope spoke per se, and in another sense not per se. 'All these questions are questions for the theological school—and theologians will, as time goes on, settle the force of the wording of the dogma, just as the courts of law solve the meaning and bearing of the Acts of Parliament. 'I don't think it should interfere, whatever perplexity it may cause, with the great fact that the Catholic Church (so called) is the Church of the Apostles, the one fold of Christ. 'I have written as my course of thought has taken me, without premeditation—hoping, if what I have said is worth nothing else, it will at least show that I have not forgotten your anxieties. 'I am, my dear Sir William, TO MR. WILLIS NEVINS 'June 16, 1872. 'The question then is whether you can properly say that Honorius, in countenancing the Monothelite doctrine, spoke ex cathedra. Now here recollect {557} that Popes do not decide on matters at the very beginning of a controversy, but at the end. It runs its course and then the Holy See speaks. The dogma of two Wills was not decided till forty years after Honorius's death—Monothelitism was no heresy in Honorius's time, any more than the double personality was a heresy before Nestorius. Ideas and words have to be defined, and they cannot be defined till controversy clears the matter. The great Council of Antioch in 364 condemned the Homoousion, which the Nicene Council has made the test of orthodoxy. On the first blush of the matter a great deal might be said for Honorius's view, and recollect his great object was to heal a schism from which the Church suffers even now, which at the time was a great help to Mahommetanism. That he was hasty, injudicious, intellectually hazy, one may grant. The question is whether he was intending to teach the Catholic Church—was he not rather experimentalizing? Is it not the part of a Lawyer or a Controversialist to argue from mere words or acts, and not to throw one's mind into the times, and to try to place ourselves in Honorius's place? I think Döllinger wants imagination, considerateness, charity. 'Poor Honorius died in peace. There was no popular general outcry against him, as in case of John XXII.—was there? I think not. This either shows his act was not a public one, or that it was so metaphysical a point, or grammatical even, that the delicate sense of Catholics was not shocked by it. Recollect St. Cyril holds the formula of the "One Incarnate nature of the Word." We all explain him in an orthodox sense ... I am far from certain that in like manner we should not clear Honorius, though he boldly said beyond mistake "one will," but for what happened after. 'Why don't we? let us see why. Honorius dies in peace. And his memory, I think, was safe till the 6th General Council—a space of forty years. Meanwhile the controversy went on; the Church gaining light, but its controversialists showing a great deal of angry zeal. The question became a party question. It was decided, and rightly, against Honorius, as in a former age it was decided against Cyril; but Honorius fell into hands not so kind as Cyril found. 'The forty years, which were necessary for a dogmatic decision, served to intensify the zeal of its promoters against those who had stood in its way. Honorius was pronounced a heretic. Recollect what that really means—not that he in his own person was heretical, but that he originated or promoted heresy. I know some or many theologians say otherwise—but I never can hold that Origen was a heretic, though he is so often called such. He is made a symbol of that heresy which was found after his day among his followers, and is anathematized as such—I think Honorius was a heretic in the sense in which Origen is. 'Here I am speaking of what in matter of fact is my own opinion—that Honorius in his own person was not a heretic—at the same time, if he was, that does not show that he has taught heresy ex cathedra—any more than Balaam or Caiaphas were excluded from being divine oracles because they were personally in pagan or Judaic error. 'Nothing good will come of the Alt-Catholic movement,
unless a strengthening of infidelity or some form of Protestantism be
good. No strengthening of the Church of England, of the Via Media, or of
the Branch Theory will come of it. TO MR. ARTHUR ARNOLD 'Sept. 22, 1872. 'I am told those are highfliers who say much more than this, and there are those, learned men, who wish to bring in a higher doctrine—but Perrone, whose book is the theological hand book for students in this day, says "Nec enim sive Rom. Pontificis, sive concilli oecumenici infallibilitas media excludit ad veritatem de qua agitur assequendam, quippe, non per modum infusi doni, sed per modum praesidii, sive ut ajunt adsistentiae, Deus illam promisit" t. 2, p. 541, Ed. 1841. 'Again: "Nunquam Catholici docuerunt donum infallibilitatis a Deo ecclesiae tribui per modum inspirationis" ibid. p. 253. 'Again, the recent definition says that the Pope has that infallibility which the Church has—but as Perrone says above "Never have Catholics taught that the gift is an inspiration." 'I think I have unintentionally shown you in these last sentences, to which I have been led on, how difficult it is to do justice to the subject in a few words.' The following letter was printed in the Guardian in reply to an attack by Mr. Capes published in that journal: 'Sept. 1872. 'I will not dirty my ink by repeating them; but the substance, mildly stated, is this:—that I have all along considered the doctrine of the Pope's Infallibility to be contradicted by the facts of Church History, and that though convinced of this, I have in consequence of the Vatican Council forced myself to do a thing that I never, never fancied would befall me when I became a (Roman) Catholic:—viz.: forced myself by some unintelligible quibble to fancy myself believing what really after all in my heart I could not, and did not believe, and that this operation and its result had given me a considerable amount of pain. 'I could say much, and quote much from what I have written in comment upon this nasty view of me. But, not to take up too much of your room, I will, in order to pluck it up "by the very roots" (to use his own expression) quote one out of various passages, in which, long before the Vatican Council was dreamed of, at least by me, I enunciated absolutely the doctrine of the Pope's Infallibility. It is In my "Discourses on University Education," delivered in Dublin in 1852. It runs as follows:— '"Deeply do I feel, ever will I protest, for I can appeal to the ample testimony of history to bear me out, that in questions of right and wrong, there is nothing really strong in the whole world, nothing decisive and operative, but the voice of {559} Him, to whom have been committed the Keys of the Kingdom, and the oversight of Christ's flock. That voice is now, as ever it has been, a real authority, infallible when it teaches, prosperous when it commands, ever taking the lead wisely and distinctly in its own province, adding certainty to what is probable, and persuasion to what is certain. Before it speaks, the most saintly may mistake; and after it has spoken, the most gifted must obey ... If there ever was a power on earth who had an eye for the times, who has confined himself to the practicable, and has been happy in his anticipations, whose words have been deeds, and whose commands prophecies, such is he in the history of ages, who sits on from generation to generation in the chair of the Apostles, as the Vicar of Christ, and Doctor of the Church. Has he failed in his successes up to this hour? Did he, in our Fathers' day, fail in his struggle with Joseph of Germany, and his confederates; with Napoleon—a greater name—and his dependent Kings, that though in another kind of fight he should fail in ours? What grey hairs are on the head of Judah, whose youth is renewed like the eagle's, whose feet are like the feet of harts, and underneath the everlasting arms?" pp. 27-28. 'This passage I suffered Father Cardella in 1867 or 1868 to reprint in a volume, which he published at Rome. My reason for selecting it, as I told him, was this,—because in an abridged reprint of the discourses in 1859 I had omitted it, as well as other large portions of the volume, as of only temporary interest, and irrelevant to the subject of University education. 'I could quote to the same purpose passages from my "Essay on Development" 1845: "Loss and Gain" 1847: "Discourses to mixed Congregations" 1849: "Position of Catholics" 1851: "Church of the Fathers" 1857. 'I underwent then, no change of mind as regards the
truth of the doctrine of the Pope's Infallibility in consequence of the
Council. It is true I was deeply, though not personally, pained both by
the fact, and by the circumstances of the definition; and when it was in
contemplation I wrote a most confidential letter, which was
surreptitiously gained, and published, but of which I have not a word to
retract, the feelings of surprise and concern expressed in that letter
have nothing to do with a screwing one's conscience to profess what one
does not believe, which is Mr. Capes's pleasant account of me. He ought
to know better. Top | Contents | Biographies | Home Newman Reader — Works of John Henry Newman |